Original subtitles

The first 48 hours of someone missing,

you have a family that is panicked.

Finally, people startedú putting puzzles together.

[Joshua] I just wanna bring my mom home.

It's been far too long.

Police tell family, "We found her.

She's at a safe house."

Missing Huron County woman who disappeared six years ago.

Today, authorities issued a search warrant

in their investigation.

There's just so many different twists of this case.

I just want truth.

The family wants truth.

[dramatic theme music]

To new developments inú the case of Amanda Dean,

missing Huron County woman whoú disappeared six years ago.

Today, authorities issued a search warrant

in their investigation.

[narrator] It's July 11th, 2017.

Shannon Dean is at home when she gets troubling news

about her sister, Amanda.

Amanda has vanished from the rural Ohio property

where she lives with her boyfriend and his mother.

I get a text saying, ú "No, Amanda in the cabin.

I hope she's doing OK."

I'm like, "No, Amanda wouldn't

just leave like that."

I knew something was wrong.

I could feel it as soon as she told me.

[narrator] Amanda's familyhaven't heard from her in days.

They know something is wrong,

because Amanda is always in touch with them,

and it would never be like herú to just go off the grid.

Amanda was beautiful.

She was vivacious.

She was artistic.

She has two sisters, Shannon and Stephanie.

[Shannon] She was an awesome sister.

Growing up, she lifted your spirits.

She was always there for you.

[Stephanie] We were kind of opposites,

but not in a bad way.

She could drive a semi-truck with no problem.

She looks like a Barbie doll,

but she can live in a man's world.

[Natalie] Amanda was a mom to four boys.

Her oldest son, Josh, was with one man,

and then the youngest three boysú had a different father.

Josh lived with Amanda,

and described her as his best friend.

She loved her boys.

I mean, that was her life.

[narrator] Amanda lives in Collins, Ohio.

It's the North Central part of the state.

[Joshua] Collins is very little.

It's a lot of farmland.

It feels like there's only, ú like, two or three roads

and that's about it.

Amanda worked in a man's world.

She loved working on boats and yachts,

and she loved fibreglass work, and she loved her job.

She was very good at it.

[narrator] While Amanda'sprofessional life is going well,

her love life isn't.

A mother of four,

her three youngest children live with their dad,

while her eldest, Josh, is sometimes with her.

Everybody was so rotten to her.

And it was just like she was a magnet

towards horrible people.

[narrator] In the mid-2010s,

Amanda falls for a man named Fred Reer.

She'd take me out to their house.

Fred had a daughter around the same age as me,

and they had a pool, a trampoline.

I thought it was fun.

Friends say that Amanda and Frederick's relationship

was always rocky from the beginning.

They just had a lot of drama, a lot going on.

[Joni] It just becomes like this kind of vicious cycle where

things are good and then things are bad.

That relationship alsoú seems to be very chaotic

and, in some, respects abusive.

[narrator] Amanda breaks up with Reer.

[Caroline] She had a couple bad relationships here,

so she wanted to just move, get a new start.

What she did,

she moved to South Carolina,

near Stephanie, that's the oldest.

[Stephanie] She had her own place,

her own apartment.

It was very, very nice.

I really thought she was in a good place down there,

until she met the other guy.

Unfortunately, ú in this new relationship,

she's also in a situation of domestic violence,

where it's almost at this point

as if she is what you consider to be

that true domestic violence victim

where they consistently end up

in these domestic violenceú types of relationships.

[Joshua] I didn't like the way he was treating her.

She wasn't defending herself at that point.

I couldn't really do anything.

I was a lot smaller.

I was only, like, 13 or 14 at the time.

[narrator] At about that time, one of Amanda's ex-boyfriends

from back in Ohio reaches out to her.

She was talking to this old ex who was promising her

certain things if she moved back to Ohio.

That she'd be safe.

And that was a big key word for her,

is feeling safe.

She packed up her stuff with Josh

and decided to go back home.

