The Fifth Nail /// Part 2 /// 119 | Forensic Files

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and talk some true crime. On the evening of May 16th, 2005 in the town of Coeur d'Alene, Idaho, the
sheriff's department, they find the lifeless bodies of three people inside of the Groene-McKenzie
household. They find both of the adults, as well as a teenage boy. His name is Slade Groene. Now, we have two missing
children here, 9-year-old Dylan and 8-year-old Shasta. It takes about 7 weeks, but Shasta is located in a
Denny's restaurant with a strange man in the middle of the morning. Now, this would be July 2nd.
On Sunday, July 3rd, the man that was with Shasta was identified as Joseph Duncan III.
Yeah, so who is Joseph Duncan? Joseph Duncan is 42 years old. He's a white uh male. He's a registered sex offender and
he's from Fargo, I believe. Yeah, Fargo, North Dakota. Now, they are holding him because they want to charge
him with two counts of kidnapping. Uh charges that in in that state, if you're convicted, um they come with possible
sentences of life in prison or possibly the death penalty. Now, it's time for detectives to
question young Shasta. And they need a lot of information from from this little girl. You know, where had the man taken
her? Where was she for for 6-7 weeks? What happened that night at the Groene-McKenzie home? And of course,
where is Shasta's brother, Dylan? That's the first question you should be asking.
Well, and of course we have this situation here, Captain, where Joseph Duncan, he does not appear that he's
willing to talk with the sheriff's department. So, as we said, they're going to have to learn this information
from Shasta. And some of what Shasta knew and understood about the crimes, Shasta actually learned from Duncan
himself. Okay. Duncan told her several times about details of the murders of Shasta's
family. And he was and and furthermore, what he was doing to Dylan while they were out
on the run, let's say. Uh Duncan told Shasta that that he was turned on when he had spotted her and
Dylan in the front yard. He was driving around. Uh we can assume probably looking for a victim or looking to
victimize somebody. He states that he sees the two of them in the front yard. He's turned on by the young girl. She's
wearing a bathing suit at the time when when he sees them. It is This is when he
decides that he was going to take the little boy and take the little girl. Okay.
Now, Duncan told her that he had watched the house and the family for a couple of
days. He's not specific on how many days these were. Um but he says that he would he would
creep up to the windows at night when the lights were out. And he See, he had night vision goggles that he brought
with him on this trip. And he would creep up to the windows when the lights are out, when the family is sleeping,
and he was looking in the window so he could get an accurate layout of the inside of the home, because he was
planning his attack. Right. And he was waiting for the right time to strike. Well, on the night of the
murders, um there's a couple of different reports here, and I think maybe the confusion is
where was Dylan, where was Shasta. But but the way that the story goes is this is that at some point on the night of
the murders, um Shasta's mother, Brenda, she came into her room and asked her to come out
into the living room. Shasta was asleep at this point. And then she calls out to
Dylan, and Dylan then joins them in the living room as well. Now, Shasta says that when she got there,
um that this is the first time she sees this strange man. She's never seen him before, and he's in the living room with
her family members. At this point, um Mark McKenzie is already bound, and he's on the ground. And then we also have
Slade, who is bound just with the hands, uh but he's on the floor as well. Then it's at this point that the strange
man, he ties up Shasta's mother, Brenda. Mhm. The man she says is wearing dark clothing, and he's wearing dark gloves,
black gloves. So, after Duncan has the two adults and the one teenager bound, he's going to
then take the eight and nine-year-old, bound them up, and then bring them out to a pickup truck that he has parked in
their I'm guessing their driveway. Yeah, he has it he has it parked somewhere on the property. He puts them
in the pickup truck, and then he goes back inside. Now, Shasta says that the kids uh in the pickup truck, they heard
several screams coming from the house um after Duncan had returned, but eventually
the night went silent. Eventually, they hear hear nothing else coming from the inside.
Right. Uh she does say that at one point, um that Dylan and Shasta, that she saw her
older brother Slade walk outside. And then he walked back inside again. Um when Shasta reported this to
authorities, she said that her brother Slade was already extremely bloody at this point when he walked outside and
then returned. And in her words, uh he was probably brain dead at this point. Wow.
Uh then they see Joseph Duncan come out of the house and he drove the pickup truck over to the neighbor's property
and then took the kids from the pickup truck and he placed them into a red Jeep Cherokee and they drove off. Now, later
Joseph Duncan told both Dylan and Shasta that on the night of the murders, he had
parked the Cherokee on Robert Hollingsworth property after dark. And he walked over to the uh McKenzie-Groner
property. Duncan had brought several items with him including the duct tape, the zip
ties. He also brought a flashlight and a rifle and a claw hammer. Once on the property, he was actually
confronted by the family's dogs outside. He had aimed the gun at both of them and
they they were disturbed by this and they ran off. Uh and then he discovered that the side
door to the house was unlocked. He let himself in and then made his way uh to to look for the adult man in the house.
Um apparently after he had the victims tied up is when he got the keys for that pickup truck. He got the keys for the
pickup truck from Mark McKenzie himself after he had tied them up. Right. So, after they're in the red Jeep
Cherokee, where do where does he take um where does he take the two kids? Well, apparently
Joseph Duncan had shown Shasta on on map where he took the two children. And so just days after Shasta is found,
she's able to show authorities that her and her brother Dylan, they were held at
two different camp camping areas. Uh one of the two uh this is an area in north in the
northwest part of Montana, only about a 2-hour drive east from the Groene McKenzie home where the two children
were taken from. Now, law enforcement searched this area. This is a remote area near St. Regis, Montana.
