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In 2020, in a small California mountain town, five women disappeared. I found out what happened to all of them, except one. A woman known as Dia, whose estate is worth millions of dollars. I'm Lucy Sheriff. Over the past four years, I've spoken with Dia's family and friends, and I've discovered that everyone has a different version of events.
Hear the story on Where's Dear? Listen on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Voices for Justice is a podcast that uses adult language and discusses sensitive and potentially triggering topics, including violence, abuse, and murder.
This podcast may not be appropriate for younger audiences. All parties are innocent until proven guilty in a court of law. Some names have been changed or omitted per their request or for safety purposes. Listener discretion is advised. My name is Sarah Turney and this is Voices for Justice. Today I am discussing the case of 19-year-old Margarita Sandoval from Oklahoma. Margarita went missing in 2018.
In May of 2021, her body was found in a box belonging to her brother in a basement in Norman, Oklahoma. To this day, no charges have been filed for Margarita's murder. Now, there are a few reasons why I wanted to cover Margarita's case. Not only is it a tragic story, but when she went missing, it didn't seem to receive any media attention.
I couldn't even find a missing persons poster for her, and I still don't know the exact date of when she was reported missing. Obviously, we don't know everything about Margarita's situation, and since there hasn't been a lot of coverage, it will be a shorter episode, but I just really felt moved to help share her story, and I hope you will consider doing the same. This is the case of Margarita Sandoval.
We don't know much about Margarita's upbringing, but her sister Taylor Heron said that she was kind, loved her family, and she's pretty sure she never heard her sister say a mean word to anyone in her life. We also know that Margarita did have a mental disability, and because of this, her caretaker would receive monthly social security payments to help pay for this assistance. Taylor says that there were many people who wanted to care for Margarita.
But not because they loved her and truly wanted to help. Instead, because they wanted those payments. I do believe as soon as Maggie turned 18 that no one saw her but as a big dollar sign. The people that did end up taking care of Margarita and receiving these payments were her brother Octavio Sanchez and his wife Desiree. Not too long after Margarita went into their care, multiple reports of abuse were filed on behalf of Margarita.
Margarita also filed at least one complaint herself in February of 2018 against Octavio and Desiree, specifically for assault. She was temporarily removed from their home and referred to Adult Protective Services. But after Margarita refused to press charges, she went back into the care of her brother.
Now, this really got to me. When the police first responded to the assault allegations, they found Margarita with bruising on her hands, arms, and face. But the Norman Police Department released the following statement, quote,
We completed a thorough investigation into this report that included follow-ups from our agency. It was also referred to Adult Protective Services, or APS. The victim declined to pursue charges. We did request that APS continue with its follow-up on the alleged situation, end quote. It's also worth noting that Margarita was at one time placed in the Griffin Memorial Hospital for reported mental health treatment.
How or why she was admitted is unknown. We also don't know if APS did any follow-up to protect Margarita, but we do know that the last report regarding Margarita's welfare was filed on April 16th, 2018. It does confirm that she was still living with her brother and sister-in-law in an apartment in Norman, Oklahoma. Like I mentioned earlier, we don't know exactly when Margarita went missing.
All I found about her going missing was that her sister says she should have known something was wrong when she stopped calling their mother. So, at some point in 2018, Margarita is reported missing by her family. It is confirmed that she was last seen at her home with her brother and sister-in-law. In October 2018, Octavio and Desiree moved out of their apartment, most likely after Margarita was already dead.
Now, I couldn't find anything about action steps after Margarita was reported missing. There doesn't appear to have been any search for her at all. This episode of Voices for Justice is sponsored by Ibotta. Are you planning your dream vacation but dreading the cost?
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This episode of Voices for Justice is sponsored by June's Journey. June's Journey is a hidden object mystery game, and you step into the role of June Parker and search for hidden clues to uncover the mystery of her sister's murder. Basically, you engage your observation skills to quickly uncover key pieces of information that lead to chapters of mystery, danger, and romance.
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Fast forward three years to May of 2021. The Norman Police Department gets a report saying that there was a body in the basement of a man named Miguel Munoz. Now, I've seen different renditions of how all of this happened. I saw one report that made it seem like Miguel called the police himself, but most others mentioned that it was Miguel's teenage daughter who overheard a conversation between Octavio and Desiree about there being a body in the basement, and that it was Miguel's
We don't know exactly when Miguel's daughter overheard this conversation. The articles I found just kind of say that she overheard the conversation and assumed that they were referring to her basement. Either way, it appears that this brave young woman does the right thing and tells someone about what she heard and the police were called. Miguel is completely cooperative with police and allows them to search his basement without any pushback.
the thing is after margarita went missing octavio and desiree let miguel and his kids live with them until they were able to get settled and find a home in the area there is no mention of whether or not miguel knew that margarita even existed let alone that she was missing at this time
But Octavio and Desiree did this huge favor for Miguel, so when Octavio later asked Miguel if he could store some things in his basement, Miguel was happy to help him, just as Octavio had helped Miguel and his family. When the Norman Police Department arrives to the home, Miguel tells them all of this, saying that he moved into the house in 2019, and his friend Octavio was storing some items in the basement.
