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- [00:00]
A
Hi, I'm Jessi Pere. And I'm Andy Cassette. Welcome to Love Murder where we unravel the darkest tales of romance turned deadly. Our episodes are long form, narrative driven and deeply researched. Perfect for the true crime aficionados seeking stories beyond the headlines. Like the chilling case of Blanche Taylor Moore, the so called black widow who left a trail of poisoned lovers. Or the shocking murders of Chad Shelton and Dwayne Johnson where family ties masked a sinister plot. Subscribe to Love Murder on Apple podcasts, Spotify or wherever you listen.
- [00:45]
B
I'm brett. And I'm alice and we are the prosecutors. Today on the Prosecutors, we conclude our look at the Bryce Lespisa case. Hello everybody and welcome to this episode of the Prosecutors. I'm Brett and I'm joined as always by my wandering co host Alice.
- [01:48]
A
Wandering. Wandering into. Well, off a cliff, perhaps. Actually in this instance. Yes, guys, this is. This case is. There's so many aspects of it that I don't think are typically talked about. So though it may seem like we're wandering through the timeline, we are not at all. In fact, we are taking a look at this because it's been so long and really no break in the case.
- [02:14]
B
Yeah, this is a weird one, as any of you who listened to last week's episode, I think can attest. This is a very strange case with some really weird stuff. As we've been talking about just to catch you up. This is the Bryce Les Pisa disappearance. And essentially Bryce had gone back to college. He was at acting in a very strange way. He starts abusing some drugs. He's drinking a lot, he's not himself. He breaks up with his girlfriend by text. He gives a bunch of his stuff away. His girlfriend's calling his mom, his roommate's calling his mom. And he starts off on this drive, this just wandering drive towards where his parents lived. They're all in California. But he's making this drive sort of up that way. It should have taken six hours. We're now, I don't even know how long he's been driving hours in, but it's a long time. At some point he runs out of gas. A guy helps him out from a local store. Christian, he's like a real one. He's the hero of this story. And Bryce just, he's not doing anything you would expect him to do. And the last thing we talked about is Christian, who had supplied that gasoline to Bryce. It's been three hours, but he's like, basically Bryce's mom calls because she's trying to Figure out where Bryce is. And he's like, I'll go back to where he was. But that was three hours ago. He shows up at this same location and there is Bryce still sitting in his car, not moving. But at this point, he sort of said to his mom, it's about noon. And he said to his mom, okay, and I'll start heading that way. And it's going to take him about three hours, or it should take him about three hours to get home. That's where we left you off last week.
- [04:03]
A
Obviously, there's a ton of red flags throughout this entire timeline. The latest being that after getting gas, many of us, I've certainly run out of gas before when I first started driving and didn't realize what the gas tank totally meant. So I have run out of gas in my life. And it's like a desperate situation, right? Like no matter how close to a gas station you are, it is a terrible feeling when you hear that sputter of the gas tank and you kind of drift off to the side of the road. And what do you typically do? You get gas as fast as you can. And then what do you do? You drive to the gas station, the nearest gas station, to fill your tank completely up. And then you go. That's not what happens here. Bryce literally sits there staring off into space, not moving, despite having enough gas in his tank to go get more gas and then continue on his journey, he sits there staring and he tells his mom, all right, I'm on my way home. It'll be three hours. You can never judge how any person will act in any situation. For me, at this point, after my son's been staring into space, 12 hours after he had a very concerning interaction with his ex girlfriend, who's the girlfriend, calls the mom, being like, he shouldn't drive. 12 hours after that, and then three hours after he stared into space on the side of the road, not going anywhere. I would probably at the very least stay on the phone with him for the three hour drive, because three hours is not short. We're not talking 30 minutes, we're not talking 15 minutes, three hours, significant amount of time. But that's not what happens. Bryce hangs up with his mom, he says, I'm coming. And he starts presumably driving. And so Bryce's parents, the ever patient parents they are, they just sit there and wait. They don't drive towards him, maybe meet him halfway at an hour and a half mark. They sit there and wait for him to make it home three hours later. And this will be a shock to no one. Three hours comes and goes. Bryce does not show up. Three and a half hours come and go. Maybe he stopped for gas, maybe he went to the bathroom. Let's give him a little bit of lead time there. 3:30 comes. Bryce still isn't home now at this point. So 30 minutes after the time he should have arrived home, his parents, Karen and Mike, begin to call him. They both, like, kind of take turns calling him, but he doesn't pick up. No one's able to get a hold of him. And they keep doing this. Now it's like, okay, he should have been here. He's not here.
- [06:27]
B
Look, can you imagine how you would feel at this point? If I say at this point, I mean, it's so many points, I would be losing my mind. I mean, I would be freaking out, honestly. The next thing they do is the. The thing that makes the most sense of anything they do, though, even that they end up not following up on, but I would just be out of. Out of my mind with concern. It is an understatement to say there have been so many red flags in this case, because there have been so many red flags in this case. There are so many points in this case where in any other case, if that one thing happened, it would trigger a massive response. But in this case, just thing after thing after thing is happening and there is no response.
- [07:05]
A
So come about six o', clock, Bryce's parents, at this point, they're like, okay, this is not just a situation where he's pulled off to the road or his phone has run out of battery. Something's really wrong. So they file a missing person's report at this point with the Orange County Sheriff's Department. Now law enforcement, they get to work immediately when they get this missing person's report, which doesn't always happen, as we know, but really, we're kind of more than 24 hours into whatever crisis Bryce is in. And so law enforcement reach out to AT&T to perform an emergency ping to Bryce's phone to get a location. We've talked about this on legal briefs before, but basically on an emergent situation, usually you need search warrants to get ping data, cell phone tower data on a phone. But when you have a situation of, like, a kidnapping or a missing person, you can get the phone company to ping their phone at that moment to try and locate where they are. So if it pings off, you know, a tower in some town, they at least can triangulate within certain number of miles to where the person is as Opposed to right now. He could be anywhere. It's been six, seven hours from the point in which he last saw him. Draw a circumference around that. That's a pretty big location to be looking. So Bryce's phone does ping, which means it's on and has batteries. It's pinging in Button Willow. So those of you who may not know this geography very well, that means in about six or seven hours, he's only moved eight miles since Christian, the hero of the story, brought him gas. He did not get very far.
- [08:36]
B
Okay? So the police have now located him. As Alice said, he's barely gone anywhere in this entire time. So the police go out to this location only 8 miles away from the place that he sat after getting gas, and they find him in his car off of Highway 58. So the police show up, and Bryce is just sitting there in his car, just like he was when Christian saw him last time. And they start talking to him, and he, frankly, according to them, seems fine. He's lucid, he's friendly, he's talkative. They don't seem to have a problem. They're like, hey, let's do a field sobriety test, because this whole thing is weird. And he passes it. This is interesting, because remember that one of his issues he had before was the drugs and the drinking. So apparently right now he's either not taking drugs and drinking, or somehow he's able to pass this test. Anyways, he even consents to a search of his car because the cops are thinking, this is strange. Something really weird is going on here. I don't know what it is, but they're doing all the things right. They search the car. Nothing notable is found. And he tells the cops he just needed to blow off some steam before heading home. And that's why he's still sitting in Button Willow, where he's been now for, like, 12 hours at this point. And they're like, hey, man, you need to call your parents. Your parents are really worried about you. And interestingly, he is very reluctant to do so. So the deputies end up calling his mom. They get her on the phone, and they basically are like, talk to your mom. They hand him the phone, and they're like, talk to your mom.
