3. Call for Help | Lost Hills

0:15Speaker 1:Pushkin. September 16, 2009, the day Mitrice drove to Malibu, her longtime off-and-on girlfriend, Desiree Black, decided to do something drastic.

0:40Speaker 2:That was the day that I had... I mean, finally worked up the courage to try and, like, break it off, call it quits. But definitely was not brave enough to do that in person.

0:58Speaker 1:She wrote my Teresa text.

1:01Speaker 2:It went something along the lines of, I love you, I care about you, but I don't think that I can do this anymore.

1:12Speaker 1:Matrice had been seeing Tessa on and off during her relationship with Desiree, and now she was head over heels for this new woman, Hannah Parks. Desiree was over it.

1:22Speaker 2:I think that it really weighed on me that I had to share. So I text that, and her response was definitely unexpected. Her response was just like, I love you, I totally understand, you're an amazing person, and, like, all of the things that you don't want to hear when you're trying to, like, break it off with somebody. Like, those are all of the things that I was getting.

1:56Speaker 1:After she sent the text, Desiree, who was still a student at Cal State Fullerton, had to go to track practice. But she thought about Mitrice the whole time.

2:05Speaker 2:I mean, like, immediately I regretted it. sending that text. I just didn't know how much I was going to regret it. Because that day, she didn't come home. And that was definitely out of the ordinary.

2:24Speaker 1:Matrice still slept over at Desiree's occasionally, and she was expecting her that night. At 7 p.m., when she got out of practice, she started texting Matrice.

2:36Speaker 2:She wasn't responding. And I just assumed that that was my own fault because of the text message that I'd sent out before I went to practice, which was, we're not doing this anymore. I didn't believe me. I don't think that she believed me either. But that's what I said.

2:58Speaker 1:Do you remember making dinner that night and waiting for it?

3:03Speaker 2:To be honest, that whole time, chunk of time in my life is just a blur. Like, it was not a good time for me. And so, I did cook dinner, but I can't say for sure, like, what else I was doing besides, like, just kind of wondering where she was at.

3:31Speaker 1:At 7pm, Mitrice was nowhere near Desiree's place. She was pulling into Joffrey's, an upscale restaurant on Pacific Coast Highway. Matrice would later tell the cops she stopped at Joffrey's because she saw the white fairy lights dangling from the trees. She parked in the valet lot. Her car was a beater, a 10-year-old Honda Civic with a jerry-rigged ignition. She told the valet she was there to meet up with Hannah, Hannah with the tattoos. She walked past the hostess station to a table, smiling at everyone. She ordered a steak and an ocean breeze. Within two hours, deputies from Lost Hill Station would be at the restaurant, trying to figure out what to do with this charming young woman who couldn't pay her $ 89. 51 bill. Where had she come from?

4:23Speaker 1:That was easy. She was from Mars, she said. And what was she doing there? Well, she said sweetly, she was there to avenge the death of Michael Jackson. I'm Dana Goodyear, and this is Lost Hills. Episode 3, Call for Help. Hannah Parks says Mitrice had been in a state of full-blown psychosis for over a week. She'd lost her grasp on reality. For one thing, Hannah says, she had no plans to meet Mitrice at Joffrey's. That was all in Mitrice's head. Mitrice had been writing desperately in her journal about not sleeping, about being trapped in a never-ending, waking dream. When she got to Joffrey's, she'd been awake for something like five days. Throughout the early morning hours and into the afternoon of September 16th, she'd churned out a steady stream of social media posts about her favorite subject, Michael Jackson. Her journals and messages in this episode are being read by an actor, and have been lightly edited for clarity. 1.17 a.m.

6:09Speaker 3:OMG, Michael Jackson, I was your biggest fan in the world, but you already knew my trees, Rich Erdson. It's all in the eyes of a believer slash child.

6:23Speaker 1:5.13 a.m.

6:26Speaker 3:Rude, Mike Jack. Current rude, crazy. I'm tired. I'm so tired. See me somebody, please. I'm here. Doesn't anyone hear me? Ghost.

6:41Speaker 1:8.47 a.m.

