Wednesday, Feb 23, 2022 • 23min
Rebecca Harvey (Queen of Clubs, Indiana) & Steven Hendricks (8 of Hearts, Indiana)
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Rebecca Harvey, an 18-year-old with plans to marry her boyfriend Steven Hendricks, was found dead in a house fire in rural southern Indiana in 1988. Investigators said she was doused with gasoline and set on fire before her killer took off. Steven Hendricks hasn’t been seen since.
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(3)
Ashley Flowers
Sergeant Brock Werne
Emily
Transcript
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Ashley Flowers
00:00
Our cards this week are Rebecca Harvey and Steven Hendricks, the Queen Of Clubs and the eight of Hearts from
Indiana
. In this episode, I'm going to tell you everything our reporting team could find out about Rebecca's horrific death in 1988, and how it's connected to Steven, who is still missing today. For years, there hasn't been much out there on Rebecca's murder or Steven's disappearance.Share
00:27
That's because their case is a lesser known unsolved mystery from right here in my home state of
Indiana
. But our team went right to the lead investigator on the case to learn more. More than 30 years later, the case continues to baffle law enforcement and everyone who's asking the question: What really happened to Rebecca Harvey and Steven Hendricks? I'm Ashley Flowers, and this is The Deck.Share
01:21
September 3rd 1988 had been a busy day for Jackie and Carol Arnold. The couple had taken a road trip to and from the
Indianapolis
airport that afternoon to pick up a family member. That trip is about a two hour drive southwest to their home in Washington, Indiana
, which is this small town in Daviess County.Share
01:42
When they got to their house that evening on Oak Grove Road, nothing out of the ordinary was going on. The Arnolds lived on the outskirts of their small town and a typical night there was quiet. They went to bed and like every other night before, didn't hear a thing stir. That is until around three in the morning.
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02:01
That's when Mr Arnold woke up to something extremely unusual for the neighborhood - a strong smell of smoke. The smoke wasn't in their house, it was coming from outside. So he peeked out a window and that's when he saw it. The neighbor's house was on fire.
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02:19
Almost the entire structure was engulfed in flames. To the point that there were flames shooting out from every direction, the roof, the windows everywhere. Without even thinking, Mr Arnold grabbed the phone and dialed the local fire department. In a matter of minutes, several volunteer firefighters responded to the scene. Some of them even drove up in their personal cars.
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02:40
They started fighting the blaze on the outside and called for more backup. As the firefighters quickly worked to knock down the flames, the Arnolds were left to helplessly look on from next door, terrified. With each piece of the house that collapsed, they worried that the young couple who lived inside hadn't made it out.
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02:58
Jackie and Carol knew that the vehicle parked out front belonged to a young man who lived there with his girlfriend. They hoped the couple maybe stayed out late or we're just out of town, but their hopes were dashed. When, not long after the firefighters tamed the blaze, a coroner's van pulled up to the burned house.
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03:16
According to
Indiana
police records, when the firefighters made their way through the small house, they hollered for anyone alive inside to come out, but no one responded. When they had reached a bedroom, they found the burned remains of a single human body on what was left of a bed.Share
03:33
Now, it was clear just from looking at it that the remains were those of a person. But because they had been burned so badly, no one could tell right away whether the body was that of a woman or a man.
Share
03:44
Reports stated it appeared from burn patterns in the room, that the person had been lying on top of the bed and likely never moved even as the house caught on fire, almost as if they'd been asleep the whole time and didn't even know that the house had started to burn. Before removing anything, the Davies County Sheriff's Department and
Indiana State Police
arrived and quickly secured the scene and started investigating.Share
04:08
The first thing they needed to do was I. D. the body, but that would take a few days for the coroner to confirm, so in the meantime, detectives started talking with the neighbors. They wanted to get a better idea of who lived in the house and that's where the Arnolds became helpful.
Share
04:24
The couple told detectives that a 22 year old man named Steven Hendricks had been renting the house and just a week before the fire, his girlfriend, a woman named Rebecca Harvey had moved in. They confirmed for investigators that it was Steven's car that was parked out front of the scorched house. And the Arnolds said they'd seen Steven and Rebecca coming and going regularly, but never spent much time with them.
