Cold Blooded Conversation with Chris Connelly

Summary

Up and Vanished Weekly

Episode: Cold Blooded Conversation with Chris Connelly
Date: October 15, 2025
Host: Maggie Freeling
Guest: Chris Connelly

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Overview

In this episode, host Maggie Freeling sits down with renowned journalist Chris Connelly—former MTV correspondent and current ABC/ESPN reporter—to discuss his new 20/20 podcast, Cold Blooded. The podcast explores the mysterious and tragic murder of Dr. Eric Garcia, a beloved surgeon in Alaska. Maggie and Chris dive into his decades-spanning career, from shaping pop culture at MTV in the 1990s to narrating complex true crime stories, culminating in Chris’s deep-dive reporting on Dr. Garcia's case.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Chris Connelly’s Journalism Journey

• From MTV to True Crime:
  Chris details the arc of his career, beginning as MTV’s "movie person" interviewing celebrities and later covering music news. The 1990s, he notes, were marked by the intersection of pop culture and tragedy, with the headline-making deaths of Kurt Cobain, Tupac, and Biggie Smalls.

  “People forget that three of the biggest hitmakers of the 1990s died in the 90s by gunfire. Kurt Cobain, Biggie Smalls, and Tupac Shakur.” – Chris Connelly [05:18]

• Reporting on Tragedy:
  Chris draws a line connecting music culture coverage with true crime—his storytelling background developed through coverage of real-life mysteries and music industry tragedies.

• Personal Roots in Crime Stories:
  He recalls growing up in New York during infamous cases (Kennedy assassination, Son of Sam), and family ties to the law:

  “My parents were both lawyers. I used to go to trials, you know, in the background as a kid.” – Chris Connelly [10:30]

The MTV Era & Its Impact

• Unique Voice:
  Chris and Maggie reminisce about MTV’s ethos as a platform genuinely covering youth culture—filling a gap left by mainstream media.

  “Nobody was covering what we were covering... we certainly represented for a demographic that was underrepresented elsewhere.” – Chris Connelly [06:43]

Transition to True Crime

• An Organic Shift:
  Chris discusses how witnessing historic crimes and participating in legal culture informed his approach to narrative crime reporting.

• Notable True Crime Coverage:
  He touches on covering Mia Zapata’s disappearance, how MTV’s reporting later contributed to the case being solved through public awareness and advances in DNA evidence.

Deep Dive into the Dr. Eric Garcia Case (“Cold Blooded”)

Why Chris Took the Case

• Connection to Alaska:
  Chris describes his experience traveling to Ketchikan, Alaska, to learn from Garcia’s colleagues, friends, and investigators. He notes Alaska as rich with compelling stories and remarkable characters.

  “Ketchikan is one of the most beautiful places you’ll ever go to... the people were the nicest people.” – Chris Connelly [11:50]

Dr. Eric Garcia’s Legacy

• Beloved Surgeon:
  Garcia, originally from Puerto Rico, became integral to the Ketchikan community, earning the admiration of colleagues and patients alike.

  “Sometimes, you think of a surgeon as being like a technician... That wasn’t Dr. Garcia. He was both a wonderful surgeon and a person who cared about his patients.” – Chris Connelly [13:15]

The Crime & Investigation

• Discovery and Welfare Check:
  Chris emphasizes the rare narrative structure where the welfare check—the discovery of Garcia’s body—occurs at the outset, setting the story’s investigative tone.

  “...the way that the people outside react to the news of his death really kind of sets the stage for what you’ve heard is this remarkable mystery.” – Chris Connelly [14:48]

• The Role of Missing Valuables:
  Missing assets (gold, valuables) quickly redirected the investigation from suicide to likely homicide.

  “...when the valuables are gone... the belief... is that Jordan Joplin was hoping this would present as a suicide...” – Chris Connelly [16:57]

  “Bob Jackson arrives aflame with the idea that there are thousands of dollars of valuables inside the house... he really drives them towards looking for these valuables.” – Chris Connelly [18:43]

• Accelerated Investigation:
  The looting and the reactions from Garcia’s friends (notably Bob Jackson) fueled a swift pivot in investigative efforts.

