Nieko Lisi /// Part 2 /// 618 | Forensic Files

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welcome to True Crime garage wherever you are whatever you're doing thanks for listening I'm your host Nick and with me
as always is a guy whose baby's got a locomotive here is the captain chugga chugga cho cho it's good to be seen and
good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling a friend [Music] this week we are very happy to be
featuring tiger chainsaw Arms by the good folks down at Singing River Brewing Company why the crazy name probably
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make sure you subscribe to that Colonel that's enough of the business all right everybody gather around grab a chair
grab a beer let's talk some true crime the last time that niik Lisa was heard from was around 5:00 p.m. on the
1st this is when when he spoke with his grandmother via phone she called him he actually picked up he said he cannot
talk to her at that time and he would call her back this is the last interaction that Nico has with any of
his family at some point on the same day and this is weird captain because we're
already talking about New York and then we're talking about Nico dropping Robbie
off or supposedly That's How The Story Goes anyway that Nico dropped off Robbie at his parents home in Michigan and then
one thing that we do know that happened for certain is that somebody retrieves a Western Union money
order for $90 made out to Nico he picks that this up at a Western Union location
that is in the state of Ohio in our state so they steal the truck in New York eyewitnesses of that no
eyewitnesses of him dropping off Robbie in Michigan and no eyewitnesses of him picking up this money order that's how
the timeline works out now we should point out here before we move too far along Nico's family they're a little
suspicious of Robbie Knight and Robbie's family you know so they're getting this
information from Robbie Knight's family that Robbie was dropped off by Nico Nico
may have robbed Robbie at gunpoint before dropping him off again the only place that that story
comes from is Robbie and his family I'm not saying that it's not true just pointing out that Nico's family at least
calls this into question so we should as well as we continue on with the rest of
this timeline this will make that money order pickup in Ohio even more questionable right we know that
happened but what happens here is on October 3rd Monica receives an envelope in the mail
that's postmarked October 1st inside of this envelope is her son's driver's license Nico's driver's license so he
has a driver's license no vehicle until he and Robbie steal this vehicle or one of them stole it there's a note inside
the envelope as well that says that someone had found Nico's driver's license on the street in front of the
post office in Corell New York again this is about 20 miles from Jasper where he was living at the time or supposed to
be living at the time now keep in mind his father lived in Hornell so it wouldn't be out of question that he
would be there what I'm throwing in here as a big question mark is if he lost his
license in New York drops it or some people have wondered did he drop it on purpose as
like a a call for help or or to try to warn somebody that that something was going on he picks up the Western Union
in Ohio now I know that not everybody follows protocol all of the time he would need his driver's license or some
form of ID to to retrieve that Western Union money order which we know that he did but his license he would not have
had that at the time that he picked up that money order right is it possible that he had a student ID or some other
form of ID that they would let him pick up this money which is possible and we'll we'll I imagine we'll get back to
the money order in a little more detail as we go through the timeline but what I'm pointing out here is the money order
was made out to niiki and it was retrieved from a Western Union location Ohio all of that is fact that we cannot
change that that's what happened what I'm pointing out is because he didn't have his driver's license with him I
don't think that any of us can say with 100% certainty that he was the actual person that picked up the money order
yeah basically what you're saying is somebody picked up the money order we just have no way of confirming that
right the the money order was picked up it was made out to Nico Lei it was retrieved I don't think we can say one
with 100% certainty who picked it up because if if whoever gave the money order out if they allowed somebody to
retrieve it without showing ID or like you said could somebody have had a debit card or a credit card just with the name
on there no picture and hey I'm I'm Nick from True Crime garage and I'm retrieving this uh Western Union money
order for 90 bucks but you don't know it because I'm showing you a debit card with niik Le's name on it and you just
believe it to be me so that part's a little wonky right just because that Western Union is picked up I don't know
that we can 100% say that it was Nico that picked it up that he was at that Western Union location in Ohio on
October the 1st this whole story is a little wonky and full of people that are full of my lock some people were really
put off by this driver's license being found a lot of people question that big time I don't question it so much because
I've actually done that I've found a driver's license before and mailed it to the address on the license now just just
to clarify it's a driver's license so Nico has his driver's license he just doesn't have a vehicle that's what's
reported it for all I know Captain it could be a state ID but but the way that it's reported is it's reported as a
driver's license now according to Nico's mother Monica she somehow was able to speak with the
person the man that actually that says he found the driver's license and made nailed it to her and then she also says
that he was interviewed by police and monicaa says that she believes that this man had nothing to do
with Nico disappearing that he was just he just did the right thing he found a license and was attempting to return it
to the person that lost it now what I question about the license is how did it get lost is it just he happened to drop
