The McStay Family /// Part 1 /// 581 | Forensic Files

thank you [Music] [Music] thank you welcome to True crab garage wherever you are whatever you are doing thanks for
listening I'm your host Nick and with me as always is a man who would like to point out that it's not impossible Dan
the answer is 544. here is the captain it's gonna be seen and good to see you thanks for listening thanks for telling
a friend [Music] this week we are featuring Lost Galaxy IPA by the good folks over at Lost
Nation Brewing this is a wheat based Session IPA with a crisp body with malt plenty of hops and balanced out nicely
with a fruit finish simply crushable garage grade 4 out of five bottle caps and here's some please and thank yous
that are going to go out to our good friends that helped us out with this week's beer fun first up a big Ron
Swanson please and thank you goes out to Melissa and Hooksett New Hampshire and a
big we like YouTube to Jessica in Cincinnati next up here's a cheers to melody in Riverside California and a big
hey hey hey to Heather in Seattle Washington here we have a cheers a long distance cheers to Shane and cork
Munster Ireland and last but certainly not least we have Megan Capps in Parts Unknown everyone we just mentioned well
they went to True Crime garage.com and they clicked on the Donate button and for that we thank you yeah BW double r u
n beer Brown time if you want to come see us live we have a few tickets left to our Nashville Show tickets are
available at truecrime garage.com and make sure you sign up on the mailing list and Colonel that's enough of the
business all right everybody gather round grab a chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime
[Music] Fallbrook California February 2010 most of the following comes from an article written by Robert jablin for the
Associated Press the article headline says what everyone was thinking disappearance of family of four is all a
mystery and that was the truth the article was just days after a very normal and happy family of four
disappeared by the looks of it they just vanished in fact given the state of their home
it would appear that the family was here one minute and then the next poof they were gone
the home was found empty of people but everything still very much in an everyday living mode
with rooms freshly painted blue painters tape still covering the ceiling corners
and woodwork eggs sitting out on the kitchen counter bowls of half-eaten food and the family's two dogs out in the
backyard so yeah by the looks of it they just vanished and now for the aforementioned news
article which states the details of The Disappearance clearly and concisely and reads
the mcstays haven't been seen since February 4th their car was found at a mall 70 miles
from home a middle-class family of four vanishes leaving their dogs unattended and
rotting food in their San Diego County home their abandoned car is later found near
the Mexico border it might sound like a TV mystery but the reality as relatives of the
mcstay family pleading for help and law enforcement searching both sides of the border for Clues
Joseph mcstay 40 his wife summer 43 and their sons Gianni 4 and Joseph Jr 3 are the missing
the family has not been seen or heard from since February 4th their white 1996 Isuzu Trooper was found
four days later in a strip mall about 70 miles from their home San Diego County Sheriff Lieutenant
borregos says it's all a mystery is the vehicle down by the border a ploy where they voluntarily missing
were they taken against their will just for a family of four to disappear I've never seen anything like it
Joseph's brother Michael went to the home on February 14th to check on the family but only found the
dogs he called authorities the next day and investigators found no signs of a struggle
still Michael mcstay said he fears for the lives of his family members and feels helpless
neighbors said they had been feeding the animals but had heard nothing from the family
acquaintances told investigators the mcstays never would have left on vacation for any other reason without
telling someone relatives have set up a website seeking information about the family's
whereabouts at www dot mcstafffamily.com this week's True Crime Story is about the mcstay family's
disappearance and the investigation to locate them this is True Crime garage [Music]
as you heard it was February of 2010 when a family of four went missing this is the mcstay family from Fallbrook
California now what I would like to do here Captain is start off by going through a timeline this is a timeline of
the general events that were taking place before and after their disappearance and this is considered to
be agreed upon as a factual timeline and we will kind of read these as bullet points here captain and fill in the
blanks as we go along but like the sheriff's office said in that article it was all a mystery a family of four to go
missing all at once with no Lee needs as to potentially where they could have gone or what could have happened to them
was all a mystery let's start off with late 2009 so this would be November before they went missing we have the
whole family the mcstay family of four they move from San Clemente to Fallbrook this is around Thanksgiving weekend now
keep in mind they will go missing in February the following year so the home that they are living in at the time of
their disappearance they're relatively new to this home and from my understanding this was a property or a
home that was once foreclosed on which makes sense when you see the year 2009 remember we had the market crash the
housing market crash around that same time this is a home that had been foreclosed on that the mcstay family
moved into for their growing family into a nice area a very quiet safe neighbor Hood but also they're going to be doing
some Renovations and cleaning up the place and updating the place probably in hopes to make a little bit
of money right we have Joseph mcstay who is an entrepreneur at the time of his disappearance he is 40 years old he owns
his own company and the company has had some success so that takes us to February of 2010. on February 3rd we
have a friend that comes over to the mcstay family home this friend comes by to help paint
