Asenath Dukat /// Part 1 /// Episode:583 | Forensic Files

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>> [music] >> And that is enough of the business. >> All right, everybody gather around, grab
a chair, grab a beer. Let's talk some true crime. >> [music] [music] [music] >> As schools all over Ohio and across this
great nation prepare to close down for the summer and kids gear up for the much needed summer break,
it is this time of year every year that many remember and think about little Asenath Louise Ducat.
Friends and family called her Seenie. She was a third grader at Barrington Elementary in the Columbus, Ohio suburb
of Upper Arlington. The city of Upper Arlington and the people who live there are some of the
best that Columbus has to offer. This is an affluent area. Families stay here for generations to
live in this tight-knit community, to raise their children up in a safe, peaceful area, and thrive in nearby
Columbus. Many Ohio State graduates stay or plant their roots here in the city of Upper
Arlington. Seenie's school and home were located in what was thought to be a very safe,
sleepy, upper-class neighborhood. But unfortunately, there was something bad bubbling up.
There was something evil lurking in this very neighborhood. Several girls reported to their parents
that they didn't always feel safe walking in the neighborhood. More than one girl said that she felt
like she had been followed and not just on one occasion. It was difficult to understand what was
happening. The neighborhood, as everyone thought, was still the same old sleepy,
upper-class neighborhood. And maybe these were just the imagined fears of children.
However, that something bad that was bubbling up to the surface boiled over on June 3rd, 1980, just days
before the end of the school year. This is when little Seenie was intercepted by that evil element
somewhere along the very short walk from Barrington Elementary School and her home, which was just blocks away.
The distance was less than a mile, a 20-minute walk. >> [music] >> This is a walk that Seenie made many
times and one that was even shorter for her as kids know all of the shortcuts and
cut-throughs. But on that bright and sunny day, something got her. In the short window of just 4 hours,
Seenie was first missing and then she was gone forever. >> [music] >> According to the Ohio Attorney General
Dave Yost website, on June 3rd, 1980 at 4:34 p.m., Asenath Ducat was reported missing by her parents
after she did not arrive home from school. The victim's parents indicated that Seenie walked home from school and would
usually arrive home at 4:00 p.m. After an extensive search, Seenie's body was discovered in a drainage ditch at
the corner of Riverside Drive and Waltham Road, which is less than one block from her
residence at about 7:30 p.m. the same evening. The investigation revealed that her
death was caused by blunt force trauma to the head and manual strangulation. Investigators believe that the victim
was abducted and murdered at a location other than where she was found. >> [music]
>> The town was devastated. The neighborhood was terrified. Upper Arlington lost one of their own.
A young, outgoing, intelligent little girl was attacked in an area where she likely felt the safest.
>> [music] >> This was her neighborhood where she lived with her four older siblings and her mom
and her dad. >> [music] >> She was literally just a 2-minute walk from her home when she was cornered and
grabbed, >> [music] >> snatched off of the street, and killed just a short time later.
Who would do such a despicable and monstrous act? >> [music] >> How could this happen here?
And how could an entire community in mourning carry on without this bright little girl?
>> [music] >> Upper Arlington did carry on, but so many have not forgotten Seenie
and what happened to her. >> [music] >> It's been over 40 years and the still strong, still proud community where
Seenie lived still remember the talkative, energetic little girl who did not make it home that one day.
That one day when a neighborhood was forever changed and permanently scarred. That one day
when evil came to town. Or did it? You see, there is a lot of evidence in Seenie's case to suggest evil did not
come to town, that evil was already there. Always there lurking in the streets of
the sleepy, upper-class neighborhood. There is good reason to believe that Seenie may have even known her killer or
one of the persons responsible. >> [music] >> The killer or killers may have known that there was only one
way to keep this girl quiet after she was taken and assaulted. But the community has refused to keep
quiet about what happened, what was taken from them, what was stolen away from the city and
the Ducat family. The members of this community are UA and they are UA strong, as strong as a bear with a heart of
gold. The kids in this neighborhood never forgot Seenie. Some to this very day wish that they
would have been walking with the little girl on June 3rd. And if so, maybe this would not have
happened. But unfortunately, from where I stand and the way things look to me, a tragedy like this was simply going to
happen. That bad element was on the rise and that evil was going to bubble up and boil over at some
point. And it did that day when Seenie was at the corner of Waltham and Malvern.
So, it's important to remember that Seenie in her final minutes, >> [snorts] >> while she was scared and surrounded,
she was actually in some not so easily explained way protecting another little girl,
probably even one of her friends. Because this evil did not come to town. It was always there.
Right there in that sleepy upper class neighborhood. Before the end of the school year,
