April 23, 2025 • 48 mins
We revisit the mysterious disappearance of Maura Murray, diving into new evidence and examining the strange circumstances surrounding her vanishing after a car crash in rural New Hampshire in 2004.
• Maura Murray disappeared after crashing her car on Wild Ammonusic Road in Haverhill, New Hampshire on February 9, 2004
• Before her disappearance, Maura had been involved in several incidents including shoplifting at West Point and credit card fraud at UMass
• She had packed up her dorm room, emailed professors about a non-existent family death, and purchased alcohol before driving north
• Recent fingerprint evidence matches Stephen Baldwin (formerly Finkelstein), a West Point acquaintance now imprisoned for animal cruelty
• Baldwin changed his name months after Maura's disappearance, and his own mother has been missing since 2007
• Despite extensive searches, no trace of Maura has ever been found
• Multiple theories exist: suicide, abduction, voluntary disappearance, or foul play
If you have any information about Maura Murray's case, please contact us through our social media channels or text us directly. We appreciate all of our listeners, and we're interested in hearing your theories about what happened to Maura.
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Wicked Wanderings is hosted by Hannah & Courtney and it's produced by Rob Fitzpatrick. Music by Sascha Ende.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Hannah (00:00):
Why was Cinderella so bad at soccer?
She only had one shoe.
She kept running away from theball.
Courtney (00:07):
You know what the worst part about this is?
It reminds me of a moreinappropriate joke about
Cinderella when she gets to theballs.
Ooh, what did Cinderella saywhen she got to the balls?
There's a little giggle, alittle gig store okay, hi, I'm
(00:41):
hannah and I'm courtney.
Hannah (00:42):
Join us as we delve into true crime, paranormal
encounters and all things spooky.
Courtney (00:47):
Grab your flashlight and get ready to wander into the
darkness with us.
Hannah (00:53):
This is Wicked Wanderings.
Courtney (00:56):
Hi Courtney, hey Hannah, how are you?
It has been a day, but I amexcited to be here with you.
(01:18):
It's been a day.
It's been the longest day, whew.
You ever have one of those dayswhere you just feel like, and
what else?
And what else?
Ah, don't put that in theuniverse.
I just feel like it's been oneof those days.
So I'm excited to be windingdown.
The day didn't turn out the waythat I wanted it to, or had,
you know, thought about it, butI always enjoy recording an
episode with you, so I'm hopingthat this will be the cherry on
(01:41):
top of my day.
I hope so too, because we needit guys.
Hannah (01:45):
We need it.
Courtney (01:49):
We've encountered it all, from jokesters to nails and
tires and straight incompetence, but we're here.
Hannah (01:55):
And like, probably the weirdest one of the weirdest
things that happened to us todayis the lady that sat us at the
restaurant and she's like I justwant to make sure you have
extra room for when yourboyfriends come and we're like,
um, they're at home.
It was like the weirdestcomment, like why can't we be
together?
Courtney (02:10):
the way we sat down together and looked at each
other and almost at the exactsame time, we're like.
I so badly wanted to say oh no,my girlfriend's right here,
yeah and I will say she was anolder woman.
Hannah (02:19):
She was an older woman, but it's just so strange it was
definitely an odd encounter ofword diarrhea in public well,
and never mind the fact thatwhen we looked at her she's like
two.
We're like yes, right, so wedidn't even say like no, we have
more people coming I don't know, man, it was strange.
Courtney (02:34):
Sometimes people just they just word diarrhea.
That's the only word I have forthat word come on.
Hannah (02:39):
It is 2025, corny.
We all know you have cases thatjust stick in your brain, right
100, like even if you do theresearch, you do an episode on
them, it just never leaves yourbrain lynn burdick, lynn burdick
.
Courtney (02:55):
For me it's lynn burdick.
It's always lynn burdick.
It will always, be forever andever.
Amen, lynn burdick I have two.
Hannah (03:01):
I have danny croto, understandable, which I've been
thinking about him a lot,because April, april, yeah, and
also it's strange with the Popedying.
It reminds me also because Ithink it's the Catholic
connection.
Courtney (03:13):
That connection was made in my brain too, where?
Hannah (03:15):
I saw it and I was like Danny.
Yeah, but the other one is MauraMurray.
Maura Murray, as anyone whoknows me or listens to the
podcast, I'm going to dosomething a little different
today.
I am revisiting the case, I amrevisiting my notes, I am going
to maybe get a fresh perspectiveon it.
Courtney, it was not a part ofthat one.
(03:38):
That was my other co-host, jess.
So we're just gonna, we'regonna try this out, we're gonna
go through this.
Maybe we'll get I I don't knowa different theory, or maybe
there's some more informationthat we just haven't seen yet,
because, of course, I know, onher date of missing, the family
usually comes out with,hopefully, some new information,
or they just get news coverageof it so we'll see.
Courtney (04:00):
And her date was in february, correct february.
Okay, yep, I'm excited I'm.
It's a really new chapter forme too, because my experience
with Wicked Wanderings at thispoint was just that of a
supportive friend.
So I'm really excited becauseMaura Murray was episode number
one.
Episode number one, episodenumber one of Wicked Wanderings
started with Maura Murray, and Ijust couldn't be excited enough
to be part of it again.
(04:26):
And and honestly, I just feellike it needs to be redone.
Why not?
It's been over almost two years.
Yeah, there's definitely newsarticles.
I've definitely scrolled beyondthem, and so I'm excited to
kind of get people maybe whoaren't familiar with her case.
I'm excited for people whodidn't hear the first episode to
hear it for maybe the firsttime, or maybe for people who
need a refresher to hear it.
Uh, again, yeah, exactly, solet's get started, shall we?
Hannah (04:43):
Let's break it up.
Let's dive into Maura Murray.
February 9th 2004,.
Maura Murray made her way up toHaverhill, new Hampshire, from
UMass and crashed her car alonga country road.
She was last seen by a fewneighboring houses, but when the
police arrived she was gone.
There are many conspiracytheories surrounding the
disappearance, but nothing canbe verified until Maura is found
(05:04):
alive or dead.
Let's go into some backgroundinformation on Moira.
So Moira was born on May 4th1982, which she was a fellow
Taurus, which just speaks to mysoul, both of our souls right
being Taurus babies.
She was the fourth of fivesiblings Shortly after Kurt was
born, which was one of herbrothers, fred and Lori Mara's
parents separated, which I thinkboth of us can relate to yeah,
(05:29):
absolutely.
According to James Renner's bookwhich, sorry, was not a fan of
at all Fred was not Kurt'sfather.
No one knows what happened, butit just seems to probably give
a little background to what theMoore family was going through.
Courtney (05:45):
Okay, so there was some like any family, there was
some secrets, there was somejuice and tea.
Okay.
Hannah (05:50):
Exactly, Maura was a very athletic person and she
also excelled in school.
She got a 1420 on her SAT,which is insanely high.
I just remember having to gothrough SATs and my mom was like
you can do better in math.
You can do better in math, justtaking it over and over again.
Courtney (06:06):
The SAT prep is something that I do not ever
wish to go back to.
Hannah (06:10):
Honestly, I probably would rather take the boards
over again.
Courtney (06:13):
I don't know about that either.
Every time my license renewalor my board certification
renewal comes on, I'm likedefinitely get that one done,
because we are not going to passthe boards exam the first time
again.
Hannah (06:23):
After high school, perter's sister, julie, went to
West Point and she studiedchemical engineering.
She was there for a fewsemesters until some incidences
occurred and she transferred toUMass for nursing.
On February 9th 2004, morrowleft UMass and drove up to New
Hampshire where a car crashedalong the curve of Wild
(06:43):
Ammonusic Road in Haverhill, newHampshire.
I want to talk about the crashfirst, and that's how I had my
notes from last time, and Ithink it'll kind of give us a
good investigative approach tothis.
Courtney (06:55):
I like it Lay out all the information for me.
Hannah (06:57):
Okay, so the crash happened at approximately 7.27
pm on February 9, 2004, in her1996 Saturn.
At this time it's February, sowhen you imagine a back road in
February In New Hampshire, inNew Hampshire, You're thinking
snowy, snowy, or at least snowon the road, or at least snow on
the side.
It's a windy back road, I'm surethere wasn't a lot of lighting
(07:19):
and it has been said she wasdrinking due to the alcohol
found in her car and there weresome empty bottles.
So if you're picturing her onthis windy, dark road with snow
and she's also likely drinkingit's probably not the best
circumstances, right.
Courtney (07:38):
And I have such a hard time with them like this, where
they're like, okay, there's apresence of alcohol in the car,
which is less troubling to mewhen they say, oh, there was a
bottle of alcohol in the carthat was unopened, so they must
have been drinking.
And it's like, well, wait asecond, if the bottle was there,
then they weren't drinking.
And again, unless there's foundalive or there's a body,
they're just not going to knowthat information and a talk
(07:59):
screen by this point would benull and void exactly, and
they'll never know like thinkingabout college kids, and I've
gone into cars before wherepeople have left empty beer cans
yeah, and they're notintoxicated.
Hannah (08:13):
It's like left from the night before.
I'm not saying you should do it, I'm not saying that, but
condoning it.
She's a college kid.
Like it could have been thatshe had a couple brewskis in the
car with a friend one day andthey just threw them in the
backseat Right.
Courtney (08:24):
Like it didn't mean she was drinking or they were
out in the woods drinking andthey didn't want to litter, I
mean I had a friend in gradschool who carried around
tequila in her trunk because shehad a very particular kind of
tequila she liked.
So when she would come over shedidn't drink it while she was
driving, right, but she wouldcome inside.
I think of a thousand reasonswhy there would be the presence
of bottles of alcohol yes, oralcohol, and not have the person
(08:45):
driving be intoxicated.
Hannah (08:46):
Right, so we need to give her a little leeway,
especially since we don't knowwhat happened.
Courtney (08:50):
Credit where credit is due.
Hannah (08:52):
And I also think that if you were drinking like that,
you would smell it in the car.
Courtney (08:56):
Yeah, and I don't remember ever reading anywhere
Spilling it, or yeah.
Hannah (08:59):
I don't remember reading anywhere where they said oh, we
smell it, because even ifyou're drinking a can of beer or
any type of alcohol, you neverget to the last drop.
So if you throw a can it getsspilt or whatever.
You're going to smell it in thecar.
So I don't remember everreading that somewhere in police
reports or whatever.
Courtney (09:14):
The only other thing I could think of is when people
return their cans and bottlesand they rinse them out in the
sink and then they put them in abag Easily.
I'm sure I mean my dad and Iused to do this when I was a kid
.
I'm sure there were times wherehe threw them into the bed of
his truck and then a couple dayslater he found a rogue beer can
or soda can rolling around inthe back.
Yeah, rinsed out so therewouldn't be any, you know,
substance left in it.
I feel like you hear a youngcollege girl and somebody says
(09:35):
oh, there was alcohol involvedand people suddenly have that
like oh well, she deserved it,she asked for it.
It's like wearing a skirt andbeing raped, kind of thing.
Hannah (09:43):
Yep, yeah, of course there's no cell service.
And then, you know, this timein the early 2000s, cell phones
weren't that great anyways, andnot everybody had one.
And not everyone had one.
Based on where her car wasfound, she was going along the
curve and then somehow I don'tknow if it was ice, I don't know
if there was an animal that gotin the way she started falling
(10:03):
asleep.
It could be a multitude ofthings.
But she spun her car so it wasfacing the wrong way in the
right-hand lane.
Courtney (10:10):
And I'm assuming they had like marks in the snow or
marks on the road to prove thatshe had been spun around.
Hannah (10:15):
Yes, I haven't researched, obviously, this case
in a while, but there wereneighbors that saw things.
I don't know if it was themarks in the snow, I don't know
if it was the way her wheelswere Something.
They just knew that she hadspun it.
Courtney (10:29):
They had something to believe that.
Hannah (10:31):
Right Now let's talk about before the crash.
There's a lot of things thathappened before the crash.
In order to try to understandwhere Maura was mentally,
emotionally and even physically,we need to look at the days
prior to the disappearance.
Fred Maura's dad was a hard ass.
(10:52):
My dad wasn't really around forme to understand having a hard
ass father, but he just seemedto push his kids to be the best.
He wanted them to be the bestathletes, the best students, and
I can understand that thatmight get to be a lot when you
want to be this perfectionist ineverything that you do.
