WEBVTT - Chapter 2 | The Go-Between 0:00:00.120 --> 0:00:05.200 This series includes sensitive and potentially distressing topics, including sexual 0:00:05.240 --> 0:00:10.380 assault and abuse involving children. Listener discretion is advised. 0:00:18.239 --> 0:00:19.580 Hi. Hello. Rob? 0:00:20.020 --> 0:00:20.180 Yep. 0:00:20.440 --> 0:00:21.160 My name's Kathleen. 0:00:21.180 --> 0:00:22.440 I'm a podcast producer. 0:00:23.579 --> 0:00:25.280 I've been calling your brother trying to get a hold 0:00:25.340 --> 0:00:25.620 of you. 0:00:25.640 --> 0:00:27.120 I just was really. 0:00:26.940 --> 0:00:27.720 Wanting to talk to you. 0:00:28.950 --> 0:00:33.430 Rob Squelante lives in Carmel, New York. His driveway is buckled, 0:00:33.450 --> 0:00:36.910 the grass has gone patchy, and there's a gap between 0:00:36.930 --> 0:00:40.110 the pavers and the steps to Rob's porch, as if 0:00:40.210 --> 0:00:42.170 someone went and kicked him in the teeth. 0:00:43.290 --> 0:00:44.570 My co-worker Paul's coming up. 0:00:46.090 --> 0:00:46.810 Paul, this is Rob. 0:00:46.830 --> 0:00:48.530 How's it going, Paul? 0:00:48.630 --> 0:00:49.710 All right. 0:00:50.030 --> 0:00:50.290 Self? 0:00:50.850 --> 0:00:51.550 I'm doing all right. 0:00:51.710 --> 0:00:52.330 Good, good, good. 0:00:52.770 --> 0:00:56.850 But Kathleen and I haven't come to discuss home repairs. Rob, 0:00:56.870 --> 0:01:00.890 you see, has history with Howard Gombert. It started in 0:01:00.910 --> 0:01:03.990 the early 90s, when Rob dated a girl our listeners 0:01:04.050 --> 0:01:08.209 know as Rachel R. We told Rachel's story in season one. 0:01:08.970 --> 0:01:11.670 She was a child of 12 when she accused Gombert 0:01:11.709 --> 0:01:15.390 of rape. Rob heard all about that from Rachel, too. 0:01:16.910 --> 0:01:18.150 You know, he's just a sick fuck. 0:01:19.810 --> 0:01:22.670 By the time Rob got with Rachel, Gombert had left 0:01:22.709 --> 0:01:26.539 her mom's house. but kept coming back for little visits. 0:01:27.600 --> 0:01:30.240 Rob knew what Gombert did to her, but says he 0:01:30.440 --> 0:01:33.030 never personally witnessed that side of Gombert. 0:01:34.330 --> 0:01:35.670 He was always respectful to me. 0:01:35.709 --> 0:01:39.870 I mean, it's not like he came after me or 0:01:39.990 --> 0:01:41.000 said stupid shit to me. 0:01:41.010 --> 0:01:43.860 He was always pleasant to me. 0:01:44.160 --> 0:01:45.700 How did he come off? 0:01:46.200 --> 0:01:48.380 What was his vibe? Okay. 0:01:49.780 --> 0:01:51.940 Until someone made him angry, says Rob. 0:01:52.980 --> 0:01:55.600 But there'd be times that, I guess, that second person out, 0:01:55.640 --> 0:01:57.000 you'd think he'd be an asshole. 0:01:58.940 --> 0:02:01.180 Rob says he asked Rachel if he should step in. 0:02:01.940 --> 0:02:04.440 He's a much bigger guy than Gombert is and could 0:02:04.480 --> 0:02:07.720 have squashed him like a bug. But Rachel, he says, 0:02:07.780 --> 0:02:11.169 kept begging him not to. And Gombert behaved like they 0:02:11.190 --> 0:02:14.570 were buddies, says Rob. Told Rob things he should have 0:02:14.630 --> 0:02:19.050 kept to himself. Here's an example. Rob told us he 0:02:19.110 --> 0:02:22.540 ran into Gombert at the laundromat in Carmel. This is 0:02:22.600 --> 0:02:28.260 early April of 1995, just before Robin went missing. As 0:02:28.300 --> 0:02:32.519 they stood and talked, Robin walked by them. Howard turned 0:02:32.560 --> 0:02:34.340 to him with a leer, says Rob. 0:02:35.720 --> 0:02:36.980 He said he was going to get some of that. 0:02:37.180 --> 0:02:38.820 He was hanging out with her prior because he was 0:02:38.840 --> 0:02:42.840 working in the laundromat. And her boyfriend was working in 0:02:44.139 --> 0:02:47.190 Burger King. And she'd walk over, hang out with him. 0:02:48.600 --> 0:02:51.150 And after that, he told me straight out he was 0:02:51.169 --> 0:02:51.810 going to get some of that. 0:02:54.070 --> 0:02:56.120 Not even a week. If it was a week later, 0:02:56.860 --> 0:02:57.560 she disappeared. 