She got here and he was seeing somebody else

and they got a place together

and Amanda was left stranded.

It was sad because her heart was broken

'cause she really wanted a place with that guy

and it didn't happen that way.

[narrator] Amanda starts working at a restaurant

where she reconnects with Reer.

[Shannon] They got together and decided to be a couple,

and it went on from there.

She was looking for love, and she thought

now Fred could give it to her, 'cause the other guy didn't.

[Joshua] She was just looking for someone

to care about her unconditionally.

And I'm sure at first he was doing that,

but as the relationship grew,

he also kind of

grew into a [bleep] person; pardon my language.

[Kristin] Family and friends were worried.

They just knew that this was not a good relationship

for Amanda to be in.

But she's a grown woman.

There's only so much you can do.

[narrator] July 11th, 2017.

Instead of hearing from Amanda,

her family receives troubling texts

from the mother of the man she's living with.

Shannon got a text from Fred's mom

saying that they hadn't heard from Amanda

for a couple of days.

[Caroline] My daughter Shannon called me and said, "Mom."

She says, "I just got this text from Fred's mother."

She says, "The whole text was kind of strange."

And she said, "What should I do?"

My heart dropped at that point

because I knew in January he had beat her.

So I told her, "Please call, report it.

Call the sheriff."

[Natalie] They went and reported it

to the Huron County Sheriff's Office.

And so, the Huron County Sheriff

opened a missing persons investigation.

[narrator] Sheriff's deputiesú head to a farm on Well Road

where Amanda lives with Reer.

The property is owned by his parents.

It was this small cabin

that was on his mother's property.

It was run down.

It looked like it wasn't kept very well.

It also didn't have plumbing,

so they would have to go up to his mother house

to use the bathroom or shower.

So, the living conditions weren't great.

[Joni] So, when detectives go to talk to Fred Reer,

they knock on the door and there"s no answer.

So, they go to the main house, and Fred"s mom is there.

She says, "Hey, you know, I'm sorry, Fred's at work.

I haven't seen Amanda for a few days,

but Fred told me thatú Amanda's sister Shannon

came and picked her up."

And that wasn't true.

[Joni] So while they're there,

they decide to take a look around.

So, they go around the property,

and they look, and they don't see anything.

And so they just end up leaving.

[Verona] You have a family that is panicked, right?

They are trying to figure out what happened to their child.

[Caroline] But I did contact the Sheriff's Office

and told them, "We're gonna go out.

We're gonna get our own search team

and look for Amanda."

We went out to the property, the Wells Road property,

where she was last known to be.

Reer's family put up a no trespassing sign

warning that anyone who did trespass would be shot.

So that was, of course, scary for them

and deterred them from searching the property.

The sheriff did tell us that we couldn't go on properties

where we weren't welcomed.

They wouldn't even help us.

So we said, "We understand."

We were driving around trying to see if we could find anything.

[narrator] The family believes Reer

is behind Amanda's disappearance.

Amanda and Frederick had a violent relationship,

so it wasn't rocket science

for the family when she disappears.

That they fear... I mean, it was something they always feared.

[narrator] Amanda's family knows

Reer has been violent to Amanda previously.

In January 2017, they receive a call.

I got a message from her on my phone saying

he gave her a black eye.

[Caroline] Shannon went straight to the Sheriff's Office

and waited there until the deputy

went out to the house and investigated it.

She lied to them

and said that a hammer fell on her face.

And he goes, "Well, your sister is at the police station.

I listened to the message,

and there's no hammer that fell on your face.

Your sister's worried about you."

Amanda finally admitted that Fred hit her,

but she didn't want to press charges.

[Joni] Things, I think, are really starting to ramp up

in terms of the speed of this volatile relationship.

Part of that is because Amanda is really wanting

to get out of this relationship.

And I think that Frederick Reer is aware of that.

[Joshua] She was trying to leave him for a while,

even up until two months prior to everything happening.

