The Cheat Sheet: Wording and Wolves

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[00:01:51] So as we run the numbers on this episode, we have two cases out of California, one case out of Colorado, and one case out of Kentucky. Two of these cases involve murders involving teenaged perpetrators, and three involve the murder of young girls.

[00:02:10] My name is Anya Kane. I'm a journalist. And I'm Kevin Greenlee. I'm an attorney. And this is The Murder Sheet. We're a true crime podcast focused on original reporting, interviews, and deep dives into murder cases. We're The Murder Sheet. And this is The Cheat

[00:02:27] Sheet, wording and wolves. My sources for this initial article are KTVU and the Press Democrat, and then accessed through newspapers.com, the Cloverdale Reveal. So this first one is about the 1982 cold case killing of 13-year-old Sarah Ann Gere. This took

[00:03:36] place in Cloverdale, California, which is a city in Sonoma County. As of 2010 from the census data, had a bit over 8,000 people living there. So on May 24th, 1982, two children made a disturbing discovery in the backyard of an apartment complex in downtown Cloverdale.

[00:03:59] They found the partially clothed body of a young girl, and she had been strangled, she had been beaten. And at that time, a girl named Sarah Ann Gere had not come home. So she and her mother Susan had been fighting because she'd been skipping school.

[00:04:18] And Susan thought she was staying with friends for the time being, but unfortunately, she was not. So Susan actually learned about her daughter's murder when she came into the Cloverdale Police Station to report her missing, that they had already found a body. Samples of blood and

[00:04:35] semen were taken from the body. She had been sexually assaulted as well as brutally murdered. So according to the Cloverdale Reveal, she was found at 10.50 AM that Monday. And she had, again, May 24th, 1982, they said she may have been accosted at the entrance of the alley because her

[00:04:54] shoes were found there, there were drag marks. And she'd last been seen 10.30 PM on Sunday night. Her body was partially found under a fence. So this really haunted the city of Cloverdale and its police department. At the time in the Cloverdale Reveal, Officer Richard Beckman told

[00:05:16] them, quote, we policemen don't go around crying, but we're sick about this thing. We want this killer as bad as anyone worse. We care about these people. And so far, most of the people have been

[00:05:27] a great help. But unfortunately, the crime went unsolved. In 2021, a Press Democrat article interviewed Cloverdale Police Chief Jason Ferguson talking about reopening the case. He expressed he was very committed to it, putting resources toward it, but nothing happened. And people around town

[00:05:49] continued to talk about this. Sarah was a very well-liked kid. People were just, how could something like this have happened and nobody get held accountable? So it was really haunting to both the city and the Cloverdale Police Chief and the different personnel there. But recently,

[00:06:12] there was a break in the case. So 62-year-old James Eunick was charged with murder, rape, kidnapping, and lewd and lavish acts with a minor under 14. And he has been booked into jail. So this is from a press release that the Cloverdale Police Department issued.

[00:06:30] Former Police Chief Jason Ferguson, who reopened the investigation in July 2021, retired in December 2023. His successor, Chief Chris Parker, continued the pursuit of justice alongside private investigator Kevin Kline and Cloverdale detective Katie Vannone. Sergeant Borusco initially took charge of the investigation in 2021, meticulously reviewing evidence and

[00:06:52] conducting interviews. A male DNA profile was identified from the evidence and through the use of modern DNA genetic genealogy technology, this dedicated team has successfully identified and apprehended James Eunick, 62, from Willows, California. He has been taken into custody and

[00:07:08] is being booked into the Sonoma County Jail." So they also thanked the Glen County Sheriff's Office, the FBI, Sari Labs, and the Sonoma County District Attorney's Office, the Department of Justice, and as I mentioned, investigator Kevin Kline. So in a quote put out to the media,

[00:07:29] Chief Parker said, quote, "'Today represents a bittersweet victory for justice. While nothing can undo the pain inflicted upon the Gere family and our community, we can finally offer some solace in knowing that the perpetrator will be held accountable. This arrest is a testament to

