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From small-town cases to nationally known crimes, the CenLAw Podcast is always going to bring you stories that hit close to home with that Louisiana connection.
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Declared Dead, But Deadly (Part 1) - The Thomas Steven Sanders Case
Click here to view extras including pictures and documents on our blog post. Each of our episodes have an accompanying blog post on our CenLAw Podcast website!
What happens when a seemingly ordinary road trip turns into a haunting true crime saga that spans multiple states and years? This episode invites you to unravel the tragic story of Lexis K. Roberts, a 12-year-old from Las Vegas, whose disappearance with her mother, Suellen, led to an intense federal investigation. From the harrowing discovery of Lexus’ remains in Louisiana to the chilling backstory of the man at the center of this mystery, we examine the somber twists and turns that continue to echo across the nation.
In part one, we explore the poignant journey of Suellen, a young mother seeking better opportunities in Las Vegas, whose fateful relationship with Thomas Steven Sanders forever altered the lives of her and her daughter, Lexi. Despite her mother’s deep-seated concerns and warnings, Suellen’s trust in Sanders led to their eventual disappearance, leaving a trail of unanswered questions. Join us as we piece together their last known moments and the relentless search for truth that followed, highlighting the complex dynamics and vulnerabilities that played a role in this tragic tale.
The unsettling history of Thomas Sanders unfolds before us, revealing a man with a dark past and a web of deception spanning across multiple states. With insights from key figures, including Sanders’ ex-wife Candace Tarver, we delve into his troubled history and the shocking revelation of his life after being declared legally dead. We conclude our episode with the remarkable efforts of forensic experts who identified young Lexis, sparking a broader investigation that sought justice for her and her mother.
Listen now and be sure to follow and check back next week for part two of this twisted tale!
Sources:
YouTube Documentary
Hattiesburg Article (dated 09.13.14)
U.S, v. Sanders Appeal (dated 07.03.14)
Las Vegas Review-Journal (dated 01.32.24)
Sins & Sinners Podcast Episode
Williams-Grand Canyon Article (dated 10.28.10)
Lexis's Obituary
This has been an elfaudio production.
Thanks for listening & Take care out there!
All🎶created by: Uncle Sawyer
An FBI news release dated November 4, 2010 stated On the evening of October 8, 2010, human skeletal remains were found in a wooded area north of Harrisonburg, louisiana. Since that discovery, there have been many. The remains were positively identified, primarily through dental records, as being Lexus K Roberts, age 12, of Las Vegas, nevada. The last time Lexus was seen was with her mother, sue Ellen Roberts, and another person. The person that this FBI news release was letting everyone know was now a suspect in the kidnapping and murder of Lexus K Roberts. What followed was an absolutely crazy whirlwind, unbelievable circumstances and the final conclusion, which happened just this year, has left me nearly speechless, but not nearly enough to not give you guys this episode.
Speaker 1:Welcome back to the Sin Law Podcast, episode 35, declared Dead but Deadly. Hey everyone, and welcome back. I can't make any excuses, I'm not gonna try. Happy New Year, merry Christmas and, when this episode comes out, merry Christmas and when this episode comes out, happy Martin Luther King Jr Day. I know, I know, I know I'm sorry I want to call them mental health months, but that's not even really true. We just got slammed between life, work, kids and the multitudinous variations in between here, there and yonder. I had to make decisions on what took priority, and my podcast is something that I do as a hobby, for fun, on the side, and, as much as I appreciate and love doing it, it's something that I have to put at the very bottom of the list of things that need my time and energy. So, however, now we are back, we are in 2025. And I am hoping to keep very consistent and get things back on track for everybody, and I decided since this is still being talked about in the news to this day I would open the year of 2025 with the very first episode that I started digging hard digging into. My mother actually told me about it back, way back when I first moved down here, I think, and we started talking about the different things and tragedies that had happened in Harrisonburg and Catahoula Parish, and this is one of the ones that came up way back and it intrigued me because it had so many levels of just very multifaceted it's a good way to say it because it's ended up being a federal case, because it traversed states and passed state lines and you know, if you know any part of how that whole thing works, especially with kidnappings, which is where this whole thing kind of started. If you go across state lines, it becomes federal. You stay within the state lines. That can be handled by the state. But once you cross a state line and commit a crime from one state to another, then it becomes federal. You stay within the state lines, they can be handled by the state, but once you cross the state line and commit a crime from one state to another, then it becomes federal. It becomes, you know, multi-state, which means that, yeah, you're pretty screwed at that point.