[Caroline] We start searchingú on this couple's property.

I noticed on my phone I got a missed call

and I looked at it and it said the Sheriff's Office.

I just called them back

and they said, "We need you to come into the office.

We have information about your daughter, Amanda."

They have this sinking feeling in their stomach

that the day that they probably always feared

had arrived.

[narrator] Amanda's family race to the Sheriff's Office.

There were a couple deputies there

that said that, ú "We found your daughter.

Your daughter's safe."

He then tells them that she's safe

in kind of a safe house or women's shelter,

so she's not missing.

[Caroline] I'm OK with it.

As long as she's safe, ú that's all that mattered.

That's what we wanted to hear.

That was the best news I could have heard.

[Joni] Shelters are there to keep people safe.

So they oftentimes don't disclose information.

They block people's phoneú numbers from calling out

and they have all kinds of safety measures.

[Caroline] He couldn't disclose it to us

because it was for her safety.

She could call her family if she wanted to.

At this point, as we see withú many missing persons cases,

the family is trusting that law enforcement

is doing their job,

and they're not questioning it.

[narrator] While the family wants to speak with Amanda,

some are just relieved that she's safe.

[Joshua] I was overjoyed.

I was like, "Cool, she got out."

She did what she said she was gonna do.

We'll see her in however long it takes

for her to recover, stuff like that.

[narrator] Days pass, then weeks, then months,

with no call from Amanda.

Amanda's family is very confused by this

because they're thinking, "OK.

We're glad that she's out of the situation,

but why is she not contacting us?"

[John] I think that a stay inú a women's shelter for,

you know, four to six weeks, ú not too terribly unusual,

but for her not to contact her family

for such a long timeúis just really, really unusual.

[narrator] Amanda's family goes back to the Sheriff's Office

for answers.

[Shannon] He says, "Oh, your sister will reach out

when she wants to, when protocols are met."

"She's an adult," you know?

Over and over and over, ú we got the same story.

I did ask the sheriff if he could also

give her my phone number.

Maybe she was traumatized.

She don't remember my phone number.

And he said he would give that to her.

[narrator] A year goes by,

and there's still no word from Amanda.

We just knew

that it had to be Fred.

That he did something with her.

Amanda's family saw her

pretty regularly before she disappeared,

and they had certainly noticed some bruises on her.

So they were aware of what was going on in her relationship

with Frederick Reer.

[Shannon] He would destroy her stuff.

He would destroy all her phones.

He'd burn them all.

He'd break them.

The only way she could contact me

was through his phone

when he was sleeping or passed out.

Fred Reer abused Amanda bothú emotionally and physically.

They had a very toxic, úvolatile, rocky relationship.

Fred Reer was very controlling.

He would threaten Amanda.

He would punish her.

He had gotten violent with her.

Her son, Joshua,

said he had witnessed some acts against her

when he was there,

and he also threatened Joshua.

I tried to come over there one time

to come pick her up,

and he was threatening to fight me and beat my ass.

Keep in mind, I'm still only a minor at this time.

[Natalie] Fred also abused drugs.

He frequently did drugs like heroin.

[Shannon] He would be using,

and she'd send me a picture of him using,

saying, "Get me the F out of here."

We did get her out of there.

When she got the black eye, she stayed at my house for,

I don't know, two or three weeks,

but then she decided she was going back to Fred.

Sometimes when people areúin these toxic relationships,

things are so bad

they don't imagine themú really ever getting worse.

They somehow adjust to the level of abuse

that they're getting.

She had made it very clear that

Fred had threatened to kill her.

And she told her friend if she goes missing

that they should look at him.

[narrator] The family tells the Sheriff's Office

to look at Reer.

[Natalie] The family was really adamant that

this was just so out of character for Amanda.

They did not believe that she was at a women's shelter.

It was hard for them to believe that Amanda would go this long

without contacting her family, especially her sons.

They were very persistent

with the Huron County Sheriff's Office,

trying to get them to look at the case,

asking for updates.

