RERUN Hell and Gone Murder Line: Justin Gaines

guilty in a court of law. Nothing in the podcast is intended to state or imply that anyone who has not been convicted of a crime is guilty of any wrongdoing.

newly single. He had broken up with his girlfriend of two years pretty recently, but according to Atlanta magazine they were still friends. In fact, Justin talked on the phone to his ex shortly before he went out that night. This was a close blended family. When Justin's mom and his stepfather married, they each brought their own children to the relationship. There were seven kids in all, and apparently

they all got along. Justin also had a good relationship with his stepdad, Stephen, who worked at a roofing company. Sometimes Justin would do odd jobs for Stephen to pick up some extra cash. Justin was handsome five foot eleven two hundred and thirty pounds. He was muscular and fit. He had blue eyes and short brown hair that he wore in a buzz cut. On the Thursday night, Justin was wearing a gray Abercrombie and Fitch long sleeve shirt and rip blue jeans. He also had a pair of

diamond stud ear rings that he sometimes wore. That night, he was wearing a single diamond stud in his left ear. On thirsty Thursdays at Wild Bills, you only had to be eighteen years old to enter the club, but Justin did have a couple of fake id's with him so that he could buy drinks at the bar. He used the names Brad Allen and Brad's Shoe. His mom, Erica, later clarified on web slue that technically these weren't fake IDs, they were the IDs of some older friends that Justin

would use. I relate to this because I did a lot of that when I was younger, old enough to get into the club, but too young to drink. So Justin didn't take a wallet out with him that night. He had no credit cards, just cash, his fake IDs,

and his cell phone. His stepfather told Atlanta Magazine, which by the way, did a really long and in depth feature on this case, that he remembered that night very well because apparently, right before he went out, Justin was joking around with Stephen about what shirt he should wear to impress the ladies. Justin was a big, very fit guy. He could take care of himself. He was also charming and confident and, according to his mother, very social, someone

who had no trouble talking to anyone, including strangers. He was a regular at Wild Bills. He knew the bartenders, and apparently he also knew some people who were going to be there that night. Justin had a car, but he wasn't driving. He left his car at his mom and stepdad's house. He caught a ride with a friend of his named Chris Byers and Chris's girlfriend, Amanda. According to Atlanta Magazine, Chris and Justin had been friends for a long time, ever since high school. They were now

college roommates. Chris and Amanda picked Justin up at his house and they headed to Wild Bills. Along the way, they stopped at a gas station where Justin mixed some vodka and gas station energy drink in one of those big fountain cups. Again, I used to do this all the time as a team. It's an easy way to save money. Later at the bar, Wild Bills is huge. This club could hold thousands of people. It's closed now, but back in the day they had seven different bars

and each bar had kind of a different vibe. They even had a tiki bar in there, and they would host all different kinds of events. They would host phone parties, sometimes mma fights, and they had line dancing nights. Most of their nights tended to have a country theme, but on Thursday Thursdays, the mechanical bull and cowboy boots were replaced with girls dancing on platforms and a DJ who

would spend R and B mixed with hip hop. Thursdays were also apparently the only night where eighteen year olds could go into the club. So Chris, Amanda, and Justin got to the bar and were ready to party. They were aiming to get there by eleven pm, but they were a few minutes late, and this twist of fate being a few minutes late changed everything because after eleven pm, Wild Bills had a cover charge. It went from being

free to ten dollars per person. Justin saw someone in line who he knew, so he was able to get a pass to get in for free, but Chris and Amanda could not, and they did not want to pay the cover charge, so they left Wild Bills and Justin went in on his own. He said that it was no problem, he would find a ride. This was something that he did often. Again, he was this big, strong

guy who could handle himself. A while later, in the early morning hours of November two, two thousand and seven, Justin walked out into that parking lot in Duluth and no one ever saw him again. I'm Catherine Townsend. If you have a case you'd like me and my team to look into, you can reach out to us at our Helen Gone Murder line at six seven eight seven four four six one four or five. That's six seven eight seven four four six one four or five. This

is Helen Gone Murder line. The disappearance of Justin Gaines became a big story in Atlanta because no one could figure out how this guy just walked out into the night and never showed up again. So remember this was two thousand and seven. Instagram had just launched, and even though pretty much everyone had a cell phone then people weren't constantly shooting video all the time like they do today.

