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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 them. Gaesy Bundy Dahmer, The Nightstalker DTK. 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, someone you know of or even love is the person who will kill you. Usually that's true, but that is not what happened in twenty eighteen to college students in Iowa. Two young women who had everything to live for killed by two men with nothing to lose, completely random attacks. Neither case had anything else in common except they both shocked the nation and even the world. What's worse being murdered by a loved one or a stranger who jumps out of the bushes when you are
most vulnerable. Previously published as Will Find You and Let's Do Murder, The Iowa Murders tells the shocking true crime stories of the senseless deaths of Molly Tibbets and Celia barquin Arosamenna. When Molly Tibbets disappeared on July eighteenth, two thousand and eighteen, her mother, Laura Calderwood, promised she would never quit searching. For five weeks in the summer of two thousand and eighteen, she searched, and the whole world
watched Brooklyn, Iowa. Because this was more than a murder story, it also became one of the top political stories of twenty eighteen. Then, just after her killer led police Tomali's body hidden in a cornfield, news of another shocking, senseless homicide came from Iowa. Celia Barquin a Rousamana was ready to begin the next phase of her life, including a professional career and marriage. Colin Richards only wanted a woman to rape in murder. Selia had everything to live for
and Colin had nothing to lose. They would come together one day in September twenty eighteen. Only one would survive. This is the shocking true crime story of two communities and two families coming to grips with the worst crime imaginable, knowing that even if the killers put behind bars today, another could be waiting tomorrow. The book that we're featuring this evening is The Iowa Murders, a shocking true crime story with my special guest journalist and author Rod Cackley.
Welcome back to the program of thanks, thank you very much for this interview.
Rod Cockley, Hi Dan, thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
Thank you very much for this congratulations on this new release. Let's get right to July seventeenth, two thousand and eight, and tell us a little bit about this small place, Brooklyn, Iowa, and a little bit about this Molly Tibbets. And she's on her very regular run in the evening. So tell us a little bit about Brooklyn, Iowa and Molly Tibbets.
Brooklyn and Iowa, Dan is a town of about fifteen hundred. I mean, this is small town America. And Molly's FETs her earbuds in place. She's going out for an evening run through the streets of Brooklyn. Now she does it every night. Even though she's not native to Brooklyn, Iowa. Everyone in town knows her, their use to watching her run by in the evening. She's so familiar that people mowing their lungs, are relaxing on their porches will wave
to her as she goes by their houses. And really that's the kind of town to Brooklyn is, where they're so family they would just wave to someone who may be a stranger to them.
Now you talk about her living arrangements and their boyfriend, Dalton Jack. She's a psychology major at the University of Iowa. Tell us the living arrangements and where her boyfriend and her brother are at the time when she goes for this run.
Yeah, you're right, Dan, as you said, Molly Timmis is a psychology major at the University of Iowa. She and their boyfriend, Dalton Jack, are living with his brother now. Both of them are out of town at the time on a construction project in another town in Iowa. So Molly is at home alone pretty much now. And you know, this is a time where she's this is a summer off from the University of Iowa, and she's young freedom.
She's you know, living on her own, setting up housekeeping with her boyfriend, Dalton, the guy she loves, the plans to marry, and so this is a big time for her. This is a time of real you know, young freedom. I guess there's a way to put it.
She's also working in the summer at a children's day camp at a regional medical center and the kids love her and she loves her job. Everyone thinks she's great. And she's also when she's running. She uses this fit Bit activity tracker, and she's got a car phone with her on that run. So tell us about a little bit about this run that she does usually goes around the same route. You say that people in this small community know who she is. They're very familiar with her.
She's out on this run July seventeen, two thousand and eight. What happens on this normally mundane or routine run of Molly's.
But as you said, Dan, she's carrying a fit Bit activity tracker and a smartphone. That's very important to remember. As she's going on her usual run. All of a sudden, a car another one of the neighbors, Devin Riley, sees or runs by his house. He's on his portion. He waves the load to her, like he does almost every night. Well, he doesn't see anything unusual that Molly does. Suddenly there's a car behind her. Now, it's not that unusual to see somebody on the road at this time of the night,
but this guy just doesn't give up. You know, she'll slow down, expecting him to pass her. He doesn't pass her. He swows down. She runs faster, thinking she can get away from him. He drives faster, so obviously he's following her. It's a black car, a car that she does not recognize. When she turns, she decides to turn right and left. He follows her. When she stops running, she stops driving.
