Original subtitles

Pictures from the air

show the massive effort searching for remains.

Bulldozers creating a huge hole at least 25 feet deep.

For the past week in Linden,

investigators have been digging up a well

and sifting through dirt,

gathering more than 1,000 bone fragments,

which they believe are the remains of people

who were killed by Wesley Shermantine

and his boyhood friend, Loren Herzog.

They were called the Speed Freak Killers.

The search effort has relied on

Shermantine's hand-drawn maps.

So far, five victims have been located.

The question now is,

how many are still buried?

There is new hope of finding victims

in a killing spree

more horrific and prolific than anyone imagined.

Victims' families had new hope

that the truth was finally coming out,

leading them to their loved ones.

Have we ever messed with this binder?

Uh, I don't think so.

I don't recognize who sent that fax. It's from PD to somebody.

"Known victims of Wesley Shermantine

and Loren Herzog."

The cases listed are Howell, which was in Alpine,

King and Cavanaugh, which was PD's,

Armtrout, which was ours,

Chevy Wheeler, SPD, and Vanderheiden, SO.

When they were doing the well dig,

they found lots of car parts and stuff like that,

and this is some of them.

There's a bumper and whatnot.

So we still have them in evidence.

We have the other items

that came out of the well as well, like...

Like, here's the shoes.

X-rays of the bones.

More shoes. There were a lot of shoes.

For a long time,

the Speed Freak Killers were like the boogeyman.

Anybody that went missing between 1985-ish and 1997-ish,

"Oh, well, then that is probably a Shermantine death."

It's everything to the imagination

and very few things that we actually know.

The stakes are very high to try to find more victims.

There's a lot of people that think

that their loved one might have been killed by them,

but their remains have not been located.

For the families, the Shermantine case,

it's still open, it's an open wound.

It hasn't closed.

The Shermantine case is a different type of case

than most cold cases.

In most cold cases, we have a victim,

but we don't know who the suspect was.

In the Shermantine case,

we've already prosecuted the suspects,

and now we're trying to locate the victims.

As far as victims go,

there's ones that they were prosecuted for.

There's also ones that they were not prosecuted for

that we know that they killed.

And then there's a list of people

that we believe they may have killed.

Mr. Shermantine has made multiple statements

of anywhere from 14 to 100.

Trying to figure out whether they're really responsible

for that many is-- is daunting.

So, who belongs in this list

of potential Shermantine victims?

Looking at the well dig from 2012,

a lot of items were pulled out of the well.

Human remains, but also clothing items,

makeup items, purses.

Trying to figure out who those might have belonged to

is key because that may identify more victims.

All the property that was found inside the well,

we have put onto a spreadsheet that we can compare it

to the timeline and to the cold missing persons list.

McCann was last seen wearing thick white sweater,

Jordache jeans that were big for her,

nylons, and open-toed heels, no color.

[Jimenez} There's no white sweater in there.

So this is blue jeans, blue jeans for both of them.

So this is blue flannel shirt and blue jeans.

This Shermantine case is part of why I'm in office,

part of why I ran for sheriff.

I came in and said,

"Who do I want to lead Cold Case?"

What type of detective,

what type of person do I want leading the charge on this?

And that was an easy one for me,

and it was Linda Jimenez.

Okay, so it says that Joann's wearing a blue

and gold striped shirt.

She is a strong-willed pit bull of a detective.

It says gray on it, is what they put,

but could it have been gold?

I mean, you know?

It's kind of like the ultimate detective position, right?

To work cold case.

Besides the challenge personally of solving the case,

I feel like there needs to be some justice.

I feel like there needs to be accountability

for your actions.

That's kind of a main motivator.

Foul play suspected. Shoulder-length hair.

- Star under left eye. - What color hair?

Green blouse.

Yeah, I know, if there's that faux hair

- or whatever. - Yeah, and it's blond.

Yeah, but I mean, was that just part of, like,

a weave or a...

You know what I mean?

Like a, one of those, what do you call it?

When you just put the little piece that's, like, color.

My niece wears them all the time, like the pink--

Yeah, but that's now, not in the '80s.

Did they have that in the '80s?

I don't know. I wasn't alive. Did they?

I hate you. What year were you born?

'85. .

[Jimenez} I was very excited to get Irene Shelvay

as a detective on the cold case team.

She had experience already in detectives

with child abuse, sexual assault.