Courtney (11:05):
It's a lot of pressure and, I think, on kids too.
People want to appease thepeople who are important to them
and I can definitely relate tothat.
My dad was at times a hard ass,but also he just was very
motivating and he had a militarybackground himself which also
added a certain layer ofexpectations and just a lot of
expectations for me as a child,which I can relate.
(11:26):
It does become a lot and Ithink it gives some of us adults
a complex, honestly, but that'snot the point of this.
Hannah (11:32):
That's a different episode.
Julie, which was one of hersisters, did say in an interview
that they never wanted todisappoint their dad.
When Julie Amora got acceptedto West Point, it was a proud
moment for many people, andwhile at West Point she met her
boyfriend, bill.
She was studying chemicalengineering and that's why it is
interesting to hear what shedid next.
This always baffled me.
(11:55):
I never understood like whatwas going through her head at
the time she stole from FortKnox.
Courtney (12:01):
Interesting why.
Hannah (12:03):
I don't know what would possess you to do it.
I always wanted to know the why.
Courtney (12:06):
Attention seeking is all I can come up with.
Hannah (12:09):
Yeah, I guess.
So it just you know, of courseshe was caught.
It's Fort Knox.
People Like you're not notgoing to get caught.
This isn't the CVS on thecorner right, and even there
with the amount of camerasyou're getting caught Right.
And they even asked her likewhy did you steal it?
And she goes I don't know.
I had the money and they'reweird things.
That she stole too.
It was a lipstick and nailpolish, and she didn't even
(12:38):
strike me from everything I'veread about her as the kind ofish
.
Courtney (12:43):
But she just was this athletic persona that just had
really good skin and she didn'tneed to wear makeup, and she was
young too, and she was young, Imean, I feel like you don't
need all those beauty productswhen you're young.
Hannah (12:52):
There was a documentary that I watched and it was titled
the Disappearance of MauraMurray and it was Maggie Fralin,
who was also a UMass grad, andshe just became so involved with
the Maura Murray case.
When Maggie interviewedKathleen, which is Maura's other
sister, she said that everyonewanted the incident to be very
hush-hush.
I'm sure that was veryembarrassing for the family
(13:16):
After an incident like that.
They wanted that transition toUMass to be easy, simple, don't
ask too many questions.
Oh, maura's just at UMass now.
You know we just had to makethis change due to whatever, as
long as it wasn't said that shestole and it also is a pretty
big flip too that I never reallythought much about until today.
Courtney (13:33):
Chemical engineering to nursing is not at all the
same.
So you could almost even make anargument to say she was here,
she was at West Point, she wasdoing chemical engineering and
she had her found her calling,she had decided she wanted to do
something else.
It makes me wonder if therewasn't something else going on.
Yep, because we know howfamilies tend to hide mental
illness and things and obviouslyI thought mania immediately.
(13:56):
To be honest with you, someonewho's impulsive and they're
stealing things is often a firstsign of mania.
Stealing things, inflated ego,things out of of the norm, the
way you're reacting.
Hannah (14:08):
I've certainly known people who have been bipolar in
my life who've gone into manicepisodes and stealing was one of
the first things they did andit was always one of the
theories that people thought waslike oh, she just ran into the
woods and so if she was in thetype of mania, was she just so
confused that she just ran andgot?
Courtney (14:23):
lost.
Think about, like like myexperiences, not personally with
mania, but with other peoplethat I know who are manic, and I
think it sounds a lot simplerthan it is right yeah, oh, she
ran off into the woods Soundsvery unpractical.
I mean, from stories I haveheard of people they might say,
oh my God, there's this personin here who needs my help, or
there's this person I'm runningfrom in here who needs my help,
(14:44):
or there's this person I'mrunning from, and they have
themselves fully convinced thatthey need to go do that.
But wouldn't they have foundthe body?
that's always what I come backto in february, unprepared,
mentally ill, and in that theorywe're working.
I just don't think that youwould have been physically fit
to withstand even the nightdepending on the temperatures in
new hampshire wild animals,other people.
There's certainly just a lot ofthings that I would question
(15:05):
about that theory very true,very true so she goes to umass.
Hannah (15:09):
And she did not stop getting into trouble.
According to the missing moramurray podcast, she got accused
of stealing credit cardinformation, and this was in
november of 2003.
Courtney (15:21):
So, fairly shortly before the crash.
Hannah (15:22):
Yeah, so you're talking three months, three-ish months
before and the thing is again,she's not using it to buy big
things.
She was like ordering pizza.
It wasn't to buy a new computer, I don't know like just steal
it to do it almost yeah yeah,just these little things, like
the thrill of doing it so,according to renner's book, a
(15:44):
umass student contacted amherstpolice and said there were
charges on her car that she didnot make.
And when the police called therestaurant they said the
deliveries were made to KennedyHall, which is where she was
staying, which was her dorm room.
I wonder who lived at KennedyHall Like?
Later on that night, one of therestaurants called the police
and said something oh, theyplaced an order with a credit
card number, just to give youguys a heads up.
So the police told him to gothrough with the order.
(16:04):
You would meet them at thedrop-off.
And, of course, who came out ofthe building was moira.
There's actually a picture ofher that the police took in
front of kennedy hall to provethat.
Courtney (16:14):
To prove yeah, it's just strange.
Do we know what ever came fromthat?
Like?
Was she ever charged withanything?
Hannah (16:21):
yeah, more story to the police was that she found the
receipt on the ground with thecredit card number on it, which
is 2004, but I don't everremember my phone credit card
number being on anything.
Courtney (16:31):
I don't know if they ever did that.
Yeah, correct us if we're wrong, wanderers or rob from the
future rob from the future.
Hannah (16:37):
The police asked for the paper with the information on
it and more gave it to them butalso had other number sequences
on them, but she claimed theywere friends phone numbers.
So when she talked to thepolice she's not saying much of
why she did what she did.
Maybe she was embarrassed, butshe got probably the best
outcome she could get becauseshe goes before a judge.
The judge cuts her some slackand says stay out of trouble for
six months and it gets off yourrecord so basically her story
(17:00):
was how did you get the creditcard number?
Courtney (17:03):
I found it on a slip of paper on the ground, correct,
but to me that misses the wholepoint of like okay, yeah,
that's how you got the numberbut were you looking?
For the receipt, because I passa lot of receipts on the ground
.
I'm sure and I've never oncethought let me pick this up
there's an intent piece that'smissing from absolutely yeah
yeah.
Hannah (17:20):
Then she crashes her dad's car into a guardrail
that's not staying out oftrouble for six months.
On the way back from a partyDrinking yeah, on February 7,
2004, which was a Saturday, shewent car shopping with her dad
to get her a new car.
And they didn't purchase one,but they met up with one of
Moira's friends to have dinnerand then after dinner they go to
the liquor store so that Moiraand her friend could pick up
(17:41):
booze at the party that night.
And it gets better more thandrops off her father at his
hotel and borrows his new car todrive to the party.
New car around three in themorning she said she had to
return her dad's car, which somany things are in question here
, like why do you have to giveyour car back to your dad at
three in the morning while you?
Courtney (17:57):
were drinking, and also, if he's in a hotel room,
it's not like she's returninghome.
Hi, I'm gonna leave the keyshere for you, so when you wake
up in the morning, you have themright.
Are you gonna like, knock,knock, dad, here's your car back
.
Bring me back to my dorm room.
Yeah, it doesn't make sense.
Hannah (18:13):
On her way to the motel she crashes into the guardrail.
To paint an image for you, shegot a point of the row where she
had to turn left or right.
It was just a guardrail infront right.
You can't go straight.
She did and she did.
She went straight again.
She got no charges that night.
Courtney (18:26):
I don't know how, but she did it right so she's like a
stroke of good luck, I guess,or maybe bad luck, because if
she had been in trouble, maybeshe wouldn't have been in the
situation yeah, from the podcast.
Hannah (18:37):
I listened to what preceded the crash.
For a good part of theirepisode that they did.
They talked about like manypossibilities of what probably
could have happened and I cannotcomfortably present any of the
following as fact, but here iswhat maybe happened.
Okay, mora arrived with the towtruck at the hotel and somehow
she got into her father's room.
I don't know if she had.
Courtney (18:59):
Maybe she had the spare key.
That was part of their plan.
You're gonna come in here.
Maybe there's two beds andthat's not totally out the realm
.
But isn't that weird if youalready have a dorm room to go
back to?
It is.
But if the story about herneeding to drop the car off to
her father is true, I can seewhere, like if that was my
situation, my dad's letting meborrow the car.
I could see him saying here'sthe second key to my room.
There's two beds in here.
(19:20):
When you're done, come back in,I'll bring you back to school
in the morning.
I I could perfectly see that.
Maybe not super far-fetched, Imean, it's not a great theory.
Hannah (19:27):
It wouldn't be like top tier but fred claims that he
didn't know she was there untilmorning.
So whether more got theattendant letter in or obviously
she had an extra key, we no oneknows.
Right the podcasters couldspeak to the phone records,
which are interesting.
There was a call made to herboyfriend, billy, from Fred's
phone at 4.49 am.
For Billy that is early becauseremember he was at the military
(19:52):
.
And he was stationed inOklahoma.
Courtney (19:55):
Okay.
Hannah (19:56):
Did Maura borrow her dad's phone?
Where was her phone?
Or did Fred make the call Right?
According to the podcast, againtwo days later and we're now
looking at the beginning of theday of the crash, phone calls
were being made.
Maura supposedly calledBartlett, new Hampshire, to rent
a condo, and the phone calllasted about three minutes, but
(20:17):
no condo was ever rented.
Later on that day she emailsher boyfriend and in this email
talks about how she does notwant to talk to anyone.
But she signs it love you, stud, which maybe that's just the
banter they had.
But she sends an email, not aphone call, an email, and I'm
pretty sure we had textmessaging back then, but it
probably cost money right right1 13 pm, she leaves a message on
(20:38):
a classmate's phone, then afterthat calls 1-800-GO-STOW.
That's S-T-O-W-E, which is aplace in New Hampshire.
For you people that don't know,it's a ski resort, correct, yes
?
Where the phone call lastsabout five minutes, but it was
pre-recorded informational.
She must have listened tobecause, according to Stowe,
phone lines were down An hourand 20 minutes after she emailed
(21:01):
her boyfriend.
She called him and they eitherspoke for a minute or she left a
voicemail, but it wasn't longenough for a full conversation.
You can't tell yeah, around 4 pmMoore emails her professors and
says there was a death in thefamily and Scherz said something
along the lines of I will beoff for a couple days, but there
was no death in the family.
She obviously was trying to geta couple days off.
Right Before she left for NewHampshire she packed stuff in
boxes in her dorm and took herpictures off the wall.
Courtney (21:24):
That's weird.
Hannah (21:24):
I also found that she sent in her homework really
early that morning To me.
Courtney (21:29):
she still cared about her grades.
She cared about her grades.
She wasn't going awaypermanently.
Hannah (21:33):
Right.
She was saying like, oh, I havea couple days off, I need to
make sure I get my assignmentsin.
Obviously, moyer was goingthrough a lot.
We can only speculate what wasgoing on in her head, but there
was something going on.
What was interesting from bothMaggie, who did the documentary,
and Renner's book that I read,was that they both retraced her
steps from that day, which, ifyou actually watch the
documentary, it's quite amazingto watch her retrace the steps,
(21:53):
because they made sure they leftat the time that she did made
all the stops that she did toget up there to see where's the
gaps.
Right, they both found aboutSorry, what'd you say?
Good strategy.
They both found about an hourdiscrepancy in time from when
she left UMass, ran a coupleerrands and then headed to New
Hampshire where she eventuallycrashed and went missing.
And, according to thedocumentary, after she left
(22:14):
UMass, maura stopped at the bank, then the liquor store and
drove to New Hampshire, and thebank then the liquor store and
drove to new hampshire.
And again, there's actualvideos of her.
You can see her stopping at thebank.
Well, the bank was actually oneof those banks in a parking lot
.
Okay, you know where, it's justan atm.
She then headed to the liquorstore, where she bought a box of
red wine, bailey's and a 12pack of wine coolers.
Courtney (22:34):
It doesn't sound like you're buying alcohol for one
person.
Yes and no, the wine coolers inthe wine, but bailey's is very
different bailey's is weird.
