The Dark Side of the Pacific Northwest: Cold Cases and Modern Violence

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to US Phenomenon, where possibilities
are endless.
Put down those same oldheadlines.
It's time to expand your mindand question what if?
From paranormal activity toUFOs, bigfoot sightings and
unsolved mysteries, this is USPhenomenon?

Speaker 2 (00:21):
From the Pacific Northwest in the shadow of the
1962 World's Fair, the SpaceNeedle.
Good evening, good morning,good afternoon.
Wherever you are on God's greenearth, if you believe in such
thing, good evening.
I'm your host, mario Magana.
This is US Phenomenon, wheresometimes we go where no other
people like to go.
And tonight, the good, the bad,the ugly I don't know if we

(00:45):
want to call the show crimedoesn't pay, but I think it's
time to focus on some of themost influential.
I don't know if I want to callthem influential, but if I don't
want to say if it bleeds, itleads.
But tonight we are going to gowall to wall coverage on some of
the most notorious.

(01:05):
We're going to cover some stuffaround the pacific northwest
and maybe beyond too, and I'mgoing to bring our guest in, who
is no stranger to uh this show,but is no stranger in regards
to uh, having been a socialmedia sensation.
I'd like to welcome back tothis show Steve Hickey, which

(01:29):
you can find at Photog, steve 81on all your social platforms.
Welcome back to the show.
You know it has been a littlebit, and let me tell you what
man.
Things are going crazy.
One people think that theworld's coming to an end.

(01:51):
Let me just let's let's justtalk about this.
Recently, the mount sainthelens eruption uh, anniversary
goes by.
You have a, a pontiff thatpasses away like the day after
easter.
Um, so new pope from the UnitedStates, from the Americas, and
then the social media sensationsof all these different like

(02:16):
conspiracies, like thisunderwater volcano that is 500
miles off the coast of Oregon isgoing to have a thousand
eruptions.
Well, come on, okay.
So if that's true, I mean, Ilove a good conspiracy, but
someone is really trying to hit,like trying to get the doomsday

(02:37):
button, like, yeah, we, I gotit, I got it.
You know, ladies and gentlemen,if you're concerned about this
underwater volcano, it's goingto be nothing like Mount St
Helens and it's supposed to.
According to USGS, it'ssupposed to be kind of like just

(02:57):
it's going to erupt but it'sjust going to be very slow and
just magma is going to come out.
It's not really, it's not goingto.
They're not anticipating a huge, major thing.
Hey, if it happens, you knowwe're all dead anyhow, so it's
not going to matter.
And then, you know, the pontiffpasses away.

(03:18):
Everyone's talking about this.
Administration is theanti-crime.
I mean, just some of thesedifferent conspiracies have just
been wild and recent and recentheadlines where you know if it,
you know, most people have beentalking about something that

(03:39):
we'll be talking about tonightand I want to cover a couple
things and maybe you might beable to give us some more
information.
But it seems to be that thereare more shootings recently and
maybe, for those who are not aship, but we'll kind of cover
some of these plus maybe some,uh, internet crimes against, you

(04:00):
know, children, internet, youknow that, that whole scene as
well.
Why do I always get the acronymwrong?
I always get the acronym wrong,especially when we're doing the
show um, and then in recentheadlines we'll talk about, um,
the, the tika lewis case andwhich had been brought to the

(04:21):
forefront over the week, um, andhad brought some, some buzz, um
, I guess let's just start offthere.
For those who may or may not befamiliar, this case goes back
to 1999 where this young littletoddler went missing from a
bowling alley.
Um, she yet has to be found.

(04:43):
Um, she's still missing.
Uh, we've talked about thismultiple times on this radio
show, uh, and I know that backin my younger radio days, uh, we
would go to this bowling alleyand it's just a very tragic
story, steve and I I'll let youpick up on what has transpired,

(05:06):
why everyone was kind of likecould this be?
What was you know?
Which is still a cold case,right, oh?

Speaker 3 (05:16):
yeah, yeah.
So you know, going back to 1999when she disappeared, there was
a bowling alley down therecalled Frontier Lane.
A lot of people had beenfamiliar with that spot and had
been there over the years andshe's there with family Tika is
two-year-old Tika at the timeHer mom's there and other family
members, and there's a lotgoing on.

(05:36):
The way that it apparentlytranspires is they believe that
Tika is in an arcade with otherpeople from the group, but
really, really, they've lostsight of her and they don't
realize that quite yet.
They come to realize she'smissing and panic sets in really
pretty quickly, even with allthese people.
Within minutes they realizethat there's a problem and law
enforcement's contacted, peoplestart descending on there and

(06:00):
she basically vanished and therewere a few theories over time.
There has been this person thatthey always call the person
with the pockmarked face,somebody who just really had a
lot of pockmarks all over them.
Then there's apparently been aperson of interest who has since
passed away.
These things just kind of keepevolving.
I can tell you in talking toTika's mother, the theory that

(06:23):
she's really clung to is thatshe was abducted because
somebody wanted a child of thatage and that looked like that
and took her to raise them andshe believes that Tika is out
there somewhere alive and justdoesn't remember, probably, what
happened back then.
And so every so often and it'sinteresting too, I'll talk a

(06:46):
little bit about it as we go onis kind of what has kept that
case in the public spacecompared to others.
You know she's really goodabout making sure that this
doesn't disappear.
Every so often they doanniversaries about it and it
hits the news.
I just recently did.
They have this cold case seriesthat they do a really great job
on and they did a really gooddeep dive with her and when this

(07:11):
case popped up there wasquestion because there was not a
lot of confirmation from lawenforcement at all.
Is it really her and why are weall thinking of her and not a
couple of others?
And I really think it's atestament to her mom making sure
that this case stays relevant.
So as time goes on, there havebeen new artist renditions A
couple times.
I talked to her maybe a yearand a half ago.

(07:33):
There was a new police chieffor Tacoma and they had gotten a
new rendition and she explainedsomething to me.
I read up on this later and Iguess it really is quite a
challenge, and that is forusually black people.
When they disappear, theserenditions don't really take
into account what theirhairstyle would most likely be,
and these renditions don't comeout very accurate.

(07:54):
And so she had another artistrendition done about a year and
a half or so ago which was muchdifferent than the others, and
it got back in the news becausethis new chief had come out and
basically had said hey, I don'tknow that this was handled to
the level that it could havebeen and we're going to re-get
into this.
And so they got a big 53-foottrailer with the new rendition
of her on there, and since thenthat chief has now exited the

(08:18):
organization.
It was kind of a contentiousexit too.
And then in talking to Tika'smom Teresa, she apparently was
not happy with, ultimately, howthat continued on, and so she
felt kind of out there in thecold.
And so over this last weekend Iget a tip from somebody who says
that there will be a dig at theproperty that we go to here in

(08:41):
a second in Tacoma, and thisproperty is an old home, it's
changed hands multiple times andI knew at that point that it
was going to be a cold case,supposedly from the nineties,
and so I decided to go out thereMonday morning.
I was told at the time theywere going to get started around
nine o'clock.
As I'm getting down there, theyapparently have already started

(09:02):
and they used a city excavatorto dig the hole.
And why that mattered is as I'mdriving there I see the
excavator going the other way.
It was because it needed to beon other jobs that day, so it
dug the hole very quickly, gotout.
I show up and I don't get out ofthe car yet.
I just kind of pull up.
This is my first time in thisneighborhood.
It's over in a neighborhoodkind of east out there, only

(09:24):
about a mile away from thebowling alley.
As I pull up, it's pretty lowkey.
There's one marked vehicle,it's a pickup that says Tacoma
Police but also Search andRescue and the rest all appear
to be undercover and a number offorensic fans.
Nobody else is out there.
There's no other news source,there's no crowd.
None of that stuff is there.
And so I call a colleague ofmine who has done a lot in the

(09:46):
past with other cases like thiswhere there's forensic stuff or
there's probably outsideagencies, fbi and such that, hey
, I'm on a dig out here thatlooks like it's legit, can you
maybe try and lean on someplaces, see if you can figure
out who it may be?
And the next thing that thatperson does is calls Tacoma
Police Department to ask for aquick statement.
And I get a call back and hegoes hey, I just called TPD.

