Texas Wine and True Crime
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Texas Wine and True Crime
Murder Without Reason: The Sasha Krause Tragedy
A young woman's devotion to faith leads her to a Mennonite community in Farmington, New Mexico, where she thrives writing church music and working for a religious publication. Her peaceful life comes to an abrupt end one January evening when she disappears while retrieving materials from her church. What unfolds next reveals the dark intersection of technology, hatred, and random violence.
Sasha Krause was known for her beautiful writing, linguistic talents, and dedication to her faith. Originally from Texas, she had found purpose working at the Lamp and Light publication in the Mennonite community. When her roommates realized she hadn't returned home one night, they found her car still at the church but her purse at home—only her cell phone was missing. The tight-knit religious community immediately mobilized to find her, but their search would end in heartbreak.
The discovery of Sasha's body in an Arizona national park a month later created more questions than answers. Why would anyone target a member of a pacifist religious community? How did she end up hundreds of miles from where she disappeared? With no obvious suspects, investigators made an extraordinary decision to subpoena cell phone data from all networks, searching for any device that had traveled the same path as Sasha's phone.
This digital breadcrumb trail led them to Mark Gooch, an Air Force airman with a disturbing secret—he harbored an inexplicable hatred toward Mennonites despite being raised in the faith himself. Text messages revealed he had been "surveilling" communities before driving seven hours to commit his crime. The randomness of his selection of Sasha as a victim makes this case all the more chilling—she was simply in the wrong place when his hatred found its target.
Through forensic evidence, digital detective work, and the killer's own mistakes, justice was eventually served with a life sentence. Yet nothing can erase the tragedy of a brilliant, kind woman whose life was cut short by senseless hatred. Join us as we examine how modern technology both facilitated a heinous crime and ultimately brought its perpetrator to justice.
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Welcome all of you wine and true crime lovers. I'm Brandi and I'm Chris and this is Texas wine and True Crime. Thank you for being here, friends, for tonight's episode, the Case of Sasha Krauss. Hey, Chris.
Speaker 2:Hey Brandi.
Speaker 1:All right. So tonight we are enjoying Tenat by our friends at William Chris Vineyards. This is produced and bottled right out of High Texas.
Speaker 2:And this went great with the dish High Texas, high Texas, I mean like the Texas high plains.
Speaker 1:H-Y-E.
Speaker 2:Oh, okay.
Speaker 1:That's how you pronounce it, right? Yes, that's how you pronounce it. That's probably high, I don't know.
Speaker 2:I think of high like from Raising Arizona.
Speaker 1:Oh, high Might have spelled it the same way. Might have All right. What did you pair with tonight's tonight?
Speaker 2:So tonight I always tend to lean towards something kind of robust and a lot of fattier dishes, but also kind of, you know, heavier dishes, and so, in the spirit of New Mexico, we had a little pozole, spirit of new mexico. We may have a little pozole, and so I did have some ribeyes that we made. This typically made with chicken if it's green, or pork if it's reds, but we were making red. So I used essentially some really delicious ribeyes and some chamayo peppers straight here from new mexico, but very hearty dish, a little hominy it. It was great the weather's just starting to cool off here and so I thought it went really well with the wine, just, you know, velvety, lush, rich wine with a kind of a velvety, lush, rich dish.
Speaker 1:It was delicious, was delicious.
Speaker 2:It sticks to your ribs, that's for sure. So I'm slowly but surely learning some of the recipes of the region. And may I say, and I made that before, I just make green a lot, so I don't typically make red.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and may I say the garnish on top and your design. It was just a beautiful picture If you haven't seen pictures of Chris's pozole, check ours.
Speaker 2:It was nice, it was symmetry at its finest.
Speaker 1:It was Well. Thank you for making a wonderful dinner. Thank you, william Chris for making a wonderful tonight, all right.
Speaker 1:Well, chris, this is our first case out of New Mexico that we're going to do. This is about a 27-year-old girl named Sasha Krause who lived in the Mennonite community in Farmington, new Mexico. So she's originally from Texas. So I actually didn't know that until we started kind of looking into this case, but I believe she was born either in Temple or somewhere near Temple Texas maybe in Temple Texas and then she lived in Grandview, texas, for a while, was teaching Sunday school, living with her family, and then she decided that she was going to apply for a job at the Lamp and Light publication, which is in Farmington, new Mexico, which is also on a Mennonite community compound that other Mennonites live.