He said his hands were tied.

He claimed that someone was telling him that she's fine.

He also made the point that she was an adult

and if she wanted to come home, he said she would.

[narrator] The months waitingúfor Amanda turns into years.

I just wanna bring my mom home.

That's it.

It's been far too long.

We haven't seen her or heard from her.

I was calling safe housesú and asking questions like,

"Hey, you know, you don't have to...

I don't expect you to tell me if she's here or not

'cause laws or whatever, but, like, is it...

is it normal for people to beúgone for two to three years?"

They're like, "It's not normal, but it's not unheard of."

So, I was like, "Oh, OK."

And maybe my mom's case was just really bad because

Fred was a drug addict.

[Caroline] What if she is in the Witness Protection Program?

What if?

You know, maybe this is what's taking so long.

Because I did research on it, and it said sometimes...

you know, this one lady said

she was put into witness protection.

And she said it was a good five years

before she was able to talk to anybody in her family.

My imagination was just running all over the place with this,

but still holding on to those words that she was safe.

I didn't believe it one bit, but...

[heavy exhale] I love my mom,

but she was always saying,

"Why would a sheriff lie?"

I knew something was wrong.

It's so horrible whenú you don't have answers.

Amanda, if you can hear me,

I love you.

[reporter] Shannon Dean hopes her sister can hear her,

because if she can,

even though Amanda has been missing from Huron County

for more than five years, it means she's alive.

[Shannon] It's confusing.

It doesn't make sense.

Why is it that she's been missing

for five and a half years?

Amanda's family has decided that they know

something happened to her.

There's just no way that she cut off communication

with her family for five years.

[narrator] Desperate for answers,

Amanda's family reach out to Cleveland Missing,

a charity that helps families

searching for missing loved ones.

At that time, it was led by police chief, John Majoy.

At the time, I was the president

of an organization called Cleveland Missing.

The organization is designed to help families

who have missing loved ones.

Well, the Dean family had reached out

to Cleveland Missing.

[Kristin] Cleveland Missing tells the family,

"OK, you need to go back to the sheriff."

And he says, "If you can't prove to us that she's in danger,

then you'll have to hire a private detective

to find your daughter."

[John] Why would you ask them to do that

or encourage them to do that?

Isn't that what you guys do?

And they say, "OK, show us proof of life.

You say that you went and she was at the safe house.

You show us proof of life."

And the sheriff couldn't.

He walked away.

He went into his office,

came back out while his deputy

was still talking to my daughter,

and said, "Say no more.

We're done here."

He told him to stop talking to us.

[narrator] In 2024,

WKYC revisits Amanda's disappearance

and the explanation originally given to reporters

by the Sheriff's Office.

[reporter] The sheriffú told 3 News at the time

that Amanda was in a good place

at a domestic violence shelter.

[narrator] In initial reports,

the sheriff says a person at a domestic violence shelter

told him Amanda was safe.

But he never publicly identifies that person.

More than five yearsú after Amanda disappears,

Cleveland Missing agrees to help her family

search for answers.

[reporter] New tonight in the case

of missing Huron County woman, Amanda Dean.

There is her picture. Please take a look.

Cleveland Missing,

the nonprofit founded in part by Gina DeJesus,

is now helping in the search for Dean.

They announced today that an anonymous donor

pledged a reward of up to $5,000

for information leading investigators

to the whereabouts of Dean.

She disappeared more than five and a half years ago.

Today, she'd be 41 years old.

[Kristin] Cleveland Missing pushes

for the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation.

Ohio BCI, it's like the FBI here in Ohio.

[John] I contacted a friend of mine

who works for Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation,

and I said, "You know, I've got this case,

and I'd like you to take a look at it."

The agent advised me he was gonna go

and do some checking into the case.

The very next day, BCI had taken over the case,

and they were basically taking a lead role, if you will.

[Natalie] The BCI brought a fresh set of eyes.

