Speaker 1: This episode on Britney Phillips. We need to start over
Speaker 1: completely on this case. In my opinion, we need fresh eyes,
Speaker 1: fresh ears, even fresh legs on this thing. We need
Speaker 1: to go back to the community. Law enforcement needs time
Speaker 1: to re examine, reinterview, reinvestigate, and I believe resubmit evidence.
Speaker 1: I have now dropped to both my son and daughter
Speaker 1: off at college. Moving them into their first apartment was
Speaker 1: like a success and a heartbreak at the exact same time.
Speaker 1: I was so happy for them, but at the same
Speaker 1: time I was gonna miss them something terrible. Anything that
Speaker 1: could make that experience easier, I just lunge toward it.
Speaker 1: And one of the things that I found comfort in
Speaker 1: is they were both living with friends since they had
Speaker 1: known from elementary school or middle school that came from
Speaker 1: wonderful families, and this helped ease my mind. So in
Speaker 1: our case today, when the mom leaves her daughter in
Speaker 1: her first apartment, knowing the apartment is right across the
Speaker 1: street from her old high school, there has to be
Speaker 1: comfort in that her old school resource officers right there,
Speaker 1: just yards away from her front door, old teachers and
Speaker 1: administrators that knew her and cared about her. Old coaches
Speaker 1: that would have helped her in a heartbeat if anything
Speaker 1: were to happen. You're talking about roughly fifty adults that
Speaker 1: could have helped her child any minute, from about seven
Speaker 1: in the morning till dinner time when practices were over.
Speaker 1: She had access to those people to help her. I'm
Speaker 1: Cheryl McCollum, and this his own seven. I started my
Speaker 1: career in the trenches, and honey, I've stayed there for
Speaker 1: the past forty years. I've worked every facet of the
Speaker 1: criminal justice system, police, courts and corrections. I've worked with
Speaker 1: law enforcement, victims of crime, and criminals to solve complex cases,
Speaker 1: and I have genuinely befriended most of them. I've had
Speaker 1: the opportunity to work on hundreds of some of the
Speaker 1: most intriguing cold cases you've heard of, and thousands that
Speaker 1: you haven't. I'm not a first responder, I'm a last responder.
Speaker 1: Today we are talking about the murder of beautiful Brittney Phillips.
Speaker 1: She was killed in her off campus apartment and there
Speaker 1: was no forced entry. So let's start where it ended.
Speaker 1: This case takes us to Tulsa, Oklahoma. Tultsa sits on
Speaker 1: the Arkansas River. Second largest city in Oklahoma. It is
Speaker 1: part of the Mother Road Honey Root, SI. Population is
Speaker 1: just over four hundred thousand people. It's the home of
Speaker 1: Garth Brooks, Alfrey Woodard, Paul Harvey, and others. But on September,
Speaker 1: just after nine pm, the worst happened. Brittney Phillips in
Speaker 1: her own apartment. Again no forced entry. A killer finds her,
Speaker 1: sexually assaults her and leaves her on the floor of
Speaker 1: her bedroom. Now did he knock on the door and
Speaker 1: Brett let him in? Was this somebody she knew? Was
Speaker 1: this a stranger or was he already inside the apartment?
Speaker 1: Because there's one fact about this apartment that is the
Speaker 1: stuff of horror movies. In her closet, there was a
Speaker 1: little doorway, a doorway she didn't even notice, didn't know
Speaker 1: anything about her mom never even noticed it. But that
Speaker 1: little doorway connected Britt's apartment with other apartments, so somebody
Speaker 1: in another area of that building could have accessed her apartment.
Speaker 1: Friends were concerned when she didn't show back up for
Speaker 1: school for work. She never missed work, she never miss class.
Speaker 1: She was an honor student, she was brilliant. Police did
Speaker 1: a welfare check and that's when the horrible discovery was made.
Speaker 1: Brett had no boyfriend, she had no known stalker, There
Speaker 1: was no drug use, There was no police issues. This
Speaker 1: was a good kid, a devoted student, a good friend.
Speaker 1: Family and friends had no idea who would want to
Speaker 1: harm her. Police did find DNA at the same but
Speaker 1: there were no matches in Codis. Law enforcement believes it
Speaker 1: might be somebody that she knew, and that person might
Speaker 1: have been aware that she lived alone. Just because she
Speaker 1: didn't know she had a talker doesn't mean she didn't
Speaker 1: have one. Brittany had no known enemies. Police had again,
Speaker 1: never been to the house for any reason. No drugs,
Speaker 1: no alcohol, no abusive behavior, nothing, nothing that gave them
Speaker 1: cause to suspect anyone of hurting her. This case has
Speaker 1: been cold for eighteen years. Brittany was eighteen years old.
Speaker 1: This case has been as cold as she was alive.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about her circle. She had good friends, she
Speaker 1: had classmates, a lot of them. She had people that
Speaker 1: she knew in the apartment, even a handyman. Neighbors, past
Speaker 1: high school connections. Again, all of her teachers and coaches
Speaker 1: are right across the street. In there were the known
Speaker 1: sex offenders in the area, and then they looked for
Speaker 1: similar transaction. The sheriff, Rigaldo said, at one point and
Speaker 1: he had two hundred and seventies six potential suspects. Let
Speaker 1: that marinate a minute. Two hundred and seventies six suspects
Speaker 1: in a area of town known to have no problems,
Speaker 1: no violent crimes, no police issues. Everybody that so far
Speaker 1: submitted their DNA didn't match anything in Codis. Nobody popped up. Now,
Speaker 1: there was one person. They found his DNA in her
Speaker 1: bedroom and in the kitchen, but he explained it away.
