Round table discussion and call to action - Alexander Blake VanDalsen - A Nefarious Nightmare - True Crime

Episode Transcript
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(00:00):
An Nefarious Nightmare contains themes that maybe explicit or triggering. For some specific
warnings and disclaimers will be mentioned inthe show notes. An the Farious Nightmare
assumes all parties that are mentioned inthese cases to be innocent unless proven guilty
in the court of law. Listenerdiscretion is strongly advised. You can help
us grow the show by leaving usa five star written review on Apple Podcasts

(00:21):
or Spotify, or you can joinour Patreon for lighthearted bonus content. I'm
Courtney and I'm Amanda, and thisis a bonus episode for an Nefarious Nightmare.

(00:55):
Alex van Dolson, Alex van Dolson, Alex Vandelos, Alex van Dalson,
Alex van Daalson. Hello, I'mAshley, the host of Fuck That,
and Today I want to discuss acase that I covered last December on

(01:17):
my podcast about the murder of Alexvan Dalson. Myself, along with some
other amazing podcasters, have covered Alex'sstory, and in light of recent events,
we wanted to bring this case upagain and have an open discussion together.
Alex's mother, Jennifer, has beenfighting for Alex's justice since February of

(01:40):
twenty twenty one. But before Iget into that, I want to take
a second to talk about Alex.Alexander Blake Vandalson was born on December twentieth
of nineteen ninety nine, and Alexwas a young, compassionate person. Alex
was trans, and while this shouldhave absolutely no impact on how how Alex's

(02:00):
case was handled, I think unfortunatelywe are all way too familiar with the
discrimination, hatred, and violence thatthe trans community faces every single day.
Alex was found in the snow,miles away from his home, deceased from
what the police stated was a suicideby a self inflicted gunshot wound. However,

(02:23):
Jennifer and every single one of usthat have covered his case and that
you're going to hear from today arecertain that Alex was murdered. Alex's body
was found in a position that Ican only describe as very obviously posed.
Alex's legs were neatly crossed over theankles, and his hands were tucked into

(02:46):
his pockets. Now, this obviouslymakes me consider if Alex did in fact
shoot himself in the head, howwould he have gotten his hands cozied into
his pockets afterwards? And if thatisn't another to make you think something isn't
right here. Let's talk about thebodycam footage briefly. We have all personally

(03:07):
reviewed the bodycam footage, and notesthat I specifically have on it clearly demonstrate
that even officers on scene thought thatAlex was murdered. In footage timestamped thirteen
twenty one eighteen, the officer whosebodycam footage was being recorded says, they've
placed him here. He was killedsomewhere else, that's my guess. The

(03:29):
responding officer says, his hands arein his pockets, that's weird. At
thirteen twenty one fifty, an officerapproaches and asks self inflicted. The same
officer who's recording on bodycam says no. The other officer says, that's not
what I wanted to hear, andthen the officer whose bodycam was being recorded
said no, sorry, it's goingto be a homicide. It looks like

(03:51):
they dumped him here. So howis it that we went from there to
the case being closed erroneously as suicide. I think we all have our theories,
but of course they are just that. But I would like you all
to consider a large problem that wehave in America today, discrimination and mistreatment

(04:12):
by law enforcement agencies towards individuals basedon their sexual orientation or gender identity continue
to be widespread issues within LGBTQ communities. This kind of bias undermines effective law
enforcement by eroding trust, hampering communication, and impeding the ability of officers to

(04:33):
adequately protect and serve these communities.Although a variety of state, local,
and federal regulations offer some safeguards againstspecific types of discrimination, the United States
as a whole lacks a comprehensive federallaw that uniformly bans discrimination on the grounds

(04:53):
of actual or perceived sexual orientation andgender identity. Still seeing so many cases
across the country in which transgender peopleare victims of crime and law enforcement agencies
misgender them both internally and in newsreports, and this alienates the victim,

(05:14):
the victim's friends, and the victim'sfamily. And I can't help but think
that this implicit bias is hampering lawenforcement's ability to successfully solve the investigation.
How can you do something right ifyou're going into it with bias? And
you know what this happened in Alex'scase in bodycam footage. Even after police

