MISSING: Brittany Wallace Shank

[00:00] Hi, Crime Junkies. It's Britt. If you're like me and you're ready to dive into even more cases, there's another podcast I think you're going to love. Park Predators. In Park Predators, host Delia D'Ambra dives into the haunting crimes that happen in some of the most beautiful and unexpected places across the globe. Delia has helped host a couple of episodes of Crime Junkie in the past, and if you've listened to her before, you already know her investigative approach brings the facts of each case and their chilling details to life. [00:30] perfect mix of captivating and informative storytelling.

So once you're done with this episode of Crime Junkie, go check out Park Predators. New episodes drop every week. Listen wherever you get your podcasts. [00:43] St. Joe County 911, where is the emergency? I'm off with Fawn River. Okay, you're on Fawn River Road near what Cross Street? [00:52] You're right. [00:55] What cross street or what address are you at on Fawn River? [00:59] I guess it's on Farn River. [01:10] Um... [01:11] Here's the guy. Okay, sure. [01:14] That [redacted address]. Joseph County Dispatch just before 9 at night. [01:19] on November 30, 2018.

[01:22] from a house off a rural road right outside Sturgis, Michigan. Okay, can you tell me what's going on there tonight? I don't know. The girl just came to the back door, and she had no shoes on, no coat. She's bleeding on her feet, on her arms. She said her boyfriend took off somewhere. He wrecked the car and took off running, I guess. So believe you? [01:47] If you didn't catch all that, the man, his name is John, said that the young woman that came to his back door was stranded after her boyfriend wrecked their car and then took off on foot without her.

It was bitter cold with snow on the ground. So the fact that she showed up barefoot with no coat and a bit scratched up and bleeding was cause for concern. [02:17] I don't know. I couldn't tell you that. Okay. All right. Would he say that she's, I mean, does she need medical attention? Or you said it's not curious? Or what's going on? It's not. [02:29] Under the static and radio chatter, you can hear the young woman John is speaking to in the background of the call. [02:36] She doesn't sound panicked.

Her tone is measured, and she tells them that she does want medical attention. [02:52] Can you tell me your name? [02:55] If you don't think you want to talk to me. Okay. [03:00] Welcome back in here. [03:02] Thank you. [03:03] That's the moment when the woman takes off from John's, still barefoot, but wearing a green John Deere sweatshirt that John had given her for warmth. [03:25] Law enforcement would later learn that the woman who ran was 23-year-old Brittany Wallace Schenck. [03:31] She was moments away from help, but something pulled her away from the safety of John's back porch.

[03:38] What or who or why has never been fully determined. [03:43] Because since Britney slipped into the darkness that November night back in 2018, [03:49] She has never been seen again. [03:52] And trying to understand what happened to her, what even brought Brittany out to that rural road to begin with. [03:59] and who she was with, [04:01] opens a Pandora's box of conflicting stories, troubling allegations, and [04:07] and a mystery that has taken on a life of its own. [04:11] I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. And I'm Britt. And welcome back, crime junkies.

[04:17] Thank you. [04:48] The entire scenario that kicked off this case, a woman comes to a stranger's door, a little worse for the wear, shoeless, coatless, in the cold, saying she was in a car wreck and her boyfriend took off and left her. [05:01] Then she takes off just before deputies are about to come. [05:05] That would be more than enough for a red flag to be thrown up for crime jenches, right? We would be like spiraling and like jumping into action. [05:14] Actually, we've literally seen this play out before.

This feels like a slightly different version of the start to our episode on LISC when Shannon Gilbert was like running to a house looking for help. Mm hmm. [05:23] Maybe that's why to me this should have been so alarming from the jump. [05:28] But sadly, that's apparently not what's on the minds of first responders. [05:34] We were able to get what seems to be most of the case file. And when they look over the car that's been abandoned, they realize this was far from a serious crash. [05:43] One of the few things almost everyone in this case can actually agree on is just how thick the fog was that night.

And it looked like the car had basically just kind of like [05:52] veered off the road into... [05:55] They call it a ditch, but like we're talking a very shallow ditch and then maybe got stuck. [06:00] The car was still drivable, though. [06:02] and [06:03] Even the injuries that John saw, he described them as small cuts on her feet and her arms. [06:09] I don't know where those would have come from. [06:11] Some suggest that maybe from the brush in the field going from the car to John's, if she cut through that way and didn't use the road.

[06:19] But like, [06:20] This is, like, right where we grew up. Yeah. These, like, Michigan, Indiana, northern Indiana, like, fields. And this is in November? Late November. Everything is, like, cut down by this point. Yeah, there'd be, like, some sticks and stuff in, like, the farm fields, but... [06:33] Not a lot. I know. And some people have even said, oh, well, if they cut down the corn and the stalks were still up, like, but I was like, yeah, but deep tracks. I know my field. You have to switch between corn and soybeans.

What was it that year? I don't know. And you sometimes like till it under at the end of the season. So like, yes, there'd be stalks, but they're like half buried. Also, like there is the paved road that goes right to his house, like from where the car was. So like, I don't even know that she would have had to have cut through a field. [06:57] Listen, I don't know where the cuts come from. [06:59] But I don't think it was from the crash because there is really no crash. [07:03] Crash.

[07:05] I have talked to enough cops to know that they do see a lot of this, right? Like if a driver doesn't want to encounter police for whatever reason... [07:14] They will just leave a vehicle. [07:16] Maybe there was a reason that Brittany seemed cagey with John. Maybe she didn't really care. [07:22] want the police to come out there. Okay, but then why go asking for medical help? That is not a mystery that they attempt to solve right then. [07:31] I mean, I don't think they know who the woman was when they first show up.