- [10:23]
A
And he says, third person, by the way, in the last 12 hours. Yes, 24 hours at this point.
- [10:29]
B
I mean, really, it's four if we have Christian. Christian, the best friend and roommate, the former girlfriend. And now the police are like, talk to your mom. And he tells his mom, I was just going to grab something to eat and head home. I don't know what world we're living in that she would believe that. Remember, it is 9:30pm at noon that day. Nine and a half hours earlier, he told her he was going to start coming home. Nine and a half hours earlier. Button Willow I mean, maybe there's no restaurants in anywhere. I don't, I don't know exactly what it would mean that you were just going to get a bite to eat and you've been driving eight miles in nine and a half hours. And she's like, but why are you still in Button Willow and he's like, I was going to hang out with some friends later. Which is completely inconsistent with what he just said.
- [11:25]
A
Right?
- [11:26]
B
So Karen will say, and she does. She asked the deputies if they think he's okay to drive and they say, yes, that is not the issue. There is clearly something going on here that is a huge problem. And the things he's saying to her, he's been telling her stuff for the last 24 hours that aren't true, Right? Like, remember before this old sojourn started, he called her at one o' clock in the morning after he left his girlfriend's house and made her think he was going back to his apartment, when in fact he wasn't going back to his apartment. Then he runs out of gas. Then we have the situation where he's just sitting there on the side of the road and then he's like, I'm coming home. And then nine and a half hours later, oh, he's just going to get something to eat, he's going to hang out with some friends. He's obviously not telling her the truth, but for whatever reason, it does not motivate Karen to take a step that you might expect her to take. You know, whether it's to head to him, I don't know. I mean, I would almost be tempted to tell the deputies, look, I don't know what you're seeing, but this is California. My son is crazy, he's insane. Something horrible is going on. You need to put like a mental health hold on him or something, right? I mean, try and convince them to hold him. Like, she doesn't seem to do that much. Like the situation with his girlfriend. It's like, well, I guess he's okay, let him go. And that's essentially what happens.
- [12:57]
A
So he doesn't really go anywhere. And about an hour later at 10:30pm so this is like at this point, I mean, maybe, maybe Bryce is sleeping in his car, probably not, he probably hasn't slept in a while here, but Christian, who's been working diligently, he's at least been working at this tire shop since 9am but maybe even before that, at 10:30, he returns a call to Karen from like an earlier call that she had left him. So he returns the call and he, he again offers to go out to where Bryce was last seen by officers. Remember, only eight miles further than where he'd been stopped for many hours before that. And he told Karen that he would go check on Bryce to make sure he was gone, that he'd gotten on his way, that he wasn't just sitting there. I don't know if it's surprising or unsurprising at this point. Christian drives out there for the third time that day while he's working a like 15 hour shift. By the way, Bryce is still there. He is still there in Button Willow an hour after the police did a field sobriety test on him, asked him if he was okay, did a search of his car, called his mother on his phone and put the phone to his ear and said, talk to your mother. He's still just sitting there. I don't care what field sobriety test you've passed. I'm not saying that he's not sober. I'm saying there is something much bigger going on either in his head, emotionally, something. He has now been sitting in button Willow for 11 hours and Christian is the one who keeps going back and seeing them there. So 30 minutes later, Bryce finally pulls onto the highway and Christian, the Good Samaritan, actually follows behind Bryce to make sure that, that Bryce isn't just gonna pretend to go and then pull off to the side of the road because that seems to be what he's been doing for the last 11 hours. So Christian's really trying to make sure this guy's okay and going towards home. So he follows him for a little bit to make sure he's in the direction of home. Christian follows bryce for roughly 10 miles before pulling off the highway. And he calls Karen to let her know that Bryce is on the way. And he had followed him for 10 miles and he seems to be going in that direction now. Over the next few hours, Bryce and his parents talk several times over the phone. He's still, by the way, three hours from home. So he's now just taking off around 11pm so even if he doesn't stop, this is driving through the night yet again when he was driving through the night the night before as well. So driving on zero sleep. Been staring into space for about 11 hours at this point. And he is in communication with his parents. And as he drives.
- [15:44]
B
Okay, but I want you to pay attention to the timing here. Right. So it's 10:30 or so, 11 o', clock, let's say it's 11 o' clock when Bryce finally pulls on the highway. Based on what Christian said though, it, it's a little unclear whether he got there at 10:30 or that's the time that Bryce started leaving me. You know, timing's a little off, but remember he's about three hours away. That's we've been expecting him to get home three hours, that's how long it's going to take. So let's assume it was 11 o'. Clock. Right. So he's driving, supposedly owning his way to his parents. He's talking to his parents a couple times. At 12:30 Karen actually attempts to call him and he does not answer, so she can't get him. Right. Which would raise a lot of red flags and concerns once again for me given everything else that's happened. At 1:50am he calls Kieran back. Now recall 11 to 12, that's one hour. 12 to 1, that's two hours. One to 1:50, that's two hours and 50 minutes. If Bryce is actually heading in the direction of home, driving the normal speed, he's 10 minutes away. Right. He should be somewhat close. It's 150 in the morning. He calls Karen back and she's like, hey, don't know why you haven't been calling me, but where are you? And he says it's too dark to see any signs. I don't even know what that means.
- [17:13]
A
Right.
- [17:13]
B
He's presumably driving with headlights. Signs light up, but it's too dark to see any signs. And he tells them that according to his GPS, he'll be home around 3:25am that for those of you who are not digging to the math, is another hour and a half. What has he been doing? Once again, what is going on here? But apparently once again the only person who made any effort was Christian who drove out to find him a couple times. Right, okay, so that's at 1:50 he's on his way. At 2:09 he calls Karen to let her know that he's just too tired to drive anymore and he's going to pull over to sleep for a little while. At this point he's been up for, I don't know, 24 hours, but anyways. And his parents are like, yeah, that's a good Idea. You should pull over and rest. Now. Look, there is.
- [18:13]
A
I would have maybe said that at 11, when he's still in Button Willow, and maybe say like, why don't you get a hotel room?
- [18:18]
B
Get a hotel. That's the other thing. They don't even say the thing that makes sense, which is get a hotel room. We will pay for you. Or no, you are going to pull over at the very next gas station, rest stop, whatever, and we will come get you. Which is what they should have said 15 times before this. And I'm sorry, there is no defending this. There is no defending what his parents have done. And I don't feel great saying that because it feels a lot like victim blaming and it feels a lot like second guessing some people who've lost their son. And that's a tragic thing. But I'm sorry, we're 24 hours into this adventure and multiple times his parents have had opportunities to take decisive action for their son and they just refuse to do it. And they continue to refuse, even at this late moment when he's suggesting doing something which is incredibly dangerous, pulling over and going to sleep. That is not good. Nothing that's happened here is good. But I just can't imagine, I cannot imagine being in this situation with my son and him suggesting something like that and me. You could not keep me off the road. You just. I'd be calling the cops again, I bet.
