WEBVTT

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Imagine you are walking down a snowy city street.

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Okay. It is 3 a .m. The temperature has just

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completely plummeted, well below freezing, and

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the city is totally silent. Right. Nobody's out.

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Exactly. The only sound is your own footsteps.

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And then you see headlights approaching in the

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distance. Which is, I mean, totally normal. It's

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an entirely ordinary occurrence. We all see cars

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driving at night. We don't really think twice

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about it. But in the case we're exploring today...

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that totally ordinary occurrence turns into an

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absolute nightmare. Welcome to today's deep dive.

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Our mission today is to understand a... A really

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highly unusual criminal profile based on the

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Wikipedia article of Lawrence Paul Mills. Yeah,

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this is a tough one. It is. We are looking into

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a predator who took everyday environments and

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his own specific mechanical skills to camouflage

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horrific intentional acts of violence as just

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tragic traffic accidents. And it really forces

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us to completely reevaluate our ingrained assumptions

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about crime. I mean, when we look at criminal

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history, we are conditioned to look for certain

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patterns, right? Like guns, knives, dark alleys.

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Exactly. Certain weapons, certain types. types

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of crime scenes. But in a world where we just

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hear about crime constantly, this specific story

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stands out because it challenges the very definition

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of what a murder weapon actually is. We're looking

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at how something as ubiquitous as a commuter

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SUV can be transformed into this highly effective,

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incredibly destructive tool for a serial killer.

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OK, let's unpack this, because to really understand

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how these crimes were committed, we have to look

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at the man behind the wheel. The sheer duality

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of his life is, it's just staggering. It's the

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classic true crime paradox. It really is. So

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Lawrence Paul Mills III was born on September

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3, 1987 in Garden City, Michigan. If you look

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at his background, his life reads like any completely

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standard biography you might find in the Detroit

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suburbs. Just a totally average guy. Right. And

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that digital footprint, it acts as a form of

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active camouflage. Yeah. We have this... This

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deep psychological need for monsters to actually

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look like monsters. Yeah, we want them to be

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obvious. Exactly. We want them lurking in the

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shadows, entirely disconnected from society.

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But here we have a man folding pizza boxes in

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Allen Park by day, smiling for selfies with his

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kid, projecting this incredibly mundane protective

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persona. But beneath that. Right. Beneath that

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carefully constructed facade, his nighttime activities

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were violently predatory. And that stark contrast

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makes cases like this exceptionally difficult

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for investigators to crack early on. I mean,

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the community doesn't suspect the friendly guy

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at the pizza shop. That camouflage of normalcy

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provides him with an immense amount of operational

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freedom. And that freedom allowed him to develop

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a modus operandi that is truly terrifying. When

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the sun went down, that ordinary dad facade just

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vanished. The research outlines his methods with

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pretty chilling clarity. Mills would solicit

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sex workers in the Detroit area, engage in sexual

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acts, and then he would demand his money back.

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It's a power play. Totally. And if the women

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refused or tried to flee, he would physically

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beat them. But his ultimate weapon of control

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and ultimately of murder wasn't a firearm. It

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wasn't a knife. It was his vehicle. It was his

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vehicle. A 2006 golden pan Chevy Trailblazer.

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He would literally use this massive SUV to run

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them down. Demanding the money back and then

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weaponizing his vehicle when denied, that really

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speaks to a calculated method of dehumanization.

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He's reducing these human beings to simple transactions.

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And when the transaction doesn't conclude on

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his terms, the rage is instantaneous. He uses

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a massive piece of machinery to enact that revenge.

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It's a profound escalation from physical assault

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to vehicular homicide. Here's where it gets really

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interesting. Automotive culture blocks, specifically

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places like Jalopnik, actually picked up on this

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case back in 2020. Which is wild because they

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usually cover like car reviews and industry news.

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Exactly. But they ran a headline pointing out

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that Mills might be the first serial killer to

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essentially use a car as his primary murder weapon.

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We hear about getaway cars all the time, obviously.

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But the vehicle itself being the actual murder

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weapon for a serial offender is incredibly rare.

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What's fascinating here is the psychology behind

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that specific choice of weapon. When we study

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serial offenses, the choice of weapon is highly

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analyzed because it reveals so much about the

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offender's internal state. Like a knife is personal.

