Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Path Went Chili.
Speaker 2: I'm Robin, I'm Jules, and I'm Ashley.
Speaker 3: Let's dive right into this week's case.
Speaker 2: July twenty seven, two thousand and nine, Placentia, California, Eighty
Speaker 2: one year old Bob Herod is discovered to be missing
Speaker 2: from his home, and he's left his car and his
Speaker 2: eyeglasses behind. One month earlier, Bob had gotten married to
Speaker 2: Fontelle Heater, a former spouse whom he had not seen
Speaker 2: in six decades, and she was scheduled to move in
Speaker 2: with him two days after he disappeared. Since Bob has
Speaker 2: a substantial net worth, the situation causes a lot of
Speaker 2: friction between Fontel and Bob's daughters about the division of
Speaker 2: his assets. But even though investigators suspect that Bob may
Speaker 2: have been a victim of foul play, no trace of
Speaker 2: him is ever found.
Speaker 1: After that the path went chilly. So today we're going
Speaker 1: to be exploring an odd missing person's case involving an
Speaker 1: elderly man, the two thousand and nine disappearance of Bob Herod.
Speaker 1: This case was once featured on an episode of the
Speaker 1: popular true crime TV show Disappeared. The title of the
Speaker 1: episode was long lost love because Bob Harod was an
Speaker 1: eighty one year old widower who reconnected with a long
Speaker 1: lost sweetheart named Fontale Heater, whom he had not seen
Speaker 1: for several decades, and they immediately decided to get married.
Speaker 1: The whole situation initially seemed like a very sweet, heartwarming
Speaker 1: love story, but things would take a much darker turn
Speaker 1: when Bob inexplicably vanished without a trace. Now, in many
Speaker 1: missing persons cases elderly individuals, one of the most logical
Speaker 1: explanations is that the victim became disoriented or had some
Speaker 1: sort of medical issue which caused them to wander off,
Speaker 1: but that doesn't seem to be the case here, as
Speaker 1: the authorities are inclined to believe that Bob was the
Speaker 1: victim of foul play. Even though Bob lived a modest lifestyle,
Speaker 1: he was actually worth millions, so his decision to get
Speaker 1: remarried caused some friction with his three daughters, who were
Speaker 1: not thrilled over the idea of Fontale getting her hands
Speaker 1: on their father's estate. Not only that, but prior to
Speaker 1: reconnecting with Fontale, Bob had developed a close relationship with
Speaker 1: a much younger woman whom he had given a lot
Speaker 1: of money to, so given the circumstances, it seemed plausible
Speaker 1: that Bob's finances might have somehow played a role in
Speaker 1: his disappearance. Without a body or any physical evidence to
Speaker 1: work with at all, investigators have been unable to crack
Speaker 1: this case, though at one point two unnamed persons of
Speaker 1: interest were briefly arrested and detained before they were released
Speaker 1: without charge. There are number of different possibilities here for
Speaker 1: what may have happened, which is why we're going to
Speaker 1: discuss them all on this series of episodes.
Speaker 3: How interesting you have an eighty one year old man
Speaker 3: who goes missing, and, like you said, the very first
Speaker 3: thing I thought of is could he have possibly wondered off?
Speaker 3: Could he have gotten lost? And you said that there
Speaker 3: really wasn't a sign of that. Instead, there's a suspicion
Speaker 3: of foul play. And then the whole world kind of
Speaker 3: cracks open of who it could be because you have Fontelle,
Speaker 3: who's his newly reconnected love, but you also have this
Speaker 3: younger woman who at some point he had a relationship
Speaker 3: with and gave a lot of money to. You have
Speaker 3: his own family members, and then you know, could this
Speaker 3: be a random crime. There's kind of countless possibilities, which
Speaker 3: is likely why it's still an unsolved case. But I
Speaker 3: can't wait to hear more because again, there's so many
Speaker 3: different directions this case could be going.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is interesting that the authorities have seen one
Speaker 1: hundred percent certain that Bob was the victim of foul play,
Speaker 1: even though there is really no evidence of foul play,
Speaker 1: like there isn't any blood or any damage to suggest that,
Speaker 1: like somebody heard them. But they obviously have more information
Speaker 1: than we have, so I'm pretty sure they have good
Speaker 1: reason to believe that's someone harmed Bob. And we're going
Speaker 1: to talk about a number of potential suspects here. And
Speaker 1: even though the Internet is not particularly fond of Bob's
Speaker 1: three daughters and how they're portrayed in this story, it
Speaker 1: is crazy to think when you wonder, could all three
Speaker 1: of them collude it together to make Bob disappear because
Speaker 1: they wanted to inherit his money. Because there are many
Speaker 1: cases out there where the child will make their parent
Speaker 1: disappear or kill them in order to inherit their estate,
Speaker 1: but very rarely will you see three of them collude
Speaker 1: together in order to do something like that, which is
Speaker 1: why it's just very hard to get a hold on
Speaker 1: what actually happened here.
Speaker 2: And wouldn't we need to know if the will included
Speaker 2: them or if he'd changed the will because we know
Speaker 2: that he'd married Fontelle. So if they were planning on
Speaker 2: killing Bob and having the estate be the directly like
Speaker 2: inherit the estate, then wouldn't they want to do that
Speaker 2: prior to Bob legally marrying Fontelle? Or is it just
Speaker 2: a case where they didn't have that information that Bob
Speaker 2: just sprung it on them and they were none the
Speaker 2: wiser until the legal proceedings had already taken place.
