Where Is Rhonda? The Mysterious Disappearance of Rhonda Day | Part 1 of 2 4/30/2024
Where Is Rhonda? The Mysterious Disappearance of Rhonda Day | Part 2 of 2 5/1/2024
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When the threads of a close-knit family are frayed by the disappearance of one of their own, the void left
behind is palpable. In this deeply personal episode of The Murder Police Podcast, we delve into the
mysterious vanishing of Rhonda Day, a woman whose life was as vibrant as it was enigmatic. Rhonda,
known for her tenderhearted care for her grandmother and her love for the written word, never returned
home after a visit to a friend in Louisville. Her absence was a siren call of concern for her family, who knew
her as someone who would never willingly leave her loved ones in worry.
Join us as Destiny and Melissa, Rhonda’s cousin and aunt, paint a vivid picture of a woman whose laughter was infectious, whose spirit was nurturing, and whose disappearance has left a haunting question in the hearts of those who knew her best. From her childhood curiosity to her adult compassion, we explore the life of a woman whose every action was an extension of her love for others. As we navigate through the last known moments before Rhonda’s disappearance, we confront the chilling reality that her car, found abandoned just miles from her destination, signals a mystery that demands unraveling.
We grapple with the complexities of a case that is as confounding as it is heartbreaking, and we extend an invitation to our listeners: your insight could be the key to unlocking the truth of Rhonda’s fate. This episode is more than a story—it’s a call to action, a plea for answers, and a testament to the enduring hope that somewhere, someone holds the piece that will complete the puzzle of Rhonda Day’s disappearance.
(True Crime Podcast, Real Detectives, Missing Person, Rhonda Day, Murder Police Podcast, Louisville Mystery, Unsolved Cases, Adult Language Warning, Family Interviews, Investigation Insights, Detective Stories, Community Impact, Nurturing Personality, Risk Factors, Drug Scene Involvement, Prayer List Discovery, Rehabilitation Success, Chevy Aveo, Cane Run Road, Library Reader)
Show Transcript : Part 1
David LyonsHost00:00
If you have been looking for a realistic true crime experience, you just found it.
DestinyGuest00:08
Get ready for true crime with the real detectives on the Murder Police Podcast.
MelissaGuest00:15
And she went to Louisville that’s where her friend lived and then she didn’t come home that night and she always, always come home. She never stayed away from home. Like I said, she lived with her grandmother. She knows that her grandmother would worry about her and she had called my mom the night before and said Grandma. Warning the podcast you’re about to listen to may contain graphic descriptions of violent assaults, murder and adult language. Listener discretion is advised. Where is Rhonda Day? Part 1 of 2.
David LyonsHost01:10
Well, today we are with Destiny and Melissa, so let’s introduce everybody. Destiny, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you’re related to Rhonda.
DestinyGuest01:19
Rhonda is my cousin. Her mom is my great aunt. I’m about to be 22.
David LyonsHost01:25
Gotcha and Melissa same.
MelissaGuest01:36
Hi David, nice to be here. I am Rhonda’s aunt and I’m here to try to help find out anything we can, and to let you know Rhonda Good deal.
David LyonsHost01:39
I think that’s the important part that we’re looking for to do today is I really want the audience to see who Rhonda is, to be able to pray for her, to be able to help look for her, maybe to shake some things loose and bring this to a resolution hopefully a good resolution and to keep the word out. Let’s start with this. I’m going to open the floor to both of you. Just tell us who Rhonda is from the youngest age, as you all can remember Destiny I know that you’re just 22, so you won’t go back as far as Melissa goes but tell us about who she is, her passions, her hobbies, her interests, her personality, anything you can think about that would let people know who Rhonda is.
DestinyGuest02:15
Rhonda is a sweet person that always loved to be with the family and she loved to take care of my great-grandma when great-grandma was in the hospital. Before Rhonda went missing, Rhonda stayed in the hospital with grandma good deal kind of a round-the-clock caretaker, were they pretty close?
MelissaGuest02:32
very close very close gotcha. She lived upstairs over top of her grandmother okay, gotcha.
David LyonsHost02:39
And how do you know any idea how long she lived with her grandmother, just roughly.
MelissaGuest02:42
Oh, many, many years, many years, many years. Okay, yeah, many years. I’d say probably 10 or more.
David LyonsHost02:48
Gotcha. Well, tell it, okay. So we know that she’s close to grandma and we have to assume that this is really rough on our grandmother If they were that close it’s got to be rough and hopefully that’s why we want to get answers for this, for sure.
MelissaGuest03:13
Tell for this for sure. Tell us a little bit more who she was. Let’s go back. Can we go back to her childhood? Okay, that would be. She was a very inquisitive child. She always, like, stopped and smelled every flower, stopped and looked at every bug. And my sisters? They would take their kids out to go for a walk and the other child, the cousin, she’d be running ahead and Rhonda Faye would be behind and they would always say come on, rhonda Faye, slow down. Dana. You know she just always loved bugs, animals. As a matter of fact, her and my daughter used to play in a creek and this creek cows played in it too, and that was just up Rhonda Faye’s alley. You know she’s in a creek with animals and she loved it and that kind of carried on into when she became an adult. She was the type that would pull off the side of the road to take a turtle out of the road, gotcha.
03:54
You know she had a very funny sense of humor. When she was real small I took her to Walmart. There was a Santa Claus there. When she was real small I took her to Walmart there was a Santa Claus there and I always had nicknames for everybody, and her name is Rhonda Faye, but I called her Faye Ray, and Santa Claus come up and said what’s your name, young lady? And she got this little smirk on her face and I could tell she was going to say something she knew that would throw the Santa Claus off. She said Faye Ray and she just looked at him like what do you think of that name?
David LyonsHost04:24
Oh love.
