352: Shannon Siders

One summer night in 1989, eighteen-year-old Shannon Siders went out to party with friends in her small Michigan town. She climbed into a car with two brothers she knew and was never seen alive again. It would take 25 years, a father's dogged determination, and witnesses finally breaking their silence to reveal what really happened that night…

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Speaker 1: As I get up there there, it's it feels like

I'm coming on in Actidy, Why do you say that

because I can see somebody laying off the side.

Speaker 2: Nowego and Michigan was founded in the eighteen thirties as

a lumber town in the western part of the state.

The town grew alongside the logging industry, with mills processing

timber from the surrounding forests. By the late eighteen hundreds,

the Muskegan River that ran through the area had become

a vital artery for transporting logs downstream. As the timber

industry declined in the early twentieth century, Nwego transformed into

acquired rural community. By nineteen eighty nine, it had become

a small pawn of barely fifteen hundred people. It was

the kind of place where everyone knew everyone, if not

by name, then at least by face. Teenagers spent summer

nights driving around looking for something to do. In the

early morning hours of the seventeenth of July nineteen eighty nine,

a teenage girl was home alone when there was a

knock at the front door. Her friend Shannonsiders, stood outside

asking to borrow a cassette The girl handed it over

and watched Shannon walk back to a red Mercury cougar

idling at the curb. Shannon climbed into the car, sitting

beside two brothers on the bench seat. The car pulled away,

disappearing into the warm summer night. Shannonsiders was never seen

alive again. Shannonsiders was born on the thirty first of

March nineteen seventy one on Mackinac Island in Michigan. Her parents,

Robert and Mary, had married just two months earlier, but

the marriage wouldn't last. When Shannon was four years old,

her parents separated, Robert was granted full custody, and suddenly

it was just the two of them navigating life together.

They moved to Nowago, a small town in western Michigan,

where they lived with Robert's elderly grandmother. It wasn't easy.

Robert worked the graveyard shift at a local Pepsi cola plant,

leaving after dark and returning home when the sun was

already up. In a later interview, he said, it was

difficult to relocate, especially with the child. It was getting

hard for my grandmother to get around. The grocery store

had moved up the hill, but they made it work.

Robert wanted what was best for Shannon. She was his

only child. By the summer of nineteen eighty nine, Shannon

was eighteen years old. She dropped out of school, but

she'd recently been reconsidering maybe getting her diploma wasn't such

a bad idea, Maybe there was more out there for

her than what nowegu could offer. In the meantime, she

worked odd jobs at a restaurant, a fast food place.

She'd baby sad when her father left for work. At night,

Shannon would listen to music, dance around the house, then

get ready and go out to see friends. It kept

her busy while she thought about her future. She also

spent time with her boyfriend, Brian Aisch. He was nineteen

and he rode a motorcycle. He would later describe her

as having a real spit for a personality. She was

a loving and very caring person. Those who knew Shannon

said that she was charming and kind, the type of

person who didn't judge others. There was an openness about her,

an honesty that made people feel comfortable. In a small

town where gossip traveled fast and reputations were hard to shake.

Shannon was someone who gave people the benefit of the doubt.

There was gossip about Shannon too, though some of it

was just small town talk, but one rumor was true.

Shannon had recently been caught shoplifting. She'd been court ordered

to perform community service, and her cousin Altina later recalled

she was ashamed of what she did and she knew

she had to pay the price. But Shannon was almost done.

On the nineteenth of July nineteen eighty nine, she would

complete her final community service judy and be free of it.

She could put the mistake behind her and move forward.

But Shannon never made it to the that final day.

It was a typical summer night in Nowego on the

sixteenth of July nineteen eighty nine. Robert had gone to

work and Shannon had gone out with friends to party.

At around one thirty in the morning on July seventeenth,

Shannon stopped at a friend's house. She wanted to pick

up a cassette tape. She knocked on the door, grabbed

the tape, and then headed back into the warm July night.

When Robert came home from work the next morning, Shannon

wasn't there. At first, he thought she might have spent

the night at a friend's place, that she'd be home soon.

But as the hours passed and Shannon didn't return, Robert

knew that something was terribly wrong. He called the police.

Officers arrived and took statements, but they didn't seem particularly concerned.

Shannon was eighteen, legally an adult. He probably left voluntarily.

They said, teenagers run away all the time. She'd turn up.

Robert was adamant that that wasn't the case. Shannon was reliable.

She wouldn't just vanish without letting him know where she

was going. Yes, there had been one time, when she

was sixteen that she'd run away. She spent two weeks

at a friend's house, but even then she let her

family know that she was safe. Shannon's aunt, Catherine laws

knew her niece well. She said she loved her family

and friends and didn't want to be apart from them

for too long. Robert looked around Shannon's bedroom and his

fears intensified. All of her belongings were there, every piece

of clothing, her makeup, her hair dryer, her curling iron.

Shannon cared about her appearance. There was no way she

would have left without those things. Plus she had no transportation,

and she hadn't taken any money with her. Robert feared

the worst that his daughter had been abducted or murdered.

To him, that was the only thing that made sense.

