All language subtitles for Dateline.Secrets.Uncovered.S11E14.720p.WEB.h264-BAE.[eng]

- I'm Craig Melvin and this is
"Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."

- I can't even believe
she would meet someone

at a park at 3 A.M.

I think she knew the second
she got in his car

that something was wrong.

- A college student
disappears.

- A secret life uncovered.

- She was on a dating site
looking for sugar daddies.

- Going into it blindly

is not something
I would recommend.

- Chilling details revealed.

- Is this guy dodging us?

- He kind of selected her
as his victim.

- Correct.

- Towards the bottom
of the dig site,

there was a damaged iPhone.

- Looked like maybe clothing.

It was just
a sinking feeling, really.

- I just replay this one night
I had with her

and I just wanna grab her
and say,

"Don't do it. Don't go."

**

- Hello, and welcome to
"Dateline: Secrets Uncovered."

For parents,
it is natural and scary

to watch their children
become independent.

College student
MacKenzie Lueck

was striking her own path
to adulthood

and she knew
what she wanted.

But MacKenzie did not know

what she was
getting herself into

until she disappeared
into a secret underworld.

The race was on to save her.

Here's Keith Morrison with
"The Waiting Car."

**

- Our minds have a curious way
of deceiving us.

We sense something off.

Something wrong.
Even terrible.

And yet, something
in the brain wants to believe

the worst didn't happen.

Kennedy Stoner
knows that feeling well.

- I was kind of pushing away
from my gut instinct.

I'm not really sure why.

I never imagined
this ever happening

to one of my friends.

- I wouldn't think you'd want
to imagine it, right?

- No, or anyone
that I know.

Or-- So, my mind
didn't go there.

- So, she told herself
it would be fine

as she reached out
from her home

here in
Salt Lake City, Utah.

Messages to her friend
MacKenzie Lueck.

- I saw that she wasn't
opening my Snapchats.

And I had texted her
and I didn't get a text back.

And this is stupid,
but I was kind of wondering

if she was mad at me
for something.

- The mind wants
a simple explanation.

After all, she knew
her best friend was grieving.

MacKenzie's grandmother
had recently passed away

in California.

- I know she was
heartbroken over that

and so was the rest
of her family

because they're all
very close.

- And she went to
the funeral.

- She did. She left Utah.
She went to the funeral.

So, I was thinking
maybe she just, like,

took a few days off
social media or something.

- MacKenzie's parents, though,
hadn't heard from her either.

After 3 days
of escalating fear,

MacKenzie's dad made
that most dreadful phone call

to the Salt Lake City
Police Department.

- The story
MacKenzie's dad told was this.

On the night of Sunday,
June 16, 2019,

MacKenzie had boarded a flight
from Los Angeles back to Utah,

arriving in Salt Lake City
around 1:35 A.M., Monday.

At 2:01 A.M.,
she texted her mom

to say she landed safely.

After that,
three days of silence.

Two patrol officers
went straight away

to MacKenzie's townhouse.

Her car was in the driveway.
That was a good sign.

[knocking]
Repeated knocks at the door,

however, went unanswered.

Peering through a window,
the officers saw nothing.

Not a soul around.

They called MacKenzie's dad
to report the news.

And next, the officers
phoned MacKenzie's friends,

and boss, and professors.

None of them had seen her.

All reasons why,

by the end
of this unsettling day,

MacKenzie's case
was referred to a place

that sounded
very serious indeed.

The Salt Lake City
Police Department's

homicide squad.

- We get a lot
of missing persons cases

in Salt Lake City.

- Lieutenant Todd Mitchell
was the unit's chief detective.

- So, I try my best to sift
through those

and find the-the ones
that kind of raise the hair

on the back of your neck,
for lack of a better term.

And this raised the hair
on the back of my neck.

So, that's why we decided,

yeah, we need
to take action now

and-and at least start a-an
initial investigation into it.

- Truth be told, most reports
are easily resolved.

The missing person may have
simply lost their phone

or just decided
to take a break

from some family drama.

But that didn't appear
to be the case with MacKenzie.

The relationship she had
with her mom and dad

would be the envy
of most parents.

- They were always
contacting each other.

They'd send little
silly texts back and forth

on a daily basis.