[00:07:43] the dedication of our law enforcement agencies and the unwavering resolve of Cloverdale's citizens." So this I think is a tragic story, but it is one that gives me hope because you have a police department not forgetting something and continuing to try to pull out the stops in order

[00:08:03] to get a conclusion as technology develops. I agree. It's ultimately an inspirational story that justice is still reachable even in cases that are decades old. And it's also a reminder that if you have committed a heinous crime and have not faced legal consequences for that crime,

[00:08:32] you haven't gotten away with it. You can't be assured of that. That crime is never going to be a part of the distant past because there are people out there who still care deeply about it

[00:08:47] and will keep on working and working. And every day when you go to sleep, you have to realize that it might be your last day going to sleep as a free person. Absolutely. And let me just say a

[00:09:00] little bit of an aside, but I got very into researching the Cloverdale Police Department because I guess that's just what I do. I get overly invested in these weird research topics and go a

[00:09:11] little too overboard and take forever to get these cheat sheet notes together. So apologies to Kevin. But this is something that I just was like, wow, reading about. So I mentioned Richard Beckman, who was a very longtime police officer in Cloverdale. He became, and this comes full

[00:09:30] circle. This comes full circle. So don't get mad at me. But he became a somewhat well-known figure, even I would say from the looks of it, maybe on a national level, because in 1988,

[00:09:41] a 23-year-old man named Ernest James Hansen, who had just been paroled, tried to stab a motel clerk, went on a whole chase with police, got into a gas station called Pellegrini Chevron, and then proceeded to take 17-year-old David Emmel, the gas station attendant hostage,

[00:10:02] and got into a standoff with Beckman and another officer named Ken Robinson. So he's using Emmel as a shield. Before he could fully raise his rifle, Beckman and Robinson fired on him from 30 feet away, hitting him and killing him and saving

[00:10:19] Emmel, who was not injured. So Emmel went on to become a volunteer with the department and the fire department, became a firefighter, became a paramedic. And I guess Beckman was regarded as a hero and eventually appeared in National Rifle Association literature nationally, I guess.

[00:10:39] They were saying like, this guy did a good thing with a gun and won a bunch of awards. So that just struck me as wild. But then this is where it gets weird. I was looking up James Eunick, the guy who

[00:10:52] is charged with killing Sarah. And on January 30th, 1985, a few years after the killing in the Cloverdale Reveal, Eunick is listed as a Cloverdale resident at the time and is mentioned in a

[00:11:08] photo caption as leading officer Richard Beckman on a car and foot chase all around town, successfully eluding him, later turning himself in. And there's a picture of Beckman surveying his abandoned vehicle. So think about that. Beckman was digging into this murder of this 13-year-old girl,

[00:11:29] and then the guy eludes him again in this foot chase, in this car chase. And he's there looking at the car of the guy whose DNA would tie him to the crime years later, not realizing that. Isn't that surreal? It is surreal.

[00:11:44] Yeah. And the only other thing I found consistently about Eunick were articles from the reveal about his bowling results. He was an avid bowler, it seemed. I'm pretty sure it's the same guy. At least it's another guy named James Eunick, and that's not exactly a common name. But

[00:12:02] if that is the same guy, I just want people to remember. So often people who follow true crimes say things like, well, wouldn't someone have confessed and how could they live with themselves? That is you talking as a normal person who doesn't go around killing people.

[00:12:17] That is what a normal person thinks, because a normal person would feel guilty about this. But people who kill kids are not normal. And I just want people to remember there is evil out there, and it's out there bowling and having babies and getting married,

[00:12:34] having slaughtered a child. And it's out there bowling. That should not shock anybody. We should be prepared to acknowledge that there are people out there that can do that. And it's just

[00:12:49] some people make the decision that they want to do horrible things and then they just live with it, because speaking up and taking accountability would ruin their lives. Anyways, we can move on. Sorry about that whole saga.

