MISSING: Leigh Occhi

[00:00] Hi, Crime Junkies, it's Britt, and I have big news. One of my favorite seasonal shows, CounterClock, is back with a brand new season, and it is wild. Host Delia D'Ambra is digging into the 2008 Lane Bryant murders. I mean, this isn't just a recap. It is a reinvestigation. She's talking to law enforcement, people from the community, even sources who have never spoken publicly until now. And you know I love a show that asks all the questions. Listen to CounterClock Season 8 now, wherever you get your podcasts. [00:31] Hi, Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. And I'm Britt. And so obviously, one of the reasons we started doing this show is because we've both been obsessed with true crime since. [00:42] forever. Right. But [00:43] Every once in a while, I come across a story that I kind of... [00:48] think of as like a gateway for new crime junkies. Like the story that just like, [00:53] hooks you and makes you realize like why all of us like bananas, true crime people are the way that we are. And that's kind of how this story is today that I want to tell you. A story filled with so many twists and turns and unanswered questions that it just grabs you by the throat and refuses to let go. Because at the heart of it all is a girl who vanished from a place where she should have been safe. [01:19] This is a living, feeling girl with hopes and dreams and fears, just like the rest of us, who, no matter how much time has passed, still deserves to have her truth told. This is the story of Lee Ochi.

[01:35] Music. [02:05] In August of 1992, the city of Tupelo in northeastern Mississippi is bracing itself for the worst hurricane as Hurricane Andrew approaches. This is a total sidebar, but did you know that Tupelo is where Elvis was born? I did not. It does not surprise me that you know that fact, but I got it now. Loved Elvis. [02:35] hurricane that has already cut a path of destruction through Florida and Louisiana, causing billions of dollars worth of damage and leaving hundreds of thousands of people homeless along the way. Like, again, this is a big one. Luckily, Andrew is losing force as it makes its way north across Mississippi. And it's actually been downgraded from a hurricane to a tropical storm. But it's still powerful enough to produce

[03:05] Definitely enough to scare anyone who's afraid of storms. And Lee Ochi is one of those people. [03:12] Even though she just turned 13 less than a week ago, Lee's still really scared of storms. And a hurricane is like the worst case phobia scenario for her. She's so freaked out by the bad weather that she spends the night of August 26, 1992 in bed with her mom, Vicki. Now, Lee's parents met when they were both in the military, but they've been divorced since she was a toddler. Her dad is stationed in Virginia and her mom just recently separated from her stepdad, Barney. [03:42] Lee and Vicky living in their house now. Lee's a pretty typical girl in a lot of ways. She loves horses, much like you did, Britt. And she's sort of awkward around her peers, like I think we probably all were at that age. I was going to say also like me when I was that age. Also very much like you, yeah. But everyone says that she's a good kid, you know? [04:03] Which is why the next day, August 27th, this is a Thursday, Lee is allowed to stay home alone. Vicki gets up to go to work like normal, but Lee is still on summer break. She doesn't start school until Monday. [04:17] So Vicki decides to let her stay home. She knows that she has plans to go to an open house with her grandparents a little later at the middle school. And then they're going to have like a special dinner at Taco Bell afterwards. So I want to go back to the weather for just a second because I didn't know this. Britt, you might have because, you know, we don't get hurricanes here in Indiana. But I know you spent a good deal of time in Florida. But storms like Andrew actually can cause tornadoes.

[04:47] Right. So as if a hurricane or tropical storm isn't enough, after Vicky's been at work for about an hour, she hears about some tornado watches that are now in the area. [04:59] So knowing how Lee feels about storms, she calls home at about 8:30 a.m. to make sure Lee's okay. [05:06] According to David Lohr's reporting for the Discovery Channel's criminal report blog, Vicky's got a special ring pattern worked out with Lee. So basically, like, she'll know if it's her calling. This is way before the days of caller ID. Like, you can't shoot a text. You can't see who's calling. So the program that they had is mom would let the phone ring two times, then hang up and then call back. And that's like Lee's signal to be like, this is my mom. I got to pick up this call. But Lee doesn't pick up the phone. [05:35] The phone keeps ringing and ringing and ringing. Lee still doesn't answer. And none of this is sitting right with Vicky. So she leaves her job and actually drives back home that morning to check up on Lee. But as soon as she pulls into the driveway, alarm bells start going off in her head because the garage door opens. [05:57] is wide open. And Vicky was 100% sure that she had closed it when she left for work? Well, here's the thing. I don't know that it necessarily matters either way, right? You know, sometimes we all get in our like routine. And I mean, how many times have you like driven home and like, I can't like tell you. I have no idea how I got here. Yeah, it's like muscle memory. Like you're just kind of in autopilot. Right. But there's something here that makes me think she didn't leave it open the whole time. Because according to Rod Guajardo's reporting in the Daily Journal,

