SPEAKER_01 0:00

In Tragedy, a true crime podcast, we discuss missing persons' cases, violent crime, and other sensitive topics that may be difficult for some listeners. Listener discretion is advised. Our show is a place where every story matters and every voice deserves to be heard. To support this podcast, you can subscribe at www.tragedy a true crime podcast.com for early access to new episodes. And join our Facebook community, Tragedy, a True Crime Podcast, for updates, discussions, and ways to support the families we feature. Welcome to Tragedy, a True Crime Podcast. I'm Elisa.

SPEAKER_02 0:45

And I'm Michael.

SPEAKER_01 0:46

And this is our third episode in our series on Audrey Heron. For those of you who have not listened to the summary, please go back and do that. But very briefly, Audrey has been missing since August 29th, 2002, from the Catskill, New York area. Now, Audrey was a nurse and she worked at a facility late night. She got off about 11 p.m. and she left her shift that night, somewhere between 11 and 11.15, and was not seen since.

SPEAKER_02 1:15

It's Irish standing too that her vehicle has not been seen since.

SPEAKER_01 1:18

Yeah, that is correct. She did drive a black Jeep Grand Cherokee, and that has also not been found since her disappearance. As we progress with our story about Audrey's disappearance, we'd like to welcome Marie Parker. Marie Parker is Audrey's best friend. Thank you for joining us and welcome to the show.

SPEAKER_00 1:39

Hello. Thank you for having me. And uh I'm one of her best friends.

SPEAKER_01 1:43

I think that's an excellent clarifier. Thank you for that. Yeah. Um, and before we learn about Audrey, please tell us a little bit about you.

SPEAKER_00 1:53

Uh I don't know. Here every day. I'm a grandma now. Uh actually, so is Audrey. Um, let's see. I moved from New York to South Carolina last year, but the last 20 plus years have been, I don't know, what you would call maybe a living nightmare because every day is like it happened yesterday. And Audrey's always in the forefront of anything that I know I do. So, I mean, I'm never gonna stop looking for her. Um, at one point, a good friend had said to me, hey, you gotta give in a little, live a little, let it go a little bit. And I I did, but I'm not gonna lie, I was very obsessed with finding my friend when it happened. I couldn't understand why we couldn't. So done better, but uh, I would love to be able to find out what happened to her, not just for me, but for her her mom who's still with us, you know, her kids, now her grandchildren. So yeah, I mean I'm just your everyday average Joe. They call me gypsy because I can pretty much paint, do, and all that stuff. But um just a waitress now, just hanging out and you know, living life. I wish she could be with us. And what would you like people to know about Audrey? Audrey was the mom that I wish I was half of. Audrey was very smart, very spunky. Um, she could actually dance too, and she was pretty good at it. She was uh the best mom. I mean, she was best daughter, she was very good to her parents, very close with her mom and her dad. She had a brother, Ray Ray. Um, family was kind of everything to her, I think, in my eyes. Um, she was a nurse, hard worker, you know, she was a pretty girl, but uh didn't underestimate her, you know, being under five foot, because I don't think she would ever have gone down without a fight. She was just she was just a good person all around. She was a good good human being with a big heart. We all fall short, but I never really saw her fall short too many times.

SPEAKER_01 4:11

Can you tell us um about the circumstances around her disappearance?

