207. Behind the Couch: Vanished- The Heather Elvis Case with Director Michael Bayer

we have a live meetup this week in LA. This is coming Friday, April eleventh at Bike Shed in downtown last Ageelius, So we'll have all the details on social media and to those of you that were listening to this in May, We hope you enjoyed the meetup or sorry you didn't make it, because sometimes it tooks a little bit longer to get the use that posted.

just a quick little bite. This one, we really kind of get into it a little bit more with Bob and Allie. Also recently, so I was just a guest on Truth Injustice. Bob Ruff and I discussed the longer video segment that came out on Bridge Guy in the Delphi case so little behavioral analysis and talked about that kind of just our thoughts without getting too deep, without you know, kind of hypothesizing too much, just kind of looking at it for what it was right after it

was released. And then next week I am going to be on the three hundredth episode of Tennis Podcast when it drops, so they have their big three hundredth episode like we just did our two hundredth. They can't even know, I can't. They got a little bit.

that out. I think, as always, I'm just a huge fan of Josh's work, and he always always offers us such respect for our work that we do in our clinical work and our forensic work, so I really feel like I had a lot to offer there. And then also just out of the blue, about a month ago, I got a great opportunity to be interviewed for an article by Alexandra Paul, who is, as most people will know, or most people my age would know, was a star

on the original Baywatch series. And Alexandra is first of all, just an absolutely stellar, wonderful human being who went through an absolutely horrific incidence of stalking from a completely delusional fan over a period of thirteen years. It severely impacted her life, her husband, her family, her elderly mother. It really is just one of the best worst examples of why we need stronger stalking laws here in the United States. Shilah is going to put up a link to that.

It's an online zine called The Ankler, and please go read it. Please, not just for my own self edification, but please distribute this article. I think every woman needs to read this article about being stalked by somebody that's not a guy. It's really important that can happen.

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the Heather Elvis Case. Michael brings over twelve years of experience in video production, having worked on everything from commercials and explainer videos to emotionally powerful documentaries, and after stepping away from production to help grow his brother's criminal defense law firm, Michael gained first hand insight into the world of criminal investigations, legal strategy, and the psychological complexity of

the justice system. So now he's combining his production expertise with his legal knowledge to tell real stories with depth and impact, and that certainly is the case and vanished how they're elvis case that not only explores the mystery around her disappearance, but also examines the powerful, sometimes dangerous, and overwhelmingly crazy trajectory that this case takes, mainly due to social media, and how that is starting to play a role in criminal cases. Very very valuable to see

in this way in today's world. Through this project and his team really aim to raise awareness around online harassment and spotlight the ongoing pursuit of justice for Heather and her family. So welcome Michael, Thank you so much for joining us.

So I don't know if you found that that background seems to have some bona fides with it and that people understand that, but it's just you know, from our point of view, it's been really valuable in this space.

But Heather Elvis was a twenty year old cosmetology student and restaurant server who disappeared on December eighteenth, twenty thirteen. So this was following a first date, which feels sounds suspicious, but the AMA side portion of her case remains open now. The investigation led to the arrests of Sidney Moore, who Heather was in a relationship with, not that person she

went on the first date with. He was arrested for obstruction, kidnapping, and his wife, Tammy Moore, was also arrested for conspiracy and kidnapping. And these two are something. I mean, Scott and I have talked about a lot of characters and true crime documentaries that we have reviewed over the years, but man, I mean, I think they might be up there and take the cake. As far as again, I'll just say characters. We don't psychoanalyze people we have not

met in real life. But throughout the proceedings of this court case, again, social media played a significant role in really shaping public perception, which we're seeing more and more

of all the time. The conflicting narratives, the online trolling component, which Scott and I have covered, the psychology of that for sure, and specifically these posts made by Tammy and her supporters and how that ended up kind of twisting things, portraying Heather as a stalker, kind of fueling the controversy that impacted, yes, the investigation, but also of course families that have to live with this forever. So with that, let's talk about the case a little bit.

with this case? And I think the handcuffing to the bed was this very abnormal behavior, something you don't see every day, and the tattoo on his lower stomach, it makes you want to dig in more and learn more about the relationship and what type of people they are, So I found that part interesting also, I think when you also dig deeper into the story, which we did more than we had more time. So we had it was a three part docu series, so Dayline did a

