Speaker 1: Hunting for Answers is a production of the Black Effect
Speaker 1: Podcast Network and iHeartRadio. Welcome to Hunting for Answers, a
Speaker 1: true crime podcast. I'm your host, Hunter, and today we
Speaker 1: continue our three part series into the life and murder
Speaker 1: of twenty eight year old Nina Cook, a young woman
Speaker 1: from Memphis, Tennessee, whose life was cut tragically short in
Speaker 1: October of twenty fourteen. In the first part of the series,
Speaker 1: we met Nina through the eyes of her siblings, Lydia,
Speaker 1: Kenya and Chris. They painted a portrait of a woman
Speaker 1: who was ambitious, loving, and fiercely protective of her family.
Speaker 1: But today we step into darker territory. We examined the
Speaker 1: circumstances surrounding Nina's disappearance, the last conversations, and the gruesome
Speaker 1: discovery that would forever change the lives of those who
Speaker 1: loved her. This is the story of Nina Cook. When
Speaker 1: does a beloved family member's absence transform from a passing
Speaker 1: concern into a growing fear? At what point does she's
Speaker 1: just busy become something's wrong For the family of Nina Cook.
Speaker 1: This transformation happened slowly and then all at once. Before
Speaker 1: we can understand Nina's disappearance, we need to revisit the
Speaker 1: last times those close to her saw or spoke with her.
Speaker 1: These final encounters, ordinary at the time, would later be
Speaker 1: examined for clues or warning signs, for anything that might
Speaker 1: explain what was to come.
Speaker 2: I think when you speak to.
Speaker 3: When you speak to a loved one, uh, you don't
Speaker 3: expect it to.
Speaker 4: Be the last time that you talk to them. So
Speaker 4: I don't remember the last conversation that I had with
Speaker 4: her because I didn't know that.
Speaker 2: It would be the last.
Speaker 3: I've tried to replay that and think about it in
Speaker 3: my mind, but I don't recall. What I probably remember
Speaker 3: last is uh my last visit coming down to Memphis.
Speaker 1: Although Lydia may not remember the exact conversation, she does
Speaker 1: remember her last visit with Nina.
Speaker 3: Vividly in celebration. And Nina couldn't make it, but promised
Speaker 3: me that she would see me the next day. So
Speaker 3: we met up at my uncle Bobby's house, and the
Speaker 3: first thing she did was she came in with a
Speaker 3: big smile, as she always did, and she wanted to
Speaker 3: hold my hand and sit on my lap. So our
Speaker 3: last pictures are of us cozy together on the sofa,
Speaker 3: holding hands as always, and we laughed and she hugged
Speaker 3: on my babies. I didn't want to let her go.
Speaker 1: For Chris, Nina's younger brother, his last memory of his
Speaker 1: sister comes from a casual family gathering at their grandmother's house.
Speaker 5: Yes, I do now. That had to have been springtime.
Speaker 5: And the last time that I saw, we were just
Speaker 5: all chilling at my grandmother's house. And man, you know,
Speaker 5: she was just very dressed to the nine. She had
Speaker 5: recovered pretty nicely. You know, they talk about the rod
Speaker 5: in her hip. She did have a little bit of
Speaker 5: a car accident, and she had recovered nicely, and she
Speaker 5: was getting dressed up to the nines.
Speaker 1: The surgical rod in Nina's like would later play a
Speaker 1: crucial role in identifying her remains. But it's what happened
Speaker 1: next that Chris holds most here, a moment that would
Speaker 1: become the final memory of his sister.
Speaker 5: I was in my grandmother's room, laying on my bed,
Speaker 5: laying on my grandmother's bed rather, and you know, she
Speaker 5: kind of just came in very softly touched my face,
Speaker 5: you know, and it's a you know, it's something that
Speaker 5: you know, like a man just said, you never think
Speaker 5: that this is going to be the last time you're
Speaker 5: gonna see or hear from somebody.
Speaker 3: You know.
Speaker 5: The last thing that I remember my sister saying to me,
Speaker 5: which is the first thing that I knew, and I
Speaker 5: always knew, you know, she told me that she loved me.
Speaker 5: You know, her last words to me was I love you,
Speaker 5: and you know, it's it's it's it's hard to kind
Speaker 5: of think about that as the last registered memory that
Speaker 5: you have of your one of your greatest inspirations. And
Speaker 5: that was what it was. And it was so soft
Speaker 5: and so sweet, and literally I remember her walking out
Speaker 5: to leave and going to get on her stride and
Speaker 5: conquer the world, and her little confident walk that she
Speaker 5: had with the hips swaying, and you know, that was it.
Speaker 5: That was the last time that I talked to her.
