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- [00:01]
A
Hi Crime House Community. It's Morgan Absher, and if you love digging into the most gripping true crime stories, then you need to listen to another Crime House original Crimes of with Sabrina Deanna Roga and Corinne Vien. Crimes of is a weekly series that explores a new theme each season from Crimes of Paranormal, unsolved murders, mysterious disappearances, and more.
- [00:22]
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Sabrina and Corinne have been covering the true stories behind Hollywood's most iconic horror villains, and this month they'll be diving into the paranormal Listen to Crimes of every Tuesday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcasts.
- [00:44]
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This is Crime House.
- [00:47]
B
One afternoon in 2017, Savannah Lafontaine gray wind went to assist a neighbor. When she vanished. At first it seemed like she was gone without a trace, like a portal had almost opened up and swallowed her. But. But one day police found a very shocking and upsetting clue and it started to illustrate just how strange Savannah's disappearance really was.
- [01:10]
A
Savannah was a member of the Spirit Lake Nation of North Dakota. In many communities, Indigenous American women are murdered at more than 10 times the national homicide rate. Savannah's case has inspired many people to get involved in advocacy for missing and murdered Indigenous people. But there is still so much more work to be done. Hi guys. Welcome back to Clues, where we sneak past the crime scene tape and explore some of the key evidence behind some of the most gripping true crime cases.
- [01:50]
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I'm Kayla Moore and I'm going to be the one digging into the timelines, the backstories, and the court files released on these cases.
- [01:56]
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And I'm your Internet sleuth, Morgan Abshur. I'm the one who's diving into the Reddit forums and everything else I can find online to talk about the lesser known details and pulling out the threads that just don't add up.
- [02:07]
B
At Crime House, we value your support. So please share your thoughts on social media and remember to rate, review and follow clues to help others discover the show. For bonus episodes, early access and ad free listening, join our Crime House plus community on Apple Podcasts.
- [02:22]
A
More on this case and the clues that defined it after this quick break. One of this week's partners is Peloton. We know that it takes just one small detail to crack open a case, and with Peloton, it takes just one step to start your fitness journey. Breakthrough.
- [02:38]
B
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- [02:52]
A
Whether you're training for a goal or just trying to make fitness fit your life, Peloton keeps you motivated and on track. It's Peloton's most advanced equipment yet, with intelligent strength coaching that tracks every rep, corrects your form and recommends the right weights.
- [03:09]
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No guesswork, no mystery, just strength coaching that keeps you safe and helps you get stronger. And just like every good investigation, there.
- [03:15]
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Are always twists with the swivel screen. You can move seamlessly from running to strength training to yoga or Pilates, whatever the case calls for. It's more than a workout, it's your personal breakthrough waiting to happen.
- [03:29]
B
So let yourself run, lift, sculpt, push, and go explore the new peloton cross training tread +@1peloton.com this is a case.
- [03:39]
A
Today that is going to have many of you out there enraged. Yeah, it's a hard one to listen to.
- [03:47]
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It's a really heavy one. We'll have some content warnings in the description for people who might be sensitive to this kind of case, but it's going to be a heavy one.
- [03:54]
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It's very heavy. It's, there's a lot of graphic descriptions as we kind of get into it. So please listen with care today. I mean, it involves a missing woman pregnant at the time of her disappearance. And it's just, it's a tough one.
- [04:08]
B
And just a quick reminder for anyone who's watching this episode on YouTube, you're going to see some assets that'll show you what we're talking about. And if you're listening, you can always find those same assets on our Instagram. That's at Clues podcast on Insta. This case begins on August 19, 2017. Then 22 year old Savannah Lafontaine Grewin started her day like she always did, taking care of others before she took care of herself. Now she lives with her parents, Joe and Norberta Greywind. Her mother's maiden name was La Fontaine and her three younger siblings who she basically helped raise. They all share this modest first floor apartment on 9th Street north in Fargo, North Dakota. And the family is about to get a little bit bigger. Savannah is actually eight months pregnant, but she has not really slowed down one bit. Today is Saturday, which means Savannah has the day off from work. So she offers to give her younger siblings rights to work. She drops her sister off and then she returns home to drive her 16 year old brother to his summer job. And that afternoon, Savannah also was exchanging some texts with her boyfriend who's also the father of her baby, Ashton Matheny. She's looking forward to seeing him the next day because they're going to have a baby shower. But at around 1:15pm a surprise visitor calls for Savannah through the open door of her family's apartment. It's her neighbor, her upstairs neighbor, 38 year old Brooke Cruz. She lives on the third floor of this building. They don't really know each other that well. They've met a couple of times just because of the proximity that they're in. But it seems like Savannah didn't find it strange when Brooke says that she's sewing a dress and and was even going to offer Savannah $20 to come upstairs and model it for her. Savannah tells her, sure, she'll be up in just a minute. Then she orders a pizza to come to the house and she tells her dad to look out for it. She's just going to be gone for a few minutes. At 1:24pm Savannah walks upstairs from her family's place to Brooke Cruz apartment to model that dress. But an hour later, she's still not back. And her parents are starting to get a little bit worried. They start calling her, they start texting her, but there's no reply. And this is really not like Savannah. So they start getting a bad feeling. Let me talk a little bit more about Savannah and her family. Savannah Marie Lafontaine Greywind was born on August 9, 1995 on the Turtle Mountain Reservation in Belcourt, North Dakota. This was a pretty significant place for her mother, Norberta, who is a member of the Turtle Mountain Band of Chippewa. Meanwhile, her dad Joe grew up about a hundred miles away as a member of the Spirit Lake Nation of North Dakota. It's an indigenous American community that comprises of two bands of the Eastern Dakota people. As is tradition, Savannah inherited her father's tribal nationality at birth, becoming a member of the Spirit Lake Nation. Now the family lived in Belcourt where jobs were pretty scarce. So they ended up moving south to Fargo where Savannah lived until she was around 10 years old. That was a pretty big change for the family, as I'm sure you guys can imagine. They went from a community that was 94% indigenous to 1 where fewer than 2% of the residents were indigenous. And eventually, in 2005, the gray wins moved to the Spirit Lake Reservation where her dad was from. The family settled in Tokyo, a community of less than 300 people. And they remained there through Savannah's teenage years. Both of her parents worked long hours in manufacturing. So Savannah had to step up and started caring for her younger siblings after school. Norberta and Joe really appreciated their oldest daughter's help, and they gave her a lot of flexibility when it came to her free time. Though, it was a little bit of a different story when there were boys involved. When she started referring to this guy in her class named Ashton Matheny as her boyfriend. Joe and Roberta were really wary. Ashton was a fellow member