Summer Wells: Don, Candus and the Hatfield McCoy connection

Good morning everyone. My name is Michelle. I hope you’re doing well. Welcome to another video. It is Wednesday morning, the 5th of August. In this video, we’re going back to Northeast Tennessee to the case of missing then 5-year-old Summer Moon, Utah Wells, who was last seen outside of her home in the Beach Creek community of Hawkins County, which nestles lovingly in between the towns of Rogersville and Kingsport.

 there in the northeast corner of Tennessee. She was reported missing around 6:30 p.m. on Tuesday, June 15th, 2021. Over 5 years later, we are still talking about the disappearance of Summerwells as if it happened yesterday. And there’s been a new couple in the mix. The Hatfield McCoy Museum Adventures channel went to on 10 Benhill Road, Summer’s House, just on the off chance that Don and Candice might be home and that they might talk to them.

And indeed, they did. They did talk to them. So, they put out this interview in three parts. What we’re going to do in this video is talk a little bit about part three, which I haven’t addressed. I’ve addressed the others. And also, I just want to lament. I feel like I’m doing a lot of lamenting lately in videos.

 I was here yesterday talking about the Lindsay Clancy case, and I wanted to lament there as well. I think lament is my word of the week, but I’m a little bit disappointed. I had really high hopes for them, for Fred and Sheila. Fred being a retired police officer and Sheila being a retired school teacher. But I am a little bit disappointed that it looks like they’re going down the same road that everybody else has gone down.

 So, let’s talk about it. >> [music] >> Heat. Heat. >> [music] [music] [music] >> He has blamed Fred and Fred doesn’t put the word out to him. You say my name again and he’ll kill you. It’s interesting that Fred McCoy is a

blood descendant of both the Hatfields and the McCoys. He does say what his uh exact relationship is in this video, but it’s fascinating, isn’t it? [laughter] Look, I’m into family history, so I find this kind of thing fascinating. If you don’t know anything at all about the Hatfields and McCoys, I don’t know too much, but it was a blood feud.

 It was a very angry feud between two clans in the Appalachas in the 19th century. These are the two, I suppose, heads of the households. So, I’m guessing that Fred McCoy is related to both of these guys. But let’s just read this just out of interest. The Hatfield McCoy feud was a famous American blood conflict involving two Appalachin families led by William Anderson Devil Ans Hatfield and Randolph McCoy.

 The war lasted from 1863 to 1891 along the tug fork of the Big Sandy River between West Virginia and Kentucky. The animosity grew from divided loyalties as the Hatfields mostly fought for the Confederacy and a McCoy fought for the Union. Stolen pig. [laughter] A disputed 1878 trial over ownership of a hog further fractured relations between the clans.

Retaliatory killings included the 1882 execution of three McCoy brothers and the 1888 burning of the McCoy home left over a dozen family members dead. The feud reached the US Supreme Court in 1888 regarding illegal extradition of arrested Hatfields from West Virginia to Kentucky.

 The family’s names became a universal symbol for any bitter ongoing rivalry. Interesting. Now we’ve got a Hatfield McCoy connection in the summer wells skates. I mean Don has talked about the Hatfields and the McCoys saying that these rival gangs in Beach Creek are like the Hatfields and McCoys and maybe we’ve seen a little bit of that but the connection isn’t obviously a direct one.

 The connection is that we now have a descendant of the Hatfield and McCoys doing investigations into the Summerwells case. So Candice wasn’t too happy about talking to them once she realized that they were recording for YouTube, but she kept going in the house and coming back out and she obviously did want to talk. They looked at some photos and Don was very open. Don likes talking. Come on now.

 I I guess you would say it’s revitalized the case a little bit. There’s new things to talk about and after 5 years that’s good. But it doesn’t lead us any closer to finding Summer. When they were talking to Don and Candice, they were incredibly polite, you know, saying that they were different from a lot of other YouTubers.

 They were a little bit misleading. He’s an ex cop. You know, he feels he’s allowed to lie. But I think they played down their knowledge of the case so that Dom would talk more. But the last two live streams that they’ve done, I was disappointed. I was Anyway, I want to play just a few minutes here of Dawn talking about the search for summer wells in the early days and this is what I always go back to.

 I think this is the most important information that we have. The first 24 48 hours of an investigation are always the most important for everybody. We’re still a little bit unclear on that timeline and as you know I’m a timelines person. So, it does concern me that we do have a 3-hour block between around 3:20 when they would have got home and 6:26 when the 911 call was made.

