4. Leads to Nowhere

Summary

The Unforgotten – S6E4 “Leads to Nowhere” (June 22, 2026)

Host: Zoe Culkin, Free Range Productions
Key Contributors: Renee & Crystal (True Crime Broads), Christian McFate (Dallas Observer reporter)

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Episode Overview

Main Theme:
This episode dives into the unfruitful leads and public speculation that followed the murder of Missy Bevers, focusing on how rumors, online sleuthing, and police investigation intersected—often to disorienting effect. The episode explores how a single ambiguous comment by Missy’s husband shifted suspicion, the problems and harm created by crowd-sourced “theories,” and the dead ends police and citizens encountered.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Brandon Bevers’ Public Statement and Its Ripple Effect

[01:10–04:21]

• Background: Just days after Missy Bevers’ murder, her husband Brandon Bevers gave a public interview, presenting Missy as passionate and loved.
• Brandon’s repetition of a detail—that Missy had texted him “I love you” every day for the last ten months—triggered intense speculation about possible infidelity.
• Renee (True Crime Broads) points out it was Brandon’s statement that seeded the idea Missy had been unfaithful, influencing both public perception and police inquiry.
  • “The crazy part about it is the reason the police mentioned it was because Brandon mentioned it.” —Renee [03:29]
• Police Reaction: Search warrants referenced Brandon’s own claims about “love affairs,” giving probable cause for deep dives into both Missy’s and Brandon’s social media and messaging records.

2. The Casey Williams Thread

[06:25–09:08]

• Discovery: Police uncovered flirtatious LinkedIn exchanges between Missy and a healthcare executive, Casey Williams.
• Despite suggestive messages, it’s unclear if the relationship was physical or if it had any bearing on her death.
• Police Publicity: Zoe and Renee express surprise and concern at how explicitly police named Casey in warrants, contrasting this with their general secrecy in the investigation.
  • Discussion on the potential harm: could distract from the crime or taint public sympathy for Missy.
  • “I don't give a crap if she had 15 affairs with 15 different men in two week time period. That is not an open invitation to murder someone, period.” —Renee [10:40]

3. The “Creepy LinkedIn Messages”

[10:59–12:13]

• Police and friends noticed that Missy had received strange, anonymous LinkedIn messages days before her murder. These were not flirtatious, but “creepy.”
• No concrete evidence tied these messages to the case, but sleuths continue to speculate their relevance.

4. Bobby Wayne Henry: A Person of Interest with a Dark Past

[12:31–20:24]

• Background:
  • Bobby Wayne Henry is a former police officer with convictions for sexual assault (including against his stepmother and sister-in-law).
  • He attended Creekside Church (the murder site); owned similar tactical gear to that seen on the killer in video footage; and drove a car matching a vehicle seen at the crime scene.
• Police Investigation:
  • Intense search and seizure of his home, car, and electronics. Ultimately arrested—not for the murder, but for child pornography.
  • Publicly cleared in Missy’s case, though police statements downplayed his criminal history (“retired” police, not “dismissed for rape”).
    • “I thought that was interesting that they protected him...he seemed like a really good candidate there for a while and especially the amount of effort they put into this...” —Crystal [20:24]
• Henry’s Claims: In a jail interview, he denied knowing Missy Bevers.
  • “I told [the police] from the get go, I didn’t know this woman. Never heard the name Missy Beavers before I heard it on the news.” —Henry (via Christian) [19:36]

5. The Impact and Pitfalls of Internet Sleuthing

[21:26–26:28]

• Online “detectives” filled investigative voids with their own theories—some gaining disproportionate influence in Facebook groups.
• Christian McFate, a journalist, struggled to track leads in the morass of code-names and wild speculation:
  • “There was so much speculation...it’s kind of like swimming through shark-infested water, trying to find the truth.” —Christian [23:04]
• Example: Single mother April Sandoval, who attended one of Missy’s classes, was accused by an influential sleuth based on a photo suggesting a swollen foot (matching the suspect’s limp), and that her mother drove a similar car.
• Police Response: Despite the very thin evidence, police interviewed April and had her “walk” for comparison.
  • “The police actually had to call her in and have her walk so that they could see that she wasn’t the person in the church.” —Renee [29:59]
• Collateral Damage: April’s life was upended, facing harassment and stigma. Renee tried to support her, highlighting April’s integrity and struggle as a struggling single mom.

