Speaker 1: Pushkin. I don't want to pick a fight with the
Speaker 1: cartel or the biker gangs or drug boards. I'm not
Speaker 1: I'm a small town chief trying to run the department,
Speaker 1: and we have one cold case that we're trying to solve,
Speaker 1: so we just want to find the truth. That's Ben Ford,
Speaker 1: the chief of police in Traveler's Rest. When I was
Speaker 1: reporting for this podcast, I spent a bunch of time
Speaker 1: with Chief Ford, or Ben, that's what he said I
Speaker 1: should call him. He's a very personable guy, and he's
Speaker 1: deeply invested in Brooke Henson's case. In fact, when I
Speaker 1: first started poking around on the story, he actually reached
Speaker 1: out to me. He wanted to share what he knew
Speaker 1: in the hopes that by getting the word out there,
Speaker 1: he might finally solve this case. So when I first
Speaker 1: got into town, we drove around owned for a while,
Speaker 1: gave me a little tour, and we talked about the case,
Speaker 1: about all the competing theories and what happened, and then
Speaker 1: we headed back to his office and talk some more. Honestly,
Speaker 1: it's unusual for law enforcement to be quite this candid,
Speaker 1: So today we're sharing some of that conversation, and one
Speaker 1: of The first things that Ben shared with me was
Speaker 1: that he'd grown up here in Traveler's Rest, and so
Speaker 1: everything that happened here with Brooke Henson it was personal
Speaker 1: for him. I'm Jake Halbern and this is deep cover
Speaker 1: this week or going back to Traveler's Rest. So what
Speaker 1: was it like growing up here? I'll just give me
Speaker 1: a sense for her. Yeah, yeah, So you know, quiet
Speaker 1: small town. You pretty much knew everybody, and you're you
Speaker 1: knew of everybody, so there weren't many things that could
Speaker 1: get kept secret around here. So you know, it was
Speaker 1: a quiet little town, not a whole lot of crime,
Speaker 1: you know, just a great place to grow up. Really,
Speaker 1: Brook Henson must have been about your age, maybe a
Speaker 1: bit younger. She was a little younger than me. Yes,
Speaker 1: did you know her or her family growing up? I
Speaker 1: did not. I didn't know. I was five years I see,
Speaker 1: five years older than her. I believe my brother actually
Speaker 1: is three years younger than me and actually knew her,
Speaker 1: and actually my my wife knew her from school, so
Speaker 1: I have those connections that they knew of her, and
Speaker 1: and Brooke dropped out of school early in high school,
Speaker 1: in tenth grade. I believe it was But but growing
Speaker 1: up through middle school in high school. Yeah, I've got
Speaker 1: family members and my wife that that kind of knew her.
Speaker 1: Does that change things in terms of making them more personal?
Speaker 1: Like this is not just some random person who you're investigating.
Speaker 1: What happeness is someone that you have personal connections to
Speaker 1: in a small town. It does for me. And even
Speaker 1: when I worked to another agency, the Maldon Police Department,
Speaker 1: I knew of this case. I knew of this case
Speaker 1: my entire career. When I worked to other agencies and
Speaker 1: I knew that she was missing and it was unsolved.
Speaker 1: And if there were people that I came across that
Speaker 1: I thought may know something, I would ask And it
Speaker 1: wasn't even my case. Then I worked for other agencies,
Speaker 1: but I would ask and if if they had good information,
Speaker 1: I would refer them up here to travels rest to
Speaker 1: see if they could help help out with the case.
Speaker 1: So it does. It does make it a little more personal.
Speaker 1: I have an investigative background throughout my career. Most of
Speaker 1: my career has been investigations, and it's something that that
Speaker 1: I don't like to give up home. It's just especially
Speaker 1: when when it hits home and it's so close to
Speaker 1: people that I know. So there's so many of different
Speaker 1: accounts in the media, and I know a lot of uh,
Speaker 1: there's a lot of misinformation out there. But let's maybe
Speaker 1: just start like, what do we know about the facts
Speaker 1: of this case? Are what are the things that we
Speaker 1: can say relatively certain, and what don't we know about
Speaker 1: the facts surrounding her disappearance. So interestingly enough, what we
Speaker 1: thought were facts in this case may not have been
Speaker 1: now that we've we found out in the last year.
