Cold Case Mystery: The Skelton Brothers: Part One

is john skelton your prime suspect yes yeah john skelton is the primary suspect in this and uh like i said we're gonna be moving forward with this investigation hello everybody welcome back and thank you for joining me for another true crime video today we're talking about the case of the skeleton brothers three small boys all under the age of 10 who vanished all of them together in 2010. on wednesday november 24th 2010 tanya zouvers dropped her three young sons off at her parents house she hugged them kissed them and told them that she hoped they would have a good thanksgiving with their father the next day she and her husband john skelton had been having some marital and custodial issues and they'd been living in separate homes since she had filed for divorce the previous september 13th but he was allowed to see the boys on weekends and they would be with him until that following friday morning she didn't know it was the last time she would ever see them the last time that she would hold them or kiss them but it was john skelton is josh powell casey anthony and michael turney all wrapped into one narcissistic compulsive lying bundle and this sad case has more convoluted twists and turns than i can even keep up with keep in mind please throughout this i'm not on the side of john or his ex-wife tanya i am and will always be on the side of the victims and in this case we have three boys who vanished and who have never been found and i'm telling you this story for them not because we want to determine who is more wrong the mother or the father not because we want to determine who did more or who cared more but because we want to know who they were we want to know their story because they're the ones who actually matter before we get started let's have a word from our sponsor and our sponsor for this video is glassesusa.com usa is the only place i've ordered glasses from for years even before going to stores was a matter of public health as a mother and someone who 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2010 there were only about 2 200 people living there so it was a small town where everyone knew everyone else and a nice safe place to settle down and raise a family which tanya and john would do john already had a daughter from his first marriage and tanya had two older daughters from her first marriage but together they had three sons andrew who was born on november 4th 2003 alexander who was born on november 20th 2005 in tanner who was born on october 20th 2001. in 2010 they were nine seven and five years of age they were known around town as normal happy go lucky kids who loved playing outside together andrew the oldest was described as being too smart for his own good he loved playing outside almost as much as he loved playing video in computer games which he was very good at his nickname was the national enquirer because he had all the family gossip and he was always looking for more he liked school and out of the three he was the most quiet and timid his mother said if he had something to ask you he would crawl into your lap and gently tap your arm to get your attention alexander the middle son was a notorious daredevil who loved jumping his bike climbing racing and getting dirty he was always getting into trouble and he'd sometimes spray his sisters with the garden hose he had an interest in cell phones and he always wanted to look at and examine everyone's phone to see how they worked his grandparents gave him one of their old flip phones and he used to wear it proudly on a belt clip the youngest tanner had a very active imagination and loved making up stories and telling them in a way where the adults around him would believe him only to laugh after he'd convinced them and tell them that he was just kidding he loved getting attention from and cuddling with his mother even though his brothers were a few years older than him tanner felt he could keep up with them and he hated being left behind when they played they all played on the morenci pto soccer team and they loved to go camping with their family it was said that all three boys would ride bikes and be outside all day if they were allowed and that they could smell mcdonald's from a mile away their father john had been working as a truck driver but when he got a dui he lost his job and he had to find other lower paying work which caused some financial strain and marital problems tanya had been a stay-at-home mother and was attending a local community college trying to get her business degree so john had always been the main breadwinner it seems that john could also be a very selfish person and when money was tight he became more so tanya said he would fall short of making sure the bills were paid or that there was food in the house but he always found money to buy his cigarettes and his beer facing a money shortage jan spent some time in jail in 2009 after failing to pay child support to his daughter from his first marriage tanya had her own troubles with the law as well in 1998 years before she met john and while she was still married to her first husband she pleaded guilty to fourth degree sexual misconduct after having sex with a 14 year old boy that worked on rental properties she and her husband had opened and managed this boy was a minor at the time so there isn't a lot of information about the situation available as it should be but i do see it often described in articles and and books about this case it's described as a consensual relationship which i have a hard time with because 14 years old is below the age of consent so it can't technically be a consensual relationship um after tanya's husband at the time discovered what she'd done he filed for divorce understandably and you know she wasn't an angel she wasn't perfect she'd certainly made mistakes in the past serious mistakes in my opinion but she hadn't hidden her history from john making sure that when they were dating she was pretty much up front about everything and he had never voiced a concern about her previous bad choices he'd never seemed to care about her past criminal activity he didn't have a problem with it essentially and he proceeded to marry her and have three children with her after she told him this according to tanya up until september of 2010 they had a normal marriage a good marriage for the most part they'd have your typical husband and wife arguments but nothing worse than that and she thought they were happy she thought that they were happy and that john was satisfied with their life but after he took a solo trip to his hometown of jacksonville florida to attend a high school reunion he began expressing interest in leaving michigan and moving to florida he'd started talking to tanya about this idea the first weekend in september and he felt that he'd be able to find a better higher paying job in florida and he would also give their sons a chance to connect with his side of the family now the relationship between john and his side of the family his parents and siblings etc is complicated we'll talk about that more in depth later according to tanya she was never big on the idea of leaving michigan all her family who she was very close to as well as her friends were in morenci the boys friends were in morenci and she hated hot humid weather on top of that due to the felony on her record she'd have to meet certain requirements and jump through certain hoops to even be legally allowed to leave the state when they woke up on the morning of monday september 12th tanya brought the three boys to school and when she got back john told her that he was