Hey, listeners, Jessica here. Be sure to check out new episodes of Undetermined every Tuesday for free wherever you get your podcasts. For early and ad free listening, check out Tenderfoot plus on Apple Podcasts. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the individuals interviewed and participating in the show, and do not represent those
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be suitable for all audiences. Listener discretion is advised. As January twenty twenty rolled around, Jessica's family was waiting on pins and needles for any update from police, any shred of new information or details that could shed some light on what happened to their Jessica. As far as the
investigation was going, it had been a long five months. Sure, they were getting snippets from Erica during that month's long text conversation she and Justin had, but as you know from our last episode, it was right around this time in early twenty twenty that Erica and Justin's conversation ended, and since Justin had zero contact with Jessica's family at this point, they were pretty much in the dark until one day in late January when an officer informed Audrey
that there was a woman who wished to speak with her. Her name Jessica.
I got a message from a cop in New Orleans telling me that this girl named Jessica wanted to reach out to me.
She had information.
I read the message from her, and she wanted me to call her. I was thinking to myself, Oh my god, this is Justin.
This is just some fake person.
I ended up calling her anyway, and I found out that she had a run in with Justin at the bar that she worked at.
You came in very quickly, so it caught my attention, and he said, while you really reminded me of my wife, she just committed suicide. But tried telling the New Orleans Police Department that in twenty six years of bartending, I've met a lot of people and had a lot of strange interactions and some scary interactions, and this was top of the list.
The late Anthony Bourdain once said, New Orleans is quote a must see city because there's no explaining it, no describing it. You can't compare it to anything, end quote. Everything in this city has a history, a uniqueness, a story. You never know where a day in New Orleans will take you for toddy. This particular day brings us to the outskirts of downtown, to a quaint Mexican restaurant called Elpavo rial.
Soar.
Upon entering, we're immediately hit with the aroma of freshly chopped cilantro and warm homemade tortillas. The walls are lined with bright, vivid artwork by locals, including a mosaic style painting depicting the church next door. The entire place is immaculate and colorfully decorated. Our reason for being here isn't as uplifting as the restaurant we're sitting in, nor it's
cheerful decor. We're here because back in January of twenty twenty, just a week after Jessica's Corner's report was released, another woman named Jessica or Jessica Vee as we'll call her, supposedly had an unforgettable encounter with Justin Derning in this very restaurant, and she wasn't alone when she met Justin. Her friend Nate was there too.
Do you think both have.
Been in the service industry for a long time, so they've had their fair share of strange encounters, but they say this one was different.
I've interacted with strangers my whole life and my jobs, and I've come into contact with any number of real strange people, but this was, I mean, this was by far the most.
The whole thing was such a mind fuct to be honest, Yeah, I just thought it was all bullshit until I was just like, there's something insane going on inside him.
Todd and I sat down with both Jessica, Vee, and Nate to get the full story of what happened the day they met Justin at the restaurant.
So me and jess had planned to hang out after she had gotten off work, and I just lived down the street at the time, so I was going to go in and sit down at the bar and wait for her to get off. I decided to stay at the bar and she made me a half watermelon, half lime swirl frozen margarita, which is my favorite. We were
just drinking and eating and Justin came in. Didn't know who he was of course at the time, he looked frantic and unhealthy, like in a way like he maybe hadn't been like eating good or he didn't look aneberated or anything. But he just looked frantic, disheveled, and scrawny. But right away I was like, please, don't talk to me right when I saw him, but I could tell that he really needed to talk to someone. Obviously.
He started walking towards us and immediately asked us about the food pantry next door. There's a church that runs a food pantry next door. We could see the very expensive car he pulled up, and so it was just right off the bat a seemingly weird situation, and I said, well, I think that closes about three hours ago. He said, of course it's closed. This is just what my life is right now. I should just kill myself. That's immediately what he said. I responded, and I said, oh, hey, hey, man,
don't hurt yourself. And I said I always tell the people around me when I'm upset that they'd better be the ones to watch out.
Justin was not out of sorts. She says. She noticed that he smelled and his hair was disheveled. She characterizes him as being twitchy.
Then when he mentioned the death and he was saying he want to kill himself that you know that, I'm like, uh, maybe he's just having a middle breakdown.
You know.
