The Traffic Stop (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)

Summary

MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories

Episode Summary – "The Traffic Stop" (April 13, 2026)

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Episode Overview

In this episode, MrBallen (John Allen) tells the chilling true-crime story of Kim Medlin, a young waitress whose mysterious disappearance in 1997 North Carolina became a harrowing tale of obsession, law enforcement deception, and tragedy. The episode reconstructs the investigation, explores possible suspects, and ultimately uncovers an unexpected perpetrator hiding in plain sight.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Kim Medlin's Life and Night of Disappearance

• Kim Medlin, a 26-year-old waitress, finishes a late shift at a topless bar in Charlotte, NC.
  • She enjoys her work as it provides good pay and allows daytime hours to tend to her horses and new home. (02:30)
  • Kim has a history of nervous late-night commutes due to a recent road rage incident.
• She leaves work after 2 a.m., speaking with her husband Bridger en route home. Their last conversation is around 3 a.m., after which Kim vanishes.

2. Discovery of Kim’s Jeep

• Police Captain finds Kim's red Jeep idling on the side of Old Charlotte Highway, empty except for her wallet (with license missing) and ringing cell phone. (07:00)
  • "He had just come across a red Jeep idling on the side of the road and found this phone inside of it. And it was ringing, and so he answered it, but he said, there's nobody here." – MrBallen, relaying the officer’s words (08:38)
• Initial theories consider car trouble, voluntary exit, or a traffic stop.

3. Police Response and Tracking Kim's Movements

• Assistance requested from a police dog, which tracks Kim’s scent to a nearby garage but no further. (12:30)
• A neighbor, Nathan Hargett, reports seeing an unfamiliar car with Texas plates and a blonde woman in the back seat near his garage at 3:45 a.m. (15:45)

4. Early Suspects and Theories

• Investigators look into a car found in a ditch nearby, but the driver is ruled out.
• Attention focuses on the earlier road rage incident, but those involved (Eric Williams, George Connell) have alibis.
• Theories of a "blue light bandit"—someone impersonating police—gain traction, especially in light of the missing driver’s license and rolled-down window. (18:45)
  • "It very much looked like her license had been pulled out on purpose." – MrBallen (09:15)

5. Discovery of Kim’s Body

• Kim’s body is found covered with roofing shingles and branches in a wooded Lover’s Lane area.
  • Signs indicate a brutal attack but no sexual assault or robbery. Her jewelry remains. (21:15)
• Forensic breakthrough: a distinct shoeprint is found on Kim’s sweatshirt. (22:50)
  • "He suddenly noticed something and shouted for the officer to stop… it revealed a shoe print." – MrBallen (22:56)

6. Suspicion Falls on Bridger and Law Enforcement

• Kim’s husband, Bridger, becomes a person of interest due to discrepancies in his alibi and emotional reactions during interview. (23:30)
  • “He shouted at Hulk that he couldn't believe at a time like this you would accuse me of lying to you. You're insinuating that I hurt my wife. I didn't do this.” – Bridger Medlin (25:27)
• Security footage and witness testimony eventually clear Bridger of suspicion.

7. Breakthroughs & The Killer Revealed

• Witness describes seeing a police-like car with roof lights speed after Kim’s Jeep at around 3 a.m. (28:15)
• Shoeprint is traced back to Thorogood boots—a model issued to Monroe police officers. The killer is not just posing as police, but actually is one.
  • "Which meant Kim's killer was not just posing as a police officer, they were a police officer." – MrBallen (35:45)
• Officer Josh Griffin, a rookie cop and son of Officer Roger Griffin (who responded to Kim’s earlier road rage), is identified as the killer.

