Jesse Ross /// Part 2 /// 129 | Forensic Files

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crime in November of 2006 19-year-old University of Missouri Kansas City student Jesse Ross was participating in
a university field trip he along with 13 other University students and a faculty
sponsor drove over 500 miles to Chicago Illinois this is for a Model United Nations conference this event drove over
a, college students from all over the country now around 2:30 a.m. this would be early Tuesday morning on November
21st this is about 12 hours after Jesse last called his mother he got up from his chair he was at this emergency
meeting that they were doing for this un conference and he got up from his chair
and he walked out of the meeting room for about a 30 minute break the surveillance camera in the hotel lobby
caught His image of of Jesse in the area of the exits of the building and this was the last Trace ever of 19-year-old
Jesse Ross the last part we talked about did he commit suicide or possibly did he
try to walk away from his life and start a new life yeah and we both agreed we didn't like either of these as being
high probability uh for what could have happened to Jesse so continuing on the path here let's get into what others
have considered more likely scenarios the first one we want to get into is the possibility that Jesse could have fallen
into the river well this would have been the Chicago River um and this as the captain had said yesterday the river
empties into Lake Michigan and this is this is late November it's icy it's cold you know the police say that this is
what they find to be the most likely scenario we have his parents saying we disagree with that we think he would
have head head back to his own hotel which would have actually taken him in the opposite direction of this River
well there's a scenic route behind the hotel where this un conference was taking place they're scheduled for this
30-minute break he's seen heading towards the exits what are you what are your feelings here
Captain regarding falling into the river well I think we have to take a look at this surveillance footage and I can't
find it online as as as far as that goes I mean I can I have a picture and then we have the description now there's two
description and I think this is coming from find uh helpf find jesse.com uh do you know what that website is off the
top of your head um it's the one the parents uh parents is it find Jess ross.com that's what it is so what they
claim is that the surveillance picked up the fact that he had a white T-shirt on
jeans had a green warm-up jacket uh and he was walking towards the main door the
thing that I thought was interesting here was that he they also claimed that he had a gatorade bottle now so gatorade
bottle not so weird right you're going to a meeting but this is also after we know that we have eyewitnesses that saw
him drinking mhm so my question would be what what is in that gatorade bottle and
if that was let's say a mixed drink I mean especially when you're 18 19 years old uh you drink some kind of silly
stuff you know uh I I here I'm going to laugh captain and and I don't mean to get you off track and we'll go right
back to you here drinking some silly stuff you know one drink that I like this is going to be considered one of
those 18 19 year old drinks I like to I get some vodka you turned me onto the Tios vodka yeah Tios is good very good
vodka I get some of that and I do about a half and half job with that very light
the diet Gatorade you know I like the purple the purple kind I drink some of that it's very funny looking people
usually make fun of me when they see me having a little glass of that but I like
drinking it because I get I get that vodka feeling that I love without the hangover in the morning because I'm
hydrating with the Gatorade at the same time but what you're saying here is he likes to call that drink purple drink he
could have come up with he could have made some kind of concoction and put it in this Gatorade bottle and carried it
around with him for the remainder of the evening like you said he's in these parties but this quote unquote emergency
meeting was actually a scheduled emergency meeting um so he knew he was going to be attending this did he did he
create some kind of drink for himself some purple drink like the Nick likes and and bring it to the emergency
meeting with him to to sip on uh as the night grew longer and longer yeah and I I would also claim that I probably puked
more from uh 16 to 20 than I have 20 to 30 yeah you know what I mean so well maybe not 20 to 30 but definitely from
uh 30 to where I'm at now but so that would be my question was he continuing drinking and if he was you know why
would he leave now I've heard some speculation you know some people uh smoke when they drink I I don't think
there was any evidence of him being a smoker so I'm just going to kind of rule that out so then why would you want to
go outside uh that that's the big question here why is he leaving this area now was
it to go back to his room or was he looking for a bathroom or I mean because look that's a big thing with guys more
so than with females is I mean we we pee anywhere you know so sometimes you know
you're at a party and you're going man there's people in the bathroom and then you just take off and go around the side
of the house right write your name uh I normally like to write Nick's name because then if I'm if they if they see
the P you know it's plus it's a lot easier to write than than the captain mhm but uh was he going out to pee you
know to take a pee or was he going to get sick and sometimes when you go to get sick you're looking for a bathroom
but if you can't find one if you can get outside that's better than puking in the
hotel lobby MH and you touched upon something that we have talked about before on the show because we covered
some other disappearances drinking we've yeah we've covered the Joey labut disappearance uh he was ultimately found
in the river we co we covered Brian schaer um and that always brings up the thought of this uh what is it the happy
face or smiley face killer that's going all over the country and and killing these young college men and uh their
bodies are ultimately found in the river eventually and and we mentioned on those
