Speaker 1: Pushkin last time on Where's Dea?
Speaker 2: I think we just got called over to put all
Speaker 2: kinds of footprints everywhere and to just damage the crime
Speaker 2: scene basically.
Speaker 3: You know, in my opinion, they've always known it was
Speaker 3: a month because the video shows that. Why the video
Speaker 3: that was here at the range.
Speaker 1: One day, about three years after Dea went missing, the
Speaker 1: Riverside Sheriff's Department made a dramatic move around a police
Speaker 1: cars swarmed beneath a Vista ranch. A white and green
Speaker 1: sheriff's helicopter flew above. Local CBS news reporter David Godfredson
Speaker 1: rushed to the scene to report the unfolding events.
Speaker 4: Neighbors woke up early Sunday morning to the sound of
Speaker 4: a sheriff's helicopter flying over Dia Abrams Ranch near Idlewild.
Speaker 1: The cops demanded through a loudspeaker that Keith Harper come outside.
Speaker 1: They handed him a search warrant and on a large trailer.
Speaker 1: The cops carted in a heavy back home, presumably to dig.
Speaker 5: Did you hear what happened a couple of weeks ago. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 5: they went in a helicopter and all that, you know,
Speaker 5: which was like ray.
Speaker 1: Finally Julie Stanford is DEA's longtime Idle Wild friend. When
Speaker 1: I spoke to her in octob twenty twenty three, the
Speaker 1: cops had just searched the ranch for her. It felt
Speaker 1: like a glimmer of hope.
Speaker 5: They must think out because how could they go there
Speaker 5: in today? Did the helicopter and all the police?
Speaker 6: Hopefully they have something.
Speaker 1: This all happened three years after Dia disappeared. I couldn't
Speaker 1: help but wonder what information the cops had that made
Speaker 1: them search the ranch again. They would have had to
Speaker 1: show probable cause to get that search warrant, that a
Speaker 1: crime had likely occurred on the ranch and that evidence
Speaker 1: of the crime was going to be found there. Though
Speaker 1: when I tried to get a copy of the warrant
Speaker 1: from Riverside Superior Court, they told me there wasn't one
Speaker 1: for that date and redirected me to the one from
Speaker 1: twenty twenty. I don't know what the cops found at
Speaker 1: the ranch, if anything, because they haven't responded to my
Speaker 1: questions about it. But what I do know is Harper
Speaker 1: wasn't arrested and he continued living at Bunnita Vista. It
Speaker 1: felt like a huge anticlimax. This sudden flurry of activity,
Speaker 1: and then once again pretty much nothing as far as
Speaker 1: I could tell. Unlike the cops, Clinton, Abrams, dear Son,
Speaker 1: and Harper have been willing to share what they've discovered
Speaker 1: along the way. Clinton has interviewed people who knew Dea
Speaker 1: and followed all kinds of leads, leads that even I
Speaker 1: thought were too outlandish to pursue. As for Harper, well,
Speaker 1: he's still working with those psychics. In our season finale,
Speaker 1: where things stand today as the search for Dea continues,
Speaker 1: I'm Lucy Sheriff, and this is Where's Deer? Episode six,
Speaker 1: Spoils of War.
Speaker 7: The food is in my truck and the waters in
Speaker 7: my truck.
Speaker 3: I have a case of water on the boat, and
Speaker 3: I have a fifty five gallon cooler on the boat.
Speaker 1: You might remember Kelly Snyder from an earlier episode. He's
Speaker 1: the former Dea agent who runs Find Me, the nonprofit
Speaker 1: that searches for missing people.
Speaker 7: You didn't get the word that I brought five hundred
Speaker 7: bottles of water.
Speaker 1: Right around the time the police showed up at the ranch.
Speaker 1: Last year, Kelly, Harper and some others embarked on a
Speaker 1: search for Deer's body.
Speaker 7: Keith you ready.
Speaker 1: I was out of the country, so one of my producers, Jacob,
Speaker 1: tagged along instead. The team was going to search the
Speaker 1: same lake the cops had searched years earlier with their
Speaker 1: sonar equipment and divers, although the FINMI group was focusing
Speaker 1: on the shoreline of the reservoir rather than the murky
Speaker 1: lake bed. And actually this was Harper and Kelly's second
Speaker 1: time going to this particular part of Lake Hemmett. They'd
Speaker 1: gone three months earlier with cadaver dogs and there'd been
Speaker 1: a promising development. The dogs had shown interests.
Speaker 7: Here, and when you have three dogs showing interests in
Speaker 7: this same exact area, then that's telling you something to
Speaker 7: indicate that more than likely there's human remains in this vicinity.