it or if if something if I were being taken against my will I would make every attempt to clue some people in that hey
something's happened to me right mom can't get a hold of Nico and she believes that he's involved in
some kind of stolen vehicle situation his state ID or driver's license turns up in her mailbox so she's going to as
we said she reports her son missing and also makes the police aware that he may have something to do with this stolen
vehicle she's trying to do the right thing but she's also mostly worried about finding her son so by Wednesday
October 5th she's frantic and she's calling everybody that she can think of her and her husband find out that
Robbie's grandmother that uh through Robbie's grandmother that Robbie had ended up at home in Michigan Monica and
her husband Nico's stepfather they speak with Robbie's father via phone there's a
couple of things that Monica says that are weird about this phone call again they're already suspicious of Robbie
Knight this is where they become suspicious of Robbie Knight's family on the phone with Nico's family Robbie's
Father Robert tells Nico's family that he had never seen Nico even though according to the story Nico dropped
Robbie off there goes on want to tell them that Robbie once he ended up here back at home he's been home all weekend
meaning after Robbie showed up he never left the house again never left this man's site again which Nico's family
finds this to be very suspicious because they're saying Robbie Knight's father offered up this information even though
nobody's asking where his son or Sons were uh because Robbie has a brother named Christopher and that was part of
the conversation Robbie's been here all weekend Christopher's been here all weekend it's almost like creating an
alibi yeah pretty strange when you're not even asked where these people were I'd call that being a little fishy
according to the information I have here Captain is that the same day that the missing persons report is filed in New
York for Nico that same day Michigan State Police go to Robbie's house in ramulus Michigan they want to talk to
Robbie of course because now he's linked to this stolen truck so they bring him into the police station to question him
about one where's Nico and two where's this truck during this questioning and this goes bad really quick it it sounds
to me like they don't get very far in the questioning or at least they don't get very much in the way of information
so this is because Robbie suffers some kind of meltdown during this questioning we don't know exact what happened but
it's bad enough that they take him to the hospital the police take him to the hospital for a psychiatric evaluation
that's beyond strange and and that's I believe the first time we've ever heard of somebody
being questioned by the police and then taken for a psych evaluation I just figured out my cover if I'm ever
involved in something horrible and need to weasle my way out of that interrogation room oh baby I'm breaking
down like you've never seen before like worse than Tom Petty said in in Breakdown I'm breaking down big time I'm
getting out of there Robbie gets sent to the hospital and he's there they keep him there at a mental hospital until
Saturday the 9th and during that time during that time period the police don't talk to them they don't they are not
afforded the opportunity to speak with them so this gives a lot of time and a lot of days to figure out what am I
going to tell these people number one but then it gets worse because on the 10th the following day after Robbie is
released from the mental hospital he posted one of those messages that you do not want to see on social
because that tells you your friend is in a bad place that that they probably need
some help so this is on the 10th Robbie posts on his Facebook page at 3:47 p.m. quote can someone send me some love I
just got out of the hospital I'm at a low place but I'm getting better I need someone to show me some love
now that's 3:47 p.m. sometime after 8:00 P.M that same day Robbie Knight dies oh [ __ ] according
to Nico's mother Monica she says that she learned from a police report that she obtained through a foyer request
that Robbie o on his own prescription drugs now to be perfectly clear whether this was an accident or deliberate we do
not know that's that's unclear here well and we don't know when he was prescribed
the this medication was this something he's been subscribed he was prescribed to for years and that he took with him
from New York to Michigan or was this something that they gave to him after he spoke with police after after being put
in the psych evaluation right you're exactly right my guess would be that it was from the mental hospital but we
can't say that with any level of certainty here but the the what's really disturbing to this case is now we have
someone who could very likely shed some serious light on what Nico was up to or what was going on with the stolen truck
situation they're no longer around to provide answers well very sad that we're losing a life but also so we're losing
this information about Nico of course that's going to shock and scare Nico's family all at the same time but while
we're on the subject of Facebook here captain book of faces Nico's family at some point becomes aware that Nico's
Facebook page had been deleted that's fishy this is because the family they they try to
access you know they go to his Facebook page to see if there's any activity on it while he's missing the page does not
exist anymore more I was just going to say that there there's so many strange things I mean we can't prove that Nico
was an Ohio we can't even prove that Nico was in Michigan like you said there then
Robbie's family is establishing Alibi not just for him but for his brother as well
it's it's beyond strange then you have Robbie where he's not going to talk to the the
police oh you want me to get psych psych evaluation well I'm not going to speak with you and then he
dies and this is after he what wasn't he the one that said you know hey I'm not going to bother you anymore yeah Robbie
said something cryptic to his grandmother when she drops him off at the cabin at what is Nico's family's
cabin says something like I'll I'll be getting out of your life now or I'm giving you your life back that's what he