[06:27] motor mechanism thing is [06:29] On. [06:30] So if she'd accidentally left the garage door open when she left for work, that light would be off. Exactly. OK, so the door to the house is unlocked and Vicki goes inside calling out Lee's name. But her heart drops when she sees blood pooled on the floor and spattered on the hallway walls. [06:54] She runs through the house, yelling at the top of her lungs for her daughter and checking every place she can think of. I mean, she's opening up closets, yanking blankets back, hoping against hope that she'll find Lee. But it is like she vanished into thin air. And so finally, around 9 a.m., Vicky calls 911 to report Lee missing. [07:17] police hurry out to the house right away. And this area, Tupelo, is considered a safe place. And in West Tupelo, where Lee and Vicky live, people don't even lock their doors. Like a child going missing is so shocking that a detective, this man named Bart Aguirre, tells the Open podcast that he's actually interrupted right in the middle of teaching a fingerprinting class so he can be told about what's happened. Like, that's how serious everyone is taking this right away. [07:47] Bart himself is one of the first officers on the scene, and right away he notices the house isn't messed up. [07:57] And there's no sign of forced entry. Like those are the things that are sticking out to an investigator.

[08:03] Bart and the other police find blood pooled on the carpet outside Lee's bedroom, and it's still wet. [08:11] They also find blood spatter and some strands of hair sticking on a doorframe. So Lee had to have hit her head or her head was hit on the doorframe somehow or something? Yeah, well, that's police's working theory kind of at this point, that whatever happened here happened inside the house. And the blood on the doorframe basically supports that, right? Right. [08:34] And I don't know if they're thinking she got, like, carried. I mean, she could have hit her head when she was walking, when she was being carried, when she's unconscious. Like, there are so many, like, unanswered questions, even though they have blood in the house. Now, in the main bathroom, the countertop is smeared with what looks like a pink substance, almost as if someone was trying to do a quick cleanup of yet even more blood. [09:04] later. [09:05] There's also a trail of more blood going from the hallway through the living room and towards the back door of the house. Was the back door unlocked? Well, nothing in my research says one way or the other. They don't specifically talk about the back door. Remember, the other door in the house was unlocked. That's how Vicki just came back in and noticed that was unlocked. But I don't for sure know about that back door. [09:28] But according to Detective Bart, here's the important piece is Vicki tells police that the doors were locked when she left to go to work. So even though I said earlier that it was a safe neighborhood and it was common for people to leave their doors unlocked, Vicki insists that she didn't do that on this day that she left her daughter home alone. Which I totally get. Like, even when I was that age and my parents would leave me home alone, we lived in the middle of nowhere, knew all of our neighbors super well and again, rarely locked our doors.

[09:58] they would still lock me in if they were leaving me alone, even just for a couple of hours. Right. So this is definitely sticking out to Vicky and again, to police. [10:09] Now, when Vicky leads the police to Lee's bedroom, that's where they make even more disturbing discoveries. [10:19] For decades, some cold cases have been reduced to files in a cabinet, but not anymore. I'm Ashley Flowers, and me and my team on the deck have been traveling across the country to report on these forgotten cases. And in some instances, it's resulted in these cases being solved after decades. [10:39] Join me every Wednesday as we revive these stories one card at a time. Listen to The Deck now, wherever you get your podcasts. [10:50] In her room, Lee's shoes, reading glasses, a sleeping bag, and a new pair of underwear she got for her birthday are all missing. But it's worth noting that the matching bra that came with the underwear as part of a set was still there, and her bloody nightgown is crumpled in a laundry basket. [11:19] down onto it, if that makes sense. So police are thinking that Lee was injured somewhere above her neck. Like maybe again, we talked about that doorframe. Maybe she hit her head on that door frame where they found the blood. Maybe she was hit over the head. Maybe something else happened. Maybe she was cut. They don't know. But just based on like the drop pattern, they know that the droplets came from above, which also makes me think that she could have likely been in an upright

[11:49] or still conscious the first time her head was hit. Right, right. So you mentioned a lot of blood, but [11:55] How much are we talking like definitely a homicide amount or? Well, it's impossible to say 100 percent if Lee is dead or alive based on what's at the scene. [12:07] Detective Bart says it doesn't look like enough that they can automatically assume she's dead, but that doesn't mean there isn't more blood somewhere else. Right. And you mentioned earlier that someone may have been trying to clean up blood in the bathroom with that. [12:20] like pink smear on the counter. Right, right. Did they ever find something like a bloody washcloth or, you know, paper towels in the trash can, something like that? No, no. Right. So like we're we're thinking someone might have cleaned up. We're thinking there might be more blood, but there's nothing there to prove that. [12:37] Now, at this point, police are operating with this super narrow time frame, which under normal circumstances could be really helpful for tracking Lee and bringing her home safe. Right. But because of Hurricane Andrew, these aren't normal circumstances. And right from the very beginning, the weather is a big problem. [12:58] obstacle in this case. [13:01] The wind and all the rain are so bad that the bloodhounds Tupelo police bring in that morning can't catch a scent anywhere. They're all over this field and ditched near the house. But as their handler tells law enforcement, either the weather is messing with the bloodhounds ability to pick up a trail or Lee was just never out there. There is no trail to pick up. There is no trail to find. Right. Yeah. And again, there's just no way to tell what happened without more evidence. Mm hmm.

