Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Pathway, Chili.
Speaker 2: I'm Robin, I'm Jules, and I'm Ashley. Let's dive right
Speaker 2: into this week's case.
Speaker 3: December thirty one, twenty ten, Wilmington, Delaware, the body of
Speaker 3: sixty six year old Jack Wheeler is discovered in a
Speaker 3: trash heap at a landfill and his cause of death
Speaker 3: is determined to be blunt force trauma. Days earlier, Jack
Speaker 3: had left his residence in New York City to travel
Speaker 3: to Delaware. A numerous eyewitnesses would report seeing Jack wander
Speaker 3: through the area and displaying erotic behavior, which may have
Speaker 3: been brought on by his struggles with bipolar disorder. It
Speaker 3: is believed that Jack's body was transported to the landfill
Speaker 3: after he wound up inside a dumpster which was picked
Speaker 3: up by a garbage truck. But even though investigators believe
Speaker 3: his injuries are consistent with the homicide, the exact circumstances
Speaker 3: of how Jack died are unclear.
Speaker 1: After that, the path went Chiley, So on today's episode,
Speaker 1: we're going to be exploring the case, which was the
Speaker 1: subject of episode number one of the second season of
Speaker 1: The Unsolved Mysteries reboot on Netflix. The Unexplained twenty ten
Speaker 1: death of Jack Wheeler, the victim in this story, led
Speaker 1: a particularly interesting life as he served as a White
Speaker 1: House aid for no less than three US presidents and
Speaker 1: was involved in a number of impressive achievements, including the
Speaker 1: creation of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, d c.
Speaker 1: But unfortunately, Jack's life went in in a very tragic fashion,
Speaker 1: as his body was discovered in a landfill in Delaware
Speaker 1: after he had spent the past few days frequenting a
Speaker 1: variety of different locations doing a number of things which
Speaker 1: do not seem to make much logical sense. Now. Before
Speaker 1: this case was even featured on Unsolved Mysteries, I had
Speaker 1: actually received a couple of requests to cover it on
Speaker 1: the Trail went Cold, and while my knowledge about this
Speaker 1: story was limited, I did know that Jack's death had
Speaker 1: officially been ruled a homicide, and because of his government connections,
Speaker 1: there were a number of conspiracy theories surrounding his death. However,
Speaker 1: once the Unsolved Mysteries episode came out, the consensus from
Speaker 1: many viewers seemed to be that Jack was the victim
Speaker 1: of a tragic accident brought on by his struggles with
Speaker 1: bipolar disorder. And while the episode did acknowledge Jack's mental
Speaker 1: health issues, it has received some criticism for its handling
Speaker 1: of the subject. Much like their episode about the death
Speaker 1: of Ray Rivera, the Unsawd Mysteries reboot has been accused
Speaker 1: of leaving out key details to craft a narrative and
Speaker 1: make the story appear as mysterious as possible, even though
Speaker 1: there was a chance that no crime ever took place.
Speaker 1: To be quite honest, this is why I was initially
Speaker 1: reluctant to cover Jack Wheeler's story on the Trail Went Cold,
Speaker 1: but I had to acknowledge that, in spite of the
Speaker 1: skepticism from online sluice, Jack's death was officially ruled to
Speaker 1: be a homicide by the medical examiner and law enforcement,
Speaker 1: so I ultimately decided to release an episode about it
Speaker 1: back in January of twenty twenty two. The most commonly
Speaker 1: proposed theory is that Jack was killed by the trash
Speaker 1: compactor in the garbage truck which picked up the dumpster
Speaker 1: containing his body, but investigators do seem to believe that
Speaker 1: his injuries were more consistent with a beating, so I
Speaker 1: think it's important to present the most well rounded account
Speaker 1: of Jack Wheeler's death that we can as this is
Speaker 1: an opportunity to explore the topic of how mental illness
Speaker 1: can sometimes be downplayed in cold case investigations.
Speaker 2: So this is one of those cases that I should
Speaker 2: probably know because I love unsolved mysteries, but I don't
Speaker 2: remember Jack case. It's really surprising to me that you
Speaker 2: have a man who has such an incredible resume when
Speaker 2: you look at the fact that he was involved as
Speaker 2: a White House aid that he was really responsible for
Speaker 2: a lot of magical things that happened in Washington, d C.
Speaker 2: And then you also have that he struggles with bipolar disorder,
Speaker 2: and so you do have that kind of dual approach
Speaker 2: to this case. Is it something that's mental health related,
Speaker 2: because like you were saying, a lot of people are
Speaker 2: arguing this might have been one of those episodes of
Speaker 2: a mental health crisis, or was it something bigger than that.
Speaker 2: Was it part of a government conspiracy?
Speaker 3: Was it due to.
Speaker 2: Something that he was involved in in his time with
Speaker 2: the government. Both are very possible scenarios when you look
Speaker 2: at cases we've covered in the past, and so I'm
Speaker 2: really interested to hear more about this. But it's tragic
Speaker 2: right from the get go. You have such an accomplished
Speaker 2: man who has such a tragic ending to his life,
Speaker 2: whether it was mental health or a homicide. And yeah,
Speaker 2: I'm just already I'm already fascinated. I've got to know more.
Speaker 3: This case reminds me so much of It's very different,
Speaker 3: but we covered Ray rivera really early, but it also
Speaker 3: reminds me of a least a Lamb just because of
Speaker 3: the initial way that the case was treated from like
Speaker 3: this supernatural perspective, rather than you know, her having a
Speaker 3: mental health episode. And I think Rays was looked at
Speaker 3: from a very conspiratorial perspective, like his friend Carter or
Speaker 3: whatever had something done to him with a helicopter. When
Speaker 3: I think at the end of our coverage of Ray's case,
Speaker 3: which was right the very beginning of the Pathway Chile,
Speaker 3: we settled on it was likely a mental health episode.
Speaker 3: So I think this is going to be a really
Speaker 3: good case for us to delve deeper into so we
Speaker 3: can explore some of those themes exactly.
Speaker 1: And I think there is a possibility this case might
Speaker 1: be a combination of both of them. That he was
Speaker 1: suffering from a mental health episode, but there wasn't any
Speaker 1: government conspiracy, but he still could have crossed paths with,
Speaker 1: say a random stranger who wound up killing him. So
Speaker 1: it's kind of a combination of both him just kind
Speaker 1: of having a mental health episode, but also following prey
Speaker 1: to someone who killed him.
Speaker 2: Okay, so no one was arguing that it ended up
Speaker 2: being a part of a government conspiracy or anything.
Speaker 1: Well, I remember before I watched this case on Unsolved Mysteries,
Speaker 1: most of the limited knowledge I had about this case
Speaker 1: was from like conspiracy websites, and it was mainly because
Speaker 1: of the fact that he had worked for the government,
Speaker 1: and they did push forward the idea that maybe that
Speaker 1: had something to do with his death on the Unsolved
Speaker 1: Mysteries episode. But all these years later, it seems the
Speaker 1: consensus is that the whole government conspiracy angle is just
Speaker 1: a red herring.
Speaker 2: Okay, so we're down to mental health crisis or potential
Speaker 2: of running into either are a random or kind of
Speaker 2: a personally known as Sailor.
Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely fascinating and.
Speaker 3: We'll get into this more. But I think Robin, you
Speaker 3: touched on something that's really really important with regards to
Speaker 3: mental health episodes, particularly if somebody is experiencing bipolar mania.
Speaker 3: You're going to be vulnerable to a lot of people
Speaker 3: who could predate on you. But you also may act
Speaker 3: in a way that isn't in alignment with who you are,
Speaker 3: with lots of impulsivity. So it's very possible that Jack
Speaker 3: could have encountered somebody who either decided to prey upon him,
Speaker 3: or he may have interacted with this person in a
Speaker 3: way that wasn't becoming in some way or triggered that individual,
Speaker 3: and then that individual beat him and threw him in
Speaker 3: the dumpster.
Speaker 2: Very true, very true.
