Amber Hoopes

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2:00My name is Sarah Turney, and this is Voices for Justice.

2:09Today, I'm discussing the case of Amber Hoops. In the days following September 11, 2001, like most Americans, Audra Bergner was with her family in Idaho Falls, Idaho, watching the coverage of the attacks. She was with her parents, Kathleen and Norris, as well as her niece, 20-year-old Amber Hoops. In that moment, Audra told Amber, I don't know what I would do if you ever went missing. And not long after that, she got a 4am phone call from her mother saying exactly that. Amber was missing. This is the case of Amber Hoops. At 10.35pm on Thursday, September 13th, 2001, Kathleen Bergner told her granddaughter Amber goodnight for the last time.

3:00Amber was in her room, lying on the floor watching TV and reading a magazine. And it didn't seem like she had any plans to go out. Aside from Amber being known as pretty shy and overall homebody, she was also dressed for bed. She was wearing a white t-shirt, gray boxer shorts, and her knee-length terrycloth robe. But at this point, nothing seems out of the ordinary, so Kathleen just goes to bed as usual. When she wakes up around 1am to use the restroom, she sees that Amber still seems to be awake. Their rooms were separated by the bathroom, so she can't really help but notice. And it wasn't out of the ordinary for Amber.

3:38She's young, she stays up late. So Kathleen pops her head in to check on Amber. Maybe just to see what she's doing and say goodnight again. The light and TV were on in Amber's room, and the door was slightly cracked. So she opens the door expecting to see Amber in bed, but she's not there. Kathleen also notices that some lights in the house were on that weren't on when she went to bed a few hours earlier. She distinctly remembers turning off all the lights in the house as she did every single night, so she figures that was Amber. But when she goes to check, Amber isn't anywhere in the house. So she checks the next place she thinks she might be.

4:16Next to the family home is the family business, an auto body shop. It's literally directly right next to their home, just separated by a sidewalk. And Kathleen noticed that the light along the sidewalk to the shop was on. And when she gets closer, she also sees that the light in the office is on. All good signs at this point. And it may seem late, but it wasn't abnormal for Amber to use the computer in the office late at night. She would often download music and had some international pen pals that she enjoyed talking to over email. She was also known to occasionally use the exercise equipment or tanning bed that they had stored there.

4:54So she assumes that Amber is doing one of those things. But when she gets into the shop, Amber isn't there either. This is when Kathleen realizes that something is seriously wrong. So she goes back to the house and wakes up her husband Norris to tell him that she can't find Amber anywhere. Now when Norris takes a look around, he notices something else. He sees that one of their red and white shop trucks was also missing from its parking spot inside the overhead door. And not just that, it was taken in a way that gives this family some clues. According to an interview that Audra gave to Nate Eaton with the East Idaho News, there were only two ways in and out of the shop, and the way the truck was taken needed to be accessed by someone with a key.

5:41Here's Audra. And he came out and he was the one that noticed the shop truck was gone because they're all parked in there nice and tidy and it was right inside the door, the overhead door. So there's only one specific way to get out because, well, there's two, but you've got to have a key for the front, the great big gate. And the only persons that have that key is the owner of the shop, my dad, and the record driver. So you had to work there or been a family member to know that you go around back through the field and out through the end. It's about two block distance and you go out on Lincoln Road.

6:22And is that the way the truck was taken out? Yes. And it was wet. It had rained a little bit. So there were marks going the other direction to the right. So basically, whoever took the truck was either someone in the family or someone who worked at the shop. and they also had a good idea of which direction the truck went due to the muddy terrain. Now, unlike Amber being up late and possibly using the computer, taking the truck and leaving in the middle of the night without telling her grandparents would be extremely out of character. But there's also a phone in the truck, so they decide to give it a call and see if maybe Amber or someone else answers.

7:01Debbie Bryce for the Idaho State Journal describes this as a bag phone. Basically, it was a large cell phone that was corded to a receiver and typically stored inside of a bag. Hence the name bag phone. I'll admit that I've never seen or used one of these, but in my research, I found that they weren't totally uncommon for people in rural areas or truckers and boaters. So basically, it's a cell phone with better service than your typical Nokia brick that was pretty common in 2001. Either way, they call and there's no answer. They also call around to family members to see if maybe she's with them, or even just contacted them.

