[narrator] Gretchen Fleming
disappeared on December 3rd, 2022.
My mother-in-law came into the house and she said,
"I haven't seen Gretchen. Something's wrong."
[man] We're gonna go drive around to every bar in town,
till we can figure out what's going on.
She wouldn't just takeoff and disappear.
This is not normal, what happened to her.
[narrator] Her family is...[reading]
[woman] My husband's like, "I found her purse."
Like "What do you mean, you found her purse?"
And he's like, "It was returned to the bar
"a week ago."
I'm like, "Oh, this is not good."
[man] When I opened up the purse, I saw her phone,
her ID, and her credit card.
Now, I'm scared.
[narrator reading] ...we trace Gretchen's... [reading]
We did run into some of Gretchen's friends
that mentioned that she left with a guy.
This just wasn't a missing persons case.
Something bad happened.
We all briefed and decided it would be all hands on deck.
At this point in the investigation,
in my mind, foul play has happened.
I think he thinks he's above the law.
I think he thinks that he's untouchable.
And I'm really scared for whose little girl's next.
[narrator] The more people who know Gretchen's story,
the greater the chance of bringing her home.
[reading]
Help find her.
[reading]
My name is David Fleming. Gretchen Fleming is my daughter,
Last time I saw her was in Parkersburg, West Virginia,
December 3rd, 20222.
And she is still missing.
Parkersburg's a small town
and everybody knows everybody.
And it's a great place to grow up.
It's a very tight-knit community.
Neighbors looked after neighbors.
Pretty much all growing up with Gretchen,
I never locked the side door.
The side door was always unlocked.
I mean, I never felt
unsafe.
Me and Gretchen were always close.
We rode bikes a lot.
We had a tandem bicycle
and she would hang on the back
while I pedaled and steered.
And he was involved in sports.
And he was real involved in church.
And just, lots of activities
with friends and...
being a child.
Gretchen's mom and I ended up splitting up
when Gretchen was a child.
They didn't have a super-close relationship
but they still talked occasionally.
I was raising Gretchen and her sister on our own,
and then I met my wife, Jennifer.
I'm Jennifer Fleming.
And I am Gretchen Fleming's stepmom.
The first time I met Gretchen
was right after she turned 14.
And I don't think she was real excited
that her dad had a girlfriend.
And then I brought in twin babies that were three.
And then it wasn't very long after that
that I got pregnant with our child together.
She was just a teenager.
Um, but whenever she needed something,
she always came to me.
[David] In high school, Gretchen had her friends
and they were into
you know, doing their thrift shopping
and putting their outfits together
and doing their makeup, and...
And she was real involved with clubs at school
and different activities.
She was an avid book reader.
I mean, she was-- Every time you saw her,
she had a book in her hand.
And Doc Martens on her feet.
She wasn't really sure what she wanted to do in life.
But she knew she wanted to get to a bigger city,
Her goal was to move to North Carolina,
Charlote-Raleigh area,
and live down there,
and start her own chapter in life.
So, after graduating high school,
she moved down to North Carolina
like she had always dreamed of.
[Jennifer] I don't know that she really
knew exactly what she wanted to do,
but she was trying to figure it out.
And just being a young adult,
enjoying life.
She ended up making a lot of really good friends down there.
And, um... Yeah, I didn't worry about her.
She was resourceful.
She was kinda just feeling it out
and just working jobs
just to pay rent,
and be social, I guess, more than anything.
She was young enough that she wasn't really career-oriented yet.
And she was just enjoying being a young, vibrant person
and-- and enjoying the lifestyle down there
with other young people.
Um, she had different jobs.
If one job didn't work out, she would find another job.
She was that kind of free spirit
where she didn't worry about it.
She was gonna figure it out.
And I think that's pretty neat.
[David] So, Gretchen was down in North Carolina
and she met a boy
and they hit it off really well.
And he lived in Charleston
so she moved back to Charleston with him.
And she was working a job in Charleston, with him.
And they dated probably for a year or so.
And they'd actually talked about even getting married.
And then, I don't really know why
but they went their separate ways.
That just kinda put her in a bad place. Understandably so.
Then she came back to Parkersburg.
[David] She was kind of in a lost place
when she moved back to Parkersburg.
And that was where she really needed a time out
and was trying to figure things out.