Mhm. And on July 10th, 2005, they announced that they had located and recovered the remains of Dylan Groene.
Mhm. There were many many rumors regarding the boy's death and what Shasta and Dylan had experienced while being held
captive. All of the newspapers, news outlets, and magazine TV shows were discussing these
rumors. Um And like well, like we said though before, I mean Joseph Duncan is a registered sex offender. Now we know
what the motive was and we know that he had these two children in a remote location. So we know what his motive is.
Yes, we know he took them for a sexual purposes. Uh he he molested them and he did things to both of them for several
weeks. Um like I said, what what we do know is that Dylan died from a gunshot. Um it
was a gunshot to the head. Uh like I said, there were many rumors regarding his death and what Shasta witnessed or
was forced to participate in. Uh I don't really want to go through all of the rumors. Um I mean, there's a lot
of them and they're pretty pretty grim. Um but but there are two that I will go through because I find these to be
likely scenarios. Um one rumor was that Dylan was dismembered after his death. And this this could be. This this could
be likely. Um they they identified the remains uh and they they the method to do that
was using DNA testing. And it is possible that that wasn't their preferred method, but that it was a
necessi- you know, Necessity, right. Right. Because the way the remains were found that that the only way to identify
them would could have been one of the ways that Duncan was trying to cover his tracks.
You're exactly right. The The other The other and I apologize um Uh but this is not as bad as some of the
other rumors that were being reported at the time. Uh but but one rumor was that
the attacks on the boy were were very similar to to one of Duncan's earlier assaults. For you know, one of the
reasons why he was a registered sex offender. Right. Uh it was similar to one of the crimes
that he had committed in his past. Okay, so what's the you know, what's the loose background
on uh this Joseph E. Duncan? Okay, so while he is, you know, like we said, they're they're wanting to press
charges for kidnapping on him. Now we found the body of Dylan. One thing that I like that that the FBI and the
sheriff's department did in this investigation and did in this case, Mhm. even once they had apprehended Joseph
Duncan, they weren't quick to rush to anything. They they understood that you know what, we recovered all the victims,
we've recovered one of them thankfully alive, we have a survivor. Right. And now we have the guy that we believe
100% committed this crime completely by himself. They had to they wanted to do their due diligence and rule out that
Joseph Duncan had no connection to the family. Um and so they they're sitting on
everything they need. I think that they did it did it the right way to take it one step at a time. Now during this time
they want to learn everything they can about Joseph Duncan III. Right. And we already know because of
these acts that he's a flaming pile of horse [ __ ] So, his past, Captain, and his his
previous crimes, uh Duncan was born in '63. It sounds like his family moved around from time
to time because of his father's career in the military. Uh however, most reports show that
Joseph he was he was mostly raised in Tacoma, Washington. Uh there are some conflicting reports
regarding the family itself. Uh he was one of five children and one of his brothers states that they had a very
normal childhood. There was no abuse in the in the household growing up where he
has a sister that that says the complete opposite that there was that was a very
abusive uh setting and that there was all kinds of problems going on. uh physical, emotional, mental
It sounds like sexual. It sounds like um mostly physical and emotional type abuse is what she
describes. Uh but again, she describes a completely different picture than what was painted by the brother. So,
who who knows what was going on. Um but in in 1978, uh at this point Joseph would be at the
age of 15. Mhm. Um he molested a 9-year-old boy at gunpoint. Um and and I don't think he
was ever caught for this. Uh I I think he actually reported this incident to a psychiatrist later in life. Uh the
following year, Joseph stole a car and he led police on a car chase and he was caught when he attempted to bust through
a police barricade. Uh for this crime, he gets sent to a juvenile detention center.
It is here that he confided in therapist that he had raped and molested some boys. And he he estimated that he had
sexually assaulted 13 boys that were younger than him by the time he was 16. In 1980
But they're going to charge him with these? No, he says this to a therapist uh when
he's serving time in in the detention center. Well, one of the things that we've
talked about and and I'll post it on Instagram. It To me, it's one of the creepiest photos of this
whole case is, you know, Joseph E. Duncan. I mean, he looks little. And then right in front of him, you
know, black and white sex offender. Mhm. So, he gets charged as a sex offender at
some point. Right. Right. And this is this takes place from an incident in 1980. This is
after having been released from juvie. So, now Joseph decides to break into a home. Uh this is a home in his
neighborhood. Mhm. Uh he says that there's an old man there that he knew he had several guns and
ammunition. He wanted to break into the home and steal the guns. So, he does. Um and it's similar to it's a little bit
similar to the murders that he would go on to commit later in life where he would he would go up and he would peek
in the window of this home and he waited for his his moment to strike. Uh he said
that he basically hid in the shadows and broke into the home where he believed nobody could see him. He steals the gun.
