Transcript of Talking Dateline: The Orchard

Hi everyone, I'm Blaine Alexander, and today we are talking Dateline. I'm joined by Andrea Canning to discuss her episode "The Orchard." Hi Andrea.

Hey Blaine.

This episode is about the disappearance of a former beauty queen from a small town in Georgia, and the decades-long investigation that followed, and an absolute surprise ending that I—I think it's safe to say I didn't see coming. I'm sure a lot of people didn't see that one coming.

I agree.

But before we get into all of that, if you haven't listened to the episode, of course, you can find it right below this one, or you can go stream it right now on Peacock. Coming up, we'll have more from Andrea's interview with lead investigator Gary Rothwell, who talks about a tip that fell through the cracks. And then later, two of our producers who worked on this episode, Senior Producer Brad Davis and Producer Marissa Meyer, will be back to answer some of your questions from social media. All right, Andrea, let's talk Dateline.

Let's talk Dateline.

I first have to say, I watched the episode. I had to watch the ending twice, because I—when I tell you I did not see that coming, I was—I was stunned. That was—that was a good one. That really was a good one.

Yeah, and it was so long in the making, you know, to even to get there, right?

As evidenced by the fact that your appearance changed through the episode.

Oh my goodness.

Seriously.

Can we just wipe that from the archives? Like, did we really have to show all that? I'm like, ugh.

You look fabulous. You look fabulous.

I know.

I will say, every time I go back and look, I—I'm the same. I look back at old clips of myself and I'm like, "Oh, what were we doing?" And I put myself on TV that way? And you brought up on another Talking Dateline the chunky jewelry, which thankfully was not in this episode. But I have some episodes that, like, I'm wearing these giant necklaces, and I'm like, "Oh my gosh, like, talk about distracting." But you know what? It was a statement. Did you really do TV in the 2010s if you didn't have a chunky necklace somewhere in some of your archive footage? Like, we all have it.

I'm—I'm calling it right now. If it comes back in style, I'm not doing it.

No.

It's not happening.

I mean, I think that's one of the amazing things about Dateline, that we can take a story and follow it for as long.

Yeah.

As we are able to, right? But let's talk about just how much of a media frenzy was around this case when Tara first disappeared. I mean, Nancy Grace was involved. It was covered on Dateline back when it happened. We saw the clip from the Today Show, like, all of the archival footage of. This truly was a huge deal when she first went missing.

It was, and I think it was, like, kind of the—the beginning, really, of this true crime obsession, right?

Mm-hmm.

You know, because we didn't have all the podcasts back then, and, you know, Dateline wasn't doing just crime. If a crime story was going to end up on Dateline back then, it had to be big.

Yeah.

And—and that was a big story. It fascinated people, because, you know, here you have this beauty queen. She's a teacher at Smalltown, Georgia. She just up and vanished. So it—I think it was kind of like, you know, the beginnings of what we see now, right? Like a germ of.

Yeah.

Like of.

Of that.

True crime obsession.

Mm-hmm. Absolutely. That—that interest, that intense interest. There are so many aspects that were relatable. She's a teacher. You know, she—she had been a pageant girl, right? I use that term lovingly, but I was a pageant girl. I did it when I was in high school, so I feel like I can say that.

Wait, I didn't know that.

I did. I did.

I didn't know.

Pageants in high school.

What pageants were you in, and.

I.

Did you take home the crown?

Well, I took home a crown. So the biggest pageant I did was Miss Oklahoma Teen, USA, when I was in.

That is.

Oklahoma growing up.

Huge.

It was fun. I was a finalist one year.

Oh, cool.

And then a semifinalist another. So it was—but you know what? It was very.

Oh my—that's big.

It was such a fun experience. I can see, though, why some—for me, it was really fun. My parents were like, "Yeah, let's try this. Let's go." I had a trainer at the time who, you know, worked with pageant gals, and it was really kind of cool to be inside that world for a bit. And then I did some more fun community ones.

Things I did not know about Blaine Alexander. Wow. Any—any beauty tricks that you still take with you today for on-air?

