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Speaker 1: Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories with

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Speaker 1: Nancy Grace. I'm executive producer Jackie Howard. It's been nearly

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Speaker 1: three years since Molly Pivots, the twenty year old student

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Speaker 1: went missing out of her hometown in Iowa. The trial

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Speaker 1: of the suspect accused and her murder is now underway.

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Speaker 1: Twenty secure old Christian Behaina Rivera is charged. As the

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Speaker 1: jury selection process began, Assistant Attorney General Scott Brown warrant

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Speaker 1: potential jurors that they would be exposed to graphic and

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Speaker 1: unsettling details of the case. Let's listen to a little

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Speaker 1: bit of the opening statement from Prosecuting Attorney Bart Flavor.

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Speaker 1: One of the things they were able to do is

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Speaker 1: collect the security camera footage and surveillance video from around

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Speaker 1: the time frame and date an area Molly was last

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Speaker 1: and as the agents meticulously went over this video. On

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Speaker 1: one of those videos that was taken from Logan College

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Speaker 1: residents who lived down the street from Dalton and Blake

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Speaker 1: Jack on East De Moines Street, they saw a specter

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Speaker 1: a silhouette of what appeared to be a jogger in

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Speaker 1: the time in the area Molly was last seen. As

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Speaker 1: they scoured that video for any other clue as to

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Speaker 1: Molly's disappearance. They noticed a certain vehicle appearing again and

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Speaker 1: again and again on that video. It's a black Chevy

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Speaker 1: Mountain out that's a common make and model, but this

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Speaker 1: one was unique. This vehicle had non standard rims, it

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Speaker 1: had chrome door handles, and it had chrome mirrors. But

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Speaker 1: shortly after this vehicle was identified as a vehicle of

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Speaker 1: interest in the case, Pawshee County Deputy and investigator Steve

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Speaker 1: Kevy was driving home on Interstate eighty when he saw

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Speaker 1: a black Chevy Malibu with the chrome side nurse. So

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Speaker 1: we followed that vehicle and he approached the driver when

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Speaker 1: it stopped. Driver didn't speak much English, and so he

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Speaker 1: had the help of a neighbor to speak to the driver.

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Speaker 1: Driver identified himself with the birth certificate as Christian Bahanna Rivera.

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Speaker 1: With me here to talk about that case in deferensic evidence,

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Speaker 1: it's just Scot, market Professor of forensics at Jacksonville State University.

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Speaker 1: Joe Scott has also featured in the Pikes and Massacre

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Speaker 1: Return to Pint County potest Joe Scott, Let's just start

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Speaker 1: off with what the attorney said at the beginning a

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Speaker 1: district attorney, he warned the jurors that what they were

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Speaker 1: going to hear and see in this trial is going

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Speaker 1: to be very disturbing. So that tells us right off

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Speaker 1: to bat that this was a very violent gat Yeah,

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Speaker 1: it does, Jackie, and what he is hinting at here

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Speaker 1: at least, and what's going to be the big reveal

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Speaker 1: in this trial is the fact that this poor poor girl,

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Speaker 1: Molly was literally ripped to shreds, and she was ripped

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Speaker 1: to shreds in forensic parlance, and what we refer to

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Speaker 1: as sharp forced injuries, and what this means is that

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Speaker 1: the perpetrator utilized and edged weapon. Now we don't know

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Speaker 1: a lot about this edged weapon at this moment, Tom.

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Speaker 1: It could be any number of things. We don't know

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Speaker 1: for this a pocket knife that he was carrying, or

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Speaker 1: maybe a hunting knife or something else, maybe maybe even

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Speaker 1: a butcher knife or all we know, but we do

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Speaker 1: know that she has been The injuries have been identified

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Speaker 1: specifically as staff ones and Jackie, there's multiple of but

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Speaker 1: there's another layer to this, and what makes this so

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Speaker 1: very and serious is that we have to remember her

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Speaker 1: body was not found immediately Jeff Dot you mentioned the

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Speaker 1: phrase edged weapon. I've heard that in several cases recently

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Speaker 1: that we've covered. What exactly does that mean? It could

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Speaker 1: be any number of things, Jackie, but specifically, you know,

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Speaker 1: when we think of an edged weapon, most of the

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Speaker 1: time we're thinking of a knife, but we have to

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Speaker 1: think of all of those items out there that do

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Speaker 1: have an edge, and this ranges from everything from a

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Speaker 1: machete to an axe to even I've handled cases involving

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Speaker 1: butter knife. Can you believe that? Or you know, as

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Speaker 1: as old folks used to call them the case knife.

