Killer Story | 1. A Rose for Mom

Seventeen-year-old Sabrina Kidd goes missing, four years later reporter Lyndal Marks, decides to find her. Binge all episodes of Killer Story ad-free today by subscribing to The Binge. Visit The Binge Cases on Apple Podcasts and hit ‘subscribe’ or visit GetTheBinge.com to get access. From serial killer nurses to psychic scammers – The Binge is your home for true crime stories that pull you in and never let go. Join our free newsletter at Patreon.com/TheBinge. The Binge – feed your true crime obsession. Killer Story is brought to you by Sony Music Entertainment and Orbit Media. Find out more about The Binge and other podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts and follow us @sonypodcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 0:26Speaker 01

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• 0:59Speaker 01

  It's just after dawn in late September 1987, and Tom Percival is about half an hour by car from Las Vegas. He's just launched his boat into the Colorado River. His wife is with him. They've planned a day with the kids, playing in the river's clean, clear water.

• 1:22Speaker 02

  We were probably at 10, 12 minutes into the water.

• 1:26Speaker 01

  As they head across the water, the two watch out for debris in their path.

• 1:32Speaker 02

  And that's when I see it.

• 1:34Speaker 03

  It's about...

• 1:36Speaker 02

  75 feet away.

• 1:37Speaker 03

  75, 80 feet, something like that.

• 1:39Speaker 02

  I told her it was a log. It just looked like it was barely floating underwater. It's barely breaking the surface.

• 1:46Speaker 01

  Tom's not convinced, so he steers the boat closer. As he approaches, time seems to stand still.

• 1:58Speaker 02

  I remembered everything. I mean, I could probably even tell you how many ripples were in the water at the time.

• 2:06Speaker 01

  Tom sees something unusual. He can't tell what it is.

• 2:11Speaker 02

  Looked like a beautiful mannequin.

• 2:15Speaker 02

  So I took the oar and kind of pushed on her. And she went about six inches underwater and then floated back to the surface.

• 2:24Speaker 02

  And I'm going, no. It's, it was a girl.

• 2:31Speaker 02

  I didn't want to hurt her skin. I didn't want to touch, really, I didn't want to touch her. And, uh, I was only just far away from her, six, eight inches.

• 2:44Speaker 02

  I remember looking at her hair, beautiful hair floating in the water.

• 2:49Speaker 02

  It just floating out like a, like a, like a rainbow, kind of like, just, it's beautiful.

• 2:56Speaker 02

  And she did have this, like a mossy green tint all over the skin that I could see.

• 3:05Speaker 02

  And that's when I noticed the teardrop. Right in the corner of her eye, I saw a bloody tear.

• 3:12Speaker 02

  I about lost it right there. And I said, who would do this to this poor girl?

• 3:24Speaker 01

  The girl's name was Sabrina Kidd, but no one knew that. They won't know that for years. Nobody will know that Sabrina is dead. And still wouldn't know if not for the preternatural drive of a total stranger. A stranger who decided for her own reasons to find out what happened to Sabrina.

• 3:49Speaker 01

  This is a story of lies, cons, and cover-ups.

• 3:52Speaker 04

  He said she never came home. I go, "That motherfucker's lying."

• 3:56Speaker 01

  And of a woman compelled to get justice for someone she's never met.

• 4:01Speaker 05

  No one ever dared tell me anything. I did it because I wanted to, because I was telling the truth.

• 4:06Speaker 01

  And it's a story of yearning for better endings.

• 4:10Speaker 06

  Because I just want someone to love me, someone to care about me unconditionally.

• 4:15Speaker 01

  This is Killer Story. I'm Steve Fishman. Episode One, A Rose For Mom.

• 4:34Speaker 00

  You're smart, right? You should get paid up to two days early. With Ally's Early Direct Deposit, you can better manage your funds and have money for when life is actually happening. So go ahead, make Wednesday the new Friday, level up Thursday's date night, and be ready when those tickets go on sale Friday. Ally, banking built for life today. Ally Bank, Member FDIC.