You know what? I will say that I still pose the same way. I—I took a—I took a lot of classes in, like, how to walk. Your lead leg is supposed to walk offstage, and when I pose in pictures, I kind of do the same thing. I would say that it was great at building discipline, because as I got close to those pageants.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, I was working out. I ran track at the time, but I was also working out. When I did ones that had a talent portion, I was—I used to play piano, so piano was my talent.

Mm-hmm.

And it was—it was a great experience.

Well, it also set you up for this career too, you know, because you.

Yeah.

You have to answer questions.

Yes.

You have to be in front of people.

Yes.

You have to be live. You have to, you know, I'm sure.

Yes.

And you're gorgeous and smart, so you.

Thank you.

You're like the perfect person for the pageant world.

You're the sweetest. Thank you. It was—I—I loved it. So not to go down the—the path of my childhood things that I tried, but.

No, I love it.

I—I'm glad that we had this conversation. I think it's cool.

It was so—it was fun. It was a lot of fun. We always learn a lot of things about you, so those are my—my random childhood things.

That's awesome.

As a teen. But I—I identified with her in that regard, because I know what it takes to prepare for a pageant. And, you know, so—so thinking about that, there were so many aspects of Tara that were—that were very relatable. So I could see why in so many cases, and then just the mystery of her disappearance, I could see why it grabbed national attention as it did. Let's talk about Smalltown, Georgia. Oscela, Georgia.

I mean, it doesn't get much more small-town than that. It was funny knowing that this was in Georgia. I know that town for sure.

Tell me, what did it feel like being down there?

There's just a quirkiness to it. There—you know, the—the accent is so great. I—I love the Southern accent. I don't know. I think there's—there's a different vibe, you know, that's just.

Mm-hmm.

It's just like a very welcoming, just a lovely—these towns are lovely.

Yeah.

You know, the—the it's just a hometown feel that you don't get everywhere.

Absolutely. Southern hospitality is real.

There you go.

Let's talk about Tara's love life. I think that you did such a great job of respectfully threading the needle when talking about that, because I—I loved that you first introduced it with her friend saying, "Ooh, I knew that I was going to have to tell my friends secrets, essentially." And you assured her, like, "No, you're being a good friend. This is, you know, there's the best friend bond, but then also."

Yeah.

"This—this is much different. You have to help her in this situation."

Yeah. I mean, you're trying to solve a murder, right? A disappearance, a murder. And, you know, Tara—while—while a lot of men's names were mentioned.

Mm-hmm.

She—this was a—a young woman.

Mm-hmm.

Who's not married, right?

Yeah.

What do you do when you're not married and you want to be married? You date.

Yeah.

And you meet different guys. That's what people do when they're single.

Mm-hmm.

And so—but I think when you put it under a microscope and you look at it as though, "Oh, could this person be a suspect? Could this person be a suspect?" Then it turns into, "Wow, there's a lot of guys."

Yeah.

To look at. But I don't think it was anything super out of the norm.

Once people started coming out, there were some people who you could look and say, "Oh, it could have been that person. It could have been that person."

Yeah.

I mean, people who looked to be viable suspects here.

Absolutely. And that—and that's what Gary Rothwell, the GBI agent, kept saying. He was like.

Mm-hmm.

Every time there was another guy, he's like, "Oh, this is—this has to be the one." You know, look at Marcus. Marcus Harper, her ex-boyfriend. I mean, he was under the spotlight for such a long time, and he had nothing to do with this.

Take me back to that interview with Marcus, because I—I—I thought it was so fascinating to hear from him. What was it like sitting down across from him?

I could definitely feel, you know, some tension.

Mm-hmm.

Because I think of—of all he's been through. Imagine that for all those years that—that you're under a spotlight, and then finally your name is cleared. That—that feeling that you have, right, of people whispering about you and looking at you and, "Did he do it?" I mean, I think it would be hard to just—just shake that off completely, right? So I think you felt some of that in the interview.

Absolutely. You know, there were so many aspects of this case that reminded me of a story that I also did in Georgia. A young woman was killed. Her name was also Tara.

Mm-hmm.

Tara Baker. Her ex-boyfriend.

I mean, people were ruining his business. I mean, he was really going through it, like having, you know, financial impacts from all of these things that were happening.

And I—I think that you make a great point of living under a cloud of suspicion is one thing, but then when you're in a small town and everybody knows you.

