Introducing: American Homicide

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Speaker 22 This is Matt Rogers from Los Culture Resist with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang.

Speaker 23 This is Bowen Yang from Los Culture Resist with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang.

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Speaker 15 Hi, Betrayal Family. It's Andrea Gunning.

Speaker 25 I want to introduce you to a new weekly true crime show that our team at Glass Podcast has just launched.

Speaker 25 It's called American Homicide and is hosted and produced by my colleague Sloane Glass, who I have here today.

Speaker 19 Hi, Sloan.

Speaker 26 Hi, Andrea.

Speaker 25 You guys may not know this, but Sloane worked on season two of Betrayal. So she's very close to the betrayal team.

Speaker 26 Yeah, it feels very close to my heart. I mean, the highlight for me working on Betrayal was interviewing Avea for the show.

Speaker 26 I'd admired her for a long time as a listener, and then getting the opportunity to sit down with her, that felt so special.

Speaker 25 You know, I think you guys did an incredible job, and they were in great hands with you. And I'm so curious, what made you want to take on a project like American Homicide?

Speaker 26 What I really love about American Homicide is how immersive it is. It's not just a retelling, it's a re-examination of infamous true crime stories through first-hand accounts.

Speaker 26 You are hearing from law enforcement who is behind the investigations. You are hearing from lawyers.
You are hearing from judges. You are hearing from victims and their friends and family.

Speaker 26 And I think what makes it so significant and special really plays off of when you are covering a story, it can be the same crime in a a different location and it will have a totally different impact depending on the community.

Speaker 26 I learned this as a local news reporter and later as a national news reporter that you are dealing with very different circumstances wherever you are in the country.

Speaker 26 When a crime takes place in, let's say, a small town, what comes to mind for me in my personal experience as a journalist, I think of in Delphi, Indiana, there was a case that had gone cold for six years.

Speaker 26 Two girls had been killed and it was a town of 1,300 people. That's different from when a crime like that happens in a city.

Speaker 26 The first story that we have in American Homicide, it made me feel that same way.

Speaker 25 So on the feed, we're sharing an episode of American Homicide called The Father's Day Murders.

Speaker 1 Can you tell us a little bit about what happens?

Speaker 26 The episode is called The Father's Day Murders. Now, you just have to imagine it's Father's Day.

Speaker 26 You go to your parents' house for dinner, you open the door, and you find your mom, dad, and brother beaten to death. And that's what happened to a woman in the small town of El Rancho, New Mexico.

Speaker 26 The main suspect for a substantial amount of time was the daughter who had found her family. It just leaves you wondering, what was going on here? Someone must know something.

Speaker 3 And they're in the community.

Speaker 26 And they're in the community. And this is a woman who had to fight to find answers to what exactly happened to her family.
And meanwhile, everyone is looking at her like she was involved.

Speaker 25 I'm so excited for this series, Sloan.

Speaker 3 You're phenomenal.

Speaker 25 The storytelling is fantastic. The episodes that I have heard, you are just at every twist and turn, just on the edge of your seat.

Speaker 1 And I don't doubt that the betrayal audience is going to love it.

Speaker 25 So, without further ado, here's American Homicide: Bother's Day Murders, Part 1.

Speaker 25 where's your emergency team?

Speaker 25 They're dead!

Speaker 28 They have gunshot once for a gun, gun, dead, gun, dead!

Speaker 26 It was Father's Day 2011 when Cherie Ortiz walked into her parents' home and found the bodies of her mother and father.

Speaker 29 They had been shot in the head and it had occurred sometime earlier in the day.

Speaker 28 I just walked in their house and everybody shot in the fing head.

Speaker 29 The brutality was unspeakable.

Speaker 26 The hunt to find the killer would tear the community apart and devastate Cherie.

Speaker 31 I really do have hope this is going to get soft.

Speaker 26 My name is Sloan Glass. I'm a journalist who covered the Long Island serial killer, the Delphi, Indiana murders, and many other high-profile true crime cases.

Speaker 26 And now, I'm the host of American Homicide, a podcast where we take you across the country to investigate some of America's deadliest crimes.

Speaker 26 We'll explore how these murders are shaped by their unique landscapes and how these tragedies have shaped the fabric of these American communities forever.

Speaker 26 Today, we're in the tiny village of El Rancho, New Mexico for part one of the Father's Day murders on American homicide.