[13:30] The blood from the house is eventually sent off to be analyzed at the Mississippi State Crime Lab. And over the next 13 days, the search for Lee stays in high gear with every resource in Tupelo working around the clock to try and bring her home. [13:46] Now, as they continue to process some of the evidence, they realize that the bloody scissors they found on top of the fridge actually turn out to be rusty. So what they thought was blood is actually not blood at all. But the other evidence at the scene, all of that blood kind of confirms what everyone's already suspecting. [14:16] all came from the same person. And that person was someone with type O blood. Was that what Lee had? So there's this article that says Lee's either type O or type A. But I heard on the Open podcast, which came out after that, that Lee is type O. [14:35] Oh, so it did seem weird that there was that inconsistency or discrepancy. But that original article that said ORA was published in 97. The podcast came out in 2017. So I'm thinking it's one of those things that, you know, as more time passes, you know, information gets nailed down a little bit better. The original article was going off of what was available at the time. Right, right. But I mean, without knowing the original source for that article, I mean, I can't even say for sure.

[15:00] Now, since this is back in the days when DNA testing was still kind of just like getting off the ground, it was still very new. The most definite answer police can take from all of this is like, again, it's one person and it could be Lee and it probably is likely Lee. [15:18] As the search continues, Lee's dad, Donald, finally gets leave from the military and hurries down to Tupelo on September 4, 1992, to help search. [15:31] Police, some on foot, others on horseback, all join with tons of volunteers to scour an 80-acre area around Lee's house. I mean, they have helicopters that are looking from the air, a special cadaver dog comes in, and the FBI even gets involved. Like, you name it, they are trying it. And it feels like the whole city is pulling together in their search for answers. [16:01] her or where Lee might be. [16:03] But then, just as the trail seems like it's going cold, a shocking development raises a ton of new questions. [16:11] On September 9th, 92, this is 13 days after Lee vanished, her mom, Vicki, gets this strange package in the mail. And inside the package are Lee's missing reading glasses. [16:30] According to the investigative podcast 13, the glasses come to the house in an envelope that's addressed to B. Yarborough with the home's street address misspelled. So the home is on Honey Locust, H-O-N-E-Y, but this was spelled H-O-N-Y.

[16:52] Okay, but who's Bea Yarbrough? Oh, so that is Lee's stepdad, Barney Yarbrough. Oh, but here is one of the things that's so strange about this. Barney, like I said, remember, he moved out. He hadn't lived with Lee and Vicki in over a month. And the other thing that I find really weird is that. [17:12] There's nothing else in this package. There's no ransom note. There's no list of demands. It's just the glasses. It is just the glasses. So this is nothing that you'd expect from like a kidnapping. Right. Now, I mean, Vicky is taking this as a sign of hope that Lee is still alive somewhere. And she actually takes to the media to thank whoever sent them. But [17:38] The police aren't so sure, though. They want to figure out, like... [17:42] the real intentions of whoever sent this. And to do that, they have to find out who actually sent this. So they send the envelope to the Mississippi State Crime Lab down in Jackson for DNA testing, for like a handwriting analysis, hoping that maybe the experts with their like advanced technology, be able to give them a little bit of information. Right. And while they're waiting for all of the results to come back. [18:04] What they also do is the Tupelo police decide to actually trace where the package was postmarked. And they trace the glasses to the town of Booneville, Mississippi, which is about a half an hour north of Tupelo. [18:20] Now, at first, they're really hopeful because just four days before Vicky got the glasses, there was actually a tip about Lee's whereabouts that came in from Boonville. So, like, this is the best lead they've had. There could really be a connection there. Someone's saying they see her there. The glasses are postmarked there. This is feeling like they're on to something.

[18:43] When they look closer at that original tip, according to Ashley Elkins reporting in the Daily Journal, it was actually an employee at the Boonville McDonald's that called into law enforcement claiming that he saw Lee on September 5th at the drive through. And this witness said they saw her in a blue pickup truck with an older African-American man. He said that Lee looked upset and she looked kind of dirty as though she hadn't showered for a few days. [19:13] you [19:13] By some miracle, police are actually able to track down this truck and this very girl. [19:21] But of course, it isn't Lee. [19:25] Ultimately, that witness sighting and that tip is a dead thing. [19:29] And once the results come back from Jackson about the envelope that carried these glasses, police are even more gutted because there's just nothing left. [19:40] There. [19:41] Like there's no fingerprints. There's no DNA. There's freaking nothing. [19:47] And the problem is, like, none of this feels... [19:50] Like a coincidence or random though, right? Like... [19:53] Clearly, whoever mailed these glasses knew enough about Lee or her family or whatever to know that Barney used to live there. [20:03] But like, maybe not enough that they knew he moved out. Yeah. And I mean, [20:07] Even to that point, like they spelled the street name wrong. So maybe they didn't know him that well, but they knew the general location. I don't know. Yeah, I mean, it's super...

