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I'm your host, Ali McLaughlin-sulkowski.
And I'm your co-host, Eli Sulkowski.
And this is Cold and Missing, where we cover cold cases and missing person cases.
Hello everyone and welcome back to Cold and Missing.
I'm your host, Ali.
And I'm your co-host, Eli.
Thank you so much for joining us again and making us a part of your week.
I'm excited to get into it this week.
Episode 73?
72.
Alright.
Great.
Let's do it.
So today we have a missing person case and just as a bit of a content warning at the
top, this case does involve a young person.
Today we are talking about the missing person case of Kevin McClam.
And this takes place in March of 1997 in Goose Creek, South Carolina.
But first, a little bit about Kevin.
Kevin is 14 years old in 1997.
He was born April 2nd, 1982, and Kevin and his family lived on the Naval Weapons Station
right outside of Goose Creek, South Carolina.
So it sits kind of in Goose Creek, but it also seems like it's its own entity outside
of Goose Creek as well.
Kevin's family moved onto the base around 1994 from Georgia.
Kevin's dad is a recruiter, and the family took advantage of living in the cheaper military
housing to help stretch the family budget.
They lived in a five-bedroom duplex, but as soon as Tracy, Kevin's mom, moved in, she
started to second-guess their choice.
The military base gave her a bad feeling, and it wasn't exactly the most child-friendly
place for her four children.
Kevin adjusted well to his new school and surroundings, however.
His teachers didn't have a bad thing to say about him, and Kevin was well-liked and played
basketball at Marrington Middle School.
Kevin was strong in his convictions and wasn't one to give into peer pressure.
Kevin was athletic and had a good heart, according to his family.
And now a timeline of events.
On Saturday, March 29, 1997, Tracey, that's Kevin's mom, went out to play bingo that
night.
On the way home, she stopped at Kmart to pick up some more candy for the Easter baskets
since the next day was Easter.
Tracy gets home later, but Kevin and his younger sister are still up.
They had been playing Super Mario Bros. in the den of the family duplex.
The siblings and their mom talk for about an hour when Tracy and her daughter decide
to go to bed.
Kevin told his mom, quote, I'm going to stay up for a while and play Nintendo, end
quote.
This is around 1 a.m. on Sunday, March 30.
So that Easter morning, when Tracy gets up to set the Easter baskets, she notices that
Kevin is gone.
Tracy prepares an Easter meal, and when Kevin doesn't show up to eat, she knows something
is wrong.
Kevin has never missed a meal in his life.
Tracy begins searching for her son.
She spends hours looking around the military base.
There were no signs of struggle in the home or any signs of forced entry.
After being unable to find her son, Tracy called the base commander for help.
According to Tracy, the base commander was immediately mad that she would call him at
his home.
When that call ended, Tracy then phoned the chaplain, who said that he would get the black
chaplain to the family who would, quote, understand her better, end quote.
That same day, in the late afternoon to the early evening, a father and son were taking
an Easter bike ride when they saw someone matching Kevin's description, walking along
the road in boxers and tennis shoes.
They said that he didn't seem panicked or under any stress.
On Monday, March 31, 1997, so this is the next day, base security waited a full day
before beginning to search for Kevin.
They write Kevin off as a runaway, even though he had no history of that, and there was nothing
in the days leading up to his disappearance that would suggest he wanted to run away.
It is believed that when Kevin went missing, he was wearing an Orlando Magic T-shirt or
jersey, both have been reported, a striped long sleeve shirt, and white pants.
There was nothing else missing from his bedroom, which is another reason the family did not
believe he ran away.
On April 1, so this is two days after Kevin's disappearance, and a day before his 15th birthday,
his clothes are found.
His shirt, jersey, or the T-shirt were found along a dirt road near a construction site,
not far from his home.
I believe his pants were also found here as well.
The clothes were found separated by five to 10 feet from each piece of clothing.
His shoes and underwear were not amongst the clothing that was found.
All of the clothes were spray painted.
The clothes were not torn or in disarray outside of the spray paint.
The clothes were also found in the same area where the witnesses, that father and son duo,
will remember seeing a person walking in his boxers and shoes.
And then from this time, it's not exactly clear what investigators do to find Kevin.
It really is not covered in the media at all.
The next big update we get is March 1998, so this is approaching the one year mark of
Kevin's disappearance.
And security officers on the base conduct a two day search through a woody and swampy
area of the 1700 acre base.
There are around 140 searchers, and that includes divers and sniffer dogs, but no trace of Kevin
is found.
Officials in the case say they are no closer to solving the case a year later than they
were the day Kevin was reported missing.
Rumors circulate that the case was not given the seriousness that it should have because
the McClams are black.
Tracy says quote, I never wanted to say that or think that, but I know it's a fact now.
End quote.
Tracy has become desperate in the search for her son.
She spends hours every day since his disappearance looking for him.
She even reached out to local psychics for help despite never believing in them before.