Speaker 26 As a note, this podcast contains subject matter which may not be suitable for all audiences. Discretion is advised.

Speaker 26 Let me paint a picture for you. Santa Fe, New Mexico is called the City Different for for its rich culture and diverse community.

Speaker 26 Native American ancestries blend with Spanish culture in a state with one of America's richest landscapes.

Speaker 24 Northern New Mexico in particular is a very unique place. It's beautiful.

Speaker 26 Alex Tomlin was a local TV news reporter who lives in the area.

Speaker 24 It has impeccable weather and the mountains are incredible.

Speaker 26 The region is home to natural hot springs and wild rivers.

Speaker 24 You can drive an hour north and go whitewater rafting or you can go down to white sands and enjoy that. But kind of on the outskirts of Santa Fe you get a lot of the smaller communities.

Speaker 26 And one such place is the tiny village of El Rancho. The predominantly Hispanic community is about 20 miles from Santa Fe and is built around co-op farming and churches.

Speaker 24 It's a lot of people who have kind of grown there, have families there, kind of all know each other.

Speaker 26 But it's also a desolate place.

Speaker 24 One of the things about New Mexico is it's so open. When you go to someone's home, often they have a significant size property.
There's not neighbors very close.

Speaker 26 And even though the homes are all spread out across the desert,

Speaker 24 everyone kind of knows each other, but there is an interesting dynamic here. As much as it's known for its beauty, it's also known for the crime.

Speaker 26 The tragic murders on Father's Day 2011 would stretch the fabric of El Rancho to its limits.

Speaker 24 So June 18th, 2011, seemed like any normal night.

Speaker 26 Cherie Ortiz had dinner plans with her parents, Lloyd and Dixie.

Speaker 24 Cherie Ortiz, she lived on the property with the Ortizes.

Speaker 26 Her parents and brother lived in a large one-story house and Cherie and her husband lived in an RV next door.

Speaker 26 Even though there's a fence around their spacious property, the family had an open door policy.

Speaker 24 Anyone could come in, have dinner at their table, or spend time with them. They were just kind of a good family in this community that was very tight-knit.

Speaker 26 Lloyd Ortiz was a man who loved to use his hands. He owned his own ceramic tile business.
His craftsmanship turned up in homes and even luxury hotels all over northern New Mexico.

Speaker 24 He was an incredibly loving father, a hardworking man who provided for his family, his wife Dixie.

Speaker 26 They sound like a perfect pair. Dixie was passionate about working with the elderly and the disabled.

Speaker 26 She was an activities director at a local retirement home, and she fostered children with special needs.

Speaker 24 They took in a child who had chicken baby syndrome and adopted him as their own, raised that child, loved that child.

Speaker 26 That child's name was Stephen. Stephen had special needs from his early life injuries.

Speaker 26 His brain never developed beyond that of a nine-year-old, but he matured into a young man that his family called the gentle giant. He loved to play drums, ride his ATV, and fish with Lloyd.

Speaker 24 They were just really giving, loving people, very northern New Mexico, hardworking, you know, love the land, love the culture kind of thing.

Speaker 26 Since it was Father's Day, Cherie Ortiz whipped up a plate of homemade enchiladas for dinner. It was her gift.

Speaker 26 Just before seven o'clock that evening, she took them and walked next door to her parents.

Speaker 26 Even though it was June, White Christmas icicle lights still hung on the gutters of her parents' home. Inside, the walls were adorned with crucifixes and some of Lloyd's handmade tiles.

Speaker 24 Cherie said she walks in and realizes something's very wrong. She found her mother in bed.

Speaker 24 Her mother's head was pretty damaged. She thought someone maybe had shot her.
She then went into the kitchen area and found what she thought was her father on the kitchen floor. The body was just so

Speaker 24 impacted by what was used against them.

Speaker 24 There sees two bodies. There's blood everywhere.
She goes screaming out of the house. And for her husband, again, they lived on the property, so it was pretty close.

Speaker 26 Cherie's husband, Jesse, ran right over to investigate.

Speaker 24 Her husband then comes in the house and he realizes it's not her father on the kitchen floor. It's actually her brother.

Speaker 24 And that's when he starts searching around and finds her father outside, right outside the back door, kind of in the field there.

