Glass & Mason ////// 451 | Forensic Files

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GameChanger [Music] [Applause] [Music] welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks
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everybody gather around grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true [Music] crime this week's True Crime Story will
focus on two young ladies home alone on a Thursday night their plans for the night fell through so it looks like Plan
B is a quiet evening at home or at least that is what it should have been the two roommates pass the time
texting with friends but life turns on a dime and just like that they go silent the next morning both both of the
roommates are unaccounted for Mia they fail to be where they are supposed to be a concerned friend
decides to check on them and finds the unthinkable both women are dead the two ladies were killed in their own home
there were very few Clues and even fewer suspects police wondered did either of them have a past with known enemies or
Associates with a reason to hurt or kill them did the killer Target the two roommates or was this a random homicidal
act could it be that only one of the young ladies was the real Target was Melissa just in the wrong
place at the wrong time or was Nicole the one who was collateral damage this is true crime garage and
this is the unsolved murder of Nicole glass and Melissa [Music] Mason it was Midday on a Friday December
3rd 2010 a young woman who has never been named publicly was trying to reach her
friend Nicole glass age 27 the unnamed friend was trying to reach Nicole for several hours Nicole failed to show up
at the gym that morning which was highly unusual Nicole went by the name of Nikki
Nikki's phone was going straight to voicemail on that morning the friend decided to head over to the home that
Nikki shared with her roommate Melissa Mason also age 27 this house was located at 4247 East
Cambridge Avenue in East Phoenix Arizona this was a modest single level home on a
call to saac in a residential neighborhood Nikki purchased the home in 2006 when the friend arrived around
12:20 p.m. there was no response to her knocks at the door now although both women's cars were parked at the home so
she suspected that they would be home at least one of them so when she tried the
door it was locked but then the friend didn't give up she walked around to the back of the house and started peeking in
through the windows and through one window she saw the body of a woman lying on the floor of the living room area of
the home so she called 911 on the 911 call she says quote I just came over to my friend's house and she's not
answering the door and I went around to the back and I just seen someone lying there end quote when investigators
arrived they noted that the house was locked and there was no sign of forced entry into the home once they forcibly
gained entry thanks to some help from the fire department they found the bodies of not one but two women lying on
the floor this was in fact the two roommates that lived at the house Nikki or Nicole glass the homeowner and her
roommate Melissa Mason sadly both were dead there was obvious and visible trauma to both bodies one of Nicole's
dogs a bulldog had also been beaten as well and required medical treatment thankfully the dog survived yeah if you
look at pictures of these two they they almost could pass as sisters yeah they were the same age age they were longtime
friends and as you just pointed out they they could pass for sisters or cousins now the autopsy Captain confirmed what
people who viewed Nicole and Melissa's bodies must have surmised they both were killed by way of ligature
strangulation this information was released in a statement by the Maricopa County Medical examiner's Office the
ligature was a cordlike object it was not stated whether police believed that the ligature or the cord like object
came from inside the home but it is reported that the Implement whatever it was was not found at the crime scene and
even more tragic the medical examiner discovered something very important while conducting the autopsies Melissa
Mason was eight weeks pregnant when she was killed so this is even more sad but fittingly so the case was declared a
triple homicide yeah when you first hear that maybe it lean to some kind of motive certainly it it raises suspicions
that's for sure now Rachel glass Nicole's mom told us True Crime garage that she narrowly avoided being the one
to find her daughter and her friend she was supposed to go over to Nicole's house to help her with a printer but she
was too tired after working so she left Nicole a message saying that she would do it over the weekend Rachel found out
that her daughter was dead when she received a phone call from one of Nicole's friends telling her to turn on
the news now I don't see in any reports where there's any sign of breaking correct there was no sign of a forced
entry into the home and in regards to Melissa's mom Sandra she received a phone call that frankly no one wants to
get she learned over the phone that her daughter Melissa was dead and even worse
that her daughter was murdered and that no one knew why exactly when or who committed the homicides now in regards
to the time of death in this case it's going to be very difficult to determine captain of course you always want to
know the time of death to determine who had the means to commit the murders but according to the family the medical
examiner was not able to pinpoint a time of death all that the public has been told is that the two were believed to
have died between this is sometime between 8:00 p.m. on December 2nd and 12:22 p.m. on December 3rd now the basis
for this very loose timeline is this it's reported that Melissa's boyfriend Maris was at the house visiting Melissa
on the night of the 2 now according to him both women were home and accounted for and of course Very Much alive when
he left the home around 8:00 p.m. Maris is the last known in-person sighting of both of these young women now per HLN
detective Toby Meyers who was in charge of the investigation initially said that
both women sent text messages from their phones after Melissa's boyfriend left their home quote since there were only
text messages and not phone calls meaning no one heard their actual voices right consider Maris to be the last
person to see or talk to the girls said the detective however at some point that
evening it may have been earlier Nicole was at a Ross clothing store in Phoenix so it must have been earlier I'm