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04:46
They described Rebecca as being several years younger than Steven and said overall the couple was nice, at least from the limited interactions they've had. Unfortunately, the night of the fire, the Arnolds told police they didn't see much action happening at Steven's house in between the time when they've gotten home from the airport and before they went to bed.
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05:04
But what little info the Arnolds did give investigators set detectives off on a good start. They quickly learned that Steven worked as a local mechanic in town.
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05:14
An 18 year old Rebecca had recently dropped out of high school to live with him. With this information in hand, authorities had to wait for the coroner's office to identify who the body in the house belonged to. Was it Steven or Rebecca or someone else? Eventually, law enforcement got medical records and dental impressions for Steven and Rebecca, and those were compared to the burned remains.
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05:38
The results confirmed that the body belonged to Rebecca. The reason police were so focused on finding out who the victim was, was because initial autopsy and evidence findings indicated that she had been intentionally set on fire. Traces of gasoline were found inside the house, particularly in the bedroom.
Share
05:58
That detail told investigators all they needed to know. They weren't just dealing with an accidental fire, they were dealing with murder. Now the two glaring questions they needed to answer were, who did it and most importantly, where was Steven Hendricks?
Share
06:21
As authorities picked and shuffled through the charred remains of Steven's rental house on Oak Grove Road, they started finding more clues, and one thing became very clear: the fire that eventually engulfed the whole structure had started in the bedroom where Rebecca's body had been found. Fire marshals found high concentrations of gasoline residue splashed all around the room.
Share
06:43
According to police records, the county coroner who conducted Rebecca's autopsy wasn't able to determine if she died before the fire started. And it's not super clear because investigators won't release the full autopsy report, but I guess there wasn't enough of Rebecca's lungs left for the coroner to determine if she inhaled any smoke before dying, or if she was already dead before the fire started.
Share
07:06
Our reporter, Emily, interviewed
Indiana State Police
Sergeant Brock Werne, who said that he and the other investigators who have worked on this case over the years have always contemplated the terrible thought that maybe Rebecca burned alive, because she was restrained or incapacitated somehow on the bed.Share
07:24
But Sergeant Werne is actually one of a handful of investigators who doesn't believe that though; he thinks Rebecca was killed prior to the fire starting. He says the position of her remains indicated she was lying on the bed motionless when she was set on fire.
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Sergeant Brock Werne
07:38
It doesn't say she was alive, she could have been. This is just an assumption, I would say she was dead and that's just based off if the house is on fire and she's alive and she can get out, she probably would have got out. Saying, I don't think a suspect would hold somebody down until they burned. You know what I mean? They would also be burnt. So my assumption is that she was dead before the fire started.
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Ashley Flowers
07:59
Our team did find some rumors out there online that suggests Rebecca might have been tied to the bed while she was being burned, but Sergeant Werne said this isn't true. He couldn't really share more from his case file about that, but all he said was, "It's just not true."
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Emily
08:15
So the rumor of her being tied to the bed are false?
Share
Sergeant Brock Werne
08:19
I didn't say anything about her and report being tied to the bed.
Share
Ashley Flowers
08:23
Unfortunately, whether or not Rebecca was alive or dead before being set on fire is just not something anyone but her killer can know. All police were sure of at the time was that Rebecca's death was no accident. Naturally, their next move was to figure out where Steven was. Firefighters found no trace of him in the house, but his car was left parked out front, his personal belongings like his wallet and keys were ultimately found in the house. That told investigators he either walked away from the crime scene, or he got a ride, or he was never there at all.
Share
08:59
But just the fact that Steven was Rebecca's boyfriend and the only other person known to live in the house, made him authorities' prime suspect. Police wondered if there was anything in the couple's history or relationship that could have led him to kill her and flee.
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Sergeant Brock Werne
09:15
Sometimes, people say they were a happy couple I guess, and then there's some that say that they were on and off. One time they'd be happy, and one time they would be yelling at each other.
