Transcript

When Investigations Take Unexpected Turns | “48 Hours" marathon

From 48 Hours · Episode page · Watch on YouTube

· 2 h 7 min · 17,791 words · 461 timestamped sections

This is the full, timestamped transcript of "When Investigations Take Unexpected Turns | “48 Hours" marathon", an episode of 48 Hours published November 7, 2026 (2 h 7 min, about 17,791 words). It mentions 79 people, works and ideas, including Tara Grinstead, Ryan Duke, Ocilla, Georgia, Georgia Bureau of Investigation, US Marshals Service.

What this episode is about

A missing-person investigation in Grand Junction reveals that Paige Bergfeld led a double life with a high-earning, secretive occupation, transforming the case from a straightforward disappearance into a multifaceted inquiry into deception, danger, and the pursuit of truth. The search expands from rugged terrain to uncover hidden details about her lifestyle and the circumstances surrounding her vanishing.

Key takeaways

  • Missings aren’t mysteries; they’re pressure-testers for relationships, revealing loyalties, lies, and collapse points.
  • Secret lives reveal the human paradox: wealth, normalcy, and danger can coexist behind a suburban smile.
  • When a missing person unfolds a double life, investigators trade surface charm for motive, opportunity, and secrets.
  • Tough terrain hides clues; in investigations, emotional terrain—trust, alibis, betrayals—sometimes proves deadlier.
  • Media framing can shape narratives: families become anchors, suspects become focal points, while truth sits in the weeds.

Who speaks in this episode?

What is discussed, and when

  1. – 15:00: Grand Junction, Rob Dixon, Colorado, Pete Howzinger
  2. – 30:00: Grand Junction, Rob Dixon, Colorado, Mesa County
  3. – 45:00: 48 Hours, Art Smith, Dan Rubenstein, Mesa County Sheriff's Office
  4. – 1:00:00: Colin Strickland, Austin, Texas, Austin Police Department, CBS News
  5. – 1:15:00: Costa Rica, Santa Teresa, US Marshals Service, Austin, Texas
  6. – 1:30:00: Colin Strickland, Costa Rica, Brenda Kennedy, Ricky Jones
  7. – 1:45:00: Tara Grinstead, Ocilla, Georgia, Georgia, Georgia Bureau of Investigation
  8. – 2:00:00: Tara Grinstead, Ryan Duke, Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Ocilla, Georgia
  9. – 2:07:22: Tara Grinstead, Ryan Duke, Georgia Bureau of Investigation, Ocilla, Georgia

Notable quotes from "When Investigations Take Unexpected Turns | “48 Hours" marathon"

  • Paige was within 5 miles of the house here in Grand Junction and disappeared.
    about Grand Junction · at
  • I'm Aaron Morardi. Tonight on 48 hours, the secret life of Paige Bergfeld.
    about 48 Hours · at
  • The day after Mariah's murder, police visited and spoke to Colin Strickland at his home.
    about Austin, Texas · at
  • They see a black Jeep with the bike rack on the back of it. So, at that point, we run the license plate and it comes back that it's registered to Caitlyn Armstrong.
    about Colin Strickland · at
  • One month after Caitlyn Armstrong disappeared, the US marshals were in hot pursuit of her and another area of Costa Rica.
    about US Marshals Service · at
  • The 2005 disappearance of Tara Ginstead, beloved teacher and local beauty queen, mystified the people of Osilla, Georgia.
    about Tara Grinstead · at
  • Investigators say Ryan confessed to killing Ginstead.
    about Ryan Duke · at
  • We thought that lead had been addressed by local law enforcement as unfounded and did not follow up.
    about Georgia Bureau of Investigation · at

Who and what is mentioned in this episode?

People

  • Tara Grinstead — Person · Central victim / case subject · 35 mentions · first at
    Beloved teacher and beauty pageant contestant whose 2005 disappearance and murder are covered in the episode 'The Tara Grinstead Mystery'. Her case spurred years of investigation and eventual arrests of persons tied to concealment and murder.
  • Ryan Duke — Person · Arrested defendant (confessed) in Tara Grinstead murder · 11 mentions · first at
    Arrested and accused of killing Tara Grinstead; provided a confession that matched physical evidence (DNA) found at the scene; central to the prosecution though defense later indicated he might recant.
  • Colin Strickland — Person · Witness / person of interest (friend/ex-romantic link) in Wilson case · 11 mentions · first at
    Professional cyclist who spent time with Mariah (Mo) Wilson the day of her death; his relationship with Caitlyn Armstrong and presence in the timeline made him central to the investigation though he was not charged.
  • Karen Wilson — Person · Victim's mother (Mo Wilson) · 1 mention · first at
    Mother of Mariah (Mo) Wilson who delivered a powerful victim impact statement at trial.
    I hate what you did to my beautiful daughter.
  • Dan Rubenstein — Person · Prosecutor (Paige Bergfeld case) · 1 mention · first at
    Chief Deputy District Attorney leading the prosecution in the Paige Bergfeld murder investigation and trial(s); argued evidence tying Lester Ralph Jones to the crime.
    Chief Deputy District Attorney Dan Rubenstein was now heading up the Paige Bergfeld murder investigation.
  • Art Smith — Person · Mesa County sheriff's office sergeant (call interaction) · 1 mention · first at
    Confirm official title and consistent spelling
    This is Art Smith with the sheriff's office. Just calling to let you know that we have both your cars ready for you and your wife. A bizarre phone call between Jones and a local sheriff who.
  • Rob Dixon — Person · Ex-husband / person investigated (Paige Bergfeld case) · 6 mentions · first at
    One of Paige Bergfeld's ex-husbands with a troubled history and domestic incidents; scrutinized by family and investigators though he was ultimately cleared by alibi.
    Always was around. According to her friends, as a single mother, she had to be. Her ex-husband, Rob Dixon, was living in Philadelphia. After their divorce in 2006, Paige was…
  • Amir Perez — Person · US Marshals deputy (Armstrong manhunt) · 3 mentions · first at
    Deputy US Marshal involved in the hunt for Caitlyn Armstrong in Costa Rica and in her eventual capture at a hostel in Santa Teresa.
    And we actually end up sending a picture of Caitlyn while we're on the phone with him. He looks at it and he goes, Yes, but she doesn't look like that. And she not using that name.
  • Marcus Harper — Person · Former boyfriend / person of interest (Tara Grinstead case) · 3 mentions · first at
    Tara's long-term boyfriend who broke up with her prior to the disappearance; was investigated and lived under suspicion though never charged.
    Little down about that. Tara had a boyfriend for a long time, and during the summer of 2005, they broke up. That boyfriend was Marcus Harper, a former cop from Osilla.
  • Brenda Kennedy — Person · Judge (trial of Caitlyn Armstrong) · 2 mentions · first at
    Judge who presided over Armstrong's trial and allowed victim impact testimony and witness statements in court.
    But before the case came to an end, Judge Brenda Kennedy allowed Caitlyn Cash, Mariah's close friend, whose apartment she'd been staying at and who had found Mariah's body, to take the.
  • Lisa Goslin Lynn — Person · CBS News consultant / cycling journalist · 1 mention · first at
    Editor and CBS News consultant who provided background on Mariah (Mo) Wilson's cycling career and potential.
    Lisa Goslin Lynn is the editor of Vermont Sports Magazine and Vermont Ski and Ride magazine. She's also a CBS News consultant.
  • Pete Howzinger — Person · District Attorney (Mesa County) quoted · 3 mentions · first at
    Mesa County district attorney (Pete Howzinger / Hzinger variant) quoted in the Paige Bergfeld segment describing investigative views about disappearance.
    My name is Pete Howzinger. I'm the district attorney for Mesa County, Colorado.
  • Polar Melendez — Person · Reporter (the Daily Beast) / commentator · 3 mentions · first at
    Senior reporter who covered the Mariah (Mo) Wilson case for the Daily Beast and provided context in the episode.
    Par Melendez from the Daily Beast says Armstrong didn't get far before deputies caught her.
  • Ron Beagler — Person · Ex-husband / early person of interest (Paige case) · 2 mentions · first at
    Paige's high-school sweetheart and one of her ex-husbands; was one of the last to see her and was questioned early in the investigation though he was described as distraught and not suspected ultimately.
    Although Beagler was one of the last to see and speak with Paige, those who know him believe he's also one of the last who'd want to harm her.
  • Jonathan Riley — Person · Austin police officer / investigator · 2 mentions · first at
    Co-investigator on the Mariah Wilson homicide who worked alongside Mark McCloud and US Marshals during the search for Caitlyn Armstrong.
    To get away or there was some sort of struggle or Austin police officers Mark McCloud and Jonathan Riley worked the case from the beginning.
  • Ricky Jones — Person · Prosecutor (trial team) · 2 mentions · first at
    Prosecutor involved in the prosecution of Caitlyn Armstrong in the Mariah (Mo) Wilson murder trial.
    Prosecutors, Ricky Jones and GMO Gonzalez, were more than ready to try the case. When we learned that she had tried to escape, it just added to our confidence level in the…
  • Stan Hilkey — Person · Local sheriff (Mesa County) · 1 mention · first at
    Sheriff who commented that evidence did not suggest Paige Bergfeld abandoned her children and emphasized the case was a crime.
    There's nothing in our investigation at all that leads us to believe that she has abandoned her life or abandoned her children and gone off in that regard.
  • Chris Godsick — Person · Podcast host / US Marshals commentator · 1 mention · first at
    Host/producer of a podcast about the US Marshals who explained the Marshals' role in tracking Caitlyn Armstrong.
    Chris Godsick hosts and produces a podcast with the US Marshall Service.
  • José Garza — Person · Travis County District Attorney (oversight) · 1 mention · first at
    District Attorney who commented that Armstrong's escape attempt strengthened the prosecution's confidence prior to trial.
    Prosecutors, Ricky Jones and GMO Gonzalez, were more than ready to try the case. When we learned that she had tried to escape, it just added to our confidence level in the…
  • Brad Riby — Person · Prosecutor (Paige Ginstead / Bo Dukes trial) · 1 mention · first at
    Prosecutor who handled Bo Dukes' trial, focusing on his lies and concealment related to Tara Ginstead's death.
    This case is about Bose's lies. It's about Bose's concealment that his best friend Ryan had killed Tara Ginston and then they both burned the body.
  • Erin Moriarty — Person · 48 Hours correspondent / narrator · 2 mentions · first at
    Host/correspondent introducing the segment on Paige Bergfeld (voiceover presence in episode).
    I'm Aaron Morardi. Tonight on 48 hours, the secret life of Paige Bergfeld.
  • Mikaela Shiffrin — Person · Referenced elite athlete · 1 mention · first at
    Correct spelling of a referenced athlete; transcript had misspelling
    Mariah attended Burke Mountain Academy, an elite ski school that produced Olympic like two-time gold medalist Michaela Shiffren. Mariah had hoped to make the US ski team, but knee injuries.

