Mr. Ballin (0:00)

Hey prime members, you can binge eight new episodes of the Mr. Ballin podcast one month early and all episodes ad free on Amazon Music. Download the Amazon Music app Today on a morning in 2002, a man in Indianapolis, Indiana woke up in a cold sweat. His hands shook as he tried to block out the images he'd just seen in his sleep. But he knew these horrific images would not just go away on their own. They would keep haunting him until he did something about it. So he got out of bed, walked to his phone and dialed 911. And when the operator picked up, he said he needed to speak to a detective because he was having dreams that showed him details of a horrific murder that happened back in 1989. The dreams this man claimed to have would help reopen an unsolved murder case that had shocked Indianapolis 13 years earlier. However, these dreams would not answer the questions police had been wrestling with for years, and it would take them another decade to finally track down their killer. But before we get into that story, if you're a fan of the strange, dark and mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come to the right podcast. Because that's all we do. And we upload twice a week, once on Monday and once on Thursday. So if that's of interest to you, please invite the follow button to come trick or treating at your house. However, when they do, only give them pennies and dental floss. Okay, let's get into today's story. Are you holding back on foreign travel plans this year because you're afraid of the language gap? Well, no need to mind the gap if you have Babbel this year, speak like a whole new you with Babbel, the language learning app that gets you talking. Babbel's quick 10 minute lessons, handcrafted by over 200 language experts, get you to begin speaking your new language in three weeks or whatever pace you choose. 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But thanks to Rocket Money, I can see all my subscriptions in one place and get rid of those I don't use. It's saving me a ton of money. That's because with Rocket Money, you can see exactly where your money is going. Rocket Money's dashboard gives you a clear view of your expenses across all of your accounts. And if you find any subscriptions you don't want anymore, Rocket Money can help you get rid of them. Rocket Money is a personal finance app that helps find and cancel your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps lower your bills so you can grow your savings. That's actually my favorite part about Rocket Money, the bill negotiation. They can scan my bills and help find me savings. They can. Then they will literally negotiate lower rates for me. Rocket Money has over 5 million users and has saved a total of 500 million in canceled subscriptions, saving members up to $740 a year. When using all of the app's premium features, cancel your unwanted subscriptions and reach your financial goals faster with Rocket money. Go to Rocketmoney.comballin today. That's Rocketmoney.comballin Rocketmoney.comballin at 5:30am on November 13, 1989, 16 year old Amy Widener woke up coughing in her upstairs bedroom in Indianapolis, Indiana. Amy's throat burned. She glanced over at the clock on her bedside table and saw how early it still was. Now, normally she would have slept a bit longer before getting up and getting ready for school, but she just kept on coughing. So she knew she was not going to be able to fall back asleep. And she knew she needed to stay home sick today. Amy heard a knock on her bedroom door and her mother, Gloria, walked inside holding a two year old little girl in her arms. Her mother said she'd heard Amy coughing and she wanted to check on her. But Amy barely even heard what her mother was saying. Instead, she was smiling at the little girl in a big animated voice. Amy said good morning and the little girl smiled back, reached out her arms and said, mamie, which was her name for Amy. This little two year old girl was Amy's daughter. The girl's father was a friend of Amy's who was a couple years older than her, but he had never really played a role in the baby's life. When Amy's daughter was born, Amy had loved her immediately, but she'd also been terrified. She had no idea how she was going to raise a child on her own, and she thought her life as a normal teenager was basically over. But Amy's mother, Gloria, had done everything in her power to make sure that didn't happen. Gloria had played a huge part in raising this little girl. In fact, Amy's daughter often called Gloria mom. And Gloria's help, along with the help from some of Amy's teachers, had allowed Amy to not only stay in high school, but to thrive. Amy got good grades. She was a cheerleader. She played clarinet in the high school band, and she even tutored other students in French, a language she absolutely loved. She had dreams of going to college someday, and most people who knew her just assumed she would grow up to be a really cool French teacher someday. Back in the bedroom, Amy told her mother there was just no way she could go to school today with her cough. Her mother agreed and told her that she could still take her baby to the babysitter like she usually did during the week. But Amy