March 8, 2023 • 39 mins
Investigators working Tammy’s case take a big risk in an effort to match her killer’s DNA. Phelps and former Master Sergeant Marty McCarthy have a heated conversation about the issues with his prime suspect, as a former detective comes forward with a troubling new claim.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Paper Ghosts is a production of iHeartRadio, previously on Paper Ghosts.
So they took to DNA and how did you feel
about that? Oh, it didn't bother me because I mean
I I wasn't part of it. They got to eliminate everybody. Well,
I think, you know, I mean, it's always easy to
(00:20):
tell the truth, right when you start making up stories.
It'll change over time. I mean, if you know, if
I told you'll lie today and you came back to
me five years later, you know I'm asking the same question,
I may not respond the same way. Right, He alone
perpetuated the Lonnie beer Brott sort of fantasy as a
(00:42):
suspect because he was no longer part of the investigation,
so he wasn't aware that Lonnie had been eliminated. My
name is eem William Phelps. I'm an investigative journalist. Then off,
they're more than forty true crime books. This is season
three of Paper Ghosts in Plain Sight. As you have
(01:12):
heard throughout the podcast, retired ESP Master Sergeant Marty McCarthy
has been the driving force behind the accusation that Lonnie
beer brought, a former truck driver with a criminal background
from LaSalle County Illinois had something to do with Tammy
Ziwicki's murder. Because of that, beer Brought's name has become
(01:34):
almost synonymous with the case. Here's a guy who was
cleared through blood and DNA, a person law enforcement is
convinced had nothing to do with Tammy's murder, and yet
if you look online, he might as well be guilty.
By the fall of twenty twenty two, I'd confirmed through
(01:54):
multiple sources that Lonnie beer Brought was no longer a
suspect and Tammy's murder. Law enforcement, however, did not do
much to publicly clear Lonnie's name, or at the very
least reach out to Marty to tell him to back off.
(02:16):
Hello Marty, Hello Marty, how you doing. It's Matthew. So
I called Marty myself to discuss the facts that his
prime suspect, Lonnie beer Brought, was not Tammy's killer, and
that much of the ribbing he'd done against the ESP
and FBI was for nothing. Yeah, man, good good. I
(02:39):
just wanted to follow up with you and talk about
a few things. Lonnie beer Brought was completely and clearly
ruled out by blood and DNA. Okay, And they first
ruled him out in nineteen ninety three, and so what
do you think of that? I don't take much of it.
(03:01):
I mentioned that everyone i'd spoken to in law enforcement
was basically on the same page about Lonnie in their view.
The eyewitness's story about seeing him along the roadway with
Tammy and later seeing his wife wearing a watch similar
to Tammy's, well those stories were false. We could talk
(03:23):
about that eyewitness because the eyewitness account I don't think
I can put much weight in. And I'll tell you
why she's traveling on the other side of the highway
and she calls this in a week later, and well,
it doesn't become an issue, you know, it doesn't become
an issue until about a week later. Well, that's what
(03:43):
that's what I'm saying. I mean, I mean, you have
an eyewitness who Okay, a week ago, I saw I
drove by, and I saw this green or blue truck
and I saw this guy talking to her. Well, I've
seen cars broken down myself. There's no way I could
remember what I saw. I don't think it's a good
(04:06):
piece of evidence to go on. Okay, do you think
Lonnie stopped in his truck when Wickie's car broke down?
I don't think that was Lonnie. And here's here's why,
because just up the road from where Tammy was broken down,
there was another car broken down. Yeah, and and so
(04:30):
I don't know that saw Tammy or saw the other
girl who was broken down. I don't know that. We
don't We have no way of knowing that. And I
can't hang my hat on a witness on the other
side of the highway driving sixty miles an hour. She
wasn't violent, no, no, no, no, okay, So she slows
down down, So she slows down, but she's on the
other side of the highway and feeling she's on wait, wait,
(04:54):
wait a minute, wait a minute, let me finish, And
she drives by on the highway, and then a week
later she gives a statement about it. So if she
had an eerie feeling, I don't know why she didn't
report it that day or why didn't she stop, why
didn't she drive away? That You're kind of sound to
me like the state police's view of the witness. I mean,
you're just down on the witness. Not fun. You concluded
(05:16):
a watch. I just lost my she lost my credibility
with this watch story. With you know, every Lonnie beer
Brod to make him the guy. The entire case hangs
on her everything. I think that's true, and I think
that that's exactly what happened. People flying by an eighty
five miles an hour. She's the honest. Why would lie.
(05:39):
I don't think she lied. I don't think she lied.
I'm just saying that what she saw, I don't think
she saw, you know, she she's just kind of you know, oh,
oh my god, there's a girl missing. Now I saw something.
Much of Marty's theory about Lonnie beer Brod hung on
the eyewitness's account. I don't blame him for pursuing this
(06:01):
lead or for being alarmed by what the witness told
him a decade later, But I spent a year trying
to confirm her story and just couldn't. The other thing
is a sticking with that same witness. There is no watch.
Tammy's watch is still missing. They don't have the watch.
(06:25):
No one's produced the watch, never had the watch. That
was a story that got out there that she has
no idea. No, no, no, that's not true. The witness
told me. I'm just going with the witness told me.
The only witness as far as I know as who
actually saw it, knew where she was, and everything showed
her to watch. It was on her risk, right, I got,
(06:46):
I got all that. I just I don't think the
witness is correct. You know you're a polarizing figure in
all of this. You and the Illinois State Police don't
like each other. Well, let me let me put it
this way. I was on that task force and I
was never satisfied with that report, and I on my
(07:08):
own went down and found this information out about Mommy.
They had never done it. The case agent never did
ship after the case was referred to him. Not ship,
he threw that whole lead out. That lead was pursued
quite thoroughly. Lonnie's car and home were searched, he provided
(07:32):
blood and DNA, his ex wife gave a lengthy interview
and passed polygraph. It wasn't blown off, though it may
have seemed that way at the time. As much as
I respect Marty, it doesn't really matter if he believes
any of this or decides not to accept it. Those
(07:54):
are the facts of the case. If you choose to
look the other way. In my opinion, of developed tunnel vision,
and that lead was never pursued. Had I not been involved.
Let me just finish that lead would never pursued if
it ends up now that he's cleared. Fact, I went
through everything I had developed up to this point, focusing
(08:17):
on the idea that the ISP hadn't done enough to
clear line. They had done the work. Marty just wasn't
briefed about it, and so he assumed the worst. But
Marty wouldn't budge for whatever reason, He's still not convinced
that Lonnie can be fully eliminated. Why wouldn't they come
(08:39):
out with that information? I never did. I asked about
DNA over the years. I've had so many different answers.
One that there is no DNA. Who is who is
saying this? Oh that's the ISP that's saying it to me. Yeah, okay,
but I don't think the i ISP tested this stuff.
