- 5/13/2025
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00:00the investigation continues tonight after a human leg washed ashore at Lake Buena Vista
00:09the discovery Saturday morning sent shockwaves through dozens of families who were there to
00:14enjoy a weekend of swimming skiing and camping before detectives arrived some campers snapped
00:20photos of the leg we won't show you those but we can say the leg is very dark in color perhaps due
00:26to decomposition when the leg was found our Bakersfield 3 Facebook page was newly up and
00:35running and somebody seen me the picture of it the leg looked like Bailey's because I'm like look
00:44it's got a bunny in here it was like oh my god that's my baby girl Jane felt pretty strongly that
00:55it was Bailey but I kept thinking could this be Micah now to say this discovery is mysterious
01:05is an understatement some of the biggest questions are is the rest of the body somewhere in the lake
01:10and was the leg severed from the body or did it break off naturally due to decomposition right
01:16now the sheriff's department says almost every answer is dependent on an autopsy
01:20I just wanted to show you guys I'm out here at Lake Buena Vista go down here and see if something's in
01:29here that's what you do when you have a missing daughter are you looking places you never thought
01:34you'd look so you can see how murky the water is you know was the rest of my daughter just laying in
01:42this lake cut up being eaten by fish I don't know how all of a sudden we've gone from having missing
01:52children to talking about body parts who wants to believe that someone in Bakersfield is psycho crazy
02:00you know to do that this is really a plea if you have any clue at all please tell detective Garrett give
02:09all this whole place to start
02:10I miss my boo
02:18our community has been captivated by this image of a young beautiful woman coupled with a
02:39heartbreaking plea from her mother for her return thousands of these flyers have been posted
02:45around town and now as the family of Bailey Despot continues to search for answers they reflect on
02:52the dark and mysterious aspects of her life before she vanished it's like something you'd see in a
02:59movie you just never think it's gonna happen to you especially to a girl that's grown up in a good
03:07neighborhood raised by good parents had a good childhood could have had everything she ever
03:13wanted but took that wrong turn in life I spent her last year probably her last year and a half
03:23trying to save her and keep her alive because I could tell she was smiling out of control her life was
03:32falling apart it was spring 2017 that her brief marriage ended that's when family says Bailey began
03:40hanging out with a new crowd and doing drugs she kind of drifted into the the crowd of people that
03:48were not doing the best things you know partying and all that type of stuff so she got sucked into that
03:54lifestyle and it changed her as a person a little bit that's kind of like what caused us to drift apart a
04:03little bit she had a lot of bad stuff happen to her starting with her arrest in July for disorderly conduct
04:14and then she was sexually assaulted Jane parent says her daughter reported she was gang raped at an
04:24apartment complex after she was given a drugged drink her family says they worked hard to get Bailey
04:31into counseling but things went from bad to worse as summer 2017 turned into fall in September she overdosed
04:40Bailey's the mom I didn't mean to overdose I just wanted to forget about the assault
04:49I don't know where she found these people I didn't know any of the people she was hanging out with the
04:58only one that I knew of that she was hanging around was Micah Micah and I met through mutual
05:10friends when he was a banker at one of the local banks so when I met him he was doing extremely well
05:17in life he was straight straight and narrow Micah and Bailey I found out were friends when Bailey was
05:26spinning out of control and she always said Micah helped her Micah would call Ubers to have Bailey picked
05:34up from parties or places she didn't want to be at she was involved with like these really bad people but the
05:43more I tried to help the more she would push back and I had a feeling something bad is gonna happen to her
05:54search and rescue crews made up completely of volunteers have scoured the lake which is especially
06:10difficult because they say there's zero visibility near the bottom essentially they have to use their
06:15hands to feel around it was just so emotional I was angry and her frantic and you're searching and the
06:23thought of not ever finding her is horrible and I want to go get the rest of her the search this
06:32morning was extensive and involved the Tulare County Sheriff's Department the search ultimately turned
