Missing?

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From the source they can happen.

“Coach, find out your best holiday and actually murder as you?”

September 3rd, streaming on Hulu and Hulu on Disney Plus for Bundle Subscribers, Term Supply. Four weeks had passed since the McStay family vanished from their fall back home. When the investigator assigned to their case, Detective Troy Dugal, asked Joseph McStay's brother to come to the San Diego Sheriff's Department.

March 1st, 2010, it's Presley 1135. I am at my office at my computer with Michael McStay. Dugal believed he could have a promising lead to share with Michael. He pressed play on a silent, blurry and dimly lit video. I'm about to show Michael the video.

It was relayed to me. In the 15 second clip, a group of four calmly crosses the U.S.

Mexico border on foot. Two of the people in the video appeared to be adults, a man and a woman. They have with them two smaller figures who appear to be children. According to police, the individuals are passing from the U.S. side into Tijuana through the Sanacidro terminal. See them going through a long open air corridor with metal gates, high sides, and barbed wire on top.

Police say that video of this group of four was captured on the very same day that the McStay's Asuzu Trooper was towed from a shopping center. Also near the border. The footage is blurry, but the shapes of the people in it still told the story. To detect a Dugal, they look like a mother, father, and two children. Each parent holding a child's hand.

There's the male with a kid. There's the female with a kid. Could they speed the McStay's?

The detective Dugal's first impression of the McStay's disappearance. According to police records,

was that something bad had happened to them. He suspected foul play. But they sporter footage cast new doubt. Maybe the McStay's had left of their own accord. In the weeks following the family's disappearance, those who knew the McStay's were left

“scratching their heads. Was the family alive and well in Mexico? Or had something terrible happened to them?”

From ABC Audio in 2020, a motion saying, "And this is what happened to the McStays." Episode 2, missing. When the McStay's vanished, they left behind close family and friends, who all wanted answers. In 2011, Patrick McStay, Joseph and Michael's father, told ABC News that he started looking into the family's disappearance himself. I don't know what happened. I'm looking for answers just like them. Let's look at everything.

Patrick and Liz did help from Joseph's friend, Gina Watson.

It's not like I always liked to crime, but I liked mysteries or like I'll go down a rabbit hole.

And I definitely did that in this case because I wanted to be able to make sense of it all, like something that's so incomprehensible. I will say, yeah, I got a little obsessed.

“Remember, Gina Watson had met Joseph McStay through work. She says when she learned Joseph and his”

family had gone missing, she was stunned. Wanting to find a way to help, Gina says she reached out to Joseph's family and eventually connected with Patrick. Joseph's dad. Of course, I was more than happy to help him put some things together. Police had executed a search warrant at the McStay's Fallbroke home. They seized a number

and bank records. They checked Joseph and some were cell phone records too.

Gina says she and Patrick did what they could to help investigators. According to Gina, Joseph had given all his email passwords to his dad for safekeeping. So she and Patrick started going through Joseph's emails together. I was conflicted because it's like I'm in my friends personal email now. Like that felt weird, but I want to help go through things as quickly as possible,

make sure everything's paid attention to that should be. Gina found a couple of messages that raised bread flags for her. She said she found one email about a counseling session for Joseph and Summer. A month before they disappeared, Gina wasn't sure what to make of this.

“A lot of times, like they say, the husband did it. So you have to be open-minded and say,”

well, could Joseph a gone mad and done something to his family? I mean, of course, you want to say no way and I did think no way, but you want to be open-minded and consider everything

did summer, like did she do something nefarious, but we could never back any of that up.

Another discovery that Pete Gina's interest was a set of transactions from a business account. I saw that there were withdrawals from the PayPal account. A PayPal account had been set up for the waterfall company to pay vendors and receive payments from customers. But what caught Gina's attention were the withdrawals from the PayPal account and the days immediately after the mixed days went missing. All told, nearly $7,000 had been withdrawn.

And so I was like, hmm, if they say they went missing on February 4th, could they have brought a laptop with them and he's doing business from a hotel somewhere? Is that

“what happened? Or, so we're trying to piece this together?”

This discovery might have offered a ray of hope that Joseph and his family were still alive. But Gina says she knew it wasn't Joseph initiating these transactions. It was Dan Kavanaugh. You'll remember from our last episode, Dan was Joseph's business partner. As a web designer, he ran the retail site for earth-inspired products and he was close to the family.