This is Modesto's case,

and I'm almost wondering if we get a hold of Modesto

to get a hold of next of kin

and have them come look at the book.

She's very intelligent.

It's like a natural thing for her to hear

what the case is about and,

like, really own it and understand it quickly.

No DNA, no dental records, no last description.

- Only nothing. - Nothing.

I try so hard to not tell people

that I do cold case investigations

when I meet them because it's everybody's favorite hobby.

I don't think fiction does enough justice

to the actual work

because it sets an unrealistic expectation for family members

or just people that are impacted by these cases.

I'll have to update the timeline

with family contacts for the rest of the victims...

- Yes. - ...and then set up

- a victim-family meeting. - I'm okay with that.

I think they really feed off each other,

and that's what makes them a strong unit.

Tough, intelligent,

just perfect for dealing with somebody

that has a psychological problem like Mr. Shermantine.

No one alive knows the truth but me.

But to really understand everything,

one will have to start at the beginning.

The Shermantine case starts out in the 1980s.

Wesley Shermantine and Loren Herzog were boyhood friends.

They grew up in Linden, towards the east part of the county,

with a lot of orchards and farmland around them.

And they were friends with a number of girls

from the east side of Stockton, who, in 1985, went missing.

Everyone refers to that area as Okieville,

just because there were a lot of Caucasian families

that lived in that area.

It's a lower income level area.

Well, it's not the best part of Stockton.

But at that time,

I had to get us a place

where I could afford, you know, and with only me working,

you know, it was hard on me.

I found a job at a canning company,

and I worked the graveyard shift there doing tomatoes.

And at that time, the girls were boy crazy,

fighting continuously over the curling iron,

the makeup, the boys.

My house was chaos. But it was a fun household.

We enjoyed it.

Joann was the sociable butterfly.

She loved everybody. Everybody was her friend.

She would bring home any animal

that was abandoned or lost.

And my mom would say, "We can't have another animal."

She was a very strong-spirited person.

She took after my mom a lot. And she was just tiny.

I'm only 5'3"

and my mom's gotta be 4'10", maybe 4'8" now.

And Joann was even smaller than that.

She was so small that she fit into the bathroom sink,

and that's where she sat to put on her makeup for, like, hours.

I went to work that night, and Joann told her sister,

Michelle, "I have a date tonight."

"Who is your date with?"

"Oh, you don't know him.

He's tall, muscular, long blondish, sandy blond hair."

And I said, "Okay, but you--

you know, you have to come home."

When I got home in the morning,

Joann was not in her room.

So, "Michelle, where is Joann?"

"Well, Mom, when I went to sleep,

she was already asleep in bed."

I said, "The window's open.

Where's Joann?"

"Mom, I don't know."

I was devastated. The fear of God was in me.

I was like, "What has happened to my child? Where is she?

Where could she be?"

We started looking for her.

All the neighborhood, anybody we knew.

"Have you seen Joann?"

Nobody's seen her. Nobody's seen her.

And the police were no help because they kept saying,

"Oh, she's a runaway. She'll turn up."

No, she's not a runaway.

She didn't take anything with her.

Why would she run away and not take nothing with her?

And then once Joann disappeared, all of a sudden,

the neighbor down the street from me,

Chevy Wheeler, disappeared.

And her and Joann were friends.

...on December 6th.

The FBI has been investigating the case as possible terrorism

after authorities discovered anti-American writing

by the gunman, with intention to expose...

I remember when she was born.

We went to see Rosemary's Baby that night at the drive-in.

And, uh, got home and went to bed and...

- I was pregnant with her. - Of course.

Six and a half months.

And, uh...

I felt something wet,

and I checked, and I was hemorrhaging.

We jammed out to the hospital.

It usually takes 15 minutes to get there.

We were there in about...

six.

Yeah, I was driving pretty fast.

And she was born.

She weighed three pounds, 14 ounces,

and we had her in the bassinet, I guess, gee,

for about six, eight months 'cause she was so small.

She was a good kid.

She liked to do things with us.

Taking her fishing and helping me with the car.

"Dad, can I help?" And I said, "Yeah," you know,

"Give me this tool or give me that one," you know.

- And knew what tool to get. - She knew--

She knew the tools and everything.

I'm sorry, I...

I just loved her.

Yeah. Yeah, yeah.

I can't help it. It's...

- It's all right. - She was my girl.

She was Daddy's little girl.

Yeah.

She grew up, and she started high school.