SPEAKER_00 4:17

Well, not gonna lie, when I first got the phone call, I kind of laughed at my then husband Jimmy and said, Hey, did you check them all? Because I mean, that's I would I worked out of town a lot, I was construction, and she would come and get my daughter, Katie, because my daughter Katie and her eldest daughter Sancia were best friends. They were about 10. So when he first told me that she was missing, I was working out of town and I said, No, she's probably at the moment. He goes, No, she's missing. And I gathered my thoughts, and I'm like, Oh, wait a minute, did you check the airport? Because Sancia had gone away with her mom. I didn't realize that she went in a camper, like they RV'd it down. So I just I knew she was in Florida coming back. So I'm like, okay, check the airport. I mean, it took him a good 10 minutes to make me realize, oh my god, she's missing. And I dropped the phone, asked my bosses. I was about three plus hours away. And when I tell you, I did that three plus hours and just over two hours to get to her house with all kinds of thoughts in my head, like, was she on the side of the road? You know, she was working um as a nurse per diem. So we had had a a case where some friends went out drinking years back, and all I could think of was this girl, her name was Joy Dio. And I thought to myself, oh my god, maybe she went off the road, nobody saw her, so I needed to get home, you know, to go look. Because that girl Joy was out with her friends, they all left a bar. She went around a turn and went over an embankment, and they didn't realize she was missing until the next morning. And she was alive for three days on the side of the road, but they could not find her because of the tracking. And that's all I could think of was, oh, we need to find her. She's off the side of the road. So I got to Jeff's house. Um, it was strange walking in, you know, they didn't really know me, know me, like Jeff did, you know, and his dad, but I had met his mom and his sister at the time, and I just looked like this bull in a china shop asking a million questions, and you know, it didn't really pan out right. So I had left there, and I had just did her route from the hospital back in, like screaming out the I could still hear myself screaming out the window, like you know, all the side roads that she could have would have maybe took, and then you know, phone calls from the girlfriends, and like the next day, like me and my husband at the time went and we got flyers, we were at the you know, the police station. I can still hear Karina's blood curdling scream, but at a reward, like so. We kind of, you know, we were friends, so we couldn't really push too much, and you know, one day led into two, one week led into two to a month, and it was just a scary time. Like I had asked, you know, can we put up a reward to Jeff? And I called all the time, and you know, some people automatically assumed the worst, and I don't know. I just wasn't gonna take no for an answer, and we just started doing fundraisers, and because I I mean, when I tell you, I was obsessed and I thought, oh, we're gonna find her. You know, this is just like watching SUV. We're gonna, we're gonna do something, we're gonna find her. And, you know, the days ran into weeks to months to years, and you know, we did bike runs, anything I could do to come up with a a scheme, I call it, to put her faith on the news, you know, we got on Montel, um, we did Crime Watch, we did a lot with like nothing. And uh I'm not gonna lie, it's probably my biggest failure in life is not finding that girl. And it's not like you know, people say, Oh, it's not your fault, but you know, I feel like I failed her as a friend because I haven't found her yet.

SPEAKER_01 8:18

So not for lack of time. And it's our understanding that she left work at normal time, which was around eleven. So she's driving home in the dark. Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:32

It was it was a rainy kind of crappy night, uh, upstate New York. Um, and I did the run because there was a nurse that was like, oh, she was behind me, and you know, she had this story, so they thought that they had her going up, they have her on, you know, a camera, what looks to be her vehicle, making a left. And I did all this. Um I'm kind of a jerk. Um, you tell me something, and until I actually believe everything you say, I gotta put the pieces together in my head. Some people call me intimidating, some people call me, you know, overbearing, but I need to know. So if I don't understand it, you need to make me understand. And I did that ride. I was very upset to find out because I don't know. I got in the car, made like I was leaving. It's 11 o'clock, it's a busy street to pull out of the hospital, and then you gotta go take a left, then take another left that is busy to get across, to go on the bypass and go up. And for somebody to say, oh, she was behind me up until, well, unless you made arrangements and you left at the same time, which I know that they did not, because that wasn't the nurse that stayed with her. The one nurse was the last one that talked to her. I mean, I did try to get a hold of her. Um, they stayed and talked for a little while. So there's no way that that. And I got to finally ask her one night at a vigil. We were having a vigil, and I said, Of course, a million questions. And she just kind of hysterically jumped back and said, I don't know. I was just trying to be of help. Well, that's when I got angry and said, Wow, you got everybody thinking she made it up this far or that far. And there's no proof of that. So I'm one of those you gotta you gotta give me solid. So I put pieces together. Yeah, I can be a jerk, but yeah, unless you know, and I do, I've I've when I go anywhere with anyone, I watch them in my my rear view mirror. Like I know that we're going somewhere, and uh yeah. So 12-mile ride.