When it became clear that police weren't taking Shannon's disappearance

as seriously as he believed they should, Robert took matters

into his own hands. He printed her on five thousand

fliers with Shannon's face on them along with the description.

He enlisted the help of Shannon's friends, family, and co workers,

and they distributed them throughout the area. He sent them

to newspapers and television stations, to every sheriff's department, and

stay at police post in Michigan. Shannon's face was everywhere,

but Shannon herself was nowhere to be found. After a while,

detective started interviewing Shannon's friends to piece together her movements

from that night. They knew she'd been out partying with

a group, the kind of typical summer night gathering that

happened constantly in Owego when there wasn't much else to do.

After Shannon left home, she met up with no and

Billy's Shields, Clint Guthrie, Ricky Gomez, Michelle Burns, Darren Sackett,

and two brothers, Paul and Matthew Jones. They were all teenagers,

and they spent the night driving around in three cars,

stopping at various spots in rural Nowego Conte to drink

beer and smoke. The aimless cruising and parking in secluded

spots was a ritual of small town teenage life, the

way young people carved out freedom in a place where

adults seemed to know everything. Around one thirty a m.

The Jones brothers had driven Shannon to a friend's house

so that she could pick up that cassette pape. Paul

drove a red Mercury Cougar, a distinctive car that was

hard to mess in a town as small as Noego,

the kind of vehicle that people remembered saying. After Shannon

grabbed the tape and came back outside, she climbed into

the car and sat between the two brothers on the

bench seat. Paul was behind the whale, Matthew and the

passenger seat Shannon in the middle. Ger pulled away, heading

back towards downtown Diego. Detectives brought the Jones brothers in

for questioning. Paula Matthew confirmed that they had been with

Shannon that night. By all accounts, they were probably the

last people to see her life. They said that Shannon

picked up the cassette tape and then they drove her

back home and dropped her off safe and well. That

was the last they'd seen of her. We were going

to go in the Shannon's and drink here and watch TV.

When we got there, she said she was too tiriage.

Speaker 1: She was going to go to bed. So chatter.

Speaker 2: What time of night was it that you last saw?

Speaker 1: Twelve one? And we lected.

Speaker 2: By this point in the investigation, there had been reported

sightings of Shannon around town. Some people were certain they'd

seen her in downtown, others thought they'd spotted her in

nearby communities. Some detectives even suggested she might have been

hiding out to avoid her final community service duty. But

this theory made no sense to Robert. It was her

final one, just one more shift and she'd be done.

Shannon had completed all the rest without complaint, showing up

every time doing the work. Why would she run away

when freedom was just two days away? Days turned into weeks.

July became August, the summer heat pressed down on Awago

like a wait. There was still no sign of Shannon's ciders.

Robert continued searching for his daughter, refusing to accept that

she'd simply run away. Then a couple of weeks after

Shannon's disappearance, a local walking through the forest came across

something that made the investigation take a sharp turn. It

was Shannon's idea. The cart had been found in an

area teenagers knew as the Pit, a secluded spot where

kids gathered to party in private after football games, away

from adult eyes. It was the kind of place that

every small town has hidden, known mostly through word of mouth.

Police searched the area, but they found nothing else of interest,

no other belongings, no sign of a struggle, no indication

of what might have happened to Shannon. Robert wasn't satisfied

with the police search. He returned to the pit himself

multiple times, Judging through the dance forest with his dog

by his side. He kept his eyes fixed on the ground,

scanning for anything, a piece of clothing and other belonging,

any scrap of evidence that might tell him where his

daughter had gone. But Robert couldn't find anything either. Still,

the question haunted him. Why was Shannon's idea there? What

had happened at the pit that night? Had she dropped

it accidentally or had somebody taken it from her? None

of her friends from that night mentioned going to the pit.

Robert spoke with detectives about bringing in treyin sniffer dogs

to conduct a more thorough search of the area. Maybe

dogs could pick up a cent that human searchers had missed.

Maybe they could find what every one else couldn't. But

in the end they wouldn't need one. It was around

ten thirty am on the fifteenth of October nineteen eighty nine,

nearly three months after Shannon had vanished into the warm

July night. Andy Weerberg was hunting in the Manistee National

Forest near em E two and Thorn Apple Road in

Brook Township, just a couple of miles from where Shannon

had lived with her father. He was moving slowly through

the trees, trying not to disturb any animals, his footsteps

careful and deliberate. Then a smell hit him. It was

strong and unmistakable, and he stopped. He smelled rotting animals

before during his years of hunting the sharp scent of

decomposition that comes with death in the woods. But this

was different. Something in his gut told him this wasn't

a deer carcass, and he followed the source of the

smell deeper into the forest, pushing through underbrush and iron trees.

Then he saw it, the body of a young woman,

heavily decomposed, partially concealed by the undergrowth and forest debris.

It was Shannon's ciders. She'd been lying there, just one

hundred and fifty feet from where her ida had been

found two months earlier, the entire time searchers had been

looking for her. Detectives arrived at the scene within minutes

of Andy's call and immediately cordered off the area. What

had been a peaceful forest became a crime scene, officers

moving carefully through the space, documenting everything before Shannon's body

could be disturbed. After the scene was processed and photographed,

Shannon was carefully removed from where she'd lain for three months.