Tracy racks her brain, but there were no signs that anything was wrong in Kevin's life.
The only theory she can even guess at is that Kevin snuck out of the house and met up with
friends when something horrible happened.
Tracy talked to all of Kevin's friends, but they all denied seeing him that Easter Sunday.
Tracy hopes that someone will come forward and say what they know about her son's disappearance.
And then again, the case goes cold until May of 2005.
So at this point, it's been eight years since Kevin's disappearance.
A local news station does a special report on Kevin.
As a result of the case getting more attention, a very credible tip comes into the NCIS.
NCIS stands for Naval Criminal Investigative Service.
Once that tip comes in, the case changes from a missing person case to a homicide investigation.
That following January of 2006, the NCIS hold a press conference at the basketball court
where Kevin would often play basketball and one of the last places that Kevin was seen.
NCIS special agent Stan Garland says, quote, we know someone is lying.
Kevin knows more than what they're saying about Kevin's disappearance, end quote.
The NCIS also say that they have new forensic evidence that shows that Kevin may have known
his killer.
The NCIS say that they are interviewing people of interest at that time.
In October of 2006, so it has been over nine years at this point, police bring cadaver
dogs to search a 3000 square foot area on the Naval base.
The special agent with the NCIS, John Nix Jr. said, quote, we turned up several items
of interest.
Further investigation will determine if they are relevant or not, end quote.
Searchers didn't unearth any human remains.
That part they do make clear, but they did bring in a backhoe to excavate an area across
the street from the basketball court that Kevin used to play at.
Base security are hopeful that there are still some people in the area that would have information.
Nix said, quote, he still has friends here.
The people that we're looking at, they still have friends here.
We will get them eventually, end quote.
A few months later, in December of 2006, police do name two suspects in Kevin's disappearance
and what they believe is subsequent murder.
The first person they name is Thomas McCardell, who was serving time in 2006 for a robbery
charge.
It's reported that while in their teenage years, McCardell and another man named Michael
Moorcroft bragged about how they participated in the murder of Kevin.
Later, Moorcroft will recant his statement and say that he was making the story up.
Police say that there are three suspects altogether.
The third person is never named by police.
But police do say in December of 2006 to expect an arrest to be made in the next month following
the announcement of these suspects.
Police searched Moorcroft's childhood home with cadaver dogs and the dog does hit on
an area under the shed.
Police dig up the area, but they don't find anything of significance.
To that, Moorcroft said that of course they wouldn't because he never did anything.
But that is truly the last update that I could find on Kevin McClamm.
So it kind of ends with the police being very confident that they were going to have an
arrest, but those arrests never come.
But if you know anything about the disappearance of Kevin McClamm in March of 1997, please
call the Goose Creek Police at 803-572-4300 or you could report a tip to the NCIS online.
And the sources for the timeline today come from the Atlanta Journal, the Times and Democrat,
Post Curia, WIS 10, the Doe Network, and the Charlie Project.
So that is the case of Kevin McClamm.
I feel like usually when I'm listening to you tell me about a case for the first time,
it's a bit of a slow wash over of information.
And my usual immediate emotional response is just like tremendous sadness.
And I do feel that in this case, but I was kind of pacing around listening.
I'm so I'm just like furious, furious that that I didn't know that it was mishandled
for numerous reasons.
One of them being racism.
I just want to ask you more questions.
Is that right?
Can we circle back to the like sighting of him in his underpants and shoes and like that's
it?
My first reaction was if that's a child walking around, I think I would be like, Hey, buddy,
what are you doing?
So between 2pm and 7pm on Easter Sunday in 1997, there's a father and son who are out
riding a bike and they see someone who matches the description of Kevin walking in his boxer
shorts and tennis shoes.
But that's it.
And I did read in a couple spots that there may have been other people who also saw him.
But this father and son, it seems like they were maybe the closest to him.
So it's never confirmed if that is Kevin or not.
But it is close to where his clothes are found two days later.
So they found everything except his boxers and shoes, which led people to think that
this could have been him since that's all that he was wearing.
I guess I question the adults who like saw that child and maybe knew who he was and like
didn't say anything that feels I guess I don't like to point blame, but I'm just I don't
understand what happened there.
Yeah, when I was researching this case, I had a couple of theories.
The first one is that maybe they just didn't know him.
You know, Goose Creek is a bigger town.
It is made up of this military base for sure.
But you know, there are a lot of people in the military base, people coming and going
kind of constantly.
So I did consider that that maybe they did.
They just didn't know him at all.
And then I also had to think about the adultification of black children.
And so, you know, he's a 14 year old teenage boy.
And to some people, they would adultify him in their mind instantly.
So they wouldn't see a child in his underwear walking down the street, they would see a
man in his underwear walking down the street.
So I think that could have also played a part in this as well.
So I think between those two, somewhere lies the truth.
And it might be a little bit of both, honestly.
