Going West: True Crime - Jennifer Pentilla // 348

Episode Date: October 13, 2023

In October of 1991, an 18-year-old woman left California bound for Mexico on a bicycle, hoping to volunteer along the way. But after a sudden lack of contact with her family, loved ones started to wonder if something had happened during her solo trip. With her belongings being found in a spot near where she was last seen and a suspicious final witness on police’s radar, everyone is wondering, what happened to her? This is the story of Jennifer Pentilla. BONUS EPISODES Apple Subscriptions: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/going-west-true-crime/id1448151398 Patreon: patreon.com/goingwestpodcast CASE SOURCES 1. Charley Project: https://charleyproject.org/case/jennifer-lynn-pentilla 2. The Missoulian: https://www.newspapers.com/image/351299569/?terms=jennifer%20pentilla&match=1 3. Doe Network: https://www.doenetwork.org/cases/302dfnm.html 4. Montana Press: https://www.montanapress.net/post/jennifer-pentilla-a-montanan-forever-lost-in-new-mexico 5. Tapatalk: https://www.tapatalk.com/groups/porchlightusa/1991-pentilla-jennifer-lynn-october-17-1991-t12090.html 6. Websleuths: https://www.websleuths.com/forums/threads/nm-jennifer-pentilla-18-deming-17-oct-1991.60427/ 7. Missoulian: https://missoulian.com/missoula-mom-hopes-appearance-on-maury-will-help-find-daughter/article_90d06bf6-0b15-50e5-bef3-838ebbb2d447.html 8. Cold Case Closure: https://web.archive.org/web/20150930041557/http://www.coldcaseclosure.com/montana-law-enforcement/chuy-vasquez/ 9. Socorro's Obituary: https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/lcsun-news/name/socorro-vasquez-obituary?id=24412804 10. The Deming Headlight: https://www.newspapers.com/image/558679681/?terms=jesus%20chuy%20vasquez&match=1 11. NBC Montana: https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=CzKIAScinZo 12. Daily Record: https://www.dailyrecord.com/story/news/2016/10/20/pentilla-case-25-years-unsolved/92478404/ 13. The Deming Headlight: https://www.newspapers.com/image/558596869/?terms=%22jesus%20chuy%20vasquez%22&match=1 14. The Deming Headlight: https://www.newspapers.com/image/558388962/?terms=jesus%20chuy%20vasquez&match=1 15. The Deming Headlight: https://www.newspapers.com/image/558288808/?terms=jesus%20chuy%20vasquez&match=1 16. The Deming Headlight: https://www.newspapers.com/image/558328954/?terms=jesus%20chuy%20vasquez&match=1 17. The Deming Headlight: https://www.newspapers.com/image/558570458/?terms=jesus%20chuy%20vasquez&match=1  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on to crime fans? I'm your host Teez. And I'm your host Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hello everybody! Today we have a case that nobody recommended but when I stumbled across it, I was surprised that I hadn't heard of it before. It was one of those because this is a really mysterious case. There's some interesting suspects here and weirdly like nobody's talking about it. And a lot of different locations in this one as well. Yeah, absolutely. We are going on a journey today. So thank you guys everybody for tuning in. Do we have anything else to share? I don't think there's anything else to report. So let's get into this one. Let's go. All right, guys. This is episode 348 of Going West. So let's get into it. In October of 1991, an 18-year-old woman left California bound for Mexico on a bicycle,

hoping to volunteer along the way. But after a sudden lack of contact with her family, loved one started to wonder if something had happened during her solo trip. With her belongings being found in a spot near where she was last seen and a suspicious final witness on police's radar, everyone is wondering what happened to her. This is the story of Jennifer Pantola. Jennifer Lynn Pantola was born on April 4, 1973, to parents Lynn and Nick Pantilla in Butte Montana. And she was later joined by a younger sister named Carrie.

Her mom Lynn remembers her young daughter as keenly perceptive and aware, and that she was a go-getter even as a baby, like she kind of got into crawling and walking sooner than the average baby. Lynn described Jennifer as headstrong and devoted to the causes that she believed in. Her family were devout Lutherans, and Jennifer enjoyed busing herself with all things related to the church.