06:37up nothing and as of now search and rescue deputies say they won't be searching again unless someone calls
06:43a person with a tip with more specific information
06:59Families out Kern River teenagers they stumble upon a bag in the water weighted down with some rocks
07:08kids being kids they probably thought initially it was buried treasure so they got all excited
07:13but there was a human arm discovered in the bag I learned that there had been human remains found in the Kern River near Hart Park
07:38right yeah and pretty sure Olivia called me and told me yeah that was nice to get the heads up before we had to hear it before it was gonna go on the news for the second time in three weeks human remains have been discovered in a local body of water this time the remains were found in the Kern River
07:45when we found the arm there was some orange and there was some orange and black rope attached to the bag and there was a zip tie around the wrist
07:52which was kind of unusual discovery
07:59which was kind of unusual discovery
08:04there was tooling marks on the upper part of the arm
08:07and there was a zip tie around the wrist
08:11which was kind of unusual discovery
08:14there was tooling marks on the upper part of the arm
08:21and a specialist found tool marks consistent with it being sawed off
08:26the bone was about three-quarters of the way sawed off
08:32and then fractured after that kind of similar like if you're cutting a log and you get stuck and you force it off the rest of the way it causes a splintering
08:41we've had a lot of people drowned
08:47and not be recovered in the Kern River
08:49yes
08:50but I don't know how the two of you felt but when they've announced that they had human remains
08:55there was never a doubt that it was some other drowning victim
08:58well a drowning victim wouldn't be found in a bag
09:02we handled a lot of murders a lot of homicide cases where people are shot
09:07but that's a whole nother level where people are actually being cut up
09:13the water is cold and the arms been submerged in there
09:17that causes tissue damage which affects the ability to do fingerprints
09:21DNA will be taken from both body parts and compared to see if they come from the same person
09:27now this process of course has many on edge especially the families of several missing persons
09:33we learned early on how much time the DOJ took processing remains
09:39and if you're missing somebody who wants to wait a year
09:43my daughter's missing why can't I just say I want these body parts tested
09:47I just remember being so despondent about that
09:51like you've just got a miscellaneous body part floating down the river
09:55and it's going to take a year to find out if it's my son
10:11oh we went to a lot of football games
10:13he always wanted sleep and money
10:19and a new guitar
10:25when Micah was 19
10:27while he was at college
10:299-11 happened
10:31and he called us pretty soon after that
10:35and he was like this
10:37I'm going to finish the year out but then I'm coming home
10:39and joining the Navy
10:41and so he did
10:45he enlisted in the Navy
10:47he thought it was cool
10:51that he was signing his life away to the military
10:55he was just so proud to serve
11:01he got through boot camp
11:05but then
11:07he was sick a lot
11:09and that's where the
11:11benign tumor in his throat
11:13started growing
11:15and he was very sick
11:17and was away at
11:19A school
11:21and that's when
11:23they decided to
11:25release him so that he could go home
11:27and have major surgery on his throat
11:29but it devastated him
11:33that he wouldn't be able to go on and serve
11:39maybe
11:41two months later
11:43but he had a very intense
11:45surgical procedure
11:47it was very painful
11:49and he came home with pain medication
11:51after his surgery
11:53he decided he wanted to go into banking
11:57he worked his way up
11:59as a teller
12:01and then went to go work for some very major banks
12:03and worked as a stockbroker for years
12:07got married
12:09in 2008
12:13had a son soon after
12:15and really was his whole world
12:17family was big too for him
12:19family was very important
12:21family was very important
12:23being a father was very important to him
12:27and then
12:28over the years
12:29things began to
12:31not go well
12:35Micah and his wife
12:37they were in the process of separating
12:39I mean
12:41you couldn't
12:43you couldn't live with Micah
12:45at that point
12:46he was so erratic
12:47and so
12:49not well
12:51and I think a lot of that was related to
12:53Micah
12:55having been using
12:57um
12:59prescription pain medication
13:01he started being real fidgety
13:03he would go outside
13:05and he'd be on the phone
13:07and making calls
13:09he'd come back in
13:10and then he'd leave again
13:11he'd come back in
13:12and I eventually followed him outside
13:14and I'm like dude what are you
13:15everything good?
