Laura Lea

Transcript

Did you know that driving high is considered driving under the influence? That's right. Driving under the influence of marijuana is against the law in every state, even in states where marijuana is legal. That means driving high could get you a DUI. And if you think law enforcement officers can't tell when you're driving high, you're wrong. Your friends can tell your co-workers can tell. Even your parents can tell. Everyone can tell. So what makes you think that law enforcement officers don't know when you're driving high? Driving under the influence of marijuana can slow your response time and change how you perceive time and speed. So even if you think you're fine to drive when you're high, you're not. Because the bottom line is if you feel different, you drive different in driving high is driving under the influence. So remember, drive high, get a DUI paid for by Netzer. Christmas is the season of giving, but it can be difficult to know who on your list once what. Save yourself the guesswork by giving the gift of choice, whether you're buying for the foodie, fashionista or whole bird of the family. They'll love a Dunnes Stores gift card. They can choose from everything we have in store and online, from fashion to homewares to groceries. It's the perfect choice to make this Christmas. Visit dermstore.com for details. Make Christmas for everyone. Terms and conditions apply. I'm Alice. And I'm Bret, and this is the prosecutor's legal place. Welcome back to legal briefs, everyone, I am your host, Alex, and I'm joined, as always, by my perplexing co-host Bret. Hello, Alex. Are you saying that because I can't talk and you can't understand what I'm saying? I think you're saying that. But I was saying that because of the case that we're covering today, which is perhaps the most perplexing case that I've read in recent memory. But also, I'm perplexed by why your tongue seems too big for your mouth right now. I don't know, guys, if if, if this show doesn't work out tonight, I'll just forgive me because there's something about talking. This is not working. My mouth is just not working. It's maybe the case of the Mondays. It's just the Monday. It's not even that late. Usually we record, you know, an hour later than we do now. So this is like early in the night, Bret. Yeah, I don't know. Maybe I'm losing it. What does that say? Well, I'm glad you're here because you're about to jet off on even more travels. And I just came back from travel. So we've just been like ships passing in the night and we've done a lot of interviews because there's been so much going on in the Delphi case that I'm actually really glad we get to sit down and record a not, you know, two hour notice interview about, you know, Delphi or something like that. As much fun as that is this this is kind of where I love just digging into a case with you and hearing your thoughts because we haven't really talked about what is taking the media true crime world by storm right now. And that's the Moscow quadruple murder. Yeah. And the thing about Delphi's we have more information than we used to, but we still don't have that much information. We have even less concrete, solid information in the case we can talk about today. And this is one we've kind of held off talking about it for a while because honestly, I just assumed that within a couple of weeks of the crime, we would have a much better idea of exactly what happened and what motivated it, even if we didn't know who did it. Even the police made an arrest, and so we just kind of kept waiting and waiting, and people kept asking and emailing and diming us and everything else. And at some point we just decided, let's go ahead and do an episode on it. Talk about what's out there in the media. I think there are a few things we have to say just right off the bat, Alice, which no one, there's not a whole lot of concrete evidence in this case so far. The police have kept a lot of stuff close to the vest, which is totally understandable. There's been a lot of speculation, a lot of rumors. Some of the stuff we're going to talk about today are rumors. We're going to try and tell you when we think it's pretty solid and we're going to try and tell you when rumors have been debunked and by the time you hear this, there may be information that we mentioned that stale. Obviously, if there's any major update in this case between to record and when we release it, we will record an update. But this is sort of where we are today as we record in what is a an incredible case and just a really strange one. I mean, look, I think, Alice, we will agree with me on this. It is rare. It is rare to have this sort of home invasion crime anyway. I mean, home invasion crimes are the kind of things that are in your nightmares, right? I mean, but they don't happen that often. Luckily, it is even more rare to have four people killed in a single home in a single night. I mean, this is the kind of stuff that some of the most famous crimes of all time have fact patterns like this. So this is an incredibly rare case, an incredibly rare occurrence, and the fact that it seems like at least as we speak, the police don't have a very solid idea of where they're going. In this case, I think really speaks to the mystery here. I think that's right, Brett. An add on top of that. You know what you just said? It's so rare to have a home invasion. And by the way, in case you didn't know why, it's because actually most people are looking for easy crimes. Most people breaking into your homes are not looking to murder you. They're trying to make a quick buck off things they can easily steal from your home. And second, not just a quadruple murder, but a quadruple murder with other people in the house at the time of the murder, who were unharmed and currently are not suspects and don't seem to be kind of a part of the inquiry into who the perpetrator or perpetrators are. I mean, it is just this is a nightmare, a real nightmare. I think everyone's like greatest fears come true to be murdered in your own bed, in the safety of your home, with other people around. I mean, there's so much about it. The victims are so young. This is a college town. I mean, Moscow people act like it's the tiniest town in America. It's actually not. I mean, it's not like a potent middle nowhere a town, but it's pretty small