Speaker 1: Does seem like a last second decision, as we're going
Speaker 1: to talk about when Bob decided to marry Fontelle. So
Speaker 1: it is possible that his daughters had no prior knowledge
Speaker 1: of it and just kind of panicked later on when
Speaker 1: they found out what happened. But again, would they all
Speaker 1: three of them be willing to commit murder together?
Speaker 3: And let's just put this out there. If dad's eighty
Speaker 3: one years old, and yes he might be getting remarried
Speaker 3: or kind of squandering his money on women. If he
Speaker 3: has multi millions and you're his kids, wouldn't there just
Speaker 3: be kind of a fingers crossed he's eighty one, and
Speaker 3: if you're out for his money, you'd wait for him
Speaker 3: to pass away.
Speaker 2: And like, I don't think it's that unreasonable. Like we
Speaker 2: can portray them in this really negative light, and we
Speaker 2: can say that they're greedy and they're this, and they're that,
Speaker 2: But I don't think it's side the realm of what
Speaker 2: would be considered normal or typical behavior for a child
Speaker 2: at the age that they're at. They have a certain
Speaker 2: expectation and if they feel like, given his behavior, those
Speaker 2: expectations won't be met financially, then it makes sense that
Speaker 2: they would be very cautious over anyone who's entering his
Speaker 2: life at that point and questioning their motives. That doesn't
Speaker 2: make them guilty of murder.
Speaker 3: Absolutely not. And I'll put a little NOTEUBT to my parents,
Speaker 3: you want to get remarried at eighty one, I'd be
Speaker 3: very hurt if there was not some kind of protection
Speaker 3: of assets for the children who probably helped care for
Speaker 3: you and our other you know, parent who probably passed
Speaker 3: passed away at this point, and all of those things.
Speaker 3: If it was something like you said, Jules, where there's
Speaker 3: been an expectation of, hey, kids, this is kind of
Speaker 3: how you know life's going to go when I am
Speaker 3: no longer here, Because that is a conversation adult children
Speaker 3: have with their parents. It would be a little nerve
Speaker 3: wracking to watch a much younger woman come in and take,
Speaker 3: you know, some of his resources and then he gets remarried,
Speaker 3: and you know, people are goible and loving and want
Speaker 3: to share with their new spouse and things like that.
Speaker 3: But I am with you, Jules, from the get go.
Speaker 3: My default would be the girls are simply sitting there saying, hey,
Speaker 3: something's not right, and I'm getting frustrated with the situation.
Speaker 2: Our story begins in two thousand and nine in Placentia, California,
Speaker 2: a city located in Orange County near Anaheim, which had
Speaker 2: a population of around fifty thousand at the time. Our
Speaker 2: central figure is eighty one year old Robert Merle Herod,
Speaker 2: who goes by the name of Bob and has lived
Speaker 2: in Placentia for the past seven years. A year and
Speaker 2: a half earlier, Bob's wife of fifty seven years, Georgia Herod,
Speaker 2: passed away after a prolonged illness, but he has three
Speaker 2: married daughters named ROBERTA Brady, Paula Borcher, and Julie Michaels,
Speaker 2: as well as a grandson and three great grandchildren. Shortly
Speaker 2: after losing his wife, Bob's pet dog also got sick
Speaker 2: and had to be euthanized, so he went through a
Speaker 2: major depression, which included a six month period where he
Speaker 2: told his daughters that he wanted to be alone in
Speaker 2: order to gather his thoughts. However, Bob's outlook suddenly got
Speaker 2: a lot brighter when he was contacted by a seventy
Speaker 2: three year old long lost love named Fontel Heater. Bob
Speaker 2: and Fontel had first met in nineteen forty nine while
Speaker 2: they were living in the small town of McFall, Missouri,
Speaker 2: and they would become engaged to be married the following year. However,
Speaker 2: Bob had joined the Marine Reserves, and before their wedding
Speaker 2: could take place, he was ordered to report to Camp
Speaker 2: Penalty in California. The couple agreed to stay in touch,
Speaker 2: but even though Fontel attempted to send letters to a
Speaker 2: residence where Bob was staying in California, they were always
Speaker 2: returned to her. At the time, the woman who owned
Speaker 2: this residence was attempting to hook Bob up with her niece,
Speaker 2: so in retrospect, Fontel believed that the woman may have
Speaker 2: intercepted the letters and sent them back before Bob could
Speaker 2: have read them. For his part, Bob never attempted to
Speaker 2: contact Fontel on his own because he feared he might
Speaker 2: be shipped overseas to serve in the Korean War. I
Speaker 2: did not want to hold her to a commitment if
Speaker 2: he did not survive. The couple completely lost touch and
Speaker 2: went their separate ways. As Bob soon met and married
Speaker 2: his wife, Georgia will Fontell went through two marriages of
Speaker 2: her own and had a total of three children. By
Speaker 2: two thousand and six, Fontell was still living in Missouri,
Speaker 2: but was left a widow when her second husband passed away.
Speaker 2: Three years later. Fontel felt a sudden desire to connect
Speaker 2: with Bob, and her daughter managed to track him down
Speaker 2: on the Internet and obtained his phone number. Fontel gave
Speaker 2: him a call, and they spoke for the first time
Speaker 2: in nearly sixty years. Bob told Fonteale that he'd always
Speaker 2: wanted to track her down as well, but didn't know
Speaker 2: what her married name was. Shortly after they connected, Bob
Speaker 2: mailed Fontell a letter which read, quote May third, two
Speaker 2: thousand and nine, the first day of the rest of
Speaker 2: my life. Dearest Fonteale, your call was an answer to
Speaker 2: my prayer. I've been thinking of you every day lately
Speaker 2: and many times over the years, and regretting leaving you
Speaker 2: under the conditions at the time. End quote stop.