Speaker 1:So, anyway, without giving too much away, I know that some people out there will know this story. Some people might only know this story because of recent headlines and someone very, very influential let's go with that mentioning the topic of our episode today in a very, very important speech. So, yeah, we're going to go ahead and go with that. However, let me warn you up front, this is not going to be one episode. It may not even be two episodes. I'm going to try to keep it as succinct and you know, all of you can send those powers of brevity towards me, but we all know how I am. I'm going to do my absolute best. There are a lot of rabbit holes to try to, you know, to absolutely fall into and then just tumble and tumble and tumble further than Alice did. So, with all of that being said, I want to tell everyone who's listening anyone who happens upon this too that I am so, so grateful and appreciative that you guys have come to listen, and if you have come back in 2025 and even after my months of hiatus, and are listening now, I appreciate you and I thank you from the very, very, very bottoms of my soul, from my toes to my forehead and all the in-betweens, and that's a lot of love. I'm just saying all right, so, without further ado, we're to go ahead and get started Now.
Speaker 1:In the intro, I mentioned an FBI news release, and I'm sorry if my voice sounds funny this weather changing back and forth is killing me but the FBI news release that I read in the intro was from November 14th of 2010. That was released. I'm going to go with almost exactly a month and four days a month and change after the original case had begun, the original investigation had begun, and all of that started on October 10th in 2010. When they found the remains of the beautiful and far, far too young Mrs Lexi K Roberts. Now I say Lexi, lexis, but Lexis, she, um, she got the shittiest end of all the sticks in this regard, um, and that's why we have to keep our, our babies, close to us. So it might be a little bit hard, a little bit gut-wrenching, for, for some people especially, we get to cause of death and things of that nature, and we'll, uh oof, we're gonna get through it, however.
Speaker 1:So let's talk about something else. First, though, we're going to go riding over and way back in the way back machine, back to 1987. Because in 1987, something interesting happened. Well, not really interesting, it was kind of shitty on his part, but the topic or suspect piece of garbage, waste of human existence.
Speaker 1:Oh, and another fun fact there are two cases that I'm going to cover. This is one of them, and there's another one upcoming this year. I'm going to cover. This is one of them, and there's another one upcoming this year. I'm actually related to Thomas Stephen Sanders and the other one I'll let you know when he gets here but both of them were charged and found guilty and have been in prison for a number of years, pretty much. The other one has pretty much his entire life, and I'm related. I'm related to both. They are in my family tree, the actual location where they found the remains of sweet lexus in harrisonburg is one of my family's burial plots.
Speaker 1:Yeah, so this one hits a little bit deeper, a little bit harder. And when they start talking and when they start talking about later, when we start talking about Sanders and his because they use the mitigation and the factors and the things to try to not get him sentenced to death but the things that they say in those are really interesting and made me do a lot more digging. Now, the fact of all of this comes down to it shouldn't have happened. But on top of all that, no one can be blamed for this except for the person who did it, except for Thomas Stephen Sanders, the man who is now going to live fucking comfortably and I apologize very comfortably in a federal prison for the rest of his life. Thanks to We'll Get there and you may already know, because you may pay attention and watch the news like we all. Well, I don't really, but I do have um google alerts, which is how I realized that this uh update had happened just this year, so just a couple weeks ago actually.
Speaker 1:So we're gonna go back, like I said, to 1987. 1987 is a very important year for the Sanders family because in 1987 they called him Steve, some people called him him Tom, others called him another nickname, which is gross, but Spider was that one and what I've been told or what I've read about was Spider is kind of like a hinting at under backhanded compliment comment not compliment, for damn sure, but comment nickname slash thing anyway to mean a pedophile, because they can slip through cracks in the dark and no one never knows, or something like that. Um, I'm not sure anyway, point being Thomas Stephen Sanders. He was going out and he told his wife he was gonna go look for a, a job and try to get a new washer and dryer and that he'd be back later. And then he never showed back up, never said nothing, never called them, never checked in, never made any kind of attempts to get back in touch with them. He abandoned her and their children, and I believe it's three. Don't hold me to that.