Relationship Between Garcia and Joplin

• Private Life and Dynamics:
  Garcia kept his personal life private. His romantic involvement with Jordan Joplin, while known to some, was discreet. Friends doubted backlash would occur, but noted social caution:

  “Nobody we talked to specifically felt there would have been backlash... but... they knew people who might have reacted negatively. And isn’t that always the way?... it’s always ‘what about the outside world?’” – Chris Connelly [22:48]

• Judgment and Risk:
  Maggie and Chris discuss whether Garcia’s discretion in personal matters may have increased risk, despite his surgical expertise and generally sound judgment.

The Smoking Gun

• Disturbing Evidence:
  Investigators discovered an unsettling video on Joplin’s phone, showing Garcia’s final moments—a pivotal piece of evidence.

  “It’s like an eight or nine second video and it is so disturbing... Why wasn’t it followed by a 911 call?” – Chris Connelly [23:54]

Why Revisit a “Solved” Case?

• Satisfaction in Resolution:
  Chris explains the podcast’s value in telling a story—beginning, middle, and end—where justice has (seemingly) been served. Though the arrest happened quickly, the trial took years.

  “Our audience likes the satisfaction that justice has been done... where the justice system has done its job...” – Chris Connelly [25:03]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Covering Legendary Artists’ Deaths:
  “I might be the only guy to have interviewed [Tupac’s] doctor on camera while he was in the hospital.” – Chris Connelly [07:22]

• On Tupac’s Legacy:
  “I always thought that Tupac’s life was like the autobiography of Malcolm X if you had ripped the last 200 pages out. I mean, there was just no telling what that human being might have gone on to become...” – Chris Connelly [08:04]

• On Reporting Tactics:
  “When the valuables are gone... [and] the people who are gathered... to hear the news and how they react tells you so much about how the rest of this story will go.” – Chris Connelly [14:48]

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Important Timestamps

• Chris’ early career and MTV days: 04:34 – 06:43
• Covering 1990s music tragedy: 06:19 – 08:41
• Connecting crime reporting and pop culture: 08:51 – 10:27
• Personal true crime interest and legal background: 10:30 – 11:28
• Intro to Dr. Garcia and Alaska experience: 11:50 – 13:15
• Community’s adoration for Garcia: 13:15 – 14:30
• Welfare check and discovery of body: 14:48 – 16:32
• Impact of missing valuables on investigation: 16:57 – 20:41
• Relationship dynamics – Garcia & Joplin: 21:52 – 23:38
• The damning video evidence: 23:54 – 24:47
• Why the case still matters: 25:03 – 25:40

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Tone & Style

The conversation is thoughtful, respectful, and deeply reflective, blending the gravity of the case with nostalgia over the evolution of journalism and music media. Chris brings humility and insight, while Maggie's curiosity and fondness for both true crime and 90s pop culture shine throughout.

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Conclusion

Chris Connelly’s reporting brings a sensitive, human lens to the tragic case of Dr. Eric Garcia, while Maggie Freeling orchestrates a rich conversation spanning decades of cultural, journalistic, and criminal investigation history. The episode is a must-listen for true crime enthusiasts and fans of investigative storytelling alike.

"Cold Blooded" is available wherever you get your podcasts.

Transcript

[Maggie Freeling]

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[Kylie Lowe]

Some stories never make national headlines, but stories from small towns and coastal communities deserve recognition too. I'm Kylie Lowe, host of Dark Down East, a true crime podcast that gives voice to victims through investigative journalism and powerful storytelling. Set in my home state of Maine and the Greater New England area, it's my goal to dig through the archives to bring the stories of the people at the heart of these cases to Light Listen to Dark down east wherever you get your podcasts.

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[Maggie Freeling]

This podcast discusses mature and sensitive content, including descriptions of violence that may be triggering for some audiences. Listener discretion is advised.

[Payne Lindsey]

Foreign.