Speaker 3: That is the seiest thing I've ever heard. Okay, so
Speaker 3: this is pretty incredible. You have two people who lived good,
Speaker 3: full lives and they lost their spouse, and there's still
Speaker 3: this idea that everyone remembers their first love. Everyone remembers
Speaker 3: people that they were with when they were younger. And
Speaker 3: this was a relationship that didn't end badly. It ended
Speaker 3: because of military duty and kind of the fears of
Speaker 3: that time and just different communication abilities, and there was
Speaker 3: an attempt right to communicate. There was a love that
Speaker 3: was still there. And then they moved forward with their lives.
Speaker 3: They lost other loves of their life, and now sixty
Speaker 3: years later, he writes a letter that says, your call
Speaker 3: was an answer to my prayers. I've been thinking of
Speaker 3: you every day lately. Think about how lonely he was.
Speaker 3: You could tell he was looking for partnership and companionship
Speaker 3: because that's likely why he partnered with that younger girl,
Speaker 3: and you know, was willing to share his assets with her.
Speaker 3: But this is someone he actually had a faithful connection
Speaker 3: to at some point and that there still was a
Speaker 3: love that had never been a negative in his life whatsoever.
Speaker 3: It was just a part of the times. And so
Speaker 3: I find this incredibly romantic. I think it's super sweet.
Speaker 3: I secretly hate that he was eighty one when this
Speaker 3: is happening, because they could have had decades together had
Speaker 3: it been you know, where he was sixty in reconnecting
Speaker 3: or something like that. But I think it's phenomenal. I
Speaker 3: think it's exciting from this. I don't feel like Fontell
Speaker 3: would have a motive to hurt him, because I think
Speaker 3: she was truly longing to reconnect with him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is just such a sweet and sad part
Speaker 1: of the story. And I remember seeing this for the
Speaker 1: first time when it was featured on Disappeared several years ago,
Speaker 1: and it was not like your typical episode because the
Speaker 1: first part of it was just so nice and sweet
Speaker 1: because you're learning this love story and how these people
Speaker 1: reconnected after sixty years and that Bob after like all
Speaker 1: these years of depression from losing his wife, was now
Speaker 1: experiencing happiness again for the first time in a while,
Speaker 1: and just he seemed destined to spend the rest of
Speaker 1: his happy life with the woman that he had not
Speaker 1: seen in quite some time. And then just within the
Speaker 1: span of a few months, it just all goes completely
Speaker 1: downhill and he vanishes without a trace, and the story
Speaker 1: just gets very dark, very quickly. So for the next
Speaker 1: several weeks, Bob and Fontell continue to speak on the
Speaker 1: phone virtually every day until he invited her to California
Speaker 1: to visit him. He proceeded to introduce Fontel to his
Speaker 1: three daughters and they managed to rekindle the relationship, and
Speaker 1: that given their advanced ages, Bob did not feel the
Speaker 1: need to take things slowly, so he decided to propose
Speaker 1: to Fontelle. Not only did Fontel say yes, but it
Speaker 1: turned out she still had the original engagement rank Bob
Speaker 1: had given her back in nineteen fifty, though they would
Speaker 1: still both buy each other so new wedding rings. On
Speaker 1: June the twenty ninth, only six days after Fontel arrived
Speaker 1: in California, the couple decided to go to the county
Speaker 1: courthouse in Fullerton in order to obtain a marriage license,
Speaker 1: and they tied the knot that very same day. Of course,
Speaker 1: Fontel was planning to move in with Bob at his
Speaker 1: residence and Carnation Drive, but before she could do so,
Speaker 1: she needed to travel back to Missouri in order to
Speaker 1: settle her affairs, pack up her belongings, and move out
Speaker 1: of her former residence. By the evening of Monday, July
Speaker 1: the twenty seventh, Fontel was only two days away from
Speaker 1: permanently relocating to Placentia, but she became concerned when she
Speaker 1: attempted to foam Bob multiple times and received no answer.
Speaker 1: At around midnight, Bontel received a call from Bob's daughter, Julie,
Speaker 1: who informed her that Bob was missing.
Speaker 3: That is tragic. You have this elderly woman who's trying
Speaker 3: to completely uproot her life, and she's saying, like, Hey,
Speaker 3: my life's going to end with my former soulmate. You know,
Speaker 3: this person that I got to reconnect with, and I've
Speaker 3: got to do all these things to settle. I've got
Speaker 3: to get all my stuff moved, I've got to get
Speaker 3: out of my old residence. I've got to settle all
Speaker 3: my affairs with my own children and things like that,
Speaker 3: and she's committed, she's ready to go, and two days
Speaker 3: before she's completely changing her life and starting a new chapter,
Speaker 3: he goes missing. And I do find it encouraging that
Speaker 3: the daughters reaching out to her, so it's not like
Speaker 3: they're estranged or angry with her necessarily. It seems like
Speaker 3: Julie knew Fontelle was important and needed to be somebody
Speaker 3: included in on this information. So from there it seems
Speaker 3: like Julie at least respected Fontelle enough to say she's
Speaker 3: one of the most important people that needs to know
Speaker 3: this info. Well.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, as we're going to find out, the relationship between
Speaker 1: Fontel and the three daughters, wh would sour very quickly,
Speaker 1: and of course it had to do a lot with
Speaker 1: money and finances, because as we're going to talk about,
Speaker 1: it seemed like they were quite unhappy that Bob had
Speaker 1: just suddenly met this new woman and it appeared that
Speaker 1: she was going to inherit a lot of his estate.
Speaker 1: And like you talked about earlier, when your kids and
Speaker 1: your your parent is getting up to an advanced age
Speaker 1: and you assume that they're going to leave you everything.