compared to a lot of places. It's not the kind of place to use the cliche. Things like this don't happen in places like Moscow, and they do. And I think that's one of the reasons this is there so much about this case that's captured people's imaginations. It is in some ways and and don't take this the wrong way because, you know, people get all sort of. Upset when you talk about cases, the way you talk about it, but in some ways this is sort of the perfect true crime case. You can understand why this has become such a big deal because of the victims, the sympathy that you have for them, the fact that they're young. The fact is in the college town, the fact that it's a home invasion, the fact that there are two survivors, the fact that it was done with a knife, all these things combined together to make this case interesting. So let's dive into it. Let's talk about what we know and sort of what we see here. Some of this is going to be speculation. But I mean, that's why you come here, right? I mean, if you came here for just the facts, you could read those in the newspaper. So we will speculate a little bit. But hopefully it'll at least be interesting to you to help you understand this. So the victims? Now I do the best I can with their names, and if I get any of them wrong, feel free to correct me. Kaylee Goncalves was 21 and Caylee was best friends from high school with another of the victims, Madison Mogan, who was also 21. So they were best friends together, and we're going to talk about some of the dynamics of the house in a second. But these two had known each other for forever. They'd gone to high school together. Now they're going to college together and they're rooming together. In addition to them, they're sort of group one. And you'll see kind of based on the pictures, almost all the pictures Kaylee and Madison are together. I think they served actually as bridesmaids recently. And one of their sisters weddings, I believe they were in the same sorority. All their pictures, you didn't have to splice them together. They seem to always be together. They posted on social media about things they did together. And as a lot of people do in college, best friends lived together, and that's what they did here. And it's often described as the Moscow for. But I think I think it's worth considering this is really the Moscow two and the Moscow two. These four people were friends, obviously, and they're living together. But those of you who ever lived in a situation like this, when you're in college or you're in law school, you're living in a big house with a group of people. In this case, six people total in this house. You're going to be closer to some than others, and some of it's going to be a matter of convenience because maybe you and your best friend can't afford the place you want. You really like this place, but you need somebody else to fill up the other bedrooms. And so you find some friends I know in law school. I lived in a house with four guys. There were four of us. Four of us total. I was really good friends with one of them. I had been friends with the other, but kind of fell out. And then, frankly, I didn't really like the third guy, but we all lived together and that dynamic affected everything else. You know, me and the guy I really liked. We were the ones who tended to go out to grab something to eat together. But we might all sit together and watch a movie on the television or something like that, right? The dynamic of the household often has little groups, and they're not opposed to each other. It's just you're not necessarily as close to people as some people, as you are to others. I think that's really important that you bring up Brett because I think we can assume that Kayla Madison, because they went out together that night that they could probably tell you the other person's schedule and generally know what the other one's up to and probably have a similar group of friends. Or at least their groups of friends overlap a good bit. But it's not clear to me that the other two that we're about to talk about fall into the same camp that all four would have had the same group of friends and would have known each other's whereabouts on any given night. And in fact, my understanding is of the six people in this house. Two of them went one place. Two of them were in another place and two of them went to third place. So you really did kind of have three groups of two people who all went to different places and then came back together at their house that night. So that's Kaylie and Madison. Then we have Zanna canoodle, who is 20. Zanna was a junior and she was dating Ethan Chapman. Chapman was also murdered. He was 20. Now he was a freshman, and he was also a member of the Sigma Chi fraternity. He did not actually live in the house, but he was dating Zanna and he was staying over that night. Right. So here we have two girl best friends and then a couple that were dating. So pretty much so far, it's all a very regular kind of college rental house. Now, the murder that we've been talking about occurred on a Saturday night. Ethan and Zanna had gone to a fraternity party at the Sigma Chi house, where Ethan was a fraternity member. Maddie and Kaylee had gone to the Corner Club Bar, and they left the bar around 1:30 a.m. and they hit up a late night food truck. They got an Uber and arrived home just before 2:00 a.m. And we know that to be true because there is security footage from that food truck with a timestamp. And so we have a pretty good idea. This is not the speculation we were talking about. We have these kind of concrete timestamps. We'll talk more about what was seen in those videos. But they do get home a little bit before, too. Now, Caylee then called and. On again, off again, boyfriend Jack Decor seven times between 226 and 252 a.m. Given the lateness of the hour, it's not too surprising, but he didn't answer, and later on he said that he didn't answer because he had been asleep. Now, even though they were currently broken up, they had dated for a very long time for multiple years and there may have been talks of them getting back together. So this wasn't a situation where she hadn't talked to Jack in a very long time. I think they had been in pretty constant communication things where I'm sure there are people out there who think it's weird that