E8 - Cause and Manner of Death

In this episode, Melissa and Justin talk to team memeber Jen Bucholtz, about the cause and manner of death. They also discuss different case scenarios related to that topic.

Episode Transcript

(00:31):
All right, welcome back to anotherepisode of Safe Haven. I'm joined as
always by Melissa, my co host, and we are joined by Jen Boukolts
as well. Today I'm going toapologize about my voice right now. I'm
kind of losing it, so I'mnot going to do very much talking.
I'll tell you that much. Imean, obviously, if I have questions,
I'll step in, but it's probablynot going to turn out well.

(00:54):
Melissa, how are you doing.I'm good, I'm good. I'm excited.
So today is New Year's Eve,right, so we're recording on New
Year's Eve before all the parting happens. Of course, my parking is in
my pajamas. I'm in bed byten, but that's okay, okay,
still an exciting holiday and going intothe new year. So definitely. How

(01:17):
you doing today? Jen? Prettygood. I feel you're paying on the
voice issue because I got a headcold in the I'm a little raspie.
Some my apologies to to the listeners, but I'm not losing my voice.
I just don't have my full voice. But it's good. But yeah,
I'm I'm excited. It's New Year'sEve. I always get excited at the
new year because it's like a freshstart, or try to look at it
as a fresh start. And Ithink for Judy's case and the case that

(01:38):
me and George are working, youknow, it just brings that, you
know, that fresh new start,the new year, so and new hope
and everything else. Yeah, andso listeners know as well, Jen,
your podcast is going to be startingoff here in about the next month or
so, isn't it. Yep?Me and George host a podcast called Break
the Case through my employer, AmericanMilitary University and editor and I just put

(02:02):
the promo together yesterday and it shouldbe finalized Monday and out this coming week.
And that's just you know, alittle intro to the case of Linda
Malcolm that we're working. So ifyou like true crime and you like the
real time investigative stuff like what Justinand Melissas are doing, follow Break the
Case too, because we have avery similar format and you'll hear me and
George week by week going through ourinvestigation. And of course, just like

(02:25):
you guys do, we encourage listenersand readers of my articles and stuff to
please join our Facebook groups, joinour social media and way and give us
your ideas and thoughts. We wantto crowdsource these investigations, absolutely, And
you guys are dealing with a casekind of like ours as well, where
there's a fire involved. Yep.So Linda Malcolm was killed in two thousand

(02:45):
and eight in Port Orchard, Washington, and she was stabbed approximately eighteen times,
and then her house was set onfire. Thankfully, she had neighbors
nearby who weren't able to save her, but we're able to detect the fire
pretty quickly and call nine one one. So it's a little different than Judy's
case because Linda's remains were found intactand a full autopsy was able to be

(03:08):
done, so we have that advantage. But yeah, it's odd because it's
the same year, the two victimsare the same age, they have some
physical similarities. You know. It'slike, wow, I'm not sure how
that happened. But all right,so today we're going to be talking about
the autopsy report and some of thetoxicology report as well. And you had

(03:30):
recently written a really good article andI don't know, we wanted to talk
about it because I don't think alot of people realize the difference between cause
of death and manner of death andhow all that gets decided, And I
don't know. I thought it wouldjust be a really good informative episode.
I don't know. For the listenersout there who do not know, you're

(03:51):
probably gonna learn some stuff today.So yeah, in the media, the
cause of death and manner of deathare often interchanged, but they're actually two
totally different things that are listed onan autopsy. So I think it's important
to explain the difference and then howthose are applicable in Judy's case or really
any case. But the manner ofdeath is just the general circumstance under which

(04:15):
the person died, and there's fiveof them. So there's homicide, suicide,
accident, natural, and undetermined,and homicide is pretty self explanatory.
It's basically, you know, theactions of one human being took the life
of another, whether intentional or not. And then suicide is where the victim
themselves intended to take their own lifeand they succeeded at doing that. An

(04:39):
accident would be unintended circumstances occur thatleads to someone's death, like a car
wreck, that would be listed asan accidental manner of death on the person's
autopsy report. And then natural isjust the internal processes of the human body
led to the person's death, Sodisease or solely internal psychological processes that led

(05:00):
to the person's heart stopping. Butthen the fifth one is undetermined, and
that's when the medical examiner can't makea solid determination on which manner of death
was the appropriate one for the victim. And so in Judy's case, that's
what was put on her autopsy report. And it does make sense because they
couldn't one hundred percent rule out someof those other manners of death. So

(05:21):
and to this day it's still listedas undetermined. Hopefully that rundown makes sense.
Okay, cause of death is muchmore specific. So ultimately everybody dies
a heart failure, right like ahuman dies when the heart stops beating,
But there's always some other reason thatled to the heart stopping beating, and

(05:45):
that's the cause of death. Soit's the underlying, underlying reason that led
to heart failure. And I mean, there's countless physiological reasons that can be
listed on an autopsy report in termsof the cause of death, but it's
supposed to be pretty specific, andsometimes you can have more than one.
Unfortunately, in a lot of autopsiesfrom a couple of decades ago and earlier