Speaker 1: Just having this new change in your life to up
Speaker 1: rut any thing can cause a lot of friction.
Speaker 2: So Julie and her husband, Jeff Michaels lived in the
Speaker 2: town of Running Springs, and earlier that morning, Jeff had
Speaker 2: traveled to Bob's house in order to help him fix
Speaker 2: up the place in preparation for Fontel's arrival. Jeff claimed
Speaker 2: that sometime between two thirty and two forty pm, he
Speaker 2: stepped out to make a trip to home depot to
Speaker 2: pick up some supplies. When he returned to the residence
Speaker 2: less than one hour later, he found Bob's housekeeper, Agnes,
Speaker 2: sitting outside on the front porch. Agnes had been Bob's
Speaker 2: housekeeper for over ten years, and even though she usually
Speaker 2: worked for him on Tuesdays, Bob had arranged for her
Speaker 2: to come by the house one day earlier than normal
Speaker 2: in order to clean the place. Agnes told Jeff that
Speaker 2: she arrived sometime between three and three thirty, but discovered
Speaker 2: that the front door was locked. When no one answered
Speaker 2: the door, Agnes proceeded to wait on the porch for
Speaker 2: the next fifteen minutes until Jeff returned. Jeff was able
Speaker 2: to let himself and Agnes into the house through the
Speaker 2: back door and even though Jeff initially thought that Bob
Speaker 2: might be upstairs taking a nap, he was nowhere to
Speaker 2: be found. Bob's nineteen ninety seven Toyota camery was still
Speaker 2: parked outside, and even though his wallet and keys were
Speaker 2: not at the residence, he left behind his eyeglasses. Bob
Speaker 2: did not own a cell phone, so no one could
Speaker 2: call him to see where he might be, and Agnes
Speaker 2: was surprised to discover that Bob's bed was unmade, which
Speaker 2: she said was very uncharacteristic of him whenever she frequented
Speaker 2: the residence. In spite of this, Jeff was not initially concerned,
Speaker 2: since he thought that Bob might have stepped out to
Speaker 2: go for a walk or visit a neighbor, so he
Speaker 2: and Agnes continued their work fixing up and cleaning the house.
Speaker 2: Jeff left at around six p m. While Agnes left
Speaker 2: a short time later, but by that point Bob still
Speaker 2: had not return. Later that evening, Julie called the residence
Speaker 2: in order to check on Bob, but there was no answer,
Speaker 2: and when she called her two sisters, Roberta and Paula,
Speaker 2: they both said that they'd not heard from their father.
Speaker 2: This compelled Roberta to call the Placentia Police Department to
Speaker 2: ask them to perform a welfare check at Bob's residence,
Speaker 2: but when they arrived, the house was still empty. Julie
Speaker 2: then decided to call Fontel in Missouri to see if
Speaker 2: she'd heard from Bob, but since Fonteale also knew nothing
Speaker 2: about his current whereabouts, she contacted the Placentia PD in
Speaker 2: order to officially report Bob missing.
Speaker 3: Well, there is a huge concern here. Bob's bed was unmade,
Speaker 3: and Agnes, who knows him pretty well, she's been with
Speaker 3: him for a decade cleaning his areas right, would know
Speaker 3: how he kept his things, and so for her to
Speaker 3: say the bed was always made when he got out
Speaker 3: of it, which is not abnormal for someone who used
Speaker 3: to be in the military. Right, So she says, it's
Speaker 3: odd his bed's unmade and his keys and his wallet
Speaker 3: are not there. It's almost like either he voluntarily got
Speaker 3: up in a hurry and needed to go do something
Speaker 3: and then got apprehended or something away from the home,
Speaker 3: or that someone entered the home and rushed him to
Speaker 3: get ready and leave. But I understand where they're coming from.
Speaker 3: For an elderly person to be out and about, especially
Speaker 3: on foot. They would be home and before the sun
Speaker 3: goes down, right, we all know you're eating at four
Speaker 3: pm for dinner and you're coming home at you know, five,
Speaker 3: and you're getting ready and sitting and watching TV and
Speaker 3: going to bed. So I can just feel the panic
Speaker 3: that was rising when you see things are out of sorts.
Speaker 3: He doesn't have his glasses, what he needs. Bed wasn't made,
Speaker 3: but he did take his wallet and his keys, which
Speaker 3: makes me think maybe he did leave and locked the
Speaker 3: door up because the door was locked, but he doesn't
Speaker 3: have his car, so he shouldn't have been going that far.
Speaker 3: It's almost like something happened into him when he left
Speaker 3: the residence.
Speaker 1: And that's what's weird about it is the narrow time
Speaker 1: frame because as we're going to talk about, Jeff's story
Speaker 1: did seem to check out, because we're going to reveal
Speaker 1: that there was footage of him at home depot around
Speaker 1: two thirty two forty, and we know that Agnes arrived
Speaker 1: between three and three thirty. So if Jeff is telling
Speaker 1: the complete truth, then something happened to Bob during a
Speaker 1: window of only like thirty to forty minutes. And there's
Speaker 1: just no evidence to sus jess why other than the
Speaker 1: fact that his is a wallet and keys are are gone.
Speaker 1: So did he leave with someone in a vehicle? Did
Speaker 1: he walk and something happened to him. It's just so
Speaker 1: strange that this would happen and he just kind of
Speaker 1: vanished without a trace.
Speaker 2: Two questions, he's a first question, do you know if
Speaker 2: Bob was nearsighted or far sighted, or what his prescription
Speaker 2: was for his glasses.
