Speaker 1: A warning.
Speaker 2: This episode contains depictions of violence and conversations about suicide
Speaker 2: that may be disturbing and triggering for some listeners. If
Speaker 2: you are struggling with suicidal thoughts, please fast forward to
Speaker 2: the end of this episode to find out where help
Speaker 2: is available.
Speaker 3: To me, Kelly's story makes the most sense.
Speaker 2: With no physical evidence tying anyone to the murder of Anastasia.
Speaker 2: Does it all come down to who can we most believe?
Speaker 4: She stands by her story still and it's twenty six
Speaker 4: years later, you know, I.
Speaker 3: Don't see anything that she gained.
Speaker 5: She could have just as easily said justin did it,
Speaker 5: And I mean she did, like stick with that story
Speaker 5: and Byron could have said that too.
Speaker 2: I'm Leah Rothman. This is the Real Killer. Episode twelve.
Speaker 2: Two Sisters and the Alibi. So far this season, we
Speaker 2: have heard from Byron Case, his legal team, his mom, Evelyn,
Speaker 2: and others. We've also heard from Kelly Moffatt's friend Angie,
Speaker 2: the former Jackson County prosecutor, Jean Peters Baker, and Anastasia's
Speaker 2: sisters Fran and Emma. In episode three, Fran and Emma
Speaker 2: shared some heartfelt stories about their sister. A quick reminder,
Speaker 2: Fran was fifteen and Emma was four when Anastasia was murdered.
Speaker 2: Before Fran, Emma and I get off our zoom call
Speaker 2: that day, Emma, you said you wanted to say something.
Speaker 4: Oh, just in regards to why we feel like Byron's guilty. Yeah, huh.
Speaker 4: Now I'm put on the spot. I feel like, to
Speaker 4: believe viron you have to not believe what's coming out
Speaker 4: of Kelly, you know, and I just I can't do that.
Speaker 4: I don't see any motivation really for her other than
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 3: What they're alleging.
Speaker 4: So maybe these are the sound bites that I'm worried about,
Speaker 4: you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 2: Well, then why don't you think about it and even
Speaker 2: write something up or you can email meself.
Speaker 4: I have written it up. That's why I'm like, just
Speaker 4: read it, okay. Yeah. So I read the transcripts over
Speaker 4: again today and I did like a close reading, you know,
Speaker 4: one time where I'm like, okay, so he's guilty. One
Speaker 4: time where I'm like, Okay, he's innocent, and you know,
Speaker 4: everything he says in that call makes sense if he's guilty,
Speaker 4: but not everything adds up if he's innocent, he's surprised
Speaker 4: and definitely caught off guard by you know, the phone
Speaker 4: call from Kelly. It sounds us and that's because it
Speaker 4: was super high stake situation. There's the cops on the
Speaker 4: other end. It's being recorded, so it's not that Kelly's
Speaker 4: making things up or because someone else made this stuff
Speaker 4: up that she's saying. But you know, at some points
Speaker 4: when he doesn't respond, you know that he's doing some
Speaker 4: like mental calculations, and it including when she says point
Speaker 4: blank like why did you have to kill her?
Speaker 3: What was the whole efing deal? Could you explain to me?
Speaker 4: There's no response for a good eight seconds, and then
Speaker 4: she continues like you know, and then there's again no response.
Speaker 4: A firm you know, like I didn't kill her? Is
Speaker 4: like what I found myself saying whenever I did the
Speaker 4: close reading where he's innocent. You know, it just doesn't
Speaker 4: make sense that he wouldn't say, like what what are
Speaker 4: you talking about? What are you talking about? Like justin
Speaker 4: did it? You know, so make that make sense. Furthermore,
Speaker 4: it wasn't just that, you know, the whole conversation. It
Speaker 4: kind of alludes to this shared trauma that they have,
Speaker 4: like you know, reading between the lines, Kelly's like, I've
Speaker 4: not been the same since It's almost like, you know,
Speaker 4: he hasn't been the same sense either. You know, you
Speaker 4: can be traumatized by something that you did. I don't
Speaker 4: know exactly how he feels about that, but it doesn't
Speaker 4: sound like what they're dealing with is their friends separately
Speaker 4: committing suicide or furtherer suicide. You know, that doesn't sound
Speaker 4: like what they're dealing with. Yeah, I wanted to ask
Speaker 4: you if your podcast also explores what happened to Justin
Speaker 4: or does it touch that at all?
Speaker 2: Yeah, we I mean as much as we can. I
Speaker 2: reached out to Justin's sister, not his mom yet, but
Speaker 2: his sister, hoping to talk with her, and I haven't
Speaker 2: heard back.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you are all in touch with
Speaker 1: Justin's family.
Speaker 2: But because you know, Justin accorded to Buyer, and Justin
Speaker 2: called him that next morning, right around nine o'clock and
Speaker 2: then within I think it was between nine to eleven
Speaker 2: and nine twenty five, he was at the gun shop
Speaker 2: buying the gun. So one would imagine he was about
Speaker 2: to take his own life because he knew something. Either
Speaker 2: he was there, he did it, he watched it. He
Speaker 2: used that gun to kill himself, though he bought a
Speaker 2: new gun. He bought a new gun in the morning
Speaker 2: of the twenty third morning her body was found.
Speaker 3: Pardon and used that one.
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, but that's not the gun that was used. Yeah,
Speaker 2: that's a new gun.
Speaker 5: So yeah, before it was announced on the tea or anything,
Speaker 5: he is already buying a gun.
