Episode 6 - Armed and Dangerous

Summary

My Friend Daisy - Episode 6: Armed and Dangerous
Release Date: April 23, 2025
Host: Jenn Swann
Produced by: London Audio, iHeartRadio, Paris Hilton

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Introduction

In Episode 6, titled "Armed and Dangerous," of the investigative series My Friend Daisy, host Jenn Swann delves into the complexities surrounding the murder of 19-year-old Daisy De La O in Compton. This episode explores the intersection of traditional law enforcement efforts and the burgeoning power of social media in community-led investigations. As Daisy's friends and family grew frustrated with the lack of progress from authorities, they harnessed platforms like TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook to amplify their search for justice, ultimately igniting an international manhunt for Daisy's killer, Victor Hugo Sosa.

Interview with Detective Ray Lugo

Jenn Swann conducts an in-depth interview with Detective Ray Lugo, the lead investigator on Daisy's case. Lugo, a seasoned detective with 28 years in the Homicide Bureau of the LA County Sheriff's Department, provides insights into the procedural challenges and emotional toll of the investigation.

[02:05] Detective Ray Lugo: "I want to show them some pictures."

Lugo describes his role as not just a law enforcement officer but as someone deeply connected to the community he serves. His upbringing in East Los Angeles and his personal experiences during the Stella riots shaped his dedication to solving crimes and protecting his neighborhood.

[04:37] Detective Lugo: "We never give up. Even when we don't have any evidence, we just never give up. We find a way, a legal way to try to find the suspects and convict them."

Investigation Challenges

The episode highlights the initial hurdles in the investigation, including the absence of witnesses and the poor quality of available evidence. Daisy's case was deemed difficult because, unlike straightforward domestic cases, there were no clear leads or direct motives.

[08:34] Detective Lugo: "It didn't happen that quick unless, you know, a husband kills his wife and, you know, he's there. That’s easy. But this wasn't as easy as people thought."

The sole piece of substantial evidence was Daisy's blood, which was later processed and entered into the FBI's Combined DNA Index System (CODIS). This led to a pivotal moment in the case when Daisy's blood matched that of Victor Hugo Sosa, a suspect with a prior assault record.

Social Media's Role in the Manhunt

As the investigation stagnated, Daisy's friends and family turned to social media to keep her case in the public eye. They created and disseminated content across platforms like TikTok and Instagram, which inadvertently placed Detective Lugo's personal cell number in the public domain.

[06:03] Detective Lugo: "They put out my number, my cell number. So I was getting calls from all over."

The viral nature of their posts led to an influx of tips from amateur sleuths nationwide, particularly from college students who identified potential matches based on Victor's distinctive appearance—dark hair, stretched earlobes, and large gauges.

[06:30] Detective Lugo: "I got calls from the University of Texas, University of Arizona, many calls here in Los Angeles."

Despite the increased attention, Lugo maintained that law enforcement needed concrete evidence before making any arrests, emphasizing the importance of due process.

Community's Frustration and Vigilantism

The delayed public announcement of Victor's status as a suspect fueled frustration within the community. Activist Valerie Panato exemplifies this sentiment, expressing anger towards the Sheriff's Department for the perceived inaction.

[17:35] Valerie Panato: "I'm ready to go out and catch him myself. We need rope and a bat because he won't go down without a fight."

Valerie's distrust in the police was rooted in prior negative experiences, including instances of racial profiling and overreach, which made her skeptical of relying solely on authorities for justice.

[28:29] Valerie Panato: "Like one time I got racially profiled. It was bad... I was kind of scared."

Her resolve to take matters into her own hands highlights a broader issue of community members feeling compelled to supplement or bypass official channels when they perceive a lack of responsiveness.

The CODIS Breakthrough and Its Timing

A critical turning point in the investigation was the CODIS hit received in mid-March, three weeks post-murder. Despite this significant lead, Detective Lugo and his team chose to delay publicizing Victor's information, aiming to collaborate closely with his family in hopes of locating him without external interference.

[23:04] Jenn Swann: "The CODIS hit came back in the middle of March, just three weeks after Daisy's murder... What might have happened if the detectives had put out Victor's name and photo after they first got this CODIS hit?"

The timing of the Sheriff's Department's public announcement in June coincided with the viral spread of Victor's image on social media, leading to confusion and frustration among the community who felt the delay hindered the investigation.

