Death in the Dorms Season 2: Episode 6: Latasha Norman - 20/20

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[00:01]
Deborah Roberts
This episode is brought to you by Companion. Iris and Josh seem like the perfect match, but when a weekend getaway turns.
[00:09]
Investigator
Into a nightmare, Iris realizes that things.
[00:12]
Deborah Roberts
Aren'T as perfect as they appear.
[00:14]
Investigator
From the creators of Barbarian and the.
[00:17]
Deborah Roberts
Studio that brought you the Notebook comes a twisted tale of modern romance and the sweet satisfaction of revenge. Companion only in theaters January 31st.
[00:27]
Investigator
Rated R. Under 17.
[00:29]
Deborah Roberts
Not admitted without parenting. Hi 2020 listeners. This week we're bringing you the sixth and final installment of Death in the Dorms, season two. Today we'll hear the story of Latasha Norman, a promising young accounting student from Jackson State University who mysteriously disappeared after class one afternoon. Let's take a listen.
[00:58]
Family Member 1
Latasha her dream was to go to Jackson State.
[01:03]
Family Member 2
To be able to go to HBCU. It's empowering.
[01:09]
Investigator
20 year old Latasha Norman was last seen leaving a class at Jackson State University.
[01:15]
Family Member 3
Sometimes I feel like if I had answered my phone, I possibly could have prevented something.
[01:24]
Family Member 1
He just disappeared.
[01:26]
Family Member 2
You supposed to feel safe when you're off to college and for that to happen, you know, everyone was in fear.
[01:33]
Family Member 1
Because it had happened on a black college campus. It draw even more attention. That's the first time we knew that an incident had happened.
[01:43]
Family Member 2
Murder.
[01:44]
Family Member 1
It was murder. It looks so lifelike.
[02:10]
Family Member 3
All the memories, just.
[02:19]
Family Member 1
All these are her trophies.
[02:21]
Family Member 3
And this right here is when she.
[02:23]
Family Member 2
Was 10 years old.
[02:24]
Family Member 3
She was a girl scout and I kept it.
[02:31]
Family Member 1
You don't want to know the person I call myself. You don't want to know what Pandora.
[02:42]
Family Member 3
Left inside the shed.
[03:10]
Family Member 1
Natasha Norman is my stuff stepdaughter, but I consider her as my daughter because I raised her from a child.
[03:19]
Family Member 2
She was the only daughter I had.
[03:22]
Family Member 3
And I was very proud of her. Everything she have, she always have that smile on her face. You never seen her angry. That's the type of person Latasha Norman was. Latasha was born April 21, 1987 here in Greenville, Mississippi. We have a huge family, a very close knit family. I am 10 years older than her, so she was more like my little sister.
[03:59]
Family Member 2
When we were younger. She started out wanting to be a teacher because we played teachers a lot. But as Tasha got older, she switched to accounting. And I think that had a lot to do with following behind Keisha's footsteps.
[04:18]
Family Member 3
I taught her, whatever you do, don't never give up.
[04:22]
Family Member 2
Do your best in everything you do.
[04:24]
Family Member 3
Because you can always go up higher. And as she grew up, she did.
[04:31]
Family Member 2
She did her best.
[04:32]
Family Member 3
She didn't sell it for less.
[04:41]
Family Member 2
In high school. At first she was kind of shy.
[04:45]
Family Member 3
Latasha always followed in my footsteps. I played the flute. Tasha played the flute. I was a majorette. Tasha was a majorette. I was on dance line. Tasha was on dance line.
[05:00]
Family Member 2
After she became a major, she really came out of her ship.
[05:05]
Family Member 3
She was that beacon of light that when she smiled, you smiled. She had that caring heart. There was nothing you couldn't ask Latasha to do for you that she wouldn't do.
[05:24]
Family Member 1
Latasha. Her dream was to go to Jackson State, and their name was known as Jackson State, the Norwegians.
[05:34]
Family Member 2
My father played football at Jackson State. My uncles played football at Jackson State. One of my uncles even went pro playing professional football. I knew that she wouldn't break the family tradition.
[05:47]
Family Member 1
I would tease her. I would call her Ms. Jackson State. She had no problem being admitted there.
[05:57]
Family Member 2
Jackson State is an hbcu, which is a historically black college or university founded in 1877. So very long time ago, about 150 years.
[06:13]
Investigator
They say the world's art came from Europe, right? Well, if that is true, they ain't do it right. Watch class, get busy on this classical. Just put me in the boot.
[06:23]
Family Member 3
That turn matter magical.
[06:25]
Family Member 2
I'm Olivia Welch. I was the managing editor for the Blue and White Flash, the student led publication for the university. It's very humbling to be able to go to hbcu considering that many, many years ago, the people who fought for us to have an HBCU weren't allowed to go to college. This being something that was made for us, it's exciting, it's empowering. I think that's one of the reasons that a lot of students come here, generation after generation.
[07:08]
Deborah Roberts
A big part of J setting is stepping part of the culture here at jsu.
[07:13]
Family Member 1
Spinning around, going up and down for them, honey. Working hard, going extra hard for that money.
[07:19]
Family Member 2
Jackson State, it's a place where you can feel home. You're like family there. We call each other the Tiger family and we're alumni. We're just proud of our dear old college home. A lot of prominent people in the community went to Jackson State and graduated.
[07:46]
Family Member 1
Jackson is approximately an hour and a half from Greenville.
[07:52]
Investigator 2
Greenville, Mississippi is in what's called the Mississippi Delta. And it's a very impoverished region of the country. It may be the most impoverished region of the country. There's not a lot of economic opportunities there. A lot of people from the Delta come to Jackson to build their careers because you have to get out of the Delta to really rise up and do something.
[08:14]
Family Member 1
On orientation day after we had moved her in. I know she was ready for us to go, but my wife wasn't ready to go. She wanted to mop. She wanted to wipe everything down. She wanted to make the bed. There was her excuse to linger around. You know, my wife had had a child before she graduated from high school. She had to work. Latasha was living her dream, and it was almost like my wife living her dream through Latasha. Latasha was getting the opportunity to do a lot of things that my wife never had opportunity to do. So we encouraged Tasha to excel.
[09:14]
Family Member 3
In her senior year in high school, she dated a guy older than Latasha. Stanley was finished with high school, and he wasn't, you know, in college or anything.
[09:28]
Family Member 1
He brought a life sized teddy bear and gave it to her, and I think he stole her heart that way.
[09:38]
Family Member 3
When Latasha decided to go to Jackson's, she encouraged Stanley to go.
[09:47]
Family Member 1
I think she wanted to make something out of him, and so she helped him get into school down there, and she was taking up accounting and he was taking up criminal justice.
[09:59]
Family Member 2
I think Tasha just really pushed him to, like his full potential in a lot of areas, including family, including school, just different things in his life.
[10:11]
Family Member 3
Don't misconstrue a skirt for a fur.
[10:13]
Family Member 2
Cause I still hit him with her.
[10:15]
Family Member 3
Dressed like a nurse, all white. I almost died twice. Latasha was extremely excited to be in college. She was excited to be on Jackson State campus. She was enjoying the campus life. She didn't go out much, as far as she would tell me. You know.
[10:37]
Family Member 2
Latasha had plans for her and Keisha to open up an accounting firm back home once she finished college. She kept her grades up.
[10:48]
Family Member 3
She kept on being on the dean list at Jackson State University. She kept on working. She kept on, you know, doing her.
[11:00]
Family Member 1
She was thriving like a peacock.
[11:11]
Family Member 3
In the fall of 2007, her and Stanley had went their separate ways. Stanley had moved on, and he was dating someone else. Latasha started dating another guy. His name was Marquise. They seemed to be getting pretty well. He looked out for her. There was times when she was having problems with her car, and he was there.
[11:43]
Family Member 2
At this point in life, I would say that she was happy.
[11:49]
Family Member 1
She wanted us to meet Marquise. And so he brought her home to watch her baby brother play in the ball game. 10th November. He seemed to be all right. But they went back that night, and that was the last time we saw her alive.
[12:19]
Family Member 3
The day after we had gotten a chance to meet Marquise, Latasha called me. I can tell by the tone of her voice that something wasn't right. But when she called I was busy at the time and so I told her I would give her a call back once I leave my meeting. I called her the next day and I didn't get an answer.
[13:01]
Family Member 1
Every night my wife would talk Latasha back to her dorm. This particular night she couldn't get Latasha. When we woke up November 14, 2007, the phone rang. It was her new boyfriend on the phone because my wife had called him, asked him had he seen Tasha and he said he hadn't seen her since the night before and she hand me the phone and I talked to him and he told me that her car was on campus and she was missing. He didn't know where she was. Immediately I told my wife, get dressed, let's go. Something ain't right.
[14:08]
Investigator 2
On 13 November 2007, 20 year old.
[14:11]
Deborah Roberts
Latasha Norman was last seen.
[14:13]
Investigator
Latasha Norman was a junior business major.
[14:15]
Investigator 2
At Jackson State University, but campus and.
[14:18]
Deborah Roberts
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[15:25]
Family Member 2
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[15:27]
Family Member 3
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[15:32]
Deborah Roberts
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[15:35]
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[15:39]
Deborah Roberts
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[15:44]
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[15:53]
Family Member 3
From the outside in. My mom called and she was like, have you talked to Tasha? She told me that my aunt and uncle were headed to Jackson because Latasha hadn't reported to class and they were worried. At that point, my heart dropped because I knew, you know, something was going on with her because of the tone of her voice. A couple of days before that.
[16:46]
Family Member 2
I get to Grandma's house and Kisha was saying, tasha's missing.
[16:53]
Investigator
Take me back to November 2007, tell me what happened.
[17:06]
Family Member 3
You can skip that. I won't talk about it.
[17:16]
Family Member 1
By the time we got to Yazoo, Mississippi, I get another call from Marques and he says that he's with the campus police and he's filed a missing person report. They did search the school at that time, the dorms and stuff. When we got there, nobody knew, nobody seen anything. She just disappeared.
[18:00]
Investigator 2
Auto burglaries, house burglaries, armed robberies, and several murders are in that neighborhood. Jackson State is a pretty accessible campus. You can drive in and out of the, out of the campus pretty easily.
[18:12]
Investigator
Latasha's vehicle was still on campus, and so we knew that she didn't leave in her vehicle. They didn't have a whole lot of evidence as to the whereabouts of where Latasha was. Some campus police departments have very limited resources, and the Jackson State Police chief decided to reach out to the Jackson Police Department for assistance. Investigators with the Jackson Police Department spoke to Latasha's boyfriend. They spoke to her roommate. A month or so prior to her coming up missing. Latasha's tires had been slashed on campus.
[18:52]
Family Member 1
I told her to go to the campus police and report and have it documented.
[19:00]
Investigator
The timing was awfully strange because particular crimes such as tire slashing, breaking out windows, those are usually more intimate type crimes. It's somebody that, you know, usually if it's a stranger, they may break into your car and try to take something, but most of the time they're not gonna slash your tires or break your windows out or anything like that.
[19:29]
Family Member 1
We had been there all that day on the 14th, and we hadn't got no answers.
[19:37]
Investigator