going to work and he'd be back around noon tanya told him that when he got home they could make some phone calls and see exactly what she would have to do in order to leave the state and then they could discuss the possibility of moving to florida a bit more in depth after john left for work tanya and her daughter courtney ran some errands but when she returned there was a message on her home answering machine from the boys school the secretary informed her that john her husband and their father had come in that afternoon and taken all three boys out of school early informing the school that they were going on a family vacation to florida but this had confused the secretary since tanya had dropped them off that morning and she'd brought with them their medicine and their lunches as if she intended for them to be present for the entire school day tanya called john immediately to find out what was going on and he told her listen we talked about this we talked about going on a vacation but you said you didn't want to come with us and tanya was like hold up no that's not what we talked about at all we talked about moving to florida and i told you i was going to figure out what i needed to do to make that possible so clearly it's suspicious right tanya knows that they never talked about going on a family vacation to florida tanya knows that john was very serious and clear about his intentions to move to florida so she got worried a friend of tania's called the morenci police station and spoke to chief larry weeks weeks thought that it would be a good idea if he reached out to john and tried to talk john down he could act as the middle man and hopefully keep things calm and civilized but when he called he found out that john hadn't even left michigan yet john was just driving around town with the kids in his van not wanting to go home with them john informed chief weeks that yeah he hadn't left yet but he was still planning on it he was going to bring his sons on a vacation he wanted them to see the beach and see the ocean and the only reason he hadn't left yet was because he called a lawyer and set up a meeting so they weren't planning to take off until after this meeting and according to tanya the fact that he had scheduled a meeting with a lawyer threw up a lot of red flags for her and it threw up a lot of red flags with the police too since meeting with an attorney isn't typically something you do right before going on a family vacation with your kids which you plan to return from more red flags were raised when john told chief weeks that they were going to florida and he wouldn't be returning for three to four weeks the school year in morenci had just started and when john was asked the question of why he would take his sons out of school within the first month of it being in session he claimed he planned to enroll them in a jacksonville school and look for a job while he was there also something that's not typical to do when you're on a vacation tanya knew that john would be unable to enroll the boys in school without their birth certificates and social security numbers which were at home with her so tanya called john to try and convince him to come home and get that paperwork as john and tanya were having this discussion tanya's older daughters from her first marriage were physically meeting with a lawyer on behalf of their mother and tanya knew that she just had to buy time so they could figure out what steps needed to be taken to prevent jon from leaving the state with her kids legally the attorney had told tanya's daughters that the only way this could be accomplished was if tanya filed for divorce and requested emergency custody of the boys so tanya was able to convince john to come back home with their sons so she could look for the birth certificates and give them to him and she never actually planned on handing them over obviously and she knew where they were the whole time but she needed to stall long enough for her daughters to return with the paperwork from the lawyer a police officer was already standing by ready to serve john skelton with the paperwork which would make it illegal for him to leave the state with the boys without their mother's permission john did return to the family home on congress street the older boys alexander and andrew remained outside playing in the yard but five-year-old tanner had come inside with his father wanting to see his mom when john was there at the house tanya put on a show of searching through files and desk drawers looking for the birth certificates even though she'd already found them within the first five minutes of getting home as this was happening tanya's daughters called her and told her to just hang on for a little bit longer because they were currently leaving the lawyer's office with the paperwork but then something unfortunate happened something ironic and completely one of those things where you ask what are the odds it turned out that the lawyer john had made an appointment with for later that day was the same lawyer that tanya's daughters had already met with in person and paid a retainer for so the lawyer's office called john to cancel his appointment at four o'clock that evening since they were now representing his wife and they couldn't legally represent them both out of the over 200 attorneys in the county tania could not believe that she and her husband had contacted the exact same one since neither of them had any relationship or interaction with this lawyer before that day when john gets this call from the lawyer's office he's standing in her house he's in his office while she's pretending to look for the paperwork and he was livid he came out of his office screaming to tanya that she lied to him she was trying to trick him as the argument escalated little tanner ran and hid behind his mother's legs and his father yelled at him to get in the car because they were leaving but tanner was too scared to obey at that moment tanya's friend who was also present grabbed tanner up into her arms to prevent jon from physically taking him john rushed out of the house gathered up his other two sons who were scared and crying and got them into his van speeding out of the driveway and down the road almost running over tanya's sister who at that time was walking up the street to tanya's house she jumped out of the way at the last minute and began screaming at him to stop as he drove off less than a minute after john had made his speedy getaway tanya's daughters arrived with the paperwork and the police officer but it was too late john alexander and andrew drove all night until they arrived in jacksonville the next day was tanya's birthday and she was relieved when she received a call from her two sons who wanted to wish her a happy birthday during this phone call they told their mother that they were at hillary's house swimming and playing with hillary's daughter tanya recognized the name hillary as somebody that john had talked about after returning from his high school reunion a few months prior so tanya tracked down the address of this woman and headed to florida with her two daughters her mother and the paperwork which stated she had been granted exclusive custody of alexander andrew and tanner it had been five days since jon had driven away from the home that they had all once lived in as a family and when tanya arrived in florida on friday she met with a sheriff's deputy in jacksonville to accompany her to hillary's apartment and serve john with the divorce and custody paperwork so that she could bring her sons home once she had andrew and alexander safe with her it still wasn't over