(06:06):
than that, they would just listlike one force trauma. It's like,
Okay, I know the person gothit in the head, but what actually
happened inside their body? And that'swhat you're trying to get to when listing
the cause of death. So likein the one force trauma example, that
would be what started the demise ofthe person, but it's like what other
official causes led to their death.So on a good cause of death report,

(06:30):
it might say something like a brainhemorrhage as a result of laceration of
the middle manigel artery as a resultof blue force trauma to the head.
And then basically that means the persongot hit in the head, artery ripped
open inside their skull, flooded theirbrain and caused swelling and pressure on the
brain, which led to the brainbeing unable to operate and control the heart,

(06:54):
and so ultimately the heart stops.So that's how the cause of death
works, and the more specific,obviously the better. So this is really
helpful I think to go through inrelation to Judy's case, and I think
what I want to do is kindof go through each one of these and
kind of talk about the likelihood,right. I know that when Alan was

(07:14):
on you know, two weeks ago, that was really helpful in regards to
you know, looking at her andconfirming that she was dead before the fire,
and so kind of ruling out orruling in some of these different scenarios
is only going to help us getcloser to what you know, happened to
Judy. So, you know,the first one we mentioned is homicide.
It can't be you know, classifiedas a homicide, but clearly that's what

(07:38):
we're investigating. This ass is ahomicide due to the fact that she was
dead before the fire, so we'relooking at who's ultimately responsible for that exactly.
Yeah, homicide definitely can't be ruledout, and in writing my article,
I knew that right away. SoI actually started with that accident and
suicide manners of death trying to figureout were those possibilities or could we rule

(08:01):
those out? And so I'm Iknow, we're going to talk through those.
Yeah. So then if you goto the next one, which is
suicide, so I know you wrotea part on that in your article,
do you want to kind of talkabout that the likelihood of suicide. I'm
gonna just Cavey out up front.I can't one hundred percent say she didn't
kill herself. Alan. Actually,after I wrote my article and then I

(08:24):
listened to Alan's interview, he gaveme even more insight than I came up
with on my own. But Iwas thinking through something I like to do
is try to put myself in theshoes of the victim and what steps would
they have to take to successfully commitsuicide but also start this fire, but
also not breathe in the gases andthe heat and the smoke from the fire.

(08:46):
Because based on Judy's carbon monoxide level, we know that she was dead
before the fire. Okay, SoI started thinking, well, could she
have you know, started the fire, shot herself, you know, which
would cause her to collapse and probablydie very quickly. But the problem is
with that scenario or even saying slicingher wrist or slicing open an artery with

(09:09):
a knife. They found her steeltoes from her boots in the aftermath of
the fire, So she'd use agun or a knife that would have survived
the fire as well, and theywould have found that, and they sifted
well through that cellar and did notfind any kind of weapon like that.
Now, there was one scenario thatI can't completely rule out, even though
it's a little far fetched, butagain, you know, we have to

(09:30):
stay open minded, and that's thescenario of her hanging herself. So I
was thinking about that one, andI thought, Okay, she could have
started the fire, say on oneside of the cellar, and then rigged
up something to hang herself from.And it doesn't take very long for you
to go unconscious in a ligature hanging. So in theory, she could have

(09:52):
maybe accomplished that, gone unconscious beforethe fire got too big, and not
breathed in hardly eddy of the gasesor smoke, and then obviously whatever she
hung herself with would disintegrate and burnup in the fire and there'd be no
evidence of it. But we gotto look at that a little deeper.
Right, So the cellar is onlysix and a half feet tall. Now

(10:16):
you can hang, You can successfullyhang and kill yourself from a door knob
on a door and be on yourknees. But my question would be what
would be the structure above the areawhere her body's found that she would be
able to rig up some kind ofhanging device. I mean, you have
a floor above, so I don'tknow. I mean I can't say for
sure, but it's like what wouldhave been above that area that she could

(10:39):
successfully do this, And I findthat part of the scenario to be highly
unlikely that she'd be able to Andquite frankly, why, I mean,
you can go into the regular houseand find way easier ways to kill yourself
or hang yourself without going down intothe dingy cellar where you can't see anything
and there's no electricity. So also, how are you having light or whatever

(11:01):
to help you with this? It'sjust too complicated, And you know Alkham's
razor usually the simplest explanation is thecorrect one, and so I can't completely
rule out the scenario of her hangingherself. But again, it's just super
complicated and it doesn't make any kindof sense. No, it's super uncomplicated.
It's super complicated. I can't speak. But the problem is too is

(11:24):
you know, it doesn't line upwith why she'd walk out to the front,
right, So when we look ather victimology and her behaviors, most
people aren't going to walk I wouldsay in general thirteen miles to commit suicide
on a property that they loved,in a seller that they did not like,

(11:46):
which she could have easily done,you know, taken her life in
many other ways, So it seemslike it to do to go to that
length is very extreme, and Ithat's why I think the likelihood of her,
you know, taking her life isa lower obability, right because she
didn't you know, breathe and smoke. I know. One of the theories
back when they first investigated this,the thought was that she had started a

