MISSING: Marilyn “Niqui” McCown

Marilyn “Niqui” McCown was the first missing person’s case covered on Crime Junkie. Now, nearly 25 years after she vanished, fresh reporting uncovers never-before-heard details from police files that challenge everything we thought we knew. What if Niqui’s story never truly ended — and the answers are still closer than anyone realized?

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:00Ashley Flowers?

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• 0:45Ashley Flowers?

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• 2:17Ashley Flowers?

  Hi, Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers.

• 2:20Speaker 01

  And I'm Britt.

• 2:21Ashley Flowers?

  And today, I am bringing you a special episode. If you recognize the name Marilyn Nicky McCown, then you've either been with us since the very beginning, or you've made it all the way through our archives. Because Nicky's story was the very first one I ever told on Crime Junkie back in December of 2017, before we even knew what this show would become, before the millions of you listening now, and long before we had a team of investigative reporters digging into these cases. And her case really shaped the future of what this show would become. Because I remember, Britt, I'm sure you do too.

• 2:59Speaker 01

  I can tell you where I was standing.

• 3:00Ashley Flowers?

  The day after that episode dropped, Nicky's daughter Peyton reached out to me, said that she listened, said she was grateful for the attention, but you know, there was more to the story. I drove all the way up to Richmond, Indiana. I met with her. And I held that conversation with me every day for the next eight years. This reminder that even when we had no following, the people who lived these stories would be listening to these stories. I never forgot her, I never forgot her mom, and I kept tabs on the case the whole time. But not much had changed eight years later. So I had this idea. Back in 2017, this show was a lot different. It's evolved so much over that time.

• 3:43Ashley Flowers?

  And maybe it's hard to notice unless you've been. So I wanted to really show everyone how far we've come, to thank you, our listeners, for showing up every week, for caring, and for giving us the resources to grow. And I want to show you how we put those resources to work. Because what started out as me and Britt here just retelling a story that's already been told, like many true crime shows do, this is now a full-fledged investigative reporting operation with a team of people, a team of reporters, to bring you never-before-heard details on cases that you thought you knew, like this one. So, little by little, over the last year, me and the team have been digging into this case with fresh eyes.

• 4:27Ashley Flowers?

  And now, I'm here to bring you the real story of Nikki McCown, with never-before-released information that you aren't going to believe. And I think, at the end of this, you're gonna realize that this case, that once had an ending, might not be as tightly wrapped up as we thought.

• 5:19Ashley Flowers?

  It's been almost 25 years since Nikki McCown went missing, and over eight years since we first told her story. So, let me start by refreshing everyone on what we knew back then. So, on July 22nd, 2001, Nikki and her fiancee Bobby Webster went to church with plans to wrap up their wedding invitations together later that day. After the service, Nikki went back to the apartment that she shared with Bobby. She changed into some casual clothes, like a pink top and biker shorts, loaded up Bobby's GMC with dirty clothes, and then drove to the Richmond Coin Laundry on Southeast Street, something that had become kind of like a weekly ritual. Now, just before 2:00 PM, a witness saw Nikki inside the building, the laundromat. Then, 15 minutes later,

• 6:04Ashley Flowers?

  security footage captured her at the nearby Village Pantry convenience store getting change, I'm assuming for the laundry machines. Now, before she left, she looked totally normal. Things seemed fine. But they obviously didn't stay that way, because just a little while later, we know that Nikki got back in her car and drove the short distance to her parents' house, where she told her mom that she felt uncomfortable. Some guys at the laundromat. That had been bothering her, like wouldn't leave her alone.

• 6:32Speaker 01

  Well, and her mom even offered to finish the laundry up at her place, right?

• 6:35Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah, she said she could like take it out, dry it there or whatever. Cause she had a machine at her place, but Nikki didn't. So she goes back and according to the Dayton Daily News, at about 3pm, someone sees her back at the laundromat. But I don't think they're like, whoever's seeing her, the witness, they're like staying there or have eyes on her for a long time. Because we just had this like brief confirmation that she's there at 3 and then that's it. We don't know when she finished, or if she left, or when she left, or if she left alone. We just know that as the afternoon wore on, she never made it back to her apartment. Didn't return to her parents' house to pick up her then nine-year-old daughter Peyton. And by early evening, her family had started to worry and they began calling around, trying to find her.

• 7:18Ashley Flowers?

  And with no luck, they end up filing a missing persons report with the Richmond Police that next morning. And even though she was in the prime of her life with a daughter, she was about to get married. Like, I mean, the wedding was just around the corner. She had no history of disappearing like this. For some reason, the family said the police didn't initially think that something bad had happened. They kind of figured that she would just come home when she was ready.

• 7:41Speaker 01

  Well, and if I remember, they actually kind of used the wedding thing against her. They thought this was like a case of cold feet. She was like freaking out and kind of just pieced out because of that.

• 7:50Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah, I mean, they had nothing else telling them differently. And so with the wedding just weeks away, this whole like runaway bride theory was a convenient narrative.

• 7:59Speaker 01

  Right, but her family never bought that. And they even told the police about her getting harassed, right?

• 8:04Ashley Flowers?

  Oh yeah, they told police, but there was no hint of a struggle at the laundromat. No hard evidence left behind, so they kind of waited it out a little to see if she turned back up. But the more time that passed, the more concerning things got. There was no activity on her bank accounts, no trace of the car that she'd been driving. In those first days, it was up to Nikki's family to organize search parties. They got dozens of volunteers to comb the wooded areas and the backroads around Richmond, Indiana. And they passed out as many flyers as they could. And one of the people helping pass out flyers was of course Nikki's fiance, Bobby Webster. But outside of that, he wasn't really participating in any of the searches.

• 8:48Ashley Flowers?

  And probably because he was too busy doing some really eyebrow-raising things at a moment when optics mattered.

• 8:57Ashley Flowers?

  According to police accounts, within days of Nikki disappearing, Bobby contacted the community college that Nikki was attending to ask about her unused tuition. Like, what would happen to it? Could he get a refund?

• 9:09Speaker 01

  Kind of like he's sure she's not gonna be going to class anymore.

• 9:13Ashley Flowers?

  And he must be pretty sure they're not getting married either, because he also went to a jeweler and returned Nikki's engagement ring, even canceled their reception venue for a refund within a week. Now, at the time, his excuse was that he just really needed the money with Nikki being gone and her not working.

• 9:30Speaker 01

  And his car was missing with her, I guess.

• 9:34Ashley Flowers?

  It was, but that's not like a factor in the money thing. Nikki had her own car and he had a key to that, so he'd been using hers.

• 9:40Speaker 01

  Okay, so he had a car.

• 9:41Ashley Flowers?

  That shouldn't have been like a money factor. Basically, he just needed to like pay the bills or whatever. Like, they weren't well off. They're kind of living paycheck to paycheck. So without her paycheck, or, I mean, like, we're talking days, but he knows her paycheck isn't gonna be coming.

• 9:52Speaker 01

  Right, or does he?

• 9:54Ashley Flowers?

  He thought money was just gonna be tight. But he insisted he was devastated by her disappearance and had no idea where she could be. Now, like I said, this is all happening over the first few days of Nikki coming up missing. And when police start getting more involved, they look at what Bobby's been doing and they become suspicious of his actions too. So they ask him to come in and take a polygraph. Now, when he does, police say that he failed an important question. One along the lines of, "Did you have anything to do with or know anything about Nikki's disappearance?" His response was no, but according to the polygraph, it said that's a lie. Now, later on, Bobby came out and said, "That is not what or how they asked him."

• 10:39Ashley Flowers?

  He said that the way the question was phrased was something more like, "Do you feel responsible for her going missing?" And he said like, "Well, how would any man not feel partially responsible for not being there when something happens to your fiance, your woman?" Now, I can't find where police ever came out and confirm or deny any of this. Is it like they said? Is it like Bobby said? Is it somewhere in the middle? Which kind of just left everyone with a lot of questions about Bobby, but no physical proof tying him to a crime.

• 11:08Speaker 01

  Well, and he had an alibi, right?

• 11:10Ashley Flowers?

  Kind of. I mean, that's what I remember knowing back then. Like, after church, he said that he met up with a cousin, and his cousin drove them to the Richmond Square Mall to get fitted for wedding tuxes. They're together for like, an hour and a half or so. And then Bobby said that he made a couple of pit stops at people's houses before going home, between like 5:30 and 5:45, where he expected to meet Nikki. They were gonna finish up those wedding invites, but she just never showed. So, yes, he has an alibi, you know, there's a little bit of wiggle room in there. And with that, with the quote-unquote "failed Polly", after he gets talked to by police, he kind of just remains in this gray space that investigators like to call "person of interest." Now, while searches continued for Nikki,

• 11:53Ashley Flowers?

  detectives went back to the laundromat a week later to interview regulars. No one saw anything that was suspicious, not even in hindsight. And more importantly, no one seemed to know anything about the men who may have been messing with Nikki. By this point, Indiana State Police stepped in to help a little by putting up a helicopter to sweep across Richmond, Indiana and the surrounding area. They're hunting for the vehicle she was in, a 1990 black and gray GMC Jimmy. The thinking was, find the car, find Nikki, or at least be one step closer to where she is. But week after week, the sky, the ground, it all offered nothing.