8. How the Case Was Solved

• The killer had learned Kim’s schedule and car details from police radio chatter—information made public after her previous encounter.
• The reconstruction: Officer Griffin pulls Kim over using his police lights, asks for her license, handcuffs her, and abduces her. Kim tries to escape from the backseat but is caught, beaten, and strangled. (31:00–35:00)
• Griffin is arrested two months after the crime and sentenced to life in prison for first degree kidnapping and murder.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On the eerie initial discovery:
  “He saw the driver's side window was down. But when he walked around to that side of the car, he saw nobody was inside. However, as he was standing there, a cell phone on the passenger seat began to ring.” (00:30)

• Kim’s fears after the first road rage:
  “She used to find this commute kind of relaxing, but lately it had been making her nervous to be driving alone late at night.” (04:50)

• First implication that killer may be a cop:
  “There had actually been dozens of reports over the years of so-called blue light bandits, pretending to be police officers in order to harass drivers, especially young women. But those cases were really quite rare…” (09:45)

• The forensic turning point:
  “He shined his flashlight on the sweatshirt's fabric, and it revealed a shoe print. And so he told the officers to send that sweatshirt to the crime lab and see if they could figure out the size and type of shoe that had left that print.” (22:56)

• On the suspect’s obsession:
  “The killer had seen that Jeep coming down this road several nights a week, and they'd sort of grown obsessed with the young blonde woman who was driving it. And now they decided it was finally time to do something about that.” (33:00)

• Case conclusion:
  “Kim's killer was Officer Josh Griffin, the off duty rookie cop who had responded to a car in a ditch about a half an hour before Kim went missing. It would turn out Josh had learned the details about Kim's vehicle and late night driving patterns from his father, Officer Roger Griffin…” (36:05)

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:00] – Kim’s last night and introduction of the mystery
• [07:00] – Discovery of unattended Jeep, police investigation begins
• [12:30] – Tracking Kim’s scent, neighbor’s sighting of suspicious car
• [18:45] – Review of suspects, road rage background
• [21:15] – Body discovered, forensics search
• [22:50–23:30] – Discovery of shoeprint
• [25:27] – Bridger’s interrogation and emotional denial
• [28:15] – Witness testimony: police-like car in pursuit
• [31:00–35:00] – Forensic match, reconstruction of the crime, and Griffin’s identification
• [36:05] – Arrest, conviction, and aftermath

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Conclusion & Case Reflection

MrBallen delivers the narrative with suspense, careful detail, and a sense of empathy for the victim and her family. The episode highlights how legitimate law enforcement resources and information can be abused, and how trust in authority can be devastatingly misplaced. The gradual reveal that the killer was an actual police officer who used his position and knowledge to commit and conceal the crime elevates the story from eerie mystery to tragic cautionary tale.

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If you seek strange, dark, and mysterious stories delivered in riveting storytelling fashion, this episode epitomizes MrBallen’s approach—immersive, methodical, and hauntingly memorable.

Transcript

[Mr. Ballen]

Before dawn In March of 1997, a police captain was patrolling the outskirts of a small town in North Carolina when up ahead he saw there was this Jeep parked on the shoulder of the highway with its headlights on. Now, the vehicle was suspicious enough that the captain pulled over and he walked up to the Jeep and as he got closer to it, he heard the engine running and he saw the driver's side window was down. But when he walked around to that side of the car, he saw nobody was inside. However, as he was standing there, a cell phone on the passenger seat began to ring. But before we get into today's story, if you're a fan of the strange, dark and mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come to the right place. Because that's all we do. So if that's of interest to you, the next time you go on vacation with the Follow button and all your friends, be sure to take lots of pictures. But when you post those pictures to social media, be sure you first systematically photoshop the Follow button out of every picture. Okay, let's get into today's story.

