245 - The Disappearance of Martha Leanne Green - Trace Evidence

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
On a cold and rainy night in April of nineteen
eighty seven, seventeen year old Leanne Greene was driving home
with her brother Lawson when their car ran out of gas.
The vehicle rolled to a stop along the shoulder of
Tennessee's Highway forty six in the Pomona community of Dixon County,
approximately a mile from the nearest gas station. Leanne chose

(00:31):
to stay behind with the car while her brother caught
a ride with a family who had stopped to assist them.
Lawson promised that he would return quickly, and less than
ten minutes later, he was back with a gas can
in hand. Leanne, however, was gone. There was no sign
or indication of where she might have gone or what
could have happened, but as the investigation kicked off, it

(00:54):
became apparent that the seventeen year old had likely been
abducted by someone who had found her alone with a
disabled vehicle along a dark and rural roadway. There was
a nightmare come to life for the green family, and
nearly four decades later, the case remains open and Leanne
has never been found. Over the years, there have been

(01:16):
many different theories in several potential suspects named and investigated,
but a severe lack of evidence has hindered any charges
from being filed. Though police believe they know the monster
who was responsible for the young woman's disappearance, they have
never found her body. Was Leanne the victim of a
random encounter with a killer? Could she have been picked

(01:37):
up by someone she knew and perhaps trusted, or was
she manipulated into leaving the safety of the car by
a cunning killer in a deceptive disguise. This is Trace Evidence,
Episode two forty five, The Disappearance of Martha Leanne Greene.

(02:03):
Welcome to Trace Evidence. I'm your host Stephen Pacheco. In
today's episode, we examined the disturbing and mysterious disappearance of
seventeen year old Martha Leanne green It's a heartbreaking story
and one which has left her family and investigators desperate
for a break for nearly four decades. This is episode

(02:25):
two forty five, The Disappearance of Martha Leanne Green. State
Route forty six is a north south highway connecting busy
city centers with more rural towns throughout much of Middle Tennessee.

(02:47):
Used mostly as a secondary route, the road maintains a
steady flow of traffic as it travels east through Dixon County,
where today the road has been widened out into a
four lane highway, servicing countless business and residential areas. It
is an unassuming stretch of road that harbors a dark
and haunting secret, one which has remained constant in the

(03:09):
minds of those who remember the nightmarish circumstances that left
a family devastated. The night a young woman seemingly vanished
from the face of the earth. It was the spring
of nineteen eighty seven, though judging from the weather one
would hardly have known. A cold front moving up from
the southwest brought heavy winds and storm clouds had been

(03:29):
gathering all day. By early evening, the dark skies had
opened up, and nearly a full inch of rain would
drop in a span of just a couple of hours.
It was an ugly night, the kind where people rush
home from their jobs and evening errands to warm themselves
within the comforting light of their own homes, safe from
a storm which felt more like a remnant of a

(03:50):
bitter and chilled winter. Seventeen year old Leanne Green was
amongst those caught out in the weather and eager to
make it back to the family home, where she lived
with her parents and siblings. Lawson, Leanne's twin brother, borrowed
a car from their cousin and made the short trip
out to the hotel where Leanne was then employed. Having

(04:11):
finished her shift, she rushed out through sheets of rain
and climbed into the vehicle, excited to be heading home.
While escaping the storm had been a nice change of pace,
it was not the sole reason for the teen's excitement.
She had gotten caught up in the furr which had
been sweeping through her school all week and would culminate
the following night when the junior prom was set to

(04:33):
take place. Having already selected her dress and been asked
to the big event by the boy whose photo stared
out from a heart shaped frame on her dresser, there
was no bigger or more exciting night on the horizon.
The dress she'd save to purchase was laid out on
her bed. She'd worn it only once when she tried
it on the night she brought it home. She couldn't

(04:54):
wait to match it up with her new pink shoes
and several pink accessories. It was supposed to be the
most fun night of her life to that point, or
at least she imagined so. In a bitter twist of fate, though,
the seventeen year old would never make it home, and
the dress she'd love so much would linger like a
heartbreaking specter of what could have been the ghost of

(05:14):
a life stolen away before she'd truly had a chance
to live it. Not long into the drive, the borrowed
vehicle began to sputter and shake. Lawson, sitting at the wheel,
steered the car off the shoulder as the engine slowly
clunked and then died. They had run out of fuel,
and so they sat on the side of Sr. Forty
six for several minutes, contemplating their next option. Moments later,

(05:39):
a family passing by stopped and inquired as to whether
or not they might be able to lend a hand. Lawson,
eager to get going, requested a ride to a nearby
filling station and a ride back so he could put
gas in the car, and the family agreed to help him. Leanne,
perhaps due to the cold of the rain. Who are
four reasons never known, told her brother that she would

(06:00):
wait there for him. The nearest gas station was only
a mile or two away and lost, and assured her
he'd return as quickly as possible. Her brother kept his word,
returning to that broken down car in less than fifteen minutes,
but Leanne was nowhere to be found. All that remained
behind were the teens, purse, and car keys, found sitting

(06:22):
on the passenger seat. It was like something out of
a bad horror movie. How could she have disappeared in
so short a span of time, leaving behind no clues
or indications of what might have happened. Nearly four decades later,
and the true horror of that night continues to resound
as the mystery of Leanne's fate tragically endures. Martha Leanne

(06:46):
Greene was born on Tuesday February twenty fourth, nineteen seventy,
to parents George and Marjorie in Dixon County, Tennessee. Alongside
her twin brother lawson. The two newborns would be brought
back to the green family home, then located along Jordan
Street in the small town of White Bluff, located in
the east central part of Dixon County. According to friends

(07:09):
and family, the greens were a tight, loving and religious
family who loved their children deeply and did all they
could to raise them in the warmest and most considerate
of environments. Leanne and Lawson had two other siblings, both sisters,
and together they grew up in the Jordan Street home.
Both George and Marjorie worked for the local government, with

(07:31):
George being a postal delivery worker while Marjorie was an
accounting clerk. Though her birth name is noted as being Martha,
the youngest would go predominantly by her middle name, LeeAnne,
with even school in public records cutting the first name
out of the equation. According to friends and family, Leanne
was extremely intelligent, considerate, and fun loving. She enjoyed attending school,

(07:55):
learning and being around her friends. She was also very
involved with the local church, the White Bluff Church of Christ,
located just a short walk down the street from the
family home. Asked about Leanne, Gilbert Taylor, a family friend,
would simply state, quote, if I had to tell you
in a few words about Leanne, she was a beautiful, young,

(08:17):
outstanding lady. The last time I saw her in church,
she was holding the children. End quote. One of the
most common terms which comes up in descriptions of Leanne
is nice. Everyone says she was one of the nicest
people you could ever meet, Warm and welcoming, though she
also had a tendency towards being shy and quiet. She's

(08:39):
described as being the type who, while it might take
a little time to get her to open up, once
she did, you'd be friends for life. In her teens,
Leanne developed into a trustworthy and highly reliable person, with
her parents noting that she never got into trouble, never
lied to them, and was extremely communicative about her life,
her plans, and her comings and goings. She never went

(09:02):
out without her parents knowing the destination, and if she
were going to be late, she always called. She was,
by all accounts, the kind of teenager and daughter that
you didn't really need to worry about. She had a
good head on her shoulders, and she knew how to
use it. By the beginning of nineteen eighty seven, everything
was moving along well for the teenager. She was a

(09:24):
junior attending Dixon County High School, and in February she
would celebrate her seventeenth birthday. She picked up a part
time job working as a hostess in the restaurant of
a local holiday inn then located along Highway forty six,
and while not the greatest job, she was happy to
earn some pocket money. Perhaps her biggest coup involved the

(09:44):
boy she'd found herself crushing on, hard Blaine Snyder. As
winter transitioned to spring, the junior prom loomed on the horizon,
and Blaine was the only guy Leanne had any interest
in going with. She was thrilled when the two got together.
When Blaine asked her to attend the prom as his date,
she was overjoyed. Leanne did have to make plans, however,

(10:06):
as she wanted the prom to live up to all
of the fantasy she'd been having about it throughout the year.
She fell in love with a beautiful pink formal prom
dress and started saving up every dollar she earned to
be able to buy it. Dedicated and driven, she squirreled
away every penny she could until she had enough gathered
together not just for the dress, but for a pair

(10:28):
of matching pink shoes and several pink accessories. The day
she purchased the dress was one of the happiest of
her life, and when she arrived home, she tried it on,
showing it off to Blaine's photograph, which sat in a
red heart shaped frame on her dresser. According to friends
and family, she eagerly anticipated the prom, and as the
date approached, her excitement continued to grow. She couldn't wait

(10:51):
to walk in arm in arm with Blaine, decked out
in all pink, with her hair done and her makeup
on point. Sadly, this would be the only time she
would ever have a chance to wear that dress, and
her dreams of prom and a life and everything beyond
would dissipate like early morning fog. Her dress would linger

(11:12):
on her bed for years, like a specter of what
could have been. The morning of Wednesday, April fifteenth was
completely normal and without incident. By all accounts, Leanne began
the day with a great deal of positive energy, as
the event of the season, the junior Prom, was set
to occur the following night, on Thursday the sixteenth. According

(11:34):
to all information which has been provided, Leanne attended school
that day and there doesn't appear to have been anything
out of the ordinary. She had a shift scheduled at
the hotel restaurant that night, and upon returning home from school,
she changed out of her school clothes and into those
she would wear to work. Along the way. Beaming with anticipation,

(11:54):
she took out her beautiful pink prom dress and gently
laid it out on her bed. We planned to put
the whole outfit together later that evening after work, to
take a look at it and to ensure it was
exactly as she wanted it to be, as it had
looked in her dreams. Leanne arrived at work and performed
her hostess duties, as always a dedicated and diligent employee.

(12:18):
At the time, it was a holiday inn, but over
the years the business would change hands several times. Today
it's an empty hotel complex, last operated as the Mega
Inn in suites located along the west side of the
Highway at twenty four to twenty Sr. Forty six and Dixon,
less than fifteen miles southwest from the family's home. Little

(12:39):
has ever been reported about her shift that night, with
coworkers later noting only that Leanne was her usual bubbly
self and that she was very much looking forward to
the next evening's festivities. While it had been a cool afternoon,
the night brought it with it much colder winds and
a deluge of rain that made everything feel even colder.
As temperatures dipped into the low fifties, it hadn't been

(13:03):
a very busy night, and the hours had seemed to
drag on. But finally, when nine pm arrived, Leanne clocked out.
Walking out into the parking lot, she was picked up
by her brother Lawson. Being twins, they attended the same
school and were in the same grade, and while Lawson
may not have been as excited, he too was looking

(13:24):
forward to the prom. Not wanting to waste the money
on getting a limo, Lawson had instead borrowed a car
from their cousin, a silver nineteen seventy nine Monte Carlo
with tinted windows. It looked good, and more importantly, it
would provide them with a stylish way to arrive at
the prom. Climbing into the car, Leanne set her purse

(13:44):
down on the seat beside her, and the two headed
off on which should have been a simple twenty minute
drive home. Instead, for Leanne and her family, that night
has stretched out for nearly four decades, with seemingly no
end or light in sight. The short drive would be
interrupted rather quickly. That night, the Monte Carlo pulled a

(14:06):
left turn onto SR. Forty six, proceeding to the northwest,
over the busy junction of I forty, less than a
mile away from the hotel, the car began making noises
and giving loss and trouble. Unsure of what the issue was,
he felt the car dragging and the engine couldn't seem
to gather any more power. Pressing the gas pedal down
did nothing, and so the seventeen year old steered the

(14:28):
car to the shoulder, where it finally came to a
dead stop, just shy of the railroad tracks at Fabric
Road in the neighborhood of Pomona, near a location formerly
known as the Barn. While much busier and built up today,
at the time, Sr forty six was a poorly lit
two lane road which, while busy during the day, didn't

(14:49):
see a great deal of traffic at night. The two
siblings quickly determined that the vehicle had run out of
gas as the result of a broken fuel gauge. Frustrated,
they discussed their options, and really there were only a handful.
There was a gas station and a general store in
the area in opposite directions, but they would have to
walk in the rain to get to either one of them.

