Killing Fields Trilogy /// Part 2 /// 133 | Forensic Files

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this is true crime garage and this is The Killing Fields [Music] trilogy [Music]
oh [Music] part two the 1980s the 1970s were nothing less than tragic for the gaveston area as the dead
bodies and number of missing girls just kept adding up there was an arrest and a
conviction yet the murders continued but still there was hope as the 1970s were drawing to a close the
murders and the finding of bodies seemed to be tapering off Suzanne Bowers was the last of far too many victims of the
70s and she was last seen in 1977 the murder cases had gone Cold and The Killing Fields were silent but they
weren't empty the 1980s were Upon Us time for a fresh start time for a new beginning
October 1983 Heidi Fay was 23 years old she left her parents house to go see her boy
boyfriend she didn't have a ride so she chose to hitchhike which would prove to be a fatal
mistake almost a year later another young lady from League City Texas would go missing this time it's 16-year-old
Laura Miller some eyewitness Reports say Laura may have been last spotted at the
same convenience store where Heidi was last seen next was 19-year-old Shelly Sykes whose blue Pinto was found
abandoned on I45 in May of 1986 Suzanne Renee Richardson from galston was last seen on October 7th
1988 combine these with the bodies of two Jane does both found in the killing field both unclaimed and
unidentified the fields were not silent anymore many nights Lura Miller's Father
Tim would go to The Killing Fields sitting alone in the dark listening to The Whispers In The Wind and waiting for
his daughter's killer some nights he cried some he yelled and screamed and once in a while he
slept the victims of the Killing Fields refused to be quiet and one by one they were
located these are their [Music] stories [Music] in October of 1983 25-year-old Heidi fi
she along with her six-year-old daughter were staying at her parents house for a
while on the evening of October 7th Heidi's father and a friend were watching a baseball game she told her
father that she was going to go into town to see her boyfriend she she thought that she could hitch a ride from
someone at a nearby convenience store so she walked down to the store located on
the corner of Hobs Road in West Main Street this is quite near I45 well Heidi never made it to see her
boyfriend later the boyfriend called the house to talk to Heidi but learned that
she was not there instead he ends up telling her parents that he had not heard from her so her father went out
looking for her and he started with the convenience store he spoke to the clerk now to be clear this is a gas station
SLC convenience store so he spoke with the clerk and she remembered seeing Heidi and told heid's father that she
had used the pay phone outside and then she had seen Heidi walk away 6 months later in April of 1984 at
a home off of CER Road this is a very rural area we have parents sitting on their front porch watching their toddler
play in the front yard yeah as they watch their toddler play they're going to see their dog come out out of the
woods and the dog's going to have something in its mouth yeah at first the parents thought that perhaps the dog had
found a ball or something that someone had left behind in the woods well it wasn't until the dog got closer that
they realized that this was not a ball in fact it was a skull the dog had brought it to the front yard and then
dropped it near the toddler the police were called and they searched the area and about 300 yard from the house police
found the skeleton of Heidi fi the skeleton is going to be found underneath a tree lying on its back yes this is in
the area near the colder oil field they found her clothing in a necklace of hers
nearby the medical examiner could not determine the cause of death now she did have some broken ribs so it's been often
speculated that she most likely would beat to death yeah and her remains are going to be found in a location later
named The Killing Fields 30-year-old Ellen Ray B who was last seen alive July 1984 uh she was last seen drinking with
a guy named Clyde hendrik at a League City nightclub now Clyde hendrik was there with her but there was also
another couple and this couple was not super close with Clyde but the woman knew Ellen B well and all of them all
four of them had been part of the same little group that hung out at this nightclub you know most nights they
would be there after work drinking since B and hendrik were still drinking when the couple had left uh eventually she
had lost touch with her friend and not seen her friend in some time so she started to nag hendrik Kyle hendrik when
he would when she would see him at the nightclub you know what happened to what happened to be what happened to my
friend where what did you guys do that night she was pressing Clyde hendrik to tell her if he knew anything uh the
woman says that hendrik denied any knowledge of what could have happened to Ellen B uh but she wasn't convinced so
she figured that if she got him drunk well then he might talk now this turns out her idea worked MH on a rainy