He steals some ammo. Um and after this, he decides that, you know, he's kind of riding out this high from from breaking
into this home, he decides he wants to have some kind of sex, right? So, he he sees a 14-year-old boy uh who is
walking to school alone. Mhm. Um he using the gun, he abducts the boy and he takes him into the woods and he
assaults him. After the assault, uh Joseph Duncan beat the boy with sticks that he found in the
area and he burned him with a cigarette. Um But they the the kid would live. Yes. Yes, he he ends up letting the boy
go. Um he he tells after he's done doing whatever he did, uh he tells him to run
away and not to tell anybody. You know, he threatens him, "Don't tell anybody." Well, not too long after Joseph Duncan
[ __ ] I'm not going to tell anybody. Well, yeah, Joseph Duncan goes home, and not too long after the attack, he's
actually picked up by police for that crime. He's charged and convicted for that crime.
Good Good for the the victim. Yes. And And they sentenced Joseph Duncan to 20 years in prison.
Well, uh he was released 14 years later um with several stipulations. One, that he live in a halfway house. Uh and he
was on parole, and he was to have no contact with minors. Uh he would continue to be in and out of
jail and halfway houses for some time. I don't want to bog down the show and go through every little charge, violation,
or jail stint. Well, it wouldn't be the first time you bogged down the show. But Joseph Duncan basically was in
prison from 1980 until 1994. I also do want to point out that he was not labeled He was labeled as a sex
offender, but not labeled as a pedophile because uh he was young at the time as well. And
And both he and the victim uh were less than 5 years apart in age. So, there That's the the cause of that.
Um and then because of a parole violation, he is in prison back in 1997 until the year 2000.
After his release in 2000, he moved to Fargo, North Dakota, where he enrolled in college. Uh per his per his parole
requirements, he had registered as a sex offender when arriving in North Dakota.
They have Duncan listed as a level three sex offender. Now, what does that mean?
Okay. I'm really confused because you said that he didn't have to be because the victim was the same age.
No, he's a sex offender, but but according to prison psychiatrist, he's not listed as a pedophile. He's a sex
offender, but not a pedophile because they were within five years of I should have been I should have been
paying a little bit better attention. Wake up. I'm sorry. I'm I'm here. I'm here.
Okay. So So they have They have him listed as a level three sex offender. What does that mean?
Joseph Duncan became a level three sex offender because his crime included the following: a non-parental kidnapping of
a minor and a sexual act committed with the threat of bodily harm or death. So level three or tier three, as more
properly called by the sex offender registry, is the highest, meaning the worst level of sex offender there is.
Okay. Okay. So if if prison {slash} jail time is required for the offense, the following must be adhered to upon
release. If you are a tier one offender, you are required to register as a sex offender for 15 years. If you are two If
you're a tier two offender, Mhm. you register for 25 years. And a tier three sex offender is required to
register as a sex sex offender for life. Okay. Right here, I wanted to go through
some of the recidivism rates here. The the rate that someone previously convicted of a crime later after a
release often offends again. Okay. We you know Here's the thing. The repeat offender.
Right. What's the percentage? Well, I wanted to go through these rates and I I got to looking into it, and then
I decided that that we won't do that. And I tell you why. Well, thanks for bringing it up.
No, but I I'll tell you why, okay? There have been some very good studies conducted over the years. But as we
review them, we will just we will just have a bunch of garage army people going, "Huh? What are you talking
about?" Right. Uh and and so look. Like they're currently doing, huh? What's Nick doing?
What's Nick talking about? Look, I I looked at it I looked at the reports for a while, and I know that the
listeners are smarter than me, thank god. I had to read the studies three times, and then I decided it's too
boring. So, anyway, the tier three sex offenders have the highest rate of recidivism.
All right, so your point is that if you're tier three, you're more likely to repeat the crime.
Mhm. And we should keep in mind as well that sex crimes are largely unreported. So, even if we had the numbers in front
of us, I would strongly argue that the rates are unfair and much lower than what in reality they actually are.
Yeah, very true. And the thing here, Captain, is that what what me and you and the True Crime
Garage Army care about is the concern for the return to criminal behavior, and we all know that criminal behavior
doesn't always lead to arrest or convictions. But it certainly leads to victims,
doesn't it? And that's that's who all of us in the garage here are here to stand
up for. So, the thing here is after about 4 years of Duncan being out, we have a complaint against Joseph
Duncan. Well, okay, so but he moves, and he registers for college. Yep. And he's also registered a sex offender,
yep, but he's in college now. Correct. And he's studying Do we know what he's studying?
studying computers. Um and he and he was actually considered a a pretty good student, uh having made the Dean's List
a couple of times. Um you know, as much as as much as you and I dislike Joseph Duncan, he he can be an intelligent
person as far as as school goes and as far as books go. Clearly not intelligent enough to try to
correct himself and correct his ways after he's been given obviously several chances to do so. So, after after being
out for about 4 years, we get this complaint against him and the complaint goes like this, that on
July 3rd, 2004, there were two boys playing in a middle school playground. This is in Detroit
Lakes community in Minnesota. The boys ages are 6 and 8 years old. They see a small red car with a male
driver driver pull into the parking lot. The man gets out and apparently he has some kind of video camera with him. He
walks to a secluded area of the playground and he calls the two boys over. Once they're there, the man pulled down
the pants of one of the boys and he fondled him. And then he tried to do the same with
the other boy, but thankfully was unsuccessful. He There's a brief struggle with this
boy and then both of the boys run off. And of course at this point the man gets in his car, this is Duncan, and he
drives off. Well, the boys are able to provide a very good description of the man as well as the car that they saw
that day, right? So, the Detroit Lakes police using this information and using the description, they start checking the
sex offenders database and they find Joseph Duncan who matched not only the the description the physical description
given by the boys, but uh he had a small red car as well. His car matched the description as well.