She decided to move in with my mom.
'Cause we have, still, four kids in the house
and I don't think she wanted to deal with the chaos of-- of our house,
She didn't want any part of that.
I wouldn't have either at 27 years old, you know.
So, it made sense to go to Nana's.
Gretchen didn't have a driver's license.
Gretchen used to say, "Why drive? I can get an Uber.
"Or I'll go with friends."
It just never was something that she wanted to do.
So, Nana and Papaw could run her around or wherever she needed to go.
It just made sense.
While she was struggling with a break up,
she still went a found a job at a department store.
[David] She had talked about and really wanted to be a flight attendant.
And so, she was kind of preparing herself to do that.
[Jennifer] Since she was living with Nana and Papaw,
they're older and kind of set in their ways
and they have rules and, you know, I think...
It was-- 10:00 was the time that if she wasn't home by
then the door was locked, and she knew that,
so she would stay with friends.
It wasn't uncommon for her to stay with friends for a weekend,
three or four days.
They'd take her back and forth to work.
You know, she had a bag, like that,
that she put her purse in and her clothes and her belongings
and she would just go couch surf
or hang out with friends or whatever for a few days.
So, it wasn't uncommon for her to be
with friends, and gone for a few days at a time.
[David] So, the last time I saw Gretchen was Thanksgiving evening.
We always have all of our family get together.
Aunts, uncles, probably 50 people in too small of a house.
I had just taken a new job as a middle school wrestling coach.
I had just started that following week.
And that weekend, I was actually out of town.
So, the following week, I sent her a couple of texts
and she didn't reply right away.
But, like I said, I didn't think much about it.
I was busy all week with the new job.
[David] There was always an open line of communication between me and Gretchen.
If she didn't respond to my texts one day,
normally it'd be the next day 'cause her phone was dead.
Or she had lost her phone.
And then she would immediately respond back to me.
Sometimes we'd talk a couple of times a week on the phone.
Sometimes we'd go a week or week and a half without talking on the phone.
[Jennifer] So, December 11th, David and I were at the house
when there was a knock at the door.
And it was my mother-in-law.
And she came into the house and she said,
"I'm worried.
"I haven't talked to cc or seen Gretchen
"since December 3rd."
She said, "I dropped her off for work.
"and she told me she wouldn't be coming home that night."
It was Saturday night.
She was gonna get off work and go hang out with friends.
And so, she said, you know, "A few days went by.
"I didn't worry about it or think about it much."
Because that's just common, you know.
She goes and hangs out with friends.
She said when it got to Thursday,
she started getting a little bit concerned.
By Friday, she hadn't heard from her.
Saturday, she was really worried.
So, Sunday, she came to our house
and she said, you know,
"Something's wrong."
David tried to call her, I tried to call her.
It immediately went to voicemail.
So, we knew that her phone was dead.
We tried texting. Of course, nothing.
[David] And I was like-- I can't see straight.
I'm-- I'm-- I'm just a train wreck.
And I told Jen, I said,
"Get in the car with me."
I said, "We're gonna go drive around
"to every bar in town,
"every establishment, hangout.
"And I'm gonna share pictures until we can figure out what's going on."
Well, one of the places that Gretchen liked to go
was called the Front Row.
Well, it's a little bar, kind of restaurant establishment.
Immediately, I go over to the Front Row,
and I ask the bartender
and I show her a picture of Gretchen
and I said, "Have you seen her here, lately?"
And she said, "Yes, she was here last weekend.
She goes, "Matter of fact,
"one of her friends dropped her purse off here."
And I go, "Can I have her purse?"
So she handed me her purse.
[sobs] And when I opened up inside of her purse,
I saw her phone,
her ID and her credit card.
Now I'm scared.
[Jennifer] David, he's like, "I found her purse."
Like, "What do you mean you found her purse?"
And he's like...
"It was returned at the Front Row a week ago."
I'm like, "Oh, this is not good at all."
[David] So when the bartender mentioned that she left with a guy...
And I think because I found the purse,
I'm scared.
I'm thinking in my head,
this just wasn't a missing persons case.
Something bad happened.
We did run into some of Gretchen's friends
that had hung out with her previously.