November night this is 4 months after B vanished Henrik told the woman that he could take her to where B was so she got
in the car with him oh well that doesn't this seems like a bad idea yeah well hendrik took her down old Galviston
Highway and pulled over into a stretch of woods not far from some railroad tracks mhm uh he then grabbed a
flashlight and the woman followed him down to a ravine that served as a dump for discarded Furniture appliances tires
and old junk he led her to what news reports have consistently called a couch once there he aimed the light toward a
nearly fleshless corpse at first the woman couldn't tell if it was really her friend hendrik gave the body a little
kick and when he did this the body shifted a bit and now the woman could see something she recognized around the
neck of the body this was a necklace one that she had given to B yeah and at this
point Hedrick is going to tell her a story and then he's later going to tell this same story to the police The Story
Goes Like This he says that he and B left the Texas Moon club that night in July 1984 and headed toward an abandoned
sand pit in Dickinson that served as a popular swimming hole mhm B slipped out of her clothes and into the water while
hendrik smoked a joint in his truck then he noticed that his truck had got stuck
on the way out to the swimming hole so he worked on this truck getting it out while B continued to swim after a while
he saw that B's body was floating in the swimming hole so he pulled her body from
the water he administered CPR but she was still unresponsive so Hedrick carried her to his truck and he headed
toward the hosital hospital but then he panicked and feared that he might be accused of killing her so he took her to
the spot that we just described and placed the couch on top of her pedrick made one thing clear to this woman
though he stated you know I hadn't killed B but I wouldn't think twice about killing you if you told anyone wow
so uh kind of a sign of guilty well this began in 8 months of hell for this woman
the woman said that hendrik stalked her uh he turned up at the same stores when it was clear that he was he wasn't there
to shop um she would come home and find a piece of paper stuck in the screen door with a big c written on it uh she
says this is Clyde hedrick's calling card uh and even worse she said that sometimes she would come home and her
two little boys well they would then tell her that a man had come by so whatever HRI wanted she gave him during
this time for you know she was fearing for her kids lives finally on a night when her boys were visiting family out
of town she decided to tell Hedrick she was done and she told him if you want to
kill me go ahead and kill me because I'm not playing your game anymore uh the next day she led police to Bon's body
right and at first hedrick's story makes some sense right some logical sense you
know we were swimming uh she drowned I tried BR I was taking her to the hospital I freaked out M where it gets a
little weird for me is once he tells the friend and then he starts basically threatening her yeah um and part of me
as the friend would be going why would I be fearful of you if I believe his story
why would I be fearful of him he didn't kill this girl it was an accident so chances are he's not going to kill me
well of course the police and the prosecutors had trouble buying hedrick's story about B's death you know the
skinny dipping related death uh but the galvaston County Medical Examiner found no evidence of Foul Play when he
examined the body uh so Hedrick was he was charged uh and ultimately convicted of a misdemeanor of abusing a corpse he
was sentenced to a year behind bars but uh the interesting thing here is while Hedrick was incarcerated right
investigators with the galston County Sheriff's Office The League City police department and the FBI continued to
probe the circumstances of Ellen B's death in September of 1984 we have Tim Miller his wife and
16-year-old daughter Laura Miller they had recently moved into a home in League City Texas in search of a fresh new
start for young Laura although they were they were from a town that was not too far away uh a new school is what the
family was in search of and they believed that League City Texas had just the school and a Cozy home for them for
this Fresh Start yeah you see that all all the time Laura suffered from seizures uh for most of her life this
caused some trouble for her at school she was different from the other kids and couldn't hide it because the
seizures although infrequent seem to come at inopportune times Laura was pretty and very likable so she had no
trouble fitting in in that sense but her parents believe the uncontrollable episodes first started affecting her
schoolwork and then later her choice of friends a lot of the other kids parents were afraid to have Laura visit their
home they especially did not want her to stay the night right worried that they would not know what to do if she
suffered a seizure at their home and a lot of the kids didn't want to stay at Laura's home as the seizures were just
something that that most kids and teenagers didn't understand and of course we tend to be afraid of things
