Speaker 1: Welcome back to our coverage about the murder of Rondick Hinson.
Speaker 1: Let's jump back right into this case. But of course,
Speaker 1: in the original investigation, Greg was never considered to be
Speaker 1: a suspect because his parents said he was home all night.
Speaker 1: He was here, he couldn't have been out. But of
Speaker 1: course you have to take it with a grain of
Speaker 1: salt when people's own family members offered them an alibi.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't really think you can really rely too
Speaker 2: strongly on familial alibis because parents are willing to lie
Speaker 2: for their children. It just comes down to it. I
Speaker 2: think siblings are willing to lie. He's actually parents. They
Speaker 2: always want to protect their children, and they're not only
Speaker 2: protecting their children when they do that, they're also protecting
Speaker 2: the integrity of their own names. And I don't think
Speaker 2: that we can underestimate how important that is. Nobody wants
Speaker 2: the stain of having your child be a murderer, So
Speaker 2: I can understand why parents will do things like this.
Speaker 2: We saw this in the Gabby Patito case with Brian
Speaker 2: Laundry's parents.
Speaker 1: It's laundry, right, yeah, laundry.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we saw it with his parents. The lengths that
Speaker 2: they were willing to go to protect him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, I'm sure there are some examples where
Speaker 1: parents are willing to do the right thing. But also,
Speaker 1: Charles McDowell was a pastor at the local church, and
Speaker 1: he sounded like someone who was very concerned about his
Speaker 1: family's image and maintaining being a pillar of the community.
Speaker 1: So he would fit the profile of someone who would
Speaker 1: cover for his son if he had killed someone.
Speaker 2: It's not a very Christian thing, no.
Speaker 1: Definitely not. But there would be another odd incident at
Speaker 1: around seven am later that morning, two of Ronda and
Speaker 1: Greg's best friends were another couple. Their names were Mark
Speaker 1: Turner and Jill Turner, even though their families both seemed
Speaker 1: to have the same last name, but it's just a coincidence.
Speaker 1: They weren't related to each other, but they heard about
Speaker 1: Ronda's death, so they decided to pay a visit to
Speaker 1: the McDowell residents in order to offer their condolences. But
Speaker 1: when they arrived, Greg and Betty were there, but Charles
Speaker 1: was not, and since he was a private pilot with
Speaker 1: his own plane, Betty explained that he had left on
Speaker 1: a flight to South Carolina in order to pick up
Speaker 1: some relatives who would be visiting the family for the
Speaker 1: Christmas holidays. When the Hints were told about this, they
Speaker 1: found it very weird because a couple of days earlier,
Speaker 1: Greg had asked them if they could spend the holidays
Speaker 1: at their house because his parents were planning to travel
Speaker 1: to South Carolina and spend Christmas with their relatives and
Speaker 1: he didn't really want to do that. But now, for
Speaker 1: whatever reason, Charles had changed his plans and was going
Speaker 1: to pick up these relatives and bring them back to
Speaker 1: his place, even though this was only about six hours
Speaker 1: after finding out that his son's girlfriend had been murdered.
Speaker 1: Flight logs did confirm that Charles's plane did take off,
Speaker 1: but I don't think it's ever been officially confirmed if
Speaker 1: he brought back any relatives. And of course there has
Speaker 1: been speculation that he might have been using this opportunity
Speaker 1: to dispose of evidence because he was a known hunter,
Speaker 1: so Greg would have had access to a rifle if
Speaker 1: it was in fact the murder weapon. And there would
Speaker 1: be another unusual situation when Mark and Jill were leaving
Speaker 1: and driving out of the driveway when Greg suddenly came
Speaker 1: out and waved them down, and after Mark stopped the car,
Speaker 1: Greg handed him a box of condoms and said, quote,
Speaker 1: I don't want them to find out we were having sex. What?
Speaker 1: And it's like I cant understand, Like this is a
Speaker 1: Christian family who may have disapproved of premarital sex, but
Speaker 1: it's like most people aren't going to be thinking about
Speaker 1: something like this, hiding condoms after finding out that your
Speaker 1: girlfriend has been murdered.
Speaker 2: That's so weird. But I've got to think, if Charles
Speaker 2: is a pastor at a church, does he really need
Speaker 2: to take his lane to dispose of evidence? Couldn't you
Speaker 2: hide evidence on church property? Like what is the probability
Speaker 2: that they're going to be able to get a search
Speaker 2: warrant for church property?
Speaker 1: Yeah? I thought that is kind of an exaggeration that
Speaker 1: if he needed to dispose of evidence, you could just
Speaker 1: drive somewhere and dispose of it. You don't have to
Speaker 1: take a plane out there. But still we've never even
Speaker 1: found out if he was telling the truth about bringing
Speaker 1: relatives back to the house and picking them up, So
Speaker 1: it just seems odd that he would take this impromptu
Speaker 1: plane ride so soon after finding out what happened to
Speaker 1: his son's girlfriend.
Speaker 2: I think it's absolutely bizarre, But I could see a
Speaker 2: scenario where they were originally planning to go to South
Speaker 2: Carolina for the holidays, but then given everything that happened,
Speaker 2: they were like, Okay, we're going to talk to the
Speaker 2: family and see if they're now willing to come up
Speaker 2: here and be around us during this very difficult time.
Speaker 2: But the one thing that I've got a difficult time
Speaker 2: reconciling is the time frame. Would you really go six
Speaker 2: hours after finding this out that Ronda was dead?
Speaker 1: Yeah, because supposedly Charles had been woken up at like
Speaker 1: quarter after two in the morning, so he obviously didn't
Speaker 1: get much sleep. So would you instantly feel gung ho
Speaker 1: to start flying a plane after you must be tired
Speaker 1: just to go pick up the relatives, Like why not
Speaker 1: have a nap or something and then go later in
Speaker 1: the day if you really wanted to bring your relatives
Speaker 1: back there. So my next story is going to paint
Speaker 1: the mcdowells in an even more unflattering light. And this
Speaker 1: is particularly weird. But Ronda's funeral service was held on
Speaker 1: Christmas Day at the same church where Charles was the pastor,
Speaker 1: so he wound up giving the eulogy. But the Hintsons
Speaker 1: thought that it was very weird because he barely seemed
Speaker 1: to be mentioning Ronda at all, didn't really want to
Speaker 1: say a lot of good things about her, even though
Speaker 1: she was a victim, and he stated that he barely
Speaker 1: knew Ronda, even though she had been his son's girlfriend
Speaker 1: for the past two years. And then he flat out
Speaker 1: shocked everyone by saying, quote, I don't know if Ronda
Speaker 1: went to Hell or not. And of course this enraged
Speaker 1: the Hinsons, and then after the service, Judy decided to
Speaker 1: confront him and say, why would you say something like that?