20 year old Latasha Norman was last seen leaving a class at Jackson State University.
[19:42]
Family Member 2
I thought I was in a nightmare because you see things like this on TV all the time, but never in a million years would I have thought that, hey, this is actually happening to someone in my family, like, missing. The next day, the cousins and the rest of the family decided, hey, we're gonna Go to Jackson on our own, and we're gonna look for Tasha. We started formulating search teams. We put up flyers, we walked door to door, mainly in the area of where Jackson State was.
[20:35]
Investigator 2
It was a big, big ordeal in the city of Jackson to find her. And everybody locally knew about the case.
[20:46]
Family Member 1
When I first appeared for help on the Jackson State campus, they set up where I could speak. The sheriff there did, and it was media there from everywhere. If you can hear us, we want to let you know that we love you and that we're not going to stop until we know something. Because it had happened on a black college campus. So it drew even more attention. But I'm not shy. To Mike. Even before that happened, I had took a media class. It was almost like God had prepared me for this. I went on every talk show, radio show, TV show, news show, anybody that would listen to me. Tasha had a class at 1:00, and she got out of class at 2:20, and she just disappeared in thin air. She never made it back to her dorm. She never made it to a car. I was willing to be a man and stand up and fight for them, protect them. That's my job. I raised Latasha, and I told them when I first came here that I was not gonna leave Jackson until I found my child. I missed Tasha. My wife missed Tasha. And we hope to hear something from her real soon. We hadn't gotten no answers. The police, well, they really weren't accomplishing much.
[22:23]
Investigator
Investigators decided to reach out to the FBI.
[22:28]
Family Member 2
The FBI is joining the search for a missing Mississippi college student.
[22:32]
Investigator
Latasha Norman disappeared last Tuesday. I was the case agent for the Latasha Norman case. When I first got assigned the case, the Jackson State Police Department and Jackson PD gave me the rundown of what they had already attained and just where they were at that particular point, which was basically, they didn't have a whole lot of evidence as to the whereabouts of where Latasha was. So we have to go back over the case because we may have missed something. We decided to pull Natasha Norman's cell phone information. The initial cell phone data that I got from her phone showed that it was at Marquis's location, where he lived, and then it was traveling towards the direction of Jackson State University. And somewhere within that time frame, all activity ceased. She could have cut the phone off. It could have died, could have been on purpose. But as far as I'm concerned, the college student her age would not leave her phone dead for over 30 minutes, you know, so let alone three days in, looking at Latasha's life, there was nothing that would lead us to believe she would end up walking away from everything.
[24:06]
Family Member 1
They interviewed me, the investigators, and they wanted to know who we thought might have had some involvement in it. I told him, check out her new boyfriend. After she became missing, I became very suspicious of him. I didn't trust him. He jumped a gun and filed a missing person report before we can even get to town. I had told him I was on the way, and I was like, why you didn't give us the opportunity to get there and do this? It seemed like he was hiding something. He seemed like he was nervous.
[24:48]
Investigator
When.
[24:48]
Family Member 1
He brought her home. My baby son had a game that night, and so she come home to watch her baby brother play in the ball game. Then he introduced her to her new boyfriend, and it was a little disagreement between him and Latasha's cousin. After the game, he wanted to go back, so I thought maybe him and her got an argan or something on the way back home, and he might have tried to retaliate against her or whatever.
[25:23]
Family Member 3
We didn't know much about him. Of course. Our minds wondered, had he done something to her?
[25:42]
Family Member 2
When Tasha went missing, it was a very dark spot for everyone. I had a few friends and classmates who attended Jackson State during that time. You're supposed to feel safe when you're off to college, and for that to happen, you know, everyone was in fear. I can recall one of my friends. Friends calling and texting me every day. She would always say, like, Nikki, this can't be real. We're all on this college campus. That could have been one of us.
[26:40]
Investigator
We decided to interview Latasha's current boyfriend, Marquis Smith. Because usually when you're dealing with a missing person, oftentimes it's that person in an intimate relationship with that individual that has something to do with the whereabouts of that individual. Marquise was a little older. He had a job. He had a car. He had his own place. We also wanted to check his cell phone, ping information. Back then, it was fairly new. Most people didn't know that we could use that to help corroborate certain stories they told us. Time, dates, and things of that nature that he gave us. They seemed to match up just fine. He mentioned that the night prior to her missing, Latasha spent the night at his house, and he probably was one of the last people to see her.
[27:40]
Family Member 1
Marquise was telling me that the FBI was questioning him, and I told him I knew, and me and him had some Choice words. And I told him if I found out that he had something to do with it, it wasn't gonna be nothing nice. Our relationship really kind of ended.
[28:03]
Investigator
Stanley's cold came across my radar from Marquis Smith.
[28:09]
Family Member 2
So the first two and a half years of Tasha being at Jackson State, she dated Stanley. They dated on and off.
[28:18]
Investigator 2
By the time Latasha Norman went missing, Stanley and her were not dating. At that time, Latasha was dating Marquis Smith.
[28:25]
Investigator
We went to Jackson State, we checked out his records, and we found out that he withdrew from school a week or two before us checking into him, which I thought was strange. Talking to Latasha's friends, we learned that Latasha's friend kind of suspected him of slashing her tires. We also found out that they're in a relationship. He got in physical at times.
[28:55]
Investigator 2
They started learning evidence about the incident that happened in Pearl, Mississippi, which is just a suburb of Jackson, on October 9, which is about a month before Latasha went missing. She takes Stanley Cole to get his paycheck. Latasha sometimes helps Stanley out with stuff, like giving him a ride. She was on the phone with Marquis Smith, who was her boyfriend at the time. Stanley got mad and lunged at her and actually broke her phone.
[29:28]
Investigator
She also reported that to the campus police as well.
[29:53]
Family Member 1
That's the first time we knew that an incident had happened, that she had filed this report against Mr. Cole. So she never did tell us. I mean, I cried. I was hurt. I couldn't believe.
[30:15]
Family Member 3
When Latasha was, you know, dating Stanley, she told me that he had slapped her. I had went through domestic violence. So I told Latasha, I said, because what happened with me, I'm just gonna let you know, if he did it once, he would do it again. It's time for you to let him go. You know, you move on. Let him move on. And I just kept it between us. After she went missing, that was the first time that my family knew that he had placed his hands on her before, because I had never said anything to anyone about the first incident.
[31:01]
Investigator 2
The women that are the victims of these crimes generally do not like to tell anybody because they're embarrassed about it.
[31:07]
Family Member 1
At that time, we thought she had broke the relationship off with him because she had found out that he had another young lady pregnant.
[31:22]
Family Member 3
I was shocked that Stanley had put his hands on Latasha again. I just couldn't believe that Latasha didn't come to me and tell me, but I kind of understood at the same time the reason why she didn't tell me. After they had called it quits, I told Stanley if I find out that he put his hands on her again, he was gonna see me. And Jackson, he promised that he wouldn't bother her, he would cut all ties in communications. He was out of her life to our knowledge. I just hate that I reacted the way I did, that I made Latasha afraid to come to me the next time. But I was proud of her. At the same time, I was proud of Latasha that she did step up and take other actions. When Stanley placed his hands on her again.
[32:24]
Investigator
We learned that this was not a normal ex boyfriend, ex girlfriend relationship. They are having some physical altercations that are occurring and that could lead to deadly altercations.
[32:42]
Deborah Roberts
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[33:50]
Family Member 1
We had hope. We had faith. We had belief. We was determined to stay in Jackson until we find her.
[34:04]
Family Member 2
As time started to dwindle down and we continued to hear bits and pieces that Latasha had been physically abused by Stanley, you go from being hopeful to like, well, it's not looking good.
[34:23]
Family Member 3
Latasha was last seen leaving class last.
[34:26]
Deborah Roberts
Tuesday afternoon around 2:00.
[34:42]
Family Member 2
My aunt took it really hard to see her, like, not being able to eat and not being able to sleep. It was heartbreaking. When one family member hurts, all of us hurt.
[35:09]
Investigator
It was Thanksgiving. We received a call from a car dealer.
[35:17]
Investigator 2
Car salesman in Jackson calls the police and says that this car, this 1998 Dodge Neon, is really suspicious. The carpet in the trunk was cut out, which is not something normally somebody does when you trade in a car. The fact that a car salesman would call the police about something being strange in a car was pretty odd.
[35:40]
Investigator
We checked the tag in the van and found that it belonged to a young lady that we found to be Stanley Cole's girlfriend, Simone. We found out that Simone was pregnant and Stanley was the father and that they lived in an apartment building in North Jackson. If you were to do a mental checklist, you have a young lady missing. She was possibly in a volatile relationship with her ex boyfriend, who just dropped out of the same school that she was going to, and his current girlfriend was selling her car. The timing was awfully strange. Some things that we can't act on as far as getting arrest warrants, but we will definitely able to get search warrants for the vehicle. The FBI Evidence Recovery Unit discovered quite a bit of blood splatter in the trunk.
[36:43]
Family Member 2
Just the thought of them finding blood in the trunk of the car, my heart dropped. It was like I was reliving that nightmare. From the very first day she went missing on November 14th of 2007.
[37:01]
Investigator
They.
[37:01]
Investigator 2
Positively identified the blood in the trunk of the car to the DNA of Latasha Norman. So they realized that she was in the trunk of that car. Jackson Police Department, as well as the FBI in Jackson State, decided to subpoena Stanley Cole's cell phone records. After the investigators recovered Stanley's cell phone records and realized that he was at Jackson State that day, and they found him at a wooded area off of Brown Street. They decided to go up to Greenville, see if they could speak to Simone Harris.
[37:52]
Investigator
Simone came, and to my surprise, Stanley came. I kind of ignored Stanley. Acted like I didn't really know who he was. Shook his hand, and I took Simone back. We asked her about the phone records. She was very forthwith. She told us that this is one particular time that Stanley was supposed. Supposed to go out and empty the trash. He did, but he took 40 minutes to do it. The interview lasted 20, 30 minutes. And we decided that we wanted to talk to Stanley next. His demeanor was very, very nonchalant. A little too nonchalant. He kind of slid back in his chair and Put his arm back up on the chair, and he said, all the girls from Jackson love all the guys from Greenville. And it was the way he said it, it was almost adversarial. Right. And you would think that if I'm trying to find out where your ex girlfriend is, that you wouldn't be my adversary. Basically, the test question for me is, what do you think should happen to the person that did something to Latasha? And Stanley answered, I don't really know. Most people minimize their punishment. So I knew then he had done something. We knew that Stanley most likely knew where Latasha was. I have daughters, and I wouldn't want my daughter to be laid in some field or somewhere, you know, whether dead or alive, by themselves. So I kind of. I told Stanley that we need to find Latasha. Can you help us find Latasha? He hesitated. His eyes started watering, and he just kind of stared out for a little while. He's. He shook his head, and he said, if I tell you where she is, will you let me see my mom? Stanley's mother was in the lobby. He said, let me see her before I tell you where Latasha is. My partner said, okay. She went in the room and spoke about two minutes. She opened the door and she said, is my son under arrest? And I said, no, ma'am. She said, well, we'll be leaving. The fact that Stanley's mother, rather than her helping, assisting, she started looking out for her son, that stung. It became more personal. At that point, we set out to go ahead and get an arrest warrant for Mr. Stanley Cole.