Now she's very worried. She's concentrating on the run. She's a good runner, she's a practice runner, she's a trained runner. So the fact that she's running, you know, she figures she can out run this guy if nothing else. She looks back and the car passes her. Finally, finally, the car passes her, so Molly figures everything's okay. She wasn't staping to be worried, but that only her relief. On the last moments, the car circles the block, and all
of a sudden, it's back behind her again. Finally, she decides to stop and confront the guy. She is not going to put up with this, and that is in an instant she realizes that she was wrong to do that. She hears the car door closed, she doesn't look back. She knows it's trouble. Quickly she's running to Now she's running as fast as she can. She's forgotten about confronting the guy. She just takes off. She looks back over her shoulder. She's running even faster. Can't believe is what
he sees. The guy thought of his car, and now he's running after her. She figures that she can outrun him, perhaps even outside him. But she grabs her smartphone and practically shoves it into the guy's face. He's not a big guy, a couple inches taller than Molly, about five foot six, thick, black chair, neatly trimmed mustache, and goateee. He grabs her smartphone as she shoves it into his face. They're running side by side, now matching her pace step
for step. She yells, I'm going to call the police, waving the phone at him. He doesn't back off. You think he might, but he doesn't. And now it's a real fight. Now this guy is fighting her. She's never been in a real fight before. And you know, as I wrote, in the blink of her eyes on the state of his and the stare of his, she sees the end of her life.
Yeah, you right. Then the next July nineteenth, Molly doesn't show up for work at this medical center. And of course this is unlike her and Dalton, her boyfriend had texted her that morning and there was no response, so he calls her mother, Laura Calderwood. So what happens Devin, our partner, me, Dalton and Molly and the search for her that morning.
Well they start. He's worried immediately. You know, they're young in love till they're youth, protecting each other, back and forth, good morning, I love you, that kind of thing. He does that. She does not respond, as she does every day. So now he's worried he doesn't hear from her. He tries her again and again. Then he calls her mother, Laura. Laura's worry too, but she's thinking, hey, Brooklyn's too small to you know. She calls Molly. She's afraid something's wrong.
Then work the daycamp center calls Dalton and her. Laura calls the center. All of a sudden, she knows something's wrong. She's a mother, Laura can just feel it. Something is definitely wrong. Brooklyn doesn't have its own police department, the how she County Sheriff's Office handles law enforcement in Brooklyn, Iowa. So Laura calls the Sheriff's department. But before she and before she goes to bed that night, she sends a text to Molly's phone. She texts, I love you, We're
looking for you. We'll find you no matter what, and she tries to go to sleep. They begin searching for her immediately, and then about ten days later, in Kearney, Missouri, police get a tip. You know, the word goes out. It's a small town, so you know, the next morning, everyone knows that Molly's missing. Everybody's involved in the search, and they all volunteering to help.
But you have the Iowa Department of Criminal Investigation and the FBI involved because of this. What they determine ferdie On is an abduction, don't they correct?
Yeah, the correct They're assuming that it's an abduction. They don't really have any eyewitnesses, but Chess everything is. They're checking surveillance video from gas stations and convenience doors at points where the kidnapper might have stopped and wore racing out of town. There is filming that she's been kidnapped. They get a chip that she was seen at a gas station that turns out in Kurney, Missouri, about two hundred and thirty miles away from Brooklyn. That turns out
to be false alarm. Then they go to a hog farmer's house in Guernsey, asking to search the property without a warrant. Why that farm, Well, Molly was last being jogging within a fifteen minute drive of the property. Remember, they can track her cell phone, her smartphone, and they can track that bit bit tracker, so they have an idea of where she is. So now they're talking to this farmer, Wayne Cheney, says he doesn't have anything to hide. He lets the FBI spend a couple of hours inside
his house in garage taking photos. The investigative team asks Wayne to go to the local firehouse with them for an interview. He does this without a lawyer, and they spend two hours together talking. Wayne tells them, like everybody else, he's heard about Molly's disappearance, but he's never met her, doesn't know who she is. After this interview, he allows them to keep this cell phone overnight so that they
can check his phone records. The Wayne comes out of this and talks to a reporter and says he thought it was all a waste of time, but oh well. After they finished searching the farm, the FBI spends more time walking through about a mile of dishes near the farm. Do they have so much interest in the land of the farmers simply because of the location. But no, there's more, there's a potential clue. They find their red shirt, not unlike the shirts Molly and the other people who work
at that day camp wear every day. The shirt was discovered by a guy mowing his lawn near the Wine and Wildlife Reserve, so he called sheriff Sheriff's deputies, and it turns out that Wayne Chaney, even though this had nothing to do with dollyge Wayne Cheney pled guilty to stocking charges twice in nine and twenty fourteen, and so they've got a real interest in Wayne Chaney at this point and in Wayne's firms.
