Veronica Blumhorst /// Part 1 /// 425 | Forensic Files

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[Music] crime [Music] a young woman leaves work late at night and arrives home her car makes it into
her usual spot in the garage but somehow she never makes it inside the house with very few Clues Left Behind
police are left scratching their heads the number one suspect the boyfriend acts suspicious but nothing ties him to
The Disappearance the case grows cold and languishes for 30 years in so many of these missing
person's cases decades pass there is no movement on the case and we are left with no
resolution but in this case all is not as it seems after nearly three decades there
is new information that is not really knew it all but it was left out of the case
files some suggest this information was conveniently lost or covered up intentionally this is true crime garage
and this is the case of Veronica Jill Bloom Hurst [Music] Veronica Jill Bloom Hurst was born on
September 4th 1969 nothing is known about her birth parents this is actually a major speed
bump for the investigation it's complicated but we will get into that the why that is important after we get
to know a little more about Veronica her family and the day that she went missing
Veronica was adopted by Paul and Betty Bloomer when she was only 7 months old she had an older sister named Carolyn
also adopted but from a different family and a younger brother named Todd who was
the bloom Hurst biological son reports are that Veronica had some early physical disabilities that impeded her
ability to walk but with the help of leg braces and hard work she eventually overcame this she had magic shoes she
was also diagnosed with a learning disability and took special education classes in school Veronica was somewhat
quiet and shy but was friendly and everyone liked her she was a bit of a homebody her family likes to say that
she often was tucked into bed by 8:00 p.m. unless she was working or with her boyfriend in 1990 Veronica Bloomer was
21 years old and living at home with her family in menot Illinois Veronica lived with her parents
and her brother Todd on Monroe Street Mota is a very safe small city of about 7,000 residents in Northern lale County
and on top of that they moved there because the father became a firefighter and he was well connected not just in
the fire department but also with the police department as well yeah her father Paul was a firefighter her uncle
was a police officer and her mother worked at a nursing home her older sister Carolyn in 1990 was in her mids
and lived about 20 minutes away with her husband Veronica was working as a sales
associate at a local retailer about a half a mile from her home this is at Dempsey's Super Value she had multiple
job duties this included cashier Manning the movie rental counter and selling lottery tickets many people in town knew
her as the friendly movie Clerk and although she was not a gregarious person she was described as
bubbly when she wasn't working Veronica spent a lot of of her time with her boyfriend Jeff Vera a 22-year-old
computer science junior college student whom she met about 6 months earlier the two were serious and had discussed
marriage although they were not officially engaged at this time now we relied heavily on the terrific series of
articles in this case by Jim Hagerty that was released earlier in 2020 on the Rockford Advocate website we spoke with
Jim as well and we'll be sharing some information that he gave to us now let's get into the events captain of September
19th and 20th of 1990 this weekend ahead of us marks 30 years that this young woman has been
missing and Foul Play is absolutely suspected in this case now the day in question will be Wednesday September
19th 1990 Veronica went to work at 5:00 p.m. for her evening shift as usual this is the
cashier gig at Dempsey's Super Value she has worked there for several years Veronica recently had a bad case of mono
and she wasn't feeling very well have you ever had Mono I have not it's awful it just you feel completely drained like
you don't even feel sick so much or at least I didn't I just felt complet completely exhausted and it ruined the
New York Jets football season last year mhm so you know it's serious so she's not feeling well she's still taking
medication for mono at this time around 9:30 Veronica's sister Carolin came into
the store and talked to her sister about a doctor's appointment that Veronica had
the next day this of course to address the mono that she's still fighting off mhm then Veronica called Jeff her
boyfriend she rented a movie for herself from the store's catalog of VHS films this was the B Midler movie Stella old
school VHS Be Kind Rewind mhm when her shift ended at closing time she walked out of
the store in the company of another sales associate this was her friend Sharon vaner what time was this at it
was late this was at 1:07 a.m. so Veronica told Sharon that she was very tired and she was going to go home and
go to bed she intended to watch the movie the following day MH the two walked to their cars parked on the west
side of the parking lot they warmed up their vehicles defrosted the windshields and then Veronica got into her blue
Chevy Corsica and drove North out of the parking lot onto Meridan Street and headed East toward her home on Monroe
Street which again is just half a mile away the next morning Veronica's brother Todd
woke up for school Todd was having some car troubles so Veronica was supposed to
drive him to school that day right she wasn't downstairs yet but he saw her car in the garage so he just simply waited
but she never came down when he went and looked in her room he realized that she