MelissaGuest04:25
And so then also that nickname carried on into when she got married and she married a man with the last name Day, and she and I would just laugh because her name was Fay Ray Day.
David LyonsHost04:35
Oh Lord.
MelissaGuest04:36
So I mean just stuff like that that we laughed about all the time. And I know there was a time when my daughter that was the humor side of her, if you want to see her heart was my daughter had surgery and if you’ve ever had anybody had wounds that had to have a wound back, they had to have their bandages changed twice a day. Right, and after she got out of the hospital I was going to have to come home from work every day and change her bandages and Rhonda said no. Aunt Melissa said I’m going to come down and change them while you’re at work. And she came down every day, changed Amy’s bandages and took her to the doctor so I wouldn’t have to miss work. So she really she had an affinity for to help. You know I can also. There was this.
05:27
One lady told me about a time that Ron Fay got all her paint brushes and her paint together and they took the kids down to the park. Well, there was a time when they had these rocks that you had to paint and you put dates on them and where you were from and you hid them and people would go looking for them and that they painted a bunch of stuff for the kids. They hit them and then they went rock looking and that they had found a rock from Florida. So they just found that very interesting, that you know that they found that. And then of course I look around here and we’re here at the library and Rhonda Fay was a very big reader. There was a librarian that told my sister that Rhonda was the most prolific reader that they had ever had. So she was very intelligent. She went to Bernheim one time, took kids and she was like a tour guide, you know. She would explain everything as they walked, what it was and everything. So she was not only funny, smart, you know, but she just learned a lot. I love to love, I loved to learn.
06:26
My mother told me that Rhonda Faye always took good care of her. Rhonda Faye worked at a secondhand store. She was always buying things and bringing stuff home to Mom. She would take Mom to her doctor’s appointments. They were just really, really close.
06:43
My mom also said we were talking about we always do this. What if Rhonda Faye walked through the door? What would we do? And somebody said, well, I think I’d spank her butt. And my mom said, no, you wouldn’t, because I’m going to grab a hold of her and I’m going to hug her and never let her go. So you’d have to pry me off of her. That’s just how close mom and Rhonda were.
07:06
I know that Rhonda, she had a brother that was 10 years younger than her and they got into trouble together. But she was kind of responsible for going down the road that they went with Michael Gotcha and she let him in kind of on the drug scene and after she disappeared we found in her Bible like a prayer list, and one of the things on her prayer list was babies without mamas. So it’s always the downtrodden those that she felt sorry for. And then she also had a little note that said God, if this is wrong I’m sorry. So we’ve had a lot of wonder what she meant, wonder what she meant, but I really really think she had a lot of guilt for Michael going down the road that he went down.
David LyonsHost07:58
Sure.
MelissaGuest07:59
And I really think, I really do think that she was praying that whatever it takes to get my brother clean, that she was willing, and I don’t think it’s a matter of coincidence that he signed himself into drug rehab on her birthday right after she went missing and thankfully he’s six years clean, he is preaching the Word of God, he’s got a family, so I really think that Rhonda would say it was worth it, whatever has happened to her. What a remarkable story. I think she would say it was worth it.
David LyonsHost08:35
Yeah, and it sounds like that big heart is probably genuine. Very maternal, very maternal. I just found out this morning that Rhonda used to work for this library system here in Bullitt. County. Yes, she did, yeah, and here we are, and I kind of talk about Kismet. Is the idea that we’re actually borrowing a room from them and that she used to work here when she read. Do you have any idea what her biggest interest in reading was?
MelissaGuest08:58
I know she did read a lot of Stephen King novels, but I think she just loved to read anything, right, anything. She just loved to read. Maybe it took her to a different place, but then and it also helped her to learn. You know you, just if you can delve into reading, you can delve into other life, other you know worlds, and she just loved to do that.
David LyonsHost09:19
And that kind of fits with that interest in things like bugs. I mean is is trying to get as much as you can in that too, so she’s an avid reader. What read? Or what would in her sense of humor what was the kind?
MelissaGuest09:36
of what was that like? What do you? What do you think her sense of humor circled around the most. I think she just liked to make people laugh. She probably probably saying things that would just take somebody off guard like your brother.
DestinyGuest09:41
Like your brother, my brother’s terrible, but that’s why can I say something, yeah, absolutely how my grandma mentioned she loved cat and animals. Rhonda never left home without her cat and also Rhonda had a cat that my great grandma loved. You could explain the?
MelissaGuest09:58
rest of it. Rhonda had a cat that was beautiful. It was beautiful. She just brought it in because she always took care of any kind of animals you could find and my mother fell in love with it. So of course she she’d wanted it for herself, but she brought it and gave it to my, to my mom, and mom still has that cat to this day.
David LyonsHost10:18
and uh, just a thing, that ronda faye, if she thought she could make somebody happy, that she would do it and we’ll come back to the cat in a little bit, because that’s actually one of the things that makes this whole thing very suspicious is that when somebody leaves things that we know that they love and they attend to all the time, but we’ll circle back around to that because that’s actually a pretty important part of Rhonda’s story. So growing up and everything let’s go into. You said she had married somebody by the last time of day and we don’t have to really go into that. But so she’s been married before. She’s been married twice, twice gotcha, and we don’t have to name names but any children in any of those relationships.
MelissaGuest10:53
She has one son. He’s in his 20s now.
David LyonsHost10:56
Gotcha.
MelissaGuest10:57
And she had two grandchildren.
David LyonsHost10:59
Gotcha. So we talked about the fact she’s got a great sense of humor, an avid reader, very curious. What about other hobbies besides reading? Do you remember anything growing up that she was interested in Other hobbies besides reading? Do you remember anything in her?