(10:08):
They say that they're not outthere and they don't know what
you're talking about.
I said, well, it's not reallyup for debate.
I'm looking at it.
Let me go up and I'll asksomebody for a card.
I'll call you back.
So I walk on up and, as I do,everybody kind of like turns
away and looks the other way,which is, you know, I'm used to
usually when I go to scenes,pretty, you know, warm
interactions and and sometimessome some sort of request which

(10:33):
I'll get into in a minute, butusually it's pretty, pretty easy
on.
So I awkwardly say is anybodyhave a business card?
I could have.
I know you can't make anystatements, but I just like to
have a card.
And they all kind of look ateach other.
You know's like somebody wantto give this guy a card and kind
of smirk, almost kind of likeyou know, get a load of this guy
.
So I'm feeling very awkward andone who turns out to be the lead

(10:53):
investigator goes out to hercar.
She comes back, gives me a cardand I look on there and realize
that it's Julie Dyer and in myhead I'm like I know who this is
and I know one of her biggestcase.
I know a number of her cases,but I know one of her biggest.
So I go back to the car, I senda picture, they another call
goes into TPD and they said theyseem kind of more confused this

(11:14):
time.
The first time they justdiscounted it.
The second time they seemconfused, like we don't know,
but we're definitely not goingto have a statement.
Don't call us, we'll call youand I get the word back and
right around that time a coupleof marked units pull on into the
block sure around my vehicle,not like boxing me in, but
around my vehicle and get out.
Let me know that.
Hey, uh, we were just broughtout here to close the block and

(11:36):
move you out of here.

Speaker 2 (11:37):
You need to move down to the next block why do you
think they were doing such athing like that steve to like?
Do you think that in in thissituation, they didn't want
someone like yourself as areporter to tip others off?
Were they?
Are they concerned, like?
What was your thoughts on thatpiece?

Speaker 3 (11:56):
yeah, so I thought about that and I, and so I, when
the cop came up, the theuniformed officer was great, but
I said, hey, if you know, ifthey need something such as keep
quiet for a day or just say it,you got to use your words, yeah
, and she kind of goes back over, them, comes back over, she
goes, yeah, they, they don'thave any words for you.
And I kind of smiled.
I was like, all right, at leastwe're clear where we stand here

(12:18):
, you know, and I moved on over,and then I called um.
A couple other people lawenforcement said hey, if this
was happening and you were onthat, why would you respond that
way?
And both of them said it'sdefinitely got a big case
everybody knows about and theydon't really know what to do,
and generally, when it's a bigcase, leadership wants to handle
all communications so that theycan get their name on it.

(12:39):
It may not be as much as theydon't want to talk to you that
they can't talk to you.
Okay, fine, I start looking up,though, and start trying to
figure out well, who could thisbe?
And, as I said, I'd heard itwas somebody from the 90s and
that was about it.
So I look up Julie Dyer'sbiggest cases that she's working
and Tika Lewis pops up.

(12:59):
I start going into thebackground of the home and it's
changed hands a handful of times.
It looks like the records forthat area out there.
You know, I don't know how farthey go back, but the oldest
record I can find is 2004.
And at that time there was anowner of the house with the last
name Lewis.
Now that ultimately, I thinkInternet sleuths started taking

(13:21):
that and saying it's someone inthe family, right, I think it's
a coincidence, but there is aconnection potentially between
that owner and somebody elsewho's been named a person of
interest in the case and that'skind of where I think that's
going.
I haven't gone out and confirmedwhat I believe that is or what
I'm hearing.
It is because, with the waythey're being so closed up on

(13:42):
evidence, I don't know ifthere's a reason they don't want
that out, because now they haveat least confirmed what they
were doing there but still willconfirm that part.
So then I start making someother calls to other people just
in law enforcement, saying, hey, I think this is what it is.
Do you think that there's areason that they don't want this
out.
I've given them a chance to not.
They don't have to tell me areason, just tell me a reason,
just tell me.
Hey, we need time.
And they haven't taken me up onit.

(14:04):
So not that we know of it's anold enough case.
There's definitely haven't beenany arrests, anything like that
.
So at that point, you know, I'mkind of annoyed.
You know my ego's been a littlebit ahead of like why I'm
getting kind of pushed out andtreated the way I was.
So I thought, well, thisthing's going to become bigger.
There's no way it's going tostay a scene that only I'm at.
I'll start making some phonecalls.

(14:25):
So I start leaning on otherpeople in the industry written
media as well as television newsand we start getting everybody
on out there and by about noon,one o'clock, it's pretty much
circus.
At this point Everybody's there.
Now community members are comingand gathering outside, and at
one point I'm not going to saywho it was, though I don't stand

(14:46):
by what they did.
But first we're all up there,kind of everybody.
You know, we're all chattingamongst each other.
How did we get to here, what dowe got?
And all of a sudden the PIOshows up and we're like, oh, we
might actually get a statement.
So she comes on out and it'sOfficer Boyd, she.
She comes on out and it'sOfficer Boyd.
She's great, pretty, you know,no-nonsense, very serious

(15:07):
individual but really easy towork with.
But she walks on up and I kindof sarcastically say, hey,
should we just start hitting youwith questions or do you got a
statement you want to give?
And she's like I am not here togive any statements.
The only reason I'm here is tofind out which one of you put a

(15:29):
camera over top the fence.
Oh, and I'm like what?
It definitely wasn't me.
And one of the camera guys fromthe tv news, uh behind said I
did it, I knew I shouldn't.
I told my boss we're notallowed to do that, we shouldn't
do.
And he said I had to do itanyways.
And so like, there you go.
And so she chastises him a bitand tells him you know his legal
cons, because the fence wasn'teven close to far from the hole.
You had to go on a neighbor'sproperty to then look over the
fence.
And so then at that point wesaid, hey, can we get anything

(15:52):
out of you?
And she's like I don't haveanything to tell you.
I said can you give us a 10seconds saying, hey, obviously
there's something happening hereand we're not ready to give out
any information?
She said I will give you that,but you can't be hitting me with
a bunch of questions.
Okay, fine, we turn on camerasand one of the other we'll call
them TV news reporters who hadheard that negotiation and that

(16:12):
expectation.
Wait until she finishes about a10 second, 15 second thing, and
then goes well, we're hearing itprobably involves Tika Lewis,
and what do you have to sayabout that?
She just kind of looks and justgoes silent like yeah, that's
there.
And then she uh says, you know,I don't have anything I can say
.
She's like so you're telling me, tacoma police department
doesn't even know what'shappening out here and this, and
finally it just ends like shewalks away.

(16:33):
And so this point now we have,you know, really unfortunately,
established a pretty adversarialrelationship.
I feel like right, and then theuh mobile precinct shows up,
which is that big RV vehicle andthose usually show up and it's
going to be a multi-day orpretty extended scene.
And once we saw that, we'relike, well, this went from a hey
, we're just kind of lookingaround to we're going to be here

(16:53):
for a bit Right Over the nextcouple of days.
We also, by the way, at thatpoint did talk to Tika's mom and
she said I didn't know this washappening.
I have made some phone callsinto the department and what
they're saying is that theycan't say it involves TICA, but
they can't deny it involves TICAeither.

Speaker 2 (17:11):
I wonder why they I guess I don't know why wouldn't
they, like, give her you know,say, hey, we're doing you know,
is it?
They don't want to get herhopes up.
You know what I mean.

Speaker 3 (17:29):
Like, do they?
I don't know what the protocolin that situation is.
I, you know, I've wonderedabout that and I and I kind of
wonder if it has to do withtheir concern that she also
might talk and so they don'teven want to put something on
her that then she could even sayum, she, you know she has been
very verbal about this case overthe years.
I don't mean that in any sort ofnegative light whatsoever, but
I don't know if there was anyconcern that somehow she would
then tell us or what.
And in the end I don't know whythey were so concerned about us

(17:51):
knowing that it's that caseanyways.
That in itself is interesting.
It's not like we're going tosee what all's going on in there
, but nonetheless, that was allshe had, and so we've been
talking to her over the coupleof days and so as we start
putting stuff out there into theworld, saying hey, there's
speculation that it has to dowith this case, and I'm feeling
at that point about 90 pluspercent, that's what it is.

(18:11):
I had a few other people sendme little bits of information
about stuff in the past.
I was like I'm feelingconfident, but I don't go off
something because I feelconfident.
I go off something when I haveit.
So I said, hey, there's thisgoing on, there's this
speculation, and that case has alot of people stuck with it.
For those who live here.
Pretty much everybody remembersthat happening, remembers when

(18:33):
it happened and remembers thesaga of it and I didn't realize
there were such strong Facebookgroups that are just dedicated
to that, and so my story went inthere.
And then it became this battleof the private sleuths or saying
that, oh, this isn't true.
And apparently David Rose hadgone and weighed in and said
that it has nothing to do withthem and he doesn't know what
he's talking about, which Ithought was really quite odd.