He also adds that he hadn't seen Octavio since May of 2020, when he, quote, was trying to get into the house uninvited, end quote. Ultimately, Miguel had to call police in order to get Octavio to leave. Now, let's talk about what they found in the basement, and I want to warn you that it gets a little graphic.
When officers searched the basement, they found a black storage box underneath the stairs. They say that it was pretty much completely out of sight. The box was 3 feet by 4 feet, end quote. Heavily wrapped in high-density plastic, packing tape, and rope, end quote. Some reports say that the box was wrapped in 20 to 30 inches of layered plastic.
Now, before opening the box, they actually called in the bomb squad to take x-rays and confirm that it was human remains inside. The officer who cut into the plastic recognized the smell of a decomposing body immediately. It was at this point that liquid began leaking from the box and insects began crawling out. When the box got to the state medical examiner's office, they confirmed that it was the body of Margarita Sandoval.
Obviously, by this point, her body was badly decomposed. Her cause of death has yet to be released. However, police have stated that they do believe Margarita was 19 years old when she died. I think it's pretty safe to assume that Margarita lost her life right around the time she was reported missing. On May 14th, 2021, authorities obtained a search warrant for Octavio Sanchez's apartment.
I wasn't able to find anything about his wife, Desiree. Authorities found a 9mm handgun inside of a trash can in the garage. Although he wasn't charged right then and there for Margarita's murder, he was arrested for possession of a firearm after a felony conviction. Unfortunately, what that felony conviction was, we just don't know.
When police searched Octavio's apartment, they did find evidence to show that he continued to cash the checks for Margarita after she went missing, all the way up until her body was found. Again, I want to remind you here that it does look like they moved after Margarita went missing. So this would not be the apartment that she last lived in. So honestly, who knows what type of evidence might be in the apartment Margarita was last seen in.
Investigators did tell local news reporters that they were looking into Margarita's records from a mental health center, presumably from that stay I mentioned earlier. Spokesperson for the Norman Police Department, Sarah Jensen, said, "...due to the current status of this case, information is limited at this time. Detectives are actively compiling a thorough and detailed investigation."
Once compiled, we will present the case to the district attorney's office, who will review the case and file the appropriate charges, end quote. On June 21st, 2021, the Norman police executed another warrant for Octavio's home. This was in order to seize buckle swabs and photographs. For those of you not familiar, buckle swabs are basically where they take a little swab of the inside of the cheek.
Although Margarita's brother and sister-in-law are not currently facing any charges related to her death, the Norman police says that it's still an open and ongoing investigation, and they've also stated that they are now pursuing first-degree murder charges. Margarita's sister Taylor is still in disbelief that someone would do this to Margarita. I don't know how you can live knowing that you did that. I don't know how you can sleep at night knowing that you did that.
I feel like you would have to be the most heartless person. Now, all of these cases tug at my heartstrings. But when I see a victim who doesn't seem to have many people advocating for them, it hits me really hard.
And that brings me right to our call to action. Please share the limited resources that are out there on Margarita's case. Please share her picture. There seems to be some type of delay in order to get charges in this case, so it looks like they might need some extra evidence, you guys, and honestly, it never hurts to have more. As a reminder, Margarita Sandoval was 19 years old when she went missing sometime in 2018 near Norman, Oklahoma.
Her body was found in a home near the University of Oklahoma in May 2021. She was a Hispanic female with dark brown hair and brown eyes. We may not know all the details about who Margarita was, like whether or not her smile lit up a room, or her favorite movie. I mean, I can't even give you stats like her height and weight.
But I hope that although I'm not fully able to emulate who she was as a person, and although we have very little information on this case, that we can all agree that no one deserves to be used, abused, and ultimately shoved into a 3x4 foot box. So please, share. It looks like Margarita didn't have a whole lot of people looking out for her. We can't change that. But we can help her now.
We all know that a little public pressure can go a long way in cases like this. Anyone with information about the death of Margarita Sandoval is urged to call the Norman Police Department tip line at 405-321-1600. As always, thank you, I love you, and I'll talk to you next time.