6:43Speaker 3:Princess Diana and Michael Jackson equal Mitre's America's princess. Long live the king.

6:52Speaker 1:She went to her job at the freight company owned by Tessa's family. She kept posting strange things all day long.

7:00Speaker 3:With Michael's death, a legend is born that will last until the end of time. The proof is in the number. Mind playing tricks on me? Haha, you're such a player. They speak in letters and all I understand. Just ask the believers who are there. 1.34 p.m. Two I equals six S's. Michael Jackson's number one fan. I know it. O-M-G, O-M-G, O-M-G, O-M-G.

7:25Speaker 1:According to law enforcement documents, while Mitrice was watching a soap opera in the break room at the freight company, she thought that one of the actresses gave her, quote, a message from God telling her to go to Malibu.

7:38Speaker 4:So she was acting strange at work. She wasn't, you know, getting her work done because Mitrice was very efficient at her job.

7:45Speaker 1:This is Dr. Rhonda Hampton. She's a psychologist Mitrice interned for in college.

7:52Speaker 4:It's almost like I saw her what, four days a week? And we would spend a lot of time together.

7:58Speaker 1:She considered herself a mentor to Mitrice.

8:01Speaker 4:So, I mean, a lot of our relationship was definitely about the work, but it was also about her future.

8:08Speaker 1:Mitrice was Dr. Hampton's intern in 2007 and 2008. And during that time, Dr. Hampton began to notice a change in Mitrice.

8:16Speaker 4:It's just that her symptoms were really subtle. You know, it wasn't anything that was bizarre. A couple times she would come in very disheveled or very angry sometimes. And I started to notice like a cyclical pattern to that. And it was almost like clockwork. I can tell like every six or seven weeks something's going to happen. You're going to look not right, right?

8:39Speaker 1:She urged Patrice to get a psychiatric evaluation. This would have been at least a year before Hannah was urging her to do the same thing.

8:48Speaker 4:We talked about psychosis. specifically about bipolar disorder and about the treatment for that. And, I mean, she was very open to hearing that. And I know that she got evaluated, and I know that she went to the school counseling center at least on two occasions.

9:04Speaker 1:Over time, Mitrice's condition grew noticeably worse. But no one except Hannah seemed to really comprehend just how bad things had gotten. Mitrice's mother, Latice, was preoccupied with marital problems. Although they later got back together, in 2009, she and her husband Larry were in the midst of a painful divorce, and she had Mia, her young daughter with Larry, to worry about. On the day of her disappearance, Maitrese sent her mother some really confusing texts, which Lattice included in her memoir. 12.48 a.m.

9:41Speaker 3:I told you I would take care of everything, Mommy. I love you.

9:44Speaker 5:3.04 a.m.

9:48Speaker 3:Did you know my name means behind every man is a strong woman?

9:54Speaker 1:What have you taken care of, Latice replied when she woke up. My trees, I'm not understanding. After my trees left work, she didn't go straight to Malibu. She headed to Cal State Fullerton. She was looking for one of her old psychology professors, someone she may have recently confided in about her mental problems.

10:17Speaker 4:That professor was not in the office at the time. I think she may have been teaching a class and So when Mitrice went in there, they said, she's not going to be here for a few hours. And apparently, from what I hear, is Mitrice sat there and waited for the professor to come. So for whatever amount of time.

10:31Speaker 1:When the professor returned to her office, she found Mitrice in an elevated state, talking excitedly about publishing her journals as a book. Recognizing something was wrong, the professor tried to find someone to help Mitrice.

10:46Speaker 4:And so that professor actually walked Mitrice to another professor who was a clinical psychologist, walked her to that psychologist's office. And Maitrese was apparently not happy with that. And so Maitrese at that point said, well, I got to go. I'm going to go hang out with my friends. And so she ran off.

11:08Speaker 1:After Maitrese left campus, she stopped by her aunt's house, where she left some flyers advertising her go-go dancing. Then she set out for Malibu.

11:19Speaker 4:She did say the beach was calling her, so that was one of the things that she had said earlier in that day. I could see her driving out to the beach. She was familiar with Pepperdine because she was considering going there for grad school. I can't say whether she had ever eaten at Joffrey's before. I don't know. But I do know that she was familiar enough with how to get to Malibu and the beach.

