September 18, 2017 • 47 mins
The boyfriend who allegedly murdered Laura Wallen told the pregnant Maryland teacher's father he had no contact with another woman for 2 years, but that was before police revealed Tyler Tessier was living with the second woman. "He is a monster and he is a liar," Mark Wallen said of the man accused of killing his daughter. Wallen's father and mother pretended at the request of police to not suspect Tessier as part of a strategy to get him to incriminate himself, police said. Nancy Grace discusses the case crime scene expert Sheryl McCollum, psychoanalyst Dr. Bethany Marshall, and reporter Leigh Egan. They also look at the first week of testimony in the trial of the Tennessee man accused of kidnapping, raping and killing Holly Bobo.
Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
It's the last week of National Make a Will Month.
At legal Zoom, they're still time to take control of
your family's assets and their future. Sure, there's a lot
to think about, but that's why legal Zoom created an
estate planning kit to help you get going. You get
an estate plan checklist and e book and other information
(00:21):
to help you decide what to do. And you can
always get advice from legal zooms nationwide network of independent
lawyers without being billed by the hour. Since legal zoom
is not a law firm, hurry to legal zoom dot
com now for your free estate planning kit. No obligation,
(00:44):
just great resources to help you protect what you care
about your family. For special savings, be sure to enter
code Nancy in a n C Y at checkout legal
zoom dot com legal zoom dot com. Crime Stories with
(01:06):
Nancy Grace on Serious x M Triumph Channel one thirty two.
Montgomery County police have searched Laura Wallon's condo looking for clues.
Wallon didn't show up to teach her a social studies
class on Tuesday, the first day of school at wald
Leg High. The missing teacher's father and sister says she
was four months pregnant. She was a woman of faith
and right now she is in the arms of God.
(01:27):
Her body has now been recovered. Tyler Tessier, Mrs Wallon's boyfriend,
was arrested for her murder. In addition to having me
having this Wallon as a girlfriend, he was engaged to
another one. Key lied to my face when I asked
him about the other girl and said, I haven't seen
her in two years. I haven't talked to her in
(01:48):
two years, and I believed him. He's a very believable guy.
Teacher of the year, Teacher of the year, four months pregnant,
sound dead and a shallow grave in a remote field. Why,
why odds are she thought she was about to be
(02:10):
proposed to. She had just sent her sister a text
saying Tyler has taken me on an adventure. We're out
in a field. What could it be? It was a
burial ground, That's what it was. No ring involved. I'm
(02:31):
Nancy Grace. This is crime stories and I want justice.
I am talking about a thirty one year old woman,
four months pregnant with the baby of Tyler Tessier. She
is dead now. Her autopsy is ongoing. Why I believe
(02:53):
because they are trying to determine the age of the
baby Catch twenty two. In many countries around the world,
viability for a baby starts at just fourteen weeks. Fourteen
weeks in the United States, typically it's twenty weeks twenty
(03:17):
weeks for viability. Why is this important Because if that
baby was viable at the time the teacher of the
Year is shot in the back of the head, then
that's a double murder. Okay, that's what's taking so long
on the autopsy. Was the baby viable? Joining me right
(03:38):
now an all star cast with me Crime Online reporter
Lee Egan, who's been doing a lot of digging on
this case. The director of the Cold Case Institute, Cheryl McCullum,
psychoanalyst Dr Bethany Marshall joining me from l A. Ladies,
thank you for being with us. You know, when I
(03:59):
hear what has gone down, I'm literally sick at my stomach.
Cheryl McCullum sick. Tyler's taking me on an adventure. That's
some adventure. Huh. Oh my god, Nancy, it is horrifying
for her to sit there and tech I'm waiting in
this field, waiting, and then he comes from behind her
(04:21):
calculated and shoots her in the back of the head.
It is a death sin of the case as far
as I'm concerned. Well, here's the deal. It's Maryland. In Maryland,
the governor and all of his wisdom got rid of
the death penalty and commuted everybody on death row to
(04:41):
life behind bars. You can kill as many people as
you want to in Maryland and just get life behind bars.
In fact, what brought that to my attention was when
three little girls were stabbed dead in Maryland, all under
the age of ten. Uh huh, and there's no death penalty.
Three little girls stab dad. I want to go back
(05:02):
to something we were just saying, Cheryl Um when I
first learned through our sources that there was no visible
trauma to the body, they didn't know the cause of death.
I'm like, wow, okay, I did not expect him to
asphyxiate her in an open field. He didn't. We now
have information she was shot once in the back of
(05:24):
the head. And I'm gonna go to Bethany on this
in just a moment, because Cheryl, no way could he
look her in the face and strangle her. No way
shot her in the back of the head like the coward.
He is punk and that's exactly right, Nancy. He could
not face them, he couldn't, So let me go to
Lee Egan. Um, I wanna We were starting with a
(05:47):
dead body of the teacher of the Year and I'm
sick about it. And her family is sick about her family,
her mom and dad that sat there giving a press or,
holding the boyfriend, Tyler Tessier's hand, patting him on the shoulder,
they knew at the time they did that press or
(06:11):
that he was a suspect. Lee Egan, they did know,
and they did not like it. He had a bond
hearing yesterday morning, and Mark Wallen, Laura's father, spoke at
the bond hearing and said, he's a monster, a liar,
and it took everything he had just to play that role.
(06:32):
And he knew that he had to do it to
to get Tyler to talk, which is what the police
wanted him to do, to see what he had to say,
to see if he he slipped up, watch his body language,
the words he said. And it was just extremely difficult
for the family to do. The mother, she was shaking
so much while holding his hand that she couldn't move.
(06:52):
She just sat on that bench, she couldn't talk. Um.
It was just extremely difficult for for the family. Following
up on what Lee and has just reported, listen to
what Laura Walla's dad said about that press or the
press conference that we did the other day was a
press conference to get out the baby, a picture and
(07:14):
the name of the baby daddy. And it was all
we could do two be seen as a unified family
with him. He is a monster, and he is a liar,
and it is It was absolutely the hardest thing that
(07:35):
my wife could do would be to sit next to
him and hold his hand, and she had to hold
his hand with two hands because she was shaking so badly.
And but we did it because as any father would
do if your child is missing and someone has that child.
(07:57):
We were pretty sure it was Tyler, but we didn't
know where she was. And you can't put somebody away
on a missing person. Someone doesn't go to prison for
life on a missing person. And he it's it defies
(08:18):
description the the awfulness and the horror that we have
been put through on this. We've all been deceived through
days your family, most computely, did you feel as though
you were being deceived? Really a fine views have been
(08:40):
anyway he is. He has been deceiving and lying their
entire existence, and it their their relationship was the only
thing that Laura and her family ever fought about. Laura
is a wonderful girl, so bright, of such a bright future.
(09:05):
And he he lied to my face when I asked
him about the other the other girl, and said, I
haven't seen her in two years. I haven't talked to
her in two years. And I believed her. I believed him.
(09:26):
He's a very believable guy. To Dr Bethany Marshall, Dr Bethany,
I want to talk to you about the psychopathy behind this.
What do you make of the fact that she, Laura
Wallen was saying, Oh, Tyler has brought me on an adventure.
That some adventure, Bethany, some adventure. What I kept thinking
(09:48):
about was the hopeful anticipation she had. You know, they
had been together for ten years. They didn't live together
as far as I know. She was four months prey meant,
and I imagine that she thought that finally, finally they
would be engaged, finally he would move in with her,
finally they would have a life together. And four months pregnant.
(10:12):
I mean that she's beginning to show it's about the
time you start shopping for the crib and and thinking
about the life of the unborn child of future together.
And so this is the moment in her mind where
she thinks he's going to propose. But in terms of
the psychopathy, what we know about sociopaths is that they
(10:34):
cannot attach. They have low levels of empathy and remorse.
They have reckless disregard and lack of concerns for the
right and safety of others. That they are homicidal. They
played by their own rules rather than the rules of society.
And on brain imaging scans, if you look at the
brain scans of sociopaths, the part of the brain that
(10:57):
lights up when looking at other people and having empathy
and engaging with other people, that part of the brain
is dead. They just do not have empathy and they
do not attach. However, they don't want to let other
people down. They are very concerned about their own self image.
So I think it's significant that he shot her in
(11:18):
the back of the head. Wait a minute, Wait a minute,
Dr bethany Um. Now I'm certainly no psychoanalysts like you are.
I'm just to try a lawyer and a crime victim,
Cheryl McCollum. When Dr Bethany says they don't want to
let people down, I don't think he gave it a
flying fig about letting anybody else down or their feelings.