[Maggie Freeling]

Hey y'. All. Welcome back to another episode of up and Vanish Weekly. I'm Maggie Freeling. Today we have a special episode I am particularly excited about. If you were a 90s child, then chances are MTV played a big part in your after school activities. It certainly did for me. One of the more recognizable faces and voices of the early days of the network was host and correspondent Chris Connelly. Chris reported for MTV News and hosted the pre shows for the MTV Movie Awards as well as countless other network Specials. Now over 20 years removed from MTV. These days, Chris reports for both ABC and ESPN. He's also the host of the new 2020 podcast, Cold Blooded, that follows the case of Dr. Eric Garcia, a 58 year old beloved surgeon whose decomposing body was found inside his Alaska home back in 2017. What initially appeared to be a suicide quickly morphed into a murder investigation. Things changed after police traced suspicious financial transactions made from Dr. Garcia's accounts to an acquaintance named Jordan Joplin. Joplin's fate was sealed after investigators discovered a video on his phone showing Dr. Garcia in what appears to be his final moments. Chris Connelly traveled to Alaska with 2020 and spoke to the locals that knew Dr. Garcia, documenting everything in the chart topping podcast. The goal was simple. Shining the spotlight on the life and tragic death of Dr. Garcia. So when the 2020 team reached out to us a few weeks back about having Chris on to talk about the series, I was thrilled to speak with him about his experience covering the case as well as the journey that's taken him from MTV to the world of true crime. Chris, you have an incredibly impressive career. Multiple Emmys for your reporting. It's an honor to have you joining me.

[Chris Connelly]

Thank you. I'm grateful to the Disney Corporation for allowing me to work for ESPN and for the ABC News people. And so, you know, I like getting the chance to tell all these different kinds of stories. And stories in this space, as you well know, are incredibly powerful. You meet amazing people, and you're also given the time to tell these stories in some depth. And you speak to an audience, as you do, that's knowledgeable and that knows their way around these stories. And I always like it when you get to talk to elite audiences. And so I'm grateful for the opportunity.

[Maggie Freeling]

So, Chris, going back to the beginning, where did your career start?

[Chris Connelly]

I actually began at MTV as their movie person.

[Maggie Freeling]

Yes.

[Chris Connelly]

I had a show called the Big Picture, and I interviewed movie people and folks like that. And then I was made part of the news department. And so that's when I interviewed bands and told stories all through the 90s. So 90s was a very active time in music in lots of different ways. Tragically, among those ways were true crime stories that we had to tell. People my age like to talk about how Jimmy and Janice and Jim Morrison died, you know, during the 1960s. And, you know, early said what the tragedy that was. And people forget that three of the biggest hitmakers of the 1990s died in the 90s by gunfire. Kurt Cobain, Biggie Smalls, and Tupac Shakur. And so covering music in that era meant covering the same kinds of things that we talk about now. In a strange and unfortunate way. That was the kind of training that I guess I sort of got that put me in some sort of shape to tell these stories now.

[Maggie Freeling]

Well, you know what? It was like, you mentioned it was informational. It wasn't just this, like. And I don't. I haven't put on MTV in forever, but I do remember the evolution. By the time I got to college, it was less informational, less news, and more of just music videos of what was going on today. So it really was that era that we learned things and we learned about the music, and it was just really. It felt wholesome, maybe, is the word. It felt wholesome.

[Chris Connelly]

I guess the thing that I noticed was that nobody was covering what we were covering. Like, we had to feel to ourselves, if we were covering youth culture, mainstream culture just wasn't touching it. Even though I wasn't of the age, we certainly represented for a demographic that was underrepresented elsewhere.

[Maggie Freeling]

Yeah, it was great.

[Chris Connelly]

And Gen Xers everywhere, I think, seem to remember that MTV was their network when nobody else was.

[Maggie Freeling]

I have a question for you, and you may or may not be able to answer, but your music career, your true crime career, is Kurt Cobain's death an unsolved murder?

[Chris Connelly]

I don't believe that it is, no.

[Maggie Freeling]

Did you cover that case intimately?

