[audio logo]
[crickets chirping]
[water lapping]
[discordant music]
[unsettling music]
There's nothing
in the human language to describe what they did to her.
BRAD PINCE: They had an opportunity to help her
or to let her go.
And none of them stepped up to do that.
[sirens wailing]
BRAD PINCE: The cell phone was located at a hotel.
The police had the place surrounded.
These people were very, very dangerous.
[dramatic music]
BRAD PINCE: They used tear gas.
There was a lot
of finger pointing going on.
Detectives knew there was more to the story.
- I photographed his hands.
I saw some calluses.
We knew they were from digging the grave.
MICHAEL DOWNES: It was an utterly
horrendous, heartless crime.
That's what wakes you up at night.
The jeopardy is that you mess it up,
and these people walk free.
[unsettling music]
[theme music]
[wind blowing gently]
BRAD PINCE: Along Highway 2,
over the mountains into Eastern Washington, is Gold Bar.
[eerie music]
- It's one of the last towns
you come to before you get out to the middle of nowhere.
[bird chattering]
MICHAEL DOWNES: Very small, narrow dirt roads,
streams flowing across the road.
- There is absolutely no one around that
could hear anything that was going on.
It was early in the morning, nine days after a missing girl
was last seen by her family.
A 17-year-old high school kid took
the detectives down a small road that goes
into this old forestry area.
It was very remote.
Investigators searched the ground, looking for bullets.
One of the detectives arrived and grabbed a shovel
and started scraping away some dirt.
Towards the end of the day,
they had found a portion of a leg.
[ominous music]
MICHAEL DOWNES: They uncovered the body.
She was face down in this hole.
She had several gunshot wounds to the back of the head, wounds
on her fingers, no clothes on.
This woman was small, 4 foot 11,
weighed less than 100 pounds.
Brutally murdered?
There's no question in my mind.
You can't stop looking.
You cannot stop asking questions.
We have to find those responsible for her murder.
[unsettling music]
[atmospheric music]
- Snohomish County, it's a rural part
of Western Washington.
It's beautiful.
Anybody who loves nature
or outdoors, it's paradise--
beautiful trees, Puget Sound, rivers, lakes, and mountains.
ALI TAYLOR: Growing up in Snohomish County
was really, really sweet.
We played a lot of sports.
We would go to the beaches, lots of bonfires with friends.
[bright piano music]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: My sister Rachel
and I were three years apart.
I remember when she came home from the hospital,
she was my baby.
It was my job to look out for her and protect her.
We were super, super close.
Our parents divorced when Rachel was probably
six years old, and I was nine.
Her and I spent countless nights with my dad.
ALI TAYLOR: Her laugh was just contagious.
She definitely stood out.
She was amazing, beautiful, gorgeous, just a lot of energy.
I always really admired the relationship
she had with her father, Bill.
My dad, he was
an athlete when he grew up.
So he was really in on coaching her.
It was something that bonded them.
Rachel was a total jock.
We always would describe her as a 4' 11"
giant because she was small in stature, but she was mighty.
[pensive music]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: Being super athletic,
she still loved being all done up.
We had even talked about perhaps working in the beauty
industry together.
As Rachel grew into her teen years,
she was definitely Miss Popular.
People were just so drawn to her.
In high school, Rachel and Corey were very close.
Corey was definitely her best friend.
He meant the world to her.
On August 5, 2001, Corey was in a fatal car crash.
ALI TAYLOR: It really shook the entire school.
It shook all of our friends.
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: Rachel had survivor's guilt.
She was [clears throat] supposed to be in that car.
And that's where everything changed.
She went into a heavy depression.
She dropped out of school.
She was self-medicating, partying
and doing drugs recreationally, trying to fill a void.
[OFF] CAROLYN OSSORIO: She kind of
started losing herself a little bit, started hanging out
with people that she may not have
been hanging out with before.
Rachel was vulnerable.
JUDY HO: Because of her own trauma,
Rachel really, in essence, chose a lifestyle where
she's walking on razor's edge.
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: Then, one day, she tells me,
yeah, I met this new guy.
His name is Diggy.
He was a bad boy.
