Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Pathwin Chili, I'm Robin.
Speaker 2: I'm Jules, and I'm Ashley. Let's dive right into this
Speaker 2: week's case.
Speaker 3: August third, nineteen eighty, Osable Township, Michigan, Twenty year old
Speaker 3: Charita Thomas borrows her friend's car to pick up her
Speaker 3: daughter from a babysitter, but the vehicle breaks down before
Speaker 3: she arrives. Witnesses see Charita climbing into a blue pickup
Speaker 3: truck driven by a white male, but she's never heard
Speaker 3: from again. Jimmy Allen Nelson, the babysitter's brother in law,
Speaker 3: is suspected of harming Sharita in a racially motivated hate crime,
Speaker 3: and even though Scharita's body is not found, Nelson is
Speaker 3: convicted of her murder. Three decades later, however, Nelson's conviction
Speaker 3: is overturned when new evidence surfaces which reportedly implicates another suspect,
Speaker 3: but no one else is charged with the crime, and
Speaker 3: Sharita remains a missing person.
Speaker 1: After that, the path went Chiley, So we've got a
Speaker 1: pretty convoluted missing persons case to cover today. The nineteen
Speaker 1: eighty disappearance of Charita Thomas, our future victim is a
Speaker 1: twenty year old African American woman who went missing over
Speaker 1: forty five years ago, and one theory is that her
Speaker 1: disappearance may have been a racially motivated hate crime. In fact,
Speaker 1: over two decades after Tarita's disappearance took place, a suspect
Speaker 1: named Jimmy Allen Nelson, who had a reputation for being
Speaker 1: a violent racist, wound up being charged and convicted of
Speaker 1: her murder, even though Tarita's body was never found. However,
Speaker 1: Nelson's conviction would be overturned after new evidence surfaced which
Speaker 1: allegedly pointed towards another suspect. Though specific details about why
Speaker 1: this happened have been sealed and kept hidden from the public.
Speaker 1: There have been a number of twists and turns in
Speaker 1: this story, and the reason I wound up learning about
Speaker 1: it is because it has a connection to a very
Speaker 1: controversial segment which was once featured on Unsolved Mysteries. But
Speaker 1: we'll go into more details about that a little later,
Speaker 1: but let's just say this is one of those cases
Speaker 1: where I started out feeling absolutely convinced of the prime
Speaker 1: suspect's guilt before I was thrown for a loop, and
Speaker 1: I now have a lot more questions than answers.
Speaker 2: Well, I have a lot of questions too when we
Speaker 2: start looking at this case. One we know in the
Speaker 2: American justice system, when we look at someone who has
Speaker 2: been convicted and then has their conviction overturned, that is
Speaker 2: incredibly rare, even when there is significant evidence presented in
Speaker 2: their case. So there had to be something so damning
Speaker 2: to say that there was an error. Maid's that this
Speaker 2: case was one reinvestigated whatsoever, and two a court went
Speaker 2: all the way through with actually reversing his conviction. That's
Speaker 2: a major step in our justice system. There's cases where
Speaker 2: we have DNA matching another suspect and the person's still
Speaker 2: not released. The story just morphs to include that person
Speaker 2: in the crime. So I'd be so fascinated to know
Speaker 2: what that information is. But you said, it's been quite quiet.
Speaker 2: The other thing we see here is that we know
Speaker 2: that she was actually getting into a blue pickup truck
Speaker 2: by a being driven by a white driver, and that
Speaker 2: that's the last time she seems to be recognized anywhere.
Speaker 2: It is scary because it does play into this idea
Speaker 2: of was this something a racially motivated crime and who
Speaker 2: was driving that blue truck? In the end, when we look,
Speaker 2: do we know if Nelson had a blue truck?
Speaker 1: He did, Yes, And as we're going to go along,
Speaker 1: we're going to mention a whole bunch of compelling pieces
Speaker 1: of circumstantial evidence against him, where at first glance you're
Speaker 1: probably going to think this is the right guy, because
Speaker 1: regardless of whether he's guilty or innocent, it does not
Speaker 1: sound like he's a good person. Yet, completely out of
Speaker 1: the blue, his conviction wound up being overturned. And this
Speaker 1: is very out of the norm, like you said, because
Speaker 1: it's the prosecution who takes the initiative and decides to
Speaker 1: drop the charges because of new information that they supposedly uncovered,
Speaker 1: but they have still to this day not publicly revealed
Speaker 1: what they found. But like you said, it's just so
Speaker 1: rare that it must have been pretty compelling if they're
Speaker 1: willing to drop what looked like, on the surface, a
Speaker 1: pretty compelling case against Jimmie Allen Nelson.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and when they drop a case, they're saying, we
Speaker 2: messed up, we did something wrong, or we failed to
Speaker 2: provide the justice he deserved. And that takes quite a
Speaker 2: special prosecutor to be willing to admit that. So fascinating
Speaker 2: and like you said, it had to be pretty darned powerful.
Speaker 3: Our story begins in Michigan in nineteen eighty and our
Speaker 3: central figure is twenty year old African American woman named
Speaker 3: Cherita Thomas who's currently living in a apartment in the
Speaker 3: town of Oscota with her four year old daughter, as
Speaker 3: well as her fiance, William Merritt, who's enlisted in the
Speaker 3: Air Force. One of Sharita's best friends is a woman
Speaker 3: named Patricia Bates, who also happens to be one of
Speaker 3: her neighbors in the apartment building and has two children
Speaker 3: of her own. On Sunday, August third, Patricia was planning
Speaker 3: to travel to the nearby town of Mikado to see
Speaker 3: one of her friends play in a softball tournament, and
Speaker 3: Sharita wanted to go with her, so they made arrangements
Speaker 3: for Patricia's sister, Anna Bouchard to babysit their kids. The
Speaker 3: two women, along with Sharita's daughter and Patricia's two children,
Speaker 3: climbed into Patricia's car, an AMC Matador, and traveled to
Speaker 3: Ossable Township, where they dropped off the kids with Anna.
