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Speaker 4: You are now listening to True Murder, The most shocking
Speaker 4: killers in true crime history and the authors that have
Speaker 4: written about them Gasey, Bundy, Dahmer, The Nightstalker BTK. Every week,
Speaker 4: another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous
Speaker 4: killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host,
Speaker 4: journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Speaker 7: Good Evening. The remote farming community of Murdoch, Nebraska, seem
Speaker 7: to be the least likely setting for one of the
Speaker 7: Heartland's most ruthless and bloody double murders in decades. In fact,
Speaker 7: the little town had gone more than a century without
Speaker 7: a single homicide. But on the night of Easter two
Speaker 7: thousand and six, Wayne and Sharman Stock were brutally murdered
Speaker 7: in their own home. The murders garnered sensational front page
Speaker 7: headlines and drew immediate state wide attention. Practically everybody around
Speaker 7: Murdoch was filled with fear, panic, and outrage. Who killed
Speaker 7: Wayne and Sharman Stock? What was their motive? The Stocks
Speaker 7: were the essence of Nebraska's All American farm family, felt made,
Speaker 7: God fearing and of high moral character. Barely a week
Speaker 7: into this double murder investigation, two arrests brought a sense
Speaker 7: of relief to the victim's family into local residence. The
Speaker 7: case appeared to fall neatly into place when a tiny
Speaker 7: speck of murder victim Wayne Stock's blood appeared in the
Speaker 7: alleged getaway car. Then an obscure clewe left at the
Speaker 7: crime scene took the investigation down a totally different path,
Speaker 7: stretching into Iowa, Louisiana, New York, Texas, and Wiscon Jhnson.
Speaker 7: By the time this investigation was over, the charges against
Speaker 7: the original suspects were dismissed and two new individuals emerged
Speaker 7: from the shadows. Author John Ferrick covered the Stock murders
Speaker 7: from the very beginning, including all of the trial proceedings.
Speaker 7: When the criminal prosecution finally ended in two thousand and seven,
Speaker 7: he remained puzzled by one nagging question, why was the
Speaker 7: blood of victim Wayne Stock in a car that was
Speaker 7: ultimately proven to have no connection to the murders. Over
Speaker 7: the next few years, the astonishing, bloodied lies were revealed,
Speaker 7: culminating in a law enforcement scandal that turned the case
Speaker 7: on its head and destroyed the career of Nebraska's celebrated
Speaker 7: CSI director David Koefd. The book that we're featuring this
Speaker 7: evening is Bloody Lies, a CSI Scandal in the Heartland,
Speaker 7: with my special guest, investigative journalist and author, John Ferrick.
Speaker 7: Welcome to the program, and thank you very much for
Speaker 7: agreen to his interview.
Speaker 8: John Ferrick, Thanks fam Dan, very happy to be here.
Speaker 7: Thank you very much. Incredible book and an incredible case.
Speaker 7: And let's get right to this. Normally I asked people
Speaker 7: why they felt compelled to write this book. In this case,
Speaker 7: let me ask the question about your background and your
Speaker 7: connection to this area and to this story, and your
Speaker 7: personal background as an investigative journalist, and to tell us why,
Speaker 7: without asking that question, why you felt compelled to write
Speaker 7: this book. So give us your background and your connection
Speaker 7: to this area and this story.
Speaker 8: Yeah, Dan, let's see long and short. I grew up
Speaker 8: in Juliet in Plainfield, Illinois, and at a young age,
Speaker 8: pretty much fourteen or fifteen, I set my sights on
Speaker 8: becoming a journalist. At that point in time, I was
Speaker 8: interested in sports. Went to college at Eastern Illinois University
Speaker 8: and really became interested in enamored with investigative journalism and
Speaker 8: our hard news coverage and that's kind of where my
Speaker 8: professional career went from from there on. Ounce I always
Speaker 8: took a strong interest in investigative reporting public spending, but
Speaker 8: then I also realized that public safety. Covering the court
Speaker 8: system was really fascinating to me, and I was really
Speaker 8: interested in digging into cases and really learning more and
Speaker 8: more and more about the criminal justice system, learning about
Speaker 8: law enforcement, judges, prosecutors, defense attorneys, just how the whole
Speaker 8: system operated. And I had covered a case or kind
Speaker 8: of picked up the end of this case when I
Speaker 8: was at my first job in South Bend, Indiana, where
Speaker 8: I was a regional reporter, and there was a case
Speaker 8: involving a man named Edgar Garrett, and ed Garrett went
Speaker 8: on trial for a murder of his daughter. And what
Speaker 8: was really fascinating about the case is, though, the first
Speaker 8: case that the county prosecutor had lost in that county
Speaker 8: in twenty five years, and it was because of the
Speaker 8: videotape confession of the suspect that really blew up in
Speaker 8: the prosecutor's space. The confession didn't match with the real
Speaker 8: evidence in the case, and it turned out that this
Speaker 8: Edgar Garrett was coerced into making false confessions. So that
Speaker 8: case kind of always stuck with me because I at
Speaker 8: that point in time, I had heard a lot of
Speaker 8: people say, there's no way anybody would ever confess to
Speaker 8: a murder that didn't do it. So years later, two
Speaker 8: thousand and six. By that point in time, I had
Speaker 8: been working as a regional reporter and doing a lot
Speaker 8: of investigative journalism at the Omaha World Herald, which is
Speaker 8: Nebraska's largest newspaper, and part of my area of coverage
Speaker 8: was southeastern Nebraska and a lot of small towns. These
Speaker 8: talents had five hundred to one thousand people. The county
Speaker 8: seat had about seven thousand people. The county itself was
Speaker 8: about twenty five thousand. This is an area about twenty
Speaker 8: miles twenty five miles south of Omaha, which is a
Speaker 8: big metropolitan city of about five hundred thousand. The metro
Speaker 8: areas about a million people. But when you get to
Speaker 8: Platsmiths in Cass County, you're really kind of in farm
Speaker 8: country in Nebraska. And that's this whole area where I
Speaker 8: was part of my coverage area where I really kind
Speaker 8: of cherry picked for the biggest and best stories that
Speaker 8: I thought would have regional impact and be of interest
Speaker 8: across the whole state of Nebraska, and some of those
Speaker 8: cases involved criminal justice and crimes, and that's kind of
Speaker 8: what happened here. Whereas by two thousand and six I
Speaker 8: knew a lot of the law enforcement officials pretty well
Speaker 8: well first name basis, you know, they knew me, and
Speaker 8: likewise the same way with the prosecutor in the court
Speaker 8: court official fan And it was just a shock on Monday,
Speaker 8: the day after Easter, when word got out later in
Speaker 8: the day that there happened to be a double murder
Speaker 8: outside of Murdach, Nebraska, a town of about two hundred
Speaker 8: and seventy people. It just just everybody was jarred and
Speaker 8: Florida and couldn't believe it. And you know, and I
Speaker 8: knew just again, based on several years as a reporter
Speaker 8: and an investigative journalists, my instincts went up, and I
Speaker 8: knew that this was an important story that needed to
Speaker 8: be covered.
Speaker 7: Now. Part of this importance and is also the nature
Speaker 7: of the murder itself. So for our audience, if you
Speaker 7: don't mind, tell us the details of the actual murder itself.
Speaker 7: The crime police, what officials, what officials actually found, don't
Speaker 7: give too much away, but what officials, well not officials
Speaker 7: found because tell us who discovered the bodies and what
Speaker 7: was discovered.
Speaker 8: It was, you know, it was around nine in the morning,
Speaker 8: and and Andy Stack, who was in his mid to
Speaker 8: late twenties at the time. Andy, Andy was a farmer.
Speaker 8: His father was a farmer, and the Stacks lived on
Speaker 8: a pretty good sized farm about thousand acres or so
Speaker 8: out in rural Murdoch, Nebraska. They ran, uh, they ran
Speaker 8: a they ran a stock hay company, which was a
Speaker 8: pretty good little, uh, you know, hey, hey, alf alfa business.
Speaker 8: And so Andy went out to the farm on Monday
Speaker 8: morning to go to work help his dad out. And
Speaker 8: he gets to the farmhouse and and there's no activity,
Speaker 8: which is unusual because mom and dad usually got up
Speaker 8: pretty early. And so Andy's looking around for his mom,
Speaker 8: Sharman Stock, aged fifty five, and his father Wayne, who's
Speaker 8: fifty eight, and can't find them anywhere throughout the house,
Speaker 8: which is unusual. So he goes around, goes outside, figuring
Speaker 8: maybe his dad's out tinkering with, you know, with one
Speaker 8: of the farm machinery or tractors, checks the outbuildings and
Speaker 8: can't find his father out there either. Eventually, Andy goes upstairs,
Speaker 8: figuring maybe his dad's upstairs. He had an office upstairs
Speaker 8: where he did a lot of his paperwork for the
Speaker 8: farm business. And and no sooner does Andy start to
Speaker 8: get up the stairs, but he finds his father face
Speaker 8: down in a pool of blood, I mean, just a
Speaker 8: horrific pool of blood. And there's a handful of red
Speaker 8: shotgun shells sprawled across the body and actually another live
Speaker 8: shell actually that was that was left on the on
Speaker 8: the on the carpet. So Andy just is terrified, obviously,
Speaker 8: and it just runs back out, back down the stairs
Speaker 8: and eventually runs out to his truck and uh and
Speaker 8: pick grabs his cell phone and calls UH, calls nine
Speaker 8: one one. And that's what caused law enforcement Cass County
Speaker 8: Sheriff's office and eventually the Nebraska State Patrol and eventually
Speaker 8: the Douglass County Crime LAMB to all respond within minutes
Speaker 8: to you know, over several hours, uh to you know,
Speaker 8: spend uh to descend upon the property in the farmhouse. Uh.
Speaker 8: This just bloody awful carnage that had just taken place
Speaker 8: in an area of uh Murdoch, in an area of
Speaker 8: Nebraska that just was totally totally unexpected. Dan.
Speaker 7: Now, no, the police are called, and so what did
Speaker 7: they find? What are they determine in terms of the murder,
Speaker 7: how that these these this couple was murdered. What was
Speaker 7: the weapon?
Speaker 8: Uh?
Speaker 7: Tell us about those first details that they encounter and
Speaker 7: the and the actually grizzly sight. Uh so what do
Speaker 7: they encounter?
Speaker 8: Well, when they get there, they they ultimately go up
Speaker 8: the stairs and again Andy, Andy had only found his father.
Speaker 8: He was so horrified by what happened that, you know,
Speaker 8: he ran down the stairs. So his mom was still missing.
Speaker 8: Nobody knew where she was at. At first, the thinking
Speaker 8: was maybe she drove up the road but to visit family,
Speaker 8: but her car was still in the driveway. Cass County
Speaker 8: Sheriff's Office gets to the scene. They searched the property. Eventually,
Speaker 8: well the obvious they went up the stairs and they
Speaker 8: found Wayne Stock in a pool of blood and and
Speaker 8: it was just a horrific sight. His head had been
Speaker 8: he had taken at least two he had taken two
Speaker 8: shots to the back of his head and uh just
Speaker 8: basically maybe the back of his head was blown up off.
Speaker 8: Blood was everywhere throughout the walls. He's like, I said
Speaker 8: he was sprawled up kind of tied up or tangled
Speaker 8: up in his bed sheets. He was a Russell. He
Speaker 8: was asleep shortly before this. Uh, this horrific intrusion had occurred.
