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This program is about unsolved mysteries. Whenever possible, the actual family members

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and police officials have participated in recreating the events. What you are about

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to see is not a news broadcast.

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In Mississippi, a hike in the woods ends in tragedy when 17-year-old Norman Latimer is

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shot and killed. The local coroner rules the death of suicide. Norman Latimer's parents

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are convinced that their son was murdered. At a lonely highway rest stop, truck driver

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Dwayne McCorkinville was brutally gunned down in cold blood for $25. Perhaps you can help

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find his killers.

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More than a century ago, a mysterious carpenter arrived at a tiny chapel in Santa Fe, New

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Mexico. He left behind a wondrous legacy, a magnificent spiral staircase, and vanished.

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Was he just an itinerant craftsman, or as the nuns believed, God's answer to their prayers.

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Nileen Marshall disappeared during a picnic seven years ago. She is now 12 and a man who

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claims to be holding her has mailed taunting letters to the authorities.

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Also tonight, a poignant update on our story about a seven-year-old girl who made a solemn

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vow to her sick friend 21 years ago. Thanks to our viewers, Nikki Crowder has finally fulfilled

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her promise and we filmed their joyous reunion. Join me for another edition of Unsolved Mysteries.

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Norman Charles Ladner, a Picayune, Mississippi, was a third child and eldest son in a family

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of seven. He was a senior in high school, a good student, and a skilled craftsman with

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his own workshop in the family barn.

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On August the 21st, 1989, Norman left his parents' country store to go hunting on the

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family farm. It was a muggy summer day that apparently began like any other.

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Norman, you are a property very well. It's fenced on all four sides, even though it's

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122 acres. It has some repastional and about 60 acres of more timber and woods. So he knew

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most every foot of it. He'd walked it a number of times.

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He loved to fish. He loved to hunt. He loved to be among the wild animals, squirrels. He

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would come back so excited when he would see a young deer in the back pasture. It was

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just his fascination and love of being out there where it was peaceful and quiet.

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Norman would always be back by 7 to 7.30 in the afternoon or in the evening without fail

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to help sweep up and mop up the store and restock the coolers. And about 7 o'clock

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up again, he got worried about it because he was very punctual and it was the most

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unusual. You could almost set your clock on him. That's the type of young man he was

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very punctual.

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Norman's not back yet, man. Getting a little worried. Yeah, I went down to the barn. He's

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not there either. But bring the dog and meet me at the farm. We'll go look for him.

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I helped to some degree in the search. But then I decided that it would be best had I

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waited at the store for him. Perhaps if he was lost he could come to the store or if

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he was limping from a snake bite or whatever. He would come to the store first. And I felt

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my place should be there.

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Norman!

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Norman!

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Norman!

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I fell down by him and I felt it. I felt he was cold so I knew he had been dead for a

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while. It's a deep shock and a tragedy to come on by and find your own son. Because

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you could never imagine or think how this could happen or the loss of a child until

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you've experienced the gone through it.

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Just after 10 p.m. the Pearl River County Sheriff's Department cordoned off the death

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scene and began an investigation.

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Power play is the first thing that I normally address in the course of an investigation.

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I ruled it out in this instance because I saw nothing there to indicate that.

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The gun was part like that, right?

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Yes it was. You notice it's been broken in the pan before.

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At first I thought it might have been an accident. In viewing the scene it looked as though he

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might have been in a tree nearby and subsequently fallen out of the tree and the gun discharged

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him.

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After they found him a deputy came to the store and approached the door and he looked

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at me as if trying to find the right words to tell a mother that her son was dead. And

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I said is he dead? And he said yes.

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I can tell you it's the most shattering experience anyone can go through.

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We felt that it was an accident and even when the coroner came back to the store after

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the results of his examination he came up with two devotees and he said he felt that

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it was 90% sure that it was an accidental shooting.

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The case of Norman Ladner became a living nightmare for his parents when the coroner

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heard his findings. He officially ruled their son's death a suicide caused by a close contact

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wound in which the bullet had entered at Norman's right temple and exited at his left.

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Imagine for a moment that you were Norman Ladner's parents. You understand the corner

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to say that your son's death is an accident. This is at best difficult to accept but it

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becomes nearly impossible to accept when you are told it is not an accident after all.

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Their son has committed suicide. It was impossible for it to be a suicide. I knew my son too well.

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He enjoyed and he lived life to the fullest. He was happy. He was outgoing. He was not

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depressed in any way and he had too many things going for him. The results of that autopsy

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is what I base my findings as to believing that it was a self-inflicted wound.

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I think that he went back into an area where he felt comfortable. He enjoyed going and for reasons

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that I don't know, we don't know that he decided to take his life.

