1
00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:29,340
What happened that day?

2
00:00:29,340 --> 00:00:32,340
How did the boat get out that far?

3
00:00:32,340 --> 00:00:40,980
Why would no boats notice this unmanned vessel traveling all that distance?

4
00:00:40,980 --> 00:00:45,140
There's just so many things that made no sense.

5
00:00:45,140 --> 00:00:48,460
They won't say homicide, they won't say suicide.

6
00:00:48,460 --> 00:00:54,740
Any reasonable person looks at this and decides, boom, this is not a suicide.

7
00:00:54,740 --> 00:00:56,740
This is a murder.

8
00:01:24,740 --> 00:01:48,380
When we moved up here, Braynton was a pretty small town.

9
00:01:48,380 --> 00:01:54,660
My husband Pat and I were able to purchase a house that was on a river.

10
00:01:54,660 --> 00:01:57,820
And it was a great place to raise the kids.

11
00:01:57,820 --> 00:02:02,900
A big part of my time growing up in Braynton was just being out in the water, fishing some.

12
00:02:02,900 --> 00:02:05,540
I had a good time hanging out.

13
00:02:05,540 --> 00:02:10,500
So there are spots I know I could take my little dinghy and go push it up on shore and

14
00:02:10,500 --> 00:02:19,180
hop out and hang out for a little bit.

15
00:02:19,180 --> 00:02:22,300
My brother Pat and I grew up on the water.

16
00:02:22,300 --> 00:02:23,300
Boats were everywhere.

17
00:02:23,300 --> 00:02:31,220
I mean, we all had boats and we were able to go out all the time.

18
00:02:31,220 --> 00:02:36,620
Pat's boat was a 14-foot stump knocker.

19
00:02:36,620 --> 00:02:39,100
Growing up, Pat really coveted them.

20
00:02:39,100 --> 00:02:42,620
It's like, boy, that would be the boat to have.

21
00:02:42,620 --> 00:02:44,220
Stump knocker is a brand.

22
00:02:44,220 --> 00:02:51,860
It's a flat bottom boat.

23
00:02:51,860 --> 00:02:58,220
Stump knocker was pretty much for the Brayden River, which was extremely shallow.

24
00:02:58,220 --> 00:02:59,220
We would go out and mull it fishing.

25
00:02:59,220 --> 00:03:03,180
It was kind of magical, almost, because you could see a fish take off underwater because

26
00:03:03,180 --> 00:03:05,820
you see its trail glow in the water.

27
00:03:05,820 --> 00:03:08,540
So that was always fun.

28
00:03:08,540 --> 00:03:18,820
It was just a peaceful place to be.

29
00:03:18,820 --> 00:03:26,220
On January 27, 2013, I was going down to my sister's house in Sarasota.

30
00:03:26,220 --> 00:03:34,540
I didn't know what Pat's plans were for the day, but he had numerous outboard motors that

31
00:03:34,540 --> 00:03:38,380
he always wanted to be working on.

32
00:03:38,380 --> 00:03:44,340
Pat wished me a good day, gave me a kiss, and off I went.

33
00:03:44,340 --> 00:03:48,540
I came home that night, 6.30, I think, 7.

34
00:03:48,540 --> 00:03:51,580
And when I got home, Pat wasn't there.

35
00:03:51,580 --> 00:03:57,860
His truck was there, so I thought he was at a neighbor's house.

36
00:03:57,860 --> 00:04:05,140
I called his cell phone, but Pat didn't like to carry a cell phone, so that wasn't a surprise

37
00:04:05,140 --> 00:04:08,820
not to get an answer.

38
00:04:08,820 --> 00:04:11,140
I went outside and looked for him.

39
00:04:11,140 --> 00:04:13,580
I looked at the neighbor's houses.

40
00:04:13,580 --> 00:04:15,420
I didn't see him.

41
00:04:15,420 --> 00:04:17,820
We had a pretty regular routine.

42
00:04:17,820 --> 00:04:23,940
On a Sunday, we considered it a work night, and we kind of started winding down about

43
00:04:23,940 --> 00:04:27,860
7 o'clock, so it was odd that he wasn't home.

44
00:04:27,860 --> 00:04:34,020
I was getting later, and I got more and more nervous.

45
00:04:34,020 --> 00:04:44,500
When I walked out to where our stump knocker was kept, it was not there.

46
00:04:44,500 --> 00:04:50,940
When I realized that the stump knocker was gone, then I realized I needed help.

47
00:04:50,940 --> 00:04:54,660
So I called my son Miles.

48
00:04:54,660 --> 00:04:59,860
I was in Tampa studying my bachelor's degree program, and I told my mom not to worry about

49
00:04:59,860 --> 00:05:00,860
it.

50
00:05:00,860 --> 00:05:05,340
I had spoken to one of my uncles the day prior, and I mentioned that he was going to go take

51
00:05:05,340 --> 00:05:09,700
a boat out for a spin, just to go run some gas through it.

52
00:05:09,700 --> 00:05:10,700
He'll get home.

53
00:05:10,700 --> 00:05:16,420
He's the last person you'd have to worry about being able to find his way home.

54
00:05:16,420 --> 00:05:19,780
And then it got later, and she called again and said he's not back.

55
00:05:19,780 --> 00:05:25,160
I'd known that something was different or out of the ordinary, so I just immediately

56
00:05:25,160 --> 00:05:28,940
left Tampa and drove down to Braydenton.

57
00:05:28,940 --> 00:05:31,860
I called my brother-in-law.

58
00:05:31,860 --> 00:05:34,260
This was probably 11 o'clock at night.

59
00:05:34,260 --> 00:05:38,180
I was kind of silent because I didn't want to ask him to please go out in the boat and

60
00:05:38,180 --> 00:05:43,060
try to find Pat, but he asked, do you want me to?

61
00:05:43,060 --> 00:05:47,660
And I, yes, please.

62
00:05:47,660 --> 00:05:53,300
Their uncles met me at the boat ramp with my boat, so I just jumped on and we started

63
00:05:53,300 --> 00:05:55,300
searching.

64
00:05:55,300 --> 00:05:59,340
We focused on the Brayden River because we knew he was on the Stumpknocker, which is

65
00:05:59,340 --> 00:06:01,900
designed for shallow water.

66
00:06:01,900 --> 00:06:06,100
I think it's highly unlikely that he would take the Stumpknocker into the Manatee River.

67
00:06:06,100 --> 00:06:21,540
Its intended area of use was the Brayden River, and that's where it stayed.

68
00:06:21,540 --> 00:06:26,100
We did the main routes when we didn't find anything on that, then we started to go into

69
00:06:26,100 --> 00:06:35,180
all the small little nooks and crannies and streams.

70
00:06:35,180 --> 00:06:41,020
After 11 p.m. at night, we received a call from Jill Mullins, Patrick Mullins' wife,

71
00:06:41,020 --> 00:06:42,500
that he was missing.

72
00:06:42,500 --> 00:06:44,420
He went out on the boat and didn't return.

73
00:06:44,420 --> 00:06:49,900
At that time, we asked the common missing questions, any problems or anything, they

74
00:06:49,900 --> 00:06:54,420
didn't even know that he had his phone with him, which he did not have his phone with

75
00:06:54,420 --> 00:06:55,420
him.