(09:00):
What I was sent to the FBI. Yeah, I mean
they worked together, so they all knew what was going
on within the investigation. Well, I don't know much about
the DNA. I find it strange that if they had this,
they wouldn't have come out with us, and I mean
they could have. I find that strange. Number One, Well,
(09:20):
I'm telling you he is cleared. He is cleared. Lonnie
beer brought has been cleared from this crime. I mean,
I'm open to anything if they have evidence of this,
But in my experience, I accept the witness. She gave
me this information. I did everything I could to get
(09:41):
that to the State's attorney and to the state police,
and they threw up a wall. From the minute I
mentioned it to him, I saw him that strange and
weird now knowing what they know at the time, which
is this, They've already ruled him out with DNA, So
why waste time on the guy he been ruled How
come the state's stourney never said that? Why would he
(10:04):
tell you that? The state's attorney never said that, the
state police never said that. If that's true about Lottie
in ninety three, why wouldn't they put that out? And
here this is the first time here, it's what twenty
twenty three, that's the first time I've heard this. It's
from you in twenty twenty three? Was that put out
(10:25):
publicly that Lottie was eliminated? I don't know why they
would put that publicly out until they needed to. I mean,
they were they were keeping a lot of their cards
close to the vest On this right. Do you know
how much press There was a lot of it, instigated
by me all over the count Yeah, I've looked at
was the suspect and here they had the capability in
(10:47):
ninety three to bow that out of the water and
never did. Don't you find that suspicions? No, The fact
is the ISP and FBI were not running an investigation
based on what Marty was telling the media. That would
only hinder their work on the case. There was also
(11:08):
a lot of information the ISP did not want release
to the public. What would it take for you to
believe that Lonnie didn't do this? I'd like to be
convinced that if there's no evidence of the watch, then
there's probably any any more information to go on. Monnie.
(11:29):
I'm telling you, I'm telling you, there is zero information
about that watch. That watch is a story that got
out there somehow by so it's not a story. It's
not a story. It's from the eyewitness who interviewed them,
if not just some rumor. Right, What I'm saying is
she put out that story. I don't know why. Marty
(11:50):
and I spoke close to an hour. It got heated
at times. He was not ready to believe that beer
Brott was innocent. No matter what I said, I do
know that Marty ultimately wants Tammy's killer to be caught
and brought to justice, and he's not looking for any fame.
And if that guy is someone other than Lonnie beer Brott,
(12:13):
so be it. Marty told me he's okay with that.
Why did you push Lonnie so hard in the media
when you knew that it was going to piss off
the state police because I thought as the killer. One
(12:34):
of the goals within all the work I do is
to portray the true nature of what investigators go through
and show how their work truly unfolds in real time.
If there is one standout lesson I have learned over
the years, it is the tedious nature of the ups
and downs, the exhilaration of thinking you've got your guy,
(12:57):
only to be let down when that last pace of
the puzzle doesn't fit. Over the course of its investigation,
THESP looked at many different potential suspects, people outside the
traditional serial killing trucker. Most of those inquiries never made
headlines and are known only to the people's task with
(13:21):
investigating them. Well, I appreciate you getting back to me
so quickly. I was working Sunday and I heard something
on the radio. Your podcast was about Tammy jose Wikis.
Right away I recalled that there were some similarities in
our case. After the first few episodes of this season aired,
I got a call from a former detective who'd worked
in the area of Tammy's abduction in nineteen ninety two.
(13:44):
He remembered her story and had knowledge of a potential suspect,
one I hadn't previously known about for various reasons. He's
asked for his name not to be used, but agreed
to share his recollection. I remember I was on my
way home. I was getting ready to leave because we
worked a ten hour shift, and then we got the
call on that The call was from a neighboring police district,
(14:08):
from officers who said a man walked into their station
and claimed that there was a dead body in this camper,
which was parked in a campground that was under my
sources jurisdiction. So we all went to the scene. Camper
was locked up tight. They actually got a warrant for
the camper, and the body was found. It was actually
wrapped up in a blanket with duct tape on each end.
(14:30):
It was that grayish silver duct tape. Inside the blanket
was the body of Denise Marino, a twenty five year
old waitress from West Chicago. The camper was parked at
the now defunct Hideaway Lakes Campground justice of Yorkville, Illinois,
a city about halfway between Chicago and LaSalle County, where
(14:53):
Tammy was abducted just eight months prior. The man who
owned the camper was Charles D. Parker, a thirty eight
year old ex con who had served eight years out
of a fifty year sentence in prison for rape. So
I spent several hours interviewing him, and he admitted to
(15:14):
being the only one with her drinking. They were drinking
excessive mouth alcohol and they were inhaling carburetor cleaner. He
met her at a bar in West Chicago and then
somehow convinced her to go back there with I believe
he convinced her to go back there with and from
what I can recall, but she did leave with him willingly.
(15:34):
My source described a deeply unsettling scene. The young woman
had been stabbed a number of times and had been
sexually assaulted. The body was it was obviously signs of
you know, just brutal, almost like a torturous thing that
he had did her. It was she was bound in
duct tape and then wrapped up in the blanket with
(15:55):
duct tape. But now the interesting thing he took her
after she was dead. He took her into the showers,
which it wasn't too far a walk from where his
camper was. It was one of those truck bed campers,
and it was up on Jack's so he could drive
in and out from underneath of it. You don't see
him any much anymore, but it was a camper mounted
on the back of the pickup bed. But it was
(16:17):
a pickup. It was a pickup truck. Many of the
circumstances surrounding how they met and how he lured her
back to his camper did not fit with Tammy's abduction.
But there was one detail that piqued my interests and
certainly got my attention. One of the investigators searching the
camper found the ring that said Tammy, but it was
(16:41):
spelled Tami. Okay. It was kind of like a square
ring yea with two letters on the bottom two letters
on the top formed a bigger square. I went back
and asked Tammy's family, and a half a dozen of
her friends. If any of them we call a ring
anything like that, none did. I still hadn't found out. However,
(17:05):
if Parker had been completely eliminated, the chances were slim
he'd had anything to do with Tammy's murder. But you
can never be entirely certain unless the evidence backs it up.
And he was questioned about the ring Charlie was and
what did he say about it? What the other detective
told me is he got very angry when he was
(17:26):
asked about it. He said, I did not kill Tammy
Jose Wiki. That's what he said to him, allegedly when
he was asked about it, and he got angry. He
got angry. The way I recalled him, describe me it
to me is while he said that he pounded his
fist on the table and what happens after that? To
(17:48):
my knowledge, the other detective brought that information to ESP
and nothing became of it. I remember Charlie and this
case in particular because he had tortured her. It was
an exceptionally violent rape and murdering. Former IP Lieutenant Jeff
Padilla was certain that Parker could be excluded from Tammy's
(18:10):
case based on the violent nature of Parker's crimes, and
also how Parker met the victim and got her back
to his camper. I might also add that Parker was
sloppy in didn't seem to be honestly smart enough to
get away with the murder. For thirty plus years, we
had looked at him, and we had talked about him,
and we had talked about him, and he didn't fit
(18:33):
for a number of reasons. Yes, he had a pickup truck,
but it was in like an encampment. He didn't live
in a neighborhood. It was like a mobile home. She
had come with him voluntarily back and at some point
the sexual interaction turned violent, and Charlie found her and
then tortured her throughout the night before she finally died
(18:53):
of blood loss. So the m that entire situation did
not fit at all with what had happened to Tammy,
and we didn't dismiss it. But the DNA that we
did have was, you know, there was never enough for
a codus inquiry. You know, you essentially could Charlie's DNA
(19:15):
is available and it has been encoded. You could do
a one to one inquiry against him, which I know
has been done since then. The m O didn't really match,
so we did the best we could to look into it,
but it didn't fit what we had with Tammy. One
of the more interesting and certainly promising threats the IP
(19:38):
followed early into the investigation is worth mentioning, if only
to put one of the more popular Internet based theories
in this case into perspective and maybe even gained some
insight into where it originated. There was a guy that
was a truck driver for a company that came onto
the radar and it turned out, you know, he was
(20:00):
truly a sex offender. He had done a home invasion
rape in like nineteen eighty eight, just prior to the
DNA and sex offender laws and was sentenced to like
four years in prison and got out right before Tammy
was abducted and murdered. You know, he had done he
had met this girl at a diner that was a waitress.
