The views and opinions expressed in Cold and Missing are exclusively those of the hosts. All parties mentioned are considered innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Cold and Missing also contains adult themes and languages and is intended for a mature audience. Listener discretion is advised. Hello everyone and welcome back to Cold and Missing. Welcome back y'all. I am your host, Ali McLaughlin-Sulkowski. I am your co-host, Eli Sulkowski, and we are Cold and Missing.
Cold and Missing where we cover cold cases and unresolved missing person cases. So what do you have for us? So today we are talking about the cold case of Jubilee Maile Lum. And Jubilee, her family and friends, they call her Maile. So that is what we're going to be referring to her as throughout the podcast. This takes place on the island of Oahu in Honolulu, Hawaii. So a little bit about Maile. Maile is 21 years old in 1999, which is when our case takes place.
She was born November 26, 1977. She lived with her family on the island of Oahu in Honolulu. And she was one of six kids. So she had five brothers and sisters. She had three sisters and two brothers. In her youth, her family says that Maile had fallen into a rougher crowd and wanted to live a street lifestyle. But her family believed that she was turning her life around and was starting to leave that street lifestyle behind.
And they said that she had just begun taking adult education classes in January. She was engaged to Ambrocio Lazaro, and they had known each other for over 10 years. And the two had planned to get married on November 26 of that year on her 22nd birthday. And at this time, this is August of 1999. At this time, she is four months pregnant. And her family described her as lovable, kind, very family-focused. Her younger sister said she was more of a mother to her than like a sister.
So she really loved her family. So some events leading up to Maile's death. On Sunday, August 22, 1999, Maile's fiance, Ambrocio, he was actually in the hospital for some time because he was having heart problems, but he is released on Sunday. And it's reported that from this time, he starts trying to kind of locate Maile. But it's unclear if they're ever able to connect after he is released from the hospital.
On Monday, August 23, 1999, Maile was last seen alive downtown on Hotel Street in the Chinatown neighborhood in the morning hours in Honolulu. Her fiance says that he was trying to find her all day Monday, but was unable to. On Tuesday, August 24, 1999, there is a very old flower shop in Honolulu. It's called Beretania Florist. And it's actually been there since 1937. And it's still there as of 2023. And it's run by the same family. It's like a fourth generation. So this is like an institution.
It kind of feels like on the island. It's a very well-known place. At the flower shop, it is a regular Tuesday, August 24. And an employee is outside checking the trash cans in the dumpster. And there's nothing suspicious, nothing odd. And this is at 1130, this happens. At 1230, the employee checks again the dumpsters outside. And this time, he sees a large, round garbage bag in front of the dumpster.
Now I'm guessing here that he tries to pick up the bag and put it into the trash can, but he's unable to lift it. Because ultimately, it is reported that three employees from the florist shop actually lift the bag up off of the ground and put it into the dumpster. One of the florist employees, her name is Nicole Findland, she was curious about the bag, so she punctured about four layers of heavy duty trash bags with her florist knife.
And she says, quote, I thought I saw a strand of hair, dark, brown. I saw blood on the floral knife and I stopped, end quote. Police are called and when they arrive on scene, they find the body of Maile Lum. She was completely nude in the garbage bag, but had no obvious injuries or gunshot wounds. Quote, her body was intact, end quote, according to Lieutenant Alan Napoleon. Police believe that she was dead less than a day from the time she was found.
And they begin canvassing the area because it's a really residential area and it's the middle of the day on a work day. And there are also apartments above the flower shop, but none of the residents that lived up there had seen anything. But a witness does end up coming forward. And this witness, she worked next door at Total Fitness USA. But Total Fitness USA and the florist shop, they shared a parking lot.
So she was leaving her work around noon to run an errand and saw a purple or turquoise Dodge Dakota pickup truck entering the parking lot. But she says many cars entered the parking lot. She didn't say that she saw anyone dump anything or at least it's not reported. The next day, Wednesday, August 25th, police are able to ID Maile through her fingerprints and they inform her family and begin investigating her death.
Maile's mother breaks the news to her fiance and she says, quote, he was shocked. Everybody was shocked, end quote. And that's her mother Melva. On Thursday of that week, the police asked the public for help for anyone who saw Maile Monday morning or after to come forward. And if anyone saw any cars or people leaving the parking lot between Beretania Florist and Total Fitness USA between 10 and 1 PM on Tuesday, the day that her body was found.
