June 21, 2025 • 30 mins
With Casefile on a short break, we thought this would be a great time to shine a light on some of the shows that may have flown under the radar for many of you. These are shows we've put our hearts into and are really proud of.
Today, we’re showcasing The Bakersfield Three. The Bakersfield Three is our most successful limited-run series to date. The series reached number one on the overall podcast charts in the U.S.—a first for any Casefile Presents show. If you’d like to hear the rest of The Bakersfield Three, just search for it wherever you get your podcasts. It’s a Casefile Presents production—created by the same team behind Casefile, with the same high standards you expect from us.
I hope you enjoy the series. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
Today, we’re showcasing The Bakersfield Three. The Bakersfield Three is our most successful limited-run series to date. The series reached number one on the overall podcast charts in the U.S.—a first for any Casefile Presents show. If you’d like to hear the rest of The Bakersfield Three, just search for it wherever you get your podcasts. It’s a Casefile Presents production—created by the same team behind Casefile, with the same high standards you expect from us.
I hope you enjoy the series. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
A cast recommends Hello, this is blind By.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Around every two years or so, I'm contractually obligated to
record an advertisement for my own podcast, the blind By Podcast.
I'm a writer and I like to use the podcast
space for writing. I write with my mouth for you
to read with your ears. I write about curiosity, and
I've delivered an episode every week for the past eight years.
(00:25):
I love doing it. If you want to listen to
do If you don't, I'm sure we'll be grand, but
most importantly, mind yourself. The blind By podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
A cast is home to the world's best podcast including
Crime World, The Other Hand, and the one you're listening
to right now.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
Hi, it's Casey here. A few days ago, we shared
something a little different here on the case File Feed,
episode one of our case File present series Missing Name.
The decision to do so came after I spent some
time chatting with case File listeners at our live shows
and discovered that a lot of them had no idea
(01:07):
what case File Presence actually is, or that we produce
other podcasts aside from Case File. I realized that if
someone is a big enough fan of case File to
attend a live show but hadn't heard of case File Presents,
then clearly we need to do a better job of
shining light on the other stories we've put a lot
of hard work into. For those who don't know, case
(01:31):
File Presents is our production platform. The main show we
produce is, of course, Case File, but we've also produced
a number of other podcasts. Our level of involvement varies
from show to show, but we've had a direct hand
in all of them, whether it be financing, research, production, editing,
or music. I even narrate a few of them myself.
(01:55):
With Case File on a short break, we thought this
would be a great time to spotlight some of the
shows that may have flown under the radar for many
of you. These are series we've put our hearts into
and are incredibly proud of. Today, we're showcasing the Bakersfield Three.
The story begins when two young friends go missing in California.
(02:18):
In between their disappearances, a third frand, is murdered. As
the case unfolds, the mothers of the trio take it
upon themselves to investigate. As they do so, they uncover
devastating revelations, including one that shakes their entire community to
its core. The series is hosted by Olivia La Voice,
(02:42):
an award winning journalist who spent five years reporting on
this case. When I first met Olivia, I immediately knew
I wanted to work with her. She's tenacious, empathetic and
shares the same core values that drive Case File presents,
giving voice to Victor and their families. What makes The
(03:03):
Bakersfield Three so unique is that Olivia wasn't looking back
on this story after the fact. She was there from
the beginning, reporting in real time as events unfolded on
the ground. For every twist, turn and shocking reveal, and
trust me, there's one twist in particular that you won't
see coming. The Bakersfield three is our most successful limited
(03:28):
run series to date. The series reached number one on
the overall podcast charts in the US, a first for
any Case File present show. To put that in perspective,
case File itself has only reached as high as number
three in the US. Bakersfield three spent extended time at
(03:49):
the top, also reaching number one in Australia and charting
highly around the world. So far, the series has been
downloaded over twelve million times. We're incredibly proud of this
show and if you missed it, when it first came
out in late twenty twenty three. Now is the perfect
time to jump in. We're releasing episode one here on
(04:12):
the case file feed. If you like what you hear,
you can find the rest of the series by searching
the Bakersfield three wherever you get your podcasts now Here's
episode one.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
There's no way two friends just go missing within a
month of each other.
Speaker 5 (04:35):
Somehow, someway I know they're connected.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
It's a haunting mystery, one that seems to grow more
complex and dark the disappearance of Michael Holsenbak and Bailly Despot.
Speaker 6 (04:45):
And in between those two disappearances, a murder in a
Bakersfield neighborhood where crime is rather rare.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Is it three mysteries or one?
Speaker 6 (04:54):
These three people knew each other and they're all either
at this point dead or missing.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
There's something big about what's going on.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
There's something something crazy about this case.
Speaker 7 (05:06):
They gotta finder of older when last time, even if
it is just.
Speaker 5 (05:10):
Her bones, We're just trying to find out where they are.
Just some money, Tell me where they are and we'll
go get them. I will go dig, I will go dig,
and I will find them.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Working in Bakersfield as a local news reporter was a
unique time in my life. I had a hunger and
drive I don't think could ever be replicated. I was
a twenty something making no money, working often obscenely long hours,
completely by choice, eating almost strictly microwave meals and fast food,
and spending way too much time making sure my fake
(05:49):
eyelashes and hair were just right. I look back on
the days right where heels and a dress while knocking
on doors in a rough neighborhood in over one hundred
degree heat to find someone who'd give me a SoundBite
describing hearing gunshots, which by the way, is almost always
the same. I thought it was fireworks at first, and
(06:09):
every time I'd get the SoundBite, it was an accomplishment
for maybe all of five minutes until the next breaking
news event happened, and I loved every second of it.
I lived and breathed it and felt a sometimes maddening
need to be first, which is kind of the name
of the game in local news, trying to break the
(06:30):
big story, meaning you're the first reporter to uncover the information.
When I first started, I envisioned myself going to a
local bar after work where there'd be a group of
deputies having beers, they'd welcome me to join them, and
I'd end up leaving every night with a big scoop.
But that never happened, not even close. I quickly learned
(06:52):
that usually if there's a significant event like a homicide
or armed robbery, all of us reporters hear about it
at the same time through the police scanners we have
blaring in the newsrooms twenty four to seven. We then
all race out to the scene, elbowing each other, trying
to get as close to the yellow tape as possible.
(07:13):
My old news director, Mike try he used to say,
you make your own luck, so we'd persist with the
ritual of digging, coming up empty, and trying again another day.