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Speaker 1: You know, give me a case knife. I've actually worked

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Speaker 1: cases involving that, and of course hunting knife. But what

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Speaker 1: you're looking for is something that has a milled edge,

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Speaker 1: and that means that's something that has been processed in

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Speaker 1: a factory and created and can be sharpened to a

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Speaker 1: fine edge that's used specifically for cutting. Now they specifically, though,

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Speaker 1: and this is very very important to remember, they didn't

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Speaker 1: mention chopping injuries. They didn't mention slicing injuries. They said

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Speaker 1: that Molly Dodd as a result of multiple stabbing injuries.

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Speaker 1: And when we talk about stabbing, these injuries are not

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Speaker 1: shallow and long. They are more accurately described as being

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Speaker 1: narrow and deep. And there's multiple of we know that

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Speaker 1: they are on multiple surfaces of her body neck, there's

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Speaker 1: even she's even god, can you believe that she's even

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Speaker 1: goes stabbling to the head. And we can get into

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Speaker 1: that a little bit, but that that goes to, that

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Speaker 1: goes to who may have been the perpetrator of what

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Speaker 1: their kind of mindset was at the time. So you're

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Speaker 1: leading to me to a very specific point. Let's start

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Speaker 1: at the beginning of where the physical events is going

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Speaker 1: to start. It was with the video where we have

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Speaker 1: seen the Hana Rivera. It's seen starpling Mollie's tibbits and

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Speaker 1: he admitted that he turned around because he thought she

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Speaker 1: was foalth hot and then he got into a struggle

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Speaker 1: with her and she ended up in his trunk. So

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Speaker 1: we start there where he had to be able to

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Speaker 1: get her in a trunk, So we're looking at a

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Speaker 1: physical struggle there. So we have evidence fall on the

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Speaker 1: body of the struggle and then she is in his trunk.

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Speaker 1: So at that point do we think that she was unconscious?

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Speaker 1: I think that that's an excellent question. And you know,

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Speaker 1: the police at this point haven't necessarily revealed a lot

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Speaker 1: of that information. I think that's going to come up

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Speaker 1: at trial because this is key Jackie. What they're saying

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Speaker 1: is is that Molly's DNA was actually found in a trunk. Now,

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Speaker 1: the question we have to ask as forensic scientists and

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Speaker 1: certainly as trial viewers as well, we have to ask, well,

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Speaker 1: what type of DNA are we talking about? And when

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Speaker 1: I say that, I mean we're talking about something like

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Speaker 1: the touch DNA that's essentially partial DNA that comes as

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Speaker 1: a result of say sloping skin cells where you only

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Speaker 1: get a partial strand from dead skin cells. Or was

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Speaker 1: she stabbed and so many times prior to being placed

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Speaker 1: into the trunk and there has literally been blood that

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Speaker 1: has either splashed about or leaked out of her body,

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Speaker 1: maybe in the throes of death as he's placed her

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Speaker 1: into the trunk and they're traveling some distance. The thing

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Speaker 1: about the blood evidence, if there is blood in there,

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Speaker 1: and I think that there probably is, blood evidence presents

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Speaker 1: us with a very evidence rich environment as far as

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Speaker 1: DNA goes. When you when you go into kind of

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Speaker 1: harvest of DNA and collect it, those strands that are

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Speaker 1: provided by blood are complete strands, and so it's very

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Speaker 1: easy to generate a profile, a genetic profile off of

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Speaker 1: her that would be a specific tieback. Because look, logically,

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Speaker 1: you have to ask this question as an investigator, how

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Speaker 1: in the world would this young girl's DNA wind up

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Speaker 1: in a total stranger's trunk And you know, how does

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Speaker 1: that even happen? These people have never met before, assuming this,

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Speaker 1: they've never crossed pass and of course, as we know,

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Speaker 1: it's just it's not standard to give somebody a lift

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Speaker 1: in your car, in the trunk. It's just that it's

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Speaker 1: it's it's a typical. So you have to ask that

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Speaker 1: question as an investigator and guarantee you that's what the

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Speaker 1: authorities in Ireland have done time stories with Nancy Grace.