She was known to take a principled stance against the typical kind of rebellious teenage behavior, but also just walked with open-mindedness when it came to her peers. She's remembered as being kind and studious, and her hometown paper later printed that Jennifer had, quote, a hunger for adventure, and a heart for the less fortunate. And that will be very apparent as we continue to tell her story today, as well as the fact that she loves spending time outdoors, especially camping and hiking. Jennifer also had an insatiable thirst for knowledge, she was a voracious reader, especially

taken with the Nancy Drew series, great taste, and loved to read about other cultures in her National Geographic magazines, and she would just spend a lot of time reading maps and facts about other countries that she wanted to visit. And wanting to expand her knowledge even further, she taught herself Spanish. So she was just really motivated in anything she set her mind to. But Jennifer had a softer, more artistic side as well,

and love to write poetry, and her poems were later bound into a book for her family to remember her by. Her sensitivity and passion for helping others really blossomed when she was in high school, and it all started with her turning down holiday gifts and urging her family and friends to make donations to the less fortunate instead. After completing her junior year in high school, Jennifer ventured all the way to Ivory Coast or Coat de Voix in West Africa on an exchange

program and got to experience what it felt like to live and work there. So as Jennifer neared the end of high school, her dad Nick started experiencing hard issues, but when he was suddenly diagnosed with leukemia, the family was completely shocked, because he had been a seemingly healthy army veteran in his early 40s at this time. In October of 1990, so during autumn of Jennifer's senior year of high school, her dad, Nick sadly succumbed to leukemia at just 44 years old. So this was a very hard time on the family, but

they apparently really looked to their church and their community for support. The following spring, Jennifer graduated from Great Falls High School, class of 1991, and was given the Presidential Academic Fitness Award upon graduation. That fall, she planned to attend Concordia College in Minnesota, alongside her best friend, Michelle, and she was really excited about this prospect. But a couple of months before she would do so, in July of 1991, she attended a charity trip to Mexico, facilitated by her church that would change the trajectory of her entire life.

The goal with this trip was to help the local church with a construction project where they would, you know, repaint and facilitate new plumbing. And Jennifer did this alongside a group. Now, while on this trip, she told her mom that she felt like she had found her purpose in life and that traveling and serving underprivileged communities in other countries was what made her feel the most fulfilled. So back at home, her family was also undergoing changes. Her mom Lynn had reconnected with someone that she knew from high school, this guy named Jim Harris, and they relocated from Great Falls, Montana, about three hours west to Missoula, Montana. So Jennifer was originally planning on leaving for college that fall semester anyway,

but instead came up with a new plan. She was going to return to Mexico for a longer stint and spend her time writing her bike from church to church, just helping communities in need. Though obviously both Lynn and Jennifer's new stepdad Jim were hesitant about her trip, Jennifer's mind was made up. Jennifer had received a white Fuji brand mountain bike as a graduation gift, so she was preparing to bring that to her travels in Mexico and beyond, and Lynn also loaded her up with the necessary camping supplies that she would need during this trip that fall.

And on October 1, 1991, 18-year-old Jennifer and her bike boarded a plane from Montana to San Diego, California, to start her next and seemingly final adventure. Now allegedly, Jennifer originally planned on doing this in a group with other young missionaries, but the plans either fell through or the timing of their departure did not align with Jennifer's timing, depending on which source you believe. But regardless of what happened with the mission trip, Jennifer was so fixated on her plan that she wasn't willing to wait, so she set off on her own.

She supposedly began her journey by staying with a friend in San Diego and then set out south to the border of Mexico. Lynn remembers having nightmares about what might happen to her daughter and that she just had a bad feeling about this trip, especially now knowing that she was totally by herself and she's only 18 years old, like she just graduated high school. And after the loss of her father and embarking on this new chapter of her life as an adult, her mom recalled quote, she just wanted to do some thinking, I think.

Though she wasn't planning on coming home to Montana until March of the following year making this a five-month journey, Jennifer vowed to check in frequently along the way. With her, she had only what she could strap to her bike or carry in her Jansport brand backpack, which was a tent, a sleeping bag, and sleeping pad, a few changes of clothes, hiking boots, two Bibles, one which was in Spanish and one in English, her journal, a portable water filtration system, her camera, a stuffed platypus, a walkman, maps, and a traveler's guide to Mexico. She also carried with her $450 in cash, which would be around $1,000 today, which needed to last her the entirety of her journey.

And then with her, she also had a book that was gifted to her by her mom. It was entitled To My Daughter With Love on the Important Things in Life. So I want to stop and talk about this for just a second because, so I've actually had a lot of friends that have done the Pacific Crest Trail, which is from Canada down to Mexico. So in a lot of times they do travel by themselves, they either bike or they walk or hike, but you know, thinking about this, she's going to be in Mexico. They do travel by themselves, they either bike or they walk or hike.