Speaker 1: I'm not entirely sure, but I do know that every
Speaker 1: single photograph that I've seen a Bob online, he is
Speaker 1: wearing his glasses, so I have to assume he probably
Speaker 1: needed them to see.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like a near sighted person, I'm not going anywhere
Speaker 2: without my glasses or my contact lenses in because I
Speaker 2: can't see. So I would think that going past the
Speaker 2: porch of your home would be a difficult thing if
Speaker 2: you're somebody who relies on glasses. Whereas my husband is
Speaker 2: far sighted and so he sometimes forgets his glasses, so
Speaker 2: I think maybe that detail matters. The second question is
Speaker 2: did they check the phone records to see if there
Speaker 2: was any incoming calls around the time that Bob may
Speaker 2: have gone missing.
Speaker 1: They haven't really revealed that information. And that is also
Speaker 1: like a question I've always had, because they talk about
Speaker 1: how Bob made a last minute decision to call Agnes
Speaker 1: and ask her to come like a day early rather
Speaker 1: than her usual cleaning day, and I'd like to think
Speaker 1: that they verified that phone call. So I do wonder
Speaker 1: if this is one of those things where maybe police
Speaker 1: do have some information about a phone call or something,
Speaker 1: but are just not revealing it publicly. So, according to
Speaker 1: the someone initially shared a theory with them that Bob
Speaker 1: might have disappeared voluntarily because he regretted having gotten remarried,
Speaker 1: but this idea didn't hold much water, as there would
Speaker 1: be no further activity on Bob's bank accounts or credit cards,
Speaker 1: or any evidence to suggest that he was still alive.
Speaker 1: Bob's daughters claimed that he had recently been experiencing some
Speaker 1: memory problems and would sometimes repeat himself or forget how
Speaker 1: to do things, but Bob's doctor told police that he
Speaker 1: saw no signs of him having dementia or any serious
Speaker 1: medical conditions, and described him as the healthiest eighty one
Speaker 1: year old he had ever seen. On July to twenty ninth,
Speaker 1: two days after Bob was last seen. Bontel arrived in
Speaker 1: California and took residence in Bob's house, but he still
Speaker 1: did not resurface. Investigators would soon discover that even though
Speaker 1: Bob lived a modest lifestyle, he was actually quite wealthy.
Speaker 1: He had retired after a long career in contract administration
Speaker 1: and saved his money well. Bob also made some successful
Speaker 1: real estate investments and owned a number of properties, so
Speaker 1: his total net worth was around five million dollars. According
Speaker 1: to Bob's daughters, they had no idea how wealthy he
Speaker 1: really was until after their mother, Georgia, passed away and
Speaker 1: they saw paperwork about the couple's finances. Bondell also claimed
Speaker 1: that she was unaware of Bob's net worth when she
Speaker 1: married him, but handwritten notes were found in his house
Speaker 1: to indicate that he had been planning to include his
Speaker 1: new wife in his will and put her name on
Speaker 1: some of his assets, including his properties. In fact, this
Speaker 1: situation caused some tension between Bob and his daughters. Back
Speaker 1: in nineteen ninety five, Bob and Georgia had created a
Speaker 1: trust and made their children the beneficiaries, and after Georgia
Speaker 1: passed away, the family's attorney sent Julie, Roberta, and Paula
Speaker 1: a letter informing them that Bob was the trustee and
Speaker 1: he would report to them about how the trust was
Speaker 1: being managed on a regular basis. However, over the course
Speaker 1: of the next year, Bob did not keep his daughters
Speaker 1: informed about this, so they decided to draft a formal
Speaker 1: letter to it demanding that he complied with his responsibilities
Speaker 1: as trustee, which made him angry. On the day before
Speaker 1: he disappeared, Bob held a meeting in his house with Julie, Roberta,
Speaker 1: and Paula, where he was supposed to provide them with
Speaker 1: copies of their mother's bypass trust, which Bob was legally
Speaker 1: obligated to do because of the financial mechanisms set up
Speaker 1: by the estate. But when his daughters arrived, Bob still
Speaker 1: did not have copies of the trust, and this caused
Speaker 1: a heated argument. Bob's daughters maintained that the tension soon
Speaker 1: dissipated and they peacefully resolved the situation and left on
Speaker 1: good terms. However, Fontale claimed that when she spoke to
Speaker 1: Bob on the phone later that night, he still sounded
Speaker 1: quite shaken about the situation and told her his daughters
Speaker 1: were not happy about his decision to add Fontelle's name
Speaker 1: to the house and his checking accounts. In fact, he
Speaker 1: also allegedly suggested that his marriage be annulled.
Speaker 3: Okay, a couple of things here. So when you go
Speaker 3: back up to where the girls said that their father
Speaker 3: had been forgetting things or repeating himself a lot of
Speaker 3: times with utterly people too, that's a hearing issue where
Speaker 3: they don't really understand what your response was, and so
Speaker 3: they'll repeat a question or they think they heard something,
Speaker 3: and they'll you know, like my mom will say, hey,
Speaker 3: where's Reagan tonight? And I'll say she's a dance And
Speaker 3: my mom has hearing aids, and so later she'll say,
Speaker 3: is Reagan with you right now? And I'll say, Mama,
Speaker 3: she's a dance and she's like, oh, I'm sorry, I
Speaker 3: didn't hear you say that. And at first my brother
Speaker 3: and I both said, like, I'm really worried because you'll
Speaker 3: say somebody in the same conversation and she won't remember.