Victor Sosa: The Suspect

Victor Hugo Sosa, a 25-year-old with a prior assault record, became the primary suspect after his DNA matched the blood found at the crime scene. Described by Detective Lugo as "awkward" and "antisocial," Victor's profile painted him as someone who might evade capture through unconventional means like skate parks and public transportation.

[20:24] Detective Lugo: "He couldn't keep a job. He's too weird to keep a job. It's just so awkward and almost weird."

Despite these characteristics, Victor had no extensive criminal history beyond the assault, making the case against him reliant heavily on forensic evidence rather than behavioral patterns.

Community Impact and Ongoing Tensions

The episode underscores the psychological strain on Daisy's neighbors and loved ones, who lived in a state of constant fear and uncertainty. The community's reliance on social media for updates and support reflects a shift in how modern investigative efforts are conducted, blending official procedures with grassroots activism.

[27:35] Valerie Panato: "It seemed like it didn't matter, you know, that this is death."

Valerie's determination to secure justice for Daisy, despite mistrust in the authorities, encapsulates the episode's central theme: the evolving dynamics between law enforcement and the communities they serve in the digital age.

Conclusion

"Armed and Dangerous" intricately weaves the narrative of Daisy De La O's tragic murder with the broader implications of social media's role in contemporary criminal investigations. Through Detective Ray Lugo's account and the passionate efforts of Daisy's supporters, the episode illuminates the challenges and ethical dilemmas faced when traditional law enforcement intersects with the democratizing force of online platforms. As the search for Victor Hugo Sosa continues, the episode leaves listeners contemplating the balance between collaborative community efforts and the indispensable role of trained investigators in achieving justice.

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• [04:37] Detective Ray Lugo: "We never give up. Even when we don't have any evidence, we just never give up. We find a way, a legal way to try to find the suspects and convict them."

• [08:34] Detective Ray Lugo: "It didn't happen that quick unless, you know, a husband kills his wife and, you know, he's there. That’s easy. But this wasn't as easy as people thought."

• [17:35] Valerie Panato: "I'm ready to go out and catch him myself. We need rope and a bat because he won't go down without a fight."

• [20:24] Detective Ray Lugo: "He couldn't keep a job. He's too weird to keep a job. It's just so awkward and almost weird."

• [27:35] Valerie Panato: "It seemed like it didn't matter, you know, that this is death."

Key Takeaways

• Social Media as a Double-Edged Sword: While platforms like TikTok and Instagram empowered Daisy's community to seek justice, they also complicated the investigation by spreading unverified information and personal contact details of law enforcement officers.

• Trust and Distrust in Law Enforcement: Historical tensions and negative experiences with the police influenced the community's response to Daisy's murder, highlighting the need for building trust between authorities and the communities they serve.

• Importance of Timely Communication: The delay in publicizing Victor Sosa as a suspect created frustration and skepticism, emphasizing the crucial role of transparent and timely communication in maintaining public trust during investigations.

• Community Vigilantism vs. Official Investigation: Valerie Panato's actions illustrate the fine line between community support and vigilantism, raising questions about the best ways to involve and empower communities without undermining official investigative processes.

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For those who haven't listened to My Friend Daisy, Episode 6: "Armed and Dangerous" offers a compelling exploration of how digital activism intersects with traditional law enforcement in the pursuit of justice. It sheds light on the human emotions and societal dynamics that drive community-led investigations in the modern age.

Transcript

[Jeremy Scott]

Something unexpected happened after Jeremy Scott confessed to killing Michelle Schofield in Bone Valley season one.

[Gilbert King]

Every time I hear about my dad, it's, oh, he's a killer. He's just straight evil.

[Jeremy Scott]

I was becoming the bridge between Jeremy Scott and the son he'd never known.

[Gilbert King]

At the end of the day, I'm literally a son of a killer.

[Jeremy Scott]

Listen to new episodes of bone Valley Season 2 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Soledad O'Brien]

I'm Soledad O'Brien, and on my new true crime podcast, Murder on the Towpath, I'm taking you back to 1964 to the cold case of artist Mary Pinchot Meyer.

[Gilbert King]

She had been shot twice in the head and in the back.

[Soledad O'Brien]

It turns out Mary was connected to a very powerful man.

[Gilbert King]

I pledge you that we shall neither commit nor provoke aggression.