But you know, thinking about this, she's going to be in Mexico. She's got $450, which she said was about $1,000 today. But if you think about it, things are a lot cheaper in Mexico, so $450, even though that doesn't seem a lot for five months of travel, it seems like it could have been enough because she was going to be in Mexico. So I just wanted to mention that because a lot of people were probably thinking, wow, 450 bucks for five months, that's not a lot of money. Yeah, I mean, considering she's camping most of the way, I don't know if she's staying at any

hostels or anything like that. She's just trying to do this very cheaply and I'm sure she's she's planning on eating very cheaply as well, so super doable for sure. Right, so Missoula-based journalist and author Brian D'Imbrogeo, who is considered the foremost authority on the history regarding Jennifer's case, explained in an interview quote, The time frame is a bit nebulous and a little murky, but it's also been illuminated by her journals, which were discovered in 1992. So Jennifer did in fact make it south of San Diego to the border of Mexico, weaving inland and

east to Ticate, Mexico, which is just south of the small town of Patrero, California. Now this journey would have carried her 48 miles or 77 kilometers away from San Diego. She made it to Ticate on Saturday, October 5th, but after a few days there she was going to head farther south bound for Aermasio, which is a landlock city in the Mexican state of Sonora that is 571 miles or 920 kilometers from Ticate by bicycle. Then she planned to continue on to Guadalajara, which is even farther south. Situated in the center of the country and the capital of its state, Holesco Guadalajara is about 1,242 miles or 2,000 kilometers from Jennifer's proposed departure city of

Hermosio, but her plans were about to change. While scoping out volunteer work in Ticante, Jennifer happened upon someone that she knew, which was another missionary, who was living there serving homeless people. This person warned her against traveling alone on a bike through treacherous terrain as a young woman. It must have discouraged Jennifer enough

that she became fearful and then she abandoned her original plan. Though this had been her dream for months, she also seemed to realize the physical toll that it was taking and the demand that it required. Intermittently during her journey, she would be passing through rocky and mountainous terrain, desert, and even rainforest, So this was no easy feat. Especially since highs in Takate hang in the 80s Fahrenheit or the 20s Celsius in October, in temperatures would only get hotter as she moved south.

Then as the elevation began to rise, the temperatures would drop and Jennifer had very few items of clothing with her. So although she was disappointed, Jennifer just regrouped and took the advice of her friend who seems to be someone named Bob. Jennifer left to Cate behind and ventured back into the United States, crossing the border into California where she camped in Petrero, and Petrero is by the way a census designated place home to only a few hundred people. As a writer, she kept meticulous notes of her journey, which really helped the investigation

later on, for sure. So when she reached Patrero, she penned, quote, "'Tonight is my first night camping out by myself. I'm in a very small town called Patrero in Southern California. I've decided to go a different route than I had originally planned. Instead of going across the border and through the desert on the Mexican side, I'm going on the American side. Bob and I discussed it a lot and he really thought it would be better for me. Since I've made the decision, I really feel a lot more at peace. I've decided that I would try for a week and if by then I don't feel God pushing me on,

I'm going to head back to Takate and do some volunteer work for Christian outreach appeal. I want to make sure I don't rely on other people's doubts or even my own, but God. On October 7, 1991, Jennifer headed east to Campo, California, located about 10 miles or 16 kilometers from Patrero. She planned to spend a week or so cruising the desert, but promised herself that if she felt unfulfilled, she would cross the border back into Ticate, Mexico and finish what she started. That day, she was caught with a flat tire shortly after she began riding and had to stop at

a hardware store to get it fixed. And after fixing her tire, she continued along her route. But finding it very steep and uphill most of the way, she returned to where she had stayed the previous night, vowing to get an earlier start the next morning. And by the way, if anybody is wondering who Bob is, we really don't know. There is no information on him. And he doesn't seem to be considered suspicious because he's never been discussed

in the public investigation. So he seems like he was just somebody that she knew that she ran into. They had a conversation. He was trying to help her and that was that. Yeah, and it appears that he was probably in a completely different state when Jennifer disappeared. I mean, they were in two separate states. Yeah, and it appears that he was probably in a completely different state when Jennifer disappeared.

I mean, they were in two separate states. Yeah, exactly. He was in California. And it was in California at the campground that she stayed at that she met a family with a pickup truck who offered to take her as far as they were going, which was El Centro California. She told them that her goal was to make it to No Gales, Arizona, which was another 360 miles or 580 kilometers from El Centro. So she loaded her bike into the back of their pickup

and the family parted ways with her at a gas station in El Centro. Between October 7th, when she started in Campo, California and the 14th, she found herself in Arizona, passing through Wilcox, which is near the border of New Mexico. At some point in her journey, she had shortened the gap between herself and her next destination and hopped on a bus. One night, she reportedly took refuge in a church, just asking if she could spread out her sleeping bag on a pew in the chapel, which is very sweet, and also a really good idea. And Jennifer noted that the pastor had not taken kindly to her request in that she just

felt uncomfortable asking for their hospitality, which left a bad taste in her mouth. Then Jennifer found herself with another flat tire in Lord's Burg New Mexico, and a truck driver picked her up and drove her to Deming, New Mexico, which is about 60 miles or 96 kilometers east. When she came upon Deming, she had her bike tire fixed again. And likely due to being busy and unsure of what was next, there was a gap in her journal entries for the week between October 7th and October 14th, and when she returns to writing, her passage sounds a bit discouraged. She wrote quote, October 14th, 1991.

