Just The Tip-sters

The Long Island Serial Killer has preyed on victims for too many decades. Someone probably knows something they may not think is important. IF you know, suspect, think, intuit ANYTHING, please let the task force know. www.gilgonews.com

Melissa Lucio's death penalty conviction has been given a stay of execution pending a lower court review. We aren't done yet, though. There are ways we can all help at the end of this episode. 

Update on the Will Cierzan case from 2017 and the indictment of his nephew Daniel Cierzan for his murder. Will's case has been previously covered in Episodes #4, 120, 164 and other murdertizer updates. 

Over the course of these first three-and-a-half seasons of this podcast, Melissa has been presented with a wide array of missing persons cases from Tip-Sters from around the world.  Melissa has followed up, done her research, and presented many of them as episodes.  The inspiration for “Just The Tip-Sters” itself was inspired by Melissa’s deep devotion to solving the 2017 disappearance of Will Cierzan – an ongoing mission that could be culminating soon with the trial of Will’s nephew Daniel.  But hovering over every such case are questions – about the nature of the case itself – and how to actually help when help is needed.  What makes one missing persons case more compelling or worthy of attention than another?  How can one tell if a reported vanishing is evidence of wrongdoing or someone walking away from their life or a hoax?  And if one is motivated to help the family and friends of a missing person, how does one do so without getting in the way or actually hindering the investigation?  And what, in fact,

In this episode Melissa tackles the complex moral, ethical and practical aspects of sentencing reform – in particular the parole of those who have committed heinous murders – and the answers aren’t easy to come by.  The focus begins with the murder of three innocent workers in Northern Kentucky in January 1980, when then 24 year-old Paul Kordenbrock and his accomplice Michael Kruse entered a Western Auto store in the town of Florence, stole a cache of firearms, then Kordenbrock shot Stanley Allen and store owner William Thompson in their heads while they laid on the floor.  Allen died and Allen survived.  Just 15 hours prior, in neighboring Kenton County, Kordenbrock (who was also accompanied by Kruse) shot and killed two service station workers, Rick Allen Jones and Timothy Mains.  While the fate of Kruse is foggy, Kordenbrock - the trigger man in both crimes – was sentenced to death in the Western Auto murder – then later had that sentence reduced to life in prison after he admitted to the service station k

In the early morning of May 13, 2013, 33 year-old Bardstown Kentucky police officer Jason Ellis, just weeks away from his seventh anniversary on the job, was heading home after a late night of arrests and subsequent paperwork.  Ellis took Exit 34 off the Bluegrass Parkway, headed for his home in nearby Bloomfield, when he encountered tree limbs blocking the exit ramp.  He turned his car to block the ramp to prevent other drivers from hitting the debris, and suddenly, with an armful of the limbs in his arms, he was shot four times – in the side, neck, arm and head – with what authorities later determined to be 12-gauge shotgun rounds.  He died at the scene.  Ellis was probably the most beloved officer in the Bardstown PD – he left behind a wife and two young sons.  Primarily assigned to the K-9 unit, Ellis’ K-9 partner – a German Shepard named Figo – was not with him as he drove home that night.  It was a photograph of Figo putting his paw on his partner’s casket at Jason Ellis’ funeral that captured the atte

This episode brings the first of what will be two updates on the ever-growingly infamous Randy Sellers case out of Kenton County Kentucky.  It was at the County Fair in 1980 when 17 year-old Randy Sellers, after some rowdy behavior, was ostensibly driven home by Kenton County Police, who claimed they dropped Sellers off close to his home – only to have him go missing…forever.  Melissa and the podcast have developed a keen interest in this case , and Melissa’s saga with the case, involving everything from misinformation, a possibly corrupt police agency and even a phone call with the FBI.  If you haven’t been following along, listen to Episodes 69, 121 and 151 (in order).  You’ll be drawn in too.  One of the most fascinating characters Melissa has met in her investigation of the Sellers case is the owner of a farm that was once part of a larger farm where rumors have had it for years that Randy Sellers’ body is buried.  That concerned citizen – who we’re calling “Jeremy” in this episode, has spent innumerable