Denise Pflum /// Part 1 /// 651 | Forensic Files

[Music] thank you [Music] [Music] thank you welcome to True Crime garage wherever
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talk some true crime foreign [Music] forever [Music] the pain never goes away for the family
of those that reported as last seen here are last seen by who posters have become synonymous with the
missing missing posters or missing Flyers no one needs a definition or clarification
you can close your eyes and envision the template when you are out and about on occasion you may see a poster or flyer
and you stop and you look and you make a mental note of some of the information listed
the poster flyer headline missing last scene seeking information and have you seen me
[Music] today's case Denise flum is a case that is easily remembered for many reasons
but one of those is for The Unique last name spelled p f l u m the missing posters show us what she
looks like they contain all the pertinent information that might help someone to identify her
like Denise's missing poster on missingkids.org reads missing since March 28 1986.
missing from Connersville Indiana date of birth January 14 1968. age now 55. if she's still alive
a Caucasian female missing since she was just 18 years old with brown hair brown eyes and she is
listed as five foot six inches tall and weighing about 135 pounds this poster is complete with two photos
of Denise it looked like they were taken some time during her senior year of high school
if we achieve nothing else in covering this story this spans several decades and has several suspects
we hope that at the very least we can tell you what the posters cannot Denise flum was last seen leaving her
parents home in Connersville Indiana it was Good Friday just about a half past noon
she was going back to an area where she attended a party the night before she was going to look for her purse
almost 37 years later and Denise has not come home like most cold cases there have been
plenty of tips theories and rumors some claim to know what happened to Denise some claim to know where she is buried
detectives have talked to prisoners they say they know who was responsible but also like many cold cases
this case faces a key problem time the Indiana State Police and the Fayette County Sheriff's Department have some
physical evidence they have some witness statements and incriminating statements made by
suspects but everyone stopped expecting Denise to return long ago sadly they have been reserved to looking
for her remains Judy flum Denise's mother said nine years ago that it is likely that someone killed
Denise but Judy still clings to some tiny amount of hope that Denise is alive somewhere
Judy says quote the pain never goes away you learn to wall it off and you go about your daily
business you don't think you're going to lose your mind like we did back then like we said detectives have some
physical evidence they have some witness statements and incriminating statements
made by suspects but what will it take to finally catch a break in this case well that likely will come in one of two
forms either getting a confession or finding her remains this True Crime garage and this is the case
of Denise flum right away [Music] missing since March 28 1986 Denise flum was just 18 years old
when she vanished and that's what this story really is to me the first thing that jumps off the page here Captain is
that she simply poof seems to disappear Into Thin Air very few traces of this young woman this is one of those stories
you hear them time and time again one bad night one bad day and it turns into a lifetime of Torment for a family an
endless heartache for a pack of friends portions of today's trailer leading into
this case description and timeline came from a 2014 Indianapolis Star article by
Christine Guerrera and in 1986 Palladium Item article by Harold Wiley now what those missing posters cannot tell you is
that Denise flum was fun she was likable she had a bunch of friends and all of her life's intermediate goals she had
them all planned out she had worked very hard to lay the foundation of the path that stood in front of her what likely
would seem like a future that was just footsteps ahead of her it was Denise's senior year at Connersville High School
in the Hoosier State of Indiana Denise was 18 and all set to graduate with the end of the school year just months away
she was sixth in her class and one teacher referred to Denise as a perfectionist like you said she was six
in her class but she also played three Sports yeah beyond the typical high school curriculum she played softball
basketball volleyball and she was a long time member of the science club but more
importantly at Connersville High School Denise ran track and she was hoping to secure a track scholarship
after graduation the plan was to go off to the neighboring state of Ohio and attend Miami University in the fall she
planned to study microbiology March 27 1986 was a Thursday and on that Thursday night Denise and Friends attended a
local high school party she went to the party with one of her closest friends her name is Kim this was
that time that time of year that time in most people's lives and a time that most
of us have been fortunate enough to experience you've already put in all of the hard work High School graduation was
imminent it was that short little window of time that goes by so fast but it is a time
that one can focus on socializing and creating some last minute memories with high school friends both new and old
before shipping oneself off into the uncharted waters of a college that may be far away but as we already said in
Denise's case Miami University it was just about 30 miles or so away from home just far enough that one could spread
their wings a bit but close enough to keep tight with family this party here is a great place to start off our
timeline leading up to Denise going missing this party was on a Thursday and it was going to be hopping yeah the
party was going to be hopping you nerds now it's spring break this week and the kids were ready to gather and
throw down from my understanding Captain a lot of the locals traveled out of town
and out of state for a big spring break getaway but not Denise she had track to attend to she had school and other
things that she was concerned with and so she was going to do a bit of a staycation if you will and hang out with
some friends Denise attended the party that night as did about 100 or so other students now this is curious to me