that we don't understand uh I'll give you an example of a situation this poor young girl had to go through when Laura
was about 11 or 12 she was in the choir at her school and everyone knows that the choir always puts on a good
presentation some you know at Christmas time for the parents and students to celebrate the holiday season well they
put on a presentation we don't know if it's good oh they're all good um they're most of the time not Laura was selected
for a solo and she had a seizure during her solo uh she was not in the choir for
much longer after that the Miller family was stuck they were still unpacking at their new home they weren't quite
settled into their new home yet and this is September 10th Laura asked her mother
for a favor The Miller's home phone was not yet set up and she was missing some of her old friends and especially her
boyfriend and wanted to talk to them and tell them about her new home and school
so Laura asked her mother if she could take her to a nearby pay phone so she could make a couple of calls Laura's
mother agreed they went to the gas station convenience store this is on the corner of Hobbs in Maine same one mhm
where Laura would use the outdoor pay phone to reconnect with some of her old friends Laura's mother waited in the car
now after some time had passed it was time to leave Laura's mother had to go to work Laura begged her mother to let
her stay reminding her that she is 16 years old and the gas station was only about a mile from their home and she
could walk home Laura's mother agreed and after giving her daughter a few more quarters she waved goodbye and was on
her way to work later that night when Laura's Father Tim got home from work he was surprised to see his daughter was
not at the house as he waited for her to return he grew more nervous and decided
to hop in his truck and go to a pay phone and check in with his wife maybe she had you know given l permission to
go somewhere right um You can imagine how his nervousness though quickly changed to confusion and fear when he
phones his wife and learned that she had left Laura alone at the gas station pay
phone Tim raced to the actual gas station that they were talking about and he spoke with the clerk the clerk had
not seen Laura didn't know where she was uh the night came and went and then the
following day Tim drove to the League City Police Department and filed a missing person's report when the officer
learned that Laura and her family had recently moved the officer assured Tim that the girl had simply taken off with
some friends and this sort of thing happens all the time and it would only be a matter of time before she would
turn up yeah that's your lazy answer the next night came and went and by now Laura's parents knew in their gut that
Laura wouldn't have run away or just taken off for a while and they truly feared that she may have suffered a
seizure somewhere or she could have been injured and unable to seek help you know
their minds raced from thought to thought as they tried to figure out what could have happened to Laura as the
weeks went by they began to lose any sense of hope then Tim Miller heard something that shook him to his core he
learned that just a few months before the Miller family moved to League City a dog had dug up a human skull in an area
off a cder road in League City leading the police to the of what turned out to be 25-year-old woman who had disappeared
in October of 1983 Heidi fi lived with her parents as we had said but this was just about three blocks away from The
Miller's new home right three blocks away they're also going to come to the realization that she used the same pay
phone at the same convenience store that their their daughter used yes and so Tim
Miller is more than disturbed by The Coincidence soon after Tim had a feeling that he wasn't really searching for
Laura but searching for her body Miller Miller again went to the League City police department and this time he asked
a detective if they' searched for Laura in the field where Heidi fi's body was found all that had been reported was
that fi was found in the 3000 block of Calder road so Tim didn't have an exact address or exact location of where this
body was found right now the detective's response a a dismissive eye roll and he
gave Tim a theory the detective said that Heidi fi worked at a bar she was a cocktail waitress some guy probably took
her out after closing time she wouldn't consent to sex there was a struggle and the guy killed her and dumped her Heidi
fi's murder as far as he was concerned was an isolated incident even though we saw her at the pay phone at the
convenience store mhm so so he's just making up random stuff you're going to be a lazy pile of dog dookie right
don't be a cop okay in the days and weeks that followed Miller hounded the detectives he urged them to search the
field for Laura or at least give him the exact location so he could search the field himself they told him to let them
do their job and not to contact fi's family as the months then turned into a year Tim and his wife Jan Miller they
were not dealing well with Laura's disappearance Tim began drinking quite heavily and then 17 months after Laura