Speaker 1: He explained why his DNA would be in there. And
Speaker 1: I'm gonna get right to our guest. Y'all. This woman
Speaker 1: is a road warrior, there is no two ways about it.
Speaker 1: She's Brittany's mama, she's got a PhD. She's a hard worker,
Speaker 1: she's a good friend. But when I tell you, she
Speaker 1: is tireless and fearless. She did something that is so
Speaker 1: remarkable and just cool that when you hear what she's
Speaker 1: done to try to find the killer of her child,
Speaker 1: I think it's gonna just make you fall in love
Speaker 1: with her. So I'm gonna welcome Dr Maggie Zingman and
Speaker 1: doctor welcome to Zone s Heaven. Thank you, Cheryl. It's
Speaker 1: always great and it's always invigorating talking to you. Well,
Speaker 1: let's get right to it. Worse happens. You get a
Speaker 1: knock at the door. I get a knock at the door,
Speaker 1: and I'm fifty miles away from Tulsa in Chandler, Oklahoma, Alma.
Speaker 1: And the knock on the door that I get, which
Speaker 1: was after my son was notified, was a young sheriff
Speaker 1: who just has a little piece of paper and he
Speaker 1: asked me, are you Maggie Zingman And I said yes,
Speaker 1: And you hanced me this piece of paper and goes,
Speaker 1: you need to call detective felt In your daughter has
Speaker 1: been murdered, and then he leaves. I mean, that was
Speaker 1: my notification. You know. I found out later my son
Speaker 1: had been notified because they thought I was still in
Speaker 1: Tulsa with a chaplain with two detectives. You know, he
Speaker 1: was notified in the right way, but mine. It was
Speaker 1: shocking anyways to hear my daughter was murdered, but to
Speaker 1: be told in that way was even more unbelievable. It's
Speaker 1: gut wrenching. And you had tried to call her a
Speaker 1: couple of days before. Well, I actually talked her Monday night.
Speaker 1: She was at school and she was having problems with
Speaker 1: her sinuses and trying to get into doctors and she
Speaker 1: couldn't and she would always get really upset when things
Speaker 1: wouldn't go her way. And so I told her i'd
Speaker 1: meet with her on the weekend like when you usually do,
Speaker 1: and find her a doctor to go see. And then
Speaker 1: I called her. That was Monday night, and then Tuesday
Speaker 1: night I called her. Wednesday night, I called her, and
Speaker 1: I knew she was in classes late those nights, so
Speaker 1: I thought nothing of it. But Thursday night I called
Speaker 1: her and left that typical mom message, Brittany, I know
Speaker 1: you're okay, but please please just call me. I know
Speaker 1: you're fine. And that was probably a like ten at night,
Speaker 1: and at one am the next morning, which was October one,
Speaker 1: that's when I received that knock on the door. We
Speaker 1: all know that desperate need just let me know you're okay.
Speaker 1: I think every mom whose child has been away from
Speaker 1: them for ten minutes, if their next door playing with neighbors,
Speaker 1: just let me know you're okay. You know that's instinctual.
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't help that, you can't. And then
Speaker 1: every time that you do that call, you get a
Speaker 1: call back. You know, you are used to getting those
Speaker 1: calls back. You don't expect that knock on the door. Oh,
Speaker 1: and there's no way to prepare for that. So a
Speaker 1: lot of times, you know, people will say, oh, you
Speaker 1: know the worst thing, What in the world would I do? Like,
Speaker 1: what would you do if this happened? Well, I know
Speaker 1: what you did, and it is unbelievable. So you go
Speaker 1: to Parabon and you get a composite made of the
Speaker 1: suspect from the DNA the police have. So with phenotyping,
Speaker 1: you basically have his picture. All right, y'all, Parabond, I'm
Speaker 1: going to explain my way. I am a crime scene investigator.
Speaker 1: I'm not a scientist. I collect evidence to sin to
Speaker 1: scientists to tell me what we can get from it.
Speaker 1: But the Parabond nano labs they do something so extraordinary.
Speaker 1: They take this nano pharmaceutical and develop DNA from phenotypes.
Speaker 1: And what that basically means is inside your DNA are
Speaker 1: all these little phenotype and things running all around, and
Speaker 1: they inside tell everything about you. Your hair color, your
Speaker 1: eye color, whether or not you have freckles, anything about
Speaker 1: you physically is in phenotypes. Inside your body, and that
Speaker 1: Parabond takes and develops a composite of what the person
Speaker 1: looks like that left behind this DNA sample. So Parabon
Speaker 1: literally puts together a composite of what the suspect looks
Speaker 1: like based on the DNA left behind. You know, he's
Speaker 1: a white guy with blue eyes and blonde hair and
Speaker 1: a little bit of freckles. And what do you do
Speaker 1: with that composite? Well, you know, it's interesting, But I
Speaker 1: just want to step back for one second, real quickly
Speaker 1: and say that composite was done that year fifteen after
Speaker 1: like you said earlier, hundreds and hundreds there was Jeff Felt,
Speaker 1: and then there was Vic and then there was Eddie Majors.