I think he just wanted to keep all the balls
(11:38):
into the air for his own amusement. He had two women,
one he was engaged to and living with the other
one is four months pregnant, and reports that he had
gone to Laura Walla's father and asked for her hand
in marriage. She's the one that's four months pregnant. He
wanted to keep playing, keep both of these women on
the line. That's why he hadn't settled down after or
(12:00):
ten years. Now, Listen, I certainly don't have a leg
to stand on because it was many, many years after
case murderer before I finally finally could bring myself to
try to marry again. But I don't think it was
any sentimentality on his part that kept him from wanting
(12:20):
to get married. I mean, the woman is four months pregnant. Now,
if that ain't the time to poop, then I don't know,
you better just get off the pot. But what I'm
saying here is think about it? Is it true, Cheryl McCollum,
He said he didn't have a cell phone? My how
convenient that way Laura Wallan couldn't face time and and
(12:41):
see that he wasn't at work and see that he
was at somebody else's place. That's convenient, right, no cell phone?
Are you kidding me? It's convenient? And he also didn't
need the phone pinging to where he went to bury
your body, and he used her cell phones to send
the text messages as though it were her and look
at his own word as the nancy. They go to
(13:01):
the store together on September two, he kills her on
September one. September four, he sends a text message as
though he were the victim to our sister that says, oh,
you know, I'm like sure that Tyler is not the
baby's dad. Um, I think it's my egg boyfriend. I mean,
what a piece of crap this guy is. Then he's
still trying to get himself out of trouble with the
(13:24):
other fiancee. He doesn't want anybody to say that baby
is his. And incidentally, she hadn't seen the egg boy
friend in two years, so that'd be quite a trick
paller piece of crap. You know, I want to go
through what we know about Tyler Tessier, Cheryl McCollum at
this point, let me hear what you and Lee know.
(13:46):
Then we'll get Bethany Marshall to shrink at Go ahead, Cheryl.
We know he has two women. We know he doesn't
have a job. We know he's got three places that
he stays occasionally to sleep. So it's like he does
have any responsibilities like a real adult. He's not going
to take care of this baby. He ain't worried about
a boral one k or retirement. He doesn't have a
(14:08):
mortgage in a house he's taken care of. He damned sure.
He ain't gonna try to take care of a job
for the next eighteen years. So, Lee Egan, how does
that play into the facts as we know them regarding
the murder? For one thing, without a steady home, you know,
nobody could drive by and see what he was doing. Um.
I I understand Lee, that he was living in three
(14:31):
different places. I don't know where that third place is. Yeah,
I'm not sure either that that has been reported though
that there was he was living with the fiance we're
not sure who she is yet. And then he was
living on and off with Laura, and then there was
a third place. I don't know if that was a
third woman, a friend, or what, but reports are saying
(14:52):
that he was kind of hopping around from three different places.
And I guess, since I don't know how, Laura didn't
know where his other home was, but she didn't know
about that he was engaged to this other woman. She
had no idea too until I believe August or so,
and that's when she sent this other woman a text
message wanting to meet with her. So I don't know
(15:15):
how she didn't know where he was living when he
wasn't with her, but obviously it was what with you know,
the other woman. You know also Dr Bethany A lot
of times, you you believe, you think what you want
to think. If he said, um, going, I'm going home
to mom and Dad's, you know, don't call it too
late to wake him up, Um, I'll see you tomorrow,
(15:38):
and he didn't have a cell phone, doesn't have a
cell phone, so you know what she's supposed to do
track him down to his parents house and drive by
like she's sixteen years old and look in the window.
You know, Nancy, what a deadbeat. He didn't even have
a cell phone. And my understanding is that he didn't
even have a job at this point when the crime
was committed. So this guy had a lot of time
(16:00):
on his hands to do whatever he wanted to do.
You know, when I think of sociopathy, I think of
it as a more intense form of narcissism. It's all
the same features of a narcissist, but a more intense version,
Like a narcissist will lack empathy, as sociopath will be callous.
A narcissist will take advantage of other people. Um associate
(16:24):
path will have a parasitic lifestyle and live off of
other people. So I think that what was happening is
that the multiple women and bouncing around from house to house,
it was not just for the sexual gratification and the
excitement of having two women, and who knows, he may
have had even more than two. But but I think
of it as as a part of a parasitic lifestyle
(16:47):
living off of other people. Um, So he didn't have
a job, so I wouldn't be surprised to learn that
both women were supporting him. Financially and more in heaven.
I mean, this guy is okay, he's certainly not a catch.
Let's just put it that way, all right. He's not
(17:10):
gonna be he's not gonna be um nominated for the
Bachelor Show. But beyond that, I mean, I don't know
what either of them saw in him, but what it
has ended up in is the murder of this beautiful girl.
And I know I said it yesterday. I just keep
(17:33):
thinking about, um, the one student and y'all are gonna
kill me. But I'm gonna tell a story again. So
the twins had to read a story. A book, another book.
This one is realistic fiction. Lucy always picks these incredibly
sad books, like one the mother dies in the end. Uh,
this one the teacher dies in the end. I don't
(17:54):
know how she does it. I call her Wednesday Adams
right to her face. But um, she picked this book
called Mrs Bigsby's Last Day and it's about this awesome,
incredible teacher with one strand of pink hair that is
just really affects these these middle schoolers lives and she
gets cancer, and the big finale is the three boys
(18:17):
try to cut school and get across town on a
bus to give her the perfect day. That one day
sometimes in school, she described, and it was sitting on
the side of a hill looking at the sky, having
a glass of wine and eating her favorite cheese raspberry
cheesecake from Michelle's is French Bakery. So they cut school.
(18:42):
They catch all this series of busses. They try to
buy wine under age, and the guy that agrees to
do it steals their money and buys Jack Daniels and
runs away from them. They catch him later, attack and
get the Jack Daniels. They end up getting her out
of intensive care, taking her outside and sitting there having
she has a sip of Jack Daniels, you know, and
(19:05):
the kate got smushed in the knapsack, but they have
that moment that they tried to recreate for her. And
then I read about this woman Laura. I think I
might actually tear up Laura Wallen. And one student said
that he was down and out and he was talking
(19:26):
about skateboarding. She showed up that weekend. This is not
Miss Bixby. This is the real Laura Wallon who's dead now.
She showed up at his door with her skateboard and
they go skateboarding in front of his house. I read.
Another student said that she paid as much attention to
people that obviously needed help as to those who are
(19:47):
really quiet, like my little girl, Lucy super quiet, John David,
very gregarious, he's the mayor of the school. She would
pay attention to those quiet students too, and once do
it insists that I'm being called o G, original gangster.
And so she called the little girl o G the
(20:07):
whole year, just to make her happy. And she would
go up to students and say, give me up what
a jellyfish hug. I don't know what that is, but
that was her thing. And she would open her arms
up in wiggle her arms. That's who Laura Walla is.
February two thousand four, Maura Murray empties her bank account,
(20:29):
drives four hours from school, crashes her car, gets out
and vanishes. Everybody has a theory. Was she murdered? Was
it a suicide? Did she run away? Join the search
as an investigative reporter and former US Marshall uncovered new evidence,
interrogate new witnesses, trace down new leads, and this riveting
(20:49):
new investigative series, The Disappearance of Maura Murray and starting Saturday,
September eight fift pm, seven fifteen Central on GIN the
new network for Crime and Now. As promised straight into
(21:12):
that press conference from the State Attorney Listen Tyler Lewis
Lewis Tessier, age thirty two of Damascus Up has been
charged and three charges, including the first degree murder of
Laura Wallen, age thirty one, a magnificent teacher from wild
Like High School in uh Howard County, UH. In addition
(21:36):
to the murder charge, which carries a maximum sentence of
life without the possibility of parole, the defendants charged with
altering evidence. If you read the charging document it was
distributed to you in court, you will see their work.
Various actions or activities taken by UH by the defendant
Mr Tessier Uh in the days after he murdered Miss
(21:58):
Wallen UH aging the evidence, moving her car, taking a
tag off of her car, throwing keys or license away.
He did tamper with the evidence. Is all contained within
the charging document. He also did and as as as
Donna Fenton mentioned in court, he did give a series
of statements to the police, essentially none of which were
consistent with the others. I think miss Fenton characterized his
(22:20):
statements as containing hundreds of lies that the police could
prove based on their inconsistency with his other statements were
other investigative efforts, UH that were made by the police
that showed that what he was telling them was not,
in fact the truth. Defendant today appeared before these are
Zubari Williams, Judge of the District Court for Montgomery County.
(22:41):
Judge Williams, at the request of the state, agreed with
our request that he'd be held without bond, and the
defendant is held without bond, he will remain incarcerated UH
pending preliminary hearing date, which is set for October thirteenth
of this year. UH. I will tell you, for many
of you who are experienced covering these cases, that creliminary
hearing date will probably never come to pass, because the
(23:04):
reality is we will take action bringing this matter to
the Grand Jury of Montgomery County prior to that date,
and the only thing that will happen on October will
be the announcement we hope of an indictment of the
defendant for what we believe are the appropriate charges at
that time. UM. As we know from in court today, UH,
the defendant in this matter was characterized in court and
(23:29):
did characterize himself to some as the boyfriend of the deceased,
as was mentioned also in court. UH. There was somewhat
of a trial triangle of atmosphere surrounding this because the defendant,
in addition to have me having Miss Walland as a girlfriend,
he was engaged to another woman. I think that he was.
(23:50):
It was clear. I think from what was said in
court he was not honest with either of the women
regarding the true nature of the relationship with with the other. UH.