Speaker 1:There are a lot, lot of things. It's really hard to find someone like this, because when I say he lived off the grid, it wasn't technically off the grid, because he got arrested a few times after he abandoned his family, but I there, there's no electronic footprint because he was never that involved, involved in that way. He flew very under the radar. He got paid under the table. He did a lot of you know handyman type jobs and things, and we'll get into that more in just a minute.
Speaker 1:But the fact of it all comes down to, I can't even find this man's actual birth date. Like the date of birth, like I have the years of 1957, but I don't know what day he was actually born because it's not something that's just readily available online. I found, like his mother's, his father's, his, I mean, because his dad's tombstone is readily available up there, just like you know, right up the road. But other than that, I've had a really hard time and so, and even if I did know exactly who his children were, I would never, ever, ever, you know, do that to them. I'm sure they don't want anything to do with that side of the family. I'm sure they were already done with him by the time they declared him legally dead in 1997. Is that right? No, 1994. That's right?
Speaker 1:1994, after seven years of no contact, no way of reaching him, putting all of those posts in the newspaper which I have pictures of. They'll be on the website under there on the blog post for this episode which is going to be slammed. I will have them on my Patreon for this episode as well and episode two will be up and ready to go. So if you want to look into that, you can go and I think you could do a free trial as well as the lowest start set $5, I believe, for full access to all of the Patreon goodies and you also get a care package. But anyway, 1994 they but uh, his ex-wife, who actually filed for divorce from him in 1988 for, quote, habitual, cruel and inhuman treatment, um, aka abuse, very abusive, and they declared him missing and declared him missing in 1987. She divorced him in 88. And then, in 1994, after the seven-year limit, they petitioned to have him declared legally dead so that they could get the Social Security benefits for his children.
Speaker 1:And it says sons in one of the articles. So I don't know if it was sons and daughters. Like I said, I don't know for sure. That wasn't as pressing or important for me as the information in the background as to how and when and where and what. Okay, so, and like I said, there was so much, I got lost so many times in these rabbit holes that it was a little unreal and they declared him legally dead in 1994.
Speaker 1:And after that point it's not like he completely dropped off, like I said, because he was arrested for maybe DUI a couple times. He actually served some time in Georgia, from what I understand, for a battery case and then when he got out of that, you know he basically they were. Time Magazine actually did an article on him and they called him a quote legal zombie. Basically, time Magazine actually did an article on him and they called him a quote legal zombie and he it wasn't. Like it doesn't make a lot of sense as to why he was never found, quote unquote, but like, once they declared him dead, like why would they keep looking for him? Do you know what I mean? Like?
Speaker 1:So it makes sense, especially since this is earlier in the 90s and early 2000s and it wasn't as ramped up internet time as you know, if he had done it now, if someone goes missing now you have a very, very cold, cold ice cube chance in hell to, you know, get lost completely in anywhere, just because of the amount of electronic everything that is always watching, whether it be a camera, other people, you know you leave some kind of digital footprint in some way or another, whereas late 90s, early 2000s, it wasn't as prevalent. It was getting there, but not quite so all the way up until this incident happened. And the incident that I'm referring to is initially it became it was a missing persons case and the reason that his name got dragged into it was because the family of Sue Ellen and Lexus knew his name, but not much else. She knew his name and when they started digging they realized that the person who met the description, who met, you know the information that they were given, it matched up to the person that they had declared dead 16 years earlier. And before we get too much further into the details of the incident and such, I want to back again, but we're not going to go back quite as far, we're just going to jump back a touch to Sue Ellen Roberts and Lexus K Roberts. There's oh my gosh, it's just a travesty. There's oh my gosh, it's just a travesty. It is a true, true, tragic travesty of a story that led them to be in the company of this murdering, abusive, probably psychopathic. There's a lot of things. There are a lot of things that are very, very wrong with this situation. However, it's an interesting and complex story that kind of led them there to be in that situation on that day.