MelissaGuest11:12
growing up that she was interested in. Well, she would bring her nephew to my house to go swimming all the time. Okay, you know, I had to let her know I don’t have to be home. She’d want me to be home. I’d say, just bring him Gotcha. And now her nephew has not been swimming again since she left. Oh, that’s sad. Yeah, I’m trying to encourage him to come back this summer and go swimming.
David LyonsHost11:34
Yeah, there we go again. The impact that these things have on families and people that are close to people. It changes people’s lives.
DestinyGuest11:39
Yes, it does In a very negative way for sure.
David LyonsHost11:44
How about jobs? Can you remember the first things that she did? I do know she’s waitressed before. Okay.
MelissaGuest11:51
And she also, like I said, she worked at an old folks home. She loved old people.
David LyonsHost11:57
Okay.
MelissaGuest11:57
You know she liked to take care of them. So you know, just listening to even things that I’m saying right now, it’s a nurturing kind of thing, that’s what we keep coming back to. Yeah, she loved the old people and she took care of them and she worked at, like I said, the library, and she also worked at a secondhand store.
David LyonsHost12:14
Gotcha. And one thing, too, again, that we’ll keep in the back of our minds the listeners will too is that when we talk about risk factors, is that sometimes, when we’re nurturing people, we’re a little vulnerable? And I don’t know if it has anything to do with this case, but we tend to go into gray areas with people because we believe more than they do sometimes.
MelissaGuest12:33
Right, yeah, I think, though, to her detriment, she trusted everybody. There we go. You know, when I think about her disappearance, it probably, if she had run out of gas or something, it wouldn’t have been anything for her to just say okay, come, take me to go get gas.
David LyonsHost12:47
Exactly and I think she would trust anybody. Yeah, get gas and I think she would trust anybody. Yeah or, or it uh, it’s somebody stopping at the side of the road, right, you know, and things like that, and we’ll get to how that that all plays out and and how they’re. That’s one of the many possibilities I think in this whole thing. That’s there. Uh, destiny, can you think back to at 22? Can you think back to the first memories you have of ronda and the relationship you all had?
DestinyGuest13:11
Was it cheesecake? She made like pumpkin cheesecake.
MelissaGuest13:14
Sometimes special cheesecake, I think.
DestinyGuest13:15
She made the best cheesecake ever for Thanksgiving.
David LyonsHost13:20
There we go.
DestinyGuest13:21
Yes, gotcha, everyone loved it. My mom took, wasn’t it? My mom and Aunt Amy? No, rhonda and my Aunt Amy made my mom eat cat food.
MelissaGuest13:31
Oh Lord, yeah, that was funny the one time that she tricked my daughter into eating some cat food and they thought it was funny until my dad made her eat cat food oh, To show her what it was like If you can make somebody else do it. But that’s just a childhood prank that she thought was funny.
David LyonsHost13:47
And it was Rhonda who had to eat cat food. Yeah, rhonda had some. I eat cat food. Yeah, ron, if I had my, had my daughter, her mother, just eat some cats. Yeah, I had four crazy brothers growing up and I was in the middle and that we might have beat that once or twice, but that’s still pretty good, that’s a, that’s there, so it uh.
14:03
That gives me ideas about wendy, but anyway, when I get back home, yes, maybe we’ll try that on her and see how she likes that. Well, can you think of anything else about her that we needed to know? If we can just touch on the drug use, because that’s a risk factor too, I don’t want to delve on it. And again, one thing I always like to make sure people understand is that there’s nobody or no family that isn’t vulnerable to that, and I’ve experienced it in my family more than once. So we have to understand that we can’t look at people differently because of that, and sometimes it’s a vulnerability. How was she doing at the time that she disappeared? Pretty much in good shape.
MelissaGuest14:43
Well, she had gotten clean, Gotcha, and then I had heard recently that she had gotten back into it, gotcha. Okay, I didn’t know a lot of what kind of drug or anything like that, because that was a world that was apart from her family life, gotcha, you know. So we can’t I can’t delve a lot into. I know that she started out with marijuana and, like I said then, when her brother he was 10 years younger, when he got to be a teenager, she got him into it, gotcha. When he got to be a teenager, she got him into it Gotcha. But as far as I think, from what I’ve heard, pills was her go-to drug.
David LyonsHost15:19
Easy to obtain. Yeah, and again, that’s important in a case like this. Only because, if there’s a nexus between that, the people listening, we need to talk to people in those communities, in those people to see, because that’s where an answer might lie to. Well, let’s go and get into that. We’re here today because she’s missing and arguably, as the listeners hear you tell the story, it’s very suspicious, is that?
DestinyGuest15:47
it’s not normal.
David LyonsHost15:47
There’s not a lot to it. We’ve done shows about missing person investigations and I did tons of those when I was a detective at the police department and we try to educate people on the idea that lots of adults just do leave, most just have some kind of a circumstance, and what we’re always looking for is those handful of things where everybody would agree that, say, this just isn’t a case probably where somebody uprooted and changed their life or suffered a traumatic brain injury or mental health issues.
16:20
Arguably, there’s something fishy about ronda going missing, so can you take us back to uh july of?
MelissaGuest16:27
2018, july 28th, um she was wanting to go visit a childhood friend. It was a cousin of her best friend.
David LyonsHost16:38
Gotcha.
MelissaGuest16:38
And she needed gas money. So she went to my grandmother, who she lived with, and asked to borrow $5 for gas. So we know she didn’t have a lot of gas.
David LyonsHost16:48
That would be a couple gallons back then, right.
MelissaGuest16:50
Right, and we even went to the truck stop and they looked on their film and she was there getting gas. So we do know that she did get the gas and she went to Louisville that’s where her friend lived and then she didn’t come home that night and she always, always came home. She never stayed away from home. Like I said, she lived with her grandmother. She knows that her grandmother would worry about her and she had called my mom the night before and said Grandma, I’m going to be a little bit later than usual, but I’m going to be home, said you can go ahead and lock the door if you need to. And mom said no, I’m going to leave it open for you. Well, so that shows to me that she was intent to come home. She was going to come home and then she didn’t come home that night.