However, they don't find any information or evidence in that extensive search, and he's cooperative, and there are other people that they looked at. However, what they still were looking at was trying to get video surveillance from the business's local businesses but also other homes. So while they were doing their regular routine investigation, they were still analyzing some of those and also putting out information to the public for leads in this case as well.
Didn't they right exactly? And you know, the whole community starts searching. Four hundred spontaneously started searching the day after Molly went missing, But the County Sheriff's office says, everybody stand down. If they're needed. The world go out. It's hard to coordinate four hundred people, and when the police aren't in charge of it, who knows what they're going to do, what evidence they might contaminate, for instance, what crime seems they might contaminate. So they tell people who
are searching to just go home, stand down. If we need you, we'll put the word out on social media. So what they do then is, speaking of social media, they're honing in on Molly's digital footprint. Dozens of search warrants, their files. They gain access to Molly's social media accounts along with devices like that smartphone and the fifth bit, and that opens the door to a ton of information.
It's amazing how they can track you and how they tracked Molly and your movements on that with that smartphone and the fifth bit.
Yeah, it's interesting you you write that via the GPS they could see exactly her running and then traveling later in a vehicle, because they could make no other conclusion other than that she was moving so fast, so in almost in for these people, was the evidence more than a very strong circumstantial evidence that this is what happened to her, and then she was certainly abducted.
And exactly right right, Yeah, that first chapter where I described her run, that really where I described the run that really is taken from her the GPS information. That's what the GPS track of shows happen. They're running, the starting, the stopping, the turning left, the turning right, that kind of thing. And then what they do is they get on Facebook, Twitter and other social media to figure out the kind of person that Nolly is or the person that she was, I guess you should say, and they're
surprised to see nothing but positive stapments about BOLLI. You know, there are haters on Facebook, but nobody he's Molly. Everybody loves this woman. So that brings a whole other thing into this where they're starting to figure out her personality. Then they want to find out who she has been chatting with recently, what they talked about, if there's anything that's relevant to the investigation. The team believes right now that Molly is alive. They're holding out hoping they really
believe that she is alive. The investigative team, I mean to say, they do think she was abducted, but they believe at this point she is alive. However, people who know her, the people who know Molly, tell the police they cannot believe that Molly was taken without a fight.
They really believe that. Now. Molly is something of an athlete too, okay, and she may never have been in a real fight, but she is a strong athletic woman, and they can't believe that anyone would take her away if she was still alive.
That Jesus has an opportunity to stop for a second for these messages.
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You talked about everybody that knows her thought that a stranger couldn't trick her or overpower because she was a person that was in great shape. And you also talk about Rob Tibbets, her father. Again, they go to the national media and ABC's Good Morning America, and he just wants to focus on bringing her back. As you say, everyone wants to hope and believe that she is still alive. And a reward, you say, goes up from one hundred and seventy thousand to two hundred and sixty thousand dollars
and flyers at baseball games. So there's an incredible effort in the community by Rob Tibbots and others and friends to be able to let people know about this search for this woman.
And now you talk of the family. I'm sorry. The family dynamic here too, is really interesting. Dan Rob Gibbitts lives in San Francisco. He and Laurel Cawleywood are divorced, So here you have the ex husband flying into Brooklyn, Iowa to take part in this and I thought that was just a really interesting part of the story.
Absolutely. Now you talk about August twentieth, so not too far along. But police get a home surveillance video from someone I'm from a house on July eighteenth. Now what do they see in this video and what do they conclude?
Now, this was a real break. A month and two days after Molly vanished, after tracking down thousands of leaves and citizen tips, they finally get a videotape that could crack the case wide open. It's the home surveillance video. It shows Molly running by a home on July eighteenth. On the tape, they can see a black Chevy Malibu that seems to be following Molly, speeding up and slowing down as she does, and finally stopping just like the
GPS and bullet told them. Now, if this isn't the person who kidnapped Malli, they figure he's at least or this person he or she is at least one of the last people to ever see Molly alive. And so they got they have to find this car. This the description of the Malibu goes out to every police official in Iowa. Every set of law enforcement eyes is looking for this black Malibu that the FBI is afraid carried Molly to her final resting place. A County death betimes the car.