Speaker 3: Our story begins in twenty ten, and our central figure
Speaker 3: is sixty six year old John Parsons Wheeler, the third
Speaker 3: who goes by the name Jack. Originally born in Laredo, Texas,
Speaker 3: Jack hailed from a family with an extensive military history,
Speaker 3: and he arrived with his father, John Parsons Wheeler, the Second,
Speaker 3: nicknamed Big Jack, was fighting overseas in World War Two.
Speaker 3: In fact, only five days after Jack's birth, his family
Speaker 3: actually received a telegram the Big Jack had gone missing
Speaker 3: an action during the Battle of the Bulge. Thankfully, Big
Speaker 3: Jack was later found to be alive. After receiving the
Speaker 3: Bronze Star and Purple Heart, he would continue on with
Speaker 3: the military career which lasted over thirty years and he
Speaker 3: reached the rank of US Army Colonel. Jack decided to
Speaker 3: follow in his father's footsteps by joining the United States
Speaker 3: Military Academy at West Point, and after graduating near the
Speaker 3: top of his class in nineteen sixty six, he went
Speaker 3: to Vietnam and served in a non combat administrative position
Speaker 3: at Long Bin Post, where he worked at computerizing army operations. However,
Speaker 3: Jack was hit hard by the fact that a number
Speaker 3: of people he knew at West Point lost their lives
Speaker 3: during the Vietnam War, as ten percent of his graduating
Speaker 3: class were killed in action. In fact, the experiences of
Speaker 3: Jack and his West Point classmates would be chronicled in
Speaker 3: the nineteen eighty nine book The Long Gray Line, The
Speaker 3: American Journey of West Points Class of nineteen sixty six,
Speaker 3: which was offered by Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Rick Atkinson.
Speaker 3: Following his return from va Vietnam, Jack served on the
Speaker 3: General's staff at the Pentagon and went on to have
Speaker 3: a successful career in the private sector, but by nineteen
Speaker 3: seventy nine he decided to become chairman of the Vietnam
Speaker 3: Veterans Memorial Fund, the non profit organization was established by
Speaker 3: a Vietnam veteran named Jan Scruggs, and eventually paid the
Speaker 3: way for the creation of the Vietnam Veterans Memorial three
Speaker 3: years later, which would be built in Washington, d c.
Speaker 3: And feature the names of every service member who lost
Speaker 3: their lives during the war. Over the next three decades,
Speaker 3: Jack would keep himself busy by working for the government
Speaker 3: and being the CEO of such nonprofit organizations as Mothers
Speaker 3: Against Drunk Driving and the Vietnam Children's Fund. He served
Speaker 3: as a White House aide to Presidents Ronald Reagan and
Speaker 3: George H. W. Bush, working on the latter's transition team
Speaker 3: when he entered office, and during George W. Bush's second
Speaker 3: term as president, Jack served as special assistant to the
Speaker 3: Secretary of the Air Force.
Speaker 2: So Jack had an incredible career, but he also was
Speaker 2: exposed to a lot of really high profile, high stress positions, jobs, responsibilities.
Speaker 2: You know, my dad is an amazing Vietnam hero as well,
Speaker 2: And when you look at the fact that Jack was
Speaker 2: at West Point, there's a lot of stress that goes
Speaker 2: into that, a lot of pressure that goes on to
Speaker 2: those cadets and those individuals serving our country at West Point,
Speaker 2: it's an amazing institution. And then he went to Vietnam,
Speaker 2: or has friends that go to Vietnam, and there's a
Speaker 2: lot of trauma and stress that comes from that. Right,
Speaker 2: you lose people that you love and you care about
Speaker 2: that you're defending our country with. And at the time,
Speaker 2: Vietnam veterans and veterans before that, they didn't have mental
Speaker 2: health support to really deal with the consequences of that
Speaker 2: war and service to our country. Now we are getting
Speaker 2: a lot better with the VA and with military providing
Speaker 2: mental health to our soldiers and to our veterans. But
Speaker 2: I guarantee you that Jack did not have that kind
Speaker 2: of support, nor did his comrades that he served with
Speaker 2: or went to school with. And so for me, when
Speaker 2: you look at that and you talk about the fact
Speaker 2: that down the road we're going to have larger mental
Speaker 2: health issues, the stress of all of those positions, the
Speaker 2: fact that likely at that time, men especially were not
Speaker 2: encouraged or supported in a pursuit of mental health care,
Speaker 2: and we just didn't have the structures in place, Like
Speaker 2: I remember my dad saying, you know, World War two
Speaker 2: men didn't have PTSD. That's not a thing, you know,
Speaker 2: like because he was young and they were told you're fine,
Speaker 2: and then you see years later where these men are.
Speaker 2: It's a disservice to them. They're hurting and they don't
Speaker 2: know how to get help because it just wasn't something
Speaker 2: established or addressed at the time. And so I really
Speaker 2: feel for Jack, and I feel that his positions and
Speaker 2: his amazing accomplishments probably have a lot to do with
Speaker 2: the mental health crisis that he could have had, or
Speaker 2: at least the mental health battle he struggled with. The
Speaker 2: older he got in his life, Well, we're.
Speaker 1: Going to talk about this as we go along, but
Speaker 1: as he got older, he did acknowledge that he had
Speaker 1: some mental health issues and finally began to start treating it.
Speaker 1: And I think that's just remarkable about it. I'm not
Speaker 1: entirely sure at what point in his life that he
Speaker 1: realized he had these issues, but I think like it
Speaker 1: during the late seventies and early eighties, he was thinking
Speaker 1: that there are a lot of Vietnam veterans out there
Speaker 1: that are struggling. So that's why I'm going to help
Speaker 1: establish the memorial fund and the memorial in Washington.
Speaker 3: D C.
Speaker 1: Because he knew that a lot of people were struggling
Speaker 1: and he wanted to pay tribute to them and help them.
Speaker 1: And that's what's great is that he led a very
Speaker 1: productive life and it's all the more sad that he
Speaker 1: would die in such a tragic fashion.
Speaker 2: And you know, for our Vietnam vets, they were not
Speaker 2: respected or loved on the way many other war veterans are.
Speaker 2: They were brought home a war that many of them
Speaker 2: didn't even understand what we were fighting for, right, and
Speaker 2: they served our country the way that they honorably said
Speaker 2: I'll do that, I will go and serve our country,
Speaker 2: or they were drafted to do so. But the political
Speaker 2: unrest here in the United States when they got home,
Speaker 2: they were so disrespected and so just not cared for
Speaker 2: by the community, by you know, anyone welcoming them home.
Speaker 2: It was a very different feel at the time. And
Speaker 2: I think it was that the political scene they came
Speaker 2: home to at the time, but that that had a
Speaker 2: big effect too of what they thought of themselves and
Speaker 2: their service. And I just think it's a very complicated
Speaker 2: war to be a veteran on.
Speaker 3: And weren't they labeled baby killers when they came back.
Speaker 2: Yes, it was horrible. My dad said, he got off
Speaker 2: the plane, was he had been well, No, not his plane.
Speaker 2: My dad had been shot five times in Vietnam and
Speaker 2: was yeah, paralyzed and blind for almost two years in rehab.
Speaker 2: But when he got out of the hospital, he said,
Speaker 2: he got spin on like people would tell them they
Speaker 2: were disgrace to our country, or he was a baby killer,
Speaker 2: or they were all rapist or whatever, And my dad said,
Speaker 2: we were seventeen year old boys serve in our country
Speaker 2: like we didn't. You know, a lot of just a
Speaker 2: lot of disrespect. And you had a lot of famous
Speaker 2: people at the time protesting the war, which caused a
Speaker 2: lot of backlash too in the communities right where young
Speaker 2: people were saying, I support this famous person who's protesting
Speaker 2: the war, and just sad like those boys did their
Speaker 2: job and they came home to not having the care
Speaker 2: and love and respect that you give to military personnel
Speaker 2: who defended your freedom.