said which almost sounds like hey I've been a burden to you the last several years I'm freeing you of that burden
which may mean something as simple as hey I mean Robbie's 20 at the time did he die by Suicide we can't say that but
he does die shortly after that interaction with his grandmother so was that his plan all along or was it just
something as simple as I'm 20 and you don't have to care for me you don't have to provide a a shelter and food for me
I'm going to going to relieve you of of your responsibilities and your duties that have been weighing you down for a
while maybe they thought look maybe they were running from something we did something bad we're going to get out of
town we're going to start a new life in the process yeah we're going to steal a truck to get us there there's a credit
card in this truck we're going to use that for gas and food and this is going to get us to Michigan and so we can
start over and as long as we don't get caught then we won't have to deal with any of the charges from the stolen car
the stolen credit card stuff like that and then when you get caught it's like he's not he's still running by this OD
like you said you can't 100% say that it was an accident or it was on purpose well and again the truck thing's
confusing too because did did he steal it did Robbie steal it did they steal it together and where the heck is it at you
steal the truck so you can get out of Dodge or did you get out of Dodge because you stole a truck right so this
is where the Tennessee connection all comes back in so we've got New York Pennsylvania if if they were to have
traveled and everything went down the way that Robbie says it went down then that meant that him and Nico went from
New York to Pennsylvania to Ohio up to Michigan and then Nico went back to Ohio to retrieve that Western Union $90
transfer but so remember Nico spent his junior year at Franklin High School in Franklin
Tennessee and of course during that year he's going to make some friends while he's there Monica his mother says that
she's not really certain if he stayed in touch with any of these people once he moved back to New York for his senior
year or even After High School in New York now he could have just because she doesn't know that he if he stayed in
touch doesn't mean that he didn't but now we're at the situation where police are looking for Nico they use his phone
records and his phone did Ping in Nashville Tennessee on October 1st and it last pinged in Franklin Tennessee at
505 p.m eastern time which would be 4:05 Central Time there on October 1st so the
Ping that takes place at :05 Eastern time this is when his grandmother called him remember somebody picked up the
phone said I can't talk right now I'll call back so the phone records reflect that indeed on September 30th through
October 1st my notes say Nico here but I think maybe we should point out that maybe what's more accurate is Nico's
phone traveled from New York to Michigan and then down to Tennessee the phone records also showed evidence of a series
of calls that involv some interactions once he gets to Tennessee or on his way to
Tennessee the unfortunate thing though is nobody has Nico's actual phone they're going off of phone records and
what they can get from the phone company this being law enforcement and Nico's family what they cannot get access to is
the content of Nico's text which is incredibly unfortunate because I mean we're talking about
2011 and we're talking about a kid that's 18 almost 19 years old yeah there's probably more communication going
through text messages than are going through by actual phone conversation I would bet you that most of the important
stuff that we want to know is would be in text if if you were hoping to find something that's where I
would be looking now at this point Monica again I give kudos to her she's taking matters into her own hands
as much as she can remember Nico's phone was on the family account so this is going to get
her access to certain information on that phone what she does is she gets a list of contacts that were on that phone
and she's calling everybody on those contacts to see if anybody's seen him heard from him now some of his contacts
this would be evidence that maybe he was staying in touch with these people or maybe these are just leftover numbers
and contacts that were on his phone from when he spent his junior year in Franklin Tennessee right but some of the
numbers in his contacts are the 615 area code which is Franklin and Nashville Tennessee area again she's calling all
these numbers finally one of these phone calls pays off this is when a young man in the 615
area code area calls her back he calls back on October 15th we can only call him by his first initial so we will
refer to him as e this is because this this name is known to law enforcement but some of these names that we are
going to refer to just by initial right law enforcement have stated to Nico's family that they've been advised to not
use these names publicly to they've been advis please keep speaking about your son's missing person's case because
getting it out there in the media can help but we would advise you against saying these person's actual names so e
went to Franklin High School with Nico during the 200920 school year when Nico was down in
Tennessee so e tells Monica Nico's mother that yes Nico was here at my place the night of October 1st e says
that he picked up Nico about two blocks from his home the home is located on flint lock Drive in Franklin and he
brings Nico back to the house he says the two of them played soccer with some buddies and then Nico spent the night
Nico did some laundry and then the next day Nico packed up his stuff and left he
was carrying a backpack but e says that at no point did he see a vehicle and E also tells Monica I don't
know where he was going even though he left Monica's sister in-law the one that Nico lived with in Franklin knew this
family and confirmed that Nico had spent time there when he lived in Franklin two
years earlier the other thing that's weird here though Captain is though although e told
Monica that he had not seen Nico in two years we know from the phone records that Nico called E's phone number 30
plus times in one day this is that's a lot of times yeah September 30th into October 1st e or at least E's phone
