14 Years Gone

On Monday September 30, 2004, 18-year-old college student Brittany Phillips was found dead in her apartment in Tulsa, Oklahoma. She was a student at Tulsa Community College, went to her evening chemistry class with her friend Lydia. She was found lying next to her bed. Clothing was found scattered all around her in a haphazard way, and the balcony doors to her second floor apartment were open. Investigators believed she had been dead for at least a couple of days. News reports said that she had been raped, and strangled, but he medical examiner’s report stated that there was no definitive evidence of sexual assault. What happened to Brittany Phillips? And could her killer already be behind bars, or is he still out roaming the streets? If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

23 Okt 33min

On Monday September 27, 2004, 18-year-old Brittany Phillips, a student at Tulsa Community College, drove home from campus with her friend Lydia. They just took a chemistry test, and Brittany was looking forward to hanging out and celebrating her nineteenth birthday, which was coming up on October 4. But then as the week rolled on, Lydia didn't hear from Brittany. And then, she noticed that Brittany didn’t show up for their next class on Wednesday. Lydia was unsure if she was overreacting, but her gut told her that something was wrong. She called in a welfare check, and when first responders and police arrived, they found Brittany’s body in the bedroom of her apartment. News reports said that she had been raped, and strangled. In the two decades since, ex-boyfriends and strangers have been questioned, sex offenders have been investigated, DNA swabs have been taken, but there are still no suspects. And the information that we found made me question if a lot of the “facts” that have been reported about this case are true at all. We’re going to be going back to the beginning and ask some fundamental questions. Could the timeline of Brittany’s murder be off by up to 48 hours? Was Brittany definitely raped? Was this the work of someone who knew her and staged the crime scene, or could it have been a serial killer? And could that person still be out there? And finally, could police have been on the wrong trail all this time? If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

16 Okt 27min

This week, we continue with the disappearance of Jennifer Wix and her daughter Adrianna. Could Jennifer have left voluntarily and started a new life? Could she have left with someone in that white car and then that person harmed her or Adrianna? Or, could, as the Wix family suspects, the answers lie closer to where Jennifer was last seen on or around the 100 acres owned by the Bentons? If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

9 Okt 28min

On March 25, 2004, 21-year-old Jennifer Wix was in crisis. Jennifer lived in Robertson County, Tennessee and was a single mother to her two-year-old daughter, Adrianna, who she adored. She and Adrianna had moved in with her boyfriend, William Joseph “Joey” Benton, and his parents, Cynthia and Franklin Joseph Benton, a few months before in December. But the situation at home was volatile - Before moving in with Joey’s family, Jennifer lived with her mother, Kathy Nale, and her younger half-sister, Casey Wix. Casey told us that Jennifer had been calling home and complaining that she wasn’t getting along with certain members of Joey’s family. So even though they were only hearing Jennifer’s side of the story, Casey and Jennifer’s mom were forming an impression of Joey, based on what Jennifer told them, that wasn’t great. Over the months, Casey says that the situation at the Benton home had become increasingly strained. Then on March 25, something happened. At some point during the day, Joey got a call at work and left suddenly, saying that he was going to deal with a situation at home. He told police that he picked up Jennifer and Adriana at home and that they went for a drive. During that drive, Joey claimed that he and Jennifer decided to end their relationship. After that, Joey told police that he stopped at a grocery store so that Jennifer could use the phone, and then he drove her and Adriana to a nearby gas station in Cross Plains. Joey said at that gas station, which he said was in Cross Plains, a town a few minutes away, Jennifer and Adrianna got into a vehicle, which he described as a white four door sedan. The two were never seen again. But from the beginning Jennifer’s family was suspicious of this story. They say that they don’t believe that a young mom with a toddler would leave without any of her things and without ever calling her family. Also, they pointed out that Jennifer could have stayed with multiple family members who lived in the area. Why drive off with someone else? It’s been almost 20 years, and those years have been filled with rumors, several searches of a property, shifting stories about what really happened that day, a wrongful death lawsuit, and most recently, a severed body part connected to a family member were found in a creek. And yet no one has found any trace of Jennifer Wix or her daughter Adrianna. If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