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Ashley Flowers
09:25
The problem was, everyone detectives spoke with: friends, family, the Arnolds, they all said that Steven and Rebecca really seemed to love one another. In fact, they weren't even just girlfriend and boyfriend; they were engaged. It was kind of low key, but together they had been working hard to save up for their wedding.
Share
09:44
Steven worked on cars at a place in
Washington
called Craney's Body Shop, which is still in business today. And Rebecca worked as a waitress at a local restaurant called Patsy's Pizza
. Some of her friends told police back in 1988 that she'd even contemplated going back to high school to finish her senior year and get her diploma. And the Arnolds told police that on several occasions, they had gotten the impression from Steven that he really encouraged Rebecca to go back and graduate.Share
10:10
Emily tried to contact several of Rebecca's old classmates and friends about their relationship,, and even just to learn more about Rebecca in general, but no one responded. Records indicate that her parents died years ago and little else is known about her other than what I've told you. In'88, police knew just as much info, and so they were left asking the question: If Steven and Rebecca had a wedding date on the horizon and happy future ahead of them, then why would he kill her? That's a question that investigators have never been able to find the answer to, because they have never been able to find Steven. Today, he's listed as a missing person.
Share
10:51
Investigators back in 1988 interviewed his boss at the auto body shop in
Washington
right after the fire, and that guy told the cops that it was truly bizarre Steven never showed up to work again after the incident. He was one of the best employees Craney's Body Shop had at the time.Share
Sergeant Brock Werne
11:07
He was a very good worker, I know that for them. And they did report that in here that, because I think Mr Craney at one time, when he hired him or they went and interviewed him said he was a good worker.
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Ashley Flowers
11:16
Mr Craney told police that Steven not returning to work was odd because he'd left thousands of dollars worth of personal mechanics tools inside the shop. For a long time, news publications that have covered this case, reported conflicting information about whether or not Steven collected his paycheck from his work before the fire.
Share
11:35
Some news reporters from that time said that Steven did not pick up his last paycheck. But Sergeant Werne took a fresh look at the investigative reports, specifically for this show, and he said that Steven did in fact pick up his paycheck and cash it at the local I. G. A. the afternoon before the fire.
Share
11:53
So, you could assume if Steven was planning to murder Rebecca and take off and start a new life, that he might have used that paycheck to get a head start. But then, why wouldn't he take his valuable mechanics tools with him that he could, I don't know, sell or pawn off to help with his getaway? And why would he leave his wallet behind? It doesn't make sense.
Share
12:15
The last known sighting of Steven was after he cashed his paycheck, just a few hours before the Arnolds woke up to see his house on fire. A friend of his was at the Oak Grove Road house with Steven late in the afternoon on September 3rd.
Share
12:29
Police interviewed that friend not long after the crime and he told investigators that Steven was helping him work on his truck, which had overheated earlier that day. The guy told police that everything seemed normal with Steven when he was there, and that Rebecca was gone at the time working at Patsy's pizza. No one has heard from or seen Steven Hendricks since that moment.
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Sergeant Brock Werne
12:51
That's the hardest part of this case is he hasn't been located. So, is he somebody that was involved or is it somebody else involved that took him somewhere else? That's the unknown right now, and that's probably the biggest question they had back then. It's probably still the biggest question we have today is, where he's at?
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Ashley Flowers
13:07
Never having a solid lead on where their prime suspect went, and no forensic evidence to push Rebecca's murder case forward caused the investigation to grind to a halt.
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Sergeant Brock Werne
13:18
There's just so much unknowns I think in this case, so some people out there haven't make assumptions to the case and I don't know the facts and that's how the rumors start getting going around, you know. Especially since Steven's missing, Hendricks, so with him missing and never being found with, there's a lot of scenarios that could have took place, you know, that sends people into starting rumors.
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Ashley Flowers
13:38
A bizarre theory that was floated on social media a few years back indicated Steven was killed the same night as Rebecca, and his body was dumped in
Oak Grove Cemetery
, not far from the original crime scene. Police took this tip so seriously that they taped off the cemetery and started to dig.Share
Sergeant Brock Werne
13:56
I believed a body to be, I don't remember whose body if it was Hendricks or any or somebody else's, but we just looked into that area and nothing was located.