Speaker 1: And he told her that since Ronda wasn't affiliated with
Speaker 1: this particular church, he couldn't know for certain where she was.
Speaker 1: And he then stated, quote, there was a lot of
Speaker 1: good people in Hell. Just because a person is good
Speaker 1: doesn't mean they are not in Hell. I know a
Speaker 1: lot of good people who have gone to Hell.
Speaker 2: End quote excuse you, Like, how dare you say that
Speaker 2: about this deceased nineteen year old girl. Ronda did absolutely
Speaker 2: nothing wrong to have you say that she could possibly
Speaker 2: be in hell. And then he qualifies his statements that
Speaker 2: there's lots of good people in Hell. Like her parents
Speaker 2: don't want to hear that what an absolute pos.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just so bizarre to me. I love to
Speaker 1: think I know a lot of good people who have
Speaker 1: gone to Hell. How could you possibly know that, to
Speaker 1: let you been there? How could you know where these
Speaker 1: people have gone after they died. But it just seemed
Speaker 1: like there's some major projection here. And some people have
Speaker 1: theorized that maybe he blamed Ronda for causing his son
Speaker 1: to kill her or something like that, saying that she
Speaker 1: did something bad to him so that Greg had no
Speaker 1: choice but to kill her, And in order to project
Speaker 1: he started saying disparaging things about at her own funeral
Speaker 1: service with her family and attendance, and trying to say
Speaker 1: that she went to hell, even though she's an innocent
Speaker 1: nineteen year old girl who did nothing wrong.
Speaker 2: I think we see something similar in uh. I think
Speaker 2: it's the case of Djunko Feruda in Japan. I think
Speaker 2: it was like the Hello Kitty murder.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I know that one.
Speaker 2: It is absolutely vile what they did to this young girl.
Speaker 2: But in the end, after she's deceased and she's buried,
Speaker 2: the mothers of some of these boys were just they
Speaker 2: were so angry about what happened that they would go,
Speaker 2: and they would desecrate her grave on multiple occasions, and
Speaker 2: it's like, why don't you put the blame where it belongs,
Speaker 2: squarely on the shoulders of your son. Why are you
Speaker 2: blaming this poor girl who was tortured for like a
Speaker 2: month or something like that. I can't remember all the
Speaker 2: details of the case, but it was horrific, and so
Speaker 2: it's very possible that we're seeing something similar.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I definitely heard about that case where they pretty
Speaker 1: much blamed the murder victim who was tortured for ruining
Speaker 1: their son's life, even though they were directly responsible for
Speaker 1: what happened. And that just may be Charles's mentality where
Speaker 1: even though his son killed someone, he's doing nothing but
Speaker 1: blaming the victim. And to make this situation even more odd,
Speaker 1: Charles resigned as the pastor at the church only two
Speaker 1: days after the funeral, and he never gave an official reason.
Speaker 1: But as the years went on, it would turn out,
Speaker 1: surprise surprise, that Charles had been conducting an extramaral affair
Speaker 1: with one of the parishioners, and he eventually got divorced
Speaker 1: from Betty after thirty years of marriage, which says a
Speaker 1: lot about his character. And the last time that the
Speaker 1: Hinson's ever communicated with Charles was about two years after
Speaker 1: Ronda's murder, where he stopped by their house and had
Speaker 1: a conversation where he made yet another odd remark, stating, quote,
Speaker 1: the case will never be solved, nothing will help Ronda
Speaker 1: now and other people should not be hurt because of
Speaker 1: this end quote.
Speaker 2: Oh my dear lord, what is up with this man?
Speaker 2: Somebody stop him from speaking because nothing good comes of it,
Speaker 2: and he just gives these vague, these vague statements, but
Speaker 2: yet they're very telling. How do you know this for
Speaker 2: a fact? You are stating that nobody will find out?
Speaker 2: How do you know you would know if you would
Speaker 2: dispose of evidence and you had seem to it that
Speaker 2: there is no way that anything could be tied to
Speaker 2: potentially your son. Otherwise, if he had nothing to do
Speaker 2: with it, and this was somebody else, or this was
Speaker 2: a complete accident, why are you showing up on their
Speaker 2: doorstep and showing concern for the potential that it could
Speaker 2: hurt somebody aka his son, whoever would be charged with it.
Speaker 2: So it feels to me that he's got some inside
Speaker 2: knowledge or some involvement in what happened. To Ronda.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just very, very self absorbed because ordinarily, yes,
Speaker 1: you want the person who committed a crime to be
Speaker 1: hurt because they should be punished for what they did.
Speaker 1: So why would he be saying something like that unless
Speaker 1: he felt that his son and his family name would
Speaker 1: be hurt if this case was ever solved. So now
Speaker 1: let's get back to the whole Ronda taking showers thing
Speaker 1: and the speculation that she was a victim of sexual assault,
Speaker 1: because it turned out that prior to her death, Ronda
Speaker 1: told her best friend Jill, as well as one of
Speaker 1: her cousins, that Reverend McDowell had made any appropriate advances
Speaker 1: toward her. She described an incident where she was exiting
Speaker 1: the bathroom at the residence and Charles decided to like
Speaker 1: walk up close to her and corner in the hallway
Speaker 1: and kind of violate her space, even though he did
Speaker 1: not actually physically touch her. But there was another time
Speaker 1: where Ronda went out to a restaurant with the McDowell
Speaker 1: family and she said that Charles sat beside her and
Speaker 1: placed his hand on her knee while they were eating.
Speaker 1: And while she never actually described being raped or sexual
Speaker 1: assaulted or any the situations escalating after that. That's still
Speaker 1: troubling behavior, so would not surprised me. Possibly if Charles
Speaker 1: at one point did a lot more than just put
Speaker 1: his hand on her knee, but she was reluctant to
Speaker 1: say anything, and that could have been the reason that
Speaker 1: she just decided to get up in the night and
Speaker 1: start having these constant showers.
Speaker 2: It's possible that that's all that happened. It's also possible
Speaker 2: that more happened, because when one is sexually assaulted, there's
Speaker 2: a lot of shame that's attached to that, and a
Speaker 2: lot of times the victim will blame themselves for the
Speaker 2: actions of this other person, although incorrect, it's never their fault,
Speaker 2: but I know from personal experience you can feel that way.