Her body was transported to Gerber Memorial Hospital, where doctor

Ronald Grecer would perform an autopsy. Shannon had been brutally

beaten to death. She had numerous blows to the head

and had suffered broken ribs and should their bones. Doctor

Gracer said it was a sadistic, sexually oriented murder. There

was a great deal of violence in it. Shannon had

been beaten over a prolonged period before she eventually died.

She had bruises scattered across her body. The back of

her skull had been caved in. This wasn't a quick death.

Robert Siders had known from the moment Shannon didn't come

home that something terrible had happened. Now three months later,

his worst fears were confirmed in the most horrific way possible.

Shannon hadn't run away, she hadn't been hiding out. She'd

been murdered and left in the woods decomposing, just one

hundred and fifty yards from where he had been searching.

The news about Shannon's murder spread fast throughout Nuwego. In

a time of fifteen hundred people, where everyone knew everyone,

the confirmation that Shannon had been brutally beaten to death

sent shockwaves through the community. Shannon's family gathered, trying to

process what they'd always feared but hoped wasn't true. Robert

simply said now we know. It's not easy, but now

we know. He remarked that he believed all along his

daughter was the victim of file play. When asked about

the police response, Robert was careful not to be critical.

He said, they beat around the bushes pretty good right

around town locally. Maybe she could have even been found earlier,

but I understand they have to work within certain guidelines.

She was eighteen years old. There was no reason for

police to expect file play. Lieutenant Jeff Horvath of the

police Department felt compelled to defend their handling of the

case anyway. He said to the Miskegan Chronicle, we handled

the report of her being as we would have handled

any other situation. The missing person investigation was now officially

transformed into a murder investigation, and that meant starting from

the beginning, detectives naturally first looked at the people closest

to Shannon. In murder investigations, it's almost always someone the

victim knew, a boyfriend, a family member, someone with regular

access to her life. Shannon's boyfriend, Brian was brought in

for questioning, but he was quickly ruled out. He'd been

in Ohio for a temporary job the night that Shannon disappeared,

far from Nwego. He later recalled I talked to her

on the phone twice prior to her disappearance, had gotten

a phone call from Robert, who asked if she was

with me. Even Robert himself became the focus of the investigation.

Its standard procedure the parent, but Robert too was quickly

cleared he'd been at work during Shannon's disappearance, his alibi

solid and verifiable. The investigation asked forward, but leeds were scarce.

Whoever had killed Shannon had left very little evidence. Shannon

was laid to rest in a ceremony that drew her

on two hundred and fifty people, a significant turnaround in

a town as small as Nuego. Robert stood at the

church entrance and hugged most of those in attendance, offering

comfort even as he drowned in his own grief. But

as he embraced person after person, a dark thought overcame him.

He wondered if he might have hugged his daughter's killer

in a small town where everyone knew Shannon, where she'd

been killed by someone who clearly knew about the pit

and probably hung out there. The murderer could have been anyone.

They could be standing right there in the church. Robert

later said, do you think I might have been close

enough to have my arms around them, my hands on them.

That's something that bothers me, but I want to know.

At the funeral, Robert addressed the teenagers directly and scouraging

them not to go out alone until the killer was caught.

He stated, there's somebody around here that kills people for

whatever reason. It may have been a one time thing,

but we may have another funeral and still not know

who the killer is. Robert had his own theory about

what happened to his daughter. He believed that Shannon was

killed by somebody she knew. He said, she wouldn't have

gone off with someone she didn't know. He had a

feeling that something had happened and gotten out of hand.

He added, whether it was drinking, smoking, pot, or some

sexual thing. He trailed off the possibilities too painful to

fully articulate. Then he added contexts that spoke to his

understanding of teenage life. She was found at a local

party place. She partied, well, I partied when I was

her age, but we all partied differently when I was young,

they didn't have the drugs like they do now. Robert

wasn't content to sit around waiting for detectives to solve

his daughter's murder. He spent his time searching through Shannon's

bedroom for clues, going through her belongings again and again,

looking for anything that might point to who had done this.

He queried parents of other teenagers, asking questions, piecing together

the social dynamics of Nowego's youth. Robert wasn't the only

one who believed that Shannon knew her killer. Her friend

Carol Grant voiced what many in harm were thinking. I

just have this feeling that it's someone we all know,

so I don't go anywhere alone. I'm just glad the

police are dealing with it more than what they did

in the beginning when she was missing. The idea that

Shannon's killer was still walking around Diego, possibly someone they

all knew and trusted, cast a shadow over the entire community.

While theory circulated, Robert's friend Shirley Gallipous started collecting money

for a reward fund. She explained the motivation this shook

up a lot of kids in this town and a

lot of parents. I have three daughters, and somebody's daughter

was murdered. Somebody in this town knows something. Hopefully money

will help them talk, but it didn't. If anyone knew

anything about Shannon's murder, they were keeping quiet. After Shannon's

autopsy was complete, Robert and Shannon's mother, Mary got into

a painful dispute over their daughter's remains. Mary wanted to

bury Shannon on Mackinac Island, where she had been born

and where Mary's mother and other relatives were buried, but

Robert wanted her buried close to home, close to him.