guessing here Captain but there's no time frame for this event as far as we know the Phoenix PD has never reviewed
the video surveillance footage from the store to see if it help any clues now I want to put a little caveat on there
they may have reviewed this surveillance footage they've just never spoke publicly about right this event on the
timeline and again we know that this happened per the family and per Witnesses however we don't know when
this event occurred that evening I'm guessing because of statements given by the detectives and law enforcement there
in Phoenix that this would have been before the boyfriend left the home or again we're taking him for his word the
boyfriend says he left the home at 8:00 P.M so this must have happened before then right and all they're what they're
trying to do there is that we have this eyewitness saying hey I came over I was there for a while when I left they were
both alive well we got to find out if they were alive before then okay well we have now this movement where Nicole was
at at a shopping center possibly she used her debit card to pay for something and then we have other eyewitnesses so
so now we know that his story is lining up more with what he's telling law enforcement and to further extend that
timeline a little bit Captain according to Melissa's mother Sandra Melissa also sent out some text that evening the last
one going to her boyfriend Maris just after 1 p.m. now he says when he called her back it was after midnight and her
phone went straight to voicemail this is according to what he told Phoenix police
and I'm guessing law enforcement has both of their cell phones they do and that was a bit of a mystery for the
public and we'll get into that deeper as we go because I think that's a big part
of this case and a big part of the mystery of who done it so we have Maris the boyfriend being the last known
person to see the girls apparently he told the police that when he left Nicole was in the
shower and it sounds like they had a a bartending job scheduled for that night but neither woman ever went to this
bartending job and that's it when when the when the friend showed up at their house at 1222 p.m. the next day both of
our victims are already dead and the killer or killers were long gone by that time now Captain I would mentally walk
everyone through the crime scene but that will be quite difficult in this case the Phoenix police have released
almost no information about the crime scene so little that even the families of both of the victims know next to
nothing about the state of the crime scene and what evidence may have been found inside the home and remember our
poor woman who discovered them who has never been named did not enter the home so we don't have any statements from her
either she simply saw the body of one of her friends lying on the floor in the living room area and then called 911
when looking through after looking through the window of the back of the house well two things there one they're
protecting the friend's identity because we don't want her to become a suspect that's one but two or a victim right and
but I also want to take a second to look at the front of this house it looks like
it's a single car garage I'm guessing the garage has access to the house like maybe side access to the house and then
you have the front door but it looks like there's possibly a window on the front door but also there's a front
window which if somebody's at your front door you'd be able to look out and and know who was at your front door yes
that's correct now the the Phoenix Police Department told family and friends of the victims that this was a
very high profile case and they said that it would be best if very little information was released not just to the
public but very little information released to the the victim's Inner Circle of family and friends as well and
as we stated they did confirm that there was no forced entry into the home all the doors and the windows were found to
be closed and locked and law enforcement stated that the killer must have locked
the door on their way out of the house this was not done with a key but with the kind of door handle lock where you
turn to engage the lock in the middle of the knob and then you close the door behind you and now you have locked the
door on your way out of the house right there is some information about the crime scene that we do know and it
is as follows both Melissa and Nicole's cars were parked at the house Melissa was found on the floor between the
kitchen in the dining room area well hold on and the reason why that's important to for them to say hey both of
their cars were there meaning that the individual that did this definitely knew both of them were home yeah if you're
going to just judge on suspicion of anybody being home based on vehicles spotted out front then you see both
vehicles and you go well they they must be home at this time right and if I was a killer and I was going to Target one
of the individuals I probably wouldn't go in it probably would not be the opportune time to try to kill one of
them if both of them were there right and that's going to that leads us down the path of was this planned or was this
something that just was reactionary now Nicole was found on the floor of the living room other than that
no information was released whether there was any sign of a struggle inside the home or whether the two women were
restrained in any manner or whether anything was missing from the home which is very interesting to me as the
detectives have said that they could not rule out robbery as a possible motive but they went on to you know just to add
to the vagueness of investigator statements here they also went on to say that they could not rule out any other
type of common motive for the murders yeah but with death by strangulation with two individuals it almost feels
like it leans to more than one um perpetrator well we do know regardless of what it should be or
what it is we do know that they that law enforcement collected quote a lot of evidence from the crime scene this is
per Sergeant Steve martos of the Phoenix PD but exactly what that means specifically right it is unknown now
several family members told True Crime garage that one of the pieces of evidence was the cell phones that you
asked about there Captain so both cell phones the phone belonging to Nicole and then the phone belonging to Melissa were
in fact found inside of the home but get this the phones were found in a pot of dirty water in the kitchen sink so