• 5:06Speaker 01

  Head west from the Colorado River, and you'll most likely run into Las Vegas, known across America as Sin City. That's its attraction. Las Vegas is a place to do whatever you want. People float into Vegas to shake off their workaday selves. They hit the Vegas Strip, a row of casinos with high-stepping showgirls and flashing neon lights, so bright you can see them miles into the Mojave Desert. Viva Las Vegas, a place where adults gamble on changing their stories. What Sin City is not is a place for a beautiful, naive teenager.

• 5:46Speaker 01

  So why, in the late spring of 1987, did 17-year-old Sabrina Kidd move to Vegas alone? The answers begin with her mother, don't they always?

• 6:01Speaker 01

  It's the 1980s and Sabrina is a child living with her mom, Bobby Sue, in Texas.

• 6:07Speaker 06

  She worshipped her mom.

• 6:09Speaker 01

  This is Dewana, Sabrina's first cousin.

• 6:12Speaker 06

  I remember when I would go over and I would spend the weekend over at my Aunt Bobby's and Sabrina and I would, we would go walk the strip mall.

• 6:21Speaker 01

  Sabrina was probably eight or nine at the time. At the strip mall, they drifted past store windows, peering in, until Sabrina found what she wanted, always the same thing.

• 6:34Speaker 06

  And her ideal was always to stop and get her mom a rose.

• 6:39Speaker 01

  And so I picture a young girl walking with a single rose in her hand. She holds it in front of her like a candle. I imagine it's red. She's moving with purpose, eager to get home to mom with her special gift. But mom wasn't always there, not emotionally at least. Mom was beautiful herself, a Playboy model at one point, according to Dewana. And men flocked. And when a man came into Bobby Sue's life, well, that's when mom's focus changed. And Sabrina was out of the picture.

• 7:17Speaker 06

  She spoiled Sabrina and gave her just about whatever she wanted. I mean, material things she didn't do without. But her mom was always gone. So, you know, as long as Sabrina got in the way of her boyfriends or got in the way of anything, then, you know, she just shoved her off onto people.

• 7:38Speaker 01

  At 17, Sabrina moved in with Dewana, whose family had migrated from Texas to Vegas. They shared an apartment for a time.

• 7:47Speaker 06

  She was over in the one bed and I was in the other bed. And I asked her, I said, "What do you want?" And she goes, "I just want someone to love me, someone to care about me unconditionally and not judge me."

• 7:59Speaker 01

  Did you remember saying anything to that?

• 8:03Speaker 06

  I told her, "You know, I love you."

• 8:08Speaker 01

  Sabrina wasn't particularly bold or assertive. She didn't strike people as driven. She was running from, not to. But she was a good friend, the kind everyone values. This is her friend Jennifer.

• 8:23Speaker 04

  She was just a really nice, good-hearted person. And she was very trusting and she was a good friend. And the big standout for me is that she was just, just really kind.

• 8:40Speaker 01

  Sabrina did have moments of conflict, and not just with her mother. A few weeks after she moved in with her cousin, Dewana, they had a falling out. Dewana didn't approve of a guy Sabrina was seeing. So much for unconditional love. The boyfriend was soon gone and Sabrina was on her own again, hunting for a job and a home where she felt welcome. I imagine her rippling with anxiety. And yeah, I find that heartbreaking. Seventeen and on your own and just wanting to be loved. Then she met Jim and life seemed to get better. They met at a party.

• 9:22Speaker 07

  As soon as I saw her, I was like, wow, she's a cutie. And so obviously I started to strike up the conversation and we just hit it off.

• 9:31Speaker 01

  This is Jim Bixel. Jim was a good-looking Vegas native. He sported a moment when it was the going fashion and usually wore a leather motorcycle jacket.

• 9:42Speaker 07

  She didn't get into detail with me, but just the little things that she did tell me, yeah, she did not have a great childhood. So one of my goals was just for me to make sure she had a great time whenever we were together.

• 9:55Speaker 01

  A lot of those great times involved Jim's motorcycle.