They don't know that it was Britney. [07:36] They're kind of thinking like whoever that was, she's probably just going to show back up. [07:40] And the truth is, the people in Britney's life were probably making some of the same assumptions. [07:46] The 23-year-old mom was struggling with substance use. She had recently given up custody of her four kids while trying to get back on her feet, hoping to start a new job, maybe enroll in school. [07:58] And she had a warrant out for her arrest at the time for larceny. [08:02] So when she goes MIA, at least at first, they kind of wonder if that's because she wanted to.

[08:09] But don't get it twisted. I mean, some of her family and friends had been looking for her, like asking around, even. [08:14] Her boyfriend had been out trying to find her. The boyfriend who took off on her? That's the catch. It was her boyfriend, Sheldon Ashbrook. It was his car that she had been driving. [08:27] But when police dropped by unannounced after the incident, likely sometime around 10.30 m. or later to tell him that his car had been impounded, [08:35] Sheldon was home and informed them that he hadn't even been with Britney.

[08:39] She borrowed his car that night and he said he had no clue who she would have been with. [08:43] So it sounds like even he just assumed that Brittany was either embarrassed, maybe by what she had done to his car, or maybe she was laying low due to the fact that there was a warrant out on her. [08:55] Weirdly, it doesn't seem like he told her family about the car incident right away. [09:01] We told some friends, but the family didn't find out until later that she had taken off after the car went off the road.

[09:08] Though even then, they hear that the car was operable, so [09:12] She must have just walked off, right? [09:15] Even her being barefoot in the snow didn't stand out to them too much. [09:20] Her mom told us that Brittany was known to run around in flip-flops or even barefoot, even when it was freezing in Michigan. [09:27] And listen, [09:28] Those instincts might have been right. [09:31] Because it turns out when Brittany went to John's that night looking for help, [09:35] She did. She went to his house looking to use the phone.

[09:38] But she didn't necessarily call 911 right away. [09:42] She had actually tried calling her grandma Vicky first. [09:45] But either that call didn't go through or grandma just didn't answer. [09:49] And I don't know for sure if it was her or John who actually ended up dialing 911. [09:54] Like she ends up passing the phone off to him pretty quickly and then doesn't seem to want to give him any information. So, [10:00] I keep thinking... [10:01] Maybe he like dialed before she realized what was going on. Like since she didn't seem scared, my gut is...

[10:09] that Britt probably wasn't looking for help for first responders. - She called Grandma for a ride or something. - Exactly. [10:15] And when she realized that deputies were going to be showing up, [10:18] She took off. [10:20] But that doesn't explain... [10:22] why she hadn't turned back up now. [10:26] And with every day that passed with no word from her, [10:29] Everyone who knew Britney was growing more worried. [10:32] especially the longer she went without being active on social media. [10:36] Because apparently she is like a Facebook junkie. [10:39] But the real final straw that set off alarm bells was learning that Brittany hadn't been in touch with her grandma Vicki.

[10:46] at all after she tried to call her that night. [10:49] Because the two of them were close and they talked constantly. [10:54] So eight days after the night that she walked off into the cold, Brittany's dad, Greg Wallace, reports her missing to the St. Joseph County Sheriff's Office. [11:03] And once they open an investigation, they decide to go to Grandma, since she likely had the most contact with Brittany. They think she's going to be super helpful in trying to map out Britt's movements leading up to the night of November 30th.

[11:16] And it is a worthwhile stop. [11:18] Grandma is a wealth of information because luckily the last time Grandma had seen bread just so happened to be the same night of this. [11:27] car crash or the car going off the road. [11:30] And Brit wasn't alone. [11:32] Deputies learn that [11:34] Earlier on November 30th, sometime around 6.30 and 7, [11:39] Brittany had stopped by her grandma's house to do laundry with a guy. [11:43] Now, it doesn't sound like they were really interacting too much with anyone else at the house, but [11:47] That could have been because they had been using drugs that night.

[11:51] Now later, when her family finally heard that 911 call, they told us that they suspect that she was high because of the way that she sounded. [11:58] Now, at Grandma's, she and this guy... [12:00] also appeared to be arguing a bit, and he was rushing her like he had somewhere better to be. [12:06] And they stayed long enough to wash the clothes, but not long enough to, like, fully dry them. Instead, Brittany stuffed damp laundry into a basket, and then they left together. Let's call it, like... [12:15] 8:30, 8:45

m. So Sheldon lied. Sheldon did not lie. [12:21] Grandma knows Sheldon. He and Brittany had been friends for years before dating on and off. [12:26] Grandma says this wasn't him. [12:30] Okay, then who was he? Nobody knows. [12:35] But like I said, Brittany and this guy barely interacted with anyone else. And in hindsight, Grandma says there was something... [12:42] off about this guy. Like he just [12:44] They couldn't put their finger on it. [12:46] Nobody ever got his name, though, is the catch. [12:49] they do have a pretty good description of him.

[12:53] He is this. [12:54] thin white guy in his like early to mid 20s between 5'6, 5'8 ish with short blonde hair and thick [13:01] mutton chop sideburns. [13:03] like Elvis, as Grandma described. [13:06] And he was wearing, like, a yellow sweatsuit-type outfit with, like, some black on it. So when Brittany said her boyfriend took off after the crash... [13:14] Is she talking about... [13:15] This guy, like whoever he is, if if there was a man in the car with her when it went off the road, I think it has to be this guy just based on the timeline.