Speaker 3: They then stopped off at the Wurtsmith Air Force Base
Speaker 3: so Sharita could borrow some money from her fiance William,
Speaker 3: before driving to the Hilltop Bar in Oscota.
Speaker 2: For a drink.
Speaker 3: While there, they briefly ran into twenty eight eight year
Speaker 3: old Jimmy Allen Nelson, who happened to be Anna's brother
Speaker 3: in law, before they left to travel to Mikado for
Speaker 3: the softball tournament. After finding out that Patricia's friend was
Speaker 3: not actually playing in the game that was scheduled, they
Speaker 3: decided to grab something to eat at the Mikado tavern.
Speaker 3: While they were there, Patricia recalled that many of the
Speaker 3: patrons stared at them and made them feel so uncomfortable
Speaker 3: that both she and Sharita stepped into the ladies room
Speaker 3: together for a moment in order to chat. When they
Speaker 3: walked out, one of the patrons shouted out, quote, did
Speaker 3: you two have a good time in there? This prompted
Speaker 3: Sharita and Patricia to leave the tavern, and while they
Speaker 3: were doing so, the bartender told them not to come back.
Speaker 2: Do we know much about this interaction because it sounds
Speaker 2: like they're being harassed and mistreated, But do we know
Speaker 2: why they were asked not to come back in? Is
Speaker 2: this something because he's being a jerk, or he's being
Speaker 2: racist or making assumptions, or were the girls getting into
Speaker 2: a verbal altercation with people. What happened and when they
Speaker 2: reacted to these people harassing.
Speaker 1: Them, it sounds like a speculation that this was kind
Speaker 1: of a racist area, and because Trida was black, they
Speaker 1: maybe just did not like her being in their establishment,
Speaker 1: and they were giving like the cold eye to both
Speaker 1: her and Patricia because Patricia is white, and they probably
Speaker 1: did not like the idea of a black girl and
Speaker 1: a white girl being friends. And that's probably why they
Speaker 1: gave that sarcastic comment when they went into the bathroom together,
Speaker 1: this black friend and his white friend, did you two
Speaker 1: have a good time in there, maybe trying to imply
Speaker 1: that they felt they were lesbians or something, And that's
Speaker 1: when they started getting the hints that these people don't
Speaker 1: want us here and it's time to go.
Speaker 4: Wow.
Speaker 2: So it really was a racially don't come back in here,
Speaker 2: like you're not welcome here.
Speaker 1: That's what it sounds like. Yeah, like they never explicitly
Speaker 1: said it, but the way that the entire bar stopped
Speaker 1: and started staring at them the moment that Trida walked
Speaker 1: in through the door and this is known for being
Speaker 1: a predominantly white conservative area. It seems like they just
Speaker 1: did not want a woman of color in their establishment.
Speaker 3: That sounds terrifying. I can't even imagine you go in
Speaker 3: with your friend to grab a drink and every single
Speaker 3: person at the bar is staring at you. Of course
Speaker 3: they wanted to go to the bathroom together, and then
Speaker 3: to think that they probably are not only racist, but
Speaker 3: they're anti gay or anti LGBTQIA plus, so you have
Speaker 3: a situation where they're implying that these women didn't go
Speaker 3: to the bathroom just to seek comfort in each other,
Speaker 3: that they're gay, and then that might add just another
Speaker 3: layer of complexity and hate to the situation. It sounds
Speaker 3: very charged, it does.
Speaker 1: It sounds like a scene you'd see in like the
Speaker 1: Deep South, in like the nineteen twenties or thirties. But
Speaker 1: this is Michigan in nineteen eighties. So I think it
Speaker 1: kind of took them completely aback that they would go
Speaker 1: into this town that was near to where they lived,
Speaker 1: and you then just have a feeling of being completely
Speaker 1: unwelcome there and almost that their lives were being threatened.
Speaker 1: So Treda and Patricia finally went to see the softball tournament,
Speaker 1: and after it concluded, the tea seemed that Patricia's friend
Speaker 1: played on went to the Macado tavern for drinks, and
Speaker 1: in spite of the uncomfortable situation they had experienced at
Speaker 1: the tavern earlier that afternoon, Trida and Patricia decided to
Speaker 1: accompany them there. However, sometime after they arrived, Trida said
Speaker 1: that she wanted to leave so she could get back
Speaker 1: home before fiance returned from work. Since Patricia wanted to
Speaker 1: stay out later, she agreed to let Trida borrower car
Speaker 1: and said she would find her own way home. She
Speaker 1: also drew up a map to her sister Anda's place
Speaker 1: in Ausable Township so that Schrida could drive there and
Speaker 1: pick up the three children before returning to their apartment
Speaker 1: building in Oscata. Trida left Macado and Patricia's mattador, and
Speaker 1: after spending a couple more hours at the tavern, Patricia
Speaker 1: was given a ride back to her apartment at around
Speaker 1: two thirty am on August fourth. However, she was surprised
Speaker 1: to see that the mattador was not parked outside, and
Speaker 1: after phoning Anna, she learned that Trida had never shown
Speaker 1: up to pick up the children. Patricia then spoke to
Speaker 1: Triita's fiance, William, who to that Charita had not yet
Speaker 1: arrived home and he had no idea where she was.
Speaker 1: They subsequently contacted the Ascota Township Police Department to report
Speaker 1: Charita missing, but it wasn't long before they informed Patricia
Speaker 1: that her abandoned Matador had been discovered on Sunset Street
Speaker 1: in a Sable Township, only two blocks away from Anna's residence.
Speaker 1: There was no trace of Treeda, and even though the
Speaker 1: vehicle's keys were missing, Charita's apartment keys, cigarettes, and the
Speaker 1: map to Anna's place which Patricia had drawn up were
Speaker 1: still inside. The Mattador had broken down because of a
Speaker 1: leaky radiator, and it wasn't long before police were able
Speaker 1: to retrace the car's steps to figure out how it
Speaker 1: got there.
