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You are now listening to True Murder The most shocking Killers in true crime history and the authors that have written about him Gaesy Bundy Dahmer, The Nightstalker BTK. Every week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and infamous.
Killers in true crime history.
True Murder with your host, journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Good evening on an unseasonably warm April evening. In two thousand and one, the headless body of a tiny girl was found discarded in a makeshift dump site in the woods on the southeast side of Kansas City, Missouri. One long night turned into four long years for Sergeant David Bernard and the Kansas City Police Department's ten twenty squad.
They followed fifteen hundred leads at a replica of the child's head sculpted from her skull, and ultimately conducted the single most extensive area canvas in the Kansas City Police Department's history. Erica Michelle Marie Green aka Precious Dough, captured the hearts of not only the dedicated detectives who fought tirelessly to identify her in her killer, but of an
entire community. Precious Few Clues is a candid and touching account of the painful impact that this brutal murder had on Sergeant Bernard, his family, and the Kansas City Police Department's ten twenty squad. It chronicles the all too frequent story of child abuse, failed social services, a flawed court system, and battered women who sacrificed their own children to shield their abuse of lovers, echoing the same preposterous explanations of
but I Love him. The book that we're featuring this evening is Precious Few Clues, the true crime investigation of Kansas City's Precious Though Murder, with my special guest, victim advocate and author Marla Bernard. Welcome back to the program, and thank you very much for this interview. Marla Bernard, Thank you.
I'm delighted to be here.
Thank you so much, and congratulations on this extraordinary book.
Thank you.
You've been asked many times why you'd want to write a book about the untimely deaths of children and the grizzly events that surrounded them. Tell us about that.
I have always had a passion for writing, and I think that this case in particular was one a story that needed telling, certainly a victim who needed a voice. I was a reserve sergeant for the Kansas City, Missouri Police Department and am married to the chief investigator on
this case, Sergeant David Bernard. But for this particular case, I'm also a mother and it was hard for me to wrap my head around how something like this could possibly happen when traditionally mothers and motherhood is represented by wanting to be the protector, the defender, the nurturer, and so I felt like the story needed to be investigated, rifled through to try and get to a resolution as
to how this could occur. And in the process, so many things were revealed regarding child abuse and child murder cases, and I found it oddly fascinating, But again, I just felt that it was a story that needed to be told.
Yes, in a story it is you take us initially to April twenty eighth, two thousand and one on Kansas City, Missouri, and your sergeant David Bernard is at the murder squad or the ten twenty squad of those called around seven thirty PM tell us about the call that he receives and what happens after that.
He received a call. He was actually at home in the evening, trying to have a little downtime because murder Squad in Kansas City was developed to be a day shift squad until a murder becomes a crime saying where it's possibly murder, where there is no immediate suspect, and then they go on for twenty four forty eight seventy two hours, nine stop. So he's taking a little bit of a respite. The phone rings. He gets information that a body has been found in a wooded area at
fifty ninth in Kensington. It's a deceased female. They estimate aided her to be proximately three to six years old, and she had been decapitated and there was no head at the scene. And from there they respond to the crime scene. And it was the case that David initially thought once they once they got all of the information together, recovered the body, got it to the medical examiner, would be quickly solved because someone was missing a child, and ironically that was not to be.
What were the first steps in trying to identify who this child was? You say, that of course, the medical examiner inducted in an autopsy tell us about this unique birthmark and the efforts for police to go to the public to try to identify this precious doughe This was.
The single largest area canvas that had ever been conducted by the Kansas City, Missouri Police Department at that time. They officers literally went door to door. They posted flyers, They had artists rendering of the child. They gave the media a picture of the she had a unique birthmark on her shoulder. They gave a physical description as this they could again you know, once the head was recovered, they had an artist do a sketch as appropriately as
they could to reveal what the child looked like. They engaged the Center for Missing Children. They got what they hoped would be a computer rendering of what the child might look like that had to be redone multiple times, but they did. It was a lot of shoe leader literally going NonStop door to door, bringing cadets from the police cat to me to search inch by inch that area to try and get any information possible roadblocks, flyers. They tried to do as many unique things as possible.
Initially and again they thought that surely someone would come forward saying they were missing a child, which was like pulling a thread. They found that nationally there were dozens of missing children that fit the description of this child, who was named by an area activist as Precious Dough because she had no other name, and they the lady that came up with that name said, this is a
precious child. She's a Jane Doe, and she belongs to this community, and we have to give her a name, an identity until we can find out who she truly is.