Right. So based on what grandma remembers, they left her house around 830 m. [13:29] The spot where the car went off the road is about a five minute drive away. [13:33] And then getting to John's should take less than 10 minutes on foot. [13:37] We know that the 911 call is placed around 8.50. [13:40] So it seems like there wouldn't have been a lot of time for her to have, like, [13:44] picked up anyone else. I don't think anyone else could have been in that car with her. [13:48] If someone was in the car with her, it has to be this guy that she left grandma's with.

[13:53] Now, is there a chance that she dropped him somewhere and she was alone in the car? No. [13:58] Maybe. [13:59] But there isn't a whole lot in this area. I was going to say, this is like a pretty rule. [14:03] area. Yeah. So personally, I think it's unlikely. [14:07] Also, the direction that they were driving is kind of interesting to me. [14:11] I don't know where Brittany was headed to, but like the direction she was going in was toward Bronson. [14:17] Now, she used to live in Bronson, but Bronson is away from Sturgis, where she has been staying with Sheldon.

[14:24] Now, the thing I'll say is that we're told a lot of drug connections lived out that way in Bronson. [14:29] So, [14:30] Maybe she was going to somewhere she used to live or to a connection she knew, but like, [14:35] I have no idea. Okay, so I'm buying that the mystery man is in the car with her. [14:40] But like, why does she call him her boyfriend though? Nobody really knows. [14:45] Now... [14:46] I mean, I have to say, according to some family members that we spoke to, [14:49] Sheldon actually did kind of fit at least...

[14:53] some parts of the description. Like, [14:56] He is blonde. I think he has like similar-ish facial hair, which I can show you. [15:01] But the build, I think, was really different. [15:04] And years later, some close to the case would question just how reliable everyone's memory really was that night. Right. Like Grandma's saying, I know Sheldon's for sure not him. But they also say Grandma had a few beers. [15:15] And nobody at the house seemed to be paying particularly close attention to this guy. [15:20] And I'm not like blaming them for that.

They couldn't have known the importance that like he would become in this case. [15:26] Grandma says it is not Sheldon. [15:29] So to your point, why is Brittany calling someone else her boyfriend? [15:33] Maybe she used the term loosely. [15:35] Maybe it was someone that she was seeing on the side. [15:39] Or maybe she just didn't feel like explaining her love life to a complete stranger, right? [15:43] 'Cause [15:44] Let me tell you, her love life was pretty freaking complicated, as we will soon get into. [15:50] But just a quick observation.

[15:53] I've seen what's believed to be the last selfie that Brittany took from Sheldon's car before leaving that night. [16:00] And she looks pretty done up. [16:02] Maybe that means absolutely nothing. [16:04] But to me, it doesn't exactly scream like I'm just going to grandma's to do laundry. More likely, she may have been like going out, going to meet up with somebody. Yes. Yes. [16:13] And if she was seeing another guy... [16:17] Then the question becomes, [16:19] Did Sheldon know about it? [16:22] When investigators circle back to Sheldon, [16:24] The short answer, according to him, [16:27] is no.

[16:28] He admits the two weren't exactly in the best place the day that she vanished, mostly due to Britt's meth use. [16:35] He insists this wasn't some like blow up fight they had or anything more just like bickering. [16:40] But he does say that before leaving the house that night, Brittany told him something along the lines of, you're not going to like me much later. [16:47] which he took to mean at the time that she was going to go out and get high. [16:52] He says he actually didn't want to lend his card to her that night.

[16:55] People we spoke to told us that that car was his baby. [16:59] But that night, Brittany asked to borrow it so she could go to her grandma's. [17:03] And according to Sheldon, he actually even offered to drive her himself. Like it was only like a 15 minute cruise away. [17:09] But he says that Brittany got irritated about this and was adamant about taking the car. [17:13] Which makes sense if she's meeting up with another guy. Which is what I think happens. [17:19] Because Sheldon helps fill in more of the timeline for November 30th.

[17:24] He says that she left his place likely sometime between 5 and 6 m. [17:29] And not long after, Brittany called him up, like half joking, half complaining. I think that there wasn't enough gas in the car and she was going to have to stop and fill up. [17:37] And after, that's when we have a gap where we think she picks someone up before going to grandma's. [17:43] Now, once hours pass by, Sheldon tries contacting Brittany to see where she's at. She's supposed to be back with his car, but she won't answer, which probably frustrates him.

[17:54] Not because he is thinking she's with some other guy. He is thinking that she's out using. And like I said, not back with his car after he already seemed like on the fence about her taking it. [18:03] And look, after talking to people close to this case, Sheldon [18:06] doesn't really seem like the jealous type. He is more so the guy that Britt felt she could always fall back on if she needed something. [18:14] So at 9.42, he actually called a friend and his cousin and asked them to pick him up so they could go out and look for Brittany.

[18:22] And deputies end up confirming this with those two people. [18:26] The first place they said they checked, [18:28] are the Village Manor Apartments in Sturgis. Why not Grandma's if that's where she said she was going? Well, because according to Sheldon, Brittany would go to these apartments to visit friends and to do drugs. [18:39] like or get drugs and remember like that is what he thought was going on here why she isn't back [18:43] But he goes there, doesn't spot her car. So then they did go by grandma's. No car there either.