of the Spirit Lake Nation, but her parents noted that his life was a lot different than Savannah's. His parents were divorced, and he kind of bounced around between his father's house on the reservation and his mom's place, which was 95 miles away in Grand Works, North Dakota. Plus, Ashton was described as being a little bit of a dreamer. He would release rap music on Soundcloud and he hustled for gigs at local venues. Now, the Gray Ones really wanted to make sure that Savannah got good grades and completed her education. So they wouldn't really let her see Ashton outside of school. They just didn't think he was necessarily the best influence. But that in some ways made them fall a little bit harder from each other. When Savannah graduated from high school in 2013, they continued dating. As they were figuring out the next steps of their lives, Savannah decided she was going to work in healthcare. She got her certified nursing assistant certificate, and she began working at an elder care facility called Eventide in Devil's Lake, North Dakota. It was about a 20 minute drive away. Now, in early 2017, Savannah learned that she was pregnant with Ashton's child. And at this point, he was living in Minneapolis, which was about six hours away. But they knew that they wanted to figure out how they could raise this baby together, even though they lived so far away from each other. He was trying to find a job in Fargo so that they could actually live together and raise this baby together. And finally, Savannah did find an apartment for them and she paid the 700 deposit and they set a move in date for September 1st. Now, the two of them are going to have a big baby shower thrown by their parents on, on the 20th. And after that, it was just going to be 12 days until they moved in together and got ready to welcome their first child. And also, Ashton had one more plan which he hadn't told anyone about yet. On their seventh anniversary, just before the baby's due date in September, he was going to propose to her. But unfortunately, life had other plans. And that brings us back to August 19, 2017, when around 1:24pm Savannah walked upstairs from her place to her neighbor Brooke Cruz. Apartment at her parents after that didn't really hear from her. But sometime between 2:33pm and 2:40pm Savannah's mom, Norberta, sees Brooke, the upstairs neighbor's boyfriend William Hayne, arrive at the building. Savannah's dad Joe goes upstairs and he knocks on Brooke and William's door Multiple times between 2:30 and 3:45pm at first, Brooke tries to talk to him through the door. She says that she and Savannah aren't done with the modeling. But then he comes back a second time and then Brooke says Savannah has actually already left the apartment. But by 3:45pm Savannah is still not home. So Joe goes and knocks on the door again and he asks if he can come in to see for himself whether or not Savannah is in there. And Brooke says no. And then she starts kind of acting like she's afraid of Joe, like he's going to do something. So at 4:30pm, three hours after she last saw her daughter Norberta, who at this point is really starting to feel like something's not right, decides that it's time to call 911 and report her daughter missing. Norberta makes sure to tell them that Savannah is eight months pregnant. There's not really any chance that she would have left home without her wallet or her car, which is still there. And she was also in contact with her family through text messages most of the day. And also on top of that, she had just ordered a pizza that was being delivered to the apartment. So clearly she had thought she was going to be back relatively quickly. And at this point, Norberta also contacts Ashton, Savannah's boyfriend, to ask if he has heard from her. And he says that they last texted at 1:24pm about the same time as the last text of her family, which was also around the same time that she went upstairs. So when he hears that she's missing, Ashton starts looking for a way to get to Fargo. Remember, he's like six hours away. Meanwhile, the 911 dispatcher requests an officer to head to Savannah's address. The closest officer is this 30 year old named Samuel Bowman. He's a nine year veteran of the Fargo Police Department. And Officer Bowman shows up at around 4:37pm but he doesn't go upstairs to apartment number five, where Savannah vanished too. Instead, he spends about 20 minutes questioning Savannah's family downstairs in their apartment. He asks about problems at home, problems with her boyfriend that could have caused Savannah to run away. Joe tries to get Officer Bowman to focus on the two people to last see Savannah, their upstairs neighbors, Brooke and William. Joe says that he's always had a bad feeling about this couple. He even has told Savannah in the past to not go up there or interact with them. See, Joe is this pretty hardworking, straight laced dad. And Brooke and William aren't actually much younger than Joe, but they reportedly smoke weed in their apartment. They get drunk a lot. They have very loud fights that everyone can hear in the apartment complex. They're both frequently unemployed, though recently it seems like William's been working as a roofer. But still, they're not the kind of people that Joe wants his young pregnant daughter around. But Savannah figured she could just make a quick 20 bucks and that would cover the pizza that she just ordered her family for lunch. So the gray wins urge Officer Bowman to go upstairs and talk to Brooke and William. And finally, I mean, at this point this is already botched, but finally I.
- [13:30]
A
Gave it a mark, you guys.
- [13:31]
B
At 5pm Officer Bowman finally heads upstairs and asks for permission to search Brooke and William's apartment. And Brooke seems happy to let Bowman in.
- [13:44]
A
This is so frustrating. I mean, do you think a woman that just ordered herself a pizza just going to run away that just put a deposit down on an apartment?
- [13:51]
B
Yeah. Let me interrogate these parents to see if they did anything that would have made her want to run away.
- [13:56]
A
It's right. Botched. Botched. So this brings us to our first clue though. The initial searches of apartment number five. The first one happens about three and a half hours after Savannah was last seen by her family. Officer Bowman didn't have a search warrant or even enough grounds to obtain one, so he couldn't be too invasive during this search. He just kind of browses around in a cursory way. Doesn't really search through anything for evidence. When he enters the bedroom, he sees William lying casually on the couple's bed as if he's about to take a nap. Bowman says, quote, well, you're not Savannah.
- [14:36]
B
As in cracking jokes, my guy.
- [14:39]
A
What, dude? What? After that, he doesn't search the bedroom any further. Then he questions Brooke briefly about the partially finished dress lying on the couch, asking if Savannah modeled it. Brooke says that Savannah helped with the tailoring, not by modeling the dress. All told, this search sounds like it only lasted a few minutes. And when Officer Bowman filed a report describing Brooke and William, he described them as, quote, calm and their apartment as tidy. The same report, however, called the Gray Winds quote, upset, anxious and distraught. Which, duh, of course they're distraught. Okay. Even Though Officer Bowman's search didn't turn up anything, the Fargo police claims that they placed the couple under, quote, constant surveillance. We weren't able to confirm whether this was true or not, but we can tell you one thing, and it's that the Gray Wins are not happy with how this investigation is being handled kind of from the jump. Norberta told a reporter early on that the police were, quote, very rude and had no sympathy whatsoever. And they, quote, told me they did their job, end quote. Even though obviously Savannah is still missing. And there is evidence that the Fargo PD really might have given Norberta the brush off exactly like she described. Because a dispatcher admitted to yelling at Norberta when she called 911 repeatedly to demand more action. They actually even went so far as to stop recording her repeated 911 calls.
- [16:16]
B
Which I didn't even know you could legally opt to not record a 911.
- [16:20]
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Call, which I'm not sure, but that seems extremely strange.