To complicate things, the day after Precious Dough is found, there is a April twenty ninth Pine Bluff Police. They've been looking for somebody connected with the missing Renee Wilson, missing since March two thousand and one. Tell us briefly what happens with this and the irresponsible media and its effect.
There was a murder that occurred in Kansas City, unbeknownst to the ten twenty squad it was it was a missing girl. She had been murdered, placed in the trunk of a car, and the suspect in that case fled Kansas City and went to Pine Bluff, Arkansas, where he had some family. The Pine Bluff, Arkansas Police Department were a able to get this man try and get him into custody. He did kill himself at the scene, but
they recovered a large knife, a hunting knife. And because of the fact that he had come from Kansas City, there was a deceased female who was of an appropriate age that could possibly have been the mother of our victim at fifty ninth in Kensington, the child. They deduced that the reason no one had come forward in Kansas City was because the mother was dead. She was in the trunk. Here was this fishing knife, none of which
was related at all. But this information was leaked to the media, and while they're trying to do the investigation and manage and contain what information they have to protect the integrity of the fifty ninth and Kensington child murder, the media in Arkansas, with information provided by the Pine Bluff Police Department is saying that they've solved the case. Well,
none of which unfortunately was accurate. But it was just another roadblock thrown in their path as they're trying to keep a lid on information because, as you know, Dan, it's essential that the police department hold back significant pieces of information. So that when they do get a suspect, they can determine whether or not they actually were involved, and they're going down the right road.
Now you talk about the Medical Examiner's office and this autopsy, we didn't talk about the injuries that they saw, the old scars that they saw, tell us about what they found and could deduce from this autopsy.
What they determined was obviously the obvious decapitation. What they speculated the type of object that would have been used to do that. Was also determined that the little girl had a blood infection that we believe was from wounds that were starting to heal. They had found on her body that appeared to be looping injuries, And by looping, I mean that someone had taken like a lamp cord, a computer cord extension cord, looped it and beat the child with it, and those injuries were in the process
of starting to heal. Because of those wounds. They determined that that the infection might have been possibly from that. There was also an indication that the child had been sexually abused, but otherwise she was in an upper percentile for her age, her growth, her health. She had from appearances, been well fed, well kept but she did have extensive bruising as though she had been physically abused. There were some major contusions on her body that it was determined
later were from her being violently kicked. When the head was recovered, it was determined that she had a brain injury. Again that was from being kept and the tragic part of it was if medical care could have been summoned, she would have survived those injuries.
Now, in this extraordinary story May one, two thousand and one, with the police academy recruits assigned to search, the conducting of field search, the media shows up, but also Billy Stiegel shows up. This guy's known to police. He has these visions Elizabellue, Billy Stiegel, who he is and what happens that day with the media present.
He was known to police. He was a veteran, he had some mental health issues. Was just an odd deck, if you will, small time crimes, nothing really significant other than the mental health issues. He was convinced that the government was investigating him. He heard voices, he had visions.
He would insinuate himself into different investigations over the years, and he decided he had a vision that he knew where the child's head was, so he decided to go to fifty ninth in Kensington, in an area that police had not cordoned off yet had not expanded the gram search in that direction yet. There were some other weather
related things. There was a small creek nearby, some things that the mandated the timely investigation of that area first, should there be should the child's head be in that area. So while they're going in one direction, Billy Stagall decides to go in the opposite direction, and he's going through the woods. He walked with a cane and had the cane with him. Ses a young reporter, a news reporter and a cameraman and said, hey, why don't you come
with me? So she followed him through the woods and as he's moving his cane around, he sees an area where inside a discarded tire there are trash banks or well it's actually determined to be a trash bag inside a trash bag, and a lot of flies around it because it was starting the weather was starting to get warm here in the Midwest. And he the takes the cane and starts moving it around and he said, I think there's a head in here, and rips the bag and indeed that's what they found.
Now with that examination, I know we just spoke that what does the medical examiner determine in terms of the injuries and when the heading actually occurred? What are the some of the things they learned from the examination of the head, And of course there's a match made to the body, But tell us more about what else they could deduce from that examination the head and their next step forward in identification.