 And I’d like to see that 3 hours filled in a little bit more. We’ve got a lot of speculations about Candice being here, there, and everywhere. you know that she went down to Fred Hill’s property further down Ben Hill Road and she was seen by Chad Arnold and Fred Hill wasn’t there because Fred Hill was possibly lying about where he was and oh dear it’s a big thing and if Fred and Sheila Hatfield McCoy Museum Adventures really want to investigate this case I think they do have to look at all of the things that have been said by the people

closest to the wells in terms of geographic proximity. Those that have spoken, maybe those that haven’t spoken basically do a whole lot more due diligence. I mean, they might have more information in their heads than have done more research than they’re letting on to anybody at the moment. I think focusing on Don and Candice and doing the right thing and it’s just going over a lot of old ground and if you think you’re going to get a confession from Don and Candice if indeed they’re guilty of anything, you’ll be a long time

waiting. Personally, a lot of people ask me what my view is of this case, and I’m going to say what I said for over four years now that I do think potentially Dawn knows a little bit more that he has an idea of who took Summer, which is why he made a lot of what we see as incriminating statements at the beginning of the case.

 you know, I’ll see her in the resurrection and that he knew she was gone as soon as he got home and she wasn’t near the creek and he knew she was gone and he knew that she’d been taken and he’s focused all his energies on CPS that the CPS took her, but I think maybe he has a little bit more idea of who took her and he hasn’t said.

 That’s just my feeling, I guess you would say. I don’t think they murdered Summer. I don’t think there was an accident. I think they would have cracked by now, especially how many times they’ve been online drunk under the influence. Things would have been spilled. Well, let’s play a little bit of this and uh just go all the way back to the beginning.

>> Oh, okay. No videos of it. Okay. Well, there’s really >> You’ll complain. You’ll complain. I’m doing this for you. But he doesn’t want to see. >> Okay, you take your time. >> Hold on a minute. [laughter] >> Take your time. >> Sorry. >> It’s all right. >> It’s all good, guys. Listen, this is a This ain’t something that’s easy for you. You all, I’m sure.

>> Well, it’s been a nightmare. >> I’m sure. >> Living nightmare. >> There’s nobody can criticize you. >> Things it was so bad up here. >> Police presence. I mean, half the country police force was here, descended here. Uh, I went took my Subaru down. I was going to go somewhere and I got traffic was back up all the way out on both ends of Beach Creek.

 All you couldn’t even leave here. You couldn’t go nowhere for days. >> Wow. >> Searching people searching everywhere. [snorts] >> You think if she was around here, they would have found >> Oh, yeah. >> Sure. That’s what we >> Yeah, she was definitely taking that car. Search dogs got here. We give them some of her clothes, the dirty laundry, >> and they went straight down the dog trail to the road down there and then her the dog lost her scent on that road down there.

>> Wow. >> Yeah. I mean, we’ve talked about this so many times and Sheriff Ra Lawson has confirmed that a dog got the scent and went down to the road and then lost the scent and he said it’s because potentially the road surface changed and that’s absolutely true. Uh, they got a scent article from Out of the Dirty Laundry.

 That’s not good practice. Honestly, I’m doing scent discrimination training with Eller at the moment. You have to be so careful about contaminating scents and getting it out of the dirty laundry means that there’s potentially scent from other people on it. It depends to a some extent which item and what that dominating scent was and they might have got lucky.

 But normally these shoes cuz only one person wears a pair of shoes. And if you give a dog the shoe or swab a shoe and give the dog the swab, then you’ve got a a clean scent. But maybe they didn’t have any shoes. I mean, she love just love to be barefoot. So maybe they didn’t have any shoes that, you know, were to hand.

 So it is a little bit disappointing that they got items out of the dirty laundry. I guess in a house where there were so many people living, it wasn’t like they could even use a pillow or something like that off her bed because she slept with Don and Candace. So I think that’s probably the best they can do.

 Yeah, it is what it is. >> So, somebody picked her up in the car. You’re thinking that’s what I would think. >> Oh, yeah. If she wandered off by herself, the dogs would have found her. >> They would have picked up her scent and found >> You would think, but there’s so many times for so many reasons that dogs don’t pick up a scent.

 The dog that went down the dog trail was there on the 16th, not the night of the 15th. I might be wrong on that because it was still light, you know, when they did report him missing and it’s possible they could have got a dog team there on the evening of the 15th, but it’s my understanding that that was on the 16th and then on the 19th, so 4 days later, dogs were still in the area and that’s when they found the footprints that were deemed to be Summer’s barefoot childsized footprints.

quite a ways away. Talked about the footprints a lot. I think that’s one thing that people want to deny and not talk about because it loosens the possibility that Don and Candice might have murdered Summer or done something to her or an accident happened. So, it doesn’t fit a lot of people’s theories. I think you always have to factor in those footprints.

