The Murder of Jill Behrman - 673

Audible subscribers can listen to all episodes of Generation Y ad free right now. Join Audible today by downloading the Audible app. Hi June, tonight I'm doing good. The weather is warming up, man, and so nice out. And what's the weather like over here in your place? It is 9 a.m. in the morning and it is 59 degrees. See? So I don't want to complain, but seriously, that's pretty interesting. Go global warming. Well, whatever you want to blame, we'll just enjoy the weather, I guess. So tonight's case, Aaron, is a very interesting and tragic one. It's one of those cases where a lot of people will claim it's been solved. There's a conviction, but there are many questions surrounding this conviction. Sometimes we'll cover cases where I'm like, yeah, this is a wrongful conviction. Other times I'm like, there's a conviction, but we don't really know if this was accurate or not, I guess. And that always leads to arguments and questions online where people can debate until they're blue in the face and they can't tell you what's wrong. They can debate until they're blue in the face on whether or not they think this case has been resolved. So do we have any announcements before we get into it? Yes, definitely. We have people asking when you're going to cover this. When we talk about this case, I sent in a suggestion and we love your suggestions. Sometimes we take those suggestions and we cover those cases on our Patreon. So real quick, it's patreon.com slash generation Y. I would urge you to go out there. We do have some free content. Just go take a look, listen. And if you want more, you can easily subscribe. We have multiple tiers and we hope to see you there. We love your feedback. Keep it coming. And we're going to be at CrimeCon May 29th through the 31st, Las Vegas, Nevada. Go to CrimeCon.com for all the details. But if you're going, use our code Gen Y. It will save you on your tickets. We hope to see you there. All right, well with that, Aaron, what are we covering tonight? Tonight we're talking about Jill Bearman. This happened in May of 2000, Bloomington, Indiana. She was a 19 year old Indiana University student who disappeared while riding her bike. And there were many, many searches, but Jill wasn't found for quite some time. And as you said, there are answers in this case, but they're not necessarily answers that everyone in the public accepts. So Jill Christian Bearman, she was born September 17th, 1980. She was a business major at the University of Indiana, where she had just finished her freshman year. She participated in countless sports throughout her school years and was described as athletic. And she was an avid cyclist. We know a lot of people that are cyclists, Aaron, and they tell us that they will go 10 to 50 miles a day. I have a hard time driving that far. Yeah, I know one and his name's Brad. And he's such a big fan of riding his bicycle that he is now getting rid of his Mustang and getting a truck because he wants to be able to take his bike somewhere else to ride. And he loves Mustangs. So that should tell you something. So it's on the morning of Wednesday, May 31st. Jill was due to work at 12 p.m. to 3 p.m. She worked at the Student Recreational Sports Center at the University of Indiana before meeting her father and grandparents for lunch. At 9.32 a.m., she logged off of her computer and got on her bicycle. It's a Cannondale R500 and she went out. Shortly after, Jill was reportedly spotted by the intersection of Moffitt Lane and Harrell Road. This was southeast of Bloomington, but she did not show up for work that day, nor did she make it to her lunch with her father. When she still hadn't come home that evening, her father, Eric, called the police. And the family soon started distributing flyers around town. Eric and Brian, Jill's brothers, decided to drive along the road she routinely cycled just to look for her, look for clues, but there was no sign of her. They made calls to hospitals and even jails, but nobody seemed to know where Jill was. So her family immediately goes into alert mode because she'd went out on her normal cycling route, supposed to eat lunch and go to work that day, no shows and no one's heard from her. So by Thursday afternoon, search parties made up of police officers and volunteers were canvassing the streets of Bloomington. They wanted to find Jill or any sign of her. And by the next day, her picture was plastered on the front page of the newspapers appealing to the public. Do you have any information about Jill Bearman's disappearance? And sadly, it's on the afternoon of Friday, June 2nd, when Jill's bicycle was recovered. That previous Wednesday on the day Jill disappeared, but before she was reported missing, a jogger had noticed the bike in a cornfield near North Maple Grove Road and West Maple Grove Road in Elletsville, which is 10 miles northwest of Bloomington. Now he took it home with him and then presented it to the police when he heard that Jill was missing on the news. Now, of course, they went back to look where this bicycle was first discovered and they didn't find anything of significance there. But investigators noted that going in the Northwest direction was quite unlikely for Jill because in speaking with the family, this was not one of her regular routes and she has allegedly last been seen southeast of Bloomington. So something may have happened where she and her bike were moved. However, this sighting might not be accurate as the witness who came forward said they saw Jill at 9.38 AM and it would take her 14 minutes to get from her house to Harrell Road. This doesn't line up with Jill's 9.32 AM logoff time on her computer. Another witness said they saw Jill riding her bicycle north of town on North Maple Grove Road at around 10 AM. This statement was substantiated by the fact that a tracking dog had identified Jill's scent in that area and not south of Bloomington. So we can talk about where people normally go, what their habits are, but investigators, they need verifiable facts. And just a quick clarification. The person that found her bike, they had no idea that she was missing. So they just thought, hey, I found a bike and they kept it. And then as soon as they saw those news reports, they knew whose