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We believe the boy was standing when the shot was fired because of his body position in

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relation to the gun at the sink. They made no attempt to locate the bullet. They never

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finger pointed the gun. They cannot say with any facts that his gun was the weapon that

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he was used to killing. Even with their ruling of suicide, I still believe that it was an

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accident and for several weeks we did nothing about it. Until we started to piece the jigsaw

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together, then we realized that it was definitely not a suicide. As a matter of fact, it definitely

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was not an accident. One particular item in the coroner's report made no sense to the

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ladders. The coroner described a one and a quarter inch long laceration on the very top of

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Norman's head. If Norman had committed suicide, how would he sustain such a wound? The coroner and

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the pathologist found this jagged root at the death scene. They say it was spattered with

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blood and believed the root caused the laceration. We didn't see how that could happen because

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falling straight back, you would hit your head on the side or directly in the back, not up in the

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crown of your head, up in the peak of his head. Because the authorities had never found the bullet

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that killed Norman, the ladders began their own investigation. They dug through the earth in

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the area where their son had fallen. I remember so well the feeling that I had of having to

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sift through the dried particles of brain tissue and blood of my son. We found a bullet that was

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longer than a bullet that Norman's gun would hold. The chamber was not bored out for the length

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of that bullet. And the bullet was intact. It had a slight twist on it and it had a nick on it. And it

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had blood studying, dried blood, and a hair that we examined under the magnifying glass. We have no

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way of knowing where that bullet came from. We don't have any reason to believe that it was the bullet

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that was fired that caused the boy's death. Mainly because we feel that the boy was standing at the time

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the gun was fired. And if that being the case, with the direction of travel that the pathologist says

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the bullet had taken, it would not have been in the ground underneath his head.

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Finding the bullet indicated that our son was not in a standing position when he was killed. The bullet was

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retrieved out of the ground which had, the bullet was embedded about two or two and a half inches in the

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ground. And we came to the conclusion that he was lying on the ground and he was shot by someone in a standing

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position. A state ballistics expert was unable to determine whether the bullet had been fired by Norman's rifle. He

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returned the bullet to the Ladner's but they say it is not the one they found. Three weeks after their son's death, the

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Ladner's went to the coroner's office to question his ruling. According to Mrs. Ladner, a stranger interrupted the

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conversation.

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As we were a distance away, he said, Mrs. Ladner, don't open this case up. You have other children. I suggest you raise them

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for your own good. You'll never find the person that killed your son. And then the man left. My reaction to that

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statement was that it was a warning. That we would experience some type of problems if we would investigate this

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case. But my feeling on this issue is that this was my son and I will not back down under any circumstances.

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Undaunted, Norman's father returned to the area where his son had died.

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Hey, come here.

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300 yards away, he found a strange radio-like device that looked homemade.

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Who's that? I don't know. Come up there.

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We figured we had a piece of evidence of some sort that we must try to find somebody that you wanted to have.

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State authorities felt it was not an important clue, but a neighbor suggested he take it to an ex-narcotics agent living in the

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area. The former DEA agent said that this was a type of devices that drug dealers used to signal aircraft by sending out a low-range signal

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for the proper alignment to drop shipment of drugs.

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Well, that led me to speculate that Norman possibly came upon someone picking up a shipment of drugs on our land.

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And possibly this was the reason he was murdered, that he would have recognized the person or persons.

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I don't think that that's what happened in this case. It's very hard to accept a death period. It's that much harder to accept a suicide.

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It's my feeling that if this case was ruled an accidental death today, they would say nothing else about it.

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What really happened to young Norman Ladner? Authorities continue to stand by the coroner's ruling.

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Norman's parents refuse to believe that their son could have killed himself.

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This stays with you almost constantly, almost 24 hours a day, every waking hour you think about this.

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It's a part of us that's missing, and it's a great deal of strain knowing that he was murdered and nothing has been done to bring his murderers to justice.

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We have to proceed. We will not stop this investigation, no matter what, until it is finished.

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We owe it to our son, and we owe it to our children, we owe it to ourselves, and we owe it to the other people's children out there as well.

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We want to know what happened to our son.

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In 1969, 7-year-old Nikki Crowder was hospitalized in Los Angeles, California to have several tumors removed from her throat.

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There she met 8-year-old Sherita Lynn Hardy.

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Sherita had a rare and dangerous form of cancer.

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I looked up to Sherita because once she was older, and she was there first, so she kind of initiated me of being in a new place, a new atmosphere.

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In the days that followed, a warm and caring friendship blossomed between the two girls.

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There was a bond there because we mattered to one another, we looked out for what went on, and we had something in common, and that was our illnesses itself.

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A few weeks after they met, Sherita underwent several hours of grueling surgery.

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Mommy, is this going to happen to me?

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No, honey, this isn't going to happen to you.

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She has a different type of operation than you're going to have.

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So that's when my mother explained to me that Sherita had had a very, very delicate surgery, and that she wouldn't be able to have kids.

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And I remember feeling like, oh, that was just the worst thing in the world.

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That night, Nikki did her best to comfort her friend.