(18:56):
And then this morning we do getword that it absolutely was a
tip to deal with Tika Lewis'scase.
They won't't say exactly whatthe tip was, but they did go
there in the hopes of possiblybeing able to find remains.
They have said that they didnot find her body and I want to
make that very clear.
That's they said specifically,we did not find the I believe,

(19:16):
the remains of tika.
With the amount of processingthey did, there's still maybe a
chance they found something ofinterest that is still being
processed.
I mean, a lot of times theytimes they'll just kind of dig.
They're done this.
I mean they went through threedays of sifting every little bit
of granular anything, wow.
They have said that this tipinvolves multiple prongs and
what that tells me is, I believe, that they have a person of

(19:39):
interest that is involved inthat property at some point in
time, somehow, some way, andthen on top of that, is probably
involved in other locations,and so this was one of those
locations that they're checking,but they're not done.

Speaker 2 (19:53):
And I know this isn't really talked about very much
anymore, but I mean, think about, for those who have lived here
for such a long time, this casebeing very much.
You know you got to leave it toTika's mom for continuing to,
you know pound the drum and youknow to be the voice for Tika to

(20:15):
get some type of resolution.
If it's a reunite, you know toreunite with Tika if it's to
find closure.
It's interesting to me are welooking at a situation because I
know that a lot of people talkabout the little boy who was
also weeks prior to this case oryou know, tika going missing,

(20:38):
but there was a young boy whowas, you know, alleged had.
You know they believe thatthere may have been a tie with
the guy or the person in ofinterest who had may have done
something to the little boy inthe bathroom who had been
hanging out near the bowlingalley the time of her miss.
You know her disappearance.

(21:00):
And what's interesting to me iswhen you think about the 1999s,
that time period there wasn't alot of it, there wasn't a lot
of video going on, there wasn'ta lot of surveillance going on
on a lot of these propertiesthat you typically see to this
day, um, the fact that it youknow how this case really plays

(21:22):
out and you know it is like aparent's worst nightmare to get
that gut feeling for that half asecond when your child is like
you can't find your child.
Everyone's had that feeling.
You know where you're, like ohmy gosh.
Now think of tika's mom, who'shad this same feeling for this
long, this long that she's beendealing with this gut-wrenching

(21:46):
stomach, empty feeling, like ohmy gosh I mean, being a parent
of a 17, soon to be 17 year old,I mean I, you know we're out
and I'm like you know, I hadthat like where'd you go?
I lost you for a second and itjust you freak out, you know,
and it's like the worst, it'sany parent's worst nightmare.
You freak out, you know, andit's like the worst, it's any

(22:06):
parent's worst nightmare.
Steve, I wonder if they don'tfind any evidence in regards to
any evidence remains, whateverthe case may be, are we looking
at possibly another victim?
Could this be tied to GreenRiver Gary?
Could this be tied to GreenRiver Gary?
Could this be cases to him aswell?

(22:28):
I mean, I know that they saythat that is the big piece that
the tip was for Tika, but are wemaybe looking for maybe some
leftover stuff from maybe apotential serial killer as well?

Speaker 3 (22:45):
So it does seem to be that this was for Tika.
I don't see them making adefinitive statement like that
if that wasn't accurate, andthere has been descriptions of a
couple of people that were veryspecific, that did not seem to
be a Ridgeway type One of them,as I said, is deceased.
Now there's another person thatI believe they do have history

(23:08):
with, that there was even somepast restraining orders with in
the past.
That also is deceased.
I mean, this is now 26 yearslater, 25, 26, depending on what
time of the year it fell and alot of times we see the age
range of people committing thesetypes of acts is already going
to be closer to the 30s, middleage, so on.

(23:29):
So with that in mind you knowit's a long time it's not
inconceivable that whoever wasinvolved may be deceased.

Speaker 2 (23:39):
It is strange, because I think what they're
going to start to do is I thinkwhat you were saying, too steve,
was that they are, uh, lookingat the records of who was who
owned the house, who owned theproperty at that point in time,
and these tips, this case isvery, still much, very much
fluid, cold case still.

(24:00):
Would we still call it a coldcase, or do you think that this
may be lighting the fire and theadding some fuel to the case?

Speaker 3 (24:07):
Yeah, so we see this a lot in cases like this where
there is something that ends upbeing ultimately a dead end and
would otherwise remain a deadend.
But then it gets other peoplethinking about the case again,
thinking about stuff that mayhave clicked to them later or
they've heard something over theyears, and they get that
motivation to speak up.
Send in another tip.
Uh it, I see there probablybeing an influx of tips going

(24:30):
into investigators right now.
Whether or not they're credible, I don't know.
Yeah, but you generally do seean uptick, after an event like
this, of information coming uhtalking with uh photoc steve 81.

Speaker 2 (24:40):
You can find him on all his socials youtubes, the
internets, the tiktokies, the um, the tiktokies, uh, no, we're
not talking about talkies, theuh chips or whatever, but um, on
all the social platform.
Here's an interesting question.
I, since the last time you andI spoke they had that big.
I don't want to even call itlike driving down memory lane

(25:05):
for Gary.
You know I shouldn't say ourgood friend Gary Ridgway,
because we don't know him by anymeans.
Did anything else come of that?
Have we heard anything?

Speaker 3 (25:17):
There was a release that they at least as far as
what they're willing to discloseit turned up nothing, nothing,
absolutely nothing, nothing,absolutely nothing.
And they don't ever put a lotof detail in that.
I don't want to give Gary anybit of credit, sure, but I don't
know.
Was it he intended to give themnothing, or is it one of these

(25:38):
that they've had in the past,like, hey, let's drive out there
and take a look?
That man's been incarcerated along time.
The world looks much differentnow, and a lot of where he was
placing these bodies isn't goingto be in green areas.
That changed over the years.
So I don't know.
I don't know if what they'rereally trying to tell us is he
outright duped them or misledthem, or it just did not produce

(26:01):
the results that they werehoping for, but nonetheless it
did not produce any of theresults that they put all that
effort in for.

Speaker 2 (26:08):
And to me it's like almost, is King County looking
for closure?
For obviously, a lot of thesevictims that are still, you know
, haven't been identified orthey're missing victims that
still are out, possibly stillout there.
And what is very strange isyou're right, I mean, when we're
talking about 80s, I mean we'retalking about about 40

(26:31):
something years of, uh, ofchange.
You know, the evolution of thatwhole area has completely
changed.
Someone who lived in the area,someone coming from a mexican
restaurant near riverbend, goingacross the green river bridge,
saw them taking out the firstbody.

(26:51):
Yeah, I was so little but my dadwas like these, you know, my
dad was like, oh, they'repulling out a body, and that was
, you know, that was thebeginning of the boogeyman you
know.
For for us young kids, you'relike, oh, this is crazy to think
about what gary did in thosethe 80s, 90s and 2000s.

(27:13):
Um, it's just, it ismind-blowing.
I, just to this day, obviouslyhe, you know he will spend the
rest of his life incarcerated.
But I don't know how muchthey're going to get out of Gary
anymore On these field trips,if we're going to see any

(27:34):
results and say, hey, look, Idon't think that Gary can
probably remember.
I mean, I couldn't tell you.

Speaker 3 (27:42):
He wasn't a young guy .
When he got caught he wasn'told.
But he wasn't a young guy whenhe got caught.
Right, he wasn't old, but hewasn't young.
And now we've added decades on.
I don't believe he's hit his80s yet, but he I think he's in
his 70s, 70s, but he looks everybit of 70 something years old.
He has aged a ton, and so youyou also have that too.
Is his capacity still there?
I think it's been generallyaccepted and he has alluded to

(28:05):
that there were more that hejust couldn't even remember and
investigators have said theredefinitely are more.
So I think there's hope,because you know the, the what,
who he was going after werepeople who generally weren't
looked, looked after.
These are generally womenworking the streets and runaways
not tied to their family, andboys.
They're not tied to theirfamily anymore.

(28:26):
They're not checking in.
It could have taken years andthen it's just they just kind of
disappear.
Was there even a missing personreport put in in the first
place?
We don't know.
So when you have that, youcould just have somebody just
kind of vanish and never belooked at again, and so there's,
there's all you got people whonever did find a loved one and
wonder if it was because of him,or somebody just evaporates off

(28:47):
this earth.
It's harder to do that now thanit used to be, but it's
certainly.
It was certainly possible backthen.

Speaker 2 (28:53):
And I know that we've talked about this multiple
times too, about the.
You know the, the uptick of.
Oh my gosh, we have a serialkiller running around and I
still, to this day, I don't evenknow if they found anybody for
that 16 year old girl that theyfound on 509.
I haven't, you know, I haven't.
I mean especially Gary.
You look at, you know Ted Bundy, you know Wesley Allen Dodd the

(29:24):
list is very long for this area, but the Green River Killer
being so prolific in that timeperiod and then actually
catching him with you knowclearly the DNA of, you know the
paint and whatnot, to be ableto figure out what the profile,
very, very interesting to me.
What's your thoughts right now?

(29:46):
If you were just to say do wethink that this is going to,
that tika's case is going to goback in a spot where they're
going to continue to have verylittle to work with, I think, or
do you think that they're?