They were not under the impression

that Amanda was at a women's shelter.

You know, they were exploring all options.

They seemed to believe the family

when they said that they felt something was wrong.

[reporter] Now to continued coverage

on the case of Amanda Dean.

She has been missing more than five years,

but her case was just opened two weeks ago.

[John] They're starting from ground zero.

So at this point, there is not a person of interest.

There is no suspect.

Obviously, there is a lot of inroads

that point in a certain direction.

[narrator] Amanda's family hopes they will finally find her.

[Joni] So, when BCI takes over this investigation,

they find a tip that is pretty intriguing.

The same day that Amanda's family is told

that she's safe in a shelter,

they come across this tip

that an anonymous person had called in.

It's just not adding up.

[Shannon] I wasn't wrong,

and I'll never not listen to my inner self ever again.

We have not heard from Amanda

in five years and seven months.

The families are lost for words,

because Amanda would never be gone

from her loved ones for this long.

[narrator] In 2023,

the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation

takes over the Amanda Dean missing person case.

[Joni] They come across this tip

that said that Fred Reer

had been talking about murdering Amanda.

He was very angry with her.

There was comments about

him saying that he was gonna kill her

and dump her in a blue barrel

which really is the start of the investigation

by following up on some of these things

to see if in fact that's what he actually did.

BCI began their investigation,

but the problem with an investigation like this

is that you've got five and a half years

of virtually no information.

So, BCI basically had a pile of nothing to deal with,

and they actually were able to start piecing that together,

conducting interviews and doing background information,

knocking on doors,

the whole gamut to get things started.

There was a witness who said heúhad seen Amanda with bruises

all over her body frequently.

I know people have reported

hearing fighting between the two.

[Caroline] They started putting her story together.

And, I mean, they flew out of state

to talk to witnesses.

They were trying not to leave no stone unturned.

[John] They went to a prison interview someone.

They talked to a lot of people.

There was tips that were being called in,

but some of the tips were also rabbit holes

and so you get those in investigation.

But they were able to start tacking pieces

of the puzzle together.

[narrator] Some witnesses described suspicious activity

at Reer's house.

There was a witness who said that they had

saw a bloody mattress.

But again, this was shortly after she had gone missing.

And so, when that statement was given to law enforcement,

it wasn't until

well over five and a half, maybe six years later.

[Joni] Another thing that really stood out for them

is investigators talked to witnesses

who said that there had been this burn pile

out on Fred's property for days after Amanda went missing.

And another witness was sayingú that Fred had told them

that he had murdered Amanda

and basically burnedú her body up in this pit.

It took a while.

It took a lot ofú investigation from BCI.

A lot.

But they finally narrowed it down

and they finally got their information.

Police realize they need to search

Frederick Reer's property.

Now, to new developmentsú in the case of Amanda Dean,

missing Huron County womanúwho disappeared six years ago.

Today, authorities issued a search warrant

in their investigation.

You're talking a search for evidence that's,

at this point, over six years old.

And so, you're looking for a needle in a thousand haystacks.

[narrator] Ohio's Bureau of Criminal Investigation

meticulously scours Reer's home,

looking for remnants of blood

that witnesses talked about seeing there.

There was a carpet in a specific room

where the carpet no longer exists.

Indicative.

Circumstantial evidence thatúsome crime happened in that room

and he took steps to get rid of that evidence.

[narrator]ú Investigators search land

and outbuildings for evidence.

[John] They dug up the place pretty well

and they were there for a long time.

They probably spent a good 10 hours there.

[Verona] They find a pile where things have been burnt.

Believed, not known, but believed

that her body may have been burnt in this pile.

Every spot that they could think to search,

they have dug and they have used large cranes to do so.

And there are multiple officers with shovels.

They are searching thoroughly,

looking for every bit of evidence

and any body parts they may be able to locate.

[John] They did take some items of evidentiary value,

but they didn't find a body there that day,

which is what they were looking for.