She was like seventeen years old, eighteen years old, followed
(20:24):
her home, waited outside her residence, saw like when her
parents left, then broke into the house while she was there,
and then raped her on the floor in the hallway
and took her panties as a souvenir, and we were
I was like, this has got to be our guy,
and that was never nobody had ever looked into this
that guy's background. If you recall, there was talk early
(20:48):
on about Tammy's killer potentially keeping her body in a
refrigerated truck before placing it off Exit thirty three in Missouri,
which answered the question of why perhaps her boy was
not in an advanced stage of decomposition. He was a
truck driver. It was a refrigerated truck, so that could
account for some of the lack of d comp on Tammy.
(21:09):
When she was recovered, he was up and down I eighty.
As the IP began looking into the guy, they realized
he had taken off to the Upper Midwest for three
days near the time of Tammy's disappearance. And at that time,
you know, like if you'd get a little paper receipt
from the tollway, that was a big deal because the
tolls were expected for trucks, so they everybody saved the receipts,
(21:31):
and he didn't have his receipts from going to Michigan.
So when we went back and looked at the case,
and particularly after VIDOC, he's a guy that that pops
and took up a lot of time from us, because
then we went back and looked at all that. We
went after him hard, you know, had the FBI do
a covert surveillance to him and recovered, you know, and
then did a one to one DNA comparison on him
(21:53):
and eliminated him, even though he was like perfect candidate.
But boy, we thought for probably a year and a half,
we thought he was good for Tammy's murder. I mean,
so there's a good example here. You are, you got
your guy. You could easily tunnel vision that guy and
bullhorn that for the next twenty five years, right, Yeah,
because we dug I mean, I mean that's how we
(22:15):
found out all about this previous charge and it was like,
oh my god, look at that. We thought we hit
the jackpot, and it turned out it wasn't. You never
got a chance to interview him in the aftermath. We
just knew that without the DNA being a match, we
were out of luck with him. Within all the theories
and suspects I had encountered, many of which seem promising
(22:36):
at face value, there always seemed to be something missing,
something important. The science DNA is going to solve Tammy's case.
I am completely certain of that, and as these things
generally go, something we hear about every day within the
world of true crime, technology has caught up to Tammy's case.
(23:00):
A new DNA profile has been extracted from old evidence,
which has opened up a full proof way of developing
a new suspect. We're sorry you have reached a number
(23:21):
that has been disconnected or is no longer in service.
You have reached the Lawrence County Sheriff's Office. If this
is an emergency, please hang up and die. All nine
one one, Good morning, Sergeant Phillips. This is m William Phelps, Matthew. Hey,
you've reached the law office of Pierre and Dannally. Please
leave your name number. In the year leading up to
the release of this season and even after, I've pounded
(23:44):
the pavement and made call after call, placing my entire
focus on several unanswered questions from years past and several
new questions that had arisen in recent months. Most of
the time I got this, Please leave a message, give
me your number if you want to call back. Thank you.
(24:06):
In my line of work, you get used to leaving
voicemails and never hearing back from people, but persistence is key,
and every now and again it pays off. Hi, Karen,
Nice to meet you. Karen Donneley is the former state's
Attorney for LaSalle County, Illinois, a position she held from
two sixteen to twenty twenty. During that time, she became
(24:32):
deeply familiar with Tammy's case. Yeah, we met about two
years after she left office at her legal practice in
downtown Ottawa, Illinois. You've heard from Karen briefly in earlier episodes.
She had Tammy's case for four years as state's attorney,
and she was brief by investigators from the FBI and
(24:54):
IP whenever significant developments came up. Like many others from
the region, Karen was already quite familiar with Tammy's story.
I was alive and present during this when it happened,
so I was very aware of it and very concerned
that this happened in such a close location to where
(25:15):
I live, and that she was such a young age
when she was taken. So that's how I knew of it.
And then when I became state's attorney, we had a
small file on it that we kept in the office,
and I looked at the file to see if there
was anything in there that was worth noting, and there
really wasn't anything that was new until I was approached
(25:35):
by the investigators because they liked to come every year
and tell us, you know, whoever sitting in the seat
of states Attorney, what's going on. And so you began
to look back at this case and what strikes you
mostly about it. I was concerned that there was no resolution.
It was so many possibilities, but nothing was ever zeroed
(25:58):
in on that when I spoke to members of the
FBI or Illinois State Police that there wasn't much that
they were going on, and we just felt like it
was a dead end. And therefore, when I was State's Attorney,
I offered whatever services I could give them, whether it
was monetary, you know, anything that we could do. I
was willing to help. And what did you do? First?
(26:19):
The investigators came and met with members of the State's
Attorney's office every year to give us an update what
they were doing, just to give us a heads up
in case they needed something from us. We were often
briefed on where they were at. Here's what you know
some of the public doesn't know. Here's what we're doing.
They don't share everything with me. They gave us a
(26:42):
lot of information about what they were doing. They would
often come to us and ask for permission to do
certain things that I had to clear with Tammy's mother.
In twenty twenty, law enforcement asked Karen Donnelly to reach
out to Tammy's mom, Joanne, discussed using the remaining DNA
that investigators had inevidence. It was later on in my
(27:06):
ten year of state's attorney that they came to me
and asked for permission to consume what they had insofar
as the DNA evidence. That's important to say consuming because
they only have so much correct. Once it's choosed up,
it's gone. This might surprise the general public, but certain
DNA tests require physically using up part of the actual
(27:30):
sample in evidence, and so once the source sample is gone,
that's it. It's gone. Investigators are left with a profile
they can match to offenders who are already in some
type of DNA database, but they're unable to go back
to that sample again. This can be a big deal,
(27:54):
especially in an era of constantly evolving technology. Law worseman
agencies are also hesitant to consume all available DNA because
it can haunt prosecutors. Later, defense attorneys will often ask
to test DNA independently, and if there's nothing left to test,
it can make it more difficult to be successful in core. Still,
(28:18):
it was clear that law enforcement was taking one last
chance at solving Tammy's case via DNA, and from what
I had learned, it wasn't a shot in the dark.