Speaker 1: But we had ruled out almost a thousand suspects and finally,
Speaker 1: through me pushing for funding and getting some funding for
Speaker 1: it to be sent to Parabond, that's where we finally,
Speaker 1: in your sixteen and seventeen got the phenotype sketch. And
Speaker 1: I had already wrapped three different cars that I travel
Speaker 1: across the country, and and so this time I took
Speaker 1: his picture and I put it on my hood of
Speaker 1: my car. I didn't want it on the side because
Speaker 1: I didn't want to look at his face, but I
Speaker 1: wanted other people to look at his face. So it
Speaker 1: was on the hood of my car. When I went
Speaker 1: to hotels, people would be on balconies, people would come
Speaker 1: up to the car, and so that also got us
Speaker 1: a lot of tips. Okay, I just want to be
Speaker 1: sure people understand what you just said, y'all. She took
Speaker 1: that composite of the person she believed killed her daughter
Speaker 1: and slapped it on the hood of the car and drove.
Speaker 1: Drove to the grocery store, drove to the bank, drove
Speaker 1: wherever she needed to go during the day. But then
Speaker 1: she put together a road trip where she went across
Speaker 1: the United States and back. She logged over three hundred
Speaker 1: thousand miles. Now I was lucky enough to sit shotgun
Speaker 1: while she came through Georgia. When I tell you the
Speaker 1: attention she got from this car, the people that would
Speaker 1: at a stop like give a thumbs up or take
Speaker 1: a picture of the car. When we would stop to
Speaker 1: talk to people, they would come up. They would want
Speaker 1: to hear the whole story. And what struck me again
Speaker 1: as a mama myself, you were champion for your child.
Speaker 1: One person at a time you would stop and talk
Speaker 1: to one person for thirty minutes. I saw you do it.
Speaker 1: You came to my police department and talked to everybody
Speaker 1: in c I d you and I even went to
Speaker 1: some private homes and talk to people so that you
Speaker 1: could get the word out. And then you would leave
Speaker 1: the next day and go to another state. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was a remarkable thing to see that sort of drive.
Speaker 1: That's sort of just I'm gonna, you know, take this
Speaker 1: on the road because I don't know where he's at,
Speaker 1: but whether he's on a highway or a back road
Speaker 1: or a dirt road, that's where I'm going. Really. In
Speaker 1: two thousand seven, when I started, it was only for
Speaker 1: our story and stuff, But by about two thousand and fifteen,
Speaker 1: because I had met so many other homicide families and
Speaker 1: most aren't as crazy as me. You know, they're not
Speaker 1: driving three hundred thousand miles alone by themselves. And so
Speaker 1: I really started focusing on every city where I was
Speaker 1: doing a story, asking homicide survivor families to connect with
Speaker 1: me because so many, I mean, I've met thousands who
Speaker 1: don't have a voice, and that's a problem. Sometimes it
Speaker 1: seems like the cold cases get the least coverage because
Speaker 1: the missing and unidentified. You know, these are still stories
Speaker 1: that could be solved either way, so you know there
Speaker 1: is a sort of urgent need to solve them. But
Speaker 1: these are urgent too because our killers, if they're not dead,
Speaker 1: they're killing and raping. Still absolutely all right, So you're
Speaker 1: hitting the road, you're meeting people. How does this help
Speaker 1: bolster your case? Like, what does your local law enforcement
Speaker 1: think about your caravan injuice? Well, it depends which ones
Speaker 1: you're talking about. Um. For the first ten years of
Speaker 1: my case, Jeff felt In, my detective was so unbelievable.
Speaker 1: He was my champion. He would allow me into getting
Speaker 1: some information on where they were because he would tell me.
Speaker 1: And I always try to talk with criminal justice people
Speaker 1: and I say, tell people what you can and tell
Speaker 1: them why you can't, you know, And he would say, well,
Speaker 1: I can't share this with you, or I'm going to
Speaker 1: share it with you, but if it is shared with media,
Speaker 1: you know, it could hurt our stoice. I really learned
Speaker 1: a lot about criminal justice through that, and so he
Speaker 1: and Mike Cupp, who was head of homicide, they were
Speaker 1: my champions. Every new car because I'm on my fourth
Speaker 1: car now that's been wrapped, every car that I got wrapped,
Speaker 1: my cuffed, the head of homicide would be there. And
Speaker 1: Mike used to say, if we solve this case, Maggie,
Speaker 1: it's going to be because of you, because you're out there.
