November 15, 2023 • 28 mins
The morning of July 27, 1989 in Kansas City, Missouri would forever change the lives of the Cox family. Fawn Cox's mom and sister found her lifeless body when they went to wake her up that morning. She had been beaten, raped, and strangled, all while the family slept downstairs the night before. It would be 31 years before her family would get the answers as to who had killed Fawn.
Sources for this episode:
Wikipedia - Kansas City, Missouri
Wikipedia - List of people from Kansas City, Missouri
CBS News - Teen's decades-old murder solved with new DNA technology
Fox 4 KC - KC teen's cold case rape, murder solved by 'advanced techniques' 31 years later
Northeast News - New DNA tech solves Cox cold case
Heavy - 31 Year-Old Rape & Murder of Kansas Teen Fawn Marie Cox Solved: KCPD
Newspapers.com - KC teen charged in death of girl, 16
Newspapers.com - Three teens held in girl's death
Newspapers.com - Northeast area girl, 16, found slain in bedroom
Newspapers.com - Northeast girl was strangled, autopsy shows
Sources for this episode:
Wikipedia - Kansas City, Missouri
Wikipedia - List of people from Kansas City, Missouri
CBS News - Teen's decades-old murder solved with new DNA technology
Fox 4 KC - KC teen's cold case rape, murder solved by 'advanced techniques' 31 years later
Northeast News - New DNA tech solves Cox cold case
Heavy - 31 Year-Old Rape & Murder of Kansas Teen Fawn Marie Cox Solved: KCPD
Newspapers.com - KC teen charged in death of girl, 16
Newspapers.com - Three teens held in girl's death
Newspapers.com - Northeast area girl, 16, found slain in bedroom
Newspapers.com - Northeast girl was strangled, autopsy shows
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Crime on My Coffee.This podcast contains graphic descriptions and adult content
mature audiences only. Please Hi,y'all, and welcome to Crime with My
(00:31):
Coffee. I'm your fabulous hostess withthe most June, and I'm Suzanne.
We're gonna tell you some stories you'veheard, some you haven't, and some
you'll wish you hadn't, all witha Texas twang. Well, welcome back,
guys, Welcome back, glad youcould join us absolutely, And if
(00:51):
you're here for the first time,make sure you listen to this episode,
then go back and pick one fromsomewhere else that we have out and then
just start listening from there and listento all of them. That's it.
Or you know, if you hateus, tell your enemy and maybe they'll
like it. Oh maybe, yeah? Or if you like us, tell
(01:14):
you tell two friends, and nowtell two friends, and now tell two
friends. You remember that commercial usedto be a commercial? No, I
don't. Okay, you're not asold as me, so well i'd be
really weird if I was. Thatwould yeah, it would all right?
Well, what's in your monk thisweek? This morning I made a pot
(01:34):
of white Russian coffee and it isso good. It's so good. It's
so good. It's very creamy tasting. It's got a nice sweetness about it.
It's not as sweet as the Crusader'scup that I had last week,
(01:57):
but it is sweet. I didput French vanilla creamer in it. It's
it's good coffee. It is goodcoffee. It's good, it's sweet,
it's very smooth. I like thatabout my coffee. So anyway, but
what do you have in your mug? I'm on my second pot of coffee
(02:17):
for the day. We're not recordingat our normal time, really, and
so I am drinking Folders because Iwas like, dude, just give me
the coffee. I need the caffeine. Just all the caffeine. Give me
all the caffeine. So I brewedan extra strong pot a Folder's coffee and
I'm drinking that with tons of sugarand tons of creamer in it because I
(02:37):
made it so strong. It's likeI got it from the truck stop and
I'm almost chewing it. Wow.And the funny thing is the way our
recording schedule has turned out here lately, we really don't have any kind of
set schedule. It's like, oh, Willy Milly everywhere. One of us
will text the other, Hey,you got a minute to record? It's
(03:00):
crazy. Yeah, it's four o'clockin the morning on Thursday. Sure,
why not. I'm about an hourbefore I go to work. Let's do
it, you know. Yeah,it's crazy, absolutely crazy. So yeah,
well I have a case for ustoday. Okay, sweet, I'm
about it. We're going to goto Kansas City, Missouri. Oh okay.
(03:24):
Kansas City, Missouri is the mostpopulous city in Missouri and it is
the largest by area and it straddlesthe Missouri in Kansas state line. Nice.
Different companies have their headquarters based therein Kansas City, such as Hallmark,
Cards, aw H and R Block, YEP, and the Hostess brands.
(03:49):
My husband is a fan of theho host Hostess. If I if
I could marry Hostess or Little Debbie, I would be so oh man,
me and Little Debbie we are tight. Okay. So I have to tell
you this just because I just foundthis out very very recently. A friend
(04:12):
of my husband's was talking about LittleDebbie now has ice cream out that can
be found at Walmart and it isall the Little Debbe treats. Ice cream
I'm gonna look for that, butprobably not mind Walmart because my Walmart sucks.
But I'm gonna look. I I'llreport back. Okay. Now,
(04:33):
I have looked every time I've goneto Walmart since I've heard this, and
I have seen Swiss miss and ZebraCake and all Star Crunch, all this
ice cream. Little Debbie makes right. I'm here for the Star Crunch you.