Speaker 2:And I believe there's two of those here in Farmington that are both associated with one another. Okay, kind of West Coast, east Coast kind of thing, when you look at the proximity of one another on the map.
Speaker 1:Okay.
Speaker 2:And so I think too, when we initially were talking about this case in Mennonites, we weren't super familiar with what that was. And so I think, initially, when I think of that, we were, you know, I think of Amish and it is essentially the same thing. I think you know, in kind of looking too, it is kind of a different. There's different most of the time, I think, with Amish community. Amish communities that we're more familiar with you know, media, movies and whatnot. You see the horse-drawn buggies, carriages, things like that. Yes, not any reliance on typical.
Speaker 1:You know the comforts that people you know Sure yeah, tvs, things like that, cars yeah, technology is one of the big things.
Speaker 2:But there also are Mennonite communities, apparently, that embrace these technologies, that's right. So that is, I think, more along the lines of kind of this community that was here in Farmington.
Speaker 1:Well, and they talked about how they created their own rules. Right, she did have a cell phone.
Speaker 1:We know that she had a cell phone. She wrote a lot. I mean she wrote music for the church. So I think they said she had stacks of journals in her room and so many pages of written poems and words and her parents would say that she studied languages. It was really something that came really easy for her and she enjoyed it and this was part of her coming to Farmington. She wanted to work for a publication company in the Mennonite community.
Speaker 2:I mean, how great is that To be able to translate in some of those languages? And, looking at it, they had a publication company which obviously requires electricity machines, things to do that's not typically, and so they were. I'd say probably that more. I was about to use the word advanced. It has nothing to do with that, but just a little more use of technology to navigate society and I also don't want people to think that this was like some shut off community.
Speaker 1:You can drive through there and you can. I mean they are welcoming, they welcome people to the church. It's not like I think when people hear the word compound they think of like David Koresh right? This is not we're talking about a very loving community of people who support it. And not only that they wanted people to come and visit.
Speaker 2:And I found it was interesting that people converted to this. I would have assumed just that's. It is a lifestyle, and so you would think that most now people leave the church like any church for that matter. But the notion of someone you know, either a young adult or an adult for that matter deciding to kind of join in that being accepting that I think is kind of cool.
Speaker 2:But you know, that was something I didn't know. That that is, like I said, very open, accepting not. I think it's kind of cool, but that was something I didn't know that is like I said, very open, accepting, not inclusive. I mean sorry, not exclusive. Exclusive, yeah.
Speaker 1:All right. So she was here in her community, she was working for the church, she was doing Sunday service and had gone to the church to get some books and things she was taking with her to Colorado the next morning. So this was a Friday night, going into a Saturday morning, and she was going there to teach.
Speaker 2:I'm assuming, another Mennonite community within Colorado.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and people just said she was happy. I mean, you know they really couldn't find. You know. This is why, when she first went missing, you know they were struggling with you know what happened to this young girl. She's seen and people know where she's going and then she's gone and so it was. But, like you said, this is a community that is first of all took this very seriously, very quickly when she went missing and in regard also to that community which we're going to kind of talk about later, is, I did not know that there are certain professions that Mennonites don't believe you should be involved in. One they don't join the military.
Speaker 2:They are pacifists by nature.
Speaker 1:yes, yes, they don't become police officers.
Speaker 2:Once again pacifists by nature.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so it is. I learned a lot. I mean, I learned a lot about this case, I learned a lot about this community and I'll tell you what people kind of reached out when they knew we were going to do this case people who live over in that area and how much this really did affect people in Farmington. And it wasn't that long ago I mean, we're really only talking, you know, five years ago. So just just really sad and just such a senseless murder and abduction which we're going to talk about. All right.
Speaker 1:So she is here for about Chris, I think she was here about 19, 20 months somewhere around there, a little less than two years already, working and being a part of the community. She did live with two other young women in a house on the property, in a house and, you know, on the property, and again, she just was a good person and people really didn't have anything bad to say about her. They really couldn't think about anybody, of any enemies who would do this to her. But, and thankfully, her roommates kind of took action when they realized she had not come home. So the night in question which is January 18th 2020, chris, she goes to the Mennonite church again to get some books and pamphlets that she's taking with her to Colorado the next morning.