A built in part of that routine for me at
seventeen News was to go to the courthouse once a
week and look through search warrants. Doing this probably hundreds
(07:33):
of times. I can only think of a few instances
when I found a search warrant that was to put
it simply, anything good, anything we'd put on the news.
Ninety nine percent of the time, any search warrants pertaining
to a case the media would report on are sealed
by law enforcement. It's rare that one slips through the
cracks and you're lucky enough to find it. Despite all this,
(07:58):
something kept bringing me back to court to look through them,
still having that glimmer of hope that one day I
would find something big. That day came in early summer
of twenty eighteen, though just how big no one could
have known. Then. I'm Olivia la Voice and this is
(08:22):
the Bakersfield Three going through my stack. That day, I
(08:49):
started thumbing through a warrant that was for a crime that,
on the surface seemed pretty dull, an investigation into a
felon being in possession of a firearm. There's nothing newsworthy
of a felon having a gun when they're not supposed to.
It happens all the time. It's illegal, yes, but not
significant enough to report on. This warrant, though, was different
(09:12):
because of one little sentence that mentioned a missing woman
who I'd later learned was named Bailey Despot. It then
went on to describe a man named Arturo coming home
while his wife was out of town and finding something odd.
Here's our Turo to explain.
Speaker 8 (09:27):
I seen bags in my front door, and I was like, wow,
this is my wife home supposed to be go on
like the next day, and I said, well, maybe she's
surprising me. That's what I thought. But the closer I
got to the door, I noticed that that was not
her luggage, and I was like, okay, that's weird. And
I looked down and there was a note and it said,
(09:50):
tell baby that I love her, but I cannot be
with her.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Arturo knew Bailey as a friend of his sons from
high school. He recalled his son recently telling him that
no one had heard from Bailey for several months.
Speaker 8 (10:05):
It kind of stung me a little bit, like, well,
she's missing. Wife's her bags here. So I called him
and I go, son, I go, it's Bailey here. And
he was like what and he goes, no, she's not here.
I go, her bags are here in the front. He goes,
what are her bags doing? I said, I do not know.
He goes, well, let me call her mom and find out.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Soon after, Bailey's mother, Jane, showed.
Speaker 8 (10:30):
Up and I had never met her, and we're talking.
She goes, yeah, this is her stuff. So she studied
going through her bags, and poor lady, she was so emotional,
like this is what I gave her for her birthday.
This is what I gave her last year. And I mean,
she was just crying. I was just like overwhelmed. And
she's like, well, who dropped them off? And I said,
I don't know. So we went through my cameras and
(10:53):
finally I found the footage of who.
Speaker 7 (10:57):
Dropped them off. I'm like, oh my god, that's Queen
and he's got a gun.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Bailey's mother, Jane, recognized the man, Matt Queen, as the
guy she refuses to call her daughter's boyfriend. But it
seems for all intents and purposes, he was. And here
he was about a month after Bailey vanished, dropping off
her things at a friend's home. That really seems like
a random choice. And when he dropped her belongings off,
(11:23):
as shown in the surveillance video, he was armed.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
The gentleman he put up to the door, and of
course nobody was here. We're all work. So he puts
the bags down. Then he goes back to a suburban
and then he comes back. He gets the letter and
he says it on the back, but when he bends
over to set the letter down, his sweater picks up
(11:48):
and he had a gun on his back and mean,
Jean was like, Wow, we're just stung, like one of
us was to be home, Like what what the outcome
would have been? I don't know.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Jane called the police immediately after seeing the video for themselves.
Investigators went to Matt Queen's house to speak with him,
where they found a loaded gun, which, legally, as a felon,
he can't have. Queen wasn't in jail for long, just
a few days before he made bail, but this warrant
described how after his arrest he called his wife from jail. Yes,
(12:22):
as I'd later find out, Queen had his wife and
Bailey living with him under the same roof. We'll get
more into that later. When Queen called his wife after
his arrest that day, he told her to come get
some things from his car before the cops could.
Speaker 9 (12:38):
Behind the DRIVERSY is a backpack gray and black?
Speaker 4 (12:43):
Is there?
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Yeah?
Speaker 9 (12:46):
Okay, pay that in the house and better packet all
the letters and everything with all the evidence. Yea, And
she left it gained a lion hit all she wrote
about her mom left you the phone too. If nap cut,
if still on that phone, you don't have to act
if if you open it, it all climbed like arian
(13:11):
so that Jane is not lying and they be a
crazy person.
Speaker 1 (13:15):
It appeared Queen was telling his wife in the backpack
there was evidence that quote she left she being Bailey.
He referenced letters and a phone with a Snapchat account
that would show Bailey's mom Jane acting crazy. It seems
at that point Queen sense detectives were looking at him
for Bailey's disappearance, and he blamed Jane for that. In
(13:39):
addition to the letters and phone, Queen also asks his
wife to see if his tools are there yet.
Speaker 9 (13:47):
Told this okay, and he had to take the job
right away.
Speaker 7 (13:53):
I gotta go get him go right now.
Speaker 9 (13:56):
That you know they listened to everything out there right now, helliyah.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
They Queen told his wife to go get his brother
and to have him take the quote tools in his
car to the dump right away. It sounded suspicious, of course,
so according to the search war and I'd found, detectives
wanted to search Queen's home, vehicles, and phone for evidence
that he could be involved in the manufacturing of illegal firearms.
(14:25):
Seemed pretty obvious to me that sure, maybe if police
discovered evidence of that, it'd be a bonus. But what
they were really after was evidence pertaining to the missing
woman he'd been living with, Bailey. I thought looking at
him for illegal guns was just their way in, and
having this warrant was my way into the story. I
(14:46):
remember when I first saw Bailey's photo. She's striking, tall, slender,
with long, dark hair, and big green eyes. There was
something classic and effortless about her beauty. She stood out.
But as I looked at photos of her on Matt
Queen's Facebook page, what stood out even more was Queen's extensive, bizarre,
(15:07):
and somewhat fascinating social media presence. He had numerous posts
about looking for Bailey that included missing flyers he'd made
himself that said he last saw her getting into a
black SUV with a heavyset man. But what really caught
my eye were screenshot text messages he posted between himself
and Bailey's mother, Jane. One screenshot showed Queen sent this
(15:31):
text to Jane. At first, I thought you were simply
an over protective mother, and I respected that, But it
is now clear that Bailey was right all along. You
have a mental disorder, yes, Jane, I'm twice her age.