76
00:06:55,420 --> 00:06:56,420
How was your relationship?

77
00:06:56,420 --> 00:06:59,420
Did you have money troubles?

78
00:06:59,420 --> 00:07:00,980
Do you own a weapon?

79
00:07:00,980 --> 00:07:02,940
Does your husband own a weapon?

80
00:07:02,940 --> 00:07:07,020
They went and checked out a couple of boat bars.

81
00:07:07,020 --> 00:07:12,340
Pat was not a bar person, a boat or otherwise.

82
00:07:12,340 --> 00:07:19,100
We started a search operation with our Marine unit to commit searching for a lost boater

83
00:07:19,100 --> 00:07:22,300
at that point.

84
00:07:22,300 --> 00:07:27,140
We know that Patrick was seen by his neighbors leaving in his boat around three that day,

85
00:07:27,140 --> 00:07:31,740
and we have no indication that any other person was with him.

86
00:07:31,740 --> 00:07:36,620
His boat was a riverboat, so we concentrate on the area of the Brayden River and the Manatee

87
00:07:36,620 --> 00:07:40,820
River.

88
00:07:40,820 --> 00:07:44,700
And then the Coast Guard became involved.

89
00:07:44,700 --> 00:07:50,860
At 2.40 in the morning on January 28th, the Manatee County Sheriff's Office notified us

90
00:07:50,860 --> 00:07:57,460
of Mr. Mullins missing status, whether he was underway on his boat or in the water,

91
00:07:57,460 --> 00:07:59,900
was unknown at that time.

92
00:07:59,900 --> 00:08:03,820
So in the search and rescue case, time is not exactly your friend.

93
00:08:03,820 --> 00:08:09,820
The longer you search, the farther something could drift, and we don't know what exactly

94
00:08:09,820 --> 00:08:17,300
we're looking for, whether it's an upright boat, a capsized boat, or a person in the

95
00:08:17,300 --> 00:08:19,100
water.

96
00:08:19,100 --> 00:08:23,980
Helicopters went over our house in the neighborhood all night long.

97
00:08:23,980 --> 00:08:25,780
I was very worried.

98
00:08:25,780 --> 00:08:29,500
Something was very wrong.

99
00:08:29,500 --> 00:08:36,580
The most obvious thought to me was that Pat had broken down, or he had back problems.

100
00:08:36,580 --> 00:08:39,340
Maybe he'd heard his back or something.

101
00:08:39,340 --> 00:08:45,900
We kind of expected to find him stuck on shore with something broken.

102
00:08:45,900 --> 00:08:49,540
I had to think that it had to be some kind of physical element, because if something

103
00:08:49,540 --> 00:08:53,580
had happened with the boat, it's almost impossible to think that he couldn't fix it and get

104
00:08:53,580 --> 00:09:02,740
home.

105
00:09:02,740 --> 00:09:08,060
The next day after Pat disappeared, the Manatee Sheriff's Office called and said the stump

106
00:09:08,060 --> 00:09:14,660
knocker had been found.

107
00:09:14,660 --> 00:09:17,740
The boat was found northwest of Eggmont Key.

108
00:09:17,740 --> 00:09:23,500
It was in the shipping channel that a lot of these large container ships coming to deliver

109
00:09:23,500 --> 00:09:30,940
goods used, so definitely not where it's supposed to be.

110
00:09:30,940 --> 00:09:35,060
The boat was amazingly far out so far from our house.

111
00:09:35,060 --> 00:09:39,980
I don't see how it could have traveled that far.

112
00:09:39,980 --> 00:09:46,820
His belongings were in the boat, but he wasn't with it.

113
00:09:46,820 --> 00:09:54,180
It had life vests in it, sunglasses and a straw hat, but the anchor was not in the boat

114
00:09:54,180 --> 00:09:56,580
and it was out of gas.

115
00:09:56,580 --> 00:10:01,940
The engine was set to idle, the ignition was on, indicating that it possibly ran dry

116
00:10:01,940 --> 00:10:05,020
when it was in the idle state.

117
00:10:05,020 --> 00:10:10,060
There was no indication of a crime scene, there was no obvious sign of injury or anything

118
00:10:10,060 --> 00:10:12,940
that traumatic that happened.

119
00:10:12,940 --> 00:10:18,180
Could have been a medical event, fell overboard, boat could not have function and he got off

120
00:10:18,180 --> 00:10:19,180
somewhere.

121
00:10:19,180 --> 00:10:23,780
It was unknown at that point.

122
00:10:23,780 --> 00:10:30,860
We did do an in-depth investigation of Pat to try to find out financial, was having problems,

123
00:10:30,860 --> 00:10:34,260
phone records, civilians in communication with.

124
00:10:34,260 --> 00:10:39,500
There was no troubled areas that in his past or problems that we could center on that might

125
00:10:39,500 --> 00:10:44,740
lead us to conclude that he went missing on his own or someone else caused him to go

126
00:10:44,740 --> 00:10:45,740
missing.

127
00:10:45,740 --> 00:10:50,340
We had no idea what happened to Pat.

128
00:10:50,340 --> 00:10:56,420
At the time the boat was found, they ultimately released it back to the family.

129
00:10:56,420 --> 00:10:59,860
We did go and take a look at the boat at first.

130
00:11:00,220 --> 00:11:05,540
Nothing looked out of the ordinary, but we did notice just some kind of light red paint

131
00:11:05,540 --> 00:11:11,900
markings on the side of the boat and that was something that was not there in the past.

132
00:11:11,900 --> 00:11:20,900
It was interesting and something to note, but we didn't know what to think about it.

133
00:11:20,900 --> 00:11:24,620
After the boat was found without my father in it, everyone was still thinking, where

134
00:11:24,620 --> 00:11:27,300
do we go from here, what's next?

135
00:11:27,300 --> 00:11:29,300
Did he get on the land somewhere?

136
00:11:29,300 --> 00:11:31,140
Which island do we not see yet?

137
00:11:31,140 --> 00:11:33,100
What could have happened here?

138
00:11:33,100 --> 00:11:35,100
Just more questions, no answers.

139
00:11:41,100 --> 00:11:44,700
And back to Patrick.

140
00:11:44,700 --> 00:11:49,260
Pat and I were married in 1983.

141
00:11:49,260 --> 00:11:53,460
Pat and I had two children.

142
00:11:53,460 --> 00:12:00,740
Our eldest is Mason and about two years later, Miles came along.

143
00:12:00,740 --> 00:12:07,020
My dad taught fourth grade for 21 or 22 years before he and my mother went and got their

144
00:12:07,020 --> 00:12:10,580
graduate degrees and they both became librarians.

145
00:12:10,580 --> 00:12:15,100
At the high school where he worked, he was really loved and respected by the kids because

146
00:12:15,100 --> 00:12:18,140
he'd cared.

147
00:12:18,140 --> 00:12:24,860
He might have 10 or 12 kids staying until six or seven at night and he would just stay

148
00:12:24,860 --> 00:12:27,500
there and keep the library open.

149
00:12:27,500 --> 00:12:33,260
And he always got the children who needed that little bit extra, the children who didn't

150
00:12:33,260 --> 00:12:37,460
have a father figure in their life.

151
00:12:37,460 --> 00:12:40,620
I have two brothers and two sisters.