- [19:34]
A
Look, I was gonna say if for some reason you can't get in the car, you don't own a car, you're. You can't pay for gas, your legs are broken, you can't drive. I'd be calling the police and be like, there is an emergency situation. You need to go find my, my son.
- [19:48]
B
And look, this was their last chance. This was it. They had had so many opportunities to take some sort of action. They didn't do it. This was their last chance. And from here on out, it's just mystery and tragedy.
- [20:10]
A
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- [21:04]
B
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- [23:08]
A
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- [24:21]
B
And he's so obviously been lying the.
- [24:23]
A
Whole time, the whole time to everybody. And everyone around him recognizes, including a stranger who works at the tire shop. He knows he's lying. That's why he follows him for 10 miles. He doesn't follow him for one mile. 10 miles is kind of a long time, guys. He follows him for that long. Because this guy has been sitting there for 14 hours not moving. Something is not right. So even a stranger who doesn't know him is like he's not telling the truth. So is it surprising to anybody that at 2:09, despite telling his mother he's too tired he to drive and he's going to pull over and rest, he does not, in fact do that. So at 2:15, about six minutes after telling his parents that he's going to pull off, go to sleep, surveillance footage captures Bryce's car traveling up Lake Hughes Road in Castaic Lake. That's not that weird to me. Okay, maybe he wants a beautiful scenic route for his sleep. This next part is the weird part at 4:29am so two hours and 14 minutes later, that same surveillance camera captures Bryce's car traveling up Lake Hughes Road again in the same direction as before. So he's not going anywhere. He's like going in a circle. He's going the same way. He's not coming the opposite way. This is like a merry go round. Which makes sense, by the way, because he traveled eight miles in three hours in Button Willow. He's clearly not going in a forward motion intentionally.
- [25:55]
B
This whole thing is so sad because at this point, whatever's Going on with Bryce, he is just lost. I don't mean physically lost. He's just a lost individual. He's on the verge of collapse. He's sort of almost by rote really heading in the direction of his parents home. I mean, he's not actually trying to get there, you know, and he's putting off something that he's thinking about doing. That's why he's sitting there on the side of the road, you know, the things that are going through his head. And I'll say this, some people have suggested that perhaps this is schizophrenia. This is about the age that schizophrenia will manifest itself. A lot of times people do self medicate when schizophrenia first begins to sort of show itself. Number one, I'm not going to diagnose someone I've never met when I'm not a psychiatrist or a psychologist. So. So maybe. Right. But honestly, doesn't seem like that to me. He's not behaving irrationally. It's the stuff he's doing is unusual, but he's not, you know, when he's with the police, for instance, he's not giving any evidence to them that he's in some sort of strange mental state, that he's hallucinating, that he's paranoid. I mean, he's not doing any of those things.
- [27:17]
A
Right.
- [27:18]
B
In many ways it feels like what he's actually doing is he is struggling with something massive. We don't know what it is, and he's just, he's just lost. And so you see this circumstance where as Alice said, he's kind of driving in circles and he is reaching sort of the moment of crisis, but it is taking him a while to get there. And just the cries for help throughout this, even if they were subconscious, even if they were unintentional, there are so many of them and they just never got answered. They were just ignored up until this point.
- [27:57]
A
So that was 4:29 that he's seen driving a second time. Remember now we are well into like day two of not sleeping. I'm sure he is in fact tired. At 5.30am, Bryce's 2003 Toyota Highlander was found abandoned off an access road to the state recreation area in Castaic Lake, California. Now his car had been crashed and was found on its side at the bottom of a 25 foot embankment. So a cliff. It was adjacent to the lake's main boat access road. The back window had been broken from the inside, which is likely how Bryce was able to get out of the vehicle actually. Incredible that despite falling down a 25 foot cliff and crashing onto its side. Bryce was able to escape because he was not found in the vehicle. Now, his laptop and phone were still inside the car, and his duffel bag and wallet were also located just outside the vehicle by the rear window. In other words, wherever he is, his wallet is not with him, his phone is not with him, his laptop is not with him, his duffel bag with all his things, and he has nothing with him. There is a small spot of Bryce's blood found on the passenger side headrest, and another small spot found in the back seat. There were no signs that anyone was seriously injured and absolutely no sign of Bryce other than that little spot of blood.
- [29:28]
B
Okay, so you have this discovery, and that happens at 5:30am at 8:00am, the Les pieces are woken up by the doorbell. And I just another. I wouldn't be asleep. You know, maybe now I'm just being overly critical, but if this had been going on that long, I would be. Why would we be on the road? But best case, I'm sitting by the door waiting, calling him every 30 minutes. Hey, how's it going? You still. You woke, you wake it? Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't just go to sleep like. Well, he's, he's resting. I'm sure he'll be here eventually. Got to get my beauty rest, right? And then at 8am still be asleep, but whatever. So the list pieces are woken up, they think, hey, Bryce is home. But when they get to the door, it's the California Highway Patrol, and they ask if they own a beige 2003 Toyota Highlander. And they say they do. It was the car that their son drove. And that's when the officers inform them the car has been found wrecked and abandoned. But there is no sign of Bryce, which I'm sure came as a shock, but shouldn't have because we've been leading to this almost inexorably this entire time. Okay, so obviously people are looking for Bryce immediately. And remember, we catch him on camera at 4:30. His car is found at 5:30. That's only an hour. They're already looking for him at that point.
- [30:58]
C
Right.
- [30:59]
B
Based on what they're seeing, they are able to determine that Bryce had accelerated intentionally when he was driving towards the cliff. He goes past the cell phone tower and through some brush. And apparently the angle of this cliff makes it look like the water is just below you. Like if you go up the cliff, you're gonna go into the water. But that is an optical illusion. The water's not actually there. So what you actually end up doing is you go off the cliff like Bryce did and crash your car. And this has led many people to leave. I think, correctly, that Bryce was attempting to drive into the lake, most likely to end his life. So following that line of thinking, the detectives were like, well, maybe he kept going, you know, maybe he got out the back and he's going to finish what he started. And he went down into the lake or towards the lake. They're calming the area by foot. They're on ATVs, they have helicopters, they search all weekend. They have dogs out looking for him, they have cadaver dogs looking for him. They're searching the hills, they're searching the shoreline, they have police divers on the lake looking for him. But no sign of Bryce is recovered.
- [32:11]
A
So five days after this, on September 4, 2013, a jogger is running around Castaic Lake and they report a brush fire just three miles from the scene of where Bryce's car was found. A person had been set on fire. I know what you all must be thinking, oh, my goodness, this is Bryce. He hasn't been found so far. Why is he on fire? What is happening? But despite everyone getting their hopes up that maybe Bryce was finally found, this was not Bryce. This was a man from LA who was the victim of a homicide. And in fact, it had nothing to do with Bryce's death, disappearance. But you can see how people are latching onto these things because how does someone drive off a cliff and just disappear?