because I've reviewed many reports on the timeline of Denise going missing the number of persons attending this
party seems to be up for debate I've seen it reported as few as 100 people or 200 people maybe even as many
as a few hundred people which seems a bit exaggerated to me it sounds like the fish that I caught when I was on
vacation that keeps getting bigger and bigger every time I tell the story there are only so many people that attended
Connersville High School this was not a huge town this is a small town back then
I believe the population was about 17 000 people and with some of them out traveling for
spring break I question how much of a quote high school party this was how many adults do we have attending this
big party but it was a typical party where they'd have a bonfire in those scenarios you have a lot of people
coming and going maybe staying for a beer and then leaving on the way to the party Kim and Denise stopped off at a
place called the Greenwood Inn this was to buy beer to take with them to the party now her purse becomes a big
portion of this story and I want to go ahead and throw out there that I have a lot of questions about this purse
situation so we're going to jump in and out of the purse situation from time to time throughout our timeline here but
for our story the way that this is typically reported is that she left her purse at this party
and then would need to go and retrieve it the following day I found it interesting that once you dive a little
bit deeper into the story that she actually misplaced the purse at the party and was aware of that situation
before leaving that night that she was seen and there are several people that have stated that they saw her or spoke
with her and she was actively looking for her purse at the party with all those other reports the shorter versions
I just made the Assumption as it was reported that she had left her purse there like so many of us do leave your
phone somewhere leave something else and then have to retrieve it later that evening or the following day
but no her purse was misplaced sometime during the party and she was actively looking for it and at some point she
leaves the party and goes home so other than missing her purse losing her purse at the party everything seems pretty
normal on this Thursday evening and night so March 27th is the party she wakes up on the 28th and obviously she's
concerned because she doesn't have her driver's license she doesn't have any money so she wants to head back to where
the party was and now that it's daylight maybe she'll be able to find her purse that's correct so she decides to venture
out around 12 30 p.m Denise left her home to retrieve her purse and as the captain pointed out she's leaving the
home with simply her car keys and her vehicle and she has no money she has no identification or driver's license
because those items are in her purse that she lost the night before and her family is aware that she's going to be
heading back to the party site to try to look for her purse now the party site is
only about 15 minutes away from her home the interesting thing here is it's obvious to everyone that Denise for
whatever reason did not want to go alone to go looking for this purse we know this because she called a few of
her friends two of them in fact that we have names for that she asked hey can you go with
me back to where the party was I need to find my purse both of her friends that she spoke to were unable to go with her
now there's some question as to what this could mean here it could be just as simple as a teenager that doesn't want
to miss out on hanging out with some friends hey could you join me for this errand that I need to run or was there
something else going on here where she did not want to go alone back to that location of the party to retrieve her
purse Denise's house was about seven miles outside of Connersville and so this party location it's pretty remote
so I could see somebody going there's nothing out there there's nobody out there I'd like for somebody to come with
me and we know the time that she left for two factors one her younger sister was at home at the time and again this
is around 12 30 pm and on her way out Denise stopped and briefly had a conversation with one of
her neighbors the conversation with her neighbor is believed to be and reported to be the last confirmed sighting of
Denise now fast forward to later that evening when Denise doesn't return home that
night her parents of course they begin to worry this is not like they're very responsible daughter to not return home
well she was also known to check in a lot so her mom starts calling the house I think at round two So within an hour
and a half her mom's going there's there's something wrong because she hasn't come home yet
and like I said it's not that far of a drive out to to the party site and you're exactly right mom got a very
uneasy feeling very early on in this case now her parents they're nervous they don't know why Denise is not
returned so of course they go to local law enforcement and they report their daughter is missing they try to
inform the police and ask for their help however it's 1986 the person we're talking about
is only 18 years old and of course the cops are telling Mom and Dad don't worry about it she probably took off with some
friends she'll be back late tonight she'll be back in the morning it's spring break who knows what's going on
she'll return don't worry about it yeah but I have a big problem with this with law enforcement your job is to Serve and
Protect this is maybe a 15-minute drive out to the party site from their location maybe
20 at tops send a cruiser out there just to check on her yeah this is something I've always had an issue with
and we've talked about this plenty of times here in the garage and you can understand it's one of those debatable
items one of those one of those arguments where you can sympathize with the police department and say well they
you know you get these reports of these teenagers and then 99 of the time they turn up no harm no foul other than they
weren't where they were supposed to be they've done upset mom and dad and it's as simple as that now on the other side
of that argument is where you empathize with the parents and with the loved ones
in the family and you say my God man help us out here we we are coming to you we we put a lot of thought
into coming to you we didn't just show up willy-nilly this is about eight hours after she was last seen our daughter
sixth in her class this isn't like her she's not someone that runs the streets she's not someone that's out all hours