presumably the killer or Killers wanted to destroy the phones to destroy evidence on those phones and as we saw
police were still able to determine that the women had been texting that night and with whom this is interesting
because you have to wonder did police gather that information about the women texting that night and who they were
texting and when from the two victims phones or was that information that they collected from other people I I'm or
both yeah I'm wondering it it appears to me whoever killed these women be it one perpetrator two or
more there was some concern given to the phones that they they went out of their
way to purposely destroy the phones right you have to wonder how successful they were by leaving them in in water
soaking in water presumably overnight or whenever the murders went down again it
just leads in my mind to more than one perpetrator I mean if you have control of one victim the
other victim is going to possibly put up a fight or run to get help or something
and it looked a dog was putting up a fight as well yeah it just seems like there's there's a lot going on and
there's a lot to control in this environment yeah yeah and speaking of environment the neighbor said that the
young women pretty much kept to themselves but always had a lot of cars so a lot of people coming and going from
the home you know all the time Phoenix Police Department reported that they did not have any reports of illegal activity
having taken place at the home it seems maybe the neighbors were they might have
been a little touchy about all of the friends that the women had over from time to time now I don't know this to be
the case but often you will see this when younger people we know both of our victims here Captain are 27 years of age
right you see this when you have younger people like our victims when they live in an older neighborhood but I guess of
course you don't need to be older to be a busy body you know sometimes you get neighbors watching one another and
policing each other for reasons only because they're they may be bored now Nicole had a series of different
roommates over the four years that she owned the home so there was always people moving in and out of the house
and as we said the home was on a c toac but there was only it looks like there was only one house across from them also
situated in the C AAC behind our victim's home where the women died was a brick wall around a small yard area separating
their plot of land from a parking lot for an apartment building so who knows how busy that apartment building parking
lot would be at certain times let's get into a little background information here in regard to these two ladies the 2
27 year-olds were close friends as we said roommates and also colleagues they live together off and on since they met
when they were both 23 until very recently up until the time of their deaths they both worked as
bartenders and waitresses at a strip club in Phoenix called The Sweet Spot Melissa still worked there at the time
of her death now until 2008 both women had worked at a gentleman's club called panta and overlapping there for about
three years yeah I used to strip out a club called Mega Death the managing General partner of the club Frank vanui
told the desert news that the two were quote real good girls real smart end quote Nikki was 5 foot4 inches tall she
was a workout junkie she used the treadmill and waits at her gym regularly remember this kind of the first sign
that all is not right when her friend at the gym says she did not show up for her
normal workout that day red flags go up she goes over to check on her friend right when she worked as a bartender as
someone who used to bartend she would be what I would call a a very smart SLP poopular bartender she
knew how to play the bartending game all right so her regular patrons would bar hop they would follow her from bar to
bar as she filled in for Relief shifts or for other bartenders right this is something you
know your your whole salary as a bartender is based off of tips and you'll see some very smart bartenders
who do this often you can only work a couple days a week at a bar because they they have other bartenders and they
don't you you traditionally work longer shifts so you work just a couple of days
well if you want to make good money in in that career you get two two different bars or you move around and you're
always letting everybody know all of your regulars uh Hey tonight I'll be at this bar on Thursday I'll be at that bar
and they tend to follow you around and that really if if your bar ain't busy you ain't making much money that night
so she was not only good at her job but but smart enough to to have that following now she recently quit her job
at the club and was taking classes at at the University of Phoenix where she was
studying Communications better than computer it was reported by the media that she did not have a steady boyfriend
at the time of her death Nicole's Aunt described her to the Phoenix news times as quote she loved to tease she was fun
happy go-lucky she just loved life and lived life to the fullest but it's also a little bit a part of the job uh if
you're bartender or you're a server or if you're even in the band that night your job is to have make sure
everybody's having a good time maybe you're you become a little flirty that's natural Melissa was known
as B to her friends she was a recent graduate from the it looks like Pima Pima Pima Medical
Institute where she trained to become a dental hygienist but she since decided to go
into forensics she also loved to travel in fact one time visiting a cousin as far
away as Qatar in the summer of 2010 she lived with her sister Samantha so this would be the summer before the young
women were killed Samantha is her younger sister she was planning to move back to Tucson where her family was from
now Samantha told us that the summer in the summer of 2010 Melissa seemed great she was acting
totally normal wasn't into anything shady didn't disappear at random times or receive mysterious phone calls when
they lived together she was living a normal life that summer before she was killed right but we would be remissed if
we didn't point out both women worked at a strip club and a lot of times with strip clubs there are there is drug use
yeah well with bars in general there's there's drug use by be it by the patrons or by the the staff staff yeah now
Melissa moved back into Nicole's house in the fall so she moves in relatively not too long before these
murders take place and she did recently discovered that she was pregnant it's not known whether this was a planned
