Bonus: Tara Grinstead Update + TV Show
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Previously on Up and Vanished. You'll remember Grinstead as the former beauty queen turned teacher who disappeared from her home in Osceola way back in 2005. This case is cold as Alaska. In the past hour, Ryan Duke made his first court appearance just minutes after authorities announced his arrest. Irwin County Public Defender John Mobley, who's representing murder suspect Ryan Duke, asked for the gag order right after his client was arrested. There has been a second arrest today.

Today we learned authorities have arrested Bo Dukes on charges of hindering the apprehension of a criminal and tampering with evidence. We're looking for answers. The community wants to know. This was a big thing for such a small community, and we want answers. We want to know what happened. Supreme Court of Georgia has thrown out a gag order in the Tara Grinstead case. Do-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da. Do-da-da-da-da-da-da-da.

From Tenderfoot TV in Atlanta, this is Up and Vanished. I'm your host, Payne Lindsey. Ever since a judge issued a gag order in Tara Grinstead's case, things in Osceola got pretty silent. The local media fought hard to remove it, and eventually, they were successful.

The gag order in Tara Grinstead's case has been lifted, and I'm excited to announce that the Up and Vanish team has gone back to Osceola to follow up on the disappearance of Tara Grinstead. But this time, we filmed everything. Up and Vanish is coming to TV in a one-night special on the Oxygen Network on Sunday, November 18th at 7 p.m. Eastern Time. To get you guys prepped for the TV show, I'd like to share some behind-the-scenes moments and a few interviews that didn't make the show.

For those of you who listened to season one from the beginning, I think you'll like our first stop. I found time to come by for-- Yeah, come on out here. I brought my cameras with me. Oh, my lord. How you doing? How you doing? Good to see you. I love you. How you been?

Did you? It smells good. We're here filming the TV show for Up and Vanished. Yeah, so we're back in Osceola again, investigating Tara's case and trying to figure out what happened. Uh-huh.

Not a thing. Not a thing. Nothing. I haven't heard anything. Really? Really, I haven't heard a thing. But, you know, my generation...

They don't know much about a podcast, you know, and they haven't, you know, my age, they haven't listened to it. Well, you do. I do. You got an iPhone. I do. You're hip, that's why. You want to come in? I do, actually, yeah. Do you mind? No, uh-uh.

Morning, Mason. How you doing, honey? Good. Good. You brought the gnats in with you. I did. I know. Sorry. That's one thing I hate about southwest Georgia. There's so many bugs here. Huh? There's so many bugs here. I know it. Well, take some back with you to Atlanta. Okay, I'll try, yeah. You don't have the gnats, do you? No, not like this. This is way different. I know it. Oh, Alexis, stop music. She didn't hear me, did she? I don't think so.

Before going to Osceola to shoot some interviews, I sat down with my brother and my grandma and asked her how things have been in town since the arrest. If you remember, my grandma lives in South Georgia, less than 20 minutes from Osceola. And just like everyone else there, she's been following this case for years.

I was trying to surprise you. Okay. Did it work? This is a surprise. This is a surprise. It really is. Good gracious. So what are y'all going to do now? Are you going back to Osceola? We're going back to Osceola now. I came here first to see you. Well, thank you. Well, when you go to the restaurant, do they know you there? I mean, how...

how the people reacted when you, you know, sell it. A year ago they did, so I'm assuming that they might know me even more now. I don't know if they like me or hate me or what, but I think they're definitely going to know we're here. But do you think that Tara's case is still a very sensitive subject down here? I think so. I think so, but I wish, gosh, I wish they could go to trial and get it over with, you know. I really do. And I think it was...

It was an accident, you know. But the fact still remains, she's dead. Well, what about Bo? What has happened to him? Not Ryan, Bo. What's happened to him? Is he working there or moved? Do you know anything about him? I think Bo's working at his girlfriend's mom's restaurant. Uh-huh. And he's just hanging out, walking the streets.