[41:00]
Investigator 2
Stanley Cole was arrested on November 29th of 2007.
[41:16]
Family Member 2
Throughout that time that Tasha was missing, Stanley was looking or acting as if he was looking for her. People thought that he was genuinely concerned. I know I did.
[41:31]
Investigator
There's media everywhere. They're all outside police headquarters. There's detectives and the chief in this interview room looking through the two way glass. It is literally a show now. As soon as I opened the door, I started in on Stanley. Just technique playing chess. If you do not.
[41:54]
Investigator 2
You try to act like a cop.
[41:56]
Investigator
No. Am I going to shoot you like a trap? You understand? I was going to make him angry at me. So angry that he would just forget to lawyer up, so to speak. It wasn't hard to get angry. I said a few curse words, and through my notepad. He was upset. I was upset. I stormed out. He had liked one of the female investigators that had interviewed him before. I had from Jackson Police Department. I ran upstairs and got the Investigator. I said, hey, you're on. I want him to maybe find solace in this young lady, and maybe she would be the one to get him to tell her where Latasha was. I wasn't sure if that would work. It was a gamble. She started out far away. She moved in close. He starts to tell us they got an argument in Simone's car. We just got the odds of fighting over stuff that we've been through in.
[42:55]
Family Member 3
The last couple of years, and so.
[42:57]
Investigator
Stuff we was going through now. And he was sitting in the driver's seat, and he struck her with a back fist to her nose area. When I realized I hit her too hard. She wasn't breathing, just panicked and just quit in the trunk and just rolled around trying to figure out what I was going to do. At this point.
[43:25]
Investigator 2
He went and met up with a friend of his and his girlfriend, and then they picked up Simone Harris, and they ended up eating at Garfield's restaurant in Jackson. And all the while, during this time, where they're going back and forth between people's houses, where they're picking friends up from classes and they're eating dinner, Latasha Norman is in the trunk. Trunk of that Dodge Neon.
[43:58]
Investigator
For him to drive around with her in that trunk. That stood out for me. It stood out. He starts to tell us where she is.
[44:10]
Family Member 1
Just combed her up and just dropped.
[44:11]
Family Member 3
Off and just ran and never said nothing to anybody.
[44:19]
Investigator
How he's explaining it, he's got to show us. So we decided to take him to the scene. We had this long caravan of police cars and news cars behind us. Stanley led us to the area. Within 10 minutes, we were able to recover Latasha Norman's body. She was partially closed. The upper torso of her body, including her face, was covered with a piece of cardboard. Unfortunately, her body had been pretty badly decomposed. In order to identify Latasha, we needed to have her dental records checked.
[45:33]
Investigator 2
And.
[45:34]
Investigator
They were able to give us a positive match.
[45:49]
Family Member 1
All we could do then was just come home, because with nothing else in Jackson that we could do.
[46:00]
Family Member 2
I would have never in a million years thought that Stanley would take her life. Like that was the last thought on my mind.
[46:11]
Family Member 3
If. I'm sorry. Sometimes I feel like if I had answered my phone to see what was going on with Tasha, I possibly could have prevented something or just said something to her to avoid what Stanley had done. I just hate that I reacted the way I did the first time that I had learned that he hit her. I felt like she didn't Want to put me in any danger.
[47:04]
Family Member 1
I hate to this day that she got tangled up with this young man. My wife was so broken. I was just barely, just disappointed. And to be honest with you, I wasn't pleasant. It didn't take much to make me go off. And that wasn't nice. I thought that was ugly. I had to ask God to take this bitterness, anger from me.
[48:01]
Investigator 2
Because Stanley never told us how he killed her. I mean, his explanation was that he hit her.
[48:07]
Investigator
I hit her too hard and knocked.
[48:09]
Family Member 1
Out after a couple of hours.
[48:11]
Investigator
I checked on her. It was no cost.
[48:14]
Investigator 2
And if you see Stanley Cole, he's 140 pound man. I don't know that his blow would have caused death to Ms. Norman. It just didn't seem likely to any of us.
[48:26]
Investigator
Not to mention that if she was bleeding so much out of her nose as he said, we should have found some blood in the front seat. Once Natasha Norman's body's at the medical examiner, we discover a slight jagged nick to the inside of her rib cage. The portion of that rib was missing due to the jaggedness of it. It looked like it could have been a metal device or even a knife. But unfortunately, we weren't able to tell if she received any damage internally from her organs because she was so badly decomposed. So we did send that bone to a forensics expert as well, and they were able to tell us that it appeared to be possibly a stab wound. The body of a missing college student from Mississippi has been found, and her ex boyfriend is charged with murder.
[49:37]
Family Member 1
Mr. Cole was still trying to say it was an accident.
[49:41]
Investigator
I kind of felt, you know, he was a bit strange or whatever, but I didn't actually expect anything like that to happen. So you hear about things like that everywhere else, but no one ever actually expects, you know, trouble to be at their door. Failed.
[50:08]
Investigator 2
We had a community that was really aching from this crime because it happened at Jackson State, which is just a beloved university in the city, and then her family. And if you meet her dad or stepfather, Danny Bolden, you can see how much this man loved his daughter. And they were there every day rooting us on that made us really, really want to go in there and win this case.
[50:33]
Investigator
Did you know that defendant Cole had been violent towards Latasha?
[50:39]
Family Member 1
No, because I warned Mr. Cole from the beginning that I was the type of gentleman, that I did not tolerate that type of stuff. Natasha, she never exposed that to us. She kept it here. I think she was ashamed of it.
[50:59]
Family Member 2
It was hard to keep your composure. So There were times that, you know, I had to step out.
[51:05]
Investigator
And then even listening to his attorney, right. Try to clear him of that. It's really surreal.
[51:16]
Deborah Roberts
Putting her in the trunk doesn't make it murder. The evidence only shows this is manslaughter.
[51:40]
Investigator
We the jury find the defendant guilty of murder. You have caused her parents, other family members and friends enormous grief. As punishment for this murder, you're hereby automatically sentenced to life in prison.
[52:01]
Family Member 1
That's the only time I seen him show emotion. Then them big crocodile tears come down. He apologized to us, but the damage had been done.
[52:18]
Family Member 2
Stanley would be held accountable for it. It was just a sense of relief.
[52:32]
Investigator 2
In 2012, the Court of appeals overturned the case.
[52:37]
Investigator
It was a one punch homicide. Cole's attorney claims extensive media attention prevented him from receiving a fair trial.
[52:47]
Deborah Roberts
Now he suggests a lesser charge to be considered.
[52:51]
Family Member 1
Well, we went before the state supreme court. God has granted us this victory two years ago. And we have faith and we believe that he won't reverse it. And they ruled in his favor, saying that it was a mistrial because the judge had put consideration for manslaughter on the table for the jury to choose from. It was not manslaughter.
[53:17]
Family Member 2
Murder.
[53:18]
Family Member 1
There was murder.
[53:26]
Deborah Roberts
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[54:35]
Family Member 1
Stanley Cole is offered a retrial. So me and my wife had to go back to Jackson and meet the D.A. we just wanted justice, but we didn't want to go back through the trial. She didn't want to go back through it, and I didn't either. And on the way down there, we had this conversation. We gonna offer him a 40 year plea. No parole, no provision. And he accepted it. Cause it was better than the deal he had at first. And I realized I had to forgive him. I had to release him in order to release myself.
[55:23]
Family Member 3
You forgive and you move on. You don't forget it, but you move on. So a day passed that I don't think about Tasha. But I know God through him, he give me grace.
[55:42]
Family Member 1
It ain't all been bad. A lot of good has come out of this man. But you gotta take the bitter with the sweet.
[55:52]
Family Member 3
I wouldn't want another parent have to live and go through what we went through. Nobody.
[56:02]
Family Member 1
God, want to use Latasha Light to shine the light on teen domestic violence. Domestic violence is nothing new. See, for so long, this is like a taboo in our community. People don't like to talk about it, but we have to talk about it.
[56:24]
Family Member 3
Don't stay silent. Just speak out and tell someone, because it is help out there at Jackson State honor our daughter, Natasha Norman. They have this domestic violence center in.
[56:39]
Family Member 2
Honor of her.
[56:42]
Family Member 3
For Jackson State University to step up and name the Latasha Norman Counseling Center. That was amazing policing.
[56:55]
Family Member 2
Her picture's on the wall there, and her story is written there too. So students actually get a chance to learn who she was, why she's so important, and why domestic violence is not okay, and it never will be okay. It lets people know the signs to look for, and giving them the proper materials and tools to actually have someone to talk to that is professional.
[57:28]
Family Member 1
Well, after her death, they wanted to do a walk in her name, and we've done it for the last 15 years. All the proceeds goes back into the Latasha Norman Center.
[57:43]
Family Member 2
It keeps her name alive on campus.
[57:53]
Family Member 3
I talk to my kids about her, my daughter. I tell her, you have an open line of community. There's nothing you can't come to me or be afraid to say to me.
[58:09]
Family Member 2
After losing her, I went back to school to get my master's in counseling just to bring, like, awareness and be that safe person for people to talk to. She just inspired me to want to be that voice and help others so we can save some people.
[58:40]
Family Member 1
Life has a great impact. Her legacy live on, man. She was an angel of God. She's one of his angels.
[59:01]
Deborah Roberts
This is Deborah Roberts that does it for season two of Death in the Dorms. Death in the Dorms was produced by ABC News Studios with the Intellectual Property Corporation and yes, like a River for Hulu Originals. You can find the whole series streaming on Hulu. Next week, we begin season four of Wild Crime. 11 Skulls follows the FBI's investigation of Israel Keyes, an elusive survivalist and serial killer whose hunting ground ranged from Alaska to Vermont. And be sure to tune in to ABC Friday nights at 9 for all new broadcast episodes of 2020. As always, thanks for listening. If you love your phone but not your carrier, just switch to T Mobile. You can keep your phone, keep your number and we'll help pay it off up to $800 per line. You can also use our savings calculator to compare our plans and streaming benefits against Verizon and AT&T. So switch and keep your phone, keep your number and keep more of your moolah@t mobile.com up to 4 lines via virtual prepaid card. Allow 15 days qualifying unlock device, credit service port in 90 plus days with device and eligible carrier and timely redemption required. Card has no cash access and expires in six months.