6. The True Crime Community: Double-Edged Sword

[30:35–31:58]

• Renee points out that sleuths intent on notoriety or vindication can be as harmful as helpful, even targeting other podcasters and critics.
• Online speculation, fueled by police silence and true crime media consumption, created both pressure for justice and severe personal harm for innocent bystanders.

7. Foreshadowing: A New Lead from the Tribute Band Scene

[32:43–33:05]

• Teaser for next episode hints at an alleged confession within Dallas’s Ozzy Osbourne tribute band community, potentially shaking up the case.

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Notable Quotes & Moments

• “Every day for the last 10 months, she has made it a point to text me at work that she loves me.” —Brandon Bevers [03:12]
• “He’s the one that let it out.” —Renee on Brandon seeding the affair rumor [05:20]
• “An adulterer does not make a murderer, and a scorn woman doesn’t make a murderer either.” —Zoe [08:18]
• “It was really interesting because Midlothian police worded it like this...they have cleared Bobby Wayne Henry, retired Lancaster police officer. That’s not true.” —Crystal [19:59]
• “People will fill the vacuum when there’s not enough information out there...I think that was kind of what was happening.” —Christian [24:33]
• “She needed help with something...I just offered to help her...I thought, well, that’s an honest person.” —Renee on supporting April [27:25–28:30]

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Timestamps for Crucial Segments

• [01:10] – Brandon’s post-murder interview & the “10 months” comment
• [03:29] – Renee discusses how Brandon’s statement triggered rumors
• [06:25] – Discovery of Casey Williams’ LinkedIn messages
• [10:40] – Renee’s response to victim-blaming
• [12:31] – Introduction of Bobby Wayne Henry as a suspect
• [17:19] – Henry’s suspicious presence at Missy’s memorial
• [19:36] – Henry’s jail interview denying any connection
• [21:26] – Social media’s entanglement in the case; Christian’s reporting
• [24:33] – Christian reflects on the perils of social media speculation
• [27:25] – Renee helps April and comments on her honesty
• [29:59] – April’s “walk test” to clear her as a suspect
• [32:43] – Teaser: the Ozzy Osbourne tribute band connection

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Language & Tone

• Candid, empathetic, skeptical: The host and panelists openly question received wisdom and express strong sympathy for those wrongly accused.
• Investigative: The episode moves methodically through each lead, exploring the interplay between rumor, police work, and the experience of those caught in the crossfire.
• Reflective: The episode dwells on the collateral damage of unsolved crimes in the age of online vigilantism.

---

Summary

This episode of The Unforgotten spotlights how, in the vacuum left by unsolved murders and a reticent police force, both local law enforcement and amateur internet sleuths chase after every possible lead—often to dead ends. The case of Missy Bevers is shown to be not just a mystery, but a cautionary tale about the harm of speculation, the complexity of truth, and the dire need for both sensitivity and skepticism in true crime investigations.
The episode concludes with a teaser of a new potential lead, hinting that the story, though marked by fruitless paths, is still far from over.

Transcript

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[Zoe Culkin]

how you buy just two days after Missy Bevers was murdered, her husband Brandon did one of his rare interviews, one I've mentioned before in previous episodes. Here's Renee from the True Crime Broads.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

He was actually having an interview and there was a bunch of people in his yard. This was right after the murder. I mean, a bunch of people like there's all these news stations and they've got big cameras everywhere and you can see them walking back and forth.

[Zoe Culkin]

The police hadn't named any possible suspects. There was no autopsy. The press was grasping at straws for any information to pass on to the public. So when Brandon agreed to speak with Fox 4 Dallas Fort Worth, they had a lot of questions, but first they wanted to know more about Missy as a person and more specifically how Brandon would speak about her.

[Brandon Bevers]

My wife was a godly woman. She was very passionate about changing people's lives with fitness and changing their mental attitude towards their body and themselves and their abilities in life.

[Zoe Culkin]

He seemed heartbroken but overwhelmed, and he spoke about Missy with love, respect and pride. He emphasized that he wasn't totally tapped into all she was doing with Camp Gladiator, but he received an outpouring of messages after her death from people who had taken her classes.

[Brandon Bevers]

I'm very proud of her. I just want it to be publicly known that we Are very proud of all the passion and effort that she's put into so many people's lives.

[Zoe Culkin]

He also talked about the early days of their relationship. Who she was before motherhood, before camp gladiator.