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Right. Knives imply a desire for intimate, close

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-quarters control. Firearms imply a desire for

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lethal efficiency and physical distance. But

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a car? A car is a totally different psychological

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tool. How so? Well, first, it offers distance

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and a physical barrier. The killer is literally

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encased in steel and glass, physically protected

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from their victim, and psychologically insulated

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from the immediate tactile reality of the murder.

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You don't have to look them in the eye. Exactly.

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Second, it provides overwhelming brute force.

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A 2006 Chevy Trailblazer weighs well over 4 ,000

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pounds. When accelerating, the kinetic energy

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is just devastating. But the absolute most crucial

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element here is the plausible deniability. Oh

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man, that plausible deniability is terrifying.

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Because if someone finds a body on the side of

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the road that has clearly been struck by a vehicle,

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the immediate assumption from first responders

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isn't... You know, premeditated murder. Precisely.

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The immediate assumption is a hit and run accident.

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Right. A tragic, reckless, maybe drunk driving

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incident, but an accident nonetheless. It essentially

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gives the killer an automatic alibi built into

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the very nature of the crime scene. The authorities

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are initially looking for a panic driver who

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made a terrible mistake and fled. Not a serial

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killer. No, they are not looking for a calculating

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predator who's hunting for sport. That fundamentally

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changes the trajectory of the investigation from

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day one. I mean, homicide detectives aren't necessarily

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the ones getting the first call. It goes to the

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traffic division. He exploited a massive bureaucratic

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and investigative blind spot. And exploiting

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that blind spot allowed him to go on just a horrifying

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spree. Let's look at the timeline of terror that

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gripped southwest Detroit in 2017. Seeing it

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chronologically really highlights how his brazenness

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escalated. The earliest incident noted in these

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records happened on March 17, 2017. It's around

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4 a .m. near the intersection of Michigan and

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St. James. There is a hit -and -run incident

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fitting this exact MO, but in this initial case...

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the victim actually survived. The timing there

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is highly significant. 4 a .m. This is an individual

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who deeply understands the cover of night and

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the rhythm of the city. He knows exactly when

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the streets are empty, when the likelihood of

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witnesses is practically zero. Especially in

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Michigan. Exactly. In a Detroit winter at 4 a

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.m., the environment itself is hostile. That

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means there are very few people even looking

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out their windows. His victims are at their most

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isolated. He certainly used that isolation to

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his advantage, because after that March incident,

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things escalate drastically. Seven months later,

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on October 16, 2017, at 3 a .m., the violence

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turns fatal. The body of 34 -year -old Melinda

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Salazar is discovered on a sidewalk in southwest

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Detroit. And the details surrounding her death

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are truly heartbreaking, particularly because

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Melinda Salazar was pregnant at the time. It

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is entirely devastating, and it underscores the

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extreme vulnerability of the specific demographic

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he was targeting. He wasn't just using a physically

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overpowering weapon. He was selecting victims

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who were already operating at a severe disadvantage.

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The violence didn't stop there. Less than two

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months later, on December 13, 2017, at 3 .45

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a .m., another devastating discovery is made.

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59 -year -old Carol Ann White is found face down

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in the snow, lying between the sidewalk and the

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street on Campbell in southwest Detroit. And

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it's also noted that Mills is strongly suspected

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in the death of a 32 -year -old woman named Mary

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Pentagore, whose body was found on that exact

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same street. When we look at this cluster of

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attacks, March, October, December, and we look

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at the locations, primarily in southwest Detroit,

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specifically around Campbell Street, a very clear

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geographic hunting ground emerges. Yeah, he had

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a territory. He did. And we have to analyze the

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victims themselves in the context of the environment.

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Serial killers historically prey on marginalized

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groups, sex workers, people out on the streets

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at three or four in the morning in the freezing

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snow. These are individuals who are already operating

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on the fringes of societal protection. It's so

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sad. It is. Predators rely on systemic blind

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spots. They bank on the grim reality that these

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victims might not be reported missing immediately

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by family members or that law enforcement might

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not prioritize a pedestrian hit and run involving

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a sex worker the way they would, say, a high

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profile home invasion in the suburbs. That systemic

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blind spot is what allowed him to keep operating.