She had met this guy

from a mutual friend,

and he'd come over, and we didn't like him.

That was Shermantine.

And that was Wesley Shermantine.

We told her not to see him,

but I guess one day he decided that he wanted to go swimming.

And I assumed that she was going to check

to see if Shermantine knew anything about Joann.

That was the last time I saw her.

She had a midriff sweatshirt on. It was lavender.

Jeans, a lavender jacket, white shoes.

I've got her button. I've got her button.

I went in my jewelry box, and I brought out her button.

It's the last thing I have of her.

When we called, they didn't want to do much.

"Oh, she'll come back. She just ran away."

No, she didn't run away.

Somebody took her.

Where is she?

Everything went flat.

No Chevy.

They went up and interviewed Shermantine.

"Oh, I don't know anything." And they'd leave.

Wesley Shermantine and Loren Herzog's names came up

in that investigation.

In fact, a search warrant was executed on the property

of Wesley Shermantine's parents' residence.

Is the tape running? Can you see?

Yeah.

They finally found Shermantine's cabin.

The officer said that there was sprays of blood everywhere.

God damn.

Watch your shadow,

watch your shadow doesn't get on it.

And they found long blond hair.

Of course, Chevy had long blond hair.

But they didn't want to do anything much about it.

And they couldn't do anything

because they didn't have the techniques up yet

in '85 to do it.

Some items of evidentiary value

were collected.

However, the remains were not found,

nobody was prosecuted for the case,

and Chevy Wheeler went on to be

one of the long-term missing people from the county.

We used to look at cars going down the street, you know,

and if she was blond,

we would follow her and see if it was her.

We did that for years.

After Joann came up missing,

I would call them every day, almost every day.

"Anything about my sister? Anything about my sister?"

And still always get the same answer.

"We have no developments. It's just gotta sit on the shelf

until we get some kind of evidence."

I kept thinking in my head she's gonna come up one day

on the doorstep and be home.

But my heart told me something different.

The Shermantine case is a very difficult case

to talk about for a number of reasons.

One, the scope of the case is amazing.

The case file for this is no longer a file.

It's-- It's a room full of boxes.

It's gonna be in one of these, and I got the numbers.

LG-62,

LG-74,

LG-18.

Okay, I don't think this is--

They're not gonna be on the front.

- You guys just gotta open them. - Oh.

LG-54?

64.

Getting up to speed on this investigation takes months.

Everything that we're starting with is extremely old,

extremely dusty.

Yeah, it's just a piece here.

You're missing 74, aren't you?

- No, it's over there. - Oh, okay.

Chris Matsuoka and Kenji Yang

started out from patrol level.

They had no prior detective experience at all,

but they had no problem jumping in.

I was definitely told by Linda coming over, be ready to work.

I think in cold case, you have to take every inch

that anybody gives you, and run with it as far as you can.

You want people with strong determination,

strong will to try to solve these cases.

You're looking for a needle in a haystack.

There it is, 62, right on top.

It's a lot to pour over and to decipher what's true,

what's not true, and what's exaggerated.

Thank you.

I didn't grow up here,

so I didn't know the Shermantine case.

But when people talk about San Joaquin County,

it's the case that we're known for.

The Shermantine Herzog case.

Well, the reason we talk about it is to basically relive

our career, to a certain degree.

But the-- the fact is, is that it was one

of the highest-profile cases we had here

in San Joaquin County.

A lot of people that don't even live in this county

know about it.

And so it's hard not to talk about it sometimes.

After the disappearance of Chevy Wheeler

and Joann Hobson, several years pass.

Then, in 1998, Cynthia Vanderheiden goes missing.

And when Cyndi goes missing,

again, Wesley Shermantine and Loren Herzog's names

come up as potential suspects.

Okay, now walk over here this way more.

Okay, tell me where you're going.

Prom.

You gotta put it in that little button there,

See that little hole right there?

Yeah.

Look out, James. She's dangerous.

Let's go.

Okay.

Now, look like you're having a good time.

♪ Whoa-oa-oa-oh-oh-oh ♪

Cyndi Vanderheiden is my baby sister.

♪ Oh-oh-oh ♪

We were country girls.

♪ Oh-oh-oh ♪

Horseback riding, hanging out with the chickens and the goats,

frog gigging.

Frog gigging?

Frog gigging is where you go at night,

and you shine your flashlight in, like, a creek or a canal,

and you have this fork, and you would shine the light,

and it would blind them, and then you'd stab 'em.

