Mollie's Murder

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Dispreshing business part mister. On May
eighth, nineteen ninety eight, a family

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in San Francisco, California, welcomed
their third child into the world and became

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complete. This was the Tibbitts family, and Rob and Laura Tibbitts now had

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two sons and a little baby girl, a girl who'd grow up to be

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warm and bubbly, a light in
all of their lives. Mollie Cecilia Tibbets

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was fast friends with everyone she met. She was kind, loved her family

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and her friends, but maybe most
of all, she was very funny.

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Molly often made the people around her
laugh with her sense of humor, and

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that drew people to her all the
time. But her second grade in school

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was a time of great change for
Molly. First, her parents got a

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divorce, and then Molly, her
two older brothers, and her mother moved

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from the bustling, lively San Francisco
to Brooklyn, Iowa. Tram cars and

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vivid culture were replaced by corn fields
and a tightly knit community. But it

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was the community where Laura Tibbets had
grown up and it seemed to suit her

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daughter as well. The distance separated
Rob from his children, but he made

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every effort to stay in touch and
see them as often as he could while

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his children settled into the quiet and
sleepy life Brooklyn had to offer. They

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were only around fourteen hundred people living
in Brooklyn, making it one of those

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places where everyone knows everyone. But
it was when Molly was a junior in

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high school that she came across a
new face. His name was Dalton Jack,

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a senior in the same high school
that Molly was in, and he

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was sitting with one of his friends
in his truck. When Molly and one

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of her friends approached, the four
teenagers met. Molly's sense of humor broke

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the ice between her and Dalton,
and the next thing anyone knew was that

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Molly and Dalton were inseparable. Anyone
looking at them would know that they shared

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a love and connection that only seems
to happen in the movies. But their

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relationship would be tested when Molly graduated
high school and began her journey to college.

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She enrolled at the University of Iowa
to study psychology, but by then

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Dalton was a few years ahead of
her. After graduating high school, he'd

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chosen to join the workforce and had
found a job in construction at a local

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company. This meant that Dalton was
staying in Brooklyn, but it also meant

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a little bit more than that.
Sometimes Dalton would be in town, sometimes

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he'd be across the state on another
job site. Basically, Dalton had to

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go where their work was, and
very few opportunities put him in the same

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place as his girlfriend. To Molly. Where other high school sweethearts would have

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called it quits, Molly and Dalton
held strong. The couple made every effort

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to see each other, oftentimes on
the weekends and sometimes during the weekdays,

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whenever they could make it work.
That was why when Molly returned home from

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the semester in the summer of twenty
eighteen, she was coming home not only

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to her family, but to Dalton
as well. For those precious warm summer

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months, it looked like the only
time they'd missed spinning together would be when

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Dalton had to work, and this
young couple made the most of it.

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When Molly wasn't with Dalton, she
was with her family or out on the

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town. The very small town.
To keep her heelf busy during the day

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and to earn a little extra money, Molly found work at a local children's

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daycare, and managed to squeeze in
a few hours of studying into her evenings

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to make sure she was ahead when
she got back to school that fall.

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But something else Molly almost always managed
to find time for was an evening run.

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The days were usually too hot and
the sun too strong to have won

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during the day, but once the
sun started to go down for the evening,

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Molly would put on her shoes and
would be often seen running around town

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and enjoying herself. That's why on
the evening of July eighteenth, no one

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was really surprised to see the twenty
year old out and about in her running

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gear. Dalton was out of town
for work that evening, and Molly had

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been staying at his house to dog
sit and to study. She left his

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home around seven and headed east into
town on her usual evening run. Neighbors

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remembered seeing her, and security cameras
picked up a portion of her run,

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but they missed a very crucial part. There was no footage of Molly returning

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home. The next day, Molly's
supervisor from the daycare called Dalton to ask

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where Molly was and to see if
he knew why she was late, but

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Dalton had been working out of town
and he didn't have any answers. Calls

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to Molly's phone went unanswered, and
her social media accounts remained eerily quiet,

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and Molly was nowhere to be found. By that evening, her family,

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Dalton, and the local police had
begun a town wide search for Molly,

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leaving Missing Persons posters behind them wherever
they went. Investigators managed to piece together

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that Molly had headed east during her
run, but not much else. They

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set up a tip line, spread
her poster, and raised awareness of her

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disappearance through several states in the Midwest, and they tried to pin her location

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through the fit bit Molly often wore. All leads came to a dead end.

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In a desperate attempt to help,
the community came together and raised over

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three hundred and sixty six thousand dollars
as a reward through their local Crime Stoppers

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branch, a reward that would sadly
go unclaimed. Instead, a neighbor's security

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camera caught some disturbing footage that shows
a small and blurry figure running down a

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street at approximately the right time and
direction for that person to have been Molly

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Tibbets but it also shows something else. A black car can be seen first

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heading away from Molly's direction, then
somewhere off camera, that car turns around

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and heads towards the running figure.
With Brooklyn being the small community that it

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is, it didn't take long to
track down the owner of that car,

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a man by the name of John
Budd. John first claimed to know nothing

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about Molly or her disappearance, but
the investigators dug deeper and uncovered a series

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of startling truths. The first lie
to be overturned was John Budd's identity.