bike this belonged to and they called law enforcement immediately and law enforcement spoke to them, vetted them. This person showed them where the bike was found. So I just want to make it clear that the person who found her bike probably had nothing to do with this and the police seemed to be happy with their response. So true. On June 3rd, the police opted to call off the search due to a lack of concrete leads, but the FBI was now involved in the investigation led by agent Gary Dunn. On June 5th, a digital radio was found in a church parking lot and it was the same color and model that Jill used on her bike rides. And as soon as it was found, a churchgoer noticed a blue pickup truck speeding out of the lot. The police were unable to identify the driver even with the thousands of tips received after they put out a call to the public. So her bike is found 10 miles in one direction and then a radio is found that her family's like, yeah, that looks like her radio. It's like this little yellow kind of Walkman iPod thing. So it looks like somebody's dropping off her belongings and different places around town. Now, a solid lead did materialize when an 18 year old girl approached the police about two weeks after Jill's disappearance. She said that she was walking in Elletsville, three miles from where Jill's bike was found at about 10 30 PM when a man in a black Ford pickup tried to forcefully pull her into the vehicle. Now she managed to escape and run away and then provided the police with the description of him. The subsequent composite sketch was distributed along flyers about Jill as authorities believe that the two cases could be related but they were never able to identify this man. They just had what he looked like and it was kind of a warning to the public, like be on the lookout because someone might be trying to take young ladies. And I wanna add that Jill's bike didn't have any scrapes or damage to it. So if somebody did hit her, it might have left a bent rim or maybe dirt and grass would have been clogged up into this handlebars but it looked like it was in pretty decent condition here. So when you hear about another woman who's been, somebody attempted to grab her, you can almost imagine if Jill's on her bike and she stops or if somebody pulls up next to her and grabs her, maybe her bike isn't going to be damaged. Just something I wanna note because later on, some things happened where it's like, what, wanted to put that out there. Even though there was very little going on, this case is getting widely publicized and has gained national attention. Jill's face was on the cover of People Magazine and her story was shared on an episode of America's Most Wanted and this meant there are even more tips coming in and local police and FBI agents were filtering through information and interviewing as many people as they could about Jill's disappearance. The family was offering a $25,000 reward, which was later raised to $50,000 to anyone with information that would lead to Jill. In November of 2000, the story was featured on Million Dollar Mysteries, eliciting another flurry of tips. And as you can imagine, Aaron, when you get that many tips, it's really hard to go through each one and determine what is legit and what isn't. Yeah, when you say there's not much going on, it's just this is a difficult investigation. They have her bike and then they have some sightings, but it's not like they have anything really to work with here. And they're certainly trying. Now, in April of 2001, authorities announced that their main theory was that Jill Bearman could have been the victim of a hit and run incident. And instead of contacting authorities, the driver panicked, hid the bicycle, and moved Jill's body. However, like you said, Justin, this bike didn't show a bunch of damage to it. Certainly there wasn't any damage to indicate that a car struck it. So at the very least, you'd have to say, it's possible maybe someone could have swerved and caused her to go off the bike and get injured because that wouldn't create a bunch of damage on the bike. But either way, by the end of May, this reward was doubled to $100,000 to anyone with information because this is just a theory. They're still looking for someone to call in something that helps them more or to find something that breaks this case open. And this is just so maddening because of the police's theory, even though the evidence doesn't quite match up with it. But this does lead to another call, another tip. In fact, almost a confession here. It's March 22nd of 2002. Wendy K. Owings confessed to Agent Dunne to being in a vehicle that allegedly struck and killed Jill Bearman. She said that she and Alicia Evans were riding in Uriah J. Klaus's pickup truck when they hit Jill. They panicked and took the body to an isolated area of Salt Creek. Once there, they say they proceeded to wrap Jill's body in plastic and secure it with bungee cords before taking turns repeatedly stabbing her and then throwing her body into the water. All three individuals were well known to the police and all of them had been mentioned in relation to the case as early as June of 2000 as a result of comments they had made about this case to witnesses who had come forward. So we have three people who claim we hit her while she was on her bike and then panicked and then decided to stab her to death and throw her into water. And they've made mention of this to other people during the course of the case. So obviously, Erin, police are going to hone in on this party of three that made these allegations, right? Well, it's frustrating because you start to get answers supposedly, but then is this really the truth of what happened? But in April of 2002, Klaus was named as an official suspect in Bearman's disappearance, although he denied any involvement. Now, the FBI and the police, they started their search of Salt Creek, which ended up being halted due to flooding and then resumed in August of 2002. That's when they found a large sheet of industrial plastic similar to the one described by Owings in which Jill's body had allegedly been wrapped in. So now they're starting to think maybe there's something to this. In September, temporary dams were put up and a part of the creek was drained to help