And that's when they mentioned that she left with a guy,
They were going down to My Way Lounge for karaoke night
So, that kinda put us on the trail of--
of heading to the My Way and seeing what they knew down there.
Well, the same DJ for karaoke night was there.
And he was the one that kinda told us
that she was there that night.
She came with the guy that she came from the Front Row with.
And his name was John.
We need to find him.
[Jennifer] So we ended up at the Front Row,
which is where the purse was found.
And we ran into some friends-acquaintances of hers
that said, yes, they had seen her there.
She had left and went to the My Way Lounge.
They actually said her friend, John, drove her to the My Way.
and-- we didn't know him.
Or where he lived.
[David] Before Gretchen went missing,
her mom passed.
It was very suddenly, and...
She was the only person that could give consent
for them to take her off life support.
Which is terrible for a young person to go through...
to do that and watch her mother pass like that.
[Jennifer] I think she was closed off because of that.
She didn't have the best relationship with her own mom.
I think it was a little overwhelming for her.
[David] And after that it was her and her boyfriend breaking up.
She was kind of in a lost place when she moved back to Parkersburg.
And that was where she really just needed a time out.
[Jennifer] While a lot of bad things had happened, she hadn't lose hope.
You know, she was struggling
and trying to figure things out.
But she was going out with friends and having fun.
[David] She was working jobs and...
you know, kind of going out to the bars here, in town, you know.
A lot of young people gather there.
So, you know, she didn't have a whole lot of friends still here.
Because, you know, she's 28. A lot of her friends have moved off.
She was meeting new friends and just hanging out wit their social circles.
We started with the Front Row, trying to get some answers to what happened.
And that's when we found her purse.
[Jennifer] And we go home and in her purse is her phone, her tablet,
her ID, her debit card, her credit card,
her hairbrush, a bottle of water, you know--
All of her belongings are in her purse.
So, she had an iPhone.
So we took the Iphone and we plugged it in.
There's no passcode on it.
So, we get on the phone.
I start going through all of her messages,
all of her social media.
And the last contact she had with anyone
was on tat Saturday, December 3rd.
David's in sheer panic mode at the point.
We start going through her contacts. We start calling people.
"When's the last time you saw her?"
"Have you heard from her?"
And nobody had heard from or seen her since that December 3rd.
So, we plugged in her tablet as well.
We went through that. There was nothing there.
A girl doesn't leave her purse and not go look for it the next few days.
That's just not normal.
So, the next morning we went straight to the police station
and filed a missing person's report.
I'm James Zimmerman and I'm a detective
with the Parkersburg Police Department.
And I've been investigating Gretchen Fleming's case since December 12th, 2022.
Typically, when we have a missing persons case,
you know, usually they're runaway, of a juvenile.
It's somebody that we typically locate,
you know, within a short amount of time.
With Gretchen's case, you know, what kinda concerned us
from the beginning, was that
the family had located her purse and her cellphone
and the length of time that the--
that the family hasn't communicated with Gretchen was concerning.
My name is Matther Board.
I am the Chief of Police for the city of Parkersburg, in West Virginia.
My initial thought was, you know, it was concerning.
You try not to jump to conclusions.
But after a conversation, you know, it was agreed upon
this would be an all hands on deck kind of circumstance.
[James] I started reaching out to our local hospitals, our location shelters.
And checking her social media if there's anything that she had posted recently.
And then checking our systems to see if any officers had any contact with her
since December 3rd. We had not.
I had my lieutenant post a picture of Gretchen on our Facebook page,
Immediately, within the next 24 hours,
there's over 1,000 shares
of her image, that she was missing.
[Jennifer] Our family, our friends, our community...
Anybody that has any contact with us,
has shared over and over and over and over.
They've had their own posts.
Again, it's a small town.
This hits home with everyone in Parkersburg
because it could be their niece, or their daughter,
or their granddaughter, or their sister,
or their cousin.
It hits this community very, very, very hard
because, again, everybody knows somebody
in this town, that knows us.
They may not know Gretchen but somebody knows some of our family.
[James] Based on my witnesses' statements
they believe that Gretchen had left with a male named John.
After speaking with him,
he told me that they started their night off at Front Row.
From there, Gretchen had mentioned going to My Way lounge,
for karaoke.
So they stopped there that evening.