Speaker 1: But it wasn't just the dog's reaction that brought them
Speaker 1: back to this spot. Like I mentioned before, Kelly's network
Speaker 1: of psychics share coordinates of where they thought deer could
Speaker 1: be buried, and this spot in Lake Hemmett was one
Speaker 1: of them, so they felt like this place had potential.
Speaker 1: On the first search, though they couldn't reach the area
Speaker 1: where the dogs showed interest.
Speaker 7: The hall is approximately thirty to forty feet deep and
Speaker 7: at a time, we didn't have the dog's harnesses to
Speaker 7: lower them into the area. This time, we brought our
Speaker 7: boat and we're going to approach the area from the lake,
Speaker 7: and then the dogs can walk easily into the hole
Speaker 7: where we believe that dea abrams remains are either buried
Speaker 7: or somewhere in that vicinity.
Speaker 1: This time around, they approached the spot from two different angles.
Speaker 1: The dogs and their handlers go by boat, Harper, Kelly
Speaker 1: and Jacob go by land, hiking towards the embankment.
Speaker 3: The next one.
Speaker 8: You see where that rod's coming down from the telephone pole.
Speaker 7: Yeah, that's what I was zeroing in on.
Speaker 1: The search team reaches the shore and the dogs do
Speaker 1: their thing. After some time, the dog handler's hike over
Speaker 1: to Harper and Kelly to give them an update. Their
Speaker 1: dog soul detected something.
Speaker 9: Full alert from soul. I got a full alert from sol.
Speaker 7: If you've got a full blown alert, then.
Speaker 3: Then that is a body.
Speaker 5: But there's.
Speaker 1: The cadaver dogs alerted to some kind of human presence.
Speaker 1: But as one of the dog handlers points out, the
Speaker 1: dog could be picking up on anything with a trace
Speaker 1: of what's referred to as human decomposition. Basically the sentences
Speaker 1: emitted by human remains.
Speaker 3: Don't you ass panties, diapers, campons.
Speaker 1: We're all over this lake without digging, there's no way
Speaker 1: to know exactly what's there, and Kelly won't dig without
Speaker 1: the cops present, and so reluctantly they have to stop there.
Speaker 1: Kelly will take note of their coordinates and send them
Speaker 1: over to the cops, hoping they'll return to the site
Speaker 1: and continue the search. Kelly and Harper are disappointed, to
Speaker 1: say the least, and somewhat surprised. They look down the
Speaker 1: embankment towards the lake at a washout of fallen trees
Speaker 1: and debris.
Speaker 7: I would have given money on this spot, though, I
Speaker 7: mean that to me, that's just perfect.
Speaker 8: But see where I would I would do it right
Speaker 8: down in here.
Speaker 7: But how do you get there?
Speaker 3: Well, there's a trail.
Speaker 7: I know there's a trail, but holy shit, you're carrying
Speaker 7: a body, Keith.
Speaker 1: Throughout this search, Kelly has been on and off the
Speaker 1: phone with one of his psychics. She's been advising them
Speaker 1: on where she thinks Dia is buried.
Speaker 7: I would tell her to.
Speaker 8: Summon Stea if she's a better one sea, if she can.
Speaker 1: See us Kelly calls his psychic one last time, just
Speaker 1: in case DIA's given her any extra guidance.
Speaker 7: Pretty much, she said, Dia didn't come to her.
Speaker 4: God damn it.
Speaker 7: Ah she asked her to. And that was what two
Speaker 7: three hours ago.
Speaker 5: Ship.
Speaker 8: I feel ten times more and better if we just
Speaker 8: do without one sch.
Speaker 1: Harper has fixated on one particular spot that the psychics
Speaker 1: pinpointed and that he previously marked with flax. He wants
Speaker 1: the dogs to search it again.
Speaker 8: I just don't want to pass up an opportunity that
Speaker 8: could well.
Speaker 7: Yeah, I understand where you're coming from, but that's not
Speaker 7: where the dog showed interest. That's the only reason I
Speaker 7: would say would discount it. That it would be not
Speaker 7: necessarily a waste of time, But.
Speaker 8: It's just if you have if you have someone a
Speaker 8: psyche telling you that it's in between certain flags and
Speaker 8: it's all in this area, would it hurt to spend
Speaker 8: another hour or two just search in the general area
Speaker 8: one more time?
Speaker 1: But Harper is vetoed, and so the search party and
Speaker 1: Jacob DeCamp back to Benita Vista Ranch to try and
Speaker 1: unpack the and have so much needed lunch.
Speaker 7: Can I get some fricken bread here pretty soon, he's
Speaker 7: working on it.
Speaker 10: Man, dude, calm down.
Speaker 1: One of the dog handlers takes out his phone and
Speaker 1: shows the group a video of the spot where the
Speaker 1: dog alerted. Harper gets agitated.
Speaker 8: Okay, that was that a location of where the body was.
Speaker 6: It was a location of something.