They were there. said they were real. Neighbors knew. I think anybody coming into the case has to at least consider the possibility that they were summers. I personally believe they were summers. I think someone was walking her away from the area because as Don said here, the area was all closed down.

 I think someone had Summer in that immediate vicinity, realized they weren’t going to be able to get her out and walked her out towards Fields Road. That’s my opinion. >> How long do you think she was missing before you noticed she was missing? >> Well, Candace helped her mom put her knee brace on, then come in the house and like where’s Summer? Well, she went downstairs, so she’s hollered for her and she’s nowhere.

>> Okay, >> she’s gone. And the police come up here and led her by the hand down the dog trail. According to the search dog, it went straight down the dog trail. >> And the police talked to the three boys, I’m sure. >> Yes. >> And they told them the same thing. >> Yeah. That’s when they started brainwashing them.

>> Yeah. >> That’s when they started brainwashing them. Is that the potential Dons getting in there that the boys may have told a story that’s different than theirs because they’ve been they’ve been brainwashed? I don’t know. But they did actually tell Sheriff Ronny Lawson a slightly different story than Donna Candice have brought out.

 So again, any investigator of this case coming in needs to think about this too. >> But but the boys told them that Summer come up wanted to go downstairs and play. She went downstairs and played and that’s the last time they saw her. >> Yeah. The boys were the last one. >> Is that right, Candace? >> Yeah. >> I see you shaking your head.

 Correct me if I’m wrong, dear. If I say something or you can share with them people to see life before >> she’s probably >> so Don changes the subject. Candice is shaking her head. I really want to know why that happened because I’ve never been entirely comfortable with this script. I’m not saying that summer didn’t help grandma plant some succulents at some point when she got home, but the helping her with a knee brace, walking her over to the house, and then her brothers being at the kitchen table and watching her go down

to the basement. I think there’s more to that story. I don’t know why. If the brothers did say that they saw summer going out the back door as has been said by Sheriff Ronny Lawson, he told the news on the evening of June 15th, 2021 and WJHL ran with it on the 16th of June that they last saw someone going outside the back door.

 And you can’t from the kitchen table see anybody going out the back door. You can say, “I think she went out the back door.” because she’s not in the basement. But if you actually saw her going out of the back door, either you have to be in the basement or you have to be outside and the interview on the what was it 25th of June with WJHL, the first time that Don and Candace actually sat down, it was many times, but Summer’s been outside and the brothers come in and they leave her outside and why did you leave her outside alone? And that’s her

downfall. Summer went outside. Now, whether she went down to the basement and then straight out the back door and then she disappeared from there, I think at least one of those boys saw her. And I don’t know why Don and Candice won’t talk about that. Maybe they’ve been told not to, but after 5 years, but that’s what the boys said, or at least one at least one boy said that.

 Now, one of them told Jordi Sue, if you want to believe Jordi Sue the neighbor, that they last saw somewhere on the swing set. So, the swing, the rope swing, which is just here, just off the camera. So, she was outside in the press conferences. She was last seen outside of her home in the Beach Creek community of Hawkins County. She wasn’t inside.

 It doesn’t mean that somebody came up into the basement and took her and forced her down the dog trail. No, she could have been outside. She could have been playing off that hill and somebody grabbed her. I think the chance of a complete stranger abduction, not very likely in that location, but somebody who knew that family, somebody who had beef with Dawn or Candice, maybe that’s why Dawn talks about the Hatfield McCoy feud.

 that, you know, there’s waring factions in Beach Creek. Maybe he’s um stepped on the wrong side of one of them. Yeah. Like I said, I’m a bit disappointed because in the last two videos, so this is from a day ago, do the right thing. Although they’re saying everyone’s innocent till they’re proven guilty, the way that they’re talking, you know, now’s the time to do the right thing and they’ve been living with this for 5 years.

 And that could relate to anybody who is involved. But I hope, and this is where I’m going to lament, that they don’t go down the same road that everybody else went down, blaming Don and Candice with the exclusion of everything else. That’s been done to death. And I was pleased that there was new sets of eyes on this case. I would assume by the way they’re talking people who’ve been involved in this case have been contacting them with information and they’re putting it together now with Don and Candice as you know the chief suspects and obviously if you are brand

new you’ve got to consider everybody you’ve got to go through that process but I hope they don’t stick there and start ignoring everything else as so many other people have done because there’s so much more to this face than just Donna and Candice did it. I think that’s honestly it’s a cop out. So anyway, let me know your thoughts in the comments.

Bye guys. Ella. Ella, get it.