went missing Tim checked himself into a hospital that same day in February of 1986 kids riding dirt bikes through the
fields off of CER Road smelled something rotten and they called the police this turned out to be the skeleton of a woman
um possibly 25 years old who had been shot in the back uh possibly from a 22 caliber weapon there was a bullet hole
in her spine her body would have been dumped in the field within the previous 6 weeks uh she was described as I said
as 25 years old 5'5 to 5' 8 in tall 140 to 160 lb she had reddish brown hair and
a distinct gap in her teeth uh she was lying about 200 ft from where Heidi fi had been found they could tell that she
was too old to be Laura Miller uh police had nothing to identify this woman and she had she had not been there long
enough to be any of the other older missing women cases that we've had despite many efforts she has never been
identified and is known today simply as Jane Doe then while the police were searching
for more clues in this case they came upon another body just 20 yards away from Jane Doe the other body was
identified as 16-year-old Laura Miller no longer was she missing and turn turn out her father had been right right the
medical examiner was unable to determine how or when Laura was killed now there there were three victims all found in
that same area all had been killed and then placed there in less than a three-year time span they were all found
lying on their backs and underneath of a tree someone had placed them there lying
them out like they had simply gone to sleep forever under a tree yeah but you wonder if that means something the cases
the causes of death were not considered the same Heidi had most likely been Beat
to Death Jane do died of a gunshot and lore's cause of death was unknown all three victims were white with shoulder
length brown hair brownish hair uh Tim Miller's emotions turned to anger uh when asked about the bodies being found
in the field Tim Miller told the newspapers Jane do was killed and place there after Laura maybe if the police
had done their jobs Jane Doe may not have been killed and he said that he blames the Jane Doe's death on the
police yeah it's tough I mean with not every case do I want the parents or or the loved ones of the victims to go
after the cops but some of these cases just seems so ridiculous and and again these lazy answers and this lazy uh
police work you know maybe they are responsible for Jane Do's death well Tim was not only angry with the police but
he was angry with himself you know Laura was his daughter and he believed he was
supposed to protect her he was also filled with guilt because he knew he should not have listened to the police
he should he believed he should have gone against them and went to the fields and searched for his daughter or talk to
the other you know victim's parents mhm well if so he may have found her a long time ago and who knows what evidence
would have come with that right a couple of months just before Christmas in 1986
Tim his wife wife Jan and their only other daughter this is uh her name is Wendy went to the location in the field
where Laura's body was found Tim had constructed a large wooden cross uh they brought it to the spot um now where she
was found there is a cross uh the Millers believe that Laura should have two graves uh one of them being of their
choosing and one in the field where she was found and the other thing we have to
keep in mind here Captain is that at this time the police they had laur's remains and they would not release them
to the family for about three years wow so you know the family needed something and it takes you it takes you three
years to do autopsy and get all the information you need well and the family they believe that Laura deserved a
resting place even in the meantime um the family planted a tree at this location and place some sentimental
items around the cross uh but this would not be the last time uh or the last visit to the fields
because for Tim Miller this area became sacred ground yeah this guy becomes I mean just he he almost acts like
somebody in a movie what you imagine you would act like if this tragedy ever happened to your family well he was
going to try to bury his pain and anger in the same field where Loris killer had
left her right Tim thought that the secret to finding his daughter's killer was the area you know the the location
that they are now calling the killing field now let's talk about the name here for a second the name came from a movie
that came out around this same time called The Killing Fields uh but it had nothing to do with the murders down in
Texas this was about finding Mass graves in Cambodia after the Texas murder land
near CER field received the name the Texas Killing Field the murders gain national attention uh the killings along
I5 the Galviston serial killer and the Killing Fields were now big news it's just a shame that the big news didn't
come with big results we'll get right back to part two of The Killing Fields Trilogy right after this quick beer
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for uh joining us in the garage well captain now we have new detectives looking at these three new murders and
