Crime Junkie - MISSING: Esther Hollis

Episode Date: April 1, 2021

When Esther Hollis goes missing after a conversation with her husband, her best friend and sister try to get justice in what they believe is a no body homicide. For current Fan Club membership options and policies, please visit https://crimejunkieapp.com/library/. Source materials for this episode cannot be listed here due to character limitations. For a full list of sources, please visit https://crimejunkiepodcast.com/missing-esther-hollis/

Hi, Crime Junkies. I'm your host, Ashley Flowers. And I'm Britt. And today, we wanted to hop in your feed with an extra special ad-free surprise episode. This is a story about a woman who seemed to have everything she could ever want. She had a steady job, a loving husband, and a lifelong best friend. Everything seemed to be going perfectly until the day she vanished. This is the story of Esther Hollis. On September 13, 2011, in Bloomington, Indiana, which is like this college town that's about

hour, hour and a half from where I'm sitting right now in Indy. Yeah. This woman named Natalie Sterrett is at her favorite restaurant, waiting for her very best friend, Esther Hollis, to come meet her. Now, everyone calls Esther by her nickname, Estie. Calling her Esther would honestly be like me calling you Brittney. Yeah. Let's not do that.

I saw on Twitter the other day, someone was like, in an old episode, you called Brittney, and it honestly took me by surprise. I never even considered that her name was anything other than just Brittney. Yeah. I think I even said to that person, most of my friends don't even realize my name is Brittney, to be honest. Natalie and Estie, honestly, they sound a lot like you and me. They grew up together.

They've been best friends since forever. And regardless of anything else that's going on in their lives, they make it a point to get together every single Tuesday night for just some solid BFF time. They meet up at the Olive Garden, they have dinner, they have wine, maybe split a dessert, talk about life, all the inside jokes that no one else can understand. I love it. Yeah. It totally sounds like our Wednesday night dollar mark place that we went to, literally

every Wednesday after our old jobs for an amount of time and an amount of marks that I personally am just going to keep to myself for now. That much marks now at 32 would probably knock me over. Oh, yeah. We might die, for sure. So on this particular night, Estie is running late. Now, Natalie waits for 15 minutes, then a half hour, then a full hour. But there is no sign of Estie anywhere.

She's not picking up her phone. She's not answering her texts. And even though this is weird behavior for Estie, Natalie is telling herself, you know, don't panic. She could have had something come up at work. These things happen. And plus, like if anything was really wrong, like if Estie was in the hospital or something, Natalie knows that she'd have heard about it right now.

Estie's husband, Brandon, totally would have called her. So Natalie just kind of finishes up her wine. And as she's leaving the restaurant, she kind of gets this idea like, you know what, I'm just going to drive by her house and just like take a look, make sure everything's good. Again, this is a small town. And when she drives by, she sees the lights on like normal, but she also sees Brandon's truck in the driveway, which strikes her as a little bit odd since she spent enough time over there at the house to know that Estie usually is the one who parks in the driveway.

And Brandon normally parks out on the street. But again, not that weird. And I mean, if Estie wasn't home yet, you can see that, you know, why Brandon maybe wouldn't want to park on the street, your car can get dinged up, whatever. Oh, right. And like maybe he was planning on going out and then moving when she came back. Or I mean, really, does it matter? Right.

Exactly. So again, this isn't anything that's like keeping her up at night. But the next morning when she still hasn't heard from her best friend, things are starting to feel off. Like she can't deny that she's starting to get nervous. She knows Estie doesn't act like this and she knows she's going to be worried until she knows her best friend's okay, which I get totally get. I don't want to know my siblings are okay, my friends, my husband, otherwise it just

kind of like eats at you. So at about 9am, this is Wednesday morning, Natalie stops by Estie's workplace. She's a receptionist at this car dealership in town. She is always there by 830 on the dot at the absolute latest. But when Natalie goes inside, she sees something shocking. Estie's desk is empty. And when one of the sales guys hurries over to answer one of the phones that's ringing, he tells Natalie that Estie never showed up for work that day.

And more than just not showing up, like it's not like she called in. She was a no-call, no-show. Oh, Natalie's heart immediately plummets. This isn't right. It's one thing not to show up for dinner. It's a total another thing to miss work without even calling. And that's when this memory creeps into Natalie's mind. This memory that for a second gives her relief.

Last Tuesday, when they were having dinner, she remembers that Estie said something about needing to have an important talk with her husband, Brandon, and that if the talk didn't go well, that she actually might go stay with her sister, Bethany, for a bit. So does Natalie call Bethany? Well, more than that. I mean, she wants to act like at this point, put eyes on her best friend, even like just check in and make sure everything's okay. Because if she's at her sister's, it means they have this con bone.