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I'm sorry you're feeling so bad. Does it hurt?

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I said, you don't have to cry because if I ever have a baby, I said, you can share it with me and we can both be its mommy.

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I said, I don't even name it Sherita after you.

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Don't worry.

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Five weeks later, Nikki was released from the hospital.

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The two friends never saw each other again.

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Today, Nikki is the mother of a beautiful three-year-old girl.

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She wants to christen her daughter Sherita and keep the promise she made in 1969.

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I promise. I'll name her after you.

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A few minutes after Nikki's story aired, we learned that Sherita Lynn Harding was alive and well and living in Oklahoma.

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We immediately contacted Nikki with a good news.

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Just 10 days after our broadcast and more than 21 years after they said goodbye,

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Sherita Lynn Harding and Nikki Crowder were finally reunited at Nikki's home in Los Angeles.

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Oh, my God. I can't believe it.

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It's been a long time.

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I'm so glad to see you. I'm so glad you're alive.

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I don't think Nikki has changed that much.

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She was always caring, giving person.

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It seems like she still is the same.

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She would have to be to try to find me in all these years and be so persistent about it.

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Father in the name of Jesus, watch over this child,

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protect her all of the days of her life.

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On October 20, 1990, Nikki Crowder was finally able to fulfill her promise.

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A child is a gift you can't buy. It's the most perfect gift in the world.

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And it comes from God.

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Nobody should be deprived of that, whether they have it naturally or can share it with somebody.

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And that's something that I wanted to share with Sherita.

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Because of all the joy and strength she gave me, I could give her back something that she missed.

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Lord, bless them even as Godparents cause your spirit to rest upon them.

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Being a Godmother is special to me because I don't have any kids.

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And you know, that's giving me a child of my own that I can share.

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I'm just honored, so I'll try to live up to it as best as I can.

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I'm very happy.

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Very happy that I've had Sherita.

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And now I can go on, and I can go on on a positive note because she's a liar.

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And I just like to say thanks to everybody.

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I christened the Sherita Kennedy Crowder.

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November 12, 1988, Chandler, Oklahoma.

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An anonymous caller reported seeing the body of a man lying beside a phone booth at a highway rest stop.

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At approximately 8 p.m., the Oklahoma Highway Patrol arrived on the scene.

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The man was a man, and he was a man.

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The man had been murdered.

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Coins were scattered about his body.

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The dead man was Dwayne McCorkendale, a 27-year-old truck driver and father of twin girls from Kansas City, Kansas.

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He had been killed by a single shotgun blast, fired a close range into his back.

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The apparent motive? Robbery.

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If Dwayne had been killed in an accident, I could have stood it a lot better.

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It seemed so ironic that he was killed for money when the last thing a trucker will do is carry very much for that very reason.

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Boston to Bakersfield, San Antonio, Seattle.

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Every day, thousands of big rigs travel the highways and back roads of America.

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Though they come from many walks of life, truckers have one thing in common.

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That's double-wavvy, head back to Kansas City, come on back.

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Seemingly, the truckers have a lot of work to do.

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The truckers have a lot of work to do.

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The truckers have a lot of work to do.

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That's double-wavvy, head back to Kansas City, come on back.

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CB Radio's their lifeline to the rest of the world.

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Well, I have a two-baby girl waiting for me back there.

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But for Dwayne McCorkendale, an idle conversation over the airwaves may have signed his death warrant.

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Dwayne's final run began like any other.

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On November 10, 1988, he left Detroit, Michigan, en route to Oklahoma City.

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McCorkendale made a regular run bringing parts to an Oklahoma City automobile plant.

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We have no reason to believe anything was different that night.

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He enters the turnpike, he's given a ticket with the time on it.

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And through that ticket, we're able to determine that he made no other stops.

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He drove directly from the turnpike gate to the rest area.

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Other truckers reported that at approximately 545 P.M.,

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Dwayne McCorkendale told them he was stopping at the Chandler rest stop to call his wife.

208
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I'm gonna pull over here at this rest area, call the wife, see how things are back at home.

209
00:24:49,440 --> 00:24:51,440
We'll catch you on the other side.

210
00:24:51,440 --> 00:24:53,440
It's double-wavvy, we gone, bye-bye.

211
00:24:53,440 --> 00:24:57,440
We theorize that someone had been listening to him on the CB

212
00:24:57,440 --> 00:25:01,440
and actually followed him into that rest area where perhaps was already there waiting for him.

213
00:25:09,440 --> 00:25:13,440
It looked like he was walking up to the telephone, perhaps counting change out in his hands

214
00:25:13,440 --> 00:25:16,440
and so it was changed there at the base of the phone booth

215
00:25:16,440 --> 00:25:20,440
and was killed as he stepped up to make the call.

216
00:25:27,440 --> 00:25:39,440
Whoever was involved in this killed McCorkendale, just shot him in the back

217
00:25:39,440 --> 00:25:42,440
and he was dead before he hit the ground, it killed him instantly.