He'd already picked out a cemetery plot beneath an oak

tree on a hill above the Mistaken River. He said,

I've been up there and talked to her, and I

know she's not there. At Shannon's funeral, nobody in attendance

knew that the casket was empty. Shannon's body was lying

in a private morgue while her parents fought in court

over where she should be led to rest. In January,

Robert and Mary appeared before judge. Mary argued she should

have custody of the body because Robert wasn't Shannon's real father,

a claim that cut deep Robert denied that was true.

He said she had threatened me with that. I paid

for her birth, paid for her upbringing, and paid for

her funeral. She lived here, this is where her friends were. Then,

showing the compassion that defined him even in grief, he added,

I understand her grief. I understand where she's coming from.

She was hurting. I could tell she was hurting. So

was I. Judge Anthony Monton ruled that Robert, who had

raised Shannon from age four, could choose where to bury her.

Robert said, she's laid out in the woods long enough,

she's led in a body bag long enough. It's time

to put her in the ground. The next month, Shannon

was finally led to rest at the spot her father

had picked for her, beneath that oak tree on a

hill over the river. Before she was lowered into the ground,

father Reymond Brooke offered a prayer. May the Angels lad

you Shannon into paradise, May you have eternal rest. It

had been seven months since Shannon was killed. Robert was

determined to see justice for his daughter. He took out

newspaper ads about her murder and distributed bumper stickers that

read who killed shannonsiders somebody knows something. He said he

wouldn't rest until he got answers. Like everybody else, including detectives,

Robert believed that Shannon was killed by somebody she knew. Nevertheless,

the months continued to drag pass with no movement in

the case. Robert then paid for Shannon's case to be

advertised on a billboard just south of town, her face

staring down at passing motorists, asking the question that nobody

could answer, who killed her. Robert explained to reporters, I

have to keep her name out there, not because she

was my daughter, but because she was murdered. If she

was killed in a car accident, all the things I've

been doing might seem weird, but she wasn't. Somebody killed

my daughter, and there's nothing to say he won't kill again.

Robert estimate did he'd spent around ten thousand dollars of

his own money in the search for her killer, a

staggering sum for somebody working the graveyard shift at a

Pepsi plant. He said, I'm not going to pay for

a wedding or presents for my grandchildren. I'm spending it

now instead of over the next thirty years. Shannon should

have had a wedding if she wanted one. She should

have had children if she wanted them. Robert should have

been walking her down the aisle, holding his grandchildren, watching

his only daughter build a life. Instead, he was pouring

his savings into billboards and newspaper ads, desperate for someone

to come forward with information. Eventually, those months turned into years,

other cases took precedence, The investigation stalled, leads dride up,

and Shannon's murder became another cold case gathering dust in

the files. In December of nineteen ninety three, more than

four years after Shannon's murder, Detective Sergeant Richard Miller admitted

he was in confident that the murder would ever be solved.

He said, I don't know if we'll ever get an

arrest to find out who was responsible. There are various

theories on who is responsible, and we would like to

find out which one is accurate. But Robert wasn't giving up.

He continued placing newspaper advertisements and purchasing billboard space, keeping

Shannon's name in the public eye, refusing to let her

become just another forgotten victim. In nineteen ninety four, Robert's father, Charles,

passed away at seventy one years old. He died without

ever learning who had killed his granddaughter. Robert hoped that

the same wouldn't happen to him. He hoped that before

his own death, he'd finally get the answer to the

question that had consumed his life since that July morning

in nineteen eighty nine, when Shannon never came home. Who

killed Shannon's ciders. Before the end of twenty eleven, more

than two decades after Shannon was killed, a police task

force was set up to take a fresh look at

her case. Twenty two years had passed since such July night.

Over those years, her case file had grown to almost

two thousand pages. Detectives had followed up on hundreds of tips,

chased on countless leads, interviewed and reinterviewed witnesses, but nothing

had stuck. No arrest had been made. Shannon's killer remained free.

In an effort to generate more interest in the case,

a documentary was shown at the Nowego High School cafeteria.

It was called Into the Dark and was produced by

David Shock, a filmmaker who specialized in cold cases and

unsolved murders. He was mentioned in the earlier Morbidology episode

Onburderdo Carabello. Robert Siders was now sixty two years old

and retired from the Pepsi plant. He spoke with the

Grand Rapid's press about how the murder of his only

child had left him forever altered. He said, it's changed

my life. I think it's changed my personality. I don't

socialize any more. I used to be happy, jovial fund

The bay around the weight of Shannon's unsolved murder had

crushed something fundamental in Robert. The man who had printed

five thousand flowers and hugged two hundred and fifty people

at his daughter's funeral, had retreated into himself, isolated by

grief that never healed because it never had resolution. But

the renewed interest in the case gave him something he

hadn't felt in years, hope. He said, I'd like to

see this resolved. I'd like to know what the hell happened.

In July twentyand and twelve, an announcement sent shockwaves through Nwago.