shows when we've brought when we've brought that up that we find it more likely that the person that had fallen
into the river was probably an intoxicated young male that had hit his limit way earlier in the night and
decided to urinate alongside the river or in the river and inadvertently fell in and met their demise that way well
but yeah the the tough thing about the smiley pH killer theory is I'm probably one of the only uh True Crime dorks out
there that is you know kind of likes this Theory uh not in this case but the the theory overall and what I've I've
stated and the funny thing was I brought up at at crime con when I was talking to
Devon from uh thinking sideways you know I I brought it up and she said smiley face killer and she started laughing uh
because a lot of people find this Theory to be laughable now I I feel like they they made a mistake stake in their
Theory these and for people that don't know the theory it's this simple these retire these retired detectives were uh
studying some cases they found that there was some graffiti by the bridges or alongside the riversides that that
these bodies were found and it was a smiley face now a smiley face is probably the most common graffiti in all
of mankind right M along with some words that you say right you say those words too I know but uh but you're prune on
the shelves so but the thing is is uh so if you if you iay the graffiti right from the smiley face killer I don't
think it's it's that farfetched to to think that there is a killer or a possible a ring of killers that that are
rounding up these individuals and not necessarily to just be found in in a body of water there's a lot um you know
Jesse Ross is one of them a college age student that went missing and has never been seen again and has
been se you know last seen drinking or partying with people now now Jesse wasn't last seen drinking with people he
was at an emergency meeting but if there was an emergency meeting Jesse would have been last seen drinking with people
right and the thing is this is the Chicago police's Theory and that what they state is that you know it's you
know people don't fall into this River every day but they're stating that it does it's more common than one would
think and and if you want to Google it uh the what was interesting to me is a lot of times when one person fall Falls
in that multiple people that they're with fall in cuz they're trying to save them or yeah I mean there was this case
where I I believe one individual died but three people fell into the river and they were trying to retrieve a cell
phone so one of the beliefs that the police you know the thing is is why he's going down to the river one maybe maybe
drank too much he's going to get sick maybe he needs to empty out his bladder right M maybe he wanted to take a
picture right well who knows so maybe his cell phone drops in or maybe he's peeing and and falls in um maybe he just
goes out to catch a breath of fresh air decides to stand by the scenic side of of this hotel and take a look at the
river something catches his eye and draws him near he starts walking close to the the river the thing here is it's
extremely it would be cold out that night and I think you had some of those numbers for us uh but but there's a
potential of ice of an ice situation maybe he didn't simply fall maybe he slipped and fell into the river possible
yeah so the the police this is their Theory it seems I hate to say this Captain it seems likely to me um it's
also yeah it's it's the A to B Theory mhm just because this is the nearest point that would present a danger to
this person that has gone missing you know we see him what has been reported as moving in the direction of the
exits referring to What was seen on the surveillance and just like the captain said I was unable to find the actual
footage of him walking in the direction of the exits but there is a there is a still photo of him in that area now I'll
try to find that and put that on Instagram they did state in those reports though that they never actually
see him exit the building but they they anticipate that that's what he was intending to do M um so yeah this is the
nearest point that creates a danger for Jesse and maybe a good a good explanation for what happened to him you
had mentioned that the Chicago River empties into Lake Michigan right but the the problem with this Theory though too
is it's also the lazy Theory and I really question you know we're talking about a area that's you know um you know
as far as tourists go we really need to have a good reputation or Chicago needs a really good reputation of this area
being safe and so what do they do they have a bunch of surveillance and to to claim that you don't find him on any
other tape MH is just so unlikely to me even you know if he heads back if he heads back to his hotel room that we're
talking about a path that is heavily lit heavily traveled and also heavily surveillance and if he goes to the left
there's still some surveillance why isn't he caught on any of these other tapes right and you would think that if
he fell into the river that he was either a chose to go that route for some reason uh what his destination would be
I don't know or B what I think would be more likely is that if he were over by the river that he was just simply
Milling about just kind of hanging out waiting out this break catching some fresh air maybe having a smoke I like
you said no evidence to point to that that um but maybe out there just Milling about having some fresh air and waiting
to go back in after the 30 minute break my thought is if he if he did um fall in is to me it'd be more likely
that he would be you know vomiting mhm and the reason why is because this whole theory that you know guys go and they
pee off a bridge and then they just fall in I look I've peed pretty drunk before
right where you know uh you're just kind of swaying but but to to fall in uh to a
river that would be you know I don't know less likely but if you're Heaven uh I could totally see that being
more likely of a scenario oh yeah because your whole body is convulsing your whole body is out of control MH and
sometimes your sight is blurred your you know your vision is definitely impaired