Speaker 1:Now, sue ellen, she was born in her hometown but in the 80s and 90s up there she was having troubles because her education got interrupted at age 18 when she became a young mother to Lexi, who was born on oh gosh, I forget what month 1997. She was born in 1997. And you know, as hard as it may have been, she persevered. She got her GED and in 2001, she moved to Las Vegas. They were looking for opportunities of family and support and of family and support and the um. I think her father lived in las vegas and wanted to help her out there.
Speaker 1:So by 2010, which was the year that all of this kind of occurred and happened, lexus was in her, lexi she was in seventh grade. She was so well known for a vibrant personality. All the pictures that I had that I will be posting on the blog post on sinlawpodcastcom. You can see just great, big old smile, very fun, loving. She looks like she's greeting the world with open arms, open heart and just an equally like huge, great, big old smile. She loved the color purple, which is also my favorite color. She played the viola and had recently just joined the band. She was actually in middle school, like I said, seventh grade. So she was in the middle school band and they were doing okay. It had been hard.
Speaker 1:But after, I think around 2007, everybody kind of shifted down. We went into the economic recession and in a tourist town like Las Vegas where they were living, that hit especially hard because, you know, people don't have as much money to be going and you know, at that point I believe it was that Sue Ellen lost her job. Then she had to end up moving back in with her mother and, like, put all the belongings in storage. And it was during this really low point of Sue Ellen and Lexi that moving back in and doing all this that she actually met Thomas Stephen Sanders and at that point, in 2000, somewhere between 2008, 2010, it was somewhere in there and they ended up catching some sparks. You know, finding a relationship and now when you look at pictures of this man, you're gonna try. You're gonna have the same reaction that most everyone did when they see this um, what, um, what? Of all the options you had on the planet, that's the one that stuck. It doesn't make any sense.
Speaker 1:Sue Ellen was a beautiful young lady. She, I mean like, obviously with her own personal problems and issues, and she may have very well had a lot of deep-seated, you know, like confidence or struggled with any kind of problems in that regard, and maybe she was just looking for a win at that point. I mean, like we're all guilty of that, we've done things just to make ourselves feel better and maybe that was, maybe that was what it was, because, from what I understand, thomas Eamon Sanders had a way of um trying to be charming and trying to overly um be overly affectionate, or I think they call it love bombing. So it's like the affection, but using it in manipulative ways. So catching her at that manipulative or that vulnerable moment and showering her with gifts and love and praise and telling her how beautiful and how great she was and she was going to come off great and all of these things, even though Lexi, initially from from the time that she met him, lexi, she didn't ever really warm up to him. She was never really comfortable with him. But despite that, sue Ellen still became involved with him, which was in, I'm sorry, august of 2010. And just two months into their relationship, which would have made it september.
Speaker 1:Sanders, thomas, even sanders. He persuaded sue ellen and to go on a trip to barizona which is adorable, google it it's and the Grand Canyon, and to bring Lexi along. Now Sue Ellen's mom, she was not happy. She was not happy about that. She was not happy about the relationship that had developed between them. She had always been put off by him and it wasn't something that she thought was a good idea. Now she told Sue Ellen as much that she didn't agree with it. She didn't like it, she didn't want Lexi being around him, but she did it anyway and she decided to go ahead and go on the trip to Las Vegas with him anyway, las Vegas with him anyway. And that's pretty much the last time that that anyone saw them alive. Anyone that knew them or loved them or cared about them never saw them again. In fact, mary Woodburn, who is Sue Ellen's mother and Lex's grandmother they told a reporter with the Action News 13 station there in Arizona that or, I'm sorry, in Nevada, quote it's not like my daughter just to turn cold and leave and not call me in so many days. I think maybe he did something to my daughter and now my granddaughter is with him alone. All I want is to hear their voices and know that they're her right. Unquote.