I'll admit bailey's, unlessyou're buying guinness with it,
or but she's potentially goingto a ski resort, because she
called stowe for the information.
So to me I'm like, okay, she'sgoing to stowe, maybe she's
gonna have hot chocolate, she'sgonna spike it with bailey's.
(22:55):
Maybe it doesn't seemfar-fetched for what she's doing
.
It just seems like a lot forone person.
It does.
Hannah (23:02):
Yeah, I guess I'm just trying to think of, like, when
I'm going on vacation and westop.
Before we get to Maine, we stopat the New Hampshire liquor
because, it's cheap and we stockup for a couple days.
But that's also two people, so Idon't know.
It's different alcohols?
Yes, true.
Different alcohols yes, true.
That's my point.
Now we're looking after thecrash.
Maura crashes the car and onthis road it curves to the left.
(23:23):
Her car was found facing thewrong way.
Like I was saying.
Right, we have eyewitnesses theWestmans, the Marotes and
Atwoods.
The crash happened around 7.27pm, because that is the time of
the first 911 call that was madeby faith westman at 7, 30.
Courtney (23:46):
This guy has always creeped me out, and even now.
Hannah (23:47):
Look at butch atwood that bus driver man, sorry but
still think I mean.
Unfortunately he's dead now,but I just feel like he knew
something off.
Yeah, I agree so he's drivinghome in his bus and notices mara
Butch speaks to her and seesthat she's shaken up.
Moira refuses help, claimingthat she called AAA, which she
knew was not true because thereis no signal, which is also
creepy in a way.
Courtney (24:09):
Yeah, what did he think about that?
It's like almost as if he wasseeing an opportunity, like, oh,
you called AAA Right.
Hannah (24:16):
But it feels very horror movie-esque.
It does, but AAA doesn calltriple a right, but it feels
very.
Courtney (24:19):
Horror movie, yes, but triple a doesn't have service
here it does.
Or like, hey, I cut the phonelines for the house and you're
telling me you already called9-1-1 right right feels like
very one step ahead of thevictim, kind of thing.
Yes, yeah, I agree.
Hannah (24:29):
About two to three minutes later he leaves mara and
drives the rest of the way home.
Courtney (24:33):
Butch also had changed his statements a couple times
always sus when you change yourstatement a few times.
Hannah (24:38):
740 butch or his wife.
One of them calls 911, but thelines are busy.
Courtney (24:43):
How does the yeah, I know, I've never once heard of
trying to call 911 and the lineis busy.
Hannah (24:47):
Yep, so I've called 911 and I've had it where they've
pushed me to like a differenttown.
Courtney (24:54):
You go to the state police usually, yeah and usually
dispatches from springfield tomass state police.
I've never been like beep, beep, beep.
Sorry, no help is available.
Try again tomorrow.
So he does his paperwork in thebus and waits.
Yeah, apparently.
Hannah (25:09):
That's not morbid.
7.43,.
The dispatcher calls back andgets Butch's wife and says she
does not know where Moira is.
Okay, so obviously either she'salready gone at this point or
she hasn't looked out her window.
7.46 pm, sergeant Cecil Smitharrives and Maura is gone.
By that point, when the policewent through her car, several of
the wine coolers were empty ormissing and there was red wine
(25:30):
all over the car.
But that could be also be fromthe crash, not her drinking,
right?
Yeah, exactly.
So from the documentary theywere able to see that Maura's
car car, since it was still in acar lot.
They saw a savage hop card.
Airbags were deployed.
They could see the dust fromfingerprinting that they had
died.
It was shaken up.
Yeah, maggie did get her handwith maggie's a documenter, did
get her hands on an officialpolice list of items, found her
(25:51):
car and some things wereinteresting.
So we have shampoo, okay,sleeping pills.
Obviously she's having somecollege that, but she also she's
having mental health issues andshe can't sleep.
Turn your mind off like we knowif they're prescription sleeping
pills or if they were like theover-the-counter honestly, if
I'm thinking back to thedocumentary, they were kind of
common, like how like birthcontrol would come like, just
(26:13):
pop one out, I don't know, likea pill, like a pill pack yeah,
because I just know that likethere are things you can even
buy at, like the Dollar Tree,that are sleep aids, I don't
know that I would trust DollarTree medication.
Courtney (26:24):
I'm sure it's fine If you're a pharmacist, let us know
about that, but I do feel likeit's not abnormal for a college
student to need sleep aid.
Do I get concerned about sleepaid with alcohol?
Yes, absolutely.
Hannah (26:37):
Deodorant lotion, body spray.
Okay.
Razor makeup all yes absolutelydeodorant lotion body spray.
Okay, you're going away for theweekend that's normal birth
control.
Courtney (26:44):
Okay, if you take it, you're gonna keep it with you
every day and candy and someschool stuff.
Hannah (26:49):
Like we said, this sounds like an override bag
right for a girl who just wantsto get away from life's bullshit
right.
36 hours into the investigation, new hampshire fishing game
were called in and did a 10 milecircle radius around the crash
and they found no footprints oranything of interest.
10 days after the crash, thecadaver dogs called it.
Courtney (27:06):
I don't know why it was 10 days later.
Do they think 10 days wasnecessary?
I don't know, but that seemslike a long.
You're down to the inside jobor poor police work again.
I hate this question.
Hannah (27:17):
I really hate that it's what comes up all the time they
tracked more ascent for a smallway down the road and then lost
it like she got into a car orsomething.
Like she got into a car exactlywhat they thought.
According to kurt mora's littlebrother, lori moro's mom could
not help in the investigationdue to having cancer.
She has passed and she died onher daughter's birthday.
(27:37):
Yeah, fred, her father did notsit down for a formal interview
with police for almost five anda half years, which I don't know
how I feel about that either.
Courtney (27:49):
It kind of makes sense based off of his persona that
we know about, though, too well,and also during that interview
he made sure his attorney waswith him yeah, I feel weird
about that.
I do.
The attorney part makes me feelweird.
Hannah (27:59):
The rest of it could just be him being rigid in my
mind, but I do feel weird aboutthe attorney part he obviously
was going through something,because he did say that his
daughter had been depressed andmaybe went off the trail and
died.
That seems very specific, veryspecific wouldn't be.
Courtney (28:16):
I mean also five and a half years.
You probably lost hope thatyou're going to find her at that
point too.
Hannah (28:20):
Yeah, but this is a weird thing to say to the police
, like you knew your daughterwas depressed With your attorney
present.
Courtney (28:25):
Yeah, very strange.
Makes you wonder what you wouldhave said if the attorney
wasn't present.
Hannah (28:30):
Let's talk about some theories.
I think we touched on some ofthese already.
Maura was in tandem drivingwith someone and when the crash
happened she hopped over to okayexplain this for the short term
, but not for the long term,exactly short term, and then of
course, that's why there was somuch alcohol, that was.
But then if she would havetaken it with you, right, you
(28:51):
know?
Courtney (28:51):
right, and anything that had her name on it and
things.
Hannah (28:54):
Assuming you weren't already intoxicated, you'd be
like, oh, I need my overnightbag if we're gonna keep going,
exactly yeah another one isafter the crash, mara ran into
the woods scared of a dui, whichwould be something else on her
record, and ended up dying inthe woods.
But they would have found her.
They would have found herSomething.
Courtney (29:10):
Some part of her.
Whether it was clothing orfootprints or something.
Yeah, that one doesn't seemlikely to me.
There's also a theory about thepolice that has something to do
with it.
Like I said, poor police workor inside job.
Hannah (29:35):
no-transcript.
Yes, I don't know why it was inmy notes, but tinny and
rattling no-transcript.
Courtney (29:49):
That could have caused an issue, because I know right
now there's a thing going aroundshout out dad, where they're
putting zip ties on people'srims so you can hear it and
their goal is to get you out ofthe car.
Because then you're vulnerable.
You're not in the car, youprobably car, you probably don't
have your phone right.
You bend over to get it.
They're behind you, right.
So it kind of makes me thinkabout that too, in the
documentary they actually had agarage.
Hannah (30:11):
Get her type of model of car, put a rag in the exhaust
okay with how fast she was going, like how long would stuff
happen, and it ended up justlike popping out I kind of want
to like ask a mechanic friendright now like what would happen
.
Courtney (30:23):
Do we have any?
Hannah (30:24):
I do, I'm gonna text him right now I might even ask two.
I'll work on this while youkeep going, okay another thing
they were talking about was wasit possible that she stopped in
town, went to the diner orsomething?
Someone saw her got interested.
Courtney (30:39):
You know, it could have been something that, oh,
the waitress is like, oh, you'realone, and it could have been
like, yeah, I'm just going bymyself up here for a few days,
or whatever, and just was anopportune type thing, that's
true there's so manypossibilities so many I see why
this one becomes your lynnburdick because there are just
so many possibilities that, eventhough there's a lot of
(31:01):
information for her, which isdifferent from lynn, there's a
lot of theory, there's a lot ofdo these things connect or not,
but there isn't a lot of hardphysical evidence.
Hannah (31:10):
The other one is Maura got picked up by a stranger.
Whether willingly or againsther will, she got into the car.
Courtney (31:16):
And, but there was never any sign of struggle.
But if they didn't do reallygood investigative work for 10
days, work for 10 days, I meancome on right, because she was
outside the car at one point.
Right, if you wreck a car,you're gonna get out, you're
gonna look at the damage.
Hannah (31:29):
You're potentially in the dark because if you're going
to get into a friend's car,wouldn't you grab your stuff,
like you were saying absolutelyabsolutely I would need all my
stuff, especially if we'rehaving a good time.
Courtney (31:39):
I'm gonna want the alcohol.
Hannah (31:41):
Yeah, at least right exactly, and the last theory I
have going unless, according toyours, you have one is that more
committed suicide.
An empty pack of sleeping pillswas found with a full pack,
which I think is weird that youwould keep an empty one so one I
I see where I have an issuewith that.
Courtney (31:58):
I feel like I'm debunking all of your things.
No, it's fine.
My issue with that is suicidemeans there's a body.
Where's the body?
Hannah (32:05):
well, that's why I'm did she just take a bunch and just
walk off into the woods?
Courtney (32:08):
And I know you're like .
Hannah (32:10):
I mean she could have been in Butch's basement for all
we know.
Courtney (32:13):
honestly, and also what I will say about me in
college and bags.
I know for certain that I hadthis one go-to overnight bag
that I never fully emptied out.
There were probably pairs ofsocks in there that existed
solely in that bag and never gotworn.
So for me, if I'm at your houseI'm sleeping over, I empty my
sleeping pills.
If there's no trash can in theroom, I'm going to stuff it back
(32:34):
in my bag To me.
I'm not satisfied that she tookthose pills just because it was
empty.
She could have, but I just Idon't know.
She didn't seem organized.
She was definitely impulsive.
I could have seen if somebodypulled over and said hey, you
want to come here, we're goingto have a good time.
That seems more likely to methan that she committed suicide
(32:56):
Truthfully, yeah.
Hannah (32:57):
I hope there's some information.
I mean, of course there's alsotheories that she ran off into
Canada and she has a newidentity and she just wanted to
get away from everything.
But then why turn in yourhomework?
Courtney (33:09):
that's the part that really gets me, because you
obviously cared about yoursuccess.
Yeah, otherwise you would havejust left and went missing.
Yeah, she's either very good atdisappearing and was coached by
somebody.
Like you have to make thesecalls, you have to be strategic.
I don't know, I don't reallyknow.
Do we know if there's any newupdates, since I can peruse yeah
(33:33):
, peruse I did see that theyrecovered a fingerprint and that
they were able to link it fromour car.
I don't remember where it saidthat it was from, but I do
remember they were saying thatthey were able to link it and it
was someone who was in jail forsomething else and the prints
were a match.
I do think it was inside of hercar.
Hannah (33:54):
Because you know, of course I mentioned that there
was the fingerprint dusting thatthey had found from the police
doing that.
Courtney (34:00):
And allegedly if I'm thinking of the same person she
knew the person.
It was someone who she had goneto West Point with.
From the article that I saw.
Hannah (34:08):
And the guy's in prison.
Courtney (34:11):
So the guy's name was Stephan Baldwin and he was the
executive director of the UnionCounty Humane Society in Ohio.