0:03:02.660 --> 0:03:06.400 Rob wasn't our only door knock in Putnam. My team 0:03:06.440 --> 0:03:08.460 and I spoke to as many people as we could 0:03:08.900 --> 0:03:12.899 in our quest to answer two questions. Who was Howard 0:03:12.980 --> 0:03:16.660 Gomber to Robin Murphy? And how on earth did she 0:03:16.760 --> 0:03:20.880 end up in his car just moments before she went missing? 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:33.660 Do you hear my madness? 0:03:36.450 --> 0:04:05.780 Laughter hides my fears. Sorrows depths are endless. I'm Paul Solitarov, 0:04:06.520 --> 0:04:17.840 and this is Season 2 of The Devil's Quarry. Last 0:04:17.860 --> 0:04:20.919 season's listeners will recall Howard Gomber with a mix of 0:04:21.020 --> 0:04:26.700 nausea and revulsion. A skilled woodsman and practiced sadist, he 0:04:26.790 --> 0:04:30.650 preyed on young girls, right beneath the noses of cops 0:04:30.730 --> 0:04:35.000 and parents. By the time Robin vanished, Gombert had been 0:04:35.040 --> 0:04:36.640 accused of raping at least. 0:04:36.520 --> 0:04:37.940 Four underage girls. 0:04:39.000 --> 0:04:41.690 He called himself a warlock and wore a pendant with 0:04:41.730 --> 0:04:45.830 the star of Satan, among many advertisements of his evil. 0:04:47.070 --> 0:04:51.230 But he wasn't without his charm, or a fine-tuned ear 0:04:51.270 --> 0:04:56.210 for human frailty. Our reporter Kathleen Horan found some of 0:04:56.250 --> 0:05:00.309 his old friends. Denise Lanz and Eddie C. were tight 0:05:00.350 --> 0:05:03.539 with Gombert in the 90s. They were also friends with 0:05:03.600 --> 0:05:06.990 Rachel and her mom. They knew Howard was a burglar. 0:05:07.370 --> 0:05:10.150 He admitted as much to them. But aside from counting 0:05:10.170 --> 0:05:12.590 their stuff when he left, they saw him as a 0:05:12.630 --> 0:05:13.870 harmless scoundrel. 0:05:15.400 --> 0:05:17.119 He was really good at picking on people. 0:05:17.870 --> 0:05:22.050 If there was something or somebody was just even just 0:05:22.110 --> 0:05:25.500 wearing something or just like somebody. 0:05:25.600 --> 0:05:28.460 Say ugly, was with somebody good looking, he'd just come 0:05:28.580 --> 0:05:33.400 out with something. And you would laugh your ass off. 0:05:33.620 --> 0:05:33.940 Yeah. 0:05:35.040 --> 0:05:37.140 If you were smoking pot with him, fucking forget about it. 0:05:37.160 --> 0:05:37.790 You'd be crying. 0:05:37.880 --> 0:05:38.290 Oh, yeah. 0:05:38.350 --> 0:05:39.229 You would be crying. 0:05:39.370 --> 0:05:41.190 You're laughing so hard, your fucking jaw hurt. 0:05:42.310 --> 0:05:45.469 But both of them admitted that he could snap, suddenly 0:05:45.510 --> 0:05:47.409 switch personalities in a blink. 0:05:48.520 --> 0:05:49.119 This is Howard. 0:05:49.420 --> 0:05:51.060 Funny? Goodbye. 0:05:51.980 --> 0:05:53.000 That's him, right there. 0:05:53.310 --> 0:05:54.020 I'll light the switch. 0:05:58.330 --> 0:06:02.370 Eddie specifically recalled a time Gombert flipped his lid. Eddie 0:06:02.410 --> 0:06:05.150 had just finished work when he bumped into Gombert's boss, 0:06:05.790 --> 0:06:08.810 a guy named Bill, who owned the laundromat Gombert worked at. 0:06:09.910 --> 0:06:12.430 I was walking uptown, and Bill had just gotten a 0:06:12.470 --> 0:06:14.830 brand new washing machine for me. He just bought the laundromat. 