she's calling her on again, off again boyfriend in the middle of the night. It is not weird at all. I mean, she had been drinking that night, especially after I was going to say, especially after a late night of drinking. So much so that you probably needed like a little. We call it a grease soaker upper. You know, like getting a good, greasy meal before going to bed to kind of help that hangover that might, may or may not be coming. I mean, were you at a fraternity? I was in a sorority in college. Yeah, I I will say that was cool. That's I don't know that I was cool, but I was in a sorority and I will say a lot of calls are made between like the two and three a.m. hour because after three, I feel like a lot of people pass out from like exhaustion or from drinking, but two to three, I think especially if it's a going out night, a lot of people have gone out. They've had a good time. People tend to call exes or people that they might want to come over to hang out in a romantic sense. So I'm not saying that's what happened here, but I don't think this is that strange. So I don't know this for a fact in Moscow, Idaho, but I'm going to guess that the bars close around to where I went to school. University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. The first year or so I was there, the bar is actually never closed. And that was interesting, right? But at some point, Alabama got named like the number two party school in America, and they decided that was not a moniker they wanted to have. So they crack down on it, and they went to two o'clock for the bars to close down. And the reason they said they were doing that is that's pretty standard around the country. I haven't looked it up on Moscow. I bet you that's a that's basically what happened here is the bar started to close. They leave. They hit up the food truck. They get some food, they grab it over, they head back. And then once again, 3:00 in the morning is not that late. I mean, that's kind of the going to bed hour, is what I recall from college. I can't believe that I ever stayed up that late on a regular basis, but I did. And so I don't find anything strange about these times. I don't think it's strange that she was awake. I don't think it was strange she was calling her boyfriend. I don't think you can read anything into that. I don't think they were being held hostage, and she was trying to get his attention to come rescue her anything. No. I think what we can say for certain based on this is there was no crime before 2:52 a.m. Whatever happened happened after that. Yeah. So this is an interesting house. First of all, I think it's worth talking about. It's a three floor house in the college town I went to. Really, it was like any room that could be a bedroom was rented out by the landlords and it didn't really matter. But this particular house was three floors, the first floor, almost like a basement, because I think the living space was mostly on the second floor. And then the third floor to there were two people in the House when the murders happened. Who lived at the house and they both lived on the first floor. What we do know is that the four people who were murdered lived on the second and third floors, and so we know of at least Caylee and Maddie, who were on the list at the house, and Zana, that's three people. Ethan was not on the list in the house, but he stayed there because he was dating Zanna. The two people who lived on the first floor also were on the list in the House, and apparently so that's I just listed five people. Apparently, there is a sixth person also on the lease. We don't know their names, but apparently that person was not at the house. Just to kind of give you an idea of the size of the house and how many people who may have access to the house because each of those people probably have other friends who have access to the house. I mean, for one, my college house was, I think, never even locked. But this is not like a small apartment with just two bedrooms, for example. This is a pretty big rental house. Now we do know that there were at least two other girls, like I mentioned, who also lived in the home, and the two who survived are Bethany Funk and Dylan Mortenson, and they were completely unharmed that night. And we can speculate as to why this is. But if you look at the house and it's likely not evident that there would be two people living on the first floor since, if you don't know the House, well, it's possible. You just think the first floor, as most houses are, just have like the living space kitchen, living room, cetera. And let me say, if you look at a picture of the house to like and we'll post a picture on the website, it is a weirdly constructed house. So this first floor is kind of. It almost looks like like if you look at it from the side, it almost looks like a staircase like you have this first floor and then attached to it kind of higher up to the right. I mean, imagine this you got like a box and that's the first floor. And then to the right of it, you have another box. It's a little higher. And that's the second floor. And then on top of that's the third floor. And if, for instance, this isn't someone who's familiar with this and they're entering on the second floor through a sliding glass door, they might just not even think about the first floor being a living space. It may just not be something that even crosses their mind. And then people have wondered, You know, why would you kill everybody, but not those two? Well, if you don't even know there's bedrooms down there, you might not think to check. And does this, you know, point to this being someone who didn't necessarily know that House had never been in it? Maybe we can talk about that more. Yeah. And and that's a really good point, because the it appears that the perpetrator came in through the second floor and a lot of people said, Well, how can these two girls who are living on the first floor not have heard something that was happening again? This was a going out night, and those two girls on the first floor had gone out that night and they stayed out pretty late in terms of, you know, late for me, I guess not that late compared to their roommates, but they stayed out till about 1:00 a.m. and probably had something to drink and were probably out out in terms of like falling asleep and in a deep slumber