said to leave her at home. It'd be nice to spend the day with her little girl. Gloria said okay, and then put the little girl on the bed next to Amy. And then she walked out to get ready for work. As tired and sick as Amy felt, she couldn't stop smiling. She loved that her mother had made it possible for her to still just be a teenager most of the time. However, she missed her daughter a lot when she was at school. And so a day like today, to be alone with her daughter was really special. While Amy sat and talked to her daughter on the bed, her older brother JP Walked in. The siblings were only a year apart and they were extremely close. They drove to school together every day and ran in the same circle of friends. And this close knit group of high schoolers spent almost all of their free time together. JP told his sister to get well and said he'd see her when he got home from school. The house remained loud and full of energy for the next couple of hours while Amy's mom got ready for work and her brother and two younger sisters got ready for school. But eventually everybody cleared out and the house became quiet. Amy continued to sit in her bed and just play with her daughter. In a house with four school age kids and a baby, silence was very rare. So this morning felt Extra special. However, that feeling quickly disappeared when Amy heard a door open downstairs. She figured one of her younger sisters must have just forgotten their backpack or something, so Amy cleared her throat and coughed a little and then called out to see who would come home. A little before noon, a few hours after Amy and the baby had been left alone, Amy's mother, Gloria, pulled her car up to the front of the house. She had called Amy several times from work, but she hadn't gotten an answer. She worried that since Amy was sick, she might have fallen asleep, and she just wanted to make sure Amy and the baby were okay. Gloria got out of her car, rushed up the walkway, unlocked the front door, and walked inside. She called out for Amy, but she didn't hear anything. Then, as she walked through the front room and reached the bottom of the stairs, she froze. Amy's little girl was sitting on the landing at the top of the stairs all by herself, and she was crying and she had blood in her pajamas. Gloria instantly ran up the stairs and picked up the baby and held onto her tight. And then she ran through the upstairs hallway and called out for her daughter again, but still didn't get any answer. Gloria reached Amy's bedroom and opened the door. She looked over at the bed and immediately began to scream. That afternoon, not long after Gloria had gotten home, Detective Norman Matthews of the Indianapolis Police Department parked in front of Amy's house and stepped outside. Police had already taped off the property, and Detective Matthews saw forensics officers scouring the front yard for evidence. Matthews also saw a woman standing with several uniformed police officers. The woman was crying, but at the same time she was gently bouncing a little girl in her arms, doing everything she could to make sure the girl wasn't scared or upset. Matthews put on gloves, ducked under the crime scene tape, and walked into the house through the front door. More forensics officers were busy searching both floors of the house, and one of them pointed Matthews upstairs. Matthews walked up the steps, went down the hall, and into Amy's bedroom. A camera flashed as a forensic photographer took pictures of the scene in the bedroom, while Matthews just stood there inside the doorway, staring at the bed. There he saw Amy Widener's lifeless body. Her face and her red hair were bloody. She was naked, and there was blood all over the sheets and on the wall above her. Matthew stepped closer to the body, and he could see cuts and a deep gash on Amy's forehead, and there was bruising on her throat, arms, and legs. The attack on this young woman looked vicious and uncontrolled. Which was horrific enough in and of itself. But when Detective Matthews had gotten the call to come to this house, he'd been informed that this attack had taken place while the victim's two year old daughter was present. And that information made this crime scene much, much worse. Detective Matthews met with a forensics officer who was working in the bedroom. The officer told him that amidst the blood on the wall, they had found what looked like a pretty clear palm print. The officer said the forensics team would carve out that section of the wall to make sure the print was preserved in its entirety in hopes they could eventually find a match in their databases for reference. In 1989, DNA testing was still very much in its early stages, and so it was not being used as an investigative tool by the Indianapolis Police Department. Matthews stepped out of Amy's bedroom and along with several other police officers, started a full search of the house. The front door had apparently been locked when Gloria had come home to check on Amy and the baby. And there was no sign of forced entry. But Matthews and his team found that the sliding glass door on the back patio was unlocked. He also found that Amy's brother's bedroom looked like it had been ransacked. The dresser drawers