[18:50] They said they drove back to the Village Manor apartments one more time, but when they still couldn't find her, they just went back to Sheldon's house. [18:57] and it is very soon after he gets back home [19:00] that there is a knock on his door. [19:03] Not Britney, obviously, but police. [19:06] And so now we're back to the point in the timeline that I've already told you about. [19:09] When officers showed up to tell him that his car was found abandoned after this quote-unquote crash, [19:15] And Sheldon said that he had no clue who Britt had been with.

[19:19] And so... [19:20] This is one of the great mysteries of this case because [19:24] There is some evidence to suggest that Britney might not have been running from a car accident that night. [19:31] She may have been running, [19:33] From this man. [19:35] And there are signs that Mystery Man may have found her. [19:45] Let's face it, if student loans are slowing down your financial goals, it might be time for a smarter strategy. That's where today's sponsor SoFi comes in. SoFi is helping you tackle student debt by refinancing your loans with flexible monthly payments that fit your budget.

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Visit com slash Crime Junkie to see how much you can save. That's com slash Crime Junkie and start making smarter money moves with SoFi. SoFi student loans are originated by SoFi Bank and a member FDIC. [20:44] S 696891. [20:52] This case started with Sheldon's car going off the road. [20:55] Supposedly, that is why Brittany went to John's and asked to use the phone. [21:00] But there is something about that that doesn't really ring all the way true. [21:05] I mean, yes, the car went off the road, but like I said, I think it was still totally drivable.

[21:10] Now, police did have it told, probably just because it had been abandoned. Someone had fled the scene. [21:15] But most people our reporter Madison talked to said that this ditch was super crazy. [21:20] shallow. [21:21] arguably they wouldn't even call it a real ditch. I wouldn't either. I was like on Google Maps. I've seen videos that they sent us of out. Like you grew up in this area. I can like close my eyes and imagine it's like a slight divot on the shoulder and then back into the field. Barely.

[21:35] And if a car went off, and I know there's a little snow on the ground, like say it was really low to the ground, I think even just with a little bit of effort, you would have been able to get it out of there. Now, to be fair, if you're on your own or like if you were high, maybe you are really stuck. [21:51] But for argument's sake, [21:53] Say the car could have been driven out of there. [21:57] Why wouldn't she? [21:58] Maybe she was trying to get away from someone else.

[22:01] in the car. [22:03] Remember, she had those small cuts and injuries that can't fully be explained by her... [22:08] just going off the road. [22:09] maybe tapping a little small tree that was there. [22:13] Grandma said that Brittany and the mystery man seemed to be arguing a bit, remember. [22:18] And Brittany's mom, Jessica Rolfe, told us something interesting about her. [22:23] Believe it or not, she said that Brittany actually had this habit of impulsively jumping out of cars when she was pissed off. [22:29] Like it's something her mom had witnessed her doing before in an argument.

And to further hint at this idea that something happened in the car, [22:39] When Sheldon got the car back from impound, he says the inside was trashed, like, [22:44] The glove box was open. Britney's purse had supposedly been, like, dumped out. Her belongings were scattered everywhere. [22:50] And apparently that was exactly how it was when first responders found it on the side of the road in the first place. [22:57] So say something happened in that car. [23:01] before or after it went off the road. [23:03] Was Brittany trying to get away from the person she was in the car with?

[23:09] If so... [23:10] there is a good chance that he caught up to her. [23:13] Now, John isn't around anymore for us to get this story directly from him. [23:18] But Brittany's dad, Greg, relayed to us, [23:21] that John had told someone that when he went out to his detached garage the next morning, after Britney had been at his house, [23:29] It looked like someone had gone through his stuff. [23:32] The insinuation being... [23:34] that this had supposedly happened when Brittany herself was inside with John talking to dispatch. Meaning Mystery Man is in the garage.

Right. [23:44] That doesn't mean she didn't know. [23:46] What do you mean? [23:47] I mean, like, I'd venture to guess people are more willing to open their door to a young woman in trouble than a woman and a man. Like, maybe she went up to use the phone... [23:57] told him to wait outside, away. Actually, that would make a lot of sense, especially... [24:03] when combined with the tidbit of info that we get when deputies canvass the neighborhood. [24:09] Okay, there isn't like much of a neighborhood campus. Again, you know this area.

It's super spread out. Yeah, it's pretty rural. But there was another house not too far from Johns on the same road. [24:20] And someone in that house saw Britt that night, too. [24:24] According to the case file, there was this young teen who was home alone, and they reported seeing Brittany outside this house wearing a big green coat, just like the one that John had given her. [24:35] So, I mean, we can almost be sure that this is her. [24:37] And we can be sure that this happened after she left John.

[24:41] But it's what happened next that's really unsettling. So according to the report, while he watched this woman, like, circle from the backyard to the front, like, peering through the windows... [24:49] He heard someone else knocking on his front door at the same time. [24:54] time. [24:55] Now, this teenager is obviously like super freaked out. He's not going to answer the door for whoever is knocking. [25:00] He didn't see what that person looked like or anything. [25:03] The question is... [25:05] was to like to your point so like I was originally thinking like was this person [25:09] like stalking her and looking for her, thinking maybe she was at John's, maybe she's here.

[25:14] OR [25:15] Now thinking what you're saying, were they together? Did they travel to that second house? [25:19] together. So, [25:21] did they ever do searches in like the fields? Cause again, like, [25:25] Looking at a map of this... [25:27] like you said, this is an area like where I grew up. These houses are [25:30] kind of like square miles apart sometimes. They're huge. Yeah, huge fields in between. If she's barefoot and it's freezing, there's some snow on the ground, [25:40] And this next house didn't open their door. Maybe she didn't make it any...