I'm looking for one specifically, andis the oatmeal cream pie. I
(04:57):
was gonna say, that's the onlyone that I haven't found yet, so
I have not bought any of themyet, but he tells, he says
that they are all wonderful. Okay, Well, if I find some at
my Walmart, I'll buy it andI'll put it in my freezer and you'll
have to come up for a weekend. Okay, but yeah, that's the
only one. I want to trythat one before I try any of the
(05:20):
others. Now. I love agood Zebra Cake and Swiss Cake and all
the all the Nutter butters or whateverthey Debbie, we're tight, Little Debbie
is going to make everything else alittle bit tighter now as far as let's
go, because yeah, ice cream, I am about it. It was
(05:43):
also in Kansas City that Walt Disneymade his first animation in his garage and
started the animation company laugh O GrahamStudio where Mickey Mouse was born. Oh,
that's awesome. He did, however, you know, end up moving
it to Hollywood and making it WaltDisney Company after Lafograham Studios did go bankrupt.
(06:10):
Wow, that's awesome though, acouple of people from Kansas City,
Missouri ed Asner. He's an actor, yeah, Ernest Hemingway an author.
Sweet, this one I did justfor you. Bill Kinney he played for
the Kansas City Chiefs as a quarterbackfor eight years. I want to say
(06:30):
he also did one year for theDolphins I think so for something like that
back in the eighties. And thenhe turned state senator for eight years.
Wow. And also Tech nine theRapper. Oh there you go. Well,
it was the summer of nineteen eightynine when our case takes place.
(06:53):
Okay, so we're going to goa little back, not super far back,
but a little back is all right. I was a I was too,
So was one of my sisters.Yes, yes, Fawn Cox was
a sixteen year old kid. Shewas fn I love like a little baby
(07:13):
deer On. I love it.Oh why did you make me that?
I know, give me a cutename like Fon or Salem, one of
the two Right Fun worked as acashier at Worlds of Fun, which I
did a little bit of googling onthis, and it's an amusement park that
(07:36):
to me, according to their website, and the pictures and stuff looks a
lot like Six Flags over Texas.Nice, very nice. She turned sixteen
in March of nineteen eighty nine.She was the oldest of three girls.
Her little sisters were twelve and fifteen. I fill you with the oldest kid
syndrome. Man, it saw shewas getting ready to start her her junior
(08:00):
year of high school that fall injust a couple of months. She was
super excited about our class ring.She was saving her money to buy her
own class ring because she was goingto have her class ring. You guys,
aw, I got mine for Christmas, which I thought was I can't
remember if it's Christmas or my birthday, but you know, and they're very
close together, so but I remember, and I was so excited. I
(08:24):
still you know, of course Istill have it. Anyway, Well,
it was mid to late July ofnineteen eighty nine, when she got her
learners permit to start working towards herdriver's license light. On July twenty sixth,
nineteen eighty nine, she had aclosing shift at Worlds of Fun.
She got off work at about eleveno'clock that night. She went home and
(08:46):
she went straight upstairs to go tobed and go to sleep because she had
another shift of the very next day. There was no rest for this girl.
She had plans for her money.Man, she has got it figured
out. Well, it was hot. It's July, you know, even
though it's in Missouri and it's notas hot as it is here, it's
(09:09):
so hot, right, it's whateighty five ninety maybe no, I don't
even know. I don't know.I probably should have looked that up,
you know what, you keep talking, I'll check the weather out in city
July teen for July Kansas City weather. Okay, okay, okay, So
it's hot. But she went aheadand went upstairs to the upstairs bedroom to
(09:33):
go to sleep anyway, because shecould leave the window open for airflow.
And she wasn't about all that downstairsnoise where everybody else was sleeping. Because
you know they're teenage, you know. One of her sisters is a teenager.
One of them is almost a teenager. They're not ready for bed yet.
It's summertime. They ain't got timefor sleeping, but she does because
(09:54):
she's got to go to work.So she goes upstairs and goes to sleep.
And it was downstairs where they hadthe air conditioning because they had air
condition the window units in the airconditioners. They don't really have central heat
and air like we do here thatfar north, A lot of places don't
have the central air. Sorry,they have the heat, they don't have
(10:16):
the air. Right. So,about nine thirty or so the next morning,
Fawn's alarm clock started blaring. Aftera few minutes of her not hitting
snooze or turning it off or anythinglike that, her mom and one of
her sisters goes upstairs to wake herup because they're like, oh, she's
(10:37):
just sleeping so hard because she's sixteen, she's a teenager. She's going to
sleep and she ain't gonna hear nothing. She's sleeping, right, ok Okay,
Now I did look up the weather, and usually on July first of
the year, it's roughly the highas eighty eight. The lows are you
(10:58):
know, low to mid seventies throughoutthe month of July, but about the
mid July mark, it gets toabout ninety degrees and that's what it is.
Yeah, so that's a little warm, yal guys. Yeah, yeah,
it's probably a lot warm for them. But in the nighttime temperatures,
that's I mean, seventy. Forme, that's a little uncomfortable. But
(11:22):
I also have a dog and acat cooking me every night. Oh yeah,
me too, So you know,seventy is a little uncomfortable for me,
but not too bad. And ifI'm sleeping alone, I should be
good. I'd be I'd be fine. So her mom and her little sister
go upstairs to wake her up andsay, hey, you know your alarm
(11:43):
clock's going off. We're tired ofhearing it. Shut it up, get
up, you know, you gotthings to do, right, And they
go in her room, but she'snot sleeping. She's dead. Yeah what
Yeah, So they call the cops, and the cops come out. Now
how do they know she's dead?Well, we'll get to that in just
(12:05):
second. Hold on, like youare ten seconds ahead of me, lady.