Voices for Justice is hosted and produced by me, Sarah Turney. For more information about the podcast, to suggest a case, to see resources used for this episode, and to find out more about how to help the cases I discuss, visit VoicesForJusticePodcast.com. And if you enjoyed this episode, please take a moment to rate and review the show in your podcast player.
It really does help more people find the podcast and these cases in need of justice. Hey guys, welcome to our secret after show moment here on the Voices for Justice podcast. Now, something happened with this week's episode that I want to tell you about. I actually had a whole other case ready to go and lined up, but last night I was contacted by the family member that participated and they're just not ready to share the story.
Now, I did get permission to share that much with you guys, but that's pretty much all I can say at this time, and that I'm respecting that choice 100% obviously. So that's why you saw this in your feed today. But this would have been in your feed anyway, to be totally honest. I've talked about this in the past, I believe, but I am making an effort to get all of these unsolved minisodes that I did on Patreon onto the main feed.
There's something about them living there behind a paywall that just doesn't sit right with me. So you should expect to see, I don't have a regular schedule for these, I'm kind of doing them as I have extra time, but essentially you will see minisodes popping up in your feed. I want to do this in addition to the regular episodes to help bring attention to cases that don't have that much information.
All of these cases deserve attention, and to be honest, I have a never-ending list of the cases I want to help, so this is just a really easy and nice way to include these in the main feed. These episodes will be quite short, like the one that you heard today, but I just thought it was a nice way to kind of mix it in with the main feed without getting them lost in the shuffle. But that's the backstory of why today's episode was so short.
But also, I am really, really glad that I could bring Margarita's story to this main feed. I cannot tell you how devastating it is for me to see cases like this where there doesn't appear to be a lot of support. Now, I don't mean to disparage anyone in that way. I never know, there could be lots of people working behind the scenes, but I could really only find that one interview from Margarita's sister.
And just the way that she was reported missing without there being a poster, I just feel like maybe Margarita needs a little extra support from the true crime community. So again, I really hope you'll join me in sharing this case. It's another one of those, you guys, where it seems really likely that we know who did this to Margarita. And for some reason, there's just some type of roadblock. But this house was near a college campus that somebody has to have seen something.
And I know I say that all the time, but I mean it, you guys. It may seem like, you know, something silly that you would never think could result in something. But yeah, I just hope that hopefully it sparks somebody's memory. Somebody can come forward with some more evidence to finally get this case to move forward. Again, we can't really help what happened to Margarita in her life, but I hope that we can help her now.
Now, I thought an issue that was really highlighted in this episode was the social services failures, which, to be honest, is kind of all over the news right now. I think this is in large part because of the Harmony Montgomery case. If you haven't seen, Harmony Montgomery was the 7-year-old that's been missing for two years. Her father's family claims that they reported signs of abuse to authorities many times, but nothing was done.
Of course, Harmony's case could be a whole episode in itself, and I might get there someday. I'm waiting to see kind of how things develop, and it seems like it's getting a lot of attention. But I think that this greater topic of social services and how they are intervening and how they're not intervening is really interesting.
Now, some of you know this, but I used to work in the foster care system. I was an event manager for a company that cared for 300 kids in foster care. So although I was not a direct care provider, I was not a social worker, I worked closely with those folks. Now, I don't know if this is true for everywhere, but in Arizona, social worker after social worker would tell me that the idea is always to try to keep the family together.
It's hard. It's a double-edged sword because I worked with so many kids that were basically begging to go back home with their families. But I also saw and understood the abuse they were going through. Now, every case is different, but I do think it's a little bit different with children in general. But for Margarita, she was an adult. I don't understand the same fear of separating her from an abusive caregiver.
especially if what her sister said was true about so many people wanting to take care of Margarita. I also have a question about her not pressing charges. We don't know everything about her mental state, we don't know everything about her mental disability, but I wonder if she did have the capacity to even say that she wanted to press those charges, if she was even able to reiterate those thoughts. We just don't know. I've only heard one small clip of her talking, and it doesn't really explain much.
But I still have questions there. I have questions about the Adult Protective Services system. I'm not as familiar with it, obviously, as, you know, child services, but I have to wonder what happened there. Like, what exactly did Margarita say? Hopefully we'll find out someday, and hopefully if there was some type of oversight, which in my opinion it looks like there was, I really do think that something should have been done.
I hope that, you know, some type of correction, correction, some type of corrective plan will be put in place. Now, I also want to kind of give a shout out to Miguel's teenage daughter. Now, to be fair, I saw one report that said that it was his niece, but every other report said that it was his daughter. So I went with that. But I think that it's amazing. I mean, this is truly an example of see something or, you know, in this case, hear something and say something.