Seeney's classmates in memory of wrote the following acronym for and about Seeney.
But in her proper name, Asenath. This is from Mrs. Suber's third grade class at Barrington Elementary School.
Asenath Ducat, a friendly third grader. >> [music] >> She always had a sunny smile. Her eyes
glimmered and sparkled like stars. Nice, considerate, honest, polite, and aware of other people's feelings.
The class has happy thoughts of her. She will always be remembered. >> [music] >> In August of 1980, Asenath's father,
Alexander, was interviewed by the UA News. I believe this quote clearly showcases the strength, the resolve, and
the compassion of the Ducat family. Quote, "We have suffered a great loss, but it's not a reoccurring one.
She's gone, but the community may have to go through this again. This case doesn't have to be solved for
our benefit. The Lord will deal with this fellow in his own way. We don't wish the killer any vengeance.
Sometimes we pray for his soul that he may be saved, but we are concerned about the safety of others.
He may try to wreak this tragedy on someone else. I can't picture a person who is capable
of rape and murder living a normal life. >> [music] >> I am sure we will hear from him in one
way or another. Alexander Ducat, August 6, 1980. [snorts] >> [music] >> The Ducats were and remained UA and UA
strong. This is True Crime Garage, and this is the still unsolved murder case of Asenath Seeney Ducat.
This is a case that we have wanted to cover for a while [music] now, a couple years in fact. And it's only been
covered a little bit, and here we are today, Captain, covering it for the very first time. And there have been some
speed bumps along the way that got in the way of us covering this at an earlier date, and we will discuss those
at a later time in these episodes. But we are here today to talk about the unsolved murder of Asenath Ducat.
Asenath Ducat was born July 24th, 1971. And on our day in question, she was 8 years old.
She went by the nickname Seeney, and later that day when her parents would report her missing, she was listed as 4
ft 5 and 1/2 in tall, weighing about 68 lb. She had brown hair and brown eyes, and she was in the third grade at
Barrington Elementary School, which was located on Barrington Road in Upper Arlington, which is a suburb of
Columbus, Ohio. >> Our day in question is June 3rd, 1980. >> This is a Tuesday, and this would be a
bright and sunny Tuesday. On this day, Asenath left school at 3:10 p.m. This is 10 minutes later than her usual
dismissal time. Seeney and her classmates had to serve a 10-minute detention for rowdy behavior, disrupting
the class. This delay caused her to miss the crowd that she would have regularly
walked home with. So, typically, she's walking home less than a mile. This walk would take her less than 20 minutes to
make it from the door of her school to the front door of the Ducat family home. And on this day, she's going to be
walking alone because those other friends from other classrooms have left and already made the trek from the
school to their homes. >> There were several eyewitnesses that saw her walking home that day. It's believed
that she disappeared sometime between 3:20 and 4:00 p.m. on that day. Now, what we do have here, Captain, is that
we have a situation where mom gets worried because Seeney usually arrives home every day at the same time. And
when her daughter, her youngest child, is not there, Seeney, she starts to get a little nervous.
And this is going to be followed by sending out the other kids of the Ducat family to go out on their bicycles and
walk the streets and ride their bikes to look for their little sister. It's also
going to be followed with Mrs. Ducat calling the school to ask where her daughter was, and calling a couple of
her friends' parents. I imagine this would be friends that she would typically walk home with.
And she's going to find out about this 10-minute detention and realize very quickly that Seeney was probably
traveling by herself, walking home alone that day from school. Again, this 10-minute detention didn't come about
until the day of, on June 3rd, 1980. She's also going to call her husband, Alex or Alexander, and let him know that
their daughter did not come home from school yet. Alex works within walking distance of the family's home. He will
actually end up leaving work a few minutes early on this day to help go look for little Seeney. So, I'm not that
clear on the details, but it was either the whole class that got a detention or group of kids because they were talking
too much in class, but kind of odd that they would be handed out a 10-minute detention for that day. Normally, you'd
have to serve your detention on another day. Yeah, I'm guessing a couple things here, Captain. One,
it makes sense to me, it's the end of the school year, kids get a little rowdy, they probably weren't listening
to the teacher, teacher gets upset, and has to continually warn the kids, and then decides, you know what, I've got to
make uh example here and let them know that they can't just do whatever they want. So, here's a 10-minute detention,
probably served by the whole class. We got to keep it short, though, I'm guessing because some of those kids are
going to be riding buses home. Some of these kids, as we said, like Seeney, will be walking home. Now, I've heard it
reported that like 1980 was something different than the setup that we have today, that many more kids walked home
back then. If you looked up where the Ducats lived and this Barrington Elementary School, it's less than a
point ninth of a mile. I believe it's typical for kids that live in the same neighborhood as the school to commonly
walk to school. So, I don't believe that it's any different 1980 than it would be
