Blow that idea apart. We recorded the conversation. And it was dynamite. What secrets lurked in these High School Hallways . She would just yell and holler, call her every name imaginable. The only mystery greater than who was why. A bad idea that became a horrible idea. A bad idea that went very, very bad. Im lester holt, and this is dateline. Heres Keith Morrison with under the desert sky. He waved at you for miles, the big neon cowboy. Wendover will is what they called him and his job these last 65 years has been to tempt travelers off interstate 80 at the utahnevada border, with this tiny gash of high desert, casino commerce and most leave lighter in the wallet. Knowing precious little about the stories wendover love to tell about the racers that come here to break speed records at the nearby bonneville flats, and about the local air base where the plane that took off for hiroshima. But theres also the story they whispered to each other up and down the little strip, the one that shocked them all, that puzzles them still about the terrible night when three families lost their teenage children. About the dark mysteries spawned under the pointing grin of wendover will. It was a thursday afternoon. A windy, late winter day in the high desert, here at the local high school, star runner Micaela Costanzo cleaned up after track practice. Mickey, as everyone called her, intended to walk home. Wasnt far, about a mile. Her usual ride, her sister christina was out of town. Before we had left, me and or my husband would always pick micaela up from school, and so we were, like, are you sure youre going to have a way home . This is something you do every day . This is something i do every day. It was the first time i left her. Mickey was 16, a junior. Clockwork reliable said her mother celia. Micaela is not your typical teenager. That girl would check in with me all of the time. So we have a routine. Im changing. Im going to be heading out. Im heading home. Im home. Always kept in touch. Always. To a fault. As the sun began to set, celia was still working at one of the local casinos expecting mickeys usual checkin call. She did not call me to tell me track practice was over and she was getting ready. She didnt call me to tell me she was walking home, and so i started calling her phone, and it rang and rang and rang the first time, and then i called it right back because that was unusual, and it was like you hit the ignore button. This is so not her. Now celia called christina 400 miles away in las vegas to see if she had heard from mickey. And i said, mom, shes probably at practice. And she says, no practice ended and shes not home. And i said calm down. Youre probably just missing her. Christina tried calling mickey, too. No answer. Im thinking, maybe for the first time in her life shes being a normal teenager. Mickey was the youngest of celias three girls. She was a star student and athlete, mature beyond her years. She liked to write poetry, short stories and she was pretty and very popular. She was the one out of all three of us girls that id say was just going down the path you would want any child to go down. She was doing it the right way, stereotypically. Bright. Talented, good looking. The trifecta. Yes. She had it all. One of those special kids said celia, born happy. She was always positive. She just had a different approach to life. She found the good in everything, in everybody. A depressive personality she was not. No. Oh, no. Not at all. Oh, and one more thing. Mickey and d. J. , her Middle Sister were inseparable. Id consider us twins. Everything we did we had to be together. If we werent at the same place we always had to know where the other was at all times. But now nobody seemed to know where mickey was. It was getting dark in the desert. Dark and cold. Celia bolted out of work early and rushed home hoping to spot mickey on the way or find her at the apartment, but only d. J. Was there. My mom came in and she said mickeys not here. Where is she because this isnt funny. I immediately went out and searched for her. Called her friends, called my friends. If you hear from mickey, you need to tell me. Word spread fast across wendover. By the time i called the police there were over 80 people starting to look. The police asked me, did you check with all of her friends . Did you go any place she would go . Im, like, yes, and theyre all panicked and theyre all out looking and everything. So they immediately knew something was wrong. Reporter the tiny West WendoverPolice Department jumped on the case right away. Veteran detective, Donald Burnham was in charge. Theres no point in waiting. The longer you wait the bigger problem you have and the harder it will be to find them. Hours now since mickey was due home. Scared, upset, panic, worried because it was dark now and it was cold and she had no jacket and and in the bottom of my heart i knew something was really, really wrong. And you try to tell yourself, no, no, no, no, no. It cant be. Yeah. Then the police had an idea. Maybe mickeys cell phone, the one she always used to keep in touch, would give them a clue. So they checked her most recent calls. And there it was. One particular number that kept popping up just before mickey disappeared. Ten digits. Would they lead detectives to Mickey Costanzo or Something Else altogether . But maybe not for people with rheumatoid arthritis. Because there are options. Like an unjection™. Xeljanz xr. A once daily pill for adults with moderate to severe ra for whom methotrexate did not work well. 