Speaker 26 Lloyd's body was found on on a cinderblock path that connected the Ortiz back porch to their fenced-in yard. He was face down, wearing only his underwear.
His eyeglasses sat just inches away.

Speaker 26 Covering his head was some green shrubbery. By now, Cherie was on the phone.

Speaker 29 San Fe 911, where's your emergency?

Speaker 29 They have gunshot one through on.

Speaker 32 They're dead, dead, dead, dead, dead. They've been dead through the party.
What is your name?

Speaker 26 Cherie frantically told the 911 operator that her mother, father, and brother were shot to death.

Speaker 32 I just walked in their house and everybody shot in the fing head. It's my brother, my dad, and my mom's killed in bed.

Speaker 26 This was Cherie's second attempt at a 911 call. Since Cherie and her parents' homes were out in the middle of the desert, her cell reception was spotty.

Speaker 26 Imagine the panic, the fear that your call would drop again when you're trying to get emergency help for your family, and she didn't know where the perpetrator was or if they were still on the property.

Speaker 32 Oh my god.

Speaker 32 Oh my god.

Speaker 32 Oh my god. I am freaking out.
I can't even walk over there because I lose service.

Speaker 26 And then there's another problem. El Rancho is way off the beaten path, which delays the response time for law enforcement.

Speaker 32 Oh my gosh, you have to hurry. They're on the way.

Speaker 29 They're on the way.

Speaker 26 With no local police force of their own, the New Mexico State Police were dispatched to investigate.

Speaker 32 I can't believe they're already dead.

Speaker 32 Oh, my God.

Speaker 32 Oh, my God.

Speaker 32 Oh, my God. Why, you know, and all because I didn't have money for a Father's Day gift, I didn't want to go until I finished cooking a chila for him.

Speaker 32 Oh, my God.

Speaker 26 Cherise stayed on the phone for nearly 20 minutes before officers arrived.

Speaker 28 All the units are going as fast as I can to get past.

Speaker 32 I'm going to walk to the gate and wait to them. I'm like too nervous just sitting in my yard.

Speaker 29 My name is Paul Chavez. I was a member of the full-time crimes unit as an agent with the New Mexico State Police.

Speaker 26 The 200 homicide cases Officer Chavez worked in his career didn't prepare him for what he saw inside the Ortiz house.

Speaker 29 In this case, the magnitude of the violence involved was the worst that I had seen in my career. The brutality was unspeakable.

Speaker 29 Sherry Ortiz had found her parents and her adopted stepbrother dead within the residence. She reported that they had been shot in the head and it had occurred sometime earlier in the day.

Speaker 26 It turns out that although Cherie said she didn't see who committed these murders, She did hear something.

Speaker 29 There was reportedly gunshots heard the previous night in the area.

Speaker 26 Now, hearing gunshots isn't entirely unusual in New Mexico, but Cherie and her parents' homes sit on a dead-end street in the rural New Mexico desert.

Speaker 26 It's a remote area with unpaved roads and no nearby streetlights. Their nearest neighbor is about 50 yards up the road.
Inside the Ortiz home, Officer Chavez and his team assess the situation.

Speaker 29 Once I enter into the residence, there is a master bedroom immediately to the left as you walk in.

Speaker 29 And that is where the first victim, identified as Dixie Ortiz, is in her bed in her nightgown under the blankets.

Speaker 26 Dixie was found clutching her pillow.

Speaker 29 Her upper extremities and her head is completely saturated in blood, where she had sustained apparent trauma. From that bedroom, there is a drip trail which extends to the kitchen area.

Speaker 29 where we have a second victim, a young man, identified as Stephen Ortiz.

Speaker 26 Stephen, her adopted brother, lay face down in a pool of blood, wearing only his underwear. Police noted that he took the brunt of the attack.

Speaker 29 This scene was absolutely brutal.

Speaker 26 Stephen was 21 years old at the time of his murder, and based on his injuries, police believe that he tried to fight off the killer before ultimately losing that battle.

Speaker 29 The blood continued from that area out the back door. When the third victim, Lloyd Ortiz, was was found outside the back porch.

Speaker 29 There was a significant amount of bloodshed, indicating that he did sustain some massive trauma. And there was also shrubbery from a nearby bush that was covering his head.

Speaker 26 That's two bloodied bodies inside the home and one outside.