Speaker 1: So what was reported was that Brooke was last seen
Speaker 1: at her residence at about two thirty in the morning,
Speaker 1: outside of the residence going for a walk. That's reported
Speaker 1: by her mother and a couple of other individuals family
Speaker 1: members there that spoke to her saw her. That's their account.
Speaker 1: We don't actually know if that's true or not. They're
Speaker 1: they're conflicting stories now saying that no, she never walked
Speaker 1: away from the house. She was other places. We have
Speaker 1: several statements now that she was last seen alive up
Speaker 1: in the River Falls community of Greenville County, which is
Speaker 1: about six or eight miles north of Traveler's Rest, and
Speaker 1: we believe that she was last thing alive up there
Speaker 1: on the same night or a different night. It would
Speaker 1: be the same night, the same night she was known
Speaker 1: to leave and maybe walk around the town. She was
Speaker 1: known as a walker around town, and she may walk
Speaker 1: to get some cigarettes or walk up to the to
Speaker 1: the local store, and there was some pool tables there
Speaker 1: and a little hangout. Of course, these places were closed
Speaker 1: this time of night, which makes it even more strange
Speaker 1: on why she would have went for a walk. Then, however,
Speaker 1: we have statements that say that, you know, this person
Speaker 1: picked her up, or this person picked her up, or
Speaker 1: we have so many different statements. Don't know what's true
Speaker 1: and what's not. So what we're finding out is the
Speaker 1: deeper we dig, the more stories we're hearing. I heard
Speaker 1: one the other day and I can't go into detail
Speaker 1: about some of the stories, but allegedly this person killed
Speaker 1: her now and we never heard that person's name in
Speaker 1: twenty three years, and this is how this person did it.
Speaker 1: So you know, we're we're still following up on that obviously,
Speaker 1: but but you know, she was The facts remain in
Speaker 1: the case file that she was last seen at her residence. However,
Speaker 1: we do have statements she was seen in Riverfalls, so
Speaker 1: we believe somebody picked her up what we believe now
Speaker 1: took her to River Falls to some more parties. We've
Speaker 1: been told there were parties up there too that night,
Speaker 1: so we believe that she was last seen alive up there.
Speaker 1: What happened that all of a sudden a year ago,
Speaker 1: this changes. I mean we're almost more than twenty years out,
Speaker 1: so what happens that kind of gets this new information going.
Speaker 1: So when I came in the end of twenty eighteen,
Speaker 1: I started digging into the case myself. I wanted to
Speaker 1: look at it and see after a couple of years
Speaker 1: of doing that off and on, you know, being the
Speaker 1: police chief, I have other responsibilities too. There's a friend
Speaker 1: of mine, this retired law enforcement that he and I
Speaker 1: talked about this case a little bit, and he wants
Speaker 1: to be anonymous, and I'm going to keep him anonymous.
Speaker 1: But he came into the picture and we talked a
Speaker 1: little bit, and I allowed him to look at the
Speaker 1: case file, which is, you know, for bankers box full
Speaker 1: of information. Of course, I scanned it and put it
Speaker 1: on digital format so he could look at it and
Speaker 1: that type of thing. So when he came on the scene,
Speaker 1: he had some it was a fresh set eyes. It
Speaker 1: was a retired law enforce a officer. This is just
Speaker 1: volunteer in his time. So at that point we really
Speaker 1: sort of hitting it hard and talking to more and
Speaker 1: more people. And so about a year. It was April
Speaker 1: of last year, April twenty twenty one when we started that,
Speaker 1: and that kind of jolted us in this investigation to
Speaker 1: spend more time working on it. The main thing that
Speaker 1: we've heard in the last year is that it's not
Speaker 1: necessarily how Route was killed, it's what happened to her afterwards,
Speaker 1: and that it's much bigger than we could ever imagine.
Speaker 1: That's what people are telling us, So we're trying to
Speaker 1: figure out what they mean by that. And and the
Speaker 1: different theories that have come into play is one has
Speaker 1: to do with some type of satanic worship or cult,
Speaker 1: some something's you know that could be a possibility. Um,
Speaker 1: there's been mentions of of maybe biker motorcycle clubs involvement. UM,
Speaker 1: I won't go in specifics because you just don't know
Speaker 1: if it's true. We haven't proved any of that. And
Speaker 1: then there's there's also been mentioned of of cartel of
Speaker 1: Mexican cartel involvement and over drugs and stuff. Is that
Speaker 1: carteller was that cartel active at that time in this area.