They had good reason. So they come to you and
you give them the ok to consume that DNA. I
first called Joanne and we have this discussion about this
(28:41):
as our one shot. You know, we may not get
it again if we agree to do this. She was
in complete agreement and said we've got to do what
we've got to do. So I authorize them to consume
the sample, and that was for testing, to put it
into CODAS or genealogical or they had a suspect. I
don't know that they had a suspect. I know that
(29:01):
when we gave them the authorization to consume the sample,
it was going to be put into the CODA system.
And I believe at the time there may have been
issues about a backlog and codas, and at that time
I did offer any resources I could, as far as
reverse genealogy because I'm a crime scene nut and I
watch all those shows. And I offered that to the
investigators and said, if you need funding to provide the
(29:25):
sample to them to do this reverse genealogy to see
if they get a hit, I would fund that. And
did they take your offer? They weren't at that point yet,
because I think they were still waiting to submit to CODIS.
Since twenty twenty, investigators working on Tammy's case have refocused
on DNA. They started reaching out to people connected to
(29:45):
Tammy and anyone involved in the earliest days of the
investigation and asking them for a DNA sample. On top
of that, with the help of more advanced forensic and
DNA technology, they started to go back through all the
evidence to see what, if anything, the killer could have
left behind. When I spoke to Joanne Ziwiki, she confirmed
(30:07):
that the ISP had been in contact as recently as
twenty twenty two and had told her they were sending
DNA to a lab in California for testing. Here's Tammy's brother, Todd.
DNA evidence became more sophisticated, that started becoming more promising.
I started to hear rumors that they had additional DNA
(30:29):
that was usable, and so, you know, in the last
few years, I've become a little bit more optimistic as
it sounded like the operation was still proceeding and that
they were building, you know, potentially building a case and
starting to express some greater optimism than they did for
decades before that. And recently your mom has told me
(30:52):
that has been calling to ask, you know, we have
some DNA that we want to submit somewhere in California,
right what have you heard about that part of it?
A couple of local FBI agents came to my house
and took a DNA swab for me, and I believe
they've done the same thing with both of my brothers.
(31:12):
They apparently found now DNA that they can use and
they wanted to make sure it wasn't ours, So obviously
they have something that they're processing. They did find something
somewhere that was usable, that was different from what they
had previously had, at least enough and good enough condition
that they wanted to take my own DNA and rule
out the possibility there was one of us, one of
(31:34):
the boys in the family. I've also been told by
law enforcement who were present at the body recovery site
in nineteen ninety two that they too, had recently given
the FBI their DNA. Every DNA expert I consulted with,
along with former members of the ISP, talked about one
of three scenarios likely taking place. That technology had caught
(31:58):
up with the DNA collected at the time Tammy's body
was recovered, a new suspect had been developed, and or
investigators were now pursuing investigative genetic genealogy. Forensic genetic genealogy
is a labor intensive science that utilizes genetic information from
(32:20):
direct to consumer companies like ancestry, dot Com and twenty
three in May to identify suspects or victims in criminal cases.
Many see it as a magic investigative wand to wave
and a suspect of peers, but it's far more difficult
than that. Millions of DNA profiles within a database help
(32:43):
investigators create family trees, working backwards funneling down with the
hope of matching a DNA sample to a suspect. As
former ISP Lieutenant Jeff Pedia explains, the DNA analysis part
of the investigation is complex work. Just remember that there's
going to be the involvement of essentially two different laboratories,
(33:06):
so one can extract DNA and then expand it. You know,
so if you if you had a limited sample, you
could then you would use that that lab for that,
But then you would need another you would need a
genealogy like a laboratory that specializes in genealogy DNA because
it's much different, right, right, two different types of testing
if you the source of the DNA in Tammy's case
(33:30):
has never been made clear to the public. Where exactly
did the most viable DNA sample or samples come from
and what does it tell us about Tammy's killer. So
there was never no um DNA on her shorts or
anything like that, like semen blood no okay, no, okay, okay.
(33:52):
So yes, there's was lots of blood. The problem is
that her blood contaminated and eliminated the ability for us
to collect epithelial DNA. Basically, the blood soaked like her
blood soaked T shirt was of no use to us.
(34:15):
By the time Padilla and his team started working the case,
technology had advanced to the point that investigators were able
to collect and test epithelial DNA or touch DNA, which
essentially are cells that have been left behind on an object.
Or surface tammy shirt wasn't something they could test, but
(34:36):
other sources now provided investigators with the opportunity to develop
valuable samples. Items such as the blanket that her body
was wrapped in, the clothing that she was found in.
There was duct tape that was used to secure the
ends of the blanket that she was wrapped in, and
so all of those items, those physical items were available
(34:58):
to us. Her shoe were of interest to us. I'll
say that in the process of our analysis of the
physical evidence using more modern DNA a test, the shoelaces
were of tremendous interest to us, which was a struggle
getting any of this um any of this physical evidence reanalyzed.
(35:19):
So the DNA is definitely DNA that can connect the
killer to her murder. Yes, that is the power of
technology evolving, catching up two killers in this particular case.
You en, DNA was in its infancy at that time,
(35:40):
there's very limited opportunities to do DNA, and the DNA
tests were inaccurate or inconclusive. But by twenty and twelve
we had some really DNA had made some tremendous advancements
as it continues to do, and so I thought it
was worth it to go through the case foule like
it was brand new, like we had just got and
(36:01):
make it a bit of a project for the detectives
assigned me. The issue at hand was whether the amount
of DNA law enforcement had left to test in twenty
twenty two was enough to develop a viable DNA profile
that could be compared to forensic genealogy databases. Somebody had
to have contact with the sheet when she was wrapping.
(36:22):
Somebody had to have contact with the duct tape. Somebody
had to have contact with Tammy's clothing and body, and
so all those items were methodically identified In talking with
different investigators from the case. I'm confident it was all
of this information. Advancements in DNA technology, swab samples, a
(36:47):
new lab involved, and potential forensic genealogy began to make
more sense to me during the summer of twenty twenty
two when I learned about the latest potential suspect, someone
connected to the DNA findings who had been on investigator's
radar since the early nineties. Someone was still alive, not
(37:12):
a semitruck driver or a known serial killer. I'm told
the person law enforcement has been hyper focused on at
the time of this recording. It's right there throughout it
all on the ground, in the thick of it, wearing
a uniform on the next episode of Paper Ghosts, and
(37:42):
some interms have insolved after so many years because of
its being left in a spotlight. So some days are good,
some days I'm so good. We always struggled with the
idea of, you know, the couple of things, somebody in
a position of authority, or somebody right at her age
(38:03):
that she may have known. I believe that she was
dumped across state to draw interest away from where she
was picked up, and I believe that that's because that
area has a connection to her killer. If you are
enjoying Paper Ghosts, please listen to my other podcast, Crossing
the Line with Them William Phelps, where I use the
(38:25):
same storytelling elements you've heard in Paper Ghosts and cover
missing person and murder cases. Paper Ghosts is written and
executive produced by me and William Phelps and iHeart executive
producer Christina Everett. Additional writing by our supervising producer Julia Weaver.