Speaker 2: And so to then share more information and to go, God,
Speaker 2: I put myself in this situation and this ended up happening,
Speaker 2: and now I just feel too ashamed to even like
Speaker 2: articulate it, because that makes it real, It makes it
Speaker 2: like a tangible thing once you say it out loud
Speaker 2: to somebody else. And then also to admit that I
Speaker 2: was in this position, like I saw the potential that
Speaker 2: this could happen, yet I still ended up in this position,
Speaker 2: and this happened to me, And it's just so typical
Speaker 2: for a victim to blame themselves when it's obvious that
Speaker 2: this is Charle. She's a teenage girl and the girlfriend
Speaker 2: of his son, and he's making these advances and he's
Speaker 2: just a disgusting human being. And I truly hope that
Speaker 2: nothing more happened to Ronda than what she described, But
Speaker 2: we're just never going to know the truth unless Charles
Speaker 2: is one who's going to come forward and admit that
Speaker 2: he did something to her, and we know that's not
Speaker 2: going to happen.
Speaker 1: Definitely not. But the fact that he lost his marriage
Speaker 1: because he had an affair with one of his parishioners
Speaker 1: shows that he is capable of stuff like that. And
Speaker 1: of course it adds more context to the conversations that
Speaker 1: she had with her father, saying that I have something
Speaker 1: bad to tell you and you're not going to like it,
Speaker 1: and she's probably feeling secret shame, like maybe she wanted
Speaker 1: to tell him about the incident where he put his
Speaker 1: hand on her leg, or maybe tell him about something worse,
Speaker 1: but he's she's thinking to herself, well, this is my
Speaker 1: boyfriend's father. He's also a pastor and a pillar of
Speaker 1: the community. So no matter what I say, even though
Speaker 1: it's all his fault, a lot of people are probably
Speaker 1: going to blame me for it, for leading him on
Speaker 1: or something like that. And she probably felt a lot
Speaker 1: of sa secret shame, and that's why she wanted to
Speaker 1: remain silent.
Speaker 2: Refresh my memory. What the exact question was that she
Speaker 2: asked about a married man, Well, I was just.
Speaker 1: Going to bring that up, and she asked her mother,
Speaker 1: is it okay to date a married man? And of
Speaker 1: course her mother said, no, it's never okay. It could
Speaker 1: hurt a lot of people, and that's when she dropped
Speaker 1: the subject. And yes, there has been speculation that she
Speaker 1: may have been referring to something that was going on
Speaker 1: with her and Charles, but it's also possible that it's
Speaker 1: a red herring because apparently a couple of years afterwards,
Speaker 1: one of Ronda's co workers admitted to the family that
Speaker 1: she had been having an affair with another married man
Speaker 1: at her workplace and had told Ronda about it. So
Speaker 1: it's very possible that Ronda was just asking questions because
Speaker 1: of something her friend did, and it wasn't something that
Speaker 1: was going on in her own personal life.
Speaker 2: That seems more likely to me personally, just because I
Speaker 2: don't see any world in where Ronda would be into
Speaker 2: the idea of having an affair with Charles, because she
Speaker 2: seemed to be so off put by him cornering her
Speaker 2: and then invading her space, and then again putting his
Speaker 2: hand on her leg in a way that she felt uncomfortable.
Speaker 2: That doesn't align to me with somebody that is thinking
Speaker 2: about potentially having an affair with this man. So, yeah,
Speaker 2: I agree with you. It does sound more like a
Speaker 2: red herring.
Speaker 1: I think so too. I don't think she would ever
Speaker 1: want a consensual affair with him because she always was
Speaker 1: repulsed by him, so if anything happened, it was probably
Speaker 1: because he forced himself on her. And while we're on
Speaker 1: the subject of red herrings, it's possible that the eyewitness
Speaker 1: account from Reggie Smart, the truck driver who said that
Speaker 1: he saw a man pulling Ronda's body out of the car,
Speaker 1: might be nothing more than a red herring, because it's
Speaker 1: kind of I always assumed that this was the person
Speaker 1: who killed her, But it turned out that the people
Speaker 1: who reported the discovery of Ronda's car were a pair
Speaker 1: of men named Tim Ponce and Mark Nickel, and they
Speaker 1: claimed that sometime after one am, they were driving down
Speaker 1: Mineral Springs Mountain Road and decided to pull over when
Speaker 1: they noticed Ronda's datson in the ditch, and when they
Speaker 1: watched for a closer look. Oddly, they said that even
Speaker 1: though they saw a bullet hole and they saw some blood,
Speaker 1: they claimed they did not see Ronda's body lying on
Speaker 1: the ground, which seems odd like why wouldn't her body
Speaker 1: be there? But their story was corroborated by three other
Speaker 1: eyewitnesses in a blue Toyota pickup truck who were driving
Speaker 1: through the area and pulled over to check what was
Speaker 1: going on, and that's when Ponds and Nicol said that
Speaker 1: they were going to the police, so the two parties
Speaker 1: went their separate ways. Ponce and Nickel went into town
Speaker 1: and managed to flag down a patrol officer and lead
Speaker 1: them back to the scene, and by the time the
Speaker 1: officer arrived, he was able to confirm that yes, Ronda's
Speaker 1: body was on the ground and on the surface. The
Speaker 1: whole situation doesn't seem to make a lot of sense
Speaker 1: because I don't think like someone would kill Ronda, move
Speaker 1: her body away and then put it back by the
Speaker 1: time the police went there. But what's interesting is that
Speaker 1: Ponce and Nickel actually drove a dark transam which marched
Speaker 1: the description of the vehicle that Reggie Smarts. So it
Speaker 1: seems to me that the man who pulled her body
Speaker 1: out was probably Ponds or Nickel, but for reasons unknown,
Speaker 1: decided not to tell that story to the police. They
Speaker 1: just said that they discovered the car and did not
Speaker 1: handle the body. And I don't know why they would
Speaker 1: do that. Maybe they thought that they would be incriminated
Speaker 1: in the crime if they admitted to touching the body.
Speaker 1: But when you look at the timeline and you look
Speaker 1: at like the description that Reggie Smart provided, the only
Speaker 1: explanation that makes sense because he had seen a gray
Speaker 1: car driving away from the scene which likely had Ronda's killer,
Speaker 1: is that these two guys, these bystanders, were the one
Speaker 1: who moved her body and then stayed silent about it
Speaker 1: and may have compromised the investigation because I have a
Speaker 1: feeling that if they checked the DNA found on Ronda's weather,
Speaker 1: it might wind up matching Tim Ponce or Mark nicchol.
Speaker 2: Oh my god, I agree with you. That sounds like
Speaker 2: the most likely scenario. Otherwise, how else did her body
Speaker 2: get out there? And maybe they were just thinking like, oh,
Speaker 2: I don't want to be tied to this, and you're right.
Speaker 2: If they run the DNA and it matches one of them,
Speaker 2: it just if they would have explained a way why
Speaker 2: their DNA was there in the first place. And I mean,
Speaker 2: we can read between the lines and say they were
Speaker 2: likely scared and so they didn't want to be involved
Speaker 2: in this any more than they needed to be, and
Speaker 2: so they weren't thinking in nineteen eighty one that they
Speaker 2: could be incriminating the scene with touch DNA, because it
Speaker 2: literally wasn't the thing exactly.