- God. - Waiting tables, I don't know. - That's unreal, isn't it? - It's bizarre. - I don't know how in the world they've lived with themselves this long with all of that, you know. Well, why is it that it's taken so long for him to go to court, why? Is it expensive or what? - I think that they don't have a good case. I mean, it's always expensive, but he has a public defender, and I'm sure it's a complicated case, and I guess he's just asking for the most time he could possibly get to,

put up a good defense, but I don't really know. I mean, they're taking their time. I hope it all works out for you, honey. I hope all this thing will come to an end, you know, and really have closure to it. Before leaving my grandma's house, I had to ask. Do you have any cookies? I do. Let me get some. I keep them in my fridge. Cowboy cookies. Uh-huh. You can't pass that up. I pass a lot of them out, but I'll be honest, I ate a lot of them, too. Did you? I did.

While we were down in Osceola, my business partner Donald sat down with Matt Seal, the mayor.

Small town life in Osceola. Everyone likes to think that they are very unique and special, but I'm sure we're like a lot of other small towns. Everybody knows everybody. And there's just a real sense of community that sometimes gets lost in a big city. So I actually have lived in both a big city and small town for the small town myself.

Osceola is just a great place, hardworking people. Most of the people that live here now grew up here and have family here and five, seven generations have farmed the land in Irwin County. But then there are increasingly people like myself who stumbled upon it and decided to call it home and just made themselves part of the community. What was the atmosphere like in the following weeks after Terry Grintz had disappeared?

Anytime something like that happens, it just does a ripple effect in the whole town. It's not something that's just every day. Imagine in a bigger city, you hear about a crime every day, every other day. It seems to shake a small town a little more. And so that was no different here in 2005. Just the idea that, hey, that kind of thing just doesn't happen here, and yet here it had. What happened? It was a mystery. That sense of community I've already described really came out because...

Every weekend and even in between weekends there were there were people getting together Going out to search look for clues look for you know any signs that would that would lead to the answers to those questions just as Something like that kind of rocks a small town Maybe a little harder than in a place with a larger population where people don't know everybody She's a schoolteacher and so she was very well known very well liked

That same small town atmosphere is what caused the community to really come together and search for answers and just comfort each other.

When did you first hear that there were arrests made in this case? Police Chief Billy Hancock, he let me know that there was going to be a press conference, that there was an arrest made. I was given the name, but I didn't ask for any other information. I just knew that things were moving, and I knew that was going to bring a lot of attention to Osceola. And you were there. You saw it too. I mean, this courtroom was absolutely packed in a way that I've never seen before. The TV crews, we're not used to TV crews in Osceola.

It was a big deal. There was a faceless person responsible and now we had a face and now we had a name. We got to see him. And I mean, on the podcast, I remember the audio. Hearing the chains as he came in, it was dramatic.

It certainly brought some answers, but then of course it brought more questions. So while it brought some sense of closure, which was certainly needed and welcome, it brought other questions too. So it wasn't a complete end. The theories and the talk, and you explored some of that stuff on the podcast before the arrest. It closed the door on who wasn't responsible. And I think that was the best benefit because that came to an end.

So there were two names that we found out about right before the press conference. Ryan Duke, Bo Dukes. We actually talked at length about do we put Bo Dukes' name out there to the public before authorities have the opportunity to. We met with you at the Osceola Star actually. That's right. We were discussing the case. You happened to be there. You helped us make that decision. Do you remember that? I do. I do. How that went down? Well, I mean, really, like I said, the arrest was able to close out some theories.

and my fear, and I still stand by what I said that day, there was rumors going around. And his name came up. And until those rumors were grounded in something, I was not interested in having just more rumors and pretty much start the process all over again of what happened in Osceola and Irwin County in 2005.

that I'm always going to be, when it comes to my city, and I guess this is my responsibility as the mayor, I'm supposed to be a good steward of the finances, but also as much as I can the community and the social and cultural aspect. I mean, if there's a way to keep that kind of thing from inflaming a rumor mill, I'll always err to that side. Do you think Ryan Duke and Bo Dukes can get a fair trial here in Irwin County with so many people knowing about the case?