[Chris Connelly]

I was still doing movies most of the time when that happened. I was more involved with the Tupac case and with Biggie a little bit Tupac, mostly because he was Tupac. I went to Vegas. I think I might be the only guy to have interviewed his doctor on camera while he was in the hospital. So that was kind of a big one for. For us. Yeah, certainly. But I think the case is closed on. On Kurt Cobain's passing.

[Maggie Freeling]

2001 is when you stopped at MTV, I believe.

[Chris Connelly]

Yes.

[Maggie Freeling]

So 2001, I was in middle school, so I was very into Tupac and Biggie, and, like, I was just growing up on those things when you, I guess, were reporting on them. It's very interesting.

[Chris Connelly]

Yeah, it is hard to kind of put your mind back to what that period of time was like. You know, it was very strange at the time, but in retrospect, you just think of everything that you lost. You know, I always thought that Tupac's life was like the autobiography of Malcolm X if you had ripped the last 200 pages out. I mean, there was just no telling what that human being might have gone on to become. He might be our Senator now, you know, he might have gone on to any number of. He was so brilliant and so one of a kind, that his future could have gone in any number of directions. And I think people still think about that.

[Maggie Freeling]

That's really incredible to hear. How does a music career transition to 2020 and true crime connect that for.

[Chris Connelly]

Me, I grew up in the 1960s in New York. I was six years old when the crime of the century happened, and that was the Kennedy assassination. And so I think for anyone in my generation who read the newspaper and sort of kept up, that was the crime that horrified and fascinated, you know, all of us as people attempted to investigate it and did all the kinds of things that we do now when we tell these true crime stories. At the end of the day, it was a crime, it was a murder. And the different ways that people tried to solve it, you know, were certainly compelling. And then, because I was in New York, I was around for the Kitty Genovese murder, which was the legendary 40 people who heard her cries and didn't do anything about it. Or I remember Richard Speck and the Chicago Nurses. You know, I remember F. Lee Bailey representing Dr. Sam Shepard, who was the basis for the fugitive character, and Carl Coppolino and getting acquittals for them both. And then, of course, I was in New York for Son of Sam in the 1970s. So true crime was sort of part of your life if you kept up with the news. And then inevitably, it touched music as well. Even MTV did a half hour on Mia Zapata from the Gits, who disappeared without explanation in Washington State. And it was an effort to try to get people to come forward and to see if the crime could be solved and that eventually it was solved through DNA, years after we did our stories. So telling these kind of narratives, you know, even in the pop culture or sports space, is very much part of, you know, of what we kind of do for a living.

[Maggie Freeling]

Did these kinds of stories always interest you?

[Chris Connelly]

Oh, sure, yeah. My parents were both lawyers. I used to go to trials, you know, in the background as a kid. I mean, they didn't do criminal law. And then, weirdly enough, this is a strange thing to confess. In January of 1975, I worked as an intern for the Southern District of New York.

[Maggie Freeling]

Wow.

[Chris Connelly]

You know, wore my dad's suits and helped out a guy who went on to become the Attorney General of the United States, Michael Mukasey. As. As he prosecuted a Small Business Administration crime. I helped get the handwriting analyst that proved that one of the defendants was lying when he said that he had not signed a particular document. You know, in a lot of ways, I guess I thought I would be the lawyer. I grew up to be the lawyer who knew who had played bass on a particular record or who had starred in a particular movie. And at some point in college, I realized you might actually be able to make a living just knowing who played bass on a record or who starred in a particular movie. And this was a light bulb. Hence I never became a lawyer.

[Maggie Freeling]

We'll be right back after a quick break. And we're back. We have you here today to talk about Cold Blooded, your new podcast with 2020. What attracted you to this case of Dr. Eric Garcia? When did you get involved? Tell me the inception of Cold Blooded.