Dayline did two segments on it. Investigation did one. They weren't able to dig deeper into the relationship between them, and even father and the sister and the sister's boyfriend and all these other people that along the way, you know, helping clean the truck, the videos and all this, so a lot more of the evidence were able to get into and it just shows that the dynamics of the

personalities of these people involved in the crime. So I thought it was I thought it was very interesting from a psychological standpoint for sure.

own particular focus, which is a really great concept. I don't know if that was intended, I mean, but it really worked to work for me, as you know, for someone who works in this area, and also as a viewer just a participant, you know, with a bag of popcorn, like it was that engaging, and you know, for those of who have not had the opportunity to see it yet, Episode one really focuses on Heather herself, her background, her personality, her you know, coming of age challenges as the teenager

right into this event, sledding into her disappearance. So that made me wonder as we were sitting watching and thank you very much for inviting us to the event and to the premiere, But that helps me generate this first question, what initially drew you to Heather's case and what about this particular case made it feel important to you to revisit now over a decade later.

you say this about me? Say that about I was just like like what, I used to have no privacy settings on my Facebook account. Didn't think anything of it. Didn't think anything of it. Maybe you want to be my friend who cares? I didn't didn't see any danger of it. I think when social media first started, a lot of people were like, this is something that just throw your stuff out there, put all your information out there and whatever. I mean, there's no harm behind it.

That was the first time I was like, wow, like this can really be used as a dangerous weapon. And at the time I was working with my brother and I had an experience in production. I said, I wouldn't mind making a documentary about this topic cyber stocking. So I was going to make Originally I was going to make a documentary just about online harassment, cyber stocking, people who use the Internet and social media in negative ways. Then I was looking for different examples of it, and

I came across the story. When I came across the story, I looked and watched into it and I was like wow. And then I saw the whole thing about Tammy and the handcuffing, and then you just draw in and then I was like, Okay, go all the way back. This crime isn't solved yet, she's still missing, so really grab my attention. Maybe we can bring awareness to it. There's the whole online harassment part. I can maybe mess these

two things together. I'm sure, I thought to myself, I'm sure the family would want to shine light on this story. And that online harassment part wasn't told. I just found it all online, but I watched it. Then I did a little further investigation. I watched the Dayline episodes, watched the Investigation Discovery episode No One talks about this, and I was like, this is probably one of the main parts of this story. I want to do this, and

I think it's also going to help the case. It's a topic you can tell a story through a story type deal.

on our part. And this is not victim shaming at all, but it's the idea that we would hope in today's world that most people would know to turn on their privacy settings, and yet people still don't. You know, it's been fifteen years since this all exploded and people still don't.

And it's also sort of sobering to see that not only are there some really bad actors out there, there are some people out there that are expressing their inner rage, their inner frustration and taking it out, you know, behind this safety of the keyboard. But we also have people that are not critically thinking about it, right, Like they're

not thinking about is this true or not. So in the case that you're presenting, people can hop on Tammy's bandwagon and just absolutely, you know, help her become this avalanche of trolling that occurred. So I'm really really glad that you focused on that. Thank you.

But I mean, really we're talking about like this leading to some real life horrific events for the family, which we have seen with other survivors and family members of victims, where we're talking probably they were shot at, that they're being chased and stocked themselves, you know, really moments where just unbelievable things unfold, especially like in episode two where you're really covering what that led to that is completely distracting them from the fact that they're still looking for

their daughter.

and it was just in talking to them. How can you imagine going through a situation where you think everybody's going to want to help you to find your daughter, and now you have these random people who think you did it and are going out of their way to harass you in person. Yeah, you know, it's just it's eye openly shocking. And people are starting to really realize

the internet. When you start getting it's like bullying almost or I don't know what we're to say, but people get on these the idea, then the group gets, the whole group piles and then they become they get their own status in the group and so and this can snowball up to the point where people are shooting at you or harassing you in person just to get just to get a little higher up in that little group that's online, and these people find themselves, they find their

little group this way, I'm guessing. And when I heard the story deeper and deeper there's I mean, a lot of these people are just random people. You know. Yes, Tammy Moore was a person that was spearheading this, there were other people that were leaders of the group, but these other followers just jump on and it's like a cult almost.

person's crazy, why are you listening to them? And you know, all without going into diagnostic criteria, Tammy and her husband are odd characters, and that's being kind to put it. They're both clearly like every basic sort of boundary of lying is totally transgressed every time they open their mouths.