7:39If maybe there was some emergency that Amber went to help with, or just something. But no one they speak with has seen Amber either. So from here, they report her missing to the Bonneville County Sheriff's Office. Sergeant Brian Lovell is the one who takes the call. He was working the night shift and got to the scene at about 2 a.m. He speaks with Kathleen and Norris to gather as much information as he can. There's no runaway note, there doesn't appear to be any signs of foul play in the home, there's nothing missing, there's really just nothing to indicate what may have happened. They just know that Amber was gone.

8:15But according to Audra, the sheriff's office believes that it was Amber who took the truck, still in her pajamas and a pair of sandals she used to walk to and from the shop. Ultimately, they believe that Amber was probably just fooling around, and would return. Here is Sergeant Lovell also talking to Nate Eaton from the East Idaho News. You know, you're initially thinking did she take off on her own? You know, she's 20 years old and, you know, she could take off on her own if she wanted to. It wasn't like a juvenile runaway type of thing. But, you know, we're trying to dig into who does she know?

8:52Who's her friends? You know, is this something that she would normally do? Sneak out at night or anything like that? and we just, there was none of that. But Audra says her family not only immediately suspected that Amber was in danger, but also had a good idea of exactly who may have taken her. So they called the police after looking and calling the family and they were kind enough to come out, but they really did. They thought Amber was just fooling around. She stole the shop truck. She'll come back, not to worry. She just is having fun with some friends And we just knew that wasn't the case.

9:30In fact, we all had suspicion of who took her. I say that because probably about three months before Amber was abducted, there was an employee at the shop that left. I don't remember if he was fired or if he just left on his own. But he did not get along with my dad. My dad didn't get along with him. And he went and sold the MacTool stuff in the MacTool truck. And he came to the shop to sell the tools, and Dad asked him to leave and not to ever come back. So Mark said, I will make it my life long, then dead it'll ruin you. This message is sponsored by Greenlight. Money is this invisible thread that ties us all together.

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12:02It's honestly always really hard for me to hear. Andras described Amber as being extremely shy, to the point that she wouldn't even go to the store by herself. She loved her family, she loved kids, and she worked as a nanny for a couple in Idaho Falls. Her best friend was her little sister. They spoke the night that Amber went missing, and she doesn't report anything out of the ordinary. So the idea of Amber just up and leaving, let alone stealing a vehicle from her family to go on some type of joyride, just didn't align with her character at all. But I will say that despite this initial belief that Amber was likely not in harm's way, the investigation still began rather quickly, and Sergeant Lovell calls for backup pretty much right away.

12:47And it's this other official, Deputy Al Thompson, as he's on his way to Amber's house, who ends up finding the shop truck about 30 minutes after Amber was reported missing. It was found over half a mile down the road at the corner of Ammon and Lincoln Roads. And it was clear that it had just been driven, because when he felt the hood, it was still warm. Now, back in 2001, there wasn't much in this area. According to Sergeant Lovell, there was a building that used to be a store and just a gravel parking lot. So while the possibility of there being any witnesses around was pretty slim, it did seem like they were close to hopefully finding Amber.

13:27Or at least whoever stole the truck. Now, like I mentioned at the very top of this episode, Amber's Aunt Audra gets a call from her family at about 4am. And I mean, no one is ever truly prepared for something like this. For the way these feelings, the stress, and anxiety of a situation like this hits you. But she immediately takes action. While it was still dark, the first thought she had was to make flyers. It wasn't long before they had hundreds of people out searching for Amber. But there was no sign of her anywhere. Of course, while all of this is being done, authorities and Amber's family were analyzing the truck, and they discovered that it had gone much further than a half mile from the home where it was found.