the reason why we have new detectives is just like we said yesterday you know eventually our story the victims in this
story will span the course of Three Counties and we will have many different police and Sheriff's departments
investigating these murders M so the new detectives that are looking for answers
in the three killing field murders they were hindered by one of the same problems that plagued most of the
investig ations into the murders that took place in the 70s the bodies sat there for quite some time and evidence
was lost hairs fibers fingerprints tire and shoe tracks all washed away but the victims in the 80s presented another
problem in all three cases police were certain all three had been killed elsewhere and then brought and dumped in
the field several investigators pointed out that they didn't have a crime scene to deduce what had occurred or who was
to blow blame for the bodies they only had bodies to look at no crime scene well let's talk a little bit more about
Tim Miller the father of Laura Miller yeah he began spending most of his time in the field where Laura's body was
found in the evenings after work when it was still daylight he would search the field looking for Clues looking for
anything sometimes he did this on foot other times on Horseback after dark Tim would sit in the field or in his truck
drinking beer and smoking cigarettes Tim believed that laur's killer would returned to the field one night and if
he did well Tim would be there and Tim could get the guy's plate number or confront him or maybe even kill him and
leave him there in the field well I believe he was out there with with a gun yeah many nights uh Tim stayed in the
oil field all in the field all night uh sometimes cursing the killer sometimes cursing God and at sometimes even
cursing Laura uh Tim would cry out to the killer asking him why doesn't he come out into the field and kill him or
at least try to on some occasions as you said Tim brought his gun with him sometimes this was for protection other
times might be to kill the man that killed his daughter on one of these nights uh whether it was out of anger or
if it was simply an experiment only Tim might know for sure but Tim pointed his gun to the sky and he pulled the trigger
until it was out of bullets well then he waited and he waited and yet no one came
not the police not anyone at all and you know he started to wonder did anyone hear did they even hear the shots that
he fired that night Tim doesn't think so well and you wonder how much of this is
also just I mean he's heavily drinking mhm you know is he is he uh make believe in any of this is he falling asleep and
having any odd dreams about him being out there what was real and what was uh what was fictitious and all this
drinking and anger turned into more drinking and then the addition of drugs and grief Tim lost his job and his
marriage Tim and Jan's marriage started to fall apart when Laura disappeared and
it only got worse after they found her body there was a lot of arguing and at times they blamed each other for what
happened maybe if they hadn't moved to a new home or maybe if Jan hadn't left lore at the gas station maybe if Tim was
more understanding none of this would have happened they didn't just blame each other they they blame themselves
and all this would prove to be too much right and like we've talked about before
the success rate of a marriage goes down by tons of percentage once you lose a child all right we have to back up here
just a little bit Captain to Memorial Day Weekend 1986 uh and introduce 19-year-old Shelly
Sykes Shelly attended the University of Texas she had a boyfriend in a job she was a waitress at a very busy and very
popular seafood restaurant in galvaston this is one of those no nothing like that this is one
of those places that everyone says you have to try and if you are just visiting the island for a long weekend to enjoy
the beach well Long John silers this is a place that is a must stop before you go home I guess this restaurant's been
around since like 1911 or something like that but anyway shell worked at this place now her father and her boyfriend
didn't love Shelly working on galeston they both kind of thought the place to be a bit of
a a Sin City you know everyone travels there for fun in the sun uh there's lots of drinking lots of parties and let's
not forget shelle's father uh would be old enough to remember all of the horror stories about all the murdered and
missing women and girls from the 70s so shell was there working late uh she left
work around 11:30 p.m. that night after clocking out shell went out to the parking lot and hopped in her 1980 blue
Ford Pinto uh she lived with her father and stepmother and would typically get home around midnight on these late night
shifts and hang out with her father for a bit for some late night TV before turning in well on this night her father
was out of town on a trip with some friends so shell after work intended to drive out to her boyfriend's house to
watch some movies well after more than enough time had passed for Shell to arrive her boyfriend Mark became
concerned Mark called the restaurant and spoke with a coworker of Shell's only to