• 12:34Ashley Flowers?

  And it turns out, that's because the car wasn't in Indiana. You see, Richmond, Indiana, you know this, is right on the eastern border of the state, bumping against Ohio. So it's not uncommon for people who live in Richmond to work in Dayton, Ohio, because that's the closest big city. Nikki is one of those people. She worked at a prison there, even lived in Dayton before.

• 12:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, and this is all kind of in the same bubble for Richmond locals, I think.

• 13:00Ashley Flowers?

  Yes, but jurisdictional lines are pretty- Solid. Yes. And so, since every indication pointed to Nikki going missing from the laundromat in Indiana, no one was really paying much attention to Ohio. I mean, they could go like, talk to people in Ohio who knew her and stuff, and I think they did what they could, like getting ahold of her ex, her coworkers, her friends, but the focus was definitely not on Dayton. So this big clue got missed for months, from July 22nd all the way to November 3rd, 2001. That is when someone just happened to stumble upon this vital clue that had just been sitting there casually, as if it had been waiting to be found all along.

• 13:44Ashley Flowers?

  The GMC was parked at the Meadows of Catawba Apartments, roughly 45 minutes from Richmond. Now, the reason the vehicle gets spotted is that one of the doors was left open, which catches the eye of a Montgomery County Sheriff's Deputy. He eventually runs the plates and sees that the car was flagged for a missing persons case. So, when Richmond PD gets notified and gets out there, they know that the door lock was damaged, the ignition had been tampered with, and the stereo was missing. So someone had gone through the car, but they didn't take everything. Left behind in the backseat was a laundry basket with folded clothes. And this changed so much. Nikki's family first thought something may have happened to her at the laundromat, or

• 14:29Ashley Flowers?

  like, right as she was leaving, or coming or going, whatever. But this made it seem like maybe she had, you know, finished up there completely, made it to wherever she was going on her own. But where that was, Lord only knows. I mean, at least police had a starting point before. Now, all of Richmond and Dayton and everywhere in between were in the mix. However, the complex where this vehicle was found had to mean something. I mean, first of all, the driver's seat was positioned in a way that fit Nikki's petite frame, so they're thinking, you know, she may have actually driven the car here herself. But more importantly, she knew not just this general area well, but this specific...

• 15:13Ashley Flowers?

  Complex. She used to live there and her ex, Steven Johnston, still lived there when the car was found. There was no way that this was a coincidence. So Richmond Police went straight to Steven, who admitted his relationship with Nikki back in the day had been rocky. But he swore he had no idea where she was or what happened to her, and that the first time he'd even seen the GMC there was on the news.

• 15:38Speaker 01

  Which I remember being kind of side eye about this, like having a hard time understanding it. Like, he had to have known that everyone was looking for his missing ex. Like, not just his missing ex, his daughter's mother. And like, the car is in the complex? Like, how does no one see this car? How does he not see this car?

• 15:57Ashley Flowers?

  Well, I mean, it is possible that the car wasn't there the whole time. Or where it was wasn't in an area that like he or everyone passed regularly. I mean, this was a big complex. And yes, it's a little weird that he didn't see it. Because like, I did get a glimpse of some of the footage from Richmond Police, like their evidence footage that was put on an episode of Disappeared on Investigation Discovery. And the car is like not hidden by any means. But it would almost be weirder to me if he had something to do with it and then like left the car in his own complex.

• 16:27Speaker 01

  Oh, totally. And I actually don't think he's the most likely culprit. And not to jump the gun on like all your storytelling here, but we know he fully cooperated, submitted DNA, passed the polygraph. He was cleared pretty quickly.

• 16:39Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah, right.

• 16:40Speaker 01

  So the car being there almost feels like a setup, which maybe someone parked it in a place where he wouldn't see it for that reason. But it still blows my mind that it was there for months.

• 16:50Ashley Flowers?

  If it was there for months. I mean, the only thing we knew regarding the timing in those early days was that police believed the car was likely broken into sometime after it was abandoned there, totally unrelated to Nikki's disappearance. So we knew it was there for at least a little bit of time, but nothing more than that in those early days.

• 17:07Speaker 01

  But we don't know actually how long.

• 17:09Ashley Flowers?

  Right.

• 17:09Speaker 01

  Especially because they weren't looking in Ohio at all.

• 17:11Ashley Flowers?

  So if it wasn't Steven who put it there, which we're saying we don't think it was, it may have been someone who knew that he lived there, or at least knew that Nikki used to live there. Maybe they knew about her and Steven's rough relationship. That is someone who has to know you pretty well, right? Well, as detectives dug into her life in Dayton, one name kept coming up in their interviews. Someone who worked with Nikki and lived nearby. Thirty-four-year-old Tommy Swint, who is a corrections officer at the facility where Nikki was employed, the Montgomery Education and Pre-Release Center. Now Tommy had a reputation for being close to her, maybe too close.

• 17:54Ashley Flowers?

  Some coworkers, friends, family described his behavior as protective, innocent, like a big brother figure. Someone she had known for like five-plus years. But others called his behavior or feelings toward Nikki obsessive. Nikki's sister, Michelle McCowen-Luster, said that Tommy had actually even sent lingerie to Nikki's bridal shower just weeks before she disappeared, if you remember. She also said that one time, years before, she walked in on Tommy, pinning Nikki against a chair, and Nikki had her like foot on his chest screaming for help, something that Tommy tried to like laugh off as just playing around. And this is all sus, but kind of like with Bobby, it didn't go anywhere. They couldn't prove that he moved the car

• 18:39Ashley Flowers?

  or did something to Nikki, so he didn't stay in the hot seat. And that's really kind of where Nikki's case seemed to stall.

• 18:46Speaker 01

  Did they end up getting any physical evidence from the GMC that they could use?

• 18:50Ashley Flowers?

  Well, early on, they never said too much publicly. But if they got anything, like when you think about it, if it came back to either of the two persons of interest, Tommy or Bobby, I don't think it would have helped much. Like, it's Bobby's car in the first place.

• 19:05Speaker 01

  Oh, yeah.

• 19:05Ashley Flowers?

  Of course, there's gonna be like some sign of him in the vehicle. And Tommy had been friends with her for five or so years. Like, he could easily write that off, too. But they weren't writing him off completely. They had, over the years, kind of been keeping tabs on him. And lo and behold, in 2007, this dude pops back up on the radar. Not in Nikki's case, or even for another crime. No, they got word that he was employed as a police officer in Trotwood, Ohio. So Richmond Police decide that they probably need to phone a friend here. They call up Trotwood PD and they're like, hey, don't know if this came up in like the interview process. But that guy you just hired, he is a person of interest in one of our cases.

• 19:50Ashley Flowers?

  Like maybe not somebody you want on your squad. They agree and basically they forced Tommy to resign. But this man did not want to go quietly. He filed a lawsuit against Richmond PD and several officials, multiple newspapers, along with two reporters alleging defamation. His whole thing was like, he says he was never informed that he was a suspect or a person of interest in Nikki's case. And that pretty much everyone from the prison where they all worked had been questioned. So like, he just thought that was like par for the course. But here's the thing, in stirring this pot, he pushed himself into local headlines. And all this renewed attention finally triggered something investigators never saw coming.

• 20:35Ashley Flowers?

  A new tip.

• 20:36Speaker 01

  A new tip, but not in Nikki's case.

• 20:38Ashley Flowers?

  Mm hmm. But there would be a connection. So in late 2007, an informant reached out to Dayton police and said, "You should look at Tommy for something much older. The unsolved 1991 murder of Tina Marie Ivory. She was a 33-year-old woman found beaten and strangled, wrapped in trash bags and a quilt dumped near a road outside Dayton." Now, at first this seems like a long shot, but the crime lab had preserved DNA from the scene for nearly two decades. Semen and blood. What they didn't have was a suspect to compare it to.

• 21:11Speaker 01

  But now they do.

• 21:12Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah, and they get him using Nikki's case. So he's out here raising hell, being like, "I didn't know police were even looking at me. I have nothing to do with this case involving Nikki." So Richmond PD are like, "Okay, like, you know, to help..." Yeah, "To help prove your case, give us your DNA." And he does, not knowing that Dayton police are the ones intending to use it. So they take his DNA and the lab matches it to the semen on the clothing Tina Ivory was found in. And the blood evidence found on the quilt that she was wrapped in was either consistent with- Him or like couldn't exclude him depending on like what source you're looking at. Now Tina did sex work for a living, so the semen was good evidence, but not great.

• 21:55Ashley Flowers?