So close, Dan says the mixed-akeings called him Uncle Dan. Remember, Dan was the first one to

call in a welfare check for the family. Detective Dugal of the San Diego Sheriff's Department asked Dan about the PayPal transactions. Dan had an explanation for the withdrawals.

“Let me ask you this, Dan, I know you have access for PayPal and PayPal transfers.”

I know there's been several all the way back to like the fifth. If you could do that and just shoot me a quick ledger on where the money went. That way my questions are answered. Dan explained he needed the money to keep the business afloat. He said the website cost money to maintain.

Dan also told investigators, he wasn't anywhere near the mixed-akeings house at the time of their disappearance. He was in Hawaii with his girlfriend. When investigators looked into flight information, and Dan's girlfriend, his story checked out. They cleared him from the list of parties, potentially involved with the mixed-akeings disappearance. Dan wasn't the only person in the mixed-akeings circle that police spoke to.

There were a few others that detectives interviewed, hoping to learn something, anything while where the family had gone. Among the people on that list was Charles Merrick. Better known as Chase. He was a welder who built custom fountains for earth-inspired products. Joseph and Chase had worked together for around three years.

The world of custom water features is small, and Gina Watson had worked in the space for years. She says not everything that she'd heard about Chase was positive. I started hearing more and more of these things, these problems, customer service issues. I did ask Joseph during one of our last conversations long conversations

that's your guy, and he was like, "Yeah, I know I've heard the things and I know that he's

“had trouble in the past, but I'm trying to help him."”

Authorities said what they really wanted to talk to Chase about was his calendar. Yes, John Joseph. There's the surrounding Thursday, which Thursday the fourth. Chase sat down with Detective Troy Dugal and his partner Suzanne Fisk for an in-person interview.

Chase said he had a meeting with Joseph the day the mixed day is one missing, to discuss work.

Two projects that we're in the middle of, we were in the middle of, we had to go over them and get to make sure all the specs were right, where the different electricals coming out to

“our clients don't add Chick-fil-A. He met me at Chick-fil-A, and he bought lunch there.”

At that February fourth meeting, Joseph and Chase spoke about all kinds of money stuff as Chase put it. Himans to vendors, payments from Joseph to Chase, there was nothing out of the ordinary about the meeting, according to Chase. But during this interview with Detectives, Chase said something that caught their attention. Joseph was one of my best friends. Joseph was one of my best friends. Detectives Suzanne Fisk clocked this choice of words immediately.

Never.

“If Joseph was still Chase's best friend, why did he use the past tense?”

In any way, Chase performed nothing to do with this appearance, whether it's good or bad. Absolutely not. I don't know of anybody that has anything to gain by Joseph being gone. I think everybody that I know has everything to lose. Chase told detectives that his whole business depended on Joseph McStay, that he and Joseph were close and talked almost every day for the last two years. Plus, Chase told them he was one of the

first people in the McStay's inner circle to help search for the family. On the day Michael McStay

went into his brother's home through a back window, it was Chase who had met him there. Before detectives ended their interview with Chase, asked to collect his DNA. You agreed to a Cheekswob. Ultimately, San Diego police determined that was no crime to charge anyone with. No arrests were made and no indictment found in the McStay's disappearance.

But interviewing people wasn't the only avenue detectives pursued. They also chased and come through potential evidence, like the family's assooser trooper. One found near the southern border. It's something inside the vehicle tell detectives what happened to the McStays. Add free exclusive true crime content, search 2020 True Crime Plus on Apple Podcasts and start

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Everybody okay in here? I'm Hormonal!

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Premier's August 27th on FXX. All episode streaming on Hula.

When police located the McStay's white is Susan Trooper, it took it to the crime lab and processed it.

“What I remember that they recovered from the vehicle was some, I believe, as a asthma medicine.”

And I think one of the boys was taking asthma medicine, which hits essentially a red flag when you see some of them left medication in the car, especially if they were going into another country. Why wasn't his medication taken with him? This is Lieutenant Dennis Brugos. We heard from last episode. He was Detective Troy DuGal's boss and oversaw the McStay investigation for the San Diego Sheriff's

Department. Investigators collected DNA swabs, lifted fingerprints, and searched the SUV. According to authorities, there were no signs of struggle in the vehicle. If the Asuzu Trooper itself offered little information, the investigation around the McStay's home offered more leads. A police report shows that detective spoke with the residents of Avocado Mr. Lane. There was one neighbor that came forward with a surveillance video.