hear what he had expected that shell had left a long time ago worried shell may have had some car trouble of sorts uh
Mark then drove from his house to the restaurant and back when he got back to his house he asked his father to go with
him and search for Shelly in the blue Ford Pinto once again they tried to retrace Shell's route isn't that crazy
that's what we used to have to do 80 and '90s you know before cell phones you just you know you'd have you you'd have
that Gap when you went from one place to another place there' be be that Gap in time where now it's like you could make
a cell phone call well this time what they were going to do they were going to have uh Mark's father he would drive
while Mark he would keep his eyes glued to the sides of the highway looking for her vehicle eventually Mark spotted the
car Mark pointed out the vehicle to his father and they approached the vehicle uh they could see that the dome light
was on inside of her car all of the doors were closed they hopped out of their vehicle and ran up to the car now
the first thing that they noticed is that the driver's side window had been smashed and there was glass on the
outside of the car and more lying on the inside and it makes you start to wonder
you know did Shelly have car problems park the car leave the car maybe start walking and somebody came by and uh
tried to break into the car the two men noticed blood uh this is blood on the glass and blood on the car door they
notified authorities Shell's father who was out of town uh he was notified as well police arrived on the scene and
Shell's father he was racing toward galvaston to try to figure out what had happened to his daughter and her car now
shelle's boyfriend and his father noticed that the responders uh to the situation they were concerned that there
had been a car accident the officers took report and they asked Mark if he wanted to get the car off the road and
return it to Shell's home now Mark he's the boyfriend his father stepped in he interrupted the officer explaining that
he was convinced that there had not been a traffic accident at all he believed that something awful may have happened
and he told them that he would not be taking the car anywhere he wanted the officer to have the car picked up by one
of you know somebody with the police department right so they can investigate the car and secure the car and then
search it for evidence um after some convincing the officers agreed to do this oh they decided to do their job
well now the following day at the police department some people came forward having seen the blue Pinto involved in
some strange and alarming activity the prior night uh first was a couple of drivers from two different cars that had
seen the pinto uh they told officers that they had witnessed the pinto in a brief but dangerous car chase Shell's
car was being chased by a pickup truck after the truck pursued the vehicle and forced it to the side of the road A man
jumped out of the truck and pulled his shirt off he then wrapped the shirt around his fist and he began pounding
and punching the driver's side window until he smashed it the man then reached through the broken glass and into the
car and pulled Shelly through the window and out of the car Jesus shell fought the man and grabbed at the car window as
the man carried her Kicking and Screaming back to his truck one of the witnesses said something to the man uh
and I don't need to use any of the language that the man used that night you want me to use it but but basically
he told them uh that what they had witnessed was some kind of domestic dispute uh it was none of their business
and they should leave um when the witness started to speak to the man again the man then motioned at as though
he was going to pull out a gun so the witnesses left uh a composite drawing was made of this suspect but neither of
the witnesses got a plate number from this guy's truck um so of course the police they're investigating this crime
but they they don't have a whole lot to go on well they start investigating Shell's boyfriend of course Mark um and
he did cooperate uh in the investigation he offered to assist them as much as he
could in the investigation now after some time had went by on this case uh Shell's father in a moment of
desperation he picked up the phone and he called John Walsh now at this time John Walsh was a bit of you know he was
an advocate for missing persons uh he had not become a TV personality by this point uh but he called John Walsh and he
asked him for advice you know I'm looking for my daughter what can I do John Walsh told him do do whatever you
can to keep this case in the media if you keep the case in the media you keep it alive in the newspapers and you keep
the police officers out of the coffee shops and you keep them on the streets doing their job right well after a while
into the investigation police eventually got another eyewitness this time the eyewitness backed up the two previous
eyewitness statements but added a bit of a Twist this eyewitness had seen another
man inside the pickup truck right that would make sense after more than 8 months uh nothing seemed to be happening
with the case they were running out of leads the family wasn't getting any answers and then in another moment of