event but she told friends that she was very happy about the pregnancy and she told everyone that the father was her
boyfriend Maris Melvin and Melissa told Samantha her sister about the baby but was waiting for three more weeks until
Christmas to surprise her mom Sandra with the good news it was after she was killed that the positive pregnancy test
was found in the home in a baggie with merry Christmas written on the baggie in a Sharpie with a sharpie but the
boyfriend knew that she was pregnant the boyfriend knew the sister knew and of course her roommate knew as well as a
couple of friends she's just keeping it for Mom I'm guessing she would have found out uh she was eight weeks
pregnant is is what we said so she would have found out probably in November and
you know she's probably waiting just Christmas to surprise Mom saying hey wonderful news you're going to be a
grandmother well I'm an idiot so I don't know this for sure but I I've heard a lot of people say that you wait 12 weeks
something could go wrong right you don't want everybody getting all excited and and happy and and then it just adds to
the sadness later investigative reporter Nicole Parton told Nancy Grace we're also hearing from former employer
friends family members co-workers that both of these girls were very loving very generous and had
absolutely no known enemies and we really couldn't find anybody to say anything negative about either one of
them yeah and I think law enforcement would be able to find out if there was any disputes going on through text
messages yeah again how successful were the killers in in destroying those phones or what information would have
been on those phones we don't have statements from detectives to tell us where they collected the the knowledge
of of knowing that there were text messages sent and received that night they right from from the people that
received them or that that were communicating with Nikki and Melissa that night now as we said in 2006 Nikki
purchased the the three-bedroom single level home on East Cambridge Avenue where the women were living she did this
with some roommates so immediately she's buying the home and then having roommates move in to help with the
expense by paying her rent and taking advantage of at the time what was readily available mortgage loans that
were around in the mid 2000s right it looks to us from from our review of the fin fincial documents that she borrowed
about $300,000 to purchase this home at some point she got underwater with the house
after a refinance this home went into foreclosure but in November so this is this is to point out
that she's having some money issues leading up to the murders November of 2010 just one month before they were
killed Nicole was able to come up with the money to save the house and at the time of her death it was actually under
renovation so she and Melissa were still living there while the house was being renovated but it was empty it was it was
somewhat empty you know there's not a lot of furniture inside the because the floors were being redone at this time
and the two young women were sleeping on couches while the work was being accomplished
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that [Music] all right we're back cheers mes cheers to you Captain cheers to everybody out
there and happy happy happy holidays Nicole and Melissa's families feel that they have been given the runaround by
Phoenix police the initial detective on the case as we me mentioned earlier her name Toby Meyers she went out on
maternity leave for five months after the murders and according to the families no one worked the case until
she returned in October of 2011 so unfortunately that you know this is such a stupid thing to say but
unfortunately the timing of the murders of the investigation is just not not great we have the detective who's going
be working the case looking into it and after 5 months she has to go on maternity leave and then you have the
even more sad fact of the case just kind of sits there on the Shelf nobody doing
anything with it while Toby Meyers is off on maternity leave yeah but that's speculation from the family correct
correct but speculation or not what they can say is for x amount of time this case was unsolved it was relatively
fresh and no one's contacting us we did not see or hear of any work being done on our daughter's case so after Toby
Meyers comes back in October of 2011 she moves on and the case was handed off from there to another
detective and then to another detective and it really this case really bounced around the department to different
detectives for years and apparently there were a large number of homicides in the city in
2010 and the police force was just overwhelmed well and the problem here with this case is it's
not right away when you look at the situation you look at the victims you look at Nicole what she's doing with her
life you look at Melissa what she's doing with her life you have a one of them pregnant so okay that's a possible
motive then you go well maybe burglary and could be known it could have been a known burglary and the reason why is
because you have both individuals that worked at a strip club both individuals worked as bartenders both of those
occupations give you loose cash right that's true so that's very true you you'd be coming home with cash and most
of the time because you're working as a bartender you don't have the time to make a deposit to your bank at night so
it's safer to come home and then on top of that think about the patrons whether whether they're a stripper whether
they're working as a stripper or whether they're working as a bartender guess what both of those occupations have
fans right and so now you have a situation where it's like okay were they robbed and people knew what they were
doing just robbed in general because they thought oh well there's two females here we can control the situation but
did it have something to do with uh the one being pregnant or was there some Patron that was had some had some uh
fantasy about one or or had some crush on one and there's so many motives in this case yeah it's possible some skevy
old dude becomes obsessed with with one of these young ladies I think the issue where I take with that theory is you
would want to you would very likely want to wait until your target would be alone and as
you pointed out seeing the two vehicles out front if you were watching either one of these young women or following
them around you would know that right now is not a great time to to go into the home the other thing we got to