Speaker 1:Okay, roommate realizes she's not there. Um, sometime after midnight her she's not in her room. Um, they know that she had gone to the church about seven o'clock to pick up those pamphlets. Um, they were starting to. She was, you know, the. The one roommate was concerned. She then tells the other roommate Now, they're both concerned, they're calling her phone, they're trying to figure out where she's at.
Speaker 2:Because, I mean, I think too, a big part of that is, um, you know, not a remote area, but it is where this church is located. They're just not like you don't just walk yeah, I was gonna say you don't just drive to the store. And I would say also probably pretty typical in this community that people probably went out as a group as well too. I mean, in some respects I mean for her just to want not be present, and you know, that's very abnormal.
Speaker 1:She's not just going to wander off, no, and they had a curfew this is another thing 10 o'clock curfew, which apparently is a big deal if you break curfew in the Mennonite community, as from just from what I gathered.
Speaker 1:I did think the curfew was a little interesting, but I wasn't sure that was across the board, because I mean I mean, and if we're wrong about some of this, please let us know, because we're learning about this community as well. But, chris, I did hear this is why the two roommate, the two young girls, did not go, and when I say girls, I don't mean like 15. I mean like in their, you know, in their 20s. They didn't go looking for her because they're not supposed to.
Speaker 1:They're really not supposed to go out and wander around to. They're really not supposed to go out and wander around and maybe that's also probably a little bit of a safety thing in taking care of one another is having that curfew, I mean.
Speaker 2:I don't know, there could be other reasons for that. I could really. I mean, I didn't look that hard, but I did look to see about the curfew thing and I couldn't really see anything that that spanned across, you know. I mean she's 27, clearly an adult. That's just to cost the board for everybody. You don't have to be in your room. Don't go out. That's right. There's bad things at night yeah. Which clearly we learned.
Speaker 1:Chris, they do find her car at the church. So, chris, they do find her car at the church, which was very worrisome because she's not at the church and her car is there. There was nothing around the car to make them think there was any sort of foul play, but once the girls tell her supervisor from the publishing company, that's who they went to. He then gathered a bunch of people and they start going look for her. I'm sure they probably looked for her for a few hours at least, and then, when they realized that she's really nowhere to be found, her car has now been found. This is raising a lot of concern, and so they decide to call authorities.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I mean even think in proximity, that's um there's a river close by there um but it is very deserty, so I mean, I could see what you might think if somebody was to wander out, because it's very dark too very and so you easily getting lost or something wandering around initially, but I guess they quickly realized that wasn't the case for a few hours and then they call authorities.
Speaker 1:So I'm going to maybe guesstimate. This is probably like 5, 6 am. Now the San Juan County officials come out. They start talking and asking questions. You know, was she prone to run away? Was she prone to be a nefarious activity? Is it like her? Was she involved in any relationships? Right, they just want to know about her and and and. Immediately they realize her purse is in her house. So she didn't have to take her purse, her debit cards, credit cards, everything was left in her room. The only thing she had on her was her cell phone.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I thought that was an interesting notion as well. As far you know, taking the cell phone too, just to walk from um, I I kind of.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I know it's a house, yeah she drove, though her car was found at the church but I mean, yeah, I mean I guess it's just, but you're not going.
Speaker 1:It's pretty well, no I wouldn't have taken her. I wouldn't I was thinking about that like I wouldn't have taken my purse. I wouldn't take have taken my purse to the church. If I was pulling something and I lived in the community and I was going back to my house, I would see as a woman. The whole idea of the purse is that she didn't, because if she's missing and she's not on the property in the community, they think well, she left, Maybe she just took off and didn't want to be in the Mennonite community anymore. Well, why would she do that and not take her purse and credit cards? How is she going to survive?
Speaker 1:So, that's why they thought well, this is strange, her purse and credit cards and everything is here, but her vehicle is here. So did someone come pick her up? Well, you know it like that way because she's not on the property. They've searched the property, but then if she was leaving with someone, why not take her purse? It just didn't make, it didn't make any sense, and so they were really just really struggling um to figure out.