[25:44] Yeah, I mean, people have wondered that, thinking that she... [25:48] like either became disoriented in like the freezing dark, especially if she was using drugs. She succumbed to the elements somewhere near the road that they're on. It's called Fawn River Road. [25:57] Or they're even thinking, like, did she possibly overdose? [26:00] But to answer your question, yes, they have surged. And [26:04] They haven't found anything. So like that makes me think that that's super unlikely. [26:08] Especially when you think about this is like late... [26:10] November, early December when they're searching.

[26:13] This is flat, flat farmland for, like, as far as the eye can see. The joke is, like, you can watch your dog run away for a week. Like, there's nothing there. If she had just, like... [26:24] like, you know, fallen and died there or like whatever. You would see her body. She would have been discovered by now. [26:31] And even since those early days, there have been even more searches beyond the open fields, like in surrounding woods. [26:37] water, but still, Britney has never been found. [26:41] And outside of people having their own varying opinions on who he might be, mystery man has never been identified.

Which I'm still having a hard time wrapping my head around because this is like 2018, right? Yeah, this is like fairly recently. Right. Did we not pull phone records? How do we not... [26:59] No. [27:00] who she was meeting up with that night and again. [27:03] What about the car? Because Prince should have been all over it if he was in it, right? It's so frustrating. So we know she has her phone with her when she leaves Sheldon. Remember, she took that selfie. Right. But I don't know what happened to her phone.

Because actually, one of the things I keep wondering is why she wouldn't use that to call for help. [27:19] Like, why did she even need to go to John's farmhouse at all? [27:22] And according to Sheldon, [27:24] It hadn't been left behind in his car when he went to pick it up. So the only thing... [27:29] that I can come up with as far as her phone goes is like, [27:32] A, maybe Mystery Man took it, and that's why she needed to go to John's. [27:36] Or B... [27:38] Like, I'm trying to think back to 2018.

Was this a world where, like... [27:41] there was bad service. Like, I mean, it could definitely be spotty for sure. And listen, I know, according to the case file, authorities attempted to ping it, even though you can't find it. In my [27:51] you know, it is 2018, let's pull the records. [27:55] But it's noted in the case file that whatever ping they tried to do just didn't work. Like the phone was either... [28:00] off or it was roaming or there was like no service. Okay, but can't they see where it was like, [28:05] before it went offline?

I would think, but there is no detail in the records about this. [28:11] And law enforcement wouldn't talk to us, so... [28:13] I don't know exactly what they did or didn't pull. [28:16] And I believe it may have been like a prepaid or like pay as you go kind of thing. So like, I don't know if that factors in. [28:23] But even still... [28:25] I don't know what they tried to track location wise or like communication wise, like related to that phone. [28:31] But if anything... [28:33] I assume it didn't lead them to Mystery Man or we wouldn't be here talking about it.

Right, and what about the car? So, oh, that is the thing that's going to frustrate you. It was just never processed. [28:42] I guess because they just assumed initially that this was like a girl who didn't want to be found. [28:47] like they're not thinking foul play, especially not at first. So like, [28:51] They just give it back to Sheldon. He just goes to pick it up from impound. No problem. [28:55] And then I don't know if by the time they realize what's going on, they're like, [28:58] oh well too late.

To me, it's never too late, but like never gets processed. [29:04] but at least in giving evidence back to Sheldon. [29:07] They did get a statement from him. [29:10] And he starts telling police about the people that Brittany was known to go see. [29:16] Starting with a woman named Ashley Hooley. [29:19] And Ashley's interesting because she lives at the same Village Manor apartment in Sturgis where Sheldon first went looking for Brittany the night that she vanished. [29:28] It wasn't Grandma's house he went to. It was there. Right. And Sheldon told investigators that he did that because Brittany regularly went there to buy and use meth.

[29:37] But Ashley wasn't just some random drug dealer. [29:41] When she comes in to speak with investigators, she tells them just how deeply she was tied to Brittany. [29:47] They're sisters. [29:49] And she's desperate to find her, and she is already trying to do whatever she can to help. [29:54] Except... [29:55] That's a lie. [29:56] I mean, she did seem to be inserting herself into the investigation, but she is not Britney's blood sister. [30:04] Brittany's dad is like, I don't even know who this woman is. What? Now, Ashley does eventually clarify that she and Brittany are not biologically related.

They're just like really close. Yeah. [30:15] And in a later interview, she'd eventually say that Britney was her best friend, but [30:20] she didn't know if she was Brittany's. [30:23] And some of Britney's family says Ashley may not have been nearly as close to Britney as she was presenting herself to be. [30:30] And over time, [30:31] They start wondering whether Ashley is genuinely trying to help solve Brittany's disappearance. Because like I said, she just keeps like putting herself in the middle. [30:40] or whether she may be trying to steer attention away from something else entirely.

[30:47] But what? [30:49] According to Ashley, she and Britt had recently been in touch, but [30:54] pinning down exactly when they last spoke or saw each other gets a bit tricky because [31:00] In one part of her interview, Ashley tells investigators that the last time she physically saw Brittany was November 23rd. [31:07] Then later, she changes that to November 28th. [31:10] But she says the last contact of any kind she had with Britney was through Facebook Messenger online. [31:15] On November 30th, the very day she vanished, [31:19] And listen, from what we know, that communication was friendly enough.