was not there so now he's like she's not home at all he called his father at work
at the firehouse and his father told him you know just drive your own car to school and I'll come and pick up this
vehicle later and I'll do some work on it so Todd leaves the house he goes off to school Paul father arrived home from
his overnight shift around 8:00 a.m. that morning he assumed that Veronica was out to breakfast with her boyfriend
Jeff and simply forgot about driving her brother to school that day again it's not a regular activity for her to drive
him maybe it just slipped her mind well and like you said Jeff is this is a serious relationship so the family knows
who Jeff is and and everybody is aware of of who he is so Paul leaves the house again some Reports say that he went off
to his part-time job some say that he went to run some errands regardless of why he leaves the house when he returned
to the house the phone rang and it was the doctor's office they're calling to say that Veronica didn't show up for her
follow-up appointment that was scheduled for that day then the phone rang again now this
time it's Jeff the boyfriend he's asking for Veronica is Veronica there they were
supposed to go out to lunch he said Paul told him that Veronica was not home and
actually asked Jeff had he seen her anytime since she left for work the previous day he said no I had not
starting to worry Paul calls his wife who's at work he ask her if she had seen Veronica that morning and she says of
course she had not as well all right so we are in a weird spot here Captain everything appears to be as it should
with the exception that no one knows where Veronica is mhm her car is parked in its usual spot in the bloom Hurst
garage it also appears that the vehicle arrived at or about the expected time but anywhere that Veronica should
be she is not she wasn't home to drive her little brother to school that day she missed the doctor's appointment and
she was not out with her boyfriend I heard it reported multiple times some people say that was a false followup
doctor's appointment and some people were saying that because she didn't feel like the Mona was getting better or she
wasn't feeling better that it was a extra appointment and so that makes it even more important sometimes you don't
follow up on an appointment cuz you're feeling better the other thing too here is the garage setting right there's
multiple different kinds of garages your house now has a attached garage your house before had a detached
garage but this this is a detached garage and it's I believe roughly about 30 ft away from the house so it's it's
quite a distance between the garage and the house well and it looks to me too that you would actually if you were
driving and wanted to park in the garage that you would enter the garage from an
alley that is behind the house and behind the garage right that makes sense that you wouldn't pull that that there
may not even be a driveway to get you from Monroe Street to the garage so with Veronica's car in the
garage this means that she or at least the vehicle arrived home after her shift at the Super Value the night before her
mom woke up around 2 a.m. and from the kitchen window she could see Veronica's car was in the garage the garage door
was shut and the lights were off this was the family's kind of signal you know that everyone was home and safe at the
house for the night the last person in would close down the garage and Betty it was routine for her to get up in the
night to check that the garage was closed out B again like we said it's a very small
community her father works for the fire department within the area I think one of their neighbors was a police officer
it's a very safe area so since there's no sign of Veronica Paul he gets in his vehicle he drives out to the sister's
house out to Carolyn's house again about 20 minutes away and this was just to see
if Veronica was there she was very close with Carolyn and there was some reason to believe that she intended to go to
her sister's house that day to talk about maybe wedding arrangements or wedding dresses but Veronica was not out
there as well when Paul showed up at the house Carolyn was immediately alarmed she says you know her father was
normally a calm and practical dude but on this day he was quite panicked and this set her off so Carolyn had no idea
where her sister was and she followed her dad back to the Bloomer home when they
arrived they were surprised to see Veronica's boyfriend Jeff as well as their neighbor John John lives across
the alley behind the Bloomer home he is as the captain was saying a mandota police
officer Jeff called 911 around noon to report Veronica missing with the arrival of the police
people started to gather at the Bloomer home and Searchers fan out to scour the neighborhood we aren't going to get into
the whole scope of the search but the PJ star summed it up nicely by saying quote
police quickly began searching the town and questioning people 2 hours after the
first report planes began to crisscross the sky for a glimpse of a missing woman
that day and several after just about every Fire and Police Department within 30 Mi of Mendota assisted in the search
hundreds of civilians scoured the area hour after hour day after day not stopping even in the rain dive teams
jumped into lakes and ponds to seek Clues end quote now remember Paul was a firefighter so you can
imagine that we're going to have an all handson deck type of response right and that her neighbor was a police officer
yeah the police chief stated that he could not even begin to guess how many man hours were were expended on the