Speaker 1:You know what could have possibly um happened to this girl, chris, eventually, they have to tell her parents in Texas that she is missing. And you know, again, they were just puzzled by the fact that she was missing and there was really just no answers of you know what could have happened to her. So at this point, you know, so at this point, you know, we now have 24 hours going by, we now have 48 hours going by and they are really starting to try to figure out, you know what possibly could have happened to her. They've got the car. They know that.
Speaker 1:You know, did anyone see her at that church? Now, chris, there was a coworker who did go to the church that night. He had gone in, he had claimed not to see her. He said he had stopped for gas and we know now that this person had nothing to do with it. But at the beginning, when police are doing this, they're investigating the possibility of someone in this community probably being involved because she didn't leave the property. And so if you don't leave the property and all of your stuff is found on the property except you, I mean, police are instantly going to think somebody who knew her did this.
Speaker 2:That's kind of to me, because this church and the publishing company are a couple hundred yards away from one another oh yeah.
Speaker 1:So you know, said sure luck, she had it, of course, but I mean, and these are the kinds of cases where it's just like gosh and nobody sees anything right. And it's like these. I, we did jennifer kessie case, you know, on the last episode, and that was daylight, and nobody sees anything of a girl getting abducted. Or you know they saw a car. But I mean gosh, I mean it's just so heartbreaking to think that she felt so safe, so secure, which she should have. That's why this community is what it is is because there is a sense of safety, a sense of guard being down, which, gosh, what a beautiful way to live. And then for this to happen, it's an alibi.
Speaker 1:But they were very they. They just they thought his story just was a little strange. How could you have not seen her if you were kind of in the same building, kind of at the same time, but he had claimed not to see her? Now you always, 27 year old, young, young woman, you know relationships are happening. You have other women, young women, in this community. So there was a question of you know, did someone, was she involved with somebody? Did somebody, was she having a relationship with someone? I mean, police tend to move this way when it comes to young, 27-year-old girls missing.
Speaker 1:Well, and I think that's probably a they think sexual crime a lot when you're kind of dealing with this kind of scenario.
Speaker 2:But I also think too that with this community that does, you know, like I said, there are midnight communities that don't really intermingle much with the town. They live more rural, they might go in town for supplies and that, but you know, she had her own car. These people had their own cars. They did have to go out shop, do things within town. So I think, yes, that is a likely scenario. Like was she out? Because that is some of the reasons that people do leave that lifestyle is because they want to live a more, um, you know, live a life that's not as restricted, I guess, with some things. And so you know that is a likely scenario.
Speaker 1:So they're really trying to figure out what happened to her, Because at this point, it's just an abduction she is missing. They are trying to follow the leads, they are interviewing people. They are, you know, cell phone is not found and they are, you know, trying to figure out where her phone was paying. I mean, God, they did so much cell phone data in this case and really this is how they got him. And on February 21st 2020, um, a woman who is camping in a national park near Flagstaff, Arizona, um, unfortunately finds the body of Sasha Krause Um, hands are bound with tape in front. She's still in her gray dress that people had seen her in, uh, when she had gone, um to go get the pamphlets at the church, and they actually had to identify her by fingerprint analysis.
Speaker 2:So you did again mention the cell phone data. So this time all Farmington has is that there's like two towers. They see it, that's it. But they do know that, they know it's pinged on two towers that are in the general of ascending, and then that's just kind of where the trail goes cold.
Speaker 1:Yeah, one in the community and one at the four corners, the actual where the monument is. Yeah, which?
Speaker 2:is roughly 60 miles from there. But that's just kind of it Just kind of vanish, not trace Once again her car's there. So yeah, that's why really there's just literal, just a dead end yeah, um, police have to notify her parents in the mennonite community.
Speaker 1:Um, you know, I can only imagine her parents are in texas family. I believe she had six brothers and sisters, um, and then you have the whole Mennonite community that have been searching for her, and I know that they were just hoping for a very different outcome and again that sense of safety. I just it's just because this girl was like hunted, because this girl was like hunted, and it's just so very difficult to you know, when you find out what actually happens in this case, in the extreme. You know, gosh, aren't we living this right now?