0:06:15.540 --> 0:06:17.320 I was going up to Bob's Diner to get something 0:06:17.339 --> 0:06:20.400 to eat, and Bill stopped me and said, can you 0:06:20.480 --> 0:06:22.900 help me put the washing machine in and bring it 0:06:22.920 --> 0:06:23.460 to Carmel? 0:06:24.440 --> 0:06:26.680 And he helped Bill get the washer into his truck. 0:06:27.380 --> 0:06:30.810 They drove to Laundromat together to offload it, where they 0:06:30.870 --> 0:06:32.380 ran into Howard Gombert. 0:06:33.690 --> 0:06:37.150 I'll never forget that. He was fucking fuming. He had, like, 0:06:37.230 --> 0:06:41.250 his fucking face was red. He's like, these fucking posters. Hey, 0:06:41.270 --> 0:06:43.610 keep putting these fucking posters up. And he kept ripping 0:06:43.630 --> 0:06:43.930 them down. 0:06:45.220 --> 0:06:48.880 And which posters was he enraged by? The missing person 0:06:48.920 --> 0:06:52.089 flyers that went up around town when Josette and Robin 0:06:52.130 --> 0:06:56.150 went missing. Someone had plastered them on the windows of 0:06:56.170 --> 0:07:00.050 the laundromat. Eddie doesn't recall whether the posters were for 0:07:00.110 --> 0:07:04.479 Josette or Robin, but Howard's rage stands out 30 years later. 0:07:05.700 --> 0:07:10.440 So he's there ripping all the posters down. I mean, 0:07:10.860 --> 0:07:14.200 that whole plaza was plastered with posters, and he wanted 0:07:14.220 --> 0:07:15.800 them off the laundromat window. 0:07:18.700 --> 0:07:22.490 At the time, did anyone know that he was kind 0:07:22.530 --> 0:07:24.170 of more of a serious criminal type? 0:07:24.190 --> 0:07:26.270 No, no, I don't think any of us had any clue. 0:07:27.210 --> 0:07:30.830 That's Sharon, who worked at the Burger King back then. She, too, 0:07:30.850 --> 0:07:32.740 has troubling memories of Gombert. 0:07:33.690 --> 0:07:35.850 I just thought, what the hell are they doing going 0:07:35.890 --> 0:07:39.090 hanging out with like a 30-year-old? I'm already, in my mind, 0:07:39.110 --> 0:07:43.090 this guy's a freaking creep. You know, these are 15-, 16-, 17-year-olds, 0:07:43.290 --> 0:07:46.640 and you're partying with them? But we do know why 0:07:46.680 --> 0:07:48.540 they all went down there, because you'd give them alcohol 0:07:48.580 --> 0:07:50.920 and give them weed. So that's why they'd all hang 0:07:50.980 --> 0:07:51.440 out down there. 0:07:51.800 --> 0:07:54.000 How close was the laundromat to the Burger King? 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:54.780 It was close. 0:07:54.940 --> 0:07:56.720 Like, if you're at the back of the drive-thru and 0:07:56.760 --> 0:07:59.220 you look straight ahead, you'd see the laundromat. 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:03.240 The laundromat is where Robin came to know Gombert. Her 0:08:03.280 --> 0:08:06.040 buddy James Blaisdell got to know him there, too. 0:08:07.300 --> 0:08:10.260 He would talk to us like he was just like 0:08:10.380 --> 0:08:12.240 one of us and all that stuff, trying to act 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:14.880 like he was younger. But at the same time, I'm like, 0:08:16.280 --> 0:08:18.320 it honestly sounds like he's acting. 0:08:20.620 --> 0:08:24.670 He acted friendly. He talked friendly. He sounded friendly. But 0:08:26.490 --> 0:08:29.590 he just gave off this vibe like, I'm not really 0:08:29.650 --> 0:08:30.090 your friend. 0:08:33.770 --> 0:08:37.210 Rob and her boyfriend, Matt, would occasionally hang at Gombert's place. 0:08:37.230 --> 0:08:40.969 It was a shabby little flat above a garage from Carmel. 0:08:41.850 --> 0:08:45.449 Gombert shared it with his girlfriend, Anne-Marie, and their toddler daughter. 