Speaker 2: I do.
Speaker 8: I don't need to hear this, well, need to hear
Speaker 8: more specific. Do we have a location where we believe
Speaker 8: that she is.
Speaker 9: We have a location where we believe something is that's
Speaker 9: putting active.
Speaker 1: Under a bol it's a boulder.
Speaker 9: I cannot say that that is a body and but
Speaker 9: human decom I mean, my dogs are trained to alert
Speaker 9: on a tube, a fragment of a bone, any blood tissue.
Speaker 8: So in your opinion, there's something.
Speaker 9: Something, something putting decomp off.
Speaker 1: Finally, Harper seems to give up.
Speaker 8: So my understanding is that we're going to file a report.
Speaker 8: We're not going back out right. We're done.
Speaker 9: I don't think there's much we can do in that area.
Speaker 9: I mean that we haven't already covered, unless we've got
Speaker 9: new areas to search.
Speaker 1: I debriefed with Kelly a few months after the search.
Speaker 1: He was still confident that deer is buried in that
Speaker 1: lake Hemett's spot where the dog alerted. He tells me
Speaker 1: he sent a second report to the Riverside Sheriff's Department.
Speaker 1: But as far as I know, they've not taken any action.
Speaker 11: They have not gone back to search for our dogs,
Speaker 11: who incidentally, never, never, never mist say that there's something
Speaker 11: human where they alerted two of our dogs, our best dogs,
Speaker 11: And as far as we know, they have not gone there.
Speaker 1: As I say these words, Dea is still missing. We
Speaker 1: can't even say whether she's dead or alive. It's easy
Speaker 1: to get caught up in the chaos of DEA's story,
Speaker 1: people turning on each other, wild theories that are almost
Speaker 1: too wild to believe. There is, after all, a special
Speaker 1: kind of ugliness that rears its head when money's involved.
Speaker 1: But I keep coming back to the fact that at
Speaker 1: the center of all of this is a woman who
Speaker 1: one day in twenty twenty just suddenly disappeared from her
Speaker 1: own home. One moment she was there, the next moment
Speaker 1: she was not. And that, regardless of who, or how
Speaker 1: or why, is truly heartbreaking. For now, all that remains
Speaker 1: is a group of people racing to find out the
Speaker 1: truth in their own way, racing against the clock as
Speaker 1: one very important date swiftly approaches. More on that after
Speaker 1: the break in the background of all of these searches
Speaker 1: and theories, a date is fast looming. Sixth of June
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five. That's the day the Deer will be
Speaker 1: declared dead. Her estate will be split up fifty percent
Speaker 1: to Harper, twenty five percent to Clinton, and twenty five
Speaker 1: percent cross her daughter. It's hard to imagine that the
Speaker 1: date isn't on everyone's mind like some ticking time bomb,
Speaker 1: because if any of those three are found to be
Speaker 1: involved in Deer's disappearance, they get nothing. While Harper search
Speaker 1: with dogs and psychics, Clinton focused on tactics. He pushed
Speaker 1: for some of Deer's property to be liquidated, and with
Speaker 1: those funds, the court appointed guardian who represents Deer's estate
Speaker 1: set up a tip hotline and a three hundred thousand
Speaker 1: dollars reward was established for anyone with information leading to
Speaker 1: an arrest and conviction or the discovery of Deer's whereabouts.
Speaker 1: But this wasn't just any old reward, oh No, this,
Speaker 1: as Clinton explained to me, was a trap for Harper.
Speaker 10: Well, the way I structured it was that the reward
Speaker 10: was going to be the bait and it would be
Speaker 10: made manifest that he was involved in my mother's disappearance,
Speaker 10: and he wouldn't get anything, and we'd have the case
Speaker 10: solved and we'd have him removed.
Speaker 1: Right. So was it your idea then, to because there's
Speaker 1: that really interesting caveat where if one party is found
Speaker 1: to have an involvement, everything goes to the other party.
Speaker 1: Was that your suggestion?
Speaker 11: Yeah?
Speaker 6: That was me.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, Okay.
Speaker 6: That was my little trap strategy.
Speaker 1: But it backfired. Despite his efforts, Clinton has never been
Speaker 1: able to pin anything on Harper, and now Harper is
Speaker 1: in Lyne to get fifty percent of his mother estate.
Speaker 1: It was a gamble, Clinton admits, and now he regrets it.
Speaker 1: He gambled too much.
Speaker 6: Ah, and I couldn't believe that I compromised with Yeah
Speaker 6: the devil.
Speaker 1: When that little trap didn't work, Clinton tried something else.
Speaker 1: He attempted to work with Harper directly. Harper sent me
Speaker 1: a screenshot of their conversation, and this is what Clinton
Speaker 1: texted him. Harper, you want to deal. What is the deal? Clinton?