Companies & orgs

  • Georgia Bureau of Investigation — Company · Investigative agency (lead/coordinating) · 7 mentions · first at
    State investigative body (GBI) that took part in the Tara Grinstead investigation; its handling and missed leads are discussed in the episode.
  • US Marshals Service — Company · Law enforcement / fugitive recovery · 4 mentions · first at
    Led international manhunt for Caitlyn Armstrong after she fled the U.S.; marshals coordinated with Costa Rican authorities and ultimately captured Armstrong in Santa Teresa.
  • Austin Police Department — Company · Investigative agency (Wilson case) · 2 mentions · first at
    Local police agency that investigated Mariah Wilson's murder scene, canvassed neighbors, reviewed video evidence, and coordinated early investigative steps.
    To get away or there was some sort of struggle or Austin police officers Mark McCloud and Jonathan Riley worked the case from the beginning.
  • Mesa County Sheriff's Office — Company · Investigative agency (Paige Bergfeld case) · 1 mention · first at
    Sheriff's office that investigated the disappearance and murder of Paige Bergfeld in Mesa County, Colorado, and led parts of that prosecution.
    Although George Coraluzo remained a person of interest, they named the main target of their investigation. We have narrowed it down to one primary suspect, that being Lester Ralph Jones.
  • CBS News — Company · Producer / publisher · 1 mention · first at
    Parent network that produces and airs '48 Hours' and its episodes; credited in episode information and calls to action.
    Lisa Goslin Lynn is the editor of Vermont Sports Magazine and Vermont Ski and Ride magazine. She's also a CBS News consultant.
  • Lone Star Fugitive Task Force — Company · Fugitive task force (US Marshals collaboration) · 3 mentions · first at
    Task force designation (Lone Star/Fugitive Task Force) referenced as the team that joined Austin police and US Marshals in the search for Caitlyn Armstrong.
    Damen Fernandez and Amir Perez are deputy US Marshals. They joined Austin police officers Jonathan Riley and Mark McCloud on the case.
  • Irwin County High School — Company · Victim's workplace / community setting (Tara Ginstead) · 3 mentions · first at
    School where Tara Ginstead taught and was beloved by students; central to community impact in the case.
    After college, Tara got a job at Osilla's Irwin County High School teaching 11th grade history. She was an excellent teacher. She was dedicated to making her students feel wonderful.
  • Daily Beast — Company · Media outlet · 3 mentions · first at
    News organization that covered the Mariah (Mo) Wilson case; Polar Melendez is identified as a reporter there.
    Around this time, I think Mo was pretty confused about her the status of her relationship with Colin. And she literally wrote, This weekend was strange for me. If you just want to be.
  • Homeland Security — Organization · Federal partner · 1 mention · first at
    Agency name standardization; formal name
    The marshall suspected that Caitlyn Armstrong had used her sister's passport to flee. Christy Armstrong later emphasized to authorities she did not give her sister the passport. She has.
  • Pampered Chef — Company · Paige Bergfeld's income source / side business · 2 mentions · first at
    Company Paige worked for as a high-end kitchen supplies sales agent; used to explain her income streams.
    Paige also sold high-end kitchen supplies out of her home for a company called The Pampered Chef. And as one of the top sales agents, she earned a free trip to the Caribbean. But Dixon was.
  • Wal-Mart — Company · Location referenced in evidence chain · 1 mention · first at
    Brand capitalization; ensure proper entity recognition
    According to investigators, there's surveillance video from a local Walmart showing a man they say is Jones buying such a phone.
  • Burke Mountain Academy — Company · Education / training institution · 1 mention · first at
    Elite ski academy where Mariah Wilson trained in her youth — used to explain athletic pedigree and transition to cycling
    Mariah attended Burke Mountain Academy, an elite ski school that produced Olympic like two-time gold medalist Michaela Shiffren. Mariah had hoped to make the US ski team, but knee injuries.
  • Facebook — Company · Outreach platform · 1 mention · first at
    Brand capitalization and platform-type alignment; used for social engagement references in transcript
    We decided we were going to put an ad out for a yoga instructor and see what would happen.
  • Army Rangers — Organization · Affiliation / background · 1 mention · first at
    Military unit capitalization
    So two southern boys meet in Oklahoma in the army.
  • Mile High Saloon — Company · Past employer · 1 mention · first at
    Strip club in Denver where Paige previously worked as a stripper; cited as part of her background and explanation for later escort work
    She said she had been making 400,000 a year doing it and she didn't need to do it anymore.
  • Vermont Sports Magazine — Company · Media outlet / commentator affiliation · 1 mention · first at
    Publication whose editor Lisa Goslin Lynn commented on Mariah Wilson's racing career and served as a CBS News consultant for the segment
    First place, Mo Wilson. Mariah had the potential to be one of the top bike racers definitely in the country and probably in the world.
  • Cook's Smokehouse and Bar — Company · Local business / eyewitness source · 1 mention · first at
    Restaurant in Santa Teresa whose owner (Greg Haber) saw Armstrong (as 'Ari') and later noticed a bandage that became relevant to the identification
    I saw her on the beach. I walk my dog on the beach every night for sunset and you're walking through and you see the bandage on her face. It's what happened? She A surfboard.
  • Warner Robins Police Department — Organization · Law enforcement agency · 1 mention · first at
    City police department name spelling
    The Warner Robbins Police Department says on Tuesday afternoon, Dukes brought two women to the house and threatened them with a firearm. He pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial.
  • Veritone — Company · Licensing contact · 2 mentions · first at
    Company listed in the episode metadata for video licensing inquiries — peripheral production detail

Products & tech

  • Strava — Product · Digital tracking app (evidence) · 1 mention · first at
    Fitness app prosecutors said Armstrong used to track Mariah's location prior to the murder (used as part of motive/plan evidence).
    Prosecutors said Armstrong had been tracking Mariah Wilson using a sports app.
  • Google Translate — Product · Tool used during US Marshals' on-the-ground identification · 1 mention · first at
    Product capitalization and proper noun spelling
    She was trying to get to Google Translate on her phone. and she'd raised it up to me and I got even closer and I noticed that she had a bandage on her nose and possibly her…
  • Tinder — Product · Means of meeting · 1 mention · first at
    Product capitalization
    Brooks says she was studying in Savannah to become a pharmacist when in 2015 she came face to face with her online date.

Concepts & topics

  • Botox treatment — Concept · Arrest trigger / procedural detail · 1 mention · first at
    An old warrant for failing to pay for a Botox treatment led to Caitlyn Armstrong's initial pickup and interview by police (warrant later invalidated by DOB mismatch)
    Police worked quickly. That same day, investigators picked Caitlyn Armstrong up on an old warrant for failing to pay for a Botox treatment.

Places & events

  • Ocilla, Georgia — Place · Setting (Tara Grinstead case) · 13 mentions · first at
    Small Georgia town where Tara Grinstead lived, taught, and disappeared; many investigations, searches and community responses were centered here.
    The 2005 disappearance of Tara Ginstead, beloved teacher and local beauty queen, mystified the people of Osilla, Georgia.
  • Santa Teresa — Place · Hideout / arrest location (Armstrong capture) · 9 mentions · first at
    Small beach town in Costa Rica where Caitlyn Armstrong was located and arrested by US Marshals after she used aliases and changed appearance (including plastic surgery).
    One month after Caitlyn Armstrong disappeared, the US marshals were in hot pursuit of her and another area of Costa Rica.
  • Grand Junction — Place · Setting (Paige Bergfeld case) · 7 mentions · first at
    Colorado city where Paige lived and where searches, investigation, and discovery of her burned car occurred; location central to that segment.
  • Austin, Texas — Place · Setting (Mariah Wilson murder) · 5 mentions · first at
    City where Mariah Wilson was murdered, the crime scene and early investigative work by Austin Police Department took place here.
  • Costa Rica — Place · Country / foreign jurisdiction in Armstrong manhunt · 14 mentions · first at
    Country where Caitlyn Armstrong fled and attempted to hide using aliases and plastic surgery before being arrested by US Marshals with local cooperation.
    This is Hakaco, a popular tourist destination known for its nightife and its beaches and the perfect place to hide. It was the marshall's first real tip, so they rushed out here.
  • Georgia — Place · Jurisdiction (Tara Grinstead case) · 8 mentions · first at
    U.S. state where Ocilla is located and where the Grinstead investigation and GBI involvement took place.
    Nearly 27 years with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, I've never encountered such a complex and difficult case.
  • Colorado — Place · Jurisdiction / setting (Paige Bergfeld case) · 4 mentions · first at
    State where Grand Junction is located and where Paige Bergfeld lived and disappeared; local law enforcement and terrain are discussed in relation to search challenges.
    Grand Junction is situated on the western slope of Colorado and it's very mountainous and beautiful.
  • Mesa County — Place · Jurisdiction (Paige Bergfeld case) · 3 mentions · first at
    County in Colorado containing Grand Junction; local law enforcement and prosecutors (Mesa County Sheriff's Office, DA) conducted the Bergfeld investigation and prosecutions.
    That Mesa County Sheriff's Office, Lester Jones defense team countered by introducing five alternate suspects.
  • Kingdom Trails — Place · Setting / memorial location · 2 mentions · first at
    Proper capitalization and noun format
    Today in Kingdom Trails in Northern Vermont, a place that was sacred to Mariah, a trail was built in her honor.
  • Irwin County — Place · Setting / jurisdiction · 2 mentions · first at
    Location reference; standard naming
    I've had to come to a conclusion that I'm just going to have to live the rest of my life not knowing.
  • Newark Airport — Place · Travel node (Caitlyn Armstrong flight) · 2 mentions · first at
    Airport where investigators tracked a flight (sister used to exit) that helped indicate Armstrong fled to Costa Rica using her sister's passport.
    When the task force checked outbound flights at Newark airport, no reservations had been made in Caitlyn Armstrong's name.
  • San Jose — Place · Travel hub / staging city (Costa Rica search) · 2 mentions · first at
    City in Costa Rica referenced as the marshals' operational hub when searching for Caitlyn Armstrong.
    So, Sunday, okay, we're done. None of them have panned out, so we're going back to San Jose. Now back in San Jose, the Marshalls were getting ready to head home when suddenly…
  • Highway 50 — Place · Evidence location (Paige Bergfeld case) · 1 mention · first at
    Road where personal items belonging to Paige were found, helping investigators track her movements and possible abduction route.
    They did find some pretty critical pieces of information for us down on Highway 50.
  • Travis County — Place · Jurisdiction · 1 mention · first at
    Location referenced; ensure consistent naming and capitalization
    This was just more evidence of her guilt. Joseé Garza is Travis County's district attorney. He says his team of prosecutors, Ricky Jones and GMO Gonzalez, were more than ready to try.
  • Philadelphia — Place · Alibi location (Paige Bergfeld case) · 2 mentions · first at
    Alibi/location tagging consistency; confirms city location mentioned as alibi
    September 2006, Rob Dixon had declared bankruptcy and he was living in Philadelphia. When Paige disappeared, that's exactly where Dixon said he was in Philadelphia, 2,000 miles…
  • New Jersey (Jersey) — Place · Alibi jurisdiction · 2 mentions · first at
    Proper noun capitalization and location accuracy for alibi context
    The car was in the parking lot across from where Jones worked.
  • Gravel Locos — Event · Race event (context for Mo Wilson's presence) · 1 mention · first at
    Cycling event in Austin that Mariah (Mo) Wilson traveled to compete in; she was favored to win, providing motive for her presence in Austin.
    On May 10th, 2022, just one week before her 26th birthday, Mariah arrived in Austin, Texas to prepare for the Gravel Locos bike race, a race she was favored to win.
  • Jacó — Place · Lead location / intelligence tip · 1 mention · first at
    Spelling variant; canonical form needed
    And we actually end up sending a picture of Caitlyn while we're on the phone with him. He looks at it and he goes, Yes, but she doesn't look like that. And she not using that name.
  • Seattle — Place · Residence / origin · 1 mention · first at
    City where Paige Bergfeld's brother, Dr. Craig Bergfeld, lived and from which he traveled to help care for Paige's children during the search
    Home, Dr. Bergfeld has a new full-time job, Uncle Craig, to Paige's three young children. Callie and I decided at that time that our role was to be there for the kids and try to, take care of them, be family there for them, just help them.
  • Denver — Place · Past employment / background · 1 mention · first at
    Context suggests place-based reference rather than employer; needs reclassification to reflect proper context
    Before becoming a mother, Paige had worked as a stripper at a place called the Mile High Saloon in Denver when she was 21 years old. She said she had been making 400,000 a year.
  • San Francisco — Place · Residence / training base · 1 mention · first at
    City where Mariah moved to focus on cycling and further her professional career
    Mariah eventually moved to San Francisco where she focused on cycling and quickly rose to the top of the sport.
  • Emmy Awards — Event · Show accolade (context) · 3 mentions · first at
    Referenced as awards the program 48 Hours has received — part of the show's credibility and production context
    Recognized with multiple Peabodys, Emmys®.
  • Peabody Awards — Event · Show accolade (context) · 3 mentions · first at
    Referenced in the episode intro as one of the awards 48 Hours has received — provides show credibility (metadata)
    Recognized with multiple Peabodys, Emmys®.
  • Savannah — Place · Residence / study location · 1 mention · first at
    City where Brooke Sheridan was studying to become a pharmacist and where she later encountered Bo Dukes after meeting him on Tinder
    Brooks says she was studying in Savannah to become a pharmacist when in 2015 she came face to face with her online date.
  • Warner Robins — Place · Jurisdiction / locality · 1 mention · first at
    Correct spelling and location consistency; transcript showed 'Warner Robbins'
    The Warner Robbins Police Department says on Tuesday afternoon, Dukes brought two women to the house and threatened them with a firearm. He pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial.
  • Terrace High School — Place · Educational institution mentioned · 1 mention · first at
    Verify correct school name; possible garbled reference
    Rumors swirled about that cop whose card was found at Terara's house. He was a family friend married with kids who said he'd gone by that Sunday night and left the card after Tara didn't answer the doorbell. He had an alibi, but the.

Media & podcasts

  • 48 Hours — Media · Broadcast / program · 4 mentions · first at
    The TV newsmagazine presenting the three true-crime investigations in this marathon episode; serves as the publisher and storyteller for the cases covered.
  • The Secret Life Of Paige Birgfeld — Media · Episode segment title · 1 mention · first at
    Segment title within the 48 Hours mini-marathon covering the Paige Bergfeld case
    I'm Aaron Morardi. Tonight on 48 hours, the secret life of Paige Bergfeld.
  • Tara's Grinstead Mystery — Media · Case segment / episode topic · 3 mentions · first at
    Title/segment referenced in the episode covering the Tara Grinstead disappearance and investigation.
    The 2005 disappearance of Tara Ginstead, beloved teacher and local beauty queen, mystified the people of Osilla, Georgia.
  • Capturing Moriah Wilson's Killer — Media · Episode segment title · 2 mentions · first at
    Segment title within the 48 Hours mini-marathon focusing on the investigation and prosecution of Mariah (Mo) Wilson's killer
  • Chasing Evil — Media · Referenced podcast · 1 mention · first at
    Capitalization and media entity normalization
    Chris Godsick hosts and produces a podcast with the US Marshall Service.
  • Pre-Ride Show — Media · Media appearance · 1 mention · first at
    Online pre-ride show where Mariah (Mo) Wilson appeared shortly before her death — establishes timeline and public presence
    In March of 2022, up and cominging progravel bike racer, 25-year-old Anna Mariah Wilson, known as Mo to some, appeared on the pre-ride show, an online program about cycling.
  • Wahoo Frontiers — Media · Referenced media credit · 1 mention · first at
    Video featuring Colin Strickland (2020) cited to illustrate his prominence and public profile in cycling
    In 2020, he appeared in an online video called Wahoo Frontiers about his long and successful career.