- [16:24]
B
Yeah. Wow.
- [16:25]
A
You're gonna stop recording and then what? And then that's when you start yelling at her. So after that, Norberta called the police station and spoke to Officer Bowman's supervisor, Sergeant Mike Urbes, about how the case was actually being handled. Yet when police returned to the apartment building later that Same Night around 10:30pm it wasn't to investigate Savannah's disappearance further. It was actually to follow up on an anonymous disturbance call about a rowdy group of Native Americans on the lawn. The disturbance air quotes Heavily on that one guys turned out to be a 25 person group of the Grey Wins friends and family, including Ashton, who rallied to find Savannah partly because they were so unhappy with the police response, but also because a lot of times in Native American culture, like they really prioritize a communal response to, to all kinds of crises. They had all been taking turns going up to apartment number five to see if they could search the place themselves. But Brooke refused to let any of them in. Around the time Officer Bolman returned for the disturbance call, accompanied this time by Sergeant Urbes, Brooke had moved their couch in front of her locked door. She said she was worried the gray winds and their friends were going to break in. But instead of questioning Brooke and William further, Officer Bowman and Sergeant Urbes tried to get the group on the long to disperse. Still, they demanded the police look for Savannah in apartment number five again. So to de escalate the situation, the officers, somewhat reluctantly did agree. Bowman and her bess approached Brooke and asked for permission to come inside. But this time, instead of Being calm and friendly, she seemed almost irritated, saying, quote, what do I have to do to show you? I don't know where that girl is. Still, Brooke did consent to a second search, and once again, William was lying on the bed in the bedroom. And something I personally found kind of strange is like police didn't really ask him to move, despite seeing him in the same spot twice.
- [18:41]
B
It seemed like they were more interested in not disturbing him because he was laying on the bed than actually searching that room.
- [18:46]
A
Yeah, seems that way. And Norberta and Joe had even suggested that they check in a bathroom closet for Savannah. I think it's because, you know, obviously they live in the same building, and they kind of knew the apartment's layout, and they thought that could be a place where a person could hide another person. Still, the officers completed another walk through and went back downstairs to tell Savannah's loved ones that they had searched, quote, thoroughly. Bowman later filed a report saying, quote, I saw no signs of any struggle or issues and did not see Savannah. It's giving. It's giving botched, y'.
- [19:25]
B
All.
- [19:25]
A
It's giving botched. Our second clue does show up this same night after the second search. After telling Norberta earlier that he didn't have enough evidence of a crime to track Savannah's cell phone, Officer Bowman actually changes his mind. And so he requests a phone trace. But when Savannah's cell service provider tries to ping her phone, they get no response, which means her phone is either already turned off, out of battery, or. Or out of service. So now the police know she wasn't just ignoring her family's calls like someone who's running away might. It was more likely that she had been harmed. But they also know they aren't going to be able to pinpoint her location this way. If there was ever a chance of finding Savannah through her cell phone, police had already missed that window. Another one of this week's partners is simply safe.
- [20:23]
B
Morgan, I think I told you this, but after Matt and I went on a vacation, we came back and found out that our been robbed. Luckily, we were okay, but it just really hammered home that having a security system is one of the best things you can do for yourself.
- [20:37]
A
Yeah, in today's times, you need a security system. My dad didn't have one, and his building got broken into three times within two months.
- [20:44]
B
What's amazing about simplisafe, too, is the system that they sent Matt and I comes with so many things that I wouldn't have even expected or necessarily thought about. One thing personally, That I really like that Simplisafe has. They have temperature and water sensors. So think about it. If you're out of town for the weekend and your pipes freeze, that's not something I would ever know about. But the Simplisafe system can actually alert you to that. It's so much more than just security.
- [21:09]
A
I also love that Simplisafe stops crimes before they happen because they have this active guard outdoor protection, so the cameras detect threats while they're still outside your house. That peace of mind is amazing.
- [21:23]
B
Don't miss out on Simplisafe's biggest sale of the year. 60% off. Right now, our listeners can save 60% off on a SimpliSafe home security system@simplisafe.com clues. That's SimpliSafe.com clues. There's no safe like simply safe.
- [21:40]
A
Another one of this week's partners is Merit Beauty. Merit has become essential in my makeup routine.
- [21:47]
B
We've gotten a few products from Merit that I use every day. The flush balm is one of my favorites. Every time you see me on camera, I have the flush balm on the bronzer stick bronzer and the mascara. That's another fan favorite of mine that I probably wear every single day.
- [22:01]
A
Oh, the lip. I cannot go anywhere without a Merit lip on. And they have so many. They've got tinted, they've just got clear. It's not sticky. I feel moisturized. I got a nice glow. I'm pretty much obsessed with all of Merit's products. Merit is really this minimalistic beauty brand that makes elevated makeup and skin care designed to help you look put together in a matter of minutes. All right, now Merit Beauty is offering our listeners their signature makeup bag with your first order@meritbeauty.com that's M E R I T beauty.com to get your free signature makeup bag with your first order. Merit beauty.com and that brings us to.
- [22:39]
B
Sunday, August 20th, which was supposed to be the day of Savannah's baby shower. But instead, it is the second day that she's been classified a missing person. The gray ones spend the afternoon hanging up missing person flyers all over Fargo. Kayla, Savannah's 18 year old sister, helps by posting on Facebook asking if people could help them look for Savannah. And as the day goes on, Kayla also has this other idea. She knows that it's the district attorney who actually decides whether or not to prosecute a crime, not the local police. So she calls the DA's office and she talks to a prosecutor named Tanya Martinez. Tanya seems to Take Kayla's concerns pretty seriously. So she contacts a Fargo cop that she knows named detective Philip Swan. And he gets into his car and just goes around and starts looking around Savannah's neighborhood. He also talks to his colleague, detective Bowman, about why he didn't make more of an effort in his initial searches. Bowman says that Brooke appeared reluctant to let him in, so he didn't want to scare her into closing the door and making him get a warrant. He didn't want to do paperwork is what that translates to. Detective Swan finds this whole scenario to be pretty suspicious. So he gets together with another officer, Sergeant Jim van Le, and they decide that they're going to do another search of Brooke and William's apartment around 6:30pm that Sunday.