[Soledad O'Brien]

John F. Kennedy. Listen to Murder on the Tow path with Soledad O'Brien on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

[Jennifer]

Everything looks very closed up. Like, they definitely don't want people just popping in. I think I need ring the bell. Hey, my name is Jennifer. I have an appointment with Ray Lugo. Hey, how's it going? It was a weekday afternoon, and I was at the Homicide Bureau of the LA County Sheriff's Department. It's this institutional looking building in a suburban office park just east of la.

[Gilbert King]

We have some podcasters. I'm just giving them a little tour. I want to show them some pictures.

[Jennifer]

Okay, that's Detective Ray Lugo. He's got broad shoulders and a bald head. He used to be a high school football coach, and he still kind of got that coach vibe. Like, he likes to remind me that he was the lead detective on Daisy's case. He says he always had a plan for it. He walked me around the office and pointed to newspaper clippings and photographs on the wall. And because this is Los Angeles, there were also movie posters.

[Gilbert King]

The movie with Angelina Jolie. The changeling.

[Jennifer]

Changeling?

[Gilbert King]

Yeah, you know, in the movie it's called LAPD and stuff, but that was a sheriff's case instead.

[Jennifer]

Stuff.

[Gilbert King]

Okay, but in movies, they always put lapd. But that was. And we didn't know. The historian told us, and we had pictures of it and stuff.

[Jennifer]

And do you feel like you get slighted? LAPD gets all the.

[Gilbert King]

Not really. They're the JBT to us anyway, so we. We don't feel that way.

[Jennifer]

All right, so if you didn't catch that, Luca was saying that the changeling was based on a sheriff's department's case, but that the movie made it all about the lapd. When I asked if that bothered him, that the LAPD always gets the Hollywood treatment, he said no. I mean, it sounds like what he said was their junior varsity to us. Again, he's a former football coach. And by the way, the LAPD and the LA Sheriff's Department have separate jurisdictions. The former patrols the city of la, whereas the latter serves the county's unincorporated areas and more than 40 of its other cities. So everywhere from Palmdale to Malibu to Compton, it is a massive area. Luko showed me a break room. It looked kind of like a high school cafeteria, right down to the mascot that was painted on the back wall. It was this cartoon bulldog wearing a fedora, and it had a little piece of paper in the fedora, and on that piece of paper were the numbers 1, 8, 7, California penal code for homicide. Been noticing this bulldog everywhere.

[Gilbert King]

The LA Times called us the Bulldogs.

[Jennifer]

Lugo pointed me to a newspaper clipping mounted on a wall. It was from 1977. The headline is Sheriff's Bulldogs Hang In Where LAPD Doesn't. Oh, so they're like pitting you against LAPD again? I didn't know there was like this rivalry.

[Gilbert King]

No, not really. We don't consider them arrival to us. They can't hang with us. They can't.

[Jennifer]

So what does it mean to be a Bulldog?

[Gilbert King]

The reason why they in the article, the reason why they said that was because we never give up. And that's how they. They teach us that here. That although even when we don't have any evidence, we just never give up, we find a way, a legal way to try to find the suspects and convict them.

[Jennifer]

Well, that's actually what I was here to talk with Lugo about. Like, what exactly was he doing? While Daisy's friends and family were putting Victor on blast, desperately looking to get attention on the case, where was that bulldog spirit when it came to finding a murder suspect? I'm Jen Swan From London Audio iHeartradio and executive producer Paris Hilton. This is my friend, Dacey. Episode 6 Armed and Dangerous In June of 2021, Lugo's cell phone had been blowing up. Susie had been calling him just about every day to ask about her daughter's case. Daisy's friends and relatives were calling him too. But those weren't the only people calling about Daisy's murder.

[Gilbert King]

They put out something on social media, so. And they put out my number, my cell number. So I was getting calls from all.

[Jennifer]

Over Muco's cell phone number, he discovered, had been plastered all over the Internet. Unbeknownst to him, it was on the TikToks and the Instagram and Facebook posts that Daisy's friends and family had made, the posts that had since gone viral. Now Lugo was getting calls at all hours of the day, all from people who said they'd seen a murder suspect, a 20 something guy with dark hair, distinctive eyebrows and stretched earlobes.

