September 22, 2017 • 46 mins
Where nursing student Maura Murray went and what happened to the 21-year-old has been a mystery since a minor car crash on a winding road in New Hampshire’s White Mountains in February 2004. Maura's story has been the subject of a popular podcast, but now it gets the full investigative treatment with an Oxygen docuseries. Nancy Grace discusses the case with investigative journalist Maggie Freleng and former U.S. Marshall Art Roderick, the primary investigators in "The Disappearance of Maura Murray."
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
February two thousand four, Maurra Murray empties her bank account,
drives four hours from school, crashes her car and vanishes.
Joined the search as an investigative reporter, uncovers new evidence,
interrogates new witnesses, and traces down new leads in this
riveting new investigative series, The Disappearance of Maurra Murray. Tomorrow
(00:24):
eight fifteen, seven fifteen Central on Oxygen, the new network
for crime Climb Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM
Triumph Channel one thirty two. Sunday will mark ten years
since anyone has seen or heard anything from a woman
(00:44):
named Maura Murray. Now the college studn't crashed her car
one twelve and north have miles north of the U
mass Amherst campus. Mara had vanished. When police arrived. There
was what appeared to be indications that she may have
been running away, but her father and investing ters think
there is much more to her disappearance. My initial thought
is still my what I think, and that's somebody locally
(01:06):
grabbed on a mission to find his missing daughter. Maura
bred Murray went to Conquered to see Governor Lynch. Frustrated
with the state police investigation into her disappearance. Mr Murray
is asking the governor to release all her case files,
and he'd like the FBI to get involved in the investigation.
She had her world in front of her, a twenty
one year old, gorgeous nursing student from Hanson, Massachusetts. She
(01:33):
goes out in her car, she has a fender bender,
she gets out of the car, and she vanishes. Maura
Murray has never been seen alive again. I Nancy Grace,
this is crime Stories. Thank you for being with us,
(01:53):
joining me right now to break it down and put
it back together again and try to get answers about
Maura Murry. The search is ongoing. Former US martial art
Roderick and investigative journalist Maggie Freeling. Guys, thank you so
much for being with us. First of all, I want
you to hear what the dad says. What do you
(02:16):
think happened to Mara. I think somebody, some somebody grabbed
maybe somebody hearing it in a scanner or something like that.
I think there's a Monday night It isn't there's nothing
really going on. It's not a tourist type of deal.
I think a local dirt bag grabbed it, and I
(02:36):
know she would have called me that that Monday night
as you were able. Then the accident happens, and that
changes everything. Change. Whatever plan she had is out the window.
Whatever she was trying to do is now she's got
a whole new set of circumstances. It's got to be
frustrating that the same possibilities that you were dealing with
the Wednesday afterwards are still all in play, exactly the
(02:57):
same thing, the same thing. Now there's there's no question
about whether I'm gonna look for you know, this is
my kid. Uh my kid wants me to look for her.
I'm gonna do. I'm gonna look for my kid. You know,
I don't know what happened to her. I mean, I
don't have Maura, I don't have a body, you know.
(03:18):
I'm I'm I have to I have to think in
these terms. But the case, certainly it's an olva to
Maggie free Lang again, thank you and Art for being
with us. Take me back to the evening the day
that Maura Murray disappeared. What happened? So from what we know,
um happened because we do have receipts from a liquor
(03:41):
store and at m footage with time stamps. Maura dropped
off some clothing at a nursing friend's dorm, headed to
the A p M. Withdrew all of the money from
her bank account, which was around two and then she
headed to the liquor store, but up liquor, hopped in
her car and drove up towards New Hampshire. UM. We
(04:05):
don't know where she was going, but the fender bender
happened in haveral Um and that is the last time
anybody saw her. UM bus driver Butch Atwood was coming
home from work head around seven pm and says he
had a conversation with a young woman who appeared shaken
(04:26):
up right near his house in a car accident. He
asked her if she wanted him to call the police,
and he says she said no, she called Triple A. However,
he knew that was not true because even today you
do not get any sort of cell phone reception in
that area. So Butch, the Butch bus driver, went home
(04:47):
and he called to Aren't Roderick, former US Marshall art,
isn't it true that something got hanky with a nine
one one call? Was it diverted what happened, you know
when and Butch Atwood got back to his um house,
which was only about a hundred yards from the accident location,
he called one and according to him, there was there.
(05:11):
The call was either busy. Then it got diverted to
a different county dispatcher and they forward the call back
to the Grafton County, which was in the area where
the original nine one one call should have gone. That
dispatcher from Grafton County actually ended up calling back Butch Atwood.
(05:32):
And that's kind of like how this whole call came together.
This girl, Maura Murray, who disappears on Fab nine after
a car crash on Route one twelve. Have her heell
New Hampshire. It's I say, out in the middle of nowhere,
but I grew up in an area just like that,
very very rural. Now. Moura Murray was a nursing student
(05:54):
at University Massachusetts Amherst. That afternoon she left campus, but
before she left, she emailed her professors and her supervisor,
writing she was going to take a week off due
to a death and her family. Now, this is the
weird part. Nobody in her family has ever been able
(06:17):
to confirm that any death occurred, not even recently. There
was no death in her family. Okay, we know that.
Now here's the problem. This so often happens. Police initially
treated her case as a missing person's case, thinking she
wanted to disappear, and that speculation was all because she
(06:40):
had made preparations to travel and there seemed to be
no evidence of foul play. But many people, including myself,
are convinced that Maura Murray was kidnapped that day, and
I believe she's dead. It's very hard for me to
believe that Maria Murray somehow created a whole new life
(07:02):
Maggie Freeling, investigative journalist somewhere else and has never contacted
her family. Again, that's hard for me to blame Maggie. Yeah,
And you know, I think that's also kind of them
perspective that I was able to put into this. I mean,
I was a twenty one year old girl who did
go to U mass and I found so many similarities
(07:24):
between Maura and myself. And while this, you know, this
whole theory came from James Runner. You know, while this
tandem driver she escaped started a new life seems really
sexy and he can make it compelling. Um, you know,
having been in her situation, I think it is also
(07:45):
very unlikely that that is something that she did. What
are you saying made it's sexy? James Runner, the author
his whole book came out True Crime Addict, and his
whole theory in the book is that she, you know,
was driving up there with a tandem driver, a friend
(08:06):
or somebody who helped her escape and start a new life.
When you're saying she started a whole new live based
on this book by James Renner. UM True Crime Addict
by James Renner, True Crime Addict, How I Lost myself
in the mysterious disappearance of Maura Murray. Maggie, you disagree
(08:29):
with Renner's portrayal of what happened to mar Murray? What
exactly is he claiming happened? So, you know, I wouldn't
say I necessarily disagree. I just don't see it being
the most likely possibility in this day and age. But
this wasn't like the eighties where there was no you know,
(08:49):
internet trades, no cell phones. I mean, I so James
Renner is claiming that Maura, when she left U Mass
had a plan to drive away with a tandem driver,
a friend, a family member, somebody that was going to
help her escape and start a new life, escape from what. Yes,
(09:12):
she had once using uh stolen credit card to buy
some food, all right, she had a fenderbender with her
dad's car. There's nothing to escape. This girl had gone
to West Point, she was about to start a nursing career.
She had a high school sweetheart, Billy rash Uh stationed
at Fort Seale in Oklahoma, that she was going to marry.
(09:33):
She's gorgeous, she's young, she's healthy. Escape what so, I'm
not sure what we're winter is headed with this, but
the fact that she stopped and made some purchases and
was planning to take a week off, which she told
everybody that. I mean, I don't think the crash was
part of the plan. And if she wanted to disappear,
(09:55):
she could have done that. And back to his theory,
Maggie Freeling, who was this quote in tandem driver? In
other words, somebody's driving along with her or is going
to meet her somewhere. It's not the body and her family, right,
And I think there there are many things to what
you just said. I mean, she did have a fender bender. Yes,
you know, before this one, she also crashed her dad's
(10:17):
car right before she disappeared. Um, yes, she stole from
Fort Knox Um. Renner also claims that her relationship with
her boyfriend Bill Roush was not great. Um. Neither was
my relationship with my high school boyfriend. That's why, thank
you lord, I didn't marry him as wonderful as he
(10:38):
seemed when I was sixteen. Uh So the fact that
that wasn't working out. You know, you can make a childish,
immature decision, aren't Roderick, But you really think she would
have kept up the force of a disappearance for all
this time and cut herself off from her parents and family.