Speaker 3 (30:00):
I don't, so I don't know what.
When they say multi-pronged tip, right, and I you know some of
the stuff I put out I was a bitcritical of how I kind of
thought they handled the scene.
I'm not critical of theinvestigation or any of that,
and that level of detail is notat all needed in in in the
public.
They have every right to keepthings close, and so I don't
know the quality of the tip thatthey have or what the other

(30:22):
parts of that are or what elsethey're working with.
I really don't know.
I can tell you this.
So they are having a lot ofsuccess right now in cold cases,
more than we've ever had before, and some of that comes from
the ability, if there's alreadyevidence locked away, to be able
to go back and retest evidencethat was not thought to be
viable in the past.

(30:42):
Just in the last couple ofyears there have been massive
increases in what is a viablesample to test from Sure.
So you know we're going back to99.
I don't know what theirevidence locker looks like.
I have to imagine that they didcollect things back then and
there may be other people alongthe way that they had points of

(31:04):
interest in that if they wereable to eventually find her,
that then they can go back andtest to maybe get something.
It depends obviously, if shedid lose her life back then,
what that end-of-life processlooked like as far as what type
of samples would be availableand or viable.
But I feel more optimistic aboutcold cases now than I really

(31:25):
ever have, and it's reallybecause of the advances just in
DNA testing.
We may have even talked aboutit last time, you know the
testing facilities thatorchestrate those types of lab
settings are saying we arereally within a couple of years
from I don't think it will becost effective, but to a point
where officers in the fieldcould test a steering wheel for

(31:47):
whoever's touched that steeringwheel on DNA and get a result in
the field.
Wow, now I don't see withinmore years.
It's going to be many moreyears, I think, before they get
to a cost-effective way.
And there is still something tobe said, unless there's
advances in this where they canhave less controlled

(32:07):
environments, but those aregenerally done in very
controlled environments.
But in theory that's whatthey're getting to is in the
past you needed liquid ormoisture, right?
So fingerprints leave oils,things like that that you need
to be able to get, or you need askin flake, something that can
go into a beaker.
You can see it, even if ittakes a microscope and work with

(32:28):
that.
They're saying now that it maynot even be that deep anymore
with how quickly they're goingfrom.
In the past they needed youknow, think of OJ right Like
they needed a fair amount offluid to be able to test the.
Any of that they don't needhardly anything.

Speaker 2 (32:45):
That case itself is quite an interesting case on its
own, but so recently there'sbeen a lot of shootings, a lot
of shootings.
Man, it's wild right now.
Why is the Glock, the Glockswitch, becoming such the gun du
jour?

Speaker 3 (33:01):
yeah, so there's a couple things going on, and I
know that it's been talked abouta lot.
Homicides, in Seattlespecifically, are down this year
.
Now we're getting intosummertime.
I don't think you ever want tolook at a statistic within you
know three to four months oftime, but the numbers are down.
That is indisputable.
The numbers are downsignificantly.
But what we have seen going onfor some time, and we're seeing

(33:24):
it now, is the glock switch.
Is is basically a part that youadd on to a glock firearm.
A glock firearm there's asemi-automatic handgun right,
but the hammer is not.
You know a lot of.
Even when you slide a rail,what you're really doing is
pulling a hammer back.
It's just a smoother way thantaking your thumb and doing it.
Well, in a Glock, that's allinternal and that action the way

(33:46):
that works.
You can add on a part generallyknown as a switch or a Glock
switch.
That then makes it perform as afully automatic weapon.
Now, there's some downsides tothat too, not only at the amount
of fire rate.
That is not good for the public, but let's talk a little bit
more about this.
So if you look at an AR-15,whether that's single shot or

(34:08):
you have one that's actuallyautomatic.
You have.
You know you're up against ashoulder, you have a hand on a
trigger and you have a handforward.
You have three points ofcontact across that firearm to
hold it steady.
Those also shoot very smoothly.
But even on top of that shotgunany of that you have three
points of contact.
Generally you could be down toyour side maybe.
You have two points of contact.
You're always going to have atleast two, if not three, in a

(34:30):
handgun.
You now are one hand on there.
You may have one hand righthere.
You really have one point ofcontact to hold that weapon and
every time you fire it goes bamright.
And so hopefully, as you getbetter at shooting, if you're
practicing, you're gettingbetter at handling that recoil.
But every time you get torecenter and pull, when you use
a Glock switch and you are onjust this point, it basically

(34:52):
goes right.
You just kind of keep dealingwith recoil.
So that's where now, when wehave shootings like what just
happened in Pioneer Square,everything is getting hit.
We're even finding now theshooters themselves have tried
to deal with this by startingdown low.
They don't aim at the bottomNormally.
For those of you who don't know, I really like firearms.

(35:12):
I'm a big fan of firearms.
That's why I'm kind of gettingthis much into it.
But you know, a lot of timeswhen you aim you go for the box.
So you're going to aim straight.
You want to go for what's theeasiest part.
There's a lot of vital ifyou're, if you're in
self-defense or or if or ifyou're a killer, you're going to
be in the box because that'swhere all the big stuff is and
you got the best chance ofhitting.
They're now starting to aim nowat the feet, knowing it's going

(35:33):
to kick back.
So what we're finding isvictims with more leg wounds
because those first shots hit.
But the problem is then, as itcomes up, it just starts going
everywhere spraying yeah it isbelieved right now, the three
victims.
There was a mass shooting inseattle just this last weekend.
Uh, of the three victims, onlytwo may have been the intended

(35:53):
target.
The female was not the targetand there were shell cases,
shells in or bullets in wallsand windows all over the place.
And what happens is you gogenerally from, say, a nine
somewhere around their clip.
They're now using 20 and 30round clips.
So you have a glock now thatwould otherwise fit in your hand
and there's a, you know, a clipall the way down here to the

(36:14):
bottom.
It's longer this way now thanit is that way, right, and
they're emptying the entire clipin seconds.
Then they drop, put another onein again, and it just keeps.
And so now you're dropping 20,30 rounds time and time again,
and if you have multiple peoplewhich this one does appear to be
gang related you now haveupwards of four, five people all

(36:36):
pumping 20, 30 rounds at a time, and so in a matter of under 60
seconds generally under 30seconds you may have well over a
hundred rounds fired, and sothere's been a big uptick in
that.
We get a lot of shots fired,calls They'll go out there.
There's no victim.
They may be, not.
We're even aiming at somebody.
We're wanting to send a messageto somebody's house or whatever

(36:57):
, and they show up, they go.
We don't seem to have a victim.
Nobody's called in yet, there'snobody here.
But we have like 40 shellcasings on the ground and you
know, generally it's going to bea 9mm or something.
A Glock 9mm is a very popularhandgun and so that's where the
uptick has happened.
Now that is still indicative ofa lot of pent-up available

(37:18):
violence.
Thankfully, it is not turningout the amount of cold bodies in
the street, because I think alot of these shootings are much
more about messaging or peoplejust showing off.
They're driving around and it'sjust put out the window and
just keep on going, but theamount of rounds being fired is
really remarkable.
These switches do make it.
Now it is a federal offense Ifyou keep on going, um, but the
amount of rounds being fired isis really remarkable.

(37:38):
These switches do make it.
Now it is a federal offense.
If you put that on there now yougot to get caught, obviously.
But if you get caught with thatit, it changes everything.
Just having that alone if youget stopped by the police, you
are now looking at a federaloffense.
Yeah, so what that doesbasically is it keeps the keeps
that from fully going back andso it just kind of keeps
bouncing.
That's a very rough explanationfor it, but that piece where

(38:01):
you see that bar going throughthere that would normally go
completely forward and it'skeeping that from happening.

Speaker 2 (38:06):
So if you're not watching the show, you can go to
my website on airmariocom andyou can go back and watch the
video as well.

Speaker 3 (38:15):
Think of it similar to like a bump stock on an AR-15
.
Similar concept Now the weaponsthemselves and that was found
in the AR-15s with bump stocks.
When you have a semi-automaticAR-15, everything about it is
not really engineered to domachine gun fire.
Machine gun fire is a lot ofheat happening very fast.
You get the barrel can turn redhot very quickly.
You need a firearm that'sengineered for that, these
Glocks, because they're usinggenerally 30 round clips and

(38:37):
they're not sitting there justgoing where an AR-15, they may
want to throw a drum in there.
You're talking 50 to a hundredrounds.
Now you could actually look atthe weapon failing or becoming
next to impossible to be able toaim or operate the Glocks.