Speaker 1:Other family members told police that they had believed that they were traveling in the silver 2001 Kia four-door sedan with the Nevada plates and it had noticeable damage on the passenger side. So that was an indicator or something that you know officers could look out with the boatload that went out and the information that went out in the FBI news release on November 10th. So the Flagstaff Arizona Sheriff's Office they tracked them down to Ellen and Alexis to a motel and they determined that they had signed the guestbook on Saturday, september 4th that's literally Labor Day and then they were last seen visiting the next day the Barizona Wildlife Park. It showed them entering they had actually video surveillance of them entering the recreational drive-thru area and then after that, however, after they drove off camera, exiting that they had no other trails to follow. So they didn't rule out the possibility of foul play, but they were not anxious really to embrace that because instead they thought it was possible that maybe Sue, ellen and Sanders had run off to begin a new life together. And that was actually supported by later testimony from a friend of Sanders who had worked with him and said that he told him Sanders had told the friend about them going on a trip to the Grand Canyon and down to Arizona, whatever, and that he said he was going to go and get hitched or get married to Sue Ellen. So the family, however, of Sue Ellen did not at all not even a little bit, not even a single featherweight amount buy into that. They immediately assumed that something bad had happened.
Speaker 1:Now, when they finally did the missing report and all of that, they called and reported the missing. They got everything out. They did a nationwide all-points bulletin for the mom and daughter and described them in full brown hair, brown eyes for Alexis. She was five feet tall, about 100 pounds. Sue Ellen was about five feet four, about 150 pounds, brown hair, blue eyes. And they had some other information that they were investigating and trying to figure out what had actually happened because they were trying to see. You know, they a lot of times will take these missing persons cases and work them to the fullest of their capability, hoping that they find the person and that everything, all the investigating that they did, doesn't have to be used for anything other than you know, maybe later, for whatever reason. But it's just information that was gathered, but they don't have to use it. But in the worst case scenario, where it becomes a homicide investigation, they've already got a good start. So that's kind of how that works.
Speaker 1:And so they found out that Sue Ellen was born and raised in Manchester, new Hampshire. Lexus had been born there too, but they left when they were, when Lexus was four, to go to new to Las Vegas. And you know, at that point in in 2000, what was it? Four, no, I'm sorry, 2001-ish that Las Vegas was booming, like you know, economic boost, all that. So there was a lot of reason to move down there as well. As Sue Ellen's mom lived there.
Speaker 1:So Alexis had attended school in kindergarten, starting in kindergarten in Las Vegas, and had just started seventh grade at the Sylvester Junior High on the south side of the city when she disappeared she had turned 13 during the time that she went missing. So she was 12, had turned 13 and in the interim, and so her birthday was missed by her family. Her 13th birthday was missed by everybody, and they lived in an apartment complex, also in the southeast part of the city, but they had moved about six months before they vanished, and know because they were known to visit relatives in new hampshire every summer. That was so they could, like, get away from the heat of the summer of vegas, which makes sense. That them not doing that or them, um, having just done that, it seemed kind of crazy that they were just kind of up and leave because nobody had, you know, she hadn't made any mention of that.
Speaker 1:Sue Ellen hadn't said that she was thinking about running away and starting a life with her dream lover or whatever, though, and she just, you know, she was trying to get back on her feet. She was trying to put herself and her daughter and back in a in a good place after, you know, the economy failing and everything else and getting laid off and having to move back in with their parents. So, up until that point of six months prior, they had lived in their own apartment, they had been taking care of themselves, everything was going well, and because of again, we're talking about that vulnerable position she was in, she was having a hard time getting ends to meet and that the gifts and money and things that he was throwing at her when they first met, you know, was very appealing to Sue Ellen, which was unfortunate because, that's just, he took advantage of the fact that she was in that that position in that place. Um, and Sue Ellen had actually told her great aunt that she uh, patricia, I believe, was her great aunt's name. She lived in New Hampshire. She said that you know he treated her well, and Lexus too. Um, and Miss Patricia, the great aunt was quoted saying she was at a low point in her life and he charmed her into trusting him makes all of the sense.