That's when everything was really

set in stone and...

my brain was finally like,

"And no, we're, we're not,

we're not getting her back."

[narrator] BCI agents meet with prosecutors.

[Kristin] It is rare that prosecutors will take on

what we call a no body case,

meaning they have to try to prove murder

without a body, without a victim.

It's not something that is usually done,

but the prosecutors in this case felt that

they had amassed so much circumstantial evidence

around this violent, abusive relationship

that they felt that a jury could see through it.

And so, they decided that they wanted to

take this to trial.

[narrator] Amanda's family learns

that Fred Reer is going to be arrested.

We learned that the grand jury had returned a true bill,

which basically means that Fred Reer

was being indicted at that time.

The BCI was on their way to physically arrest him,

and take him into custody.

So, brought a huge sign of relief to the family,

but it also brought them to a grounded reality

in that Amanda's no longer living.

[officer] Hi, Lorinda. Is Fred home?

- My son? [officer] Yeah.

[Lorinda] Hold on.

[officer] Hi, Fred. You got some shoes?

[Fred] Yeah, in there.

[officer] OK. [Fred] Why is that?

[officer] We have a warrant for your arrest.

[John] His reaction was not textbook.

Like, he didn't seem all too terribly surprised.

He didn't seem all too terribly innocent in it.

[officer] Turn around and put your hands behind your back.

You got anything on you? Not at all? Nothing?

[John] I thought they got the right guy.

He did it.

He knows he did it.

Everybody knows he did it.

And his body language spoke for itself there.

[officer] Did you want to leave your...

[Stephanie] It was a good day.

I really didn't want him toú have the chance to hurt

another woman,

another daughter, ú another sister, mother.

He should not have been out as long as he was

walking free around all these people.

[Caroline] By the time BCI took over,

it was five and a half years.

I was elated.

I mean, it's not closure for us at all,

but it's conclusion.

Frederick Reer will beú in court to face charges

of murder, ú gross abuse of a corpse,

and tampering with evidence inú connection to Amanda Dean's

disappearance back in 2017.

[judge] And are you aware of the charges

that you're facing here today?

Uh, somewhat.

It's not about guilt or innocence.

It's about sufficient evidence

to prove beyond a reasonable doubt

that this person committed the crime.

[Natalie] Going to trial is always a risk

because something could happen

and the defendant could walk away

not facing any charges.

[narrator] Prosecutors are building their case

against Reer.

It is extremely difficult to prove a case

when you don't have a body.

It is extremely difficult to prove a case when

there has been no investigation done

immediately whenú the person went missing.

They have very little evidence, in all reality,

compared to what you would have in a typical murder case.

You don't have anyone confessing.

You don't have any witnesses who actually saw it happen.

You don't have a murder weapon.

However, what they had gleanedú from their investigation

and talking to people, what they had shared,

just made it, you know, ú a highly circumstantial

but yet compelling case.

I mean, ú they're fully prepared,

most likely because of the strength

and advocacy of Amanda's family.

I mean, they're just pushing so hard.

[news anchor] In other news tonight,

a man facing charges nowú in the death of Amanda Dean

will stand trial later this year.

Frederick Reer was arrested just last year

on charges of murder

after Ohio BCI executedsearch warrants at his property.

Now, Dean disappeared back in July of 2017.

Reer's trial is now set to begin August 18th

in Huron County Court.

[narrator] To ensure Reer is convicted,

prosecutors come up with a new plan.

They were going to offer him a plea deal

or plea arrangement, if you will.

And so, they had contacted the family.

[narrator] The deal on the table

is for Reer to plead guilty to lesser charges

in exchange for a lighter sentence.

[John] They said, ú you know, "Think about it,

and let us know what you think."

We spent several hoursúwith the whole entire family,

and basically everyone had theirú opportunity to speak to it.

And they started with me and they said,

"Well, what do you think?"

I said, "You guys have been drug to hell and back

more than once with this case."