218
00:25:42,440 --> 00:25:46,440
Then checked him to see if he had any money on him, any valuables at all.

219
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So people like that are, to us, scary because those type of people in our minds are very likely to do it again

220
00:25:53,440 --> 00:25:56,440
and that's why we've placed so much emphasis on this case.

221
00:25:59,440 --> 00:26:04,440
Investigators determined that the only items missing were Dwayne's keys and his wallet.

222
00:26:06,440 --> 00:26:10,440
They estimate that the killer's take was no more than $25.

223
00:26:12,440 --> 00:26:16,440
Being killed for that little money seems ridiculous,

224
00:26:17,440 --> 00:26:21,440
especially when I know that if they had come up to him,

225
00:26:23,440 --> 00:26:26,440
in any threatening manner, he would have handed it over.

226
00:26:26,440 --> 00:26:33,440
Early on in the investigation, I hate to say we were to dead end but our leads were thin, they were very thin.

227
00:26:33,440 --> 00:26:39,440
One of the things that the agent started doing is he started putting notices in the trucker magazines across the United States

228
00:26:39,440 --> 00:26:41,440
and the call started coming in.

229
00:26:44,440 --> 00:26:49,440
Within days, investigators received reports about a brown Ford Pinto equipped with a CB radio.

230
00:26:50,440 --> 00:26:54,440
Several truckers told of a dangerous game of Captain Mouse.

231
00:26:55,440 --> 00:27:02,440
At the time of the McCorkindale death, we have reports that the Pinto was driving very erratically on the highway,

232
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trying to cut 18-wheelers off.

233
00:27:05,440 --> 00:27:08,440
Hey man, what do you think you're doing? Trying to get somebody hurt out there?

234
00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:13,440
You don't know who you're messing with, good buddy. We'll drive anyway, we won't.

235
00:27:13,440 --> 00:27:17,440
Hey man, don't worry, Billy, come on now, behave right here, you're gonna get somebody hurt.

236
00:27:17,440 --> 00:27:22,440
So we've already killed one trucker and we'll kill another if you stand our way.

237
00:27:22,440 --> 00:27:26,440
And when the truck driver would call him on the CB, they were abusive.

238
00:27:26,440 --> 00:27:33,440
They said that leave us alone or we'll do to you what we did to this other trucker.

239
00:27:35,440 --> 00:27:39,440
Three weeks later, authorities received a call from trucker Ed Heitkamp.

240
00:27:39,440 --> 00:27:45,440
He was breaking for lunch at a rest stop when he was approached by a young woman who was acting strangely.

241
00:27:45,440 --> 00:27:51,440
Hey there, how you doing? Let's see if you can let us have something.

242
00:27:51,440 --> 00:27:55,440
She was, well, I hate to say it about her, she looked kind of trashy.

243
00:27:55,440 --> 00:28:00,440
I mean, it looked like she had been on something and she was just awful shaky.

244
00:28:00,440 --> 00:28:04,440
Well, me and my crew, we've been down in Texas visiting some friends.

245
00:28:04,440 --> 00:28:09,440
We're trying to get back to Alabama. Can you help us find the road to get there?

246
00:28:10,440 --> 00:28:15,440
I kind of turned to reach to get a map and next thing she's got her hold in the front half inside the truck.

247
00:28:18,440 --> 00:28:24,440
Well, then she started asking if I could spare some money. She needed to fix awful bad.

248
00:28:24,440 --> 00:28:27,440
So I wasn't about to give her none for that.

249
00:28:27,440 --> 00:28:36,440
And about that time this brown panel pulled up and then she jumped down off the truck and headed for the car and they took off.

250
00:28:37,440 --> 00:28:45,440
The next day, just 13 miles south on the same highway, Dwayne McCorkindale was gunned down.

251
00:28:45,440 --> 00:28:50,440
After I read that article, I thought maybe I'm lucky that I didn't get out of the truck.

252
00:28:50,440 --> 00:28:55,440
Otherwise I might have been the one that would have got shot because they was desperate.

253
00:28:55,440 --> 00:29:01,440
While we have no way of knowing if the pinto was actually involved in this or not, it is without a doubt our strongest lead.

254
00:29:01,440 --> 00:29:08,440
And we have got to locate the pinto and ultimately the people to talk to them to see if nothing else we can eliminate them from this situation.

255
00:29:12,440 --> 00:29:15,440
Dwayne McCorkindale was murdered doing the thing he loved best.

256
00:29:15,440 --> 00:29:21,440
But for him, the freedom of the road ended in one senseless and violent split second.

257
00:29:22,440 --> 00:29:34,440
Having the twins grow up, knowing their father only from pictures has been hard because they see other little girls and boys with their daddies.

258
00:29:34,440 --> 00:29:42,440
And they've asked where their daddy is and we've had to tell them that their daddy's in heaven with Jesus.