And then there's nothing really in the news following this for a few weeks. Maile's funeral happens on September 11th, 1999. She's laid to rest. And then the next bit of news we get is at the three week mark. So this is September 15th or coming up on the three week mark. Police come forward and they ask for the public's help in looking for a van.
Now the van was seen downtown in the Chinatown area and Maile was seen getting into this van and the vehicle is described as a white or light colored Ford Echoline van. And it's either a 1987, a 1988, 1989 or 1990 year of make for the vehicle. And it has swing out doors with windows on the passenger side. Police believe that Maile had gotten into a van of this description.
And then at right around the one month mark, investigators began exploring the potential that Maile's murder had been linked to another murder. Her name is Michelle Anne Bensinger. Michelle's body had been found August 10th. So this is about two weeks before Maile's death and her body was found in a field. However, her body was so badly decomposed that the police were unable to tell the cause of her death. So her death is actually not listed as a homicide.
It's considered a quote suspicious unattended death, but the police believe that she was in the field where her body was found for at least two weeks. So originally police believe that these two deaths are connected because both of them are found in the nude and they're around the same age. Maile is 21 and Michelle is 24. And this is the first connection that police kind of make.
However, a jailhouse informant who is currently serving time for promoting prostitution per the newspaper, he was a convicted pimp. He wrote to the police and said that Maile and Michelle were working for an escort service called Petite Pleasures. Michelle was running that service and Maile was answering the phones. Police never confirm if these cases are connected. They say, quote, we're not saying they are connected, but we're not saying they are not connected, end quote.
And that's Lieutenant Alan Napoleon. But a detective working Maile's case said that he believed there was no evidence of a link between these two deaths. The quote that the women probably knew each other and that's Detective Michael Tsuda. On September 24th, about a month after Maile's body was found, the family and her fiance are interviewed by the local newspaper. Her family reveal that Maile's cause of death was suffocation and police tell Melva, Maile's mother, that she was strangled.
Police believe that Maile was involved in sex work, but her family maintains that they were not sure what she would get into downtown. But her younger sister Harmony says, quote, no matter what she did, we still love her, end quote. Her fiance, Ambrocio, says that his mind had been going crazy since her death. He said, quote, she treated me good. I love her a lot and she loved me too, end quote.
He also says that he would often pick her up from the downtown area and would try to encourage her to stay home and leave her street life behind. But they never got into the specifics of what that was in the interview. In September of 2000, so this is coming up on a year, the FBI arrives on the island of Kauai due to a series of attacks against middle-aged white women on the island.
So there were three attacks and then one woman was missing that fit the profile, but all of the women were beaten, sexually assaulted, and stabbed. Two women die, but one woman survives the attack. And then the fourth woman, as I mentioned, was meeting the profile and was missing. So the FBI and police want to try to link Maile and Michelle's death to these cases because, quote, then we can expedite some tests through the labs and we can get some assistance from them.
We don't see any obvious connection, but the FBI profiling team may see something that we don't, end quote. And that was Lieutenant Bill Cato of the Hawaii PD Homicide Unit. So ultimately, Maile and Michelle's death are never linked with these attacks that happened on the island of Kauai. And these attacks are actually still unsolved today. There was this brief period or this moment where they thought they had solved them, but charges were never brought against anybody.
There was a prime suspect in the case, but a DNA comparison came out as inconclusive. But it was noted that after this main suspect, he was arrested, re-arrested on a parole violation. These attacks stopped after he went back to jail. But as of 2023, these cases on Kauai have never been solved either. And then that's really the last time you hear of Maile. In 2006, police asked the public again for their help. They hold a press conference.
They again are asking about the late 80, early 90 van that Maile was seen getting into, if anybody knows anything about that. And then they also bring up that purple or turquoise jeep that was seen around noon in that really critical time period of 1130 and 1230 when that employee was going out to check the dumpsters, when it seemed to be dropped really critically in that hour. And there was that Dodge pickup truck that was seen leaving.
So police ask again if anybody knows any information about those vehicles in 2006 to come forward. But at this point, it's been almost seven years that Maile was killed. And in June of 2006, Lani, Maile's sister, was interviewed by the paper. She was 15 years old when Maile was murdered. And she went with her mother to the morgue and she says, quote, she didn't have a peaceful death. There were bruises on her body. It looked like she suffered, end quote.