today of the amount of kids that were walking to and from school. When I was growing up, Captain, when you
were growing up, if our school was in the same neighborhood, you just walked because the buses didn't travel that
short distance, or mom and dad would drop you off at the school. Well, Colonel, can you give us a general
overview of this case, and then we can come back through and do a very detailed account of the events? Yes, so as we
said, Seeney was walking home from school. It's believed that she was last seen within just blocks of her home that
day. Her body was eventually found at approximately 7:30 p.m. So, let's note those times here before we get to that
very detailed timeline of June 3rd. We have people that say that they have seen Seeney around 3:20 p.m., maybe even
a few minutes after that. So, we believe that she obviously went missing during some point after that 3:20, 3:25
marker on that day. Her body is found at approximately 7:30 p.m. that day. So, what we're really working with here,
roughly, is a window of about 4 hours where we have a lot of question marks and a lot of blanks to fill in, and I
think we will be able to do that with some of this timeline that we will later present. But her body was found, this is
after an extensive search. Remember, we've already said brothers and sisters are out looking for Seeney. We have
neighborhood kids looking for her, mom and dad are out looking for her, mom's driving around the neighborhood looking
for her. This is followed by an official search that is going to start after the missing
person's report is filed with the Upper Arlington Police Department at 4:34 p.m.
on that same day. So, we got a lot of people in a small area looking for this little girl, and yet we have 4 hours
where we have to fill in and figure out what was going on during that time frame. Her body was found at the mouth
of a culvert located at the corner of Riverside Drive and Waltham Road. So, to give a very basic description of this
area, what we have here, Captain, is Riverside Drive is a very busy road. It was back in 1980, it still is to this
day. In fact, if you look up the population for Upper Arlington, the population is roughly the same today as
what it was back in 1980. It's only about 1,500 people more. So, traffic and things like that are not significantly
different. However, the lay of the land is significantly different, especially right here on this corner. This area has
been landscaped and renovated several times since 1980. Now, think of your neighborhood growing up,
everybody out there in listener land. And you know the busy road that is just outside of your neighborhood that mom
and dad say, "Hey, wherever you go, you can go ride your bikes, you can go play with your friends, but you do not go
near that road, you do not go across that road." Well, this would be that road. Riverside Drive, very busy road.
Waltham Road is right off of Riverside, and it's one of the main vessels through
this neighborhood, through Seeney's neighborhood. Her body is eventually found near this intersection of Waltham
and Riverside Drive. The interesting thing about that to me, Captain, is this is very close to her home. It's less
than 2-minute walk from her front door to where her body was ultimately found. Yeah, my parents would always say,
"Don't play by that busy intersection, but stop hanging out with that kid that thinks he's a colonel."
Too young to be a colonel. So, unfortunately, her body is found 4 hours later, and this is about a block from
her home. And I encourage everyone to look this up on a map, because it will shock you how
close she was found to her home. And it was determined that she was sexually assaulted, and her death was
caused by blunt force trauma to the head and manual strangulation. The murder weapon
I've actually seen several different weights >> [snorts] >> for this murder weapon over the years.
I've seen She was killed with a rock. Someone took a rock and hit her in the head with it.
And I've seen this rock to have weigh as little as 12 lb or as many as 25 lb. Most of the information that I've
reviewed over the years suggests that this is a 20 to 25-lb rock. So, this is a pretty big rock. Now, the area that
she's found, there's a lot of rocks there, and this rock was recovered. It was still at the murder scene. And
that's something that's key to remember here, too. Murder scene. She was killed where she was found. So, what you're
saying is law enforcement believes a perpetrator or multiple perpetrators took her, assaulted her somewhere,
transported her alive to this location, and then the murder took place at that location where she was found. Yes, that
is correct. And here's the I don't think that things were so clear for law enforcement at the time
when they were investigating this case. We have the benefit of 42 years of looking at this case and looking at the
different information that have come up in 42 years. They did not. One thing that police revealed was that there had
been a previous and a very similar attack in that similar area on May 7th. So, less than a month earlier, a similar
type of victim and a very similar type abduction took place in that same neighborhood. Now, this would be news to
some of the people in the neighborhood, but not to everyone in that neighborhood. Were there any
eyewitnesses to this previous situation before the murder? Yes, there were. So, we have
the survivor of the attack, and then we also have a potential eyewitness in that
situation. The thing here, Captain, is eyewitnesses are key in this case. Eyewitnesses for the day that Seeney was
killed, and eyewitnesses on this other attack that may or may not be related. However, what we do know is at the time
