0:02

Welcome to Episode

0:05

352 of

0:07

FBI Retired Case

0:09

File Review with Jerry

0:11

Williams. I'm a retired agent

0:13

on a mission to show you

0:16

who the FBI is and what

0:18

the FBI does. Through my books,

0:20

my blog, and my podcast case

0:22

reviews were former colleagues. Today

0:24

we get to speak to retired

0:26

agent Kelly Liberty Gardner.

0:28

who served in the FBI

0:30

for 23 years. In

0:32

this episode, Kelly reviews her

0:34

investigation to identify and

0:36

apprehend the unknown male who

0:38

abducted a six -year -old

0:40

girl from her home and

0:42

abused her before releasing

0:44

her in a different neighborhood

0:46

17 hours later.

0:49

using historical cellular

0:51

analysis and Familia

0:53

DNA, also known as

0:55

Investigative Genetic Genealogy, the

0:57

unknown male was identified as

1:00

Justin Christian. This case

1:02

marked the first use of

1:04

Familia DNA in Ohio.

1:06

Kelly also reviews the FBI's

1:09

National Child Abduction Rapid

1:11

Deployment or CARD team. Kelly

1:13

spent her entire FBI

1:15

career in the Cleveland Division,

1:17

where she worked primarily

1:20

violent crime and violent crimes

1:22

against children, specializing in

1:24

child exploitation, child abduction,

1:26

and child sex trafficking.

1:29

When she was investigating the Justin

1:31

Christian case, she was one

1:34

of two agents assigned to

1:36

the Illaria resident agency where she

1:38

spent six years working on

1:40

all violations until the RA closed

1:42

and she was transferred back

1:44

to the field office. Kelly

1:46

was a crisis negotiator for

1:48

20 years and for seven

1:51

of those years served as

1:53

the team coordinator. In 2006,

1:55

she was selected for

1:57

the newly minted card team

1:59

and deployed on cases around

2:01

the country. During the last

2:03

three years of her Bureau

2:05

career, she was the central

2:07

team leader for Card. Kelly

2:09

was also an adjunct instructor

2:12

for the FBI, certified in

2:14

the areas of crimes against

2:16

children and negotiations. Kelly,

2:18

a former broadcast journalist

2:20

before joining the FBI,

2:23

also taught media relations. After

2:25

her retirement from the FBI, Kelly

2:28

spent three years working

2:30

as a child forensic investigator,

2:32

interviewing close to 1 ,000

2:34

children for law enforcement

2:36

or children services. Currently,

2:38

she works as a contract

2:40

investigator on cold cases for

2:42

the National Center for Missing

2:44

and Exploited Children. Kelly is

2:47

also an instructor for the

2:49

National Criminal Justice Center for

2:51

Child Abduction and teaches negotiations

2:53

for a private company. Now,

2:55

before we get to the

2:57

case review, I want to thank

2:59

Taylor Adams for inviting me

3:01

on the Film Nuts podcast to

3:03

talk about the movie Boiler

3:05

Room. We had a fun time

3:08

talking about why it's one

3:10

of my favorite crime dramas. I

3:12

hope you'll check out my

3:14

episode on the Film Nuts podcast.

3:17

In your podcast app's description of

3:19

this episode, there's a link

3:21

to the show notes at GerryWilliams.com.

3:23

You'll also find links to

3:25

where you can buy me a

3:27

cup of coffee. Join my

3:29

reader team about crime fiction, where

3:31

you'll learn all about the

3:33

FBI and books, TV, and movies.

3:35

and where you'll learn more

3:37

about me and my books. Thank

3:39

you for your support. Now

3:41

here's the show. I

3:44

want to welcome my

3:46

guest, retired agent, Kelly

3:48

Liberty. Hey Kelly, how are

3:50

you? Hi Jerry Good, how are you? I'm

3:53

excited because this is a

3:55

case that got a lot

3:57

of media attention. Of course

3:59

it did because when I

4:02

was just going over the

4:04

material, preparing for this, my

4:06

heart was aching. I was

4:08

upset because as any parent

4:10

knows, the thought

4:13

of their child being

4:15

taken is just

4:17

a heartbreaking scenario. Right

4:19

and especially when stranger abductions

4:21

are so uncommon they're really

4:23

not the most frequent type

4:26

of child abduction usually it's

4:28

someone the child knows in

4:30

this case we're dealing with

4:32

a complete and total stranger

4:34

abduction. And i know one

4:37

of the cases that i've

4:39

reviewed matter fact it's the

4:41

case that made me realize

4:43

that this podcast was more

4:45

than just a true crime

4:48

podcast but away. for the

4:50

public to really understand the

4:52

dedication and the sacrifices agents

4:54

make was the case review

4:56

that retired agent Eddie Fryer

4:59

made, the polyclass abduction case.

5:01

And this is very similar

5:03

in the sense that the

5:05

perpetrator went into the child's

5:07

home and abducted her. Correct.

5:10

Ours has a happier ending.

5:12

Yes, it certainly does. Where do

5:14

you want to start? Let's

5:16

start by letting your listeners know

5:18

where we are talking about.

5:21

I retired out of the Cleveland

5:23

office and spent my entire

5:25

career in Cleveland. So the

5:27

cases that we're talking about

5:29

happened in Alleria, Ohio and

5:31

Cleveland, Ohio. For those of

5:33

you not familiar with Ohio, Alleria

5:35

is a suburb about 25 to 30

5:37

miles west of Cleveland. At the

5:39

time, I was working in a two

5:41

-person office in Lorraine County, and that's

5:43

where Alleria sits. We had a

5:46

very great relationship with the Illyria Police

5:48

Department. We got a call

5:50

in February of 2016 that there

5:52

had been an attempted abduction of

5:54

a 10 -year -old girl and there

5:56

was a ladder found outside her

5:58

bedroom window. So that's how this

6:00

all started. This was a two

6:02

-story home? It was not. This

6:04

was a one -story home. The father

6:06

of this 10 -year -old girl worked

6:08

for a local cable company. As

6:10

such, he had some equipment sitting

6:12

by the house and there was

6:14

a small step ladder that he

6:16

used for work that belonged with

6:19

his work truck that was typically

6:21

by his work truck. But on

6:23

this night, it was under his

6:25

daughter's window and it had not

6:27

been there prior to that. What

6:29

happened on this night, so we

6:31

are talking about February 25th of

6:33

2016. any ten year old girl

6:35

woke her father up around three

6:37

thirty seven in the morning and

6:39

she said dad dad dad there

6:41

is a guy in my window

6:43

and he's pulling on my leg

6:45

the dad got up ran around

6:47

the house looking for somebody could

6:49

not find anyone she was in

6:51

a raised bunk bed that was

6:53

window level and the window was

6:55

a slider. Her window had been

6:58

slit open. She said someone

7:00

reached in and she gave a description.

7:02

She said he had a mask on

7:04

and that he told her, come with

7:06

me now. If you tell anybody about

7:08

this, I will kill your entire family.

7:10

Well, this girl, she screamed, she kicked,

7:12

she jumped off her bed and ran

7:15

to tell her dad. And that was

7:17

all we had at that time. So

7:19

the Illyria Police Department responds. We

7:21

found out about it shortly

7:23

thereafter. And now we have a

7:25

whole group of people. We're

7:27

doing neighborhood canvases, looking for video,

7:29

looking for any type of

7:31

clues that will tell us who

7:33

is in that neighborhood. But

7:35

this is in 2016. Doorbell cameras

7:37

were really not that popular

7:39

at that point. They weren't on

7:41

every house like they are

7:43

now. And as far as security

7:45

cameras, very few, but in

7:47

that neighborhood, no video, none whatsoever.

