CA - Chelsea King (17) Rancho Bernardo (north San Diego County) #3

[Leila]

Listening on the radio
http://www.kfi640.com/main.html

relative heard that the first victim at 13 was flirting with him, ditched school and lied about attack not to get in trouble.
He pleaded guilty. Family never heard about psychiatrist.
Mother knew everything.....she had court transcript.
Now relative is looking at hind sight.
impulsive outburts of violence.
babysitting and attacked a cousin, beyond normal.
6-7 yrs old at time.
iintelligent but troubled, immature.
Relative thinks there are other victims out there.
pontiac gold partial plate seen from man in park
impound lot crashed a month ago and towed away
black sedan girl friend honda body damage missing bumper
current gf car.
relative doesn't want to talk about sons, or X girlfriend and her children.
Lots of warning signs.
Job and relationship problems.
Electrical/construction probabtion said he couldn't leave county til last summer. or 9-08
Moved in Feb 20, 2010 with mom and step father.
No one reported it.
Feb 17th relative found out about JG addy.
Mother is denial and chose not to believe any of this.
The relative hasn't talked to mom since the 17th.
He could be the life of the party or violent.
Childhood...........reason? no trama, but trouble in school.
Father is dead, out of state. Grew up without a father.
Step father image in Running Springs.
Not this step-father.
Relative hopes Amber is not a victim, but he believes the evidence DNA will prove
(interviewed by FBI)
Family calls him Johnny
Gma house broken into house empty and Le was in it.
sherrif,county FBI all at scene, relative had no idea.
then turned to talk about JG.......he allowed house to be searched.
At the end of the interview he was told of murder.
Relative gave them info on cars etc.
Relative was in shock, he didn't even know about Chelsea disappearance.
There is certain stuff he cannot talk about FBI asked.
Who could talk to JG and ask about where is Amber.
JG set him off is relationship with JG mom.
He called sherrif on JG on Feb 17th.......JG was not allowed to be there.
JG very threatening, loud etc.
Relative says he is an old man and Gma is in hospital very ill.
JG went to hospital to see gma.

Great summary! Thanks!

 

[TravelingBug]

Weren't there reports of attempted attacks/abductions in or around Kit Carson Park? Or am I just imagining things now?

No, there have been. You're not imaging it

Escondido also has a fair bit of gang activity which some of the incidents in Kit Carson have been ultimately tied to.

But there was even one just a few months ago (article linked on the thumbtack of my map) in Kit Carson that was pretty similar to Chelsea's - female 17 year old cross country runner alone (separated from her team) but the attempted abduction involved two guys. One, obviously (unfortunately the one with the more detailed description) is not JAG, but the height and dark hair fits.

 

[sarx]

Here's the article from back in September of 2009 at Kit Carson Park.
The 2nd man may have just been a homeless man, it doesn't really specify if both tried to take her.
The description is a bit off, but not horribly, terrified victims don't always have the best memories. The MO seems just a little too similar, right down to a high school cross country runner. I wonder if parents of X-country HS students have been contacted. Wouldn't surprise me if he's watched their meets.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2009/sep/03/bn03girl-attack-escon/?northcounty&zIndex=160199

 

[pugpugpug]

I agree. There'd have been many other choices.

I could see it he might have used in other cases, but Amber's? Unlikely in my opinion.

Agreed. Assuming that he (or whoever kidnapped her) got Amber in his car, there are a million places that he could have gone. Kit Carson park, right next to a busy mall, doesn't sound logical. Unfortunately there are so many secluded areas north and east of Esco... Or he could have taken the 78 out near Ramona. :/

 

[pugpugpug]

Gardner was contacted at least eight times by the Escondido Police Department since January 2008, but they refuse to say why: http://www.10news.com/news/22750621/detail.html

 

[Leila]

Mick, Im sorry to say this but that sounds like LAKE ELSINORE! Can someone put some pics of LAKE ELSINORE.

My in-laws used to live in Murrieta, and we visited them about every six weeks. We'd pass Lake Elsinore and often get off the freeway there for a rest stop or gas. As I remember, the lake had big changes in the water level. I remember my in-laws talking about the lake being "high this year" or low.

 

[sarx]

Robert Wayne Gardner isn't related is he? Not dragging an innocent family member in her, he was involved in a kidnapping case of an adult in 2007 in Lake Elsinore. I haven't heard anything about siblings, so I don't even know, he could be an only child.

 

[TravelingBug]

Agreed. Assuming that he (or whoever kidnapped her) got Amber in his car, there are a million places that he could have gone. Kit Carson park, right next to a busy mall, doesn't sound logical. Unfortunately there are so many secluded areas north and east of Esco... Or he could have taken the 78 out near Ramona. :/

I agree. Many places much closer and many reasons not to look at Kit Carson for Amber...others incidents at Kit Carson, maybe, especially given the proximity to his mom's in Westwood.