• 9:59Speaker 07

  I bought a Kawasaki Ninja 600. The crotch rocket is what we called it. On the weekends, we'd meet at the old Wet and Wild Water Park on Las Vegas Boulevard on the Strip, right next to the Sierra Hotel.

• 10:14Speaker 07

  And then at midnight, we would all take off and we'd do a really fast, long ride somewhere. We went up to Mount Charleston.

• 10:22Speaker 01

  Mount Charleston is over two miles high.

• 10:25Speaker 07

  We came down that canyon and we were doing 135, 140 miles an hour.

• 10:32Speaker 07

  She was definitely holding on for dear life. She would love going fast. She would say, you know, riding on the bike really makes me feel free.

• 10:46Speaker 01

  In Las Vegas, friends remember Sabrina as a blonde, though I've seen early photos and in them she's a brunette with thick, gentle waves of hair. She has hazel eyes. Her skin is almost as pale as her shining teeth. In most of the photos, she's smiling, though it strikes me as the smile you put on for the camera, thinking one thing's showing another. To me, Sabrina looks almost middle-aged in these photos. In one, she actually wears pearls. She looks ready for a job as a bank teller.

• 11:22Speaker 01

  In Vegas, Sabrina seems to shake off the person she was. For one thing, she lightens her hair and she crafts a signature hairstyle, short on one side, long on the other, and sometimes she manages to feel free.

• 11:41Speaker 01

  Jim introduces Sabrina to his friends. One, a childhood friend, lives with his girlfriend at his father's house. Turns out that his father has an extra bedroom to rent and Sabrina jumps at the chance.

• 11:54Speaker 07

  So Sabrina liked that idea and said, yeah, I'll do that.

• 11:58Speaker 01

  Sabrina hasn't had a steady address in the six months she's been in Vegas, and now that problem seems solved.

• 12:06Speaker 01

  Life seems to be getting better and better for Sabrina. A dependable living situation, new friends, a boyfriend who makes her feel free. And she's recently interviewed for a job at the fashion mall, and she landed it. Her first solid gig since arriving in Las Vegas. She seems to have, to her credit, developed a network of support in an intimidating new city. And then, another break. Her friend's father, her landlord.

• 12:36Speaker 07

  He asked her something the effect of, hey, what do you want to do ultimately with your life? And she said, you know, I'd like to be a model.

• 12:43Speaker 01

  And her landlord, a kind, fatherly figure, encouraged her. And so for Sabrina Kidd, life is looking pretty good. She's too young to gamble, but it's as if she walked into a casino and exited with a pocketful of cash. And then, just as everything is coming together, one morning in late summer, one of Sabrina's best friends knocks on her door, expecting to spend the day with her. Instead, she learns that Sabrina didn't come home the previous night. No one sees her ever again. Sabrina vanishes. Why? How? What happened to this promising life on that late summer morning?

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• 14:26Speaker 01

  In Las Vegas, Sabrina made a couple of close friends, Jennifer and Crystal. They were the same age as Sabrina, 17. They'd grown up in Vegas. The three were a striking trio, young, full of life and pretty. They snuck into Caesar's Palace to hear their favorite bands. They went to high school parties. They talked nearly every day. This is Jennifer.

• 14:52Speaker 04

  You talk about like girl shit and boys and what are we doing this weekend? And what are you wearing? That's the kind of stuff. It's day to day. It's weekend to weekend. It's not really deep like, oh, my mother's, you know, it doesn't, it never got into that. So you were all 17? Yeah. Vegas was a good town to be 17 in? It was because you knew everybody. You know, there was only so many high schools. Everybody knew everybody.

• 15:23Speaker 01

  So they did Las Vegas-y things like hang on the strip and teenage things like attend a junior varsity football game, which is what was on the agenda on what would be the evening before Sabrina disappeared.

• 15:39Speaker 01

  After Sabrina vanished, Jennifer and Crystal would review again and again their last hours together.