A few doors down from the McStay residents, a neighbor had installed a security camera facing the street. Lieutenant Brugos's team took a look at the footage from February 4th, the day the McStay's went missing, and lo and behold, at 747 p.m. Here to be a vehicle, which it looked like it might be the Asuzu backing out of the driveway and driving down the street, but we weren't able to get any kind of license plate number on everything like that.

Detectives also couldn't tell who was inside the car as a drove away. The video was dark and only showed part of the vehicle. But assuming it was the McStay's Asuzu Trooper leaving their driveway, police say there was a four-day gap before it appeared again at that shopping center near the border. The drive from Fallbroke to the McSkin border takes about one hour.

“So where had the car been for the rest of the four days?”

While detective's puzzled over this new information, Gina Watson, who'd been doing her own digging, found a new potential clue. An email in Joseph's account about purchasing the Spanish language software. I see an email to someone to get Rosetta Stone Spanish and it was when Rosetta Stone

first came out and everybody was touting it as like you're going to learn the language,

like you'll be fluent if you just do this Rosetta Stone. So I think summer was excited in the email. Was it possible the family had been learning Spanish to prepare for a plan trip to Mexico? It's not. I might try to go. In March 2010, a month after the McStay's went missing. Detective Dugal called Michael McStay to share another discovery he'd made. A little bit of information. Finally got a little bit of a lead.

That's good. Yeah, it does not tell me where your family is at but it does tell me which direction they may have went. Dugal said the forensic analysis of the family computer had come back. It showed that about a week before the McStay's were last seen, somebody had searched for information about crossing into Mexico with children, including requirements for children's passports. For Detective Dugal, the theory that the family had gone to Mexico voluntarily was looking

“more and more viable. It was only possible I think it's above possible now with that information.”

Earlier in the month, Detective Dugal asked Michael to his office at the police station and showed him that blurry surveillance video of the four people crossing the border from the US into Tijuana. Police felt that if they could say definitively that the people in the video were Joseph, Summer, and the Boys. Then the footage could serve as visual proof that the McStay's were

If you recognize that check, the kids are the right size for GI and Joseph. Yeah, it seems that well, if I had to guess if that would be the younger one, Jay and that would be

“Gianni. Can I watch it in the real time? Should I can tell my brothers how he walks?”

The detective pointed out that the children were wearing beanies, like Gianni and Joseph Junior often did, and that the height and size of the adults and children seemed to roughly match the McStays. But Michael said he needed a better shot, a better angle to know for sure. Detective Dugal said that wasn't likely.

Here's what I can tell you. We frequently get cases that involve next time. We know where cameras are

and we know what images are good, for people going into the border, this camera is my part of this. It may have been the best footage available, but Michael still wasn't convinced it was in fact his family in the video. He said the walk of the female adult wasn't consistent with Summer's walk, and he didn't recognize the jackets the adults were wearing. With these four figures on the screen, the McStays family were not.

Detective Dugal had his doubts too. A mystery that was feeling impossible to make sense of. Dark blurry image offering nothing

recognizable. After weeks of looking for evidence of foul play, Detective Dugal hadn't found any.

In fact to him, all the available evidence was pointing in the same direction. At the McStays had left the country voluntarily. Michael, I currently can convince somebody who has nothing to do with this case that there's a stronger likelihood that they're alive and south than I can convince somebody that they were abducted or being held. There's no ransom, no long-twistness come across any suspicious circumstances persons people have been killed.

And then we have things like this. Things like this, as in this border crossing video,

“but was there more to the story of what happened to this family?”

There's a headlight every 30 minutes for our show. I'm pretty sure. Welcome to Get Real. I'm your host, Amanda Hirsch. This is the show for the reality to be obsessed. You thought the show was crazy, living it was crazy. If I was dripping sweat for I even stopped it. For the stars and stands of the Hulu reality birth. Do we think she's stirring the pot to secure a place on the show? Find and listen to Get Real wherever you get your

podcasts and stream new episodes Thursdays on Hulu and Hulu and Hulu on Disney+. Termsify. We're going to roll the school. Don't we already? It was supposed to be the best year of their lives. Oh, it's staff, someone for a drink right now. Until their friends started going missing. There's something going on.

From your second to producer Ryan Murphy, and based on the best selling

thriller by Brent Easton Ellis, I'm terrified. Infectious, the show arts now streaming on Hulu. This is the way. Hi, I'm John Favreau. We are launching the all new Star Wars the Mandalorian and Groguo official podcast.