Speaker 3: And my mom said, if I don't have my hearing
Speaker 3: aids at the right point, I hear about every third
Speaker 3: or fourth word you say, and I don't want to
Speaker 3: make you repeat everything you say, so I just go
Speaker 3: along with it, and then sometimes I needed no information
Speaker 3: that I've already I've already asked. So when she told
Speaker 3: me that, I don't question that anymore. It's very possible
Speaker 3: that he was having issues with his hearing and the
Speaker 3: kids interpreted that as a memory loss issue. I'd probably
Speaker 3: default to what the doctor said, because God bless, when
Speaker 3: you're that old, you're going to the doctor quite often.
Speaker 3: That's like your social event of the week. So I
Speaker 3: bet his doctor knows, and so I think that the
Speaker 3: him being confused is probably out. But when you get
Speaker 3: down here, this meeting time is very odd. The day
Speaker 3: before he disappears, the girls are confronting him or trying
Speaker 3: to get information about the trust, and that's right after
Speaker 3: he's gotten married, so they want to know kind of
Speaker 3: what's included, what's happening with the money, and he doesn't
Speaker 3: have information for them. Everyone's frustrated, and they weren't happy
Speaker 3: about his decision to be adding her, and they want
Speaker 3: him to get annulled from this marriage. It's very fishy
Speaker 3: and odd timing one. At that point, your dad needs
Speaker 3: still have the best life he can. He doesn't have
Speaker 3: very long to live, so you go, do you dad,
Speaker 3: and whatever's left, like share it with all of us. Okay,
Speaker 3: that's fine, but they seem very entitled that like that's
Speaker 3: ours and you better not spend any money because we
Speaker 3: get we get it when you die. That would be
Speaker 3: a very hard way to live your life when your
Speaker 3: children are kind of holding your feet to the fire
Speaker 3: like that. However, like you said earlier, if the girls
Speaker 3: are the ones who planned this, all three would have
Speaker 3: to be involved. Because if my brother and I met
Speaker 3: with my parents and my brother was hateful about it
Speaker 3: and fuming and left and I was kind of uncomfortable
Speaker 3: and frustrated, and then they go missing, you better believe
Speaker 3: I'd tell the police, like we were fine when we left,
Speaker 3: but my brother wasn't, you know, or my sister wasn't.
Speaker 3: So I feel like of the three girls, if everybody
Speaker 3: hadn't truly resolved it, or everybody wasn't on the same page,
Speaker 3: or if all of them were not involved in his disappearance,
Speaker 3: at least one of them would have told the police.
Speaker 3: I'm getting uncomfortable, and I feel like my sister's not
Speaker 3: telling you everything she knows.
Speaker 2: And I really wonder about this trust. Was this trust
Speaker 2: Georgia's idea, and she had a prolonged illness, so perhaps
Speaker 2: she put those mechanisms in motion and Bob just kind
Speaker 2: of went along with it because it was his beloved
Speaker 2: wife and he knew that she was going to be
Speaker 2: departing the earthly plane soon, so he wanted to do
Speaker 2: everything to make her feel secure and to know that
Speaker 2: their children and grandchildren would be taken care of with
Speaker 2: the considerable assets that they had accumulated over the years.
Speaker 2: So I wonder how much of this was Bob just
Speaker 2: going along with what Georgia wanted on how much was
Speaker 2: actually Bob's idea, because it seems like there's a lot
Speaker 2: of pushback from him. Even though he is legally obligated
Speaker 2: to be giving information, he's very resistant. So I can
Speaker 2: see both sides. I can see that he has this estate,
Speaker 2: he's earned this money, he has the right to spend it.
Speaker 2: But also if you have this trust set up and
Speaker 2: your children have a certain expectation and you are legally obligated,
Speaker 2: I can understand where the daughters are coming from as well.
Speaker 1: Yeah, this is a case where I would really love
Speaker 1: to hear more backstory about the entire family because even
Speaker 1: though there was obviously tension between Bob and his three
Speaker 1: daughters in his last days. We don't really have all
Speaker 1: this much information about their lives before he disappeared and
Speaker 1: what kind of relationship they had with their deceased mother,
Speaker 1: because you'll often see in these shows when someone goes missing,
Speaker 1: their family is saying, like all the stuff in the
Speaker 1: interview is saying, oh, they were just such a wonderful father,
Speaker 1: such a loving person. They lit up a room whenever
Speaker 1: they walked inside of it. But I noticed that the
Speaker 1: Bob's daughters don't really talk all that glowingly about him
Speaker 1: during their interviews on the Disappeared episode, And I always wondered,
Speaker 1: was their friction like their entire lives. Did they just
Speaker 1: not have such a great relationship like possibly maybe Georgia
Speaker 1: was the one who wanted them to be financially taken
Speaker 1: care of, but maybe Bob just didn't think so highly
Speaker 1: of his kids and that's why he was being more
Speaker 1: stingy about it and maybe was feeling more compelled to
Speaker 1: leave everything to Fontelle.
Speaker 2: Well. A few days after Bob went missing, Julie, Roberta,
Speaker 2: and Paula came to visit Fontale at their father's house
Speaker 2: and informed her that she was not entitled to Bob's assets.
Speaker 2: Fontel claimed that they told her that a family attorney
Speaker 2: had advised them to kick her out of the house,
Speaker 2: but the three daughters have always insisted that this was
Speaker 2: misconstrued and the attorney had simply advised them that they
Speaker 2: shouldn't have let Fantel into the house. A short time later,
Speaker 2: Bob's daughters filed a petition of conservatorship in order to
Speaker 2: gain control of his assets, claiming that they needed to
Speaker 2: do this in order to maintain their father's home and
Speaker 2: pay his bills, as well as hire a private investigator
Speaker 2: and put up a fifty thousand dollars reward for information.
Speaker 2: Fontell responded by contesting the conservatorship application, as she changed
Speaker 2: the locks on Bob's house and continued to remain living there.