Sponsors

  • Red Bull — Company · Sponsor / industry reference · 1 mention · first at
    Mentioned as a major sponsor of Colin Strickland, illustrating his prominence in the professional cycling world
    Colin Strickland who was 35 was considered a pioneer in the sport. He had won some of the most prestigious races and was sponsored by the industry's top brands like Red Bull.

Full transcript with timestamps

Grand Junction is situated on the western slope of Colorado and it's very mountainous and beautiful. I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but one thing is apparent. It is very tough terrain to search in. There are hundreds of thousands of places where you could hide the body and we might never find it.

I'm Frank Bergfeld. I'm the father of Paige Meredith Bergfeld. She's the mother of three children. My sister did not return from a uh meeting she had with a previous husband of hers.

Paige was within 5 miles of the house here in Grand Junction and disappeared. My sister was missing.

You start asking missing? What do you mean missing? My name is Pete Howzinger. I'm the district attorney for Mesa County, Colorado. We're looking at somebody who has disappeared. We don't know why.

I said, "You're in the midst of a crime. This is not someone who would run off." Paige would have never never abandoned her children.

Loves her kids. Appears to be a typical divorced mom. Lives in a nice house in one of the nicer neighborhoods in Grand Junction.

They found her car abandoned in a parking lot and lit on fire a couple days after she went missing. This led investigators to believe that there was foul play involved. We search fields, national parks, mountains, and I am committed to search for her until we find her and bring her home.

Then we started finding out some things that really pretty much changed everything.

First you find out Paige is missing and then within a couple days we started finding out about this other life that we didn't know about. you start hearing things about your own daughter that you didn't know about.

We got more details about the extent of Paige's business and the type of person she was and the type of lifestyle she led.

After Jess was born, she had told me that she wasn't doing it anymore. She kept all these secrets from her friends and family.

She said she had been making 400,000 a year doing it and she didn't need to do it anymore. She had a couple things on her computer.

I said, "Okay, well, that certainly puts a different twist on this investigation. Where is my girl? She may be a 34 year old woman, a mother of three children, but to me, she's just my little girl. I'm Aaron Morardi. Tonight on 48 hours, the secret life of Paige Bergfeld.

We first brought you the story of Paige Bergfeld in 2008. Shortly after the young Colorado mother of three disappeared, police discovered that she was leading a secret life, a life that may have led to her disappearance. We've tracked her story ever since. And tonight, at long last, the mystery of what happened to Paige Bergfeld may finally be solved.

And Paige was always the one that was family first and she was always the one that was keeping us together.

How many would like a cookout out by the pool? No one loved a family gathering more than the one person missing from this one. 34year-old Paige Bergfeld.

I mean, she would literally beam. She would radiate. Those were the absolute cherished times that she she enjoys most.

So, when their daughter Paige vanished, Frank and Susie Bergfeld feared the worst.

This is a crime. There's a crime here. Instantly, I knew this was a problem. She didn't want to even go out to dinner without her children.

For them, we need to find her and we need to bring her home. She's in our room.

Paige's older brother, Dr. Craig Bergfeld, is a long way from his home in Seattle. By day, he specializes in the facial reconstruction of children. And by night, he's dad to his own young family.

Is that the T-Rex board? Yes. And a devoted husband to his wife, Callie. But now living in his sister's home, Dr. Bergfeld has a new full-time job, Uncle Craig, to Paige's three young children. Callie and I decided at that time that our role was to be there for the kids and try to, you know, take care of them, be family there for them, um, just help them.

And I just remembered, you know, little girl just going, "So, do you know what happened to my mom? do you know where she is? And I was like, what do I say? So I said, wherever she is, she wants to be with you right now.

Paige had a circle of close friends. Her kids love her. They uh they glow when she's around.

And Paige was the type of parent that always was around. According to her friends, as a single mother, she had to be. Her ex-husband, Rob Dixon, was living in Philadelphia. After their divorce in 2006, Paige was the primary caregiver for their three children. It wasn't an easy job.

Paige is the most patient and loving mother I've ever seen, but it was the only job Paige had ever wanted.

I think as long as I can remember, what she wanted to be was a mom. And um she just couldn't wait to be that mom. So when Paige Bergfeld disappeared, Sheriff Stan Hilkkey was pretty convinced this mother of three would not leave on her own.

There's nothing in our investigation at all that leads us to believe that she has abandoned her life or abandoned her children um and and gone off in that regard. My daughter, if she had two broken legs, she'd crawl on her she crawl on her elbows to get to her children.

Authorities started by looking at those closest to Paige. It's kind of police investigations 101 that you usually will look at the emotionally involved people, ex-husbands or current husbands, etc. And they quickly learned that Paige Bergfeld had not one but two ex-husbands. Her first husband was her high school sweetheart, Ron Beagler.

He was the first big heartthrob, the first big to love. In fact, for the past few months, the two had been dating again.

She was um very excited about rekindling her relationship with Ron. 10 years after divorcing her first husband, Paige said she was in love with him again. An ex-husband number one became the focus of the investigation in June 2007 when it's learned he was with Paige the day she disappeared.

We believe that yes that uh she was with her first ex-husband that day of the 28th.

Paige and Beagler had their last date at this rest stop, a halfway point between her home in Grand Junction and his home more than four hours away. I understand that Paige and Ron Beigler had planned to meet, had a picnic, spent um part of the afternoon together. When she was driving home later that night around 900 p.m., Paige called Beagler from her cell phone. They spoke briefly and Paige told him she'd call him later.

It has helped us identify persons of interest. Cell phone records show that Paige was just a few miles from her home when she made that call to Beagler. And that phone call was one of her last. Paige never did call Beagler back that night. So the next day he tried calling her

and her phone rolled over to the voice message right away so indicate the phone was turned off or the battery was was down. On Saturday morning, two days after seeing Paige, Beagler finally tried calling her at home. Paige's live-in nanny was taking care of her three children.

He actually called the house and got her granddaughter, and she was the one that told him that Paige hadn't been home since Thursday night.

At that point, the alarm start going off and he touched base with us, touched base with the the sheriff's office, and things started getting in gear then. And ironically, after Bigler called authorities to report Paige missing, he became one of the first they wanted to question.

And I'm sure he was open and willing to have them look at him. Although Beagler was one of the last to see and speak with Paige, those who know him believe he's also one of the last who'd want to harm her. We met with him recently and I think he is very devoted to Paige and very emotional that she's not here. I've spoken to him on the phone since she went missing and it's obvious he's pretty distraught and um upset that she's not around. I know he's broken up by this whole thing. Paige's friends were far more suspicious about her second ex-husband, Rob Dixon, the father of her three children.

A lot of her friends would say, "Where was Rob? I'm afraid Rob is involved." Paige had an explosive, troubled history with Dixon.

911. Where's your emergency? He said that I would come home. Afraid of all murdered. They might not have known exactly where to begin.

It's going to be a good morning. But Paige's family knew they'd have to start somewhere if they were ever going to find her. You want to get out and start looking and try and figure out where she is.

So Craig and Callie Bergfeld set off in one direction. Good luck today. Thank you. Hopefully we'll find her today.

And Frank Bergfeld headed off in another. My daughter's the one who's missing. So when you're out there, keep your eyes open.

While the Bergfeld family searched for Paige, the sheriff's department continued its own investigation. Deputies brought in specialty divers to search the river

and they got one of their first big leads in the case when someone called 911 after seeing a car in flames parked in an empty lot. It turned out to be Paige's car, the car she was driving when she disappeared. The next morning, authorities discovered that the fire was started from inside the car on the passenger side. DA Pete Hzinger.

It at least suggests to me that that person is fairly savvy and intelligent enough to think that there's a real possibility law enforcement could find evidence in that car that would implicate him or her.

It looks like whoever is involved here is not afraid of committing a crime. and the realization of what that might mean for his daughter was too much to bear.

You know, it occurred to me I hadn't cried in a long time. I've learned how to do that. That's it.

While Paige's family clung to hope that she was still alive, the reality is creeping in that something bad has certainly happened here. Investigators turned their attention to Paige's second ex-husband, Rob Dixon.

The most recent ex-husband is a logical person to take a close look at. Paige met Dixon in 1997, and back then he seemed like a real catch.

Uh Rob had had a business success with his father, had a significant amount of of wealth.

It was a whirlwind courtship. And the following year, the two had a wedding and started a family together.

And they moved to Grand Junction together, you know, moved into that house together, built onto that house together.

But Dixon had extravagant taste. And he was reckless with his money, investing millions of dollars in risky business ventures. When the bills started piling up, Paige did what she could to pitch in. She started a little preschool dance business she called Brain Dance to come in and be with your children and I appreciate you all for

She would have recital um twice a year and make costumes for all those students.

Paige also sold high-end kitchen supplies out of her home for a company called The Pampered Chef. And as one of the top sales agents, she earned a free trip to the Caribbean. But Dixon was losing money a lot faster than Paige was making it. In a few short years, his business investments fell through and he'd lost almost everything.

And I think as financial strain came on the relationship. It got worse and worse.

By 2004, the problems in the marriage took a turn for the worse. We think of Rob as good Rob and bad Rob. There are times where Rob is just really a good good funny guy, bright, but at other times Rob is a difficult person to be around. He can be violently angry, condescending, derisive, uh you walk on eggshells, uh a feeling of tension. She stuck by him through a lot, but when he started getting more angry and then finally violent, she had to draw the line there.

Finally, in October, Paige had to call the police for help. 911, where's your emergency?

Um, my husband and I were in a fight. He wanted the children to stay with him, and he said that I would come home and find them all murdered.

What's your name, ma'am? Paige Dixon. By the time police and local media arrived, the crisis was diffused. Dixon was allowed to leave after authorities decided he wasn't a threat to himself or anyone else. No charges were filed.

Hey Rob, what happened? Why were the cops called? But one year later, the police were called again. Paige said Dixon had pushed her to the ground. Then later, he punched her while she was holding their baby. This time in October 2005, Dixon was arrested. But the case was later settled after he completed a course in anger management. When everything went rocky and she finally decided enough was enough when the kids and her were put in jeopardy, she decided it was over.

By the time the couple divorced in September 2006, Rob Dixon had declared bankruptcy and he was living in Philadelphia. When Paige disappeared, that's exactly where Dixon said he was in Philadelphia, 2,000 miles away. But when Paige's family found disturbing entries about Dixon written on a website message board by Paige herself, they were hard to ignore.

I've read the things that have been written on her website and on the Pamper Chef website, and um, you know, they're pretty scary. Just three months before she disappeared, Paige wrote, "My children would ask me if dad was going to kill me. I can't imagine what they were thinking life would be like after he killed me." Investigators questioned Dixon about his whereabouts the day his ex-wife vanished, but they didn't release details to the public.

We can say that we have had contact with Rob Dixon, and that's all that we'll say about him.

But Paige's family got word that his alibi held up. I understand that a person's biography might make them a suspect. At the same time, if you're 2,000 miles away, I I think it takes you off the roster.

Both of Paige's ex-husbands seem to have had solid alibis. So, who in Paige's life had any motive to harm her?

Hello, you've reached out. And that led investigators to an even bigger mystery. This one about Paige herself.

Please leave your message and I'll get back to you within the next few days. Who knows why people make those sort of choices?

Certainly not for us to judge. Mesa County is a big county. It's 3,300 square miles uh of a lot of open space, a lot of canyons.

Two weeks have passed since Paige had vanished. You realize unless you know where to look, you could spend the rest of your life looking around out there. It's just so remote. This is big country out here. It is vast.

And the question remained, where to look when the vista stretches out as far as the eye can see.

There are hundreds of thousands of miles around us which could be used to hide a body.

But the investigation was about to get a lucky break. Her name Connie Fluki. We'll never quit. I will never ever give up.

Conniey's can do spirit inspired the dozens of other volunteers here to help find Paige Bergfeld.

This is our search area. Uhhuh. She just gave hope. We were starting to become so dejected and she just walked in and took charge.

But I'm getting ready to send a team out. Okay. Dork. Craig and Callie got ready to search in the punishing desert heat.

I'm Craig. Paige is my sister. I wanted to thank you guys for coming to look for her.

Today's going to be the day. I know today's going to be the day. Today's the day we're going to find her.

We'll go up this road, loop back down that one. As the volunteers pressed on, the Bergfelds had to navigate through a darker, more difficult terrain. the mysterious double life that Paige had apparently been leading.