SPEAKER_01 10:36

So I heard you say something a little interesting that is new to me, and just help me understand if the if I heard you correctly, it sounds like maybe she didn't actually leave at the end of her shift. She stayed and chatted with somebody a little bit.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

Yep, yeah. She they were out there maybe, you know, a good 10 minutes or so. Um, from what I understand, she had had some baby clothes in the car, which I didn't find out about till a while later. It should have been part of the description, you know, because hey, if there was some discarded baby clothes, if they stole her Jeep, you know, that wasn't in there till later. A lot of different things were said. Um, the timeline, you know, I I do, and I'm not gonna lie. I mean, I spoke to Jeff quite often, up until a certain point. But uh the Audrey I knew would not have stayed overnight, like the story goes, where they talked at 9:30, she was upbeat. She had gotten a raise, she was actually talking about that raise for quite a while. She was looking for this raise. Um, and she got that raise, everything was good dandy. There was no talk of staying over. Um, when she used to come with me, she'd get in the car, she'd have to let Jeff know where we were. We'd go shopping, we'd get back, we'd she'd get in her car at my house, go home from my house. There was always some kind of connection there. So it struck me a little funny that um there was no phone call made, and there was an assumption by Jeff that she just stayed the second shift without calling. And then there was, you know, the second call in looking for her at like 6, 6:30. Because I know from what I understand, could be wrong, but the timeline goes 9:30 phone call home. Ha ha, I got my freeze. Then 11 o'clock, she was to leave, didn't come home. He woke up at 2:30, thought nothing of it, did some dishes, left the kid sleeping. At 6:30 and 7, there was a phone call from Jeff to the hospital looking for her. And then this is me being a jerk again. Okay, so her shift, she stayed 11 to 7. Why were you calling at 6:30 or 7 looking for her when she wouldn't be home until 7:30-ish? Do you understand what I say when I say that?

SPEAKER_01 12:54

Mm-hmm. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:56

So back, you know, and mind you, I still never thought nothing bad. I still don't, because you can't make somebody guilty on assumptions and, you know, the Russians and the rumors and all this stuff. But I can question why you didn't do certain things that you used to do. So it started rattling my brain. We started doing things, we started looking. Um, we put her VIN number in, the wrong phone number was given to us. I can't imagine whoever heard me call that. She had what they had a bag phone. And for whatever reason, we were given the wrong phone number. And I remember calling that phone number, going, odd, you know, something happened. Let me come get you. For the first like 30 to 45 days, she was missing. So you just think about little things that could have been done. And then, of course, the first interview that was done, where a lot of people thought, because Audrey was a pretty girl. I mean, it wasn't called in until what, 9:30 the next morning by her dad's step wife, which was Jeannie, um Audrey's stepmom, because she worked for the state police, till about 9:30. And I I call it uh boots on the ground. There was no boots on the ground at that hospital until maybe the earliest 12 o'clock. I don't know about you, but I can get from New York to Myrtle Beach in 10 hours. So I kept thinking was, wow, lost time, lost things, and people like there's witnesses that say that the cops that were there were joking, pretty girl, they must have had a fight. So it was kind of not taken serious right away. So to me, that's lost time again. And then, of course, she had all the rumors of the Russians and you know, people not talking, and we raised a reward, and Jeff kind of stayed in the background, and you know, people get suspicious when you don't do anything. Um, I always just say, you know what, if he's not guilty, he's definitely guilty of never looking for her. Whether he did behind closed doors, and I don't know about that. But I'm pretty sure I tried my damnedest to be in the same ball field, and just after a while, you give up thinking, wow, you know, you just step away and you try to look into other things. But I am. I'm I'm still angry that it wasn't done a different way. Could have woulda shoulda, but you know, I think whatever happened to Audrey, the person knew her or she knew them. Audrey would yell at me because you know, I I picked up hitchhikers, I did construction, you know. I hitchhiked when I was a kid, so I had no fear, but she always used to say, you know, what are you doing? And uh, I don't know. I've done the psychic route. I mean, I've damaged some cars, I've been on property I shouldn't be on. You know, we've had the divers in there. It's just very heartbreaking. Because now, of course, and I by now it's I guess I guess I can say it out loud. Sansia is now pregnant for her second grandchild. And I feel guilty that I see everything Audrey should be able to see.