I mean, the answer you've you've you know, you've been
(10:58):
in the law, enforce, the judicial area for criminal justice
process for a lot of years. It's almost impossible, I think,
in this day and age for twenty one year old
girl to just drop off the face of the earth.
Uh intentionally. And I think Renner's theory is based on
a lot of false premises because what actually occurred was
(11:20):
he never really got to speak to a lot of people.
The family refused to talk to him. Uh, you know,
a lot of her friends didn't talk to him, so
I think he's based theory on a lot of false
premises and rumor and innuendo. I like you and Maggie,
and I also agree to that there's that there's probably
(11:40):
she was grabbed in this, some foul play involved in
her disappearance. I have no doubt in my mind, and
I'm not trashing then because his book brought a lot
of attention to the marmur And case, and I'm grateful
for that, and a lot of his research has really
helped mentcy. I have a clip I'd like to play
(12:00):
of Maggie interviewing Keim and Lance. We've interviewed them before.
They're the podcasters, the missing Maura Murray podcasters, And this
is a clip about the timeline of what happened that night,
and it is a clip from the Disappearance of Maura Murray.
(12:21):
Did you guys get interested in the case? Just being
interested in the in true crime overall and U Maura's
case always comes up once you start reading about it.
It just starts like unlayering and unfolding and just before
you know what, you're like down the rabbit hole. The
mystery within the mystery is why was she heading up
there in the first place. Do you guys have an
opinion on why do you think she was heading up there?
(12:43):
I can't really say I do. We tried really hard
to not have fear. Tell me a little bit about
the crash. Uh Well, based on the police transcripts and
the call log, a neighbor calls. A pat with a
bus driver pulls up who was also a neighbor and
talks to her. She said she already called her. Blage
(13:04):
is a lie because there's no cell phone service up there,
so she could not have gotten a call up and
he knew that immediately. And I think that is like
the most fascinating thing, at least for me, that this
accident happens. There were eyes on the accident. It is
in the White Mountains in New Hampshire. But there's a
house there. There's a house here. Someone pulls up and
(13:26):
talks to her, there's phone, calls me to and right
at this moment where apparently everybody turned around or he
wasn't looking, she's gone. And that window of opportunities like
mind belonging to me. It's baffling. How long is that window? Um?
You can probably narrow it down to about seven minutes.
(13:48):
Figuring out why Morea vanished sometime during those seven minutes
when the neighbors turned away and didn't see anything is crucial.
Oh Omura disappeared in a remote part of New Hampshire.
The ROADSI crashed on was well traveled, which brings me
(14:09):
to the theory of foul play. Let's take a look
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Alright where I left off, let me think, Oh, yes,
foul play. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine that?
(15:39):
Alan do? That's what I'm focusing on, foul play. And
I can tell you something. This girl didn't just disappear.
She didn't go off on her own for soul searching
or to find herself or just start a new life
in Oh, she's dead. Okay. I can tell you that
right now from my studio and my series of sex
(16:00):
M one three two show She's dead. Okay. So now
that I've established that in my mind, can we get
to work and try to figure out what happened. Let's
start with the crash. Okay, Arn't Roderick, former US Marshall,
Maggie Freeling investigative journalist, and of course the Duke Alan.
Do you joining me along with my friend here in
(16:21):
the studio, Jackie Um. Arn't Roderick. Tell me about this crash,
because art I don't care who wrote what in their book.
She did not plan for a crash that day, all right,
that through the monkey wrench in the work. So tell
me about the crash. I mean, when you when you
look at the crash scene you had mentioned it's a
(16:42):
rural area. It is kind of a rural area, but
there are about twenty houses within a half mile radius.
So where this accident occurred. The accident occurred on room once. Well,
it's it's like at the beginning of the kink Comengus
Highway in New Hampshire. It's a two lane highway and
there was a sharp almost ninety degree turn that she
(17:04):
couldn't negotiate and she kind of clipped the inside elbow
of that whoa art art. I love you, man, but
I'm drinking from a fire hydrant here too much at once,
too much, I'm not to let me just let me
just break it down for a minute because it's actually
for Alan deep because he just can't process that quickly.
(17:27):
So yeah, okay, so let's just hold on um, poor guy.
He and you're so much So we've got mar Murray.
She's going along the Cake and Mangus Highway there in
New Hampshire. First of all, is it rural, yes? Is
it heavily wooded? Heavily wooded? Yes? Is there a body
(17:50):
of water nearby? My chance, there's there's a pond sort
of a mile from it's called French pond. It's about
a mile from where the accident occurred. Are you saying
French or fresh French? French? Okay, as in the country
freence al right, Okay, So she's driving along. What are
the weather conditions? Just curious. Do we know it's cold,
(18:11):
it's February. There was about two and a half but
pet snow on the ground, but the roads were clearing
two and a half did you say two and a
half feet? Well, about two ft of snow on the
side of the road. The roads are pretty clear, I
mean Hampshire. Okay. This is very significant to me because
in my mind, this greatly reduces the likelihood that somebody
(18:35):
stopped and engaged in conversation with her and farthering I'm
not getting I'm not putting one toe outside the car,
and also to me minimizes also it changes her actions
and reactions because it's freezing cold outside. But again, she
did not have sales service, so let's factor that in
(18:56):
no cell service. Hold on, hold on um Along the
street wretch where she had her collision, were there any
red lights, any businesses, any anything, or is it out
in the middle of forest? Now? There there there were
there was a business rate at the corner of that
sharp turn. There was several houses in the area about
(19:18):
what was the business and a half mile radius there
was several houses in the area. Okay, that is important
to me. Several houses within a half a mile. M Yeah,
there's actually there's actually one collar. The closest neighbor was
(19:38):
only about from the accident scene. Is that Butch Atwood? No,
that would have been the Westman's which Atwood lived about
a hundred yards from the accident scene. Straight down the road.
You could actually see which Atwood's residents from the accident scene.
But there was a home forty feet away from the craft.
This is ok this is Nancy. This is what's really incredible.
(20:00):
And you go up there, you know, Art and I
both expected it to be, you know, super rural. Nobody
was around. But when you get to a crash site,
it actually like it is a neighborhood. There are houses there.
And yes, the Westman's house was basically on top of
the crash site, and just maybe a hundred yards down
(20:20):
the road are three other houses. So there were many
many eyes on this scene. Guys, just hold on, let
me process this. I was you know, joking around with
Alan Deep for a minute. But this is completely different
than what I imagined. This changes everything. It absolutely changes
(20:40):
everything because if she had when I say, crash, it
was basically a fender bender. I think, Um, yes, the
car could have driven out of there. That was my
next question. Hold on, hold on, I'm taking notes as
fast as I can. So her car could have driven
out of there. Is that what you said? Yes? Yes?
Was it off the road? Is there some reason she
(21:02):
would just keep going? Well, what we found is we actually, uh,
as part of the show, we actually went out and
purchased the Saturn, the same model that she had at
this particular time. We took it to a garage mechanic
did several tests on it, and we found that when
(21:24):
that model of that satur installs out, which which more
than likely happened installed out when it kind of had
that fender bender, Um, you have to take the key
out of the ignition before you can put it back
in to restart the vehicle. I don't think she knew that,
because when they downloaded the black box inside the vehicle
(21:45):
to do some tests on it, they found that after
the air bags deployed, there was seven clicks ignition and
the vehicle wouldn't start. So, um, we think that she
didn't realize that she had to take the key out
and put it back in to restart the vehicle. Wow.
Hold on, so that was revealed with the black box.
(22:09):
That was revealed with the black box inside the car,
but also revealed by a mechanic car mechanic. Uh, he
took this particular model of vehicle too. He said, you
have to remove the key out of the admission to
actually start the vehicle back up again. Wasn't it art?