Get over it. Find something else wrong with me. You're
obsessed with Bailey and it's not healthy. I'm in love
(15:52):
with her, and if I'm not mistaken, she's in love
with me. Keep trying to drive a wedge between us,
it's only weakening the strength in yours.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
A cast recommends.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Hello, this is blind By. Around every two years or so.
I'm contractually obligated to record an advertisement for my own podcast,
The blind By Podcast. I'm a writer and I like
to use the podcast space for writing. I write with
my mouth for you to read with your ears. I
write about curiosity, and I've delivered an episode every week
(16:28):
for the past eight years. I love doing it. If
you want to listen to If you don't, I'm sure
we'll be grand, But most importantly, mind yourself. The blind
By podcast.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
A cast is home to the world's best podcast, including
Crime World, The Other Hand, and the one you're listening
to right now.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Naturally, I had to hear what Jane had to say
about all this.
Speaker 10 (16:56):
You wanted to interview me in I was very hesitant, remember,
and You're like, well, I think the best thing is
to get it out there, and I'm like, yeah, but
they're telling me I can't do that.
Speaker 7 (17:05):
It might scare off the bad people or sentence.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Jane was in a tough spot at this time. A
little over a month after her daughter's disappearance. Detectives had
told her to stay away from media, which, by the way,
almost never makes sense in missing persons cases. How can
someone be found if no one even knows they're missing.
Being told to avoid the news, but desperate to get
the word out, Jane had taken to hanging literally thousands
(17:32):
of flyers around town. That first phone call, she was
pretty disappointed to know that none of the flyers had
caught my attention. Apparently, as I explained, I hadn't heard
of her daughter's case until finding the search warrant that day.
If you haven't heard of Bailey's case, asked Jane, have
you heard of Michael Holsoenbak's case? I told her I hadn't.
Speaker 5 (17:55):
Well.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
He went missing a month before Bailey did, and the
two of them were friends. Jane said, Now this sounded
a bit more complex than I initially thought this case
was going to be. Even more so when Jane explained
how the connection between Micah and Bailey was made in
the first place. I found out that after Michael Holsoenbak
(18:17):
went missing in late March. Micah's brother immediately started his
own investigation of sorts. Some when he spoke with said
he should try to track down a couple of people
who might have information, including a young woman Bailey parent.
That's weird, that doesn't sound like anybody we know. That's
Micah's mom, Cheryl. The name Bailey parent didn't mean anything
(18:41):
to them then, But a few weeks later Cheryl and
her husband Lance were out in Bakersfield looking for Micah.
Sometimes they would drive around aimlessly when they'd ran out
of people to talk to. That day, Cheryl and Lance
spotted a missing flyer for a young woman. How horrible
her families going through? What we're going through, they thought.
(19:03):
Then they noticed the name Bailey, only the last name
listed was different. It was Despot. The Bailey they were
told knew Micah was Bailey parent. But something in Micah's dad,
call it fatherly instinct, told him to do a little digging.
The flyers had clearly been made by the missing woman's mother, Jane.
Speaker 5 (19:24):
But he looks her up on Facebook and he's like,
Jane's last name is parent. That's Bailey parent.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Oh my god, And there. It was the name Micah's
brother had been given shortly after Micah went missing. The
initial disconnect was Bailey and Jane having different last names,
but there was no mistaking it. This was the same Bailey.
Speaker 5 (19:47):
She supposedly knew something. That's what we'd been told. You
better talk to Bailey.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Parent now, knowing she too had gone missing. Cheryl says
Lance had a horribly grim theory.
Speaker 5 (19:58):
He said, Mike is dead and she knew too much.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
Regardless of if the hunch was right, they knew there
was something going on here.
Speaker 5 (20:08):
We had no proof of anything. We just knew they
were gone.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Cheryl and Lance hadn't been getting far with detectives and
were determined to get answers themselves, so they reached out
to Bailey's mom. Jane.
Speaker 10 (20:21):
I was very leary. I didn't trust anybody. I didn't
know who to trust, or I didn't trust them in
the beginning. They probably didn't trust me, But we had
two things in common. Our kids knew each other and
they were missing.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Jane met with Cheryl and her husband at a restaurant where,
over pie an iced tea that sat untouched, they discussed
the horrifying possibilities of what could have happened to their children.
They compared notes and commiserated over the difficulty of getting
detectives to take them seriously. After Jane told me all
of this on that first phone call, the questions were endless.
(20:55):
So I put together a short and simple story with
the little I knew, primarily on Bailey being missing, and
mentioned the possibility of a connection between her and MICA's cases.
After an average social media immediately lit up with theories,
the most popular being that Micah and Bailey were lovers
that ran off to Mexico to be together. Among the comments,
(21:17):
I remember seeing one from Lance, Micah's dad. It said
something along the lines of the connection between the two
should definitely be investigated, and referred to Micah and Bailey
as acquaintances. I noticed someone responded to that comment, a
girl named Sarah. Her response read, I was a good
friend of Bailey's and Micah was around a lot. We
(21:40):
knew him more than just as an acquaintance. Also, I
believe they are linked as well. I clicked on Sarah's profile.
She had a few posts about Bailey's disappearance. One read
you are a good friend, Bailey. I know you're just
hiding out somewhere. I bet you're a smart girl, and
I miss you and I love you. Bee.
Speaker 11 (22:03):
I couldn't tell you how or why her and Bailey
started hanging out, but they did.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
That's Mattie, one of Bailey's closest friends. She says Sarah
went to high school with them, but Bailey and Sarah
didn't connect until after a graduation, and they seemed to
get close very fast.
Speaker 11 (22:21):
The wildness about them is very much the same, and
that is what drew them so close together.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
Sarah and Bailey both loved to thrill, both acted like
they didn't care much about what other people thought, and
I noticed they both looked very similar, same body type,
same fair complexion, with the same long, dark hair and
green eyes.
Speaker 11 (22:44):
I know that Sarah was dating a different guy named Matts,
and she's the one that introduced Bailey to Queen.