of the night and as you said Captain she's somebody that regularly checks in with Mom or Dad
so this is incredibly out of character the other argument that I have here is when we talk about these smaller towns
this seems more strange to me in these smaller towns now I know 1986 a lot of things have changed since then a lot of
police departments and law enforcement agencies have changed their protocol for looking for missing persons much earlier
than they would have in the 70s and the 80s but when you have these smaller towns
forgive me small towns but part of me goes what else you got going on out there nothing and that's the problem
because uh object at rest stays at rest and I think that's what happens is they go well we're not doing anything right
now so instead of getting off our getting off of our ass and looking for somebody we're gonna stay in lazy mode
and that's just the thing man you signed up for this job likely not to be a hero but as the
captain pointed out to Serve and Protect and you find yourself when you work as a
first responder you find yourself in a situation where you could end up being the hero and this case needed a hero
other than her parents and some people that come along much later in this investigation I don't see a whole lot of
Heroes here in this case well I don't even know if this case needs a hero as much as it just needs somebody to do
their job that they signed up for they took an oath like I said 15 to 20 minute drive out there and look if something
bad happened to her at that location maybe there would be something that the officer would come across maybe another
vehicle maybe another person out there you talk to detectives we talk to detectives all the time and one of the
things that we hear about in these cold cases time and time again is had we just spoke to the right person
early enough in the investigation had we just found this one piece of evidence that we know was covered up or discarded
of later if we would have found that earlier in our investigation this would be a solved case this would be a
completely different situation you and I captain here might not be sitting here 30 some years later discussing Denise
flum still being missing now what could have happened is the officer could have said sure give
me the description of Denise heck he or she may have even known the flums this was not a large town give us a
description of her car that's even more important because cops are very good at finding Vehicles now they don't go out
looking that does not stop her parents that does not stop her family from calling people they know they're calling
hospitals and businesses calling friends asking where Denise could be they're rounding up people and they're going out
and they're doing their own search an unorganized one but they are conducting their own search starting that night as
soon as they are turned away for a lack of a better word from law enforcement they start actively searching for their
daughter they were doing so before they showed up to law enforcement but they continued the search that night and then
on to the next day it would be quite some time before law enforcement would get involved in the search for and nice
flaw the following day we are now at March 29th Denise's car is found parked near a farm the car was
parked alongside Tower Road this is a gravel small Gravel Lane or road that is east
of Glenwood and the car is parked near a barn yeah technically the road is Fielding road but all the locals call it
Tower Road the landowner would later tell police that the vehicle hasn't left that spot where it was found
since he says about 12 30 pm to approximately 1 15 p.m the day before this is interesting because this lines
up with our timeline we know that she left her home at approximately 12 30 PM the day before and as the captain
pointed out we're talking about a 15-minute drive to get to where she needed to go to look for this purse
and so it would appear that if Denise took off or if something bad happened to her that this vehicle was placed there
by someone or Denise herself a relatively short time after she left her home yeah and this this road Tower
Road like the locals call it is only four miles from the party site but it's still strange because if you're looking
for your purse you're not gonna find it four miles away right right unless that purse grew legs you're not finding it
four miles away now the interesting thing here Captain points out four miles away I've seen one report that says it's
approximately a six minute drive from the general Party location from the night before the point here is that
according to multiple reports there was no reason for Denise to be in that area where her car was found so at
this point they're not able to find Denise but like the colonel said they found her vehicle the vehicle is a white
or cream-colored Buick Regal 1981 when the vehicles found the doors are locked and the keys are gone
and as said no one could come up with a reason for the vehicle to be in that location the family also believes that
the car seat was in the position that Denise would normally have it in when she was driving and there seemed like
there was no crime scene or no sign of a struggle inside that vehicle so there's
pretty much no evidence around the vehicle also it's a rural area no Footprints were found around the vehicle
yeah very interesting and keep in mind that at the time when her Vehicles found it's found when the family and friends
are out searching for Denise police have not joined in the search effort at this
time now they once they find the vehicle they report this to police and now the police are getting involved the police
look it over and they determined that there's no sign of a struggle there's no sign of Foul Play as far as they can see
regarding the vehicle the condition of the vehicle and the seat is in that normal position the normal position that
Denise would have left it in this is according to her parents and Denise as we said is five foot six
inches tall and we've seen in some cases where the seat position can be rather important
because we may have a very short woman who owns the vehicle and the seat is found all the way extended away from the
steering wheel indicating a much taller person may have driven the vehicle here we have a situation where it's hard for
me to tell given the description by the police and the pictures that I've seen and the statements from her parents I
think one could make a strong argument that Denise may have placed this vehicle there herself