as well. And this this, to me, is just not weird, and I don't really understand why people think this is so strange. I mean, look, I don't know if presumably a lot of you out there have drank before and never drank too much before and then fallen asleep. For me, I can be a light sleeper. But if I've been drinking once I'm asleep, I'm probably not going to wake up until the morning. And that's just the way it's going to be in the world can pretty much end and I'm not going to wake up, and that's just how it is. And these girls, it's not as if they're right next to what was happening. They were on the first floor. That's the first thing. The second thing. If the police are right and everyone was killed in their beds, that means that it's not just them. They didn't wake up. It was it. It was two of the victims who didn't wake up because whoever this is, they killed two of the victims. Then they moved on to the next two, and if they were still in their beds, it means they slept through it, too. So it's not that surprising that these girls would also have slept through it. That's a great point, Brett. And also remember, we noted that so many people lived in the house, and even people who didn't have their name on the lease in the house were staying over in college. My house is pretty loud. You know, sometimes the after party would come back to my house, but I was like, I'm out for the night, like, I'm not going to come out into the living room. So sometimes there was a lot of ruckus in my house, especially if there six, maybe seven people who regularly stay over at your rental house and you may not even think that any commotion is something out of the ordinary. Put on top of that, you might be in some kind of alcohol induced slumber and not inclined to be an easy waker. So again, I think so far, putting into context of where they are in life and kind of the time of night and what was going on before so far, it seems pretty run of the mill. Yeah. And I think this is a really important point. I think everything else is saying is really important to remember. And just keep this in your mind when you're watching the news and you're hearing people and everybody always wants to, they want to sensationalize everything, right? Because it's better for ratings and just pull back a little bit. This is a college place. You get used to the noise. I can sleep through things that are probably wouldn't be able to sleep through otherwise because I lived in a house. Not unlike this. Like I said, there were four of us in our part. There were two people downstairs. It was a house that essentially the rental person had divided into. There were three floors, but he sold it as the first floor apartment that had two bedrooms and then the second and third floor apartment that had four bedrooms. But it was really one big apartment, and in fact, we knew the people downstairs, so people were coming and going all the times, you know, the walls were thin. You could hear things all the time. You learn to ignore it and certainly whatever you're hearing, unless it's very obvious, you're never going to assume it's someone stabbing my roommates to death. You're just not going to think that you're going to rationalize it away. So whether they just slept through it or whether they heard something but didn't think anything about it, I just don't think it's necessarily significant. Maybe it'll turn out to be, but I don't think it is. And I think particularly when you look at the top of crime that was committed here as we continue to go through this highly unlikely, I think and I'm sure, you know, if you're on Reddit, close your ears because it's going to upset you. I think it is unlikely that two young women committed this crime. That's one thing I'm going to throw out there. And these two roommates, her two young women, I just I don't think they did this. So police believe this was not someone in the home. They believe that someone entered the home through a sliding glass door on the second floor between three and. 6:00 a.m.. 3:00 a.m., Obviously, because it had to be after all these phone calls were being made, now we've talked about these four people who were killed, they were actually in two separate bedrooms is what we understand. So Maddie and Caylee were only third floor and they were actually in the same bedroom in the same bed. Ethan and Zana were in her room on the second floor in the same bed. So you can imagine someone comes in through the second floor glass door. What we've heard is the police think that Ethan died first. Now that could tell you a couple of different things. One could be that the person was familiar with this home and knew who would be in it and knew that it was important to go to that second floor room and kill Ethan first because he is the only male in the home and he's going to present more of a challenge. Or it could just be that whoever came in second floor then went to the first room. They found they killed the first people they found. And Ethan was the first person. Either way, they then moved on to the third floor and killed Maddie and Caylee. And I think this is really important that these four people were in two beds because I think this goes more towards someone who is like sweeping the house to kill everyone they find right? They made it to two bedrooms, and they may not know that the first floor even had anyone who slept there. Because when you kill this, many people out of the two beds, it seems more like a total elimination rather than a targeted attack at one person. Because think about it, if the target were someone on the second floor, why go to the third floor? Why risk being caught? Do your business of whoever you need to finish, maybe finish off the person who's the only witness in the same bed on the second floor, but then run. And it's seems highly unlikely that if they were targeting Maddie or Caylee on the third floor, that they did it double oopsie because clearly one of those people, Ethan, was not Maddie or Caylee. He's a man, not a woman. It seems strange that they would oopsie kill three people before they finally got to the right person. So what I'm seeing so far is just like someone who's sweeping a room almost like military, like to eliminate every living person that they see along the way. And we're going to talk about there's been a lot of