Speaker 7 (22:54):
So that's how all that happens.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Sarah was dating a guy named Matt vandakkehas who was
good friends with Matt Queen. So when Bailey coupled up
with Matt Queen, it seemed like that dream scenario, friends
dating another set of friends getting to double date and
hang out all the time. Both Matt's were much older
than their girlfriends. Matt Van der Casteele was ten years
older than Sarah and Bailey and Matt Queen had lived
(23:20):
twice the life they had with their twenty year age gap.
Queen had a wife and family when Bailey and Sarah
were in elementary school. Now the four of them were
spending a lot of time together, and apparently before he
went missing, Michael Holsoenbake was spending a lot of time
with them too. When I got in touch with Micah's mom, Cheryl,
(23:41):
she told me after Micah went missing, before she found
out about Bailey and reached out to Jane, something strange happened.
Speaker 5 (23:50):
I get this phone call out of the blue. The
gist of her conversation was, my son is James Cul's dad.
James and Mica were friends, and James was killed.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
James Colstead was murdered about two weeks after Michael went
missing and about two weeks before Bailey's disappearance. Here's James's mom, Diane,
or Die as we all call her.
Speaker 12 (24:18):
I'm reading on Facebook that Mike is missing, and I
knew from conversations that James and I had that he
had been hanging out with Micah.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
When Di saw Michael was missing so close to her
son's murder.
Speaker 12 (24:35):
Something didn't feel right, just something in my gut.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
So she contacted Cheryl, who liked Die had been doing
her own investigating.
Speaker 12 (24:44):
Cheryl and I talked a lot. We were talking every
day on the phone. We were starting to do our research,
you know, names, background checks on different people, and just
so many of the same names kept coming up.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
It was a this time that Cheryl and her husband
discovered Bailey was missing. Suddenly they found themselves looking at
all three cases.
Speaker 5 (25:07):
They were connected somehow. We had gotten enough information that
we knew they had shared friends.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
As it was relayed to me that Micah, James, and
Bailey all knew each other and their mothers were trying
to figure out if the three were connected, I knew
I had to get the three moms in a room together.
We agreed to all meet at Die's home. James's mother, Die,
a medical billing specialist, keeps her home and her appearance impeccable. Cheryl,
(25:37):
Micah's mother, a college finance professor, dressed the part simple.
She'd let her hair start to gray and wore no makeup.
Bailey's mother Jane, a special education care specialist, dresses casual
but colorful, think gene overalls with a bright purple top
and sunflower scarf tied in her hair. As the three
(25:57):
of them sat down at Die's dining room table with me,
I noticed how fragile they were, trembling voices with what
initially felt like a sense of apprehension. But the more
we all spoke, I began to see a shift from
anguish to a feeling of determination.
Speaker 10 (26:14):
I didn't want to stop that day. I think we
talked for hours, didn't.
Speaker 5 (26:18):
We We talked a long time. I felt relief. I
felt like somebody's finally listening. Who wants to hear more
than Mike is missing. They wanted to hear what we
thought was going on.
Speaker 7 (26:36):
The backstory of why this happened to him, and.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
The notebook after notebook after notebook that we had filled
with information. I think we needed someone to give us
that confidence that we could take this on, and I
think you did give us that.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Together. The three of them were emboldened and quickly adopted
the motto fight like a mother.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
We began leaning on each other early on, because who
else do you call?
Speaker 12 (27:07):
And it was nice not to be walking that walk alone.
Speaker 7 (27:11):
We could call each other anytime, day or night.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Each of them brought a different skill set to the table.
Jane Bailey's mom was the one hitting the streets.
Speaker 7 (27:20):
Well, I was the flyer girl.
Speaker 10 (27:22):
I'm like, let me get out and do it, because
if I'm not out there searching or doing something, I'm like,
it's nice, sanity keeper.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
She hung up thousands of missing flyers for Bailey and
missing flyers for Micah, and eventually a poster for all
three of the cases that read the Baker's field three
Can you connect the dots? For three friends? When it
comes to connecting the dots, Cheryl, Micah's mom, was taking
all the bits of information on the cases and all
(27:53):
the people that Micah, James, and Bailey had in common
and organizing it.
Speaker 5 (27:58):
My career was in research and data collection, and so
I knew how to take anecdotal evidence, and I knew
how to prioritize it and put it in a nice
spreadsheet and make sure we passed it off to the
right people. And I knew how to look for information.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
And James's mom die.
Speaker 12 (28:16):
I'm the one that will make the calls and set
up the appointments.
Speaker 5 (28:19):
Yes, very much, our schedule keeper.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
They recognized immediately they were a powerful team.
Speaker 5 (28:25):
If we were by ourselves, you can't hold it together
long enough to do it in this. In our situations,
none of us could have held it together and done
all of those.
Speaker 10 (28:36):
Yeah, the detective work we did, and the calling and
the looking people up, and so I learned how to
look and track people down.
Speaker 5 (28:46):
Interviewing people till two in the morning on the.
Speaker 7 (28:48):
Phone, take notes with a crayon and you can't find
a pen.
Speaker 12 (28:52):
And convincing the local people to put us on their
schedule and meet with us and talk to us.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
I remember the first time they showed up to my
news station with a binder of timelines and spreadsheets and
even a color coordinated diagram of people who were in
the circle of friends with Micah, James and Bailey, complete
with the individual's photos. I couldn't believe how much information
they'd gathered themselves and how quickly they'd done it. Frankly,
it was almost a bit overwhelming as they mapped out
(29:23):
a plethora of different crimes they believed this web of
people might be involved in, ranging from male theft to
drug dealing to sex trafficking, and it was all apparently
happening in an area of town. I didn't normally report on.
Speaker 5 (29:40):
Very nice schools, nice neighborhoods. Well, you know, large homes
people they talk about. Oh well, I live in this
part of town, so that kind of stuff doesn't happen here.
Oh yes it does, and maybe two doors down. You
have no idea.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
It was a lot to untangle. The first The most
pressing issue was understanding the ties between Mike and James
and Bailey. Yes, they knew each other and had many
people in common, but what was really going on with
this group of people and were the cases really all connected.
Speaker 6 (30:14):
It's one of the few times in my career where
I've kind of almost been warned, Hey, you don't want
to dig too deep on this one.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
That's next time on the Baker's Field three.
Speaker 4 (30:28):
Thanks for listening. If you'd like to hear the rest
of The Bakersfield three, just search for it wherever you
get your podcasts. It's a case File presents production created
by the same team behind Case File, with the same
high standards you expect from US. I hope you enjoyed
the series.