(15:12):
Lawson clicked on the vehicle's hazard lights and went around
to the back popping the trunk and retrieving a gas can.
It has never been revealed what exactly the conversation was
between Lawson and LeeAnne at the time, but neither had
any reason to feel genuine concern. Just then, a set
of headlights appeared on the highway and a car came
to a stop next to the disabled Monte Carlo. A

(15:35):
family making their way home from church had spotted the
flashing hazard lights and called out to Lawson and Leanne,
asking if they could be of any assistance. Lawson explained
the situation, and the family offered to give him a
ride further west up the road to where there was
a general store from which he could get some gas
and call his parents. Lawson jumped at the opportunity, but

(15:57):
for reasons which have never been explained, if in fact
they are, Leanne decided that she would stay behind in
the car. It shouldn't have been a long wait anyway,
the siblings thought, as the store was a five minute
drive away. Just after nine pm, Lawson got into the
Good Samaritan's car, telling Leanne he would be back within

(16:17):
ten minutes. Neither of them could have ever imagined this
would be the last time they would ever see one another.
Driving away from the scene, Lawson and the family arrived
at the country store, only to discover that it had
already closed for the night. Unsure of what else to do,
the family offered to drive the seventeen year old back
to the IYE forty junction near to the hotel, where

(16:40):
there were several gas stations just off the busy interstate.
Turning around, they proceeded east along Sr. Forty six, once
again passing the broken down Monte Carlo. Though Lawson looked
at the vehicle as they passed by, he couldn't really
see anything between the darkness of the night, the rain,
and the tinted windows. He was de livered to a

(17:00):
shell gas station located approximately three quarters of a mile
from the broken down vehicle, where he was finally able
to fill the gas can. The family then drove him
back to the car and wished him the best as
they prepared to continue on their way. Lawson walked over
to the car, popped the gas tank, and began pouring
in the few gallons he'd purchased. Finishing up, he placed

(17:23):
the can back in the trunk and slammed it shut.
Walking around to the driver's door, he pulled on the
handle and found it locked. Having left the keys behind
with LeeAnne, he knocked on the window several times but
got no answer. Moving around to the front of the car,
he peered in through the windshield, at which time he
discovered that his sister was no longer in the car,

(17:44):
and he had no idea where she could have been
in her place. He could only see her purse and
the car keys laying on the passenger seat. A lump
of panic began forming in his throat, and his mouth
grew dry as he wondered what he should do. As
quickly as he could, he made his way to the
nearest payphone and called his parents to notify them of

(18:05):
what was going on. Immediately worried their father, George got
the exact location from his son and then dialed nine
one pint one to report his daughter missing. He would
be frustrated to discover that law enforcement did not readily
share his urgency. After giving directions to the dispatcher, George
left the home and proceeded down to the location where

(18:27):
the car was. While he made his way across town,
Marjorie was calling everyone she could think of, wondering if
anyone could have heard from Leanne, and if not, perhaps
if they'd be willing to come out and help search
for her. At the time, no one knew what had happened,
and it was presumed that Leanne might have gone to
seek out a bathroom, or perhaps had been picked up
by someone she knew. None of that made much sense

(18:50):
to the family, who didn't believe she would have gone
anywhere without first waiting for her brother's return. Time was
of the essence, and they wanted to move quickly, but
they they would find themselves frustrated by the seemingly slow
motion response of local police from the get go. There
were two law enforcement departments involved in the case, those

(19:10):
being the Dixon City Police and the Dixon County Sheriff's Department.
According to George, when he arrived at the scene, he
was joined first by a Dixon City Police officer and
then one deputy from the Sheriff's department. It would be
later reported that only two deputies were on duty in
the whole county that night. George discussed the situation with

(19:32):
the officers, and according to him, he found them to
be somewhat dismissive of his concerns. They apparently told him
that Leanne was seventeen years old and probably ran into
a friend or someone she knew and had gotten a
ride with them. They told the frightened father that his
daughter would probably be home soon, but George knew Leanne
and she wouldn't just go off without anyone knowing, especially

(19:55):
considering she had left her purse and her brother behind.
The dis x An officer looked over the vehicle and
quickly assessed that he didn't see any indications of a struggle,
nor of anything to indicate foul play. Jeff Bledsoe was
new to the Sheriff's department and would be the first
deputy on scene. Asked his recollection years later, he replied, quote,

(20:18):
I was nineteen and in my first year serving as
a deputy with Dixon County when I received the radio
call and responded, I could see no obvious signs of
a struggle, and her belongings left in the car had
me thinking she was expecting to return back to that car.
End quote. By eleven fifteen pm, approximately two hours since

(20:40):
Leanne had last been seen, a large group of people
were gathering along the roadside. Many of them were friends
and neighbors who had come out to assist in what
was presumed to be a search for the missing seventeen
year old. However, while many of them had hoped to
help out, they may have also added to the confusion.
George noted that several people had looked inside and touched

(21:01):
the Monte Carlo. Concerned about potential evidence, he implored law
enforcement to block the vehicle off, but no such action
was taken. Years later, George would explain telling reporters from
the tennesseean quote, I guess maybe one hundred and fifty
people had congregated around the car by then to help
us look for her. They were milling around, leaning on

(21:23):
the car, and rummaging through it, trying to help. Finally,
I asked the officers, aren't you going to rope off
this area and impound the car so you can check
it out? The Dixon City Police officers said, no, I'm
not going to impound it. I've done checked the car
and there ain't nothing in there. Just take it on home.

(21:43):
That's what we did because we didn't know any better.
End quote. According to the family, when they asked that
an official search be organized, they were instead advised to
call all of their friends and family in the area
in order to confirm that Leanne was not with one
of them. Marjorie and George were extremely frustrated by this,

(22:03):
as they explained that had Leanne gone somewhere, she would
have contacted them by now. Still, law enforcement wouldn't organize
a search until all of those calls had been made.
Marjorie later stated, quote, I told them, if Leanne had
known she was going anywhere, she would have told me.
But that wasn't good enough. And then there was something

(22:24):
about having to wait so many hours after a person
is missing before you can really do much. I remember
sitting there on the couch the next morning and thinking, Yeah,
in these hours that are going by, I'm losing my daughter.
I'll never see her again. End quote. Not much of
a search was conducted that night, though police did finally

(22:44):
take an official report, and the Greens did bring the
Monte Carlo home despite George's request for it to be
properly searched. Back at the family home, Marjorie sat by
the phone waiting for any potential updates, and was ultimately
contacted by Tom Wall, then the chief deputy of the
Sheriff's department. Wall would tell Marjorie that given the lack

(23:04):
of evidence, their department's limited resources, and the nature of
the disappearance. He had reached out to the TBI, the
Tennessee Bureau of Investigation, for additional assistance. However, he was
informed that the TBI agent assigned to that area wouldn't
be able to get involved in the case for at
least five days because he had already worked his maximum

(23:27):
case load for that particular week. Sadly, much of whatever
evidence might have existed at the scene was destroyed or
compromised by a combination of failing to impound the vehicle
and a lack of crowd control around the side of
the road where the car had run out of gas.
The next day, Thursday, April sixteenth, Lawson was driving the

(23:48):
Monte Carlo as he conducted searches for his sister, and
it was sometime that afternoon that law enforcement finally requested
to access the car so they could sweep it for evidence.
It was a little late, as George noted, saying, quote
to me, that was like closing the barn door after
the mules already gotten out end quote. The vehicle was

(24:10):
officially impounded, but no solid evidence could be acquired. Back
at the scene, dozens of footsteps from friends, family, and
those volunteering to search had smeared the muddy soil beside
the passenger door, and if there had been any indication
of someone being there and abducting Leanne, it was now
lost for good. With little else they could think to do,

(24:33):
law enforcement began organizing searches in the area in hopes
of finding any signs of Leanne. In addition to this,
they set up checkpoints along Sr. Forty six and requested
calls from anyone who had driven through that area the
night Leanne vanished. They hoped that someone might have seen something,
even if they didn't know, they had a car or

(24:53):
truck in the area, an unidentified person near the Monte
Carlo anything might help. Police were quick to note that
they had very little solid evidence to work with, and
they had almost nothing to indicate what might have happened.
Given the lack of contact and the mysterious manner in
which Leanne had vanished, investigators acknowledged there was a high

(25:13):
probability that foul play was involved. Jerry Hayes, an investigator
with the Sheriff's Department, took it a step further, saying, quote,
we feel she's been abducted. She's not the type of
girl who would run off end quote. Five days into
the investigation, the TBI finally joined in, but their angle

(25:34):
on the case only added to the frustration felt by
the Green family. According to them, the TBI was hyper
focused on lawson and believed that he had played some
role in his sister's disappearance. The seventeen year old, who
was already blaming himself for leaving his sister behind, now
had law enforcement looking at him sideways. He agreed to

(25:55):
take a polygraph, which he easily passed, but this did
little to shore relations between the family and investigators. Marjorie,
grief stricken and angry about the approach of the TBI,
would later state quote, it never made a bit of
sense to me. I mean, the couple who picked him
up to get gas saw Leanne in the car when

(26:16):
they left, and he was with them the whole time
until they got back and Leanne was gone. End quote.
Law enforcement noted that, based on a lack of physical
evidence or signs of a struggle, they believed Leanne had
exited the vehicle of her own accord, whether or not
that had been at the insistence of another party could
not be known at the time. Given what they did know,

(26:38):
the Green family had three possibilities. They considered most likely
that someone brandishing a weapon had forced her from the car,
that she had gotten out because she believed her brother
had returned, or she encountered someone she knew and thought
she could trust. They were all possible, and yet police
could not say with any certainty what had actually happened.

(27:00):
They continued searches throughout the week, but the combination of
a lack of leads and a failure to locate any
evidence or traces of Leanne began to wear on them.
By Saturday, April eighteenth, investigators were losing hope as they
wrapped up another search consisting of sixty people with nothing
to show for it. Fritz Sanders, chief of the Dixon

(27:22):
County Rescue Squad, would tell reporters that they had searched
all around the area and at least in his opinion,
there was nothing to suggest the seventeen year old was
still around there. They had combed a twenty mile stretch
of SR. Forty six with the location of the car
at its heart, and they hadn't found anything. While search
efforts were proving fruitless. Law enforcement did receive several calls

(27:45):
from people who had been in the area that night.
While a lot of information was delivered, none of it
led to any solid investigative avenues. The search soon grew
to encompass sections of neighboring Hickman County, and Leanne's family
went to that area, putting up signs and missing Persons
flyers wherever they could. Some searchers stumbled upon clothing in

(28:06):
the woods that was close to those Leanne was last
seen wearing, but her family were able to rule the
items out, and it was later determined the clothes were
mens beyond the roadway. The search grew to cover a
ten square mile area, and police were now knocking on
the doors of local motels and scouring rest stops and
surrounding areas for any possibilities, but they continued to come

(28:29):
up empty handed. Reportedly, investigators were contacted by a witness
who claimed to have seen a wine colored vehicle in
the area the night Leanne vanished. This witness believed they
might have seen someone nearby to the car, but they
couldn't give a thorough description based on a quick glance.
In hopes of igniting the witness's memory. A hypnotist was

(28:50):
called in to assist. The witness claimed to have seen
the unknown vehicle pulling up behind the Monte Carlo in
which Leanne was sitting, but beyond that his memory was vague.
Seemingly nothing of major value could be obtained from the
witness despite the hypnosis. On Wednesday, April twenty second, one

(29:10):
week after Leanne's disappearance, police set up a roadblock from
eight forty five to ten pm in the area where
the car had broken down. Cars were stopped and drivers
were asked if this was their normal route, if they
were in the area of the previous week, and if
they remembered seeing anything or anyone that appeared out of place. Reportedly,
several drivers gave information to authorities claiming to have seen

(29:33):
Leanne or the Monte Carlo. District Attorney Kevin Atkins noted
that while they did find some witnesses, they needed to
sort through and analyze all of the information before they
could move forward. Asked about using a hypnotist on additional witnesses,
Adkins had no further comment. As additional searches kicked off,
Leanne's family were left in the dark, struggling to maintain

(29:55):
their grasp on what little hope they possessed. By the
end of the month, it was extremely difficult to have
any hope at all. Slowly, this new, warped and horrific
version of their lives took shape and began moving forward.
George and Marjorie took leaves of absence from their jobs,
while Lawson continued his education through the use of a tutor,