He was sentenced for more than15 years in prison after he was
found guilty of 32 counts ofanimal cruelty, bribery, theft
and various other charges thatwere not listed, which is
interesting because obviouslyyou're talking about somebody
who was the director of a humanesociety.
(34:32):
He was posing as this personwho really cared about creatures
he really loved pets butinstead he was illegally
euthanizing them and pocketingthe proceeds for personal use.
So he's a douche canoe.
What's his name again?
His name is stephan baldwin.
He was arrested in august 2020and his fingerprints were then
entered into the nationalautomated fingerprint
(34:52):
identification system andshortly after, the new hampshire
state police were alerted likehey, these fingerprints are in
here and that they matched oneof the fingerprints that was
recovered from mora's car.
And he was from west point.
Yeah, yeah.
So Baldwin and Maura attendedthe US Military Academy at West
Point together in the early2000s and allegedly they were
acquaintances.
Baldwin claimed when he talkedto Renner the person who you
(35:14):
were mentioning was doing thedocumentary that he and Maura
were in a casual romanticrelationship together while they
were at West Point.
Hannah (35:23):
Oh my God, he might be on the documentary.
Courtney (35:25):
Yeah, Because they interviewed a couple different
guys for that Maura and Baldwinalso withdrew from West Point
within weeks of one another,which is interesting to note.
She withdrew from the WestPoint school in January of 2002,
and he resigned December 21st2001, according to the school
records at West Point.
Dude, what the fuck, fuck, sofast forward from?
(35:47):
You know we were talking aboutwhen they were in school
together.
In 2024, the fbi visited him tokind of quiz him about his
connections to maura, and thiswas four years after the
fingerprints were matched fromhim to the car and he denied any
involvement in thedisappearance, claiming that he
hadn't had contact with hersince leaving West Point.
Hannah (36:04):
I mean, I guess that's possible that his prints would
be in the car if that was thesame car she used from West
Point.
Courtney (36:10):
However, I phoned my friend about the tailpipe and
having the rag in the exhaustand he said that he supposes it
could potentially choke theexhaust gases, which would cause
too much back pressure,depending on how big the cloth
is in the exhaust and wherewithin the exhaust it's located.
Okay, so I asked him.
I got a little bit morespecific.
I said would this cause the carperformance to be so bad that
(36:31):
it could stall or cause apotential car wreck, or would it
just pop back out of theexhaust?
Thinking about what theinvestigators?
had said and I also told himthat we're talking about a 90s
saturn and he said it couldpotentially stall the car.
If it's that jammed in theexhaust which could potentially
slash, probably stall it out andcause a wreck, do with that
(36:52):
what you must, but this is amechanic who we trust with
aircraft mechanics as well andhas about 10 years of experience
working with cars, which makesme wonder if somebody didn't set
it up and then just follow herfrom a distance waiting for it
to happen.
Hannah (37:05):
Follow her.
Now we're thinking like we haveprints of some guy did he
follow her?
Courtney (37:11):
so yeah, so you're talking like did this guy follow
?
What's really striking me isthis guy from west point.
He withdrew in december of 2001and she withdrew in january of
2002, so that kind of doesn'tmatch our profile if he's
following her, because in thatpoint she followed him, if
you're looking at that as apattern.
Hannah (37:30):
But I still don't understand no one leaves West
Point and doesn't finish.
I feel like that's like one ina chance circumstance.
Courtney (37:38):
Not many people would do that Right Without, like, a
medical reason.
Well, we know her reasonbecause she was freaking,
stealing Allegedly, or is that abetter reason than what it was
now?
I'm like, was she involved withthis man?
Were they trying to hide it?
Hannah (37:51):
was there a pregnancy that was actually something that
renner talked about in his booksupposed pregnancies that she
didn't want anyone know about,or her boyfriend, because it
might not be his that's like.
Courtney (38:02):
That's an easy one that they always go to for women
.
Yeah, she's pregnant and it'snot his.
So baldwin did not say anythingabout his involvement in the
disappearance when the fbi wentto him and asked about it.
However, he did exchange someemails with renner and he did
say, quoting here, and here I amquoting since spoke, I spent a
(38:25):
little bit of time looking intothe details around Maura's
disappearance and trying tothink of anything that might be
even the slightest bit relevant.
He went on to talk about that.
He never really looked into herdisappearance because he always
just had that little twinge ofdisappointment and sadness about
how his relationship with herended.
And he did claim to recall thata fifth-year student had been
quote unquote following Mauraduring her final year at West
(38:48):
Point.
So it seems like a little bitof that blame game, like yeah,
ok, I don't know anything.
Oh, wait a minute.
There was this fifth yearstudent who was kind of
following her around.
Again here I am quoting.
I wanted to say Chris was hisname.
I can't be positive about that,but I know there aren't many
fifth-year seniors so hopefullyit's not too hard to nail that
individual down.
He had been following Mauraaround a lot at school and I
(39:08):
only know that because he burstinto my room one night when
Maura and I were together and Igot a lot of demerits for
sharing the same horizontalsurface as a cadet of the
opposite sex.
When I asked Maura how thisupperclassman knew she was in my
room, she basically said thathe had been stalking her but was
pretty dismissive about thewhole thing.
I can't imagine she ever gavehim the time of day and I don't
(39:28):
know what happened to him.
I'm not sure what his name was.
I hope that our disciplinaryrecords might show who turned us
that night.
So there's a lot.
Hannah (39:36):
It feels like pointing the finger at somebody else and
he's saying it's chris and he'ssaying I don't know the guy's
name, what he was doing on rightkind of it would make sense, I
mean.
Courtney (39:45):
But I will say the charges that stephan baldwin had
were about animals and thingslike that.
What do we know about peoplewho have a history for violence
is that they do typically startwith with animals.
Is it possible?
Yes, am I convinced afterreading this update of
information, that I think that'swhat happened?
I don't know, because baldwindid confirm to someone I think
(40:06):
it was Renner that hisfingerprints were found inside
the car, meaning he's confirmingthat the FBI told him your
prints were on the car.
But he was claiming and stayingpretty true to the fact that
the FBI told him they werediscovered on a CD or a CD case.
He's saying oh, Maura and Iexchange CDs frequently.
You know when we were at WestPoint, but he denied ever having
any contact with her when heleft the school and when she
(40:28):
left the school or ever visitingher at UMass.
So it's kind of far-fetchedthat much time had gone by and
it's important to also know thatthe police never confirmed
where on Maura's car the printswere found.
Hannah (40:41):
If you're getting arrested for animal cruelty and
abuse, I have no qualms thinkingthat you don't stop there, that
you just have a violentpersonality, yeah.
Courtney (40:51):
It's also very weird because it sounds like he told
others and I'm sorry, I'm notsure if it was Renner or
somebody else that he didn'tcontact her after West Point.
He didn't know she was missinguntil he saw it on TV.
He never read about it onlineuntil he saw it on TV.
He never read about it online.
He never saw it anywhere else.
And that is just kind ofstrange.
Because you have thisrelationship in college, you're
not at all interested in thefact that she disappeared.
Hannah (41:14):
Yeah, you have a friend missing.
Courtney (41:21):
You knew all of this information about a stalker 20
years ago, but you didn't shareany of this with detectives.
You're saying you didn't noticeany of it.
This article really just like.
I feel like it was like whambam as I'm going through it.
They also mentioned that hechanged his name months after
she vanished, according to courtrecords, so his legal name when
she knew him was stephenfinkelstein oh god, I would
change the last name.
And he changed the surname tohis mom's maiden name in
december of 2004.
(41:42):
Not that he was asked or why,you know.
I mean, he would probably lieanyways if it was something
about that.
Hannah (41:47):
He sounds like someone that needed a fresh start to me.
Or is hiding something Becausethat's expensive to change your
name.
It's expensive.
Courtney (41:57):
It is.
And even more weird, apparentlyhis mother, barbara Baldwin,
who remember he took her maidenname, hasn't been seen or heard
from since 2007.
Stop, it's not clear if therewas a missing persons report,
but she was last seen inCalifornia.
Hannah (42:13):
Wait, it's not sure if there's a missing person report.
Courtney (42:15):
It's not sure if there was a missing persons report
ever made, but apparentlyBaldwin, on his Facebook, had
posted pictures before he was injail about his mother's
disappearance.
Hannah (42:24):
Well, is that something that you can look?
Courtney (42:26):
up?
I would think so, andapparently when Runner
interviewed Baldwin's dad hesaid quote nobody's heard from
her as far as we know, she couldbe buried in the desert
somewhere.
Interestingly enough, again,we're talking about a pattern
here.
Two of Baldwin's ex-partnersand lovers died in drug and
alcohol-related tragedies Onewas of an overdose and the
(42:46):
second was in a DUI car crashand so he's not been named an
official suspect.
At least not at the time of thearticle that I read, he was not
listed as a formal suspect, andit seems like Renner is doing a
lot of the legwork to say, hey,why are we not looking a little
bit closer at this guy?
You know he's very interesting,he's got a lot of stuff going
on.
You know he's very interesting,he's got a lot of stuff going
(43:06):
on.
You know, why are we notspending that due diligence
looking into him?
I'm trying to think of likereasons why they wouldn't be
looking into him and I justcan't think of anything.
I mean, it seems prettyconvincing to me.
I just her case gets more andmore complex every time I see an
update.
Her family was pretty dead seton saying that they just didn't
think that she would run off tohurt herself, that they kind of
(43:27):
figured she would leave and findsome kind of foul play later on
.
But her sister also did.
Her sister, julie, did say in2024 that she had an eating
disorder and was making poordecisions and they did know that
as a family.
That's the first I had seen ofthe eating disorder, but I
haven't watched the documentaryor read a book about it.
Obviously you might haveuncovered that in your own
research disorder, but I haven'twatched the documentary or read
a book about it.
Obviously you might haveuncovered that in your own
(43:47):
research.
Did you uncover in yourresearch that her sister
kathleen suffered fromalcoholism and had been
discharged from rehab?
on february 5th.
Yes, her response is veryinteresting to that as well, and
her supervisor at work, whenshe was at work and got the call
, was like you need to see acounselor and she would not go
if you watch the documentary itgets to interview kathleen.
Hannah (44:06):
It's heart-wrenching because you can see the sister
was like I was dealing with myown demons and I felt like I
couldn't help more.
Yeah, it's really sad that issuper sad.
Courtney (44:14):
I and I they have a whole section too that looks at
like the last movements that youhad listed out.
And I do think it's interestingbecause they did note that she
went to the nearby liquor store,purchased $40 worth of alcohol,
box of wine they have Kahlua,but Kahlua and Bailey's are kind
of the same thing and vodka,and traded in 79 bottles and
cans for $3.99 in store credit.
So if that's true, the cans onthe floor could be that, because
(44:38):
if you're talking 79 cans, Imean if a few of them roll out,
you're not going to notice.
Interesting, I don't know,hannah, I was hoping we were
going to be able to like crackpart of the code or come up with
a different theory.
There is so much to this casethere is there's a lot there's
absolutely there's so much.
I'm really interested to see ifthe wanderers have theories
about them, because obviously wetalked about a lot of
(45:01):
possibilities that obviouslyyou've spent time thinking about
, I've spent time thinking about, I know, on the original
release.
Just talked about her theoriestoo, too, I'm really interested
to see if anybody I know it'sbeen 2023 when you release that
so we're talking a year and ahalf probably, because I think
it was like fall of 2023.
But if anybody has any thoughtson this case, or information or
(45:22):
things they've seen, share themwith us.
We're doing a little revamp onsocial media so you'll notice a
little bit of a differentpresence.
So we're using Facebook, we'reusing Instagram and then, if you
prefer the anonymous route,always you can text us as well.
Hannah (45:34):
Yes, text us, we love text.
Courtney (45:35):
We love text, and if you do, we really can't see who
you are.
So you could play a total AprilFool's joke on us know that it
was you.
That was a great episode,hannah.
I'm going to be definitelythinking about Maura Murray for
the foreseeable future now.
Yeah, she's in my head and justmy heart goes out to her family
.
I can't stress enough that incases like these, a lot of
(45:56):
people have thoughts andopinions, and none of those
things mean that she deservedwhat happened, whether she was
drinking or she wasn't, whethershe had mental illness or she
didn't, whether she made a poorchoice or she didn't.
Her life is still worth honoringand we have this whole episode
composed with that at the heartof it.
Absolutely Wow.