[Gilbert King]

I got calls from the University of Texas, University of Arizona, many, many calls here in Los Angeles, University of California at Santa Barbara University, San Diego State University, University of San Diego. Just students, because people in college wear those. He had the earplugs, and the earplugs were extremely big. And not very many people have the big holes in their ears. Is that the gauges? Is that what it's called?

[Jennifer]

I had a feeling that the reason why college students were calling didn't actually have much to do with gauged ears. It had to do with their age group and the media they were consuming. I wonder if those were also people that were seeing the TikTok and the Instagram that were put out for friends.

[Gilbert King]

Yes, yes, they did tell us that. That's how they got my number. So I'd get calls in the middle of the night all the time. So I would send the local agency and, you know, that's part of our job. That's what we do.

[Jennifer]

Lugo said things like that a lot. Things like, that's part of our job, that's what we do. I'd come here to interview him to find out what he and his partner had been doing all that time when Daisy's loved ones were desperately looking for answers. And he'd come to this interview ready to defend his investigation.

[Gilbert King]

Most people thought, oh, this was an easy case, but we didn't have any witnesses. The video was not very good at all.

[Jennifer]

Lugo had a stack of index cards in front of him, notes and talking points that he referred to every so often. We were sitting in a boardroom where on the back wall an American flag was printed on this big framed piece of wood. It had a thin blue line running through the middle. And in the left hand corner among the stars was that cartoon bulldog in a fedora. And Lugo was in bulldog mode. He wasn't giving up, explaining how difficult the investigation was.

[Gilbert King]

It didn't happen that quick unless, you know, a husband kills his wife and, you know, he's there. And those are easy. Anybody could do those, right? You guys could do Those. Right. Those domestic. But this wasn't as easy as people thought. And I know at times families get frustrated with us, but we can't go play by play with them on all the information we have. And they just have to trust us.

[Jennifer]

I think from Susie's point of view, you know, she had. And I think she told you this from the beginning, too, she had this fear that this case wouldn't be taken seriously because she's Mexican or. Cause she lives in Compton. And it's like going to Compton. It could be a body dump. It could be an unknown victim. And so I think she always had this, like, defensiveness of like, I have to fight.

[Gilbert King]

Yeah, yeah. No, but she has to remember, too, that we're Mexican, too. And we. I grew up in East LA and in the worst neighborhood. And we understand. And we're not going to let anybody get away with murder. Right. We don't do that. We have a conscience. We have a family. I've been doing this for. I'm in my 43rd year, 28 at Homicide.

[Jennifer]

And. Can I ask how you decided to join the shift? Was there something that happened in your life that.

[Gilbert King]

Yeah. I was born and raised in East Los Angeles. In the early 70s. We had the Stella riots. I lived half a block away from Whittier Boulevard from where it was all happening. And I remember seeing the. My parents went to a wedding, so it was me and my brothers and sisters. There was four of us, and we were in the house by ourselves when the riots broke out. And people were running down the street with tires and stolen lawnmowers, but everything was on fire. And I noticed the sheriff's department were coming in, and I was impressed. My older brother, he was two years older. He was a LAPD officer, and I was a couple years behind him. And I didn't want to follow my brother, be that guy, be the little brother.

[Jennifer]

It occurred to me that maybe this was the source of Lugo's competition with the lapd. It's not an agency rivalry. It's a sibling rivalry. Lugo said he wanted to work his own neighborhood, which was under the sheriff's jurisdiction, and try to solve problems from within. He put in time as a patrol officer and then worked his way up to a night detective. He says he ended up solving a lot of murders, in part because he just knew a lot of people in the neighborhood and they trusted him. Eventually, he found his way to the Homicide Bureau in the mid-90s. And the only way he's been able to keep doing it is by compartmentalizing. He didn't use that word, but that's essentially what he described.

[Gilbert King]

I tried to not really let the rest of my family know about what's going on with. With the job and the whole bit. Right. But there's no one to talk to. I don't talk about that. Right. I think that's why I've been able to survive that this long. But I'm always thinking about it when I'm by myself, driving to work, figuring out a plan. When I'm jogging on the treadmill, that's when we do. That's when I think about how we can approach this case or how can we trick them if we're tricking somebody. And most of the time, it works out.

[Jennifer]

But Daisy's case, it didn't just come together. When he was driving to work or jogging on the treadmill, he did at least have a suspect, but the suspect had vanished, his whereabouts unknown, which was sometimes true even before he disappeared.