There were cameras at Wild Bills, so there was some surveillance footage, but according to Justin's mom, Erica, most of the cameras were focused on areas that handled money, like the register and the front and back doors. Erica did an interview with a podcast called Unfound, and in that interview she explained that an FBI agent who was a friend of her, someone she knew, had come in to unofficially help her with the case, and the FBI agent

was able to pull some of that surveillance footage. The footage showed that at the club, Justin had some drinks, he was on camera talking to a female bartender who he knew. Later, that bartender talked to Erica and told her that Justin seemed normal, like he was having a good time, and she said he did not appear to be super intoxicated. He apparently even made a comment to this bartender about not getting too smashed. While he was in the club, Justin made a couple of phone calls

to friends of his who he believed were inside. We're not sure exactly what Justin was doing the whole time he was in the club because we only have a few moments on camera, but at one point he apparently did start talking to a girl. Later in some media reports, some reporters asked questions about what they called a minor altercation over a woman who Justin was apparently dancing with. Apparently, this woman had a boyfriend, and Justin and the guys

who were with this woman exchanged a few words. Some of these details came from a private investigator who was later hired by Erica Justin's mom, but the PI said he could never nail down a description of the two guys who Justin was supposedly talking with. There are a lot of moments from Justin's time inside the club and afterward that are missing. But Justin was there for a while after he talked to this girl. He seemed to

be in good spirits and he was chatting to people. Then, at around one point thirty he got ready to leave. Justin walked outside the club at one thirty eight am. You can see that on the security footage. He started calling friends trying to find a ride home. Again, remember this was a time before ride shares became a huge thing. Uber didn't come on the scene until around twenty ten.

There were taxis, but it's never been reported how much cash Justin was carrying, So I wondered did he have a big wad of cash or just enough to cover drinks. He may not have had enough money to call a cab, and even if he did, some of his friends said he wasn't really a person who had a habit of calling taxis. He would hit up his friends for rides instead. His mother, by the way, made it clear that he could have called home at any time and she or

her husband would have come to get him. She told Atlanta Magazine quote, I think he didn't call Stephen because he didn't want to disappoint us, and that haunts me, you know, because nothing the kids do would ever disappoint me. End quote. I find myself really feeling for Justin again here. He just wanted to go home. He made a ton of calls, but no one was able to come get him. And I can relate to this part too. He probably didn't want his parents to know he'd been drinking again.

As a fit guy, he probably thought he could take care of himself. Often a person's size, especially a man's size, will give them a false sense of security. Most guys I know, especially young ones around this age, just don't feel that they're in danger in the same way in general as young women would. Plus, this was a safe area. Over the next half hour or so, Justin made twenty four calls to eleven different people, none of them could come get him. Justin's last call was to Chris, the

friend he rode with to Wild Bills. He made that call at two two am. Chris later told Atlanta Magazine that Justin had called him and he was kind of half asleep. He remembered Justin asking for a ride, but Chris said he had borrowed his girlfriend's dad's car. He said he couldn't really go out at that time of night, and asked for the car again. He thought that Justin would be fine, and later of course, said that if he had had any idea that his friend was in trouble,

he would have gone and gotten him instantly. After that phone call nothing. At first, Erica wasn't worried when Justin didn't come back home the next morning. She knew he was going out to party and he's an eighteen year old guy. But then the weekend went by. She didn't hear from him on Saturday, and on Sunday morning, she

started calling his friends. He never came home to get his wallet or to pick up his car, and on Monday morning, November fifth, she became seriously alarmed because he never showed up to give Chris a ride back to school. Remember they were roommates. Erica told Dateline that at that point she logged onto Justin's online school portal, which she had access to. That's when she saw that he had not turned in some homework, and she knew that that

was completely out of character. She reported Justin missing friends, family and volunteers started trying to retrace his last steps. The police did a search as well, but Erica said that it really took about two weeks for police to start seriously searching. Everyone was trying to retrace Justin's steps. They were trying to figure out from that parking lot

what his next move would be. Several people came forward and said that they had seen him sitting on a bench in the back parking lot on his cell phone. We know that he was making a ton of calls during that time. Shortly after two two am, Justin's phone pinged one more time, and then the phone appeared to die. Erica said that he had a habit of sometimes letting his phone die. So did the battery die or did