7:50

So we had an open window, a

7:52

step ladder that we really didn't

7:54

know if anyone had used. That was

7:57

it. Then we went back to

7:59

the father had just put in an

8:01

alarm system on their house. And

8:03

when we looked at that alarm system,

8:05

we saw that on the 24th

8:07

of February, so the day before, that

8:09

at 5 .08 in the morning, that

8:12

same window was opened for the

8:14

alarm system. And then at 5 .11,

8:16

the kitchen door was opened. And then

8:18

at 5 .12, the kitchen door was

8:20

closed. We also knew that on

8:22

that day at 10 .23 in the

8:24

morning the father of our little girl,

8:27

his brother, came over and he

8:29

shut and locked all the windows because

8:31

dad had noticed something was going

8:33

on at home with these locks and

8:35

windows. Now we go to the

8:37

24th and we see that at 10

8:39

p .m. the windows are locked but

8:42

the alarm was not activated and

8:44

then at 3 .16 in the morning

8:46

the living room window was opened. At

8:48

3 .30 that living room window was

8:50

closed. And at 336, that's when

8:52

our 10 -year -old girl's bedroom window was

8:54

opened, and she was awakened by

8:57

this stranger. And after dad went outside

8:59

to check things out, they called

9:01

police at 344 in the morning. So

9:03

the alarm system told us something

9:05

had been going on there. These doors

9:07

and windows were being opened, but

9:09

no one really knew anything about it.

9:12

having those security alarm notifications i

9:14

would imagine helped everyone really believe this

9:16

little girl because i guess there

9:18

could have been some members of the

9:20

family some members of law enforcement

9:22

who may have thought she's just dreaming

9:25

or just didn't believe her. That's

9:27

a great point because that little girl

9:29

was interviewed multiple times over the

9:31

course of this investigation but even in

9:33

her first interview what we found

9:35

out was that she liked to watch

9:37

scary movies she was very active

9:40

on social media she would stay up

9:42

very late she had a whole

9:44

system set up in a room and

9:46

she would stay up late talking

9:48

to people online so we did have

9:50

a question of was this somebody

9:52

she had met online. was this a

9:55

bad dream that she had because

9:57

other than the alarm system telling us

9:59

that these doors and windows are

10:01

being opened, we really didn't have anything.

10:03

But we did process the entire

10:05

house for evidence. We took the ladder,

10:07

we processed the doors, the windows,

10:10

everything that had been opened. I want

10:12

to go back to that day,

10:14

that February 25th, because later that morning

10:16

at six o 'clock in the morning,

10:19

so her incident happened around 3 .30

10:21

in the morning, but now at six

10:23

o 'clock, in Lorraine, which is a

10:25

neighboring suburb to Illyria. We have

10:27

a 15 -year -old girl who was grabbed

10:29

by an unknown male, and he

10:31

punched her twice in the face when

10:33

she screamed. At 630, another 15 -year

10:35

-old reported there was a man in

10:37

her driveway. At 720, a

10:39

13 -year -old female was chased by the

10:42

same man, same description, who exposed

10:44

himself to her and made a derogatory

10:46

statement to her mom. At 748,

10:48

there was a 9 -year -old female that

10:50

this man picked up. and her

10:52

friends were able to get her out

10:54

of his group. All of the

10:56

descriptions from all of these people matched.

10:58

They were all the same, and

11:00

they all kind of sounded like the

11:02

description that our 10 -year -old girl

11:04

had given us as well. When we

11:06

looked at police reports for that

11:08

area, we saw that the week prior,

11:10

which had been Super Bowl Sunday,

11:13

which was February 7th, or I guess

11:15

a couple weeks prior, that there

11:17

was a report of a male exposing

11:19

himself to two female children ages

11:21

about eight and nine. So we have

11:23

all these incidents in a very

11:25

short period of time with a suspect

11:27

who sounds very similar in all

11:29

of these descriptions. He actually

11:31

sounds desperate like he is being directed

11:33

or there's some force making him

11:35

want to complete this task of abducting

11:37

a child. Almost obsessive. Yeah, that's

11:40

the better word obsessive. We conducted our

11:42

investigation we canvas the neighborhoods all

11:44

of the neighborhoods where all of these

11:46

incidents happened we had a little

11:48

task force going we did everything that

11:50

we were trained to do and

11:52

we really didn't come up with anything

11:54

we came up with a whole

11:56

lot of nothing course like you said

11:58

people begin to doubt whether anything

12:00

had really happened. We did process that

12:02

ladder. So that ladder came back

12:04

as having male DNA on it, but

12:06

that was it. And that could

12:09

have been from someone touching it. It

12:11

could have been from someone sweating

12:13

on it. It could have been from

12:15

many things, but that ladder was

12:17

also, remember, a work ladder. So how

12:19

many people have stepped on that

12:21

ladder, have touched that ladder, have been

12:23

around that ladder? The kids in

12:25

the neighborhood could have played on that

12:27

ladder. Getting male DNA from that

12:29

ladder really didn't do a lot for

12:31

us at that time because we

12:33

didn't have anyone to connect it to.

12:35

You run it through the system,

12:38

it doesn't come back, so we have

12:40

male DNA, but it could belong

12:42

to anybody. It could belong to someone

12:44

at the cable company, it could

12:46

belong to a neighbor, it could belong

12:48

to anyone, or any child that's

12:50

played at that house. I'm now going

12:52

to fast forward you to May

12:54

2016. On May 21st, In Cleveland, we

12:56

have a home where there is

12:58

mom and grandma and multiple children, lots

13:00

of siblings living in this house.

13:02

One of those was a six -year -old

13:04

girl. She had two older sisters

13:07

and two younger brothers. On this day,

13:09

she was going to spend the

13:11

night across the street at a friend's

13:13

house. And that's how her

13:15

night started out. She went over there,

13:17

but around 1030, she decided she wanted

13:19

to come home. So the mom who

13:21

had her brought her home and put

13:23

her to sleep on the couch in

13:25

the living room. But no one knew

13:27

this. Everyone else was already asleep. So

13:29

mom didn't know that she was home.

13:31

Grandma didn't know that she was home.

13:33

At 4 .30 in the morning, this little

13:35

girl is taken by an unknown stranger

13:37

who entered the house, took her off

13:39

the couch, and walked out the door

13:41

with her. She's not reported missing until

13:43

11 o 'clock the next day because

13:45

they all thought she was still at

13:47

her friend's house. So once the morning

13:49

gets rolling and everyone's eating breakfast and

13:51

the kids are playing and then someone

13:54

says, hey, you know, where is she?

13:56

And then they find out that the

13:58

mom had brought her home the night

14:00

before and she's nowhere to be found.