Speaker 2: I think at seven o'clock in the morning, there is
Speaker 2: the Sheriff's Department sends out a media alert to saying
Speaker 2: that a body, no name, no identification, but a body
Speaker 2: had been found in Lincoln Cemetery. So technically he might
Speaker 2: have heard something.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: I don't have any evidence that says any of the
Speaker 2: new stations put anything out at seven or before nine.
Speaker 2: All I have is the Sheriff's Department report that they
Speaker 2: send out a media alert.
Speaker 1: But yees.
Speaker 2: So that's a long way of saying, yes, we do
Speaker 2: absolutely talk about Justin. We talk about you know, it's
Speaker 2: in a lot of the interviews with Kilgore, and you know,
Speaker 2: whether it's with Byron or Kelly or about what people
Speaker 2: think may have happened and why Justin would have taken
Speaker 2: his own life. Let me ask you, because one of
Speaker 2: the rumors that went around a lot was that there
Speaker 2: was a suicide packed do you think that there was
Speaker 2: any credibility to that? I mean, Anastasia I had talked
Speaker 2: about suicide. Do you think that there was any chance
Speaker 2: that she and Justin and maybe I don't.
Speaker 3: Think that's the way it went down.
Speaker 4: No, No, they may have talked about that because they
Speaker 4: were goffy teenagers, but that's not what happened. You know,
Speaker 4: she was super vain about her She.
Speaker 5: Never would have shot herself in her tiny little ski
Speaker 5: slate slope nose. I thought it was just the smallest,
Speaker 5: tiniest nose ever. She had a great smile, perfect set
Speaker 5: of teeth, no braces. She was too vain to kill herself,
Speaker 5: especially shooting herself in the face like like pills, or.
Speaker 3: Splitting her wrists or something dramatic like gosh.
Speaker 4: I mean again, you would have to be saying that
Speaker 4: you don't believe Kelly's story or if this happened, you know,
Speaker 4: in isolation, what happened to the murder weapon? Like are
Speaker 4: those suicide the bullets?
Speaker 3: What happened to that stuff?
Speaker 5: So I can say, like in terms of her that night,
Speaker 5: we had fought about clothes, and that's how I remember
Speaker 5: what she was wearing so distinctly. And I mean, I
Speaker 5: think some of the other eyewitness accounts say she was
Speaker 5: wearing jeans, and I just there's no way she had them.
Speaker 5: The black pants we fought over, and I was super
Speaker 5: sad after she was gone because I couldn't steal those
Speaker 5: pants from her anymore.
Speaker 3: And she and.
Speaker 5: She took my shoes and they were just some hand
Speaker 5: meeting on Doc mart We'll not hanging down. There were
Speaker 5: secondhand Doc Martins that I got at a thrift store
Speaker 5: in Michigan when I was out of town, and I
Speaker 5: remember thinking like, why did she have to die in
Speaker 5: my shoes? Not because those are my shoes, but because
Speaker 5: if she had been trying to run away, the inside
Speaker 5: of those shoes were so slippery, like they had like
Speaker 5: a smooth insole, and how your socks would just slip around,
Speaker 5: and she had smaller feet than me, and how like
Speaker 5: she would not have been able to.
Speaker 3: Run in those shoes. And I just remember thinking like, oh.
Speaker 5: My god, like before we knew what happened, before Kelly
Speaker 5: came forward, thinking like, oh my god, she couldn't escape
Speaker 5: because she had those damn shoes on, and.
Speaker 3: She definitely wasn't walking home.
Speaker 5: My thought she was not a locker. We were not athletic.
Speaker 5: Like she knew how to call collect on a payphone.
Speaker 3: She would have gotten a ride home. She would she
Speaker 3: would have called and gotten a ride home. There's no way.
Speaker 2: What about because your dad was the one who thought
Speaker 2: that she may have come home home because he found
Speaker 2: a pair of blue jeans in the washing machine and
Speaker 2: underwear soaking, and that is and that sort of matches
Speaker 2: what don Wright at the Dairy Queen said that she
Speaker 2: you know, was wearing that night.
Speaker 5: Doud She was terrible about doing laundry. That stuff could
Speaker 5: have been in there for two weeks. She was absent
Speaker 5: minded when it came to that stuff. So I don't
Speaker 5: I don't think that. I mean, it could have been
Speaker 5: mine for all I know. I don't remember specifically, she
Speaker 5: might remember what she was wearing. I do know what
Speaker 5: she was wearing because it was, Yeah, like it's sad.
Speaker 5: It's sad to think about the last time you saw
Speaker 5: someone before they dies. You guys were fighting, like that's
Speaker 5: clothes and because I stole her clothes and more than
Speaker 5: to school, like a good sister she was, so, you know,
Speaker 5: I I think the eyewitness accounts, well, you know, it's
Speaker 5: it's I'm.
Speaker 3: Glad people saw her. I don't.
Speaker 5: I don't think what she was wearing could be considered
Speaker 5: reliable from other people.
Speaker 4: I don't understand whenever they interviewed that person, was that
Speaker 4: before or after or during the trial, Like can I
Speaker 4: just think, yeah, like that's I don't know that part either,
Speaker 4: And I know she gave testimony, and so I don't
Speaker 4: doubt that Anastasia was there.
Speaker 3: Her whole description of the outfit.
Speaker 5: I'm just like, that's not what Anastasia like, never wore sandals, like,
Speaker 5: she didn't carry purses.
Speaker 3: Really she I don't recall her having a purse on her.