A lot has happened, and I finally decided to get caught up. October 8th, I wound up at the Methodist Church, where a kind elderly couple agreed to put me up for the night. It was very generous of them, but it felt like they were doing it because they felt obligated, rather than out of Christian love. I really haven't had good feelings about the churches here, and it makes me wonder about the state of Christianity in this country. Jesus plainly states that we should love and help those in need, no matter how dirty or strange. But her luck seemed to change on the evening of Wednesday, October 16, 1991, in Deming.

She found an open church and attended an evening service that night, and by contrast with the rest of her trip, Jennifer enjoyed quite a luxurious evening. She got to talking with the pastor, Robert Summers, and his wife, Loretta, who invited her to stay the evening with them. She was able to have a hot shower, she watched some television and slept in a bed, perhaps for the first time since she left Montana over two weeks earlier. Then the following morning around 7 a.m., Loretta and Robert took her for breakfast at McDonald's, brought her back to their home so that she could retrieve her bike, and then walked her to the local Shell gas station, where Jennifer could use the pay phone to call her mom. But that was the last time that she would ever be seen in public. At public mobile, we do things differently.

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Pfff. Pfff. Pfff. Pfff. At this point in her journey, coming up on the border of Texas and still only about 36 miles or 57 kilometers from the border of Mexico, Jennifer reportedly told the pastor and his wife that she was planning on heading into El Paso, Texas, or down to Juarez, Mexico next, which they dissuaded her from. They urged her to work with an organized group rather than playing her travel plans by ear, and potentially stumbling into an unsafe situation, so these were the second people to warn her if you're not counting her own mom. But Jennifer had been keeping her mom in the know of her travel developments like she called

Lynn at least eight times between October 1st and 13th and then one more time on the 17th before she was never heard from again. So after speaking with Loretta and Robert about the rest of her trek, she felt once again discouraged by her original plans, so she had hatched another new one. At 7.52am, she called her mom from the Shell gas station phone booth that morning and told her, Mom, I have a change of plans. Obviously, Lynn was thrilled to hear this, as she had been on pins and needles back in

Montana for the entirety of her daughter's trip, which by this time was only about two weeks. So Jennifer's new idea was to head back North, but instead of going to Montana, she wanted to go to Minnesota. Remember, Minnesota is where her friend Michelle was going to Concordia College without her. So Jennifer wanted to visit her, And we're saying Montana and Minnesota, I don't want people to get them confused because I did for a little bit while researching this.

But yeah, so she would have to go back home to Montana, but first she wanted to go up to Minnesota to visit her friend, Michelle. So she also told her mom on the phone, please don't tell her that I'm coming to visit. The look on her face will be priceless." She was also toying with the idea of picking up her college aspirations again, and enrolling in college for creative writing and art classes for the spring semester.

She had written poetry very frequently on her trip, and muse that she may start framing her poems and selling them at craft fairs when she returned home to Montana, which she was planning on doing after visiting Michelle in Minnesota. So Lynn wondered if maybe Jennifer was feeling homesick, but no matter the reason was so relieved to have her daughter on her way back up north. And Jennifer was going to miss Christmas in Montana with her family, obviously she was going to be gone until March, so Lynn was really excited about the idea of being together for the holidays after all. Lynn later remembered, quote,

�I was excited that she was going to be home for Christmas. When her dad was sick with leukemia, our last two Christmas' were pretty sad, and they were spent at the hospital. We were hoping to have a better Christmas, and I just knew we would because she was going to be home. Already halfway through October, Fall would give way to winter soon and cooler weather would creep in as Jennifer headed north. The only part of her daughter's new plan that concerned Lynn was the impending drop in

temperature and potentially icy conditions. So she offered to buy her daughter a bus ticket to Morehead, Minnesota, which is where Concordia College is located. But the thing is, Jennifer really wasn't ready to give up her bike riding yet, and also told her mom Lyn that she still had about 350 out of the $450 that she had saved for this trip. So obviously she could decide later if she wanted a bus ticket.