Like, Britt was just checking in on her. And what did their other interaction say, like, further back? [31:27] Why, I'd love to tell you. [31:29] But, [31:30] and this is jumping ahead just a little bit, [31:32] Something weird ends up happening with Britney's social media [31:36] People we spoke to told us that Facebook Messenger was like one of the main ways that Brittany communicated. [31:41] But everything... [31:42] on her social media had gone completely dark since she disappeared. [31:47] Except, months after she had been missing, a friend notices that one of her Facebook accounts suddenly appears active again.

So... [31:53] She tells Britt's mom, Jessica Rolfe, who then notifies law enforcement, [31:57] and [31:58] It's not like she is talking to anyone or like posting anything normally. The account just starts doing these strange things like they think stuff was possibly being like hidden, deleted, altered in some way. [32:10] Then apparently some of Brit's conversations with Ashley start disappearing. [32:15] Now, I know investigators took the activity seriously enough that in July of 2019, they requested emergency Facebook records tied to Brittany's account. [32:24] and they obtained IP address information connected to the logins.

[32:28] put a freaking course, their findings aren't documented in the files that we got access to. Why would they be? But I do believe at least some of that activity that happened on her account was [32:41] can be tied to Ashley. [32:44] because our reporter Madison got in touch with Ashley. [32:48] And she did agree to answer some questions via Facebook Messenger, of course. But they did end up hopping on a quick call later for some like follow ups at the last minute, too. [32:58] Now, Ashley acknowledges that she did, in fact, access some of Britt's online accounts after she disappeared.

[33:05] But she says that it's not in the way that's like being portrayed. Like it wasn't malicious. [33:12] She says that Sheldon sent her a picture of like notebooks that Britney kept with passwords and account recovery information and that they were like hoping those accounts might reveal who Britney had been talking to before she went missing. [33:24] According to Ashley, most of the passwords no longer work. [33:27] And she says she was only able to get into that one Facebook account. And later she told detectives that she had access to it.

[33:33] They asked her to stop going in. She says she did. [33:37] But then months later, she says that a private investigator approached her for help accessing the additional accounts. [33:42] Now, Ashley says she believed that this PI was like working with law enforcement and. [33:47] Like, again, she was trying to help. [33:49] Ashley's explanation is that she wasn't trying to alter evidence or hide information. She was simply looking for clues. [33:56] that might help locate Brittany. [33:58] And here's the thing she says isn't correct about any of these allegations.

She says that lots of stuff was already gone before she got access to it. [34:07] And according to her, it wasn't even just messages between her and Brit that got deleted either. She says there were lots more. [34:13] But, [34:14] Both of Britt's parents dispute that. Who else has got deleted? [34:19] Her parents say that there is at least one other person whose messages seem to have been messed with. [34:26] It was actually the one other person whose name kept coming up over and over again with Ashley's as they like police and her family were talking to people.

[34:35] And that... [34:36] He's Eric Schenck. [34:38] Britney's husband. [34:39] One per what, but two of these names are also... [34:44] giving me a hard time actually Eric I know I know listen I told you that her love life is complicated [34:50] Buckle up because... [34:52] This is where the case really takes a turn. [35:01] In the, there's a break-in every 26 seconds, and most security systems only alert you after a break-in has already started. But that's too late. Thankfully, SimpliSafe can actually stop crimes before they start. You guys know I've been a SimpliSafe customer for years now, and their proactive philosophy to home security is a big reason why.

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Right now, you can get 50% off your new system by visiting com slash crimejunkie. That's half off at com slash crimejunkie. There's no safe like SimpliSafe. [36:04] - Eric Shank is Britney's ex. [36:07] But still, he was technically her husband in November of 2018. [36:12] They're separated, but still legally married and sharing two children. [36:16] Brittany had reportedly started filling out divorce papers shortly before she disappeared to try and make things official. [36:23] Now, whatever arrangement they had going on meant that Brittany was free to date Sheldon or whoever else she wanted.

[36:30] But emotionally, [36:31] things were messier than that. Because according to Brittany's mom, Jessica, even though the relationship had become incredibly toxic due to drugs, [36:40] Brittany and Eric still had this intense pull toward one another. [36:45] Like, [36:45] they could split up and somehow still always end up right back in each other's orbit. [36:51] And by the time Brittany goes missing... [36:53] She may be back with Sheldon, but Eric is still deeply woven into her everyday life. [36:59] and into their little friend group because [37:02] Eric knows Ashley well, too.

He goes to her apartment to buy and use drugs, too. [37:07] And when he's later asked where he was when Brittany went missing, [37:12] Eric remembered staying over at Ashley's apartment. [37:15] that entire night. [37:18] That is part of why some of Brittany's family starts paying such close attention to Ashley moving forward. She is basically Eric's alibi and Eric hers. [37:30] And when we asked her about that night, Ashley, I mean, [37:33] She said Eric came over at like... [37:35] 8:40 m. and then was there [37:38] like [37:39] Most of the time.

[37:40] perfect alibi for the kind of exact time that Brittany goes missing. Yes, but around 1 m. she says that he left, took her car to put air in the tires, [37:53] And then it sounds like he comes back and then he eventually leaves her place again to go back home to his parents at around 2 m. [37:59] Quick question. Were they like together together? Like, I love him. He's great. My husband's not running out to fill up my tires at one in the morning. They say no. Like Ashley was actually dating someone else at the time.

This guy named Curtis Polly, who everyone called Pocket. [38:13] Get it? I got it. [38:14] But Ashley being tied up with someone else or not, I think the thing that's important here is that Brittany's mom, Jessica, told us she believes there is. [38:22] No way that Britney would have been cool with how close they seemingly were. [38:27] And Ashley herself tells detectives that she thought Brittany wanted to work things out with Eric. [38:32] even though she was seeing Sheldon. [38:34] But what Ashley is saying... [38:38] doesn't exactly pass the sniff test.

