← Drop Dead Serious With Ashleigh Banfield
Drop Dead Serious With Ashleigh Banfield
FBI Tears Up Concrete, Seizes Evidence Bags from Mom’s Home in Melodee Buzzard Case
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A
Limu Emu and Doug, here we have the Limu Emu in its natural habitat helping people customize their car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. Fascinating. It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug.
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B
Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us.
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A
Cut the camera. They see us.
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Only pay for what you need@libertymutual.com Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Savings vary unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company and affiliates Excludes Massachusetts foreign.
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C
Hey everyone.
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D
I'm Ashley Banfield and this is drop dead serious. I'm recording this on Halloween night. So happy Halloween. I hope you had a good one. I was busy working because I really wanted to bring this to you. It's important and it's timely and it has to do with Halloween because honest to God, I have no idea what what Halloween night is like in Lompoc, California. That's a ways up the coast from Santa Barbara. But I can guess and I'm damn sure I know that nine year old Melody Buzzard ought to be a part of it. She ought to be hitting the neighborhood streets with a gaggle of all her little girlfriends wearing costumes that no doubt they picked out in the summer. And she ought to be collecting a ton of free candy that is going to give her and her friends all cavities and tummy aches, you know, for days. This is like the epitome of a fourth grader's night to remember. But Melody is having none of that. Or if she is, she's having it a long way away from her home and police would really like to know where. And as you know, if you've been following my coverage, this little girl's whereabouts can't be verified beyond an outbound leg of a cross country road trip that was made with her mom and that happened earlier this month. She was seen on surveillance video at a car rental office near the family's home on October 7. The Daily Mail newspaper said that she was also seen on security cameras at pit stops that were made en route to Nebraska. But police say when Ashley Buzzard returned home on October 10, her daughter was no longer with her. That's not good. We don't know how police know that, but they say it's a fact. Nor do we know why Ashley Buzzard drove to Nebraska, nor what became of Melody between California and Nebraska. But we do know that mom is apparently home tonight and I am real curious to know whether she's handing out candy to all the trick or treaters on her block and what's running through her mind right now. If she Is this time last night that mom Ashley Buzzard was out, out of that house. And not by choice. It looked like police had come to collect her and move her to what they called a, quote, alternate location. While they scoured her house and her garage for evidence. And not just her house and her garage, they also scoured a storage unit and that rental car that she took that trip across the country with her daughter a couple weeks before.
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C
So.
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D
So the way they did this was weird. The plainclothes officers with, you know, guns and holsters on their hip, which was the dead giveaway that they were officers, although I can't be certain. They came and picked her up, she packed a bag, she got into a van, drove off with them, and then they brought her back many hours later. Yes, but they brought her back to the house, and according to a neighbor, those agents went inside and stayed inside with her for about 30 minutes before they finally came out and left on their way. That was around 12 midnight, 1am Pacific Time last night. The house, though, that she came home.
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C
To was very different.
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A neighbor tells us exclusively that agents took out two large yellow evidence bags and that they also removed carpet and drywall. And it appears they tore up some of the concrete in the garage. That gave me Gacy vibes, I'm not gonna lie. I just watched the Gacy doc and, well, docudrama and you know, Gacy took detectives into his garage and started like taking spray paint and xing the areas, goes, oh, here's where this guy is.
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C
And told him the whole story.
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D
And of course, what did the detectives do? Wide eyed, took it all in and then returned and actually cut into the concrete. So that's kind of fresh in my mind. So hearing that agents were in Melody Buzzard's home while Ashley, her mother, was at an alternate location and that they are taking concrete out of the garage, it didn't feel good. But here's what I do know. They didn't find anything because Ashley Buzzard wouldn't have been coming home, right? They'd found anything like they found in Gacy's. They'd never, ever bring her back home. She'd be in the lockup, right, the local jail, but the home in the garage, that's not the only search warrants that were executed last night. The feds also, and I say the feds because they had FBI on their jackets. They also searched a storage locker and they searched that rental car that Melody was last seen in, which made me a little frustrated because it's been weeks since that rental car was returned. How, how many people have rented it since? How many times has it been vacuumed? But you're going to hear in a minute why that matters. Ashley Buzzard, the mom, needless to say, is stonewalling everybody, not just the investigators, but Melody's relatives on her dad's side, too. And don't forget, Melody's dad died back in 2016 when Melanie was just a baby. But worse than that, Ashley, that mom now seems determined to sabotage the search for her own kid. You probably saw my coverage earlier this week where Ashley Buzzard was caught ripping down her kids missing posters, her own daughter's missing posters out in her front yard. She's tearing them down, collecting them up, you know, bundling them up and walking into her house like it's garbage. My next guest knows all too well about what the FBI does when a child is missing and the agents start flipping the the house. Jennifer Coffendoffer is a retired FBI agent and a good friend of mine, and I turn to her whenever I need to figure out what's what. Here's our conversation from my News Nation show. Banfield.
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And Doug. Here we have the Limu Emu in its natural habitat, helping people customize their car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. Fascinating. It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug.