Wasn't it her car? Wouldn't she have known that if
(22:29):
it was her car? Well, I I you would think that,
But I was kind of shocked because I didn't realize
that with the the issue with the vehicle. I mean,
how many times did the car stall out? It was
an automatic transmission in that particular Saturn, and she probably
never had it stalled out before. Now, the car did
have some mechanical issues to it. Her father was getting
(22:53):
ready to buy her a newer, used vehicle so that
she could get back and forth to her school, but
the car was not in good running condition. But she
probably just didn't know that you just take the key out,
put it back in. Well, I gotta tell you something.
I've had my Toyota. I had my for I guess
(23:16):
twelve years. When I got when I was sixteen. I
had so many problems with it. And it was not
the Toyota's fault, you know, Okay, I didn't know you
had to put oil in it. Nobody told me that.
I just knew about gas. So, needless to say, the
fact that I had the car for thirteen years does
say that Toyota is a pretty good car, no matter
what I did to it. But when it wouldn't crank,
(23:37):
the first thing I would just instinctively do is take
the key out, pray and curse and carry on, and
then then try to crank it back up again. I
mean to me, that would just be natural instinct to
take the key out and then try it again and
try it again. But that's really interesting because a black
box can it tell you the key was never taken
(23:58):
out of the ignition and tell you that the mom
times that it was that it was attempted to be
turned over, and what when you look at the black box,
the black box indicated that there was a slight jar
in the vehicle, and then point two seconds later the
air bags deployed. It shows that in the black box
(24:20):
now after the airbags deployed, there was an attempt to
there was an attempt to turn the vehicle over. There
was seven clicks after the airbags deployed on the ignition itself.
You know, Maggie Freeling, investigative journalist. I'm just at this
moment feeling like I'm right there in that car that
(24:41):
Saturn with her and it's two ft of snow outside.
The airbags have deployed over a simple fender bender, and
she's trying seven times to restart the vehicle, and she
realizes I'm I'm stuck. Right. You know another thing you're
(25:02):
telling me, Maggie, I had imagine something completely different. And
that's why I never went to a jury with a
case or two a major plea unless I went to
the scene, because that changes everything. I can't tell you
how many cases I won because the other side didn't
(25:24):
get off their lazy rear ends and go out on
the weekend or whenever and look at the crime scene,
take it in, go to the witnesses, houms homes, find them,
talk to them, question them, put it all together. But
seeing the scene makes all the difference. I thought she
was out on a curvy, windy road in the snow
(25:46):
with nobody around and some freaky dudes coming up asking
if she needed help. That's what I imagined in my head.
That's not That's not what it is at all. It's
a neighborhood. Okay, I understand the car thing. Let me
just ask you one last thing about the car, Maggie,
what does she shit? We believe she hit a snowbank, um,
(26:06):
and the car sort of bounced off of the snowbank.
And there actually has been um, a lot of questions
and we still can't really get to the bottom of
whether the car was in the snowbank or not in
the snow bank, but it seemed like the car hit
the snowbank. Well, certainly their photos of where her car
was right there is a series there's a series of
(26:32):
photographs that were taken by the officer at the scene
that responded, UM, but we have not seen those. There's
a lot of issues going on in this particular case
where the Attorney General's Office in New Hampshire has a
lot of information to us, but it's also withholding a
(26:52):
lot of information in case they can actually come up
with the subspect. You know, my gut, my knee jort
reaction is they should release the remation. Why are they
doing that? But you know that's not always correct because
a lot of times false confessions have been ruled out
because the the liar didn't know the facts of the
murder or the case, and confessions or corroboration can be
(27:16):
ruled in because these people know things that have not
been released to the media. So I get it. Okay.
So we're in a neighborhood. She has a fenderbender, probably
into the snow bank, and but it can't be that
much of a snowbank, because you know, you're in the
middle of a neighborhood. And she tries to recrank the car.
She may or may not know you've got to remove
(27:38):
the key from the ignition to make it work. We've
learned that from the black Box. And then she vanishes,
She completely vanishes. Listen to this. This coming Sunday will
mark ten years since anyone has seen or heard anything
(28:01):
from a woman named Maura Murray now the College Stude
crashed her car on one twelve and North Haverty, miles
north of the UMass Amherst campus. That she had left
just a few hours earlier. Mara had vanished when police arrived.
There was what appeared to be indications that she may
have been running away, but her father and investigators think
(28:21):
there is much more to her disappearance. My initial thought
is still my what I think, and that's somebody locally
grabbed him. Twelve years ago today more vanished from this
very spot on a cold, dark knight. She has not
been seen or heard from since. Is it safe to
(28:42):
call us armchair detectives with a camera and a microphone.
It's something that starts as a hobby and gradually grows
into something more obsessive. That he said to because blood
and people have said, ah, yeah, I don't know. I
don't know. I don't know that it's dangerous to do
something like we're doing right now. But there are some
questionable characters involved who may be listening at some point
(29:06):
hopefully what's going on right now? Well, we're in Lincoln,
New Hampshire. We're at the roadway end, and someone knew
we were going to be in Lincoln. There is no
way that someone that knows that their daughter is missing
knows why they're missing or had anything to do with it.
Would spend twelve years looking for their daughter. I would
put this whole thing on for twelve years, taking over
(29:29):
their lives. I know it took over mynd on a
mission to find his missing daughter, Mora Bred Murray went
to Conquer to see Governor Lynch. Frustrated with the state
police investigation into her disappearance. Mr Murray is asking the
governor to release all her case files, and he'd like
the FBI to get involved in the investigation. She was U, buddy,
(29:50):
and we want to act. There's the hotplation I can
stop looking for my daughter, so I'm never going to stop.
In seven minutes, seemingly, Moura Murray disappears. Question to you,
Maggie Freeling. Investigative journalists with me? Aren't Roderick former U. S.
(30:12):
Marshal with me, who have researched and investigated this case exhaustively. Maggie,
what about the people that lived right around the little
finderbend or didn't they see anything? It's really bizarre. I mean,
there must have been unless somebody saw something that they
(30:34):
don't want to say. There must have been a moment
where everybody who was looking at the scene turned around
and when they were all investigated, or when when all
of the neighbors were spoken to um they did say,
you know, butch Atwood he got out of his bus
and went into the house to call nine one one.
(30:55):
I mean he turned around for that moment. I mean
there must have been a moment where everybody turned around
and didn't see what happened. I I don't believe that.
I don't believe that that everybody at one moment. You
know what, what's funny, Alan, do you? I've investigated so
many cases where there are a ton of people, but
for instance, let's just say it's a shooting, but the
(31:17):
moment I would say, well, okay, he's got the gun
in his hand, it's pointed. Then what happened? I don't know.
Ms Grace. I looked at the window right then. I
don't know what happened. I just heard a pop and
nobody happens to be looking at that precise moment, which
(31:39):
I find really not only hard to believe, but statistically
highly improbable. On the other hand, what time of the
day did this go down? Aren't Roderick? Yeah? The first
nine one one call came at SEM in February, so
it's dark obviously, I mean that area is very dark,
(32:00):
so people are in their homes. They're not outside. They're
not outside sitting on the front porch. They're inside, probably
having supper, getting their children ready for school, watching TV.
They don't even know what's going down outside, you know,
under free from their home. So that means to me,
not many people saw it. How many nine one one
calls where there aren't there There was two nine one
(32:23):
one calls. The first one came in at seven seven.
Then you have Butch Atwoods nine one one call probably
coming in around the same time. Now the lawn. The
dispatch log shows that the Sergeant Smith from Behaviral p
D called out at seven forty six. Now we talked
to him when he arrived at the scene. According to
(32:45):
the dispatch log at seven forty six, there was nobody
at the scene, so she was already gone at seven.
So Atwoods called, wait a minute, that was call? Is
at what time? Seven? To me to uh, we're not
exactly one pent sure because we haven't been able to
confirm that. What we have is the first time we
(33:11):
have at seven seven, and that's from the Westman's calling
Grafton County and the and the cop gets there at
what time at seven forty six is when he calls out?
But when we interviewed the police officer, he said when
he got there, he immediately got out of the vehicle
to make sure nobody was hurt, and he called out,
(33:32):
he says, a few minutes later, So he might have
been there at seven forty. Um, and the Westman's who
called at seven seven had eyes on Mora or somebody
that was driving that vehicle at that particular time. What
time is that at seven seven? Okay, hold on White,
(33:55):
this name keeps popping up. But Atwood? Who is Butch Atwood?