14:02

So she reported missing around 11 o 'clock

14:04

that next day. There is an all

14:06

hands police everybody. Everyone is looking for

14:08

this six year old girl. And at

14:10

9 30 that night, she was dropped

14:12

off on a street corner two miles

14:14

from her home. And this six year

14:16

old girl walked down the street until

14:18

she found a house with a light

14:20

on she walked up and knocked on

14:22

the door and a young boy answered

14:24

the door and she said hi she

14:26

told him her name and said that

14:28

she had been murdered because she was

14:30

too young and did not know the

14:32

name for abducted. Oh my

14:34

goodness shells just went through my body

14:36

so she's found she's safe she's alive

14:38

she's you know taken to the hospital

14:41

eventually returned home. The problem with cases

14:43

like this Jerry is that people tend

14:45

to think once the child recovered that

14:47

the case is over but what do

14:49

we have now we have we don't

14:51

know who took her we don't know

14:53

where she was for that entire day

14:55

from 430 in the morning till 930

14:57

at night we don't know where she

14:59

was we don't know who had her

15:01

we don't know what happened to her

15:03

she was interviewed she gave a spectacular

15:06

interview and that started our search. But

15:08

in the public's mind, this was over

15:10

because this little girl's home and she's

15:12

back with her family. That was a

15:14

big wall that we had to tear

15:16

down is to let people know, no,

15:18

there is still a case here. We

15:20

still have an issue. We have to

15:22

find out who did this. I don't

15:24

want to go into details, but

15:26

I'm assuming that this little girl

15:28

had been molested. She was abused, and

15:31

we did collect a DNA from

15:33

her and her clothing as well. That

15:35

plays into the next part of

15:37

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15:39

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15:41

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16:44

We had submitted the DNA that we got

16:46

from her in her clothing. It's one

16:48

of those moments in your career that stays

16:50

with you, Jerry. The one you always

16:52

remember, it's like it happened yesterday. The head

16:54

of our evidence response team in Cleveland

16:56

called me on a Friday. It was Friday,

16:58

May 27th. It was in the afternoon.

17:00

He said, hey, we have a match to

17:02

the DNA. We have a match to

17:04

another case. And I said, oh, fantastic. Whose

17:07

case is it so I can give

17:09

them a call? And he said, well, Cal.

17:11

It's yours. It's Illyria. He said the

17:13

DNA from Cleveland matched the DNA we found

17:15

on the ladder in Illyria. And

17:17

I'm like, oh, and my heart just

17:19

dropped because now we have a bigger

17:21

problem. Now we have two incidents that

17:24

we know this person was involved in,

17:26

but we don't know who he is.

17:28

No idea. And then you have all

17:30

of the other incidents that had occurred

17:32

during that time period. Correct. What's

17:34

the difference in time between the

17:36

first incident with a ten -year -old

17:39

and the six -year -old? The first

17:41

incident was in February. The

17:43

six -year -old was in May. So

17:45

we don't know what's happened. When you

17:47

work child abductions, most likely there's

17:49

been something that happened in between. We

17:51

don't know what happened between February

17:53

and May. Was it nothing and it

17:55

just started escalating again? We know

17:57

we're dealing with the same person. Is

18:00

it more than one person, though?

18:02

Lots of questions at this point. We

18:04

have run this DNA through the

18:06

system. There's no matches. And at this

18:08

point, Ohio did not do familial

18:10

DNA searches, which is much more common

18:12

now. But Ohio didn't do that

18:14

at the time. We have DNA we

18:17

don't know who it belongs to.

18:19

And at this point, we went really

18:21

big with our video surveillance and

18:23

our canvases. We had canvassed the neighborhood.

18:25

We had collected video. Thank

18:27

goodness in this neighborhood there was actually

18:29

a lot of surveillance video from private

18:31

homes and people were very great and

18:34

they gave it to us and we

18:36

were able to collect a lot of

18:38

video that we started putting out there

18:40

through news releases and press conferences. What

18:42

we found in this video was that

18:44

our suspect had been in this neighborhood

18:46

multiple times. We have this same suspect

18:48

on camera by our victim's home, our

18:50

six -year -old's home, on May 14th at

18:53

2 .30 in the morning, on the 15th

18:55

at 4 .30 in the morning, on

18:57

the 20th at 3 .30 in the morning,

18:59

and the 21st we see him at

19:01

3 .21. We see him again at

19:03

4 .29, and at 4 .29 that's when

19:05

we see him leaving with our little

19:07

girl. It appears that he had been

19:09

at this house many times. We know

19:12

that from the family, This was a

19:14

rental and the mother had been asking

19:16

the landlord to fix the locks and

19:18

fix the windows, those type of things

19:20

that did not get fixed. He was

19:22

able to take advantage of some of

19:24

those issues. But we had video. We

19:26

see him walking by the house. We

19:28

see him walking all around this neighborhood.

19:31

And then in one video, we see

19:33

him get out of a car. And

19:35

we were ecstatic because now we have

19:37

a car to put him with. And

19:39

when we expanded our search out to

19:41

businesses that were in this neighborhood and

19:43

taking logical routes of how would I

19:45

reach this neighborhood? What businesses am I

19:47

going to go by to get to

19:50

this house? We were able to find

19:52

even better video. What we ended up

19:54

finding was he was driving this car

19:56

that appeared to be dark gray with

19:58

a different colored front fender. It was

20:00

lighter. So actually been in an accident,

20:02

been repaired, but a different color. And

20:04

I remember thinking, this is fantastic. How

20:06

long is it going to take us

20:09

to find this car? I've seen a

20:11

photo of the car. I will put

20:13

it in the show notes for this

20:15

episode and it's pretty distinctive. Just show

20:17

it to somebody and they should be

20:19

able to say, oh, I know who

20:21

drives that car. Exactly, exactly. And

20:23

that's really what our first thought

20:25

was. This is a great lead

20:28

and somebody should know who drives

20:30

this car. But I don't know

20:32

if you've heard the saying, you

20:34

know, that a car with purple

20:36

polka dots, once you start looking

20:38

for one, you're going to see

20:40

a thousand of them and you

20:42

may have never seen one before.

20:44

And that's pretty much what we

20:46

ran into. We started looking for

20:48

this car and what we did

20:50

is we had some experts from

20:52

Detroit help us out and our

20:54

experts identified the car as a

20:56

Chevy Malibu 1997 to 2005 in

20:59

a six county region because we

21:01

looked at at the time Ohio

21:03

was the adept two plates. In

21:05

our six county region, eliminating Chevy

21:07

Malibus in light colors, we had

21:09

over 2 ,000 Chevy Malibus. Through

21:11

Chevy, we were able to narrow

21:13

our numbers down to a 2002

21:15

or 2003 Malibu or a 2004

21:17

or 2005 Chevy Classic. We started

21:19

running Chevy's. We ran them with

21:21

no spoiler. We ran aftermarket spoilers.

21:23

We even had an analyst from

21:25

NASA offer to do a paint

21:27

chip analysis from what the car

21:30

looked like under a light. And

21:32

that came back as the car

21:34

was metallic teal green, which it

21:36

was not. We physically, agents

21:38

in our office, police officers all around

21:40

the area, I mean this was

21:42

just a huge effort by every law

21:44

enforcement official that lived in this

21:46

area. We personally looked at more than

21:49

500 Chevy's. Did you do this

21:51

before you actually put the car out

21:53

to the public or were you

21:55

doing it simultaneously? simultaneously.

21:58

We went out and found a Chevy that looked

22:00

just like ours and we actually dummied it

22:02

up. We put tape on it so that it

22:04

looked like the one from our video. We

22:06

had a press conference. We had the reporters go

22:08

out and we said, this is what it

22:10

looks like. Still, we

22:12

got nothing. Now, we tracked down hundreds

22:14

if not thousands of leads on

22:17

Chevys of different colors and that have

22:19

been in accidents. Of

22:21

course, everyone's telling you people call up

22:23

and say, hey, that's not a

22:25

Chevy. Well, this is what we're going

22:27

on, right? We spent months looking

22:29

for that Chevy in addition to following

22:31

up on any leads that we

22:33

had. We advertised on Facebook, did stories

22:35

on the local news. We were

22:37

all over social media. We've

22:40

got tips. We got lots and lots

22:42

of tips. There are boxes and boxes

22:44

full of tips, but none that took

22:46

us in the right direction. Which is

22:48

amazing because again i've seen the photo

22:50

of this car and like you if

22:53

i saw it while you were investigating

22:55

this case i would be like yes

22:57

this is an unbelievable lead we're gonna

22:59

find this guy right away yes and

23:01

it didn't happen and it didn't happen

23:03

we also had video of our suspect

23:05

walking walking down the street. And he

23:08

had a distinctive walk, and we thought

23:10

somebody has to know who this is.