(05:38):
learn that Alex is a trans mail. They still refer to Alex using his
dead name, and they misgender himtime and time again, and they do
it in the police reports. AndI just want you to ask yourself,
why what does this mean? Thisintentional bias even after somebody dies, this

(05:58):
blatant lack of rest, What doesit mean and where does it come from?
This month, Jennifer received a responseto her request to reopen the investigation
into Alex's death, and we aregoing to discuss those details during our discussion
later in the episode. But beforethe discussion begins, I want to end
this introduction with something Jennifer said tome about Alex while I was putting together

(06:23):
my episode for his case last year. I asked Jennifer if she could tell
the world about Alex, what wouldshe say. Jennifer said, quote,
Alex was a goofy kid, veryfriendly. Nobody was a stranger. He
even knew all of our delivery peopleby name. He spoke to them all
the time. He was always tryingto help someone and he'd give them the

(06:45):
shirt off his back if they neededit, even if they were perfect strangers.
Hello, I am Ashley from FuckThat, and you can find my
episode on Alex wherever you get yourpodcasts. It is episode seventeen. Hi,
I'm CJ with Beyond the Rainbow,True Crimes of the LGBTQ. You

(07:10):
can find my episode of Alex onseason eight, episode two. Hey,
I'm Courtney Fenner. I am onehalf of an Afarious Nightmare. We covered
Alex van Dalson in season four,episode one titled He Always Sang Justice for
Alex Van Dlson. Hi, I'mCourtney, one half of the Book of

(07:30):
the Dead podcast. We covered Alex'scase on chapter fifty eight, a Search
for Answers the Death of Alex Vandalsen, which you can find wherever you get
your podcasts. Hi, I'm Robthe host of the Criminal Activity podcast.
We covered Alex's episode on episode one, which can be found wherever you get

(07:51):
your podcasts. Thank you everyone forcoming together to recover this case. Essentially,
we wanted to have a roundtable discussionbased on new information that has come
out. Essentially, Jennifer has notgotten any help from local law enforcement,
so we are hoping to come togetherto rediscuss the case. And really our

(08:13):
goal in all of this is toraise awareness, get more attention on this
case. For Jennifer for Alex,and we're hoping that by doing so,
we can get this case reopened andlooked at it the way it should have
been from the get go. Ifyou want further information on this case,
please go back and listen to eachof our episodes. We each covered the
case from different perspectives and it'll giveyou a really good idea of exactly what

(08:39):
happened. Something that was obvious toeach and every one of us when we
covered the case is that this casewas very obvious that this was a homicide,
but it was immediately deemed a suicidecase closed and there wasn't a proper
investigation looking into the possibility that thiswas a homicide, and that is,
unfortunately some that's common. It isobvious that there is a lot of bias

(09:03):
in this case based on the factthat Alex was a transgender male, and
this is an area where there isa lot of bias against marginalized communities.
You're right, Ashley, I coveronly LGBTQ community crimes and the marginalized community.
The law enforcement they're not fair toLGBTQ people for the most part,

(09:28):
and that's why a lot of LGBTQpeople are scared to go to law enforcement
if something bad happens to them.But with Alex, I think because he
was trans, I believe that there'sa huge bias and they're not looking at
this case the way they would hadhe been a long haired, blonde woman

(09:50):
of twenty three. You know,it is twenty twenty three, we're getting
into twenty twenty four, and westill have people out there doing hateful shit
to those in marginalized communities such asthe LGBTQ plus communities, and it's just,
I don't know, it just needsto stop. I mean, I

(10:11):
am infuriated. I know everybody hereis infuriated, specifically for this case,
but in several other cases where nojustice is seen. The fact that this
is getting treated as if they'll flyon their shoulder, they're just going to
swat it away. It's not gonnafly. So I guess essentially what we're
all trying to do is do acall to action at the end of this,
after we do our roundtable. ButI really just wanted to mention that

(10:35):
because frankly, I am sick andfucking tired of seeing, you know,
our gay and lesbian friends, ourtrans friends, being treated the way that
they are and thrown away like theirjust disposable garbage. Yes, I think
that's exactly right, and I thinkwe should explore that. Courtney L I'm
going to have you chime in withwhat we talked about, But I think