She had a couple things on her computer. We were saying, "Wait a minute. What's this computer doing here?"

Yeah. Why don't the police have this computer? So, they called police because they were convinced that her computer held clues that could have put her in danger.

It doesn't change what I think of her. I would give anything to see her again right now and give her a big hug.

As Craig's concern grew, the search paid off with a discovery that could lead them closer to Paige.

They did find some pretty critical pieces of information for us down on Highway 50.

Various personal items, such as Paige's checkbook and a membership card to a local video store, were found scattered along this highway. 15 miles from where her burned out car was discovered.

Obviously, our focus is still on Paige. Um, not just her things, but her things do hopefully lead us to her.

For all its beauty, there is clearly a darker side of the mesa. It's beautiful, but scary for me now.

Every search, I pray that we find my sister. We're halfway through this canyon. And we haven't found her yet. Still hoping we do, but part of me is still praying that we don't. I haven't found her not alive. As long as that condition exists, I presume she is. I choose to hold out hope. We're coming, Paige. We're coming. We are coming to get you.

First you find out Paige is missing. Then within a couple of days, we started finding out about this other life that we didn't know about.

It was a life kept secret from her family. Well, at first blush, she looked to us to be a really good mom, very active with her kids.

District Attorney Pete Hzinger. Then some things came out that really pretty much changed everything.

And that's when Grand Junction began asking not just where Paige Bergfeld was, but also who she was, who she really was.

She had a side industry, and it wasn't just any side business. It turns out Paige wasn't just teaching dance classes and selling kitchen products. In provocative ads on the internet, Paige was also known as Carrie, a highpriced escort. I, for one, was shocked. I've been a prosecutor for 20 years. This is the first time I've encountered somebody from that kind of socioeconomic level and that kind of family involvement to be involved in this business.

Sessions with Carrie could include stripping, dancing, and role playing. On one website, she suggests that clients can pay for extras such as topless and nude massage. Those were things that we didn't know anything about before she went missing, but have unfortunately learned about since.

I think for Frank and Susie that the thought of their daughter even doing that, it didn't even cross their minds because it's their daughter. You don't think your daughter is going to do that. So, I think for them it was a really, really big shock. As upsetting as it was for Paige's family to learn about her secret life, they were convinced she turned to the escort world for one reason and one reason only, her children.

She found herself in a position of being the bread winner and trying to make ends meet.

Paige was overwhelmed with debt. She had three children and her ex-husband was bankrupt, paying only $500 a month in child support. Plus, Paige's mortgage was huge, almost $6,000 a month.

It never really made sense to me that she would be able to come up with a mortgage for that place for more than a couple of months.

Her friends say Paige did what she had to do and turned to the one job she knew would pay well. She always saw a situation and got it under control. If something needed to be done, she made sure it happened. I would say that whatever she was doing was for her children.

And it has no bearing on the kind of mother friend that she is. Um, and her sister-in-law, Callie, now thinks she knows where Paige got the idea to become an escort in the first place. Many years earlier, Kelly had asked Paige how she was able to afford her first home on a dance teacher salary.

I flat out asked her if she was doing something other than teaching dance. And she had told me that she had been stripping.

Before becoming a mother, Paige had worked as a stripper at a place called the Mile High Saloon

in Denver when she was 21 years old. She said she had been making 400,000 a year doing it and that, you know, she didn't need to do it anymore,

but apparently she later did. And so then we're like, okay, you can kind of see where Paige made the next step to escort.

I wish I had been given the opportunity to be involved and perhaps been able to sort it out.

I would have counseledled her that. That strikes me as dangerous. It doesn't sound totally moral. Paige's family knew this new information could help investigators figure out who was responsible for Paige's disappearance.

It opens up a whole another list of people, a whole another group of people. But will it also bring them closer to learning what happened to Paige? News that is difficult to hear. think she was probably murdered by one of her clients.

Police never found a diary or a black book with names, but she did have that cell phone and that helped investigators track down everyone who had had contact with Paige.

We have looked very carefully at all of her clients and have made every effort to investigate everybody who may have been on that list of people she was going to be contacting later that night. That included George Coraluzo, a 30-year-old house painter who called Paige 20 times on the day she disappeared. He also left town hurriedly 2 days after her disappearance. And there was also this man, a 56-year-old father of two named Lester Ralph Jones. Actually, I was out searching and that's the first time I ever heard of him. At that time, the rumor was that he had known Paige through the escort service.

Mr. Jones was a client of Miss Burke Belts. My understanding is there had been at least more than one encounter.

Authorities got warrants to conduct searches of his home where he lived with his third wife. They spent hours searching through his belongings, but wouldn't talk about what they found, not even with Paige's family.

I can't comment specifically as to what was or was not found at Mr. Jones's home.

And remember her burned out car discovered a few miles from her home? Search dogs led investigators from that parking lot to an RV shop across the street. It turns out that's where Ralph Jones worked as a mechanic.

The fact that her car was burning so close to his place of employment is at least one significant fact. Common sense certainly would indicate that it's something more than a coincidence.

There is something else that links Ralph Jones to the disappearance of Paige Bergfeld. One of the last conversations she had that night was with someone using a throwaway phone like this. According to investigators, there's surveillance video from a local Walmart showing a man they say is Jones buying such a phone. Jones declined our request for an interview and denied having anything to do with Paige's disappearance. But Ralph Jones does have a criminal record, a record that shows he was more than capable of violence.

And then we're also able to find out some newspaper articles about that whole previous case. It's pretty scary stuff. Jones was arrested for two incidents involving his aranged wife Lisa back in 1999. In one of them, he threatened to take her someplace remote and kill her. Joan served three years in prison after pleading guilty to kidnapping and assault charges, both felonies. Those are by definition kind of violent offenses.

None of that bodess well if Paige had uh any kind of involvement with him at all.

It's not the kind of person you want to be out alone with your sister. And so more than 3 months after Paige Bergfeld disappeared, authorities publicly cleared her two ex-husbands. Although George Coraluzo remained a person of interest, they named the main target of their investigation. We have narrowed it down to one primary suspect, that being Lester Ralph Jones.

Lester Jones has been our primary suspect from the very beginning of the case. Chief Deputy District Attorney Dan Rubenstein was now heading up the Paige Bergfeld murder investigation. He was convinced that Lester Ralph Jones, a convicted felon and a client of Paige's escort service, was the man who killed her. But without Paige's body, he didn't feel he could prove it. Paige went missing in June of 2007. We always knew that the case wasn't something we were ever going to be able to prosecute until we found her.

Let's go. Come on. Let's go find Paige. Frank Birdbell never stopped searching for his daughter.

There's so many acres. His determination to find her fueled by his concern that the investigation was stalled.

Many of these cases are never solved. You know, how many times do we see one of these in the paper and you never hear anything more about it?

There's no doubt that the family was frustrated and I do not blame them at all.

But then 5 years after Paige went missing, a break. A hiker came across partial human remains in a gully right where a team of volunteers had been searching. There were people that were in that area time after time over that 5-year period from 2007 to 2012. So, her body must have been buried at least deep enough to have hidden it from people going by.

Investigators had little trouble identifying the remains. Paige's remains were found in

it was Paige. We had her jaw and her skull were found uh intact with the teeth, and we were able to get her dental records and verify that the dental records matched up with the teeth.

Although investigators couldn't determine how she died, Paige's bones gave clues. Among other injuries, her cheekbone was badly fractured, a sign she may have been beaten.

That fracture occurred at or near the time of her death. Other findings helped the investigators piece together the circumstances of the last hours of her life.

There was also some duct tape um that appeared to be right around the area of where the skull was found,

suggesting she may have been tied and gagged. And there was more. Knowing where she had been found now helped explain the objects that had been discovered when she was initially reported missing. checks, business cards, driver's license, other documents that had pages or her kids' names on them that were strewn about the highway about 5 miles before the area where her remains were found. That I think is indicative of somebody who is kidnapped throwing those items out.

Investigators believe that Paige, desperately reaching out for help, was leaving a trail to wherever she was being taken. For Bergfeld's family, all these discoveries were hard to bear.

My feelings were a heavy dose of sadness. Um, even when we were searching, you wanted to find her, but you didn't want to find her.

Adding to their pain, they would have to wait for a proper burial for their daughter.

When she was found, I went ahead and made arrangements with a local funeral home to uh go ahead and retrieve her. and we would then decide what to do with the remains. We were told that they weren't going to give her to us. Uh, in fact, I assume that she is in a cardboard box in the coroner's office. They were told that uh they must keep her for the purpose of evidence and that's just flatout baloney.

If it was any consolation, with Paige's remains discovered, the case could finally move forward. Once you find the body, you've taken away one of the important reasonable doubts that are going to be in a criminal trial.

The evidence is still circumstantial, but Rubenstein believes he now has enough to make his case against Lester Ralph Jones. He's confirmed that the only other potential suspect, George Coraluzo, had a solid alibi for the time Paige disappeared and was in New Jersey the night her car was set on fire. The car was in the parking lot across from where Jones worked. The seat pushed back to accommodate someone much taller than Paige. And there is the track phone.

It actually only made five phone calls in its entire history. And all five of those phone calls were either two pages work phone. The last phone call was from her phone.

Despite Jones's denials that he owned such a phone, Rubenstein says he can prove that Jones lied.

We have video evidence of of Mr. Jones buying that track phone. uh we've you know have the computer records showing the exact date, time, store and register that that track phone was purchased at and we pulled the video and it was Mr. Jones purchasing it.

And then there is this Mr. Jones. Yes, sir. This is Art Smith with the sheriff's office. Just calling to let you know that we have both your cars ready for you and your wife. A bizarre phone call between Jones and a local sheriff who had seized two cars belonging to Jones so that they could be thoroughly searched.

I can come pick him up. Sergeant Smith contacted Mr. Jones just simply to let him know that the vehicles were ready to be released and to figure out how they wanted to go about doing that. It was a simple routine phone call and uh he didn't get the uh the response he was expecting.

Mr. Jones, I'm not following you. You asked me where I would bury a body. I'm sorry.

You asked me where I could bury a body. When did I ask you that? Um, Mr. Jones, are you there? That was to me a very very interesting thing for him to say and certainly would be the sort of thing that would go towards being satisfied that Lester Ralph Jones killed my daughter. The call along with all the other evidence did the trick. In November 2014, just before Thanksgiving, more than 7 years since Paige Bergfeld disappeared, Lester Ralph Jones was arrested and charged with her murder and kidnapping. He appeared notably unsurprised.

Lester did not react at all when he was told that there was an arrest warrant for him. He didn't ask what it was for. He just turned around and put his hands behind his back.

Jones went to jail. His bail set at $2 million, but for the prosecutor and Pa's family, the case was far from over.

We certainly believe we had enough to bring it to a jury. But remember, at this stage in the process, these are just allegations.

And they must be proven in court. Did Jones kill Paige Bergfeld? If so, how did he do it?

It's certainly our intention to have a front row seat. And like his commitment to search for his daughter, Frank Bergfeld is committed to attend the trial every single day.

I'd like to say goodbye to her. I think I owe it to her. With all that the family has endured, the years of uncertainty, the discovery of their daughter's secret life, and the painful proof of her death, they prefer to remember Paige as she was and for them will always be.

Motherhood was central to her life. The kids meant everything. As far as a legacy, uh, remember Paige's smile. I guess I would call it radiant. In her obituary, it was said that she was so radiant it made the son jealous. And I would think that would be at least for me what sticks with me the most.

Thank you. Please rise for our jury. In July 2016, 9 years after Paige Bergfeld went missing, Lester Ralph Jones went on trial for her murder.

Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. With no direct evidence, the prosecution's case was circumstantial.

The only calls from that track phone were to Paige Bergfeld and they ended at the time of her disappearance.

That Mesa County Sheriff's Office, Lester Jones defense team countered by introducing five alternate suspects.

These are men that the sheriff's office let slip through their fingers while they were busy fixating on Mr. Jones. But after a six-w weekek trial, the jury was deadlocked. Although they all thought Jones was guilty, several had reasonable doubt.

Is there a likelihood of progress towards a unanimous verdict? No. No. All right. Thank you.

After a mistrial was declared, I'm sorry. One of the jurors apologized to the Bergfeld. We wanted this and I saw you all during the trial and I see the agony. I am sorry.

Please rise for our jury. But there was a second trial which would end just days after Christmas 2016.

And this jury could reach a verdict. We the jury find the defendant Lester Ralph Jones guilty of count one murder in the first degree.

Convicted of the kidnapping and murder of Paige Bergfelt. Jones was sentenced to life in prison without parole. But having him brought to justice after almost nine years seemed to give Paige's father, Frank, little comfort, as he expressed in this phone interview.

What happens to him doesn't bring Paige back. If he wanted to make me a deal and skip prison and bring her back, I I'd take it.

48 hours. Don't miss an episode. Hey. Hey. Hey. here with the fabulous Mo Wilson. You are like ready.

I'm ready. I'm so excited to be here. Um, it feels like the first big race in a year. So, um, yeah, I'm ready to kick it off.