Speaker 26 And then something else stood out to law enforcement.

Speaker 29 There was a small marijuana grow on the property. It was fenced off and padlocked.
They did have a medical marijuana card for Stephen for some of the medical conditions he has.

Speaker 26 But none of the 17 marijuana plants appeared to be disturbed. In fact, nothing seemed to be stolen or even out of place.

Speaker 26 On the kitchen table, in plain view, sat Lloyd's wallet containing hundreds of dollars.

Speaker 29 This did not look like a robbery. It looked like a case of anger.

Speaker 29 A lot of anger based on the brutality that occurred.

Speaker 26 It was a Father's Day to forget for residents in this tiny suburb of Santa Fe, New Mexico. Lloyd and Dixie Ortiz were pillars of the tight-knit El Ranto community.

Speaker 26 They were quick to lend a helping hand to others in need. So who was angry enough to harm them? And why?

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Speaker 26 Shuri Ortiz lived in an RV right next door to her parents' house on the same property. Both homes sat on a sprawling lot surrounded by hills in the dusty El Rancho, New Mexico desert.

Speaker 26 On the evening of Father's Day 2011, Cherie walked into her parents' house and found her mother, father, and brother savagely murdered.

Speaker 26 Like many others in the community, Pastor John Trujillo was in shock.

Speaker 30 I get a phone call. They call me PJ.
Pastor John. It says, PJ,

Speaker 30 they found

Speaker 30 Stephen, Lloyd, and Dixie dead.

Speaker 30 I said, what are you talking about? Was it a car accident? What happened? He says, no,

Speaker 30 it seems like they were murdered in their home. You need to get down here right away.
And as I drive up, the community is already showing up. State police are there.
And about that time,

Speaker 30 Cherie made her way out and she was just in tears and tears and tears.

Speaker 30 Pastor John, my family's dead, my family's dead. Somebody murdered my family, somebody killed my family.
How do you handle that? What do you do?

Speaker 30 I mean, can you imagine the emotional and physical and just spiritual distraught that you would face? Nobody kept prepared for that. I don't care.
Nobody's prepared to walk into a scene like that.

Speaker 30 Especially the daughter.

Speaker 30 The family was grieving and they were mourning. It's all El Rancho.
This isn't supposed to happen in a community like this. People are speculating that could this have happened from the community?

Speaker 30 Did somebody come here from somewhere else? Was it a family member? Was it a friend? Was it a robbery that went wrong? You know, why, why, why? It was like, okay,

Speaker 30 we need some answers.

Speaker 26 Since El Rancho didn't have a police force of their own, the New Mexico State Police handled the investigation. By morning, the police still didn't know much.

Speaker 29 We're still unsure as to what happened out there. The guys are still working it,

Speaker 29 working very hard to determine what exactly happened, but at this point, we still don't know.

Speaker 30 Well, how in the world could something like this happen? You know, one person dead, okay.

Speaker 30 But when there's three,

Speaker 30 it raises a lot, a lot of questions.

Speaker 26 Police believe that three victims were shot to death inside their home, but nothing appeared to be missing. Investigators wondered if it was a murder or a murder suicide.

Speaker 26 Officer Paul Chavez was one of the first responders.

Speaker 29 My role primarily is to process and document the crime scene and try and make sense of what occurred there.

Speaker 26 But the severity of the crime scene limited what he was able to do.

Speaker 29 You can't disturb the body much. And with the amount of bloodshed that was present, we weren't able to assess the wounds as well as we would like to have been able to.

Speaker 26 So originally, the police believed all three victims were shot to death. But the results of the autopsies for each victim revealed something something far more personal.

Speaker 29 That these were in fact not gunshot wounds. They were actually lacerations that were penetrating with a blood object.

Speaker 26 Clearly something was missing. When the police returned to the scene of the crime, they found a five-pound pickaxe lying on the ground just over the fence of the adjacent property.

Speaker 26 And the pickaxe contained bloodstains.

Speaker 29 What the pickaxe did provide us was DNA from all three victims. So we unequivocally had our murder weapon.
However, we were unable to forensically link a suspect to the pickaxe.

Speaker 26 So what does that mean? A murder weapon with DNA of the victims, but nothing to indicate a suspect?

Speaker 29 It could mean a number of things that maybe they were wearing gloves or they covered their hands in some way or shape or form.