- [24:07]
A
Which brings us to our third clue. That third search on August 20th. This time, Detective Van Leith and Swan record audio on their body cams. Now, one might conclude Brooke sounds friendly and accommodating as she lets them in. She says, quote, I'll go ahead and open up the whole house to you guys. She also seems a little flirtatious with detective Van Leith, saying, quote, you're tall, and you can hear enough activity in the audio to tell that the two detectives are doing more than just a walk through. This time. It does sound like they're opening drawers and cabinets, which wasn't done previously, but it's still like it just feels a little unsettling to hear how friendly they are with Brooke, talking about things like, quote, making this easier on you and, quote, making us and hopefully the family feel better. They even ask her about her cats. According to Fargo police, detectives Swan and Van Leith searched Brooks kitchen cupboards. They also checked the bathroom closet that the gray winds suggested they look in, but apparently they didn't notice anything alarming. Then, about six minutes later, they leave. Six minutes. On the recorded audio, Detective Swann refers to the gray winds theory that Brooks done something to Savannah as this, quote, grandiose idea. After the search, they go downstairs and speak to Joe Greywind for exactly 2 minutes and 12 seconds. During that conversation, the two detectives actually tell Joe that they know how to spot a liar and Brooke is not a liar.
- [25:49]
B
Well, even though officers at this point are seeming to be less than helpful, thankfully, they do continue at least searching for Savannah in the following days, Though not in the same spot. On Monday and Tuesday, August 21st and 22nd, both the Fargo police department and a private search and rescue group comb through the area. The police deploy specially trained dogs, One of which picks up Savannah's scent from her Dirty laundry and follows it to a nearby convenience store. But there's no sign of her having been there. I mean, I remember reading that dogs can smell like two weeks in the past. I think these scent dogs can smell even further into the past. So it's not unrealistic that they would have smelled her going to the convenience store. The local police also call in U.S. customs and Border protection so they can search for Savannah by air. But that also doesn't turn up anything. Meanwhile, Savannah's uncle searches the nearby red river in his own personal boat. The red river actually has a profound link to Savannah's family history. The traditional caretakers of the river were both of her ancestral tribes. The turtle Mountain Chippewa on her mother's side, and the spirit Lake Dakota on her father's side. Plus, the Fargo fire department is also searching the red river as well. But unfortunately, none of those boats find any clues. And by Tuesday afternoon, Savannah's family receives some more bad news. Joe Anderson, who's a deputy chief with the Fargo police department, actually gives a statement to the local news saying there was, quote, nothing to suggest criminal activity, end quote, in Savannah's disappearance. Except here's the thing. The police know for a fact they have the records that they can access that there has been a lot of criminal activity in apartment number five, even before Savannah vanished. Because Brooke and William have a pretty, let's just say, checkered past and also an emotionally and physically abusive relationship.
- [27:46]
A
Botched.
- [27:47]
B
So. Botched.
- [27:48]
A
Botched.
- [27:48]
B
So let's go.
- [27:50]
A
Sorry. You're gonna go on air and say that nothing to suggest criminal activity.
- [27:55]
B
Okay. Because we're gonna get a little bit more into Brooke and William right now. Let's go. 38 year old Brooke Cruz and 32 year old William Hayne. Let's talk about how they came to be the great ones. Upstairs neighbors. So Brooke was born in Florida as Brooke Doolin. She grew up in and out of foster care. She reportedly had as many as seven children by at least five different men. Experiencing her first pregnancy when she was only 14 years old. Her second baby's father, Aaron Edwards, ended up with custody. While Brooke skipped out on child support entirely. She also had a string of run ins with the law. She was arrested and put in jail for the first time at age 23. After she got caught bouncing checks. And after she married a man named Carl Cruz in 2006, the then 26 year old Brooke seemed like she was settling down. They welcomed two children together, and they worked together at Carl's carpentry business. But the marriage only lasted three years until, according to Carl, Brooke abandoned the family in 2009 to move to California with another man. Though a few Years later, in 2012, Brooke was arrested. There is record of this for allegedly attacking Carl with a knife in front of their children. Now, this is an accusation that she did go on to deny. And shortly after that incident, she moved to Australia to marry a man there. Again, this marriage also lasted just a few months. By the fall of 2012, she was back in the United States and she had found someone new. William Henry Hayne, who had his own share of problems. In 2012, the same year that he met Brooke, William was convicted of felony child abuse for putting his three month old son down on a changing table so hard that it caused skull fractures.
- [29:42]
A
Horrendous.
- [29:43]
B
That didn't turn Brooke off though. For whatever reason, she wrote in her diary that William had made, quote, a terrible mistake. That's one way to put it. But quote, nobody is as hard on him as he is on himself. By that point though, Brooke thought her own childbearing years were in the past because after she had these seven pregnancies, it seems like she had a medical procedure done to ensure that she wouldn't get pregnant again. And William obviously is not great dad material that's putting it so lightly on top of the child abuse charges. He was a really big conspiracy theorist and he was also, again, they have record of this violently racist, especially when he would get really drunk and it seemed like a lot of his rants he would go on and kind of like racist leanings were towards indigenous Americans. In 2013, Brooke enrolled at Minnesota State University, Moorhead. And she starts majoring in psychology and minoring in sociology. She thought pretty highly of herself. She really believed that she could use her degree to rewrite the entire dsm. Morgan, that's the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders. It's one of the most important texts in modern psychology. It's been around forever. There's a bunch of different versions of it.
- [31:04]
A
It's gold standard.
- [31:06]
B
She considered psychiatric medications to be dangerous. She didn't want to take them herself. Despite admitting that she did suffer from anxiety, stress and ptsd. Maybe that was something she was going to do when she rewrote the whole dsm.
- [31:18]
A
Yeah, that thick ass book.
- [31:20]
B
That thick ass book. She's gonna, from page one get rid of all the Maggie.
- [31:23]
C
Whatever.
- [31:24]
B
Brooke also had this fascination with her own dark side. And she one time wrote about how all humans are born with two personalities. One that was socially acceptable and one that was not.
- [31:38]
A
It's giving Dexter's dark traveler, Dark passenger, whatever Dexter calls his dark side.
- [31:44]
B
Like, oh, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [31:46]
A
I'm like, what? Okay.
- [31:46]
B
The darkness that lives inside of him. Yeah. At this point, it's safe to say that Brooke and William both had some serious issues. They were dealing with mental health, otherwise, whatever. And it seems like they were probably magnifying each other's worst traits. By 2016, around the time the gray winds moved into the apartment below Brooke and William, things had gotten so volatile between the couple that William forcefully threw Brooke into the bathtub, and the cops were called for a physical disturbance. After pleading guilty to the assault, William was ordered to have no contact with Brooke. But six months later, they were living together again. They were violating the no contact order. That is until January of 2017, when William did move out once more. And this time, it looked like their four year relationship might actually be over for good. Until Brooke told William that she was pregnant with his child.