Speaker 1: They were, They were not and not the way that
Speaker 1: they are in today's world with the with the methamphetamine
Speaker 1: trade and things like that. But and again I'm not
Speaker 1: gonna accuse any which one of those because I don't
Speaker 1: know yet. Um, but you know, these may be distractions
Speaker 1: as far as we know, we don't. We don't know,
Speaker 1: but there's a lot of things that lead us that
Speaker 1: point to those different possibilities with the Satanic worshiping and
Speaker 1: then the drugs and the money, you know, because when
Speaker 1: when people go missing or or get killed, you know,
Speaker 1: funny and drugs and greed, you know, lust, those are
Speaker 1: big reasons why people die. Among those three theories, is
Speaker 1: there a front runner or is it impossible to say?
Speaker 1: I think it's impossible to say right now. Depends on
Speaker 1: what week it is. And one week we're looking at
Speaker 1: at the theory of the Satanic worshiping and the black magic,
Speaker 1: and then uh, the next week something points us in
Speaker 1: a different direction. So we're just trying to keep an
Speaker 1: open mind to all of it and not get tunnel
Speaker 1: vision on it. The one key thing we're really missing,
Speaker 1: it's the body, and that's the big, big thing we're missing.
Speaker 1: I believe that if we could find the body, then
Speaker 1: this case would move forward faster. We just don't have
Speaker 1: a body. Talked me through how that would be true.
Speaker 1: So when you have a missing person, you can't there's
Speaker 1: no crime. So somebody that's missing, there's no crime. If
Speaker 1: you find a body, and then you can determine if
Speaker 1: the person was murdered normally, or if they died of
Speaker 1: natural causes or whatever the case may be. Brooke could
Speaker 1: be alive in California right now. Do you think that's
Speaker 1: a possibility. I don't know. I don't think that she
Speaker 1: would have left her mom. Her mom and her very close.
Speaker 1: I don't think she would have left her mom or friends.
Speaker 1: And if she had, she would have she would have
Speaker 1: made contact by now. I don't believe that's a possibility.
Speaker 1: So the body you were saying, if you could find,
Speaker 1: if you had the body, then what if we had
Speaker 1: the body, that would confirm one of the many stories
Speaker 1: we have or theories about how she died about maybe,
Speaker 1: for example, if the body is in said grave and
Speaker 1: said wooded area, then we take it and go back
Speaker 1: and look at all the tips that came in and say, okay,
Speaker 1: well these ten tips now may be true because of
Speaker 1: where the body's found. I see. So it's kind of
Speaker 1: like putting the putting the puzzle together, but we don't
Speaker 1: have that that main piece we need. It's almost like
Speaker 1: you know how the story ends, and then you can
Speaker 1: work backwards to figure out what happens in between. Correct. Correct.
Speaker 1: We believe that in the case file the answers are
Speaker 1: in there. We just don't know. It's like a multiple
Speaker 1: choice tests. We don't know which one is true. But
Speaker 1: we believe that the answers right there in front of
Speaker 1: so we just don't know which one's true yet. That
Speaker 1: sounds like that could drive you crazy. Absolutely can Absolutely
Speaker 1: it has been driving me crazy for three years. Now.
Speaker 1: Can I ask you why is this so important to you?
Speaker 1: I mean, I get I think I understand it. But
Speaker 1: someone might look and say, hey, this happens so long ago.
Speaker 1: Parents are both deceased, Brook appears to be deceased. Why
Speaker 1: why is this so important to get to the bottom
Speaker 1: of this? Because this is my hometown, and when someone
Speaker 1: goes missing and allegedly something happened to that person, somebody
Speaker 1: needs to fight for justice for her, and if the
Speaker 1: family has passed on, there are friends of hers, and
Speaker 1: there's me, and there's this police department that will fight
Speaker 1: for justice for And I don't plan on giving up,
Speaker 1: even though it gets frustrating, because someone needs to fight
Speaker 1: for her. And if we don't fight for her, then
Speaker 1: who then who's going to fight for the justice for her?