And they met at a high school party.
Luckily, they had only dated for about six months
before they broke up.
After that, Rachel had this resurgence.
[soft music]
ALI TAYLOR: She knew that she needed
to pull her life together and start thinking
about finishing school.
And one day, she
was really, really excited.
She told my dad that she met a new friend named Maurice.
They made a pact that they were going
to graduate high school together
and turn their lives around.
September 23, 2002.
[suspenseful music]
[OFF] MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: I remember
turning around and looking at the kitchen counter.
She always made to-do lists.
So I looked at her list, and it said, "Be home tonight."
And I thought, OK, good.
Like, I'll see her tonight.
By the time I got home from work that evening,
I had been calling her.
I had left voicemails.
There was just no communication.
The next morning, I wake up, and I don't see her.
I'm looking through her room.
All of her belongings are there--
all of her clothes, all of her makeup.
If she had planned on being gone for any period of time,
she would have taken her things.
I remember my dad said, maybe she
just stayed at a friend's house,
and she'll be back later.
The next morning--
[phone ringing]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: - I'm up at 6:00 AM,
and the home phone is ringing.
It's her friend, Carrie.
And I said, what's going on?
You haven't seen my sister?
[ominous music]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: She said, no, I've been trying
to reach her since Monday.
And I just completely panicked.
I'm getting very freaked out.
I grabbed my dad, and I told him.
He just went white as a ghost.
He knew there was something really bad going on.
That's when he called the police
and reported her missing.
Our patrol officers
responded to his address and took the initial report.
We are pleading with them.
And we're telling them, her things are here.
This is out of character.
BRAD PINCE: The information
that I got from her father is she was kind of a party girl.
Her ex-boyfriend at the time was Diggy.
His real name was John Anderson.
Her father said when Diggy and Rachel broke up,
she started dating this guy, JJ.
[suspenseful music]
BRAD PINCE: After we took the report,
we run a criminal history check on Diggy.
We learn Diggy had done some time in prison for a robbery.
JUDY HO: Police were trying to piece all of
this together.
They're already starting to think maybe Diggy or JJ
know what happened to Rachel.
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: After we reported her missing,
we got every single friend, family member, church member
on board.
We are doing our own searches, searching for her car,
searching for anything.
We were checking the morgues, checking the hospitals.
We are posting up missing posters all across the state.
[crickets chirping]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: Then, on September 30,
I found Rachel's car.
It's parked at an apartment complex.
First thing I notice when I look at the car
is that it's backed into a parking spot.
My sister didn't back in anywhere.
The car was unlocked and her wallet, with her ID
and $80 cash, is on the seat.
The driver's seat is really far back.
And she's short.
My sister wouldn't have been able to reach the pedals.
My sister didn't park this car.
Whoever did something to her, they parked this car.
[unsettling music]
BRAD PINCE: We knew that everybody on the other side
of the duplex was lying to us.
JUDY HO: He felt like she had been torturing him,
and he just wanted to hurt her.
BRAD PINCE: He broke down.
He told us Rachel was taken out of the Jeep
and that he just heard some shots.
[theme music]
[train rattling]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: On September 30,
I found Rachel's car.
[ominous music]
The driver's seat
is really far back.
And she's short.
My sister didn't park this car.
Whoever did something to her, they parked this car.
We call the police, and the police come out.
BRAD PINCE: One of our deputies learned
that an ex-boyfriend of Rachel's
by the name of JJ lived in that apartment complex.
Officers interviewed him.
JJ insisted he had no idea where Rachel was
or what happened to her.
He didn't know why Rachel's vehicle was there
in that apartment complex.
We learned JJ had some outstanding arrest warrants.
At that point, officers arrested JJ.
We knew there might be evidence of what
happened in Rachel's car.
We processed that car thoroughly.
We didn't find any fingerprints.
Rachel's car was clean.
The next day--
[somber music]
BRAD PINCE:--I arranged for the family
to come into my office.
They were all very, very concerned.
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: I had found a stack of love letters.
They were from Diggy to Rachel.
He's really obsessive.
Like, I can't live without you, talking about if she ever needs
protection, he's there, and, no one's ever
going to love you like I do.