Speaker 2: When Bob's daughters filed a claim in probakeport in order
Speaker 2: to get Bontel removed from the residence, the judge ruled
Speaker 2: against them. While Fantel never directly accused any specific individuals,
Speaker 2: she expressed her belief that Bob was the victim of
Speaker 2: foul play and was killed inside his upstairs bathroom. Either
Speaker 2: intentionally or accidentally. There was evidence to suggest the bathroom
Speaker 2: had been damaged and repaired, though nothing to definitively prove
Speaker 2: that foul play had taken place.
Speaker 3: Okay, question, maybe he didn't have dementia or anything like that.
Speaker 3: But if there was possible damage to the bathroom, I
Speaker 3: don't think it could be repaired quickly the day that
Speaker 3: he's killed. But is it possible that maybe he fell
Speaker 3: and became disoriented, Because eighty one and a fall is
Speaker 3: not a hard stretch of imagination. So is it possible
Speaker 3: that he could have injured himself and then stumbled out
Speaker 3: onto a walk or thought he was going somewhere and
Speaker 3: we're not sure where he ended up.
Speaker 1: I'm not so certain because it sounds like he was
Speaker 1: living in a suburban neighborhood. So if he had injured
Speaker 1: himself or wandered off in any way, I think someone
Speaker 1: would have seen him, or he just wouldn't have gotten
Speaker 1: far enough that they would have found his body. And
Speaker 1: that's what's curious about this case is that we don't
Speaker 1: get a lot of eyewitness sightings of Bob after he
Speaker 1: went missing, because usually it's inevitable that these happened. Missing
Speaker 1: persons cases, even if they're false, because Bob was a
Speaker 1: really distinct looking guy. He was a bald guy with
Speaker 1: really thick glasses, so he would definitely stand out if
Speaker 1: you saw him coming out in public. But surprisingly, it
Speaker 1: doesn't sound like there were too many witnesses who saw him,
Speaker 1: which makes me think that something did happen to him
Speaker 1: in the house and that he didn't wander off on
Speaker 1: his own. So even though Bob's son in law, Jeff Michaels,
Speaker 1: was the last known person to see him alive, time
Speaker 1: stand for seats and surveillance footage did back up his
Speaker 1: story that he visited home depot on the afternoon Bob
Speaker 1: went missing, and a forensic search of Jeff's vehicle turned
Speaker 1: up no evidence. Investigators have stated that neither Jeff nor
Speaker 1: any of Bob's daughters are considered suspects in his disappearance,
Speaker 1: but Jeff did state that while he was at Bob's
Speaker 1: house that day, he recalled seeing an suv driving slowly
Speaker 1: down the street past the residence on multiple occasions. This
Speaker 1: suv was believed to belong to a forty four year
Speaker 1: old woman named Josie who owned a barbershop up that
Speaker 1: Bob and his late wife, Georgia, had frequented for years.
Speaker 1: Following George's death, Josie attended a memorial service in which
Speaker 1: the Herrod family was taking her ashes out to sea.
Speaker 1: In spite of their massive age difference, Josie started becoming
Speaker 1: closer to Bob, even though Josie was married to another
Speaker 1: man at the time. It's unclear if she and Bob
Speaker 1: became romantically involved, but he did reportedly lend her a
Speaker 1: total of eighty six thousand dollars over the course of
Speaker 1: nine months. Bob's daughters became concerned enough to contact the
Speaker 1: Department of elder Social Services, who proceeded to interview Bob,
Speaker 1: and while they believed that Josie had taken advantage of
Speaker 1: him financially, they also believed that Bob was of sound mind,
Speaker 1: and since he did not want to pursue the matter
Speaker 1: any further, there was nothing the department could do. After
Speaker 1: getting married to Fontelle, Bob asked Josie to repay him
Speaker 1: the money she owed, though he went missing before this
Speaker 1: could happen. In spite of this, Josie reportedly had an
Speaker 1: alibi on the day Bob vanished, and both she and
Speaker 1: her husband were cleared of any connection to his disappearance.
Speaker 3: Okay, if you hadn't told me that they had been cleared,
Speaker 3: I would wonder if Josie had a jealousy or a
Speaker 3: kind of fear that if Bob was remarried, he'd stop
Speaker 3: being somebody that she could go and use or turn
Speaker 3: to for help. Maybe he willingly did it and was
Speaker 3: very well aware of what he was doing, but if
Speaker 3: he's going to be a completely cut out of her
Speaker 3: life because he's remarried, now, was that something that caused
Speaker 3: distress for her or kind of anger in her? But
Speaker 3: it seems like she was cleared by the police, so
Speaker 3: that ends up being a dead end.
Speaker 1: Yeah, in Mills to other cases, I would think that
Speaker 1: Josie would be the prime suspect. And unfortunately we don't
Speaker 1: know all that much about her. They have never released
Speaker 1: her last name publicly, and she has never done any interviews,
Speaker 1: and we don't have any specifics about her whereabouts that day.
Speaker 1: But police said they did check into her alibi and
Speaker 1: thought that it held up, so they seem pretty confident
Speaker 1: that she personally was not responsible for what happened to Bob.
Speaker 2: Do you think that there's a possible ability that, say,
Speaker 2: Josie felt that Bob was going to pursue this eighty
Speaker 2: six thousand dollars, and she also knew that he was
Speaker 2: worth a considerable amount of money. Is it possible that
Speaker 2: she hired somebody or she knew somebody to abduct him
Speaker 2: and maybe try to hold him for ransom and it
Speaker 2: just it went sideways and then those individuals ended up
Speaker 2: killing Bob and disposing of his body.