SPEAKER_02 16:05

Yeah, it sounds like she's missing a lot.

SPEAKER_00 16:08

Yeah, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I used to feel bit because mind you, when this all happened, Sancia went to live with her real father, Dave, and the two other kids, which we were all real close. But the animosity and the the rumors and what have you, I guess, you know, we just it all blew apart, the whole friendship circle. It just changed everything. Like, and I can still remember seeing Katie. She had she, of course, had a Katie too. And last time I saw Katie, she was like four. I used to call her Chatty Kathy because she'd always get on the phone with me. And I saw her at a, I want to say it turned 18. So I was allowed, not allowed. I don't know. I was at that birthday party and she sat next to me on a bench, plopped right down next to me. I didn't know what to say or do. And uh she's like, I know you, you're my mommy's friend. And I just thought, you know what? If that girl knows who I am that way, I'm good with it. So, and they actually did get to come, like Quinn was the young one, used to call him curtain climber. Um, you know, I got to see them older, but I missed out on a lot of things. So did Ray, because Ray was kind of wanting to know where his daughter was. So there was a whole thing where Ray didn't get to see his grandkids. You know what I mean? He saw Sancia because he was Dave Court's kid, but there was just that animosity and that break. And uh, like I said, it's heartbreaking because things should have been different. We should have been around for things. Um and like I said, all I want for Christmas is somebody just I don't care if they throw a box of donuts and a set of keys on a table down to the police station for her. So, because if we don't have that car, we have nothing.

SPEAKER_02 17:53

One one thing I want to go back to is you talked about, you know, one of the things that you've done is you really analyze things and make sure that you understand how things fit together regardless of anyone's story. Is there any piece of evidence or any story that you've never felt really fit together or made sense?

SPEAKER_00 18:10

Um, the one main thing, I don't know if I said that to Alyssa, was it still irks me about in her description, it says what she was wearing turtlenecks, scrubs, tennis sneakers, you know, scar on her thumb. But they talk about um her wearing a number one mom necklace, and that did not come to light or in the description until like a couple months later. And I remember because I worked out of town a lot, I did construction, and I remember seeing that, and I was at that police station a lot. Like I was bringing the flyers, I was trying to ask questions, I was a pain. And I got there, and it just drove me nuts about this because I'm one that will look at you and go, oh yeah, she was wearing A, B, and C. To my knowledge, Audrey never really had um a number one mom pendant, necklace. And I think the reason it aggravated me the most was because there was a um a number one mom pendant found on remains over in Massachusetts. And of course, we all got the phone call. Oh my god, is it her? And when it wasn't her, it just really started to drive me nuts because I don't remember that. And I remember certain things. She had, like, you know, the little mom, maybe Alyssa, you remember when they did the little charm necklaces, um, where the little charm kids were on like a charm over. Audrey had that, didn't say number one mom. And of course, I was a pain. I would call. I asked everyone, and I I had called Jeff and I said, Hey, you know, who said she was wearing that? And he said that, you know, must have been one of the nurses. So, of course, my uh my behind went right down to the nurses, asked everyone, and that's when I found out that it wasn't etiquette, for lack of a better word, to be wearing jewelry outside of your person because she worked in a hospital nursing home setting. So patients were elder, they would grab at you. So I was like, okay, so none of you said that she was wearing that. And then I asked the mom, I asked the cousin, because you're not gonna, unless I don't know, I would never buy myself a number one mom necklace, you know what I mean? It's usually given as a gift or something like that, right? Am I being a jerk? No, you're not. That makes that makes sense to me. Sounds presumptuous. Yeah, no, I agree with you. It drove me insane because I couldn't piece together where this necklace came from. So there was one time where I got to go into that office, got got the right trooper. I don't know if he's still there. One of the and he goes, because I kept asking about it. And he goes, Well, you know what? Let's just go look. So he looked up through, and that's when I found out about the clothes and the Jeep and that. And apparently it was Jeff on this report that said she was wearing it. So my heart kind of sank a little. I kept it in the back of my mind, you know, like, why would you say because if it's not if it's not a detail that's true, don't put it out there. You know, like if you're looking for a red truck, don't tell me to look for a blue one. So, and we're talking about a human. So I was angry, annoyed, obsessed. I mean, I just kept going along, but there's that's just one detail that just still irks me. The timeline irks me. Um the fact that like because he was inactive in things, I mean, I guess other people say yes, he was, no, he wasn't. But I mean, we hired a private investigator. I was kind of the bad guy, I guess, because I just didn't shut up. I mean, there was times when I mean I dated this man for 10 10 years, Dave, and he was like a little worried, like, well, what if it is the Russians? I'm like, you know what? I hope it is the Russians and they come after me. Like, because then at least it there'll be some kind of truth to the Story. Let them come get me. So I just I don't know. Like I get so anxious and nervous when I talk about it, but I will never stop talking about it. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_02 22:12

