Speaker 1: You're listening to the Mind Over Murder podcast.
Speaker 2: My name is Bill Thomas. I'm a writer, consulting, producer,
and now podcaster. I am now trying to use my
experience as the brother of a murder victim to help
other victims of violent crime. I'm working on a book
on the unsolved Colonial Parkway murders and I'm the co
administrator of the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook group together with
Kristin Dilly.
Speaker 3: My name is Kristin Dilly.
Speaker 4: I'm a writer, a researcher, a teacher, and a victim's advocate,
as well as the social media manager and co administrator
for the Colonial Parkway Murders Facebook page with my partner
in crime, Bill Thomas.
Speaker 3: Welcome to Mind Ever Murder. I'm Kristin Dilly and I'm
Bill Thomas, and we're joined again today by one of
our very favorite people, Joe Jack Alone, here to talk
to us about all of the goings ons in the
world of true crime and true crime podcasting. Sarge, thank
you so much for joining us again anytime.
Speaker 5: Nice to be here.
Speaker 3: Against So take a minute and refresh our listener's memory,
if you would, about who you are and how you
got into the true crime space.
Speaker 5: Sure. I am a retired sgeant from the New York
City Police Department. I spent over twenty years. I retired
as an SDS, which is supervisor to the Technive Squad.
I was the commanding officer of the Bronx Cold Case Squad.
I've been an adjunct professor at John Jay College for
almost twenty years now, and I've written two books, The
Criminal Investigative Function, A Guy for New Investigators in the
fourth edition, and my new book of the Cold Case Handbook,
which just came out last April. So I'm excited about that.
And I started a YouTube channel. I do my life
shows on True Crime with the Sergeant. I started that
in August and I'm closing in on ten thousand subscribers,
so that's exciting too.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's fantastic, Ravo.
Speaker 3: That is not a small feat. Congratulations.
Speaker 5: Thanks, yep. I got a long way to catch up
to you, guys, but we're starting to do something.
Speaker 2: You're insights are so interesting and thoughtful, and you're bringing
this twenty year career to bear on discussing new cases.
It's really interesting to have someone like you talk about
what's going on in the true crime space.
Speaker 5: Well, I appreciate that.
Speaker 2: How did you get into podcasting?
Speaker 5: It's honestly, it's something that I always wanted to do,
and like probably a lot of other people, some of
the friends and acquaintances discouraged me from doing it. Who's
going to listen? Why do you want to do this?
I do a lot of TV media, as you guys know. Yeah,
and I do a lot, and I used to do
a lot more. I paired back over the last few
years just because it becomes a full time job that
you don't get paid for. And the issue that comes
down to is you listen to sometimes some bad advice,
and then you realize that, hey, you know what, what's
the worst that's going to happen if I fail? At
least I say I tried.
Speaker 3: There you go. I love that. That's a great way
to look at it.
Speaker 5: And everybody faces the same thing in the podcasting world.
You guys know that. Do people have told you, I'm
sure it's you're wasting your time, nobody's going to listen
and everything else. And then here, you guys are right,
I think when you got a million downloads and everything else,
that goes on. So for all those people, all the
haters out there, you know what, they got to do
something other than focus on what everybody else is doing.
If they just focus on their doing, they wouldn't have
time to hate on anybody else.
Speaker 2: But I'm baffled, Joe, with all of your experience and
all of your insight, why would your friends or colleagues
say to you, all, don't bother. It's a waste of time.
No one's gonna listen. The truth is, I think people
are very interested in what you have to say.
Speaker 5: And that's been the positive of that, right, And I
was pushing up against it because I'm saying, listen to
I'm on CNN and MSNBC and Fox News and you
name it. And I'm like, everybody else wants to listen
to me. Why wouldn't people out there who don't watch
those channels? Right, Because not everybody watches the local news anymore.
I grew up on that. Maybe you guys grew up
on that too. We watched the local news every night,
and we were tuned into the TV. And things have
changed dramatically, and social media has taken over, and podcasting
and videocasting and all the other things that have become
a real point whereas people who wanted to get their
voice out and wanted to do things have that opportunity now,
and I encourage others to do it. There's plenty of
room in the true crime space, no matter what people
will tell you.
Speaker 3: Absolutely, and there's always room for expert voices, and obviously
you are very much one of those. Does your work
in the true crime space make you miss being a
homicide detective? Do you actually want to get back out
there on the pavement and follow leads, rundown suspects, that
sort of thing.
Speaker 5: Every now and then I get that thought in my head,
and then I quickly dismiss it because I did it
one of those been there, done that kind of thing.
I'm getting old now it's a young person's job. Maybe
I can pass along some of the things that I've learned,
some of the mistakes that I've made, and some of
the insights that I've had in regards to specifically cold
case homicides and try to help families. And that's one
of the reason why I wrote my book, is because
it helps not only the police, but it also helps
the family and the true crime community. We can get
a lot of tips on that too, about how they
can get exposure to some of these cold cases because
they are just piling up. Unfortunately.
Speaker 2: Are there times, Joe, when you think back on cases
that you handled in the BRONX years ago that you'd
like to revisit with the latest forensic technology. Does that
cross your mind? Boy, if we had the science that
we have in twenty twenty four back when I was
working these cases.
Speaker 5: Absolutely, and it's not just the forensic science actually of it.
I wish we had the cell phone records and the
video surveillance and the Internet records that I refer to
as the three forensic horsemen, not even including the DNA,
because the cases that we were investigating in the early
two thousands were from the eighties and nineties where none
of that existed, and we were dealing with VHS tapes
that kind of you got from the local bodega that
had been written over one hundred times, and you when
you could barely see the person's face, was a blurry thing.
And I always make a joke, I said, we can
send pictures from Mars that are absolutely flawless, but meanwhile,
the local grocery store can't give you a straight picture
from the robbery suspect. It's absolutely insane.