- [32:43]
A
So let's get back on track here with some clues. We're gonna hop into our fourth clue, which is an interview with William himself. Because around midnight On Tuesday the 21st, the Fargo Police department arrested William as he arrived home in a borrowed red truck that actually belonged to his boss. Official records kind of conflict here. Some documents said the arrest was based on an outstanding warrant for failure to pay a fine and a protective order relating to the domestic violence involving Brooke. But others suggest that William was booked on a new charge because he had actually bumped into a car in the local Walmart parking lot earlier that night after shopping with Brooke. Allegedly, he left the scene without providing his contact info, and the other person got his plates. Regardless, police weren't actually interested in either of these crimes, really. They just wanted to get him talking more about Savannah. By this point, it does seem like police had finally come around to the idea that Brooke and William were somehow involved in Savannah's disappearance. Or at the very least, Brooke was. And they figured if they could get William alone, maybe he'd turn on Brooke, tell them what really happened to Savannah that day in the apartment. So down at the station, they coddled him and allowed him to chew tobacco. They listened patiently as he ranted about, quote, hardcore feminists ruining society. When they did get him on the topic of the Gray wind family, he also revealed his racist views about the.
- [34:21]
B
Indigenous community, just not holding on anything.
- [34:24]
A
He portrayed himself as an innocent victim, unable to go about his normal life because of the indigenous people constantly bothering him about Savannah. As for Savannah herself, William said that she was in the apartment working with Brooke when he got home Saturday afternoon between 2 and 2:30pm and then William claimed that he took a shower. And by the time he got out, Savannah was gone. In the interview clip, though, I will say I personally think he seems a little confused on what he did. Yeah, I just came in. I wanted to get my shit off, get my clothes off, and then I showered. Yeah, I showered.
- [35:03]
B
Yeah. The way he presents the order of events is also incorrect.
- [35:07]
A
How are you confused?
- [35:09]
B
We're gonna play a little bit of that clip here for you now.
- [35:12]
A
Let me know what you think.
- [35:13]
B
I went to bedroom, started to like undress for my day, started my shower and her dad knocking. Savannah's dad. Yeah. And then she took her off.
- [35:27]
A
So he's also kind of changing his story a little bit here, kind of admitting, oh yeah, I actually was in the apartment when Savannah disappeared. Yet despite this admission, police don't hold William for further questioning. Instead, they release him on early Wednesday with plans to talk to his co workers about his behavior instead. So on Wednesday, August 23, Fargo detectives interview William's boss, the one who actually lent him that red truck. And through him, they learned this. William had been telling his co workers that he and Brooke just had a baby in a home birth. Which leads us to our fifth clue. That Walmart trip and what William was purchasing. So the detectives, they go back to Walmart, they get a copy of William's receipt to see exactly what he purchased. And sure enough, he purchased a pack of newborn sized diapers. Detectives at this point want to make absolutely sure it was William. So they requested to see the store's security footage too, which confirmed what investigators already knew. William went to Walmart, and there he was on camera purchasing baby diapers.
- [36:46]
B
Now they've decided they want to fill out the paperwork to get a real search warrant for William and Brooke's apartment, which long I know they reportedly do by Wednesday morning, which is four days into the search for Savannah. But they don't use the warrant that morning actually, or that afternoon or that evening. The Fargo police department later claimed that they actually put William and Brooke under 24 hour surveillance while they tried to figure out if they would be endangering Savannah in any way by forcing their way in to conduct a search.
- [37:17]
A
But hold on. Don't they already have them under constant surveillance?
- [37:21]
B
Yes, basically. Okay, but. So they, they're thinking that Savannah is in there. They don't know, but they just don't want to go in because they don't know if it'll endanger her in some way. Yeah, but the next day, that's when the police department seemed like they were ready to move. They come in with a crime scene investigation van and at 1:30pm Police ask the gray winds to wait across the street while they execute the warrant. At 1:41pm they pound on Brooke and William's apartment door and there's no answer. So to their credit, they do break it down with a battering ram. They have the warrant, they're getting inside, and once they get inside the apartment, they they see that Brooke is in there. But there's also someone in there they were really not expecting to see. Because laying quietly on Brooke and William's bed is a newborn baby girl.
- [38:13]
C
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A
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A
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- [40:16]
B
Someone living downstairs heard police talking and shouted across the street to the gray winds. They found a baby. If the baby was Savannah's daughter, as the officers realized it must be, then she was four weeks premature and she might need urgent medical care. So they bundled the baby off to Sanford Children's hospital, Ignoring the grey wins request to see or hold her. Ashton, presumed to be the baby's father, was across the street with Savannah's family, But he wasn't allowed to see his newborn daughter either. Instead, the baby was placed in the custody of Cass County Social services with no visitors permitted until the authorities could determine who the child's lawful parent or guardian was. Then detectives took Savannah's toothbrush and dirty clothing from her family's apartment to collect DNA, make sure that the baby was in fact hers. Meanwhile, Brooke was arrested at the apartment and another team of officers arrested William at work. And unfortunately, even with all of this that they gathered, there were still no leads on Savannah herself. So let's go back and revisit when Brooke initially told William she was pregnant. So here's what we know about, at least what William says about his experiences during Brooke's pregnancy. He claims at first he was thrilled. He even told all of his friends and co workers at a local roofing company that he was about to be a dad again. But the couple was struggling emotionally and financially. Besides their money problems, William had another really big fear. He thought that the baby might actually be taken away from them at birth because they both had this history. They both had crimes that they had committed as parents towards children. And so it seems like they were making plans to ensure that the baby wouldn't be taken away from them immediately. They talked about having an unattended home birth so that the authorities, at least according to William, wouldn't crucify them. Essentially, they wanted to have like an off the grid birth so people wouldn't even really know that they had had the baby. They also skipped every single prenatal appointment because they didn't want anyone to find out and contact child Protective services. William said, though, despite all this, he could not wait to meet their baby. And Brooke had told him that the baby was due In September of 2017, the same month that Savannah was due to have her baby. There was just one big problem. The whole thing was a lie. It seems like Brooke tricked William with a fake pregnancy specifically to keep him from leaving her. But she says over time, she started convincing herself of this lie as well. Brooke had told William earlier that she had her tubes tied. She said that was the procedure she had to make sure she couldn't get pregnant again. And when she told him that she was pregnant, he didn't question it. And he said that it's just because he's not an OB GYN and that's not his area of expertise, and so he just figured you could still get pregnant. He also said that he thought he was seeing changes in her body that corresponded with pregnancy, but that was not the case. Brooke went to pretty extreme lengths to continue this lie. She even found a fetal heartbeat recording online, and she sent that to William along with her own sonogram photo and a photo of a positive test from a previous pregnancy. So all of the evidence of the pregnancy was just shown to him via photos. And William bought it. They restarted their relationship with plans to raise this child together. Brooke claims that the pregnancy seemed so real to her that she kept a record of her symptoms, including her weight changes, swelling, even contractions she said she was having. And according to Brooke, William didn't get suspicious of this fake pregnancy until August 6, when they had a really big fight about it. And eventually the truth came out. That's when he hit her. He said he had already told everyone he knew about this baby. And it seems like Brooke realized she had to find a way to fix this problem. She needed to come up with a baby somehow, or else William was going to be embarrassed. Conveniently, her downstairs neighbor was due right around the time that Brooke told people that she would be expecting. And now it was just a matter of figuring out how to make that baby her own.