Speaker 8: The Cass County Sheriff's office eventually worked their way into
Speaker 8: the bedroom and that's where they found Wayne's wife, Charman,
Speaker 8: and she was found along the bedside, tangled up in
Speaker 8: uh in a in a telephone. It turned out that
Speaker 8: she was trying to make a desperate call to nine
Speaker 8: one one to notify the sheriff's office. So I don't
Speaker 8: know if I law enforcement that that there were invaders
Speaker 8: that that had entered their bedroom and arched into the
Speaker 8: room in the middle of the night. But the killers
Speaker 8: were able to uh shoot her through the middle of
Speaker 8: her face and she just fell down and died instantly,
Speaker 8: one single shot. Now, it was pretty clear based on
Speaker 8: the crime scene what kind of weapon was involved in this.
Speaker 8: It was it was for sure a shotgun, and it
Speaker 8: was pretty obvious it was also a twelve gage shotgun
Speaker 8: as well. Dan just based on the fact that there
Speaker 8: were several shelves that were left at the crime scene
Speaker 8: that law enforcement was able to collect and retreat from
Speaker 8: the crime scene. And they also knew that this was
Speaker 8: not a murder suicide because the shotgun that was used
Speaker 8: in the crime was nowhere to be found. So law
Speaker 8: enforcement had some key evidence that was left at the
Speaker 8: crime scene, so they didn't need to spend an incredible
Speaker 8: amount of time trying to figure out, you know, this
Speaker 8: was a pistol or you know, or a certain type
Speaker 8: of handgun. They clearly knew what kind of weapon this
Speaker 8: was that they were looking for, and based on the
Speaker 8: crime scene, just based on how bloody and uh and
Speaker 8: awful things were, it was clear that that the Stokes
Speaker 8: were taken by surprise. They were still wearing their pajamas,
Speaker 8: so it was it was pretty obvious that they were
Speaker 8: killed sometime late at night or in the middle of
Speaker 8: the night after they had gone to sleep.
Speaker 7: Now, was there any what was the evidence pointing to
Speaker 7: in terms of number of weapons or number of perpetrators
Speaker 7: before we get into any and was there any evidence
Speaker 7: of theft as a motive?
Speaker 8: The let me back up on that. That's still the
Speaker 8: great questions. The evidence of of multiple intruders that becomes
Speaker 8: clear by the end of the day of the first
Speaker 8: by the end of the day, on the first day
Speaker 8: of the investigation, the crime lab that was ultimately was
Speaker 8: called into to help process the scene and collect evidence.
Speaker 8: They had done this before, and they were smart enough
Speaker 8: to realize that in the upstairs hallway where Wayne Stock's
Speaker 8: body was found, and it's a narrow hallway, white walls,
Speaker 8: but there was an outline or a silhouette of a
Speaker 8: human being, and it was clear to the crime scene analysts,
Speaker 8: the bloodstained experts, that this was a shadow or silhouette
Speaker 8: of a second person. This person had to be standing
Speaker 8: off to the side at the time that their co
Speaker 8: conspirator or accomplice had fired one of the shots into
Speaker 8: the back of Wayne's head. So it becomes clear that
Speaker 8: there has to be two perpetrators involved in these crimes.
Speaker 8: It wasn't immediately clear, though dan at that point in time,
Speaker 8: that there were two guns. That doesn't become clear until
Speaker 8: many many months later, actually, So law enforcement is working
Speaker 8: off of the premise that there's two perpetrators, two people
Speaker 8: that are there at the scene. They're still working off
Speaker 8: of the theory though, that it's that it's one gun
Speaker 8: and there's a twelve gage shotgun that that some that
Speaker 8: somebody had used in these crimes. Now, your question about
Speaker 8: was there any sign of robbery? I believe this he asked.
Speaker 8: Right the back of the property really stood out to
Speaker 8: the crime scene analysts. There was there was one window
Speaker 8: in the back of the property, near the near Wayne
Speaker 8: and Sharman stacks wooden patio. There was a window, and
Speaker 8: this was a window that led to their laundry room.
Speaker 8: And this window was propped open. And not only that,
Speaker 8: but the screen, the the exterior screen for this window
Speaker 8: had been pried off and was just left, uh, laying
Speaker 8: in a in a bed of rocks right underneath the
Speaker 8: uh the window. In closer examination of this, uh, this
Speaker 8: window screen showed that clearly somebody had had taken it
Speaker 8: off or you know, kind of punctured a little hole
Speaker 8: into it, which ultimately would have helped them pry it off.
Speaker 8: And uh So one of the crime scene analysts was
Speaker 8: taking several photographs of the property that was part of
Speaker 8: his assignment. And and frankly a specialty, and he was
Speaker 8: asking around, you know, as far as he clearly was
Speaker 8: focused and and uh and really interested in this in
Speaker 8: this window because as he would say later, this was
Speaker 8: about the only thing and that really stood out on
Speaker 8: the exterior of the property. That really was unusual, and
Speaker 8: uh and and and seemed to inferred that this is
Speaker 8: the point of entry for whoever the intruders slash killers were.
Speaker 8: But for whatever reason, some of the local sheriff's investigators
Speaker 8: really kind of waved them off basically as far as
Speaker 8: you know, just indicated to him that this window. Don't
Speaker 8: really spend your time, you know, focused in on this window.
Speaker 8: It really didn't fit their theory that they were working
Speaker 8: off of as far as how the murders and how
Speaker 8: the intrusion happened. They flipped the they worked off of
Speaker 8: the premise at the front door, which the interior door
Speaker 8: was left wide open. They were convinced that the killer
Speaker 8: had just walked right into the killers, I should say,
Speaker 8: but had walked right in through the front door and
Speaker 8: went up the stairs, found Wayne and Sharman in their
Speaker 8: bed and just blew them away at point blank range
Speaker 8: with a twelve gate shotgun, and then you know, ran
Speaker 8: out or scampered scampered down the stairs and ran back
Speaker 8: out the house. And part of the reason why I
Speaker 8: think that they've worked off of that theory from the
Speaker 8: get go was the fact that all the other rooms
Speaker 8: in the farmhouse if you looked around, you know, most
Speaker 8: starting with the kitchen, Wayne ands and the living room,
Speaker 8: dining room, everywhere else. Wayne and Sharman Stock had a
Speaker 8: very immaculate and tidy farmhouse. And this was a nice farmhouse.
Speaker 8: They had been in the family for several generations. It
Speaker 8: was nineteen a lets early nineteen hundreds home, and it
Speaker 8: had actually undergone some renovations over the years too, so
Speaker 8: it really looked nice and it was a nice house.
Speaker 8: And even when law enforcement got to the farmhouse to
Speaker 8: investigate the murders, the rest of the house was immaculate,
Speaker 8: and that signified to the law to the cops that
Speaker 8: whoever did this crime must have clearly been intent on revenge.
Speaker 8: And there didn't seem like that there was anything of
Speaker 8: value that was stolen. None of the rooms were ransacked.
Speaker 8: There was no obvious sign that any money had been
Speaker 8: taken or any jewel In fact, yeah, Wayne Charman's Charman
Speaker 8: Stacks jewelry was left out and planed view just a
Speaker 8: couple of feet away from her body, and and Wayne's
Speaker 8: wallet was right across the hallway from his body, and
Speaker 8: in his computer just in his office area, and again
Speaker 8: none of them, no money was taken. So so law
Speaker 8: enforcement worked off of the theory that this was not
Speaker 8: about robbery dan uh and uh, and they worked off
Speaker 8: the theory that this clearly had to be some type
Speaker 8: of premeditated orchestrated, well planned out double murder that happened
Speaker 8: in the middle of the night. That's the way it
Speaker 8: seemed to them at first.
Speaker 7: Let me go back just a little bit because I
Speaker 7: think it's a little bit important to to ask you
Speaker 7: where the stocks Wayne and Charman her earlier in the evening,
Speaker 7: and then to ask this question because I think it's important,
Speaker 7: where did the police have this idea that the door
Speaker 7: was open? And did they get any kind of that
Speaker 7: idea from having the son Andy go there earlier and
Speaker 7: go in that door? And did he tell them that
Speaker 7: the door was open, did he had unlocked it, did
Speaker 7: he have a key? What was the information he gave
Speaker 7: to them? And how if you can tell us, how
Speaker 7: would they have thought that that was the entry point?
Speaker 8: Well, the first part of your question to as far
Speaker 8: as where people were at earlier, earlier before the murder,
Speaker 8: Wayne AND's Charmon's. Wayne and Charman were at Wayne's mother's place,
Speaker 8: which is just around the bend, probably a quarter mile
Speaker 8: or so away. She lived on a farm or actually
Speaker 8: her house was right around the bend, and the and
Speaker 8: the Stock family had had a family gathering on Easter
Speaker 8: Sunday over there. There was about let's say, no more
Speaker 8: than ten to twelve relatives that were over there, including
Speaker 8: Wayne's only sister, Barb Libers and her husband Dave, and
Speaker 8: their oldest son, Matt lives so Wayne's nephew was at
Speaker 8: this family gathering. And the family gathering broke up around
Speaker 8: dinner time, I think four thirty or five o'clock or so.
Speaker 8: And from there Wayne and Charman went back to their
Speaker 8: house and they had some of their grandkids over around
Speaker 8: dinner time and did some Easter egg hunts around the
Speaker 8: property and you know, just had a great time with
Speaker 8: their grandkids, you know, before ultimately you know, retiring to
Speaker 8: bed around ten ten thirty or so. Let's see, uh,
Speaker 8: what was the other part of your your your question.
Speaker 7: When Andy when Andy Andy went there the next morning
Speaker 7: and looked around and finally entered the house. Did he
Speaker 7: have a key to the house or was the door unlocked?
Speaker 7: How did he find the house to try to surmise
Speaker 7: why the police would dismiss the idea that they came
Speaker 7: through a window. They must have been pretty positive at
Speaker 7: that door. Why would they think that What was the
Speaker 7: information that Andy gave them regarding how he got there?
Speaker 7: Did he have a key? What was that information?
Speaker 8: Yeah, I'm going out for memory on that. I know
Speaker 8: that he's he surely would have had a key. He
Speaker 8: pulled up in his truck and put uh kind of
Speaker 8: behind the house. And uh, and if I'm not mistaken,
Speaker 8: he actually would have had to use his key to
Speaker 8: get into the back door, because I remember in the
Speaker 8: aftermath it was clear law enforcement made it plainly clear
Speaker 8: that that the facts home was locked at the all
Speaker 8: the doors or all the doors were locked at the
Speaker 8: time of the at the crime. So so Andy clearly
Speaker 8: had to go inside the house, uh, you know, on
Speaker 8: his own. And uh and I'm pretty sure that when
Speaker 8: he runs out of the house that he probably would
Speaker 8: have run out that front door. So it's uh, I'm
Speaker 8: not really sure exactly as far as how that how
Speaker 8: that scenario goes as far as with Andy, and Frankly,
Speaker 8: I don't think that they spent very much time trying
Speaker 8: to clarify that point too, Dan, as far as just
Speaker 8: whether or not Andy went out the back door or
Speaker 8: or or did he go out the front door. But
Speaker 8: but the fact is that the front the interior front
Speaker 8: door was open.