factor in here too is you have a situation where there is no force entry was was this someone that the one of the
women knew or both of them knew and let into the home that's also quite the possibility what what I think we have
here and this is really just someone trying to read between the lines of the statements given by law enforcement when
I hear we cannot rule out the pro possib of robbery as a motive but we cannot rule out any other motive either where
that leads me is I don't see this being a home that is randomly robbed meaning it there does
not seem to be evidence or if there was it's not a very smart tactic as far as law enforcement go to not say say so if
this if there was clear-cut evidence to detectives that someone just at random picked out a house and said
all right let's go in there and Rob the place oh [ __ ] everything went bad and we
ended up killing the two people that lived there police in my experience will almost always say publicly that this was
a robbery we feel that the motive here for these murders was a robbery gone bad they say that because they need the
public to be aware that this could happen again that these offenders could pick another house at random it's time
to alert the public that that is is a likely possibility and that their safety is a concern so what I think we have
here when you have law enforcement saying we cannot rule out the possibility of robbery but we cannot
rule out the possibility of any other motive I believe that there were there was something missing from the home
something maybe an item or a couple of items that were taken from the home and that's why they have that statement we
cannot rule out the possibility of robbery but it's not a clear-cut robbery at random as said because they would
have taken a whole bunch of stuff from the house they you don't just go in there and kill and then walk away with
little to nothing you you come out of there with with every treasure that you can uncover while you're in there and so
to me I it's the same as the cell phones I feel like somebody went out of their way to try to destroy those phones or
what could be on those phones and then had to take it a step further and take an item or two from the
home that may have some connection to them or to make it to Stage it to look like some kind of robbery and I and then
I think if you're going to go that route you also have to include what you said they could have had a lot of cash on
hand and if somebody knew that then it's not a random robbery it's a targeted robbery with a very specific goal in
mind for the perpetrator yeah or it's one of the goals there could be multiple goals you know what I mean well and with
all of these with the with the high homicide rate in the area at the time in the city of for the year of
2010 we've seen this in other cases in other cities as well it it appears that the case quickly lost the attention of
the investigators because they have Case Files piling up on their desk and from what the police were saying there was
very little concrete evidence to go on in this case to begin with yet they kept telling the
family all along for 10 years now that they can't tell them any details about the evidence because they were worried
they would jeopardize the investigation yeah that again that's one of those things that I think would be so
difficult with law enforcement because as you're giving this information to the family you can tell that the family is
they're they're suffering their loved one was murdered they want answers they're starting to point the finger at
you and putting blame on you for not getting this solved but there's a part of you going hey we don't have a lot of
evidence and if I turn this over to you then then there goes our case possibly yeah and I'm going to continue to read
between the lines here so law enforcement would not address this is according to the families would not
address whether there was any sexual assault or even confirm whether there was any type of robbery at all now the
family members that we spoke with are skeptical about both of these items they were being
told this is very interesting they were being told that there was no helpful DNA
that seems very intriguing to me Captain the choice of words there there is no helpful DNA it sounds like there is some
kind of DNA evidence but what the problem is with it we do not know uh they were told there were no prints no
forced entry and no digital record of anything useful to go on in this case that's according to what the family says
they were told by law enforcement but we know that Melissa texted her boyfriend that night again around 1 p.m. if it was
in fact Melissa that that sent that text it could be if the phones are a big concern to the
Killer maybe this is just a a red herring here we do know that there were other Communications that night as well
now according to family members DNA was found on some cigarette butts and drinking cups found at the crime scene
there was some partial prints that were found by crime scene texts and per the Phoenix Police Department none of these
things panned out that's what they're saying but the family says that the Phoenix PD has failed to use updated
testing methods to test the DNA that they they have it and they're simply running it every six months or so
against databases of known offenders but they're not retesting the DNA itself the
family even tried to petition for further DNA testing saying that not everything from the scene the the
evidence that they've been told was collected they saying the families are saying not everything at the scene has
been tested but the state officials have not been receptive to to the families trying
to get a hold of this information or pushing them to to test it this could be because an of an Infamous backlog in
text in testing I'm Sorry by the state crime lab so in 2016 the Arizona sexual assault evidence
collection kit task force reported a total of 6,424 untested rape kits in their storage at law enforcement agencies
across the state so I'm pointing all this out to to just say Hey look it's very possible that there is some
material from Nicole and Melissa's attack that has never been tested I mean we have
we have them on record the State of Arizona saying over 6,000 untested rape kits are in storage at law of law
enforcement agencies across the state and that is absolutely ridiculous yeah and it unfortunately it goes on in every
state Arizona is not just the only one in fact there there are cases here in Ohio and I can say this because of our