It does. One one question I have this has come up a few times, and um I'm not sure if Elise already knows this or not. Both you and Maria have talked about this Russian connection. Can you describe that to me?

SPEAKER_00 22:21

Like, um, where does that so I'm not really sure who said it? I believe, like Jeff or um, his dad Ron, they owned well, Ron owned it. Ron owned a place called he bought a place that was originally called Schmollinger's. So up on 67, where Audrey's house was, it's a little resort, golf course. And from the details I found out, it was a silent partner. His name was Gary Radzinski. I could be wrong, but this is just what I went after. Um, he was a silent partner. Jeff had said something that at one time we were talking that she witnessed them fighting, they owed money, rent, or whatever. So the story goes that the Russian m did it to pay back something. And I thought to myself, okay, all right, that's it, then why you staying in the backyard she was taken from? Okay, do you understand why I say that? Like, oh, because Russians, you're not afraid no more.

SPEAKER_02 23:21

Um yeah, I mean that's that's that's a lot of people.

SPEAKER_00 23:26

That's just a rumor. There's lots of people to talk about. There's people that talk about seeing equipment, there's lots of people, but a rumor is not guilt. And like I said, the guilt goes, you know, people try to throw it on Jeff or his dad or whatever. Um, you can't say they're guilty. Say a little bit that, you know, you didn't do too much. Um, but um, and I was friends with Jeff. Like me and Audrey tried to get our husbands at the time um, you know, to go out together. We had gone out a couple times, had dinner. I mean, my husband at the time didn't really click too good. And in fact, that first weekend, I mean, my husband was on TV much more so than Jeff. And I'll never forget him getting back into the car after posting, because I would be driving and he'd be getting out stapling posters up. And it was big on the news those first couple weeks, and someone had stopped when he was putting one on the corner, I think down a ravina, and had yelled out the window, hey, did they find your wife yet? And I remember Jimmy, he was uh a mad mess because he just thought the world Audrey, you know, we would joke every once in a while because I don't, he seemed like the best dad, um, good husband, but there was things I didn't know about that other girls did. Like you tell one girlfriend one story, you tell the other one the other. Like I didn't know that she had an appointment because she found a lump under her arm to go to the doctors. Like we didn't get to get that conversation. So um they had broken up years prior. Didn't know that. You know what I mean? Like I met Laudrie after being in school years later at a Brownie meeting, and we became fast friends because our daughters were so you know the routine, but when someone acts outside of that routine, it it's eventually gonna catch up to you and make you think. So you betcha. I have that in the back of my head. Well, did you? And I did ask him point blank on the phone one time. I said, I gotta ask you, Jeff, she was my friend. Like, do you have anything to do with it? There was no no, there was no nothing silent, and then oh, you know me better than that. Well, do I? So, and you know, forgive me if you're listening, Jeff, but I had to ask you, so but um, I don't know, it's just it's horrifying to know that we live somewhere, and mind you, Greenville and Freehold and that little town, it's not too big. So, and there's you know, missing people until you get into it, you don't realize it. Me as a kid, I still remember Katherine Wilson. You know, that was the first fly. That's how we got the idea for the flyers. Because I remember being a kid, she had gone missing from Albany, so did the college student, Susie Lyle, and I just remember seeing flyers on the throughway. Boost, so that's what Jimmy and I'd done. My husband at the time, we just made a bunch of ugly black marker flyers with a picture from my wedding because she disappeared two months to the day after my wedding. I got married June 29th and she disappeared August 29th. So, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

Can I ask a clarifier um about the timeline? Yes, ma'am. And this is also about like what is typical or atypical behavior, which I love that you've already talked about. So, on the times when Audrey would have worked a double, do you know what her typical pattern was? Would she call home and say, hey, I'm I'm staying over? I would assume, yeah, because I mean because you should tell your husband where you are.