Truthfully, I think if he did take Amber, for lack of knowing she could be anywhere at this point - especially with so many places in Escondido, that they'd best continue to scour Lake Hodges around the edges in some of the lesser travelled areas, because if he was going to move Amber, I could see him having a thing for certain place to dump evidence.

I also wonder if it might not be wise to get cadaver dogs going around the perimeter of Lake Elsinore, as well, given the number of abduction attempts there, as well.

 

[Leila]

I've looked around Lake Elsinore, but nothing like what I 'saw'. Lake Elsinore is flatter around the edges, as I recall, and from the map. Used to sky dive ouit of lake Elsinore Paracenter in the 70's. Now those where the good old days!! So I've seen a lot of ariel views of Lake Elsinore, but the google map makes it look much more buildt up than then.

http://maps.google.com/maps?q=Lake+...69,-117.337246&spn=0.033286,0.051241&t=h&z=14

Lake Elsinore and the whole area of Temecula and Murrieta has seen rapid growth over the past 25 years. I remember watching the gliders and the ultralites at Lake Elsinore in the early 1980's. I remember when there was nothing on either side of the 15 for miles, and only two or three supermarkets. Now days, there's big shopping malls and residential housing on both sides of the 15.

 

[sarx]

Lake Elsinore looks to be pretty big, and without some generalized pinpointing of an area taking cadaver dogs out there would be like a needle in a haystack. They would have to just completely luck upon the right area. They don't work areas very big.

 

[pugpugpug]

So I was looking at the local San Diego CW news website and they linked to this story: [ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W9tUGV35bZ0&feature=player_embedded[/ame]

It said that Amber was wearing a black hoodie when she went missing. Didn't police find a black hoodie when searching for Chelsea? I mean I realize there are thousands of black hoodies in the world, I just thought it was interesting.

 

[sarx]

I recall a grey sweatshirt being found in a ravine, not a black. I'll see if I've got anything in my notes.
(edit to add, this was heard over the scanner by a searcher, NOT through the news)

 

[TravelingBug]

Lake Elsinore looks to be pretty big, and without some generalized pinpointing of an area taking cadaver dogs out there would be like a needle in a haystack. They would have to just completely luck upon the right area. They don't work areas very big.

It is pretty big. But it seems like over time it might be something they need to consider a way to do - maybe from boat. At least on the edge nearer his grandma's home.

I think they need to do the north side of Hodges from around the bend below Del Dios Park and down past Hernandez Hideaway. It's the area where the possible knife was rumored to be found, and with him have damp pants from the knee down I still think he may have been revisiting an area of interest, especially given the amount of searching they were doing.

 

[sarx]

I didn't find anything on a black sweatshirt, just the grey one the searchers found in a ravine, called in and wanted to know if it was of interest or should it be ignored. (seriously, should anything be ignored??? The answer to that btw is NO!)

 

[sarx]

Kinda off topic, but I'm watching Nancy Grace that I taped and it's on Natalie Holloway and found it weird that Johan has similar looks to John Gardner.

 

[Leila]

Here's the article from back in September of 2009 at Kit Carson Park.
The 2nd man may have just been a homeless man, it doesn't really specify if both tried to take her.
The description is a bit off, but not horribly, terrified victims don't always have the best memories. The MO seems just a little too similar, right down to a high school cross country runner. I wonder if parents of X-country HS students have been contacted. Wouldn't surprise me if he's watched their meets.

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2009/sep/03/bn03girl-attack-escon/?northcounty&zIndex=160199

On Wednesday, John and Ken (KFI Radio - 640 am Los Angeles) interviewed a man who said he and his wife were at a park watching some sort of outdoor girls sport event last September. They both had bad vibes about a man who was standing away from everyone else, watching the girls. They had observed him park away from the other cars, and got a partial plate number. The man went to the police dept. the next day to report their observations. This man wasn't happy with the police and said they just dismissed his report.

 

[sarx]

3 kids 9-11 yrs old remember a bag from months ago with what they thought was hair in it. Take cops to it, nothing left but a shredded bag and off of this they bring in dive teams and drain a pond? I don't by it, they've got more information from somewhere that caused them to take this kind of action. That's overboard for CYA and way overboard based on the info from the kids. There is more to this story....

 

[Blue_Dolphin308]

Yes they did find a black sweatshirt.

 

[blacklabpit]

Yes they did find a black sweatshirt.

Was it in the lake hodges area?

 

[Blue_Dolphin308]

I don't recall where it was, but i remember hearing on the scanner that it was found!