So, the kids were were a photo lineup. It's this is an example of the system working.
You're Thank you, Captain. Thank you. The They're shown a photo lineup. And they both successfully pick Duncan from
this lineup. Mhm. And because they have all of his information in the database, they're
able to go and pick up Joseph Duncan for this crime, speak to him for it, arrest
him for it, and eventually charge him with this crime. Now, we will also point out a situation where maybe the system
did not work. We'll talk about that right after this quick beer break. All right, welcome back to True Crime
Gay Ridge. All right, Captain. We had talked about the system working. Let's talk about
where we start to run into problems here. The first problem presents itself, you
know, we said that he is going to be arrested and charged for this crime. The problem here, Captain,
we have a situation where we have a report. The report of this crime was misfiled or lost somewhere. For whatever
reason, Duncan's not going to face any justice here regarding this charge until about 9
months later. So, we have an We have an extreme delay in the process. Right. And to further that, you know, this
crime hap- happened in Minnesota. He's a registered sex offender in North Dakota.
But, I don't think that that is any excuse here that the court didn't know who they were dealing with. Right? This
should be easy, in my opinion. You know, we have a level three sex offender who,
according to these charges, may have reoffended and tried to do so against not one but two children.
I believe uh that Joseph Duncan had a either a public defender here or maybe he had a license, you know, a private
attorney at this point because he did have Captain, he had he actually had two well-to-do friends. Um one was a
physician and the other I believe he had been in real estate, but regardless both
had made a good living during their careers. And why are they friends with this scumbag?
Well, let's get into that a little bit. One of these friends, okay, ends up giving Joseph Duncan $15,000.
And he says that this is to aid in his defense or if there was to be a bail, well, it would probably help for both.
Mhm. But so his attorney, when he's facing these charges, his attorney asks that the bail be
reduced. That, you know, typically in a situation like this, we would see a a bail that
would be set at like $25,000 or more for a crime of this nature with a possible reoffender.
Mhm. So, the attorney for Joseph Duncan tells the judge that Duncan, this is in April,
right? April 2005. So, Duncan is due to graduate from college in May. The attorney asks that the bail be set at a
reasonable rate so that Duncan can get out of jail and he can attend he can attend to his affairs and complete his
graduation process. not how the world works. Right. But the judge ends up agreeing to
this and he sets the bail at $15,000. Right, how much money did they put in his pocket?
Mm, well, I don't know about don't know about that, but remember we said that Joseph Duncan got that
$15,000, that money from his friend. So, picture this, we have a level three sex
offender. Right. The bail is reduced to 15 grand and the defendant says, "No problem." Pulls out his checkbook
and he writes a personal check for $15,000, hands it to the bailiff, and boom, he's
released into the public. Right. Just walking around whistling Dixie. By the way, I heard that that check
bounced. You know, for that can't can't they can we Gotcha. Yeah, can we at least hold someone until
the check clears for starters? Yeah, that should be a that should that should easily be a rule.
Yeah, so so back to what the captain was saying and I'm sure everybody else is is
is scratching their heads. but I can just Hey, no problem. No problem. Let me just write you a check
for that. All right, free I go. It almost and I hate to to to joke around over something so serious, but it almost
it's as stupid to me as that part in Dumb and Dumber where he opens up the briefcase full of IOUs.
Yeah. You know, and he picks up one he's like, "$9,000." He's like, "Yeah, you might
want to hold on to that one." So anyway, cash. Like the Yeah, like the captain said,
and like I'm sure all of you out there are scratching your heads by now going, "How does this Joseph Duncan guy have
any friends at all? Especially one that would give him a loan or whatever you want to call it for 15 grand?"
Well, I'm going to go into this, but I want to be clear that that a lot of this here is
my is just my opinion. Uh but I believe there's plenty of evidence of this to back some of this
up. where you're going. So Joseph Duncan at different times in his life, he held many different
sexualities. You know, at some points in his life he was straight, he was gay, he
was a cross-dresser. Mhm. Uh I actually Very ugly cross-dresser. Yeah, not very good at it.
I actually don't believe that that he went from feeling one way to another at different points in his life. I
believe as noted in Duncan's prison files Mhm. from the time that he was a kid that he
was diagnosed as a sexual psychopath. Uh and I I do believe he was actually a pedophile. Um and and this this is a a
person that is a pedophile who would abduct and kill to fulfill his urges. I think that Joseph Duncan could
could have sex with anything really. And that that he was Okay. that he was a cons- that he was a
constant manipulator of situations that he found himself in. Okay. I think if he saw a situation where he
could benefit from being homosexual, well, then he was happy to play the part. I think that that's where these
friends may have come into play. Heck, one of these guys, just listen to this, okay?
One of the guys said to the courts Uh-huh. that he thought that Duncan could be rehabilitated with some counseling and
that the courts should release Joseph Duncan to him, to his care, where Joseph Duncan could come and live with him.
His wife and his two children, might I add these children were just of the age that Duncan would have liked.
This guy knew that Joseph Duncan was a sex offender. He knew of his sex offender status. He knew of his criminal
past and the crimes he was currently being charged with. I'll tell you what, if if I'm married to
someone and they say to me, "Hey, honey, let's let this level three sex offender
live with us and our kids. It will all work out." Well, I'm going to say, "No, but I'm also going to say, you know what
is a good idea? A vacation. Now, go take one by yourself because me and the kids
are throwing your ass out. So, pack your suntan lotion." Mhm. So, Joseph Duncan, he he is out now.