Speaker 1:This extreme mindset and this extremeness of anger, animosity, hate. You know you have to take it out on someone and you know, from what I've done in my research, I think he had some, probably he had a lot of issues growing up. He came from a Mennonite family. I, him and his brothers, basically all took jobs that the Mennonites didn't believe you should have. One I was in technology, the other one was a cop, and then of course he, mark Gooch, who we're talking about, was an airman in the Air Force, and so yeah, nothing.
Speaker 1:It's just so random and sad they don't seem to indicate, I think even in his interview when he is eventually caught.
Speaker 2:It's just more so, I think, as he states. Well, even back to what I had stated earlier about people converting to this religion, his father had converted basically the family into this and he had always felt that they weren't accepted within the community because they weren't like born into it. They were kind of outsiders who came in, but also too a lot of it, you know it is. This is, of course, in Wisconsin.
Speaker 1:who knows how strict or rigorous, you know, I mean it's yeah. I do want to say that it wasn't. He wasn't like raised in New Mexico, he was raised in Wisconsin and it's yeah minute.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was like and he had no relation, no connection to this church. It's just he had a bad experience along with his brothers and left it yeah but he did have um quite this amount of disdain for the religion he did to the point where I mean obviously you see what he ended up doing.
Speaker 1:So yeah, and I think I have enough therapist friends and psychiatrist friends that they would probably tell me that a lot of it anger is probably stemmed from his childhood hating his parents for um basically using what his father used on the sand was like. If you don't want to go from darkness to light, then you're shunned right. So you in the dark, you're in the darkness, you as a person are in the darkness and you've got to come to the light. Until you do that, you cannot be baptized as a Mennonite. So I would say my psychiatrist friends would say that this probably is but he was not a good kid.
Speaker 1:Apparently he had a lot of trouble. Police went back to Wisconsin once they started to get on his tail, which we'll talk about, that cell phone data and actually how he was caught, but they said that he had a lot of issues even growing up.
Speaker 2:Since his dad converted to that we I don't know what, how old him or his brothers were, I mean, if they were well, he was well.
Speaker 1:When this happened he was 22 years old, so you can imagine, probably within the 10 years before that, let's say yeah, who knows, he could have been a young.
Speaker 2:He could have been a young kid. He could have been a middle-aged kid Could have been a middle schooler. We don't know that, but I guess what I'm saying is imagine, if you, I mean imagine our kid who has an iPad in their eyeball at least a little bit of the day, right?
Speaker 1:Sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, access to TV. You've got all this freedom and you're doing all these things and just, and then your father decides we're gonna go live because his father was a dairy farmer. They're already living kind of a rural, but yeah that you're gonna restrict all these things. I mean, if that's obviously the older kids are is much more of a. I could see a lot more pushback on that, sure, because it wasn't like there was a.
Speaker 1:Or when they're old enough to push back. I guess also, you know, when they come of age and they want to do something.
Speaker 2:Well, that was the other thing, what they had, that crazy series like Amish Gone Wild or something, because that's kind of the thing, like when you become a certain age, you have the option to go in the more strict.
Speaker 2:That option to go um in the more strict, that is, like you know, the horse and buggy style, but to go and experience oh what the city life is, what you know, and then, and then you kind of have that option, uh, to decide if you want to come back to the community or go out and try the secular world quote unquote, so to speak, and so you know well, chris, one thing she did was write songs and lyrics.
Speaker 1:Um I well, I got really choked up when people sang her songs that she wrote at her. They had a service for her and I mean, it's just like you know. You have a girl who was found with a gunshot wound to the back of the head, a 22 caliber. She had blunt force trauma. There were no defensive wounds, according to the medical examiner found. Usually they see like bruising on the arms of the fingers and again, you had mentioned that.
Speaker 2:That they're pacifists yeah.
Speaker 1:And so you know, did? I don't think we'll ever know the answer to that question. I don't. We don't know. We know he subdued her right. We know he kidnapped her from the property he had driven from the Air Force Base in Arizona.
Speaker 2:Seven hours away.
Speaker 1:Seven hours. Came to the Mennonite community in Farmington. And you know why. I think he came here, chris, instead of the one closer to where he was, because he could have found a Mennonite community much closer than seven hours. I think he felt like the closer he stayed of where he was, he was going to get caught. I think he had to leave the state to feel like more secure about what he was actually about to do.