Share
Ashley Flowers
14:07
The number of semi-credible tips dwindled as the case got older and colder. Police struggled to get to the bottom of who killed Rebecca and where Steven was. Cold case investigators turned to reexamining Steven's life more closely, hoping it would reveal more clues.
Share
14:25
Learning more about Rebecca and Steven's past was essential for us to put this episode together. Law enforcement is limited to what detectives working on the case now can say on the record, but that's why we hired the team to dig deeper. Emily interviewed Steven Hendricks' younger sister, woman named Felicia, to learn more about him and his past, both before and while he was dating Rebecca.
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14:46
Felicia didn't want to be recorded, but she says for years she felt something terrible happened to her older brother the night Rebecca was murdered. Felicia says Steven was funny, caring and protective of her and anyone else he loved, including Rebecca. He enjoyed riding motorcycles, fixing cars and getting together with family when he could. Growing up, Felicia and Steven were tight and on a weekly basis, either went to dinner or the movies and sometimes went on camping trips.
Share
15:14
Felicia says that three days before the fire, she met Rebeca over the phone. She'd been chatting with her brother and said it was great to hear about how happy and excited he was to get married. Felicia says Rebecca sounded like a really sweet girl and she wishes she could have met her future sister-in-law in person.
Share
15:30
But for all his good qualities and bright future Steven, did have his share of trouble though. He didn't have a significant criminal history by any means, but according to his statement, Steven's boss gave police, Steven had actually been arrested just one town over, five months before the fire.
Share
15:47
Sergeant Werne said that police arrested Steven for battery, criminal mischief and criminal recklessness in late spring of 1988. The charges were fairly minor and according to county jail records, Steven only served 45 days in jail before being released on the morning of May 26th, 1988. Here's the thing though, Steven's arrest wasn't because he got out of control with Rebecca or any kind of domestic violence incident. According to Sergeant Werne, Steven was arrested for taking a baseball bat to the car of one of Rebecca's ex-boyfriends. While the ex-boyfriend was in the car. As far as we could find, this information has never been reported in detail before. And what he told us about the ex really piqued my interest.
Share
16:39
Sergeant wormy said at one point in time, this ex-boyfriend who Steven attacked, was someone investigators did look at pretty hard.
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Sergeant Brock Werne
16:50
There was other persons of interest of course, ex-boyfriends to her, I think were persons of interest.
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Emily
16:55
Were they ever named as suspects?
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Sergeant Brock Werne
16:57
No, I guess everybody's a suspect, so depends on how you put that, you know what I mean. So yeah, were they suspects? Yeah, they were suspects, but they were interviewed and obviously nothing came out of those interviews where they're not in custody or you know, I mean, they were locked up for it. So, but are they still suspects? Yeah, I guess anybody's still a suspect in this case because we don't have the answers yet.
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Ashley Flowers
17:18
The rumor at the time was that Rebecca's ex was overheard in a local store stating that if he saw Rebecca and Steven together, he would kill them both. As promising as this lead seemed, after several interviews with locals who reported the rumor, police determined someone made the whole story up.
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Sergeant Brock Werne
17:38
Everybody was interviewed at the time. All family members and I mean the the I saw the list of people being interviewed, it's huge. They did a very good investigation who did this. I mean they interviewed everybody, everybody that knew anything: friends to family, the neighbors to coworkers. Everybody was interviewed and asked questions.
Share
Ashley Flowers
17:56
On top of that, Rebecca's ex provided police with an alibi. According to reports, he was said to be at a friend's house the night of the fire and he had some buddies who corroborated his story.
Share
18:08
But there never seemed to be any additional follow up by police that the ex-boyfriend provided proof that he was at the friend's house the whole night. What's worse, police said that that ex-boyfriend has since died. So, who knows if he took any secrets to the grave with him.