They're strange in the way they interact, they're defensive in the way they answer questions, and so the idea that they would have such a following and such a defensive following in their online supporters is really a big part of this story. So yeah, I like how you dipped into that in the second episode. I think it was a really important part of this narrative.

into it. There are people out there who just this is their group and they think some of them think they're doing good, they're cracking the case. They they think Terry's doing power from that right that they're the ones who are figuring out a conspiracy that no one else knows.

And it's wild how this whole and Tammy does have that personality of being a leader, and she's a strong personality and she was very manipulative, you could say, and you could see how she was using soft puppet accounts and other things to be able to draw people in a very intelligent person or not dumb at all.

with it. And one of one of the things you find out as a member of the audience is that at one point she sleeps with him handcuffed to the bed and he admits to it, and later in the trial she denies it. But then it moves on from that to she demands, in retribution for him having the alleged affair, that he get a tattoo in big, you know, sort of English Gothic letters across his lower abdomen, almost like a gang sign, but it's her name across his

lower abdomen. It's also an awful tattoo, and so it's and I don't say that for for humor's sake, although it is kind of funny, but there was a really uncomfortable reaction in the audience when that flashes up on the screen and there's a excuse my language, there's a what the fuck moment and a real funeral giggle that went through the audience because it's so crazy that someone would demand this of their partner, and then that the partner would agree with it, which I think speaks to

just how intelligently manipulative she was in that relationship, how.

the just very bizarre presenting Dad. I don't know you you really get that from what we are able to see and then what you were able to pull into the documentary through footage, TV interviews, news interviews of course, the trials, and then through the re enactments as well. Just how there probably is a lot of fear built into Sydney, like saying, you know, why would he go

through with getting this tattoo? Well, maybe she made it so he didn't have a whole lot of a choice there, right, You mentioned you know obviously sitting down and talking with Heather's parents and sister and friends. Tell us what that was like to come in as a filmmaker and start building a rapport with them. I mean you can tell especially I don't know. I mean there's a real hesitance to them obviously through everything they've been through, and the dad just seems like he would be a tough nut

to crack. I mean, he wears his heart on his sleeve, and you know, God bless both of them. But what was that like to come in and say, here's my idea, trust me to tell your daughter's story.

just want to help, you know. They but it takes time because they don't know who I am. This is this was my first true crime documentary, and they didn't know what story I wanted to tell. They were. They were always guarded a lot because of the situation they had with all the conspiracy theories and everyone in the everyone that everything that happened on social media. They didn't

they didn't know what angle I came from. I think having Summer and jim in Summer and Jimmy Richardson the solicitor, he was the first one to kind of get on board and say, hey, look this, Mike's going to do a good job. And I think after I had that, it slowly they started to feel more comfortable. But another thing about making a good documentary and interviewing someone, as you guys know, it takes a while to build trust and to get them to open up about their story.

It's not something where you just throw a camera on someone's face and say, okay, what happened here? Here? Here? They have to really, they have to get to trust you and be open. And that's a very important part of making these type of documentaries and these stories are This isn't about opening up about hey, what do you think about the economy or tell me about your job history that I mean, this is something that they lost

their daughter. She's still missing, so it was something they had to feel comfortable with it, but took it took while, it took time.

is very very interesting showing the character. You do need the facts, always need the facts. I mean, people want to know what happened. Also, I like to skip around in the timeline in order to keep people's attention. Show them something, move them back, move them forward. I'm not saying all documentaries are going to be made like that,

but I like that style. But as for setting it up, because I've seen where you have footage or you have everything together and in someone could cut that up and it's a completely different movie than if an other person did. I think one thing that's very important when making the documentary or a movie in general is don't put too much information in there and make people feel something. I think you have to people feel something, and that's something

that people always want to tell information. Well, they have to know everything. If they don't know this part, they don't know this part, they're not going to understand the story. Because if you noticed one thing that I skipped over, and I spoke to Debbie Elvis about this, she goes, Wow, she goes, you did a really good job of telling the story in regards to what you put in and what you kept out. Because even at the trial. There was so much stuff the prosecutors had a hard time

with that. She's like, I'm gonna show Nancy Live saying, these people, you know, you did a really good job. They're going to be shocked to see how what you kept in what you kept out. For example, the first trial for Sidney Moore was a mistrial. I could have spent ten minutes on that. I had it just as one line. And when I was first editing the movie, I did have all that stuff in there, and I was scratching my head. I'm like, God, this really slows

it down, confuses people. Well, there's one trial, there's two trials. People don't understand a mistrial. They really don't get it's just gonna it could really just stop the movie right there, slow everything down. So I'm just going to put one sentence as a mistrial. And then now we have two trials, so Tammy and Sydney, but they use the same evidence. How do you do that? If I was to do one trial and then another trial until the same that

was very difficult to navigate. So I said, let's just combine them together, take the key moments from both of them, because it's the same evidence and just move them across the timeline. I think it worked, but other people could cut that apart, and they could do they could have spent ten minutes on that first trial and then in a mistrial then, but I think you to confuse people, so you have to keep people's interest and not give them too much information.