And what Maggie does he have to do with this scenario?
Butch Atwood is the bus driver that drove by, and
he is, according to you know what, we've found, the
only person to have seen Moura that night or spoken
(34:16):
to Maura that night. I'm sorry, Butch Atwood is the
only person to have spoken to Maura. Um. Butch was
then the last person to have seen Maura. Huh? And
he he was He was a county school bus driver,
so he's hid a yellow school bus coming back from
(34:37):
dropping a bunch of kids off from the ski trip
at that particular time, and he's headed home, he sees
the accident. Um, there's there's sort of a little bit
of a discrepancy in some of the statements that he's given. Unfortunately,
he passed away in two thousand nine. Um, so you know,
we aren't able to talk to him. But um uh,
(35:00):
he was a known individual to law enforcement in that
he was worked for the county. He was a friend
of the particular police officer that showed up at the scene,
and he was at by that police officer to help
him search the area. What do we know about him?
Not too much interesting individual. Yeah, he he his his
(35:27):
family originally came from Massachusetts. They were sort of part
time police officers down there. Um. Sort of a strange guy,
a bit of a hoarder from what we understand, Um,
moved away from this area. Do you say a hoarder
from New Hampshire to Virginian And how old is how
(35:54):
old is he? He was older, middle aged sixties maybe yeah, yeah, okay,
sixty hoarder. What were you about to say, Maggie. Yeah.
From some records we have read by private investigators that
interviewed right at you know, in two thousand six, Um,
they had interviewed some friends of the Atwoods, and apparently
(36:19):
friends never went into the house because it was just
so you couldn't you couldn't get into the house. It
was just so. So. He had his common law wife. Yeah,
she lived there with him at the time Morrol went missing. Yes, children,
(36:39):
I don't think you know, we never had children, right,
So did she actually the wife lived there with him?
Are we sure they were cohabitative at the time? Yes?
But was he a hoarder at that time? Yeah? She
when when nine when one dispatcher called back, which Atwood's house,
(37:02):
they actually spoke to the White first. Is she still alive?
She's still alive. Yes, So the hoarding was in that home.
So there would have been an opportunity if you wanted
to hide something in a hoarder's home, who would ever
find it? Yeah? I maviously. From from a law enforcement perspective,
(37:28):
you always look at the last person that had contact
with somebody that goes missing. Talking to the New Hampshire
State Police, the major crimes unit that had the case
right now, they have for all intensive purposes, couldn't find
anything to connect him with her disappearance. Did they search
(37:48):
his home? I they haven't told me that they have
searched his home. Um, But I don't know the answer
to that. There's some stuff they've been pretty open to
us about and given us a lot of information. Other
things they haven't. Um. They have looked at everybody that
(38:11):
has had any type of contact with moral whatsoever, either
on a friendly basis of quick meeting. Um. The law
enforcement has done a lot. They have basically treated this
case probably within a three to four time frame after
she went missing, three to four daytime frame. Behavioral PD
(38:33):
more or less just turned this over to the state police.
So they quasi investigated. Butch I would say more than
at that time. Okay, why do you say. I mean,
I'm not saying he's guilty. I'm just saying he's the
last one to see her in your right. There was
(38:54):
a couple of polygraphs given, there was a there was
a couple of grand juries that were initiated by the
new after State Police to bring everybody in to get
testimony on record. And they they have told me, they've
told me and Maggie both that they do not have
any person of interest in this particular case. So it
(39:15):
appears to me that this is one of these incidents
where everybody that has had of contact with Maura in
the past or around that timeframe that she went missing
has been investigated and cleared to a certain degree. Wow,
what do we know about the witness Karen McNamara. Now
(39:36):
she's apparently the key witness to the biggest conspiracy theory
that UH John Smith has been pushing for many, many years,
and that's with the blessing apparently of the father, Fred Murray.
What do we know about that? I kind of think
(39:58):
it's far fancy trying to a the uh have her
Hill police. Yeah, I mean this is so we we
look into every single one of these theories thoroughly, and
you know, we don't want to give too much away,
but we look into it and we find Karen to
be a very credible witnessed and art personally. You know,
(40:19):
as law enforcement doesn't love our witness testimony, but both
of us when we sat down and spoke to her,
I mean, you know, she she truly believed and we
don't think she's making up what she saw. Wow, what
exactly is she's saying? She saw? What? Karen says she
(40:41):
saw yeah, you can you can do Yeah, I mean
what she says she we we actually math about the timing.
Maggie and I actually drove the same robe she drove.
We drove with her and had her tell us exactly
what she was doing that particular evening and the route
she took to go home from Woodsville to Lincoln, New Hampshire,
(41:03):
which would have taken her along that stretch of highway
when Maura had her accident, when she she saw a
cruiser come by her twice with the lights and lights going,
lights and siren responding to the accident scene. Um, she
took a more direct route. And you know, some of
those roads up there, we're pretty bad pot hold and
(41:25):
it was very difficult to do any type of high
speed driving on those roads. So she actually saw the
cruiser come by her once, take a different route, come up,
and come by her again, as it responded. The whole
question is she's saying that the vehicle was an SUV
when she got to the scene, the suv was pointing
nose to nose with More's vehicle. But and she pulled
(41:51):
over up near Butch Atwood's house, which was, you know,
about a hundred yards away. But she did not see
anybody at the scene at all. She didn't see the
drive of the vehicle that was in the accident, nor
did she see a police officer at the scene. That
is basically her testimony in a in a nutshell. She
stayed for a couple of minutes and then went home,
(42:12):
drove h home, and as soon as she could get
cell phone service, she actually called her house to let
him know she was coming home. We have that specific time,
and we did all the distances, the you know, time
measurement of where she could have been and at what
time she might have passed, uh the accident scene, and
she she saw what she saw. Wow, it's kind of
(42:36):
hard to take the whole thing. You say, are you
telling me that you believe her? Yes, let me find
her to be very credible. Yeah, okay, let's let's take
that to its next step. What what do you make
of allegations have her Hill police were responsible for Maura
(42:58):
Murray's death and they've been covering it up for twelve
years now. Isn't it true that Karen McNamara, who you
seem to believe, could have seen the police suv but
that police are not part of a cover up. I mean,
(43:20):
it's just hard for me. First of all, I don't
think many people are smart enough to create a conspiracy,
much least less keep it quiet for twelve years. What
about that art I am with you a d I mean,
anybody it's been in that the law enforcement criminal justice
field knows that's almost impossible to do. Number one. Number two,
(43:40):
we do believe Karen mcamara and we go through this
whole issue on the show. Um. And and I mean
even when you sit down with with Fred, he doesn't
believe that the police were involved in in Moore's disappearance.
I think when you look at it and you listen
(44:03):
to the explanation from law enforcement, I mean, really, what
they were responding to was an abandoned vehicle in a
minor motor vehicle accident. And this happens every day in
this country. Um, this is not an unusual call. Um.
You know, I worked as a local police officer on
Cape cod for for three or four years, and I
(44:24):
can tell you I came across incidents is like this,
where the report of a nine or one call an accident,
you arrive at the scene, it's mired, there's no personal injury,
there's very minor property damage to the car and no
driver around. So you take the information down and just
move on to your next call. And that's basically what
happened here. The search for mar Murray and for the
(44:47):
truth goes on with me. Is Maggie Freeling, investigative journalist
and Aren't Roderick former U S Marshall. Join the crime
Con Cold Case Club work alongside experts and fellow crime
sleuths help uncover new leads and theories in cold cases
(45:09):
that they adopt. The very first case is focusing on
the mysterious disappearance of this gorgeous young nursing student, Maura Murray.
You're free to join thanks to Oxygen. You can sign
up now and find out more at club dot crime
con dot com. Club c l U B dot crime Con,
(45:34):
c r I M A c o N dot com,
Club dot crime con dot com. Our search for the
truth is not ending here. Nancy Grace Crime Stories signing off.
Goodbye friend. Do you find yourself obsessing over unsolved mysteries?
(46:00):
You wish there was a group of people just like
you to talk motives and alibis with. If so, join
the crime Con Cold Case Club and work alongside experts
and fellow crime sleuths to help uncover new leads and
theories in the cold cases they adopt. Their first cold
case focuses on the mysterious disappearance of nursing student Maura
Murray in two thousand four, and it's free to join
thanks to Oxygen. Sign up now or find more info
(46:22):
at Club dot crime con dot com. That's club dot
crime con dot com.