- [32:53]
B
It's funny because we've just gotten to the mystery, right? Like, this is the mystery, what happened to him. And I was like, and to me, I'm just so blown away by everything that's happened up to this point that this part is almost like an animal.
- [33:07]
A
This part isn't a mystery to me, unfortunately. I think I know exactly what he did. I think he was a man in crisis. And it was like 36 hours of pure cries for help that went unanswered. By the way, those of you who are like, well, he's an adult. Whatever, he was 19.
- [33:22]
B
Yeah, come on.
- [33:23]
A
I mean, okay, legally he can vote. I don't care if he's talking about like a 59 year old man who's been on his own, he's been away from home for one year. This is the very beginning of his second year of college. And by the way, I don't know if any of you have ever been in these types of situations, but if you recognize someone in crisis around you, it doesn't really matter. What their age is doesn't even matter if they're related to you. I was very recently in a situation where kind of similar to this, the girlfriend of someone who was in massive crisis called. Don't even know them that well. They were just like, we feel like you are someone who knows how to deal with the situation. Clearly there was a crisis going on in the background. This was a grown man, many years older than Bryce was. And it was clear to someone, me, who didn't even know this person that well, that something was not right. And I'm not talking like they were high. They probably would have passed this field sobriety test. But something was not right in the sense that it was headed towards disaster unless someone tried to do something. That's why the person they were with was desperately trying to call for help. So your age certainly matters. When you're talking about like, well, you got yourself into this credit card mess, you're gonna have to pay it off yourself. Is very different from 36 hours into crisis mode when the words coming out of your mouth, I'm fine, I'm fine, I'm fine. Are not matching your actions. Sitting still for 14 hours despite saying that you're okay. People who know you the best, your best friend and roommate, your ex girlfriend, who you were, you know, very, very close with, both recognizing that something was deeply wrong in terms of danger to yourself and were calling out for help. Those situations like age doesn't really matter when people around you who can recognize that there is like help needed, otherwise devastation will occur. This is where community matters. There's no law that enforces that, like, you have to step in and do something. But as fellow human beings who recognize dignity in someone else, when you see someone in Crisis, you call 91 1. You do. That's why there's like the 911 exists. When I see a car crash, I call 91 1. I don't know who just crashed. Probably a lot of other people have called 91 1, but this is the human dignity being recognized in other people. When you see someone in crisis, you do something. But I do want to note that he is 19, so we are not talking about like a middle aged man. He's barely making his way in the world at this point.
- [35:58]
B
What you're saying is so important. This is not, he decided to join the circus or he decided to drop out of college, or he decided to sell all his stuff and go to Vegas and bet it all on red. That's a situation where I say, well, he's an Adult. I mean, he can do that if that's what he wants to do, right? No, this is very different. And I think you're right. It just doesn't matter how old he is. And I think the fact that Christian, the dude at the tire store, recognized this. I mean, it wasn't just even the best friend and the girlfriend. Christian saw this and tried to help. Tried to just. And he is great. I mean, I can't praise Christian enough. You want everybody to be like him, right? You want everybody, when they see this kind of stuff, to act this way.
- [36:41]
A
And I'll give you a bystander effect.
- [36:44]
B
Exactly. Yeah.
- [36:45]
A
He is the bystander who does something.
- [36:47]
B
And back when I was writing books, I mean, it's kind of like the podcast, you know, you. You make friends with people who read the books and you sort of talk to them and. And there was one guy who. He was. He was a fan, and he would write me every now and then. And one time he just sent me an email that was weird. And it just. It. There was just something about it. I'd read a bunch of his emails, but there was something about this email that I just. I didn't like. And I knew sort of generally where he lives, so I figured out where he lived. I figured out what his address was. It was like, I was in a hotel in Cleveland. It was midnight when I got this email. He was out in Oregon, called the police department in Oregon, and I was like, I know this is gonna be strange, but I didn't really know this guy. But I got this email, and it seemed weird, and I was just wondering if you guys would go out there and check on him. And they did. They went out there, and it turned out he was kind of having a mental health crisis, but they were able to talk him down. And they called me back and they're like, hey, he's fine. He's gonna go to, you know, a facility for tonight. And thanks for calling us. Other stuff. And I was so glad that I called. Right. Because it was just. There was something about it that was just a little off. I just. The signals that Bryce is sending are just so obvious. And we're going to talk about what may or may not have happened to him. But the mystery of this case to me is why you could send so many signals and not get a response.
- [38:10]
A
And I recognize that sometimes when someone has their mindset on something. By the way, this does not appear to be Bryce. He does not appear to have. Be someone who is. I'm gonna drive 10 times as long as it takes to drive off a 25 foot cliff. Seems like he quite literally was pushed to that point. It seems like it was. That was not what he set out to do 30 hours earlier. He was not like leaving his girlfriends and he was like, I know what lake I'm gonna go to. I'm gonna go off this embankment. I think there are situations where people make up their minds and they're gonna do something. And it may be true that there's nothing you can do to change it. You also don't know the effect in which you showing an ounce of care may change something. That someone does call on your behalf. Or someone sends a text and just says, hey, haven't heard from you in a few days. Despite me, our group text, I've been texting everyone. Everyone's responded but you, are you doing okay? You never know what that effect may have. We don't know what that effect may have had here either. And look, lots of people were reaching out to him. His ex girlfriend, his roommate and best friend, Christian, the sheriff's deputy. So there may be a situation where none of this would have changed in outcome. But I think that is a very fatalistic view and also what a difficult way to live to think I will do nothing because my actions will have no effect on whatever tragedy may happen. We never know. So still haven't found Bryce. Nine days after he goes missing. September 8, 2013, the investigators bring in bloodhounds to try and track down Bryce's scent. They bring in two separate bloodhounds who did catch on to Bryce's scent. And both dogs trace this scent trail through the recreational area of this lake and to a nearby truck stop where the trail just ended. Many have interpreted this to mean that Bryce got to the truck stop and got into a car and is gone.