local law enforcement and the courts had become involved so now tanya and john had to meet with a judge before she could drive back to michigan with her kids the following monday tanya hired an attorney in jacksonville and they showed up to the court date to find that john had also hired an attorney tanya was shocked when john told the judge his justification for taking his sons was because his wife was a registered sex offender john had known all about tanya's past indiscretions even before they'd gotten married she'd made sure to give him all that information while they were still dating and he had never seemed to have a problem with it i i'll stress that again she told him he knew he did not have a problem with it to the point where he felt safe having three children with her he never suggested to her or anybody else that he felt unsafe with his wife being around his sons tanya's lawyer pretty much said just that to john and the judge and the jacksonville judge called judge no in michigan who stated that she didn't feel tanya's past issues with the law held any relevance in this particular custody hearing so this is judge margaret no in morenci who you know it's a small town so she's like one of the only judges in town and you'll see her name come up a few more times so judge margaret no pretty much said i don't really see how tanya's past activities have anything to do with this case that we're talking about today which is you know the custody hearing john kidnapped his two kids essentially and took them out of the state tanya had to track him down follow him take them back so in the wrong at this point was clearly john skelton and he was dredging up things from the past in order to make his actions seem more justified jacksonville florida didn't want to deal with the the skeleton drama so tanya and john were basically informed that they needed to leave the state immediately and drive back to michigan between florida and ohio they would have joint custody the kids could ride in whoever's car they wanted but as soon as they left ohio and crossed into michigan all three boys needed to be in tanya's car and she would have full custody and the right to not allow her children to see their father once back in michigan john changed his tune he was no longer angry or accusatory he wanted to make things work with tanya after what he just put her through tanya had no interest in ever returning back to the way things were but she didn't feel comfortable shutting that door not knowing what he might do when faced with the reality that their marriage was over and he'd lost custody of his kids so in order to keep him appeased and calm tanya suggested that they all go to therapy and try to work things out to keep their family together tanya said she knew she'd never be able to trust jan again anything else she may have been able to overlook or forgive even an infidelity on his part but he messed with her children and that was something that she would never forget never forgive she met with her attorney and together they decided that it would make her look more favorable to a judge if she cooperated with john and offered him visitation tanya felt that if jon was under the impression that she was willing to work things out and there was a chance they would be together again he wouldn't pull another fast one on her and he would try to be on his best behavior but how long did she really think she could have kept that charade up how long did she think he would have waited and been patient they did however decide to live apart john stayed in the family home on congress street and tanya and the boys moved into a vacant house that one of her daughters owned nearby and was trying to sell but it hadn't sold yet so it was empty this house was literally just over two blocks away and john could see into the backyard from his own house especially as fall turned to winter and the leaves began to fall leaving the trees bare tanya had decided that staying that close to john would be good for her kids they'd be close to their father and they'd also still be able to play with all their friends in the neighborhood it wouldn't be a huge change for them they wouldn't be completely uprooted during the week the boys remained with tanya and most weekends they stayed with john this arrangement continued peacefully for about two months and they were planning their visitation schedule for the upcoming thanksgiving holiday tanya had no reason to believe that anything was amiss or that jon was planning something however the weekend before thanksgiving john did something that didn't make tanya feel like doing him any favors and kind of cemented her feelings that she couldn't trust him according to her john told her sons that tanya had been in prison and he told them why when they got back home the boys were obviously not in a good place mentally what their father had told them made them feel worried that at any point their mother could be hauled off to jail again or taken away and they would lose her she did her best to keep her own anger in check and she gently put their fears to rest telling her sons that this had happened a very very long time ago long before they were born long before she'd even met their father and it was nothing that they needed to worry about now she put them to bed that evening and that was when she gave herself permission to feel the anger that had been boiling inside of her she grabbed the phone and called her husband they had an argument the initial plan had been for john to have the kids from wednesday evening the day before thanksgiving to the following friday at 3 p.m but he'd asked her if they could stay longer on friday since he wanted more time with them she'd been considering it before this but she now let john know that it wouldn't be an option for him before hanging up so the plan for that thanksgiving break it kind of stayed as it was the plan was that andrew alexander and tanner would go to tanya's mother's house on wednesday november 24th 2010. their father would pick them up from there later that day tanya had left them there promising to see them in a few days she said i'll see you on friday she felt that everything was normal and that she would in fact see them in a few days the next day thanksgiving john called and had a thousand questions for her about what was next for them as a couple um are you gonna move back in soon are we gonna be together soon like what's the next step tanya was getting a little tired of playing this game and the pretenses pretending that she wanted things to work out with him so she told them you know i'm not in the right mindset to answer that question conclusively at this point you already broke my trust when you took my kids to florida without my permission and now you betrayed me again by telling our very young sons something about my past that i'd been waiting to share with them until they were older and could understand better tanya was already hurt and felt betrayed by the whole florida incident and this was just the cherry on top or the straw that broke the camel's back and tanya claims while she was having this conversation with john on the phone she could hear the boys in the background being very you know loud playing video games just sounding completely normal this was the last time she'd ever hear their voices this was the last time she'd ever hear the sounds of them playing uh the joyous sounds of them laughing together or jumping up and down this was the last time but she she didn't know that on friday morning tanya texted jon to ask if there was any way she could pick up the boys earlier than 3 p.m because