BRAD PINCE: We determined that it was important for us
to locate Diggy.
And then Rachel's dad received information
from one of Rachel's friends.
They told us where Diggy was staying,
the extended stay in Everett.
[tense music]
BRAD PINCE: Diggy did allow
us to look through his hotel room
to make sure that Rachel wasn't there.
Nobody was in the room at the time.
Diggy said he believed that Rachel was hanging out with JJ.
We learned after Rachel and Diggy broke up,
Diggy considered JJ as an enemy when she started dating JJ.
Nothing that took place at the hotel
ruled Diggy, John Anderson out.
[phone ringing]
BRAD PINCE: That afternoon, we got a call
from a female who had information that Rachel had
been at her duplex a few days before with this group of guys
that hung around with Diggy.
They fancied themselves as hardcore gang members.
She was suspicious that there was a problem.
She provided us with some background information
on one of Rachel's friends, Yusef Jihad.
Yusef Jihad was living next door in this duplex
with Trissa Conner.
We run a criminal history check.
JUDY HO: The police discover
Yusef Jihad is the ringleader of a group
called the Northwest Mafia.
Most of the other individuals involved
were between the ages of about 16 to 18.
The second in line was Diggy Anderson, who was 20.
BRAD PINCE: On October 2, we went to the duplex.
A Black male came out, identified
himself as Yusef Jihad.
I told him that we were looking for 18-year-old
Rachel Burkheimer.
He admitted that he knew Rachel.
They were friends.
He provided us with information that he
was supposed to meet with Rachel the weekend
before she had disappeared.
He had last seen Rachel at a hotel party in Everett.
Rachel actually invited Diggy and Yusef Jihad to the party.
They saw her with some people that they felt threatened by,
so they left.
[ominous music]
BRAD PINCE: Then, at that same location,
I identified John Whitaker.
He was a very close associates of Diggy and Yusef Jihad.
He also had last seen Rachel at a hotel party in Everett.
[faint laughter]
BRAD PINCE: Finally, we met Trissa Conner.
Trissa actually owned the duplex.
And her to-be husband was Yusef Jihad.
Trissa told us that she didn't know Rachel.
And she did allow detectives to walk through her side
of the duplex.
We located a locked door inside the duplex.
Trissa Conner told us that that is the door
that leads into the garage.
It was locked.
And she didn't have a key to it.
One of the things that we noticed about the locked door
is that it was turned to where you could lock the garage,
and nobody from the house could get in there.
That was rather unusual.
To me, that was telling me that there was something
going on in that garage.
Then, Jeffrey Barth, another gang member,
actually came out of the other side of the duplex.
He confronted me, wanting me to leave the property.
We had nothing to arrest anybody on,
so we packed our stuff and left.
Something's going on.
But we did not have any solid information
that they were involved in anything
that happened to Rachel.
The day after we'd made contact at the duplex--
[phone ringing]
BRAD PINCE: - we got a phone call
from one of the neighbors.
She said after we had left the duplex,
things started going a little crazy.
She told us that she'd heard some of the neighbors talking.
Rachel had, in fact, been at that duplex.
Rachel had been tied up and placed in the garage.
We needed to get inside that garage.
[intense music]
[theme music]
[wind blowing]
[ominous music]
BRAD PINCE: Detectives got a phone call
from one of the neighbors.
She told us she'd heard some of the other kids
say that Rachel had, in fact, been at that duplex.
She had been tied up and placed in the garage.
She said Rachel had been taken out of the duplex
and put in the back of a Jeep.
She also felt it was important that we knew that everybody
in the duplex was lying to us.
We knew that background of some of these people.
They thought they were hotshot little gangsters.
I took the information and started
working on a search warrant affidavit
for that side of the duplex.
Several people needed to be interviewed.
We located a teenager named Maurice Rivas.
Rachel's dad had pointed out that Maurice
was encouraging Rachel to go back to school,
get her life back on track.
We located him.
He admitted that he knew Rachel and Diggy.
Maurice said he was trying to disassociate
himself with Diggy.
He was supposed to meet with Rachel the weekend before she
had disappeared, but that was the last time
that he'd seen her.