- [40:11]
B
We'll talk about that a little bit more when we get to theories. So at this point though, the trail really has gone cold. In August of 2015, the family, I guess, hires some sonar specialists to search Castaic Lake for Bryce. And you guys know this is the side sonar. Basically you drive around the boat and it's very effective. They attempted to use this in Lacy Peterson case, as a matter of fact, but they don't find any sign of Bryce. In 2017, a human skull is found along the Templin highway nearby to where Bryce's car was located. But once again, it was determined not to belong to Bryce. And look, you know, we got somebody getting lit on fire and we have a skull being found. I mean, it's a dangerous world, right? And we talk about this sometimes. Seems like whenever there's a search for a missing person, they always find five or six bodies. And there's a little bit of that going on here as well. And that's basically the end of the timeline. There have really been no development since then. You have sort of the standard things that you see. People are looking for Bryce and they see somebody and think, oh, that's him. And it turns out not to be him. There was one person who I think an investigator said basically it could have been Bryce's doppelganger. I mean, he looked just like him, but it wasn't him. He had these sightings. But really, as far as any kind of concrete evidence that Bryce is still with us or really any indication of what happened to him, there's been nothing in the last 12 years. So that's the end of the timeline. Before we go go on to theories, I do want to talk about this Vyvans a little bit. Sort of the role it had in his disappearance, the extent to which he was abusing it, it has been disputed by different sources. And there have been some people who have suggested that Bryce actually had struggled with a substance abuse issue in high school. Now, whether that's true or not, we don't know. As always cases, there are always people who claim to know things, but then it's not. There's no way to verify that. There's been discussion about how Vyvans can result in a psychotic break if you're abusing it. And actually several people have written in to talk about that, that if you're really abusing Vyvans in the way that Bryce was, you could really have some sort of mental breakdown. And the fact of the matter is it seems like Bryce was not only abusing Vyvans, but he hadn't slept in over a day. And with everything that's going on with him, I don't know, I would believe pretty much anything could have happened. And I don't know. I mean, the other thing is some people say this isn't a big deal. This is the kind of thing that lots of kids do in college. You say he's abusing it, but really he's just taking a few. For me, given the fact that all of this strangeness happened and he disappeared, it's difficult for me just to sort of hand wave away really anything he's doing. And that includes taking Vyvanse.
- [43:08]
A
Right. And the Vyvanse is In conjunction with all the things happening. You're right. Someone who is recreationally taking it for fun doesn't have a proclivity to, I don't know whether emotionally, mentally, to being affected by the Vyvanse in ways that are unexpected. Maybe they're fine taking it. But it doesn't change the fact that there were other situations happening. There were other things happening in Bryce's life that led to whatever was happening. The alcohol abuse, the Vyvanse abuse, and the giving away his things. And there's a nucleus of facts that we don't understand that is at root of all this. And the Vyvanse, I think, is certainly an important factor to consider. One of these. And the fact that there are kids out there who use it recreationally and they're fine does not necessarily affect what Vyvanse had to do in this case because of whatever was happening in Bryce's mind or in his life at this time. So theories, let's get there. There are a million theories in this case. The chat's going wild with theories of what has happened. And most of all, these theories really hinge on two main things. Number one, did Bryce drive off that embankment by accident or on purpose? And two, is Bryce still alive today? So the first theory that we've already mentioned and probably is number one for a lot of people thinking, well, this is obviously what happened, is suicide. So one of the most prevalent theories is that Bryce wanted to end his life, and he did, in fact, end his life. There were reports that Bryce was acting erratically leading up to his disappearance. According to these reports, he was drinking heavily, he was taking Vyvanse, and he was giving away his most prized possessions. This all explains why he would drive in the direction of the cell phone tower embankment twice before actually driving his car off of it. Maybe he had to work up the nerve in order to drive off that cliff. That's why the strange kind of going in the same direction, like, he tries to do it, can't quite do it, so comes back around, takes an hour breather, paces around, tries to get up the courage to do it again, and then succeeds that second time. This could also account for why he spent so much time in Button Willow. Not close to his home, not his real home, his home that his parents moved to, or his college or where his girlfriend lived. Button Willow. He probably doesn't have friends there. Button Willow is kind of nowhere with respect to him. It does not mean anything to him except that he ran out of gas there. So maybe he was sitting in Buttonwillow, calmly staring straight ahead for 14 hours because he was trying to make a plan and get up the nerve to end his life. If he thought that water below the embankment was actually closer than it really was, due to the position of the cliff, he may have intended to drive straight into that lake, let the car consume water, sink down and end his life that way. But there was evidence, and of course we know that water was not there. So in fact, the car crashed and Bryce was okay enough to not be in that car. So he wasn't knocked out. He could move. In fact, he did move. He broke his way out of the car. So there is evidence, of course, that suggests Bryce left his vehicle after the crash. His body was never found in the immediate area or in the lake. And the fact that these bloodhounds tracked his scent to a rest stop seems to suggest that Bryce made it to that rest stop and got in a car. This of course kind of cuts against that suicide theory because let's say he thought that was the lake, he was gonna end his life. He drives off, he hits it, bang. And he's like, gosh darn it, I'm still here. Well, let's go end it now. Break the window, climb out, leave all your things behind. Because who needs it when you're about to end your life? Walk towards that lake, jump on in. But that's not what he does. He kind of does something that cuts against that theory of him wanting to end his life. He goes to find a way out, but he doesn't take anything with him.
- [47:22]
B
In some ways, suicide is the most obvious theory since it seems patently obvious he attempted suicide. But as you said, you know, you have this bloodhound information that I don't know about, and I'll say this, I don't think it is possible to walk into a lake to drown yourself and the police not find him. I just think they would have found him. I realize that sometimes bodies disappear in lakes. I don't know anything about this lake. Maybe this is a lake that's famous for bodies sort of disappearing. There's one near where I grew up, which is a. It's a power company lake and it's got a lot of trees in the bottom that were never cut down when they filled it up. And so every time we have a drought, they'll find 50 year old bodies that people drown. Their bodies went down, they got caught in the trees and they never came up. And so then when the trees start sticking out, they're the Bodies. Right. Maybe that's this kind of lake. I don't know. But given that they started looking for him about an hour later, it just seems like they would have found him. It seems like they would have found some evidence of him. And I will say this. It's one thing to drive your car into a lake. It's another thing just to walk into a lake. I'm not saying he couldn't have done that, but I don't know. I just. I don't know about that. Now what we can't know is let's say that he did walk off to the truck stop and let's say he got a ride somewhere. He very well could have ended his life somewhere else. And either because of the way he did it, his body was never found, or possibly because he got rid of all identifying information. There's a John Doe somewhere that we don't realize as a price. And maybe one day Othram will do a DNA test on an unknown body and boom, this mystery will at least be partially solved. That's a possibility. But even though I think suicide was his initial intention, I don't know if that's what ended up happening or not. And that leads to the second theory, which, as we've said in every disappearance is always a theory. But frankly, of all the cases we've ever done, this is the one where maybe. And that's that he ran away to start a new life. And this is something that people have speculated about, that he got into a car at that truck stop and left to start a new life. This would explain why his body was never found. It would explain why he was lingering in Button Willow much like the suicide theory. Maybe he was just trying to decide what to do. Now, look, I think, though he did not drive up to that lake thinking, I'm gonna start a new life. He drove up to that lake thinking, I'm going to kill myself. But after he drives off the embankment and doesn't die. It is a very common thing, well documented that people who attempt suicide often have immediate regrets. This is most famously seen in the people who've jumped off the Golden Gate Bridge and survived. Many of them have said that literally the moment after they jumped off the bridge, they regretted it. And many of them who survived it completely changed their lives because they had this sort of brush with death and then their lives were completely different and they had a different view on everything. And some people think maybe that's exactly what happened. He drove off that embankment, he survived. He breaks out the back and Then what does he do? He leaves all this stuff there. All his connections to his old life, the