He mentioned when they traveled from Front Row to My Way,
she had left her purse and cellphone in his vehicle.
She never brought it into the My Way Lounge.
Later that night, he was looking for her
and he was concerned that he couldn't find Gretchen.
He started canvasing the downtown area.
When he wasn't able to locate her, he returned back to My Way,
seeing if she had came back while he was out looking for her.
She had not.
He then went home. And later that day, he returned the purse
to Front Row bar, hoping that she would visit there.
The reason he returned the purse to the Front Row
was he didn't know where Gretchen lived
and, you know, she didn't have her cellphone with her.
And that was a place she typically would visit
and his thought process was that she would get back there and get her purse.
[Jennifer] He was really upset and worried.
He said-- You know, he told us. He said, "I came out and she was gone.
"I don't know what happened to her.
"She just disappeared."
He was very concerned.
[David] John, I know he didn't have anything to do with it.
I've spoken with him.
He-- He was just as freaked out
as I am as a father.
You know, because, he was the one that took her there.
I know he felt a lot of responsibility in it.
Because she didn't leave with him
and, you know, I think he just felt responsible
that he couldn't find her.
He was completely cooperative with the police
because he didn't have anything to hide.
Everyday, it's just-- You never know what is gonna be thrown at you.
I mean, we're all walking on eggshells.
We are all sick to our stomachs over this.
And again, we have children.
We have a 19-year-old. We have 17-year-old twins.
We have a 12-year-old.
They're upset. They're kids. It's horrible.
[David] The next morning, you know, the My Way Lounge,
the owners, they contacted me on Facebook
and sent me a private message.
And said that they have the video surveillance
if I would like to come and watch it.
So, of course, I said yes.
So I grab my wife and we go down there at lunchtime,
and we ask to see the video.
And it shows Gretchen innocently just sitting
at the end of the bar, by herself.
The friend that she had came with was, like, a couple of seats down.
And he was talking to a couple of other people
and she was kinda just sitting there by herself.
Well then, comes in the picture
a man, out of the gambling room.
He stands beside her and ends up bringing her a drink.
Then they end up talking and they go back into the gambling room, together.
Probably for about a half hour, 45 minutes.
And then, they come out of the gambling room,
and the man ends up walking out the door
and she's walking right behind him.
John ends up going to the bathroom,
so when Gretchen comes out of the gambling room, to leave,
he was actually in the bathroom.
So, he didn't see her leave.
So, he comes out of the bathroom
and then the bar's getting ready to close down there.
And he's looking for her, and can't find her,
'cause he was gonna give her a ride home.
And then the footage actually shows Gretchen leaving with the man
and his car driving away.
At the bar, they tell us that she left with Preston Pierce.
And we're like, "Who's that?"
[David] The owners at the My Way, and the bartenders,
they were completely cooperative.
They released all their video footage to the police.
The police was able to go in and...
and get whatever they needed.
The bartenders mentioned that Gretchen left with Preston Pierce.
What I gathered from the bartenders and the owners...
Preston was not a regular customer there.
But he had been there, maybe a time or two, before.
[Jennifer] I don't know what he said to her.
How he got her in the gambling room.
It's just kind of a social, kind of, thing.
Maybe he said, "Hey, I've got 20 bucks.
"Do you wanna go play the machines?"
I don't know.
And how he got her to leave with him, I don't know.
Maybe he said, "If you need a ride, I'll give you a ride."
You know, it's late into the hours of December 3rd-- December 4th morning.
She knew she couldn't go to Nana's.
You know, "Hey, I can give you a ride to a friend's house."
Or, "If you wanna sleep on my couch, you can."
You know, I don't know.
[David] I think she probably had too much to drink that night.
Maybe he said, "Hey, I got another place up the road." Or something.
[stutters] I don't know but I don't think
that, like, he was a friend of hers or anything.
[James] After speaking with one of the bartenders at My Way Lounge
they were able to tell us that Gretchen
left with another male subject named Preston Pierce.
I described who Gretchen Fleming was.
And then he was able to recall the accounts he had that evening with Gretchen.
He said that he and Gretchen had left the bar together.
He dropped her off in the downtown area of Parkersburg.
And that's when we went back to the downtown area,
started knocking on doors,
canvasing the area
with a team that we put together.