(38:47):
Our associate producer is Darby Masters, Audio editing and mixing
by Christian Bowman and abou zafar Our series theme number
four four two is written and performed by Thomas Phelps
and Tom Mooney. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
(39:11):
favorite shows.
Paper Ghosts is a production of iHeartRadio, previously on Paper Ghosts.
So they took to DNA and how did you feel
about that? Oh, it didn't bother me because I mean
I I wasn't part of it. They got to eliminate everybody. Well,
I think, you know, I mean, it's always easy to
(00:20):
tell the truth, right when you start making up stories.
It'll change over time. I mean, if you know, if
I told you'll lie today and you came back to
me five years later, you know I'm asking the same question,
I may not respond the same way. Right, He alone
perpetuated the Lonnie beer Brott sort of fantasy as a
(00:42):
suspect because he was no longer part of the investigation,
so he wasn't aware that Lonnie had been eliminated. My
name is eem William Phelps. I'm an investigative journalist. Then off,
they're more than forty true crime books. This is season
three of Paper Ghosts in Plain Sight. As you have
(01:12):
heard throughout the podcast, retired ESP Master Sergeant Marty McCarthy
has been the driving force behind the accusation that Lonnie
beer brought, a former truck driver with a criminal background
from LaSalle County Illinois had something to do with Tammy
Ziwicki's murder. Because of that, beer Brought's name has become
(01:34):
almost synonymous with the case. Here's a guy who was
cleared through blood and DNA, a person law enforcement is
convinced had nothing to do with Tammy's murder, and yet
if you look online, he might as well be guilty.
By the fall of twenty twenty two, I'd confirmed through
(01:54):
multiple sources that Lonnie beer Brought was no longer a
suspect and Tammy's murder. Law enforcement, however, did not do
much to publicly clear Lonnie's name, or at the very
least reach out to Marty to tell him to back off.
(02:16):
Hello Marty, Hello Marty, how you doing. It's Matthew. So
I called Marty myself to discuss the facts that his
prime suspect, Lonnie beer Brought, was not Tammy's killer, and
that much of the ribbing he'd done against the ESP
and FBI was for nothing. Yeah, man, good good. I
(02:39):
just wanted to follow up with you and talk about
a few things. Lonnie beer Brought was completely and clearly
ruled out by blood and DNA. Okay, And they first
ruled him out in nineteen ninety three, and so what
do you think of that? I don't take much of it.
(03:01):
I mentioned that everyone i'd spoken to in law enforcement
was basically on the same page about Lonnie in their view.
The eyewitness's story about seeing him along the roadway with
Tammy and later seeing his wife wearing a watch similar
to Tammy's, well those stories were false. We could talk
(03:23):
about that eyewitness because the eyewitness account I don't think
I can put much weight in. And I'll tell you
why she's traveling on the other side of the highway
and she calls this in a week later, and well,
it doesn't become an issue, you know, it doesn't become
an issue until about a week later. Well, that's what
(03:43):
that's what I'm saying. I mean, I mean, you have
an eyewitness who Okay, a week ago, I saw I
drove by, and I saw this green or blue truck
and I saw this guy talking to her. Well, I've
seen cars broken down myself. There's no way I could
remember what I saw. I don't think it's a good
(04:06):
piece of evidence to go on. Okay, do you think
Lonnie stopped in his truck when Wickie's car broke down?
I don't think that was Lonnie. And here's here's why,
because just up the road from where Tammy was broken down,
there was another car broken down. Yeah, and and so
(04:30):
I don't know that saw Tammy or saw the other
girl who was broken down. I don't know that. We
don't We have no way of knowing that. And I
can't hang my hat on a witness on the other
side of the highway driving sixty miles an hour. She
wasn't violent, no, no, no, no, okay, So she slows
down down, So she slows down, but she's on the
other side of the highway and feeling she's on wait, wait,
(04:54):
wait a minute, wait a minute, let me finish, And
she drives by on the highway, and then a week
later she gives a statement about it. So if she
had an eerie feeling, I don't know why she didn't
report it that day or why didn't she stop, why
didn't she drive away? That You're kind of sound to
me like the state police's view of the witness. I mean,
you're just down on the witness. Not fun. You concluded
(05:16):
a watch. I just lost my she lost my credibility
with this watch story. With you know, every Lonnie beer
Brod to make him the guy. The entire case hangs
on her everything. I think that's true, and I think
that that's exactly what happened. People flying by an eighty
five miles an hour. She's the honest. Why would lie.
(05:39):
I don't think she lied. I don't think she lied.
I'm just saying that what she saw, I don't think
she saw, you know, she she's just kind of you know, oh,
oh my god, there's a girl missing. Now I saw something.
Much of Marty's theory about Lonnie beer Brod hung on
the eyewitness's account. I don't blame him for pursuing this
(06:01):
lead or for being alarmed by what the witness told
him a decade later, But I spent a year trying
to confirm her story and just couldn't. The other thing
is a sticking with that same witness. There is no watch.
Tammy's watch is still missing. They don't have the watch.
(06:25):
No one's produced the watch, never had the watch. That
was a story that got out there that she has
no idea. No, no, no, that's not true. The witness
told me. I'm just going with the witness told me.
The only witness as far as I know as who
actually saw it, knew where she was, and everything showed
her to watch. It was on her risk, right, I got,
(06:46):
I got all that. I just I don't think the
witness is correct. You know you're a polarizing figure in
all of this. You and the Illinois State Police don't
like each other. Well, let me let me put it
this way. I was on that task force and I
was never satisfied with that report, and I on my
(07:08):
own went down and found this information out about Mommy.
They had never done it. The case agent never did
ship after the case was referred to him. Not ship,
he threw that whole lead out. That lead was pursued
quite thoroughly. Lonnie's car and home were searched, he provided
(07:32):
blood and DNA, his ex wife gave a lengthy interview
and passed polygraph. It wasn't blown off, though it may
have seemed that way at the time. As much as
I respect Marty, it doesn't really matter if he believes
any of this or decides not to accept it. Those
(07:54):
are the facts of the case. If you choose to
look the other way. In my opinion, of developed tunnel vision,
and that lead was never pursued. Had I not been involved.
Let me just finish that lead would never pursued if
it ends up now that he's cleared. Fact, I went
through everything I had developed up to this point, focusing
(08:17):
on the idea that the ISP hadn't done enough to
clear line. They had done the work. Marty just wasn't
briefed about it, and so he assumed the worst. But
Marty wouldn't budge for whatever reason, He's still not convinced
that Lonnie can be fully eliminated. Why wouldn't they come
(08:39):
out with that information? I never did. I asked about
DNA over the years. I've had so many different answers.
One that there is no DNA. Who is who is
saying this? Oh that's the ISP that's saying it to me. Yeah, okay,
but I don't think the i ISP tested this stuff.