when you're in that situation now you and I talked about um talked about the the situation of he didn't appear to be
intoxicated nobody in that that group of 30 people in that meeting thought that he was intoxicated his friend that Ralph
Parker didn't believe that that he was that Jesse was drunk um but we're talking about first of all we're talking
about 2:30 a.m. right who knows how long he was drinking who knows what was in that that gatorade bottle well first of
all how many of those people were drinking mhm because you know I was just at this alumni event for my town
um and I had like maybe two beers so everybody else around me is super wasted right right I can tell this because I
only had two two beers um how many of these people you know because I'm sure some of the people if I said oh so and
so was wasted they'd say oh they weren't that bad but that's all you know normally depending on how bad off you
are right so I I wonder how many of these people in this emergency meeting were drinking themselves and yes so yeah
maybe not intoxicated during the meeting but he he was also for all we know as far as eyewitnesses go he was sitting
down during this meeting well yeah and you had you were telling me an interesting story on the phone the other
day about a bar we used to play yeah so there's this story has a bit of a double
whammy effect on it okay whammy it might have some insight to the state of Jesse
Ross I had this situation many many years ago I probably was was a year or two older than Jesse but as you had
mentioned earlier your your tolerance is a lot lower at that age for most people
I would believe uh as far as how much alcohol you consume and how much you can handle over the course of an evening or
an entire night and we I was at this bar that we had played at our band had played at several times but I don't
believe we were playing that night I think I went there to see some a friends band and I belly up to the bar as soon
as I get there this is like January it's very cold out that night and it's late at night it's already you know it's
probably 10:00 at night by the time I got to the bar when I decided to leave there it's around midnight I sat there I
drank draft beer all night no shots nothing crazy you know had a had a decent time but I get up to leave I felt
fine I felt like a million bucks as a matter of fact I walked out I walked out onto that I felt like a million bucks
but I looked like a 10 I walked out onto the that downtown Street captain that cold air hit me and I don't know if it
was the combination of walking you know sometimes when you when you were sitting
in you're drinking you don't realize how drunk you are until you get up to go MH
and I got up to go and I walked outside and the combination of that and the cold
air hitting me I went from sober as a judge to to drunk as hell MH you had scarecrow legs that's that's right it
was like a ton of bricks that hit me mhm and I had to boot man I had to run to the to the nearest trash can and I I
booted and then I went back inside you R and I sat at the bar and I drank a whole
bunch of water because I was in no shape to drive home it made me that experience
made me curious about Jesse you know why would he go outside if he's not a smoker
he and he's not going out with any other people you know he obviously he went out
by himself what what is his purpose of going outside it's either to just hang out wait out the break or he has a
destination he I think what more so points to is that he was probably attempting to leave the meeting and
leave that hotel because he didn't go outside with anybody with him you know if if I were just taking a break I would
mention to somebody in the group hey what are you going to do for the 30 minute break oh you're going to go sit
over there oh is there still a hotel party going on or or you want to come outside and hang out with me for a few
minutes M um I think him going by himself points to a situation where he may had a destination in mind and for
whatever reason if he did not appear to be intoxicated he could have been very intoxicated like my situation right had
he got outside right and the eyewitnesses at the emergency meeting claimed that he was no sign of him being
intoxicated then Chicago PD comes out and they say well there's no sign of him being intoxicated as far as their
surveillance either mhm but we're talking about a very small room that they would have footage of him in and
for him to walk a straight line or or to not look intoxicated I mean look also if
he was a man on the on a mission again you know when you're getting to the point where you might get sick sometimes
you start getting the sweats right you know and so you're going I'm going to get outside get some cool air you know
and then if I do get sick I'm at least outside I'm not puking in the hotel lobby like I said before well your
adrenaline can take over and can carry you a certain amount of distance um the thing here is that the river was as we
said it was it empties into Lake Michigan which can be hundreds of miles long you know it's a great lake it's
huge it's not like some Lake that you go visit somewhere it's it's a huge body of
water it is a lake that you go visit somewhere it's not a man-made lake is probably what you're trying to get at
divers they didn't find divers and search groups did did search the river itself on several occasions and despite
several searches they did not find uh any of Jesse's remains or evidence that would lead you to think that he had
fallen into the river right but there's several bodies that end up you know watching a Shore or or coming to the
surface once they get to Lake Michigan mhm and over the years these bodies have appeared and unfortunately you know
every time this happens we have Jesse's parents who are there wondering if that's Jesse that has surfaced well and
I think initially when the first part of the investigation came out that his parents didn't want to believe it was
something as simple as an accident right so then it became or or possibly that he
was also somewhat responsible for that uh accident if he was very intoxicated M so you know um I don't think they wanted
to believe it at first but now that we're 11 years out every time a body comes up and the or is found in Lake