Speaker 1: They would have been thinking about that. But I can
Speaker 1: only imagine what they might have felt when they watched
Speaker 1: the Unsolved Mystery segment years earlier, because that lead with
Speaker 1: the guy pulling Randa's body out of the car was
Speaker 1: like the biggest development. They were hoping to identify this
Speaker 1: man because they felt he was Ronda's killer. So I
Speaker 1: always wonder if they watched that thinking that, ooh, we
Speaker 1: were the ones who did that, and we did kill her.
Speaker 1: But if anyone finds out, we're going to get into
Speaker 1: a lot of trouble. So we're gonna stay quiet about it.
Speaker 2: If that is the case, they probably went through a
Speaker 2: bunch of years where they had an incredible amount of
Speaker 2: anxiety and they were constantly worried that they were going
Speaker 2: to get caught, and then eventually it probably slowly, year
Speaker 2: by year dissipates a little bit, and then eventually they're thinking, Okay, look,
Speaker 2: we got away with the Scott free nothing's happened. But
Speaker 2: if they were to come forward now and give that
Speaker 2: context that yes, this happened, this is why we didn't
Speaker 2: disclose it. And if you run that DNA, it's very
Speaker 2: possible it could be either of our DNA, it would
Speaker 2: be incredibly helpful in the case.
Speaker 1: I think so. And Pont and Nickel were never mentioned
Speaker 1: in any public accounts of the case until Larry Griffin
Speaker 1: wrote that series of articles starting in twenty nineteen. And
Speaker 1: when I read that, I was like, ah, yeah, that
Speaker 1: was probably them. But I have no idea if these
Speaker 1: two men are still alive, and I'm thinking that they
Speaker 1: should come forward, given that their names are already out
Speaker 1: there and people know that they probably moved the body.
Speaker 1: So yeah, the main reason I think it's a red
Speaker 1: herring is that l Azure. Recall, Reggie Smart said that
Speaker 1: before he saw this guy, he had seen what he
Speaker 1: described as a blue Chevelle driving away from the scene,
Speaker 1: and about a half hour before that, other witnesses had
Speaker 1: reported seeing a car matching that description parked under the
Speaker 1: overpass with two men sitting inside. So it seems very
Speaker 1: likely that that car was involved in Ronda's murder. And
Speaker 1: it turned out that Greg was driving a blue nineteen
Speaker 1: seventy six Chevy Nova at the time, which was registered
Speaker 1: to his father. And even though Smart thought that it
Speaker 1: looked more like a gray Chevelle, Chevelle's looked similar enough
Speaker 1: to Nova's that he easily could have mistaken them, and
Speaker 1: because there were poor lighting conditions, he could have also
Speaker 1: mistakenly believed that the blue paint was gray. And most importantly,
Speaker 1: as you recall, Smart described the front of the vehicle
Speaker 1: as looking messed up, and the McDowell's family Nova did
Speaker 1: have damage to the front end at that time, So
Speaker 1: in retrospect, it seems very likely that that was the
Speaker 1: McDowell's car speeding away from the scene right after Ronda's murder.
Speaker 2: Wow, that does seem to be pretty good evidence that
Speaker 2: it was the McDowell's car, and honestly, to the surprise
Speaker 2: of no one, the fact that their car was a
Speaker 2: the scene. Who was present in that car? Do you
Speaker 2: think that it was potentially junior and senior, like if
Speaker 2: it was Charles, Charles ng Greg.
Speaker 1: People have pushed that forward as an idea. But what's
Speaker 1: crazy is that when we discover Ronda's vehicle, the driver's
Speaker 1: side window was rolled down, and because it was a
Speaker 1: very cold night, they don't think that she would have
Speaker 1: rolled it down just to drive home. So they've always
Speaker 1: suspected that she did stop and talked to someone, and
Speaker 1: they figured that she might have done that for Greg,
Speaker 1: but they thought that if Charles had been at the
Speaker 1: scene with them, she probably wouldn't have stopped for him
Speaker 1: because she was afraid of him, and I think she
Speaker 1: would have considered it be a red flag. Charles and
Speaker 1: Greg were at the scene together. But in a couple moments,
Speaker 1: I'm going to bring up another potential suspect who could
Speaker 1: have been the second man inside the vehicle. So another
Speaker 1: thing that looked incriminating from the McDowell's is that when
Speaker 1: Ronda's vehicle was discovered, there were three items in the
Speaker 1: back that her family swears were not there when she
Speaker 1: originally left the house for the Christmas party. One of
Speaker 1: them was a letter jacket from Eastbrook High School, which
Speaker 1: belonged to her. Another one was a hooded gray sweat
Speaker 1: jacket which also belonged to her, and also a stuffed
Speaker 1: pink snake which Ronda had won as a prize for
Speaker 1: Greg during a trip to Myrtle Beach that they had
Speaker 1: taken during the summer of nineteen eighty one. So before
Speaker 1: she left for the Christmas party, Ronda had asked her
Speaker 1: father if he could drive the car up to the
Speaker 1: front door for her because she wanted to avoid getting
Speaker 1: her shoes dirty, and Bobby would say that he was
Speaker 1: absolutely certain that those two jackets and the pinak snake
Speaker 1: were not in the back seat. Well, he was in
Speaker 1: the car, and as you recall, Ronda drove her friend
Speaker 1: Sheery Pittman home from the Christmas party, and Shery would
Speaker 1: also say, I don't recall seeing those items in the
Speaker 1: back seat when I was dropped off. So it seems
Speaker 1: that somehow, within the next thirty to forty minutes after
Speaker 1: Ronda left Sherry's house, those items wound up on the
Speaker 1: back seat by the time her car was discovered in
Speaker 1: the ditch.
Speaker 2: That is so weird, isn't it. I guess if you
Speaker 2: couple it with the fact that the windows rolled down,
Speaker 2: there is a very high probability that she bumped into
Speaker 2: somebody she had to otherwise, how did those items get
Speaker 2: there and why would her window be rolled down?
Speaker 1: Yes, it totally fits the timeline because it did turn
Speaker 1: out that a few days prior to her death, Ronda
Speaker 1: had left her school letter jacket at Greg's residence, and
Speaker 1: as far as anyone knew, she didn't get it back
Speaker 1: because when Ron left for work on the morning of
Speaker 1: December the twenty second, she asked if she could borrow
Speaker 1: her brother Robbie's jacket because she did not have her own.