Speaker 3: They're instruments of the government. They're being told what to do,
Speaker 3: So getting mad at the instrument you should be getting
Speaker 3: that at the institution, not the people.
Speaker 2: Right, you don't disrespect the boys who came home or
Speaker 2: in women who came home hurt, you know, like, yeah,
Speaker 2: it's just very.
Speaker 1: Very sad. So by twenty ten, Jack had become a
Speaker 1: very influential figure among Washington's elite, who had many prominent friends,
Speaker 1: and he was now working as a national security consultant
Speaker 1: to the nonprofit research and development firm, the Metra Corporation,
Speaker 1: assisting them with cybers security issues. However, in spite of
Speaker 1: Jack's personal achievements, he had lifelong struggles with depression and
Speaker 1: bipolar disorder, and took medication to control his condition. For
Speaker 1: the past thirteen years. Jack had been married to his
Speaker 1: second wife, Catherine Kleis, and he had a twin son
Speaker 1: and daughter from his first marriage, as well as two
Speaker 1: step children from Catherine's first marriage. Jack and Catherine were
Speaker 1: now splitting their time living in two separate residences, a
Speaker 1: condo in the Harlem neighborhood of New York City and
Speaker 1: a getaway home in the town of Newcastle, Delaware. On
Speaker 1: Christmas Eve, Jack took an Amtrak train from Newcastle to
Speaker 1: Harlem to spend the holidays with his family, but on
Speaker 1: December the twenty eighth, he decided to leave and hop
Speaker 1: on a train to Washington, d c. Jack told Catherine
Speaker 1: he was planning to spend a few days there doing
Speaker 1: some work for the Metra Corporation, but she was not
Speaker 1: thrilled with this decision, as she hoped Jack would spend
Speaker 1: the rest of the holidays with her until the new year.
Speaker 1: The couple got into a heated argument, but Jack still
Speaker 1: left on his train trip as planned and spent most
Speaker 1: of the day using his phone to remain in contact
Speaker 1: with Catherine and other members of his family through emails
Speaker 1: and text messages. But even though it would be established
Speaker 1: that Jack arrived in Washington and spent part of the
Speaker 1: day there, he eventually decided to hop on another train
Speaker 1: and make an unexplained trip to Wilmington, Delaware. Wilmington is
Speaker 1: only six miles north from Newcastle, the location of Jack's
Speaker 1: second home, and shortly after eleven thirty pm, Jack's next
Speaker 1: door neighbor, Scott Morris, heard an odd sound outside his residence.
Speaker 1: When Morris looked out the window, he claimed that he
Speaker 1: saw the darkened silhouette of a man standing in the
Speaker 1: frame of a three story house across the street, which
Speaker 1: was under construction at the time. After the man walked away,
Speaker 1: Morris noticed that there was smoke coming from the house,
Speaker 1: so he phoned the police in the fire department, but
Speaker 1: when the authorities arrived, they discovered that the structure was
Speaker 1: not actually on fire, as somewhat had tossed some smoke
Speaker 1: bombs into it, causing very little damage. However, a cell
Speaker 1: phone was eventually founded the scene and it was identified
Speaker 1: as below. To Jack Wheeler, crazy.
Speaker 2: When you think about this fact that it's Christmas time
Speaker 2: and you have a family who's trying to figure out
Speaker 2: holiday plans, right, and there's this big argument, it makes
Speaker 2: you wonder is that big argument any part of the
Speaker 2: mental health crisis that could have come from that? But
Speaker 2: Jack says, listen, I'm gonna be with family for the holidays,
Speaker 2: but then I'm going to be working for this corporation.
Speaker 2: Am I right when I say he does not inform
Speaker 2: anyone that he's actually going to Delaware, that's where his
Speaker 2: house is located, but he doesn't tell the family that
Speaker 2: he's going to make that pit stop there.
Speaker 1: That's correct. He just said that he was going to Washington,
Speaker 1: but did not tell anyone that he was going to Wilmington.
Speaker 1: So we have a couple hours of him in Washington
Speaker 1: and we don't actually know what he does there, But
Speaker 1: at some point he just makes the spontaneous decision to
Speaker 1: go up to like the same area where his house
Speaker 1: is and then potentially throw smoke bombs into this other
Speaker 1: house that's under construction. So it's a sign that something
Speaker 1: has really broken inside of him.
Speaker 3: Where does someone acquire smoke bombs?
Speaker 1: We do make later on, But Jack often used them
Speaker 1: into his garden to get rid of bugs, apparently, so
Speaker 1: he did own them. I don't think he just went
Speaker 1: out and bought them that very same day. I think
Speaker 1: he kept them inside his house.
Speaker 3: Jack's residence was located across the street from a house
Speaker 3: which was under construction, and he'd spent a lot of
Speaker 3: time and energy organizing petitions and filing legal challenges in
Speaker 3: order to prevent it from being built. Jack was unhappy
Speaker 3: that the house was going to block his view of
Speaker 3: the Delaware River and opposed any construction on that particular
Speaker 3: piece of land, as he felt it had historical significance
Speaker 3: since William Penn had taken his first step on American
Speaker 3: soil there in sixteen eighty two. While Jack had attempted
Speaker 3: to file a temporary restraining order against construction of the house,
Speaker 3: a Delaware Court of chancery judge had denied Jack's request
Speaker 3: over two weeks earlier, on December thirteenth. The incident with
Speaker 3: the smoke bombs was particularly interesting since Jack Robin just mentioned,
Speaker 3: was known to own smoke bombs, which he would use
Speaker 3: to get rid of rodents in his garden. The following morning,
Speaker 3: at eight forty five am, Jack hailed a cab from
Speaker 3: the Amtrak station in Wilmington to the Hotel du Pont,
Speaker 3: Which is unclear why he decided to visit this location
Speaker 3: since records would show he never registered there. But about
Speaker 3: forty five minutes later, Jack sent an email to the
Speaker 3: Metra Corporation to inform them that his house was burglarized
Speaker 3: and a number of his personal items, including his cell phone, briefcase, wallet,
Speaker 3: identification badge, and Keith fob, had been stolen. He also
Speaker 3: sent an email to his daughter and another one to
Speaker 3: his therapist to say that he felt dazed, boxed, and
Speaker 3: in a corner following his most recent fight with Catherine.
Speaker 3: Since Jack no longer had his cell phone in his
Speaker 3: possession by this point, it's never been made clear where
Speaker 3: exactly he sent these emails from, and even though he
Speaker 3: told his employer that he'd been burglarized. Jack never attempted
Speaker 3: to report the incident to the pull. Jack's wareboats for
Speaker 3: the next several hours are unknown, but at around six pm,
Speaker 3: he walked into Happy Harry's pharmacy in Newcastle, located just
Speaker 3: a few blocks from his residence. Jack was captured by
Speaker 3: the security cameras, and the pharmacist immediately recognized him since
Speaker 3: he was a regular customer who often had his prescriptions
Speaker 3: filled here. Even though it was very cool, it was
Speaker 3: a very cold night. Jack was only dressed in a
Speaker 3: suit jacket and did not have an overcoat. According to
Speaker 3: the pharmacist, Jack looked visibly upset and asked for a
Speaker 3: ride to Wilmington. Since the pharmacist couldn't leave the establishment,
Speaker 3: he offered to call Jack a cab, but even though
Speaker 3: Jack declined, he managed to convince a couple there to
Speaker 3: give him a ride before they left together.
Speaker 2: That is also a little bit odd. It doesn't sound
Speaker 2: like he knew this couple that he asked for a ride.