Speaker 1: That changed with the third detective, Vic Regulatto, was only
Speaker 1: my detective for one year. I didn't know he was
Speaker 1: going to become head sheriff, which now he's there, you know,
Speaker 1: helping out as much as he can. But after that,
Speaker 1: there was blockage to use in cold case groups. There
Speaker 1: was a lack of information shared, and even though he's retired,
Speaker 1: that is pretty much. I really feel TPDE even though
Speaker 1: I've done nothing to break their trust, They've become very
Speaker 1: untrusting and they also don't have the resources. Every city
Speaker 1: that I've gone to has has formed, like you, all
Speaker 1: cold case groups. You know, they don't just put one
Speaker 1: person into the second major city of Oklahoma over cold cases.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's ridiculous. And the thing is, if they
Speaker 1: would reach out, there are resources out there that would
Speaker 1: be willingly given to them at no cost. In the
Speaker 1: decades since Brittany's murder, technology has advanced just ridiculously, So
Speaker 1: you think if we could go back in time and
Speaker 1: it her crime scene have what we have today. We
Speaker 1: would have had access to Francine Bardola, the Bardol method
Speaker 1: in that and Jared Bradley working it. We would have
Speaker 1: had CC more immediately helping with the ancestry connections. We
Speaker 1: would have had folks like Dr David Middleman, an authorom
Speaker 1: that almost in real time can tell you who the
Speaker 1: DNA belongs to. We wouldn't have wasted years in decades
Speaker 1: testing and experts and flying people, you know, back and forth.
Speaker 1: It wouldn't cast him a dime if they would just
Speaker 1: reach out to these people that are more than willing
Speaker 1: to help out, and they're saying that they are, but
Speaker 1: so far uh from what people are telling me. I
Speaker 1: don't know this maybe is my assumption, but dragging their
Speaker 1: feet on allowing it. So you know, we're meeting more
Speaker 1: and more because like you said, eighteen years alive, eighteen
Speaker 1: years of cold case, this anniversary on October four, because
Speaker 1: we buried her on her nineteenth birthday. It just broke
Speaker 1: my heart because every story I did, I was saying
Speaker 1: she was alive eighteen years, we buried her on our
Speaker 1: nineteenth birthday. And now it's been a cold case for
Speaker 1: eighteen years, although the first ten years they never really
Speaker 1: called it cold because Jeff kept turning over every single suspect.
Speaker 1: And I also wanted to just add something here. When
Speaker 1: we discovered that DNA belonged to, you know, someone who
Speaker 1: they said wasn't her killer. That was after using it
Speaker 1: until two thousand nineteen to compare against suspects, every single
Speaker 1: suspects that profile was used to, you know, say most
Speaker 1: likely this isn't our killer because their DNA isn't matching.
Speaker 1: So what I fought with since two thousand nineteen is
Speaker 1: getting tell us the police to go back over a
Speaker 1: lot of those suspects. We had some great, very bizarre
Speaker 1: ones that you know, Jeff would go, I'm so surprised,
Speaker 1: as DNA doesn't match. Yeah, so you drive around with
Speaker 1: this guy's picture on your car, We all take pictures
Speaker 1: of your hood, we all share it, and then they
Speaker 1: call you and they say it's not him. After all
Speaker 1: those miles and all those years, it's not him. I
Speaker 1: got the call. I was on I think my twenty
Speaker 1: caravan and I was in Yacoma, Washington, and I got
Speaker 1: the call and when and I knew that they possibly
Speaker 1: had a hit, but I didn't know exactly. And when
Speaker 1: I got a call from him and it said from
Speaker 1: Detective Majors and he said, we got a direct hit
Speaker 1: and he's not our killer. I felt almost the same
Speaker 1: exact way that I did when I got that notice
Speaker 1: that she had been murdered. You know, it was like,
Speaker 1: oh my god, that means we're back to ground zero.
Speaker 1: How can I And one of the things I said
Speaker 1: to him, and I said to everybody else during that
Speaker 1: whole month long of torture, while we were explaining to
Speaker 1: people what happened, I said, I can't. I'm not going
Speaker 1: to live in another nineteen years. I don't think I'll
Speaker 1: be alive to solve this. And that's how I felt.
Speaker 1: And I was told that there was a good alibi,
Speaker 1: air tight. So Mr X left seminal DNA in Brittany's
Speaker 1: bedroom and blood evidence in the kitchen, and he explained that, hey,
Speaker 1: sometimes my girlfriend and I would use Brittany's department for
Speaker 1: a little tryst, and you know, possibly I got hurt
Speaker 1: once whatever, and that was it. They accepted it had
Speaker 1: moved on. When you and I talked, one of the
Speaker 1: things that we agreed on is if that is true,
Speaker 1: then there should be vaginal fluid from another female, not Brittany,
Speaker 1: on that same piece of evidence. And if that's not
Speaker 1: the case, then we have an issue that needs to
Speaker 1: be cleared up. And each meeting that I've had, a
Speaker 1: meeting I had in February and one later, um I
Speaker 1: was told they were going to analyze it. Of course,
Speaker 1: since they don't share anything with me, I don't know
Speaker 1: if they had, but I know both you and you're
Speaker 1: a code case group, and I know Sheriff Regulatto and
Speaker 1: his code case group, which also includes FBI agents. I mean,
Speaker 1: it includes a lot of retired experts. I know. Those
Speaker 1: are the questions you asked and the feeling I get
Speaker 1: when I asked these questions, and it's like, you can't
Speaker 1: see this, but a little pat on the shoulder. You're
Speaker 1: just a homicide mother. It's okay. You don't understand this stuff.