Speaker 1: If this person or those persons killed her. We want
Speaker 1: to get to the bottom of it and hold those
Speaker 1: individuals accountable. So it's justice is what it's about. For me.
Speaker 1: I get that. And I could also see how it
Speaker 1: in some ways to finds this place and sense of like,
Speaker 1: this is not okay to happen in this town, right
Speaker 1: and we're not gonna accept this right exactly, And in
Speaker 1: twenty three years, this is the only cold case we have,
Speaker 1: This is it? We don't We don't have a lot
Speaker 1: of violent crime happen here, well, you know, and I
Speaker 1: pride myself on that, and I love this city because
Speaker 1: of that. And we're four and a half square miles.
Speaker 1: It was small. We're small, seven thousand residents, and we
Speaker 1: have about five violent crimes a year, which I love.
Speaker 1: But this one, you know, if we don't try to
Speaker 1: find out and give it my all. I'm gonna try
Speaker 1: it to the day I retire the best I can
Speaker 1: to try to find out what happened to her. And
Speaker 1: if we don't try, then who John Campbell and I
Speaker 1: and view him today was talking about being involved in
Speaker 1: the early days at this case, and he said a
Speaker 1: few things that were interesting. One he said he took
Speaker 1: over about two years into it, and he said all
Speaker 1: he got were some written notes that were pretty hard
Speaker 1: to make sense of because it was pre computer days.
Speaker 1: And he wished that it had been treated as a
Speaker 1: murder right from the beginning. What's your take on that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, anyone that looks when you put a new
Speaker 1: set of eyes on a case like this, you can
Speaker 1: always say, well, why didn't they do this, why didn't
Speaker 1: they do that? And some of that's been frustrating for
Speaker 1: me too, you know, wondering why they didn't document it better,
Speaker 1: or why they didn't do this or that. Unfortunately, you know,
Speaker 1: after you spend a couple of days worrying about that,
Speaker 1: you kind of have to let it go because it's
Speaker 1: just not there and you kind of move on with
Speaker 1: what you have. But but John's right there there. I
Speaker 1: wish it had been treated differently. But then again, you
Speaker 1: look at you know, hundreds of thousands of people go
Speaker 1: missing every year in this country, and if every one
Speaker 1: of them was treated like a homicide, imagine how many
Speaker 1: officers it would take to, you know, follow those cases
Speaker 1: correctly and work them like a homicide. Sure, we may
Speaker 1: get a missing person called this afternoon and then thirty
Speaker 1: minutes find the person, and that's the happy ending. We
Speaker 1: find the person, they're safe, and you know, then we
Speaker 1: may get one that maybe another twenty three years we
Speaker 1: haven't found. So you never know how it's going to
Speaker 1: end out. So I guess back then they thought it
Speaker 1: was just another runaway and that maybe she just ran away,
Speaker 1: she'll be home in a couple of days. You know,
Speaker 1: it was kind of thought of that way, and you
Speaker 1: never really know. So unfortunately it was handled in a
Speaker 1: way that that turned out to not be just another runaway.
Speaker 1: John made a reference to an area. Didn't tell me where,
Speaker 1: but that there was a place where they thought the
Speaker 1: body might be. What can you tell me about I
Speaker 1: understand that's sensitive, but what can you tell me about
Speaker 1: about that? There's several places mentioned in all of these
Speaker 1: tips that came in where the body may be, and
Speaker 1: some of the places are very difficult to navigate. If
Speaker 1: and I'm going to mention just a pond for example. Okay,
Speaker 1: if you have a pond and over the course of
Speaker 1: twenty plush years, and the pond is in the mound,
Speaker 1: the sediment that rolls that comes down the mountains over
Speaker 1: twenty plush years, gathers in the bottom that pond. So
Speaker 1: the bottom of the pond is not the bottom of
Speaker 1: the pond that it was twenty years ago. Or if
Speaker 1: you have concrete that is sixteen feet deep and a
Speaker 1: body is put in concrete fifteen feet down, how are
Speaker 1: we ever going to get it? How are we going
Speaker 1: to know it's down there? So these things are those hypothetical?