or if somebody else did they left little evidence behind to indicate that someone
else moved this vehicle after a rather quick assessment of Denise's car the cars returned to Denise's parents and
unlike the vehicle Denise never comes home [Music] all right away foreign [Music]
all right we are back cheers mates thanks for joining us here in the garage cheers to you captain now this should be
a homicide case not a missing person's case Denise had a lot of plans in place she was excited for the future she had a
good home life she was vocal and openly expressing to those she knew how excited
she was for some of the upcoming events in her life and we're talking about things like prom graduation going off to
school and mind you she had an opportunity to go with friends on a trip out of town for spring break and chose
not to because she wanted to stay and focus on her schooling which the main reason was track track was starting up
and was Act active at that time that week and she wanted to stay involved with track it was one of her passions
well this is my problem with law enforcement they do this a lot in missing person cases where they tell the
family well look she probably ran away and there's zero evidence that she ran away we don't know if she ever found her
purse so as far as we know she has no money she has no identification like you said there's evidence that she
stayed in town to keep pursuing her goals and then on top of that law enforcement
didn't even really search her car that well and didn't search her house so it's not like they went back to her house and
found Journal upon Journal of her wanting to escape her life or something we've seen a bunch of these cases where
it appears that we may have a missing person and then the missing person's case turns into a homicide investigation
and we've seen multiple times where a vehicle is found and it's returned to the family
heck we covered one case very recently gave the Bowman where I believe that the police returned the vehicle to the prime
suspect the vehicle is not processed properly and there is a lost opportunity there for evidence that could lead you
to what actually happened to Denise flump well I just think it's a common misstep by law enforcement it needs to
stop happening unless you have some evidence that they wanted to start a new life or
they wanted to run away with somebody I mean it's not even like she had a relationship with somebody that was from
out of town there was there's just no reason that she would want to take off the other thing too is I never
understand why especially in this case when you have an 18 year old daughter why the police aren't saying to Mom and
Dad hey it's probably nothing we still think that there's an opportunity that she may return
but would you mind if we hold this vehicle in a secured location for x amount of days and in case this turns
into something else right you could have lost evidence in this case especially if
this vehicle was moved by the person responsible for her disappearance yeah finding a fingerprint in that vehicle
could be a a big deal there's no doubt in my mind Mom and Dad say yes please hold on to this car and here's the other
thing too you find a person's vehicle a missing person's vehicle you look it over and you go I don't see a sign of
struggle I don't see any signs obvious evidence of Foul Play the vehicle itself being parked in a strange location with
no person with no owner to be found is in itself evidence of Foul Play in my mind yes I agree and the other problem
that I keep going back to is why is this vehicle four miles away from the party site
correct she went to the party site to look for her purse it would make sense if you found her car at the party site
but we don't we find it four miles away on this Gravel Road basically one of the most
heartbreaking parts of this story is Denise's parents they I watched a bunch of interviews with them these short
little news clips from 1986. where they keep saying like we don't believe she had any reason to
run away she was not that type but we're hoping and praying that she ran away right and you have her father on
camera saying me and her mother are questioning everything right did we not show enough affection did we not tell
her that we loved her enough we could have said it more I guess we should have said it more and it's this heartbreaking
thing where you're constantly telling law enforcement and the media please take this seriously because my daughter
she's not the type she would not run away but oh I'm praying and hoping that she did well I think that's coming from
law enforcement I mean the the lead detective Ted mcquinley was also related to the father
he was the cousin he was David's cousin yeah so I think then that becomes a does
a conflict of interest anyways you probably shouldn't be the lead detective if you are related to the
father because look like I said it shouldn't be viewed as a missing person case it should be viewed as a homicide
assume the worst thank you and then and then work backwards and if evidence uh leads you to another path fine but at
least you're doing your due diligence from the word go but again object at rest stays at rest and to me this is
just it's just constant laziness by law enforcement I like what you're saying here Captain so we easily agree this is
most likely a homicide case and since we have run out of breadcrumbs for our general timeline I think going forward
we pursue this and discuss it as we would a homicide case so typically we would talk about some of the persons
that may be responsible for Denise to go missing let's talk about evidence or some things
that could be evidence in this case before we get into some suspects since this is a missing case
let's start off by talking about what exactly is missing simply put we have Denise
her clothing that she was wearing that day and her car keys that's it that's what is missing in this
case what is not missing is her car as we know it was found four miles from the party site right
and strangely enough the other item that's not missing is her purse her purse was returned to her family
the same day that Denise goes missing so the persons returned to her family but what items do we find in that purse
that's very that's a very good question here and that's one of the big big problems that I have with this case I
believe there are so many things that are missing from this timeline I believe that there are witnesses that have
statements that are missing and I believe that there's a lot of evidence that could clue us into what may have