[20:17] Super strange to me. And by the way, it's not like. [20:21] Oh, we didn't get like a good profile or anything like whoever sent this. So this isn't like someone found the glasses and just sent it in as like, again, this isn't a coincidence. This has to be a person related to the case because they found that they used water to like. [20:37] seal the envelope instead of saliva. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And they used water to put all six of the stamps on the envelope. So it's not just someone being like, I found these glasses. I know they belong to this case, but I don't want to get involved. It seems way more pointed than that. Yeah. And at first when I heard six stamps, I was like, that seems excessive. Like it takes one, but it's not talking a letter, right? Like we're talking about actual, like something that's heavier. Like a little parcel. Yeah. Yeah. I have no idea if six was the right amount. Nobody [21:07] knows, but the Clarksdale Press Register reported that it for sure was six stamps on the envelope, whatever that means. Like, I mean, I think we're just looking at like whoever mailed these glasses clearly wanted to ensure that. [21:20] They made it. But seemingly overnight, this... [21:25] like really promising clue turns out to just be a brick wall. And so people around the city start to wonder, what if that was the point of the glasses all along? Like a red herring? Yeah, like a diversion. But you said there aren't any suspects. Like, [21:43] There's no attention to divert from, you know? Well, officially, no, there are no persons of interest. There are no suspects. But according to the local rumor mill, there might be a person closer to Lee that needs to be looked at.

[21:57] Her own mother, Vicki. [21:59] Multiple articles I read and the shows that I listened to about this case mentioned that the people in Tupelo have been suspicious of Vicky, honestly, from like day one. They think she's been too calm, too collected about the whole thing. And generally, they think that she's acting fine. [22:19] Honestly, just totally opposite of how they think a scared mom should behave. Okay, but to be fair, Vicky was in the military, right? She was trained to be calm in crazy situations. She was. And in the interviews that I've read or listened to or whatever, they do acknowledge that. But people still see it as something wrong. [22:40] more sinister than military training kicking in. And the people in town who think this [22:46] They're not alone. [22:50] I recently learned that after working out, performance and recovery come down to what's happening in your blood. Now, I pay a lot more attention to what's happening inside my body. And here's what most people overlook. Training gives your body the stimulus, but your internal environment determines what happens next. Thankfully, function can help you see exactly what's going on under the hood. Things like your glucose, whether your body is burning clean or running on fumes. Your omega-6 to omega-3 ratio, which one is winning the inflammation battle. Your DHEAS, one of the building blocks your body uses to make testosterone. [23:20] one of the first things to quietly decline. When these markers are off, you can do everything right and still feel like you're fighting against yourself. Check in on your health. Function provides over 160 labs for $1 per day and member pricing on MRI and CT scans. Join at functionhealth.com slash crimejunkie or use gift code crimejunkie25 for a $25 credit toward your membership.

[23:41] You see, Lee's dad, Don, Vicky's first ex-husband, is super, [23:48] dubious of Vicki and he makes some really disturbing claims about how she acted in the first couple of weeks after Lee disappeared. He alleges that Vicki misled him about what happened, telling him first that Lee ran away from home. [24:05] In his interviews, both with Open and 13, Dawn says she didn't tell him about the blood in the house until a couple of weeks later. [24:16] Like what? Yeah. He says that's part of why it took him so long to leave Virginia and get to Tupelo. He said he had no idea how how important it was to be there. Yeah. Thought she was a runaway. Yeah. He didn't have the full story. I mean, did he ever talk to the police himself? Like, I trust my husband and I trust a lot of my friends, but I would still want to go to the source to be like, tell me everything. Well, you trust your husband because you then you're still married, right? You have a good relationship. This is what I didn't understand either. [24:46] question that anyone asks him as follow-up like he doesn't clarify one way or the other in interviews if he ever had contact with police before he actually got to Tupelo but he's adamant either way that the very first thing he did once he got to town was then go right to police and it seems like from all the interviews I've seen like that's the first time that he really understands what's happening like the severity of the situation yeah and when we get more background

[25:16] Vicky kept Lee away from him and didn't let them talk very much and he thinks he knows why. [25:23] He believes Vicky was worried that Lee might say too much or tell him things that she wasn't supposed to. What does that mean? Well, he won't say what those things might be. [25:36] And listen, I think we all have to take Don with a little bit of a grain of salt, because just from listening to him, I mean, you can hear in his voice just how much animosity he has towards Vicky. And I mean, listen, co-parenting through divorce and then compounding that with this kind of trauma, it's super messy. [25:57] I do think that we have to at least consider his version of events. [26:02] And when asked what he thinks happened to Lee, this is what Don said on 13th. [26:07] Quote, I believe she was murdered either accidentally or intentionally inside her house. [26:16] Maybe somebody got real mad at her, maybe knocked her against the doorframe, into the kitchen, and she died from it. End quote. [26:27] Now, I do want to be very clear here. Vicky's never been officially named as a suspect, and she's never been charged with a crime related to Lee's disappearance. And like I said, angry ex, living out of state, kind of grain of salt thing. But the people living in the state right there in Tupelo have their own reasons for being suspicious of Vicky, beyond just her being like too chill for their comfort.