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Speaker 1: So the one thing that we know is that the

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Speaker 1: hanover there allegedly admitted that he took her quote bloody

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Speaker 1: body out of the trunk. So at that point, if

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Speaker 1: that is the case, then we can assume, if I

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Speaker 1: can use that term, we can assume that some of

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Speaker 1: the stabbing took place before he was put in the trunk.

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Speaker 1: Is there any way, I mean, how do we tell

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Speaker 1: that or can we or do we just go by

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Speaker 1: the fact that there's blood in the trunk. This is

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Speaker 1: an excellent question because this poses these two dynamics in

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Speaker 1: a death investigation. When you're looking at injuries, we have

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Speaker 1: to consider anti mortem injuries, which are those things that

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Speaker 1: occur prior to death. Let's say, for instance, an individual,

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Speaker 1: say for instance in Molly's case, is stabbed in life. Well,

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Speaker 1: what do we know happens when you sustain an injury, Well,

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Speaker 1: like this a stab wound, you blieve or if there's

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Speaker 1: blunt force attached to it, say, the health of the

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Speaker 1: knife is buried into her, it's going to leave behind

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Speaker 1: a little contusion or in common phraseology of us. And

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Speaker 1: the only way that happens is that blood still has

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Speaker 1: to be pumping in the body, so you hemorrhage into

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Speaker 1: that area, and you know, you can actually hemorrhage out

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Speaker 1: of the wound, and you splash blood about as you're

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Speaker 1: in the throes of death. And then we look at

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Speaker 1: things we assess the body based upon post mortem injuries.

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Speaker 1: And let's just say we have an individual that has

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Speaker 1: been stabbed in life. They're placed in the trunk, and

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Speaker 1: they're traveled, they're transport at some distance, and they die

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Speaker 1: in the midst of this transportation that's taking place, and

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Speaker 1: then when prior to the body being removed, they're stabbed

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Speaker 1: once again. In death. Well, those insults, those injuries, those

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Speaker 1: defects are not going to have any injuries associated with them.

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Speaker 1: So I've worked in many cases over the course of

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Speaker 1: my career where there is a distinct delineation, that distinct

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Speaker 1: line and a marker where you can say, Okay, this

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Speaker 1: happened before death and this happened after death. And why

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Speaker 1: is that important? Well, it's important because it establishes a

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Speaker 1: tom lot. How are these two connected? How long did

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Speaker 1: it take? And one of the things that the EMI

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Speaker 1: would look for at autopsy is how much blood did

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Speaker 1: Molly actually lose as a result of these stab wounds?

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Speaker 1: How long could she have sustained life after being insulted

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Speaker 1: And a lot of that is going to go to

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Speaker 1: were there any major vessels that would clips they like

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Speaker 1: the corotids in the neck or did she throw up

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Speaker 1: her arm and maybe he sliced her brachial artery, did

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Speaker 1: he stabb her in the leg, maybe he got her

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Speaker 1: femoral artery, or maybe he went so deep into her body,

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Speaker 1: Jackie that he got her heart or her a order,

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Speaker 1: or maybe he nicked the lung. And if that's the case,

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Speaker 1: when you open a person's body that has been stabbed,

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Speaker 1: their organs will literally internally be floating in blood. All

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Speaker 1: that blood doesn't necessarily come out of the body, and

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Speaker 1: it's a glaring indication of blood laws at that time.