someone shut it off? Did Justin get tired of waiting for a ride, did he decide to try to walk toward home or could someone have picked him up there. In the weeks following Justin's disappearance, some news outlets checked Justin's court history. They saw that Justin had a public intoxication charge on his record from the summer of two thousand and seven. It happened after he fell asleep in the backseat of his car with an open bottle of vodka in there. He got caught with the open container

and a fake ID. So some people suggested that maybe Justin had left voluntarily to avoid going to court on November twenty first. But this seemed extremely far fetched right from the beginning, and his family immediately dismissed this theory. They knew it wasn't plausible. Also, these were not serious charges. There was no reason for Justin to have left on his own. And by the way, if he was leaving, why would he leave his wallet with his real ID

and everything else behind. Justin's family did everything they could to help the search. Erica turned her home garage into an office. She started printing up flyers. The family put billboards up on Highway I eighty five. This tidbit was in the Atlanta magazine article. By the way, and it's so heartbreaking to me, because I've heard this before in

Rebecca Gould's case and in some others. According to the article, people called Justin's stepfather to report buzzard sightings, and he would take his four wheeler out to look and see if there was a body out there, but he never found anything other than animal carcasses. Of course, police talked to Justin's friends. There were rumors early on that Chris

wasn't being super helpful to law enforcement. Apparently, Chris believed that police were too hard on his girlfriend, Amanda, but Erica later clarified on a web sluse forum that after some initial friction, all of Justin's friends had been cooperative and police confirmed Chris and Amanda were at home in bed when Justin went missing. Erica told the Unfound podcast that she does not believe that Justin walked out of that parking lot. It was late, but not super late.

There were people around, and Justin was in the back parking lot, which was less busy than the front parking lot, but it wasn't deserted. In fact, it was somewhere where in the past Justin had hung out and had some drinks with friends again Wild Bills was in a safe area, pretty much in the middle of suburbia. Erica believes that if Justin decided to walk along the highway toward home, she believed someone would have seen him, and I think

she's right. A big guy like that probably would have been spotted on a camera somewhere or by some witnesses, which means that Justin almost certainly got picked up in that parking lot, So the question is who picked him up. Police have said they believe that Justin may have been picked up by a blonde woman, possibly driving a black car. They got this information from a friend of Justin's named James. Now.

According to Erica, James, who knew Justin from college, saw him getting into a car with a blonde woman wearing a black dress. Unfortunately, James has since passed away. So who is this mystery woman? Was it someone who knew Justin before or a stranger who lured him into the car? Was she alone or was she with people? Could this have been some kind of robbery set up. Justin did not seem to have any enemies, but the Atlanta magazine

reporter did talk to a friend of Justin's. This person wasn't named, but they told the reporter that he and Justin would occasionally break into cars that were unlocked around their off campus apartment. Basically, what they do is just pull the handle of the car see if it was unlocked, and if it was, they would go in and take money. The friends said there was a drug dealer living there.

Apparently Justin thought that this person might have a lot of cash in his car, so they went up to the car, but they said the drug dealer was standing right there on the porch, so in the end they didn't go to the car and there was no confrontation. But it did get me thinking if he had a habit of pulling on car doors, could he have opened someone's car or maybe tried to sleep in someone's car if he couldn't find a ride in his battery was dead.

Stranger things have happened. According to Justin's mother, Erica, one very early name that came up to her was Dustin Dylan Glass, a career criminal and gang member. Now apparently Dustin showed up at a pawn shop in the early morning hours of November two. Police have found surveillance footage that pawnshop and there is an image of Dustin. He's wearing a diamond studd in his ear that looked very much like the one that Justin had been wearing that night.

I'm not clear on why police first got tipped off to him, but once Dustin's name was mentioned, police continued to track him. Time went by with no arrest and no sign of Justin and no body. Tips started coming in from everywhere, everything from random sightings of Justin that would turn out to be bogus to psychics who said that they believed that he was in a body of water somewhere, which is, by the way, what psychics always seem to say. It drives me crazy. Side note there.