A cast recommends Hello, this is blind By.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
Around every two years or so, I'm contractually obligated to
record an advertisement for my own podcast, the blind By Podcast.
I'm a writer and I like to use the podcast
space for writing. I write with my mouth for you
to read with your ears. I write about curiosity, and
I've delivered an episode every week for the past eight years.
(00:25):
I love doing it. If you want to listen to
do If you don't, I'm sure we'll be grand, but
most importantly, mind yourself. The blind By podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:34):
A cast is home to the world's best podcast including
Crime World, The Other Hand, and the one you're listening
to right now.
Speaker 4 (00:47):
Hi, it's Casey here. A few days ago, we shared
something a little different here on the case File Feed,
episode one of our case File present series Missing Name.
The decision to do so came after I spent some
time chatting with case File listeners at our live shows
and discovered that a lot of them had no idea
(01:07):
what case File Presence actually is, or that we produce
other podcasts aside from Case File. I realized that if
someone is a big enough fan of case File to
attend a live show but hadn't heard of case File Presents,
then clearly we need to do a better job of
shining light on the other stories we've put a lot
of hard work into. For those who don't know, case
(01:31):
File Presents is our production platform. The main show we
produce is, of course, Case File, but we've also produced
a number of other podcasts. Our level of involvement varies
from show to show, but we've had a direct hand
in all of them, whether it be financing, research, production, editing,
or music. I even narrate a few of them myself.
(01:55):
With Case File on a short break, we thought this
would be a great time to spotlight some of the
shows that may have flown under the radar for many
of you. These are series we've put our hearts into
and are incredibly proud of. Today, we're showcasing the Bakersfield Three.
The story begins when two young friends go missing in California.
(02:18):
In between their disappearances, a third frand, is murdered. As
the case unfolds, the mothers of the trio take it
upon themselves to investigate. As they do so, they uncover
devastating revelations, including one that shakes their entire community to
its core. The series is hosted by Olivia La Voice,
(02:42):
an award winning journalist who spent five years reporting on
this case. When I first met Olivia, I immediately knew
I wanted to work with her. She's tenacious, empathetic and
shares the same core values that drive Case File presents,
giving voice to Victor and their families. What makes The
(03:03):
Bakersfield Three so unique is that Olivia wasn't looking back
on this story after the fact. She was there from
the beginning, reporting in real time as events unfolded on
the ground. For every twist, turn and shocking reveal, and
trust me, there's one twist in particular that you won't
see coming. The Bakersfield three is our most successful limited
(03:28):
run series to date. The series reached number one on
the overall podcast charts in the US, a first for
any Case File present show. To put that in perspective,
case File itself has only reached as high as number
three in the US. Bakersfield three spent extended time at
(03:49):
the top, also reaching number one in Australia and charting
highly around the world. So far, the series has been
downloaded over twelve million times. We're incredibly proud of this
show and if you missed it, when it first came
out in late twenty twenty three. Now is the perfect
time to jump in. We're releasing episode one here on
(04:12):
the case file feed. If you like what you hear,
you can find the rest of the series by searching
the Bakersfield three wherever you get your podcasts now Here's
episode one.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
There's no way two friends just go missing within a
month of each other.
Speaker 5 (04:35):
Somehow, someway I know they're connected.
Speaker 1 (04:37):
It's a haunting mystery, one that seems to grow more
complex and dark the disappearance of Michael Holsenbak and Bailly Despot.
Speaker 6 (04:45):
And in between those two disappearances, a murder in a
Bakersfield neighborhood where crime is rather rare.
Speaker 1 (04:52):
Is it three mysteries or one?
Speaker 6 (04:54):
These three people knew each other and they're all either
at this point dead or missing.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
There's something big about what's going on.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
There's something something crazy about this case.
Speaker 7 (05:06):
They gotta finder of older when last time, even if
it is just.
Speaker 5 (05:10):
Her bones, We're just trying to find out where they are.
Just some money, Tell me where they are and we'll
go get them. I will go dig, I will go dig,
and I will find them.
Speaker 1 (05:26):
Working in Bakersfield as a local news reporter was a
unique time in my life. I had a hunger and
drive I don't think could ever be replicated. I was
a twenty something making no money, working often obscenely long hours,
completely by choice, eating almost strictly microwave meals and fast food,
and spending way too much time making sure my fake
(05:49):
eyelashes and hair were just right. I look back on
the days right where heels and a dress while knocking
on doors in a rough neighborhood in over one hundred
degree heat to find someone who'd give me a SoundBite
describing hearing gunshots, which by the way, is almost always
the same. I thought it was fireworks at first, and
(06:09):
every time I'd get the SoundBite, it was an accomplishment
for maybe all of five minutes until the next breaking
news event happened, and I loved every second of it.
I lived and breathed it and felt a sometimes maddening
need to be first, which is kind of the name
of the game in local news, trying to break the
(06:30):
big story, meaning you're the first reporter to uncover the information.
When I first started, I envisioned myself going to a
local bar after work where there'd be a group of
deputies having beers, they'd welcome me to join them, and
I'd end up leaving every night with a big scoop.
But that never happened, not even close. I quickly learned
(06:52):
that usually if there's a significant event like a homicide
or armed robbery, all of us reporters hear about it
at the same time through the police scanners we have
blaring in the newsrooms twenty four to seven. We then
all race out to the scene, elbowing each other, trying
to get as close to the yellow tape as possible.
(07:13):
My old news director, Mike try he used to say,
you make your own luck, so we'd persist with the
ritual of digging, coming up empty, and trying again another day.
A built in part of that routine for me at
seventeen News was to go to the courthouse once a
week and look through search warrants. Doing this probably hundreds
(07:33):
of times. I can only think of a few instances
when I found a search warrant that was to put
it simply, anything good, anything we'd put on the news.
Ninety nine percent of the time, any search warrants pertaining
to a case the media would report on are sealed
by law enforcement. It's rare that one slips through the
cracks and you're lucky enough to find it. Despite all this,
(07:58):
something kept bringing me back to court to look through them,
still having that glimmer of hope that one day I
would find something big. That day came in early summer
of twenty eighteen, though just how big no one could
have known. Then. I'm Olivia la Voice and this is
(08:22):
the Bakersfield Three going through my stack. That day, I
(08:49):
started thumbing through a warrant that was for a crime that,
on the surface seemed pretty dull, an investigation into a
felon being in possession of a firearm. There's nothing newsworthy
of a felon having a gun when they're not supposed to.
