Debanhi Escobar
53:44 Share

70,000 people are here and Bob Dylan is the reason for it. Inspired by the true story. If anyone is going to hold your attention on stage, you have to kind of be a freak. Are you a freak? Hope so. And starring Timothee Chalamet as Bob Dylan. How does it feel?

He defied everyone. Turn it down! They lied. To change everything. Make some noise, BD. Timothy Chalamet. Edward Norton. El Fanny. Monica Barbaro. A complete unknown. Only in theaters Christmas Day. Rated R. Under $17.99 without parent.

When you check out at the pharmacy, you see the journey from idea to medicine, thanks to our intellectual property system, or IP for short. IP safeguards inventions, like a new way to prevent seizures or lower cholesterol. And IP supports competition from other brands, then lower-cost generics, which are 90% of prescriptions filled in the U.S. Innovation, competition, lower costs, thanks to IP.

Learn more at phrma.org slash IPWorksWonders. Hey, it's me, the Quenchies. I'm that late afternoon craving you just can't shake. Wait, what's that? Welch's grape aid? No! Made with real fruit and no added sugar, nothing answers the call of the Quenchies like grape aid. Got the Quenchies? Grab a grape aid in your juice aisle.

To enjoy this episode of Forensic Tales ad-free, check us out on Patreon. Patreon.com slash Forensic Tales. Forensic Tales discusses topics that some listeners may find disturbing. The contents of this episode may not be suitable for everyone. Listener discretion is advised. An 18-year-old college student goes missing after a night out with friends in Monterrey, Mexico. Two weeks later, her body is found floating in the water tank of a motel.

But even after three autopsies, there is still a lot of confusion surrounding her death. This is Forensic Tales, episode number 259, The Mysterious Death of Debony Escobar. ♪

In 2021, the Netflix documentary crime scene, The Vanishing at the CISO Hotel became an instant hit.

It follows the story of Elisa Lam, a Canadian student who went missing while staying at the Cecil Hotel in downtown Los Angeles in 2013. She was last seen on January 31st and was reported missing by her parents a few days later on February 8th. But just days later, her body was found floating in a rooftop water tank at the Cecil Hotel after guests staying there complained about foul-smelling water.

Even now, years later, her case is still a very popular talking point among the true crime community. But as strange as Elisa Lam's case sounds, she isn't the only young college student to mysteriously turn up dead inside a hotel water tank. Nine years later, a similar thing happened to an 18-year-old student from Monterrey, Mexico. This is her story.

Debony Escobar was born on September 4, 2003, in Monterrey, Mexico. I wasn't able to find much about her background or her childhood, but here's everything that we do know. She was an only child, and both of her parents worked as teachers, Mario Escobar Salazar and her mom, Dolores.

and in 2022, she was an 18-year-old college student studying at a local university. She was described as a nice, kind girl who dreamed about conquering the world someday. She was also someone who was passionate about helping others.

Just a few weeks before she went missing, she joined thousands of other women in protest of gender violence in Mexico. She stood side by side with so many others who wanted the Mexican government to do something to stop the violence against women that's happening every single day. She would have no way of knowing it at the time, but she was about to become a victim herself.

On April 9th, 2022, Mario Escobar woke up to a bunch of missed phone calls on his cell phone. At first, he ignored them because he didn't recognize the number. It was probably just spam. But eventually, Mario decided to call the number back to see what was going on because there had been so many calls. He figured it had to be something important if they kept calling. And that's when he got the news that would forever change his life.

It was one of his 18-year-old daughter's friends saying that she was missing. No one had heard or seen her in about four hours. This is the story that the friend tells him.

Debony had gone out with this friend who was calling and two other girls. Now, full disclosure, there are some conflicting reports about all of the girls' names. But from what I could find, it was Debony, Yvonne, Alejandra, and Jasari. They all went to a house party in Nueva Castilla, a neighborhood in the northern part of Monterrey, Mexico.

But apparently, Debony had a little bit too much to drink, and they all thought that she should probably go home for the rest of the night. They didn't need to be out anymore. So the girls thought that they should get Debony home so that she could just sleep off all the alcohol. So the friends said that they called for a car to come get her and take her home.