The Walton County Sheriff's Department cold case investigator Michael Rising, who is now in charge of the investigation, told Dateline in twenty twenty three that police had investigated a couple of different theories early on. One that Justin could have been flirting with a girl who had a boyfriend and that there was some kind of altercation, and the other theory was that someone targeted Justin for a robbery based

on his clothes and his diamond earring. On the Wild Bill's website back in two thousand and seven, there was a statement about Justin being missing and it read quote last scene walking toward a car that he called his ride, with two men standing by the car. Reports also say he was seen in the parking lot of Barnacles another bar with these same two men end quote. Now this is just a rumor. It's unconfirmed, and honestly, I can't

find that information anywhere else. I don't know if it's just something someone posted, or if it was a legitimate tip, and I wonder who first said it. There does seem to be more than one source saying that Justin was talking to some men that night. Again, it wouldn't have been out a character for him to talk to people. His mom and his friend say he talked to strangers all the time. But for a while, those two police theories appeared to just be dead ends. Over the next

few years, justin moms Erica said openly she struggled. Even though she was printing up flyers and stickers and talking to the media, there were days where she found it hard to get out of bed, and the family had another setback in twenty eleven when one of Justin's brothers died. But even when she was going through dark times herself, Erica never stopped trying to get media coverage of this case. Police looked in a lot of different directions. They really

didn't have anything to go on. They looked into rumors that could have been the National Forest serial killer Gary Hilton, but there was absolutely no evidence of that, and of course, every single time an unidentified body was found in the area, the family would have to go through the agony of waiting. None of them were Justin. As we said before, Erica hired a private investigator named Bob Pulno. He started his investigation in two thousand and eight and basically he's never stopped.

According to Atlanta Magazine, Bob is retired now, but this is one of those cases he can't let go of. Bob did lots of interviews and in two thousand and eight he said he identified several people of interest. He also looked into theories that Justin could have been extremely intoxicated or drugged. The PI also tried to track down everyone who Justin talked to on the phone that night, and he found a pattern. No one felt that Justin was behaving out of the ordinary. It's the same story

with the video surveillance footage. Eric has said. And if you look online, you can see Justin walks out of the club. He's calmly walking forward, not stumbling. He has his phone pressed to his ear. He looks like he's walking with purpose, and he's talking on the phone. Seven years after Justin disappeared, a local news station WXIA broadcasts some additional footage that was taken from inside the club that night. This footage showed Justin walking out the door

toward the back parking lot. Right after him, a group that looked like three girls and a guy walked outside the club. Justin seems to kind of veer left, and they look like they're veering right, but there are also a couple of other guys standing outside in that parking lot. A few minutes later, two men and a woman enter the club. They come from the same direction Justin was seen leaving. Another couple leaves. This woman has long, dark

hair and jeans on. You can only see the guy from the back, but he's wearing a number twenty two jersey that the news anchor pointed out as pretty distinctive. There are also two guys and white shirts. They look like they're going into the club, but then they turn around after Justin passes them. They don't go in, and then when footage is shown from a few minutes later,

you can see them entering the club. Now, I'm not saying that any of these people had anything to do with Justin's disappearance, but they may have seen something, even something small, that could help crack this case. Again. Wild bills can hold thousands of people. It was a crowded night. It is mind boggling that no one saw anything. In September of twenty fifteen, seemingly out of nowhere, there were two arrests and someone said they knew exactly what happened

to Justin Gaines. That it went down at a dark garage at a house in Snellville. This person said Justin had been lured to that residence and then when he walked in, he was attacked, robbed, beaten, and murdered. In September of twenty fifteen, after a long period of silence, there were two arrests in connection with the disappearance and now police believed death of Justin Gaines. In two thousand and seven, the police's original person of interest was Dustin

Dylan Glass. He had been arrested for distributing methamphetamines, among other things, and was facing some serious charges, according to the arrest warrant. After he was arrested, he started cooperating with police. He told police that he and another man, fifty seven year old Martin Leonard Wilkie, had assaulted Justin and robbed him. He said that this assault and robbery of Justin had ended with Justin being fatally shot. Dustin told police that he took the earring from Justin, but

said that Justin was alive when he left him. The detective who talked to reporters later said he believed Dustin was saying this to kind of confess in a roundabout way, and it seemed to me the detective believed Dustin was kind of taunting the detective. Martin Wilkee was arrested and charged with concealing a death. Then a woman backed up Dustin's story. She said she had participated in helping get rid of the body. And the crazy part was that