It happens all the time. It's illegal, yes, but not
significant enough to report on. This warrant, though, was different
(09:12):
because of one little sentence that mentioned a missing woman
who I'd later learned was named Bailey Despot. It then
went on to describe a man named Arturo coming home
while his wife was out of town and finding something odd.
Here's our Turo to explain.
Speaker 8 (09:27):
I seen bags in my front door, and I was like, wow,
this is my wife home supposed to be go on
like the next day, and I said, well, maybe she's
surprising me. That's what I thought. But the closer I
got to the door, I noticed that that was not
her luggage, and I was like, okay, that's weird. And
I looked down and there was a note and it said,
(09:50):
tell baby that I love her, but I cannot be
with her.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Arturo knew Bailey as a friend of his sons from
high school. He recalled his son recently telling him that
no one had heard from Bailey for several months.
Speaker 8 (10:05):
It kind of stung me a little bit, like, well,
she's missing. Wife's her bags here. So I called him
and I go, son, I go, it's Bailey here. And
he was like what and he goes, no, she's not here.
I go, her bags are here in the front. He goes,
what are her bags doing? I said, I do not know.
He goes, well, let me call her mom and find out.
Speaker 1 (10:28):
Soon after, Bailey's mother, Jane, showed.
Speaker 8 (10:30):
Up and I had never met her, and we're talking.
She goes, yeah, this is her stuff. So she studied
going through her bags, and poor lady, she was so emotional,
like this is what I gave her for her birthday.
This is what I gave her last year. And I mean,
she was just crying. I was just like overwhelmed. And
she's like, well, who dropped them off? And I said,
I don't know. So we went through my cameras and
(10:53):
finally I found the footage of who.
Speaker 7 (10:57):
Dropped them off. I'm like, oh my god, that's Queen
and he's got a gun.
Speaker 1 (11:02):
Bailey's mother, Jane, recognized the man, Matt Queen, as the
guy she refuses to call her daughter's boyfriend. But it
seems for all intents and purposes, he was. And here
he was about a month after Bailey vanished, dropping off
her things at a friend's home. That really seems like
a random choice. And when he dropped her belongings off,
(11:23):
as shown in the surveillance video, he was armed.
Speaker 8 (11:27):
The gentleman he put up to the door, and of
course nobody was here. We're all work. So he puts
the bags down. Then he goes back to a suburban
and then he comes back. He gets the letter and
he says it on the back, but when he bends
over to set the letter down, his sweater picks up
(11:48):
and he had a gun on his back and mean,
Jean was like, Wow, we're just stung, like one of
us was to be home, Like what what the outcome
would have been? I don't know.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
Jane called the police immediately after seeing the video for themselves.
Investigators went to Matt Queen's house to speak with him,
where they found a loaded gun, which, legally, as a felon,
he can't have. Queen wasn't in jail for long, just
a few days before he made bail, but this warrant
described how after his arrest he called his wife from jail. Yes,
(12:22):
as I'd later find out, Queen had his wife and
Bailey living with him under the same roof. We'll get
more into that later. When Queen called his wife after
his arrest that day, he told her to come get
some things from his car before the cops could.
Speaker 9 (12:38):
Behind the DRIVERSY is a backpack gray and black?
Speaker 4 (12:43):
Is there?
Speaker 1 (12:44):
Yeah?
Speaker 9 (12:46):
Okay, pay that in the house and better packet all
the letters and everything with all the evidence. Yea, And
she left it gained a lion hit all she wrote
about her mom left you the phone too. If nap cut,
if still on that phone, you don't have to act
if if you open it, it all climbed like arian
(13:11):
so that Jane is not lying and they be a
crazy person.
Speaker 1 (13:15):
It appeared Queen was telling his wife in the backpack
there was evidence that quote she left she being Bailey.
He referenced letters and a phone with a Snapchat account
that would show Bailey's mom Jane acting crazy. It seems
at that point Queen sense detectives were looking at him
for Bailey's disappearance, and he blamed Jane for that. In
(13:39):
addition to the letters and phone, Queen also asks his
wife to see if his tools are there yet.
Speaker 9 (13:47):
Told this okay, and he had to take the job
right away.
Speaker 7 (13:53):
I gotta go get him go right now.
Speaker 9 (13:56):
That you know they listened to everything out there right now, helliyah.
Speaker 1 (14:02):
They Queen told his wife to go get his brother
and to have him take the quote tools in his
car to the dump right away. It sounded suspicious, of course,
so according to the search war and I'd found, detectives
wanted to search Queen's home, vehicles, and phone for evidence
that he could be involved in the manufacturing of illegal firearms.
(14:25):
Seemed pretty obvious to me that sure, maybe if police
discovered evidence of that, it'd be a bonus. But what
they were really after was evidence pertaining to the missing
woman he'd been living with, Bailey. I thought looking at
him for illegal guns was just their way in, and
having this warrant was my way into the story. I
(14:46):
remember when I first saw Bailey's photo. She's striking, tall, slender,
with long, dark hair, and big green eyes. There was
something classic and effortless about her beauty. She stood out.
But as I looked at photos of her on Matt
Queen's Facebook page, what stood out even more was Queen's extensive, bizarre,
(15:07):
and somewhat fascinating social media presence. He had numerous posts
about looking for Bailey that included missing flyers he'd made
himself that said he last saw her getting into a
black SUV with a heavyset man. But what really caught
my eye were screenshot text messages he posted between himself
and Bailey's mother, Jane. One screenshot showed Queen sent this
(15:31):
text to Jane. At first, I thought you were simply
an over protective mother, and I respected that, But it
is now clear that Bailey was right all along. You
have a mental disorder, yes, Jane, I'm twice her age.
Get over it. Find something else wrong with me. You're
obsessed with Bailey and it's not healthy. I'm in love
(15:52):
with her, and if I'm not mistaken, she's in love
with me. Keep trying to drive a wedge between us,
it's only weakening the strength in yours.
Speaker 3 (16:04):
A cast recommends.
Speaker 2 (16:07):
Hello, this is blind By. Around every two years or so.