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Speaker 8: Probably likely that one of the intruders you know, ran
Speaker 8: out that front door, based on the fact that when
Speaker 8: they ran out to the to their vehicle they dropped
Speaker 8: some qps of evidence. I don't know if you are
Speaker 8: to get into that yet or you know or later.
Speaker 7: But well, yet we want to win fold that when
Speaker 7: when it need be. Uh So, now what we have
Speaker 7: is this incredible murder. Do they have any idea about
Speaker 7: a getaway vehicle? And again tell us where they what
Speaker 7: their theory is very quickly and within how long do
Speaker 7: they have a theory? And then from that theory, of
Speaker 7: course comes this incredible tale. But tell us about this
Speaker 7: theory and who are the who are the people that
Speaker 7: come up with this theory, the the the players in
Speaker 7: this grand theory, and tell us about that.
Speaker 8: Well, there was there was a couple of newspaper carriers
Speaker 8: justin Hergan Raider was one of them and his girlfriend
Speaker 8: at the time, Tamra Jeffrey, and they came forward a
Speaker 8: day or two after the murders had happened, after this
Speaker 8: was all over the news, they were trying to be
Speaker 8: helpful and they remembered that on the night of the crime,
Speaker 8: when they were delivering the newspapers between three thirty and
Speaker 8: four am, they had driven to the to the Stocks
Speaker 8: farmhouse like always to bring them their morning early, their morning,
Speaker 8: their Monday morning newspaper. And when they were going to
Speaker 8: that farmhouse, camera had noticed a car that was parked
Speaker 8: at a cemetery about a mile down the road from
Speaker 8: the Stocks farmhouse. And later on that evening, when they
Speaker 8: were finishing up their route, the same car nearly ran
Speaker 8: them off the road, and it was speeding and it
Speaker 8: was heading towards the city of Lincoln, you know, bright lights,
Speaker 8: and so law enforcement becomes convinced that this was an
Speaker 8: incredible tip and in their mind this had to be
Speaker 8: the killers get away vehicle that you know, the killers
Speaker 8: were heading back to the city of Lincoln, and they
Speaker 8: focused in on the fact that they had also remembered
Speaker 8: that Wayne and Charmanstact's nephew, Matt Livers, also lived in
Speaker 8: the city of Lincoln.
Speaker 7: M now tell us about Matt Livers because they have
Speaker 7: this again. This idea now tell us they have the
Speaker 7: theory that it might be somebody from their own family.
Speaker 7: They take this tip and what do they do with
Speaker 7: this idea that it might be a person named Matt Liver.
Speaker 8: Well, they were convinced that Matt Liver seemed like the
Speaker 8: logical suspect because he had had some disagreements over the years,
Speaker 8: he was kind of estranged from his aunt and uncle,
Speaker 8: and there had also been some issues over the years
Speaker 8: that have bubbled up involving a property that well, Matt's
Speaker 8: grandmother's where Matt used to live there down in the basement,
Speaker 8: and apparently he had become kind of a burden for
Speaker 8: the family. For his grandmother, she didn't mind him living there,
Speaker 8: but Wayne and Charmon ultimately decided to intervene and he
Speaker 8: kind of kicked him out of the house. So I
Speaker 8: didn't want him living there. So so that caused some
Speaker 8: tensions in a risk between the in the family. And
Speaker 8: and again he had spent Easter Sunday at the family
Speaker 8: with the family at the Easter Sunday gathering, certain family
Speaker 8: members immediately just jumped to the conclusion that this was
Speaker 8: a premeditated, whole blooded killing and that Matt, since he
Speaker 8: was the black sheep of the family, had to be responsible.
Speaker 8: And you had a situation where somewhere between at least
Speaker 8: a half a dozen different extended family members were interviewed
Speaker 8: by local law enforcement on the day of the murders,
Speaker 8: so later in the day at one of their houses,
Speaker 8: and all of them, one after one, just said that
Speaker 8: they were convinced that that Matt Livers had to be
Speaker 8: responsible for these murders. There was no These were all
Speaker 8: rumor and innuendo. There was no hard evidence at this
Speaker 8: point in time. There was no eyewitnesses that you know,
Speaker 8: that that had come forward to say Matt Levers was responsible.
Speaker 8: But law enforcement becomes convinced that that Matt Livers has
Speaker 8: to be this this awful bad guy, this monster that
Speaker 8: had somehow, you know, pulled this double murder off in
Speaker 8: the middle of the night.
Speaker 7: Now, tell us about Matt Lever, who he really is
Speaker 7: in terms of character, tell us about Matt libry and
Speaker 7: his and if he has any criminal record.
Speaker 8: Matt Levers was twenty eight years old at the time
Speaker 8: that this had all unfolded, and at that point in time,
Speaker 8: Matt did not even have a speeding ticket on his record.
Speaker 8: He he had kind of a not a tough upbringing,
Speaker 8: but just he he uh, he was in special education
Speaker 8: throughout his whole schooling. He was some people would characterize
Speaker 8: him as slow, but he had a little bit of
Speaker 8: a diminished capacity where his IQ level was around seventy
Speaker 8: or so. And uh and just growing up in school,
Speaker 8: he had some tough times where kids would make fun
Speaker 8: of him. But uh, you know, he always tried to
Speaker 8: move past this and uh, and he really wanted to
Speaker 8: do the best that he could for himself. But uh,
Speaker 8: he also tried to compare himself to his his family members,
Speaker 8: and you know, in certain family members, really you had
Speaker 8: a lot more going for them than he had. But
Speaker 8: at the time that this had happened, he was he
Speaker 8: was struggling. He had been uh uh he had lost
Speaker 8: a job, but he'd recently been fired from a from
Speaker 8: a security job position that he had. The situation was
Speaker 8: that he I believe he kicked the door real hard.
Speaker 8: He was angry about something at work and ultimately kicked
Speaker 8: a hole in the door at this uh, at this
Speaker 8: pharmaceutical plant. So he had been fired from his job
Speaker 8: about a month prior to these murders. And law enforcement
Speaker 8: becomes convinced that the fact that he was fired unemployed
Speaker 8: and he kicked a hole in his door, that that showed,
Speaker 8: you know, violent tendencies and and just unbelievable anger. And
Speaker 8: it kind of snowballs into the theory that, yeah, this
Speaker 8: is the same guy that ultimately is gonna go back
Speaker 8: to his uncle and aunt's farmhouse late on Easter Sunday night,
Speaker 8: just hours after he had spent some time with them
Speaker 8: earlier that day, at this Easter, at this Easter family gathering.
Speaker 7: Now, how do they proceed in terms of questioning him?
Speaker 7: He's a he does he want a lawyer? Request a lawyer?
Speaker 7: Do they tell him about that? And I just I
Speaker 7: pardon me, but I wanted to ask this one question too.
Speaker 7: When you say that that the family members, six of
Speaker 7: them or so had stated that, well, if you want
Speaker 7: to talk about a suspect, this matt our nephew, the
Speaker 7: nephew of Wayne, is the likely suspect. Did the police
Speaker 7: already have this idea in their head and prompt you know,
Speaker 7: knowing as time goes on, will the audience will understand
Speaker 7: why I'm asking this question? Was there prompting by the police,
Speaker 7: Did they already have the idea that could be a
Speaker 7: family member. I mean, I mean, he's not really contained
Speaker 7: in the book, but did is there was there prompting
Speaker 7: which which came first, the idea or the idea from
Speaker 7: the relatives.
Speaker 8: I think it had to be a combination of both.
Speaker 8: Because even some of the crime lab personnel that showed
Speaker 8: up at the crime scenes and looked at the carnage
Speaker 8: in the hallway, their first suspicion was that this was personal.
Speaker 8: I remember that comes up a lot as far as
Speaker 8: the even some experts you know that had been to
Speaker 8: numerous crime scenes that that they came and helped on
Speaker 8: this case. The theory was at first that this was,
Speaker 8: you know, a deeply personal type of revenge kind of killing.
Speaker 8: So when you're working off of that theory, law enforcement
Speaker 8: Cass County Sheriff's oft did think immediately that it probably
Speaker 8: was somebody closely connected to Wayne and Charman Stock. And
Speaker 8: again within a matter of hours, you know, they're sitting
Speaker 8: down with several family members distraught. But all the family
Speaker 8: members that they spoke with were very persuasive, persuasive in
Speaker 8: convincing them that you need to spend your time focused
Speaker 8: in on Matt Livers and that just becomes the way
Speaker 8: that that it ultimately goes. They they they think they're
Speaker 8: convinced that the family is presenting them with a great
Speaker 8: solid suspect and uh, and they really disregard other other
Speaker 8: possible scenarios as far as what could have happened and
Speaker 8: what may have happened. And basically, Matt becomes you suspect
Speaker 8: number one. But there isn't any other people that are
Speaker 8: even being looked at. And you asked about, uh, you know,
Speaker 8: does Matt lawyer up or anything like that. No, it's
Speaker 8: actually a matter of That same night, the same night
Speaker 8: after the two Cass County Sheriffs investigators met with the
Speaker 8: grieving and distraught family members. Uh, later that night, they
Speaker 8: go back to to to the grandma's house and they
Speaker 8: went over there asking if Matt lives still over there,
Speaker 8: and Matt has already left to go home back to Lincoln.
Speaker 8: His mom gets on the phone, calls him up on
Speaker 8: his on his cell phone, and he proceeds to drive
Speaker 8: back to his grandma's house. Uh. Back to Murdoch late
Speaker 8: that night and he rides and he gets into a
Speaker 8: squad car with with two of the investigators rides around
Speaker 8: with him for they ultimately take him over to to
Speaker 8: a fire station to do uh, to do an interview.
Speaker 8: But U but no, he's he's more than willing and
Speaker 8: compliant as far as you know, being being candid with them,
Speaker 8: answering any and all questions they have, giving them ultimately
Speaker 8: over the next several days, providing them with DNA samples,
Speaker 8: uh and hair samples are just anything that that they need,
Speaker 8: you know, that's more than willing to comply and and
Speaker 8: help them out in the investigation. And it's really because
Speaker 8: he's in his mind, he's convinced that he's helping them
Speaker 8: get closer to finding out who the real killer or
Speaker 8: killers are. He he's aware that they're looking at him
Speaker 8: as a suspect, but he's you know, he he believes
Speaker 8: he didn't do the crime. So why why why does
Speaker 8: he need to get a lawyer? You know? Why does
Speaker 8: he need to not participate in any interviews that the
Speaker 8: Sheriff's office in the state patrol, you know, are asking
Speaker 8: of him at that point in time, Dane.
Speaker 7: Did he offer any alibi? And if there was an
Speaker 7: alibi offered for any witnesses interviewed?
Speaker 8: Ye know, Matt Matt maintained that that he was at
Speaker 8: home the entire night of the of the murders, and
Speaker 8: he actually had to get up the very next morning
Speaker 8: he had a phone interview for a job job interview.