search MH which extended to a 15 to 20 mile radius of Mendota and yet there was no sign
anywhere of this young woman no sign anywhere of Veronica it seems that she has just
simply vanished now at the house it was Veronica's sister Carolyn that thought someone should check the trunk of
Veronica's car we got the car in the garage no one's thought to check the trunk and this is really we've talked
about this with many cases that we've covered when a person goes missing the vehicle is
located this is always a very traumatic experience for whomever is the one that is in charge of opening up the trunk and
a lot of times we tell these stories and it's a family member that's opening up the trunk of the vehicle and it's
something that they never ever never forget right now Carolyn was very careful to open the trunk very very
slowly all that was in there thankfully was Veronica's overnight bag which I guess was packed and still in there from
the weekend before MH now of course police looked at whether Veronica had actually made it home that
night as we said her car was found in the usual spot in the unattached garage about 30t from the house right Betty
usually left the garage lights on for her so Veronica would not come home to a dark garage again their routine was that
Veronica would shut off the light close down the garage before entering the house sure enough the garage door was
shut the garage light was off there was no sign whatsoever that anything was a Miss no sign of a struggle nothing was
dropped near you know there's not items laying on the ground that right we don't
have blood on the garage floor yeah or any personal items that would be lying on on the ground out there but so we we
have evidence that the car made it into the garage the light got turned off the door got shut we have evidence of that
we don't have evidence that it was her other than her co-workers saying that I walked her out to her car probably
actually saw her drive off for a second yeah and I say that that it appears that everything was
as it should be because we don't have a whole lot of time between when the coworker said that they left from their
shift to the time where her mother would routinely wake up to make sure that the
garage you know that Veronica's vehicle was in the garage and the garage was shut down it was 107 according to the
coworker and according to her mother mother Betty Betty would usually get up around 2: a.m. to look out the kitchen
window to check and see if the garage was shut down yeah so nothing seems a Miss except for we have a missing woman
correct correct so police did begin to suspect that Veronica did drive home did in fact drive home and then immediately
left with somebody else this of course is because not only was she missing but some of her personal items were missing
that seemed to indicate that she had taken them with her mhm these items were her purse and car keys the items that
she was wearing of course were were gone as well and this included her boyfriend's class ring her earrings a
watch her glasses and her red work smok also missing was the VHS movie that she had rented at work and brought with her
when she left that night so Captain you're starting to see a picture here of if in fact she did drive
home she gets out of her vehicle shuts off the light closes the garage door she's going to walk from the garage to
her her house yeah roughly 30 ft away and it's almost like everything you would expect for her to be carrying into
the home with her that night is also the things that are missing along with her yeah so then the question becomes
is she abducted does somebody pull up that she knows and says hey come with me real quick and she gets in their car
what happened right and I've not been able to find anything in regards to if the vehicle
was locked or not or if the garage was locked or if it was common for either to be locked it it's likely not important
but I was looking for those details yeah but to be very clear yes yes there was a
search that happened we have planes flying overhead we have people searching countless manh hours 15 mile radius they
didn't do a lot of searching of the actual property of of the House of the garage
of her car the idea to even search her trunk was not the police officer's idea came
from the family well and I think the problem here is very similar to what we were talking about yesterday on off the
Record it's what do you think that you're searching for can often dictate the way that a search is is that you go
about the search and it feels to me like in in these very crucial hours you know
we can sit here 30 years later and go well why didn't they do this why didn't they do that but in these very crucial
hours they think that they're just looking for a person who who is missing for any number of reasons they're not
fully aware maybe they're not equipped I don't know the answer to that Captain but for whatever reason they don't think
that they should be looking for Clues uh or evidence for for foul play at the time they're simply looking for
Veronica right the Bloomer family also believed that Veronica must have left with somebody she
knew Paul told the register star that if his daughter was taken against her will it was by somebody she knew
otherwise there would have been some noise or some sign of a struggle in the garage she's always been he says very
naive and overly trusting I think what it's kind of a weird statement that he gives there but I think what he saying
is even if she was taken against her will she may not have realized that at the time and very likely willingly got
into someone's vehicle or walked away with somebody that night a dogs were brought in to track Veronica scent from