Hannah (46:13):
Okay, well, thank you Courtney, thank you Hannah, and
we will see you, wanderers,later.
We'll see you later, wanderers,take care.
Thanks for listening today.
Wicked Wanderings is hosted byme, hannah, and co-hosted by me,
courtney, and it's produced byRob Fitzpatrick.
Music by Sasha N.
If you enjoyed today's episode,don't forget to leave a rating
(46:33):
and review and be sure to followon all socials.
You can find the links down inthe show notes.
If you're looking for somereally cozy t-shirts or hoodies,
head over to the merch store.
Thank you for being a part ofthe Wicked Wanderings community.
We appreciate every one of you.
Why was Cinderella so bad at soccer?
She only had one shoe.
She kept running away from theball.
Courtney (00:07):
You know what the worst part about this is?
It reminds me of a moreinappropriate joke about
Cinderella when she gets to theballs.
Ooh, what did Cinderella saywhen she got to the balls?
There's a little giggle, alittle gig store okay, hi, I'm
(00:41):
hannah and I'm courtney.
Hannah (00:42):
Join us as we delve into true crime, paranormal
encounters and all things spooky.
Courtney (00:47):
Grab your flashlight and get ready to wander into the
darkness with us.
Hannah (00:53):
This is Wicked Wanderings.
Courtney (00:56):
Hi Courtney, hey Hannah, how are you?
It has been a day, but I amexcited to be here with you.
(01:18):
It's been a day.
It's been the longest day, whew.
You ever have one of those dayswhere you just feel like, and
what else?
And what else?
Ah, don't put that in theuniverse.
I just feel like it's been oneof those days.
So I'm excited to be windingdown.
The day didn't turn out the waythat I wanted it to, or had,
you know, thought about it, butI always enjoy recording an
episode with you, so I'm hopingthat this will be the cherry on
(01:41):
top of my day.
I hope so too, because we needit guys.
Hannah (01:45):
We need it.
Courtney (01:49):
We've encountered it all, from jokesters to nails and
tires and straight incompetence, but we're here.
Hannah (01:55):
And like, probably the weirdest one of the weirdest
things that happened to us todayis the lady that sat us at the
restaurant and she's like I justwant to make sure you have
extra room for when yourboyfriends come and we're like,
um, they're at home.
It was like the weirdestcomment, like why can't we be
together?
Courtney (02:10):
the way we sat down together and looked at each
other and almost at the exactsame time, we're like.
I so badly wanted to say oh no,my girlfriend's right here,
yeah and I will say she was anolder woman.
Hannah (02:19):
She was an older woman, but it's just so strange it was
definitely an odd encounter ofword diarrhea in public well,
and never mind the fact thatwhen we looked at her she's like
two.
We're like yes, right, so wedidn't even say like no, we have
more people coming I don't know, man, it was strange.
Courtney (02:34):
Sometimes people just they just word diarrhea.
That's the only word I have forthat word come on.
Hannah (02:39):
It is 2025, corny.
We all know you have cases thatjust stick in your brain, right
100, like even if you do theresearch, you do an episode on
them, it just never leaves yourbrain lynn burdick, lynn burdick
.
Courtney (02:55):
For me it's lynn burdick.
It's always lynn burdick.
It will always, be forever andever.
Amen, lynn burdick I have two.
Hannah (03:01):
I have danny croto, understandable, which I've been
thinking about him a lot,because April, april, yeah, and
also it's strange with the Popedying.
It reminds me also because Ithink it's the Catholic
connection.
Courtney (03:13):
That connection was made in my brain too, where?
Hannah (03:15):
I saw it and I was like Danny.
Yeah, but the other one is MauraMurray.
Maura Murray, as anyone whoknows me or listens to the
podcast, I'm going to dosomething a little different
today.
I am revisiting the case, I amrevisiting my notes, I am going
to maybe get a fresh perspectiveon it.
Courtney, it was not a part ofthat one.
(03:38):
That was my other co-host, jess.
So we're just gonna, we'regonna try this out, we're gonna
go through this.
Maybe we'll get I I don't knowa different theory, or maybe
there's some more informationthat we just haven't seen yet,
because, of course, I know, onher date of missing, the family
usually comes out with,hopefully, some new information,
or they just get news coverageof it so we'll see.
Courtney (04:00):
And her date was in february, correct february.
Okay, yep, I'm excited I'm.
It's a really new chapter forme too, because my experience
with Wicked Wanderings at thispoint was just that of a
supportive friend.
So I'm really excited becauseMaura Murray was episode number
one.
Episode number one, episodenumber one of Wicked Wanderings
started with Maura Murray, and Ijust couldn't be excited enough
to be part of it again.
(04:26):
And and honestly, I just feellike it needs to be redone.
Why not?
It's been over almost two years.
Yeah, there's definitely newsarticles.
I've definitely scrolled beyondthem, and so I'm excited to
kind of get people maybe whoaren't familiar with her case.
I'm excited for people whodidn't hear the first episode to
hear it for maybe the firsttime, or maybe for people who
need a refresher to hear it.
Uh, again, yeah, exactly, solet's get started, shall we?
Hannah (04:43):
Let's break it up.
Let's dive into Maura Murray.
February 9th 2004,.
Maura Murray made her way up toHaverhill, new Hampshire, from
UMass and crashed her car alonga country road.
She was last seen by a fewneighboring houses, but when the
police arrived she was gone.
There are many conspiracytheories surrounding the
disappearance, but nothing canbe verified until Maura is found
(05:04):
alive or dead.
Let's go into some backgroundinformation on Moira.
So Moira was born on May 4th1982, which she was a fellow
Taurus, which just speaks to mysoul, both of our souls right
being Taurus babies.
She was the fourth of fivesiblings Shortly after Kurt was
born, which was one of herbrothers, fred and Lori Mara's
parents separated, which I thinkboth of us can relate to yeah,
(05:29):
absolutely.
According to James Renner's bookwhich, sorry, was not a fan of
at all Fred was not Kurt'sfather.
No one knows what happened, butit just seems to probably give
a little background to what theMoore family was going through.
Courtney (05:45):
Okay, so there was some like any family, there was
some secrets, there was somejuice and tea.
Okay.
Hannah (05:50):
Exactly, Maura was a very athletic person and she
also excelled in school.
She got a 1420 on her SAT,which is insanely high.
I just remember having to gothrough SATs and my mom was like
you can do better in math.
You can do better in math, justtaking it over and over again.
Courtney (06:06):
The SAT prep is something that I do not ever
wish to go back to.
Hannah (06:10):
Honestly, I probably would rather take the boards
over again.
Courtney (06:13):
I don't know about that either.
Every time my license renewalor my board certification
renewal comes on, I'm likedefinitely get that one done,
because we are not going to passthe boards exam the first time
again.
Hannah (06:23):
After high school, perter's sister, julie, went to
West Point and she studiedchemical engineering.
She was there for a fewsemesters until some incidences
occurred and she transferred toUMass for nursing.
On February 9th 2004, morrowleft UMass and drove up to New
Hampshire where a car crashedalong the curve of Wild
(06:43):
Ammonusic Road in Haverhill, newHampshire.
I want to talk about the crashfirst, and that's how I had my
notes from last time, and Ithink it'll kind of give us a
good investigative approach tothis.
Courtney (06:55):
I like it Lay out all the information for me.
Hannah (06:57):
Okay, so the crash happened at approximately 7.27
pm on February 9, 2004, in her1996 Saturn.
At this time it's February, sowhen you imagine a back road in
February In New Hampshire, inNew Hampshire, You're thinking
snowy, snowy, or at least snowon the road, or at least snow on
the side.
It's a windy back road, I'm surethere wasn't a lot of lighting
(07:19):
and it has been said she wasdrinking due to the alcohol
found in her car and there weresome empty bottles.
So if you're picturing her onthis windy, dark road with snow
and she's also likely drinkingit's probably not the best
circumstances, right.
Courtney (07:38):
And I have such a hard time with them like this, where
they're like, okay, there's apresence of alcohol in the car,
which is less troubling to mewhen they say, oh, there was a
bottle of alcohol in the carthat was unopened, so they must
have been drinking.
And it's like, well, wait asecond, if the bottle was there,
then they weren't drinking.
And again, unless there's foundalive or there's a body,
they're just not going to knowthat information and a talk
(07:59):
screen by this point would benull and void exactly, and
they'll never know like thinkingabout college kids, and I've
gone into cars before wherepeople have left empty beer cans
yeah, and they're notintoxicated.
Hannah (08:13):
It's like left from the night before.
I'm not saying you should do it, I'm not saying that, but
condoning it.
She's a college kid.
Like it could have been thatshe had a couple brewskis in the
car with a friend one day andthey just threw them in the
backseat Right.
Courtney (08:24):
Like it didn't mean she was drinking or they were
out in the woods drinking andthey didn't want to litter, I
mean I had a friend in gradschool who carried around
tequila in her trunk because shehad a very particular kind of
tequila she liked.
So when she would come over shedidn't drink it while she was
driving, right, but she wouldcome inside.
I think of a thousand reasonswhy there would be the presence
of bottles of alcohol yes, oralcohol, and not have the person
(08:45):
driving be intoxicated.
Hannah (08:46):
Right, so we need to give her a little leeway,
especially since we don't knowwhat happened.
Courtney (08:50):
Credit where credit is due.
Hannah (08:52):
And I also think that if you were drinking like that,
you would smell it in the car.
Courtney (08:56):
Yeah, and I don't remember ever reading anywhere
Spilling it, or yeah.
Hannah (08:59):
I don't remember reading anywhere where they said oh, we
smell it, because even ifyou're drinking a can of beer or
any type of alcohol, you neverget to the last drop.
So if you throw a can it getsspilt or whatever.
You're going to smell it in thecar.
So I don't remember everreading that somewhere in police
reports or whatever.
Courtney (09:14):
The only other thing I could think of is when people
return their cans and bottlesand they rinse them out in the
sink and then they put them in abag Easily.
I'm sure I mean my dad and Iused to do this when I was a kid
.
I'm sure there were times wherehe threw them into the bed of
his truck and then a couple dayslater he found a rogue beer can
or soda can rolling around inthe back.
Yeah, rinsed out so therewouldn't be any, you know,
substance left in it.
I feel like you hear a youngcollege girl and somebody says
(09:35):
oh, there was alcohol involvedand people suddenly have that
like oh well, she deserved it,she asked for it.
It's like wearing a skirt andbeing raped, kind of thing.
Hannah (09:43):
Yep, yeah, of course there's no cell service.
And then, you know, this timein the early 2000s, cell phones
weren't that great anyways, andnot everybody had one.
And not everyone had one.
Based on where her car wasfound, she was going along the
curve and then somehow I don'tknow if it was ice, I don't know
if there was an animal that gotin the way she started falling
(10:03):
asleep.
It could be a multitude ofthings.
But she spun her car so it wasfacing the wrong way in the
right-hand lane.
Courtney (10:10):
And I'm assuming they had like marks in the snow or
marks on the road to prove thatshe had been spun around.
Hannah (10:15):
Yes, I haven't researched, obviously, this case
in a while, but there wereneighbors that saw things.
I don't know if it was themarks in the snow, I don't know
if it was the way her wheelswere Something.
They just knew that she hadspun it.
Courtney (10:29):
They had something to believe that.
Hannah (10:31):
Right Now let's talk about before the crash.
There's a lot of things thathappened before the crash.
In order to try to understandwhere Maura was mentally,
emotionally and even physically,we need to look at the days
prior to the disappearance.
Fred Maura's dad was a hard ass.
(10:52):
My dad wasn't really around forme to understand having a hard
ass father, but he just seemedto push his kids to be the best.
He wanted them to be the bestathletes, the best students, and
I can understand that thatmight get to be a lot when you
want to be this perfectionist ineverything that you do.
Courtney (11:05):
It's a lot of pressure and, I think, on kids too.
People want to appease thepeople who are important to them
and I can definitely relate tothat.
My dad was at times a hard ass,but also he just was very
motivating and he had a militarybackground himself which also
added a certain layer ofexpectations and just a lot of
expectations for me as a child,which I can relate.
(11:26):
It does become a lot and Ithink it gives some of us adults
a complex, honestly, but that'snot the point of this.
Hannah (11:32):
That's a different episode.
Julie, which was one of hersisters, did say in an interview
that they never wanted todisappoint their dad.
