0:00

This is a Glassbox Media Podcast.

0:42

Welcome back to Missing. I am Tim here today

0:44

with Lance. Lance, how are you today? I'm

0:47

doing fantastic today, Tim. I hope everyone out there

0:49

who's listening, they're doing as

0:52

fantastic as myself. I

0:54

always love bringing these conversations back

0:56

around with updates. We speak about

0:58

these disappearances or these cold cases,

1:01

and most of the time, hey, they're cold.

1:03

So there's the definition there. We hardly have

1:05

an answer when we're done speaking about it

1:07

the first time around. So it's always great

1:09

to get updates and have old

1:12

friends bring new friends on who have joined

1:14

in the conversation. But Tim, part of the

1:16

conversation is how you're doing. How are you?

1:19

I'm doing great. Thanks a lot for asking. And

1:22

yeah, I am excited to

1:24

introduce this conversation that we

1:26

had with James Wollner and

1:29

Lisa Jo. And they are

1:31

both working diligently to find

1:33

Barbara Cotton. Barbara Cotton

1:36

has been missing from Williston,

1:38

North Dakota since April 11th,

1:40

1981. She

1:43

was 15 years old at the time of

1:45

her disappearance, five-two, about a

1:47

hundred pounds, and was wearing a blouse,

1:49

jeans, and loafers, brown hair,

1:51

and hazel eyes. James does

1:53

a podcast called Dakota Spotlight,

1:56

and that show dug really deep

1:59

into Barbara's. Barbs case and that is

2:01

how he and Lisa Jo met. And

2:04

since that podcast, uh, started

2:06

working on Barbara's case, Lisa

2:08

Jo has really helped with

2:10

research and she runs

2:13

the findbarbcotton.com website. And

2:16

it's, it's really a very informative website.

2:19

And so Lisa Jo joins James in

2:21

this conversation. We did previously speak

2:24

with James about Barb's disappearance about

2:26

two years ago. So check that

2:28

one out. If you haven't already,

2:30

it was the most recent episode

2:32

here on missing. And

2:34

this one kind of picks up

2:36

where the last one left off.

2:38

And anyone with information on Barbara

2:40

Cotton is instructed to contact the

2:42

Williston police department at seven zero

2:44

one five seven seven one two

2:47

one two. You

2:49

can also email Lisa Jo at

2:52

findbarbcotton.com and that's

2:55

[email protected]. All

2:57

right. We're going to take a quick break

2:59

here and we'll be right back with Lisa

3:02

Jo and James. Thanks a lot for listening.

3:08

Before we begin today's episode, you're about

3:10

to hear a word from our sponsors.

3:12

These ads make our show possible. However,

3:14

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by clicking try free at the top

3:43

of the feed. Now a word from

3:46

our sponsors. Tim and Lance here. Lance,

3:48

I got a question for you. Yes,

3:50

sir. Am I the butthead for stealing

3:53

an engagement ring or for ruining an

3:55

entire dog Olympics? Is that something you've

3:57

actually done, Tim? Or are you presenting?

4:00

with a hypothetical scenario. I'm presenting

4:02

you with a hypothetical scenario that's

4:04

based on rslash, which is a

4:06

new podcast that I've been listening

4:09

to. It's fantastic. Tim and you

4:11

know that I love a good

4:13

Reddit scroll, so rslash is my

4:15

kind of show. I think it's

4:17

your kind of show as well,

4:20

and for those who don't know,

4:22

rslash is a hilarious podcast where

4:24

Dabney Bailey uses ridiculous voices and

4:26

emotions to read aloud the week's

4:29

craziest Reddit post. He reenacts

4:31

various Reddit threads covering wild stories

4:33

and secrets, petty revenge, relationships, and

4:35

much more. So if you're looking

4:37

for a daily distraction and a

4:40

laugh, check out rslash wherever you

4:42

get your podcast. Tim, can you

4:44

spell that for me? Sure can

4:46

Lance. That's R-S-L-A-S-H. Welcome

5:00

to the podcast, Lisa Jo and

5:03

James. How are you today? Ben,

5:06

how are you? Doing well. Thanks

5:08

for having me back my second time here.

5:10

Lisa's first time. So thanks so much for

5:12

having us. Yeah, absolutely. We always

5:14

like inviting guests back to give us some

5:16

updates on these stories that come our way

5:19

because that's sort of the whole thing, right?

5:21

You have these stories that come up, you

5:23

get involved emotionally, personally, you do a lot

5:25

of work, and you go on and you

5:27

talk about it for like an hour, and

5:30

you want to make sure that you can

5:32

come back and have updates. So welcome back,

5:34

James. And for the first time, Lisa, nice

5:36

to meet you. Nice to meet you. So

5:39

how is it that you two know each

5:41

other? You know, I started this

5:44

season five of my podcast, Go

5:46

to Spotlight, about missing Barbara Cotton,

5:49

and about, and I had

5:51

to re-listen to it here yesterday.