Speaker 1: So this could be a thing where Greg pulled her
Speaker 1: over because this is a route she always drove home,
Speaker 1: so he would have known she would have been there,
Speaker 1: so he could have flagged her down and says, I'm
Speaker 1: going to give you back the jacket, and that's what
Speaker 1: convinced Ron to pull over and roll down the window. Though,
Speaker 1: the presidence of the snake is a weird thing, because
Speaker 1: why would Greg bring like this pink snake to like
Speaker 1: the side of the road to give to her in
Speaker 1: the middle of the night, unless it was maybe something saying, oh,
Speaker 1: remember when we went to Myrtle Beach this and won
Speaker 1: me like a pet snake that shows much better times
Speaker 1: and cho when our relationship was in a good place.
Speaker 1: Maybe it would have been a manipulative thing to convince
Speaker 1: ron and not to break up with him or something
Speaker 1: like that. But whatever happened, I know that both Bobby
Speaker 1: and Sherry were certain that that pink snake was not
Speaker 1: in the car earlier that night, and somehow showed up
Speaker 1: there before she was killed.
Speaker 2: I can't think of any other explanation than what you
Speaker 2: just said. If it was something that was going to
Speaker 2: be used to try to either to aid drop her
Speaker 2: guards so she's relaxed and he can then take a
Speaker 2: shot at her, or be try to get her back
Speaker 2: in some way, And maybe he felt as though he
Speaker 2: wasn't going to get her back, or his actions or
Speaker 2: his efforts weren't going to be rewarded in the way
Speaker 2: that he was hoping, so then he basically enacted his
Speaker 2: contingency plan, which was to take a shot at her,
Speaker 2: either to scare her or to harm her.
Speaker 1: Yeah, possibly, and I don't know if he was planning
Speaker 1: to kill her, Like maybe he thought he was only
Speaker 1: going to scare her. But the fact that he had
Speaker 1: a hunting rifle with him to begin with is obviously
Speaker 1: a major red flag because if this was just a
Speaker 1: meetup where you wanted to speak with her or just
Speaker 1: flag her down to return her jacket, you would not
Speaker 1: need to bring a rifle to the scene unless you
Speaker 1: were planning it to do something. And maybe he thought, well,
Speaker 1: we're going to reconcile or something like that. But maybe
Speaker 1: at that moment she told Greg that she was going
Speaker 1: to break up with him and that's when he lost it.
Speaker 1: And they figured that the rifle was probably fired while
Speaker 1: Ronda was driving away, so it could have just been
Speaker 1: like maybe he was planning to fire a warning shot
Speaker 1: and just never dreamed that it would just go right
Speaker 1: through the trunk and through the back seat in the
Speaker 1: front seat and pierce her right through the heart.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it sounds like he maybe was just trying to
Speaker 2: scare her, because I think if he was trying to
Speaker 2: kill her, you would take more than one shot.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm thinking as well. Yeah, I don't think
Speaker 1: it was premeditated But the thing that really really confuses
Speaker 1: me is the presence of the second jacket in Ronda's
Speaker 1: back seat, which was a hooded gray sweatsh jacket. It
Speaker 1: turned out that she had gone Christmas shopping with Mark Turner,
Speaker 1: who was the boyfriend of her best friend Jill, and
Speaker 1: wound up leaving her hooded sweat jacket in his car.
Speaker 1: And I know that Mark and Jill had spent the
Speaker 1: evening of December the twenty second hanging out together before
Speaker 1: Mark drove Jill back to her residence and dropped her
Speaker 1: off at around twelve twenty five am on December the
Speaker 1: twenty third, which was about thirty to forty minutes before
Speaker 1: Ronda's body was found. But what's weird is that Jill
Speaker 1: claimed that when she exited Mark's car, she noticed Ronda's
Speaker 1: sweat jacket in the back seat, and she asked Mark
Speaker 1: if she could take it and give it back to
Speaker 1: Ronda at a later time, but Mark said no, it's okay.
Speaker 1: I'm going to give it to Greg and then he
Speaker 1: can return it to Ronda. And then Mark drove away.
Speaker 1: And this was only about a half mile from the
Speaker 1: spot where Ronda was killed, and Mark probably would have
Speaker 1: been heading in that direction when he was heading home,
Speaker 1: And of course they questioned him afterwards, saying that do
Speaker 1: you recall how the sweat jacket that was in your
Speaker 1: car in Ronda's car within the next half hour, And
Speaker 1: Mark said, honestly, I have no recollection of ever giving
Speaker 1: the jacket back to her. And he says, but I
Speaker 1: had been suffering from a back injury at the time,
Speaker 1: and I've been taking a lot of pain medications, so
Speaker 1: that whole era is a blur, So I honestly don't
Speaker 1: remember what happened. And so that also looks pretty suspicious.
Speaker 2: That's majorly suspicious. And how long after Bronda's murder did
Speaker 2: they question him.
Speaker 1: I think it was like maybe a couple weeks or so,
Speaker 1: but not long afterwards. And I'm thinking, though, even if
Speaker 1: you were on a lot of pain pills at the time,
Speaker 1: I think the night when your girlfriend's best friend when
Speaker 1: murdered would be a memorable enough event that you would
Speaker 1: remember a lot of the events that happened. And remember
Speaker 1: if you had given the jacket back to Ronda or Greg.
Speaker 2: And if you were still messed up on pain pills,
Speaker 2: why are you awake at that time? They're a downer,
Speaker 2: not an upper. So you're still awake and you're cognizant
Speaker 2: enough to be driving around. Sure, you could be really
Speaker 2: messed up, but I would think there's a probability that
Speaker 2: she would remember that. It's not like he's being asked
Speaker 2: three years later exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So, And as you recall, there were a number
Speaker 1: of witnesses who saw it, like the blue Chevy underneath
Speaker 1: the overpass, and they said that they saw two men
Speaker 1: in there, not just one. So I think it's very
Speaker 1: possible that Mark was heading in that direction he noticed
Speaker 1: Greg park there and decided to stop by and give
Speaker 1: him the jacket, and that maybe Greg wound up giving
Speaker 1: the gray jacket Toronda when she stopped by a short
Speaker 1: time later. But in Mark's defense, he was driving a
Speaker 1: gold nineteen seventy seven Buick Regel at that time, and
Speaker 1: even though a bunch of eye witnesses reported a number
Speaker 1: of different vehicles near the scene, no one has ever
Speaker 1: seen reported seeing a gold Buick Regal anywhere in the vicinity,
Speaker 1: so Mark cannot be placed there. But I'm thinking to myself,
Speaker 1: if this was just an inocentt case where Mark saw
Speaker 1: Greg stopped by and gave him the jacket and then
Speaker 1: drove away and Ronda's murder took place like after he
Speaker 1: already left. Then Mark technically didn't do anything wrong, So
Speaker 1: why has he remained silent all this time? Like? Why
Speaker 1: is he lying about giving the jacket to Greg? Did
Speaker 1: he really want to cover for him to like let
Speaker 1: his friend get away with murder.