and help do some general remodeling inside the home this is believed to be the last or one of the last known
face-to-face interactions with Summer mcstay and the two young boys the two young sons of the family
so this is someone that they knew a personal friend that comes over and is physically there at the mixed Day family
home and like you said this house is under construction they're doing painting they're going to be replacing
the flooring they don't have a lot of furniture in the house and they don't have it decorated that's correct now
that takes us to the next day which is Thursday February 4th 2010. on this morning we have summer who
speaks with her sister and they are making plans for a future visit and I underline that part in our timeline
because we know at some point based off of our trailer that this whole family is
going to go missing and when they go missing the Sheriff's Office labels the case or the investigation as
an voluntary missing investigation which I think is a mistake it is a mistake but there's reasons why they
would label it or categorize it as such now for this portion though it's key to know that we do have a situation that's
leading up to their disappearance where we have someone saying I'm making future plans with one of the members of
the family her sister is saying hey I have a newborn Summer's got two young Sons we were planning a visit to so that
so that my newborn child could meet their aunt so that summer can meet my newborn child so they're making plans
for a future visit together now around noon on that same day on the fourth Joseph the Father Joseph mcstay he
leaves the family home in his Isuzu Trooper this is for a meeting with his business associate Charles Chase Merritt
so we need to kind of fill in everybody on what it is that Joseph mcstay does for a living and his company so he owns
he's the owner operator of a company that is called Earth inspired products and they make these custom water Falls
and if you were to go into a law office or a fancy business or a business building that houses multiple
businesses in our fancy hotel fancy hotel you may have seen one of their products and this is the the products
that I've seen and I'm sure that they make all kinds of different products being that they are in the custom water
feature custom waterfall business but the ones that I have seen are these fancy glass kind of ceiling to floor
straight down waterfalls where the water falls and Cascades down the glass and on
the glass you may have your company logo right looks very impressive when you walk into the lobby of a building we
have one in the lobby of the garage of the garage that's right in the the lobby which leads to the West and East wing of
the garage Studio here would be lucky if we could afford a chicken wing so around noon Joseph
leaves his home in his vehicle which is an Isuzu Trooper to meet his business associate Charles Chase Merritt now for
simplification purposes as we continue along we will just refer to him as Chase Merritt or chase
now Chase works for Joseph mcstay right Joseph he's the owner and operator of this business he's the sales guy he's
also in the designing portion of what the business does but we also have Chase who is the Builder the manufacturer of
these custom-made waterfalls so he works with Joseph in the designing stages but
he's the one that's in charge of actually constructing these custom-made water features everybody would say that
chase is Joseph's right-hand man they become friends some would say best friends through the process of working
together and growing this business and again the business has had some success I doesn't sound to me like they were
just a complete success you know falling over each other successful with just success month after month after month
but we also have a third associate and I'm not going to sit here captain and pretend to know all of the ins and outs
and everything about Joseph mcstay's business there could have been other individuals that worked with them maybe
as a contractor or maybe even part-time or full-time seasonal employee that I don't know but there's going to be three
major figures in this earth inspired Products company and again it's Joseph mcstay owner operator Chase Merritt who
is the Builder slash manufacturer but then we also have a third individual and his name is Dan Kavanaugh and he is
involved more behind the scenes and will get into Dan Kavanaugh as we go a little
bit further down the road here this meeting with Joseph mcstay and his business associate Charles Chase Merritt
is in Rancho Cucamonga now later what we are told is this meeting is going to take place at a Chick-fil-A and it's
going to be an hours-long meeting several hours long a casual meeting it checks are going to be exchanged plans
are going to be made they're going to be working and discussing business related
items at this Chick-fil-A at this Rancho Cucamonga location this brings us to about 4 25 PM when we have an outgoing
call from the home phone to Joseph's cell phone which pings from a Fallbrook cell tower this is reported as the last
outgoing call from the home phone around five and up to about 6 PM there are several text messages that take
place between Joseph and his wife Summer's cell phones and just so we can get a better picture of what's going on
Joseph is the breadwinner at this moment in their lives they have a young family a three and a
four-year-old and summer is Raising her kids yeah she's a stay-at-home mother at
this time while Joseph is running his company now we have 8 28 p.m that evening Joseph calls or his cell phone
calls Chase's cell phone and Joseph's cell phone pings off of a Fallbrook Tower cell phone tower that's important
because remember their home is in Fallbrook and this to me would indicate that either a Joseph mcstay's phone is
at his home at this time or near his home at this time rather than being in Rancho Cucamonga at the Chick-fil-A
right this activity and these phone calls will all be very important because it's generally believed that February
4th may be the day when the mcstay family vanished when something happened to change the events of their life and