were open, and it appeared that some pieces of stereo equipment had been pulled out of the wall and stolen. And so, on the surface, this murder now looked like it could have been the result of a burglary gone wrong. Maybe someone had shown up to rob the place and heard Amy or the baby upstairs, and then just attacked and killed Amy, like a target of opportunity. But as Matthews and his team combed through the rest of the house, something hit him. No other rooms looked like Amy's brother's room. There were no signs of robbery anywhere else. If this was a robbery gone wrong, Matthews figured that whoever did it must have been familiar with the house. They must have known exactly where that stereo equipment was and had come there specifically to get it. Matthews knew he did have a witness that might be able to identify the intruder, especially if the intruder was someone who had been to the house before. But there was a big problem with this because that witness was just two years old. After Matthews and his team had completed their initial search of the house, he met with Amy's mother, Gloria, outside. Gloria was able to confirm that stereo equipment was missing from her son's room. She also said JP usually kept about $50 in cash in a dresser drawer, but that was gone, too. Matthews told Gloria that this information was extremely helpful. But there was something more important that he needed from her. He needed her permission for police to question her granddaughter. The idea of putting her granddaughter through any more stress after what that little girl had been through that day made Gloria feel very uneasy. But her daughter had just been brutally murdered, and so she needed the killer to be found and brought to justice. So she agreed to Matthew's request. Gloria and Amy's 2 year old daughter took a seat on the front porch along with Detective Matthews and a police officer who specialized in working with young kids. And that officer introduced herself to Amy's little girl and then handed her some finger puppets. And then she asked the little girl to use these finger puppets to tell everybody what had happened that morning. And then that officer and the others watched and listened while as the little girl used the finger puppets to act out a scene, she made it look like two of the puppets were fighting for a little while. And then she said later on, Mamie was laying on the bed. The little girl had said she had tried to lift Mamie up, but then said Mamie was just too heavy. When Gloria heard her granddaughter say this, she just broke down. And Matthews and the other officer tried not to show how much this affected them. The fact that this little girl had clearly seen her mother get murdered was not something they could just shake off. Eventually, the officer who specialized in working with young kids asked the little girl one more question. Did she know the person who had come into Mamie's room? But all the little girl could remember was that the person was strong. Detective Matthews told the little girl what a great job she'd done. And then he asked Gloria if he could speak to her alone for a minute. Gloria told her granddaughter to stay with the police officer and she'd be right back. Then she followed Matthews off the porch. Matthews told her that the fact her son's room was the only room that had been robbed led him to believe that the killer was very likely another young person who her kids knew. And very likely they knew in advance, that the stereo equipment and the $50 would be in JP's room. So Matthews asked Gloria to come up with a list of names of people who were closest to Amy and jp. Gloria said that Amy and her brother JP hung out with a small group of friends. But she said there was someone outside that group that Matthews should definitely talk to before anybody else. The father of Amy's child, a young man named Tony Abercrombie. And sure enough, the day after the murder, Detective Matthews brought Tony into the station for an interview. Tony was 18 years old, tall, with long Wavy brown hair, and he wore jeans and a T shirt. He looked to Matthews like almost every other teenager in the area. The night before, Matthews had seen Tony giving an impromptu interview about Amy's murder on a local news show, and Matthews didn't really know what to think about that. The reporter had most likely shown up at Tony's house unannounced, and it could be difficult for a young man like Tony to tell a reporter to leave him alone. But there was also the possibility that Tony craved the attention. There were plenty of homicide cases throughout history where the killer went out of their way to get their name in the news. However, Matthews was not ready to jump to any conclusions like that. And now, looking at Tony across the table, he could tell. This kid seemed very upset and maybe even a bit scared. Matthews told Tony he was not in any kind of trouble. The police just needed to know some things about his relationship with Amy. Tony nodded and told Matthews he'd been good friends with Amy's brother, J.P. that's how he had met Amy. He said they had gone out a few times and then ended up sleeping together, and Amy got pregnant. Tony admitted that the idea of becoming a father