Speaker 2: Okay, this is really frustrating because you see Sharita kind
Speaker 2: of in this Charita. This is really frustrating because you
Speaker 2: see Charita in this kind of compromise situation where she's
Speaker 2: relying on her friend for transportation. She needs to get
Speaker 2: her kids, and still she says, Okay, I can I
Speaker 2: borrow your car? Or the friend says you can borrow
Speaker 2: my car. So she's trying to be responsible while the
Speaker 2: friend wants to stay out late. She says, I can't.
Speaker 2: I gotta go get the kids. I gotta go home
Speaker 2: to my fiance. And so you see a woman who's
Speaker 2: making good choices that evening. And you know, if you're
Speaker 2: a young woman broken down on the side of the road,
Speaker 2: you don't know how to examine your car or fix
Speaker 2: your car. So I'm assuming we have no cell phones.
Speaker 1: What year is this, nineteen eighty Yeah, okay, yeah.
Speaker 2: We definitely have no cell phones back then. And so
Speaker 2: Charita is sitting there thinking, how do I get help? Well,
Speaker 2: the only way you're going to get help is to
Speaker 2: thumb down or wave down somebody and pray to God
Speaker 2: that they're able to help you. Remember, there wasn't as
Speaker 2: much panic back then because we didn't have social media
Speaker 2: in the news telling you all the time how awful
Speaker 2: crime was. So I bet Charita really believed if I
Speaker 2: can get somebody to help me, I can get back
Speaker 2: to a place where I can contact my fiance, I
Speaker 2: can go to Anna's house, those kinds of things, And
Speaker 2: instead almost seems as if when she did trust somebody,
Speaker 2: they could have taken her life.
Speaker 1: That definitely sounds like what probably did happen is that
Speaker 1: she just broke down it was bad luck, and tried
Speaker 1: to get a ride with someone, but it just happened
Speaker 1: to be the wrong person. But the big answered question
Speaker 1: in this case was this just a complete stranger who
Speaker 1: was just passing by there by chance, or could it
Speaker 1: have been someone who was following Tarita from the tavern
Speaker 1: and got their eye on her and then just decided
Speaker 1: to take advantage of the situation After the car broke.
Speaker 3: Down, Investigators learn after leaving the Mikado Tavern on the
Speaker 3: evening of August third, Sharita had been traveling through Oscota
Speaker 3: when steam started leaking from the Matador's hood and it
Speaker 3: broke down at an intersection. A trio of teenage boys
Speaker 3: stopped to help her and discovered the leak in the radiator,
Speaker 3: so they refilled it with water and put some duct
Speaker 3: tape over the hose as a temporary solution. While this
Speaker 3: was going on, the teens claimed that a man driving
Speaker 3: a blue pickup truck passed by and gave them and
Speaker 3: of a scene gesture. Charita got back into the Matador
Speaker 3: and drove away, but the radiator evidently broke down again
Speaker 3: when she was driving down Sunset Street in O Sable Township.
Speaker 3: An eyewitness would claim that he saw Sharita walking down
Speaker 3: the street away from the vehicle while steam was leaking
Speaker 3: out of its hood. However, he then saw Sharita returned
Speaker 3: to the scene a short time later in a blue
Speaker 3: Ford pickup truck being driven by a white male. Another
Speaker 3: eyewitness would later say that they thought they might have
Speaker 3: seen a third person inside the truck, but could not
Speaker 3: be certain. After making an unsuccessful attempt to start the
Speaker 3: Matador again, Charita and the man climbed back into the
Speaker 3: truck before it drove away at around eleven fifteen pm,
Speaker 3: and unfortunately, this would turn out to be the last
Speaker 3: time that Scharita was confirmed to be alive.
Speaker 2: So, okay, this is interesting because you have this idea
Speaker 2: that it's possible multiple people stop to help her, and
Speaker 2: then you have this that's confirmed.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 2: We know that those three boys were there.
Speaker 1: Uh yeah, the teens, like they weren't involved in her disappearance,
Speaker 1: but they came to the police and said that, yes,
Speaker 1: we pulled over and helped give her water because the
Speaker 1: radiator was overheating.
Speaker 2: Okay, so they get kind of intercepted by this blue truck,
Speaker 2: and that's where we find out this information that is
Speaker 2: very reliable, given that these boys were present at the
Speaker 2: scene and they what's said, is it those trio of boys.
Speaker 2: Had they been the only ones to arrive, she would
Speaker 2: likely would have returned home that evening and been just
Speaker 2: fine because they seemed like kids that said, there's a
Speaker 2: poor lady on the side of the road. We're going
Speaker 2: to stop and help her. How devastating that this blue
Speaker 2: truck pulls up and most likely that entire hopeful situation
Speaker 2: turns into absolute horror.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what I'm wondering. Was this guy in the
Speaker 1: blue pickup truck following Treeda for a long time, like
Speaker 1: maybe all the way from the tavern, or was it
Speaker 1: just a chance encounter where the first time her truck
Speaker 1: brought her truck broke down, he just happened to be
Speaker 1: passing by and saw that these teenage boys were helping
Speaker 1: her and then thought, Hm, she's got an unreliable truck.
Speaker 1: Maybe I'll follow her for a while to see if
Speaker 1: it breaks down again. And unfortunately, it seems like that's
Speaker 1: likely what happened. Where she needed to get some help,
Speaker 1: and even though he had supposedly given an obscene gesture,
Speaker 1: I guess treated didn't feel fearful of him or anything,
Speaker 1: because she was willing to briefly climb into the truck
Speaker 1: with him and return to the scene of her car
Speaker 1: and then drive away. So that makes you wonder could
Speaker 1: it have been someone she known rather than a complete stranger.