  Like it could be argued away and the blood wasn't a slam dunk either. So they needed something to like really nail him. And that's when they re-examined tape used to bind Tina and they uncovered a never before seen print. That was his. So all of this played out over years. You know, this stuff doesn't happen fast. So it wasn't until early 2010 that a Montgomery County grand jury issued an indictment, charging Tommy Swint with Tina Ivory's murder. Investigators believe they finally had their suspect, not just for Tina's 1991 homicide, but possibly for Nikki's too. But by then Tommy was living far away from the Midwest. He was down in Phoenix City, Alabama.

• 22:38Ashley Flowers?

  Now he had been questioned about Tina over the years as they were like doing all that testing. So when law enforcement from Alabama came knocking on February 3rd to arrest him, he must have known why they were there. And before they could make it inside, a gunshot rang out. Tommy had taken his own life. He left no confession, no explanation, no answers about Tina or about Nikki. But for many people, his actions said more than enough. And that moment became the unofficial end of Nikki's story. The obsessed coworker with the violent past no one knew about had finally been exposed. End episode, roll credits.

• 23:21Ashley Flowers?

  But we have been doing this a long time now together, you and me and the crime junkies. And I might have bought that ending in 2017 when I was green. But after covering more than 600 cases, including those in the fan club, and building out a team of investigative reporters, I know an ending like that is too vague to hang your hat on. After all, we still haven't found Nikki. So I got to wondering, with our resources now, could our team dig up anything that changes this case? Are we looking in the right places? Are we sure that we landed on the right? When we reached out to Nikki's family to see if they'd be interested in us revisiting her case, I was actually kind of shocked to learn that they themselves had already

• 24:04Ashley Flowers?

  been asking those same questions. For them, Tommy's sudden death didn't settle anything. And in the aftermath, some of them have become far more suspicious of someone else. So they welcomed our help. And sometimes, I think if you're in the right place at the right time, the universe just lines up perfectly. Because even though every records request and interview request was denied by Richmond PD, a trusted source gave us some of the case reports that shed a whole new light on every detail of this case, starting at the very beginning.

• 24:44Ashley Flowers?

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• 25:27Ashley Flowers?

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• 25:47Ashley Flowers?

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• 26:31Ashley Flowers?

  You can find so many treasures without even leaving your couch. Download Whatnot today and get $20 off your first purchase. Search Whatnot, W-H-A-T-N-O-T, in the App Store. Sign up and start finding the best deals on the products you love with $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply.

• 26:50Ashley Flowers?

  In those first few days after Nikki had gone missing, I told you that Nikki's family was suspicious of Bobby. He was never as helpful as they expected him to be. He wasn't really doing much to help them look for her. Instead, he was busy returning Nikki's ring, trying to get her tuition money and canceling their wedding. Oh, and watching movies. Or maybe just one movie, but he watched it enough times to be concerning. Nikki's sister Michelle told us that Bobby was practically fixated on this one particular movie, one that she felt was absurdly inappropriate considering the situation. I don't know if you've seen this one, but it's a movie from 2000 called The Gift.

• 27:31Speaker 01

  Isn't The Gift with Katie Holmes, the one where she has a jealous fiance who becomes a suspect after she goes missing?

• 27:38Ashley Flowers?

  That's the one.

• 27:39Speaker 01

  Okay.

• 27:40Ashley Flowers?

  Which like, can you imagine? You are out searching for your missing sister and you walk in on her unhelpful fiance watching The Gift. Michelle said she remembers standing there just like in shock, watching him just like play this same movie, thinking like, why this one? Why now? Why repeatedly?

• 28:00Speaker 01

  Over and over.

• 28:01Ashley Flowers?

  And he's not even hiding it. But like, nothing he was doing felt normal or appropriate for the situation. I mean, she told us that his emotions never seemed to match the moment. One minute, he would be sobbing, and then the next, he seemed totally fine. Like, he could switch it on and off. It didn't feel real to her. In 2024, news outlet Dayton 24/7 Now obtained Bobby's 2001 interview with Richmond PD. And there is this moment where, in my opinion, I hear what Michelle is talking about. And I'm actually going to play a little snippet for everyone here.

• 28:34Speaker 02

  Any thoughts where she could be at all?

• 28:37Speaker 03

  Nothing at all?

• 28:39Speaker 02

  I mean, give me a-

• 28:40Speaker 03

  I don't wanna sit and go, maybe another guy. I do hope it's another guy. I can deal with that pain. Pain that I can deal with is not knowing. I don't know if she's hungry. I don't know.

• 28:52Speaker 02

  Is she's what?

• 28:53Speaker 03

  The city's a work is can't eat. I don't know this and I'm sitting around trying.

• 28:58Speaker 02

  Yeah, I'm just-

• 28:58Speaker 03

  Hoping it's another guy. I can deal with that pain. I just don't. I'm sick of everyone going to psychics.

• 29:04Speaker 02

  Oh, they've done that too?

• 29:05Speaker 03

  It's, it's okay until the phone rings. At her sister's. I can't stay at my house. It's okay until the phone rings. And it's like, what is it now? What dead end are we headed out now?

• 29:17Ashley Flowers?

  There are a few moments like that where he sounds like he wants to cry, but then maybe doesn't. Though like, I can't tell because it's audio only. But he even tells police he's all cried out because he's just been crying for three days straight before they came to talk to him. Now, Michelle didn't see that in the first three days. And when she tried to press him about the day Nikki went missing, July 22nd, she said that his answers seemed very surface level. It was like the same basic outline repeated again and again. Church, wedding errands, back home. But he does get more detailed with police in his interview. He says that after church, he and Nikki went home. She changed into her casual clothes. She took his car because it was a gas guzzler and unreliable. So since she was just going a few miles away to the laundromat,

• 30:01Ashley Flowers?

  she took his with like a quarter of a tank of gas in it. And he took her Toyota sedan to go run his errands. He also tells police that he gave her $10 to cover laundry. It usually costs about six to do the three loads that she was planning. But he also found two quarters, like right before she was leaving, gave her that too. He said that he drove to someone else's house to meet his cousin. Cousin wasn't there, so he drives to another house. On the way, he passes the laundromat, sees the GMC there. He says this is about two fifteen-ish. Now he ends up finding his cousin, hops into his cousin's car to go to the Richmond Square Mall where they do the whole tuxes thing. And then he says he's at the jewelry store in the mall by like 2:45 or 3 o'clock. And he even tells police like- They should have him on surveillance footage at the mall.

• 30:46Ashley Flowers?

  But whether police ever verified that and got the footage is TBD. There's nothing saying that they did in what we have. He says after the jewelry store, they left and he was taken back to his car. And by like 3:30 or 3:45, he was passing back by the laundromat. And this time, the GMC was gone. So he figured, you know, Nikki's done. Now, he stops by a few houses before getting home at around 5:30, maybe 5:45. But he notes that he wasn't really paying attention to the times. And then he just kind of hung out at their apartment, waiting for Nikki and watching Any Given Sunday on TV. To me, this isn't a super strong alibi, especially if we believe that Nikki left the laundromat alive and well.

• 31:30Ashley Flowers?

  She is last seen there by somebody at around like 3 o'clock, remember?

• 31:34Speaker 01

  Well, and he's literally putting himself right there where she was at 3:30, 3:45.

• 31:40Ashley Flowers?

  And that is especially interesting, knowing what I found in the case report. There is a witness who apparently places Bobby at the laundromat with Nikki. This woman tells police that she walked into Richmond Coin Laundry on the day that Nikki vanished. Now, apparently she was just trying to use the payphone when she saw Nikki at the entrance, talking to a black man. She didn't know who he was, didn't think much of it, not until investigators circled back to her years later and asked her to review this six photo lineup. They explained the process, tell her, you know, take your time, but she doesn't need time. She immediately points to photo number six, Bobby Webster. And she indicates, "That is the man I saw talking to Nikki."

• 32:26Ashley Flowers?

  Now, what can you do with an ID that comes like four years later? And after your person of interest has been in the news for this case, right? Like, probably not a lot, even though the woman says that she didn't know who he was, never saw him other than that one time talking to Nikki and then in the photo lineup. But without corroboration from other witnesses, her ID just kind of sits there. An explosive claim, if real, left inside the case report. But now that we know about it, we wondered if there was maybe more strange behavior that Bobby exhibited after Nikki went missing. Now, up until this point, all we really had were Nikki's family's suspicions, which like valid, but we really wanted to find somebody not in her family,

• 33:11Ashley Flowers?

  who could give us some kind of outside perspective. And side note, I'm also desperately on the hunt for a TV guide that covers July 22nd, 2001, to see if any given Sunday was playing on TV. You don't know how hard I look for this.

• 33:24Speaker 01

  You are usually really good at finding like old publications like this.

• 33:28Ashley Flowers?

  I found one for all the cable channels, but not for like the basic channels. I am desperate, so if anyone out there knows, hit me up. But what we did find was a woman named Kim, who knew Bobby since childhood and actually ended up having a fling with him about a year after Nikki went missing. And what Kim said that she witnessed has never sat right with her. Now, Kim went to the same church as Bobby and Nikki. She had seen them both the morning of July 22nd at service. And she remembers Bobby practically glowing about the wedding. So like no red flags before. But a few days later, after word about Nikki was out, he showed up at her door and something just felt wrong.

