manhunt for phil barr. kinda lost track of him. we were actually then able to to locate phil in the vermont area, very close to the canadian border, where we think he had fled with the intent possibly of of leaving the country. reporter: but the case against the men needed more, and so the cold case team kept investigating. and in 2014, one of them came across a name buried deep in an old file. right after tara disappeared, a next door neighbor told investigators she saw barr and another man at tara s house that day, but she couldn t see much because her view was blocked by a fence. so that went nowhere then, except the neighbor happened to mention that her sister-in-law had been visiting that day. but, no one had ever interviewed her.
repair business that had been at tara s house the day she went missing. but, was pee wee telling the truth? would he ever tell the truth? he told multiple different stories. what did he say? he said a little more each time he was interviewed and he would change his story to where to the point where it made him an uncredible witness. he admitted that he had seen the body at some point. it was a little interesting in that that particular area, tara s bones were recovered was within a couple hundred yards of one of peewee s favorite fishing spots. isn t that your connection? that it was a great connection, but mr. saint john was a very incredible witness. reporter: that story about getting stolen jewelry from phil barr? no jewelry from tara s home was found in the possession of phil barr. reporter: and anyway, barr told investigators, tara was fine when he and his helper left her house that afternoon.
ord, then almost 14 years old, and her younger brother, paul. and i remember halfway down the road, remembering that i forget my key. but the closer we got to the house, i had seen my sister s car. so i said, oh, okay, cool. you know, i don t i don t need the key. you know, she s home. reporter: then she noticed the door wasn t quite closed. it was closed, but it wasn t latched. like you could just pull on it and the door would open. i remember walking in and oprah was on the tv. what did you assume when you saw the door open and the tv on? i thought maybe she left in a hurry. maybe she went with a friend, you know, and she just didn t close the door all the way. reporter: she was tara, veronica s older sister, not quite 20 then. veronica called out. no answer. she walked through the house, bathroom light was on. i went and looked in the bathroom and then i went in our bedroom and i d seen her purse and everything on top of her dresser. so then, i m like, where wo
then eventually we found the we found another one. yeah. and and then the third one. reporter: like, ground into the carpet? yeah, right oh, yeah, just we had to pull them out. reporter: they also noticed a small palm tree in their front yard had been damaged along with the decorative bricks around it. and then there was tire tracks. reporter: what, across the lawn? across the lawn. reporter: how close do those tire tracks come to the house? it wasn t a big yard, but no, it wasn t a big yard. reporter: they went up to the door. and they found two ribbons, the kind tara wore in her hair, outside their front door, and scuff marks on their bedroom dresser. tell me about the what those scuff marks look like. like somebody moved it or rubbed something against it? if you took your shoe and you kicked something and you left a mark. reporter: okay. like, if, you know, if you walk on a floor and you drag your feet, it leaves a mark? r
we wanted to know more about every piece of evidence, every we have to rule out every piece of dna in that house. so it was closing doors, it was excluding other people. reporter: so, that s what these three did, as a large photo of tara kept watch. but, again, there was no dna to help them. all they had really were lingering suspicions about the workmen who went to tara s house the day she vanished. phil barr, the guy who owned the septic tank business, his helper that day, dave mcmannis, and their buddy peewee st. john, but nothing in this huge trove of investigative material proved anything. kurt, we call him the scribe. he organized it in in such a way that it was easier to understand. what had been difficult to understand?