UPDATE: Melissa Casias

**Delia D'Ambra** (0:01)
Every year, millions of people head into the wilderness searching for peace, beauty and adventure. But hidden in those same scenic landscapes are stories of violence, survival and lives cut short.
I'm Delia D'Ambra, and on my podcast, Park Predators, I uncover the true crimes that happened in the most amazing places on earth. Listen to Park Predators wherever you get your podcasts.

**Ashley Flowers** (0:29)
What did I tell you, Crime Junkies? More answers in the Melissa Casias case inevitably leads to more questions. But things are getting interesting, so I wanted to bring you some stuff hot off the press. I got a couple of things to hit on, and I'm going to save the strangest for last, so stick.
So update number one, Public Pressure and the PI.
There has been a ton of intensity heating up around this case. A lot has to do with the press attention resulting from Melissa being connected to these missing or dead scientists. Which, by the way, not sure if you clocked this, but at the time we recorded our episode, there was a list of 11, if you included Melissa. Well, Fox News published an article April 21st about a family who died in a plane crash just recently. Onboard was a quote, decorated veteran pilot, aerospace engineer and defense researcher, James Tony Moffat. And also his son who was up and coming in the field, Andrew Moffat. Their plane crashed in South Carolina, but they were from Huntsville, Alabama. The same city that chemist and entrepreneur Amy Eskridge called home. Now, Amy's 2022 death was ruled a suicide, but she has been grouped in with that list of scientists. And before her death, she said in an interview that Huntsville was the biggest deal you've never heard of. It's home to NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, where Amy's father, Richard Eskridge, spent his career as an engineer. He and Amy co-founded a research institute together before she died. Now, it's worth saying, though, that he told NewsNation he does not believe that her death was suspicious. Though an interview Amy gave a couple of years before her death and texts that she supposedly sent in the weeks before she died make it clear that she felt targeted and that her life was in danger.
So, that is all blowing up, bringing more attention to Melissa's case. So much so that Agent Mata told us that the FBI had reached out to him given the media attention, and he's working something out with them for assistance. But at the same time, there are other driving forces stirring things up. Namely, the Mondragon family has a PI working on their behalf, who they met through a missing person support event. This man, Thomas McNally, is licensed to practice in Arizona, but according to New Mexico's Regulation and Licensing Department, he's not licensed in the state of New Mexico, where Melissa went missing. McNally's tactics have been aggressive. He has been making a series of strongly worded public Facebook posts calling for Mark to be investigated as a person of interest, and naming other members of the Casias family. That's kind of putting it lightly. Now, because of the backlash, the Casias family says that they have become worried for their own safety, and not just Mark, but his daughters as well. Now, we talked to Agent Mata about this, and he was aware of the PI, but he had not heard anything about McNally's tactics being aggressive. So that's all blowing up bringing more attention to Melissa's case. So much so that Agent Mata told us the FBI has reached out to him, given the media attention, and he's working something out with them for assistance.
Now, on to update number two, Rick Valerio. Now remember, this is the guy who was sitting on his horse crying in front of a church. The one who told the tourist that he had just found his cousin decapitated in the mountains. Now Mata confirmed more about that second interview he did with him after the body cam one that you saw in our episode. But there wasn't much more. He said that in that follow up, Valerio admitted that he is intoxicated every time he's on a horse. But not much else came from the interview. Other than Mata says he has not been able to establish any connection between Rick Valerio and Melissa. As for the blue truck that he had, in our episode, we were interested to know if anyone had searched it, knowing that there was a sighting of a blue truck near Melissa when she was last seen walking down Highway 518
And the answer is, kind of. So Mata told us he did look at it, but only visually, like he walked around it. And he noted old looking rusty damage on it. Valerio said that the truck had been at a commission for several months and had not been driven, but I don't know if Mata managed to confirm that. He did confirm for us, though, that there were no license plate readers on the relevant stretch of Highway 518 to help him out in identifying whose blue truck that was, that was seen near Melissa.