February two thousand four, Maurra Murray empties her bank account,
drives four hours from school, crashes her car and vanishes.
Joined the search as an investigative reporter, uncovers new evidence,
interrogates new witnesses, and traces down new leads in this
riveting new investigative series, The Disappearance of Maurra Murray. Tomorrow
(00:24):
eight fifteen, seven fifteen Central on Oxygen, the new network
for crime Climb Stories with Nancy Grace on Sirius XM
Triumph Channel one thirty two. Sunday will mark ten years
since anyone has seen or heard anything from a woman
(00:44):
named Maura Murray. Now the college studn't crashed her car
one twelve and north have miles north of the U
mass Amherst campus. Mara had vanished. When police arrived. There
was what appeared to be indications that she may have
been running away, but her father and investing ters think
there is much more to her disappearance. My initial thought
is still my what I think, and that's somebody locally
(01:06):
grabbed on a mission to find his missing daughter. Maura
bred Murray went to Conquered to see Governor Lynch. Frustrated
with the state police investigation into her disappearance. Mr Murray
is asking the governor to release all her case files,
and he'd like the FBI to get involved in the investigation.
She had her world in front of her, a twenty
one year old, gorgeous nursing student from Hanson, Massachusetts. She
(01:33):
goes out in her car, she has a fender bender,
she gets out of the car, and she vanishes. Maura
Murray has never been seen alive again. I Nancy Grace,
this is crime Stories. Thank you for being with us,
(01:53):
joining me right now to break it down and put
it back together again and try to get answers about
Maura Murry. The search is ongoing. Former US martial art
Roderick and investigative journalist Maggie Freeling. Guys, thank you so
much for being with us. First of all, I want
you to hear what the dad says. What do you
(02:16):
think happened to Mara. I think somebody, some somebody grabbed
maybe somebody hearing it in a scanner or something like that.
I think there's a Monday night It isn't there's nothing
really going on. It's not a tourist type of deal.
I think a local dirt bag grabbed it, and I
(02:36):
know she would have called me that that Monday night
as you were able. Then the accident happens, and that
changes everything. Change. Whatever plan she had is out the window.
Whatever she was trying to do is now she's got
a whole new set of circumstances. It's got to be
frustrating that the same possibilities that you were dealing with
the Wednesday afterwards are still all in play, exactly the
(02:57):
same thing, the same thing. Now there's there's no question
about whether I'm gonna look for you know, this is
my kid. Uh my kid wants me to look for her.
I'm gonna do. I'm gonna look for my kid. You know,
I don't know what happened to her. I mean, I
don't have Maura, I don't have a body, you know.
(03:18):
I'm I'm I have to I have to think in
these terms. But the case, certainly it's an olva to
Maggie free Lang again, thank you and Art for being
with us. Take me back to the evening the day
that Maura Murray disappeared. What happened? So from what we know,
um happened because we do have receipts from a liquor
(03:41):
store and at m footage with time stamps. Maura dropped
off some clothing at a nursing friend's dorm, headed to
the A p M. Withdrew all of the money from
her bank account, which was around two and then she
headed to the liquor store, but up liquor, hopped in
her car and drove up towards New Hampshire. UM. We
(04:05):
don't know where she was going, but the fender bender
happened in haveral Um and that is the last time
anybody saw her. UM bus driver Butch Atwood was coming
home from work head around seven pm and says he
had a conversation with a young woman who appeared shaken
(04:26):
up right near his house in a car accident. He
asked her if she wanted him to call the police,
and he says she said no, she called Triple A. However,
he knew that was not true because even today you
do not get any sort of cell phone reception in
that area. So Butch, the Butch bus driver, went home
(04:47):
and he called to Aren't Roderick, former US Marshall art,
isn't it true that something got hanky with a nine
one one call? Was it diverted what happened, you know
when and Butch Atwood got back to his um house,
which was only about a hundred yards from the accident location,
he called one and according to him, there was there.
(05:11):
The call was either busy. Then it got diverted to
a different county dispatcher and they forward the call back
to the Grafton County, which was in the area where
the original nine one one call should have gone. That
dispatcher from Grafton County actually ended up calling back Butch Atwood.
(05:32):
And that's kind of like how this whole call came together.
This girl, Maura Murray, who disappears on Fab nine after
a car crash on Route one twelve. Have her heell
New Hampshire. It's I say, out in the middle of nowhere,
but I grew up in an area just like that,
very very rural. Now. Moura Murray was a nursing student
(05:54):
at University Massachusetts Amherst. That afternoon she left campus, but
before she left, she emailed her professors and her supervisor,
writing she was going to take a week off due
to a death and her family. Now, this is the
weird part. Nobody in her family has ever been able
(06:17):
to confirm that any death occurred, not even recently. There
was no death in her family. Okay, we know that.
Now here's the problem. This so often happens. Police initially
treated her case as a missing person's case, thinking she
wanted to disappear, and that speculation was all because she
(06:40):
had made preparations to travel and there seemed to be
no evidence of foul play. But many people, including myself,
are convinced that Maura Murray was kidnapped that day, and
I believe she's dead. It's very hard for me to
believe that Maria Murray somehow created a whole new life
(07:02):
Maggie Freeling, investigative journalist somewhere else and has never contacted
her family. Again, that's hard for me to blame Maggie. Yeah,
And you know, I think that's also kind of them
perspective that I was able to put into this. I mean,
I was a twenty one year old girl who did
go to U mass and I found so many similarities
(07:24):
between Maura and myself. And while this, you know, this
whole theory came from James Runner. You know, while this
tandem driver she escaped started a new life seems really
sexy and he can make it compelling. Um, you know,
having been in her situation, I think it is also
(07:45):
very unlikely that that is something that she did. What
are you saying made it's sexy? James Runner, the author
his whole book came out True Crime Addict, and his
whole theory in the book is that she, you know,
was driving up there with a tandem driver, a friend
(08:06):
or somebody who helped her escape and start a new life.
When you're saying she started a whole new live based
on this book by James Renner. UM True Crime Addict
by James Renner, True Crime Addict, How I Lost myself
in the mysterious disappearance of Maura Murray. Maggie, you disagree
(08:29):
with Renner's portrayal of what happened to mar Murray? What
exactly is he claiming happened? So, you know, I wouldn't
say I necessarily disagree. I just don't see it being
the most likely possibility in this day and age. But
this wasn't like the eighties where there was no you know,
(08:49):
internet trades, no cell phones. I mean, I so James
Renner is claiming that Maura, when she left U Mass
had a plan to drive away with a tandem driver,
a friend, a family member, somebody that was going to
help her escape and start a new life, escape from what. Yes,
(09:12):
she had once using uh stolen credit card to buy
some food, all right, she had a fenderbender with her
dad's car. There's nothing to escape. This girl had gone
to West Point, she was about to start a nursing career.
She had a high school sweetheart, Billy rash Uh stationed
at Fort Seale in Oklahoma, that she was going to marry.
(09:33):
She's gorgeous, she's young, she's healthy. Escape what so, I'm
not sure what we're winter is headed with this, but
the fact that she stopped and made some purchases and
was planning to take a week off, which she told
everybody that. I mean, I don't think the crash was
part of the plan. And if she wanted to disappear,
(09:55):
she could have done that. And back to his theory,
Maggie Freeling, who was this quote in tandem driver? In
other words, somebody's driving along with her or is going
to meet her somewhere. It's not the body and her family, right,
And I think there there are many things to what
you just said. I mean, she did have a fender bender. Yes,
you know, before this one, she also crashed her dad's
(10:17):
car right before she disappeared. Um, yes, she stole from
Fort Knox Um. Renner also claims that her relationship with
her boyfriend Bill Roush was not great. Um. Neither was
my relationship with my high school boyfriend. That's why, thank
you lord, I didn't marry him as wonderful as he
(10:38):
seemed when I was sixteen. Uh So the fact that
that wasn't working out. You know, you can make a childish,
immature decision, aren't Roderick, But you really think she would
have kept up the force of a disappearance for all
this time and cut herself off from her parents and family.