Winn's body was being exhumed by the Cold Case Task

Force after twenty three years in the ground. Shannon would

be brought up so that evolving forensic technology could be

applied to her remains. Maybe there was evidence that nineteen

eighty nine technology couldn't detect. Maybe modern science could finally

provide the breakthrough the case needed. It was raining heavily

on July twenty seventh when Robert stood at his daughter's

grave and watched as heavy machinery slowly raised her casket

from the earth. The weather seemed grimly appropriate. Robert said,

I don't care to see them lower her in, but

now I can see her come out. Her burial was

a crummy day too. It was a nasty day in February.

I figured if it rained today, it was just the

angels crying a little bit. But Robert wasn't there alone,

standing alongside him with Shannon's former boyfriend, Brian, the nineteen

year old who'd been in Ohio when Shannon disappeared. Brian remarked,

I was nineteen at the time. I'm here to day

because this is part of my life. I was here

the day she was buried. He was married now with

children of his own, but he'd never forgotten Shannon. He

owed it to her to be there to bear witness

as her body was brought back into the light. Shannon's

remains were examined by doctor Norman Sawer, a forensic anthropologist,

and doctor Bryan Hunter, a pathologist. They applied modern techniques

to bones that had been in the ground for over

two decades, looking for anything that might have been missed.

In nineteen eighty nine. Channon was reburied on the fifteenth

of October two thousand and twelve. Her mother, Mary was

there and placed a naidive American Medicine pouch with her

daughter's casket before it was lured back into the ground

beneath that oak tree. Everybody was hopeful that the exhumation

would lead to charges. They didn't know it at the time,

but they had another two years to wait for an arrest,

and it would be people who had been right under

their noses all along. After Shannon's body was found in

nineteen eighty nine, detectives had two main suspects in mind,

Paul and Matthew Jones, the brothers who had been the

last people seen with Shannon. They admitted she was in

their car, their story about dropping her home safely didn't

match the fact that she ended up dead in the

woods with her id founded the pit, but suspicion isn't proof,

and for years detectives couldn't build the case strong enough

to bring charges. What they didn't know, what nobody knew

for over two decades, was that there had been witnesses

to Shannon's murder, Witnesses who had seen exactly what the

Jones brothers had done, Witnesses who had stayed silent out

of fear. The night that Shannon disappeared, fourteen year old

Jenny Corrigan and nineteen year old Dean Robinson had been

driving around in Dean's car at the pit in the

early morning ours. According to Deane, he was searching for

his girlfriend, who he thought was out partying with friends.

He claimed that Jenny had tagged along with him against

his will and refused to get out of the car.

When they arrived at the pit, they came across Paul

and Matthew Jones. Paul approached them and asked if they'd

seen a female walking around. They said they hadn't. Sometime later,

Jenny and Dean came across the brothers again, but this

time they weren't alone.

Speaker 1: As I get up there, it's field bigger coming on

in an accident. Why do you say that because if

you see somebody laying off from the side on the

driver's side.

Speaker 3: Laying off into the.

Speaker 1: Grass here at the fern air and it just felt

like I rolled up on an accidain and their head

lights are in us, our head lights are into them.

And and I pulled up there and I just turned

him a little bit, you know, I before I could

focus on the accident, I got out of the car

and I went to running. And there was one person

standing over the top of the person's there, and he

looked franky like something had happened to me. The whole time,

it looked like I come on an accident. And as

I went across the front of my car, I just

I don't know, I just stepped and I tripped and

I fell about I wanna say, eight ten feet from

the person laying there in the draft in the in

the off the side of the two tracks. And when

I hit the ground, but I must have startled the

guy standing there. He turned around in me and I

got kicked right here and I.

Speaker 3: Right in a trick above the eye right here. The

person that kicked you, uh, he was the driver of

the car that I seen earlier and kicked me right here,

and I and I went rolling backwards and it it

and at that time had blood in my face, you know,

and and I would you know, I just felt I

just felt that it was a good a good king

the face and uh.

Speaker 1: And then somebody was coming around the back of the car,

and at that time, Jenny, she laid on the horn

and it stopped everything and just everybody froze up right

then and there. And I get up, you know, I

started back in a way, I get going back to

the car, and they got in the car, grabbed the

person laying there, drug them off to their car, and

you know, I got in my car and him back

in their back.

Speaker 2: As Dane and Jenny went to drive away, they watched

Paul grab shot him by the arm and drag her

to the back of the vehicle. Jenny would later recall

the casual brutality of it. He went over where this

person was laying and grabbed her arm like she was nothing,

drug her away. Despite what they had seen, a young woman,

bloody and limb being dragged by two teenagers, they decided

not to tell anybody. Jenny said that Dane told her

frantically not to say anything that it had just been

an accident that Paul and Matthew were helping Shannon. Deane

later admitted he was terrified of people finding out he

was with a fourteen year old girl, even though he

stressed their interaction was innocent. That fear kept him silent

for twenty three years. It wasn't until twenty twelve, after

the documentary aired, after Shannon's body was exhumed, after Robert

Siders had spent decades begging for someone to come forward,

that Jenny and Dane finally decided to tell detectives what

they had witnessed that night at the pit. While Jenny

and Dane had kept quiet for over two decades, apparently

Paul and Matthew Jones hadn't been so discreet. Over the years,

They'd told various people they had killed Shannon Ciders. Sometimes

they were drunk when they said it. Sometimes they seemed

to be bragging, but they said it. In the summer

of ninety ninety, just a year after Shannon's murder, Bernadette

Clark overheard the brothers telling somebody a horrific story. They

said they had chased Shannon with the car and hit

her with the side mirror after she got out and

tried to run away. Then they said they'd gotten something

out of the car and hit Shannon with it. Then

they'd taken turns raping her. They were almost bragging about it,

Bernadette recalled. Paul had said something along the lines of,

we're say if they can't get us. Bernadette didn't tell

detectives what she'd heard until twenty twelve. Over twenty years later.