The family was president in court. We've had constant communication
members of my office, Miss Herdman and Miss Fenton have
been working around the clock on this matter. I will
tell you UH. The autopsy and as matter is still pending,
(24:13):
UH mr is not done. We don't not do not
have the results of that as of yet. UM. As
you know, the body of Miss Wong was recovered in
a field UM up in Damascus, Maryland. UH. Again, I
want to salute the Morcomery County Police Department of the
Homicide Division. I think that the marvelous job following this case,
(24:34):
UH repeatedly interviewing the defendant, challenging him on his inconsistencies,
and then using the forensics, they use cell phone records
to show that he was repeatedly, night after night after night,
going back to the same field. That is the field
where Ms. Wallen's body was in fact recovered. Now that
was the States attorney talking about the so called other woman.
(24:57):
But frankly, you know, and I do not like a
another woman. But um oh, that reminds me. Okay, is
everybody sitting down, you better lay down for this one. Okay.
So at my little Methodist church that I go to,
there is a guy that's got to be he's got
to be eighty seven years old, and he got a
young wife. She's about eighty one. And I love her
(25:21):
because she's always dressed to the nines every time, you know,
I see her like with a hat, the whole shebang.
So I was in this Bible study and this old
gentleman was in it with me, and I used to
fight with him all the time because he would actually
suggest that Christ didn't happen. Okay, So we get into
and why is he im Bible study for a pieces?
(25:42):
I'm trying to be a better person, everybody, you know,
I need it. I need it. Okay, I need the help,
all the helping get and so I spend the whole
hour fighting with him during disciple study. Anyway, long story short,
because I fought with him so much, I felt that
I had to be really friendly to him to show
in that no hard feelings. When I would see him,
I'd go up and say hello, good morning, and hug
(26:04):
and you know when I would see him, well, anyway,
he actually wrote my assistant and asked me because his
wife was jealous for me not to be so exuberant
and saying hello to him. I'm like, Oh, dear Lord
in Heaven, I'm the other woman in this scenario. I'm like,
so anyway, I have now been you know, brand did
(26:27):
as the big hussy, all right. Needless to say, when
I see those two come in, I run the other
way from it. So that's my big story. But what
I'm what I'm trying to say is I really don't
think either one of these ladies or the other woman.
I don't think that existed in this scenario. One of
him he's living with, he's engaged to, the other one
(26:49):
he's about to have a baby with. I mean, you
know what else broke my heart Cheryl McCullum the neighbor.
Her neighbor said that he's known her for years. She
must have lived on top of his apartment because she
liked to bead and make jewelry, and she'd sit outside
on her patio and beads would fall through I guess
(27:10):
the patio, and she would always be scurrying down there
to get the beads that have fallen down on his patio.
And he said that all these boxes had started arriving
from bed bath and beyond and other places. You know,
it's for the baby, Cheryl. Of course, the whole thing
is so heartbreaking, you know. And again, I know we've
(27:31):
talked about it at nauseam, but he said gaping hole.
And then he takes as another friend and says, hey,
I'm gonna need a ride to Baltimore. Um, I gotta
clean up a meth. He's telling you again, this was messy,
this was awful, and he's asking for help. And on
top all of it, you're gonna be too lazy to
(27:53):
dig the hole yourself. It's pathetic. The whole thing is now,
you did say that at the very beginning before where
he was even a suspect, when we the three of
us were talking. You said it disturbed you, Cheryl McCollum,
the director of the Cold Case Institute, that when he
said it's left a gaping hole in our lives. Right
(28:14):
immediately you said, okay, right there. And this is when
later it came out that there was no obvious trauma
or in the back of the head as she was
lying face up, that maybe they didn't see it. Um.
But almost immediately, Cheryl, you said his phraseology of gaping
hole disturbed you, and you were right. She was shot
(28:34):
in the back of the head. Now, guys, you all
know what a big turn of events it was when
I got pregnant and had the twins. I mean, nobody
loosted on me ever expected that was gonna happen in
my life. And Cheryl, do you remember that shower. It
was like it was just very simply the event of
(28:56):
the season. Okay, just kidding. I mean, we had so
many cops and investigators and lawyers, prosecutors. I don't think
there are any defense attorneys. Oh there was one, Renee Rockwell.
But I'm just thinking about that time in life when
you're suddenly doing something unexpected and different, wonderful and as
(29:21):
it's turned out, Cheryl. I mean, it's been the project
of my life. It's the best time ever. It's the
It's the greatest love you're ever gonna have. And he
robbed her of that tune, Nancy, And I was just
thinking about it with those best I mean, those bad
Bath and Beyond boxes showing up. You know, there were
things for the baby, right of course, that's the greatest
(29:44):
shopping ever because you're picking out stuff for your baby,
the crib, the theme, everything is going to be soft
and precious and wonderful, and you're not doing anything for
yourself ever again. And it is the most remarkable selfless
path you're ever gonna be on. And he had her
standing in a field, thinking they were fixing to do
(30:06):
all these wonderful things together, when the reality is who
went back and got a weapon, walked back toward her
with her back to him because he's such a coward,
and shot her in the back of the head. You know,
I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't say, okay, turn around,
turn around to get her to turn around, like he
was about to give her a ring. You know, another
(30:27):
thing that may have brought this to a head, and again,
it's certainly not psychoanalytical verbiage. Dr Bethany, I'm sure you're cringing.
But the fact that, uh, the victim, Laura Walling, had
recently texted the so called other woman and said, hey,
(30:51):
I want to meet with you. I'm sure if you're
in my position, you'd want answers to This is not
a confrontation. I just want to talk to you, woman
to woman. I can't believe they were going to actually
fight over this guy. I like, you know, here, he's yours.
I'll send him to your c O D keep him
for peacesache. But you know, obviously the other woman may
have told him about this text and you're like, I
(31:13):
gotta do something, And this is what he did in
the language of Laura's text was so kind. That's that's
all I was struck by when I read the text.
You know, she said, this is not when she texted
the other woman. I I she says something to the effective, Um,
I think that you would want answers and this is
not a confrontation. This is what a kind person Laura was,
(31:36):
you know. And I wouldn't be surprised if the fact
that it came to a head is not because he
was afraid of the discovery or that the women will
get jealous, or that he would lose the fiance's love
or affection. I wouldn't be surprised if it's just because
he wasn't he was going to lose his paycheck. In
(31:56):
other words, maybe the fiance had more money, or the
fiance was supporting him in some way, or that's where
he was residing, and so that's where the greatest loss
would be. To see what I mean, um that it's
probably had nothing to do with love or affection. It
had to do with where the greatest gratification was. You know.
(32:17):
The other thing that I cannot get out of my mind, Nancy,
is what the parents must have been thinking over the
past ten years. Their daughter has his boyfriend who is
a deadbeat. He's works maintenance for landscaping company. He can't
even afford his own phone. He's bouncing around from house
(32:37):
to house. Their daughter gets pregnant. The father of the
baby is not even living with her or providing anything
for her. What a heartbreak for those parents. I mean,
they've really been suffering for ten years as they've seen
their daughter go through this with this guy, and then
to have such a horrible outcome. Really through it they have,
(33:02):
really And I remember, Cheryl, you lived through a lot
of this with me because you met me when I
was a Brandy prosecutor after Keith was murdered. Um, my
parents stood by for all those years saying, please Mary, David,
please please rush now, run to the don't look back.
(33:23):
And you know, I just kid, I was too messed
up to do anything. And now after this family has
been through all this, Cheryl, now, oh, can you imagine
what it's like for them to wake up in the morning, Cheryl,
I cannot imagine, Nancy. They have lost a daughter, a
grand child. And and again they knew this man for
(33:45):
ten years for on some level, I'm certain they cared
about him too, because she did. So it's it's to me,
it's more than devastating. It's more than gut wrenching, heartbreaking.
There's no word for it. There is absolutely no word
for just the devil had walked through their house. I mean,
I don't you know, uh Lee egan right at the
(34:08):
get go when I found out it was her thought.
Laura's father called the school and said, have you heard
from Laura Wallen? And they went No, he thought to ask,
did she ask for a sub? This is the first
day of school for pizza. You don't not show up
on the first day of school. And when it's your dad,
(34:28):
when it's your father calling to check up on you,
and he thought to ask, is she arranged for a sub?
He knew her that? Well, why wasn't it TESTI er,
why wasn't her her boyfriend looking for her? That? Right then?
I knew you. Okay, this is way wrong, to Lee Egan,
reporter Crime Online dot Com. Lee, what about these texts?
(34:52):
Two messages? Oh yeah, One more thing I wanted to
point out to Dr Bethany to think about is her
text didn't just say Tyler has brought me on an
adventure with him. She also said he had her quote
waiting in a field. I mean, okay, Lee, what about
the other texts he sent from her phone? According to police,
(35:12):
he sent a text message I think it was Monday.
It was either Sunday or Monday UM to her sister
saying I'm ninety sure that Tyler is not the father
of my baby. And then he penned on a guy
that she had not dated in around two years and
one of the biggest red flags. Was he misspelled this
(35:33):
guy's name and this is somebody that that Laura knew. Well.