0:08:46.150 --> 0:08:47.990 James remembers being over there with him. 0:08:49.130 --> 0:08:53.290 It definitely was one room with a bedroom and a 0:08:53.350 --> 0:08:59.089 bath type of situation. Very old wood, almost kind of 0:08:59.130 --> 0:09:03.850 graying in places. A little bit of warped wood. floor 0:09:04.130 --> 0:09:07.619 because it was unprotected so it had worn away in 0:09:07.660 --> 0:09:11.480 a couple places not a whole lot of furnishings very 0:09:11.580 --> 0:09:16.810 sparse and we basically sat down and we started listening 0:09:17.390 --> 0:09:20.969 to a cd that had just come out it was 0:09:21.030 --> 0:09:24.840 dennis leary's no cure for cancer comedy album was it 0:09:24.880 --> 0:09:27.780 funny It was very funny. And it was made more 0:09:27.840 --> 0:09:31.740 funny because that was when he brought out some marijuana. 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:37.240 And Matt and Robin did not partake, but me, Gompert, 0:09:37.640 --> 0:09:39.680 and his girlfriend did. 0:09:41.000 --> 0:09:44.160 James wasn't tight with Anne-Marie, but he does recall her. 0:09:46.920 --> 0:09:47.740 She was very nice. 0:09:48.420 --> 0:09:51.360 She looked a little bit like Robin with how they 0:09:51.400 --> 0:09:52.839 wore their hair and. 0:09:52.720 --> 0:09:54.990 The the type of makeup they used. 0:09:55.130 --> 0:10:00.160 So they both had kind of like this almost really 0:10:00.240 --> 0:10:03.840 pale-ish ivory cheeks thing going on. 0:10:04.600 --> 0:10:05.679 She was very reserved. 0:10:06.920 --> 0:10:08.990 Looking back on it, I don't know if this is 0:10:09.050 --> 0:10:13.990 my memory with knowing things now, putting it into things 0:10:14.050 --> 0:10:16.790 in the past, but it almost looked like she. 0:10:16.750 --> 0:10:19.650 Always looked to him before she did anything. 0:10:24.260 --> 0:10:26.780 Do you remember once you met Robin what your first 0:10:26.860 --> 0:10:31.000 impression was or what you thought about her at first? 0:10:32.200 --> 0:10:34.500 I just thought that we probably would get along really well. 0:10:34.540 --> 0:10:35.860 We were a little bit similar. 0:10:36.940 --> 0:10:40.520 That's Anne Marie, who's long since left Carmel and set 0:10:40.580 --> 0:10:44.400 up in another coastal state. Kathleen reached her by phone 0:10:44.450 --> 0:10:45.110 last spring. 0:10:46.330 --> 0:10:46.870 In what ways? 0:10:49.030 --> 0:10:52.710 Looks a little bit. Both of us were fairly tall. 0:10:53.429 --> 0:10:54.809 Both had really dark hair. 0:10:54.830 --> 0:10:58.729 And they both worked a registered shop, right? Which is 0:10:58.770 --> 0:11:00.200 where they met and bonded. 0:11:01.500 --> 0:11:03.559 I definitely considered her a friend. 0:11:05.260 --> 0:11:11.460 I remember driving her around. I knew she had her license, 0:11:11.559 --> 0:11:13.760 but I remember doing most of the driving a lot 0:11:13.780 --> 0:11:14.200 of times. 0:11:16.100 --> 0:11:18.340 She was down to earth. She had a level head, 0:11:18.420 --> 0:11:20.540 and she was trying to just make her way in 0:11:20.559 --> 0:11:21.860 the world as a teenager. 0:11:23.400 --> 0:11:26.620 But you don't know exactly what you're doing wrong as 0:11:26.679 --> 0:11:28.750 a teenager because you don't have a frame of reference 0:11:28.800 --> 0:11:29.170 for it. 0:11:29.679 --> 0:11:32.390 You know, 30 years ago, I probably thought I knew 0:11:32.429 --> 0:11:33.050 a lot, too. 0:11:33.110 --> 0:11:36.330 And now I look back and, yeah, I probably didn't 0:11:36.370 --> 0:11:37.710 know as much as I thought I did. 0:11:39.230 --> 0:11:42.650 What did you love at that time? Like, what things 0:11:42.690 --> 0:11:46.709 were you obsessed with or music or hobbies or? 0:11:46.710 --> 0:11:50.170 There wasn't a whole lot of things that I did 0:11:50.210 --> 0:11:50.870 at that point. 