They were able to fairly quickly determine that the injuries were such that the head obviously belonged to that body, which was an initial relief because one of the concerns they had is is this a singular Is this a singular case? Could there possibly be more than one victim? What are we looking for? They determined that that was a match, certainly clearly the lab results of the tissue
the blood. They determined that the head had been at the crime scene with the blood and the whole investigation, that the head had been moved at some point by objects and paint chips and dirt that was found in her hair that was not at the crime scene. It was determined that it was not a sharp object like a clean a knife cut that if you just took a large knife, like a hunting knife and made the cut,
that was not the case. There was chopping motion and it was later determined that it was hedge clippers that were actually used, and those were all consistent with the effort that went into removing the head, and they were able to determine that that occurred after.
She was deceased.
Now there's a thirty three thousand dollar reward offered, and there are people that step up to the plate to try to make some kind of a composite to try to still identify her. You talk about Steve McBride for the Field rep for the Center for Missing and Exploited Children. He used a computer he thought a computer generated composite would be might work.
And then there was other people that came.
To the forefront a little bit later, and notably this nationally known sculptor named Frank Bender tell us about a couple of these initiatives to make a realistic composite to try to identify Precious Still.
The first computer generated one was a lovely, lovely rendering, but there were things in the photograph, in the computerized drawing that were not consistent with the victim herself, the hair, the age, she looked older than what the medical examiner felt was her approximate age. They thought closer to three to four years old. This child looked to be seven or eight in the photograph. She had longer hair, corn rows,
and earring, none of which the victim had. So they brought in a forensic artist named Lee Hammond and she did a very close rendering using the actual victim as the model. They subsequently brought in Frank Bender, who was a nationally known forensic sculptor. I think Frank Bender is best known for a model that he did of John List,
who was murdered. He was a family annihilator back in I believe the late fifties, and that sculpt when he did that sculpture, aging it down to the detail of the type of eyeglasses they anticipated that List would be wearing. They used that on America's Most Wanted and got the lead that police needed and they were actually able to
locate and arrest John List. So having Frank Bender's sculpture, they were so confident that surely now we have something that we can show the public like and someone will come forward, and they did. It was featured on America's Most Wanted, but nobody called. Nobody came forward, they got leads, but there were a lot of people that had a lot of information that were aware of America's Most Wanted, and no one called.
Let's use this as an opportunity to stop for a second for these messages.
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Take us to again.
We've mentioned the thirty three thousand dollars reward and this extraordinary effort to try to identify this precious though. But on April twenty ninth, two thousand and five, a detective Taylor took a call from someone named Thurman McIntosh, and the caller had seen an ad sponsored by General Mills Foods. In the call, a newspaper local Kansas City publication, tell us about this Thurman McIntosh, what does he have to say?
He calls the police, And it was never determined if mister McIntosh had had multiple strokes for what his difficulty was. But he was very, very hard to understand. He was calling from Oklahoma. He said that he believed that this child was related to his grandson, but he did not know her name, and he could send a picture and identify the child, but again he didn't know where she was where they were and he said, oh, and he said that they were in Aurora, Colorado, And what he
actually was close. He actually meant Aurora, Illinois, where the mother's precious Doe's mother's family was from. So it sent the police investigating in Aurora, Colorado, trying to run down what little information he could provide. And he did call more than once. He called a second time, and the second time he called. By that time the police already had information and were pursuing it, so you had two
things kind of running in parallel. And the picture that he did send he sent to a local activist here, but it did have Precious Doe's mother in the picture, but the child that he identified was not Precious Stowe and she was not in the picture. So again, they're close, but not quite close enough. They have information, but just not enough. They're just on the precipice of getting the clues to line up, but they just weren't quite there yet.
Mister McIntosh did call because he did want the reward, which he ultimately did receive, much to the chagrin of Precious Stowe's mother, and he was related. But what it was determined was that mister McIntosh and his daughter the suspect's mother, had known for pretty much since the time that the child had been deceased, So for several years they had known the identification of this child and had not come forward.
Tell us about Michelle Johnson Michelle Green aka Johnson and Harold Johnson.
Michelle Green was a native of Illinois, a suburb of Chicago. She had been a victim of sexual abuse, she claimed by adult family members when she was about thirteen years old, she got involved with a man named Larry Green, who got her addicted to drugs prostituted her. They did subsequently get married. They had several children together, and she met
Heral Johnson because he was one of her Johns. Larry Green had bought drugs from Herald Johnson and in exchange for the drugs, he prostituted Michelle and that's how she became acquainted with Heral.