Speaker 1: I want you to flip on all the others. I
Speaker 1: can get you off free. This can't stay secret. Forever
Speaker 1: you are getting older. I'm not after you for anything
Speaker 1: related to Dea. We can work out finances so you
Speaker 1: are happy if you have real information on what happened
Speaker 1: to Dea. I just want to know. I was definitely
Speaker 1: quite It felt like a pretty brazen move from Clinton.
Speaker 1: Why do you think he's saying that.
Speaker 3: This is what?
Speaker 1: You know?
Speaker 3: I thought originally he was asking to kind of work together.
Speaker 3: And then what I got the more I got into it,
Speaker 3: what he's asking it's for me to come forward and
Speaker 3: and kind of tell him that I'm responsible, and then
Speaker 3: he has something to.
Speaker 6: Go back to law enforcement with. You know, It's what
Speaker 6: I kind of got.
Speaker 1: Clinton insists that he was just trying to get information
Speaker 1: out of Harper. Either way, Harper does not fall for
Speaker 1: Clinton's booby trap. It all feels like a strange loop,
Speaker 1: but it's almost satisfying. These two sides who've been at
Speaker 1: war trying to pin the blame, okay, still trying to
Speaker 1: pin the blame on each other, coming together to try
Speaker 1: to work out some kind of deal. Despite all of
Speaker 1: Clinton's strategizing, nothing really seems to happen to Harper until
Speaker 1: in November twenty twenty three, the same month. As Kelly's search,
Speaker 1: Harper ends up getting into hot water all by himself.
Speaker 1: He gets himself kicked off the ranch. Harper tects a
Speaker 1: real estate agent, asking if she's interested in listing the
Speaker 1: ranch for sale. Word gets out that Harper is trying
Speaker 1: to sell DIA's ranch, even though he doesn't have the
Speaker 1: authority to do so. Five days later, a judge removes
Speaker 1: Harper as trustee of DEA's estate just like that. Later
Speaker 1: that month, eviction notices are posted outside the ranch. It
Speaker 1: seems Harper's time a Benita Vista is up. He denies
Speaker 1: trying to sell the ranch and considers fighting the decision.
Speaker 3: The purpose was determine the value? What is the value
Speaker 3: finally of the property and anyway to judge the spook
Speaker 3: He said, yeah, it looks like you weren't tending the
Speaker 3: list it And I said, no, I was not, And anyway,
Speaker 3: that's how I got removed from trustee.
Speaker 1: Eventually, Harper packs his bags and leaves. Even though he's
Speaker 1: removed as trustee, it doesn't affect him potentially getting half
Speaker 1: of Deer's assets. I call him as he once more
Speaker 1: is doing that long long drive from Idlewild across the
Speaker 1: deserts of Arizona into New Mexico.
Speaker 3: I left the lands today.
Speaker 1: Wow, how does that feel?
Speaker 3: You know, to deal with the tough, tough, tough thing.
Speaker 6: But the situation you.
Speaker 3: Get either you work with the court or you work
Speaker 3: against them, and they can they can take away all
Speaker 3: your privileges, you know. Oh, after long consideration, can't. Some time,
Speaker 3: I decided to leave. And so my concern is this
Speaker 3: that if I'm gone, they will never work at finding her.
Speaker 1: I keep imagining Benita Vista Ranch now that Harper's gone,
Speaker 1: those impressive Western style gates locked and chained shut, deers
Speaker 1: antiques gathering dust, the endless land stretching towards the mountains,
Speaker 1: slowly growing wild. I wonder how Dea would have felt
Speaker 1: her pride and joy, her home sitting empty. Soon it
Speaker 1: could be sold to some stranger who will probably fit
Speaker 1: it out in that modern dude ranch style, and every
Speaker 1: trace of Deer will be gone. But what happens to
Speaker 1: the people in her life, what happens to that vacuum
Speaker 1: she left behind, will be right back in some way
Speaker 1: or another. DEA's disappearance has shaped the life of everyone
Speaker 1: in this podcast, including mine. As I wound down my reporting,
Speaker 1: it felt right to touch base with them all, to
Speaker 1: see how they were moving on, how they were finding closure.
Speaker 1: I'll start with the one silver lining I found in
Speaker 1: all this mess. DEA's siblings Peggy and Jim had told
Speaker 1: me how much they missed their niece and nephew, Chrissara
Speaker 1: and Clinton, how sad they were that their family was estranged.
Speaker 1: And so I spoke to Clinton and I suggested perhaps
Speaker 1: he might want to reconnect with his aunt and uncle,
Speaker 1: given that his father was dead and his mother was
Speaker 1: still missing. Eventually he gave them a call.
Speaker 6: It was unbelievable.
Speaker 4: It was unbelievable seeing just to see our our nephew.