- Detective Nate Wiley
and Tiffany Sayes

led the missing persons
investigation,

even though their specialty
was murder.

- I mean, in a usual homicide
investigation, we start--

there's a dead body.
We're starting with something.

We have a-a victim
and we're moving backwards.

In this case,
we started with nothing.

- First action
Sayes and Wiley took

was to pull
the Salt Lake City Airport

surveillance camera footage

from the night of
MacKenzie's disappearance.

And sure enough,
there she was.

- So, it was nothin'
out of the ordinary.

We're able to see her
come off the-the terminal

and we followed her all the way
down to the baggage claim

to where she picked up
her luggage.

- Seemed perfectly normal,
fine, causal?

- Yes.
Nothing out of the ordinary

that we could see at all.

- The last clip
shows MacKenzie,

like so many
other passengers,

casually getting into a car
outside baggage claim.

But the identity
of the driver?

A mystery.

News of
the police investigation

quickly spread
among MacKenzie's friends.

- The second
that I heard about that,

my stomach dropped.

- So, Kennedy launched
her own investigation.

- I went on Facebook.

I dropped pictures
of us together

and I said,
"She's missing."

Like, "If you know anything,
reach out to me.

"Reach out to police."

- I thought she was still
in California

until I saw Kennedy's message
on Facebook.

- Ashley Fine, another of
MacKenzie's college friends,

put up her own
Facebook post.

- And I tagged her in it.

And because
I tagged her Facebook,

some of her other
family members

reached out to me
immediately.

- What family members?

- Um, some of her
distant cousins.

- Okay.
- One who lives here in Utah.

And we started talking
and messaging.

And I said, "You know,
I have a feeling

"that she took a Lyft share.

"I feel really strong
that she did that."

- So, you're worried that
something may have happened--

- Definitely. Definitely.
- In that car?

On their own, Ashley
and this cousin called Lyft

and Uber to see
if either one of them

had picked up MacKenzie
at the airport.

- And that's really
when this began,

because somehow,
they let it slip. Lyft did.

That she got in a Lyft
that night.

- What did you do
at that point?

- We contacted law enforcement
about the Lyft.

- A big break for Sayes
and Wiley

because it gave them
probable cause

to serve Lyft
with a search warrant.

- And find out
where her destination was,

where she was dropped off,
what time she was picked up.

- Where did she go?

- So, we were able to get the
destination from the airport

all the way up to
a North Salt Lake address

and she was dropped off
at Hatch Park.

Up in North Salt Lake,
just before 3 A.M.

- A park? At 3 A.M.?

Why would MacKenzie
come here?

And just as important,

why would a driver
leave a young woman alone,

burdened with luggage,

at a park
in the middle of the night?

Who would do such a thing?

It was Detective Sayes' job
to track down the driver.

Who, she discovered,
was not so easy to find.

- We were like,
is this guy dodging us?

- MacKenzie's friends
have a terrifying theory

about why she's missing.

- I assumed that
the Lyft driver abducted her.

- We wanted to know
if he was in fact

going to be
a suspect or not.

- And here's one reason why.

- Her last text message
that we recovered was at 2:58,

prior to her arriving
at the Hatch Park location.

And that was the last activity
ever we had on her phone.

**

- Before MacKenzie Lueck
disappeared in June 2019,

a disturbing story
had gone national.

Several stories, actually,

about women being assaulted
while using Lyft or Uber.

- At least 14 women
have now filed a lawsuit

against the rideshare giant.

- And perhaps no surprise,

MacKenzie's friend
Ashley Fine

imagined something like that,
or worse.

- I assumed that
the Lyft driver abducted her

or maybe they were
in a car accident

and their car
had driven off the road.

- The detectives thought
that was a possibility, too.

So, they wanted
very much to find

that elusive Lyft driver

who gave MacKenzie a ride
the night she vanished.

- We wanted to know
if he was in fact

going to be
a suspect or not.

- He was, though,
nowhere to be found.

Just as odd?

MacKenzie's phone,
the detectives learned,

was turned off

just as her Lyft ride
came to an end.

- Her last text message
that we recovered was at 2:58,

prior to her arriving
at the Hatch Park location.

- Mmm-hmm?

- And that was
the last activity ever

we had on her phone.