Speaker 2:Well, according. So you and I debate this um cause, according to text messages, him and his brother, and in testimony to even when he was an issue by the police officer, that he his state, why would he be up there in Farmington? And I think we we still needed to get in discussion on how they even caught this guy too. We haven't gotten there yet, but you know that he was out trying to seek some guidance from the Mennonite community. So according to him, he visited three churches. We don't know, but he also.
Speaker 2:We found there were texts we didn't find but the text messages to his brother about how he was essentially surveilling Mennonites. And so was he. Did he stop at a few? Did this just? I mean, because there is quite a few communities between upper Arizona, utah, western New Mexico. There is a lot of choices, you're right. And also even there that was one of the things too the cops were asking why didn't you just go down the street? Why'd you drive here? It just was it random, Did you say, like you said, did he get so far away? That's certainly not the first one. I mean, I just can't imagine that's the first one you find in New Mexico. We'd have to really look and see.
Speaker 2:Oh no, I think he mapped them out, I think he knew exactly where he was going and looking when he was at Phoenix, correct?
Speaker 1:Well, the Air Force Base, yeah, so seven hours away.
Speaker 2:You've got to drive pretty deep into New Mexico, so you're going to pass a lot of them.
Speaker 1:So like.
Speaker 2:I said said why is this one? Because he could have actually probably driven the closer ones in new mexico.
Speaker 1:You know this is a pretty far one because farmington's up in the far northwest corner. I think, and some of that to me is getting the courage to do what you're about to do maybe he did.
Speaker 2:I think that is very likely that he did go and try to see she. Um, I mean well, why you her?
Speaker 1:Well, why are you going over state line, right? So if you know you're going back to Arizona, which is where he lived, then he's going to probably feel like maybe he's possibly throwing them off if he does this in another state and goes back to another one. He wasn't very smart, he made, I mean, it really wasn't that hard to find.
Speaker 2:I'm just saying if you got to Google map and you said I want to go to another.
Speaker 2:I want to go to another state and find a Mennonite church. I think you would have gone through a lot of them. So did he go through a lot in New Mexico? This just happened to be because I mean seriously, like there was days of doing this. Did he work up the courage and eventually stop at this church? I mean, it is not so random in that he is looking for someone in the M community to take out his anger on, but totally random that it happened to be this church this time of night. How did he know? Or did he go there? Because that's the other thing too.
Speaker 1:Him using the term surveilling in his text messages, he could have been out there all day just waiting for somebody in the right moment just to see. Well, they actually know that he got there. So her phone and his phone. Okay. So let's stop here for a second because I think we need to. We know her body is found in the National Park.
Speaker 2:Oh yeah, we need to discuss how he was found.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so her body's found Again. Autopsy showed Um little to no defensive wounds, um a gunshot to the head, blunt force trauma to the head. Her arm, her wrists were tied in the front of her. She was fully clothed, her hair was still done, she was laying. She looked like she had laid, had been laid by a bush Um and a woman walking through the national park during the day um found her through the national park during the day um found her. So what police were really trying to figure out is here's what they had on her phone, chris they actually knew her path right because they knew where now she was found.
Speaker 2:So they arizona police did not know that. They did not know that until because she was not fitting the profile of any missing reports right, they put it out to new mexico that's right, that's when they learn, you know, identify that.
Speaker 1:This based on the dress and everything yeah, and then they identify her by fingerprints. So fingerprint analysis is actually how they realized it was her um. But they, because of one, they knew where she was living um, they knew where she was now found. So how did she get that far away, with no vehicle? Who could she have possibly been with if nobody in that community had actually left with her um? And the only thing? So I didn't even know that they could do this. Did you know that they could subpoena all cell phone networks? I mean, we're talking thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of phones, right, because what they were trying to do is figure out the one cell phone maybe not, maybe two, who knows? But this was one cell phone that had the same exact path from where her phone started in the community, went to the four corners monument, which was about 60 miles away from farmington, and then down to the national park by flagstaff, and they only found one. But they did this by cell phone, and that is how they found 22-year-old.
Speaker 2:Mark Gooch, when they learned of her path and then saw this other one.