It's an amazing justice system that we have where they can just you're you're on trial, You're sitting in front of these people, and you have to explain yourself.

but you know a lot. You said you want the audience to feel something, and so often I think we have talked about watching a documentary and feeling gross afterwards, feeling like it was more exploitative, like the cameras were kept on a little too long when people started to get uncomfortable. And you know, another friend of ours, Leonora Claire, who does some consulting in the victim advocacy space, is really advocated like having people on set to be a go between to say, like so and so needs a

break or what have you. How did you kind of think about going into that in terms of working with people that were in such a vulnerable state, yet of course wanting to hear from them, because that's a hard thing to balance, But just curious of your comment her thoughts on that.

you're twisting things up, you're omitting information. There's things in there where you could put in the movie to make it the part where they're describing Heather or anything like that, making more gruesome, more stuff like that. So for example, in our reenactments, we didn't have anything showing Heather being killed or murdered or anything. And that's something that I would not want to put in there because I wouldn't

want the victims to have to watch that. So I do think about the victims and recall cards to their feelings about the whole thing too. You want people to feel, but you also have to look at them and say, hey, look, did they want this out there and everyone to see their family member in that way?

bringing maybe some new information in. But in today's world, with the challenges that you're talking about with social media, that's kind of the problem when you do a bait and switch. If you're going to build something up as a possibility, that creator, whether they mean to or not, is feeding the flame of what ifs and conspiracy theories.

And you've now just built up a case and one line of saying, but he was proved innocent by a blood test, and now we're on It's like, well, wait, you just built this up for ten minutes, and now you're going to dismiss it with literally three words the audience. You've already planted the seed. You can't unplant that seed in a listener's mind. I love that you have this approach. I think that is just a lot more ethical in an approach.

check her phone. I mean, it wasn't like a huge mystery. I mean, there are a few of them that were really really good. I will say where there's like huge twist and turns and where they falsely accused someone and they found out that person didn't do it. So I mean that storyline works, but to try to make that storyline out of where it doesn't belong, I mean, there's other storylines in this documentary. I think the storyline was good versus evil, and I saw a huge conflict between

the victims and the perpetrators. In the conflict didn't just go between Tammy and Heather. It went between Tammy the whole moors, and then the cases too and the Elvis family. So there was a huge conflict that naturally keeps your attention because it's just going back and forth. I don't want to everything. Well, then you have the ending, you know,

so you had the resolution. It had a natural story of good and evil too, is what I saw after I got watched all the trial, listened to all the interviews. That's the storyline that I saw stuck out the most to me, So that's what I went with.

the defensiveness. I get that's going to happen in a trial, but there was one physical thing that just punched me in the gut. And what to me was so telling is the way she kept turning to the jury to explain. And it was so reminiscent of Amber heard during Amberhard's trial, where it's like I've got an audience, so I'm going to change my focus and I'm going to explain to you. This attorney is not giving me any respect, but I'm going to play to you.

very nice person, very sweet. We did the interview and I think just an excellent, excellent prosecutor, and I'm happy to be able to show her story in this and her work in this as well, and I hope people see that and give her the recognition that she deserves for that trial. She did an excellent job.

I magine being a prosecutor and you're feeling threatened all the time, and here's your shot to do the cross examination, which was a huge part of that trial, and she nailed it. I think it was just amazing how and in the way that she combated the alibi. I thought it was just genius and Tammy Moore going on twenty twenty the night before about her, I mean, who does that? Who goes on twenty twenty the night before explaining your alibi?