Speaker 3: Doesn't it strike you both as odd that if this
Speaker 3: person's objective was to harm Sarita, that he would then
Speaker 3: drive her back to her vehicle to try to get
Speaker 3: it up and operational.
Speaker 1: It makes me wonder if it might be a thing
Speaker 1: where he wasn't planning to kill her at first, Like
Speaker 1: maybe he thought, well, if I help her, she'll have
Speaker 1: sex with me or something like that, and then she
Speaker 1: resisted and fought him off, and then things escalated into violence.
Speaker 1: So may be a thing where he thought that he
Speaker 1: was going to take adage of her. But then after
Speaker 1: she climbed to new his truck for the second time,
Speaker 1: something went horribly wrong after they left the scene. So
Speaker 1: a search effort was launched for Trida, but it wasn't
Speaker 1: long before investigators focused on a potential suspect. Anna Bouchard's
Speaker 1: brother in law, Jimmy Allen Nelson. As you recall, Treeda
Speaker 1: and Patricia had briefly bumped into Jimmy at the Hilltop
Speaker 1: Bar several hours before Treeda vanished. Jimmy participated in the
Speaker 1: initial search effort for Trida, but one week after she
Speaker 1: went missing, he drew the attention of investigators when a
Speaker 1: woman came forward and accused Jimmy of sexually molesting her
Speaker 1: and also said that he was a violent racist. Indeed,
Speaker 1: a number of other people would back up allegations that
Speaker 1: Jimmy often expressed his dislike for African American people. One
Speaker 1: of these people was the bartender at the Hilltop, who
Speaker 1: claimed that Jimmy freely used the N word and once
Speaker 1: told her quote, the only good N word is a dead,
Speaker 1: one end quote. In fact, according to Anna Bouchard, Jimmy
Speaker 1: had once gotten angry with there for allowing Charita into
Speaker 1: her home because she was black. Jimmy also happened to
Speaker 1: live on Sunset Street with his wife and children, not
Speaker 1: too far from where the Matador broke down, and he
Speaker 1: drove a blue pickup truck. This made police wonder if
Speaker 1: Tarita's disappearance might have been a racially motivated hate crime,
Speaker 1: as she lived in a predominantly white, conservative area. Since
Speaker 1: the case was looked at as a potential hate crime,
Speaker 1: the FBI would be brought into assist with the investigation.
Speaker 1: When Jimmy was questioned, he did admit to owning two
Speaker 1: pickup trucks, one of which was a blue Ford brand
Speaker 1: while the other was red and orange, but he said
Speaker 1: his wife was borrowing the blue one. In the end,
Speaker 1: please never did get a chance to search Jimmy's blue
Speaker 1: pickup truck because their investigation soon turned towards another promising suspect.
Speaker 2: Interesting, Okay, so we'll talk about that promising suspect in
Speaker 2: a minute. But when you look at Jimmy, Jimmy actually
Speaker 2: already knew Anna. I mean, he knew Anna. But did
Speaker 2: he already know Sharita or is that Charita or is
Speaker 2: that somebody that he was going to meet?
Speaker 1: He had met her before. I mean, I don't think
Speaker 1: he knew her any more than casually, because I think
Speaker 1: he'd been present when his sister in law Anna, like
Speaker 1: let Chrida into the house, and that's why he got
Speaker 1: so mad at her about it. And then he bumped
Speaker 1: into Patricia and Schrida at the bar like a couple
Speaker 1: hours before Trieda went missing. So theoretically, if he had
Speaker 1: pulled up in a blue pickup truck, it's possible that
Speaker 1: Treeda might have felt comfortable enough with him to climb
Speaker 1: inside with him. Because I'm not sure if she was
Speaker 1: aware at that time that he had a reputation for
Speaker 1: being a racist. I don't know if he had displayed
Speaker 1: any racist behavior in front of her. So that's why
Speaker 1: at the outset it looks plausible because he owned a
Speaker 1: blue pickup truck that he could have been the guy
Speaker 1: that picked Trieda up.
Speaker 3: Even if it was the case that he came off
Speaker 3: as mildly racist, I would think that, given the way
Speaker 3: that that evening had gone and there wasn't any other
Speaker 3: options of anybody picking her up, mildly racist would have
Speaker 3: been not as bad as what she was experiencing at
Speaker 3: the bar, and it would feel very unsafe to be
Speaker 3: alone on the road. So I really feel for Charita,
Speaker 3: especially if she knew that he was a racist, but
Speaker 3: we can't be sure if she did. But either way,
Speaker 3: if that is your best option, it's nighttime and you're
Speaker 3: alone and you're in an unsafe situation that that is
Speaker 3: the person that you have to choose to be your like,
Speaker 3: quote unquote savior at that moment. It's terrifying.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's really it's really terrifying. And you have this
Speaker 2: idea that I was wondering if they knew each other,
Speaker 2: like deeply, because if they did, I was wondering, you know,
Speaker 2: did he not present that way with her, like, Oh,
Speaker 2: she's an exception to the rule, because I've met really
Speaker 2: ignorant people who will be like, oh yeah, but not her.
Speaker 2: You know, she's she's she's a cool person. You know,
Speaker 2: I'm not. I don't hate her. I just hate most
Speaker 2: of those people, right, They're just ignorant and in mean.
Speaker 2: And so when you sit here and you have Charita
Speaker 2: and Patricia where they have bumped into him, if it's
Speaker 2: not this kind of deep familiarity with him, I wonder
Speaker 2: if she was aware of his racist tendencies, if it
Speaker 2: was just such a passer by thing that he presented
Speaker 2: as someone who was comforting and someone who was safe.