[Gilbert King]

Sometimes he wouldn't come home. Sometimes he stayed out in the streets. They didn't know what. Where he stayed at. He really got into skating, and he was pretty good. So we had surveillance teams at every skate park in Southern California.

[Jennifer]

Every skate park?

[Gilbert King]

Just about every skate park from the Lincoln Heights or his favorite skate parks, from Lincoln Heights all the way to Long Beach. So in Lincoln park, we knew he went there. We had a surveillance team for weeks at that location. And he traveled through the Metro line, the Metro rail. So we tried to follow that. We had surveillance teams, but with no luck.

[Jennifer]

The Metro line, the place where Valerie Arellano and so many others reported seeing a skateboarder who looked like Victor.

[Gilbert King]

I know the family thought, oh, just go arrest the boyfriend. Right? It's always the boyfriend. But we can't be wrong. We have to be right, 100% right. And we had to wait till the lab results came back and we got the CODIS hit.

[Jennifer]

Codis? The Combined DNA Index System. It's this big federal database maintained by the FBI, and it combines data from law enforcement agencies all over the country. And a CODIS hit. That's a bingo. It's when the DNA collected from a crime scene brings up a match for someone who's been arrested before. Which is exactly what happened. When the blood around Daisy's body was processed, it matched with a suspect.

[Jeremy Scott]

Something unexpected happened after Jeremy Scott confessed to killing Michelle Schofield in Bone Valley Season one.

[Gilbert King]

I just knew him as a kid.

[Jeremy Scott]

Long, silent voices from his past came.

[Soledad O'Brien]

Forward, and he was just staring at me.

[Jeremy Scott]

And they had secrets of their own to share.

[Gilbert King]

Gilbert King I'm the son of Jeremy Lynn Scott.

[Jeremy Scott]

I was no longer just telling the story, I was part of it.

[Gilbert King]

Every time I hear about my dad is, oh, he's a killer. He's just straight evil.

[Jeremy Scott]

I was becoming the bridge between a killer and the son he'd never known.

[Gilbert King]

If the cops and everything would have done their job properly, my dad would have been in jail. I would have never existed.

[Jeremy Scott]

I never expected to find myself in this place. Now I need to tell you how I got here.

[Gilbert King]

At the end of the day, I'm literally a son of a killer.

[Jeremy Scott]

Bone Valley Season 2 Jeremy Jeremy, I.

[Gilbert King]

Want to tell you something.

[Jeremy Scott]

Listen to new episodes of bone Valley Season 2 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts and to hear the entire new season ad free with exclusive content. Subscribe to Lava for Good plus on Apple Podcasts.

[Soledad O'Brien]

I'm Soledad O'Brien and on my podcast Murder on the Towpath, I'm taking you back to the 1960s. Mary Pinchot Meyer was a painter who lived lived in Georgetown in Washington D.C. every day she took a daily walk along a tow path near the E and O Canal. So when she was killed in a.

[Gilbert King]

Wealthy neighborhood, she had been shot twice in the head and in the back behind the heart.

[Soledad O'Brien]

The police arrived in a heartbeat. Within 40 minutes, a man named Raymond Crump Jr. Was arrested. He was found nearby, soaking wet, and he was black. Only one woman dared defend him, civil rights lawyer Dovey Roundtree. Join me as we unravel this story with a crazy twist, because what most people didn't know is that Mary was connected to a very powerful man.

[Gilbert King]

I pledge you that we shall neither commit nor provoke aggression.

[Soledad O'Brien]

John F. Kennedy Listen to Murder on the Tow path with Soledad O'Brien on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.

[Jennifer]

There are stories from all over the country about social media users accusing the wrong person of a crime. It even happened in Compton, the city where Daisy lived about eight months before her friends took to social media to find her killer.

[Soledad O'Brien]

33 year old Compton resident Darnell Hicks.

[Jennifer]

A father to two girls and a youth football coach, feared for his safety.

[Soledad O'Brien]

And his family's after being wrongfully accused.

[Jennifer]

On social media of ambushing two LA county sheriff's deputies Saturday, he saw a be on the lookout post with his face on it. He and his attorney say they have no idea who started these accusations. There are stories of sleuths misidentifying someone as a victim or filming them without their consent because, you know, they thought they were a missing person.