Share
18:25
According to Sergeant Werne, two other suspects emerged over the years that felt like they could be solid leads. Police say these suspects were two men from
Indianapolis
who were seen in the town of Washington
on September 4th and 5th of 1988. They had been hired to do some electrical work at Patsy's Pizza, the same restaurant where Rebecca worked. While on shift the night of September 4, the bartender at the restaurant saw these two men come in, and after a while the guys started chatting her up.Share
18:54
According to her transcript in Sergeant Werne's case file, the bartender mentioned the men indicated they wanted to buy some cocaine while they were in town. The strangers also stated that they didn't have a place to stay while they were there, so they tried to convince the bartender to let them crash with her. The bartender said that the guys wouldn't let up, so finally she told them that they could crash at her place, but she intentionally gave them a wrong address to throw them off, which is like such a great crime junkie move on her part.
Share
19:22
But according to her interview with police though, these two guys somehow still figured out where she lived and when she got home from work that night, which was technically early in the morning, September 5th, the men were at her kitchen table, her boyfriend's brother had let them inside.
Share
19:39
The bartender told police that she sent these guys packing into the darkness in the direction of Oak Grove Road. And that would have been around the same time of mourning that Rebecca Harvey was murdered. Now, I don't know if the police ever tracked these guys down and interviewed them or ever got alibis for them. But from what Sergeant Werne said, the men reportedly just drove around the rest of the night and morning in
Washington
. So maybe the cops did interview them, maybe they just relied on eyewitness sightings, I'm not really sure. But either way, Sergeant Werne said they could never come up with a motive for why these men would have been involved in killing Rebecca, and abducting or killing Steven.Share
20:18
I mean I guess you could venture and say robbery or possibly it was sexually motivated, but again, why take Steven? Why burn the house and only douse Rebecca with gasoline?
Share
20:28
But just the detail that these guys were working at Patsy's pizza the same day as the crime is super interesting to me. Unfortunately, the police could never come up with enough evidence or witness testimony to connect these men or anyone else to the case. And that's what the problem has always been and might always be with this case if we keep looking where we've already looked.
Share
20:51
The reality is the key people that have been investigated are either missing or dead. The ex-boyfriend, deceased. The shady guys from
Indianapolis,
confirmed dead. Steven hasn't been seen in 33 years, so possibly he's dead too.Share
Sergeant Brock Werne
21:09
Who did it? We don't know. Is Steve dead or did somebody else kill him and take him out first, you know what I mean, and then go to the house? I mean, it's just a lot of unknowns. Read through this report, we still don't know, either way. And that's just making a guess on my part.
Share
21:23
We don't know whether he's a suspect or a victim obviously because he's missing, can't be interviewed. Makes you assume something happened to him, but at the same time, as a detective, you never want to assume anything because if you assume that next thing, you know, he shows up somewhere. Just because he changed identities or he started a new bank account under a fake name. So I've learned in this job never to assume anything, anything can happen.
Share
Ashley Flowers
21:46
Despite these setbacks,
Indiana State Police
think there are still people out there who know exactly what happened to Rebecca Harvey and Steven Hendricks. And those people have to come forward to even begin to move this case forward.Share
Sergeant Brock Werne
22:02
You never really lose hope, you always hope you can solve it, but the longer the years go by, the harder it is to solve a case like this. Somebody knows something out there, I would say in this case. Whether Steven's still alive and maybe somebody's talked to him and he's admitted to killing somebody who lives in another state or if an ex boyfriend at this point has told anybody that they admitted to anybody over the years that they did it.
Share
22:26
It's just anybody that would know any information just to come forward. It's been long enough. That's what we hope for. It's been long enough and the truth needs to come out. The family needs closure.
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Ashley Flowers
22:40
If you have any information about the murder of Rebecca Harvey or the disappearance of Steven Hendricks, you're asked to call the
Indiana State Police
Jasper Post at 812-482-1444.Share
23:07
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. To learn more about The Deck and our advocacy work, visit "TheDeckPodcast. com". So what do you think chuck, do you approve?Share
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Ashley Flowers
Sergeant Brock Werne
Emily