authorities in their search. And that's where they found more plastic sheets along with a knife and bungee cord. So all of this starts to seemingly corroborate the story that Owings gave them. Now, a few months later, all three were asked to undergo polygraph tests. When they were asked whether they had any knowledge of Bearman's disappearance, Klaus and Evans showed deception while it appeared that Owings was telling the truth. However, shortly after that, Owings recanted her confession. When she had initially spoken to Agent Dunn, Owings was facing drug dealing and armed robbery charges and was allegedly being pressured by the police to reveal information in exchange for leniency. Some believe that she gave them what they wanted and lied about being involved in Jill's disappearance to get these charges dropped or kicked down to lesser offenses. It always baffles me, Aaron, when people get involved in cases that they have nothing to do with. And she's saying, we did this thing and they're going out to Salt Creek. They're finding plastic sheets and stuff, but the other members of her party are saying, we had nothing to do with this. And then she's recanting and saying, yeah, I just did this because I wanted to get lesser punishment. Yeah, and that's where, you know, if you're an investigator, you're probably tempted to say, there might be something to this or you might say, well, I've got to look into every lead, but you also have to look at what's in it for them. Some people might still be wondering, well, did they have anything to do with this? Because she seemed to have a lot of details here, but she says they dumped her in this Salt Creek in the water. Well, we know that's not true because they end up finding remains far away from where this Salt Creek was located. I'm Leon Nefok, best known as the host and co-creator of podcasts, Slow Burn, Fiasco, and Think Twice, Michael Jackson. I'm here to tell you about my show, Final Thoughts, Jerry Springer, whose name is synonymous with outrageous guests, taboo confessions, and vicious onstage fights. But before the Jerry Springer show became a symbol of cultural decline, its namesake was a popular Midwestern politician and a serious-minded idealist with lofty ambitions. Through dozens of intimate and revealing interviews with those who knew Springer best, I examined Springer's lifelong struggle to reconcile his TV persona with his political dreams and aspirations. Named one of the best podcasts of the year by The New Yorker and Rolling Stone, Final Thoughts, Jerry Springer is a story about choices, how we make them, how we justify them to ourselves, and how we transcend them or don't. Listen wherever you get your podcasts or binge the whole series ad-free right now on Audible. Start your Audible subscription in the Audible app. On March 9th, 2003, a hunter found human bones in Morgan County, northeast of Bloomington. Now, the skeleton was incomplete. There was no soft tissue left on any of the bones, but some teeth were found. And that helped confirm that these were Jill Bearman's remains. Now, court records stated that there was no sign of blunt force trauma or knife wounds, and that 380 lead pellets, usually found in 12-gauge shotgun shells, were recovered along with scattered skull fragments. They also found a part of the murder weapon, the forearm of the shotgun. It's a piece that usually sits near the trigger. This led authorities to determine that Jill's cause of death was a contact shotgun wound to the back of the head. After Jill's remains were found, the FBI took a step back in the investigation, and Indiana State Police Detective Rick Lang took over. So we know that she has been murdered and a shotgun was used. It is now 2004. At this point, authorities, you know, they've found her body. They have no suspect, no motive, and only part of a murder weapon. They decided to focus on a man who had caught their attention earlier in the investigation. His name was John Robert Myers II, and he was a person of interest for a lot of different reasons. Why were they looking at him, Aaron? Well, he lived in Elletsville at the time of Jill's disappearance, less than a mile away from where her bicycle was recovered. On the day of her disappearance, May 31st, 2000, two separate witnesses told the police that they had noticed Myers' trailer windows were covered up. This isn't something that they're used to. Normally, they're not covered up. A witness also noted that his car was parked out of sight for a number of days. Again, not normal. Myers' explanation was that he did not want anyone to know he was home. Other reports came in of a white van spotted in the area, which is similar to the van that Myers had accessed through his work. But yeah, there are even more details than those that make the authorities think Myers might be involved here. Because I'm thinking there is a change in his behavior. You know, he's covered his windows up. I don't know. That's not a glaring red flag to me. But on the same day of May 31st, it's reported that Myers had been hysterical and was threatening to leave town. In the month leading up to this, Debbie Bell, Myers' aunt, had noticed that her nephew was quite depressed, supposedly due to relationship issues. He told her that he felt like a balloon full of hot air about to burst. Myers, who was then 23 years old, had been in a relationship with a 17-year-old named Carly Goodman since 1999. In March of 2000, according to court records, the pair took a long drive near some woods in Morgan County. They argued which frightened Goodman. Other sources reported that Myers confined Goodman in his trailer for a whole weekend, stripping her of her clothes and threatening to rape and kill her. He allegedly took pictures of her as blackmail and told her he can do what he wants and that she and her family cannot do anything because his father is a sheriff's deputy. His four-year-old daughter was allegedly present during all of this. Goodman ended the relationship in late April 2000. She applied for protection order against him, which was denied when she did not attend the court hearing. She filed another request in June, citing that Myers frequently grabbed her by her upper arms and threw her around, sometimes bruising her arms, at which point