Speaker 8: It was actually UH for for a nation, the Schneider National,
Speaker 8: which are the big orange trucks that you see driving
Speaker 8: all over North America. They thought of Wisconsin, but h
Speaker 8: But he had a phone interview that that that very
Speaker 8: next morning with the with this trucking company, and so
Speaker 8: he had to get out, get up really early and
Speaker 8: and do this uh, this phone interview with them. And
Speaker 8: that's what he maintained that he was in bed, went
Speaker 8: to bed and was asleep that entire night, and he
Speaker 8: had too his two roommates. One was his UH fiancee
Speaker 8: at the time, eventual wife, Sarah Schneider and and Sarah
Speaker 8: Matt left in the same bed, and she remembered going
Speaker 8: to bed around the same time that that Matt went
Speaker 8: to bed. I think it was around eleventh or eleven
Speaker 8: thirty and uh and she woke up first that next
Speaker 8: morning and and insisted that Matt was in bed wearing
Speaker 8: his pajamas just like he was wearing his pajamas and
Speaker 8: laying in bed next to her when they went to
Speaker 8: bed the previous night. There was also another roommate that
Speaker 8: they had and her name was Susan Gill. And Susan
Speaker 8: also was, like Matt's fiance, also worked as a nurse.
Speaker 8: And Susan came home sometime late that night or in
Speaker 8: the middle of the night, I can't remember exactly, but
Speaker 8: Susan insisted as well that Matt Leverts was home and
Speaker 8: you know, in his vehicles were there the entire time,
Speaker 8: you know, when she got home, you know, from her
Speaker 8: late night workship. So you had two other roommates, you know,
Speaker 8: eyewitnesses alby witness Susan's proper terminalogy, but two other alby
Speaker 8: witnesses that were interviewed by law enforcement, and they maintained
Speaker 8: that Matt Livers, you know, was home at the time
Speaker 8: the crime. But they were ultimately discarded or disregarded and
Speaker 8: not taken seriously.
Speaker 7: So they didn't have any They didn't answer to that.
Speaker 7: How do they reconcile that they didn't? They just moved
Speaker 7: on and proceeded to question Matt Livers.
Speaker 8: The theory was that they just worked off the theory
Speaker 8: that maybe these women were lying for them, trying to
Speaker 8: cover for them or him, I should say, for Matts.
Speaker 8: But and and then the other scenario was too that
Speaker 8: they thought that, yeah, maybe they didn't know that Matt
Speaker 8: somehow sneaked out of the out of his house in
Speaker 8: Lincoln and uh, you know, was gone for a few
Speaker 8: hours and ultimately, uh you know, returned and slipped back
Speaker 8: in the bed. So whatever reason, they just really didn't
Speaker 8: didn't didn't take it seriously, the you know, the possibility
Speaker 8: that these two other roommates of Maths, you know, we're
Speaker 8: you know, we're believable, or they just decided not to
Speaker 8: just put that much faith and stock into that they
Speaker 8: were convinced that that Matt was able to sneak out
Speaker 8: of his house in Lincoln and ultimately drives the thirty
Speaker 8: thirty five miles or so to the farmhouse and commit
Speaker 8: the murders and make it back make it back home
Speaker 8: before the next morning.
Speaker 7: Now they outline their theory eventually with Matt, but how
Speaker 7: he responds is that he denies, and he denies dozens
Speaker 7: of times. So try to take us into how it
Speaker 7: eventually turns around and in what manner do they get
Speaker 7: him to turn around and get this into a confession
Speaker 7: from a person who's trying to help out the police.
Speaker 7: He knows he's innocent to confession. Tell us about that,
Speaker 7: pro sister, because I think it's important.
Speaker 8: Yeah, we we're basically about a week into the murder investigation.
Speaker 8: We're starting the second week of the case. It's about
Speaker 8: the eighth day since the murders had happened, and Matt
Speaker 8: Lebers had gotten into a squad car with the two
Speaker 8: lead investigators. They picked him up at his house. He
Speaker 8: was not under rest at that point in time, but
Speaker 8: they drove him to the sheriff's office in Platsmith, Nebraska,
Speaker 8: you know, for an interrogation. And the point, the hope
Speaker 8: was that they were going to get him to finally
Speaker 8: confess to these crimes. But over several hours the investigators
Speaker 8: were pretty frustrated. Matt, as you said, denied over and
Speaker 8: over and he had anything to do with these murders.
Speaker 8: So they asked him if he'd be willing to take
Speaker 8: a polygraph test allow detector test to prove his innocence,
Speaker 8: and Matt said sure, absolutely and uh, and the two
Speaker 8: investigators already had you know, one of their cohorts, a
Speaker 8: Nebraska State Patrol investigator Charlie O'Callaghan on standby, and Charlie was, uh,
Speaker 8: you know, was just right around the other office and
Speaker 8: he was waiting to uh to give Mad his polygraph test.
Speaker 8: And uh so, ultimately Matt takes this polygraph test with
Speaker 8: Charlio O'Callahan. Charlie leaves the room after the test is done,
Speaker 8: and this time the two lead investigators returned to the room.
Speaker 8: And before they were kind of playing the mister nights
Speaker 8: guy approach. This time they just came back into the
Speaker 8: room and uh just uh, you know, the looks on
Speaker 8: their eyes just scared the daylights out of Matt Livers
Speaker 8: and uh and and they just start yelling at him
Speaker 8: and telling them that we've seen it, we're seeing another
Speaker 8: side of you. You know, it's time for you to confess.
Speaker 8: You know, we know that you're up to your ears
Speaker 8: in this thing. And and he still denies that he's involved.
Speaker 8: But over and over the next several minutes and hours,
Speaker 8: Matt just kind of Wilf's and Wilt's under pressure and
Speaker 8: he feels trapped in the situation. And one of the investigators,
Speaker 8: Earl Skink, ultimately just tells him you know, his Earl's
Speaker 8: theory about how the murders happened, and it basically breaks
Speaker 8: it down into a right or wrong set of questions.
Speaker 8: I think it's probably about eight to ten different questions
Speaker 8: and Earl asks Matt, you know, right or wrong you
Speaker 8: did this? Right or wrong? You did this? And Matt
Speaker 8: answers right to every single question, and that at first
Speaker 8: becomes that's Matt's confession. And at that point in time,
Speaker 8: it's incredible. This is probably for a lot of our
Speaker 8: listeners to believe. But Matt was thinking at that point
Speaker 8: in time, if he confessed to these crimes, he was
Speaker 8: going to get to go home that night, that these
Speaker 8: two investigators you know, were going to drive him home
Speaker 8: after he had confessed to the murders. And again that's
Speaker 8: just with with Matt's you know, mental capacity. He he
Speaker 8: that he was thinking that this is the way it
Speaker 8: was going to go, but that wasn't the way it
Speaker 8: was going to go. And and and he also knew
Speaker 8: at that point in time though, see, he knew a
Speaker 8: lot of the crime scene evidence as far as just
Speaker 8: kind of what had happened, because other family members had
Speaker 8: talked to his mom and dad about what some of
Speaker 8: the evidence was that was found at the crime scene,
Speaker 8: including the fact that a shotgun shell or shotgun shells
Speaker 8: were found and the shotgun was used. So there's a
Speaker 8: couple aspects of his quote confession that that investigators think
Speaker 8: are bulls eyes, But in reality, Matt was telling them
Speaker 8: stuff that he had already heard and you know, again
Speaker 8: to try to placate them. But again, ultimately, over several hours,
Speaker 8: he wealth under pressure and he confesses and at first
Speaker 8: he takes credit for committing the murders by himself, that
Speaker 8: he did it and he did it alone. Now the
Speaker 8: two investigators realized again thinking back to the upstairs hallway,
Speaker 8: they knew that there was a second person involved in
Speaker 8: this crime. So they ultimately, you know, pressed Matt for
Speaker 8: more details as far as who could have been his
Speaker 8: accomplice and and he names one of his cousins, a
Speaker 8: fellow by the name of Nick Sampson.
Speaker 7: And what does he say Nick did and his entire involvement,
Speaker 7: what was his entire involvement? According to Matt livers.
Speaker 8: Well, it ultimately changes and it actually evolves over several hours.
Speaker 8: Fact actually even until the next morning, i should say,
Speaker 8: the next afternoon, while Matt's still in jail. But at
Speaker 8: first it was that Nick had furnished the shotgun that
Speaker 8: was used in the murders, and that Nick had furnished
Speaker 8: the getaway vehicle, which was a car that Nick's brother
Speaker 8: fellow by the name of Will Sampson. But but he
Speaker 8: Matt maintained that Nick had had borrowed or obtained Will's
Speaker 8: car and UH, and that that was the car that
Speaker 8: Matt and Nick had borrowed and used to UH to
Speaker 8: commit the murders and uses the getaway car. So that's
Speaker 8: the original statement that that Matt makes. It evolved to
Speaker 8: being that Nick was serving as a lookout at the
Speaker 8: farm while Matt went upstairs to commit the murders, to
Speaker 8: eventually that Nick had actually fired or allegedly had fired
Speaker 8: the final shot into the back of Wayne Stock's skull
Speaker 8: in the hallway. But as soon as Matt had implicated
Speaker 8: his cousin, Nick Sampson during that interrogation, Cass County Sheriff's
Speaker 8: office made a phone call to the Nebraska State Patrol
Speaker 8: and UH and they ultimately raided a small town bar
Speaker 8: in Murdoch, Nebraska, where Nick Sampson had worked and a
Speaker 8: part time job as a kitchen cook. And uh, and
Speaker 8: they went out and pulled Nick out of the bar
Speaker 8: that that Tuesday night, in front of a large crowd
Speaker 8: that was there. Created quite a scene, as you can
Speaker 8: imagine a small town, two hundred and seventy people, six
Speaker 8: six or seven police officers storm in the bar. They
Speaker 8: pulled Nick out of the bar and and and tell
Speaker 8: him that he's being arrested for a double murder. And
Speaker 8: I'm not going to repeat the words that Nicks said,
Speaker 8: but our listeners, can you know, understand Nick's uh frustration
Speaker 8: with you know, with with with with what he had
Speaker 8: just been told. But uh so Nick gets put into
Speaker 8: a squad car and he's driven back to the Cass
Speaker 8: County Sheriff's office where he's told that he has been charged,
Speaker 8: is being arrested for for this brutal double murder. And
Speaker 8: unlike Matt, Nick refuses to participate in interview. I mean,
Speaker 8: he tells law enforcement that he's innocent, that he didn't
Speaker 8: commit these crimes, but he wants a lawyer and uh,
Speaker 8: you know, really doesn't want to talk to these these
Speaker 8: these individuals.
Speaker 7: So he remains in custody though doesn't.
Speaker 8: He yes, as far as pretty much from the moment
Speaker 8: that that he gets uh that they raid the bar again.
Speaker 8: This was a little unorthodox, he would think most people
Speaker 8: would think. But but Nick was never questioned. There was
Speaker 8: never any Uh. They didn't go interview his his his
Speaker 8: fiance future wife, and her roommate as well. They get
Speaker 8: interviewed that same night after Nick's already sitting in jail
Speaker 8: charged with these two murders. That's when Nick's fiance at
Speaker 8: the time, Laurie and the other roommates, a girl named Nashley,
Speaker 8: they were interviewed late that night and they maintained that
Speaker 8: Nick had to be home the same night that these
Speaker 8: murders had happened. Nick and his fiance had two big dogs,
Speaker 8: friendly dogs, the big dogs that always left in their
Speaker 8: bedroom at the foot of the bed, and Laurie maintained
Speaker 8: that that absolutely no way that Nick had had got
Speaker 8: out in the middle of the night that night. The
Speaker 8: dogs usually would bark at any opportunity that people were
Speaker 8: coming and going. And in the other roommate, Ashley, had
Speaker 8: also maintained that no, there's no way that Nick uh
Speaker 8: left at night. Uh. He was still in bed and
Speaker 8: got up ready for work that next morning. That this happened.