work with the porch light project and our work here in True Crime garage that we are aware of several cases that have
DNA evidence and for whatever reason they're either not testing it or you know it's it's it's just
frustrating it's frustrating there is a certain amount of expense that is associated with with these tests though
too we we do need to point that out that there it's not free to to do this type of testing and and these agencies do
have to run on on budgets like everywhere any other business would right but if it was if it was men being
raped I guess guarantee you those tests would be done already they wouldn't have
any sitting on the shelves yeah I don't know I can't I can't speak to that I'm guessing that uh if you have over 6,000
untested rape kits that that some of the victims might not or might not all be female um there are some people that
have been vocal in this case in the glass and Mason case here that say look the the the ball has been dropped and I
will Echo that that feeling as well I will say it looks to me that the ball has been dropped here but some have gone
as far to say that the the ball the dropping of the ball in this case was so blatant that they're wondering was this
on purpose is is there someone protecting someone else here or are the investigators in the Phoenix Police
Department just borderline incompetent in this case well you also a one or two with uh Nicole and
Melissa's you know working in a bar or working at a strip club sometimes they have off-duty officers that will work
security at night or they'll have like a I know my buddy's bar they' have Cop come in as they would be closing down
for the night so maybe that's where the suspicion is leading people and as far as if you want to look a little little
closer to home we do have on record police saying that they that Maris Melvin the
Melissa's current boyfriend at the time when she was killed they say that he this is a direct quote from the police
department quote he's certainly been Cooperative with our detectives certainly providing some information to
us that we hope will be useful in this investigation but because we do not have any Le at this point we certainly don't
want to rule anybody out so they checked out this this current boyfriend of Melissa and their their stance on him is
he's been Cooperative he's worked with our detectives and our investigators if we need something he's responsive
however we've not officially ruled him out we've not cleared him uh specifically now they did say that a
former boyfriend of of Nikki again not saying that he's ruled out either but they did go on record to say that they
do not believe that the former boyfriend of Nikki was involved in any way at all
so I don't know if this means that he has a solid Alibi for the night or if he was just you know nowhere near the area
but in regards to that old relationship of Nikki we do have family members who are
saying that the the breakup was amicable that um that there didn't seem to be any hard
feelings it was not a a violent or hostile type uh relationship now per the Phoenix New Times they reported that
Melissa's boyfriend Maris took and passed a polygraph examination uh so that would further
further along the statement by police saying that he was in fact Cooperative again though they've not officially
cleared him and if you're reading between the lines they're going out of their way to publicly say he's been
Cooperative but we've not officially ruled him out so there must be something suspicious there and as you pointed out
Captain this pregnancy unfortunately it's supposed to be a beautiful wonderful thing we've seen this in other
cases it's also a motive for for murder yeah which is sad and pathetic as for other suspects police
uncovered some information that could be relevant to the murders Nicole glass had
a record a police record in fact she was arrested in 2009 so the year before she
was caught up in a some kind of giant sting operation that was targeting drug dealers and drug users in the area
Nicole used her phone to contact the dealer and she bought some pot now I do want to point out this is very low level
stuff here um I've seen people online who suggest that this is the motive that this is your answer that that she must
have ratted somebody out or when they busted this this drug ring that this pot de that that this this was a little more
bigger than than normal situations because it looks from what I could find they busted everyone they could find involved
in this thing and there were it was reported there were between 60 to 110 people
arrested so it it does seem to to go a little bit above and beyond your your normal low-level pot dealing but from
what I could see though Captain through all the weed smoke it appears to me that
she made a phone call and bought some weed and that's about the extent of her involvement in this so I don't know that
I see a situation where it's some big-time drug dealer some drug cartel being ratted out by this person who
probably liked to smoke a little pot on the weekend so I think it's a little far-fetched to say that this is in
fact the cause for a double homicide here uh in in regards to Nikki and now one thing that I found to be very
interesting as we're kind of going through some different possibilities and theories here Captain the girls both of
the the young women were supposed to work a private event that night so this is something that would be out of the
norm for both our victims right and of course murder is completely out of the norm so we're looking for anything
strange going on around the time of of the crimes this I found to be very interesting they were supposed to work a
private event that night and whoever I I couldn't figure out find who set this whole thing up
or who was supposed to pick them up somebody was supposed to pick them up and take them to the private event that
night and for whatever reason whoever this was they did not show up so the the two young women did not go and work
event this right and do we have a record of a a car showing up and honking the horn or going to the door and knocking
and and the girls just didn't come out and then the car left well what we do have is we have communication from the
the victims to others that say the event was not going to happen or the event fell
through so that's that's how we know that this this event this private event that they were supposed to work
uh did not happen so let's go into to what this event was or could have been this from my understanding keep in mind