this woman was Dustin's own mother, Alma Ruth Below. Let me back up for a minute, because I was trying to make sense of this story and how everything went down. So of course I went back through hundreds of pages of court records, and I found out that after Dustin got arrested, so of course he's in custody. Of course he had a residence that he wasn't staying at because he was in jail. Well, it turns out that during

this time police were doing surveillance on Dustin's house. They were there on August twenty eighth, and they saw Thelma Dustin's mother and some other men carrying white bags, which they later determined had been stolen from a local concrete company. Thelma confessed that she'd strip some copper wire and stolen some supplies for the company and was hoping to seldom on she was arrested on burglary charges in Walton County. She told the authorities she helped Martin Wilkee and her

son Dustin get rid of Justin Gaines's body. She said they disposed of Justin's remains in the High Shoals area near the Appalachi River, Walton County. Thelma led investigators to a well there, and police searched different wells for several days, but in the end they found nothing. Thelma later told police that she had lied in order to get out of trouble. After that, Thelma was charged with making a

false statement to police. So after this happened, After Thelma was arrested and charged with lying, it seemed like police and the district attorney were split over whether or not she was at all credible. Some of the detectives seemed to believe that, yes, Thelma and Dustin had lied about some stuff, but they thought there were grains of truth in what they were telling the authorities, while the Gwinette County District Attorney, Danny Porter, said he thought the whole

thing was a dead end. He told Fox five, quote, I think they are following up on an unproductive lead that has already been investigated end quote. He basically went on to say that Thelma and Dustin would come up with a different story every time they got arrested to try to get police to cut them a brake on other charges. In two thousand and seven, there was more news. Authorities told WSBTV Channel two that they believed that Justin was robbed and killed, and that his body was taken

to Lake Lanier in a white van and dumped. It seemed as though they were now disclosing more details of the story that Thelma had told the police. The lead investigator on the case at the time, Detective Simms, said that he believed that Justin got a ride from a blond woman, that the woman took him to a house in Snellville, and that he was attacked there and robbed, then killed, and his body was dumped in Lake Lanier. Then a few days later, on November fifth, Justin's body

apparently floated up to the surface. After that, police say they believe his killers panicked, put the body into a black metal toolbox and carried it to another location, eventually dumping it in a well. At the time, Detective Sims said they had a vehicle of interest. He said, right after Justin went missing, the nineteen eighty four Chevy white work van that belonged to Thilma's boyfriend at the time also went missing. Police tried to locate it, but never

found that vehicle. Detective Sims also talked about Justin's earring. He said, quote, this is a photograph of Justin Dillon Glass the day after Justin Gaines went missing, wearing an almost identical earring. Of course, the photos aren't that great, but if you look at it like this and compare them, you're gonna see this earring is pretty much the same as this earring. Dylan Glass has told me and has

confessed in his own way. He said that he took that earring out of Justin's ear the night that he was killed. End quote. Police did try to run down the lead on this earring. They did go to the pawn shop and eventually they found the earring, but Erica said when they tried to run a DNA test on it, apparently there was no trace of DNA. So in the end police had a kind of confession, but they had

no trace of Justin. The people who were talking to them had their own reasons why they could be lying to police so and they already felt like they'd wasted a lot of time on these searches. Eventually, a couple months after his arrest, the charges against Martin Wilkie were dismissed, and Martin Wilke has always denied he had anything to

do with Justin's disappearance or his death. Over the next few years, occasionally stories would come up about things being dragged up from the one hundred and sixty foot depths of Lake Lanier. In twenty seventeen, a house boat named six Pack Sally, which was kind of a local legend because the boat was a wreck that had apparently been sold for a six pack of beer, was slowly sinking, and the news story about this boat sinking was interesting to me because it talked about how many houseboats have

gone to the bottom of the lake. It got me wondering what else was down there. It's also interesting because, according to Erica, the theory that the police believe is credible is that Justin's body was taken out and dumped in Lake Lanier, that it was done on a houseboat, and they also confirmed that Thelma's boyfriend at the time owned a houseboat and a home on that lake. In twenty nineteen, human remains were found near Lake Lanier again,

though they were not connected to Justin. Erica also said in an interview that Thelma's boyfriend at the time owned the white van, the one police were unable to find. So we have this person out there who allegedly owns a houseboat, a house on the lake, and a van of interest. But this person was never charged with anything, and unfortunately, according to reports I've read, this person has also passed away. Since Justin went missing. In twenty twenty two,

a new investigator came on the case. We've talked about him a little before. His name is Michael Rising. He works with the Walton County Sheriff's Department and he's a cold case investigator. He has stated he's following several leads and theories that Justin may have been interested in someone else's girlfriend or may have been targeted for a robbery. So this is kind of what police have said before.