things that were used to track him, right? How they found him once they pinged his cell phone, how did they find him the other time? They looked at his credit cards. What do we find sitting next to the car? All of that stuff, right? All of the things that tied him to his life are now gone. And there you go. Now he goes off to start his own life. Now I will say this, it is incredibly difficult to do something like that in the modern world, number one. Number two, he would have had almost no resources if he had sold his Xbox and sold his diamond earrings. I would be like, you know what, maybe he was getting some cash, right? But he literally would have had to have walked to that rest stop, right? Got in a car and basically gone somewhere and just completely reinvented himself. Without a Social Security number, without a false id, without anything. Given this state that he was in at this moment, do we really think he could have pulled that off? Do we really think that he was in the mental place to be able to do that and avoid ever being found? I don't know. That seems hard to believe, but, you know, it is a possibility. And what could drive all this? What could drive suicide? What could drive certainly life. Remember one of the things that his mom tells us that he said to her was he had something that he wanted to tell her, there was something he wanted to talk about with her. And that thing, whatever it is, seems to be what started all of this to sort of spiral down this path. And I'll say this, the other problem with him doing this is he actually, he does not blend in, right? If you've seen a picture of him, I mean, he's a big red headed dude, right? He has a large tattoo of a bull on his arm. He's the kind of guy you'd probably see. So unless he like went down to the Baja Peninsula or something, it's just difficult to believe that he is actually alive and well somewhere. Though there are people who work this case who think that's exactly what happened. And I don't know. As I've said, I almost never believe that is a real possibility. In this case, it might actually be one. So you have heard us talk about Lola Blankets before and how much we love them. And it is absolutely true. It doesn't matter what your wind down ritual is. It doesn't matter. Do you like curling up in front of a fire? Do you want to be outside? 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- [54:02]
A
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- [57:43]
B
Look, he wasn't murdered. If he was murdered, it was by someone who didn't know him, wanted to rob him, something like that. They wouldn't have bothered to hide the body. They found two bodies while they were looking for him. That's just. That's not what happened. They would have found him if he'd been murdered. So that's not what happened. Now, the head injury thing, there are people who believe that if you look at the accident, he probably did suffer a head injury based on, number one, the way the accident happened, and number two, where you see the blood and maybe he's out there and he doesn't remember any part of his life. If that's true, though, once again, surely someone would have recognized him, because then he wouldn't even be making any effort to hide himself. He would have shown up in a hospital somewhere. He would just be somewhere, and he would be found. So if he's still alive, I don't think he's out there sort of living alive, not knowing who he is. I think if he's alive, he chose to disappear for whatever reason. And that brings us to the last thing we want to talk about, which is the first thing we said, which was that there's a lie in this story. And the question for all of you is, how much does this lie matter, if at all? It may be completely irrelevant. And I say it's a lie. I'm going to caveat that later on, and you'll see that, because it's impossible to say whether or not what I'm going to tell you is actually true. But what is the lie? Well, the lie is that Bryce is not an only child because Mike is not his father. So despite the fact that it is repeatedly reported in basically every coverage of the story that Bryce was the only child of Mike and Karen, that does not appear to be true. There are two sort of ways this story is told. The first has almost no support other than a anonymous Reddit person, though it has been ran with, and that's that Bryce actually had an older sister who lived with her father until her father died. She then came to live with the Les Pieces. Then there was some sort of falling out, and she became estranged with her parents and now no longer talks to them. I can find no proof of that. I don't know if that's true. However, putting that aside, the other thing, though, is I did reach out to someone who claims to be Bryce's younger brother, and the story he tells is different from that one. It's that Bryce was born in Chicago to Karen and a man named Richard Birmingham, and that very shortly thereafter, that relationship ended. Mike came into the family very quickly after that and was the only father that Bryce ever knew. This person who claims to be Richard Birmingham's son was able to provide a lot of information, including the fact that Birmingham died in New Jersey in 2016, which I was able to confirm. I was also able to identify an address in Illinois that is tied to three people. Richard Birmingham, Karen Lespiza, and Bryce Lespiza, all three of them. If you do record searches on that property, all three names come up. They're all tied together, which I think is a pretty good indication that what this person is saying is true. Also, I was able to tie this person to Richard Birmingham, so it appears that he is indeed Richard Birmingham's son. He also Provided a photograph of Richard Birmingham, and he is the spitting image of Bryce. If this person is lying and making all this up, I don't know why they'd be doing that, but they've done a really good job of sort of papering this story. Impossible to confirm because Bryce is a ghost. If you try and find any information about him through sort of ancestry.com, record searches, all that stuff, basically nothing shows up. No birth certificates. I don't think he's ever been declared dead, but just. There's just nothing out there. So it's hard to really prove that. It was interesting to me that that address is tied to him. And he also does have an older sister, by the way, an older half sister. She is Richard's daughter by another woman. So that whole story about her moving in with the LES pieces would make no sense. So I think the first story is false, but I think this story is almost certainly true. And the thing I'll say, assuming this person is telling the truth, is one thing that they wanted me to say was if by some chance Bryce is still alive out there, there are people who love him, even though they've never met him, and would like to be part of his life. So that's one of the things I'm throwing out there now. How important is this? I don't know. I don't know if it's important at all. I don't know if it tells us anything about what was going on with Bryce. I don't know if he knew about this. I don't know if he just found out about this. Like, I have no idea. But it's interesting to me that assuming this story is true, which there's a possibility, like I said, this person is just a total fraudster, but assuming the story is true, it is interesting to me that that part of Bryce's history is completely whitewashed. It's just not part of this discussion. Maybe because it doesn't have anything to do with his disappearance, but nevertheless, I find it interesting that we've been told for so long that he is the only child of this family, and that, at least, is not a hundred percent true.
- [63:24]
A
Now, we're just, like, creating that part researched. But it may not be that the lie is perpetrated for any reason, but the fact that maybe Bryce thought he was an only child, right? I have no idea. I have no idea. But it is kind of weird. Like, why would you. The lie is maybe too strong of a word or with too many negative connotations when you don't know the intent behind the person who has said it. But to say something that is not true repeatedly and not correct it over time, it is interesting. Unless it's the family history lore, what have you say? So there might be more to this than we can even understand.
- [64:06]
B
And I'll say this, from conversations with this person, it sounds like the end of the relationship with Karen and Richard, it wasn't great. I mean, Richard gave up all his rights completely out of Bryce's life, moved to New Jersey, spent the rest of his life in New Jersey until he died in 2016. It may just be kind of like we talked about this in the. In the West Memphis Three case. And like John Mark Byers, I mean, it may just be like Mike was just always in his life. He was in his life from the very beginning. He was the only father ever knew. And so why even worry about that messiness? We'll just tell the story the way we've always told the story. But given everything else in the case and given the weirdness and frankly, given what I think is some strange behavior by the parents, I think it's something worth considering. And I just. It is hard for me not to sort of wonder if Bryce might have learned some things about his family history and himself that summer. You know, I mean, you think about, like, what was the trigger for all this change? Like, why was it that he went back to college and just. Completely different person. I mean, maybe this was something he discovered. Complete speculation. You know, we'll never know that unless it's true and someone wants to tell us that. But I don't know. Just another little wrinkle in what is a very strange case. Well, look, it is not too late to solve this case. We can always hope that Bryce will be found either alive or if, unfortunately, he is deceased. If you're out there, just something to remember. He's a big old white guy with red hair and green eyes and a tattoo of a Taurus bull and his birthday in Roman numerals on his upper left arm. He has pierced ears. And if he were alive today, he would be 30 years old. So if you know somebody like that, I mean, I don't know, maybe find out whether they want everyone else know or not. But if you have any information, you can always contact the Los Angeles County Sheriff's office at 323-890-5500. Okay. Well, Alice, do you want to answer a question?