of Seeney's murder that police absolutely did think that it was highly likely that the two were in fact
connected, so much so that they are releasing a sketch, a composite sketch, to the public of the individual that
they believe may have been spotted in Seeney's attack, or at least in the area of where Seeney was last seen.
And this is believed to be a similar sketch, a similar composite sketch, to the earlier attack that took place in
May. Again, just less than 1 month earlier. >> [music] [music] >> All right, cheers, mates. Cheers to you,
Captain. Make sure you slap that bass big time. Big time. Detective Ed Tine was one of the lead investigators in
Seeney's murder case. He put together some really invaluable information on this case that I think still holds a lot
of weight to this day. And this is how we can get a clearer picture of those 4 hours that went by from the time that
she was last seen to the time that her body was discovered at the mouth of that culvert. This is a timeline put together
by Detective Ed Tine, and it starts roughly at 3:00 p.m., and it's going to take us all the way up until about 7:30
p.m. that night. Now, a lot of these names have been redacted, and then on top of that, these times are not exact.
Most of them are going to be approximate. So, I think it was key to give an overview of the general
information of the case and what is known of that day first before we start getting into the specifics, because this
could get a little confusing without having that information prior. At the start of
Detective Tine's timeline, we have 3:10 p.m., and it's stated here that the victim, Seeney Thuka, and the rest of
her third grade class was dismissed after they had been held over for 10 minutes for a class detention.
Normal dismissal time was 3:00 p.m., as we've already discussed. At 3:10 p.m., we have a lady that is driving home. She
returns to her home on Waltham Road. Waltham Road is not only part of the intersection where her body was found
near, but this will be part of her route home, back to her house. Now, this lady
says that at about 3:10 p.m., she pulls into her driveway on Waltham Road, and she observed an
unknown male white wearing blue jeans, a white shirt, and possible blue jean jacket walking out of the field.
And this is a field that is located directly across from the intersection of Waltham
and Hillside. This location is eight city blocks west of the Barrington Elementary School, so very near Seeney's
school. At approximately 3:15 to 3:20 p.m., a classmate of Seeney's sees her walking, observes her walking westbound
on Waltham Road crossing Arlington Avenue. Now, at 3:15 p.m., this is just 5 minutes after the lady that lived on
Waltham returned home, she goes outside to do some lawn work and notices that the man that she saw earlier is no
longer there. She does not see him at this time. We also have a second classmate of Seeney's see her walking
west on Waltham at Coventry and Barrington around this same time. It's important to remember that any
individual that's seen at this time in this area could be a suspect. >> We have a driver that reports that
approximately 3:20 p.m. I think this time is probably a little early in the timeline, but again, we're going off of
this eyewitness, off of their report, that says at approximately 3:20 p.m. while driving westbound on Waltham Road
and at Malvern Road, he observed a male white with dark glasses carrying a limp girl into the yard of, and then the name
is redacted, off of Malvern Road. He also saw a red bicycle lying along the curb in the south side of Waltham and
Malvern Road. So, this is interesting, because later, of course, we know that Seeney is abducted
and killed in this area. This motorist at this time does not believe what he is witnessing to be anything of importance
until, of course, later that day at 7:30, when we find out the worst thing that a neighborhood could experience
experience. He's saying simply that he saw the bike, he saw a girl being carried away by a
guy. He made the assumption that she had wrecked her bike, was injured, and this
was either her brother or father tending to her and carrying her away. So, what he believes that he sees is
something very innocent, something very normal. However, he's going to find out hours later that something not innocent
and not normal at all happened in this general area, maybe at this same time. And we're going to have a lot more
eyewitnesses to this male on a bicycle. Yeah, at approximately 3:20 p.m., we have another witness who says that they
observed a male white with dark hair, approximately 18 to 21 years of age, riding westbound
at Golford and Fairfax on a bicycle. He was wearing a white shirt and dark trousers. This seems to match up with
the previous descriptions we have by other eyewitnesses. Again, we see the bicycle and we see a similar outfit
along with uh similar age description for this unknown male. At 3:25, we have a similar report of another individual
that lives on Tremont Road. This says that they observed a male in his 20s, 6-ft tall-ish, average build
with brown hair, white short-sleeve shirt, dark pants, running south, and carrying a small child.
The witness goes on to say that she also saw a red bicycle on the south side of Waltham in the bushes by the pine trees.
>> Now, can you imagine if you saw a teenager or somebody in their early 20s carrying a child? This is not going to
look natural. This is not going to look like they're playing around. At the same
time though, you got to keep in mind around this 3:00 hour, we have two schools in this neighborhood. So, you're
going to see a lot of kids kind of out walking around or on bikes at this time. >> Right. The other thing too that we need