And just by the way, New Mexico, for those who are outside the US or those not super familiar with US geography, New Mexico is in the far south of the US and Minnesota is in the far north. So she would have to cross the country vertically all the way up. So in total on average,

it's about 122 hours on bike from Debian, New Mexico to Moorhead, Minnesota. So this was a journey that would take her at least two weeks if she were riding eight hours a day, which I'm not sure how many she planned on, and if she rode the entire way. By the way, it is 1,500 miles or 2,400 kilometers. This is a journey.

Yeah, this is a big trek. So according to Lynn, Jennifer said, quote, I'll call you later tonight or tomorrow morning. I'll let you know what way I'll be going to head out of New Mexico. I'm headed to Los Cruces. I'm excited to know that I'll be home for the holidays. Love you, Mom.

That 14-minute call would be the last time that she would ever hear from her daughter. Jennifer never called her mom back that Thursday and never followed up on Friday either. Saturday, October 19, 1991 was Lynn's birthday, so she knew that she would hear from Jennifer, regardless of what her plans were for the duration of her trip. But when the day came to a close without hearing from her, Lynn had the sinking feeling that something was wrong. So the following week she reported her daughter missing to the police in Missoula, Montana, who communicated with the New Mexico State Police and the Deming Police Department to open Jennifer's missing persons case. Lynn later remembered that the Deming Police didn't seem to take the case very seriously,

and we're leaning towards the conclusion that she was simply a runaway. Lynn later lamented, quote, they just did not want to get involved. And I guess it's easy for me to kind of understand where the police are coming from. Like she was on this massive bike riding trip. And so they're probably just thinking, well, you know, maybe she's headed to a different location or, you know, she's on this trip by herself. So she could be anywhere. Right.

But since Lynn obviously knew that that didn't feel like it was a case it felt like something really did happen, she and Jennifer's stepfather Jim decided to take matters into their own hands so they flew to Deming to investigate themselves. When they got there, they hung up missing persons' posters and kept meticulous notes of what they were hearing and observing around town, spearheading their own assessment of what had happened. Lynn actually talked to Loretta and Robert Summers, and they told her that they had given her directions to get to the city of Los Cruzes, New Mexico, where she was planning to call Lynn from next. In an interview in 2021, Loretta Summers remembered, quote, she told us that she was going to

be biking to Minnesota to see her friend. We told her to go to Highway 70 to Interstate 40 and gave her directions to the Fair Acres Baptist Church in Los Cruces. And remember this part guys, she asked about making a cut across to Hatch, which is a town about a five hour ride northeast from Deming. We said that that was not a good idea. There was not a lot of traffic that way, and it was not a good idea to go that way.

We assume that she went to Interstate 70. We learn later that bikes would not have been allowed on Interstate 70, so what could have happened to that poor girl? There was one witness, believed to be the last person to see Jennifer before she vanished. Twenty-one-year-old Jesus, who went by Chewie, was working as a gas station attendant at the shell where Jennifer stopped to use the payphone to call her mom for that final phone call. And this gas station was actually owned by his parents, Sakura, or Koi, and Henry Vascas. When questioned by police about Jennifer's activity that day, Chewie claimed that he

had watched her lean her bike against the side of the building, hang her helmet over it, and bring her backpack into the store with her. Now he claimed that she asked to use the restroom and he pointed her in the right direction. Strangely, he said that she had come in between 10 and 10.30 a.m. But here's the thing, she had been talking to her mom on the payphone outside at 8.00 a.m. So Chewy remembered complimenting her bike and said that they had made small talk as she made a purchase and exited the store, walking east alongside her bicycle.

Chewy told the officers who questioned him that she had mentioned something about going to the travel agency to get a map. Aside from the obvious time lapse of about two hours, Jennifer already had a map with her, so this was enough to raise the eyebrows of investigators, but with nothing but a cursory final interaction, they had nothing tying Chewy to Jennifer. Lynn actually spoke with Chewy herself and kept detailed notes on each of their interactions. She wrote quote, he described Jennifer, said he talked to her, asked her where she was headed for, and she said Mexicali.

This is hard for Jim and me to believe because that would mean that she would have to go back to San Diego. She would not have done that. I asked Chewy if he meant Minnesota and he said, no, Mexicali. He then said that he would talk to his brother when he got home because he told him about Jennifer. And he would ask him what he talked about with him

and see if you remembered anything. The next morning we talked to Chewy and he would ask him what he talked about with him and see if he remembered anything. The next morning we talked to Chewy, and he said his brother remembered him saying that she was going to Mexico, not Mexicali. It was another person going to Mexicali. He remembers her brown boots and wool socks. He's interested in bikes, and that's why he noticed her. He remembered telling her that she has a nice bike. So she used the restroom, got a coke, and then she used the pay phone.