I saw that immediately. First of all. First of all,
as if Laura Wallen is going to be putting it,
why don't you just send an omni to everybody she knows?
Oh guess what I had the wrong daddy. I'm not
totally sure, but maybe my baby is Antoine's and then
(35:57):
misspell it. He spelled it a n W a n
Antoine instead of a N t O. I n okay e,
but I'm like, okay. When I first saw I thought, well,
maybe it's one of those people they give a weird
spelling to their name, but probably not. This is misspelled.
That was my first thought. And then later I saw
(36:19):
where Antoine was actually spelled a different way. She had
not seen the Antoine person for several years, and I'm
sure the sister knew that. Um. And then she's like,
if you talked to Tyler, you know, tell him what
a great guy he is. I don't want to hurt
his feelings. I mean, Bethany helped me, but he has
(36:41):
just shot the woman in the head. She's in a
shallow grave out in the field and he's writing about
himself from her cell phone. Help me, h you notice
saying that criminals are stupid. I mean Tyler really exemplified
this because not only does he use the deceased girlfriend's
(37:02):
cell phone to send text messages to the sister, he
doesn't even try to adopt her style of writing. I mean,
when the sister receives these text messages, it was very
clear to her that this was not Laura's writing style,
so it was Tyler's writing style. There were misspellings, it
was like an odd quality to the text. I mean,
(37:25):
Tyler could not have been more obvious. And when you
talk about her, you know, standing in the field, he says,
you know, wait here talking about this really low functioning,
potentially low i Q. Man who cannot even hold down
a job, doesn't support himself. How's to ask for a
ride to clean up the mess he's made, doesn't have
(37:48):
his own cell phone? And yet Laura, Laura is completely
compliant with him when he asks her to stand in
the field. And you pointed out that she probably thought
that there was going to be a big surprise that
he was going to propose to her. Um, Laura text
to the sister, you know, Tyler's taking me on an adventure.
But my other thought about this is that she's completely
(38:10):
under his spell. He is so manipulative that he has
really gotten Laura to bend to his will. And I
keep pointing out she was probably supporting him, probably doing
everything for him, so he was able to just take her,
take her to this field and ask her to stand
there in the field while he either retrieved the pistol
(38:32):
from his pocket or went back to his vehicle and
got it. And I think that's really the sad part
of all of this, is that she had really little
to no suspicion about him. We are standing by as
we wait for justice. We're trying to find out the
results of the autopsy report. We think we know the
(38:54):
co D cause of death and m O D manner
of death. Were we're waiting to find out is was
the baby viable? Because if the baby was viable, that
is a double homicide. We now had from Maryland to
Tennessee and the shocking and disturbing trial ongoing in the
(39:17):
murder of a beautiful young nursing student, Holly Bobo. I
remember when she went missing because she's related to a
country music star and I didn't even know about her
disappearance until the country music star contacted us and asked
us to cover her missing and we did, and we
started covering it at the beginning. It is now a
(39:41):
murder trial. Joining me right now, Shane Deeter w A
T N in Tennessee. Dr Bethany Marshall still with me
and Lee Egan, investigative reporter with Crime online dot Com. Shane,
I didn't think the facts could get any worse than
the people out looking for are Jen saying, okay, I
(40:02):
don't if you don't even know what they're Jen saying, okay,
they're out of the force looking for Jen Sing and
they find her skull. They also found other items that
they said were very disturbing the trial. In my mind,
the facts, not the trial have just descended into pure hell.
And I hope the family is not hearing all these facts.
(40:23):
Shane Dieter w A T and give me the latest.
You know, Nancy uh in my twenty some years and
uh TV, I have never heard testimony like was come
out of this trial. And Justin Audrey was on the
stand testifying. I've never seen a witness defendant. He'll be
(40:43):
trial later. Just talked the way he talked in his testimony.
I mean, we had to bleed so much out of it.
And just the cavalier way. He talked about how Zach
Adams uh show Holly when they realized she was alive. Uh,
(41:04):
he and Zack did drugs together, and he was talking
about how they'd been up doing drugs when Zack came
by with Holly Bobo in the back of his pickup
truck and they went out by the Tennessee River to
dispose of the body. And he testified when Zack Adams
ask him if he would help, it was just like
(41:25):
He's like sure, you know, just like you're gonna go
get dinner with somebody or something. I just I was
shocked listening to it. Uh, when I Autrey was on
the stand, it's never heard anything like it. So explain
to me his connection to the case. For people just
hearing the Holly Bobo story for the first time, Shane,
(41:48):
give me in a nutshell, what happened, Nancy. From what
I've seen and heard about this case, Autrey and Zack
Adams and then Zach's brother Dilling, Uh, they were friends.
And from what I've seen from this case is it
was a a drug related friendship, the math, Yes, Ma Math,
(42:11):
and they talked about morphine. They would make some type
of cocktails. So I want to go through the timeline.
What do we know happened that day? Shane Deeter the
day that Holly was kidnapped. It appears, Nancy, it was
just a normal day. A a daughter got up, had
breakfast with her mother and was going to go to
her nursing school classes. And it looked like it was
(42:34):
her routine that she had done, you know, for a while,
and she's in nursing school and she when she walked
out to her car, that's where she encountered zach A
Lee Egan joining me reporter with Crime Online. What do
we know about the day she went missing? I understand
that the brother who was still home, the mother was
at work, uh and the parents were gone. Holly usually
(42:56):
leaves that morning in the morning around seven to go
to nursing school. She packs your lunch, takes a little
lunch pail, goes out to the car board to get
in the car. The brother hears a Ruckason goes out.
He sees, to my understanding, someone dressed in camouflage and
they're walking into the woods to see that would have
sparked my interest right there, while you're walking in the
(43:16):
woods when you're supposed to be going to school. But
he thought it was Holly Bobo's boyfriend. And it was
only later when a neighbor heard a scream called Holly's
mother at work, that the mother called the home and said,
find Holly. He goes outside, he finds blood in the
garage and the mother says, call n one. He calls
(43:39):
one Leagan. What happens. Then that's when it becomes kind
of a mystery, because of course everybody's denying to hit
any involvement, except for the autry guy who's trying to
get a plea deal, trying to get out of life.
But um, from what I understand that they it was
that same day, or might have been the day after.
There was a man who was he noticed something wrong
in his on his property, like something was off, and
(44:01):
he walked out to a stream and he found a
lunch pill, and in court it was the same exact
lunch pill that Holly's mother was holding up. It matched,
So I guess they tossed. I believe that they tossed
all her stuff right there or after they killed or
maybe it went downstream, but yeah, she wasn't. She was
(44:22):
in trouble immediately. You know, what we have heard is
that these meth freaks kidnapped Polly. They rape her repeatedly
in video. The rape Shane Deeter w a t n as.
I don't believe that that video has ever been recovered
or has it, Nancy, to my knowledge, it has not. Uh.
(44:43):
Two other men were indicted, the indictment ended up being dropped, uh,
and their charges were tampering with evidence and it was
the tape. But to my knowledge it has never surfaced. Uh,
you know other than outside this circle of myth free
DJ Bethany Marshall please weigh in. I mean just the
(45:06):
fact that we know not they kidnapped the woman, uh
twenty one. I think you're all nursing Steed in her
whole life before her. They're doing this at seven in
the morning. You know, I haven't even had a second
cup of tea by then, and they're out planning a
kidnap at in the morning. And the psychopathy behind videoing
(45:32):
while you rape somebody, you know, Nancy. In preparation for
this show, I started looking up meth crimes. I just
started looking at the research and trying to figure out
the mindset of the methodict. And I read a shocking
statistic that this property crimes are committed by people on
meth amset. I mean that that was one piece of research.
The other was some of the crimes I heard. I
(45:54):
read about a father of a seven month old put
the seven month old into freezers so he could take
him out later for a snack. Um, a mother of
a four year old injecting for four year old repeatedly
with methem fetamine. Uh. Twenty something year old going into
the bathroom of the dollar store masturbating, eating food that
(46:17):
he had stolen from the store. When the employees tried
to get him out, he ran into the store, grabbed
silly stream started uh, sprang it all over the store.
And so uh, these these crimes, these acts that these
meth freaks commit, are so strange. They're in a bizarre,
dark world. And one of the first crimes that we
(46:39):
covered on when you had had a show on hl
Lynn was a man who was forgetting the name, but
he kidnapped um two kids, tied up the parents, bludgeon
them to death. There was blood all over the home
and and at that point I started researching meth, and
I kept hearing the term overkill, that when meth addicts
(47:00):
commit crimes where there's a homicide involved, there's always an
overkill effect because they're so high and they're in such
an altered state that they literally kind of lose perspective
on where they are. And I think that's really the
only explanatory principle behind this crime. But behind the fact
that it was seven in the morning, uh, that they
(47:21):
raped and killed her so quickly, uh, and even the
fact that the mother, when Clint Bobo called the mother,
she said, get a pistol and go get them, as
if the mother had some growing cognizant of the danger
around the house and what these methodics are capable of.