Speaker 2: Yeah, from shot a dozen feet behind the register. You
mentioned the three horsemen. Go back over that a little
bit for our benefit. What are the three horsemen?
Speaker 5: The three Yeah, refer to U as the three threndsic corsemen.
And the first wrote about it in around twenty eleven,
I think, in the first edition of my investigation book,
and it was the video surveillance, Internet records, and cell
phone records. Those are the three things that, of course
law enforcement should be keen in on every case, no
matter what. And we see that play out every night
over and over again on TV when you're talking about
some of these cases. And I keep on trying to
tell people like listen, look, you got to look at
the cell phone records. You gotta do this, you got
to do that. And it's almost as if some well
gloss over that and saying it's not that big of
a deal, or it might not exist, or what have you.
That phone in your pocket or that smart watch on
your wrist, which I call the snitch on your wrist
track so much information and data, and and you think
about it, it could help detectives with the estimated time
of death right because this thing tracks your heart rate
and everything else, and when that thing goes to zero,
which is me on Sundays, it keeps on asking me
are you alive? Kind of thing. But it's a great
investigative tool, and they're pretty pervasive or ubiquitous, whatever word
you want to use. They're everywhere. Everyone's got them, no
matter what social structure. People have these things.
Speaker 3: Yeah, let the record show I was just showing the
snitch on my wrist, which does tell me every single day,
why aren't you walking more and get more steps? This hour?
Speaker 2: Eating myself? Even my cell phone reminds me I need
to walk more and get more exercise, which is good advice,
but I don't necessarily need an iPhone telling me what
to do.
Speaker 5: It's a great investigative tool, but it just has to
be done properly, and we've seen time and time again
law enforcement make that big mistake. I mean, had Coppint
versit the United States, which is a California case, if
McCall correctly, I think it was California. Basically kept on
telling the cops you have to get a warrant in
order to get into the phone. It's an important step
that we see and I think there was just the
recent case where they messed that up, maybe even in
this Karen Read case, right, because the allegation is that
the trooper will get into this maybe later on, but
the trooper searched the phone without a warrant allegedly. Here's
these things keep on popping up over and over again,
and I just went I want to bang my head
against the wall because there's lots of information that people
can get for free. You don't have to buy a
book or pay for a course. There's plenty of information
out there for free that investigators can do excellent point.
Speaker 3: You obviously have a wealth of knowledge, and there is
no shortage of interesting cases to talk about. How do
you choose the cases you discuss, or rather, how do
you triage all of the information that you get coming
at you. We have sort of an embarrassment of riches
here within the true crime space, So how do you
choose your cases?
Speaker 5: Yeah, unfortunately, this month is going to be a hell
of a year for true crime. You have Karen Reid case,
You have this case that just happened in South and
North Carolina with this young woman who committed suicide and
all this other stuff, and then you have you know,
the Brian Colberger case in DELFI the next four weeks
are going to be insane, and there are cases I'd
like to be more involved in the Delphi case, but
I've hooked my caboost to the Colburger case and the
Red case. I have just backed into this just because
a buddy of mine that does I have this morning
show I call roll Call, which is a police term
where everybody gets their assignments today, and he comes on
quite often to Mike Galcazar and he's, Joe, are you
watching what's going on with these with this investigation? He goes,
is this is right up your ally. This is like
a total disaster in the making. So he got me
involved in that. Boy, was he right? Unfortunately, this has
turned out to be a real textbook case. This is
they're going to write about this case for years to come.
Speaker 2: You're talking about Karen read there.
Speaker 5: Karen read, oh, yeah, this is going to be textbook material,
just like for my first book, the OJ case was
textbook material about things you don't do because detectives, like
many others, we learn from other people's mistakes. Because you
don't want to be the guy a girl that has
a Supreme Court decision with your name attached to it,
or or you just don't. And just on a side note,
A couple years ago, I had spent some time with
Carol Cooley, who was the detective that arrested Ernesto Miranda,
and I spent a number of hours with him in
his house and we talked about certain things, and I
asked him before I was leaving, I said, did you
ever think fifty years later people would be still mentioning
your name? He goes, absolutely not, because there were four
other cases that went to the Supreme Court. It just
so happens that the Miranda case, the M was the
first letter of the alphabet that was available. Everybody else
was after the M. So that's why it's called Miranda
versus Arizona. So he was like, yeah, just one letter
off I would have you wouldn't even have known who
I was. So he was choking about that.
Speaker 2: Oh, in that we've all heard Miranda's name thousands of times.
If you watch the news or follow true crime in
any way, shape or form, it's always there.
Speaker 5: It had sent out a couple of years ago to
do like this living history bit with Laura Enforceman and
I said, I had reached out to Carol in Arizona
and I said, listen, are you interested in doing a
sit down interview? And he said sure. So I went
out to Arizona and I sat down at him. My
mistake was I went out in July and nearly melted.
But I have about four hours of material that I
don't know how to edit because this is just like
everything else. And I had a recorded conversation with James Levell,
who was the famous detective that was handcuffed to Lee
Harvey Oswald when he was showing, Oh yeah, I have
that interview. So I have a lot of these historic
interviews that need to get them out there, and now
that I have a platform for it, now I finally
have a good reason to get it out into the public.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about Karen Reid for a few minutes. Kristin
and I had done some coverage with a focus on
Turtle Boy, the blogger slash advocate slash problematic has kind
of inserted himself in this case without focusing on him
as much. Where are we with Karen Reid and what
are some of your latest observations with that case as
it moves through trial.
Speaker 5: The first week, it was one zero defense for sure,
and so far this week is setting up to be
to nothing by the time this week is over. And
the reason is because law enforcement has really done a
bad job. The prosecutor has done a terrible job. Everybody
was talking conspiracy, and I'm trying to explain to people
competence does an equal conspiracy. Right, you might be able
to find something else down the road, but right now
I'm just seeing police work that is not even gradable,
so to speak. If you had to give him a grade,
the best grade I would give them would be a
D minus right now. And that's something too. This was
one step below above F because how they handled the
evidence is atrocious. The train of custody, they can't answer
any questions, everything is I don't recall. It just really
looks bad. And you have a district attorney who is
pretty much asleep and not really garnering much attention and
getting people to be on his side, and I yet
to see him win even a small battle so far. Jo.