Speaker 5: I remember that ugly corduroy jacket and she loved it,
Speaker 5: and I was I thought it was hideous, Like I
Speaker 5: hate I had trauma from corduae from when I was
Speaker 5: a kid, I guess, but like the just yeah, it's
Speaker 5: very weird.
Speaker 2: I share more with brand and Emma about dairy queen
Speaker 2: worker Don Wright, who interacted with Anastasia that night. Weird,
Speaker 2: don right, she's passed away, Oh okay, but I have
Speaker 2: the police report and so, and she was interviewed by
Speaker 2: kil Gore on audiotape.
Speaker 1: They audio taped it.
Speaker 2: So she was interviewed on the twenty fourth, so the
Speaker 2: day after, and then kil Gore writes a report that
Speaker 2: he called her the next day to say, do you
Speaker 2: remember anything else? And she's like, yeah, I actually remember
Speaker 2: what she was wearing. And so that's when she gives
Speaker 2: a report of the blue jeans and the socks and
Speaker 2: sandals and the purse.
Speaker 1: So it was two.
Speaker 2: Days one day after she was found that Don Wright
Speaker 2: is interviewed and the day after that she talks about
Speaker 2: the clothes.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I just don't know what to make about that.
Speaker 3: I don't think it proves anything.
Speaker 2: When your dad says that he found that stuff at
Speaker 2: the house, and your dad is like in multiple emails,
Speaker 2: like she came home, Like I believe she came home.
Speaker 3: Did she hit hike I don't know.
Speaker 2: Or got a ride or they came back, or she
Speaker 2: got out of the car, because Don Rand at the
Speaker 2: Amaco saw her get out of the car and she
Speaker 2: started to walk and they went and picked her back up.
Speaker 2: And I have no idea. I have no idea. I
Speaker 2: drove it multiple times while I was in Kansas City.
Speaker 2: And even though this is twenty something years later, I
Speaker 2: tried to imagine myself if I would walk that far.
Speaker 1: That's very very.
Speaker 3: Far, it really is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, three plus miles right and at night.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and passed like you know, for sex shop, and
Speaker 2: I mean it gets better as it.
Speaker 1: Got to your old you know, to the true.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but that's incredibly long. I've never walked up for
Speaker 3: in Independence now.
Speaker 2: I mean, I tried a lot of self in her
Speaker 2: shoes and I'm like, I can't even if you're like
Speaker 2: angry and you're like, I'm just so mad at my boyfriend,
Speaker 2: I'm just gonna walk home.
Speaker 1: It still is. If it were a mile, I could maybe.
Speaker 2: Imagine that it seemed very far to me, it seemed
Speaker 2: quite far.
Speaker 4: How much does that like matter to the case, Like
Speaker 4: we're just trying to account for what happened, like the time,
Speaker 4: but I mean.
Speaker 2: I think it matters in that a lot of people,
Speaker 2: especially before Kelly comes forward, is a lot of people
Speaker 2: are debating all these things like this is part of
Speaker 2: the investigation.
Speaker 1: Did she use the payphone?
Speaker 2: You know, like your dad says that he spoke to
Speaker 2: So there was that Amico station that used to be
Speaker 2: at the corner. And then there was another gas station
Speaker 2: next door, Phillip sixty six station, And your dad tells
Speaker 2: kil Gore like, look, I spoke with Don Rand at
Speaker 2: the Amico station. I also went next door to the
Speaker 2: Phillip station and the father and daughter who owned that
Speaker 2: station said that they saw a young woman that night too,
Speaker 2: and she used the payphone. Okay, well, also kill Gore?
Speaker 2: What the ah? Like, what the tuck? Did you not
Speaker 2: get payphone records or you know what I mean? So
Speaker 2: it is part of the investigation. And it's also part
Speaker 2: of what wasn't done.
Speaker 1: So was it this? Was it Anastasia? Who's the phone?
Speaker 1: Who knows?
Speaker 2: But you're you know, like your your dad brings that
Speaker 2: to kill Gore, and kill Gore doesn't follow up. Nobody
Speaker 2: goes and tries to find that father and daughter to
Speaker 2: to corroborate that. We speak for a few more minutes,
Speaker 2: then start to wrap up our conversation. I'm very, very
Speaker 2: appreciative and thankful for today. Yeah, and if there's anything
Speaker 2: you think I need to know, whether it's about Anastasia
Speaker 2: or Justin or Byron or you know, your family, anything.
Speaker 3: Pretty much both that we believe Kelly. Yeah, I don't.
Speaker 3: I don't. I mean we heard from.
Speaker 4: The prosecutor that she would probably be willing if it
Speaker 4: came to it again, testify against him again. She stands
Speaker 4: by her story still, and it's twenty six years later.
Speaker 4: You know, I don't see anything that she gained. She
Speaker 4: could have just as easily said Justin did it. And
Speaker 4: I mean she did, like stick with that story, and
Speaker 4: Byron could have said that too. And I think the
Speaker 4: fact that.
Speaker 5: The Sheriff's department I remember, I feel like I remember
Speaker 5: them wanting to label that this murder suicide. And how
Speaker 5: easily it could have just been written off by that
Speaker 5: because then they don't have to have a trial. Justin's dead.
Speaker 5: How easy would that have been for that to happen.
Speaker 5: She wanted to let us know what happened. I mean,
Speaker 5: that was her motivation.
Speaker 4: And she wasn't under the his palm anymore. You know,
Speaker 4: It's not that she was angry. She just was like
Speaker 4: finally like.
Speaker 3: Trauma.