259
00:29:42,440 --> 00:29:49,440
Later on, I'm going to have to find a way to tell them what somebody did to them.

260
00:29:52,440 --> 00:30:01,440
When we return, the legend of the miracle staircase in Santa Fe, New Mexico, no one knows who built this mysterious and ethereal structure.

261
00:30:12,440 --> 00:30:17,440
Santa Fe, New Mexico is a city rich in the tradition and lore of the Old West.

262
00:30:17,440 --> 00:30:27,440
A century and a half ago, it was a last outpost along the Santa Fe Trail, a bustling untamed haven for outlaws, gamblers, mavericks and renegades.

263
00:30:27,440 --> 00:30:36,440
In 1852, the Sisters of Loretto, a religious order in Kentucky, dispatched seven nuns to bring religion and education to the frontier.

264
00:30:36,440 --> 00:30:42,440
It was a journey fraught with danger, harsh weather, hostile Indians and disease.

265
00:30:43,440 --> 00:30:53,440
When they were on their way, they were attacked by cholera. One of the Sisters died and one had to return because she was too ill to travel.

266
00:30:53,440 --> 00:30:58,440
So five Sisters continued the trip to the West.

267
00:30:58,440 --> 00:31:00,440
This is an A.

268
00:31:00,440 --> 00:31:06,440
Once in Santa Fe, the Sisters established a school and began making plans to build a chapel.

269
00:31:07,440 --> 00:31:15,440
Finally in April of 1878, the Sisters celebrated the completion of the Chapel of Our Lady of Light. It still stands today.

270
00:31:21,440 --> 00:31:27,440
More than 20 French and Italian stone masons spent five years constructing the magnificent Gothic Chapel.

271
00:31:28,440 --> 00:31:31,440
Our chapel is so splendid.

272
00:31:31,440 --> 00:31:38,440
The Sisters were delighted except for one minor detail. There was no staircase leading to the choir loft.

273
00:31:38,440 --> 00:31:44,440
The Sisters finally had their chapel, but no means of ascending to the music chamber.

274
00:31:45,440 --> 00:31:51,440
Many of the lofts of early churches in New Mexico had no staircases.

275
00:31:51,440 --> 00:31:56,440
They simply leaned a ladder up and climbed the ladder and sang.

276
00:31:56,440 --> 00:32:03,440
But the Sisters couldn't climb a ladder in their long robes, so they needed a staircase.

277
00:32:03,440 --> 00:32:09,440
A conventional stairway was not feasible as it would require the removal of too many seats.

278
00:32:09,440 --> 00:32:19,440
Some carpenters had come in and looked the situation over, but shook their heads in dismay and said there was just no way.

279
00:32:19,440 --> 00:32:26,440
And so they decided they would not do anything until they made a novena to St. Joseph, the patron of carpenters.

280
00:32:29,440 --> 00:32:33,440
A novena requires nine days of meditation and regular prayer.

281
00:32:36,440 --> 00:32:39,440
Three days, the Sisters prayed. Nothing happened.

282
00:32:39,440 --> 00:32:45,440
And forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us.

283
00:32:45,440 --> 00:32:50,440
On the ninth and final day of the novena, a stranger arrived at the chapel.

284
00:32:51,440 --> 00:32:52,440
Come in, sir.

285
00:32:53,440 --> 00:32:56,440
Mother Superior, I'm seeking work.

286
00:32:56,440 --> 00:32:58,440
And what is your trade, sir?

287
00:32:58,440 --> 00:33:00,440
I'm a carpenter.

288
00:33:01,440 --> 00:33:05,440
We do have need of a stairway to be built in our chapel, but it's a great...

289
00:33:05,440 --> 00:33:09,440
The Sisters left the stranger a tent, but so many had said it was impossible.

290
00:33:11,440 --> 00:33:14,440
They were hopeful their prayers had been answered.

291
00:33:16,440 --> 00:33:26,440
If the carpenter had a name that has long since been forgotten, according to the legend he carried only three tools, a hammer, a saw and a T-square.

292
00:33:26,440 --> 00:33:30,440
Some say he worked for six months, others say it was more.

293
00:33:30,440 --> 00:33:33,440
When he was finished, he called the nuns together.

294
00:33:33,440 --> 00:33:40,440
You have your staircase, he announced, then he left without being paid and was never heard from again.

295
00:33:51,440 --> 00:33:55,440
The carpenter obviously had to be a very fine carpenter.

296
00:33:55,440 --> 00:34:00,440
He had to be a master carpenter to build the staircase that was built.

297
00:34:00,440 --> 00:34:02,440
Because you see, there's no center support.

298
00:34:02,440 --> 00:34:05,440
This is what makes that staircase so extraordinary.

299
00:34:05,440 --> 00:34:07,440
There is no center post.

300
00:34:08,440 --> 00:34:12,440
It rests by its own geometric balance and design.