she'd missed them and she wanted to see them john told her he'd really like to help her out and and that usually wouldn't be any problem but he and the boys weren't home at that time which was confusing to tanya since she was able to see his van parked in the driveway from the window of the house she was living in which she mentioned to him so john quickly backpedaled and he claimed that he'd left the van at the house the day before when some friends of his had picked he and the boys up so they could spend thanksgiving at the house of his friends through a series of phone calls and texts that would follow john skelton changed his story many many many times at first he told tanya that he'd see if they could get home earlier but then he told her that he wasn't actually even with their sons that his friend joanne had picked them up and taken them while he stayed home but she was bringing them back to morenci by three in time for tanya to pick them up so john told his wife that the woman who had their sons was named joanne taylor and tanya didn't personally know joanne but john had told her about a family he'd helped one day while he was still a truck driver he'd apparently pulled over and helped a family on the side of the road with their tire and this family ended up being joanne and her husband and their kids and then ever since then john and joanne and her husband had been real tight online and sending facebook messages back and forth additionally sometime in september or october after john had kidnapped the kids and taken them to florida but before tanya had filed for divorce someone named joanne friended tanya on a parenting site called cafe mom but remember this is a very very small town and tanya had never met this woman in real life neither had anyone in morenci for that matter so when john told her that her children were with some strange woman that she had never met and nobody knew tanya panicked she freaked out and she got very worried she called john again to try and get more information and at that time john told her that he was driving to an ohio hospital because he had hurt his foot but this was not the same story that he told the people at the hospital according to hospital records janet told the staff that he tried to hang himself and he was checked in on a mental health hold tanya could not sit around and wait for this person to return with her children so she called her lawyer who told her to wait until 3 p.m to call the police and i gotta tell you i i have to struggle with this one because i understand that as a as a person you probably want to you know follow your lawyers legal advice that's what you have them for they they know best but as a mother my kids are with a stranger my husband who's clearly off his rocker and already tried to kidnap them is now in a different state and you want me to wait hours to call and have somebody check in on my kids and they could be anywhere and they could be with anyone so i definitely would have struggled with that and i most likely would not have waited until three o'clock and as it was tanya only waited till 301 before she got the police on the phone she was able to be put into contact with chief weeks and he decided to drive to the hospital in toledo ohio and questioned john himself in an effort to find out where joanne taylor might be with the boys because she never brought them back at 3 p.m john basically told chief week's um he didn't know we didn't know where where she was he said he'd met joanne and her family a few years prior they'd been friends on facebook ever since um but that was about it so obviously the police are gonna question him well if you really don't know much about this woman then why would you let her take your kids well john revealed that the past few months he had been having some trouble struggling emotionally he couldn't get a steady job he was losing his wife he was about to lose custody of his children and probably never get it back the holiday season hadn't made things any better and he decided to end it all on thanksgiving which is why he'd requested his friend joanne to pick up the boys so they wouldn't be there when he did it even though this joanne woman had never met alexander andrew or tanner she apparently agreed to drive them to john's parents house in florida 15 hours away on thanksgiving night so that john could take his own life and she did nothing to stop him from doing so nor did she call the police or make any effort to interfere with his plans at all she just picked up these kids that she'd never met and said she was gonna drive them across the country for a man so he could end it all obviously as a trained and seasoned police officer chief weeks knew john was lying so he issued an amber alert for the three boys and the silver van that joanne was allegedly driving and at this point the fbi were also brought in to assist three young brothers missing their father in the hospital and the fbi now getting involved tonight an amber alert in effect and the desperate search continues to find these young boys good evening to you new information continues to come into the newsroom since we first broke this story on saturday morning the three boys reported missing friday that's the same day their dad tried to hang himself in his mourincy home tonight they're now believed to be in extreme danger once this was done the morency police needed to track the movements of john skelton as well as his sons they spoke with a neighbor and a family friend gail johnson who lived next door and is now considered to be the last person to have seen any of these three boys alive she claimed that she saw them playing in the yard on thanksgiving day at about 2 30 p.m five-year-old tanner was wearing camo pajama pants and a scooby-doo t-shirt seven-year-old alexander was wearing black pajama pants and a gray t-shirt and nine-year-old andrew was wearing brown pajamas with orange trim gail said the boys were always well behaved and respectful and whenever she and her husband were outside in their yard the kids would call over to them and say hello so that's how she knew that they were there morenci fire chief chad shisler put together a team of 25 volunteers to begin searching vacant lots parks and wooded areas in the town sheriff's deputies searched to the back roads north of the ohio state line and in ohio fulton county deputies did the same park rangers at harrison lake state park in ohio a popular camping area searched the trails and shrubbery for any sign of the three missing boys back in morenci chief weeks had obtained a search warrant to go into john skelton's home search it and take any electronics that they could find now tanya had brought her keys to the house so they wouldn't have to break the door down but it turns out having keys did not help with entering that home at that specific time since jon had nailed two by fours across the door from the inside tanya began to panic as the police busted through the door what would they find on the other side were her children inside were they hurt or worse no longer alive but all they found inside the house was a house that looked like it had been the location of a home invasion it was a complete disaster area broken furniture littered the floor broken dishes were scattered all over even the mattresses had been cut open revealing their innards it had been destroyed by someone who appeared to be incredibly unhinged and out of control she has been inside once though with police and she could not believe what she saw inside things that were glass were busted the big curio cabinet was smashed to pieces along with everything