0:11:52.530 --> 0:11:57.110 Well, it. 0:11:59.240 --> 0:12:04.280 Wasn't so much she didn't as she couldn't. Because everywhere 0:12:04.340 --> 0:12:08.160 she went, she had a devil on her shoulder. She 0:12:08.200 --> 0:12:11.410 says he stalked her every move. And then he put 0:12:11.450 --> 0:12:35.670 a knife to her throat. The tale of Anne-Marie and 0:12:35.750 --> 0:12:39.650 Gombert appears in Robin's case file. I'd read those pages 0:12:39.690 --> 0:12:43.330 while reporting our last season. Then this year I went 0:12:43.429 --> 0:12:46.969 back to it and found something chilling. A timeline of 0:12:47.050 --> 0:12:51.709 Gombert unraveling in the weeks before Robin vanished. You might 0:12:51.770 --> 0:12:54.590 remember that Anne-Marie owned a red and black sports car. 0:12:55.050 --> 0:12:59.500 The little Pontiac Sunbird Gombert borrowed all the time. In 0:12:59.520 --> 0:13:01.990 her sit-down with the cops, she talked about that car 0:13:02.830 --> 0:13:04.650 and the fact that Gombert used it to pick up 0:13:04.710 --> 0:13:10.410 Josette Wright just before she disappeared forever. And then Anne-Marie 0:13:10.429 --> 0:13:13.960 dove deeper with those cops, talked about her siege of 0:13:14.059 --> 0:13:18.160 terror at Gombert's hands, a siege that ran three years 0:13:18.720 --> 0:13:22.439 and very nearly got her killed. She was all of 0:13:22.440 --> 0:13:25.800 16 when she met him, a shy girl living in 0:13:25.840 --> 0:13:29.740 New Fairfield, Connecticut. Gombert was almost 30 at the time. 0:13:30.380 --> 0:13:34.400 They were introduced by mutual friends. Anne-Marie the Jr. at 0:13:34.460 --> 0:13:38.229 New Fairfield High, he the swaggering bad boy on a 0:13:38.350 --> 0:13:42.690 motorcycle who pulled over to hand her flowers. She was 0:13:42.730 --> 0:13:45.929 a guns and roses freak in those days, and Gombert, 0:13:46.210 --> 0:13:49.530 if you squinted, had just a touch of axle in him. 0:13:50.429 --> 0:13:53.570 Within months, if not weeks, she fell pregnant by Gombert 0:13:53.670 --> 0:13:57.140 and left her family for him. The sexual and physical 0:13:57.200 --> 0:13:58.900 assaults began soon after. 0:14:03.740 --> 0:14:07.880 With most abusers, they come off looking sincere and trying 0:14:07.920 --> 0:14:10.100 to make themselves look like the better person. 0:14:10.500 --> 0:14:12.020 He was also a very good liar. 0:14:12.040 --> 0:14:17.650 And I think, in a weird sort of way, he. 0:14:19.310 --> 0:14:20.330 Believed his own lies. 0:14:22.030 --> 0:14:24.130 At the time, Gombert didn't have a place of his own. 0:14:24.450 --> 0:14:27.750 so they flopped with his friends in New Fairfield. That 0:14:27.790 --> 0:14:31.250 place was a hellhole to hear Anne-Marie tell it. The 0:14:31.310 --> 0:14:34.700 heat rarely worked, the stove was on the blink, and 0:14:34.740 --> 0:14:37.760 the neighbors called the cops on Gombert's friends, who came 0:14:37.780 --> 0:14:41.400 and went at all hours. It's where Anne-Marie wintered through 0:14:41.420 --> 0:14:45.200 her pregnancy. But after three years with Gombert, she couldn't 0:14:45.260 --> 0:14:48.710 take it anymore. She ran to the Putnam Sheriff's Office 0:14:48.750 --> 0:14:51.410 for help and dropped heavy charges on him. 0:14:52.530 --> 0:14:53.450 Before Robin. 0:14:57.060 --> 0:15:01.780 disappeared when I tried to leave him in February and 0:15:04.060 --> 0:15:11.030 I put charges against him. I charged him with rape 0:15:11.070 --> 0:15:16.510 and sodomy. I didn't know much about the criminal justice system. 