the order was now granted. So we have a whole ordeal of him dating an underage girl and then allegedly holding her captive and taking photos of her, threatening her and physically assaulting her. On June 5th, Bell said she spoke to her nephew, Myers again. He brought up Jill's disappearance to her, saying that he feared he would be accused of abducting her as they blame him for everything, especially since her bike was found so close to his home. Now Myers also said that he was scared of roadblocks that had been put in place. On the back end of this conversation, Bloomington police detective Rick Cressen decided to interview Jody and John Sr., which were Myers' parents on June 27th, 2000. Literally, this guy is almost like waving his arm saying, they're gonna blame me for this, because of this, that and the other thing. And if you're a detective, you go with that. Yeah, there's so many cases where we've seen this play out and sometimes they don't arrest the person or question them. But here they're saying, wait, why are you behaving this way? Why do you think we're going to blame you for everything? Well, you do have a history of violence against women. So yeah, you kind of make a good suspect here. Come on in and we're gonna question you. So this Bloomington police detective interviewed Myers the next day. And when asked about his whereabouts between May 29th and June 2nd, Myers said he was here and there. He was working at the Bloomington hospital warehouse at the time, but had been off that week. Now he claimed he was meant to go to Myrtle Beach in South Carolina with his girlfriend, but obviously that trip had been canceled. Goodman denied ever making such plans with Myers. They were broken up. Now, a few phone calls were made from his trailer on the morning of May 31st, but his mother reported that she was the one who made the calls mostly to state parks and movie theaters. Prior to being interviewed, Myers had mentioned Jill Berman's disappearance to multiple people around him. He told his supervisor that authorities had spoken to him in relation to the case as Jill's bike was found near his home. During a conversation with a coworker, Myers wondered if the police had searched a barn off Maple Grove Road. There was another instance where Myers told a colleague that the bicycle was found close to his home and that Jill had possibly been abducted in that same area. I understand that this is big news in this town, but it just seems really odd that he's talking to everybody like, oh yeah, our bike was found close to my house. And I wonder if they've searched here and searched there. I know we're all true crime aficionados. We like to talk about this stuff, but everything he's doing here makes it look like he had something to do with this case. Everything he's saying just makes him look suspicious. So after Myers was questioned, he did not lay low. On July 18th of 2000, there was an altercation at John and Jody Myers house. Myers assaulted his father, who had had cancer, as well as his mother and brothers because they refused to babysit his daughter. Jody attempted to reason with her son, but he pushed her to the ground and told her to shut the F up before he punched her in the mouth. He did the same thing to his dad when he had reached for the phone. Myers then punched one of his brothers in the face and the other in the chest. He asked where the guns were being kept before fleeing and saying, if I'm going out, I'm going out for murder. What are we supposed to say to that? Either he is having a very untimely mental breakdown or this is essentially projection and a confession to his family. Yeah. Well, the officer who attended the scene wanted to charge Myers with intimidation and battery two days after the incident. An order was issued instructing Myers to have no contact with his parents and brothers and forbidding him to carry deadly weapons or firearms. Now, within a week and a half, Myers was arrested for battery and intimidation. His bail was set at $10,000. Later, due to John's seniors declining health, the no contact order was amended for him to be able to speak to his father. Now, throughout that time, Myers was also writing letters to the judge stating that he had found Jesus and he started citing scripture. He was released in November 2000, a month before John R. Myers Sr. lost his battle to cancer. Cancer sucks, Justin. Yeah. Now, in 2001, he continues to randomly bring up the case with everyone he interacts with. While driving on Maple Grove Road with a colleague, Myers said that if he was ever in a situation where he needed to hide a body, he would dispose of it in a wooded area pointing north. He also told a family member that he bet that baremen would be found in the woods, meaning these woods up north. In October 2001, another charge was brought against Myers. This time, it was for stealing a motorcycle back in 1999. His mother paid his $1,000 bond. In December of that year, police searched Myers' Susan Street property after report from his supervisor at Thompson Furniture, who suspected that Myers had stolen $8,000 worth of store property and merchandise from the warehouse. When officers arrived at his home at around midnight, Myers could be seen asleep on a stolen burgundy love seat while his daughter was coloring. When he didn't answer the door, they entered the property and arrested him. Can I just stop right here, Aaron? I mean, he's assaulted his family. He's bragging to everyone he knows about where he would hide a body, and then he steals a bunch of furniture and property from work. This guy is a piece of work. That's all I can say here. And they literally find him sleeping on top of a couch that he has stolen. Yeah, and his daughter was just coloring while he was sleeping. This is caught red-handed, right? So that should mean this dude, I mean, he's obviously a criminal. He's a dangerous individual, and he's done nothing but wave his arms and jump up and down and scream this to everyone that he knows. And of course, this gets to the authorities. These officers that showed up to his house, they questioned his daughter who's sitting there coloring. And she said that she was there when her father and another man went to a large building, removed furniture, and then took it