that was inside of it what did you feel when you went into the house ryan um just something didn't seem right i can't really put it into words it it just didn't things didn't add up in the houses and the story that he was giving just didn't add up as well that scene um was troubling because it wasn't a normal scene it wasn't we've been through many crime scenes and this was the intensity the things that were destroyed there wasn't anything usable in that house the appliances the cords were cut the keys were cut the hutch was knocked over the dishes were broken the house was fundamentally destroyed other items recovered from the home are as follows rope a noose bleach and cleaning products and a bullet found on the stairs according to john the noose was for a project which he can't talk about due to an ongoing investigation the ropes were for a climbing harness that he was making and the bullet on the stairs was from a gun collection he'd owned while living in alaska which he hadn't been in possession of for some time when asked about the bleach and cleaning products he had no creative answer as action news first reported months ago police found ropes and at least one noose in john's home when they searched it john says none of what was seized in the home proves he hurt his sons your family released the search warrant return from your home the day that the boys were declared missing and in that search warrant it said that there was ropes and a noose found in your house along with a lot of bleach and cleaning products what exactly were those products for and why was their noose in your house i don't you're saying you did not hurt the kids with that news okay at all did you say that was for a project yes can you describe the project at all no not right now because of the investigation the ropes were for a cradle harness yes you call it making a harness to go around my waist and legs also according to the search warrant return a bullet was found on a stair inside john's home skeleton says it was part of an old gun collection which is long gone since i lived in alaska now that the police knew where the boys had been on thursday afternoon they could narrow down the period of time that something had happened to them they started with john skelton's cell phone records and gps location which showed them that in the early morning hours of friday at 4 29 am john's phone left his home in morenci and traveled towards ohio at 5 00 am john's cell phone basically wasn't pinging anymore either because it had been purposely turned off or the battery had died and there was no further gps activity on it until 6 46 am when it showed that he had returned to his home in michigan the last tower ping on the phone was located somewhere around holiday city ohio around 4 29 that on friday morning that john's phone is located moving down near down into ohio yeah 429 he's about 3.3 miles from his home um and then it again at 5 00 a.m he's near holiday city pioneer ohio with his with the phone we began um driving and looking at that location directing search parties to that location just indicating from what we have from the phone records i believe the route that we're taking right now would would be the most direct route to where the cell towers indicate down here it's pretty rural so the phone towers there aren't too many of them and so due to how the phone records and the towers came back giving us the time stamps it would lead us to believe that he probably stayed on at least for the most part some of the main roads um traveling in the direction that he did an area in which the cell phone did track towards uh was an area that john was very familiar with he was a truck driver and drove to that area for some of the truck driving routes that he had we also know that he had spent some time with uh i believe with tanya there was kind of a special place for them we don't know exactly where he was we just know that the uh the phone pings or the phone tower hits put us on an area that was very consistent with the low distance between holiday city and morenci and knowing what we know from some of the things that skelton has said along with talking with family members this was kind of an important spot uh to them um i don't know if they had some family outings here some different things that happened in holly city around this area so just very consistent with the information that the evidence led to along with some family confirmations that this and he knew this area like the back of his hand right the turnpike is right here the 80-90 turnpike this was black friday a day when people notoriously get up very early to go out shopping for doorbuster deals so the police were actually hopeful that someone may have seen john's blue van in the 2 hour and 17 minute window time period where he'd been traveling from michigan to ohio and back but they were never able to locate anyone who legitimately had seen him they were also able to determine that once john had gotten back to michigan he'd send some texts and some emails to family members but it's never really been revealed what those texts and emails said speaking of family members john skelton would later claim that he'd spoken to his parents on the phone uh previous to this day and they'd expressed sympathy for his situation that he was you know going through a divorce and tanya was trying to keep the kids from him and his mother offered to drive from florida to michigan pick him up and bring him back to florida but just him alone no tanya no kids allegedly they thought he needed to sort of just admit defeat and move on with his life and they gave him a deadline to make a decision about whether or not he was going to take them up on that offer and that deadline was the wednesday before thanksgiving there was a plan and it made me feel you know i guess you know anxious anxiety and i felt like it was not the thing to do the plan john's referring to is his mom and dad told him they would come pick him up take john by himself back down to florida john would live with them by himself no kids john says his parents demanded an answer by wednesday the day before thanksgiving 2010 it felt like i was running out of time because i couldn't live there and i couldn't hold a job you felt like you were running out of time i felt like i was running out of options according to john he felt panicked he felt like his back was to the wall he wanted to leave michigan he wanted to move to florida he'd been wanting to move to florida for months but he didn't want to leave the boys with tanya so he made a decision that he now regrets allegedly and we'll talk about that in a moment on monday november 29th the chief weeks revealed some information to the public about the ongoing investigation during a press conference in the fire station's training room he said that although they could not confirm or deny that joanne taylor was an actual person who existed they could confirm that john skelton had no relationship online or otherwise with anyone by that name the only activity on his facebook page was posts that he'd made on his own wall and the last post that he'd made had been thanksgiving thursday evening and it had read may god and tanya forgive me chief weeks told the public that he believed john had apparently driven from the ohio turnpike into holiday city and west unity that thursday evening or early friday morning and he basically asked people to you know call in if they'd seen his blue van that was missing a gas cap because that would have been a very kind of notable thing about his van most important about this gps location stuff though is it caused the police