the garage this is a good move after sniffing an item of of her clothing the dogs left the garage and went into the
alley behind the garage and after about 200 ft the dogs seemed to become confused and simply lost the trail or
whatever Trail they were following the obvious conclusion was that Veronica may have gotten into a vehicle that was
waiting for her in the alley when she disappeared Veronica was 5T tall 100 lb with braces and hazel
eyes she was wearing a mint green sweater with a white tank top cream colored pants and wire rimmed
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[Music] 2023 all right we are back Cheers Cheers Cheers Cheers police labeled Veronica a
missing person early reports state that police did not believe that there was Foul Play but it was clear to everyone
who knew her that something bad happened to Veronica well we see this a lot with
police where they go L she's an adult she probably took off maybe she's with another guy doesn't want to tell her
boyfriend about it maybe she took off with some friends maybe she took off to start a new life yeah they did the
typical thing they thought that she left on her own you know she is 21 in their defense there is no sign of a struggle
so they awaited they waited about 24 hours to take an official report but again her friends and family are saying
she didn't run away that this is totally out of character for her and there is some evidence of this right she did not
take any additional clothing or any sentimental items right it's just the things that she would have carried from
the vehicle to her home her and those items are the only things that are gone she run at a movie just the night before
that seems like a strange thing to do if you're planning on taking off the next day mhm she had a doctor's appointment
later that day and remember she wasn't feeling very well the morning before in fact she considered calling in sick to
her shift at Super Value plus her family they're on record they said that she only had $10 cash on her at the time and
that she left her paycheck at work uncashed well she lived kind of a simple life she struggled through school so
going to college was not really an option that she put into her own mind and so really her plans were I like my
job yes it's kind of strange hours but it gives me a bunch of time during the day to do my own thing and really the
plan for her or her plan for herself was I'm going to get married and become a mom and and that's what I'm going to do
and I'm pretty sure that in regards to her job with th those weird hours I'm kind of guessing here Captain because I
don't know for certain but I'm thinking that she probably shut down the store that that store must close maybe at the
1:00 hour and that's why her co-workers pretty firm on that 107 a.m. time of having last seen her mhm again $10 cash
on her at the time she had a paycheck at work that was left uncashed if she intended to run away she
would have very likely needed some money some resources you would wait to get that check and cash it well let's stay
on that check for a second because it's reported multiple ways some people make it seem as if there was a check left in
the car like she had a work check in the car that was what I believe is not the case
that she had actually a check that she was going to be receiving that the next Friday in a couple days and that's the
check that people are talking about her not having correct the the information I
have says that the check her paycheck was at her work she also never used any credit card or accessed her bank account
after the night that she went missing finally Veronica's mom Betty was battling cancer at the time of course
Veronica was very concerned about her mother and made sure to check in with her all of the time so the idea that
Veronica would just leave was really Unthinkable to her family and friends a coworker of hers says at the Super Value
who says she was the closest of the employees to Veronica said that she would have told someone if she was
planning to leave or to go somewhere as she often spoke and told everybody at work about her upcoming plans I'm
reading a little between the lines here Captain I don't know that I believe that
this statement from the coworker means so much that she would have told us if she was planning on running away and
starting a new life somewhere I think it also hints to the idea of if she had something going on that day to meet with
a specific person or go to a a specific place she probably would have blabbed about it to her co-workers at some point
leading up to that event right and what we have pretty much on record is her telling her co-workers hey I'm going to
go home I'm not even going to watch this movie I'm just going straight to bed so
no talks about meeting up with her boyfriend afterwards or meeting up with a friend after work she's seems like an
open book doesn't she where we have both co-workers and her family that seems to
say that they were very aware of what her plans would have been for the following day well and I think a lot of
people make something out of the fact that she was adopted and maybe now that she's a
little bit older maybe she' want to know where she came from but all indications
point to she was kind of curious but not that curious and felt that it would be almost like an insult to her family that
that gave her this life that she enjoyed yeah her adopted family is her family and I believe that was her own words you
know this this is my family whether it means now or whatever or however she felt about it she didn't feel the need
to seek out the people that gave her up she was living with who she wanted to live with she was very proud that her