Okay, ah, wait, Sothey called the cops. The cops
come out, they start their investigation. Her autopsy would eventually show, though
the police didn't release this information fora while, that she had been beaten
and raped and strangled to death withher sister's nightcown. Oh no, this
(12:31):
is how they knew she was dead. Okay, Now, did her parents
see her when she came in andwent straight upstairs? Did they see and
make sure she wasn't beat up?Then? So I want to say that
her mom and sisters picked her upfrom work and brought her home, because
remember she only has her permit,she doesn't have her license yet, right,
okay, okay, so they wouldhave seen her face and yes,
(12:54):
okay, okay, because that hadme a little concerned. So the police
or start questioning the family. They'relike, how in the world did you
not hear anything exactly? Yeah,And they said, we've got the window
units going down here and they're loud. This is the late eighties. Those
(13:15):
window units are loud as crap.Yes, you you can't hear anything going
on? Yeah, Like you gotyour TV blarrein just to hear the commercials.
Yeah, you know, because youcan't hear anything over the window units.
Yeah, Okay, I get it. I understand that that's true.
They said that they did notice,you know, that their dog was a
little on edge the night before thoughkind of barking wouldn't really settle down or
(13:39):
anything, you know, But theyjust chalk that up to the fact that
their dog was pregnant and she wasjust on edge because she's all pregnant and
knocked up now, right, right, So they went on, you know,
with their night. They had noidea what was going on upstairs.
Well, originally the cops were thinkingthat this was probably a robbery gone wrong
(14:03):
because they did notice that some thingswere missing. Now, they never did
say as far as I could find, they never did say what was missing
or if it was ever recovered.Mm hm. And they also said,
you know, there's no signs offorced entry, you know, to this
house. Hmmm. So they figuredthat whoever had killed Fawn had climbed in
(14:26):
through the open window in her bedroomand went back out the same way after
they were done. Oh my god. Wow. Now, at some point
someone came forward and said that itwas this group of kids, members of
the Ninth Street Dog Gang, whichwas basically just a group of who bangies
(14:48):
in the neighborhood that were out causingtrouble, and eventually three teenagers that this
witness would name would be arrested andcharged with murder of Fawn. The witness,
though, would later recant their statement, and these three teens would eventually
be released and the charges dropped becauseeven though the DNA back then isn't what
(15:15):
it is today, they could stilldo a little bit with DNA, but
about the most they could do wascompare blood types. Mm hmmm, yeah,
yeah. So they did this andit came back inconclusive. It couldn't
rule these guys in, but itcouldn't rule them out either, So it's
inconclusive. So they don't have anythingagainst these kids, so they have to
(15:37):
let them go, and they haveto drop the charges because double jeopardy and
if these are the guys that didit, they want the evidence so that
they can put them away and notfind the evidence in six months, you
know, after they've already been acquittedand they can't do anything about it now,
right, So the family was gettingfrustrated, of course, because they
(15:58):
didn't have the answers as to whohad killed fawn. You know, the
community is getting a little irritated.Because the case wasn't solved, and this
went on for a long time,like a long time. Wow, I
will tell you, we do havea conclusion this is not unsolved. Oh
good, But it would take themthirty one years to get the answers that
(16:23):
this family wanted so badly. Wow, that's a that's a long time.
That's a very long time, avery long time. So time's going on.
DNA testing is making these huge leapsand bounds, and they can do
way more with the DNA. Now, you know, at this point in
the early two thousands, they coulddo way more with DNA than they could
(16:45):
in the late eighties. Right,So they take this DNA sample that they
had gathered from the crime scene inthe early two thousand or in the early
two thousands. They take this DNAsample that they had gathered from the crime
scene in eighty nine, and theyuploaded it into no Hits. Oh no,
(17:06):
yeah, no Hits. So evenmore years go by, and the
investigators in I want to say twentyeighteen, they went back to their original
three suspects and they asked each ofthem for a DNA sample to compare to
what they had at the crime scene. They all said you know, Okay,
yeah, here you go. Theydidn't match it either. Oh no.
(17:30):
So at this point, the familystarts pushing for the genealogical testing to
be done, you know, wherethey take this DNA and they build a
family tree, like how they caughtthe Golden State Killer and how they caught
William Talbot the second who by theway, we covered back in episode eight
if you want to go listen tothat one. Yes, But the police
(17:51):
kept saying that they didn't have thefunds or the manpower to do this.
The Famili's getting frustrated because they're like, look, we raised the money that
would cover whatever testing is involved inthis. And I want to say I
read it was like at that time, it was it was going to cost
like five thousand dollars or whatever todo this genealogical testing, right, and
(18:14):
the police department said, you know, look, we can't take your money
for investigation purposes, though which Ican. I can kind of see that
right now, But at the sametime, I can understand the frustration the
family is feeling. So the family'sbuying billboards around the area, putting Fawn's
picture up there, saying you know, hey, look we're offering this reward.
If you have any information, callit in. You know, we
(18:38):
just want to know what happened toFawn. Right. Nothing was panning out
though. Aw Then in the summerof twenty twenty, the federal government entered
the chat. Uh. Oh.They brought with them federal resources and they
wanted to use these resources to helpsolve violent crimes, including the rape and
(19:00):
murder of Vaughn Cox. Well,good, so they start. So they
funded this testing that the police departmentsaid that they didn't have the money to
fund. They fund this testing andboom, they have a suspect. Oh.
Through their magical DNA family tree buildingways of genetic genealogy, they had
(19:21):
found their suspect, Donald Cox Junior, Bond's cousin. Oh okay, eh
wow, oh yeah, that's rightbecause she had two sisters. She didn't
have a brother, right, whywould he do that? He was the
one that had left the DNA atthe crime scene. Oh my god.