Speaker 8: But Uh, but at that point in time, though, Dan,
Speaker 8: you know, their alibi witnesses really were im material for
Speaker 8: law enforcement. Nick was in jail, Matt had named him
Speaker 8: as his accomplice, and UH, you know, it was continue
Speaker 8: on work with the UH, with the with the prosecution
Speaker 8: of Matt, Livers and Sampson.
Speaker 7: Now they proceed ahead and like you say, they're doing
Speaker 7: the investigation backwards. It basically in terms of you know,
Speaker 7: they haven't questioned him, and they haven't. They're looking at
Speaker 7: interviewing people that they should have interviewed before, but they're
Speaker 7: doing it after the fact. Now there they have this
Speaker 7: information that that the car they getaway vehicle was Will's,
Speaker 7: Will Sampson's vehicle. So what do they do with that
Speaker 7: information and his vehicle and how does that work? How
Speaker 7: does a pro seed for them?
Speaker 8: Well, and I should point out too that uh that
Speaker 8: Will's car was ultimately impounded in the middle of the
Speaker 8: first week of the investigation, probably the third or the
Speaker 8: fourth day of the case. Will's car was taken in
Speaker 8: the custody and and it was driven to a crime
Speaker 8: lab in Omaha where was processed and UH and the
Speaker 8: car at the first go around came back as clean.
Speaker 8: There was no evidence, no blood, no uh blood spann,
Speaker 8: no other fragments or tissue or anything like that. Nothing
Speaker 8: that that indicated that jumped out to the crime lab
Speaker 8: that this car was involved in the murders. However, the
Speaker 8: local law enforcement officials just were in disbelief. They couldn't
Speaker 8: believe that this was the case. Their first thought was
Speaker 8: that this car, you know, had to be cleaned, and
Speaker 8: and it actually had been cleaned.
Speaker 4: Uh.
Speaker 8: The car. Part of the reason why the car drew
Speaker 8: suspicion was the fact that it was dropped off at
Speaker 8: a detail shop, a cleaning shop, on the morning that
Speaker 8: the bodies were discovered and uh, and that was part
Speaker 8: of the reason why law enforcement kind of zeroed in
Speaker 8: on this car. However, Nick, the car owner, maintained that
Speaker 8: there was no way that Anbey borrowed this car. He
Speaker 8: had the one and only key to the car, and
Speaker 8: his fiance eventual wife, Alynn, also told law enforcement there
Speaker 8: was no way that anybody could have borrowed this car,
Speaker 8: either from her from her husband. But but again, the
Speaker 8: car was taken into custody, and even when the car
Speaker 8: came back with no obvious evidence inside of it the
Speaker 8: lead investigators tell the crime lab in Omaha to keep
Speaker 8: the car impounded, you know, and that it still was
Speaker 8: their theory that this was to get away car that
Speaker 8: Matt Lyverts and Nick Sampson had used to commit the murders.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 7: So this is very very important we of course, if
Speaker 7: the audience can remember, we alluded to it in the
Speaker 7: synopsis for the book. It's a very important detail. David
Speaker 7: Kovid is from this prestigious unit that does this important work,
Speaker 7: and they've done some great work apparently and solved all
Speaker 7: kinds of cases. David Covid, And I want to ask
Speaker 7: you too that I was really curious. Again, you can't
Speaker 7: go into everything in the book, but is it common
Speaker 7: practice for what David Kovid does what he did do
Speaker 7: alone in terms of checking out this vehicle again, is
Speaker 7: that standard procedure to go ahead and do something like
Speaker 7: this alone and then tell us what, tell us the
Speaker 7: whole background story about how he became involved in what
Speaker 7: and what he found.
Speaker 8: The answer to that question, as far as there were
Speaker 8: sometimes when it makes sense for law and for the
Speaker 8: crime lab officials to you know, do their own work.
Speaker 8: But what what really stood out, Uh, it was the
Speaker 8: fact that it was unorthodox to be doing follow up
Speaker 8: tests on evidence that was tested the first time, that
Speaker 8: was already tested once and and came back as being excluded.
Speaker 8: That there was no sign that any that any blood
Speaker 8: or trace evidence or DNA was found on something, whether
Speaker 8: that was a knife, a gun, a sword, and uh
Speaker 8: and certainly in this case in a in a car.
Speaker 8: So the fact that this car was already checked and
Speaker 8: he supervised the search that wasn't five minutes long, and
Speaker 8: but six to eight hours long, from about midnight to
Speaker 8: about eight am. He supervised this search of the car
Speaker 8: and had a couple of his best people working for
Speaker 8: him carrying through that car, taking photograph after photographs of
Speaker 8: pretty much every spot in the car. And there were
Speaker 8: a few stains, there were a few substances found in
Speaker 8: the car, but they just turned out to be, you know, immterial.
Speaker 8: They weren't they weren't blood, and they certainly weren't any
Speaker 8: DNA or any spatter that came from the crime scene.
Speaker 8: But Dave Covid at that point in time, we're talking
Speaker 8: in two thousand and six, Dave was already had built
Speaker 8: up a pretty grandiose reputation across Nebraska and certainly throughout
Speaker 8: that region including Iowa. Nebraska and Iowa pretty close to
Speaker 8: each other, I should say, Omaha. And so Dave would
Speaker 8: also work a lot of his unit would work a
Speaker 8: lot of cases in Iowa as well. But Dave, Dave
Speaker 8: Covid in his crime lab, we're building up this this
Speaker 8: uh important reputation is being able to solve pretty much
Speaker 8: every case that a local law enforcement agency called them
Speaker 8: on to help out. And uh and some of these
Speaker 8: were amazing and very very high profile crime stand that
Speaker 8: were all over the news, covered by a newspaper journalist,
Speaker 8: in the TV and radio stations as well. And uh,
Speaker 8: in all these cases ended up with the bad guy
Speaker 8: going to prison or ended up on death row in
Speaker 8: some cases. But uh, but uh and and and in
Speaker 8: a lot of these cases as well, Dave Covid plays
Speaker 8: a key role in finding some piece of evidence or
Speaker 8: crucial pieces of evidence that ultimately helped seal the deal,
Speaker 8: you know, kind of get law enforcement or the prostitutors
Speaker 8: off is over the hump. And uh. And he's a
Speaker 8: very good uh testifier, a very eloquent speaker, public speaker,
Speaker 8: very chatty and with a very smart individual and he
Speaker 8: liked the limelight, and he also liked to boast and
Speaker 8: brag about the successes of his crime lab that he
Speaker 8: had managed and was really building up. And that's why
Speaker 8: you have a situation where a small town agency like
Speaker 8: the Cass County Sheriff's Office immediately called in the Douglas
Speaker 8: County Sheriff's Office crime lab because they wanted Dave Covid
Speaker 8: and they wanted Dave Covid to work their case. And
Speaker 8: it becomes a head scratcher for the lead investigators when
Speaker 8: the first time that Dave Covid supervises the search of
Speaker 8: the suspected getaway car that there's no evidence in the
Speaker 8: crime in this car. Dave Covid ultimately goes back after
Speaker 8: Matt Livers and Nick Sampson had in jail for a
Speaker 8: few days, he goes back on his owen and ultimately
Speaker 8: reports back to that one of the lead investigators that
Speaker 8: same evening that I found some blood underneath the dashboard
Speaker 8: of the car. And the lead investigator and ultimately comes
Speaker 8: out to the Sheriff's office that night Dave shows him
Speaker 8: where he finds the blood, and that investigator kind of
Speaker 8: reacted with this, you know this is an unbelievable this
Speaker 8: is a needle in the haystack kind of find, but
Speaker 8: it kind of matched Dave COVID's reputation and the fact
Speaker 8: that the lead investigators were absolutely convinced that this was
Speaker 8: the getaway car to begin with. So that's kind of
Speaker 8: the way that things proceed from that point on. Dave
Speaker 8: now had found some blood in the car, after all,
Speaker 8: blood that came from the murder victim, Wayne Stock, to
Speaker 8: corroborate Matt Liber's confession that this was the getaway car
Speaker 8: that he and Nick Sampson had used to commit these murders.
Speaker 7: And so it looks like the case closed. But there's
Speaker 7: more to this story. Now. I know this is jumping ahead,
Speaker 7: but we will only go about another half an hour
Speaker 7: into this incredible twisting tail. Tell us how with all
Speaker 7: of this evidence stacked up against these men, how it
Speaker 7: comes to be that there is a CSI officer investigator
Speaker 7: that notices something in a photo.
Speaker 8: The it's a fluke, basically, and it's it's an unbelievable fluke.
Speaker 8: But we have a situation where the lead investigators, worse,
Speaker 8: we're just puzzled that no one that this was such
Speaker 8: a brutal crime scene. They figured that the killer they
Speaker 8: were thinking it was Matt Livers and x Samson had
Speaker 8: to have gotten an incredible amount of blood spray and
Speaker 8: stains all over their clothes and inside this car. Well, again,
Speaker 8: as we talked about earlier, they do everything backwards. So
Speaker 8: they arrest Nick Sampson and Matt Livers and then search
Speaker 8: and raise their houses and take all their clothes, take
Speaker 8: all their shoes, and can't find no blood anywhere is
Speaker 8: found on any of the clothing or garments or anywhere,
Speaker 8: you know, from the two properties where Matt Livers and
Speaker 8: Nick Sampson lived. So they're still trying to figure out
Speaker 8: kind of what other key pieces of evidence that were
Speaker 8: left that they could possibly link Matt Livers and nck
Speaker 8: Samson too from the crime scene. And they're going through
Speaker 8: these photographs, I mean, those hundreds of photographs that Don
Speaker 8: Bays from the Douglas County Crime Lab had taken, and
Speaker 8: one of the photographs an obscure photograph of the kitchen.
Speaker 8: Ultimately catch is the guy of one of the detectives
Speaker 8: from Cast County, and he notices in the photograph that
Speaker 8: there's a shiny object and he sees it on the
Speaker 8: and this is the photo of the kitchen, and he
Speaker 8: notices a shiny object and he points this out. A
Speaker 8: couple other investigators I believe, agreed with him. Yeah, it
Speaker 8: looks like there is something there. And again, this is
Speaker 8: the fourth day of the case, so the crime lab
Speaker 8: had already kind of closed up shop and left the farmhouse.
Speaker 8: But law enforcement goes back out to this farmhouse and
Speaker 8: lo and behold, there is the shiny object was still
Speaker 8: there on the floor. And the shiny object happened to
Speaker 8: be a gold ring, an engraved ring that had the
Speaker 8: names it says love Always Hory Cori I and Ryan
Speaker 8: R Y A N. And the investigators were by this,
Speaker 8: and they asked family members who Corey and Ryan could be,
Speaker 8: and none of the grieving family members could identify anybody
Speaker 8: that they could think of named Corey and Ryan. DNA
Speaker 8: is tested on the ring Matt Livers and Nick Sampson
Speaker 8: since they were in jail. Their their DNA was was
Speaker 8: matched up to this ring and actually another piece of
Speaker 8: evidence too from the property. But law enforcements in for
Speaker 8: another major shocker when the DNA on this ring turned
Speaker 8: out to exclude Matt Livers and Nick Sampson. Now at
Speaker 8: that point in time, CAS's kind of Sheriff's office isn't thinking,
Speaker 8: oh my god, we arrested the wrong to people for
Speaker 8: these murders, because they, you know, are still convinced that
Speaker 8: their confession was air tight, you know, on bulletproof. But
Speaker 8: they're thinking that this just proves that Nick Sampson and
Speaker 8: Matt Livers must have had other people that helped them
Speaker 8: out in these murders, and it just happens to be
Speaker 8: a matter of time before they're eventually going to figure
Speaker 8: out who these other people would be.