Speaker 1: Are those those are possibilities? Those are actual possible possibilities,
Speaker 1: their possibilities, there's real possibilities. But I don't I don't
Speaker 1: know which one is to me. They're all equally important
Speaker 1: to check out. So what do you do with those
Speaker 1: two possibilities. Well, you hope that technology comes along far
Speaker 1: enough and you get someone that can either volunteer their
Speaker 1: equipment or maybe get the FEDS involved, or maybe Greenville
Speaker 1: County helps out and tries to locate you know, a
Speaker 1: body in in these areas. UM. So a combination of
Speaker 1: all those things. And then UM, you know one you know,
Speaker 1: you think you can drain a pond. You know, ponds
Speaker 1: can be drained, but depends on how big the pond is,
Speaker 1: how deep it is. There's so many factors that come
Speaker 1: into play. UM. Concrete, you know, you can't just tear
Speaker 1: up the concrete unless you have something solid to to show, yes,
Speaker 1: that body is down there. So then you look at
Speaker 1: you know, equipment like UH or penetrating UM, I forget
Speaker 1: what the solar penetrating or you know, the ground penetrating radar,
Speaker 1: that's it ground and you look at that and using that,
Speaker 1: but it's not going to show a three D image
Speaker 1: of a body or bones. It may just show avoid
Speaker 1: you know. So technology, it depends on technology, It depends
Speaker 1: on and and I do believe that if we were
Speaker 1: ever to find a body, UM, then you do you
Speaker 1: have DNA possibilities. You know, Now, if there's anything with
Speaker 1: the body, maybe we find one of these suspects DNA
Speaker 1: in there with it. You know, So that type of thing.
Speaker 1: That's why I mentioned the body's important right now. But um,
Speaker 1: you've got whales. People have said she's been put in
Speaker 1: a whale. Well in the country, there's lots of whales
Speaker 1: and if and to look in whales, we had to
Speaker 1: We've looked in one whale. We had to get a
Speaker 1: camera from a local um a company, drop it down
Speaker 1: about fifty feet and look around in that whale. And
Speaker 1: of course we didn't find anything. But there's a lot
Speaker 1: that goes into trying to use the equipment and check
Speaker 1: out these places. It seems it seems overwhelming very much.
Speaker 1: So it is I go home with this, I think
Speaker 1: about it all the time. I have to try to
Speaker 1: set it aside because I have a family, you know,
Speaker 1: I have to try to set it aside and just
Speaker 1: not think about it all the time. But when you
Speaker 1: open up this Pandora's box of of what happened to Brooke,
Speaker 1: then you know there's fifty people that have my work
Speaker 1: cell phone number and they'll call me weekends nights if
Speaker 1: they have information. They don't mind calling, and I don't
Speaker 1: mind them calling me because I want to try to
Speaker 1: get everybody involved I can to see if we can,
Speaker 1: you know, find out. But it weighs on me a
Speaker 1: little bit. I think I've had hair turned gray and
Speaker 1: turned loose a lot over the past couple of years,
Speaker 1: given me both. I mean, the other thing that seems
Speaker 1: that they would kind of mess with my head is
Speaker 1: that there are folks walking around this town. You said,
Speaker 1: you said, one of the first things you said we
Speaker 1: said this interview is they're not a lot of secrets
Speaker 1: in this town. And yet we're talking about maybe the
Speaker 1: biggest secret right here. Because if what you're saying is right,
Speaker 1: there may be multiple people who know what happened to her. Now.
Speaker 1: I believe that. I believe multiple people know. I believe
Speaker 1: in my mind six eight ten people know what happened
Speaker 1: to her. And I believe there were accomplices and there
Speaker 1: were people that helped help move the body or help
Speaker 1: you know, bear the body. There's I believe a lot
Speaker 1: of people know. However, the people that they're scared of,
Speaker 1: the ones above them that are run that we're running
Speaker 1: the show back then, or that they help control over them,
Speaker 1: that's why they can't tell. And I believe a lot
Speaker 1: of the people that are several of the people that
Speaker 1: know are dead now. Ricky Shawn Shirley, he's dead now,
Speaker 1: and I believe he knew what happened to her. It
Speaker 1: sounds like your investigation would be helped by support from
Speaker 1: the county and maybe even the FEDS. Yeah, And to
Speaker 1: be honest with you, the FEDS have been here, They've
Speaker 1: talked to us, they're assisting us on some things. The
Speaker 1: FBI is they've worked with us a little bit when
Speaker 1: a halftime. The county has helped us on some things
Speaker 1: with some searches of some areas outside of our jurisdiction
Speaker 1: here in the city. We do not believe our bodies
Speaker 1: in this city. We believe it's out in the county.