Speaker 5: She seemed very calm, very poised, and gave me that
Speaker 5: I love you.
Speaker 1: Kenya. Nina's younger sister also recalled seeing Nina at their
Speaker 1: grandmother's house shortly before her disappearance.
Speaker 6: So when I found out it was really more so
Speaker 6: my family just kind of like, oh, we haven't heard
Speaker 6: from we call her Gina In my family too. We
Speaker 6: hadn't heard from Gina in a little bit. I recall
Speaker 6: my last time seeing her was around maybe early June
Speaker 6: or so. I mean, she came by my grandmother's house
Speaker 6: and I saw her.
Speaker 1: None of Nina's loved ones remember her expressing any concerns
Speaker 1: or fears during these last interactions.
Speaker 6: No, I don't recall any fears being express No, she
Speaker 6: came around the family, She was fine, We had fun,
Speaker 6: we talked. I think around that time, I probably had
Speaker 6: just had my daughter not too long before, maybe a
Speaker 6: year or two before she was missing, So she was
Speaker 6: trying to be in my daughter's life and just making
Speaker 6: sure she stayed connected with the family. But I didn't
Speaker 6: sense any fear or any threat or you know, that
Speaker 6: she was in danger or anything like that.
Speaker 1: Family gatherings, expressions of love, staying connected to family, Everything
Speaker 1: seemed to be fine. There were no dramatic goodbyes, no warnings,
Speaker 1: and no sense that anything was wrong, which makes what
Speaker 1: happened next all the more disturbing. The exact timeline of
Speaker 1: when Nina went missing is difficult to pinpoint. There was
Speaker 1: no single moment when an alarm was raised. Instead, her
Speaker 1: absence and lack of communication drew concern that gradually grew louder.
Speaker 1: Nina was known to travel often, so it wasn't unusual
Speaker 1: for her to be out of touch for short periods
Speaker 1: of time. However, this time was different.
Speaker 6: When we didn't hear from her around her birthday, which
Speaker 6: is in September, that's when my side of the family
Speaker 6: for sure started, you know, getting a little bit more worried,
Speaker 6: like Lydia said. And I was actually not the one
Speaker 6: to submit the missing persons because I think for me
Speaker 6: as well, we were just kind of like, oh, yeah,
Speaker 6: she's out of town. It wasn't uncommon for her to
Speaker 6: go out of town and we not hear from her
Speaker 6: for a couple of weeks, or she's in the studio
Speaker 6: working on music, or she'd be in Atlanta or just wherever.
Speaker 1: Since Nina was always on the go and at the time,
Speaker 1: her family had no reason to suspect the worst.
Speaker 6: So I don't think the worst came to mind automatically.
Speaker 6: I know it didn't for me, So I did not
Speaker 6: fill out the missing person's report because I just knew
Speaker 6: that we were gonna hear from her again, and she
Speaker 6: would pop up when she's ready.
Speaker 3: She was not.
Speaker 6: She was known to kind of go do her own
Speaker 6: thing and then we hear from her when she was
Speaker 6: finished or you know, felt like talking or whatever.
Speaker 1: So, but there was one day that should have brought
Speaker 1: word from Nina, her birthday. No matter where she was
Speaker 1: or what she was doing, she would always speak to
Speaker 1: her family on or around her birthday.
Speaker 3: Of course, I called and talked to Dad about it,
Speaker 3: and Dad said the last time he had heard from
Speaker 3: her was Father's Day. He had already mailed off her
Speaker 3: birthday card and he was waiting to hear back from
Speaker 3: her because she would always call when she got her
Speaker 3: birthday card.
Speaker 1: Father's Day was in June. Nina's birthday was in September.
Speaker 1: The realization that no one had seen or heard from
Speaker 1: Nina in months finally began to sink in Lydia remembers
Speaker 1: getting the call from Kenya about how Nina seemed to
Speaker 1: be missing.
Speaker 3: Can you call me? And I remember I was helping
Speaker 3: my mom out at the hair salon, and I am
Speaker 3: always optimistic, so at the mention of her possibly being missing,
Speaker 3: I'm like, no, you know, we'll hear from her birthdays
Speaker 3: coming up. She's just traveling, you know how Nina is,
Speaker 3: we'll talk to her soon.
Speaker 1: As the days turned two weeks and September gave way
Speaker 1: to October, the silence became increasingly difficult to ignore. Eventually,
Speaker 1: a missing person report was filed and the official missing
Speaker 1: person's investigation was launched. But no one could have imagined
Speaker 1: where the investigation would lead.