number called Nico's phone back several times so there's a lot of communication there and where does e live
again flint lock Drive in Franklin Tennessee so I'm trying to keep this all straight in my head they they
leave from New York possibly go to Michigan drop Robbie off Robbie's claiming that Nico robs him Nico goes to
Ohio collects money and then goes to Tennessee where this e character claims that they hung out in Tennessee correct
and he says that other people hung out there with them and this is where everything gets really wonky because
we're going to keep saying that Nico went from New York up to Michigan through Ohio and down to Tennessee but
what I think we should point out is the only thing that we can definitively say is that Nico's phone made those
travels because all right so let's go back to the grandma phone call because this is a big pivotal point in this
story in my opinion because now we know we have the phone records and the phone is traveling to Michigan then to
Tennessee this is great because it gives some kind of trail for Nico's family to
try to follow but what we have here is the phone call from Grandma at 50:05 p.m. that's the Ping that puts n
or at least his phone in Franklin Tennessee at that time so that goes along with this eers story but if you
ask Grandma today she says now I'm not certain that it was Nico that I spoke to on the
phone for years she said that it was Nico now she questions that and the other problem with this case is the
multiple law enforcement jurisdictions that are at play here the New York State Police were in charge of the case at one
point but for the first few years in their investigation it seems that they believe
that Nico was on the run which would make some sense the investigators seem to embrace the theory that Nico was
anxious wanted to elude that rape charge he's having fallouts with his family he
St old truck that he simply just split town that he got out of Dodge we have seen time and time
again that when law enforcement or police believe that someone has voluntarily disappeared that can dramatically impact
the actual investigation but here we have the issue of multiple jurisdictions at play we have Monica who's dealing
with the New York State Police about her missing son we have the Franklin Tennessee Sheriff's Department who are
now dealing with the possibility that Nico and the stolen vehicle may be in their County we also have the fact that
the Michigan State Police are completely styed when Robbie Knight [Music] dies this show is sponsored by better help do
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cheers the people in the front and the people in the back and to the colonel cheers to you captain and cheers to
hopefully Nico's family getting some information getting some answers soon our timeline we're going to go to March
of 2012 this is Monica Nico's mother conducting her own investigation and she's been looking for her son since
October of 2011 but in March of 201 12 she traveled to Franklin Tennessee this to talk to
the teen who says that he saw Nico the night of October 1st so she goes to this kid's
home she sits down with E the the teenager that we're calling e and E's father and what Monica learned from them
really didn't help the situation at all so this is from The Tennessean in 2016 that's quoting Monica in this
situation saying I said to the young man you haven't seen him in two years what did he say what did he want where did he
go and he couldn't deliver anything positive or anything concrete as far as information for me so Monica says that
she gets three different versions of how Nico got to their house e told her one time that he picked Nico up two blocks
away that was the the original story then he said Nico got dropped off at their home in another version of that
same story and then later he says that Nico drove up but this young man e denies ever seeing the truck e and his
father for the most part according to Monica were very casual but they were also very vague on any of the details
she wasn't able to get really much in the way of answers from them regarding her son or what the manner of his
Transportation was well again Nico is in this place in his life this Dark Cloud if you will and on
top of that he's making bad decisions he's hanging out with people that also make bad decisions and we don't know
much about this e guy but if he's hanging out with Nico around this time period Then e is probably a person
that's making bad decisions and you just can't trust everything that they're saying because they might be telling you
a story that makes them look better what's weird here too Captain is this is when Monica finds out about the Western
Union money gram for $90 that someone picked up that we're told that Nico picked up in Ohio and this is because e
was the one who had sent the money gr but he refused to tell Nico's mother Monica why they sent the money of course
Monica says that she just assumes the money was for gas right so he could continue to drive the
truck that he was making his way to Tennessee I do want to point out you know there's always these little
missteps you know not all the time but but often times there are these little missteps there's so many cases out there
that don't have missteps by the police and we don't discuss those because they get solved right right we don't hear
about all the things that they got right because when they get it right they find
the person that perpetrated or they find the missing person and everything's squared away but here we have a missing
person person with a set of bizarre events and behaviors in my opinion leading up to his disappearance it's
really actually even hard for me to say did he disappear in New York did he disappear in Michigan did he disappear
in Tennessee I I can't look at this information and decipher which of those is most correct what's interesting to me
Captain is that and this is incredibly surprising it seems that there was never an APB out for this stolen truck even
though it's reported stolen we know that it passes through m mple States you know
you would think that maybe it went through some tolls or toll records that would be have some of the information on
this truck I think that that was a misstep here by investigators now who knows if they had put out an APB and it