13:16but then
13:17at the time though
13:18he was going through a divorce
13:19so I was like okay well
13:20that's just
13:21normal behavior
13:22for that kind of thing
13:23but
13:24and he
13:25he didn't tell me anything
13:26he kept it all to himself
13:27gradually
13:29over time
13:30he seemed a little bit more
13:32not his self
13:33the last time I'd seen him
13:35and he just
13:36wasn't focused
13:37so I just left him alone
13:39I was like well do your thing
13:40you know that's something
13:41you gotta
13:42work out
13:43and it's probably none of my business anyway
13:44you know
13:46but I think like for all of us
13:48I wish I would have asked more questions
13:52he started exchanging good friends
13:55and old friends
13:56for um
13:57sketchy
13:58people
13:59he was paranoid
14:01if I'd give him a ride somewhere
14:03he would
14:04make me turn my phone off
14:05put your phone on airplane
14:08he would call in the middle of the night
14:09being downtown
14:10I don't know where I am
14:11somebody's trying to kill me
14:12come get me
14:13he came home one day with a story
14:15about
14:16being kidnapped
14:17and put in the trunk of a car
14:19and having his legs and hands zip tied
14:25he had started seeing a psychiatrist
14:27so we were kind of worried that it was
14:29something mental health related
14:32we didn't know what was real
14:35right
14:36right
14:37and it sounded crazy
14:38it sounded crazy
14:39it sounded crazy
14:44it's difficult
14:46as a mom
14:47to talk about
14:49certain things
14:50things
14:51but I really didn't know
14:53the magnitude of everything
14:55James was going through
14:56up until the day that he died
14:58he did not want people to know
15:01that he was struggling
15:03he didn't want people to know
15:04that there was something wrong
15:05James you know he had his troubles
15:09he had his troubles
15:10and what I mean by troubles
15:12you know basic stuff as
15:13getting fired from a job
15:14being late to work
15:16stuff like that
15:17most of that stuff is acceptable
15:18he had moved to San Diego
15:21and on his birthday
15:23he was hit by a car
15:24and it shattered his wrist
15:27so he had to go into surgery
15:29and have his wrist pinned and wired up
15:31unfortunately that was the beginning
15:36of his addiction to pain pills
15:38you could just walk into an urgent care
15:43and leave with a 30-day script for pain pills
15:46he just had such easy access to them
15:49and I think when things weren't going well
15:52in his relationship
15:54that he began leaning on those things
15:58like many people do
16:00as the laws changed
16:05the doctors were not prescribing as many
16:07and James then graduated from
16:11you know the prescription drug
16:13to finding what he could out on the streets
16:15Micah started making bad decisions
16:19and using painkillers exacerbated it
16:23and led to more illicit drugs
16:26and he watched his world fall apart
16:29James wasn't that guy
16:32and up until
16:34you know the last year
16:35here in a couple months of his life
16:36you know I wouldn't say that's who he was
16:38but he had an addiction with drugs
16:40he went from
16:42you know handsome
16:43six four six five
16:44you know 250
16:46six eight pack tan
16:48to within a year's time
16:50you know 165 pounds
16:51you know just not him
16:52you know just not him
16:55before he was gunned down
16:57I noticed James you know
16:59hanging out with people that I had never met before
17:01it wasn't his normal people that he had hung out with
17:05he would you know meet him up side down on the driveway
17:09and now I know he was probably having someone bring him drugs
17:1435 year old Micah Holsenbake had been missing a week when 38 year old James Colstead was gunned down in a quiet southwest neighborhood on April 8th
17:24James was driving near Sandstone Lane and Mountain Ridge Road when someone fired into his vehicle
17:31I always felt that James's case of the three cases would be the one that was solved first and that hasn't been the case
17:39I've always felt specifically with James's case that nobody wants to talk
17:45a lot of people were very fearful for their life
17:49didn't want to get caught up into something
17:52it's hard knowing that there's a killer on the loose and thinking of the safety of our you know of other people in our community
18:03for Jean Parent each of the last 100 days has started the same way
18:07she wakes up and posts flyers of her missing daughter
18:10this is what I do when I feel like I'm going crazy
18:13I go hang flyers
18:16whether she's alive or dead I just want my daughter
18:18I just need to have her home
18:23and as if the agonizing search and constant wondering of what happened to Bailey isn't enough
18:28now Bailey's mother is dealing with someone seemingly trying to make finding answers a little bit harder
18:34in a Rosedale neighborhood someone took down her flyers
18:38replacing them with new flyers
18:40and greasing utility poles to prevent Jane from putting them back up