- On the morning
of Saturday, June 22,

Six days after
MacKenzie went missing,

Detective Tiffany Sayes
finally tracked down

MacKenzie's Lyft driver.

- He says there wasn't
a lot of conversation

going on in the car.

He did recall
her being on her phone,

um, but he didn't know
who she was talking to.

- Was he fully cooperative?
Did he seem--

- Oh, yes. Definitely.
- Like he wanted to help you?

- He did. He didn't--
He didn't seem...

...like he had anything
to do with this at all.

- Because he had an alibi.

A very good one,
actually.

As soon as he dropped
MacKenzie off,

surveillance footage
at a nearby intersection

captured him leaving
to pick up another fare.

The date, time,
and location

all confirmed by the tracking
software on his Lyft app.

- And he continued that
through the night. And so--

- So, you could eliminate him
pretty easily,

based on the fact
that he was elsewhere.

- Very quickly, yes.
- She was smiling.

Um, she was in--
uh, in good spirits.

- MacKenzie's Lyft driver,
Heath Canada,

told police and later, us,

he remembered
the weird drop-off location.

Even MacKenzie
commented on that, he said.

- Saying how it was odd
to be dropped off

in the middle of the night
at a park.

- Canada, though,
said he wasn't too worried

because someone with a car

was there waiting
for MacKenzie.

- I unloaded, um,
her luggage.

Said goodbye
and drove away.

- So, who was that someone
in the waiting car?

The detectives were hoping
they could identify him

or her through
MacKenzie's phone records.

And she had been texting
a number with a 206 area code

right up to the point
her phone went dead.

- So, we were able
to actually take that number

and run it through
our little databases

and it came back
as absolutely nothing.

Didn't come back to anybody.

- Had to be some type
of burner phone, they thought.

So, whoever that was
did not want anyone to know,

uh, anyone
in any official capacity,

to know who it was.

- Yeah, it was pretty obvious
at that point.

- But according
to the Lyft driver,

whoever met MacKenzie
at the park

made no effort to conceal
their identity from her.

To the contrary.

- They seemed to know
each other, um, really well,

'cause I-I think
all I heard was,

"How are you doing?
How was your trip?"

Just kind of basic,
uh, greetings.

The situation seemed
real-- very safe.

Uh, she, uh,
obviously knew the person

that she was, um, getting
in-- um, into the car with.

- That MacKenzie had caught
a ride with someone she knew

was both good
and bad news.

The good news,
of course, was it meant

maybe MacKenzie just went off
with a friend somewhere.

The bad news?

Because there was now
no proof of a crime,

the detectives
had lost their power

to get any additional
search warrants.

- We had lost our--
what we call "probable cause"

that a crime
had been committed.

And so--
- Just like that?

- Just-Just like that.
- Because of this supposedly--

just because of
what the Lyft driver said,

suddenly, you can't be
getting warrants for things.

- Correct.

And so, that was a hard part
and it really slowed down

the investigation
at that point,

because we didn't have
a crime to attach to it.

It was still now just
a missing persons investigation.

- Without a warrant,
the detectives were blocked

from getting
detailed phone records,

which, theoretically,

would have shown
who MacKenzie was texting.

So, who was this friend
MacKenzie met at the park?

And where did they go?

- MacKenzie's phone is off,

but investigators
have other ways

to follow her
digital footprints.

One place
MacKenzie wasn't missing

was on social media.

- Different people stating,

"Hey, I'm looking at
her site right now.

"It's showing that
she's actively online."

- Her bank account
was active, too.

- So, we were hopeful
that there would be

further transactions on there,
so that we could find her.

**

- So many questions.

Why did MacKenzie go to a park
eight miles from home,

at 3 A.M. no less?

Who did she meet?

It made no sense,
thought her friend Ashley Fine.

- I can't even believe
she would meet someone

at a park at 3 A.M.
It's just so unlike her.

- It is?
- So unlike her.

- Because MacKenzie,

like most of
her sorority sisters,

had talked a lot
about safety.

- I mean, I've been out
with her a lot of times.

- Yeah?

- And she's always
been extremely safe.

She's texted me
after going out at night

and said,
"Hey, did you make it home?

"Are you okay?"

- You would exchange things
just to keep each other safe?

- Mmm-hmm. Yes.