Speaker 2 (38:51):
I have not heard of that happening very often
because it's just a differenttype of shooter who's going out
with that and not as many roundsyou know when, when people are
out here in the, in the, in thenight club industry, you know
going out to, you know,obviously a much younger crowd
is going to these nightclubs, um, and you know, being someone

(39:12):
who has been at a coupleshootings, three to be, uh, you
know to, to look back, it'sterrifying.
One in a nightclub, uh, and Iwas, you know, in the dj booth
for a broadcast and I was likeit is just, it is something if
you've never been a part of it.
It just it is not fun, andespecially in those types of

(39:34):
environments.
And what's what's really, whatis really terrifying.
What is going on right now,because of the amount of rounds
that are being dispersed, issomeone may catch a stray bullet
, and that seems to be the casewith the Federal Way incident as

(39:56):
well.
You know the young kid who mayhave caught in a stray bullet.
I would recommend and I knowthat our listeners are not
spending a lot of time in thesetypes of environments.
But you know, again, it'shappening right now and it seems

(40:17):
to be I don't want to say itthe new norm.
This is the new norm.
This is how people are gettingthings done.
But what's interesting to me,someone who kind of knows that
area very well.
There is now another newnightclub in Pioneer Square.
Is now another new nightclub inpioneer square?

(40:43):
Uh, so are there, you know younow, you, you have two
nightclubs within a half a blockof each other.
Where the shooting was.
The shooting was on secondavenue, roughly right as that
were a lot of um, yeah, betweennext stadium and that, yeah yeah
, and I know a lot of people arelike listening, like, oh, this
is not bigfoot, there's not ufo.
I mean, it's still somethingthat there's a loss of life and

(41:07):
and what we want to do iseducate people.
You know, educate your.
Maybe it's your grandchildrenthat are still going out to
these nightclubs, you know you,maybe you know somebody in their
20s, you know, let them know,say, hey, these are things that
you need to be looking for.
Uh, looking for and look, thatarea, relatively, is still being
reactivated and I know they'retrying to bring up that area um,

(41:31):
generally safe.
But again, when you get intothose late hours, you know we're
talking the 1 am hours.

Speaker 3 (41:40):
That's when the riffraff starts to show up and I
, yeah, they tried to roll outsome new rules now, just in this
last week.
I I'm not totally up to speedon all, but I believe it and it
involves the nightclubs now haveto provide a certain amount of
security.
They also have to provide acertain amount of video
surveillance.
I don't know.
What I haven't really seen iswhere these shootings are

(42:03):
happening really inside the club.
They're generally outside.
Is providing security to theinterior going to make a
difference?
I don't know.
Is better surveillance maybegoing to help in prosecution?
Sure, maybe catching suspects?
Sure, it's not on the front endgoing to stop any of this?
I think what you've got a betterchance is as you keep arresting

(42:24):
, and a lot of times too.
I don't want to give up toomuch on one that just came in.
There was an arrest hererecently on one.
These shooters are not justhaving one time, they're doing
this multiple times.
So if you do get one off thestreet and actually in custody,
the numbers do start to drop.
I can tell you with a highlevel of certainty that does
have to do with the drop inhomicides.

(42:45):
In seattle they pulled somepeople off who were involved in
much more than what they gotarrested for.
Interesting.
When you see that type of drop.
It's indicative of that.
I've seen the people thatthey've arrested and seen who
they've been affiliated with.
It makes sense that the numberswere going to drop.
Some of the other things too,and there were a couple of
massive fentanyl busts that HSIgot involved with.

(43:06):
That netted some seriousnumbers and their amount of
firearms that they weredistributing out here.
Once that drops, it makes adifference.
You also see an immediateuptick and overdose and violence
as people now don't have theirmoney source and they can't pay
very serious people the moneythey owe, right, so they have to
make up that and then you startto see that decline and I do
believe that is part of it.

Speaker 2 (43:27):
I think there is a positive thing there that you're
seeing, but there are newup-and-comers so, as we continue
to talk with Foxtalk Steve 81,his handle, steve Hickey it's
time to talk about probably oneof the most not fun topics, and
I bring this up because I thinkthat it is a passion of yours.

(43:51):
I think that anyone who is afamily, who has kids, I don't
think it's talked about enough.
I know that there have beenthings that have been put in
place, steve.
I know that when we talk aboutthe war on drugs, I mean we know
that there is buckets of cashthat goes to that.

(44:15):
But let's talk about what isprobably one of the most ugliest
cases and we're not talkingabout Diddy, because we won't go
there but Internet CrimesAgainst Children.
I know this has been a passionof yours.
Where did it kind of start?

Speaker 3 (44:34):
for those who may be listening for the first time,
yeah, so I started out reallyfocusing on just kind of crime
stuff.
I love this place, I loveliving here.
I choose to live here.
It's not a terrible place.
My mind kind of works well forthat.
It's very linear type factualreporting so it works well in
the crime space.
And as I started going throughit I started running across what

(44:57):
are called ICAC cases.
So ICAC is a task force,internet Crimes Against Children
task force.
What ICAC really is yougenerally have a lead agency In
this area it is Seattle Policebut then multiple other agencies
around have a detective or twodetectives who are then assigned
to help in that and it's agroup of individuals who are

(45:18):
specially trained.
They also do other things.
Kind of think of it like a SWATcop.
That cop's usually out doingcop stuff, whatever their
day-to-day is answering calls.
They also get a special pagewhen there is a SWAT call and
ICAC's kind of that.
They are detectives who alsospecialize in the thing and so
where a lot of their work comesfrom is tips and they'll get

(45:39):
tips from platforms saying hey,we think that there's been CSAM,
which is sexually abuse,sexually child sex abuse
material is CSAM that we haveseen being transferred.
Here's the IP addresses and theusers involved and they follow
on those.
They also get a lot of tips toowhen you have stuff happening

(46:01):
in town and a detective hearsabout something and goes, hey,
this is probably more of an ICACcase.
They're generally not handlingthe familial relationships If
you have a father doingsomething like that, unless he's
distributing content from thoseactions.
That's not what they'retouching.
So they go and handle all ofthis stuff.

(46:24):
And as I started getting into itmore, I think there were a
couple things that and Irealized kind of how naive I was
.
I think in my mind you thinkthat's so much.
We realize that there's peoplehere doing things, but you think
that the majority of that typeof activity where you have in
these rings of peopleparticipating this must be
happening in other parts of theworld and that it's just a
financial motivation for them.
And what I found is, as I'veworked this more, the number one

(46:47):
producer of c-sam is the unitedstates of america.
The number one consumer ofc-sam is the united states of
america and there's a fewreasons why that probably is
Number one.
We have a lot of, you know.
We are a wealthy nation.
We have a lot of children witheasy access to electronic
devices, and that means thenaccess and those people then

(47:10):
have access to them if they'retaking advantage of that
situation.
There has also been some studiesrecently and I'm not, you know,
these are not fringe studies,these are looked at through ICAC
and there's also other groups Idon't want to say ICAC's the
only one, but they're usuallywho you're going to deal with at
a local level that have shownthat hormones in the food in the
United States and I'm not thisis not a pro-hormone, anti, this

(47:33):
isn't meant to be a healthconversation but just simply
hormones and the food havechildren developing differently
in this area, but that has ledother parts of the world to want
c sam produced in the us aswell because of the way that
these children are developing.
And they started finding thisas they would have international
cases that would come in andour detectives are struggling to

(47:54):
get the ages correct on thosevictims, because when they, when
they get somebody's cache of ofcontent, sure they have to
review all of this stuff andthey have to decide what the age
of the victim is and so on, andthen, as they would have other
countries do the same thing withus, everybody was getting the
ages wrong, and that's when theystarted realizing they're
developing much differently.
But all that being said, um,you know, I found just finding

(48:15):
out right there that we are thenumber one producer and consumer
.
I'm thinking I'm a father.
How did I not know this?
Was I just discounting it,wanting to think it doesn't
happen?
Sure, as I started looking intothese cases more, I think you
know we're kids of the 80s.
Usually, in the past, you alwaysthought it was the creepy guy
in the van.
Yeah, it's not.
These are your neighbor, yourchild's teacher, your coworker.

(48:42):
They're leading otherwiseseemingly productive, functional
lives, and they have thiscomponent of that life that you
know, and there has been debateas to when or where this starts.
What's motivating this?
Because the numbers seem to beup.
I think the general consensusis that we're not creating more
people who want to participatein this.
What we have created, though,is opportunity, and so more are

(49:04):
willing to go into this world,and then they're able to
communicate with each other.
Think of prison.
When you send people to prison,they talk with other people who
have been convicted of thecrime, and they usually come out
a little bit savvier.
How to not get caught.
The difference here is go backto the creepy uncle of the
creepy guy in the van analogyfrom the 80s.
He probably didn't have anybodyelse he was talking to.