152
00:12:40,620 --> 00:12:45,980
We all were so compelled to work on things and tinker and tear them apart and put them

153
00:12:45,980 --> 00:12:49,340
back together.

154
00:12:49,340 --> 00:12:52,500
And Pat was good at all of it.

155
00:12:52,500 --> 00:12:56,020
He was brilliant.

156
00:12:56,020 --> 00:13:02,820
He was very regimented, he was very disciplined, he was very serious first.

157
00:13:02,820 --> 00:13:06,940
He was by the books, he did things the way that they were supposed to be done.

158
00:13:06,940 --> 00:13:08,820
That was kind of him, very cautious.

159
00:13:08,820 --> 00:13:12,940
It's a Coleman table lamp.

160
00:13:12,940 --> 00:13:14,540
Pat was living a good life.

161
00:13:14,540 --> 00:13:26,940
He was vital and he was close to retiring soon and was looking forward to his future.

162
00:13:26,940 --> 00:13:29,940
The family is desperate tonight as a man remains missing.

163
00:13:29,940 --> 00:13:34,300
There's speculation that he may have fallen off that boat long before they found it.

164
00:13:34,300 --> 00:13:38,940
Rescue crews will continue searching even though the danger of hypothermia makes survival

165
00:13:38,940 --> 00:13:42,820
chances slim.

166
00:13:43,100 --> 00:13:47,180
After the boat was found, we continue searching because we're looking for a person in the

167
00:13:47,180 --> 00:13:48,180
water.

168
00:13:48,180 --> 00:13:53,220
When we found the empty boat, we have our best clue so we can kind of backtrack from there

169
00:13:53,220 --> 00:13:58,020
and figure out where the person we're looking for might be.

170
00:13:58,020 --> 00:14:02,900
So looking at where they found the boat, it was about nine miles offshore.

171
00:14:02,900 --> 00:14:07,420
It was essentially open ocean in the Gulf of Mexico.

172
00:14:07,420 --> 00:14:12,780
When we find an unmanned vessel in a location like this, what we're trying to do is figure

173
00:14:12,780 --> 00:14:19,100
out where we think it most likely came from using the surface currents and the wind data.

174
00:14:19,100 --> 00:14:21,340
So we use a method called the reverse drift method.

175
00:14:21,340 --> 00:14:27,900
The wind was out of the east that night and with the tide also pushing offshore, we estimated

176
00:14:27,900 --> 00:14:34,340
that the vessel probably drifted from somewhere in the lower Tampa Bay.

177
00:14:34,340 --> 00:14:38,660
Searching for a person for an extended period of time is definitely challenging.

178
00:14:38,660 --> 00:14:44,900
We certainly don't slow down any of the search efforts once we find an empty boat.

179
00:14:44,900 --> 00:14:53,020
After the stump knocker was found, it was a very long week, waiting to find out if Pat

180
00:14:53,020 --> 00:15:00,820
would be found, hoping that he'd be found alive, but really praying that he would simply be

181
00:15:00,820 --> 00:15:07,540
found because an answer at least is an answer.

182
00:15:08,660 --> 00:15:35,900
After they found the boat and the man was missing, I was fishing every day.

183
00:15:35,900 --> 00:15:43,060
I am a full-time saltwater fishing guide and I was on my way in from a charter and as

184
00:15:43,060 --> 00:15:51,660
we approached Emerson Point, one of my clients said, Captain, Captain, what is that out there?

185
00:15:51,660 --> 00:16:01,460
And I started to see what looked like a body, but I wasn't sure.

186
00:16:01,460 --> 00:16:07,980
So we eased up to him very slowly and then it clicked.

187
00:16:07,980 --> 00:16:12,380
I said, boys, this is that school teacher.

188
00:16:12,380 --> 00:16:15,420
They had found the boat north of Eggmont.

189
00:16:15,420 --> 00:16:25,220
I knew that guy was going to pop up and sure enough, he popped up.

190
00:16:25,220 --> 00:16:32,700
I noticed that he had some type of shirt, blue jeans, belt, one shoe missing, one shoe

191
00:16:32,700 --> 00:16:35,660
off.

192
00:16:35,660 --> 00:16:37,580
Everything was clean as a whistle.

193
00:16:37,580 --> 00:16:44,300
I mean, all the hairs on his arms, his hands, wristwatch, wallet in the pocket, and this

194
00:16:44,300 --> 00:16:46,660
rope was wrapped around him.

195
00:16:46,660 --> 00:16:55,780
It was very well intricately wrapped underarm around the neck, through the chest.

196
00:16:55,780 --> 00:17:01,940
The rope went down the water and there was a little bitty tiny anchor dug into the sand.

197
00:17:01,940 --> 00:17:08,860
I think it was four to six feet of water at the most, complete sand bottom.

198
00:17:08,860 --> 00:17:13,020
I didn't flip him over or touch him in any way, but it was crystal clear water and I

199
00:17:13,020 --> 00:17:17,540
looked and I could see the face and there was no nose or face.

200
00:17:17,540 --> 00:17:19,060
It would just look like spaghetti.

201
00:17:19,060 --> 00:17:22,060
That's the best way I could describe it.

202
00:17:22,060 --> 00:17:32,580
I called the Florida Marine Patrol and they had an agent out there within 40 minutes.

203
00:17:32,580 --> 00:17:40,460
It was February 5th that I got a phone call saying that a body had been found.

204
00:17:40,460 --> 00:17:44,100
That was Pat.

205
00:17:44,100 --> 00:17:47,180
It was horrible.

206
00:17:47,180 --> 00:17:50,700
I was searching all the areas where they actually found him.

207
00:17:50,700 --> 00:17:53,940
That was my area.

208
00:17:53,940 --> 00:17:55,700
I've thought about it a lot.

209
00:17:55,700 --> 00:18:04,860
Did I want to find him?

210
00:18:04,860 --> 00:18:08,300
It's a good thing.

211
00:18:08,300 --> 00:18:14,460
I didn't need to find him.

212
00:18:14,460 --> 00:18:15,460
So I think that was luck.

213
00:18:15,460 --> 00:18:18,500
That was just luck.

214
00:18:18,500 --> 00:18:29,900
I do remember when his body was found, thinking how lucky, how lucky I was to have him in

215
00:18:29,900 --> 00:18:31,540
my life as long as I did.

216
00:18:31,540 --> 00:18:35,900
There's people out there that don't have that.

217
00:18:35,900 --> 00:18:43,700
So that was sad.

218
00:18:43,700 --> 00:18:48,900
Maybe?

219
00:18:48,900 --> 00:18:56,220
Yes.

220
00:18:56,220 --> 00:19:03,140
When we first saw the body, the body was fully clothed with the exception of one shoe with

221
00:19:03,140 --> 00:19:06,820
a rope and anchor tied around it.

222
00:19:06,820 --> 00:19:12,940
The body was in a moderate state of decomposition, consistent with the body being out there for

223
00:19:12,940 --> 00:19:14,580
eight or nine days.

224
00:19:14,580 --> 00:19:18,220
But there's really no way to be able to narrow it down specifically.

225
00:19:18,220 --> 00:19:24,100
It was clear that there had been some kind of severe head trauma.

226
00:19:24,100 --> 00:19:30,540
There were six separate exit perforations on the left side of the skull and then what

227
00:19:30,540 --> 00:19:37,380
appeared to be one larger perforation on the right side.