[38:41] And I'll give you an example. I'm sorry, him staying over at her house late night isn't the example? Well, that could have been anything, right? You know? Oh, right. But honestly, truly. Maybe it was about, like, the drugs. Maybe he crashed there. Also, it sounds like he's up and out and about at, like, one in the morning. [38:54] Maybe no one's crashing and they're just like hanging out. It's hard to prove anything with that. [38:59] But... [39:00] This next thing, especially the timing, [39:03] is a little bit harder to argue with.

[39:05] It's body cam footage from a traffic stop in Three Rivers, Michigan, involving Eric, [39:11] from December 23rd, 2018. So we're talking like three weeks after Britney went missing. [39:17] Is it your car, Eric? No, it's not. We just bought it for life, for a friend of yours. I borrowed it from a... [39:26] My girlfriend. [39:28] Been out in the damn woods all day. [39:31] What are you guys doing out in the woods? Looking for my wife. [39:34] She missing? Yeah, she's going to Wallace. [39:36] She's been missing since November 30th.

[39:40] Britt, do you want to guess... [39:42] who he says his girlfriend is. [39:46] All right, so I'm following this black Ford SUV with [39:50] A plate out of Sturgis registered to Ashley Hooley showing no insurance. [39:53] and it's cutting through the First Ward neighborhood using side streets. [39:57] So I make a traffic stop on it because it's not insured. It's Eric Schenck driving. [40:02] He's on a restricted license. [40:05] and John Fox Jr. is in the passenger seat, [40:07] Now, Ashley's relationship with Eric is one of the things that we asked her about.

And she did admit to us that after Brittany vanished, she and Eric spent a lot of time together because they were both caught up in the search. They were using drugs. They were dealing with intense emotions. [40:26] And Ashley acknowledges that their relationship did eventually become intimate, but she maintains that happened only after Britney's disappearance. [40:33] She says it was not during the time of this traffic stop when he is calling her his girlfriend or even before. [40:41] So anyways, back to this stop, because [40:43] There is more here. [40:44] The officers...

[40:46] like are searching the car as part of this. And it sounds like they're like concerned about drugs. [40:51] But when they ask John Fox, or, as he's known, if he's got anything on him, [40:57] He explains that he's got a notepad in his pocket full of names because he's trying to figure out what he described as... [41:04] Some sex trafficking thing that's been going on. [41:07] And I can't be 100% sure, but I think he's insinuating that this sex trafficking thing has something to do with their search for Britney.

Maybe even like why they've been out in the woods all day. [41:19] But weirdly, these officers, like, don't press. [41:22] I mean, you can definitely sense they're like skeptical about why they're really out there. [41:26] But remember, Britt's missing person case isn't theirs. Like, this is Three Rivers. She went missing in St. Joseph County. So they have no reason to connect these dots. Exactly. [41:37] Now, when Ashley shows up to the scene, because she had been called, it's her vehicle that they're in. Right. And when she's asked by an officer, she does in that moment deny that she is Eric's girlfriend, saying that he's just a friend.

[41:48] But she's clearly upset that her car is going to get impounded. She says like she can't afford it, that she has already been through a lot. [41:55] And then the situation just kind of like escalates from there fast. [41:59] They say she's not cooperating and she ends up in handcuffs. And then she claims officers hit her head on the car while arresting her. [42:06] JJ and Eric, on the other hand, appear to be staying like... [42:09] cool as cucumbers. [42:11] And even though officers find... [42:14] needle caps, and a billy club type impact weapon.

I'm sorry, a what? Like, you know, when it was like a... [42:21] It was like a heavy, like, [42:22] duty nightstick kind of thing, like a police baton. [42:25] They find all of this in there. Still, they decide to give these guys a break because it's the day before Christmas Eve. Happy holidays, folks. So all things considered, Eric and JJ seemingly, like, make it out of this traffic stop pretty much unscathed. [42:41] But here is like another reason why I think this stop is so important. [42:45] And it has to do with JJ, the passenger in the car.

[42:50] So remember in our timeline of November 30th, [42:53] After Britt leaves the house in Sheldon's car, [42:56] Sheldon said that she had called him up complaining that there wasn't enough gas. She was going to have to like stop, fill it up, whatever. So if Britt did end up stopping for gas that night, that would make sense. [43:08] "Well, what have I told you?" [43:09] There is reason to believe. [43:11] Ashley had the receipt from the transaction that Britt made [43:17] in her possession at some point. Ashley, who's saying she didn't see Brittany at all that particular day.

That's the one. Cool. Cool. [43:23] So this receipt is for $20 worth of gas at the Marathon Station on Fawn River Road. Which is the road that, like, everything is happening on. Yes. [43:32] It is time-stamped for 6-11 m. on November 30th. [43:37] and it appears to have Britt's account information on it. [43:41] But investigators don't end up with the physical copy of the receipt. They end up with photos of the receipt. [43:47] that Ashley had. That's somehow almost weirder? I know. Weirder to me is that she's not even the one who originally brought it to their attention either.

Okay, but why does she have them? Okay, so... [44:02] And this is all according to a later interview that she does with detectives. Okay. Basically, she tells them that her Ford Explorer had been stolen sometime near the... [44:12] end of January, beginning of February 2019. So this is like, to put in context, like two months after Britt went missing. Okay. Two months after her car is taken, she's [44:23] It's finally recovered. Okay. She says that when she got her car back, there was this garbage bag full of just like random items and trash inside the vehicle.