23:12

Someone has to look at that and

23:14

say, hey, that looks like my buddy,

23:16

that looks like someone I went to

23:18

school with, that's an old boyfriend. And

23:21

that didn't happen. We even in press

23:23

conferences, we told people, we're like, hey,

23:25

you know, this could be someone you

23:27

would never ever suspect. But even

23:29

if you have any suspicion, just give

23:31

us a call and let us make that

23:33

determination. And we did get a lot

23:35

of those, but we didn't get the right

23:37

call. And now through this entire thing,

23:39

I walk up to our NCIC and the

23:41

folks that work up there who were

23:43

absolutely phenomenal through all this, collecting all the

23:45

tips and asking all the right questions.

23:47

And every day we look at each other

23:49

and say, we just need that one

23:52

tip. We just need the right one. Actually,

23:54

we brought in a unit from headquarters,

23:56

from FBI headquarters, and they did a forensic

23:58

height exam, which they were able to

24:00

take some of the surveillance video. And we

24:02

went back out to the same spot

24:04

where they had this video. through their magic

24:06

they were able to tell us through

24:08

this overlay in forensics that our suspect was

24:10

five foot eleven. That helps with the

24:12

tips that come in if somebody is you

24:14

know five four or if somebody is

24:16

six two it kind of helped us narrow

24:18

it down. I was a little skeptical

24:20

I was like mmm that's great but I

24:22

don't know if I want to eliminate

24:24

someone who is six foot because you just

24:26

don't know. We had been doing so

24:28

many different things that I was like, I'd

24:30

be so afraid. But in the end,

24:32

I will tell you that our guys were

24:34

right on the money. And in the

24:36

end, our suspect did turn out to be

24:38

exactly five foot 11. Could you do

24:41

me a favor since this is audio and

24:43

for the people who aren't going to

24:45

go look at the show notes, could you

24:47

describe what he looked like and what

24:49

he was wearing? He was in

24:51

different clothes in different videos, but usually

24:53

jeans and a sweatshirt. A lot of times

24:55

a hoodie with a hoodie up, but

24:57

nothing out of the ordinary. He was a

24:59

white male. At one point he had

25:01

a beard and he wore glasses. I

25:04

would say very ordinary and I'll talk a

25:06

little bit more about him in just a

25:08

second here. We spent from

25:10

May until November doing all of

25:12

this work. Chasing leads, trying to exploit

25:14

any piece of evidence that we

25:16

had. While we were doing this,

25:18

the FBI was helping on this

25:20

case because the child was returned. It's

25:22

the abuse of a child case,

25:24

so this was being prosecuted by

25:27

the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office. We were

25:29

working with them and Cleveland Police

25:31

on this case, and they were

25:33

having a continuing dialogue about this

25:35

DNA and the fact that we weren't

25:37

exploiting the DNA, but remember, Ohio

25:39

didn't do that. So they did

25:41

approach the Ohio Attorney General's Office and

25:43

BCI, which is in Ohio, it's

25:45

the Bureau of Criminal Investigation and

25:48

Identification. They were granted permission to

25:50

make this the first test case in

25:52

Ohio to use familial DNA. On

25:54

Monday, November 28th, I am cooking dinner.

25:57

I think I was stirring some spaghetti

25:59

sauce, actually, because I remember standing at

26:01

the stove when the prosecutor called me

26:03

and he said, Kelly, VCI has something.

26:05

I'm like, what do they have? He

26:07

goes, we're going to find out in

26:09

a couple of days. They're

26:12

not releasing it yet. On December 2nd,

26:15

we had a big meeting. the energy

26:17

in this room, Jerry, it was just

26:19

brimming because we're like, this could be

26:21

it, this could be it. The Lorraine

26:23

Police Department, the Illyria Police Department, we

26:25

had been working for months and really

26:27

hoping that there were no other victims

26:29

that we were missing. That was our

26:31

biggest fear is that this was going

26:33

to happen again and we weren't going

26:35

to be able to stop it. So

26:37

we have this big meeting on December

26:39

2nd and they told us they were

26:41

able to identify a guy by the

26:44

name of Justin Christian. And how they

26:46

identified him was because when they ran

26:48

this familial DNA, there were family members

26:50

of his that were in the system.

26:52

He was the only one who was

26:54

not in the system. Now, this is

26:56

a lead, right? So now we have

26:58

to make sure that we have the

27:00

right guy. But what we found out

27:02

was that Justin drove his deceased brother's

27:04

2005 gray Chevy Classic. The vehicle was

27:06

registered to a relative in southern Ohio

27:08

to avoid e -check because here in

27:11

Ohio we have emissions checks and you

27:13

have to pay for them. So in

27:15

order to get out of that they

27:17

had registered the car in southern Ohio

27:19

so that's why we never found it

27:21

because it wasn't registered here. He was

27:23

a student at a local community college. The

27:26

telephone number that we found linked

27:28

to him via the college and some

27:30

social media was also included in

27:32

one of the phone analysis that we

27:34

had done in the Illyria attempt

27:36

of all the phones that were in

27:38

the area that night. He was

27:41

29 years old at the time and

27:43

5 foot 11. We discovered that

27:45

his dad owned a body shop in

27:47

Illyria and his brother worked on

27:49

cars in Cleveland and lived somewhat near

27:51

our Cleveland victim in the same

27:54

neighborhood. As we got into the investigation,

27:56

we found parts of that Chevy

27:58

Malibu at the brother's home. I take

28:00

it not the part where the

28:02

paint job was different. No, by the

28:04

time we identified Justin and did

28:06

all of our searches, there were a

28:09

few tires, a license plate, and

28:11

one part with a number on it.

28:13

It had been dismantled and he

28:15

had been getting rid of it piece

28:17

by piece. He was arrested on

28:19

December 2nd of 2016. He

28:21

was indicted on the 5th.

28:23

The DNA came back as

28:26

a match. He entered into

28:28

a plea agreement. in September

28:30

of 2017 and was given

28:32

a 35 year sentence. The

28:35

parents of these kids not wanting

28:37

their kids to go through a trial.

28:39

Everyone agreed to this 35 year

28:42

sentence. We've talked about

28:44

this case and we've kind

28:46

of casually discussed two investigative

28:48

techniques that were used that

28:50

were what broke the case.

28:52

One of them was the

28:54

historical cellular analysis. which i

28:57

have done a fantastic case

28:59

review about which was episode

29:01

three thirty two with bill

29:03

chute so people want to

29:05

learn about historical cellular analysis

29:07

they can check out three

29:09

thirty two we've also talked

29:12

about the familiar dna which

29:14

is also investigative genetic genealogy

29:16

which i've done two other

29:18

episodes episodes three oh six

29:20

and three oh seven with

29:22

steve bush and steve kramer

29:24

that talked about that. Can

29:27

we talk a little bit

29:29

more about those investigative techniques? We

29:31

all know when it comes to

29:33

abductions that we do the neighborhood,

29:36

that we look for video and

29:38

things like that, that we seek

29:40

the public's help. But in this

29:42

particular case, these different techniques seem

29:44

to be the key. They were

29:46

because all of the techniques we

29:48

typically use in child abduction cases

29:50

were not giving us results. So

29:53

all of our neighborhood canvases, all

29:55

of the interviews. Our little

29:57

girl in Cleveland, our six -year -old, she

29:59

gave us a lot of information in her

30:01

interview that was very helpful. And once

30:03

we identified him, really helped to seal the

30:05

deal on that. I think her forensic

30:07

interview was also a good part of this.