Michigan they're somewhat hopeful that they at least will find his remains so therefore they would get some closure
yeah and that sounds crazy to say that they're somewhat hopeful but you're exactly right Captain they've already
reserved themselves to the thought that so much time has passed that he he must have passed on himself yeah and this
idea too A lot of people talk about that oh well he probably went downtown right uh there was a
speculation that he wanted to pass out these records to different record companies um and that he would do this
at 2:30 in the morning mhm it doesn't make a lot of logical sense to me yeah yeah there's two stories and these were
presented by people in the group within the group that he traveled with uh one being that he wanted to get these CDs to
different radio stations of course the radio stations can be you know most of them are open 24/7 you know they're oper
operating 24/7 um I don't know that anybody's going to answer the door if you come knocking at 2:33 in the morning
it seems like an odd time to be dropping them off um you would think he he may have some connections that he may have
he knows the business a little bit he may know the appropriate time and people to drop these things off to without
doing it at 3: in the morning um the other thing uh the thought was that the band remember we mentioned the band he
was still at this time in his life he was still promoting a band now I don't know if it's the same band that we
mentioned the dead giveaway um but he he had brought Flyers with him that he wanted to pass out at a bar if there was
an opportunity now this was just something that he mentioned to somebody that he was traveling with there's
nobody has any proof that that he ever did this at any point on this trip right it seems again seems strange to me that
he would choose 2:30 or 3:00 in the morning to do this this was his last night there so so maybe he felt this was
his last opportunity I heard that some of the bars in Chicago will stay open till about 4:00 a.m. um so this there
was an opportunity to to do this but again I think the timing seems unlikely 30 eyewitnesses that never said that he
had anything a flyer or anything you'd think if he had a stack of flyer that 30 eyewitnesses would at least one of them
would said hey we saw him with this stack of flyers and from the still photo that we saw from the surveillance camera
the only thing that appears to be in his hands is that gatorade bottle let's get
back to this and more theories right after this quick purple drink [Music] break this show is sponsored by better
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when you Angie that all right we're back all right Captain I tell you what I think the the fall in the river scenario
I think we got to put that more towards the higher possibility end of the spectrum would you agree yeah I mean I
think it's most logical mhm that leads us right next to right into the next Theory um that he was attempting to
return to the hotel or as you had stated and I had stated was that he was attempting to go to a bar or someplace
downtown and he was met with Foul Play along the way right so I mean again where's the evidence right um and and
the thing here is we have you know we have Jesse's mother um you know his father's name is Donald and her name is
Donna um so we have Donna and Don uh Ross but Donna says you know the police cannot prove to us that he even left
that hotel building you know so and and like you said with with the River thing possibly being a lazy Theory um by the
police my my argument if I'm the parents and maybe they've done this would be okay if you can't prove to me that that
he even left the hotel room prove to me that or the hotel building prove to me that he did not leave the hotel building
because no what I'm what are you saying what I'm saying is when they say to when
they say to us I we don't know what happened to your son because we can't prove that he even left that hotel
building I'm saying back well prove to me that he did not leave that hotel building meaning there's surveillance
cameras yeah start there along along his route back to his hotel I think it's easy for all of us to agree that that
would be that seems like the most likely destination at 2:30 in the morning for a
guy that has a 10-minute walk to get back to where his bed is um and his belongings are where he needs to be in
the morning time for when when they leave I think this seems like the most likely scenario that he might have
attempted to leave but if I'm the parents I want proof that he was not on that route you know and if you tell me
that you've seen surveillance and he's not on any of those pictures let me see it with my eyes let me look at the at
the time that it lasts from 2:30 until about 3:30 or 4 in the morning so that I can say you know what that person right
there is not my son that person you see walking is not my son that person is not my son well that's my big
question in this whole case itself is the collection of these different surveillance tapes and and was he
actually seen in the hotel lobby or somewhere else in that hotel again that's what makes it so confusing one
like I said from the beginning I think it's irresponsible yeah they're 18 19 maybe even 20 year old students but to
have a emergency meeting so late at night it doesn't matter if it was 2 a.m. or if it was 1:00 a.m. that's still too
late especially when the when the two um buildings are not connected and when we're at crime con for example uh a lot
of the podcasters let's say Bob Ruff from truth and Justice and Generation Y uh crawl space guys a a bunch of people
white wine True Crime um we're all just looking for a place to meet up and drink
sideways and everybody all the names that we just mentioned all those famous you know Wonderful podcasts out there of
names we just dropped you owe us round for next year's crime Cod okay yeah you guys owe it how about two rounds they
owe us two rounds no but one of the things that we talked about when I was like oh well let's meet up for a drink
and let's have a meet up with uh listeners and and and friends and at first the the kind of conversation was
okay well what's good in Indianapolis MH well my question then was well how are these individuals are going to get there