5:53

It's 20 episodes, actually. After

5:56

about five episodes, I

5:58

started getting a lot of... of, you know,

6:00

I have a Facebook group and

6:02

Lisa Jo started, you know, getting,

6:05

just saw her name more and more and

6:08

next thing I knew she's related to missing

6:10

Barbra Cotton. So I mean I'll

6:12

let her introduce herself more but she just

6:14

started helping me basically with a lot of

6:16

the research and

6:18

has now spearheaded Find

6:20

Barb Cotton a movement to find Barb

6:22

Cotton. So I kind of started I

6:24

guess you could say with the podcast

6:26

this movement and she's been holding the

6:29

torch here for the last

6:31

few years. So how would

6:33

you describe it all Lisa Jo? Like

6:37

I kind of inserted myself

6:40

actually. No, all good. So

6:43

I do genealogy and obviously

6:47

I'm an extended family member of Barb's. I'm

6:49

actually my ex-husband

6:51

Barb was his aunt. So

6:54

very extended but we're

6:57

still close and I do

7:00

a lot of genealogy and that's just kind of

7:02

in my hobbies for a long time and when

7:06

the podcast started up I was

7:08

super excited because this is the case that's always

7:11

followed me obviously. As

7:13

James was going through the first few

7:15

episodes I started to follow

7:17

along and I'm researching on the side and then,

7:19

you know, I'm sending him things like hey I

7:22

found this. I found this. It

7:24

was the episode before you had released

7:26

Stacey Werder's name and

7:29

I had found the article

7:31

detailing what happened to him and

7:34

I sent it to you and you're like oh my god how'd you find

7:36

that and you were like please wait

7:38

till the next episode to share that. Yeah

7:41

and yeah from

7:43

there I think you kind of asked

7:46

me if I wouldn't mind looking into another

7:49

person and then I don't

7:52

know how I ended up here. No but she's been an

7:54

amazing amazing resource. Yeah you guys know how

7:57

it goes. You start on the story and

7:59

people start to offer help and

8:01

Elisa Jo's just been, she's just

8:03

a dog and researcher. You

8:06

know, we can talk later about how she

8:08

found a friend. She mentioned Stacy Werter. He's

8:10

a person of interest in this case. And

8:12

yeah, she's just been a great resource. And

8:16

like I said, she's holding the torch at this point.

8:18

I've moved on to, you know, I just wrapped up

8:20

season nine of Dakota Spotlight. Meanwhile,

8:23

she is just, you

8:25

know, dedicated to the

8:27

Barb Cotton story. And

8:30

Barbara Cotton disappeared in 1981. So

8:33

this is not a recent story.

8:35

This is a story that

8:37

is cold as

8:39

cold comes. Not

8:41

a whole lot to go on. You did say that there

8:44

was a person of interest, but Lisa Jo, you

8:46

said that you're a distant relation of

8:49

Barbara. Can you give us a little bit of a background

8:51

on Barbara? Just to refresh the listener's memories. Barbara

8:53

came from a large family. My

8:55

ex mother-in-law was an older sister. She was

8:57

older siblings in the family. Her

9:00

mom was a single mom. So the

9:02

kids had to kind of grow up fast. There

9:05

was older siblings, but they were adults. They were out

9:07

with, you know, their own families and

9:09

things. So it was basically

9:12

just her, her younger sister and her

9:14

brother that was a year older and then

9:16

their mom and their mom worked a lot to

9:19

make ends meet. Barb was

9:21

15 when she disappeared in 1981. Sounds

9:26

like a typical teenager. Very

9:29

well liked. And

9:32

she was very sweet, maybe

9:35

almost naive in some things. Gave

9:39

people a little too much credit maybe.

9:43

Loved animals. You know, she

9:45

was starting to dabble into going to parties and

9:47

things like that, which her mother was not happy

9:49

about. So

9:51

there was some risk factors there, nothing

9:54

I wouldn't consider atypical for a teenager.

9:57

You know, some teenagers at least. And

9:59

she was feeling... at the time of her

10:01

disappearance. Can you talk

10:04

about the circumstances of her

10:06

disappearance? I mean I can I can try.

10:08

We don't know much for

10:10

sure. The typical story that

10:12

you hear is that Barb

10:15

went to dinner with her boyfriend

10:17

and another friend and her boyfriend watched

10:20

her walk into Recreation Park and she

10:22

was never seen again. And

10:25

maybe I'll let James talk

10:27

about how you know

10:29

the reasons that we believe

10:31

that might not necessarily be true. I

10:34

first found out about this case from

10:36

the Attorney General's North Dakota Attorney General's

10:38

website have a list of missing person

10:40

and was that that very scenario. It

10:42

says Barbara Cotton was

10:46

seen by her boyfriend parted ways

10:49

with a boyfriend downtown Williston, North

10:51

Dakota. She walks into

10:53

this park on her way home. He watched

10:55

her as far as into the park and

10:57

at that point she's you know three or

10:59

four blocks from home and she's

11:02

never seen again. And

11:04

you know then we

11:06

I start looking into this and turns

11:09

out this boyfriend this official narrative

11:11

of what happened gets

11:13

very interesting because no none

11:17

of Barbara's friends know about this boyfriend.

11:19

You know so the Attorney General

11:21

said website states this

11:25

last thing was her boyfriend and

11:27

then when I start getting into it it turns out

11:29

none of her friends know

11:32

about this boyfriend. They some of her

11:34

best friends that she didn't have a

11:36

boyfriend who is this boyfriend and yet

11:38

it's Barbara's mother called in the missing

11:40

persons the report the next day right

11:42

Lisa Jo and said she

11:44

was last seen with a guy named Stacy.

11:47

I mean if we fast forward a

11:49

little bit we tried to get confirmed from from

11:51

law enforcement that they ever talked

11:53

to this guy Stacy and

11:56

we're not sure they ever did. So

11:58

as far as we know this version and

12:00

Barbara walking into the park in Williston is

12:03

just coming from this one person who was

12:05

potentially never interviewed. Even her

12:08

siblings didn't know

12:10

about Stacy, her best friend didn't

12:12

know about Stacy, obviously being boyfriend.

12:15

But there's also a lot, I'm sorry for

12:17

interrupting, there was a lot of discussion

12:20

about was he actually a boyfriend

12:23

or just a friend? Or did

12:25

she know him at all? It's

12:27

just very, very surreal.

12:32

And how old was Stacy at that

12:34

time? 21. Okay, so

12:37

that's a pretty big age gap, especially

12:39

for Barbara when she's 15. Yeah, and

12:43

he was a drifter. The

12:47

only person who can place

12:49

Stacy and Barbara together in

12:51

Williston, I believe, is Barbara's

12:54

mother. Correct? Distinitively,

12:59

yes. There

13:01

were other people that Barb

13:03

was with a guy and they felt it could

13:05

have been Stacy. But they weren't

13:07

positive. And after this long, they weren't willing to

13:10

say for sure it was him. But from

13:12

their memory, now looking back, they feel

13:14

like it's possible it was him. And

13:19

when you say drifter, was

13:22

this somebody who just sort of drifted

13:25

into town and no one had seen him before?