But not long after Deboni got inside of the car, the friends started to get some communication from the driver saying that she was so drunk and agitated that she couldn't even give him her address so that he could take her home. She even started to get angry with the driver and she wasn't really making much sense. The friends and the driver go back and forth for a little bit, but she eventually gives him her address.

But apparently, just a few minutes later, Debeny got out of the car and wouldn't get back in. That's according to the driver, at least. The driver kept telling her to come back inside, but she wouldn't do it. She just stood there, facing away from him with her arms crossed.

That's when the driver decided to take a picture of her on his cell phone just standing there on the side of the road and he sends it to her friends to basically prove a point like here she is she's just standing there and she won't get back into my car. The friends even forwarded the photo to Mario the dad.

The photo itself is chilling. She's just standing there on the highway. And it's not just any highway. It's Highway 85, which is known as the Highway of Death because of how many women either turn up dead or they go missing from the same exact spot where Debony is now standing, refusing to get back inside of the car.

So it's not exactly the best place in the world to be as a female in the middle of the night standing there all alone. So after going back and forth for a few minutes, the driver said that he just left her there and drove away because she was becoming so angry and so difficult. He waited there for about three minutes, but she wouldn't get inside, so he was over it.

and now the friends hadn't been able to get a hold of her since then. Also chilling, whether that driver realized it or not, he took the very last photograph of her alive, and it would eventually go viral. If you get a chance, hop online and look it up for yourself.

At this point in the phone call, Mario knows that he needs to call the police and get on social media to let people know that Debeny is missing. By the time the friend had called him, no one had seen or heard from her in about four hours. Plus, the last time that she was seen was at a place known as the Highway of Death, and according to the friends, she had been drinking all night.

Young women just like her go missing there practically every single day. So time is really of the essence here.

The police put out information about Debony, and that's when they got a statement from the other friends who were out with her that night. Now, to be honest, there are a lot of conflicting reports about what exactly happened at this party. And depending on who you speak to, you might get a different version of that story. But based on Debony's friends' statements to the Mexican authorities, it sounded like she wasn't acting like herself that night.

And there may have even been some type of altercation between Debony and the other girls. They apparently got into a fight and the friends basically left her at the party there all alone. At one point, they said that Debony locked herself in one of the men's bathrooms and wouldn't come out.

But they knew that she was drunk, so they called someone to come pick her up, the driver who took that photo, and is now presumably the last person to see her. Now here's something that you should know about. The friends didn't contact the driver through the ride-sharing app Didi. That's the company that this guy drove for. It's an app similar to what we use here in the U.S., like Uber or Lyft.

Instead, the friends texted a man by the name of Juan David, also known as Jesus, to come and give her a ride. Jesus worked for the ride share app and had given the girls a ride earlier in the night.

He was also believed to be a mutual friend of at least one of the girlfriends. So this Jesus guy worked as a driver for Didi, but the friends contacted him outside of the app to come give her a ride home. And he gets there at around 4.15 in the morning. It's also worth mentioning here that the girls that Debony was supposedly with at this party weren't exactly her best friends.

Yes, they were friends, but they weren't that close. I think they had only met and gotten to know each other just a couple of months before all of this happened. So that might explain why they would leave her all alone at this party while she was clearly very intoxicated. That's not something that a close friend would usually do.

So the search for Devani begins. Her father Mario reported her missing to the police, and the family got a lot of support from the community to help look for her. Social media played a big role in the search. The last photo of her standing alone on that highway was reposted thousands of times. Her friends shared it, family, complete strangers on the internet.

Even social media influencers in both Mexico and the United States started talking about it. So by doing this, a lot of people found out about the case really quickly and they were able to help spread the word. Somewhere along the way, the family got a tip.

They got access to the last known location of her cell phone, and this is where things get even stranger. After Debony got out of Jesus's car, she was seen crossing the freeway and entering a trucking company at around 5 in the morning. She's seen on security cameras entering the building's offices, but is never seen leaving.