At first I was kind of given the benefit of the doubt of like, you know, maybe I just need to calm this dude down, and like if he sits here a second, maybe just collect his bearings, then he'll go. But then yeah, it got really uncomfortable very quickly. And he said, wow, you really reminded me of my wife. She just committed suicide. But try telling the New Orleans Police Department that I'm not certain what I responded to him, and he said again, he's like, you really remind me
a lot of my wife. What's your name And I said Jessica, and he said that is my wife's name. He's like, you look about her size. I have all of this shit of hers in my house. I gotta get rid of it. I gotta get it out of there. I have her hope chest, I have all of her clothes. They're all designer, they're all amazing, they're all expensive.
He's telling me all this and telling me he's got to go to the food.
Pantry, and I said, you know, there's some consignments that you could probably make a lot of money on these things. Maybe you should do that. I said, did she have family that might want it? He said yeah, but yeah, they're not getting it.
It just went from like I said, a stranger walking into just all of a sudden, you look like my dead wife that committed suicide. And then I have all of her things and I need to get rid of them, like I need to get her like out of my house because I can't handle But it was very like a sad like I can't handle having all her things around. I mean, it just went so gross really fast. When you know when a man's like what's your shoe size? You know, what kind of fashion do you like? What
size shirt do you wear? And stuff? Because you can come get all my dead wife's things. But then it went from there to like, maybe we should hang out sometime, like what are you into? It was mostly very focused on jess and he started talking about how him and Jessica should hang out and how he loves diving and how he has all this scuba equipment and how he loves knife and he loves hunting and shooting bows and arrows and all this stuff. I'm like, I'm so confused. It was a whirlwind for sure.
At this point, Jessica Vee says she pretty much quit engaging with Justin and went on to warn her coworkers. In this situation, she wanted to wrap up her shift so she could get out of there, but before she could, she needed to give Justin his bill. And it was then that Jessica VV and Nate both noticed him frantically scribbling something into a notebook. They weren't sure what.
I was leaving as I put his bill in front of him, and he said, wait, wait, wait, wait wait, and turned around to the notebook and ripped the page out and folded it up and gave it to me.
Could you open up the letter and just like read through the gibberish that it is okay.
It starts with his personal information at the top. It's says Justin Durning. It gives his address, it says Grace daughter. It gives me exact directions how to get there. It gives his cell phone number and his landline and his email address. Immediately it goes to the items he wants to give me of Jessica's purses, Kate Spade, Betsy Johnson, Mark Jacobs, Calvin Klein, Barbery, Chanel Shoes, Christian Leubatan, Jimmy Choos, Steve Madden, all kinds of shit jewelry, mid to high
end costume jewelry. I have some furniture that I just don't need. Dresser Cedar Chest, Hope chest questions. Do you like to shoot guns? Do you like knives? Parentheses, tactical? Do you dive or want to learn? If you or your husband or into any of this, please let me know.
Southern heels, Nola custom high end flip flops. He had mentioned that sitting at the bar, that his wife had this business that was just sitting there and it was a It was just a cash cow, and I could have that too, So it was just all very confusing.
Jessica Vee was eager to get out of there, so she took the note Justin handed her and promptly left the restaurant for the night. Her shift and her brush with Justin had ended, but her story didn't end there. After leaving the restaurant, Jessica V and Nate, still reeling from the bizarre experience, googled Justin's full name to see if they could find any more information about him, and in doing so, they quickly learned about his wife, Jessica's death.
This was a big story in New Orleans.
We'd all heard about Jessica, but we didn't know the names Jessica's or his. I immediately grew.
More concerned for his daughter.
We've read the stories that he doesn't appear to be involved in the search or any other thing, and there he's not the person contact. You know, this is our family that's in the media, not him. That he had been speaking about weapons, and then the note had really odd things about weapons. Did I like to shoot guns? Did I like tactical knives? Those things obviously concerned me a little more.
Once I found out who he was.
So that's kind of what kept nagging at me till the next day. When I called the police department to just turn the note in. I just assumed there'd be a homicide investigator working on this case. I thought I could just call and someone would come to the restaurant pick up the note. I really thought that that would be it. I thought that would be all of my involvement.
While this may have sounded easy, in theory turned out to be a lot more complicated than Jessica Vee thought it would be.
They said, we've don't handle stuff like that. There isn't a homicide investigator working on.