0:15:16.530 --> 0:15:19.640 I remember not getting a whole lot of information or 0:15:19.680 --> 0:15:26.110 getting a lot of support on my side. I had 0:15:26.310 --> 0:15:31.109 heard he was trying to make me look like the 0:15:31.150 --> 0:15:36.540 bad person, like all of that was consensual. Because there 0:15:36.580 --> 0:15:41.980 were pictures. I had heard he was trying to say 0:15:42.000 --> 0:15:45.680 that the charges were trumped up because it was consensual. 0:15:47.380 --> 0:15:51.380 Gombert's lawyer was a man named Robert Leder. You'll recall 0:15:51.420 --> 0:15:53.380 him as Gombert's rep in the Rachel R. 0:15:53.440 --> 0:15:53.740 Case. 0:15:54.600 --> 0:15:57.360 When he convinced a Carmel judge to force a panicked 0:15:57.420 --> 0:16:01.540 child to face down her alleged rapist in court. You'll 0:16:01.610 --> 0:16:05.630 also recall him as Anthony DePippo's lawyer, while hiding from 0:16:05.670 --> 0:16:09.650 him that he was still Gombert's lawyer. That betrayal, which 0:16:09.690 --> 0:16:13.050 would have led to his disbarment, was in large part 0:16:13.090 --> 0:16:16.770 why Anthony was doomed to an unfair trial, and a 0:16:16.850 --> 0:16:21.890 false conviction. Leader rebutted Anne-Marie's rape charge by slipping a 0:16:22.010 --> 0:16:25.240 photo album to the D.A., That album was full of 0:16:25.360 --> 0:16:27.080 Polaroids Gombert had taken. 0:16:28.280 --> 0:16:30.740 I remember looking back at that and going, none of 0:16:30.780 --> 0:16:32.260 those pictures look like I. 0:16:33.760 --> 0:16:37.990 Was consenting to them. And some of them actually show 0:16:38.050 --> 0:16:38.810 signs of abuse. 0:16:40.130 --> 0:16:43.530 Nonetheless, Leder convinced the DA that those photos were, quote, 0:16:43.790 --> 0:16:45.710 boudoir shots, unquote. 0:16:46.770 --> 0:16:49.830 So it's sad that I didn't know that much about 0:16:50.010 --> 0:16:50.950 justice back then. 0:16:51.730 --> 0:16:53.810 But what do you do when you're 18 and never 0:16:53.850 --> 0:16:55.010 was involved in all of that? 0:16:56.730 --> 0:16:59.970 Those pictures of her torment got passed around the courthouse. 0:17:00.890 --> 0:17:04.090 None of those so-called stewards of the law did anything 0:17:04.150 --> 0:17:04.710 to help her. 0:17:06.250 --> 0:17:08.630 And then, like I said, I don't know what happened 0:17:08.869 --> 0:17:11.600 afterwards or why I was being subpoenaed. 0:17:12.460 --> 0:17:13.800 It was a whole weird thing. 0:17:13.940 --> 0:17:16.920 And it's sad because there was nobody there to guide 0:17:16.960 --> 0:17:21.490 me through it. And, you know, eventually I dropped that charge. 0:17:23.619 --> 0:17:26.860 But if Anne-Marie thought the worst was behind her, well, 0:17:27.440 --> 0:17:30.980 she hadn't factored for Gombert. Once he had his hooks 0:17:31.040 --> 0:17:34.379 in a woman, he hung on like grim death. He 0:17:34.460 --> 0:17:39.020 peppered Anne-Marie with pleas and apologies. She relented and went 0:17:39.140 --> 0:17:42.229 back to him. But after a couple of weeks, she 0:17:42.270 --> 0:17:44.830 woke up one morning to find Gombert in a rage, 0:17:44.890 --> 0:17:47.780 she says. He yanked her out of bed and dragged 0:17:47.800 --> 0:17:50.859 her down to the garage. He popped the trunk of 0:17:50.900 --> 0:17:53.639 her car and told her to get in. I'm going 0:17:53.660 --> 0:17:56.619 to drive you to the Bronx, he snarled. I know 0:17:56.760 --> 0:17:58.459 guys there are going to show you what rape is 0:17:58.700 --> 0:18:04.429 really all about. Anne-Marie screamed and ran upstairs. Gombert, who 0:18:04.470 --> 0:18:06.429 didn't have a car of his own, took off for 0:18:06.470 --> 0:18:09.910 work in hers. She phoned a friend who drove her 0:18:09.970 --> 0:18:12.250 and the baby to a safe house in Connecticut. 