And then you'd fry up the frog legs,

after you peeled 'em, cooked 'em.

Dad can make good frog legs.

We used to go karaokeing a lot.

That was pretty fun.

Sing to our dad, sing to our mom.

I was more the country.

She was more the alternative music, they call nowadays.

♪ I'm feelin' ♪

Hey! Hey!

Hey.

A breakfast with the characters in Disneyland.

Say hi.

♪ So in the present ♪

She was very close to me when I had my children.

Krista!

She was very into her nieces,

very close to them, very protective of them.

Turn it down.

I don't think she would have ever had children.

She had a cat, and that cat was her life.

The cat always was with her.

We had spoke on the phone for her birthday.

I called and wished her happy birthday,

saying to her, like we always do.

Um, we discussed a few things about my eldest daughter,

um, and then we said our goodbyes.

And then 10 days later, my parents called to tell me

that Cindy was missing.

I got a call from my sergeant in homicide

that I would be assisting the lead detective,

Debbie Scheffel, in this investigation.

The information we had was that Cyndi Vanderheiden's vehicle

had been abandoned at the Clements Cemetery.

My first contact was talking with her father,

who found the vehicle.

He said that it was unlocked.

I looked in, and I could see

through the window her purse was in the back seat.

And so I came back, and I says, "Didn't Cyndi go to work today?"

And we'd call the sheriff's and they wouldn't do anything,

because it's gotta be 24 hours, even for a missing person.

And that no one would know if she maybe took off,

and I says, "No, she never takes off."

I knew she didn't run away or anything,

because she would have taken her car.

She worked very hard, and that was a brand-new.

She had just bought that car.

It wasn't like she would just leave it.

When I first met John, you can see the concern

on his face as a father.

And I still remember him telling me

that the last person that he was concerned about

was Loren Herzog and Wes Schermantine.

That-- That stands out for me from the very beginning.

But I had no idea who these guys were.

Loren Herzog is somebody that I am ashamed

to say that at one time, I sorta kinda dated.

We hit it off. He was kind.

You would have never known he had a dark side.

Wesley Shermantine, I only knew him by name.

I just knew he was a partier.

He was a dirtbag.

They knew each other since they were kids.

They lived right down the street from each other.

They were always running around together.

I think I met Loren out at a party,

and it was just somebody that you heard of.

You know, he was the guy with all the drugs.

I met Wes at a party, too. It was a drug deal.

Back in those days, you know,

people did a lot of house parties,

and a lot of vineyard parties.

There was a bunch of people there for the same reason,

and that was to hope that the person that was carrying

all the drugs would share.

Wes and Loren, they were really involved

in the east side of Stockton.

It was a really big drug culture.

At that time, it was kinda called Okieville.

If you would like to describe as a Wild West,

East Stockton would definitely be it,

because there would be bar fights.

There would be people that used methamphetamine.

We would be working at midnight to 4:00 in the morning.

People would be working on their cars,

riding their bicycles, drinking and partying all night long.

They were so into meth, they were shooting it up,

they were snorting it, they were smoking it.

It made you feel like you were 10-foot-tall and bulletproof,

that you could do no wrong.

All we knew is that it was cheaper than cocaine,

it lasted longer than cocaine,

and we liked the feeling.

Police! Police!

We didn't understand what a big hold

that drug would have on people's lives,

and how addicted people would become.

Think about when Cyndi went missing,

and she was meeting supposedly to get some drugs.

It was nothing to meet out at the cemetery.

I mean, I wouldn't have thought twice.

When this first happened, I had previous knowledge

from a meeting with a Stockton police officer

who had said that Wes Shermantine,

and this is prior to this occurring,

to keep an eye on him, because he's about to be released

from Calaveras County on a rape charge,

in which he had confided in his victim

that he had killed people.

Then when I learned that he was at the bar that night

when Cyndi became missing, ears are up, the focus is on.

We made arrangements to interview Wes Shermantine.

No.

And she didn't--

So the people that say that she was talking

to you and Loren are lying?

Mr. Shermantine is currently on death row

at San Quentin Prison.

He really isn't communicating with us at this point in time,

but we would love a conversation with him.

And so I thought maybe to establish some sort

of rapport with him and some sort of conversation,

I wanted to write him and try to establish some dialogue.

Dear Mr. Shermatine, my name is Linda Jimenez,

and I am a sergeant with the San Joaquin County

Sheriff's Office Cold Case Investigations Unit.