to the apartment. She reported that she was instructed not to tell anybody about this. Good girl. Oh my God. I mean, seriously, right? Yeah, don't tell anyone we're doing this. And then when the police showed up, she was like, yeah, they did this. I'm curious. I'm just, this is speculation, but I'm wondering if Myers has a drug problem or something going on here because that would be the only explanation here of him having these outbursts with his family, having these paranoid episodes of police roadblocks and covering up the windows and his trailer and whatnot, stealing things. That would be the only reasonable explanation to me outside of he probably is a criminal who might have committed these crimes, including abduction and murder. I was gonna say, sometimes you're paranoid for good reason. So Myers was then back in prison at the Monroe County Jail. His plea to be released for Christmas was denied by the judge. Now, court records show that in March of 2002, Myers told a prison officer that he had found letters containing information about Jill's disappearance. And he even provided them with a list of places potentially providing clues to Bearman's location. In April, Myers pleaded guilty to the charges brought against him. And he received a suspended two-year sentence and was put on probation for four years. You would think that they would be questioning him about Jill's disappearance. You would think that this would be the moment where they have him in custody. Let's drill him for this, but it seems that he keeps falling to the cracks on that, even though he keeps raising his hand saying, hey, talk to me about it. Yeah, because the next thing that we're gonna talk about happens two years after this. So it's November 2004. Myers says a bunch of things that gets him looked at. He rang his grandmother, Betty Swafford, and told her, grandma, if you just knew things that I've gotten my mind, if the authorities knew it, I'd be in prison for the rest of my life. He added, I wish I wasn't a bad person. I wish I hadn't done these bad things. By December of that year, Myers was officially considered as a suspect in Jill Bearman's disappearance. At this point, secrecy and discretion were paramount when it came to any information related to this case. But again, Aaron, if you knew the things in my mind, if the authorities knew it, I'd be in prison for the rest of my life. That's not for stolen furniture. That's not for beating people up. Going to prison for the rest of your life is a serious offense, such as killing somebody. Why is he saying this? Again, the only explanation I could come up with would be some drug-induced delusion or mental health crisis, but there seems to be a pattern of behavior here. Yeah, well, his grandmother contacts the authorities. In October of 2005, she called the police to say that she thought her grandson was breaking into her house when she was out, and she also claimed that he was harassing and intimidating her. She went as far as to change the locks when Myers was bailed out of jail. Now, she told this sergeant that Myers stole some towels, a gold ring with a tiger's eye stone and a pearl necklace, and she said she knew it was Myers who took them because when his daughter was at her house for dinner one night, she told her that daddy had a new ring with a tiger's eye stone. Now, this little girl was used to being looked after by her great-grandmother, especially when Myers was in prison or at work. And so, Betty Swofford said that the girl was always wary about going back home, and she seemed terrified of her dad. When asked if she wanted to file a protective order against her grandson, she opted not to out of fear that it would anger him and he would hurt her. And so, this sergeant made arrangements for police to patrol near the grandmother's house more frequently, and she wrote in a report that this woman, Betty, appeared very frightened of her grandson. Now, this is frustrating, Justin, because we hear stories like this. Well, I would take out a protective order. I would do this, I would do that, but I'm worried that they're just gonna come back and hurt me. What does that say? I mean, they know that by filing this order, this person's going to get served this paperwork, and it's going to escalate the issue. They don't want to provoke this person anymore. I get why they refrain from filing it, although we know if they did file it, it would be more, I don't know, ammo against that person if they're ever charged, but I understand why they don't, because they're just like, right now, we have peace. Right now, he's not here. He's not here in my face threatening me. If I do this, he will come here, and that protection order isn't going to protect me when they try to murder me or hurt me. So, I get the reasoning here, I do. Well, it was on Sunday, April 9th, 2006, when John R. Myers II was arrested and charged with murdering Jill Bearman. Prior to making the arrest, Detective Lang had been working hard behind the scenes to bring a solid case to the grand jury. You know, you wonder, with all this stuff that's gone on, what's taking them so long, right? This included driving with Goodman, Myers ex-girlfriend to Morgan County. She identified a clearing as the place Myers had driven her to back in 2000, where they had argued. This clearing is significant because it was 40 yards away from where Jill's remains were finally discovered. This, on top of everything else that Myers had been telling people over the years, sealed the deal for the authorities that he was the guy they were looking for. The police's theory was that on May 31st, 2000, Jill was riding her bike north of Bloomington on Maple Grove Road when Myers spotted her. And they say, at the time, he was very angry about his breakup with Goodman. So, out of rage, he abducted and killed Jill Bearman. Myers was arraigned on Tuesday, April 11th, and pleaded not guilty to the charges against him. I mean, how does his ex-girlfriend know where this is at? Unless she's been coached, she took the police to this area that just happens to be right next to where Jill's body's found. This is pretty damning. I mean, is this a coincidence? Like, come on, I understand why they've arrested him now and are charging him. Now, Myers's defense, they're