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It paid well and by working the night shift it left her days free so she could focus on her two real passions, which were taking care of her horses and decorating her brand new house. So Kim and her husband Bridger had recently bought a 7 acre plot of land outside the nearby town of Monroe where Bridger had actually grown up. They'd spent the past year building their dream home, including a barn for their three horses, and now that the construction was done, they had finally started moving in and decorating. Now, as Kim delivered the filet mignons to a table of middle aged businessmen, she glanced over at the clock on the wall and she felt a surge of excitement when she saw that there was less than an hour left in her shift. Kim had the next three days off and she planned to use all that free time to finish some of the smaller moving projects that still needed to get done, like just unpacking boxes and hanging some pictures. So she flashed the businessman a smile and then went to check on her other tables. An hour later, a little after 2am, Kim walked out the back entrance of the bar, now wearing a baggy sweatshirt instead of her work uniform, and she called out a goodbye over her shoulder to some coworkers and then walked over to where her red Jeep was parked along the side of the building. She got in, dropped her purse onto the cow print seat cover on the passenger seat and turned on the car and then turned on some music for the hour long drive home. A half an hour later, Kim drove south down Old Charlotte Highway, a secluded two lane road that was pretty much deserted at this hour. She used to find this commute kind of relaxing, but lately it had been making her nervous to be driving alone late at night. And the reason for that was because a couple of weeks ago while she was driving home from work around this same time of night, Kim she'd been involved in a really scary road rage incident. Another vehicle had come up from behind and started tailgating her and honking their horn at her repeatedly for really no apparent reason. Kim had been afraid that this was a customer from the men's club who was now following her home and it freaked her out so much that she'd actually pulled over into a convenience store parking lot because she saw there was a police car parked in there as well and so she'd gone right over to the officer to ask for help. He'd promised to go and try and track down this road rager and he'd even sent out a broadcast over the police radio telling all the other officers to keep an eye out for Kim's car on the night she was working in case anyone gave her more trouble and so now, even though you know that Road Rager had never been caught, Kim did feel better knowing that the police had her back. But again, because the Road Rager had not been caught, she was still a bit scared about driving home alone. So tonight, to calm her nerves, she fished out her cell phone out of her purse and just called her husband, Bridger. When he answered, he told her that he was actually on the road too. He was still driving back from a gig DJing at a prom in a town two hours away, but he was almost home. After chatting for a few minutes, Bridger told Kim that he was actually pulling into their driveway and that he would call her right back once he got inside the house. So Kim said fine and said goodbye and they hung up and she kept on driving. Then about 15 minutes later. So a little before 3am, her phone rang and it was Bridger again calling back like he had promised he would. And he asked Kim if she was close and she told him that she was just passing by Union Station Restaurant, which meant she was maybe about 20 minutes away from home. Bridger said he was pretty tired and he was getting ready for bed. And in case he was asleep by the time she got in, he wished her good night and Kim said goodnight back. And then she hung up and, and she put her phone down on the passenger seat. But just as Kim turned her attention back towards the road, a sudden bright light almost blinded her. She looked in the rearview mirror and saw headlights right behind her. About an hour later, Kim's husband, Bridger sat up in bed and looked over at the clock on his nightstand. It was 3:59am, an hour after having spoken to Kim. I mean, she should have been home 20 minutes after that phone call and she still wasn't back. So he got out of bed and he checked every room in their two story house. But Kim wasn't in any of them. There was no sign of her. Then Bridger looked out the window and he saw her Jeep wasn't in the driveway either. So at this point he hurried into the kitchen and he picked up the phone and he dialed Kim's cell phone number and it rang a few times and then a strange male voice