Speaker 1: I'm sorry. Maybe some don't, but I've been educated by
Speaker 1: some of the best, like you, like Jeff, like vic
Speaker 1: so I do understand that. Along with that, you know,
Speaker 1: there's stuff that in two thousand four, we didn't have
Speaker 1: the ability to analyze DNA the way we do now. Absolutely.
Speaker 1: We have such gift nowadays with Francine Bardole and Jared
Speaker 1: Bradley and orthrom Are you kidding me? It's a whole
Speaker 1: different world today. There's touch DNA, there's the m VAC,
Speaker 1: you know. And I had a meeting and I asked him,
Speaker 1: are you using these things you know and stuff? And
Speaker 1: I was totally were. But again, everywhere I travel, and
Speaker 1: that's three hundred thousand miles, and that's probably three hundred
Speaker 1: cities and probably at least two hundred police departments I've
Speaker 1: talked to, every single one of them says hell, yeah,
Speaker 1: we have asked this cold case group to come in,
Speaker 1: or yeah, hey we got funding to develop our own
Speaker 1: nonprofit cold case group from all the experts. And when
Speaker 1: I first was asking at Majors about this, way back
Speaker 1: in the early years of him doing this, every time
Speaker 1: I asked him until the year he retired, I kept saying,
Speaker 1: he goes, well, you know, we have such great detectives here.
Speaker 1: I said, it's not about great detectives or anything. It's
Speaker 1: on old cases having a fresh set advice. You know what,
Speaker 1: They might prove that you've done everything that is possible,
Speaker 1: or they might be able to see some corners that
Speaker 1: you couldn't see around. It's about wanting help to solve
Speaker 1: these cases. And on the front line, I'm always told,
Speaker 1: you know, we're dedicated, you know, and you shouldn't feel
Speaker 1: this way, you know how Almost some meetings I've had
Speaker 1: it's like, how dare you feel like we're not working
Speaker 1: the case? How dare you ask for a cold case investigators?
Speaker 1: It's ridiculous. I'm tired, you know, and you know me. Uh.
Speaker 1: In earlier interviews, I've I've been good, you know with Jeff,
Speaker 1: I applauded tp D. You know I had no reason
Speaker 1: to complain. Um, but this is ridiculous. Well, here's the
Speaker 1: bottom line. I believe they're dedicated, I know they're good,
Speaker 1: but that doesn't mean you don't need some help exactly.
Speaker 1: I mean I was a dedicated, good parent, but honey,
Speaker 1: I needed help a lot. And that doesn't do and
Speaker 1: that that's not a negative thing. I mean, I've got
Speaker 1: four sisters that absolutely helped raise my children. There's nothing
Speaker 1: negative with that. If anything, it made my children more
Speaker 1: incredible people, period. Bottom line. So ask for help, and
Speaker 1: even if you don't ask it, if it's offered, freaking
Speaker 1: take it. It's important to get that, you know, fresh
Speaker 1: set of eyes, and to learn about these new people
Speaker 1: and these new tools that maybe you don't know. And
Speaker 1: people ask me all the time, hey, do you know
Speaker 1: so and so that's a medical examine or do you
Speaker 1: know so and so a homicide detective? Just because I've
Speaker 1: never heard of them, don't And that doesn't mean they're
Speaker 1: not faculous. It just means I haven't heard of them yet.
Speaker 1: But tell me about them now. I know. Now they
Speaker 1: can go in my Rolo dex. Happy day. It's all good,
Speaker 1: all right, Let's walk through the crime step by step.
Speaker 1: Like I said, I called her at nine nine pm
Speaker 1: was probably when I talked to her on the so
Speaker 1: what they told me and I met Jeff the next morning.
Speaker 1: I drove down there by myself, and you know, her
Speaker 1: body had already been taken away. They identified it by
Speaker 1: the license, which upset me. But Jeff was there relatively soon,
Speaker 1: and what he initially told me was that some time
Speaker 1: between nine pm and eight am, which would have been
Speaker 1: the Tuesday morning, that she was raped and suffocated, and
Speaker 1: that she probably died immediately. That they didn't find any
Speaker 1: literature marks on her. But I remember them telling me
Speaker 1: that possibly there was some very faint thumb prints. And
Speaker 1: the fact was that she was dead for three days.
Speaker 1: That friend who you know, had them do a wellness check.
Speaker 1: That was after she didn't show up at school on Wednesday. Thursday,
Speaker 1: she came there and that's when she called the Tulsa Police.
Speaker 1: So I don't know a lot about dead buddies, but
Speaker 1: you know, because of the swelling, because of all that,
Speaker 1: and then she was also found beside her bed on
Speaker 1: the floor. Normally her pillow would be up near the
Speaker 1: wall and so she would be lying with her head
Speaker 1: near the wall. She was beside the bed on the
Speaker 1: side with her head in the opposite direction, on her back,
Speaker 1: And I remember the detective telling me it seemed like
Speaker 1: possibly somebody had placed her clothes back on her made
Speaker 1: it look like she had just fallen out of bed,
Speaker 1: and she had her t shirt and underwear on. And
Speaker 1: so they also when I came there, because they had
Speaker 1: already done the crime scene investigation, there is a love
Speaker 1: that spray or whatever on the walls. They really do
Speaker 1: feel she put up a fight, which breaks my heart.