13:27

He didn't go to the high school and he

13:29

didn't have like a job at one of the

13:31

local establishments? He just

13:34

sort of came into town and

13:36

somehow connected with Barbara? That's

13:40

what we think. And he did have a job for

13:43

a while, which is that job that almost at

13:45

a drifter can get, which he washed dishes at

13:49

a restaurant in Williston. Apparently,

13:51

when Barbara's mother called

13:55

the police, she said she saw

13:57

him with this guy who used to.

14:00

to wash dishes

14:02

at this restaurant called Cakes and Combs

14:04

in Williston and

14:07

how long he'd been in

14:09

Williston, how they met,

14:11

we don't know, but Barbara

14:14

did work as either a

14:16

waitress or bus person at

14:19

a restaurant, I believe, at a cafe. So if

14:22

you're busing tables at a cafe, you're

14:24

pretty likely to run into a dishwasher,

14:26

a person who washes dishes, and

14:29

it's possible they met that way, but

14:32

we're not sure. So, but

14:34

yeah, he was basically a drifter and through

14:38

the podcast, I end up speaking

14:41

to Stacy's sisters out in

14:43

California, and they told us that,

14:45

yeah, he was a drifter. He went

14:47

all over the country. So he was

14:49

a drifter by choice. Yes. Stacy

14:51

didn't drive either. He hitchhiked

14:54

everywhere. He didn't have a

14:56

driver's license, at least to his sister's

14:58

knowledge. He didn't drive at all. This

15:01

wasn't his first time drifting. He would

15:03

go and he would come back. He was

15:05

from California. They recalled that one of their

15:07

brothers had gone with him once and they

15:09

were in Canada even. He had at least gone

15:12

out drifting a few times this way and to

15:14

their knowledge. It wasn't

15:16

him driving. He just picked up rides. And

15:19

on our last conversation,

15:22

James, a couple of years ago, was

15:25

it true, did I hear this correctly, that

15:28

Barbara was seen with him at a party,

15:30

was seen with Stacy that night or shortly

15:33

before she went missing? So that was a

15:35

really interesting thing with this. I got

15:38

an interview with a current

15:40

present-day detective at Wilson

15:42

PD who is

15:45

one of a couple or two or three

15:47

who work on this case when

15:49

they have time and they say they have

15:51

boxes and boxes of material. And

15:54

she shared with us that Barbara's

15:57

mother told the police back then that...

16:00

A full Barbara

16:03

was with Barbara later at a party.

16:05

So we have this official version of

16:07

the last, and it's interesting, you know,

16:09

the official version online was, including

16:12

the attorney general's website, was she

16:14

was last seen walking into this

16:17

park. But then we learned directly

16:19

from law enforcement. Well, actually later she was

16:21

at a party. If

16:24

we have we confirmed that that was later in

16:26

such a or could it have been before? It

16:30

sounded like law enforcement wasn't really sure. I

16:33

know they had said that they had tried to reach out, I

16:36

think it was, to

16:38

the people that they felt had the party

16:40

or the friend. And

16:43

they weren't exactly sure

16:45

if the party had occurred either,

16:49

or if it was

16:51

just a couple people hanging out at somebody's

16:54

apartment or, you know, a big house

16:56

party where a lot of people should

16:58

have seen Barb. They

17:00

weren't sure about much with it. And

17:05

then we did get in

17:07

contact with a couple of sisters.

17:10

They used to have house parties back then, and

17:12

they know that Barb had at least came to

17:15

one of their parties recently. They

17:19

are hesitant to say that it was 100% positively

17:22

that night, though they both do believe

17:24

it was the night that she

17:26

disappeared. And that's what I

17:28

was mentioning earlier, that she

17:31

was with a guy. And,

17:33

you know, after 40 plus

17:36

years, it could have been Stacey.

17:39

They think it could have been, but they aren't

17:41

positive. And they don't want to give anybody

17:43

the impression that they are positive, which I

17:45

appreciate a lot. That, you

17:48

know, I hate when people

17:50

repeat things like they're factual

17:52

and you find out that they're

17:54

not true. So I'd rather somebody let me know if

17:56

they aren't positive and I can act

17:59

accordingly. Follow me. Complicating

18:02

matters. Stacey committed suicide not long

18:04

after, is that correct? Yeah.

18:08

It goes like this, I guess. Again,

18:10

some of this we got from law enforcement. Barbara's

18:13

mother calls them back the next day.

18:15

She reports them missing the day after

18:17

and then calls them back on Monday

18:19

and says she thinks Barbara might be

18:21

in Scobie, Montana in

18:23

this hotel, Pioneer Hotel in Scobie, Montana.

18:25

She has a room number even. And

18:28

we don't know why to this day,

18:30

we don't know where she got this

18:32

information or we don't, maybe law enforcement.

18:35

The only thing we know is that there's

18:37

a note in her file that some local

18:39

law enforcement went there and the girl that,

18:41

quote, the girl is not there, unquote. We

18:43

don't know if Stacey was there, if anyone

18:45

was there, but the girl was

18:47

not there. And it's just weird.

18:50

We cannot hear, like, how does she, why

18:52

does she think Barbara's up

18:54

there? And you'll have to remind

18:57

me now, Lisa Jo, because it's been a while. Does

18:59

Louise, Barbara's mother, say she thinks

19:02

she's with Stacey? Yes,

19:05

I think she did. I think she did.

19:08

Now that I'm thinking about it. Yeah, I think you're

19:10

right. Yeah. Let's see.

19:13

So then Stacey ends up in jail

19:15

in Glasgow, Montana for a week or

19:18

so. What was that

19:20

for? We think it was some

19:22

kind of, his sisters believe, told

19:24

me that he was in some kind

19:26

of fight or he got jumped or

19:28

something. There was some kind of brawl.