answered. Bridger asked who he was speaking to and the man told him he was a police officer with the Monroe Public Safety Department. Bridger asked him, okay, well, where's my wife? And the officer told him that he didn't know. He had just come across a red Jeep idling on the side of the road and found this phone inside of it. And it was ringing, and so he answered it, but he said, there's nobody here. Several minutes later. So this is a little bit after 4am on March 29, 1997, Assistant Chief Bobby Hulk, a police investigator with the Monroe Public Safety Department, drove north along Old Charlotte Highway. He drove his patrol car past parking lots and houses until he reached the very edge of town. And finally, he saw what he was looking for. A red Jeep parked along the opposite side of the road with another patrol car parked right behind it. He pulled a U turn and parked on the shoulder. And as he got out of his car, he recognized Captain David Simpson standing there waiting for him. Simpson told Chief Hulk that he had just found this Jeep idling on the side of the road about 15 minutes ago with its headlights on. And he had walked up, There had been nobody inside of it. But when he looked in, there was a cell phone, and it began to ring. And so, you know, acting on instinct, he answered the phone, and it was a man named Bridger Medlin who was calling, saying, I'm looking for my wife. This is her phone. She hasn't come home. And Captain Simpson also said that he actually recognized this Jeep from a random run in he had had two weeks earlier outside of a convenience store with Kim Medlin. And so he put it together, and he's like, okay, Bridger's calling. This is definitely Kim's car. But Kim's nowhere to be found. And Hulk actually recognized Kim's name because he actually happened to be friends with Kim's husband, Bridger. And so he pulled out his flashlight and he began looking inside the Jeep. And right away he saw there was a wallet lying open on the passenger seat. And when he looked inside the wallet, there were credit cards, there was cash, but there was, like, this clear section of the wallet where obviously you would slide your driver's license. And there was nothing there. So it very much looked like her license had been pulled out on purpose. Now, their initial theory was, okay, well, maybe Kim got pulled over by a police officer and took out her license to hand to the cop. But in a department as small as Monroe's, there were only a few officers on duty at this time of night. And when Assistant Chief Hulk asked Captain Simpson had any of the on duty officers pulled anybody over that night? Simpson was already all over it. He had checked, and he said, no, none of our officers pulled anybody over. So this made Hulk wonder if maybe Kim had been pulled over by somebody posing as a cop. There had actually been dozens of reports over the years of so called blue light bandits, pretending to be police officers in order to harass drivers, especially young women. But those cases were really quite rare, even though they did happen. So Hulk didn't want to jump to any conclusions quite yet. Just then, Hulk heard a truck engine and saw headlights approaching up the highway. So he set the wallet back down on the seat and then walked over to where a black pickup truck was now pulling to a stop right behind Hulk's car. A tall man with blonde hair got out of the driver's seat, and right away, Hulk knew who it was. It was his friend and Kim's husband, Bridger. And Bridger looked frantic, and he demanded to know what had happened to his wife. But Hulk told him to calm down, that they were here to try to figure out what happened to his wife and where she went. Hulk went on to say, that look like we showed up and we just found her car here. But there were no broken windows or slashed tires or any sign of a struggle. So it was possible that maybe Kim just ran into car trouble and maybe she went out to go find help. But then, without asking for permission, Bridger pushed past Hulk and just climbed right inside of the Jeep's driver's seat and said, well, let's test your theory right now and see whether the car was working. Hulk told him to get out of the Jeep, but Bridger just totally ignored him. And then he put his wife's car in drive and moved it forward a few inches. Then he put it in reverse and he drove it backward, ultimately parking it in its original place, showing that it worked just fine. And even though at this point, Hulk was kind of annoyed with Bridger for what he had just done, he couldn't help but think, this is bad. Something's going on here. And so Hulk walked over to his car and he radioed the dispatcher for reinforcements. And he asked them to bring a police dog so they could try to track Kim's scent in case she left on foot.