Speaker 5: Yeah, coming to terms with her on trauma and the
Speaker 5: damage it did to her. I think the damage just
Speaker 5: all everyone that knew and a station cared about her.
Speaker 3: This traumatized us all. How does how does someone that
Speaker 3: you've known for years kill you?
Speaker 1: Anna?
Speaker 5: Stasia could definitely piss a person off. I don't remember
Speaker 5: her ever, like being beat up in school. I think
Speaker 5: Anastasia was so cerebral that and you know a few
Speaker 5: times that somebody wanted to pick a fight with her,
Speaker 5: you know, she was the one getting them in trouble.
Speaker 5: Like it wasn't a lot of physical altercations. Now could
Speaker 5: she have defended herself, Like, oh my god, that girl
Speaker 5: could scratch. I have.
Speaker 3: Faded scar it's been so long, but from her scratching.
Speaker 5: Like if she had been in a situation I feel
Speaker 5: like with a stranger where it was you know, die
Speaker 5: or live, Yeah, altercation, she would have she would have fought,
Speaker 5: she would have ran, she would have gotten help. She
Speaker 5: wouldn't have gotten in a stranger's car, like so many things,
Speaker 5: like she was smart about and this caught her off guard,
Speaker 5: like this would happen to her. She she didn't have
Speaker 5: a chance to run away. She didn't have, you know,
Speaker 5: a chance to escape. And so I think, to me,
Speaker 5: Kelly's story makes the most sense about why she didn't
Speaker 5: have any signs of fighting for her life because she
Speaker 5: trusted these people and she shouldn't have.
Speaker 2: Anastasia's sisters Fran and Emma very much believe Kelly Moffatt
Speaker 2: told the truth when she came forward in September of
Speaker 2: two thousand. I still hope Kelly and I get a
Speaker 2: chance to sit down and talk, I suggested before she
Speaker 2: makes her decision. She listened to these twelve episodes first.
Speaker 2: And there are other people I was hoping to interview,
Speaker 2: like Prosecutor Teresa Crayon, Judge Charles Atwell, doctor Thomas Young,
Speaker 2: and defense attorney Horton Lance, none of whom will talk
Speaker 2: right now. I also really want to speak with John Fisher.
Speaker 2: Bob Whitblesfuchen's alibi the night Anastasia was killed. Remember Bob
Speaker 2: said after work on the evening of October twenty second,
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety seven, he went to John's house for a
Speaker 2: meeting about a marathon he was going to run. It
Speaker 2: seems no one from the Jackson County Sheriff's Department ever
Speaker 2: contacted John Fisher to verify Bob's alibi that night, but
Speaker 2: Byron's legal team does find and speak with John and
Speaker 2: his wife Elizabeth in Indiana. They both write AffA Davits,
Speaker 2: and they both agree to speak with me. We begin
Speaker 2: with how John and Bob met while working for the
Speaker 2: IRS in Kansas. It's a coworker of yours. Tell me
Speaker 2: a little bit about how you met Bob Whitbolsfugen.
Speaker 6: Okay, Well, we crossed paths at the IRS, so I
Speaker 6: had met Bob and chat. We're acquaintances. We hadn't really
Speaker 6: developed the friendship spending time together until this marathon came
Speaker 6: up and I decided that I wanted to run a
Speaker 6: relay team for the marathon and posted this notice on
Speaker 6: the bulletin board at work, and Bob saw it too
Speaker 6: and then said, yeah, I'll do that. He seemed like
Speaker 6: a nice guy. It might have been was a little different,
Speaker 6: but I think he had an unusual sense of humor
Speaker 6: and different air, different persona about him.
Speaker 1: Or what did he do with the IRS? Do you
Speaker 1: know what his job was?
Speaker 7: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Well he did pretty much the same thing I did,
Speaker 6: answered phone calls from taxpayers with questions about their tax returns.
Speaker 2: Did you and Bob work near each other, like sit
Speaker 2: near each other or did you eat lunch together?
Speaker 6: No, as a matter of fact, I didn't, as it
Speaker 6: was an acquaintanceship, but really not so much of friendship.
Speaker 2: Did Bob ever talk about his family or his daughters.
Speaker 6: Well, I knew that he had a large number of daughters.
Speaker 6: It was four or five.
Speaker 3: Something like that.
Speaker 2: Around seven pm on October twenty seconds, nineteen ninety seven,
Speaker 2: people gather for that meeting about the marathon they all
Speaker 2: planned to run. Where does this meeting take place?
Speaker 6: Meeting took place at Elizabeth's house.
Speaker 7: Well, that's right, we had it at our at my house.
Speaker 2: And by that time Elizabeth, who was John's girlfriend at
Speaker 2: the time, says she didn't know anyone there that evening,
Speaker 2: but one person who would turn out to be Bob
Speaker 2: Whitbullsfuchen did make an impression on her.
Speaker 6: Nothing.
Speaker 7: I remember sitting in the living room looking at Bob
Speaker 7: Bitbull's fuch and thinking, you are sitting on George's chair,
Speaker 7: and I really hope when you stand up that you
Speaker 7: don't have an orange rear and because your pants are black,
Speaker 7: And that was pretty much all I could think about
Speaker 7: during the entire meeting was and just to be clear,
Speaker 7: who's George. Oh, George was my cat? Yes, my cat George.
Speaker 7: That chair because it was kind of out of the
Speaker 7: way usually nobody said it.
Speaker 1: It was an old chair for my grandmother.
Speaker 7: With a needle point cover that it didn't look inviting,
Speaker 7: and it was just over in a corner, but he
Speaker 7: chose that Jair.