When Julie Amora got acceptedto West Point, it was a proud
moment for many people, andwhile at West Point she met her
boyfriend, bill.
She was studying chemicalengineering and that's why it is
interesting to hear what shedid next.
This always baffled me.
(11:55):
I never understood like whatwas going through her head at
the time she stole from FortKnox.
Courtney (12:01):
Interesting why.
Hannah (12:03):
I don't know what would possess you to do it.
I always wanted to know the why.
Courtney (12:06):
Attention seeking is all I can come up with.
Hannah (12:09):
Yeah, I guess.
So it just you know, of courseshe was caught.
It's Fort Knox.
People Like you're not notgoing to get caught.
This isn't the CVS on thecorner right, and even there
with the amount of camerasyou're getting caught Right.
And they even asked her likewhy did you steal it?
And she goes I don't know.
I had the money and they'reweird things.
That she stole too.
It was a lipstick and nailpolish, and she didn't even
(12:38):
strike me from everything I'veread about her as the kind ofish
.
Courtney (12:43):
But she just was this athletic persona that just had
really good skin and she didn'tneed to wear makeup, and she was
young too, and she was young, Imean, I feel like you don't
need all those beauty productswhen you're young.
Hannah (12:52):
There was a documentary that I watched and it was titled
the Disappearance of MauraMurray and it was Maggie Fralin,
who was also a UMass grad, andshe just became so involved with
the Maura Murray case.
When Maggie interviewedKathleen, which is Maura's other
sister, she said that everyonewanted the incident to be very
hush-hush.
I'm sure that was veryembarrassing for the family
(13:16):
After an incident like that.
They wanted that transition toUMass to be easy, simple, don't
ask too many questions.
Oh, maura's just at UMass now.
You know we just had to makethis change due to whatever, as
long as it wasn't said that shestole and it also is a pretty
big flip too that I never reallythought much about until today.
Courtney (13:33):
Chemical engineering to nursing is not at all the
same.
So you could almost even make anargument to say she was here,
she was at West Point, she wasdoing chemical engineering and
she had her found her calling,she had decided she wanted to do
something else.
It makes me wonder if therewasn't something else going on.
Yep, because we know howfamilies tend to hide mental
illness and things and obviouslyI thought mania immediately.
(13:56):
To be honest with you, someonewho's impulsive and they're
stealing things is often a firstsign of mania.
Stealing things, inflated ego,things out of of the norm, the
way you're reacting.
Hannah (14:08):
I've certainly known people who have been bipolar in
my life who've gone into manicepisodes and stealing was one of
the first things they did andit was always one of the
theories that people thought waslike oh, she just ran into the
woods and so if she was in thetype of mania, was she just so
confused that she just ran andgot?
Courtney (14:23):
lost.
Think about, like like myexperiences, not personally with
mania, but with other peoplethat I know who are manic, and I
think it sounds a lot simplerthan it is right yeah, oh, she
ran off into the woods Soundsvery unpractical.
I mean, from stories I haveheard of people they might say,
oh my God, there's this personin here who needs my help, or
there's this person I'm runningfrom in here who needs my help,
(14:44):
or there's this person I'mrunning from, and they have
themselves fully convinced thatthey need to go do that.
But wouldn't they have foundthe body?
that's always what I come backto in february, unprepared,
mentally ill, and in that theorywe're working.
I just don't think that youwould have been physically fit
to withstand even the nightdepending on the temperatures in
new hampshire wild animals,other people.
There's certainly just a lot ofthings that I would question
(15:05):
about that theory very true,very true so she goes to umass.
Hannah (15:09):
And she did not stop getting into trouble.
According to the missing moramurray podcast, she got accused
of stealing credit cardinformation, and this was in
november of 2003.
Courtney (15:21):
So, fairly shortly before the crash.
Hannah (15:22):
Yeah, so you're talking three months, three-ish months
before and the thing is again,she's not using it to buy big
things.
She was like ordering pizza.
It wasn't to buy a new computer, I don't know like just steal
it to do it almost yeah yeah,just these little things, like
the thrill of doing it so,according to renner's book, a
(15:44):
umass student contacted amherstpolice and said there were
charges on her car that she didnot make.
And when the police called therestaurant they said the
deliveries were made to KennedyHall, which is where she was
staying, which was her dorm room.
I wonder who lived at KennedyHall Like?
Later on that night, one of therestaurants called the police
and said something oh, theyplaced an order with a credit
card number, just to give youguys a heads up.
So the police told him to gothrough with the order.
(16:04):
You would meet them at thedrop-off.
And, of course, who came out ofthe building was moira.
There's actually a picture ofher that the police took in
front of kennedy hall to provethat.
Courtney (16:14):
To prove yeah, it's just strange.
Do we know what ever came fromthat?
Like?
Was she ever charged withanything?
Hannah (16:21):
yeah, more story to the police was that she found the
receipt on the ground with thecredit card number on it, which
is 2004, but I don't everremember my phone credit card
number being on anything.
Courtney (16:31):
I don't know if they ever did that.
Yeah, correct us if we're wrong, wanderers or rob from the
future rob from the future.
Hannah (16:37):
The police asked for the paper with the information on
it and more gave it to them butalso had other number sequences
on them, but she claimed theywere friends phone numbers.
So when she talked to thepolice she's not saying much of
why she did what she did.
Maybe she was embarrassed, butshe got probably the best
outcome she could get becauseshe goes before a judge.
The judge cuts her some slackand says stay out of trouble for
six months and it gets off yourrecord so basically her story
(17:00):
was how did you get the creditcard number?
Courtney (17:03):
I found it on a slip of paper on the ground, correct,
but to me that misses the wholepoint of like okay, yeah,
that's how you got the numberbut were you looking?
For the receipt, because I passa lot of receipts on the ground
.
I'm sure and I've never oncethought let me pick this up
there's an intent piece that'smissing from absolutely yeah
yeah.
Hannah (17:20):
Then she crashes her dad's car into a guardrail
that's not staying out oftrouble for six months.
On the way back from a partyDrinking yeah, on February 7,
2004, which was a Saturday, shewent car shopping with her dad
to get her a new car.
And they didn't purchase one,but they met up with one of
Moira's friends to have dinnerand then after dinner they go to
the liquor store so that Moiraand her friend could pick up
(17:41):
booze at the party that night.
And it gets better more thandrops off her father at his
hotel and borrows his new car todrive to the party.
New car around three in themorning she said she had to
return her dad's car, which somany things are in question here
, like why do you have to giveyour car back to your dad at
three in the morning while you?
Courtney (17:57):
were drinking, and also, if he's in a hotel room,
it's not like she's returninghome.
Hi, I'm gonna leave the keyshere for you, so when you wake
up in the morning, you have themright.
Are you gonna like, knock,knock, dad, here's your car back
.
Bring me back to my dorm room.
Yeah, it doesn't make sense.
Hannah (18:13):
On her way to the motel she crashes into the guardrail.
To paint an image for you, shegot a point of the row where she
had to turn left or right.
It was just a guardrail infront right.
You can't go straight.
She did and she did.
She went straight again.
She got no charges that night.
Courtney (18:26):
I don't know how, but she did it right so she's like a
stroke of good luck, I guess,or maybe bad luck, because if
she had been in trouble, maybeshe wouldn't have been in the
situation yeah, from the podcast.
Hannah (18:37):
I listened to what preceded the crash.
For a good part of theirepisode that they did.
They talked about like manypossibilities of what probably
could have happened and I cannotcomfortably present any of the
following as fact, but here iswhat maybe happened.
Okay, mora arrived with the towtruck at the hotel and somehow
she got into her father's room.
I don't know if she had.
Courtney (18:59):
Maybe she had the spare key.
That was part of their plan.
You're gonna come in here.
Maybe there's two beds andthat's not totally out the realm
.
But isn't that weird if youalready have a dorm room to go
back to?
It is.
But if the story about herneeding to drop the car off to
her father is true, I can seewhere, like if that was my
situation, my dad's letting meborrow the car.
I could see him saying here'sthe second key to my room.
There's two beds in here.
(19:20):
When you're done, come back in,I'll bring you back to school
in the morning.
I I could perfectly see that.
Maybe not super far-fetched, Imean, it's not a great theory.
Hannah (19:27):
It wouldn't be like top tier but fred claims that he
didn't know she was there untilmorning.
So whether more got theattendant letter in or obviously
she had an extra key, we no oneknows.
Right the podcasters couldspeak to the phone records,
which are interesting.
There was a call made to herboyfriend, billy, from Fred's
phone at 4.49 am.
For Billy that is early becauseremember he was at the military
(19:52):
.
And he was stationed inOklahoma.
Courtney (19:55):
Okay.
Hannah (19:56):
Did Maura borrow her dad's phone?
Where was her phone?
Or did Fred make the call Right?
According to the podcast, againtwo days later and we're now
looking at the beginning of theday of the crash, phone calls
were being made.
Maura supposedly calledBartlett, new Hampshire, to rent
a condo, and the phone calllasted about three minutes, but
(20:17):
no condo was ever rented.
Later on that day she emailsher boyfriend and in this email
talks about how she does notwant to talk to anyone.
But she signs it love you, stud, which maybe that's just the
banter they had.
But she sends an email, not aphone call, an email, and I'm
pretty sure we had textmessaging back then, but it
probably cost money right right1 13 pm, she leaves a message on
(20:38):
a classmate's phone, then afterthat calls 1-800-GO-STOW.
That's S-T-O-W-E, which is aplace in New Hampshire.
For you people that don't know,it's a ski resort, correct, yes
?
Where the phone call lastsabout five minutes, but it was
pre-recorded informational.
She must have listened tobecause, according to Stowe,
phone lines were down An hourand 20 minutes after she emailed
(21:01):
her boyfriend.
She called him and they eitherspoke for a minute or she left a
voicemail, but it wasn't longenough for a full conversation.
You can't tell yeah, around 4 pmMoore emails her professors and
says there was a death in thefamily and Scherz said something
along the lines of I will beoff for a couple days, but there
was no death in the family.
She obviously was trying to geta couple days off.
Right Before she left for NewHampshire she packed stuff in
boxes in her dorm and took herpictures off the wall.
Courtney (21:24):
That's weird.
Hannah (21:24):
I also found that she sent in her homework really
early that morning To me.
Courtney (21:29):
she still cared about her grades.
She cared about her grades.
She wasn't going awaypermanently.
Hannah (21:33):
Right.
She was saying like, oh, I havea couple days off, I need to
make sure I get my assignmentsin.
Obviously, moyer was goingthrough a lot.
We can only speculate what wasgoing on in her head, but there
was something going on.
What was interesting from bothMaggie, who did the documentary,
and Renner's book that I read,was that they both retraced her
steps from that day, which, ifyou actually watch the
documentary, it's quite amazingto watch her retrace the steps,
(21:53):
because they made sure they leftat the time that she did made
all the stops that she did toget up there to see where's the
gaps.
Right, they both found aboutSorry, what'd you say?
Good strategy.
They both found about an hourdiscrepancy in time from when
she left UMass, ran a coupleerrands and then headed to New
Hampshire where she eventuallycrashed and went missing.
And, according to thedocumentary, after she left
(22:14):
UMass, maura stopped at the bank, then the liquor store and
drove to New Hampshire, and thebank then the liquor store and
drove to new hampshire.
And again, there's actualvideos of her.
You can see her stopping at thebank.
Well, the bank was actually oneof those banks in a parking lot
.
Okay, you know where, it's justan atm.
She then headed to the liquorstore, where she bought a box of
red wine, bailey's and a 12pack of wine coolers.
Courtney (22:34):
It doesn't sound like you're buying alcohol for one
person.
Yes and no, the wine coolers inthe wine, but bailey's is very
different bailey's is weird.
I'll admit bailey's, unlessyou're buying guinness with it,
or but she's potentially goingto a ski resort, because she
called stowe for the information.
So to me I'm like, okay, she'sgoing to stowe, maybe she's
gonna have hot chocolate, she'sgonna spike it with bailey's.
(22:55):
Maybe it doesn't seemfar-fetched for what she's doing
.
It just seems like a lot forone person.
It does.
Hannah (23:02):
Yeah, I guess I'm just trying to think of, like, when
I'm going on vacation and westop.
Before we get to Maine, we stopat the New Hampshire liquor
because, it's cheap and we stockup for a couple days.