(10:56):
one of the things that stuck outto me initially was just the handling of
the crime scene in and of itself. There were multiple officers, I believe
between five to six unseen, theydid not cordon off the area with caution
tape. In fact, in thebodycam footage you can hear one of the
officers who really advocated for the factthat this was clearly a homicide. He
stated it explicitly multiple times. Thatsame officer, who I commend highly in

(11:22):
this case, said Hey, weneed to section this off. There's people
walking through, to which another officersays, Uh, why does it matter.
People have already walked all over it. Anyway, it doesn't matter.
There's footprints all over. So Ithink it's obvious that it was mishandled,
and Courtney, if you could chimein about what you were saying that you
heard on the body camera footage too, I think that's a good piece of
information. Yeah. Absolutely, andI'll have to go back and watch all

(11:48):
that body camera footage again because Ican't recall at the top of my head
which video I explicitly heard it.But the thing that really got me is
when they realized that the decendent thatthey were called about was Alex Mandelson.
It wasn't Okay, this is themissing person we've been looking for, this

(12:11):
is the missing young man we've beenlooking for. It was hei, she
whatever it is. And that's thatis almost an exact direct quote. And
it's disgusting to me, first ofall, that you your whole job is
to protect and serve your community asa member of law enforcement, and you

(12:33):
turn around in so blatantly disrespect avictim with such careless disregard for who they
are, you have diminished them inthat moment, you diminished Alex to nothing
by saying that. And so muchof that body camera footage was muted.
So it's interesting to me that thatlittle bit, that little that little snide

(12:58):
remark that one of the off hatwas left in and was not muted,
And it's like, why you mutedeverything else, But you left that particular
statement, in that disgusting statement inand that shows to me how little you
value this young man as a humanbeing. And I will never forget it.

(13:20):
That's stuck in my brain. AndI watched it three or four times
to confirm that that's actually what Iwas hearing. I will never forget it,
the blatant disrespect and the blatant bias. Yeah, And I think it's
obvious too that there was this implicitbias because even just going beyond the way
that they failed to cordon off thecrime scene when they were transporting Alex's body,

(13:45):
they did not lock or put anyidentification to make sure that it wasn't
mishandled in any way. And that'sdirectly in their report. And that's how
it's supposed to go. How doyou know that it's not going to be
tampered with? How do you knowthat nobody is going to do anything prior
to the autopsy? So how dowe really know how many hands they passed

(14:05):
Alex through? How do we knowthat they've followed proper protocol procedure? We
just don't because they failed to followprotocol the entire way. And you know
what, that just kind of fallsalong the line of the Indiana Law Enforcement
actually, and I know that thegovernor, Eric Holcom, I believe is

(14:26):
the governor of Indiana. I hopeI have that right. He was trying
to He knows that the law enforcementsucks there, and he's been trying to
upgrade the law enforcement and make thembetter. But I don't know how long
that will take. I don't knowif he's effective it all. I just

(14:46):
this is the second case out ofIndiana of LGBTQ that I've covered, and
the law enforcement has been horrible there. When I did some research and some
statistics of the Indiana law enforcement,they they were actually graded and their grade
would have been like two steps twopoints above an F that's how bad they

(15:09):
are. And I went through allthe counties, not just Tippekanoe County where
this happened, where Lafayette, Indianais They need training. I mean,
you know, all law enforcement,they just need to continually be trained,
and I don't think they are andthis one is particularly bad. The things
that set out to me were oneofficer in the body cam footage pointed to

(15:33):
the wound and was like, look, you can see the entrance wound here
and the exit wound there. Andit was the complete opposite when it got
to the medical examiner's office, andyou don't have an exit wound that is
larger or smaller than an entrance wound, and correct me if I'm wrong,
But I think on the medical examiner'sreport they found gunpowder residue around the wind

(16:00):
which wouldn't happen. I don't seehow when they searched the crime scene they
couldn't find bullet casings. These metaldetectors to sweep the area and couldn't find
any. So where's the bullet casing? To kind of piggyback off that I
had. After I recorded hour episode, Lisa, my co host, spoke

(16:21):
to my stepdad. He's a firearmsexpert, twenty five years in the military.
He was a sniper. He didthe whole nine. We asked him
basically his thoughts, his opinions,and he said, you know, did
they ever find the shellcasing? Isaid, no, they did, as
you said, with metal detectors,they couldn't find it. He said that
it could not have been suicide becausein order for it to have been suicide,