I'm still getting better. I'm still learning. It's an exciting time. There's still so much for me to learn.

Her name was Mariah, but everybody called her Mo. My name is Polar Melendez, and I am a senior reporter with the Daily Beast. Funny and friendly and smart and driven, Mo was a rising star. She graduated from Dartmouth in engineering. Everyone thought she was about to make her big break in cycling.

I have always relied on other people to push myself. myself. What happened to Mo was a tragedy.

They found Mo inside the residence. It was pretty grizzly scene. She had been shot multiple times.

At first, detectives thought it was a robbery. You're looking into this possibility of a robbery or a burglary, but parallel to that, there is this name Colin Strickland. Sure.

My name is Colin Strickland. I am a bicycle racer. Colin Strickland was a top biker and he was also friends with Mo.

I mean, Colin, you know, he was an interesting character. Had a lot of like, you know, cool qualities about him. Motorcycles, professional athlete. I mean, Colin had dated like a few girls in the cycling scene, you know, girlfriends here and there, but, you know, pretty standard stuff. Colin's relationship with Mo like was like they were both bike racers. They had like a romantic relationship.

There had definitely been something romantic between them. Colin said they had broken up. The situation was complicated. There was another woman in Colin's life. Her name was Caitlyn Armstrong. Caitlyn, you know, first impressions, she was really nice. globe hopping around the world was, you know, really interested in yoga. Like very attractive person, uh, both inside and out. At least the Caitlyn I, you know, initially knew.

Homicide detectives were very interested in talking to Caitlyn Armstrong. He's starting to get this sense that there could be some jealousy to it. She has a gun. Few things like that start to paint a picture of like it could definitely be her. We were still trying to figure out, are they going to have enough information to sit down and scratch out a ward? At this point, she kind of disappears. No one knows where she is.

Caitlyn Armstrong vanished, seemingly in a thin air, sparking what would become an international manhunt. first leading authorities across the United States and then eventually here to the beaches of Costa Rica. Along the way, she used multiple identities and changed her appearance, even getting plastic surgery.

How smart was Caitlyn Armstrong? She did some pretty intelligent things. The thing that people don't know is you don't have to be just smarter than one, two, three, or four of us cuz there's a team of 20 plus people. You have to be smarter than a lot of people to get away with it.

It almost worked. It almost worked. Hello. Hello. I'm here with the fabulous Mo Wilson. You are like ready.

I'm ready. In March of 2022, up and cominging progravel bike racer, 25-year-old Anna Mariah Wilson, known as Mo to some, appeared on the pre-ride show, an online program about cycling.

So excited to be here. Um, feels like the first big race of the year. So, um, yeah, I'm ready to kick it off. Just 2 months later, Mariah was found murdered. The news shocking the cycling community.

I don't think anybody could really believe it at first. You know, why would anybody want to hurt or harm or kill this lovely, talented young woman?

Lisa Goslin Lynn is the editor of Vermont Sports Magazine and Vermont Ski and Ride magazine. She's also a CBS News consultant.

Mariah Wilson right there coming in. Lynn had been following Mariah Wilson's career for many months before her tragic death.

It is all Mariah Wilson as she is snaking through into the finish of Mariah was pretty much winning every race that she entered.

Mariah Wilson, the winner of round one of winning or finishing in the top two. And the races that she entered were top tier.

First place, Mo Wilson. Mariah had the potential to be one of the top bike racers definitely in the country and probably in the world.

Mo phenomenal race. Remarkably, Lynn says that Mariah was new to the pro cycling world. Her first passion had been downhill ski racing, a love shared by her close-knit family.

She was born into a family of really great athletes. Her father, Eric, had been on the US ski team, and Mariah's aunt actually was a two-time Olympic Nordic ski racer.

And it's no surprise that Mariah was drawn to outdoor endurance sports. She was raised in Northern Vermont next to Kingdom Trails, a mecca for skiers and mountain bikers,

and that was her playground. Mariah attended Burke Mountain Academy, an elite ski school that produced Olympic like two-time gold medalist Michaela Shiffren. Mariah had hoped to make the US ski team, but knee injuries eventually ended her skiing career. That's when she switched sports.

She had used cycling as a way for rehabbing and kind of building back her strength. What was fascinating to me was she then went on to Dartmouth. She got an engineering degree. And after doing that, she went to her mother and said, "Hey, mom, I think I want to be a professional cyclist." And Mariah told the podcast we got to hang out that she wanted to do much more than just win races.

How can I inspire people? How can I give back to the cycling community? How can I bring more people into the sport? How can I make it more inclusive? Like I want to find meaning and purpose in cycling that goes like far beyond the the result. Mariah eventually moved to San Francisco where she focused on cycling and quickly rose to the top of the sport.

Mariah was forging her own path. She knew what she wanted to do and she was working hard to pursue it. On May 10th, 2022, just one week before her 26th birthday, Mariah arrived in Austin, Texas to prepare for the Gravel Locos bike race, a race she was favored to win. Mariah stayed with a close friend in this Austin apartment. But the next evening, just before 1000 p.m., the friend returned home and discovered Mariah, who had been shot multiple times. She called 911.

She's laying on the bathroom floor and there's blood everywhere. Mariah's friend tried CPR, but it was too late.

It sound like started off near the door and went backwards like she was trying to get away or there was some sort of struggle or

Austin police officers Mark McCloud and Jonathan Riley worked the case from the beginning.

Whoever shot her at that point stood over top of her and shot her at least once. Charlie 7, you're in 13.

Investigators wondered who could have murdered this promising young athlete. As they canvased the immediate area, police discovered a possible clue.

432. I located the bike. Mariah's expensive racing bicycle had been discarded in the bushes.

So, at that point, okay, is this a burglary, a robbery gone wrong? But that theory was quickly dismissed because there was no sign of a break-in. Then police learned that just hours before Mariah was found murdered at around 8:30 p.m. she had been dropped off by another professional bike racer named Colin Strickland.

So obviously the focus would be who's this Colin Strickland. Colin Strickland was a very good gravel racer. He was at the top echelon.

Colin Strickland who was 35 was considered a pioneer in the sport. He had won some of the most prestigious races and was sponsored by the industry's top brands like Red Bull.

My name is Colin Strickland. I am a bicycle racer and general entertainer. In 2020, he appeared in an online video called Wahoo Frontiers about his long and successful career.

Pretty early on, I looked up to Colin when I was coming up in the scene. Please welcome Chris Tally. Chris Taly is friends with Colin Strickland. They met on the racetrack.

He was the one to beat. He loved to kind of create a show around bike racing. Uh kind of selling bike racing. He was really passionate about it.

And Tali said although his friend had been popular with women, he eventually became serious with a woman named Caitlyn Armstrong. However, in a social media post after the crime, Strickland wrote that about six months before Mariah's murder during a short breakup with Armstrong, he did have a brief romantic relationship with Mariah that spanned a week or so. He said that it ended and their relationship had turned into a platonic and professional one.

He just wanted to be friends with like someone who was going to do great things in cycling. The day after Mariah's murder, police visited and spoke to Colin Strickland at his home.

My personal take was he was being very cooperative, being very forthcoming. Um, obviously he was in shock.

Being very transparent at times. Very transparent. Yeah. And investigators say when he agreed to go down to the police station to be interviewed, he didn't seem to hold back when telling them about the day he spent with Mariah, a day that would end up being her last. That day in May, it was hot in the 80s. And this story started with a swim right here. It's a famous old outdoor pool. And Colin Strickland told detectives he took the victim, Mo Wilson, on the back of his motorcycle here to cool off. They went swimming, then they got food.

Mariah and Strickland are seen here on the restaurant's security camera. I know he's being transparent at this point during this questioning, but what he's saying is starting to sound a lot like a date.

Oh, yeah. 100%. Investigators had a lot of questions, and their prior visit to Strickland's home had raised even more. On the night of Mariah's murder, police discovered an important clue on video from a neighbor's security camera. The video was taken just 1 minute after Mariah was dropped off. There's a video from a Ring doorbell camera that clearly shows like a black SUV with a bike rack. Can't see the license plate because of the bike rack on it.

So, it was obviously like we need to focus on this. And a vehicle that fit that description was outside Strickland's house. Who was driving the black Jeep SUV with the bike rack? The answer would lead directly to another woman.

The day after Mariah Wilson's murder, investigators quickly had an answer to who could have been driving that black Jeep that was seen on security cameras shortly before her death. Investigators had spotted a similar looking Jeep in Colin Strickland's driveway when they spoke to him.

They see a black Jeep with the bike rack on the back of it. So, at that point, we run the license plate and it comes back that it's registered to Caitlyn Armstrong.

Caitlyn Armstrong, Colin Strickland's girlfriend. Chris Tally says he knew her very well.

You know, we connected pretty early on. Caitlyn and I became friends. They were both from the Midwest.

We kind of had a similar uh like upbringing and so I think that kind of uh you know helped us become like even better friends. She'd come over to parties I would have.

Armstrong had a background in finance and loved yoga. She had a really strong you know kind of uh you know love for travel love you know she'd spent time pretty much you know globe hopping around the world really you know kind of interesting person. Armstrong got certified as a yoga instructor in Bali. After she met Colin Strickland in 2019, she also started getting into cycling. He was very willing to kind of show her, you know, what his passions were and how passionate he was for cycling and, you know, get her involved with it and she also became, you know, kind of addicted to cycling along with Colin.

Armstrong even started racing on an amateur level. At the end of the day, like I feel like they had a pretty like normal relationship. They both ride bikes together. They would, you know, do fun stuff and, you know, then 2020 happened and the pandemic started, so everyone was kind of, you know, forced with, uh, you know, close quarters with their significant others. The couple eventually moved in together. The moment I I saw the relationship become more serious is, you know, they talked about uh that they purchased a house recently uh together, which I thought, you know, was a pretty big indication that it's, you know, a serious relationship.

They also started a business together, restoring classic trailers. I think she was helping with the finance side of things. Colin was doing a lot of the operations. Their relationship went from, you know, just a normal couple to also owning a business together.

But things got bumpy in late 2021. The breakup, I personally didn't know like they were split up at the time. Neither of them mentioned anything to me.

It was during this time that Colin Strickland and Mariah Wilson had briefly dated. Although Strickland had said they had broken it off, Mariah seemed confused in the aftermath. Polar Melendez covered the case for the Daily Beast.

Around this time, I think Mo was pretty confused about her the status of her relationship with Colin. And she literally wrote, "This weekend was strange for me. If you just want to be friends, that's cool. Honestly, my mind has been going in circles. It sounds like someone who's in her early 20s who just wants to know the status of a relationship with someone that's confusing her. And it seems totally reasonable that she might be confused.

Strickland had a lot to say about his relationship with Caitlyn Armstrong. He starts to portray her as being the jealous type, even saying things like, "I can't keep people in my phone. Like, Mo's not in my phone as Mo." Strickland told investigators he kept Mariah's phone number under an alias in his contacts. And on that evening, after he'd been out with Mariah at the pool, he texted Armstrong that he'd been running an errand and that his phone had died. That was not true. Investigators say there were other clues pointing toward Caitlyn Armstrong.

On the night of the murder, Caitlyn Armstrong's phone was not connected to a cell network. not connected.

Correct. So whether she powered it off, whether she put it in airplane mode, uh there's some something happened that her phone was not communicating with any cell phone towers.

Do you think this was on purpose? Absolutely. In this day and age, if your phone is off and not connected to a network, you're either the victim of a crime or you're probably committing one.

A silent phone speaks louder in some cases than actions. Oh, absolutely. Strickland also shared that he had bought handguns for Armstrong and himself for personal security.

He talks about how they purchased guns and that there are these two guns and that she has a gun. Um they've taken lessons and that the these guns are back at the house.

And so few things like that start to paint a picture of like this could it could definitely be her.

Police worked quickly. That same day, investigators picked Caitlyn Armstrong up on an old warrant for failing to pay for a Botox treatment.

She's just kind of sitting there and she's not showing very much emotion at all.

What were you doing yesterday? I would like to leave. I think typically when we see some interviews going on and if you didn't do it, this is your like you're going to be like, you know, not me, not it. I want out of this room. What do you want to know so you don't come back looking for me? And there was none of that. Is there any explanation as far as why the vehicle would be over there?

I would like to leave. She was almost completely disinterested in in hearing what the detectives had to say.

So, it sounds like this is a big red flag immediately. Oh. Oh, absolutely. Absolutely.

But investigators had to let Armstrong go. There was a problem. Armstrong's birth date did not match the date on the warrant. So, the warrant wasn't valid, and police didn't have enough to charge her with anything else. 2 days after that interview, police got an unexpected call. It was from a friend of Caitlyn Armstrong. Police say the caller told them that Armstrong was so angry about Strickland's relationship with Mariah that she wanted to kill her. It was yet another indication that they were on the right track.

A few days later, an arrest warrant was issued. But when police went looking for Caitlyn Armstrong, she was gone. After Caitlyn Armstrong vanished, US Marshalss got the job of tracking her down. Plain and simply, the Marshalss are manhunters.