This young woman did the right thing, and I hope that she knows that. I hope that she is extremely proud of what she's done and how she's helped Margarita. Honestly, who knows how long she would have been down there if she didn't say something. Now, I do want to talk about the charges or lack of charges in Margarita's case. I understand that it looks like they're trying to build a first-degree murder case, and that might take some time.
However, I really do wonder why there haven't been charges for something regarding Margarita, not social security fraud or tampering with a body, like literally nothing. I just have to hope that they're doing a lot behind the scenes to help her. I just always worry if I don't see a family advocate that's extremely outspoken. I have to hope that somebody is there fighting for Margarita behind the scenes, possibly her sister.
Now, outside of the case, I do want to give you guys some updates in life and in this podcast. Now, I did talk about doing a big fundraising slash donation goal for 2022. And I want to tell you guys that I am already well on
the way. I'm terrible at math and percentages, but according to my Excel spreadsheet here, I'm about 20% to my goal for 2022 for donations. And you guys, we're about two weeks into 2022, and I cannot tell you how amazing that feels. Like I want to put my money where my mouth is. I always talk about going above and beyond to help these cases, and I want to do exactly that.
So far, the podcast has already made a donation to Private Investigations for the Missing. I bought a complete microphone and headphone setup so a family member that we have featured on this podcast can tell their own story in a podcast. That was honestly one of the coolest things I think I've done so far. The podcast donated to the DNA Doe Project through a charity livestream with YouTuber Joshua Miles. We were able to donate to the Alicia Navarro event coming up in March in Arizona.
And the podcast just purchased a large sponsorship for the Black and Missing Foundation's 5K Walk. I just can't believe that we are less than two weeks into 2022 and the podcast was already able to give over $4,000 in donations. Now, I'm not saying this to brag. I've said it before and it still makes me uncomfortable to talk about these donations. I actually don't think I've ever talked about donations until late last year.
But the thing is, I realize I talk so much about ethics in true crime, I talk so much about going above and beyond to help these cases past making an episode, that I felt like I just kind of needed to show that I'm putting my money where my mouth is.
Because that's really what it's all about for me. I know I've said it before, and you guys probably already know this, but I see these cases as more than just episodes. I see the families behind them. I see the efforts behind them. I see the victims behind them. And I really want to do, I want to do something that will tangibly help these cases. Like I create these episodes and I hope that you guys are sharing. I mean, I see that you guys are sharing, but, you know, I put these episodes out into the universe with my fingers crossed, hoping it will help.
And I really love that I'm able to go one step beyond and really help monetarily. Okay, I'm going to do a little throwback here. I don't know who remembers when I used to take voice memos for the show, but I actually just got one. I got one and I was like, oh, I forgot that I did that. It was a long time ago. I think it was like if you had questions, I honestly forget why I was asking for voice memos.
but I do want to ask for voice memos here. I thought it'd be kind of fun if you guys wanted to submit, just you can do it on your phone. I think most people do it that way. Submit a question, a comment about a case, something you want to talk about in the after show. If you guys want to be involved in it in any way, send me a voice memo. I would love to hear from you. Please send it to sarah at voicesforjusticepodcast.com.
See, we are getting a little more structure to these aftershows. I do think it's just a good way to kind of put all my rants and all my personal feelings into the aftershow so that if you do like to separate your true crime that way, which I do, you know what I mean? I want to hear just the facts when I'm talking about a case and I kind of like all the opinions and updates about the podcast. I like all that to be separate. So I hope that you are enjoying these aftershow moments and the way that I've kind of set up the podcast.
But yeah, I think voice memos would be a cool way to interact with you guys because that's what this after show is all about. It's me putting down the script. It's me just talking to you guys and leaving in all the ums and leaving in just the realness of this conversation.
I also do have a book update for you guys in terms of what I'm reading. I actually just got both Dave Holloway and Beth Holloway's books on the disappearance of their daughter, Natalie Holloway. So if you are looking for something to read that comes directly from family members, which is my favorite way to consume true crime, I definitely recommend those books. I'm just getting started, but I always think that it's good. You guys hear my neighbor's car? Okay. Anyway, I always think that it's good to, uh,
to hear it from them. You know what I mean? And I always encourage you guys to get that angle as well. I think we so often hear these cases reiterated by, especially a case like Natalie Holloway's, reiterated by pretty much everyone, right? It's a very popular case. So I think it's super interesting to go back and hear it directly from the family members. So again, 10 out of 10 recommend getting any book from a survivor, a victim, whatever you want to call them, or a family member. So yeah, that is what I'm currently reading right now.
But as always, thank you for tolerating me here in our secret after show moment. I love you and I'll talk to you next time.