228
00:19:37,380 --> 00:19:43,580
So this was clearly a pattern of a shotgun with some kind of buckshot.

229
00:19:43,580 --> 00:19:48,620
Gunshot wound came from the right side, definitely from right to left, a little bit upward and

230
00:19:48,620 --> 00:19:55,740
a little bit backward to exit on this side.

231
00:19:55,740 --> 00:19:58,180
In this case, we don't know if it was suicide or homicide.

232
00:19:58,180 --> 00:20:05,500
So we have currently listed in our reports the manner of death is undetermined.

233
00:20:05,500 --> 00:20:08,780
But the arms were not bound up at all.

234
00:20:08,780 --> 00:20:26,900
So I consider the possibility that suicide occurred in this way a very reasonable possibility.

235
00:20:26,900 --> 00:20:35,100
We met at the medical examiner's office and the medical examiner told us that he really

236
00:20:35,100 --> 00:20:38,500
leaned towards suicide.

237
00:20:38,500 --> 00:20:44,620
He said that the ropes would be tied differently if it were a homicide.

238
00:20:44,620 --> 00:20:48,100
I thought, okay, let's look at this.

239
00:20:48,100 --> 00:20:51,620
This is a suicide.

240
00:20:51,620 --> 00:20:59,620
But I couldn't find any reason to think what they were telling me was true.

241
00:20:59,620 --> 00:21:00,620
My name is Lee Williams.

242
00:21:00,620 --> 00:21:05,540
I was an investigative reporter at the Herald Tribune in Sarasota.

243
00:21:05,540 --> 00:21:09,660
The Sheriff's Office said it was a suicide before Pat was even pulled from the water.

244
00:21:09,660 --> 00:21:13,820
And from then on, they just pressured Jill to accept the fact that her husband killed

245
00:21:13,820 --> 00:21:15,740
himself.

246
00:21:15,740 --> 00:21:21,420
When I interviewed law enforcement about this, they tried to get me to buy into the suicide

247
00:21:21,420 --> 00:21:22,540
theory.

248
00:21:22,540 --> 00:21:27,140
They were trying to convince me to leave this one alone because it was a suicide.

249
00:21:27,140 --> 00:21:33,580
And that's probably the best thing for the family.

250
00:21:33,580 --> 00:21:42,980
The police suicide theory was that he tied that rope around himself, tied to this anchor,

251
00:21:42,980 --> 00:21:53,820
positioned himself on the edge of the stump knuckle, shoots himself, went overboard.

252
00:21:53,820 --> 00:21:55,660
How would you get to that outcome?

253
00:21:55,660 --> 00:22:01,060
Or why would you assume a suicide under those circumstances?

254
00:22:01,060 --> 00:22:04,700
It didn't really make any sense to us.

255
00:22:04,700 --> 00:22:12,060
I was really surprised when we learned that Pat died of a shotgun wound to the head.

256
00:22:12,060 --> 00:22:15,140
We never had any guns in our house.

257
00:22:15,140 --> 00:22:20,700
Pat, he didn't really have the interest in them.

258
00:22:20,700 --> 00:22:25,100
The Manatee County Sheriff's Office did a forensic audit of his bank accounts.

259
00:22:25,100 --> 00:22:27,420
He never got the money out to buy a shotgun.

260
00:22:27,420 --> 00:22:30,020
He didn't have any shotgun, never owned one.

261
00:22:30,020 --> 00:22:32,220
Never had any shotgun shells.

262
00:22:32,220 --> 00:22:33,340
They checked local dealers.

263
00:22:33,340 --> 00:22:34,980
I called local gun dealers.

264
00:22:34,980 --> 00:22:37,980
Nobody had sold Pat Molo as a shotgun.

265
00:22:37,980 --> 00:22:44,060
There's also no note or anything found that would lead us up to suicide.

266
00:22:44,060 --> 00:22:48,140
Based on what I think Pat's life was like and his personality, I just don't think that

267
00:22:48,140 --> 00:22:52,660
suicide was an option for him.

268
00:22:52,660 --> 00:22:57,460
Even before he went out on the stump knuckle that day, he bought like, I think it was some

269
00:22:57,460 --> 00:23:01,740
discount welding goggles that he wouldn't need for today and had no plans for.

270
00:23:01,740 --> 00:23:04,380
But it was a good buy, so he bought it for later.

271
00:23:04,380 --> 00:23:06,020
He just had plans for later.

272
00:23:06,020 --> 00:23:10,260
He was excited for the future.

273
00:23:10,260 --> 00:23:13,180
He wanted to be a grandfather so much.

274
00:23:13,180 --> 00:23:16,140
That was big in his mind.

275
00:23:16,140 --> 00:23:19,900
We were going to be celebrating our 30th anniversary that June.

276
00:23:19,900 --> 00:23:27,940
There was just too much positive to say goodbye to the world.

277
00:23:27,940 --> 00:23:32,300
Another thing that didn't make sense is the way the rope was tied on him when he was found

278
00:23:32,300 --> 00:23:38,820
wasn't something that my dad or any boat person would be doing, not wise.

279
00:23:38,820 --> 00:23:42,260
They weren't knots that he would have chosen to use.

280
00:23:43,260 --> 00:23:49,900
I think he would have done it with one good knot if he were to have committed suicide.

281
00:23:49,900 --> 00:23:56,460
I kept hearing from the sheriff's department it was clearly not homicide because Pat's

282
00:23:56,460 --> 00:23:58,660
hands weren't tied.

283
00:23:58,660 --> 00:24:06,100
Well, why would you need to tie hands if perhaps he was killed beforehand?

284
00:24:06,100 --> 00:24:15,300
Pat would need to be unconscious or already gone to be wrapped like that.

285
00:24:15,300 --> 00:24:23,100
I even had the primary detective at one point phone me and asked me to be reasonable that

286
00:24:23,100 --> 00:24:28,980
if somebody were to have killed Pat then they would have taken his wallet.

287
00:24:28,980 --> 00:24:35,580
I don't know why somebody killed my husband, but I don't think Pat was killed for the $8

288
00:24:35,580 --> 00:24:37,580
he had.

289
00:25:05,580 --> 00:25:14,780
I think he was shot with a shotgun, but he wasn't recovered on the boat.

290
00:25:14,780 --> 00:25:18,140
The shotgun wasn't recovered on the boat.

291
00:25:18,140 --> 00:25:25,580
Just the idea of the way that he was wrapped within the ropes sounded really unusual.

292
00:25:25,580 --> 00:25:28,300
It's not something I've seen in a suicide case.

293
00:25:28,300 --> 00:25:29,940
Round the waist, I think.

294
00:25:29,940 --> 00:25:36,260
So we're trying to reconstruct it being a suicide with a grown man tying himself up,

295
00:25:36,260 --> 00:25:41,980
being on the edge of the boat with an anchor tying you down.

296
00:25:41,980 --> 00:25:47,780
And then how do you hold a gun given what we know about the trajectory of the gun?

297
00:25:47,780 --> 00:25:52,060
How would he have sat on the boat to ensure that he went into the water along with the

298
00:25:52,060 --> 00:25:58,460
shotgun while tied to the anchor?

299
00:25:58,460 --> 00:26:03,740
How don't you put the anchor in the water?