(12:09):
fire and it got out of handin the house, so then she moved
to the cellar. Well, thatdoesn't make any sense because number one,
if you're going to start a fireand it's accidental, you would go to
a neighbors and call and get held. You wouldn't they go to the seller
to seek refuge if it got toowarm. She's not going around trying or

(12:30):
got too cool. She's not tryingto set multiple fires to keep her warm
when there was we now know,electricity in the house. So that whole
theory or ideas back in oh eightjust you know, goes to show that
the likelihood just isn't there that shetook her life right exactly. And we
can talk through that accident scenario too, because I know that's been brought up,

(12:54):
but yeah, kind of you gotinto it a little bit right there.
But that one I also can't makesense of either. If you start
a fire to keep warm, Firstof all, I don't know why you
would start a fire outside the woodburningstove inside the home. She knew how
to use the woodburning stove, Justuse that, it'll warm the house.
You don't, I am, whatare you starting a fire in in a
woodhouse? Like? Honestly, Iwould just like to hear the explanation of

(13:16):
that, like where and how areyou going to start a fire to keep
warm in this house, like inthe bathtub or what. I don't it's
so confusing what the thought process wason that. And I mean she's a
well grown adult with logic. She'sgonna know this house is mostly made of
wood and I stand a great chanceof setting it completely on fire if I
don't use the woodstove, So whowould do that? And also forget she

(13:41):
can turn up the heat. Look, I don't like the wood burning stove
because I would be one who wouldstart the whole place on fire. I
don't know how to use one.I'm sure she did. I'm sure she's
much, you know, more savvythan I am, but I would just
turn up the thermstat So none ofthat to me seems like the likelihood that

(14:01):
she went to those great lengths andeven like you mentioned the hanging, you
know, she's not going to goto the cellar to do so. At
the bottom level, let's go intothe accident, the accident theory. What's
your thoughts on the accident. Well, we just just discussed the one scenario
that I find just unbelievable literally,but the same ago for the outbuilding.

(14:24):
You know, like for some reasonshe's in the outbuilding that has no electricity
or light, what is she usingto start a fire? Also, again
there's like all kinds of wood productsinside that building, and the building's made
of wood. She knows it's goingto catch fire. I mean, she's
not a little kid that doesn't understandthat. So there's it's completely nonsensical.
And also, like Alan pointed out, and this is where this was huge

(14:48):
to me, her body positioning doesnot support a suicide or accident. It
supports her being dragged down those stairsand then left right there at the bottom
of the stairs. If she hungherself from a rafter or something in that
cellar, she I guarantee she'd bein a totally different body position. She'd

(15:09):
be on her front most likely,depending how much room there was around her.
Her body may have ended up flat, but she would have been on
her front side. She wouldn't havebeen all bent in the position that she
was and right where her body wasposition. I'm trying, you know,
going back to when we were onseeing there, there isn't a lot to

(15:31):
like really hang your like, youknow, from an accident standpoint, right,
I mean, there isn't a lotof room in that cellar. It
was pretty jam packed, and Ithink that's why if you are going to
do anything, the house would bemuch more yeah, likelihood. But when
I think about an accident, Ithink about some of other scenarios, right,

(15:52):
Like could we mentioned earlier, couldshe have been hit by a car
and that's considered an accident, rightin the sense of well, I kind
of want to hear your thoughts onthat, right, because if you get
somebody with a car by accident,So let's say she's walking, let's play
this out right, We've kind oftalked about this before, but I think
let's kind of explore it more nowfor the listeners. If you're walking on

(16:17):
this very dangerous road at night andsomeone is driving, they don't see she's
wearing dark colors, now that wegot the case file, she's wearing like
black sweatpants. So somebody, let'ssay, hits her and the impact itself,
maybe she's killed instantly, maybe she'snot, but then that's considered an

(16:41):
accident. But then this person tookthe steps if this is what happened to
then conceal direct accident set her onfire. So this could initially have started
out as an accident and then itthey took it to the next level,
and you know, maybe she wasn'tdone at that time. Usually when you
get hit by a car, youdon't die right away, especially on that

(17:03):
road you can't do a real highrate of speed. So she obviously would
have been very injured, probably brokenlegs at a minimum, And depending how
far she got thrown or if shewent up onto the top of the car
something like that, she could havesuffered upper body trauma as well, bluenforced
trauma. It just depends, youknow, on the angles and the speed.