(30:16):
not wanting to return to Dixon High School without his sister,
Marjorie noted that the disappearance had been devastating to Lawson,
who couldn't help but blame himself. She explained, quote, he
doesn't say too much, but by his actions I know
he feels somewhat responsible. We just try to tell him
it could have happened wherever she went. It can happen

(30:37):
to anyone end quote. Friends and neighbors pulled together, not
only assisting in searches, but also helping the family out
by bringing over meals and spending time with them. People
had banded together tightly, and by early May they had
acquired five thousand dollars to offer as a reward for
Leanne's safe return. On Wednesday, May thirteenth, nearly a month

(31:00):
after Leanne was last seen, the TBI decided to set
up a tip line where anyone could call in at
any time and report what information they might have. John Carney,
then TBI agent in charge of special Investigations, noted that
setting up the phone line came primarily due to how
little evidence or information they had gathered. Tips and calls

(31:20):
into the sheriff's department and local police were dwindling and
they needed help from the community. Carney explained, quote, the
purpose of the toll free hotline is to solicit cooperation
from the community. We're getting to a point where we're
not getting that much information end quote. Carney noted that
the TBI had six agents working the case, and later

(31:42):
stated that within the first few days of the hotline
being active, they had received hundreds of calls, leading to
an excess of two hundred investigative leads. Unfortunately, many of
the calls provided vague information or details that simply didn't
align with what they knew to be fat It seemed
everyone wanted to contribute, but, as one officer would later comment,

(32:05):
while they all believed they had seen something, most of
them hadn't seen anything. Focusing on what information they could
rely on. Investigators turned their attention to the timeline. According
to Lawson, he had only been gone for between ten
and fifteen minutes, which included driving back past the Monte
Carlos several minutes after he left the first time. Investigators

(32:29):
decided to conduct a reenactment, with their goal being to
narrow down the window of possibility. Following the reenactment, which
followed all of Lawson's movements that night after leaving the car,
it was the determination of investigators that Lee Anne had
disappeared in a span of time not greater than five
to seven minutes, not a whole lot of time, but

(32:51):
seemingly enough to lead to the seventeen year old's mysterious disappearance.
Without any true direction to pursue. Beyond the belief that
lee had been abducted, law enforcement began looking at other
cases in the county which had shared similar circumstances. It
was thought at the time that perhaps Leanne's case was
not a standalone judging from the lack of information received

(33:13):
from locals. They were also wondering if the assailant might
have only been visiting or passing through the area. Specifically,
they were looking for cases in which loan women were
abducted from their vehicles, and as their search expanded, they
found a few that matched up between the states of
Oklahoma and Arkansas. DA Kenneth Atkins, when asked about this approach, replied, quote,

(33:36):
we've tried to analyze any similar type instances of abduction.
That's just one of the things we're looking at. You
never know whether there's somebody traveling the country doing this.
We just don't know yet. There may not be any
connections at all end quote. In addition to this new avenue,
local businesses and then Governor of Tennessee Ned mcwerder contributed

(34:00):
us towards a reward leading to Leanne's safe return. In total,
one month after the disappearance, the reward amount had reached
twelve thousand, five hundred dollars. Unfortunately, no one would claim
the reward. The money offered did increase calls in tips
coming into the investigators, but again, none of the leads
developed showed much promise, and when chased down, detectives always

(34:23):
hit a dead end. One month later, in June, the
case really began stalling. While law enforcement continued to analyze
similar cases, the dim light of hope continued to fade out.
George and Marjorie returned to their jobs that month, and
while they had left the porch lights on for Leanne
for all those months, they finally decided to shut them off.

(34:46):
It wasn't about giving up, though, but her family needed
to be able to move forward, even if ever so slightly.
Marjorie explained to the Tennessee saying, quote, we haven't given
up hope. We released a bunch of balloons today with
Flyer in them. I just know there's someone somewhere who
knows something about Leanne. The hardest part is not knowing.

(35:08):
If we'd buried her, at least we'd know where she
was and that she was all right. But like it is,
every day we just wonder. We wonder if she's alive,
if she's all right, if she's being mistreated. End quote.
For the most part, June and July passed with little
news and few new details released about the investigation. Searches

(35:30):
continued to be conducted, though they were more sporadic and
tended to involve local volunteers more so than dedicated law enforcement.
Flyers bearing Leanne's image and description were hung on trees,
power poles, and storefronts, but as time passed, the printing
began to fade, Just as it seemed that Leanne's case
was destined to grow cold with little progress made by investigators,

(35:53):
The attempted abduction of a Tennessee woman drew the attention
of police in Dixon County as well as neighboring stone
dates the crime had taken place in Hardiman County, approximately
one hundred and ten miles southwest from where Leanne was
last seen. Thankfully, the abduction attempt failed and the intended
victim managed to remember enough about her assailant for law

(36:15):
enforcement to track him down. Eighteen year old Marcia Ritt,
a nurse employed at Jackson Madison County General Hospital, was
driving along Tennessee Route eighteen, four miles south of Bolivar
when she spotted a vehicle with a flashing blue light
driving closely behind her. Believing she was being stopped by police,

(36:35):
Marsha pulled over to the side of the road, and
the vehicle with the light pulled up close to her
rear bumper. Marcia was somewhat confused in that moment as
she looked back and noted that she had been stopped
by someone driving a red Dodge Ram pickup truck. She
imagined it was possible that the officer was driving an
unmarked vehicle, but instantly something about this traffic stop didn't

(36:57):
feel right to her. A man from the truck and
approached her driver's side window, noting that he was a
member of law enforcement and that she had been pulled
over for speeding. Expecting only a ticket, Marcia was both
shocked and confused when the man instructed her to exit
the vehicle, stating that he was going to place her
under arrest. The man walked Marsha back towards the truck

(37:19):
and then produced a pair of handcuffs, to which the
eighteen year old protested. Marcia began to question the man,
and he grabbed her aggressively and placed a gun to
her head. Marcia, frightened, could detect the scent of alcohol
on the man's breath and began to realize that this
was no police officer. She struggled against him and waved

(37:40):
her arms, crying out for help from passing cars. This
spooked the man enough, and he told her that he
was going to let her off with just a warning.
He instructed her not to mention the incident to anyone,
and then got back into his truck and fled the scene.
The incident had taken place on Wednesday, July twenty second,
and while Marsha was scared, she wasn't going to let

(38:03):
it pass. The following morning, she went down to the
local police station and reported the incident, at which time
she was shown a photo lineup, recognizing one of the
individuals as the man who had tried to abduct her.
Marcia was certain of her identification and was also able
to provide police with a description of his truck, as
well as the fact that the first two numbers of

(38:23):
his license plate were five to three. The suspect was
identified as twenty two year old Robert McKinley Richards, someone
familiar to authorities in Hartman County. In fact, David Smith,
then Chief Deputy of the county, purposefully included Richard's photo
in the lineup because of several incidents which had occurred

(38:44):
with him in surrounding areas more than a month earlier.
On Tuesday, June second, Richards was stopped by a Germantown
police officer after he had been spotted following a young
woman named Julie Specter. Germantown Chief Robert Cochrane reported that
Richards had been following specter from the intersection of Park

(39:05):
and Ridgeway, close to Saint Francis Hospital. Richards followed a
woman for several miles and was pulled over just after midnight.
Chief Cochrane noted that Saint Francis Hospital was located just
over three miles from the home where Richards was living.
Upon being stopped, Richards at first told officers that he

(39:25):
was a sheriff's deputy, at which time he flashed a badge.
It was noted that he was wearing a sheriff's deputy's
hat at the time. Suspicious police began asking questions of
Richard's and when they went to run his information to
verify what he had told them, Richards changed his tune
and admitted that he did not work for the county,
nor was he a member of law enforcement. Looking through

(39:48):
the vehicle, police found a loaded shotgun on the floor
of the truck and several items bearing law enforcement branding.
Smelling alcohol on his breath, Richards submitted to a breathalyzer
test and blew up point zero five, just shy of
the requirement for an arrest, Richards was taken down to
the station where he was photographed and fingerprinted. He was

(40:10):
released with a misdemeanor citation for reckless driving, carrying a
dangerous weapon, violation of vehicle registration, and impersonating an officer.
Hardman County authorities tracked Richard through his red Dodge Ram
truck and arrested him in regard to the attempted abduction
of Marcia Ertt. Richards was officially charged with impersonating an officer,

(40:33):
aggravated assault, and carrying a pistol. Richards was also being
considered a suspect for a series of sexual assaults which
had taken place in Memphis, Shelby County, and DeSoto County, Mississippi,
between June of nineteen eighty four and October of nineteen
eighty six. After his arrest for the attempted abduction of
ert he was then charged with raping a Memphis woman

(40:56):
in her home on Sunday, June seventh. The victim was
able to identify Richard's from a photo lineup. During questioning
about these crimes, Richards was also asked about the disappearance
of twenty six year old nurse Teresa Anne Butler, who
had vanished nearly a year earlier. On the night of Monday,
November tenth, nineteen eighty six, Butler, who was employed at

(41:18):
Saint Francis Hospital, finished her shift at approximately nine pm
and was last seen driving out of the parking lot.
When she failed to arrive home, her husband went out
looking for her, under the assumption that she'd had some
kind of car trouble. He found his wife's abandoned Honda
Civic parked in the eastbound lane in front of an
address noted as one one three ninety four Monterey Road,

(41:41):
approximately thirteen miles northeast from Saint Francis in a very
rural area. The car's lights were still on, the engine
was running, and the radio was blasting. It looked almost
like Teresa had simply pulled the car over, opened the door,
gotten out, and disappeared. During questioning, Richards shocked investigators when

(42:03):
he outright confessed to abducting and murdering Teresa. Reportedly, Richards
told police that he impersonated a deputy and used his
blue light to pull Teresa over along Monterey Road. From there,
he forced her into his truck, sexually assaulted her, murdered her,
and then stashed her body beneath a thick pile of leaves.

(42:24):
While investigators believed Richards, they were unable to charge him
with the murder at that time because they could not
recover Teresa's body and they had no way to verify
the confession. Tragically, all these years later, Teresa's remains have
never been located, and her case remains open with the
Shelby County Sheriff's Office. Law enforcement agencies from surrounding states

(42:47):
had interest in questioning Richards in regards to several unsolved
murders and disappearances which seemed to fit his mo On Saturday,
April twenty fifth, nineteen eighty seven, just ten days after
Leanne vanished, twenty year old Sandra Lynn Williams mysteriously disappeared.
Sandra left her home in bb, Arkansas, en route to

(43:08):
a cookout at her boyfriend's home, then located in Equitment,
a distance of thirty five miles. Sandra never arrived, though,
and her charcoal gray nineteen eighty four Oldsmobile Cutlass Supreme
was found abandoned along the shoulder of Arkansas Highway thirty one,
approximately a half mile north of Romance in White County.