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Im like this doesnt help. Mickeys sister was angry, terrified or both. I called her phone real mad and said this isnt funny. You need to tell me where you are and whats going on. I just kept calling her phone. Crying, begging her. Please answer. Please be okay. Eldest sister christina in las vegas attending nascar races with her husband had been telling people, dont worry. Shes just being rebellious. Not any more. I looked at my husband, and i said you need to take me home right now. He said what changed your mind . I said because nothing happens in wendover and something did. By now in wendover it was a local media event. I just hope we find this little girl safe. I never thought anything like this would ever happen in wendover. Not her to run away from home. Everybodys sad, but thats just hoping. Police were hoping, too, for a break. They had no solid clues. No eyewitnesses and nothing that pointed to mickeys whereabouts. I didnt believe she was dead. I was hoping maybe she was just somewhere and we would be able to find her at the time. That shed gone off to be with a friend and been irresponsible for once. We didnt know whether she met with foul play or being restrained and held somewhere against her will and we didnt know if it was a runaway juvenile, but we didnt know how far it had gone. Police started talking to everyone who knew mickey like her boyfriend javier. Called him down to the station for questioning. How was she acting lately . She was acting pretty fine. If there was something wrong she would vent. Shes not one of these girls that hides her feelings, like puts her emotions in her. Could they believe the boyfriend . When they pulled mickeys cell phone records something odd stood out at the very time she disappeared. There were a lot of texts and phone calls transpiring immediately after school and just up until 5 00. And then they stopped. Abruptly stopped at the time she left the school. Those calls and texts pinging off the local cell phone tower were all from one number. Definitely having communication back and forth. There was something going. Something. The last calls were made to a kody patten. Kody patten . Who was he . Certainly not her boyfriend, but as any kid knew, he was a friend, in fact, one of mickeys oldest friends. They grew up together. Did they ever date . Micaela was not allowed to date until she was 16. Im sure it was puppy love, what i call puppy love. Kody was an 18yearold senior at mickeys high school. Big handsome football player, once lived in the same apartment complex as the costanzo family and now he was engaged with another girl and lived with his fiancees parents. Police brought kody in for a talk as well. Last time i seen her was about 5 30. And that was where . At the school. She was with somebody . I thought it was her boyfriend because it was a her boyfriend being javier . Yeah. Kody wasnt sure it was javier, but he seemed and probably was exhausted. Hed been out the night before searching for mickey. Do you have any questions for me . Yeah. Find her, please. Search teams combed the desert outside of town. Police, volunteers. Mickeys sister, d. J. I remember i was out searching and i remember dropping on the ground and i said i really dont think shes alive. Theyre like you need to think positive. Reporter but where was she . She wasnt at school. She wasnt with a friend. She apparently wasnt in town, and its a very big desert around wendover. So much space to get lost or to hold a person against her will or god knows, to hide a body. Celias last hope, through her sleepless night, had been seeing mickie show up at school in the morning, wondering what all the fuss was about. When she didnt go to school on friday morning, i knew i wouldnt see my daughter alive. And i felt like a failure as a parent. Not just for micaela, but for dj too, cause i couldnt make her better. I went to my moms house. And i told her that i was going to go find my sister. Even though shes not okay, i will bring her home. And for whatever reason, in my mind, at that point, i knew that i was gonna find her. And i wasnt gonna find her the way we wanted to, but that i was gonna bring her home. All night christina roamed the rugged landscape alone. I stopped and looked at any little mound of dirt that looked weird, and i went to to the gravel pits. So close, had mickey called out, her sister would have heard her. But, of course, that wasnt possible. And pause. Not even in your vocabulary. So when a cold sore tingle strikes you act on it. Only abreva can heal a cold sore in as little as two and a half days when used at the first sign. It starts to work immediately to block the virus and protect healthy cells. Nothing heals a cold sore faster. And because abreva acts on it. You can too. Act on it, with abreva. 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Reporter day three. 