19:30

I think the official arrest was disorderly

19:32

conduct, though. Oh, thank you. Yeah, you're

19:35

right. But we do think that there's a background

19:37

story there that his sisters were aware of. After

19:39

he gets out of jail in Glasgow, he ends

19:42

up in a town called Malta, which is further

19:44

west, you know, I don't know, 100 miles or

19:46

60 miles. He's probably

19:49

hitchhiking. And

19:51

there he gets

19:53

arrested for disorderly conduct again at a movie

19:57

theater. And

20:00

they arrest him and they put

20:02

him in jail for the night. And

20:04

the next morning they discovered that he's hung

20:07

himself or hanged himself using

20:10

the legs, like his overalls they

20:12

gave him for jail. He

20:16

took like somehow took the pant leg, tied

20:18

it together and hung himself in

20:20

jail. And

20:23

I ended up petitioning, I thought, well, let's

20:26

get more information about that. There

20:29

was a inquest done by

20:32

the coroner or the, you

20:35

know, they wanted to be sure that it was

20:37

actually suicide. There was actually an inquest. I had

20:39

to petition the counties up there. And

20:43

it took months before I

20:45

got the documentation. And

20:48

that's when we discovered, we got really

20:50

excited because we had heard that there

20:52

was, Stacy

20:55

was hanging out with a guy named Red

20:57

and that's all we had was his

21:00

nickname. And I don't think I

21:02

had, this had happened when I was on with you

21:04

guys last time. And sure

21:07

enough in this coroner's inquest, there's

21:10

this kind of like almost like

21:12

a little trial where they're interviewing

21:14

law enforcement and it's all

21:16

transcribed and I'm reading here and they're asking,

21:19

you know, the sheriff who arrested Stacy, like

21:21

was he with anyone? Oh yes, he was

21:23

with Red Sullivan. That's when

21:25

I called Lisa Jo, like,

21:28

oh my God, we found Red, we found Red. We found

21:30

someone who was with Stacy at

21:33

the time he died. We didn't

21:35

know like, could this guy read? And also,

21:37

you know, if Stacy was involved co-conspirator

21:42

or did maybe Stacy confess to

21:44

him? You know, what information does

21:46

this guy read have? And

21:49

so we've got super excited because as I said, we

21:51

only had a nickname, Red, and how are you gonna

21:53

find her, Red, you know? And

21:56

all of a sudden we had his name

21:58

and that's when Lisa Jo's... research

22:01

capabilities really kind of, you know, impressed

22:03

me, like, because it

22:05

wasn't that long I'll let her tell the

22:07

story herself, but she found Red.

22:10

Oh, it's never that easy, right?

22:13

You find the name, it's never that easy.

22:15

It's just a quick Google search, right? And

22:21

we'll be right back after a quick word

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25:36

So we yeah we had

25:38

no idea we knew he was in Malta at that point

25:40

in time. By the time they

25:42

were having this inquest he was

25:45

not still in town. We had known

25:48

previously from Stacy sisters

25:50

that he actually brought

25:53

Stacy's belongings out to

25:55

California to his mother. And

25:57

they they knew that he He

26:00

had been arrested at some point afterwards

26:02

for something like burglary, armed robbery, something

26:04

like that with him and a couple

26:07

other guys that had came out there.

26:11

And it was kind of a dead end. It's like you're

26:13

looking for a guy that obviously traveled quite

26:15

a bit named Red until

26:18

the inquest. And then we had a last name and

26:20

we had the initials. And

26:23

I'm thinking, oh, we got him. Here

26:25

we go. Oh, no,

26:28

absolutely not. It

26:30

actually, we looked very

26:33

hard and then we still could

26:35

not find him. And what

26:38

it actually took was

26:41

more of a stroke of luck, probably,

26:43

than my research abilities. But

26:46

somebody actually

26:49

commented on the Facebook story

26:51

about it and said

26:53

that they lived in Malta and that when

26:56

they were growing up, there was a couple

26:58

of brothers there named and

27:00

she listed off Red's name and also

27:02

his brother's name. And I was like,

27:05

okay. So then using

27:08

the full first name that

27:10

she gave me, then I was

27:12

able to track him,

27:14

I think, to Florida where he

27:17

had been arrested for, like,

27:22

it was not armed robbery. It

27:25

was he had broken to a

27:27

church. He was hungry. So

27:30

it was much less of

27:33

an offense than what she had, what

27:36

they had remembered. And from

27:38

there, we were able to track him, you know,

27:41

to other states and things where we

27:44

eventually found him. He didn't want to

27:46

be found in the first place. No. By

27:48

anybody. Lisa Jo finds

27:50

his address somehow. I

27:53

think he had been petitioning Florida

27:55

to get

27:57

this felony removed from his record from

27:59

breaking into this. church. So we found,

28:01

you know, the open records, there was

28:03

an address or something, which

28:05

leads to a pastor somewhere,

28:08

I don't even remember what state, but it was

28:10

in the south. And I some

28:13

end up calling this pastor and asking if

28:15

there's a red there and he goes, well,

28:17

he lives in my, he

28:19

rents out like a little cabin

28:22

and he lives there, he doesn't have a phone

28:24

or anything. And as a true crime, you guys

28:26

can imagine like, oh my, it's like Unabomber, right?

28:28

We found, he doesn't have a phone.

28:31

This is our, you know, this is, you know,

28:33

this is a hot lead. And

28:36

I talked to this, the pastor

28:38

asked me why, and I just walked into the

28:41

whole thing. Barbara Cotton disappeared. She was last

28:43

seen with the guy who committed suicide in, in

28:45

Malta, Montana,

28:47

1981. And red was with

28:49

him and we just want to know if he

28:51

has any information. And he's like, wow, another

28:54

pastor comes over like the next day and they

28:56

call red over. He tells us this

28:58

story in my podcast when Lisa Nut Joe and I

29:00

talked to them in one of the episodes. And he

29:02

said, they call me over there and said, we're going

29:04

to have a meeting. And

29:07

he says, they started reading

29:09

me something about a missing girl. And

29:12

then they say the name Stacy Werder.

29:14

And he, you know, he says, I

29:16

just, did you say Stacy

29:18

Werder? I haven't heard this guy's name since

29:21

forever. How do you, I mean, for him, it

29:23

was so surreal and long

29:25

story short, well, let Lisa Joe

29:27

tell, tell everyone what red

29:30

had to say, what we found out. Yeah.