We don't do that.
You got to turn that into the corner. Are you afraid he's going to hurt himself or someone else? I'm not concerned he's going to hurt me, but himself or someone else. Yes, I am concerned, highly concerned, and that there's a child in his care. That is what I'm calling about. And they explained to me that I would have to take the letter to the coroner's office. She told me that where that was and told me that they would be able to pick him up for a mental health hold.
So Jessica v drives to the corner's office around seven or eight that night. She walks inside and meets a woman who she thinks is a receptionist but is later told is one of the coroners. Jessica Vee starts telling her about the exchange she'd had with Justin and was stunned by the woman's reaction.
She said, Oh, my god, I probably shouldn't be telling you this, but she's still here. He has not released her body to her family, so she's still here.
So and we're talking five months. So at that point she's been there five months.
This is January and this has been since Oko so yes, So that was very distressing for me to hear. She started to prepare all this paperwork, making copies of the note. She wouldn't keep the note. She's filling out some other paperwork. She picks up the phone and calls a friend that She tells me, I'm calling my friend at the New Orleans Police apartment. So I think this is kind of
going to be the end of my situation. She starts talking to her friend and she says, Hey, I've got this girl in here who had an interaction with Justin Darning. So she's like telling her about the note and she's kind of talking to her, but it's not it's in a personal way. It's not in a you're recounting this to a person who is taking official notes about this.
She was reading parts of the note about the questions at the bottom about the tactical knives and do you like to shoot guns and scuba dinive mentioned it by name, and the person must have known who that was. And quickly I realized she's just like gossiping with a friend there maybe or just wanting to tell her like she had wanted to tell me Jessica was still there. That was a little off putting for me and distressing to be honest.
And to add to that, once the woman wrapped up the paperwork, she told Jessica Vee that since she's the person instigating the mental healthhold, her name would be on the paperwork, allowing doctors, lawyers, or whoever could be involved to see her name. And while this wasn't what Jessica Vie preferred, it didn't stop.
Her at that point. I didn't feel like I couldn't do it.
I just didn't feel like I could not do it.
I was very obviously distressed, and I mean I even said to her, I was like, that is so fucked up.
I can't believe that's the process.
And the Unfortunately for dusk A Vee, this wouldn't conclude what was turning out to be a complicated and rather frustrating process.
She prepared all this paperwork and made a copy of the note, gave me the noteback, wouldn't keep it, put all of them in an envelope with an official seal all over it, and she leaned across the desk and handed it to me, and she said, now you need to take this to whatever precinct it is, the Lakeview Police Department. You need to deliver this to them in the next forty eight hours. I said, but I'm here to give it to you. You've made all this official.
You have spoken to someone at the police department and told them this is happening. And now I really don't understand why I have to do this. And now I'm really am a little concerned that this is the procedure.
The process itself caused Jessica viv to have second thoughts as to whether or not the hassle was worth it. She took the rest of the day to think on it, but eventually she decided to go ahead and give the letter to police.
Like, at this point, I feel really bad if I don't see it through, because the whole reason I got involved was this kid, and so I mean, it's just typical New Orleans shit. This is not the right way for any of this to happen. Maybe this is ridiculous for me to be involved anyway, But at that point, my conscience wasn't gonna be all right.
While speaking with the officer, Jessica Vie was very direct about her frustrations how things were being handled.
I said the same things to him that I'd said to the corner. This is just garbage that I have to be here. This is insane to me that this is the process. I don't know anyone else.
That would do this. He was, you know, yeah, well, I mean because you're.
Worried about him, right, You're worried about his daughter and other people's safety.
I said, yes, yeah, I am.
In twenty six years of bartending, I've met a lot of people and had a lot of strange interactions and some scary interactions, and this was top of the list. Bananas to me, this god's behavior. So he asked me could he see the note because the paperwork was sealed, He looked at it, he made a copy. He told me that will be at his house by seven to pick him up and take him in.
Jessica Vee then left the station and that was the end of it. She also never saw or heard from Justin again. According to a source within the n OPD, Justin was in fact picked up and held on a mental health hold or some digging, we found out that in Louisiana, a mental healthhold request does in fact go
through the corner's office, not the police. Since our interview with her, she's been trying to get a copy of the paperwork she filed and at the very least a copy of the affid David that she signed, but without success, and it was the same outcome for us. In our request for a copy of the paperwork, the corner denied our request, citing it's not considered a public record and
citing hippolaws. The NOPD also denied our request for any paperwork pertaining to the mental healthhold, police pickup, or any supplemental or supporting materials, including, but not limited to, any signed requests or documents by Jessica Vee.