[26:57] more in the Daily Journal, Lee reportedly showed up to school with bruises and black eyes. And when pressed about what happened to her face, Lee claimed that she got kicked by a horse. Now, to be fair, like I said, Lee was very into horses. She did ride horses. She spent time at a local stable. So it isn't a totally like [27:17] out of left field kind of thing. I mean, I did all those things growing up too, and there were definitely some times where I [27:25] got pretty banged up, but it wasn't [27:27] all the time, [27:29] And, I mean, I even remember a time you got kicked pretty badly by a horse. Oh, like in the side of the leg. My leg was like four times its normal size. I don't know how I didn't break anything. Yeah. So, I mean, again, it could happen, but it's... [27:44] kind of a rarity, at least in my experience. Well, and that's what I go to, right? So like, you and I have both been hurt by horses. I've been flung off of them. I've been kicked by them. Didn't one of my horse try to like, just rub you off on a tree one time while we were? Yeah, I got like, we were riding in our bathing suits and I got bucked off. Naturally. Yeah, I got bucked off your horse. And like, I hit like a brand. I mean, it was a whole thing. My bathing suit ripped. But this is what I'm saying is like, we have been injured by horses a lot. [28:14] Neither was I. Not that that can't happen. But I think that it's it's more rare to have your face be injured. And then more than that, it's really rare to have that happen over and over for that to be your excuse more than once, I think, is a little bit of a red flag and something that for sure a reason I can see why people would be taking notice in her schools.

[28:36] Now, just putting this aside, though, like beyond... [28:39] the bruises and the black eyes or whatever, like, [28:43] this isn't the only thing people are going off of. Multiple people interviewed by both Jason Lee Usry and Emma Kent for their shows all shared some pretty disturbing thoughts. [28:55] not anecdotes, but things that they claim to have [28:58] heard about Lee in her home life mixed with things that they'd seen themselves that impacted like how they thought of Lee's home life, what they thought of Lee's home life. And we can start with people further away from her. And as we get closer, honestly, the allegations only get darker. Like, for example, teachers at Lee's school describe Vicky as being a. [29:19] like a pretty strict disciplinarian who maybe doled out spankings beyond what some might consider normal or acceptable. [29:28] Some of Lee's neighbors mentioned she was afraid of her mom and her stepdad and that Barney locked her out of the house as punishment one day. [29:36] One person remembered hearing that when Lee went to summer day camp, she actually freaked out so badly about having to go home that the staff had to call in counselors more than once to calm her down. I'm sorry. Can we pause for a second? Because I have a question. Yeah, what's up? Was any of this ever reported to child protective services or anything? You know, it seems like it would have to be. Yeah, especially when you talk about like multiple counselors coming in more than once for showing up at school with all these like bruises and stuff.

[30:06] So that was the thing I was super curious about as well. I mean, granted, this is early 90s. You know, we're a couple of decades out from that now. But I was like, surely, I mean, her teacher, someone would have had to report. Like, again, I don't know when mandatory reporting started at schools. But like the 90s doesn't feel like that long ago. Right. Right. [30:25] I couldn't find anything official in my research that said... [30:30] like CPS had ever been called or involved with the family or like there had never been formal allegations of abuse as far as I can tell, which is an important distinction to make. [30:41] But I also think it's important to say that there was this classmate that remembers Lee that came to this school support group. And this classmate said that she was super... [30:52] careful to kind of like walk this line between sharing what was going on at home, but not sharing so much that the school would be obligated to report it. I don't even know she was being open and not cagey, but was never quite as open as maybe she felt comfortable being. Yeah, it's almost as if Lee like knew if I say too much, like it's going to affect my home life. Like, again, does she know that because it had before? How did she know? I don't know any of that. Right. And like, [31:22] Like you said before, there was definitely some animosity between her parents. So she may have just been trying to protect her relationship with both of them, really. Yeah, right. And and again, like I I think she was super careful about what she said to authorities. It sounds like she was more open with her friends. Like one of her friends goes even further and claims that Lee directly admitted that Barney whipped her. And another friend hints at rumors that he allegedly abused her sexually.

[31:52] who was one of the few close friends that she had, also said that Lee confided in him about being afraid of Barney. Now, no specific allegations of why she's afraid of Barney, but that she was. Was Barney ever considered a suspect? Well, David Lohr reported that Barney's very cooperative and passes a polygraph test. So he was actually ruled out as a possible person of interest pretty early on. [32:22] Vicky, he was never charged with a crime, never declared like an official person of interest in the case. So with these rumors kind of swirling all over town and pressure mounting to find answers about where Lee might be, the Tupelo police do start to look at Vicky a little bit differently. Like they're hearing everything in town as well. [32:44] Now, I wasn't able to find an exact time frame of when she really, like, was. [32:50] gets on their radar. But I do know that police aren't just basing their interest on town gossip. They are much more interested in Vicky's timeline of events about everything. [33:01] Like basically exactly what happened that morning. That's what they're honing in on that makes them kind of question her. Wait, you said that Vicky left for work around 7.40 that morning and she called 9-1-1 around 9, right after she got back home, right? So here's the thing. Vicky tells police a couple of different versions about what she did that morning. Oh, no.