• 34:10Ashley Flowers?

  She said that she remembers he was wearing Nikki's engagement ring and wedding band around his neck, even though Kim swears that she saw Nikki wearing them on the day that she disappeared, like she was wearing them at church.

• 34:22Speaker 01

  Are we talking about one of the rings that he returned to the jewelry store? Or something else?

• 34:26Ashley Flowers?

  No, yeah, he ends up returning her engagement ring on the 27th. So there are like five days between her disappearing and then him returning it. And Bobby's at her door only like days after, whatever. And listen, it was weird to her. There could be a straightforward explanation here. I mean, according to Bobby himself, in his interview with police, he said that Nikki took her rings off before she would do laundry. And he said she did that day. And this seems likely because in the case report that we have, it mentions that Nikki wasn't wearing anything on her left hand from what detectives could tell in the surveillance footage. But still, Kim couldn't make sense of it because the explanation that Bobby gave her at first didn't match the one that he gave her later. Like at first, he said the rings were too loose, so she was worried about them like falling off.

• 35:11Ashley Flowers?

  Off while doing laundry.

• 35:12Speaker 01

  Mm hmm.

• 35:12Ashley Flowers?

  But then in 2002, he told her that she'd taken them off because she'd gained weight and they were too tight.

• 35:18Speaker 01

  Which isn't just like a different explanation, it's the opposite.

• 35:22Ashley Flowers?

  Right. And Kim also said that when she offered to help search for Nikki, Bobby told her not to bother, that it would be a waste of time. And what really spooked her was when Bobby started saying that Nikki was already dead, talking about her being an angel. And Kim just could not understand why he would be talking like that, especially when in her opinion, it was early on enough where there was still every reason to hope that she was going to become a girl. So with all her uneasy feelings like building up, eventually, when they were seeing each other, Kim did something that I think most people in her position might not have the nerve to do. She looked square at Bobby and asked him point blank if he killed Nikki. According to Kim, Bobby didn't answer.

• 36:08Ashley Flowers?

  He didn't deny it, he didn't defend himself, he just broke down crying. Kim told us that moment stayed with her for years and deeply disturbed her. She didn't ask him again, and they ended things shortly after this.

• 36:24Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 36:24Ashley Flowers?

  Obviously. And for years, she didn't have much contact with Bobby. But then, one day, around early 2021, so not that long ago, she gets this phone call from Bobby out of the blue. He's telling her, you know, he's broke, he's out of work, he's unable to get hired because of his connection to Nikki's case, like it's always like followed him, and he begged her to let him come stay with her. Kim's like, I don't know, but she agreed to at least like talk to him. And what followed was a conversation that lasted over eight hours, that left her seeing him and the case very differently. Kim says that during this long call with Bobby, she learned more information about him and Nikki and their relationship

• 37:08Ashley Flowers?

  than she had ever been aware of in all the years she'd known him. He claimed that Nikki and Tommy Swint were lovers.

• 37:16Speaker 01

  What?

• 37:17Ashley Flowers?

  And when she asked how he would know that, he told It was because he'd been following them, watching them, seeing things that he never confronted Nikki about because he didn't want them to be true. And Kim couldn't believe what she was hearing. This felt like a man unraveling, like revealing a side of himself that she had never seen before. Someone jealous enough to stalk the woman he loved. So by the time Bobby finished talking, Kim said that she knew one thing for sure. He was not coming into her home. Whatever darkness he was carrying, she wanted no part of it. Kim said that Bobby kept reaching

• 37:57Ashley Flowers?

  out, but then seemed to give up after she stopped responding altogether. And then just a couple of months after that call, Bobby died of a heart attack.

• 38:07Speaker 01

  Do police know about this? I mean, I know a heart attack isn't like an expected event, but this feels almost like, it feels like a deathbed confession.

• 38:15Ashley Flowers?

  I don't know what this was, but like Kim held the weight of it for a few years until she just couldn't anymore. She told us that it was after listening to Bobby's taped interview that was made public online, part of the one that you heard earlier. She said that she heard that and she felt compelled to come forward. So she says that she spoke with Richmond detective Mike Wright about her concerns.

• 38:36Speaker 01

  But now Bobby's dead, so like, what can they even do?

• 38:40Ashley Flowers?

  Exactly. And listen, Kim is clear. None of this is proof. This is only her experience. But based on everything she saw and everything Bobby told her, she could no longer reconcile the longtime friend that she thought she knew with the man on the other side of that line during their last conversation. And girl, same. Like, I'll link out to Bobby's full interview with police, but I bet what rubbed her the wrong way is what I had a hard time with too. In this interview, he's like, oh, you know, I hope there's another guy. I hope like, that's the reason. At least she would be okay. I mean, you heard him. But he says he didn't know about anything. And he mentions Tommy Swin, but like, as one of her friends in line with a bunch of

• 39:22Ashley Flowers?

  other people, never says a word about knowing they were having an affair or about following them. So if he knew that while he was sitting in the room with those detectives, then he was bold-faced lying to them. Why?

• 39:36Ashley Flowers?

  But here's the thing. As recently as 2024, Detective Wright told Dateline that Bobby is no longer considered a person of interest in this case. But when we tried asking police that same question ourselves, if Bobby was officially cleared, how he was eliminated, as of this recording, we have not heard back. Now, before we let a claim like Nikki and Tommy possibly being lovers reshape this narrative, I want to be absolutely clear about what is fact and what is rumor. We still don't know the true nature of Nikki's relationship with Tommy Swindt, who, by the way, was married at the time Nikki vanished. And he was even still married to the same woman when he took his own life after being indicted for Tina's murder. When I look at the case report, like depending on who we talked to, depending on who police talked to,

• 40:21Ashley Flowers?

  the story of like his relationship with Nikki, it varies. And the files are full of conflicting accounts. I mean, there's one person at least who believed that Nikki and Tommy were having an affair. Others insisted they were just close friends. Some say it was all just one-sided, with Tommy wanting more and Nikki shutting him down. So I am going to get like more into Tommy later. But before him becoming like the foregone conclusion to this case, and after they had looked hard at Bobby, it turns out that there were a lot of people that they looked at in between.

• 40:55Speaker 01

  It was only ever Bobby and Tommy, Tommy and Bobby. I thought that was kind of all they had.

• 41:01Ashley Flowers?

  That's all we got publicly. But that's never been the full story. And this one is full of winding roads, twisty turns, and more red herrings than one case can handle. But it's been almost 25 years, and maybe to find Nikki, we have to kind of wade through all of that. Starting with a totally out of left field allegation that came about two years after Nikki disappeared, when someone tried to inject a brand new theory into the case. One so pointed that if it were true, would turn the entire investigation on its head.

• 41:39Ashley Flowers?

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• 42:22Ashley Flowers?

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• 42:42Ashley Flowers?

  I don't know if this is just a Midwest thing or a me thing, but I get a rush of excitement when I score an incredible bargain. And I am one of those people who feel compelled to tell anyone about it when given the chance. So like, I'm the person who immediately responds to a compliment like, "Thanks, I got it on sale," or "Thanks, got it on Whatnot." And if you haven't tried Whatnot, then you're missing out on some great deals to brag about. Whatnot is the number one live shopping app in the US, where shopping happens in real time with real people, real conversations, and incredible deals. You almost never pay full price. You can shop name brands across makeup, perfume, clothes, handbags, jewelry, and more. When I say "more," there is literally everything. I have gotten lost in the estate sale side of the app?

• 43:25Ashley Flowers?

  You can find so many treasures without even leaving your couch. Download Whatnot today and get $20 off your first purchase. Search "Whatnot," W-H-A-T-N-O-T, in the App Store. Sign up and start finding the best deals on the products you love with $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply.

• 43:44Ashley Flowers?

  In November 2003, detectives received something completely unexpected. An anonymous letter claiming investigators had missed a crucial relationship in Nikki's life. No name was signed to this letter, just a set of accusations sharp enough to ruin a career or derail an entire investigation. According to the case report, this letter alleged that Nikki had been romantically involved with someone from work and not Tommy Swint, not even just an officer like Tommy. This letter named the guy presiding over the entire prison.

• 44:20Speaker 01

  Like the warden?

• 44:21Ashley Flowers?

  The warden. And the letter claimed that the two had some sort of secret relationship, that they had argued before she disappeared, and that there were rumors he didn't want her getting married. And just to make things even stranger, this letter was signed only with the number 6345789.

• 44:43Speaker 01

  What is that? Like an inmate number, a badge number, like employee ID?

• 44:48Ashley Flowers?

  That's what I thought at first too, but it probably is none of the above. The best guess, according to the case report, is that it's referencing a Wilson Pickett soul song where that number is the title. It's a made-up phone number, basically like that you can call when you want someone to like come over and give you some attention. So if that's what it is, I don't know if the author was doing this as a nod to being anonymous or like trying to give some clue that like we're not picking up on, or if this is just like a super weird coincidence and the number actually is something else. I mean, there wasn't like a dash in it like the song title, or like a phone number actually would be. So could it be something else? Maybe, but like just look at this as a whole.