Speaker 1: All these different locations that that Dopu mentioned as possibilities
Speaker 1: that they're all out in the county. Yeah, talk to
Speaker 1: me about a little bit about the Aster Reid situation.
Speaker 1: Obviously that's first of all, you weren't here in Champa's
Speaker 1: rest and it's kind of peripheral to to brock Hanston's story.
Speaker 1: But do you remember that unfolding at the time, What
Speaker 1: were thoughts about about all that? I do remember that unfolding,
Speaker 1: and when that happened, it really piqued my interest, and
Speaker 1: I actually called John back then and I said, John,
Speaker 1: what's going on? Is this a possibility, and he said,
Speaker 1: I'm checking, I'm checking, let me check, And I said,
Speaker 1: do what you gotta do. You know, I'm just because
Speaker 1: I knew John worked here. Um. I was an investigator
Speaker 1: in another agency at the time, and it really piqued
Speaker 1: my interest that Now, when you say a possibility, do
Speaker 1: you mean that that that this was really Brooke Hanson.
Speaker 1: It was up in New York at Columbia, right right?
Speaker 1: I mean it would it would have been um, it
Speaker 1: would have been very interesting. Um. You know, one tip
Speaker 1: back then in the Brooke Henston case was that that
Speaker 1: she left and went to California, and she just ran
Speaker 1: away to California and wanted to be on her own.
Speaker 1: So it was feasible that she could have possibly went
Speaker 1: to New York, you know, and stayed up there, so
Speaker 1: that it was a possibility. But then it didn't take
Speaker 1: much checking to determine the truth, obviously, But but it
Speaker 1: did pique my interest in the case, and I was
Speaker 1: very curious at the time and talked with John about
Speaker 1: it a little bit back then. What I mean, there
Speaker 1: was for a brief while there was a ton of
Speaker 1: media attention, mainly ons to read, but probably also spill
Speaker 1: over into Broke Hanson. Me. Look here, I am all
Speaker 1: these years later. What did that do for the case?
Speaker 1: Between two thousand, Between about two thousand and I guess
Speaker 1: two thousand and six, there was hardly anything done on
Speaker 1: this case. Very little. John did a little bit, but
Speaker 1: there wasn't a lot to go on. When Esther read happened,
Speaker 1: all kinds of tips started coming in after that, so
Speaker 1: they determined that Esther Reid was Ester Reid, not Brooke Henson.
Speaker 1: But then more tips came in and more tip It
Speaker 1: brought more attention. It brought it back to life, so
Speaker 1: to say. And that's kind of what I did when
Speaker 1: I came in twenty eight, twenty nineteen, kind of bring
Speaker 1: it back to life. So it was very it was
Speaker 1: good attention. It was sad that it happened the way
Speaker 1: it did, but it was it kind of brought it
Speaker 1: back to life. And and uh so, so the friends
Speaker 1: of hers wouldn't forget, so the community wouldn't forget. And
Speaker 1: as far as as as long as I'm here, um,
Speaker 1: we'll use our social media to always remind the community
Speaker 1: will never forget. I was surprised that you reached out
Speaker 1: to me in all my years as a journalist. I
Speaker 1: don't think I know a case where the law enforcement
Speaker 1: reached out. I mean, this is a missing person, but
Speaker 1: clearly this must be part of your mission. It is,
Speaker 1: and transparency is what I'm all about. I don't mind sharing.
Speaker 1: Of course, you know there's details of the case. I
Speaker 1: can obviously and you understand why. But why hide We
Speaker 1: need the we need help. If if if one of
Speaker 1: your listeners here's here's this and says, you know what.
Speaker 1: I know the truth and I'm tired of you know
Speaker 1: it needs to come out now, and it'd be great.