Speaker 7: Now, keeping with that theory, again, they think what they think,
Speaker 7: who do they go to as their likely co conspirators
Speaker 7: in this?
Speaker 8: In their mind, first they worked off of Matt. Livers
Speaker 8: really only had one close friend at that point in life,
Speaker 8: and it was a fellow that lived in the state
Speaker 8: of Texas whose name was Ryan Paulding. And again that
Speaker 8: was the only Ryan that anybody could even think of
Speaker 8: that match, you know, name matched up with the name
Speaker 8: on the ring, and Matt had spent a few weeks
Speaker 8: with Ryan prior to the murders. So again they're thinking that,
Speaker 8: well this, you know, this Ryan had to be at
Speaker 8: the crime scene as well. He probably helped Matt plan
Speaker 8: this thing out, but uh so law enforcement who works
Speaker 8: with the Texas Rangers, and uh, you know, and uh
Speaker 8: the interview in Ryan Paulding obtained his DNA samples as well,
Speaker 8: but uh, but they don't match up and uh and
Speaker 8: you know, Ryan was clearly in the Dallas Fort Worth
Speaker 8: area of Texas at the time and the murders. So
Speaker 8: they back off Ryan Paulding, but they're not convinced that
Speaker 8: he's completely innocent or you know, or has nothing to
Speaker 8: do with this. They think that eventually, you know, that
Speaker 8: maybe Ryan still might know something, but for the time being,
Speaker 8: they back.
Speaker 7: Off of Ryan.
Speaker 8: But he's the first person they think about. And then
Speaker 8: the other one that they were still kind of working
Speaker 8: off of was uh was Will Sampson, Nick's brother, but
Speaker 8: again nothing was really pointing to Will as uh as
Speaker 8: as being ultimately out as well participating in the murders.
Speaker 8: So so locally everything's kind of hitting dead ends. They
Speaker 8: also looked at the possibility to Dan that Matt Levers
Speaker 8: and Nick Sampson's fiances Sarah and Laurie, possibly that they
Speaker 8: were you know, at the farmhouse at the time of
Speaker 8: the murders. But again that doesn't hold any weight of
Speaker 8: water either. So everything that they're looking at locally just
Speaker 8: is not coming together for them.
Speaker 7: Now, tell us about Jim Rorr and how he gets involved,
Speaker 7: and how this really starts unraveling and we get to
Speaker 7: the truth eventually here. So tell us about Jim Rohrer
Speaker 7: who he works with, and tell us a little bit
Speaker 7: about him and how he gets involved in this.
Speaker 8: Jim Roorr was in the state of Wisconsin. He was
Speaker 8: a small talent detective for It's kind of about an
Speaker 8: accounty of well, let's see, the city was about twenty
Speaker 8: five thousand, a small, small county, a little bit bigger
Speaker 8: than Cass County, Nebraska. But he gets a call about
Speaker 8: a month after this murder had happened from Nebraska authorities,
Speaker 8: and at that point in time, they had determined that
Speaker 8: a ring, that that ring that had been dropped at
Speaker 8: the farmhouse with the name Corey and Ryan had ultimately
Speaker 8: traced back to the state of Wisconsin, and and it
Speaker 8: had come from a Walmart store in Dodge County, Wisconsin.
Speaker 8: And at that point in time, it was kind of
Speaker 8: like a collision course of two completely separate criminal investigations.
Speaker 8: That neither law enforcement entity kind of knew about the
Speaker 8: other up until now when Jim Morra gets the call
Speaker 8: about this ring that had been found in Nebraska. Jim
Speaker 8: Rourr had already been investigating a slew of local auto
Speaker 8: thefts and and there were several vehicles three or four
Speaker 8: that had been taken over a matter of a few
Speaker 8: days in the Dodge County, Wisconsin jurisdiction, and Jim Roer
Speaker 8: already had a pair of teenagers, Greg Fester and Jessica
Speaker 8: Reed in custody for these vehicle thefts. And it was
Speaker 8: clear to Jim Rorer that this ring had come from
Speaker 8: one of those one of those vehicles that was stolen,
Speaker 8: because the ring was owned had been given to a
Speaker 8: fellow by the name of Ryan Krenz who was about
Speaker 8: twenty or twenty one years old at that point in time.
Speaker 8: And Ryan Krens happened to be the owner of a
Speaker 8: big red Dodge Ram pickup truck that had been stolen
Speaker 8: the day before Easter by this pair of Wisconsin teenagers.
Speaker 8: And this truck was ultimately a and and in the
Speaker 8: state of Louisiana about four or five days later, and
Speaker 8: it was stolen so so Jim Mower ultimately kind of
Speaker 8: really digs into this, these two local suspects, Greg Vester
Speaker 8: and Jessica Reed, and he does some amazing, excellent detective work.
Speaker 8: He he thinks that there's a chance that they're involved
Speaker 8: in these murders in Nebraska, but he's kind of very
Speaker 8: he needs to be very careful not to tip them
Speaker 8: off that he's looking at them as murder suspects. So
Speaker 8: he ultimately uses a couple of different ruses or you know,
Speaker 8: tricks them. Basically, it's all legal, but but he goes
Speaker 8: up to them and tells them that, you know, that
Speaker 8: he was looking at he took a phone call from
Speaker 8: an agency in Iowa that was looking at the possibility
Speaker 8: that they may have you know, ramsacked and burglarized the
Speaker 8: house in Iowa, and that that agency needed, you know,
Speaker 8: to compare their DNA. So Jim Rower is able to
Speaker 8: get DNA samples from Greg Fester and Jessica Reed, and
Speaker 8: he doesn't send those Iowa because he never got a
Speaker 8: call from Iowa yet. But he sends those back to
Speaker 8: the state of Nebraska and lo and behold two key
Speaker 8: pieces of evidence. One was the ring, the second was
Speaker 8: a dope pipe that was left in the driveway of
Speaker 8: the farmhouse. But both those key pieces of physical evidence
Speaker 8: happened to include the DNA samples that were a bulls
Speaker 8: eye for Greg Fester and Jessica Reed. Now this is
Speaker 8: about two full months into the murder investigation, so now
Speaker 8: it becomes clear that two other people are involved, and
Speaker 8: that's where all the physical evidence is starting to line up.
Speaker 8: They weren't from Nebraska. They were from five hundred miles
Speaker 8: away in the state of Wisconsin. These teenagers named Greg
Speaker 8: Vester Jusca read aged nineteen and seventeen at the time.
Speaker 7: Now we just skipped over, and it's an incredible part
Speaker 7: of your book too, and I think that we have
Speaker 7: to give this is such a again when when you
Speaker 7: talk about the CSI agent looking at a photo and
Speaker 7: seeing some sparkle and something really shining, and then going
Speaker 7: back to a farmyard that had been thoroughly searched again
Speaker 7: in light of all the sloppiness with some great police work.
Speaker 7: But this is a citizen, not a police officer. This
Speaker 7: Mary Martino, and she works at the A and I Jewelers,
Speaker 7: And so we just go back just a little bit
Speaker 7: because she's got an incredible story of just due diligence
Speaker 7: and helping out the police with this. Tell us her
Speaker 7: story because it really warrants inclusion.
Speaker 8: I think, Yeah, we had a situation where the Douglas
Speaker 8: County Sheriff's Office, the crime lab in Omaha, based out
Speaker 8: of Omaha, ultimately half possession of that ring. And one
Speaker 8: of the forensic scientists makes a phone call to this
Speaker 8: A and I Jewelers in Buffalo, New York. Really, you know,
Speaker 8: because this was kind of about the last ditch effort
Speaker 8: that anybody could make to figure out who this ring
Speaker 8: belonged to. And and if this call doesn't materialize, who
Speaker 8: knows where, that's just going to become a dead end
Speaker 8: in the case. Frankly, and and this Mary Martino takes
Speaker 8: the phone call, and she was the operations manager of
Speaker 8: this jewelry manufacturer that was on the brink of bankruptcy
Speaker 8: and closing down, shutting off its lights, and disconnecting its telephone.
Speaker 8: A matter of days later that Mary takes the call
Speaker 8: from this desperate sounding CSI invest official and she hears
Speaker 8: the words, you know, this is a Nebraska double homicide,
Speaker 8: and she decides to drop everything else that she's doing
Speaker 8: at the time with her job and really just bears
Speaker 8: down and really digs into trying to figure out if
Speaker 8: there is a receipt that can figure out who bought
Speaker 8: this engraved ring and uh and she goes through box
Speaker 8: after box after box and just becomes exhausted and uh
Speaker 8: and frustrated because she's getting nowhere. And at that point
Speaker 8: in time, Dan, she could have given up and just said,
Speaker 8: the heck with this. You know, it's not worth It's
Speaker 8: not worth the time and effort. I got a million
Speaker 8: other things to do, especially closing down this business. You know,
Speaker 8: Nebraska and New York aren't exactly next door neighbors. And
Speaker 8: uh and she didn't she'd never been to Nebraska, and
Speaker 8: she didn't know any of these people, so she didn't
Speaker 8: even frankly have to call them back. And there was
Speaker 8: nothing they could do but U. But she continues onward
Speaker 8: and and becomes ingenious and ultimately works with other people
Speaker 8: in her company that I believe we're out of Toronto
Speaker 8: if I'm not mistaken, and they help her put together
Speaker 8: computer grid. And long story short is that within a
Speaker 8: few days they ultimately figure out that this was this
Speaker 8: engraved ring. This love always Corey and Ryan Ring was
Speaker 8: one hundred and twenty nine dollars ring that had come
Speaker 8: from a Walmart had been sold at a Walmart store
Speaker 8: in beaver Dam, Wisconsin, town of about twenty thousand people.
Speaker 8: And this ring was bought by a girl that was
Speaker 8: about eighteen or nineteen at the time named Corey Zastro,
Speaker 8: and she bought this ring for her boyfriend at the time,
Speaker 8: a young farmer named Ryan Krenz, who was twenty or
Speaker 8: twenty one at the time. And you know that she
Speaker 8: bought it from around Christmas time and and you know,
Speaker 8: their relationship visit was shortly thereafter that, and you know,
Speaker 8: Ryan didn't want to wear that ring around anymore, you know,
Speaker 8: since they weren't going together. So what does he do,
Speaker 8: But he just puts the ring into his glove box
Speaker 8: and his his truck to kind of forget about it,
Speaker 8: you know. And uh, And unfortunately, a year and a
Speaker 8: half later, his truck is stolen on Easter on the
Speaker 8: night before Easter, and and the trucks driven through several
Speaker 8: different states and ultimately ends up in Louisiana. But it's
Speaker 8: because of the heroics and unbelievable investigative work by a
Speaker 8: civilian named Mary Martino. That that's what is kind of
Speaker 8: the you know, the key moment in this case, the
Speaker 8: breakthrough moment Dan to this case is when when Mary
Speaker 8: Martino identifies that this ring came from not Nebraska but
Speaker 8: Wisconsin and it came from a Walmart store. That that's
Speaker 8: kind of what really kind of kind of breaks the
Speaker 8: ice in this case. And uh, and really from that
Speaker 8: moment forward, it's all about Wisconsin and it's not about
Speaker 8: Nebraska in this Nebraska double murder case.