(19:45):
Well, they can't ask Cox whyhe did it because he died back in
two thousand and six. Oh no, he died from a drug overdose.
But when so they couldn't exactly getask him for his DNA sample. You
know, to compare it to this. So, but they're pretty sure through
(20:06):
their genealogical tracing stuff that this iswho their guy is, this is who
they're looking for. So since theycan't, you know, just ask him
for a DNA sample, you know, after they found out that he's dead,
they did find out that when hehad originally died, it was through
suspicious circumstances, and so the medicalexaminer actually had his DNA on file because
(20:29):
you know, before foul play wasruled out and it was just ruled an
accidental drug overdose, they had tohave, you know, certain things for
testing or whatever. Right, Sothe medical examiner still had this DNA in
their storage. So they take thisDNA that they know belonged to Donald Cox
Junior, and they run it andit is a match for the DNA that
(20:52):
was found in Vaughn's bedroom. Now, now Fawn was sixteen. How old
was he at this time? Ithink he was like twenty one or so,
early twenties, okay, I thinkis what I read. I think
he was in his early twenties.Okay. In nineteen eighty nine, while
the family wouldn't be able to seeher killer be brought to justice. They
(21:18):
at least knew who had done thisto Fawn and knew since he had passed
away, he's not going to becausing a scene with anybody else, right,
And they also figured that that's probablyhow he was able to get in
and out of the house. Heknew that everybody would be sleeping downstairs.
(21:42):
Maybe he was breaking in to stealthings and came across Fawn sleeping upstairs unexpectedly
and all of this took place.Maybe she was the target to begin with.
Maybe one of her sisters was thetarget to begin with. Maybe she
woke up said what the are youdoing in my room? And why are
(22:03):
you taking our stuff? And yeah, I mean, we'll we'll never really
know, but we do know thathe was her killer. He did come
in through the bedroom window and leavethrough the bedroom window. It was at
the back, I want to say. It was at the back of the
house and kind of like growing up, I had the upstairs bedroom and there's
(22:26):
like a roof outside of the windowsupstairs. There was a roof outside her
window as well. Okay, soit's not like he's having to you know,
spider man it up, you know, to the second story, right
right, right, so and inthrough the window. But yeah, that's
that's it. You know, theynow knew how how this killer knew how
(22:48):
to get in and out of thehouse, and that it wasn't just a
stranger that got lucky that all thepieces fell into place for them to have
gotten away with this murder. Right, Wow, it's amazing that it took
that long to solve though. Youknow, unfortunately DNA, you know,
(23:08):
you couldn't do then what you couldnow. And if he never went to
prison for anything, they're not goingto take his DNA and put it in
codis exactly. It's not going tobe on file at all. That's wow.
Wow, that's my case. Wow, that's crazy to think that family
(23:34):
can be that backstabbing, you knowwhat I mean. So I feel,
and this is only my opinion,that he actually did come in to steal
stuff knowing that he thought probably everybodywas going to be downstairs and didn't realize
she was going to be upstairs,and Fawn confronted him, and him being
(23:56):
probably bigger and older, just youknow, you can't tell I can't be
tattled on, you know, Andit still doesn't explain the rape to me
that well, no, no,that's yeah, that's just gross, that's
just absolutely disgusting. But yeah,I have a feeling she just caught him
(24:22):
and confronted him, and he didnot like it. And I bet maybe
what he was thinking because he's twentyand dom still because he's a guy or
a boy whatever, twenty, buthe thought, you know, not probably
not knowing anything about DNA or anythinglike that. He thought if he did
(24:48):
this, it definitely would not pointtowards him because he is family, you
know what I mean. He thoughtmaybe that would throw them off somehow because
she and maybe that's why he rapedher, you see what I'm saying.
Maybe I don't know. I don'tknow, but you know, uh,
well, I'm glad we have answersfor that because and I'm glad. I
(25:12):
also want to point out that,of course this took thirty one years.
So at that point, let's say, let's just say her parents were twenty
when they had her. She wasthe oldest, so they're thirty six when
she was killed. So they're sixtysix, you know, sixty seven sixty
(25:33):
eight. Are they even alive?Right? Do they know? I can
answer that question for you. Yes, her parents were both still alive when
they were able to conclusively solve hercase. Oh, that's got to be
such a relief for them, sucha relief because I cannot imagine having to
(25:56):
go thirty years in not knowing whenanything, not having any kind of answers,
not having any kind of promise ofsomebody being caught or punished or anything.
Wow. Because both of her parentswere still alive. When when they
(26:18):
found out who did this, andher family was notified the night before or
the day before they announced to thepublic that they did know who had killed
Fawn. Wow. Yeah, I'mglad that they found out. I'm glad
that they were still here to getthat news. Wow. Me too.
A lot of times when a casegoes that long without being solved, a
(26:40):
lot of times the parents aren't herefor that, right right. Wow,
that's that's so crazy, so crazy. Well, thank you very much for
sharing that, because you know,I don't I can't say that I've ever
(27:00):
heard of this case. But Iam naming my next dog or cat Fawn
because I love that name. Yeah. I'm kind of mad you didn't name
me Fawn. I'm gonna go tellmy husband I'm changing my name. Okay,
Okay, I think you should,because that's an awesome name. I
love that, so I do too. But I don't know that my husband
will let me actually change my name. Yeah he might not. Yeah,
(27:22):
he might not. He might not. Oh, I can't change my name.
Oh okay, because then my initialswouldn't be eighty eight when my initial
things and I like my initials beingeighty eight. It's really easy for me.