[Brandon Bevers]

She was a very good mother. She spent. I'll go a little further here. Before we had children, Missy was a teacher, public school teacher. She worked with special needs children, and she did that for about two years. I could see the amount of outpouring in her soul to help needy people.

[Zoe Culkin]

But in between all these musings on Missy, he says something strange.

[Brandon Bevers]

Every day for the last 10 months, she has made it a point to text me at work that she loves me and have a good day, honey. Every day for the last 10 months. For the last 10 months. 10 months.

[Zoe Culkin]

Renee says this is a sentence that started it all.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

The crazy part about it is the reason the police mentioned it was because Brandon mentioned it.

[Zoe Culkin]

By it, she means Missy's alleged infidelity. Renee says Brandon is the one who put the idea of Missy being unfaithful not just into the minds of the public, but the minds of the police as well.

[Brandon Bevers]

Every day for the last 10 months, she has made it a point to text me at work that she loves me and have a good day, honey.

[Zoe Culkin]

Why would he specifically say that for the last 10 months, she'd been texting him that she loves him? Missy and Brandon had been together for 20 years at this point.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

He never said it, but you can figure it out.

[Zoe Culkin]

Meaning he never says the words affair, cheat, or infidelity.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

But I mean, anybody. The last 10 months, we've been telling each other we love each other. Okay? It doesn't take a rocket science to figure out what happened 10 months ago.

[Zoe Culkin]

This may seem like a tiny detail and a crazy thing for the sleuths and even the police to harp on, but there was so little to go off of the whole Dallas metro area was hanging on every word Brandon said. But this was such a broad statement. Did anybody think that he had an affair?

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

No.

[Zoe Culkin]

From free Range Productions, this is the who killed Missy Beavers? Episode four Leads to nowhere. Immediately after the murder, the police filed search warrants for Missy's electronics and Brandon's. According to public records, messages recovered from their phones quote, indicate and confirm statement and tips provided to officers of an ongoing financial and marital struggle as well as intimate personal relationships external to the marriage.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

To me, he's the one that let it out.

[Zoe Culkin]

Renee and many others believe that if Brandon hadn't said that, the public narrative of Missy having an affair Wouldn't have existed. The Midlothian police department did not want to participate in this podcast, given that it's an open investigation. So I wasn't able to confirm this, but between timelines in the Facebook groups and piecing things together through public records, it seems like after Brandon made the 10 months comment, police questioned him about extramarital affairs and his marriage, and Brandon sang. Here's a quote from one of the early search warrants requesting access to Brandon's social media. Because Brandon Keith Bevers has stated that the decedent was having love affairs, and because both Brandon Keith Bevers and the decedent have active Facebook accounts, your affiant has probable cause to believe that the Facebook account and records of Brandon Keith Bevers contain information of direct relevance to this investigation. Authorities also requested access to Missy's social media accounts, her Facebook, her LinkedIn.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

Casey Williams was somebody that they confirmed right off the bat that she had been talking to, like right before the murder.

[Zoe Culkin]

According to public records, through the search of Missy's electronics and socials, detectives discovered she had been talking to a man named Casey Williams on LinkedIn since January of 2016, just four months before she was murdered at Creekside Church. They said Casey was a healthcare executive in Dallas and called his communications with

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

Missy flirtatious and familiar conversations.

[Zoe Culkin]

They also said the conversations seemed intimate in nature and that they had often been deleted, so they had to do a forensic data extraction to recover them. Plus, Missy posted about her camp gladiator classes on LinkedIn on a regular basis. So it didn't seem far fetched that the killer could have been monitoring her account to see where she would be that morning and when she would be there. Renee, not shockingly at all, dug all the way into this Casey Williams theory.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

I actually had a conversation with his ex wife.

[Zoe Culkin]

I expected nothing less. The true crime broads do their research. Though the police did name Casey Williams in the search warrants, it's not exactly a unique name. There are lots of Casey Williams in the Dallas area. Renee wanted to find the right guy and hear the full story from the horse's mouth, or at least the horse's ex wife's mouth.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

So then I thought, you know what I'm gonna do even better. I'm gonna message his ex wife because they're not together anymore. So I messaged her. Well, she didn't see my message for like four months. She finally reaches out to me one day and I'm sitting right here and she replies to me and I'm like, oh my goodness. So we start talking back and forth and she basically tells me that was definitely my husband, that was him. And I was like, okay. She pretty much told me the whole story.