11:39Speaker 1:In her journals, Mitrice wrote about the ocean as a place of healing, a place of calm. She was in pain, and she thought... Malibu would help. Can you settle a long-running question for us? Why is it called Joffreys, not Jeffreys?

12:22Speaker 6:You know how many times people have had that argument? Settle a bet. And I'm like, okay, I know exactly what you're talking about.

12:29Speaker 1:This is Jeff Peterson. He owns Joffreys Malibu.

12:33Speaker 6:Joffrey and Harvey Baskin started Joffreys in 1983. Yes, it should be pronounced Jeffreys, but his name was Joffreys.

12:45Speaker 1:Jeff lives in a big McMansion in Malibu. When I went to see him, he was in the middle of a divorce. The place was half empty, and his two gigantic dogs were jumping all over the place. He told me he came to L.A. in the late 80s to be an actor and started busing tables at Joffrey's. Eventually, he bought the place.

13:03Speaker 6:Lucky for me, I'm a terrible actor. Fail at one thing, do well at something else.

13:11Speaker 1:Joffrey's is a Malibu institution.

13:12Speaker 2:Think Joffrey's.

13:14Speaker 1:Tourists, aging celebrities, and a few Malibu regulars sipping cocktails and eating food that hasn't changed since the 80s.

13:23Speaker 6:Well, it sits along like a cliff overlooking the ocean, and it's surrounded by gardens and water fountains and fire pits. I mean, I was talking to Chuck Woolery one time, the old dating game guy. It was Love Connection, one of those things. And he was at the restaurant filming something, and he said, you know what? This was the number one place that men would always say they take their dates. because it's so romantic and relaxing. So there's a lot of anniversaries and dates and birthdays and special occasions.

13:52Speaker 1:It's a celebrity clubhouse. The art on the walls is made by patrons like Clint Eastwood and John Travolta.

13:59Speaker 6:Yes, we get our celebrities. I used to wait on Redford back in the day. Nicest man in the world. What a class act. So we get a combination of both. And we get presidents. So we get everybody.

14:13Speaker 1:In depositions they gave later, just about everyone who interacted with Mitrice at the restaurant said they noticed that something was wrong with her. The valet, for instance. He says he found Mitrice sitting in his car, rifling through his CDs. When he asked her what she was doing, she replied, it's subliminal. And the hostess. She says Mitrice got up from the table where she'd been seated alone and joined a party of seven. Hi, sorry I'm late. Can I sit next to you? she asked one of the strangers.

14:47Speaker 1:From what these witnesses said later, Mitrice was pretty amusing, chatty, spirited, and zany, talking about her fascination with the number eight and her plans to move to Hawaii, and, of course, Michael Jackson. In her deposition, the hostess stated, quote, At this point, I did not make too much of the situation, because during my time working in Malibu, I had encountered lots of people who were off in their behavior and personalities, unquote. About an hour after Mitrice walked into Joffrey's, she walked out, past the hostess stand to the valet. There was just one problem. She hadn't paid her bill. In his deposition, the manager says he confronted Mitrice in the parking lot.

15:37Speaker 1:When she said she couldn't pay, he took her back inside. He asked her to empty her pockets, thinking there might be a credit card or some cash in there. She pulled out a joint instead. The manager called Jeff, the owner.

15:52Speaker 6:I can remember that night. I remember I was sitting on a couch, not this couch, but another couch right here. I was sucking a Theraflu down. I had a cold. For the best of my recollection, he calls me up. He tells me there's a lady there. They don't know if something's wrong with her, if she's mentally ill, if she's drunk, if she's high, she's only had one drink, and she's talking in gibberish, and he doesn't know what to do.

16:20Speaker 1:According to law enforcement documents, when the manager confronted Mitrice about paying her bill, she said, quote, that she was from Mars and that she was going to have sex with him, unquote.