0:18:13.410 --> 0:18:16.040 I was in a shelter, and then I was beginning 0:18:16.080 --> 0:18:19.880 to learn some of those abusive tendencies because. 0:18:20.140 --> 0:18:22.260 All the women there are going through the same things. 0:18:23.619 --> 0:18:27.980 Gombert responded by dyeing his hair black, leaving dead flowers 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:31.119 on the windshield of her car, and stalking her at 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:32.470 her job at Sears. 0:18:33.770 --> 0:18:36.670 I was fully involved in not taking the same routes 0:18:36.710 --> 0:18:41.970 home each night and just trying to live my life 0:18:42.010 --> 0:18:42.889 without being followed. 0:18:46.430 --> 0:18:49.649 She renewed her order of protection. She moved to a 0:18:49.690 --> 0:18:52.310 different shelter after he tracked her to the first one. 0:18:54.690 --> 0:18:56.810 You know, he did follow me to four different places 0:18:58.450 --> 0:19:00.409 and threatened me with a knife and told me not 0:19:00.430 --> 0:19:00.810 to scream. 0:19:02.830 --> 0:19:05.780 According to the case file, he didn't just threaten. He 0:19:05.840 --> 0:19:09.859 carjacked her in public. She was stuck in traffic in Danbury, 0:19:09.900 --> 0:19:12.740 Connecticut when he ran up to her window, put that 0:19:12.960 --> 0:19:15.520 knife to her throat, and told her to shove over. 0:19:16.590 --> 0:19:19.550 She screamed so loud that the drivers behind her blared 0:19:19.609 --> 0:19:23.870 their horns. Gomber dropped the knife and fled. She drove 0:19:23.990 --> 0:19:31.260 straight to the cops and told them everything. And still 0:19:31.340 --> 0:19:34.980 she couldn't escape him. He barraged her with pleading letters. 0:19:35.960 --> 0:19:39.119 All were multiple pages, saying the same thing over and over. 0:19:39.780 --> 0:19:44.129 The apologies and self-pity. Then the demand that she come back. 0:19:45.080 --> 0:19:47.790 This went on for weeks and didn't stop there. He 0:19:48.530 --> 0:19:50.640 kept coming to the mall where she worked. 0:19:51.840 --> 0:19:54.680 I had been contacted by security a couple of times 0:19:54.780 --> 0:19:56.760 because they knew what was going on and they would 0:19:56.780 --> 0:19:59.080 be like, hey, he's here, just staying in the back. 0:19:59.720 --> 0:20:07.230 So they were very protective of me, thankfully. And then. 0:20:08.060 --> 0:20:11.199 the back sort of back hallways of the mall we 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:15.000 would use to get to the food court. And you're 0:20:15.040 --> 0:20:17.990 walking down the back hallway and you're reading, you know, 0:20:18.609 --> 0:20:20.270 stuff all over the walls. 0:20:21.630 --> 0:20:25.969 And I'm looking at it and I'm reading it. And 0:20:25.990 --> 0:20:27.530 then I'm like, holy shit. 0:20:29.520 --> 0:20:29.730 Yep. 0:20:30.450 --> 0:20:33.480 He left me fricking letters on the walls of the 0:20:33.520 --> 0:20:34.140 fricking mall. 0:20:35.790 --> 0:20:38.010 Here's an excerpt from one of them, as read by 0:20:38.090 --> 0:20:39.090 our colleague Rob. 0:20:40.490 --> 0:20:42.560 I must have hurt you much more than I'll ever 0:20:42.600 --> 0:20:46.240 know to have you hate me this badly. I'll never 0:20:46.280 --> 0:20:48.780 be able to express to you just how sorry I 0:20:48.900 --> 0:20:51.780 am for hurting you like I did. The guilt of 0:20:51.840 --> 0:20:54.439 hurting you like I did still keeps me awake and 0:20:54.480 --> 0:20:58.120 brings tears to my eyes. By hurting you as much 0:20:58.180 --> 0:21:01.270 as I totally regret it, there is nothing I can 0:21:01.310 --> 0:21:04.959 do now about it except respect your wishes and and 0:21:05.000 --> 0:21:07.560 stay away in hopes that one day you will at 0:21:07.619 --> 0:21:09.260 least give me a chance to explain. 