[Valerie Panato]

I seen this video come across my Facebook story, and I keep wondering, who is this girl?

[Jennifer]

Where is she?

[Soledad O'Brien]

Why does she look so lost?

[Jennifer]

There are stories about the way good intentions can become misguided. Search parties like this one that Sarah Turney reported on, of course, a viral video went around of this girl, and people were really nervous for her. At first they thought it was Cassie Compton, but it has been confirmed to not be Cassie. But this is not one of those stories. Because when DNA evidence from the crime scene was processed, it showed that the person Daisy's friends and family had been adamant about, the person they'd been calling detectives about and making videos about and circulating photos of, it was the same person whose DNA was found at the crime scene.

[Gilbert King]

Some of the blood that they found was Victor Sosa's blood, luckily. And there was a lot of blood in these stabbings. You know, when people start stabbing someone and blood and starts getting slippery, so the hand slips, you see, and usually the suspects get cut. And that's what happened in this regard. So, fortunately for us, Victor had been arrested years before for some sort of assault. And they took his DNA then. So he was in the system, the CODIS system.

[Jennifer]

Do you know what that assault was regarding?

[Gilbert King]

I'm not sure.

[Jennifer]

Okay.

[Gilbert King]

It was.

[Jennifer]

You don't know whether it was related to Daisy?

[Gilbert King]

No, I don't. I know they had had an incident before. There was an incident where the grandfather had told us that months before, he struck her with the skateboard in the head. And that's why there was a breakup for a time. And when the investigators finally spoke to Daisy, she refused to cooperate with the investigation and she refused to prosecute. We did talk to an investigator on that case, and she signed a waiver dropping the case.

[Jennifer]

Daisy did?

[Gilbert King]

Yes.

[Jennifer]

Okay. Were there ever any records of him having a history with domestic abuse besides this one assault charge?

[Gilbert King]

No. No, he didn't have much of a record at all. He was kind of a loner, antisocial, kind of awkward. He was really weird.

[Jennifer]

Weird? It's a word that Lugo used to describe Victor at least six different times during our 90 minute interview.

[Gilbert King]

He couldn't keep a job. He's too weird to keep a job. It's just so awkward and almost weird. Victor's so awkward and so weird. He's just a weird kid.

[Jennifer]

But Victor wasn't a kid. He was 25 when he murdered Daisy. When he fled, when more than Three months later, Daisy's friends and family began posting about it online. And when a little more than a month after that, the LA County Sheriff's Department decided to co opt their strategy, they turned to social media too. This man, 25 year old Victor Hugo Sosa, should be considered armed and dangerous. The Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department says he's wanted for the murder of his girlfriend. The local news began broadcasting Victor's name and photo after the sheriffs posted a flyer about him on their Facebook page. Wanted for murder, the graphic said in all caps. Across the top of the flyer in the center was a DMV photo of Victor. It had been taken about four years earlier, actually around the time that he met Daisy. In it he had shaggy hair that fell to the base of his neck and clear gauges in his ears. Sosa is described as around 5ft 6 inches tall and 130 pounds. He's known to use his skateboard and public transportation to get around. The local CBS news station wasn't the only media outlet to pick up the sheriff's announcement. The LA Times ran a story and this time it included Daisy's name and details about her life. Her mom was quoted in the article talking about how she dreamed of opening a salon someday. And Lugo was quoted in it too. He said that he believed Victor had fled to Mexico but had since returned to the LA area and that he'd recently been seen in homeless encampments all over town. These sightings, they were the result of all the calls that Lugo had been getting. Calls from people who had seen the Tiktoks and the Instagrams.

[Gilbert King]

I know those kids meant well and I always thanked them for calling and I would tell them, hopefully you'll see it on the news. And we had our plan. We had the surveillance teams out there still looking. I know people think that these cases are easy and we just arrest them and it would be easy to prosecute, but if you don't have any evidence, and we at the time, we didn't have any evidence other than the blood. And it took a while for us to get that. The CODIS hit. I believe we got the codis hit on March 13th or 14th.