to point out because that description that I gave is just a little tricky there.
The witness lives on Tremont. She's not saying that she saw or witnessed this on
Tremont Road. She's saying that she witnessed this near Waltham Road on the in the bicycle was on the south side of
Waltham Road. So, this individual lives nearby but was driving in this general area where they witnessed this man or
young man carrying a small child. We also need to point out that this Tuesday in 1980 was a primary election day.
And we have two locations in this neighborhood that are voting locations. So, we have additional people that are
out and about on this day for the purpose of voting. And we get our first witness,
eyewitness, who says that on their way to voting saw something that might be of interest
to our case. So, this is a woman who lives on Riverside Drive. Says that she walked to vote at First Community
Village. First Community Village is very near where Seeney Ducat's body was later
found. She says that she crossed the culvert on her way and observed a male white standing on the south side of the
creek at approximately 100 yards east of her. She said that there was something red
and blue cloth-like on the ground in front of him. This occurred between 3:25 p.m. and
4:20 p.m. Now, another thing to note there as well. I know that she's giving us a window of time that is
approximately an hour. But, this individual is crossing the same culvert where Seeney Ducat's body will later be
found. I've walked and crossed this culvert several times. I would find it incredibly difficult to
believe that anybody, whether they were looking around or not, would not have seen her lying there on that day at that
time. So, what this tells me is even though we don't know exactly what time this woman is walking and crossing the
culvert. She says between 3:25 p.m. and 4:20 p.m. Whatever time she crossed that culvert,
Seeney is not there. She's not there at this time. And that's going to be key to our case.
Now, at approximately 3:40 to 3:50 p.m. we have another woman who returns to the
culvert after voting and decides to pick up a rock from the creek that she's going to take home and use as
a paperweight. The rock came from the location where the body is later discovered. Again, this person gives us
a different window, 3:40 to 3:50 p.m. So, now we can say, based off of these two eyewitness statements,
that even if we go to the earliest parts of their timeline, of their window that
they provide for us, that at 3:25 to 3:40 p.m. Seeney is not located, she's not in that culvert at
that time. So, our window for those 4 hours is starting to shrink a little bit. Now, if we were to take that out to
the end of their windows, we're up to 4:20 p.m. I mean, doesn't seem a little insane the day that they find
this missing murdered girl where there's a bunch of rocks at that somebody stopped to pick up a rock to
use it for a paperweight? It seems very bizarre to me, number one, but number two, I think that it it's one of those
things that come up in in question, you know, when when police interview you and
you're telling them about your day, they want to know why you did everything. Why
the hell would you stop to pick up a rock? Or why did you notice that she wasn't there?
What what proof do you have for that? Why were you looking around? Why weren't you just minding your own business?
Well, I decided to stop and pick up a rock for a paperweight. Sounds weird to me. However, I don't have this person's
name as it's been redacted, so I don't know if I should be questioning her statement if she's just a regular
Mrs. Citizen, then I don't question her statement and I believe it to be true. And I'm really just trying to figure out
when Seeney was placed in that culvert because that's a fact that we know for certain that happened. And we have the
statement of police saying that she was killed there. So, we're trying to shrink this window
of time, this 4 hours to a much smaller amount of time because we have all these
different people that are seen in the area walking about at this time. One of those people that were seen is
responsible for this, if not more than one that was seen. And so, we want to really narrow down who it could be that
placed Seeney in that culvert that day. Well, here's something that's also pretty strange in this case. Mr. Ducat,
like you were stating earlier, he works close enough to the family's home that he could walk home. Well, he is going to
cross that that culvert where she is found. So, if she was there at the time, it's most likely that Mr. Ducat would
have seen his daughter. Yeah, we're going to be able to put a lot of people in this area where her body would
eventually be found that do not see her there. They do not see her body lying in
that culvert. And that really shrinks the window here. So, again, he would have had to walk
across this little bridge to get over this culvert. And I'm telling you, there's no way unless you got blinders
on, man, on both sides of your head. There's no way that you're not seeing her lying there on the rocks.
At 4:40 p.m. is when Mr. Ducat left work. And he walked home. His normal route would make him cross that culvert.
Right. >> have an exact time for when he was crossing that bridge that day, but we
know it was after 4:40 p.m. So, our window is getting even smaller. This is going to take us all the way up
to 5:55 to approximately 6:00 p.m. when we have a woman who lives on Waltham Road. She walked across the culvert on
her way to vote. Again, does not see Seeney in the culvert. We're now up to 6:00. Her
body's going to be found before 7:30 p.m. I think one of the things that makes cases more difficult,