301
00:34:13,440 --> 00:34:21,440
It's very steep, 22 feet, going around and around, because it makes two 360 degree turns.

302
00:34:22,440 --> 00:34:32,440
And once again, with no center post, there's a certain springiness when you walk up it and you realize you're climbing a very, very special staircase.

303
00:34:32,440 --> 00:34:41,440
Sisters, I've counted the stairs. There's 33. The exact number of years on Lord Jesus Christ was on this earth.

304
00:34:43,440 --> 00:34:48,440
I never failed to count those steps whenever I go up or come down, and it's still 33.

305
00:34:49,440 --> 00:34:52,440
The sisters planned a feast for the carpenter.

306
00:34:52,440 --> 00:34:58,440
When he failed to appear, they searched the town. The mysterious stranger was missing.

307
00:34:58,440 --> 00:34:59,440
You've seen him around town?

308
00:34:59,440 --> 00:35:07,440
Nobody had seen him. Nobody knew where he slept. Nobody ever fed him.

309
00:35:07,440 --> 00:35:12,440
They made a novena to St. Joseph, the patron of carpenters.

310
00:35:13,440 --> 00:35:17,440
So it's understandable that they would believe St. Joseph did it.

311
00:35:25,440 --> 00:35:29,440
So far as anyone knows, the carpenter never returned to Santa Fe.

312
00:35:32,440 --> 00:35:34,440
The chapel is now a tourist attraction.

313
00:35:34,440 --> 00:35:38,440
Through the years, the mystery surrounding the staircase persisted.

314
00:35:39,440 --> 00:35:45,440
Then in 1965, Oscar Hadweiger, a third-generation master carpenter, visited the chapel.

315
00:35:48,440 --> 00:35:52,440
He went in and he saw the staircase, and of course he was overwhelmed.

316
00:35:52,440 --> 00:35:58,440
Being a builder, any builder is overwhelmed when they see this magnificent piece of carpentry.

317
00:35:59,440 --> 00:36:08,440
And he remembered a story in the family that his grandfather had come to this country and had built a staircase.

318
00:36:08,440 --> 00:36:17,440
Oscar's grandfather, Johann Hadweiger, was a renowned European carpenter who spent two years traveling and working in Colorado and New Mexico.

319
00:36:17,440 --> 00:36:22,440
It was during that two-year period that the spiral staircase was built.

320
00:36:23,440 --> 00:36:26,440
Oscar Hadweiger became obsessed with the staircase.

321
00:36:26,440 --> 00:36:30,440
Over the next ten years, he created ten perfectly-scaled models.

322
00:36:30,440 --> 00:36:35,440
He sent a letter to the sisters, contending that his grandfather had been the builder.

323
00:36:35,440 --> 00:36:38,440
The sisters were skeptical.

324
00:36:38,440 --> 00:36:44,440
The sisters are indeed surprised, shocked at his claim all of a sudden.

325
00:36:44,440 --> 00:36:51,440
And they tell him that perhaps he can't prove this claim, and that if he can't prove it, it might be fraudulent.

326
00:36:52,440 --> 00:36:57,440
They have nothing except their word of mouth that he did it.

327
00:37:00,440 --> 00:37:03,440
I really can't, I don't buy it.

328
00:37:05,440 --> 00:37:09,440
In 1970, Oscar Hadweiger found what he felt was proof.

329
00:37:09,440 --> 00:37:14,440
In a storage room in his sister's home, he came across his grandfather's toolbox.

330
00:37:14,440 --> 00:37:18,440
Inside was a faded sketch of a spiral staircase.

331
00:37:18,440 --> 00:37:22,440
The drawing was an overhead view with 33 steps.

332
00:37:22,440 --> 00:37:26,440
Oscar Hadweiger passed away in 1980.

333
00:37:26,440 --> 00:37:30,440
The sketch was never authenticated and has since disappeared.

334
00:37:30,440 --> 00:37:35,440
All that exists today is this photocopy of the drawing.

335
00:37:35,440 --> 00:37:40,440
As for Johann Hadweiger's tools, they too have disappeared.

336
00:37:43,440 --> 00:37:47,440
Who was a stranger who answered the sisters prayers?

337
00:37:47,440 --> 00:37:51,440
Was it Johann Hadweiger, the European builder?

338
00:37:51,440 --> 00:37:59,440
Or could it have been, as the sisters of Loretto believed 100 years ago, a messenger of God on a sacred mission?

339
00:38:05,440 --> 00:38:12,440
Next, a family's desperate search for their missing daughter, and a man who claims he will never return her.

340
00:38:18,440 --> 00:38:28,440
In 1983, four-year-old Nyleen K. Marshall disappeared while picnicking with family and friends near her home in Montana.

341
00:38:28,440 --> 00:38:34,440
For over seven years, Nyleen's family has been trapped by the agony of not knowing what happened to her.

342
00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:38,440
Nyleen's story is all too familiar.