- Ashley had met MacKenzie
almost four years earlier.

- She was a little bit shier

than people would think
she would be.

- Mmm.

- But once you got
to know her,

she had a big personality.
She could make anyone laugh.

- Kennedy Stoner
also met MacKenzie in college.

- Her family
doesn't live here.

- Mmm-hmm.

- So, she was
all on her own here.

So, she had a job.
She was going to school.

She was, like,
checking off everything

that a responsible adult

would have
on their checklist, I guess.

- MacKenzie grew up
near Los Angeles.

El Segundo, California.

And she was raised in
the Church of Latter-Day Saints,

but when she came to
the University of Utah

to study Kinesiology,
according to Ashley,

MacKenzie didn't exactly
remain devout.

- I know she was registered here
at a ward in Salt Lake City,

but I heard that she was
never active

and that makes sense to me,

because I think she wanted
to find her own path.

- You saw her changing.
- Mmm-hmm.

- In recent times, didn't you?
- Mm-hmm.

- In what ways?

- I think she was trying
to almost gain confidence

and security in herself.

She'd always write herself,
like, notes

saying how she wanted
to feel more confident

because I think she realized
she was really shy

and she wanted to be
more outgoing and meet people.

And she wanted
to explore dating

and-and, um, and it might not
be how everyone else

thinks that dating
should be.

- What Ashley is getting at

is that MacKenzie
was active on dating sites.

So much so
that by Saturday June 22,

the sixth day after
MacKenzie's disappearance,

detectives had received
several phone calls

from some of the men
MacKenzie met online.

Mainly to say they had nothing
to do with her disappearance.

- I mean, nowadays,
that's how people meet people.

So, while it was
of significance

because it gave us, you know,
one more thing to look at,

it wasn't this, you know,
big, huge red flag either.

- So, was MacKenzie
off on a lark

with a guy she met online?

A hookup she wanted
to keep secret

from her
devoutly-religious parents?

Well, that certainly
seemed far more likely

than some sort of
kidnapping scenario.

- She could've gone camping
or have gone with a friend

where they would
lose cell service

and it wouldn't be
out of the ordinary.

- But once I did some
checking around,

that camping idea
seemed a lot less likely.

Why?
Standard procedure.

They looked up airline
flight records

and discovered MacKenzie
had been booked on a flight

out of town, to Las Vegas.
So, maybe she was there.

And meanwhile, the detectives
began to see activity

on her bank account.
And something else.

- Different people stating,

"Hey, I'm looking
at her site right now,

"it's showing
that she's actively online."

- So, maybe she was just fine.
Ignoring the fuss.

Or zoned out
and entirely unaware of it.

- And so, we were hopeful.
- Sure.

- 'Cause,
when people go missing,

even if
it's on their own accord,

they're still going to be
making transactions

or paying for stuff.

And so, we were hopeful

that there would be
further transactions on there,

so that we could
find her.

- Not far
from the police station,

Kennedy and Ashley
hosted a rally

to make sure everyone
in Salt Lake City knew

to be looking
for MacKenzie.

- Hey, guys.
This girl's missing

and we're looking for her.
She could be in danger.

We think she's in danger.

- But, was she?

On Sunday, June 23,

detectives learned
MacKenzie had a flight booked

for that very day,
traveling from Las Vegas

to Los Angeles
to attend a friend's wedding.

- And she wouldn't miss that.

So, we contacted,
uh, LAPD

and they had officers waiting
for that flight to land.

- They waited by the jetway

for all the passengers
to de-plane.

MacKenzie was not among them.

Then, they learned this.

It wasn't MacKenzie

who'd been logging into
her social media accounts.

That had been her friends.

- They'd obtained
her email and password.

And they weren't doing it

to try to ruin things
or anything.

They were tryin'
to go on there

to monitor
the sites as well,

to see if any information
could come up.

- And the activity
on MacKenzie's bank account?

- It was the Lyft transaction
on the 17th,

and then an automatic
payroll deposit from her work.

- And then, the detectives
got a tip from this guy.

Who, just maybe,

could bring all those blurry
details into sharp focus.

- I got on the computer
and within an hour,

two hours,
I had found her profile.

- I didn't know anything
about her being on that site.

- The world of sugar babies.