Speaker 2: Elizabeth, did anything stand out to you about Bob other
Speaker 2: than that he was going to be covered in George's
Speaker 2: cat hair?
Speaker 1: Not a thing that I recall. Do you remember seeing
Speaker 1: the cat hair on him?
Speaker 7: Yes? I did, And I thought I stood there saying, oh,
Speaker 7: good night, And I thought, do I tell him or
Speaker 7: do I let his wife tell him?
Speaker 1: And I and there were all these.
Speaker 7: Other people, and I thought, if I tell him now,
Speaker 7: he'll be embarrassed, and it just I decided not to
Speaker 7: tell him.
Speaker 2: John, do you remember anything or pett Bob seem at
Speaker 2: Elizabeth's house that night during the meeting.
Speaker 6: Well, he seemed like he'd always seemed kind of normal Bob,
Speaker 6: kind of a different sense of humor, maybe you kind
Speaker 6: of ry and dry sense of humor, but otherwise just
Speaker 6: like himself. Yeah, he didn't give off any vibes of,
Speaker 6: you know, being concerned or angry or upset at all.
Speaker 2: Elizabeth and John say because it was a work night,
Speaker 2: they would have normally gotten ready for bed by ten,
Speaker 2: so they believe the meeting broke up around eight thirty
Speaker 2: or nine. The next day, John says he gets a
Speaker 2: call from Bob with the tragic news about Anastasia.
Speaker 6: The next day actually called, I think and said, you know,
Speaker 6: I'm sorry. I can't can't run in a race anymore.
Speaker 6: My daughter was killed last night.
Speaker 1: Do you remember any more about that conversation?
Speaker 6: Yeah, I'm so sorry, and jeez, is there anything I
Speaker 6: can do? And he sounded very forced, but also kind
Speaker 6: of kind of yeah, kind of forced, like he was
Speaker 6: trying to keep himself under control. But you know that
Speaker 6: made him sound kind of cold. But you're going to
Speaker 6: tell he was angry too, and upset.
Speaker 2: The Fisher's a Anastasia's funeral. Then, some time later, John
Speaker 2: tells Elizabeth about a conversation he had with Bob.
Speaker 7: Bob had gone to find her when he got home
Speaker 7: and found out she hadn't come home. That he went
Speaker 7: to find her and he tried to get her to
Speaker 7: get into the car, and she wouldn't get into the car,
Speaker 7: and then.
Speaker 1: She was killed.
Speaker 7: And this was just stored in the back of my head. No,
Speaker 7: Bob said that he went to find her and she
Speaker 7: wouldn't get in the car.
Speaker 2: And you remember this because John told you. Why do
Speaker 2: you remember this?
Speaker 7: John told me this, and you know it was just
Speaker 7: part of the story that I was storing in my
Speaker 7: internal violin cabinet.
Speaker 2: Do you remember what you thought when hearing that Bob
Speaker 2: may have come in contact with his daughter that night?
Speaker 7: Well, it was just heartbreaking. My thought, I guess my
Speaker 7: feeling and thought was she might not be dead if
Speaker 7: she would have gotten in the car. She should have
Speaker 7: gone with dad. Duh, she should have gone with her dad.
Speaker 7: Too bad she didn't go with her dad. She wouldn't
Speaker 7: be dead. He almost had her, and then he didn't
Speaker 7: get her, and then she got killed.
Speaker 2: Do you remember any more details about that interaction that
Speaker 2: Bob had shared with John?
Speaker 1: Not much.
Speaker 7: I just remember him saying he couldn't get her to
Speaker 7: get in the car. Now, what I'm not sure about
Speaker 7: is did he have her in the car and she
Speaker 7: jumped out? Maybe I couldn't say that didn't happen. I
Speaker 7: couldn't say John didn't tell me that, Or did he
Speaker 7: just see her walking along and he said get into
Speaker 7: the car. So that precise thing I don't know.
Speaker 2: Now, John, do you remember this conversation or this part
Speaker 2: of the conversation with Bob very vaguely.
Speaker 6: Yeah, And I couldn't tell you exactly when it took place,
Speaker 6: but it was within a couple of three weeks.
Speaker 1: Of the murder.
Speaker 6: He was back at work and obsessed, of course with this,
Speaker 6: and I'm sure he was well providing that he was
Speaker 6: telling the truth about having found her and she refusing
Speaker 6: to get into the car.
Speaker 2: You say in your Affidavid that you don't remember this
Speaker 2: as much as Elizabeth does, but you very much trust
Speaker 2: Elizabeth's memory.
Speaker 6: Well, Elizabeth has an eye, has an eye for detail.
Speaker 6: I mean she always has and still does. If she
Speaker 6: says that's the way it happened, and you can be
Speaker 6: pretty sure that's the way it happened.
Speaker 2: And again you remember John sharing that information that Bob
Speaker 2: shared with.
Speaker 7: Him, because well, you know, it's just it was stored
Speaker 7: in my head.
Speaker 1: Had like a clip from a film.
Speaker 7: Right, guy comes to your house, Guy sits in Kent
Speaker 7: for goes home, daughter gets killed in a cemetery. He
Speaker 7: can't be in the race. I very clearly see that
Speaker 7: Bob tried to get her back in the car. Bob
Speaker 7: said he tried to get her into the car.
Speaker 2: So you said, John that after Anastasia's murder, Bob. You
Speaker 2: could see Bob becoming more and more obsessed.