at his age scared him, and he was not looking forward to the birth of the baby. However, when the baby was born, Amy and Gloria had basically raised her without him. So Tony said he hadn't talked much to Amy since then or had anything to do with his child. He told Matthews he'd gotten a phone call from Amy's friend that Amy had been killed on the morning it happened. Tony said he'd felt completely torn up when she had told him, and in fact, he had to leave work because he was so upset. Tony said he might not have seen Amy very much lately, but he still cared about her. And on top of that, she was one of the sweetest people he'd ever met. It didn't make sense that somebody would want to hurt her. Shortly after that, Matthews got Tony's work details and then told him police would follow up if they needed more information. And then he let him go. Matthews needed to see if Tony really had been at work on the morning Amy had been killed. But based on this one interview he had just done, Tony, Tony did not seem like the type of person who had done that TV interview to draw attention to himself. Instead, he just seemed like a kid who was very upset that a girl he'd been with and fathered a child with was now gone. In the days immediately following the murder, the investigative team started to look into a Range of Amy's friends and classmates, believing the person who broke in and killed her was. Was most likely someone Amy knew. But based on what he'd seen at Amy's house, Detective Matthews had also developed a new theory. Maybe there hadn't been a break in at all. Maybe Amy's brother JP had killed her and then ransacked his own room to try to throw off the police. So Detective Matthews met with JP Multiple times. And in every meeting, JP Made it very clear how angry and upset he was that police would even think he could do something like this to his sister. He said he loved Amy maybe more than anybody else in the whole world. They had been so close ever since they were little kids. But despite these multiple interviews and Detective Matthews continued interest in J.P. the detective did not find anything linking him directly to the crime. His fingerprints were all over the house, including inside of Amy's room. But that was expected. He lived there, so it really didn't mean anything. And there was nothing JP did in the aftermath of the murder that added more suspicion to him. In fact, JP Just seemed devastated by the loss of his sister. And then, on November 17th. So, four days after Amy's murder, when Amy's friends and family all gathered together for her funeral, JP Shared countless stories about some of the best times he'd spent with his sister. He said because they were so close in age, was like they weren't just siblings. They were more like really good friends. At the funeral, J.P. along with J.P. and Amy's mutual friend Rodney and some of Amy's girlfriends, did their best to try to console Amy's younger siblings and her mother, Gloria. But it felt like an impossible task because none of them could accept that this had really happened. Following the funeral, Detective Matthews and his team collected the guest book and made a note of everybody at the service who'd signed the book. Many of the guests had been Amy's classmates and her teachers. And so Matthews and his team first met with some of the high school students on the list that they had not already spoken to. But none of these interviews really led anywhere. All of them just sort of ended with the students talking about how much they were going to miss their friend. And at the same time, Matthews still didn't have any real concrete evidence, like any information on the bloody palm print that had been found in Amy's room. So one afternoon in the week following the murder, Matthews walked down a long hallway lined with lockers at Amy's high school. School was already out, so there were only a handful of students who were still there. Matthews turned down a different hallway with classroom doors on either side and found the French classroom. He walked in and saw Amy's French teacher, Jody George, waiting for him. Matthews had heard from several people that Jody was Amy's favorite teacher, and so he told Jodi this, and this immediately made Jodi break down into tears. She told the detective that Amy had always been a great student, but the real reason that she and Amy had connected was actually because they both had been raising babies at the same time. Jody's child was born not too long after Amy's daughter had been born, and so Amy and the teacher shared parenting tips with each other and bonded over being new mothers. Matthew's hope was that in meeting with Jody, that perhaps she could point him towards other students who were maybe Amy's friends, but who didn't attend the funeral. Detective Matthews ended up getting a list of students that Amy had tutored in French, and he asked Jody if any of these kids might have had a problem with Amy. But Jody said no, not that she knew of. And then over the next several days, as Matthews went down this new list of students, it didn't really go anywhere because once again, all these students could say was just that they really liked Amy and they couldn't believe she was gone.