[33:31] She tells them, yes, I did call 911 as soon as I got home. But then in another version, she tells police, no, she actually called her mother as soon as she got home and found Lee was missing before she called 911. Okay. [33:45] In that version, there's like, [33:48] 15, 20 minutes of unaccounted time between when Vicky got home and when she called the police. And obviously there's like [33:56] No one else who can corroborate her story. And, you know, one of the biggest things police are looking at when they're starting to get these inconsistent stories is they're not even 100 percent sure that Lee was alive when Vicky left for work that morning. Like up till this point, they've had to take Vicky's word for everything. But now that they're starting to question Vicky, they're kind of wondering, like, well, we don't know what we can believe because there's no one to corroborate that story. [34:23] Lee was alive that morning. Right. You almost have to take the time frame that you originally had and go back [34:30] Honestly, who knows how far back to determine what timeline you're even looking for? Yeah. So you can see things are getting really messy. And so far, again, we talked about how limited the physical evidence is. All police have is Vicki's word, which is looking pretty shaky to them after she fails not one. [34:53] Not two, but three polygraph tests. Oh, my God. But Vicki isn't bothered by what police or the people in town have to say about her. She not only maintains her innocence, but she also has a theory of her own about what could have really happened that morning.

[35:17] I recently learned that after working out, performance and recovery come down to what's happening in your blood. Now, I pay a lot more attention to what's happening inside my body. And here's what most people overlook. Training gives your body the stimulus, but your internal environment determines what happens next. Thankfully, function can help you see exactly what's going on under the hood. Things like your glucose, whether your body is burning clean or running on fumes. Your omega-6 to omega-3 ratio, which one is winning the inflammation battle. Your DHEAS, one of the building blocks your body uses to make testosterone. [35:47] and one of the first things to quietly decline. When these markers are off, you can do everything right and still feel like you're fighting against yourself. Check in on your health. Function provides over 160 labs for $1 per day and member pricing on MRI and CT scans. Join at functionhealth.com slash crimejunkie or use gift code crimejunkie25 for a $25 credit toward your membership. [36:08] Vicki is convinced that a man named Oscar Kearns, who a lot of people know as Mike, might have something to do with Lee's disappearance. [36:20] This guy lives about a mile away from their house and teaches Sunday school at the Holy Trinity Lutheran Church where they all go. And he also keeps horses at the same stable where Lee goes. So there is a connection there, right? He's not a total stranger. [36:38] But I get the impression that they're basically casual acquaintances at most, like the kind of people who would say hi at church or if like they passed in the grocery store, like they know. I was going to say, you like nod to them at the grocery store is what I was imagining. Right. Friendly, but not like socializing regularly or anything.

[36:55] According to David Lohr's reporting, Vicky first gets suspicious of him when she notices that Oscar starts to act really weird after Lee goes missing. Weird how? [37:08] He brings a picture of Lee over to the house and gives it to her. [37:14] which I don't know if you're like me, but like I, when I heard this, I wanted to know [37:19] everything about this picture. Yeah, I have so many questions. I have all the questions. What was it? Yeah, like, listen, how did he get it? I have no kids. But I feel like the very first thing I'd be asking is like, why on earth does this grown man have a picture of my missing 13 year old? One year. [37:38] thousand percent yeah so i like did a deep dive trying to find out more like what exactly is this a picture what is this picture right is this a picture she posed for is it like a newspaper clipping i yeah my mind is going wide yeah did he take it like of her but like you know she's walking by and like she had no idea it was taken i don't know to your point was taken by him at all did he clip it out of the newspaper but i don't know because um that david lores in in discovery's [38:08] any more details about this picture but it's something she points to as like all her spidey senses are going off when again this like grown man stranger yeah i like totally imagine it being like a picture he snuck and he has it in like a really pretty frame and it's awful yeah i i don't like any of this and i get why vicky's like f this you can say whatever you want about me like this guy and the other thing that i think is weird too right you know we talked about like how they're casual acquaintances he's never been to their house before so he clearly knows where

[38:38] shows up. Now suddenly he's here with this picture. So, you know, at first Vicky kind of thinks maybe he's just trying to be nice and doesn't know how to do it and not creepy. Yeah. But like if that was all, maybe it wouldn't have stood out to her so much. I mean, I think it still would. Again, not a mom here, but like I think it would have stood out. But there was more because the changes in Oscar's behavior are just kind of a one time thing, because as Vicky realizes, as time goes on, [39:08] looking her in the eyes. [39:10] Every time she sees him after Lee goes missing, it's the same thing. Like Oscar can't make eye contact anymore. And this change feels off to Vicky, like even if she can't put her finger on why. And according to that same article, Vicky also remembers Lee telling her that Oscar had offered to take her to ride his horses. [39:33] So this kind of all boils down to the fact that Vicki is convinced that Lee never would have opened the door for a stranger. Remember, there's no forced entry. She doesn't think she'd open the door for a stranger. But she might for someone that she knew from church or the stable. Exactly. [39:53] Now, even though Vicky's got her suspicions, there's no reason for police to suspect Oscar had anything to do with Lee's disappearance. [40:01] Nothing in my research clarifies when exactly she brings Oscar to police's attention, and there's not a huge amount out there about how exactly the investigation timeline unfolds.