to divert their resources and manpower pull out of morenci and start searching in that area in ohio and this area was thoroughly searched absolutely yes we searched we had some information that put us in this area mainly the cell phone pings but some other things as well and we had search teams down here for multiple days searching buildings hotels dumpsters pole barns everything that was in the air that could be searched we searched again with all the information that we had leading up days after it happened we really thought this was the place where we would find the boys it is a very i mean you described it it's very rural it's very i mean there are a lot of back roads there is a lot of farmland right and in order for us to search i mean we search everything that we can even with a search party of a hundred people you can search an area or an open field like that very thoroughly however there's just hundreds upon hundreds upon hundreds of acres and so it really is a needle in a haystack and we searched the best we could with the evidence and relating to the evidence that we had but there's just no talent the fbi had planes and helicopters searching from the air they had teams on the ground using police dogs to find the trail of alexander andrew and tanner there was a lot of people who came out to help look for these boys this was a tight-knit community everybody knew each other they all knew these these little kids and they wanted to find them 200 volunteers eagerly donated their time to find the boys they walked door to door they put up posters featuring smiling pictures of three young children that had vanished without a trace prayers tonight for andrew alex and tanner the three skelton brothers police say remain in grave danger the longer they go missing no one has seen them since thanksgiving and everyone here is praying they are out there somewhere and safe today marked another day of dozens of volunteers searching this tiny town for any signs of the little boys working with few with any leads neighbors here spending the day traipsing through wooded areas even streams haley simkins searched late last night it's personal for her she knows the boys and their family well it's devastating to them to know that they don't know where the boys are she's back out today and isn't discouraged when nothing is found no it's not because then there's hope that they're warm and safe and they're going to be returned to their mother the fbi brought cadaver dogs to the williams county landfill where holiday city was located but they found nothing at the ohio hospital john scalison was questioned again and he claimed he now had no recollection of what had happened to his sons or anything that had happened late thursday night into friday morning he did however remember a dream where he saw his children at an abandoned schoolhouse in kunkel ohio he also couldn't even remember driving to holiday city but he did have a foggy memory of a dumpster located in the parking lot of a ramada in there now here's the creepy part creepier part creepiest part it's creepy allegedly in 2007 john skelton had written a poem about a little boy whose body was found in a dumpster the poem went into details about the thoughts that were running through this boy's mind as he died the poem was titled the dumpster and john had posted it to his myspace page i was actually able to find this poem and i'm going to read it to you now it's very sad and very disturbing and it does make you wonder what kind of person would not only think this or think about this in such great depth but would write it down and then publicly share it with people knowing that their mind is going to these places that are very dark and very disturbing hello mama i see your fuzzy face i hear your heart beat and feel your warm embrace i feel you tremble don't be scared what did i do mom what did i say to make you put me down and run away are you late for school well that can wait i'm your little boy so please mom stay i'm cold and alone in this metal room with plastic bags and a worn out broom nobody hears me call for you come back mommy cause i need you it's my dying breath and i see a glow it's an angel from heaven and he's taking me home they found nothing at that schoolhouse in kunkel that john had led them to they found nothing in that dumpster behind the the inn in my opinion all of this garbage literally that john was telling the police it was just a way of throwing them off the scent and wasting time because he knew exactly where those kids were and it wasn't in any of the places he indicated he would have been stupid to send the police to the places that he indicated considering that he didn't want anybody to know what he'd done with his kids 200 volunteers were split up into teams of 10 with two firefighters in charge of each team and they were bussed to the lazy river campground north of holiday city where the skeleton family had allegedly spent some time in the past they were instructed to pick up everything that could potentially be evidence pieces of clothing scraps of paper trash even but it was also the first day of hunting season which meant there was a lot more people not involved with the search who would be roaming through the woods not only adding their own personal items and trash into the mix of potential evidence but posing a threat to volunteers looking for the skeleton brothers they might they might accidentally get shot pretty much in a wooded lot on the northwest corner of an intersection east of montpelier ohio they found what looked like a shallow grave roughly two feet wide three feet deep and four feet long with a pile of fresh damp dirt sitting right next to the hole the fbi spent about an hour searching this site and they were never able to figure out why it was there or who dug it but they also weren't able to connect it to the skeleton brothers this same day as hundreds of volunteers were searching for her sons tanya had to hear the news that a toledo television station had aired a story titled mom of missing michigan boys on sex offender list the next day tuesday november 30th the volunteers gathered again to continue searching while this was happening john skelton was released from the toledo hospital where he was under like a mental health hold and he was transferred to the lucas county jail in toledo and he was actively fighting the extradition order that would bring him back to michigan and more than that his story had changed again and while he was behind bars he got a visit from his parents and from the pastor of his church and i guess both of these parties kind of left this um this visit with him feeling differently john's parents left saying that they believed everything he said and that he um was doing the right thing and nobody's listening to his side of the story said to tell you that his boys are safe and sound his kids are fine i know this as a grandmother i have a grandmother's heart and i know this i don't know where they are if i did they wouldn't be there well they say it's a hundred percent you do you feel 100 that john gave the kids to somebody yes you do believe that yes and you believe that those kids are safe with whoever that group is yes you're 100 confident that your son is telling the truth yes so you you believe that to the state of those women i believe those boys are fine you believe that or do you want to believe that no i believe it i believe it full in my heart i believe it totally 100 that them boys are fine they basically claimed they didn't doubt one word that came out of his mouth but the the pastor had a little bit of a different experience