- [Announcer] What is up, EWU Crew?
Today, we are exploring three cold case crimes
that miraculously got solved
years after detectives had accepted dead ends.
Number three,
the disappearance of Ashley Freeman and Lauria Bible.
18 years to solve.
On December 30th of 1999,
Ashley Freeman and Lauria Bible
shockingly vanished from the scene of double murder
in an arson in Craig County, Oklahoma.
The two girls had been best friends for years
and Ashley had turned 16
the day before their disappearance.
To help her friend celebrate,
Lauria had asked her father's permission
to spend the night at Ashley's family's mobile home.
Lauria promised her father
she would be home by noon the next day,
but this promise would unknowingly
be the last ever exchange
between the father and daughter.
When firefighters first arrived on scene around 5:30 am
on the morning of December 30th,
Ashley's home was engulfed in flames.
Ashley's parents, Karen and Danny Freeman,
were found dead inside the scorched house
with fatal wounds to the back of the head.
The two girls were nowhere to be found.
The hunt for Ashley and Lauria kicked into overdrive
as detectives tirelessly searched
in a nearby lake, mineshaft, and a water filled quarry.
Investigators followed multiple promising leads
including a confession to the crime
by two convicted killers,
Tommy Sells and Jeremy Jones.
The two men later recanted their confession
and claimed they had been lying for the thrill of it.
Years pressed on
and the mysterious disappearance of the young girls
continued to bewilder authorities
and the Craig County community.
Were the girls still being held captive
somewhere nearby in the community?
Lauria Bible's family refused to take down
their Christmas tree after she went missing,
holding onto hope that one day she would return home
and undecorate with the family.
However, seven years after her disappearance in 2006
the Christmas tree fell apart.
Fast forward to 2017.
Newly released court documents
uncovered a threesome of criminals
that appeared to have been well-known
in the law enforcement community.
Warren "Phil" Welch, David Pennington,
and Ronnie Busick were notoriously
unhinged substance cookers, users, and violent criminals
in December of 1999.
Prosecutors had supposedly alleged
but were unable to prove
that Welch, Pennington, and Busick
had been at the Freeman trailer to settle a substance deal
on the night of the girls' disappearance.
Witnesses had confessed to police
that after murdering the couple in the mobile home
the three suspects had kidnapped Ashley and Lauria.
An ex-girlfriend of Welch informed police
that when she had lived with Welch
in the months after the murders
she had discovered a leather brief case
filled with graphic Polaroids
of what she was sure had been Ashley and Lauria.
She recognized the girls from the reward poster,
but had been too afraid to come forward
at the time of the discovery.
Phil Welch had threatened her
to keep quiet about the photos,
warning that if she told anyone
she would end up in the pit just like those two girls.
What finally brought this 18 year case to a close
was an anonymously dropped box of documents
to Craig County sheriffs.
The box pointed investigators to a new witness
and former case detective Tom Pryor.
Although Tom Pryor
no longer had the files from the case on hand,
he had kept an insurance card
that had been found on the site
the day after the Freemans were brutally murdered.
The insurance card miraculously belonged to a woman
that had lived with Welch at the time of the murders
and was proof enough
to officially place him at the scene of the crime.
Both Welch and Pennington died
before the discovery of this incriminating information,
but 66-year-old Ronnie Busick
was arrested and charged with four counts of murder
in April of 2018.
The bodies of Ashley Freeman and Lauria Bible
have still never been recovered.
Number two, the murder of Jane Doe.
20 years to solve.
- [Announcer] On July 21st, 1999,
the body of a young woman was discovered
in a corn field in Racine County, Wisconsin.
Her injuries were brutal
and her right arm was unnaturally bent behind her.
Investigators were unable to identify her body
and began calling her Jane Doe.
They had so little evidence to go off of
that the victim's denim jacket
was the closest thing they had to any leads.
No shoes had been discovered at the scene of the crime
so it was possible
that the victim had been killed elsewhere
and dumped in the corn field.
Unfortunately, the night before her discovery
had been a torrential downpour
which kept police from collecting crucial DNA evidence.
The body was autopsied
and it was determined that the victim
could have been anywhere from 18 to 30 years old
and possibly had mental disabilities.
The investigation proceeded,
but authorities still could not identify the victim.
The young woman was laid to rest
with more than 50 people in attendance at her funeral
and her gravestone continued to read "Daughter Jane Doe"
for nearly 20 years after her brutal murder.
Then in November of 2019,
a concerned citizen reported a conversation she had
with an intoxicated acquaintance.
This conversation turned police onto Linda LaRoche,
a Florida woman who worked at a medical center
at the time of Jane Doe's death.
She had been drunkenly boasting
about a young woman she had murdered
back when she lived in Illinois.
This led investigators to question LaRoche's children.