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Nathan said he hadn't recognized the car, but he noticed that it had Texas plates and that there also had been a woman with blonde hair in the back seat. Hulk asked Nathan for permission to search his property, and Nathan told them to go right ahead. And so Hulk directed the other officers to search the inside of the house while he clicked on his flashlight and headed over to the garage. When he got there, he turned the handle of a door on the side of the garage, and he found it was unlocked. So he pushed the door open and he shined his flashlight inside, but all he saw was a truck and some gardening tools. There was no sign of Kim. By the time dawn broke around 6am that morning, this had become officially a missing persons case. So police began a search of the woods around the old Charlotte highway with help from members of the community. Meanwhile, Hulk and Simpson went back to the station to speak to one of the dispatchers who had been on duty that night. After speaking to that homeowner, Nathan and searching his house and his garage, he had been ruled out as a suspect. So now they were focused on finding that car with the Texas plates that Nathan had seen loitering outside of his garage. So they were hoping that maybe there was a report of a traffic stop or maybe a suspicious car in the area or anything that might help figure out who was driving that car. But the dispatcher said again that really there had been no stops, nothing that night. However, there had been one incident in the area that night. It was around 2am so it was about an hour before Kim was last heard from. They'd gotten a call about a car that had run into a ditch not too far from where Kim's Jeep was found. Hulk asked who had responded to that call, and the dispatcher said it was car 491, which was driven by a young rookie officer named Josh Griffin. Hulk immediately gave Officer Griffin a phone call and asked if he had seen or heard anything unusual while he was out responding to that car in the ditch. But Griffin said no. He actually said that his shift was over around the time that driver had flagged him down for help. So he had actually just called for a tow truck. And when it got there, maybe a little bit after 2:30am Griffin said he just went home. Hulk hung up the phone, feeling pretty disappointed. Bridger said the last time he heard from his wife Kim was around 3am so if this car was already being towed away by 2:30am Then it definitely was not the same car that Nathan saw loitering outside of his garage. And the driver of that car in the ditch was likely not a suspect. Hulk sighed in frustration. But then another idea occurred to him. He asked Captain Simpson to elaborate on that random run in he had had with Kim a couple of weeks earlier. Now, this was sort of a long shot to bring it up again, but Hulk wondered if maybe the same driver from the road rage incident could have maybe come back and, you know, maybe chased Kim off the road or something. Simpson said he would go dig up the report that he had filed on the incident, and then he left to go find it. About half an hour later, Hulk sat at his desk reading through a copy of the road rage police report. It said that in the very early morning hours of Saturday, March 15, so exactly two weeks before Kim's disappearance, Kim had pulled into a convenience store and flagged down Captain Simpson and another officer named Roger Griffin. So Officer Josh Griffin is the one who responded to the car stuck in the ditch. Officer Roger Griffin is actually Josh's father, and he was with Captain Simpson that night. So the report said that Simpson and his partner, Roger Griffin, had actually caught up with the car that was harassing Kim a little bit further down the road. There were two men inside the car, Eric Williams and George Connell. And they claimed that they thought Kim was actually the one harassing them by flashing her lights at them. And so To Simpson and to Griffin, it had seemed like a big misunderstanding, so the officers had just let them go. But Hulk, now looking at this through a very different lens, felt like he needed to speak to Eric and George regardless. And so in the report, he found the contact information for Eric and George, and he called them both up. But it turned out they both had airtight alibis for the night of Kim's disappearance. But even still, it struck Hulk as very odd that Kim had gone missing from her car on the same road at the same time of night and on the same night of the week as the road rage incident just two weeks earlier. And he had a hard time believing it was all just, you know, one big coincidence. The next day, just after Sunset On Sunday, March 30, Hulk drove down Westwood industrial Drive, a deserted dead end street at the edge of town, about two