(09:00):
What I was sent to the FBI. Yeah, I mean
they worked together, so they all knew what was going
on within the investigation. Well, I don't know much about
the DNA. I find it strange that if they had this,
they wouldn't have come out with us, and I mean
they could have. I find that strange. Number One, Well,
(09:20):
I'm telling you he is cleared. He is cleared. Lonnie
beer brought has been cleared from this crime. I mean,
I'm open to anything if they have evidence of this,
But in my experience, I accept the witness. She gave
me this information. I did everything I could to get
(09:41):
that to the State's attorney and to the state police,
and they threw up a wall. From the minute I
mentioned it to him, I saw him that strange and
weird now knowing what they know at the time, which
is this, They've already ruled him out with DNA, So
why waste time on the guy he been ruled How
come the state's stourney never said that? Why would he
(10:04):
tell you that? The state's attorney never said that, the
state police never said that. If that's true about Lottie
in ninety three, why wouldn't they put that out? And
here this is the first time here, it's what twenty
twenty three, that's the first time I've heard this. It's
from you in twenty twenty three? Was that put out
(10:25):
publicly that Lottie was eliminated? I don't know why they
would put that publicly out until they needed to. I mean,
they were they were keeping a lot of their cards
close to the vest On this right. Do you know
how much press There was a lot of it, instigated
by me all over the count Yeah, I've looked at
was the suspect and here they had the capability in
(10:47):
ninety three to bow that out of the water and
never did. Don't you find that suspicions? No, The fact
is the ISP and FBI were not running an investigation
based on what Marty was telling the media. That would
only hinder their work on the case. There was also
(11:08):
a lot of information the ISP did not want release
to the public. What would it take for you to
believe that Lonnie didn't do this? I'd like to be
convinced that if there's no evidence of the watch, then
there's probably any any more information to go on. Monnie.
(11:29):
I'm telling you, I'm telling you, there is zero information
about that watch. That watch is a story that got
out there somehow by so it's not a story. It's
not a story. It's from the eyewitness who interviewed them,
if not just some rumor. Right, What I'm saying is
she put out that story. I don't know why. Marty
(11:50):
and I spoke close to an hour. It got heated
at times. He was not ready to believe that beer
Brott was innocent. No matter what I said, I do
know that Marty ultimately wants Tammy's killer to be caught
and brought to justice, and he's not looking for any fame.
And if that guy is someone other than Lonnie beer Brott,
(12:13):
so be it. Marty told me he's okay with that.
Why did you push Lonnie so hard in the media
when you knew that it was going to piss off
the state police because I thought as the killer. One
(12:34):
of the goals within all the work I do is
to portray the true nature of what investigators go through
and show how their work truly unfolds in real time.
If there is one standout lesson I have learned over
the years, it is the tedious nature of the ups
and downs, the exhilaration of thinking you've got your guy,
(12:57):
only to be let down when that last pace of
the puzzle doesn't fit. Over the course of its investigation,
THESP looked at many different potential suspects, people outside the
traditional serial killing trucker. Most of those inquiries never made
headlines and are known only to the people's task with
(13:21):
investigating them. Well, I appreciate you getting back to me
so quickly. I was working Sunday and I heard something
on the radio. Your podcast was about Tammy jose Wikis.
Right away I recalled that there were some similarities in
our case. After the first few episodes of this season aired,
I got a call from a former detective who'd worked
in the area of Tammy's abduction in nineteen ninety two.
(13:44):
He remembered her story and had knowledge of a potential suspect,
one I hadn't previously known about for various reasons. He's
asked for his name not to be used, but agreed
to share his recollection. I remember I was on my
way home. I was getting ready to leave because we
worked a ten hour shift, and then we got the
call on that The call was from a neighboring police district,
(14:08):
from officers who said a man walked into their station
and claimed that there was a dead body in this camper,
which was parked in a campground that was under my
sources jurisdiction. So we all went to the scene. Camper
was locked up tight. They actually got a warrant for
the camper, and the body was found. It was actually
wrapped up in a blanket with duct tape on each end.
(14:30):
It was that grayish silver duct tape. Inside the blanket
was the body of Denise Marino, a twenty five year
old waitress from West Chicago. The camper was parked at
the now defunct Hideaway Lakes Campground justice of Yorkville, Illinois,
a city about halfway between Chicago and LaSalle County, where
(14:53):
Tammy was abducted just eight months prior. The man who
owned the camper was Charles D. Parker, a thirty eight
year old ex con who had served eight years out
of a fifty year sentence in prison for rape. So
I spent several hours interviewing him, and he admitted to
(15:14):
being the only one with her drinking. They were drinking
excessive mouth alcohol and they were inhaling carburetor cleaner. He
met her at a bar in West Chicago and then
somehow convinced her to go back there with I believe
he convinced her to go back there with and from
what I can recall, but she did leave with him willingly.
(15:34):
My source described a deeply unsettling scene. The young woman
had been stabbed a number of times and had been
sexually assaulted. The body was it was obviously signs of
you know, just brutal, almost like a torturous thing that
he had did her. It was she was bound in
duct tape and then wrapped up in the blanket with
(15:55):
duct tape. But now the interesting thing he took her
after she was dead. He took her into the showers,
which it wasn't too far a walk from where his
camper was. It was one of those truck bed campers,
and it was up on Jack's so he could drive
in and out from underneath of it. You don't see
him any much anymore, but it was a camper mounted
on the back of the pickup bed. But it was
(16:17):
a pickup. It was a pickup truck. Many of the
circumstances surrounding how they met and how he lured her
back to his camper did not fit with Tammy's abduction.
But there was one detail that piqued my interests and
certainly got my attention. One of the investigators searching the
camper found the ring that said Tammy, but it was
(16:41):
spelled Tami. Okay. It was kind of like a square
ring yea with two letters on the bottom two letters
on the top formed a bigger square. I went back
and asked Tammy's family, and a half a dozen of
her friends. If any of them we call a ring
anything like that, none did. I still hadn't found out. However,
(17:05):
if Parker had been completely eliminated, the chances were slim
he'd had anything to do with Tammy's murder. But you
can never be entirely certain unless the evidence backs it up.
And he was questioned about the ring Charlie was and
what did he say about it? What the other detective
told me is he got very angry when he was
(17:26):
asked about it. He said, I did not kill Tammy
Jose Wiki. That's what he said to him, allegedly when
he was asked about it, and he got angry. He
got angry. The way I recalled him, describe me it
to me is while he said that he pounded his
fist on the table and what happens after that? To
(17:48):
my knowledge, the other detective brought that information to ESP
and nothing became of it. I remember Charlie and this
case in particular because he had tortured her. It was
an exceptionally violent rape and murdering. Former IP Lieutenant Jeff
Padilla was certain that Parker could be excluded from Tammy's
(18:10):
case based on the violent nature of Parker's crimes, and
also how Parker met the victim and got her back
to his camper. I might also add that Parker was
sloppy in didn't seem to be honestly smart enough to
get away with the murder. For thirty plus years, we
had looked at him, and we had talked about him,
and we had talked about him, and he didn't fit
(18:33):
for a number of reasons. Yes, he had a pickup truck,
but it was in like an encampment. He didn't live
in a neighborhood. It was like a mobile home. She
had come with him voluntarily back and at some point
the sexual interaction turned violent, and Charlie found her and
then tortured her throughout the night before she finally died
(18:53):
of blood loss. So the m that entire situation did
not fit at all with what had happened to Tammy,
and we didn't dismiss it. But the DNA that we
did have was, you know, there was never enough for
a codus inquiry. You know, you essentially could Charlie's DNA
(19:15):
is available and it has been encoded. You could do
a one to one inquiry against him, which I know
has been done since then. The m O didn't really match,
so we did the best we could to look into it,
but it didn't fit what we had with Tammy. One
of the more interesting and certainly promising threats the IP
(19:38):
followed early into the investigation is worth mentioning, if only
to put one of the more popular Internet based theories
in this case into perspective and maybe even gained some
insight into where it originated. There was a guy that
was a truck driver for a company that came onto
the radar and it turned out, you know, he was
(20:00):
truly a sex offender. He had done a home invasion
rape in like nineteen eighty eight, just prior to the
DNA and sex offender laws and was sentenced to like
four years in prison and got out right before Tammy
was abducted and murdered. You know, he had done he
had met this girl at a diner that was a waitress.