(16:44):
there would be a shellcasing, unlessAlex would have died by a gunshot
from a revolver. Because there wasno shellcasing. That means someone quote unquote
policed their brass, they picked upthe shellcasing and took it with them.
That's the only way, it isthe only possible way for there not to
be a shellcasing. So based onthat alone, it can't be suicide because

(17:07):
Alex could not have physically would nothave been able to pick up the shellcasing.
Besides the fact that there was nobullet and it was a through and
through a wound. And how wasAlex found? We were just discussing and
his hands were in his pockets whenhe was found. Exactly his hands were
in his pocket. He was layingon his back, his legs were crossed

(17:27):
the the ankles. How do youput your hands back in your pocket after
you shoot yourself? You don't exactlyif you're literally going to unlive yourself,
how would you do that and thenquickly put your hands back in your pockets.
I mean, you're pretty much instantlydead at that point if that were
the case. That's just one ofmany things about this whole case that rubs

(17:51):
me the wrong way. I honestlyhad no idea about the hay she or
it thing until you brought that upto me just now, and CJ,
you were telling me prior to it, like when we first started doing this
case, when it was just us, you were telling me about how Indiana
has a big history with misconduct andmishandling cases. Do you mind elaborating a

(18:15):
little bit more on that real fast. It's been a while since I covered
Alex's case and the research I didfor that case and the other case I
covered in Indiana, so I reallydon't have anything I can grasp from at
the moment other than I remember thegrades. But what I can tell you
is that Alex's family had some communicationwith the Indiana Police Department before this.

(18:42):
For example, we were talking aboutJen. Alex's mom had once worked as
a corrections officer, so she knewa lot of the law enforcement, and
she briefly interned with the Lafayette PoliceDepartment. She got to know some of
the people I don't know how well. Also Alex's dad, his father was

(19:06):
a police officer there in Indiana,and the father's cousin and both of them,
I guess were shady cobbs who gotin big trouble with law enforcement.
So one of and they were alsoboth very in with the mayor of Lafayette,
Indiana at the time, and whenthe cousin, when I think it

(19:30):
was a cousin, it might havebeen the grandfather. When he lost his
job, he was appointed as theparks and wreck security officer by the mayor,
who he was good buddies with.And there was something about Oh,
the person who found Alex's body wasthe snowplowed driver who worked for the Parts
and rec Department. I don't know. That could just be coincidental, if

(19:53):
you believe in coincidences. Also,Jen Alex's mom had told me that there
was a tunnel nearby where he wasfound. Where Alex's body was found,
I think she had said that itwas well known during good weather, because
you have to remember, this happenedin February of twenty twenty one, and

(20:15):
it was very cold and very snowy. Alex had asthma and he went out
in a very light layer of clothesfor that type of weather. But apparently
in good weather, the kids hungout in the tunnel, and you know,
I guess maybe there was drugs exchangedor something. But there was a
tunnel nearby, and I don't knowif they ever checked for a bullet there,

(20:40):
because it's quite possible Alex was murderedthere and dragged to the spot he
was placed in and posed. That'skind of my theory on it. Also,
Alex's dad is not Father of theyear. He refused to call Alex
by Alex and used Alex's dead nameand Alex's female pronouns Alex didn't use.

(21:00):
Yeah. I think the other thingthat really drove home for me that this
couldn't have been something that he wasplanning to do. If you're going if
the police are insisting upon looking atit as a suicide angle is again the
the clothes he was wearing is notclothes you wear to walk four miles in

(21:22):
the winter. And the fact thathe was a severe enough asthmatic that he
relied on his inhaler. You know, from what Jen told me, you
know, he stopped sports. Heyou know, he needed his inhaler.
And that was the one thing thatshe had recalled telling the officers when they
finally came to take the missing person'sreport, that he did not have is

(21:42):
inhaler with him, and she hadgotten some excuse after the fact by I
believe Lieutenant Payne saying, oh well, some people, you know, can
deal with their asthma and you know, like something to that effect. I'd
have to go back and read theemail again. But I know from having
asthma myself. My mother has asthma. It is physically painful to be out