[Zoe Culkin]

And honestly, there wasn't much to the story. Missy and Casey exchanged those flirtatious and familiar messages for a few months, but it's unclear if they ever had a physical relationship. But even if there was, I had the same issue with this theory as I did with The Courtney and A.J. tucker theory, which we got into in the last episode. So what if cat guys were having affairs with Missy or sending her inappropriate text messages? An adulterer does not make a murderer, and a scorn woman doesn't make a murderer either. It certainly can, but in this case, there were no other strings tying any of these people to the church. That morning buzz around Casey Williams eventually died down.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

I guess they checked him out and everything was okay. And they, you know, basically they were no longer interested in. In that situation.

[Zoe Culkin]

What was most shocking to me about this Casey Williams situation wasn't that they had a sketchy relationship, but instead that the police decided to be so forthcoming about it. Yes, they have to provide probable cause and warrants, and warrants are public, but they hadn't been this clear in any other warrant for the entirety of the investigation. Police have kept their cards close to the vest. Remember, we still don't have an autopsy even 10 years later because of worries it would harm the investigation, but what I would think would harm the investigation is sharing the names of people Missy may or may not have had an affair with, with no evidence that it had anything to do with the murder in any way, shape or form. This is Texas. The murder happened in a church. Missy was a wife, a mother, a Christian. So much of these cases rest on the public caring about the victim, wanting justice for them. Not only could it cause people to zero in on the fact that her alleged affairs must have something to do with her murder, but people could start to think of her as not such a sympathetic victim. The Internet is a cruel place and people, especially in the south, don't like it when a woman who is supposed to be godly, an example for her daughters and steps out of line. Renee is loud in her rejection of this logic, hoping that her listeners don't fall into that backwards way of thinking either.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

I don't give a crap if she had 15 affairs with 15 different men in two week time period. That is not an open invitation to murder someone, period. Because if it is, there's a lot of people going to be dead. So never has that come out of my mouth? Not one time.

[Zoe Culkin]

Police followed lots of leads in the early days of the investigation as a clearer picture of Missy's life emerged. Through searches of her phone, interviews with friends, thorough analysis of her social media activity. When looking through her LinkedIn, they found other messages from someone other than Casey Williams. Messages that were not characterized as flirtatious and familiar, but instead creepy in storage. Detectives said a friend of Missy's had actually mentioned these messages to them. Neither of them knew who the account belonged to, but they were both creeped out.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

So it would have been probably Friday because they said it was three days before the murder. The murder was Monday, Monday, Sunday, Saturday, Friday. Yeah. See, I'm thinking it's probably like Friday that she received the message and then showed it to a friend.

[Zoe Culkin]

Again, no solid evidence or information came from these messages.

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[Zoe Culkin]

It's not clear who they were from or what the messages said, but Renee says she and Crystal, her fellow true crime broad, still think those messages are relevant to the murder.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

We kind of feel like it's message from, you know, the killer or someone. I don't know. I mean, that's just us speculating. We don't know for sure. I don't know that we'll ever know, to be honest with you.

[Zoe Culkin]

After all, speculating is all that can be done without clear answers from the police. So the LinkedIn search turned out to be pretty fruitless. But police were also looking at someone else, someone who had nothing to do with Missy's LinkedIn posts or her alleged affairs.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

They executed a pretty intense search warrant on him. They tore up his house, his car. They took his car, they took his electronics. They took a lot of tactical gear.

[Zoe Culkin]

His name was Bobby Wayne Henry.

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[Zoe Culkin]

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[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

He was a retired police officer and definitely didn't have a clean record. Let's just say he had been in trouble before.

[Zoe Culkin]

That's Crystal of the true crime broads. I was very familiar with Bobby Wayne Henry and his criminal record before we talked about and Crystal was putting it lightly. He was like a rapist, right?

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

Yeah, there you go. Exactly. Yeah. I mean that's putting it. Yeah. That's cutting to the chase.

[Zoe Culkin]

Henry has been charged with multiple sex crimes.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

He had sexual assaults on his record and just not a very nice fella from what we understood as far as his personal life. Like his sexual assault victims according to public records. Well, one of them was his stepmother. Okay, that's just even more gross than. Yeah, it's hard to really conceptualize that like his dad was currently married to this woman.