18:44the signs posted over the missing flyers have messages about mental illness and about pretending to be a victim
18:51somebody's messing with me
18:54somebody's trying to scare me into stopping my search for Bailey
18:59you know
19:00you know
19:01you know
19:02you know
19:03you know
19:04you know
19:05you know
19:06you know
19:07you know
19:08you know
19:12you know
19:13you know
19:15you know
19:16you know
19:17you know
19:18you know
19:22you know
19:24you know
19:25you know
19:26you know
19:27you know
19:29you know
19:31you know
19:32you know
19:33there's going to be
19:34more murderers every day
19:35you can't imagine your detective having enough time to devote to your case
19:39we needed more eyes more ears you know we felt like our detective needed some help
19:47we formed our non-profit and we found some things that were broken that needed to be fixed
19:53for the next family coming along and we just decided to channel some of our grief into
19:59trying to help fix some of these things the dna results were taking a very long time
20:06in our opinion so we needed to do something to try and speed that up
20:14we were very outspoken we were advocating in the news the mothers behind the bakersville
20:21threes they're rallying to bring awareness to a large number of unsolved current cases
20:26and the lack of resources they say the board of supervisors have discretionary funds
20:34that they can help out with
20:40you know james died in april and then since then if you watch the news we've had a lot of more
20:46senseless murders and so he's going down and down in the pile our purpose here today is to ask the board
20:54for discretionary funds to be allotted to the secret witness program because
21:01if nobody's going to talk to the police then our best bet is through secret witness and one of the
21:07main things is waiting on dna for all these months later you know it shouldn't take months to find out
21:13if an arm or a leg is your daughter or your son i cannot imagine uh what you are experiencing
21:21thank you for being here
21:34shortly after the lake was fountain there was a picture placed on the windshield of my vehicle which
21:56was parked in my garage at the time and i was like oh my god who put that picture there
22:02it was a little polaroid instamata of bailey with her boyfriend at the time matt queen
22:09so we'll go the back way to matt queens where i used to live with bailey
22:20i still do come over here but just to say and think about the last time i saw her
22:29this is the house right here
22:36i was dropping off churros and she came running out to the car
22:43and i could just sit in the car and stay for a little bit because i can't oh my god to go back
22:47in the house and that was the last time i saw her
22:51i met matt queen for the first time in december of 2017. bailey came in and she was happy like oh
23:06mom i want you to meet my friend matt they rode over on his motorcycle and he sat down and took his
23:13helmet off and i'm looking at him thinking oh my god he's a 40 year old man what's he doing with my
23:20daughter i could tell he's not good
23:28matthew queen had criminal cases in san diego they ultimately did a six seven eight year prison stint
23:35for the kidnapping and shooting that occurred and then it was released i think 2013 2014 or so and
23:45moved to bakersfield california matthew queen was a compelling character from my point of view as a
23:56reporter because he was a husband and father he had a a nice home he had a good job
24:05he was studying to be an electrician he was an apprentice
24:12but he also had a fondness of firearms he made firearms there is a you know at least one occasion
24:18or more that i could prove that he sold firearms okay during the day he's a dad and an electrician but
24:27then at night is he going in his garage and building these assault rifles he told me numerous times he
24:34wanted to talk to me he wanted to share information with me but he always said i wasn't quite the right
24:41fit that the story was too big for me
24:57bailey and matthew queen were operating a suv that was stopped by law enforcement
25:02and they were both arrested because there was five to six illegal firearms in the vehicle
25:09bailey wasn't a convicted felon matthew queen was so earlier on in that investigation bailey was trying
25:16to take blame for all those firearms and basically saying it's hey those are mine not his because
25:22she's not really going to face much time versus him there's a lot more charges that can be leveled
25:26against him because he's a convicted felon then just after bailey and matthew queen got out of jail
25:41he brought her to the house one day while i was at work and packed all her stuff up moved her in with him
25:48that in itself was a weird dynamic because he lived this residence with his kids his ex-wife his mother now bailey
26:07i think he moved her over there so he could keep her close he didn't want her talking to anybody
26:14because she would tell me mom i can't talk about the arrest when you stop asking about it