(43:30):
Romance is halfway between bb Equitment. Two and a half
weeks later, on Saturday, May ninth, Sandra's body was recovered
from a lake in the unincorporated community of Floyd, approximately
three miles from where her car had been located. She
had been stabbed to death. While all of these crimes
shared certain similarities and appeared to have been conducted by

(43:52):
someone with a similar mo a lack of evidence made
it impossible to officially charge Richard's with either Teresa or
Sandra's murder. Law enforcement back in Dixon County believed there
was an extremely high likelihood that Richard might have been
responsible for Leanne's abduction, but once again they had no
evidence to make an arrest. They began digging through everything

(44:14):
they could, tracking down every aspect of Richard's life. They
sought to interview anyone who knew him in an attempt
to link him to Dixon County or surrounding areas. For
the most part, his crimes had been committed in Memphis
and that surrounding community not far from his home. In
Sandra's case, Romance, Arkansas, where her car was found, is

(44:36):
one hundred and thirty miles west of Memphis, which meant
that if she was one of Richard's victims, it was
the furthest he'd wandered from home in his crimes spree
to that date. This gave investigators some pause, however, as
Leanne vanished nearly two hundred miles from Memphis, which would
in turn make her crime the Furthest. Away. Asked about

(44:57):
the possibility that Richards might have even more vicictims up
to and including Leanne, the FBI wasn't ready to make
any definitive statements. Special Agent Joe Bonner, working out of
the Memphis Field Office, explained to the Commercial Appeal saying, quote,
a lot of agencies are interested when you have an
individual who is a suspect. They obviously become a suspect

(45:20):
in other mysterious disappearances. Whether the other cases will ultimately
be laid to the same individual remains to be seen
end quote. Steve Watson, then director of the TBI, noted
that given the similarities in the crimes, they would be
sending agents down to Memphis to question Richards while he
was still in police custody. We'll get back into the

(45:42):
case after these quick messages. While most of law enforcement
believed Richards likely was involved in Leanne's disappearance. At least
one official was unconvinced. John Carne, an TBI agent in
charge of special investigations, told the Tennessee And that he

(46:05):
believed reports of Richard's involvement were likely inaccurate and blown
out of proportion. He stated, quote, I think law enforcement
officials in Shelby and Hardman Counties have over exaggerated the
possibility of Richard's involvement with Leanne. But I've sent agent
Mike Breedlove to Memphis to try and find out if
Richards had contact with Leanne end quote. Strangely, Carney made

(46:29):
this statement shortly after investigators were contacted by a woman
who claimed to have knowledge of Richard's involvement in Leanne's disappearance.
Angie Moss, who had previously lived in the area of Centerville,
twenty five miles south from where Leanne had disappeared, was
a former girlfriend of Richard's. She told investigators that Richards

(46:51):
had confessed, or more accurately, had bragged to her about abducting, raping,
and murdering a young woman whose physical description matched Leanne.
According to Moss, Richards explained to her that he had
stabbed the teenager to death while he was sexually assaulting her, sickly,
describing the crime as his greatest sexual experience. Moss went

(47:15):
on to explain that she and Richards had been dating
and he had asked her to move from her home
in Hickman County to live with him in Memphis. She
agreed at the time, but as they left Hickman County,
they drove along Sr. Forty six, making their way towards
I forty. When they were less than one mile from
where Leanne had vanished, Richards began telling Moss the grisly details.

(47:39):
Moss told authorities that Richard stated he had stabbed the
young woman several times, and noted that he kept a
long serrated knife, a loaded handgun, and a pair of
handcuffs in his truck at all times. Asked if she
knew why Richards had committed the crime, Moss stated that
the horrifying murder seemed to turn him on and he

(48:02):
experienced sexual gratification from it. While Richards had confessed to
Theresa Butler's murder, he would not acknowledge any involvement in
Leanne's disappearance. Richards appeared to enjoy toying with law enforcement
as he would give details of crimes and then recant confessions.
He confess again, and then a second time he'd tell

(48:22):
a slightly different version than from what he'd originally said.
Based on statements from Richards as well as people who
knew him, Authorities from Shelby and Dixon Counties were involved
with the search of an area in Memphis, with the
bodies of both Leanne and Butler being the targets. They
were working on what information they had received from people
who claimed that Richards had told them about his crimes

(48:44):
and where he'd hidden the bodies, but these searches would
yield no results. Deputies with Shelby County asked Richards if
he would be willing to take a polygraph, and he
agreed to do so. The FBI was asked to provide
an expert in the field, and he was flown into
Memphis to conduct the test, But before the polygraph could
be given, Richards told investigators that he would no longer

(49:06):
be willing to take the test, under the advice of
his lawyer. Once again, investigators were banging their heads against
the wall and hanging off the claims and recantations of Richard,
who appeared to be enjoying the cat and mouse game.
Digging more into the suspect's life, law enforcement would note
that he appeared to have some kind of an attraction

(49:27):
to or desire to assault women who were dressed in white.
Several of his targets were nurses or worked at a hospital.
In what could only be called a disturbing coincidence or
perhaps a motive, Leanne was wearing a white sweatshirt the
night she vanished. Richard's home and vehicles were searched for

(49:47):
any evidence linking him to any of the crimes, but
nothing substantial was found. Police did, however, recover several police
uniforms in his home, including a Shelby County Sheriff's uniform
and a Memphis police uniform. Reportedly, Richards had volunteered to
be a reserve deputy in Shelby County, but had dropped
out early on. Just days after he dropped out, Theresa

(50:09):
Butler went missing. Investigators continued to work on Richards, questioning
him and asking him to lead them to the bodies.
Seeing it as an opportunity to get out of his
cell for a field trip, Richards told police he would
lead them to a body on multiple occasions, but then
when they would take him to the area he had specified,
he wouldn't point out anything. It was considered unlikely he

(50:33):
had forgotten and was instead probably just messing with law enforcement.
Thursday October fifteenth marched six months since Leanne had vanished,
and while they now had a potential suspect in Richards,
they hadn't come up with a whole lot more given
the passage of time. Investigators were direct with the Green family,

(50:53):
noting that it was highly unlikely that Leanne was still
alive out there somewhere. It was no longer a search
for his recovery, but instead the hunt for a body
and the beginning of a homicide investigation. Marjorie confirmed that
the family had begrudgingly come to accept the probability that
Leanne was deceased. She explained, quote, we just don't feel

(51:15):
that Leanne's alive. I know that if she was alive,
she'd call me or contact me some way. I hope
it's handled in such a way that he will be
punished because of this. Leanne was minding her own business
and someone just snatched her up and snuffed her life out.
At seventeen We're very much in favor for having the

(51:35):
electric chair back in use in Tennessee end quote. During
a law enforcement conference discussing similar crimes throughout the country,
Leanne's case was presented as one to be analyzed for
potential connections. While Richards remained a suspect, another name came
to the surface, that of twenty seven year old Travis McGuire. McGuire,

(51:58):
who was living in New Mexico at the time, was
arrested and charged with the December sixth, nineteen eighty five
murder of fifty eight year old Gina Marie Repp. Rep.
Disappeared from the wind Rock shopping Center in Albuquerque at
approximately nine pm after she had left her job at
a doughnut shop. Five days later, Rep's purse and some
of her clothing, splattered with blood were found off Interstate forty,

(52:22):
approximately twenty miles east from Albuquerque. Rep's car was later
found to be in McGuire's possession. McGuire was also considered
a suspect in the abduction of forty one year old
Kathy Sue Angle of Oklahoma City. Angele was seen being
dragged screaming into her car in the Shepherd Mall parking
lot at eight pm on April twenty third, nineteen eighty six,

(52:45):
eight days after Leanne disappeared. Engle's vehicle was found two
days later along IYE forty Intocam Carrie, New Mexico. Her
body was found on April thirtieth, just a few miles
off I forty near Saya, Oklahoma, in an oil field.
She was found face down with her hands bound, and

(53:06):
it was determined that her throat had been cut. Police
found some connections between the two crimes and were able
to confirm that McGuire was in Oklahoma City at the
time of Angle's kidnapping. McGuire would later be convicted of
first degree murder, kidnapping, rape, and several other crimes in
Rep's case. A key witness in the case was McGuire's

(53:28):
half brother, Ricky Martin, who testified that McGuire had abducted
Rep from the parking lot. Martin stated that McGuire had
taken Rep to an isolated field off New Mexico three
south of I forty, where he strangled her with a belt.
In regard to Kathy Sue Angele, however, McGuire would be cleared,
her case would remain unsolved for decades until two thousand

(53:51):
and eight, when a fingerprint and DNA led detectives to
two suspects, thirty three year old Stephen A. Burner and
forty five four year old Kyle Richard Eckerd. Borner, an
ex con from Michigan, had died several years earlier, but
Eckerd was already in prison serving time from a sexual
assault conviction. Eckerd would ultimately enter a plea of guilty,

(54:15):
noting that while he did not admit to committing the crime,
he didn't want to risk being found guilty and facing
the death penalty. At the time, McGuire was considered a
potential suspect in Leanne's disappearance, but there didn't appear to
be enough evidence to link him to any area of
Dixon County around the time the seventeen year old vanished.

(54:35):
While his emma was similar and he targeted a woman
in a vehicle, Law enforcement would later note that while
McGuire was a possibility, he was far from their best
suspect and they could neither rule him in around. With
McGuire ruled unlikely, investigators once again turned their attention to
Robert McKinley, Richards. In the late fall of nineteen eighty seven,

(54:58):
Richards confessed to detectives that that he had in fact abducted, raped,
and murdered Leanne. However, much as had been the case
with Teresa Butler, he would not reveal the location of
her body, and without physical evidence, they couldn't corroborate his
confession nor charge him with any crime related to the
seventeen year old's disappearance. To their surprise, Richards agreed to

(55:20):
undergo hypnosis, where he would be asked to recount details
of Leanne's alleged murder. According to investigators, Richards made two
statements of fact while under hypnosis that only the killer
would have known. Richard stated that Leanne was on her
period the night she disappeared, and also described a distinctive

(55:41):
piece of jewelry the seventeen year old was wearing at
the time. Detectives further noted that when they showed Richards
a picture of Leanne, he became visibly shaken, did not
want to look at it, and eventually turned it over.
After the hypnosis, Richards once again recanted his confession and
then later confessed again. He continued to tell police he

(56:03):
would lead them to Leanne's body, only to bring them
out to the middle of nowhere where nothing was found. W. J.
Buck Wood, then a Shelby County detective, was involved in
questioning Richards and fully believed he was the person responsible
for Leanne's disappearance and murder. Wood stated, quote, Richards looked

(56:24):
me square in the eye, raised his right hand and said,
I swear on my mother's life that I killed Leanne Green.
I know Robert Richards did it. End quote. Following that statement,
would ask Richards why he wouldn't just tell them where
her body was, and, according to him, Richards had replied,
I just can't give her up. Richards continued playing his

(56:48):
twisted games, and the search for truth and the recovery
of Leanne's remains began stalling out again. Ultimately, the year
of nineteen eighty seven would come to an end with
law enforcement still struggling to put the pieces together. While
some detectives believe that Richards had to be the one
who abducted Leanne, others weren't so sure and didn't want

(57:08):
to rely solely on the statements of a sick and
disturbed individual who appeared to enjoy toying with police, almost
as much as pretending to be one of them. March
of nineteen eighty eight marked eleven months since Leanne had disappeared.
Considering the location from which he had vanished, law enforcement
decided to conduct an underwater search of a Dixon County quarry.

(57:32):
The water search was executed by members of the State
Department of Safety's Tactical Squad. The search took place on Monday,
March twenty third, and, despite rumors to the contrary, was
not performed as the result of a tip or new lead.
The decision was apparently made by John Puckett, an FBI
agent working the case. He explained, quote, I arranged for

(57:54):
the diver's last Wednesday to go over to a rock
quarry in Dixon County and conduct an underwater search. They
did and found nothing. There was nothing that said go
search this quarry. There were some circumstances during the investigation
relating to one of the suspects that caused me to
feel like we ought to check that quarry. Obviously, I

(58:16):
wasn't right because we didn't find anything. It was just
based on circumstances from a section of the investigation. I
felt like it was something that needed to be done.
End quote. One month later, in April, came the heartbreaking
anniversary of Leanne's disappearance. For her family, it had been
a brutal year, and while they had done their best

(58:37):
to maintain some level of positivity that had faded out
long ago. They had come to except that LeeAnne had
probably been killed, but they needed to know why, They
needed to bring her home, and they needed to see
justice served for them. As is often the case, the
lack of an answer was much more devastating than whatever
the harshness of the truth could be. Believe that Richard's

(59:01):
was likely the person responsible for Leanne's disappearance, and hoped
that they could find some evidence against him. She stated,
quote Richard seems more likely. He's got friends in the
Dixon area, and he had a blue light. Leanne wouldn't
hesitate if she thought it was a good guy coming
to help her out at this time. I think he's

(59:21):
the best we've got to go on. End quote. Asked
about the investigation, Marjorie expressed that the family felt frustrated.
She described law enforcement as not very communicative and stated
the family worried that if there was a break in
the case, they would be the last ones to learn
of it. At the same time, she noted that anything

(59:42):
short of bringing her daughter home safely would fail to
live up to her deepest desires. She explained to the
Leaf Chronicle saying, quote, I know many persons have spent
many hours in overtime, maybe neglecting their own pleasures and families,
to uncover something in this. And yet on the other hand,
I feel like there may be something they haven't looked at.