Of course, we don't have access to the whole case file, but I find myself wondering what if it was both? What if Justin met an attractive woman who he was talking to and she lured him into that vehicle in order to set him up for a robbery. Through the years, Erica has kept going, even through the false sightings, all the tips, and even people leaving her messages with their theories about the brutal ways in which they said that Justin was murdered, including someone who told her that he

had been put through a wood chipper. Erica told Atlanta Magazine she had heard it all, but she kept doing media interviews and getting the word out there. Justin's family

once answered, but their priority is bringing him home. So let's go back and take a closer look at Dustin Dillon Glass because police, even though they believe that he was lying about certain details, seem to still have his name on their radar after all these years, and when they do make statements to the media, they continue to refer to the story that was told by Dustin and Thelma. So I wanted to know more. I've seen some references to Dustin being a gang member. Well, it turns out

that this is more than just a rumor. I did a deep dive into this guy, and Dustin is a member of a very notorious gang in Atlanta called the Ghost Face Gangsters. I've seen Dustin's mugshot, and his entire face is covered in tattoos. I highly doubt that Justin, even if he was super intoxicated, which people say he was not, would have gotten into a car with a stranger whose face is covered in gang tattoos. So a

little background on the Ghost Face Gangsters or GfG. They started around the year two thousand inside a Georgia prison, and basically the GfG is a white supremacy prison gang, but it's spread to the streets and it's now apparently the largest gang in Georgia. It has thousands of members, and these gang members have been responsible for huge crime waves.

They've also since spread out to other states too. According to a twenty twenty two report by the Anti Defamation League on white supremacist gangs in prison, the Ghost Face Gangsters, while they're definitely racist, are not as overtly white supremacist as some other groups. Apparently the ghost face gangster's loyalty is to making money, so they do have racist beliefs, but for example, they will form alliances outside prison with

gangs that have primarily black members. And I also learned today that there are white gangs, even white supremacist gangs that sometimes have Hispanic members. Again not to say that these groups aren't racist. Their loyalty is to the crimes they're committing and money above any sort of racial loyalty. Within the GfG, the seven original members are called the Pillars.

New members are all supposed to have bloodlines they're supposed to trace back to one of those original founding members, and over the years they have been involved in a tremendous number of crimes, including drugs, murder, kidnapping, assaults, and obviously witness intimidation. There have been many high profile busts of the GfG in recent years, but in two thousand and seven, when Justin disappeared, this gang was not really

making headlines yet. In twenty fifteen, after Dustin Glasses meth charges, mushroomed into a federal indictment for racketeering and conspiracy commit murder. He pleaded guilty to multiple counts of conspiracy commit murder, aggravated assault, violation of the Street Gang Terrorism Act, and possession of a firearm during the commission of a felony. So he was facing some serious federal charges. In the end, Dustin Glass was sentenced to sevent ten year sentences, but

they're running concurrently, so actually it's not seventy years. This guy got just over fourteen years in federal prison instead of being behind bars for the rest of his natural life. I tried to find all the documents on this case. Some of them are sealed, so I really wonder what information he gave prosecutors to cut a deal like that. So now we go back to Justin's case. We have

a lot of pieces and theories. We have the earring, we have Dustin's gang affiliation and the story that he told about being there when his alleged accomplice fatally shot Justin and then they all allegedly disposed of Justin's body. But there's no physical evidence. There's no body, and the people of interest are liars and not credible. So police seem to be saying they're not going to believe these people unless there's actual evidence to back them up, and

also if there is not a lot of evidence. Then, even if they did bring charges against Dustin or anyone else right now, there's a very high possibility that that person could get acquitted and then the charges could never

be brought again. They need evidence. The prevailing theory now seems to be Justin Gaines was at the wrong place at the wrong time, and that while he was outside on that bench, a little bit tired, a little bit buzzed with a dying foam battery, and desperately in need of a ride, someone saw his nice clothes and diamond earring and targeted him. I do believe that someone lured him into the car. Was it the two men or was it the mystery blonde woman or both or someone