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Speaker 1: And then the more we measure that told thing. So

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Speaker 1: that's the kind of ammunition that the forensic pathologists, the

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Speaker 1: state medical examiner there in Iowa is going to bring

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Speaker 1: to the court when they're examined. Okay, So, so I'm

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Speaker 1: not even a JD as Nancy Chess. I'm gonna ask

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Speaker 1: You'm gonna see if I can make sure I understand

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Speaker 1: what you're saying. You're telling me that the amount I

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Speaker 1: mean the roundabout and part of the answer is that

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Speaker 1: the amount of blood itself that in the trunk played

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Speaker 1: a part in this investigation. Absolutely it will. And that

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Speaker 1: gives you an indication as to how much she bled

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Speaker 1: out into the trunk from the wounds and how much

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Speaker 1: blood is still contained within her body that's kind of

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Speaker 1: floating around. And let me give you an assessment of this.

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Speaker 1: And one of the ways that is horribly graphic, but

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Speaker 1: this is kind of what we look at at autopsy.

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Speaker 1: Not all of the blood that is issuing from her

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Speaker 1: body goes out outside of her body. It will there will.

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Speaker 1: People have heard the term internal bleeding, you know, Jackie.

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Speaker 1: There's actually a term that we use in the more

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Speaker 1: when people are stabbed in the chest, and it's actually

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Speaker 1: the floating of lungs. Will say that the lungs were

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Speaker 1: floating in blood. And if you're stabbed in the chest,

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Speaker 1: the plural spaces, all of those spaces within your luans,

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Speaker 1: that within your chest that are not filled with the

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Speaker 1: lungs themselves, even when they're fully expanded, that's air in there.

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Speaker 1: Well that's let me step in on you right here,

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Speaker 1: because you're talking about something I want to expand on

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Speaker 1: a little bit. You're talking about the blood feeling, the

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Speaker 1: chest heavity, and knowing that she was stabbed between seven

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Speaker 1: and twelve times. I mean, that's a lot of opportunity

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Speaker 1: for blood to spread. Yes, it is, Yes, it is.

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Speaker 1: It's it's a when you have that many insults to

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Speaker 1: the body, that many injuries, that many defects, there is

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Speaker 1: an opportunity not just to leak blood out of the body,

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Speaker 1: but every time that knife is inserted and inserted deeply

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Speaker 1: into the body, you up the chance as the perpetrator

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Speaker 1: that you're going to knick a major organ. And it

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Speaker 1: can be the slightest nick. It can be the upper

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Speaker 1: lobe of the left lung, it can be maybe the

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Speaker 1: apex of the heart. You might can clip the a

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Speaker 1: order and even the smallest nick in those areas will

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Speaker 1: cause the individual to here's a fancy term, and it's

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Speaker 1: actually that means bleed out, but physicians call it exanguinate.

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Speaker 1: Many people have never heard that, and essentially all that

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Speaker 1: means is that you believe to death internally and the

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Speaker 1: person loses so much blood that there is no chance

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Speaker 1: of surviving even if she were found laying on the

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Speaker 1: road after sustaining these many wounds, and this is assuming

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Speaker 1: that most of them are lethal. Even if the was

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Speaker 1: a trauma team of surge and standing bond of kidness

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Speaker 1: saved her life. Probably time stories with Nancy Grace Joe.

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Speaker 1: We know that it was a month before Molly Tivot's

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Speaker 1: body was family, so we've got decomposition here. I want

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Speaker 1: to know what her body is that enough time, given

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Speaker 1: the time, the weather, the time of year, and the

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Speaker 1: fact that her body was hidden under cornstalks with the

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Speaker 1: multi edge question here, sorry, how would that affect the decomposition,

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Speaker 1: the breakdown of the body and the investigation. Oh well,

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Speaker 1: it's going to escalate decomposition. And let me tell you why.

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Speaker 1: First offware in Iowa, and a lot of people think

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Speaker 1: of Iowa during the wintertime, I think it was very cold.