(01:00:04):
We're so near to it. Maybe they've overlooked some little something.
I appreciate what they've done. I guess I expect them
to do the impossible end quote. For the Green family,
not only had they lost their daughter and sister, but
they began to feel as though the community was withdrawing
from them. The more time passed, the less the phone rang,

(01:00:26):
the fewer visitors came by. They felt that people avoided them,
the family with the missing girl, because after a while,
people just don't know what to say anymore, and rather
than saying the wrong thing, they will choose to say
nothing at all. Even in their own personal lives, the
dark cloud of Leanne's fate tainted everything, As Marjorie explained

(01:00:47):
that even the birth of a grandchild hadn't managed to
lighten their spirits. While hoping for the best. Marjorie couldn't
muster the strength to see through to a brighter dawn,
she explained. Quote the others and see how lucky they
are to live a normal life, And we ask ourselves
if we will, but we won't. Even if she's alive

(01:01:08):
and found, our lives will never be the same end quote.
On Wednesday, April twentieth, Tennessee law enforcement announced that they
would be conducting an extensive search for Leanne's body. While
remaining tight lipped about it, it was revealed that a
new source had provided them with information that they believed
could be reliable. The same source had just days earlier

(01:01:32):
led them to a location where they uncovered bones, initially
believed to be human, they were later determined to belong
to a deer. It would be revealed that this new
search had targeted a rural cemetery in Hickman County and
was based on information from the source who claimed that
Richards might have disposed of Leann's remains at that location

(01:01:52):
in a shallow grave. The search failed to turn up
Lean's remains or any new evidence, and law enforced noted
that they would likely not search that area again. Richards
himself had once again told police he would lead them
to the body. He was taken to the Cuba Landing
area along the Tennessee River, where he newly claimed to

(01:02:14):
have disposed of Leanne's remains. However, once again nothing was found,
and just days later, Richards told police that he had
had no involvement in the teen's disappearance. He told investigators
that he had been lying to them and stringing them
along the entire time. Despite this, he remained their best suspect.

(01:02:35):
Assistant District Attorney Dan Cook noted, quote, irrespective of what
he has had to say and done, we have not
and cannot eliminate mister Richards as an important suspect end quote.
For the most part, the year of nineteen eighty eight
passed with little new developments or leads. In October, a

(01:02:55):
woman came forward and claimed that in July, while traveling
through Ohio, she believed she had seen a woman matching
Leanne's description in the restroom of a restaurant. Her story
closely matched up with one giving by a group of
Tennessee teenagers who had visited Washington d c In July
of eighty seven, they claimed to have seen Leanne in
the bathroom of a fast food restaurant. According to the teens,

(01:03:19):
when they mentioned that the girl looked a lot like Leanne,
a man hustled the unknown woman out of the restaurant
before either of them had even been able to order
their food. While both sightings stirred up some hope for
the family and investigators, it was ultimately determined that both
had been cases of mistaken identity. Five months later, in

(01:03:39):
March of nineteen eighty nine, a new potential suspect emerged.
Dixon County Chief Deputy Tom Wall noted that he didn't
have a lot of hope in this lead, but it
was one which needed to be pursued. On Wednesday, March first,
thirty one year old Henry Harris, Junior, an unemployed truck driver,
was at a Veterans Admitsdministration Hospital in Biloxi, Mississippi. Excusing

(01:04:03):
himself for a moment, he walked outside, crossed the parking lot,
got into his van, and shot himself in the chest
with a twenty two caliber handgun. Harris would ultimately survive
this attempt, but when police examined his van, they found
several items they captured their attention. There were two copies
of Leanne's Missing Persons flyer, and in a note written

(01:04:25):
by Harris prior to shooting himself, he stated that all
he wanted was a girl that he could call his own.
While this piqued the interest of Deputy Wall, he noted
that it wasn't uncommon for truckers to have copies of
missing Persons flyers as they travel a lot and keep
their eyes peeled about possibly obtaining a reward. Investigators in

(01:04:45):
Biloxi also found a photograph of a woman which they
believed to be lean but Deputy Wall, upon obtaining the image,
noted it looked nothing like the missing team, and it
was later determined that it was a relative of Harris's.
Dixon County investigators, though thinking the lead Week, did put
in efforts trying to prove whether or not Harris could

(01:05:07):
have been in the area, especially at the time of
the disappearance, but they were never able to find anything,
and Harris was ultimately ruled out of the suspect pool.
It was once again back to the drawing board for detectives.
Two months later, in May, a resident of Dallas Texas
contacted authorities and claimed to have spotted Leanne in the area.

(01:05:29):
Dixon County Sheriff's Detective Tim Eads and TBI special agent
Mike Breedlove flew down to Dallas and interviewed the woman,
who turned out not to be Leanne, although they noted
there was an undeniable resemblance. Dixon County Sheriff C. D.
Martin noted that while it turned out to not be Leanne,
it had been a tip worth pursuing. He stated, quote,

(01:05:51):
she resembled her a great deal. This was definitely a
good possibility. We went out and checked it out there.
They talked to her and a death wasn't her end quote.
With new tips and leads drying up or being completely
ruled out, and with no ability to coerus Richard's to
give any more information which may or may not be

(01:06:11):
reliable anyway, law enforcement felt their best bet was to
get the story of Leanne's disappearance out to as large
an audience as possible. Unsolved Mysteries was becoming very popular
at this time, and so investigators and the Green family
reached out to producers about putting a segment together. Ultimately,
Unsolved Mysteries chose not to run a segment on the case.

(01:06:34):
No specific reason was given. In hopes of changing their minds,
locals circulated a petition to request Unsolved Mysteries take another
look at the case and reconsider it, but a producer
for the show told the Tennesseean that they would not
be swayed by a petition and that the decision had
already been made. Stuart Schwartz, the producer in question, explained, quote,

(01:06:56):
we run across hundreds of stories and could only run
four or five show. Obviously, we have to say no
a lot more than we say yes. End quote. While
Unsolved Mysteries turned down the case, investigators were contacted by
producers for a new show which aimed to cash in
on the success of Unsolved Mysteries. Missing Colin Reward, hosted

(01:07:20):
then by famous actor Stacy Keish, told the story of
unsolved cases and aired reenactments much like Unsolved Mysteries in
the fall. Producers for the show expressed their interest in
covering Leanne's case, and both the family and investigators hoped
that the exposure might bring them some new tips or leads.
The show scheduled the reenactments to be filmed months later

(01:07:42):
in December, and the episode was to be released in April.
Leanne's parents and her brother lawson would both appear on
camera doing interviews along with Mike Breedlove of the TBI
and several Dixon County locals. Before this would happen, however,
the Green family made a very difficult decision after speaking

(01:08:03):
to investigators about it. They agreed to travel to Memphis,
where they could sit down and speak with Robert McKinley
Richards face to face. It was hoped that confronted by
Leanne's parents, Richards might be plied to reveal details, specifically
the location of her body. The visit, which took place
in November, unfortunately, did not lead to any new revelations

(01:08:25):
or new information from Richards, who denied any responsibility and
told the family that he had no knowledge of what
had happened to their daughter. However, Richard's cellmate at the time,
Eric Price, claimed that after a meeting with the family,
Richards told a very different story. Price would explain quote,
Robert said he was relieved because he thought he had

(01:08:47):
convinced them that he hadn't killed her. He said he
thought that would put them at peace. Then he smiled
a little and admitted to me he really did kill
Leanne Greene end quote. According to Price, Richards had gotten
drunk on prison brew and admitted to him that he
had abducted, raped, and then stabbed Leanne to death. The

(01:09:09):
Green family had been fairly well prepped by law enforcement
and told not to get their hopes up, so when
Richards denied any involvement, they weren't surprised. However, it was
less what Richards had to say that mattered to George
and Marjorie. Being able to look into his eyes, to
be in the same space with that man confirmed for
them everything investigators had claimed. They no longer had any

(01:09:32):
doubts that Richards was the one responsible for their daughter's
disappearance and murder. In that sense, it did provide them
a certain level of comfort, but still there remained far
too many questions without answers, and no one in the
family would ever truly feel at peace until they could
bring Leanne home and lay her to rest. Frustrated and
worn out by years of grief, Marjorie told the Tennessee

(01:09:54):
and quote, I guess people think that this is really
awful to say, but I always thought that a child
of mine being killed in a car accident and having
to bury that child would be terrible, But in this
instance it would be a blessing. At least we would know,
we'd have a place to go and say, here she is,
this is her remains. But to think, you know, maybe

(01:10:17):
some serial killer took her, killed her, and threw her
in a dumpster somewhere, you know, it's the not knowing
end quote. October of nineteen ninety marked three and a
half years since Leanne had vanished, and her family were
slowly coming to terms with the fact that they would
never see her again. On Saturday, October twenty seventh, a

(01:10:39):
memorial service was held at White Bluff Church of Christ,
where the family had been parishioners for years. For them,
the memorial was less about accepting the reality of Leanne's
disappearance and more about having a way to share their
grief with friends and the community, a way for them
to vent it out and to try to exercise some
of the demons they found themselves haunted by. Marjorie, speaking

(01:11:02):
to the media, noted that they already felt like every
day was a funeral. For the previous three and a
half years. She explained quote. At first, I guess I
tried to hold in my grief and be strong. It
just bogged my mind down, and I've had a lot
of physical stress related problems. I've lost about seventeen pounds.

(01:11:22):
But this is no way to do it. Can you
understand there is no greater bond than a mother's love
for her child. Other people have to go on with
their own lives, and you're left to deal with it.
End quote. For the most part, Leanne's case had been
growing cold for a while, but following the late stages
of nineteen ninety the story began to fade from the

(01:11:45):
headlines and the local community. While the Green family obviously
never forgot much to their chagrin, life continued moving forward
whether they had wanted it to or not. The next
turn in the case would come out of left field,
catching both the family and investigators off guard when an
unexpected murder would deal a hefty blow to the case.

(01:12:08):
We'll get back into the case after these quick messages.
On Sunday, July twenty first, nineteen ninety one, a struggle
broke out between Robert McKinley Richards and his cellmate Eric Price.
Price had previously claimed that Richards had confessed to him
that he'd murdered Leanne, but law enforcement could never confirm this.

(01:12:31):
According to Price, he told a prison guard about the confession,
and the guard initially dismissed it, noting that Richards was
always lying about everything. According to Price, Richards had claimed
he'd buried both Leanne and Theresa Butler's bodies beneath a
police firing range, a claim that law enforcement found ridiculous,
another attempt by Richards to toy with them. Few details

(01:12:55):
are available, but on that Sunday evening, Eric Price strangled
Richard's to day death with an electrical extension cord. I
should note some places report that Richards was stabbed to death,
but this appears to be inaccurate. Price would later claim
that Richards had alleged to be working for the CIA
and told him that if he didn't kill him, he'd

(01:13:16):
have to kill Price. Price would later receive an additional
twenty year sentence for second degree murder. While no one
shed any tears over Richard's death, most feeling that the
world was a better place without him, law enforcement noted
that his murder would hamper the investigation moving forward. No
more could they ask questions or try to probe Richards

(01:13:36):
in hopes of obtaining some new legitimate piece of evidence.
He would, however, remain at the top of their list
of suspects. It was believed at the time they would
eventually find something to confirm Richards as the killer, or
confirm that they could rule him out. Either way, with
him in the ground, the process would be a lot
more difficult. Richards had been killed while serving a thirty

(01:14:00):
year sentence at Lake County Regional Prison. Following his death,
the case became quiet again. Another year would pass before
a disturbing discovery would once again bring Leanne's name back
into the media. In early March of nineteen ninety two,
a dog wandering through a wooded area returned home carrying

(01:14:21):
a thin piece of tissue with clumps of human hair
still attached and a bobby pin sticking out. The discovery
was made near the small town of Burns, less than
five miles from where Leanne had last been seen. Investigators
would not reveal the exact location of the find at
that time, with Chief Deputy Tom Wall telling the tennesseean quote,

(01:14:43):
I've been asked not to say where in Burns. A
citizen in the area had a dog bring it up
to their house. It wasn't a couple of strands and
it wasn't a humongous bunch either. It wasn't cut. It
definitely had been attached. I don't know if it decayed
away or was pulled away end quote. The hares were
described as ranging from light blonde to dark brown, making

(01:15:07):
it difficult to determine a visual match to Leanne or
anyone else for that matter. The sample would be sent
to the FBI lab in Washington, d C. For analysis
and would be compared to hares taken from one of
Leanne's brushes. Following the find, approximately twenty five law enforcement
officials spent the better part of two days combing through
the area in search of any additional evidence or signs