I think that would be difficult. And we were talking before we got on here, your episodes with Phillip Holloway actually is where a lot of this information will come from. I know there's already been discussion about where a trial would have to be because in Irwin County, it would be too much of a challenge and there'd be too much doubt that it could be fair. I think they have to look for similar demographics. And so it'd be a similar enough community, but far enough away that

Whatever community they pick in the whole state of Georgia has likely heard about this case and heard the name. It's just too big for you to find a place that nobody has, but in a place that hasn't been quite as saturated with the news and the rumors and the conjecture and, you know, the theories that obviously the Sill and Irwin County being where this happened, it's just been too involved in. So, Beaudou's comes from a pretty prominent local family.

Do you think that could directly or indirectly benefit his trial? I'm sure that would be a question if it was in Irwin County. I know that anytime someone is loosely connected to what anyone would consider a prominent political family or person, there's always going to be the suspicion there's something like that.

Personally, I don't know how much that actually would have played into, but just the idea that that question is going to be raised and we're going to ask the question, then I'm sure some level of care will be taken to make sure that's at least minimized.

In a small town, everybody's connected to somebody that's an elected official at the local, the state level. It's got a third cousin that's on the board of something in Georgia. Just because it's just so small, you can't not be related to somebody. I think people like to make a little more of that than maybe is actually true. It does make good media, but I don't know how much that would actually play into it.

Whenever you're dealing with someone of political prominence or someone connected to anybody of any level of power, you probably have just as many people that would actually hold that against that person than would actually help them out anyway. So, you know, it kind of cuts both ways on something like that. Derek Bauer is a First Amendment lawyer who represented NBC affiliates in Atlanta and battled the gag order. Within days of Ryan Duke's arrest, there was a gag order in this case.

Is that strange to you? It's highly unusual in criminal cases, even high-profile criminal cases. Gag orders are generally the exception, not the rule. Why so quickly? It's a cold case, the largest case in GBI history. It's an unsolved murder of someone who was a prized citizen in the community. So it immediately garnered a lot of attention.

What happens when a gag order is entered is everybody understands that that means if you talk, you go to jail. Was this gag order a violation of the First Amendment? It was, and that's what the Georgia Supreme Court ruled. What's it going to take to really find out what happened to Tara? A fair trial.

That's exactly what should happen. And we don't dispense justice in secret in this country. The community of Osceola needs to know and feel comforted that law enforcement has the right people, that they don't need to be afraid that there's still a killer on their loose in the community, and the public has an equal interest in making sure that those are the right people.

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I actually met Tracy while working on season one, so I asked her to come talk to us again. With so much speculation about where and how Tara's remains were found, I thought her perspective would be helpful. Dogs tell us two things. They tell us where something is and where something isn't. And again, these dogs are trained to find people dead or alive. We start our search efforts at essentially ground zero.

where was the person last seen or believed to have been? In this case, Tara was believed to have been in her house where she was last known to be. Not where she was last seen, but where she was last known to be. So we expand outwardly and we always start what we call the high probable areas first, based upon a lot of variables.

As with any case, places change, areas change, memories change. So it gets much more difficult. And my experience is that, especially if you're looking in a wooded area, dogs are really a great and vital resource to help cover those areas. You're looking in the woods...

Things have grown up now. Things have changed. You don't see what you're looking for. Where we are very limited in our visual capabilities if we're searching through the woods or even in an environment like this, it's very easy to overlook something, even a full-sized body.

Certainly if you're now looking at maybe bones or fragments, it's very difficult to see that with our own eyes. So dogs, you can't hide scent from them. It doesn't matter how wooded it is or how long it's been. These dogs have found remains over 250 years old.