17:40
So my mom called me the very next morning and she said Melissa, how do you report a missing person? I said well, who’s missing? She said Rhonda Faye. And I said what do you mean missing? She said well, she always comes home. She didn’t come home last night. So my mom automatically knew something was up, because it was so out of her character not to come home. So I said well, mom, she’s 42, and she was going to a guy’s house. We don’t like it if she spent the night, but she’s 42. We can’t do anything about it.
David LyonsHost18:09
True.
MelissaGuest18:10
So we just kind of thought maybe that’s what it was. She spent the night with her friend, and when she didn’t come home the second night we reported her missing.
DestinyGuest18:19
Right.
MelissaGuest18:20
And my sister and her Aranda’s brother, mike. They went to this friend’s house and they asked him if he had seen her or where she was house. And they asked him if he had seen her where she was, and he said he had seen her at 5 am that morning in his driveway playing on her ipad. Well, she sometimes did that sat in her car and played on her ipad, right so uh, but the thing about that, though, too, is at home. Her ipad charger and her phone charger were on her bed at home right Right.
18:51
So that’s another point to me. She planned to come back.
David LyonsHost18:54
Sure.
MelissaGuest18:55
You know, or she would have brought her charger if she was planning to go and be gone for a while.
David LyonsHost19:00
For logistics, for the listeners and for our YouTube people, I’ll have some maps and some video about what all this looks like. So she leaves Lebanon Junction and what that’s 30 to 40 minutes to Maria.
DestinyGuest19:13
Anna Drive.
David LyonsHost19:18
And also what people might want to understand. I think that we call that area Pleasureish Park. Yes, prp, I’m an old Louisville boy. Yeah, prp, I’m an old Louisville boy. Yeah, prp. And that’s roughly southwest of the heart of Louisville, very close to the Ohio River.
DestinyGuest19:30
Yes.
David LyonsHost19:30
So I’m trying to give people, I’m trying to paint a picture of where that is. So she, and what kind of car did she have?
MelissaGuest19:37
again, she had a blue Chevy Aveo Okay, and it was found just 1.3 miles from my friend’s house 1.6 miles, 1.3 miles Okay.
David LyonsHost19:46
Pretty close, pretty close. Yes, on Cane Run.
MelissaGuest19:49
Cane Run yeah, Cane Run Cane.
DestinyGuest19:50
Run.
MelissaGuest19:50
Road.
David LyonsHost19:50
Yeah, so, and again, just keeping the logistics, we’re talking 30, 40 minutes away, a couple gallons of gas, Unfortunately. When I was a friend again, how long had they known each other and what kind of friendship was it?
MelissaGuest20:12
From what I know, it was a childhood friend, gotcha. She was best friends with his cousin, Okay, and so they kind of played together as kids, you know, and then it grew into when they were adults. Now Mike says that they all partied together.
David LyonsHost20:30
Okay.
MelissaGuest20:31
So I would think probably a party friend.
David LyonsHost20:33
There we go Somewhere. That if we were back to dabbling in that stuff as you would like us to like? That’s why we have to recognize that as a risk factor in here for sure too. So she goes there and and this may be going past what you have, but he sees her in a driveway. It did he ever mention anybody that you’re aware of of when she left the door of his house to go to the car?
MelissaGuest20:56
no, I have not heard that. All I know is I he said he saw her sitting in his driveway when he went to let his dog out and that she waved at him and then then she pulled out of his driveway is what it says, so we believe he saw her leave the driveway. Yes, yes, Now. The car was not found until five days after.
David LyonsHost21:14
Right, that was early August.
MelissaGuest21:15
Yes, yes. So I have some question about why none of us saw it or anything when we went down there.
DestinyGuest21:23
Right.
MelissaGuest21:23
You know, I don’t know.
David LyonsHost21:25
You know, because again and again on YouTube I’ll put a map and I’ll show, because it was in a parking lot of the there’s a refinery, if I remember correctly, there, so I’ll have those graphics and that’s the thing. Is okay, we’re talking. I think August 3rd it’s discovered is when we look at a case like this is we have to start wondering was it always there of the day of the missing? And here you go, now you’re saying you’ve all been in that area and didn’t see it right, we did not see it exactly, which is odd, isn’t it destiny?
21:56
yes is uh, so if, if we who knows, is that you’ve got a series of days in there where that vehicle may have been there and I’ve seen a picture of where in there where that vehicle may have been there, and I’ve seen a picture of where it was at.
DestinyGuest22:10
It was right off of Cane Run, if I remember correctly. Yes, it was.
MelissaGuest22:12
You almost hit it Now we did have somebody, though, that did contact us and say hey, you know there’s more to this story, so go find the next episode. And listen.
David LyonsHost22:23
The Murder Police Podcast is hosted by Wendy and David Lyons and was created to honor the lives of crime victims, so their names are never forgotten. It is produced, recorded and a link to the official Murder Police Podcast merch store where you can purchase a huge variety of Murder Police Podcast swag. We are also on Facebook, instagram and YouTube, which is closed caption for those that are hearing impaired. Just search for the Murder Police Podcast and you will find us. If you have enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe for more and give us five stars and a written review on Apple Podcasts or wherever you download your podcasts. Make sure you set your player to automatically download new episodes so you get the new ones as soon as they drop, and please tell your friends.
DestinyGuest23:23
Lock it down, Judy.
00:00 / 23:24
Show Transcript : Part 2
MelissaGuest00:00
and then I said this I may not have. I should have, but I said this may not be important to you and I feel like we’re filler news, that nothing’s going on. So you put me as a filler. It may not be important to you, but it’s the most important thing in the world to us.
David LyonsHost00:18
Absolutely.