Speaker 3: I love what you just said about incompetence doesn't equal conspiracy,
because I think there are actually any number of people
that you could shut down arguments with by just making
that point. Just because someone isn't doing their job right
doesn't mean there's a whole world of conspiracy out there.
I love that, Thank you for putting that on my radar.
Speaker 5: It's the conspiracy thing. That's how it started off with,
right Karen Reid was framed. Now the defense has done
such a good job picking these guys apart that now
they've put themselves in a position where they're not proven conspiracy,
and now the jury might be actually left on the
thing going on. There is no conspiracy here, so it
could actually end up haunting them. Listen, most cases don't
go to trial, we know that, and out of the
cases that do go to trial, something like eighty five
percent of them end up in a guilty verdict. Right now,
if this case ended today, I would say either on
jury or an acquittal. It's just as simple as that,
because it's just has not gone well.
Speaker 2: Do you think this is more of a problem of
bad police work improper handling of important evidence, or is
it bad presentation by the prosecution or is it all three?
Speaker 5: It's a confluence of things for sure, But listen from
the police perspective, when you're looking at how the evidence
was done who was interviewing questions and making I think
there was a couple of people specifically. I think it
was the lieutenant or the sergeant. You have detectives, they
have an investigations unit that you know, where are the
detectives asking the questions? Who's getting the case? Why are
these supervisors in there? And you know what, small departments
do things differently. I get it. I talk from the
experience of the largest police department and basically the world,
at least the country. You're dealing with a situation where
you need to have people who have done this before
to be able to handle it. Right, I think I
saw too many people involved, right they ald saying too
many cooks boil the super broath or whatever it is.
That's what I see here. That kind of led to
this spumbling. And what didn't help was the blizzard. Right,
So the state police weren't coming. We know that because
people are like, why in the state police. They're supposed
to respond to homicides and death investigations. They're supposed to
do this, Yeah, but not coming there's a blizzard. So
my question is where was the backup plan? Who was trained,
who was sent for this kind of situation? That knows
how to take photographs, collect evidence, secure it. The lieutenant, understand,
couldn't even remember if you ever use evidence tape. These
are the kind of things where just shake your head
at a certain point and say, what is going on here?
Speaker 3: It's like a certain amount of malfeasans is definitely the
name of the game for this.
Speaker 5: I did a little bit of a rant on Twitter
just because I was just aggravated yesterday after watching it.
I just I left home and I went outside and
I told everybody that the lieutenant deserves to be put
on traffic duty the rest of the day. And I
am going to get a coffee and don't because that's
what I deserve.
Speaker 2: But I noticed you mentioned the doughnut. When I was
watching the clip, I just laughed out loud.
Speaker 5: It was that frustrating, and I even said it, Listen,
we are still within the anti cop environment in this country.
Nobody's going to tell me otherwise. My opinion has been set.
Anybody can argue with me if they want it. I'm
just not going to pay attention because it is And unfortunately,
this kind of situation brings out the sea. Look see
how bad they are. Look at this is going on right.
I just this is the word. I'm looking for it.
There's gonna be a magnifying glass on this case in
regards to what the cops did or didn't do. And
I'm just telling you it's like almost like you're looking
for that other shoe to drop, right, something big is coming.
The defense has been setting everybody up. I don't know
if you guys saw it. I was on Court TV,
the first witness that was being interviewed, and I told
that was what Julie Grant and I told her, I said, look,
this is what's coming, this is where he's going. And
sure enough, and she said, how did you know that?
I said, because, first of all, I've testified in court,
that's the first thing. Second of all, if you just
look at what goes on, in order to impeach anybody's credibility,
you have to prove that they made so many mistakes
that it's basically an incompetence thing. It was about documentation.
The saying goes if it's not documented, it wasn't done.
As simple as that. So you can't go into court
and say we did this, but I didn't write it down.
You might as well have just said I want a
million dollars, but it's not my bank account. It doesn't work.
Speaker 2: In your heart of heart, Joe, do you think Karen
Reid killed her boyfriend with SUV that the night they
were out drinking?
Speaker 5: To be honest with one of the reasons why I
stayed away from this case is because I couldn't, for
lack of a better word, or I couldn't get a
read on this case. I usually have a very strong
feeling one way or the other when I'm talking about
these cases. When I'm dealing with this from the very beginning,
I stayed away from it because I couldn't get a
read on it. One of the things that first popped
into my mind was she was so terribly drunk she
might have hit him and then drove away. But then
the murder charge kind of threw me all off right,
because I think that was a bit of an overstep
on the DA's part two. I don't like when they overcharge,
and it was like one of those if you shoot
for the stars and you get the moon, great kind
of thing. I don't think that's the way things should go.
You charge what the crime is and that the chips
fall where they make. When the first cop on the scene.
I think his name was Officer Sarah. The first testimony
and he said that he didn't even sit down with
the district attorney before the trial in preparation for his testimony.
I nearly fainted. I couldn't believe it. Now, Yes, and
he wasn't the only one I have never heard. You're
talking about a homicide case and you're talking about no
trial prep. It's absolutely insane if that's the truth. I
think you had at least two or three of the
cops now said that we did not speak to the
DA before going to this court. So I'm like, what
that's just there's nothing wrong with sitting down with the
district attorney before your testimony, because the idea is, Okay,
the defense is going to ask you this question. What's
going to be your answer?
Speaker 2: Think about it or listen.
Speaker 5: We know there's a problem, right, So they brought out
the sheet that has the dispatch log that showed the
sergeant already at the scene, which he wasn't, And there
was supposed to be another unit at the scene which
showed him they were at the scene, and they were not.