Summary5 min read

Podcast Summary: "Death in the Dorms Season 2: Episode 6: Latasha Norman"

Introduction

In the sixth and final episode of Season 2 of ABC News' "20/20," titled "Death in the Dorms: Latasha Norman," listeners are presented with the harrowing true story of Latasha Norman, a promising accounting student from Jackson State University (JSU) who mysteriously disappeared after class one afternoon. This comprehensive episode delves into Latasha's life, her relationships, the subsequent investigation into her disappearance, and the impact her tragic fate had on her family and community.

Latasha Norman: Early Life and Education

Latasha Norman was born on April 21, 1987, in Greenville, Mississippi. Described by her family as a beacon of light with an unwavering smile, Latasha was deeply admired for her caring nature and academic excellence. Her father, Danny Bolden, referred to her as his daughter despite being her stepfather, highlighting the close-knit family dynamic.

Family Member 1 [03:09]: "Natasha Norman is my stepdaughter, but I consider her as my daughter because I raised her from a child."

Latasha's academic journey was marked by determination and resilience. Initially aspiring to be a teacher, she later shifted her focus to accounting, inspired by her friend Keisha's footsteps. Her commitment to education was evident as she consistently appeared on the dean's list at JSU.

Relationships and Personal Life

Latasha's personal life played a significant role in the unfolding of her tragic story. During her senior year in high school, she dated Stanley Cole, an older individual who later became an ex-boyfriend. Their relationship was tumultuous, involving instances of domestic violence.

Family Member 3 [30:15]: "When Latasha was dating Stanley, she told me that he had slapped her. I had gone through domestic violence. So I told Latasha, I said, because what happened with me, I'm just gonna let you know, if he did it once, he would do it again."

After parting ways with Stanley, Latasha began dating Marquise Smith, who appeared supportive and attentive. Friends and family noted that at this stage, Latasha seemed genuinely happy and focused on her future plans, including opening an accounting firm with her friend Keisha post-graduation.

The Disappearance

On November 14, 2007, Latasha Norman vanished from the JSU campus. She was last seen leaving a class around 2:00 PM, never returning to her dorm or making it to her car. The day after, her family received a distressing call from her new boyfriend, Marquise, indicating that her car was still on campus, and she was missing.

Family Member 1 [14:07]: "I get to Grandma's house and Kisha was saying, Tasha's missing."

Despite immediate and extensive search efforts by her family and JSU authorities, Latasha's whereabouts remained unknown for several days, heightening fears and suspicions.

Investigation and FBI Involvement

As local police investigations yielded minimal evidence, the FBI stepped in to assist. Initial clues were sparse, with Latasha's car found intact on campus, indicating she had not left in it. However, a breakthrough occurred when a suspicious car was reported by an AT&T Mobile car dealer investigating a 1998 Dodge Neon with blood evidence in the trunk.

Investigator [35:08]: "We checked the tag in the van and found that it belonged to a young lady that we found to be Stanley Cole's girlfriend, Simone."

Scientific analysis confirmed that the blood in the trunk matched Latasha's DNA, leading investigators to focus on Stanley Cole, her ex-boyfriend. Further interrogation revealed inconsistencies in Stanley's accounts of the events leading to Latasha's disappearance.