He's written this this check for $15,000. It's a rubber check. Mhm. And he's out and he's he's
he knows he's going to have to face these charges eventually. And I believe that that is what
triggered him. I believe that that is the trigger that that brought on what he called the demons to take him over. Now,
we have to point out here when the investigators were looking into his past, when they were looking into Joseph
Duncan's background, they learned he was going to school for computer. And he figured and they figured out
For computer? Well, for I I can't remember. I'm I'm struggling here to remember the exact
thing that he was going, but it was for Thank thank you, Gavin. I can just see For computer.
I can just see the kid going going home, you know, he's visiting his parents for a
uh for like you know, what's Christmas time. Hey, uh you grandparents ask him, "Hey, what are
you going Hey, Nick, what are you going to school for? What are you going to college for?"
Just say computer. Computer. I'm going to school for computer. I can't it All right. Well, the major's
a little more specific than that, but it involves it involves him going into that
line of work. They're making my day. So, they they are convinced that he's going to have some type of online
presence. And they tracked down some some resumes that he sent into different people looking for jobs.
Um they they they actually lock down his apartment. You know, they contact Fargo, North Dakota and they
contact the landlord and they they lock down his apartment so they can go through everything.
Right. And it's at this point that they discovered this Fifth Nail blog that we talked about in the first episode.
Right. Well, he's the creator of of this blog of this website. Well, and like you stated before, he
talked about offenses that he made prior to this. Mhm. And so these would be the offenses, you
know, these this rubber check that he wrote. These are the offenses that he's talking about on the blog.
Well, and the thing here is Captain, like I said, he's going to have to face this these charges eventually. He in his
mind, he knows he's going back to prison and probably maybe even for good at this
point. I don't know what the rules are on re-offending. Um but he's going to go away for a long
time. He faced 20 years the first time. And I think that this was the trigger that that that was the demons that he
talked about on his blog taking him over. And because he was going back to prison, he snapped and he thought, you
know what? I'm going to go out rather than go on the go to prison, I'm going out, I'm going on the run and I'm going
to kill and abduct until they catch me or kill me. Well, and some of the true crime army
might be they might go against me on this thought, but hear me out. So with killers or even sexual
offenders, they they a lot of the times talk about the urge, you know, I get this urge to kill. And we'll see it time
and time again with different serial killers where they try to fight the urges. Mhm.
And some serial killers, they don't even try to fight it. And some sexual offenders, they don't even try to fight
the urges. But there are some that do. So it's it's possibly that's kind of what he's talking about, too, is with
these demons where it's like, you know, maybe at certain points of his existence, he's
tried to fight these urges. Right. Which which he's calling demons. And now that he knows that, there's
really no future for him, why fight the demons? Mhm. Why not just let them take over?
Yeah. And, you know, not only were they looking into his background, Captain, but you know, the his arrest, when they
found him with with Shasta, and after they found the body of Dylan, and then they they connected him to this triple
homicide, they're starting to see this guy is not just a level three sex offender. No,
this guy is I mean, one of the worst of the worst, right? Is he a serial killer?
He's a serial killer, and he's capable of of monstrous things. Well, that's going to lead the FBI to launch a nation
nationwide review of unsolved missing children cases. Right. Um and they they wanted to see if he
during the times he was out, you know, what who went missing, where did they go missing from? They started looking at
cases that were everywhere as close to like 70 to 100 miles from where he was, all the way to about 7 or 800 miles away
from where he was living at the time. Uh they believed that because they had seen in
more than one situation by this point that he was capable of going to other states to commit these crimes.
So, he was actually implicated as a possible possible suspect in several crimes that
occurred between 1994 and 1997. This was when he was on parole the first time before he violated his parole and went
back to prison. Now, so So, a 3-year gap. Yes. And and who knows what happened then?
Right. And at this time, he would have been in the Seattle-Tacoma, Washington area. He was he was living in
that area when he was free from prison during this 3-year stint. Um although he was cleared as a suspect in some of
these cases, authorities in California and Washington, they believed that they had enough evidence and believed that
Duncan had committed unsolved murders in their jurisdictions. Now, the first one
that I want to talk about is a boy by the name of Anthony Martinez. Okay. Okay, so on April 4th, 1997,
10-year-old Anthony Martinez, he was playing with friends in his in the front yard of his home in Beaumont,
California. A man approached the group of kids asking them if they would help him find
his missing cat. The boys did not want to help this man. They were they were refused to help him. So, the man instead
grabs Martinez, and he puts a knife to his neck, and he he threw him into a white four-door sedan into the back of
his car. Well, on April 19th, this is just 15 days later, 1997, after searching for the boy for 2 weeks, his
body was found nude and partially decomposed in a California desert ravine and covered in rocks. Uh the
investigators said that he had been sexually assaulted and bound with duct tape. Now, this is one reason why
they're looking at him. Furthermore, they're looking at Joseph Duncan because a composite sketch was made of the
suspect at the time of the crime. Yeah, I think this was the one with the army hat, maybe? I'm army hat and the
mustache. Well, when this crime was committed, they had no leads, and and eventually this case
goes cold until after Joseph Duncan's arrest in 2005. Well, the thing here is, once they announce that he has an online
presence and that he had this blog, well, of course, websleuthers and everybody else that has
a computer that's interested in true crime, they're looking at they're following the story on CNN and Fox News,
and now they're following it on their computers as well. Well, several people noticed that
there's quite a bit of similarity between Joseph Duncan and the composite sketch in the Martinez case case.