desperation again Shell's father picked up the phone this time he called the FBI
he spoke with the supervising agent um and he said you know have you let me tell you about my daughter that went
missing and nothing seems to be happening with this case he asked the man do you have any kids and the kid guy
said yes and he said have you ever been in a shopping mall or been in a grocery store and you turn around and and your
kid has disappeared and that moment of fear and nervousness that just takes over your body and he said yes of course
he says well I've been doing this for nine I've been doing this for eight months for eight months I've had this
feeling I've been looking for my daughter so the FBI eventually sends out to investigators to help the local
officers in their search for Shelly uh and still the investigation kind of drags on with really no new information
as the one-year anniversary approached of Shelly syes disappearance the family refused to give up hope uh they started
pushing local newspapers to carry the story again they started putting up Billboards seeking information and they
put out more flyers by this time they had put out like 300,000 Flyers looking for their daughter well then one month
later something happened this is on June 22nd 1987 a man called 911 begging for help
uh the man was staying in a hotel and he had tried to hang himself and he had also slit his wrist uh when the police
arrived they found two suicide notes in one of the notes the man wrote that he was involved in the kidnapping of Shelly
Sykes the man was 29-year-old John King King was taken to the hospital and the next day he was interviewed by the
police at the hospital now King not only implicated himself but implicated a friend of his as having been involved in
the kidnapping as well and this is Gerald zwarst after King was released from the hospital he was interviewed
again this time at Police Headquarters and the interview would be videotaped when asked about the night that the girl
had gone missing King told the investigators that he and zwarst had been out fishing all day they were
drinking smoking pot and PCP that night well there's your problem around midnight they were driving off of
galston Island when they spotted a young girl driving in her car well they gestured at her the men were
were now following her car pulling up next to her and trying to flirt with Shelly eventually Shelly gave the men
the bird and tried to feet away from them King told the cops that zwarst was driving and that he just went crazy he
forced the girl off of the road and the busted out her window now sounds like some Wayne Brady stuff King wasn't able
to give really great detailed information or maybe he was and he was just withholding it um but he claimed
that he was extremely high and drunk that night and he was in a bit of a drug and alcohol Haze through this whole deal
hay said that the men took Shelly to king's parents house and took her uh back to the woods behind the house King
said that zwarst then took a shovel and Shelly into the woods King didn't know how long they were gone but Shelly
didn't come back right so Shell's remains should be you know on this guy's property and the thing here is Captain
King wasn't really certain how shell had died or at least he couldn't tell investigators how she had died he said
that maybe she was hit with the shovel or maybe she was buried alive um basically what ends up coming this comes
down to is we have two guys picked up for this and ultimately they would just simply blame one another they both
admitted to being together that night they both admitted to chasing her car and pulling her out of the vehicle but
when it came to the actual events of what happened once she was in the truck or once they got back to King's property
um they they differed on their stories of who was to blame and whose idea it was to to kill the girl there was a lot
of problems with this case because one thing that happened was it seemed like the guys or at least one of the guys was
willing to lead the police to the body of Shelly Sykes the problem Captain was that they
both lawyered up and once they lawyered up they were no longer willing to lead them to the body police went out there
and I mean they they searched with everything that they could anything that you could think of all means uh they
never found Shelley Sykes body what eventually happened was the two men were charged with kidnapping but they were
not charged with murder and I think you know that's a bit of a let down but in a
way I think it's a bit of a brilliant move by the prosecutor because at that time in Texas
as far as murder and kidnapping went they both carried pretty much the same punishment right and here here's was the
prosecutor's thought was this you know without a body and now I have two guys blaming one another uh who are going to
be in separate trials it's going to be hard to get a murder conviction now of course they do have the death penalty
for capital murder down there but the problem is you know if you can't get the death penalty then you're looking at a
life sentence well kidnapping carries the same punishment carries a life sentence yeah so he thought you know