And trying to see if there's any witnesses
or video footage that may have captured that.
It's our job to determine what did happen, not what might have happened.
So, you're looking for Gretchen herself.
You're looking for a piece of clothing that she may have had.
Or maybe you encounter somebody that was walking down the street
that you could interview,
and-- a field interview and garner information.
So, you know, no stone's been left unturned.
On December 14th, we obtained video footage
from the multiple surveillance cameras
and went back to he office to review that.
And that's when we were able to reconstruct
where, you know, Preston went
in the early morning hours of December 4th.
So, My Way Lounge,
it's at the intersection
of 5th and Julianna.
This is the front entrance of My Way.
This is where we've last seen Preston and Gretchen exit the door.
So, after they exit the front entrance of the establishment, My Way,
we believe that Preston was parked
in the ordained parking lot
at My Way Lounge.
Near the News and Sentinel.
From there we got video footage
that captured headlights.
So, after the headlights kick on, you see
the vehicle looks like it turns down the alley
heading towards 6th Street.
We knew that vehicle to be Preston Pierce's vehicle.
Shortly after, we obtained video footage
from a nearby gas station.
We believe we see Preston's vehicle on Ann Street.
And he's headed in the direction of Southside Parkersburg.
We're trying to, you know, see if there's any place Gretchen end up-- may have
gone out of the vehicle
or anytime the vehicle had stopped.
We're also not just looking for a vehicle,
we're looking to see if Gretchen-- you know, walking,
in any area.
There's a lot of wooded area.
And underneath the fishery bridge.
We canvased that area as well.
Looking for, you know, anything that may place Gretchen in that area
or any evidence that may help us further our investigation.
And we weren't able o locate anything that placed her
at those area.
From the video footage that we obtained,
we did not see her get out of the vehicle,
we did not see her walking
in the area-- in the downtown area.
And through that, we continue
looking at the video footage.
We believe we see Preston's vehicle,
what we believe is his vehicle,
is travelling in the direction of his home.
We know that Preston and Gretchen left the bar together.
We believe his vehicle
traveled in the direction of his home.
I immediately knew something bad happened.
Gut instinct. This is not normal.
And that's what made this
turn int a scary situation
where we knew something was wrong.
At this point, things aren't adding up.
Preston, in a lot of the statements he gave us
that evening, were inconsistent
with the surveillance that we collected.
[David] Last person that she walked out
of the My Way Lounge was with Preston Pierce.
And she hasn't been seen yet since.
I mean, if his little girl was missing
and I was the last person seen with his little girl,
he'd expect an answer from me.
[James] Due to the totality of circumstances of the information that we had,
it led me to draft up search warrants
and meet with our local prosecutor.
Our prosecutor reviewed the search warrants
and we were able to present that to a circuit court judge
who believed in the probable cause
to do a search warrant of Preston's home,
vehicle and his storage unit.
At this point in the investigation,
in my mind, foul play has happened.
[narrator] Gretchen Fleming was last seen
December 3rd, 2022.
[reading]
We believe Preston was the last person with Gretchen
in the early morning hours of December 4th.
On December 15th, our detective bureau was able to secure
three different search warrants.
One, for Preston's house.
A storage building that he rented.
As well as his vehicle.
Um, after doing so,
three different search teams were divided
and all three warrants were executed.
After we put the teams together,
to go and execute these search warrants,
we're trying to place Gretchen inside the home
or inside Preston's vehicle.
That's the evidence that we're looking for.
You have to be very detailed while you are doing a search warrant.
You wanna collect as much evidence as you possibly can.
While there, you're thinking it may be relevant or not,
it's better to collect it
and then you have to bring it back
because it's sent off to the lab at that point
to verify if it is
relevant to our case.
I was hoping we were gonna--
I don't know what I was hoping.
I just-- I was hoping we were gonna find something,
we were gonna find her.
Just emotions were going through my head.
I just can't even explain.
I still can't explain the emotions that I'm going through. It's--
You just don't even know how to process it. Just--
Just day by day, the processing is... It...
I don't know. I don't really know.
[Jennifer] We wanna know where she's at.
But at the same time,
you don't wanna know.
You know what I mean?
You don't want to have to
hear the details and know
what happened. I mean...
It makes me sick to my stomach
thinking about
having to identify a body.