343
00:38:38,440 --> 00:38:45,440
Every year, thousands of children in the United States disappear, and tragically many of them are never found.

344
00:38:45,440 --> 00:38:48,440
With your help, Nyleen's case may have a different ending.

345
00:38:48,440 --> 00:38:55,440
Two and a half years after she disappeared, authorities received this letter from an anonymous man who claims he has Nyleen.

346
00:38:55,440 --> 00:38:59,440
He writes, she's a sweet little girl.

347
00:38:59,440 --> 00:39:02,440
I realize how much her family must miss her.

348
00:39:02,440 --> 00:39:06,440
I love her and I have her. I just can't let her go.

349
00:39:06,440 --> 00:39:10,440
Please watch carefully. You may know the man who wrote this letter.

350
00:39:10,440 --> 00:39:13,440
You may even know Nyleen K. Marshall.

351
00:39:15,440 --> 00:39:19,440
June 25, 1983, Helena, Montana.

352
00:39:19,440 --> 00:39:24,440
A group of local families were enjoying a picnic in a remote wooded area.

353
00:39:24,440 --> 00:39:31,440
Less than a hundred yards away, Nyleen and several other children were playing on the banks of a shallow creek.

354
00:39:31,440 --> 00:39:35,440
At around 4 p.m., Nyleen vanished.

355
00:39:36,440 --> 00:39:41,440
For ten days, more than 2,800 searchers combed the area.

356
00:39:42,440 --> 00:39:46,440
The dogs weren't successful. The grid search was unsuccessful.

357
00:39:46,440 --> 00:39:53,440
It was just absolutely nothing to indicate if she was even there.

358
00:39:55,440 --> 00:40:00,440
Authorities were baffled. Then, Nyleen's mother learned of a chilling possibility.

359
00:40:02,440 --> 00:40:08,440
Some of the children playing near Nyleen told her they remembered seeing a strange man dressed in a jogging suit.

360
00:40:09,440 --> 00:40:13,440
Two little girls had walked by Nyleen while she was sitting there.

361
00:40:13,440 --> 00:40:16,440
A man stepped out from behind the trees.

362
00:40:16,440 --> 00:40:20,440
The first little girl didn't recognize him as part of the group.

363
00:40:20,440 --> 00:40:25,440
Nyleen was heard by her saying, my brother can run faster than you.

364
00:40:25,440 --> 00:40:28,440
She was still sitting there with her little legs crossed.

365
00:40:28,440 --> 00:40:33,440
A second child, an eight-year-old girl, came by and saw the man.

366
00:40:33,440 --> 00:40:35,440
The man took a step closer to Nyleen.

367
00:40:36,440 --> 00:40:38,440
Have you ever played Follow the Shadow?

368
00:40:38,440 --> 00:40:39,440
What?

369
00:40:39,440 --> 00:40:40,440
Follow the Shadow.

370
00:40:40,440 --> 00:40:44,440
One of the little boys, a six-year-old, said that Nyleen had told him.

371
00:40:44,440 --> 00:40:47,440
The man had told her to follow the shadow.

372
00:40:47,440 --> 00:40:49,440
And they haven't been seen since.

373
00:40:52,440 --> 00:40:56,440
Convinced that Nyleen was abducted, Nancy Marshall and her husband, Kim,

374
00:40:56,440 --> 00:40:59,440
distributed thousands of missing posters across the United States.

375
00:40:59,440 --> 00:41:04,440
They received dozens of reported sightings, but none could be confirmed.

376
00:41:04,440 --> 00:41:11,440
Then on November 27, 1985, the case of Nyleen came out and took a dramatic turn.

377
00:41:11,440 --> 00:41:15,440
The National Center for Missing and Exploited Children received an anonymous

378
00:41:15,440 --> 00:41:20,440
phone call from a man who claimed he had Nyleen.

379
00:41:20,440 --> 00:41:24,440
Two months later, an organization called Child Find of America

380
00:41:24,440 --> 00:41:27,440
received a typewritten letter from the same man.

381
00:41:27,440 --> 00:41:30,440
In the letter, the man claimed that he was raising Nyleen,

382
00:41:30,440 --> 00:41:35,440
but he loved her and had no intention of returning her to her parents.

383
00:41:35,440 --> 00:41:39,440
This man said he was taking good care of her,

384
00:41:39,440 --> 00:41:46,440
but during the same phone conversation or same letter that he would write,

385
00:41:46,440 --> 00:41:53,440
would also make reference to things that he was having Nyleen do,

386
00:41:53,440 --> 00:41:55,440
which would be sexual abuse.

387
00:41:56,440 --> 00:42:01,440
Over the next six months, Child Find of America received two more letters

388
00:42:01,440 --> 00:42:03,440
and another two phone calls.

389
00:42:03,440 --> 00:42:07,440
These phone calls were coming from the Madison, Wisconsin area,

390
00:42:07,440 --> 00:42:10,440
as were letters that he was sending.