Okay, all right, well justleave it like it is then.
Okay, Well, Gatchie's mom needsto change her name to Fawn. She
doesn't go by her first name anyway, so there you go. Can you
(27:47):
change her name to Fawn? We'vejust changed your sister's name altogether. That's
not awesome. Okay, I'll gotomorrow when she calls me, I was
gonna say, I guess we'll lether know tomorrow when we see her.
So wow. Oh yeah, youwill probably see her tomorrow. Huh.
Yeah, she probably won't call me. She'll probably call me the next day.
(28:07):
Yeah, yeah, so I'll lether know we're changing her name,
all right? Cool? Cool?Cool? So all right, well,
I guess until next time. Guys, that's it for us, and we'll
catch you on the slip side.Yeah. And from me, Fawn's oldest
sister. Okay, bye bye
Welcome to Crime on My Coffee.This podcast contains graphic descriptions and adult content
mature audiences only. Please Hi,y'all, and welcome to Crime with My
(00:31):
Coffee. I'm your fabulous hostess withthe most June, and I'm Suzanne.
We're gonna tell you some stories you'veheard, some you haven't, and some
you'll wish you hadn't, all witha Texas twang. Well, welcome back,
guys, Welcome back, glad youcould join us absolutely, And if
(00:51):
you're here for the first time,make sure you listen to this episode,
then go back and pick one fromsomewhere else that we have out and then
just start listening from there and listento all of them. That's it.
Or you know, if you hateus, tell your enemy and maybe they'll
like it. Oh maybe, yeah? Or if you like us, tell
(01:14):
you tell two friends, and nowtell two friends, and now tell two
friends. You remember that commercial usedto be a commercial? No, I
don't. Okay, you're not asold as me, so well i'd be
really weird if I was. Thatwould yeah, it would all right?
Well, what's in your monk thisweek? This morning I made a pot
(01:34):
of white Russian coffee and it isso good. It's so good. It's
so good. It's very creamy tasting. It's got a nice sweetness about it.
It's not as sweet as the Crusader'scup that I had last week,
(01:57):
but it is sweet. I didput French vanilla creamer in it. It's
it's good coffee. It is goodcoffee. It's good, it's sweet,
it's very smooth. I like thatabout my coffee. So anyway, but
what do you have in your mug? I'm on my second pot of coffee
(02:17):
for the day. We're not recordingat our normal time, really, and
so I am drinking Folders because Iwas like, dude, just give me
the coffee. I need the caffeine. Just all the caffeine. Give me
all the caffeine. So I brewedan extra strong pot a Folder's coffee and
I'm drinking that with tons of sugarand tons of creamer in it because I
(02:37):
made it so strong. It's likeI got it from the truck stop and
I'm almost chewing it. Wow.And the funny thing is the way our
recording schedule has turned out here lately, we really don't have any kind of
set schedule. It's like, oh, Willy Milly everywhere. One of us
will text the other, Hey,you got a minute to record? It's
(03:00):
crazy. Yeah, it's four o'clockin the morning on Thursday. Sure,
why not. I'm about an hourbefore I go to work. Let's do
it, you know. Yeah,it's crazy, absolutely crazy. So yeah,
well I have a case for ustoday. Okay, sweet, I'm
about it. We're going to goto Kansas City, Missouri. Oh okay.
(03:24):
Kansas City, Missouri is the mostpopulous city in Missouri and it is
the largest by area and it straddlesthe Missouri in Kansas state line. Nice.
Different companies have their headquarters based therein Kansas City, such as Hallmark,
Cards, aw H and R Block, YEP, and the Hostess brands.
(03:49):
My husband is a fan of theho host Hostess. If I if
I could marry Hostess or Little Debbie, I would be so oh man,
me and Little Debbie we are tight. Okay. So I have to tell
you this just because I just foundthis out very very recently. A friend
(04:12):
of my husband's was talking about LittleDebbie now has ice cream out that can
be found at Walmart and it isall the Little Debbe treats. Ice cream
I'm gonna look for that, butprobably not mind Walmart because my Walmart sucks.
But I'm gonna look. I I'llreport back. Okay. Now,
(04:33):
I have looked every time I've goneto Walmart since I've heard this, and
I have seen Swiss miss and ZebraCake and all Star Crunch, all this
ice cream. Little Debbie makes right. I'm here for the Star Crunch you.
I'm looking for one specifically, andis the oatmeal cream pie. I
(04:57):
was gonna say, that's the onlyone that I haven't found yet, so
I have not bought any of themyet, but he tells, he says
that they are all wonderful. Okay, Well, if I find some at
my Walmart, I'll buy it andI'll put it in my freezer and you'll
have to come up for a weekend. Okay, but yeah, that's the
only one. I want to trythat one before I try any of the
(05:20):
others. Now. I love agood Zebra Cake and Swiss Cake and all
the all the Nutter butters or whateverthey Debbie, we're tight, Little Debbie
is going to make everything else alittle bit tighter now as far as let's
go, because yeah, ice cream, I am about it. It was
(05:43):
also in Kansas City that Walt Disneymade his first animation in his garage and
started the animation company laugh O GrahamStudio where Mickey Mouse was born. Oh,
that's awesome. He did, however, you know, end up moving
it to Hollywood and making it WaltDisney Company after Lafograham Studios did go bankrupt.
(06:10):
Wow, that's awesome though, acouple of people from Kansas City,
Missouri ed Asner. He's an actor, yeah, Ernest Hemingway an author.