I can't figure out why did she tell Chewy Mexico? I remember telling her that it would be too cold and snowy for her to go to Minnesota. She said that she would call me from Los Cruces and let me know which way she would go. That phone called Never Came. Both Chewy and his dad appeared to be clean-cut and very helpful. But this timeline of events was even more confusing because Chewy had told Lynn that Jennifer used the pay phone after she had come inside. But the call log from the pay phone clearly displayed that Jennifer called Lynn at 7.52am.

And Chewy stated to the officers that she hadn't come into the store until 10am. So was he misremembering or did Jennifer for whatever reason stay there for two hours outside just idling? Sadly, even though they felt that they made great strides in getting the word out about Jennifer, Lynn and Jim had to go back to Montana empty-handed. But Lynn continued her detective work from afar. As time went on, rumor circled the town of 11,000 people, this is Deming we're talking about, and all things seemed to lead back to Chui. Multiple witnesses came forward to law enforcement stating that they had seen Jennifer with Chui

on the day she disappeared. Then one woman claimed to have seen either Jennifer or another woman locked in a shed near where she disappeared from, and why this witness didn't report this very disturbing sighting before is unknown. And eerily, Chui's ex-girlfriend came to police, claiming that she noticed that Chewie had started wearing a bracelet, that was apparently similar to the leather friendship bracelet that Jennifer wore daily, but that when she questioned him about it, he stopped wearing it.

Documents later turned over to Jennifer's family detailing the investigation red quote, there have been several witnesses and sources that have identified Haseus Choui Vasquez as the individual responsible for Jennifer's abduction and death. But remember there's no heart evidence at this point that she is deceased? It's just believe that she is. So Chewy was questioned again by state police and suspiciously. Continue to change the timing and the details of his story slightly. But because police had no concrete evidence against him for doing anything, since Jennifer and her bike seemingly vanished into thin air, he went free. And Chewy has kind of an interesting backstory, so let's talk about what we know about this

guy. So his family owned the Shell gas station in town, as we discussed, and then later a restaurant, which his parents eventually closed before his dad's passing in 2008 and his moms in 2010. The year after Jennifer's disappearance in the summer of 1992, Chewie headed overseas to Korea to work as a professional dancer. He was hired through talent scouts connected to his local dance studio, run by instructor Cindy Gallegos, who was actually the person that put Lynn in touch with Chewie in the first

place. He also volunteered in Central America working on a reforestation project before moving to Providence, Rhode Island, where he worked for AmeriCorps, which is a federally funded service organization. Chewie was employed as a case worker and a health clinic, often dealing with children from abusive or food insecure homes. After moving back to Deming, Chewie had a son named David who then tragically passed away at only three years old. But the circumstances under which he died are undisclosed, it's only been revealed that he died at home. Now at some point amongst all these life events, in September of 1990, so three years-ish, after Jennifer disappeared, Chewy, aka, Hey Susvazquez, was

arrested for trying to sell narcotics to an undercover agent, and he had previously either suffered an accidental overdose or was trying to commit suicide. After the death of his parents, Chewy opened his own restaurant in their honor, and then in 2011, another strange circumstance occurred in his vicinity when his brother died after the two got into a physical altercation. So a fight of unknown origin broke out at the house, that both of the brothers shared, both Frank and Chewy shared together, and Frank was found unconscious and unresponsive. He later died in the same hospital that his mom passed away in the year prior. But because Frank apparently had an underlying heart condition that was found to be the ultimate cause of his death,

Chui was only charged with manslaughter and served four years in prison, but he still, in a way, obviously, was held responsible. Yeah, he was. And I did read somewhere that the heart condition came upon because of methamphetamine use, which would, you know, kind of align with this narcotics issue. Exactly. And as far as we know, by the way, to this day,

Chuy still resides in Debian New Mexico. Now, the latest development in Jennifer's case came less than a year after she went missing. In September of 1992, a New Mexico couple were hunting doves near Hatch, New Mexico, so about 48 miles or 77 kilometers from where Jennifer disappeared in Deming. In the shade of a mosquito tree, they came upon most of the belongings that Jennifer had been traveling with, eerily stacked into neat piles, and then covered with her tent. And what they did next is the subject of some controversy, and the accounts differ.