- [66:26]
A
That's the answer question. I was going to say, what's the takeaway, man?
- [66:29]
B
I guess it's like, I'll say this. We're always trying to have a positive takeaway with all these cases and sometimes a hard to find one. I actually don't think it's hard to find one at all in this case. And Alice has already said it, and that's be Christian. In a world of not Christians, be Christian. Like, if you see somebody in crisis. Yeah, if you see somebody in crisis. If you see somebody, everything's going wrong. Don't just look the other way. Do what you can.
- [66:53]
A
I'll give an additional example where it could have been really easy to just look away. Like, Brett's example was so good. Where Spidey senses went up. And if that guy was totally fine, Brett may have come off looking pretty creepy, Right? But he was like, you know what? I'm gonna do what I think is right. I was on Facebook, this was a few years ago, and someone I haven't talked to in, like, 15 years, but we used to be friends, childhood friends. A lot of us are friends together. Started posting really crazy posts. Classic. Something was wrong, mentally, the way the words were strung together, very hallucinator. And this person was not normally. Like, this was like 20 posts a day. And they were. Clearly something was wrong with this person. I haven't spoken to this person in 15 years. And it popped up immediately because he was posting so often. It popped up on my feed even though I never engaged with him on Facebook, his post was at the top of my feed every time I opened up Facebook. And I saw for the third day in a row, and I was like, clearly something is wrong. I don't know. I don't know how else to reach out to him. And so we had all gone to high school together, and I reached out to every person I was still in contact with from high school, which is not that many people. But I was just like, hey, have you seen this person's post? Something's wrong, right? Like, this is clear. And as soon as I said that, basically everyone was like, yeah, I've been seeing these posts. Something is clearly wrong. And through basically, like telephone, we figured out who this person was still in contact with, at least in more recent history from our high school class. And we were able to narrow it down. And it had turned out where his parents had actually moved out of the country and was not around and so did not know that this was happening. And we were able to get people who had been in contact with him more recently in the last couple of months show up to where he was living and in fact, this person was in crisis, and he ended up getting institutional help. Made a recovery is okay, but that's what it may look like. Maybe nothing would have happened, or maybe our actions would not have changed the outcome, but I think in this instance, it did. So it's along the lines of see something, say something, but more so than even say something, do something if you can, because we should not live disjointed from each other. We were meant to be in community, and this is what, 2013. I think we've become much more disjointed as a society even since 2013. And the only way to fix it is to be more Christian, to be the person who smiles and says hello to people around you and know your neighbor's name, and to recognize when something may be wrong and then do something about it.
- [69:37]
B
Hello. We've been really hard on the parents, and I can't imagine what it's like to lose your son. And I'm sure it was a terrible thing. And I'm sure they feel guilty about what they could or should or do. They probably ran this through their head a thousand times. And let me just say this, just giving them the absolute benefit of the doubt. I think it is probably understandable that initially they weren't going to helicopter in, right? I mean, their son is trying to become an adult. He's trying to sort of live his own life. But I think at some point you have to trust your gut. Like, at some point, you have to stop telling that voice inside of you that says something wrong. No, it'll be fine. This is kind of like a corollary to that whole gift of fear thing, right, we talked about before, where you should listen to that sort of intuition because it's there for a reason. This wasn't that, but I'm sure there had to have been multiple times over the course of that 24 hours that they said to themselves, something is horribly wrong when they filed the police report. But they never allowed themselves to take that next step. And maybe it was because they thought, man, if we drive out there, he's gonna be so mad at us, he'll never talk to us again. You know? Or they just wanted to believe him when he said, oh, no, I've just been looking for a McDonald's for eight hours. Right? They just wanted to believe so badly that everything was fine, that they didn't take any actions. And trust your gut. Trust it. Because if you call the cops and the person's fine, maybe you're embarrassed, maybe they're angry. But everybody's still alive, right? And I don't know, I know that it can be hard to do, but especially when you just keep seeing the red flags. You've got to act because if you don't, that's what you're going to regret. And I truly believe that is right. Okay, I've got some like funny questions. Let's do some funny questions because that was deep.
- [71:32]
A
I like funny questions. Funny questions, guys, because I just, I.
- [71:38]
B
Don'T know, I find the idea of this disgusting. So I'm just gonna ask you. Anyways. This is from cmp. CMP wants to know what do you put on a meatloaf sandwich? Ketchup or mayonnaise? What about you, Alice? When you slice off a big chunk of meatloaf and put it between two slices of white bread, what else, what else do you have on it?
- [72:01]
A
First of all, maybe it's a cultural thing. I didn't know that was a thing.
- [72:05]
B
I've never had a meatloaf sandwich in my life.
- [72:07]
A
I didn't know it was a thing. I'm not.
- [72:08]
B
It's has to be a northern thing, right?
- [72:10]
A
Maybe I've just never heard of that. I've had a hamburger before, but not a meatloaf sandwich.
- [72:14]
B
I mean, I've had meatloaf. You've had meatloaf.
- [72:15]
A
I've had meatloaf and I've had sandwiches, but not a meatloaf sandwich. I've had meatball sandwiches. So I don't know what you would put on a meatball sandwich, but the idea of putting mayonnaise on meatloaf at all makes me a little bit, A little queasy. So I guess if I had to choose between the two, it would be ketchup.
- [72:36]
B
So I do like ketchup with meatloaf. So I guess burger.
- [72:40]
A
I could. I get that.
- [72:42]
B
If I had to eat a meatloaf sandwich, I would go with ketchup. But I gotta say, I can think of like one time in the last 15 years when I had a craving for meatloaf and got some. I can literally remember the day.
- [72:54]
A
Who makes meatloaf that you crave? I'm just curious.
- [72:57]
B
I don't crave any particular person's meatloaf. I was just having a craving for meatloaf and so I went to restaurant that had meatloaf and I got some meatloaf, some ketchup and I ate it. But it's like not typically what I'm going to do.
- [73:07]
A
I think I've had meatloaf Maybe like a handful of times. All I remember about meatloaf is it was like meatloaf Mondays or whatever at school. You know, like, the cafeteria meal was like meatloaf Mondays. But I never got it. I just knew it was there and I would smell it again. I'm sure, look, if you want to make me a meatloaf, I will eat it. But I'm not gonna say that I would slather some mayonnaise on it. I had a college roommate who, if you even began to say the word mayonnaise, she would physically throw up because she thought it was so gross.