Speaker 29 And just sometimes the lab just can't find it. It's not 100% certainty that they're going to be able to find DNA when something is touched.

Speaker 29 There's a chance that we will, but it doesn't always work out that way.

Speaker 24 So the one thing about the Ortiz murder was really the pressure on the police.

Speaker 26 Reporter Alex Tomlin covered the story for a local TV station.

Speaker 24 There was an incredible amount of pressure from that small-knit community, but also the surrounding communities.

Speaker 24 And so there was a lot of pressure on them to get who did it, make it a clean investigation, and let's get this person behind bars. And I'm sure at times that pressure was overwhelming.

Speaker 26 The people of El Rancho couldn't shake the fear that they could be next.

Speaker 24 Nobody wants to think that they're going to go to sleep and somebody who's pickaxed a couple and their son to death is going to come into their home next.

Speaker 26 They even refused to talk to TV reporters, not because they felt pestered, but they were fearful of their own safety.

Speaker 24 And that's the other terrifying thing. Think about the strength it takes to push that pickaxe back multiple times and pickaxe someone to death.
That is cold-blooded. That is calculated.

Speaker 24 That is incredibly scary for a community because that person is dangerous.

Speaker 24 You know, when you can't easily tie up a case like this, when you can't say, oh, it's, you know, a scorned lover or it's, you know, a drug deal gone wrong or different things like that, then it becomes a well, am I next?

Speaker 24 You want to find who did this because you don't want the community looking at you and saying, what are you doing? Why aren't you protecting us? Why don't you have the answers?

Speaker 26 With no suspects, a weapon and murder scene free of any DNA, investigators started to look look at the person who first discovered the bodies. That person was Cherie Ortiz.

Speaker 24 When something this horrific happens, the community wants answers and they want them quickly, right? So you want to be able to tie a nice bow on this thing and be done with it.

Speaker 24 And Cherie and her husband seemed like that nice bow. They lived on the property.
You could come up with a motive.

Speaker 26 The police wondered if Cherie and her husband Jesse knew more than they were saying, especially after they listened back to Cherie's original 911 call.

Speaker 24 She's very frantic in that 911 call, as you can hear.

Speaker 32 They're dead! Dead, I've gunshot once they're dead! They're dead, dead, dead, dead, dead!

Speaker 24 She made some comments on that 911 call about, you know, they must have been shot because of how they looked.

Speaker 32 I just walked in their house and everybody shot in the fing head. It's my brother, my dad, and my mom's still in dead.

Speaker 24 It wasn't later until the office of the medical investigator determined that actually they had been pickaxed to death.

Speaker 32 And you have no idea who would have done that?

Speaker 32 Do you see anybody around? No! I didn't even look. I didn't even look.
I just break out.

Speaker 32 Oh, my God. They were such good people.
Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
Oh, my God. Oh, my God.
We have to hurry.

Speaker 26 Desperate and upset, Cherie spent 17 minutes on that 911 call. But as investigators listened back, they zeroed in on a comment Cherie said.
Now, listen closely to what Cherie told the operator.

Speaker 26 They've been dead since today morning.

Speaker 26 They've been dead since today's morning. So Cherie said her parents had been dead since that morning.
How did she know that? And why didn't she call 911 till seven that evening?

Speaker 32 I can't believe I didn't come check earlier this morning. But

Speaker 32 oh my God.

Speaker 32 Oh my God.

Speaker 32 Oh my God. Why, you know, and all because I didn't have money for a Father's Day gift, I didn't want to go until I finished cooking and shinaged up for him.

Speaker 24 They 100%

Speaker 24 thought she was a main suspect.

Speaker 28 I can't believe this is happening.

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Speaker 26 When Lloyd, Dixie, and Stephen Ortiz were brutally murdered in their El Rancho home, their daughter Cherie and her husband Jesse appeared to investigators to be the only people with motive and the access to execute such a violent crime.

Speaker 26 For months, Cherie and Jesse felt the stairs.

Speaker 26 Their pastor John Trujillo tried to be the voice of reason.

Speaker 30 I think when you have to go through that,

Speaker 30 like Jesse and Cherie did, I think it was just a reassurance that said, listen, you know, you need to do this. You need to go through this.