Arrest of Stanley Cole

Stanley Cole was formally arrested on November 29, 2007. During his interrogation, his demeanor raised red flags among investigators. His evasive responses and the discovery of his involvement in Latasha's domestic abuse history painted a grim picture.

Investigator [41:16]: "Stanley Cole was arrested on November 29th of 2007."

Under intense scrutiny, Stanley eventually confessed to a violent altercation that culminated in Latasha being confined in the trunk of his car, where she tragically lost her life.

Trial and Verdict

The trial culminated in Stanley Cole being found guilty of murder. The court recognized the severity of his actions, sentencing him to life imprisonment.

Family Member 1 [52:18]: "Stanley would be held accountable for it. It was just a sense of relief."

However, in 2012, the Court of Appeals overturned the conviction, citing concerns over extensive media coverage potentially influencing the jury's impartiality.

Appeal and Retrial

Post the appellate decision, Stanley Cole was offered a retrial. Seeking closure without enduring the emotional toll of another trial, Latasha's family negotiated a plea deal. Stanley accepted a 40-year sentence without the possibility of parole, bringing a semblance of peace to the grieving family.

Family Member 1 [54:34]: "We gonna offer him a 40 year plea. No parole, no provision. And he accepted it."

Aftermath and Legacy

Latasha Norman's untimely death left an indelible mark on her family and the JSU community. In honor of her memory and to address the issues of domestic violence, JSU established the Latasha Norman Counseling Center. The center serves as a beacon of support, offering resources and counseling to those affected by domestic abuse.

Family Member 3 [56:38]: "After her death, they wanted to do a walk in her name, and we've done it for the last 15 years. All the proceeds goes back into the Latasha Norman Center."

Annual walks and memorials keep her legacy alive, ensuring that her story continues to inspire and educate others about the perils of domestic violence and the importance of speaking out.

Family Member 1 [56:01]: "God, want to use Latasha's light to shine the light on teen domestic violence. Domestic violence is nothing new. See, for so long, this is like a taboo in our community. People don't like to talk about it, but we have to talk about it."

Conclusion

"Death in the Dorms: Latasha Norman" is a poignant exploration of a young woman's life cut short by domestic violence and the ensuing quest for justice. Through heartfelt testimonies and thorough investigative reporting, the episode not only chronicles Latasha's tragic demise but also highlights the broader issues of domestic abuse within college communities. Her enduring legacy serves as a reminder of the importance of support systems and the need to confront and eradicate domestic violence.

Note: Advertisements and non-content segments within the transcript were omitted to maintain focus on the core narrative.