We are on the case as the Holly Bogo trial
(47:42):
goes on. Nancy Grace signing off Goodbye Fan
It's the last week of National Make a Will Month.
At legal Zoom, they're still time to take control of
your family's assets and their future. Sure, there's a lot
to think about, but that's why legal Zoom created an
estate planning kit to help you get going. You get
an estate plan checklist and e book and other information
(00:21):
to help you decide what to do. And you can
always get advice from legal zooms nationwide network of independent
lawyers without being billed by the hour. Since legal zoom
is not a law firm, hurry to legal zoom dot
com now for your free estate planning kit. No obligation,
(00:44):
just great resources to help you protect what you care
about your family. For special savings, be sure to enter
code Nancy in a n C Y at checkout legal
zoom dot com legal zoom dot com. Crime Stories with
(01:06):
Nancy Grace on Serious x M Triumph Channel one thirty two.
Montgomery County police have searched Laura Wallon's condo looking for clues.
Wallon didn't show up to teach her a social studies
class on Tuesday, the first day of school at wald
Leg High. The missing teacher's father and sister says she
was four months pregnant. She was a woman of faith
and right now she is in the arms of God.
(01:27):
Her body has now been recovered. Tyler Tessier, Mrs Wallon's boyfriend,
was arrested for her murder. In addition to having me
having this Wallon as a girlfriend, he was engaged to
another one. Key lied to my face when I asked
him about the other girl and said, I haven't seen
her in two years. I haven't talked to her in
(01:48):
two years, and I believed him. He's a very believable guy.
Teacher of the year, Teacher of the year, four months pregnant,
sound dead and a shallow grave in a remote field. Why,
why odds are she thought she was about to be
(02:10):
proposed to. She had just sent her sister a text
saying Tyler has taken me on an adventure. We're out
in a field. What could it be? It was a
burial ground, That's what it was. No ring involved. I'm
(02:31):
Nancy Grace. This is crime stories and I want justice.
I am talking about a thirty one year old woman,
four months pregnant with the baby of Tyler Tessier. She
is dead now. Her autopsy is ongoing. Why I believe
(02:53):
because they are trying to determine the age of the
baby Catch twenty two. In many countries around the world,
viability for a baby starts at just fourteen weeks. Fourteen
weeks in the United States, typically it's twenty weeks twenty
(03:17):
weeks for viability. Why is this important Because if that
baby was viable at the time the teacher of the
Year is shot in the back of the head, then
that's a double murder. Okay, that's what's taking so long
on the autopsy. Was the baby viable? Joining me right
(03:38):
now an all star cast with me Crime Online reporter
Lee Egan, who's been doing a lot of digging on
this case. The director of the Cold Case Institute, Cheryl McCullum,
psychoanalyst Dr Bethany Marshall joining me from l A. Ladies,
thank you for being with us. You know, when I
(03:59):
hear what has gone down, I'm literally sick at my stomach.
Cheryl McCullum sick. Tyler's taking me on an adventure. That's
some adventure. Huh. Oh my god, Nancy, it is horrifying
for her to sit there and tech I'm waiting in
this field, waiting, and then he comes from behind her
(04:21):
calculated and shoots her in the back of the head.
It is a death sin of the case as far
as I'm concerned. Well, here's the deal. It's Maryland. In Maryland,
the governor and all of his wisdom got rid of
the death penalty and commuted everybody on death row to
(04:41):
life behind bars. You can kill as many people as
you want to in Maryland and just get life behind bars.
In fact, what brought that to my attention was when
three little girls were stabbed dead in Maryland, all under
the age of ten. Uh huh, and there's no death penalty.
Three little girls stab dad. I want to go back
(05:02):
to something we were just saying, Cheryl Um when I
first learned through our sources that there was no visible
trauma to the body, they didn't know the cause of death.
I'm like, wow, okay, I did not expect him to
asphyxiate her in an open field. He didn't. We now
have information she was shot once in the back of
(05:24):
the head. And I'm gonna go to Bethany on this
in just a moment, because Cheryl, no way could he
look her in the face and strangle her. No way
shot her in the back of the head like the coward.
He is punk and that's exactly right, Nancy. He could
not face them, he couldn't, So let me go to
Lee Egan. Um, I wanna We were starting with a
(05:47):
dead body of the teacher of the Year and I'm
sick about it. And her family is sick about her family,
her mom and dad that sat there giving a press or,
holding the boyfriend, Tyler Tessier's hand, patting him on the shoulder,
they knew at the time they did that press or
(06:11):
that he was a suspect. Lee Egan, they did know,
and they did not like it. He had a bond
hearing yesterday morning, and Mark Wallen, Laura's father, spoke at
the bond hearing and said, he's a monster, a liar,
and it took everything he had just to play that role.
(06:32):
And he knew that he had to do it to
to get Tyler to talk, which is what the police
wanted him to do, to see what he had to say,
to see if he he slipped up, watch his body language,
the words he said. And it was just extremely difficult
for the family to do. The mother, she was shaking
so much while holding his hand that she couldn't move.
(06:52):
She just sat on that bench, she couldn't talk. Um.
It was just extremely difficult for for the family. Following
up on what Lee and has just reported, listen to
what Laura Walla's dad said about that press or the
press conference that we did the other day was a
press conference to get out the baby, a picture and
(07:14):
the name of the baby daddy. And it was all
we could do two be seen as a unified family
with him. He is a monster, and he is a liar,
and it is It was absolutely the hardest thing that
(07:35):
my wife could do would be to sit next to
him and hold his hand, and she had to hold
his hand with two hands because she was shaking so badly.
And but we did it because as any father would
do if your child is missing and someone has that child.
(07:57):
We were pretty sure it was Tyler, but we didn't
know where she was. And you can't put somebody away
on a missing person. Someone doesn't go to prison for
life on a missing person. And he it's it defies
(08:18):
description the the awfulness and the horror that we have
been put through on this. We've all been deceived through
days your family, most computely, did you feel as though
you were being deceived? Really a fine views have been
(08:40):
anyway he is. He has been deceiving and lying their
entire existence, and it their their relationship was the only
thing that Laura and her family ever fought about. Laura
is a wonderful girl, so bright, of such a bright future.
(09:05):
And he he lied to my face when I asked
him about the other the other girl, and said, I
haven't seen her in two years. I haven't talked to
her in two years. And I believed her. I believed him.
(09:26):
He's a very believable guy. To Dr Bethany Marshall, Dr Bethany,
I want to talk to you about the psychopathy behind this.
What do you make of the fact that she, Laura
Wallen was saying, Oh, Tyler has brought me on an adventure.
That some adventure, Bethany, some adventure. What I kept thinking
(09:48):
about was the hopeful anticipation she had. You know, they
had been together for ten years. They didn't live together
as far as I know. She was four months prey meant,
and I imagine that she thought that finally, finally they
would be engaged, finally he would move in with her,
finally they would have a life together. And four months pregnant.
(10:12):
I mean that she's beginning to show it's about the
time you start shopping for the crib and and thinking
about the life of the unborn child of future together.
And so this is the moment in her mind where
she thinks he's going to propose. But in terms of
the psychopathy, what we know about sociopaths is that they
(10:34):
cannot attach. They have low levels of empathy and remorse.
They have reckless disregard and lack of concerns for the
right and safety of others. That they are homicidal. They
played by their own rules rather than the rules of society.
And on brain imaging scans, if you look at the
brain scans of sociopaths, the part of the brain that
(10:57):
lights up when looking at other people and having empathy
and engaging with other people, that part of the brain
is dead. They just do not have empathy and they
do not attach. However, they don't want to let other
people down. They are very concerned about their own self image.
So I think it's significant that he shot her in
(11:18):
the back of the head. Wait a minute, Wait a minute,
Dr bethany Um. Now I'm certainly no psychoanalysts like you are.
I'm just to try a lawyer and a crime victim,
Cheryl McCollum. When Dr Bethany says they don't want to
let people down, I don't think he gave it a
flying fig about letting anybody else down or their feelings.
I think he just wanted to keep all the balls
(11:38):
into the air for his own amusement. He had two women,
one he was engaged to and living with the other
one is four months pregnant, and reports that he had
gone to Laura Walla's father and asked for her hand
in marriage. She's the one that's four months pregnant. He
wanted to keep playing, keep both of these women on
the line. That's why he hadn't settled down after or
(12:00):
ten years. Now, Listen, I certainly don't have a leg
to stand on because it was many, many years after
case murderer before I finally finally could bring myself to
try to marry again. But I don't think it was
any sentimentality on his part that kept him from wanting
(12:20):
to get married. I mean, the woman is four months pregnant. Now,
if that ain't the time to poop, then I don't know,
you better just get off the pot. But what I'm
saying here is think about it? Is it true, Cheryl McCollum,
He said he didn't have a cell phone? My how
convenient that way Laura Wallan couldn't face time and and
(12:41):
see that he wasn't at work and see that he
was at somebody else's place. That's convenient, right, no cell phone?