MelissaGuest00:18
So if you can’t have it to be of importance, then I’m not interested. Warning the podcast you’re about to listen to may contain graphic descriptions of violent assaults, murder and adult language. Listener discretion is advised.
Wendy LyonsHost00:59
Where is Rhonda Day? Got a series of days in there where that vehicle may have been there and I’ve seen a picture of where it was at. It was right off of Cane Run, if I remember correctly.
David LyonsHost01:08
Yes, it was.
MelissaGuest01:09
You almost hit it Now we did have somebody, though, that did contact us and say that they were going to a birthday party and did see that car Sunday afternoon.
Wendy LyonsHost01:19
Okay, there Sunday afternoon, yeah, so I don’t know.
David LyonsHost01:25
Yeah, you know, maybe we saw it, but we did not recognize it at the time.
MelissaGuest01:27
No, we would have recognized it. Yeah, could it have been somewhere?
Wendy LyonsHost01:30
else when we searched. I don’t know and you’ll know everything too, yeah. Have you ever had this happen? You’re looking for a blue car and that day you see every blue car. Oh yeah, yeah, that’s something that even when I was still a cop as soon as they put an attempt to locate out on something.
MelissaGuest01:45
Something that we did try. We went door to door. Okay, and we were trying to find somebody that had a video camera that could have spotted that car. If they would go back and look at it and see if they spotted that car when it was parked there, who was driving it, or if they could zoom in and see if it was a male driving it, female driving it.
Wendy LyonsHost02:05
But we didn’t have any luck. Yeah, and a couple things on. That is that. Uh, today you probability would probably be higher more people because of the way the internet’s advanced and technologies.
02:13
You probably have that too. And something else too that I think is is neat that you all did that is it doesn’t hurt for families to go out and do and and I know we live in a world where we have a lot of expectations on law enforcement and that’s reasonable. But at the same time, the more people that are out hunting and looking, the more likely we are to gather something if that makes any sense.
02:35
So hats off to you all for looking for the car and then going door to door and trying to exhaust that possibility. Like I said, these days you probably have a higher probability of that. So the car is located. Am I correct in the fact that it didn’t get towed or processed?
MelissaGuest02:52
No, it did not. No, they just called A policeman, called my sister and said we found her car. You need to come get it.
Wendy LyonsHost02:58
Okay, gotcha.
MelissaGuest02:59
So that’s when my nephew, her son, kind of set up surveillance on it, hoping it’s you know. And of course I need to mention that her brother and her son, when they said to come get it, they went to it and they started looking through it to see if they could find any hints. But then that was already tampering with evidence.
Wendy LyonsHost03:19
Well, yeah, I wouldn’t say tampering with evidence, because it wasn’t a criminal offense.
MelissaGuest03:23
Well, yeah, or that was messing up what they could have found out.
Wendy LyonsHost03:26
But here’s the thing is, that is again, uh, when we, when we don’t do this for a living, we don’t know. So, yeah, that’s completely understandable.
MelissaGuest03:32
But then, um, when he was on the like I said, had it under surveillance he heard some kind of noise and he called a cop and a cop come and said they didn’t, uh, take thatounded. And he said no, and they said, well, they should have impounded it right away. I got you. Yeah, that’s a little frustrating, yeah.
Wendy LyonsHost03:52
And again, I have no idea. You know, I know that sometimes with adult missing person cases there’s this gray area as you’re gathering these facts that make them. I’m not making excuses for it, but I know that you’re looking for things again and we’re going to keep covering those things that say this one probably should be looked at differently and there’s a fuzzy time period in there. So, yeah, I mean that would have been good, you know. Look at seat position fuel tank levels, things like that.
04:21
But again, nobody should be wearing any guilt for going through the car. I’d have gone through the car, right like that and uh, but again, nobody should be wearing any guilt for going through the car out of going through the car, right, right, because we’re curious and we’re really hungry to find that out. So she vanishes and the last place we have her is on mariana drive at her friend’s house. He’s the last person that we know of that so far that saw her. Um, how’s he been? And again, we’re not. We’re not going to name him because he’s not you know, he’s not a known suspect.
04:47
That’s it exactly, and so we we got to be fair to people, but has he? Has he been very helpful in the search for?
MelissaGuest04:54
um, not really, not at all. He has not participated in any of the searches. We had two searches. He has never called to say have you found her? You know here. Let me give you some information. The last thing I can tell you is so he wasn’t present in help at all.
Wendy LyonsHost05:13
Right Gotcha, and some I hate to say it, but some people just don’t care. That’s the world we live in I know.
05:18
But you know, of course, I always think, if it was my friend, I’d done every, I’d turned every rock, exactly and that’s okay to think that way, because I think that we have to compare people’s behavior to what most people would do. So what’s that look like? So you reported her missing, I guess with, uh, the police in lebanon junction, in lebanon junction first, okay, gotcha, yes, and then with the car being found in louisville, I’m going to assume lou Louisville police took the investigation, and that’s how that works too. Is that wherever the preponderance of the evidence?
05:49
is goes, and not to mention too that Louisville will have a few more resources than Lebanon Junction. Lebanon Junction is a very good police department. I’ve worked with a lot of people and trained some other people before. Very good PD. But you know, when you get into an area like Louisville the resources are a lot deeper and not well. Exactly what’s it look like in those initial days. So you find the car. What kind of efforts did everybody make to try to find her?
MelissaGuest06:15
I know you were looking for the car. Well, like I said, we went door to door and then we also did a search down by the river and down at the boat docks and everything on foot. And there’s two aerial searches and two foot searches.
Wendy LyonsHost06:29
Gotcha.
MelissaGuest06:31
I did want to mention that we did have a lot of help from the Crystal Rogers search team there we go, they came down to help us, which was very much appreciated.