When Tara disappeared, we were called in because I have search dogs. And I was called in by the local law enforcement officials, the sheriff's office, and the police department. And then, of course, from there, the GBI got involved and also assisted them as well.

Over the years, we've been requested to come down and search different areas. All of them have been wooded areas. When we first initially started the search, while we were searching in a wooded area, there was a burned-out structure that they asked us to come and search. Cap Dragon Road?

Yes, yes. So we searched that area. That's the only structure or building, so to speak, that we searched. The dogs did indicate in that area and we determined it was human scent, but it was not human remains specifically related to Tara in this case. In this situation, the dogs did alert at that burn structure. When we looked at it,

And in every case we look at, when these dogs indicate to us that they are located human remains sent, we, as the human part of this equation and this team, is this related to the case? Is it evidence? What's going on? Why the dogs alert here? Was there a body here and then moved later on? Is there a crime scene here or is it totally unrelated?

We determined this was an older home with very old piping systems, that the dogs actually alerted to the pipe that was going to the bathroom and to the septic system. The dogs were right. They told us there's human remains sent here, but it's not related to Tara's case and it's not evidence for this case.

If a body's been burned, 10 plus years later, could a dog still pick up that scent? - Yes they can. Yes they can. I wanna say as a proof, as example of that, the sugar plant disaster that happened a number of years ago here in South Georgia, in the Savannah area. We actually searched that area

And based upon what the investigators told us, they had temperatures ranging from anywhere from 1,000 degrees to about 4,500 degrees. Extremely hot temperatures. There were still two persons missing in this huge, enormous area. Very dangerous, very complicated, very difficult to search for people and dogs. And the dogs were able to locate...

the remains of the last two victims in that disaster. So that showed us, even in these extremely, not only hot, burned conditions for the remains, but also all of the smells. You've got just a vast amount of odor that we can smell. We can only imagine what the dogs are picking up. So they were not only able to locate these dogs

burned remains, even fragments, but also throughout all of those smells and be able to distinguish we've got human remains sent here versus all of the chemicals that they're having to process through and say, no, that's not what I'm looking for. And I've learned over the years, honestly, Payne,

Dogs' noses are a lot better than my brain. So I trust these dogs. They have this amazing, incredible ability to pick up and detect things. These dogs are amazing. You can't hide things from dogs. You can't. So even if Tara's remains are burned, and even after all of these years, absolutely dogs can locate that. Dr. Maurice Godwin also joined us in Osceola, and he brought all of his original crime scene photographs.

And together, we sat down to go over them. Now that Ryan and Bo have been charged, if there was indeed a struggle inside Tara's home on that fateful night, then the evidence would be in here. Okay, this is the picture of the lamp.

There had to be light. She couldn't see in the dark. So either she had the lamp on or she had her overhead light on. So I believe she had this lamp on. The lamp's definitely broken here. Oh, yeah, it's definitely broken. So was this lamp, in your opinion, broken before? It's been confirmed the lamp was not broken before that Saturday night. This lamp was broken during some type of altercation between Tara and the perpetrator or perpetrators. Obviously, it could have been broken in a struggle situation.

I mean, to me it makes more sense that it could have fallen off the nightstand. You say that's not likely. Not to have that stress marks in the plastic that would require two hands to break it. Why would somebody use their hands to break a lamp? In that type of confrontation like that, it's hard to find a switch.

I mean, so you just have to do the fastest thing, right? So you're saying someone was scrambling to turn the lights off in that place? Oh yes. And in that action of scrambling to turn the lights off, they grabbed the lamp and snapped it in that... That's right. This black piece here popped off of that and this was laying under the bed. Point is, it suggests possible struggle. And the second point is that the GBI didn't take the lamp.

and they didn't find this piece of plastic here. GBI came out in October. They said that there wasn't any sign of struggle. Well, regardless of how it got broken, the lamp is broken. That's clear. It was a piece of plastic on the ground that you found. This picture clearly shows that the top of the lamp is kind of snapped open. We don't know how it got broken, but if you're saying that there was no evidence that this was broken before that night, then it happened before.

in some sort of struggle inside Tara's home. Well, I confirmed the lamp was not broken by family and friends. Well, we got a minute. I'm going to buy that truck I've been wanting.