didn't get out until October 2nd or 3rd or fourth or 5ifth it might have been too late because based off of the phone
records and based off of all of the information we have if Nico did in fact travel from New York to Michigan down to
Tennessee he would have completed his trip to Tennessee before those dates as of today have we found that truck yes
the truck has been located but it took several years so let's get into that but before we lead up to that I want to
point out another part of the problem we've already pointed out that Robbie Knight who was traveling with Nico who
was at least traveled with him in the stolen vehicle while it was in the state of New York we know that that is fact we
pointed out that he passed away that he ODed shortly after Nico disappears but then in 2012 Robbie Knight's father who
had had some communication and interaction with Nico's family he passes away as well this is not helpful to the
investigation because remember Monica and Nico's family have said that they were suspicious of Robbie Knight of
Robbie Knight's father and Robbie's brother Christopher Christopher from my understanding was later
incarcerated on charges not related in any way or form to this case this is one of the most bizarre missing person cases
that I think we have covered in the last six years this takes us to November of 2015 now we still have the New York
State Police the the investigators from that agency they're still the lead technically on this case at this point
they go to ramulus Michigan this to question the two people in 's family who were still alive this seems a little
after the fact to me right there's four people in this family Nico was supposedly close enough to this home
that he drops off Robbie or robbed Robbie two of these family members have passed away before New York State Police
go out to interview these individuals but again State Police believed that Nico had left voluntarily in law
enforcement's defense they were or Robbie was questioned by local law enforcement which led to him being psych
evaluated correct and so what we have here Captain is some new information that comes out because of these
interviews they learn from Christopher he's not admitting to really much uh he's not doesn't have any information on
where Nico went but he admits that he and Robbie his brother Robbie who's now deceased they were the ones that shut
down Facebook page they did that from their house this was something that was done sometime after Robbie showed up
back in Michigan but before Robbie died a few days later so this makes you wonder even though Christopher gives
this information he's not incredibly helpful but was there some kind of conspiracy to make Nico completely
disappear we know his phone was shut off at some point yeah or maybe they maybe they knew he was having a okay
hypothetically he Nico's having a hard time communicating with his phone or his phone's not working or something maybe
he didn't have a charger and he takes off on the road now he doesn't have a charger so he then robs Robbie so now he
has his phone but we're going to shut that down and well he can communicate with people through Facebook and we're
going to shut that down as well well my head goes to this end of it because one of the first things I look at in these
cases is trying to figure out did this person hit the reset button and choose to disappear or are they running from
something or did something terrible happen to them where I go with this is I I see the Facebook page shut down and I
go okay well maybe Nico shut it down because he does not want to have any communication with his family and he
wants to disappear but now we find out years later that no these two guys Robbie and Christopher they shut it down
they shut down the communication yeah why did they shut down Nico's Facebook page is that to make Nico disappear CU
they did something to him or was that because would there be something incriminating that somebody could find
on the Facebook page yeah very good point and this is why you're the colonel and they don't let me leave my house
he's not allowed to leave just research cases give us the information as long as
I wear that ankle bracelet I can I can go and in one handcuff yeah so this leads us up to the point that you wanted
to get to here Captain July 2016 this is it when e the person that we are calling e he's finally questioned
by the New York State Police and the Franklin Police Department this was the first time that New York state police
came to Franklin to talk to e and his family in person they've had some communication over the phone but this
was the first time they're going to interview him in person this is 5 years after Nico goes missing so Nico's family
says that e was initially helpful in the investigation but at some point lawyered
up and he shut up but we know that police got a tip while they were on the ground in Franklin Tennessee this is
because the truck that Robbie and Nico were driving that Nico was believed to have driven to Tennessee or at least
that's the story that we're getting told was found they found the truck it was found stripped and
dismantled in a locked detached garage of a home in silven Park which is a residential area in Nashville so this is
about 21 miles from Franklin Tennessee a statement from the Franklin Police Department posted by Lieutenant Charles
Warner on July 22nd 2016 reads as follows new lead of uncovers dismantled truck missing New York teen last seen
driving in Franklin a Cold Case investigation Into The Disappearance of a missing New York teen has led to the
discovery of the truck he drove to Franklin following a lead yesterday afternoon Franklin police detectives and
New York State Police investigators found the stripped down truck locked inside the garage of a middle Tennessee
home the discovery only increases the concern of Foul Play in the disappearance of Nico Lei who was last
seen on flint lock Drive in Franklin on October 1st 2011 investigators are hopeful that
forensic processing of the truck will help to provide answers in the case police urge anyone with information to
come forward so that's 2016 so now we sit back and we look at that and we soak that all in we absorb that information
and we go unfortunately the truck probably didn't provide any answers forensically