It didn't go well. So Natalie goes over to Bethany's house hoping against hope that maybe she'll see Estie's car in the driveway, but it's not there when she pulls up. And when she talks to Bethany, who's home, she says that she hasn't even seen Estie in like the last week, hasn't even heard from her in a day or so. Oh, wow. And here's the thing. Bethany says that she knew Estie was upset about something going on with Brandon.

So she had actually been keeping the guest room ready just in case. Like, so she had had the same conversation with Estie as Natalie did, but she hadn't heard anything about her sister coming over, like nothing to make her worry. And again, she really hadn't only been talking to her for like a day. So Bethany wasn't on high alert or anything. And at that moment, this moment when they both realized they haven't talked to her, they hadn't seen her. That's when they both knew that they had no other choice.

They had to go to the police. Now Natalie and Bethany don't bother calling 911. I mean, they go directly down to the station and tell them that they want to report a missing person. Now they get the usual like questions. How long has this person been gone? Do you have any reason to think that they might be in danger or that they would want to leave themselves?

And Natalie kind of shares this look with Bethany and they both nod a little bit. Natalie tells the officer everything about how they've been looking for her, how it's totally unlike her to not show up for work or just to ghost people. And Natalie also tells the officer something else. So you remember that important thing that she wanted to talk to Brandon about that she had mentioned to Natalie at dinner, mentioned to her sister? Yeah. Now, even though she didn't outright say the word infidelity, Estie made it pretty clear

that she had been thinking that her husband Brandon had been cheating on her. And so that Tuesday before she said sometime in the next week, she was finally going to confront him about it. Wait, what do you mean that she like had these feelings that did she have any proof or tips off on this? So a little bit. I mean, no solid proof. That's why, again, she wasn't like throwing around the word infidelity, but she kind of

walked Natalie through this feeling that she'd been having in her gut for months, that something wasn't right with them and it was only getting stronger and stronger. And there was like weird things that kept happening. Like he would come home later and later saying that he was working late, but like his lips and teeth were always like red wine stained when he came home. And finally, when her suspicions were at like this all time high, Estie said that she actually checked the monthly statements for their credit cards and she found a couple of these really mysterious charges.

One was for a necklace. The other was for a pair of earrings. And the charges were from like months ago. And since Brandon hadn't given her any gifts lately and she knows she didn't buy them, she knew or at least believed that he was buying them for someone else. Right. So Natalie and Bethany tell all of this to the officer who's taking all this information down.

He's like typing it into the computer system. But as the officer is typing in her name, he suddenly stops. He says, oh, you don't need to report Esther as missing because. What? Yeah. She's already been reported missing by her husband, Brandon. Oh my God. Natalie and Bethany are chilled to the bone and their shock only gets worse as the officer

keeps talking. Apparently, Brandon came in late the night before, which is basically like the early morning hours of the same day that they're there and explained that he and his wife had had an argument earlier in the evening and she got so heated that she took off. And so he says, you know, he waits around. He waits around thinking she's going to come back. And when she wasn't home by 2 a.m., he says that he got worried that something might have happened and he wanted to file a report just in case, you know, maybe she showed up at

a hospital or a jail or something. As a precaution. Right. So they took the report, but the officer tells Natalie and Bethany that the police are kind of just playing the waiting game. Like, listen, she hasn't been gone that long. We're pretty sure she's going to come back as soon as she cools down. But all of this feels so wrong to Natalie and Bethany.

If she was missing and like Brandon was worried about her, why wouldn't Brandon have called either one of them? Or even like check with them to see if she's at one of their houses before saying she's missing. And like, I don't know, maybe she's just going to show up at a hospital somewhere. That seems really bizarre to me. Exactly. Like if you get a fight with your husband, when you think the first thought is like, oh,

she went and stayed with a friend, like maybe she doesn't want to be home. But like, I'm not going to think that something terrible happened within hours. Like a friend or a sibling or a family member, something not like a hospital or a prison. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And this is obviously like they're having the same feeling. But no matter how hard Natalie and Bethany try and tell the officer that like something is wrong here, no matter how much they plead with him to start an investigation, they can't

get anywhere. And at some point they stop wasting their breath because they start realizing something. This guy is never going to take their word over Brandon's because you see Brandon is a local prosecutor. This is a small town where all the cops know him and they're going to listen to their buddy Brandon. Well, yeah. The only thing Natalie and Bethany can do is go home and pray that maybe the police are

right and that SD will be back soon. But a week goes by and then two weeks and then a month and nobody hears a thing from her. It's like SD just fell off the face of the earth and nobody but Natalie and Bethany seem to be doing anything about it. And there's even this one point where Natalie goes back to the police station one day and basically stages a sit-in. She brings her iPad, her charger, a packed lunch and literally refuses to leave until the chief of police himself agrees to talk to her.