their timeline and they essentially go missing there's going to be a little confusion on exactly when this family
went missing if we all knew exactly when they went missing well this probably would not have been such a mystery
and they probably would have been a better investigation to take place what we have next on our timeline Captain is
February 10th and this is the San Diego County Sheriff's office that is doing a welfare check on the mcstay Family
there's a little confusion as to how the San Diego County Sheriff's Office was notified that there could be something
wrong at the mcstay family home we would later hear from Joseph mcstay's Father Patrick who would say that
I received an email from business partner Dan Kavanaugh who says hey I can't get a hold of Joseph
I've been trying to reach him via phone via email I can't get a hold of him and this Dan Kavanaugh tries to call Patrick
Joseph's Father Patrick doesn't answer the phone for whatever reason and then ultimately gets an email telling him hey
I can't get a hold of your son so Patrick has a son that lives in the area this is Mike mcstay or Michael mcstay
who is Joseph's brother he asked his brother Mike would you go by and check on your brother
I can't get a hold of him myself his business partner says he can't get a hold of him to which Mike gives a little
pushback he's too busy to go over there so what we have happen is actually a couple days go by before Mike mcstay is
at the home checking in on his brother now he's also checking in on his brother at the request of his other business
associate Chase Merritt right and Chase Merritt is actually there with him for one of these visits this takes place
prior to anyone calling and notifying San Diego County Sheriff's Office and Chase Merritt says that when me and Mike
mcstay were there Mike climbed through a window this would be the office Joseph's
office window in the home to enter the home enter the premises and goes to the front door unlocks the front door
allowing Chase to come in the two of them walk the home together they don't see any obvious signs of a strong or
break in but the other thing is they don't see any of the mcstays either the family of four poof gone no blood no
sign of a struggle there's some debate on this conversation the way that it has been told and
reported is that Chase Merit says to Michael mcstay we need to call the police we need to call the
authorities and report them missing this doesn't feel right something feels wrong
here right again we have Mike mcstay who offers a little more pushback and says no it looks like everything's fine they
probably just took off for a few days I'm sure they'll be back so we have some people that are on kind of high alert at
this point Dan Kavanaugh Patrick Joseph's father and the other business associate
Chase Merritt they all seem to be on high alert but Mike mcstay he's pretty casual about this and we
don't know I don't know personally a lot of his personality Mike mcstay's personality but his brother Joseph is
described as super casual guy super nice very laid back doesn't get stressed easily so maybe the
maybe this is just how it is in their family and they share a similar personality and Mike is going well maybe
they took off for a few days on an adventure to have some fun as a family I don't see a big deal here well I think
there's a couple issues when you're in the house you have food left out but one of the other issues is that the house
has never been put together they never made the house a home yet so everything looks a little out of place and
everything looks a little disorganized so one can make the argument of well it doesn't seem like there was a struggle
here the other person can make an argument well this house was never really put together at this time their dogs are
outside when the brother is sitting there when Michael is saying well I'm hopeful that they just went on vacation
you just went on vacation for seven to ten days or or maybe even two weeks and you're gonna leave your dogs
outside that doesn't make a lot of sense to me no and in fact being a dog guy I get furious of people that I hear tell
me oh you know they're out staying the night somewhere they go straight from work out with their friends and then
stay the night somewhere and never went home to let the dog out or never went home to feed the dog I get furious when
I hear that I would have been on high alert I'm with you the the home to me I don't know that any regular person or
even somebody that knows them well could walk through the home and decide if there's been a struggle or if things are
out of place or disturbed or disrupted what have you but the dog thing would really put me on
high alert and the other thing too that that rubbed me the wrong way about Michael mcstay's thoughts and feelings
was I get what you're saying maybe they took off for a couple days okay maybe they're being negligent with their dogs
for whatever reason or made arrangements with neighbors to feed the dogs and we'll just leave them out back right not
being able to get a hold of them not being able to get in touch with them is what would concern me Heck on the way
here I text my brother-in-law said hey I think I just saw you down the street wanted to say hello he was nope that's
not me I'm in Louisville so it's it I think that it's odd that that someone's gone and you can't get in touch with
them and that's what would put me on high alert now these other individuals convinced Mike mcstay to contact the
Sheriff's Office and this will lead to a visit on February 15th when we have Mike
mcstay there with deputies from the Sheriff's Office to do a quick sweep inside the home now note here
that Mike mcstay once again has to climb in the window and go and unlock the front door of the
home because technically the Sheriff's Office does not have a search warrant at this time they're just going to Simply
go in take a look around see if they see any obvious signs of a crime and if they do not they're going to
leave but officially the mcstay family is reported missing by this time note the date February 15th later we
would be told that we believe that they went missing or something happened in the mcstay family on the fourth