He said he didn't know what was going on.
He was worried about Rachel.
[tense music]
- That night, during the process
of the search warrant, we made arrangements
for FBI crime scene team to come
out and process the duplex.
But when we arrived at the duplex,
there was nobody in there.
Trissa was next door.
She was nervous that we were there.
She told us that there was nobody inside that unit,
and she didn't have a key to it.
We forcefully entered the duplex
and cleared it to make sure there wasn't anybody inside.
Then we turned the duplex over to the FBI crime lab for them
to process it for any evidence.
When we processed the scene, there
was evidence that the scene had been cleaned up.
But we did not locate any blood or hair that we
could associate with Rachel.
Detectives were interviewing Trissa Conner.
When she was confronted with the witnesses' story
that Rachel had been in the garage,
we discovered Trissa had been holding back.
She told us that at one point, she gets home from work.
She knows that something's going on.
There's people in her garage.
Yusef Jihad is being very evasive with her.
She tried to get into the garage.
Diggy tried to keep her out of there.
She pushed her way into the garage
and found Rachel taped up there and was on the carpet.
Trissa told us that Barth, Diggy,
and Whitaker were there, and a 17-year-old high
school guy named Matt Durham.
Rachel had been beat up.
Trissa runs upstairs.
Yusef followed her to make sure she wasn't going to call 911.
A short time later, Rachel was taken out of the garage
in Matt Durham's Jeep.
We established probable cause to secure the Jeep that
belonged to Matthew Durham.
MICHAEL DOWNES: Detectives went
to Matthew Durham's house.
They talked in the detectives' car.
Matthew gave them a story which lacked significant detail.
BRAD PINCE: He told detectives
Rachel was taken out of the Jeep and that he drove away.
We took the Jeep for processing.
[OFF] MICHAEL DOWNES: The detective
said, Matthew, there seems to be more to the story here
than what you told us.
You've got a little sister.
If something happened to your sister, Matthew,
wouldn't you want to know?
JUDY HO: The detectives really
made him think of his family.
That's when he was really able to let the consequences
of his actions sink in.
BRAD PINCE: He broke down.
He told us that he was sure that Rachel had been killed.
[unsettling music]
[sirens wailing]
- The SWAT team had the place surrounded.
They were very, very dangerous.
- And they start turning on each other.
Said, this is
where she was shot and buried.
- It's just your worst nightmare.
[theme music]
[birds chirping]
[train rattling]
BRAD PINCE: It's been approximately
nine days after Rachel Burkheimer
was last seen by her family.
[somber music]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: With every day,
you just start losing hope and becoming even more
shrouded in terror each day.
[grim music]
- We had one subject in custody,
17-year-old Matthew Durham.
He admitted to detectives that Rachel
had been killed and buried at a remote location
in Eastern Snohomish County.
MICHAEL DOWNES: And that was a major break in the case,
the first major piece of evidence that set
into motion everything else.
BRAD PINCE: Durham told us
that he had received a call from Diggy,
asking him to bring Rachel to the duplex,
Yusef Jihad's place.
When they got there, Yusef, Whitaker,
and Tony Williams, who was Trissa's cousin, were there.
Jeff Barth and Maurice Rivas both eventually arrived.
They're playing video games.
There's laughter.
Then the energy completely changed.
BRAD PINCE: Rachel was beat up
and taken out of the garage and put in the Jeep.
They drove her out to the Gold Bar area.
Matthew Durham said Rachel was taken out of the Jeep
and that he drove away and just heard some shots.
[gunshots]
BRAD PINCE: Based on the information that Matthew Durham
provided, we had probable cause to arrest
Diggy, John Whitaker, Yusef Jihad, and Jeffrey Barth.
But we didn't know, at the time, who shot her.
It was determined that I would go ahead
and book Matthew Durham for kidnapping.
We couldn't prove a murder because we
hadn't found the body yet.
But we had enough information that we
could arrest these guys.
I met with Prosecutor Downes and briefed him.
We knew we needed to find the body.
Matthew Durham agreed to take them to the location
where Rachel was buried.
Matthew Durham took
the detectives up to Gold Bar.