29:32

So when we went into this, you know, we're

29:35

thinking maybe he was with Stacy

29:37

and Williston, you know, maybe

29:40

Stacy must have said something to him. He ran

29:42

all this stuff out to Stacy's mom. They must

29:44

have been great friends, you know. But

29:47

actually, as it turns out, he

29:50

actually just picked Stacy up, hit

29:52

hiking. He

29:55

was from Malta and he was back

29:57

in town. He

30:02

was waiting for some sort of check

30:05

or money for something to

30:08

come in for him. So he

30:10

was back in Malta and he had

30:12

seen Stacy Hittiking. He picked him up.

30:16

They actually camped together for

30:18

like a week while Red was out there waiting

30:20

for this check to come in for him.

30:23

And he said he was quiet, but

30:26

nothing weird about him. He

30:29

didn't have any extreme angry

30:31

outbursts or anything in that week while

30:34

they were camping. They were both

30:36

flat broke. So Stacy had a 22. They

30:39

would shoot squirrels and stuff. And

30:41

they ate well. He said they ate very

30:44

well that week or five

30:46

days or whatever it was. Yeah, they

30:48

camped. And at

30:51

some point they went to the theater

30:55

and were watching a movie and

30:58

they had alcohol in their drinks. And

31:04

I don't know if they were being kind of rowdy maybe. And

31:08

one of them, I think Stacy

31:11

spilled his drink and

31:13

it flowed down under

31:15

the seats. Somebody

31:17

went and told on him and they asked him

31:19

to leave and he blew his

31:21

top. And

31:26

we learned this from the inquest, but he pulled

31:28

the hat off his head and ripped it in

31:30

half over them telling

31:32

him to leave. It was very

31:35

out of nowhere, an overreaction.

31:39

And Red was like, this is my hometown. I

31:42

don't want any trouble with any of this. I'm

31:44

fine with leaving. So he did leave.

31:48

And Stacy ended up getting arrested. He pushed

31:50

it to the limit where he got arrested.

31:53

And Red did end

31:56

up bringing his things out

31:58

to California. California for

32:00

his mother. But as it turns out, it

32:02

was just a good deed. He's like,

32:04

I would want somebody to do that for

32:07

me. So he didn't know

32:09

anything about Barb. He

32:11

never heard any mention of I

32:13

mean, this is how long later, he

32:16

doesn't recall him ever

32:18

saying anything about a girl or being

32:21

in Wilson or anything like that. So

32:23

for me, I went

32:25

kind of numb. I was like, Oh my God,

32:27

we got absolutely nothing.

32:30

This was huge. And we got absolutely,

32:33

we really didn't catch it all. We know that

32:37

he had a normal week up till that point. And

32:39

he snapped, but no mention of

32:41

Barb. So it was very, it was good, but it

32:43

was disappointing. It was hard to get over at the

32:45

time. So yeah, but

32:47

that's been very helpful. Like,

32:50

as far as sharing what he

32:52

did know about what

32:54

happened. And unfortunately,

32:57

it wasn't as much as we would have liked that.

33:00

Yeah, it's great that you were able to connect with him

33:02

though. That's really interesting stuff.

33:04

And the story about Stacy kind

33:06

of snapping is definitely

33:08

interesting for that alone.

33:12

Did the police get a chance to talk

33:14

to Red? Yes, actually. I

33:18

actually reached out to Wilson PD

33:20

and I gave them the

33:22

information. James didn't, we decided,

33:25

you know what, like we should give police the chance

33:27

to interview him before, you know, we try

33:29

to contact him for sure. And

33:32

I gave that information to them.

33:34

And I asked

33:37

multiple times if they were going to follow

33:39

up with it in a

33:41

timely manner. And they dodged

33:43

my question every time.

33:45

And I was like, I don't,

33:48

I don't know what to, I

33:50

don't know if they're doing that on purpose

33:53

or, or not. And

33:56

I was worried that we

33:58

might lose. him. You know,

34:00

I don't know why I really thought that because he had

34:02

been there for a while. I didn't know that

34:05

at the time though. We didn't actually

34:07

know that that

34:09

pastor's address, that he was living there.

34:13

We didn't know that at the time either. So

34:16

James didn't find that out until he called because

34:19

finally I'm like, you know what, maybe

34:21

just give him a call. I mean, see

34:23

what happens. Because

34:25

I wasn't sure how

34:27

quickly they were going to follow up with it

34:29

or if they, you know,

34:32

even felt like it was a big deal. But

34:34

also, like I said, we didn't really expect that

34:36

he lived there and that James would end up

34:38

talking to Red, you know, within a day. So

34:43

yeah, the circumstances changed pretty quickly

34:45

there. But

34:47

I do believe that law enforcement did talk to him after that.

34:50

It's interesting that you mentioned that they were

34:52

camping together and they

34:54

ate very well because they were using

34:57

this .22 to shoot squirrels and eat

34:59

them. You'd think that they were like,

35:01

you'd think that if they were these

35:03

career criminals and they had a gun,

35:06

if they had a .22, the

35:09

first thing I thought you were going to say was they had a .22. So they robbed,

35:13

held up a couple of convenience stores or, you

35:15

know, did some home invasions. Yeah, nope,

35:18

nothing like that. And

35:21

the reason that we actually asked the

35:23

questions that led to the answer, knowing

35:25

that they ate very well, is James

35:27

actually had kind of a

35:29

theory about Stacey ahead of that, you

35:32

know, wondering if maybe he just wanted a

35:34

free meal and, you know, a warm bed

35:36

for the night getting arrested like that for

35:38

seemingly no reason. So. Oh,

35:40

so intentionally. Yeah, because

35:42

it almost seems intentional that he threw

35:45

a fit, you know,

35:47

to go to jail. Yeah, like

35:49

so over the top over something so

35:51

insignificant. What kind of hat was he

35:53

wearing? Like what are we talking here?