30:10

She told us in her interview that

30:12

she was taken by a white male, that

30:14

he had a square face and a

30:16

beard and glasses. She also told

30:18

us he had a cursive tattoo on his neck

30:20

that was a name. Now, she didn't know

30:22

what name it was, but she was able to

30:24

recognize that it was a name. She told

30:26

us that they had been in the car a

30:28

long time. In the mind of a six -year

30:30

-old, what is a long time? That was one

30:32

of the things that we had looked at

30:34

was, you know, is a long time 10 minutes?

30:36

Is a long time an hour? When we

30:38

did a search warrant after identifying Justin, he was

30:41

living in Lorraine with his mother. From

30:43

Lorraine to Cleveland, it's about a 35

30:45

-minute drive. So for a six -year -old

30:47

who was taken, put in this car,

30:49

35 minutes, long time. She said that

30:51

she had been kept in a house

30:53

with two dogs and in a room

30:55

with mooses on the wall. That was

30:57

another big clue that we spent a

30:59

lot of time trying to track down.

31:01

What are mooses on the wall? Is

31:03

it wallpaper? Is it stenciling?

31:05

Is it a border? Is it a

31:07

blanket on the wall? We tracked down

31:09

Drew, went through Gander Mountain and Cabela's

31:11

and Bass in any place that might

31:13

have wallpaper that would be mooses. I

31:16

can't tell you how many houses I

31:18

went into that had Olaf from Frozen

31:20

on the wall that people had called

31:22

in as a tip. When we finally

31:24

did do the search warrant at his

31:26

home, we had found that the walls

31:28

had been stripped of whatever had been

31:31

on them before. At some point, he

31:33

had taken off whatever wall coverings were

31:35

on these walls. She'd

31:37

also described the two dogs. She

31:39

had told us that she had heard

31:41

voices of a man and a

31:43

woman while she was there. Not that

31:45

she saw them. She didn't know

31:47

if they knew she was there, but

31:49

she heard their voices and gave

31:51

us enough that when we did identify

31:53

Justin, it all fell into place.

31:56

But before we identified him, we just

31:58

had all of this information trying

32:00

to find the dogs and the mooses.

32:02

She did not have a description

32:04

of the house because it was dark

32:06

when she arrived and it was

32:08

dark when she left. That was a

32:10

lot for a six year old

32:12

to provide and for you to rely

32:14

on as part of your investigation.

32:16

You know the details that she provided

32:18

were so great that a lot

32:20

of them when we did the search

32:22

warrant and when police go in

32:24

and do a search warrant they take

32:26

pictures before and after and they

32:28

take pictures of everything they find. Her

32:30

descriptions were so spot on that

32:32

they matched the pictures taken by the

32:34

investigators that night during the search

32:36

warrant. And so spot on her

32:39

description of the bedspread, of the

32:41

sheets, of the mattress, of the room

32:43

where she was kept, of the

32:45

things that were on the dresser. They

32:47

were spot on. You couldn't argue

32:49

with them. I think I read in

32:51

one of the news articles that

32:53

he had children himself. Yes.

32:55

So he had two children. And

32:57

I'm going to give you

32:59

some of his background because about

33:01

a year after he was

33:03

sentenced, one of the Illyria detectives

33:06

and I decided to go talk to him

33:08

and see what we could find, see

33:10

if he'd be willing to give us information

33:12

that could help us on other cases.

33:14

See if we could clear up some cases,

33:16

right? Like those Lorraine cases, maybe some

33:18

other ones that we didn't know about and

33:20

we had gone back through a lot

33:22

of cases in Lorraine County and Cleveland that

33:24

had similar MOs. We took all those

33:27

with us and gave it a shot and

33:29

he did meet with us and we

33:31

actually sat with Justin on three different occasions

33:33

and we talked. What he

33:35

told us was very interesting. He

33:37

had age appropriate girlfriends in

33:39

the past. He had two daughters

33:42

with an ex -girlfriend. Those

33:44

daughters and the ex -girlfriend lived in

33:46

Florida at the time, so they

33:48

are not here. He talked about both

33:50

of the attempts in this, like

33:52

we said before, this obsession of driving

33:54

around and looking at houses and

33:56

looking at any house that there was

33:58

an indication there were children there. If

34:01

you left your hot wheels out one night,

34:03

there's a kid there. He might come back to

34:05

your house. He said he had been in

34:07

a lot of houses. He didn't break in, but

34:09

if there was a door open or a

34:11

window open, that was enough. He would go in.

34:13

As far as Illyria, he told us that

34:15

he had been in that house multiple times, that

34:17

he had kind of stalked the house. He

34:19

had come through the living room

34:21

window because it was open. He had

34:23

seen the 10 -year -old girl in

34:25

her bedroom. Now, they had a dog,

34:27

and there was also a dog

34:29

in Cleveland. This is somebody who, Justin

34:32

had a very easygoing manner

34:34

and was very calm. He

34:36

said dogs liked him. He said dogs are cool.

34:38

Dogs didn't bother him. When he went into

34:40

houses, they didn't make a lot of noise when

34:42

he was there. Oh, that's disappointing

34:44

to hear because I'm always thinking

34:46

that dogs have this special instinct

34:49

that they know. Exactly,

34:51

right? And I think a lot of us think that.

34:53

I have a dog and I always think, oh,

34:55

my dog is going to bark. And sometimes he said,

34:57

you know, if a dog did bark, he would

34:59

just leave. But when it came to the Illyria attempt,

35:01

he said that he went to that back of

35:03

the house so he could reach the girl through the

35:05

window because the back of the house offered an

35:07

escape route. He thought there might

35:09

be some cameras in the neighborhood, so

35:12

he had driven around this neighborhood

35:14

and he came back later looking for

35:16

cameras. And when that attempt failed,

35:18

he said he did go to Lorraine

35:20

afterwards because his compulsion was that

35:22

bad that day. So like we talked

35:24

about earlier, this compulsion to act

35:26

out on whatever it was that he

35:28

needed to do that day, whether

35:30

it was touch a child or grab

35:32

a child, that compulsion was strong.

35:34

So when Illyria didn't work, he went

35:37

to Lorraine. And then we have

35:39

that whole series of girls being touched

35:41

or grabbed in Lorraine that morning.

35:43

And that was him as well. When

35:45

we talk more about the work

35:47

that you did throughout your career i

35:49

really want to touch on that

35:51

compulsion and obsession because that's what really

35:53

makes all of these cases so

35:55

frightening for everyone is how do you

35:57

stop that let's finish this up

35:59

first but i did want to make

36:02

that note how my mind is

36:04

swirling with that thought so we asked

36:06

about the cleveland abduction. He had

36:08

been in that house multiple times. He

36:10

had taken items from the house.

36:12

We knew that he had taken items

36:14

because the mom had told us

36:16

that there were certain things missing and

36:18

our six -year -old had told us

36:20

that when he put her in his

36:22

car, she actually saw items that

36:24

belonged to her sisters on the floorboards,

36:27

some clothing and some shoes. He

36:29

had been there. He had kind of

36:31

stalked that house as well. He

36:33

said that taking her was a spur

36:35

of the moment decision. It was

36:37

not planned. He drove around for a

36:39

long time around Cleveland before trying

36:41

to figure out what he was going

36:43

to do. What's interesting is

36:45

that so many of these cases have a

36:47

social media connection, that there's some type

36:49

of communication through an app, through something. In

36:51

this case, there was nothing. He was

36:53

not active on social media. He didn't talk

36:55

to these kids on social media. When

36:57

we looked for phones that run in the

36:59

Cleveland area, his phone didn't show up.