Sweet, this one I did justfor you. Bill Kinney he played for
the Kansas City Chiefs as a quarterbackfor eight years. I want to say
(06:30):
he also did one year for theDolphins I think so for something like that
back in the eighties. And thenhe turned state senator for eight years.
Wow. And also Tech nine theRapper. Oh there you go. Well,
it was the summer of nineteen eightynine when our case takes place.
(06:53):
Okay, so we're going to goa little back, not super far back,
but a little back is all right. I was a I was too,
So was one of my sisters.Yes, yes, Fawn Cox was
a sixteen year old kid. Shewas fn I love like a little baby
(07:13):
deer On. I love it.Oh why did you make me that?
I know, give me a cutename like Fon or Salem, one of
the two Right Fun worked as acashier at Worlds of Fun, which I
did a little bit of googling onthis, and it's an amusement park that
(07:36):
to me, according to their website, and the pictures and stuff looks a
lot like Six Flags over Texas.Nice, very nice. She turned sixteen
in March of nineteen eighty nine.She was the oldest of three girls.
Her little sisters were twelve and fifteen. I fill you with the oldest kid
syndrome. Man, it saw shewas getting ready to start her her junior
(08:00):
year of high school that fall injust a couple of months. She was
super excited about our class ring.She was saving her money to buy her
own class ring because she was goingto have her class ring. You guys,
aw, I got mine for Christmas, which I thought was I can't
remember if it's Christmas or my birthday, but you know, and they're very
close together, so but I remember, and I was so excited. I
(08:24):
still you know, of course Istill have it. Anyway, Well,
it was mid to late July ofnineteen eighty nine, when she got her
learners permit to start working towards herdriver's license light. On July twenty sixth,
nineteen eighty nine, she had aclosing shift at Worlds of Fun.
She got off work at about eleveno'clock that night. She went home and
(08:46):
she went straight upstairs to go tobed and go to sleep because she had
another shift of the very next day. There was no rest for this girl.
She had plans for her money.Man, she has got it figured
out. Well, it was hot. It's July, you know, even
though it's in Missouri and it's notas hot as it is here, it's
(09:09):
so hot, right, it's whateighty five ninety maybe no, I don't
even know. I don't know.I probably should have looked that up,
you know what, you keep talking, I'll check the weather out in city
July teen for July Kansas City weather. Okay, okay, okay, So
it's hot. But she went aheadand went upstairs to the upstairs bedroom to
(09:33):
go to sleep anyway, because shecould leave the window open for airflow.
And she wasn't about all that downstairsnoise where everybody else was sleeping. Because
you know they're teenage, you know. One of her sisters is a teenager.
One of them is almost a teenager. They're not ready for bed yet.
It's summertime. They ain't got timefor sleeping, but she does because
(09:54):
she's got to go to work.So she goes upstairs and goes to sleep.
And it was downstairs where they hadthe air conditioning because they had air
condition the window units in the airconditioners. They don't really have central heat
and air like we do here thatfar north, A lot of places don't
have the central air. Sorry,they have the heat, they don't have
(10:16):
the air. Right. So,about nine thirty or so the next morning,
Fawn's alarm clock started blaring. Aftera few minutes of her not hitting
snooze or turning it off or anythinglike that, her mom and one of
her sisters goes upstairs to wake herup because they're like, oh, she's
(10:37):
just sleeping so hard because she's sixteen, she's a teenager. She's going to
sleep and she ain't gonna hear nothing. She's sleeping, right, ok Okay,
Now I did look up the weather, and usually on July first of
the year, it's roughly the highas eighty eight. The lows are you
(10:58):
know, low to mid seventies throughoutthe month of July, but about the
mid July mark, it gets toabout ninety degrees and that's what it is.
Yeah, so that's a little warm, yal guys. Yeah, yeah,
it's probably a lot warm for them. But in the nighttime temperatures,
that's I mean, seventy. Forme, that's a little uncomfortable. But
(11:22):
I also have a dog and acat cooking me every night. Oh yeah,
me too, So you know,seventy is a little uncomfortable for me,
but not too bad. And ifI'm sleeping alone, I should be
good. I'd be I'd be fine. So her mom and her little sister
go upstairs to wake her up andsay, hey, you know your alarm
(11:43):
clock's going off. We're tired ofhearing it. Shut it up, get
up, you know, you gotthings to do, right, And they
go in her room, but she'snot sleeping. She's dead. Yeah what
Yeah, So they call the cops, and the cops come out. Now
how do they know she's dead?Well, we'll get to that in just
(12:05):
second. Hold on, like youare ten seconds ahead of me, lady.
Okay, ah, wait, Sothey called the cops. The cops
come out, they start their investigation. Her autopsy would eventually show, though
the police didn't release this information fora while, that she had been beaten
and raped and strangled to death withher sister's nightcown. Oh no, this
(12:31):
is how they knew she was dead. Okay, Now, did her parents
see her when she came in andwent straight upstairs? Did they see and
make sure she wasn't beat up?Then? So I want to say that
her mom and sisters picked her upfrom work and brought her home, because
remember she only has her permit,she doesn't have her license yet, right,
okay, okay, so they wouldhave seen her face and yes,
(12:54):
okay, okay, because that hadme a little concerned. So the police
or start questioning the family. They'relike, how in the world did you
not hear anything exactly? Yeah,And they said, we've got the window
units going down here and they're loud. This is the late eighties. Those
(13:15):
window units are loud as crap.Yes, you you can't hear anything going
on? Yeah, Like you gotyour TV blarrein just to hear the commercials.