I'm contractually obligated to record an advertisement for my own podcast,
The blind By Podcast. I'm a writer and I like
to use the podcast space for writing. I write with
my mouth for you to read with your ears. I
write about curiosity, and I've delivered an episode every week
(16:28):
for the past eight years. I love doing it. If
you want to listen to If you don't, I'm sure
we'll be grand, But most importantly, mind yourself. The blind
By podcast.
Speaker 3 (16:38):
A cast is home to the world's best podcast, including
Crime World, The Other Hand, and the one you're listening
to right now.
Speaker 1 (16:52):
Naturally, I had to hear what Jane had to say
about all this.
Speaker 10 (16:56):
You wanted to interview me in I was very hesitant, remember,
and You're like, well, I think the best thing is
to get it out there, and I'm like, yeah, but
they're telling me I can't do that.
Speaker 7 (17:05):
It might scare off the bad people or sentence.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Jane was in a tough spot at this time. A
little over a month after her daughter's disappearance. Detectives had
told her to stay away from media, which, by the way,
almost never makes sense in missing persons cases. How can
someone be found if no one even knows they're missing.
Being told to avoid the news, but desperate to get
the word out, Jane had taken to hanging literally thousands
(17:32):
of flyers around town. That first phone call, she was
pretty disappointed to know that none of the flyers had
caught my attention. Apparently, as I explained, I hadn't heard
of her daughter's case until finding the search warrant that day.
If you haven't heard of Bailey's case, asked Jane, have
you heard of Michael Holsoenbak's case? I told her I hadn't.
Speaker 5 (17:55):
Well.
Speaker 1 (17:56):
He went missing a month before Bailey did, and the
two of them were friends. Jane said, Now this sounded
a bit more complex than I initially thought this case
was going to be. Even more so when Jane explained
how the connection between Micah and Bailey was made in
the first place. I found out that after Michael Holsoenbak
(18:17):
went missing in late March. Micah's brother immediately started his
own investigation of sorts. Some when he spoke with said
he should try to track down a couple of people
who might have information, including a young woman Bailey parent.
That's weird, that doesn't sound like anybody we know. That's
Micah's mom, Cheryl. The name Bailey parent didn't mean anything
(18:41):
to them then, But a few weeks later Cheryl and
her husband Lance were out in Bakersfield looking for Micah.
Sometimes they would drive around aimlessly when they'd ran out
of people to talk to. That day, Cheryl and Lance
spotted a missing flyer for a young woman. How horrible
her families going through? What we're going through, they thought.
(19:03):
Then they noticed the name Bailey, only the last name
listed was different. It was Despot. The Bailey they were
told knew Micah was Bailey parent. But something in Micah's dad,
call it fatherly instinct, told him to do a little digging.
The flyers had clearly been made by the missing woman's mother, Jane.
Speaker 5 (19:24):
But he looks her up on Facebook and he's like,
Jane's last name is parent. That's Bailey parent.
Speaker 1 (19:30):
Oh my god, And there. It was the name Micah's
brother had been given shortly after Micah went missing. The
initial disconnect was Bailey and Jane having different last names,
but there was no mistaking it. This was the same Bailey.
Speaker 5 (19:47):
She supposedly knew something. That's what we'd been told. You
better talk to Bailey.
Speaker 1 (19:51):
Parent now, knowing she too had gone missing. Cheryl says
Lance had a horribly grim theory.
Speaker 5 (19:58):
He said, Mike is dead and she knew too much.
Speaker 1 (20:03):
Regardless of if the hunch was right, they knew there
was something going on here.
Speaker 5 (20:08):
We had no proof of anything. We just knew they
were gone.
Speaker 1 (20:13):
Cheryl and Lance hadn't been getting far with detectives and
were determined to get answers themselves, so they reached out
to Bailey's mom. Jane.
Speaker 10 (20:21):
I was very leary. I didn't trust anybody. I didn't
know who to trust, or I didn't trust them in
the beginning. They probably didn't trust me, But we had
two things in common. Our kids knew each other and
they were missing.
Speaker 1 (20:33):
Jane met with Cheryl and her husband at a restaurant where,
over pie an iced tea that sat untouched, they discussed
the horrifying possibilities of what could have happened to their children.
They compared notes and commiserated over the difficulty of getting
detectives to take them seriously. After Jane told me all
of this on that first phone call, the questions were endless.
(20:55):
So I put together a short and simple story with
the little I knew, primarily on Bailey being missing, and
mentioned the possibility of a connection between her and MICA's cases.
After an average social media immediately lit up with theories,
the most popular being that Micah and Bailey were lovers
that ran off to Mexico to be together. Among the comments,
(21:17):
I remember seeing one from Lance, Micah's dad. It said
something along the lines of the connection between the two
should definitely be investigated, and referred to Micah and Bailey
as acquaintances. I noticed someone responded to that comment, a
girl named Sarah. Her response read, I was a good
friend of Bailey's and Micah was around a lot. We
(21:40):
knew him more than just as an acquaintance. Also, I
believe they are linked as well. I clicked on Sarah's profile.
She had a few posts about Bailey's disappearance. One read
you are a good friend, Bailey. I know you're just
hiding out somewhere. I bet you're a smart girl, and
I miss you and I love you. Bee.
Speaker 11 (22:03):
I couldn't tell you how or why her and Bailey
started hanging out, but they did.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
That's Mattie, one of Bailey's closest friends. She says Sarah
went to high school with them, but Bailey and Sarah
didn't connect until after a graduation, and they seemed to
get close very fast.
Speaker 11 (22:21):
The wildness about them is very much the same, and
that is what drew them so close together.
Speaker 1 (22:28):
Sarah and Bailey both loved to thrill, both acted like
they didn't care much about what other people thought, and
I noticed they both looked very similar, same body type,
same fair complexion, with the same long, dark hair and
green eyes.
Speaker 11 (22:44):
I know that Sarah was dating a different guy named Matts,
and she's the one that introduced Bailey to Queen.
Speaker 7 (22:54):
So that's how all that happens.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Sarah was dating a guy named Matt vandakkehas who was
good friends with Matt Queen. So when Bailey coupled up
with Matt Queen, it seemed like that dream scenario, friends
dating another set of friends getting to double date and
hang out all the time. Both Matt's were much older
than their girlfriends. Matt Van der Casteele was ten years
older than Sarah and Bailey and Matt Queen had lived
(23:20):
twice the life they had with their twenty year age gap.