16:33Speaker 6:So I think the managers really, they just wanted to help her because The message I got from her was that she was a nice, sweet, she wasn't threatening, she wasn't mean, but something was just very wrong. One of the concerns was that we couldn't let her go that night without calling for help. Because if you let a person who's obviously something's wrong with them, and like I said, I didn't know if it was drugs or alcohol or mental illness. If you let a person go and give them their car keys and send them out into the road and they run over a child or hit a family, then people ask you the question, why would you let this person go?

17:14Speaker 1:At 8.30 p.m., the manager told the bartender to call 911. Hi, I'm.

17:21Speaker 7:Calling from Joffrey's Restaurant in Malibu. We have a guest here who is refusing to pay her bill and we think she may, she sounds really crazy, she may be on drugs or something. We were wondering if someone could come by and pick her up.

17:36Speaker 8:And is she a white, black, Asian, Hispanic?

17:39Speaker 7:She's a young black girl. She's probably in her.

17:44Speaker 5:20s.

17:44Speaker 9:Is she with anybody else?

17:46Speaker 5:No, it's just her.

17:47Speaker 1:Twenty minutes later, three Lost Hills deputies arrived at Joffrey's. Now, the equation changed. The deputies searched Mitrice's car, supposedly looking for a form of payment. and found it was a mess, full of CDs, clothes, and shoes. It was so bad, they thought maybe she'd been living out of it, which was pretty accurate. In the trunk, they found some handles of vodka, a half-drunk bottle of tequila, and half a case of beer. And between the two front seats, they found a small bag of weed. The valet asked a deputy what was wrong with Mitrice. He replied that she was, quote, a ding. which is cop speak for mentally ill. With the deputies, Mitrice was lovely. Later, according to investigation documents, they said that while she, quote, seemed slightly embarrassed, Ms.

18:44Speaker 1:Richardson was cooperative and polite, unquote. The deputies gave her a field sobriety test, which she passed. Mitrice was trained at keeping up appearances. She was afraid of what was happening to her mind, and she was in the midst of a crisis that was altering her sense of reality. When they asked her if she had a history of psychiatric problems, she said no. Still, she had to pay that bill. The hostess asked Mitrice if there was anyone she could call. Mitrice gave her the number of her great-grandmother, Mildred Harris. The hostess called her and asked her if she could come to the restaurant and take care of the bill. Joffreys apparently had a policy, and they wouldn't take a credit card over the phone. I'm 91 years old, Ms.

19:35Speaker 3:Harris said.

19:35Speaker 1:I can't drive to Malibu. Then Mitrice's mother, Latice, called the restaurant and spoke to a manager. Investigation documents state that Latice told the manager her daughter had, quote, been spending time with persons of whom she did not approve, end quote, needed to learn a lesson and be taken to jail. Mitrice's offense, Dine and Dad, or defrauding an innkeeper, was misdemeanor petty theft. That's typically a citation, not a crime for which a person usually gets taken into custody.

20:10Speaker 1:But the Joffreys' management didn't want Mitrice leaving in her car. The cops told the manager that if he wanted them to take Mitrice away... the manager would have to make a citizen's arrest. Here's how Jeff Peterson, the owner of Joffrey's, explains it.

20:26Speaker 6:So what happened was, and excuse my dogs, they're coming in the room now. The only way that we were able to get her help, the deputy told us, we have to be able to take her away on something because that came from them. So they told us, this is what you need to do for us to be able to get her help.

20:46Speaker 1:There was another option, though. The deputies could have put Mitrice on a 72-hour psychiatric hold, also known as a 5150. Jeff says he had no idea.

21:00Speaker 6:If I knew that there was other ways, like if she could be charged on a 5150 and taken for mental evaluation, and we didn't have to do that, then absolutely, why the heck would I want to charge her? Because it's never been about $ 89. 00.