[Jennifer]

Hang on. The CODIS hit came back in the middle of March, just three weeks after Daisy's murder. I thought about all the weeks that passed after that. Weeks when her friends and family were on pins and needles waiting for updates. I thought about Daisy's neighbors watching their backs around the apartment complex, wondering who the killer was, not knowing he had any relation to his victim. It was impossible not to wonder what might have happened if the detectives had put out Victor's name and photo after they first got this CODIS hit. What exactly was gained by waiting an additional three months to warn the public and what was lost? I sat there in the conference room dumbfounded. I had been working on the story for three years at that point in some form or another, and this piece of information about the date of the CODIS hit, It had totally eluded me up until then. I must have had this blank stare on my face when I heard it, because Lugo suddenly seemed self conscious. There was this awkward silence, and then.

[Gilbert King]

He said, you still want to talk about the investigation?

[Jennifer]

Yes, I do. I just. Yeah, when you say that. I know you've explained this to me before, but when you say the CODIS hit, saying that you were able to sample the DNA from the scene and match it with the DNA from his previous arrest, Is that right?

[Gilbert King]

Yes.

[Jennifer]

Okay. But then the. The public didn't know to look for Victor until, I think, June, the end of June.

[Gilbert King]

You put out that. Right, right, right. We had surveillance teams looking for him.

[Valerie Panato]

Okay.

[Gilbert King]

And so walk me through.

[Jennifer]

Like, how do you make the decision about when to. When to tell the public? You know, okay, we're looking for this guy. Here's what he looks like. Like, if you. If the CODIS hit was in March, tell me about, like, April, May, June.

[Gilbert King]

Yeah. Once we were working with the family, and we believed that. That he was out of the country. And the family, they had had a little contact with him via telephone, and they had met him. We don't want to say who that was, but they actually went down to Mexico to meet up with him and then contacted me. And then we set up a little plan to get him. And we tried it two times, weeks apart, you know, three, four weeks apart, so we wouldn't scare them and scare them off. And both times we were unsuccessful. And it was at that point where we decided to go public. Once we kind of thought that we were going get a little help from social media.

[Jennifer]

I spoke to Lugo and his partner Sanchez, multiple times to try to clarify this timeline, to try to understand their reasoning for not putting out this information sooner. They maintained that they were working with Victor's family to try to track him down. They didn't want to put out the information about him to the public because they didn't want to scare him off. They were afraid that he'd find out people were looking for him and he'd Flee even further south and then he.

[Gilbert King]

Leaves to a country that we don't have a treaty with and we'll never get him back. Right?

[Jennifer]

Never mind that by the time the detectives posted their flyer on Facebook, Victor's face had already been plastered across TikTok and Instagram for weeks. Which is probably why when people saw this flyer on Facebook, they wrote comments like, this is old news. Another comment read, I can't believe you guys are just now posting this. When it happened in February, there was this one comment that really seemed to sum up the anger of some people in the community. It read, everyone's been telling the police department where he is and they don't care. I'm ready to go out and catch him myself. This comment, it had been posted by Valerie Panato. Underneath that comment, she'd written the one about wanting to hunt Victor down. We need rope and a bat because he won't go down without a fight. Yeah, she'd written that comment on the LA County Sheriff's Department's Facebook page. When I talked to her about these comments, she did not back down from them. She said she meant every word. Was some of your anger around the fact that like it had been four months and Victor still hadn't been arrested? Like the comment that you wrote was something like, they don't take this seriously?

[Valerie Panato]

Yeah, pretty much. I already knew. It's like, it's like another, another day for them, another day for the cops. Like it like it seemed, it felt like for me it seemed like it didn't matter, you know, that this is death.

[Jennifer]

Didn't matter.

[Valerie Panato]

Pretty much, yeah. I just saw that they didn't really care. And I wanted to say that I wanted to bring that awareness, you know, like put some pressure for them to take it serious. And cuz it's Compton too. Yeah, they just like, oh, it's just another day in Compton. So I'm like, like I'm going to make sure that she gets her justice.

[Jennifer]

So you might be wondering, what kind of beef does Valerie have with the cops? And it may not shock you to learn this, but she too, like so many others I spoke with in Daisy's community, had had an unnerving encounter with law enforcement. Here's how she put it.

[Valerie Panato]

Like one time I got, I got like racially profiled. It was bad, like over my tail light in one of my cars. This was like years ago, but I had like my hands on the wheel. They pulled me over in front of my cousin's car and yeah, at that time I got a Little bit more tan. So I was, like, kind of scared. And everyone outside of the houses came to, like, just watch so that they wouldn't do anything, because that's how scared, you know, the neighbors were. And I was like, look, I'll leave my car here. I won't drive it. You know, I'll get my cousin to fix it. And they wanted to tow my car. It was like, for what? Over a tail light? Yeah, that was really scary, too. And I. I kind of saw the cop put his hand on his gun, and I was like, oh, my God. I was like, please. And I kept telling my Valerie, who.