But then that's the last bit of information that I could find about Maile's death or any breaks in the case, any updates. But her murder has never been solved. Michelle's has never been classified as a homicide. So when you go onto the cold case website, her name isn't even listed because it's not technically a homicide, but that case was never solved. Her death was never solved. And then the Kauai murders were also never solved. A lot of unsolved in Hawaii that all kind of were around Maile.
But if you know anything about Maile's murder or any of the vehicles that were mentioned, you can call Honolulu PD at 808-529-3111, or you can also call Crime Stoppers at 808-955-8300. And the sources for today's podcast come from the Honolulu Star Bulletin, the Honolulu Advertiser, and the Hawaii Tribune Herald. Okay. Do you have any questions for me? No, do you have any for me?
I guess, like, how does a body end up in a garbage bag and it's that heavy and it's there for such... I just don't understand how that part happened. How her body ended up in a bag outside. Yeah. I mean, that's a big question that is part of this. So...I guess I think I need to recap. Maybe like 10 minutes before you started talking about the bag, can you tell me? Could you remind me? Yeah. So there's the florist. The florist. Yes. Okay. The florist. Baretania florist.
And so it seems like there was an employee whose job was like every hour go out and check the trash bag, like check the dumpsters, because he goes out at 11 a.m. or 11.30. I had to do that when I worked at the florist. Oh, yeah. So... Because you're...when you work as a florist, you have so much compost trash, quite trash. And it's like by the bag. It's like after you mow your lawn or rake your leaves, but making flowers is like the same amount of trash.
Sure. Yeah. So he's outside at 11.30 a.m. near the dumpsters checking them. Nothing's there. Okay. But he comes back at 12.30, and then there's the bag in front of the dumpster. That's another thing. I was like, it's the middle of the day. Yeah. Like what? And a trash bag so...because I hate saying this, but like literally physically dead weight feels so much heavier than a person who is alive. So it's just... Yeah, and they were four heavy duty trash bags.
So like those construction plastic bags. You said four? They were four of them. Oh, all wrapped in one? Yeah. So it was like they were all inside of each other. Oh, like how you...if there's like liquid in your trash, how you would put more on. Right. How you might double bag it. Double bag, triple bag, yeah. Yeah. But so there were four of them all together. And she was smaller. She was a petite person. She was like five foot two, weighed like around 160 pounds, I think, at this time.
So the employee of the floor shop, I'm guessing he tries to pick up the bag by himself. And he can't. And he can't because it's reported that three of them have to lift this bag to get it into the dumpster. And after they get it in the dumpster is when one of the florist workers, Nicole, is curious about what's inside of this and opens it with her florist knife. And so she said she punctures through all these layers of trash bag and then sees hair and notices there's blood on her knife.
So then she stops and they call the police. And then also I would be really curious at this time, it's 1999, I have to think that there is a database of registered vehicles on the islands of Hawaii. And if not all of them, maybe even specifically which island? I don't know. But it does seem as if you could kind of quickly find everybody who owns either a purple or turquoise Dodge Dakota pickup truck because that's kind of a unique color anyway. Yeah. And it's that color on a truck.
Most colors are white, red, blue, or black. Right. So even if it's like you pull up 50 trucks across all of Hawaii, it's like, well, that's like a suspect. Yeah. If you have a turquoise Dodge, that's like the color of... What color is turquoise? I'm color blind, by the way. That's why I'm asking. Or like what I know it is. Isn't it like Tiffany's? It's like close to that. It's like a bluish green. Oh, so I really wouldn't be able to see. Yeah. You've never seen this color in your life.
It's beautiful. It's gorgeous. It's a great color. Yeah. So that truck that's there around noon, again, it could be nothing because it is the middle of the day in a shopping area and next to a gym. It's a busy spot. I mean, it's a great place to like discard of something because those places are constantly sweeped to trash is constantly picked up, especially on an island. They want those areas where lots of tourists are also going into them. They want those spaces to be like kept up.
So whoever dropped it knew this trash is going to be picked up, but they really fucked up for multiple reasons. Yeah. So between this kind of unique color of the Dodge Dakota, but then this late 80s, early 90s, it's almost the year 2000. Those kind of unique... They're so specific that even if you have 50 turquoise trucks and 150 between 1988 and 1990 vans of this kind, that's still a suspect pool that you can start with and start eliminating.