Now, later on, her family says that they think she went there basically looking for someone to either help her or give her a ride home. They also said that some of the security camera footage from the company has since disappeared from that night, and no one knows why. But in a statement on its website, which is dated April 18th, the company's legal representative said that they were fully cooperating with the investigation.

And the family's claims that some of the video evidence was missing is simply not accurate.

Part of their statement read, quote,

So is some of the video footage missing? I don't know. It depends on who you ask, the family or the company themselves.

After that, she's seen again on security cameras walking toward a motel by the name of Nueva Castilla. It's a place about a block and a half south of the transportation company, but none of these videos show her talking with anyone. No one's following her, she's completely alone, and it almost looks like she's sort of wandering around and doesn't know exactly where she wants to go. So

So as soon as this video evidence surfaced, the search for her focused around this transportation company and the motel using over 200 drones at one point and search dogs. It was a lot of people's belief that she might be staying in one of the motel's rooms. So they searched it on the 12th and then at least a few more times, but they don't find her or anything connected to her. She's not there.

Later that day, the police got something else to work with. They finally found that rideshare driver, Jesus. They had him arrested on unrelated drug charges just so they could sit down and question him. He was, of course, the last person to see her alive. So everyone was on pins and needles waiting to hear what he had to say. And to make things even more interesting, this driver wasn't exactly what you would describe as an upstanding citizen.

This episode is brought to you by LifeLock. The holidays mean more travel, more shopping, more time online, and more personal info in places that could expose you to identity theft. That's why LifeLock monitors millions of data points every second. If your identity is stolen, their U.S.-based restoration specialist will fix it, guaranteed, or your money back. Get more holiday fun and less holiday worry with LifeLock. Save up to 40% your first year. Visit LifeLock.com slash podcast. Terms apply.

Since 1979, TireRack.com has been helping people find the right tires for how, what, and where they drive. They sell only the best, like the full line of Bridgestone tires. Test results, ratings, and reviews are there to assist. Or try the Tire Decision Guide to get a personalized tire recommendation. Tires ship fast and free to you or one of over 10,000 recommended installers. In many areas, they offer mobile tire installation that comes to your home or office. Shop Bridgestone tires at TireRack.com.

This guy has a long criminal history, which even includes charges for attempted kidnapping and harassment of young women. So this really piqued the interest of investigators. Debony is missing. She's a young college student. He was the last person that we know of to see her missing.

And he has a criminal record, which includes attempted kidnapping. But he completely denied everything. He told the police pretty much the same story that Deboni's friend had told her dad. He said he had given the girls a ride to the party via this rideshare app, but they were the ones who asked him for his personal phone number just in case they needed a ride home later on.

Who knows why, but the girls didn't want to use the app. So when they called him later on, he said he went to the party and picked up only debony.

But according to him, the other girls were still at the party too. They got into another car and drove off. Now, this is a little different than what the friends had said before. They said they left Debony at the party, but now Jesus is saying that no, they were definitely still at the party when he got there to pick up Debony. Now, maybe that's just a small detail, but maybe it's not.

He told the police that Debony was really drunk when he picked her up and she wouldn't give him her address or her parents' phone number so that they could come help. She was crying, saying how mean her friends had been to her, and at some point during this short car ride, she asked him for a phone charger so that she could charge her cell phone.

But she didn't end up doing that. She doesn't charge the phone. Instead, according to him, she climbed into the front seat of the car and basically started arguing with him even more and almost started to become aggressive with him. That's also when they ended up on the highway and she told him, hey, stop the car. I need to get out. And that's what she did. She got out.

So he waits about three minutes to see if she's going to calm down and get back inside of the car, but she won't.

Meanwhile, he's on the phone sending voice messages back and forth with Debeny's friends. He's asking things like, did she take any drugs? Why is she acting like this? But the friends were like, no, she just drank a lot of vodka at the house party. So he took that photo and drove away because according to him, she just wouldn't get back inside of the car.

Now, it's unclear why this driver didn't immediately come forward to the police when Debony first went missing. It seems like the authorities had to hunt him down just to speak with him. But regardless, the police searched his cell phone and pretty much everything that they found on it supported his story.