At least through a trial prep you would have found
that out. Ahead of time, and you would have said, Okay,
what's the reason for this. It might be the fact
that that dispatch louge just meant that they sent this
cop and the sergeant and this other cop. It just
it wasn't about them arriving. I don't know. At least
you could have had an answer. If not, it looked
as if the defense just proved that we're already making
up stuff by not having the sergeant at the scene,
but saying to telling everybody, according to this piece of paper,
he's at the scene, when we have it on the
dashcam that he's not right. These are problems that you
put out and you can't refute them because of the
fact that you have the dashcam video.
Speaker 2: Which is a heck of a lot more accurate than
a log would be in terms of who was sent there,
when they arrived. Obviously, the camera is recording real life
events in real time exactly.
Speaker 5: And how do you not know that this is going
to come up? How do you not know you have
this whole thing on video? How do you not how
are you not prepared to answer these sometimes just simple questions,
because some of them could be explained very easily. Just
for instance, the lieutenant. I bashed him pretty good yesterday,
but he got caught up in something. I think he
just got vaklempt is. He didn't know how to answer something.
He probably knew the answer to it when he says,
don't you know that the state police say you don't
put biological evidence in plastic containers. That's not the case.
That's you don't put anything with biological fluids in plastic
security envelopes and then seal them because it creates that
condensation and it degrees to DNA. If I was understanding,
he would have said that to me, and I've been like,
you're mistaken, right, It has to do with this. Here's
the thing. They're putting evidence in red solo cups that
a cop brought home from his house. They're using a
stop and shop paper bag for this kind of stuff.
You guys don't even have crime scene supplies back at
the station. Like, what are we doing over here? I
had said yesterday, I said, listen, this department needs an
overhaul big time. If you're the general. The chief of
police is a female. I think her name was Oh God,
her first name is Elena. Whatever. She's got some answers.
He's got some questions coming at her if I was
the city council for sure, like how is your department
not prepared for a crime scene? How do you not
have crime scene tape or not have the containers for
these things and the paper bags and the security tape
and everything else. I just I'm going to question like,
and I guarantee you they have it. These guys just
didn't get it. That's that's my thinking. It's bad.
Speaker 2: I don't think Canton, Massachusetts is exactly murder central. They
must have had some violent crime, so they should have
all of these supplies necessary for a crime scene. Am
I correct?
Speaker 5: Yes? This stuff doesn't expire, right, A plastic bag isn't
going to expire, so you could you don't have to
buy a thousand of them or ten thousand of them,
buy a hundred of them and just have them on hand.
Because in this day and age, you don't know what's
going to happen, when it's going to happen, and the
idea is you'd rather be prepared for it and have
it never happened than to happen and not be prepared
for it. I understand training costs a lot of money,
and this and that I spent a lot of my
own time and money even and got training on my
own time, took days off, and that kind of stuff,
just because the department isn't going to pay for you
to spend a week in a a forensics class or
a document class or any of these other things. So
you end up doing these things on your own. But
it's really about benefiting yourself in the long run and
making you more marketable within the department, and you're dealing
with small departments, and you're dealing with other issues when
you're dealing with small departments in twenty twenty four, to
have the correct type of mechanism to secure evidence. Let's
put it this way. It's unfortunate about that word. It's unfortunate.
Speaker 2: Now you're being charitable because when I watched you on
your video clip, you ripped into them pretty good.
Speaker 5: Yeah. I do everything, and I do this on my
own show too. I do everything short of cursing. I
don't really curse nothing like that. Let me tell you something,
I almost dropped a couple of bombs yesterday because it
just infuriated me that, like I said, in twenty twenty four,
we're still talking about this stuff. It's come on, guys,
we've been dealing with DNA now for over twenty five years.
We know exactly how this is supposed to be done.
This isn't a big secret. Most of your audience probably
understands how some of these pieces of evidence and trace
evidence and biological fluids should be done. I give quizzes
every day on my YouTube page, and we've quizzed it
on this already. Every day there's a quiz question and
it's about and one of the quiz questions about I
guess about a month ago was what kind of security
envelope do you put biological fluids? And then the answer
was paper bag.
Speaker 3: Paper bag?
Speaker 5: Yeah, not stopping shop paper bag, a paper bag. Right,
you're bringing stuff from home. You don't know what's inside
those cans and those cups. It's not sterile, it's not
coming out of a package, per se. Everyone's touching these things.
Chain of custody. They haven't even spoken about cheane of custody,
but mark my words, guys, next week it's all gonna
be about chain of custody.
Speaker 2: It's funny. You're actually able to listen and you can
hear the markers being laid down, and this is where Oh,
when you were doing the Court TV appearance, you're actually saying,
this is where this is going, yes, and.
Speaker 5: This is where it is going, right, because now it's
they started talking about the tailight and the pieces. Next
week you watch, it's going to be who found the pieces?
Where are the pieces? Where's the documentation to see what?
Who had them at the lamb, who tested them at
the land, who sent them back? And when they say
we don't know.
Speaker 2: Oh no, luck Yeah funny. When you were talking about
the use of colorful language, I was thinking to myself,
they don't use bad language in the Bronx, do they?
Speaker 5: Oh? Yeah, sure. Listen. People will tell you sometimes when
they listen to my podcast, they go all great victims,
the real Joe finally and then it's run up to
the edge and I walk back because I don't listen.
My show is not a PG rated show person just
because of the topics that we show. Watch shows where
people are cursing like every other word, and it just
like it was interesting so to speak in that kind
of so I avoid that, but a well placed one
once in a while it works.
Speaker 3: We gotta keep it classy, We gotta keep it classy.
Up in here.
Speaker 5: It's just make sure the beasts sometimes do my old job.
That's everybody's cursing. People are cursing you, and every all
day long is cursing. So it's hard to get that
out of your system. But I've been out now for
twelve years and I conquered that.