[Zoe Culkin]

Henry found himself on police's Radar in the Missy Beavers case for a few reasons. One, he had attended Creekside church before, so he was familiar with the scene of the crime. Two, he had a history of violence, specifically against women. Three, he owned a car similar to one seen in the parking lot on the morning of the murder. Four, he was a former police officer, so he had access to the tactical gear the killer was wearing in the surveillance video. He was a member of the Lancaster police department for years, A town not too far from Midlothian. But he was suspended and ultimately let go after being charged with the rape of his sister in law. An article from the times says he held her at gunpoint, handcuffed her, forced her to put on lingerie. I mean, really horrible, horrible stuff. But he was a free man at the time of Missy's murder.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

He was very, very fortunate. He kind of skated. Any kind of real repercussions from any of these things that he did throughout his life. He was a security guard at the time of Missy's death because he had lost his peace officer's license as part of his punishment for sex assault accusations.

[Zoe Culkin]

Police started looking at him seriously after a video resurfaced showing that he was working Missy's funeral.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

In the probable cause, they said that he had volunteered to work Missy's memorial. Now, this is not her funeral that took place at cowboy church. This is her community memorial service that they had at Creekside, the place where she was murdered.

[Zoe Culkin]

Crystal thought it made sense that Henry could be the culprit they'd been looking for.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

At first I thought that he was the killer. I mean, it's very compelling because he had tactical gear. He admitted to it. He's working her memorial, which a lot of killers like to go back and kind of hang around, you know, and attend funerals. So I thought it kind of started to add up in my mind.

[Zoe Culkin]

Plus, Crystal said Missy and Brandon had attended the same church that Henry was known to attend.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

Missy and Brandon before her murder, had been visiting Avenue. And she had a good friend that worked at Avenue. So I was thinking he could have seen her and thought she was attractive. Stalked her online, saw that she was teaching at that church early morning, went there and killed her.

[Zoe Culkin]

And the video of Henry at the memorial at creekside didn't just raise flags because of his presence alone.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

When you watch him working the memorial, there was the media person who was there, was just filming people going in to the memorial service. But they locked in on him and they even did a close up of his face feed. It was so interesting. But he was walking a lot like the perpetrator in the church. Had kind of a little, kind of a little kick in his walk, you know what I'm saying?

[Zoe Culkin]

After police executed the search warrant, Bobby Wayne Henry was arrested, but not for the murder of Missy Beavers. Investigators found child pornography on his devices. He sat in jail for months for the charges of child pornography and as a person of interest in Missy's murder. ABC did an interview with him through a glass wall as he sat in custody. They asked him about when police showed up to search his house. He claims he had no idea what they wanted with him.

[Christian McFate]

I thought somebody was pranking me. They said, step out on your front porch. I step out on my front porch. There's eight police officers standing out there in full tactical gear with weapons drawn. And I'm like, I'm just, you know, stunned.

[Zoe Culkin]

He claims he had no idea what they wanted with him.

[Christian McFate]

I told him from the get go, I didn't know this woman. Never heard the name Missy Biebers before I heard it on the news.

[Zoe Culkin]

Shortly after ABC conducted the interview, police announced Bobby Wayne Henry had been cleared. Something they hadn't done often. Not for Randy, not for Courtney, not for Casey Williams. Crystal remembered reading the statement from the police after clearing Henry.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

They had done a little blurb and it was really interesting because Midlothian police worded it like this. I remember this very well. They said they have cleared Bobby Wayne Henry, retired Lancaster police officer. That's not true.

[Zoe Culkin]

What Crystal means here is that retired is a generous way to put it. Remember, he had been quietly let go after being charged with rape.

[Crystal (True Crime Broads)]

I thought that was interesting that they protected him by saying he was retired. I guess they just thought the public doesn't need to know any more else, you know. But he seemed like a really good candidate there for a while and especially the amount of effort they put into this. From my understanding, there's been no one else that they've done that thorough of a search warrant on.

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[Christian McFate]

Because people are normally that's where they go to talk, right? Social media is on new town halls, you know, our new coffee shops, right? Used to back in the day you'd have to down to a local coffee shop to your gossip, right? Nowadays it's all online.

[Zoe Culkin]

Christian and I bonded over how frustrating it was to follow these groups. As I mentioned in the first episode, the members often talked in code, using initials instead of names.

[Christian McFate]

The most difficult thing about following the Facebook groups was they kept using, you know, the initials. So it was trying to figure out who was those initials applied to, you know, and who these people were. That was difficult too.

[Zoe Culkin]

He says it was also difficult to discern which posts had merit.