Oh, even worse.

Everybody sees you.

It's—it's—it's almost crushing, yes.

Yeah.

And I've—I've interviewed many men like Marcus over the years.

Mm-hmm.

Who were—you know, they were the boyfriend or they were the suspect, and they didn't do it. But once they're excluded.

Sure.

From—you know, from the suspect list.

Mm-hmm.

Life doesn't just instantly go back to normal.

Right.

You know, it—it's—even living with it for such a long time, it's very hard to sort of get back into the—the mix. And—and then even then, I've—I can't even tell you how many I've interviewed where they say, "Oh, there's still people who think I did it."

Well, speaking of suspects that came up, let's talk about this YouTube video, this cat—the Catch Me Killer.

Oh my gosh.

Gosh, what a creep.

What a creep.

What a loser.

What a—

Like, loser.

Loser is a better word.

Loser. There were so many things that I thought about this. One, this happened in 2009. I mean, these are kind of—the internet has come so far in such a short amount of time, but when you think back to that time, YouTube was relatively new. This notion of people kind of uploading videos, like, we didn't have social media, certainly to the degree that we do today.

Mm-hmm.

So I would imagine that somebody kind of uploading this blanked out, you know, this camouflaged video of themselves on YouTube.

Yes.

You don't see that often. And so.

No.

Or—

No.

Yeah, it was very strange for everyone involved, and they're like, "What the heck?"

I had to think, though. I just—I just kept thinking about Tara's family, and I'm like, "Gosh, that had to have been so hard for them."

I—I mean, just to know that someone's playing a game with your loved one's death, and then to think, "Oh, maybe we've got them," and then to have that ripped away.

I mean, talk about just rubbing salt in the wound, right?

Of course. But let's talk about Pain Lindsay, because this is somebody who seemingly just happened upon this case and really, really dove in. I—I loved hearing his origin story about, "Yeah, my grandma lived down there. I called Grandma."

Yeah.

And I mean, there was kind of a connection immediately. And he said, "Oh, that's a sign. Let's do it."

He could not have picked a better case.

Yeah.

You know, truly. He had the personal connection.

Mm-hmm.

It was ripe to be reopened and examined, and he started to get people to talk, you know? I think it's absolutely fair to say that Pain Lindsay shook the trees, got people talking, got renewed interest in the case.

It's interesting to me when I hear, when we talk about podcasters who, one, take a sustained interest in a case to the degree that I mean, they almost have their own case file, right? Like, have their own notes, their own, you know, research and things that they found.

Mm-hmm.

And then are able to move the needle forward, because there's always a part of me that thinks, "Why didn't police do that? This is just a regular person."

Yeah.

No investigative skills, no formal training.

Mm-hmm.

And basically, it was just dogged determination that—that led them to be able to bring forth some results.

I mean, I think what happens is that, you know, there—there's a case, the police are doing everything they can, and then it cools off, and they get busy.

And again, I should say, certainly no—no shade to officers, because I know that law enforcement is doing their best, right, in so many of these cases.

Yeah.

And in many of these cases. You know, it was interesting in talking to him or hearing you talk to Pain Lindsay. Now, he said there were some people who a lot of people in her inner circle didn't really want to talk, right? I mean, that's something that we're familiar with, but.

Yeah.

It was ultimately, once he kind of started to build some credibility and—and people said, "Okay, maybe—maybe he's onto something here," that people started to—to open up.

Well, yeah.

I mean, we're familiar with that, right?

I mean, imagine being, you know, a—a small-town outsider.

Yeah.

And—and you're—you're bringing up one of the most sensitive chapters of that town's history, a high-profile disappearance and presumed murder.

Sure.

And you don't know these people. They don't know you.

Mm-hmm.

And you're asking them to talk. It's not easy.

It's not.

You know.

I'm curious. I'm curious, as you were working on this story and over the course of the years that you've worked on this story, did you have you and, you know, the producers who worked on it with you kind of have some of those similar experiences where people were apprehensive at first and then came around or more willing to speak to you after seeing that you stayed on it for so long?

Yeah. I mean, getting Marcus to sit down. Marcus was one of them, the gentleman who went forward, came forward to the police and said that Beau had told him the story at Christmas about a woman, you know, who disappeared.