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Transcript183 lines

[00:01]
Deborah Roberts
This episode is brought to you by Companion. Iris and Josh seem like the perfect match, but when a weekend getaway turns.
[00:09]
Investigator
Into a nightmare, Iris realizes that things.
[00:12]
Deborah Roberts
Aren'T as perfect as they appear.
[00:14]
Investigator
From the creators of Barbarian and the.
[00:17]
Deborah Roberts
Studio that brought you the Notebook comes a twisted tale of modern romance and the sweet satisfaction of revenge. Companion only in theaters January 31st.
[00:27]
Investigator
Rated R. Under 17.
[00:29]
Deborah Roberts
Not admitted without parenting. Hi 2020 listeners. This week we're bringing you the sixth and final installment of Death in the Dorms, season two. Today we'll hear the story of Latasha Norman, a promising young accounting student from Jackson State University who mysteriously disappeared after class one afternoon. Let's take a listen.
[00:58]
Family Member 1
Latasha her dream was to go to Jackson State.
[01:03]
Family Member 2
To be able to go to HBCU. It's empowering.
[01:09]
Investigator
20 year old Latasha Norman was last seen leaving a class at Jackson State University.
[01:15]
Family Member 3
Sometimes I feel like if I had answered my phone, I possibly could have prevented something.
[01:24]
Family Member 1
He just disappeared.
[01:26]
Family Member 2
You supposed to feel safe when you're off to college and for that to happen, you know, everyone was in fear.
[01:33]
Family Member 1
Because it had happened on a black college campus. It draw even more attention. That's the first time we knew that an incident had happened.
[01:43]
Family Member 2
Murder.
[01:44]
Family Member 1
It was murder. It looks so lifelike.
[02:10]
Family Member 3
All the memories, just.
[02:19]
Family Member 1
All these are her trophies.
[02:21]
Family Member 3
And this right here is when she.
[02:23]
Family Member 2
Was 10 years old.
[02:24]
Family Member 3
She was a girl scout and I kept it.
[02:31]
Family Member 1
You don't want to know the person I call myself. You don't want to know what Pandora.
[02:42]
Family Member 3
Left inside the shed.
[03:10]
Family Member 1
Natasha Norman is my stuff stepdaughter, but I consider her as my daughter because I raised her from a child.
[03:19]
Family Member 2
She was the only daughter I had.
[03:22]
Family Member 3
And I was very proud of her. Everything she have, she always have that smile on her face. You never seen her angry. That's the type of person Latasha Norman was. Latasha was born April 21, 1987 here in Greenville, Mississippi. We have a huge family, a very close knit family. I am 10 years older than her, so she was more like my little sister.
[03:59]
Family Member 2
When we were younger. She started out wanting to be a teacher because we played teachers a lot. But as Tasha got older, she switched to accounting. And I think that had a lot to do with following behind Keisha's footsteps.
[04:18]
Family Member 3
I taught her, whatever you do, don't never give up.
[04:22]
Family Member 2
Do your best in everything you do.
[04:24]
Family Member 3
Because you can always go up higher. And as she grew up, she did.
[04:31]
Family Member 2
She did her best.
[04:32]
Family Member 3
She didn't sell it for less.
[04:41]
Family Member 2
In high school. At first she was kind of shy.
[04:45]
Family Member 3
Latasha always followed in my footsteps. I played the flute. Tasha played the flute. I was a majorette. Tasha was a majorette. I was on dance line. Tasha was on dance line.
[05:00]
Family Member 2
After she became a major, she really came out of her ship.
[05:05]
Family Member 3
She was that beacon of light that when she smiled, you smiled. She had that caring heart. There was nothing you couldn't ask Latasha to do for you that she wouldn't do.
[05:24]
Family Member 1
Latasha. Her dream was to go to Jackson State, and their name was known as Jackson State, the Norwegians.
[05:34]
Family Member 2
My father played football at Jackson State. My uncles played football at Jackson State. One of my uncles even went pro playing professional football. I knew that she wouldn't break the family tradition.
[05:47]
Family Member 1
I would tease her. I would call her Ms. Jackson State. She had no problem being admitted there.
[05:57]
Family Member 2
Jackson State is an hbcu, which is a historically black college or university founded in 1877. So very long time ago, about 150 years.
[06:13]
Investigator
They say the world's art came from Europe, right? Well, if that is true, they ain't do it right. Watch class, get busy on this classical. Just put me in the boot.
[06:23]
Family Member 3
That turn matter magical.
[06:25]
Family Member 2
I'm Olivia Welch. I was the managing editor for the Blue and White Flash, the student led publication for the university. It's very humbling to be able to go to hbcu considering that many, many years ago, the people who fought for us to have an HBCU weren't allowed to go to college. This being something that was made for us, it's exciting, it's empowering. I think that's one of the reasons that a lot of students come here, generation after generation.
[07:08]
Deborah Roberts
A big part of J setting is stepping part of the culture here at jsu.
[07:13]
Family Member 1
Spinning around, going up and down for them, honey. Working hard, going extra hard for that money.
[07:19]
Family Member 2
Jackson State, it's a place where you can feel home. You're like family there. We call each other the Tiger family and we're alumni. We're just proud of our dear old college home. A lot of prominent people in the community went to Jackson State and graduated.
[07:46]
Family Member 1
Jackson is approximately an hour and a half from Greenville.
[07:52]
Investigator 2
Greenville, Mississippi is in what's called the Mississippi Delta. And it's a very impoverished region of the country. It may be the most impoverished region of the country. There's not a lot of economic opportunities there. A lot of people from the Delta come to Jackson to build their careers because you have to get out of the Delta to really rise up and do something.
[08:14]
Family Member 1
On orientation day after we had moved her in. I know she was ready for us to go, but my wife wasn't ready to go. She wanted to mop. She wanted to wipe everything down. She wanted to make the bed. There was her excuse to linger around. You know, my wife had had a child before she graduated from high school. She had to work. Latasha was living her dream, and it was almost like my wife living her dream through Latasha. Latasha was getting the opportunity to do a lot of things that my wife never had opportunity to do. So we encouraged Tasha to excel.
[09:14]
Family Member 3
In her senior year in high school, she dated a guy older than Latasha. Stanley was finished with high school, and he wasn't, you know, in college or anything.
[09:28]
Family Member 1
He brought a life sized teddy bear and gave it to her, and I think he stole her heart that way.
[09:38]
Family Member 3
When Latasha decided to go to Jackson's, she encouraged Stanley to go.
[09:47]
Family Member 1
I think she wanted to make something out of him, and so she helped him get into school down there, and she was taking up accounting and he was taking up criminal justice.
[09:59]
Family Member 2
I think Tasha just really pushed him to, like his full potential in a lot of areas, including family, including school, just different things in his life.
[10:11]
Family Member 3
Don't misconstrue a skirt for a fur.
[10:13]
Family Member 2
Cause I still hit him with her.
[10:15]
Family Member 3
Dressed like a nurse, all white. I almost died twice. Latasha was extremely excited to be in college. She was excited to be on Jackson State campus. She was enjoying the campus life. She didn't go out much, as far as she would tell me. You know.
[10:37]
Family Member 2
Latasha had plans for her and Keisha to open up an accounting firm back home once she finished college. She kept her grades up.
[10:48]
Family Member 3
She kept on being on the dean list at Jackson State University. She kept on working. She kept on, you know, doing her.
[11:00]
Family Member 1
She was thriving like a peacock.
[11:11]
Family Member 3
In the fall of 2007, her and Stanley had went their separate ways. Stanley had moved on, and he was dating someone else. Latasha started dating another guy. His name was Marquise. They seemed to be getting pretty well. He looked out for her. There was times when she was having problems with her car, and he was there.
[11:43]
Family Member 2
At this point in life, I would say that she was happy.
[11:49]
Family Member 1
She wanted us to meet Marquise. And so he brought her home to watch her baby brother play in the ball game. 10th November. He seemed to be all right. But they went back that night, and that was the last time we saw her alive.
[12:19]
Family Member 3
The day after we had gotten a chance to meet Marquise, Latasha called me. I can tell by the tone of her voice that something wasn't right. But when she called I was busy at the time and so I told her I would give her a call back once I leave my meeting. I called her the next day and I didn't get an answer.
[13:01]
Family Member 1
Every night my wife would talk Latasha back to her dorm. This particular night she couldn't get Latasha. When we woke up November 14, 2007, the phone rang. It was her new boyfriend on the phone because my wife had called him, asked him had he seen Tasha and he said he hadn't seen her since the night before and she hand me the phone and I talked to him and he told me that her car was on campus and she was missing. He didn't know where she was. Immediately I told my wife, get dressed, let's go. Something ain't right.
[14:08]
Investigator 2
On 13 November 2007, 20 year old.
[14:11]
Deborah Roberts
Latasha Norman was last seen.
[14:13]
Investigator
Latasha Norman was a junior business major.
[14:15]
Investigator 2
At Jackson State University, but campus and.
[14:18]
Deborah Roberts
City police say they have no suspects in her disappearance. There are major tax changes coming this year with income tax brackets expected to adjust for inflation. While the exact figures aren't final, you can expect to see slight increases in the income thresholds for each bracket. But here's the thing, you don't have to navigate these changes alone. If you owe back taxes or have unfiled returns, do not wait for the IRS letter to act. Turn it over to Tax Network usa. Tax Network USA has a strong relationship with the irs. They have a preferred direct line to the irs, so they know exactly which agents to talk to and which ones to avoid. Their expert strategies are designed to settle your tax issues whether you owe $10,000 or 10 million. In fact, they've already resolved over $1 billion in tax debt. Stop looking over your shoulder and take control. Call now at 1-800-958-1000 or visit tnusa.com 20 that's T N usa.com 20 this.
[15:25]
Family Member 2
Episode is brought to you by Meundies.
[15:27]
Family Member 3
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[15:32]
Deborah Roberts
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[15:35]
Family Member 3
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[15:39]
Deborah Roberts
Plus you can match with your partner, friends or even your pets.
[15:42]
Family Member 3
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[15:44]
Family Member 2
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[15:53]
Family Member 3
From the outside in. My mom called and she was like, have you talked to Tasha? She told me that my aunt and uncle were headed to Jackson because Latasha hadn't reported to class and they were worried. At that point, my heart dropped because I knew, you know, something was going on with her because of the tone of her voice. A couple of days before that.
[16:46]
Family Member 2
I get to Grandma's house and Kisha was saying, tasha's missing.
[16:53]
Investigator
Take me back to November 2007, tell me what happened.
[17:06]
Family Member 3
You can skip that. I won't talk about it.
[17:16]
Family Member 1
By the time we got to Yazoo, Mississippi, I get another call from Marques and he says that he's with the campus police and he's filed a missing person report. They did search the school at that time, the dorms and stuff. When we got there, nobody knew, nobody seen anything. She just disappeared.
[18:00]
Investigator 2
Auto burglaries, house burglaries, armed robberies, and several murders are in that neighborhood. Jackson State is a pretty accessible campus. You can drive in and out of the, out of the campus pretty easily.
[18:12]
Investigator
Latasha's vehicle was still on campus, and so we knew that she didn't leave in her vehicle. They didn't have a whole lot of evidence as to the whereabouts of where Latasha was. Some campus police departments have very limited resources, and the Jackson State Police chief decided to reach out to the Jackson Police Department for assistance. Investigators with the Jackson Police Department spoke to Latasha's boyfriend. They spoke to her roommate. A month or so prior to her coming up missing. Latasha's tires had been slashed on campus.