like in the '80s, is that not everybody has a clock on them. Where now, almost everybody carries a cell phone. Your
cell phone has some some kind of clock on it. And also, you have then time frames of well, I saw
this happen and then this person text me, so I know it was before that time. Where in the '80s, if you're not
carrying a pocket watch or a wrist watch, you probably have no reference of time. So, some of these people's
time frames could be off by, you know, 10 to 15 minutes, give or take. The other thing that we didn't have or
wasn't so readily available back then that we have today is this First Community Village where people were
going to and from for voting purposes. They would have had Today, they got a bunch of cameras set up. So, they'd be
able to go, "Okay, Mrs. So-and-so says that she crossed the culvert to come here and vote and we have her walking
through our doors at this time. And Mr. So-and-so says that he left and then had
to cross the culvert to get back to his house. Well, we have him leaving our doors at this time." And so, we would be
able to get more exact times. These times to me are still incredibly important and it's important to shrink
this window. We have another eyewitness. This is two people, actually, that say between 6:15 and 6:30 p.m. we have a
woman with her son. Her son is young. We know this because he's on a tricycle. If
he's If he's not young, that would be weird. >> Hey, sounds awesome sauce to me.
>> But, the two of them cross the culvert between 6:15 and 6:30 p.m. This, again,
the same location where the body was later found. Now, at 7:26 p.m. Officer Mike Worley, along with two other
individuals. Remember, by this point in the evening, we have neighbors, friends,
neighborhood kids out looking for Seeney. Plus, we have the police actively looking for Cini at this time.
So, at 7:26 p.m., we have a a police officer along with two adults from the neighborhood.
The three of them together sadly discover the body of Acenith Ducat lying at the base of an open culvert in a
stream located on the north side of First Community Village. And this is directly from the police report. The
victim is lying in approximately 4 in of running water with a large rock covering
her head. Her head had been crushed by the large limestone rock that had been taken from the creek bed. She was fully
clothed, although there were indications that her pants had been down at one time
and then pulled back up. It was observed that the pants were unbuttoned and there
was grass in her undergarments. Well, such a sad scene and we we see so many cases like Delphi or West Memphis 3
where the the whole community is searching for a missing child or missing children and that they don't discover
the bodies until the next day. This one within a couple hours they're discovering her body. It's almost like
these killers or killer is almost not worried about even trying to conceal the body
whatsoever. Correct. And actually, what I think has happened here, Captain, is we run into a situation where things
started going badly for the killer or killers and now they're just making impulsive decisions based off of getting
the hell out of the area as quickly as they can. Again, it's awfully confusing and such risky behavior to see such a
horrible act in such a a a a crime take place in an area that we can clearly see
there's a lot of movement. There's a lot of people out and about for the purpose
of voting this around the evening hours. But again, go back to the 3:00 hour. We
have two schools in this neighborhood that are letting out in that 3:00 hour. So, there's a lot of kids out and about
during the time that she was abducted. Unless one were to think that she was just hanging out and doing God knows
what for 3 hours before something terrible happened to her. And I don't think anybody believes that at all. I
certainly don't believe it. I think she was snatched on her way home from school
and then obviously, based off of the timeline we just went through, she had to be gone
for several hours before someone placed her in that culvert because we have all these people that say they walked across
that culvert and did not see Acenith Ducat at any time. Well, what's so sad, too, is that she would be more likely to
talk to a kid, you know, somebody in their late teens, even early 20s. When you're
that age, 8 years old, you're you're viewing a even a 20-year-old as one of you, you know, like, oh, that's
just a older kid. You don't necessarily with kids and teenagers view them as dangerous. And so, they
were able to lure her in and then then this assault takes place and now they go, well,
there's a good chance that she knew her attacker or attackers because it seems like they're they thought the
only the only way out of this is that we have to kill her so she can't identify us.
>> Well, and the thing here is that goes back everything that you're saying goes
back to all of these eyewitness accounts, right? The other people in the area at the time that are spotted by the
citizens saying, "Hey, yeah, I we have one person saying I saw the victim walking home at this time in this
location." And we have other eyewitnesses saying, "I saw a young male, probably 20 years old, of average build,
approximately 6 ft tall. He's in the area at the same time. We have two people that say they believe
they saw a similar-looking man carrying a small child or a little girl across the street around the same time
that Acenith would have been abducted on her way home. Now, I want to take this opportunity to clear up a couple things
here because I've seen it reported plenty of times this way that there were some unusual
deviations in Cini's route that she took home that day. I have discussed this with several people and