I mean, the answer you've you've you know, you've been
(10:58):
in the law, enforce, the judicial area for criminal justice
process for a lot of years. It's almost impossible, I think,
in this day and age for twenty one year old
girl to just drop off the face of the earth.
Uh intentionally. And I think Renner's theory is based on
a lot of false premises because what actually occurred was
(11:20):
he never really got to speak to a lot of people.
The family refused to talk to him. Uh, you know,
a lot of her friends didn't talk to him, so
I think he's based theory on a lot of false
premises and rumor and innuendo. I like you and Maggie,
and I also agree to that there's that there's probably
(11:40):
she was grabbed in this, some foul play involved in
her disappearance. I have no doubt in my mind, and
I'm not trashing then because his book brought a lot
of attention to the marmur And case, and I'm grateful
for that, and a lot of his research has really
helped mentcy. I have a clip I'd like to play
(12:00):
of Maggie interviewing Keim and Lance. We've interviewed them before.
They're the podcasters, the missing Maura Murray podcasters, And this
is a clip about the timeline of what happened that night,
and it is a clip from the Disappearance of Maura Murray.
(12:21):
Did you guys get interested in the case? Just being
interested in the in true crime overall and U Maura's
case always comes up once you start reading about it.
It just starts like unlayering and unfolding and just before
you know what, you're like down the rabbit hole. The
mystery within the mystery is why was she heading up
there in the first place. Do you guys have an
opinion on why do you think she was heading up there?
(12:43):
I can't really say I do. We tried really hard
to not have fear. Tell me a little bit about
the crash. Uh Well, based on the police transcripts and
the call log, a neighbor calls. A pat with a
bus driver pulls up who was also a neighbor and
talks to her. She said she already called her. Blage
(13:04):
is a lie because there's no cell phone service up there,
so she could not have gotten a call up and
he knew that immediately. And I think that is like
the most fascinating thing, at least for me, that this
accident happens. There were eyes on the accident. It is
in the White Mountains in New Hampshire. But there's a
house there. There's a house here. Someone pulls up and
(13:26):
talks to her, there's phone, calls me to and right
at this moment where apparently everybody turned around or he
wasn't looking, she's gone. And that window of opportunities like
mind belonging to me. It's baffling. How long is that window? Um?
You can probably narrow it down to about seven minutes.
(13:48):
Figuring out why Morea vanished sometime during those seven minutes
when the neighbors turned away and didn't see anything is crucial.
Oh Omura disappeared in a remote part of New Hampshire.
The ROADSI crashed on was well traveled, which brings me
(14:09):
to the theory of foul play. Let's take a look
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Alright where I left off, let me think, Oh, yes,
foul play. Can you imagine that? Can you imagine that?
(15:39):
Alan do? That's what I'm focusing on, foul play. And
I can tell you something. This girl didn't just disappear.
She didn't go off on her own for soul searching
or to find herself or just start a new life
in Oh, she's dead. Okay. I can tell you that
right now from my studio and my series of sex
(16:00):
M one three two show She's dead. Okay. So now
that I've established that in my mind, can we get
to work and try to figure out what happened. Let's
start with the crash. Okay, Arn't Roderick, former US Marshall,
Maggie Freeling investigative journalist, and of course the Duke Alan.
Do you joining me along with my friend here in
(16:21):
the studio, Jackie Um. Arn't Roderick. Tell me about this crash,
because art I don't care who wrote what in their book.
She did not plan for a crash that day, all right,
that through the monkey wrench in the work. So tell
me about the crash. I mean, when you when you
look at the crash scene you had mentioned it's a
(16:42):
rural area. It is kind of a rural area, but
there are about twenty houses within a half mile radius.
So where this accident occurred. The accident occurred on room once. Well,
it's it's like at the beginning of the kink Comengus
Highway in New Hampshire. It's a two lane highway and
there was a sharp almost ninety degree turn that she
(17:04):
couldn't negotiate and she kind of clipped the inside elbow
of that whoa art art. I love you, man, but
I'm drinking from a fire hydrant here too much at once,
too much, I'm not to let me just let me
just break it down for a minute because it's actually
for Alan deep because he just can't process that quickly.
(17:27):
So yeah, okay, so let's just hold on um, poor guy.
He and you're so much So we've got mar Murray.
She's going along the Cake and Mangus Highway there in
New Hampshire. First of all, is it rural, yes? Is
it heavily wooded? Heavily wooded? Yes? Is there a body
(17:50):
of water nearby? My chance, there's there's a pond sort
of a mile from it's called French pond. It's about
a mile from where the accident occurred. Are you saying
French or fresh French? French? Okay, as in the country
freence al right, Okay, So she's driving along. What are
the weather conditions? Just curious. Do we know it's cold,
(18:11):
it's February. There was about two and a half but
pet snow on the ground, but the roads were clearing
two and a half did you say two and a
half feet? Well, about two ft of snow on the
side of the road. The roads are pretty clear, I
mean Hampshire. Okay. This is very significant to me because
in my mind, this greatly reduces the likelihood that somebody
(18:35):
stopped and engaged in conversation with her and farthering I'm
not getting I'm not putting one toe outside the car,
and also to me minimizes also it changes her actions
and reactions because it's freezing cold outside. But again, she
did not have sales service, so let's factor that in
(18:56):
no cell service. Hold on, hold on um Along the
street wretch where she had her collision, were there any
red lights, any businesses, any anything, or is it out
in the middle of forest? Now? There there there were
there was a business rate at the corner of that
sharp turn. There was several houses in the area about
(19:18):
what was the business and a half mile radius there
was several houses in the area. Okay, that is important
to me. Several houses within a half a mile. M Yeah,
there's actually there's actually one collar. The closest neighbor was
(19:38):
only about from the accident scene. Is that Butch Atwood? No,
that would have been the Westman's which Atwood lived about
a hundred yards from the accident scene. Straight down the road.
You could actually see which Atwood's residents from the accident scene.
But there was a home forty feet away from the craft.
This is ok this is Nancy. This is what's really incredible.
(20:00):
And you go up there, you know, Art and I
both expected it to be, you know, super rural. Nobody
was around. But when you get to a crash site,
it actually like it is a neighborhood. There are houses there.
And yes, the Westman's house was basically on top of
the crash site, and just maybe a hundred yards down
(20:20):
the road are three other houses. So there were many
many eyes on this scene. Guys, just hold on, let
me process this. I was you know, joking around with
Alan Deep for a minute. But this is completely different
than what I imagined. This changes everything. It absolutely changes
(20:40):
everything because if she had when I say, crash, it
was basically a fender bender. I think, Um, yes, the
car could have driven out of there. That was my
next question. Hold on, hold on, I'm taking notes as
fast as I can. So her car could have driven
out of there. Is that what you said? Yes? Yes?
Was it off the road? Is there some reason she
(21:02):
would just keep going? Well, what we found is we actually, uh,
as part of the show, we actually went out and
purchased the Saturn, the same model that she had at
this particular time. We took it to a garage mechanic
did several tests on it, and we found that when
(21:24):
that model of that satur installs out, which which more
than likely happened installed out when it kind of had
that fender bender, Um, you have to take the key
out of the ignition before you can put it back
in to restart the vehicle. I don't think she knew that,
because when they downloaded the black box inside the vehicle
(21:45):
to do some tests on it, they found that after
the air bags deployed, there was seven clicks ignition and
the vehicle wouldn't start. So, um, we think that she
didn't realize that she had to take the key out
and put it back in to restart the vehicle. Wow.
Hold on, so that was revealed with the black box.
(22:09):
That was revealed with the black box inside the car,
but also revealed by a mechanic car mechanic. Uh, he
took this particular model of vehicle too. He said, you
have to remove the key out of the admission to
actually start the vehicle back up again. Wasn't it art?
Wasn't it her car? Wouldn't she have known that if
(22:29):
it was her car? Well, I I you would think that,
But I was kind of shocked because I didn't realize
that with the the issue with the vehicle. I mean,
how many times did the car stall out? It was
an automatic transmission in that particular Saturn, and she probably
never had it stalled out before. Now, the car did
have some mechanical issues to it. Her father was getting
(22:53):
ready to buy her a newer, used vehicle so that
she could get back and forth to her school, but
the car was not in good running condition. But she
probably just didn't know that you just take the key out,
put it back in. Well, I gotta tell you something.