gonna file multiple motions here. The first one is for a change of venue due to the public nature of the case. I mean, everyone in town knows who he is. Everyone in town knows about this case, but the court denies the change of venue motion. They also tried to completely exclude Myers's grandmother and Goodman's testimony because his grandmother's talking about this phone call where he's talking about the things in his head and Goodman is his ex-girlfriend who's saying he essentially held me captive and tortured me and took me out to this place in the woods where they found Jill's body. Well, the court denies both of these motions and will allow their testimony to go in, which I agree with. I don't know if I agree with denying the change of venue. I think that probably was needed, but I think his grandmother and ex-girlfriend's testimony is very valid to this case. Well, after some delays in the proceedings, Myers trial began October 2006 in Martinsville, Indiana, and it was presided over by Morgan County judge, Christopher Burnham. During opening statements on October 2nd, Morgan County prosecutor, Steve Sonega, explained to the jury that Myers became a suspect in Jill's murder after family members came forward about questionable things he had said. And here's an example. Five days after Jill disappeared, well before anybody even knew that she was dead, Myers told his aunt that he was afraid he would be blamed for her slang because he lived in the area. He had also made a comment to his grandmother that if the authorities knew what he had done, he would go to prison for the rest of his life, which in the eyes of the prosecution seemed to implicate him. I mean, I think they're onto something there. Yeah, I mean, that sounds like a confession. Sounds like it isn't a confession. It sounds like a confession. I'll be clear with my wording there. The prosecutor also told the court that Jill died from a close-range shotgun wound to the back of her head. Myers had owned a 12-gauge shotgun and was very familiar with the area where Jill's remains were recovered as he often hunted there. The prosecution did mention, however, that the case was predominantly built around witness recollections that linked Myers to the disappearance and murder of Jill Berman. Patrick Baker, Myers lawyer, stressed the point to the jury, highlighting that there was no physical evidence directly linking his client, the defendant, to the crime. And there isn't. There isn't any physical evidence linking him to it. Just a lot of circumstantial. Yeah, and that's a thing. It seems to matter to us, but not everyone believes that you need that kind of evidence. They feel probably like this man has said enough things, been suspicious enough around that time, even on that very specific day, that that's enough for them. They believe he's involved. So as we get through the trial here, it'll be interesting to see how it plays out and how people feel about it. I understand why he has been indicted. I understand why he was arrested and charged with all these things, but you got to prove it in court. You got to prove beyond a reasonable doubt. And that's where we're at now, Aaron. And it goes kind of sideways here, I think. Yeah, so proper proceedings on October 16th, 2006. A couple hundred witnesses were expected to take the stand over at least three weeks of these proceedings. But to everyone's surprise, both the defense and the prosecution rested after just 12 days. This is considered a short amount of time given the list they had of witnesses that they could call. Now, the defense, they called for a mistrial four times during this trial after Jill's parents spoke to the media. When a detective mentioned a polygraph test, it was implied that Myers was aware of specific information surrounding the murder and when accusations about jury misconduct were made. So the judge stepped in, denied all these motions. But this would be concerning for the defense because things said in the media were getting to the jury and to the public about the polygraph test or that he may have said things that were very specific and only the killer would know. This is all concerning. And I would say this is especially where when you have people who say they're not sure about this case, they don't believe the authorities got the right person. This is where it begins. Exactly. And they called for a mistrial four times. It doesn't happen. The judge allows this to go through and on October 30th of 2006, after an hour of deliberation, this jury will find Myers guilty of murdering Jill Bearman. On December 1st, he was sentenced to 65 years in prison. His legal team did not wait before filing an appeal which was submitted before the end of the year because they knew there were problems with this trial. They knew there were problems with this case. They were calling for mistrials throughout the 12 days because they're like, this is wrong, this is wrong. This shouldn't have happened. So when he's found guilty, the defense team is ready to go. Yeah, and many concerns were raised by the defense team in the appeal. It mentioned jurors' behavior during the proceedings. They claimed that the jurors were drinking alcohol, watching TV and making phone calls when they were supposed to be sequestered. Now, the court argued that all phone calls were monitored and that jurors only had access to DVDs rather than cable channels. It was also highlighted that there was no evidence pointing to jurors being inebriated during deliberations. And yeah, I'll tell you what, just in an hour of deliberations at the end, it seems like the other mind's made up. Now, when it came to the change of venue, which I agree, that's something that courts seem to strike down a lot, but sometimes you think maybe they should do that. The appellate decision argued the jury confirmed they could set aside any notion of guilt and that Baker failed to make the maximum permissible effort to secure juror impartiality by not challenging jurors enough. So they're basically blaming the defense here for the court deciding that no change of venue is necessary. Maybe they can back that up. Maybe they did. I don't know, but it does seem like, you know, it comes down to the court making their decision. I still think a change