(49:24):
He had maybe one person hefound with a common interest.
Now they are able to gettogether in chat rooms and talk.
It's gotten so bad.
Now we are seeing in KingCounty in-person viewing parties
.
Somebody gets in King Countyin-person viewing parties.
Somebody gets new content.
They meet physically in thesame place to then watch it
together.
Now, outside of absolutelydiscussing that sound, why that

(49:51):
matters most is that is amassive escalation in a comfort
zone for them.
In the past they would neverwant to be in any such thing and
have others know who they are,let alone a group of people know
who they are.
And so when I started seeingthat, I was like I really want
to start focusing more on this.
So what I have discovered nowin doing these cases and they're
pretty harsh for those of youwho may not have heard my stuff,
I do.
I tell these stories bluntly,but I'm not interested in

(50:15):
desensitizing the public, uh,re-victimizing victims or doing
it just for shock value.
It is it, it is thought through, but it is not meant to be an
easy, easy lesson, but we do tryand soften it a bit.
But we are seeing now, lawshave not caught up to this.
This is kind of where thepassion of the work is going and
why I put so much effort intothis.

(50:36):
I want to put purpose to thiswork.
If all we do is just maybeinform people or get people
worked up over something, but wedon't change anything, then
what's the point and what I amfinding now?
I'll give you two separateexamples Again, without getting
too deep into it.
I had a case recently where aman had been arrested, and I had

(50:59):
a case recently where a man hadbeen arrested and what put him
over the top is he was watchinglive streams of children being
really brutally victimized.
But it wasn't happening in theroom he's in.
It's happening somewhere in theUSA.
It could even be theoreticallyin the same state.
It's not some internationalthing, but somewhere in the USA
could even be theoretically inthe same state.
It's not some internationalthing, but somewhere USA.
And this falls into this weirdcategory and we've seen cases in

(51:24):
the past where a woman is beingan adult woman is being harmed
and nobody steps in.
But you really have the onesuspect who has harmed her or
raped her.
The others didn't participate,they just turned a blind eye and

(51:44):
so so generally, the othersaren't charged.
Sure, there is not a law rightnow that that is meant for live
streaming services for thepeople who view, and these
people may even participate inmaking requests of what they
want to see happen in real timebut the law isn't caught up.
These laws were designed beforethat technology was there.
The only reason that this mangot caught and what he
ultimately got charged for was,as I'm sitting here at a desk

(52:05):
looking at a laptop.
He's basically here, he iswatching, he is pleasuring
himself and he decides, as he'sbeen doing this, he wants to
create new content of himconsuming the content.
So he has a camera over hereoff to the side, kind of
silhouette of him in the screen.
Well, not only is he despicable, he's also really stupid, and

(52:28):
on his desk is his W-2.
He's a Boeing employee and hisW-2 is on his desk.
It has his name, his address,his employer and his social
security number.
At some point he moves, itzeroes in on that.
It's now caught.
He doesn't realize that and hedistributes that.
He got charged with distributionhe got charged with.
I believe he had possession ofsome other stuff, but really
what he got was a manufacturingand distribution charge.

(52:51):
In my eyes, he participated inthe rape of a child.
What he got charged with wasmanufacturing and distribution,
and this is a simple thing thatcould be solved, but we haven't
had to solve it before.
So there's that one there.
Another one what I'm about to dohere very shortly involves a

(53:13):
man who did have CSAM materialsconsiderable amount of c-sam
material and he's using an appthat is available to everybody,
that you can take your face andput it on somebody else's body
and we've seen this type ofstuff when you're making memes
and things like that.
He is taking pictures of peoplein his real life, taking their

(53:34):
face and putting it on the bodyof the children.
So what he really got chargedwith was he had possession of
material that he was thenaltering.
Not the altering is the crime,but putting that on there.
So my first thought is wait aminute.
I've been doing this enough.
I know a couple of things.
Number one one of the biggestsources of tips to ICAC are the

(53:57):
social media platforms.
They can catch that stuff inDMS very, very easily through
automated systems.
They're not having to havesomebody sit there and watch it.
All it triggers they validatetip goes in Right.
These apps as I started lookinginto this particular app
company and I'm still trying toget a statement out of them
actually advertise within sitessuch as pornornhub, saying you

(54:20):
can put your face on thesepeople and what they do is they
download the app for free andthen they buy coins.
There's actually a financialtransaction for them to have
enough coins to continue tocreate this stuff and my
frustration, right there, isokay, let's, for just a half a
second, give them the passive.
Okay.
This is an for just a half asecond, give them the passive,
okay.
This is an unintendedconsequence.
Let's get this caught up.

(54:42):
This has already been proven tobe an issue and you should have
known.
It's step one.
All of the other platforms havemade that this made sure that
this was not possible, and youare.
You are not only letting thishappen, but you are advertising
in a place, giving people thatthought process.
You didn't put in your ad thatyou can use this this exact way,
but you pretty well walked themto it, and so that again shows

(55:04):
okay, we need to have a new law.
I think we need to start.
When you have organizationsAlso with AI I want to throw
this in there too.
Ai platforms, where you can nowcreate other types of images,
those platforms already havesafeguards in place to make sure
that this can't happen.
Other types of images thoseplatforms already have
safeguards in place to make surethat this can't happen.
This particular organization,which really is AI, doesn't.
They don't seem to care.

(55:24):
They've been called out beforeand they're still doing it.
And for a direct financialprofit, go ahead.
I'm sorry.

Speaker 2 (55:31):
Our guest, steve Hickey.
Photog.
Steve81, you know, for thosewho are listening, are probably
freaking out.
They're like, oh, oh, my god,my kid has an iPad.
My kid has this and, you'reright, our kids do.
They're connected.
The great thing is that thereare apps within these different

(55:52):
platforms that you're able tomonitor.
You can you can have fullparental control of your child's
iPad, iphone, whatever thedevice may be.
It doesn't have to be an Appledevice, it can be any device and
you can have full control.
If you're questioning this,send us a text at 775-990-5151.

(56:18):
We'd be happy to help you out,or I'm happy to help you out and
put you in the right directionto make sure that you're able to
safeguard your children'sphones.
If that's something that youneed, send us a text.
We're happy to help you.
We'll touch base with you.
It's interesting, steve.
When we talk about these things,it's not fun.
I mean, this is the ugly stuffthat really makes my skin crawl

(56:44):
and that the laws haven't, youknow, continued to evolve
because it's ever-changing sofast.
It's very fluid and the lawshaven't caught back up to where
we are at in the consumption ofhow people are consuming things
and if that's the case, whereyou know if what they are doing

(57:09):
is criminal intent.
Then we got to.
You know, we got to stay on topof making and making sure that
one, our kids, understand whatthey're, what they're doing on
the internet, how to stay awayfrom people who you know may be
trolling and things like that onthese social media platforms
and making you feel good and,you know, giving you likes and
clicks for you know the thedumbest things.

(57:31):
Um, you know it's a generationof you know what hip move I, as
I sit here and almost throw myback out on what you know tiktok
move, that we, you know, dancewe're doing.
But to keep our kids off ofsome of these social media
platforms as long as humanlypossible.

(57:52):
It is so challenging for today'syouth.
They think they need it andit's it's, it's available to
them.
You know they want to.
Everyone wants to be a YouTubesensation.
They want to be a TikToksensation.
They want to make that.
You know that viral dollar.
You know to make that.
You know that viral dollar, youknow.
And you know maybe your kiddoes have a niche, a niche and

(58:17):
they're able to.
You know, maybe they're able totake evidence and find
sasquatch hair in the wildernessor you know they.
They have this thing wherethey're able to make connections
with u.
You know aliens, or whateverthe case may be, whatever their
content may be, it is sodifficult, once you get past
that threshold, to allow them tohave access.

(58:40):
It is a whole other world outthere.

Speaker 3 (58:44):
I would add too you know I had one just recently
that I did.
A Kitsap County medicalexaminer death investigator with
that organization has beencharged with molesting a
13-year-old girl, which isterrible.
He also basically admitted thathe did it to investigators and
to the family.

(59:05):
Wow, the reason I pointed outis what really stuck out to me
in that one was what he had doneto the girl.
It was clear she knew she couldgo to her family and say this
just happened to me and thatthey would come around her and
protect her.
And I don't know them, Ihaven't talked, but I didn't get

(59:27):
the sense.
Sometimes I think all parentsdon't want that to happen.
Sometimes, when your kids comeand tell you something, that
they get involved with thatimmediate reaction to get angry,
even though you're workingtowards, okay, we're here
together, but it's like, well,how did this?
How could you stop?
If your child is scared to comeand tell you this, even if they
know eventually you'll comeback to the, you know, as you go

(59:47):
through the cycle of this andcome back and they were you need
to stop and realize that.
They need to know that you'regoing to extrapolate that well
then, you shouldn't have beenthere you should have whatever.
And it's not intentional Idon't believe parents are

(01:00:16):
intentionally but you are makingsure your child is probably not
going to come to you.
They're going to want to hideit.