I've had my Toyota. I had my for I guess
(23:16):
twelve years. When I got when I was sixteen. I
had so many problems with it. And it was not
the Toyota's fault, you know, Okay, I didn't know you
had to put oil in it. Nobody told me that.
I just knew about gas. So, needless to say, the
fact that I had the car for thirteen years does
say that Toyota is a pretty good car, no matter
what I did to it. But when it wouldn't crank,
(23:37):
the first thing I would just instinctively do is take
the key out, pray and curse and carry on, and
then then try to crank it back up again. I
mean to me, that would just be natural instinct to
take the key out and then try it again and
try it again. But that's really interesting because a black
box can it tell you the key was never taken
(23:58):
out of the ignition and tell you that the mom
times that it was that it was attempted to be
turned over, and what when you look at the black box,
the black box indicated that there was a slight jar
in the vehicle, and then point two seconds later the
air bags deployed. It shows that in the black box
(24:20):
now after the airbags deployed, there was an attempt to
there was an attempt to turn the vehicle over. There
was seven clicks after the airbags deployed on the ignition itself.
You know, Maggie Freeling, investigative journalist. I'm just at this
moment feeling like I'm right there in that car that
(24:41):
Saturn with her and it's two ft of snow outside.
The airbags have deployed over a simple fender bender, and
she's trying seven times to restart the vehicle, and she
realizes I'm I'm stuck. Right. You know another thing you're
(25:02):
telling me, Maggie, I had imagine something completely different. And
that's why I never went to a jury with a
case or two a major plea unless I went to
the scene, because that changes everything. I can't tell you
how many cases I won because the other side didn't
(25:24):
get off their lazy rear ends and go out on
the weekend or whenever and look at the crime scene,
take it in, go to the witnesses, houms homes, find them,
talk to them, question them, put it all together. But
seeing the scene makes all the difference. I thought she
was out on a curvy, windy road in the snow
(25:46):
with nobody around and some freaky dudes coming up asking
if she needed help. That's what I imagined in my head.
That's not That's not what it is at all. It's
a neighborhood. Okay, I understand the car thing. Let me
just ask you one last thing about the car, Maggie,
what does she shit? We believe she hit a snowbank, um,
(26:06):
and the car sort of bounced off of the snowbank.
And there actually has been um, a lot of questions
and we still can't really get to the bottom of
whether the car was in the snowbank or not in
the snow bank, but it seemed like the car hit
the snowbank. Well, certainly their photos of where her car
was right there is a series there's a series of
(26:32):
photographs that were taken by the officer at the scene
that responded, UM, but we have not seen those. There's
a lot of issues going on in this particular case
where the Attorney General's Office in New Hampshire has a
lot of information to us, but it's also withholding a
(26:52):
lot of information in case they can actually come up
with the subspect. You know, my gut, my knee jort
reaction is they should release the remation. Why are they
doing that? But you know that's not always correct because
a lot of times false confessions have been ruled out
because the the liar didn't know the facts of the
murder or the case, and confessions or corroboration can be
(27:16):
ruled in because these people know things that have not
been released to the media. So I get it. Okay.
So we're in a neighborhood. She has a fenderbender, probably
into the snow bank, and but it can't be that
much of a snowbank, because you know, you're in the
middle of a neighborhood. And she tries to recrank the car.
She may or may not know you've got to remove
(27:38):
the key from the ignition to make it work. We've
learned that from the black Box. And then she vanishes,
She completely vanishes. Listen to this. This coming Sunday will
mark ten years since anyone has seen or heard anything
(28:01):
from a woman named Maura Murray now the College Stude
crashed her car on one twelve and North Haverty, miles
north of the UMass Amherst campus. That she had left
just a few hours earlier. Mara had vanished when police arrived.
There was what appeared to be indications that she may
have been running away, but her father and investigators think
(28:21):
there is much more to her disappearance. My initial thought
is still my what I think, and that's somebody locally
grabbed him. Twelve years ago today more vanished from this
very spot on a cold, dark knight. She has not
been seen or heard from since. Is it safe to
(28:42):
call us armchair detectives with a camera and a microphone.
It's something that starts as a hobby and gradually grows
into something more obsessive. That he said to because blood
and people have said, ah, yeah, I don't know. I
don't know. I don't know that it's dangerous to do
something like we're doing right now. But there are some
questionable characters involved who may be listening at some point
(29:06):
hopefully what's going on right now? Well, we're in Lincoln,
New Hampshire. We're at the roadway end, and someone knew
we were going to be in Lincoln. There is no
way that someone that knows that their daughter is missing
knows why they're missing or had anything to do with it.
Would spend twelve years looking for their daughter. I would
put this whole thing on for twelve years, taking over
(29:29):
their lives. I know it took over mynd on a
mission to find his missing daughter, Mora Bred Murray went
to Conquer to see Governor Lynch. Frustrated with the state
police investigation into her disappearance. Mr Murray is asking the
governor to release all her case files, and he'd like
the FBI to get involved in the investigation. She was U, buddy,
(29:50):
and we want to act. There's the hotplation I can
stop looking for my daughter, so I'm never going to stop.
In seven minutes, seemingly, Moura Murray disappears. Question to you,
Maggie Freeling. Investigative journalists with me? Aren't Roderick former U. S.
(30:12):
Marshal with me, who have researched and investigated this case exhaustively. Maggie,
what about the people that lived right around the little
finderbend or didn't they see anything? It's really bizarre. I mean,
there must have been unless somebody saw something that they
(30:34):
don't want to say. There must have been a moment
where everybody who was looking at the scene turned around
and when they were all investigated, or when when all
of the neighbors were spoken to um they did say,
you know, butch Atwood he got out of his bus
and went into the house to call nine one one.
(30:55):
I mean he turned around for that moment. I mean
there must have been a moment where everybody turned around
and didn't see what happened. I I don't believe that.
I don't believe that that everybody at one moment. You
know what, what's funny, Alan, do you? I've investigated so
many cases where there are a ton of people, but
for instance, let's just say it's a shooting, but the
(31:17):
moment I would say, well, okay, he's got the gun
in his hand, it's pointed. Then what happened? I don't know.
Ms Grace. I looked at the window right then. I
don't know what happened. I just heard a pop and
nobody happens to be looking at that precise moment, which
(31:39):
I find really not only hard to believe, but statistically
highly improbable. On the other hand, what time of the
day did this go down? Aren't Roderick? Yeah? The first
nine one one call came at SEM in February, so
it's dark obviously, I mean that area is very dark,
(32:00):
so people are in their homes. They're not outside. They're
not outside sitting on the front porch. They're inside, probably
having supper, getting their children ready for school, watching TV.
They don't even know what's going down outside, you know,
under free from their home. So that means to me,
not many people saw it. How many nine one one
calls where there aren't there There was two nine one
(32:23):
one calls. The first one came in at seven seven.
Then you have Butch Atwoods nine one one call probably
coming in around the same time. Now the lawn. The
dispatch log shows that the Sergeant Smith from Behaviral p
D called out at seven forty six. Now we talked
to him when he arrived at the scene. According to
(32:45):
the dispatch log at seven forty six, there was nobody
at the scene, so she was already gone at seven.
So Atwoods called, wait a minute, that was call? Is
at what time? Seven? To me to uh, we're not
exactly one pent sure because we haven't been able to
confirm that. What we have is the first time we
(33:11):
have at seven seven, and that's from the Westman's calling
Grafton County and the and the cop gets there at
what time at seven forty six is when he calls out?
But when we interviewed the police officer, he said when
he got there, he immediately got out of the vehicle
to make sure nobody was hurt, and he called out,
(33:32):
he says, a few minutes later, So he might have
been there at seven forty. Um, and the Westman's who
called at seven seven had eyes on Mora or somebody
that was driving that vehicle at that particular time. What
time is that at seven seven? Okay, hold on White,
(33:55):
this name keeps popping up. But Atwood? Who is Butch Atwood?
And what Maggie does he have to do with this scenario?