(17:25):
But either way, yeah, thatwould have started out as an accident.
And if that's what happened and theperson called nine one one right away
and got help, it would beclassified as an accident. Now, there's
obviously some mitigating factors that could comeinto play, like if the person is
on drugs or drinking or something likethat, it could have ended up being
a manslaughter. But if the person'scompletely sober and it literally was just an

(17:47):
accident and Judy's like in the roadin dark clothing, I mean that's partly
her fault too, And I'm notvictim blaming, but that would be a
very unwise thing to do in thepitch black. And so if the person
had hit her and then got medicalattention, they and as long as they
were sober like, they probably wouldn'thave been charged with anything. So if
this scenario did happen, it kindof makes me think the driver was high

(18:11):
or drunk or something else going onthat was illegal. The thing is someone
gets hit by a car they used, they have some pretty distinctive injuries and
a medical examiner would be able tofigure that out, and so it would
be very illogical why the person wouldwant to dispose of the body and make
sure that the cause of death couldnot be determined. And I think too

(18:32):
like if you're if You're going,because Alan shared an article with me yesterday
which was really interesting in a similarsituation, or could be to Judy's in
the sense that there was this womanwho was jogging in Arkansas on the side
of the road out in the country. Somebody, killer monster hit her,
you know, purposely, and shedidn't die right away, and so he

(18:55):
ended up taking her to try toconceal it. She was still alive.
The only injuries noted at that timewas to her face, so she was
bleeding from the face. But hesaid that the truck that this man was
driving had a little dent. Youwould have not known that he just hit
somebody. They just happened to seea little speck of a speck of blood.

(19:17):
And so that's a you know,how they ended up finding him,
and he actually joined the search partyand on Facebook and you know, did
all these things. And here hewas the one who hit her and then
she was still alive and he youknow, raped her and strangled him.
So that's Sydney Southerland case, I'mguessing. Yeah, yeah, where Yeah,

(19:37):
he purposely hit her with an intent, you know. Yeah. And
what it shows me though, iswhen he showed me that article and I
was reading it, there wasn't damageto this guy's truck like you would think,
and yet this girl was She wassmaller right than Judy, And so
who knows and how fast you're goingand all of those factors You just don't
know. But it's very likely thatthat is something that happened. Is some

(20:00):
was driving on these back roads andhit her and then said, oh you
know, panic, said oh shit, and then decided to cover it up
exactly. Yeah, it does dependthe level of damage to the body and
the vehicle depends on the type ofvehicle. So I should have clarified a
little bit earlier when I said thatthe shins are around the knee area is

(20:21):
often broken by somebody gets hit bya car. That's by somebody who actually
gets hit by a car like asedan. Now if you have a higher
up you know, truck or ajeep or a semi or something, yeah,
the injuries are going to be totallydifferent. And something else I want
to point out, she could havebeen hit and then run over because the
person didn't have time to veer aroundher or stop or whatever, and that

(20:42):
could have caused more injuries to her. And like you said, the person
panics. I mean, I canvisualize this entire thing going down. So
the only thing that the hiccup,right, if we go that, if
we talk about that, we've alltalked about this before. The only sticking
point for me and if that's howthis happened, was the fact that she

(21:03):
ended up at her family's farm.So somebody had to know. It wasn't
left somewhere else in a field,you know, she wasn't put somewhere else
but actually at the farm. Sosomebody had to know that number one,
that that's her property farm and thatnobody lives there. You got it.
As you walk through that, I'mlike, what's the likelihood of that,

(21:25):
right of I think the hit hittingher is very likely, But then you
have to go who would have knownthose things? Right? Yeah? And
so then that's another area of tryingto figure that out. Who had that
information? I mean, I thinkin a rural area like that, a
lot of the local residents have beenthere for years and they probably kind of

(21:47):
get to know who lives aware andwhat properties are inhabited or not, So
it wouldn't surprise me. You know, someone that's driving on that road is
probably going to their own residence.So there's a decent chance that there are
a nearby red of the Petty farmand knew that family and knew that they
were no longer living there. Idon't think that's out of the question at

(22:07):
all. And there's others who wouldknow the area very well, like law
enforcement or maybe local city officials.I mean, somebody like that especially.
You know, I'm not pointing anyfingers at anybody in law enforcement, but
we have to consider this scenario,right, So like a cop, they
patrol the roads constantly, they knowwhere people live so and they know which

(22:27):
places are inhabited or not. Idon't think it's out of the question that
someone could have hit her and realizedwho she was. It was like,
you know, what am I goingto do? Well? And the other
thing is that you know, wehave Chris saying he picked her up out
there, so we know, youknow, at that point, even in
the case files, you know,he's saying that he did pick her up

(22:47):
there on Jericho Road, and wehave now confirmed in the witnesses statements that
she was at walking on those roadsat time frames. Now that yeah,
kind of that put her out thereor Chris enough to pick her up.
That's what happened in d the farm. And let's do a little language analysis,
right, I'm not pointing the fingerat Chris at all, But when
you say I picked her up,well, what happens if you hit somebody

(23:10):
and they're laying in the road,you have to pick them up? Right.
We always think, oh, pickingsomeone up means they're standing on the
side of the road and they getin my car willingly. But there's other
meanings to that language usage, sowe have to again just keep an open
mind and know that. Again,not pointing any finger at Chris. I
mean, he's been so helpful andso informative, you know, so far

(23:30):
as story seemed believable, but againyou got to look at you know,
people leak information when they're trying tohide stuff, and so picking someone up
there's a lot of different meanings anda lot of different ways you can pick
somebody up. So if we lookat you know, we kind of went
through the accident scenario and for me, I think getting hit is the most
likely kind of first initial accident,right, like, didn't me do it?