Speaker 2: But that's my first thought is that how would he
Speaker 2: be manipulating his way? Did he follow her there? But
Speaker 2: didn't we know down the road. There's another suspect you're
Speaker 2: about to tell me about. And we know that somebody
Speaker 2: was so incredibly likely involved in this case that they
Speaker 2: dropped the conviction against him down the road. So was
Speaker 2: it not even him? And we're going down a rabbit
Speaker 2: hole trying to see how he gained access to her
Speaker 2: when it probably wasn't him.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what's bizarre, because, like I said, just hearing
Speaker 1: this information now you're thinking, Okay, this has to be
Speaker 1: the right guy. Yet, for reasons that we still don't
Speaker 1: know to this day, the state would eventually drop the
Speaker 1: charges against him.
Speaker 3: So on August thirteenth, a man named Grant Goddard broke
Speaker 3: into a wealthy family's vacation residence in Alcona County, Michigan,
Speaker 3: alongside his son Kenneth in order to perform a burglary. However,
Speaker 3: they crossed paths with the property's caretaker, George Wistmiller, and
Speaker 3: wound up fatally shooting him. At the time, Grant Goddard
Speaker 3: was already a wanted fugitive on federal charges, but after
Speaker 3: he and his son were taken into custody for wist
Speaker 3: Miller's murder, they both accused the other of being the
Speaker 3: one who pulled the trigger. It would be Kenneth Goddard,
Speaker 3: who was ultimately convicted of the crime, but he told
Speaker 3: investigators that his father was involved in Schirita's disappearance, so
Speaker 3: they started looking for possible links. Grant could be placed
Speaker 3: in the area around the approximate time period Sharita went missing,
Speaker 3: and he owned a blue pickup truck. He also resembled
Speaker 3: the unidentified white male driver who was seen with Scharita,
Speaker 3: and he seemed to have a stronger resemblance than Jimmy
Speaker 3: Allen Nelson. Months after Sharita's disappearance, Grant's truck was found
Speaker 3: abandoned and stripped down in a national forest in a
Speaker 3: Scota Well. Grant was eventually sent to prison for his
Speaker 3: role in George whistle Miller's murder, but it was not
Speaker 3: until nineteen ninety three when the FBI formally interviewed him
Speaker 3: about his potential role in what happened to Sharita. Grant
Speaker 3: initially said that someone had once asked him to assist
Speaker 3: in the disposal of a black woman, but he later
Speaker 3: admitted he was lying about this because he hoped investigators
Speaker 3: would take him out of prison to help search for
Speaker 3: her body, giving him a potential chance to escape. In addition,
Speaker 3: Kenneth Goddard also confessed that he'd lied about his father
Speaker 3: being responsible for Cherita's disappearance because he wanted to get
Speaker 3: revenge on Grant for his decision to testify against him
Speaker 3: when he went on trial for wist Miller's murder. A
Speaker 3: more thorough investigation eventually determined that Grant had an alibi
Speaker 3: on the night Jarita went missing, so he was ruled
Speaker 3: out as a suspect in her case.
Speaker 2: Well that's a pretty deep sick twist that comes into this, right.
Speaker 2: You have a missing person that we were assuming met
Speaker 2: some type of terrible fate. And not only do you
Speaker 2: have somebody falsely confess saying that they could help you
Speaker 2: find the body, but their own son had turned against them, saying, hey,
Speaker 2: you know my dad, you need to look at him.
Speaker 2: And so both of these men are working the system
Speaker 2: and manipulating the system. But it's so bizarre because the
Speaker 2: son's seeking revenge and trying to protect his own legal
Speaker 2: self and the dad takes it and goes with it. It's
Speaker 2: something that I've never heard of before. I've heard someone
Speaker 2: turning someone in falsely and saying, pursue this. I've heard
Speaker 2: of someone falsely confessing and saying, hey, it got me
Speaker 2: out of prison for a little bit, or you know,
Speaker 2: I got me out of jail for a little bit.
Speaker 1: Let me help.
Speaker 2: But together they seem so counterproductive and so kind of
Speaker 2: against one another.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what kind of relationship would they have had, just
Speaker 1: the fact that they commit a crime together and then
Speaker 1: they totally turn on the other after they've been arrested
Speaker 1: and try to pit all the blame for the murder
Speaker 1: on their father or their son. Though I guess in
Speaker 1: the end it determined that kennetha was the one who
Speaker 1: actually pulled the trigger and killed George Wistmaller. But I
Speaker 1: don't know any details about Grant Goddard's alibi, so I
Speaker 1: don't know what evidence they used to completely rule him out.
Speaker 1: But I think this was detrimental to the investigation because
Speaker 1: they spent so many years investigating the Guitards that they
Speaker 1: took their focus off Jimmy Allen Nelson, and this may
Speaker 1: have prevented them from exploring more compelling leads. So after
Speaker 1: Gadar was ruled out, investigators decided to take a fresh
Speaker 1: look at Jimmy Allen Nelson, who had since moved to Houston, Texas.
Speaker 1: Over a period of two decades, Jimmy would be interviewed
Speaker 1: several times by both the police and the FBI, but
Speaker 1: provided so many conflicting statements and inconsistencies in his stories
Speaker 1: that the authorities became convinced he was involved. At one point,
Speaker 1: he claimed to have not even known treat at all,
Speaker 1: even though he had been seen at the Hilltop Bar
Speaker 1: with her and Patricia Bates on the day she went missing.
Speaker 1: During an interview with the FBI in March of two
Speaker 1: thousand and one, Jimmy suddenly told them a completely news story,
Speaker 1: claiming that he had just seen a hypnotist, causing his
Speaker 1: memory to prove He now admitted that he was the
Speaker 1: driver of the blue pickup truck seen giving Treeda a
Speaker 1: ride before she disappeared. Jimmy said he had been at
Speaker 1: the Hilltop Bar that night when Tchorita arrived and told
Speaker 1: him that Patricia's mattador broke down on Sunset Street, so
Speaker 1: he gave her a ride there. When they failed to
Speaker 1: get the car started, he drove Trieda to her apartment
Speaker 1: so she could pick up her keys and purse, and
Speaker 1: at her request, he then drove her to an establishment
Speaker 1: called Wiltsey's Restaurant. After dropping Trida off there sometime after
Speaker 1: eleven to fifteen pm. Jimmy maintained that he never saw
Speaker 1: her again and claimed that he never told anybody about
Speaker 1: this earlier because Chreeda asked him not to.