they're they're bartenders so someone had hired them to work a private event as bartenders for that night now the
boyfriend leaves their home if the boyfriend's not involved I mean he could be if he's not involved if
he didn't kill them if if him and and somebody else didn't kill them because I'm with you Captain I think this was
more than one person but was this whole private event was this this person that's supposed to show show up and pick
them up is this some kind of ruse that to me seems likely but if that person were to be the killer or wanted to
attack or rape one or both of the women or what have you it seems to me that this person would have went along with
hey the event still going on and picked up the women and taken them willingly from the home to another location yeah
that makes sense the event from my understanding had something to do with the Phoenix
Cardinals with the with the football team it was supposed to be some kind of after hours party that they were going
to bartend and for whatever reason again AC according to this communication it looks like either they it was decided
that they were not needed for this event or that the event did not happen at all
now I looked up the 2010 Cardinal schedule because my first thought was they were found Friday Friday morning
Friday early afternoon so was this a situation where the Cardinals were playing a Thursday night home game and
there was going to be some Afterparty well there's nothing in the football schedule that would indicate to me
anything obvious uh any kind of obvious event going on that night they played the Sunday before and they played the
Sunday after and the Cardinals were not very good that year so I don't see any reason for celebration at all so I I I
do wonder what this event was what the exact details of this event were to be it's something that I've looked at and
would like to know more about and then to circle the wagons one more time here Captain I think that the answer to me
I think this is a very solvable case now I don't know what has been lost due to time I mean keep in mind we're sitting
here in the garage December 2020 so this month marks the 10-year anniversary of the triple
homicide and it is still unsolved and you have to wonder how cold has this case got by now
and what do we have in the way of evidence we know that they collected a lot of items from the home it seems to
me like there's meat on the bone here for detectives it sounds to me like there is somewhat of a breadcrumb trail
that they have some type of evidence I just question how well they are currently working this case and I think
it's solvable or there might not be much there's a trail but there's not much Bread on there well I think it's
solvable too because of the cell phones to me that points at every indication that one of the girls likely both of the
young women knew the as salent or the asants people went out of their way to try to destroy information on those
phones did somebody I'm wondering if it could be to the point where somebody even made a threat via text message or
was there somebody calling one of these young women over and over and over again
that night right and they thought by dump it in and look there could have been a pan with water in the sink
already but they decided Well if I dump it in this pan with water it'll get rid of these text messages or these phone
records yeah it and and it does it looks to me like someone was very concerned about what was on one if not both of
those phones to the point where they made an a a conscious effort to one not take the phones with them not remove
them from the home I think there was something removed from the home maybe to Stage the possibility of a robbery or
there was something that tied something that directly tied the perpetrator to that home that they decided to remove
with them but they decided not to take the phones but oh I got to destroy these phones they didn't smash them they were
smart enough to leave them in water well that's what makes you um start going down the conspiracy theory
Rabbit Hole a little bit because you go put the cell phones into water don't take them with you because even if the
phone was turned off he probably could get some cell phone ping technology who has knowledge of that
well law enforcement um so that could get your brain going down the conspiracy theory
Rabbit Hole pretty or people listening to this show you know they you can pick up on these things uh a multitude of
different ways so to me I think that that is your breadcrumb that is your bread crumb Trail right there for me
it's it's who in their Inner Circle would have killed them I mean obviously we said it's been reported to
the newspapers by by employers and co-workers family and friends that we could not find an enemy we could not
find any one that didn't like them but obviously someone someone did not like them or did not like what was going on
or somebody like them too much that's true that's true and what I would like to know and I think it's something that
they again you know was the case dropped was the ball dropped here I don't know but they didn't obviously pick up the
ball and run with enthusiasm right right it wasn't Nick chub from the Cleveland Browns grabbing the ball taking off
running with it no or if you saw Chase young pick up that fumble and run into the end zone you're not going to stop
those guys and I think some of the stuff that they could have done and I would like to know the answer maybe they know
the answer if you have a smaller time period of when you think possibly Nicole was killed or Melissa was killed is
there a Gap or is it within maybe a couple minutes again because we need to figure
out it are we looking for one suspect or are we looking for or two or three so I think that's some stuff that with
autopsy you know take the ball and run with the autopsy that they could have better
answers and and that I think would lead you into different Avenues of Investigation
well and one thing too that I think is just ridiculous I mean when we spoke with
johnon when we spoke with John Douglas he said I I don't get he's like he's like yeah I get that you have to have
some hold back information he's like but the public is who is going to help investigators most of the time solve
these cases before they go cold and he's saying you know I don't understand why they would choose to hold back
everything and not let the public know anything at all there is no doubt in my mind
that law enforcement knows has a much better idea of well they were killed sometime between 10 p.m. and 12:22 p.m.