300
00:26:03,740 --> 00:26:08,580
So it's pulling pretty good.

301
00:26:08,580 --> 00:26:09,580
Yeah.

302
00:26:09,580 --> 00:26:10,580
Okay.

303
00:26:10,580 --> 00:26:17,820
The angle in this case is unusual and not typical at all for suicide.

304
00:26:17,820 --> 00:26:23,820
Theoretically if this were an 18 inch barrel like in a tactical shotgun, it's heavy and

305
00:26:23,820 --> 00:26:24,820
it's unwieldy.

306
00:26:24,820 --> 00:26:29,020
So you're going to brace it and you're going to brace it up next to the area that you're

307
00:26:29,020 --> 00:26:31,820
going to fire at.

308
00:26:31,820 --> 00:26:37,380
But what's interesting is when we look at the skeleton, there are no black marks on

309
00:26:37,380 --> 00:26:38,380
there.

310
00:26:38,380 --> 00:26:42,100
There would definitely be something if this were a contact wound.

311
00:26:42,100 --> 00:26:46,620
The fact that it's not a contact wound using something that's long barreled like this, it

312
00:26:46,620 --> 00:26:50,580
doesn't make it most likely to have happened that way.

313
00:26:50,580 --> 00:26:54,620
In our experience, most gunshot suicides are contact wounds.

314
00:26:54,620 --> 00:26:59,220
The muzzle of the weapon is placed up right up against the skin at the time it's fired.

315
00:26:59,220 --> 00:27:05,540
But the wound in this particular case, being on the side of the head, I haven't seen one

316
00:27:05,540 --> 00:27:07,540
with a shotgun in that location before.

317
00:27:07,540 --> 00:27:13,380
So if you're holding that, it's going to be coming in right at your jawline here and

318
00:27:13,380 --> 00:27:15,660
not too much at an angle.

319
00:27:15,660 --> 00:27:17,780
It's kind of actually up a bit like this.

320
00:27:17,780 --> 00:27:18,780
Yeah, it's an awkward position.

321
00:27:18,780 --> 00:27:19,780
It's an awkward position.

322
00:27:19,780 --> 00:27:20,780
It's an awkward position.

323
00:27:20,780 --> 00:27:21,780
It's an awkward position.

324
00:27:21,780 --> 00:27:22,780
It's an awkward position.

325
00:27:22,780 --> 00:27:23,780
It's an awkward position.

326
00:27:23,780 --> 00:27:24,780
It's an awkward position.

327
00:27:24,780 --> 00:27:25,780
It's an awkward position.

328
00:27:25,780 --> 00:27:26,780
It's an awkward position.

329
00:27:26,780 --> 00:27:27,780
It's an awkward position.

330
00:27:27,780 --> 00:27:28,780
It's an awkward position.

331
00:27:28,780 --> 00:27:29,780
It's an awkward position.

332
00:27:29,780 --> 00:27:30,780
It's an awkward position.

333
00:27:30,780 --> 00:27:31,780
It's an awkward position.

334
00:27:31,780 --> 00:27:32,780
It's an awkward position.

335
00:27:32,780 --> 00:27:33,780
It's an awkward position.

336
00:27:33,780 --> 00:27:34,780
It's an awkward position.

337
00:27:34,780 --> 00:27:35,780
It's an awkward position.

338
00:27:35,780 --> 00:27:36,780
It's an awkward position.

339
00:27:36,780 --> 00:27:37,780
It's an awkward position.

340
00:27:37,780 --> 00:27:38,780
It's an awkward position.

341
00:27:38,780 --> 00:27:39,780
It's an awkward position.

342
00:27:39,780 --> 00:27:40,780
It's an awkward position.

343
00:27:40,780 --> 00:27:41,780
It's an awkward position.

344
00:27:41,780 --> 00:27:42,780
It's an awkward position.

345
00:27:42,780 --> 00:27:43,780
It's an awkward position.

346
00:27:43,780 --> 00:27:44,780
It's an awkward position.

347
00:27:44,780 --> 00:27:45,780
It's an awkward position.

348
00:27:45,780 --> 00:27:46,780
It's an awkward position.

349
00:27:46,780 --> 00:27:53,780
After the body was found, we did go back to Patrick's boat.

350
00:27:53,780 --> 00:27:56,780
And we did aluminum testing on it for blood spatter.

351
00:27:56,780 --> 00:28:06,780
Unfortunately, we didn't get any blood spatter.

352
00:28:06,780 --> 00:28:08,780
Whatever happened, maybe blood didn't get on the boat.

353
00:28:08,780 --> 00:28:10,780
It was undetermined at that point.

354
00:28:10,780 --> 00:28:14,060
of information to make a sound conclusion on it.

355
00:28:19,420 --> 00:28:22,220
I still can't get over it, even as we stood there,

356
00:28:22,220 --> 00:28:24,420
and it was a very still day out on the water.

357
00:28:24,420 --> 00:28:27,460
There wasn't much of a breeze, but there was a breeze.

358
00:28:27,460 --> 00:28:31,620
And that breeze and the amount of spray

359
00:28:31,620 --> 00:28:34,500
from the type of trauma that occurred

360
00:28:34,500 --> 00:28:37,900
from that kind of projectile, it's very challenging,

361
00:28:37,900 --> 00:28:40,740
even when you try to do something like this.

362
00:28:40,740 --> 00:28:42,780
To not leave any trace evidence.

363
00:28:45,700 --> 00:28:49,540
Absence of trace evidence, to me,

364
00:28:49,540 --> 00:28:52,100
makes it less likely that it occurred in the boat.

365
00:28:55,020 --> 00:28:56,780
He clearly wasn't killed in that boat.

366
00:28:56,780 --> 00:28:59,500
There's zero biological evidence in there.

367
00:29:00,900 --> 00:29:02,100
So he was killed elsewhere,

368
00:29:02,100 --> 00:29:05,460
which pretty reasonable person would conclude,

369
00:29:05,460 --> 00:29:08,300
was it means that this was not a suicide.

370
00:29:08,300 --> 00:29:09,340
This is a murder.

371
00:29:11,740 --> 00:29:14,260
The thing that I find perplexing

372
00:29:14,260 --> 00:29:15,940
when I looked at the photographs,

373
00:29:15,940 --> 00:29:19,260
is there's absolutely no indication

374
00:29:19,260 --> 00:29:20,860
that there were any scavengers

375
00:29:20,860 --> 00:29:23,220
that did anything to his body

376
00:29:23,220 --> 00:29:25,900
while it was in the water for almost 10 days.

377
00:29:28,580 --> 00:29:31,020
After a gunshot went to the head,

378
00:29:31,020 --> 00:29:33,460
there's so much blood that happens.

379
00:29:37,260 --> 00:29:39,220
Within, you know, just a few minutes,

380
00:29:39,220 --> 00:29:41,820
you start to see some scavenging activity

381
00:29:41,820 --> 00:29:44,420
by something within the water.

382
00:29:44,420 --> 00:29:47,900
We don't see any damage to his hands at all.

383
00:29:50,620 --> 00:29:52,260
When there's an open wound,

384
00:29:52,260 --> 00:29:54,660
sharks can smell blood from a fourth of a mile

385
00:29:54,660 --> 00:29:56,380
to a half a mile away.