what let's let's do this let's go after kidnapping because they had a solid Surefire win case when it came to
kidnapping they had a very weak case when it came to a situation of murder charged them with kidnapping got the
conviction and then the thought is this if the body is ever recovered if they do
find it eventually then they could potentially go back and seek the death penalty against one or both of these
guys so we got these two two clowns we got zor and King right and we know that they're responsible for her kidnapping
we both agree they're responsible for her murder as well 100% And so what's weird about The Killing Fields is that
there is this you know huge timeline for one right right we got 70s 80s '90s and
then we also have these cases within the overall case where we know that these individuals are responsible for this
murder but are they responsible for maybe possibly another one right and then is this just a big Dumping Ground
and so is that you know so not all the cases fall under one killer but how many of them are connected I mean there could
be six Killers mhm well in this situation they're connected by the location where the bodies are found and
like you said so at this point in our story we have zwarst and King who are spending the rest of their lives in
prison for kidnapping and like you said we know they killed that poor girl we also have uh Clyde Hedrick who is
serving just that one-year sentence for the abuse of a corpse but at the same time what took place here in the 80s is
we had these three bodies that were found in that field near CER Road and there's no there's we don't have any
guilty party we don't have anybody in handcuffs for one or any of those murders and furthermore we have one
victim that's that's remains unidentified right and we still have some of those victims from the 70 mhm
with no answers no leads well in a quick followup before we close out the 1980s uh regarding Clyde Hedrick
remember he got the abuse of a corpse charge received oneyear sentence for that yeah he is the one that was
claiming he went swimming with his girlfriend he found her face up took her CPR and then put her out by the trash
correct now remember the medical examiner couldn't find a cause of death they couldn't find any um they didn't
see any evidence of Foul Play when they reviewed the body so he ended up spending one year like you said earlier
he got one year in the clink well remember we said that the FBI and the sheriff's department they were going to
continue to look in and investigate that situation while he was sitting in prison
so ultimately what they ended up doing was they exhumed the body of Ellen Ray B and when they looked at it a second time
through different eyes they were able to determine that the cause of death was actually homicide it wasn't an
accidental death it wasn't uh a drowning like they had originally thought they found that she had been struck in the
head there was obvious signs of of trauma to the to the skull right you you figure they would have got that the
first time well it would be many years later captain that he would ultimately be sentenced to prison he would reive 20
years in prison for the 1984 beating death of Ellen Ray [Music] be and for everything True Crime Check
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Killing Fields Trilogy /// Part 2

Part 2 of 3

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There is a large plot of land about a mile from interstate 45 in south Texas called the Killing Field. This spot along with the stretch of I-45 that runs from Houston to Galveston have claimed many victims and held many secrets. Since 1971 homicides of girls and young women have occurred here at an alarming rate. There have been over thirty murders and several women who have vanished. This story will span three different Texas Counties. Twelve different law enforcement agencies worked these cases. Join us as we take a trip to one of our favorite states to discuss one of America's most notorious serial cases.

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Brief Summary

The episode details the unsolved murders of women in Galveston during the 1980s, focusing on Heidi Fay, Laura Miller, and Shelly Sykes.

Key points

Heidi's Disappearance. Heidi Fay's decision to hitchhike leads to her tragic fate.
The Killing Fields Trilogy. A deep dive into the tragic events surrounding the Killing Fields and its victims.
Laura Miller's Last Call. Laura Miller's disappearance raises fears as her family searches for answers.
Tim Miller's Search for Justice. Tim Miller spent countless nights searching the field where his daughter was found, hoping to confront her killer.
The Killing Fields. The area where Laura's body was found became known as the Texas Killing Fields, gaining national attention.
Desperation Leads to FBI Involvement. After months of no leads, Shell's father called the FBI for help in finding his daughter.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

The 1970s were nothing less than tragic for the Galveston area.

2:08WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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