I'm sorry, go ahead, Dan, No I was gonna ask you talk about a deputy being alert and spotting the car. What happens?
Yeah, right right on the road, a county deputy spots the car and pulls it over, walks up very slowly on the side of the car, and approaches the driver's window. It's a man alone in the Chevy Malibu. And there he meets Christian Bahina Rivera. A computer check shows the twenty five year old has no history of any criminal conduct with any police department of the area. Rivera has been working at a local dairy farm for about four years.
But this isn't interesting. He's been working at the dairy farm under a different name, the name of John Bud. Now Rivera can't produce any identification under either name John Budd or Christian Vahina Rivera. Here's another point, very difficult conversation between the deputy and Rivera because neither is fluent in the other's language. Rovera is a native of Mexico. He answers some questions and they are able to put a few things together. He of the deputy.
Now you say that they have the problem of getting a translator. So they find a personal name an officer Iowa City police officer named Pamela Romero, and she's fluent in Spanish. Tell us what happens she gets involved, Well.
She makes a real connection with Rovera. He opens right up to her. It's not just that they're fluent in Spanish together, it's he just seems very comfortable with Pamela. Yeah, they just open up and he starts talking and tells the whole story, not the story about Molly, but he just is comfortable. He does a d gives a DNA
sample with no problem at all. He agrees to let the officer a search inside the car, his car, the Malibu, and the officers find a blood stain at the truck, or at least it looks like a blood state of the trunk. They've got to get back to the forensic lab. Of course, that's enough. They figure to bring Rovera into headquarters for more questioning. He's told they can ride with the city police car and be brought back to his
Malibu when they're finished Officer Romero. Pamela Romero asks in Spanish if he'll go with the FEDS and the Iowa City cops. Rivera agrees, and so then they get him in for questioning. They've been talking to him so far for about ninety minutes. The interview really begins now they it's five oh five in the evening. They take ten breaks, but other than that, not a stop questioning, just Officer Pam Romero and Rivera until about eleven thirty at night.
So you're looking at six and a half hours of interrogation. And then and only then, as Rovera read his Miranda.
Rights, you say that they believe he believe he's implicated himself in her murder. And the only question left is there's her body?
Right, That is the only question left? Where is the body? And so on August twenty one, twenty eighteen, Rivera, you know, they ask him what happened, you know, and he's really struggling to tell the story of his encounter with Molly. He says, she tried to run away but couldn't. He talks about the fight they had on you know, for the cell phone, the smartphone, and then he says, the next thing I remember is taking her body out of the trunk. I saw a blood on the side of
her head. Then he talks about putting her body into a cornfield and covering it up with corn stalks to protect her from the stunt.
Yeah. So he also talks about this again very convenient that he got mad when she pulled out the phone and then went by. He says, when I get upset, I blocked my memory or again I guess he mentioned where he is blocked. He can't remember, but of course then the next thing he does remember is taking her body out of the trunk and he saw the right side of her head.
Yeah yeah, and taking that he takes the police to where he left the bocket too.
So m So they find this body, it's many days decomposed. What else do they find forensically in terms of what has happened to her? Stab wound, wise and otherwise.
Oh yeah, they it was o vicious stabbing attack. Stabbed in the head, stabbed multiple times. They find her clothing had been ripped off of her and left in the area. It's a very bloody, floating crime scene.
Yeah, you say that she into her chest numerous times and even broke through her her skulp. There was evidence of a violent struggle, defense wounds on her hands, and she didn't die quickly.
Right, right, right exactly.
Now he has a one million bonds, so he's not going anywhere. And after this reward had got up to four hundred thousand dollars and fifteen one hundred tips, they finally have this perpetrator behind bars. But now this case, again, the particulars of the case are interesting enough for national and international media. But now because they find out the immigration status of this person, what does this story become?
Now it becomes a political story. Now, former President Donald Trump tells an audience at a rally in Charleston, West Virginia, you've heard about today the illegal alien coming in varies badly from Mexico. And you saw what happened to that incredible, beautiful young woman. Should not have happened illegally in our country. Trump says, We've got a huge impact, but the laws are so bad, the immigration laws, that's such a disgrace. We're getting it changed, but we have to get more Republicans.