Chris Godsick hosts and produces a podcast with the US Marshall Service. I'm Chris Godsick and this is Chasing Evil.

His podcast tells the stories of some of the US Marshals's biggest cases, including the hunt for Caitlyn Armstrong.

Nobody thought Caitlyn Armstrong was going to run, and she surprised them all. She disappeared. Caitlyn Armstrong ran from a murder charge, but the US Marshall's Lonear Fugitive Task Force had a different plan. So, take me through this. Where do you begin when you're looking for somebody that does not want to be found?

You know, it depends on the case. Honestly, we look for friends. Sometimes we look for family.

One of the things that I did was collect as many photos as I could. Damen Fernandez and Amir Perez are deputy US Marshals. They joined Austin police officers Jonathan Riley

and Mark McCloud on the case. The team based in Texas is known as the Lonear Fugitive Task Force. With no sign of Caitlyn Armstrong, the task force suspected Armstrong may have left town headed for her sister Christiey's place in upstate New York.

We were thinking maybe she's driving cross country. We didn't know. Their instincts were right. In upstate New York, another deputy marshal managed to track down Armstrong's sister.

What did the sister say? The sister ultimately said that her sister had come to visit her, had stayed with her a couple of days, but that she had dropped her off at the airport in New York. And uh last she heard she was going to board a flight back to Austin, but then called her back later and said that she decided that she was going to drive back. which made absolute no sense to any of us that you would just drive back.

When the task force checked outbound flights at Newark airport, no reservations had been made in Caitlyn Armstrong's name.

We never got a hit on Caitlyn Armstrong's passport. But the team had a hunch because Christy told the deputy marshal in New York that she didn't know where her passport was. So, they checked with their contact at Homeland Security

and within minutes of reaching out to him, he got back to me and he's like, "Yeah, we're showing uh Christy Armstrong traveled out of Newark, New Jersey International Airport on a one-way flight to Costa Rica."

You knew it. And I said, "There's no way that the sister left and we're looking for him. We can't find Caitlyn." No, that's Caitlyn.

The marshall suspected that Caitlyn Armstrong had used her sister's passport to flee. Christy Armstrong later emphasized to authorities she did not give her sister the passport. She has never been charged with any crime related to this case.

And this is where Caitlyn Armstrong landed. Costa Rica, gem of Central America, home to mountains, tropical rainforests, and white sand beaches as far as the eye can see. But she didn't spend much time here in San Jose. Shortly after arriving, Caitlyn Armstrong disappeared again, and she had a huge lead on the US Marshalss. Marshalss Amir Perez and Damen Fernandez arrived in Costa Rica a month after Armstrong.

This is you guys now on the hunt. How intense is it once you touch down in Costa Rica? What happens?

You're on a timeline. I hear timeline and I hear the pressurees on. Pressure's on. And I know we were sitting in the plane and we're talking what's the game plan? Although they would have help from the Costa Rican authorities and US State Department officers on the ground, they knew finding Armstrong was going to be a big challenge.

We had other intelligence indicating that she was staying in hostiles in Costa Rica. And I don't know if you know anything about Costa Rica, but Costa Rica has a lot of hostels. A lot. An unbelievable amount of hostiles. The Marshalss wouldn't tell us exactly how their intelligence gathering worked, but their team back in the States had managed to track down the phone number for an American businessman they believed had connected with Caitlyn Armstrong at some point.

We didn't know what city he was in. So, we decided, hey, let's just cold call him. So, we call him and we're on the conference room. He answers and we're like, hey, it's the US Marshalss. My name is Mark. And he goes, I don't want any click. Just hangs up like it's a like

a telemarketer. telemarker spam call. Yeah. After three or four call attempts, the businessman finally stayed on the line to answer the marshall's questions.

And we actually end up sending a picture of Caitlyn while we're on the phone with him. He looks at it and he goes, "Yes, but she doesn't look like that." And she not using that name.

And did he tell you her new name? He did. It was Beth. She was going by Beth. And the businessman said Armstrong no longer looked like this. She had cut her hair and changed its color.

Brown instead of red. She dyed her hair. The businessman told the marshals he had no idea that the woman who called herself Beth was actually Caitlyn Armstrong. But he did tell them where they might find her.

He's like, "Well, I met her at a yoga studio in Hakaco." This is Hakaco, a popular tourist destination known for its nightife and its beaches and the perfect place to hide. It was the marshall's first real tip, so they rushed out here. They canvased the area, combed through hours of surveillance video, but could not find a single sign of Caitlyn Armstrong anywhere. It was a bust. But the marshals have one more solid lead and that takes them to a beautiful touristy beach town, a one street town called Santa Teresa.

One month after Caitlyn Armstrong disappeared, the US marshals were in hot pursuit of her and another area of Costa Rica. A source had suggested she might have gone to a small village on the Pacific coast. The marshals took a ferry like this one to reach a remote peninsula. Once there, they drove by car through those mountains to the tiny town of Santa Teresa. But when they finally arrived, they ran into an unexpected problem. Get to Santa Teresa. Was it easy to identify her there from the other people that were there?

I think from the get-go, we were told, "You're going to be in for a surprise cuz a lot of the women in Santa Teresa look just like Caitlyn." A lot of them. And it turns out that advice was right. The town was full of foreign tourists. Deputy marshals Fernandez and Perez arrived in Santa Teresa after dark.

So we get there and he starts walking down a main strip that's there uh like down the street.

There's only one road on on that town and he sees main road. He sees a girl and he says, you know, that looks just like her. Well, couple of minutes later, we see another one

and it's late at night and we're like, well, oh man, that's two. And then there's another one.

As the marshals tried to find Armstrong, they even had one of their female operatives start going to yoga classes to see if they could spot her.

She actually did three different classes for us. And they tapped into local contacts.

Oh, yeah. We made friends with people there that would send us pictures. Oh, look. I I think I saw her at this restaurant yesterday, and she's in the back in the background of a photo that I took. Stuff like that.

In fact, people had seen Caitlyn Armstrong at local spots in Santa Teresa, but they didn't realize who she was. Armstrong was hiding in plain sight, using different names.

She had like multiple names. Yeah. Um, she came in Beth. Um, Beth. It wasn't Beth.

Ari. Ari. Ari. Ari. Right. So, she came in as Ari. Greg Habber is an American from the New York area who owns a restaurant called Cook's Smokehouse and Bar here in Santa Teresa.

Ari. What did Ari look like? Did she stand out to you? Pretty came in, introduced herself as a yoga teacher, which is basically anybody else down here. Hey, I moved here teaching yoga down the street and that was it.

What was her general vibe like? She definitely seemed like she was trying to establish roots here, like this was going to be her new home.

And Haber says one day he noticed something different about her. I saw her on the beach. I walk my dog on the beach every night for sunset and you're walking through and you see the bandage on her face. It's like, "Ah, what happened?" She like, "A surfboard hit me in the face." It's like, well, happens to everybody, right? At least once. So, you wouldn't even question that story here. Like, you see people all the time. Turns out that bandage would later prove to be an important part of this story and one of the reasons the marshals say Armstrong was so hard to find.

So you're this close to giving up? Yeah. Finally, they decided on one last tactic. They turned to a local Facebook page.

We decided we were going to put an ad out for a yoga instructor and see what would happen.

So this is the equivalent of Craigslist. Yes. Correct. Right. Pretty much. and a little bit more lively, but yes, and just saying, "Hey, we're this hostile. We're looking for a yoga instructor as soon as the possible. Please contact us at this number."

But after almost a week of hunting, even that didn't seem to be working. Sunday, we decided we haven't gotten any response back from anything.

We're done. So, Sunday, like, okay, we're done. None of them have panned out, so

we're going back to San Jose. Now back in San Jose, the Marshalls were getting ready to head home when suddenly

we got a bite. Somebody that identified herself as a yoga instructor and said that wanted to meet with us at a particular hostel and we said this is this is our chance.

Deputy Marshals Perez and Fernandez rushed back to Santa Teresa just ahead of a tropical storm. Tourism Police Lieutenant Juan Carlos Solanos's team helped the marshals in their search for Caitlyn Armstrong. They did surveillance on a hostel called Don John's where the yoga instructor, the one who answered the online ad, was believed to be.

So there is this massive international manhunt and of all places in the world, it ends in this very discreet hostel. It was now time for the marshals to make their move.

So, I walked up and I got in. They decided that Deputy Marshall Perez would approach the woman alone. They didn't want to scare her off. He would pretend to be a tourist and try to get a really good look at her face.

And I saw two individuals sitting there at a table off to the left uh as soon as I walked in.

He says one was a woman. She looked like Caitlyn, but not 100%. So, I thought, well, how can I approach her or get close enough where I start asking questions where she doesn't suspect something? So, I decided that I was going to speak to her in Spanish. So, I spoke to her in nothing but Spanish.

So, you're communicating. She goes to use her phone for Google Translate. And then,

so I got a little closer cuz I saw that she was trying to get to Google Translate on her phone. and she'd raised it up to me and I got even closer and I noticed that she had a bandage on her nose and possibly her lips were swollen and I saw her eyes. The eyes are the exact same ones that I saw in the picture and this is her 100%.

He gets in the car and he's like, "That's her. She's in there." Local police moved in to make the actual arrest. And soon the marshals discovered why Armstrong had been so hard to find. She had been getting plastic surgery when they first arrived in Santa Teresa. At the hostel, they found a receipt. The receipt for surgery.

Plastic surgery. Plastic surgery. In these sidebyside photos, you can see that Armstrong changed the shape of her nose. The deputy marshal said their female operative, the woman they sent to yoga classes to try to find Armstrong, told them Armstrong's new look, would have tricked her. And she told me, "I think if I would have run into her at the yoga studio, I don't think I would have recognized her."

Wow. It almost worked. It almost worked. The marshals took Armstrong back to Texas where she was charged and held in jail. But just weeks before she was due to stand trial for the murder of Mariah Wilson, Caitlyn Armstrong escaped again.

Almost three weeks before her trial, former fugitive Caitlyn Armstrong somehow managed to escape from custody.

She was at a doctor's appointment and tried to escape as they were walking out.

Par Melendez from the Daily Beast says Armstrong didn't get far before deputies caught her.

It was pretty astonishing that she did that given the fact that she had tried to escape prosecution prior.

This was just more evidence of her guilt. Joseé Garza is Travis County's district attorney. He says his team of prosecutors, Ricky Jones and GMO Gonzalez, were more than ready to try the case. When we learned that um she had tried to escape, um it just added to our confidence level in the facts of this case that we would be able to secure justice for Mariah and her family.

On November 1st, 2023, Armstrong's trial began. The last thing Mo did on this verdict was scream in terror.

In opening statements, Jones told the jury about chilling audio from a security camera that captured the last moments of Mariah's life.

Scream followed by two gunshots. Kayan Armstrong stood over Mo Wilson and put a third shot right in Mo Wilson's home.

Prosecutors said Armstrong had been tracking Mariah Wilson using a sports app. Caitlyn, prior to the murder, had been following Mo on a Strava app, which is basically an app that athletes use to track their miles, running, biking, and she knew exactly where she was. And they said that Armstrong on the night of the murder was most likely tracking Colin Stricklin as well.

She did uh have the ability to monitor his communications. She had access to all of his password. So she had access to um his Instagram account. I believe that when Mo sent Colin a text letting him know the address of where she was, I believe that Caitlyn Armstrong was at home on Colin Strickland's laptop. She saw that message. After murdering Mariah and before leaving the scene, Jones told the jury that Armstrong took Mariah's bike and discarded it in the bushes just yards away from where her Jeep was parked. Our belief is that she maybe staged it to look like a robbery or something. Or another theory is Mo Wilson's bike is a tool of her trade.

It might have been like the bullet shot in the heart. I'm going to shoot you in the heart. I'm going to throw away your bike. But they said Armstrong made one big mistake. She left her DNA behind on the handlebars and seat of Mariah's bike. And that's not all the evidence prosecutors had against Armstrong. There was that receipt that showed Armstrong had received plastic surgery while hiding out in Costa Rica.

Everything she does, it's all consistent with trying to evade the authorities. But when it was the defense's turn, attorney Jeffrey Purrier told the jury there was no direct evidence, including security footage that actually showed Armstrong was at the scene of the crime.

Not one witness saw Caitlyn Armstrong allegedly commit this murder. Then why would Armstrong flee and hide from the authorities? Defense attorney Rick Kofur pointed the finger at Colin Strickland. Was she scared? What do you think? Do you think that she may have been concerned a little bit that her boyfriend had killed someone? Fear results in fight or flight. And it was flight.

But Jones said there was a big problem with this theory because Strickland had nothing to do with the murder of Mariah Wilson.

In fact, at the time of the murder, he was actually on the phone speaking with someone. It wasn't counter stricken.

Armstrong's defense team did not respond to our request for an interview. After a twoe trial,

the defendant will please rise. It took the jury around 2 hours to decide Armstrong's fate.

We, the jury, found the defendant, Caitlyn Armstrong, guilty of the offense of murder. As a prosecutor, the first row right behind you is the family and you begin to feel their pain and their desire for a just outcome for their loved ones.