Speaker 3: I want to shift our attention to the Brian Coberger
Idaho four case, because there is something very interesting going
on with that. But I do want to actually get
your input on this question about preservation of the crime scene.
We had actually spoke about why we thought that Terry
the house down was a mistaken We got a pretty
fair amount of pushback on that side. I'm really curious
go on the record with us. What is your thought
about tearing down the Idaho fourhouse before the trial has
even taken place.
Speaker 5: Yeah, this is the dumbest move since they Mets traded
the Tom Sevett to the Reds for a couple of
bats and a couple of used baseballs. This was a
real head scratcher. We could come up with reasons why
this happened and speculate all day long, but just from
the point of view, So just I'll bring a break
back to the Karen Rea case. What did the jury
do the other day they went to the crime scene nay,
and they looked for they were able to look and
take this all in on their own because the questions
that they have about backing up and where the body
was located and all these things. The people want to
see this right. You have a huge problem now with
the Colburger case. Besides other issues. Now when you say,
because people ask how come the young girl that was
in the first floor, how come she didn't hear the
screams and all those other things, you can't test it now.
You can't have somebody standing in the basement where this
girl came out of wh this woman came was living
at the time, go up to the third floor and
scream and see if you can hear it. You don't
have that ability anymore. And it's an absolute travesty what
they did, and it's going to come back and haunt them.
Speaker 2: It's funny because Kristin and I talked about this several
months ago, and as Kristen said, we've got a lot
of pushback. People said, no. They go in and they
measure every aspect of the structure using lasers and they
record endless amounts of footage showing you the first floor,
second floor, third floor, of the stairs, the whole thing.
We both said, there's nothing like being there.
Speaker 5: The same reason that people go to Italy to see
the coliseum, because it's still standing, you still get that feeling.
There's nothing that can replace. There's no photo, there's no
video that can replace the actual thing. We've all been
to a historic location and that says on this site,
something happens, right, and then you look at it and
it's just a building or an empty parking lot. It
doesn't have the same feeling to you, right, I know
something happened here. He doesn't give us feeling. And just
take for instance, I'm a big baseball fan, and growing
up in New York, you've always heard about the Dodgers
and the at Edbits Field, and I've been to those projects,
working there, the apartments, and I've worked in that location.
And you sit there where home plate is, there's a
plaque and you sit there, says on the spot Jackie
Robinson became the first African American to break the color barrier.
And you're standing in the middle of nowhere and you
just don't get the same feeling right, and I've seen
photos of it, I've seen videos of its field, but
I don't have the experience of what it was like
to watch a ball game there. That's about the best
analogy I can give you. And if if sorry, if
you're not a baseball fan, you can lose it. But
I think you can understand what I'm trying to get across.
Speaker 2: You're listening to mind over Murder. We'll be right back
after this word from our sponsors. We're back here at
mindover Murder. Before we get back to the podcast, just
wanted to remind you that we have a go fundme
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help us raise funds to help promote mind over Murder
and specifically to push the Colonial Parkway murders investigation forward.
We'd love it if you could support us in any
way that you can. Any donation from five dollars to
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be incredibly helpful. The link is in the show notes
and in our social media pages. As always, thanks for
your support. Now back to mind over Murder. The Karen
Read example is a good one. Now, obviously, if the
jury was there recently, they're not in the middle of
a blizzard. But even something as simple as which way
she backed up in the driveway, I'm guessing that she
might have been turning the car around or whatever. But
I had a lot of questions about her sightlines. It
was snowing, it was dark, she'd been drinking. But for instance,
if she was not impaired, would she have even been
able to see John O'Keefe, her boyfriend, who was fatally
struck by it appears fatally struck by her vehicle. You'd
be able to answer a lot of questions with a
visit to the site in terms of give me the
lay of the land.
Speaker 5: Listen, As a cold case investigator, one of the first
steps we did was go to where the crime happened,
if we can get access to it, or to take
a look at it, because you want to get the
feeling of where the positioning of the victim was, where
certain items that were found at the scene, and you
try to get that visual so that you can start
to mentally put a picture together about what you think happened.
And this is actually investigative one oh one, where the
detectives get together and they come up with their theories
or their hypothesis or educated guess, whatever you'd like to
call it. And one of the things that we always
warn detectives about was don't marry your hypothesis, don't find evidence,
or only choose evidence that proves your theory to be correct,
because that's the major problem. And I see that happen
in a lot of the true crime community, where they
look for certain pieces that go, aha, see that fits
my theory, See this is what's going on. Yet it
doesn't work that way. You have to take a look
at the whole picture. Like I tell people, I'm not
pro Karen read. I'm not pro guilty Karen read to me,
I look at it as from a strictly criminal justice
and investigative standpoint. We want the justice system to service correctly.
We want the police to do what they're supposed to do,
because when either one of those fail, we all lose.
And that's the bottom line. And yes, sometimes you have
to let a guilty person go free. That's what the
saying is right, because you don't want a miscarriage of justice.
And I am a firm believer in that. And the
other thing that I see in some investigations and I'm
not saying the Karen Reid one per se, but it
might come back to me that way. One of the
goals of an investigation is to exclude all others. When
you don't do that, this is what happens. Right. So
now they're looking at other people who could have been
involved in the death of John O'Keefe, right, because the
police didn't do what they were supposed to do and
eliminate them as potential suspects from the very beginning. And
when you don't do that, this is what you get. Folks.
Speaker 2: Joe, you had mentioned overcharging a moment ago in relation
to the John O'Keeffe death. Are you thinking that manslaughter
might have been a more appropriate charge if Karen Reid
is found to be responsible for John O'Keeffe's death.