So, the FBI, and now again with the help of the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children, they they get
involved in this case and they start working with the Riverside County authorities who are still active in the
investigation. Now, that blog was since you know, they took down the blog. Um yeah, well well what you want to go
into that just real quickly and we'll go back to Martinez? Yeah, yeah. Just cuz that cuz at some
point they take it down. Yes, it's I've read several newspaper articles and magazine articles, online
articles. Everyone I've come across says that the website has been taken down. However, I
don't know if this Remember I said earlier the guy went to the school for computer? Well, that's about my
understanding of everything as well. So, He went to school for computer. I found I found this website and I don't
know if it's an archive or if it's somebody retelling I don't fully understand what it is, but
you can find it out there. You really if I found it, that means you don't have to
look extremely hard. from what I was reading, it made it seem like they was taken down at some point,
then they put it back up. Then when they took it down again, somebody had saved all the information
and so then they relaunched it because it was really about them not wanting uh him to have any control over it or
access to it or or something like that because I think that they do get some computer time in
prison. So. Yeah, and the thing here is, Captain, he has when I say he, Joseph Duncan has a similar active blog
that has that and it's it's the same thing where it's like almost journal entries.
Right. Um and a lot of it's talking about his time in prison and and things he gets in
trouble for in prison and he talks smack about the wardens and about the judicial
system and things like that. Um, the way I understand it, this is an active blog and it has a similar name to
the fifth nail. It's something like the the fifth nail chronicles or the fifth chronicles, something like that.
It has a very similar name. Again, you can easily find it if you just look up his name. Uh, I will throw out there,
maybe don't waste your time cuz it's a lot of very boring, dry reading. Uh, I read through some of it. Like I said,
boring stuff. And plus you know this guy is a horrible monster. I don't want to spend any time with him.
And if the colonel says it's boring, you know it's boring. So, the the way that I understand the
that the current blog works is that he is not actually allowed to write any of it himself. Um, which which should be. I
applaud that. I don't think I'm all for freedom of speech, but I don't think that people serving time, life in
prison, on death row, that they should be just typing away their own newsletter. Now, that should be
especially people that have crimes against children. Exactly. So, the thing here is from my
understanding is there's somebody on the outside that operates this for him. Um, that he, you know, he he corresponds
with this person and from time to time this person posts things on that blog on his behalf.
Well, he got these weirdo rich friends. Could be. Could be. I I think it might be a woman. I'm not I'm not certain.
Anyway, sorry. We got kind of sidetracked there, but you you were right to bring that up because people
were probably questioning that. So, we have this unsolved case of Anthony Martinez, the 10-year-old, that
disappeared for 2 weeks and then later was found dead. And we have people coming forward
stating that there's similarities between Duncan and the composite drawing. Also, remember the little boy
was bound with duct tape. Duct tape. Yeah. So, authorities were able to after looking into this, they're able to match
Duncan's fingerprints to a partial thumb print that they found on the duct tape on Martinez's body.
Also, it was learned that Joseph Duncan had stolen his girlfriend at the time, he had stolen his girlfriend's car, and
that car was a white Chrysler Town Car, which matched the description of the abductor's car, as well.
Well, there you go. Yeah. During the sentencing, he would have he eventually go to trial for this.
For the the death of Ernesto Martin- I'm sorry. For the death of Anthony Martinez. But, during the sentencing
phase of the trial, Ernesto Martinez, this is the boy's father, he said, "14 years ago to this day, my
son's life was brutally taken by the hands of a monster. I am angry that instead of attending my
son's college graduation, I am spending a day at the sentencing for Tony's murderer.
As a father, I would love nothing more than to carry out this execution with my own two hands.
I know there will be no punishment greater than the special place God has in hell for Joseph Duncan to endure the
pain and suffering we've had to experience." Right. The Riverside County Superior Court
judge, this is David Downing, said, "I can say in 31 years involved in the criminal justice system, I have never
met a more evil person than Joseph Duncan." And he immediately had the prisoner removed uh from the courtroom.
Then, six deputies, they lead Duncan out of the courtroom, and during this time,
he glances off into the audience with a kind of a dumb smirk on his face as he's
as he's facing the audience there. Yeah, I'll post some of these pictures of him at trial and him like being
transferred from prison to to to trials. And and you'll see him he has a bunch of
different looks. But you know, there's definitely something something wrong with him. I mean, you
can just see it in his eyes. It's there there's something like just something missing about him.
Mhm. Now, there's some other crimes that they're concerned about as well. The federal
Oh, hold on hold on hold on. If I wasn't clear, I'll I'll post those on our Instagram at True Crime Garage.
The federal prosecutors also revealed that Joseph Duncan confessed to the murders of Sammy Jo White, 11 years old,
and her half-sister Carmen Cubias. This is she's 9 years old. The two girls vanished in July of 1996
after leaving the Crest Motel in Seattle. They lived with their mother at this motel and the family was very poor.
The kids would often make a little bit of money panhandling. The exact details of their disappearance
are not known. They're they're completely unknown. But their remains were not found until February of 1998.