Speaker 2: It sounds like he's got a lot more to do
Speaker 2: with it than just simply dropping off the jacket. Maybe
Speaker 2: he was just more aware of what happened, and maybe
Speaker 2: he's of the mindset where he doesn't want to rat
Speaker 2: on his friend. I don't know, or maybe he thinks
Speaker 2: he's more complicit because he stood by and watched it
Speaker 2: happen and then did nothing. I have no idea why, like,
Speaker 2: other than being more involved than he's alluding to their
Speaker 2: being a potential that he was. He's basically saying, oh yeah,
Speaker 2: like I may have given her that sweater or anything
Speaker 2: might have happened. I don't remember. I was messed up
Speaker 2: on pain pills. He's trying to basically blackout that whole
Speaker 2: night and say like I don't really remember anything so
Speaker 2: that we can't like tie him to anything specifically. And
Speaker 2: I agree with you if he had just simply handed
Speaker 2: that sweater over, that's what you would say. You would
Speaker 2: want to get to the bottom of what happened. So
Speaker 2: it just leads me to believe that he knows a
Speaker 2: lot more than he's telling us.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm thinking as well. And it's also worth
Speaker 1: mentioning that Jill and Mark wound up breaking up a
Speaker 1: short time later, and she would say that one of
Speaker 1: the contributing factors is that she thought that Mark was
Speaker 1: acting very cold and insensitive towards her about Ronda's death,
Speaker 1: even though she had lost her best friend. So it
Speaker 1: almost feels like he has some sort of guilty knowledge
Speaker 1: as well. And I do think there's a good chance
Speaker 1: that Mark may have been the second man seen inside
Speaker 1: the blue Chevy alongside Greg. But like I said in
Speaker 1: his defense, Mark's own vehicle, a gold nineteen seventy seven
Speaker 1: Buick Regal, has never been placed at the scene, so
Speaker 1: if he was inside Greg's vehicle, I'm wondering where he
Speaker 1: parked the Buick Regal, and maybe if the witnesses just
Speaker 1: didn't see it. But I do think that after the
Speaker 1: murder took place, that if Mark was present, that he
Speaker 1: and Rake high tailed it out of there, and there's
Speaker 1: separate vehicles and have remained silent about it ever since.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that sounds like you're pretty good theory, because otherwise,
Speaker 2: if I guess if you parked your view a regal
Speaker 2: somewhere that like nobody could see, I don't really know
Speaker 2: what the landscape was like there, if there was somewhere
Speaker 2: that you could park to easily conceal a vehicle, and
Speaker 2: then maybe he just jumped in with Greg. That is
Speaker 2: entirely plausible. But do we know how loose the two
Speaker 2: of them were?
Speaker 1: Uh? I mean, they were friends, but it sounds like
Speaker 1: they were more like mutual friends, maybe just because he
Speaker 1: happened to be dating Ronda's best friend Jill. So I
Speaker 1: wouldn't say that they were close enough that if Greg
Speaker 1: committed a murder that Mark would be willing to stay
Speaker 1: silent and cover for him, unless he was somehow complicit
Speaker 1: and did something that could have got him charged with
Speaker 1: something criminally. But yeah, it does seem likely to me
Speaker 1: that after this took place, they went their separate ways
Speaker 1: and then Greg drove home told his father about what
Speaker 1: they did, and they helped cover for him and get
Speaker 1: rid of ittential evidence, and of course Charles decided to
Speaker 1: take the lead because when he got the call from
Speaker 1: the Hintsons about an hour later, he drives off to
Speaker 1: like the murder scene and accompanies the detectives to the
Speaker 1: hints In residences when they're informed about what happened to Ronda,
Speaker 1: so he can keep an eye on everything that's going
Speaker 1: on in the investigation. So, of course, when Larry Griffin
Speaker 1: wrote his series of articles many many years later, Greg
Speaker 1: did not want to talk to him. Betty did not
Speaker 1: want to talk to him. His mother, I think she
Speaker 1: was in a nursing home at that point. But surprisingly,
Speaker 1: in December of twenty twenty one, Charles, who was in
Speaker 1: his mid eighties at that point and had since remarried,
Speaker 1: agreed to sit down and give an interview to Larry Griffin.
Speaker 1: But his answers were considered to be evasive, and of
Speaker 1: course he denied any allegations that he was involved in
Speaker 1: Rhonda's murder or had made any inappropriate advances towards her.
Speaker 1: But at one point, even though Griffin never even brought
Speaker 1: up the subject of DNA, and Charles suddenly stated, out
Speaker 1: of the blue, quote and I don't believe they have
Speaker 1: my DNA either. I wasn't at the scene that night,
Speaker 1: so I didn't leave any DNA. I have never given
Speaker 1: any DNA to anyone, and I don't think they have
Speaker 1: Greg's either. End quote. And once again he said this
Speaker 1: completely out of the blue, even though Griffin never even
Speaker 1: brought up the topic of DNA.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I would say that that is unprompted. Basically, he's
Speaker 2: leaking some of the truth there. There's some kind of
Speaker 2: admission where he's the dude, doth protest too much, like Charles,
Speaker 2: you're doing too much. You should have said nothing at all,
Speaker 2: because every time you open your mouth, it's like these
Speaker 2: vague admissions.
Speaker 1: Exactly, And technically what he's saying might be true, because
Speaker 1: if the DNA belongs to Tim Plants or Alan Nicol,
Speaker 1: they probably were the ones who left it there. So
Speaker 1: it is true that neither Greg or Charles's DNA will
Speaker 1: be found at the scene. So he's saying that, so, hey,
Speaker 1: since I volunteered this, that proves that we have to
Speaker 1: be innocent because you have no physical evidence linking to
Speaker 1: the crime. But it just sounds like projection, like he's
Speaker 1: trying to like divert the suspicion away by talking about
Speaker 1: the evidence which seems to clear him.
Speaker 2: I think it's weird that Greg's DNA wouldn't be at
Speaker 2: the scene. It's a vehicle, it's his girlfriend's vehicle, and
Speaker 2: if he handed her those items of clothing, I would
Speaker 2: just think that, like his DNA would be all over
Speaker 2: that vehicle. It would be more odd to me if
Speaker 2: there was no DNA of his bound exactly.
Speaker 1: Like I'm sure that his DNA might not be on
Speaker 1: the sweater, the touch DNA, because I'm not entirely sure
Speaker 1: he touched her body that night, but it's reasonable to
Speaker 1: assume that his DNA is going to be on the
Speaker 1: jacket and the snake and a number of items in
Speaker 1: the car. And for all we know, maybe his fingerprints
Speaker 1: were on the window that conveniently went missing during the
Speaker 1: mid nineteen nineties. So there is evidence Lincoln into the scene.
