Danelle Geier

0:00A quirky college professor vanishes without a trace. You would have spot him a mile away. He would have been wearing a Hawaiian shirt, flip flops. He's not the type of person that would just go drive away someplace. So right away, I was in a panic. His body later discovered at the bottom of a cliff, police suspect foul play. There was a flock of vultures literally circling in the air. He'd been there for several days. It was our pathologist conclusion that he had actually survived the fall. We need to determine whether it was a homicide, a suicide, or an accident. The investigation leads to one of the professor's most trusted friends, and a terrifying story of manipulation, betrayal, and greed.

1:01Witness informed us that he did see a blonde female and a male at the scene. What they're really planning on doing was lowering him down to the beach, get him out into the water and drown him. When schemes falter, they stop at nothing to get rid of him. They get in there, take advantage and gain his trust. That was part of the plan from the very beginning. What was the plan to take him up in the corridor and push him up? Nestled in the lush, nitty-nitty valley of Central Pennsylvania, is the bustling town of State College. We're a university town, but the minute you step out of the town, we're a rural county with residents who have go-back generations.

2:03Over 8,000 of Penn State University's academic staff also live and work in the area, but on August 15, 2016, one of them goes missing. State College Police Department received a call for a missing person, but General Minute lived in Lomont. The callers say they're friends of Dr. Ronald Bedig, a 55-year-old professor. They reported that Ronald Bedig had been missing for the entire weekend. They were calling from their house on a Monday. Ronald Bedig and the callers would speak on a regular basis and had regular communication with him. They tell police that Ron had gone to the beach the previous week with his live-in girlfriend Danielle Geier and her uncle, George Ischler. They knew it was supposed to come back on Friday the 12th. Whenever several days went by and they had not heard from him,

3:04it caused them concern. Our patrol officers responded to the Bedig residents to see, you know, if they could locate him or learn where he may be. When they arrived, Danielle Geier and George Ischler were at the residence. Danielle Geier described herself as Ronald Bedig's girlfriend. George Ischler described himself as Danielle Geier's uncle and a friend of Ronald Bedig. George and Danielle confirmed they were the ones who went with Ron to Rahobith Beach in Delaware, a five-hour drive from State College. They stayed at a hotel for a few days before returning with the professor on August 12th. Danielle Geier indicated they had last seen Ronald Bedig on Friday, late Friday night into Saturday morning after they had returned from going to the beach.

4:07Danielle tells police they went to bed after the long drive and George returned to his home. But when Danielle woke up, Ron was gone. They were concerned about him and they did find it also unusual that he had not shown up over the weekend and they also knew that his vehicle was not at the residence. They had serious concern. They indicated he was depressed over the loss of his wife from several years prior. He was having some mental health issues. They thought that something bad had happened to Ronald Bedig. The main issue was where was Ronald Bedig and where was his vehicle. Ronald Bedig was born in St. Joseph Michigan in 1961 and grew up alongside a younger brother and sister. He liked very simple things, wanting to be outside and being a part of nature and was

5:09very strong inside of him. His interest in academia was instilled by his mother, who held two doctorates in psychology and education. Our parents were both immigrants. Honestly, what they ended up accomplishing was pretty remarkable and I think that's where all three of the children really had a drive to succeed and to work hard. Ron earned a PhD in communications and in 1988 he was hired as a professor by Penn State University. He taught in the Media Studies Department and he specifically taught the political economy of communications. He authored two books related to that. Ron's lectures made him a popular, if eccentric, figure around campus. He didn't like a lot of the technology that was out there. He really was more wanting to interact with them and wanted to have these deeper conversations. You would have spotted him a mile away.