[Chris Connelly]

Well, the nice people of 2020 asked me if I'd be willing to go up to Alaska to spend some time talking to the people who knew Dr. Garcia and some of the people who had investigated the crime, as well as going to Washington State and continuing those conversations afterwards with some law enforcement and some people who knew other folks connected to the crime. And so I said yes. I think it's the advantage of being on the west coast is that they think of you for these things. Ketchikan is one of the most beautiful places you'll ever go to. I mean, everywhere you look there are the most amazing vistas. And you know, I realize Alaska is not an unknown place to our listeners here, but it was just so stunning and the people were the nicest people.

[Maggie Freeling]

Was that your first time?

[Chris Connelly]

No. I had done a story with a producer named Sharon Matthews for ESPN on a runner named Marco Cessetto. And Sharon Matthews is such a good producer that we won a Murrow Award for that. And she went on to be involved with an Oscar winning short. So I was a barnacle on her in a speedboat. But that was a great story long. And the short of it is as many people I guess know, Alaska is a place of amazing stories. And it's also a place of amazing human beings. And not all of those amazing human beings are people who grew up there. Some people wind up there and they're amazing too. And that was what Everybody told me. Dr. Eric Garcia was like. He had been brought up in Puerto Rico. He'd worked in Chicago and worked on the border with Mexico in Texas at a hospital. But when he came to Ketchikan, he might have seemed like an outsider, but he was welcomed into this community immediately. And people really had great fondness and appreciation for him in a way that was really striking. His brother Saul, who I talked to, said I went to visit him in Ketchikan and we went to the grocery store and we almost couldn't get out of the grocery store for people stopping my brother and thanking him for how he had treated their sister, their aunt, themselves. And Dr. Garcia knew who those people were and talked about them. Sometimes, you know, you think about a surgeon as being like a technician, right? And there's also that expression, you know, if the surgeon cries, the patient dies. Like they're supposed to be unemotional. That wasn't Dr. Garcia. He was both a wonderful surgeon and he was a person who cared about his patients. He was a great diagnostician. And so he was really taken to the heart of Ketchikan. And when I went up there, people were going out of their way, his co workers, his friends, people who had done business with him to tell me what a special man Eric Garcia was.

[Maggie Freeling]

Yeah, you can see that in the ABC special, the 2020 special, you guys did. So many friends. I mean, even just the police footage outside his house for the welfare check, so many friends around. So maybe that answers my next question, but what stood out to you about this case?

[Chris Connelly]

You know, you mentioned that that welfare check moment that begins the story. So many stories in crime fiction, you know, end with a moment like that. There is Hercule Poirot in the room at the end with all the people involved and the crime is solved. Or there's, you know, a dramatic moment like that. And this is our dramatic moment. And it comes right at the beginning, the moment when, at the behest of an out of towner named Jordan Joplin, police enter the home of Dr. Eric Garcia to discover if he's there. They don't think that he will be. They think it will be an empty house when he goes there, because they've checked before. And so they are shocked to find that he's there. And so the way that the people outside react to the news of his death really kind of sets the stage for what you've heard is this remarkable mystery and this investigation that takes place on two fronts. Both to figure out what happened to Dr. Garcia's, you know, valuables, tens of thousands of dollars of them. And what happened to his life? Why is he no longer with us? Has he died of natural causes? As many people in their late 50s sometimes do in Alaska? Cops told us that that's not an unfrequent occurrence. Has he taken his own life? Well, his friends certainly don't think that had happened. But they have to check that possibility out. Or is something much more tragic happened or much more sordid, let's put it that way. And it all begins with that, you know, welfare check. The discovery of his body, and then the people who are gathered at that house to hear the news and how they react tells you so much about how the rest of this story will go. It's fascinating.

[Maggie Freeling]

Do you think if his valuables. And it was quite impressive. You can see in the. In the show, the police body camera goes into where his valuables are kept and it's completely looted. Like we were told by his friend, there's gold, all these things in there. Do you think that if that wasn't found emptied, perhaps we wouldn't have had an arrest, that it would have been perhaps a suicide?