They saw the voice messages back and forth between him and her friends, the phone calls, so everything looks good on his end. So at this point, the police let him go. On top of the surveillance footage from the transportation company and the motel, the police also found video from earlier in the night. And this was the first sign that something really bad might have happened.

Video taken at around 11.30 p.m. showed Debony and her friends buying a bottle of vodka to take to the party. Then they eventually ended up at the party in the Nueva Castilla neighborhood. And this is where more and more video evidence surfaces. Later on, at around 1.30 in the morning, Debony is captured on video running down the street.

Not jogging, not walking. She's running it. She's booking it down the street. And behind her, there's a guy chasing her who appears to hit her before she turns around and slaps and kicks him. A few moments later, two of her friends come to intervene, and that's when things look like they started to settle down.

None of the others attacked the guy or anything. It just looks like as soon as the two friends showed up, whatever happened between this guy and Deboni seemed to calm down. Now, after this particular video surfaced, the friends sort of changed their stories a little bit.

They now said that the reason why they left the party was because Debony was acting angry and aggressive toward them. This is basically the same exact thing that the driver said, that she was being aggressive. And now this video surfaced with her getting into a physical fight with this unknown guy. So maybe that's why the friends decided that enough was enough. It was time to send her home.

She had already locked herself inside of the bathroom. She got into a fight with this guy on video. And according to her friends, she just wasn't acting like herself.

Now several more days go by and there's still no sign of her. Despite the traction that the case got through social media and everywhere else, no one knew where she was. She hadn't contacted anyone and there was zero activity on both of her bank accounts and on her cell phone. It was like she was just gone. But then April 22nd happened, 13 days after she went missing.

Employees at the motel, the same one that she was seen around the night that she went missing, reported a very foul smell coming from the property. They had searched all of the rooms but didn't find anything. It was just the strange smell. So they eventually decided to call the police, thinking that it might be something serious.

When they got there, the employees walked the police to the pool and courtyard area because that's where the smell was coming from. And by the courtyard were also three water wells in the ground. Two of them were open, but one of them was covered. These were essentially 12-foot subterranean water tanks for the motel.

And when they looked inside the one that was covered, they discovered a body in a pretty bad state of decay and about three feet of water. And based on the clothes found inside of the water tank and a crucifix necklace, it was pretty obvious that it was debony.

DNA tests would also later confirm that it was definitely her. So despite four different searches of this particular motel by the Mexican authorities, it wasn't until its employees reported that smell that they finally found her. She had been in that tank for days, leaving her body almost unrecognizable.

So how could they have missed her? Well, besides Deboni's case, the Mexican authorities had a lot of others on their hands. This was all happening at a time when killings of women have dramatically increased in recent years in Mexico.

According to NPR, they went from 977 cases in 2020 to 1,015 cases in 2021. And those were just cases that were classified as femicides, a legal term used in Mexico when women are killed simply because of their gender. Killings of women in general are actually much higher than that.

Here's the reality. Some crime reports say that Mexico is a country where around 10 women are murdered every single day. Disappearances of women are also extremely high. They go missing, their cases don't receive nearly as much attention as this one did, and they're simply never found. They're gone and no one knows what happened to them. Here's another example of that.

Just one week before Devaney disappeared, another woman was killed in Monterey, a woman named Maria Fernandez. She was 27 years old and allegedly murdered by a friend of hers who was arrested shortly afterward.

Her story has been closely tied to Deboni's, but received far less attention than hers. Now here's an even more interesting data, according to NPR. During the time that the authorities were searching for Deboni, the local media reported that the bodies of five other women and young girls had been found all across the state. And that's just within a two-week time frame.

They had all been reported missing around the same time as Deboni, and four of them were younger than 16. So this is real life. Deboni's case wasn't the only one happening in the same exact time in the same state of Mexico. Some people might say it's because the Mexican law enforcement agencies out there simply don't care about female victims like maybe they do males.

something that we'll talk about at the end of the episode. But others say that it's just an oversight why they didn't find her sooner. Again, despite four searches of the motel, drones, search dogs, hundreds of people, she was right under their noses this entire time.