35:55

Like a. I'm not sure. They just listed in

35:58

the inquest. I mean, if it was one of those men, ones,

36:00

that'd be easy, but I don't know.

36:02

Yeah, interesting though. But then

36:04

he kills himself right then? Yeah,

36:06

they arrest him, they take him to the jail,

36:08

they give him his, you know, overalls or whatever.

36:11

He asks for a book, they give him a

36:13

Western book. He's

36:15

like really happy. Oh, thanks. I like

36:17

Westerns. He's in the cell by

36:19

himself, but there are other people

36:21

in the jail and someone kind

36:24

of talks to him, like, he was

36:26

a wall or he was a bar.

36:28

They couldn't see him, but someone talked

36:30

to him, just asked him, what are

36:33

you in for? It wasn't anything

36:35

really, no

36:38

real information. And then

36:42

he basically, yeah, at some point during

36:44

the night he hangs himself, he kind

36:46

of tied his pant

36:49

legs in a loop,

36:51

I think, and then there was some kind of

36:54

vent. I've actually seen photographs, you know, that

36:56

they would not, I didn't really, would

36:58

never have, you know, published

37:01

these photographs of him hanging there

37:03

anyway, but the judge up there

37:05

in Malta, so you can look

37:07

at him in our office, but you can't make copies

37:09

or anything, but I did get to

37:12

see them and he kind of took his pant legs

37:15

and up through the bars there was like a

37:17

air duct or vent that he kind of looped it

37:20

around and then he just wasn't really

37:22

a noose, it was just more, he just looked

37:24

kind of weird actually the way he did it, but there was

37:27

no one else there and, you

37:29

know, in the morning they found him there

37:32

and I guess we should mention that his

37:34

sister, oh that's

37:36

also on the podcast, that she was the last

37:38

one to talk to him and he had called

37:41

and we kind of thought maybe he called her

37:43

from jail, but I'm not sure that makes sense

37:46

now, but he called his sister and say

37:49

her story version is, her story is that he says,

37:51

hey sis I'm coming home and she says, well when

37:53

you get here be careful I got a new dog

37:55

and he'll fight you and he says,

37:57

no that it doesn't matter the way I'm coming home.

38:00

home, the way I'm coming

38:02

home, it doesn't matter. Tell mom I love her

38:04

and I'm sorry for what I did. So

38:07

we don't know if he's referring to Barbara

38:09

Cotton's murder or he's just saying,

38:11

tell mom I'm sorry that I killed

38:14

myself. Wow, that's quite a tangled web

38:16

there. Yeah, and we probably don't want

38:18

to get off this call without noting

38:20

that there's another person of interest who

38:23

also hung himself in jail. Right, yeah.

38:25

Tell us about that person. What was

38:27

their name? Frank Delapena and

38:29

we got his name from Wilson PD

38:31

in my interview with detectives that by

38:33

the way, there's another person

38:36

of interest somewhere in

38:38

Barbara's file that someone noted way

38:40

back in 81 that

38:43

Wyoming had called about

38:46

to get information on a Frank

38:49

Delapena who had just murdered two

38:52

girls in Rawlings, Wyoming. Everyone missing

38:54

on the 11th and

38:56

this murders were on May 7th, I

38:58

think April 11th and murders in Rawlings,

39:00

Wyoming were on May 7th. Renee

39:04

Davidson, nine years old and Penny Swanson,

39:06

12 years old, just walked to the

39:09

store to get candy or ice

39:11

cream, drugstore kind of thing. And

39:15

many, several people had seen both

39:17

in Rawlings and in other towns that same

39:20

day and the day before I believe a

39:23

man driving around with a van

39:26

I think and a trailer asking

39:29

people if they wanted to adopt

39:31

his puppy, if they would

39:34

just come on inside the van, you know,

39:36

trailer to get the puppy, they could have

39:38

it. And he tried

39:41

several times and unfortunately

39:43

it's just terrible. Actually he stopped

39:45

in Rawlings. Of

39:47

all the, I'll just have to say this, all

39:50

the things I've reported on, you know, in

39:52

these nine seasons, the

39:54

most saddest

39:56

I guess moment I've had to

39:58

experience, it was. stopping in

40:01

Rawlings where these girls got kidnapped

40:03

and were found dead the next

40:06

morning. This Frank Delapena murdered

40:08

them. He was in

40:10

Williston when Barbara went missing. While

40:13

they're investigating this case down there

40:15

in Rawlings, this double homicide, they

40:18

call up to Williston and they're like, you

40:20

have any information on this guy Frank Delapena?

40:22

He's murdered two girls down here. He's a

40:25

suspect. And someone noted that

40:27

and put it in Barbara's file and then

40:30

years later, just a few years ago,

40:32

someone came across that and now he's

40:34

like, that's a huge red

40:37

flag, right? And now

40:39

he is considered a person of

40:41

interest. As we mentioned

40:43

earlier, he also was arrested

40:45

for these murders and hung himself in

40:48

jail. So he never really faced justice? No.

40:51

Nope, he never went to trial. He did it

40:53

before he could be extradited. You know, I got

40:55

a hold of all

40:58

the records down there. There's a handwritten suicide

41:00

note. In this case, he left a suicide

41:02

note and it was the most narcissistic

41:07

thing. You know, I

41:10

actually refused to read it in

41:13

my podcast. I just

41:15

refused to give this person

41:17

a platform. You could tell

41:19

at the time he was even writing notes to media

41:21

back then. Tell the media this

41:24

and this. You know, he's trying to

41:26

control the narrative and he

41:28

was almost succeed. I mean, if

41:30

I had done that, I would have felt like,

41:32

wow, he actually succeeded. You know, it's getting his

41:34

narrative out there and I just refused to do

41:36

it. But obviously, very sick

41:39

individual, very narcissistic.