Speaker 1: But yeah, it's it really does seem like there's a
Speaker 1: family cover up. And Greg is now in his sixties.
Speaker 1: He's gone on and gotten married and moved on with
Speaker 1: his life, And as far as I can tell, Charles
Speaker 1: is still alive. I think he would be eighty seven
Speaker 1: or eighty eight years old this year. But I think
Speaker 1: the good news is that Judy and Bobby Hinson are
Speaker 1: also both to alive in their eighties and they're still
Speaker 1: seeking answers. I know that they have constantly talked to
Speaker 1: Larry Griffin and the local media keeping Ronda's case in
Speaker 1: the spotlight, So they are still holding out hope that
Speaker 1: they will see a resolution in this case before they
Speaker 1: pass away.
Speaker 2: Yeah, my heart really goes out to Judy and Bobby.
Speaker 2: Feels like such an injustice when you have evidence go
Speaker 2: missing and you have these really good suspects who behave
Speaker 2: very very strangely, and Charles just who keeps popping up
Speaker 2: and saying stupid things, and Greg who behaved in a
Speaker 2: strange way in the aftermath. When we couple it with
Speaker 2: his coercive, controlling type behavior prior to Ronda's death, When
Speaker 2: we look at the way that he acted, the throwing
Speaker 2: up and the not speaking to anybody, everybody grieves differently.
Speaker 2: That is for sure a blanket statement that we apply
Speaker 2: to pretty much every case. When you try to analyze
Speaker 2: somebody's grief process, you really can't. All we can do
Speaker 2: is look at Greg in a holistic manner and say,
Speaker 2: this is a guy that it seems like there's a
Speaker 2: very strong likelihood that, personally, I believe that he was
Speaker 2: trying to scare her, maybe injure her. But I don't
Speaker 2: believe that he was trying to kill her, because I
Speaker 2: think if he was, he would have taken multiple shots,
Speaker 2: not just assumed that one shot would finish the job.
Speaker 1: That's what I'm thinking as well, And his constant vomiting
Speaker 1: later that morning gives me the impression that, like, if
Speaker 1: he had planned to kill her all along, he probably
Speaker 1: wouldn't be so overwhelmed with anxiety and guilt. But I
Speaker 1: think it was hitting him that I killed my girlfriend
Speaker 1: even though I wasn't intending to, And now I'm going
Speaker 1: to have to face the police and become a potential
Speaker 1: suspect any murder investigation. But of course, the big question
Speaker 1: now that I've heard all this new information is like,
Speaker 1: why wasn't any of this mentioned on Unsolved Mysteries back
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty nine, Because if I known about Greg
Speaker 1: McDowell and Charles McDowell and all this incriminating information, I
Speaker 1: would have looked at this case in a much different
Speaker 1: light when I covered it on the Trail Went Cold
Speaker 1: nine years ago, and I know Unsolved Mysteries has a
Speaker 1: history of suspects who have been willing to appear on
Speaker 1: camera and try to proclaim their innocence, and we've seen
Speaker 1: people like Jewel kal Or who have been themselves, yeah,
Speaker 1: the ultimate example where they just don't care how they
Speaker 1: look and make themselves appear even worse and more suspicious.
Speaker 1: But we've heard nothing about Greg McDowell or Charles McDowell.
Speaker 1: And I'd be curious to know if Unsolved Mysteries ever
Speaker 1: asked them to be interviewed and they said no, and
Speaker 1: they were probably thinking to themselves, well, they've never been
Speaker 1: named as suspects or persons of interest, so for legal reasons,
Speaker 1: we can't mention anything about them on this episode. And
Speaker 1: if you watch it today, if there are just so
Speaker 1: many red herrings, like the married man and like the
Speaker 1: man seen pulling the body out of the car, you
Speaker 1: realize that none of this has anything to do with it,
Speaker 1: and that the solution is probably a lot more simple.
Speaker 2: And I think if you were going to get anybody
Speaker 2: to talk, you'd likely be able to get Greg to
Speaker 2: like dig his own grave, because he seems to like
Speaker 2: to talk. Not Greg, Sorry, you're be able to get
Speaker 2: Charles to dig his own grave, whereas I think that
Speaker 2: Greg is a little more trepidacious, and he seems to
Speaker 2: be more cautious, maybe because he truly is guilty, that
Speaker 2: he feels guilty about what he's done. And if we're
Speaker 2: to look at the vomiting and we're too from that
Speaker 2: context of he feels really bad. It wasn't his intention
Speaker 2: to kill her, it was just to scare her, then
Speaker 2: maybe he doesn't trust himself to be able to hold
Speaker 2: back his guilt and to not appear like he feels
Speaker 2: really sorry for his actions. If he's to speak to somebody,
Speaker 2: so he's going to operate cautiously and to say I'm
Speaker 2: not going to talk to anybody because it's not going
Speaker 2: to help me in any way, shape or form.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's exactly what happened, because he has
Speaker 1: never been extensively interrogated, and I think it was because
Speaker 1: his parents automatically provided him with an alibi right away,
Speaker 1: saying he was home all night. And of course this
Speaker 1: is a small town not used to dealing with homicides,
Speaker 1: and Reverend Charles was a respected pastor in the communities,
Speaker 1: so they're probably never thinking that a guy like that
Speaker 1: is going to lie to protect his son from being
Speaker 1: a murder suspect. So Greg had never had to be
Speaker 1: extensively interrogated, and I don't think he's spoken to the
Speaker 1: police at all these past four decades. But he does
Speaker 1: fit the profile of someone if you got him in
Speaker 1: an interrogation room and you pushed him hard enough, then
Speaker 1: maybe he would eventually break and confess. But I think
Speaker 1: he's self aware enough not to do that. Whereas Charles McDowell,
Speaker 1: I could see him going on Unsolved Mysteries, pulling a
Speaker 1: jewel Kayler saying it was rough losing lurand at first,
Speaker 1: but now all things are pretty good.
Speaker 2: What one hundred percent? That is exactly the trajectory I
Speaker 2: was seeing too. I'm like, I'm surprised that Charles didn't
Speaker 2: do it, just because from what you've told me, I
Speaker 2: get the impression that he's like a little bit of
Speaker 2: a showboat.
Speaker 1: He is, yes, and the fact that he was so
Speaker 1: willing to speak with Larry Griffin all these years later,
Speaker 1: even though the case is going back into the spotlight,
Speaker 1: seems to me that he's someone who will defend his
Speaker 1: innocence no matter what, even if he could potentially incriminate himself.