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Speaker 1: But I gotta tell you, Jackie, Iowa, Missouri, that area

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Speaker 1: in there that kind of leans against the western the

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Speaker 1: western side of the Mississippi River, it is one of

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Speaker 1: the most hot and human places. Even by southern Deep

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Speaker 1: South standards. It's one of the most hot and human

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Speaker 1: places in America. And so what we do know folks

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Speaker 1: that have had basic science class even when they were

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Speaker 1: you know, in grade school, heat speeds things up. And

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Speaker 1: so anytime you get this hot, moist environment where you've

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Speaker 1: got you know, maybe eighty five percent relative humidity in

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Speaker 1: the air, it's going to speed up the process of decomposition.

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Speaker 1: And so the injuries that you have because they're open wounds,

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Speaker 1: and you know, I so hate to be so graphic,

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Speaker 1: but you have to understand these open wounds, those areas

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Speaker 1: are going to attract insect activity. So you'll have larval

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Speaker 1: deposits in there, and you'll have maggot that will be

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Speaker 1: growing in several by this period of time. And she's

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Speaker 1: laid after, you're going to have several life cycles of

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Speaker 1: flies that would have lighted on the body, and they're

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Speaker 1: going to distort these injuries. It's going to make it very,

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Speaker 1: very difficult for the forensic pathologists to assess it. And

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Speaker 1: you've talked about these cornstalks. This is you know, if

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Speaker 1: folks have never been to Iowa, it's a beautiful place.

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Speaker 1: And particularly when you see these rows and rows of

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Speaker 1: corn folks, remember like the fields of Dreams movie. They're

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Speaker 1: so heavy you can't see your hand in front of

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Speaker 1: your face when you walk out into one of these fields.

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Speaker 1: They're so thick and you look down that dirt and

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Speaker 1: it's so dark and rich. Well, and this is what's

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Speaker 1: referred to as an aerobic in environment, and it's oxygen rich.

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Speaker 1: You've got a lot of nutrients. They're breaking down the soul.

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Speaker 1: And remember her body was covered with corn stalks. It

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Speaker 1: was like pressed down, probably de rooted, thrown down. So

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Speaker 1: not only not only it's Molly's body decomposing, it's not

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Speaker 1: decomposing in a vacuum. Her body is laying on top

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Speaker 1: of this very loamy soil, heavily organic, and she's being

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Speaker 1: covered with decomposing vegetable matter at that point. So you've

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Speaker 1: got all of these little cycles that are taking place

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Speaker 1: on multiple levels. So it's going to just speed speed

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Speaker 1: this process of decomposition. So by the time you get

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Speaker 1: down the road here, you know, three four weeks after death,

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Speaker 1: her body would be greatly decomposed. And what does that

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Speaker 1: mean for us as forensic investigators, Well, what it means

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Speaker 1: is there is a high likelihood that you're going to

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Speaker 1: lose evidence and that's a very slippery slope. And one

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Speaker 1: more thing that we do know about this area, and

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Speaker 1: I can guarantee of Jackie that the authorities looked into this,

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Speaker 1: is that we know that there are strong summertime thunderstorms.

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Speaker 1: They'll come through there. And you know, one of the

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Speaker 1: worst things you can ever hear as a crime scene

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Speaker 1: investigator album the scene out on the scene is the

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Speaker 1: rumble of thunder automate distance because water washes away and

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Speaker 1: it destroys a lot of things. So you have to think,

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Speaker 1: if she's been out there that long, there would have

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Speaker 1: been several probably opportunities for clouds to have passed by

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Speaker 1: that there may have been several thunderstorms that her body

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Speaker 1: would have had to have endured all along through this.

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Speaker 1: You know, you couple that with this process of decomposition

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Speaker 1: and it presents a set of circumstances that are daunting

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Speaker 1: for the investigators. That's scene. Well, let me throw something else.

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Speaker 1: That's you, Joe Scotty. Cornstalks actually have a staff in them.