SPEAKER_00 27:22

She always did. I mean, it's okay. So that's the one thing that I didn't notice until after the fact. Do you know what I mean? Like it was just normal. Like she'd come in the house, drop her stuff, we'd get in my car. Because at the time my brother got into an accident years ago, nobody drove me around. Like up until about five, six years ago, nobody drove me anywhere. So she would park her car in my lawn, well, her Jeep, and I had a Jeep, and we'd get in my Jeep. She would call, let him know she got there. You know, we'd be wherever if she was on her way home. And there wasn't actually a night where she we got there late because we were getting stuff for the wedding mostly. And he called after she left. I'm like, yep, she just left. You know, she just got in her car because we were running late. He called looking for her. So for for the timeline thing, and I'm not, you know, being I'm trying not to be a jerk, but at this point in time, like, what do I have to lose other than say, hey, where did it change that you didn't go looking? Do you understand? Like the the getting up, the Jeff I knew would have called looking. And like, and I guess the thing that really rocked me most, because it was a few months in, and I did not know Ray, her dad, other than he was the guy that Katie would get dropped off with was Conscia. It was Conscia's grandfather. They would go to Connecticut or wherever they went because he used to go roll his cigarettes. But Katie always went with them, like I trusted them because it was Audrey's dad. I never met him, but I saw him on the news at like 11 o'clock at night. Just gone home. My husband's sleeping. I'm sitting on the edge of the bed, and I'll never forget Ray sitting there, you know, cigarette, cigarette butts in the ashtray, little cup of Jenny beer, and he's smoking a cigarette. And he said, I don't know. If it was my wife, I'd be out there looking for it at 4:30 in the morning. No lie. I called Karina at 11 o'clock at night and said, Hey, does it look like the old man thinks that she made it home? Because it didn't hit me the right way until then. And of course, Karina and everybody, they had their own versions of Jeff's and Audrey's thing because they knew each other a little bit better. And she's like, Well, yeah, that's what we were trying to say. We think she made it home. I mean, we went there that first weekend. Me, Mitzi, and Karina parked our cars and walked it. And I remember thinking to myself, why is the spare tire outside? You know, Jeff came in from wherever he was and he was smoking a cigarette. Why do you don't smoke a cigarette? You used to yell at her, like, we have to sneak cigarettes. What are you doing? So that atypical behavior you're talking about, does it make somebody guilty? No, but at the same time, it's just like it kind of makes you wonder. And you want to know. So I don't know. Like we're we're talking, we're going, this is the 24th year. And we don't know anything more than we knew the day that she went missing. No Jeep, no nothing. No phone, no godness.

SPEAKER_01 30:19

No phone. Footticks, no nothing. Wow.

SPEAKER_00 30:23

And it's just sad to think, wow. Well, I mean, I I wish we had Facebook back then. I wish we had the internet that we had back then.

SPEAKER_02 30:33

Why I bet. What about her behavior? Did there was anything strange going on um with her maybe leading up to her disappearance?

SPEAKER_00 30:42

None that I know of. None that I know of. I mean, she she worked, she shopped. I mean, that was Audrey. Like, you know, she was a good friend to all of us. Like, there was never any craziness.

SPEAKER_01 30:56

Tell us a little bit about um law enforcement's response. I know you already indicated that it it wasn't swift, um, but keep telling us about what that looked like moving forward from there.