[ominous music]
BRAD PINCE: It's a small little road
that goes into this old forestry
area over the mountains, into Eastern Washington.
It was early in the morning when Matthew Durham showed
us where the gravesite was.
[intense music]
BRAD PINCE: We secured the gravesite
and brought in the crime scene team.
A detective grabbed a shovel and started
scraping away some dirt.
On October 4, at approximately 5 o'clock
in the afternoon, that's when they located what
appeared to be human remains.
MICHAEL DOWNES: They found an exposed part
of one of the victim's legs.
BRAD PINCE: They uncovered the body.
She was 5-foot-tall, maybe 90 pounds, face down in this hole.
She had several gunshot wounds to the back
and to the back of the head.
She had some wounds on her hands or fingers, no
clothes on.
Once the medical examiner was able to remove her remains,
detectives continued to process below and around the grave.
They recovered bullet fragments inside the grave
and several spent casings.
The next day, I drove to Bill Burkheimer's house.
[somber music]
BRAD PINCE: I told him that the tattoos match
and that it was Rachel.
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: It was afternoon time.
Detective Pince showed up.
I'll just never forget--
so silent.
I mean, you could hear a pin drop.
[crying]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: After about a few minutes,
all the tears started just coming.
Everybody's crying.
It's just your worst nightmare.
[unsettling music]
And at that point,
you know there's evidence out there,
and you've got to get it.
And you keep pushing through.
We had to get all of the people that were involved.
They were very dangerous.
That's when the hunt started.
[theme music]
[birds chirping]
MICHAEL DOWNES: Nine days after Rachel has disappeared,
her remains are found in a shallow grave in the Cascade
Mountain foothills.
The police are now proceeding to find and arrest those
responsible for her murder.
[grim music]
BRAD PINCE: We knew that Rachel
had been shot several times.
Detectives were working to locate the gun.
The evening of the 5th, Matthew Durham
showed us where the pond was that
the gun had been disposed of.
We had members of our dive team out there.
It took them several hours to find the handgun.
At this point, Matt Durham was in custody.
He identified several suspects that we were able to tie
to Rachel's murder.
We had established probable cause
to arrest Maurice Rivas, Diggy Anderson,
as well as John Whitaker, Yusef Jihad, and Jeffrey Barth.
I received a call from a witness.
He had information that there was this juvenile party going
on at an address in Lynwood.
They saw Maurice Rivas and Diggy Anderson at this party.
[sirens wailing]
- I put out information to our patrol
officers that this party was taking place,
and that Diggy and Rivas were supposed to be there.
They arrived.
One of our deputies saw somebody in the house
that he identified as Diggy.
My supervisor made the decision to call out the SWAT team.
There was lots of young adults, 19, 20 years old there.
The deputies had the place surrounded.
And eventually, they talked many of the people
inside into coming out.
One of those persons that came out
was identified as Maurice Rivas.
They arrested him.
We got information from the people inside the house
that Diggy had gone up in the attic.
[ominous music]
- We knew he was in there,
and he wasn't coming out.
The SWAT team filled the house full of tear gas.
They pulled some sheetrock down, and they located John
"Diggy" Anderson in the attic.
He gave himself up, and he was taken into custody.
He was very uncooperative.
I saw some calluses.
I photographed his hands.
It was proof of what happened.
They were from digging the grave.
Then I took him to the jail and booked him for murder.
At this point, we needed to arrest John Whitaker, Yusef
Jihad, and Jeffrey Barth.
We didn't know where they were at.
We developed information that they
probably had fled the state.
Barth had his mother's cell phone.
We were able to locate that cell
phone as it was going down the coast in the California area.
A day later, we had information that the cell phone was located
in the LA area at a hotel.
We contacted the LA authorities.
They determined which room Yusef Jihad was in.
[sirens wailing]
BRAD PINCE: All three were arrested
and taken into custody.
[dramatic music]
[wind blowing]
BRAD PINCE: Whitaker and Jihad
both gave statements to the FBI,
downplaying their involvement.
Jeffrey Barth was not as cooperative.
Back in Snohomish County, I had a couple
other detectives come in and do the interview on Maurice.