• 45:29Ashley Flowers?

  The whole thing to me feels designed and not like someone trying to help, more like someone trying to steer the investigation.

• 45:38Speaker 01

  Almost like a diversion.

• 45:39Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah. And the case report states that investigators followed up on this, but they didn't find anything to support it. But did they? Because we reached out to the warden and he agreed to answer our questions via text. And he was quick to shut down the rumor. And according to him, he had never heard of this letter. Now, it's unclear to me whether like police had talked to him or not talked to him, but he was clear that the letter at least, like that this had never come up. He was surprised by it. Which I was kind of shocked that he wouldn't have gotten word of something like this. But he made it clear that he was not romantically involved with Nikki, that there were no arguments of any kind, and that in his words, she was an exceptional employee

• 46:22Ashley Flowers?

  who earned high marks on her evaluations.

• 46:25Speaker 01

  This is feeling a little bit like the car to me. Like I said before, like a misdirection. Something tells me that figuring out who wrote this letter would be far more telling than who it's implicating.

• 46:38Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah, I agree. And I know detectives were able to determine like a couple of things about this letter, really just that it was postmarked from Dayton, Ohio. So like, again, we're still focused on this Dayton area. That's where the car is found. And I know they tried to process under the flap area for prints, but they didn't get anything. So all in all, based on what we have, detectives conclude that like this Nikki Warden rumor, whatever, isn't true. And the report even like notes that the allegations didn't seem credible and that they even say kind of what we're saying, that this appears to be an attempt to push the investigation in a different direction. But it's also worth considering too, that maybe this was just a hoax. Because whoever wrote the letter didn't even spell Nikki's last name correctly.

• 47:23Speaker 01

  If it was someone connected though, what was going on in the case like right before this letter appeared?

• 47:28Ashley Flowers?

  I had that same question. Because this is coming two years later, like what?

• 47:33Speaker 01

  Where it feels like kind of cold, nothing's happening.

• 47:35Ashley Flowers?

  Things had stalled by that point. And so I had the exact same thought, like what is happening that you're like, oh?

• 47:40Speaker 01

  I need to do something. Yeah.

• 47:41Ashley Flowers?

  I don't have all the files. The only note that I see right before this one was from like a few weeks before, when this body had been found in Owen County, Indiana. Now, it sounds like they were going to run some tests to make sure that it wasn't Nikki. Obviously, it didn't end up being her.

• 48:00Speaker 01

  But maybe someone panicked.

• 48:02Ashley Flowers?

  Right. But like- You would think that if it was someone connected to actually what happened to Nikki, they would know where they put her body and they would know that this one in Owen County wasn't her.

• 48:12Speaker 01

  Yeah, I guess.

• 48:13Ashley Flowers?

  And like Owen County, by the way, is like southwest of Indianapolis. It's a hike from like this Richmond Dayton area.

• 48:19Speaker 01

  Which is on the east side.

• 48:20Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah. Now, maybe they were just getting word that a body had been found. I don't know. Or it's possible this whole thing was a red herring that just, you know, took a lot of time and investigative energy from detectives. And this wasn't the only thing they were running down. What seemed much more promising to me were two separate anonymous tips saying that Nikki's remains were in illegal dump sites closer by. In the first one, the McCowen family got a call claiming that Nikki's remains could be located at this site near the intersection of State Road 320 and US 40 in New Paris, Ohio. Now, the caller refused to give a name or any additional information. And in the second tip, someone anonymously called the Wayne County Sheriff's Office,

• 49:04Ashley Flowers?

  again referencing an illegal dump site over the Ohio state line, possibly even referring to the same one mentioned in the tip before. Now, this second call investigators were able to trace to this Nebraska-based phone number tied to a trucking company. And they like started to kind of run this down to see if any of these truckers had ties to the Richmond area or the Dayton area. And it seems like they got it kind of narrowed down, but they were never able to identify who actually made this call. I got kind of obsessed with this one. So our reporters followed this lead and we got in touch with the company owner's son. And we're like, listen, like there are these two employees. They had it narrowed down to these kind of like two names.

• 49:45Ashley Flowers?

  And based on the descriptions he gave us, one of these guys seemed more likely over the other. We still tracked down both guys, but either way, they each denied having anything to do with the call. And they said they didn't know Nikki or anything about the case. And we were even able to like figure out exactly what phone the call would have been made from inside the building. It was like in this area that was accessible to all employees if they were in town at the time, of course. But with this being So long ago, we couldn't get like a hundred percent confirmation to nail down one person. So kind of the way detectives hit a dead end, so did we. And honestly, things really slowed down with this tip.

• 50:27Ashley Flowers?

  Those come in in two thousand and six, and as they investigate into two thousand and seven, that's when things with Tommy start heating back up, right? This is when they find out he applies or gets a job at Trotwood. And so that's where all the focus ends up going. But before we circle back to him, I have to tell you about something tucked so far down in the narrative of this report. I almost missed it. But the second my eyes hit one name in particular, I froze. Like, I couldn't believe what I was seeing in the case report because this name was one I knew well. So you see, after they found the GMC in Dayton, police made a concerted effort to really try to talk to everyone in Dayton who knew Nikki, right?

• 51:11Ashley Flowers?

  Well, one of the people that they get in touch with tells them that some woman named Kay told her she ran into someone else. I know this is getting a little conflated, but this someone else told Kay that they were Nikki's godmother. And this godmother said that Nikki had just got cold feet. And oh, by the way, Kay has this boyfriend named Jeff Moore. And Jeff actually just happened to be friends with this disc jockey who was murdered in Ohio the year before Nikki's disappearance. Her name was Kelly D. Wilson. That stopped me in my tracks because if anyone's listened to my other podcast, The Deck, they might remember that I covered Kelly's case years ago. And that case is still unsolved.

• 51:53Ashley Flowers?

  Now, the next note in the report says that they talked to this Jeff guy who's like mentioned. And he's like, yeah, I worked construction at the apartments where Kelly was killed and we were friends. That's it. Like, that's like the end of the summary of their conversation. This Kelly, Jeff, Kay, none of it sticks. But I was over here freaking the F out because another weird detail I already knew because I lived in that case is that Kelly's on-air disc jockey name was Nikki. And the apartment- Apartment where this Jeff guy worked, the apartment where Kelly was killed in 2000, was Meadows of freaking Catalpa, the same place where Nikki once lived,

• 52:37Ashley Flowers?

  where her GMC that she was driving ends up being found.

• 52:41Speaker 01

  Something about these Meadows of Catalpa apartment, I know. It keeps pulling us back.

• 52:45Ashley Flowers?

  Everything comes back to these apartments. And guess who frequented those apartments? Tommy Swint.

• 52:52Speaker 01

  And we're back.

• 52:53Ashley Flowers?

  Apparently, he used to pick Nikki up from that complex when she and her ex-Steven would be like fighting. This is before Bobby. So my big question, did Tommy know Kelly? Like, we know he hung around that area, but we can't seem to confirm if Tommy was in the same circle of friends as Kelly. We tried asking around, but so far, we can't find anyone who can say for sure either way.

• 53:17Speaker 01

  And are we sure Kelly knew her killer?

• 53:19Ashley Flowers?

  No, not necessarily. I'm actually gonna put Kelly's Deck episode here in the Crime Junkie feed the day after this one drops. So anyone not familiar with that case, you really need to listen. It is a truly wild case. But at least in my opinion, it's totally possible she could have been killed by someone who just saw an opportunity, someone who may have just been in her apartment complex and saw her come home late after drinking at a party. Now, we actually reached out to the Montgomery County Sheriff's Office, asking if they have any DNA in Kelly's case, wondering if they could compare it against Tommy. But they said, no. They don't have any unknown DNA samples from a possible suspect.

• 53:58Speaker 01

  But have they considered him? I mean, Dayton's big, but it's not that big, right?

• 54:03Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah, so we asked them about a possible connection between Nikki's case and Kelly's. And we were told that they're, quote, "not aware of any connection between these two," end quote.

• 54:14Speaker 01

  Okay, that's not what we asked. Have they considered a connection?

• 54:18Ashley Flowers?

  Honestly, I don't know. I don't know if they're like dodging the question, because like, I too was like, that's like, that didn't totally answer it. Yeah. Or I don't know if they actually haven't considered a connection at all.

• 54:31Speaker 01

  But if there is a connection, then in that hypothetical scenario, we're back where the first episode ended, and Tommy is the most likely culprit for Nikki's case. I mean, did the case report convince you of that?

• 54:45Ashley Flowers?

  Convince me 100%? No. I mean, like, to me, like, until we find Nikki, nothing is 100%.

• 54:51Speaker 01

  Right.

• 54:52Ashley Flowers?