and if it's in walking distance then are we putting people at risk by getting drunk drunk and then having to walk you
know even if it's 10 minutes away I love the captain thinking like a man that's talked about too many horrible crimes
and accidents that have happened to people yeah well I think some of these people were just looking for uh you know
more um content for their show I I I wasn't really I I actually really didn't give a [ __ ] about anybody's um safety it
was more my safety like if I'm going to drink uh I want to get hammered I want to get it to the point where you know uh
I become this small you know a little aliceon Wonderland and I'm and all I have to do is crawl my way back up to my
room so again I like I said with this case I think it's irresponsible um that that they had this
uh emergency meeting so late 10 minutes walking away and and you know it's dark in a city that people these students are
not familiar with and that you know that there's a dance but you probably knew that there was drinking going on as well
well and you know that on the flip side people are going to argue with you and they're going to say you know what
Captain well these are adults and they are kids you know we're having this emergency meeting so we want to give
them the feel and the taste of a real emergency meeting so we're going to hold it at An Inconvenient time I'm with you
I'm with you I think it's irresponsible on behalf of the people in charge of organizing the event to hold something
so late at night we're going have a fictitious emergency meeting for a fictitious un you know right you could
hold an emergency meeting at any time right right but the thing is they hold all these fictitious uh you know
horeshit when when the but the uh but the threat is still real right you know the danger is still real so I just think
it's irresponsible yeah I mean if you want to hold it at An Inconvenient time you can interrupt their breakfast you
can interrupt their lunch or another scheduled event um so I get it that you're trying to create an atmosphere
amongst that group I just think it's irresponsible like you said it's 2:30 in the morning some of these people are
staying at a hotel that's a 10-minute walk and we all know you know you don't have to be in an Einstein or a Sherlock
Holmes to understand that the Chicago crime rate and murder rate are significantly higher than many other
cities in the rest of this country well again like I said okay so I have a issue
with was there enough um work put in to get the surveillance tapes um because I think look I think again like we said
this is a couple days before Thanksgiving I think some of these cops thought you know what this guy's a kid
seems like a smart kid seems like a good kid he's going to turn up I don't think
initially they're just like well he fell into the river and that's what happened no but it's like they I don't
think they did their work and then with the eyewitness accounts you can't tell me if the meeting started at 1 a.m. or 2
a.m. right it's like there's so many contradictory stories there and then it then it becomes well how much
surveillance footage do you need do you need the time where he walked in and then the time that he walked out and
maybe there's another time or how did you here here's my other question for the uh Chicago PD do they have the video
footage of him walking from his hotel to this emergency meeting cuz I'd like to see that and then from that point to the
until 3:00 a.m. 4:00 a.m. I want to see all that footage and I don't think they pulled that and I think they got lazy
and like I said I think you know I think they just assumed that this kid is going
to come up it's you know this is big trip 1,200 students he's just going to show up and I think this was the
frustration that the Ross family had from the get-go you know and then once they didn't collect this evidence and
once they didn't talk to all the people that they should have talked to yeah I think it haunts this guy but I think it
haunts him because they know they didn't try hard enough and so then we'll go okay well what was the logical thing
well the logical thing is he fell into the river yeah yeah and you're right that wasn't their initial thought that
was not like they they showed up to the hotel they took a quick look around and they were like oh guy fell into a river
seen it a 100,000 times no it was like you said it was after a couple days that they kind of come to that conclusion um
I think they were looking for leads obviously I think they were trying to track down some leads but I'm with you
it's like my understanding was that they that he would have been in this specific
Hotel building for a decent amount of time you know that this was there was the scheduled dance there was some
events there there were people hosting hotel room parties and then there's this emergency meeting he would have been
there for a considerable amount of time before he left or fell into the river at
2:30 in the morning um so I regarding the surveillance footage of him arriving to the hotel could be difficult
depending on the group that the amount of people walking in and out but but I'm with you I I where is all this footage I
again I go back to the parents say so you're going to tell me that these 30 students walked hand inand together uh
and so it makes it hard to have the footage going in but then this one Lone Wolf just walked out by himself again
this also kind of you know hints to me a little bit like Lisa lamb right mhm we have all this video footage but then all
of a sudden we have nothing like you know the big thing about her and the and um the elevator is that we don't have
the lobby footage and if we had the lobby footage that would change some things but remember there was some you
know technical difficulties with them and so that's why we don't have them so was there technical difficulties with
these these trail cams or other surveillance footage from that area mhm you know well and the thought here too
is regard guarding the hotel that Jesse's staying at um Ralph Parker went back there at some point he went back
there after he thought Jesse had returned to that hotel now can you show me law enforcement can you show me that