Are you kidding me? It's convenient? And he also didn't
need the phone pinging to where he went to bury
your body, and he used her cell phones to send
the text messages as though it were her and look
at his own word as the nancy. They go to
(13:01):
the store together on September two, he kills her on
September one. September four, he sends a text message as
though he were the victim to our sister that says, oh,
you know, I'm like sure that Tyler is not the
baby's dad. Um, I think it's my egg boyfriend. I mean,
what a piece of crap this guy is. Then he's
still trying to get himself out of trouble with the
(13:24):
other fiancee. He doesn't want anybody to say that baby
is his. And incidentally, she hadn't seen the egg boy
friend in two years, so that'd be quite a trick
paller piece of crap. You know, I want to go
through what we know about Tyler Tessier, Cheryl McCollum at
this point, let me hear what you and Lee know.
(13:46):
Then we'll get Bethany Marshall to shrink at Go ahead, Cheryl.
We know he has two women. We know he doesn't
have a job. We know he's got three places that
he stays occasionally to sleep. So it's like he does
have any responsibilities like a real adult. He's not going
to take care of this baby. He ain't worried about
a boral one k or retirement. He doesn't have a
(14:08):
mortgage in a house he's taken care of. He damned sure.
He ain't gonna try to take care of a job
for the next eighteen years. So, Lee Egan, how does
that play into the facts as we know them regarding
the murder? For one thing, without a steady home, you know,
nobody could drive by and see what he was doing. Um.
I I understand Lee, that he was living in three
(14:31):
different places. I don't know where that third place is. Yeah,
I'm not sure either that that has been reported though
that there was he was living with the fiance we're
not sure who she is yet. And then he was
living on and off with Laura, and then there was
a third place. I don't know if that was a
third woman, a friend, or what, but reports are saying
(14:52):
that he was kind of hopping around from three different places.
And I guess, since I don't know how, Laura didn't
know where his other home was, but she didn't know
about that he was engaged to this other woman. She
had no idea too until I believe August or so,
and that's when she sent this other woman a text
message wanting to meet with her. So I don't know
(15:15):
how she didn't know where he was living when he
wasn't with her, but obviously it was what with you know,
the other woman. You know also Dr Bethany A lot
of times, you you believe, you think what you want
to think. If he said, um, going, I'm going home
to mom and Dad's, you know, don't call it too
late to wake him up, Um, I'll see you tomorrow,
(15:38):
and he didn't have a cell phone, doesn't have a
cell phone, so you know what she's supposed to do
track him down to his parents house and drive by
like she's sixteen years old and look in the window.
You know, Nancy, what a deadbeat. He didn't even have
a cell phone. And my understanding is that he didn't
even have a job at this point when the crime
was committed. So this guy had a lot of time
(16:00):
on his hands to do whatever he wanted to do.
You know, when I think of sociopathy, I think of
it as a more intense form of narcissism. It's all
the same features of a narcissist, but a more intense version,
Like a narcissist will lack empathy, as sociopath will be callous.
A narcissist will take advantage of other people. Um associate
(16:24):
path will have a parasitic lifestyle and live off of
other people. So I think that what was happening is
that the multiple women and bouncing around from house to house,
it was not just for the sexual gratification and the
excitement of having two women, and who knows, he may
have had even more than two. But but I think
of it as as a part of a parasitic lifestyle
(16:47):
living off of other people. Um, So he didn't have
a job, so I wouldn't be surprised to learn that
both women were supporting him. Financially and more in heaven.
I mean, this guy is okay, he's certainly not a catch.
Let's just put it that way, all right. He's not
(17:10):
gonna be he's not gonna be um nominated for the
Bachelor Show. But beyond that, I mean, I don't know
what either of them saw in him, but what it
has ended up in is the murder of this beautiful girl.
And I know I said it yesterday. I just keep
(17:33):
thinking about, um, the one student and y'all are gonna
kill me. But I'm gonna tell a story again. So
the twins had to read a story. A book, another book.
This one is realistic fiction. Lucy always picks these incredibly
sad books, like one the mother dies in the end. Uh,
this one the teacher dies in the end. I don't
(17:54):
know how she does it. I call her Wednesday Adams
right to her face. But um, she picked this book
called Mrs Bigsby's Last Day and it's about this awesome,
incredible teacher with one strand of pink hair that is
just really affects these these middle schoolers lives and she
gets cancer, and the big finale is the three boys
(18:17):
try to cut school and get across town on a
bus to give her the perfect day. That one day
sometimes in school, she described, and it was sitting on
the side of a hill looking at the sky, having
a glass of wine and eating her favorite cheese raspberry
cheesecake from Michelle's is French Bakery. So they cut school.
(18:42):
They catch all this series of busses. They try to
buy wine under age, and the guy that agrees to
do it steals their money and buys Jack Daniels and
runs away from them. They catch him later, attack and
get the Jack Daniels. They end up getting her out
of intensive care, taking her outside and sitting there having
she has a sip of Jack Daniels, you know, and
(19:05):
the kate got smushed in the knapsack, but they have
that moment that they tried to recreate for her. And
then I read about this woman Laura. I think I
might actually tear up Laura Wallen. And one student said
that he was down and out and he was talking
(19:26):
about skateboarding. She showed up that weekend. This is not
Miss Bixby. This is the real Laura Wallon who's dead now.
She showed up at his door with her skateboard and
they go skateboarding in front of his house. I read.
Another student said that she paid as much attention to
people that obviously needed help as to those who are
(19:47):
really quiet, like my little girl, Lucy super quiet, John David,
very gregarious, he's the mayor of the school. She would
pay attention to those quiet students too, and once do
it insists that I'm being called o G, original gangster.
And so she called the little girl o G the
(20:07):
whole year, just to make her happy. And she would
go up to students and say, give me up what
a jellyfish hug. I don't know what that is, but
that was her thing. And she would open her arms
up in wiggle her arms. That's who Laura Walla is.
February two thousand four, Maura Murray empties her bank account,
(20:29):
drives four hours from school, crashes her car, gets out
and vanishes. Everybody has a theory. Was she murdered? Was
it a suicide? Did she run away? Join the search
as an investigative reporter and former US Marshall uncovered new evidence,
interrogate new witnesses, trace down new leads, and this riveting
(20:49):
new investigative series, The Disappearance of Maura Murray and starting Saturday,
September eight fift pm, seven fifteen Central on GIN the
new network for Crime and Now. As promised straight into
(21:12):
that press conference from the State Attorney Listen Tyler Lewis
Lewis Tessier, age thirty two of Damascus Up has been
charged and three charges, including the first degree murder of
Laura Wallen, age thirty one, a magnificent teacher from wild
Like High School in uh Howard County, UH. In addition
(21:36):
to the murder charge, which carries a maximum sentence of
life without the possibility of parole, the defendants charged with
altering evidence. If you read the charging document it was
distributed to you in court, you will see their work.
Various actions or activities taken by UH by the defendant
Mr Tessier Uh in the days after he murdered Miss
(21:58):
Wallen UH aging the evidence, moving her car, taking a
tag off of her car, throwing keys or license away.
He did tamper with the evidence. Is all contained within
the charging document. He also did and as as as
Donna Fenton mentioned in court, he did give a series
of statements to the police, essentially none of which were
consistent with the others. I think miss Fenton characterized his
(22:20):
statements as containing hundreds of lies that the police could
prove based on their inconsistency with his other statements were
other investigative efforts, UH that were made by the police
that showed that what he was telling them was not,
in fact the truth. Defendant today appeared before these are
Zubari Williams, Judge of the District Court for Montgomery County.
(22:41):
Judge Williams, at the request of the state, agreed with
our request that he'd be held without bond, and the
defendant is held without bond, he will remain incarcerated UH
pending preliminary hearing date, which is set for October thirteenth
of this year. UH. I will tell you, for many
of you who are experienced covering these cases, that creliminary
hearing date will probably never come to pass, because the
(23:04):
reality is we will take action bringing this matter to
the Grand Jury of Montgomery County prior to that date,
and the only thing that will happen on October will
be the announcement we hope of an indictment of the
defendant for what we believe are the appropriate charges at
that time. UM. As we know from in court today, UH,
the defendant in this matter was characterized in court and
(23:29):
did characterize himself to some as the boyfriend of the deceased,
as was mentioned also in court. UH. There was somewhat
of a trial triangle of atmosphere surrounding this because the defendant,
in addition to have me having Miss Walland as a girlfriend,
he was engaged to another woman. I think that he was.
(23:50):
It was clear. I think from what was said in
court he was not honest with either of the women
regarding the true nature of the relationship with with the other. UH.
The family was president in court. We've had constant communication
members of my office, Miss Herdman and Miss Fenton have
been working around the clock on this matter. I will
tell you UH. The autopsy and as matter is still pending,
(24:13):
UH mr is not done. We don't not do not
have the results of that as of yet. UM. As
you know, the body of Miss Wong was recovered in
a field UM up in Damascus, Maryland. UH. Again, I
want to salute the Morcomery County Police Department of the
Homicide Division. I think that the marvelous job following this case,
(24:34):
UH repeatedly interviewing the defendant, challenging him on his inconsistencies,
and then using the forensics, they use cell phone records
to show that he was repeatedly, night after night after night,
going back to the same field. That is the field
where Ms. Wallen's body was in fact recovered. Now that
was the States attorney talking about the so called other woman.