Like so many others, she's staid silent, perhaps not be

leaving the brothers were serious, perhaps afraid of getting involved.

Elizabeth Brooks was fourteen years old in nineteen eighty nine.

She was datting seventeen year old Paul Jones at the time,

a relationship that should have raised red flags on its own.

A few days after Shannon disappeared, Paul had said something

disturbing to Elizabeth face it, she's probably dead. Around the

same time, Paul showed up with his car damaged. He

claimed he'd hit with a baseball bat, but Elizabeth accused

him of lang. His response was disturbing. I hid a

deer and I hid a tree. Maybe I just ran

down Shannon with it. But the brothers also told conflicting

stories over the years. They told some people they couldn't

remember what happened that night, convenient amnesia. When pressed for details,

Paul told another purse and he'd seen Shannon walking down

into the pit with Matthew, as if he hadn't been

there himself. They told other people they'd been at a

party with Shannon and left before her. The story shifted

and change depended on who they were talking to and

how much they had to drink, but the common thread

was always there. The Jones brothers knew exactly what happened

to Shannon's ciders because they were the ones who'd done it. Eventually,

the brothers left Nowego to start new lives. One went

to Texas, the other headed to Alaska. They scattered, putting

distance between themselves in the small town where everyone knew

Shannon had been murdered, yet nobody could prove he'd done it.

But both men eventually came back, because that's what killers

sometimes do. They returned to the scene, drawn back to

the place where they got away with murder, confident that

too much time had passed that they were safe. Paul

Jones had been right when he told someone back in

nineteen ninety, we're safe. They can't get us, and for

twenty three years he was right. But time, as it

turns out, wasn't on their side. On the twenty fourth

of June two thousand and fourteen, nearly twenty five years

after Shannon was killed, Paul and Matthew Jones were arrested

and charged with premeditated first degree murder. During the court hearing,

the prosecutors requested no bomb. Then they revealed the information

that painted a disturbing picture of who these men really were.

Matthew had been a suspect in unreported sexual assaults back

in nineteen eighty nine, the same year that Shannon was killed.

Paul had served time in two thousand and four in

two thousand and six for home invasions, and when he

was arrested in two thousand and fourteen, police found what

was described as a rape kit in his possession, duc tabe, condoms, vasilene,

and a stun gun. The arrest brought a wave of

relief to Shannon's loved ones. Robert said he wasn't see

prized by the names. He said, those two names have

been circulating since day one. They were on the short list.

I've always been kind of suspicious the names don't surprise me.

She knew them in that circle of friends. She hung

around with one of them. I'd passed many times in

a party store for twenty five years, Robert had been

walking past one of his daughter's killers in town, making

small talk, perhaps even nodding helloo. The thought was nauseating.

A pretrial hearing was held on September eighteenth, and Jennie

Corrigan and Dean Robinson took to the stand to testify

about what they had witnessed that night in the pit.

It was the first time their accounts would be heard

in court, and the defense attorneys immediately attacked their credibility.

Dean Robinson was currently serving a prison sentence for soliciting

perjury in a court proceeding, as well as assault with

intent to murder, home invasion, and other major felonies. He

admitted he lied to detectives about the case earlier. He

also admitted he'd taken lsta and cocaine and drunk whiskey

the night that Channon was killed, hardly the profile of

a reliable witness. Jenny also admitted she lied to detectives

about the case in two thousand and twelve, initially claiming

she had no direct knowledge of what happened. Both witnesses

said they hadn't wanted to get involved in the ordeal.

Of police interviews and court testimony, Deane said he hated

police and prosecutors and didn't want to help them. He

also said he didn't want the prison stigma of testifying

against somebody else, so he stayed silent all those years.

Jenny said she didn't even connect the encounter with Shannon's

murder until two thousand and eleven, when a friend mentioned

the case to her and the pieces suddenly fell into place.

The defense attorney hammered on these credibility issues. These were

witnesses with criminal records, witnesses who'd lied, witnesses who'd waited

over two decades to come forward. How could their testimony

be trusted? But despite the credibility problems, the judge ruled

there was enough evidence against the brothers for them to

stand trial for Shannon's murder. After the decision, Robert spoke

to reporters, it took twenty five years to get here,

so it's been tough. I don't know if it's hit

me yet. Robert also said he understood why so many

witnesses hadn't come forward for so long. They were all

immature teenagers at the time, but I believe what they're saying.