happened or give us a bigger picture a bigger better picture of what happened and we simply don't have a lot of that
stuff and I think it's because and I hate to do this two weeks in a row but I just see a poor investigation
from Jump Street in this case well and I'm just gonna piggyback off that for a little bit I I agree this this
investigation is horseshit for one but there are a couple things working against law enforcement
like you said a hundred plus people at this party and anybody that's been to a bonfire knows that there could be crowds
of people around the fire and you might go to that bonfire you might be there for an hour you might have a couple
drinks but you're not in a well-lit area where you see everybody so there could have
been I've gone to bonfires before where one of my buddies was at the bonfire I just
never saw them so I think one to identify all the individuals that were at this party
there's also rumors that she was making out with some guy John that night that person John I I don't know if if he's
ever been fully identified and then I think the other issue for law enforcement is this happens during
spring break so you have a bunch of kids out of town and then the kids that you have in town
there's no school that day it's Good Friday so now all those individuals normally if a girl went missing let's
say on a Friday at noon or 12 30 the majority of the people that you would want to question their Alibi would be
school they would be in school but because they're not in school now every person that you interview you
have to figure out what their Alibi is and then you have to follow up on that lead to make sure that the Alibi is
correct well and you're right with so many people potentially at this party what we should have here is one of your
favorite words Captain a plethora a plethora a plethora of witness statements of people that saw her that
night spoke with her that night or guess what's also important the ones that didn't speak to her and didn't see her
that night what else did they see what else did they hear while they were there now we talked about how big could this
party be well we know that she went with her friend Kim and from one report that I've seen is
that her senior class had 348 students in this class now that could mean that 300 of those 348
went to that party like one report States most Reports say a hundred to maybe 200 kids
but what's interesting to me here is that based off the report that I'm looking at in front of me right now we
gain some information not a lot but the information here is that Kim Gilbert and
Melissa Cook both seniors at Connorsville High School were good friends with Denise flum
these were two of the persons that she called on that day before she left her home to
go look for her purse these are two of the people that she called to ask if they would go with her neither was able
to they were unable to go so now she heads out on her own and then what we are told later is she
goes out looking for this purse she vanishes poof disappears Into Thin Air as it would appear
never returns home they find her vehicle and her purse made its way home and I've seen two reports one report
says that it was returned to the flum's house about an hour and a half after Denise left to go looking for it and the
person that brought the purse to them from my understanding was somebody that was
pretty to fairly well known to the family this wasn't any kind of mystery person to them the person has remained
unidentified they're not listed by name in any of the reports that I've seen but what's crazy is this purse makes its
way back home Denise does not now that leads me to what is missing from this case as we say to Denise her
clothing and her car keys all missing but what also is missing from this case is background statements for that party
background a background story on the purse itself witness statements here's the thing
when she drove out there to retrieve her purse who was she hoping to meet was she
hoping to meet up with somebody once there was she hoping to speak with somebody once there help me find my
purse or now that nobody's here everybody's left from last night did you happen to see my purse well that's
another thing that's not clear to everybody at this bonfire leave or did some people just crash in their car
or did people set up some tents I mean I've been to bonfires before where at the end of the night a couple people
just set up some tents and just stay the night and so was it found by a person that
went back out to the party or was it somebody that woke up at the party or did they find her purse last night
these are questions that should be easily answered and they should have been easily found out this information
should have been easily found out by detectives in law enforcement you know it sounds like we are a couple
vultures circling around one small item here but here's where my head is Captain
I don't think we're circling around one item I think there's a bunch of things that we're a little pissed off about I
feel like this my gut feeling is that this party and her disappearance could have a lot to do with one another
yeah duh what happened at that party and the thing too with the statement of there's a statement out there in
multiple reports that says she did not want to go alone to retrieve her purse okay well what does that mean did she
was she just simply a busy body that liked to be hanging out with people all the time and didn't want
to really do anything by yourself or is there a reason why she didn't want to go alone was she afraid did something
happen the night before at the party that made her uncomfortable made her uncomfortable to go alone to retrieve
her purse and what's the back story on the purse itself it could be just as simple as she
set it down somewhere misplaced it or is there something more nefarious going on here did somebody take it from
her as a prank did she set it down and somebody took it on purpose when it was returned what items were in
the purse we talked about her having no money and no identification because those items were in her purse when she
left on that Friday was there money in her purse when it was returned to the family yeah my gut feeling is just one
it's a royal area so maybe she just wanted somebody to go with her because she wouldn't feel safe out there by
herself and also if you bring somebody it's probably quicker to find the purse with two people looking
yeah I would love to hear some background statements for the party itself yeah who's this John guy yeah