Speaker 2 (01:00:20):
Sure, and I think we live in a day and age where
ruling by an iron fist I'm not,you know, I'm not telling you
how to raise your kids, buthaving the open dialogue with
your children.
In regards to, you know theday-to-day activities, but let
alone social media, if you'reallowing your children to have

(01:00:41):
these platforms, you know how doyou police it, how do you guide
them, because there is so muchcontent available and you go
down the wrong path and nextthing, you know, you have a
whole other plate and a wholeother circumstances.

Speaker 3 (01:00:58):
It's also difficult when you have teenagers.
We all can remember when wewere teenagers and we thought we
were just adults withoutdriver's licenses, we thought we
could handle it all.
And it isn't until you getolder and you see people who are
the, who are the same age, thatyou can think of that happening
going.
That's a child.
Yeah, I couldn't make thosedecisions back.
I thought I could, I veryconfidently thought I could, and

(01:01:18):
there's not a chance.
And so, remembering that andand you know, I think it's so
easy to try and say, well, youshouldn't have been doing this
or you shouldn't have been there.
Why weren't you home, have beenthere, why weren't you home?
That's another thing.
I think.
If you have a child, you know, Ihave read these where the child
broke curfew and then got intoa situation and didn't want to
go to their parents because theywere worried about the

(01:01:39):
consequence of what got them inthat place.
I'm not saying you've got togive your kids a pass, and I
can't speak to every scenario,sure, but as a parent, you have
to at least say hey, yeah, thereare consequences when you break
the rules.
By the way, if something, to acertain level happens to you,
that all goes aside.
Yeah, we're going to getthrough that right and maybe

(01:01:59):
sometime down the road, yeah,we're going to talk about that
thing, but I am the place youcan go when this happens without
any fear.

Speaker 2 (01:02:09):
If someone has a tip or they know something, they
really should go to the websiteof ICAC and make an anonymous.

Speaker 3 (01:02:21):
Yeah, there's a couple ways you can do it.
So number one if you think youhave a child who has been a
victim or if you think you are avictim, the easiest way is
still go through local lawenforcement.
It would be a 911 call.
They will then make thereferral and it can happen very
quickly.
That case of the medicalexaminer it was a dispatch 911
call and within an hour theyalso realized that this death

(01:02:42):
investigator worked with thatlocal agency.
They not only got it to ahigher level, they got it to an
outside agency and had adetective over there within like
45, 60 minutes.
They move very quickly on this.
Um, if you think that, uh, youknow, you just have a tip, you
have somebody you were concernedabout, yeah, go, you can look
at the ICAC page, you'll get it.
But really, icac operatesbecause of the local agencies

(01:03:04):
that they're attached to Sure.
So you're still probably goingto go through that intake of
9-1-1, something like that,unless you, you know you really
have.
Oh, I think something happenedsome time ago or I heard
somebody got arrested recentlythat I think I've had.
I've had that a lot um, where Ido a story on somebody and then
potential victims from theirpast come up and say that person

(01:03:26):
was my teacher, my whatever,and there were things happening
back then.

Speaker 2 (01:03:30):
And then I usually say yeah, you should really
probably contact investigatorsat that point a couple cases
that you worked on that havebeen probably, I would say,
trending stories that um havebeen posted on on on your social
platforms.
Uh, one would be the, as wetalk about the icac um, was
there any more information otherthan the guy that went to the

(01:03:54):
um?
The taquilla case, where theguy went down to the um, to the
hotel, to to meet the mom andall that was there.
Anything else that came out ofthat other than you know not
much you know I have been stilltrying to work on more on that.

Speaker 3 (01:04:08):
We're going to start doing some records requests just
to see what we can put together.
What unfortunately happens andI've talked to people close to
that case when the suspect isdead, the resources dry up
really pretty quickly.
There's no risk of more victimsand even for the past victims
there's really not much elsethat they can do.

(01:04:29):
The person's no longer here andso the justice system doesn't
really have a mechanism for thatand all of these agencies have
more caseload than they knowwhat to do with.
So there were a lot of thingsthat he was believed to be
involved with but they were notable to continue to pursue.
But I plan on going backthrough.
I want to learn more what wasin his vehicle when they got a

(01:04:51):
hold of it, learn more of hisblood alcohol level.
I want to get reports on that.
That thing had an end.
It had a closure, but there wasa lot of potential what that
man was there to do.

Speaker 2 (01:05:05):
And he was the one that lived in Port Orchard.
Is that right?

Speaker 3 (01:05:08):
That's right he lived in Port Orchard.
And he was the one that livedin Port Orchard.
Is that right?
That's right.
He lived in Port Orchard.
He was the medical director forGuantanamo Bay under Bush and
Obama.
Okay, high-functioningindividual yeah, had crushed it
in his professional life, butappeared to have this part of
him that he had been placating,he'd been satisfying for years,

(01:05:31):
and they believe that it wasn'tjust when he lived here.
This was all over, you know,he'd been all over the world uh.

Speaker 2 (01:05:37):
The other case uh was uh, the gentleman who may have
had a, an arrangement with ayoung woman that was uh.
Then uh found dead.
Uh, she, I, I believe that shewas.
I wasn't sure if she was a, ifshe worked at the nightclub as a
dancer.
Has anything come from that one?

Speaker 3 (01:05:59):
Yeah, that was the ex-Bothel City Council member.
So you know, these things havea lot.
They get really intense and weall jump on it.
We start telling the story andthen it just nosedives because
it goes in the legal system andthat's not a bad thing.
These cases take a lot of time.
Um, different actions.
Good example here differencebetween that and an ICAC case.
So I can, I can tell you thisIf ICAC comes and knocks on your

(01:06:20):
door, uh, and they start askingyou questions, they know the
answer to every single one.
They've been looking at you forsome time.
It's kind of like any federalcase when the feds come after
you.
They've been looking at you forsix months or a year.
They know things about you youforgot.
When you get into a situationwhere that man has killed that
young lady, they didn't knowanything about this until the
day there's a body and sothere's all that catch-up time.

(01:06:43):
So then to even get it readyfor court can take months, and
that's really where that one is.
It's got a long time leftbefore it's going to actually
start going through the courtprocess, um, where usually you
know, like I said, when you getcharged by the feds, you're
probably in front of a judge.
You're probably in trial withinthe next 60 days.
They're ready to go.
Yeah, your, your defenseattorney's the one going.

(01:07:03):
Hey, let me catch up.
But they're at 99 convictionrate.

Speaker 2 (01:07:06):
It's just a very different process, sure um, I'm
trying to think of any othercases that we you know that were
huge at that point in time.
It's unfortunate that there aresome cases.
Are you going to be doing morecold cases?

Speaker 3 (01:07:20):
um, yeah, I I might.
So I personally I would love to.
I think that they're verydifficult to produce.
There's tons of information togo through, years of it.
The production side is verydifferent.
I think it will be long format.
I would love to dive into it.
It's finding resources.
It is really hard to monetizethese types of operations like I

(01:07:42):
have.
There's a reason.
It's really just me.
It's hard to scale up and it'shard to scale up.
So eventually, yes, I wouldlove to.
I don't know when that willhappen.
I think what I could continue todo is insert myself into cases
like this where there is somebig thing that happens, get a
lot more people paying attentionto it and then hopefully pass

(01:08:02):
the baton on to the other truecrime type of people.
King 5, not that I ever want tobe pat, you know, telling
people to watch competition, butking fives actually does a
really great cold case series.
It's well produced, um, it'swell put together.
They've also most of thosecases that they're working or
cases they've covered in thepast.
So they've already got a warchest of footage and they're

(01:08:25):
really good at working throughthat stuff.
So, um, you know I'm kind ofbeing sarcastic, but I want to
they're.
They're a great organizationfor that type of thing yeah,
check it out.

Speaker 2 (01:08:33):
Yeah, their local unsolved mystery show that they
uh, yeah, I thought for a momentthat that show had gone away
but it is still running, so goodfor them.
I.
I think it's good that peopleget a you know, kind of a
re-enlightenment or refresh ofwhat stories may have been going
on in the Pacific Northwest atthat point in time and then, to,

(01:08:54):
you know, bring back some ofthese cases that maybe people
forgot of Again, like one, forexample, is the DB Cooper case,
another one from the PacificNorthwest, and obviously that
you know, to this day alleged.
You know stories have gonethrough that it could be this
person, it could be that personand you know, I I think right

(01:09:15):
now everyone is pointing back toRichard McCoy who passed away,
his wife finally passed away,and now his kids are saying, oh,
we have, you know, evidence ofthe parachute.
So all these different storiesand that one being huge back in
the day, yeah, I've seen some ofthe stuff that King 5 has done
on that local Unsolved Mysteriesshow.