I can't say with 100 certainty when Mike mcstay was notified of this we do have several family members who
are aware that something is wrong we do have several business associates that are aware that something is wrong but to
me that seems like a lot of time that has passed from when authorities later believe something happened to the mcstay
family to When anybody is actually reporting this and people are on scene looking for the family looking to see if
there's any obvious signs of a crime no place we can go [Music] away [Music] and we are back to the windows to the
walls cheers cheers like you were stating the stay family they rule it involuntary
disappearance I think this is a huge mistake you hear law enforcement state that when we get to a scene of a crime
if we have bodies and we don't know what happened we assume the worst why not in
this situation why wouldn't law enforcement assume the worst and then work backwards that's a good question
and I'm not going to go down the road of of what a job what kind of job that they
did on this case early on I don't really have a strong opinion either way I'm pretty down the middle on
on my thoughts on that whether they did a good job or a bad job what I will say is this though
is a good detective should be working off of fact and factual information and unfortunately at this time when
deputies go to the home and detectives get involved what they have here is missing people that's the fact they see
nothing at their home that would indicate to them that there was Foul Play or an abduction or a break-in or
anything of that going on and so they have to categorize it something so that is the category that was given to it
based off of the facts that were known to law enforcement at that time now we do have the detective who is on record
saying yes when I saw the home I only knew one thing that I had four missing people
now in my mind because of my job and because of my experience I am always concerned with a potential homicide
so while he he can categorize it as voluntary missing because there's no other indication that it is anything
other than that he also states that the thing he was majorly concerned with is not so much to the missing adults we
have missing children here and they're young children with no explanation from anybody in the family as to why they may
be missing or even hints as to what was going on with the family as to why the kids would be missing you know he says
that often in his line of work what he sees when we have missing children is a parent may take off that there's some
kind of fight and one parent leaves and the other parent takes the children and goes looking for them however in this
situation they have everybody on summer side of the family and everybody on Joseph's side of the family saying
everything's great they loved each other the family was great business was wonderful their home was great their
lives were great you know everything's great so he has no explanation or even no hint as to why the children would be
missing now we talked a little bit about the home and you gave a good description
of that but I think that we should go a little more in depth with that to take a
look at what the police what the authorities were seeing when they walked through the home for the first time and
this is from a San Diego news Outlet this is nbcsandiego.com where in March okay so they're
Officially Missing by February 15th according to the timeline that we just went through
but this is from an article from March of 2010. this is Mike mcstay Joseph's brother who is going through the events
as well as what the home situation was like when they found it with reporters they lived in the 3400 block of avocado
Vista Lane the brother says that the home had been cleaned and vacuumed since the family had disappeared cleaned by
his mother Susan Susan Blake who is no longer with Patrick cleaned the home after the
family had disappeared and before this interview took place and I'll read directly from the interview
it says inside the house is a moderate level of disarray mostly because the home was in the process of being
remodeled according to Mike four upstairs bedrooms are for the most part empty several children's toys including
a large Playhouse remain in the home the master bedroom is empty Furniture had yet to be delivered said Mike mcstay in
a walk-in closet Mike mcstay said several purses were found but not but did not appear to be currently being
used downstairs strips of masking tape protect the edging of several walls the kitchen was being repainted two sets of
sunglasses one of which has prescription lenses were found on a counter in the garage a double stroller sits with
several wetsuits resting on top of it Mike mcstay said his brother would always take the stroller on planned
trips I don't want to throw the mother under the bus but this is another huge mistake and and probably what happened
and what she was thinking in her mind is they're gone they went on vacation I came over to their house it's in a
little bit of a disarray I'm worried about my son I'm worried about my daughter-in-law I'm worried about my
grandchildren so to keep myself occupied instead of worrying I'm going to go over
there and and she cleans and not only cleans but she deep cleans using bleach in the kitchen and using bleach in the
bathrooms whatever happened to this family whether it happened at the home or otherwise this house does not look
the same when police are able to get a search warrant to officially search the home and I'm with you Captain I get it
it's a very motherly thing to do she's probably just over there doing what she thinks she can do trying to stay busy in
the time of being nervous and worried about the family but this is yes this is a misstep by her mother or sorry this is
a misstep by the mother another thing that I found that was odd too was Mike mcstay took Joseph's computer around the
same time that the house was being cleaned and the Sheriff's Office basically says that you know this family
yeah they're nervous they're concerned I'm not in a position where I'm going to tell you what you cannot do what you