26:20i never really got to talk to her much after that
26:28she couldn't come see me she barely talked to me
26:33he got her in his grasp and didn't let her go
26:37matt queen had court for the december gun charges with bailey who was supposed to take the fall so
26:52i'm like well i can come to court oh no you public's not allowed
26:55and so on the 24th when i texted her she did say mom i can't come to dinner court went real bad
27:16and i even went over there later that night with the pie as an excuse to you know see bailey and uh
27:33matt queen's oldest son who was in high school answered the door i said is bailey here the son
27:40said that she wasn't there i go where'd she go and he goes i don't know my dad just said she left
27:49and so the next day i was like okay something's not right even if we had an argument she would always
27:55call me i was texting i was calling i wasn't getting anything everything went silent
28:10but then matt queen he would play mind games with me he would text me and stuff like that
28:25in the beginning i would respond
28:32he didn't like me but i wasn't backing down and he didn't scare me
28:40nothing i'd say she was going to be a friend of the daughter who was leaving
28:43but he died until i couldn't say she didn't believe it was it makes me to call me and her
28:44somebody said that they made me change the way to the other day in my life was just a friend
28:45like yeah she said i'm not paying attention to the that i was not saying that's what i didn't
28:47know exactly where she was going all he knew was she was leaving
28:53matthew queen often voiced on social media that basically jane was barking up the wrong tree
29:00that she was falsely accusing him i tried to talk to matthew queen several times and he usually would shut down or just continue
29:08talking with me after 10 15 minutes matt queen well you've already heard that name
29:15that's this guy who's making the weird comments to jane he was very convinced that he was the
29:22person we needed to be looking for and then lance is like i think micah told me about him
29:38oh okay i guess we're live so i just wanted to show you guys i'm out here
29:47in the neighborhood um posting flyers of the last place i saw bailey so i always hang flyers up on
29:59white pole right here in front of the house that's the house right there i last saw her
30:04on it they really really hate for me to put stuff because they see it all the time and they leave
30:11their house that's something really slowing by to look at me so if you're who it is
30:23i waved to them because i didn't know how come they were stopping right here
30:27i think matt queen got a new car looks like certain people are you know living their life
30:40i thought it was matt queen driving by in a new car but it ended up being sarah wiedemeier
30:45there's sarah there's my beautiful baby and there's matt queen sarah wiedemeier and bailey
31:03went to junior high school in high school together bailey and her would get in fights and then they
31:10would borrow clothes and hang out but i don't believe they were that good of friends
31:18after bailey went missing sarah wiedemeier moved in with matt queen because her boyfriend was in jail
31:26and she shortly became pregnant with matt queen's child
31:31kind of a weird dynamic as main girlfriend mailey goes missing and moves in her friend sarah
31:43i even messaged sarah's mom on facebook and said you know i don't know if you know my daughter's
31:50missing sarah's hanging around matt queen um you need to get her away from him before she's next
31:57before she goes missing i did my facebook live after the poles had been greased trying to figure out who
32:08did it let me just slap these up real fast
32:13headed back over to my car because here they come
32:27the restraining order happened because sarah thought i was harassing them hanging flyers up
32:34and people on facebook were saying bad things about her
32:38the court tried to make us do a mediation before we went in to see the judge and i'm like i'm not
32:48talking to her because i know i didn't do anything wrong she's saying she's passing out fires but it's
32:56it goes a little further than that people are trying to intimidate me to try and solve the same person's
33:01face he's the last person to have seen my daughter i'm trying to find my daughter and i'm not going to
33:08stop but i've never decided anything to threaten or hurt her you're doing it to look for your daughter
33:15but it's been eight months do you think you're going to see her walking around where you're putting
33:19up the flyers in front of our house well why would i not see her do you know something that i don't know
33:49we were just desperate to find someone to tell us whose parts were ours we could hardly
34:07function not knowing they told us well it can be a year to a year and a half before they can have the
34:13id you know the dna done the dna is what's holding up the investigation i am so thankful that you saw
34:21that article cheryl it was paradise california where the fires forest fires had had decimated that