At first, the police seemed to suggest that Debony had simply fallen into the 12-foot hotel water tank and accidentally drowned. They knew that she drank a lot that night, vodka, and multiple witnesses said how strange and weird she was acting. So for the Mexican authorities, this was all they needed to say that this was a drunken accident.

But when her family heard that that's what law enforcement was saying, they said absolutely not. This couldn't have been any type of accident. And we have the forensic evidence to back up our claims.

So let's get right into it. Let's talk about what the forensic evidence is. Three separate autopsies would eventually be done. The first was done by the Mexican government. The second was at the family's request. And the third one was meant to be an independent investigation to see which side was correct. Now, that's already something to think about.

All three autopsies and all three medical examiners had the same forensic evidence to consider. But yet, all three of them came up with completely different opinions about what happened to her. Same forensic evidence, different conclusions.

Support for this episode comes from Smart Labels. Have you ever gone on a hunt for a holiday decoration that you know you have, but you just can't remember where you put it last year? Well, those days are over with Smart Labels.

With their QR code labels, you can just put a label on your storage container, scan the QR code with the Smart Labels app, and then catalog everything you put in the container with a name, description, and picture. Then just let the app know where you put the container and voila! Next year, when you need that one thing, you can just do a search in the app and it will tell you the color of the label, the four-character code on the label, and where you put it.

Or if you're curious what's in a storage bin on a high shelf, just scan the QR code with the app and it tells you everything that's inside. It's like organizing magic. So this holiday season, whether you get these labels for yourself or a gift for someone else, make sure you pick up a pack on Amazon by searching for Smart Labels, one word, and get ready for a huge thank you from your future self.

Starting with the first one, done by the Mexican government, the official autopsy. According to the Attorney General's office, her cause of death was a deep contusion to her skull, and the manner of death is likely an accident. Their theory is that she got the skull injury from accidentally falling into the hotel's 12-foot water tank and drowned.

So that's their narrative, based on their autopsy and the interpretation of the forensic evidence. They found a massive injury to her skull, a deep contusion. She was found lying in a couple feet of water. She had been drinking heavily at a party all night long. So this was all an accident. A drunken accident involving a young female victim. Case closed.

There were no other injuries noted in the autopsy report, no mention of a sexual assault. They made it seem like the one and only injury that she had was the skull injury, which could be easily explained by an accidental fall down into the water tank. They made no conclusions about how or why she fell and drowned. They just simply reported what that's what they believed. Again, case closed.

But the family completely disagrees with this. There was no way that they thought this was an accident. No matter how much or little she actually had to drink that night, she didn't end up in that hotel water tank by accident. So that's when they demanded that a second autopsy be performed. Let's talk about it now.

The online newspaper El Pais, which I used the translated English version for, reported that the second autopsy completely ruled out the government's accident theory. Their findings suggested that Deboni was already dead before she ended up in that water tank. She had been hit in the head several times with what the second medical examiner described as a blunt object. So there's no way that this could have been any type of accident.

If she had died from blunt force trauma to the head before she ended up in the water, it would have been impossible for her to do this on her own. That means that someone else had to be responsible for her ending up in that water tank and ultimately her death. Someone must have dropped or pushed her into the tank after they killed her, so the cause of death was ruled to be a deep cranial contusion.

But that's not all this second autopsy found. The report also said, quote, the body presented traces of a violent sexual relationship, end quote. So on top of being struck in the head with some type of blunt object, there was also forensic evidence suggesting that she had been sexually assaulted, evidence of multiple head trauma before death, and evidence of a sexual assault.

This is completely different than what the government found during their autopsy just a couple weeks before, where they made no mention of a sexual assault. They also made it seem like she died inside of the water tank from the fall, not that she was already dead before getting inside. So which one is it? Was she alive before she ended up in the water tank, or was she dead before?

And was she sexually assaulted that night? Again, same forensic evidence, but clearly very different conclusions about what all of it means. Because if there's evidence of a sexual assault, this is probably murder. If she was dead before ending up in that water tank, this is probably murder. If she had multiple blunt force injuries to her head, this is probably murder. None of that screams accident.