[Christian McFate]

There was so much speculation, right. That's what they're doing to speculate. There was so much of it, you know, know it's kind of like swearing through shark infested water like, you know, and trying to find the truth can be difficult, right?

[Zoe Culkin]

Like me. He was shocked at the dedication from the group members.

[Christian McFate]

I was surprised at the extent some of the people had gone to try to solve the case.

[Zoe Culkin]

Christian wrote a long form piece about one specific rabbit hole he went down. There was a theory put forth by one specific sleuth that a woman named April Sandoval had committed the crime. April was a single mom who worked at the gas station right down the street from Creekside Church. Her only connection to Missy was that she had won a free pack of camp gladiator classes and had attended at least one of Missy's classes. This sleuth had come across a picture taken after one of the classes April had attended where it looked Like April had a swollen foot. That's when Christian decided to get the full story.

[Christian McFate]

That's how I came across her, was through the Facebook post. And so then I just tracked her down.

[Zoe Culkin]

Christian had tried to get into Creekside to talk to people about Missy, but the doors were locked.

[Christian McFate]

I couldn't get in. And so I ended up going back down the road and stopped at the gas station, and April was working there.

[Zoe Culkin]

He spent some time talking to April, and it was clear to him that she had been pulled into this mess for no real reason.

[Christian McFate]

People will fill the vacuum when there's not enough information out there. Right. And make connections that may or may not be true. Right. And so I think that was kind of what was happening.

[Zoe Culkin]

But this accusation, based on nothing but one photo and a major jump, that if this person had an injured foot, they must be the person in the video was made by an influential sleuth, one who, for whatever reason, had the year of the police. See, not all sleuths are created equal. Some have more time to dedicate to Missy's case, meaning they post more often in the groups. They offer up more theories, find more clues, often gaining respect or a kind of trust with the others in the groups. This particular sleuth would often post in the Facebook groups, emails she had received from the Midlothian police officers. The police took her theory on April seriously.

[Christian McFate]

Even the police talked with her. Right. And interviewed her. Yeah, you know, they. I mean, they followed up.

[Zoe Culkin]

For this reason, Christian believes the Midlothian Police Department was desperate to find the killer if they were willing to follow even the most unlikely tips, you know,

[Christian McFate]

they were following up. They were doing their best to follow up on tips.

[Zoe Culkin]

He understands why people are skeptical of the mpd, but thinks it might be a symptom of the true crime content. So many people intake for hours and hours a day.

[Christian McFate]

I mean, watch true crime shows, right? And they cut out all the boring, long months that it takes to get what they need to get, and they make it seem like it's happening, you know, quickly. Right. When you're watching these, you know, true crime documentaries or true crime podcasts you're listening to, and, you know, there's definitely a market for it. And I don't think they realize, you know, the extent that these investigators have to go to try to look into stuff.

[Zoe Culkin]

It's a good point. We expect these things to unfold, like how they do in documentaries and podcasts, quickly and in a way that makes sense. But this investigation had lasted 10 years, and nothing about it Makes any sense. Christian hasn't talked to April in many years, but he wanted to see how she was doing.

[Christian McFate]

Did you find April? Did you go through on social media and talk with her?

[Zoe Culkin]

I hadn't had any luck getting in touch with April. She's a very private person now and moved out of Midlothian after all the media attention she got from the allegations. But luckily, Renee had been in touch with her before she went off the grid.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

So I actually messaged her.

[Zoe Culkin]

As I said, April was struggling, trying to support her children on very little money and battling other personal demons. Apparently, she had made a post in some local Facebook group seeking advice.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

She needed help with something, and at the time I had the money to help, it was like her car was broken, and she had two boys. She didn't have a lot of money. She wasn't really asking for help. She was kind of asking for suggestions or, you know, advice. And I just offered to help her. I just said, I will pay for your car to be fixed.

[Zoe Culkin]

Renee always thought the idea that April had anything to do with Missy's death was preposterous. She felt horrible that her life had been even further complicated by all the attention from the sleuths. She wanted to help in any way she could.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

So I told her to let me know, and she said, okay, I will. And so I actually had to reach back out to her, and I was like, do you want me to help you with your car or not? She goes, no, I just got my income tax in, and I don't need you to pay for it. But I appreciate you so much offering to pay. And I thought, well, that's an honest person. Because some people would have just been like, heck, yeah, I need you to pay for it just to have extra money. I mean, here she was, this young mom of two boys and struggling, you know, I mean, any help like that would have been beneficial. But she didn't take it.