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What's this right here? This is a clasp from a necklace and you can see that it's actually pulled apart.

This class by itself is meaningless, basically. Without the necklace being the beads on the floor, that's correct. But the GBI found beads on the floor from a broken necklace. That's right. They were found on the floor scattered on the wooden floor at the foot of her bed. I didn't find those. That was before I got there. But so I knew that. So I went and got on my knees on the floor and

She had the old-timey floors with crevices, cracks between them that were stained. So I started looking with a magnifying glass, going up and down each one of those crevices. - Jeez. - Well, I mean, you got a missing teacher. They don't know what happened. This is a possible major case, right?

For sure. And even if it wasn't a major case, you still should take these kind of steps. So I found a clasp here. This clasp from that necklace she had on that night? I don't know. See, here's the thing. This is not direct evidence like DNA or fingerprint. This is circumstantial evidence. So in order for this clasp to make sense,

there has to be known that the necklace was, the beads were laid on the floor and broken. And so when you put those two pieces of the puzzle together, that makes more sense. - So with those two things put together, you're saying that- - Force pulled this apart. - What kind of force? - From a hand. - As in grabbing and pulling the necklace? - That's right, that's exactly right. Her trying to get away and the perpetrator trying to control her.

I did a cursory search of the house and this is the bedroom window where she would turn the lamp is at where Joe would look at to see if she was home or not. And this was a jarred but if you actually look in the center here you can see that this actually is bent. The aluminum in the frame of the screen is bent and this was off. I questioned Joe about it next door he said that window, that screen been like that for a long time.

So you just stared at that broken window for a long time? That's what I asked him and then he asked me to leave. But most interesting that goes with this is this. This is inside of her house, that window looking toward Joe's house. And this is the latch that holds the two windows together.

I didn't lift that up. That was already like that. So this latch had been loosened. So when she walked in her bedroom, she walked over to where the phone was, that little table beside the bed. Now, this woman, Tara, lived alone, right? Mm-hmm. I do not think that she...

over long periods of time looked at these screws in this latch without doing something about it. She was going to change the locks. She wouldn't leave this like this. Yeah, I talked to her friend Maria. She told me that Tara was really cautious about locking her doors and had this fear of an intruder. So why would Tara leave her window unlocked like that? That's right. It's out of character for her.

What we do know is that she was at the theater that night. She left the theater. She left the theater by 725 to 730. This was confirmed to me by one of the pageant participants who walked Tara to her car. And she said Tara was in good spirits. And she said that Tara told her that she had to go to her boss's barbecue place.

So the next location we know she was at was at the barbecue. She was at Troy Davis's house here. But before then, she stopped, she arrived in Osceola about quarter to eight. She went by her landlord's son's house, which is directly behind Troy Davis's house. That's right. And they spoke for about 15 minutes, right? They spoke about 15 minutes, and then she just pulled up

up here in Troy's and turned into the driveway. And then she stayed there. She received a lot of calls and made several calls. Then she left, Troy saw her out about 11 o'clock. And then she drove about a half a mile to her house over here, turned in, and in the blink of eye, she up and vanished.

- So technically, Troy's house is the last place she was known to be at. - The last place that she was known to be at and it was the last person other than the killer to see her. - That's right. In driving from the barbecue to her house,

That's when she could have possibly seen this party or pulled into her driveway and maybe Bo and Ryan or whoever else were outside going to their car. Maybe they saw each other, said hey, and that's how they met up. How far is that party house from Terrace House?

across the street, across from the mailbox. - So she would pass it coming from close? - Oh, when she turned left into her driveway, her call would be right in front of the house. - So it's right in front of it. If somebody was in the driveway across the street-- - Or on the porch. - Or on the porch, no doubt she would've saw him. - They would've saw him, yeah. I think by 1:30 a.m., I think she was dead.