[Chris Connelly]

We give you a lot more of the body camera conversation than we were able to on tv, and it's really evocative. And just that exact moment you're talking about, you get to hear exactly how it happened. When those goods are revealed and they're gone, when the place where they're supposed to be is gone. You know, as we look back, I certainly think it's the. It's the belief of at least the people who knew Dr. Garcia, it is their belief that Jordan Joplin was hoping that this would present as a suicide, that this was, you know, there was an empty pill bottle. There was maybe a suggestion that there was a, you know, an attempt to use the charcoal grill as a way to raise the level of carbon monoxide in a manner that would look like you were taking your own life. I think it admits to two possible scenarios. One is the murderer is trying everything they can to cause the murder because the murderer doesn't know, like, you know, if any of this stuff's gonna work. So the murderer's gonna try everything. Because the murderer's, you know, hope is to commit the crime. And the other is as a fake out. The other is to make it look like it was the equivalent of being in your garage and turning on the exhaust and dying that way? I think the hope was that it would be an open and shut situation, the absence of those valuables. But more importantly, I think the presence of Bob Jackson on the site, that everyone is in mourning, you know, devastated. Don Hink is telling the cops, well, he did have a really bad heart. You know, he had a triple bypass. He absolutely could have, you know, I mean, there was a moment when he was literally in the operating room and he had to go to emergency to get Treated at Ketchikan, going from the OR to the er.

[Maggie Freeling]

Wow.

[Chris Connelly]

So they're investigating every possibility, you know, But Bob Jackson arrives aflame with the idea that there are thousands of dollars of valuables inside the house. And while everyone is understandably, like, wrapped up in their own emotions, Bob Jackson is buttonholing these cops and saying, you have got to check the valuables. You have got the. And so he creates such an energy as he feels this. And Bob Jackson is a great guy. Like, he's Mr. Ketchikan. Like you could talk to him about anything. You know, he is just a wonderful human being, but he is aflame. And so he really drives them towards looking for these valuables. And then when the valuables are gone and we are talking tens of thousands of dollars of hard goods, it's a shocking moment.

[Maggie Freeling]

It's incredible footage. Yeah, yeah.

[Chris Connelly]

And you can hear the reactions and stuff. And what it means is they don't have to wait for toxicology to get this investigation going. Like, okay, we're gonna have to wait and see what it is that the cause of Death is for Dr. Garcia. But there's stuff missing here. Now, Dr. Garcia is the kind of guy who gave away a lot of his valuable stuff and did it in a kind of profligate way or like it came from a good place. With Dr. Garcia, he just wanted to make people happy here. Have a nice. Have an expensive watch, have a 20 year old, you know, single malt whiskey. But even people who knew him and liked him said, you know, Eric, you might want to ease off the gas a little bit. Pump the brakes on all the giving away you're doing. Will Hink, who was Don Hink's husband, said, you know, you got that piece of gold out there so the pizza delivery guy could run off with it. You know, they wanted him to be a little more careful about that stuff. So everybody knew he had lots of valuables, I think, in town. So the fact that it was gone gave them something immediately to investigate. And so they got some breaks there in a hurry. And like you say, that turbocharged the.

[Maggie Freeling]

Investigation back after a short break.

[Kylie Lowe]

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[Tenderfoot TV Announcer]

Hey, listeners, if you have a tip or theories about a case you want to share or a case of interest you'd like to recommend to us, then we want to hear from you. Email us casesenderfoot tv, DM us on Instagram UAVWeekly, or give us a call at 770-545-6411. You can also join the conversation on our discord at discord. GG upandvanished. Now back to the show.

[Maggie Freeling]

Can you talk more about the relationship between Dr. Garcia and Jordan Joplin? Because I know it is central to this case.

[Chris Connelly]

Dr. Garcia, you know, in the words of his friends and in the words of his brother Saul, was not very experienced in manners of the human heart. He had dated a little bit, but it hadn't been a big part of his life. And so his private life, if he had one, was held very close to the vest. Some people in Ketchikan had seen Jordan Joplin on a number of occasions, and they made for an unusual couple. This, you know, ripped young man and this doctor in his late 50s. He obviously seemed to convey that he didn't really want to talk about their relationship with them. Nobody we talked to specifically felt that there would have been backlash from people had they known about this relationship.