- [44:39]
A
So let's get into clue number six for us, which are the bizarre stories Brooke and William told police after they were caught. Now, Brooke admitted that the baby was Savannah's, but she said that she didn't do anything to actually harm Savannah. Instead, Brooke swore that Savannah didn't want the baby and didn't want to wait for her due date to give the baby up. So when Savannah came over to help Brooke with the all terrain, Brooke had given her advice on how to induce labor. Then Brooke said Savannah left her apartment alive on Saturday afternoon, only to return on Monday after the first three police searches when she gave Brooke her newborn baby. Afterwards, Brooke said she never saw Savannah again, but presumed she ran away to escape from her family and Ashton. But William's story was totally Totally different. He said that the baby was in the apartment when he got home on Saturday and was there during all of the searches. According to his version of events, he returned from work to find Brooke cleaning up blood in the bathroom and holding a newborn. He goes on to say that Brooke showed him the baby and said, quote, this is our baby, this is our family. William said he never saw Savannah at all, just the baby, which contradicts his previous statements to police, which he said he saw Brooke and Savannah working together when he got home. He also explained that the infant was, quote, in a little bed next to him in the bedroom during the first three searches. The little bed was later revealed to be a suitcase. William he actually goes so far as to say, quote, the baby was right there. You guys just didn't see it. The baby was right there because they.
- [46:40]
B
Didn'T want to disturb him laying in.
- [46:42]
A
Bed, make him move. It was probably. The baby was literally probably just under the covers right there. The detectives interrogating him didn't buy his story, though. One of them replied, quote, this is eating you up inside. It's all over your face. She's eight months pregnant and all of a sudden you have a tiny Native American baby in your house and she's gone. This is pretty straightforward as far as that part of it. End quotes. They tried to tell William that Brooke was inevitably going to turn on him, so he should just tell the truth first. But William insisted He was, quote, 100% backing Brooke and that he really believed the baby was hers.
- [47:23]
B
After that, he just went to work one day and she had a home birth and gave birth to a baby that didn't look like either of them, right, and didn't ask any questions.
- [47:33]
A
After police got done talking with the couple, they realized the baby was probably their motive all along. Their new theory is that Savannah was killed by one or both of them so that they could pass the baby off as their own child.
- [47:49]
B
On Friday, August 25, the detectives collect DNA from Ashton to compare to the baby, who still at that point had not been allowed any familial visitors at the hospital. Meanwhile, Savannah's friends and family gathered again, this time without any help from the police, to still search for Savannah. They go to multiple local parks. They come back empty handed every single time. There's a bigger public search party that starts on Saturday the 26th, and for that one, over 200 people show up, including Chippewa firefighters from Norberta's reservation, and they start focusing on the Red river and its banks once again. They don't have any luck finding anything. But during these searches, Ashton and the gray winds actually realized that one of the searchers is a well known indigenous activist named Ruth Buffalo, who's actually running for state legislature. So they ask her to join the organization team for Sunday's search party. And that day she catches wind of a possible lead.
- [48:52]
A
Yeah, which is kind of a clue. Maybe not. And you guys will see why. But it's the farmhouse. That afternoon, one of the searchers says she spotted blood and a breast pump at a farmhouse near Red River. The gray winds let themselves get a little bit of hope if there's fresh blood at the farmhouse, maybe Savannah is alive, maybe being held captive. The police think this is credible enough that they show up to search and they tell the media the farm is a potential crime scene. But just a couple of hours later, they get a call that pulls them away from the farm. And we never really find out anything else about this location. But regardless about this location, potentially what it holds, they get some shocking news that steers the direction elsewhere.
- [49:38]
B
Yeah. And that's because at about 5:45pm These recreational kayakers that are on the Red river, they have nothing to do with the search party. They're just out there kayaking. But they spot a human sized object in plastic trash bags on the river. It's wrapped in duct tape, lodged against a tree. Police respond to the scene immediately. And sadly, we. When they get there and they start looking at what's been found, they unwrap it and find that it is a body and it is Savannah. They know it's her immediately from a tattoo that's on her. It's actually a tattoo that honors her late grandmother. And it reads, quote, too beautiful for earth. And right there, Brooke's story about Savannah wanting to induce labor is conclusively busted. Because Savannah's body has been, you know, the investigators that found her described it as being sliced open from hip to hip, which shows that her daughter had been removed through some sort of amateur C section that was performed on her. And the medical examiner determines that her cause of death is homicidal violence. However, the police still hope to get the full truth out of either Brooke or William. And the best way they decide to do that is actually going to be by pitting them against each other.
- [51:02]
A
Yeah. And that brings us to our clue number eight, which is William's ace hardware visit. Even after finding Savannah's body, William denies he did anything besides help clean up the blood. So police still need to tie him to the actual crime. In Order to put him behind bars. That's when they find out he went to ace Hardware at 1pm on Sunday the 20th, the day after Savannah disappeared. And there, William bought duct tape, which is exactly what was used to wrap the plastic bags around Savannah's body. Police actually test the duct tape used to conceal Savannah and find William's fingerprints all over it. Which means while Savannah died Saturday afternoon, her body must have been dumped after William's duct tape purchase at 1pm on Sunday, almost 24 hours later. So either Brooke and William somehow got Savannah's body out of the apartment Saturday afternoon, Past her entire family downstairs who are suspicious and watching like hawks, or her body was in that apartment during at least the first two searches. And it's actually quite possible that Savannah was hidden in that bathroom closet where Joe Graywin told them a body could be hidden. But police didn't check the bathroom closet until the third search, which happened Sunday evening, a few hours after William had bought that duct tape.
- [52:28]
B
So William and Brooke both lawyer up. At this point, they refuse to tell police anything more. So prosecutors charged both of them with conspiracy to commit murder, Conspiracy to commit kidnapping, and providing false information to the police. And both of them. Would you believe it? Plead not guilty on all charges. Prosecutors successfully argue for a two million dollar bail for each of them. After presenting evidence that Brooke and William were searching travel sites before their arrest. They do not want them posting bail and going anywhere. William complains about the bail being unattainable.
- [53:03]
C
Duh.
- [53:03]
B
William. Like that's why they did it. William. But the judge has no sympathy for him. William complains a lot, actually. Not just in court. I mean, we heard about him talking to the cops. He's complaining about the indigenous people. He's complaining about just every. He, like, always has someone to blame his sorry life on. And even though he knows that his calls are being recorded, he uses his phone time in jail to complain, even about Savannah because he's a sicko.