Speaker 1:So, knowing all that, the last time when they're finishing their investigation out and they're trying to get everything figured out, the they realized the last time that anyone had heard from Sue Ellen was on the 5th of September when she used her cell phone to call a relative. Now they urgently wanted to speak to the man known as Sanders. They learned, learned that he and this is where the nickname Spider comes in, because that's what people called him there in Vegas apparently they did not have anything concrete on him, but they suspected him of kidnapping, obviously, and believed he could at least provide a clue as to what happened to Sue Ellen and Lexus. So, even if he didn't actually do anything, they still needed to talk to him because he was the last person seen with them, right, and they couldn't find much of anything else on him and his background. So they put an APB out, which an all points bulletin which was issued for the car and him, and that was through the FBI, I believe, after the fact. But they believed that, even if, you know, the car had to be somewhere because they couldn't just drive off into the middle of nowhere. And so either that Sue, ellen and Lexus were in the car and he was gone, or he was in the car and they were gone, or they were all three still together somewhere off in the you know glorious new future. Now they did say, like look out for this car, but the license plate might have been changed If he had done something wrong. Something wrong we don't know, but according to what they had dug up from his past before he was legally declared dead, they came across some information that was pretty unsavory, apparently, because they also made a point to say that the reason you should look to double, double check if the license plate is different, because sanders had been known to do that in the past. So as they started to learn more about him, they shortly followed that up with the news release from the FBI with federal charges of kidnapping.
Speaker 1:They continued digging and learned that he had worked as a welder, a night watchman, at a mini storage facility on the south side of Las Vegas. He was a handyman and it was reported that when Sue Ellen went to move her things into storage remember she moved back in with her parents when she moved her stuff into storage. There was where they met and that would have been easy for him to ascertain all of the situation that she was in. Let me lend you a hand. Oh, why are we putting all this stuff up? It's like a house, a house full of you know. It would have been easy to to gather all the information he needed to understand exactly what point she was at in her life, to see the devastation and things that you know, and for her to be at such a low point. He would have been easily able to prey on her at that time. So he did that. He worked at the storage facility but but he also would collect like scrap metal to earn money and then he would exchange automobiles or cars by dealing with the salvage yards and trade stuff up and try to get. That's how he would get money that way Now.
Speaker 1:At the time, police described Sanders as 5 foot 8 inches tall and about 200 pounds. He had brown eyes, gray hair and his Nevada driver's license which he had, which obviously means he wasn't dead depicted him with a bushy gray beard and a receding hairline. So while they're doing their investigating, they realize, or they learn from some of Sanders' relatives, that he has no upper teeth and only two lower teeth. Nothing says I love you like a two-tooth smile. Yeah, I don't mean to make fun, but that's. It just doesn't follow for me, like no matter how nice somebody be to me, like I'm not judging anybody, that it doesn't. You know, my teeth are not the greatest either. Like it's genetic as well as a lot of other factors and a lot of other things, but like 20 years older than her and a lot of other things, but like 20 years older than her, no freaking teeth. His nickname is Spider. He meets, she meets him off in the middle of a storage facility. I just and he's not like handsome, like he doesn't look. Anyway, y'all, y'all make your own decisions. I'm gonna stop talking about it. So again, they're still digging, they're still looking. They found out that he had like a scar on his abdomen, tattoo on his chest. He also occasionally would go by his middle name, steve or Stephen, instead of Thomas or Tom.
Speaker 1:And then they finally got around to the part where he was declared dead in Mississippi in 1994. He vanished and had walked out on his first wife. Her name was Candace Tarver. She used to live in Hammond, louisiana, but they had moved to Mississippi and there, oh there it is three sons, 1987. They had three sons. His parents, brother and ex-wife all filed a court petition to have him declared legally dead so that the children could claim benefits. And the FBI agent that was talking about this at some point said he just walked away and never came back. And then he was originally from Macomb, mississippi. So that's where they had ended up living, him and Tarver.
Speaker 1:And when she divorced him she cited, you know, the abuse, the cruel and inhuman treatment and abuse. And when the FBI agent showed up at her house to ask her if she knew where he might possibly be at, she said um, what, what? And she was actually quoted as saying that she had almost passed out because he destroyed her life. And now he's doing it again. And then, of course, she's put into a panic, thinking maybe he is coming back here and it's just mind-blowing mind-blowing for her. She had no idea that this was even a possibility of a thing. I mean, can you imagine after what was that? That was 94, and this is 2010,. So 16 years after the fact, after you've had the person, the man who walked down on you and your three kids, like agents show up on your front door looking for him because he's possibly kidnapped, harmed or injured a mother and her child, I think you'd be a little bit shaken as well Anyone, rightfully so.