Speaker 2: He's not necessarily dressed for the right weather, and he
Speaker 2: seemed dazed and boxed in a corner is what he
Speaker 2: says when he's reaching out to family. This robbery that
Speaker 2: he doesn't report to the police. But he says he's
Speaker 2: been burglarized, He's lost all of his important documents, including
Speaker 2: his I believe, his wallet, his identification badge, his key fob,
Speaker 2: his cell phone, and you still don't report it. It
Speaker 2: does start to sound like he's in this spiral where
Speaker 2: maybe he's perceiving that he's at risk or perceiving that
Speaker 2: he's in danger, when in actuality, he's just kind of
Speaker 2: losing connection with reality. I do wonder how much that
Speaker 2: argument with Catherine plays into that, right, like sometimes trauma
Speaker 2: and stress spurs on a mental health crisis. I also
Speaker 2: wonder was there any indication that he could have been
Speaker 2: meeting somebody at that house in Delaware, which is why
Speaker 2: he didn't tell anyone about it.
Speaker 1: I guess it's possible, but they never found any communications.
Speaker 1: I mean, obviously he didn't send any emails or text
Speaker 1: from his phone or anything. But I guess he could
Speaker 1: have called someone on a payphone, or maybe had spoken
Speaker 1: to someone ahead of time meet me at my hose
Speaker 1: in Delaware at this particular time. But I was going
Speaker 1: to talk about throughout the course of his actions, he's
Speaker 1: captured on a lot of surveillance footage, and he is
Speaker 1: never in the presence of any strangers or anyone who
Speaker 1: appears to be following him around. So I don't see
Speaker 1: any indication that he had any encounters with anyone except
Speaker 1: the people that came forward as witnesses.
Speaker 2: And who's this couple. Who's the couple gave him the ride.
Speaker 1: It's kind of interesting. After this air, they interviewed the
Speaker 1: producer of Unsolved Mysteries and she said that they were
Speaker 1: able to find out from police records that this couple
Speaker 1: was questioned and ruled out his suspects. But I know
Speaker 1: that the show tried to track them down to interview
Speaker 1: them again and see if they would give their account
Speaker 1: of their encounters with Jack, but they could not find
Speaker 1: their whereabouts, so their identity is kind of unknown to
Speaker 1: the public. But they were looked at by police during
Speaker 1: the early stages of the investigation.
Speaker 3: And even though Jack might not have been followed on
Speaker 3: security cameras, that doesn't mean that he didn't have the
Speaker 3: perception that he was being followed, because it seems like
Speaker 3: and he's talking when he's saying to family that like
Speaker 3: he feels boxed in in days, feels like a moment
Speaker 3: of lucidity within you know, a mental health crisis or
Speaker 3: bipolar mania that can lead to psychosis, And if anyone
Speaker 3: has ever experienced that, I mean I can I've experienced hypomania.
Speaker 3: I've never had a manic episode, but I can say
Speaker 3: at a point when I've had very little sleep and
Speaker 3: I feel like my behavior is verging on what could
Speaker 3: be dangerous, I can only describe it as during a
Speaker 3: moment of lucidity, questioning what I'm doing and being like
Speaker 3: it feels like I'm running with scissors. That's like the
Speaker 3: best way I could possibly describe it. And it seems
Speaker 3: like in this moment, that's what Jack is able to
Speaker 3: reach out and say. So it's hard to know if
Speaker 3: like all of these behaviors that he's doing are because
Speaker 3: it's some kind of subterfuge because he believes that he's
Speaker 3: being followed, or he believes that he's under threat, or
Speaker 3: if he's questioning whether or not he's just doing these
Speaker 3: because of the state that he's in. It's just it's
Speaker 3: so hard to know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because on some of the surveillance footage that shows him,
Speaker 1: like you can clearly see that he's not being followed
Speaker 1: or shadowed by anyone, but by his body language. Yanit
Speaker 1: kind of get the sense that he is paranoid or
Speaker 1: feels like he might be in danger, though you can
Speaker 1: never really know what's going on in his mind at
Speaker 1: that moment. Well about forty minutes after he left the pharmacy,
Speaker 1: security camera footage recapture Jack walking through the parking garage
Speaker 1: attached to the Newcastle County Courthouse in Wilmington. He was
Speaker 1: walking around with what appeared to be a limp and
Speaker 1: was carrying his right shoe in his left hand, and
Speaker 1: his body language seemed to indicate that he was disoriented
Speaker 1: and agitated. When Jack spoke to the parking attendant on duty,
Speaker 1: he told her that he had been robbed and that
Speaker 1: his briefcase, which contained his parking ticket, had been stolen.
Speaker 1: He also said that he could not find his car,
Speaker 1: but in actuality, Jack had actually left his car at
Speaker 1: an entirely different parking garage at the Amtrak train station
Speaker 1: three blocks away. Jack originally parked there when he arrived
Speaker 1: in Newcastle one week earlier, before he took the train
Speaker 1: to New York on Masive to see his family. A
Speaker 1: security guard from the courthouse was summoned down to the
Speaker 1: parking garage to speak with Jack, and would later say
Speaker 1: that his eyes were red, as if he had recently
Speaker 1: been crying. In spite of this, the guard said that
Speaker 1: Jack did not smell of alcohol in his speech was
Speaker 1: not slurred, and when a state employee offered Jack money
Speaker 1: to get home, he declined and said that he already
Speaker 1: had enough money on him. Jack soon left the parking garage,
Speaker 1: and since the next confirmed sighting of him would not
Speaker 1: take place until the following morning, it's unclear where he
Speaker 1: spent the night. At around eight am on the morning
Speaker 1: of December the thirtieth, Jack was seen buying coffee at
Speaker 1: a subway sandwich shop, and the owner would later describe
Speaker 1: him as looking like a homeless person, as he was
Speaker 1: no longer wearing a sport coat and had on a
Speaker 1: dress shirt which was filthy from the elbows down. Later
Speaker 1: that day, Jack was seen wandering through the lobby of
Speaker 1: the high rise office building, the Amor's Building, and even
Speaker 1: though multiple people asked him if he needed help, Jack declined.
Speaker 1: He eventually made it to the tenth floor and visited
Speaker 1: the law firm Connolipo Lodge and Huts, where he asked
Speaker 1: to speak with a managing partner, while the receptionist left
Speaker 1: her desk to go find someone Jack left before she returned.
Speaker 1: Jack also paid a visit to a small business administration
Speaker 1: office on the eleventh floor to ask for a ride
Speaker 1: to Philadelphia for unknown reasons. At three twenty six pm,
Speaker 1: security cameras captured Jack wandering around the Nemors Building's basement,
Speaker 1: and later that night, surveillance footage showed him exiting the building,
Speaker 1: and he was now wearing a dark hooded sweatshirt which
Speaker 1: his family believed did not belong to him, and was
Speaker 1: pulled up over his head in an attempt to cover
Speaker 1: his face. At eight forty two pm, a security camera
Speaker 1: outside the Hotel DuPont showed Jack walking east towards Rodney Square,
Speaker 1: but what happened to him next remains a mystery.
Speaker 2: This is heartbreaking when you think about the description of
Speaker 2: Jack and the many people who are running into him,
Speaker 2: and clearly they know something's wrong, but they don't know
Speaker 2: what's wrong is It's just devastating. So you have people
Speaker 2: who see him in the parking lot and they know
Speaker 2: enough is wrong to go ahead and get someone to
Speaker 2: come down and try to talk to him. One on one,
Speaker 2: and so when the security guard comes down from the courthouse,
Speaker 2: he's talking to Jack and he says, listen, the poor guy.
Speaker 2: It wasn't like he's this, you know, belligerent, drunk or
Speaker 2: something that's going on and on he's something's wrong. It
Speaker 2: looked like he was crying. He looks really dishoveled. He's
Speaker 2: limping with his shoe off, like there's clearly a mental
Speaker 2: health crisis going on here. Something's happened, and then it
Speaker 2: kind of just keeps escalating where he looks dirty, he's
Speaker 2: seen where people describe him as looking homeless. He's stumbling
Speaker 2: around and random places without really any explanation as to
Speaker 2: why he would be there. And then we see him
Speaker 2: with that dark hooded sweatshirt, which a family says, I
Speaker 2: don't think that's him, and we don't know what happens
Speaker 2: to him after that. But he's making these stops and
Speaker 2: not following through with any kind of actual success there,
Speaker 2: like the law off as he goes and it leaves
Speaker 2: when the lady comes in. He goes down to the
Speaker 2: Small Administration Business Small Business Administration office. Who the heck
Speaker 2: knows what he did there. It doesn't seem like logical
Speaker 2: movements where people can say, oh yeah, he came in
Speaker 2: and applied for an LLC, Oh yeah, he came in
Speaker 2: and asked us about workmen's comp or you know, filing
Speaker 2: in a lawsuit for workplace malpractice whatever, none of that.