you were able to decipher who Ralph Parker was according to the surveillance footage at that hotel when he walked
into the building because we've seen these security cameras we've seen some of the footage that they that they
record sometimes you can't decipher you can tell it's a person you you might be able to you might be able to it's a
person right you might be able to judge if they're 3 foot tall or six foot tall you might be able to judge if they're
light-skinned or dark skinned but you might not be able to know anything other than the guy had on a a purple ball cap
or he had on a uh green ball cap you know you might not be able to to tell me that that's not Jesse Ross walking there
you might not be able to tell me that it's Ralph Parker walking into the hotel unless you have written down from his
account of that evening exactly what time that he walked into that hotel yeah I'd like to know where his whereabouts
were I mean I don't I don't find his story to be that fishy though I me it's it's very logical to think that somebody
opens up their hotel room uh it's dark you see a pile on the bed you know you you just assume that it's Jesse and then
you fall asleep uh some people are not going to turn on that light he might have been intoxicated himself and just
again like U like I said earlier uh just pulling this you know I got to crawl to
my bed you know that's all maybe that's all he was worried about the Ser you know that's the thing when you're
drinking you get be you become a survivalist I just need to get to my bed at some point um especially when uh I'm
drinking some liquor but um so I think his story is logical then he wakes up in the morning and Jesse's not there well
is it that far-fetched to think oh this guy got up and got going maybe he had something to do do maybe he was hungry
you know mhm so I I don't find his story illogical but at the same point show me
him on surveillance footage right show him walking back to his hotel show him walking into the lobby of his hotel well
right and and I've seen parks and wreck so I'm no dummy right I've seen parks and wreck and and what do you what you
what do we know line of dummy people that people that have not seen parks and wreck you're you're a dummy people that
have you are literally no but I've seen it and the and the funny thing is you know I
you know I don't want to make a big joke about this but the idea that there are these heated debates and these even
though it's a fictitious you know it's this Mock You in thing um there are some heated debates and some people take this
stuff very seriously so again that would um some crazy loon student uh I think uh
Jesse was in charge of uh zier H so did was zier stepping on somebody's toes and was some nefarious act taking
place because of a debate um so we have video footage of him Jesse possibly leaving I want the video footage of all
the other students right where's their whereabouts because those 30 students in that in that room they are suspects High
suspects you know because they would have more contact with them than the other 1200 mhm and they would have been
you know um we can assume some of the last people to see Jesse live right and and why aren't these people questioned
more and did all of them return to the meeting after the break or remain seated during the break right or who went back
to the hotel M who left who went for a smoke break you know who went to get some more booze and that's what I keep
going back to Captain that if if he did in fact leave the hotel building to me it points more that he had a destination
in mind because he left by himself um right but to me that to me look if you're at a party you
normally don't make an announcement or want somebody to come hold your hand while you go Yak right so to me that
would be the motivation there now the thing here is you've walked us well into the other theories um and I think that
you can kind of lump these together in a way so I'll kind of just mention them both and we'll talk about them uh as
they pertain to his story and maybe possibly one another but so the other thought is um and this was presented you
know by other people but I heard his mother State this in an interview Donna said you know how do we know that they
he didn't go back to a hotel room within that hotel building that he never left that hotel building during the break
that he went to a hotel room either to continue to party to talk to somebody that he had spoken to earlier that night
or simply just to go somewhere to hang out for the 30-minute break you know she says you can't prove to me that he left
that building and she says how do we know there wasn't some kind of accident in one of these hotel rooms and somebody
decided to cover it up this would be pointing toward uh that situation but also pointing towards somebody in the
group in that group of 1200 students well I've always thought the idea of a student or a person o seeing and then
people dumping the body somewhere or covering up was complete just Malarkey mhm uh until I've been reading about it
non-stop like it's been happening a lot uh I think there was three girl or four girls charged uh from Ohio State because
they they they literally dump the body uh at the hospital they just the girl ODed wait so they they pull up in a car
and just roll the body out of the car and dump it at footstep of the of the uh Hospital dead yeah and they're going to
be charged and there's multiple cases if you're going to do that why not just call the ambulance I don't because for
whatever reason again you know they're not adults you know it's not the 40s 50s 60s maybe even 70s anymore I would argue
that those people might not have been adults back then as well but yeah but you're right different time though and I
I think people expected people to be more mature at a younger age and I think people expected people to grow up a lot
faster than we do today um and I think we kind of coddle people and put people into these little safe spaces so it it's
not out of the realm of possibility that he was partying with some people and and
and something bad happened again like the mother says prove to me that he left MH you know and I I think it's real
possibility but again it's questioning those 30 some people so I'm interested to see because