of venue would have been good, but that's just my opinion. I agree. And I know every motion filed gets argued by the defense and the prosecution. In front of the judge. And then the judge makes their determination. When the judge denies it and then says, well, you didn't make a good enough argument. I don't know. I think it was self-evident that this is, I won't call it a small town because people get mad whenever I say that, but if you call every town a small town, yeah. But in this case, everyone in this town knew what was going on and they seemed to know who Myers was. They know who Jill was. I think a change of venue, to me, it was self-evident that that should have happened. Well, what stands out to me is the jury being able to say that they could set aside any notion of guilt and found him guilty inside of an hour. Now, look, if we had gone through the trial and they were able to say he owned the murder weapon, he can't account for this time, and they saw him over here, if they were able to put together a real case, then I could understand. But, you know, the funny thing is, is we've gone through trials before where they have a good amount of evidence tying the person to a crime, and it still takes the jury several hours to debate it out. And this one, this is fast. This is very fast. Now, Erin, when they found her remains, it was essentially skeletal remains. And we know that there were pellets, so all we could really say about the remains was she was shot in the back of the head. It was years before they found her remains. So, it's hard to say what all was done here, right? Absolutely. So, what was another problem the defense had here? Well, there was testimony by Dr. Stephen Radence. He was a forensic pathologist. He suggested during the trial that Jill had been raped prior to being killed. Now, the defense argued that Radence was unable to support his claim with physical evidence and that this testimony was irrelevant as Myers had not been charged with rape. This is a big deal because for the average person, if you hear from someone such as a forensic pathologist, a doctor, that the victim had been raped, that's only gonna make you dislike the person more who is on trial, I would argue. So, the appellate judges decreed that any error in the admission of Dr. Radence's rape testimony did not substantially influence the outcome of the trial. The question of rape was peripheral to the murder charge and received relatively minimal attention at trial. I've heard this a number of times. It's like, well, this was mentioned, but it wasn't a big part of their case. Seriously, this does, I think, make the jury more prejudicial against the person who they're judging. Absolutely. I think this was improper, but maybe some of the attorneys that listen to us can chime in and let us know how they feel about this, but I just feel like this is damaging and it seems to be irrelevant given the evidence or lack thereof. I don't think it should have been allowed. It should have been struck down. I agree. So, they're running these appeals in May of 2008. This is eight years after Jill's disappearance, the Indiana Court of Appeals announced that Myers's conviction would be upheld. And despite all the issues that the defense highlighted, the panel concluded that the imperfections in the murder trial of John Myers II did not deprive him of a fair trial. So, this is shot down. In April, 2013, Myers ended up back in court, but this time he had new attorneys. He was being represented by public defenders Ann Murray and Joanna Green. They argued that Myers's conviction stemmed from ineffective counsel from Patrick Baker. Now, they said that Baker and his team were not prepared to defend Mr. Myers at his 2006 trial and made poor decisions because of that and stated that if Myers had received proper representation, there is a significant chance he would have been acquitted. When he took the stand, Baker denied not having spent enough time on the case. He told the court that he devoted the great majority of his time towards this case, saying he spent 20 hours a week helping Johnny at the expense of paying clients and believed he had put together a case that cast enough reasonable doubt around Myers's conviction. In his mind, Baker was well-prepared for the trial. He, however, admitted to providing the jury false information during his opening statement. His theory at the time was that Jill had been having a sexual relationship with her supervisor at the Student Rec Sports Center who decided to kill her when he found out she was pregnant. Baker also told the jury that they sent dogs out right after the disappearance on May 31st. You'll hear from Detective Tom Arvin that a dog followed a scent, went to a home of a co-worker. Did he go inside? No. He pulled the dog off. So this is his defense saying, I have this whole other idea of what happened here, but then they don't back it up with anything and it didn't go anywhere. I kind of see where he might not have been prepared for this case, but at the same time, they were fighting during the first trial with this is a mistrial, this is a mistrial, this should be thrown out. And then he admits in my opening statement, this didn't go well. The court's response was that these statements were false and Baker should have known that no evidence would be admitted at trial to support them. Yeah, I don't know if you call that unprepared or just sloppy or irresponsible, but I can see the arguments here that he didn't get proper representation. I think that's a pretty terrible start to a trial. Now, Baker went on to explain how he started working with Myers. Said on April 10th, 2006, he received a phone call from an unknown caller who told him that Myers needed his help in a wrongful death case. So Baker visited Myers in jail the next day and represented him at his arraignment before taking over the whole case. Now he could see that the Myers family, they could not afford him and they were expecting the cost to reach about $30,000 or more. So Baker decided to represent Myers pro bono. So Baker conceded that accepting $2,000 from the Myers family was a mistake and the Supreme Court of Indiana suspended Baker's law license in 2011 during disciplinary proceedings for a minimum of six months as