37:01

He said, after this, there was no activity

37:03

for weeks afterwards because he truly thought

37:06

he was going to get caught. He actually

37:08

said, and I don't know if this

37:10

is true, Jerry. This is just what he

37:12

told us in an interview. But he

37:14

said he left his car sitting out in

37:16

Lorraine for someone to see for a

37:18

while. And when no one arrested him, he

37:20

moved it to a shop. And that's

37:22

when he started to get rid of the

37:24

pieces and parts of it. This was

37:26

an obsession. He told us

37:28

that he had been in more

37:30

than 50 homes in Cleveland and

37:32

Lorraine County area. Could not remember

37:34

the first time that it happened.

37:36

He had an attitude that empowered

37:38

him and didn't have fear. So

37:41

dogs didn't bother him. The fear

37:43

didn't bother him. But he would not

37:45

break in. He would only go

37:47

through an open door window. Sometimes he

37:49

just stood outside and watched what

37:51

was going on in the house. The

37:53

scariest thing that he told us

37:55

Jerry is that he had no deterrent.

37:57

Nothing deterred him from doing this.

37:59

When you say that he went into

38:01

fifty houses the whole purpose was

38:03

to feel connected to the child inside

38:05

what was it he wasn't there

38:08

to steal stuff of value. No the

38:10

purpose was to fulfill this obsession

38:12

this compulsion to go into these houses

38:14

not all of it had to

38:16

do with kids and again jerry i'll

38:18

say again that this is what

38:20

he told us i don't know if

38:22

that's an exaggeration. I don't know

38:24

if it's completely true or if he

38:26

said it to lead us down

38:28

that road. I don't know. But

38:30

he did tell us, and I'm going to go

38:32

back to dogs for a second here, no one

38:34

wants to get out of bed to see why

38:36

their dog is barking. And that really hit home

38:38

for me. I think it's true. Oh

38:41

my goodness, it happened to us last night.

38:43

My dog was barking last night and my husband

38:45

and I kind of looked at each other

38:47

like, why is he barking? But we didn't go

38:49

downstairs. Right. And he told

38:51

us that people usually just tell the dog

38:53

to stop barking, but no one gets

38:55

up to check. And it's the same with

38:57

people. He said people will say they

38:59

hear someone in their house, but they don't

39:01

get up to check. Now, I

39:03

won't say that. I won't do that.

39:05

So those are some things that he

39:07

told us about when he was in

39:09

people's houses. And as far as the

39:11

victims, he said the reason

39:13

for this random selection. Like what

39:15

took you to this house in Cleveland?

39:18

What took you to this house

39:20

in Illyria? Was that it's harder to

39:22

hurt someone you know? So

39:24

he wanted to go outside of his

39:26

community? Outside of the people, right? Not

39:28

going to hurt people he knew. And

39:30

these were random places that he would

39:32

go back and go back and go

39:34

back to them. We did work a

39:36

lot with the behavioral analysis unit on

39:38

this case. The profilers. I worked with

39:40

a lot of them as part of

39:42

the card team. One of the things

39:44

that they offered up in their analysis,

39:46

they said maybe his brother's death triggered

39:48

some of this behavior. He told us

39:50

that boredom caused an increase in his

39:52

behavior and that he usually offended during

39:54

the winter months here in Ohio so

39:56

he could wear a hoodie to help

39:58

disguise his identity. And you really can't

40:00

pull off a hoodie in that look

40:02

in the summer months here. Could you

40:04

tell us more about his brother's death?

40:07

I don't have a lot of information

40:09

on it, Jerry, but his brother died

40:11

of an overdose, I believe. That's why

40:13

he was driving his brother's car at

40:15

the time. Okay, but his brother was

40:17

not a young child. No, no, no.

40:19

His brother was an adult. So he

40:21

told us that sometimes he did take

40:23

very small things from residents to sell

40:25

them. Sometimes he ate things while he

40:27

was in the house. Sometimes he interacted

40:29

with the victims and would have conversations

40:31

with them. And he said sometimes he

40:33

entered homes even if he knew they

40:35

didn't have children. He never had a

40:37

real plan when he entered the home,

40:39

but he always had an exit plan

40:41

as we saw from Illyria. That's why

40:43

he used that ladder and was in

40:45

the backyard because there was an escape

40:47

route through the backyard. He did tell

40:49

us that he became, as

40:51

these impulses increased, he became more

40:53

desperate, more reckless. That's what

40:55

we saw in Lorraine that morning, approaching

40:57

kids on the street. that victim

40:59

behavior influenced his behavior. If they didn't

41:01

respond or react the way he

41:03

expected, it would throw him off and

41:05

he would usually leave. So our

41:07

10 year old in Illyria by her

41:09

kicking and screaming and running and

41:11

jumping off her bed and running to

41:13

get her dad, that's why he

41:15

left because that wasn't the behavior he

41:17

expected. This is really a

41:19

strange case because in most

41:21

instances when I've talked to somebody

41:23

about an abduction case or

41:25

where you hear about it, That

41:27

was the main purpose of

41:30

that person. They went out to

41:32

get a child that day

41:34

to molest, to sexually assault. It

41:36

doesn't really sound like his

41:38

obsession compulsion had him focused on

41:40

that at that time. It's

41:42

obvious that if this continued and

41:44

he had not been caught

41:46

or almost caught, and stopped his

41:48

activity that it would have

41:50

gone in that direction. But at

41:52

this point where these activities

41:54

were done, it sounds like it

41:56

wasn't a target or a

41:58

focus of his. Do you agree

42:00

or am I getting that

42:02

wrong? No, I think this

42:04

is a very unusual case in that

42:06

the motive is different because his motive

42:08

was more to follow this impulse or

42:10

this compulsion to find people to maybe

42:12

just touch them, be with them, go

42:15

into this house, talk to them. It

42:17

wasn't so much taking. So it is

42:19

very different in other child abduction cases

42:21

that we worked here in Cleveland. We've

42:23

had a lot of different abduction cases,

42:25

our most famous one with Amanda Berry

42:28

and Gina DeJesus. This is completely different.

42:30

And the fact that he dropped her

42:32

off on a street corner and let

42:34

her go after one day was very

42:36

different. That's an unusual thing to happen

42:38

in one of these cases. Thank

42:41

God that happened. Correct. I'm

42:43

sure this case would be

42:45

one that many parents of abducted

42:47

children would look for as

42:50

a sign of hope that their

42:52

child will be returned. I'm

42:54

just quoting statistics that I've heard,

42:56

but I've heard that if the child

42:58

is not found within 24 to

43:00

48 hours, the chances of them being

43:02

found or returned alive are drastically

43:05

diminished. Correct. Typically in those cases, those

43:07

statistics are true because we have

43:09

people that, for whatever reason, they act

43:11

out on an impulse or it's

43:13

planned, but they act out. And then

43:15

once they have taken that child,

43:17

once they have hurt that child, it's

43:19

like, oh no, what do I

43:21

do now? And that's when we see

43:23

these children get murdered is because

43:26

that offender has acted on maybe something

43:28

that was a fantasy, something that

43:30

was planned, but when that's done, what

43:32

are they going to do? So

43:34

if they don't plan on keeping the

43:36

child for a long time, that

43:38

child can identify them. And some of

43:40

these people that we have dealt

43:42

with felt like that was the only

43:44

choice they had. I don't even

43:47

know what to say. I think it's

43:49

important to talk about these cases.