speculation that Caylee was the focus of this attack, but what Alice says, I think, makes a lot of sense. If Caylee is the focus of this attack, then. I think it almost has to be someone who wasn't very familiar with the house that knew she lived there, but that was all they knew. And so they went in there planning to kill her. They went in the second floor. They found the people on the second floor. They kill them. It wasn't her. And so they went to the third floor. If this is someone that knew her, well, if it was someone that was intimately familiar with her. I don't think they would have done that. I think they would have gone directly to the third floor and killed her. The only possible exception to that is if they were so depraved that they thought I am willing to kill everyone in that house to get to her just to prevent the possibility that the people on the second floor would wake up and confront me as I fled. I'm going to go ahead and kill them too, and eliminate them and then go for her. And if you're going to do that, might as well cover all your bases and kill the people on the first floor to, you know, if you were so intimately familiar with Kaylie and her living situation. Yeah, I mean, it's just walking through that and the fact that you did, you do it with a knife, you know, as we're going to talk a little bit ahead of ourselves, but you know, you think through this if you're prepared to kill multiple people. I mean, to me, a knife is not the type of weapon I would use, but I guess if you use a gun, it's loud. I don't know. It's all speculation there, but nevertheless, let's keep going. So I've read 11. I've read noon. We'll go with it. Around noon, someone calls 9-1-1 to report an unconscious person, and this is all very strange. But I think some of this may be just we don't necessarily have the best information here, so we don't necessarily know exactly how this went down. We just know what's been reported. It's been reported that this was an unconscious person that seems a little strange to me because what we do know for certain is this was a very bloody crime. So I don't know how. I don't know how you would walk into one of those rooms and think somebody is just unconscious, but that's what's been reported. Now, according to media reports, the caller was not one of the surviving roommates. It was a third person who was using one of their phones to make the call. Like I said, that'll get fleshed out later. Some weirdness. They're not exactly sure what's going on. When the police arrived, Caylee's dog Murphy apparently was there, though it's not entirely clear to me if the dog was in the house at the time of the murders. I have read that the dog was put up in another room, whether that was what they did every night and whether that's unusual. I can't say, but obviously one of the reasons people think this is significant is this is the dog that didn't bark situation. The dog obviously wasn't going crazy because he didn't wake up. The other roommates, I guess, is a speculation. But the dog thing is something that I think it will either be explained away very simply, like the dog went in there that night, or it might become kind of significant. We'll just have to see what happens. Did you know that driving high is considered driving under the influence? That's right. Driving under the influence of marijuana is against the law in every state, even in states where marijuana is legal. That means driving high could get you a DUI. And if you think law enforcement officers can't tell when you're driving, hi, you're wrong. Your friends can tell your co-workers can tell even your parents can tell. Everyone can tell. So what makes you think that law enforcement officers don't know when you're driving? High driving under the influence of marijuana can slow your response time and change how you perceive time and speed. So even if you think you're fine to drive when you're high, you're not. Because the bottom line is, if you feel different, you drive different in driving high is driving under the influence. So remember, drive high, get a DUI paid for by Netzer. Yeah, and it could be significant because if the dog didn't bark, it could indicate that the dog knew the person who was the perpetrator. Now one theory I've heard about the unconscious person thing because that was that struck me so weird. My understanding is this is an incredibly gruesome scene. There was like no question that all four of them had been stabbed to death and there was blood everywhere. So I don't think anyone would have described them as unconscious. But what I've heard and this might make more sense is that the unconscious person was actually one of the surviving roommates or someone who walked into the scene and fainted had actually run away from the scene and fainted, and someone used that roommate's phone to then call the cops. An unconscious person is not referring to one of the murdered victims, but rather one of the people who happened upon the murdered victims and passed out because it was so gruesome. It's an interesting theory that is complete speculation. That is complete speculation. It's interesting theory. I'll be interested to see how that. Yeah. And I do think that needs to be explained away a little bit. If we don't if we ever hear the 9-1-1 call, because if the unconscious person is referring to one of the four victims, that is I mean, people will just go out the wazoo with their theories because this is like a lot of the other 9-1-1 calls that we have analyzed to death. Like the Ellen Greenberg, we've talked a lot about that 9-1-1 call describing, not describing actually the knife that was like protruding straight out of her chest. That that's strange, the fact that the protruding knife wasn't described or that she was maybe in a position that was impossible for her to be in being described on the 9-1-1 call. So either way, I think it's of note if one of the victims was described as unconscious. Yeah. So and particularly when you look at how these people were killed, all four were stabbed to death. They were likely asleep when the stabbings began, at least according to the police. Apparently, some of them did show defensive wounds, which is not surprising because two people in one bed. Even if you stab one of them, the other one's going to wake up and fight back. There were no signs