Tell us about the birth of Erica Green and also introduced missus Betty Brown.
When Michelle had several other children by Larry Green. By this time, she was living in Oklahoma and she was pregnant. She was arrested on shoplifting charges, and because she had had previous arrests by this time, she was sentenced to a jail term. Erica was born in prison and Michelle still had several months to serve on her sentence. Lady named Betty Brown was a friend of Larry Green's mother
and agreed to take the child. She had other foster children, so Michelle agreed and the child was transferred to the care of Betty Brown in Oklahoma, and she to have Erica until Michelle was released from prison. However, Michelle did not come back to retrieve the child. She left her in Betty Brown's care and would periodically drop by for a visit, but would never take the child. Left her there to be raised by Betty Brown, which in fact, was a good environment for the child to be raised in.
The other children that Michelle at that time she was Michelle Green had were being raised in Aurora, Illinois by her mother. She'd have a baby, she and Larry would go back. They would move between Oklahoma, where Larry had family in Illinois where Michelle had family, and they would take the children up there and just leave them and then go on about their business, which was prostitution and drugs.
This interview with Danny and Tammy the two detectives, what does Michelle eventually fest up to? According to her, what are the details of that incredible, horrible.
Day when they got Michelle in custody. She told the detectives that she had Michelle at that time was married divorced Green and had married Harold Johnson, and she was pregnant. She also had a job. She was working in a I think she called the food Savor grocery store. Had just gotten back home. They were renting a back bedroom in a home of an acquaintance of theirs, using their Erica's aged dependent children, her food stamps and welfare to pay for the room. Michelle had planned to go take
a bath. She had left Erica in the room with Heral, and Erica was crying. The child had only been in Michelle's custody for about three weeks. Michelle had gone taken Erica under the guise of going to visit family and would be bringing her back to Betty Brown in Oklahoma, which she failed to do. They kept the child in
Kansas City. Obviously, she was terrified, she was with strangers, she was foreign surrounding, so she cried, and she was crying and it angered Heral Johnson he knocked her down, kicked her across the room multiple times about the head and body. She sustained a head injury and was knocked unconscious, and Michelle decided that even though she knew the child needed so an immediate medical attention, that they couldn't go seek medical attention because she and Herel had outstanding warrants.
Michelle's just for simple shoplifting corals were more serious attempted murder and a pretty violent assault and robbery, so she elected not to seek medical attention but to try and care for the child in the room for I believe it was probably about forty eight hours before before Erica passed.
Now this Harol, he's desperate. What is his plan to dissolve the dispose of the body? And according to him who goes.
Along, it was determined that they had to get rid of the child and Herel and Michelle. Michelle was pregnant by Herel. They also had an infant daughter with them, so they had the infant daughter and heir in that bedroom. It was determined by both of them that they needed to they needed to discard the body and come up with a story about where Erica would be. They climbed out the back bedroom window. Herrel went out the window first.
Michelle passed the child to him. He located some hedge clippers in the yard, and they took the child into the woods to leave her there. They decided, Herald decided that they would cut the child's head off so they would have that significant piece of identification discarded. Originally, Michelle threw Erica's head in a dumpster that was in a church parking lot directly across the road from the wooded
area where they discarded Erica's body. Then Michelle decided someone might it was the next day was Sunday, people would be at church, perhaps someone would discover her. So she climbed into the dumpster, retrieved the child's head, put it in a trash bag that they found in the wooded area, which was kind of an informal dump site, if you will, and herrel took the head through it, went in farther into the woods, threw it into the tire, and then they left the body on the path where she was
ultimately discovered. And their story was because of the fact that people where they were staying, people in the family, knew that she was a foster child of Betty Brown's. Their story was that they sent her back to live in Oklahoma. The people in Oklahoma were told that she was sent to live with family in Illinois. They were able to manage that story for a significant portion of
time without being questioned much about it. Their tale seemed reasonable to the people that knew the circumstances such as they were.
It's interesting Michelle requests to be able to speak to Harold before his interrogation. Sergeant Bernards says, it's risky, but it might be worthwhile you write about that interaction before they speak officially to harrel in an infurrogation.