miles from where Kim's jeep was found. And as he was driving, he saw at the end of the street, there were a couple of police cars parked there. And so he pulled his own car behind them, and he got out. He walked into the trees, where he could see the beams of several flashlights moving around in the darkness. And as he got closer, he saw officers putting up police tape around a small clearing. And then on the ground in that clearing, he saw a pair of feet in sneakers poking out from underneath a pile of roofing shingles and branches. The police had gotten a call earlier that evening from two men who were part of the community search effort for Kim, and they said to police that they had found a body in the woods in this spot, but they hadn't touched it. And so now, with Hulk on the scene, the forensics team removed the shingles and branches that were covering the body, and Hulk pulled out his flashlight and knelt down to get a better look. And he saw right away it was a deceased woman, and it was definitely Kim Medlin. She was only wearing a pair of shorts, a bra, and a sweatshirt that had been pulled up over her head. One side of her face was very badly beaten, and there were also cuts and bruises all over her neck. And there were some scrapes on her knees. And her necklace and wedding ring were still on. So her killer had not robbed her. Hulk stood back as the forensics team untangled Kim's sweatshirt from around her wrists so they could collect clippings of her fingernails in case she had maybe scratched off a trace of her killer's DNA. And as Hulk watched, one of these forensics officers go to put the sweatshirt inside of an evidence bag. He suddenly noticed something and shouted for the officer to stop. Hulk stepped closer, and he shined his flashlight on the sweatshirt's fabric, and it revealed a shoe print. And so he told the officers to send that sweatshirt to the crime lab and see if they could figure out the size and type of shoe that had left that print. But while he would have to wait for those results, he knew he had a couple of other big clues to help narrow down a suspect. The first was the location of Kim's body. Westwood Industrial Drive was known as Lover's Lane. So basically a secluded, out of the way spot where people often went to be alone. And the fact that Kim's killer had thought to take her there meant they were probably a local and familiar with the area. Now, it was still theoretically possible that she'd just been run off the road by some stranger for some reason, or, you know, maybe a customer had followed her home from work, or maybe it was a blue light bandit impersonating a police officer. But the second big clue was that there was no sign of a struggle at Kim's Jeep. And because of that, Hulk did not think she had been kidnapped by a stranger. He thought it was far more likely that she had gotten out of her car for somebody that she knew and trusted. The very next day, Monday, March 31, Hulk sat down in an interrogation room with his friend and first murder suspect, Kim's husband, Bridger. Bridger had been really pushy and really in some ways over involved in the investigation from literally the moment Kim's Jeep was found. He'd messed with the crime scene by getting into the Jeep without permission. And now Hulk had information that Bridger had lied about his alibi. So when Kim first went missing, Bridger had told the police that he got home around 2:30 that morning. He called Kim for a brief chat a little before three, and then he immediately went to bed. But now a police officer had told Hulk that he had seen Bridger's black pickup truck driving around the center of town around 2:30am which was nowhere near Bridger's house and nowhere near the route he would have taken to get back from his DJing gig. So once Hulk sat down immediately, he could see that Bridger was visibly distraught. I mean, he's just learned that his wife was found dead. But Hulk had a job to do. And so he cut right to the chase. And he said to Bridger that, you know, hey, this other officer said they saw your truck driving around in town. It contradicts your alibi. Why did you lie? And Right away, Bridger exploded. He was so mad and he shouted at Hulk that he couldn't believe at a time like this you would accuse me of lying to you. You're insinuating that I hurt my wife. I didn't do this. He also yelled at Hulk for just wasting time looking at him as a suspect when there were so many clues pointing to a different story, like the lack of a struggle at the Jeep and the rolled down window and missing driver's license, all of which made it look like a traffic stop gone wrong. Bridger said he knew Kim better than anybody and she would never ever get out of her car in the middle of the night for a stranger, especially after that road rage incident two weeks earlier.