Yeah, you know, because youcan't hear anything over the window units.
Yeah, Okay, I get it. I understand that that's true.
They said that they did notice,you know, that their dog was a
little on edge the night before thoughkind of barking wouldn't really settle down or
(13:39):
anything, you know, But theyjust chalk that up to the fact that
their dog was pregnant and she wasjust on edge because she's all pregnant and
knocked up now, right, right, So they went on, you know,
with their night. They had noidea what was going on upstairs.
Well, originally the cops were thinkingthat this was probably a robbery gone wrong
(14:03):
because they did notice that some thingswere missing. Now, they never did
say as far as I could find, they never did say what was missing
or if it was ever recovered.Mm hm. And they also said,
you know, there's no signs offorced entry, you know, to this
house. Hmmm. So they figuredthat whoever had killed Fawn had climbed in
(14:26):
through the open window in her bedroomand went back out the same way after
they were done. Oh my god. Wow. Now, at some point
someone came forward and said that itwas this group of kids, members of
the Ninth Street Dog Gang, whichwas basically just a group of who bangies
(14:48):
in the neighborhood that were out causingtrouble, and eventually three teenagers that this
witness would name would be arrested andcharged with murder of Fawn. The witness,
though, would later recant their statement, and these three teens would eventually
be released and the charges dropped becauseeven though the DNA back then isn't what
(15:15):
it is today, they could stilldo a little bit with DNA, but
about the most they could do wascompare blood types. Mm hmmm, yeah,
yeah. So they did this andit came back inconclusive. It couldn't
rule these guys in, but itcouldn't rule them out either, So it's
inconclusive. So they don't have anythingagainst these kids, so they have to
(15:37):
let them go, and they haveto drop the charges because double jeopardy and
if these are the guys that didit, they want the evidence so that
they can put them away and notfind the evidence in six months, you
know, after they've already been acquittedand they can't do anything about it now,
right, So the family was gettingfrustrated, of course, because they
(15:58):
didn't have the answers as to whohad killed fawn. You know, the
community is getting a little irritated.Because the case wasn't solved, and this
went on for a long time,like a long time. Wow, I
will tell you, we do havea conclusion this is not unsolved. Oh
good, But it would take themthirty one years to get the answers that
(16:23):
this family wanted so badly. Wow, that's a that's a long time.
That's a very long time, avery long time. So time's going on.
DNA testing is making these huge leapsand bounds, and they can do
way more with the DNA. Now, you know, at this point in
the early two thousands, they coulddo way more with DNA than they could
(16:45):
in the late eighties. Right,So they take this DNA sample that they
had gathered from the crime scene inthe early two thousand or in the early
two thousands. They take this DNAsample that they had gathered from the crime
scene in eighty nine, and theyuploaded it into no Hits. Oh no,
(17:06):
yeah, no Hits. So evenmore years go by, and the
investigators in I want to say twentyeighteen, they went back to their original
three suspects and they asked each ofthem for a DNA sample to compare to
what they had at the crime scene. They all said you know, Okay,
yeah, here you go. Theydidn't match it either. Oh no.
(17:30):
So at this point, the familystarts pushing for the genealogical testing to
be done, you know, wherethey take this DNA and they build a
family tree, like how they caughtthe Golden State Killer and how they caught
William Talbot the second who by theway, we covered back in episode eight
if you want to go listen tothat one. Yes, But the police
(17:51):
kept saying that they didn't have thefunds or the manpower to do this.
The Famili's getting frustrated because they're like, look, we raised the money that
would cover whatever testing is involved inthis. And I want to say I
read it was like at that time, it was it was going to cost
like five thousand dollars or whatever todo this genealogical testing, right, and
(18:14):
the police department said, you know, look, we can't take your money
for investigation purposes, though which Ican. I can kind of see that
right now, But at the sametime, I can understand the frustration the
family is feeling. So the family'sbuying billboards around the area, putting Fawn's
picture up there, saying you know, hey, look we're offering this reward.
If you have any information, callit in. You know, we
(18:38):
just want to know what happened toFawn. Right. Nothing was panning out
though. Aw Then in the summerof twenty twenty, the federal government entered
the chat. Uh. Oh.They brought with them federal resources and they
wanted to use these resources to helpsolve violent crimes, including the rape and
(19:00):
murder of Vaughn Cox. Well,good, so they start. So they
funded this testing that the police departmentsaid that they didn't have the money to
fund. They fund this testing andboom, they have a suspect. Oh.
Through their magical DNA family tree buildingways of genetic genealogy, they had
(19:21):
found their suspect, Donald Cox Junior, Bond's cousin. Oh okay, eh
wow, oh yeah, that's rightbecause she had two sisters. She didn't
have a brother, right, whywould he do that? He was the
one that had left the DNA atthe crime scene. Oh my god.
(19:45):
Well, they can't ask Cox whyhe did it because he died back in
two thousand and six. Oh no, he died from a drug overdose.
But when so they couldn't exactly getask him for his DNA sample. You
know, to compare it to this. So, but they're pretty sure through
(20:06):
their genealogical tracing stuff that this iswho their guy is, this is who
they're looking for. So since theycan't, you know, just ask him
for a DNA sample, you know, after they found out that he's dead,
they did find out that when hehad originally died, it was through
suspicious circumstances, and so the medicalexaminer actually had his DNA on file because
(20:29):
you know, before foul play wasruled out and it was just ruled an
accidental drug overdose, they had tohave, you know, certain things for
testing or whatever. Right, Sothe medical examiner still had this DNA in
their storage. So they take thisDNA that they know belonged to Donald Cox
Junior, and they run it andit is a match for the DNA that
(20:52):
was found in Vaughn's bedroom. Now, now Fawn was sixteen. How old
was he at this time? Ithink he was like twenty one or so,
early twenties, okay, I thinkis what I read. I think
he was in his early twenties.Okay. In nineteen eighty nine, while
the family wouldn't be able to seeher killer be brought to justice. They
(21:18):
at least knew who had done thisto Fawn and knew since he had passed
away, he's not going to becausing a scene with anybody else, right,
And they also figured that that's probablyhow he was able to get in
and out of the house. Heknew that everybody would be sleeping downstairs.