It was decided that Paul and Matthew would stand trial together,

but they would face separate juries. It was a complex arrangement,

but designed to ensure each brother received a fair trial

while hearing similar evidence. The murder trial began on the

twenty first of April two thousand and fifteen. Prosecutor Robert

Springstead summarized the case against Paul, while prosecutor William Rosslyn

summarized the case against Matthew. The cases were similar, as

prosecutors alleged both brothers were actively involved in Shannon's murder.

They laid the timeline Shannon, Paul, and Matthew had been

part of a larger group of teenagers riding in cars

and parting at various locations that night. The brothers claimed

they'd driven Shannon home safely, but according to the prosecution,

that was a lie. The prosecution believed the murder had

been sexually motivated. Paul had been attracted to Shannon and

had been hitting on her since her boyfriend Brian had

moved to Ohio for work just days earlier, the prosecution

revealed that the brother's great uncle said one of them

had told him back in nineteen eighty nine, we shouldn't

have hit her so hard. She should have given us

what we wanted. The theory was simple, yet horrifying. When

Shannon rebuffed Paul's advances, the brothers turned on her. What

started as unwanted sexual attention escalated into violence, then rape,

then murder. During opening stamens, Paul's defense attorney Paul Stablin

told the jury their decision would come down to whether

the prosecute had proved beyond a reasonable doubt that his

client had committed first degree murder. He emphasized one critical point,

there was no physical evidence against Paul or Matthew. The

prosecution acknowledged this. There was no forentic evidence connecting them

to the murder. It was all circumstantial, but prosecutors believe

they had enough. Matthew's defense attorney Rick Presock made similar

points during his opening statements. Both defense attorneys attacked the

eye witness testimony, pointing out the witnesses had only come

forward years after the murder, some with serious credibility issues.

Robert Siders was the first witness for the prosecution. He

described leaving for his job at the Pepsi plant at

ten thirty pm on the sixteenth of July nineteen eighty nine.

He kissed his daughter goodbye and said he'd see her

the next day. He never saw her again. The prosecution

called various witnesses who spoke about that night. Multiple people

confirmed that she Shannon had been in the brother's car.

One witness said he saw the brothers in Shannon turn

off on to Hesslake Road from M thirty seven, in

the direction of where Shannon's body would ultimately be found.

He didn't see the brothers again until hours later. They

weren't with Shannon then, but they came from the same

direction on M thirty seven. They said they dropped her home,

but Robert testified that Shannon's bed hadn't been slept in.

Other friends said they'd stopped by the house repeatedly throughout

the night, but nobody was ever home. Jenny and Dane

took the stand and testified about what they saw at

the pit that night. Shannon limp and bloody being dragged

by Paul while Matthew held what looked like a hammer

or a hatchet. Several other witnesses testified about the various

statements the brothers had made about the murder over the years,

the bragging, the confessions, the threats that they were safe

and couldn't be touched. Then the juries got to see

footage the brother's interviews with the detectives when the case

was reopened in twenty twelve. At one point, Matthew was

alone in the interrogation room, apparently unaware he was still

being recorded. He kept whispering phrases to himself, such as

I don't remember or I don't recall, as if he

were rehearsing his answers preparing his story. During closing arguments,

defense attorney Stablein argued forcefully that there was no physical

evidence connecting his client to Shannon's murder, no DNA, no

blood found in his car. He revealed that a hare

had been found caught in a necklace clutched in Shannon's hand,

and a forensic expert had excluded it as coming from

either brother or from Shannon herself. He suggested the hare

belong to her real killer. Prosecutor Springstead rebutted this theory.

Hair and other trace physical evidence transfers from person to

person all the time. He argued the hare could have

been caught in Shannon's necklace at any early time, at

a party, a crowded car, anywhere. It proved nothing. The

defense then hammered on the credibility of Jenny and Dean.

They told different stories. Earlier in the investigation. Dean's prison

sentence had been reduced by five years. They said that

suggested he benefited from testifying against the brothers, but the

prosecution rebuffed this as well. Springstead explained that the reduction

was a correction of an error made in Dean's original

sentence that had nothing to do with the Shannon Cider's case.

The crux of the case came down to one question.

Did the Juries believe the witnesses. None of them had

come forward during the original investigation. It had taken them

all decades to divulge what they had allegedly seen and heard.

Were they telling the truth now or were they unreliable

witnesses with motives to lie. The two Juries were sent

off to deliberate. They returned with verdicts the next day.

Matthew Jones was found guilty of first degree murder. His brother,

Paul Jones was found guilty of second degree murder. Robert

said he was pleased with the verdict. He said, it's

good news. It's justice and that's what counts. It's past you.

Even though Paul's conviction was second degree, it might wipe

that smug off his face. Then, Robert said he was

taking Shannon's group of friends from that night, the ones

who testified against the brothers, to the cemetery. He said,

we're going to share the news. We might have a

little prayer time, quiet time, some tears.

Speaker 1: Shit.

Speaker 2: Those teenagers who had been too afraid to speak up

in nineteen eighty nine, who carried the weight of what

they knew for decades, had finally done the right thing,

and because of them, Shannon's killers were going to prison.