- [53:31]
A
Which leads us to our final clue number nine, William's lack of remorse. The biggest mystery kind of left at this point is how each person contributed to Savannah's murder. Both of them are expected to blame the other at trial. So prosecutors are busy gathering evidence to figure out who's exactly lying or at least who's telling the biggest lies. And when it comes to William, they've actually got what they think is a secret weapon. His ex fiance, Tanith McLeod. She took William in briefly when he left Brooke before she lured him back in with her fake pregnancy. And Tanith is Indigenous, too. In fact, she's actually from the same tribe as Norberta's family and is a distant cousin of Savannah's. So when she heard about Savannah's disappearance, she immediately turned against William and started helping the police. She actually pressed William's mom for information on his possible involvement. So much so that William called his mom from jail on September 16th to tell her to stop talking to Tanith. Arrogant. Even from behind bars, William tells his mom that Tanith's motivations aren't exactly pure, saying, quote, she's not hurt because Savannah left this world. She's hurt because I chose Brooke over her. But that didn't stop William from talking to Tanith in prison, too, even though he suspected the police were listening. And of course they were. They recorded him rattling off a long list of complaints, like the Greywind family had set him up. The police weren't telling the public the whole truth. His bail was too high. His cellmate was a snitch. He never asked how the baby was doing or expressed any regret about Savannah's death. In fact, he told his mom, quote, I don't f ing think twice about Savannah or how Savannah was going to be bringing that baby up.
- [55:23]
B
For months, prosecutors continue preparing for two trials with two separate defendants who are both just going to point the finger at each other. But then, on December 11, 2017, Brooke really throws him a curveball by changing her plea to guilty. There's no deal. Prosecutors are still going to seek the maximum sentence of life without parole. She's just decided that she wants to skip the whole trial process, and she wants to tell her story in her own words. The day after she pleads guilty, Brooke actually sends a letter to a reporter declining an interview. And she writes, quote, there are many things that I would like to say, but I'm ashamed of what I've done. Because of this shame, and with a good amount of humility, I don't feel I have the right to say a damn thing except, I'm sorry. She also says that she still expects to testify against William. And after her sentence hearing, she admits one of the most shocking things that is revealed, really, in this entire case. But she does admit that Savannah was alive when Brooke performed her amateur C section on her. She says, and this is very graphic for anyone listening, quote, she would wake up and pass out and wake up and pass back out, and then she would wake up, but it happened so fast. I did cut her, and then I took the baby out of her. She was not dead when I cut her and took her baby out of her. Although there was evidence of strangulation, Savannah's cause of death was revealed to be blood loss, which was due to having a C section with what they were able to determine was a utility knife and of course, no anesthesia. For her crime, Brooke does get the maximum sentence, life without the possibility of parole. But it's at William's trial, which starts on September 18, 2018, that Brooke ends up really telling her whole story. Brooke said that she and William always had a violent relationship. It featured him choking her during sex and making her listen to his fantasies about sexually assaulting and killing young girls. But she never thought that they were going to actually do anything like that until. Remember we mentioned earlier that Brooke claimed that they had a big fight on August 6, 2017, which was regarding the fake pregnancy. And it's then William called her out, and Brooke had to admit to everyone involved that she was faking the whole thing. Then she claimed that William angrily told her that she had better produce a baby. And he was the one that mentioned Savannah downstairs. He told her that she was pregnant. On August 19, she lured Savannah to her apartment and then started a fight with Savannah, pushing her backwards. Savannah ended up hitting her head hard enough to be unconscious. And that's when Brooke started doing the C section. And that's when Brooke admits that William came home and saw Savannah's body. And that's when he got a rope and wrapped it around her neck and said, if she wasn't dead before, she's dead now. Then the two of them work together to put Savannah in the bathroom closet, the exact one that Jo told the cops to search since that very first day in the investigation. And the two of them together cleaned the crime scene before the cops even arrived. The baby stayed quiet while they hit her on the bed. For the first two searches, it was honestly pure luck that the police didn't hear anything they said. And at some point on Sunday, they moved Savannah's body into a hollowed out dresser. Early on Monday, under the COVID of darkness, they carried that dresser outside. And then Brooke stayed home with the baby While William drove to red river to dump the dresser that was containing Savannah's body.
- [59:05]
A
However, William's attorney told a pretty different version of the story. The biggest being that William didn't participate in her murder at all, Only in the cleanup and disposing of her body. Which is why, when it came time for his trial, he changed his plea from not guilty to guilty to the lesser crimes of conspiracy to commit kidnapping and making false statements to Police. He still pleaded not guilty to conspiracy to commit murder, though. His lawyer, Daniel Borgin, basically said William's biggest mistake was falling in love with Brooke. She tricked him into thinking they were going to have a family together, and he bought all the pregnancy stuff. Then when she realized Savannah was due the same time her fake baby was, Brooke meticulously planned her murder. Brooke's own journals do support that. She was researching midwifery and other topics related to delivering a baby at home long before August, which shows she was likely thinking about this plan for a while. Overall, the defense paints a picture of William as someone who was under the spell of a master manipulator. And it works. On the afternoon of September 28, just before 4pm the jury returns a shocking not guilty verdict on the conspiracy to commit murder charge for William. The Grey wins are devastated.
- [60:32]
B
But that is not the end of this case. Prosecutors come up with a hack that's going to allow them to get a heavier sentence for Williams other two crimes. So they classify him as what's known as a dangerous special offender. It's a designation that's reserved for those convicted of two, quote, substantially similar serious crimes, both of which endanger someone's life. William's first crime was when he cracked his infant's skull on the changing table. And the prosecutor says that that is similar to his second crime, which is endangering Savannah's baby by abducting her. That allows the judge to give a sentence of life in prison, though with the possibility of parole. And that at least brings a little bit of relief to the Gray Wynn family, at least until August 22, 2019, almost two years to the day after Savannah's murder. The North Dakota Supreme Court overturns William's sentence, saying the prosecution erred in determining that his two crimes were similar. Both the severe endangerment of infants. Their reasoning is that kidnapping Savannah's baby didn't endanger her life, though they forced her to be born four weeks premature, did not seek out any medical attention, anything but. They ruled that William and Brooke took good care of her during the abduction. William was re sentenced to 20 years, meaning that he will get out of prison by the time he is 51 years old. And that is just the most devastating blow to the Gray Wynn family I can imagine.
- [62:16]
A
Yeah, and honestly, it feels to me like a pretty big failure on our justice system.
- [62:23]
B
That man is a threat at 51. He could go on to have more children.