Speaker 30 Just cooperate with the state police, investigators, whatever you need to do, because it's just a process of elimination. They're looking for answers just as much as everybody else is.

Speaker 30 And they need a starting point somewhere. Just go through the process, answer the questions, be honest, be truthful, and let them eliminate you.
And then they can move forward from there.

Speaker 29 So there were a number of red flags that required us to investigate Sherry and Jesse to the fullest.

Speaker 26 State police agent Paul Chavez took the difficult line of questioning a mourning Cherie.

Speaker 29 Could family gain from the death of the victims? Sure, they can if there's insure insurance policies in place or is there property in place? Is there something to be gained?

Speaker 29 That's definitely something that was going to be looked at.

Speaker 26 Investigators asked about Cherie's credit card debt and the fact that she didn't pay her car loans or even the rent on her RV.

Speaker 26 And then there was this.

Speaker 26 Cherie also told investigators that she had removed $80,000 in cash from her parents' home. But she didn't tell this to police until three days after the murders.

Speaker 29 Jesse and Cherie's involvement couldn't be ruled out.

Speaker 26 Jesse and Cherie told detectives that they were at a local casino on the night of the murders.

Speaker 29 But there were some conflicting statements between Cherie and Jesse.

Speaker 26 The triple murder that rocked the close-knit village of El Rancho turned friends into enemies, families into suspects.

Speaker 24 At the time, there was a lot of speculation about her and her husband and whether or not they had been involved in this crime.

Speaker 26 Alex Tomlin worked as a reporter for a local TV station.

Speaker 24 The case was a little bit cold at this time, and we got a call saying she's willing to talk to you.

Speaker 26 Cherie was on the defensive and wanting to publicly clear her name. So she scheduled an interview with Alex.

Speaker 24 Cherie offered to show me the home where her parents had lived and had been murdered.

Speaker 26 Alex met Cherie at her home and interviewed her just steps away from where Lloyd, Dixie, and Stephen were murdered.

Speaker 24 I remember distinctly being in the kitchen, and we were talking about her brother, Stephen.

Speaker 24 And,

Speaker 24 you know, when the autopsy came out, he had held about a dozen or so blows, I think, about maybe 17 blows.

Speaker 24 And I remember her talking to me about how he was such a big guy, that he was kind of a teddy bear, but he was such a big guy.

Speaker 24 And it's such a weird sensation when you're standing in someone's kitchen and you're seeing marks on the floor, and you know their body had been there.

Speaker 24 And, you know, she cried a lot during during that interview, understandably, but really thinking about this young man coming out who didn't really have the cognitive ability to understand what was happening, you know, very much still a child kind of in a man's body.

Speaker 24 And to have that many blows to him, my only thought in that moment was he must have been trying to protect his parents. He must have been really scared.
He must have really fought back.

Speaker 24 And that was just so sad.

Speaker 24 It was so sad to think about those final moments and what that must have been like for him, either knowing that he was dying or knowing that something had happened to his parents.

Speaker 24 It was just really traumatic standing there and knowing this is where he died, and he died in such a violent way.

Speaker 26 With the cameras rolling, Alex asked Cherie about the investigation.

Speaker 31 I believe they're going through it with tunnel vision, just specifically focusing on us instead of the real people or per I I know it had to be people. How could one person do that?

Speaker 24 So it left this very weird sensation in the community where some people were still speculating, other people really believed them. Why would they do this?

Speaker 26 Cherie said her parents had life insurance, but she could not collect that money since she and her husband were considered suspects.

Speaker 26 And without that money, Cherie said they couldn't pay their bills and worried their homes would be foreclosed.

Speaker 24 So it was really this sense from her of trying to advocate for herself, but advocate for her parents and her brother to say, I need to know who killed them.

Speaker 24 And at the same time, I need people to know it wasn't me. And so that was really what the conversation centered around.

Speaker 31 We could lose everything my dad worked so hard for.

Speaker 24 I actually saw like marks on the floor and different things like that where this had happened. It was a really horrific experience.

Speaker 31 Something has to give. I really do have hope.
I know this is going to get stopped.

Speaker 26 With tears in her eyes, Cherie then looked into the camera to try to clear her name and her husband, Jesse's, as well.

Speaker 31 We had nothing to do with it. My God, that was my mom and my dad and my little brother.

Speaker 26 It was no secret that the two were being looked at in the triple murder. But were they that desperate for money that they would murder their own family?