14:13Here's Audra. And there was dust lining over the truck, but the truck had been wiped down otherwise in the inside with fingerprints, so there were no fingerprints that were useful. Interesting enough, the shop truck was filled up with fuel the night before, or the day before, so they kept the odometer readings and there was a certain amount of miles put on the truck that no one from the family or the shop had done. So we searched in that direction and then the vegetation that was found underneath the truck, a professor in Puppetello said that those vegetations only are in high C area and the bone area.

14:54By matching the mileage with the information they found about the vegetation under the truck, it seemed clear that it was driven to the high C area. which becomes the new focus of the search. But again, nothing related to Amber was found. Now, this entire time, in all of these searches for Amber, her family is screaming to the sheriff's office to investigate Keith Mark Hescock, this disgruntled man who literally told this family they would pay, that he would make it his lifelong vendetta to get this revenge. And the sheriff's office does eventually follow up. They speak with Hescock, but he denies any involvement in Amber's disappearance.

15:35He says he was home all night, and his family backs this up. It seems that he has an alibi. Now, of course, investigators look into other angles as well. Amber didn't have a cell phone, and she didn't have a boyfriend. They do look into her international pen pals that she liked to email, and they were able to confirm that she was using the computer that night. But according to Sergeant Lovell, they were not in the area when Amber went missing, especially with so many flights being canceled after the 9-11 attacks. So the idea of these people being in the area seemed very far-fetched to him and they never found any evidence to indicate that they may have been involved in any way.

16:15He's actually discussed how all of these flights being grounded and the restrictions on flights made it harder to look for Amber. They were ultimately able to jump through some hoops to get some planes in the air to support these searches, but I thought it was a pretty unique aspect of her case that I wanted to share with you. Sergeant Lovell discusses how 9-11 was kind of this double-edged sword in Amber's case. It dominated the media, it made getting aerial support more difficult, but it also allowed them to eliminate these pen pals as potential suspects pretty early on. Now, the DEC podcast also interviewed one of the investigators on this case, who points to a possible suspect that I didn't see in traditional reporting, another employee of the auto body shop named Farron Poole.

17:02According to that reporting, he was a sex offender who lived a few miles away and was someone who made advances towards Amber, but ultimately she refused to go out with him. I definitely encourage you to go listen to their episode on Amber, but basically he lies to investigators about his whereabouts on the night Amber went missing. He fails a polygraph, but they also search his apartment and find nothing. In the end, they can't connect Poole to Amber's disappearance. And then, a few months later, something happened that led them right back to Keith Hescock. When it comes to what your family eats and drinks, you know your choices matter.

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18:41On the morning of June 2nd, 2002, the Bonneville County Sheriff's Office responded to the call of a missing 14-year-old who we'll call Jennifer. She lived off Highway 26 in a rural part of Idaho Falls. The night prior, she'd had a sleepover outside on her family's trampoline with her sister and possibly some other siblings. Reporting does differ here. But when they woke up, Jennifer was gone. According to reporting by Belinda Luscombe for Time, Jennifer had been taken by 42-year-old Keith Hescock. She'd been abducted at gunpoint as he threatened to harm her siblings. Then, Hescock took Jennifer to his home, chained her to his bed, and repeatedly assaulted her.

19:25According to reporting by the Idaho Statesman, Hescock told her that she was not his first victim. Hescock tried to call out of work the next day, but his boss basically forced him to come in. And this one little action, this one moment, this one person changed everything. When Hescock went to work, Jennifer found a fire extinguisher and began smashing it against the chain for several hours until it broke. And then she did something that I think is so brave and so smart. Before she left the house, she found an envelope with Hescock's name and address on it. From here, she ran to a phone, eventually made contact with her family, and was able to lead investigators back to the home and to Hescock.

20:12As deputies were at his home collecting evidence, Hescock got home from work, saw the authorities, and fled the scene. He was chased east of Idaho Falls and into the hills of the Grand Teton National Forest, but Hescock found himself trapped on a dead-end road in the area of Moody Meadows. Then he called his mom and left a voicemail saying he wasn't going back to prison. He'd previously served two years on burglary charges in Oregon. From here, Hescock got out of his vehicle, a canine unit was deployed on him, and he began shooting. The dog bit Hescock on his left forearm before he shot and killed it.