- I think
we're living in a culture

where it's much more
accepted and embraced

for women
to be upfront

about what they need
and want.

- Did MacKenzie know
what she was getting into?

- A lot of people
who go into it

are, like,
seriously so blind

to like, the whole reality
of what it is.

**

- Welcome back to "Dateline:
Secrets Uncovered."

I'm Craig Melvin.

College student
MacKenzie Lueck vanished

after secretly meeting
someone at a park at 3 A.M.

Why rendezvous there
at that odd hour?

Now, a tipster was about
to share troubling details

of his encounter
with MacKenzie

shortly before
she went missing.

Back to Keith Morrison with
"The Waiting Car."

- It was a few weeks before
MacKenzie Lueck vanished.

A chance meeting at a bar
with this man, Rob Joseph.

- She just seemed
like a very bright,

uh, bubbly girl.
Um, friendly.

- They talked for more
than an hour, said Rob.

Or she did
while he listened.

Rob is an ex-
Salt Lake City cop.

Private eye now.

Which, of course,
he told her.

- If you mention you're
an ex-cop and you're a PI,

everybody all of a sudden
wants to tell you

their dark secrets,
you know?

Or-Or risky behaviors.

- Is that what happen--
is that how people react, truly?

- Oh, yeah.

You'd be surprised that people
just wanna tell you things

that you don't wanna hear.

- Anyway.

He only saw MacKenzie
that one time, he said.

Didn't get
her phone number and--

- And I didn't offer
my number.

I generally don't
give out my number.

- And that was that,
he said.

He didn't expect
to see her again.

But just 3 weeks later,
MacKenzie was missing.

And Rob said the friend
who was with him at the bar

that night made
the connection.

- He just mentioned
to me casually,

"Hey, you know that girl
we met at the bar, uh,

"that's the girl
that went missing."

- Of course, Rob remembered
the friendly college student.

And the secret she revealed
to him that night.

- I don't know whether
she was seeking approval

or just advice
or recommendations and--

- How did she put it?

- Uh, she just said
she was on a dating site

and looking
for sugar daddies.

And I asked her
which one and she said,

"Seeking Arrangements."

- Seeking Arrangement.

A website designed
to connect young women

with prosperous older men.

Rob knew a lot
about dating sites.

He's a PI, remember.

And he figured
if MacKenzie was missing,

that might just have something
to do with it.

- I went straight home,
got on the computer,

and got on to
Seeking Arrangements.

And within an hour, 2 hours,
I had found her profile.

- There she was, beachbaby96.

- What was interesting
about her profile

was it was just
very authentic and honest.

Uh, she wasn't really
hiding who she was.

She was pretty specific
about, you know,

she's a 23-year-old
grad student at the U,

studying kinesiology.
California girl.

You know,
likes to drink wine.

Likes to go out.
Likes to travel.

Looking for somebody to,
you know, do that with.

- A little more PG
than some of them, maybe?

- Yeah.

- Soon as he found it,
he sent a screen grab

of MacKenzie's profile

to the Salt Lake
City Police Department.

- This was definitely
another avenue that
we had to look at

and, you know,
track down anybody

that might have been
in contact with her.

- MacKenzie, it appeared, had
compartmentalized information

about her life.

The plane ticket to Las Vegas,
for instance, had been paid for

by a man she met through
Seeking Arrangement.

And a $300 deposit to one
of MacKenzie's back accounts?

- That was from one
of her other dates

that she had been on that
she'd received a-a payment from.

And that was prior to her
going over to her, uh,

grandmother's funeral.

- Her friend Ashley said
she didn't have a clue.

- I didn't know anything
about her being on that site.

- She didn't talk about it.

It wasn't a-- like
a subject of conversation.

- Not with me.

- MacKenzie's friend Kennedy
wanted to avoid

the subject altogether.

But she acknowledged
that Seeking Arrangement

is well-known on campus.

- This site is not unfamiliar
to a lot of women in college.

- Everybody knows about it.

- Everybody knows
of this site.

- Seeking Arrangement
was founded in 2006

by a self-proclaimed nerd
and MIT grad named Brandon Wade.

He declined
our interview request,

but in this 2016
"Today Show" story,

Wade said he came up
with the idea as a way

to meet young women.

- The average sugar baby
is roughly 27-years-old.