  I will say that the case report filled in a lot of the blanks, making it clear why they were so confident that it was him. And it made it clear to me that we never got the whole story on Tommy. Because if Tommy Swint had anything to do with whatever happened to Nikki McCown, it is clear that police theorized he worked with and had help from someone that you have probably never heard of until right now. 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

• 55:35Ashley Flowers?

  with flexible monthly payments that fit your budget. We're talking about the potential to lower your interest rate, reduce your monthly payment, or even pay off your loan sooner, depending on the term you choose. You can also consolidate your student loans into one simple monthly payment, so you could save more each month and work towards achieving your long-term financial ambitions. SoFi offers competitive fixed and variable rates and no origination fees, prepayment fees, or late fees required. It takes just two minutes to check your rate with SoFi, and they have already helped over 500,000 members refinance more than $50 billion in student loans. Visit sofi.com/crimejunkie to see how much you can save. That's sofi.com/crimejunkie, and start making smarter money moves with SoFi.

• 56:17Ashley Flowers?

  SoFi's student loans are originated by SoFi Bank, N.A., member FDIC. Additional terms and conditions apply. NMLS 696891.

• 56:27Ashley Flowers?

  I don't know if this is just a Midwest thing or a me thing, but I get a rush of excitement when I score an incredible bargain. And I am one of those people who feel compelled to tell anyone about it when given the chance. So like, I'm the person who immediately responds to a compliment like, "Thanks, I got it on sale," or "Thanks, got it on whatnot." And if you haven't tried whatnot, then you're missing out on some great deals to brag about. Whatnot is the number one live shopping app in the US, where shopping happens in real time with real people, real conversations. And incredible deals. You almost never pay full price. You can shop name brands across makeup, perfume, clothes, handbags, jewelry, and more. When I say more, there is literally everything. I have gotten lost in the estate sale side of the app.

• 57:11Ashley Flowers?

  You can find so many treasures without even leaving your couch. Download Whatnot today and get $20 off your first purchase. Search Whatnot, W H A T N O T, in the App Store. Sign up and start finding the best deals on the products you love with $20 off your first purchase. Terms apply.

• 57:30Ashley Flowers?

  It's impossible to talk about the new stuff I learned about Tommy Swindt without discussing this other person because it's all so intertwined. And while this is all new information now, it's been there all along. Actually, after I released our first episode on Nikki and then met up with her daughter Peyton, she told me about this other person, like not in detail, just kind of like mentioned that there was this other woman who worked at the prison, who was like mixed up with Tommy. And if Tommy had answers, maybe this woman did too. And it was that comment that Peyton made that had me so sure we never knew the full story. But I didn't have the tools to dig back then. Well, welcome to 2026. That woman is Darlene Williams.

• 58:16Ashley Flowers?

  Darlene is a coworker and friend of both Tommy and Nikki. They all worked at the prison together. And I really should say she's a friend of Nikki's, but she's a little more than just that with Tommy. It turns out the two had been having this longstanding affair, one that was still going on when Nikki went missing. And it made for a complicated dynamic. Because no matter which way you slice it, the one thing that's clear about Tommy and Nikki's relationship is that Tommy seemed to have a thing for Nikki. And Nikki, at minimum, was keeping Tommy close. I mean, we saw something in the report that maybe she was even using one of his credit cards, like according to one of her friends. And she may have at least once been intimate with him

• 58:59Ashley Flowers?

  based on an account that someone in her family gave police that is recounted in the case report. So there may have at least been some truth to what Bobby told Kim like a few years ago. But the question is, did Darlene know that? And if she did know about all of this, how did she feel about it? In an early interview with police, she seems to think that she is the only other woman in Tommy's life. Like, obviously, she knows he's married, but like, she's the mistress. Now, people describe Darlene and Nikki as friends, but it seems like something was coming between them right before Nikki went missing. When investigators talked to a fellow employee, she says that Nikki, Darlene, and Tommy hung

• 59:41Ashley Flowers?

  out together, but later tells them that Nikki and Darlene had been fighting before her disappearance, and that Nikki even left work upset the Friday before she went missing. Now, the case report doesn't explicitly say why, though. It doesn't offer any details about this. And when they go talk to Darlene, Darlene denies to police that there was any kind of fight. But what she can't deny, what I never knew until recently, is that it's possible the actual last confirmed time Nikki was alive wasn't 3 o'clock when that witness saw her back at the laundromat. It may actually be later than we thought, when Nikki called Darlene.

• 1:00:21Speaker 01

  What?

• 1:00:22Ashley Flowers?

  So let me give you the whole scoop on this call, because I think it is so important. I don't know how police initially become aware of this. Nikki does not have a cellphone. She only has a pager, but apparently she had left that pager in her Toyota that day. There is one note in the case report that this call between her and Darlene is not on the home phone. So where did she make that call from?

• 1:00:45Speaker 01

  I mean, do you think they're just getting this from Darlene?

• 1:00:47Ashley Flowers?

  Possibly. I mean, she admits to police in her interviews that Nikki called her, and apparently she was saying that she called to ask about these, like, skin, nail, hair vitamins that Nikki wanted to get before her wedding. And she says that Nikki was gonna pick them up that day before the store closed, maybe from like a CVS. Now, I do think this call happened. This is like one of those things that is stated as fact over and over in the case report. So they must have confirmed this somehow, like, maybe through Darlene's phone. Phone records. I mean, I know they subpoenaed her call records for the 21st and the 22nd. But as I got to thinking about it, like, maybe it's not as confirmed as I think because over time and in different interviews with Darlene, the time of this call changes.

• 1:01:31Ashley Flowers?

  I mean, like, in different statements, it's as early as 3:30 PM to as late as 6:00 PM. And at least in the reports I have, there's no, like, firm time they decide on, which makes you take back what I said, and I like, which you would think they'd be working up a phone records, unless they just didn't write about it in the case reports I have.

• 1:01:48Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:01:48Ashley Flowers?

  Either way, it doesn't seem like police ever determine where this call is made from, which I think is so important.

• 1:01:56Speaker 01

  Yeah, especially when you think of like the timeline of where Nikki was that day. So wasn't there a witness who was at the laundromat to use a payphone and like she saw?

• 1:02:06Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah.

• 1:02:07Speaker 01

  Nikki, so there's like, there's a phone there, so maybe Nikki used that.

• 1:02:10Ashley Flowers?

  Yes, but per Bobby's timeline, if we're believing his story, he's driving by the laundromat at like this exact time, 3:30.

• 1:02:18Speaker 01

  3:30, 3:45.

• 1:02:19Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah, and her car is not there. So to me, she's not making the call from the payphone, which like leaves two options in my mind. One, Nikki made the call from a payphone at a gas station. This option half works with the theory that police seem to have. It's clear from the detective's notes that they don't fully buy Darlene's story about why Nikki called, or like, at least there's something they don't buy because like in the case report, they call out the fact that there was a CVS like right by the laundromat that was 24 hours. So she didn't need to get anywhere before it closed. And when we spoke to a close friend of Nikki's, she told us that the rumor was Nikki wasn't going to a store to get these.

• 1:03:02Ashley Flowers?

  She was going to someone's house to pick these up, possibly a coworker's house. Most of her coworkers live near Dayton. The coworker she is calling about these vitamins lives in Dayton. And the about 44 mile drive to Dayton was one that Nikki made all the time for work. Like, so I don't think she would think twice about just like going there to pick something up. So my thinking is if she's gonna make a longer drive, remember Bobby's car is a gas guzzler. Like that's part of the reason she drives it to the laundromat. It's super close.

• 1:03:36Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:03:36Ashley Flowers?

  It only had like a quarter of a tank of gas, according to what he told police in his interview. But I found from the case report that when the car was found, it had half a tank of gas. So if she drove the car out there, it had to have been filled up. Maybe she called then at a gas station.

• 1:03:54Speaker 01

  I mean, that's makes a lot of sense, actually.

• 1:03:57Ashley Flowers?

  Maybe. Hold that thought because it's not a perfect theory. Here's the problem with it. Bobby said the only money she had on her was like 1050, right? That he had given her.

• 1:04:06Speaker 01

  For the laundry.

• 1:04:07Ashley Flowers?

  It would cost about six bucks to do the three loads. So that gives her like $4.50 left. Did I research the price of gas in this area, July 2001? And then the size of a GMC Jimmy tank? Couldn't be your crime junkie if I didn't.

• 1:04:19Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:04:20Ashley Flowers?

  So the tank held like 31 gallons. Gas was anywhere from like 132 to 145 a gallon, depending on if she filled up in Indiana or Ohio.

• 1:04:30Speaker 01

  I wish.

• 1:04:30Ashley Flowers?

  I know, like so cheap. So if it's already a quarter full, to get to a half a tank, and this is before she drove and used any more, she needs like $11 worth of gas? And again, this is before she makes the 40 mile drive. In good condition, a 1990 GMC Jimmy gets like average 15 miles per gallon on the highway.

• 1:04:50Speaker 01

  It's a lot of math, by the way.

• 1:04:51Ashley Flowers?

  I know. Everyone's probably like, don't place over.

• 1:04:53Speaker 01

  This is a word problem and I am.