of sexual assault. The four were killed with a fixed blade knife. And although the police haven't been specific, they have been looking in stores where these blades are sold, indicating that the weapon did not come from the home, which is important because, as we've talked about before. Ordinarily, when someone comes to kill someone, they bring the weapon with them and it appears. They did that here. The weapon has not been located, so they did not leave the weapon there, which is also pretty common when you're murdering someone. You don't leave the weapon behind because you don't leave evidence of yourself. And I'm thinking of several cases we covered where neither of those things are true and what does that indicate? It indicates that someone inside the home did it, but you don't have that here. According to some reports, the police believe the knife was a KBR style combat knife. Now this knife was invented by the Marine Corps as my understanding, but it is a very popular knife. If you're into nice, I mean, this is the kind of knife you'll have, you'll have one of these. Having said that, it is a I mean, it's a combat knife is not a knife. You just pick up somewhere. It's not like killing someone with a kitchen knife, for instance. So the fact that as a KBR style knife tells you something, it tells you something about who did this, though it's hard to say exactly what it is other than it wasn't somebody who walked into the kitchen, pulled out the kitchen knife and then killed a bunch of people or brought a kitchen knife with them. This is someone who owns a knife. And let me just go and say, if he owned one KBR knife, you own more than one. Yeah, I don't. I doubt this is the only knife owned by this person. And that's the kind of thing that could become important at some point in sort of figuring out who this is now. Blood was everywhere to the extent it has been said, and there have been photos indicate this that it was actually sort of seeping out of the walls. And one investigator said in 30 years, he had never seen a crime scene as gruesome as what he saw that day. And this is interesting because remember, we have no idea who the suspect or suspects are, but it's unlikely the perpetrator escaped the home without some blood on him or her because of where the victims were likely. It sounds like they were. At least some of them were in bed. You have to kind of get intimate, you know, the bed doesn't have to be that big, but you kind of have to lean over someone, especially if there's defensive wounds, they're going to be touching you at some point. And if this is the bloodiest scene, you know, one of these investigators has seen in 30 years, it sounds very unlikely this person would have escaped without blood on them and probably a lot of blood on them, even if it's just on the floor. If blood is seeping out of the house, it's going to be on the ground. And I don't know if they have boot prints or shoe prints, but that's something that if it's dark, you probably can't see where you're going and you're probably stepping in some blood. And let me just say, I mean, this reminds me of the Dali wittier case. We talked about this an incredibly bloody crime. There should be a lot of evidence of the person. It is hard to commit a crime like this and not leave evidence behind. Like Halle said, footprints, handprints. Even if you're wearing a glove, handprints, there's actually a picture of a handprint on a window. Unclear whether or not it's the person who did this or not, but it's a picture has been floating around the internet. Like I said, you can have to lean over the bed. I mean, there should be DNA. There should be hair. There should be all sorts of things. If their defensive wounds on the people, then they're going to be, I'll call them defensive wounds on the killer. I mean, we've talked about this before you stabbed somebody with a knife. You get into a fight with a knife. You're going to end up cutting yourself. They're going to fight back. There should be DNA under people's fingernails. There should be all sorts of evidence of who this is now. One thing to say about this if this is a person who's never committed a crime before or at least never been arrested for a crime, just having their DNA doesn't necessarily mean you're going to have a hit. As we've talked about on DNA just because you have DNA, if you put it into CODIS and it's an offender who's never offended before, you're not necessarily going to get a hit. It's one of the reason the genetic genealogy is so exciting because it's another database of DNA, and this might be the kind of case we're going to have to end up doing something like that. This is a college town. You could imagine that the killer is a college kid. Their DNA might have never been in a database, so even if you have it, it could be an unknown subject. You got all this evidence of them, and if you find them, they're going to be dead rights. You're going to convict them easily. The first you have to find them. And so far, they haven't done that right now. Let's talk more about this house. Some have described the house as a party house, but neighbors report that while there were some small parties kind of like what I was talking about with that many people, even if every one of the roommates were home, it's almost a small party. The house was usually quiet by about 10 p.m. This also makes sense with the patterns of all of the roommates who slept in the house that night. None of them had a party at the house. They all went to parties outside of the house, and they all came home to sleep around 1:00 or 1:30 a.m.. Now police appear to have no suspects. We haven't heard anything from them. It's possible. They haven't told us, but it really doesn't seem like they have honed in on anyone. But they have said that the totality of the circumstances lead them to believe this is a targeted crime and not a murder suicide. Now, the police have ruled out a number of suspects, including the survivors we talked about, who lived on the first. Law, which I think is important, basically everyone who we know in this story has been ruled out. And that's the survivors who lived on the first floor. Jake, the ex-boyfriend and a man at the food truck who apparently was standing by and could be seen in the security footage, and the Uber driver who dropped off Matty