Speaker 1: This is Peggy Kenchlo dear sister.
Speaker 4: And if any anything came out of this tragedy, it's
Speaker 4: this that we have. That we have our nephew back.
Speaker 4: We have him, we have him back. He's our kid.
Speaker 4: You know, I'm sorry about whatever horrible thing happened to
Speaker 4: my sister. I am, but we have my nephew back.
Speaker 1: Peggy's trying hard to move on despite the toll it's
Speaker 1: taken on her and her family.
Speaker 4: It's an emotional Katrina, you know it came in it
Speaker 4: washed everything out.
Speaker 1: She's not the only one who felt like things fell
Speaker 1: apart when dear disappeared.
Speaker 10: It's been a four years of NonStop obsession of the
Speaker 10: mind and the gravitational pull that I cannot seem to
Speaker 10: extricate myself.
Speaker 6: From no matter how hard I try. I just have to.
Speaker 10: Have to do something to always try and move the
Speaker 10: ball forward.
Speaker 1: Thanks to his years of research, Clinton's developed a theory
Speaker 1: about Harper and about what happened to his mother.
Speaker 10: To me, he's pulpable, he's guilty, but he's also serves
Speaker 10: as the patsy, as the fall guy and its low
Speaker 10: hanging fruit. He's the easy, easy guy to pin this on.
Speaker 10: And I think there are so many other people involved
Speaker 10: and so many other people who know. And I think
Speaker 10: as long as law enforcement doesn't pursue those other angles
Speaker 10: and ask, you know, deeper questions, I don't they'll ever
Speaker 10: solve the case.
Speaker 1: Clinton doesn't believe that Harper is solely to blame for
Speaker 1: DEA's disappearance.
Speaker 6: Yeah, I don't give too much credit to Keith Harper.
Speaker 6: I don't think he's a criminal mastermind. I think he
Speaker 6: did buffoon.
Speaker 10: I think focusing too much on him, it just it's
Speaker 10: just too narrow of the perspective.
Speaker 1: His theory is that a motorcycle gang took Dear, an underground,
Speaker 1: sinister intelligence operation that has access to high tech surveillance equipment.
Speaker 1: He believes Harper struck a deal with this gang. Let's
Speaker 1: go with your theory for a minute. If she's kidnapped
Speaker 1: and she's killed by somebody who isn't Harper, what is
Speaker 1: the motive, Like, what are they getting out of it?
Speaker 6: They're getting one hundred and fifteen acre ranch.
Speaker 10: And millions of dollars in antiques, jewelry, and I think
Speaker 10: the actual property was desired. I think there was a
Speaker 10: I think there was a deal amongst multiple people to.
Speaker 6: Split the spoils of war, so to speak.
Speaker 1: Clinton believes this gang would be able to access DearS
Speaker 1: assets through Harper, but there is of course no evidence
Speaker 1: to prove this. When I first interviewed Clinton, we met
Speaker 1: in San Diego, out in the open at a coffee shop,
Speaker 1: but that's the last time we met face to face
Speaker 1: Since his mother disappeared. He seems to have become increasingly paranoid,
Speaker 1: sending me hundreds of emails with what he says is
Speaker 1: evidence he's being Heraz he's convinced his house is bugged,
Speaker 1: that he's under surveillance by this gang who killed Dia.
Speaker 10: I've received a tremendous amount of harassment. Well, I've had
Speaker 10: buried pornography left on my mailbox. I've received unmarked packages
Speaker 10: that contain very obscure threats and also direct threats. I've
Speaker 10: had loud motorcycles that have basically, you know, kind of
Speaker 10: followed me and stocked me for a number of years.
Speaker 1: Clinton is adamant that the same people who killed his
Speaker 1: mother are out to get him.
Speaker 10: I believe it was, you know, a message to me,
Speaker 10: you know, we can get to you too, And I
Speaker 10: truly understand that it, you know, sounds crazy to most people.
Speaker 1: I don't know whether Clinton is paranoid or if he
Speaker 1: is truly being harassed by some kind of gang. But
Speaker 1: he was sent this really crazy package. I've seen pictures
Speaker 1: of it. The envelope didn't have proper postage, so it
Speaker 1: was likely hand delivered. On the front, it said important
Speaker 1: information about Lydia Kenschloe Abrams. There were all these court
Speaker 1: documents inside about rich people who disappeared in mysterious circumstances
Speaker 1: and the fights that ensued over their money. There was
Speaker 1: a letter to which made some pretty far fetched claims.
Speaker 1: It read, the reason for this letter is anonymous because
Speaker 1: the FBI is criminally corrupt. They will a death sentence
Speaker 1: for innocent people to cover up themselves, leaving you with
Speaker 1: no one and nowhere to turn the authorities cannot find bodies.