a direct result of misconduct in the case. Now, it's been reinstated since. For Myers defense team, the next step was to appeal to the Indiana Supreme Court. However, in November, 2015, justices unanimously refused to review Myers conviction, citing that the court of appeals had already dismissed claims that he had not received a fair trial. In other words, they're just saying, the lower court found this, we have no reason to go against them. You've already brought these arguments, they've already been shot down, we're done. Yeah, and that's how it works. I mean, if you're gonna go to the Supreme Court of the state, you need something and right now they have some stuff, but the courts are saying this isn't enough, this isn't getting our attention. So all of that changes, September 30th of 2019, the US district court judge, James Sweeney, ruled that due to ineffective counsel, Myers Sixth Amendment right had not been respected and he did not actually receive a fair trial. Sweeney cited the defense's failure to object to evidence that should not have been presented during trial, as well as the false statements made during the opening statement, which Baker admitted to, which tainted the entire trial. As a result, the conviction was reversed and the judge ordered Myers release from custody within 120 days of his ruling. And unless the state chooses to retry him, after more than a decade in prison, Myers could become a free man. We don't see this very often, Aaron, we just don't. Well, when speaking to the press, the prosecutor said that the district judge's decision was disappointing, but that it was still too early to determine what the state's next steps would be. They have to decide, are they gonna retry this guy or do they just let the judge release him? The state attorney filed a 60 day extension to the 120 day window in January of 2020, which would give them more time to file an appeal against this order by this judge. And of course, as we know, 2020 was an interesting year. So April 2020, Myers asked to be released from prison in light of COVID-19 due to lowered immunity and higher risk of infection. His request was granted a month later. He was to be released on house arrest after a two week quarantine in which to have no contact with the Beermans. However, on Tuesday, August 4th, 2020, the Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned Sweeney's decision, thus reinstating Myers' conviction. This is just back and forth. The ruling stated that even though the defense was deficient and plainly so, the jury would still have found Myers guilty as the most damning piece of evidence was the self-incriminating claims he had made to family members and colleagues about Jill's disappearance and murder. The decision reads, what leads us to reinstate Myers' conviction? Though, is the strength of the state's case against him separate apart from those errors? The weight of these statements, when combined with other evidence, leads us to conclude that his counsel's deficient performance did not prejudice him. The proper outcome is to respect the finality of Myers' conviction in the Indiana courts. So, in summary, he got himself charged convicted. He got himself into this hot water. And regardless of what his lawyers did or said, it was his own words that caused his conviction. And his own words are why the jury found him guilty. Yes, absolutely. And to finish this up, Justin, he can ask the Supreme Court to take a look at it, but ultimately that just doesn't go anywhere. They deny to look at it. They don't want to look at it. This case really comes down to this man self-incriminated himself multiple times. I think that's why you have a decent amount of people on one side saying, look, he did it. They got him. I mean, her body was found just yards from where he took his ex-girlfriend, now ex-girlfriend. And that's no coincidence in their mind. On the other side, they don't have any evidence he did this. Not any direct, solid forensic evidence. So it really comes down to how do you see this? Do you see this as a case where, look, he said he did it in many ways, except for just shouting, I did it. He did it every which way, but that. So we know he did it. And there are these coincidences. And we know that he had just been broken up with by his girlfriend. So now he's mad and he's looking to take his rage out on somebody, another woman. And we do know this happens. We know it's a real theory based on prior cases, but there is a lack of evidence here that he's the one who did it. So is it enough? And can the public feel like this was a successful court case that they got the right guy that John Myers, the second is who killed Jill Bearman? I feel like there were mistakes made. I feel like there was a lot of prejudicial things that were said by both sides. I don't know. I don't think the system worked the way it's supposed to. I think there were a lot of flaws here, but do you let this guy out based on those mistakes? Do you give him a new trial? If you did give him a new trial, would you have enough to find him guilty? I don't know. Yeah, well said. I mean, I honestly believe there are cases where honest law enforcement really do feel when they've seen and heard from their suspect that they've got the right person. And it's possible that in this case that they sensed that with them, that they knew. But the thing is, is we like to see some evidence. And did they just miss it? Did they not put the case together as well as they could have? I don't know. I would like to think at the end of the day that they got the right guy because that's something that helps the Bearman family. And that's also something that helps the public. But I think questions remain in this case. And so I'd certainly love to hear from people how they feel about it. Well, we're headed out, Justin, but as a reminder to our listeners, we really appreciate all of you. And if you could do us a little favor, if you haven't left us a review in a while, please head out to your app that you use, whether it's Spotify or Apple Podcasts or Cast Box, wherever you use, and please leave us a review. Thank you. Mission Mission Follow Generation Y on the Audible app or wherever you get your podcasts. 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