21:14Speaker 1:The Lost Hills deputies executed a citizen's arrest on the Dine and Dash charge and also charged Mitrice with another misdemeanor for the pot in her car. Everyone, even her mother, seemed to agree she'd be better off in custody. So Anthony Larreiro, the arresting officer, decided to hard book her at the Lost Hills Sheriff's Station. The justification he gave his superiors is that he was worried about her. that she was, quote, a little ditzy, and he was uneasy about just letting her go. According to internal station correspondence written after Mitrice was officially a missing person, or MP, quote, deputies uncomfortable with field release, no articulated reason, instinctive feeling, concern for MP's welfare. Lorero put Mitrice in the back of a squad car, and they drove through Malibu Canyon to the station, about 13 miles away. Meanwhile, her car was taken to a tow yard near Pacific Coast Highway, where it was impounded. While Mitrice was in transit, deputies were preparing for her arrival. One of the deputies who'd responded to the Joffreys' call typed a message to another deputy over the interdepartmental computer system. At station and 15, re-femsearch,

22:35Speaker 1:he wrote. What'd you get? His colleague typed back. Defrauding an innkeeper.

22:40Speaker 5:LOL.

22:41Speaker 6:What?

22:42Speaker 1:Did she leave without paying? Tried, but failed. Then had no means to pay. Citizen's arrest. Why didn't you help assist her out? This exchange is callous, and it has uncomfortable racial undertones. Mitrice was a black female, alone and in crisis in Malibu. For many, her race would be the defining factor in what happened to her. She should have been granted extra protection, but that's not what happened. What happened is that sometime on that long, dark drive from the restaurant to the station, the concern for Mitrice's well-being that had justified her arrest in the first place seemed to vanish.

23:40Speaker 5:I am calling. I'm a little frazzled right now. I understand my daughter is being brought into the station. My Therese Richardson has made it to the station yet, and she's been booked.

23:51Speaker 9:Okay. Do you know where she's coming from?

23:53Speaker 5:It's some restaurant out in Malibu, and I didn't even think to get the name. The manager's name is.

24:01Speaker 10:The only place we have somebody that's in custody that they just announced on the radio that they're coming up is from Joffrey's.

24:07Speaker 9:In Typical Highway. It's the only female that's being brought up to the station as we speak.

24:12Speaker 10:They actually just put it on the radio right before you called.

24:16Speaker 1:This is a recording of a call Latice Sutton made to Lost Hills Station on the night of the arrest. It was published on the internet shortly after Mitrice disappeared.

24:25Speaker 5:Okay, okay.

24:27Speaker 11:I'm her mother.

24:28Speaker 5:And you guys want to book her and then release her on her own recognizance tonight because it's dark.

24:35Speaker 10:She doesn't have a car, and I don't want her wandering out.

24:38Speaker 5:I'm totally just taken aback because this is so out of character for her. And you'll see when she comes in, she's well-spoken. I think the only way I will come and get her tonight is if you guys are going to release her tonight.

24:51Speaker 1:It was already late, almost 10 p.m., Latice lived at least an hour away from the station. She and Larry weren't living together at the time, and she couldn't leave their daughter home alone.

25:03Speaker 5:If she's going to be held in custody for some type of arraignment tomorrow, then I will wait until tomorrow. She definitely has no place, you know, I mean, she's not from that area, and I would hate to... Wake up to a morning report, lost somewhere with her head chopped off. So I guess I would have to come and get her. Oh, my God.

25:22Speaker 9:Yeah, we're in a great house. The only thing is, at least in the station here, she will be separated, but nobody's going to be with her. So at least that's, you know, the plus thing, so you don't have to worry about her safety.

25:32Speaker 3:Oh, yeah.

25:33Speaker 5:No, I feel safe with her being in custody. It's being released, but I'm worried about it. It's crazy out here.

25:45Speaker 1:A short time later, the squad car carrying Mitrice arrived at Lost Hill Station. She was taken to a booking cell, where she was searched and made to hand over her possessions. She was given a medical and mental health assessment and a live scan for fingerprints and other identifying details, like her tattoos, to submit to law enforcement databases. In pictures, Mitrice was always radiant, eyes lit up, dazzling smile, In the mugshot taken at Lost Hills Station that night, she looks like a different person. Her hair is messy. Her skin looks waxy and tired. But really, it's her eyes.

26:27Speaker 1:The light has gone out. Lost Hills is what's known as a slow station. That night, there was just one other person in custody.

26:39Speaker 11:My name is Shemaine Marie Henderson.

26:42Speaker 1:I recently met Shermaine in the courtyard of a motel where she was staying.

26:47Speaker 6:It was just me and Matrice.