should not do don't you dare do this I'm in the process of trying to get a search
warrant so I can look through the home as quickly as possible before they disrupt what could be a potential crime
scene but at this point in the investigation they didn't feel that they needed to
instruct the family what to do other than asking them for help help us to help you tell us everything about the
family about their home give us everything that you got so we can create some kind of investigation and try to
locate this family of four well in the process of that they learned something that is
very interesting and is going to be a kind of a strange part in this case they locate the Isuzu Trooper so this is
Joseph mcstay's vehicle and we know that he was driving that vehicle on the fourth but it's on February 8th this is
before that they are officially missing on February 8th around 11 pm the family's trooper that vehicle was towed
from a parking lot which was about two blocks away from the U.S Mexico border and no one by this point has reported
the family missing yet the detective then says that knowing this area and knowing that people often will park
their vehicles there illegally and then leave and go across the border that became their number one concern we found
their vehicle in an area where that's typical Behavior so we must investigate that Avenue and see if there is any
evidence to back that thought up again my eyebrows raise when you hear about the computer being
removed from the home but it could be a situation just like the mother cleaning the house that there's an easy
explanation for it I just don't know what that is other than there is a business that needs to be run and now at
this point Michael has said that he's worried that his brother and his family is not going to return so there is talk
within the family on how or if they're going to try to continue his business because he has contracts for six months
to a year out yes and I'm glad that you went back to that Captain because that is correct right and that is something
where I look at it and go wow I think it's a little fishy that one would take one's computer but what we do know by
this point in the investigation is Chase Merritt has access to Michael mcstay we
know that because they are at the home together they go through the mcstay family home to together at some point
it's a little blurry to me right if Mike mcstay is involved Loosely or in some form or fashion with
his brother's company but you're exactly right we have a company that needs to be run and now we
have Dan Kavanaugh who's saying hey I'm trying to do my thing and Chase Merritt who is saying I'm trying to do my thing
to keep this company going while Joseph is gone and hopefully he returns soon and will
be it'll be business as usual but in the meantime somebody needs to access that computer and someone needs to be able to
relay information or do things for us we need someone that we can get in touch with that can act as Joseph in the
meantime so I guess when you look at it that way you go okay Mike mcstay has two
options either he takes the computer and helps out Dan and helps out Chase and return he's obviously helping his
brother while his brother's gone run his business Earth inspired products or he could give it to one of the business
associates and be hands off and let them take take the reins and so I guess given
those two options if I'm Mike I'm taking the computer myself well the other reason that he might have taken this
computer Joseph which is missing has a very close relationship with Patrick his father and
so Patrick knows that Dan Kavanaugh has made some threats before they actually call him the hacker and so it is
possible that they have some kind of conversation about well we might need to take his computer because we don't want
one of his business associates to hack into the system yes and so a little clarification on Dan Kavanaugh from my
understanding he's a partner at one point in this business now what his role was exactly is not clearly defined
however what we do know is he did set up the website for the company for their products and
that is one method that they use to sell their products to gain potential customers and he also figured out some
kind of search engine algorithm that he tapped into to make it so that when you search for custom water features or
water features or water fountains that Earth inspired products may be the first one or one of the first ones that come
up in your search it's the same as back when we were little kids and everybody relied on the
Yellow Pages or the phone book for a lot of business or to find vendors that could do work at their home or at their
business and so a lot of businesses would call themselves double a concrete or Triple A
woodworking or my favorite ABC Liquor it makes it puts you at the top of the list
when people go looking for you and then likely would drum up more business like you said it's not very clear what his
role was defined as but from the information I gathered like you said he set up this website now business
websites can cost a lot of money and maybe the the thought process is I'm not going to give you this money up front
but based on sales I'll pay you and so maybe in the long run you would make more money but at some point this is not
the typical situation when you have a website built for a company they build the website they get paid for it but bye
you don't get a check every time my order comes in and it seems like for years that Dan Kavanaugh was getting a
check when he possibly shouldn't have but a guy makes agreement with a business owner I put some of this onus
on the owner of the business because it's up to the he should have done his research to say well this is not how it
normally works and also when you buy a domain name you as the business owner should own that domain name so that
domain name and the website could have been completely owned by Kavanaugh and that's what he would be holding hostage
over Joseph's head and you're exactly right it we should point out that these are all moves that Joseph mcstay
either made or created or was reacting to in reaction to what Dan Kavanaugh is saying to him and their dealings