Speaker 3: Let's take the necessary steps in case there is something wrong,
Speaker 3: but I could not. I couldn't allow my mind to
Speaker 3: go there. So I think I just kind of compartmentalized
Speaker 3: things and was just like, it's one of those days.
Speaker 3: You know, she's gonna call. You know, of course we'll
Speaker 3: find her. These type of things, don't you know happened
Speaker 3: to us.
Speaker 1: In October twenty fourteen, Kenya rect an unexpected visit from
Speaker 1: the police that would change everything for me.
Speaker 6: And then in the October is when I actually found
Speaker 6: out that it really was something wrong. And so on
Speaker 6: that day, it's when I got a knock at the
Speaker 6: door from the police department and they gave me the
Speaker 6: contact number for the sergeant and basically said that they
Speaker 6: had you know, they wanted me to talk to the sergeant.
Speaker 6: They felt like they had found a body, and they
Speaker 6: just kind of wanted to confirm, and so that was
Speaker 6: my first real notification that.
Speaker 1: She had passed.
Speaker 3: I believe it was October.
Speaker 2: Once. Can you call me and said that they had
Speaker 2: identified our body and that they had found her.
Speaker 7: That was really hard because it became real and something
Speaker 7: that we now have to face and deal with.
Speaker 3: And you're wondering why and how I had to share
Speaker 3: that news with my dad and for it to be
Speaker 3: solidified through dental records and the ride that she had
Speaker 3: in her leg from the accident.
Speaker 2: It wasn't.
Speaker 3: It wasn't something that I could deny.
Speaker 2: I just I just broke down. I don't know how
Speaker 2: you and how you deal with something like that.
Speaker 1: The surgical rod in Nina's leg, along with the dental records,
Speaker 1: was the final confirmation Nina Cook was gone. On October seventh,
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen, Nina Cook's remains were discovered in a vacant
Speaker 1: church building at eleven seventy five East Trigg Avenue in Memphis.
Speaker 1: The property had been foreclosed and empty since October twenty thirteen.
Speaker 1: A church caretaker made the grim discovery and called nine
Speaker 1: one one. Nina's body was found lying on the floor,
Speaker 1: covered by a soiled curtain and in an advanced state
Speaker 1: of decomposition. Her remains were largely skeletonized, with only a
Speaker 1: torn piece of red underwear still adhered to her. Scattered
Speaker 1: around her puzzle pieces, a pen, a penny, a toy shoe,
Speaker 1: and fragments of jewelry, including a hard necklace. According to
Speaker 1: Nina's autopsy report, the medical examiner documented perry mortem fractures
Speaker 1: to her facial bones, sternum, and vertebrae, concluding the cause
Speaker 1: of death was homicidal violence, though the specific means remained
Speaker 1: impossible to determine after so much time had passed by
Speaker 1: a missing person's report had only been filed two weeks earlier.
Speaker 1: Though family hadn't heard from Nina for approximately three months,
Speaker 1: the window of time between her disappearance and the time
Speaker 1: she had been discovered had its effect, leaving behind unanswered
Speaker 1: questions about her final moments. With the discovery of Nina's remains,
Speaker 1: the missing person case transformed into a homicide investigation. Memphis
Speaker 1: police began the difficult task of piecing together what happened
Speaker 1: to Nina. Cook Kenya recalls the early days of the investigation,
Speaker 1: when the quest for answers had more energy.
Speaker 6: I remember in the beginning going down to the station,
Speaker 6: to the investigations bureau and you know, talking to the sergeant,
Speaker 6: getting you know, information, giving information details, and just trying
Speaker 6: to come up with next steps.
Speaker 1: The family provided whatever information they could, trying to reconstruct
Speaker 1: Nina's final days in weeks leading up to her untiled death.
Speaker 6: So yeah, being told about possibly running DNA through the
Speaker 6: cysts them to see if there was a match, and
Speaker 6: you know, talking about the crime scene and just giving
Speaker 6: our statements and trying to recount and recall who we
Speaker 6: remember her being in communication with, you know, people that
Speaker 6: she knew, people that she went to school with, anyone
Speaker 6: that she dated, or just anything that we could come
Speaker 6: up with to try to find clues.
Speaker 1: Social media provided one potential source of information, a digital
Speaker 1: trill that might offer insight into Nina's last movements.
Speaker 6: We were looking at her social media to kind of
Speaker 6: see where she was or what she posted things like that.
Speaker 6: And like Amanda say it, this was October and so
Speaker 6: we were a few months behind, so it was a
Speaker 6: lot that we could not get access to. But in
Speaker 6: the beginning it did really feel like we were making
Speaker 6: some lead way.
Speaker 2: I think any family member.