with john skelton that day i asked him to start from the very beginning pastor donna galloway was shaking trying to talk between the tears as she recounted conversations she had with john skelton soon after alexander andrew and tanner disappeared that i would listen to whatever he had to say and do whatever i could to bring the voice point galloway is the pastor of mourinho's united methodist church he turned to his pastor for comfort but she says she wanted answers and that's when he said to me that there was a big blank spot in his brain it was like a big dark color those first conversations were followed by a bizarre phone call from skelton pastor donna was still in the hospital but in a room where family had gathered along with an fbi agent that's when she says skelton called and told her in an angry impatient tone he had taken the boys home not back to his ex-wife tanya not to a relative but that he had taken them home and that the pastor of all people should know what he meant you came to the conclusion then those boys are no longer with us in my head i asked the skeleton what he meant when he told the pastor he had sent the boys home you left her with the impression even though you didn't say it but you intimated that your children were dead oh yeah well uh the half the guy and and uh donna uh were into that zone and they would not listen they wouldn't leave me alone so i let them go on their rent so it's not true oh absolutely not so like i said john's story changed again the police had figured out that john didn't know anyone named joanne taylor and more than that once they got into his computers they discovered that it had been john himself who created a fake account using the name joanne taylor which he had then used to friend tanya on cafe mom this had happened shortly after she filed for divorce and it does raise some questions did jon create this account so he could keep tabs on his wife under the guise of being an unassuming fellow mom or had he created it so he'd have a paper trail for this woman meaning what ended up happening to his sons was premeditated and he was planning it for months in advance but now that the cops are like okay we know joanne taylor's not real we know you made her up john skelton had to pivot and come up with a new story that still didn't place the responsibility of his children's disappearance directly on him at this point john had claimed he'd been trying to hang himself but he failed falling to the ground 10 feet below him hitting like concrete or asphalt and breaking his foot and he was in a wheelchair he was being wheeled around in a wheelchair but he was sporting a soft shoe cast which confused people including medical health professionals because if he had fallen from a height of 10 feet you'd expect to see a more serious injury that would require an actual plaster cast not just a soft cast a soft cast is usually used for like small hairline fractures if you twisted your ankle but if you fell onto concrete from 10 feet up you're gonna have more than a hairline fracture in your ankle you're gonna break your foot most likely and you'd need an actual plaster cast to set the bones so that they heal properly john still claimed that joanne taylor was a real person that he knew but now he was saying she was connected to a secretive group of people he alleged that he had discovered his wife was abusing his sons so he reached out to this secret organization who helps remove kids from dangerous circumstances a rescue organization run by either mennonites or the amish or some reorganized mormons eventually john admitted that he didn't really know any of their names since they used aliases like virgil and elijah and it had actually been niles michigan where he'd first met one of these people on november 1st which is funny because previously he'd used the name niles as one of the people who had taken his kids but then he said no there was no niles it was actually niles michigan so i don't know what he's doing is he doing one of those things where he tries to like mix in the truth with his lies so that it makes it more convincing because it's not working it's not working so let's break it down quickly because it's confusing we've got joanne taylor who has some relationship to this secret child saving group we've got a man named virgil who john met in niles a man named elijah a woman named sue and two children named mary and alex now when he meets these people i don't know how this conversation would have come up randomly out of the blue when you meet people like this for the first time but allegedly according to john when he met virgil john confessed to him that he didn't want his sons to be with their mother who was hurting them and virgil offered to help within a week john found a manila envelope in his mailbox with business cards and pamphlets on an organization called united foster outreach there was also a burner phone in the mailbox which he used to call them after which he dumped the phone and burned the paperwork conveniently because now you have no evidence that this ever happened according to john this group of people made a number of visits to his home on the weekends while his sons were there so that the boys would get used to these strange people and on november 25th they came back to his house with amish style coats for the boys to wear and john let these people take the kids expecting that later they would reach out to him to let him know how he could communicate with them and check in on his children now keep in mind no law enforcement agency could ever confirm the existence of such a group including the fbi but john had an answer for this as well saying quote it's an organization that knows what it's doing we covered our tracks well end quote even though they lied to him about only taking the children for one night john told police he still felt that his sons were better off with this mysterious group of strangers than with their mother john skelton says he gave his boys to an underground group he says the boys are safe with them he also says he's given the police all the information he can like i'm saying you know the heck with you you know it's your problem not mine i've been i've been helping them john told investigators he gave the boys to a group of people to keep them away from their mother tanya john says tanya was abusing their children did you want to get back at tania for everything she had done no just like i told you i i i didn't i didn't do anything to try to hurt tanya i still love tanya it was my mom who told me i had to stop saying that why did your mom tell you you had to stop saying that i don't know maybe she thought it sounded stupid ridiculous or made me look like an idiot i don't know we asked john if the underground group that has his kids were to hurt the boys what would he do if i found out and i i found him like probably end up back in here because i i'd hurt him so you think that that person who you know god forbid you know ever hurt them they should be hurt he says if he could go back and change things he would i wouldn't burn all my evidence any contacts any you know any evidence whatsoever i wouldn't have burned that i would have i would have gotten you all my parents involved asked them what i said you know if i should really do this if uh asking you know if there's any other things that i could do i don't know i i probably would i would have been a hot thing stick when i suppose so once again according to john these people picked up the kids that night and they were like we're gonna do a trial sleepover sort of thing to see how they do with us and in their new