[Jennifer]

Was not scared of anything, including suspected murderers, was scared of being pulled over by the police. And yet, when a murder happened in her own community, she wondered, where were the police? What had they been doing? And so she decided she wasn't going to let this go.

[Valerie Panato]

That's why I had to keep harassing. I had to keep talking shit on all these pages. I was like, we're gonna get the guy. The cops don't do anything.

[Jennifer]

You're like, I got to talk for justice. I got to do it.

[Valerie Panato]

Yeah, that's. I. That's when. Yeah, pretty much that's when I ended up talking to Daisy's mom, too, at some point. Yeah, I did.

[Jennifer]

On. On Facebook.

[Valerie Panato]

Yeah, I did. And on. I think, Instagram, too. I think it was Instagram, too.

[Jennifer]

Do you remember what you guys talked about?

[Valerie Panato]

Oh, yeah. I. I remember in the post, before, she reached out to me.

[Jennifer]

She reached out to you?

[Valerie Panato]

Yeah, she did.

[Jennifer]

Why?

[Valerie Panato]

I just kept telling her in a post, I'm praying every day, we're gonna get this guy. I told her I'm praying, and I know God is gonna come through. I would tell her that. God's gonna come through. I promise you. I made that promise to her. I was like, I promise you we're gonna get this guy.

[Jennifer]

Valerie would turn out to be right, but not in the way that anyone expected. Next time on My Friend Daisy.

[Gilbert King]

I get a phone call from our office.

[Jennifer]

I want to transfer a phone call to me.

[Gilbert King]

Some commandante from some place in. In Mexico.

[Jennifer]

And it occurred to me, I. I didn't. I said, okay, just transfer him.

[Gilbert King]

I didn't know. I didn't know who he was. I. I wasn't sure what he was calling about. And he says, hey, are you looking for Victor Sosa?

[Jennifer]

Yeah.

[Gilbert King]

Says, I have them.

[Jennifer]

Hi, everyone. This is Paris. Thanks for listening to my friend Daisy. If you or someone you love is experiencing abuse, you are not alone. Help is available. 24. 7. Contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline. For free confidential support, call 800-799-7233, text START to 88788 or visit thehotline.org your safety matters. Reach out Today My Friend Daisy is a production of London Audio with support from Sony Music Entertainment. It's reported, written and executive produced by me, Jen Swan. I'm also your host. Our executive producers for London Audio are Paris Hilton, Bruce Gersh, Bruce Robertson and Joanna Studebaker. Our executive producer for Sony Music Entertainment is Jonathan Hirsch. Our associate producer is Zoe Culkin. Production assistants and translations by Miguel Contreras. Sound design, composing and mixing by Hans Dale. She Our fact checker is Fendal Fulton. Our head of production is Sami Allison and our production manager is Tameka Valance Kolasny. Special thanks to Steve Akerman, Emily Rosik and Jamie Myers at Sony, Ben Goldberg and Orly Greenberg at UTA and Jen Ortiz at the Cut.

[Jeremy Scott]

Something unexpected happened after Jeremy Scott confessed to killing Michelle Schofield in Bone Valley Season one.

[Gilbert King]

Every time I hear about my dad is, oh, he's a killer. He's just straight evil.

[Jeremy Scott]

I was becoming the bridge between Jeremy Scott and the son he'd never known.

[Gilbert King]

At the end of the day, I'm literally a son of a killer.

[Jeremy Scott]

Listen to new episodes of bone Valley Season 2 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts.

[Soledad O'Brien]

I'm Soledad O'Brien and on my new true crime podcast, Murder on the Towpath, I'm taking you back to 1964 to the cold case of artist Mary Pinchot Meyer.

[Gilbert King]

She had been shot twice in the head and in the back.

[Soledad O'Brien]

It turns out Mary was connected to a very powerful man.

[Gilbert King]

I pledge you that we shall neither commit nor provoke aggression.

[Soledad O'Brien]

John F. Kennedy. Listen to Murder on the towpath with Soledad O'Brien on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.