[18:52]
Family Member 1
I told her to go to the campus police and report and have it documented.
[19:00]
Investigator
The timing was awfully strange because particular crimes such as tire slashing, breaking out windows, those are usually more intimate type crimes. It's somebody that, you know, usually if it's a stranger, they may break into your car and try to take something, but most of the time they're not gonna slash your tires or break your windows out or anything like that.
[19:29]
Family Member 1
We had been there all that day on the 14th, and we hadn't got no answers.
[19:37]
Investigator
20 year old Latasha Norman was last seen leaving a class at Jackson State University.
[19:42]
Family Member 2
I thought I was in a nightmare because you see things like this on TV all the time, but never in a million years would I have thought that, hey, this is actually happening to someone in my family, like, missing. The next day, the cousins and the rest of the family decided, hey, we're gonna Go to Jackson on our own, and we're gonna look for Tasha. We started formulating search teams. We put up flyers, we walked door to door, mainly in the area of where Jackson State was.
[20:35]
Investigator 2
It was a big, big ordeal in the city of Jackson to find her. And everybody locally knew about the case.
[20:46]
Family Member 1
When I first appeared for help on the Jackson State campus, they set up where I could speak. The sheriff there did, and it was media there from everywhere. If you can hear us, we want to let you know that we love you and that we're not going to stop until we know something. Because it had happened on a black college campus. So it drew even more attention. But I'm not shy. To Mike. Even before that happened, I had took a media class. It was almost like God had prepared me for this. I went on every talk show, radio show, TV show, news show, anybody that would listen to me. Tasha had a class at 1:00, and she got out of class at 2:20, and she just disappeared in thin air. She never made it back to her dorm. She never made it to a car. I was willing to be a man and stand up and fight for them, protect them. That's my job. I raised Latasha, and I told them when I first came here that I was not gonna leave Jackson until I found my child. I missed Tasha. My wife missed Tasha. And we hope to hear something from her real soon. We hadn't gotten no answers. The police, well, they really weren't accomplishing much.
[22:23]
Investigator
Investigators decided to reach out to the FBI.
[22:28]
Family Member 2
The FBI is joining the search for a missing Mississippi college student.
[22:32]
Investigator
Latasha Norman disappeared last Tuesday. I was the case agent for the Latasha Norman case. When I first got assigned the case, the Jackson State Police Department and Jackson PD gave me the rundown of what they had already attained and just where they were at that particular point, which was basically, they didn't have a whole lot of evidence as to the whereabouts of where Latasha was. So we have to go back over the case because we may have missed something. We decided to pull Natasha Norman's cell phone information. The initial cell phone data that I got from her phone showed that it was at Marquis's location, where he lived, and then it was traveling towards the direction of Jackson State University. And somewhere within that time frame, all activity ceased. She could have cut the phone off. It could have died, could have been on purpose. But as far as I'm concerned, the college student her age would not leave her phone dead for over 30 minutes, you know, so let alone three days in, looking at Latasha's life, there was nothing that would lead us to believe she would end up walking away from everything.
[24:06]
Family Member 1
They interviewed me, the investigators, and they wanted to know who we thought might have had some involvement in it. I told him, check out her new boyfriend. After she became missing, I became very suspicious of him. I didn't trust him. He jumped a gun and filed a missing person report before we can even get to town. I had told him I was on the way, and I was like, why you didn't give us the opportunity to get there and do this? It seemed like he was hiding something. He seemed like he was nervous.
[24:48]
Investigator
When.
[24:48]
Family Member 1
He brought her home. My baby son had a game that night, and so she come home to watch her baby brother play in the ball game. Then he introduced her to her new boyfriend, and it was a little disagreement between him and Latasha's cousin. After the game, he wanted to go back, so I thought maybe him and her got an argan or something on the way back home, and he might have tried to retaliate against her or whatever.
[25:23]
Family Member 3
We didn't know much about him. Of course. Our minds wondered, had he done something to her?
[25:42]
Family Member 2
When Tasha went missing, it was a very dark spot for everyone. I had a few friends and classmates who attended Jackson State during that time. You're supposed to feel safe when you're off to college, and for that to happen, you know, everyone was in fear. I can recall one of my friends. Friends calling and texting me every day. She would always say, like, Nikki, this can't be real. We're all on this college campus. That could have been one of us.
[26:40]
Investigator
We decided to interview Latasha's current boyfriend, Marquis Smith. Because usually when you're dealing with a missing person, oftentimes it's that person in an intimate relationship with that individual that has something to do with the whereabouts of that individual. Marquise was a little older. He had a job. He had a car. He had his own place. We also wanted to check his cell phone, ping information. Back then, it was fairly new. Most people didn't know that we could use that to help corroborate certain stories they told us. Time, dates, and things of that nature that he gave us. They seemed to match up just fine. He mentioned that the night prior to her missing, Latasha spent the night at his house, and he probably was one of the last people to see her.
[27:40]
Family Member 1
Marquise was telling me that the FBI was questioning him, and I told him I knew, and me and him had some Choice words. And I told him if I found out that he had something to do with it, it wasn't gonna be nothing nice. Our relationship really kind of ended.
[28:03]
Investigator
Stanley's cold came across my radar from Marquis Smith.
[28:09]
Family Member 2
So the first two and a half years of Tasha being at Jackson State, she dated Stanley. They dated on and off.
[28:18]
Investigator 2
By the time Latasha Norman went missing, Stanley and her were not dating. At that time, Latasha was dating Marquis Smith.
[28:25]
Investigator
We went to Jackson State, we checked out his records, and we found out that he withdrew from school a week or two before us checking into him, which I thought was strange. Talking to Latasha's friends, we learned that Latasha's friend kind of suspected him of slashing her tires. We also found out that they're in a relationship. He got in physical at times.
[28:55]
Investigator 2
They started learning evidence about the incident that happened in Pearl, Mississippi, which is just a suburb of Jackson, on October 9, which is about a month before Latasha went missing. She takes Stanley Cole to get his paycheck. Latasha sometimes helps Stanley out with stuff, like giving him a ride. She was on the phone with Marquis Smith, who was her boyfriend at the time. Stanley got mad and lunged at her and actually broke her phone.
[29:28]
Investigator
She also reported that to the campus police as well.
[29:53]
Family Member 1
That's the first time we knew that an incident had happened, that she had filed this report against Mr. Cole. So she never did tell us. I mean, I cried. I was hurt. I couldn't believe.
[30:15]
Family Member 3
When Latasha was, you know, dating Stanley, she told me that he had slapped her. I had went through domestic violence. So I told Latasha, I said, because what happened with me, I'm just gonna let you know, if he did it once, he would do it again. It's time for you to let him go. You know, you move on. Let him move on. And I just kept it between us. After she went missing, that was the first time that my family knew that he had placed his hands on her before, because I had never said anything to anyone about the first incident.
[31:01]
Investigator 2
The women that are the victims of these crimes generally do not like to tell anybody because they're embarrassed about it.
[31:07]
Family Member 1
At that time, we thought she had broke the relationship off with him because she had found out that he had another young lady pregnant.
[31:22]
Family Member 3
I was shocked that Stanley had put his hands on Latasha again. I just couldn't believe that Latasha didn't come to me and tell me, but I kind of understood at the same time the reason why she didn't tell me. After they had called it quits, I told Stanley if I find out that he put his hands on her again, he was gonna see me. And Jackson, he promised that he wouldn't bother her, he would cut all ties in communications. He was out of her life to our knowledge. I just hate that I reacted the way I did, that I made Latasha afraid to come to me the next time. But I was proud of her. At the same time, I was proud of Latasha that she did step up and take other actions. When Stanley placed his hands on her again.
[32:24]
Investigator
We learned that this was not a normal ex boyfriend, ex girlfriend relationship. They are having some physical altercations that are occurring and that could lead to deadly altercations.
[32:42]
Deborah Roberts
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[33:50]
Family Member 1
We had hope. We had faith. We had belief. We was determined to stay in Jackson until we find her.
[34:04]
Family Member 2
As time started to dwindle down and we continued to hear bits and pieces that Latasha had been physically abused by Stanley, you go from being hopeful to like, well, it's not looking good.
[34:23]
Family Member 3
Latasha was last seen leaving class last.
[34:26]
Deborah Roberts
Tuesday afternoon around 2:00.
[34:42]
Family Member 2
My aunt took it really hard to see her, like, not being able to eat and not being able to sleep. It was heartbreaking. When one family member hurts, all of us hurt.
[35:09]
Investigator
It was Thanksgiving. We received a call from a car dealer.
[35:17]
Investigator 2
Car salesman in Jackson calls the police and says that this car, this 1998 Dodge Neon, is really suspicious. The carpet in the trunk was cut out, which is not something normally somebody does when you trade in a car. The fact that a car salesman would call the police about something being strange in a car was pretty odd.
[35:40]
Investigator
We checked the tag in the van and found that it belonged to a young lady that we found to be Stanley Cole's girlfriend, Simone. We found out that Simone was pregnant and Stanley was the father and that they lived in an apartment building in North Jackson. If you were to do a mental checklist, you have a young lady missing. She was possibly in a volatile relationship with her ex boyfriend, who just dropped out of the same school that she was going to, and his current girlfriend was selling her car. The timing was awfully strange. Some things that we can't act on as far as getting arrest warrants, but we will definitely able to get search warrants for the vehicle. The FBI Evidence Recovery Unit discovered quite a bit of blood splatter in the trunk.
[36:43]
Family Member 2
Just the thought of them finding blood in the trunk of the car, my heart dropped. It was like I was reliving that nightmare. From the very first day she went missing on November 14th of 2007.
[37:01]
Investigator
They.
[37:01]
Investigator 2
Positively identified the blood in the trunk of the car to the DNA of Latasha Norman. So they realized that she was in the trunk of that car. Jackson Police Department, as well as the FBI in Jackson State, decided to subpoena Stanley Cole's cell phone records. After the investigators recovered Stanley's cell phone records and realized that he was at Jackson State that day, and they found him at a wooded area off of Brown Street. They decided to go up to Greenville, see if they could speak to Simone Harris.
[37:52]
Investigator