Butch Atwood is the bus driver that drove by, and
he is, according to you know what, we've found, the
only person to have seen Moura that night or spoken
(34:16):
to Maura that night. I'm sorry, Butch Atwood is the
only person to have spoken to Maura. Um. Butch was
then the last person to have seen Maura. Huh? And
he he was He was a county school bus driver,
so he's hid a yellow school bus coming back from
(34:37):
dropping a bunch of kids off from the ski trip
at that particular time, and he's headed home, he sees
the accident. Um, there's there's sort of a little bit
of a discrepancy in some of the statements that he's given. Unfortunately,
he passed away in two thousand nine. Um, so you know,
we aren't able to talk to him. But um uh,
(35:00):
he was a known individual to law enforcement in that
he was worked for the county. He was a friend
of the particular police officer that showed up at the scene,
and he was at by that police officer to help
him search the area. What do we know about him?
Not too much interesting individual. Yeah, he he his his
(35:27):
family originally came from Massachusetts. They were sort of part
time police officers down there. Um. Sort of a strange guy,
a bit of a hoarder from what we understand, Um,
moved away from this area. Do you say a hoarder
from New Hampshire to Virginian And how old is how
(35:54):
old is he? He was older, middle aged sixties maybe yeah, yeah, okay,
sixty hoarder. What were you about to say, Maggie. Yeah.
From some records we have read by private investigators that
interviewed right at you know, in two thousand six, Um,
they had interviewed some friends of the Atwoods, and apparently
(36:19):
friends never went into the house because it was just
so you couldn't you couldn't get into the house. It
was just so. So. He had his common law wife. Yeah,
she lived there with him at the time Morrol went missing. Yes, children,
(36:39):
I don't think you know, we never had children, right,
So did she actually the wife lived there with him?
Are we sure they were cohabitative at the time? Yes?
But was he a hoarder at that time? Yeah? She
when when nine when one dispatcher called back, which Atwood's house,
(37:02):
they actually spoke to the White first. Is she still alive?
She's still alive. Yes, So the hoarding was in that home.
So there would have been an opportunity if you wanted
to hide something in a hoarder's home, who would ever
find it? Yeah? I maviously. From from a law enforcement perspective,
(37:28):
you always look at the last person that had contact
with somebody that goes missing. Talking to the New Hampshire
State Police, the major crimes unit that had the case
right now, they have for all intensive purposes, couldn't find
anything to connect him with her disappearance. Did they search
(37:48):
his home? I they haven't told me that they have
searched his home. Um, But I don't know the answer
to that. There's some stuff they've been pretty open to
us about and given us a lot of information. Other
things they haven't. Um. They have looked at everybody that
(38:11):
has had any type of contact with moral whatsoever, either
on a friendly basis of quick meeting. Um. The law
enforcement has done a lot. They have basically treated this
case probably within a three to four time frame after
she went missing, three to four daytime frame. Behavioral PD
(38:33):
more or less just turned this over to the state police.
So they quasi investigated. Butch I would say more than
at that time. Okay, why do you say. I mean,
I'm not saying he's guilty. I'm just saying he's the
last one to see her in your right. There was
(38:54):
a couple of polygraphs given, there was a there was
a couple of grand juries that were initiated by the
new after State Police to bring everybody in to get
testimony on record. And they they have told me, they've
told me and Maggie both that they do not have
any person of interest in this particular case. So it
(39:15):
appears to me that this is one of these incidents
where everybody that has had of contact with Maura in
the past or around that timeframe that she went missing
has been investigated and cleared to a certain degree. Wow,
what do we know about the witness Karen McNamara. Now
(39:36):
she's apparently the key witness to the biggest conspiracy theory
that UH John Smith has been pushing for many, many years,
and that's with the blessing apparently of the father, Fred Murray.
What do we know about that? I kind of think
(39:58):
it's far fancy trying to a the uh have her
Hill police. Yeah, I mean this is so we we
look into every single one of these theories thoroughly, and
you know, we don't want to give too much away,
but we look into it and we find Karen to
be a very credible witnessed and art personally. You know,
(40:19):
as law enforcement doesn't love our witness testimony, but both
of us when we sat down and spoke to her,
I mean, you know, she she truly believed and we
don't think she's making up what she saw. Wow, what
exactly is she's saying? She saw? What? Karen says she
(40:41):
saw yeah, you can you can do Yeah, I mean
what she says she we we actually math about the timing.
Maggie and I actually drove the same robe she drove.
We drove with her and had her tell us exactly
what she was doing that particular evening and the route
she took to go home from Woodsville to Lincoln, New Hampshire,
(41:03):
which would have taken her along that stretch of highway
when Maura had her accident, when she she saw a
cruiser come by her twice with the lights and lights going,
lights and siren responding to the accident scene. Um, she
took a more direct route. And you know, some of
those roads up there, we're pretty bad pot hold and
(41:25):
it was very difficult to do any type of high
speed driving on those roads. So she actually saw the
cruiser come by her once, take a different route, come up,
and come by her again, as it responded. The whole
question is she's saying that the vehicle was an SUV
when she got to the scene, the suv was pointing
nose to nose with More's vehicle. But and she pulled
(41:51):
over up near Butch Atwood's house, which was, you know,
about a hundred yards away. But she did not see
anybody at the scene at all. She didn't see the
drive of the vehicle that was in the accident, nor
did she see a police officer at the scene. That
is basically her testimony in a in a nutshell. She
stayed for a couple of minutes and then went home,
(42:12):
drove h home, and as soon as she could get
cell phone service, she actually called her house to let
him know she was coming home. We have that specific time,
and we did all the distances, the you know, time
measurement of where she could have been and at what
time she might have passed, uh the accident scene, and
she she saw what she saw. Wow, it's kind of
(42:36):
hard to take the whole thing. You say, are you
telling me that you believe her? Yes, let me find
her to be very credible. Yeah, okay, let's let's take
that to its next step. What what do you make
of allegations have her Hill police were responsible for Maura
(42:58):
Murray's death and they've been covering it up for twelve
years now. Isn't it true that Karen McNamara, who you
seem to believe, could have seen the police suv but
that police are not part of a cover up. I mean,
(43:20):
it's just hard for me. First of all, I don't
think many people are smart enough to create a conspiracy,
much least less keep it quiet for twelve years. What
about that art I am with you a d I mean,
anybody it's been in that the law enforcement criminal justice
field knows that's almost impossible to do. Number one. Number two,
(43:40):
we do believe Karen mcamara and we go through this
whole issue on the show. Um. And and I mean
even when you sit down with with Fred, he doesn't
believe that the police were involved in in Moore's disappearance.
I think when you look at it and you listen
(44:03):
to the explanation from law enforcement, I mean, really, what
they were responding to was an abandoned vehicle in a
minor motor vehicle accident. And this happens every day in
this country. Um, this is not an unusual call. Um.
You know, I worked as a local police officer on
Cape cod for for three or four years, and I
(44:24):
can tell you I came across incidents is like this,
where the report of a nine or one call an accident,
you arrive at the scene, it's mired, there's no personal injury,
there's very minor property damage to the car and no
driver around. So you take the information down and just
move on to your next call. And that's basically what
happened here. The search for mar Murray and for the
(44:47):
truth goes on with me. Is Maggie Freeling, investigative journalist
and Aren't Roderick former U S Marshall. Join the crime
Con Cold Case Club work alongside experts and fellow crime
sleuths help uncover new leads and theories in cold cases
(45:09):
that they adopt. The very first case is focusing on
the mysterious disappearance of this gorgeous young nursing student, Maura Murray.
You're free to join thanks to Oxygen. You can sign
up now and find out more at club dot crime
con dot com. Club c l U B dot crime Con,
(45:34):
c r I M A c o N dot com,
Club dot crime con dot com. Our search for the
truth is not ending here. Nancy Grace Crime Stories signing off.
Goodbye friend. Do you find yourself obsessing over unsolved mysteries?
(46:00):
You wish there was a group of people just like
you to talk motives and alibis with. If so, join
the crime Con Cold Case Club and work alongside experts
and fellow crime sleuths to help uncover new leads and
theories in the cold cases they adopt. Their first cold
case focuses on the mysterious disappearance of nursing student Maura
Murray in two thousand four, and it's free to join
thanks to Oxygen. Sign up now or find more info
(46:22):
at Club dot crime con dot com. That's club dot
crime con dot com.
Host
Nancy Grace
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