43:51

You are providing investigative techniques that others

43:53

that are listening who are in

43:55

law enforcement might be able to use.

43:57

what happened to you in this

43:59

case as far as not being able

44:01

to hit on some of those

44:03

obvious clues that you had at the

44:05

beginning will bring them some comfort

44:08

in knowing that they're not doing anything

44:10

wrong. Sometimes the obvious does not

44:12

work. But this is just an interesting

44:14

case because of the quote unquote

44:16

happy ending and it is a happy

44:18

ending. I don't want to diminish

44:20

that a child was returned to her

44:22

loved ones alive. And so it

44:24

is a happy ending. But there are

44:26

so many things that happen in

44:29

this case that if you were looking

44:31

at a textbook on abduction investigations, it

44:33

covers many of those things that

44:35

would be listed there as what

44:37

you could do or things to

44:40

do. Yeah. The FBI has a

44:42

child abduction response plan. And because

44:44

we're the FBI, we call it

44:46

the CARP. We have to have

44:48

an acronym for everything. But we

44:50

followed the CARP. We followed every...

44:52

Outline in every best practice that

44:54

we have in these cases. But

44:56

when you deal with complete stranger

44:58

abductions, this guy, Justin, he had

45:00

absolutely no connection to either of

45:02

these families. There was nothing to

45:04

put him with these families. So

45:06

when you have that and then

45:08

the lack of identifying information really,

45:10

really made it hard. But at

45:12

the end, because of the work

45:14

that was done, because of the

45:16

information that was provided in these

45:18

forensic interviews, when we did get

45:20

that identity, we were able to

45:22

act quickly and say, yes, this

45:25

is the right guy. This is

45:27

the guy who matches everything that

45:29

we have. And I want to

45:31

stress again that the difference between

45:33

this case and the case that

45:35

provided me with a true understanding

45:37

of what these case reviews can

45:39

share with the public was that

45:41

case that i did with retired

45:43

agent eddie fryer on the abduction

45:45

of poly class and that was

45:47

episode 57 so i wanted to

45:49

just mention that again because it

45:51

was one of the first fully

45:53

publicized cases where a stranger goes

45:55

into a home and takes a

45:57

child and that again is just

45:59

the worst nightmare for any parent

46:01

to have to think about. I

46:03

just wanted to remind everyone you

46:05

said that he received thirty five

46:07

years right and that's a state

46:09

charge a state sentence what does

46:12

that really mean as far as

46:14

Ohio is concerned thirty five years

46:16

because this was a plea agreement

46:18

i think he'll get close to

46:20

that. I don't have any information

46:22

on his behavior, if he's been

46:24

moved around a lot, anything like

46:26

that, but I would suspect that

46:28

he would do close to that

46:30

35 years. He might get out

46:32

a little early if there's good

46:34

behavior involved, but every case is

46:36

different, so I can't predict that.

46:46

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47:38

That's odoo.com. I want

47:40

to thank you again for

47:42

sharing this case review with us

47:44

i think the institutional knowledge that

47:46

you've passed on will be

47:48

invaluable for someone listening to this

47:51

who might have to work at

47:53

abduction case one day i

47:55

want to spend some time now

47:57

just talking a little bit more

47:59

about your career and the fact

48:01

that so many of the

48:03

things that you did involved similar

48:05

cases or crimes against children. Right.

48:07

So in my career, I

48:09

served as a negotiator and a

48:11

police instructor and adjunct instructor for

48:13

the FBI. But a good portion

48:16

of it was spent working

48:18

on violent crimes against children. In

48:20

2006, the Bureau created the Child

48:22

Abduction Rapid Deployment Team. That was

48:24

created out of a need for

48:26

best practices because child abductions are

48:28

rare. They really don't happen that

48:30

often. And when they do happen,

48:32

they tend to happen in places

48:34

that haven't had a lot of

48:36

experience with them, or maybe it's

48:38

a very small town or community

48:40

where they don't have the resources

48:42

that a bigger city would have.

48:44

So the Bureau created this team

48:46

and said, we're going to train

48:48

up this group of agents. We're

48:51

going to make them specialists in

48:53

child abduction and teach them techniques

48:55

and really focus in on best

48:57

practices for these types of cases.

48:59

So I joined the team in

49:01

late 2006. and was on

49:03

the team until I retired. When I

49:05

retired, I was the team leader for

49:07

the central part of the United States.

49:09

We would deploy whenever a child went

49:11

missing and that sheriff's office, police station,

49:13

whatever it might be, if they reached

49:15

out and requested our help, and we

49:18

would go that day. but we had

49:20

to be invited in. What we would

49:22

do is go in and really say,

49:24

okay, let's help set up a command

49:26

post. Let's look at this case and

49:28

go into our arsenal and say, okay,

49:30

where have we seen this before? What

49:32

have we done in the past that

49:34

has worked well? What do we know

49:36

works the best? Was the neighborhood canvas

49:38

done in the way that would exploit

49:41

every single part of that to make

49:43

it the most useful information that we

49:45

can get. Were people in every single

49:47

house interviewed? Were any houses missed? If

49:49

they were, did we go back and

49:51

do them? Was every person in every

49:53

house interviewed? Did we look in all

49:55

of these houses? Did we look in

49:57

all of these places? But bringing our

49:59

institutional knowledge to every single case. And

50:02

so the more deployments you go on,

50:04

the more you get, and then as

50:06

well, then you take the resources that

50:08

we can bring to these cases, which

50:10

are being provided. It doesn't cost anybody

50:12

anything. And you have the resources of

50:14

the cellular analysis team. You have behavioral

50:16

science. You get divers if you

50:18

need them, drones if you need

50:20

them, planes if you need them. One

50:22

of my first deployments was in

50:24

Bemidji, Minnesota. And we didn't have

50:26

any working communication when we got there. So

50:29

we had to bring in phones because we

50:31

had no way to talk to each other.

50:33

So there's a lot of different things that

50:35

come in. So the dogs, every resource that

50:37

is available in the FBI will be brought

50:39

out at a moment's notice on one of

50:41

these child abductions. You mentioned the fact

50:43

that you had to be invited. Could you

50:45

share a little bit more about that? Sure, well

50:47

typically, unless we know a

50:49

child is taken across state lines, typically

50:51

these child abductions are going to be

50:53

local investigations. They're going to be investigated

50:56

by the local police, the sheriff's department,

50:58

the state, really not an FBI investigation

51:00

unless we know that there is some

51:02

interstate jurisdiction. On some of them, if

51:04

it's just, hey, this kid is missing,

51:06

we don't know where this child is

51:08

and we don't have any reason to

51:11

suspect they've been taken anywhere, it's not

51:13

a federal case. But when you want

51:15

those resources, it's a phone call. Hey,

51:17

we'd like the car team to come

51:19

in. We'd like some help with this,

51:21

right? And then we jump on a

51:23

plane and go. And I also like

51:26

to remind people that's done with the

51:28

knowledge that if the person is caught,

51:30

if somebody is arrested, just like in

51:32

this particular case that you just reviewed,

51:34

it's going to be a state charge,

51:36

a state. It's going to go through

51:39

state court and not federal court. The

51:41

FBI is just going to walk away.