Fifty percent of them
are college students.

They're ambitious.
They're beautiful.

Um, and they're
on the website

because they want to find
somebody who's successful

who's going to actually
help them or spoil them.

- I think we're
living in a culture

where it's much more accepted
and embraced for women

to be up front about
what they need and want.

- Journalist Maryella Mastoff
writes about sex and culture

and sees sugaring as a form
of female empowerment.

- And to hold power
in a way that's open,

that is less stigmatized
than it has been in the past.

- Mmm-hmm.

So, they would see
this as holding power?

- I see it as
very powerful, yes.

- How-- Explain
that a little bit.

- Anytime you go into
a relationship of any kind

saying "This is what I need
and if you can't give me this,

"I'm going to move on,"
is a powerful thing to say.

- There is some debate
about this.

Whether it actually
empowers young women

or exploits the innocent.

- I mean...
[sighing]

a lot of people
who go into it are, like,

seriously so blind to,
like, the whole reality

of what it is, you know?

- Like MacKenzie,
Tasia Larkin

from Salt Lake City had
a Seeking Arrangement profile.

But unlike MacKenzie,
Tasia told us she was anything

but a newbie when
we spoke to her in 2019.

At the time,
the 20-something had been

with a sugar daddy
for 6 months.

He was 63.

- Do you mind telling me
how much he pays you?

- My allowance
is $1200 a month.

Tasia told us
it took her a long time

to find an arrangement.

- You have to fish through
all of those guys who, like,

literally, they're like,
"Let's meet up at a hotel,

"have sex,
and I'll give you money."

And I'm like,
"That's a prostitute."

- Shades of gray can be
confusing for anybody,

said Tasia.

Let alone a novice
on Seeking Arrangement.

- I've seen girls
who have had sugar daddies.

They're not even
the same person after it.

- Do you read, um,
MacKenzie's, uh, profile?

- Yes, I did.

- She came from a very sheltered
sort of upbringing.

Would that have made it
more dangerous for her?

- Oh, most definitely.

- Yeah?

- Going into it blindly

is not something
I would recommend.

- No.

- Like, at all.

- Welcome to
"Let's Talk Sugar."

This episode is all
about getting ready

for your sugar date.

- Seeking Arrangement
does make what they call

"Let's talk sugar" videos
that offer up advice

to novice sugar babies,

giving tips on everything from
how to ask for an allowance

to what to pack
in your purse.

Perfume, they say,
and pepper spray.

- Not that you'll
need it on your date,

but going out looking hot
is always a risk.

- Did MacKenzie
watch the videos?

We don't know.

But one of her decisions,
said Tasia,

betrayed her lack
of experience.

- Why would you meet
in the middle of the night

in a park?

- And there was
something else.

Whether MacKenzie did it
or the person she met,

we don't know.

But remember,
right after the Lyft driver

dropped her off
at the park,

someone turned off
MacKenzie's cell phone,

which happens to be contrary

to Seeking Arrangement's
most important rule.

- You never want
to get stuck phoneless.

That's your lifeline.

- Before her electronic
lifeline goes silent,

MacKenzie is busy texting.

Investigators are determined
to follow those cyber clues

wherever they may lead.

- We've got an IP address that
comes back to his residence.

- Tracking text messages.

- He said, "Well,
I have an open Wi-Fi

"because I run
an Airbnb business.

"And so, it could be
anybody from here."

- Did he run
an Airbnb business?

- And a tip from
a concerned neighbor.

- She described it as just
being a really offensively smoky

and very odorous.

- What was it like for you
when this discovery was made?

- It was just
a sinking feeling, really.

**

- Detectives in Salt Lake City
were trying to find out if

MacKenzie Lueck's disappearance
was voluntary or not.

Remember the flight
she was supposed to be on

to Los Angeles?

They found out it had been
paid for by a sugar daddy.

But remember, MacKenzie
wasn't on that flight.

And they found out she wasn't
on the one to Vegas, either.

- It was at that point that
we were able to say, okay,

we've got enough here that we
build our probable cause back up

and really kick in
and start serving

some search warrants again.

- And off the detectives went,
in search of the mystery person

MacKenzie was texting
the night she vanished.

- With a 206 area code.

Conversations going well
before she left LA

to all the way to where
she ended up in Hatch Park.