Speaker 2: I love that Larry Griffin did this really deep dive
Speaker 2: and we're getting this view of Ronda that we would
Speaker 2: have never got, and all of these other people who
Speaker 2: are connected to or in tangentially connected to her, and
Speaker 2: all of these potentials and something that we looked at
Speaker 2: that could be this thing, maybe she's having an affair
Speaker 2: with a married man. Well, no, it's likely just a
Speaker 2: red herring because her friend asked her about that, because
Speaker 2: that was their experience and not Ronda's. And being able
Speaker 2: to find this context with all these gross interactions with
Speaker 2: Charles that we maybe can tie to these showers that
Speaker 2: she was taking and saying that she felt dirty and
Speaker 2: the big thing that she had to tell her dad
Speaker 2: that she just never got a chance to do. It's
Speaker 2: just so important in these cases to know these small details.
Speaker 2: So I really think Charles Griffin, wherever he is, for
Speaker 2: giving us this context and this nuance all of the
Speaker 2: layers of this case were able to look at it
Speaker 2: from a completely different lens.
Speaker 1: Yes, And I am actually hoping that he does a
Speaker 1: long form podcast at some point because there are just
Speaker 1: so many articles that I'm thinking to myself, this needs
Speaker 1: to be resented in podcast forms so that no more
Speaker 1: people get this whole story because the newspaper he wrote
Speaker 1: it in, the Wilkes Record, is a pretty small one,
Speaker 1: so I'd wag sure that the vast majority of people
Speaker 1: out there have never read this and are basing their
Speaker 1: assumption about this case based solely on the unsolved Mystery segment,
Speaker 1: which is now outdated and doesn't give the whole story.
Speaker 1: So I do hope that all this work eventually pays
Speaker 1: off and that maybe this will be featured on a
Speaker 1: bigger true crime show and a documentary series or a
Speaker 1: podcast series, because once you know the whole story, it
Speaker 1: seems pretty obvious that yes, this was not an accident
Speaker 1: by a stranger and was not ron to being killed
Speaker 1: by a married man. It just seems like she was
Speaker 1: killed by a strange boyfriend, Greg McDowell, and that he
Speaker 1: has somehow managed to get away with it for over
Speaker 1: forty years now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this would make a really excellent long form podcast.
Speaker 2: So yeah, I really hope Charles Griffin does that because
Speaker 2: you could really just get into the details here. There's
Speaker 2: so many interesting el men's and connections, so I would
Speaker 2: really hope he's got so much material to go with.
Speaker 1: Oh, definitely. Yes. Like I mentioned earlier, is I'd encourage
Speaker 1: after listening to this everyone like read these articles if
Speaker 1: he can, because there's so much information I couldn't get
Speaker 1: into here, because it goes so in depth about Ronda's
Speaker 1: life and so many of the other people in our life,
Speaker 1: and a lot of the stuff about the original investigation
Speaker 1: that it provides such a clear picture about what happened
Speaker 1: in this case.
Speaker 2: I'll get you to send me a write up on
Speaker 2: this case, link your sources so then people can go
Speaker 2: down to our sources and they can explore these articles
Speaker 2: that Charles Griffin wrote, because I know that a lot
Speaker 2: of people are going to finish listening to this episode
Speaker 2: and want to know more.
Speaker 1: Yes, and it's eighty one parts long, so pre prepared
Speaker 1: for a very large rabbit hole. So before we conclude
Speaker 1: any further thoughts on the murder of Ronda Hinson.
Speaker 2: No, this was a really interesting case. I'm glad that
Speaker 2: you chose this to share this with me, especially because
Speaker 2: it's got such vintage vibes that it goes back nine
Speaker 2: years to episode number four of The Trail Went Cold,
Speaker 2: back when you were a baby podcaster.
Speaker 1: Yes, yes, I probably cringe if I go back and
Speaker 1: listen to that episode now. But when people have always
Speaker 1: asked me over the years, is there any case you'd
Speaker 1: covered on The Trail Went Cold where you've changed your
Speaker 1: original thoughts since you released the episode. I always mentioned
Speaker 1: this one because, like I mentioned in that episode, I
Speaker 1: leaned towards ron as death being an accident with a
Speaker 1: stray bullet by a complete stranger. But now I've done
Speaker 1: a complete one eighty and think that she was likely
Speaker 1: killed by her boyfriend. So that ends our coverage about
Speaker 1: the murder of Ronda Hinson. Thank you so much for
Speaker 1: listening to us, and we will have Ashley back for
Speaker 1: our next Theories of episodes. But until then, have yourself,
Speaker 1: say a great series of weeks, Robin.
Speaker 2: Do you want to tell us a little bit about
Speaker 2: the Trail Went Cold? Patreon?
Speaker 1: Yes, The Trail and Cold Patreon has been around for
Speaker 1: three years now, and we offer these standard bonus features
Speaker 1: like early ad free episodes, and I also send out
Speaker 1: stickers and signed thank you cards to anyone who signs
Speaker 1: up with us on Patreon if you join our five
Speaker 1: dollar tier Tier two. We also offer monthly bonus episodes
Speaker 1: in which I talk about cases which are not featured
Speaker 1: on The Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive
Speaker 1: to Patreon and if you join our highest tier, Tier three,
Speaker 1: the ten dollars tier. One of the features we offer
Speaker 1: is a audio commentary track over classic episodes of Unsawved Mysteries,
Speaker 1: where you can download an audio file and then boot
Speaker 1: up the original Unsolved Mysteries episode on Amazon Prime or
Speaker 1: YouTube and play it with my audio commentary playing in
Speaker 1: the background, where I just provide trivia and factoids about
Speaker 1: the cases featured in this episode. And incidentally, the very
Speaker 1: first episode that I did a commentary track over was
Speaker 1: the episode featuring this case. So if you want to
Speaker 1: download a commentary track in which I make more smart
Speaker 1: ass remarks about Jewel Kaylor, then be sure to join
Speaker 1: Tier three.
Speaker 3: So I want to let you know a little bit
Speaker 3: about the Jeweles and Nashty. Patreon so there's early ad
Speaker 3: free episodes of The Path Went Chili. We've got our
Speaker 3: Path Went Chili minis, which are always over an so
Speaker 3: they're not very many, but they're just too short to
Speaker 3: turn into a series, and we're really enjoying doing those,
Speaker 3: so we hope you'll check out those patreons, we'll link
Speaker 3: them in the show notes.
Speaker 1: So I want to thank you all for listening, and
Speaker 1: any chance you have to share us on social media
Speaker 1: with a friend or to rate and review is greatly appreciated.
Speaker 1: You can email us at the Pathwentchili at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1: You can reach us on Twitter at the Pathwink. So
Speaker 1: until next time, be sure to bundle up because cold
Speaker 1: trails and chili pass call for warm clothing.
Speaker 2: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers Comedy