(24:57):
But frankly, you know, and I do not like a
another woman. But um oh, that reminds me. Okay, is
everybody sitting down, you better lay down for this one. Okay.
So at my little Methodist church that I go to,
there is a guy that's got to be he's got
to be eighty seven years old, and he got a
young wife. She's about eighty one. And I love her
(25:21):
because she's always dressed to the nines every time, you know,
I see her like with a hat, the whole shebang.
So I was in this Bible study and this old
gentleman was in it with me, and I used to
fight with him all the time because he would actually
suggest that Christ didn't happen. Okay, So we get into
and why is he im Bible study for a pieces?
(25:42):
I'm trying to be a better person, everybody, you know,
I need it. I need it. Okay, I need the help,
all the helping get and so I spend the whole
hour fighting with him during disciple study. Anyway, long story short,
because I fought with him so much, I felt that
I had to be really friendly to him to show
in that no hard feelings. When I would see him,
I'd go up and say hello, good morning, and hug
(26:04):
and you know when I would see him, well, anyway,
he actually wrote my assistant and asked me because his
wife was jealous for me not to be so exuberant
and saying hello to him. I'm like, Oh, dear Lord
in Heaven, I'm the other woman in this scenario. I'm like,
so anyway, I have now been you know, brand did
(26:27):
as the big hussy, all right. Needless to say, when
I see those two come in, I run the other
way from it. So that's my big story. But what
I'm what I'm trying to say is I really don't
think either one of these ladies or the other woman.
I don't think that existed in this scenario. One of
him he's living with, he's engaged to, the other one
(26:49):
he's about to have a baby with. I mean, you
know what else broke my heart Cheryl McCullum the neighbor.
Her neighbor said that he's known her for years. She
must have lived on top of his apartment because she
liked to bead and make jewelry, and she'd sit outside
on her patio and beads would fall through I guess
(27:10):
the patio, and she would always be scurrying down there
to get the beads that have fallen down on his patio.
And he said that all these boxes had started arriving
from bed bath and beyond and other places. You know,
it's for the baby, Cheryl. Of course, the whole thing
is so heartbreaking, you know. And again, I know we've
(27:31):
talked about it at nauseam, but he said gaping hole.
And then he takes as another friend and says, hey,
I'm gonna need a ride to Baltimore. Um, I gotta
clean up a meth. He's telling you again, this was messy,
this was awful, and he's asking for help. And on
top all of it, you're gonna be too lazy to
(27:53):
dig the hole yourself. It's pathetic. The whole thing is now,
you did say that at the very beginning before where
he was even a suspect, when we the three of
us were talking. You said it disturbed you, Cheryl McCollum,
the director of the Cold Case Institute, that when he
said it's left a gaping hole in our lives. Right
(28:14):
immediately you said, okay, right there. And this is when
later it came out that there was no obvious trauma
or in the back of the head as she was
lying face up, that maybe they didn't see it. Um.
But almost immediately, Cheryl, you said his phraseology of gaping
hole disturbed you, and you were right. She was shot
(28:34):
in the back of the head. Now, guys, you all
know what a big turn of events it was when
I got pregnant and had the twins. I mean, nobody
loosted on me ever expected that was gonna happen in
my life. And Cheryl, do you remember that shower. It
was like it was just very simply the event of
(28:56):
the season. Okay, just kidding. I mean, we had so
many cops and investigators and lawyers, prosecutors. I don't think
there are any defense attorneys. Oh there was one, Renee Rockwell.
But I'm just thinking about that time in life when
you're suddenly doing something unexpected and different, wonderful and as
(29:21):
it's turned out, Cheryl. I mean, it's been the project
of my life. It's the best time ever. It's the
It's the greatest love you're ever gonna have. And he
robbed her of that tune, Nancy, And I was just
thinking about it with those best I mean, those bad
Bath and Beyond boxes showing up. You know, there were
things for the baby, right of course, that's the greatest
(29:44):
shopping ever because you're picking out stuff for your baby,
the crib, the theme, everything is going to be soft
and precious and wonderful, and you're not doing anything for
yourself ever again. And it is the most remarkable selfless
path you're ever gonna be on. And he had her
standing in a field, thinking they were fixing to do
(30:06):
all these wonderful things together, when the reality is who
went back and got a weapon, walked back toward her
with her back to him because he's such a coward,
and shot her in the back of the head. You know,
I wouldn't be surprised if he didn't say, okay, turn around,
turn around to get her to turn around, like he
was about to give her a ring. You know, another
(30:27):
thing that may have brought this to a head, and again,
it's certainly not psychoanalytical verbiage. Dr Bethany, I'm sure you're cringing.
But the fact that, uh, the victim, Laura Walling, had
recently texted the so called other woman and said, hey,
(30:51):
I want to meet with you. I'm sure if you're
in my position, you'd want answers to This is not
a confrontation. I just want to talk to you, woman
to woman. I can't believe they were going to actually
fight over this guy. I like, you know, here, he's yours.
I'll send him to your c O D keep him
for peacesache. But you know, obviously the other woman may
have told him about this text and you're like, I
(31:13):
gotta do something, And this is what he did in
the language of Laura's text was so kind. That's that's
all I was struck by when I read the text.
You know, she said, this is not when she texted
the other woman. I I she says something to the effective, Um,
I think that you would want answers and this is
not a confrontation. This is what a kind person Laura was,
(31:36):
you know. And I wouldn't be surprised if the fact
that it came to a head is not because he
was afraid of the discovery or that the women will
get jealous, or that he would lose the fiance's love
or affection. I wouldn't be surprised if it's just because
he wasn't he was going to lose his paycheck. In
(31:56):
other words, maybe the fiance had more money, or the
fiance was supporting him in some way, or that's where
he was residing, and so that's where the greatest loss
would be. To see what I mean, um that it's
probably had nothing to do with love or affection. It
had to do with where the greatest gratification was. You know.
(32:17):
The other thing that I cannot get out of my mind, Nancy,
is what the parents must have been thinking over the
past ten years. Their daughter has his boyfriend who is
a deadbeat. He's works maintenance for landscaping company. He can't
even afford his own phone. He's bouncing around from house
(32:37):
to house. Their daughter gets pregnant. The father of the
baby is not even living with her or providing anything
for her. What a heartbreak for those parents. I mean,
they've really been suffering for ten years as they've seen
their daughter go through this with this guy, and then
to have such a horrible outcome. Really through it they have,
(33:02):
really And I remember, Cheryl, you lived through a lot
of this with me because you met me when I
was a Brandy prosecutor after Keith was murdered. Um, my
parents stood by for all those years saying, please Mary, David,
please please rush now, run to the don't look back.
(33:23):
And you know, I just kid, I was too messed
up to do anything. And now after this family has
been through all this, Cheryl, now, oh, can you imagine
what it's like for them to wake up in the morning, Cheryl,
I cannot imagine, Nancy. They have lost a daughter, a
grand child. And and again they knew this man for
(33:45):
ten years for on some level, I'm certain they cared
about him too, because she did. So it's it's to me,
it's more than devastating. It's more than gut wrenching, heartbreaking.
There's no word for it. There is absolutely no word
for just the devil had walked through their house. I mean,
I don't you know, uh Lee egan right at the
(34:08):
get go when I found out it was her thought.
Laura's father called the school and said, have you heard
from Laura Wallen? And they went No, he thought to ask,
did she ask for a sub? This is the first
day of school for pizza. You don't not show up
on the first day of school. And when it's your dad,
(34:28):
when it's your father calling to check up on you,
and he thought to ask, is she arranged for a sub?
He knew her that? Well, why wasn't it TESTI er,
why wasn't her her boyfriend looking for her? That? Right then?
I knew you. Okay, this is way wrong, to Lee Egan,
reporter Crime Online dot Com. Lee, what about these texts?
(34:52):
Two messages? Oh yeah, One more thing I wanted to
point out to Dr Bethany to think about is her
text didn't just say Tyler has brought me on an
adventure with him. She also said he had her quote
waiting in a field. I mean, okay, Lee, what about
the other texts he sent from her phone? According to police,
(35:12):
he sent a text message I think it was Monday.
It was either Sunday or Monday UM to her sister
saying I'm ninety sure that Tyler is not the father
of my baby. And then he penned on a guy
that she had not dated in around two years and
one of the biggest red flags. Was he misspelled this
(35:33):
guy's name and this is somebody that that Laura knew. Well.
I saw that immediately. First of all. First of all,
as if Laura Wallen is going to be putting it,
why don't you just send an omni to everybody she knows?
Oh guess what I had the wrong daddy. I'm not
totally sure, but maybe my baby is Antoine's and then
(35:57):
misspell it. He spelled it a n W a n
Antoine instead of a N t O. I n okay e,
but I'm like, okay. When I first saw I thought, well,
maybe it's one of those people they give a weird
spelling to their name, but probably not. This is misspelled.