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But a predator's luck eventually runs out. And

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the turning point in this case is an incredible

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testament to human survival. It really is. Just

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days after Carol Ann White was found in the snow

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in December 2017, Mills attacked again. Yeah.

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He targeted a 29 -year -old pregnant woman. He

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beat her and then he struck her several times

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with that golden tan trailblazer. But despite

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being beaten and despite being hit by a two -ton

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SUV multiple times, she managed to get away.

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Wow. Yeah, she escaped and she immediately called

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the police. Her survival is nothing short of

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miraculous given the sheer kinetic force of a

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vehicle strike. But it's her courage to immediately

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contact the police that ultimately breaks this

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case wide open. She provided the crucial eyewitness

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testimony that linked the vehicle to a deliberate

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physical assault. It wasn't just an accident

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anymore. Exactly. She transformed a string of

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isolated accidents into a clear, undeniable pattern

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of attempted murder. Without her explicitly stating

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that the driver intentionally used the vehicle

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as a weapon after an assault, who knows how long

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he would have continued to hide behind the guise

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of traffic fatalities. So what does this all

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mean? We have a timeline of attacks concentrated

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heavily throughout 2017. We have a survivor who

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escapes and calls the police in December of 2017,

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providing a description of the method and the

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vehicle. Yet Lawrence Paul Mills wasn't arrested

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until April 24, 2020. That's a huge gap. I keep

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getting stuck on that gap. That is an investigation

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spanning nearly three years after a survivor

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literally goes to the police. How does a man

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committing these massive, brutal, incredibly

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messy vehicular attacks evade capture for that

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long? Hitting a human body with a car isn't a

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clean process. If we connect this to the bigger

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picture, hitting a human body with a vehicle

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at speed causes immense, highly specific damage

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to the car. In forensic terms, a hit and run

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vehicle is a massive driving piece of evidence.

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There has to be damage. We're talking about the

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kinematics of pedestrian impacts. You get severe

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dents to the hood, shattered plastic from the

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headlights, cracked windshields, and significant

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underterrage damage. Furthermore, the low -card

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exchange principle dictates that every contact

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leaves a... A transfer, right? Yes. A vehicle

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strike leaves fabric impressions on the clear

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coat of the paint. It leaves biological evidence,

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blood, hair, tissue deeply embedded in the grill

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and the undercarriage. It also leaves paint transfer

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from the car onto the victim's clothing. Normally,

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finding the car means finding the killer because

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the car is a billboard of guilt. But Mills wasn't

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just an ordinary driver who panicked. He had

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a very specific skill set that changed the forensic

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equation entirely. Investigators noted that he

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had the mechanical ability to frequently change

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vehicles and repair cars. And that is the terrifying

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differentiator in this case. His mechanical skills

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essentially acted as a highly effective forensic

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shield. He wasn't just taking his car to a local

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body shop where a mechanic might get suspicious

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about a blood -stained, shattered bumper. He

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did it himself. He had the knowledge to pull

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that golden tan trailblazer into his own garage

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and systematically dismantle the crime scene.

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He could hammer out the dents, source and replace

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the shattered headlights, and aggressively scrub

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the biological matter from the undercarriage,

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effectively erasing the physical footprint of

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his car. his crimes. Or just get a new car entirely.

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Exactly. Alternatively, he had the know -how

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to just swap vehicles entirely, acquiring a different

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car and blending back into traffic. He was quite

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literally destroying the murder weapon after

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the kills and then rebuilding it to use again.

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It is deeply unsettling to think about the level

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of cold, methodical calculation that requires.

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You commit a brutal murder at 345 a .m., crushing

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a person with a 4 ,000 -pound machine. And by

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breakfast, you are standing in a freezing garage,

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methodically replacing a shattered bumper and

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scrubbing away biological evidence, all so you

00:12:50.990 --> 00:12:53.009
can go clock in at your job at the pizza place

00:12:53.009 --> 00:12:55.480
in Allen Park like nothing happened. It demonstrates

00:12:55.480 --> 00:12:58.340
a chilling level of compartmentalization. The

00:12:58.340 --> 00:13:00.600
psychological disconnect required to transition

00:13:00.600 --> 00:13:02.639
from a violent predator in the dead of night

00:13:02.639 --> 00:13:05.139
to a meticulous mechanic at dawn and then to

00:13:05.139 --> 00:13:07.639
a smiling father in the afternoon is profound.