(01:09:37):
Very, very well put togetherthey do.

Speaker 3 (01:09:39):
I like too.
When you go back and you watchsome of that, all of us like to
think it was so picturesque backin the day and these things
didn't happen.
The numbers don't support that.
There was a lot going on.
There always has been, and Ithink it's good sometimes to go
back and go oh, that's right,there was those things going on.
We did have serial killers, wedid have.
You know, I don't think we'recalling gun violence, I think it

(01:10:00):
was just called gang violenceback in the day.
The verbiage has changed.
But uh, to say that somehowthis place is just in this
absolute state of unrest andit's just this shithole is just
not factual and the numbersdon't support it.
It evolves.
As a population we've evolved.
As citizens we've evolved, andas a culture we've evolved and

(01:10:22):
we have more people living herethan we ever have before.
I think crime rate matters.
I don't have the statisticssitting here at my fingertips,
but our crime rate is actuallyreally pretty, especially
compared to all the other areasin the country.
We have one of the best crimerates there is.

Speaker 2 (01:10:36):
Yet somehow we get thought of as this lawless area,
and I think people reallyshould make a distinction
between major crimes and pettycrime, and I think our lower
level crime is absolutely up,but the stuff that really
affects our day today, oursafety, is going to be more in
the major crime category and Ifeel like I'm starting to see

(01:10:57):
this in the, in the in the city,is you're starting to see a lot
of movement in regards to andthis is always an ugly topic of
of of homeless people beingmoved around and kind of cleaned
up, and I'm not saying that,you know, to sweep away the
homeless from an area WestSeattle, you know, fremont

(01:11:18):
neighborhoods.
These areas aren't sustained,they're not great places for
them to be held up.
You know, I know that there wasan encampment off of 15th.
As you're going to the BallardBridge, that is gone, going to
the West Seattle Golf Course,there was an encampment there
that is gone now.

(01:11:39):
So they're pushing but they'realso making limits to where
people can hang out.
They cannot be in the properjunction.
It was told to me that theycan't be up there hanging out,
um, at certain times of thenight and during the day, um, so
the evolution of themcontinuing to be to move, I

(01:12:00):
don't want to say you know it'slike shuffling the cards and
like just keep moving and keepmoving.
Uh, you know, even when youtalk about soto and and that
area being kind of continuing tobe worked and cleaned up, and
you know you're not seeing theyou know the white house anymore
.

Speaker 3 (01:12:17):
That was the encampment there and and I joked
because that was something thatyou saw on on a social media
platform like ish seattle lookslike ish or whatever had been
posting and doing drive-bys byyou know this, this makeshift
white house, and I was like damnthat's I think there's still
also and you've seen it now,especially with the political

(01:12:39):
climate and so on we have localyou know, online media
influencers I guess we'll callthem who really are just into a
couple topics and they arereally trying to get the
attention of people on anational level.
They're not really evenspeaking to people locally as
much as they are speaking outand what they're trying to show
is all this place is the worstit's ever been, and for those of

(01:13:00):
us who live there realize, no,that's not the case, I think.
I think we're starting to workmore towards a manhattan model.
Manhattan in new york hassimilar homeless numbers than we
do.
They manage it very differentlyand they have a lot more
resources, and that is that iscapitalism in a way that most of
this country really can'tunderstand.
So the amount of availablerevenue is a whole nother world,

(01:13:21):
but they do not let that go outinto certain areas.
They will have a ton ofresources of shelter.
I don't know that anybody everthen exit that shelter to get
back into society, but they willnot be out on the street and I
feel like we're kind of goingthat direction where we're not
really going to solve anything,but we will make a different

(01:13:44):
perception to those who are outthere and I think that in itself
would probably be a successfulmove from, say, the mayor if
they can get to that.
And I think that in itself wouldprobably be a successful move
from, say the mayor if they canget to that, because I think
people are much more willing topay when they see a result.
But right now it really is ashift and the sweeps themselves
though they, I think they can bevery problematic for those who
are in them.
The amount of stuff that getscleared out from the jungle and

(01:14:07):
other areas like that it Istruggle to really get people to
truly understand how much stuffthat is out there.
And if you want to consideryourself to be an
environmentalist or concernedabout people, you can be
concerned about somebody outthere on the street.
You can also be concerned whenthey're living in that, or we're
just letting that stuff pile upsix feet high out there, and

(01:14:28):
I'm not saying that to bedemonstrative, that's just what
it is.

Speaker 2 (01:14:32):
It very much is.
Yeah, very much.
And the other place too, lasVegas.
You don't see a lot of thehomeless population on the Strip
Like in years past.
You would go to the Strip andyou would see someone on a sky
bridge, and they really don'tlet that happen anymore.
You would go to this trip andyou would see someone on a sky
bridge and that they reallydon't let that happen anymore.
It is really much just a cleantouristy trap.

(01:14:55):
Now you're not.
I promise you.
You go to Vegas.
It is night and day difference.
You're not like every time I gothere for a conference, I'm not
seeing.
You're not.
I'm.
I'm not running into homelesspeople hanging out and if they
are on these sky bridges, policeare moving them.
They're getting moved.

Speaker 3 (01:15:11):
And I think you get more support from the people who
are paying the tax.
I think in recent years thefrustration has been you keep
saying you want more money,you've got more money than
you've ever spent on this and itseems to be the worst it's ever
been.
So I think it could also go inwaves.
I think if you can get thegeneral public to see some sort
of movement, then you can go andsay, okay, we've done that, now

(01:15:32):
we need to get to step two.
If you want to go from we havethe biggest problem we ever have
to, here's the ultimatesolution.
You're not going to get there.
It's got to start with okay,you, you, you, not.
You voted for me.
I came in.
Now you can go in parts of town.
Maybe you weren't able to, butwe didn't fix the problem.
We just fixed your trafficproblem.

(01:15:52):
Here's what we can do next.
But I've shown you I can dostep one.
Here's what two is, here's whatthree is, and you keep kind of
inching that along with results,and visual results matter.
I think that can almost be theunfortunate part.
You could maybe, behind thescenes, be doing great work.
If people can't see it or feelit, it really won't matter.
It won't sustainably matter.
You will lose your funding veryquickly and you will lose the
will of the people.
You have to give the visual,tactile change and then you can

(01:16:15):
start asking more.
And I think that's kind ofwhere more Manhattan has gone.
When I've gone out there andseen these spots, the amount of
resources for people.
They're not forcing people notto be homeless, they are giving
them daily pairs of cleanclothes, much cleaner shelter
space, much better ecosystem.
I don't think they're gettingthem out of there, but for

(01:16:37):
myself, I think, saying well, wewant to make it a protected
space for you to live on thesidewalk.
All you've done is let thatperson live in bondage.
That is not compassion.

Speaker 2 (01:16:46):
Yeah, our guests this evening.
Uh, photog steve 81.
Uh, steve hickey, it's always apleasure as we wrap things up
from the pacific northwest.
Um, anything you're working onthat you want to kind of share
before we uh head out?

Speaker 3 (01:17:02):
the big one's going to be that one on the face,
swapping out that one's going tobe an icac one.
I've got a number of of arrestsI'm going to go through.
We got one that nobody elsereally got out.
In Gig Harbor there was adouble homicide that there was
just an arrest on here this week.
A young man is suspected oftorching his dad and brother's
home, killing them both, and itoriginally just came in as a

(01:17:23):
house fire.
But we got somebody out there,noticed the ATF and more were
out there and thought this mightbe something.
And sure enough, here it is.
So we'll get on that.
I would suspect there'llprobably be in the next week
some other revelation in theTika Lewis case and then
otherwise back to the normalbusiness as usual and hopefully

(01:17:43):
we will get to an arrest in thatPioneer Square shooting.

Speaker 2 (01:17:46):
Oh, yeah, yeah.
Well, if anything breaks on thetika lewis, keep me, keep us
posted.
We I'm sure.
Um, it'd be very unfortunate if.
If you're, if you're hittingthis up, then it's.
It could be a conclusion, but Ihope.
I hope that she's out theresomewhere alive and you know
someone to this day.

(01:18:06):
Hopefully she's.
You know, it's just, you just.
You know it's very bleak and Ialways want to keep hope for
that.
In regards to her returning toher mom safely, but in most
reality that's not always thecase.
So, fingers crossed on that.
As we wrap things up.
From the Pacific Northwest, I'dlike to thank our guest Photog

(01:18:29):
Steve for hanging out with usthis evening.
If you have a suggestion for ashow, please send me an email at
mario at onairmariocom as wewrap things up.
From the Pacific Northwest, I'dlike to thank our guest Steve.
I'd like to thank MarkChristopher, sofia Magana and
myself.
Mario Magana, be sure to lookup at the sky, because you never

(01:18:49):
know what you.

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