confirmed this with people that knew Cini and it was explained to me as such that
Cini had a preferred route that she would take from her school to her home. And there was a group of kids that she
would typically walk with. Well, some of the other kids in the group had a different route that they
preferred. And when the kids when the entire group was there, they would take this other route. It's a more
straightforward route, less turns, less twist. Cini's route might be a little quicker,
but for whatever reason, it's been noted by several of her friends that this was
the route that she preferred. Now, we do know that she was walking alone that day
and so, she would have taken her preferred route. Now, we go back to the idea of unusual deviations. Well, why
would they believe that there were unusual deviations? Well, we know the route that she ultimately took on the
day that she was abducted and killed because we have several things. One, we have the eyewitness statements of what
time and where she was and where she was walking at those times, as well as they
brought in a scent dog to track her movements from the school and her route home that she took.
So, I believe that the earlier portions of her route that have those deviations are simply based off of a route that she
preferred. And that was the route that she chose to take that day. Now, the other deviations that are the later
part of her route, those aren't deviations that she was making by choice. In my opinion, Captain, that is when she
started to get nervous. She was being followed. She did not like somebody that she's seeing in the area. She felt
uneasy and maybe she diverted from her route to get away or to avoid someone. Or
a scarier thought, at some point she's being chased by this individual. Well, let's dive into some
of the details of this murder scene. Yes, because the layout of where Cini is ultimately found is very important to
this case and figuring out who is responsible. So, her body is actually found near a
near the mouth of a culvert. This culvert runs under a service road. And mind you, if you look at pictures from
1980 compared to 2022, the layout of this land has changed a little bit over the years. It's been filled out a little
more. But the other place that is curious that is nearby this culvert where her body is
found is a tunnel which the locals, or at least the children of the neighborhood, called Frankenstein's
Cave. Now, we mentioned earlier that your parents, if you lived in this neighborhood, would tell you, "Do not go
to Riverside Drive. You do not cross Riverside Drive walking or on your bike. The road is just far too busy. It's too
dangerous for people crossing on foot or on a bike." But this Frankenstein's Cave is a larger
tunnel that runs underneath that Riverside Drive. Now, this would be another location that your parents would
likely tell you that you are not allowed to go to. The other thing, too, as a child, you
may not want to go there anyway because it's called Frankenstein's Cave. If there were anybody to be hanging out
there, this would be the older kids, the teenagers, the maybe people were down there drinking beer smoking a joint. And
somebody had spray-painted Frankenstein's Cave inside the tunnel on one of the walls, the tunnel wall. So,
this is how it kind of got its name. Other than that, it's a little tricky to figure out where the name came from. But
ultimately, Cini's body is recovered at the mouth of this culvert, which is underneath the service road, runs
underneath the service road that is near Frankenstein's Cave that runs underneath
Riverside Drive. Again, we had multiple witnesses that are traveling that are traversing this
area, this exact area for that 4-hour time period of when she was gone. So, you have to believe, based
off of those witnesses not seeing her there where she's later found, that she wasn't there until much later in the
evening, closer to the time that she was discovered. Again, the time that we have
on record for the police is 7:26 p.m. There was also a brief description in the Columbus Dispatch
about her autopsy. >> Yes, according to the June 10th, 1980 Columbus Dispatch, "Skull, brain injury killed Ducat girl,
autopsy shows" is the headline. A brief description of that article is as follows. In a Columbus Dispatch
newspaper article published on the 10th, a preliminary autopsy reported that 8-year-old Acenith Ducat
died of skull fractures and brain contusions inflicted when she was struck on the head with a 20-lb shale-type
rock. The autopsy also showed that the third grader had been raped. Hand prints were left on both sides of her throat as
her attacker choked her. Bruises were found beneath both eyes and on the left side of the nose.
Upper Arlington police were to distribute pamphlets describing the murder suspect to motorists on Waltham
Road near where the body was found. They hoped to find another witness in addition to the woman who is thought to
have seen the killer carrying the youngster into the retirement complex grounds. Police also believed that
Ducat's killer was the same person involved in the attack of another schoolgirl on May 7th.
Police described the man as white, between the ages of 16 and 20 years old with a Mediterranean look. The killer
was riding a red Schwinn 10-speed bicycle. >> [music] [music] >> Thank you for joining us here in the
garage. We would be [music] nothing without you. We love you and thank you so much for the support and telling your
friends and family about us. That's how we continue to grow and we appreciate you more
than we can even begin to put into words. Join us back here in the garage tomorrow.
>> And until then, be good, be kind, and don't litter. >> [music] [music]