Speaker 2: So it's almost like he's just going from place to
Speaker 2: place and you see all these people saying, can we
Speaker 2: help you? Is something wrong? Can we call someone for you?
Speaker 2: And unfortunately Jack declines all of that. So, Jules, I
Speaker 2: think you nailed at where it's that perception of somebody's
Speaker 2: after me or something's wrong. So he's in that heightened
Speaker 2: paranoid state and he just is stumbling around lost.
Speaker 3: Do we know if he had any familiarity with this building.
Speaker 1: I'm not entirely sure. We're gonna talk about this later.
Speaker 1: But he did have an attorney with the last name Connolly,
Speaker 1: so it's been theorized that he might have gone to
Speaker 1: this particular law firm because it had Connolly in the name,
Speaker 1: but his Connolly did not actually work there. So it's
Speaker 1: almost like he goes to this building and he's seeing
Speaker 1: stuff that's kind of familiar to him, but he's not sure,
Speaker 1: and that's why he's stopping at this random law firm
Speaker 1: that he's never been to before. But some of that
Speaker 1: stuff is completely unexplained, Like we still don't know why
Speaker 1: he went to this small Business Administration office to ask
Speaker 1: for a ride to Philadelphia, because as far as anyone
Speaker 1: can tell, he didn't have any connections there. So I
Speaker 1: think he was just going into this building because there
Speaker 1: was something going on in his mind that made him
Speaker 1: think that he was familiar with it. But as far
Speaker 1: as anyone can tell, I don't know if he'd ever
Speaker 1: been there before.
Speaker 3: Well, earlier that day, one of Jack's neighbors in Newcastle,
Speaker 3: Robert Dill, who functioned as a caretaker for the Wheeler
Speaker 3: residence when they were not there, noticed that one of
Speaker 3: the houses upstairs rear windows was open. When Dill went
Speaker 3: over to the house, he discovered that his side door
Speaker 3: was open, so he decided to go inside. It appeared
Speaker 3: that the residence had been burglarized, as chairs knocked over,
Speaker 3: a plant had been overturned, a spice rack was knocked over,
Speaker 3: and there were broken dishes in the kitchen sink. Some
Speaker 3: powdered cleanser had been spilled on the kitchen floor, and
Speaker 3: there was the lining of a bare footprint in it.
Speaker 3: Dill also noticed that one of Jack's most prized possessions,
Speaker 3: his ceremonial West Point Cadet Sword and Shield, was lying
Speaker 3: on the floor nearby. In addition, a copy of that
Speaker 3: book we've mentioned earlier, the Long Gray Line, The American
Speaker 3: Journey of West Point's Class of nineteen sixty six, was
Speaker 3: lying open on the kitchen counter. On the surface, it
Speaker 3: did not appear that anything was stolen, but Dill proceeded
Speaker 3: to phone both Jack and Catherine cell phones and left
Speaker 3: them voicemails about the situation. After not receiving any response
Speaker 3: from either of them, Dill decided to inform the police
Speaker 3: about the break in the following day. It turned out
Speaker 3: that Catherine had made repeated attempts to call Jack's cell phone,
Speaker 3: but they kept going a voicemail and he never returned
Speaker 3: her calls. Jack and Catherine had been planning to attend
Speaker 3: a cousin's wedding on New Year's Eve, but when she
Speaker 3: couldn't get a hold of him, Catherine went to the
Speaker 3: wedding alone. While at the time she left, Catherine was
Speaker 3: not yet aware that Jack has been found dead. Shortly
Speaker 3: before ten a m. On the morning of December thirty first,
Speaker 3: a spotter at the Cherry Island landfill in Wilmington discovered
Speaker 3: a body on top of the trash heap, and he
Speaker 3: was soon positively identified as Jack Wheeler. An autopsy would
Speaker 3: soon discover that Jack suffered a number of serious injuries,
Speaker 3: including a collapse lung, broken ribs, as well as severe
Speaker 3: bruising and swelling to his face and lacerations all over
Speaker 3: his body. There have also been conflicting accounts about whether
Speaker 3: or not Jack suffered a heart attack prior to his death.
Speaker 3: Months later, during an interview in an article with the
Speaker 3: Wilmington based newspaper The News Journal, Catherine said the police
Speaker 3: kept changing their mind about the heart attack, stating, quote
Speaker 3: first they said he did, then they said he didn't,
Speaker 3: Then they said he did, end quote cardless. The medical
Speaker 3: examiner believed the Jack's injuries were consistent with the beating,
Speaker 3: ruling that his exact cause of death was blunt force
Speaker 3: trauma and the manner of death was listed as homicide.
Speaker 2: Imagine, poor Catherine. This is a man that she's been
Speaker 2: married to.
Speaker 1: For quite a while.
Speaker 2: They got into a fuss around the holidays, and they
Speaker 2: still have plans like She's like, listen, it's fine.
Speaker 1: Couple's fight.
Speaker 2: That's a fuss, you know, And she says, we have
Speaker 2: plans to go to our cousin's wedding on New Year's Eve,
Speaker 2: but he's not returning her phone calls. And there had
Speaker 2: been communication with the family throughout his trip for quite
Speaker 2: a while. He's emailing his daughter, he was checking in
Speaker 2: with his phone. But then once that phone quote goes
Speaker 2: missing or is stolen, you obviously see that communication stop.
Speaker 2: And Jack is clearly in a downward spiral of kind
Speaker 2: of what reality is and what reality is not. What's
Speaker 2: sad is that she's not getting clear information even after
Speaker 2: his body's discovered. What was the cause of death? Is
Speaker 2: it the heart attack? Is at this beating? And that's
Speaker 2: super confusing for her as well and causes a lack
Speaker 2: of trust in the police department, because give me a
Speaker 2: straight answer, don't keep changing what you're telling me, or
Speaker 2: else I can't trust anything else you're telling me moving forward.
Speaker 2: When you do look at what the medical examiner says
Speaker 2: the injuries look like, which is that beating blunt force
Speaker 2: trauma and they list his cause of death as a homicide,
Speaker 2: then I really do start thinking exactly what Jules said.
Speaker 2: Either because he is disheveled very clearly isn't aware of
Speaker 2: what's real and what's not. Someone who encounters him doesn't
Speaker 2: say can I help you? They say I can hurt
Speaker 2: you because you're vulnerable and easy. You can't defend yourself
Speaker 2: right now because you're not in your right mind. So
Speaker 2: I'm thinking he either becomes the victim of somebody's foul play,
Speaker 2: or the other scenario becomes he actually acts out with aggression,
Speaker 2: maybe scare somebody gets into an altercation with someone who
Speaker 2: isn't mature enough to say, something's clearly wrong with this man.
Speaker 2: I need to get a way, and he's met with
Speaker 2: an attack against him because of something he presents in
Speaker 2: his own behavior. So I think that's a very plausible situation.
Speaker 2: And then who knows. I think you said in the opening, Robin,
Speaker 2: some people were saying those injuries could also be because
Speaker 2: of the way his body was disposed of and the
Speaker 2: way that if he was, let's say, rummaging through a
Speaker 2: trash can and got crushed, could that also be consistent.