(01:15:30):
of a body. Nothing more was found at that time,
though several days later it was revealed that the search
area revolved around West Circle Drive, a stretch of road
which held several homes as it cut through a heavily
wooded area. Police focused in on searching areas where the
dog was known to wander and play, and at one
point bone fragments were located. The bones were taken by

(01:15:54):
TBI agent Mike Breedlove to forensic anthropologist doctor William Bass
in Knoxville. In addition to a grid search of the area,
a cadaver dog was also utilized, but after sweeping through
the field and woods, there was no indication of additional
human remains. At the time, they couldn't be certain that
the hair or bones belonged to Lean, but either way

(01:16:17):
they were under the assumption that there were human remains
somewhere in that area. A few days after these searches
were conducted, doctor Bass determined that the bones brought to
him were not human, but instead those of a cow.
Given the limitations of technology available at that time, tests
on the hair samples took longer. Two months later, in

(01:16:38):
May of nineteen ninety two, the results finally came back.
While the lab was able to determine that the hares
had come from an unknown white female, they were also
able to rule Lean out as that donor. This once
again would set detectives back to square one, and future
searches of the area were put on hold, pending some

(01:16:59):
new information or evidence to justify them. Since five years
had passed, it was decided that the whole case would
need to be looked over again to see if anything
had been missed. Jeff Long, a spokesman for the TBI, explained, quote,
what do you do. We've made a diligent search of
the area and there wasn't anything. I think We've got

(01:17:20):
to reinvestigate everything we've got up to this point, recheck
all of our leads. It's not, by any means an
inactive case. It's one that we do interviews on every
week if we get new information. That's one of those
cases you just don't give up on. You just don't
want to give up on it. End quote. Six months later,

(01:17:41):
in November, with no new information or advances in the investigation,
Leanne's family began recruiting volunteers to assist with their own
search of the area where the hare had been found.
The Dixon County Sheriff's Department was asked and agreed to
coordinate the search. It was set to take place on Saturday,
November fourteenth, but the target area covering a spread of

(01:18:02):
more than twenty acres. Chief Deputy Wall noted that while
they didn't think there was anything to require this additional search,
they were participating to support the family. He explained, quote,
it's a request from the family that we search it
one more time. Most law enforcement agencies wouldn't do it again,
and probably wouldn't have bothered with the first search. If

(01:18:24):
it was my daughter, I would wonder all kinds of
things I'd like to check that field again. End quote.
The search included around eighty volunteers and thirty five members
of the Tennessee Defense Force. Searchers formed a long line
and used sticks, canes, and other tools to push away
grass and weeds while scanning the ground. The search, which

(01:18:46):
began at ten am, finished up a little over five
hours later at approximately three point fifteen. Again, however, nothing
was found, and law enforcement felt fairly certain that there
was no additional evidence or remains to be found, at
least in the areas they had focused on. Once again,
the case began growing cold. One year later, in October

(01:19:09):
of nineteen ninety three, George and Marjorie Green flew to Chicago,
where they participated in a taping of the Jerry Springer Show.
I should note this was before the show became known
for wild and outlandish stories and constant fights between angry guests.
At the time, it was more of a run of
the mill afternoon talk show like Dona Hugh or Sally

(01:19:29):
Jesse Raphael. During the taping, the Greens discussed Leanne's case
and consulted with both a psychotherapist and a so called psychic.
The alleged psychic, Patricia Mitchell, made a wild claim that
Leanne was still alive, being held against her will and
forced to participate in the manufacturing of pornographic movies. After

(01:19:51):
touching a pair of genes which had belonged to Leanne,
this so called psychic claimed to have a vision where
she saw the seventeen year old forced into a white
van by two men. Of course, nothing could ever be
found to corroborate the so called psychics claims, and for
their part, the Green family wasn't swayed by her so
called visions, noting that they did not believe their daughter

(01:20:13):
was still alive anyway. Their appearance on the show had
been more about generating buzz and new interest in the case,
with Marjorie later saying quote, I really don't believe in psychics,
but I feel it's my responsibility to keep it before
people because it is still an open case end quote.
One year later, in October of nineteen ninety four, seven

(01:20:35):
and a half years after Leanne vanished, her family officially
went to court to have her declared legally dead. They
filed their suit in Dixon County Chancery Court at that
time because Tennessee state law requires seven years to pass
before someone can be declared dead. The suit also asked
that two insurance companies pay out on policies that were

(01:20:57):
carried in the teen's name, though the family made a
this was not about money, but out of necessity to
move forward and ensure that no one out there was
illegally using Leanne's name or social Security number. Her brother
lawson was emphatic that this did not mean they were
turning their backs on his sister, saying, quote, of course,
we're not quitting. It's just something that we felt was necessary.

(01:21:20):
It's another step forward for us, a step towards trying
to cope, end to quote. One of the insurance companies
refused to pay off their policy and instead filed action
challenging the family's suit. According to the Globe Life and
Accident Insurance Company, their life insurance policy on Leanne was
issued in nineteen ninety one, four years after she vanished.

(01:21:44):
The family argued that their agent at the time. Carolyn
Blackwell was completely aware of Leanne's disappearance when she issued
them the policy, which had a death benefit payment of
twenty four thousand, three hundred and fifty six dollars. The
company alsochallenged the policy, noting that no body had been
found and it could not be confirmed that Leanne was

(01:22:05):
one hundred percent dead. The other insurance policy, which paid
out five thousand dollars, was not challenged at the time.
The court battle between the family and the insurance company
would play out over the next few years. Leanne would
officially be declared dead by Dixon County Chancellor Alan Wallace

(01:22:25):
five years later in March of nineteen ninety nine. Wallace
noted there was no evidence available to show that Leanne
was alive, and this decision was made in part due
to the testimonies of TBI Special Agent Mike Breedlove and
Chief Deputy Tom wall who stated that they could find
no evidence to show Leanne was alive and it was
their determination as law enforcement officers that she had likely

(01:22:48):
been killed within hours of her disappearance. According to documents
from law enforcement, Robert McKinley Richards remained their prime suspect
and following his murder in jail in nineteen ninety one,
the FBI had officially closed their investigation into Leanne's disappearance.
The TBI in Dixon County Sheriff, however, have never closed
their investigations. The ruling from Wallace was retroactive, declaring Leanne

(01:23:13):
dead as of the original filing in October of nineteen
ninety four. Interestingly, investigative documents also revealed that police had
found a smudge or indistinguishable mark on the front passenger
side door of the Silver Monte Carlo where Leanne had
been sitting. This mark indicated that Leanne may have been
forcibly removed from the car and her assailant then kicked

(01:23:35):
the door shut behind them. Several months after the original
filing in court, in early nineteen ninety five, several new
searches were conducted. One focused in on a pond in
the area of Savannah, more than one hundred miles southwest
from where Leanne was last seen. The pond search came
following a tip which had reported that a woman's remains

(01:23:56):
could be found in a small body of water, but
as per usual, nothing was found. Two divers, who described
the pond as shallow and Murky felt the tip was
likely inaccurate or false, and it was later learned that
the person who had called it in hadn't even been
in that area when Leanne disappeared and was going purely
off rumors that he had heard. There must have been

(01:24:19):
something reliable about the information, however, because four months later,
in May, police returned to Savannah again to search and
interview potential witnesses. Two locations not revealed by police were
the focus of searches in that area. This new information
came from a former cellmate of Robert McKinley Richards, who
claimed that the deceased suspect admitted to discarding both Leanne

(01:24:41):
and Theresa's remains at that spot. Nothing would be found
during these new searches, and law enforcement were unsure if
it was bad information from the cellmate or just Richard's
toying with them again, this time from beyond the grave. Regardless,
they were determined to follow any and all leads until
they were able to find Leanne. Dixon County Attorney General

(01:25:03):
Dan also Brooks told the tennesseean quote, Leanne Green's disappearance
is still an open and active investigation. We have already
searched more than forty locations, but knowing the pain the
Green family has been through, we will search another forty
or more locations if we need to. End quote. After

(01:25:23):
this new flurry of information and fruitless searches, it was
once again determined that the case needed to be reorganized
and everything had to be sorted through. It was quickly
learned that there had been extremely poor communication between all
of the different law enforcement agencies involved, from the TBI, FBI,
Dixon County authorities, and investigators in the Memphis area. Dixon

(01:25:47):
County authorities noted they weren't completely sure what officers in
the Memphis area did or did not do in the
early days of the investigation. Memphis officials reported the same
issue in regard to Dixon County, as it appeared original
detectives working Lean's case, Teresa's case, and the other cases
revolving around Richards had not shared very much beyond the

(01:26:09):
basics of those investigations. As it turned out, Dixon County
authorities had been pursuing a local man for years. The
suspect had previously contacted police and stated that he had
seen a white van near Leann's car the night she vanished. Curiously,
the more investigators looked into the tip the more they

(01:26:29):
found themselves drawn back to the tipster. They found his
behavior suspicious, and on subsequent meetings they started to believe
he might have been involved in the abduction. However, after
spending several years tracking and following the man, they would
ultimately rule him out. When this man, who has never
been named publicly, was crossed off their list, the only

(01:26:50):
name that continued to remain was Robert McKinley Richards. With
Richards dead, they couldn't ask any new questions, and given
his history of confessing and denying, they couldn't have moved
forward without additional evidence. Either way. They did manage to
determine that Richards was in the Middle Tennessee area when
Leanne disappeared, but they could not put him specifically in

(01:27:11):
Dixon County that night. According to Chief Deputy Wall, if
they could have conclusively put Richards and Dixon, they would
have charged him with kidnapping in hopes that he would
open up and reveal exactly what had happened. Donnie Dean
was an inmate who had become friends with Richards in
the month leading up to his death. Would also claim

(01:27:32):
that Richards had confessed to him about Leanne's murder. Dean stated, quote,
in those last days or that last night, Richards told
me he was afraid he was going to get prosecuted
for killing Leanne Green. He said he didn't want to
be embarrassed, and that he was scared of the electric chair.
He told me he raped Leanne, then got scared and

(01:27:53):
killed her. He said he stabbed her several times because
she kept screaming. End quote. Law enforcement continued to believe
Richards was likely the killer responsible for Leanne's disappearance, with
or without the evidence needed to file any kind of charges.
The Green family agreed with them. While they still had
many questions and wanted to bring their daughter's body home,

(01:28:16):
they felt some sense of comfort in having one part
of the equation solved, at least in their minds. Marjorie commented, saying, quote,
we've always suspected Richards killed Leanne, but from what we
know now, we know he did. After all these years
of anxiety, and now knowing what authorities have known all along,

(01:28:36):
it's hard to describe how we feel finally knowing what happened.
End quote. Law enforcement concurred with Deputy Randy Starkey, stating
that they believed Richards was the killer, lamenting that he
had gone to his grave with whatever secrets he possessed.
Two years later, on Sunday, February Tewod nineteen ninety seven,

(01:28:59):
Marjorie Green tragically lost a battle with cancer and passed
away at the age of fifty seven. Marjorie had feared
that she would pass away without knowing the full truth
of Leanne's fate, and heartbreakingly that fear came true. She
was laid to rest in Dixon County Memorial Gardens following
a service at the Tailor Funeral Home. With the passing

(01:29:20):
of Marjorie, who had for nearly a decade been the
standard bearer and the loudest voice in the search for
her daughter, the case would begin growing cold again. It
was the hope and belief of the Green family that
mother and daughter had been reunited in the hereafter, leaving
them behind to confront their grief and to try and
move forward with their lives. As time is not guaranteed

(01:29:44):
to anyone, tips, calls, leads, and any information regarding the
seventeen year old's fate was drying up. The world continued onward,
and soon Leanne's name only appeared in local papers and
media when marking the grim anniversaries ten years, u, fifteen years,
twenty years. While the passage of time only made the

(01:30:06):
truth seem more out of reach for the family, investigators
also struggled to grasp the idea that they might never
find the truth or Leanne herself. Jeff Bledsoe had been
one of the first cops on the scene and would
go on to become the Dixon County Sheriff. Randy Starkey
was also one of the first called in to investigate
the case, and would later become a captain with the

(01:30:27):
Sheriff's Criminal Investigation Division TBI. Special agent Mike Breedlove would
leave the agency running for and successfully becoming the sheriff
of Cheatham County. In twenty fifteen, on the twenty eighth
anniversary of Leanne's disappearance, all three officers appeared on a
local radio show in which they discussed not only the

(01:30:49):
impact of the investigation and what it did to their lives,
but also how being unable to solve it had left
them haunted. In twenty twenty two, Randy Starkey spoke to
the Tennessee and about the case, noting that it remained
the one hole in a distinguished career with law enforcement.
For him, the investigation will never end until Leanne is

(01:31:10):
found and the full truth is known. He stated, quote,
I think about Leanne and her family every day. Her
photo still hangs in my office as a constant reminder
to never give up. We constantly review the case file
and follow up on new information as we get it.
I just hope and pray for a resolution end quote.