parents adoptive parents were the ones that raised her she's in a unique situation too Captain where her sister
her older sister was adopted as well from another family so if she had any weird or mixed feelings about being
adopted she had someone sharing the exact same experience as her to go to and bounce things off of yeah police
eventually came around to the belief of Foul Play in connection with Veronica's disappearance and their thoughts this is
not that it was not a random abduction so per the register star that we quoted earlier Chief Ken Han said police quote
doubt that it's a random abduction in a in part because the Super Value Store where she worked and her home are off
the beaten path Mendota is also small enough that everybody knows everybody and any strange face or vehicle would
likely be noticed end quote now I know this is back in what 1990 yeah but answer me this question if
you could as many cases as we've gone through especially missing person cases if you're in law enforcement how are you
handling this because to me it's almost like they use this well we think that she just took off on her own and she'll
turn back up it's almost like they're which I know that happens a lot of times I know that there's thousands of missing
person cases and within 24 hours 48 hours that person's found and they're okay no big
deal but it seems to me that it's not the responsible thing to do that it's just it's it would be better
to you know let's wait and see and and not put out any information at all mhm I think it's a tricky
situation because she is an adult I think had this been a younger person that we wouldn't be in the same boat
that we are now right I do also o believe that there's likely in many of these cases things behind the scenes
that we are unaware of simple things of okay well we have our our shift roll call for
police uh for first shift second shift third shift of of this day oh one of the notes is we have a missing young woman
she's 21 years old here's a description of her and a picture even though we've not gone official with it at this point
yeah it's it's weird because when you look at these small towns especially the ones that are safe and have very low
crime rates you go well what else could they be working on just make this priority number one yeah but it's also
strange too because it's like maybe their their words and their actions don't necessarily match up where they go
well look we think that she went missing on her own or she went went to go hang out with
somebody but we're also all hands on deck and a bunch of people searching and we have a 15 to 20 mile radius of a
search that seems a little take that's that's a little more taking it serious than the words of oh
we think she'll turn up yeah I I think we're probably putting those in the wrong chronological
order it's obvious to me that it would be oh she might turn up and then it's all Hands-On deck for a search right
okay so who took Veronica now that the police have come around to the idea that she's not just gone that she's not just
where she shouldn't be or was expected to be that someone took her and their words are we believe there's Foul Play
in connection with her disappearance and we also do not believe that this is a random abduction I think they're
probably pretty spot-on with both of those thoughts and theories now as we've seen in so many cases the investigation
is going to start with those closest to her so 2 days after Veronica was last seen police sat down with Veronica's
boyfriend Jeff as we saw Jeff showed up at the bloom Hurst home very quickly after learning from Paul that she was
missing right he hears from Paul and then Paul goes off on some errands out to the sister's house comes back to the
home with the sister and now Jeff the boyfriend's at their house with the police officer and now it's kind of
becoming a thing that Veronica is missing right so him being there I guess is understandable right he would go over
there to look for well if they're supposed to have lunch that day well he goes over there cuz he now believes
she's missing not just to pick her up for lunch he's already from the father what I'm saying is he was had plans with
her and she didn't show up and now he's worried where she's at he and Veronica were serious at this time he loved her
by all accounts he was concerned when she didn't turn up but then he called 911 rather than leaving it to her
parents I think some people might think that this is weird I'm totally fine with
this right because we sat here before in these same chairs and said why isn't anyone taking action so we're not going
to uh punish somebody for being the first to take action yeah I I don't fault him at all for that you wonder was
that a discussion that that Jeff and Veronica's father had right like you wonder because there there was a
conversation before Jeff shows up at the house did Jeff tell the father hey I think we should call 911 or I think we
should report this to the police and the father says being the firefighter being
the guy that is said by his own family to be always calm levelheaded did the father say no
it's it's early give it a give it an hour give it a couple hours let me go to her sister's house you know was Jeff was
he panicked from from the get-go well like I said I mean it just throws another wrench in the whole case
because like we said she had some learning disabilities she struggled just to get through school I mean they had to
get her special help just to get her through school so you would assume that Jeff would know her almost better than
anybody at this time you know especially when you're 21 you're not sharing everything with your parents so I just