26:49Speaker 11:I don't know how big the station was, but I know it was like a little small station where they held people. They say you go in for like DUI, they go in until you get well enough to drive, you know, leave again. Like they have hold-of-selfs of that type, you know. It was a small station.

27:06Speaker 1:That night, Shermaine said, she'd been picked up in the valley for soliciting. Her memory's foggy. It's been a long time. And over the years, she's had multiple strokes. But she does remember that Mitrice was already in the cell when she arrived.

27:21Speaker 11:I mean, she was there before me. And I walked in. Because she was standing, like, in the doorway. Like, I need to sit down. I'm very tired. I want to sit down. It was just me and her in the cell. And she was just by the doorway. And I was like, excuse me, can I get in so I can sit down?

27:37Speaker 1:Charmaine noticed right away that Mitrice was acting strange.

27:41Speaker 11:From some of her, like, her actions and stuff, I could tell that she was not okay to be by herself. I don't know what kind of mental state she was in. Like, some people ain't okay to be by themselves.

27:52Speaker 1:She seemed kind of vulnerable to you. Yes, very vulnerable, yes. I read somewhere that you requested to change cells. Do you remember that? Was she being annoying?

28:04Speaker 11:Because she was, like, she would not understand her situation. Like, I'm trying to sleep. If she's going to keep knocking at the door, trying to, like, you know, she wanted out. Come on, who will arrest someone? You get a ticket for that. You don't go to jail for not being able to pay your meal. Who will arrest someone for that? So it was like they went overboard with it. And I felt her. So she was like, she wanted out.

28:29Speaker 1:She's, like, banging on the door? Banging on the door, like, trying to.

28:31Speaker 11:Get Debbie, like, sign me out or let me know my charges.

28:36Speaker 1:Around 11.45 p.m., When it was determined that Mitrice had no outstanding warrants, the jailer gave her the citation and told her she could go. She asked Mitrice if someone was going to pick her up. Mitrice said she hadn't been able to reach anyone. According to the sheriff's department, she had tried calling her great-grandmother, Mildred Harris, with no luck. The jailer later said she offered to let Mitrice stay the night in an unlocked cell or wait in the front lobby until she got a ride. but she declined, saying she had to go meet friends. Shemaine was in a different cell at this point, but she says she could hear what was going on. I guess they cited her out.

29:20Speaker 11:But when you cite someone out, you still don't let them leave until they have knowledge of a ride or they have a way to get somewhere. I mean, they can call a cab on their own, something like that, you know? They wouldn't have released me in the middle of the night. I mean, I would hope not, you know, because it was in the middle of nowhere.

29:39Speaker 1:It struck her as unusual and not okay.

29:42Speaker 11:When I seen the news, it was like, damn, that's crazy, because I was like in a cell with this woman.

29:48Speaker 2:And all of a sudden, she's missing.

29:50Speaker 11:I was thinking like, damn, if I would have got released, like, that could have been me.

29:56Speaker 1:Over the following weeks, months, and years, the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department would repeatedly seek to justify their release of Mitrice Richardson, saying that legally they did not have the right to detain her. She had no outstanding warrants, her infractions were misdemeanors, and she was not gravely disabled or in immediate danger to herself or others. That's the standard for a 5150 psychiatric hold. That's bullshit.

30:26Speaker 12:Is what that is.

30:27Speaker 1:That's bullshit. Here's Hannah again.

30:33Speaker 12:A young woman by herself drives to Malibu to go to Joffrey's, an expensive restaurant in Malibu, by herself, claiming she's there to avenge Michael Jackson's death, sits with people she doesn't know, says weird things, gets arrested for her own safety. goes to the police station, all of a sudden she's okay. That's bullshit. She wasn't okay.

31:04Speaker 1:Mitrice's unstable mental condition was the reason deputies had taken her into custody in the first place. Remember, the arresting deputy thought she was, quote, a little ditzy, and he was uneasy about just letting her go. But once she got to the station, law enforcement says, Mitrice was acting normal. so they had no reason to keep her. In fact, they said, they were legally obligated to release her. Hannah says that is just not possible. Anyone who interacted with Mitrice would have recognized that she was in crisis.