(23:52):
The other option is she's out atthe farm, someone knows she's out
there, they go to the farm, and then something happens there. So
maybe the intention was to just gocheck on her. Maybe the intention was
maybe there was bad intention right thatsomeone knew she was up there and they
went there and then there was astruggle and then they had to cover up.

(24:17):
The evidence. Is it likely thatthere was a sexual assault. We
don't know of the evidence, soit can go either way. I think
of looking at this as was shehit, you know, and it had
to be you know, Chris putshimself there as to you know, picking
her up and then dropping her off. But that's where we're not sure right

(24:38):
as to how that all happened.But did you know somebody go back,
Chris did pick her up, let'ssay, dropped her off and left,
and somebody else knew she was outthere, or somebody else had to come
upon her out there, So that'sall likely as well. I really really
struggle with believing that she could navigateup that driveway. I mean, you

(24:59):
and I walked it the videos onYouTube and we walked it during the day,
But I really just struggle with believingshe could make it up that driveway
uninjured in the pitch black. Imean, there was no moon. What
was a crescent moon that night,but basically no moon. I'm not saying
she didn't have a flashlight. Wedon't know, but it doesn't sound like
it. It's how is she makingit up to the house to begin with?
And then why mister Petty was specificallylooking for shoemarks, tire tracks,

(25:23):
anything on that driveway and didn't seeany. And even if you know,
and if it was muddy, youwould still even you won't get the shoe
print, there would be evidence ofsomebody trying to walk up there, I
have to believe, and he foundnothing that pointed to that. But let's
just say she is making it upthe driveway. There is another scenario we've
discussed where somebody's maybe illegally hunting onthe property and they accidentally shoot her,

(25:47):
And so that would make a lotsense too to where they need to cover
up this crime so the medical examinercan't figure out the cause of death because
if they find out she's shot,that's going to give a clue to the
killer. So I could see Ican also see I know we looked at
you know what we're I was askingpeople like the hunting time frame, you

(26:07):
know, is that possible? Andwe know that the Petty Farm is a
beautiful farm in one hundred and eightacres or something. People love to hunt
there so much so that you know, mister Petty is very strict on who
he lets on his property and who'snot he wants that property, and everyone
knows the rules and the family rightas to making sure that the gates lock,
making sure that you do it justas you know Grandpa Dad has said.

(26:33):
So it is possible that they werehaving things stolen back then. So
it was possible, or is possiblethat she did make it up there and
something was going on and walked intosomething that she shouldn't have walked into.
So that's definitely likely. The otherthing that we've talked about before is that
the Petty Farm backs up to otherhouses, and we've mentioned that before,

(26:57):
so you can get from the PettyFarm to Tom Sam's house taking trials.
You don't need to go up thatdriveway. And also, you know the
Packers lived back there when we werethere. Kelly took us in the four
wheeler very easy to do it.If you wanted to, you can walk
it. And if you have afour wheel drive, I believe that you

(27:18):
could have driven it easily too.Absolutely. So you know, I think
that's kind of where we're at is. You know, if we go to
the of an accident, was ita hunting thing, was it she walked
upon something, or was it shegot hit and there was you know that
that kind of cover up? Yeah, to me at this point in your

(27:38):
investigation, Like, to me,there's two pop scenarios on my list.
One is what we just discussed,some kind of accident happened and the person
felt they needed to cover up,they needed to burn her body in order
to disguise the cause of death.Or the other one is that someone had
some kind of vendetta against this familyand so that was part of setting the

(28:00):
fire to the family farm. Butwe have not found really anything pointing in
that direction, but just with thelevel of damage and everything, I can't
rule that out yet that somebody hadsome kind of like real anger towards this
family and this was their way of, you know, getting revenge. Those
are my top two right now.That's that's where the evidence points me.
The other one, you know,and the other death cause that we can

(28:23):
look at too is a natural,which I think we've already ruled that out,
right, Yeah, she had heartproblems, diabetes, all of that.
She was still dead before the fire. She didn't naturally, Yeah,
die, you don't. The chanceof setting a fire and then having a
heart attack to me is about zeroor whatever. And in the stellar as
well, right right, right,yeah, or you remember are one of

(28:48):
the first episodes where that sheriff toldor that cop told mister Petty that maybe
because she was overweight. That stillgets me. But anyways, so we
can rule out the you know,natural, and that kind of leads us
with the indetermined. Yeah, soit is appropriate, Yeah, it is,
it is. And you know,for me, I would say where
everything is leading me at this pointwas, you know, I feel that

(29:11):
she made it to the farm,and well, of course we know she
made it to the farm, butI think she made to the farm and
was like in the house, wasat the house, and then something happened.
I think somebody knew that she wasthere and then came to do whatever
they were going to do. That'swhere I'm at, And then realized crap,

(29:33):
I've gone too far right and thenhad to cover it up. So
I think that that is pointing memore likely you know that way. I
mean, I think we did prettygood talking through the other scenarios and basically
saying it's just not very feasible.I don't know where the steel toes were

(29:55):
found. If they were like foundright by her feet, then I indicate
the boots or stall on her,which means no sexual assault most likely because
you're not gonna it's pretty hard torape somebody their pants aren't off. But
well, for sure, Yeah,yeah, I don't think sexual assault was
the motive at all. No,that doesn't really make much sense to me.