Speaker 1:Yes, I mean this is how they found him. So by this time they are, you know, I mean, crazy. They found it this way. But I mean my gosh, what technology can do and the ability to find him and this phone. And so what they start doing is they basically just start trying to figure out. You know, why do they know each other? How do they know each other? Or how did she end up down here? So that's when they realize, okay, he's from um, you know, they start realizing that he's from wisconsin and they start doing research. They know he's an airman, right, and so it's like they. Then they're like wait, this guy, he doesn't really have any criminal history here. He is in the military, in the air force. Um, there is, is that thunder? That's okay. And I and so they were like, okay, the cell phone matches up, but I don't know if it's this guy. So they were a little, I think, think, taken back that his phone is the one that pings with hers throughout this whole time.
Speaker 1:But they finally decide to go and talk to him and once they do, they bring him in, they ask him some questions what were you doing? And by this time they kind of know that they have all this information. And police typically don't just like lawyers, they typically don't ask questions they already don't know the answer to. So they already knew the answers to these questions. They're just wanting to see what his answers are. And immediately investigators know he's lying.
Speaker 1:Right, he says that why did you go to the church? Well, I went there to look at church times. Well, really that's interesting. Why would you drive seven hours when there's plenty of Mennonite churches by where you are and if not, within a certain amount of radius of where you're living? So it really just wasn't adding up. And then they ask him you know, did you travel to Farmington? He admits, yes, that he did and that he was looking at the church times. And I mean, again, he was showing absolutely no emotion, he was basically just making no sense. I mean, they had him. They had him. They immediately arrest him, chris. They find, while they're talking to him, they are getting a warrant to search his vehicle. Right, they find some gloves. They find a receipt that he had his car detailed, I think within 24 to 48 hours of her once.
Speaker 1:They actually found her, yes, and then you know they find, find, I think they find some gloves and just other other stuff. Okay, but they know this guy did it, they feeling good about this. It's a lot of circumstantial evidence right now but it's pretty powerful circumstantial evidence. And again, you talked about the text messages to his brothers. So I mentioned one was a cop, one was an IT and then he himself was an airman. And you know they, you know, gosh, I don't know, it is hard to kind of say they found enjoyment hating Mennonites because they did, they literally did, they would text each other their disdain for them and I just it's very hard for me to wrap my head around just not liking something because you don't, I don't know, I don't even know. It's just so unbelievable sometimes when you think about it, because this guy literally drove to Farmington, to this community. Why do racist people hate another race? Sometimes, when you think about it, because this guy literally drove to farmington, I mean, why this community? Why?
Speaker 2:do racist people hate another race I know it's never done anything to them, it's just hatred, it's just hatred doesn't have to be anything specific. That happened. Yeah, who knows? It is pretty, pretty strange and kind of disgusting, but yeah, I mean just even their messages back and forth and what is? Even his brother. And this guy's a police officer, which is so crazy too, because, you know, this is the guy who's supposed to be helping people, and he's a pretty nasty person too, as we do learn yeah and oh, I mean it is kind of wild they're texting, even when mark gooch went to, when you know ends up in prison.
Speaker 1:His brother and him are having conversations over the prison phone line like no one's listening.
Speaker 2:Which seemed that to me struck me as so odd. His brother is a police officer.
Speaker 1:Well, he was talking to the TIT brother because he asked him to erase his phone.
Speaker 2:I know the other brother is a police officer. You would think that he would tell the other like if you're speaking on the phone, be careful what you say and talk about. They record your freaking phone conversations.
Speaker 1:I don't know, unless you're talking to your attorney.
Speaker 2:So I mean it's. It's almost like having a cell phone. We all, america's dumbest criminals. I guess he thought he was going so far away and they would never ever be connected to this, but I mean, once again, technology technology wins.
Speaker 1:I mean, well, and I'll tell you, the biggest piece of that technology and cell phone was the fact that his phone was sitting in like in the same spot for about three to four hours, which was in the community, for about three to four hours, which was in the community. So they know that he was sitting waiting to abduct or hurt someone and they also know that he was actually text messaging his brothers during this time. Now, whether or not his brothers knew he was going to commit murder, I don't know. I don't think police really could ever say that they were in on it or knew what he was going to do. There wasn't exact messages like I'm about to do this, but he was sitting there waiting to abduct someone and that's what he did.