Girl, that's what I would do for you too. Love you. Same girl, love you. But even this doesn't work. He does talk to her, but he gives her the same old spiel. Listen, she's a grown woman who had a fight she wanted to leave. It's not illegal to go missing. And he says there's no signs of foul play.

And there's really nothing we can do unless something new turns up to tell us otherwise. So that's kind of where things stood. At least for the next two months until one day when Natalie gets a call from Bethany. Bethany can barely spit the words out when Natalie picks up. She is crying. She's hyperventilating. And when she can finally talk, she tells Natalie that she is at goodwill and something caught her eye.

It was one of her sister's favorite shirts. And at first she thought she was just like losing it. Like so grief-stricken and just missing Estee so much that she was seeing her in everything. But the closer she looked, she realized she wasn't losing it. This shirt was unique. It was this Dolly Parton t-shirt that Bethany had made and customized for Estee a couple of years ago. But she's looking at it and she knows she's not imagining it.

Like it's right here. She knows that she would never have given this to goodwill. And so she goes on to tell Natalie that she became so frantic at that point and just kind of started looking around through the racks. I mean, just like tearing through them all throughout the store. And she said that she found 13 items of Estee's before she called Natalie crying. Oh my God. Including a mug that she had made at one of those like painter on pottery places that has

her name on it. Like we're talking one-of-a-kind things. Not anything that would be mistaken. Yeah. As Natalie is listening to this on the phone, she can like feel her heart pounding in her ears. He had gotten rid of all her stuff. He knew she wasn't coming back.

And honestly, to me, this is one of the most heartbreaking moments of this whole case. Like, I can't imagine how hard it would be standing in this freaking goodwill and seeing like our memories. Like if our Marianne and Wanda shirts that I made for us for the chicks concert were like hanging up with price tags on them for just anyone to take. But I literally cannot imagine I would be bawling that shirt as one of my same price possessions. I literally wore it yesterday.

It will like I will be buried in that shirt. Well, somehow though Natalie keeps it together. And I'm like, don't get me wrong. The girl is crying in the parking lot. Just totally overcome with grief from missing her best friend. Oh, I'm sure. And like white hot rage. Yeah.

That so little has been done to find Estee and bring her home safe. But once Natalie has cried herself out, she drives over to Brandon's to confront him. But before she even does, she notices something strange. His truck is still in the driveway. It's been there all of this time that her best friend's been gone, but now it looks different. And it takes her a second to like put her finger on it. But then she realizes that he has four new tires on his truck.

Okay, but that's not like that strange. That's because you didn't know Estee and it wouldn't be strange to anyone who wasn't Natalie. People get new tires all the time. Right. But what Natalie knows that none of us knew until this point is that just a couple of months before Estee went missing, Brandon had just gotten new tires. They had this like big fight about it because of like how much they cost.

And he didn't like ask her and she said he didn't really like need them or whatever. So there's no way that he needs new tires again already. Oh, from that moment on, Natalie knew that she and Bethany were on their own. So they watched Brandon. They drove by his house. They would pop into court on their days off. Like they wanted him to know that they knew. But honestly, Brandon didn't care.

He felt untouchable, so untouchable that Brandon was actually already being seen around town with his new girlfriend. It was this woman named Crystal who worked as like a waitress at this like little sandwich shop across the street from the courthouse where Brandon used to always go. And 13 weeks to the day that Esther went missing. Wouldn't you know it? Crystal moves into their house. Uh, that seems kind of quick.

Uh, yeah. And mind you, at this point, Brandon's basically cut off all contact with Estee's family and Natalie. According to Bethany, he told her that it was like just too painful to stay in touch and that he really just like wanted to put this whole thing behind him. Put it behind him. It's only been like three months. Girl, it only gets worse. So that following Tuesday, Natalie and Bethany actually decided to like meet up.

They really become like each other's confidants and they're really the only two people in the world who like going through the same thing. So they meet up at this like nice little bistro downtown and as they're walking to their table, they see Brandon and Crystal together, like all cozied up on the same side of the booth, having this romantic candlelit meal. And as you can imagine, I mean, this is super hard to stomach for both of them. Yeah. But then Crystal looks up.

She actually makes direct eye contact with Natalie and Crystal puts like one hand up on her chest so that both Natalie and Bethany can see the ring on her finger. Oh my God. Is Crystal engaged to Brandon? Maybe. But Natalie and Bethany aren't even like thinking about that right now because they actually recognize the ring and that's what's like taking them aback. It is this really distinctive piece.

It's like a small diamond surrounded by a circle of opals. And it's the exact ring that Grandma Hollis left to Estie in her will. Estie wore that ring every single day and she never took it off except when she like took it to the jewelers to have it cleaned. So I mean, as if there was any question in their minds before, I mean, they know now, like if she really had run away, like the police insist she did, she would have never left that behind. That ring meant the world to her.