- That digital trail eventually
led them to a Wi-Fi router

at this Salt Lake City house,

owned by a man named
Ayoola Ajayi.

AJ.

Ex-national guard.

Successful tech worker.
Part-time model.

Police knocked on AJ's door.

Talked with him and found
he was friendly. Helpful.

Sure, he said,
he had girlfriends.

But MacKenzie?

They showed him a photo,
and he...

- Told them he'd never seen
that lady before.

- So, why, then,
the police asked,

did MacKenzie get texts routed
through AJ's home Wi-Fi system?

- He said, "Well,
I have an open Wi-Fi

"because I run
an Airbnb business.

"And so, it could
be anybody from here."

- Did he run
an Airbnb business?

- He did.

He rented out
the two bedrooms down

in his basement
for Airbnb.

- They looked around.

Saw nothing amiss.

And left.

And then, that same evening,
AJ stopped by the police station

to say he'd
discovered something.

Turned out he had texted
with MacKenzie Lueck

the night she'd disappeared.

He'd forgotten, he said,
because MacKenzie was the one

who reached out to him,
without identifying herself.

Maybe, he said, she'd seen
his Seeking Arrangement profile.

Said he had no idea
who it was.

But she'd blew
him off, he said.

Ghosted him.

So, he forgot
all about her.

But he told that story
with so much confidence.

Too much, maybe?

- We had
two different things now.

We've got an IP address that
comes back to his residence,

and now we know he slowly
had contact with her.

- Except there was no proof
MacKenzie had been abducted

by AJ or anyone else,
for that matter.

So, he was free to leave.

But before doing so,
he gave the detectives

his cell phone number,

just in case they needed
to get hold of him.

A cell number actually
registered in his name.

Remember, police didn't
have that before.

They just had
that bogus 206 number

used by the texting app.

So now, with AJ's
personal cell number,

they could get a search warrant
for his call records

and tracking data.
And 2 days later--

- We got the confirmation
back from the FBI

that MacKenzie's records
were showing her going

from the airport to Hatch Park
and AJ's records

were showing going
from his residence

and also meeting up
at Hatch Park

at the exact same time.

- And that was enough to get
a warrant to search AJ's home,

where investigators noticed
a mattress was missing

from the bedroom.

And there was
the strong smell of bleach.

They also spoke with
a concerned neighbor--

her face blurred
in this police video--

who wanted the police
to know that AJ,

the week before, had started
an illegal backyard trash fire.

- And she described it just
being a really offensively smoky

and very-very odorous.

- Debris even flew into
the neighbor's yard.

- It looked like maybe
they were clothing.

Pieces of like,
maybe fake leather,
vinyl, something.

We weren't sure
what it was.

- What was it like for you
when this discovery was made?

- I don't know how
to describe it.

I mean, it was just
a sinking feeling, really.

I mean, we-- it's like we
wanna know what happened,

but we also don't wanna
know what happened.

Because if it's
what we think happened,

then we don't wanna
know that happened.

If that makes sense.

- That was probably
the hardest part

in the investigation
is watching him

walk out the door
that night.

- Hard for detectives, but
it gave MacKenzie's friends

reason to hope.

- Maybe MacKenzie was still
alive and he was hiding her,

because the police
let him go.

- I mean, you look at
his profile pages on these sites

and he comes across
as a gentleman.

- When "Dateline:
Secrets Uncovered" continues.

**

Welcome back.

MacKenzie Lueck was secretly
texting a man who went by AJ.

While AJ told police
he never met MacKenzie,

cell phone tracking data
placed them together

at the very hour
she vanished.

Investigators had
a suspect in their sights,

but still no idea
where to find MacKenzie.

Now, with the conclusion
of "The Waiting Car,"

here's Keith Morrison.

- Police looking
for MacKenzie Lueck

had heard a disturbing story
from a neighbor

who said Ayoola Ajayi
had set a suspicious fire.

The neighbor had found
debris in her backyard.

So, they looked
in AJ's backyard

and found
something else disturbing.

A freshly-dug patch
of soil.

They called in
a cadaver dog which gave

the unmistakable signal--
human remains.

AJ, who'd been calmly watching
it all from his driveway,

was taken into custody.

- We have him 10-82.