Okay. Figure out if the Dodge truck had anything to do with it. Eliminate that because that feels like it would be the smallest pool of potential. What you're saying is like, it's really fucking weird that no one found this car. It's really weird that this hasn't been solved. I feel as somebody in true crime, and I know you know this to be true as well, but it feels like she didn't get the work that her case deserved because she was perceived as a sex worker.
Yes. It's unconfirmed if she was or wasn't, but it seems like at least early enough in the investigation, police found out that she liked to hang out on the streets. She did not have an adult arrest record. She had some run-ins when she was a kid, but there was no adult arrest record for her. Well, that's the thing.
That's what I wanted to comment on in this portion is that obviously the story talks about sex work in a specific way, but our views of sex work is very positive and sex work should be decriminalized. That's what I believe. Totally. Yeah. Like she's a person. Yeah. It's a human being. It doesn't... None of those things matter, but I think in talking about it right now with you, it's important to recognize that that one small fact most likely did.
Most likely did push this, kick the can down the road. You kind of see it with Michelle. She was found naked in the middle of a field. I find it very unlikely that she got herself there in that condition. Sure. I believe she was murdered, but they were unable to tell a cause of death because she had been there for two weeks. I'm like, really? You find causes of death for people that thousands of years. Yeah. That's done. Why was that never declared a homicide?
Michelle had a more active arrest record for things like sex work. She had it on her name, so they weren't even classifying her as a homicide. Then it's... Mylay didn't have those arrests on her name, but maybe had an association, so just got lumped in. It's just really sad because her sister said, no matter what she did, we loved her. Exactly. They want answers.
That was... I hate when people do this, but it's like that was somebody's sister, that was somebody's fiance, but it's like that was somebody, somebody. She's a person, and she had a loving home to come home to no matter what. It just made me sad that the only way that their cases even got picked up again was when these white women were attacked on the island. Exactly.
It was because if they could get a serial case going, then all of their tests for these other attacks that were happening on Kauai could be expedited if they could show there was a serial offender in Hawaii. That's why they were trying to find these other deaths that could be linked with it to expedite this investigation into these white women.
Of course, they deserve an investigation as well, but it's like everyone deserves that kind of investigation, that kind of pressure, that kind of importance. A life deserves it, point blank. Yeah. Oh yeah.
I also wanted to say that oftentimes, or maybe not oftentimes, but in the percentage of people who work in sex work, there's a percentage of folks who are either they don't have a choice in the work that they're doing, or they really feel like they don't have a choice, or they're threatened into it. Oftentimes there are folks with addiction who kind of end up trapped in that world. It's possible that her family members didn't know any of that about her.
Whether or not she was there by her own choice, or she was forced into it, that doesn't make sex work as a blanket statement bad. It gets that descriptor because of, well, one, how people talk about it, the lack of education and information, and because there are bad things that happen in that world. But you could say that about anything. Look at Wall Street. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Thank you so much, Allie.
I'm looking forward to doing more research about this person, and I'm glad you brought her name back into the forefront of people's minds. Yeah. I just saw her picture, and that's why I started looking at this case. That's usually why I start looking at any cases. Somebody's picture just really calls to me. That's beautiful. I didn't know that. Yeah. I mean, this is a little woo-woo for our listeners out there. But it's like I meditate, and I kind of ask.
I believe in energy and in spirits in doing this work, so I'm just like, who wants to be talked about? I just let that guide me to the state I'm looking at, the area I'm looking at, and then a picture. That's how I find my cases, and it all seems to be working for me. Very woo-woo, but- You're going to have to pause. I'm sorry. That's really beautiful. I didn't know that. Thank you for sharing with me. Yeah. You're so cool. That's also, you always ask why I double do my notes.
I take them digitally, and then I write them. When I'm writing them, I try to meditate on the person and just spend time with them in the writing process. I think writing is a spiritual practice. Yeah. But if you are enjoying my way of finding cases and you want to keep listening and keep up to date, go ahead and subscribe in your podcast app so that way our newest episodes get to you. If you want to leave us a review, go for it. Follow us on Instagram. You'll find pictures from our cases.
Please tell your friends about our podcast. Please, please. We want to get our cases in front of as many people because someone knows something out there. Someone knows something. The more ears it gets into, the better. But that's all we have. Stay safe and have a good week, y'all. Stay safe, y'all.