And so this is it. Like looking at this, both Natalie and Bethany now know the truth beyond a shadow of a doubt. In their mind, Estie is never coming back. She's probably dead and no matter what law enforcement says, they are 150% sure that Brandon had something to do with it. Okay, but they can't prove it. No, not without her body or some like really compelling evidence. And so they wait.

Finally, in October of 2012, this is 13 months after Estie disappeared, Natalie comes up with an idea. She knows that if she and Bethany ever want to see any kind of justice for Estie, then it's up to them to take things into their own hands. And Bethany agrees. It takes a little bit of planning, but they're in no hurry. They want to do this right. And first up is Bethany.

You see, Bethany works in insurance. So she forages this fat life insurance policy in Brandon's name with crystal listed as the sole beneficiary. Before the ink even has time to dry, Natalie is on deck. She calls Brandon's office pretending to be crystal. Now she knows that Brandon's in court, so she leaves this message telling him to meet, you know, quote, crystal at this motel off Highway 109 after work. She's got a surprise for him.

Brandon takes the bait and he heads there straight after work. He's so cocky that he forgets he is heading straight to Natalie's home turf, a place that she's worked at as a housekeeper for years. She picks a quiet room down at the end of a long hallway, puts a tarp on the floor and waits for the key to turn in the lock. If anyone saw a woman in a boat out on Lake Monroe that night, they never say anything. You know, if they saw it, it's probably some college kids out skinny dipping. Nothing to worry about.

It takes a few weeks before the police come by the motel to ask if she'd heard anything from Brandon Hollis. As the officer tells her, Brandon went missing under very mysterious circumstances, and no one's heard from him in several days. And Natalie is shocked. I mean, what a tragedy. And as she tells police, she's really worried about Brandon's sister-in-law, Bethany, because she's just been through so much, so much loss in such a short time.

Yeah, and I'm sure Bethany told the police it's been really hard to cope with everything that's been going on. Well, yes, that. And police also want to know, can Natalie confirm Bethany's story that they were together the night Brandon disappeared? Which, yeah, of course she can. You know, they binged some classic Grey's Anatomy. They made a frozen pizza, split a bottle of wine.

I mean, if they were to check, their phones are going to ping in the same location. They were together all night. When they leave, Natalie can't be anything but angry. It's been a week. They're investigating after a week when Brandon goes missing. But over a year after Estie went missing, there still had never been a real investigation into her case. And that's when she knew that they made the right decision.

Now, the next time that Natalie and Bethany go to Olive Garden together, Brandon's maybe fiance crystal is actually at the bar waiting for them. And girl looks rough, like her mascara is flaking off, her lipstick is like a little bit smeared. And as soon as she sees Natalie and Bethany, she freaks out. She starts screaming and making a scene in the middle of this restaurant. She keeps telling them that she knows that they killed Brandon and they're trying to pin it on her.

She's like just repeating this over and over. And she keeps saying like one day she's going to prove it. She's calling them names. She's making threats. I mean, the whole nine yards while they're just standing there looking totally shocked. Now poor Bethany, I mean, she starts crying a little. Natalie tries to comfort her while crystal makes the worst kind of scene possible until finally this poor waiter manages to like get her out the door.

They are threatening to call the cops on her basically to get her to leave. Oh my God. Now, the Olive Garden manager, you know, he apologizes like 10 ways to Sunday. He says, you know, listen, we're going to take care of the whole meal. Have a nice dinner. Again, so, so, so, so sorry. So they sit down. They each have a glass of wine.

And when no one's looking, they do a toast, a toast to Estie's memory and to Brandon staying gone for a long, long time. Because if there's one thing they learn from him, it's that if there's nobody, then there's no crime. April fools crime junkies. If you haven't picked up on it by now, then you are definitely not a Taylor Swift fan. But we are. We loved her song, Nobody No Crime from Evermore.

And we thought it'd be really fun to just imagine what the story would be like, you know, if it were a real crime junkie episode. Yeah, I mean, this was don't read into it 100% fiction, not based on any crime. Listen, I have no idea if Taylor Swift has ever even heard of our tiny show before. But I like to believe that deep down in her heart of hearts that maybe she's a little bit of a true crime junkie. I mean, clearly she is right. Like nobody writes that song if they don't love true crime a little bit.

I mean, and can I maybe throw Natalie Mainz into the mix? I'm pretty sure I heard some Goodbye Earl references in there as well. I snuck some of those in. You guys, we just wanted to drop something fun in your feed for April Fool's Day. But if anyone out there knows Taylor, tell her we love her. Yeah, bye. Crime junkie is an audio chuck production. So what do you think Chuck?

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