Speaker 7: Now, as we see in many other cases, and this
Speaker 7: will be another great example of people not wanting to
Speaker 7: admit they were wrong or refusing to believe that they
Speaker 7: were wrong one way or another. Now they have the
Speaker 7: two suspects. Before I get into and we'll get into
Speaker 7: the interview of those two suspects, what do they think
Speaker 7: they have now? With these two suspects, with the DNA
Speaker 7: proof and the connection through the stolen vehicle and the
Speaker 7: people sitting in prison, what.
Speaker 8: Is in their theory at that point in time becomes, Aha,
Speaker 8: these two scumbags from Wisconsin must have come to Nebraska,
Speaker 8: have been recruited here to carry out these murders or
Speaker 8: bring the weapons. But just somehow that Matt Livers and
Speaker 8: Nick Sampson had conspired with these two thugs out of Wisconsin.
Speaker 8: And and they can't see it any other way. But
Speaker 8: that's and so when Jim Rori it ultimately determined, you know,
Speaker 8: that the DNA came back for sure. So Greg Fester
Speaker 8: and Jessica Reid, the two lead investigators Nebraska, get in
Speaker 8: a vehicle and ultimately drive up to Wisconsin here and UH.
Speaker 8: And when they sit down and meet Jessica Reid and
Speaker 8: Greg Fster separately to interview them and interrogate them, they're
Speaker 8: not thinking that these are necessarily the people that were
Speaker 8: the shooters. They're thinking that these were, you know, helpful
Speaker 8: participants of Matt Livers and Nick Sampson and and and
Speaker 8: they can't get it out of their minds that that
Speaker 8: Jessica Read and Greg Fster don't know these other people.
Speaker 8: So when they bring up these uh, they bring with
Speaker 8: them a handful of stock photographs of Matt and Nick
Speaker 8: and even Nick's other Will and another fellow who gets
Speaker 8: pulled into this as well, unfortunately, named Tom Todd. Greg
Speaker 8: and Jessica look at these photos and and and mainly
Speaker 8: the ones of Matt and Nick and and they can't
Speaker 8: identify these people, they don't know who they are. And
Speaker 8: the lead investigates Nebraska are flabbergasted. They just think that
Speaker 8: they're they're bessing them and just lying to them, and uh,
Speaker 8: you know, and they tell them, you're going to get
Speaker 8: the death penalty and you know, and uh, and you know,
Speaker 8: we're not gonna be able to go easy on you,
Speaker 8: and uh, and just just pressing them, you know, and
Speaker 8: trying to intimidate them into into implicating Matt Lyvers and
Speaker 8: Nick Sampson as their co conspirators. So it becomes very
Speaker 8: complex and as a very muddy part of the case
Speaker 8: at this point in time. Dan. But uh, but they're
Speaker 8: ultimately going to refuse to believe Jessica and Greg when
Speaker 8: they're initially telling them that, no, it's just us. We
Speaker 8: were the only two that were involved in these murders.
Speaker 7: Now, you say that there's so many people that really
Speaker 7: that do the right thing, and you're saying during this
Speaker 7: that a couple of public defenders really set the prosecutor straight,
Speaker 7: because unlike the prosecutor normally working hand in hand right
Speaker 7: from the very beginning of investigation, the prosecutor of Matt
Speaker 7: Livers and the Samson brother are really basically going on
Speaker 7: whatever the police gave them, whatever information they gave them.
Speaker 7: So the public defenders again do an admirable job of
Speaker 7: kind of informing and educating the prosecutors so that.
Speaker 8: Right in this case they really were they really had
Speaker 8: to play the role of detective and an investigator for
Speaker 8: the prosecutor's office and law enforcement. And at that point
Speaker 8: in time when the Wisconsin break occurs and reg Fester
Speaker 8: and Jessica Ree get charged with these double murders, but
Speaker 8: their clients are not released from custody, they realized and
Speaker 8: that that this initial statement or confession from Matt Lyras
Speaker 8: clearly was dubious, you know, and very very suspect, and
Speaker 8: they were convinced that their clients were not guilty of
Speaker 8: these crimes and didn't know didn't know Greg and Jessica.
Speaker 8: So they really turned on the offensive and really did
Speaker 8: their own investigation and really dug into into various aspects
Speaker 8: of the case and and really determined that there was
Speaker 8: no way that Matt and Nick had had an involvement.
Speaker 8: And then they basically went through and pulled Holt and
Speaker 8: went through mass confession, the videotape which the cops thought
Speaker 8: was their I mean really got them over the hump.
Speaker 8: The video tape confession really turned out to be the
Speaker 8: biggest detriment for law enforcement case because uh, this confession,
Speaker 8: Uh when when they turned it, uh turned when when
Speaker 8: they really went through it really was a disaster. And
Speaker 8: and and and Matt never mentioned in this confession, Greg
Speaker 8: Vester and Jessica Reid, the two people whose DNA was
Speaker 8: in fact left at the crime scene, the two individuals
Speaker 8: you know that that pretty much overwhelming physical evidence lined
Speaker 8: up against, including their own admissions and confessions, that they
Speaker 8: were the ones that were responsible and they didn't know
Speaker 8: any anybody else that was at these at these murders.
Speaker 8: And it really was the credit to the two public defenders,
Speaker 8: Julie Behar and Jerry Susci that they really sought out
Speaker 8: from outside national experts to help them out. I'm the
Speaker 8: phenomenon which is known as false confessions. And they were
Speaker 8: able to bring in uh distinguished uh psychologist h out
Speaker 8: of out of Ohio named doctor Scott Wrestler. And Scott
Speaker 8: was able to uh interview Matt Livers and really dissect
Speaker 8: the the confession and uh and and doctor Bresler put
Speaker 8: together a formal report for the court that concluded that
Speaker 8: Maths confession was not was not reliable, it was a
Speaker 8: false confession and uh, that this was obtained under duress
Speaker 8: and uh and that was one of those individuals that
Speaker 8: was highly susceptible to police coercion and intimidation and uh
Speaker 8: and ultimately the confession, uh, like I mentioned earlier, just
Speaker 8: really it really didn't didn't didn't amount to anything. It
Speaker 8: really was not a legitimate confession like you like you
Speaker 8: normally would see and expect.
Speaker 7: And yeah, it was. It's amazing that they could look
Speaker 7: at that confession and and go, uh woohoo. Meanwhile, it's
Speaker 7: almost like a textbook of what not to do and
Speaker 7: how and here's how they get a false confession.
Speaker 8: Unfortunately, Yeah, right now, that's true. And uh and like
Speaker 8: I said, there was really a lot of holes in it.
Speaker 8: When I think doctor Bresler determined, I think there was
Speaker 8: over a hundred different times that Matt Lyras had ultimately
Speaker 8: steadfastly denied that he had any involvement in these murders.
Speaker 8: And and and normally when a suspect is innocent, that's
Speaker 8: one thing that usually stands out to good detectives and
Speaker 8: good investigators that if the person is in it, and
Speaker 8: they'll be very adamant and very forceful and and and
Speaker 8: very persuasive and maintaining no, I didn't do it. I
Speaker 8: had nothing to do with these crimes. And that's the
Speaker 8: way Matt Libras was for a long time until he ultimately,
Speaker 8: you know, gets fooled, you know, on the polygraph test
Speaker 8: where he's told that he flunked it, you know, the
Speaker 8: worst polygraph that investigator had ever seen, and and ultimately
Speaker 8: goes along with their theory that he committed these murders
Speaker 8: and was initially willing to take credit for doing the
Speaker 8: murders by himself, and those guys at least were smart
Speaker 8: enough to know that that wasn't possible. But it just
Speaker 8: really was a helpless situation for him, and and and
Speaker 8: it really does go to show that these things, unfortunately
Speaker 8: do happen from time to time, and law enforcement does
Speaker 8: need to be vigilant uh and uh and and verify
Speaker 8: statements rather than just take the word of an individual
Speaker 8: that he or she committed a crime and uh and
Speaker 8: leave it at that.
Speaker 7: Now, obviously the just like we we talk about in
Speaker 7: the synopsis, now people would logically look at David Colvid
Speaker 7: with some kind of with the ultimate question, how on
Speaker 7: earth David did this DNA get in the vehicle? And
Speaker 7: everybody in the audience would probably love to hear what
Speaker 7: really was his response, how what was his explanation, how
Speaker 7: on earth that could have happened?
Speaker 8: Well, at first, at first he had kind of, you know,
Speaker 8: kind of quietly drifted away from the case. While the
Speaker 8: whole Fester and Reid prosecution was moving forward, he was
Speaker 8: working on another case that I mentioned at the end
Speaker 8: of the book, another huge murder case involving that Jessica O'Grady.
Speaker 8: But ultimately, when the case is resolved, the questions come
Speaker 8: back to him because naturally he was the individual that
Speaker 8: purported to find this blood in this car that now
Speaker 8: is clearly determined to have nothing to do with the murders.
Speaker 8: It was clear that the truck that Greg Fester and
Speaker 8: Jessica Reid stole in Wisconsin was the getaway vehicle. So
Speaker 8: all eyes kind of come back to Dave Covid, and
Speaker 8: it starts with the prosecutor. It's at that point in
Speaker 8: time when Dave comes forward and this time has an
Speaker 8: alternative theory and he maintains that it had to be
Speaker 8: the result of cross contamination or some type of accidental transfer,
Speaker 8: that somehow, some way, since it was a very mesty
Speaker 8: and bloody crime scene, that through no fault of his
Speaker 8: own or any of his highly skilled and top match
Speaker 8: investigators from the crime lab, but somehow somebody got some
Speaker 8: blood from the crime scene onto the crime lab's equipment,
Speaker 8: and when Dave Covid goes out to check that car
Speaker 8: the second time, that somehow he already has blood contaminated
Speaker 8: blood on his filter paper when he went and checked
Speaker 8: that dashboard. So that becomes his theory to explain how
Speaker 8: the blood of the murder victim suddenly had showed up
Speaker 8: inside the car of of of of a you know,
Speaker 8: of a person that had nothing to do with these murders.
Speaker 8: And that's kind of the that's kind of the way
Speaker 8: it stayed for a while, and it it uh kind
Speaker 8: of The next big change in the case is when
Speaker 8: a civil one of the civil lawsuits gets filed in
Speaker 8: federal court alleging police misconduct in the case, you know,
Speaker 8: for the wrongful arrests of Matt Levers and Nick Sampson.
Speaker 8: One of the allegations that gets made in the civil
Speaker 8: lawsuit Dan involves the claim or the belief that that
Speaker 8: blood had had gotten into Will Sampson's car by some
Speaker 8: unknown law enforcement official who planted the blood in the car.
Speaker 8: And it's at that point in time that the Federal
Speaker 8: Bureau of Investigation office out of Omaha kind of raises
Speaker 8: their eyebrows and takes a serious, hard look at this case.
Speaker 8: And and and they start with working with the Douglas
Speaker 8: County Crime Lab. And the second person they interview happens
Speaker 8: to be Dave Colvid. And they tell Dave Covid, after
Speaker 8: he tries to give them this story again, that they
Speaker 8: tell him that his story just doesn't pass the smell test.