(30:17):
And yeah, the thing is,if your scenario is right, and
somebody in your shoes up there,there's a small small number of people who
knew that she was there alone corrector could have known, right, I
guess we can pick up there.I think that's something I think we can
kind of rule. We know peoplewho were aware shoes up there, right,
So if we talk about so weknow, according to Chris himself,

(30:40):
you drop her off, right,we know that so he knows she's there.
There is another potential for we've heardthe name Billy schmucking Goss thrown out
so many times, who also livedout in that area, who was friends
with the Petty family, who supposedlyhad a crush on Judy. But the
likelihood of him knowing that she wasout there at that point, I don't

(31:03):
know. You would have to eitherbe in communication or come upon her,
right Yeah, So yeah, it'sso remote. And as far as we
know, she didn't tell anybody shewas going out there. So Billy shows
up or walks by because I guesshe used to walk at night and walk
everywhere. Is that possible? Sure? But right now we only have potentially
two people who knew she was there. Am I forgetting anybody? Well,

(31:27):
Chris could have said something to someonetoo. You know, we don't know
for sure where he went if hedid drop her off, and he lived
with other people, I mean,you could have mentioned it to his housemaid,
or he could have made a phonecall, or you know, he
could have had friends that came overthat nine eight could have told them.
I mean, so you can't,you know, discount the possibility that just
by word of mouth a few otherpeople found out. But it's still going

(31:49):
to be a really small number ofpeople, like five, I think at
the most, right, And weknow when Chris came back, he said
everybody was asleep and he went rightto bed, right, So unless he
went somewhere else before going home again, it would have to be why are
you mentioning you dropped this lady offat the farm? Like why is that

(32:09):
significant? I don't know. Sowe have a very small handful of people
that would knew she was up there. So then where does that leave us?
Right? And right? Investigation iswe know she was there, and
now let's look at who knew shewas there exactly. And again that number
is small. I mean maybe thatneighbor at the bottom of the driveway,
like saw a car pullover, sothey peeked out the window and saw her

(32:30):
get out. So I guess possiblyyou could add that person to the list,
But I mean, it's it's atiny list. It's hard for me
to grasp. I think we're lookingat somebody who panicked, who definitely went
to extra lengths to cover up whatthey which We've talked about what they've done.
And listen, you know, ifit was an accident and something happened,

(32:52):
let's work it out, right.I mean, it was an accident,
but then you went to these lengthsand let's talk about it. Let's
finally get this aired out, becauseI can't imagine. Can you imagine living
with this for fourteen years? Almostfifteen years? No? I could not.
And what we know, what weall know, is that most people

(33:12):
who kill someone and they're not ableto keep that completely to themselves. Now,
they don't necessarily go out and givea full confession, but they'll leak
information. They'll collect news articles aboutthe case. They'll maybe talk about the
case to their friends, their familyor tiptoeing around it in a way,
so they'll keep tabs on it,for sure, Yeah, or like and
over again, sometimes they join theeffort. I'm gonna say, I'm sure

(33:35):
they're following your investigation, no doubt. Well, I hope so, and
I hope, if not themselves,people around them, right, And so
we always say, even with likethe Delphi or anybody like that, like,
start paying attention to people and whatthey're saying and what they're doing and
how they were acting. You knowback in oh eight or oh nine or
even now with this investigation heating up, they must be feeling the pressure.

(33:59):
And I can't. I couldn't imaginefourteen years of If this was on my
shoulders for fourteen years, I wouldI think it's time, rights, it's
time for this person or persons tocome forward and say, get that off
your shoulders. Right, You're gonnafeel so much better and be a better
person if you would just come forwardand tell us. And the Petties deserve

(34:23):
that. And I would say tothe person, you know, a person's
responsible, mister Petty deserve this.And it's been fourteen years, stop being
a coward, right, come forward, say what happened, and let's move
through this, and let's work throughit, because I'm not going to stop.
Yeah, And I would think,you know, I can't speak for
the prosecuting attorney in most cases andattorneys that you know I've been in contact

(34:46):
with. If the person just comesforward and explains what happened, yea,
you know, the prosecuting attorney isgoing to take that into account when filing
charges. But if the person waitsaround for us to figure out who it
is, improve it gary, theattorney's going to throw every charge possible at
that person. So that's something totake into consideration too. And here's a

(35:06):
shout out, like to all yourlisteners, because you got a ton in
the Parkersburg area. If you remembersomebody with a damaged vehicle the week that
Judy was killed, please let usknow. You can stay anonymous. But
I still believe if she was hitby a car, I mean, I'm
sorry, she's two hundred forty pounds, that's probably most likely going to do
some decent damage to a vehicle.And then if she's bleeding, her body's