We were sure that he knew what happened that night.
The detectives that had dealt with Maurice
had discovered that he had some calluses on his hands as well.
[ominous music]
JUDY HO: It was one of those physical reminders
of how much he really was a part of this crime.
BRAD PINCE: At that point,
Maurice realized the horror of what he was involved in.
He said he was ready to come clean.
[OFF] MICHAEL DOWNES: The next step
is to take Maurice's statement and assess whether you have
sufficient information to take it in front of a jury
and persuade the jury beyond a reasonable doubt
that these people did it.
But the jeopardy is that you mess it up,
and these people walk free.
[ominous music]
[theme music]
MICHAEL DOWNES: After Rachel Burkheimer's remains are
found, there is no question in my mind
seven people were involved in Rachel Burkheimer's death.
[tense music]
BRAD PINCE: At that point,
we had Durham, Maurice, Diggy, Whitaker, Jihad, Jeffrey Barth,
and Tony Williams in custody.
Yusef Jihad's girlfriend, Trissa, is never arrested.
We determined that it would be better
just to use her as a witness.
We needed to interview everybody involved in it.
Basically, they
start turning on each other.
Ultimately, Maurice told the detectives the core of what
actually happened.
MICHAEL DOWNES: According to Maurice Rivas,
Diggy had asked Matthew to bring Rachel to the house.
Diggy appears, and he's really angry.
He gets into it with Jeff Barth.
And they're both waving guns around and getting
in each other's faces.
JUDY HO: Diggy felt like she had been torturing him,
dangling her happiness around him when they weren't
together anymore.
And he just wanted to hurt her.
MICHAEL DOWNES: Rachel headed for the door.
Diggy grabbed her, punched her in the face.
John Whitaker started kicking her.
BRAD PINCE: Tony Williams turned up the stereo
to drown out her screams.
MICHAEL DOWNES: They taped her up
and put Rachel in the garage.
At some point, Trissa Conner came home.
And she was told to get out of there.
Then Rachel was put in a black hockey
bag in Matthew Durham's Jeep and taken
up to Gold Bar, Washington.
BRAD PINCE: While Rachel was in the bag at the trailhead
with Maurice, Maurice unzipped the bag
and took the tape off so she could talk.
Rachel pleaded to him.
He put the tape back on and zipped her up.
Maurice was her friend.
They had plans to go back to high school together.
And she's terrified.
In that moment, he could have just let her go.
And he chose not to.
MICHAEL DOWNES: John Whitaker,
Matthew Durham, John "Diggy" Anderson, and Maurice
Rivas dig out a grave.
Diggy proceeds to shoot her seven
times, three times in the head and four times in the back.
And she was buried.
BRAD PINCE: And Diggy reminded everybody in the ride
back that loose ends get clipped.
[birds chirping]
- The prosecutor's office,
they worked day and night on this case.
They finally decided to go to trial.
[OFF] MICHAEL DOWNES: The jury was
persuaded in all three trials that the murder
was premeditated.
BRAD PINCE: Diggy, John Anderson,
and John Whitaker were convicted of aggravated murder.
And their sentencing was life without parole.
Yusef Jihad was convicted of first-degree murder
and received 37 years.
Durham and Maurice Rivas received 26 years.
Tony Williams got a 10-year sentence.
- And any number of people could have
stopped this, but they didn't.
JUDY HO: This is a poignant illustration of what
groupthink can be like.
They were too afraid to speak up
and to be humiliated by their peers
or to be kicked out of this group.
As a result, Rachel was killed.
MICHAEL DOWNES: The Burkheimer family
went through a living hell.
Getting a conviction was important,
but that doesn't fix it.
Absolutely nothing that we ever did could fix it.
[foghorn honking]
[somber music]
MEGHAN BURKHEIMER: Everyone that was in her life--
friends, family-- she left us with so much love.
She extracted every drop out of every minute, out of every day.
And that's something that most of us
never achieve in a lifetime.
I know that she knows I was looking out for her,
and I'm so grateful that I got lucky enough to be her sister.
Like, I hit the jackpot.
[poignant music]
[pensive music]
[audio logo]