But basically some sources say that they couple initially passed the belongings and only reported them when they noticed that they were still there a few days later. Others say that they reported what they found, but when authorities didn't handle it quickly enough, the couple collected the discarded belongings themselves and brought them to authorities directly, which may have destroyed DNA evidence. Jennifer's mom Lynn was initially hopeful at the discovery, wondering if it meant that her daughter was still in the area. But as time progressed, it became increasingly more likely that her items were left behind by someone other than Jennifer. Lynn said sadly, quote, her helmet was there, her bibles were there. She would

have never left her bibles. All in all, found in the pile were her bicycle helmet, backpacks, a blue and gray tent, a set of journals, and then strangely, around the pile of stuff were full jars of baby food, which obviously Jennifer would not have any use for, and cigarette butts, which Jennifer did not smoke. And the baby food and cigarettes were not taken into evidence, so whether those items were already there or if possibly they were discarded by her likely killer is very unclear. And one of the things that was missing from this pile was her bike, which was a white Sundance Fuji bike with green lettering, a front battery operated headlight, a set of black saddlebags on the front and rear,

Jennifer's aunt's name engraved on the underside of the bike, which is either Linda or Joanne, and the bike's serial number, which is F9101771. And what's crazy to me is that this bike was never found. So I used to work at a used sporting goods store and people would bring in like stolen bikes all the time and try to sell them to the store and that's the only way that we could check whether or not that bike was stolen was by the serial number. Because it's registered to a person's number. Exactly. All right, my name. It's your person's name. Exactly. So if this bike was ever found, they could check the serial number and find out that it was Jennifer's. But unfortunately,

with so much time passing, it could have been scrapped for parts. It could be anywhere. It might not even be in somebody's possession. So the likelihood of it being found is kind of slim, but would be crazy if it was found and it was connected to somebody. But there is the information for you guys. And also there were a couple other items that were missing. One of them is her leather friendship bracelet, which again, Chuy had allegedly been wearing. Obviously this is missing because she's missing.

But the other thing that's missing that to me is really Erie is Jennifer's blue and silver sleeping bag. And that's just Erie to me because I know that a lot of times when we cover cases, when we talk about bodies and remains being found, sometimes they're wrapped in sleeping bags and comfortors. So this is kind of to me and a disturbing thing to be missing. Yeah, absolutely. And before we continue, let's talk about the location of her belongings more and kind

of, you know, run through. So again, her stuff was in a neat pile about seven miles from hatch new mexico and a mile off highway 26 under a tree now remember back to when we were talking about loretta and loretta was telling Lynn and Jim about their conversation with Jennifer before they dropped her off and before she called Lynn. Right, saying that she should not go in the direction of hatch because there's not a lot of traffic, so they thought it might be more dangerous for her, and then the fact that her belongings end up just outside of hatch makes us believe that possibly she didn't take the red as advice,

or maybe she found out that she couldn't ride her bike on Interstate 70 so she had to go that way to hatch. Exactly, so here I'm just going to read again what Loretta said so we can talk about it. So Loretta said this, she told us that she was going to be biking to Minnesota to see her friend. We told her to go to Highway 70, to Interstate 40, and gave her directions to the Fair Acres Baptist Church in Los Cruces. She asked about making a cut across to hatch.

We said that that was not a good idea. There was not a lot of traffic that way and it was not a good idea to go that way. Now this is really weird because I'm trying to describe the map. We're going to post this you guys can, but think of like a rounded triangle almost. Or think of a triangle, that's fine. So Deming is the left corner of the triangle. Now the top of the triangle is hatch, and the lower right corner of the triangle is lost crucess.

So what doesn't make sense to me is why she would say she was going to cut across To hatch to get to Los Cruces because it would have taken longer than for her to just take What is it highway 10 to go to Los Cruces? I mean, that's like a major highway I don't know a doubt she could bike that. I don't know what it looked like in 1991, but It wouldn't make sense for her to go up to hatch and then down to Las Cruces. So this is really confusing to me. Yeah, I think maybe it was possibly just because of the road conditions. Maybe it was easier to bike on, but it does look like it might take more time unless obviously depending on the roads, right? Yeah, depending on the routes for sure. Yeah, if you have to go uphill on interstate,

or highway 10, Good point. And you know, you're going downhill to hatch. I mean, who knows? Who knows? So, not us, because we're not in New Mexico. But I think it is interesting that she mentioned hatch, and then her stuff was found only seven miles away from hatch

on the highway that connects deming hatch on the highway that connects Deming and or off the highway that connects Deming and hatch that's really interesting to me right in the only person that we have this account from that she was headed to hatch was loretta and her husband exactly and then if you're thinking about so obviously she was gonna go to lusk recess and then from there figure out which way she was gonna go up to Minnesota, but what's weird to me too is if you look at the map again,

basically, Deming and Las Cruces, they're parallel. So she could cut straight across, hypothetically, from Deming to Las Cruces. Minnesota is northeast. So it would make sense for her to go straight across and then up, but if she's going up, she's going Northeast to get to hatch. Right, and then back down like Southeast

to get to Los Cruces. To Los Cruces. Right, so why go up just, or why go north just to go south, just to go all the way up north? Yeah, that's, and this probably sounds really confusing if you're not looking at a map.