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[Mr. Ballen]

When Hulk left the interrogation room a few minutes later, he told his team to track down security footage from around town on the night Kim was killed to see if there was proof that really Bridger was driving around when he said he was home. Because right now they had no evidence to show he was lying and they actually just had to let Bridger go. But when Bridger was leaving, he'd been so angry and so defensive, it sort of made Hulk think that maybe Bridger did this. And in fact, the fact that Bridger had brought up that his wife would never have gotten out of the car in the middle of the night for a stranger. Well, that only reinforced that she might have gotten out of the car for you, Bridger, because she knew and trusted you. But also, Hulk was thinking that another person or group of people that Kim might have gotten out of the car for would be police. Now, Hulk already knew that there were no police that pulled anybody over that night. But somebody could have pretended to be a police officer, you know, a blue light bandit. That was a theory that did sort of make sense. Hulk thought about that bulletin that had gone out over the police radio two weeks ago. You know, telling officers to be on the lookout for Kim's Jeep at certain times of the night because of that road rage incident. Now, police radios were not private, so anybody with a police scanner could have been listening in. And what they would have heard is, well around this time of the night, this woman Kim often drives this road all by herself. And they basically could have just been waiting for her, knowing she was vulnerable. So Hulk picked up his phone and he began calling around to other police departments in the region. And he actually found out there had been two separate reports of blue light bandits harassing women recently. Now, one of the culprits had already been caught and he was in jail when Kim was killed, so it could not have been him. But the other suspect still hadn't been found. A couple of days later, on April 4, Assistant Chief Bobby Hulk slammed down the phone in frustration and crossed another name off a list on his notepad. It had been five days since Kim's body was found, and all the leads he'd had at the start of the investigation were now coming back as dead ends. When he tracked down surveillance footage from the night of Kim's disappearance, there was no sign of her husband Bridger's truck driving through town until 4am After Kim's Jeep had been found by police. So the officer who claimed to have seen Bridger's truck driving around at 2:30 did appear to have been mistaken, as Bridger said. Hulk also had reached out to Kim's manager and co workers at the bar she worked at, thinking maybe her killer might have been a patron who followed her home. But none of them knew of any problems she had had with customers. Meanwhile, Hulk's team had spoken to a man who worked the night shift at a business that was near where Kim's Jeep had been found. He said he had left work a little before 3am on the night that Kim disappeared. And as he was waiting to turn onto Old Charlotte Highway. He. He had seen her red Jeep go past. And right afterwards, he saw another car that was going in the other direction, make a sort of sudden sharp three point turn and speed right after the Jeep. The man had said that this other car had lights on the roof and reflective tape on the rear. And he thought, or at least assumed, it was a police car. But he didn't get a good look at the markings. Now, Hulk knew that every single Monroe police officer that was on duty that night was accounted for, and they hadn't pulled anybody over at the time that Kim went missing. However, this new information certainly did support the theory that maybe Kim's killer was posing as a police officer, that they were a blue light bandit. So Hulk had spent the past couple of days trying to track down witnesses who had seen that other blue light bandit, who was recently reported in a nearby town, but had never been caught. But he kept coming up dry. Nobody knew anything that could help track down that suspect. So it seemed like the investigation was really starting to slow down. But then Hulk's phone rang, and he answered it. And it was an expert from the forensics lab who had just finished analyzing that shoe print that had been found on Kim's sweatshirt. And so Hulk leaned forward in nervous anticipation as the expert told him the results. And when he did, Hulk knew exactly how to find Kim's killer. Based on that shoe print, witness testimony, and other forensic evidence, this is what police believe happened to Kim Medlin. On March 29, 1997, Around 3am the killer was driving down Old Charlotte Highway. They'd been prowling around for hours, pulling over young women for minor traffic infractions or sometimes for doing nothing wrong at all. And as they drove, they saw a familiar red Jeep pass by. The killer had seen that Jeep coming down this road several nights a week, and they'd sort of grown obsessed with the young blonde woman who was driving it. And now they decided it was finally time to do something about that. So they pulled an abrupt three point turn and raced after the Jeep and flipped on their car's flashing lights. Pretty soon, the Jeep pulled over onto the shoulder and the killer got out of their car and