• 15:48Speaker 01

  It's September 17th, 1987. The evening starts with a junior varsity football game at Valley High School. It's a bit after sunset and Crystal picks up Sabrina. Sabrina doesn't have a car, though. With her new job, it's on her list. As usual, Sabrina looks great. She's tall and slender. Her nails are painted pink, her favorite color from childhood. A couple of boys decide to flirt with Sabrina, which annoys the boys' girlfriends, harshing the mellow. Crystal and Sabrina leave in a bad mood, talking about those rude girls.

• 16:28Speaker 01

  A bit after 8:00 PM, Crystal drops Sabrina off at her place. An hour or so later that same evening, so still September 17, Jennifer picks Sabrina up. Around 9:00 PM, they head over to Jennifer's boyfriend's apartment. He's older and has his own place. Both Jennifer and Sabrina spend the night.

• 16:52Speaker 01

  It's now morning, September 18. Sabrina's running late for work and starts shaking Jennifer awake. Sabrina needs a ride home because Crystal is picking her up. Crystal and Sabrina are both working at Lane Bryant at the fashion mall, and they can't be late. So Jennifer drives Sabrina back to her place. She drops Sabrina at about 8:30 in the morning. The drop-off will stick in Jennifer's mind because Sabrina doesn't have her keys. She empties her purse in Jennifer's car looking for them, but no luck. Sabrina has to knock on the door. Jennifer remembers that the landlord lets Sabrina in. You dropped her off at like 9:00 in the morning and you...

• 17:37Speaker 04

  It was early. Yes.

• 17:41Speaker 01

  Right.

• 17:45Speaker 01

  About an hour later, Crystal pulls up to Sabrina's place. It's around 9:30 in the morning. Sitting in her car, Crystal honks, expecting Sabrina to pop out. As her friends know, Sabrina is dependable and always punctual. But Sabrina doesn't appear.

• 18:05Speaker 01

  So Crystal gets out of her car and goes to the front door and knocks, two times, three times. The door finally opens, but only a few inches. It's the landlord in his bathrobe. Usually, he's friendly to Crystal and invites her in. This morning, he seems put out. Crystal asks him, "You seen Sabrina? We're supposed to go to work. I told her I would meet her." "She's not home," the landlord tells her. He doesn't know where she is.

• 18:40Speaker 01

  So Crystal heads to work alone. Sabrina doesn't show up. Crystal doesn't hear from Sabrina all day. And neither does Jennifer. And they're usually in touch daily. Sabrina had mentioned an opportunity to go to California for free that weekend. Maybe she's taken up that offer. Maybe it's tied to modeling work or that guy she just met. Still, it isn't like Sabrina to be out of touch. Jennifer says they have to go to the police.

• 19:13Speaker 04

  We waited 24 hours and then we went to the police. We said she's missing, something happened, and they just didn't believe us. One point, they said that she was classed as a runaway. And there's nothing they could do.

• 19:28Speaker 01

  Jennifer isn't satisfied. When Sabrina doesn't show up in the next couple of days, she and Crystal return to the police department. This time, the cops accuse them.

• 19:39Speaker 04

  I remember them saying, "Oh, you were a prostitute that went to Caesar's Palace." And I was like, "No." Even if it was, it had nothing to fucking do with the fact that she's missing. I remember being so fucking angry.

• 19:54Speaker 01

  What happens after Jennifer and Crystal visit the police? As far as they can tell, nothing. Sabrina's case is filed with the files of hundreds of other missing teenagers. Seemingly a final resting spot. Except that her family back in Texas, Bobby Sue, Sabrina's mother, along with her aunt, will not give up. They scour missing person reports from around the country. They reach out to media. If they could just get her image on TV, maybe someone would recognize her. Four excruciating years pass like this.

• 20:38Speaker 01

  It's now 1991, and someone, mother or aunt, gets an idea. There's a very popular new tabloid TV show, A Current Affair. Maybe they've taken an interest in the story of a beautiful teenager who mysteriously vanishes in Las Vegas. It's worth a shot.