I think it is a little confusing over like a podcast episode. But I think, you know, once you do see the map it might make more sense. But yeah, it is really confusing to me why she would go to hatch and then to Los Cruces, but I don't want to get lost too much in that. Well, let's get, so the point is,

is that her stuff was found a mile off the highway Which is kind of a far or this kind of a distance, you know off the highway Why would it be a mile off the highway sure? on the way to hatch so She definitely because it was found in Somewhere of the direction that she would have been traveling it would make sense that maybe she was traveling on Highway 26 and then that she would have been traveling, it would make sense that maybe she was traveling on highway 26 and then went over to that tree a mile up like that's a five minute bike ride so it doesn't make sense to me why she would go up a mile and then just vanish from the tree from a mile off the road.

But here's one thing that we know also the fact that those other things were left behind really, really highly doubt and this is what leads us to believe that foul play was involved really highly doubt that jennifer is going to leave those things behind she left her tent behind her bike was nowhere to be found obviously uh... but her bibles were left behind as well well that's why i don't think that it makes sense for her to go a mile off the highway and then abandon all of her things.

Right. To me, that feels more like somebody was trying to get off of the highway and get out of sheer visibility and ditch her stuff there, discard her items there because they did something to her. Absolutely. It feels like she may have been abducted or picked up along her route and then like some of her stuff was just discarded and left behind as evidence. Totally, that is where my head is too. So although Chewy is the person of interest, most commonly connected to Jennifer's case, another man was also on the radar of police.

So an employee at a pick quick convenience store reported seeing a young woman fitting Jennifer's description in Hatch, New Mexico, which is the shortcut that Jennifer was thinking of taking to Les Cruz as, that's not really a shortcut at all. Or at least it doesn't look like one to me. So she had been warned by LaReta and Robert Summers not to cut through hatch, but she may have started to do so anyway. So this employee said that she saw Jennifer accompanied by two men, one of whom was identified as a local farmer named Henry Apidaca.

A few hatch locals later said that they actually overheard a Henry bragging about having abducted Jennifer. Now, this pick-quick store was located only 7 miles or 11 kilometers from where Jennifer's belongings were found, but frustratingly, Henry died in 2011, so if he is in fact involved, we may never have confirmation. For a while after her disappearance, Lynn ran Jennifer's missing poster in the Las Cruces New Mexico newspaper Every Christmas and on Jennifer's birthday. But now 32 years since her daughter vanished, she seems to have resigned to the fact that Jennifer is gone, however frustrating it is that she may never know the reason."

Lynn also found this passage scribbled in Jennifer's journal. I just wanted to share it. It says, quote, faith is not faith until it's all you're holding on to. Today, Jennifer Pantilla would be 50 years old. When she was last seen, she was five feet five inches tall, and weighed around 120 or 125 pounds. She had blonde hair, blue eyes and a fair complexion. She wore brown framed glasses, which have also not been found, and again her bike was never recovered. She had a gap between her front teeth and diagonal scars on her index and middle fingers.

She was last seen wearing a blue bum-brand sweatshirt over a tank top with denim shorts and brown hiking boots. She wore a cross necklace, a silver ring with the words Love Jesus engraved on it, dog tags with her name on them, a friendship bracelet, and a watch with the Rice Krispies character Snap Crackle & Pop on the face. If you have any information about the disappearance of Jennifer Pantola, please call the Deming Police Department at 575-546-3011. Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West.

Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode and on Tuesday we'll have an all new case for you guys to dive into. What a baffling story. The fact that they found only some of her belongings and not all of them and that they were in this neat pile of mile-off a highway like it's just so confusing and also really crazy finally she took that advice. She was ready to go home and it was at that point that she was met with something. Yeah, it's so so sad. Crazy. It's very crazy and it's very sad. I'm also kind of wondering if maybe because it's been so long, I know that those people the people that found her belongings possibly had touched DNA on her on her items, but I wonder, I just wonder if the person who's

responsible for this had possibly left behind fingerprints or DNA that might be able to be tested today and maybe they can rule out that couple that you know had found the belongings in the first place. Yeah, I really hope there are some answers and resolution brought to this case soon. Remember guys, we did post a like the missing poster of Jennifer, so you can see what she looks like. And there's all the information if you want to share it, especially if you were in the new Mexico area or even in the Texas area because it's happened very close to El Paso, Texas. So please don't forget to share, tell Jennifer's story, thank you guys so much, and we'll see you next week.

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