I am hoping this letter finds you well,

and I am hoping to have an open dialogue with you.

My only goal is to speak with you in hopes of locating

loved ones who were killed.

My team and I were not part of the original investigation,

or any of the follow-up in 2012.

I understand that there were miscommunication,

mistrust, and bitterness throughout.

I have enclosed a department photo of myself

so you will know who you are speaking with.

I sincerely hope you will write me,

and that you will allow me to visit and speak in person.

Sincerely, Sergeant Jimenez.

You know, I really wasn't comfortable

with putting my department photo in there,

um... but I kind of wanted him to think

that I was throwing out my trust first

by giving him the photo.

I don't know if he would, you know,

confess everything to me, I'm not expecting that,

but I am expecting to at least get something that would help us

to go further, and find some more victims.

There are many wells out there in the country.

It's so simple.

I can't believe the cops have never figured it out.

You gotta think outside the box.

There are more.

Back then, I don't know how the sheriff's office

could not know that there were young girls disappearing.

And not just Chevy and Joann,

but also Kimberly Billy and Robin Arntrout went missing.

I think that they thought that they were throwaways.

I think that they thought that they were, you know,

the girls from the east side, and all of that.

But then Cyndi went missing, you know,

and Cindy wasn't from that area.

Cyndi Vanderheiden was from a more well-to-do family.

Her father owned a business in the area, right?

I think that the county dropped the ball

until Cyndi came missing,

and we were able to give them more resources,

and the sheriffs actually had

to get off their butts and do something.

The search for a missing San Joaquin County woman

is shifting from land to water this morning.

25-year-old Cyndi Vanderheiden, of Clements,

has been missing since Saturday.

Find my daughter. Somebody find her.

That's all I can tell you right now.

With Cyndi, we searched everywhere.

You're talking about a vast area,

so if you look at the initial crime scene,

which is in Clements,

which then expands out to Linden,

which expands into Calaveras County,

you could imagine how difficult it would be

just to coordinate everything.

Vanderheiden's family and friends...

As a family, we decided to set up

a search headquarters.

We had flyers, we had billboards, we had pictures.

I know my dad went up in a helicopter several times.

A glimmer of hope went through us,

and I think that's what kept us all going,

that she was alive,

and that she was scared,

and that she was being held somewhere.

Cyndi was last seen alive...

I don't think law enforcement thought

we were gonna push the issue as much as we did.

At this point, we didn't know what had took place.

You know, we didn't have Shermantine's car yet.

The famous car.

At some point, we had learned that someone

had observed Wes cleaning out his car.

Wes wasn't the type of person who went and cleaned his car

by looking at it every time he finished something to eat.

He threw it on the floorboard.

The access to the vehicle was after he defaulted

on the payments, and it got repossessed.

They ended up finding bloodstains on the back side

of the trunk, as well as on the headrest.

Some new developments in the search

for a San Joaquin County woman.

Officers say they have found traces of blood in a car

belonging to a man that was questioned

in the disappearance of Cyndi Vanderheiden.

I did meet up with Herzog one-on-one.

And asked him point-blank what happened,

and he couldn't look me in the eye.

And at that point in time, I knew that he was involved.

From the beginning of the investigation,

I think we always really knew that Loren Herzog

would be the weak link.

You could tell that Wes was the one that had a little bit

more control over Loren rather than the other way.

Joe and I had a search warrant to get a blood sample from him.

When we knocked on the door, his wife came to the door.

We asked if Loren was home.

She said, "Sure, he's-- he's right here."

His parents came out, his mother and father.

I pointed at his hands and said,

"Your son and your husband, those hands right there,

either killed Cyndi Vanderheiden

or was there, and knows everything about it.

And if those hands killed Cyndi Vanderheiden,

you should not talk to us.

You better get an attorney.

But you're going to go with us,

because we're gonna take your blood."

And as soon as we got into the car,

we started driving down the road.

Loren turns to us and says,

"How can I get myself out of this?"

- As he began to cry. - As he started to cry.

And that's when I looked at Joe,

and we're going, I think we got him.

We won't interrupt you.

Well, just-- just tell us the way you want to tell it.

Okay.

We immediately took him to the sheriff's office.

And that's when we started to get

a little bit of information,

which turned out to be a little bit more,

and then a little bit more,

and then all of a sudden, it just started exploding.