00:13:07.860 --> 00:13:10.159
It's sociopathic. Completely. That ability to

00:13:10.159 --> 00:13:12.659
scrub the evidence is exactly why he could evade

00:13:12.659 --> 00:13:15.960
capture from 2017 to 2020. He was covering his

00:13:15.960 --> 00:13:17.779
tracks with a wrench and a fresh coat of paint,

00:13:17.919 --> 00:13:20.500
effectively neutralizing the primary physical

00:13:20.500 --> 00:13:22.500
evidence the police needed to make an arrest.

00:13:22.799 --> 00:13:26.720
But eventually... The net did close. The investigation,

00:13:27.080 --> 00:13:29.779
spanning those several years, finally gathered

00:13:29.779 --> 00:13:32.000
enough circumstantial and direct evidence to

00:13:32.000 --> 00:13:36.620
move forward. On April 24, 2020, Lawrence Paul

00:13:36.620 --> 00:13:39.659
Mills was arrested. And the legal proceedings

00:13:39.659 --> 00:13:42.740
that followed were incredibly intense. Mills

00:13:42.740 --> 00:13:44.860
actually confessed to two of the murders during

00:13:44.860 --> 00:13:47.259
the process. But then he pled not guilty. Yes.

00:13:47.789 --> 00:13:49.649
Despite that confession, when it came time for

00:13:49.649 --> 00:13:51.950
court, he still pleaded not guilty to the charges.

00:13:52.090 --> 00:13:54.450
Which is a complex legal strategy, but not entirely

00:13:54.450 --> 00:13:56.649
unheard of, especially given the unique nature

00:13:56.649 --> 00:13:59.809
of the weapon. By pleading not guilty, the defense

00:13:59.809 --> 00:14:02.490
forces the state to prove their case beyond a

00:14:02.490 --> 00:14:04.769
reasonable doubt in a trial setting. They were

00:14:04.769 --> 00:14:07.399
playing on the hit and run angle. Exactly. They

00:14:07.399 --> 00:14:09.379
may have been hoping that the unusual nature

00:14:09.379 --> 00:14:11.500
of the weapon, the car, might create a sliver

00:14:11.500 --> 00:14:14.460
of reasonable doubt in the minds of a jury. The

00:14:14.460 --> 00:14:17.360
defense might attempt to argue a lack of premeditated

00:14:17.360 --> 00:14:20.080
intent, suggesting that perhaps these were tragic

00:14:20.080 --> 00:14:22.059
accidents that occurred during an argument rather

00:14:22.059 --> 00:14:25.320
than calculated vehicular homicide. When the

00:14:25.320 --> 00:14:28.100
weapon is a car, the line between vehicular manslaughter

00:14:28.100 --> 00:14:30.759
and second degree murder hinges entirely on proving

00:14:30.759 --> 00:14:33.240
the driver's state of mind at the exact moment

00:14:33.240 --> 00:14:36.379
of acceleration. But the jury saw right through

00:14:36.379 --> 00:14:38.879
any attempts to minimize the intent behind his

00:14:38.879 --> 00:14:42.500
actions. On November 17, 2021, the verdict came

00:14:42.500 --> 00:14:45.379
down. Lawrence Paul Mills was found guilty of

00:14:45.379 --> 00:14:47.519
two counts of second -degree murder, as well

00:14:47.519 --> 00:14:49.620
as assault causing a miscarriage, stillbirth,

00:14:49.679 --> 00:14:52.179
or death. For transforming a Chevy Trailblazer

00:14:52.179 --> 00:14:54.299
into a weapon of terror and stalking the streets

00:14:54.299 --> 00:14:57.100
of Detroit, he was sentenced to 28 to 48 years

00:14:57.100 --> 00:14:59.580
in prison. He is currently serving that sentence

00:14:59.580 --> 00:15:01.860
in prison at the Macomb Correctional Facility

00:15:01.860 --> 00:15:04.200
in Michigan. It's a heavy, dark conclusion to

00:15:04.200 --> 00:15:06.340
a deeply unsettling chapter in Detroit's history.