Speaker 1: But they also said that she died they think from
Speaker 1: something collapsing in her neck. That happens with some wrestlers
Speaker 1: that pressures put on the neck. So that's what I
Speaker 1: was told then, you know, And that's also you mentioned
Speaker 1: this earlier. That's when Jeff, who was I still think
Speaker 1: he is six ft three six ft four, went into
Speaker 1: the closet and he said, are you aware of this?
Speaker 1: And he pointed up to the ceiling and there was
Speaker 1: maybe a three foot square piece of wood up in
Speaker 1: the ceiling which was access to the attic, and he
Speaker 1: moved and showed that he could pull himself up. And
Speaker 1: he was a pretty big guy, you know, not just tall,
Speaker 1: but also not he may she eat it or anything,
Speaker 1: and he could have pulled it. So, yes, all four
Speaker 1: of the upstairs apartments had attic access two and so
Speaker 1: they all joined kind in the middle, like if you
Speaker 1: think of the middle of the wheel, you can go
Speaker 1: to either of the apartments from that center. That's the
Speaker 1: thing of a horror movie, it is. It is just
Speaker 1: the idea, whether it's a handyman, whether it's a neighbor,
Speaker 1: whether it's somebody that used to work there or used
Speaker 1: to live there, laying cable, laying telephone bugga, you know,
Speaker 1: And were they up there observing her before that. I mean,
Speaker 1: I know they searched up there. I don't think they
Speaker 1: found anything, but you know, you just if it was
Speaker 1: a stalker, how long was he up there? You know?
Speaker 1: And there's another thing too, is that gosh, I think
Speaker 1: before she went away because she went down to Texas
Speaker 1: to visit a friend. And that's a whole another thing
Speaker 1: about the case. But she went down to visit a
Speaker 1: friend in Texas and then she was killed about less
Speaker 1: than a month when she got back, because that was
Speaker 1: in August. Before that, she had said that she came
Speaker 1: home and she found urine in the toilet and she
Speaker 1: didn't remember doing that, and there was no toilet paper. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but again I didn't think anything really about it. Tell
Speaker 1: me how many interviews you think you've done with media, Well,
Speaker 1: tell us a media. Channel six, especially Laurie Fulbright, Channel
Speaker 1: two and Channel six and Fox twenty three have followed
Speaker 1: me religiously, even though I've retired a number of reporters.
Speaker 1: But between them and all my travels, at least three
Speaker 1: hundred on the road and probably another hundred um here.
Speaker 1: I'm very lucky that Tulsa still follows us and everything,
Speaker 1: and sometimes especially with Channel six we've shared information that
Speaker 1: tp D did not share. And one of the major
Speaker 1: things is, and this is still causing problems, is when
Speaker 1: I got back to Tulsa after I was informed about
Speaker 1: the DNA not matching. The reason we knew it didn't
Speaker 1: match was because C. C. Moore analyzed it and found
Speaker 1: a direct hit to the owner. That's the same DNA
Speaker 1: that the picture was made from. When Tulsa Police announced it,
Speaker 1: they announced it as DNA was used to create a
Speaker 1: picture and a tip came in from the picture and
Speaker 1: that individual was ruled out. So tell me what's the difference.
Speaker 1: I mean, I know, you know, what's the difference between
Speaker 1: saying a tip came in and we ruled out this
Speaker 1: individual versus we had a direct hit to the DNA
Speaker 1: We identified the owner of that DNA, that blood sample,
Speaker 1: that semen, that DNA which said he was Caucasian, which
Speaker 1: said he looked like this that DNA. If we're saying
Speaker 1: it's not our killer, it's no longer viable. So a
Speaker 1: lot of people were still thinking he was you know,
Speaker 1: and he may well be, but it started still restricting
Speaker 1: our pool of tips because they were still thinking he's Caucasian,
Speaker 1: he's mid twenties. They weren't thinking that he could be Asian, African, American, Polynesian, whatever,
Speaker 1: you know. And so I, with Laurie Philby, broke the
Speaker 1: news that you know, it was the DNA because it's
Speaker 1: so important. And I still get people whose go, oh,
Speaker 1: so a tip came in and it wasn't the killer.
Speaker 1: It's so different. I mean, you know that I was
Speaker 1: utterly god smacked by the whole thing. I mean, I
Speaker 1: was so knocked out. I mean I talked to you
Speaker 1: that day and I'm like, Maggie, how in the world.
Speaker 1: And the other thing that crossed my mind is, how
Speaker 1: does this guy watch you drive a hundred thousand miles,
Speaker 1: two hundred thousand miles, three hundred thousand miles a year
Speaker 1: after year after year and he don't say, Hey, the
Speaker 1: hood of your car looks like me. But I didn't
Speaker 1: do it. I've already got an alibi. Hey, don't say
Speaker 1: a word. Hey, let you drive all over creation never
Speaker 1: says a word. Yeah, I go both ways. Part of
Speaker 1: me says, you know, back in two thousand four, I
Speaker 1: didn't understand DNA, and what I was told by some
Speaker 1: people back then who were aware of it, him and
Speaker 1: her back then said they all thought that the DNA
Speaker 1: was found inside of Britty and it wasn't. And so
Speaker 1: I understand that a little bit. But the fact is
Speaker 1: is we just need to have everything really looked at again.