386
00:29:56,380 --> 00:30:00,060
And this is an area where there are lots of sharks.

387
00:30:01,620 --> 00:30:03,500
Even around here, there are alligators.

388
00:30:03,500 --> 00:30:06,300
I mean, there's just a lot of stuff in these waters.

389
00:30:10,060 --> 00:30:11,980
So it makes me wonder,

390
00:30:11,980 --> 00:30:15,020
was he really in the water for 10 days?

391
00:30:17,500 --> 00:30:21,020
That makes me question if he was somewhere else

392
00:30:21,020 --> 00:30:24,700
for any amount of days before going into the water.

393
00:30:24,700 --> 00:30:27,100
Maybe he was held somewhere on land.

394
00:30:28,620 --> 00:30:29,620
Who knows?

395
00:30:33,420 --> 00:30:36,020
My personal theory is that he encountered something

396
00:30:36,020 --> 00:30:38,420
on that river that he shouldn't have seen.

397
00:30:39,900 --> 00:30:42,300
Maybe because he went over as a good Samaritan

398
00:30:42,300 --> 00:30:43,900
and wanted to help somebody out.

399
00:30:46,940 --> 00:30:48,260
That makes the most sense

400
00:30:48,260 --> 00:30:49,940
because he was that kind of a guy.

401
00:30:52,220 --> 00:30:56,460
If my dad saw somebody with a boat mechanical issue,

402
00:30:56,460 --> 00:30:58,460
I'm pretty sure he would approach

403
00:30:58,460 --> 00:31:00,260
and try to help them out.

404
00:31:01,940 --> 00:31:03,700
When the boat was found, the engine wasn't neutral

405
00:31:03,700 --> 00:31:05,340
and then the gases run out.

406
00:31:05,340 --> 00:31:08,220
It kind of points to there was a pause

407
00:31:08,260 --> 00:31:09,820
while he was doing something.

408
00:31:11,380 --> 00:31:13,100
My dad would leave the engine running

409
00:31:13,100 --> 00:31:15,580
if it were like a not a long-term stop.

410
00:31:19,420 --> 00:31:20,820
You know, you put the engine in neutral

411
00:31:20,820 --> 00:31:22,100
as you're pulling up to a dock

412
00:31:22,100 --> 00:31:24,820
or if you just want to stop moving to look at something.

413
00:31:27,740 --> 00:31:30,740
In my humble opinion, Pat Mullins saw something out there

414
00:31:30,740 --> 00:31:33,140
in that boat of his that he wasn't supposed to see.

415
00:31:33,860 --> 00:31:35,340
And they killed him for it.

416
00:31:41,540 --> 00:31:42,780
So you'd have to ask yourself

417
00:31:42,780 --> 00:31:44,940
what's worth taking a man's life for?

418
00:31:46,860 --> 00:31:48,940
Probably looking at somebody who was running drugs

419
00:31:48,940 --> 00:31:50,540
or some other type of contraband.

420
00:31:52,740 --> 00:31:54,340
Brainted in the Braden River,

421
00:31:54,340 --> 00:31:56,500
it's a great place to go and recreate,

422
00:31:56,500 --> 00:31:59,700
but you have some people using that river for...

423
00:31:59,820 --> 00:32:00,860
bad purposes.

424
00:32:01,860 --> 00:32:04,460
There's been a lot of motorboat theft.

425
00:32:05,460 --> 00:32:07,860
There are people harvesting fish illegally

426
00:32:07,860 --> 00:32:09,300
and I've heard that there's drugs

427
00:32:09,300 --> 00:32:10,900
that move up and down that river.

428
00:32:12,500 --> 00:32:14,900
Pat's boat was found way out in the bay

429
00:32:14,900 --> 00:32:16,500
and Pat never went out in the bay

430
00:32:16,500 --> 00:32:18,300
in that stump knocker to begin with.

431
00:32:19,500 --> 00:32:21,060
I think whoever murdered him

432
00:32:21,060 --> 00:32:24,300
may have taken the boat out there just to dump it.

433
00:32:24,300 --> 00:32:26,900
So they probably just dumped it to get rid of it.

434
00:32:26,900 --> 00:32:28,660
Or they just could have, you know,

435
00:32:28,660 --> 00:32:31,100
towed it out there and cut the rope.

436
00:32:40,100 --> 00:32:43,300
So we're passing the CSX Railroad Bridge right now

437
00:32:43,300 --> 00:32:46,500
for the stump knocker to end up where it was found.

438
00:32:46,500 --> 00:32:48,500
It had to go past this bridge.

439
00:32:51,500 --> 00:32:53,500
And I do have cameras mounted on there.

440
00:32:53,500 --> 00:32:54,900
I don't know if you can see it,

441
00:32:55,300 --> 00:32:57,500
and I do have cameras mounted on the bridge

442
00:32:57,500 --> 00:33:00,700
that are recording any and all boats that pass through.

443
00:33:00,700 --> 00:33:03,300
It would have been able to capture the stump knocker

444
00:33:03,300 --> 00:33:05,300
and my dad going by

445
00:33:05,300 --> 00:33:07,900
if he did take the stump knocker through here.

446
00:33:09,100 --> 00:33:11,100
So you would know, is he by himself?

447
00:33:11,100 --> 00:33:13,100
Is he with a friend?

448
00:33:13,100 --> 00:33:14,900
Is he towing a boat?

449
00:33:16,300 --> 00:33:18,100
Is he helping somebody out?

450
00:33:18,100 --> 00:33:19,700
Is somebody towing him?

451
00:33:20,300 --> 00:33:22,300
We were hoping to see just anything.

452
00:33:22,300 --> 00:33:23,900
Would the stump knocker going through there

453
00:33:23,900 --> 00:33:25,900
would have been valuable information?

454
00:33:30,500 --> 00:33:34,300
We obtained the video shortly after this incident happened.

455
00:33:34,300 --> 00:33:37,500
Unfortunately, the CSX personnel

456
00:33:37,500 --> 00:33:40,300
downloaded a corrupt video file.

457
00:33:40,300 --> 00:33:42,100
We went back a second time.

458
00:33:42,100 --> 00:33:44,100
The second time was corrupted.

459
00:33:45,300 --> 00:33:46,700
It was this one.

460
00:33:46,700 --> 00:33:48,700
The second time was corrupted.

461
00:33:49,700 --> 00:33:51,700
It was disappointing.

462
00:33:51,700 --> 00:33:55,700
I was definitely frustrated that that was an immediate dead end

463
00:33:55,700 --> 00:33:58,700
because that footage was so important to us.

464
00:34:03,700 --> 00:34:05,700
It is frustrating.

465
00:34:05,700 --> 00:34:10,700
We have no facts, no answers, just theories.

466
00:34:10,700 --> 00:34:12,700
But I believe he was killed.

467
00:34:12,700 --> 00:34:14,700
Someone killed him.

468
00:34:15,700 --> 00:34:16,700
Who?

469
00:34:16,700 --> 00:34:19,700
You know, it was a million dollar question, I suppose.

470
00:34:21,700 --> 00:34:23,700
At the start of the investigation,

471
00:34:23,700 --> 00:34:26,700
we tried to talk to many people, at least we can.