SPEAKER_00 31:10

Um, Dave Darling was the main guy, and uh he was I mean, he retired, but he worked tirelessly. He wanted to know what happened to her before he retired. I mean, I had a conversation with him one time that because there's the whole big story about how Jeff took a lie detector test and failed it. It's never been confirmed. I think Jeff himself thinks that he took it. I mean, I don't know how you can confirm it or not confirm it. I could be wrong. But from what I understand from a conversation, because again, I was always at that police station, and Mr. Darling took me in the back. Hope he's not around to come follow through with the thread of, hey, if you say anything, he was very upset because that was the thing. Everybody thought he took a lie detector test. He did, but I guess it was inconclusive, didn't finish it, something. And I could be wrong, but he was very upset that his dad, Ron, came into that thing, took him out, and lauried him up. And again, that led to more suspicion at the time. Why are you getting a lawyer? You know, it's kind of like watching a TV series in your backyard. So like I said, I can I I've said it before, I can make him and his dad and the whole thing look guilty, but that's rumor, hearsay, and unless you give me a smoking gun or the keys and a box of donuts to for that Jeep, I got nothing. So I try not to, like when people are talking about it, I always ask them, listen, as crazy as you think it might be, you think you saw something, you might know something. Email in, call them. They have nothing. Like we we had a kid that um came on our had a brave net guest book at the time before Facebook, and somebody came on there acting as if they were Audrey. I'm okay, leave me alone, don't look for me. Well, yeah, serious? You think I'm not gonna look for you? It took them a year and a half to trace that IPS or what do they call IPS address or something?

SPEAKER_02 33:16

IP address.

SPEAKER_00 33:17

And yeah, yeah. And uh it was a kid 13 years old in Canada playing a game. So I I mean, I got if I had a to write a book, like I could say so many things. Like I've gone with people into the woods with the the coat hanger looking for the water and been on the cliffs, been in the woods. Three years ago, we went on a uh walk, me, Don, and Nelly down behind the field airport, down where the creek runs. No chance of missing a Jeep, but we walked it for three hours just in case there was a deep enough hole. Like I've done and gone some places, I've been to all the psychics, like and I'll do it again. You know, I I was here in South Carolina for the first time this year on the 23rd anniversary, and I had forgotten that I had to change my phone number. And most times, you know, they call, they say, Hey Marie, you got anything to say? You know, it's anniversary. And I thought to myself, wow, nobody's calling me. And I remembered that my phone was changed. I was like, oh man, but I have bumper stickers, so I'm in the middle of South Carolina. I asked the guy at the bodega, hey, can you put the sticker in your window just because my friend's missing and I feel like I didn't do anything today? And he said yes, you know. And my bosses, I walked in and, you know, I did get lucky to look at my Facebook messages or whatever, and I did get to do an interview from South Carolina to talk about her. You know, it's nothing to someone else, but when they put her face on, you just never know who might see something, who might finally get a conscience, because I don't know how lucky you are about going all by yourself to get rid of a car or a Jeep, a body, or whatever. But I swear someone somewhere saw and know something. I don't know. You gotta have that little bit of hope.

SPEAKER_01 35:12

Can you talk to us about you're kind of already leading there, but the impact that um Audrey's disappearance has had on you, you know, this many years later?

SPEAKER_00 35:22

Uh it's like uh it's like an unfinished book or a recipe you don't have enough of the ingredients for, and you can't get to the right store. If that makes sense, um you know I I can't imagine for the kids. I mean, Sansi is a beautiful girl, she's done well with her life, all the kids have done well, but it's like Karina said that first weekend, she didn't die of cancer. It wasn't a a motorcycle accident or a train wreck where you know what happened. So you literally live a nightmare all the time. Like what could have happened? Like I've pictured her fighting off this one or that one, I've pictured her home, I've pictured her getting, you know, caught up in a wherever. So it stays steady in the back of your head. I know life goes on, it always has, but I don't really have a word for it other than it's a like a puzzle that you know one of the kids took the puzzle piece and hit it, and you're almost done.

SPEAKER_02 36:31

It's interesting we we use that same analogy quite a bit whenever we start doing investigations.