and Caylee back home after they were at the food truck. And whoever called the 9-1-1 call who apparently was not one of the roommates survivors. There are rumors that Caylee had a stalker, but those suggestions are unconfirmed. They seem to be coming from other sources, not the police. They are coming from other students at the university, from anyone who's willing to talk to the media. And that's kind of what has made this case a little bit confusing is that family members have released cell phone records and, you know, neighbors have talked to media and university students have talked about what they know in terms of rumors about these victims. And this isn't coming from the police, really. They should be talking to the police and let the police kind of put all these things together because the police are supposed to be the one who can see all the different evidence that's coming in and see if there's lines to be drawn. But I think that's partly why there is so much interest and confusion in this case, because it's not clear what is actually fact. And you know, the thing about this case is very close to spiraling out of control because the longer it goes with no leads and no suspects. I mean, this case is ripe for speculation in a way we talking about Delphi law in a way that even Delphi wasn't in a way that I mean, this is media on the level of Scott Peterson, Caylee Anthony level and you what you seen is more and more people who are talking to the press being critical of the police. And I just I worry and and I get it, I get it. I know people are concerned, but I do worry that so much misinformation is going out there. Is it going to compromise the investigation? Is it going to make it harder to find this killer? One of the parents, I'm not going to say which one, though. If you follow the case, you know, is very frustrated with the police and has gone on a lot of different news stations, all of which are more than willing to have him talk because the media is perfectly happy exploiting the pain of a father to get ratings. And they've done that. And and he said a lot of things that some people have have expressed a lot of concern that it may jeopardize the investigation. I don't know if it will or not. But I'm worried that if they don't find who did this soon, this is only going to get worse. And this what Alice said is very real and is a very real problem. Yeah. And some of you may be saying, Wait, wait, wait. You just mentioned a potential stalker that sounds very like alarm bells. Well, the police did look into that, and they've they've said that they've identified the so-called stalker and that Caylee's interaction with him was an isolated incident rather than some like long, drawn out obsession. Now there are also reports that Caylee's injuries were significantly more brutal than others. That's not coming from the police, and I think whether that's true or not, that's probably why people are thinking that Caylee was the targeted one who knows she could have fought back the hardest. She could have been the only one who is awake, who could fight back. And maybe that's why her injuries were so significant. I think it's hard to read into that right now, and it could be fraught to read into it without knowing more. That's actually confirmed evidence. And that's such an important point that Alice makes because we've heard about overkill and overkill is a thing, and it's something that people, profilers and others police will look at if there's overkill on a victim. It makes you think this is a personal attack. However, if there are signs of defensive wounds on that person, it may just be what Alice said. The person who fights back the most may also be the person who is stabbed the most or beaten the most or shot the most because the attacker is trying to neutralize them, and it is purely an artifact of that. So if she was the one who was woken up, I mean, imagine she's not the target. Imagine that it's her best friend. It's Madison, who's the target. And so the person goes in there and the first person they attack is Madison, and it wakes are up and she fights back. That would interrupt the attack on Madison. The attack will now be directed on her. And you could imagine a much more brutal attack doesn't mean she's the target at all. In fact, it's the opposite of that. So that kind of speculation is a kind of speculation that things problematic because if you think she's targeted, who are you going to look at as suspects people related to her and you're going to ignore people related to Madison? And so I do think the police are not falling into that trap. I think they are looking at everybody and the FBI is involved in this. The police have not been shy about asking for help. I think the concerns about this investigation are a little overblown. I think so far, there's no reason to be concerned. The only reason has been, as all of you know, I mean, the police, they've said they don't think there's any danger to the public. And that is as confused a lot of people and raised a lot of alarm bells because at times they say it's targeted. At times they say it's not and people are confused. And they assume that because the messaging is mixed, that that means the police don't know what they're doing. They're botched in this investigation, et cetera, et cetera. And I'll just tell you, as someone who's worked in the communications field before comms is so much harder than the actual investigation, interacting with the public, interacting with the press is much more difficult. So don't read into their flubs with the press and assume that means the investigation itself is not going well. These guys know how to investigate a case. They may not be ready in Moscow, Idaho, for the press crush. That's happened in this case, but they know how to investigate the case. So don't assume just because sometimes they're public facing interactions don't inspire a lot of confidence. Don't assume that means they're not doing a good job in the actual investigation. Yeah, I think that's right, Brett. But time is ticking. Weeks have passed by, about a month has passed by and there doesn't seem to be much movement. And just so you know, in an investigation, a month is not a very long time. Obviously, with something so gruesome. As for young people, you know, murdered in their beds. People want