Speaker 5: I don't know the exact statutes of Massachusetts, but whatever
would be the vehicular manslaughter for people who are under
the influence, right, whatever that charge might be, Because there's
different kinds of charges, not only for murder but also
for manslaughter. Vehicular manslaughter is for generally people who are
under the influence of either alcohol or narcotics. To me,
that would have probably been a more appropriate charge. But
I also think I would have waited a little while
if I was the district attorney. I'm a lawyer, Let's
put it that way. Let's get that right out there.
I'm no lawyer, but I've built cases for prosecution, and
that's where I'm coming from, right. I don't think the
police built the case strong enough to withstand this barrage
from the defense. And it's showing.
Speaker 3: Before we leave Brian Coberger and the Idaho for our
case behind. What else do you really have your eye
on in terms of proceedings in the Coburger trial? What
else are you really looking forward to to discussing on
your pod.
Speaker 5: I've already started, and I've also done it in the media.
If I was a defense, the first thing I would
have been going I would be yes, of course the
DNA and the cell phone records. Of course you're going
to go after that. But for me, what's ripe for
a defense to just steam roll the prosecution is how
the crime scene was handled. It was just so many
people involved, and I hope they kept the crime scene
log about who entered that place and when they entered it,
and then you had issues where they were giving back
furniture and personal items during the middle of a crime scene.
And I was on News Nation with Chris Cuomo at
that time, and I said, as far as I'm concerned,
and you could find that episode is still up there,
and I said, I told Chris, I said, as far
as I'm concerned this day, this time, the crime scene
is over. Anything you find now is going to be
bought left and right because they're just going to the
defense is going to go how do I know that
you didn't have evidence in those other items that you
sent away? Right? You gave away and then they had
the crime scene crew, cleanup crew come in, remember that
whole mess. And then the chief is driving a U
haul with stuff in it, and then the mattresses are
in the back of a pickup truck. The list just
goes on and on. I'm like, if I was the
chief and that pickup truck, I would just drive myself
right off the cliff because you sit there going, my god,
if he goes no, it's a small town nonsense. You
had the state police there, the feeds a day. You're
telling me nobody has the right equipment to do this.
Give me a break with this already.
Speaker 2: Come on, they had strong support. It didn't just fall
to the Moscow, idaholp Police Department like you said that
Idaho State Police and they're a very well regarded lab
and the FBI, and they had a lot of resources.
And this isn't like this was when we talk about
the Colonial Parkway murders, and we're talking about a case
that's thirty seven years old, and the standards by which
crime scenes are handled in twenty twenty four are radically
different than they were in nineteen eighty six. I'd a
four case. We're not talking about ancient history, and we're
not talking about a police department that is completely without resources,
particularly since they called in the state and federal agencies
almost from the very beginning.
Speaker 5: And a lot of people don't understand why didn't the
FBI do something about this, because the FBI has no
jurisdiction on it. It's just there as support. People have
been tainted by television so much. Where the FBI shows
up says we're in charge, now, local hicks go home,
it just doesn't happen. The FBI must be invited into
the case unless there is a federal nexus, and that
federal nexus is actually rare and it usually has to
do with terrorism. Number one has to do with a
child under twelve, or it has to do with I
think it's the Hobzact where you're doing this interstate crime
so to speak. Like so somebody was kidnapped in Washington
and then killed in Idaho. Now we can come up
with a federal mexices and then the FBI could take over,
or or I could happen on a reservation in the
Indian territory, then that's an automatic FBI case, right, But
that's not the case in this respect. You bring them
in to enhance your case. They could give you the advice.
That doesn't mean you have to listen to them. And
that's what I think he saw probably on some of
these things.
Speaker 2: It's painful to see them just through mishandling of evidence
hand the defense all kinds of opportunities to chip away
at the credibility of the prosecution and the investigative agencies.
Speaker 5: Of course, and that's what I always said, if I
had hair, this is where I'd be pulling it out,
because you're giving the opportunity for people that shouldn't have
an opportunity. Because some of the other evidence, as far
as I'm concerned. It's pretty strong, and I know that
everyone is talking about, oh, the cell phone. Oh. The
expert that they have is gonna tell him that he's
on the other side of a mountain with DC in
that DC and Washington right in this park. And I
try to explain to them, like, once again, your cherry
picking information. If this expert comes into court and says.
Speaker 6: Your cell data is wrong, my guy was a far
away from the crime scene, then I would have to say, okay,
then explain to us why he was in I think
was Allentown where we have him at the Albertsons where
his cell phone was pinging, and then he gets out
of the car with the video surveillance and he's shopping
for fifteen minutes.
Speaker 5: So you're telling me they were wrong on that too,
or they just happen to be right at one time. Right.
The defense has to be real careful about what they
say about this cell data because they cannot totally do
a scorched earth policy. They're gonna have to pick and choose,
and I think that hurts them. I think it really
does hurt them because there are certain things that they
can't deny based on their cell phone data. I know
there are people that will argue with me on this
all day long, but I say they happen to be
right once. Come on, guys, we're talking about our very
rural area. This technology is somewhat new, and yes there
could be some mistakes. And everyone is talking about, well,
ping is not necessary this and that. Okay, I get it,
but the ping with video surveillance is pretty damning as
far as I'm concerned. And then they say, what about
the white car and this and that is the one
plate It's all going to come out. And I also
try to explain to people, because of the gag order,
we only know probably twenty five percent of what the
prosecution actually has. The defense is only going to bring
out the things that benefit them, And people don't understand.
It's either that the prosecutor can't say anything, but the
defense could come out there at whole court all he
or she wants, and the defenses are going to bring
up all of it because they have most of the discovery.
Right they are arguing over certain parts of the discovery,
they have the majority of it that if you notice,
they're only keying in on one thing, they're only key
and in so far on the cell phone data. They
haven't mentioned anything about the DNA though the IgG the
investigative genetic genealogy. I think that hearing comes up next week,
but it's not going to be in an open court.
It's going to be closed. We won't hear about that.