Speaker 8: And it's at that point, are around that point in
Speaker 8: time that Dave Covid just becomes defiant and cuts off
Speaker 8: the interview with the FBI and tells him he's going
Speaker 8: to get a lawyer, And that frankly becomes the last
Speaker 8: time that Dave Covid has any involvement or interaction with
Speaker 8: the FBI related to this case.
Speaker 7: Yeah, you go on to talk about the well, there's
Speaker 7: a lawsuit and substantial significant money. I'm more interested, and
Speaker 7: I think the audiences too, is that the motivation for
Speaker 7: this senseless crime. You talk about comparisons to other you know,
Speaker 7: Charles Stark Weather crime is free and that that that
Speaker 7: that's what this was. So tell us about this, what
Speaker 7: this really started out as and what it ended up as,
Speaker 7: according to the killers themselves and from the investigators after
Speaker 7: they did get on track with finding the real perpetrators,
Speaker 7: if there was anything to tell us about it.
Speaker 8: It's there's there's there's a lot of different theories on
Speaker 8: this stand now, but but by the time the case
Speaker 8: goes to ultimately the sentencing, the theory that the prosecutor
Speaker 8: works off of that this was a random a random crime.
Speaker 8: I mean that Wayne and Sharman's fact the farmers were
Speaker 8: clearly picked out, you know, in random fashion, and that
Speaker 8: is absolutely true. It's so unfortunate, but it's true their
Speaker 8: farmhouse was targeted and they became the unfortunate victims as
Speaker 8: well of a brutal and senseless double murder that was
Speaker 8: committed in random fashion. However, the thinking at that point
Speaker 8: in time was that this was a burglary that went awry,
Speaker 8: that went horribly bad. But there really is no evidence
Speaker 8: that shows that Greg Fester and Jessica Reid tried to
Speaker 8: steal anything or or that they did take anything at
Speaker 8: that house that night. And and and Greg Fester and
Speaker 8: just to Reid were were very big drug users at
Speaker 8: that point in time. They dropped the marijuana pipe in
Speaker 8: the driveway. They were heavy in the drugs. But they
Speaker 8: were also really kind of engaged in becoming more bold
Speaker 8: and more daring in the different crimes that they were
Speaker 8: committing over the last several weeks. And and the one
Speaker 8: theory is that this, uh, that they were kind of
Speaker 8: building up to these crimes, and there there may have
Speaker 8: even been as strange as this sounds kind of an
Speaker 8: arousal factor, where where where Jessica and Greg were getting
Speaker 8: excited and and and and becoming aroused, you know, by
Speaker 8: by committing an awful double murder such as this. Uh.
Speaker 8: And that's based on uh conversations I've had after the
Speaker 8: book came out. Came out actually with Jim Rorer as
Speaker 8: the detective. He pointed out that based on his interviews
Speaker 8: that he did with Jessica Reid, just how she kind
Speaker 8: of put his hand on his hand, you know, when
Speaker 8: she was recalling certain aspects of the crime afterwards, and
Speaker 8: just talking about oh, you just had to be there,
Speaker 8: you know. So so the strange as that sounds, that
Speaker 8: is a possibility. But another theory, and this is kind
Speaker 8: of the one that I worked off of, you know,
Speaker 8: in my book, was kind of just going straight off
Speaker 8: with Greg Vester's own own own words at the time
Speaker 8: of you know that he was going to be sensed
Speaker 8: trying to make sense of all this, and he basically
Speaker 8: just very short but just said that we were there
Speaker 8: for the thrill. I guess.
Speaker 6: So.
Speaker 8: I think it's very possible too that this was a
Speaker 8: was just a thrill kill by these two, given given
Speaker 8: the propensity of islands, given the other crimes that they
Speaker 8: were committing, and uh and and other people that they
Speaker 8: were preying on other farmhouses that they had broken into
Speaker 8: just a matter of hours earlier, that that basically this
Speaker 8: becomes a throat show for them. And I know that's
Speaker 8: incredible and hard for people to believe, and you know,
Speaker 8: and it's scary that something like that could happen to
Speaker 8: any one of us. But uh, but but that's I
Speaker 8: think that that's a very good possibility, is why these
Speaker 8: murders that happened.
Speaker 7: Unfortunately, Dan, Yeah, it seems incredible that as you describe
Speaker 7: in the book that they shot Wayne in the leg
Speaker 7: as I guess he was trying to get out of
Speaker 7: the bed he was. They were startled in bed, like
Speaker 7: you say, likely, most likely absolutely, and she was trying
Speaker 7: to call on the phone and they shot her right
Speaker 7: in the face. They shot him in the leg and
Speaker 7: then shot him in the head, and then shot him
Speaker 7: again in the head.
Speaker 8: Yeah, he took three shots. And the thing is that
Speaker 8: Jessica Reid, one of her shots probably was the one
Speaker 8: that was responsible for killing Wayne during a struggle with
Speaker 8: Fester over the gun between Fester and Wayne Stock, but
Speaker 8: Fester ultimately fire fires another fatal shot, another shot into
Speaker 8: the back of Wayne's head after he was probably already dead.
Speaker 8: And and again working off of pro Fester and Reed
Speaker 8: that that really seems to kind of be their m
Speaker 8: It seems like that that this really was, you know,
Speaker 8: something that they were looking forward to doing at some
Speaker 8: point in time. They just didn't even realize, as crazy
Speaker 8: as this sounds, stand that they were in the state
Speaker 8: of Nebraska at the time that these murders had happened.
Speaker 8: They still thought that they were in the state of
Speaker 8: Iowa because they had remembered breaking into a farmhouse there
Speaker 8: a matter of hours early.
Speaker 7: Yeah, well, yeah, senseless murder. But you know what, the
Speaker 7: story really illustrates and demonstrates that there's a lot of
Speaker 7: people that need to hang their head in shame here
Speaker 7: by reilroading people not doing good police work at all,
Speaker 7: in fact, doing bad police work on David Kofid. And
Speaker 7: then but there are these unsung heroes, and fate intervened
Speaker 7: on behalf of these victims I would believe in, and
Speaker 7: justice in general. Again, it's it's amazing how many stories
Speaker 7: I do cover and it seems like fate intervenes, you know,
Speaker 7: I hate to get all. I don't know what the
Speaker 7: word is, but it just seems there's no other explanation.
Speaker 7: But somebody like Mary Martino or you know, a very
Speaker 7: very observant CSI agent, and otherwise these things would be
Speaker 7: unsolved completely.
Speaker 8: And that's true. And and I mean Darnel Cush for example,
Speaker 8: one of the CSIS that had worked kind of been
Speaker 8: in the doghouse for Dave Covid for a number of years.
Speaker 8: She's ultimately the one that's going to go to the
Speaker 8: FBI because she had made complaints up the chain of
Speaker 8: command against Dave Covid over a number of years, under
Speaker 8: the premise that she thought there was something suspicious or
Speaker 8: shady about him on other cases, not not involving necessarily
Speaker 8: blood planting, but just other things involving fingerprints and fake
Speaker 8: combination letters that she thought that he was writing and
Speaker 8: putting in his own file. And you know, without her
Speaker 8: going forward to the FBI, you know, that's another part
Speaker 8: of the case. It's it's you know, whether or not
Speaker 8: whether or not he would have been prosecuted, or whether
Speaker 8: or not, you know, the FBI would have moved forward
Speaker 8: without having someone like her go to them is really unknown.
Speaker 8: But you're right that there's a there's a handful of
Speaker 8: people that just did's phenomenal, excellent work in this case,
Speaker 8: from the prosecutor Clarence Mack that prosecuted Culvid, to Detective
Speaker 8: Jim Mourura in Wisconsin, to Mary Martino. But there's also
Speaker 8: a handful of law enforcement officials in the Cass County
Speaker 8: Sheriff's office, in the Nebraska State Patrol. You know that
Speaker 8: that should just be ashamed of themselves, you know, for
Speaker 8: the performance, I mean just abysmal, abysmal work that they
Speaker 8: did on this case. Sadly, that's true.
Speaker 7: Well, I got to publicly shame the six relatives that
Speaker 7: were absolutely certain that their relative was guilty of this
Speaker 7: heinous murder as well. And you got to look at
Speaker 7: a victim of somebody with an IQ of seventy and
Speaker 7: special ed and this you got to really feel for
Speaker 7: this guy too, because it's on I guess you can't
Speaker 7: really quantify the trauma and the damage they did to
Speaker 7: this guy by twisting his brain around and getting the
Speaker 7: sign a confession and this whole thing, and no amount
Speaker 7: of money will ever compensate him or his his cousin
Speaker 7: either and being involved in this. So there's a lot
Speaker 7: of shame to go around, like you say.
Speaker 8: True, And that's and that's a good point too, Dan,
Speaker 8: is that even after it's incredible as the sounds for listeners,
Speaker 8: but even when it becomes one hundred percent clear that
Speaker 8: Greg Vester and just to Read were the killers, for
Speaker 8: the next several years, this myth was still perpetuated in
Speaker 8: Nebraska by that Sheriff's office and by several of those
Speaker 8: family members that Matt Livers and Examson work somehow ultimately
Speaker 8: involved in these crimes as well. They just would not
Speaker 8: let it go, and part of it was probably you know,
Speaker 8: out of a you know, they just I mean, they
Speaker 8: look horrible as far as just being so foolish and wrong,
Speaker 8: you know, after the fact, but they they they wouldn't
Speaker 8: let it go and refused, I think to this day
Speaker 8: to still make amends with those those two cousins Dan.
Speaker 7: So, yeah, incredible. Well, you know, the good thing, the
Speaker 7: one good thing is that we have programs like this
Speaker 7: that may run for years and years where people will
Speaker 7: get the true story behind this and your fine book,
Speaker 7: of course, Bloody Lies tells the true story, and that's
Speaker 7: why it's so valuable to not get a little snapshot
Speaker 7: of stories, because that's misleading, not get all of the
Speaker 7: information and not get all the evidence and rush to
Speaker 7: judgment at all. So it's it's great to have these books.
Speaker 7: And nobody can write fiction this crazy. It's just amazing.
Speaker 7: So I want to thank you very much, John for
Speaker 7: coming on. For those that want further information and we'ld
Speaker 7: like to contact you or Facebook you or get more
Speaker 7: information about this or other some of the other work
Speaker 7: that you do, how may they contact you and tell
Speaker 7: us a little bit about that.
Speaker 8: Sure, the couple different options would be I have I
Speaker 8: have I have a Facebook page which is true crime
Speaker 8: author John Ferk. You can follow me and uh and
Speaker 8: and like me there. I also have a true crime website,
Speaker 8: UH which which I go into great detail about different
Speaker 8: aspects of Bloody Lies and and I do a fairy
Speaker 8: number of questions and answers with other individuals that were
Speaker 8: involved in this case and in other cases as well.
Speaker 8: And uh and my website is John Ferrik dot com.
Speaker 8: You can contact me through the website there as well,
Speaker 8: and UH and I'm also on Twitter. My handle is
Speaker 8: John Ferrek. So so those are those are different ways
Speaker 8: on social media for people to reach me and contact me.
Speaker 7: Yes, well, thanks very much, John, thank you very much,
Speaker 7: great book, Bloody Lies, and thanks for coming on and
Speaker 7: talking about it tonight. And you have yourself a great evening.
Speaker 8: Thank you, Thank thanks very much. Dan, thank you, good night,
Speaker 8: Have a great night.