She did ask to speak with him because she had given the confession first, and it was risky because they could try and line up their stories. But it wasn't speaking before they gave a statement. Michelle had already given her statement, so they felt that it was a chance they were taking that perhaps she might be able to reason with him. She went in, sat with him and said, you just need to tell what happened. I have told
what happened. And she sat there, And I think one of the things that I found most troubling was did she sat there and combed his hair and graded it and was nurturing with this man who had murdered her daughter. She was complicit, but she was still protecting him over advocating for her daughter and advocating for herself, not saying I was abused, this happened whatever, taking care of him
and sitting closely with him. Their legs were touching. She was holding his hand, braiding his hair, preparing him to give his statement, which in fact he did, although he
blamed decapitation in the discarding, he blamed Michelle. She blamed him for taking those steps in discarding the child, but he did take ownership of his abuse to the child, although he denied any other physical abuse to her, which was discounted by people who lived in the home and heard him beating the child but never intervened, but they were able to say, yes, in fact, we believe he did it. He was in the room with the child, but no one ever tried to help her.
He blamed this incident on PCP and other drugs, but then also tried to say that that previous abuse was the Betty Brown and her family and not certainly from him. And so that's kind of when he confesses he's still throwing blame around. Her story was different in a couple regards in terms of blame worthiness.
Tell us what those things he said she said.
He claimed that it was Michelle's idea to discard the body, to we have to hide her. We've got to get rid of her before somebody finds out. It was her idea to take the child into the woods. Michelle adamantly refuted that. She said, yes, indeed she did, and the child to her well, but she never left the room. She never participated in discarding her head, climbing into the dumpster, or having anything to do with that. He stated that the child was in a state of undress and her
clothing was gone when her body was found. Michelle claimed that heral undressed her and discarded her clothing. Herel stated that it was Michelle who addressed the child and discarded
the clothing. So those facts we were in dispute. But as time went on, it came to light how this actually the sequence of events that occurred over that period of time, and that Herald did in fact violently beat the child, although it was never determined when or how the sexual abuse that the medical examiner discovered had occurred.
You write and include some of the correspondents that Harold and Michelle had and while they were in prison, some of the things that he was fascinating. It was virtually instructing her on what she should say legally, always thinking of himself.
And then you include just the.
Braved sexual fantasy between these two criminals, and also some of the people that were close to Michelle that came forward to provide crucial evidence about the couple and Erica and the abuse of Erica as well.
Yes, there were two of Michelle's sisters came forward who were in no way involved in any of this, but gave investigators good information about the relationship between Michelle and heral because we had this is over a period of time.
When they left Kansas City, they fled and went back to Michelle's family in Illinois, which allowed the sisters and her mother to observe the interactions and the farce that they perpetrated on the family of oh Erica is alive, She's in Oklahoma, but Michelle went to such lengths that investigators were able to actually procure from the state of Illinois, where Michelle went and claimed aid to dependent children, she
got welfare for Erica. She actually during the period of time between Erica's murder and when they were arrested, she was getting funding from the state of Illinois, the state of Oklahoma, and the state of Missouri. So they were not only aware that the child was dead, they were perpetrating frauds at a federal level, at a state level in three states. And family knew that Herral's family in Oklahoma.
His mother was aware claimed after the arrest and investigators went and interviewed her that Michelle had in fact fast to her that the child that was being featured on an episode of America's Most Wanted was in fact Erica and Heral's mother Thurman Mitchell's daughter. Thurman McIntosh's daughter never came forward, so that's how Thurman McIntosh became aware of
the situation. He and Heral's mother both knew for a period of not just months, but years that the little girl known as Precious Stone in Kansas City was in fact Herald Johnson's stepdaughter.
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Now person comes forward. A call comes to the ten twenty squad from rachel Or Rachelle Allandale. Tell us who Rochelle Allendale is and her previous connection to Michelle and what does she have to say?