Wendy LyonsHost06:39
What a great group of people. I mean. I love when people get involved. Again. More boots on the ground, more, yes.
MelissaGuest06:47
More right, yes but it didn’t turn up anything. And also, um the police, they did do uh, took a cadaver dogs right to his, to the friend’s house and to his truck, and there was nothing found okay, gotcha, so we’ve got that, so we aerial searches, foot searches, cadaver dogs. I mean, we went to the Internet, we had podcasts, we had put a flyer out to everybody, shared a flyer with everybody.
David LyonsHost07:19
Right, we had it out on the news twice.
MelissaGuest07:22
Yeah, we’ve had some of the local stations.
Wendy LyonsHost07:25
They didn’t cover it a lot, but yeah you know you know the media gets what they can get, and if something big’s going on then they’ll drift to it.
MelissaGuest07:33
So it’s just an experience with not too long ago. Oh yeah they were wanting to do a. They contacted me wanting to do a story on her again and I said okay, I would do it. So we had it all set up what day it was going to be. The night before she said her boss was putting her on something else. I said okay.
Wendy LyonsHost07:55
Well.
MelissaGuest07:56
I said, well, get back in touch with me. And I thought they probably wouldn’t. But she did, got back in touch with me, said we’d do a story on it. Then the day of I think, she contacted me, said her boss put her on something. And then I said this I may not have, should have. But I said this may not be important to you and I feel like we’re filler news that nothing’s going on. So you put me as a filler. May not be important to you, but it’s the most important thing in the world to us, absolutely.
08:27
So, if you can’t have it to be of importance, then I’m not interested. Yeah, and that’s just how I felt, you know, because I don’t want her story to be filler news.
Wendy LyonsHost08:38
Sure.
MelissaGuest08:39
Because it is a real thing. She’s really missing. There’s a family tore up, you know, and where she’s at I don’t know, but there’s just not a day that goes by that you don’t hope that you’ll hear from her. Exactly or you’ll see her or you’ll hear something you know. And it’s not just her, it’s every missing person.
Wendy LyonsHost09:03
It’s true, and there’s so many. Every missing person, it’s true, and there’s so many. Yes, there are Again. Wendy, who’s not here today, breathes and eats this whole thing, and one of the things that, years ago, I got across to her is how many people are missing. And what’s frightening is how many people are missing that just never were reported Exactly, when people just assumed family or friends assumed that they’d drifted off. It’s scary.
09:28
Yesed off it’s scary, yes it is. It’s frightening. And again here we are. She’s a person. She was loved by many and loved people, obviously.
MelissaGuest09:35
I mean just a compassionate maternal person. And see, that’s where I feel like that. I guess the world feels you Is. They think that if it’s a person that had a problem, they’re not worth finding and they’re wrong. I think that’s something that goes around and it’s so untrue. I agree, everybody deserves to be found.
Wendy LyonsHost09:51
And I think that’s gotten worse is, as a society, we have people that can be incredibly judgmental and there’s people that can wash their hands of something, and we call it victimology and risk factors. What they do is they wash their hands of any interest in with phrases like well, they had that coming, or you know you, you effed around and found out. Whatever they use, uh, that’s so wrong and and usually and I would never wish this they’ll never understand that unless they’re happy to then, and then the world then we won’t be able to do enough, or nobody will be able to
10:24
do enough for them, and it’s sad. Now I can tell you, though, that, after doing the job, is that we always used to take our victims as we found them, and there were plenty of times that me and the people I worked with and the detectives in Louisville and Lebanon Junction right now that, however you walk, that walk really doesn’t matter. When somebody hurts somebody else, take somebody else. That’s an offense against the whole community, because we’re all at risk with that exactly and and again.
10:53
You know better than I that if somebody has harmed ronda, then they removed the possibility of her completely turning her life around that, that gotuished and that’s horrible.
11:07
That’s not tragic, that’s just evil is that a lot of people deal with issues and they change. But if we take away, if somebody takes away the opportunity for them to change, that’s the devil. That’s the devil at work. So anything new and maybe the other new stations will come around I mean I would recommend taking what you can get from them. I know that they’re right you know, and whoever this person was, she’s probably a fine person, but she’s got a boss like oh, I told her that.
MelissaGuest11:36
I said I understand that you have to do your job and do what the boss says, sure, but I said I’m just asking you to understand that it’s making me feel like that. It’s just, you ain’t got nothing else to broadcast, so let’s do this yeah and I said that’s not how I feel about it. I feel like it’s important.
Wendy LyonsHost11:52
Yeah, that I. I don’t know if sometimes they’re prepared for the emotional rawness that they run into it. I just don’t know it. Uh, I can share. One time I remember I was on the phone with a reporter, with the herald leader, many years ago on a, and she had gone to a victim’s house and what I heard on the other end of the phone was her getting thrown off the porch.
David LyonsHost12:13
Oh, wow.
Wendy LyonsHost12:14
And again she’s covering a story, but I don’t think she was prepared for that. The rawness, the rawness of it that I’m going to knock on this door and where people are in that moment and even detectives will tell you that we’re used to it it beat up on us. I mean, I’ve had people yell at me and scream at me and that’s fine.
MelissaGuest12:34
Because you realize where it’s coming from. That’s it, yeah.
Wendy LyonsHost12:37
And so, hopefully, I have no doubt that whoever’s working the case now in Louisville is probably of that same nature- is that they’re probably waiting for the thing they need to move it forward. Whatever that is, let’s go there for a minute. If you could speak to the community in this area, what would you all ask them to do? I’ll start with Melissa and then Destiny you two. What?
MelissaGuest13:04
would you ask people in the community to do Well at this point, since it’s been almost six years to always keep their eyes and ears open? Yes, you know, always try to and be ready to come forward.
Wendy LyonsHost13:13
Yeah.