Simone came, and to my surprise, Stanley came. I kind of ignored Stanley. Acted like I didn't really know who he was. Shook his hand, and I took Simone back. We asked her about the phone records. She was very forthwith. She told us that this is one particular time that Stanley was supposed. Supposed to go out and empty the trash. He did, but he took 40 minutes to do it. The interview lasted 20, 30 minutes. And we decided that we wanted to talk to Stanley next. His demeanor was very, very nonchalant. A little too nonchalant. He kind of slid back in his chair and Put his arm back up on the chair, and he said, all the girls from Jackson love all the guys from Greenville. And it was the way he said it, it was almost adversarial. Right. And you would think that if I'm trying to find out where your ex girlfriend is, that you wouldn't be my adversary. Basically, the test question for me is, what do you think should happen to the person that did something to Latasha? And Stanley answered, I don't really know. Most people minimize their punishment. So I knew then he had done something. We knew that Stanley most likely knew where Latasha was. I have daughters, and I wouldn't want my daughter to be laid in some field or somewhere, you know, whether dead or alive, by themselves. So I kind of. I told Stanley that we need to find Latasha. Can you help us find Latasha? He hesitated. His eyes started watering, and he just kind of stared out for a little while. He's. He shook his head, and he said, if I tell you where she is, will you let me see my mom? Stanley's mother was in the lobby. He said, let me see her before I tell you where Latasha is. My partner said, okay. She went in the room and spoke about two minutes. She opened the door and she said, is my son under arrest? And I said, no, ma'am. She said, well, we'll be leaving. The fact that Stanley's mother, rather than her helping, assisting, she started looking out for her son, that stung. It became more personal. At that point, we set out to go ahead and get an arrest warrant for Mr. Stanley Cole.
[41:00]
Investigator 2
Stanley Cole was arrested on November 29th of 2007.
[41:16]
Family Member 2
Throughout that time that Tasha was missing, Stanley was looking or acting as if he was looking for her. People thought that he was genuinely concerned. I know I did.
[41:31]
Investigator
There's media everywhere. They're all outside police headquarters. There's detectives and the chief in this interview room looking through the two way glass. It is literally a show now. As soon as I opened the door, I started in on Stanley. Just technique playing chess. If you do not.
[41:54]
Investigator 2
You try to act like a cop.
[41:56]
Investigator
No. Am I going to shoot you like a trap? You understand? I was going to make him angry at me. So angry that he would just forget to lawyer up, so to speak. It wasn't hard to get angry. I said a few curse words, and through my notepad. He was upset. I was upset. I stormed out. He had liked one of the female investigators that had interviewed him before. I had from Jackson Police Department. I ran upstairs and got the Investigator. I said, hey, you're on. I want him to maybe find solace in this young lady, and maybe she would be the one to get him to tell her where Latasha was. I wasn't sure if that would work. It was a gamble. She started out far away. She moved in close. He starts to tell us they got an argument in Simone's car. We just got the odds of fighting over stuff that we've been through in.
[42:55]
Family Member 3
The last couple of years, and so.
[42:57]
Investigator
Stuff we was going through now. And he was sitting in the driver's seat, and he struck her with a back fist to her nose area. When I realized I hit her too hard. She wasn't breathing, just panicked and just quit in the trunk and just rolled around trying to figure out what I was going to do. At this point.
[43:25]
Investigator 2
He went and met up with a friend of his and his girlfriend, and then they picked up Simone Harris, and they ended up eating at Garfield's restaurant in Jackson. And all the while, during this time, where they're going back and forth between people's houses, where they're picking friends up from classes and they're eating dinner, Latasha Norman is in the trunk. Trunk of that Dodge Neon.
[43:58]
Investigator
For him to drive around with her in that trunk. That stood out for me. It stood out. He starts to tell us where she is.
[44:10]
Family Member 1
Just combed her up and just dropped.
[44:11]
Family Member 3
Off and just ran and never said nothing to anybody.
[44:19]
Investigator
How he's explaining it, he's got to show us. So we decided to take him to the scene. We had this long caravan of police cars and news cars behind us. Stanley led us to the area. Within 10 minutes, we were able to recover Latasha Norman's body. She was partially closed. The upper torso of her body, including her face, was covered with a piece of cardboard. Unfortunately, her body had been pretty badly decomposed. In order to identify Latasha, we needed to have her dental records checked.
[45:33]
Investigator 2
And.
[45:34]
Investigator
They were able to give us a positive match.
[45:49]
Family Member 1
All we could do then was just come home, because with nothing else in Jackson that we could do.
[46:00]
Family Member 2
I would have never in a million years thought that Stanley would take her life. Like that was the last thought on my mind.
[46:11]
Family Member 3
If. I'm sorry. Sometimes I feel like if I had answered my phone to see what was going on with Tasha, I possibly could have prevented something or just said something to her to avoid what Stanley had done. I just hate that I reacted the way I did the first time that I had learned that he hit her. I felt like she didn't Want to put me in any danger.
[47:04]
Family Member 1
I hate to this day that she got tangled up with this young man. My wife was so broken. I was just barely, just disappointed. And to be honest with you, I wasn't pleasant. It didn't take much to make me go off. And that wasn't nice. I thought that was ugly. I had to ask God to take this bitterness, anger from me.
[48:01]
Investigator 2
Because Stanley never told us how he killed her. I mean, his explanation was that he hit her.
[48:07]
Investigator
I hit her too hard and knocked.
[48:09]
Family Member 1
Out after a couple of hours.
[48:11]
Investigator
I checked on her. It was no cost.
[48:14]
Investigator 2
And if you see Stanley Cole, he's 140 pound man. I don't know that his blow would have caused death to Ms. Norman. It just didn't seem likely to any of us.
[48:26]
Investigator
Not to mention that if she was bleeding so much out of her nose as he said, we should have found some blood in the front seat. Once Natasha Norman's body's at the medical examiner, we discover a slight jagged nick to the inside of her rib cage. The portion of that rib was missing due to the jaggedness of it. It looked like it could have been a metal device or even a knife. But unfortunately, we weren't able to tell if she received any damage internally from her organs because she was so badly decomposed. So we did send that bone to a forensics expert as well, and they were able to tell us that it appeared to be possibly a stab wound. The body of a missing college student from Mississippi has been found, and her ex boyfriend is charged with murder.
[49:37]
Family Member 1
Mr. Cole was still trying to say it was an accident.
[49:41]
Investigator
I kind of felt, you know, he was a bit strange or whatever, but I didn't actually expect anything like that to happen. So you hear about things like that everywhere else, but no one ever actually expects, you know, trouble to be at their door. Failed.
[50:08]
Investigator 2
We had a community that was really aching from this crime because it happened at Jackson State, which is just a beloved university in the city, and then her family. And if you meet her dad or stepfather, Danny Bolden, you can see how much this man loved his daughter. And they were there every day rooting us on that made us really, really want to go in there and win this case.
[50:33]
Investigator
Did you know that defendant Cole had been violent towards Latasha?
[50:39]
Family Member 1
No, because I warned Mr. Cole from the beginning that I was the type of gentleman, that I did not tolerate that type of stuff. Natasha, she never exposed that to us. She kept it here. I think she was ashamed of it.
[50:59]
Family Member 2
It was hard to keep your composure. So There were times that, you know, I had to step out.
[51:05]
Investigator
And then even listening to his attorney, right. Try to clear him of that. It's really surreal.
[51:16]
Deborah Roberts
Putting her in the trunk doesn't make it murder. The evidence only shows this is manslaughter.
[51:40]
Investigator
We the jury find the defendant guilty of murder. You have caused her parents, other family members and friends enormous grief. As punishment for this murder, you're hereby automatically sentenced to life in prison.
[52:01]
Family Member 1
That's the only time I seen him show emotion. Then them big crocodile tears come down. He apologized to us, but the damage had been done.
[52:18]
Family Member 2
Stanley would be held accountable for it. It was just a sense of relief.
[52:32]
Investigator 2
In 2012, the Court of appeals overturned the case.
[52:37]
Investigator
It was a one punch homicide. Cole's attorney claims extensive media attention prevented him from receiving a fair trial.
[52:47]
Deborah Roberts
Now he suggests a lesser charge to be considered.
[52:51]
Family Member 1
Well, we went before the state supreme court. God has granted us this victory two years ago. And we have faith and we believe that he won't reverse it. And they ruled in his favor, saying that it was a mistrial because the judge had put consideration for manslaughter on the table for the jury to choose from. It was not manslaughter.
[53:17]
Family Member 2
Murder.
[53:18]
Family Member 1
There was murder.
[53:26]
Deborah Roberts
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[54:35]
Family Member 1
Stanley Cole is offered a retrial. So me and my wife had to go back to Jackson and meet the D.A. we just wanted justice, but we didn't want to go back through the trial. She didn't want to go back through it, and I didn't either. And on the way down there, we had this conversation. We gonna offer him a 40 year plea. No parole, no provision. And he accepted it. Cause it was better than the deal he had at first. And I realized I had to forgive him. I had to release him in order to release myself.
[55:23]
Family Member 3
You forgive and you move on. You don't forget it, but you move on. So a day passed that I don't think about Tasha. But I know God through him, he give me grace.
[55:42]
Family Member 1
It ain't all been bad. A lot of good has come out of this man. But you gotta take the bitter with the sweet.
[55:52]
Family Member 3
I wouldn't want another parent have to live and go through what we went through. Nobody.
[56:02]
Family Member 1
God, want to use Latasha Light to shine the light on teen domestic violence. Domestic violence is nothing new. See, for so long, this is like a taboo in our community. People don't like to talk about it, but we have to talk about it.
[56:24]
Family Member 3
Don't stay silent. Just speak out and tell someone, because it is help out there at Jackson State honor our daughter, Natasha Norman. They have this domestic violence center in.
[56:39]
Family Member 2
Honor of her.
[56:42]
Family Member 3
For Jackson State University to step up and name the Latasha Norman Counseling Center. That was amazing policing.
[56:55]
Family Member 2
Her picture's on the wall there, and her story is written there too. So students actually get a chance to learn who she was, why she's so important, and why domestic violence is not okay, and it never will be okay. It lets people know the signs to look for, and giving them the proper materials and tools to actually have someone to talk to that is professional.
[57:28]
Family Member 1
Well, after her death, they wanted to do a walk in her name, and we've done it for the last 15 years. All the proceeds goes back into the Latasha Norman Center.
[57:43]
Family Member 2
It keeps her name alive on campus.
[57:53]
Family Member 3
I talk to my kids about her, my daughter. I tell her, you have an open line of community. There's nothing you can't come to me or be afraid to say to me.
[58:09]
Family Member 2
After losing her, I went back to school to get my master's in counseling just to bring, like, awareness and be that safe person for people to talk to. She just inspired me to want to be that voice and help others so we can save some people.
[58:40]
Family Member 1
Life has a great impact. Her legacy live on, man. She was an angel of God. She's one of his angels.
[59:01]
Deborah Roberts
This is Deborah Roberts that does it for season two of Death in the Dorms. Death in the Dorms was produced by ABC News Studios with the Intellectual Property Corporation and yes, like a River for Hulu Originals. You can find the whole series streaming on Hulu. Next week, we begin season four of Wild Crime. 11 Skulls follows the FBI's investigation of Israel Keyes, an elusive survivalist and serial killer whose hunting ground ranged from Alaska to Vermont. And be sure to tune in to ABC Friday nights at 9 for all new broadcast episodes of 2020. As always, thanks for listening. If you love your phone but not your carrier, just switch to T Mobile. You can keep your phone, keep your number and we'll help pay it off up to $800 per line. You can also use our savings calculator to compare our plans and streaming benefits against Verizon and AT&T. So switch and keep your phone, keep your number and keep more of your moolah@t mobile.com up to 4 lines via virtual prepaid card. Allow 15 days qualifying unlock device, credit service port in 90 plus days with device and eligible carrier and timely redemption required. Card has no cash access and expires in six months.