I guess I'd like to get into more of the suspects with the confessions.
I'm sorry, I just heard it fresh.
So just like a little recap.
Yeah, so it seems that Michael Moorcroft had been heard kind of bragging about participating
in the murder of Kevin, that he didn't disappear, he was murdered and implicated in this confession,
I believe kind of everything that I read is Thomas McArdle as well.
And there's also a third person that police say is a suspect, but is never named.
So I don't know if he comes from this confession directly or not.
But Moorcroft appears to have said some things that people later turned into the NCIS.
And that is what kind of brought the spotlight over these two people.
But it does seem like the NCIS was investigating them and talking to them for a while.
They also bring in cadaver dogs to Moorcroft's childhood home.
I believe his mother was still actually living there at the time.
And there is a hit under the shed.
But when they dig it up, nothing is found, nothing of any significance.
And Moorcroft kind of points to this as saying that like, of course they didn't find anything
because I didn't do it.
I made it up.
It was just a story.
That's where that kind of stands.
But the two of them have been named as suspects by police, by the NCIS, but they've never
been arrested for any crime related to Kevin McClam.
A case can become a homicide investigation even if there is no body.
Is that correct?
Yeah.
So it just kind of shifts how they investigate it.
So we've seen this in other cases that we've covered where the person has been missing.
But because of X, Y, or Z, they shift their investigation tactics to more of a homicide
investigation.
And that's how they look at it until proven otherwise.
And it does seem a question that I had is the NCIS later, they talk about that they
have forensic evidence saying that Kevin could have known his killer.
And I just couldn't exactly find what that forensic evidence is.
It doesn't appear like they got into details at that press conference.
They just said they have forensic evidence.
So I don't know if that also is how they got to their suspects that they eventually made,
if that also plays a hand in this, as well as the confessions.
But I would be very curious to know what that evidence is and where they got it from.
I can only suspect that it's his clothing, since that's all we know that has been found
of his.
But that is something that I kept kind of returning to and rereading it, because I wasn't
sure that I was reading it right.
But they say it was forensic evidence that shows that Kevin may have known his killer.
So I just don't know what that is, frankly.
Yeah, it's an ambiguous statement, because we all know a lot of people, you know, it
just doesn't say anything, which again is frustrating, which makes me think about Tracy,
his mother, to have the realization like midway through the investigation of this system is
killing me and like the case shifted from missing to homicide and to know like, I am
being failed by this system because of x, y, and z racism being the main component and
that I just, I'm just so sorry.
And you know, as things were kind of heating up in this investigation, you know, 2005,
2006, reporters did reach out to Tracy, her and her family had moved back to Georgia at
that point.
But she said something along the lines of all they can do now is keep faith and keep
their faith, which they've had this whole time.
And they also mentioned that they did have faith in the investigators.
So it's like they still are wanting to believe that they're going to get help, which is sad.
But what an incredible woman to still give people the benefit of the doubt and these
new investigators on the case, giving them the benefit of the doubt that they would be
helpful and they would close this case.
And it really seems like for a minute that they were very confident it was going to be
closed.
They had like a special cold case unit that said that they weren't going to leave Goose
Creek until the case was closed.
But here we are in the year 2024 and the case is still not closed.
So I want to believe that they are very close.
They are just missing a few pieces of information, which it does sound like they believe is out
there.
If somebody knows more than what they're saying, somebody has been hiding something, somebody
who either knows Kevin or knows the person that did it is keeping back information.
So it does seem like it's out there somewhere.
Well, I think that you bringing it to us will, you know, it's definitely a nudge forward
and just getting his name out there.
Again, if you know anything about the disappearance of Kevin McClamm in March of 1997, please
call the Goose Creek Police at 803-572-4300 or you can go online and submit a tip to the
NCIS that way.
And they even have an app you can download to submit tips.
It's just NCIS tips and you can send a tip that way.
While we have you here still, hopefully, please, please, please, if you have a moment, rate
and review us in Apple podcasts.
We love seeing those reviews.
And more importantly, we really we encourage the reviews because it helps get the podcasts
out there, which helps get the names out there and cases out there just like Kevin's.
So thank you.
We'll also be posting pictures on our Instagram of Kevin.
There is an age progress picture of him to the age of 33.
So we'll be putting that up on our Instagram as well.
So if you're not following us, that's a great way to keep up with the podcast, with the
cases, and then just other things that we share in our stories that is kind of true
crime, cold case related.
So all that information is on Instagram.
You can just search at cold and missing and we'll pop right up.
You can also visit our website cold and missing.com where you can leave a review, you can listen
to all our old episodes.
And there are also transcripts on the website.
So if you or someone you love is hard of hearing, you can follow along to the podcast that way.
But that is all I have.
Thank you again so much for listening to cold and missing.
I'm your host, Ali.
And I am your co host, Eli.
Have a good week and stay safe, y'all.
Stay safe, y'all.