- [62:28]
A
I am just baffled how there wasn't enough evidence to convict him of the conspiracy charge. But that's my personal hot take for the day. At this point, it feels like we kind of know everything we're ever gonna get unless either Brooke or William change their story. But honestly, they're both pretty unbelievable at this point. It's also hard to say why the investigation was handled so poorly. I mean, we've got five tallies on our botched board today. But if you're out there listening and think we needed more, please let us know what number you came up with. I just find it completely baffling how police failed to notice an infant in three different searches and not looking in one of the closets, like, not checking anywhere. Especially when Joe, like, lives in that same unit and is, like, this is where she could be. And they would have found her. They likely would have found her if they would have searched on those initial searches.
- [63:31]
B
She was in that apartment for a while.
- [63:33]
A
According to the Fargo Police Department, their story is basically this. They did everything they could to find Savannah all along. And anything that seemed sketchy to the public, like the detectives flirting with Brooke and then being harsh and unfriendly to Joe, was just them playing a long game so Brooke and William would let their guard down. They also said that the delays didn't really change the case's outcome.
- [63:57]
B
What the hell are they talking about?
- [64:00]
A
Didn't one of them go on audio recording? I know a liar, and Brooke is not a liar.
- [64:06]
B
Yeah, the outcome isn't necessarily just the sentencing. The outcome is also the trauma that you inflict upon innocent families. Like, I don't understand how they don't see that.
- [64:17]
A
And it also. It could have changed the case's outcome. You could have found her body in that apartment before William went and disposed of it and then got off on all conspiracy to commit murder charges. Yeah, it could have totally changed. So don't say could have not changed the case's outcome. It. It very easily couldn't.
- [64:35]
C
We.
- [64:35]
A
We don't know. Yeah, you don't. You don't have a crystal ball. The gray Wins obviously experienced all of this very differently. Norberta felt dismissed and talked down to by dispatchers even before the first police officer responded to her 911 call. I mean, one dispatcher yelled at her. Joe told the police exactly where Savannah could have been hidden, and he was dismissed. But they felt like the police just wanted to dismiss Savannah as a runaway because she was a young, pregnant indigenous woman, which, again, I find hard to believe, considering she put a deposit on an apartment and had just ordered pizza. This was a woman that was making plans to have a life and raise her baby, not someone trying to run away.
- [65:17]
B
Absolutely. It has been eight years now since Savannah died, and a lot has happened in that time. Ashton, we're happy to announce, has received full custody of his daughter. Her gray wind grandparents were very happy with this. He's an amazing dad and they get to see the baby all the time. Who is now like a third grader, I guess. Eight years old on June 13, 2022, Ashton did actually get into an accident that left him in a coma for a little while, but he was able to make a full recovery and continue just being a great dad to his daughter. Almost a year after his accident, he posted about it on Facebook saying, quote, I just want to say I'm grateful and blessed to still be here with all of y'. All. Smiley face. I was literally on the edge of dying, but my strength pulled me through yet once again. And that is coming from truly one of the strongest people I can't even imagine. And these days, he posts a lot of pictures of his daughter, and it's clear that he still really loves Savannah, even after all these years. In 2024, he posted a picture of the two of them captioned, you knew everything about me and that's why I fell in love with you. Miss you, babe.
- [66:30]
A
Savannah has had a huge impact on the missing and murdered indigenous women movement. In October 2020, Savannah's act became law. It's meant to protect indigenous people by encouraging more prompt and complete cooperation between federal, tribal and local authorities. Under the law, states are supposed to choose indigenous organizations. Liaisons such as MMIP and the Department of Justice is supposed to notify those organizations whenever an indigenous person is missing or becomes the victim of a murder. When indigenous communities find out about cases involving indigenous victims, especially those who are missing, they can rally resources who may bring specific, crucial tribal knowledge to the table. In searching for someone, helping US Law enforcement agencies collaborate more actively with indigenous resources is a win win for everyone, especially missing people and their families. But there's a bit of a problem with this. Savannah's act makes it optional, not mandatory, for law enforcement agencies to submit a plan to the federal Department of Justice for how they'll handle communication with indigenous groups in MMIP cases. And reportedly, as of November 2023, not one law enforcement agency in the country had done so yet. So if you guys out there, I know I do want to see more cooperation, hopefully less botched investigations of cases involving indigenous people. You can support organizations like the Indian Law Resource center and the National Indigenous Women's Resource center, which are pushing for cooperation with Savannah's law and other legal reforms to help prevent another case like this one. And on that note, we are closing our case on Savannah Gray Wind and moving on to our Missing Person of the Week. Our Missing Person of the Week is coming from one of you out there. We saw your comment on our YouTube channel and you wanted us to look into the disappearance of 21 year old Courtney Stouffer from Palmera, Pennsylvania on Sunday, July 29, 2012. Courtney disappeared without an apparent reason. The last known contact with her was at 3:30am by the Palomar police regarding a disturbance. According to the comment on YouTube, she disappeared after cops had been called to her place twice after she had a really sketchy neighbor who she did not get along with who was seen after taking a lot of black trash bags out of his apartment in the weeks following her disappearance. According to the FBI website, foul play is suspected regarding Courtney's disappearance. Courtney was 21 at the time of her disappearance. Blonde hair, longer than shoulder length, green eyes, five eight, about 115 pounds. She has a tattoo on her right arm that reads one love. A tattoo on the top of her right foot of three stars and a tattoo on her left side of a pistol shooting flowers. If you have any information please contact Detective Jared Henry of the West Lebanon County Regional Police Department in Lebanon, Pennsylvania at 717-838-8189 or you can contact the FBI at 800-634-4097. Thank you so much for commenting and highlighting Courtney's case and if there's any cases you guys out there want to see us highlight, please keep commenting on our YouTube. We do see them and others see them too. Thousands of people are seeing these names now so let's keep getting the word out there.
- [70:04]
B
And that is all we have for this episode. Now we want to hear from you guys your thoughts, your feedback theories, how these cases impact you. Really really means a lot to us and we read through the comments and we just love to hear from you guys. It's what makes this community so special.
- [70:20]
A
Yeah, thank you At Crime House we really value your support. So again share all your thoughts and remember to rate, review and follow clues to help others discover the show.
- [70:28]
B
All right, we will see you next week for another episode. Bye guys. Bye. Looking for your next Crime House? Listen, don't miss Crimes of with Sabrina Diana Roga and Corinne Vien. Crimes of is a weekly series that explores a new theme each season season from Crimes of the Paranormal Unsolved murders, mysterious disappearances, and more. The first season is Crimes of Infamy, the true story behind Hollywood's most iconic horror villains. And coming up next is Crimes of Paranormal Real life cases where the line between the living and the dead gets seriously blurry.
- [71:05]
A
Listen to Crimes of every Tuesday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you listen to podcast.