[00:12:59] Well, before we do move on, it is true you spend more time working on your cheat sheet notes than I do, but I'm not annoyed by that. I remember, I believe it was President John F. Kennedy made a

[00:13:14] remark about Jackie Kennedy when they were taking a trip to Paris. He said that she takes a whole lot longer to get ready than I do, but she looks a lot better when she's done.

[00:13:28] So you do more work and you get these little interesting nuggets that I don't get because I'm out enjoying a leisurely meal at Arby's while you're still working hard. You do a great job with yours. I feel like my cheat sheets are more

[00:13:42] narrative sometimes, and yours are more legal. So that kind of makes sense because of our different backgrounds. It would be weird if mine were more legal and yours were more narrative. Yes. You wouldn't know what to do with that.

[00:13:54] I just didn't want your putting yourself down there at the beginning of your comments to go unchallenged. So let the record show, no one is annoyed with Anya for that reason. Well, thank you. You're very sweet.

[00:14:08] So with that said, let's go on to a story, another story out of California. I found this in the Los Angeles Times. This is a story that goes all the way back to 2015. An eight-year-old

[00:14:25] girl named Madison or Maddie Middleton was killed. She was a girl who was well known in this particular neighborhood. She was said to have a special fondness and interest in wolves. She is basically

[00:14:44] murdered by a 15-year-old boy in the neighborhood who beat her, choked her, and sexually assaulted her, stabbed her in the throat, and then put her body in a recycling bin, treating this

[00:15:01] this lovely child like she was a piece of garbage. And this person was 15 years old, as I say, at the time. His name was Adrian Jerry Gonzalez. He was originally going to be charged as an adult,

[00:15:16] but then some laws were passed in California that said no, if a person is 15 years old, you can't charge them as an adult. You have to charge them as a juvenile. So he was charged

[00:15:27] as a juvenile, and he committed this crime. He's pled guilty to it, but now he is about to turn 25, and so he is going to be aging out of the juvenile system. So there is every possibility that he

[00:15:46] could be released now or perhaps held for another couple of years, and residents are very troubled by the possibility that he could be released because there is some indication he could still perhaps pose a danger to the community.

[00:16:04] Yeah, I don't blame them. He's still quite young. And has there been any indication that he's been rehabilitated? A clinical forensic psychologist recently told a court that Gonzalez was deemed above average on one particular sexual assault risk assessment.

[00:16:27] Oh, oh my god. Okay. Yeah. Then no. I don't think someone like that should be out around kids that… Around anybody.

[00:16:38] …around anybody, especially if he's ranking as being still a threat. I know it's complicated and controversial, but my understanding is that in some cases, there can be… It's often stated that it's almost impossible to sort of rehabilitate sex offenders. My understanding is that the reality is more complicated. There can be successful rehabilitation in some cases.

[00:17:03] Reality is always more complicated than generalizations. Yeah, generalizations. Exactly. But that doesn't mean necessarily that that's possible or happening in every case. And in this situation, if an expert is saying, no, he's actually more of a threat than most people, then, you know, most people aren't saying…

[00:17:22] It's hard to treat someone to no longer have a particular sexual desire. It'd be like if eating fish sandwiches were a crime, could you somehow find a doctor who could make me not like fish sandwiches anymore? I mean, it's a silly example, but that's basically…

[00:17:42] But also it's just like then it's like, you know, I understand children, teenagers, the brains are not fully developed yet. There's a level of is a young person as complicit in a horrible crime? To me, oftentimes those arguments are a lot more compelling for something like shooting somebody because there's a little bit more of a removal, even though that is a horrifying, awful crime.

[00:18:11] But if you're in some sort of gang war and you're one of the people who shot somebody and just happens that your gun hit, you know, your bullet hit somebody. I think there's more possibility for helping a teenager who is convicted of murder in that setting than somebody who brutalizes a child like this that even at a young age, that just seems like a huge potential for risk in letting them out so early.

