Nick McGuffin and Leah Freeman have been highschool sweethearts up until the day she disappeared. What happened to Leah Freeman? '20/20' explains.
"June 28, 2000, I'll never forget that date," Nick McGuffin tells ABC News. That's the day his girlfriend Leah Freeman disappeared. The high school sweethearts spent the day in combination which integrated washing Nick's Mustang, doing such things as spraying each different with the hose. "I remember we were having a good time," stated Nick.
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The couple had plans to hang around later, however first Nick dropped Leah off at her good friend Cherie's house. When she and Cherie reportedly were given into an issue, Leah left and went for a walk. Apart from a few witnesses, that was once the last time any person would see her alive.
What happened to Leah Freeman? 20/20 takes a have a look at this many years outdated story.
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Who killed Leah Freeman?
In the small town of Coquille, Ore., there have been only a few secrets. Everyone knew everyone, and they indubitably knew each different's trade. A missing child was felt in a community like this. The night Freeman vanished, McGuffin arrived at her friend's area at Nine p.m. to select her up as deliberate, but Freeman nonetheless hadn't returned from her walk. McGuffin says he right away went searching for her.
"I went back to Fast Mart probably five or six times,” he shared with ABC News. “There was [sic] different people there every time. They didn't see Leah. I didn't see Leah." McGuffin says that around 2 a.m. he did another force past Freeman's area the place he saw a gentle on in her room. Assuming she were given home safely, McGuffin went home.
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That identical evening, a mechanic found certainly one of her footwear at a cemetery close to the highschool but idea it belonged to certainly one of his personal kids. A week later, Freeman's different shoe used to be discovered simply out of doors of the city, coated in blood. That's when authorities began to take Freeman's disappearance extra severely. On Aug. 3, 2000, her "decomposing body was found on a steep wooded embankment, eight miles away through back roads from where the first shoe was found," ABC stories. Naturally, police turned to McGuffin, who was once nothing but cooperative.
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With no leads, the case went cold. A traumatized McGuffin moved on along with his lifestyles the most productive he could, attending culinary college and beginning a new courting with a girl who gave birth to their daughter in 2007. A yr later, a new Coquille police leader would reopen Freeman's case. The only new "evidence" to come to gentle used to be the fact that on the night time Freeman went missing, McGuffin was putting with a woman pal of his who claimed the two smoked pot. The evening ended when he attempted to sleep with her. That was once enough for a grand jury to indict him.
Where is Nicholas McGuffin now?
The case against McGuffin was once built fully from interviews with various witnesses. “My trial came down to other people's phrases,” McGuffin stated. “My story has in reality by no means modified.” With simplest circumstantial evidence to be had, McGuffin was sentenced to 10 years in prison. Four years into his prison sentence, lawyer Janis Puracal became interested in his case and brought DNA checking out into the combo.
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Freeman's sneakers were examined again in 2017, only this time, the DNA of an unidentified man was found. The first time the sneakers were examined in 2000, the "Oregon State Police crime lab discovered something that DNA technology 20 years ago could not conclusively characterize," according to ABC. This used to be omitted from their record. During the trial, this DNA wasn't tested further as nobody knew it existed.
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In December 2019, Judge Patricia Sullivan dominated that "there is a 'reasonable probability' that McGuffin's guilty verdict would have been different had the presence of the unidentified man's DNA been disclosed to law enforcement, prosecutors and the defense," ABC reviews. The District Attorney chose no longer to seek a new trial, if only as a result of the pain it could cause everyone involved. Because McGuffin already served "97 percent" of his sentence, he used to be released from jail.
According to the Associate Press, in June 2020 McGuffin "filed a federal civil rights lawsuit Monday [July 20] against police," naming "multiple Coquille, Coos County and Oregon State Police law enforcement officials." In it, he alleges that evidence was once hidden and manufactured so as to secure a conviction. As of the time of this writing, the civil case has but to be resolved.
To be informed extra about Leah Freeman and Nick McGuffin, tune into 20/20 Friday, Aug. 26, at 9 p.m. EST on ABC.
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