wonder if he really understood her capabilities with inside the world when we talk about how her father says that
she had this um sense of naive how much does Jeff understand this but he would have a better sense of who she was what
she was capable of doing and like I said this this the the house being 30 ft from
the garage it leans to the idea that you could abduct somebody but it seems like the idea that somebody would have
to know her and on some capacity to get her into that car agreed and I think you could look at
this thing with Jeff of calling 911 one of two ways with him arriving at the house and
calling 911 and and throwing himself into the investigation it's either one of two things either he is responsible
for why Veronica is missing right and he's manipulating things to make it look like he's concerned or to me I I think
you could go either way with it but you could also lean that this is further confirmation by somebody else outside of
the house that she would not have just went off somewhere but this Jeff guy is a unique character he seems to have
some social immaturity I guess would be the way I'd put it well he's not the best
Communicator with people kind of a nerdy guy smart guy everybody says he's pretty
bright well there's there's what we have is we have several people that say Jeff
started to act inappropriate early on in this case so first of all they said that he would not leave the
bloom Hurst home so he showed up there he stayed there for 3 days sleeping on the
couch and the Father Paul said quote he was constantly asking how the investigation was going yeah almost like
he was a little too concerned yeah Paul says that he Jeff began answering the phone as if he was a
person that lived there right trying to control the situation okay and Paul told
the media that he would not meaning Jeff would not leave our house we didn't think much of it at first but then we
would just he would just lay on our couch in the fetal position Paul says I think he went home to shower but other
than that he was at our house all of the time M every time the phone rang he would try to answer it we thought that
was very strange again it's it's one of two things the same thing we just talked
about it's either him trying to control the investigation knowing what the police know knowing what the family
knows or he's just really freaking concerned well not only is he concerned but he just doesn't think other people
are capable so you don't need to answer the phone I'll answer the phone you know
what I mean I I don't know that I we would I would take it that far um to to worry that people aren't capable Paul's
a firefighter I I don't want to try to think of what what Jeff was thinking just judging his actions it it shows me
it's either one of those two things he's trying to know be the first to know about the investigation to cover his own
ass right or he wants to be the first to know that everything's okay and that the
woman that he loves is alive and well right but that's what I'm saying about the maybe he there was a sense of him
not thinking other people were going to do as much as he could do for the investigation that's why he has to plant
himself in their house that's why he has to answer every phone call that's why he
has to talk to the police about every detail that's why he's getting arguments with people about details and and
conversations about her going missing according to the Rockford Advocate series on the case Again by Jim Hagerty
Jeff the boyfriend approached the producers of the radio broadcast of the Mendota High School football game that
took place on Friday September 21st this is the day after Veronica came up missing Jeff asked them to play
something for him during the halftime show it was a recording that Jeff gave them to play that had Jeff reading some
words and he says on this recording quote I am making this recording for you you because me and all your friends and
family miss you we want you back I don't care what the problem is I don't care where you are or whoever you're with I
won't be happy until you're back with me I hope I haven't pushed you or anything
I don't think I have I want you to know I love you everybody else loves you and we're waiting to hear from you cuz we
got some sad people and wherever you are and whatever you are doing call the mandota police department at and he
gives their number cuz I love you I know you love me so I brought this tape for you to hear cuz it's going to be strange
to a lot of people out there but you know this song and it's for you and you know I always think of you when I hear
it Veronica I love you this was followed by a paa song I unfortunately I do not have the the name
of the the song it's followed by a PA song well PA's big in that portion of the country
it makes me think of you every time I hear it well so a lot of people thought that
this was totally strange right maybe this guy is one of those just a dramatic person who is gushing publicly about his
feelings and it might be overreacting the eyes of some but airing this public statement
basically very very shortly after Veronica went missing I do think it's a little odd yeah a little
odd and a quick background investigation on Jeff revealed some concerning information um according to people who
knew him at work he had a temper and was the type to quickly fly off the handle over very small things like a machine
malfunctioning or something not working properly didn't he have an accident at some point he did further A co-worker of
his who was a longtime friend of Veronica's told police that Jeff had become possessive and controlling of