That was my first thought. And then later I saw
(36:19):
where Antoine was actually spelled a different way. She had
not seen the Antoine person for several years, and I'm
sure the sister knew that. Um. And then she's like,
if you talked to Tyler, you know, tell him what
a great guy he is. I don't want to hurt
his feelings. I mean, Bethany helped me, but he has
(36:41):
just shot the woman in the head. She's in a
shallow grave out in the field and he's writing about
himself from her cell phone. Help me, h you notice
saying that criminals are stupid. I mean Tyler really exemplified
this because not only does he use the deceased girlfriend's
(37:02):
cell phone to send text messages to the sister, he
doesn't even try to adopt her style of writing. I mean,
when the sister receives these text messages, it was very
clear to her that this was not Laura's writing style,
so it was Tyler's writing style. There were misspellings, it
was like an odd quality to the text. I mean,
(37:25):
Tyler could not have been more obvious. And when you
talk about her, you know, standing in the field, he says,
you know, wait here talking about this really low functioning,
potentially low i Q. Man who cannot even hold down
a job, doesn't support himself. How's to ask for a
ride to clean up the mess he's made, doesn't have
(37:48):
his own cell phone? And yet Laura, Laura is completely
compliant with him when he asks her to stand in
the field. And you pointed out that she probably thought
that there was going to be a big surprise that
he was going to propose to her. Um, Laura text
to the sister, you know, Tyler's taking me on an adventure.
But my other thought about this is that she's completely
(38:10):
under his spell. He is so manipulative that he has
really gotten Laura to bend to his will. And I
keep pointing out she was probably supporting him, probably doing
everything for him, so he was able to just take her,
take her to this field and ask her to stand
there in the field while he either retrieved the pistol
(38:32):
from his pocket or went back to his vehicle and
got it. And I think that's really the sad part
of all of this, is that she had really little
to no suspicion about him. We are standing by as
we wait for justice. We're trying to find out the
results of the autopsy report. We think we know the
(38:54):
co D cause of death and m O D manner
of death. Were we're waiting to find out is was
the baby viable? Because if the baby was viable, that
is a double homicide. We now had from Maryland to
Tennessee and the shocking and disturbing trial ongoing in the
(39:17):
murder of a beautiful young nursing student, Holly Bobo. I
remember when she went missing because she's related to a
country music star and I didn't even know about her
disappearance until the country music star contacted us and asked
us to cover her missing and we did, and we
started covering it at the beginning. It is now a
(39:41):
murder trial. Joining me right now, Shane Deeter w A
T N in Tennessee. Dr Bethany Marshall still with me
and Lee Egan, investigative reporter with Crime online dot Com. Shane,
I didn't think the facts could get any worse than
the people out looking for are Jen saying, okay, I
(40:02):
don't if you don't even know what they're Jen saying, okay,
they're out of the force looking for Jen Sing and
they find her skull. They also found other items that
they said were very disturbing the trial. In my mind,
the facts, not the trial have just descended into pure hell.
And I hope the family is not hearing all these facts.
(40:23):
Shane Dieter w A T and give me the latest.
You know, Nancy uh in my twenty some years and
uh TV, I have never heard testimony like was come
out of this trial. And Justin Audrey was on the
stand testifying. I've never seen a witness defendant. He'll be
(40:43):
trial later. Just talked the way he talked in his testimony.
I mean, we had to bleed so much out of it.
And just the cavalier way. He talked about how Zach
Adams uh show Holly when they realized she was alive. Uh,
(41:04):
he and Zack did drugs together, and he was talking
about how they'd been up doing drugs when Zack came
by with Holly Bobo in the back of his pickup
truck and they went out by the Tennessee River to
dispose of the body. And he testified when Zack Adams
ask him if he would help, it was just like
(41:25):
He's like sure, you know, just like you're gonna go
get dinner with somebody or something. I just I was
shocked listening to it. Uh, when I Autrey was on
the stand, it's never heard anything like it. So explain
to me his connection to the case. For people just
hearing the Holly Bobo story for the first time, Shane,
(41:48):
give me in a nutshell, what happened, Nancy. From what
I've seen and heard about this case, Autrey and Zack
Adams and then Zach's brother Dilling, Uh, they were friends.
And from what I've seen from this case is it
was a a drug related friendship, the math, Yes, Ma Math,
(42:11):
and they talked about morphine. They would make some type
of cocktails. So I want to go through the timeline.
What do we know happened that day? Shane Deeter the
day that Holly was kidnapped. It appears, Nancy, it was
just a normal day. A a daughter got up, had
breakfast with her mother and was going to go to
her nursing school classes. And it looked like it was
(42:34):
her routine that she had done, you know, for a while,
and she's in nursing school and she when she walked
out to her car, that's where she encountered zach A
Lee Egan joining me reporter with Crime Online. What do
we know about the day she went missing? I understand
that the brother who was still home, the mother was
at work, uh and the parents were gone. Holly usually
(42:56):
leaves that morning in the morning around seven to go
to nursing school. She packs your lunch, takes a little
lunch pail, goes out to the car board to get
in the car. The brother hears a Ruckason goes out.
He sees, to my understanding, someone dressed in camouflage and
they're walking into the woods to see that would have
sparked my interest right there, while you're walking in the
(43:16):
woods when you're supposed to be going to school. But
he thought it was Holly Bobo's boyfriend. And it was
only later when a neighbor heard a scream called Holly's
mother at work, that the mother called the home and said,
find Holly. He goes outside, he finds blood in the
garage and the mother says, call n one. He calls
(43:39):
one Leagan. What happens. Then that's when it becomes kind
of a mystery, because of course everybody's denying to hit
any involvement, except for the autry guy who's trying to
get a plea deal, trying to get out of life.
But um, from what I understand that they it was
that same day, or might have been the day after.
There was a man who was he noticed something wrong
in his on his property, like something was off, and
(44:01):
he walked out to a stream and he found a
lunch pill, and in court it was the same exact
lunch pill that Holly's mother was holding up. It matched,
So I guess they tossed. I believe that they tossed
all her stuff right there or after they killed or
maybe it went downstream, but yeah, she wasn't. She was
(44:22):
in trouble immediately. You know, what we have heard is
that these meth freaks kidnapped Polly. They rape her repeatedly
in video. The rape Shane Deeter w a t n as.
I don't believe that that video has ever been recovered
or has it, Nancy, to my knowledge, it has not. Uh.
(44:43):
Two other men were indicted, the indictment ended up being dropped, uh,
and their charges were tampering with evidence and it was
the tape. But to my knowledge it has never surfaced. Uh,
you know other than outside this circle of myth free
DJ Bethany Marshall please weigh in. I mean just the
(45:06):
fact that we know not they kidnapped the woman, uh
twenty one. I think you're all nursing Steed in her
whole life before her. They're doing this at seven in
the morning. You know, I haven't even had a second
cup of tea by then, and they're out planning a
kidnap at in the morning. And the psychopathy behind videoing
(45:32):
while you rape somebody, you know, Nancy. In preparation for
this show, I started looking up meth crimes. I just
started looking at the research and trying to figure out
the mindset of the methodict. And I read a shocking
statistic that this property crimes are committed by people on
meth amset. I mean that that was one piece of research.
The other was some of the crimes I heard. I
(45:54):
read about a father of a seven month old put
the seven month old into freezers so he could take
him out later for a snack. Um, a mother of
a four year old injecting for four year old repeatedly
with methem fetamine. Uh. Twenty something year old going into
the bathroom of the dollar store masturbating, eating food that
(46:17):
he had stolen from the store. When the employees tried
to get him out, he ran into the store, grabbed
silly stream started uh, sprang it all over the store.
And so uh, these these crimes, these acts that these
meth freaks commit, are so strange. They're in a bizarre,
dark world. And one of the first crimes that we
(46:39):
covered on when you had had a show on hl
Lynn was a man who was forgetting the name, but
he kidnapped um two kids, tied up the parents, bludgeon
them to death. There was blood all over the home
and and at that point I started researching meth, and
I kept hearing the term overkill, that when meth addicts
(47:00):
commit crimes where there's a homicide involved, there's always an
overkill effect because they're so high and they're in such
an altered state that they literally kind of lose perspective
on where they are. And I think that's really the
only explanatory principle behind this crime. But behind the fact
that it was seven in the morning, uh, that they
(47:21):
raped and killed her so quickly, uh, and even the
fact that the mother, when Clint Bobo called the mother,
she said, get a pistol and go get them, as
if the mother had some growing cognizant of the danger
around the house and what these methodics are capable of.
We are on the case as the Holly Bogo trial
(47:42):
goes on. Nancy Grace signing off Goodbye Fan
Host
Nancy Grace
Popular Podcasts
40s and Free Agents: NFL Draft Season
Daniel Jeremiah of Move the Sticks and Gregg Rosenthal of NFL Daily join forces to break down every team's needs this offseason.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.