So this becomes a very political. Remember this is we're talking the off term election here, this is twenty eighteen. This is an on mid term election, I guess I should say. And so this becomes a very big political story.
It's interesting too. Surprising that the farm where he worked, they asked, and again they've got numerous hundreds of threatening calls. Why did they get threats against them? And what was the defense of the owner of that farm in regards to hiring this illegal immigrant.
Yeah, this is the Arabee Farms near Brooklyn, Iowa. And they are totally taken by surprise. They said that they did their bet. They received close to one hundred threatening phone calls after ten o'clock in the morning August twenty second, So this is really blowing up the people in depth threats,
what have you? And was the thing is? They are asking the question is if Rivera was in the country illegally, how did he gain employment at the Arab and Dan Yerrab claims the staff that everything required by the federal and state laws to ensure that Rivera was in the US legally. They had no idea. They claimed that he was here illegally and they just found out in the past twenty four hours. They say that the name John
Budd that he gave them was a fake name. They said, it's really the federal and state bureaucracies that fell down on the job here.
Yeah, you talk about to August twenty seconds the first court appearance. And in this small town, Christiane's girlfriend Iris Moneris also went to school with Molly Till. But another person, Bailey Gibson, comes forward to say that he followed her sister in the same way, using the same and when she heard the report it struck a nerve in her to say that we're very similar. And August twenty third is the funeral from Molly tell us a little bit right now.
Yeah, the funeral. It doesn't matter if you're there Catholic, Protestant, Jewish, Muslim, or atheist. At Saint Patrick Catholic Church in Brooklyn, everyone's welcome, but especially true this evening August twenty third, for the funeral of Malli. Father Corey Close calls her a beautiful young woman, but he knows evil is irrational, so we could never wrap our minds around in fully. Then others
in Brooklyn are shocked for a different reason. Chloe Redding says it's terrible to see the suspected killer on TV and realized that she was friends with him on Facebook. So you talk about that small town, So many people in this town knew both of these people. Rivera and Molly.
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murder one nine nine. Now we were talking about him getting ready, Christiane getting ready and his defense attorney's getting ready for this this trial. And then on September seventeenth, twenty eighteen, we're talking about a few weeks later, Celia Barquin Rosamanna is playing golf by herself at the Coldwater
Golf Links in amas Iowa. As this is a public course, tell us who this Celia Arosamena is, and a little bit more about this, a little bit more about her life, and a little bit about more about this golf plan that she has planned for golf that day.
Okay, quite simply, Celia is one of the best women amateur golfers in the world at this point. Earlier this year or that year of the twenty two year old won the European Legs Amateur Championship with a course record sixty three. She qualified for the twenty eighteen US Women's Open before missing the cut. She captured the twenty eighteen Big Twelve individual title and was honored as Iowa Stags
Female Athlete of the Year. She comes from Spain and town of fifteen thousand in Spain's Twente San Miguel, Spain. She is now played her eligible at Iowa State University. Remember Maui went to the University of Iowa. Now Celia is working on her degree at Iowa State University. She's no longer eligible to play on the university's team, but she is still obviously a very talented amateur golfer. Shoulder length blonde hair, blue eyes, bright, infectious smile, bubbly personality.
She's half rolled away from her family in Spain, but her mother has always said that Celia is delighted with her life in Iowa. Now this morning, she's alone. She's on the fourth te at Cold Water, which is one of the best public courses in the state of.
Iowa and so Okay. So what happens to alert people that something has gone wrong? You talk about four guys that were let her go ahead, realizing that she was going to get through the course much quicker than them, And then they find some evidence that something has gone awry.
Yeah, it's four middle aged guys and they know that Celia is going to play a lot faster than them, so they allow her to play it through. An hour later, Harley, one of the guys is Harley Harley Thornton. That's we're calling him the leader of the sports them here the Holly Spotsom arrives at the ninth te and they can see that something's wrong. Celia's golf bag, several keys, her rangefinder, and her hat are all rying on the ground. But there's no sign of Celia. I mean, that's not something
you see on the golf course. Nobody abandons their clubs in the middle of the fair way, ever, and there's one more sign of trouble Celia's cell phone. Harley finds it on the ground too. Now they haven't heard any sounds that would suggest to Celia was in danger. No scheams, no sounds of the struggle, no signs of the struggle
except this stuff left on the course. But shortly after ten am, Harley calls cold Water's Pro Shop to report what they have found, and then he calls nine to one one and minutes later the Ames Police Department receives a corresponding call from a nine to one to one dispatcher notifying them of Parley's concern. So the police arrived in cold Water at ten twenty four, about twenty four minutes after Harley's forsom found what they found on the ninth key.