34:29community family members couldn't find their loved ones because it just would have burned so hot that
34:37there was a little left of the remains this company andy had volunteered to go out to the state of
34:46california and said we would be honored to identify the remains and this company agreed to do it for them
34:54for free andy rapid dna the military uses it they have soldiers who take it out into the field right and
35:02they were able to identify all the remains yeah they can like do the dna sample right there even
35:08when you have very little bit of dna left that we found out they didn't have rapid dna here in
35:14bakersfield and then jane's all i'm calling them i called him and said how much does it cost and
35:23and he goes oh well we would do it for free that's right they were our hero that because the california
35:28department of justice and it can take over a year but with andy it took like less than two weeks to
35:35get it it was in december when we got the official dna profile at which point we had a meeting with
35:46the moms and so that we knew that it was it was one it was either bailey or michael was one of these two
35:54remains i remember sitting at my house i was there my mom was there my sister the coroner was there to
36:11tell us the chief of police the detectives we pulled up and there were so many cars at jane's house
36:20it was like everybody in their neighbor was there oh it was horrible you can brace yourself when you're
36:31okay this is what it's gonna be the meeting with the three of us moms it was very difficult
36:38it was difficult for cheryl and it was difficult for jane obviously that's not an easy meeting to have
36:51we walked in and sat down and then the head of homicide was the one who talked with us and said
36:57we've gotten the results back
37:04they told us that the leg didn't match either of us but the arm mama loves you matched my dna
37:21i was devastated that peace that defined him as part of me proved that he was dead it's hard to explain but
37:34i've never been the same
37:36i couldn't imagine i mean i i know where my son is you know he wanted to be cremated and i have his ashes
37:49but i couldn't imagine only having his arm
37:52and for jane you know she was devastated she didn't know where else to look for bailey
38:01you know she thought that was you know she was going to have a piece of her daughter too
38:05and so it was um it was hard
38:14i was devastated that it wasn't my daughter because i thought i had found her you know she
38:21was in the lake and i was going to get to bring her home and her story can be told
38:26i knew that meeting was happening and i was just sort of sitting by my phone
38:38and i answered it was just cheryl just sobbing
38:47i don't often feel like i don't know what to say to
38:52someone who's gone through something so tragic but there are no words
38:56i think she was going to be able to talk to her parents
38:59jay and i went and got across and i made a little paper ship because he was in the navy
39:07like a little tribute for him we're out here at the heart park at the kerr river
39:14in the spot kind of where micah was found we love you micah and we miss you
39:20we'll never stop looking for micah and for bailey and we'll never stop looking for who did these
39:30heinous crimes to our children
39:40we're investigating micah's case as a missing person but then when we found the arm it was a match
39:45which obviously we knew there was something more sinister afoot that coroner concluded that it was
39:53an injury that would not have been survivable and would not have done himself or by accident so they
39:59listed it death by homicide
40:05the uh bakersfield police department agreed to take on both micah's homicide case
40:11of course chad already had james case so he became the custodian of all three of our cases
40:29when you compare like a missing person to a homicide case there's a lot more doors open for the homicide
40:34case we were able to justify getting search warrants for call detail records phone records bank account
40:40stuff social media accounts during the investigation i spent time looking at social media i discovered
40:48a facebook post that was made by matthew queen it was the piece of the puzzle it was basically saying
40:57that he had direct knowledge of what happened but also placed somebody else as being involved
41:03i knew early on from a leak that was given to me i just had a hard time believing it i felt like i was
41:18in the middle with this information but it wasn't my story to tell that micah had been dismembered
41:26and that bailey was a participant
41:37and that bailey was a participant
41:38and that bailey was a participant
41:40and that bailey was a participant
41:42and that bailey was a participant
41:44and that bailey was a participant
41:46and that bailey was a participant
41:50and that bailey was a participant
41:52and that bailey was a participant
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