Speaker 2: Okay, that doesn't seem to make sense, because supposedly these
Speaker 2: three teenage boys who were actually good Samaritans, see this
Speaker 2: blue truck come up in the middle of it, and
Speaker 2: he's saying that she comes back into the bar, asks
Speaker 2: for help. He drives her to go get all of
Speaker 2: the things she needs to actually go get her children
Speaker 2: and go back to her fiance, and that's the end
Speaker 2: of the story. But you're admitting you were the blue
Speaker 2: truck driver, but you're not including the correct steps of
Speaker 2: what these boys say actually happened.
Speaker 1: And another big hole in his story is that he
Speaker 1: said he was at the bar when Trieda walked there
Speaker 1: and told him that her car was broken down. But
Speaker 1: it was a great distance, something like ten or fifteen
Speaker 1: miles from the Plazer car broke down to the Hilltop bar,
Speaker 1: So there's no way she walked there on foot, and
Speaker 1: you're thinking to yourself, is this just the result of
Speaker 1: him having a bad memory, or is he completely lying?
Speaker 1: And of course he's telling a story with a lot
Speaker 1: of holes in it. But as we're going to talk
Speaker 1: about later, the police no longer seemed convinced that he's
Speaker 1: the guy. So is he just making this up to
Speaker 1: toy with the authorities, or is just his memory bad
Speaker 1: and he's confused about what happened? Or is there a
Speaker 1: legitimately some truth here. Did he drop Trida off at
Speaker 1: this restaurant and maybe something happened to her afterwards.
Speaker 3: However, there were a number of holes in Jimmy's story.
Speaker 3: The investigating agent spoke to the owner of Wilty's restaurant,
Speaker 3: who informed them that the establishment would not have been
Speaker 3: open after eleven to fifteen pm. When confronted with this,
Speaker 3: Jimmy said that even though the restaurant was closed, there
Speaker 3: were still employees inside who were cleaning, and he saw
Speaker 3: them let Sharita inside. But once again, the restaurant's owner
Speaker 3: disputed this, maintaining they always closed at eight pm on
Speaker 3: Sundays and that it would have only taken the staff
Speaker 3: around forty to ninety minutes to clean before they left.
Speaker 3: Jimmy then responded by saying his memory was faulty and
Speaker 3: he could not actually remember where he dropped Scharita off
Speaker 3: that night. Another major hole in Jimmy's story was his
Speaker 3: claim that he stopped by Charita's apartment so that she
Speaker 3: could pick up her purse, while when Sharita's fiance, William
Speaker 3: Merrett arrived till him that night, he maintained that Sharita's
Speaker 3: purse was there, and since Shrida's apartment keys were found
Speaker 3: inside the mattador, how would she have gotten inside to
Speaker 3: begin with. Investigators would also speak to numerous witnesses who
Speaker 3: claimed that Jimmy had asked them to lie to the
Speaker 3: authorities in order to back up his stories, but they
Speaker 3: refused to do so. For example, when Jimmy frequented the
Speaker 3: Hilltop Bar on the evening of August third, the bartender
Speaker 3: was certain that he drove his blue pickup truck there,
Speaker 3: but he allegedly kept pushing her to say that he
Speaker 3: had actually driven his red and orange truck. According to
Speaker 3: the bartender, she never saw Jimmy drive his blue pickup
Speaker 3: at all. Following Sharita's disappearance, as he apparently kept it
Speaker 3: in his backyard surrounded by two or three feet of firewood.
Speaker 3: He sold the truck sometime during the nineteen nineties and
Speaker 3: once told the bartender that the police would need a
Speaker 3: warrant if they wanted to search it. In addition, the
Speaker 3: bartender said that Jimmy seemed to mellow out with his
Speaker 3: racist attitudes after Sharita went missing and started speaking with
Speaker 3: and being more cordial towards black people.
Speaker 2: It's like he was manipulating the entire situation, like, let
Speaker 2: me change my approach and my social mask that I
Speaker 2: wear that I'm not racist, that you know, I don't
Speaker 2: have problem with any anybody, no matter what color they are.
Speaker 2: And he's actually going and asking people to change their story.
Speaker 2: Very very frustrating, and it's kind of unsettling that that
Speaker 2: blue truck wasn't searched, that those teen boys when they
Speaker 2: came forward and said, hey, there was this blue truck
Speaker 2: and they linked Nelson to it, that there wasn't an
Speaker 2: extensive examination of the truck, because I wonder what they
Speaker 2: would have found and what could have been processed decades later.
Speaker 2: Even if it couldn't have been tested back in nineteen eighty.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's why it's kind of frustrating that that
Speaker 1: whole lead with the Grant and Kenneth Gadard popped up,
Speaker 1: because they started putting all their focus on them, even
Speaker 1: though it's unlikely that they were responsible and if Jimmy was,
Speaker 1: If Jimmy really was the one who was responsible, he
Speaker 1: would have had ample time to cover his tracks and
Speaker 1: dispose of evidence that could have implicated him. The authorities
Speaker 1: became interested in a deer hunting camp that Jimmy had owned,
Speaker 1: which was located in Huron National Forest on the edge
Speaker 1: of Oscata. Simmy just seemed to abandon the camp and
Speaker 1: stop using it. After Treda vanished, they decided to perform
Speaker 1: a search of the property, which would lead to another
Speaker 1: surprising development. Now, remember how I mentioned during the intro
Speaker 1: that this case had a connection to a controversial story
Speaker 1: from Unsolved Mysteries. Well, in two thousand and one, the
Speaker 1: show produced a segment about a dog handler named Sandra
Speaker 1: Anderson and her Doberman pincher, Eagle. Anders's job involved training
Speaker 1: dogs for search and rescue work, and Eagle was a
Speaker 1: cadaver dog with an amazing sense of smell who supposedly
Speaker 1: had a special ability to sniff out human remains. There
Speaker 1: were already several documented cases of Eagle uncovering bones which
Speaker 1: had been buried at hard to find locations. So in
Speaker 1: April of two thousand and two, the FBI in the
Speaker 1: Oskota Township Police Department decided to enlist Anderson's services, as
Speaker 1: she had Eagle perform a search of Jimmy's deer hunting
Speaker 1: camp and Huron National Forest. Well, sure enough, on the
Speaker 1: second day of the search, Eagle uncovered some human remains,
Speaker 1: and everyone initially believed that Treeda had finally been found.