Veronica and would get mad at her if she was late for something or busy when he wanted to talk to her Veronica told this
friend on several occasions quote he mad at me and I don't know why this friend believed Veronica was afraid of Jeff's
angry Outburst another cooworker of Jeff's this is a woman told police that he had
called her down to their workplace one night after Veronica vanished but didn't want to talk about work stuff creeped
out she left but Jeff followed her home and demanded to know whether she thought
that he had done something to Veronica he even said to her quote this is according to this woman I don't know why
anyone would think I would have anything to do with her disappearance or murder the whole incident left her feeling very
unsettled because Jeff and I have a problem with this too Jeff was the first person to mention the word
murder in regards to Veronica to everyone else she was just missing now Jeff her boyfriend he is saying the word
murder kind of I want to argue with you on that a little bit because isn't that kind of similar to the 911 call
everybody's looking for her and you go well I don't think that's enough going to call
911 hey I think she's just missing right that's a level of concern and he then ramps up that level with of
concern by saying I don't I'm not so for sure that it's just a missing that she's just
missing I think there's something more nefarious here yeah I I don't know to me it's similar in where one may talk about
somebody in the past tense and be the only one to know that they're no longer with us true true after his daughter
went missing Paul Bloom Hurst recalled that one weekend when Veronica had gone to a paa festival with Jeff she had come
home with bruises on her face she told her parents that she walked into a speaker so now there's a question to
Veronica's parents was Veronica covering up for something that actually happened
something bad that happened on that trip and maybe Jeff was to blame maybe was she covering for Jeff it's worth
mentioning that this character assassination of Jeff was not it doesn't seem to be
Universal Veronica's parents Paul and Betty Bloom Hurst and sister Carolyn and her husband they all liked Jeff they
have said that he was I think you use this word a little odd a little quirky but he he was a horse of a different
color well they all said that it was clear that the two of them were in love that that he very much loved Veronica
and she loved him and things seemed great between the two of them of course people pointed fingers at him because he
was the boyfriend but there wasn't much to go on right even after years passed Jeff moved away and started his own
family but in 2004 14 years after Veronica vanished the mandota police department officially re examined her
case and in the course of doing so they did some re-interviewing of people and reviewing of the evidence this
examination also included some new interviews for example Veronica's closest friend Tracy was interviewed for
the first time 14 years later for the first time and then they gave the case File to the Bloomer family and what it
contained about Jeff the boy friend was enough to convince some family members particularly Todd Veronica's little
brother that Jeff had killed Veronica and when the case File was leaked to the public it had the effect
of trying Jeff veverka in the court of public opinion so what do we have as evidence that points the finger in a
negative light towards Jeff well it's the case File so let's go through what this case File
said on September 23rd 1990 this is 2 days after Veronica went missing police sat down with Jeff who was at the time a
composing room worker at the local paper the Sterling Daily Gazette as well as a
community college student the investigator who interviewed him supposedly over a long period of time
there are varying reports on this and you're going to have that when you you have a case that's 30 years old most
Reports say that it was about 6 hours maybe a little longer the officer the investigator who interviewed Jeff then
wrote up a summary of what he says Jeff said in this interview and what has been
purported to have been said by him is very suspicious now this investigator who wrote up this report was Mota Police
Department in investigator John P I'm going to go with P for his last name that's p period who was in charge of the
investigation yes this is the same John who was neighbors with the bloom Hurst his house was directly across the alley
that was in the back of their home here is what the report says Jeff told police
keep in mind that this is all as described by the interviewer John not verbatim and not taken from any
transcript or recording either of those things apparently do not exist in this case
this is all as described in Jim Hagerty series about the case he has personally reviewed the police report containing
this information about Jeff so in this interview it said that Jeff said that on September 19th the last day that
Veronica was seen he drove his father's van to Veronica house and then used Veronica's car to run some errands he
later returned to the car to the Bloomers home that's a confusing story in it in
itself I don't know why he wouldn't just use the van to go about his errands but
this is what police are saying he said then around 4:40 he was in his van and he saw Veronica leaving for work so he
drove to Super Value waited for her to Park when Veronica pulled into the lot he said he inched the vehicle his van up
next to her vehicle and then the two kind of you know gave an I I love you type signal to one another he then drove
home to his house in sublet Illinois and didn't talk to Veronica until 9:30 p.m.