supposedly there's a documentary coming out about this uh the the little trailer
I saw of it was absolutely horrible uh as far as a a film standpoint but I'm interested on what they were able to
uncover because the other problem too about this is there's a lot of podcasts that then go in and investigate just one
case spend their whole time on that you know I think we met uh pay from uh up and vanish and very cool thing this is a
cas that would be almost impossible to do because you got 1,200 students at this event m i mean you can start with
the 30 but this this would be a a monster undertaking yeah there yeah there is a documentary coming out at
some point um and it's U done by a guy that's from his hometown or from his area from Jesse Ross's area uh I don't
know the date of when that's to be released other than the article I read was stating that it was due to be out
later this year um Captain says it looks terrible i've not seen just the trailer
looks terrible but what I'm hoping is that this individual was able to um uncover some things that that we can't
find I've not seen the trailer myself um Captain the thing here is though you know fall in the river I put that at a
high probability um a hotel accident a hotel room accident the only thing that there there's one thing that points me
to that and again that's they cannot prove that he actually walked outside the four walls of that hotel right um
the other problem with that though is you you again you know it's like with the suicide thing well where's Jesse
where's the body where's um you think that you might see depending on what type of accident it could have been you
would think there would have been some kind of evidence of such that took place in some kind of hotel room and obviously
he would have had to have been his body would have had to been removed from that
hotel at some point um but again you're up against this situation like the police said where you get to an area you
get to you there's a a report filed we go out to investigate there's no crime scene there's no crime scene for us to
go something happened here and furthermore you you're hearing about something who knows he could have
actually disappeared at 2:30 in the morning there could there could have been nobody that seen him after 2:30 in
the morning until it's reported at approximately 400 p.m. the next day and many people have left this hotel rooms
have been cleaned people you know people have been in and out of these rooms yeah
and I and I know I I sound like I'm throwing the police under the bus and saying that they didn't do their due
diligence one first of all they're underst staffed they're underand they're they're underfunded uh under resources
this is also weirdly happening it's it's an adult so I think it becomes less of a
urgent situation um and again it's it's a bunch of people at this you know he seems like a good kid he's probably
going to show up and then you got Thanksgiving a couple days beforehand I think that factors into things a little
bit um so I I don't want to make it seem like I'm completely faulting them like if they would have done everything
they're supposed to do we would have we' have a closure for his family I I I don't believe that I think you know I
think they ran into some brick walls here yeah there are certainly incidences when we have seen plenty of times before
where there just appears to be no answers there there doesn't there's no arrows pointing the police and
investigators in any type of direction to come to any conclusions at all um now one thing the the parents have as you
said you know they don't they're they seem to be unhappy with the police they unhappy with the investigative efforts
as far as when it comes to Jesse now he you it's under understandable I mean they're not getting the results that
they want so you're going to be you're going to be upset you're going to be unhappy that doesn't mean that they
didn't do everything they could do now one thing that uh don Ross has brought up there was a strange incident uh
regarding the Chicago Police Department where his so Jesse Ross is on the National Database for missing persons
this is on the U ncic um and for whatever reason I don't know if it was a glitch in the system
but he his name was removed and his father was discovered this I don't know if somebody told him about it or
whatever but he called the Chicago Police Department and he told the investigators involved he
said look my son's name is no longer on this database for missing persons did you find him of course is the first
thing he wants to know and then second of all he wants to know well why would his name be removed
I don't know the specifics of why it was taken off but the problem that Don Ross
has with the investigation and that I would have with this investigation as well is that he alerted them of this and
they seem to drag their feet about putting him back onto that database so the way the database works is that
information has to be uploaded uploaded and inputed by somebody by one of the investigators involved in the case so
that database didn't do anything wrong they sit around waiting for somebody to give them the information unless it was
a glitch right um regardless though Captain yeah but here's how it works you file a missing person report right then
you go looking for the person if the police find the person they have no legal responsibility to tell the family
that we found this person and that he is okay they have no legal responsibility to do so right and and that's that's on
them now they might might let's say Jesse went missing on his own cord and they go Jesse do you want us to tell
your family no they don't have any responsibility to tell the family oh we found him he's okay they have a
responsibility to the city and the taxpayers to close the case mhm so I wonder if on some level it was one of
these things where they closed the case and then they said uh somebody found out
about it and then they end up putting him back on the thing so they don't have to have the odd conversation with the
family that oh we found him he just doesn't want anything to do with you that's certainly a possibility which
would lead to the odd speculation of you know if there was something you know look look for all we know his family was