Speaker 3: That deals with a tragic loss. They want answers, they
Speaker 3: want help, they want support from law enforcement, from media
Speaker 3: to bring justice to your family member. When things first
Speaker 3: started out, I felt like everyone was going strong, We're
Speaker 3: gonna find the answers. Uh. There was talk about DNA.
Speaker 3: I watched enough crime shows right to know that you
Speaker 3: can find, you know, answers with just the smallest shread
Speaker 3: of evidence. The hope was that people would talk, they
Speaker 3: would see her story, calls would flood in. Unfortunately, things
Speaker 3: died down really quickly.
Speaker 1: Despite the initial spark of interest in Nina's case, the
Speaker 1: investigation faced significant challenges and roadblocks.
Speaker 2: So I didn't.
Speaker 3: Understand why we couldn't get more answers, why her email
Speaker 3: couldn't be accessed, why checks in like the Green Dot
Speaker 3: card things couldn't be.
Speaker 2: Traced.
Speaker 3: I understood because I went to some of the businesses myself,
Speaker 3: and at the time a lot of them only held
Speaker 3: recordings for thirty days, maybe ninety days, and we were
Speaker 3: far behind from the time that they found her body
Speaker 3: to the time that the investigation began.
Speaker 1: The condition of Nina's remains also presented for what is
Speaker 1: it challenges for the investigation.
Speaker 3: So because of the state of her body. I did
Speaker 3: understand that and the time frame. I did understand that
Speaker 3: we were at a disadvantage, but I had so much
Speaker 3: hope that we would have more resolved than we did
Speaker 3: and just more support. I thought my phone would be
Speaker 3: ringing off the hook trying to get answers and people
Speaker 3: reaching out and wanting to share her story and also,
Speaker 3: you know, fine justice, But.
Speaker 2: It just wasn't.
Speaker 3: Everything dried up and I didn't hear back from anyone
Speaker 3: until now.
Speaker 6: Unfortunately, I don't think we got any clues or tips
Speaker 6: through like the hotline, like the Rewards hotline. We were
Speaker 6: trying to get some information, see if anybody could give
Speaker 6: some anonymous tips, but we were not successful with that.
Speaker 6: We did not have that much concrete evidence at all.
Speaker 1: As the investigation continued to unfold or lack thereof, Lydia
Speaker 1: and the rest of Nina's loved ones felt like her
Speaker 1: case wasn't being treated fairly or given the priority it deserved.
Speaker 3: And I think in the investigation, when her story didn't
Speaker 3: look picture perfect, it didn't see news worthy enough to
Speaker 3: pull on the heartstrings, it felt like her life didn't matter,
Speaker 3: and things began to be swept under the rug.
Speaker 1: Lydia's frustration grew as she encountered roadblock after roadblock in
Speaker 1: her own quest for information in the truth behind what
Speaker 1: happened to her sister.
Speaker 3: I heard a lot of there wasn't enough of this.
Speaker 3: I couldn't do that. I couldn't I wanted to get
Speaker 3: into her post office box at the University of Memphis.
Speaker 3: I wanted to get camera footage. I wanted DNA evidence.
Speaker 3: I wanted, you know, different people to be spoken to
Speaker 3: or interviewed more thoroughly.
Speaker 1: Despite the decline and resources into Nina's case, Lydia says,
Speaker 1: the lead investigator did make genuine efforts, even when other
Speaker 1: authorities began to turn their time elsewhere.
Speaker 3: And I know things probably take time. And I believe
Speaker 3: that the sergeant who was working with us put in
Speaker 3: really great efforts. He was supportive and communicative for a while,
Speaker 3: but then I think he was on the verge of retiring.
Speaker 3: And I'm sure there's processes and high crime city, all
Speaker 3: these things. Perhaps her story was one that was easily
Speaker 3: placed on the back burner.
Speaker 1: Over a decade later, the questions surrounding Nina's death remain
Speaker 1: largely unanswered. Who would want to harm her? What were
Speaker 1: the circumstances leading up to her final moments, and what
Speaker 1: happened between June and October of twenty fourteen. In Part
Speaker 1: three of this series, will examine the broader implications of
Speaker 1: Nina's case, how it fits into patterns of unsolved cases
Speaker 1: involving women of color, the challenges of Cold's case investigations,
Speaker 1: and the family's ongoing journey for justice and answers. Anyone
Speaker 1: with information regarding Nina Cook's case should contact the Memphis
Speaker 1: Police Department or Prime Shoppers. Their number can be found
Speaker 1: in the description box below. As we close out this episode,
Speaker 1: don't forget to hit the follow button to stay updated
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Speaker 1: a five star rating. Thank you so much for joining
Speaker 1: us on another episode until next time. Hunting for Answers
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