You talk about this, Mitch Mortvitt is on the case and he's the assistant director of the Iowa Department of Criminal Investigation. How is it that a police officer and Ames heath Rop spots Dalton Barnes. Who's Dalton Barnes And why does he stop him? And what does he have to say?
Okay, we should we should backtrack a little bit see the golf course. And they did find for a body another group of golf respound's body on the course in upon Now Heith Rops spots Dalton Barnes. Dalton Barnes is a twenty two year old who he's one of these guys who has just never made it in right. He got out of the Skate prison June fourth of this year after serving about seven months for violating terms of approbation that he'd been sentenced to for a condition in
Burglarians and other related tribes. He's been troubled. He's been troubled his whole life. He's living homeless, living in a tent in an area near that golf course. He becomes a person of interest when Officer heath Rops spots Dalton Barns walking north on the trail, the trail that led from the golf course and the general area where Celia's body was found. So they're looking at this guy. You
can just see there's trouble in him. Heath thropped. His officer, Rob just knows right away there's trouble in this guy.
So how does he proceed and what does he What does he blurt out in this conversation with this heath Rop officer, He says that he is They asking if he's aware of this woman being killed, and he says, be blurred, So what did Colin do to her? So the police ask why would he ask that question?
Right? Yeah? And because he as Colin gets close to them, So they go to the place where they've been living together, and Dalton tells Roe that he and Colin each have attention in this area. Dalton and Colin Richards are sharing a temporary squatter's encampment and He just knows something's wrong with Colin, because Colin's been talking. He's been talking crazy. He's been talking about finding a woman to kill. That's what he wants.
And they know that these tents where they're living, they have a view. And Dalton mentions this as well, that they both have a view of these golfers all day. That's how close they are to this golf.
Course, right exactly.
Yeah, now you talk about him, the Colin Richards, and you talked about you just mentioned that he had just been in prison. But they look, police look, and they find it. Even though he's homeless, unemployed, he has time to set up a Facebook page where he celebrates drinking coffee and murder. Weirdly enough, Yeah.
He does with a phone. You know, with a smartphone you can do anything. He has a smartphone, and he sets up a Facebook page and he celebrates and says let's do murder. He writes, let's do murder on his homepage.
He's also been reported that he's been carrying a big knife and this is obviously Dalton saying this and with a serrated edge. So police are very interested in this information. It doesn't sound like it sounds very credible, doesn't it to them?
Yes, it does, you know, Dalton shots when he says his friend has been talking about an irresistible urge to rape and murder a woman, and he's been carrying a blade that's big enough to cut wood, a blade with a serda edge. It sounds like the knife that might have been the weapon used to kill Celia. Other officers working the case who have a history with Colin remember that it's not unusual for him to carry a knife,
and so they're very interested in him. And as they're working and investigating, all of a sudden, Colin walks right into the investigation. He walks right into the middle of it. Yeah, liter, He scratches on his face, he's been in a fight. He drops the black backpack on the ground about ten feet from the tent, and the bag is his because it has his name on it, see Richards. And he sits down and sticks his left hand into the dirt while the detectives are talking to him.
Wow, So they ask him why he's why he's scratched. They ask him why his hand is bleeding, so he gives some unreasonable excuse for that, and they ask her ask him about his whereabouts. So that questioning does not satisfy them. They take him to the hospital to document his wound, which will they believe it will help them when the autopsy is performed. What happens in that autopsy? What do they find out?
Well, after the quick interview, they take Colin to the Married Greeley Medical Center z ARE to get the hand damage and they had to ask him to pull it out of the dirt. He was obviously hiding his hand in the dirt. And they want to compare colin injury to what they've learned from tomorrow's autopsy about the stab wounds and cuts to what they will learn from the stab wounds and cuts they killed Celia, and they find
a similarity. They see that there's a relationship between the hand wound and the wounds that killed Celia.
Right, So now you talk.
About the comtary the cuts matched. The puncture wounds could could have come from any knife with a four inch blade, So it's going to be hard to pin down the weapon. About the stab wounds, the slashes, the cuts on Colin's hand and Celia's body to match the em spine.
Yeah, you write that September twentieth, Thanks to a grad fire. The Ames Police think that they discovered the knife used to kill Celia and a long serrated knife with two serration serrated patterns.