2 Okt 35min

The morning of Friday May 25, 1979, started out like just another day for Julie Patz; her husband Stan, a photographer; and their children, eight-year-old Shira, six-year-old Etan and two-year-old Ari. It was a busy morning. Julie ran a daycare out of her Soho loft at 113 Prince Street in New York City, and she was getting her own kids ready for the day and at the same time, preparing for the influx of kids who would be arriving soon. Shira didn’t want to roll out of bed, but Etan, who his family described as a sweet, loving and friendly boy, was excited to start the school day. Six-year-old Etan asked his mom if he could walk the two short blocks to the school bus stop alone - for the very first time. Since it was the last few weeks of the school year, his mom said that would be okay. Etan had a plan. He had a dollar in his pocket, which a neighborhood handyman had given him the day before when Etan helped him in his workshop. Etan was going to stop at the corner bodega at Prince and West Broadway, and buy a soda before getting on the bus. Julie walked Etan downstairs, and as she watched him walk down the street before going back upstairs, she told herself that it was only two blocks. That was the last time that Julie ever saw her son. This case became a huge story not just in New York but in the entire country. Etan Patz became the literal poster child for missing children, and Julie and her husband Stan were the living embodiment of every parent’s worst nightmare. What if your child disappeared one day, and you never found out what really happened to them? Forty-six years later, this case is still active. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

25 Sep 36min

On August 24, 2012, a Vietnam veteran who had been staying at the Lake Lanier Club Apartments off Dawsonville Highway in Gainesville, Georgia with his daughter and grandchildren, was taking a walk through the woods behind the complex. The man liked taking nature walks, and he was also following up on a report that he had made to the apartment management about a missing manhole cover. He later told police that he wanted to see if it had been replaced yet. It was around 7:30 pm in the evening, and still almost full daylight, and when the man paused near a stream bed, he saw something disturbing...something that he at first thought was a mannequin. Upon closer inspection, he realized that he was looking at a dead body. He called 911 and told them that a young lady, about 18 or 19 years old, was dead and looked like she had been dead for two or three days. The young woman was 16-year-old Hannah Truelove, a student at Gainesville High School. She had been missing since the night before. And even though her exact cause of death has not been revealed, police said she died a “violent death." She had been stabbed multiple times and left in the stream bed a quarter mile away from home; her flip flop was found a few yards away, tangled in some branches. Who killed Hannah Truelove?See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

18 Sep 27min

At 1:40 AM on Saturday, September 28, 1974, police got a call about a traffic accident on State Highway 77 in Crittenden County Arkansas, three miles north of the Lake David Overpass. When they got there they found a 1964 Chevrolet which was stopped in the southbound lane of the highway. Near the abandoned car in a ditch, they found the body of 35-year-old Fred New Jr., a married father of three who worked the night shift at a local trucking company. Fred had been shot, three times, at very close range, with a shotgun. He had been shot in the neck, the side and the elbow. His shoes and socks had been removed and he had no identification. His pockets were turned out and the money he had on him which according to his wife was around $200, had been stolen. There was blood in the front of the car. Fred was lying in a pool of blood near the back of the vehicle - so either his killer or killers threw him out of the car, or he stumbled out after being shot and his killer fired the final shot or shots outside the car. Police got the call about Fred’s car after another driver ran into it, as it was stalled on the highway. But that driver fled the scene. And then, near where Fred’s body was found, police learned that a local gas station had been robbed. So they had a robbery, a hit-and-run, and a brutal execution style murder - all in the same night in the same small town. If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to the Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

11 Sep 33min

On June 14, 2000, there was a huge storm brewing in northeast Arkansas. It had been raining heavily all day and according to local weather data, tornados had hit. Over 100 trees were downed, power lines were down and homes were destroyed. Twenty year old Amanda Tusing was hanging out with her fiancé, Matt Ervin, at his apartment in Jonesboro. Amanda lived 40 miles away in Dell, Arkansas, which is in Mississippi County, with her father Ed, her mother Susan and her twin brother, Andy. She also had an older brother who worked out of state. Matt didn’t want her to go home that night. It was about a 45-minute drive on a good day, and the weather was bad, but Amanda wanted to get home. So she left Jonesboro at around 11:30 pm and should have gotten home around 12:30 at the latest. Amanda told Matt that she would call him from her parents landline as soon as she got home. She did have a cell phone but never kept it charged. But Matt never got that call and by 1:30 he was concerned. Matt called Amanda’s mother, Susan Tusing, and woke her up. She went to check to see if Amanda was in bed, and when she went into her bedroom, she saw that the bed had not been slept in and that Amanda was not home. This was totally unlike her, and they knew something happened. So her dad and brother drove toward Dell, and Matt left his house in Jonesboro and started driving down Highway 18 in the opposite direction. Their plan was that they would meet in the middle and hopefully see her or her car along the route. Matt saw her 1992 Pontiac Grand Am parked under a streetlight on the shoulder of AR Highway 18 about a mile west of the small town of Monette. It was on the side of the road and looked like it was parked there intentionally - not like she randomly swerved over. Matt got out of his car, walked over and looked inside. If you have a case you’d like Catherine Townsend to look into, you can reach out to us at our Hell and Gone Murder Line at 678-744-6145. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

4 Sep 32min