20:53Then he turned his gun to the other officers. He struck one officer in the right thigh, and Hescock was shot in the left forearm and shoulder. He then fell to the ground and turned the gun on himself. Shots were fired for a total of four seconds, resulting in two deaths and one injury. After this, Hescock's family was interviewed again, and here they admitted that they lied about his alibi for the night that Amber went missing. They said he came home, switched vehicles, and left. Many hours later, he returned with some firewood. As far as I could find, they never faced charges for interfering with the investigation.

21:39After his death, Hescock's home was searched for any evidence linking him to Amber or anyone else. They searched through two truckloads of movies, dirty clothing, computers, and a plethora of other items. But nothing was found. From here, Amber's case really went cold. It seemed that all they had was speculation and theories. Audra believes that Hescock likely came into the shop that night with the intention to steal tools. She's talked about how she was told that he knew the shop was often left unlocked, and she believes he'd stolen from her family in the past. So her theory seems to be that he came in that night, saw Amber, and took the opportunity to enact the vengeance he'd previously threatened.

22:24She also believes he likely held Amber for a period of time before killing her, similar to Jennifer. And we know through Jennifer's statements that Hescock told her that she was not his first victim, but Audra and many others believe that that may have not just been Amber, that he may have also been responsible for the 1993 disappearance of Stephanie Crane near Chalice, Idaho. I covered her case last year in episode 182, but as a brief refresher, she was nine years old when she was last seen on October 11, 1993, between Chalice High School and the Chalice Lanes Bowling Alley on Highway 93. Her case remains unsolved.

23:05But here's Audra. He worked for my mom and dad's business, and his truck was the same color and design as the truck that the people saw up there at the time by the bowling alley. And then the FBI got involved after the 14-year-old girl was abducted. So they get involved in the case, in Amber's case, and they want to see if we have the time sheets of Hescox for that day. And luckily we still had him and he wasn't at work. He was hunting, and he actually did kill an animal. He tagged an animal that weekend, or that week, whenever it was. But I do believe he took her. To be clear, Audra is far from the only person to believe this.

23:51As she mentioned, the FBI has explored the possible connection, and it is widely reported on. Here's Sergeant Lovell discussing this theory, as well as the possible connection to Stephanie Crane. There were a lot of things that just sort of lined up, that pointed towards Amber's case as well. Right. And I think over the last couple decades, you know, whatever other suspects were out there, you know, our detectives, the different detectives that have had this over the years, because it's remained active, you know, I think they've done, you know, a good job in backtracking anybody else that could be a suspect, any other names and people that come up.

24:30But the most likely thing keeps pointing back to Mark Hescock. And so there's just most of this case is, you know, most all of the information we've ever got has been vetted. And up to that point, we've just never been able to finish connecting that last piece and confirming it was him or not him or someone else. wasn't he also possibly tied to stephanie crane in uh chalice yeah and my involvement in those things hasn't been a whole lot other than working for the same agency that's vetting a lot of that but i do know that there were um similarities in in places he had been things he had done that could have lined up with that case up in chalice and that was you know a decade or so earlier or 93, I think, so just less than 10 years earlier.

25:27So I don't know is, you know, that case is still active, you know, in Custer County. I don't know is that last dot's ever been connected there as well. So you've got two cases with two still missing people, almost at the same point that you just can't quite, you haven't found them yet and we haven't quite connected that last piece.

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26:19Over the years, Amber's family has seen many sets of human remains recovered that authorities thought may belong to Amber, but ultimately didn't. A body wrapped in a tarp found near a campground. Remains found 12 miles east of Idaho Falls by someone searching for better cell reception. Authorities also chased a tip from a psychic in 2003. They said Amber was in a nearby body of water, but all they found was the skeleton of a beaver, underwear, a shoe, a towel, and a bracelet. Nothing was ever connected to Amber. Through all the ups and downs, through all the heartache, Amber's family has worked hard to further her case and her legacy.