answers, especially if it means that they need to be afraid for their own lives. But I do think that this case can quickly spiral out of control with all the people talking to the media and kind of all the armchair detectives. So we'll see what happens and we'll, you know, we'll give you any updates that we can. But we thought it'd be helpful to put all of this evidence all in one place. What we do know and what is. Relation so that you guys have it at your fingertips. Yeah, and look, I hope that this I hope this case is solved quickly. It is interesting to me that it hasn't been solved after this point because you would think if this was someone who knew them, it shouldn't be that hard for the police to figure it out. It's usually not when somebody is killed by people they know. It's usually pretty obvious, and the police usually pretty quickly identify that person and move in on them. That hasn't happened here, and that does raise the possibility in the specter of a serial killer or some sort of other random attack. And I understand why that is, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say that at the end of the day, whenever this crime is solved, it will be someone in that community and it will be someone who is familiar with these folks, even if they weren't familiar with the house. And and the crime will never make sense because murdering four people never makes sense. But it won't be a random attack in this won't be a serial killer that's I'm going out on a limb there. But that's sort of how I think it's going to end up. And obviously, we will continue to follow this case, as will not be the last time we talk about it. And once there's more information, more concrete information, we'll do a follow up. Yeah, I think I'm in the same camp with you that this is not a serial killer because a serial killer's M.O. is usually not just like eliminating four people. I think we will find out that several, if not more than one of these victims was like collateral damage to whatever the attack was actually meant for. Well, we just don't know enough at this point. But if it were a serial killer, this is very risky. It seems strange. These are like kind of four separate or at least two separate groups of people. It's not like they were attacking a close knit group of friends who had maybe slighted them. So I do think that we will find out that some of these victims possibly were collateral to the intended victim. Yeah. And you think about like Hanukkah Kathak, which we talked about on the prosecutors a long time ago, it seems like a couple of years ago now, I guess. And that was a crime like this in that. Several people, six people, I think, were killed by an axe on a farmhouse. And as we talked about that, there were speculation that it was sort of a random killer, it was a serial killer. That's not where we ended up. We ended up that it was the neighbor who was in love with one of the people on the farm, and that's what led them to do it. I think that's what you're going to see here. I think you're going to find that this is someone connected to this group, even if it's only one person. We'll see what happens. I know there's a lot of speculation that's not the case, and we may be wrong, but I will say this if we are wrong, this will be one of the most sensational murders in history because it's just not common to have this kind of random, brutal crime like this. And if I mean, why is Ted Bundy famous? Because of something like this, right? Going into a sorority house and murdering several girls in the sorority house is kind of like what happened here? And if that's what this turns out to be, then this is really going to be a huge case when people talk about for decades and decades. At the end of the day, I don't think that's gonna be the case. I think they're going to find who did this and it's going to quote unquote make sense. That's right. Well, with that, you know, it's funny when we started, we're like that. We have nothing to talk about because there's really not that much information. And here we go doing what we do best, which is to talk. But before we sign off, is there anything else you'd like to add? No, Alice, I can barely talk today. Anyway, I'm surprised I made it through the whole episode. I'm just glad I made it here. So thank you guys for listening and can't wait to see you next time. Absolutely. Well, thank you guys for joining us. And thank you for checking us out at the prosecutors pod, as well as legal briefs and for all the five star reviews you guys have been leaving. We've been seeing a massive slew of I don't know if it's the holiday spirit or whatnot, but we read them and we are so thankful for them and thankful for all of you. We couldn't do this if it weren't for you listening. So until next time, I'm Alice and I'm Bret, and this is the prosecutor's legal briefs. I've heard it announced a couple of different ways, but I heard a I heard one where it seemed like people knew what they were talking about and they pronounce it can Alavés. And they had the dad on and they introduced him as grandfathers and he didn't correct them. So I'm sure if it's wrong, someone will correct this. But maybe just know that we think that the pronounced. Yeah. OK, let's start because I think you need your sleep and do something. I want to get through this and it's going to be fine. OK, I'm not tired. I just can't talk. It's OK. But talk to maybe. Did you know that driving high is considered driving under the influence? That's right. Driving under the influence of marijuana is against the law in every state, even in states where marijuana is legal. That means driving high could get you a DUI. And if you think law enforcement officers can't tell when you're driving high, you're wrong. Your friends can tell your coworkers can tell. Even your parents can tell. Everyone can tell. So what makes you think that law enforcement officers don't know when you're driving high? Driving under the influence of marijuana can slow your response time and change how you perceive time and speed. So even if you think you're fine to drive when you're high, you're not. Because the bottom line is if you feel different, you drive different in driving high is driving under the influence. So remember, drive high, get a DUI paid for by Netzer. 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