she called him from work he said and they discussed having lunch after the doctor appointment the next day he said
he then watched a movie and fell asleep at 1:30 a.m. then according to mandota police
investigator John his report says Jeff gave reasons why he might be involved in Veronica being missing and he also gave
us ways he thinks it might have happened per the report Jeff blurted out that maybe someone she knew in a van no a
truck drove up by by her garage and she got into the vehicle with them maybe they got to fooling around and maybe she
said no and she was pushed or shoved and got hurt real bad and then he dumped her
somewhere where no one would find her also it's possible that when she got off work she took her red smok and placed it
over the passenger's front seat and someone may have taken it and put it around her head and did something and
the Smock was not found correct he went on with another hypothetical saying maybe I thought when
she told me on the phone that night her sister was taking her to a doctor's appointment that she was pregnant and I
drove down there pulled up in the alley and she got into a van no a truck and we
argued and maybe I was afraid of what our parents would say and I did something I don't remember maybe I was
the person who picked her up and I thought she was pregnant and I thought she was pregnant and I lost my mind yeah
but this is after how many hours of questioning the least amount of time that I found in the reports say 6 hours
yeah so it's anywhere from six to I think I've seen up to 24 hours of them questioning this guy yes which that
would be a long time I don't know how the you think the officer would need to take some kind of work the officer
started confessing uh hey I worked I several times I worked over a 30 hour shift if you want somebody to talk put
me in a room with them we'll go at it for two or three days yeah I'm ready nonstop the other big problem and issue
I have with this with this information is how it comes to us this is not a audio tape of Jeff
being interviewed by police this is not a videotape of Jeff being interviewed by
police this is not a transcript of that interview with questions and answers questions and answers well it is a
transcript no it's not it's what it is is it's the officers he is telling he's reporting
later yeah it's a transcription of his him remembering well right but we can get into semantics if you
like but it's it's not the proper use of the word transcript what what I'm saying
is this is not even the officer didn't sit down and write down this stuff in the interview itself this is a couple
days go by and he's told his superiors that Jeff said some incriminating stuff when I interviewed him for hours the
other day oh what did he say oh he said this and this and this well could you write that down for us in some kind of
report right and what I mean by that is you could you could take that any way that you want there's a lot of new
nuances that are missed and left to speculation in this situation this officer is reporting this Days Later did
Jeff say that he did this or did Jeff say that someone could have done this well that's two very different things M
and we have this officer writing it down days later also we just we're just we have only this officer to report this we
don't have anybody else backing this up we have no again no recording of any of this nobody else sitting in the room
writing down the same notes right but this reminds me again Shaker Heights a little bit right West Memphis
3 Shaker Heights they recorded the interviews and they had multiple officers in the interview room at the
same time right but again with this case we don't know but I I don't like the question of well how do you think it
would have been done you know or like when in West Memphis 3 when Daman goes well the killer must have enjoyed it or
and must have felt some power or something right he speculating on something and then people turn that into
well he must have done this because why would he say that well cuz you're asking
him to speculate those are pretty common questions that are that are that are in
these interviews again I believe to me it's the nuances that are missed because you
didn't bother to you didn't transcribed the interview you didn't record the interview then now 48 hours
later where the officer says to Jeff well what was she going to the doctor for well she had Mono could she have
been pregnant Jeff says I don't know and then later the report says Jeff said she
might have gone to the doctor because she was pregnant those are two completely different things using about
the same words right it's it's way too messy I think to look at this and go well
Jeff's statements are very incriminating no the practice in which that you obtained that information seems to be
extremely [Music] flawed if you have thoughts on this case go to True Crim garage.com check out our
blog we're interested in hearing your thoughts and until tomorrow be good be kind and don't
[Music] litter you can live out your Master Chef dreams when you find a professional on Angie to
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Veronica Blumhorst /// Part 1 /// 425

Part 1 of 2

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This week we feature the case of a strange disappearance of a young woman back from 1990 in Mendota, Illinois. As of this week it will be 30 years since anyone has seen Veronica Blumhorst. For years Veronica’s little brother Todd kept the investigation organized and ongoing. Recently new information has come out that we could possibly be dealing with a cover up. Beer of the Week - True Believer by Twin Elephant Brewing Garage Grade - 4 and a quarter bottle caps

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Brief Summary

Veronica Bloom Hurst vanished in 1990; her boyfriend Jeff Vera becomes a key suspect amid suspicious behavior and police investigation.

Key points

Community Response to Disappearance. The search for Veronica Bloom Hurst mobilizes the entire community, including police and volunteers.
A Missing Woman's Mystery. Veronica Jill Bloom Hurst disappears after a late shift, leaving her family and police puzzled.
Veronica's Disappearance. Veronica's sudden disappearance raises concerns among her family and friends, leading to police involvement.
Jeff's Emotional Plea. Jeff records a heartfelt message for Veronica, expressing his love and concern for her safety.
Jeff's Temper and Control. Concerns arise about Jeff's possessive behavior towards Veronica, raising red flags.
Unsettling Statements. Jeff's comments about murder and Veronica's disappearance leave others uneasy.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

She had magic shoes!

Veronica's childhood challenges

6:47WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

60/ 100Some tension

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