31:42Speaker 12:I understand that some people are thinking, oh, maybe she was on drugs, or maybe that's what it was. For me personally... It was a psychotic break that my trees was experiencing. The drive to Malibu, the Joffreys, the saying she was meeting me, the talking about aliens and Michael Jackson and all that. And it is without question. Anybody that came into contact with Mitrice, look at the mugshot. Anybody who came into any contact with her, I don't care who you are, family, neighbor, somebody who's walking past her on the street, there is a 0% chance that they didn't know something was wrong with her mentally.

32:34Speaker 9:Zero.

32:38Speaker 1:At 12.25 a.m., Mitrice left Lost Hill Station. She had no money, and her phone was in her car, which was in a tow yard 10 miles away on the other side of Malibu Canyon near Pacific Coast Highway.

32:55Speaker 12:Make it make sense. It doesn't make sense. At bare minimum, they should have kept my trees at bay. the sheriff's station, until morning, until her mom came or somebody came to come check on her and get her. She had nothing. They knew she was mentally unwell, which is why she was there in the first place. What they should have done is placed her on a hold and taken her to a psychiatric facility, but they can't do that because they're claiming she was fine. They're lying. It's bullshit, and if you care about my treats, you'll.

33:28Speaker 1:Say what's true.

33:29Speaker 12:That's true. They're just trying to cover their own ass. That's bullshit. And that really bothers me.

33:38Speaker 1:Once she left the station, Mitrice had no way to call anyone for help and no way for help to find her. All of this was news to her mother, who called the station around 5.20 a.m. on the morning of the 17th and was horrified to learn that her daughter was no longer there. She thought she had an agreement with the cops that they would keep Mitrice overnight. Latice was alarmed. Mitrice had already been out of custody for five hours, and no one in the family had heard from her. Fifteen minutes later, at 5.35 a.m., Latice called Lost Hill Station again to find out how to file a missing persons report.

34:23Speaker 9:Lost Hill Station, Baumgartner.

34:25Speaker 1:This recording of Latice's call was released on the Internet shortly after Mitrice disappeared.

34:30Speaker 5:Yes, hi. My name is Latice. I called not too long ago regarding my daughter, Mitrice Richardson. How long before a missing persons report can be filed? Is it 24 or 48 hours?

34:43Speaker 10:Well, it depends on the circumstances, but I didn't take your call, so I'm not familiar with it.

34:50Speaker 9:Did she just not return home after going out?

34:53Speaker 1:She explains that Mitrice had been in custody at Lost Hill Station and then released.

34:58Speaker 5:She was arrested last night. This is the first time she's been arrested. She's in an unknown area that she's never been in. She's without a vehicle. Nobody can find her.

35:13Speaker 1:But the deputy doesn't seem overly concerned. He thinks Mitrice can hold off on the missing persons report.

35:22Speaker 10:Yeah, normally I wouldn't recommend doing one.

35:28Speaker 9:That soon.

35:29Speaker 5:Right. What is the time frame?

35:32Speaker 10:You know, I guess probably 24 hours would be reasonable. I mean, if there would be some mitigating factors, you know, where you would suspect maybe something.

35:43Speaker 5:You know, not quite right. She doesn't know the area. She's never been in your area before.

35:51Speaker 9:Where does she live?

35:52Speaker 5:She is unfamiliar with that area.

35:54Speaker 9:Do you think she possibly could have gotten a bus home?

35:58Speaker 5:No. Listen, my child has never ridden a bus. No. She would not know how to ride a bus.

36:06Speaker 10:I would probably wait until, you know, early this morning. And if she doesn't turn up, you can certainly call. I don't suspect anything bad happened.

36:18Speaker 1:But Latice does suspect something bad has happened, so she decides to level with him.

36:24Speaker 5:Something is obviously going on with her.

36:28Speaker 9:Have you talked to the jailer?

36:30Speaker 5:Yes, yes, yes, yes, I have. He said he tried to get her to stay, but because she was an adult, they had to let her go. I believe that she is highly depressed, and she's in a depressive state.

36:43Speaker 9:Okay. You know, it could be possible that maybe she.