(22:07):
in cold weather as an asthmatic.There's no way he would have walked four
miles in the snow in twenty degreeweather with the real feel of four without
even if he was bundled up appropriatelyfor the weather and had his in handler,
there's no way he would have madethat walk. So I personally believe

(22:29):
that he left the house to getinto a car, probably maybe get into
the car with someone that his momdidn't really want him hanging around, because
Jen said that's kind of what shethought might have happened, and I agree,
And something happened after you know,he wore such light clothes because he
was going to go from the houseto the car. That's that's what I
truly believe. I truly truly believehe got into someone's car, because there's

(22:52):
no way he would have walked fourmiles. So Alex had a couple of
situations he was dealing with too.We had discussed it briefly in our Twitter
group about a cousin or a friendthat owed a drug dealer some money and
he said Alex up and Alex wasrobbed at gunpoint by this person. Correct.

(23:15):
Yes, that Jennifer had told methat whether it was a cousin or
friend, I'm a little fuzzy onthat detail. That the friend needed money
to pay a dealer for marijuana andhad asked Alex for the money. Alex
said, no, I'm not givingyou the money this time, and then
Alex set him up to be robbedat gunpoint. And this was only I

(23:37):
think a couple of months prior toAlex's death. Alex didn't set himself up.
The cousin or the friend said Alex, I got you. I'm with
you. Yes, the friend thefriend said Alex up to be Robb's at
gunpoint because Alex would not give thefriend or the cousin money to pay off
the dealer. So this was onlya couple of months prior to Alex's staff.

(24:02):
So the coincidence there can't be deniedeither, that he was held at
gunpoint for money over drugs and thena few months later he is dead from
a gunshot wound. Also, theother issue that Alex had been dealing with
was his best friend. And whenI say I think her name is Cassie,

(24:25):
her wife was very jealous of Alexand Cassie's relationship. Now, the
gun that was found under Alex,the pistol that was found under him,
is believed to have belonged to Cassie'swife. It was a pink and black
nine millimeter. I believe Jen doesn'tbelieve Jen. Alex's mom does not believe
that that was the murder weapon thoughthis person. I'm just I'm trying to

(24:51):
just kind of grasp at things ofwho Alex might have went with that night.
It could have been. I don'tthink it was Cassie, because Cassie
would have said something for sure.Could have been Cassie's wife. It could
have been the cousin or the friendthat set him up to be wrong.
I'm just throwing this out there.I don't know if you guys agree with
that as possibility or not. Yeah, I agree. I definitely think that

(25:15):
he was with someone that night,whether it was someone that his mother didn't
want him to hang out with,or you know, maybe it was Cassie's
wife and you know, she hadsaid, you know, I want to
talk things out with you kind ofthing, and it went south from there.
Took backtrack a little bit though.It popped into my brain that Jen

(25:36):
was told that they don't test forgunshot residue. They never tested for gunshot
residue. They said that they don'tdo that. It's not TV And I
just want to say that, whileit's in my head that narrative is false.
They do check for gunshot residue.That is something that is tested for.
It would be very difficult to testfor, you know, given the

(25:59):
snow. But that was one ofthe many lies that she was told,
and I think that's relevant as wellif you want to kind of entertain the
police cover up angle. Well,you know, I was just going to
say throwing that out there, thatactual gun that was found under Alex has
never been ballistic tested. There's beenno testing upon it, and Jen believes

(26:23):
that they're still holding on to it. So why do they have it?
Why can't they do something with it? Who knows? I don't know.
So just to catch everybody up towhere we are at in present day,
that is listening, Jennifer has beenfighting and petitioning to get this case reevaluated,
opened, investigated properly, and hopefullyclosed as a homicide, and get

(26:47):
justice for Alex. The most recentupdate is that Jennifer received a response on
October eleventh of twenty twenty three inregards to her request for a new investigation.
So now Rob is going to readthe letter so you can know exactly
the reason Jennifer was given So replyto requests for a new investigation death of

(27:07):
Alex van Dolsen miss vandalson. TheIndiana State Police empathizes with the difficult loss
of your family member. However,a decision has been reached that the request
and circumstance outlined therein do not adequatelymeet the requirements set forth in Ice thirty
five forty fifteen. As a resultof a formal review process, the Indiana