Or, you know, the--
It's scary.
It's terrifying.
So after our teams collect evidence
from Preston's home,
his vehicle and his storage unit,
they come back to the office.
We start packaging up all the evidence that we do have.
And labelling everything that we have.
And documenting everything.
And sending out what items that we wanna send to the State Police lab.
But the search did not find a body.
At this point, we have to be careful.
We still don't know what happened to Gretchen.
[Jennifer] As soon as I found out
that they had conducted the search warrants,
I thought, "All right. I'm gonna get to the bottom of this."
So, when I first heard the name Preston Pierce,
it is not a name that I had ever heard before.
I immediately went into detective mode, as I do.
I got on social media and I found that
he's a food delivery guy.
Once his name was out on social media,
I never saw anything positive.
Some women were complaining that
he really creeped them out.
And was almost stalking them, at some point.
Because they'd call,
he would have their phone number
when he would use the delivery.
And then, he would start texting those women,
making inappropriate advances towards them.
And just nasty things, you know.
He knows where people live.
Because he is delivering food to their houses.
He's got their names, he's got their phone numbers.
He's contacting them after he delivers food to them.
"You're beautiful."
One of our good friends had to stop ordering
because he was texting her inappropriately
after he had delivered her food.
My mom shops at a local clothing store
and she was there, one day, shopping
and got to talking to the girls that worked there.
They had to stop getting food delivery
because Preston would come into the store
and talk inappropriately to them.
And he would start text messaging them inappropriate things.
I had a friend
call me and tell me
that one of her friends
was out at a bar one night with him
and woke up the next morning in his house.
And didn't know how she got there
or what had happened to her.
Which makes you feel sick to your stomach
and my first response was,
"Did she contact Detective Zimmerman?"
And she eventually did.
I don't think that this is...
the type of person that you
want to be the last person seen with your daughter.
He's had multiple complaints against him
for stalking women.
He's had complaints for pursuing underaged minors.
[James] After we executed the search warrant
at Preston's home,
our local news station here
put an image of Preston's house on their news site.
Through that, the following day,
I received tips from various people
that were compelled
to tell me about their past incidents with Preston Pierce.
But at this point, we have to be careful
what information we do release to the media.
In my opinion,
I think he thinks he's above the law.
I think he thinks that he's untouchable.
And I'm really scared for the community
of-- whose little girl's next?
[James] In February, two months after Gretchen disappeared,
we did put together a community search
out of Mountwood Park.
That is in close proximity to Preston's home.
And there's a lot of acreage
so, we had over-- over 500 people show up.
And through that, you--
We were able to cover a lot of ground,
out at Mountwood Park.
[reporter] Community members pray for answers today.
Hundreds driving to Mountwood Park
about 30 minutes east of Parkersburg
to participate in this search party.
[Matthew] The community was concerned.
Someone from Parkersburg was in trouble, they wanted to help.
So, we were flooded with--
with tips, and people offering to volunteer in any way that they could.
[David] Everybody genuinely cared.
The whole community showed up.
Everybody wanted to help now.
It-- It was very overwhelming.
I couldn't keep the tears out of my eyes. [sobs]
Because you see that many people trying to help you,
and help you find your daughter,
it's-- it's very overwhelming.
And-- And shows you the support that this community has
and there's still a lot of kind people.
[James] Through the community search
there was various items that were collected.
Unfortunately, none of which, we believe
had anything to do with--
with Preston Pierce or Gretchen Fleming.
So, anytime I saw a report
of an unidentified body being located anywhere,
I would contact that agency and see what information they have.
We had no evidence to say that she had passed away
but we just wanted to cover our bases
and that's why we were reaching out to agencies
throughout the-- Throughout the state.
[David] One morning, some reporter from a news station reports,
"the body of the missing woman had been found"
Got, you know, four kids in the house.
They're reading this on social media.
[Jennifer] Emma, Gretchen's sister, comes running upstairs
because she's home from school at the time
for her Christmas break, and she's like...
"I heard they found Gretchen."
I'm trying to get in touch with the detective.
You know, I'm wondering why he didn't call me
and tell me what's going on.
I'm going beside myself.
It makes me feel sick to my stomach.
In January, there was a news outlet
that the human remains may be linked to Gretchen.