Mm-hmm.

He—he opened up to us as well.

I have to say that among the many interviews that you had in here, and they were all so good, there was one that I recognized, the local reporter, Tony Thomas. I—I know him.

Tony.

I saw Tony Thomas.

Oh, okay.

We were local reporters together. We were rivals.

Nice.

At Rival Stations. Yes.

Nice.

But we're friends.

Well, we—you know, we love interviewing local reporters.

Yeah.

Who bring color, who've been on the case for a long time. They're boots on the ground. You know, they.

Yeah.

They live in that—that area, and.

Absolutely. But it does. It brings a—a different perspective. And Tony's such a great reporter.

Yeah.

He's the kind of reporter when I would show up on a scene and he was there, I'm like, "Oh, Tony's here. He probably—he probably knows stuff," right? So it was—it was a joy to see him. That was so fun. When we come back, we have an extra clip from Andrea's interview with Special Agent Gary Rothwell about a long-forgotten tip that was buried in the case file.

I loved the fact that Beau Dukes was listening to this podcast and was very clearly affected by it. What kind of a person was Beau Dukes?

He came from a prominent family in town. They—you know, they owned those orchards, some of the orchards in town, and he had been in the military.

Do you think that that impacted just when that first tip came through from his former army buddy who, "Hey, we went out, we got drunk," and he just started saying these things? Do you think that that, just his standing in the community, impacted how he was treated?

Yeah, the—when you go back to the myth stuff, right? You have the army buddy who says that he told the police. They say they have no record of him telling them.

Mm-hmm.

And then he comes back around and tells them again.

Again.

This time the GBI listens. But then there's another missed opportunity, which is the—the—the people who had started the Find Tara, the Facebook group. They had given the names, Beau and Ryan.

Yeah.

And they didn't.

Use.

Didn't go anywhere.

Yeah.

So there were just—unfortunately, there were missed opportunities in this case where some, you know, heartache maybe could have—could have been diminished a little bit earlier on if.

Mm-hmm.

If they had some—if the family had some answers.

I know that you had to ask the—the former agent about that and—and—and pressed him on it. I found myself thinking, like, how do—how does something like that slip through the cracks, right?

Yeah, he felt so guilty. But he said, as the guy at the top, as the lead investigator, you know, "I take the responsibility, and I feel terrible." And he got emotional in the interview because he did devote so much of his life to it, and it could have been solved sooner.

Sure.

We have another clip with my interview with the former GBI agent, Gary Rothwell.

Let's listen to that clip.

After the arrest was announced, Andy and Janice Park, who had run the Find Tara website, they got ahold of me that night and they said, "Y'all have heard of these names before." Someone that Andy and Janice Park knew told them that he had been at a party, a bonfire party outdoors with a bunch of people, local kids, and that a couple of guys had—had made statements, "Ah, yeah, we're the ones that killed her, and we burned her up in a pit."

It's tough.

It—it's, you know, it lived with me the rest of my life. But, you know, it—it would it have changed the—the trial outcome? You know, that's—that's a counterfactual. I don't know.

You feel Gary's pain talking about that because imagine that that consumes your life. A case consumes your—your career until your retirement.

Sure.

And, wow, there was a tip that was right under your nose.

Yes. And he said, you

know, that local law enforcement heard it, saw it wasn't founded. "We didn't follow up. That was a mistake." To hear him just—I mean, that straightforward, just cop to that.

Ouch.

To say, "That was our mistake."

Ouch.

Yeah.

Yeah. But they're human, you know?

Mm-hmm.

And they're—and there were a lot of moving parts. There were a lot of men to look at. I mean, they did hundreds of DNA swabs.

Mm-hmm.

You know, so in hindsight, it's like, "Ooh, it's like a flashing neon sign," right? This tip.

Sure.

No, it's when you're buried in the biggest case file in GBI history.

Yeah.

You have to put it into context and perspective.

Yeah.

That, you know, there's no neon flashing sign. There are thousands and thousands of tips and people to look at. And, you know, so you can see how things fall through the cracks.

Sure. Yeah. I do not envy.

It's just unfortunate.

Do not envy their positions at all.