Speaker 2:I would think.
Speaker 1:They believe he got out of his car, tied her wrist together and put her in the vehicle.
Speaker 2:Your brother's a police officer. You tell him you're surveilling a group of people that you hate.
Speaker 1:I know is his brother a freaking idiot, does he not know you don't think they're all idiots in my opinion that he's going to do some either hurt somebody, maybe not kill somebody, but it's there to do some malice and that's just so crazy.
Speaker 2:His brother's almost kind of egging him on.
Speaker 1:You know, yeah, about the whole thing they're all disgusting, um, frankly so, um, okay, so even in the, they did not know each other. Stranger on stranger crimes are the hardest to solve. Um, I am very glad there is justice in this case, because this could have turned out very differently. Thankfully there was a lot of cell phone data and they could get him. But they believe he drove that seven hours Now. Whether or not he had planned to do it somewhere else, whether or not he chickened out and just kept driving, whether he had to kind of get himself amped up, chris, whether he had to kind of get himself amped up, chris, to get to the point to abduct someone and then murder them.
Speaker 1:You know, we talk about that and hear that a lot about from our police officer friends, that sometimes they chicken out right, these abductors and murderers. They might only start with a sexual assault and then the next person, next victim, it goes, but this guy abducts her. We know she had no defensive wounds. The worst case scenario in my mind is that this woman just stood there and prayed out loud and this shit happened to her. It's it. It just makes my skin crawl and it makes me cry when I think about this, because I I just it's just unbelievable that if she did Chris, if she didn't fight back, if, if there were no defensive wounds that were seen, whether she did or not, whether he had subdued or somehow I don't think we'll ever really know all of those details um, I possibly could get um a foia and police report from farmington and read about this, but but again your mind just thinks, my god, this girl had did not see this coming and you and she's probably in shock.
Speaker 2:It's an odd group, a group of people to hate, especially given their fact that they don't really I mean, she gave her life to God.
Speaker 1:Well, not even that.
Speaker 2:It's just the fact that they're just as a group. Pacifism is widely taught, you know.
Speaker 1:That's right.
Speaker 2:We don't meet violence with violence, and so it's just of all the people you could probably have ill will against. It is just so odd too. That's also what kind of makes it. So it's all sad, but just even so too. Like why aren't people that hurt anybody?
Speaker 1:Just so unfortunate and so senseless. We know, chris, he returned to the body. We know that he went back to the national park. They don't know what he did. They don't know if he took something off of her. They don't know if he went to move her. They never. I just couldn't. I don't see where he ever said why he he went back, but cell phone data shows that he actually had gone back to the scene of the crime.
Speaker 1:He also gave a friend the gun. So once he had been arrested, the friend saw this and heard about it and he immediately called police and said that he had the weapon. Well, the simultaneously time of this is when he's asked his brother to go and actually get the weapon. Police know this and they actually put a sting on the guy's house. The brother shows up to pick up the weapon and that's when actually the brother is arrested and you know he flips on him and testifies against him at his trial. So the father gets on the stand.
Speaker 1:The father, mark Gooch, also gets on the stand and again he testified that you know just what it was like for him and his family in the Mennonite community. The brother gets on the stand and you know, I think one of the questions he's asked was you know, did your brother hate Mennonites? And he's like, well, I don't know how my brother really felt about Mennonites and you know, we know that's a bunch of bullshit and really how all of the brothers kind of felt about again targeting you know your profiling and targeting in your messaging and not only that with your words to your own family. And again, chris, my psychiatrist friends, a group of brothers who are raised in Mennonites. Now all three have jobs that you're not supposed to have as a Mennonite and then you hate them as well. Like that is all psychological shit that we could probably bring someone on and talk about, but that's not going to be us.
Speaker 1:But there was a lot there to hear in the courtroom. The judge said this murder of this beautiful young lady was the most senseless crime she had ever been involved in. She simply didn't deserve this and, again, a sense of safety in a community where she felt totally at home. Mark Gooch was convicted of first degree murder. He is serving life in prison without the possibility of parole. Until next time. Friends, stay safe, have fun and cheers to next time.
Speaker 2:Cheers. Thank you.