Paul and Matthew Jones returned to court on July twenty first,

two thousand and fifteen, to be sentenced. Robert sat in

the front row of the courtroom, his eyes fixed on

the men who had murdered his only child. The brother

spoke publicly for the very first time. They told the

judge they were innocent, that they had dropped off Shannon

safe and well. Even though even after being convicted by

two separate juries, they maintained the lie they've been telling

for twenty six years. Robert and Mary read a prepared

statement together for your murder convictions and your sentencing today.

Some balance may result, but nothing in this world will

ever replace the whole you created by taking the life

of this precious soul, or the lives you have injured,

including your own family. Then Robert spoke directly to the brothers.

He talked about the day that Shannon was born, how

she was healthy, beautiful and tiny, how holding her for

the first time changed his entire world. He said, your

kids will marry and give you grandchildren. I don't get that.

I get a headstone and a grave of sight. Did

you feel the cold case tame inching closer and closer?

Were you surprised or relieved? Want to know your big mistake?

You didn't bury Shannon, nor it's time to pay. In closing,

Matt Paul, if you have no remorse for the pain

you've caused Shannon's friends and family, at least have remorse

for the pain you've caused your own. The prosecution argued

for the harshest sentence possible. Prosecutor Springstead revealed details that

hadn't ever been made public. Shannon had injuries to her breasts,

her tail boone, and her pelvis. She'd been tortured. Speaking

of Paul, who he believed was the ringleader, the prosecutor

said it was inflicted upon her over a period of time.

It speaks to the type of person he was. She

trusted her life with them, and they ruined that. Matthew

Jones was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility

of parole. He will die behind bars. Paul Jones was

sentenced to thirty to seventy five years in prison. Given

his age, he would almost certainly die there as well.

Outside the courtroom, Robert spoke with the media. He looked older,

now weathered by more than just age. He said the

past two years of the trial process had taken a

severe toll on him. He'd planned on quitting smoking, but

it ended up chain smoking instead, an addiction that had

only been accentuated by his daughter's murder and the stress

of finally seeing her killers brought to justice. Robert revealed

he now had cop day and it was killing him.

He said, I'm sixty six years old. I'll be long

gone before Paul gets out, but I'm glad it's over.

It's been a long twenty six years. The cold case

team worked its ass off. I would have fought for

the death penalty if we had one. Then his voice

softened as he talked about his daughter. I think about

her a lot. I've got her pictures in a front room.

I always wondered about grandkids and would have liked to

have known what she'd become. I think she would have

been a good mother. But that wasn't the end of

the case. In December of twenty and twenty one, six

years after the brothers were convicted, Dean Robinson told a

private investigator that he had lied on the witness stand.

He claimed, my testimony during the trial was given to

me by law enforcement. He now said he had no

personal knowledge about Matthew or Paul and hadn't witnessed their

involvement in Shannon's murder. He said, up until the point

I testified during the trial, I'd never seen matt or

Paul Jones. I was lying under oath when I testified

about any matter about matt or Paul Jones being involved

in a homicide. Bill Procter, a former Detroit area television

reporter turned private investigator, believed the brothers were innocent. He

set up a website titled who Killed Shannon Ciders and

began investigating the case himself, claiming there had been a

miscarriage of justice. In January twenty and twenty two, the

State Supreme Court Administrative Office appointed an outsized judge to

hear the brother's appeal. That process is currently still underway.

Decades after Shannon was murdered and left in the woods,

Robert Siders passed away on the first of October twenty

and twenty five. He was seventy six years old. As

for his wishes, no service was held. In an interview

with thirteen one year side, he said now.

Speaker 3: Used the word closure. There's no closure. The word is justice.

The Jones boys got the justice they deserved. We'll never

get closure because here it's still gone. It You've always

going to be gone.

Speaker 2: For thirty six years from the moment Shannon didn't come

home on that July morning in nineteen eighty nine. Until

his death in two thousand and twenty five, Robert dedicated

his life to finding justice for his daughter. He printed

five thousand flowers, He paid for billboards and newspaper ads.

He spent thousands of his own money, money that should

have gone towards his only daughter's wedding, towards his grandchildren's presence.

Searching for answers, he trudged through the woods with his dog,

searching for clues. He stood at Shannon's grave as her

casket was raised from the ground so modern science could

examine her remains. He never stopped fighting, He never stopped

saying her name. He never let the world forget that

Shannon Ciders had been murdered and that someone needed to

answer for it. Robert lived long enough to see Paul

and Matthew Jones convicted. He lived long enough to look

them in the eye and tell them exactly what they'd

taken from him. He lived long enough to know that

his daughter's killers would die in prison, just as she

had died in those woods. Whether the brother's current appeal

will overturn those convictions remains to be seen. But Robert

Siders died believing he had fulfilled his promise to Shannon,

that he had found her killers and made them pay.

In the end, that's all a father could do. Well,

That is it for this episode of Morbidology. As always,

thank you so much for listening, and I'd like to

say a massive thank you to my new supporters of

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this episode and to read some true crime articles. Until

next time, take care of yourselves, stay safe, and have

an amazing week