6:14He probably would have been wearing a Hawaiian shirt, flip flops and a pair of shorts. Longish hair, you know, looks like somebody who grew up in the 60s. He was a friendly individual. He was the kind of guy who gave you the shirt off his back if you needed it. Over the course of his 30 years teaching, Ron was married twice. He had a son and daughter with his first wife. He met his first wife once he went away to college. They were not getting along as well and decided to divorce and went their separate ways. He then met the woman who would become his second wife, Jeannie. He became involved with a colleague that was also at Penn State teaching there. I knew that he was really happy with the way that things were going with him and Jeannie together. Their interactions were very loving. With his second marriage, I think there was a lot of

7:14parts of him that really started coming alive. Though the couple amicably divorced in the late 90s, they remained very close. But in 2011, tragedy struck when Jeannie took suddenly ill. She was very sick and he took her to the hospital and later that night or the next morning, she passed away. They were together probably for 10 years. He would tell me all the time how much he missed her. He was losing weight and he wasn't going out. And that's also the point where he started to have some memory issues. Four years after Jeannie's death, the professor took a sabbatical from work. By the time you get to 2014 and 2015, he's not doing very well. He's not able to teach.

8:19While on sabbatical, Ron was befriended by a shop worker named George Ischler. George was working at this tobacco shop on college avenue and state college. Ron would stop in there frequently and they struck up a friendship based on their mutual interest in marijuana. As their friendship deepened, George confided in Ron about the struggles his niece, Danielle Gire, was facing. She comes up here in February 2016. She doesn't have a place to live. She's got a young baby and no way to support herself. I remember him calling me and saying, you know, the thought of a person living in their car with a young child is just something that I can't let that go. In 2016, Ron gave Danielle and her child a room of their own in his house and having people around gave Ron something in return.

9:21The life force was starting to come back into him. He had purpose. As he started having more and more conversations with Danielle, I think that he also was starting to have feelings for her as well. After a few months, Ron's relationship with Danielle became romantic despite their 23-year age difference. He was very attentive to my sister and the baby. He was a very good man. He was always helping my sister get the thing she needed. What Danielle Gire was to Dr. Betty was that kind of that bright light. He was no longer alone. He wasn't loved. After seven months of living together, Ron has now gone missing. Danielle tells police she's been trying to help Ron with his memory loss and keeping track of his medications. Though George lives separately, he came over that morning when he learned of Ron's

10:22disappearance. Now she and her uncle are afraid he's wandered off on his own. They've mentioned that he had marijuana plants that he would hike and uh, take care of the plants. After the patrol officers returned back to the police station, I was immediately assigned as the detective. A lot of times cell phone information can be a valuable way to quickly identify and locate somebody. In this case, Ronald Betty did not have a cell phone. It did not use one. When officers check Ron's bank records, they find cause for concern. Ron's credit card had been used pretty regularly up until that weekend and then all activity had just stopped. There had been no purchases on it. If he was traveling, gas, food, lodging, at some point in time, he would run out of cash. He's not the type of person that would just go

11:22drive away someplace. So for him to be missing from home right away, I was in a panic. I started asking what's happening, what's going on. Coming up, two days after the professor's disappearance, investigators make a gruesome discovery. At the top of the quarry, they find a hand rake, water bottle, and a flashlight. She says that she's forced to help him stage the scene so it looks like an accidental fall. After speaking with Dr. Ron Betty's friends and family, state college police open an official missing persons investigation. We listed him and his vehicle in a national database. We also did a media release on hopes that

12:23if anyone saw the vehicle or had contact with him, it would generate people calling in. Obviously the longer a missing person's case goes, the more concerned we have. So every day that went by without finding him or finding a vehicle, that concern became greater. Investigators are able to locate surveillance footage from the trip to Rahubith Beach, confirming Danielle and George's timeline of Ron's disappearance. On day three of the search, investigators get their first lead. On Wednesday the 17th, first thing in the morning, I was advised by our non-1-1 dispatch center that Ronald Betty's vehicle had been located on a remote country road. Investigators drive 10 miles outside of town. The vehicle was parked unoccupied and off to the side of the road and appeared to have been sitting there for several days.