Speaker 1: But there was one problem. Sandra Anderson turned out to
Speaker 1: be a complete and utter fraud.
Speaker 2: I remember this case of Sandra Anderson, not necessarily the
Speaker 2: investigation of this property, but I remember her being exposed
Speaker 2: as a fraud and that she was leading and planting evidence,
Speaker 2: leading the dog to certain places, and she was doing
Speaker 2: it to get a reputation, to gain notoriety, but was
Speaker 2: linked to so many different local and federal cases devastating.
Speaker 2: So she's actually involved in Charita's disappearance.
Speaker 1: Well, she participated in the search effort, and it was
Speaker 1: actually Charita's case which led to Anderson being caught and
Speaker 1: exposed as a fraud. I'm sure you were going to
Speaker 1: give a shocked reaction when we told you what happened next,
Speaker 1: But it sounds like you're already familiar with this story.
Speaker 2: Yes, I just remember her name because I remember taking
Speaker 2: a course where we looked at subjective of sciences, and
Speaker 2: you know, they call them junk sciences, but they're in
Speaker 2: some cases, like odentology, when you're looking at bitemarks, right,
Speaker 2: there is some type of scientific backing, but it does
Speaker 2: require a human eye and subjective analysis of those scientific elements.
Speaker 2: And so, but when you look at cadaver dogs, there's
Speaker 2: been a huge exploration as to what extent is the
Speaker 2: human being at the end of the leash or directing
Speaker 2: that dog? Are they influencing that investigation? And it becomes
Speaker 2: much more tempting to kind of mess with those results.
Speaker 2: So you got to tell me more because I know her.
Speaker 2: I do not know this case.
Speaker 3: Whenever Eagle dug up human remains during search efforts for
Speaker 3: missing persons, DNA testing would often reveal that the bones
Speaker 3: did not match the victims. On the day Charita's remains
Speaker 3: were supposedly found, a Lescota police officer named Mark David
Speaker 3: was bothered by an incident where Anderson searched a creek
Speaker 3: and found what appeared to be a knucklebone. Well, David
Speaker 3: had searched that same creek only moments earlier and found nothing,
Speaker 3: and also thought that he had seen Anderson putting one
Speaker 3: hand behind her foot before she uncovered the knucklebone. The
Speaker 3: following day, David voiced his concerns with a lab technician
Speaker 3: who decided to keep a close eye on Anderson, and
Speaker 3: it wasn't long before the technician caught Anderson pulling a
Speaker 3: bone out of her boot and placing it in the creek.
Speaker 3: Anderson was subsequently arrested by the FBI, and a search
Speaker 3: of her home turned up a number of human bones
Speaker 3: which she had stolen from a medical examiner's office. And,
Speaker 3: as you probably guessed, DNA testing would reveal that none
Speaker 3: of the bones found during the search of the deer
Speaker 3: hunting camp belonged to Sharida, as they had been planted
Speaker 3: there by Anderson. She subsequently pled guilty to planting evidence
Speaker 3: and making false statements and received a twenty one month
Speaker 3: prison sentence. So if you've never seen the unseld mystery
Speaker 3: segment we were referring to. There's a good reason for that,
Speaker 3: as they elected not to air it again on television
Speaker 3: following Anderson's arrest, and it's currently not available for streaming
Speaker 3: on their official channel on Amazon Prime or YouTube.
Speaker 2: This is crazy, Okay, So I don't remember her pulling
Speaker 2: a bone out of her boot. I knew that she
Speaker 2: had planted stuff, or that she had directed the dog
Speaker 2: to certain locations, but she literally stole human remains from
Speaker 2: a medical examer's office and is on the scene pulling
Speaker 2: them out of her own belongings and putting them into
Speaker 2: the ground and then saying, I think we found something.
Speaker 1: That's pretty much it. Yeah, like she had been done
Speaker 1: a whole bunch of these searches before where Eagle had
Speaker 1: miraculously found human remains, and she was getting all this
Speaker 1: adulation because she had trained this expert dog who had
Speaker 1: a gift for finding victims. But it turns out she
Speaker 1: had been planting them there the whole time, and this
Speaker 1: just happened to be the first time she got caught.
Speaker 2: How did they not know so that these are just
Speaker 2: like random body parts? How did she ever get fame
Speaker 2: when they end up never linking back to the person
Speaker 2: they're looking for.
Speaker 1: Yeah, like you think they get suspicious where it's like, well,
Speaker 1: we're looking for a specific missing person, but every single
Speaker 1: time we find bones belonging to a completely different person
Speaker 1: in the same area, Like, what are the odds on that?
Speaker 1: But I think this is when it was starting to
Speaker 1: come apart, and I think the police were keeping a
Speaker 1: closer eye on her to see if she was like
Speaker 1: planting these.
Speaker 2: God blessed with that rate, you would think like almost
Speaker 2: every square mile you go there'd be some random body
Speaker 2: parts located somewhere. You know, like, hey, no matter where
Speaker 2: we look, we're going to be able to find some
Speaker 2: kidaver let's bring in the dogs.