So right, right, exactly, the blaze broke out inside of the rogat three seventeen Washington Avenue, the same small two bedroom house where police talked to Chris Johnson about Colin and Richards three days ago, the day they discovered Cellia's body on the golf course pond. And now they get into the house as part of their fire investigation, and they meet Christopher Johnson, the homeowner, and they spat a
large serrated knife with two serrated serration patterns. The blade is longer than four inches, nothing unusual there, a typical kitchen knife. But remember the autopsy results showed a knife just like that cut Celia. So now the prime suspect in the homicide investigation was seen at this house three days ago, and they find a knife very similar like a cassette, to one of the knives that cast Celia.
It turns out that Colin showered there at the house and changed his clothes at the house, and that knife indeed was part of a sect that was in the kitchen and it is a sect that is missing one of the knives.
Yeah, there's a judge, Curry, Bethany Curry is in charge. And what does maybe surprising to some people, what does this person, this perpetrator, Colin Richards want to do? Was he plead to the judge? What was his plea to the judge?
He says, he writes, and this is the way he wrote it on a piece of paper. I would like to take care of my case. I would like to do whatever it is to move forward, ending the case. Pl guilty, pleading obviously guilty, if that's what it takes. Penan cut and Stowry, I do plead guilty and Curry accepted the note.
Yeah, this story doesn't have is a little bit different because it doesn't catapult the story into political the political arena like Molly's did. But because Celia is a world class golfer, how does this story get bigger than it would?
Yeah, this becomes an international story, not just a national story, but an international story because her mother is still in Spain. Well, your family's still in Spain. The golfers around the world just love Cellia and they really aren't mourning Stellia as much. Nearly as much anyway as the family is mourning Celia.
Yeah. So there's the sentencing on August twenty third, twenty nineteen for Colin Richards first degree in Iowa already carries life without parole sentence. But it wasn't It was a chance for law enforcement, you say, to show their support for Celia's friends and family and also to express their grief. But Colin Wright, say, and note, what does he have to say to the courts via this note?
Well, there's the note where he wanted to plead guilty. Is that the note you're speaking of, Well, he just talks.
No, it's more of the note about the remorse he feels. Not much to the note, but that he said he did feel remorse for stripping society of this person.
Oh right, right, Yes he did write that. Yes, I don't have that note in front of me right now, but yeah, he did write that.
Now you take us to May twenty sixth, twenty twenty one, and Christiane's case, you say, is in limbo. Tell us why this was delayed.
Well as day for about three years by worries about three trial publicity and just the usual slow turning of the wheels of justice of their relations, and there also is the complication of the COVID nineteen pandemic. Everything is
shut down, everything's locked down. So Christian Roberta is in prison. Well, they're going to decide an important trial began just nine days ago, three years after, nearly three years after he was arrested because of COVID nineteen and the other concerns, but mainly called in nineteen.
Right about defense attorneys Chad and Jennifer Frazy Uncharacteristically, Christiane takes the stand and he's wearing headphones and he has two Spanish language interpreters. What does he claim through these interpreters happen with Molly?
Yeah, Well, this is where I get really interesting. He goes on the stand and says that he was taking a shower in his mobile home. When he came out of the bathroom, he was stung to find two men sitting in his living room. You've never seen them before. They were both wearing sweaters and masks, and of course they had outgun. One of them had a gun, the other one had a knight. One was bigger than him, the other one was about his size. The man forced him into his black Chevy Malibu and tell him to
start driving straight to Brooklyn, Iowa. And there they start talking while they're driving. They're talking about finding someone running, but they want to find a woman jogging. Well, they come upon Malway. As Christian tells his story, and he says, really, these two guys and masks and sweaters, one of the gun, one of the knife, they engineered the whole thing and forced him to do to stop and fight with Molly and put her in the trunk of his car, and as well to the cornfield.
Yes, and and what he does as well is he throws in some dialogue and says that he heard the men say come on Jack, which would clearly implicate Molly's boyfriend, Dalton Jack in this.
Right exactly exactly, So he's trying to, again, you know, say that he didn't do it, but Dalton Jack had a responsibility in this, and and the guys, you know.
And the guys and and of course this is very typical as well. What how else did he add a little detail to this? What other what other threats apparently did these people make to ensure his cooperation?
He his girlfriend and their daughter. The men threatened that to hurt Iris and their daughter if he didn't do what they told him to do. Yeah.