Speaker 1: And like I said earlier, if if we don't care,
Speaker 1: who's going to care? If I retire from here in
Speaker 1: whatever year I retire, it may be the end of it.
Speaker 1: Maybe nobody picks up, maybe nobody messes with it anymore.
Speaker 1: It's just my mentality. I don't want to let it go.
Speaker 1: Do you think you're going to solve it today? It
Speaker 1: feels like I'm not. Why do you say that? Because
Speaker 1: tomorrow it may change And one day I feel like
Speaker 1: I will, and the next day I feel like I
Speaker 1: want it based on what information has come in that
Speaker 1: day that has changed my mind. And last week there's
Speaker 1: some information that came in, I felt really good about
Speaker 1: Today I don't feel as good about it. So this
Speaker 1: is unlike any other case I've ever worked. I could
Speaker 1: work a case and I could tell you with one
Speaker 1: hundred percent certainty, I'm gonna solve this case, or with
Speaker 1: one hundred percent certainty, there's no way I can solve
Speaker 1: this case because I don't have any evidence in this case.
Speaker 1: There's a plethora of information, but we don't have a body. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I honestly think that we won't solve this case unless
Speaker 1: we have a body. After speaking with Ben Ford, I
Speaker 1: spent the next several months reporting this story, making the
Speaker 1: season that you just heard, But I never stopped thinking
Speaker 1: about Ben and the enormity of the task that he faced.
Speaker 1: Part of me hope that maybe after the podcast came
Speaker 1: out he might get some new leads. So when our
Speaker 1: last episode dropped, I called him up to check in.
Speaker 1: That's next after the break? Any you there? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: hear you that. How are you any good? How are
Speaker 1: you I'm good, I'm good. I want to check in
Speaker 1: with you on a few things. So it sounds like
Speaker 1: you had a chance to to listen to the podcast.
Speaker 1: I wondered, like, what your reactions were. You know, I
Speaker 1: really enjoyed it. I didn't know a lot about Esther
Speaker 1: Reid in that case, just for what John Campbell told
Speaker 1: me and what I read in the news. I mean,
Speaker 1: I was very surprised that you had a conversation with
Speaker 1: Esther and I loved hearing what was going on in
Speaker 1: her mind. What did you make of this kind of
Speaker 1: new stage of her life where she's after Matthews and
Speaker 1: she's a professor atak and Zaga. What did you what
Speaker 1: did you make of that? Well, you know, hearing where
Speaker 1: she came from and what she went through and you
Speaker 1: know when she was younger. You know, it just showed
Speaker 1: me and it confirmed that anybody, know, anybody can do
Speaker 1: what they put their mind to. And she chose to
Speaker 1: live one way and do certain things a certain way
Speaker 1: for a long time, and then she decided to do
Speaker 1: it a different way. I'd love to see when people
Speaker 1: actually turned their lives around, and there's six more successful
Speaker 1: than they were when they were making bad decisions. So
Speaker 1: I thought it was great. I thought it was a
Speaker 1: great story. Oh, I appreciate that. I'm wondering if, since
Speaker 1: the podcast came out, whether any additional tips or bits
Speaker 1: of information have come your way. We haven't, not since
Speaker 1: the not since the podcast has come out. Ironically, though,
Speaker 1: before the podcast was released, I did have a man
Speaker 1: contact me from our county's attencive Center and we talked
Speaker 1: with him and eventually we got him in here and
Speaker 1: he gave us some information and he actually said I
Speaker 1: knew where Brooke is buried whoa And we said, well,
Speaker 1: how do you know that? And he said, well, I
Speaker 1: heard two people talking about it and they said where
Speaker 1: she was buried at? I said, can you take us
Speaker 1: to the spot, and he said yes, I said, let's go.
Speaker 1: So we went to the spot. Um, it was on
Speaker 1: a piece of property that belongs to a family that
Speaker 1: the mom and dad are deceased there. So the sister
Speaker 1: was in charge of the property and gave us permission
Speaker 1: to look on the property. So we went on the property.
Speaker 1: He pointed out the location. We put him back in
Speaker 1: the vehicle away from the scene, and we brought in
Speaker 1: cadaver dog. Cadaver dog alerted. So we took that dog
Speaker 1: away and we brought another dog in and that dog
Speaker 1: at what is that when you said cadaver dog alerted?