- [73:44]
B
I love mayonnaise.
- [73:46]
A
I now dislike it only because every time I think about mayonnaise, I think about my roommate throwing up, and that grosses me out. Not because mayonnaise is gross.
- [73:56]
B
Like, if I get a sandwich, I usually get extra mayo. I love mayo and mustard together on basically anything.
- [74:02]
A
I mean, mayo when. I don't know it's on there because just the whole Pavlovian response of my roommate vomiting when there is mayonnaise and things, it's delicious. Like pesto mayonnaise on any sort of a sandwich. Oh, so good.
- [74:15]
B
I mean, like, an aioli is basically mayonnaise. It is.
- [74:18]
A
It is. That's just a fancy way of saying mayonnaise.
- [74:20]
B
Okay, continuing the eating discussion. And I doubt you ever. Well, I'm not gonna say. Well, let's see. Greg wants to know, if you were a jello shot, which one would you be and why?
- [74:35]
A
There are different kinds other than by color.
- [74:37]
B
I was gonna say the same thing.
- [74:40]
A
I only know of them. I mean, I don't know if this is just a Polish thing, but jello shots, I guess, are always. I always remember them as being green. Is that just because. Maybe just because in my small college green I could see red, too. But it was always. I just remember it always being green. I've done some pretty crazy things that are not Jello shot related that I love Jello shots. I mean, Jello's delicious. So, you know, jello shots.
- [75:09]
B
I wouldn't want to be a jello shot because then someone would eat you.
- [75:12]
A
Someone would eat you. But other than it being a different color, I do like green jello, I'll say that much.
- [75:20]
B
Yeah, I mean, I don't really like Jello unless it is in shot form, really.
- [75:26]
A
So I guess I'm not gonna say the other thing because then people will hate on me if they. If you thought that the chicken stories.
- [75:33]
B
You can do that in After Dark.
- [75:34]
A
This is a really One, but like, instead of jello show. So the college that I went to had a lot of traditions. None of them probably healthy, but two particular, because we are now in the holiday season. I'm gonna share two of the don't do this at home kids. But I guess while other colleges were just doing jello shots. Red and green for your festive jello shots. The two holiday themed party activities, I guess you'll call them, that we did at every, like, holiday party from Thanksgiving until, you know, finals was. We would go sledding inside downstairs on live Christmas trees because someone had bequeathed a Christmas tree farm to our school. So everyone got a free Christmas tree and so we would. Quite literally. I lived in one of these houses. This is why you should never rent a house to college student drag. Everyone brought their own Christmas tree and you drag it up the staircase. Indoor. This is like home alone style. And everyone would pile on after having a lot of jello shots and ride down on an eight foot tree with lots of branches down a indoor staircase. We did this many, many, many, many, many times. And then the other thing we did, this is a lot more dangerous. Definitely don't do this. But you would have Christmas lights up the, like little string of lights at parties. And the party trick that everyone did was you would go bite Christmas lights. Did you do that at your college?
- [77:01]
B
No, I did not. The University of Alabama, we did not bite.
- [77:05]
A
We. I will say when we went. I'm not proud of this.
- [77:08]
B
We said jello shot.
- [77:09]
A
I was gonna say. So my point being that regular schools and regular people just did cello shots. Those were the things that we ranked number one party school the year I went there as a freshman. So I did not know this when I picked it. That was not why I picked it.
- [77:23]
B
Now she doesn't drink.
- [77:25]
A
Do you see what happens when people drink?
- [77:27]
B
We really need to get the story behind the last big bender that Alice went on and why she doesn't.
- [77:34]
A
Do you see why I've seen the darks? Why I know what happens when people drink.
- [77:38]
B
There you go. All right. Well, I actually got my Christmas tree today. And that leads me into our next story. Next week we have a Christmas story. So congratulations, everybody. It's going to be a Christmas story. You're going to love it.
- [77:54]
A
This is not. This is no Hallmark.
- [77:56]
B
Yeah, yeah. It's just not a Hallmark story. If you have thoughts about this case, shoot us an email. Prosecutors podmail.comsecutors pod for all your social media. If you want to watch us record, record these episodes Join Patreon for as little as $3 a month. If you really don't want to see us record these episodes, but you hate ads, you can also Join Patreon for $3 a month and you'll get the episodes early and ad free. If you want to talk about this, criticize me from my position on the family in this case, join the gallery and you can do that all you want. We would love to see you there. Alright, Alice, before we sign off, is there anything else you want to say?
- [78:36]
A
Thanks for joining us on this. Like Brett said, I know we were very hard on the parents. We don't know the full story. We truly don't. But I think this is a very, very good exemplar. It's just such an obvious example of someone who really needed someone to reach out. And despite many people reaching out, I think the people who he really needed to hear from didn't should at least be some sort of a wake up call because you might be the person that is the person who needs to reach out in someone's life.
- [79:10]
B
And I'll say this just echo what Alice just said or part of what she just said. This case has been compared to the Maura Murray case because of the car and all the weirdness and disappearing and leaving the car behind and everything. The real thing that is similar, I believe, between those two cases is in both cases there was something going on that we don't know. There is a part of this story that is a mystery. There is a big chunk of information we don't have. If we did have it, it might not tell us where Bryce was any more than it would tell us where Mara is. But I think it would explain a lot of what happened. And we don't have that piece of information and we may never. But I think that that is my takeaway from this case is there's a big black hole in this case. And that to me, more than the mystery of where Bryce is is that question of what that missing information is. All right, guys, well, like I said, we'll see you next week for a holly, jolly Christmas story. But until then, I'm Brett.
- [80:14]
A
And I'm Alice and.
- [80:15]
B
And we are the prosecutors. Hope everybody had a good Thanksgiving.
- [80:39]
A
It was weird. Have been eating leftovers since Thanksgiving. I think it's impossible to make a regular amount of food for Thanksgiving.
- [80:48]
B
It is impossible.
- [80:49]
A
But I made a fried. I learned this from a neighbor in dc. I don't even know their name because they lived like several doors down from us and they like knocked on our door on Thanksgiving night. It was like 9pm we had a newborn at the time. So, like, time at nothing. And they're like, hey. Our tradition is we make fried turkey ramen on Thanksgiving. Like, night, late night. You want to come over, Sam? Best ramen I've ever had.
- [82:13]
B
That's awesome.
- [82:14]
A
So I've made ramen with from like, you know, the turkey carcass. And then you fry up the leftover turkey, and then you do all the, like, all the. All the other stuff, you know, vegetables, corn, whatever you want in the bo. The runny boiled egg in there. And it's just like, that's what I look forward to. Thanksgiving. Ram.
- [83:19]
B
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- [83:27]
A
So if you're feeling Frugal, stream Pluto TV.
- [83:31]
B
Stream Pluto TV. Stream Pluto TV for free. Stream blockbuster hits like 21 Jump Street Ted, The Expendables, and so much more on Pluto TV. Stream Now Pay Never.
- [83:47]
C
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