• 20:58Speaker 05

  And I'm sitting there one day, and the phone rings. And I pick it up.

• 21:16Speaker 01

  So in 1991, Lyndal Marks answers the phone in her office. Lyndal is, at that moment, a new reporter at the wildly popular TV show, A Current Affair, leader in the newest TV genre, the tabloid.

• 21:34Speaker 05

  I mean, we would get calls. Often, it would be people that you knew were crazy, people who just had dumb stories, just unbelievable stories, or, you know, "I've spotted a celebrity," or whatever. And, you know, "How much will you pay for my tape?"

• 21:56Speaker 01

  Today, the caller is a woman, middle-aged from the sound of her voice, soft-spoken, a Texas drawl. She introduces herself as the aunt. Lyndal hears the mother in the background.

• 22:09Speaker 05

  So I'm talking to her, I'm talking to her, and they weren't crazy at all. And this woman tells me that her niece is missing. And my first reaction was, okay.

• 22:26Speaker 01

  The aunt explains that her niece was living in Las Vegas when she vanished.

• 22:31Speaker 05

  And she was clearly upset. We have phoned newspapers, we've phoned other people in the media, we have phoned the local press. No one cares. We can't get anyone to do anything. You are our last resort.

• 22:48Speaker 05

  Right, okay. So what have you done to fight? Have you told the police? Yes, but the police have done nothing. What do you mean, the police have done nothing? We reported her missing a few days after she went missing. They've done nothing. And when I hear that, that makes me go, I'm here for you. I will listen to you.

• 23:09Speaker 01

  Lyndle is in her twenties and already a seasoned reporter. She comes from a hard news background. She's Australian, but more at home in a place like New York, where ambition, and she's ambitious, matters. I've seen a bunch of her TV segments from the 90s, and she looks cool in a 90s sort of way. Petite with perfect bangs and those shoulder pads that seemed so excellent back then. She's down to earth. She does her own makeup for TV. As a reporter, she's old school. Lots of shoe leather. Door knocking, file searching, and relentless, like irrationally relentless. Prides herself on that.

• 23:53Speaker 01

  The word hard-bitten comes to mind.

• 23:56Speaker 05

  You never take no for an answer.

• 23:57Speaker 01

  But also, she's like wildly idealistic. She seems to truly believe that her efforts, her relentless efforts, can change the course of history.

• 24:09Speaker 05

  If I feel like there's a big man kicking a little guy in the guts, I will go after that story. I will go after that with aggression and passion.

• 24:20Speaker 01

  And from where she sits, at a desk, on a phone, in a New York office, the mom and the aunt in Texas are the little guys. Lyndle can't believe that the cops shrugged at the report of their missing girl, that they shirked their duty. For a soft-spoken, helpless aunt and mother, the system couldn't be bothered. Or so it seemed to Lyndle at that moment.

• 24:46Speaker 01

  On the phone, the aunt shares more details. She says her niece disappeared from Las Vegas when she was 17.

• 24:54Speaker 05

  I asked her, when did she go missing? She said, four years ago.

• 25:00Speaker 01

  Whoa, Lindal, four years ago? And they're just popping up now? If there was a trail, it's not there anymore. That timetable would have made a lot of reporters hang up. Lindal keeps listening.

• 25:16Speaker 05

  So she's begging me to help. I just, I felt a connection with that family. I felt their pain and I just, I felt something was wrong. People don't just disappear into thin air.

• 25:31Speaker 01

  So Lindal, you thought everyone's pushing them aside so you can do something different?

• 25:36Speaker 05

  Yeah, 100%.

• 25:43Speaker 01

  Just one problem. Lindal doesn't actually have the authority to decide what story she works on. At a current affair, there's a chain of command. So she hangs up with the mother and aunt and heads to the office of news editor Dan Meanan. It's Dan who clears, or kills, story ideas. Reporters are in and out of his office all day. It's a busy place. Lindal edges her way in. This is Dan.