[Zoe Culkin]

Renee was struck by April's honesty. She wanted her to know she had a friend if she needed one.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

So we just kind of started talking, met her a few times, actually helped her get a job at this place that I went into quite a bit. She just seemed to be a really nice person that was struggling to take care of her boys.

[Zoe Culkin]

She said this one particular sleuth who originally dragged April into this was scraping the bottom of the barrel. To keep this theory alive, she highlighted some of April's social media posts that featured guns.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

She was in the military, and I guess she was just posting things that were military, like and her mother drove a Nissan Altima, and she just went with it. Her mother's car was white, and in 2015, looked nothing like the car. I mean, nothing. Tail lights were different, color was different. Nothing about the car looked like it.

[Zoe Culkin]

Remember, police were looking for a light colored Nissan Altima.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

This girl took all of that and ran with it. Oh, my God. She probably killed Missy. I mean, there's no reason. There was nothing that happened between her

[Zoe Culkin]

and Missy, despite how little sense it made. This sleuth wouldn't stop.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

And so she just kind of told everybody about it and everybody ran with it because she was in Camp Gladiator for a whole week. She lived in Midlothian and her mom drove in Altima. But she didn't explain the car looked nothing like it. She was only in it for a week. She didn't have any reason to go Missy. Like, she literally just met her for a week. Why would you want to kill her?

[Zoe Culkin]

Renee says she remembers when April was called into the police.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

The police actually had to call her in and have her walk so that they could see that she wasn't the person in the church.

[Zoe Culkin]

Renee was horrified. She continued to be in April's life.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

We met up numerous times to eat. I visited with her boys. She's just a really. She's a person that is struggling because she's a single mom and has two boys and their special needs, and she still does for other people. So that says a lot about her. She would never kill her or do anything, for that matter. So I don't. It just kind of grew legs and for the wrong reasons.

[Zoe Culkin]

I, like Renee, felt horrible for April. While the sleuths do a lot of good keeping pressure on the police and bringing things to light that maybe wouldn't have been looked into otherwise, there was a dark side to it. What happened to April was just plain wrong. I wanted to speak with her, give her a chance to share how this affected her all these years later. But Renee told me that would go against April's wishes.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

I told her I would never tell anybody where she lives. I would never tell anybody her phone number. And I have never done it. And I won't. But she won't talk about it. She was going to come on our podcast one time, and then she declined. She said no because she said the days that I was. Those were some dark days back then. And it was really hard. And for lack of a better word, they harassed the crap out of her.

[Zoe Culkin]

I understood and respected that. I didn't want April to go through any more pain than she already had in the early years of the investigation. The sleuth who was hell bent on getting April behind bars went after the true crime broads too.

[Renee (True Crime Broads)]

She was horrible. I mean, I don't know if Crystal told you, but she even called Crystal and screamed and cussed at her for like, however long. I mean, she harassed a lot of people. I mean, she didn't even tell people that lived locally because she didn't even live here. She would tell people to go to people's houses and take pictures and I mean, just crazy stuff. It was just. It was unbelievable.

[Zoe Culkin]

Sleuths like this one seem to want someone to blame rather than actually get justice for Missy. Maybe this woman wanted the notoriety that would come with being the person who had the winning theory. There's a lot of that in the Facebook group. Even to this day, it can be difficult to pick through who wants justice and who wants their day in the sun. But not every rumor had as little merit as the one about April. In fact, there was one rumor that really caught my eye and had me traveling to Frisco to see an Ozzy Osbourne tribute band. It turns out the vast tribute band community in the Dallas trip metro area may know more than everyone about who had a reason to kill Missy.

[Christian McFate]

So that started rippling out across the music community around Dallas Fort Worth. And it got to me and I just. My interactions with Tammy, it seemed true.

[Zoe Culkin]

On the next episode of the Unforgotten, who killed Missy Beavers? An alleged confession sh breaks up the case.

[Christian McFate]

She confessed that she had done this. And then if you tell anybody, I'll know it was you. And there's going to be consequences.

[Zoe Culkin]

The Unforgotten is a free range production. Season 6 who Killed Missy Beavers Is written and hosted by me, Zoe Culkin. Our executive producer is Wes Ferguson. Audio editing by Aislin Gaddis. Engineering and sound design by Austin Sisler with Eastside Studios. Get our newsletter at unforgottenpod. Com. Thanks for listening.