Speaker 1:So once they got to speak with her and got a little bit more information that even after he was declared dead, he still was getting in trouble like he. He had been. Like I said he served time in georgia. I said that earlier. He served two years almost in georgia for hitting a little boy, and this was this was some bullshit too but he had hit him on the back of the legs because he had soiled his underpants. He, you know, went, he potty, which is something that you know all kids go through, but he had soiled his underpants. He, you know, went and potty, which is something that you know all kids go through, but he had soiled them and then he used them to rub in his face after he had beat him for soiling his underwear. So aside from that one, he had also they heard rumors that nothing was ever concrete or nothing ever was charged, heard rumors and nothing was ever concrete or nothing ever was charged, but he was never arrested or convicted.
Speaker 1:Um, but his former wife, candace, said that he had been in a compromising position, he'd been found in a compromising position by the father of a six-year-old girl and that he was known to have an a predilection for young females, and she was quoted as saying quote he was a pedophile, but not on paper, unquote. So when he started drifting, he drifted through all the different places and they were trying to track him as best they could. They tracked him into Mississippi, louisiana, tennessee, georgia, nevada and he managed to stay pretty much off the grid until he became connected to this missing persons case with Sue Ellen and Lexis. Now it was a lot disturbing to a lot of the family of Sue Ellen and Lexis, because her first question was how many other victims are there? Because her first question was how many other victims are there? You know, the more that we learn about this guy, the more likely it is that he's not. This isn't the first time he's done something like this and that, just you know, completely made them even more unsettled and uncertain about the future and what the future held, and that it probably was not going to end with a happy, joyous reunion of their daughter and granddaughter. So this brings us back directly to the very beginning, that fbi release where catahoula pairs sheriff's office have reported that the hunters had found human remains in the wooded area up in the hills is what they call it in Harrisonburg. They could have been that of a young boy or, I'm sorry, a young girl or a young woman, due to the stature of Lexus, you remember, as I was just telling you, she was about five foot tall, about 100 pounds, and that could very easily be a young woman and not a young girl. So when they found the remains is the best way to put that, because there was little more than just a skeleton at that point Because, remember, she went missing. Her and Sue Ellen had been last seen for sure and heard from on September 5th. So on September 5th was the last time they knew that she was alive for sure. Okay, so October 8th was a month and three days after the fact and they had very little to work with Now.
Speaker 1:We've talked about this next group in previous episodes and I love talking about them because they are an amazing, amazing organization that does amazing work, especially in the forensic field. It's the Forensic Anthropology and Computer Enhancement Services Lab at the Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge, or more easily said, is the FACES Lab, f-a-c-e-s at LSU in Baton Rouge. So they are funded by the state and they help local law enforcement with forensics. They do identification of victims and bodies and remains with very few identifying characteristics, like that's their specialty. At the time the director was Mary Mannheim and her staff they had. They were immediately all over this because the victims identifying characters were so immediate, were so obviously young and female and the fact that she had braces on her teeth it just made it seem like she was a younger girl and maybe not even teenage or you know somewhere in that general area. And it was very striking because you know there's a bunch of mothers there are five others outside of miss mary, the director on staff as forensic anthropologists there at the faces lab. So they were all gung-ho because we're, you know, aunts, grandmothers, great aunts, great grandmothers, where you know we aren't gonna let this one go. We are going to figure out who killed this girl and left her in her body, just to fade away into nothing up in the middle of the woods of nowhere. So they promptly put together the profile, which wasn't much to go on, but it was still a beginning. So they had she was white, she was between 12 and 16, and had braces. That was pretty much it. That was pretty much all that they had.
Speaker 1:The night that they found the body was hard for people here in Catahoula Parish because nobody like she did not come from here Like we. Everybody who lives over here knows it's a very small town, very small. Like if somebody that age went missing, she wouldn't have been missing for as long as she was or long enough to have her body decomposed in such a way that it did, just because everybody knows everybody, somebody would have said something. It happens all the time. You know we have. If you look on the Concordia Parish and Catahoula Parish Sheriff's Office webpage, their Facebook page, they have a lot of posts pretty consistently of people that are reported missing, kids that are reported missing, even if they're just a kid that has run off with their boyfriend for whatever reason, or yada, yada, yada. They are, you know, pretty well flushed out through and they make a point to make notice of it or take note of it. And this is something that's really crazy for smaller towns and that bigger cities wouldn't really have that kind of understanding.