So, less than 2 years later. Now, we said Joseph Duncan confessed to this crime to
these two murders, but it sounds like the authorities are in need of much more than than whatever Joseph Duncan told
them because he has not been charged with their murders yet. Okay, answer me this.
Go ahead. Okay, so think about the Brian Ferguson case from last week. Right. You have a story that doesn't make any
logical damn sense, right? Right. Has no information correctly, but we hand you all the information during the
interrogation. Now you got this piece of horse [ __ ] behind bars. And he's already been
We already know that he you know, killed four people. Right. And then we charged him with this the
killing of the boy. Anthony Martinez, yeah. Exactly. And now he's confessing to crimes.
And law enforcement's going to say, "We Well, we need more than that." Well, here here's the thing.
I I mean, you you see what I'm saying? No, no, no. That's That's my confusion. No, and I agree with I agree with you,
but I I think it we're talking about the playing field. It's not an even level playing field, right? We have all kinds
of different players in this system, and just like any line of work, some of them
are very good at their jobs, some of them are very bad at their jobs, some of them care and have basic human decency,
and some people don't care. And have no human decency. And I think what we're looking at here is I think people
involved in in and I know what you're saying. We we want to see justice for as many of these victims
that of Joseph Duncan as possible. Right. And how could we not get justice for these two little girls when somebody
like Ryan Ferguson ends up in in prison with no record for nothing and yeah, for and he's
totally innocent. I see what you're saying. I think what we're seeing though is I I think in this situation we have
we have prosecutors these are federal prosecutors. Um I think they they're doing a very good job. I think they know
the law and they're working within the the confines of that law. I think Joseph Duncan, as I said, is a manipulator. I
also think he's a liar. And I think it would be you probably can't believe anything this guy says.
The thing here is, Captain, I wouldn't be shocked if he in a roundabout way somewhat confessed. You know what I
mean? That he didn't fully come out Right. Right. My understanding of it is I don't have
the confession or what he said to them, but my understanding is that they he did
not give them enough. He did not give them enough details. He was he he didn't get certain things about the crime
right. Right. Um he basically said where he had abducted the girls from. He didn't
recall their names or at least said in that interview that he didn't remember their names.
Uh-huh. Um and I think a lot of evidence was lost because they weren't found until almost
2 years later. So, just just really a bad a bad situation. Now, regarding Duncan and and
the crimes, you know, he was convicted by three different courts. He has been convicted in Idaho for the kidnapping
and the murders uh regarding the Groene family and Mark McKenzie. In California,
he was convicted by a superior court uh for the kidnapping and murder of Anthony
Martinez. He has also been prosecuted at the federal level. Um so so some of these he actually pled guilty
to. Um but he wasn't able to cut a deal like what we see in most cases. He He cut a deal to get a life sentence, but
the way that this thing was set up was that they knew he was going to get tried at the federal level.
Right. And it was expected he would receive the death penalty for those crimes. So, the
way that they worked this thing was he pled guilty at the state level and was given life for some of the murders and
for some of the kidnapping charges and all of that stuff. But they delayed the sentencing process for those crimes and
those charges because if he were not to get the death penalty at the federal level, then he would receive the death
penalty in Idaho. Now, Joseph Duncan the Third is currently being held in a maximum
security federal prison. This is the United States Penitentiary in Terre Haute, Indiana. Now, this is where we
keep persons convicted of federal crimes. This is where we keep the worst of the worst. This is where Timothy
McVeigh was held and executed. Um now, I don't believe that we have a set execution date for Joseph Duncan. If
someone finds that, please post that at truecrimegarage.com in the blog because I looked and looked
and looked and could not find it. Right, but on record they haven't I don't think they've executed anybody
since 2003. Correct. And so, it's been a while and we need to get that going again. So,
now, like with somebody with Timothy McVeigh You need to get executions going again.
We need to get that that thing fired up again, yeah. The with Timothy McVeigh, he was executed extremely fast, right?
So, on on average, a federal death row inmate is usually executed after about 15 years. McVeigh's was only about four.
Joseph Duncan committed these terrible crimes in 2005. He wasn't convicted at the federal level until the second half
of 2008. So, if we get back on schedule and the math holds up, we should we would be looking at an execution date of
2023 or early 2024. Well, I hope you enjoy those uh death penalty arguments. I Look,
arguments. You and I have talked about this a little bit before um on several different shows. My views and opinions
on the death penalty are are complex. They're not very black and white. Um so, I don't care to get involved in it here
because it would take it would take us 10 shows for me to explain my opinion on it. But but what I mean is
Sounds interesting. Save save yourself the time typing the emails because I'm not You won't read them.
Well, because what I'm saying is with somebody as bad as Joseph Duncan he's not a person that I care to discuss
whether there should be a death penalty or not. Okay. This guy's horrible. He videotaped some of the crimes that he
committed against Dylan and Shasta. We know he did this. This it's definitive it was him. He's a horrible person. The
world is will never be a better place because he's here. So let's not get into that debate.
One of my concerns though is these rich friends. I mean these you know especially the the one that was married
with kids and saying oh release him to me. You know you're either having sexual relationships with
Joseph E. Duncan or you're part of this pedophilia ring. And you're right and that's what I was
trying to kind of foreshadow and kind of throw that idea out there without outwardly saying it. But yeah I think
that they were involved in some kind of relationship together probably a homosexual relationship.