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B
Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us.
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A
Cut the camera. They see us.
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B
Only pay for what you need@liberty mutual.com Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Savings Ferry Unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company Affiliates excludes.
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C
Massachusetts what's your reaction to the evidence that we know of? I mean, again, this is a neighbor witnessing this, but yellow evidence, bags coming out, concrete being torn up in the garage and drywall and carpet being ripped.
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D
Out of the house?
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E
Well, it's really critical, Ashley, to understanding what they found in there. First of all, if they took those yellow bags, those are typically our larger yellow plastic bags. That tells me there was nothing biodegradable in there. You would never put biodegradable items in plastic bags. We're talking about electronics. Perhaps you replaced the electronics that they would have taken on the October 15 search warrant. The tools, possibly papers, photos, indissa of that crime, that drywall and that concrete. Wow. Carpet. Anything along those lines, you're looking at possibly something that would have been reminiscent of a biological items that would be in there, such as blood, DNA, hair.
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C
Yeah, that's, that's distressing whenever you hear, and I think gacy, when I see they're tearing up the garage concrete because that's what they did in Gacy's case, God forbid. But I feel like they would have known something and she would not have been allowed to return to the house if they got something right away. What do you make of that? The fact that she was back by about one o' clock in the morning, local time?
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E
Well, first of all, I agree with you. They had in that search mark the probable cause not only to show that the item was there, but it was there when they were going to go in there. So, in other words, you can't use stake. We call it stale probable cause. It has to be up to date. So their investigation gave them new information that allowed them to go back in, go to that storage locker, go to that rental car. The fact that they took her out in the first place, Ashley, I'm going to tell you, it's unusual. Usually when we serve search warrants, we allow the people to be around in that area and watch. The fact that they actually took her and she agreed to go to me is very important. It showed that they believe she would be unsafe to be around while they were doing this work.
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C
Whoa. Pull on that thread a little more. What does that mean, unsafe to be around? You can't put her in the back of a cop car and see her reaction and record it all on camera.
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E
Well, you could, but again, this is somebody that is your star witness as to where Melody would be. So if you're a good agent, you hopefully are trying to warm up to her, establish some sort of credibility with her, take her to perhaps a hotel or other location where she would be comfortable. And from all accounts, Ashley, she is not in her right mind. So you definitely don't want somebody like that going off, being in a police car for hours.
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C
So do you think they would have told her, we're about to flip your house and carve bits and pieces out of the carpet and the wall and the concrete. Or do you think they would have said, come with us for a chat and said nothing else and then she would have come home to see what had happened when she went for that chat.
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E
I think that they told her during the chat that they were going to tear her house up, if you will, that they're going to leave no stone unturned and you really can't look in the BTK case, Remember those items that were found later, many years later, that were his souvenirs of the crime. Not that this is a serial killer, but imagine if she did harm Melody, she might want to keep trinkets or something around hidden that would remind her of Melody.
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C
Okay, let's talk a little bit more about the electronics. You touched on it briefly at the top, but I'm always fascinated about, you know, the trail that the electronics leave these days is just like chef's kiss for investigators. Right. Generally speaking, you're not talking about criminals who know much about what they're doing, even if they've seen forensic files. I would think if she was planning to do anything with Melody. And I'm going to talk about Nebraska and why Nebraska is important in a minute. It would have been planned and more than likely planned on a phone or a laptop. So I'm assuming that's what they're after. Right.
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E
They're looking for those Google searches. They're also looking for maps. They're looking for what she might have planned out in terms of what roads she would have taken. Also the destination would be important. So they're going to be looking at all of that. There's going to be so many clues if there are electronics there.
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C
Okay. And then the next thing is the rental car. You know, the storage locker was being searched and the rental car was being searched. But, I mean, Jennifer, you and I have rented a million cars, right? They. You drive it into the lineup and they're cleaning it almost before you get out of it. It's pretty hard to get forensic evidence out of a rental car days and days after that car's been returned.
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Well, you know what? This isn't a Bryan Coburger cleaning crew here, Ashley, that he had the car five weeks and scrubbed it. Typically, if there really is anything in that car. And remember, it wouldn't be unusual for her hair to be there. But what could be unusual would be blood to be there. And if there's anything like that that they find, it's going to be gold.
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C
And I guess they don't clean the trunk quite like they clean the inside cabin where people are usually sitting. So that's pretty fascinating. And I hate that we're even talking about the trunk because I still hope we're talking about a little girl who was in a passenger seat and got out somewhere. Which brings me to Nebraska. I know that, you know, with all your FBI background, you know that Nebraska is a hotbed for sex trafficking. There's a whole bunch of reasons why that the crossroads of the interstates allow you to get in and out of that state easily over state lines. The laws are considered by traffickers to be more lax. Lots of big sporting events, which means lots of, you know, people looking for sex and, you know, Needing a good pool of sex workers and then a real vulnerable population, a lot of migrants and people who are underrepresented in the law. So, you know, easy targets for sex crimes. This is what I feared when I heard the road trip went to Nebraska. I'm assuming your brain went there too.