Speaker 6: Yes, I just remember generally that over the next few weeks,
Speaker 6: if not months, I didn't see a lot of him,
Speaker 6: but when I ran into him, he was always upset
Speaker 6: about the progress of the investigation, thought it was being
Speaker 6: handled poorly and not pursued it. And it's possible, you know,
Speaker 6: from what I've heard since, that there are elements of
Speaker 6: the case that maybe he should be glad weren't pursued.
Speaker 2: Did anyone from the Sheriff's department reach out to you
Speaker 2: to find out where Bob was that night, how he
Speaker 2: was that night? Did anyone Did any investigators reach out
Speaker 2: to either of you?
Speaker 6: No?
Speaker 2: No, So what John and Elizabeth just shared is interesting,
Speaker 2: to say the very least. Right, If Bob saw and
Speaker 2: spoke with Anastasia that evening, does that mean she actually
Speaker 2: did get out of Justin's car, like Byron said she did.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about some of the potential time stamps we have.
Speaker 2: According to Bob, he knew that Anastasia had been dropped
Speaker 2: off at Mount Washington Cemetery and she was out there
Speaker 2: alone because Justin wasn't coming to meet her as early
Speaker 2: as five thirty PM. John and Elizabeth Fisher say the
Speaker 2: marathon meeting started around seven and ended around eight thirty
Speaker 2: or nine. I google the distance between Elizabeth's house back
Speaker 2: then and Bob's house and it's like eighteen miles, roughly
Speaker 2: a twenty seven minute drive. So does that mean Bob
Speaker 2: could have been back in the area between nine and
Speaker 2: nine thirty? Although in Bob's first interview with investigators, he
Speaker 2: said he got home around eight thirty eight forty five
Speaker 2: that night, but Fran told Sergeant Kilgore her dad got
Speaker 2: home between nine forty five and ten. Anyway, assuming the
Speaker 2: meeting ended between eight thirty and nine, could Bob have
Speaker 2: found and talked to Anastasia sometime between nine and nine thirty,
Speaker 2: or could it have been later that evening when he
Speaker 2: said he went out looking for her, like around eleven thirty,
Speaker 2: the time he said he heard that gunshot that he
Speaker 2: believed was the one that killed her. Either way, if
Speaker 2: Bob saw Anastasia alive that night, it would have been
Speaker 2: after Kelly was already home in Lenexa, Kansas, having made
Speaker 2: her nine pm curfew. It must be said if Bob
Speaker 2: did find Anastasia that night. It doesn't mean he did
Speaker 2: anything nefarious to her. I think the biggest question is
Speaker 2: if Bob did in fact see and try to get
Speaker 2: Anastasia in the car that night, why didn't he tell
Speaker 2: any of this to detectives. Okay, there is someone else
Speaker 2: we haven't spent much time talking about, and that's Anastasia's boyfriend,
Speaker 2: Justin Brutin. If you remember, earlier in the episode, fran
Speaker 2: and Emma asked if we spent any time looking into
Speaker 2: Justin and what happened to him. Justin took his own
Speaker 2: life after Anastasia was found dead. Why what did he know?
Speaker 2: What did he see or what did he do? Since
Speaker 2: Justin left no note behind, getting to any real answers
Speaker 2: has been tough. There is something that may or may
Speaker 2: not be relevant, but I think it's worth mentioning. In
Speaker 2: nineteen ninety nine, twenty nine year old April Wilkins is
Speaker 2: convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life for
Speaker 2: killing Terry Carleton in self defense. Terry Carleton was Justin
Speaker 2: Bruton's uncle. I bring up April because although it wasn't
Speaker 2: allowed in it or trial, in some post conviction court documents,
Speaker 2: April says Terry actually brought up Justin and Anastasia in
Speaker 2: the months after her murder. According to court documents, Terry
Speaker 2: said about Anastasia, the bitch got what she deserved and
Speaker 2: that April was next. Terry's alleged threats prove nothing definitive
Speaker 2: about whether or not Justin killed Anastasia. Obviously, neither Justin
Speaker 2: nor Terry can tell their side of that story, so
Speaker 2: we're still left with no real answers on Justin. Something
Speaker 2: I've been thinking about since I started this season is
Speaker 2: what is most logical. Anastasia's sisters Fran and Emma believe
Speaker 2: that Kelly's story makes the most sense. But my question is,
Speaker 2: does what makes the most sense equal the facts. What
Speaker 2: are the undeniable facts in this case? And do they
Speaker 2: actually prove Byron is guilty or innocent or do they
Speaker 2: prove neither. Here's what we believe we know for sure.
Speaker 2: On October twenty second, nineteen ninety seven, at around four
Speaker 2: to twenty pm, Anastasia's stepmother, Diane, drove hed to Mount
Speaker 2: Washington Cemetery to meet Justin. At around five pm, Anastasia
Speaker 2: was seen by Glenn Culliver, the caretaker at Mount Washington
Speaker 2: around five point thirty pm, George and Karen Lepage, who
Speaker 2: are test driving a car in Mount Washington Cemetery, spoke
Speaker 2: with Anastasia. When she asked for the time, she told
Speaker 2: them that she was there waiting for her boyfriend to arrive.
Speaker 2: Sometime after that, Anastasia walked across the street to the
Speaker 2: Dairy Queen and called Justin several times. There she came
Speaker 2: in contact with Dairy Queen worker Don Wright and the owner,
Speaker 2: Suleiman Solid, although their times differ. They said while there,
Speaker 2: Anastasia got her period, used the bathroom, used the payphone,
Speaker 2: and then was picked up by two guys and a girl.