One day after her conviction, Armstrong was sentenced to 90 years behind bars. You may be seated. But before the case came to an end, Judge Brenda Kennedy allowed Caitlyn Cash, Mariah's close friend, whose apartment she'd been staying at and who had found Mariah's body, to take the stand and speak directly to Armstrong.

So many people in this room have lost so much. I'm angry at you, at the utter utter tragic nature, at the senselessness, at not being able to hear Mo's voice again. I feel deep sadness for the road ahead.

Then it was Mariah's mother's turn. I hate what you did to my beautiful daughter. It was very selfish and cowardly that violent act on 911. It was cowardly because he never chose to face her woman towoman in a civil conversation. She would have listened. She was an amazing listener. She would have cared about your feelings. But despite the pain, Karen Wilson closed with words of love and optimism because she said that's how Mariah would have wanted it. You killed her earthly body, but her spirit is so very much alive and you can never change that.

Today in Kingdom Trails in Northern Vermont, a place that was sacred to Mariah, a trail was built in her honor. It's called Mariah's Ascent.

Mariah was a verter. She was giving. She was hardworking. She was honest. She was caring. And she came from a wonderful family. And that family really wants that legacy and all of her good qualities to inspire others.

48 hours. Don't miss an episode. When the sun goes down in a pecan orchard, it's a little spooky. It's a lot like being in a scary movie. They're majestic in one sense, but they are very creepy. What happened in this orchard was senseless.

Tara Ginstead and I were best friends. Tara started wanting to be in beauty pageantss only to help her raise money for college. Her inspiration was to be a teacher. Tara was a very well-liked high school teacher. The students loved her. She was young. She was vibrant. She was very passionate about what she did. On October 22nd, 2005, Tara began her day doing exactly what she loved, dressing up the little girls for the sweet potato pageant in Osilla. After the pageant, she went to a cookout. The last thing I know, she was on the phone, went home, and then nobody's seen her since.

There were so many stories, so much speculation. The possibilities were running through my head of what it could be. My heart always hoped that she just needed a few days to herself. And as the days and the months and even the years went on, I knew something had happened.

I covered this story for 12 years, and hardly anyone thought this case would ever be solved in a town that is as small as it is. How could someone keep this a secret for so long?

I don't know. So, you call the police department. This is John McCulla. I know who killed Terry Ginstead. Does anyone call you back?

No. Hey man, how come nobody wants to listen to me? So many tips came in that some weren't followed up.

They never actually called anyone a suspect or even a person of interest. Nearly 27 years with the Georgia Bureau of Investigation, I've never encountered such a complex and difficult case.

We literally got tips from all over the world. Then in 2017, a woman came forward with a remarkable story about her boyfriend.

He said, "I can't handle it anymore." And he starts telling me everything. I made him take me to the orchard.

You said right then, "We're going." We're going In Osella, the word spreads in a church pew, at the restaurant, over breakfast. The 2005 disappearance of Tara Ginstead, beloved teacher and local beauty queen, mystified the people of Osilla, Georgia. Like Janice Pulk, who lived just around the corner from Terra,

Osilla is a big family. We all wanted to do something that we could do to help. There were flyers. There were billboards. We had search efforts like nothing you've ever seen. Janice, who ran a local web design company, became an expert on the case, keeping a close watch since Tara was reported missing. What were some of the theories as to what had happened to Terra?

There were people who believed she ran away. Somebody has abducted her and holding her somewhere hostage. And the one we didn't want to think about was somebody killed her. But who would want to harm this vibrant 30-year-old woman? Maria Woods Harbor grew up with Tara.

My best friend, Tara Ginstead, was a beautiful person on the inside and the outside. She was radiant. I mean, she had the biggest smile. She could tell you anything to make you feel better. This is where Tara Ginstead lived in 2005. What emotional impact does this have for you when you see this house?

Well, it's very emotional. I don't like to come very often. She loved this place. Can still see her standing at the door.

Maria says Tara was determined to live her dreams from a young age, competing in beauty pageantss to help earn scholarship money for college.

She was absolutely elegant on stage. Her main goal was to win Miss Georgia or at least to get to Miss Georgia and she did.

I am Tara Greenstead Miss Tiff. Tara didn't bring home the Miss Georgia crown but just competing was a huge achievement says Dana Wilder who grew up in Osilla.

As little girls we looked up to her. She was famous. After college, Tara got a job at Osilla's Irwin County High School teaching 11th grade history. She was an excellent teacher. She was dedicated to making her students feel wonderful.

And even when she no longer competed, she helped other women like Dana break into that world.

She just took me underneath her wing. She taught me the ins and out of interviews, hair and makeup, wardrobe. At night, Tara studied for a specialist degree in school administration, but other parts of her life hadn't come together as she'd hoped.

Personal side, she was having a little bit of a rough time. She was in her 30s and not married, and I think she was a little down about that. Tara had a boyfriend for a long time, and during the summer of 2005, they broke up. That boyfriend was Marcus Harper, a former cop from Osilla.

She obviously wanted to get married. It just wasn't what I wanted. I definitely didn't want to settle down in small town America.

Marcus enlisted with the Army Rangers and spent time overseas. It was like a calling. It was something I felt like, you know, I had to do.

The couple broke things off but stayed in touch. Tara really did want to get back with Marcus. She did not want to end it and she was very distraught.

This was the man she thought she'd build a life with. Yeah, she did. She was seeing other people and I think she was just trying to move on. In a small town of Osilla, everyone knew their situation. It was part of town gossip that they had gotten into an argument after Marcus had come back to town earlier than expected that October. But no one in Osilla knew what had happened when Terara seemingly vanished after leaving that barbecue on Saturday night, October 22nd.

What time did she go home? About 11:00. On Sunday, Tara's mom called her several times, but Tara didn't answer.

And the next morning, I got a call saying that I need to get to Osilla. Tara had failed to show up at school.

She would never do that. She would never leave her kids. Tara's car was parked in the driveway. Neighbors knocked on her door, but got no response. The Osilla police were called and entered Terara's home. Right behind them was Maria.

What did you see when you walked into her house? I wasn't quite sure what I was going to walk in and see. Her den was exactly the way it always was. There were a few things on the floor like a haird dryer and then her bed was unmade like she had been in the bed.

Tara's purse and keys were missing. Her cell phone was charging next to her bed. Maria noticed something out of place. Terara's alarm clock was under her bed and a bedside lamp was broken. And then there was something else.

So when I came back out of the house, I saw right here, right out from the front door, there was a latex glove

on the ground. On the ground. Also found was a business card from a police officer in a nearby town. Authorities couldn't explain either and collected them as evidence. The Georgia Bureau of Investigation, known as the GBI, was called in.

It is one of the most extensive investigations undertaken by the GBI. Back in 2008, I spoke with special agent Gary Rothwell.

It appeared that Tara may have left on her own. However, we had a glove, a latex glove that we couldn't explain. So, that gave us a stronger indication that something bad had happened.

The GBI tested that glove and found not only Terara's DNA on it, but the DNA profile of an unknown male. The case generated hundreds of tips over the years. Janice Pulk even created a website to help authorities collect information. find.com. I built a message board because I thought that there was a good chance that whoever knew what had happened to her would potentially come and say something.

As Janice recalls, early on, suspicion focused on the men in Terara's life. She was dating, I think, more than people realize that she was dating. And that's nobody's business, but in this case, it made it tough.

Rumors swirled about that cop whose card was found at Terara's house. He was a family friend married with kids who said he'd gone by that Sunday night and left the card after Tara didn't answer the doorbell. He had an alibi, but the whispers continued.

There were several people, several men who got a lot of scrutiny for a long time.

Another was a former student who claimed he and Tara had been secretly seeing each other. But when questioned about her disappearance, he had an alibi and was never charged. Then there was Tara's ex-boyfriend, Marcus Harper. Somebody pulled me to the side and they were like, "Listen, you know, uh, there's been some things said bringing up your military past, bringing up how you're trained to kill." Marcus always maintained his innocence, but remained under suspicion. Investigators chased down dozens of leads across the country, but tips emerged that led right back to the high school where Tara was a teacher and perhaps someone who had sat in her classroom.

I never thought it was somebody from our community, but in the same sense, I always thought, well, it has to be For years, Marcus Harper lived under a cloud. Some might say a thunderstorm of suspicion. He was the talk of Osilla, Georgia. And none of it was good. you know what they're saying at the local grocery store and at the local restaurants. They don't think that it's getting to someone who's my family or my friend. I'm not going to shy away to the fact that I was I was bitter.

Police never called him a suspect, but Marcus was more closely investigated than anyone in the disappearance of his former girlfriend, Tara Ginstead.

I was swapped for DNA. My truck was luminal. Photographs were taken. had to tell my alibi, you know, or where I was at, who I was around, and that was corroborated.

Year after year passed with no arrests. But back in 2005, authorities either missed or ignored a tip that may have solved the case. Just weeks after Tara vanished at a party in this very PCON Orchard, one of Janice Pulk's employees told her that he had overheard two young men tell a disturbing story

that they had been at a party bragging about their involvement in Terara's disappearance and that ultimately they had taken her body out to a pecan orchard and burn it in a fire pit.

It was a shocking statement. Did he have names of who these two men were who claimed they had killed Terara?

It was Bo Dukes and Ryan Duke. The two, who were friends, had similar sounding names, but weren't related. At the time, Ryan Duke and Bo Dukes were 21 years old. Ryan worked at a plastics manufacturing plant, while Bo would occasionally work at his family's pecan farm. both had been students at Terrace High School.

We shared that tip with the local sheriff's department. That tip went nowhere. And it wasn't the only one overlooked. It just brings up a lot, so it's kind of crappy right now. I'm sorry.

John McCulla says he is still haunted by painful memories of being ignored by investigators 14 years ago. This really affects you though talking about this.

Makulla, now a manager at a water company in Texas, had met Bo Dukes at Army Boot Camp in 2006.

So two southern boys meet in Oklahoma in the army. Yes. And you guys hit it off.

Yeah. And we were pretty close. Dukes invited Makulla to Osilla to spend Christmas with his family. It was a year after Terara's disappearance. As they were driving around town, a billboard caught his eye

and it had this very, you know, attractive woman on it. Tara Ginstead. Yeah. Tara Ginstead. And said, you know, missing.

The two then went to a party. After a few drinks, Makulla says Bo began talking about Tara.

He was like, "Yeah, do you remember that bulletin that you had asked me about with that girl on it?" And I was like, "Yeah." and he was like, "I know what happened."

McCulla wasn't ready for what Bo would say next. He had told me that his friend accidentally strangled her and he needed help getting rid of the body so that way there was nothing to find.

Stunned as he was, McCulla was in a dilemma. Could he betray his friend, his fellow soldier?

The the kind of guy you want to share a foxhole with, right? Who you can trust with your life,

right? The weight of what McCulla says Bo told him became unbearable. Two months later, in February 2007, McCulla says he called three police departments in Georgia, including Osilla, where he left a voice message saying, "This is John McCulla. I know who killed Terry Ginstead or had a part of it. It was told to me when I was in Georgia. Here's my number. I'll do whatever has to happen for y'all to take me serious." I just got off the phone with another department that had didn't do.

Incredibly, McCulla says no one returned his calls. This is the murder of Tara Ginstead and there was seemed to be little interest. Is that right?

Very little interest. But McCulla was determined to get the truth out. He called the state's top law enforcement agency heading the investigation the GBI. I mean, nobody ever called me back. Ever. Even whenever I reached out to the GBI, which is the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

How many times did you call the GBI over what period of time and you still didn't get any?

I would say from the year of 2007 until 2016, I would probably say I reached out nine or 10 times to the GBI.

Why do you think investigators ignored you? I have no idea. Maybe because I'm a nobody. I don't know.

Janice Pulk also spoke to the GBI in 2008 as the agency was reviewing the case and she told them about her employees tip 3 years earlier regarding Bo Dukes and Ryan Duke.

So I sat down with an agent and we just went through everything. But again, as far as she knew, it went nowhere. Terara's family could do little but pray for a breakthrough. They've had a really hard time. I can't imagine the loss of a child, but I think it's taken a lot of toll on them mentally and physically. Then, more than 11 years after Tara disappeared, this woman, Brook Sheridan, came out of nowhere with her account about not only Bo Dukes, but his friend Ryan Duke.

Ryan woke him up and said, "I killed Tara Ginstead. She was charismatic, determined, and beautiful personality.

What would anyone's motive be to kill Tara Ginstead? I don't know. In 2017, more than 11 years after Tara vanished, Brooke Sheridan came forward with a potential answer. This was her first television interview.

I had to tell them. I had to tell. There was no other option. and what she had to say implicated a man whose name had repeatedly been given to the Georgia Bureau of Investigation.

How did you and Bo Dukes meet? We actually met on Tinder. Brooks says she was studying in Savannah to become a pharmacist when in 2015 she came face to face with her online date.

It was love at first sight. Bo Dukes comes from a prominent family that owned a huge pecan orchard in the Osilla area.

And what is it about him that you love? He has a beautiful mind. He is extremely intelligent.