Now May twenty sevenths twenty twenty one, you talk about prosecutor Scott Brown, what happens with this Christiane story of kidnap? What does he believe? What does he say?
He says that Scott Brown says, you know, he disputes the allegations. He said there was Yes, he says, the truth truth, The truth is just more straightforward. Now the prosecutor insists he took her, he committed to crime. What happened Molly, he says, is no longer on this planet because of the defender.
And she was left there for five weeks. So you talk about the appalling crime scene photos that the jury had to endure as well.
Yeah, they were. They were really brutal. I mean, these were the incredible crime scene. One of the photo showed Dolly's body under a couple of stalks at corn. You can see her foot sticking out. You can see her clothing on the ground near her body. Uh, the body was very decomposed. So yeah, they were. They were really gruesome.
Grewsome photos and they had him dead to rights with the blood analysis and the DNA in the trunk didn't they correct.
They did. They had him dead to rights. Yeah and uh, and the story just the jury did not buy his story at all, Christian story about the two guys forcing him do to kidnap Molly and then and then kill her. The jury just did not believe it at all. They deliberated her a little more than seven hours and then found him guilty of first degree marke.
You talk about the impact on the community with these two sensational end up being sensational murders. Tell us a little bit about that this is a little place. So there was a significant impact, wasn't there.
Yeah, really a very significant impact. This is the kind of place Brooklyn, Iowa, where people they forgot to lock their doors at night. They didn't worry about it too much. Now they do. And now people in town would say that they're constantly looking over their shoulders because they know Brooklyn, Iowa is no different than any other place that this can happen there. And again the same thing on the golf course cold Water and the town where Celia was murdered.
You know, this was just a big wake up call to a couple of small towns and the people who live in those small towns that They're no safer than somebody in New York. I guess this.
You've written about a lot of murders. Why did you feel important to put these two stories we've previously published We'll find you and let's do murder together? And well, yeah, why put these two?
I just thought it was a better story than they deserve to be together. And the chances of these two women who had, as I wrote, everything to live for, they both had lives that they were looking forward to, those lives being snuffed out in two small towns in the state of Iowa within months of each other. It just seemed like those stories needed to be together.
Yeah, and you talk as two college students in Iowa with all of their future ahead. You talked about Molly and Dalton planning to go to his brother's wedding and the Dominican Republic. She had just gotten her passport, it was her first. I know it seems cliche, but these people both were some of the nicest people anybody to report.
And again, I know that sounds like a cliche, but there wasn't any dirt to find on these people, and it is so sad to see the most undeserving people of this if not that anyone deserves to be murdered, but just the sheer innocence of these people and the senseless murders.
You know, that's a really strong point, Dan, The innocence of these people. And that's not just Molly and Celia, but their families as well, especially in the family of Malli that you know, I found much more about them I did tell you. But yeah, just the innocence of these people throwing into this situation. I mean, none of us expects to be on Good Morning America talking about the murder of a loved one.
Yeah, and it's it's not to be under estimated. The untractable situation that they are in. Intractable situation that they're in, believing that their loved one is still alive, hoping that the loved one is still alive. Then their only course is to plead somehow to the goodness of this perpetrator to release her. I can't imagine a more horrifying situation to be in.
Yeah it is. And yeah, I can't imagine it either, I really can't. And then at your tragedy put onto a national stage by politicians who want to use the story of their advantage.
Yeah, you did mention that the family, not only the father but the aunt as well, but other people in the in the in the family wanted to make sure to ensure that this story didn't lose focus, didn't lose focus on Molly, but instead this was used by political parties at that time to talk about their policy about illegal immigration. Right, plainly right.
They both did not want that happen, and Rob Kibb went national and he was very very outspoken in asking people to not to make this a political story. Yes.
Absolutely, I want to thank you very much Rod Cackley for coming on and talking about the Iowa Murders, a shocking crew time story. For those that might want to find out more of your work, they can you refer them to page and our website.
Yeah, sure, it's Rodcackling dot com and you can always find me there. And also wherever you buy books, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Apple, Kobe, wherever you find books, you'll find buy books, But go to rodcackli dot com. That's where I try to keep everything up to date.
Absolutely, thank you so much, Rod. The Iowa Murders a shocking true crime story. It's been a pleasure. Thank you so much Rod, you have a great evening and I know we'll be talking to you again soon.
Thank you Dan, same to you. Have a good night. B