Speaker 1: The letter ended with an ominous line, we are really
Speaker 1: interested to see how you act when you get this letter,
Speaker 1: because it will tell us a lot about all of you.
Speaker 1: To this day, Clinton has no idea who sent this
Speaker 1: or if they might be involved in Deer's disappearance, but
Speaker 1: understandably it freaked him out. I mean, how concerned have
Speaker 1: you been for your family safety?
Speaker 6: Extremely concerned, very concerned, And have you.
Speaker 1: Thought about just stopping your search?
Speaker 6: Yeah?
Speaker 1: I have.
Speaker 10: I don't know if I can move on so long
Speaker 10: as we don't have answers. So frustrating is that I
Speaker 10: know that people know, but they just won't say.
Speaker 1: The fact that half of Deer's estate will go to
Speaker 1: her maybe maybe not fiancee Keith Harper would be a
Speaker 1: bitter pill for me to swallow.
Speaker 10: It's never been about to me what I get, but
Speaker 10: the principle that he gets fifty percent, when I know
Speaker 10: that he knows what happened to her and is involved
Speaker 10: is disgusting.
Speaker 6: My mother always told my sister and I, this is
Speaker 6: for you kids, This is for you.
Speaker 1: Know.
Speaker 6: I'm building this for you guys. I hope you cherish it.
Speaker 10: And I know she poured her heart and soul into
Speaker 10: that property to an extreme extent and just loved it wholeheartedly.
Speaker 10: And the fact that it's going to be liquidated just
Speaker 10: instantaneously and split amongst all parties breaks my head. Art
Speaker 10: and the fact that Keith Harper, in my view, a scumberg,
Speaker 10: gets fifty percent. I'd rather go to anybody but him.
Speaker 1: It's strange to think back to when I first started
Speaker 1: investigating Deer's disappearance. I was so desperate for Leeds to
Speaker 1: speak to someone who knew her, and I got what
Speaker 1: I wanted. I've had these two men who knew her
Speaker 1: well bombarding me with theories that feel so big, so outlandish,
Speaker 1: that they can't possibly be true, can they. When I
Speaker 1: first interviewed Harper, he told me he didn't know what
Speaker 1: happened to Dea, that perhaps she'd run off. Later, he
Speaker 1: told me he couldn't understand how the surveillance tapes on
Speaker 1: DEA's ranch hadn't captured what had happened to her, And
Speaker 1: then as he began working with Kelly's psychics, Hopper changed
Speaker 1: his story. He told me that the surveillance tapes had
Speaker 1: captured what had happened, that three people had kidnapped her,
Speaker 1: and he'd watched it all. Even now, it's hard to
Speaker 1: pin him down to one concrete story. What now, Like,
Speaker 1: do you think you're ever going to get closure about
Speaker 1: what happened? Like? How long are you going to fight for?
Speaker 4: How long are you going.
Speaker 3: To keep until she is bobbed forward?
Speaker 6: And that could happen in the next.
Speaker 8: Of what weeks?
Speaker 5: So let's say, let's say body is found.
Speaker 1: Do you feel confident that a perpetrator is also going
Speaker 1: to be brought to justice?
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay, I think once they've put Clinton under investigation,
Speaker 3: he will prayer.
Speaker 1: For now. Harper is living in Colorado, although he still
Speaker 1: owns his eighty five acres of land in a remote
Speaker 1: corner of Arizona. He's filed a motion to get half
Speaker 1: a million dollars out of Deer's estate. Half, he says,
Speaker 1: is to compensate for the time he spent working on
Speaker 1: the ranch. The other half is paying that money, he
Speaker 1: says he put into the ranch while he lived there.
Speaker 1: As for Julie Stamford, she felt like Idlewild changed after
Speaker 1: her friend went missing. It didn't feel like this safe,
Speaker 1: idyllic community anymore. Julie told me she was scared, scared
Speaker 1: that she knew something she wasn't supposed to know, and
Speaker 1: so she left and moved away halfway across the world.
Speaker 1: She's haunted by memories of her friend. I don't know.
Speaker 12: It just an't judge that I couldn't rescue her at
Speaker 12: this time. That was skin killing me, is that I
Speaker 12: couldn't rescue her this time.
Speaker 1: At first, Julie was stuck between theories.
Speaker 5: So to me, the viable suspects are the kids or
Speaker 5: Harper all along, I thoughted toe to one of those.
Speaker 1: Julie remembers a telling remark dea mate sometime after Dia
Speaker 1: had changed her trust to include Harper. She can't remember
Speaker 1: if Dia told her first hand or if she heard
Speaker 1: it from a mutual friend, but what.
Speaker 5: She said when she did the paperwork, she goes, here's
Speaker 5: your damn rant, Harper.
Speaker 1: Wow.