Eventually, they were able to take two men to trial.

Mm-hmm.

You know, so—so Ryan Duke is blaming Beau Dukes.

And, Andrea, we should note that at this point, Beau had already been convicted on charges related to Tara's death, including making false statements to investigators and concealing a death.

They bring him in to the courtroom, and it's one of those kind of gasp moments. Beau Dukes is in the courtroom, and, you know, the defense, they go to ask him questions on the stand, and he pleads the fifth. And, you know, what does that say to the jury? They're trying to point the finger at Beau like he's—he's your real killer.

Yes.

And now he's on the stand pleading the fifth. So it gives the jury pause, like, "Wait, what? Like, who was it? Beau? Was it Ryan?"

Of course. I mean, I think that you nailed it when you asked. Any time somebody just repeatedly says, "I'm pleading the fifth. I'm pleading the fifth," you're thinking, "Okay, clearly you have something to hide."

Right.

Clearly there's something going on.

Right.

Yes.

And is this really the right—do we have the right guy? Because, you know, they're both pointing the finger at each other.

I mean, when you listen to it, I mean, really, did it come down to this, "Who are you going to believe?" right? "Which—which version of events are you going to believe?"

Mm-hmm.

I mean, the way this ends, Ryan Duke is acquitted, right? Like, there's—there's an acquittal. Everyone kind of has their own idea of their own kind of hypothesis of, like, what happened. It's just kind of human nature to feel incomplete if you don't know what—what's happened. So naturally.

Right.

People want that answer.

Yeah. And imagine being the family.

Yeah.

And—and not knowing where your loved one is.

Yes.

I mean, it's a—it's a whole other level of pain, the—the not knowing.

Mm-hmm.

I mean, it's bad enough that they're gone and you're—they're presumed dead, and then hopefully someone is brought to justice. But I would say almost always, at least in the cases I've covered where there's nobody, the killers never seem to give it up.

Yeah.

They just won't say where the person is.

Mm-hmm.

And I see it time and time again, and I think to myself, "Do the right thing. You know, close that chapter of—of where this person is. Like, you're already going to prison. Just give the family some peace so they can at least bring home their loved one."

It always feels so unnecessarily cruel.

Yes.

And—and almost like a power grab. Like, "This is the last bit of power I have."

Yeah.

"Even though I'm going to prison, I—I have this power over you still."

Yeah.

It—it's—it's driven by cruelty, I believe.

I agree with you.

And how did Tara's family feel about this? I mean, that's hard.

Her mother had passed away, but clearly it did not sit well with her friends and family. They felt injustice. They—they, you know, this was not the ending. This was not the ending that they wanted. They truly believe that Ryan did this. The people we spoke to. They don't feel like the wrong guy was—was on trial and that, you know, maybe Beau did this. Now, and there certainly are people who feel Beau may have done this, even though Beau has never been charged with that crime or accused by law enforcement of killing Tara.

Yeah.

But, you know, you do have mixed feelings out there of—of who did it. But Tara's inner circle believes it was Ryan.

Wow.

But Ryan has denied it. He was acquitted, and that is the outcome, and that is what they have to live with.

Andrea, this was—this was a—a fantastic episode, so many twists. And I loved talking Dateline with you, as always. Thanks.

Yeah. Thanks, Blaine.

And coming up after the break, we have senior producer Brad Davis and producer Marissa Meyer, both of whom worked on this episode, who will be here to answer some of your questions from social media.

We are back. I'm Dateline producer Marissa Meyer, one of the producers who worked on this story. Blaine and Andrea are out in the field this week, so joining me for our social media questions is Dateline's senior producer Brad Davis, who found this story. Hi, Brad.

Hey, Marissa. How are you?

Good. How are you doing?

Good.

So starting off, Linda Davis Brown on Facebook wants to know whatever happened to the married cop Tara had an affair with. Did his wife know about it?

Yeah, that man's name was Heath Dykes. He is, I believe, still a police officer with the Perry Police Department, which is about an hour north of—of Osceola, where this happened. And we—we—we have to assume that his wife found out about it, but he testified in the trial for Ryan Duke about his efforts to reach Tara that weekend. So he is still around and—and still a police officer.