They reported a body being found in the Ohio river,
which is just right across the river,
which make sense in the vicinity where she went missing.
Detective Zimmerman, he didn't know what happened either.
He was just as ambushed as we were, reading it.
So, he was already en route
to try and figure out why he hadn't been notified
by local authorities.
[James] Through the various law enforcement agencies I did contact,
the description, it didn't match Gretchen's.
We had to reach out to the family
and tell them, you know, that this was not accurate.
I was furious.
I sent off that reporter a real nasty email
like, "Do a little bit of due diligence
"before you try and get a story."
Because we have other children.
We have aging parents
that are the grandparents.
We don't need even more stress in our life
because you want a story.
[James] After we did the Mountwood search...
Although it didn't pan out,
our team, we still didn't give up hope.
We're still out doing searches in various areas
and we're still analyzing
any-- any of the digital evidence that we do have.
And see if there is any connections that we can make
with the locations.
[David] So, in January, the police got a tip
that, possibly, she could have been put down a well.
So, Detective Zimmerman took a crew
and they went and had a drilling company come in
and they drained the well looking for her.
[Jennifer] You're on pins and needles, wondering, "What are we gonna find out?"
"Is this the moment that we're gonna get the answers?"
It's terrifying.
I mean, obv-- We want the answers
but, again, you're sitting there, terrified...
"What if they find her in that well?"
So this is the well that we did a search out in Ravenswood.
Ravenswood is a 40-minute drive from Parkersburg.
It's a small city.
Took us about a week to do a complete search.
It was a 25-feet deep well.
And that was a challenge of itself, having to drain it.
We had our city engineer here, doing a...
He had prepared some tape with a camera
and we were able to get...
a visual on the inside but it wasn't very clear.
So, we had a company come in and drain that.
We searched the woods and the riverbank.
And after that search, being here for about a week,
we felt comfortable marking this off our list.
Could not place Gretchen here.
We're almost six months, and no arrest has been made.
But it's still a very active investigation.
They're gonna get to the bottom of this. It takes time.
And as hard as it is to be patient,
we have to let law enforcement do what they do.
The police haven't slowed down at all.
They're moving faster and faster
as more information comes in.
They're building their timeline.
They haven't slowed down or stopped in this at all.
In fact, I think the momentum is picking up, at this point.
[James] Although we haven't been able to release
a lot of detail and information in regards to this case,
it still is very active, I want the public to know that.
We are still currently working on this case.
[Jennifer] I believe that Preston's the last one that was with her.
I don't have any doubt
that he is the person that has done something to her.
I believe that he is a predator.
I believe that he preys on young women.
Young, pretty women.
And Gretchen was a beautiful, kind young lady
that was too trusting
and I believe that he took advantage of that.
[James] Based on all the information we gathered with this case,
surveillance, and witnesses' statements,
I can confidently say that
Preston Pierce is a person of interest
and I believe he has more information
in regards to Gretchen's disappearance.
Unfortunately, he stopped communicating with us.
He can hide, he can run, but we're eventually gonna get him.
[David] If any of you out there, know anything--
anything at all, a tidbit,
you heard something, you heard something from a coworker,
you heard it from a friend, please come forward.
We have a reward of $100,000
for anybody that has information that can being Gretchen home.
[Matthew] I ask you to look within yourself.
There's a family that needs questions answered.
They're struggling with this everyday.
And help this family get closure.
Help us get the answers we need to find Gretchen.
[David] If I could see Gretchen again,
first thing I'd do is give her a big hug. [sobs]
And tell her how much I love her.
And how much I've missed her.
[Jennifer] Imagine if this was your daughter, your sister,
your cousin, your aunt,
your family member that you love.
How would you feel to be in this situation?
It's horrible!
Her brothers and her sisters and our family, we just all miss her so much.
[David] I feel like a part of my life has been taken from me
because I don't have the opportunity to see
my little girl grow up.
And-- And pursue her dreams, you know.
Possible having a family, having children.
Or whatever she chooses to do.
I-- I just miss her and I love her.
I just want her home.
Tracy was a no-call, no-show.
You thinking that something ain't right.
While cleaning Tracy's apartment
I ran across mail from Tracy's ex-boyfriend.
She could have been gone due to foul play.
We have to conduct a search.