together because the way that it's been explained to me and the way I understand
it is that at one point Dan Kavanaugh was an actual partner again not clearly to find what his role was it could just
be maintaining and running the website but at some point the two start to part ways at the time of
Joseph's disappearance they were ready to part way so much so that Joseph was buying Dan Kavanaugh out
as a partner and he had already paid him thousands of dollars to buy him out and
they were taking on a new role and Dan Kavanaugh's future role will be to receive a monthly check for simply
running and maintaining the website going forward he will no longer be a partner he will now become basically a
vendor for Earth inspired products this discovery of the Isuzu Trooper being towed on February 8th this is going to
be a breadcrumb trail that is going to lead detectives right to the border of Mexico and they want to know could we
have a situation where one two or all four of the family members parked illegally and just walked off into the
sunset right into Mexico never to be seen again or to live happily ever after they want to figure out is this a
possibility here in this case this will be at the San Ysidro border crossing into the Tijuana area on February 8th
the same day that the vehicle was towed that's the day that they're going to start
reviewing surveillance footage at the border and they're going to look at that surveillance footage from that day
leading up to this point in their investigation when they know that the mcstay family is officially reported
missing this is quite the task because there's like thousands if not a hundred thousand people that cross to and from
that border at that point daily yeah so you're going to be reviewing this and let's talk about this for a second we've
already kind of pointed out that it's a bit of a needle in a haystack situation right you're looking for four people
crossing the border on that day or subsequent days afterwards however we need to point out something
that makes it even much more difficult you don't have to be looking for four people you could be looking for a
situation where it's Joseph in the two boys maybe he did something to Summer you
could be looking for summer and the two boys maybe she fled or maybe she did something to Joseph or maybe the parents
did something to the children and they're fleeing the area and now you're just looking for Joseph and summer right
so out of all these people we have a needle and a haystack it's kind of a needle in a stack of needles at this
point in my opinion so the sheriff's office they get the national Center for missing and exploited children they come
to their aid and provide volunteers to help them watch and put Eagle Eye volunteers on this surveillance footage
looking for Joseph for summer for either of the boys or all four this is going to
take some time for them to sort through this but in fact what they end up saying
is hey on the same day that the vehicle was parked on February 8th on the same day that the vehicle was towed from that
parking lot two blocks away from the border we did spot something at a portion of the surveillance footage that
called into question if we were seeing the family crossing the border and the description is at the bottom left corner
of the video of their video screen they say that they can see a man walking hand
in hand with a child following him is a woman in a white jacket holding the hand
of another child and they wondered if this could possibly be Joseph Summer and the two boys now have
you seen this video yourself I've seen stills of it 100 recently actually but when this case was fairly new in 2010
2011 and so on I had seen quite a bit of news media that was on this case from Jump Street and I believe that I had
seen an actual video clip back then but leading up to our coverage of it Captain
I've only seen stills of this picture I've seen the Steals and I've seen the video itself if somebody said to me we
believe that this is the family I would say yeah makes sense I think you could make an argument it's
not them because you can't see any of their features in the video is kind of grainy when you put two and two together
well you have this vehicle that's close to the Border where people Park to then cross the border and then we have what
we believe is a representation of this family my little garage brain says it's very
possible that's them going across the border I agree with you 100 here captain now law enforcement was upfront about
this stating that they thought the video was terrible they thought that yes it could potentially be them but the video
itself the quality of the video they thought was terrible so they would not say definitively that they thought they
were seeing the mcstay family they just said it was a possibility when they showed it to people that knew the mixed
days in fact we have Michael mcstay the brother who says that's not my brother uh on that video I know you can't see
facial features but Mike says that's not how Joseph carries himself that's not how he walks I don't believe that to be
my brother and his family and I just want to reiterate not to be Mr Know It All Mr captain
knows it pants how about Mr knows it most or knows most of it but it was a mistake I think by law
enforcement to rule this voluntary disappearance it's a mistake to wait as long as they did to call law enforcement
it's a mistake to clean the house it's a mistake to disturb things in the house it's a
mistake to take the computer away there's just a lot of mistakes that happen and again I just don't understand
if somebody called me from one of my siblings work like work relations and said I can't get a hold of
your brother I can't get a hold of your sister whatever I'm I'm driving over there that day even if they live an hour
away or even if they live two hours away I'm texting them I'm calling them and by
the time I get to their house and they're not answering their door police are being called that's how I operate
but I'm also a host of a true crime podcast I agree with what you're saying there Captain I share a lot of those
same feelings I do want to point out though that to stay water that those are all mistakes in hindsight and if we're