at all right because we've not heard anything well and they said the vehicle was stripped yes but it goes back to
this idea like you were talking about with the Facebook page is it to stop communication or is it to erase some
kind of evidence or hide some kind of evidence and we know with with we know with Robbie's father he seemed to be
establishing aliis for his sons and then we find this vehicle cool which is hidden
right it's this individual was hiding this vehicle for some reason well and here's the
thing let's go in in depth here the truck when they found it was completely dismantled it had no remaining parts on
it so we're talking no lights no wires knobs no engine no doors no tires nothing all that remain of this truck
was the gray painted frame of a truck bed and the cab so if police were planning on searching it as they said in
their release for forensic evidence well you know me Captain I'm a betting man I got a crispy piece of
paper here that's green in color and it's got a picture of Benjamin Franklin on it in the center I would wager that
against other pieces of paper with other important figures on them that they didn't find anything
I mean this is years later this thing is completely stripped down and in fact someone had even attempted to remove all
of the vehicle identification numbers off of off of this piece of 10 what the reason that they know that they found
the right truck is somebody missed one and they found the VIN on some place of this dismantled truck right because
let's go back to the beginning this truck was a gold truck right yes and now now this vehicle is doesn't even have
any pain on it and luckily again a lot of these criminals are stupid and luckily they made a mistake
and left one of the VIN numbers right and what we have here is they do not police do not release the
exact location of where the truck was found because it is found on private property it's found in a detached garage
of a of a home that is owned by a family I'm guessing what we do know is that the something that Nico's
family says that they learned during the course of this investigation they say that at some point they overheard that
the truck was found at a certain address in Nashville and that Monica was later able
to piece together some more information based on other information that she's received so the house where the truck
was found stripped and locked in the separate garage belongs to a family who lives in Franklin Tennessee this is not
we need to be clear here this is not the person who we are calling e this is not
E's family home on flint lock drive that we referenced a couple times so this is
another family now in 2011 when Nico went missing and the house that the truck was later found in it was
considered a Party House the franklin-based parents own the home but their teen son who we've been instructed
to call Jay lived there so Jay and E they know each other and Nico knew them both a family member of Jay whose
parents own the home was renting the home in 2016 and was the one who allowed the New York State Police investigators
to access the garage so what's really weird here is that back in December of 2011 Monica receives a
tip on Facebook from a girl who lived in Tennessee who gave her the name of Jay's
family and suggested that she talk to Jay and his parents so there was somebody that came forward years earlier
saying hey you might want to talk to this Jay fella and his parents and that's ultimately where they end up
finding the truck stripped down in a locked detached garage and this case is so difficult for me
because the truck being found and Tennessee to me leans more towards the idea that maybe Robbie was telling the
truth and he dropped me off in Michigan and then he took off down to Ohio collected some money from there went to
Tennessee but then it becomes a big question of Foul Play because you have this vehicle that somebody's obviously
trying to uh destroy or make it so nobody knows who this vehicle belongs to or is it
simply that Nico was some bad things were happening in his life and he was also making some bad decisions and then
he made some more bad decisions to run from those well plug your ears here Captain because I don't want your head
to explode because this case is very frustrating to look at and this will make it even more frustrating so the
family that owns the home remember they when it was found the family that owned it at the time in
2016 they granted the police access to the garage there doesn't appear that they're trying to hide anything they let
them look in the garage they find this dismantled truck they find a VIN a vehicle identification number on this
scrap of metal that confirms that it was the truck that was stolen reported stolen in New
York but this is 2016 the family that allowed access to the police to the garage they say we
don't know how the truck got here we have no information on the truck why don't you have any information on the
truck oh because Jay who lived here who knew the person that we are calling e who also knew
Nico he died in 2014 two years earlier of a suspected overdose the second individual the second
eyewitness to die of a overdose yes exactly so this really leads us into really the theory portion of our show
because with all these people that have passed away that likely had information we no longer have access to
that information so we're hoping police investigators Nico's family are all hoping that those people before they
passed away told somebody whatever it is that they knew of the situation this is
a case that needs to blow up on the blog so if you have a thought that you think would help this
case at all go to our blog at truecrime garage.com and leave a comment on this episode so when we discuss theories here
we we got to point out the obvious first there's almost an infinite number of theories in this case because we have a
lot of confusing information and a lot of the people that may know something well they are not around to tell they
are dead they've passed away now one theory that I think that we can dismiss and I I say this with great sadness and
I wish that I could offer more of a light at the end of the tunnel for Nico's family but the theory that I
think that I can kind of dismiss from my investigation is that Nico is Alive and