• 26:13Speaker 00

  She came up to me and said she got a phone call. And what do I think of this story? I said, it's a missing persons. We don't do missing persons. There's no conclusion to the story. And, and she kept insisting there was. I said, I can't, no, I can't waste any money on this. I'm sorry.

• 26:34Speaker 05

  There is something going on here. This, this just doesn't sound right. She's so young. How do you not follow this kid? She's a baby. How do you not follow that? How do you ignore a mother?

• 26:46Speaker 00

  She argued with me and said, it's a story here. I'm telling you, I feel it. This is a missing girl and it's not a murder investigation and we don't have facts. What is the viewer going to walk away with?

• 27:00Speaker 01

  Lindal, he's being clear. Stop the nonsense. Get back to work.

• 27:06Speaker 00

  You know, this is a sausage factory and I've got to come up with about four or five stories a night.

• 27:13Speaker 00

  So I can't be wasting my time on stories that I feel doesn't have a conclusion.

• 27:19Speaker 01

  Lyndle's reaction?

• 27:21Speaker 05

  Yeah, totally fuck off.

• 27:26Speaker 01

  All right, so a girl is missing. A girl who, because of one phone call, Lyndle feels tied to. And so, guess what? Lyndle will find a way.

• 27:38Speaker 05

  When I feel something and my instinct is telling me, this is right, I have to follow this, I will follow it. I will go down every rabbit hole. If I feel like a victim hasn't been given a voice, I won't stop until I have found a way to tell that story.

• 27:59Speaker 01

  Now, there's a reason that Lyndle is so compelled by this phone call and by this story. A reason that Lyndle's kept secret for years. A reason that she's ready to reveal on this podcast to a national audience. Just like it's a segment on A Current Affair. Only better.

• 28:23Speaker 01

  Next time on Killer Story. Lyndle's secret revealed.

• 28:29Speaker 05

  A friend of mine came to visit me and she just walked in and I remember the shock on her face. I felt an incredible sadness because I could feel that it was going to have an impact on her for the rest of her life. Not in a good way. I completely connected to what happened to me.

• 28:54Speaker 04

  I was glad somebody was investigating it and I remember being glad somebody believed us.

• 28:58Speaker 05

  If this wouldn't have worked for Lyndle, her career at A Current Affair may have come to a dead end. You wake up one morning, you go, screw it, I need to do this story.

• 29:15Speaker 00

  You're smart, right? You should get paid up to two days early. With Ally's early direct deposit, you can better manage your funds and have money from when life is actually happening. So go ahead. Make Wednesday the new Friday. Level up Thursday's date night and be ready when those tickets go on sale Friday. Ally: Banking Built for Life Today. Ally Bank, Member FDIC.

• 29:52Speaker 01

  Killer Story is a production of Orbit Media in association with Signal Company Number One. Creator and host is me, Steve Fishman. Executive producers are Lyndon Marx, Kevin Wardis, and Jonathan Hirsch from Sony Music Entertainment. Producers Jackie Pauly, Hannah Beal, and Austin Smith. Production coordinator, Austin Smith. Series consultant, Emile Klein. Sound designer, Britt Spangler. Fact check, Ryan Alderman. Our lawyers are at Clarus Law. Special thanks to Emily Rassik, Steve Ackerman, Catherine St. Louis, Sammy Allison, Allison Haney, Fisher Stevens, and the glamorous Rhea Julian.

• 30:32Speaker 01

  We also thank our agents at WME, Evan Krassik, Marissa Hurwitz, Ben Davis. And a special thanks to Shelley Shinoi for voiceover casting. And a special, special thanks to the inimitable Emile Klein.

• 30:51Speaker 01

  Hey, it's Brianna Stewart here with Ally Bank. Whether it's at work or with family, life never calls a timeout. Sometimes you're ready, and sometimes you have to react on your feet. Unexpected travel, retail therapy, and of course, the kids need new kicks right now. Ally gets it, and they build banking around real life. So even in those clutch money moments, you can spend and save confidently with the bank that's got you back. Ally: Do it right. Ally Bank, Member FDIC.