Janice Pulk, who knows the family, paints a different picture of Bo. So Bo was known in the community for being a little over the top, unfiltered, one of those always showing off and and talking big and running his mouth. Bo got in big trouble while in the army. In 2012, he was charged and convicted of stealing more than $150,000 worth of military supplies. And Bose spent more than 2 years in federal prison. He confessed all of this to Brooke, who stuck with him.

I had never connected with somebody and had fun with somebody like I have with him.

But she says Bo was often moody. I said, "You have to talk to me." He's very shut shut off. Emotions, feelings, he doesn't talk about.

As their relationship evolved, Brooks sensed that something seemed to be eating away at Bo.

It was something very dark and I I chocked it up to, you know, serving his time in the military.

And Brooks says she helped pull Back from taking his own life. He had talked about that.

Yes. And you weren't going to let that happen. Yeah. Brooke kept encouraging Bo to open up, to talk about this dark subject that was destroying him. Finally, he cracked.

He said, "You've heard of the terror granddad case?" I was like, "Yeah." He said, "My roommate killed her."

His roommate and close friend was Ryan Duke. Why would Ryan Duke have murdered Tara Ginstead?

He said that's something that only God and Ryan know. He said, "I don't know why he did it."

But there was more. Bo told Brooke about his own involvement in the crime, saying,

"And I helped him burn her body. I was I felt like I was going to be sick. I didn't know who I was staring at. I didn't know who he was. Bo told Brooke that Ryan stole his pickup truck that night and used it to transport Terara's body to a remote part of this PCAN orchard that was owned by Bose's family.

And Ryan looked at Bo and said, "It's your truck, your family's land." And he said he threw it threw his arms up just like this. What are you going to do?

And by Ryan saying to him, "Hey buddy, this is your truck and this is your family's land." Basically, that was interpreted by Bo as a threat that you're we're partners now in this.

Yes. Bo told her they moved Terara's body to a pit in the orchard where it took 2 days to burn, destroying all evidence.

I kept thinking about her family and I couldn't sleep at night. Now it was Brook's turn to be tormented by a terrible secret. I had to tell them. I had to tell. There was no other option.

Weeks later, she called the GBI to turn in the boyfriend she loved. That family's piece to me was more important than his freedom.

But if you're ready for this, Bo had already been interviewed by the GBI a year earlier in 2016.

They contacted me. Tell me what you know. That was after investigators finally reached out to John McCulla.

I'm glad somebody's finally listening. So, I talked to him, tell him everything I know.

But back then, Bo denied everything. With no hard evidence, authorities couldn't make an arrest. But after he broke down to Brooke, she told Bo it was time to tell the truth.

I said, "You need to confess. You need to own up to what you've done and confess." What does Bose say?

He says, "I just want her family to know." I'm going to just kind of leave it open the floor to you and just tell me about you knowing about Terra.

Bo then told the GBI all the grizzly details. You can still see Yeah. body. Yeah.

Just kind of like char. Yeah. The day after Bo's confession, his one-time friend, Ryan Duke, was arrested nearly 12 years after Terara's disappearance. Ryan, could you do it?

On February 23rd, 2017, Ryan Duke appeared in court charged with Terara's murder.

I received a phone call and the voice on the other end of the phone said, "Brother, your 12 years of hell is over. We've made an arrest."

Investigators say Ryan confessed to killing Ginstead. According to notes of Ryan's confession, which were written down by the GBI and later leaked out, Ryan told investigators he was a drug addict and quote broke into Ginstead's house and was attempting to steal from her purse when he believed she came up behind him. He struck her with his fist. Duke did not mean to strike Ginstead, but he was just reacting and scared. Duke said Ginstead died when he hit her. And remember that latex glove found at the crime scene? A DNA sample from Ryan Duke was a perfect match.

Was it an emotional moment for you to realize someone had been arrested after all that time?

Yes. I cried for days. Couldn't sleep for days. It was very hard to grasp. And the next month, Bo Dukes, who years earlier had sat in Terara's class, was arrested and charged not with murder, but with concealing a death, hindering the apprehension of a criminal, and lying to investigators. Two years later, in March 2019, Bo was the first to go to trial.

This case is about Bose's lies. It's about Bose's concealment that his best friend Ryan had killed Tara Ginston and then they both burned the body.

And for the first time, everyone heard Bose's own account when his GBI interview was played in court.

Told me that he had killed Taran Rest and he asked me to help him get rid of her body.

But was Bo telling the whole story? I don't believe Ryan could have done it all by himself. in March of 2019, in a county courthouse about 30 miles from where beloved teacher and beauty pageant mentor Tara Ginstead was murdered, Bo Dukes went on trial on charges relating to covering up her death. Prosecutor Brad Riby.

This case is about those lies. Lies that lasted from 2005 to 2016. Bo was facing a maximum 25ear sentence. So he went to trial hoping jurors might show mercy for a man who had already confessed to his role in the crime.

Today's day is February. Prosecutors played that videotape of Bose's interview with the GBI. He recounted what Ryan told him the day after Tara disappeared.

Told me that he had killed Terry rested. I didn't believe him. I thought he said it was mine. I told him, you know, leave me alone.

When Ryan repeated his story to Bo a couple of days later, again, I didn't believe in him. He asked me to come with him out to to the piano. So, with Ryan Duke behind the wheel, the two men took Bo Duke's pickup truck and drove out of town on this highway and pulled off on this dirt road. And this is a Pan orchard that's owned by Bo Duke's family. The two men drove about 200 yards up this road to where Tara Ginstead's body had been placed. We drove back into the bag and he showed me where her body was.

Of all the people, no connection. Why, Terra? What's the connection? As far as I know, they didn't know her.

The agent asked Bo his first reaction when he went to the orchard with Ryan. So, you immediately see this and you're like, what in the hell did you do? Yeah. And why the would you do it here on my family's picking or building?

What did he say? Help me. Bo then gave his account of moving and then burning her body which began on a Wednesday and took 2 days.

So by Friday there's nothing left. No. Spell your first and your last name for the court. Uh, John Jn, last name Makulla.

It was now time at the trial for Bose's one-time army buddy, John McCulla, to finally tell his story of Bose's confession. And this time, the whole world seemed to be listening.

The exact location didn't tell me, but had made the comment of, you know, we took her to the middle of the pecan orchard and burned her body. He testified calmly, but inside was still seething at Bo.

If there wasn't multiple police officers that were inside the courtroom on the day that I testified on the stand, I probably would have ripped them apart with my hands.

But McCulla wasn't the only witness who gave details about Terara's death. Do you swear from testimony for the jury? Janice Pulk's former employee, Garland Lot, told the court he had overheard that 2005 conversation between Ryan and Bo at a party in the same Pan orchard where Terara's body had been burned. He wasn't sure who said what.

The statement that I recall was we killed and burned everybody. Basically, any doubt in your mind, however, that you heard these two people laughing about killing and burning Terra Grenstead's body?

No. Garland says after he reported this to Janice Pulk, he was never formerly interviewed by anyone from law enforcement.

It sounds like you're saying you assumed it was handled by I assumed it was handled by law enforcement. Yes. Okay. And in this trial, agent Gary Rothell finally explained what happened with those tips.

We thought that that lead had been addressed by local law enforcement as unfounded and did not follow up.

In cross-examination, Rothwell added that he takes responsibility for the GBI lapse.

It's something we should have followed up, but we we we didn't. It took a jury less than an hour to convict Bo Dukes on all charges. His hope for mercy was dashed. At his sentencing, Tara Ginstead's stepmother, Connie, addressed the court.

He knew she was never coming back. He could have at least told us that, but he didn't. And the reason he knew she wasn't coming back is because he had put load after load of wood on her body and burned her.

And Bo Dukes himself spoke directly to Terara's family. To the ter family, I'm truly sorry. Your long suffering has been unimaginable. Bo was sentenced to 25 years in prison. But Maria and others still have questions as to what really happened and whether Bo's statements were true. As Bo told it,

"Ryan did the killing and all I did was help him dispose of the body." I don't believe that. She points to discrepancies between Ryan's version of events and Bose. Ryan told the GBI he killed Terra by striking her. Later, he said it was possible that he choked her, but B says Ryan was certain about what happened.

He jumped on her while he was she was in bed and and strangled her right there in her bed. And there were other inconsistencies.

One said she had clothes on, the other said she did not. It's kind of odd, isn't it?

Yeah. Very. Maria believes those discrepancies may have a sinister explanation that Bo Dukes had more to do with Terara's murder than either he or Ryan have said.

I believe that Ryan and Bo Duke were both in this together. And she's not alone in believing Bo Dukes helped burn a body, not just to protect his friend.

You believe that Bo did this to protect himself? Oh, absolutely. Even with Bo Dukes behind bars for 25 years for his role in covering up Tara Ginstead's murder, some people involved in this case believe he played a much larger role. Maria Woods Harbor thinks Bo was with his friend Ryan here at Terara's house the night of her murder. I think B had more to do with it. Yes.

So too does this man, forensic investigator Maurice Godwin, who was hired by Terara's sister in 2006.

I'm headed to Terra Grenstead's house where she disappeared. Back then, Godwin canvased Terara's neighborhood and found two teenagers who said they saw strangers outside Terara's house the night she disappeared. That they saw two men on the right side of Terara's bedroom windows to the right side of her house. Then it was just dark.

It was dark. But two men were standing out here by that bush. By that bush. And who do you believe those two men were?

Bo and Ryan. Police have never corroborated that sighting. Godwin speculates Terara was targeted by the two men, but not for money.

Do you believe this was a planned sexual attack? Absolutely. I believe they sexually assaulted her in that bedroom.

Which is why Godwin believes Tara's body ended up in the pecan orchard. and they had the burned body in order to destroy destroy the forensic evidence.

Maria has also concluded that sexual assault was most likely the motive. They both went in her house, they both assaulted her and they both planned it.

In public statements, Bose's attorney has denied that. But Maria believes that Bo was just as involved in Terara's death as Ryan allegedly was. If you look at Bose's history since that happened, yes, I definitely believe that B had more to do with the planning and the execution.

Maria is referring to an incident where Bo Dukes was arrested for rape and kidnapping while he was free on bond before his trial in the Ginstead case.

The Warner Robbins Police Department says on Tuesday afternoon, Dukes brought two women to the house and threatened them with a firearm. He pleaded not guilty and is awaiting trial.

Everything narcissistic. Everything revolves around what he wants and when he wants it.

But Janice Pulk continues to believe what Ryan told the GBI. Do you believe Ryan Duke acted alone?

I believe what he said he did. Ryan's confession where he admitted killing Tara suggests his trial will be an openand-shut case. But in yet another twist in this baffling murder, Ryan's attorneys have said publicly that he will recant his confession at his upcoming trial, claiming he was high on drugs and place all the blame on Bo.

I have been told that Ryan's defense team will argue that he gave a false confession and that Bo was actually responsible for Terara's death. For all that has transpired since 2005, closure is still elusive for everyone involved.

I've had to come to a conclusion that I'm just going to have to live the rest of my life not knowing. But there is no question that in her short and impactful life, Tara Ginstead touched people in rare ways, even those who never met her, like John McCulla.

I can't explain it and wish I could have been there whenever it happened so that way I could do something.

She's been an inspiration. She had a lot of life ahead of her. She brought great things to Irwin County High School. And I would hope that eventually the word Tara Ginstead will be a bright spot cuz she did bring a lot of good things to Osilla. Osilla was Terara's life. That's where she set her roots and that's where she wanted to stay and where she wanted to be.

48 hours. Don't miss an episode. Hey, heat. Hey.

Questions about this episode

Who speaks in "When Investigations Take Unexpected Turns | “48 Hours" marathon"?

Frank Bergfeld (Guest), Paige Bergfeld (Guest), Pete Hzinger (Host), Aaron Morardi (Guest), Craig Bergfeld (Guest), Callie Bergfeld (Guest), Susie Bergfeld (Guest), George Coraluzo (Guest).

What is "When Investigations Take Unexpected Turns | “48 Hours" marathon" about?

A missing-person investigation in Grand Junction reveals that Paige Bergfeld led a double life with a high-earning, secretive occupation, transforming the case from a straightforward disappearance into a multifaceted inquiry into deception, danger, and the pursuit of truth. The search expands from rugged terrain to uncover hidden details about her lifestyle and the circumstances surrounding her…

What is mentioned in this 48 Hours episode?

79 people, works and ideas are mentioned, including Tara Grinstead, Ryan Duke, Ocilla, Georgia, Georgia Bureau of Investigation, US Marshals Service, Colin Strickland. Each one on this page links to its own page with every episode that mentions it.

How long is "When Investigations Take Unexpected Turns | “48 Hours" marathon"?

The episode runs 2 h 7 min; the transcript is about 17,791 words in 461 timestamped sections.

More from 48 Hours

About this transcript: the episode's spoken words as captioned on YouTube, split into timestamped sections. Reclip.Me locates every person, work and idea in the text, keeps the time it is first named, and quotes the words around it verbatim. Last updated November 7, 2026.