[00:18:37] Yeah, it's very troubling. It's very troubling. So we will be following that and trying to keep an eye on what happens. It's just so complicated when you're dealing with someone who was a juvenile.

[00:18:48] How like is he definitely getting released? Or is the possibility that they could hold on to him?

[00:18:52] They're now evaluating whether or not to release him now or wait two years. And if they think there might be reason to wait two years, that needs to be a process where the factors are analyzed and weighed. But then he would definitely get released two years.

[00:19:11] That's my understanding. Oh, geez. Yikes. OK, well, I I feel sorry for that community and the girl's parents. And having having someone do that, regardless of how young to your child, and then just walking so quickly. I mean, I don't know where's the justice in that?

[00:19:34] Good question. It's often very difficult to find justice in the real world sometimes. With that said, let's move on to the next one. This is a case out of Colorado and it's another more of a legal process case, which you say, obviously, this one was chosen by me.

[00:19:53] You excel at them. Well, we'll see. My source for this was some coverage I found in the Denver Post. So this is a case that involves a man named Rennie Cordova, who when he was 14 years old, shot a 32 year old woman named Pamela Capriales at a traffic light.

[00:20:20] And so he was originally going to be charged as a juvenile, but then the decision was made, no, let's charge him as an adult. And to be clear, this Cordova, he used an AR-15 rifle.

[00:20:37] And supposedly the reason why he killed this innocent woman was because he was trying to get in good with a particular gang. And so the decision is made, let's charge him as an adult.

[00:20:51] And subsequent to that decision, some of the prosecutors involved in the case, particularly district attorney Beth McCann, went before the media and she made some statements about the case. In particular, she was trying to describe why we are taking this 14 year old and charging him as an adult.

[00:21:14] And when discussing the crime and the circumstances, she was using language like this was absolute brutal savagery. It was a cold blooded murder and things of that nature. So now the defendant's attorneys argue that her using language like that was inflammatory. It possibly tainted a jury pool.

[00:21:44] It violated the rights of their client. And so they felt the case basically should be thrown out. But the judges who then considered it disagreed and the case is going to proceed. The judges felt, well, this district attorney is a public official.

[00:22:07] She has an obligation to explain to the public why she thinks a particular juvenile should actually be charged as an adult. So she was just explaining that. And I feel that that conclusion was the correct one.

[00:22:24] But at the same time, I do feel it was appropriate for the defense attorneys to raise that concern. Because there is such a disproportionate balance of power between defense attorneys and prosecutors in the state.

[00:22:39] And so I think it is important to keep that in mind and to keep complaining about things like this that could arguably taint a jury pool.

[00:22:50] Because you don't want a situation where prosecutors are going out and just saying inflammatory, awful things about people they are going to be prosecuting. That's something that should happen in a courtroom. With that said, obviously, they are public officials.

[00:23:07] They do have an obligation to inform the public about what they're doing. There just needs to be a line that should not be crossed. And so I think cases like this are useful to help illustrate and help us try to figure out where exactly that line is.

[00:23:23] So the upshot is that the prosecution side won, right? The prosecution, yeah, the prosecution side won. The case is not going to be dismissed. The judges felt that she did not cross the line. I don't believe so.

[00:23:35] I mean, this is completely savage to do that to someone sitting in their car just so you can possibly join a gang. If that's the state's contention of what happened, then describing that as brutal and vicious is completely warranted. I understand what you're saying.

[00:23:49] I think it is appropriate for the defense to push back and see if they can do anything with that. That's their responsibility. But this is also why it's so hard to get prosecutors to talk to you. Right?

[00:24:00] I mean, if we snap our fingers or flash the defense bat signal in the sky, defense attorneys will come running. And I love that because they are— God bless them. God bless them. And they're wonderful to talk to. And they just—they're great with media.

[00:24:16] And if you say, hey, can the prosecutor come and tell me something? Everyone just goes hiding. It's like one of those Western films where the villagers all shut the doors. And it's because I think a lot of prosecutors are scared of something like this happening.