She was like seventeen years old, eighteen years old, followed
(20:24):
her home, waited outside her residence, saw like when her
parents left, then broke into the house while she was there,
and then raped her on the floor in the hallway
and took her panties as a souvenir, and we were
I was like, this has got to be our guy,
and that was never nobody had ever looked into this
that guy's background. If you recall, there was talk early
(20:48):
on about Tammy's killer potentially keeping her body in a
refrigerated truck before placing it off Exit thirty three in Missouri,
which answered the question of why perhaps her boy was
not in an advanced stage of decomposition. He was a
truck driver. It was a refrigerated truck, so that could
account for some of the lack of d comp on Tammy.
(21:09):
When she was recovered, he was up and down I eighty.
As the IP began looking into the guy, they realized
he had taken off to the Upper Midwest for three
days near the time of Tammy's disappearance. And at that time,
you know, like if you'd get a little paper receipt
from the tollway, that was a big deal because the
tolls were expected for trucks, so they everybody saved the receipts,
(21:31):
and he didn't have his receipts from going to Michigan.
So when we went back and looked at the case,
and particularly after VIDOC, he's a guy that that pops
and took up a lot of time from us, because
then we went back and looked at all that. We
went after him hard, you know, had the FBI do
a covert surveillance to him and recovered, you know, and
then did a one to one DNA comparison on him
(21:53):
and eliminated him, even though he was like perfect candidate.
But boy, we thought for probably a year and a half,
we thought he was good for Tammy's murder. I mean,
so there's a good example here. You are, you got
your guy. You could easily tunnel vision that guy and
bullhorn that for the next twenty five years, right, Yeah,
because we dug I mean, I mean that's how we
(22:15):
found out all about this previous charge and it was like,
oh my god, look at that. We thought we hit
the jackpot, and it turned out it wasn't. You never
got a chance to interview him in the aftermath. We
just knew that without the DNA being a match, we
were out of luck with him. Within all the theories
and suspects I had encountered, many of which seem promising
(22:36):
at face value, there always seemed to be something missing,
something important. The science DNA is going to solve Tammy's case.
I am completely certain of that, and as these things
generally go, something we hear about every day within the
world of true crime, technology has caught up to Tammy's case.
(23:00):
A new DNA profile has been extracted from old evidence,
which has opened up a full proof way of developing
a new suspect. We're sorry you have reached a number
(23:21):
that has been disconnected or is no longer in service.
You have reached the Lawrence County Sheriff's Office. If this
is an emergency, please hang up and die. All nine
one one, Good morning, Sergeant Phillips. This is m William Phelps, Matthew. Hey,
you've reached the law office of Pierre and Dannally. Please
leave your name number. In the year leading up to
the release of this season and even after, I've pounded
(23:44):
the pavement and made call after call, placing my entire
focus on several unanswered questions from years past and several
new questions that had arisen in recent months. Most of
the time I got this, Please leave a message, give
me your number if you want to call back. Thank you.
(24:06):
In my line of work, you get used to leaving
voicemails and never hearing back from people, but persistence is key,
and every now and again it pays off. Hi, Karen,
Nice to meet you. Karen Donneley is the former state's
Attorney for LaSalle County, Illinois, a position she held from
two sixteen to twenty twenty. During that time, she became
(24:32):
deeply familiar with Tammy's case. Yeah, we met about two
years after she left office at her legal practice in
downtown Ottawa, Illinois. You've heard from Karen briefly in earlier episodes.
She had Tammy's case for four years as state's attorney,
and she was brief by investigators from the FBI and
(24:54):
IP whenever significant developments came up. Like many others from
the region, Karen was already quite familiar with Tammy's story.
I was alive and present during this when it happened,
so I was very aware of it and very concerned
that this happened in such a close location to where
(25:15):
I live, and that she was such a young age
when she was taken. So that's how I knew of it.
And then when I became state's attorney, we had a
small file on it that we kept in the office,
and I looked at the file to see if there
was anything in there that was worth noting, and there
really wasn't anything that was new until I was approached
(25:35):
by the investigators because they liked to come every year
and tell us, you know, whoever sitting in the seat
of states Attorney, what's going on. And so you began
to look back at this case and what strikes you
mostly about it. I was concerned that there was no resolution.
It was so many possibilities, but nothing was ever zeroed
(25:58):
in on that when I spoke to members of the
FBI or Illinois State Police that there wasn't much that
they were going on, and we just felt like it
was a dead end. And therefore, when I was State's Attorney,
I offered whatever services I could give them, whether it
was monetary, you know, anything that we could do. I
was willing to help. And what did you do? First?
(26:19):
The investigators came and met with members of the State's
Attorney's office every year to give us an update what
they were doing, just to give us a heads up
in case they needed something from us. We were often
briefed on where they were at. Here's what you know
some of the public doesn't know. Here's what we're doing.
They don't share everything with me. They gave us a
(26:42):
lot of information about what they were doing. They would
often come to us and ask for permission to do
certain things that I had to clear with Tammy's mother.
In twenty twenty, law enforcement asked Karen Donnelly to reach
out to Tammy's mom, Joanne, discussed using the remaining DNA
that investigators had inevidence. It was later on in my
(27:06):
ten year of state's attorney that they came to me
and asked for permission to consume what they had insofar
as the DNA evidence. That's important to say consuming because
they only have so much correct. Once it's choosed up,
it's gone. This might surprise the general public, but certain
DNA tests require physically using up part of the actual
(27:30):
sample in evidence, and so once the source sample is gone,
that's it. It's gone. Investigators are left with a profile
they can match to offenders who are already in some
type of DNA database, but they're unable to go back
to that sample again. This can be a big deal,
(27:54):
especially in an era of constantly evolving technology. Law worseman
agencies are also hesitant to consume all available DNA because
it can haunt prosecutors. Later, defense attorneys will often ask
to test DNA independently, and if there's nothing left to test,
it can make it more difficult to be successful in core. Still,
(28:18):
it was clear that law enforcement was taking one last
chance at solving Tammy's case via DNA, and from what
I had learned, it wasn't a shot in the dark.