Queen had a wife and family when Bailey and Sarah
were in elementary school. Now the four of them were
spending a lot of time together, and apparently before he
went missing, Michael Holsoenbake was spending a lot of time
with them too. When I got in touch with Micah's mom, Cheryl,
(23:41):
she told me after Micah went missing, before she found
out about Bailey and reached out to Jane, something strange happened.
Speaker 5 (23:50):
I get this phone call out of the blue. The
gist of her conversation was, my son is James Cul's dad.
James and Mica were friends, and James was killed.
Speaker 1 (24:05):
James Colstead was murdered about two weeks after Michael went
missing and about two weeks before Bailey's disappearance. Here's James's mom, Diane,
or Die as we all call her.
Speaker 12 (24:18):
I'm reading on Facebook that Mike is missing, and I
knew from conversations that James and I had that he
had been hanging out with Micah.
Speaker 1 (24:31):
When Di saw Michael was missing so close to her
son's murder.
Speaker 12 (24:35):
Something didn't feel right, just something in my gut.
Speaker 1 (24:39):
So she contacted Cheryl, who liked Die had been doing
her own investigating.
Speaker 12 (24:44):
Cheryl and I talked a lot. We were talking every
day on the phone. We were starting to do our research,
you know, names, background checks on different people, and just
so many of the same names kept coming up.
Speaker 1 (24:59):
It was a this time that Cheryl and her husband
discovered Bailey was missing. Suddenly they found themselves looking at
all three cases.
Speaker 5 (25:07):
They were connected somehow. We had gotten enough information that
we knew they had shared friends.
Speaker 1 (25:15):
As it was relayed to me that Micah, James, and
Bailey all knew each other and their mothers were trying
to figure out if the three were connected, I knew
I had to get the three moms in a room together.
We agreed to all meet at Die's home. James's mother, Die,
a medical billing specialist, keeps her home and her appearance impeccable. Cheryl,
(25:37):
Micah's mother, a college finance professor, dressed the part simple.
She'd let her hair start to gray and wore no makeup.
Bailey's mother Jane, a special education care specialist, dresses casual
but colorful, think gene overalls with a bright purple top
and sunflower scarf tied in her hair. As the three
(25:57):
of them sat down at Die's dining room table with me,
I noticed how fragile they were, trembling voices with what
initially felt like a sense of apprehension. But the more
we all spoke, I began to see a shift from
anguish to a feeling of determination.
Speaker 10 (26:14):
I didn't want to stop that day. I think we
talked for hours, didn't.
Speaker 5 (26:18):
We We talked a long time. I felt relief. I
felt like somebody's finally listening. Who wants to hear more
than Mike is missing. They wanted to hear what we
thought was going on.
Speaker 7 (26:36):
The backstory of why this happened to him, and.
Speaker 5 (26:39):
The notebook after notebook after notebook that we had filled
with information. I think we needed someone to give us
that confidence that we could take this on, and I
think you did give us that.
Speaker 1 (26:55):
Together. The three of them were emboldened and quickly adopted
the motto fight like a mother.
Speaker 5 (27:02):
We began leaning on each other early on, because who
else do you call?
Speaker 12 (27:07):
And it was nice not to be walking that walk alone.
Speaker 7 (27:11):
We could call each other anytime, day or night.
Speaker 1 (27:14):
Each of them brought a different skill set to the table.
Jane Bailey's mom was the one hitting the streets.
Speaker 7 (27:20):
Well, I was the flyer girl.
Speaker 10 (27:22):
I'm like, let me get out and do it, because
if I'm not out there searching or doing something, I'm like,
it's nice, sanity keeper.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
She hung up thousands of missing flyers for Bailey and
missing flyers for Micah, and eventually a poster for all
three of the cases that read the Baker's field three
Can you connect the dots? For three friends? When it
comes to connecting the dots, Cheryl, Micah's mom, was taking
all the bits of information on the cases and all
(27:53):
the people that Micah, James, and Bailey had in common
and organizing it.
Speaker 5 (27:58):
My career was in research and data collection, and so
I knew how to take anecdotal evidence, and I knew
how to prioritize it and put it in a nice
spreadsheet and make sure we passed it off to the
right people. And I knew how to look for information.
Speaker 1 (28:14):
And James's mom die.
Speaker 12 (28:16):
I'm the one that will make the calls and set
up the appointments.
Speaker 5 (28:19):
Yes, very much, our schedule keeper.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
They recognized immediately they were a powerful team.
Speaker 5 (28:25):
If we were by ourselves, you can't hold it together
long enough to do it in this. In our situations,
none of us could have held it together and done
all of those.
Speaker 10 (28:36):
Yeah, the detective work we did, and the calling and
the looking people up, and so I learned how to
look and track people down.
Speaker 5 (28:46):
Interviewing people till two in the morning on the.
Speaker 7 (28:48):
Phone, take notes with a crayon and you can't find
a pen.
Speaker 12 (28:52):
And convincing the local people to put us on their
schedule and meet with us and talk to us.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (29:01):
I remember the first time they showed up to my
news station with a binder of timelines and spreadsheets and
even a color coordinated diagram of people who were in
the circle of friends with Micah, James and Bailey, complete
with the individual's photos. I couldn't believe how much information
they'd gathered themselves and how quickly they'd done it. Frankly,
it was almost a bit overwhelming as they mapped out
(29:23):
a plethora of different crimes they believed this web of
people might be involved in, ranging from male theft to
drug dealing to sex trafficking, and it was all apparently
happening in an area of town. I didn't normally report on.
Speaker 5 (29:40):
Very nice schools, nice neighborhoods. Well, you know, large homes
people they talk about. Oh well, I live in this
part of town, so that kind of stuff doesn't happen here.
Oh yes it does, and maybe two doors down. You
have no idea.
Speaker 1 (29:57):
It was a lot to untangle. The first The most
pressing issue was understanding the ties between Mike and James
and Bailey. Yes, they knew each other and had many
people in common, but what was really going on with
this group of people and were the cases really all connected.
Speaker 6 (30:14):
It's one of the few times in my career where
I've kind of almost been warned, Hey, you don't want
to dig too deep on this one.
Speaker 1 (30:21):
That's next time on the Baker's Field three.
Speaker 4 (30:28):
Thanks for listening. If you'd like to hear the rest
of The Bakersfield three, just search for it wherever you
get your podcasts. It's a case File presents production created
by the same team behind Case File, with the same
high standards you expect from US. I hope you enjoyed
the series.
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