[40:13] By October of 1992, though, despite the evidence at the house, despite Lee's glasses in the mail, all the rumors all over town and the huge search efforts, [40:24] The case is just straight up going cold. [40:28] A long, miserable holiday season passes, and the cloud of Lee's disappearance hangs over Tupelo. [40:34] And I think this is why people, and I'm totally including myself in here, get so obsessed with this case. Because, I mean, on the surface, it seems so bad. [40:44] Solvable, right? [40:46] Like you have this house, which sounds like it's full of evidence. People of interest stand out pretty much right away. And assuming that someone really did snatch her that morning, there's only so far a person can get in less than two hours. I mean, whether Lee was alive or dead. Right. Like you compare this to a case like Bryce's Pizza, where he does just vanish into thin air. [41:09] That seems impossible to solve. [41:11] This one seems like it has so much more evidence and so many avenues to follow to find answers. Yeah. I mean, I specifically like hone in on like the timeline of this. Right. Like if we're if we're to believe Vicky and Vicky is right about that garage door light being open when she got home. [41:28] We're talking her missing a person who took her daughter by like minutes. Yeah. Yeah. Meaning that they still have to be really close by. And yet here they are. [41:37] Watching 1992 turn into 1993 and there have been no arrests, no suspects. There's no weapon. There's no clue about what really happened that day.

[41:50] gradually public interest starts to move on. There's not as much coverage about the case as I would have expected to find, partly because it's the 90s. They have that like 24 hour news cycle like we do today. And also, I think, too, it's because so much else was happening at the same time. I mean, yeah, we have the hurricane that was happening like. [42:11] As this disappearance happened, 92, I think, was an election year, presidential election year. Yeah, big one. The news is definitely going to focus on that nationally. Right. And you got to imagine, right? Like, so election time, we're living it currently. Election time is that like October, November. So right after she goes missing, the news cycle just gets filled. [42:31] So even though people are still kind of gossiping left and right, life just kind of moves on. [42:37] And then, in May of 1993, this is less than nine months after Lee vanished, there's a shocking development. [42:46] Oscar Kearns, Vicki's number one suspect in her own mind, [42:51] is arrested [42:53] and charged with the abduction and rape of a 15-year-old girl in Memphis, Tennessee. According to the Daily Journal, Oscar drove to this girl's house like early one morning, like around 7 a.m., when she was home alone. And he offered to take her to school before taking her into a field and sexually assaulting her. Wait, how far is Memphis, Tennessee from Tupelo, Mississippi?

[43:23] Okay, so had he moved from Tupelo to Memphis? [43:44] She knew him and she trusted him because... [43:48] Guess where they met? Where? Where? [43:50] at the Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in Tupelo. [43:56] No. Yes. That's like such a similar situation to, you know, how Lee knew Oscar. That's my mind is blown. I know. Even when you kind of like line up the two cases, right? Like. [44:08] Again, Oscar. [44:09] is not a suspect in Lee's case, but the similarities are jarring. Even the fact that he went over to this girl's house like super early in the morning. At the same time of day. Yeah, the fact that Lee didn't have any like signs of forced entry because someone is sure that she probably would have opened the door. Not that she would have necessarily gone willingly, but she at least could have opened that door for someone that... For someone she recognized and felt... [44:34] at least comfortable with, if not even safe. Yeah, I mean, the cases are just so similar to me, with the exception that the only thing that doesn't totally add up to me is that this girl, this 15-year-old girl, [44:47] obviously is still alive. She made it. Whereas Lee had happened before, you know, often we talk about predators like escalating, escalating, right. That's not always the case. I think that's something that we get in our heads from like watching too much Netflix or CSI or whatever. That's not always the case. And it could have very well been that again, it's not the actual act of murder is what he's going for. It is this sexual act, but maybe something that,

[45:12] If this was him, maybe something in the sexual act went wrong in Lee's case and... [45:17] things got terribly out of control. And he had to do something [45:21] worse. I don't know. I don't know. But I mean, you can see suddenly to everyone, Vicky's theory now doesn't seem so far fetched anymore. Right. Right. News of Oscar's arrest shocks the community. People from the church who knew him are kind of going over every single memory of him, wondering how the heck they could have missed a predator so close to home. And more and more little interactions that seemed [45:46] innocent at the time, take on sinister new angles. Like as people who went to the same church told the podcast 13, at the time, it seemed totally normal that Oscar would talk about leave, right? Like she was everywhere in Tupelo conversation. So back then, Oscar talking to people and swapping rumors he'd heard like [46:09] A rumor, he said that Lee's body had been buried out at a local barn. [46:13] Or the one about how her body was actually right there in the church basement. [46:19] the new church basement that had opened construction during Hurricane Andrew. [46:24] Like, [46:25] All of this is starting to set off alarm bells later. [46:30] Oscar eventually pleads guilty to the rape and kidnapping of the young girl in Tennessee, and he's sentenced to 24 years in prison with a 16-year suspended sentence. I mean, this has to put him on police's radar for Lee's case, right? Well, it does. So I read in William Moore's Daily Journal article that police try and get Oscar to cooperate during what the piece calls the initial investigation. But he's not.