13:23Dr. Betty's vehicle has been a turnout next to a farmer's property and to the left and up the hill is an abandoned quarry. Myself and my supervisor responded to the location. We also notified at that point in time this Pennsylvania state police. The vehicle appeared to be in good condition. It was not broken into obviously the next step was trying to figure out and determine if Ronald Betty was in the area. Investigators and state police conduct a search around the edge of the deep quarry. It's a limestone quarry that's being dug out and it's an 80-foot drop from where they were to to the bottom. It was just wooded area that ended up right out of Cliff's edge and easily you could have fallen over. At the top of the quarry they find a hand-rake, water bottle, a bag of water softener and a flashlight.

14:25It's unclear if the items belong to Ron but their attention is drawn to something else. There was a flock of bultures literally circling in the air and the trooper said that I'm pretty sure if we looked underneath where that flock of bultures are we're going to find Professor Betty. We proceeded to enter the quarry from the bottom. We found a clothe body laying at the rocks. It was very obvious that this was documenting. If you ran his driver's license record he was literally wearing the same Hawaiian shirt in that picture. The state police took over the investigation and the crime scene processing at that point in time. It went from being the missing person's case to a death investigation. So we're now shifting gears and trying to figure out what happened to Ronald Betty.

15:26We just did a basic cursory exam there. We can see that he had obvious fractures of his extremities. We felt that he came off the top of the quarry. He had been there for several days so he was decomposing. We was going off the assumption that the individual that we had was the missing person. The medical examiner conducts the autopsy later that afternoon. The findings were that Dr. Betty's both of his feet were terribly crushed. That his both femurs were symmetrically broken and very remarkably similar ways. He had no head injury. His heart and lungs and no evidence of any trauma. He had no cracked ribs. So all of his vital organs were functioning.

16:28We felt that given the fractures where they was located that he hit feet first, it was approximately 90 feet and the cause of death was determined to become a blunt force trauma. It was our pathologist's conclusion that he had actually survived the fall for approximately two days. His life was a very difficult task. Stranded without medical care, the professor eventually died from the effects of the fall. To find out his approximate time of death, investigators called in a forensic entomologist. There was maggots crawling all over him and the canine had been there for several days. With the weather, the warmer it is, the quicker the insects, the flies will arrive and then they'll lay their eggs. The entomologist dated the larvae based on how old the larvae were at the time of the autopsy.

17:32He determined that the body had probably been there approximately three to five days. But there's one answer the autopsy can't provide. At this point in time, we could not determine from what we found at the scene, whether it was a homicide, a suicide, or an accident. And that's why we decided that we would need to re-interview everybody and see if their stories matched up with the evidence and what we were finding at the scene. The evidence, the information we had, it did make sense. After finding Dr. Ron Bedig's body at the bottom of a quarry, investigators are searching for potential witnesses. One of our officers had conducted a canvas of the area near the quarry and located a gentleman who was mowing grass near the quarry during the time frame that Ron Bedig's car would have been

18:37driving at the scene. That witness informed us that he did see a blonde female with a child and a male driving Ron's vehicle. Detectives are stunned by the new development knowing exactly who matches that description. Now, the police want to go back and talk to Danielle. While they're planning to do this, Detective Chris Weaver from the State College Police Department gets a call from George Ischler. George Ischler had reached out to me and indicated that he had learned through the media that Ronald Bedig had been found. He seemed upset. He indicated that he started having concerns about Danielle and why she hadn't reported Ronald Bedig missing sooner. George tells investigators that on the ride home from Rahoboth Beach the previous Friday, tensions were high between Ron and Danielle.

19:40He did mention that on the way back that there was an argument between him and Ronald Bedig over Danielle Gire and the way that Ronald Bedig was treating her. Basically, he's looking back now on hindsight saying that he's now seeing and thinking that something was going on with Danielle. He also will suggest that Danielle had had another man over over to Ron's house while Ron was missing that weekend and really seems to start to turn suspicion on Danielle as being responsible for Rob Bedig's death. The following morning, which would have been now Thursday, the 18th, we want unannounced in the hopes of catching Danielle alone at the home. She seemed a little nervous. She didn't seem distraught. We interviewed her starting from the beginning. Danielle tells detectives that before she met Ron Bedig, she hadn't known much kindness in her life.