- A team from the crime lab
spent the night

digging up the backyard.

- They found more
burnt clothing.

Purses or backpacks.

And then, down towards the
bottom of the-the dig site,

there was a very burnt
and damaged iPhone.

And the medical examiner
identified human tissue.

- Just fragments, mind you.

They couldn't be certain who
or even what they had exactly.

- We had these tissue
samples or pieces.

And so, in order to charge
somebody or arrest 'em,

that needed
to be confirmed

and we knew that was
gonna take time.

- So, without solid proof
a murder had been committed,

they once again,
reluctantly, let AJ go.

- That was probably
the hardest part

in the investigation
is watchin' him

walk out the door
that night.

- MacKenzie's friends
heard he was released

and they took it
as a sign of hope.

- That maybe MacKenzie
was still alive

and he was hiding her,

because the police
let him go the next day.

- Then, at daybreak,
detectives got a call

from the state crime lab
about the remains

found in the backyard.

- They were able to identify
that as being consistent

with MacKenzie.

- The SWAT team
took AJ into custody

and police called
a press conference

to announce his arrest.

- We are filing charges
of aggravated murder

in the homicide
of MacKenzie Lueck.

- Kennedy was watching
on her cell phone.

- I-I almost blacked
out or something.

I dropped my purse,
my phone,

and I dropped to
the ground on the street.

And I was just bawling.

I just couldn't
even believe it.

I still can't believe it.

- But the detective work
was not done.

Although they found
human tissue in the firepit

and linked it to MacKenzie,
they had not found her body.

So, the investigation
continued.

And once again,

AJ's personal cell phone
gave them away.

Remember when he first spoke
to police about MacKenzie?

Well, the very next day
his cell phone pinged

its way up into
these mountains.

- About 2 hours north of here,
up to Logan City.

And then goes partially
up to the canyon.

And then returns back
to Salt Lake City

a couple hours later.

So, that was odd to us.

- Had he, a nervous killer,
exhumed her body

from that backyard fire pit
to rebury her up here?

They set off to
search Logan Canyon.

- And it took us
a better part of the day

until we-we found her.

- That's gotta be another
tough part of your job.

- It was horrific.

It was a-a sight that
none of us wanted to see.

- The search for
MacKenzie was over.

But the investigation
was not.

In the weeks following,
a woman came forward to say

she'd been sexually assaulted
by AJ a year earlier.

- At AJ's residence,
the same residence

where MacKenzie
was killed.

- She said she met him
through a dating app.

A religious one.

AJ was charged with
aggravated kidnapping

and forceable sexual abuse
in that case.

The evidence was
tightening around him.

Evidence of what he did
to MacKenzie was growing.

And finally,
October 7, 2020,

Ayoola Ajayi pleaded guilty
to murdering MacKenzie Lueck.

And as part
of his plea deal,

he admitted he thought
about killing MacKenzie

and then he planned
the killing of MacKenzie.

A thoroughly
pre-meditated murder.

- That he knew that he was
going to murder MacKenzie

before-before she even
touched down at the airport.

- He kind of selected
her as his victim.

- Correct.

- Was there any explanation at
all of what his motivation was

to do that?
- None.

He never offered any
reasoning of why.

Or even how.

- Ajayi also pleaded guilty
to sexually abusing

his first victim.

He was sentenced to
life without parole.

Oh, and one more thing,
said the detectives.

He was active on the
Seeking Arrangement site

right up until
he was arrested.

- Even after we had made
contact with him,

he was still
on that page,

still trying
to get a date.

- We don't know why,
you know?

Some selfish jerk
used his position on a--

on a dating website

to somehow ensnare
this bright, pretty woman

and for what?

- I mean, you look at
his profile pages on these sites

and he comes across
as a gentleman.

Somebody that
he truly isn't.

And that's
the whole cautionary tale

is you never know,

are they actually
who they say they are.

- Always, she'd been surrounded
by people who loved her.

Worried about her.
Cared about her.

MacKenzie Lueck
was an innocent.

Setting out,
if only for a moment,

to explore
new possibilities.

Unaware that in the world
she was entering,

the innocent
can also be prey.

- That's all
for this edition

of "Dateline:
Secrets Uncovered."

I'm Craig Melvin.
Thank you for watching.