They had good reason. So they come to you and
you give them the ok to consume that DNA. I
first called Joanne and we have this discussion about this
(28:41):
as our one shot. You know, we may not get
it again if we agree to do this. She was
in complete agreement and said we've got to do what
we've got to do. So I authorize them to consume
the sample, and that was for testing, to put it
into CODAS or genealogical or they had a suspect. I
don't know that they had a suspect. I know that
(29:01):
when we gave them the authorization to consume the sample,
it was going to be put into the CODA system.
And I believe at the time there may have been
issues about a backlog and codas, and at that time
I did offer any resources I could, as far as
reverse genealogy because I'm a crime scene nut and I
watch all those shows. And I offered that to the
investigators and said, if you need funding to provide the
(29:25):
sample to them to do this reverse genealogy to see
if they get a hit, I would fund that. And
did they take your offer? They weren't at that point yet,
because I think they were still waiting to submit to CODIS.
Since twenty twenty, investigators working on Tammy's case have refocused
on DNA. They started reaching out to people connected to
(29:45):
Tammy and anyone involved in the earliest days of the
investigation and asking them for a DNA sample. On top
of that, with the help of more advanced forensic and
DNA technology, they started to go back through all the
evidence to see what, if anything, the killer could have
left behind. When I spoke to Joanne Ziwiki, she confirmed
(30:07):
that the ISP had been in contact as recently as
twenty twenty two and had told her they were sending
DNA to a lab in California for testing. Here's Tammy's brother, Todd.
DNA evidence became more sophisticated, that started becoming more promising.
I started to hear rumors that they had additional DNA
(30:29):
that was usable, and so, you know, in the last
few years, I've become a little bit more optimistic as
it sounded like the operation was still proceeding and that
they were building, you know, potentially building a case and
starting to express some greater optimism than they did for
decades before that. And recently your mom has told me
(30:52):
that has been calling to ask, you know, we have
some DNA that we want to submit somewhere in California,
right what have you heard about that part of it?
A couple of local FBI agents came to my house
and took a DNA swab for me, and I believe
they've done the same thing with both of my brothers.
(31:12):
They apparently found now DNA that they can use and
they wanted to make sure it wasn't ours, So obviously
they have something that they're processing. They did find something
somewhere that was usable, that was different from what they
had previously had, at least enough and good enough condition
that they wanted to take my own DNA and rule
out the possibility there was one of us, one of
(31:34):
the boys in the family. I've also been told by
law enforcement who were present at the body recovery site
in nineteen ninety two that they too, had recently given
the FBI their DNA. Every DNA expert I consulted with,
along with former members of the ISP, talked about one
of three scenarios likely taking place. That technology had caught
(31:58):
up with the DNA collected at the time Tammy's body
was recovered, a new suspect had been developed, and or
investigators were now pursuing investigative genetic genealogy. Forensic genetic genealogy
is a labor intensive science that utilizes genetic information from
(32:20):
direct to consumer companies like ancestry, dot Com and twenty
three in May to identify suspects or victims in criminal cases.
Many see it as a magic investigative wand to wave
and a suspect of peers, but it's far more difficult
than that. Millions of DNA profiles within a database help
(32:43):
investigators create family trees, working backwards funneling down with the
hope of matching a DNA sample to a suspect. As
former ISP Lieutenant Jeff Pedia explains, the DNA analysis part
of the investigation is complex work. Just remember that there's
going to be the involvement of essentially two different laboratories,
(33:06):
so one can extract DNA and then expand it. You know,
so if you if you had a limited sample, you
could then you would use that that lab for that,
But then you would need another you would need a
genealogy like a laboratory that specializes in genealogy DNA because
it's much different, right, right, two different types of testing
if you the source of the DNA in Tammy's case
(33:30):
has never been made clear to the public. Where exactly
did the most viable DNA sample or samples come from
and what does it tell us about Tammy's killer. So
there was never no um DNA on her shorts or
anything like that, like semen blood no okay, no, okay, okay.
(33:52):
So yes, there's was lots of blood. The problem is
that her blood contaminated and eliminated the ability for us
to collect epithelial DNA. Basically, the blood soaked like her
blood soaked T shirt was of no use to us.
(34:15):
By the time Padilla and his team started working the case,
technology had advanced to the point that investigators were able
to collect and test epithelial DNA or touch DNA, which
essentially are cells that have been left behind on an object.
Or surface tammy shirt wasn't something they could test, but
(34:36):
other sources now provided investigators with the opportunity to develop
valuable samples. Items such as the blanket that her body
was wrapped in, the clothing that she was found in.
There was duct tape that was used to secure the
ends of the blanket that she was wrapped in, and
so all of those items, those physical items were available
(34:58):
to us. Her shoe were of interest to us. I'll
say that in the process of our analysis of the
physical evidence using more modern DNA a test, the shoelaces
were of tremendous interest to us, which was a struggle
getting any of this um any of this physical evidence reanalyzed.
(35:19):
So the DNA is definitely DNA that can connect the
killer to her murder. Yes, that is the power of
technology evolving, catching up two killers in this particular case.
You en, DNA was in its infancy at that time,
(35:40):
there's very limited opportunities to do DNA, and the DNA
tests were inaccurate or inconclusive. But by twenty and twelve
we had some really DNA had made some tremendous advancements
as it continues to do, and so I thought it
was worth it to go through the case foule like
it was brand new, like we had just got and
(36:01):
make it a bit of a project for the detectives
assigned me. The issue at hand was whether the amount
of DNA law enforcement had left to test in twenty
twenty two was enough to develop a viable DNA profile
that could be compared to forensic genealogy databases. Somebody had
to have contact with the sheet when she was wrapping.
(36:22):
Somebody had to have contact with the duct tape. Somebody
had to have contact with Tammy's clothing and body, and
so all those items were methodically identified In talking with
different investigators from the case. I'm confident it was all
of this information. Advancements in DNA technology, swab samples, a
(36:47):
new lab involved, and potential forensic genealogy began to make
more sense to me during the summer of twenty twenty
two when I learned about the latest potential suspect, someone
connected to the DNA findings who had been on investigator's
radar since the early nineties. Someone was still alive, not
(37:12):
a semitruck driver or a known serial killer. I'm told
the person law enforcement has been hyper focused on at
the time of this recording. It's right there throughout it
all on the ground, in the thick of it, wearing
a uniform on the next episode of Paper Ghosts, and
(37:42):
some interms have insolved after so many years because of
its being left in a spotlight. So some days are good,
some days I'm so good. We always struggled with the
idea of, you know, the couple of things, somebody in
a position of authority, or somebody right at her age
(38:03):
that she may have known. I believe that she was
dumped across state to draw interest away from where she
was picked up, and I believe that that's because that
area has a connection to her killer. If you are
enjoying Paper Ghosts, please listen to my other podcast, Crossing
the Line with Them William Phelps, where I use the
(38:25):
same storytelling elements you've heard in Paper Ghosts and cover
missing person and murder cases. Paper Ghosts is written and
executive produced by me and William Phelps and iHeart executive
producer Christina Everett. Additional writing by our supervising producer Julia Weaver.
(38:47):
Our associate producer is Darby Masters, Audio editing and mixing
by Christian Bowman and abou zafar Our series theme number
four four two is written and performed by Thomas Phelps
and Tom Mooney. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the
iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your
(39:11):
favorite shows.
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