[46:57] It doesn't exactly specify when that is. Yeah, like what is that time period? [47:02] causes the initial versus secondary or something. And it definitely sounds to me like it might be after Oscar's in jail for the rape in Memphis, though, because that same article also says that Oscar kind of toys with the Tupelo law enforcement. He tells them, sure, I'd be happy to take a polygraph test for you if my lawyer says it's okay. And as you can imagine, his lawyer's like, yeah, [47:25] I know that they had to have looked into this a little bit because I know a search came up negative out at that barn. Again, remember I talked about Oscar had these like rumors that he liked to talk about. Yeah. They did a search out there. They didn't find anything there. [47:39] But I couldn't find anything definitive about [47:42] Whether or not the church basement was ever really searched or looked into... [47:48] And as far as we can tell, Oscar's gossip is... [47:52] just that it's gossip and unfounded. [47:55] So even though he's a scumbag, Oscar's never been definitively linked to Lee or charged with anything related to her disappearance. [48:05] And his arrest also wasn't enough to take away the public's suspicion about Vicky. Those rumors are still going on. [48:14] And it took over another year after Lee went missing before her ice cold case turned scorching hot. Because on November 5th, 1993, an 18-year-old man named Ray is out on a farm in northwest Monroe County, Mississippi, which is just like catty corner southeast of Tupelo. Now, this guy, Ray, is in one of those soybean fields working the land when he makes a horrifying discovery.

[48:43] There, right in the middle of a field, is [48:47] A human skull. [48:49] According to the Clarksdale Press Register, police only find the skull when they first get out to the soybean field. Just days later, the Monroe County Medical Examiner makes a stunning announcement. [49:00] They say that they've used dental records to identify the skull as belonging. [49:06] to Lee Ochi. Within a day of this hitting the press, police announced that they found the rest of Lee's remains in the same area where her skull was, all about 15 to 30 miles away from where she lived. So as suddenly as it seems like this case might finally be solved, they're like getting closer to a resolution. All that hope comes crashing down. [49:28] because there's an even more shocking announcement. The Monroe County Medical Examiner says they're recanting their ID. - What? - They've made a mistake. - Yep. [49:39] I don't know how many times I've never seen this happen in any of the stories we've covered. But yeah, after they make an official ID, they take it back and say that the bones from the soybean field are not Liocchi. Instead, as the Hattiesburg American reported on November 12th of 93, they actually belonged to an adult woman, not a teenage girl. How does this even happen? And that's what I want to know, too. [50:09] The medical examiner says that, [50:11] A lot of the teeth were actually missing from the skull, which I guess. So it wasn't like a complete comparison. Yeah. So it limited what they could learn from dental records. But like they wouldn't go into any more detail about how exactly the office realized they were wrong, how they got to be so wrong. Like, because just like, you know, like, how does this happen? How can we make sure this never happens again? Exactly. And how does Vicki react to this?

[50:41] The former Tupelo chief of police is actually one of the people who has to break the bad news to Vicky and her parents about the bogus ID. And he sees her reaction as being right along with the lines of what he'd expect from a grieving parent, saying that she was, quote, quite a bit of emotion. [51:01] End quote. Now, it's impossible to say if Vicki's reaction actually changes any minds around the town about whether or not, you know, people think she's guilty. In December of 93, the bones from the soybean field are properly identified as belonging to a 27 year old woman named Pollyanna Sue Keith, who'd been missing since March of 93. [51:24] Now that it is officially not Lee... [51:28] Once again, her case goes wrong. [51:30] cold but it is still open and the mystery of her disappearance still haunts the tupelo police oscar kearns got out of prison in 97 only to go back less than two years later in 99 on a 20-year sentence after being convicted of another rape and kidnap oh my god yeah clearly this guy has a pattern [51:54] He was due to be released last year, but I couldn't find 100% for sure if he's out or if he's still incarcerated. [52:03] Over the years, the physical evidence from Lee's house has been reexamined with better technology. The blood from the crime scene, they like use DNA, is definitely hers. And according to another one of William Moore's articles in The Daily Journal, in 2014, police work with the FBI to develop a comprehensive DNA profile for Lee, and they get it to the missing person section of CODIS.

[52:28] A year later, in 2015, a team of cadaver dogs searches a drainage ditch near Lee's house that happened to be under construction during Hurricane Andrew. But despite a few areas kind of cropping up as points of interest and some digging, [52:42] The search, again, just comes up. [52:44] empty. [52:45] to this day lee o chi is considered a missing person in tupelo mississippi her father dawn believes she's dead but her mother vicky still holds out hope that somehow somewhere in the face of overwhelming odds lee might still be alive either way they deserve to know the truth and above all [53:08] Lee deserves justice. [53:11] If you have any information about the disappearance of Lee Ochi, please call the Tupelo Police Department at [redacted phone] or Crime Stoppers of Northeast Mississippi at 1-800-[redacted phone]. [53:27] 8477. [53:30] you can see all of the pictures and source material for this episode on our website crimejunkiepodcast.com and be sure to check us out on instagram at crimejunkie podcast we'll be back next week with a brand new episode [53:56] Thank you.

[54:14] you [54:14] . [54:15] you [54:16] you [54:20] Crime Junkie is an AudioChuck production. [54:23] What do you think, Chuck? [54:25] Do you approve? [54:29] Okay, crime junkies, you know I absolutely love a twist and a turn, especially when it comes to people who turn out to be someone they're not. That's why I have been obsessed with the podcast Chameleon. Every Thursday, host Josh Dean deep dives into a scam so bizarre, it will leave you wondering, how did they get away with that? It is truly one of my favorite podcasts right now, and I've been listening for years. [54:51] I think you'll love it too. [54:52] Listen to Chameleon wherever you get your podcasts.