(01:31:34):
It was much the same for Tom Wall, who noted
that whenever he has free time from his other cases,
it is always Leanne he turns his attention towards. On Tuesday,
January eleventh, twenty twenty three, Leanne's father, George Washington Green Junior,
passed away at the age of ninety one. For the

(01:31:56):
last thirty six years of his life, he somehow managed
to provide for his chill painting the way to a
brighter future, despite the loss of his daughter and later
his wife. His obituary noted that he was preceded in
death by both Leanne and Marjorie, confirming his belief that
his daughter was killed on that horrible night in nineteen

(01:32:16):
eighty seven. He was laid to rest in Dixon County
Memorial Gardens, having also passed without ever receiving the truth
about his daughter nor seeing justice paid for the insidious crime.
Four months from now, April of twenty twenty five will
mark thirty eight years since Leanne vanished, and nearly four

(01:32:36):
decades later, there are no easy answers, not for the
Green family, not for investigators, and not for those in
Dixon County who remember the night their quiet community became
home to a grim and indomitable nightmare. When last seen,
Martha Leanne Green has been described as being a white
female with brown hair and green eyes, standing five feet

(01:33:00):
six inches tall and weighing approximately one hundred and twenty pounds.
Leanne has had her four wisdom teeth extracted. She has
a birthmark on her chest, and her ears are pierced.
She usually went by her middle name Leanne, and often
wore brown tinted contact lenses, leading some law enforcement agencies
to list her eye color as brown. She was last

(01:33:23):
seen wearing a white sweatshirt, mid calf length, faded jeans,
and white high top rebox sneakers. She wore several pieces
of jewelry, including a white Bluff High School class ring
nineteen fifty eight, a Dixon County High School class ring
of nineteen eighty six, Tennessee silver with an orange stone,

(01:33:46):
a long gold chain necklace with a fan pendant, and
a short gold chain necklace with six or seven gold beads.
Leanne was last known to have been sitting in the
front passenger seat of a silver nineteen seventy nine Moni
Carlow on the shoulder of Highway forty six, near to
Fabric Road and the railroad tracks, across from where the

(01:34:06):
barn was previously located in the community of Pomona. It
is believed that LeeAnne was abducted from the vehicle and
likely killed and disposed of within hours somewhere in middle Tennessee.
At the time of her disappearance, Leanne was seventeen, and
if alive today, she would be fifty four years old.

(01:34:27):
The primary suspect in her case is Robert McKinley Richards,
who was murdered in his jail cell in July of
nineteen ninety one. Richards had knowledge of Leanne which could
only have been known by her killer. He confessed not
only to law enforcement, but to several friends and acquaintances
who all believe he was telling the truth. While he

(01:34:48):
would go on to recant his confessions to law enforcement,
all of the original investigators who worked this case firmly
believed that Richards was in fact the monster who stole
away Leanne and snuffed out her young life. Somewhere, it
is thought someone out there might know the truth and
could potentially lead police to Leanne's resting place, along with

(01:35:10):
that of Teresa Butler, as both of their bodies have
never been found. It was a normal night in April
of nineteen eighty seven when Leanne mysteriously vanished after the
car she and her twin brother were riding in broke down.
In a span of no more than ten minutes, The
seventeen year old was taken from the side of the road,

(01:35:31):
never to be seen again. Somehow, four decades later, her
remains have not been found and her case is not closed.
The Green family could never have imagined this terrible crime
would happen, that their daughter, sister, and cousin would be
gone without a trace, and they would not be able
to say goodbye or find the truth. It instilled within

(01:35:53):
them the value of family, the importance of speaking your mind,
and never putting off till tomorrow what could be done today,
because they know better than anyone that tomorrow has never promised.
Asked about the loss of his daughter all those years later,
George Green simply replied, quote, it's hard to put into words.

(01:36:15):
You've been always protective of your children, somehow or another,
this thing, it just seemed you can't do anything about it.
I think about her all the time. I hope one
day the authorities will find out what happened. Tell your
kids you love them. If I could just tell her
that one more time, just one more time. Nearly forty

(01:36:46):
years have passed since Leanne Green vanished from the side
of a road in rural Middle Tennessee. Despite multiple searches,
the investigation of several suspects, and following hundreds of leads
to their bitter ends, law enforcement was never able to
file charges, recover Leanne's body, or say with complete certainty
what exactly happened that cold, rainy spring night in nineteen

(01:37:10):
eighty seven. Some have wondered if poor choices made during
the early hours of the investigation stunted their chances of
solving the crime, while others fully believe the case is solved,
It just can't be proven. What began is the search
for a missing team quickly morphed into the desperate search
for a body, one which has still never been recovered

(01:37:31):
or identified. While there are different theories in this case,
they're all pretty much classified as relatively vague. There are
concepts of what could have happened, hypotheses on who was involved,
an extremely tight time frame during which this is thought
to have been committed, and a lot of lies and
deceptive pieces of information which over the years have steered

(01:37:54):
the case in one direction or another. Yet most investigators
agree about who the killer probably was, even if they
never managed to collect enough evidence to charge anyone. The
prime suspect died four years after Leanne's disappearance and took
with him whatever information he possessed, forever stilting this investigation.

(01:38:14):
Of course, there are some who do not believe that
Robert McKinley Richards was Leanne's killer, but they are few
and far between. In the absence of solid information, rumors
a myth rise and are spread throughout the community. Haunting
stories spread like wildfire, infecting the truth and tainting the
search for answers. All these years later and you will

(01:38:37):
still find an active community of locals, both those who
lived in Dixon County in eighty seven and those who
have grown up learning of this case. They continue to
hope for a solution, while law enforcement reviews the case
every few years and continues to pursue whatever tips, leads,
or information they receive. According to detectives, they knew from

(01:38:58):
the onset that the was an abduction, and they never
doubted the likelihood of foul play, though some facts seem
to question exactly what was thought of in those early hours. Regardless,
this case was investigated as an abduction nearly from the start,
and even later when it became a homicide investigation, abduction

(01:39:18):
was the primary crime. The name most commonly brought up
by investigators is Robert McKinley Richards, a serial rapist and
alleged killer who carried out a year long string of abductions, rapes,
and possibly murders throughout Western and Middle Tennessee. Throughout nineteen
eighty six and eighty seven. Richards was confirmed to have

(01:39:39):
been involved in multiple crimes, many of which involved him
dressing like a member of law enforcement and utilizing a
blue light in his vehicle to pull over and attack
unsuspecting lone women in the night. To date, Richards remains
a suspect in Leanne's case, as well as several other
open investigations, including the disappearance and resumed murder of nurse

(01:40:01):
Teresa Ann Butler. Richards was born on July eleventh, nineteen
sixty five, and was raised in his parents' Memphis area home,
located then at twenty four to seventy one Ayrshire Cove.
According to Memphis psychologist John Houston, who produced a report
on Richard's for law enforcement in nineteen eighty eight, Richards

(01:40:23):
was raised by an abnormally overprotective mother and a strict, violent,
and abusive father. His parents were known and respected throughout
the community. They ran a jewelry business and were heavily
involved with the local church. Houston interviewed Richards and his
parents for approximately sixteen hours while putting his report together.

(01:40:45):
He described Richard's home environment growing up as unhappy and
plagued by religious conflicts. Houston would write in his report quote,
Robert's mother is overprotective and vacillates between denying his problems
and his exaggerating them. His father appears to be an
extremely rigid individual with considerable suspiciousness and religiosity end quote.

(01:41:11):
Richards told investigators after his arrest in eighty eight that
he was witnessed to the abduction and sexual assault of
a woman when he was just eight years old. Richards
claimed the suspect had parked his car, waited for a
lone woman to drive by, and then pulled her over
while pretending to be a police officer. Whether or not
this instance actually happened and became prophetic for Richard's future behaviors,

(01:41:35):
or if it was entirely made up, is unknown. He
also claimed to have been molested as a child. Richards
told Houston that he was assaulted multiple times by an
adult male and his friends for a period of time
when he was thirteen years old. Again, there is no
way to verify this information. Houston would go on to

(01:41:57):
address the fact that Richard's often exaggerated, lied, and completely
fabricated information writing quote, Richards has been an extremely difficult
case to evaluate, in large part because he trusts no
one and appears to be a chronic liar end quote.
Houston would go on to note that Richard's quote clearly

(01:42:18):
has a mixed personality disorder with underlying features of hysteria, sociopathy,
and dependency end quote. As a teenager, Richards dropped out
of high school after apparently becoming withdrawn and socially isolated.
He started to drink heavily and would later claim that
he could only be social with other people when he

(01:42:38):
was drunk. After leaving high school, Richards indulged in fantasy play,
where he would pretend to be other individuals or to
have different jobs, often gathering items and uniforms to make
his stories seem more legitimate. He moved in with his grandmother,
who lived at the time in Bethel Springs, approximately one
hundred miles east of Memphis and south the Dixon County.

(01:43:01):
Law enforcement in McNairy and Shelby Counties reported that they
were aware of Richard's and his apparent interest in becoming
a police officer, but noted that he lacked the qualifications
and the ability to take on that role. In November
of nineteen eighty six, he began training to join the
Shelby County Sheriff's Emergency Services Team, a group of volunteers

(01:43:22):
who assist the Sheriff's department in specific situations. Around this time,
he began purchasing everything he would need to pass as
a police officer, from handcuffs to uniforms and firearms. Moving forward,
he would tell friends, strangers, and even romantic partners that
he was employed as a cop or sheriff's deputy. A

(01:43:43):
former girlfriend, Linda Porter, told police that he had the
full setup, saying quote, he was dressed in spruce green pants,
tan shirt, tie, the boots, fully equipped utility belt, a
hat with the Sheriff's Department patch on it, and a
windbreaker with the shit Araff's Department Fugitive Squad logo on
it end quote. Porter told police that she became suspicious

(01:44:07):
of Richard's activities and behaviors when she was present in
his vehicle one night he turned on the blue police
light and pulled over a vehicle being driven by two
teenage boys. Reportedly, Richards approached the vehicle and then joked
around with the two teens about how they had been speeding,
before returning to his car and driving off. Porter ended

(01:44:28):
the relationship with Richards a few months later. However, Richards
had been kicked out of the Emergency Services team months earlier,
in May of eighty seven, after he failed to show
up for a test, yet another incident in a long
line of missing appointments and gatherings. It didn't matter, though.
By this time Richards had a good understanding of how
traffic stops were performed, and he had all of the

(01:44:51):
accessories necessary to convince others of his status as a
police officer. Several friends and relatives would tell police that
between nineteen eighty six and nineteen eight, Richards owned at
least three Shelby County deputy uniforms with matching hats. He
also bought a hat and shirt and custom designed them
with FBI on them so he could appear as a

(01:45:11):
federal agent. Richards frequently carried large sums of cash on him,
and while it was never proven, it was theorized that
he'd pull people over and threaten to ticket them until
they offered him a cash bribe. Richards was arrested in
August of nineteen eighty seven after attempting to abduct a
woman who determined he was not a police officer after

(01:45:32):
he pulled her over. From that point forward, once he
was in custody, Richards seemed to get enjoyment out of
toying with police and claiming responsibility for multiple crimes up
to and including the murders of Teresa Butler and Leanne Green.
It would later be reported that Richards was thought to
have some kind of deep interest or fetish for women
dressed in white, which may explain why he targeted several

(01:45:55):
women working in the nursing field, including Butler. It was
noted by an investigators that Leanne was wearing white the
night she disappeared. When it comes to Leanne's disappearance, a
lot of the pieces seemed to fit and make sense.
The seventeen year old is sitting on the side of
the road in a disabled vehicle when Richards pulls up