00:15:06.740 --> 00:15:09.100
While those convictions bring some measure of

00:15:09.100 --> 00:15:11.879
justice for Melinda Salazar, Carol Ann White,

00:15:12.039 --> 00:15:14.539
the surviving victims, and their families, the

00:15:14.539 --> 00:15:16.700
sheer span of his activities and his ability

00:15:16.700 --> 00:15:19.399
to hide in plain sight leaves a very lingering

00:15:19.399 --> 00:15:22.559
footprint. It forces us to acknowledge how easily

00:15:22.559 --> 00:15:24.980
the mundane can be weaponized. It really does.

00:15:25.220 --> 00:15:27.720
And to you, our listener, I want you to think

00:15:27.720 --> 00:15:30.299
about how this deep dive changes your perspective

00:15:30.299 --> 00:15:33.259
tomorrow morning. When you walk out of your house,

00:15:33.360 --> 00:15:35.179
when you stand at a crosswalk and wait for the

00:15:35.179 --> 00:15:37.600
light to change, you are going to see heavy machinery

00:15:37.600 --> 00:15:40.279
passing by you constantly. All day long. We take

00:15:40.279 --> 00:15:42.039
the safety of our physical environment entirely

00:15:42.039 --> 00:15:46.139
for granted. This case is a stark reminder that

00:15:46.139 --> 00:15:48.919
our ingrained assumptions about crime, the idea

00:15:48.919 --> 00:15:51.740
that a murderer requires a gun or a knife or

00:15:51.740 --> 00:15:54.240
stealthy tactics in the shadows can completely

00:15:54.240 --> 00:15:56.580
blind us to the dangers hiding in plain sight.

00:15:57.309 --> 00:16:00.049
Danger hides in the form of a smiling dad on

00:16:00.049 --> 00:16:02.590
Facebook. It hides in the guise of a pizza shop

00:16:02.590 --> 00:16:05.570
employee. And it hides in everyday objects like

00:16:05.570 --> 00:16:09.289
a passing 2006 Chevy Trailblazer. We assume a

00:16:09.289 --> 00:16:11.970
car is just a car, a tool for commuting, until

00:16:11.970 --> 00:16:14.029
someone decides to turn it into something lethal.

00:16:14.669 --> 00:16:16.870
This raises an important question, and it's a

00:16:16.870 --> 00:16:18.450
thought I want to leave everyone with today.

00:16:18.529 --> 00:16:20.850
It's the kind of realization that lingers long

00:16:20.850 --> 00:16:22.830
after you finish researching a case like this.

00:16:23.360 --> 00:16:25.500
We know for a fact that Mills had the mechanical

00:16:25.500 --> 00:16:28.720
ability to repair and swap cars seamlessly. We

00:16:28.720 --> 00:16:30.620
know that a car provides the ultimate mobile

00:16:30.620 --> 00:16:32.940
camouflage, making a brutal murder look like

00:16:32.940 --> 00:16:35.720
a routine, albeit tragic traffic collision. Right.

00:16:35.799 --> 00:16:38.000
Given those facts and knowing how he operated,

00:16:38.179 --> 00:16:40.440
we have to wonder how many other tragic hit and

00:16:40.440 --> 00:16:42.500
run accidents sitting right now in the cold case

00:16:42.500 --> 00:16:45.460
archives of Detroit's traffic division were actually

00:16:45.460 --> 00:16:48.759
undetected serial murders. How many other victims

00:16:48.759 --> 00:16:50.919
were chalked up to reckless driving or a terrible

00:16:50.919 --> 00:16:52.720
mistake in the snow when in reality... reality

00:16:52.720 --> 00:16:55.379
they were the calculated kills of a man who simply

00:16:55.379 --> 00:16:57.940
drove home pulled into his garage and scrubbed

00:16:57.940 --> 00:17:00.480
the evidence away before the sun came up it makes

00:17:00.480 --> 00:17:02.279
you wonder what else is hiding in those accident

00:17:02.279 --> 00:17:04.339
files just waiting for someone to look closer