[44:33] And Ashley said she started like digging through the bag, trying to get proof of who took her car to see what they've been up to or whatever. And she claims that is where the gas receipt turned up. [44:43] So she said she snapped a picture of it. [44:45] And to be fair, she said she took photos of a lot of things that she found in that bag. [44:50] And she said she didn't realize the significance of the receipt until it had already been thrown away. But if you didn't think it was important, then why take a photo of it then?

I mean, it's literally what Mads asked her to. And Ashley said something that I think kind of contradicts what I just told you from her official statement to investigators. [45:07] Because she tells Mads now that she actually did notice the November 30th date, the time, like the specific gas station. And she says she had this gut feeling that it might be connected to Britt. [45:18] even though at that point in time, she said that [45:21] no one was thinking foul play yet. It's important if there was foul play that no one's thinking about yet.

Yeah. What? Because she's like, at that point, they're just like trying to, when she finds it, like track down her friend. [45:32] I don't know. [45:33] But I do know that back when she was telling police this, she did believe she knew who took her vehicle and who had it for like two months. [45:43] And here we're coming back. [45:44] John Fox, Jr. JJ. JJ. [45:48] She told Madison she's confident it was JJ because she claims he literally took off with her keys, left her a note saying he was borrowing it, and then just like...

[45:56] never bothered bringing it back. Oh. The thing is, she's not necessarily saying that, like, he's the one who had their seat initially. Yeah. [46:06] She's kind of just like, you know, it could have easily been like any one of the many people [46:11] in the circle that he associated with that he could have like picked up or been in the vehicle or borrowed the vehicle in like the time period that she is saying she did not have it. And he supposedly did. [46:24] But here's the thing. [46:25] The gas receipt isn't the only thing connected to Britney that somehow resurfaces after she disappears.

[46:32] Because. [46:32] Remember, [46:34] Brittany's phone never recovered from Sheldon's car or anywhere else. That's still not totally found after the crash. [46:41] And this did always strike her family as odd because according to Jessica, Brittany would have like fought somebody over that phone. So for it to be completely like gone that night with her, like seemingly untraceable. [46:52] That's always been like a big mystery. Like they're thinking that [46:55] It has to be with her, right? Who is missing. That's the only thing that makes sense. [46:59] But then this happens.

[47:00] So... [47:02] Eric Schenck showed up to one of the early searches for Britney. [47:06] Dropped off by Ashley, by the way. [47:09] Even though Britt's family told us that, like, at this point in time, like, they did not even know who she was. [47:14] But it is like in this one of like early day searches that he claims to have found [47:20] part [47:21] of Brit's phone. Part [47:23] of a heart. So according to people close to the case, [47:27] What Eric allegedly said he found was the back plate from a Samsung phone [47:33] that resembled the one that Britney had been using before she disappeared.

[47:36] Samsung J337P. [47:40] And we know that that's reportedly the same model tied to the selfie that Brittany took before leaving Sheldon's that night. [47:46] It all seems to match up. [47:48] But some of Britt's family tell us that they're suspicious of this whole finding, because according to them, [47:55] Eric was off searching by himself. [47:58] in a field near the crash site when he made this alleged discovery. [48:02] No one else from the search party was there to witness it. [48:05] And what's even weirder, Brit's mom, Jessica, said that he didn't even like run over to the rest of the group and tell them, like, I found this clue.

Jessica said that he just like left and she learned about it later. Yeah. [48:17] Now, in the case file, there is mention of a ZTE, cell phone missing backplate, [48:24] listed under the evidence, but there's like no other details. [48:28] I don't know if this is the one that we're talking about, [48:31] I also don't know why you would call it a missing backplate. [48:34] And they don't give any notes in the file about who ended up turning it in. [48:38] when that happened, or if investigators were ever even able to confirm that it was in fact Brittany's.

[48:45] Still, [48:46] the family can't help but wonder [48:48] Did Eric genuinely stumble across part of Brittany's phone while searching for her? [48:53] Or, [48:54] Did he somehow already have it? [48:56] Did anyone ever just... [48:58] Ask him? [48:59] Not really. [49:01] Even though Eric is her... [49:03] husband, even though he is allegedly finding evidence, even though he is tied up in some weird way to Ashley, who seemed to keep finding herself at the center of this thing. [49:14] St. Joseph County investigators... [49:16] don't seem to question Eric at all?

[49:20] until more than six months after Britney went missing. [49:23] And even that appears to have been this like super short interaction from what I can tell. [49:28] During that little chat, Eric even admitted he hadn't spoken directly with any law enforcement about Britt's case before. And he had only passed information through... [49:38] "'Guess who?' [49:39] Ashley [49:41] And it wouldn't be until nearly five freaking years later. [49:47] that they would actually sit him down for a 45-minute formal recorded session. [49:52] How is this even remotely acceptable for an investigation?

You tell me! [49:58] As someone from the Michiana area, it is embarrassing. Yes. Now, while the St. Joseph County Sheriff's Office did provide us with the records, they never got back to us regarding our request for an interview. [50:10] But you know what is so bizarre about people? [50:13] all of this Eric and Ashley stuff. I mean, I could go on, but you're going to tell me something new. Whether it was only with like the pure intentions, like that Ashley describes. [50:23] There is no doubting that Ashley puts herself at the heart of this case.

She is definitely...