super religious and he had some different way of life he wanted to live and that was not kosher to them mhm so I
I don't know yeah we don't know the Dynamics of of his family one thing I will will say though that kind of to to
keep their son's case alive um and to keep it in the minds of the Chicago Police dep department and their
investigators um they have asked friends and loved ones and anybody that visits find Jessi ross.com to on Jesse's
birthday send a birthday card to the Chicago Police Department um well I I commend them and I I feel sorry for them
but also they you know they they haven't really uncovered much else I mean that's
the problem with this case and probably at this point you know we got to start moving on from this case because there
is so many holes there's so many wh ifs you know but I mean we could speculate on it for 10 hours if we wanted to well
and the other thing though I do want to throw this in because some people find it extremely defiant that the Ross
family would would send birthday cards to the Chicago Police Department I I think they're just trying to keep their
son's case alive and well um and and keep hope that they will get some answers at some point so I I don't think
that it's defiant and I also do want to include that according to Donald Ross's bio um I don't know how long he this was
a career choice for him but according to his bio he did work as a police officer
uh at one time he did hold many jobs over the course of his his years so um it could have just been a short-lived
career but so he does have some ties and some knowledge of police work yeah I I I
think with all these cases when there's a missing uh child uh we all tend to judge their their families and their
parents on what they're doing but at the end of the day none of us know how we would react to this situation if you
want to dive more into this case check out that website that we've mentioned the other thing too is one thing that
was glaring to me as I watched interviews with his parents I do believe the parents when they state that you
know he was close to us that he was close to he he called us he checked in with us we always had a close
relationship and the other thing that I saw too you know it's it's it's quite common that you see a son you know his
hero may be his father that that's a common thing to see now I see this situation the way that Don Ross speaks
about Jesse Ross his son it almost comes off to me that that his son was his hero
know he talks about Jesse being very outgoing being Fearless being somebody that liked to play jokes on people that
he loved and cared about and it seemed that he admired his son for these traits so uh truly a heartbreaking story we're
not going to give up on you Jesse uh we think that there's some hope out there and hopefully one day the parents and
his brother will get the answers that they need and deserve I have a handful of cases that I have on the list and
I'll just random do a random Google search and this is one that I'll head back to and hopefully there's more
information that comes out [Music] soon this week's recommended reading is where's Opie vanished in Chicago by
Donald Ross Jesse's father where's Opie allows the reader to ride along with the
family of Jesse Opie Ross and learn details of his disappearance in Chicago learn what it's like day-to-day living
with the reality of a missing son and brother and finding the courage to go on learn how such an event affects a family
friends and law enforcement remember this could happen to any of us Donald Ross has two books on the subject the
first to come out was published in 2011 so please check out where's Opie and you
can do that by going to our website truecar.com check out the recommended page and use our Amazon Banner for all
of your purchases all right thank you Colonel thank you Captain and we'll see everybody back here next week same
garage Time same garage Channel until then be good be kind and don't [Music] [Applause]
live hey BR you know how Nationwide is more than an insurance company yeah they're
one of America's largest financial services companies we get that in a song like business life retirement or
nationwide's there to protect I'm kind of the jingle guy not sure I agree with that I'm not sure I like your hat well
it would never fit on you products issue by Nationwide Life Insurance company or
Nationwide Life and annuity insurance company the general distributor for variable products is Nationwide
Investment Services Corporation member finra Columbus Ohio

Jesse Ross /// Part 2 /// 129

Part 2 of 2

TrueCrimeGarage.com

Each year hundreds of thousands of people are reported missing. Many of them are adults. Almost all of the cases are quickly cleared. The person is located. Sometimes this is not the case and we are left looking. The family of the missing never stops looking. This is one of those stories. November 2006, 19 year college student Jesse Ross has traveled to Chicago. He went there with fourteen other people from his school. They returned home without him. What happened to him? Where is he? Tonight we discuss the troubling disappearance of Jesse Ross.

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Brief Summary

Jesse Ross, a student, vanished in Chicago in 2006; theories include falling into the river or foul play, with ongoing family concerns about the investigation.

Key points

The Mysterious Disappearance of Jesse Ross. 19-year-old Jesse Ross vanished during a university trip. Was it suicide or something more sinister?
The Chicago River Theory. Could Jesse have fallen into the icy Chicago River? Police consider it a likely scenario.
The Gatorade Bottle Mystery. What was Jesse drinking? Eyewitnesses saw him with a Gatorade bottle before he disappeared.
The Search for Jesse Ross. Despite extensive searches, Jesse's remains were never found, leaving his parents in anguish.
Questioning Police Actions. Jesse's parents demand proof of their son's whereabouts after police claim he never left the hotel.
Late Night Emergency Meeting. The decision to hold an emergency meeting at 2:30 AM raises concerns about student safety.

Episode highlights

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3:38WatchNov 16, 2023

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