Speaker 2: So you'll have to tell me more about that, I
Speaker 2: hope later on, But right now it's feeling like what
Speaker 2: Jules put forward, he ran into somebody who either said
Speaker 2: you're vulnerable or you're scaring me, and it ended in
Speaker 2: an assault.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's definitely the reverse of a lot of these
Speaker 1: type of cases because you'll often see a law enforcement
Speaker 1: or the medical examiner rule someone's death to be a
Speaker 1: suicide or an accident, and here they say homicide right
Speaker 1: at the back. They say that his injuries are consistent
Speaker 1: with being attacked by someone, and it's only after they
Speaker 1: learn more information that people start going, well, maybe it
Speaker 1: was an accidental death, maybe he wound up any trash
Speaker 1: compactor or something. Because we have no accounting of his
Speaker 1: whereabouts for several hours before he was found in the landfill,
Speaker 1: we can't be one hundred percent certain what happened to him.
Speaker 1: Investigators attempted to backtrack Jack's movements after he left the
Speaker 1: Nemors building to try and determine how he wound up
Speaker 1: at the Cherry Island landfill. They eventually spoke to a
Speaker 1: witness who hailed a taxi cab from Wilmington at around
Speaker 1: eleven pm on December thirtieth, which was headed to the
Speaker 1: town of Newark, located fourteen miles away. The witness said
Speaker 1: that a man matching Jack's description asked to share the
Speaker 1: cab ride with him when he heard it was going
Speaker 1: to Newark. Well, Jack did not have any known connections
Speaker 1: to Newark. Investigators learned that during the early morning hours
Speaker 1: of December the thirty first, a garbage truck driver named
Speaker 1: Mike Robowski emptied ten dumpsters in Newark as part of
Speaker 1: his trash collection route and subsequently dumped the contents of
Speaker 1: his load into the Cherry Island landfill. According to Grabowski,
Speaker 1: it was not uncommon for people to suddenly emerge from
Speaker 1: dumpsters before his truck was in the midst of lifting
Speaker 1: them up, as these dumpsters were equipped with side doors
Speaker 1: which would allow someone to climb inside. This led to
Speaker 1: speculation that Grabowski may have unknowingly transported Jack's body of
Speaker 1: the landfill, and when forensic testing was performed on the
Speaker 1: dumpsters from Grabowski's route, it turned up a partial DNA
Speaker 1: match to Jack in one of them.
Speaker 2: That's incredible. So when you look at this idea, this
Speaker 2: is lending credence to the idea that maybe it is
Speaker 2: actually the result of Jack being in that garbage can
Speaker 2: and the injuries to his body aren't from a beating
Speaker 2: or anything like that, but it could be from these
Speaker 2: dumpsters in the side door and the way that the
Speaker 2: truck is going to actually transport his body to the landfill.
Speaker 3: But what if somebody beat him and then threw them
Speaker 3: in the dumpster.
Speaker 2: That's also true.
Speaker 1: There's no way to know. There's no way to know
Speaker 1: that exactly. It could be a combination of both. It
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that he crawled inside and was crushed. It
Speaker 1: could mean that someone attacked him beforehand and put his
Speaker 1: body in there. But it is interesting that when the
Speaker 1: medical examiner listed the homicide ruling, did not yet know
Speaker 1: that Jack had possibly been in a garbage dumpster. Like
Speaker 1: all he knew was that he wound up in the landfill.
Speaker 1: And it does make you wonder though that if he
Speaker 1: had known Jack was inside the garbage truck, would he
Speaker 1: have possibly given a different ruling. Question.
Speaker 2: We know that Jack earlier had been stumbling around with
Speaker 2: like a limp and looked like he had a shoe
Speaker 2: in his hand and things like that. I guess there's
Speaker 2: no way of knowing if he had actually had an
Speaker 2: altercation previously with somebody where he got injured, or if
Speaker 2: he just fell and hurt himself. Right, because he wasn't
Speaker 2: stable at the time.
Speaker 1: It's certainly possible he could have had an altercation. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't believe the witnesses saw any noticeable like bruises
Speaker 1: or injuries on him at that time to indicate that
Speaker 1: he had gotten into a fight. But we still don't
Speaker 1: know the source of the limp. Could it have been
Speaker 1: like some sort of stroke, or could he have a
Speaker 1: medical issue, or could he have fallen down somewhere, or
Speaker 1: could he have actually gotten into a fight. We just
Speaker 1: don't know his whereabouts before they saw him with the limp.
Speaker 3: But the big unanswered question was whether Jack might have
Speaker 3: climbed into the umster himself, possibly in an attempt to
Speaker 3: keep warm, or if an unknown third party killed him
Speaker 3: and placed his body in there. Since Jack still had
Speaker 3: many valuable items on him when he was found, including
Speaker 3: some cash, a Rolex watch, and his West Point Class ring,
Speaker 3: it seemed unlikely that robbery was the motive for a
Speaker 3: potential homicide. Jack's family offered a reward of twenty five
Speaker 3: thousand dollars, which was later increased to fifty thousand, for
Speaker 3: information that led to the arrest of a suspect and
Speaker 3: pushed forward the idea that he was murdered due to
Speaker 3: something connected to his past government work or his current
Speaker 3: position at the Metro Corporation. In fact, Catherine openly speculated
Speaker 3: that Jack may have been of a professional hit, stating quote,
Speaker 3: I think perhaps no one has been in on the
Speaker 3: reward because they've already been paid end quote. Since Jack's
Speaker 3: death likely occurred in Newark, the Newark Police Department took
Speaker 3: over the investigation, but even though the case would be
Speaker 3: investigated by no less than three different agencies, including the FBI,
Speaker 3: they failed to turn up any promising suspect who might
Speaker 3: have been responsible for killing him. Four months after his death,
Speaker 3: Jack's body was cremated and his remains were interred with
Speaker 3: full military honors at the Columbarium at Arlington National Cemetery.
Speaker 3: But after more than a decade, the exact circumstances of
Speaker 3: how Jack Wheeler was killed remain up for debate.
Speaker 1: Gets say, the path went Chile.
Speaker 2: This really does Wreek of the Ray rivera case right
Speaker 2: where there's no way of knowing exactly what happened. But
Speaker 2: here when when you're looking at this case, it's even
Speaker 2: more confusing because the end results can point to so
Speaker 2: many different explanations. Like you said, my first thought was, okay,
Speaker 2: so he's in this garbage can. The man says he
Speaker 2: sees people get in these garbage bins frequently and then
Speaker 2: pop out.
Speaker 1: Well, that was my thought.
Speaker 2: Well, then maybe Jack is digging through there or trying
Speaker 2: to stay warm.
Speaker 1: But then, like you.
Speaker 2: Said, someone could have just disposed of his body there
Speaker 2: after a violent attack. And the thing that complicates it
Speaker 2: is that when that trash is then dumped and taken
Speaker 2: down to the landfill, there are other mechanisms in place
Speaker 2: that could have injured his physical body after the fact
Speaker 2: that he was in that bind. So was he injured
Speaker 2: before going into it? Were the injuries a result of
Speaker 2: that transportation and processing of the trash.
Speaker 1: We just don't know.
Speaker 2: And because of his mental health crisis, both are equally probable.
Speaker 2: The fact that this man, who's accomplished and a hard
Speaker 2: worker and a family man could be stumbling around a
Speaker 2: city unaware of what reality is and going through the
Speaker 2: dumpster for food, for warmth, for whatever he was looking
Speaker 2: for and then gets crushed or he dies in there.
Speaker 2: Something like that is possible. Being attacked because of that
Speaker 2: mental health crisis is also possible, So there's zero way
Speaker 2: I feel like you could distinguish injuries unless someone was
Speaker 2: to come forward, and there's a chance of nobody that
Speaker 2: needs to come forward because you just didn't have a perpetrator.
Speaker 2: It's it would be horrifying as a family to want
Speaker 2: to believe that I can get answers in this case
Speaker 2: and realizing that there's so many circumstances and possibilities here
Speaker 2: where very few of them result in an actual answer
Speaker 2: for the family.
Speaker 3: Robin, do you know if the medical examiner ever got
Speaker 3: a chance to review or revise their findings after Jack
Speaker 3: was found in the landfill and they knew that his
Speaker 3: DNA was found in the garbage can.