Speaker 1: We need to be understanding that the possible killer could
Speaker 1: be of any culture of anywhere. Now let's talk about
Speaker 1: the suspects in this case. They looked at friends, neighbors,
Speaker 1: local criminal, still nobody, They still have no clue. And
Speaker 1: all these people they looked at, they compared that DNA
Speaker 1: profile and I go fault them. In those early years,
Speaker 1: blood and seamen from the same person, even a non detective,
Speaker 1: I would think that's the killer. So I don't fault that.
Speaker 1: And in those first ten years, that's where the thousands
Speaker 1: of suspects came. So law enforcement got the DNA and
Speaker 1: they connected it to a young man that had access
Speaker 1: to Britney's apartment that sometimes would use her apartment and
Speaker 1: her bedroom supposedly to have a sexual tryst with his girlfriend.
Speaker 1: This explained why his DNA would be on her sheets
Speaker 1: or bedspread. I feel very differently about that. Re submit
Speaker 1: evidence start over look harder, because not only did this
Speaker 1: young man have eminal fluid present. He had blood evidence
Speaker 1: present in the sink. I would start over. Nobody's off
Speaker 1: the table if we don't have a suspect. There were
Speaker 1: relatives of people who lived in the apartment that we
Speaker 1: found out had some sexual crimes, which if we find
Speaker 1: out that's one of the individuals, that apartment complex is
Speaker 1: going to find a very large lawsuit because they've let
Speaker 1: a lot of people be at risk there. They never
Speaker 1: told people that Britty was murdered there, and I would
Speaker 1: tell families and people moving in. We had some suspects
Speaker 1: that we're pretending to be part of the investigation that
Speaker 1: we ruled out through the d NA. We had some
Speaker 1: people who were violent, you know. We had some old
Speaker 1: boyfriends that Britty had some issues with, all ruled out
Speaker 1: through the d NA. The thing is, if this young
Speaker 1: man is truly not our killer, we need to be
Speaker 1: looking at every single one of those suspects again. And
Speaker 1: when I say that to the current detective and the
Speaker 1: one before Eddie, I'm told, well, you know, all the
Speaker 1: other DNA was up in codis and now I think
Speaker 1: that they were interviewed, they've already been ruled out. The
Speaker 1: DNA we used is constantly not the killer. Yeah, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's just crazy. There's even an individual. You know, my daughter.
Speaker 1: What I found out, god like eight years after her
Speaker 1: murder is that part of the reason I didn't know this,
Speaker 1: she went down to Texas. It's a big beach down
Speaker 1: in southern Texas. Now it's glo Galveston. I can hear
Speaker 1: it in the back of my head. Anyway, she went
Speaker 1: down to Southern Texas. A friend of hers that she
Speaker 1: went to school with, it I knew very well was
Speaker 1: living down there. What I didn't know is that her
Speaker 1: friend had been assaulted and she and one her classmate
Speaker 1: actually who I think was the one who did the
Speaker 1: wellness check on her, went down there to support the friend.
Speaker 1: And about years after the murder, her friend called me
Speaker 1: and said, do you know why Brittany came down here?
Speaker 1: And that it had been a boyfriend of the friends
Speaker 1: that has assaulted her and raped her. And so you know,
Speaker 1: I gave the police his name. I don't remember it
Speaker 1: anymore because we didn't know if because Brittie was down
Speaker 1: there helping her and telling him to stay away, he
Speaker 1: could have followed her back. You know, these are all
Speaker 1: these really good suspects that were ruled out with the
Speaker 1: d n A. And and again, if we're right that
Speaker 1: this young man is not her killer, all these suspects
Speaker 1: need to be looked at. And that's why a group
Speaker 1: like yours, vic's cold case group, let them look at it,
Speaker 1: you know, let them look at these suspects again. And
Speaker 1: even Jeff sometime, I mean, he still stays in touch,
Speaker 1: and he said, you know, I wish I was a
Speaker 1: little bit more old school. I wish I hadn't fully
Speaker 1: focused on that DNA. And he he of that case.
Speaker 1: He still lives the case. He's an encyclopedia, and there's
Speaker 1: the current detectives only briefly talks to him every now
Speaker 1: and then. Well, you know my mantra, every tool on
Speaker 1: every case, every time. That's it. You don't pick and
Speaker 1: choose or we're gonna polygraph on this one and we're
Speaker 1: gonna you know, do or thro them on this one. No,
Speaker 1: every time, everything you got, full court press, period. I
Speaker 1: think everybody needs to be reinterviewed. I think the evidence
Speaker 1: needs to be retested. I think they need to go
Speaker 1: back ground zero, walk it again, do it again. Well,
Speaker 1: there's a good story even in CC more analyzing this
Speaker 1: DNA and not finding the killer. The one good point
Speaker 1: that I use about c C is that you know,
Speaker 1: when I have traveled across country, because along with trying
Speaker 1: to solve our murder, I've been an advocate for DNA
Speaker 1: at arrest, which we took me nine years to get
Speaker 1: it past here in Oklahoma. But people go, oh, well,
Speaker 1: they can just take that DNA and put it somewhere
Speaker 1: and falsely convict somebody. And so now I can go, hey,
Speaker 1: guess what our case, we had a direct hit to
Speaker 1: the DNA, and because there was no more evidence, we
Speaker 1: couldn't commit. That's a really important fact, you know, to
Speaker 1: argue tells the police Eddie Majors would not let media
Speaker 1: talk to cecmore because they were contracted and with parabun
Speaker 1: she couldn't you know, And that was we were going
Speaker 1: to even do the story nationally, but they wouldn't allow it.