Speaker 26 Paul Chavez investigated.

Speaker 29 If you don't investigate Jesse and Cherie to the fullest, you make a very easy argument for a defense attorney to create doubt in a jury's mind.

Speaker 29 And that's exactly what have happened if we had not followed up on all of the red flags that came up during the course of the investigation.

Speaker 26 But as the investigation dragged on, Cherie shifted the blame back on the state police.

Speaker 26 She claimed that they botched the investigation and said casino security guards or even children could have done a better job. Against the advice of law enforcement, Cherie even set up a P.O.

Speaker 26 box where people could anonymously submit information about who might be responsible.

Speaker 26 A year after the murders, the police promised a press conference to share some breaking news on the case. But that press conference never happened.

Speaker 29 There was a lot of leads that came in that were followed up on, but none of them panned out.

Speaker 26 A billboard even went up along a local highway with a picture of Lloyd, Dixie, and Stephen that offered a $1,000 reward for information. But still, there were no arrests.

Speaker 29 That was the hardest part of this case for me was

Speaker 29 knowing that we have not been able to bring justice for this family.

Speaker 26 And it wasn't just Cherie who was pressuring the New Mexico State Police. Here's TV reporter Alex Tomlin.

Speaker 24 There was an incredible amount of pressure from that small-knit community, but also the surrounding communities and pretty much all of the state saying, you've got to find who did this.

Speaker 24 You could not take a family who more more people said nice things about and have a more awful thing happen to them. I mean, they are bludgeoned to death with a pickaxe.

Speaker 26 Publicly, the police didn't reveal much about other potential suspects. But behind the scenes, it was a different story.

Speaker 26 Aside from Cherie and her husband Jesse, investigators interviewed numerous people. Then, 16 months after the murders, A local 23-year-old woman named Ashley Roybal got arrested.

Speaker 26 While she's in custody, custody, she tells the police something astonishing.

Speaker 29 Is it okay to call you, Ashley?

Speaker 30 All right. I understand that you know some details.

Speaker 26 I know who did it. Ashley tells detectives that she knows who killed Lloyd, Dixie, and Stephen Ortiz.

Speaker 24 It isn't until Ashley Roybal gets in trouble that all of a sudden she's willing to tell police what happened.

Speaker 30 I'll just let you go ahead and tell me the story.

Speaker 24 It was almost like the answer everyone had been waiting for.

Speaker 26 Ashley Roybal kept quiet for 16 months. During that time, Cherie juggled losing her mom, dad, and brother while being looked at by everyone as a suspect.

Speaker 26 All while she couldn't collect their life insurance money and was scared she'd lose everything. But now, 16 months later, Ashley was finally ready to talk.

Speaker 29 Well, this was the turning point in the investigation.

Speaker 26 But would anyone believe Ashley?

Speaker 24 There's things that kind of don't match up. They're shifting stories.

Speaker 30 We just want the truth.

Speaker 26 They say say the wheels of justice move very slowly. And in this case, that would prove to be an understatement.

Speaker 31 And I remember thinking, oh God, here we go again.

Speaker 24 This poor family has been through the ring error.

Speaker 30 I would have never suspected that it was going to come down to this.

Speaker 26 Find out what Ashley says really happened that night on part two of the Father's Day Murders. That's next time on American Homicide.

Speaker 26 You can contact the American Homicide team by emailing us at AmericanHomicidePod at gmail.com. That's AmericanHomicidePod at gmail.com.

Speaker 26 American Homicide is hosted and written by me, Sloan Glass, and is a production of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment Group in partnership with iHeart Podcasts.

Speaker 26 The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass and Todd Gans. The series is also written and produced by Todd Gans, with additional writing by Ben Fetterman and Andrea Gunney.

Speaker 26 Our associate producer is Kristen Mel Curie. Our iHeart team is Allie Perry and Jessica Kreinchak.
Audio editing and mixing by Matt Delvecchio.

Speaker 26 Additional editing support from Nick Aruka, Tanner Robbins, Britt Robicho, Dave Saya, and Patrick Walsh. American Homicide's theme song was composed by Oliver Beans of Noiser.

Speaker 26 Music library provided by MyMusic. Follow American Homicide on Apple Podcasts.
And please rate and review American Homicide.

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