A homicide case without a body is a tall order for conviction.

It's not an impossible feat,

and I think that they still would have gotten it.

However, what I was worried about was the trauma

that it would bring to the family.

Once we got done with that meeting,

I notified my contact at BCI and said that

they're in favour of a plea deal.

[narrator] The prosecutionpresents him with the plea deal,

which also includes him agreeing to something called a proffer.

A proffer is basically you are offering a confession

or you're offering information.

But whatever it is you're offering,

you cannot use that against the defendant in the case.

But I think that one of the reasons why they did that

is to basically try to fill some voids,

fill some gaps, get some information.

It's actually very sad information,

but it's all part of that working towards closure.

And I don't think you ever get closure,

but I think that there's baby steps to get there.

And I think that this was one of them.

[judge] I do understandú that your plea of guilty

is a complete admission of your guilt.

Yes, sir.

I think he knew that ifú he didn't take a plea deal,

he ran the risk of being inúprison for the rest of his life.

And he also knew that the charges against him,

there was a limit to the amount of time he could serve.

And so, I think he did the cost benefit ratio

and decided it was in his best interest to do that.

[reporter] Reer pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter,

two counts of tampering with evidence,

and gross abuse of a corpse.

[judge] If the court were to impose all of those sentences

consecutively to each other,

that could be as much as 18 years in prison.

Dean's body has still never been found.

Reer will be back in Huron County

common pleas courtroom on January 5th

for sentencing.

[narrator] Fred meets with prosecutors

to finally lay out what happened to Amanda.

[Caroline] He ended up telling what he did.

It was devastating,

but we got our answers.

What did come out was that she was killed,

we believe, by method of strangulation,

and he dismembers her body.

[Shannon] He literally chopped her up,

burned her for four days,

and took her remains,

like she was nothing, into a creek,

and dumped them there.

Two buckets full.

That's a monster to me.

BCI, once they got this information,

they had visited that area.

BCI knew... I said, ú "I want my daughter home.

I need to bring her home."

And we couldn't properly bury her

without her remains.

So, they got with a group of anthropology students

from the University of Toledo,

and they spoke to the landowner

who agreed to allow them to build a dam

to dry it out

so they could go and search.

[Caroline] They were doing it for our family.

They knew it meant so much to us.

The problem was you're talking,

it is now seven years later,

and again, you're looking for a needle in 10,000 haystacks

at that point.

They did search about a 1,000 feet of this creek,

but sadly, they didn't find anything there.

Since they couldn't find anything,

they asked if our family would like to go to the site

and visit the site where he said he placed her bones.

So, we did. We met out there.

It was a very sad time.

[John] And so, it just adds to the tragic part of this case

that, basically, the family walks away

and they don't have anything from Amanda at all.

The man found responsible forú the death and disappearance

of Amanda Deanú learned his fate today.

Dean's boyfriend, Fred Reer,

was sentenced to prison for her death

nearly a decade after she vanished.

Dean was 36 years old when she was last seen.

Words cannot describe our pain.

[reporter] Loved ones pleaded with Judge James Conway

to hand down the maximum sentence

to Dean's boyfriend, Fred Reer.

I love and miss my mom.

She was my best friend.

And it hurts knowing that

none of my brothers will get to see her ever again.

[Natalie] It was an absolutely packed courtroom

with people there to support her.

There were people with purple ribbons on,

with pins with Amanda's face on it,

T-shirts saying "Amanda's life matters."

[Caroline] We had pictures of Amanda

that we placed in everybody's hands,

and asked them to hold them up

right before the sentencing began,

and they did.

It was a silent protest for us of what he did,

'cause we were upset because the charges went from murder

to involuntary manslaughter.

[judge] Here the defendant has pled to the charge.

It's not a murder offence, and the court is bound

to go by the rules that have toú be followed in sentencing

under the charge,

for each of the charges that he has pled.

In considering those charges here before me...