• 1:04:55Ashley Flowers?

  Don't place over. So we know the GMC's in poor condition. I don't know what it actually got. Even if like best case scenario, let's just cut to the chase. Back of the napkin math, she had to have put somewhere between like 12 to 16 bucks into the car. She had 450, according to Bobby.

• 1:05:10Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:05:10Ashley Flowers?

  So did she even have money for that? Maybe Nikki's sisters, Michelle and Tammy, told us that she almost always had a wallet on her, but no one seems sure about whether she had it on her that day at the laundromat. All we know is that there was no wallet reportedly found in the GMC.

• 1:05:28Speaker 01

  So Nikki did or didn't have enough money to get the thing on her own? Like, we don't know.

• 1:05:33Ashley Flowers?

  I don't know. Like. You just saw me do the math. Like, I am desperately looking for answers over here, where I don't know if there are any. Like, it shouldn't be this hard to know if she had any of her cards on her. Like, so, I don't know. It's possible she had money or a card that nobody knew about.

• 1:05:49Speaker 01

  And she could have had Tommy's card, too, right? Like, that's in the case file.

• 1:05:52Ashley Flowers?

  Well, in the case report, I have like a narrative.

• 1:05:54Speaker 01

  Right.

• 1:05:55Ashley Flowers?

  I don't know if they checked her financial reports. I don't know if they checked Tommy's. But if she didn't have money on her, then we're actually back where we started. And she went somewhere after the laundromat, maybe even in the Richmond area, to call Darlene sometime between 3:30 and 6:00 PM, depending on Darlene's different accounts. We know it's not home, because it's not on her home phone. That I know for sure. So wherever she went, did someone intercept her and they drove the car and had money for gas?

• 1:06:26Speaker 01

  Could Darlene or Tommy have been in Richmond around then?

• 1:06:30Ashley Flowers?

  According to the case report, no, because Darlene says she got the call from Nikki while she was at work.

• 1:06:37Speaker 01

  In Dayton.

• 1:06:38Ashley Flowers?

  Right. And it's kind of insinuated in the reports that she was working her normal second shift that day, which would have kept her at the prison till later in the evening. But Tommy was not at work. He was in Dayton, says he went to church, went to dinner with his wife, like, just as he does every Sunday. Never venturing to Richmond. But when they ask his wife about this, she doesn't seem to remember much about July 22nd. And it's really the next day that things get really shifty. So the day after Nikki goes missing, this is now July 23rd, 2001, both Tommy Swin and Darlene Williams were scheduled to work, but they call out, according to the case report. Darlene calls out of work at 12:45,

• 1:07:22Ashley Flowers?

  which is just an hour and 15 minutes before her shift is supposed to start. And Tommy Swin's work records show that he didn't put in for the day off until the 24th, so the day after he actually took it, which is like, I don't know if it's a no-call, no-show, or if he just like calls someone and nobody put it down. I don't know.

• 1:07:38Speaker 01

  So if they weren't at work, what were they doing then?

• 1:07:42Ashley Flowers?

  Well, in a police interview, Tommy straight up tells- Police that he took the day off to go to Richmond to help search for Nikki with Darlene, even saying they met up with some of Nikki's family. Darlene has the same story when she speaks with detectives. But when they go back to the family to fact check this, at least according to them, Tommy and Darlene never show up on the 23rd. And we confirmed this with the family today. They don't remember either Tommy or Darlene being with their group on that day after she went missing.

• 1:08:13Speaker 01

  So I ask again, what are they doing then?

• 1:08:17Ashley Flowers?

  The million dollar question. But as far as our records could uncover, one that no one seems to find an answer to. Though you can see why police spent so much time digging into these two. So by early 2002, police were running any and all reports that they could on this couple. They're looking for anything, and I mean anything. And paying attention to details matters because in doing this, police looked to see if there were any driving infractions. And like both had some come up, but like none for the dates in question, whatever. But something did stand out to one of the detectives. It was a speeding ticket that Tommy got on October 7th, 2001.

• 1:09:02Ashley Flowers?

  And he got it near the Ohio Pennsylvania border. Seems totally unrelated, right? But it sounds like they didn't recognize the car he was in. So they run the plates and it comes back to an auto leasing company at an address in Dayton. So they pull the address up on MapQuest, throwback. And you won't freaking believe it. Catalpa. The auto leasing company is about a mile from where the GMC was found.

• 1:09:31Speaker 01

  Where the GMC is found at the Meadows of Catalpa.

• 1:09:34Ashley Flowers?

  Yep. Now, this looks like a residential area. So it's probably weird to them that it's coming back to like a leasing company or whatever. But they gotta know who this belongs to, right? Or, I mean, my big question would be like, how long has he had this rental vehicle? If it is a rental vehicle, I think that's unclear too. Anyways, so Detective Roger Redman.

• 1:09:55Ashley Flowers?

  And Detective Mark Connery decide to pay this address a visit. And listen, I've read a lot of police write ups. They're like dry and clinical. Even 90% of this report that I have on Nikki was dry and clinical. This section reads like the climax of a movie. I mean, Redmond, I don't know why he's not writing narrative fiction. So they get to this house. They knock on the door and this like big dog charges at the window. It sounds like there's maybe even more than one dog. But finally, after knocking and knocking, the door creaks open just like a few inches. And they can see that there's like a woman on the other side, but they can't see her. And she's asking, you know, like, why are you here? And like, well, ma'am, we're investigating a homicide. We'd like to speak with you.

• 1:10:40Ashley Flowers?

  And she just shuts them down right away, says she doesn't want to talk to them, ask them again, like, who are you? She's, I don't think she's like believing them for some reason. So they tell her again, like, listen, we're detectives. We just want to talk to you. She again refuses. So Redmond's like, look, I'm gonna leave my card. You can reach out when you're ready to talk. You can see like if you need to verify who I am, whatever. So they leave the car, they start going back to their car. And as they're about to get in, the woman calls them back. She's like, okay, I'll talk to you. So they go back into the house and it's like eerie. All of a sudden, there are no dogs. And as they walk into the room, which is like very dark, the woman like walks away from them. And she has them sit in the living room while she goes into the kitchen where they can't see her very well

• 1:11:25Ashley Flowers?

  because it's so dark. And so from the shadows, she's asking them, what do you want? And the detective says, you know, like, I want to know if you know a man named Tommy Swint. And she says, yes. So they ask her, do you know this leasing company? And she's like, how do you know about this leasing company? And so Redmond explains how he pulled Tommy's speeding ticket. And this is when she got upset. Like, you're looking at driving records? And she says this multiple times, you're looking at driving records? And he's like, yeah, we're looking at everything. And they can see that she's nervous. She's like rubbing her head like in her hands. And she says, you know who I am, Redmond. He really didn't. I mean, he could not see her in the dark. So he just asks, who are you?

• 1:12:11Ashley Flowers?

  I'm Darlene Williams. Now Redmond had never been to her house before. I mean, he had her address from her employment records, but everything was like, you know, on paper in those days. He didn't make the connection, especially when it comes back to a leasing company. He also never made the connection that she lived that close to Meadows of Catalpa. So now they know who she is. Darlene's pretty upset. And so he says, like, this is the point where they kind of like end their interview. But it got me wondering, what if the GMC was at her house at some point? I mean, they never were able to determine how long it had been parked at the apartment complex. From what I can see, witness accounts were kind of all over the place.

• 1:12:52Ashley Flowers?

  Some neighbors said that the GMC had only been there like a couple of weeks. Others said it had been sitting there closer to a couple of months. And there was one woman who said that she walked past it regularly, and she was adamant that it had been parked there for about three and a half months. So maybe like the entire time. And there were even a few residents who remembered the SUV coming and going occasionally. So we know the cars there, sometimes not exactly in that same spot, but no one could say what the person behind the wheel even looked like when it was coming and going. So what if, for at least part of the time, it was there at her house, in her driveway or in her garage at some point? I don't have enough documentation from police documents to know

• 1:13:34Ashley Flowers?

  how much they dug into her alibi of being at work or when exactly she would have gotten off the day that Nikki went missing. But the car Nikki's driving is found about a mile from her house. She calls out of work the very next day. She is the last known person who speaks with Nikki. That is a lot to ignore. But Brett, this is where I started having like heart palpitations. Darlene wasn't just Nikki's last known call. In what we have, Redmond also notes this. Tommy Swindt had also called Darlene Williams prior to taking his life.

• 1:14:14Speaker 01

  Why her? Why in his final moments is the person he contacts Darlene like this coworker?

• 1:14:23Ashley Flowers?

  Well, I mean, we know they had an affair, right?

• 1:14:25Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:14:25Ashley Flowers?

  But I know, I wish I could tell you, but that is literally like all we've got. Remember Tina Ivory's murder wasn't Richmond's jurisdiction. So Redman, when we're reading these case reports, he's just getting this information secondhand from Detective Patty Tackett out of Dayton. And according to the report, she relayed something else to him. Tackett stated that Swint left a note behind. And in this note, he stated he was not responsible for any deaths.