Speaker 1: Why don't you tell everybody about what happened to you
Speaker 1: between Montana and Wyoming? Talk about off the beaten path. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, Cheryl, along with many other people, admire greatly
Speaker 1: what I do, but they also think them a little
Speaker 1: bit crazy. Yeah, because since two thousand seven, I've traveled
Speaker 1: three hundred thousand miles through forty eight states, all self funded,
Speaker 1: and it's been about twenty two tours for the first
Speaker 1: ten years. Even though I know there was GPS, I
Speaker 1: didn't use GPS, you know, I used if people are familiar,
Speaker 1: those big foot big atlas is and so I would
Speaker 1: just find a route. Well, I was traveling, I forget
Speaker 1: what year in two thousand and twelve, between Wyoming and Montana,
Speaker 1: and back then I would drive, you know, ten hours
Speaker 1: it took me to get to city. So I started
Speaker 1: off in the day in Wyoming on this seemingly okay road.
Speaker 1: I mean, it was too late, but it seemed okay.
Speaker 1: As it got darker and darker, all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: I started seeing free rome animals. Beware. So for the
Speaker 1: next four hours, I'm driving in the dark back on
Speaker 1: some country road of Wyoming, and I'm just waiting for
Speaker 1: a buffalo or a cow or a chicken, And luckily
Speaker 1: nothing came out. But every five miles ago, beware, free
Speaker 1: roam animals or free range animals, you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, those were things that I took a big
Speaker 1: chance with. I mean I have a number of stories
Speaker 1: like that, but that one was just crazy, and so finally,
Speaker 1: after a couple of years, I started using GPS and
Speaker 1: staying on you know, because part of the thing was,
Speaker 1: especially on those back country roads. I mean, half the
Speaker 1: reason I've had four cars wrapped with pictures of her
Speaker 1: and caravan to catch a killer on the sides is
Speaker 1: so that people can see the car, because just from
Speaker 1: seeing caravan, they searched me out on a back country
Speaker 1: road in the middle of the night with free roaming animals,
Speaker 1: and nobody sees the car. That's right, though. Well, you
Speaker 1: and I have talked a lot, and I know you
Speaker 1: have said you're not stopping even if they take your
Speaker 1: driver's license. So I'm just telling you I will one
Speaker 1: day go on Facebook and see you head down the
Speaker 1: road and your motorized wheelchair, probably speeding, probably though it
Speaker 1: might take me five hours to go ten miles. Hopefully
Speaker 1: I will do this until I can't drive anymore. I'm
Speaker 1: getting older. I really want to do this more. And
Speaker 1: I you know, back in the first uh fifteen years
Speaker 1: really of doing this, um or probably first twelve, I
Speaker 1: really had no money. I would live without heat in
Speaker 1: my house, I would live without food, I would live
Speaker 1: when my water heat it broke. I didn't replace it.
Speaker 1: For years. I would borrow on my cards which were
Speaker 1: falling apart um, just so I could do at least
Speaker 1: two caravans every year, you know. I mean, I lived
Speaker 1: without a lot because I worked for the state and
Speaker 1: I didn't have a great income, And so now I
Speaker 1: really can afford to do it more so I'm trying.
Speaker 1: Although I'm a trauma psychologist, I work with veteran God
Speaker 1: bless them, today I'd like to sort of slow down
Speaker 1: a little bit and work or do it as I travel,
Speaker 1: and just get out there because I'm gonna be sixty
Speaker 1: eight next February. I can't believe I've been doing this
Speaker 1: for sixteen of the eighteen years that she's been dead. Well,
Speaker 1: I appreciate you, and I just I'm so thankful you're
Speaker 1: here to talk to us today, and I am gonna
Speaker 1: just pray that year nineteen is the year ever since
Speaker 1: I met you. You've been such a bright light in
Speaker 1: my life, and you know, you have a place in
Speaker 1: my heart, so I couldn't do it without you. My opinion,
Speaker 1: law enforcement needs to reinterview every single one of Britney's
Speaker 1: friends who had access to her apartment, who had an
Speaker 1: extra key? Did she have a spare key hidden somewhere
Speaker 1: that a few people knew about. Some of these friends
Speaker 1: are now parents themselves. Help Maggie with answers. Even if
Speaker 1: you don't think it's something significant law enforcement might. Let's
Speaker 1: help law enforcement by spreading the word to encourage witnesses
Speaker 1: to come forward. The phone number for the talks that
Speaker 1: he did, it's five nine six nine one three five.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna end Zone seven the way I always do
Speaker 1: with a quote from a friend, and this comes from
Speaker 1: Dr Christine Middleman, and she says, work on things that
Speaker 1: keep you up at night, be the change every single day.
Speaker 1: Never give up and know that one day your work
Speaker 1: will be the answer in the change in someone else's life.
Speaker 1: I'm Cheryl McCollum, and this is Zone seven.