So, ultimately, the judgeú handed down a sentence

of a total of 14 years in prison for Reer.

And as that sentence was being read,

Fred did not really show any emotion.

It didn't seem to affect him at all.

[Caroline] I was just disappointed the judge...

didn't give him the maximum on every charge.

And he didn't get that,

knowing that he did it.

I don't understand that.

It's such a heinous crime.

[Shannon] It's not fair.

We didn't get justice.

Amanda didn't get justice.

We got a temporary fix.

You are pure evil, Fredrick Reer.

[judge] I'm going to remand youú to custody of the sheriff

and have you begin servingú out the prison sentence

that was handed down.

[Caroline] It wasn't what we wanted.

Fred should have been in prison for the rest of his life

with no possibility of parole.

What he did to her,

no human being should have to go through that.

[narrator] Family and friends are watching closely

as a new investigation could have implications

for Reer's future.

A man convicted inú the death and disappearance

of an Ohio woman is nowúbeing looked at in connection

to a missing person in Pinellas County.

Deputies say Frederick Reerú is a person of interest

in the 2018 disappearanceú of Joseph Andrew Phillips.

Phillips, who you see right here,

was last seen onú Gandy Beach with his dog.

After Amanda's murdered,

Fred Reer moves to Tampa, Florida.

And on March 31st, 2018,

he and a bunch of coworkers decided to go

to this beach called Gandy Beach

and just kinda hang around,

drink beer, and that kind of stuff.

And one of his colleagues, a man named Joseph Phillips,

lost his phone.

They ended up all going back to their residence,

but then Fred Reer ended up volunteering

to take him back to the beach to look for his phone.

[reporter] Investigators say Reer

admitted Phillips was in his car.

Reer claimed he gave himú a ride back to the beach

in the early morning hours and left him there.

Phillips has not been seen or heard from since.

[Joni] And that is the last

anybody ever heard from Mr. Phillips.

And if he can be linked to Fred Reer,

it'd be possible for Fred Reer to never see the light of day.

[narrator] Amanda's family have more difficult questions

about the original handling of her disappearance

and why they were ever told she was in a safe place.

[John] I think that there'súa lot of unanswered questions

that didn't come out.

And when I say that,

meaning more from the Sheriff's Department

and I, too, am curious as to the source of the information

to lead him to say that she was in a safe house.

[reporter] New today, the family of Amanda Dean

is suing the Huron County sheriff

saying the office mishandled her case for years,

claiming the sheriff and others involved quote,

"Repeatedly and recklessly told the Dean family

that Amanda was alive and well

and staying in a domestic violence shelter," end quote.

[Joshua] I just want justice to be served.

I want accountability.

I just want truth. The family wants truth.

We're not 100% there yet.

I do hope that they get the answers that they seek

and just add another step towards closure,

knowing full well that they'll never get full closure,

but at least perhaps another step towards that.

And right now, a Huron County family

is pushing for a change in Ohio law,

one they say failed their loved one.

They teamed up with two lawmakers

and announced that they were introducing Amanda Dean's law.

[reporter]ú Currently under Ohio law,

gross abuse of a corpseú is a fifth degree felony,

which typically carries a sentence

of 6 to 12 months in prison.

12 months max,

that does not fit the crime.

[Natalie] They're looking to increase the penalty for that.

So under this new law,

in the most serious of circumstances,

gross abuse of a corpse would be elevated

to a second degree felony,

which would, obviously, carry a larger prison sentence.

While this won't impact Reer"s sentence,

it could help families in the future

not have to deal with the same pain

that Amanda's family has gone through.

[John] It breaks my heart to see what they've gone through,

but it also makes me happy to see where they're at today.

And Amanda's death won't be in vain.

There'll be a lot of good things coming from this.

And I hope that we can keep her story alive,

and just do good in her name.

I'll keep plodding as long as I can

for changes,

and I"m not done yet.

So...

and everything will be in her honour

and her memory.

(♪)

(♪)