Again, the government's autopsy reported only one traumatic skull injury, and there was no mention of sexual assault. But the second autopsy reported that she had multiple injuries to her head and face, including the frontal region of the skull, injuries to both of her right and left eyelids, injuries to the side of her nose, both of her lips, and injuries to her right ear.

That's a lot more than a single contusion to the skull. Here's a quote directly from the report, translated to English. Quote,

It follows that they were caused by another person and that it was a violent homicidal death. End quote. The report specifically says that the blows must have been delivered with a, quote, blunt mechanical agent.

When it comes to the idea of her drowning, the tank only had about 90 centimeters, or 35 inches of water in it. The first autopsy report noted that her body must have been face down in the water since the back appeared, quote, dark and dehydrated, while the front was softened by the water. But according to the second forensic report,

No water was found inside of her lungs, essentially ruling out drowning as a cause of death. Another point suggesting that she was already dead before ending up in that 90 centimeter pool of water. So there was no way that she could have drowned either. So for the first time since Debony was reported missing, her family finally felt like they might have enough to persuade the local police to do something.

They had in the palms of their hands what they believed to be the forensic proof that this wasn't an accident. This was murder. But after the second autopsy, the case went nowhere. It essentially turned cold. The police didn't go out and arrest anyone, and prosecutors didn't file any criminal charges. It was like the authorities still considered it a closed case.

So about two months later, a third autopsy was done and her body had to be exhumed at this point. The goal of this third autopsy was to figure out which side is correct, the government's autopsy or the family's. It was meant to be an independent investigation that didn't belong to either side. They weren't supposed to have any dogs in the fight.

Well, I don't know if that's what happened, because after this third autopsy, there only seemed to be more confusion.

According to the third autopsy, the cause of death was actually asphyxia by obstruction of respiratory orifices, or in other words, suffocation. But their report didn't specify what exactly blocked her nose and mouth and caused her to die. They also said that there were no signs of sexual assault, something that completely contradicted the second autopsy.

According to the head of Mexico City's forensic service unit, she hadn't been assaulted like previously thought. Also, they now believed that Debony had only died about three to five days before her body was found,

suggesting that she was alive somewhere for about a week after she disappeared. But they offered no explanation about where she was during that time that everyone was searching for her, or whether she was being held somewhere against her will. They even made it seem like maybe she was voluntarily missing for a week, and maybe foul play wasn't involved.

One of the things this independent investigation said was that if someone had kidnapped Devaney and held her captive for several days, no one tried to collect a ransom or anything like it. And if there was now no evidence of a sexual assault, then maybe she didn't want to be found for some reason. And this isn't a murder at all.

which again completely contradicts everything found in both the first autopsy and the second one. Neither one of those autopsies suggested that she might have been alive for several days after being reported missing. It was only the third autopsy that made any mention of that.

So now here's where we're at. First autopsy, accidental fall down into the motel's water tank, one skull contusion, no other injuries, no signs of sexual assault. She died the night she went missing.

Second autopsy, murder, multiple blunt force trauma injuries to her head, face, and skull, clear signs of sexual assault. She was dead before she ended up in the water because there wasn't any water inside of her lungs. And now the third autopsy, suffocation, no evidence of sexual assault. Ford Pro Fin Simple offers flexible financing solutions for all kinds of businesses, whether you're an electrician,

or run an organic farm. Because we know that your business demands financing that works when you need it. Like when your landscaping company lands a new account. Wherever you see your business headed, Ford Pro FinSimple can help you pursue it with financing solutions today. Get started at FordPro.com slash financing.

Time to move? Skip the hassles of selling during the holiday season and sell your home directly to Opendoor. Request an all-cash offer in minutes, close, and get paid in days. You can even pick your close date so you can move after New Year's. Start your move at opendoor.com or download the Opendoor app. Opendoor is represented by Opendoor Brokerage, Inc., License 0206-1130 in California, and Opendoor Brokerage, LLC in its other markets. Terms and conditions apply.