It made me feel good that I didn't live in New Orleans anymore. I don't know that I would have participated if I still lived there. I don't know that I would have gotten and started talking about the corner and the police department. I mean, who's supposed to help me if something happens to me. I don't have to be scared about it. I don't need their help I don't live there anymore, and I don't have to worry about him turning up at my work, which that's lesser.
That's still a lesser fear to me than talking about the Corners Office the police Department saying these things that I've said about them and my interactions with them, but they're true. That's what happened, and it was upsetting. It was super upsetting that these are the professionals that were supposed to do something.
I think the New Orleans Police Department needs to take accountability for a lot of missing persons and murder cases inside the city of New Orleans, because this is not the only one. It's a very easy city to just forget about what happened yesterday and move on to tomorrow, because we love to have a good time and love to just keep living life, and we love to celebrate
death and celebrate anything we can celebrate. But we still need to hold people accountable so there's not evil walking around us.
And that accountability applies to law enforcement just as much as criminals and everyday citizens. Thankfully, there are some people out there who care and will go to great lengths to help someone that they don't even know.
I mean, I got very invested in there'd be in some resolution for them, because it was heartbreaking to talk to Audra. My sister, Jennifer is my best friend in the world, and those were very emotional conversations for me to have with her. I felt very sorry for her and I can't imagine being in there she is. I would do anything, I would not stop if it were my sister. So I have a twin sister too, So I have two sisters and yeah, and a half sister.
I any of them, Yeah, I don't. I cannot. I cannot imagine.
And again, my interactions at the corner and with the police were so unsettling and instilled zero confidence in me that I thought, well, these are the people that they have to help them, and it felt very inadequate and really sad.
I just had a lama heart broke for.
Yeah.
I just hope the family knows and everyone that's been involved that I'm really happy that they're speaking out and they're, you know, standing up for someone who can't stand up for herself.
She seems to have been a really kind person with a lot of people that love her, and regardless of what was going on in our personal life, or whatever struggles she was having, it just doesn't matter.
Somebody killed her.
And I think that's really clear to everybody.
Jessica Vee has a point. Through what we've seen in Jessica's personal life so far, it's pretty clear she had her struggles. From the outside looking in, it appeared like she was having some issues with both her health and her relationship with Justin. But Jessica wasn't the type to open up about her personal life, even to those she was closest with. However, at Thanksgiving the year before she died, she did let Maria in on one thing, a secret part of her and Justin's life.
She told me about it to some degree before they came to stay in my home. I just thought they were bored. I thought they were a couple in their forties. Maybe the spark was gone. They spend too much time together, so maybe they were just trying to spice things up, you know. And I was like, you know, whatever, do you that's entertaining to you. I didn't know that it was really for the income the way I think it
turned out to be. But I think it's part of what held her in place after she was ready to leave. Is she had this dirty secret. It was a huge departure from who I knew her to be. She was a shadow of her former self.
Undetermined is a production of Resonate Recordings and Tenderfoot TV in conjunction with Cadence thirteen, written and hosted by me Jessica Nole and produced by Dennis Cooper and Todd Mcoma's with additional production by Whitney Bozart. Executive producers are Dennis Cooper, Mark Minnery, Jacob Bozarth, Donald Albright, and Payne Lindsay. Our senior producer is John Street. Editing, mixing, mastering and sound design by Caleb Melcher, Dayton Cole and Pat kick Glider
of the Resonate Recordings team. If you have a podcast or a looking to start one, check us out at Resonate Recordings dot com. Our theme song and original score is by Dirt Poor Robbins, with additional scoring by Dayton Cole. Our cover art is by Station sixteen. You can follow Undetermined Podcast on Facebook and on Twitter at Undetermined Pod. Show notes as well as bonus content can be found
on our website Undetermined pod dot com. If you enjoyed this episode, please take time to subscribe, rate, and review. Your feedback is greatly appreciated. And finally, if you have any information about this case, call crime Stoppers at one eight seven seven nine zero three seven eight six seven