(27:30):
State Police Department will not conduct anew investigation in an attempt to determine whether
the death of Alex Van Dolson thatoccurred on February ninth, twenty twenty one,
in Tippecanoe County was the result ofa criminal act committed by a third
person. And then it goes onto give contact information if they have any
additional questions, and that was sentby Major Brian Harper of the Indiana State

(27:53):
Police. What Jen told me aboutthat letter, well, about the whole
Indiana State Police checking into it.They weren't looking in in investigating Alex's case.
They were investigating law enforcement just tosee if they had done something wrong
in the investigation. So the consensuswould have been if they found that law

(28:15):
enforcement had did something incorrectly or inappropriate, they would reopen the investigation. But
of course they found nothing, quoteunquote, so they're not going to reopen
the investigation. That's how that goes, and that's why we're here today because
this is bullshit. It's all bullshit. That boy was he was killed,

(28:37):
he didn't take his own life.I'm one hundred percent positive, and in
my whole whole being, I feelone hundred percent positive that boy was murdered.
There's just still not enough awareness onit. So what we're trying to
do is we're trying to drive thepoint home that a if you're looking at
it from a mom's perspective, weare asking that you all look at this

(29:00):
case as if this happened to yourown son or daughter, and what would
you do so if it were me, I would be contacting that police officer
that wrote that letter. His nameis Brian Harper. His phone number is
three one seven two three two seventwo six nine. We also have State

(29:23):
Senator Ron Alting, We have theIndiana House of Representatives. There is that
one reporter that y'all were talking aboutthat wanted to cover this case. Wasn't
his name colts Chase, So wewould all probably be reaching that person Ashley
had mentioned earlier, the Attorney General. His name is Todd Rokita, the

(29:45):
ACLU of Indiana. And then wealso want to kind of apply pressure and
ask other true crime podcasters big orsmall, whoever is listening, even if
you wanted to, like, goeven if you're not a podcaster, go
to Starbucks and find some random personand be like, hey, you need

(30:06):
to go listen to X, Yand Z about Alex van Dolson because it
needs enough awareness on it. Thecops are not taking it seriously. They're
basically treating him like a throwaway.But we do want to hear this case
covered on way more true crime podcasts. We want to see more media coverage
on it as well. We wantto start seeing newspaper articles. We want

(30:30):
to see it essentially, not beshoved in just Indiana. We want to
see it outside of Indiana. Wewant to see it across the borders and
whatnot. What do you what doyou guys think we wanted to go fucking
viral? Yeah, we need weneed his case to go viral because it's
about time. Like she's coming upon two and a half years, it'll
be three years in February, whereshe still has not received any answers.

(30:55):
She's not getting any kind of transparencyin this. There's obviously and I'm sorry,
I know I'm a little late withmy opinion here, but there's a
police cover up going on here,and you know it's just not gonna fly.
You can't get away with whatever you'redoing forever. But we need as
many people to coaberate with all ofus on this and get his name known,

(31:17):
continue saying his name. That's thebiggest call action I can think of.
Alex Van Dolson, Alex van Dalson, Alex Vandalson, Alex van Dalson,
Alex van Daalson, and Jennifer,if you're listening to this, we
love you. I love you Jenvery much. They still need signatures on
the petition. I think they're likeone hundred and fifty away from hitting their

(31:41):
goal. But if everyone listening tothis takes the time to go and sign
the petition, they will surpass thatgoal, because the more signatures they get,
the more likely it is that someonewill listen. Also, Jen is
making these really cool tumblers. I'mgonna get her to send me some pictures
and I'm gonna put them up onBeyond the Rainbow wherever I am social media,

(32:04):
and hopefully you guys might too.The many is just going towards more
stuff to solve this case and findjustice for Alex. Thank you for listening,
Thank you for listening to an NefariousNightmare. Music used in the theme
was originally by ghost Stories Incorporated,remixed by Ryan RCX Murphy. Additional background

(32:30):
music is provided by Epidemic Sound.A Nefarious Nightmare is scripted, researched,
and produced by Courtney Fenner and AmandaCronin. I'm Leanie Hobbs and as always,
be vigilant for when you mess withthe bees, you get the hive.

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Round table discussion and call to action - Alexander Blake VanDalsen

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}Round table discussion and call to action - Alexander Blake VanDalsen