41:43

And maybe I'll let Lisa Jo talk about what

41:45

was going on with him up in

41:48

Wilson with his hospital

41:51

and all that. Yeah,

41:53

so he

41:56

worked for a seismology

41:58

company, obviously. actually

42:00

it's not obvious to everybody. I find

42:03

out more and more that people don't really

42:05

understand the significance of this, but in 1981,

42:08

Williston, North Dakota was experiencing

42:11

a big oil boom. So

42:13

we say it like

42:15

it's like everybody should just know

42:18

this and it's common knowledge that there was

42:20

drifters coming through, but I'm

42:23

catching myself now. But

42:25

there was an extraordinary amount

42:27

of drifters from everywhere

42:30

coming in to Williston looking for work

42:32

in the oil fields. People

42:34

like Frank D'Ilepina, for

42:36

instance, Stacy could have been there

42:38

trying to find a job in

42:40

the oil fields, you

42:42

know, and then the people who had jobs

42:45

out there, you have the long haul truckers, everything

42:48

that goes along with it, they saw a

42:50

rise in prostitution, drugs, all the

42:52

stuff that comes with an oil

42:54

boom. So I just wanted

42:56

to touch on that quickly, but that's

42:59

why Frank D'Ilepina was there. He worked

43:01

seismology in, you know, oil work

43:03

and he had been doing that for a while. He had,

43:06

we know that he also

43:08

worked in Wyoming. We managed

43:10

to track down a woman

43:13

who knew him. He was actually the best man

43:15

in her wedding and we found out

43:17

quite a bit of information from her about

43:19

him, including that he

43:21

was married and

43:23

had a son. She came out to

43:25

Wyoming for a while with the

43:28

little boy and then went back to Mexico.

43:30

So this was stuff that law

43:32

enforcement had no idea about, that I was able to

43:34

pass along to them. So sometime

43:36

after Wyoming, she had lost

43:38

contact with him. They ended up, her and her

43:40

husband ended up, actually at the time of

43:43

the murder, they were still together, but since

43:45

then they had divorced. So he worked seismology

43:47

in Williston. The woman that we found,

43:49

she was still down in Colorado

43:51

or Wyoming, somewhere down there, still

43:54

doing the same kind of work, her and her

43:56

husband both. D'Ilepina apparently had some sort of falling

43:58

out with a co-worker. He ended

44:00

up losing his job over it. When

44:03

was that, James? When did he lose his

44:05

job? The end of April? I think so, yeah. And

44:07

then he was in the hospital and got out of the

44:09

hospital on May 2nd. So

44:12

he lost his job and within a few

44:14

days was admitted into the hospital. Our

44:16

understanding is that it was psychiatric reasons.

44:19

He explained pressure in his head

44:21

and things like that. And

44:24

then he was

44:26

discharged and he actually

44:28

had a camper at a KOA there in Williston

44:30

that he lived in and he pulled

44:32

it with a van. We

44:37

know that he was at the KOA for a

44:39

couple days after he left

44:41

the hospital and then he had

44:43

himself traveling

44:46

to Wyoming. So we

44:49

don't know obviously what happened in those few

44:51

days or why specifically

44:54

he was in the hospital, but

44:56

it's curious. We

45:02

built the timeline on all that stuff and

45:05

it's very odd. Oh,

45:08

actually, you know what, something else I

45:11

found that I was able to pass along to police is

45:13

that I think it was

45:15

a couple of years prior to

45:19

him being in Williston, but he

45:21

was arrested for, I think it was

45:23

first degree sexual assault. I got no details

45:25

on it. All I got is the date

45:28

that he was arrested. They didn't

45:30

have anything else because it

45:32

would have been probably the late, it was in

45:34

the 70s. I'm surprised

45:36

they even had that, but I did find that.

45:38

I think that was in Missouri. On

45:41

that, there's not anything that suggests that

45:43

he had done anything. I

45:46

mean, that obviously is along

45:48

potential lines, but according

45:51

to this friend, that boy

45:53

was his world. She couldn't believe it.

45:56

In fact, she

45:59

couldn't believe it. to the point where

46:02

When they figured out who this guy was She

46:06

was like, you know,

46:08

and they're flashing his picture on TV and stuff

46:10

to get him arrested She

46:13

thought there wasn't a chance it could be him. No way

46:16

So she had photos of him from their wedding

46:18

and things like that basically,

46:20

she tried to call law enforcement and Talk

46:23

to them and the dispatcher wouldn't

46:25

let her through like yeah. Yeah lady and hung

46:28

up So she and

46:30

she's like hindsight. You have a terrible idea.

46:32

I can't believe I did this She

46:35

called there and said I know where he's at And

46:38

they showed up at her house

46:41

or like the motel there's guns drawn

46:44

Like she's like, oh, maybe I went too far But

46:48

she she really wanted to talk to

46:50

somebody and I'm like, well, they worked. I

46:52

mean So Then,

46:55

you know, they kept her there all night. They're interrogating

46:57

her She had explained like look I tried to get

46:59

a hold of you guys. I have these pictures of

47:01

him I think you guys are wrong

47:03

about this you know, but

47:05

they kept her there all night, you know interrogating

47:07

her and and

47:11

by the end of it, she did understand that

47:13

oh He must

47:15

have done this he absolutely did do this. They

47:17

have proof that he did this You

47:19

know, but just going into it. But

47:22

at the same time the randomness of what he

47:24

did You know James

47:26

had mentioned that he tried to

47:28

pick up multiple people Along

47:30

the way before he was successful. Unfortunately

47:34

He tried to pick up a little boy. He tried

47:36

to pick up an adult woman. He

47:38

you know kids with it. It's like

47:42

It didn't matter. He there wasn't anything

47:44

specific. He was necessarily

47:46

looking for Impulsive,

47:49

I don't know Right.

47:51

Okay. And so these were people that

47:53

he saw on the side of the

47:55

road essentially Sort of by

47:57

chance. Okay, so that's interesting when

48:01

looking at Barbara's case because, did

48:03

she also do some hitchhiking? I haven't

48:05

heard any stories of her doing that,

48:07

but that's certainly not outside

48:10

the realm of possibility. She's, from

48:13

what I know of her, she's

48:15

trusting enough that I feel like that's very

48:17

much a possibility. And we'll be

48:19

right back after a quick word from our

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49:02

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50:36

what did you make of this, I guess,

50:38

sort of hunger strike that he performed

50:40

when he was incarcerated? Wow, you've

50:42

done your research. I kind of forgot about that. I

50:45

don't know what that was about really. Like

50:47

I think maybe he was

50:49

going to starve himself to death instead

50:51

of hanging himself or something. I actually

50:54

don't know. Well, he said he doesn't

50:57

deserve to eat after what he

50:59

did. There's obviously some mental health issues

51:02

going on there. Maybe

51:04

he bounced back to feeling terrible.