But that's also two people, so Idon't know.
It's different alcohols?
Yes, true.
Different alcohols yes, true.
That's my point.
Now we're looking after thecrash.
Maura crashes the car and onthis road it curves to the left.
(23:23):
Her car was found facing thewrong way.
Like I was saying.
Right, we have eyewitnesses theWestmans, the Marotes and
Atwoods.
The crash happened around 7.27pm, because that is the time of
the first 911 call that was madeby faith westman at 7, 30.
Courtney (23:46):
This guy has always creeped me out, and even now.
Hannah (23:47):
Look at butch atwood that bus driver man, sorry but
still think I mean.
Unfortunately he's dead now,but I just feel like he knew
something off.
Yeah, I agree so he's drivinghome in his bus and notices mara
Butch speaks to her and seesthat she's shaken up.
Moira refuses help, claimingthat she called AAA, which she
knew was not true because thereis no signal, which is also
creepy in a way.
Courtney (24:09):
Yeah, what did he think about that?
It's like almost as if he wasseeing an opportunity, like, oh,
you called AAA Right.
Hannah (24:16):
But it feels very horror movie-esque.
It does, but AAA doesn calltriple a right, but it feels
very.
Courtney (24:19):
Horror movie, yes, but triple a doesn't have service
here it does.
Or like, hey, I cut the phonelines for the house and you're
telling me you already called9-1-1 right right feels like
very one step ahead of thevictim, kind of thing.
Yes, yeah, I agree.
Hannah (24:29):
About two to three minutes later he leaves mara and
drives the rest of the way home.
Courtney (24:33):
Butch also had changed his statements a couple times
always sus when you change yourstatement a few times.
Hannah (24:38):
740 butch or his wife.
One of them calls 911, but thelines are busy.
Courtney (24:43):
How does the yeah, I know, I've never once heard of
trying to call 911 and the lineis busy.
Hannah (24:47):
Yep, so I've called 911 and I've had it where they've
pushed me to like a differenttown.
Courtney (24:54):
You go to the state police usually, yeah and usually
dispatches from springfield tomass state police.
I've never been like beep, beep, beep.
Sorry, no help is available.
Try again tomorrow.
So he does his paperwork in thebus and waits.
Yeah, apparently.
Hannah (25:09):
That's not morbid.
7.43,.
The dispatcher calls back andgets Butch's wife and says she
does not know where Moira is.
Okay, so obviously either she'salready gone at this point or
she hasn't looked out her window.
7.46 pm, sergeant Cecil Smitharrives and Maura is gone.
By that point, when the policewent through her car, several of
the wine coolers were empty ormissing and there was red wine
(25:30):
all over the car.
But that could be also be fromthe crash, not her drinking,
right?
Yeah, exactly.
So from the documentary theywere able to see that Maura's
car car, since it was still in acar lot.
They saw a savage hop card.
Airbags were deployed.
They could see the dust fromfingerprinting that they had
died.
It was shaken up.
Yeah, maggie did get her handwith maggie's a documenter, did
get her hands on an officialpolice list of items, found her
(25:51):
car and some things wereinteresting.
So we have shampoo, okay,sleeping pills.
Obviously she's having somecollege that, but she also she's
having mental health issues andshe can't sleep.
Turn your mind off like we knowif they're prescription sleeping
pills or if they were like theover-the-counter honestly, if
I'm thinking back to thedocumentary, they were kind of
common, like how like birthcontrol would come like, just
(26:13):
pop one out, I don't know, likea pill, like a pill pack yeah,
because I just know that likethere are things you can even
buy at, like the Dollar Tree,that are sleep aids, I don't
know that I would trust DollarTree medication.
Courtney (26:24):
I'm sure it's fine If you're a pharmacist, let us know
about that, but I do feel likeit's not abnormal for a college
student to need sleep aid.
Do I get concerned about sleepaid with alcohol?
Yes, absolutely.
Hannah (26:37):
Deodorant lotion, body spray.
Okay.
Razor makeup all yes absolutelydeodorant lotion body spray.
Okay, you're going away for theweekend that's normal birth
control.
Courtney (26:44):
Okay, if you take it, you're gonna keep it with you
every day and candy and someschool stuff.
Hannah (26:49):
Like we said, this sounds like an override bag
right for a girl who just wantsto get away from life's bullshit
right.
36 hours into the investigation, new hampshire fishing game
were called in and did a 10 milecircle radius around the crash
and they found no footprints oranything of interest.
10 days after the crash, thecadaver dogs called it.
Courtney (27:06):
I don't know why it was 10 days later.
Do they think 10 days wasnecessary?
I don't know, but that seemslike a long.
You're down to the inside jobor poor police work again.
I hate this question.
Hannah (27:17):
I really hate that it's what comes up all the time they
tracked more ascent for a smallway down the road and then lost
it like she got into a car orsomething.
Like she got into a car exactlywhat they thought.
According to kurt mora's littlebrother, lori moro's mom could
not help in the investigationdue to having cancer.
She has passed and she died onher daughter's birthday.
(27:37):
Yeah, fred, her father did notsit down for a formal interview
with police for almost five anda half years, which I don't know
how I feel about that either.
Courtney (27:49):
It kind of makes sense based off of his persona that
we know about, though, too well,and also during that interview
he made sure his attorney waswith him yeah, I feel weird
about that.
I do.
The attorney part makes me feelweird.
Hannah (27:59):
The rest of it could just be him being rigid in my
mind, but I do feel weird aboutthe attorney part he obviously
was going through something,because he did say that his
daughter had been depressed andmaybe went off the trail and
died.
That seems very specific, veryspecific wouldn't be.
Courtney (28:16):
I mean also five and a half years.
You probably lost hope thatyou're going to find her at that
point too.
Hannah (28:20):
Yeah, but this is a weird thing to say to the police
, like you knew your daughterwas depressed With your attorney
present.
Courtney (28:25):
Yeah, very strange.
Makes you wonder what you wouldhave said if the attorney
wasn't present.
Hannah (28:30):
Let's talk about some theories.
I think we touched on some ofthese already.
Maura was in tandem drivingwith someone and when the crash
happened she hopped over to okayexplain this for the short term
, but not for the long term,exactly short term, and then of
course, that's why there was somuch alcohol, that was.
But then if she would havetaken it with you, right, you
(28:51):
know?
Courtney (28:51):
right, and anything that had her name on it and
things.
Hannah (28:54):
Assuming you weren't already intoxicated, you'd be
like, oh, I need my overnightbag if we're gonna keep going,
exactly yeah another one isafter the crash, mara ran into
the woods scared of a dui, whichwould be something else on her
record, and ended up dying inthe woods.
But they would have found her.
They would have found herSomething.
Courtney (29:10):
Some part of her.
Whether it was clothing orfootprints or something.
Yeah, that one doesn't seemlikely to me.
There's also a theory about thepolice that has something to do
with it.
Like I said, poor police workor inside job.
Hannah (29:35):
no-transcript.
Yes, I don't know why it was inmy notes, but tinny and
rattling no-transcript.
Courtney (29:49):
That could have caused an issue, because I know right
now there's a thing going aroundshout out dad, where they're
putting zip ties on people'srims so you can hear it and
their goal is to get you out ofthe car.
Because then you're vulnerable.
You're not in the car, youprobably car, you probably don't
have your phone right.
You bend over to get it.
They're behind you, right.
So it kind of makes me thinkabout that too, in the
documentary they actually had agarage.
Hannah (30:11):
Get her type of model of car, put a rag in the exhaust
okay with how fast she was going, like how long would stuff
happen, and it ended up justlike popping out I kind of want
to like ask a mechanic friendright now like what would happen
.
Courtney (30:23):
Do we have any?
Hannah (30:24):
I do, I'm gonna text him right now I might even ask two.
I'll work on this while youkeep going, okay another thing
they were talking about was wasit possible that she stopped in
town, went to the diner orsomething?
Someone saw her got interested.
Courtney (30:39):
You know, it could have been something that, oh,
the waitress is like, oh, you'realone, and it could have been
like, yeah, I'm just going bymyself up here for a few days,
or whatever, and just was anopportune type thing, that's
true there's so manypossibilities so many I see why
this one becomes your lynnburdick because there are just
so many possibilities that, eventhough there's a lot of
(31:01):
information for her, which isdifferent from lynn, there's a
lot of theory, there's a lot ofdo these things connect or not,
but there isn't a lot of hardphysical evidence.
Hannah (31:10):
The other one is Maura got picked up by a stranger.
Whether willingly or againsther will, she got into the car.
Courtney (31:16):
And, but there was never any sign of struggle.
But if they didn't do reallygood investigative work for 10
days, work for 10 days, I meancome on right, because she was
outside the car at one point.
Right, if you wreck a car,you're gonna get out, you're
gonna look at the damage.
Hannah (31:29):
You're potentially in the dark because if you're going
to get into a friend's car,wouldn't you grab your stuff,
like you were saying absolutelyabsolutely I would need all my
stuff, especially if we'rehaving a good time.
Courtney (31:39):
I'm gonna want the alcohol.
Hannah (31:41):
Yeah, at least right exactly, and the last theory I
have going unless, according toyours, you have one is that more
committed suicide.
An empty pack of sleeping pillswas found with a full pack,
which I think is weird that youwould keep an empty one so one I
I see where I have an issuewith that.
Courtney (31:58):
I feel like I'm debunking all of your things.
No, it's fine.
My issue with that is suicidemeans there's a body.
Where's the body?
Hannah (32:05):
well, that's why I'm did she just take a bunch and just
walk off into the woods?
Courtney (32:08):
And I know you're like .
Hannah (32:10):
I mean she could have been in Butch's basement for all
we know.
Courtney (32:13):
honestly, and also what I will say about me in
college and bags.
I know for certain that I hadthis one go-to overnight bag
that I never fully emptied out.
There were probably pairs ofsocks in there that existed
solely in that bag and never gotworn.
So for me, if I'm at your houseI'm sleeping over, I empty my
sleeping pills.
If there's no trash can in theroom, I'm going to stuff it back
(32:34):
in my bag To me.
I'm not satisfied that she tookthose pills just because it was
empty.
She could have, but I just Idon't know.
She didn't seem organized.
She was definitely impulsive.
I could have seen if somebodypulled over and said hey, you
want to come here, we're goingto have a good time.
That seems more likely to methan that she committed suicide
(32:56):
Truthfully, yeah.
Hannah (32:57):
I hope there's some information.
I mean, of course there's alsotheories that she ran off into
Canada and she has a newidentity and she just wanted to
get away from everything.
But then why turn in yourhomework?
Courtney (33:09):
that's the part that really gets me, because you
obviously cared about yoursuccess.
Yeah, otherwise you would havejust left and went missing.
Yeah, she's either very good atdisappearing and was coached by
somebody.
Like you have to make thesecalls, you have to be strategic.
I don't know, I don't reallyknow.
Do we know if there's any newupdates, since I can peruse yeah
(33:33):
, peruse I did see that theyrecovered a fingerprint and that
they were able to link it fromour car.
I don't remember where it saidthat it was from, but I do
remember they were saying thatthey were able to link it and it
was someone who was in jail forsomething else and the prints
were a match.
I do think it was inside of hercar.
Hannah (33:54):
Because you know, of course I mentioned that there
was the fingerprint dusting thatthey had found from the police
doing that.
Courtney (34:00):
And allegedly if I'm thinking of the same person she
knew the person.
It was someone who she had goneto West Point with.
From the article that I saw.
Hannah (34:08):
And the guy's in prison.
Courtney (34:11):
So the guy's name was Stephan Baldwin and he was the
executive director of the UnionCounty Humane Society in Ohio.
He was sentenced for more than15 years in prison after he was
found guilty of 32 counts ofanimal cruelty, bribery, theft
and various other charges thatwere not listed, which is
interesting because obviouslyyou're talking about somebody
who was the director of a humanesociety.
(34:32):
He was posing as this personwho really cared about creatures
he really loved pets butinstead he was illegally
euthanizing them and pocketingthe proceeds for personal use.
So he's a douche canoe.
What's his name again?
His name is stephan baldwin.
He was arrested in august 2020and his fingerprints were then
entered into the nationalautomated fingerprint
(34:52):
identification system andshortly after, the new hampshire
state police were alerted likehey, these fingerprints are in
here and that they matched oneof the fingerprints that was
recovered from mora's car.