Speaker 2: Around seven o five pm, Glenn Calliver said he saw
Speaker 2: Anastasia again, this time with two guys and a girl.
Speaker 2: He wrote down their license plate as they left the cemetery.
Speaker 2: This turned out to be the license plates on Justin's car.
Speaker 2: The next person who said they saw Anastasia was Don Rand,
Speaker 2: the night mechanic at the Amico station. When Don Rand
Speaker 2: was shown a photo of Anastasia, he identified her as
Speaker 2: a woman he saw on Truman Road walking east around
Speaker 2: eight thirty that night. The next thing we know is
Speaker 2: that Kelly, Justin and Byron went to where Abraham was
Speaker 2: house sitting. They picked up some stuff that he had
Speaker 2: of his ex girlfriends. They left and they took Kelly
Speaker 2: home to Lenexa, Kansas for her curfew. At nine pm.
Speaker 2: Later that evening, Anastasia's dad, Bob, went out looking for
Speaker 2: her and said he couldn't find her. Anastasia was found
Speaker 2: dead at three forty four am in Lincoln's Cemetery, wearing
Speaker 2: black pants, black Doc Martin shoes, a gray sweater, a
Speaker 2: tan corduroy jacket, and clean underwear and pad. Anastasia suffered
Speaker 2: a contact gunshot wound to her nose, meaning the gun
Speaker 2: was pressed up against her nose when she was shot. Okay,
Speaker 2: here's what we don't have. Definitive objective answers to Anastasia's
Speaker 2: time of death, what kind of gun was used, or
Speaker 2: where that gun came from. Why don writes description of
Speaker 2: Anastasia's clothes didn't match what Fran said Anastasia was wearing
Speaker 2: when she left the house, which seems to be the
Speaker 2: same clothes she was found dead in roughly twelve hours later.
Speaker 2: We also don't know why don Wright said she saw
Speaker 2: Anastasia carrying a purse Fran and others have said Anastasia
Speaker 2: never carried a purse, but sometimes she carried a wallet.
Speaker 2: We don't know for sure if Don gave Anastasia a
Speaker 2: pad or a tampon. Don first told Kilgore it was
Speaker 2: a pad, then a trial she said it was a tampon.
Speaker 2: And we don't know how if Anastasia got her period
Speaker 2: that night, why she was found in clean underwear and
Speaker 2: a clean pad. Here are some questions I have. Anastasia
Speaker 2: was found with having three dollars and sixty five cents
Speaker 2: in her pants pocket. Don Wright, as we know, said
Speaker 2: Anastasia was carrying a purse. Kelly, in her second interview
Speaker 2: with kil Gore a month after the murder, said she
Speaker 2: saw Anastasia with a wallet that night. If Anastasia had
Speaker 2: been carrying a wallet or a purse, why wouldn't the
Speaker 2: money be in one of those? Did Don Rand really
Speaker 2: see Anastasia or was it someone else he saw? Who
Speaker 2: did the father and daughter at the Phillip sixty sixth
Speaker 2: station see using the payphone. Bob says Anastasia went home
Speaker 2: and changed her clothes because he found her jeans in
Speaker 2: the washing machine and underwear soaking in a sink. Were
Speaker 2: those Anastasia's clothes or were they friends? Or was this
Speaker 2: like the caravan of cars, which means it most likely
Speaker 2: never happened. Bob says he also found Anastasia's purse at
Speaker 2: the house. Bob took a photo of it sent it
Speaker 2: to Sergeant kil Gore. Kil Gore could have shown it
Speaker 2: to Don Wright, but he didn't. The photo of the
Speaker 2: per kind of looked maybe like a long wallet. Were
Speaker 2: the purse and the wallet the same thing? Did Anastasia
Speaker 2: actually go home? If so, how did she get there?
Speaker 2: Did she call Patrick rockfer Ride or someone else? And
Speaker 2: in all of Patrick's research into the Negro League, did
Speaker 2: he really not have any knowledge of Lincoln's Cemetery and
Speaker 2: the players buried there? A quick reminder of what Patrick
Speaker 2: wrote when I asked him about his work and connection
Speaker 2: to Lincoln Cemetery. Remember we played this in episode nine.
Speaker 8: I remain a Negro League research you're only remotely active now.
Speaker 8: Hall of Famer Wilbur Bullet Rogan is buried in Blue
Speaker 8: Ridge Lawn Memorial, just a mile or so south of
Speaker 8: Lincoln Cemetery on the same road. But there are no
Speaker 8: Negro leaguers of whom I know buried at Lincoln. However,
Speaker 8: Jazz immortal Charlie Bird Parker is buried not one hundred
Speaker 8: and fifty feet from where Case murdered Anastasia. I was
Speaker 8: unaware of that fact until after the murder, never having
Speaker 8: visited Lincoln until November nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 2: If Anastasia did go home, what happened at the house?