MelissaGuest13:13
You know, so many people are afraid to come forward or they think it’s not big enough, it’s too small of a thing. But one small thing could be what could tie the whole thing together.
Wendy LyonsHost13:22
Thank you.
MelissaGuest13:22
So I would urge to come forward anything you know, because somebody knows something, that’s it. She didn’t just disappear.
Wendy LyonsHost13:29
No, you know somebody knows something?
MelissaGuest13:32
Did somebody slip and say something to somebody else? You know, my main thing would be just urging them to come forward and to realize that nothing’s too small.
Wendy LyonsHost13:45
Thank you, and that’s true, and especially six years out.
David LyonsHost13:49
Right.
Wendy LyonsHost13:49
The detectives would appreciate anything. They would appreciate a little hearsay, they would appreciate anything that turned into a lead of something Real quick too. Just what was her physical appearance? Do you remember?
MelissaGuest14:04
She’s probably about 5’3″, 5’4″ something like that, maybe 5’4″, about 180 pounds.
Wendy LyonsHost14:10
Gotcha.
MelissaGuest14:11
Blonde hair, green eyes.
David LyonsHost14:12
Had a tattoo that said was it sun, but spelled differently.
MelissaGuest14:15
Sunshine. She had a tattoo that said sunshine. Like S-O-N, like her sun was her sunshine.
Wendy LyonsHost14:21
Where was that tattoo at? Do you remember?
MelissaGuest14:25
I believe it was her leg.
Wendy LyonsHost14:26
I’m really not quite sure. I think it was her leg, but the tattoo’s a tattoo. Ears pierced, I think, if I remember correctly. Yes, her ears are pierced, sometimes wore thick flaring glasses or contacts.
David LyonsHost14:35
I don’t think so. No, I don’t think so. I don’t think she wore glasses.
MelissaGuest14:38
She probably had sunglasses on all the time as we.
David LyonsHost14:41
Last we heard she was wearing black. Was it black?
MelissaGuest14:44
flip-flops. Grandma Hodges, she was dressed in black Gotcha the last time that.
Wendy LyonsHost14:48
What kind of clothes did she usually wear when she was knocking around? Anything that you remember.
MelissaGuest14:52
Shorts and tank tops. Yes, there we go, just comfortable stuff. Yeah yeah, she never did like to dress up or anything.
Wendy LyonsHost14:59
Gotcha. That’s important too, and I know that the iPad is gone. What else do we think is still missing?
MelissaGuest15:07
Her phone, her iPad and her car keys. What’s her purse sound? So they’re not sure she even took her purse that day, but with those items gone, see to me, if she had just left to go somewhere and to be gone and she took those things she would have been using them. The phone company said there’s not been any kind of activity on either of them since the last phone call.
Wendy LyonsHost15:37
She made was to my mother that the night before Gotcha. You know, one thing I thought about too is that I think I told you when I was working, when we were planning getting together today, is when I was looking at maps and things like that and did that, zoom out on Google Earth and saw the river right there. And growing up in Louisville and I actually boated on the Ohio River for years, upriver from that is that river immediately I thought what a great place to get rid of things, exactly Because that river consumes things and it moves quickly under tow and everything. The first thing when I saw it, I just had the eebie-jeebies about that’s so close and the car was probably just several hundred feet away from where the river is and access. And again, on the YouTube channel I’m going to put quite a lot of images so people can see what that looks like on there too, so we have missing property that eventually could still be found.
16:31
We might stumble across that too, destiny. What would you say to people in the community?
David LyonsHost16:36
If you have any tips or leads, please reach out to LNPD Please.
Wendy LyonsHost16:41
It makes it harder on the family when we don’t know anything 100% and, by the way, too, is that let’s talk about this Is any tips? We really want to go straight to the detectives at LMPD, Louisville Metro Police Department. We don’t want them to come through the podcast. We don’t want anything getting in the way of this and whatnot. And the phone numbers that I have for them is the police department itself is at an area code, 502-574-7111. And then they have an anonymous tip line, which is handy. It’s 502-574-LMPD, and those tip lines are nice.
17:16
We used to use them back in the Lexham Police Department and still do To where if people have that information or they believe and they’re uncomfortable coming forward, geez, oh Pete, let’s do it anonymously, Right it is? I mean, we love witnesses and we love testimony, but this case is about.
David LyonsHost17:34
Bringing justice.
Wendy LyonsHost17:35
That’s it we need to. It’s like a buddy of mine.
David LyonsHost17:37
We need to bring Rhonda home.
Wendy LyonsHost17:39
Yeah, we do. It’s like a buddy of mine said one time is that it’s like a sweater We’ve got to pull that first snag to get the yarn going, and that can be something that somebody has. I would ask people to do the same thing. I would even suggest to people and I’ve said this before that um and I don’t know how people carry that on their heart If they have intimate knowledge about this- that’s what I was thinking on the way up here.
MelissaGuest18:03
I thought you know.
Wendy LyonsHost18:04
I know they do.
David LyonsHost18:05
Whoever?
MelissaGuest18:06
knows something. I have to believe that when they lay their head on their pillow at night, they got to be thinking.
Wendy LyonsHost18:13
And again, yeah, why you know now we hear sometimes people are afraid, and that’s true in some exceptional cases, but that’s usually not it and I’m with you. I will say this that when people carry that, they’re wired differently and they’re wired really similarly to anybody who might’ve done something wrong here. I think whoever carries that information better be real careful and check their character. And those people that carry this destiny, they’re going to stores and restaurants and church with us, to our left and our right. I’ve said it before in a couple of cases, and I’ll continue to say it, that I don’t know how people are religiously built, but we don’t know when we’re going to leave this earth. And I got a bad feeling that if you left the earth with this on your heart, that kind of information, that’s it. I don’t think it plays well, right, I think you’re a lot like people who actually do the deed.