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E
It did, but I balanced that with her actions. It seems like she wants to keep complete control of Melody.
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C
Right.
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It seems like in her world she was fearful that they might take her away and actually she might not be that far off base with what was going on with CPS and family and so on and so forth, knowing she was in a bad environment, the school and so forth. And it just seems to me that she's so controlling that she either a left her with somebody that she knows and only she knows. Maybe somebody she did contact on the Internet, or the unthinkable. Ashley.
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C
Yeah, well, there's two unthinkables in my books, and that is number one, she took her to Nebraska. Allegation here my thinking only for, you know, sex trafficking, selling, selling her daughter or murder. I mean, this is what we do on this show. These are the worst case scenarios that we're, you know, we work in this every day, so it's not out of the ordinary. What do you make of her tearing up the missing posters like that, to me was just bonkers.
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E
Well, first of all, it's in line with what we've heard about her, the bonkers part. And secondarily to me, that's all about this control. She doesn't want anyone saying anything about her daughter but her complete and solid control of the narrative and what's happening. And she doesn't want those posters up because she doesn't want anybody hoping to find Melody like you're doing on your show.
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C
Yeah, but wow, how obvious are you when you're doing that right out in front of all your neighbors? And one just has to peek out the window and see that scene, you know, for. That went on for like a couple of minutes too. She was collecting and gathering and then jamming them all together and walking them inside. One last question I'm trying to get my head around. How do we know? And how would investigators know? And I got about 30 seconds left. How would they know that she didn't return with Melody? How do they know she didn't drop.
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D
Melody off at the house and then go return the rental car?
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E
Well, a couple of things. First of all, that rental car return could have been important. In other words, was there a suitcase in there? Was not Was she or not? And I understand your point about returning first and then returning the rental car, but there would have been those cameras that would have been in that neighborhood. Ring cameras, the road cameras. I think that would have detected that secondarily. Ashley, the number one thing I thought of is she actually might have said something to somebody. This is a manipulative. She is looking to make sure she hides her story and to tell somebody, oh, you know, my daughter isn't with me because I left her in Nebraska. I could see her dropping that little hint to somebody, neighbors or possibly somebody at the rental car company.
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D
I'm not gonna lie. I thought for sure when those men with the sidearms in the, you know, the holsters on their belt, and then they had total, like, cop body. When they showed up at her house yesterday, I thought for sure they were gonna take her on a road trip. They asked her to pack a bag, or at least she had a little bag packed when she left with them and got into the van and then drove off. And I thought for sure they were gonna take her on a road trip to Nebraska. I thought for sure they were telling her, either you drive us to where you dropped her or we're driving you to the county jail, right? Or worse, a federal lockup. And I thought for sure that she'd be gone for a couple days. And then to hear that all that evidence had been taken out of her home, but she was allowed to come back. She's not being held for anything. She's not even being held for not producing this child. I was shocked. I was totally shocked to hear that she was coming home from her alternate location. In any case, I personally don't think she's going to spend a lot of time there. I. I think this case is heating up so much when you have that many warrants executed in that many locations and this much knowledge and a child still missing, I don't see that the days are going to be long for. For Ashley Buzzard. My feeling only. But I've been to this rodeo a lot. I'm still surprised that David hasn't been charged in the Celeste case of the dead girl's body in the trunk of his Tesla. Months now. But you know what? They are patient. If one thing I can tell you about murder detectives, homicide detectives, they are patient because murders forever. There is no statute of limitations on charging someone for murder. It is not the same as every other charge. The clock starts ticking, and you got to get your ducks in a row if you're going to charge them, right? Not with murder. You can just sit around and wait. Wait for her to screw up, wait for anything. If that's in fact what's going to happen. We don't know that.
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C
You have no idea.
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D
For all we know, there could be some crazy explanation. Maybe, just maybe, she dropped her with a friend. And maybe, just maybe, she just doesn't want the police to know which friend. I would be shocked if that were the case. Again, my spidey senses I'm pretty jaded. I've been in the business a while. In any case, I'm going to continue watching this story. I promised you that I would watch for every development and I'm telling you right now, just 24 hours after I dropped my last podcast, here's the newest on Melody Buzzard's mom, Ashley Buzzard, and what those cops have and what they're about to do with it. Thank you so much for listening. Thank you so much for watching. And remember, if you forget one thing I told you in this podcast, remember this. The truth isn't just serious, it's drop dead serious.
- [19:28]
A
And Doug, here we have the Limu Emu in its natural habitat, helping people customize their car insurance and save hundreds with Liberty Mutual. Fascinating. It's accompanied by his natural ally, Doug.
- [19:43]
B
Limu is that guy with the binoculars watching us.
- [19:46]
A
Cut the camera. They see us.
- [19:47]
B
Only pay for what you need@libertymutual.com Liberty Liberty Liberty Liberty Savings Ferry Unwritten by Liberty Mutual Insurance Company and affiliates Excludes Massachusetts.