So whether you're for the death penalty or against it fact of the matter is this
horrible monster is behind bars Mhm. and he will not have any more victims. And that's a that's a beautiful thing.
Another thing because you know it's funny how you know we've been doing the show for so long but so many of
these cases are connected. Right. can reference so many cases just like the Adam Walsh. I mean we talked about
these crimes being put on America's Most Wanted which would be with John Walsh. And the sex offender like
being registered sex offender basically started because of Adam Walsh. Mhm. So it's interesting to see how they're
all connected and how we're growing as a society on some level to try to prevent
these. Yeah and that's the thing you know you you when something like this happens you
know you can blame you can sit around and try to blame people if you want or you can say how do we grow and how do we
learn from this and is there any possible way that something this terrible, this depressing, that
something good could come of it. And one thing I want to, you know, I want to give Oprah Winfrey some props here.
Yeah, it seems strange, but Well, this is But some people will re- some people will remember this. In in late 2005,
this crime, you know, Joseph Duncan being out, being a registered sex offender that was he was being sought.
He was a fugitive from the law. He was facing these charges in Minnesota. Right.
So, if they could have found him before he committed these murders, we would have a whole we would have a whole
family of people that still with us. Right. And so, this crime inspired her to do
her and her show did a basically what I would call a child molester roundup. You
know, this featured different child sex offenders that were wanted by the FBI. It would feature those cases on her
show, and the show offered a substantial reward for information leading to the arrest of these individuals that were
featured on the show. There was at least two Yeah, there was at least two of these
guys that were on the FBI's most wanted list for sex offenders that were apprehended because of the Oprah show.
Um so, that that's one good thing that came of it. Um the other two is that they increased the um
the child victim recovery funds were increased in Idaho. So, at the time they would only issue they would allot I be-
believe it was $2,000 or $2,500 to a child victim for counseling and therapy uh because of all the trauma
they've experienced. The thing here is with Shasta's situation, she's very young. She
experienced something extremely horrific. They knew immediately that that that dollar amount would not even
provide the the smallest a bit of amount of counseling or treatment for her to try to correct and get things back on
path for her so that she could live a happy productive life. So, they increased that amount and I believe they
increased it to $25,000. So, that was definitely certainly a step in the right direction. And you know,
Captain, for me and you, we do a different crime every week and I thank everybody for tuning in and listening to
the different crimes that we present every week. you and I have to go out of our way and
look for the good, for the positive in these cases as we get bogged down week after week with with some depressing
heavy stuff. Uh but what's this week's recommended reading? Walking Prey: How America's Youth Are
Vulnerable to Sex Slavery by Holly Austin Smith. This is an important book with one-of-a-kind insight into this
subject matter because it was written by a victim. Not only was she a victim, but
more importantly, she's a fighter. Her book Walking Prey is truly an educational experience for both parents
and law enforcement. Holly has been on national TV, newspapers, and radio shows telling her story. She has also
consulted for the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children and the Amber Alert Program. So, pick up Holly's
book about a crime that is not well understood by most of us most of us. That is Walking Prey: How America's
Youth Are Vulnerable to Sex Slavery by Holly Austin Smith. can do that by going to our website truecrimegarage.com
and we have our recommended page and you can pick up anything from that page on our Amazon app.
Yeah, if you click through the banner and whatever you buy, they give us a kickback and they don't charge you
anything. It helps keeps the lights on, helps keep some beer in the fridge, and I think Nick had a couple too many beers
this episode. Yeah, well, I'll do what I want. I've I've done a lot of talking, so my tongue
is not working with the rest of the mouth at this point. Well, you did a fine job on the research
this week, my friend, like always. And really interesting stuff. And like you said, you can find on the on
the computer, you can find this blog if you kind of want to dive more into you know, the the fifth nail blog.
And next week, I'm very excited because we are going to feature a case that has been heavily requested as of recent. So,
we want you to know we are listening and we will be back here with you in the garage, my friends, next week.
Yeah, thank you, friends, for listening. And until then, be good, be kind, and don't litter.

The Fifth Nail /// Part 2 /// 119

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Idaho – 2005, A family goes about their normal everyday activities. They didn’t know they were in the midst of a monster. For several nights he lurked outside their home watching them. He was waiting for the perfect time to strike. When he did the crime scene was so horrific law enforcement said it was a crime for which they had never seen. This week we feature a story that investigators called one of the worst in American history.

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Brief Summary

The episode details the Groene family murders and Joseph Duncan's abduction of siblings Shasta and Dylan in Idaho.

Key points

True Crime Garage Introduction. Hosts Nick and Captain welcome listeners and share their beer of the night.
The Groene-McKenzie Murders. On May 16, 2005, three bodies were found in Idaho, with two children missing.
The Discovery of Shasta. Shasta Groene is found in a Denny's with a strange man, leading to a shocking investigation.
Joseph Duncan's Background. Joseph Duncan, a registered sex offender, becomes the prime suspect in the case.
The Fate of Dylan Groene. Dylan Groene's remains are discovered, raising grim rumors about his death.
Recidivism Rates Explained. Tier three offenders face the highest likelihood of reoffending, raising serious concerns.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

He was waiting for the right time to strike.

7:32WatchDec 5, 2022

Tension

85/ 100High tension

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