Speaker 1: Yeah. And can you imagine though being treated Thomas's family
Speaker 1: when this happened, because for about a day or two,
Speaker 1: they were under the impression that they had found remains
Speaker 1: which might belong to her, and then they're finding out, Oh,
Speaker 1: the search effort is being led by a complete fraud
Speaker 1: and these bones don't belong that they were stolen from
Speaker 1: a medical examiner's office. So I'm sure that must have
Speaker 1: been a devastating roller coaster ride to think for a
Speaker 1: a day or two that you finally have found Charita
Speaker 1: and now known that it was just a complete fraud anyway,
Speaker 1: In spite of the setback, investigators did not take their
Speaker 1: focus off Jimmy Allen Nelson and gradually build up a
Speaker 1: case against him. The Iosco County Prosecuting Attorney's Office reviewed
Speaker 1: all the interviews Jimmy gave to law enforcement over the years,
Speaker 1: and since two of the interviews have been conducted while
Speaker 1: he was under oath, the authorities believed there were enough
Speaker 1: conflicting statements and proven lies to press charges. In April
Speaker 1: of two thousand and four, Jimmy was arrested in Houston
Speaker 1: and formally charged with multiple counts of perjury as well
Speaker 1: as one count of obstruction of justice. After he was
Speaker 1: extradited to Michigan, Jimmy was released on an electronic tether
Speaker 1: to await trial, which meant he could not lead the state.
Speaker 1: So he stated his son's house in Osable Township Well,
Speaker 1: even though Treeda's body could still not be found. The
Speaker 1: Iosco County Prosecuting Attorney's Office believe they had a strong
Speaker 1: enough case against Jimmy to take him to trial for
Speaker 1: killing her, so on December the twenty eight, he was
Speaker 1: rested and charged with second degree murder, as well as
Speaker 1: additional counts of perjury, making it twenty two perjury counts
Speaker 1: against him in total.
Speaker 2: This is a pretty bold move when you look at
Speaker 2: the prosecuting attorney's move here, because while you do have
Speaker 2: some strong circumstantial character evidence, the idea that Charita had
Speaker 2: actually been killed and that we know how, we know why,
Speaker 2: we know anything about her actual murder is a massive
Speaker 2: question mark for a jury. You know, they didn't investigate
Speaker 2: and explore the evidence that could have been left in
Speaker 2: his truck. They didn't have any kind of forensic support
Speaker 2: for this claim. They basically have three teenage boys saying
Speaker 2: a blue truck pulled up with a white man, and
Speaker 2: you have a lot of choppy back and forth stories
Speaker 2: that make him look really unreliable and very probable as
Speaker 2: a suspect. But we have a standard beyond a reasonable doubt.
Speaker 2: And if you told me, you know it is possible
Speaker 2: that Charita's alive, it's possible that it was a different
Speaker 2: blue truck, a different man. Those questions are seem to
Speaker 2: be very much in this case. I'm surprised they would
Speaker 2: not have waited for more evidence before moving forward with
Speaker 2: this trial, and yet he was still found guilty.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what's weird about this case is that I
Speaker 1: don't know if there was additional evidence that they didn't
Speaker 1: release to the public. But when you hear about his arrest,
Speaker 1: you're like, well, I'm not sure that's really enough to
Speaker 1: get a conviction. Like, they have some conflicting statements. They
Speaker 1: have evidence that he may have committed perjury, but there
Speaker 1: is still plenty a reasonable doubt. I'm not sure if
Speaker 1: there was anything conclusive to prove that he actually committed
Speaker 1: murder because they still hadn't found Triita, there was no
Speaker 1: physical evidence. No, there's a witnesses who saw a man
Speaker 1: in a blue pickup truck, but none of these witnesses
Speaker 1: positively identified this guy as Jimmy. So it did seem
Speaker 1: like they were jumping the gun. But obviously, as we're
Speaker 1: going to talk about on our next episode, since Jimmy's
Speaker 1: conviction was later overturned, obviously the case against them was
Speaker 1: not as strong as they initially thought. So I think
Speaker 1: that about brings an end to Part one. Join us
Speaker 1: next week as we present part two of our series
Speaker 1: about the disappearance of Tree to Thomas.
Speaker 4: Robin, do you want to tell us a little bit
Speaker 4: about the Trail Went Cold Patreon?
Speaker 1: Yes, the Trail Cold Patreon has been around for three
Speaker 1: years now, and we offer these standard bonus features like
Speaker 1: early ad free episodes, and I also send out stickers
Speaker 1: and sign thank you cards to anyone who signs up
Speaker 1: with us on Patreon. If you join our five dollars
Speaker 1: tier tier two, we also offer monthly bonus episodes in
Speaker 1: which I talk about cases which are not featured on
Speaker 1: the Trail Went Cold's original feed, so they're exclusive to
Speaker 1: 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, on Prime
Speaker 1: or YouTube and play it with my audio commentary playing
Speaker 1: in the background, where I just provide trivia and factoids
Speaker 1: about the cases featured in this episode. And incidentally, the
Speaker 1: very first episode that I did a commentary track over
Speaker 1: was the episode featuring this case. So if you want
Speaker 1: to download a commentary track in which I make more
Speaker 1: smart ass remarks about Jewel Kaylor, then be sure to
Speaker 1: join Tier three.
Speaker 4: So I want to let you know a little bit
Speaker 4: about the jewels and Nashty patreons. So there's early ad
Speaker 4: free episodes of The Path Went Chili. We've got our
Speaker 4: Pathwent Chili mini's, which are always over an hour, so
Speaker 4: they're not very mini, but they're just too short to
Speaker 4: turn into a series and we're really enjoying doing those.
Speaker 4: So we hope you'll check out those patreons. We'll link
Speaker 4: them in the show notes.
Speaker 1: So I want to thank you all for listening, and
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Speaker 4: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers Comedy