Keith Warhola on Facebook says, "Regardless of who committed the Tara Grinstead murder, does anyone know why she was killed? Or does anyone have any speculation as to why?"

The only thing that we can say about that, really, is that Ryan Duke initially confessed to the murder, saying that he wanted to get into her house to find some money or something that could help him, you know, with his drug habit. And that's what he said in his confession. But, of course, he recanted that confession in his defense on the stand. So we're sort of left with no real, you know, answer to the question about motive. That still remains an unresolved mystery.

Yeah. On to our next one. The Sealed Docket podcast on Facebook says, "You can hear how much she meant to her student and that whole town. Tara should still be there." Brad, do you really get a sense of in—in the episode about Tara and how much she was loved and how much she gave back so much to—to her students and—and to really everyone in her life?

Yeah, she really was an active member of the community, not only at the—at the school, but, you know, working with the—the young women on the pageants and was really, you know, invested in the town itself. She was the kind of person that was really missed. You and I have both talked to so many, you know, friends of hers, and—and I've been talking to family members, you know, some of whom didn't, you know, want to end up going on television, but they were glad that we were doing this story and—and—and, you know, preserving Tara's memory.

Yeah. And something that I think we didn't get to add in the episode, Brad, didn't she also coach the cheerleading team, I think, as well? And.

Yeah, I believe she did. Yeah. I mean, she—her—her work at the school went, you know, in a lot of different directions.

It was just kind of maybe 20, 30, 40 percent of what she actually did in that community we were able to touch on.

Yeah.

Mary Newman on Facebook says, "If it hadn't been for Up and Vanish and Payne Lindsay, the case would still be unsolved." Yeah, he definitely got the needle moving.

Yeah, that's correct. I mean, this case was definitely a situation where Payne Lindsay created an atmosphere. He was, you know, at the—at the moment that certain people were coming forward, you know, like John McCullough, Brooke Sheridan, these people were coming forward, and then eventually Beau Dukes himself comes forward. During much of that, Payne Lindsay was doing his podcast. And even though he was not aware of any of those people at the time, the fact that he was doing the podcast and sort of asking questions got the community so stirred up that it created this atmosphere that I think really led people, like, led Beau Dukes and Brooke, you know, to come forward ultimately.

I know. I think Andrea really said it best in the episode too when she has that in her interview with Payne where she says, "Pressure, pressure, pressure."

Yeah.

Because it kind of feels like, yeah, he—he created this pressure cooker atmosphere.

Yeah.

Almost that led to it.

Exactly. And—and Brooke Sheridan in her affidavit with the GBI, when she talked to the GBI, she—she said, you know, the podcast was something that was weighing on Beau's mind, that it—I think it stirred up a lot of these issues for him and eventually led her to talk to her mom, who then talked to the police and then got Beau into the GBI.

Okay. So for our last question, this was a really big topic on Twitter the night the episode aired, Brad. And you're from Georgia, so I think you're probably the best person for us to talk about this with. David Neely on Facebook says, "It's Puck-Kahn. There's a lot of debate on the correct pronunciation. What do you usually say, Brad?"

Well, I would say that David is right, that it is Puck-Kahn. That's what we say. I'm from Atlanta, and that's what we say in the South. We say Puck-Kahn. I have never heard anyone down there say Peak-an. That—that's what I would go with. So kudos to David to getting that right. As far as, you know, I know it's some—some say Peak-an is still correct, which is probably—it's probably fine.

So it's—it's not a dealer's choice situation.

No, okay.

If you're in Georgia, it's.

Yes, it's Puck-Kahn if you're in Georgia. Let's just say that.

Okay.

Peak—Puck-Kahn, Peak-an, let's call the whole thing off.

Thank you so much for coming up and answering some social questions with us, Brad.

Thank you, Marissa.

And that's it for Talking Dateline for this week. Thank you so much for listening. Remember, if you have questions about our stories, you can always DM us your audio or video on our social media channels @datelineNBC, or you can leave us a voicemail. Just give us a call at 212-413-5252 for a chance to be featured right here. And you can always watch the video version of Talking Dateline on YouTube and on the NBC News app and on Peacock. And, of course, we'll see you Fridays on Dateline on NBC.