Speaker 5: Yeah, Like she was blugging her for it. I think
Speaker 5: he just wanted stuff.
Speaker 6: He always wanted that.
Speaker 1: It's memories like this that caused Julie to change her
Speaker 1: mind about Clinton and Chrissara and turn her attention to Harper.
Speaker 5: There mull be no reason for the kids to do
Speaker 5: anything George, because they were already asked the will. So
Speaker 5: my basic feeling now, I didn't want to take this
Speaker 5: in the beginning because I liked Harper because Harper was
Speaker 5: helping Dia. But that's not the feeling I have about
Speaker 5: him now.
Speaker 6: I think Harper is.
Speaker 5: Responsible for DIA's disappearance, and I frankly am afraid of him.
Speaker 1: Can I record this conversation?
Speaker 6: You can always record the conversation and nothing to hide.
Speaker 1: Right before we release this series, I gave Harper one
Speaker 1: more call with so many fingers pointed at him. I
Speaker 1: felt like I needed to talk to him again, and
Speaker 1: I questions of my own. I wanted to ask. Even
Speaker 1: in our conversations over the years, I've noticed discrepancies in
Speaker 1: things that you have told me, contradictions, and so it
Speaker 1: doesn't look good. I've got to be honest, it doesn't
Speaker 1: look great.
Speaker 6: Then why are you talking to me there?
Speaker 1: Because I'm I'm a journalist, and it's my job to
Speaker 1: get all.
Speaker 3: Sides of that, bring out, bring out specific things.
Speaker 6: Let's start at that yet.
Speaker 1: Okay, So I brought out specific things. I asked him
Speaker 1: if there was something more to his friendship with Diana
Speaker 1: fetder No. I asked him why he changed his story
Speaker 1: about the security camera footage on the ranch.
Speaker 13: I was advised by the attorney that I was to
Speaker 13: examine that, but I was not to say anything until
Speaker 13: after the investigation was completed.
Speaker 1: I asked him about leaving town so soon after deal
Speaker 1: went missing.
Speaker 3: I have told the multiple times why I leave to
Speaker 3: pay a tax bill?
Speaker 6: Was what was happening?
Speaker 3: What was happening On the day that that investigation was
Speaker 3: to happen, the.
Speaker 1: Cops were going to show up and search the ranch.
Speaker 3: They were going to come up and sew sarrants. They
Speaker 3: had called and they said we will close the ranch
Speaker 3: down when we arrived. Any vehicle that you have on
Speaker 3: the property must be removed or we'll say what would
Speaker 3: you do?
Speaker 1: So, if you knew how this was going to play
Speaker 1: out and you were going to be suspected, would you
Speaker 1: have stayed?
Speaker 6: I didn't suspect that.
Speaker 3: I thought we were dealing with a missing person.
Speaker 1: Harper has an answer for all of it and insists
Speaker 1: everything I've been told is pure speculation.
Speaker 3: Where the fat you'd think that facts would have come
Speaker 3: in the play. Facts doesn't play anything.
Speaker 6: It's strictly speculation.
Speaker 3: And that's what drives me crazy, is people speculate and
Speaker 3: it becomes fact.
Speaker 1: And perhaps he has a point. As far as I know,
Speaker 1: there is no hard evidence. So it seems like the
Speaker 1: only way this thing is going to get resolved is
Speaker 1: if her body is found.
Speaker 3: Exactly. That's why we're moving in here to get that done. Okay, Well,
Speaker 3: and if I would builty of her murder, would I
Speaker 3: move ahead and try to find her body? And shall have?
Speaker 3: I've been investigating that from the very beginning, Yes, I am.
Speaker 1: Harper is pushing to go back to the spot where
Speaker 1: the search dogs alerted this time to dig since, as
Speaker 1: far as Harpeneau's the Riverside Sheriff's Department hasn't.
Speaker 3: So they should be held accounnable for what they have
Speaker 3: not done. Since this case should have been solved in
Speaker 3: the first year and a half, it has gone on
Speaker 3: for now four and that's a year.
Speaker 1: His frustration with the police is palpable, and he's not
Speaker 1: the only one either. The Riverside Sheriff's Department has made
Speaker 1: some puzzling decisions throughout this case. I've heard this from
Speaker 1: nearly everyone I've spoken with, like Julie for example.
Speaker 14: And it's the police That's what made me angry is
Speaker 14: they never wanted to interview any of us that were
Speaker 14: closed up, so it seemed like they didn't follow through
Speaker 14: it that dune in some aspects, and that was very maddening.
Speaker 1: Carmen Ibanez, DEA's neighbor, who runs the Christian youth camp,
Speaker 1: said something similar. She told me Detective Alberta Lorero, the
Speaker 1: lead investigator on DEA's case, took three years three years
Speaker 1: to interview her.