They admitted that their mother
had taken in a young transient around 1994
and coerced her
into providing day care and housekeeping services
in exchange for a bed.
Finally, investigators believe
that they had a name for their Jane Doe.
Peggy Lynn Johnson was a 23-year-old
with cognitive disabilities and no immediate family.
Johnson was treated very poorly
while she was staying with LaRoche.
Following her arrest and interrogation,
Linda LaRoche's former husband
said that the last time he saw Peggy Johnson
she was lying lifeless on the ground of their home.
LaRoche claimed that Johnson had suffered an overdose
and that she had taken her away from the home
so her family would not be involved.
However, she later stated
that she left Johnson with a known grandmother
and that she was alive and well
the last time she saw her.
But when Peggy Johnson's grandmother
claimed she had never seen or met LaRoche before,
her story changed yet again.
She admitted to driving Peggy to Wisconsin
but claimed that she had dropped her alive and unharmed
on the side of the road before driving off.
Linda LaRoche was taken into custody
for the murder of Peggy Johnson
whose identity was confirmed
through familial DNA testing.
Soon after, arrangements were made
for Johnson to be laid to rest
with a proper gravestone alongside her mother.
- [Announcer] Before we get to number one,
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Hit that subscribe button and give us a thumbs up
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Now onto number one,
the Golden State Killer.
45 years to solve.
- [Announcer] Beginning around 1974,
the notorious Golden State Killer,
also known as the Original Night Stalker,
tormented communities
from Sacramento to Orange County California
for more than a decade.
- [Officer] Hello?
Hello?
(Golden State Killer breathing creepily)
- [Announcer] Breaking into homes
and eventually escalating to murder,
the Golden State Killer is believed
to be responsible for at least 13 murders
and over 100 burglaries in California.
Operating under a blanket of night,
the perpetrator would break into homes
while women and couples were asleep.
Finding his way to their bedroom,
he would then wake his victims
and blind them with a flashlight to the face.
(Golden Stake Killer speaking indistinctly)
After tying up a couple,
he would often place objects, such as plates,
onto the back of the husband
and threatened that if he heard
an object move, fall, or break,
he would start killing at a moment's notice.
In the midst of these endless attacks,
Sacramento County held community meetings
in order to calm the fears of the general public
and answer questions.
One of the original detectives of the case, Carol Daly,
claimed that a man took a stand at one of these meetings
to criticize both police and the men
who allow their wives to fall victim
without fighting back.
Not long after, someone broke into the man's home
and assaulted his wife.
This lead investigators to believe
that the Golden State Killer
had been in attendance at the community meeting.
Eventually, in the early 80s,
one man fought back against the attacker
and forced him to flee the property.
The attacker's next crimes soon turned murderous
as he moved from Northern California to Southern California
and decided he could no longer afford to leave witnesses.
Investigators had yet to arrest
a single suspect tied to the murders,
but were diligently collecting
a bread crumb of DNA evidence along the way.
They clung to the hope of stopping the serial murderer
before more victims suffered his abuse.
In May of 1986,
it had been four years, nine months, and eight days
since the last known murder.
Janelle Cruz,
an 18-year-old cashier at Bullwinkle's Pizza,
would soon become the youngest known victim
of the Golden State Killer.
On the evening of May 4th, 1986
Janelle was visiting with a male co-worker
inside her home in Irvine.
Janelle and her friend thought they heard strange noises
coming from outside her home near her garage.
When they went to investigate, they found nothing.
At approximately 10:45 pm,
Janelle's friend left her home.
The next day at around 5 pm
a real estate agent discovered Janelle's body.
It was suspected that she was killed
with a pipe wrench missing from the backyard.
Perhaps the noises Janelle and her friend heard
was the killer maniacally choosing the pipe wrench.
Janelle was not only
the youngest victim of the Golden State Killer,
but she was also the last known death
at the hands of such a notorious man.
Years passed and the assaults slowed to a stop.
Many assume that the killer had moved states
or had passed away
and the nation feared they may never have answers
as to who haunted California by moonlight
for more than a decade.
However, long time investigator Paul Holes
uncovered a breakthrough in January of 2018.
Using the site GEDmatch,
Holes uploaded the DNA profile of the Golden State Killer
and miraculously found distantly related family
that eventually led to one suspect.
Joseph James DeAngelo was a former police officer
who was fired from the force in 1979,
three years after the Golden State attacks began.
Once Holes and his team narrowed in on DeAngelo,
they collected a DNA sample from a discarded tissue
that happened to perfectly match their mystery attacker.
72-year-old Joseph DeAngelo
was finally arrested in April of 2018,
45 years after his first known crime.
As of March 4th, 2020,
DeAngelo offered to plea guilty
in exchange for a life sentence
to avoid the death penalty.
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