sitting in a situation where February 16 2010 the mcstay family shows up alive and well then none of these were
mistakes but when we have a situation where months and months and months go by and they don't come home and nobody can
get in touch with them then yes these are all obvious mistakes now as for the ruling or determination of what we're
going to categorize a case all of those things are very fluid situations too it doesn't stay
uh etched in stone that that's always going to be a voluntary disappearance it's only that until they
have reason to suspect or evidence of a a different situation now one thing here
that I want to point out is as I said when this case was pretty new and fresh in 2010 and 2011 it did get a lot of
media attention even on a national level so this was a case that I was aware of and I was following Loosely and when
there was something to be watched on TV or something to read on the internet about it I was tuning in I remember just
thinking this would be late 2010 after they had been gone for several months I I even after seeing the still or the
video of what could potentially be the mcstays at the border and even with their vehicle being found near the
border the way that their home was left never once made me think that they just up and
left in fact I couldn't find anything or was never presented with any reason of why
they would want to leave unless they just took a Fly by Night two-day vacation to Mexico decided not
to tell anybody and then something terrible happened to them there but the state of the home didn't make
any sense I you go back to the dogs being left outside un there's no preparations made for them to be taken
care of and then the state of the home like you said half eaten food is found laying out around the house
there's there's a like an apple core there's uh half bowls of popcorn there's eggs that are sitting on the counter
that doesn't look to me like they up and went somewhere voluntarily so that's where we kind of circle back to the idea
of well there must be something else going on here and I in 2010 man I was very concerned
about the movements the statements and the lack of the lack of effort on the behalf of Michael mcstay of his brother
he seemed kind of tuned out like I don't see any problem here I don't want to raise any red flags don't want to make
any waves don't want to report him missing don't want to swing by the home to check on him oh I took the computer
my mom cleaned the house and then let's factor in something else if somebody wanted to do something
terrible to this family or to one member of the family what happened on at least two occasions
that we are aware of when Chase mayor is with him at the home and then again when deputies are with
him at the mcstay home he clearly shows that he has access to the locked and secured home by climbing
through that office window on two occasions that's almost like that to me is a bit
of a red flag going this guy knows how to access the home when other people clearly do not yeah or maybe he just
used his brain when he got to the house maybe that was not something that he was
privy to before he got there agreed but as an outsider looking in that is something that I'm going to call into
question that's also something that's going to be put on my page and it's not going to leave there and so I'm given a
reasonable explanation as to why he knows how to do that or was able to do that unfortunately that is going to ramp
up our timeline pretty much for 2010. there's a lot of things that happen but there's nothing really in the
investigation itself that is known to the public to carry us further down the road here or give us any kind of
breadcrumb Trail as to where the family may be or what may have happened to them
in February of 2010. in 2011 what we end up having here Captain is pretty much more dead-end leads
these continue when photos were sent to the San Diego County Sheriff's department and to the mcstay
family extended family Michael mcstay these photos were of what was thought could possibly be Summer Mix day and a
child that were sent to Michael mcstay and the San Diego County Sheriff's Department of course rather quickly it's
ruled or determined that that in fact is not summer in the photo and again these
are just more dead-end leads in 2012 this is when we have all of the rumors that are still going around that the
mcstay family may be alive and well in Mexico there was even one point where we almost had breaking news where it came
out that the mcstay family was found but this time found in New Mexico in the state of New Mexico and this obviously
turns out not to be the mcstay family this is going to take us to near the end of 2013. on November 11th
2013 we have two off-road motorcyclists is what they're referred to in this article
that I'm referencing however I believe that they were on dirt bikes one of them discovers what he believes
to be a bone and in fact it turns out to be a skull he he notices this in a desert area of
Victorville California this would be about 70 miles from the mcstays home this will kick off a 30-hour excavation
project at this location at this site on November 13th we still have workers Excavating an area that is approximately
10 foot by 10 foot they are sifting through dirt they are looking for bones they are finding bones and they are also
finding other evidence in this area now two days later on the 15th we have the San Bernardino County Sheriff's
Department which holds a news conference at which Sheriff John McMahon confirms the identity of two of the bodies
recovered from this site and those two bodies are confirmed by the Sheriff's Office to be that of
Joseph mcstay age 40 and his wife Summer Mix day age 43. thank you thank you so much for joining us here in
the garage it's official True Crime garage listeners are the smartest and sexiest listeners in the history of
podcasting if you need more True Crime garage for your earballs check out our bonus show called off the record you can
find a link on our website at True Crime garage.com and until tomorrow be good be
kind and don't let it thank you [Applause] thank you [Music]