(35:30):
put in that vehicle. She's bleedingin that vehicle, you know, and
the killer has touched her and maybegot blood on themselves. So you know,
if you remember someone's clothing suddenly goingmissing, or they're getting their car
detailed or their cars in the shop, or they sell the car or take
it to a wrecking yard that week, or something, that could be a
super important clue that you guys needto know about. Absolutely, you made

(35:52):
a really good point too, Jen, And I think for me is if
you are the person responsible, absolutelycome forward and tell us what happened your
side, right, you get achance to explain, right after all these
years, explain what happened, andthen we'll go from there. And maybe
you know the verdict or the consequences. Right, you've lived your fourteen years,

(36:13):
uty has not and her family hasnot. So rather than us find
you and then bring you to justice, why don't you come forward and maybe
work something out. Yeah? Right, everybody deserves that in this and you
know, the killer themselves. Imean I can't imagine that way. I
mean, if I did I dosomething wrong and I'm like, oh my
god, oh my god, forfourteen years carrying something that big, it

(36:36):
was ruined. It's a huge burden. Yeah, it really is. So
justin we didn't hear your thoughts basedon where everything is right now on the
investigation. Were things leading you theevidence that we've got so far. I
mean, as of now, I'mgoing to have to agree with Jen,
like I do think it was somekind of accident with her walking because after

(36:58):
we got the case file, orat least the first part of it,
the fact that the sightings are confirmed, and that gives us a better time
stamp of where she was and whereshe was heading, and it does confirm
that she was out there walking onthese roads and she you know, wasn't
probably picked up earlier or whatever thecase might have been, or not have

(37:21):
been. But after reading a lotof stuff through the through the reports and
the files and the research that we'vedone, the fact that Cutwright has changed
his stories so many times that reallyreally bothers me. And we have to
take into consideration that the person hadto have had access, and like you

(37:43):
guys have mentioned, they had toknow that she was there, or where
the petty farm was, whatever thecase might have been. But I think
it was somebody who didn't necessarily needto go up that driveway. They could
have came around the back, ye, Like we've talked about that scenario as
well. The car accident scenario doesmake a lot of sense to me,

(38:06):
And I know we have talked aboutthis amongst ourselves before. I don't know.
That's kind of where I'm at withit. I mean, I don't
think. I don't know. Ithink it was a panic for sure,
and it was somebody with enough commonsense to know, Okay, I got
to get rid of this somehow andcover up what actually happened. But either
way, like, I still wantto believe that more than one person is

(38:29):
involved, So I think there's peopleout there who know more than what they're
saying, and I think it's becausefear of them getting in trouble as well.
Sure, so I don't think it'sfear of the person who did it.
I think they're scared of their involvement. Yeah, basically, Yeah,
And that's why nobody's saying anything couldbe I mean, she was a larger

(38:52):
woman. You know, adrenaline doeswonders, and I can't put a trust
someone to pick up two or fortypounds. But like, I've carried a
lot of dead bodies working at theMedical Examiner, and I could never carry
one by myself. And you know, I'm to undred sixty, Like I
would lift weights and stuff, andI can't even pick up one hundred pound

(39:12):
dead body by myself. So thatdoes sort of maybe write an indicator that
there's a second person that maybe helpedwith this. But that second person might
have, you know, they mighthave got called into this situation not realizing
what was going on, and thenit's like, oh my gosh, what
did I get myself into? Andnow what do I do? Like do
I call the cops and get myfriend in trouble? Do I help my
friend? But I'm in the middleof it now. I mean, I'm

(39:34):
sympathetic to that and if that's what'shappened again, I would think the prosecuting
attorney would take that into account,that, you know, that this person
got dragged into this terrible situation,not by choice, you know. And
as we're talking, I just thoughtof another possible situation as we go through
this. You know, maybe shewas hit, but she wasn't injured enough
to where she couldn't where she stilldidn't know what she was aware of what

(39:59):
was going on. So maybe someonedid hit her, and she said,
I'm going up to the farm,you know, right, she gets in
the in the vehicle, they goup to the farm, They go the
back way in because she can't walkthis hill. Maybe she's injured, just
get up there and then we'll figureout what to do. And then maybe
at that point the person realized,shit, she's gonna call the cops,

(40:19):
like I can't get in trouble forthis, Oh my god, And then
it goes to that next sport.Or maybe you know, I don't know
I could see, or maybe shewasn't initially hurt that bad or hurt to
the point where she couldn't still sayI'm going up there, taking me up
there, and then we'll figure itout. And that person was like,
sure, let's do that. Andthen as things going to panic, I've

(40:40):
been drinking, I'm on pills,I whatever, she can't go to the
cops. Yeah, because I justcan't have this right. So maybe that's
how you know that plays out aswell, is that's how you get her
up there, is she was ableto say, take, this is where
I'm going, let's get there andthen figure it out, and then maybe

(41:00):
she ends up dying there though maybeshe's hurt enough where they get her up
there, but she's not yet dead, and then she dies because of the
injuries, right, yeah, andthen they're like, well, now we
have to do this. Yeah,because if she's suffered more head trauma than
anything else, that doesn't always manifestin death. I imedially right, Like