36:51Speaker 10:I mean, there's a lot of options and a lot of possibilities, and I don't think all of them would be, you know, something dire. But I can certainly understand.

37:02Speaker 9:Your fears, you know, being your daughter and all that.

37:05Speaker 5:Well, I think she's depressed. That's what has me more.

37:09Speaker 9:That's worried you more than just her... Okay.

37:12Speaker 5:That and the fact that she's in an area where she doesn't know where she's at.

37:16Speaker 9:Does she take medication at all?

37:19Speaker 5:No. I believe it's a state that she's in right now because of just the weird activity that's going on.

37:27Speaker 9:What's her name? Her name is Myatrice Richardson.

37:39Speaker 1:In another hour, around 6.30 a.m., Bill and Karen Smith, the couple in Montanito who spotted Mitrice in their backyard, would call the cops. This is a recording of that call, which was published online.

37:55Speaker 8:The Smiths lived at the tennis courthouse. This is Cold Canyon, like Hot and Cold in Montenegro. But it's in the back of the house, which is right where Wood Bluff hits Cold Canyon. And we just had a strange woman walk up to the backyard here. It's a fairly large property, and she was sitting on the steps right in the back of the house here. This is kind of a circular driveway, and the gates were closed, so we don't know where this woman came from.

38:38Speaker 1:Their property, Smith said, connected to a network of trails used by everyone in the neighborhood.

38:44Speaker 9:What did she look like, white, black, and spanky?

38:47Speaker 8:You know, a tall, slim, black woman with afro hair. How tall? Well, she was sitting down, stretched out on the wooden steps in the back of the house, hard to tell. But she looked like she might have been medium to slightly tall, with a big afro hair, very skinny. I think she was wearing maybe jeans or tight pants with a t-shirt.

39:05Speaker 9:You've never seen her there before?

39:06Speaker 8:No, never. Nobody ever does that. I mean, the people hike on the trail all the time. The trail goes through our property, but we leave it open on purpose because it's kind of a nice thing for horses and people.

39:15Speaker 9:And you said she was laying across the steps?

39:18Speaker 8:She was sitting kind of sprawled out on these wooden steps in the back of the house, right against the back of the house. She's since got up and left? She's since gone, yeah. She's been gone about five minutes now, but as we followed over, we thought maybe a little drive-by wouldn't be a bad idea. And what direction was she last seen Never saw her. Once she left, she just disappeared. I moved from one window to another. I said to her, I hollered down, are you all right?

39:41Speaker 8:She said, I'm just resting or something like that.

39:46Speaker 1:According to her memoir, when Latisse arrived at Lost Hill Station to file a missing persons report, the deputy recognized the name Mitrice Richardson. He told Latice someone who looked like her daughter had been seen in Montanito early that morning. Matrice, he said, might be, quote, with some friends in the neighborhood, unquote. Friends in Montanito? Matrice didn't have any friends in Montanito. Latice asked how to get there. The deputy told her, just take Las Virginas, the road that turns into Malibu Canyon, and you'll hit Cold Canyon Road. As Latisse drove mile after mile of rural Canyon Road, no houses, no street lamps, no nothing, she thought. There's no way on earth my daughter walked here. My trees was afraid of the dark.

40:52Speaker 1:Next time on Lost Hills. Did you have the feeling when you were dealing with people in Montanito, like they wanted to tell you something, but they couldn't tell you something?

41:03Speaker 4:Yes, definitely. People just didn't want to talk. They're just afraid of law enforcement. This story by this time had broke on the news, and law enforcement did not look good. They're not really in a position to talk because these are the people that they have to rely on to protect them. Because, you know, it's so secluded.

41:23Speaker 1:That's next in Episode 4 of Lost Hills, Hopscotch. Lost Hills is written and hosted by me, Dana Goodyear. It was reported by me and Haley Fox, our senior producer. The show was created by me and Ben Adair. Lost Hills is a production of Western Sound and Pushkin Industries. Subscribe to Pushkin Plus and you can binge the whole season right now ad-free. Find Pushkin Plus on the Lost Hills show page in Apple Podcasts or at pushkin.fm slash plus.