That's another little tidbit, right some of these situations that
you see this this Coburger case, especially if the IgG
ghosts through. Idaho is a weird state because it's not
a Fry state, it's not a Doalbert state. It goes
by the Federal rules of admissibility of evidence, and if
people want to look up those Fry is what an
E Fry and Dalbert those are the admissibility of evidence.
The Fry is a very strict standard. The only about
twelve states use it. Dalbert is used by the majority
of states, and there are some states that use the
hybrid version or the federal rules. And that becomes an
important aspect of this case because the IgG, as we know,
is pretty much brand new, so to speak, and they're
using it now to identify a suspect who wasn't charged
with anything. It was like almost like a guess kind
of thing. The garbage cover perfectly fine. US Supreme Court
decision California versus Greenwood. The cops can come and get
your garbage right certain states. I think New Jersey requires
a warrant to get it. Everywhere else you could just
pick up anybody's garbage you want. So that's not going
to be an issue as far as I'm concerned. So
I when I look at these cases, guys, I look
at him from the lens of if I'm the defense,
where am I going to go at from the investigations?
Because the old rule is if you can't fight the evidence,
you fight the investigators. That's what we're seeing in the
Read case, and I think that's what you're going to
see in the Colburger case too, Because some of the
evidence is very strong, you're not going to be able
to get around it, so you go after the investigators themselves.
It's a textbook example of what's happened in Massachusetts right now.
Speaker 2: Speaking of cases with some problems, let's talk a little
bit about the Long Island serial killer Goyogo Beach four case.
I know we spoke with you last time you were
Onmind over Murder. What's your take on the latest developments
in that case?
Speaker 5: I was surprised, like a lot of people in regards
to this, because one of the pressers that I had
watched the Districtory, Ray Tierney speak about when they asked him,
are you going to be looking to tie other cases?
And he didn't say it, but he said it like,
we got the we got all kind of thing. We're
going to concentrate on these four and then basically after
these cases are done, then we can maybe look at
other things. And I was a little disappointed in that
because I thought that once you have somebody and now
you've tied them pretty much with forensic evidence, I think
the evidence is kind of overwhelming in this case. This
case is the other compared to the other two, I
think the evidence is insurmountable at this point. When I
saw the searches that were happening in Manorville in the
pine barrens, and it showed that they were looking at
specific locations because each time they went, each day they
went to a different location. They weren't just looking and
then just going west and this going through all the
woods they made they were getting in their cause they
would drive to another location. So to me, the information
was really specific. And then of course when you're looking
at where this started, Manorville, Long Island and Supper County.
You had the two partial remains of Jessica Taylor and
Valerie Mack found not too far from where this was.
So people say automatically, oh, this has to do with list.
But it also then John Bittroff, who was another convicted
killer who had killed two women, Rita ten Gritty and
Colleen mcnamine. Their bodies were found in Surely, but he
lived near Maniville right. So then because his name was
in the news again recently too, about him trying to
get his case thrown out, there was a lot of confusion,
a lot of things happening on Long Island. With that,
you had the other body parts case in Babylon. My god,
Long Island is getting such quite the rep Yeah, it's interesting,
but I was glad that they were doing this because
they were showing that we were interested in finding additional victims.
Because this wasn't about oh, let me see if I
could find some a weapon or a piece of evidence
or something. They were looking for bodies. They had Cadavia
dogs from Suffolk Nasaur the NYPD. So when you're bringing
Cadavid dogs you're looking for bodies. They had some solid
information that there was potential victims found there wherever. That
came through maybe a prisoner debriefing, maybe a confidential informant
withinside a prison, or maybe from one of the prisoners themselves,
who knows. It was just quite interesting and quite a
good thing to see. And the only you haven't asked
me this, but I'm gonna bring it up anyway. Good yeah, dude.
In January, John Ray, the attorney for the Gilbert family,
held a symposium and he I know, Johnny's he's a
really nice guy and he really he's the one that
really kept this case alike. A lot of people don't
like him or whatever. That's fine, but you can't take
any credit from him in regards to keeping the Long
Island serial killer case on the radar. Anyway. He held
the symposium in January and Queens and he had a
woman sign an APPI David that and the abidavit said
that she saw James Burke, who is then the police
commissioner of the Suffer County Police Department, and Rick Sherman
at a party together. So that was so when I
heard the search from Manorville after the district attorney kind
of pooh pooed searching for more people. I think he
might have gotten spooked and saying if this Burke thing
comes in, and because James Burke is the gift that
keeps on giving for crying out loud. He's already a
convicted felon. He got arrested again out in Suffolk County.
We all know about his history and everybody there are
a lot of people that thought he was the Long
Island serial killer, which once again, that was another thing
that I fought tooth and nail all along because listen,
I tell James Burke with a lot of things, killer
was not one of them. I mean, there are so
many people that hated this guy. Believe me, they'd been
lining up to do him and drop a dime on him,
and that never happened. So that kind of tells you
exactly what people really thought about it, because if they
had the goods on him, believe me, they would have
thrown him under the bus. They would have to need
shoulder surgery. How many times they would have thrown him
under the bus. Because cops are a funny group, right,
I know, people talked blue Wall of silence this and that,
you know what, they don't tolerate this kind of stuff,
and you're talking about somebody who was a serial killer.
Believe me, if they had information, they would have did
this guy for sure. I think that kind of spooked
the district attorney, and all of a sudden boom, they
were out searching for additional victims. And I think that
was that the John Ray thing with this Eppen David
became the fly in the ointment because about two weeks
or so, or three weeks somebody I know will fact
check me and tell you was three weeks and one day, Joe,
you were wrong, Hayter, who's gonna hay Yeah. Michael Brown,
the attorney for the reck Sherman, came out instead and oppressor.
We want the records for James Burke, the internal affairs,
we want all his personal files, we want the FBI
files on the investigation, and we want the district attorney,
Tom Spoder's information. So I go there it is, folks,
there's the reason why, because three weeks later now we're
searching for additional victims. I think that really is the thing. Now.