Asenath Dukat /// Part 1 /// 583

Original Release: 5-31-2022 Part 1 of 2

www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

This week we are taking a look at a local Cold Case. 3rd grader Asenath Dukat was abducted and murdered on a short walk home through her neighborhood in 1980. This all took place in a very safe neighborhood or so we thought. What was learned was that Asenath’s case was just one of several attempted abductions and assaults of similar victims. Now forty two years later, there is still no justice for this little girl and her family. A special thanks goes out to the good people of The Long Walk Home. This is a local project dedicated to Asenath, the Dukat family, the UAPD and the good people of Upper Arlington, Ohio. Their extensive and brilliant work on Asenath’s case has helped to keep this case alive and the investigation “active.” For a complete case review and study please visit them at www.LongWalkHomeUA.com

Beer of the Week - Uni-Chrome by Pipeworks Brewing Co.

Garage Grade - 4 and a half bottle caps

Brief Summary

The episode discusses the unsolved murder of 8-year-old Seenie Ducat in Ohio in 1980, detailing her disappearance and the investigation.

Key points

The Tragic Case of Seenie Ducat. A young girl went missing in a seemingly safe neighborhood, leading to a devastating discovery.
Eyewitness Accounts. Eyewitnesses provide crucial details about Seeney's last moments and the timeline of events.
Detective Ed Tine's Timeline. Detective Tine outlines a timeline from Seeney's dismissal to her body discovery.
The Discovery of Seeney's Body. Neighbors and police discover Seeney's body in a culvert, shocking the community.
Autopsy Reveals Tragic Details. The autopsy of 8-year-old Acenith Ducat revealed she died from severe head injuries and was raped.
Witnesses Sought for Murder Case. Police are distributing pamphlets to find more witnesses related to the murder of Ducat.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

Evil was already there, always lurking in the streets.

Discussion about the neighborhood's hidden dangers.

10:05WatchApr 20, 2026

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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