Speaker 2: I mean, I've been talking more by more people like
Speaker 2: you and other people than I have been talk to
Speaker 2: by police, and you know, it's just it's kind of sad,
Speaker 2: you know, I try to be nice. But the rest
Speaker 2: of my staff say, is police incompetence because why wouldn't
Speaker 2: you Why wouldn't you just talk to the neighbor. Isn't
Speaker 2: that the first people you want to talk to. You
Speaker 2: would think that they'd be more more effort put into it.
Speaker 1: I've also been frustrated by the Riverside County Sheriff's Department.
Speaker 1: I've tried desperately to find out what leads, if any,
Speaker 1: they have, but they've declined to confirm any information about
Speaker 1: the investigation. So I'm left with a bunch of what ifs.
Speaker 1: What if the cops had shown up sooner, would we
Speaker 1: know what lay beneath the dirt the deer's dog, Ruby
Speaker 1: laid down on and wouldn't budge from what was in
Speaker 1: Harper's r V that Diana says was searched. Was the
Speaker 1: meadow really overgrown? And if it was, where does that
Speaker 1: leave Harper and his alibi? What if he'd never been
Speaker 1: allowed to leave the ranch? It's strange. Carmen told me
Speaker 1: that despite the close knit nature of Idlewild, this small
Speaker 1: town whose mayor is a Golden retriever, there are still
Speaker 1: no answers about what happened.
Speaker 2: Everybody hears everything, so that's the thing that's the word
Speaker 2: spreads really quickly. Even though that people pretend like they
Speaker 2: don't know anything. Everybody knows about everybody.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so it kind of makes it even more strange
Speaker 1: that nobody seems to know what happened.
Speaker 6: Exactly.
Speaker 2: I mean, it's very frustrating, I just for the sake.
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't care what she's done in her life.
Speaker 2: I don't think anybody deserves that.
Speaker 1: I've been wondering how I can wrap up this story
Speaker 1: after four years of reporting, when I know I'll always
Speaker 1: have a few niggling questions at the back of my mind.
Speaker 1: That's the problem. When you report a story about someone
Speaker 1: who's not here to tell their version, You're left with
Speaker 1: that vacuum. You're left trying to appear at a blurry
Speaker 1: picture that will never quite come into focus. There is
Speaker 1: one final loose end on my mind. The other coordinate
Speaker 1: the psychics came up with way way back in Kelly
Speaker 1: Snyder's original report, the one in the middle of nowhere
Speaker 1: in Arizona, because I mapped it out and I cross
Speaker 1: reference it with the report from Clinton's PI, the part
Speaker 1: where he mapped out the route Harper took according to
Speaker 1: the cell phone towers that Harper's phone pinged. And if
Speaker 1: I take that PI report in good faith and I'm
Speaker 1: buying into the whole psychics thing, then Harper was in
Speaker 1: the same region as a psychics coordinate when he left
Speaker 1: Dear's Ranch on that Monday morning and drove all the
Speaker 1: way to New Mexico in his RV. I asked Kelly Snyder,
Speaker 1: and he can't remember why they haven't searched the area,
Speaker 1: especially because his helicopter, search dogs, dive team, his entire
Speaker 1: search crew are based in Arizona. I try and persuade
Speaker 1: him to send a team out as long as I
Speaker 1: can tag along. Of course, so as much as I'd
Speaker 1: like to think I can just walk away, I'll be
Speaker 1: keeping in touch with Kelly just in case he ever
Speaker 1: does decide to search that Arizona location. And when June sixth,
Speaker 1: twenty twenty five comes around, I'll be giving Harper and
Speaker 1: Clinton a call, just in case. Where's Dear is written
Speaker 1: and hosted by me Lucy Sheriff. Our producer is Daphne Chen,
Speaker 1: editing by Karen Schakerji production assistance from Joey Fish, ground
Speaker 1: fact checking by Lauren Vespoli. Our executive producer is Jacob Smith.
Speaker 1: Original School sound design and mastering by Echo Shawes. Special
Speaker 1: thanks to Sophie Crane, Amy Gains McQuaid, Nina Lawrence, Kira Posey,
Speaker 1: Jordan McMillan, Owen Miller, Jake Flanagan, Sean Carney, Carrie Brody,
Speaker 1: Eric Sandler, Christina Sullivan, Sarah Nix, and Greta Cone. Additional
Speaker 1: thanks to my partner Maurice and my agent, Joy Folks
Speaker 1: at the Gernert Company. To read more about DEA's case,
Speaker 1: check out David Godfridson's reporting at CBS eight. Where's Dea
Speaker 1: is a co production of Pushkin Industries and iHeartMedia. I'm
Speaker 1: Lucy Sheriff. Where's Dea was originally developed with Truly*Adventurous.