She only died three to five days before her body was found, suggesting that she was alive for about one week after she went missing. And there's no real signs pointing toward murder or foul play. She might have just been simply missing on her own free will.

They don't know what caused the blockage to her nose and mouth, the suffocation, and there was no ransom for her return. So what evidence is there to suggest that this was a homicide?

So that's three separate autopsies performed by three different medical examiners. Same forensic evidence, same everything. So how could they all come up with completely different causes of death? Manners of death, evidence of sexual assault, time of death, location of death, nearly everything is different.

How can that be when forensic evidence is supposed to be something that's consistent and concrete? Despite whatever findings that were made during the third autopsy, Debeny's family continues to say this was murder. This couldn't have been any type of accident. And they aren't the only ones who right now are fighting for what they believe is justice in this case.

Immediately following her disappearance, her story has become a symbol of what many people say is happening to so many women all across Mexico. They're disappearing, they're being assaulted, they're being murdered, and no one, specifically law enforcement and the Mexican government, are doing anything about it.

Let's not forget, the police searched that particular motel three different times, but they didn't find her. So was this just maybe sloppy police work? Or is there some other explanation for why it took them so long to find her? Well, here's another thing that you should know about.

When the police first went to the motel, the employees apparently said that their cameras didn't record anything. They were only used for real-time monitoring. Well, sometime later on, the police raided the motel and some of the employees' houses.

And on a laptop, cell phone, and USB drives, they found some recorded videos of Debony at the motel property the night that she went missing. But nothing exactly incriminating was said to be found on these videos. They really only show that Debony did go to the motel at around 4.30 that morning. She's completely alone. No one's with her. She disappears from the camera's views for about 20 minutes and

and then reappears near the location of the water tanks at around 5 o'clock in the morning. But none of the cameras actually show her going inside of the water tanks. It just shows her in the general vicinity of them. And again, no one else is seen on the video, kind of giving some credibility to this accident theory. Since no one else is captured on the water tanks or around the water tanks, then maybe she went there on her own.

Now, as far as why the motel employees tried to hide these videos, we don't know. But here's what we do know. In January of 2023, the Mexico City Daily published an article saying that two hotel workers were being charged with obstruction for failing to turn over the videos to the Mexican authorities.

What if any connection they have to Deboni's death, no one knows yet. And as of today, these criminal charges are currently pending, and neither one of the hotel workers has officially been convicted of anything yet. But it definitely makes you wonder why anyone would lie about these videos or try to hide them in the first place, even if they don't show anything incriminating.

About a month after Debony's body was found, some of her identification was found in some plants near a condo building. Now, according to Viarta News, it doesn't sound like it was her driver's license or anything like that. It's just some type of other ID that might have something to do with her dad's teaching job.

Also strange, this condo building is over 10 miles away from the motel where her body was found. So what was this identification doing all the way over there? And does this discovery have anything to do with the case? We don't know.

So if the family believes that Deboni could have been murdered and sexually assaulted, then who do they think could be responsible? Well, as far as suspects go, Deboni's family, especially her father Mario, believes that the taxi driver who gave her a ride home that night or tried to give her a ride home that night might be involved.

They think that the reason why she got out of the car was that he may have inappropriately touched her or tried to come on to her in some sexual way and she rejected him. Mario says that the prosecutor's office had some type of video evidence of this. And in an interview with CBS News, the dad was quoted as saying, I suppose that my daughter did not put up with the harassment, end quote.

I think what the family is saying is that they think the driver might have inappropriately tried to touch or assault Debony, but may or may not have anything to do with what happened to her afterward. But the Mexican authorities have all but dismissed these claims, saying in that same CBS News article that there was zero evidence that Jesus was responsible for her death.

And there was no evidence that he tried to sexually assault her during that short car drive before he dropped her off on that highway. So it's unclear what exactly Mario, the dad, saw in that video footage with her daughter inside that car. It's really unclear. As far as any other suspects go, it's also unclear if there are any others at this point.

We don't know where the case currently stands with the Mexican authorities. Do they think that this was a murder? Or are they trying to push this under the rug and saying that it could have been some type of accident? There are still so many aspects of her case that remain a mystery and remain unexplained. Why was she acting so strangely at that house party, becoming angry and aggressive towards her friends and toward that rideshare driver?

