June 6, 1992 · Springfield, Missouri
The Springfield Three
Three women, one house, one night in June 1992. In the morning their cars, purses and keys were still there, and they were gone. This is what Eli and Simone argued over.
ELIBefore we start, three people vanished from one house in one night. No bodies, no struggle, no trace in over 30 years.
SIMONEAnd nothing they left behind explains it. Not one thing.
ELIAbsence of an explanation isn't evidence of a specific one, Simone.
SIMONEThree women. Gone. And the only thing broken in that entire house was a porch light. Tell me that's nothing, Eli.
The message nobody can hear
A message on Sherrill Levitt’s answering machine struck the people who heard it as strange enough to report to police. It was accidentally erased before investigators could listen to it.
- Last callAround 11:15 PM, about painting a chest of drawers
- The messageDescribed as strange or unsettling
- ReportedTo police, by those who heard it
- NowAccidentally erased, content unknown
SIMONEThere was also a message on the answering machine that friends and family later described as deeply unsettling. And here's the part that actually makes me angry every time I read about this case. It was inadvertently erased. Whatever was on it is just gone.
ELIWhich means we're building theory around a piece of evidence nobody alive has actually heard in over 30 years. That should make us more careful, not less.
SIMONEFair. But even sticking strictly to what's confirmed— three adults, one house, zero signs any of them left on their own, and physical belongings that say nobody planned to go anywhere— that's not nothing, Eli. That's the shape of an abduction.
- 01 / 04 · THE CARS
All three women’s cars were still in the driveway the next morning.
- 02 / 04 · THE BELONGINGS
Purses, keys, jewelry and other personal items were left inside the house.
- 03 / 04 · THE HOUSE
There was no sign of forced entry and no sign of a violent struggle.
- 04 / 04 · THE PORCH LIGHT
The glass shade was shattered, with glass on the ground. Friends swept it away before police could treat it as evidence.
ELIHere's what actually matters forensically. There was no sign of a struggle inside that house. No blood, no overturned furniture beyond what's been described, nothing consistent with a violent confrontation.
SIMONEExcept a shattered porch light and a house where three separate people all somehow left without their cars, purses, or shoes.
ELIWhich is genuinely strange, I'll grant you. But the absence of a struggle actually cuts against a violent home invasion. It's more consistent with something that happened quickly, possibly with a weapon, possibly with more than one person controlling three others.
Two readings of an empty house
Same evidenceUnsolvable, for now.
No blood, no struggle, no remains and no confession that holds up. With nothing physical pointing anywhere, the honest answer may be that the evidence can’t solve it.
The shape of an abduction.
A broken porch light and three sets of belongings nobody would leave behind are circumstantial evidence in themselves. Nobody walked out of that house by choice.
Every source treats this as unresolved. None claims a settled explanation.
ELIIt was found broken the next morning, glass on the ground beneath the fixture.
SIMONEWhich reads to me like someone deliberately took out the one light that would have let anyone see what was happening on that porch.
ELIOr a bulb overheated, and the glass fractured on its own, and the timing is a coincidence people only noticed because they were already looking for meaning in every detail of that house.
SIMONEGlass on the ground isn't how a bulb dies of natural causes, Eli. That's how glass ends up when something breaks it.
ELIThat's fair. I don't have a clean natural explanation for glass on the ground specifically.
ELIWhen asked directly if he'd abducted them, he called the question frivolous and said, obviously no.
SIMONEThat's not a denial, Eli. That's a man enjoying being asked.
ELIIt might be. It's also exactly the kind of thing a certain type of person says for attention. With zero actual knowledge behind it. No investigator on this case has ever said they find him credible.
SIMONENo investigator has ever cleared him either.
Thirty years of tips
1978 to 2007- Sharon Zellers, 19, is murdered near Walt Disney World. Robert Craig Cox is convicted in 1988, then freed when the conviction is overturned.
- Suzie and Stacy graduate from Kickapoo High School. By morning, both of them and Sherrill Levitt are gone.
- Steven Garrison, arrested on a weapons charge, begins cooperating with police. His tip leads to a rural search.
- Cox is arrested for an armed robbery and sentenced to 30 years.
- In prison, Cox says he knows the women are dead and will never be found.
- Sherrill and Suzie are declared legally dead. Stacy is declared dead in a separate petition.
- A backhoe dig finds a trace of blood and a green vehicle fragment. The blood test is inconclusive.
- Ground-penetrating radar flags three anomalies under a hospital garage. Police decline to act: it was built in 1993.
Two readings
No winner“Absence of an explanation isn’t evidence of a specific one, Simone.”
- “We’re building theory around a piece of evidence nobody alive has actually heard in over 30 years.”
- “Strangers can’t close a case, though. Only evidence can, and there isn’t any.”
- “Sometimes, the honest answer is that a case can be genuinely unsolvable with the evidence available.”
“Glass on the ground isn’t how a bulb dies of natural causes, Eli.”
- “Being looked at isn’t the same as being cleared.”
- “That’s not a denial, Eli. That’s a man enjoying being asked.”
- “If you asked me what I actually believe happened in that house, I don’t think they walked out on their own.”
In their own words, from Episode 03.
No verdict.
ELISometimes, the honest answer is that a case can be genuinely unsolvable with the evidence available, not that we're missing an obvious culprit.
SIMONEAnd my case is that unsolvable undersells what's actually there. A broken porch light, three sets of belongings nobody would leave behind voluntarily, a strange and never fully confirmed message, and people with real documented history close to this family in the exact window it happened. None of that proves anything in court, but if you asked me what I actually believe happened in that house, I don't think they walked out on their own.
ELII don't think they did either. I just can't tell you who did it to them.
SIMONENo, neither can I.
- What broke the porch light, and when?
- What was on the message nobody can hear anymore?
- Did anyone questioned in this case know more than they said?
Hear the whole debate
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