Rachelle Allendale is a fictitious name that I've given that individual. She was the person that rented the room to Morel and Michelle and actually knew Morel's family was distantly related she was. She came forward with information about the child. When the few times that she was observed in the home, she generally Erica was generally not allowed out of the
bedroom that they were staying in. When she was allowed to come out of the room, she was not allowed to play with any children in the neighborhood or her grandchildren who were there. She never saw her eating. The little girl would eat. She just basically would sit whimper and cry. She was very fearful, and then there were times that she would observe heral get mad at the
little girl. She was taken into the back bedroom and they could hear her dream and cry until the cries got very weak, and generally they would just hear whimpering. So she was able to place heral and Erica and
the interactions in the room. She was also able to place interactions with her family involving a firearm and some threats that heral had made against one of her family members, and placed him at an attempted murder that Coral had committed, and also a robbery that he had done where he tried to steal a ring from a woman and cut her finger off in order to actually gain the property and had violently assaulted her. So she was able to add kind of links to the chain of events that
occurred around the time that Erica was there. She was also early on involved in the case when the area canvas was being done immediately after the child's body was found. They went door to door, they being the officers, and actually knocked on the door of her home where Michelle was staying. They made contact with both women, documented it in their area canvas and were told by Michelle and Alan Dale had substantiated the statement that they saw a man.
They gave a physical description of him, suspicious looking black man in the area about the time that this child's body was found. How they hoped that they would find the suspect. Alan Dale did not know at the time that Michelle it was Michelle's child, that Michelle Johnson clearly knew and gave a statement to the police about this suspicious party in the neighborhood.
Now, also the information that seemed most damning as well was that evening or the day of the suspicious behavior of Michelle, and that Rachelle witnessed in terms of blood on her shirt, being breathless and sweaty like she had been running. So obviously what she was intimating was that she had witnessed after the fact Michelle's participation in the disposing of her daughter, Erica.
Yes, and again she was told that Betty Brown in Oklahoma had retrieved the child, and it was not something that seemed reasonable to question because for the first three years of her life, Erica had lived with Betty Brown, been raised by her, and was only supposed to be with Michelle for a period of a long weekend a family reunion, as she claimed in Kansas City, and the child would be returned to Betty Brown, none of which
ever occurred. And Betty Brown, unfortunately was told by Michelle that Erica was in Illinois with her mother and had no reason to question it. She was just heartbroken that this little girl that she had raised was no longer
coming home, and Betty stored her belongings. Officers when they did go to Oklahoma and arrested Michelle and heral and continued their investigation, Betty Brown was able to provide Erica's clothing, her toys, her belongings, just as so she was going to return to her home and rightfully to where it was felt that she belonged.
Let's get to the trial, which has foregone conclusion. But Michelle has a plea agreement in order to testify against herall. What is her plea agreement and what is his sentence?
She takes a plea and agrees to testify truthfully all the facts in the case that the prosecutors had against heral, and for that she was sentenced to twenty five years in prison. She comes up parole next month. By the way, Yeah, and heral receives a life sentence without possibility of parole for Erica's murder. Michelle was among the other charges, obviously, the severe abuse of the child and her death. Fraud
charges were filed against her from multiple states. They stacked quite a few offenses against Michelle, making a case for her to go ahead and take the play and testify against Herrell, which she did.
Now, we didn't mention and didn't have time to talk about all of the initiatives that you were involved with and other people, this Precious Dough Committee that was formed, and all of the initiatives try to do some justice for this Precious Dough. A casket and some of the things from a funeral director was donated. I'll tell us a little bit about some of the people that seem to care for and in the funeral and the memorial, tell us a little bit about that.
Oh my gosh, the Kansas City community rallied around this child. Community. I don't want to call him an act of this he is, but he is like a figurehead in the community. Alvin Brooks kind of took the lead on getting information out about this child and there was a grassroots effort mostly women, not all, but mostly mothers formed what was
known as the Precious Doe Committee. And actually the committee headed by Alvin Brooks, went to court and got custody of this child so that she could be have a proper funeral burial and with the intent that should someone's surface and try and take her from Kansas City that they actually had legal custody of this little girl named Precious Doe. Park Lawn Funeral Home stepped up and provided a casket and she's actually buried here in Kansas City
on their property. When Erica was buried twice, she had her original funeral when she was known as Precious Dough and then she was for the purposes of further identification, her body was ashumed and her skull was taken to at Ruth Louisiana the Faces Lab, where a clay sculpture was done forensically over her actual skull. And that is the photo, the image that's on the cover of the book. The likeness that they did, the true likeness of this
child in that lab. And when Erica was reburied, Sue Stiltner from the FBI and Mary Mannhein, who was the head of the Faces Lab in Baton Rouge, came. They purchased the dress that Erica was buried in, dressed the child. I purchased the teddy bear that she was buried with. We attended the funeral. My son Alvin Brooks my husband David were paul bears for Erica and every year she is recognized. For her twentieth birthday, the Precious Dough Committee reassembled.