Speaker 1:But, like everybody, when they found that body they knew it wasn't from here. They knew the little girl was not from this area quote unquote. So they knew it was going to be someone outside of the place More than likely it would have been outside of Louisiana just because it didn't seem to fit anything here and they didn't have any missing persons that matched that description at the time. So, mary Manheim from the FACES lab, she was having difficulties with this because they weren't letting it go. Like they were on the hunt, they were going to figure it out and they were not going to let it go. So finally they moved on to the braces and after about a week they were still unable to make the identification. So they went to the dentist. They went to a dentist and an orthodontist in New Orleans and took the dental photos and x-rays of her, of her mouth, to see if they could help get that age gap a little bit smaller. Now, um, based on the expert opinions, they said that the victim was likely no longer than 13 years old, which was actually dead on spot on.
Speaker 1:But even then, after another week went by, mary still did not have any good prospects for identifying the little girl and local police were at a loss, had little hope of solving the case and finally she got really frustrated. They had got the of solving the case and finally she got really frustrated. They had got the. They had found the body located. They had recovered the body on October 10th. On October 25th, she said look, we're going to have a staff meeting. Everybody come in Monday. So she told her staff that day we are going to identify her today. So that's all they did. That day they scoured the internet, they focused all their efforts on the missing girls and any missing girls in the country around the age of 13. And before the day was over, they learned about the disappearance of Lexis and her mother and they contacted Arizona to see if they could get any information that they had maybe digital records, and they did. They had them. So they sent them immediately over to the Faces lab and within a few hours they matched the records with their Jane Doe and there was no longer any doubt that the body that was left in the hills in Catahoula Parish in Harrisonburg, louisiana, was that of Lexus K Roberts.
Speaker 1:Now I know you guys are gonna be upset and I'm not gonna blame you, but I have to. I'm gonna cut it off right here and I'm gonna leave it in bite-sized chunks because I'm going to release these sequential weeks, so I'm not gonna skip any weeks, so we'll have one released this week, next week and so on and so forth until we're done, because, again, I don't actually know, uh, it should go a little bit quicker. The next one. But then you get into the court case and then you get into the death sentence stuff and it's uh, it's a lot, it's a lot. We haven't even um got exactly how they were, were killed yet, but you can pretty well guarantee and it was later and I'll I'll go ahead and give you that I'll tell you about the fact that they did eventually find Sue Ellen and she was deceased. But that wasn't until after the arrest of the dead man that had now become a killer and he was now on the radar of the FBI and multiple states, all of their agencies, are on the lookout, and now when they actually find him, it isn't until a few days after that that they find Sue Ellen.
Speaker 1:So and this is me apologizing again, but the good news is is I won't, I won't leave you hanging for too long. I'm gonna get the other episodes out, get them up, get them done. If you are already a Patreon supporter which I don't think you are, unless this is Kayla, I guess but if you want to help support the show and get these episodes earlier, but if you want to help support the show and get these episodes earlier, I have all of the rest of this story already posted on Patreon and available for you to listen and binge right now. So thank you, guys, so much for listening and thank you for coming back, even after my hiatus, and I appreciate every single one of you and I love you and I thank you and keep every single one of those suggestions coming, because I see them Now.
Speaker 1:The fan mail I cannot write you back. I can't write back to fan mail. If you leave me some way to contact you, I will absolutely contact you back, but if you write me a fan mail on MyBreathSprout, if you click on the little thing that says send me a message now, I cannot respond to you unless you give me a way to do so. So please do that, because I love hearing from you guys, but I also like to be able to respond. If there's something that's mentioned that may or may that I feel like I should respond to in whatever way it may be, even if it's just to respond and say thank you, and you're the best. So I appreciate you guys, I love you guys and I will see you next week. Thank you so much for listening to the Sin Law Podcast.
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