Like you said, doctor Scott, I mean, it's narcissism on another level.

that's the problem. In those scenes where she's the night before and she's got the poster board in her kitchen and she's showing the timeline that she's made up, like it's she's made up. It is complete.

it won. It was excellent journalism, was excellent use of true crime being able to finally put someone behind bars. I don't know if he died before he went to jail or not, but he had to pay for his crimes and it was yeah, see, it was good to see. So I think directly for true crime, and he can't beat him. I mean, he's just a great journalist. I mean we all like Dateline and I really one show that really I think influenced me the most, and I

like the style was Locked Up Abroad. I don't know if you yeah, yeah, I love that style of storytelling. I think it's amazing. I like how to do the reenactments. I kind of modeled my reenactments after that. I don't know if you notice that, but I like showing the actors. I think the actors can bring more emotion to the story versus this new style everyone shows atmospheric or on the side they're afraid to show. Now, I get it,

though there's arguments for both sides. Some people say, look, the victim, doesn't you know it's hard on the victims to show the full actor and it's them, And is it better if they look like the actors or don't or the actors look like the real people? We don't know. But then I've heard it the other way, where when you use a lot of archival footage. Because I spoke to I'm actually Morgan Elvis told me this. She said, there's certain pictures we don't want to show. We want

to keep in whatever it's out there. She goes, you can use cause I had to asked what pictures can we use of Heather? What pictures can use of you guys? We don't want to share a lot, And I asked for some more pictures and said, we don't want to use these. We want to keep these for us, these pictures that we have of us and Heather. We want it to be for us. Go use actors, Go do what you want to do. Yeah, so it's interesting. So some victims were going to say that I understood her

point after she said that, Yeah, it makes sense. So I think the movie, because there's some movies just have you can use all archival footage. There's so much let's say, social media stuff they have out there, or they have a lot of just a lot of home videos. I mean, everyone is a camera with their phone now, so there's just tons of footage you can get. So it depends. But I like that locked up a broad style.

I heard this person say that. It can really do a lot from any of these cases.

Los Angeles originally. He lives in Minnesota, and I'm actually from Wisconsin originally, so I was like, oh, I used to It was funny. I was like, I used to play soccer terms. I thought he was from Minnesota first, like, not off from LA. I'm like, oh man, I'm like, I thought you were fro like the Midwestern me and so yeah, and then I have some family lives in the Twin Cities, so I was able to visit them and do the interview with him over there. So it worked out.

he was in the Ciso Hotel one. He really got a lot of crap online from trolls about how that was edited to kind of I don't know, people start making up their own minds. I'll just leave it at that. But he felt that experience on the other end, and I thought, God, what a great project for him to be, you know, full circle involved And did you know about any of that stuff?

it is a little lower stakes in regards to that. However, it was so bizarre. The story was just so bizarre, and I think it was very attention grabbing because it really brings up who pays on a first date. It brings up the argument. I don't want to say it's a dark comedy because it is a crime. There were victims involved. But I've gotten to know the victims. We interviewed them. I don't want to say they can laugh about it now, but they were pissed when it happened.

They were not happy. There's a lot of victims that are still out there who would not call this at all, you know, something to even joke about or laugh about it at all. And I'm not trying to say that or put that that's what we're doing, but it's lighter. No one got killed, people got scammed out of a meal, and I think it's a great story to show bring awareness to the dangers of dating, because there's a lot worse that can happen. There's serial killers that use dating apps.

There's murders, there's sexual assaults. You're meeting absolute strangers on the internet. You're twenty twenty one, twenty two, your old girl, and you really don't understand. I think when you get older you probably can. You can use a little more precaution. You're going to look up who the person is. You're not going to believe everything you hear. But when you're younger, I mean you know, you're oh, yeah, everyone's great, everyone's this,

everyone's that. Let me just go meet the stranger. So I think it brings awareness to that. I think dating apps are fine. I'm not saying, hey, look they're just horrible, but there needs to be precautions. You have to really find out who you're going out with before you do.

stakes weren't extremely high. Thankfully no one got hurt in this particular case, but people are really just not aware that. Like now, you drive down a freeway and you get a text that like, oh, you drove and you just got to eat. We're in a toll lane. You have to pay this fifty dollars. I think that's a huge scam that's happening here in southern California.

It's why if you got it, it was like it was a perfect scan because it wasn't enough money where someone's gonna report it and they're embarrassed about it, you know what goundred dollars. Let me just go home and just forget this ever happened. So he was able to do this for years. I mean, he was able to lose a lot, a lot, a lot of women. And it's one of those things where if you call the police and tell them what they were going to laugh

at you, you know. And there was a tech detective that took it on and took it very serious and ended it and you know, and found out who he was and all that stuff.