We were with them and members of the community at the little park that is across the street from the area where Erica was discarded, just an honor of celebration that she had never been forgotten. This community glorial day. David and I go and take flowers to Erica. We take flowers to another child victim one of David's cases, that I case that I mentioned in the book the community. All you have to do is say Precious Dough and people know the case, They remember where they were when
they heard about it, they know the story. She's never been forgotten. It's my understanding that Michelle Johnson gets very angry when Erica is referenced as Precious Dough because she's not being called by her name. But it was a name that Michelle refused to share with anyone for a multitude of years, and so Erica is an honorable name
for the child. Her name is Erica Michelle Marie Green, but she's also lovingly known to many of us in the Kansas City area and beyond as Precious Dough because she was a very precious child and met a great deal to very many of us.
You're right about in.
The epilogue the impact on your family, and we haven't spoken about that at all. That you have to learn how to take a backseat to your husband, Sergeant Bernard's investigations and the heavy tool that it took on all of the people that involved in the murder Squad and surrounding this, but especially those people that make up the ten twenty squad.
Tell us a little bit about how this has handled.
What you learned, and just we did not include all of the tales that intertwine that are connected with this precious dough at least it seemed to be, and the media sometimes either connected him or police, but also that your husband and the murder Squad were contacted about these cases. They had many parallels and many similarities and things that you needed to share in this book to explain the scope of this problem, which you call epidemic.
Provide some statistics when this case came to light. Because of the fact that they had no identification for this child, David had a database set up just to be able to track the leads, track similar cases and nationally, it was astonishing how many children that were missing in the same time frame. Bet Erica's description, how many little girls, how many children, The statistics were overwhelming. It was mind
boggling when you asked about the impact. It took a tremendous toll on all of these detectives, because not only did they have this case, but they had multitude of other cases over the years that they had to try and investigate at the same time. And prior to Erica's case, David had just we had attended a burial of a little girl who had been murdered here and identified, but her body was missing for a number of years. And
he had just solved that case. And I thought, oh my god, you know, another little girl, another case taking precedence. And he had a number of those cases over the years, and it was as though, I think I described it as them, these little little girls clinging to his board coat when he'd come in at night, these little invisible little angels hanging on him in desperation find me, helped me solve my case. And you could see the weight of that tear him down, and it really had an
impact on his health for many, many years. I was pretty candid we separate it over it. He was so preoccupied with this and the magnitude of this case and the others that he was managing. And I think that's about the time that I decided I can either fight this or I can get on board with it and say, Okay,
they're important to you. I'm trying to keep all the other balls in the air with our family, but I guess we need to invite these little souls into our home and embrace them and be a part of this investigation, a part of the advocacy for them. And that's what we did. For many years, my children would set a place at the Thanksgiving table for whichever child. At first it was Angel Heart, then it became Erica Green or
Precious Stow. For many years, that little child that we were trying to give her a memory, give her some dignity. They say, you will never die as long as someone remembers you, as long as as someone says your name and sorry, we get a little emotionally.
We did.
We did that. We did that, and we survived and thrived and honor those children to this day. Dan it takes a special breed an individual to go into law enforcement, to go into the medical examiner's crime scene prosecutors. They all have a portion of this, and they all do such an outstanding job, and we are so blessed to have those individuals, and certainly they all deserve our gratitude and acknowledgement for what they do for all all of
these children. And you know, unfortunately there shouldn't be any but as long as there are these cases, there are men and women willing to step up and bring them dignity and justice and give them a voice.
You certainly honored them and Erica with this book Precious Few Clues. I want to thank you very much Marl Bonard for coming on and talking about Precious Few Clues, the true crime investigation of Kansas City's Precious Still Murder. For those that might want to take a look at more information about this book. I know this is a wild blue press release. Do you do any social media?
Yes, I do, and I have a website under I have a writing tag called scarletinkwell dot com. It's scarlet with two t's, and I have a website there and have started a blog on that in addition, So yes I do, and fortunately I have the opportunity to press oblige to talk to people such as yourself and talk about these cases and kind of keep them in the forefront of people's attention and again give them a voice.
Absolutely, thank you so much.
Marla Bernard Precious Few Clues the true crime investigation of Kansas City's Precious Still murder.
Thank you so much for this interview, and you have a good evening and good night.
Oh thank you, Dan. It's been a privilege. I appreciate it.
Thank you so much.