walked up to the driver's side window. The woman inside naturally rolled down the window and she handed over her driver's license, which said her name was Kim Medlin. And then she politely asked what the problem was, and the killer just told her to get out of the car. Now, Kim was visibly confused, but she did as she was told. And once she was out of the car, the killer slapped a pair of handcuffs onto her wrists and then dragged her over to their car and tossed her in the backseat. Then the killer got in the driver's seat of their car as Kim began crying and insisting that she didn't do anything wrong, why was she being arrested? But the killer wasn't listening. Their mind was racing as they realized that even though they'd been dreaming about this moment for weeks, they actually didn't really have a plan for what they would do next. And so after a moment, they pulled over and just idled for a minute while they figured out what their next move was going to be. And then an idea came to them. They put their car in drive and continued down the highway. And as they turned onto a secluded dead end road, Kim in the back seat suddenly got very quiet. And so the killer picked up on that and looked in the rear view mirror and saw her moving around, fiddling with something behind her back. And the killer suddenly realized that in all their excitement, they'd forgotten to lock the rear doors. The killer immediately tried to lock their doors with the power locks. But before they could, the rear door opened and Kim jumped out of the moving car. And so the killer came to a hard stop. They leapt out of the car, and they ran back for Kim, who was lying in the middle of the road. You know, her hands are still cuffed behind her. And without even thinking, the killer lifted up their flashlight and they smashed it into Kim's head. And then they stomped on her back and broke her neck. But the killer wasn't done. They reached down and they put their flashlight around Kim's neck, basically put it up against her throat. And then they pulled back on their arms, basically creating sort of a noose around her neck with this flashlight. And they held it like that, and they pulled as tight as they could until Kim stopped moving. After that, they dragged her body off the road and into the woods, where they removed her handcuffs and covered her body with branches and debris to hide it. Then the killer went home and cleaned up their car, making sure there was no evidence that would tie them to the murder. But they didn't realize they had actually left behind one crucial piece of evidence at the scene. That shoe print on Kim's sweatshirt. The print had a very distinct V shaped pattern on the tread, which made it very easy to identify. And so, weeks later, the forensics lab traced that print back to a shoe that was made by the Thorogood Company, a supplier of military and uniform footwear and that particular model happened to be the exact same shoe issued to officers in the Monroe Public Safety Department. Which meant Kim's killer was not just posing as a police officer, they were a police officer. The killer was Officer Josh Griffin, the off duty rookie cop who had responded to a car in a ditch about a half an hour before Kim went missing. It would turn out Josh had learned the details about Kim's vehicle and late night driving patterns from his father, Officer Roger Griffin, after his father told him about that road rage incident that he and Captain Simpson had responded to on March 15th. And so Josh had basically been on the lookout for Kim's Jeep ever since Josh Griffin was arrested on May 30, 1997, about two months after Kim's murder. He was eventually convicted of first degree kidnapping and murder and sentenced to life in prison. As for his motive, the best we can offer is he became obsessed with Kim and attacked her. A quick note about our stories they are all based on true events, but we sometimes use pseudonyms to protect the people involved and some details are fictionalized for dramatic purposes. The Mr. Ballin podcast Strange, Dark and Mysterious Stories is hosted and executive Produced by me, Mr. Ballin. Our head of writing is Evan Allen. Produced by Jeremy Bone. This episode was written by Kate Gallagher. Research and fact checking by Shelly Shue, Samantha Vanhus, Evan Beamer, Abigail Shumway and Camille Callahan Research and fact checking supervision by Steven Ear Audio editing and post produced by Whit Locasio and Cole Locasio Additional audio editing by Jordan Stidham Production coordination by Samantha Collins Production support by Antonio Minotta and Delaina Corley Artwork by Jessica Claugston Kiner Theme song called Something Wicked by Ross Bugden thank you for listening to the Mr. Ballin podcast. And just a reminder, every new and exclusive episode we put out on the Mr. Ballin podcast you can also now watch on the Mr. Ballin YouTube channel that very same day. And trust me, some of these stories you truly have to see to believe. Again, my YouTube channel is just called Mr. Ballin. If you want to listen to episodes which one week early and ad free, you can subscribe to SiriusXM Podcasts plus on Apple Podcasts or visit siriusxm.com podcastplus to listen with Spotify or another app of your choice. So that's gonna do it. I really appreciate your support. Until next time. See y.

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