environment and we'll let you know how it goes this is just a trial and it's just another step in preparing them to you know eventually move in with us to get them away from their abusive horrible mother it's worth noting that these allegations of abuse on tania's behalf were investigated thoroughly and detectives claim that they came upon no information that tanya had abused or harmed her sons in any way ever in fact all the evidence they gathered pointed to the contrary everybody they talked to basically said that they didn't know a mother who loved her sons more or who protected and cared for her sons more everyone that was talked to said tanya was a good mother and from what the police did know from the evidence that they had gotten it all pointed to the fact that john skelton had done something nefarious with his children the police had even told john like we'll look into this and if these accusations you're making are true we'll work with you to get the children placed in the home of a third party where they'll be safe while we figure out what to do all you have to do is tell us where they are so we can get them we can bring them home and then we'll do everything in our power to make sure that they remain safe and if there's any truth to these allegations if there's any truth that tanya's hurting them we'll be able to talk to them i mean the older two were seven and nine at this point they would have been able to verbally confirm if their mother had been abusing them or not but john refused he told the police pretty much even if i wanted to tell you where they were i couldn't because i don't know where they are because this mysterious child saving group never contacted him again after they left with his kids but he did mention to the police that his sons would have to hibernate until they graduate whatever the hell that means keep in mind this was the eventual rough version of the story that john would settle on once being questioned in court little things would change here and there but this is the gist of it but earlier he had claimed that he'd driven the boys out to jd's truck stop in niles michigan and that's where virgil took the kids from him another version of the story has jon tenderly wrapping his sons in blankets in the van and placing a stuffed animal in each of their hands before sending them off with virgil and one week before the boys vanished john skelton searched on the internet for things such as rat poison will rat poison kill people and can i break someone's neck with my hands when questioned about these searches jon claimed that his sons had asked him these things and he was just googling the answers so he could tell them what a great dad i can just see it now you know the kids are like yeah we really want to know if rat poison will kill someone and john's like let me look that up for you kids because i really want to teach you that's what parents do we teach you we teach you things about how to break people's necks with your own hands and how to kill people with rap poison let's google it and on november 26th after getting back from his late night ohio trip john had dropped off some things to his aunt's house these items were his son's winter coats and toothbrushes and he allegedly told his aunt that they wouldn't be needing them anymore and he didn't want their mother to have the memories on wednesday december 1st john skelton's bond was set for 3 million his parents visited him in jail but he didn't tell them anything according to them on december 2nd the searches continued focusing on waterways in williams county in the 300 plus acres of wooded area near kunkel ohio these searches like all others turned up nothing but the next day friday december 3rd the volunteers showed up again even as the temperatures dropped and everyone realized that there was little chance these boys would be found alive that morning chief weeks announced that this would be the last day of the mass searches a reported sighting of the boys did come in on december 7th from an employee of the house of donuts in sandusky ohio this employee's name was sandy jones and sandy said she was working the sunday after thanksgiving when a woman who appeared to be in her 40s and who looked tired and haggard quickly ushered three little boys into the shop not making eye contact with anyone the entire time they were there according to sandy she heard this woman call one of the boys tanner and later when she saw their pictures in the paper she knew the boys had been the skeleton brothers the house of donuts was not far off the ohio turnpike where the fbi had been pulling surveillance footage from businesses in hopes of seeing john skelton on camera unfortunately the donut shop was a small privately owned business and they didn't have surveillance cameras so this sighting was never confirmed since the very beginning since day one chief weeks had not been optimistic that they would find andrew alexander and tanner alive and unharmed but he didn't want to announce that the case had transitioned from searching for missing kids to a homicide investigation until a snow day in mid-february he knew how tight-knit the community was especially the children who went to school together since they were very small classes the following year in 2011 the high school's graduating class held only 37 students weeks wanted to make sure that when the news broke the classmates of all three boys would be home with their families where they could find comfort and familiarity i have to give him a lot of credit honestly because when he announced it to the media during a press conference that he'd been withholding this information for several months he apologized but he stated quote the people of this town are my concern but you are not before telling the reporters to be safe driving home there was a winter storm brewing and 10 inches of snow was expected to fall that day there would be no more searches for the three missing boys as winter rolled into morenci blindingly white bitterly cold and completely unforgiving that's going to be where we end off today um there is going to be a part two but it's not going to be an extended series there's just one more part to follow there was just too much information to really fit into one video so we will have another part follow but that's going to be it just two parts and the story will be complete let me know in the comments what you think about this so far if you've ever heard of it what your theories are make sure to follow me on instagram and twitter where i update more regularly on you know just day to day cases that i'm following even though i haven't been super active this last week because social media has been driving me crazy make sure you click the like button if you liked this video make sure you share this video if you think it's worth sharing and if you've already subscribed just make sure you're still subscribed and your notifications are turned on so you get notified every time i post a video youtube's been unsubscribing people and turning notifications off for my channel for a while now so i just want to make sure everybody keeps an eye on that and 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i'll see you very soon [Music] calling how deep it goes until it's getting you slowly so you got to let it go i got blood

Channel: Stephanie Harlowe

Views: 519,198

Rating: 4.9084668 out of 5

Keywords: skelton brothers, john skelton, alexander andrew tanner skelton, tanya zuvers, true crime, mystery, stephanie harlowe, morenice mi

Id: 4_K9A5u-T6A

Length: 67min 43sec (4063 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 07 2020