And he was from west point.
Yeah, yeah.
So Baldwin and Maura attendedthe US Military Academy at West
Point together in the early2000s and allegedly they were
acquaintances.
Baldwin claimed when he talkedto Renner the person who you
(35:14):
were mentioning was doing thedocumentary that he and Maura
were in a casual romanticrelationship together while they
were at West Point.
Hannah (35:23):
Oh my God, he might be on the documentary.
Courtney (35:25):
Yeah, Because they interviewed a couple different
guys for that Maura and Baldwinalso withdrew from West Point
within weeks of one another,which is interesting to note.
She withdrew from the WestPoint school in January of 2002,
and he resigned December 21st2001, according to the school
records at West Point.
Dude, what the fuck, fuck, sofast forward from?
(35:47):
You know we were talking aboutwhen they were in school
together.
In 2024, the fbi visited him tokind of quiz him about his
connections to maura, and thiswas four years after the
fingerprints were matched fromhim to the car and he denied any
involvement in thedisappearance, claiming that he
hadn't had contact with hersince leaving West Point.
Hannah (36:04):
I mean, I guess that's possible that his prints would
be in the car if that was thesame car she used from West
Point.
Courtney (36:10):
However, I phoned my friend about the tailpipe and
having the rag in the exhaustand he said that he supposes it
could potentially choke theexhaust gases, which would cause
too much back pressure,depending on how big the cloth
is in the exhaust and wherewithin the exhaust it's located.
Okay, so I asked him.
I got a little bit morespecific.
I said would this cause the carperformance to be so bad that
(36:31):
it could stall or cause apotential car wreck, or would it
just pop back out of theexhaust?
Thinking about what theinvestigators?
had said and I also told himthat we're talking about a 90s
saturn and he said it couldpotentially stall the car.
If it's that jammed in theexhaust which could potentially
slash, probably stall it out andcause a wreck, do with that
(36:52):
what you must, but this is amechanic who we trust with
aircraft mechanics as well andhas about 10 years of experience
working with cars, which makesme wonder if somebody didn't set
it up and then just follow herfrom a distance waiting for it
to happen.
Hannah (37:05):
Follow her.
Now we're thinking like we haveprints of some guy did he
follow her?
Courtney (37:11):
so yeah, so you're talking like did this guy follow
?
What's really striking me isthis guy from west point.
He withdrew in december of 2001and she withdrew in january of
2002, so that kind of doesn'tmatch our profile if he's
following her, because in thatpoint she followed him, if
you're looking at that as apattern.
Hannah (37:30):
But I still don't understand no one leaves West
Point and doesn't finish.
I feel like that's like one ina chance circumstance.
Courtney (37:38):
Not many people would do that Right Without, like, a
medical reason.
Well, we know her reasonbecause she was freaking,
stealing Allegedly, or is that abetter reason than what it was
now?
I'm like, was she involved withthis man?
Were they trying to hide it?
Hannah (37:51):
was there a pregnancy that was actually something that
renner talked about in his booksupposed pregnancies that she
didn't want anyone know about,or her boyfriend, because it
might not be his that's like.
Courtney (38:02):
That's an easy one that they always go to for women
.
Yeah, she's pregnant and it'snot his.
So baldwin did not say anythingabout his involvement in the
disappearance when the fbi wentto him and asked about it.
However, he did exchange someemails with renner and he did
say, quoting here, and here I amquoting since spoke, I spent a
(38:25):
little bit of time looking intothe details around Maura's
disappearance and trying tothink of anything that might be
even the slightest bit relevant.
He went on to talk about that.
He never really looked into herdisappearance because he always
just had that little twinge ofdisappointment and sadness about
how his relationship with herended.
And he did claim to recall thata fifth-year student had been
quote unquote following Mauraduring her final year at West
(38:48):
Point.
So it seems like a little bitof that blame game, like yeah,
ok, I don't know anything.
Oh, wait a minute.
There was this fifth yearstudent who was kind of
following her around.
Again here I am quoting.
I wanted to say Chris was hisname.
I can't be positive about that,but I know there aren't many
fifth-year seniors so hopefullyit's not too hard to nail that
individual down.
He had been following Mauraaround a lot at school and I
(39:08):
only know that because he burstinto my room one night when
Maura and I were together and Igot a lot of demerits for
sharing the same horizontalsurface as a cadet of the
opposite sex.
When I asked Maura how thisupperclassman knew she was in my
room, she basically said thathe had been stalking her but was
pretty dismissive about thewhole thing.
I can't imagine she ever gavehim the time of day and I don't
(39:28):
know what happened to him.
I'm not sure what his name was.
I hope that our disciplinaryrecords might show who turned us
that night.
So there's a lot.
Hannah (39:36):
It feels like pointing the finger at somebody else and
he's saying it's chris and he'ssaying I don't know the guy's
name, what he was doing on rightkind of it would make sense, I
mean.
Courtney (39:45):
But I will say the charges that stephan baldwin had
were about animals and thingslike that.
What do we know about peoplewho have a history for violence
is that they do typically startwith with animals.
Is it possible?
Yes, am I convinced afterreading this update of
information, that I think that'swhat happened?
I don't know, because baldwindid confirm to someone I think
(40:06):
it was Renner that hisfingerprints were found inside
the car, meaning he's confirmingthat the FBI told him your
prints were on the car.
But he was claiming and stayingpretty true to the fact that
the FBI told him they werediscovered on a CD or a CD case.
He's saying oh, Maura and Iexchange CDs frequently.
You know when we were at WestPoint, but he denied ever having
any contact with her when heleft the school and when she
(40:28):
left the school or ever visitingher at UMass.
So it's kind of far-fetchedthat much time had gone by and
it's important to also know thatthe police never confirmed
where on Maura's car the printswere found.
Hannah (40:41):
If you're getting arrested for animal cruelty and
abuse, I have no qualms thinkingthat you don't stop there, that
you just have a violentpersonality, yeah.
Courtney (40:51):
It's also very weird because it sounds like he told
others and I'm sorry, I'm notsure if it was Renner or
somebody else that he didn'tcontact her after West Point.
He didn't know she was missinguntil he saw it on TV.
He never read about it onlineuntil he saw it on TV.
He never read about it online.
He never saw it anywhere else.
And that is just kind ofstrange.
Because you have thisrelationship in college, you're
not at all interested in thefact that she disappeared.
Hannah (41:14):
Yeah, you have a friend missing.
Courtney (41:21):
You knew all of this information about a stalker 20
years ago, but you didn't shareany of this with detectives.
You're saying you didn't noticeany of it.
This article really just like.
I feel like it was like whambam as I'm going through it.
They also mentioned that hechanged his name months after
she vanished, according to courtrecords, so his legal name when
she knew him was stephenfinkelstein oh god, I would
change the last name.
And he changed the surname tohis mom's maiden name in
december of 2004.
(41:42):
Not that he was asked or why,you know.
I mean, he would probably lieanyways if it was something
about that.
Hannah (41:47):
He sounds like someone that needed a fresh start to me.
Or is hiding something Becausethat's expensive to change your
name.
It's expensive.
Courtney (41:57):
It is.
And even more weird, apparentlyhis mother, barbara Baldwin,
who remember he took her maidenname, hasn't been seen or heard
from since 2007.
Stop, it's not clear if therewas a missing persons report,
but she was last seen inCalifornia.
Hannah (42:13):
Wait, it's not sure if there's a missing person report.
Courtney (42:15):
It's not sure if there was a missing persons report
ever made, but apparentlyBaldwin, on his Facebook, had
posted pictures before he was injail about his mother's
disappearance.
Hannah (42:24):
Well, is that something that you can look?
Courtney (42:26):
up?
I would think so, andapparently when Runner
interviewed Baldwin's dad hesaid quote nobody's heard from
her as far as we know, she couldbe buried in the desert
somewhere.
Interestingly enough, again,we're talking about a pattern
here.
Two of Baldwin's ex-partnersand lovers died in drug and
alcohol-related tragedies Onewas of an overdose and the
(42:46):
second was in a DUI car crashand so he's not been named an
official suspect.
At least not at the time of thearticle that I read, he was not
listed as a formal suspect, andit seems like Renner is doing a
lot of the legwork to say, hey,why are we not looking a little
bit closer at this guy?
You know he's very interesting,he's got a lot of stuff going
on.
You know he's very interesting,he's got a lot of stuff going
(43:06):
on.
You know, why are we notspending that due diligence
looking into him?
I'm trying to think of likereasons why they wouldn't be
looking into him and I justcan't think of anything.
I mean, it seems prettyconvincing to me.
I just her case gets more andmore complex every time I see an
update.
Her family was pretty dead seton saying that they just didn't
think that she would run off tohurt herself, that they kind of
(43:27):
figured she would leave and findsome kind of foul play later on
.
But her sister also did.
Her sister, julie, did say in2024 that she had an eating
disorder and was making poordecisions and they did know that
as a family.
That's the first I had seen ofthe eating disorder, but I
haven't watched the documentaryor read a book about it.
Obviously you might haveuncovered that in your own
research disorder, but I haven'twatched the documentary or read
a book about it.
Obviously you might haveuncovered that in your own
(43:47):
research.
Did you uncover in yourresearch that her sister
kathleen suffered fromalcoholism and had been
discharged from rehab?
on february 5th.
Yes, her response is veryinteresting to that as well, and
her supervisor at work, whenshe was at work and got the call
, was like you need to see acounselor and she would not go
if you watch the documentary itgets to interview kathleen.
Hannah (44:06):
It's heart-wrenching because you can see the sister
was like I was dealing with myown demons and I felt like I
couldn't help more.
Yeah, it's really sad that issuper sad.
Courtney (44:14):
I and I they have a whole section too that looks at
like the last movements that youhad listed out.
And I do think it's interestingbecause they did note that she
went to the nearby liquor store,purchased $40 worth of alcohol,
box of wine they have Kahlua,but Kahlua and Bailey's are kind
of the same thing and vodka,and traded in 79 bottles and
cans for $3.99 in store credit.
So if that's true, the cans onthe floor could be that, because
(44:38):
if you're talking 79 cans, Imean if a few of them roll out,
you're not going to notice.
Interesting, I don't know,hannah, I was hoping we were
going to be able to like crackpart of the code or come up with
a different theory.
There is so much to this casethere is there's a lot there's
absolutely there's so much.
I'm really interested to see ifthe wanderers have theories
about them, because obviously wetalked about a lot of
(45:01):
possibilities that obviouslyyou've spent time thinking about
, I've spent time thinking about, I know, on the original
release.
Just talked about her theoriestoo, too, I'm really interested
to see if anybody I know it'sbeen 2023 when you release that
so we're talking a year and ahalf probably, because I think
it was like fall of 2023.
But if anybody has any thoughtson this case, or information or
(45:22):
things they've seen, share themwith us.
We're doing a little revamp onsocial media so you'll notice a
little bit of a differentpresence.
So we're using Facebook, we'reusing Instagram and then, if you
prefer the anonymous route,always you can text us as well.
Hannah (45:34):
Yes, text us, we love text.
Courtney (45:35):
We love text, and if you do, we really can't see who
you are.
So you could play a total AprilFool's joke on us know that it
was you.
That was a great episode,hannah.
I'm going to be definitelythinking about Maura Murray for
the foreseeable future now.
Yeah, she's in my head and justmy heart goes out to her family
.
I can't stress enough that incases like these, a lot of
(45:56):
people have thoughts andopinions, and none of those
things mean that she deservedwhat happened, whether she was
drinking or she wasn't, whethershe had mental illness or she
didn't, whether she made a poorchoice or she didn't.
Her life is still worth honoringand we have this whole episode
composed with that at the heartof it.
Absolutely Wow.
Hannah (46:13):
Okay, well, thank you Courtney, thank you Hannah, and
we will see you, wanderers,later.
We'll see you later, wanderers,take care.
Thanks for listening today.
Wicked Wanderings is hosted byme, hannah, and co-hosted by me,
courtney, and it's produced byRob Fitzpatrick.
Music by Sasha N.
If you enjoyed today's episode,don't forget to leave a rating
(46:33):
and review and be sure to followon all socials.
You can find the links down inthe show notes.
If you're looking for somereally cozy t-shirts or hoodies,
head over to the merch store.
Thank you for being a part ofthe Wicked Wanderings community.
We appreciate every one of you.
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