36 hours since Mickey Costanzo left school and vanished. Search teams prowled the desert beyond sight of wendovers neon casinos, faint hope. Out here, the great empty basin sprawls 180,000 square miles and then saturday morning one of the searchers noted something that looked sort of odd out here in the middle of nowhere. Fresh tire tracks veering off the dusty, desert road. He followed them. He stated he seen some stage brush that seemed disturbed that was covering some ground so he looked underneath the sagebrush and saw what he thought appeared to be blood and decided he needed to call the authorities. This is the area they call the gravel pits. Police took the camera to record what they might find there. You move the sagebrush and gently dug into the area and found what we thought was part of a human body. Did you just uncover the body then . No. No. We backed out of the area and contacted the crime unit to come in and exhume that area for evidence. Crime scene investigators from reno. Reno was 400 miles away, nine hours by car. Still nothing more to do until they arrived so they sealed off the area and waited. Just as mickeys sister christina, still searching, drove by. I just felt like your heart sink. I saw the Unmarked Police car driving on the gravel pit road that i was on the night before, and i just i just sunk. Only one thing that could mean. So she rushed home and went to pick up her mother and went to see the police chief and he said, weve found a body. So we called off the search and i guess out of hope, i said, well, can you see her . And he said, no. I said, well, then you dont know its her. He said, youre right, christina, but shes the only one missing so were pretty sure its her. But they couldnt know for sure, said the chief, until the Forensics Team arrived the next morning. And i said, youre going leave her out here again all night . He said, yes, we have to, and i remember saying then im not leaving. And he told us we had to, and he said ill have somebody out here all of the time, and i said, it shouldnt be strangers. She shouldnt be left with strangers. So then to look at me and tell me well all be here. She wont be alone. Made me feel pretty good. As good as you can feel. Then police made it public. Shallow grave was discovered. The contents of which are unknown. Because the discovery was outside city limits, the case came out of the jurisdiction of the Sheriffs Department 110 miles away in nevada. Detective Kevin Mckinney raced down i80 and met the Forensics Team the next morning. We started sifting and it didnt take very long once it started. It was mickey. In a shallow grave, beneath a clump of sagebrush five miles from home. It was very emotional. The age of the victim and the brutality, i guess, disturbing would be the word. Mickey had been beaten, cut, stabbed, repeatedly. Several jagged slashes across her face, neck, head, the blood loss had saturated the ground underneath her. It was kind of personal. Uhhuh. It was very aggressive. It was not a precision type of injury. And then those policemen had to go to mickeys family and tell them what they found. My heart sank to the pit of my stomach, and i screamed and i just dropped, and i just kept screaming. The one thing i will never, ever forget in my entire life is watching my daughter d. J. Scream the scream i havent heard from her even as a baby and fall to the ground in shock and disbelief. She physically did what i felt like i wanted to do, but i couldnt do it because im the mom, and i had to keep myself together. I had to be the strong one. And so she had a News Conference and said what at this point everybody in town was thinking. Please, ladies and gentlemen, this is not over yet until the person or persons responsible are brought to justice. But why mickey of all people . Not an enemy in the world, at least as far as anybody knew, and yet here at the crime scene, one clue. One weird, awful clue. There was a zip tie that was bound around her wrist. What did that say to you . It indicated to me that she was restrained and was likely taken from that school against her will. Somebody kidnapped and murdered her with unimaginable brutality, but who and why . Then another clue. One of the officers going through surveillance videos from the school found the grainy image of mickey just outside the girls locker room and she wasnt alone. Where is it you wanna go . Where is it you wanna go . Check it out oh, dude. Im sending it to him. Where is it you wanna go . Where is it you wanna go . Where is it you wanna go . Where is it you wanna go . Thank you. Where is it you wanna go . Where is it you wanna go . Hey hey. Whatcha doin on your computer . Whats a computer . Youre so cold, come in whats wrong . Its dry. Your scalp . Mine gets dry in the winter too. Try head and shoulders dry scalp care it nourishes the scalp and. Keeps you up to 100 flake free head and shoulders dry scalp care its raining men the weather girls its almost christmas dad. Hi. Hi. Make the holidays a treat with kelloggs rice krispies. Reporter now the tv trucks roared in from salt lake and all around northern nevada, poking about in little West Wendover, demanding an answer. Exactly what happened to that perfect daughter, that pretty and popular 16yearold Mickey Costanzo . Justice demanded an answer. The police chief supplied a nonanswer for the evening news. We dont have a suspect and we dont have a person of interest, but we are getting leads all of the time. But we can tell you n