• 1:14:54Speaker 01

  But obviously that's not true. They have his DNA and prints for Tina.

• 1:14:59Ashley Flowers?

  But all they really have for Nikki are theories. Now, in one snippet of Redman's report, he theorizes that Darlene is somehow connected to Nikki's disappearance. And he believes that she was disposed of into the trash dumpster that was next to where her vehicle was left. He thinks that the car was driven there by Darlene Williams and she was assisted by Tommy Swint. But after he writes this, Tackett ends up sharing more information with him that makes him consider an alternate theory. You see, she had gotten results back from the computer that Tommy had used while in Alabama. And she told Redman that Tommy was closely watching the local Richmond newspaper and

• 1:15:42Ashley Flowers?

  he was paying close attention to a high school news story about something that happened at the school near Darlene's house, which led her to believe that maybe Nikki's body is somewhere near Williams's address or Meadows of Ketaupa, the apartment complex. Now, according to the case report, Darlene's property isn't searched until 2022, more than 20 years after Nikki disappeared. Darlene consents to the search and investigators bring in cadaver dogs trained to detect decades old remains. Based on canine results, they dig beneath a flower bed in her backyard. Nothing's found. Later, ground penetrating radar does flag underground inconsistencies. The dogs are run again.

• 1:16:27Ashley Flowers?

  Investigators dig again, this time focusing on a spot where this like plastic flower pot had been sitting. Still, nothing. No remains, no physical evidence found. But there was another canine indication of remains in the area behind Darlene's property, an area with dense underbrush and woods. It's like this expansive lot that Darlene does not own immediately adjacent to, here we go again, Meadows of Catalpa.

• 1:16:57Speaker 01

  Meadows of Catalpa.

• 1:16:58Ashley Flowers?

  Yes. This area that has been tied to this case for decades. And according to the report, an area that an investigator specifically noted warranted further searching based on this canine alert. Now again, police haven't responded to our request for comment as of this recording. So I can't tell you if that search has ever been done. The last thing it seems Detective Redman ever wrote in his portion of the narrative was this single haunting line. "This case has been suspended until further information surfaces." It leaves this awful question mark hanging in the air for Nikki and for her loved ones, people who want to know what's been done since the file we got ends.

• 1:17:41Ashley Flowers?

  So far, as of this recording, there has been no official police response from former or current investigators at Richmond PD. And the same goes for Darlene. We reached out to her for comment and advised her of the allegations presented in the police case report. We even sent her a certified letter and her signature confirms that she got it. But as of this recording, we have not heard back from her.

• 1:18:04Speaker 01

  So after all this, those woods around Meadows of Catalpa could still hold the key to everything after all. And we don't even know if anybody even followed up on it.

• 1:18:14Ashley Flowers?

  Yeah. And if Nikki's remains are somewhere in the wooded area near those The question still remains, who put them there? I get why police looked so hard at Tommy. And according to the report, Detective Patty Tackett told Redmond that Darlene even admitted to her that in the end, she no longer believes Tommy's comments about not being involved in Nikki's disappearance. And like, what about all those things Bobby said to Kim? What if he really was following Nikki in her final days? Two of the main men in this story have passed away. But I don't think it's too late for answers, or too late to find Nikki's remains. It's been almost 25 years, and it's now or never.

• 1:18:58Ashley Flowers?

  Eight years ago, Crime Junkies got to hear from Peyton. She was a new mom back then, and so many things have changed in her life. But in the search for her mother, it's like she's frozen in time. And like so many loved ones I've spoken to over the years, it really is just answers she wants now, not vengeance.

• 1:19:18Speaker 04

  I think I would just like to say what we've been saying for the last 24 and a half years is, we're not gonna stop, we're gonna continue. We will continue to put the fire under you until you decide that you want to come forward and say something and speak your piece. At this point, I'm not looking to see anybody really serve time. I just want answers. I want to be able to go somewhere and take my daughter so she can at least speak to her grandmother without looking at a flyer, or a t-shirt, or, you know, a news article, or anything like that. I would just like to have that peace and really start the grieving process of the loss of my mother. It's different grieving someone that you don't know you really lost, essentially.

• 1:20:01Speaker 04

  So I just want them to know that I, no matter what, come hell and high water, we're gonna get answers.

• 1:20:08Ashley Flowers?

  Maybe you know something. Is it about Bobby Webster's movements the day Nikki went missing? Or maybe you know more about Darlene and Tommy's movements? As far as I can tell, Tommy's wife is still alive, and in 2010, someone identifying themselves as Lisa Swint wrote on Tommy's online obituary that he was her best friend, an adoring husband, and that he was a wonderful man, and that, quote, "Those who knew Tommy also know that truth as well," end quote. We tried every number listed for her that we could find, but as of this recording, we haven't heard back from her either. Someone out there knows where Nikki is. And if that's you, please contact the Richmond, Indiana Police Department

• 1:20:48Ashley Flowers?

  at 765-983-7247.

• 1:21:06Ashley Flowers?

  You can find all the source material for this episode on our website, crimejunkie.com.

• 1:21:11Speaker 01

  And you can follow us on Instagram, at Crime Junkie Podcast.

• 1:21:14Ashley Flowers?

  We'll be back next week with a brand new episode, but stick around for the good.

• 1:21:45Speaker 01

  Okay, Ashley, are you ready for the first good of the year?

• 1:21:47Ashley Flowers?

  Ah, 2026?

• 1:21:48Speaker 01

  Yeah.

• 1:21:49Ashley Flowers?

  What's happening?

• 1:21:50Speaker 01

  This is from an anonymous Crime Junkie listener.

• 1:21:52Ashley Flowers?

  Mm, I'm already intrigued.

• 1:21:54Speaker 01

  "Hi, Ashley and Britt. I had to do this anonymously as I'm not clear of the situation yet. I am such a huge fan of your show. I've been listening religiously for years. I've listened to every true crime podcast available and thought the women in those stories could never be me. And I'm not going to be part of a tragic story, thanks to you lovely ladies. Tonight, you helped me leave my partner after he put his hands on me the first time. I might have taken him back or heard him out if it wasn't for you. He pushed me, and I just heard your voices in my head. I knew it was time to get out. I called my sister and headed to my parents' safety."

• 1:22:27Ashley Flowers?

  I literally have chills, like from my head to like my knees. Oh, my God.

• 1:22:30Speaker 01

  "The stories you tell that center abuse victims and talk about how hard it is to leave, I've heard them all, and I never thought it was me. I thought the red flags didn't apply to my situation, that it wasn't verbal abuse. He just couldn't control his anger and arguments. He wasn't hitting me, just smashing objects, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. The list goes on, and it's all becoming clear bit by bit now." I am the poster child for you can't leave until you're ready. I've watched all the videos on how to know if you're in a healthy relationship and heard all the Crime Junkie rules, but it was like they went in one ear, out the other. Well, it turns out they didn't go anywhere. My brain filed knowledge away for later because it helped me today when I needed it. I am now home safe and snuggling with my parents' dogs, adorable, you'll just have to trust me, who haven't left my side since I got here.

• 1:23:15Speaker 01

  Dogs just know. Thank you both for all the work you do centering victims of abuse and women's strength in much worse situations than mine. They helped me have the strength to call my family and friends for help, even when I felt broken. This journey isn't over, it's only just begun, but I'm so glad you both helped me take the first step today. Thank you from the bottom of my heart. Fingers crossed I have the strength to keep pushing through after a four-year relationship. Thank God I have an amazing support system and your podcast to distract me. All my love, your very grateful listener, anonymous.

• 1:23:45Ashley Flowers?

  You can do this. Do not take him back.

• 1:23:49Speaker 01

  Yeah, I just love this one. And the fact that in this moment, tonight, right? Like when she left, she thought of us and like thought of not just us, but the lessons that we talk about, the information that we provide.

• 1:24:02Ashley Flowers?

  It's wild how these like stay with people. And I think, I think also it's like people, she said, you know, you're not ready until like you're.

• 1:24:07Speaker 01

  Until you're ready.

• 1:24:08Ashley Flowers?

  Until you're ready. I think like people recognize it even subliminally.

• 1:24:11Speaker 01

  The way she said she filed away, like it kind of, just kind of breezed by in the moment, but her brain had filed it away for like such a time as this.

• 1:24:17Ashley Flowers?

  And my little piece of advice is if you're watching a lot of videos and reading a lot of things, asking if you're in a healthy relationship, that's probably the first sign that you're not. Take the steps you need, take care, look out for yourself. We love you guys. Crime Junkie is an AudioChuck production. I think Chuck would approve.

• 1:24:41Speaker 05

  When the nights grow longer, the shadows start to stir, and that can only mean one thing. Full Body Chills is back. This season, Step Inside, original tales where every doorway leads somewhere darker, every stranger carries a secret, and nothing is ever quite what it seems. Each story takes you somewhere new, but be careful, you never know what might follow you home. So gather round, listen close, and stream Full Body Chills wherever you get your podcasts.