20:46Danielle had a very tragic childhood in upbringing. She was repeatedly sexually abused and physically abused. My understanding of her familial atmosphere was negative. I don't think that she was taught morals or value of herself. She met her first husband, Thomas, in high school. Always like her in school, which just never told her to how they know she felt the same until a friend of ours took this both up together. We got married in 2003. The marriage was great up until we had our son. After he was born, it's our relationship really started falling apart. We started going through custody proceedings. After a bitter separation, Danielle lost custody of her son.

21:49She was traumatized when she lost custody. She didn't have the financial means to challenge the custody issues in court in Florida. In her trauma, Danielle moved quickly from one relationship to another. She met her next boyfriend, Brandon, with whom she had a second son. The relationship with Brandon was very chaotic. They were lovey-dovey at first when a baby was first born, but after that, it was nothing but fights. When the relationship ended in 2016, Danielle was desperate to get back on her feet and returned to Pennsylvania. She was always constantly living with people. She's never had an apartment of her own. She was bouncing between my house, my mom's house, and her dad's house. She had two children. One of them was still in her custody. A young toddler, she was near

22:56homelessness and that's when Ron took Danielle in. Danielle told us that Ron took care of her, fed her and gave her shelter and was paying for much of the items needed for raising her child. Danielle tells investigators she's often talked to her family about how much Ron means to her. So when he disappeared, she was frantic. She basically gave the same version and a very consistent version of what she had told the first time to the patrol officers. After Danielle commits to her story, detectives reveal Ron's body has been found. We alluded to Danielle that George was pointing the finger and telling us that he was suspicious of her. And he's also adding that there was an unknown male with Danielle over the weekend. That concerned her and she became emotional.

23:56Danielle denies the accusations. But her reaction tells investigators there is more to the story. I asked her what concerns you. She answered with she was concerned for the safety of herself and her son. I told her that we could ensure her safety but she needed to tell us what happened. At that point in time she immediately made a statement that George had murdered Ronald Betty and had pushed him off the quarry. When she initially blurted out, it was surprising but as she began to tell what happened, it was consistent with our suspicions. Coming up, the investigation becomes a case of he said she said. She asked where is Ron. He said I killed him. I killed him and if you say anything,

24:58anybody about it, I'm going to kill you too. And police hear the details of Ron's terrifying final moments. What were you to do in Rojoba's kill the professor? According to Danielle Geier, her uncle George Ishler is the one who killed Ron Betty. And now that she's told them, she's afraid she'll be next. She said she had nothing to do with it. She says that George Ishler has threatened to kill her. That she's afraid she's afraid for a life of her child. So at that point in time she agreed to go with us to the Pennsylvania State Police barracks. Danielle's house is a story that George Ishler is going down there to get money because he owes the professor money. He was mad at George Ishler because he had discovered the fact that he had

26:00been using his credit card for purchases that he wouldn't have authorized. Though the professor had given Danielle access to his credit card for necessities, she had abused his goodwill by allowing George to use it without Ron's consent. Ron made it clear George would pay the money back. George had told Danielle that he had loaned some money to someone in Delaware. And if they go there, he could get some of that money back and pay part of the debt that he owed Ron. According to Danielle, George was unable to collect the money. So on the ride back, he made a peace offering. George was now telling Ron that he had marijuana plants growing near a quarry and they could go there and harvest these plants. Ron agrees to this. They get to the quarry

27:02mid afternoon on the twelfth and when they get there, Danielle stays with the car and the baby. George and Ron disappeared into the woods heading towards the quarry. Danielle tells investigators that George returned along. Danielle told us that she had asked George where Ron was. George said, don't worry, he's tending to the plants. We will come back for him and they departed the area of the quarry and headed back to Ron's house. It wasn't until back at the professor's house when she noticed a dirt on George's knees that she started to suspect that maybe George had done something and that's when she asked George where where is Ron? He said, I killed him.