(21:42):
Maybe he was breaking in to stealthings and came across Fawn sleeping upstairs unexpectedly
and all of this took place.Maybe she was the target to begin with.
Maybe one of her sisters was thetarget to begin with. Maybe she
woke up said what the are youdoing in my room? And why are
(22:03):
you taking our stuff? And yeah, I mean, we'll we'll never really
know, but we do know thathe was her killer. He did come
in through the bedroom window and leavethrough the bedroom window. It was at
the back, I want to say. It was at the back of the
house and kind of like growing up, I had the upstairs bedroom and there's
(22:26):
like a roof outside of the windowsupstairs. There was a roof outside her
window as well. Okay, soit's not like he's having to you know,
spider man it up, you know, to the second story, right
right, right, so and inthrough the window. But yeah, that's
that's it. You know, theynow knew how how this killer knew how
(22:48):
to get in and out of thehouse, and that it wasn't just a
stranger that got lucky that all thepieces fell into place for them to have
gotten away with this murder. Right, Wow, it's amazing that it took
that long to solve though. Youknow, unfortunately DNA, you know,
(23:08):
you couldn't do then what you couldnow. And if he never went to
prison for anything, they're not goingto take his DNA and put it in
codis exactly. It's not going tobe on file at all. That's wow.
Wow, that's my case. Wow, that's crazy to think that family
(23:34):
can be that backstabbing, you knowwhat I mean. So I feel,
and this is only my opinion,that he actually did come in to steal
stuff knowing that he thought probably everybodywas going to be downstairs and didn't realize
she was going to be upstairs,and Fawn confronted him, and him being
(23:56):
probably bigger and older, just youknow, you can't tell I can't be
tattled on, you know, Andit still doesn't explain the rape to me
that well, no, no,that's yeah, that's just gross, that's
just absolutely disgusting. But yeah,I have a feeling she just caught him
(24:22):
and confronted him, and he didnot like it. And I bet maybe
what he was thinking because he's twentyand dom still because he's a guy or
a boy whatever, twenty, buthe thought, you know, not probably
not knowing anything about DNA or anythinglike that. He thought if he did
(24:48):
this, it definitely would not pointtowards him because he is family, you
know what I mean. He thoughtmaybe that would throw them off somehow because
she and maybe that's why he rapedher, you see what I'm saying.
Maybe I don't know. I don'tknow, but you know, uh,
well, I'm glad we have answersfor that because and I'm glad. I
(25:12):
also want to point out that,of course this took thirty one years.
So at that point, let's say, let's just say her parents were twenty
when they had her. She wasthe oldest, so they're thirty six when
she was killed. So they're sixtysix, you know, sixty seven sixty
(25:33):
eight. Are they even alive?Right? Do they know? I can
answer that question for you. Yes, her parents were both still alive when
they were able to conclusively solve hercase. Oh, that's got to be
such a relief for them, sucha relief because I cannot imagine having to
(25:56):
go thirty years in not knowing whenanything, not having any kind of answers,
not having any kind of promise ofsomebody being caught or punished or anything.
Wow. Because both of her parentswere still alive. When when they
(26:18):
found out who did this, andher family was notified the night before or
the day before they announced to thepublic that they did know who had killed
Fawn. Wow. Yeah, I'mglad that they found out. I'm glad
that they were still here to getthat news. Wow. Me too.
A lot of times when a casegoes that long without being solved, a
(26:40):
lot of times the parents aren't herefor that, right right. Wow,
that's that's so crazy, so crazy. Well, thank you very much for
sharing that, because you know,I don't I can't say that I've ever
(27:00):
heard of this case. But Iam naming my next dog or cat Fawn
because I love that name. Yeah. I'm kind of mad you didn't name
me Fawn. I'm gonna go tellmy husband I'm changing my name. Okay,
Okay, I think you should,because that's an awesome name. I
love that, so I do too. But I don't know that my husband
will let me actually change my name. Yeah he might not. Yeah,
(27:22):
he might not. He might not. Oh, I can't change my name.
Oh okay, because then my initialswouldn't be eighty eight when my initial
things and I like my initials beingeighty eight. It's really easy for me.
Okay, all right, well justleave it like it is then.
Okay, Well, Gatchie's mom needsto change her name to Fawn. She
doesn't go by her first name anyway, so there you go. Can you
(27:47):
change her name to Fawn? We'vejust changed your sister's name altogether. That's
not awesome. Okay, I'll gotomorrow when she calls me, I was
gonna say, I guess we'll lether know tomorrow when we see her.
So wow. Oh yeah, youwill probably see her tomorrow. Huh.
Yeah, she probably won't call me. She'll probably call me the next day.
(28:07):
Yeah, yeah, so I'll lether know we're changing her name,
all right? Cool? Cool?Cool? So all right, well,
I guess until next time. Guys, that's it for us, and we'll
catch you on the slip side.Yeah. And from me, Fawn's oldest
sister. Okay, bye bye
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