who's the John guy the other thing too we talk about the things she was looking forward to in her life
one of them being prom another being graduation then of course going off to college
in the fall but one of the Persons of Interest here in this case will be her ex-boyfriend
and it's reported that her and her ex-boyfriend broke up about a month before Denise went missing
well what would be interesting to know too is if her and her boyfriend his name is
Sean McClung if they were broken up who was she going to go to prom with because what you have
here all these years later is people saying Sean McClung was not looked at good enough early on in this
investigation and I agree with those statements one thousand percent however who was she going to go to prom
with who was she in a current relationship with or hoping to have a relationship with
was she just going by herself just going with friends that's not uncommon is it possible that she was still in contact
with her ex-boyfriend and that maybe they were going to go together because they were together for three
years which is that's a long time that's a very long term relationship for somebody so young
and Lieutenant Ted mcquinley as we said he was the lead investigator on this case early on back in 1986.
and when he is asked years later about the ex-boyfriend Sean McClung he simply says yeah I spoke with him
he had an alibi for that time period he was out fishing with some friends but it doesn't seem like there was a
whole lot of follow-up on Sean why I don't think he ever confirmed The Alibi correct so law enforcement comes to me
and goes what were you doing that day while I was uh fishing with a Jim and Steve well if you don't ever go ask Jim
and Steve then that's not an alibi that's just a story that I've told you and my issue too with him again stepped
down become don't be the lead detective if you're related to the family because look in these cases especially
the 18 year old you gotta start with the Inner Circle well that inner circle is your cousin
your cousin's wife now you have to what about the sister okay now we gotta look at relationships current relationships
and past relationships and one thing that I failed to put my notes Here Captain is that I do not know if Ted
mcquinley was with the local police department or with the sheriff's department at the time which I think
could have some important meaning to it because I would imagine a town of 16 to 17
000 probably does not have a very large Connersville Police Department he may have been the only investigator that's
true but at the time but we we do have or at least I heard that Indiana State Police did offer assistance so even if
you stay on as the lead why aren't you getting some assistance from them that look I I get so tired of these cases you
you don't have to be the smartest guy in the room you just have to know the smartest guy in the room and and you
become the smartest guy in the room when you place smart individuals that are qualified around you
and Ted Lieutenant mcquinley here seems to have really bought into this idea of and I'm sure he
he may have had other people than just Sean McClung telling him this but he seemed to have moved on rather
quickly from Sean McClung yeah you're moving on pretty quickly when you're not following up to see if
his Alibi is actually legit he simply seems to do this because he believes The Narrative of
they were still friends that it was a mutual breakup that they were still friendly that nobody was mad at one
another and again this could this is very likely backed up by other students other people but still you double check
these alibis and you look at this guy one thing if you you want to talk about spinning your
tires here and going completely in the wrong direction it sounds to me like they spent more time looking into
Denise's father than they did Sean McClung back in the day because one thing they State emphatically is that
David Denise's father was Miles Away with multiple people that were interacting and hanging out with him
that day that that Friday leading up to the point where he becomes aware that she's missing so I I just have a hard
time understanding why they went and verified those Alibis right but not Sean mcclung's well they did that with the
father but they also do that with the mother so that they're able to make the statement to the public that we have
cleared these individuals which that's great okay but we're still talking about the Inner Circle
close friends family members current or past boyfriends or current or past relationships however
you want to look at it and it just seemed like they did the first couple steps of the
Inner Circle and then they just again we'll just get lazy and the my other issue too is
this this dumbass doesn't take any notes so when you ask him about this stuff he
can't even refer back to his notes uh how are you investigating this oh it's just it's up in it's up in my Noggin
again him being the lead investigator might be more of a seniority situation more of a he he rose to that
rank because of attrition rather than being a great investigator or detective you gotta take a lot of notes you gotta
write everything down because you do not know two weeks from now three weeks from now
what seems to be insignificant today could become very significant to your investigation well and the notes aren't
necessarily for you because you take these notes because if this case doesn't get solved and you get
moved to a different department then when you have new detectives coming in and you have no notes
then they're basically starting at square one and hoping that you remember anything and I know that you know that
you know there's a really good documentary about this case and I know when they were asking him it's you know
30 some years later so he's not going to remember anything but again you could refer back to your
notes yeah that documentary is called small town secrets and it is available currently available on vicetv.com it's a
three-parter it's a very good very well put together documentary on this case it's one of the best true crime
documentaries I've seen in the last few years and a cheers to Nicole berserk Moore and Gianna tabani for that
wonderful documentary I hope I pronounce their last names correctly kudos to you and for doing a gangbusters
job on that documentary small town Secrets now we want to talk about notes somebody not taking notes well here's
some notes that become important and it's not brought into the light until a good deal a time later we talk about