51:43

They're going to congratulate everyone on the

51:45

investigative team, but they're going to walk

51:47

away and go on to their next

51:49

assignment, not expecting anything in return for

51:51

the work that was done. Right. On

51:54

to the next one. Well, this is

51:56

fantastic. I think we've been able to

51:58

provide a lot of information about child

52:00

abduction cases and how they're investigated and

52:02

the FBI's role. Now we're at the

52:04

point where I'd like to ask you

52:06

my standard questions, which are when and

52:09

why you joined the FBI. Wow, so

52:11

I joined the FBI in November of

52:13

1995. My previous career

52:15

was in broadcast television, so I

52:17

had my degrees in journalism. I

52:19

worked as a reporter, as a

52:22

producer, as an anchor. I

52:24

had moved all around and I was

52:26

working in Detroit. I came home

52:28

one weekend, my dad was a police officer. And

52:30

just, you know, I just don't think this is

52:32

it for me. Like, this is not what I

52:34

want to do with the rest of my life.

52:36

He said, oh, you should apply the FBI. They're

52:38

looking for women. And I

52:40

said, what would the FBI want with

52:42

me? I am five foot two. I

52:44

have no background in criminal anything and

52:46

law enforcement. And he said, oh, you

52:48

should go apply. You know how to

52:50

talk to people. And so I did.

52:53

I went over to the office in

52:55

Canton, Ohio. And back in this time,

52:57

Jerry, our applications were on paper. I

52:59

filled out an application and really did

53:01

not expect anything. Then I got the

53:03

phone call to come for the test.

53:05

Then I got the phone call to

53:07

go for the interview. I continued through

53:09

these different phases of the process. Then

53:11

I got the offer letter and I

53:13

thought, oh my gosh, what am I

53:15

getting into? You know, I

53:18

really didn't expect that the FBI

53:20

would be interested in someone with

53:22

my background. I accepted, but I'll

53:24

never forget when I went into

53:26

my news director's office in Detroit

53:28

and I turned in my tweak

53:30

notice. He looked at me. He

53:32

pointed his finger at me and

53:34

he laughed and he said, you

53:36

will never make it. Whoa. And

53:38

I love that and I love telling

53:41

people that because it served as such

53:43

an inspiration for me in the weeks

53:45

to come when as someone who had

53:47

not been through any type of police

53:49

academy, I didn't know what to expect.

53:51

And so when we were out in

53:53

the lake and it was freezing and

53:55

we're running in the snow and doing

53:57

push -ups and all this stuff, his

53:59

words would come back to me and

54:02

I thought, oh, I will, I will

54:04

make it. Like my dad had said,

54:06

being able to talk to people, being

54:08

a reporter, you're sticking your microphone in

54:10

people's faces and hoping that they'll talk

54:12

to you, right? Having a background in

54:14

being able to talk to people and

54:16

carry on conversations and do interviews really

54:18

was helpful. I'm really surprised

54:20

that anyone would not see the parallels

54:22

between what we do as FBI

54:25

agents and what reporters do. The main

54:27

job for both of us is

54:29

to gather information. True. I think TV

54:31

has given people a different idea

54:33

of what FBI agents do. But you're

54:35

right. It is to gather information

54:37

and be able to write it up,

54:39

whether that's in a report, an

54:42

affidavit, whatever it might be. Being able

54:44

to talk, being able to write

54:46

is a huge part of our job.

54:48

But I don't think that's a

54:50

widely known piece of information. That's

54:52

how I got into the FBI.

54:55

And then they sent me back to Cleveland.

54:57

I had grown up in Ohio. So

54:59

at the time my orders were processed, Cleveland

55:01

was getting a new SAC who wanted

55:03

to beef up the ranks because there were

55:05

a lot of people that were going

55:08

to retire and I spent my entire career

55:10

in Cleveland. Which is rare. Yes,

55:12

I retired as a first office

55:14

agent. Most of your career

55:16

was on the violent crime squad you

55:18

mentioned? Most of it, yes.

55:20

I worked some public corruption. I

55:22

worked in an RA for six

55:24

years and then the remainder of

55:26

my career was violent crime. When

55:28

did you retire and were you

55:30

able to use those skills that

55:32

you learned in the FBI in

55:34

your next adventure. Absolutely so i

55:36

retired in 2019 and i spent

55:38

the next three years working as

55:40

a child forensic interviewer. and interviewed

55:42

close to a thousand children in

55:44

the space of three years, interviewing

55:46

them for law enforcement or for

55:49

children's services. Then I decided to

55:51

kind of go back to my

55:53

roots a little bit. I now

55:55

work as a contract investigator. I

55:57

also contract with the National Center

55:59

for Missing and Exploited Children and

56:01

work on some cold cases for

56:03

them. And I do some teaching

56:05

for the National Criminal Justice Training

56:07

Center for Child Abductions. I also

56:09

teach with a private company for

56:11

negotiations. Sounds like you're keeping

56:13

yourself very busy. I like

56:15

to give my guest the last

56:17

word. So what would you like to

56:19

say? I would like to tell

56:21

anybody who is listening that might be

56:23

thinking about a career in law

56:25

enforcement. If you're considering it, thinking about

56:27

it, especially with the FBI, it

56:29

is a great job. There's a lot

56:31

of stuff out in the public domain

56:33

right now about law enforcement and the

56:35

FBI, but especially for any women listening,

56:37

it's a great job. It's a family

56:39

friendly job because there are times when

56:42

it is very flexible and you do

56:44

work with squads and you work with

56:46

the best people around. I've been able

56:48

to raise two kids and not miss

56:50

anything and have a great career at

56:52

the same time. So I would highly

56:54

recommend it to anyone who is considering

56:56

it. Take a look. And

56:59

that's the end of

57:01

the interview. In your podcast

57:03

app's description of this

57:05

episode, there's a direct link

57:07

to the show notes.

57:09

We'll find a photo of

57:11

Kelly Liberty Gardner along

57:13

with lots of case -related

57:15

news articles and images. There's

57:17

also a link to

57:19

other FBI -retired case file

57:21

review episodes featuring child abduction

57:24

and links to episode

57:26

332 with Bill Shoot on

57:28

historical cellular analysis and

57:30

episodes 306 and 307 with

57:32

Steve Kramer and Steve

57:34

Bush about investigative genetic genealogy.

57:36

I hope you enjoyed

57:38

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57:40

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57:42

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58:55

for listening to the very end.

58:57

I hope you come back

58:59

for another episode of FBI Retired

59:01

Case File Review with Jerry

59:03

Williams. Thank you. What

59:08

if I told you that right now,

59:10

millions of people are living with a

59:12

debilitating condition that's so misunderstood, many of

59:14

them don't even know that they have

59:16

it? That condition is obsessive compulsive disorder,

59:18

or OCD. I'm Dr. Patrick McGrath, the

59:20

Chief Clinical Officer of NoCD, and in

59:23

the 25 years I've been treating OCD,

59:25

I've met so many people who are

59:27

suffering from the condition in silence, unaware

59:29

of just what it was. OCD can

59:31

create overwhelming anxiety and fear around what

59:33

you value most, make you question your

59:35

identity. beliefs and morals, and drive you

59:37

to perform mentally and physically draining

59:40

compulsions or rituals. Over my career,

59:42

I've seen just how devastating OCD

59:44

can be when it's left untreated.

59:46

But help is available. That's where

59:48

NoCD comes in. NoCD is the

59:50

world's largest virtual therapy provider for

59:52

obsessive compulsive disorder. Our licensed therapists

59:54

are trained in exposure and response

59:57

prevention therapy. A specialized treatment

59:59

proven to be incredibly effective

1:00:01

for OCD. So visit nocd.com

1:00:03

to schedule a free 15-minute

1:00:05

call with our team. That's

1:00:07

N-O-C-D-D-com. .com.