Was it because of the alcohol that she drank that night? Or did she take any other drugs that we don't know about? If Debony really was murdered, then why hasn't anyone been arrested yet? It seems like there are plenty of possible suspects. The other kids at the party that night? Their friends? What about the video of Debony getting into that fight with that guy? Do any of her friends know anything? More than what they've already told the authorities?

And what about all the different autopsy findings? If the first autopsy is incorrect, the one that was done by the Mexican authorities, is it because whoever performed the autopsy just made a mistake about what caused her death? Incompetence on their part?

Or some people speculate whether it's because of corruption. They knew she was the victim of foul play, and for some reason they tried to cover it up and said the forensic evidence meant something that it didn't. How can there be so many different interpretations about the forensic evidence? No one can even agree on a cause of death or when exactly Debony died. Was she dead before she ended up in the water tank or was she killed sometime afterward?

And what about these findings from the third autopsy suggesting that she only died a couple of days before ending up in the water tank? How does anyone explain that?

Almost as soon as word broke about Debany's disappearance, hundreds of women marched through the downtown area of Mexico City and its suburbs. And it wasn't just Mexico City that saw protesters. Other communities throughout Mexico saw them as well. They were women taking to the streets with signs saying things like no to harassment and Mexico is a mass grave.

They were all out there protesting and marching against women's violence in Mexico and how they think no one is doing anything about it.

It wasn't just Debany who went missing. Women go missing throughout Mexico every single day. And these activists are fed up because they don't think the police or the prosecutors are moving quickly enough and they aren't properly investigating these types of crimes. This just became a case that people latched onto and started taking to the streets about.

Maybe it was because the police searched the motel so many different times and never found her. Others were shocked that a rideshare driver would just leave Debony all by herself, clearly intoxicated, all by herself alone on that sketchy highway. And of course, thousands of people saw that haunting photo of her taken by the driver.

Most of the marches were peaceful, unlike they had been in the recent past. Most people just marched with signs. Some read things like justice or 24,000 are missing. Others had small photographs of other missing Mexican women. According to an article by CBS News, the number of missing people has risen to over 100,000 all across Mexico.

At the same time the marches were happening, Nuevo León Governor Samuel Garcia made a statement saying that he would increase funding and resources to help combat gender violence. I'm not sure if those promises were ever followed through on. Over two years later, there are still so many questions surrounding Debany's death inside that motel water tank. Was she murdered? Was she held captive somewhere before ending up in the tank?

And if so, who's responsible? Will we ever get to the bottom of this and get justice for her family? Or has there been some type of cover-up? And finally, the biggest question, at least for me personally, why did all three autopsies come to such different conclusions about the forensic evidence? Deliberate? Negligence? Corruption? Incompetence?

To share your thoughts on this week's episode, follow the show on Instagram and Facebook. To find out what I think about the case, sign up to become a patron at patreon.com slash forensic tales. After each episode, I release a bonus episode sharing my personal thoughts. Don't forget to subscribe to Forensic Tales so you don't miss an episode. We release a new episode every Monday.

If you love the show, consider leaving us a positive review. You can also help support the show through Patreon. Thank you so much to this week's newest patrons, Jackie C., Tim D., and James. Thank you for joining me this week. Please join me next week. Until then, remember, not all stories have happy endings.

Forensic Tales is a Rockefeller Audio production. The show is written and produced by me, Courtney Fretwell. For a small monthly contribution, you can help create new compelling cases for the show, help fund research, and assist with production and editing costs. For supporting the show, you'll become one of the first to listen to new ad-free episodes and gain access to exclusive content.

To learn more, please visit patreon.com slash forensic tales.

Forensic Tales is a podcast made possible by our Patreon producers.

If you'd like to become a producer of the show, head over to our Patreon page or send me an email at Courtney at ForensicTales.com. For a complete list of sources used in this episode, please visit ForensicTales.com. Thank you for listening. I'll see you next week. Until then, remember, not all stories have happy endings.