the next day I mean that is a window of of 14 and a half hours roughly they know they can shrink that
window down a little bit more and what I mean by by why would you hold on to that
information it makes no damn sense because if you know if you can go you know what we have a a pretty good idea
that that both of them were dead for eight hours or 10 hours before they were found well that's a much shorter window
you have family and friends and a lot of people you have neighbors who seem to be
nosy watching the watching the culdesac watching the you know watching the neighborhood if you can release that
information now you have a much shorter window you have people that are eager to
help and provide information to the Phoenix Police Department in this specific case and they can go you know
what uh so and so was not accounted for during this time or oh uh the boyfriend uh he said this that and the other thing
well um he left in the middle of the night or he didn't come home until very early in the morning you know there
there's a hundred different ways to to shake this thing and to get some some better information I mean in in defense
of the Phoenix to police Police Department we do have the sergeant Steve martos on record saying
unfortunately this case has remained unsolved that the Phoenix Police Department and members of the crime lab
were working tireless tirelessly on this case and many other cases and this will
remain the focus on identifying and arresting those responsible for this triple homicide it says according
according to the sergeant he's saying that the department is continuing to seek help from the community well that
doesn't seem to be the actual case because you're you're claiming to the family members that this is a high
profile case and we can't tell the family anything you're seeking information from the community yes you
are but you're not giving any you're not giving any help to the community help me
to help you you know you there there is information that they can come off of in
this case that I think people can provide some details to investigators to narrow down the suspect
pool here well that's arrogance and it's ignorance as well and it's basically um
it's a ego thing and that's why John somebody like John Douglas goes I don't understand because what he understands
is at the end of the day it's again I'm going to bring up another football reference only two football references
in the last four years just just to let everybody know it doesn't matter how you
get the win as long as you get the win because 2 weeks from now nobody gives a [ __ ] if you beat the team by one point
or if you beat the team by 10 points it doesn't matter if you get the win and it's the same with law enforcement if
you solve the case it don't matter how you got there it doesn't matter if you if you put out it's just like in the
deli case if they would have put out some of this information earlier maybe it would have been solved and if it got
solved then you're the hero nobody's going to look at you and go oh You released too much information
you're not a good detective if your job is to solve the the the case doesn't matter how you solved it
and I think that's why people like John Douglas are going doesn't make any sense
to me why would not why would you not use the media why would you not use the public to try to solve this case cuz
they're the ones that are going to help you solve it and guess who's going to get credit yeah you will law enforcement
will pH the department will they they'll be the heroes they will be the heroes at
the end of the day who solved the case now if you and I are right captain and our suspicions that more than one person
was involved in this attack from what very little that they're telling us about the crime scene and the crime
itself it appears to me that this was two or more individuals that puts a much higher probability that someone in that
group has told somebody at some time maybe they got a drunk confession or or a guilty confession they just had to get
it off their chest and tell somebody I believe that someone has been told some information in regards to this triple
homicide and it's time to come forward it's been 10 years now Rachel glass spoke with the Arizona Central in 2019
saying quote I need answers my daughter was 20 7 and she was just starting her life I thought I would be planning a
wedding instead of a funeral and then we have Melissa's mom Sandra who told the Arizona Central quote we relive the
moment over and over again and we get asked the same questions I have the same answers because I have no new
information we just pray to God that one day we'll see Justice as said Captain this December marks 10
years since these women were murdered and their killer or Killers is still out there walking around free free to kill
again anyone with information on this case is asked to call Silent Witness at 480948
6377 we will include that phone number in today's show notes there is a reward for information in this
[Music] case want to thank everybody for listening I want to thank everybody for
joining us here in the garage every week we enjoy your company we enjoy your smell
Colonel do we have any recommended reading this week this week I am very happy to be recommending the snow
killings inside the Oakland County child killer investigation by Marne Rich Keenan this is in my humble opinion the
definitive book on the Oakland County case it's a very famous case and this book was put together by Marne Rich
Keenan she is an award-winning reporter and colist who recently retired after 26
years with the Detroit News if you're looking for a last minute holiday gift idea pick up the snow killings and give
it as a gift this year it's the perfect book for any True Crime fan I want to thank everybody for joining us here in
the garage yeah and if you pick up one of the recommended reading books send us a picture tag Us in it on social media
and for everything True Crime Check out True Crime garage. join us back here in the garage tomorrow
until then be good be kind and don't [Music] [Applause] listen the Angie's List you know and trust is
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Glass & Mason ////// 451

Part 1 of 1

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Sometime between 10pm, December 2nd and noon December 3rd, 2010 two young women were murdered inside their home. Nicole Glass and Melissa Mason were killed in their East Phoenix home and the case remains unsolved. It has been 10 years and their families are still seeking answers and justice. Anyone with information is asked to call Silent Witness at 480-948-6377. There is a reward for information.

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Brief Summary

Nicole Glass and Melissa Mason were murdered in Phoenix, Arizona, in 2010, with no suspects identified and ongoing questions about the case's investigation.

Key points

A Night of Silence. Two roommates go silent after a night at home, leading to a frantic search.
The Unthinkable Discovery. A friend finds both roommates dead in their home, leading to a chilling investigation.
A Tragic Triple Homicide. The case escalates as it’s revealed that one victim was pregnant, complicating the investigation.
Nicole and Melissa's Normal Lives. Both women seemed to be living normal, happy lives before their tragic deaths.
The Investigation's Challenges. Nicole and Melissa's families feel frustrated with the police investigation's progress.
DNA Evidence Issues. Concerns arise over the handling of DNA evidence in the case.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

They go silent.

The chilling moment when the roommates stop responding.

4:54WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

65/ 100Some tension

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