Speaker 1: That's a good question. I haven't seen anything to indicate
Speaker 1: that the medical examiner looked at his body again. I
Speaker 1: do know that investigators have been very tight lipped this
Speaker 1: past decade about releasing information to the public, So it
Speaker 1: is possible he got another autopsy but we just didn't
Speaker 1: know about it. But like that would be a good
Speaker 1: point because if he's unaware that Jack has been in
Speaker 1: a garbage bin, he may be misinterpreting the injuries and
Speaker 1: may just look at things differently now that he starts
Speaker 1: looking at the possibility that he was crushed by a
Speaker 1: trash compact. So this story is something a reversal of
Speaker 1: many the unexplained deaths which have been featured on UNSAWD Mysteries.
Speaker 1: The show has featured a number of cases where someone's
Speaker 1: death was ruled to be a suicide or an accident,
Speaker 1: prompting law enforcement to close the case, but the loved
Speaker 1: ones believe they were the victim of foul play. But
Speaker 1: judging from the reactions I've seen from online sluice on
Speaker 1: various message boards and read it, it seems like the
Speaker 1: majority consensus from those who watch the UNSAWD Mysteries episode
Speaker 1: is that Jack Wheeler's death was a tragic accident, even
Speaker 1: though it was officially classified as a homicide and most
Speaker 1: of the media coverage of this case has described as
Speaker 1: death as a murder. Hell, the UNSAWD Mysteries episode is
Speaker 1: literally titled Washington Insider Murder. This is definitely not part
Speaker 1: for the course when you're talking about online sluice, who
Speaker 1: will often gravitate towards theories involving foul play, even if
Speaker 1: the evidence strongly points towards suicide. Or accidental death. I
Speaker 1: mentioned in the intro that before I saw the Unsolved
Speaker 1: Mysteries episode, my limited knowledge of the case gave me
Speaker 1: the impression that this was universally considered to be a homicide,
Speaker 1: and given Jack's previous ties to the US government, you'll
Speaker 1: definitely find a lot of discussion about his death on
Speaker 1: conspiracy message boards. But I do wonder if the reaction
Speaker 1: of this case might be driven by a growing cynicism
Speaker 1: which is developed within the true crime community towards Unsolved
Speaker 1: Mysteries and true crime shows in general, which can sometimes
Speaker 1: manipulate the facts and leave out key pieces of information
Speaker 1: in order to suit their narrative. Back when Unsolved Mysteries
Speaker 1: first launched during the nineteen eighties, there was no Internet
Speaker 1: and it was more difficult to fact check the information
Speaker 1: they shared, so you pretty much took their segments at
Speaker 1: face value. But these days, it's so much easier to
Speaker 1: do additional research and find out if a true crime
Speaker 1: show is distorting the facts. We've already talked about this
Speaker 1: in great detail during our episodes about the death of
Speaker 1: Ray Rivera. As you probably know, it was featured on
Speaker 1: the debut episode of the first season of the Unsolved
Speaker 1: Mysteries reboot, which dropped on Netflix on July the first,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty. Ray Rivera was seemingly killed after a fall
Speaker 1: from the roof of the Belvidere Hotel in Baltimore, Maryland,
Speaker 1: but even though the authorities ruled Ray's death to be
Speaker 1: a suicide, his loved ones were convinced that he was
Speaker 1: the victim of foul play. Well, I will admit that
Speaker 1: I was absolutely captivated by that episode when I originally
Speaker 1: saw it and had no idea what to think, but
Speaker 1: it soon became a parent that Unsaw Mysteries left out
Speaker 1: a lot of information about this story, which may have
Speaker 1: pointed towards Ray suffering from some sort of mental health
Speaker 1: crisis and jumping off the roof on his own. Once
Speaker 1: you looked at the big picture, none of the murder
Speaker 1: conspiracy theories surrounding this case. Surrounding this case made much sense.
Speaker 1: So by the time Unsaw Mysteries dropped their second season
Speaker 1: in October of twenty twenty, I think the controversy surrounding
Speaker 1: their presentation of Ray Rivera's death had caused a lot
Speaker 1: of skepticism to develop about their presentation on Jack Wheeler's
Speaker 1: death I.
Speaker 2: Remember when you guys started describing the Ray rivera case.
Speaker 2: To me, I was like, Oh, it is a murder.
Speaker 2: It is definitely a murder. I was very much in
Speaker 2: that camp because of the way Unsolved Mysteries presented it,
Speaker 2: and it really was this crafted story to cause a
Speaker 2: question mark if nothing else, right Whereas when we went
Speaker 2: through the evidence that is actually known, it very much
Speaker 2: pointed to mental health episodes going on in Ray's life,
Speaker 2: and paranoia and fear and bizarre behaviors. So none of
Speaker 2: that was really described in that episode. So I can
Speaker 2: completely understand, and skeptics aren't wrong that when the media
Speaker 2: takes hold of a story, they're telling a story that's
Speaker 2: going to get them the most ratings and to get
Speaker 2: the most attention, the most jaws dropping at the case.
Speaker 2: And so you got to be your own little sleuth
Speaker 2: and kind of look back and say, Okay, who are
Speaker 2: they presenting this to, what's their goal and are they
Speaker 2: telling us the whole story? And oftentimes the answer is no,
Speaker 2: just because of time limits and because of the audience
Speaker 2: and the goal that they have for that show. So
Speaker 2: I think a lot of that skepticism is valid I too.
Speaker 2: I mean when I watched the Ray Rivera case. I
Speaker 2: was pretty convinced. So then when you go and you
Speaker 2: start talking about Jacks, it makes you want to question, well,
Speaker 2: how much of this is one side of the story
Speaker 2: versus the whole picture.
Speaker 3: I think when you look back in time too, like
Speaker 3: when we covered Ray Rivera's case, I feel like we
Speaker 3: as like a true crime collective. We're just on the
Speaker 3: precipice of kind of understanding that intersectionality between mental health
Speaker 3: and criminals as well as victims of crime, and understanding
Speaker 3: that situations it can seem very very mysterious. There can
Speaker 3: be an underlying mental health issue that can motivate somebody
Speaker 3: to act very much outside of themselves, and it can
Speaker 3: leave a family devastated and with more questions than answers
Speaker 3: and very very convinced that this person didn't do this
Speaker 3: to themselves. So I think we've got a much greater
Speaker 3: understanding now, even though that was just a few years ago,
Speaker 3: it feels like we've come leaps and bounds, doesn't it,
Speaker 3: Oh very much?
Speaker 1: So I think so, Yeah, I think there was more
Speaker 1: of an understanding now that sometimes people just do inexplicable
Speaker 1: things and that will cause their death. But it doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily mean that there was a conspiracy or foul play.
Speaker 2: And you look at the true crime community too, of
Speaker 2: viewers who want to consume that kind of information. And
Speaker 2: I remember the murder at the Cecil Hotel, right, that documentary.
Speaker 3: At least a Lamb.
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, that Lisa Lamb. It was a mental health crisis.
Speaker 2: But I remember reading reviews of it and people are like, oh,
Speaker 2: it's not what I thought. It's not that good, you know,
Speaker 2: and it was fascinating, but because it was a mental
Speaker 2: health crisis, it takes it out of that. You know,
Speaker 2: true crime vein in many ways, and so people who
Speaker 2: are drawn to that, they want to see those mysterious,
Speaker 2: big old question marks, what happened? Conspiracy theories. They like that,
Speaker 2: and so when people are producing segments, I feel like
Speaker 2: they are catering to what gets us the best ratings,
Speaker 2: not necessar gets the best and most accurate story out there.
Speaker 3: From a production standpoint, the Washington Insider murder episode is
Speaker 3: very well done, and if you watch it for the
Speaker 3: first time without much prior knowledge to the case, watching
Speaker 3: the events unfold is pretty compelling. But once the episode
Speaker 3: ends and you start thinking about some of the possible
Speaker 3: murder conspiracies, they just don't make any sense at all.