472
00:34:27,700 --> 00:34:31,700
And Damon Presswood, who's a good friend of Patrick's brother

473
00:34:31,700 --> 00:34:35,700
and knew Patrick, was interviewed multiple times.

474
00:34:35,700 --> 00:34:38,700
Damon is a family friend.

475
00:34:38,700 --> 00:34:40,700
I knew him from Family Get-Sogethers.

476
00:34:40,700 --> 00:34:42,700
Memorial Day, we would meet up with the family

477
00:34:42,700 --> 00:34:45,700
and some extended friends, do a lot of water sports

478
00:34:45,700 --> 00:34:48,700
and just have a good time hanging out.

479
00:34:51,700 --> 00:34:54,700
My father was not close with Damon.

480
00:34:54,700 --> 00:34:57,700
He was connected to my family through my uncle.

481
00:34:58,700 --> 00:35:02,700
I met Damon in 89 or 90.

482
00:35:02,700 --> 00:35:04,700
And we became fast friends.

483
00:35:04,700 --> 00:35:06,700
He owned his own restaurant for a while.

484
00:35:06,700 --> 00:35:08,700
And the town's the chef.

485
00:35:08,700 --> 00:35:10,700
Damon was a sweetheart.

486
00:35:10,700 --> 00:35:13,700
You know, I met him, I was probably about 12 years old.

487
00:35:13,700 --> 00:35:15,700
He was a couple years older than me.

488
00:35:15,700 --> 00:35:21,700
And he was just a likable, dependable, admirable guy.

489
00:35:23,700 --> 00:35:26,700
But after the past disappearance, Damon's behavior

490
00:35:26,700 --> 00:35:29,700
quickly became markedly different.

491
00:35:31,700 --> 00:35:37,700
Damon was very upset when Pat was missing and presumed dead.

492
00:35:37,700 --> 00:35:40,700
Almost disproportionately so.

493
00:35:40,700 --> 00:35:44,700
He would break into tears and then uncontrollable sobbing.

494
00:35:44,700 --> 00:35:47,700
He would come to the house sometimes, you know, early on.

495
00:35:47,700 --> 00:35:50,700
I don't think I'd ever seen that side of him before.

496
00:35:52,700 --> 00:35:57,700
After Pat had died, Damon told me how so many times

497
00:35:57,700 --> 00:36:00,700
he would go and look out along the Manatee River

498
00:36:00,700 --> 00:36:04,700
and cry and sob for hours.

499
00:36:08,700 --> 00:36:10,700
You know, he knew my dad.

500
00:36:10,700 --> 00:36:14,700
They had known each other, but not like a long time close friend

501
00:36:14,700 --> 00:36:17,700
that you would expect that type of reaction.

502
00:36:20,700 --> 00:36:24,700
Damon was just kind of off the rails, constantly asking,

503
00:36:24,700 --> 00:36:27,700
you know, if something happened, would you still be my friend?

504
00:36:27,700 --> 00:36:30,700
Could I count on you being there?

505
00:36:30,700 --> 00:36:34,700
None of us really knew exactly why.

506
00:36:37,700 --> 00:36:39,700
Pat was killed in January.

507
00:36:39,700 --> 00:36:42,700
My wife and I, and everyone else for that matter,

508
00:36:42,700 --> 00:36:46,700
we all noticed that he had a mental breakdown every January,

509
00:36:46,700 --> 00:36:49,700
like clockwork after Pat's death.

510
00:36:55,700 --> 00:36:58,700
It gives you an unsettled feeling

511
00:36:58,700 --> 00:37:03,700
that he knew more than he had ever told.

512
00:37:04,700 --> 00:37:09,700
Eventually, Damon intimated that he'd been using crystal meth.

513
00:37:09,700 --> 00:37:13,700
Mark's a psychiatrist, and he's like, we got to keep an eye on him.

514
00:37:13,700 --> 00:37:16,700
My job is to pay attention to behavior.

515
00:37:16,700 --> 00:37:20,700
He got more and more paranoid, impulsive,

516
00:37:20,700 --> 00:37:24,700
and there were episodes of extreme erratic behavior

517
00:37:24,700 --> 00:37:26,700
that concerned us all.

518
00:37:26,700 --> 00:37:30,700
The Memorial Day, after my dad had passed,

519
00:37:30,700 --> 00:37:33,700
the family and some extended friends got together,

520
00:37:33,700 --> 00:37:39,700
and Damon did come out, and I saw Damon tie a rope to his dog

521
00:37:39,700 --> 00:37:43,700
and then tie that rope around himself.

522
00:37:49,700 --> 00:37:54,700
It was in the exact manner that it was on Pat's body.

523
00:37:54,700 --> 00:37:59,700
That was the first time that I saw Damon,

524
00:37:59,700 --> 00:38:02,700
and it was extremely troubling.

525
00:38:02,700 --> 00:38:05,700
The nautical rope was the thing that was disturbing.

526
00:38:05,700 --> 00:38:11,700
Tied around your waist, we're just beside ourselves, actually.

527
00:38:11,700 --> 00:38:15,700
At the time, we actually confronted him about it,

528
00:38:15,700 --> 00:38:18,700
like, hey, you know, what's going on?

529
00:38:18,700 --> 00:38:21,700
Acting weird. He didn't give any explanation.

530
00:38:22,700 --> 00:38:29,700
There's another thing that started to tie him a little more intimately

531
00:38:29,700 --> 00:38:31,700
with the case.

532
00:38:31,700 --> 00:38:36,700
After the boat was found, I had seen on the side of the stunt knocker

533
00:38:36,700 --> 00:38:39,700
red paint markings on the side of the boat.

534
00:38:39,700 --> 00:38:45,700
And then we realized Damon's boat has a red stripe on it.

535
00:38:45,700 --> 00:38:52,700
And Damon lived where he would put his boat in,

536
00:38:52,700 --> 00:38:56,700
in the Manatee River, kind of close to the opening into Tampa Bay.

537
00:38:56,700 --> 00:39:02,700
That area is where Pat's body was found.

538
00:39:02,700 --> 00:39:08,700
With his erratic behavior, the red paint did start to tie Damon

539
00:39:08,700 --> 00:39:10,700
potentially into the picture.

540
00:39:10,700 --> 00:39:13,700
That was just something that was like, you know,

541
00:39:13,700 --> 00:39:16,700
we ought to look into this.

542
00:39:16,700 --> 00:39:20,700
The police really wanted to sample Damon's boat,

543
00:39:20,700 --> 00:39:23,700
the thing new was red.

544
00:39:23,700 --> 00:39:27,700
And they were declined by Damon.

545
00:39:27,700 --> 00:39:33,700
He denied to us being involved or knowing anything about what happened to Pat.

546
00:39:33,700 --> 00:39:36,700
He got to the point, eventually, he stopped talking to us.

547
00:39:36,700 --> 00:39:41,700
But we didn't have information to go further on if he was involved or not,

548
00:39:41,700 --> 00:39:43,700
we just had any witnesses.

549
00:39:43,700 --> 00:39:45,700
And that's just where it stopped.

550
00:39:45,700 --> 00:39:49,700
And there was no further efforts put towards talking to Damon

551
00:39:49,700 --> 00:39:55,700
or being able to get a paint ship from his boat.

552
00:39:55,700 --> 00:39:59,700
Damon died April 5, 2017.

553
00:39:59,700 --> 00:40:03,700
It was about four and a half years after Pat's death.