51:08

Or maybe it was manipulating the media.

51:11

It's hard to say. I could go either way. Yeah,

51:14

maybe he had times where

51:16

he realized what he had

51:19

done and felt bad about it. I

51:21

have no idea. And how old was

51:23

De La Pena at that point? He

51:25

was older. I want to say 35. That

51:29

sounds right to me. Something like that. About 35. And

51:34

we have obviously speculated and thought,

51:36

did Stacy Werder and De

51:38

La Pena cross paths in

51:41

Williston? Did they know each other? This

51:45

thing that they both hang themselves

51:47

in jail. First

51:50

Stacy, no,

51:52

first De La Pena and then Stacy a

51:54

couple months later, the same year that she

51:56

goes missing. You know, we speculated,

51:58

right? Like, did they have a suicide? suicide pact

52:00

that they were they both

52:02

involved in her disappearance. It's just,

52:05

it's kind of crazy that two of the persons of

52:08

interest hung themselves in jail. I

52:10

don't know how common that was, but yeah. Yeah.

52:14

I was thinking about that, not

52:16

eating business because

52:20

Lisa Jo, you had said that he would

52:22

pick up anybody and it seemed like a compulsion and that,

52:26

that kind of struck me like maybe, maybe

52:28

he did go through these waves of guilt and

52:31

that was a way to,

52:33

I don't know, not punish

52:35

himself, but cleanse himself.

52:37

Maybe. Yeah, maybe.

52:41

Hard to say. Yeah. I

52:43

guess we should mention that like the

52:45

last episode I produced, I believe, for

52:47

this story is a

52:50

gal who named Jerry up in

52:52

Wilson who claims

52:54

or believes she saw Barbara Cotton

52:58

after she went missing and

53:00

it was at the hospital in

53:03

Williston and she thought it was, you know,

53:06

two or three weeks after and he would see her. And

53:09

I'll just say this about Jerry. I

53:11

know that she believes she

53:14

saw Barbara Cotton. This is not a

53:16

person I've interviewed who's looking for attention.

53:18

If anything, she knows, you know,

53:20

she's, yes, she's been trying

53:22

to, she's told this story since way back when.

53:25

What happened was she went to the

53:27

police in Williston when, when

53:29

she saw Barbara or thought she saw

53:31

Barbara and she was basically chewed out

53:33

by the chief of

53:35

police for how dare you come in here

53:37

and making up stories and we're talking, you

53:39

know, within a few weeks

53:42

of Barbara going missing, but

53:44

I've just found it interesting, you know, you

53:46

can't help. Did you lay awake at night,

53:49

speculate, thinking about these cases? And so we

53:51

have Delapanya going

53:53

to the hospital within

53:55

two or three weeks after

53:58

Barbara going missing. And then this

54:00

one person being completely

54:03

convinced they saw Barbara Cotton

54:05

at that hospital a

54:08

few weeks after. When I'm

54:11

laying in bed thinking about this, like,

54:13

did Barbara know Delapena? Did Stacy know

54:15

Delapena? One

54:18

of the last things anyone knows about

54:20

Barbara, she was going to help

54:23

a friend take a dog to the

54:25

vet. There's this theme of

54:27

dogs in this story that just won't leave me

54:29

alone from the beginning. And

54:32

I don't know, you lay awake and

54:34

I just try to put these pieces of a

54:36

puzzle together without even knowing what the puzzle is

54:38

supposed to look like. Well

54:40

Lisa Jo, what's next

54:43

in your search

54:45

for Barbara? So recently I got

54:47

ahold of a team

54:49

of people, Life Away, that advocate

54:51

for missing people. So I'm

54:53

excited about that, help get

54:55

Barbara's story out there more and they seem like they're

54:58

really awesome and I think you guys know them

55:00

as well. Yeah, they're

55:02

amazing. Yeah, so I'm excited

55:04

about that. I mean, there's not,

55:08

it's not like when James was covering

55:10

this story. He said it,

55:12

I think on the last episode that he did

55:14

with you guys, that he

55:17

figured he'd do a couple episodes and that

55:19

would be that everything's out there, whatnot,

55:21

and he just experienced such a, like

55:26

a mountain of information coming at

55:28

him from people that felt that they had

55:30

no outlet. And

55:33

that's why there's 20 episodes.

55:36

And it's not like that now. Obviously,

55:40

you know, information's closed down.

55:43

I still get people who email me, you know,

55:45

and unfortunately it's stuff that

55:48

I can't share, they've asked me not to, you know.

55:50

But I look into it and

55:54

I try to get them in

55:56

contact with law enforcement, which

55:59

has worked. so far I haven't

56:01

had anybody you know

56:03

turn that down but yeah

56:06

so you know even

56:08

though it seems like things there's nothing

56:10

going on there's usually at least something

56:13

some iron in the fire somewhere but

56:15

yeah and I also help out

56:17

with other cases which

56:20

I always credit Bard for because I

56:23

just be doing I just be finding adoptees you know

56:27

not not missing people

56:29

so you

56:31

know I have to credit her for bringing me on to this

56:33

path that I suddenly found myself on

56:35

I know

56:38

I gotta just say I I know what I

56:40

think needs to be done on this case and

56:42

that is that Lisa

56:45

Jo and maybe a couple

56:47

other people who knew Bard get

56:50

access to the complete police file and

56:52

read it from beginning to end I

56:55

mean I know a lot of law enforcement have read

56:57

through it and but

56:59

it's been 42 years now and I don't

57:03

know what possible harm

57:20

you hey

57:44

listeners this is Tim and Lance here

57:46

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