I'm sorry. I can't focus at the moment. We're going behind the scenes, but the casting crew sharing stories from the set, creative insights,

“and a few surprises from across the galaxy. I think he's earned a little snack.”

Watch and listen to Star Wars the Mandalorian and Groguo official podcast, premiering September 2nd on Disney+, or wherever you get your podcasts, and catch Star Wars the Mandalorian and Groguo on September 2nd on Disney+. Terms apply. When Joseph's father, Patrick McState, saw the surveillance footage

It's blurry. You can't see it. It's a jerky motion, and the man does not have long here.

That's not Joey. Summer doesn't own a coat like that. That's not summer.

“Also, Patrick wondered, what about the surveillance cameras on route from the car to the border terminal?”

weren't there Annie? And wouldn't they have caught a clearer picture of the McState's? They had two little boys, three and four years old. Daddy, I got to go to the bathroom. Daddy, I'm hungry, and I know I had two little boys. I know what they do. And you mean to tell me that they didn't go to a restroom?

They weren't in and out of stores. They didn't go to a restaurant.

In his interview with ABC News, Patrick was clearly upset and his message to investigators was clear. Get off your rear end, get out there, and find them.

“Gina Watson also wanted investigators to do more. Lieutenant Brugos, one of the”

statements I remember him making, is that it's not a crime to go missing. I remember being so angry when I heard that because I'm all of course it's not a crime to go sit on the beach and Mexico and sit my ties, but that's not what they're doing. I know Joseph, I know he loved his kids. Like, if I disappeared and my kids were gone with me, I get emotional because it's like, I would want somebody to do something and not just say, "Well, it's not a crime."

While detectives worked on the case, the media seized on the story, both local and national. The mixed-day's disappearance was featured on Nancy Grace's headline news.

“An entire family, vanishes, including these small children, what do we know?”

America's most wanted, covered it too. Tonight, you could help solve this agonizing mystery. Joseph's family brought attention to the case, giving interviews to news outlets and sending missing flyers down to Mexico. Websites and Facebook pages, soliciting tips, went up to in Michael McState told ABC News in 2011, the public did reach out. The suggestions from across the country by where his family could be. Indiana, Tennessee, North Carolina, Florida,

Georgia, Montana. The San Diego Sheriff's Department followed up on tips that came in. Detectives notified Interpol to be on the lookout for missing family that might be in Mexico. Local authorities worked with Mexican authorities to check hospitals and airports. But according to San Diego Police, detectives eventually exhausted all their leads.

Police ultimately put out a statement saying the family left home of their own free will

and turned the case over to the FBI. If there were any sightings of the mixed-days in Mexico, the FBI had the resources to follow up. Early on, Joseph's family hoped that the four missing mixed-days would turn up safe and sound. But months, even years in, the hope of a return was giving way to fearing the worst. Something's not right. Someone needs to come forward. Someone saw something, someone knows something. I'm suspecting the worst. I'm suspecting foul play.

And the worst would come. What happens to the mixed-days is a production of ABC audio in 2020, hosted by me, Ashen Singh, produced by Madeline Wood, Vika Arancin, Audrey Mastec, and Kiyara Powell. With help from Sabrina Fang and Camille Peterson, edited by Gianna Palmer, our supervising producer and Susie Luke, music by Heaven by Ola, mixing by Heaven by Ola and

Bob Mallory. Special thanks to Katie Dendos, Janice Johnson, Chris Donovan, Joseph Reed, Sonny Andrew, Alyssa Stuller, Zander Samaras, Tom Birmingham, Indra Delisaha, and Blue Browning. Gosh, co-an is our director of podcast programming. Even McNath is our executive producer. Can't wait for more? Listen to the next episode.

There are three victims we know of. The suspect is female. White, late 20th.

“Female serial killer is killed for power, control. I believe there's a deeper motivation here.”

You have no idea who you're telling us, and you are gonna end up dead.

I've been waiting for you. Watch the Hulu original series, Furious. Now streaming on Hulu and Hulu

“on Disney Plus, Furious. Some cases fade from headlines. Some never made it there to begin with.”

I'm Ashley Flowers, and on my podcast The Deck, I tell you the stories of cold cases

featured on playing cards distributed in prisons designed to spark new leads and bring

“long overdue justice. Because these stories deserve to be heard and the loved ones of these victims”

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