391
00:42:10,440 --> 00:42:16,440
The FBI, to my understanding, had actually located the phone booth

392
00:42:16,440 --> 00:42:19,440
that the phone calls were coming from.

393
00:42:19,440 --> 00:42:23,440
Coincidentally, after locating the phone booth, however, the phone calls abruptly stopped.

394
00:42:24,440 --> 00:42:28,440
In his letters, the man reveals a few clues that might help find Nyleen.

395
00:42:28,440 --> 00:42:31,440
He claims that he lives off substantial investments

396
00:42:31,440 --> 00:42:33,440
and that he and Nyleen travel frequently.

397
00:42:36,440 --> 00:42:40,440
I teach her at home and she likes to go with me when I travel.

398
00:42:40,440 --> 00:42:44,440
She would gladly recount to you trips to San Francisco, New York, Oklahoma City,

399
00:42:44,440 --> 00:42:48,440
New Orleans, Nashville, Chicago, Puerto Rico, or Canada.

400
00:42:48,440 --> 00:42:52,440
We were even in Britain for a month last year and she loved it.

401
00:42:52,440 --> 00:42:54,440
Nobody questions passports.

402
00:42:55,440 --> 00:42:59,440
There were numerous leads about Nyleen's sightings all over the United States.

403
00:42:59,440 --> 00:43:01,440
Well, that ties in.

404
00:43:01,440 --> 00:43:07,440
If he is, in fact, traveling, that would account for the sightings from one coast to another coast.

405
00:43:09,440 --> 00:43:13,440
Just last June, authorities received another possible lead in the case.

406
00:43:13,440 --> 00:43:17,440
Nyleen Marshall's uncle saw this composite of a man and woman

407
00:43:17,440 --> 00:43:20,440
wanted for child abduction in another part of the country.

408
00:43:20,440 --> 00:43:23,440
He believes he saw them during the first day of the search for Nyleen.

409
00:43:25,440 --> 00:43:32,440
It's not really all that unusual for a person to remain at the scene of a crime,

410
00:43:32,440 --> 00:43:38,440
get lost in a crowd, and stick around to see what was going to happen next.

411
00:43:41,440 --> 00:43:45,440
I still look for her. I always will.

412
00:43:45,440 --> 00:43:50,440
Every time I'm at an airport, every time I'm at a resort,

413
00:43:50,440 --> 00:43:53,440
every time I'm at an amusement park,

414
00:43:55,440 --> 00:43:58,440
sure, I look like I'm having a good time,

415
00:43:59,440 --> 00:44:04,440
but I'm looking for my child every minute that I'm out.

416
00:44:06,440 --> 00:44:09,440
Today, Nyleen K. Marshall will be 12 years old.

417
00:44:09,440 --> 00:44:12,440
This is a computer-aged photograph of what she may look like.

418
00:44:12,440 --> 00:44:16,440
At the time of her disappearance, she had dark brown hair and blue eyes.

419
00:44:18,440 --> 00:44:23,440
Once again, the anonymous man placed the phone calls from a phone booth in Madison, Wisconsin.

420
00:44:23,440 --> 00:44:27,440
He states that he now calls Nyleen by her middle name, K.

421
00:44:27,440 --> 00:44:31,440
In his letters, he mentions that his parents and younger sister were killed in a car accident

422
00:44:31,440 --> 00:44:34,440
when his sister was nine years old.

423
00:44:43,440 --> 00:44:49,440
Next week on Unsolved Mysteries, in Aurora, Missouri, a prominent citizen is burned to death in her own home.

424
00:44:49,440 --> 00:44:54,440
A young, retarded man named Johnny Wilson confesses to the crime, but later recants.

425
00:44:54,440 --> 00:44:59,440
Two years later, the case takes a bizarre twist when another man confesses to the murder

426
00:44:59,440 --> 00:45:01,440
and says Johnny is innocent.

427
00:45:01,440 --> 00:45:03,440
But Johnny Lee says that he is innocent.

428
00:45:03,440 --> 00:45:05,440
He says that he is innocent.

429
00:45:05,440 --> 00:45:07,440
He says that he is innocent.

430
00:45:07,440 --> 00:45:11,440
Next, when another man confesses to the murder and says Johnny is innocent,

431
00:45:11,440 --> 00:45:15,440
but Johnny Lee Wilson is still behind bars.

432
00:45:15,440 --> 00:45:19,440
Two men in a bar fight over a woman in Edmore, North Dakota.

433
00:45:19,440 --> 00:45:23,440
The next day, one of the combatants, Kenneth Engie, is found dead in his garage.

434
00:45:23,440 --> 00:45:26,440
An accident or murder.

435
00:45:27,440 --> 00:45:29,440
Join me next week.

436
00:45:29,440 --> 00:45:33,440
Perhaps you can help solve a mystery.