SPEAKER_01 36:36

Yeah, I was just talking with a person related to one of our other cases, and I I talk a lot about puzzles and we need the piece of the puzzle. And today, today I said to that person, now that we have these puzzle pieces, I always think maybe we're making the wrong picture. Like, you know, maybe our idea of these puzzle pieces going together to create, I don't know, a mountain scene. Maybe we're we're driving towards the wrong picture. And that's the first time that has really come to me as a thought because we we discuss these things a lot. We spend a lot of time kicking around. Um Well, I have lots of friends.

SPEAKER_00 37:15

I made a so Mary Lyle, Susie Lyle's mom, um said it years ago about it's it's a family, but it's a family you don't want to be a part of.

SPEAKER_01 37:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 37:25

All the missing, because we had lots of families that um came to our bike run. We went to a lot of the cenophropes and stuff. But uh yeah. I don't know. It's just, I mean, and I was kind of the jerk, and I remember Doug Lyle telling me, he goes, Somebody's gotta beat the drum. So I I will forever ask where she is, you know. Um not to hurt anybody's feelings, but you know, step up, step up if you know something, because uh not fair. Not fair.

SPEAKER_01 37:59

I like to call that creating good trouble. That that's how I name it.

SPEAKER_00 38:03

Sometimes, and like I said, people call me intimidating, yeah. All that stuff, yeah. If that means they, you know, maybe we'll get some answers.

SPEAKER_01 38:12

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 38:12

I mean, there's been a couple times where they they dove, they thought they found the the deep one weekend, and I guess I'm tired of me. It's almost like you're waiting for like the surprise party to happen and nobody jumps out of the gate. Does that sound dumb, but just um and I would hope somebody would look for me, you know what I mean? So I just don't I I have no other way to describe it. Yeah. And again, you know, somebody somewhere, one of these days, they may not think they know something, because there's lots of people that will post behind the keyboard and they'll say A, B, and C. Like we just had this whole thing posted about some other guy, and we send it all into the new guy, Mike Gabriel. He's great. I hope you get to talk to him. He's got new eyes on it, going through the whole motions again. There's lots of people that get found, you know. So I mean, I have dreams about her coming back saying, hey, I was just, you know, and breaking her arm because she made me look for her and she was okay. So I I hope that you know somebody hears the podcast that we do, like we've done so many and I try to keep posting things for her, for others. It's uh it's a nightmare that kind of never ends. So and I did, like uh I spent a lot of time and I took away from my kids during that time. You know, I think my my marriage at Jim kind of dissipated because of it. So you live and learn, of course, but um yeah, I would give my right arm to find that girl.

SPEAKER_01 40:06

As we move towards a conclusion, is there anything that you wanted to talk about or anything that you want anyone you want to speak to that we have not given you an opportunity to talk about?

SPEAKER_00 40:20

Not nothing that I can think of because you know I get babbling sometimes. I hope that I put out the main points of what a good person, what a good mom she was. Um, you know, her dad died his last, like he was in the hospital before she died, or before he died, his wife didn't want to leave. And the last thing he said to her was, Hey, I'm not going anywhere. I haven't found my daughter yet. And you wound up having a heart attack. And uh it'd just be good to put it to rest for her mom because her mom is up in age and her kids, and that's just not fair. I mean, whoever's out there listening, if you got something to say that might help, please come forward. You know, it's just uh do one to others and I just can't imagine being part of taking another life. And they didn't just take one life, they they took the lives of all her kids. You know, they've had to the two little ones they have memories, you know, sons was ten, but uh it's not the same, you know. You don't know what happened to her, and I wish somebody would put it to rest.

SPEAKER_01 41:36

You've been listening to Tragedy, a true crime podcast. Our purpose is to honor victims by sharing their stories through the voices of friends, family, and those whose lives were forever changed. If today's episode resonated with you, we encourage you to subscribe, leave a review, and share the podcast so these important stories continue to be heard. Together, we can preserve their memories and ensure their voices are never forgotten. If you have ideas for cases we should cover or questions about what you heard, you can connect with us through our Facebook group, Tragedy a True Crime Podcast, on X at Tragedy Podcast, by email at TragedyAtrue Crime Podcast at gmail.com, or by visiting our website www.tragedyatrucrime podcast.com. Thank you for listening, and we hope you'll join us next time.