(41:21):
we talked about ironically, you know, the swelling on the brain earlier,
and that will lead to death,but just not right away. But that
can happen in five minutes, thirtyminutes. So yeah, she and sometimes
you know, we've seen stories wherepeople get a real bad concussion they don't
realize it, or like who's theactor that died in the hotel or remember
he fell down. Yeah, Bobsag it, right. Yeah, he

(41:45):
took a fall. He had tohave taken a fall because he had massive
trauma to the back of his skulland in his brain. But yet he
was dressed, he went to bed, he put his glasses on the bedside
table, his phone was plugged in. It's like he got himself up and
apparently thought he was okay enough.Right, So, I mean that situation
could have totally happened with Judy towhere she thinks she's okay, like you

(42:07):
said, just take me to thehouse. I can't walk the driveway,
I can't get the lock undone onthe gate, so we have to take
it back away, and then thingsgo downhill. Maybe she loses cont dismiss
you know, like you said,the person panics. Yeah, so yeah,
I could see that. Yeah yeah, just kind of thinking about it
now, you know, as we'regoing through as we always you know,
talk, I just kind of hadthis thought of, you know, it

(42:30):
was all an accident, and thenshe ended up dying from the accident,
and then it's now we gotta coverYeah exactly. That would get that would
get her to her property, takeme here, you know, my head's
or whatever. But I feel,Okay, maybe she died on the way
into the house, you know,yeah, could be So anyways, I
think that's and listen, if theperson responsible, if that's what happened,

(42:52):
that's what happened. Yeah, butyou still got to tell us what happened
so that we can figure out inthe family and Judy finally gets justice of
you know, knowing what happened.That's like you said, I'm not victim
blaming at all. But she's outon a pitch black road in dark clothes.
I could totally understand how she gothit. Yeah, I mean,

(43:13):
I mean there's a case here inColorado where this girl, she's just an
acquaintance, but she'd had one beer, literally one beer, and she was
driving home, came over a blindhill and there's a bicyclist riding in the
road, and she's also driving westinto the sun towards sunset. She hit
him and he died. She wasarrested at first, and they tried to

(43:35):
charge her with DUI and she's like, she was only a point at four
and she's like, well, I'myou know. Her lawyer obviously argued,
well, she's below the legal limit. That's why we have the legal limit,
and ultimately she was acquitted of allthe charges. And even the bicyclist
wife testified in support of this girlin court because she's like, I used
to tell my husband stop riding inthe middle of the road, but he
always hated riding on the shoulder.She's like, I totally understand why this

(43:58):
happened. So it could be exactlythe same in Judy's case. You know,
she just she made unfortunately a coupleof bad decisions right against what we've
heard a lot is that Jericho Roadwas the road that people would take after
drinking because there was not a lotof cops out there. They would take
that road because it was safer thangoing on fifty or you know, any

(44:22):
of the other roads. They wouldtake Jericho Road to go wind back there.
And as we saw on the video, it's a very windy road,
and so it is very likely,and she's wearing dark clothing that somebody who
is you know, had too muchto drink and didn't see her hit her,
and then she was able to getup and get in the car and
say take me here, and thenfrom there that happened. So I think

(44:45):
we're getting we're getting closer though,you know, and I think that as
we're going, we're going to getmore of the case files. I know
that Doug has been great. He'sgiven us all the initials so far.
I know with the new year theywere off, but he's coming back and
we're going to continue to get morecase files and then meet with him.
And like you said, the personresponsible better come now than for us to

(45:07):
come for you. And you knowthis is this evolution of your investigation has
been fantastic. It really just showshow following the evidence I think lead you
in the direction you need to gorather than I mean, it's great to
read people's statements and he said this, and she said that, and that
can be helpful. But I thinkyou guys have really been looking at like

(45:29):
the hard facts and evidence that weknow of, and you know, using
that, you know, Alan's expertiseand stuff to your advantage, and that's
just opening up I don't know,it's really opened my eyes. I think
it's opening Dougs too. So yep. And I'm glad that Doug is working
with us, and for sure he'sgreat. All right, Well, I
guess that wraps us up for twentytwenty two. And yeah, heading into

(45:52):
twenty twenty three are lucky number.This is the year I know it's I
always bet twenty three Roulette, it'smy number, and we're gonna we're gonna
solve this with the PEP. Yeah. Thanks for the great discussion. I
really enjoyed it. Thanks for comingon. We appreciate it anytime, anytime.
Yeah, and we're also for ourlisteners. We will share the link

(46:14):
to Jen and George's podcast when youknow, the trailer when that gets up
and going, so that if youalso want to follow their investigation where one
big group we support each other andyou know, again it's another case that
you know needs all thoughts, insight, ideas and joined theirs as well.
For sure, I appreciate it.Thank you so much. You're welcome.

(46:36):
All right, happy here, happynew here you guys. Hope you have
a good one too. Okay,bye bye on the