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He was, in fact Christian Rivera, a twenty four year old immigrant from

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Mexico in the country illegally who was
currently working on a farm owned by a

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Republican politician. After hours of interrogation, Christian began to tell on himself.

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After first saying he knew nothing about
Molly's disappearance, he then confessed to having

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seen her running down the road.
He'd approached Molly's car, asked to talk

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to her a few times, and
then began driving beside her in an attempt

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to get rid of him. Molly
had taken out her phone and threatened to

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call the police. Christian then claimed
that in a fit of panic brought on

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by the thought of being caught by
the police, he'd attacked Molly, killed

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her, and hidden her body in
a cornfield, a cornfield that he then

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led the police to and brought the
search for Molly to a bitter end.

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Partially hidden under the leaves were the
decomposing remains of a young woman. She'd

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been stabbed multiple times in the chest, neck, and face, and she

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was missing her shorts and underwear.
DNA analysis confirmed everyone's worst suspicions, and

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Molly's missing person's case was changed to
a homicide. It looked like an open

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and shutcase. Rarely does anyone confess
to murder, take the authorities to their

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victim's remains, and get away with
it. But this case's journey to court

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would take longer than anyone expected.
Changes in his legal counsel, moving the

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case out of the county, and
a backed up court system brought on by

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the pandemic bought Christian a few more
years, But finally, in twenty twenty

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one, he faced the judge.
To everyone's complete surprise, he pleaded not

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guilty. At court, Christian challenged
his own confession and claimed that he'd been

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tricked into giving it. His defense
came in with a sturdier rebuttal and proved

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that Christian had not been read his
miranda rights correctly, making his con fashion

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inadmissible in court. This was a
hit to the prosecution, but by then

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they had already collected forensic evidence that
put Molly's blood in the trunk of Christian's

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car. But it was Christian himself
who sealed his own fate yet again.

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Taking to the stand, Christian claimed
that he'd been attacked by a group of

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men that day. He said that
they'd had knives and forced themselves into his

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car. They'd been the ones to
make him stop alongside Molly as she was

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running that day, and they'd been
the ones to attack and kill her.

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They'd then forced Christian to drive out
to that cornfield and hide Molly's body,

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and they'd threatened Christian's daughter to make
sure that he kept silent about the whole

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thing. It was safe to say
that there were very few people who believed

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his new story, his new version
of events, and Christian was sentenced to

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life in prison without parole. But
instead of bringing Molly's family and the community

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of Brooklyn peace, media and political
coverage of this case continued to divide the

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country. One side of the fence, including names like Donald Trump, used

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Molly's tragic story to double down on
the need for stricter immigration policies. In

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a speech, the former president said, a person came in from Mexico illegally

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and killed her. We need the
wall, We need our immigration laws changed,

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we need our border laws changed.
The other side argued that Molly's murder

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was being used to spread racism and
target immigrants. This was a sentiment that

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Molly's own father, Rob shared publicly. In response to Trump's speech, Rob

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replied, quote, the Hispanic community
are Iowans. They have the same values

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as Iowans. As far as I'm
concerned, They're Iowans with better food.

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Molly, he said, would have
agreed with him, and so he stood

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up against the people who'd appropriate Molly's
soul in advancing views she believed were profoundly

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racist. But somewhere beneath the politicization
of Mali case lies a family steal reeling

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from the loss, and a young
woman whose life was unjustly and unceremoniously cut

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short. Maybe that's where the focus
of her story should have always stayed.

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That's ten Minute Murder for today brief
and bingeable true crime. I'm Joe the

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host, and thank you so much
for taking the time to listen. If

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you're brand new to this podcast,
make sure you hit subscribe wherever you like

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to listen to podcasts, probably where
you're listening right now. Follow on social

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media Facebook, Instagram, and also
on TikTok for as long as as long

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as that's around. My guess it's
gonna stick around. No one asked me,

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but I'm telling you, I'm pretty
sure that TikTok is going to be

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with us. There's gonna be some
drama, but I think it's here to

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stay, So go ahead and follow
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questions about where to find things other
places to listen, you can go to

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the website ten minute Murder dot com
and you can also reach out to me

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Joe at ten minute Murder dot com
is my email. You can ask me

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any question you want, tell me
anything you need to tell me, or

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like Amy and tennessee here, ask
me a question about allergies. Hello,

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Joe, you mentioned in a recent
episode that you were dealing with allergies and

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you sounded stuffy, but the next
episode you sounded normal. I have allergies

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too, So what was the secret? How did you get better? Amy?

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And Tennessee and Amy, I'll tell
you it's not a secret. I

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took some medicine. I took Clarendon, and that clears me up. I'm

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one of those weirdos that doesn't like
to take things every single day unless I

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absolutely have to. Now, I
know that you should probably take it when

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you have allergies like I do.
You should probably take it daily, and

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they'd let it build up in your
system and you'll be fine. I just

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don't like doing that. But Clarendon
helps, and I take it, and

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I'm fine. Now. If I
don't take it, I'm back to riding

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the struggle bus. But that's my
secret. And thank you for emailing.

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That's going to do it. That
is your episode for today. Thank you

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so much for listening. Take care,