Could I be wrong? Of course I've been wrong before,
But the issue that comes down to is they spent
a lot of money in this search. They brought in
outside agencies. You had New York City bringing in dogs
for five days. You think New York City's paying that bill. Yeah, no,
they're not paying that bill. Suffer County's paying that bill.
It's just a little interesting side note because a lot
of people say, how did this all happen? And I
think I just laid it out for you guys. This
is how it happened.
Speaker 2: So you're saying that the renewed effort at search, which
did end up finding additional bodies, that's directly as a
result of them trying to expand this case and add
additional potential charges.
Speaker 5: I think what they're trying to find as cases that
they don't think they could tie them to Burke per
Se or have Burke muddy the waters kind of thing
for me if I was investigating this thing, and of
course I'm not. I think the case with the biggest
potential is peaches. Peaches was found in North Hempstead Lake
State Park. He was found in a rubber Maid container.
Any think it was green in color as a plastic
containing you know one of those stories contains you buy
at Walmart for five bucks to the put your clothes
in that you're never going to wear again, and you
put them in the attic because your wife told you
to do, and you and there was a blanket and
there was tape. Right that to me as the best
chance of recovering DNA, and specifically they made a mistake.
The FBI had gone out and said, listen, we're looking
for we have a name. We think we know who
this person is. And they went to the Mobile Alabama
Police Department. In the Mobile Alabama Police Department put it
on Facebook saying we're looking for these individuals tied to
a case of and they put the tattoo of Peaches
on there and so then Mobile Alabama became ground zero
for peaches. Right, But they still have not named her.
But I believe they know who she is.
Speaker 2: I believe from what I've read and heard that they
also know who she is.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, I think, like I said, that was like
two years ago in October, I think would be three years. Yeah,
if you're tell me they couldn't find who she was
now even though they know what the town was, it's
I think we'd be kidding ourselves if they don't know it.
But It's an important part of the investigation in regards
to know who your victims are because then you can
find out who or what put them in a position
that they are in now, so to speak. Right, So,
what was going on in their lives? Was it drugs,
was it prostitution or a combination of both, or was
their abuse at home? Right? All these things that you
have to run into what made this person a victim?
You're doing both kinds of victimology on this right. Who
she was and what she was doing that put her
in the position to become a victim, and that one
kind of stuff.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Joe, are we going to see you at crime
con here in just a couple of weeks.
Speaker 5: No, Unfortunately I didn't get invited this time around. But
I actually worked in my favorite because it's my dad's
ninetieth birthday. We're having a big bash and the whole
family's gonna have a reunion and we're gonna be together
for a number of days. So I wouldn't have been
able to go anyway. Everything else, I'll be there in
spirit and crime cons is fun time. I think if
people get a chance to go, they should go if
they're into this stuff, because it's like the thing to
do for true crime.
Speaker 3: Well, they've announced a whole bunch of new guests even
just in the last couple of hours that I'm very
excited for. So I think it's gonna be a great
year this year. We will miss seeing you there for sure.
Speaker 5: Yeah, it's always a fun time. And even if I
was there this time, I would definitely if I had
to choose only one thing to sit on, if I
was only allowed to see one thing, because you guys know,
when you're either a podcast host or you're doing stuff
on the stage, you don't get a lot of time
to see other people. For me, it would have been
John Douglas.
Speaker 2: Yes, he was the one that I think we're the
most excited about.
Speaker 3: He also, unfortunately, is the person we're up against. He's
speaking at the same time we are. Rather we're speaking
at the same time he is. The crowds are not
going to go to us, They're going to go to
John Douglas.
Speaker 5: It's a separate event, right, so you have to pay
more for that. It's limited seating, so not everybody's going
to get a ticket to get in, So that's the
other thing that and there's five thousand people show up
at this thing and they only have a few hundred
tickets or whatever. They'll have plenty of time to come
see you guys. We hope that is true.
Speaker 2: And Cheryl McCollum mack is asking our questions and she's
amazing and oh I love show. We always have a
great time with her, and she's so widely respected in
the true crime space that she's one of the darlings I.
Speaker 5: Think of cheryld's great people. I just spent the whole
weekend with her and Joe Scott Morgan. We were at
the Hamptons, Who've done it. We were there for a
whole four days doing the Long Island version of the
crime con kind of thing, their second annual one. We
had a great time. We had a lot of fun
out in the Hamptons, the three of us.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, I saw those photos and god, our friend
Casey Sherman was out there as well.
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, Casey and I yeah, because Casey is the
true crime chairperson and I'm the true crime consultant for
the next year. So we talked. The guy's written I
think eighteen books now, yeah, and maybe nineteen, I don't
know as we speak, but yeah, he's amazing when it
comes to that stuff. But he's a really nice guy too.
We had breakfast the one one morning together. He's a
real he's a real, genuine guy. You could sit and
talk them. If you didn't know who he was, you
would would never know. He's not pretentious in any way,
and he just there talk to you and it's a
good time.
Speaker 3: We will make sure that we tell Casey you said
hello because we will be seeing him at Crime Con. Joe.
It's a pleasure as always to talk to you and
to hear your insight. Thank you so much for joining
us today. We appreciate it.
Speaker 5: You're welcome. Guys, have a good one.
Speaker 3: Thanks. That's going to do it for this episode of
mind Ever Murder. We'll see you next time.
Speaker 1: Mind Over Murder is a production of Absolute Zero and
Another Dog Productions.
Speaker 2: Our executive producers are Bill Thomas and Kristin Dilley.
Speaker 1: Our logo art is by Pamela Arnois.
Speaker 2: Our theme music is by Kevin McLoud.
Speaker 1: Mind Over Murder is distributed in partnership with crawl Space Media.
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Speaker 1: You can also follow our page on the Colonial Parkway
Murders on Facebook.
Speaker 2: And finally, you can follow Bill Thomas on Twitter at
Bill Thomas. Five six.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Mind Over Murder.