completely different? I should say that on my deep dive into the Ghost Faced Gangsters, I saw all that while women aren't allowed to be full members, they do play a crucial role in recruiting members, smuggling contraband into prisons, and luring targets to be robbed and sometimes murdered. The gang very often works in groups of several guys and one or two girls. Erica also told the Unfound podcast

something else that I think was very interesting. She talked about the last time when Justin's phone pinged right before it died. It turned out that just after two am when the phone pinged, it pinged in the opposite direction of his house, a few miles toward Lake Lanier. So where was he going? Was he afraid at that point? Did these people kidnap him? Or did someone ask him if he wanted to go to a party, And if it was a woman, did she know what was going

to happen to him? Or could it, As my friend Derek Levasso brought up when he discussed this case on YouTube, could this have been some sort of accident, like she thought he was cute and then took him to a party and the men who saw Justin there were jealous

or intimidated by him and jumped him. Now, let me say there's no evidence that the GfG is connected to Justin's disappearance, but just knowing about some of the people who have talked to police and their affiliations, knowing more about the gang, I think that if Justin's disappearance turns out to in any way be connected to the gang or anyone like that, the accidental theory becomes less likely because anyone who knew these guys would have to know

that any interaction that Justin has with these men is probably going to end in disaster. This is the same gang who in twenty eighteen orchestrated a prison break and the men who escaped murdered to corrections officers. Another gang member was arrested separately in twenty eighteen after police found the body of his six month old baby in a motel freezer. Reading the list of crimes that the GfG have committed and looking at their mugshots is like watching

a real life horror movie. The gang made headlines again when several members went to the home of someone they didn't like. Their intention was to steal guns and beat him up, but he wasn't home. Unfortunately, his fourteen year old daughter was. When she saw these ghost Face Gangsters members coming to her door, she grabbed a BB gun and tried to defend herself. They started shooting, and this

fourteen year old girl was killed. After the fatal shooting of the fourteen year old girl and the corrections officers, the federal and state authorities accelerated their crackdown on the gang. In July twenty nineteen, it was announced Operation Vanilla Gorilla. By the way, they always have the craziest code names for these things. Just a side note there resulted in the arrest of forty three defendants. In twenty twenty one, seventy seven Ghost Face Gangsters members were arrested. So they

are cracking down on these gangsters. But authorities still say that the Ghost Face Gangsters is the fastest growing white gang in the country and the most dangerous and violent gang in the state of Georgia. And Dustin Dillon Glass, one of the police's primary people of interest, is a member of this gang, and yet I've never seen that affiliation mention anywhere on the news. Officially, police have said they're treating Justin's case as a kidnapping and presumed homicide.

They have said a number of Walton County residents are witnesses to Justin's disappearance and possess knowledge of the incident that would be of great value to the investigation. This mystery blonde woman, who by the way, may not be blonde anymore, seems to be the key. Is she connected to Dustin or one of his associates. Is she someone totally random? We need to find out. I know that a lot of people have posted on social media that

the police have been unresponsive. I think it might be because there was some confusion about who was handling the case. It spanned two counties. But the investigator to contact now we can confirm is Michael Rising at Michael that's m I C H A E L dot Rising R I S I N G at CO dot Walton dot g A dot us. You can also text seven seven zero

three five four eight three four. I've never talked to Michael Rising, but I've seen where he has gone on Facebook and personally responded to comments with his contact information. So please, if you know something, if you were in the parking lot that night, if you know who this woman is, please reach out. In twenty seventeen, Erica talked to eleven Alive about how much Justin was missed by his family. He miss seeing his family members grow up,

He missed seeing his nieces and nephews born. He missed graduating from college and all the milestones that his proud parents should have been able to share with him. I'm Katherine Townsend. This is Helen Gone Murder Line. Helen Gone Murder Line is a production of School of Humans and iHeart Podcasts. It's written and narrated by me Catherine Townsend and produced by Gabby Watts. Music is contributed by Ben Sale. Jesse Niswonger scored and mixed this episode. Executive producers of

Virginia Prescott, Brandon Barr, and L. C. Crowley. If you have a case you'd like me and my team to look into, you can reach out to us at our Helen Gone Murder line at six seven eight seven four four six one four five. That's six seven eight seven four four six' one four.