Well somewhere after leaving to start a new life this to me seems very unlikely in this situation and I say that for a
multitude of reasons one given how close he was at one time with his family his mother extended and
otherwise uh for the record Monica has said unequivocally that that she does not believe that her
son is still alive based off of the relationship that she had with him and that he would not hurt her and hurt the
family for this long without some form of communication she and the investigators
now even though the State Police at one time believe he left voluntarily and that may be the case he
may have left their state voluntarily but it seems like investigators now and Nico's family now believe that Foul Play
is responsible for whatever happened to Nico and the other thing that we should point out too is that some people are
going to go well Nick calm down buddy he was running from a rape charge well that
charge was eventually dropped the charge against those other boys or men or whoever they were that that were the
allegations were put forward of rape on those guys those charges were dropped as
well yeah and that's a big thing because if to me this idea that he was running from something that's what he's running
from he's running from that satutory rape charge but then bad [ __ ] happened and if he was only running from that
char and because that would have dramatically affected his future once that charge has
dropped you come forward but maybe because of him running from those charges and making bad
decisions like stealing a vehicle maybe that would make him not want to come forward well and to further bolster this
opinion that Foul Play is involved here Monica actually told True Crime garage some relatively new information that's
not really out there to the masses and so we'll share that with you now this went down in March of
2017 Monica says that the New York State Police informed the stubin county New York
da that they believed that they had reason to believe and found this these reasons in
the course of their investigation that Nico was killed shortly after arriving in
Tennessee they said that they had obtained reliable information that Nico had died by means of homicide
so that really helps in the way of creating some kind of breadcrumb Trail where we called everything into question
earlier we now sit here with this information and go well the New York State Police see seem to believe enough
so to tell the district attorney of stubin County mhm that what we came up with what we found
in our investigation was that yes Nico left New York voluntarily Nico arrived in Tennessee he
was physically present at some point in Tennessee and he's no longer with us because he died by means of a
homicide well and remember what his mother was saying and what the family was talking about how he
left Tennessee abruptly and to do so just because you were truant from school doesn't make a lot of sense was
he trying to get out of Dodge gets out of Dodge you know is he trying to get out of Tennessee for some
reason something bad happened he goes back home some bad [ __ ] happens he he then makes a
break for it and then he's met with Foul Play in Tennessee based off of something
that happened months earlier here's one thing that I want to Circle back to because when we look at these cases I'm
always trying to evaluate these individuals these characters if you will within the
story and one of the characters is Nico's mother Monica I have found time and time again
her actions to be incredibly levelheaded right oh I I'm not going to dodge the police I'm going to inform them that my
son's missing and also inform them that he may be involved in a stolen vehicle situation if you find that truck you
might find my son right very levelheaded thinking now one interaction that I cannot vouch for I was not present when
this interaction went went down but what we are told by Monica and her family is
that when they spoke with Robbie Knight's Father Robert Knight the second who is now deceased and Robbie Knight
III is now deceased when they spoke with Robbie Knight's father the father said Nico dropped him off he here and my
son Robbie and my son Christopher have been home the whole weekend they've not gone anywhere since Robby got back
according to Monica and that's the thing when you review somebody's actions and their
behaviors she's not the type that comes off as oh she's just suspicious of everybody because she's she's pointed to
certain people that are involved throughout the story and said I don't think that person has anything to do
with this or I don't think that this person was up to no good they were just trying to help
out example being the person that found the driver's license or the state ID and
mailed it to her and so she seems to be very levelheaded and yet she says she was very almost instantly suspicious of
this statement Robbie and my son Christopher have been here the whole weekend ever since he got back offering
up this information creating an alibi when one was not requested to me the police say that they have
evidence they have reason to believe that he was killed shortly after arriving in
Tennessee I'm starting to wonder did Nico arrive in Tennessee by himself or do we have one or both of
these night Brothers in the truck with him and then this whole case too is it's like it's like a snake chasing its tail
eating itself right cannibalizing itself it's it's the chicken or the egg in a lot of these questions did they steal
the truck cuz they needed to leave or did they leave CU they stole the truck what happened after they got the
Michigan at what point do things turn for Nico turn bad for Nico from these people that are supposed to be his
friends everybody that we mentioned was considered to be a friend of his at one point this e fella this J fella Robbie
all who have passed away by the way some of them from drug overdoses accidental or
purposely we don't know did something Drive these individuals did they do something that they that drove them to
that end and it's why did they go to Tennessee what happened with the truck was he killed because of the truck
did they try to sell it for parts did they try to fence a stolen truck and and that went wrong and that's what happened