Sean McClung not being looked at his Alibi is not being checked but it seems like old Ted mcquinley moved on from him
because everybody's saying well they stayed friends and it seemed like a mutual breakup yeah
it's almost like Ted took the time out to talk to Sean and then just bought everything that Sean was selling the
notes that I'm talking about come from one of Denise's friends who had moved away and they stayed close and they
became pen pals because of the distance between them so she's writing letters to her friend
and she's telling her friend leading to the breakup with her current boyfriend Sean that you know what I recently made
what she refers to in the letter as a life or death mistake I made a fatal mistake I mean it
says in the letter life or death now we don't have that complete letter to clue us into what she means by that statement
what she's talking about though is she's telling her friend I cheated on my boyfriend and I'm
getting ready to tell him I'm going to tell him I'm going to confess she's an honest person she's not going to try to
hide this secret she's going to tell Sean this is what I've done and and take it from there
so she tells Sean and I don't know that this immediately led to their breakup but from my
understanding he was incredibly disappointed he was hurt he appreciated her honesty
and they broke up sometime after that the notes I have state that she dated that letter to her friend March 3rd
and we know that she would go missing before the end of March and we have the other two friends statements saying that
they broke up roughly a month before she went missing so we know that the date of
the letter but we don't know exactly the date that she had this conversation with
Sean but it seems based on what Sean is saying based on other people that they broke up March 6. so like you said
about a month before she went missing yeah that all lines up with the timeline I have in front of me as well
but again if you're law enforcement it's who's this individual that she slept with and that's somebody that you would
at least want to question did she continue to have a relationship with that person or did she cut that off when
she cut off the relationship with Sean and was this person looked at and cleared was this person looked at even
more finely than you looked at Sean McClung was this person John who she may or may not have been making out with at
the party the night before was this person the same person she may be attending prom with or was John the person she was
attending prom with these are the things that you need to know if you're going to
look at if I'm I'm just a little confused why they didn't look at Sean McClung more closely
early on in this investigation part of me I'm I'm a blue backer here right I I do
my best to stand with the the women in Men In Blue but you got to call it like you see it and from what's been reported
it doesn't look like there was a great job that was going on early in this investigation part of me wants to
believe captain that that was because they had other people that they were looking at that they were more
interested in at that time and could it have been whoever she was in a current relationship with
but it's this simple if you're able to confirm his Alibi for that Friday Sean's done right you never have to go
back to him right you can now ask him questions about her character and maybe other rumors now he becomes
somebody that is an ally for law enforcement now there's a couple things about Sean that that I kind of dismiss
when people say well Sean didn't help with the search ever or he never made contact
with her family I don't find that to be that strange he's he's Young he's towards the end of his
High School career so he's going to be heading off into the real world they did break up a month ago which
might not seem that long but when you're in high school a month is a very long time
he claims he was already seeing some other girls so maybe he was seeing somebody and he
didn't feel comfortable making contact so I don't find that to be as strange as some other people do
what I keep going back to that is strange is you didn't confirm his Alibi exactly and the thing too is we talk
about him not participating in searches those are keep in mind they're not organized searches yes this is the
family and friends conducting their own search and again even if the breakup was Mutual
even if they stayed friends it's widely reported by multiple people that the two of them
were living very different Lifestyles leading up to the breakup so they're together for like three years sure they
probably shared a lot of common interest early in that relationship but by that senior year they were both going down
two very different paths and very likely had very different Social Circles by that point Denise was very honed in on
her schoolwork and all of her extra curricular activities like playing Sports volleyball basketball running
track she was building her future she had plans to go off to college and then on the flip side of that you have Sean
McClung who was very much into the party lifestyle at that time and had a bunch of party party or friends at that time
his senior year the thing that that I cannot Shake here shake and bake is where is the report from the person or
persons that hosted that party right because we talk about the last and I said I purposely said that is believed
to be the last confirmed sighting well it is so far the last confirmed sighting of Denise but we know at least one other
person saw her after the neighbor that she spoke to on her way out that day where is the statements from police
from the person or persons that hosted the party the night before I it could be something as simple as
we know she went her intention was to go and find her purse that Friday afternoon around 12 30 1
o'clock 1 30 did she did you see her did you interact with her did she ask about her purse
and then where is the statement from the person that Returns the purse where did
they find it who did they get it from when did they obtain it these things I think are very key to
this case and very interesting to me because again you go back to the the land owner who says her vehicle that you
find the following day yeah it's been there since about 12 30 to 1 30 yesterday that's not too long after she left her
house [Music] all right we want to thank everybody for joining us here in the garage so much
more to get to thank you and for everything True Crime Check out true crime garage.com and until tomorrow be
good be kind and don't litter thank you [Music]