(01:46:15):
and turns on his police light. He steps out from
his vehicle dressed like a deputy and approaches the car.
From there, he either convinces Leanne to get into his
vehicle or he forces her to do so, perhaps at gunpoint.
Investigators spent a long time trying to find evidence to
place Richard's and Dixon County that night, but they never could. However,

(01:46:37):
they were able to confirm he was visiting a friend
in the unincorporated community of Lyles, located in Hickman County,
ten miles south from where Leanne disappeared. While not enough
evidence for an arrest, it's all rather compelling. These details
are bolstered by the fact that while under hypnosis, Richards

(01:46:57):
made two statements that only Leanne's killer could have known.
That she was wearing an intricate piece of jewelry which
he described, and that the seventeen year old was menstruating
that night. Both of these details are confirmed facts that
law enforcement never revealed to the public, making it impossible
that he picked up that information second hand. While confessions

(01:47:19):
to police might be ruled out as something Richard's did
to toy with law enforcement, it's more difficult to rule
out all of the times he confessed to other people,
from friends in prison, to his cellmate to ex girlfriends.
Like Leanne's case, Richards could not be conclusively linked to
the disappearance and presume murder of Teresa Butler, but the
two cases carried several similarities. Butler's car was found abandoned

(01:47:43):
on the side of the road with the engine running,
lights and radio on, and it was theorized Richard's had
pulled her over. Butler vanished five months before Leanne and
worked as a nurse at Saint Francis Hospital, located just
one mile from Richard's parents' home. As was the case
with Leanne, Richards would confess and recant his involvement in

(01:48:03):
that crime multiple times. In both instances, he offered to
lead police to the bodies, but never did, and reportedly
told one investigator he couldn't reveal the location of Leanne's
remains because he just couldn't give her up. While circumstantial
evidence cannot be used to confirm someone's involvement in a crime,
there sure is a lot of it when it comes

(01:48:25):
to Richard's likely involvement in Leanne's. To me, the sheer
fact that he knew intimate details about Leanne on the
night of her disappearance makes it fairly difficult to consider
anyone else as the prime suspect, but without something more,
there's no way to confirm it. For some, the fact
that Richards never managed to lead police to a body
lends credence to the possibility that he was lying, as

(01:48:48):
he often did, and over exaggerating his involvement. But to others,
these were mere games Richard's played with police to keep
himself entertained and to buy himself field trips out of prison.
Even if if he were still alive today, there is
a slim chance, if any at all, that he would
have ever provided proof to support his confessions. According to

(01:49:09):
a former friend and inmate, Richards was desperately afraid that
he would get the death penalty for Leanne's murder, which
basically guaranteed he would never provide a full and detailed confession. Now,
is Richards the only possible suspect in this case. Certainly not.
While he is the most prominent and is the prime
suspect for all of the original investigators, there are some

(01:49:32):
other potential suspects. While there is a lot of detailed
information about Richards, there is not a great deal about
other suspects, so analyzing these theories will be rather thin
since we possess only vague details or limited information. First,
there was Henry Harris Junior, the trucker who shot himself
in the parking lot of a Veteran's Administration hospital in Biloxi, Mississippi,

(01:49:54):
in March of nineteen eighty nine. Harris was considered a
possibility since he written a note about wanting a girl
of his own. Was a former truck driver who passed
through Tennessee and who was in possession of two of
Leanne's missing persons flyers. While authorities in Mississippi thought Harris
was in possession of a photograph of Leanne, Tennessee law

(01:50:15):
enforcement quickly determined it was mistaken identity. It was reported
at the time that local police were working to determine
whether or not they could place Harris and Dixon County
around the time of the crime, and that pending that discovery,
they would interview him about Leanne. Apparently, they never could
link him to the area, and if police ever did

(01:50:35):
go down to question him about Leanne, it was either
never reported or they did not learn anything to convince
them of his involvement. There were several other kidnapping, sexual assaults,
and murders which took place before and after Leanne's, and
some believed there could be links. When thirty six year
old Larry Mulliken abducted twenty two year old Kathy Gant

(01:50:56):
at knife point, some theorized he could have done the
same to Leanne. In nineteen eighty one, Eddie Hartman, then
a trustee with the Dixon County Jail, was allowed to
drop off a sheriff's deputy at a farm. Hartman drove
a sheriff's vehicle and instead of returning to the jail,
apparently went on a joy ride where he used the
flashing lights to pull over multiple people. Hartman would ultimately

(01:51:20):
be found guilty of murdering sixteen year old Kathy Nishiyama
of Clarksville that night. The teen disappeared on Monday, November sixteenth,
nineteen eighty one, and her skeletal remains were later found
in a wooded area of Houston County. While there doesn't
appear to be a belief that Hartman was involved in
Leanne's disappearance, some have wondered if a similar incident could

(01:51:41):
have occurred, leading the killer to be behind the wheel
of a police vehicle rather than pretending to be. Then
there was a suspicious witness, the man whose name has
not been released publicly. This man reportedly contacted investigators and
informed them that he had been on Sr. Forty six
that night saw a vehicle pull up behind the out

(01:52:02):
of gas Monte Carlo. While few details had been released,
whatever this witness said struck investigators as odd and suspicious
enough that they then considered him a person of interest.
He was watched entailed for an extended period of time,
but he never stepped out of line, nor did anything
to reveal his possible involvement in Leanne's disappearance, nor any

(01:52:23):
other crime from what I could tell. In the end,
they ruled that man out, but I would be extremely
interested in knowing what exactly he said or did that
had made them so suspicious to begin with. There are
a lot of other possibilities that get mentioned as well.
Travis Maguire, who kidnapped and murdered a woman in New Mexico,
was considered, but nothing could connect him to Dixon County

(01:52:44):
or Leanne. Some believe it had to have been someone
that Leanne knew with friends and family, noting that she
wouldn't have gone willingly with a complete stranger. Of course,
if that stranger were dressed like a police officer, she
might be easily swayed, with some wondering if perhaps her
assailant was a police officer. There have been vague mentions

(01:53:06):
of a cult operating in the area at the time,
and some believe Leanne could have been targeted by then,
But like so many theories, there's no evidence or anything
concrete to link any particular cult to Leanne's disappearance. Others
have vaguely mentioned a resident of Dixon County, someone known
locally who could have been involved, but no one seems

(01:53:27):
to want to mention a name or explain why they
think this individual played a role. Police have confirmed that
there were three known rapists in the area that night,
though again they cannot link any of them to the crime,
and outside of their presence and their predilections, there is
nothing more convincing. Unfortunately, with this case, the further down

(01:53:50):
the rabbit hole you go, the thinner the information becomes,
until you end up in a place where essentially, if
someone was in Dixon County that night, there's a chance
they were involved. Setting the theories and potential suspects to
the side and examining only what is known as a fact,
the case itself doesn't come across as unsolvable or impossible

(01:54:13):
to break. This is an extremely solvable case that has
sadly gone completely unassisted by the capture of any true
solid evidence. We know that Leanne was sitting in that
Monte Carlo, and we know that in less than fifteen
minutes she was taken. The most common belief, even if
you ignore Robert Richards, is that Leanne was likely abducted
by someone pretending to be a police officer. It is

(01:54:36):
also entirely possible that someone brandished a weapon or forced
her to go along. In a different way, you have
to consider the kind of cold cunning this crime took.
Lawson could have returned at any minute. Someone could have
driven by and decided to stop and offer help, as
the family had. Whoever the assailant was, he pulled the
abduction off rapidly and without leaving behind a single scrap

(01:54:59):
of physical lif evidence, or at least none that was recovered.
Even nearly four decades later, Leanne's body has never been found,
nor has Theresa Butler's. Did they fall victim to the
same killer, or is it just another uncertifiable coincidence. There
are a lot of different possibilities in this case, and
while one suspect seems to be held up above all others,

(01:55:22):
until there is more evidence, it's difficult to say with
any certainty which way the wind is blowing. I tend
to believe the original investigators when they state their belief
that Richards was the man who abducted and murdered Leanne.
He seems like the most likely culprit. But there have
been a lot of cases over the years in which
someone is the main suspect for decades, only for new

(01:55:44):
evidence to completely turn the case around and point it
in a different direction. While I do think that Richards
killed Leanne, I also think it's important to keep an
open mind for other possibilities should new or previously missed
evidence arise in this case. At least, while confirming the
identity of Leanne's abductor would certainly help in the legal front,

(01:56:05):
perhaps even seeing someone face charges, it would do little
to assuage the grief and anguish of the Green family
and their community as a whole. Finding Leanne returning her
home and seeing her laid to rest with a proper
opportunity to grieve where loved ones could visit and mourn
would be a different kind of comfort. Altogether, we can
only hope that she will eventually be recovered and that

(01:56:28):
her killer will pay for the great injustice he has created.
Surely there is someone out there who has more than
just a simple idea of where Leanne and Theresa Butler
might be found. This is not a case that can
solve itself, but one which needs assistance from a thus
far silent source. The cold reality is unless something happens

(01:56:51):
to break this case, the disappearance of Martha Leanne Green
will remain open, unsolved, and very cold. If you're looking
for more information about the disappearance of Martha Leanne Green,

(01:57:13):
there are many news sites and forums discussing her case.
This episode would not have been possible without the helpful
contributions of the Tennesseean and the Leaf Chronicle. If you
have any information about the disappearance of Martha Leanne Green,
please contact the Dixon County Sheriff's Office at six one

(01:57:35):
five seven eight nine four one three zero. She is
case number eight seven zero four one five zero zero eight.
You can also contact the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation at
six one five nine five two four nine eight nine.

(01:57:56):
In addition, you can submit information anonymously to Nashville Crime
Stoppers at six one five seven four crime That is
six one five seven four two seven four six three.
You can also submit a tip on their website or
by using their mobile app, both available at P three

(01:58:18):
tips dot com. What do you believe happened? Tweet me
at Tracevpod, email me at trace Evidencepod at gmail dot com,
or comment in the Facebook group As many of you know,
putting Trace Evidence together takes a lot of hard work, research,
and more than anything time. Without support from amazing listeners,

(01:58:41):
this podcast would be impossible, and that's why I'd like
to take a moment to thank our amazing Patreon producers
Andrew Guarino and m Bertram, Christine Greco, Crystal Jay Derthy,
Niece Dingsdale, Diani Dyson, Jennifer Winkler, Justin Snyder, Kara Morland,

(01:59:09):
k why leslie B, Lisa Hopson, Nick Mohar, Shers, Roberta Jansen,
Stacey Finnegan, and Tom Radford. Thank you all so much
for your continued support and for making Trace Evidence possible.
If you'd like to learn about supporting the show, please

(01:59:31):
visit patreon dot com, slash trace Evidence or visit trace
dash evidence dot com. All episodes are available completely ad
free on Patreon. This concludes our look into the nineteen
eighty seven disappearance of Martha Leanne Green, a highly solvable
case that just needs that one piece of information to

(01:59:52):
put the whole puzzle together. Before ending the show today,
I just wanted to address my absence these previous months.
As some of you know, I live in Western North
Carolina and my town was absolutely hammered by Hurricane Helene.
While many had it worse than me, I was without
power for over a week and unable to leave my

(02:00:13):
house due to flooding and damaged roads. The internet did
not return for nearly two weeks, and when it did,
it was spotty at best, and cell service was completely down.
It was a horrible experience, and I'm simply grateful to
have come out of it on the other side. Following
the storm, there was a medical emergency in my family
when my father fell ill. Over the course of a

(02:00:36):
few weeks, he has slowly regained his strength and was
finally able to come home from the hospital. After that,
I thought I was ready to come back and do
the show, but I faced my own mental health crisis
and needed some time to take a breather and process
everything that had happened. I'm extremely grateful for all of
you who offered your support, whether it was a donation

(02:00:58):
or reaching out and checking in on me my family.
It's really meant the world to me, and without all
of you, I'm not sure what state I would be
in today. You humble me with your words of affection,
and I reciprocate them completely, so again, thank you all.
I have big plans for the show moving into twenty
twenty five, and I can't wait to get them rolling.

(02:01:21):
Next week, I'll be releasing an update episode that touches
on several cases previously covered on Tray's Evidence. I know
it's been a bumpy ride, but I thank you for
sticking with me, and I hope you'll join me next
week on the next episode of TRACE's Evidence.

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245 - The Disappearance of Martha Leanne Green

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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;}245 - The Disappearance of Martha Leanne Green