Speaker 1: That's certainly a possibility. I mean, I haven't heard law
Speaker 1: enforcement address it. So if Josie covered her tracks well
Speaker 1: and didn't leave any editfidence behind, then I suppose she
Speaker 1: could have hired someone who who harmed Bob. But if so,
Speaker 1: this person got incredibly lucky because they would have managed
Speaker 1: to do so during the short window of time between
Speaker 1: when his son in law Jeff left his house and
Speaker 1: his housekeeper Agnes arrived. So it makes me wonder if
Speaker 1: he was abducted by someone who was targeting him. Maybe
Speaker 1: they were watching the house and just happened to abduct
Speaker 1: him during that small window of time when he was alone.
Speaker 2: California law states that soon can legally be declared dead
Speaker 2: after they are missing for five years, so Bob's family
Speaker 2: went through the process of doing this in twenty fourteen.
Speaker 2: Since this allowed them to inherit Bob's property, they were
Speaker 2: able to arrange for Fontel to be evicted from his house,
Speaker 2: and she eventually moved to Kansas. Authorities have classified Bob's
Speaker 2: death as a potential homicide, but they have expressed their
Speaker 2: belief that he was not harmed by a stranger. A
Speaker 2: number of Bob's family members, friends, and acquaintances were interviewed
Speaker 2: and polygraphed, and Bob's daughters would hire a private investigator
Speaker 2: and post flyers offering a fifty thousand dollars reward. There
Speaker 2: would be an interesting development in the case in April
Speaker 2: twenty nineteen, when the Placentia PD announced that they had
Speaker 2: arrested and detained two local residents in connection with the case,
Speaker 2: whom they classified as persons of interest and quote associates
Speaker 2: of Bob. The two individuals names were never disclosed publicly,
Speaker 2: and both of them were soon released pending for their investigation.
Speaker 2: Investigators have not shared any details about why they were arrested,
Speaker 2: but there have not been any new developments in the
Speaker 2: case since then. Sadly, fonteal Heater, who continued going by
Speaker 2: her married name Fontel Herod until the very end, passed
Speaker 2: away on August twenty first, twenty twenty two, at the
Speaker 2: age of eighty six. So after nearly seventeen years, Bob
Speaker 2: Herod continues to remain a missing person.
Speaker 1: So I guess you could say the path went Chile.
Speaker 3: This is really complicated because obviously it makes more sense
Speaker 3: that someone who knew Bob, knew of his assets and
Speaker 3: needed something that benefited them if he passed away, would
Speaker 3: be the your main suspects. But then to hear that
Speaker 3: law enforcement got to a point where they felt there
Speaker 3: was enough probable cause to at least arrest two of
Speaker 3: his quote associates and then later released them. Just because
Speaker 3: they were not released, or just because they were released,
Speaker 3: doesn't mean that they're not still somebody on a suspect list.
Speaker 3: It simply means law enforcement couldn't fulfill the bar that
Speaker 3: was needed to hold them or to continue with a
Speaker 3: case against them, and so there's really nowhere else for
Speaker 3: the investigation to go. In the back of my head,
Speaker 3: I wonder, are those still two people that the police
Speaker 3: say It takes one phone call where we'd have enough
Speaker 3: to actually go apprehend these two individuals, or do you
Speaker 3: think they were truly cleared.
Speaker 1: I have a feeling that they weren't cleared because they
Speaker 1: just said release pending further investigations. So I get the
Speaker 1: impression that they still have suspicion of these people, just
Speaker 1: don't have enough evidence to file charges. And I've always
Speaker 1: wondered about the usage of the word associates, Like they
Speaker 1: never specifically said family members, but I'm thinking to myself, well,
Speaker 1: if they said family members, then that wouldn't really keep
Speaker 1: the identities of these people private because everyone would immediately
Speaker 1: figure out that it's their daughters. So I'm wondering why
Speaker 1: they chose associates. Are they doing it because they don't
Speaker 1: want to tip their hand too much about who these
Speaker 1: people are? Or are these people who are kind of
Speaker 1: like associated with Bob but don't really have a close
Speaker 1: familial tie to them. So many un answered questions.
Speaker 3: I think if it was the daughters, again, if it's
Speaker 3: two of them, don't you think those two might have
Speaker 3: a different way of like showing up and making media
Speaker 3: reports and things like that, and then the other one
Speaker 3: would be much louder or kind of have a division
Speaker 3: with the relationship saying like, oh my god, my two
Speaker 3: sisters got arrested. You would know that, and they think
Speaker 3: they hurt my dad. I feel like there would be
Speaker 3: you know, it wouldn't have to be the police who
Speaker 3: exposed too, it was I feel like that might naturally
Speaker 3: come out at some point. Well.
Speaker 1: I mentioned this on the next episode, but I noticed
Speaker 1: that only two of the daughters were interviewed on the
Speaker 1: Disappeared episode, and the other one kind of remained silent.
Speaker 1: But that might not mean much. Might just mean that
Speaker 1: the one daughter was more camera shy and didn't want
Speaker 1: to do interviews. But over the years, I've not seen
Speaker 1: any indication that these daughters are turning on each other.
Speaker 1: None of them have ever pointed the finger of one
Speaker 1: of their siblings and said I suspect them. So if
Speaker 1: they were all involved, then they're keeping their mouth shuts
Speaker 1: and staying together. So I think that about brings an
Speaker 1: end to Part one. Join us next week as we
Speaker 1: present part two of our series about the disappearance of
Speaker 1: Bob Herod.
Speaker 4: Robin, Do you want to tell us a little bit
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Speaker 1: Yes, the Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
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