[Maggie Freeling]

Like, it wouldn't have been in, like, a hate crime or something.

[Chris Connelly]

But a couple of people did say that, like, they knew people who might have reacted in negative ways. And isn't that always the way? It's like, you know, no, I'll be fine with it, but I know other people who, who might be. And that might very well be true, you know, in an accurate reading. But it seems like that's always the thing that. That holds you back. It's never someone in front of you. It's always like, but what about the outside world? You know, what about something else? It's the thing that he may have wondered about or it's the thing that, you know, might have been on his mind. In whatever event, he did not feel comfortable in terms of sharing the details of his relationship with Jordan Joplin. And for someone who displayed such great judgment every time he set foot inside an operating room and who saved lives when he did that, you wonder, did he put his own life at risk with his judgment?

[Maggie Freeling]

Outside the operating room, there is a smoking gun. And I'm so curious about the person who's arrested. Had a video of Dr. Garcia's, like, last breaths. Did they film it, like, in a sadistic way? Like, what was up with that?

[Chris Connelly]

Well, it's such a fascinating question. And just as you say, it's like an eight or nine second video and it is so disturbing. I mean, it's Dr. Garcia, where he was found obviously having enormous difficulty breathing, you know, filmed on, I guess, an iPhone or something like that, and saved to, you know, to the murderer's phone. And so it's really compelling. So you can speculate Jordan Joplin testified at his own trial and had his own explanation for what it was, but it definitely looked like what was going on here. Why wasn't it followed by a 911 call? Why wasn't it followed by I need to get help? You know, I think we can only speculate on what the motives might have been, but it is, it really shakes you up. And like you say, you know, if there was a smoking gun, that's. That's very much it.

[Maggie Freeling]

Yeah, it's pretty incredulous. There was an arrest pretty quickly within I think a month or two. Very quickly. But you guys are now covering this years later. Why continue to cover a case that is, quote, seemingly solved?

[Chris Connelly]

You know, there's always a lot of speculation as to what sort of stories people like to listen to and like to and like to hear. Podcasts like yours, you know, cover all kinds of stories. People who are missing and who have not been found, murders that have not been solved. You know, I think that our audience likes the satisfaction that justice has been done. You know, I think we like to present them with a story that has a beginning, middle and end. You know, where the justice system has done its job, where law enforcement has done its job. And although this arrest took place, you know, relatively early on, it was years before this case went to trial.

[Maggie Freeling]

Chris Connolly, we very much appreciate you being here to talk about Cold Blooded, your latest podcast with 2020. Thank you so much.

[Chris Connelly]

Thank you for everything. Really appreciate it.

[Maggie Freeling]

For me as a journalist, Chris Connelly is truly an inspiration. He cares so much about the work he does. He is passionate and it was a pleasure to speak with him. I appreciate his coverage of Dr. Garcia and shedding light on this senseless murder. And I have to say, it was really exciting to talk about old MTV days. Coldblooded is available now and you can check it out wherever you get your podcasts. Y', all, thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of up and Vanish Weekly. Be sure to tune in next week as we dig into another new case. Until next time.

[Payne Lindsey]

Up and Vanish Weekly is a production of Tenderfoot TV in association with Odyssey. Your hosts are Maggie Freeling and myself, Payne Lindsey. The show is written by Maggie Freeling, myself and John Street. Executive producers are Donald Albright and myself. Lead producer is John Street. Additional production by Meredith Steadman and Mike Rooney Research for the series by Jamie Albright, Celicia Stanton and Carolyn Tallmadge Edit and mix by Dylan Harrington and Sean Nurney Supervising producer is Tracy Kaplan artwork by Byron McCoy. Original music by Makeup and Vanity set. Special thanks to Oren Rosenbaum and the team at uta, Beck Media and Marketing and the Nord Group. For more podcasts like up and Vanish Weekly, search Tenderfoot TV on your favorite podcast app or visit us@Tenderfoot TV. Thanks for listening.