[00:24:33] And that's appropriate because, as you said, there is a lopsided balance of power with the state having so much more resources. And I don't know about you, but when I read this story,

[00:24:43] it brought to mind an occasion of another case we covered a few years ago where I think we came down on the side that the comments from the police and prosecutors prior to the trial were excessive. Right. And I'm talking about the Chicago case involving— Oh my gosh.

[00:25:01] You want to tell people about that? So there was a quadruple homicide at a place called Nadia's Fish and Chicken on the South Shore neighborhood of Chicago. And they arrested a kid for that.

[00:25:18] And Chicago police threw a whole press conference where they came out and said, we got him. This kid did it. Also— Absolutely awful. Here's his juvenile record. Here's his juvenile record. And they didn't mention that this person they'd arrested had recently

[00:25:35] settled a lawsuit against the police for them earlier brutalizing him. Yes. Isn't that interesting? And then he's in jail for years, but he has a great attorney, thanks to this settlement, who works to prove that it wasn't him.

[00:25:53] Like he was dealing with his dad's funeral arrangements at the time. It literally could not have been him. And we talked at length with that attorney, and we had him on the podcast. So that's an incidence where the prosecution plainly did go too far,

[00:26:07] or the police plainly went too far. The state side went too far. Yeah, you definitely do see cases like that. And I think of the other Long Island serial killer that we've covered on the show.

[00:26:19] There was a case in the 50s where a guy was going around and killing people at different Long Island restaurants. And in that situation, his first conviction got overturned because there was so much media coverage. They ran pictures of one of the victim's bodies in the newspaper.

[00:26:34] I mean, it was this whole thing. And he ended up avoiding the death penalty because of this, because the law got changed in the interim. But that was another situation. You don't want the state to go too far with this.

[00:26:44] I do think that this, though, to me, it's not anywhere near the line. But again, the defense has to make every argument. So... Yeah. What's the next case? Well, now I want to go to Louisville. My source for this is WDRB. They did an excellent report.

[00:27:01] We're going to link to it. Please check it out. This is some really terrific local journalism. And it's all about crime in Louisville, Louisville, Kentucky. Now, I don't want to pick on Louisville. I love Louisville.

[00:27:13] Places like Indianapolis around where we live also have a pretty extreme violence problem, specifically a gun violence problem in Indy here. But this is a really important piece of reporting. And I think it underscores some problems that are widespread and probably not unique to Louisville.

[00:27:31] So WDRB did an incredible data-driven report where they compiled all of the murder cases that the Louisville Metropolitan Police Department lists online. They found 400 unsolved cases that have taken place in the last five years. So what their numbers say is that if you kill somebody in Louisville, Kentucky,

[00:27:54] you have a coin flips chance of getting away with it right now. That is terrifying. They specifically profiled the case of 16-year-old Nyla Lanier talking to her mother Candy. This is an awful case. July 21st, 2021, Nyla and her younger sister are standing on the corner of a street,

[00:28:13] completely innocent, not doing anything wrong. And a stray bullet from a drive-by shooting killed Nyla. And Candy told the news agency that this has been her experience. Again, this is three years ago. The officer in charge of Nyla's case retired. She was not notified.

[00:28:33] She learned that when she went to town hall to advocate for Nyla. There's been very little progress. Recently, there may have been some movement, but only because she was out there advocating. This is an experience a lot of families have with, especially with non-high profile cases.

[00:28:50] We went to a forum sort of seminar from the Marion County Prosecutor's Office and the Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department. And there were so many frustrated families there like, we don't have great communication. Like detectives retire or the case gets moved to somebody else and we're not being notified.