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Speaker 1: You can actually if you wanted to leave the porn

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Speaker 1: stalks up, you could have them and make syrup. It's

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Speaker 1: not going to be like you're getting out of the tree,

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Speaker 1: of course, it's not going to be as much so

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Speaker 1: when the cornstofts are cut and they're stacked. So if

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Speaker 1: her body is hidden by the corn stomp, you're going

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Speaker 1: to have some shaft residue on her body. How is

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Speaker 1: that on that? Yeah, you will, and there will be

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Speaker 1: residue of that sap that is left behind this kind

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Speaker 1: of glucose based substances. There, Uh, the sugars that are there,

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Speaker 1: and it would be interesting to know, uh it did

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Speaker 1: did the did the investigators kind of check for that

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Speaker 1: at the scene, and was her body swapped. I've actually

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Speaker 1: never heard of a body being swapped for this sort

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Speaker 1: of thing, but I do know this, even a long whizz,

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Speaker 1: even along with the normal progression of say insect activity

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Speaker 1: that come that come along relative to a decomposing human body.

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Speaker 1: And I'm talking about things like the common blowfly. Um,

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Speaker 1: when you've got deco posing vegetable matter, that's going to

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Speaker 1: attract an entirely different species or grouping of insects that

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Speaker 1: feast specifically on that, and they're going to be interacting.

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Speaker 1: So you can see how this dynamic would greatly change.

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Speaker 1: And it is a very dynamic environment contained there as

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Speaker 1: her body is covered, laying on the ground, laying in

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Speaker 1: this dirt, this tilt soil, with this decomposing in vestuable

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Speaker 1: matter on top of it, you know. And I think

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Speaker 1: that one of the questions I have that I've been

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Speaker 1: pondering about this, I'm very curious to know what the

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Speaker 1: status of or clothing was because you know, automatically, when

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Speaker 1: I as an investigator, when I see someone that has

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Speaker 1: died as a result of sustained short force injuries, remember

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Speaker 1: that's very close and personal. Jack, It's it's an intimate thing.

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Speaker 1: It's not like standing on a standing on hill with

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Speaker 1: the scope weapon and shooting you know, at one hundred

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Speaker 1: yards or something. This is of close and personal. You

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Speaker 1: can actual experienced the last breath of life leaving an

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Speaker 1: individual as you pludge a knife into the body. So

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Speaker 1: that's that implies an intimacy. I've been very curious to

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Speaker 1: know if there is a sexual element that has been

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Speaker 1: involved with us. One of the things we look forward,

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Speaker 1: seems is the status of the clothing. We would want

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Speaker 1: to know, for instance, if she's out jogging, first off,

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Speaker 1: are her shorts present, and if they are present, what

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Speaker 1: was their status? Were they still in what you would

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Speaker 1: considered a normal orientation. You know when people know what

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Speaker 1: their shorts feel like at home that they wear. You know,

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Speaker 1: are they up in the waist or are they pulled

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Speaker 1: down to the knee or they down at the ankles.

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Speaker 1: This sort of thing and also another thing to think of,

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Speaker 1: you know, what was the status of any kind of

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Speaker 1: covering on the upper body. If she's wearing a broad

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Speaker 1: as it pushed up where you know, I hate to

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Speaker 1: say it, but you know where her breast are exposed

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Speaker 1: and in view, and that is going to play into

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Speaker 1: how how her body was treated obviously in the anti

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Speaker 1: morti state prior to death and then certainly after relative this.

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Speaker 1: And it's very interesting that he was so bold, Jackie,

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Speaker 1: to do this in the light of day. And we

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Speaker 1: have no idea of what this guy's criminal history is

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Speaker 1: because of perhaps his status in our country. We have

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Speaker 1: no idea what he's what he has done in the past,

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Speaker 1: or what he is he's perpetrated maybe in some of

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Speaker 1: the location. Um, he's so bold to do this to

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Speaker 1: this young woman, you know in view of this camera,

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Speaker 1: you know, when you see the car going back and forth?

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Speaker 1: What else has he done? For more information on the

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Speaker 1: murder trial in the depth of Molly Tibbots, you can

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Speaker 1: go to crime online dot Com. With me has been

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Speaker 1: Joe Scott Morgan, Professor of forensics at Jacksonville State University

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Speaker 1: and featured forensics expert in the Pikes and Massacre Returned

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Speaker 1: to Pike County podcast now available for crime Stories with

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Speaker 1: any Grace. I'm Jackie Howard H