Speaker 1: What does that mean? Exactly? So that means they picked
Speaker 1: up what they believed to be the scent of decayed
Speaker 1: body or bones. Now it's it's not a it's not
Speaker 1: a perfect science, and it's it's not an absolute So
Speaker 1: that's why we use two different dogs, and we had
Speaker 1: a statement from somebody, so we used all of that
Speaker 1: in order to get a search warrant for the property. Well,
Speaker 1: Greeble County came out and helped, and we dug and
Speaker 1: found nothing. So we kind of like climax there, thinking
Speaker 1: we were gonna we were on something and we didn't
Speaker 1: find one ball, nothing and we dug a lot big area.
Speaker 1: Do you think this was at the time where you
Speaker 1: like this this is in or were you we use
Speaker 1: skeptical You know, I try to not to get my
Speaker 1: hopes up, um and I I try not to show
Speaker 1: that I get my hopes up because I've been let
Speaker 1: down so many times, you know. But in this case,
Speaker 1: you know, I thought there was gonna be something. I thought, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is a very good possibility. Let's let's find her.
Speaker 1: And and so I did think it was, but I
Speaker 1: didn't want to show too much enthusiasm due to the
Speaker 1: fact I've been let down so many times. So when
Speaker 1: we found out it wasn't, I was disappointed. But then
Speaker 1: yet again, it's another lead that we've checked off. Wow,
Speaker 1: it's true. It's it's like, you don't know, you have
Speaker 1: to follow up every lead. I guess that seems even
Speaker 1: remotely credible. I guess right, that's the only Yeah, and
Speaker 1: you know, we we were hesitant to listen to him
Speaker 1: at first, But anytime somebody says I know where the
Speaker 1: body's at, I can show you. I mean, we've got
Speaker 1: to go. We've got to go with it and we've
Speaker 1: got to check it out. Um. But that's that's the
Speaker 1: most we've done with the case. In the past few months.
Speaker 1: I've had people ask me too, whether you're any further
Speaker 1: along than they beginning some ground penetrating radar at the
Speaker 1: at the water treatment plan. So you know, I did
Speaker 1: some more research and I found a company and they
Speaker 1: volunteer their services to law enforce in all of the
Speaker 1: country and they have ground penetrating radar. So who are
Speaker 1: I'm planning to call? Nick? Yeah, please let let me
Speaker 1: know how let me know how that goes, whether I mean,
Speaker 1: if that ends up happening, or just stay in touch
Speaker 1: with me. I'd be curious. I really wouldn't be curious.
Speaker 1: Look is so so by far to you again and
Speaker 1: you'll have a good weekend there, Okay, take care of Ben.
Speaker 1: Bye bye, thank ye. Talking to Ben and getting this
Speaker 1: update on the investigation, it really hit home for me
Speaker 1: how there were all these leads, all these people who
Speaker 1: claim to know what happened to Brooke, and how each
Speaker 1: time one of these leads surfaced he had to take
Speaker 1: it seriously, and that inevitably part of him hoped that
Speaker 1: this one might be the breakthrough, the one that helped
Speaker 1: him solve the case and at long last bring some
Speaker 1: closure and some healing to this town. But so far
Speaker 1: it was just dead ends and heartbreak, and then inevitably
Speaker 1: a new lead and the cycle would begin again. I
Speaker 1: could see how, after so many years, this would all
Speaker 1: take a toll on everyone. And yet He's still added,
Speaker 1: we'll keep you updated if we hear anything else from
Speaker 1: the Travelers RESTPD. Then Ford is still working diligently on
Speaker 1: the Brookenson case. So if you have any new information
Speaker 1: at all that might be helpful, please contact him at
Speaker 1: Ford at tr police dot com. That's fr D at
Speaker 1: tr police dot com. Deep Cover is produced by Amy
Speaker 1: Gaines and Jacob Smith. This episode was edited by Sophie Crane,
Speaker 1: mastering by Sarah Bruger. Our show art was designed by
Speaker 1: Sean Karney. Original scoring and our theme was composed by
Speaker 1: Luis Gera Special thanks to Karen Shakergie Mia Loobelle, Greta
Speaker 1: Khne and Jacob Weisberg. I'm Jake Halper