Denise Pflum /// Part 1 /// 651

Part 1 of 2

www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

The disappearance of 18 year old Denise Pflum has got to be one of the biggest mysteries of Southeast Indiana. Denise Pflum went missing back in March of 1986 from the town of Connersville. It was her senior year of high school. After attending a party the night before Denise went back to the party location to look for her purse. Denise’s car was found abandoned the next day. Denise never came home. Join us in the Garage as we crack a couple of cold ones and discuss this cold case. Denise’s case is riddled with questions. There are several publicly known suspects in Denise’s case. One is a man locked up for a life term in North Carolina, he’s also a suspected serial killer. Fans of the Apple TV+ series Black Bird will want to tune in. This just might be one of the many victims of serial stalker and kidnapper Larry DeWayne Hall.

Beer of the Week - Hunter’s Harvest by Second Crossing Brew Company

Garage Grade - 4 and a quarter bottle caps out of 5

Brief Summary

Denise Flum vanished in 1986 while searching for her purse after a party, raising questions about the investigation's effectiveness.

Key points

Denise Flum's Disappearance. Denise Flum vanished on March 28, 1986, after leaving home to find her purse.
The Found Vehicle. Denise's car is found four miles from the party site, raising questions about her disappearance.
Denise's Mysterious Disappearance. Denise Flum goes missing after searching for her purse, leading to a troubling investigation.
Parents' Heartbreak. Denise's parents express their fears and regrets about her disappearance.
Investigation Critique. The investigation into Denise's case is criticized for its lack of thoroughness.
A Life or Death Mistake. Denise confesses to a friend about a serious mistake before her disappearance.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

The pain never goes away.

Judy Flum on her daughter's disappearance

6:30WatchMar 2, 2023

Tension

60/ 100Some tension

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