19:04
So people need to people if they’re listening or they know somebody. They’ve got to work their conscience.
David LyonsHost19:09
Just come clean with whatever you have to say, Please. It would bring our family justice. Rhonda, if you’re out there, we love you.
Wendy LyonsHost19:16
There we go, Melissa. What would you say to?
MelissaGuest19:19
If I could say something to Rhonda.
Wendy LyonsHost19:20
Yeah.
MelissaGuest19:21
First, please come home. You know, that’s the main thing we would want out of any of this would be for Rhonda to come home safe, absolutely. But of course, if she doesn’t come home, I would just like I say appeal to the people to please because I know there’s somebody out there- Somebody. There’s somebody that could help bring closure that, if she is out there and she’s okay, that could let us know, right? Um, of course, we’ve heard all kinds of things. They think she’s like hiding out somewhere I think I saw that theory somewhere yeah did she have a pending court appearance or she did have she?
19:56
had got stopped and had found um test and drug paraphernalia, okay, um, and somebody said something about that. She was hiding from that. But uh, according to my sister, they got something that said that after so many years they drop all that. And it was like five years, I think, gotcha, and so that would all be dropped. What would be stopping her from coming home?
Wendy LyonsHost20:19
True, and hiding that well is actually more difficult than people think.
MelissaGuest20:25
Rhonda could have done it.
Wendy LyonsHost20:26
She could have Right.
MelissaGuest20:27
I mean she’d have to check on her cat or check on her grandma. I mean there’s no way.
David LyonsHost20:31
To me.
MelissaGuest20:32
I always felt insulted when somebody said she was just hanging hiding out somewhere, because I know she would never do that to her family. She would never. Because she told me like shortly before she disappeared. She said you know, I love my mom so much. She said if something were to happen to her they’d have to scrape me off the floor. Well, if she loved her that much she wouldn’t have done this to her.
David LyonsHost20:52
Exactly. You know, Rhonda, if you’re out there, just know Grandma lives somewhere else now.
Wendy LyonsHost20:59
Okay, yeah, that’s good to know If there’s something to that good deal.
MelissaGuest21:02
Yeah, my mom just turned 91. She’s always saying that she just hopes Rhonda Faye comes home before she dies.
Wendy LyonsHost21:08
Yeah, yeah. What a burden to carry on your heart, right? Well, listen, thank both of you for taking the time to meet with me. Again, wendy, sorry that she’s not here. Hopefully we get a resolution sooner than later. All right.
21:23
Hopefully we get a resolution sooner than later on this and if we do get updates and everything, we’ll make sure that the audience of the Murder Police Podcast we’ll funnel that out and make sure that they’re aware of those updates. Hopefully we get really good news one day. If not, it’s really good news. Hopefully we just get answers Exactly Good deal. Thank you all both. One day, if not, it’s really good news. Hopefully we just get answers, exactly good deal.
David LyonsHost21:42
thank you all both even if it like gives answers to other people yes, yeah, that that’s one thing.
MelissaGuest21:49
Good, good point destiny is that, uh, so many other people are dealing with missing people right now is keeping hope alive yeah, I would like an awareness you know to go out about missing people and how nothing, not as much, is going on to help find them as what I feel like this should be it’s hard, you know it is it’s it’s bad, because I think I know there was times we felt like you know, why can’t we get anything done?
22:14
why can’t we can’t find her? Why don’t the news station say more? Why don’t people help us more? Why? Don’t you know, just always feeling like because in our minds we want to do everything we can right sure you know we want to find her right you know, please help us right you know, and I think that, uh, the families often are felt unhelped and like they don’t know where to turn or what to do, and I think awareness of missing persons need to go out for all those who have missing loved ones.
Wendy LyonsHost22:40
Absolutely true. Absolutely true Because it’s one of those things that none of us signs up for. A class on this. It just happens and you’re in the dark and the frustration level is incredible too.
MelissaGuest22:50
Well, I mean, I admit I look at things a lot different now than what I did before Before. You know, you kind of listen to things, you think what happens to other people but not to you Right, right. And then, when it happens to you, it’s like I used to always watch Dateline and everything, but now I watch it with a whole lot of different perspectives.
Wendy LyonsHost23:08
From the victim side, yeah, from the surviving victim side. That’s a good point. Well, good deal. Thank you all again for meeting.
MelissaGuest23:15
Thank you very much.
Wendy LyonsHost23:16
We’ll stay in touch, for sure.
David LyonsHost23:19
Thank you for doing this with us, david.
Wendy LyonsHost23:21
Yes, no, thank you for trusting us to produce the piece and put it together, and I’ll tell Wendy you said hi.
MelissaGuest23:28
Okay, please do. We’d like to meet her, yes please do we will.
Wendy LyonsHost23:30
we will for sure. Yeah, we’ll get dinner. I think that’s a wrap.
MelissaGuest23:35
All right, that’s a wrap.
Wendy LyonsHost23:43
The Murder Police Podcast is hosted by Wendy and David Lyons and was created to honor the lives of crime victims, so their names are never forgotten. It is produced, recorded and edited by David Lyons. The Murder Police Podcast can be found on your favorite Apple or Android podcast platform, as well as at MurderPolicePodcastcom, where you will find show notes, transcripts, information about our presenters and a link to the official Murder Police Podcast merch store where you can purchase a huge variety of Murder Police Podcast swag. We are also on Facebook, instagram and YouTube, which is closed caption for those that are hearing impaired. Just search for the Murder Police Podcast and you will find us. If you have enjoyed this podcast, please subscribe for more and give us five stars and a written review. On Apple Podcasts or wherever you download your podcasts, make sure you set your player to automatically download new episodes so you get the new ones as soon as they drop, and please tell your friends.
David LyonsHost24:39
Lock it down, Judy.
00:00 / 24:40