Speaker 2: Why was there a stun gun on her bed? And
Speaker 2: if Anastasia did go home, how and why did she
Speaker 2: go back out? And how did she end up in
Speaker 2: Lincoln Cemetery? And there's more? Why are there so many
Speaker 2: different timelines? Why is it that Dairy Queen worker Don
Speaker 2: Wright and owner Suleiman Salad gave different times for when
Speaker 2: they saw Anastasia, one being as late as nine thirty pm,
Speaker 2: well after Kelly was home in Lenexa, Kansas. And Franz
Speaker 2: said the plan was for Anastasia to meet Justin at
Speaker 2: Mount Washington Cemetery. So why, according to Kelly's new statement
Speaker 2: in September of two thousand, did she say that after
Speaker 2: Justin and Byron picked her up at her house, they
Speaker 2: needed her to call Anastasia to lure her out to
Speaker 2: the Dairy Queen did Kelly, Justin, and Byron call and
Speaker 2: speak with Anastasia before Fran got home that day? If so,
Speaker 2: why didn't Anastasia ask for a ride to the Dairy
Speaker 2: Queen instead of Mount Washington Cemetery? And if the plan
Speaker 2: was to kill Anastasia, why did Justin tell Fran when
Speaker 2: he called around four point thirty that he didn't want
Speaker 2: to make the drive all the way from Lenexa, Kansas
Speaker 2: to Independence, Missouri to meet her.
Speaker 1: What happened to the.
Speaker 2: Gun Justin bought in September? Did he actually sell it
Speaker 2: like many people said, or did he keep it? What
Speaker 2: messages were erased or recorded over on Justin's answering machine?
Speaker 2: Why were there no defensive wounds on Anastasia? Did she
Speaker 2: know her killer? Was this a surprise attack? How is
Speaker 2: that she had no time to react? Kelly said Byron
Speaker 2: was five feet away from Anastasia when he killed her.
Speaker 2: How could that be considering the gun was pressed up
Speaker 2: against Anastasia's nose. Why did Justin take his own life?
Speaker 2: Did he kill Anastasia? Did he witness Byron kill her?
Speaker 2: Or did he feel guilty because she got out of
Speaker 2: the car and nobody knew where she was One of
Speaker 2: the earliest rumors that went around was that Byron handed
Speaker 2: Justin a gun he didn't know was loaded. Was this
Speaker 2: just some horrible accident and everyone was too afraid to
Speaker 2: tell the truth. Was Anastasia standing up or lying down
Speaker 2: when she was shot? What are those blue fibers the
Speaker 2: crime lab now sees on the bullet fragment? What color
Speaker 2: were the paint chips they found on the tree at
Speaker 2: the scene. Are they even related to this case? Why
Speaker 2: wasn't Bob's car ever photographed and processed? Considering the front
Speaker 2: end damage noted by Deputy Eperson When Bob said he
Speaker 2: heard the gun shot around eleven thirty that night, why
Speaker 2: did he say he believed that was the shot that
Speaker 2: killed Anastasia? Was that the shot that killed Anastasia? Why
Speaker 2: did Bob go to the exact spot in Lincoln Cemetery
Speaker 2: where Anastasia was found when no one outside of law
Speaker 2: enforcement knew where it was. Did Bob actually see Anastasia
Speaker 2: that night and try to get her into his car?
Speaker 2: If so, why didn't he tell Kilgore about it? Did
Speaker 2: Justin go back out that night? Did Byron? Was his
Speaker 2: car at home or in the shop? Did Kelly work
Speaker 2: with prosecutors to come up with her new story, pointing
Speaker 2: the finger at Byron.
Speaker 1: But why would Kelly do that?
Speaker 2: Why would she implicate herself in Anastasia's murder if it
Speaker 2: wasn't the truth. Could the drugs have warped Kelly's memory
Speaker 2: when she came forward, causing some of her details to
Speaker 2: be off. Why would Byron bring his fifteen year old
Speaker 2: girlfriend Kelly to a murder if he did kill Anastasia.
Speaker 2: Why would Byron move away and risk pissing Kelly off,
Speaker 2: which could result in her turning on him. Why wasn't
Speaker 2: Kelly's new account enough for Byron to be arrested. Why
Speaker 2: did prosecutors need more like a recorded confession? And during
Speaker 2: the June fifth recorded phone call, when Kelly asked Byron,
Speaker 2: why did he feel the need to kill her, why
Speaker 2: didn't Byron deny it.
Speaker 1: Is your head spinning like mine is.
Speaker 2: All of these questions, including some great ones we received
Speaker 2: from our listeners, have come up during the making of
Speaker 2: this season. Respectfully, as much as some people think there
Speaker 2: aren't any unanswered questions, it seems there are at least
Speaker 2: a few. We are going to take a short pause
Speaker 2: until the final episode during that time, Please keep sending
Speaker 2: in your questions, thoughts, and theories. I'm also going to
Speaker 2: post key people's timelines on Instagram. In our last episode,
Speaker 2: we hope to be back with a potentially huge interview
Speaker 2: that could answer so many of our questions. The views
Speaker 2: and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of
Speaker 2: the individuals participating in the podcast. If you or someone
Speaker 2: you know is experiencing suicidal thoughts or a crisis, please
Speaker 2: no help is available.
Speaker 1: Call or text.
Speaker 2: Nine to eight eight, or chat online at the Suicide
Speaker 2: and Crisis Lifelines website at nine eight eight lifeline dot org.
Speaker 2: To see photos, maps and documents related to this season's story,
Speaker 2: follow The Real Killer Podcast on Instagram and at TRK
Speaker 2: podcast on TikTok. The Real Killer is a production of
Speaker 2: AYR Media and iHeartMedia, hosted by me Leah Rothman. Executive
Speaker 2: producers Leah Rothman and Elisa Rosen for AYR Media. Written
Speaker 2: by Leah Rothman, editing and sound design by Cameron Taggy,
Speaker 2: mixed and mastered by Cameron Taggi, Audio engineer Justin Longerbeam
Speaker 2: studio engineer Graham Gibson. Legal Council for AYR Media Johnny Douglas,
Speaker 2: executive producer for iHeartMedia, Maya Howard