The McStay Family /// Part 1 /// 581

Part 1 of 2

www.TrueCrimeGarage.com

It was all a mystery. A very normal and happy family of four disappeared. By the looks of it, they just vanished. In February of 2010 the McStay family of four seemingly vanished from their home in Fallbrook California. This week in the Garage we review this strange and bizarre disappearance and the investigation that followed.

Beer of the Week - Lost Galaxy IPA by Lost Nation Brewing

Garage Grade - 4 out of 5 bottle caps

Our show - True Crime Garage “Off the Record” is available only on Stitcher Premium. For a FREE month of listening go to http://stitcherpremium.com/truecrimegarage and use promo code GARAGE

Brief Summary

The McStay family vanished in 2010; their remains were found in 2013, raising questions about their disappearance.

Key points

The Mysterious Disappearance. In February 2010, the McStay family vanished without a trace, leaving behind a puzzling scene.
The Last Known Interactions. Days before their disappearance, the McStay family was seen painting their home with a friend.
Confusion and Concern. Family and friends grow increasingly worried as they can't reach the McStays.
The Disappearance of the McStay Family. The McStay family goes missing, raising questions about law enforcement's initial response.
The Cleaned House. The mother deep cleans the home after the family disappears, raising suspicions.
Video Surveillance at the Border. Detectives review footage to find possible sightings of the McStay family crossing into Mexico.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It might sound like a TV mystery, but it's real.

Highlighting the shocking nature of the family's disappearance.

4:34WatchOct 23, 2022

Tension

75/ 100High tension

More from True Crime Garage TV

Solve the Crime

Read a real case one clue at a time, then see how your call held up against the investigators.