0:21:09.280 --> 0:21:17.090 I took pictures and reported it as another incident because 0:21:17.150 --> 0:21:19.350 I did have a restraining order at that point. 0:21:20.570 --> 0:21:22.230 At the end of the day, though, she was just 0:21:22.270 --> 0:21:25.670 a kid of 19 with a toddler nowhere to turn. 0:21:27.280 --> 0:21:30.600 And then out of nowhere, the letters and stalking stopped. 0:21:31.300 --> 0:21:35.740 No explanation, no final letter from Gombert. He just went 0:21:35.800 --> 0:21:41.320 dark one day. Meanwhile, she learned a troubling fact. Gomber 0:21:41.340 --> 0:21:44.740 was pursuing a friendship with Robin Murphy. He called her 0:21:44.760 --> 0:21:46.980 house off and saying he was desperate to be in 0:21:47.040 --> 0:21:50.139 touch with Anne-Marie. He begged Robin to talk to him 0:21:50.160 --> 0:21:54.240 at the laundromat, then go mediate with Anne-Marie on his behalf. 0:21:55.400 --> 0:21:57.940 Unfortunately, I was in the middle of that, even though 0:21:57.980 --> 0:21:58.590 I wasn't there. 0:21:59.609 --> 0:22:02.270 Having quit her job at ShopRite, she hadn't seen Robin 0:22:02.310 --> 0:22:05.480 in weeks. her at home to try and warn. 0:22:05.200 --> 0:22:09.919 Her when i left him i did reach out to 0:22:09.980 --> 0:22:14.300 her um when i lived in a woman's shelter for 0:22:14.340 --> 0:22:16.859 a period of time but i just told her to 0:22:16.900 --> 0:22:17.980 be careful around him. 0:22:19.470 --> 0:22:20.970 If you could have talked to her on the phone 0:22:21.010 --> 0:22:22.889 if you could have reached her when you called her 0:22:22.910 --> 0:22:25.010 that time what would you have told her. 0:22:26.210 --> 0:22:29.270 That he's probably not what he appears to be um 0:22:33.170 --> 0:22:34.310 That he was unstable. 0:22:36.530 --> 0:22:39.210 And that you should probably keep your distance. 0:22:41.710 --> 0:22:45.379 Three days after Gompert pulled a knife on Anne-Marie, Robin 0:22:45.520 --> 0:22:50.260 Murphy vanished forever. Anne-Marie would spend years replaying that message 0:22:50.320 --> 0:22:53.500 in her head, agonized that she hadn't done more to 0:22:53.580 --> 0:23:16.260 warn her. Five years ago, I reached out to Gombert 0:23:16.300 --> 0:23:19.840 in prison. I was winding down nine months of reporting 0:23:19.900 --> 0:23:22.800 and needed to speak to him for comment. Over the 0:23:22.840 --> 0:23:25.639 course of two phone calls, we talked for a half hour. 0:23:26.420 --> 0:23:30.240 Both calls ended with angry hang-ups. You heard one of 0:23:30.300 --> 0:23:33.280 them at the end of season one. They're all telling 0:23:33.340 --> 0:23:34.699 the same story about you. 0:23:34.720 --> 0:23:35.480 Your M.O. 0:23:35.520 --> 0:23:36.220 Never varies. 0:23:36.660 --> 0:23:39.180 Several months later, though, I got a letter from Gombert. 0:23:39.600 --> 0:23:41.590 Though addressed to me, it included a copy of a 0:23:41.740 --> 0:23:46.869 second letter. one he'd sent to an ex-girlfriend in 2017. 0:23:46.869 --> 0:23:49.290 In the body of that letter, he wrote hundreds of 0:23:49.350 --> 0:23:54.990 words about Robin. Recently, I re-read both of those letters, 0:23:55.670 --> 0:23:59.280 scanning them for clues about his relationship with Robin and 0:23:59.340 --> 0:24:03.380 any breadcrumbs about the night she went missing. The first 0:24:03.420 --> 0:24:06.080 thing Gombert writes about is how he relied on Robin's 0:24:06.119 --> 0:24:10.520 support during his breakup with Anne-Marie. My colleague Rob reads 0:24:10.540 --> 0:24:12.050