Speaker 3: A lot of the mysteries surrounding this story fades away
Speaker 3: and it becomes obvious that Jack's strange actions were the
Speaker 3: result of his own mental health crisis. The mental health
Speaker 3: angle in the Ray Rivera case is based on speculation
Speaker 3: because he was never officially diagnosed with anything, but we
Speaker 3: do know that Jack had lifelong struggles with bipolar disorder,
Speaker 3: and to be fair, unsolved mysteries does not shy away
Speaker 3: from this. While Jack took medication to control his condition,
Speaker 3: one fact about the case which has never been conclusively
Speaker 3: established is the last time that he took his meds
Speaker 3: before he died. But if he'd been off them for
Speaker 3: an extended period of time, that would go a long
Speaker 3: way towards explaining his actions during the last few days
Speaker 3: of his life, which seemed to indicate that he was
Speaker 3: having a manic episode. Jack's condition could sometimes make him
Speaker 3: very energetic and aggressive about issues he was passionate about,
Speaker 3: and a short time before his death, a moderator at
Speaker 3: a West Point message board Jack liked to frequent had
Speaker 3: to suspend him and give him a time out because
Speaker 3: he was becoming very temperamental during his postings. Jack had
Speaker 3: obviously had become quite obsessed about preventing instruction of the
Speaker 3: house across the street from his residence at Newcastle, and
Speaker 3: his neighbor Robert Dill, claimed that he sometimes had to
Speaker 3: cut off Jack from going on angry rants, and he
Speaker 3: was once chastised by Jack for not being angry enough
Speaker 3: about the situation. Jack struggles with depression also took a
Speaker 3: toll on him, and his wife Catherine once stated quote,
Speaker 3: I don't like to say it, but I think Jack
Speaker 3: hated himself. He tried to do good all day so
Speaker 3: he could sleep at night. Then he'd wake up in
Speaker 3: the morning and that self hatred would be there waiting
Speaker 3: for him end quote. According to Jack's family, he also
Speaker 3: had a terrible sense of direction and was a type
Speaker 3: of person who would park his car somewhere and then
Speaker 3: take a taxi cab home, either because he couldn't fight
Speaker 3: his vehicle or had completely forgotten where he parked. This
Speaker 3: fits in with a situation where Jack struggled to find
Speaker 3: his car inside the parking garage in Wilmington, even though
Speaker 3: he had parked it in a completely different garage one
Speaker 3: week earlier, and I'm sure the whole thing was exacerbated
Speaker 3: if he was suffering through a manic episode.
Speaker 2: So the most heartbreaking thing you just read to me
Speaker 2: was the way his best friend and the person who
Speaker 2: knew him most. His wife describes the demons that haunted
Speaker 2: her husband. She knew him inside and out, and to
Speaker 2: be able to articulate that, look at his career, look
Speaker 2: at all of the things that he's sacrificed and fought
Speaker 2: for and worked for. People he's protected, organizations he's supported,
Speaker 2: like mothers against drunk driving. You can tell he's a humanitarian,
Speaker 2: that he wants other people not to hurt or struggle,
Speaker 2: and it's because he was hurting and struggling. His wife says,
Speaker 2: I think Jack hated himself. He tried to do good
Speaker 2: all day so that he could sleep at night, and
Speaker 2: then he'd wake up in the morning and the self
Speaker 2: hatred would be there waiting for him, like a repetitive
Speaker 2: cycle of that darkness that she watched her husband battle.
Speaker 2: To me, that is so heartbreaking as someone who loves
Speaker 2: their family and yet can't seem to find any kind
Speaker 2: of peace or way out of the darkness he feels.
Speaker 2: The medication clearly helped. I mean Jack was in.
Speaker 1: His sixties, right, yeah, sixty six.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so Jack's in his sixties. He's clearly had to
Speaker 2: deal with this his whole life. It's probably gotten exacerbated
Speaker 2: by different things. But he's even at the pharmacy trying
Speaker 2: to get his medicine refilled, isn't he at some point?
Speaker 1: Not really, No, even though he frequented that pharmacy quite
Speaker 1: a bit to get his medicine, on that particular visit,
Speaker 1: he was just looking for a ride, like he wasn't
Speaker 1: even the okay, So maybe that's why he went in there,
Speaker 1: Like maybe he recognized this place, this is a place
Speaker 1: I get my medicine, So that might be why he
Speaker 1: asked for a ride at that particular location.
Speaker 2: So in my head, I was thinking, maybe he's at
Speaker 2: the pharmacy to get this refill for his medication. But
Speaker 2: like you said, there's really nobody to know when the
Speaker 2: last time he took it would have been. It sounds
Speaker 2: like with his daughter through email and things, there wasn't
Speaker 2: anything that alarmed her, right, he said he's kind of
Speaker 2: a little bit off kiltered with after fussing with Catherine,
Speaker 2: but he is communicating and then that stops, and it
Speaker 2: seems like that's one of those mornings he woke up
Speaker 2: and he couldn't fight the demons anymore. Maybe he didn't
Speaker 2: have his medication. Maybe he lost all of the things
Speaker 2: that he said had gotten stolen or robbed away from him.
Speaker 2: But his medication could have been in that as well,
Speaker 2: and so if he had lost or misplaced it.
Speaker 1: I don't think it takes.
Speaker 2: Very long to come off of mental health medication to
Speaker 2: struggle with a severe episode, especially if you have significant
Speaker 2: swings in your disposition. So I think it's devastating to
Speaker 2: look at Catherine's perspective of her husband, because when you
Speaker 2: hear that, everything seems to fall into place where you
Speaker 2: see all the things he did to try to fight
Speaker 2: the darkness, and it sounds like the darkness in some
Speaker 2: way ended up consuming him at the very end.
Speaker 3: That's definitely true about psychotropic medications. If you are to
Speaker 3: go cold turkey off of them, it should be done
Speaker 3: under the supervision of a doctor. If somebody just stops
Speaker 3: taking their medication, especially first line bipolar intervention treatments like lithium,
Speaker 3: it can trigger a manic episode if you just all
Speaker 3: of a sudden go off lithium. I've seen it happen.
Speaker 3: It's a really messy and very very dangerous thing that
Speaker 3: can land somebody into a psych word. And if somebody
Speaker 3: isn't recognizing this behavior in Jack and he isn't getting
Speaker 3: whatever like a fifty one fifty would be in Washington
Speaker 3: or in Wilmington, that's something that he clearly needed at
Speaker 3: that time to have somebody assess his mental state because
Speaker 3: it seems like he was a danger to himself. But
Speaker 3: it's just unfortunate because Catherine didn't seem to have access
Speaker 3: to him, because he wasn't answering his phone. He didn't
Speaker 3: have his phone, So all of those people that would
Speaker 3: have been the ones that would go, okay, we need
Speaker 3: to intervene, they're not able to make contact with Jack exactly.
Speaker 1: And I think he was just feeling completely helpless and
Speaker 1: disoriented and didn't know what he was doing. And we
Speaker 1: also don't know where and if he was sleeping during
Speaker 1: the last few days of his life, So I can
Speaker 1: only imagine that if he fell asleep, say in some
Speaker 1: underground storage room or something, and then woke up, he
Speaker 1: must have been like feeling like he was in a
Speaker 1: really dark place and like perhaps even forgetting who he
Speaker 1: really was. So I think this would be a good
Speaker 1: time to bring it into part one. But speak as
Speaker 1: we present part two of our series about the unexplained
Speaker 1: death of Jack Wheeler.
Speaker 3: Robin, do you want to tell us a little bit
Speaker 3: 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 Patreon,
Speaker 1: and if you join our highest tier tier three, the
Speaker 1: ten dollars tier. One of the features we offer is
Speaker 1: a audio commentary track over classic episodes of Unsolved 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 4: So I want to let you know a little bit
Speaker 4: about the Jeweles 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 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 Pathwin. So
Speaker 1: until next time, be sure to bundle up because cold
Speaker 1: trails and chili pass call for warm clothing.
Speaker 3: Music by Paul Rich from the podcast Cold Callers Comedy