- Why? - I just, within two hours after she got back home, I think she was dead. - She likely went home because her clothes, her outfit from that night was inside of her house, arms there. - Oh, she went home. - Or at least it looks like she went home. - Oh, she went home and her phone was there. She went home. - To be honest, I'm not personally convinced that she definitely went home.

There's evidence to support that with her car being there, her phone being there, her outfit being there. But if anyone's saying that the glove is a plant, why couldn't anything else be a plant too? We don't know for a fact she went home because no one saw her go home. Yeah, well, there's a possibility that, I mean, it's a stretch that... And where's her purse and keys? Somebody probably burned it or took it from her.

Unless someone stole her purse and keys from her house, that means that she went somewhere with her purse and keys. That's true. And her purse and keys stayed where she was. And that supports her leaving. Either way, somehow, her purse and keys traveled from her house to somewhere else. Either she took them there herself...

or somebody she was somewhere else that night or someone stole them from her now i mean it's possible uh but it's a stretch that they when they removed her clothes rather than burning their clothes they removed her clothes and and and took the phone and carried them back to the house and just throw them on floor if you're going to go through all the trouble of taking a phone back to tara's house and putting it on the charger bringing yourself back to

the person's house. That's why. Why would you not put the person keys back in there, too? I know. One more thing that I always thought was weird. The front door to her house was locked. That's right. Meaning that someone had to lock it with her keys, the keys that are, in fact, missing. That's right. Yeah, I think either way, somebody else was at Tara's house that night. Was she there at the same time? I don't know. But somebody else was there because her door was locked and her keys were gone.

Unless Tara left on her own without her phone and went somewhere else and just never made it back. Either way, we're just speculating at this point. What's interesting is that we're looking at all these details now, 12 years later. This could mean, all this could mean nothing, really. It's a window was unlocked. Maybe she just unlocked it that night or it was just always like that. It was no big deal. Or maybe she never even knew.

There was a clasp on the ground. Or maybe all these things are pieces to a puzzle that say that there was a struggle inside the home. Nothing's definitive here, but, you know, we don't have much else to look at, to be honest. The night Tara went missing, she was in this same theater? Yes. It's been nearly 13 years ago now. The night Tara was here, maybe even somebody could have been stalking her. You don't know. In this theater? That individual could have been in this theater. So when the arrests happened...

- Was that a shock to you? - Absolutely. And I literally just broke down in tears. It was surreal. Ryan was a student here. I did not teach him, but I did know him and I've been friends with his family my whole life. - How do you know Ryan?

Ryan and I went to school together. We still kept in touch over the years a good bit, you know, like phone calls. How would you describe Ryan? A very calm individual, non-confrontational guy. Very quiet, very polite. He's an artsy kind of guy. He likes poetry. He is kind of like a hopeless romantic type. Was there a dark side to Ryan? Not really. Not that I ever know of. I don't know. I mean, the Ryan you know, is that guy capable of murder?

The Ryan Duke I know is not capable of murder, no. I do think Ryan had a hand afterwards. And going along with Bo's story, I think Ryan bought it hook, line, and sinker, honestly. Hey guys, don't forget, Up and Vanish is coming to TV Sunday, November 18th on Oxygen. Trust me, you don't want to miss this.

You can always roll up on the Hudson pecan orchard and see if someone can talk to us there. I don't know if Beau will be there, but I'm sure someone there knows where Beau is. Wait, hold on, hold on. Do we need to say pecan or pecan? I don't know how to say it, and I will never say it right, so I don't care. We get a lot of flack for that. We should pick one. Dude, no one knows. I say pecan. I started saying pecan. You did? Yeah. Oh, no, I was just trying to do the lighting adjustment. Oh. I'm going to say pecan.