554
00:40:03,700 --> 00:40:09,700
He had overdosed and it looked like it was meth.

555
00:40:09,700 --> 00:40:14,700
He was 48 years old and it was another trauma

556
00:40:14,700 --> 00:40:22,700
because we were hoping that Damon would tell us he knew something.

557
00:40:22,700 --> 00:40:30,700
After Damon passed away, his daughter did give permission for a paint ship to be taken from his boat

558
00:40:30,700 --> 00:40:35,700
to be tested to see if it's a match to the paint on the side of the stumb knocker.

559
00:40:35,700 --> 00:40:39,700
We thought, you know, this is a ticket, we're getting somewhere.

560
00:40:39,700 --> 00:40:45,700
The feedback we got from the police department was that, yes, it's a match, no, it's not important.

561
00:40:45,700 --> 00:40:49,700
In reading the report that came back, the boat cannot be eliminated

562
00:40:49,700 --> 00:40:52,700
as a possible source of red paint smears on the victim's post.

563
00:40:52,700 --> 00:40:54,700
It's the way they actually word it.

564
00:40:54,700 --> 00:40:56,700
The red paint is a common variety.

565
00:40:56,700 --> 00:41:00,700
We can't say what brand it came from or anything.

566
00:41:00,700 --> 00:41:03,700
Our lab didn't produce that result for us.

567
00:41:03,700 --> 00:41:07,700
They discounted the testing saying that there was a lot of paint

568
00:41:07,700 --> 00:41:12,700
that would be made that year so it was really as good as nothing.

569
00:41:12,700 --> 00:41:16,700
I didn't feel it was as good as nothing.

570
00:41:16,700 --> 00:41:17,700
I think it means something.

571
00:41:17,700 --> 00:41:21,700
I think it's highly unlikely that something else would have rubbed that boat.

572
00:41:21,700 --> 00:41:25,700
That would match the paint on Damon's.

573
00:41:25,700 --> 00:41:32,700
Given Damon's strange behavior, given his obsession with Pat's death,

574
00:41:32,700 --> 00:41:39,700
I feel that Damon is aware of what happened to Pat.

575
00:41:42,700 --> 00:41:46,700
There are some theories about the ways that my dad would have interacted with Damon

576
00:41:46,700 --> 00:41:51,700
that could have ended up with my dad being murdered.

577
00:41:51,700 --> 00:41:55,700
Maybe he's driving along and sees Damon's boat floating with the engine up

578
00:41:55,700 --> 00:42:00,700
and he would have gone straight to it to aid.

579
00:42:00,700 --> 00:42:03,700
I don't even know if Damon had the boat out.

580
00:42:03,700 --> 00:42:08,700
Maybe somebody else had his boat out.

581
00:42:08,700 --> 00:42:12,700
I don't have a scenario that puts all this together.

582
00:42:12,700 --> 00:42:15,700
I guess anything's possible.

583
00:42:23,700 --> 00:42:28,700
Based on our investigation, we have more questions and answers to what happened that day.

584
00:42:28,700 --> 00:42:34,700
We wish we could help the family by finding those answers to help them with their closure.

585
00:42:34,700 --> 00:42:38,700
We don't know. That's why it's a death investigation.

586
00:42:38,700 --> 00:42:41,700
We don't know what happened.

587
00:42:41,700 --> 00:42:49,700
Most of the time homicides come to us with background information that suggests there was a reason or motive or something.

588
00:42:49,700 --> 00:42:53,700
Certainly there was no evidence of a robbery that occurred.

589
00:42:53,700 --> 00:42:58,700
Going to the other side, the most important factor in keeping suicide as a consideration

590
00:42:58,700 --> 00:43:06,700
was the unusual rope application on the body that it just was apparently tailored to a potential for self-rapping.

591
00:43:06,700 --> 00:43:10,700
That in our minds kept suicide as a possible consideration as well.

592
00:43:10,700 --> 00:43:16,700
So without being able to really say that homicide was definitely much more likely

593
00:43:16,700 --> 00:43:21,700
or suicide was definitely much more likely, we had to consider that both were still reasonably likely.

594
00:43:21,700 --> 00:43:25,700
That only left us one alternative, is to call it a manner of death undetermined.

595
00:43:33,700 --> 00:43:39,700
I think it was on the first year anniversary that I started doing the flyers

596
00:43:39,700 --> 00:43:44,700
because we weren't getting any closer to an answer.

597
00:43:44,700 --> 00:43:48,700
I have gotten a few phone calls.

598
00:43:51,700 --> 00:43:56,700
I don't think we've gotten anything that has turned out valuable,

599
00:43:56,700 --> 00:44:02,700
but a couple calls have gone into the Sheriff's office as well.

600
00:44:02,700 --> 00:44:07,700
As one of his brothers tells me, Pat would hate this.

601
00:44:07,700 --> 00:44:11,700
He would hate what I'm doing because he was low-key.

602
00:44:11,700 --> 00:44:15,700
He didn't need or like attention.

603
00:44:15,700 --> 00:44:18,700
But Pat didn't need to die.

604
00:44:18,700 --> 00:44:24,700
Whoever did this is a danger to any and everybody.

605
00:44:24,700 --> 00:44:31,700
Nine years later, I feel like someone out there is going to have some answers.

606
00:44:31,700 --> 00:44:34,700
You got to have hope.

607
00:44:34,700 --> 00:44:39,700
You know, we see these cold cases get turned around decades later.

608
00:44:39,700 --> 00:44:42,700
You know, something like that could happen in our lifetime.

609
00:44:42,700 --> 00:44:47,700
My children need to know what happened to their dad.

610
00:44:47,700 --> 00:44:51,700
It's not a pretty story and it doesn't have a conclusion.

611
00:44:51,700 --> 00:44:57,700
We don't have answers, but I am still trying.

612
00:45:17,700 --> 00:45:22,700
I am still trying.

613
00:45:22,700 --> 00:45:27,700
I am still trying.

614
00:45:27,700 --> 00:45:32,700
I am still trying.

615
00:45:32,700 --> 00:45:37,700
I am still trying.

616
00:45:37,700 --> 00:45:42,700
I am still trying.

617
00:45:42,700 --> 00:45:47,700
I am still trying.

618
00:45:47,700 --> 00:45:52,700
I am still trying.

619
00:45:52,700 --> 00:45:57,700
I am still trying.

620
00:45:57,700 --> 00:46:02,700
I am still trying.

621
00:46:02,700 --> 00:46:07,700
I am still trying.

622
00:46:07,700 --> 00:46:12,700
I am still trying.

623
00:46:37,700 --> 00:46:42,700
I am still trying.

624
00:46:42,700 --> 00:46:47,700
I am still trying.

625
00:46:47,700 --> 00:46:52,700
I am still trying.

626
00:46:52,700 --> 00:46:57,700
I am still trying.

627
00:46:57,700 --> 00:47:02,700
I am still trying.

628
00:47:02,700 --> 00:47:07,700
I am still trying.

629
00:47:07,700 --> 00:47:12,700
I am still trying.

630
00:47:12,700 --> 00:47:17,700
I am still trying.

631
00:47:17,700 --> 00:47:22,700
I am still trying.

632
00:47:22,700 --> 00:47:27,700
I am still trying.