to Nico it's a lot of of the the chicken or the egg just to touch on something that you were saying did he arrive in
Tennessee did Nico arrive in Tennessee in that truck by himself or was Robbie or his brother
with him or was there a confrontation like Robbie claims that was a little more heated or
a little more involved or maybe Nico knew more information about Robbie than he wanted him to know and
they chased him down to Tennessee in November of 2017 the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation took over this case and in
September of 2020 the Tennessee Bureau of Investigation premiered a video on this investigation Into The
Disappearance of Nico this video shows the home where the truck was found and shows the truck as
it is now itself and also includes a plea for information as far as Nico's mother Monica goes she says she is long
since pasted worrying about Justice or convicting anyone or retribution she has spent the past 11 years Plastering
Flyers up traveling to talk to Witnesses or potential Witnesses she spent some of
that time harassing the police for information also attending missing persons rallies and conferences creating
the search for Nico Ley Facebook page and of course making her rounds to different shows and podcasts like ours
and speaking with us after more than a decade of searching she is exhausted and has just one goal she just wants to get
her son's remains back she does not believe that he's alive she says if he were he would have been in contact
especially after the charges against him were dropped and she told Williamson homepage.com quote my main focus is just
to find my son's remains if anyone if anybody knows anything I want them to come forward to police to me anonymously
to either I don't care my focus is to find my son my focus is not on the people responsible anymore I need to
know where my son is the investigators from TBI continue to seek information from anyone that was
hanging out at the house where the truck was found or remember being at a party at that
what was known to be a party house at one point the investigator says that someone knows how the truck got there
and someone knows how it was dismantled and that people in the Nashville and Franklin area know exactly what happened
to Nico Monica tells us that there are several families in Tennessee who are involved in what happened to her son
niik Lei is a Caucasian male with brown hair and brown eyes 5' 10 to 5' 11 in tall 160 lb he was last seen wearing a
black hooded sweatshirt red shorts sneakers and a silver crucifix Nico had several tattoos
including an unfinished guardian angel and a crescent moon on his left side four Chinese symbols on the back of his
upper right arm and a large kneeling woman with a Devil's Tail on his right side anyone with any information about
Nico or his disappearance should call 1800 TBI find that's 1800 TBI f n d or submit a tip online by emailing tips to
TBI tn.gov the leasy family has offered up $2500 in reward money for information
leading to Nico's whereabouts and the Franklin Police and Crime Stoppers are offering up an additional reward of up
to $1,000 for information in this case want to thank you so much want to give you hugs and kisses if I can let me get
close to you Colonel do we have any recommended reading for the beautiful people yes we do Captain this week we
are recommending a book called Ohio Heist historic Bank holdups train robberies juwel stings and more by Jane
torzillo you're going to want to check this out if if you love you some true crime if you love you some Ohio True
Crime this book features all of the great Bank holdups train robberies and Heist that you can think of coming out
of the great state of Ohio including some of the John Dillinger crimes that were committed check out Ohio Heist by
Jane torzillo you can find that on our website at true Crim garage.com click on the recommended page yeah all the guy
wanted to do was go watch a movie and his girlfriend had to turn him in ain't that the life and until next week be
good be kind and don't [Music] [Applause] litter is it possible to predict the unpredictable can 3D printed life-size
organ models help to map out complex surgeries ahead of time is it possible it already is right here Mayo Clinic you
know where to go

Nieko Lisi /// Part 2 /// 618

Part 2 of 2

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18 year old Nieko Lisi went missing sometime around October 1st, 2011. His disappearance occurred sometime during a time period filled with suspicious circumstances. Nieko is technically missing from Addison, New York. He may have gone to Michigan and/or Ohio. Nieko is said to have been seen in and interacted with persons who knew him in the Franklin/ Nashville Tennessee area. His phone also shows activity in all four of the previously mentioned states all within a short timeframe of about 48 hours. Anyone with any information about Nieko or his disappearance should call 1-800-TBI-FIND, or submit a tip online by emailing TipsToTBI@tn.gov. The Lisi family is offering a $2,500 reward for information leading to Nieko's whereabouts. Franklin police and Crime Stoppers are offering an additional reward of up to $1,000 for information in this case.

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Brief Summary

Nico Lei disappeared in 2011; his friend Robbie Knight died shortly after, raising suspicions of foul play in their case.

Key points

Mysterious Disappearance. Nico's last known interaction was with his grandmother, raising questions about his fate.
Suspicious Alibi. Robbie's family offers unsolicited information about his whereabouts, raising suspicions.
Robbie's Disturbing Post. Just hours before his death, Robbie posts a troubling message on Facebook.
Monica's Investigation. Monica travels to Franklin to seek answers about her son Nico's disappearance.
Discovery of the Truck. The truck believed to be driven by Nico is found dismantled in Nashville.
The Mystery of the Truck. The truck was found dismantled, raising questions about foul play.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

This whole story is a little wonky.

Discussion about the strange circumstances surrounding Nico's disappearance.

9:04WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

75/ 100High tension

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