[00:29:13] We're made to feel that when we call a lot, that we're just being an annoyance. And I think these are issues that are endemic and certainly a lot more commonplace than say,

[00:29:25] a case that blows up in the media and gets a lot of resources and gets a lot of time, attention, money. And I recognize that that can't be possible for every case, but I think there need to be

[00:29:37] processes in place that make family members feel that at the very least, at the very least they are being kept in the loop and treated with respect. 00.27 Absolutely. 00.28 So with this Louisville situation,

[00:29:53] it definitely sounds like action is needed to stem the violence, but also to figure out how to allocate resources and time and energy to these ongoing cases that are maybe not easy and immediate solves. What does that look like? I think that's a wider conversation.

[00:30:12] Again, we think of true crime as sort of, oh, the meticulous Columbo villain who's going to figure out a way to kill somebody in an intriguing way. Or like the serial killer, Ted Bundy going state to state.

[00:30:26] Most killings are more like this where it's like someone is just caught up in a bad situation and gets hurt because they're in the wrong place at the wrong time or gang violence or whatever. Domestic violence, something a lot closer to home.

[00:30:41] What we see as our responsibility as people who run a true crime podcast is not just to give you all the kind of really major, this is made for Hollywood cases. It's what does crime in America actually look like and who is it affecting and how

[00:31:00] are people being treated when they're caught up in that? And so I wanted to single out and also again commend the team at WDRB for doing some really good data-driven community-centric journalism here. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD Local journalists are the best. Shara Bailey Absolutely.

[00:31:15] Dave McCullen, MD, PhD Before we wrap up, I want to take a moment to note in a very professional aboveboard manner that we have caused an attractive t-shirt to be produced bearing the logo of our program and we are pleased to make said shirt available to you,

[00:31:33] the listening public, at the BritishHeatShop.com website and we're offering it for what we feel is a reasonable price. Shara Bailey I love that. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD See, a minute ago before we recorded, you said, well, you critiqued my ad last week.

[00:31:50] I'm going to critique your ad this week. So critique that. Shara Bailey You know what it reminded me of? It reminded me when I'm reading old newspapers.com articles and there's some ad from the 1800s for like a ladies boutique shop of hats. It sounded like that.

[00:32:03] Like we have new styles in from Paris and we'll make goodly for you. That's what you sound like. So formal. I love that. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD I know that nobody else will like that.

[00:32:12] I was just trying to avoid your critique because you said, oh, you critiqued me last week. Just wait. I'm going to critique you. So I tailored that ad to appeal to one person, you. Shara Bailey So you sabotaged the ad just to make your wife happy?

[00:32:28] Dave McCullen, MD, PhD Well, I think at this point after last week's ads, things went so far off a cliff. Shara Bailey We actually lost money. People were demanding us to refund their shirts after that. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD What a disaster.

[00:32:43] Shara Bailey We may have to go out of business. So well, I think it's very romantic that you bombed your pitch just to please me. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD Yes. Shara Bailey Because I'm going to buy a shirt now. Handing myself $30.

[00:32:57] Dave McCullen, MD, PhD That defeats the whole purpose. Shara Bailey I'm buying 10 shirts. Oh, no. We get bankrupted because I just buy the rest of our shirts. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD Oh, Anya, that's not how it's supposed to be. She just doesn't understand folks. She just doesn't understand.

[00:33:16] But with that, we hope you have a great weekend. Shara Bailey Yes. Thank you all so much. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD Bye. Thanks so much for listening to The Murder Sheet. If you have a tip concerning one of the cases we cover, please email us at

[00:33:30] murdersheet at gmail.com. If you have actionable information about an unsolved crime, please report it to the appropriate authorities. We very much appreciate any support. Dave McCullen, MD, PhD Special thanks to Kevin Tyler Greenlee, who composed the music for The Murder Sheet,

[00:34:11] and who you can find on the web at kevintg.com. Shara Bailey If you're looking to talk with other listeners about a case we've covered, you can join the Murder Sheet discussion group on Facebook.

[00:34:24] We mostly focus our time on research and reporting, so we're not on social media much. We do try to check our email account, but we ask for patience as we often receive a lot of messages. Thanks again for listening.