28:05I killed him and if you say anything to anybody about it, I'm going to kill you too and I'm going to kill your son. She was terrified. She says that she's forced to help him get the professor's car out to the crime scene, park it so that George could stage the scene so it looked like an accidental fall when the professor went back out to tend to his supposed marijuana plants. Danielle says George coerced her into planting water bottles and a flashlight to make it look like Ron went there by himself. Police hypothesized that this is when the witness saw the pair in Ron's vehicle. It's very possible that when George and Danielle went back to plant the items that Ron was still alive at the bottom of that quarry.

29:06Investigators can't be sure Danielle is telling the truth but for now they have no evidence she was directly involved with Ron's death. Danielle had no motive whatsoever to take his life but George and the professor were arguing over money that George had the professor. George didn't want to pay it back or couldn't pay it back. She was released that night knowing that she would likely come back for a follow-up interview. It's decided at that point in time that we're going to try to reach out to George Ischler. It's now 1130 at night but we decided just to see if he'd be willing to come in. Without hesitation he agreed. When we started to speak about Ron's death and about the scene to him, we told him that we didn't feel that he was being truthful with us then he changes his story and then says, Ron and I were

30:12messing around, wrestling around at the top of the quarry and he fell and I posed the question, did you hurt the professor and he said no. From that point on he became a little more defensive. I think he was slowly starting to realize that Danielle had told us the majority of what had occurred. We became more confrontational. I explained to George the first thing he needed to do was to start being honest with us and tell us exactly what happened with the death of Ron Bettek. His next statement was Danielle talked me into it. Danielle convinced me to kill him. In the early morning hours of August 18th, six days after Ron Bettek fell to his death, his friend George Ischler confesses that his niece Danielle Geier was the driving force behind Ron's

31:15murder. He said it was because Danielle wanted his money because of the will. We did not know he was referring to when he mentioned the will. He explained to us that he had wrote a will knowing that Ron's mental state seemed to be diminishing and Ron had signed it. The will says that Danielle will be in Harrod's house and that George will become the executor of the remainder of his estate. Danielle Geier thought he had about a million dollars in Disney stock and she believed that she was going to be a recipient. The Disney stock that they thought was worth a million dollars, that was worth about 50,000 dollars. According to George, his and Danielle's plan to kill Ron was accelerated when Ron found out how much they'd spent using his credit cards. They were racking up that the professor had discovered

32:22they had used his credit card after opening up a credit card statement and seeing all these charges that he wasn't aware of. So both Danielle and George knew that the gig was about up. The whole thing was coming to an end and Danielle was not going to have anywhere to go and be out in the street with her baby. That was what compiled the trip to Robert Beach. What were you to do in Rojovic? I killed a professor. What they were really planning on doing was lowering him down to the beach and drowned him and kill him. George goes as far to tell us that he did attempt it while they were in Rojovic. He says he put his hands on Ron and dunked him once but he couldn't do it. Did you return to Pennsylvania after that? Yes. What was the plan? To take him up in the quarry and put him off.

33:26He told Ron that he had marijuana plants at the top of this quarry. What happened while you were up there? The professor and I struggled and then I ended up pushing him up. I looked down afterwards I thought he was dead. At that time of this interview it was about 630 in the morning on Friday morning and George was placed under arrest and subsequently charged with first degree murder, third degree murder, aggravated assault, conspiracy to commit murder and tampering with evidence. But before investigators can arrest Danielle they have to corroborate George's statement. They obtain a search warrant for George's cell phone and find an incriminating message.

34:28We uncovered a text message that Danielle Geier had sent to George Isler. The text message said I'm so ready, I'm pissed off. This text message was determined to be sent while they were in Delaware. There's concerning texts between Danielle Geier and George Isler. They raised real questions. Not until police read those texts where there's something concrete to suggest that Miss Geier is deeply involved in a conspiracy to commit murder. So now on Saturday evening on August 20th we make contact with Danielle Geier and have her come back in for a follow-up interview. After hours of questioning Danielle finally confesses. She finally breaks and she admits her involvement in odd's death. They thought they could get some money from this and that they didn't like the way Ron was talking

35:33to them. He was being taken advantage of first money. She was placed on her arrest and charged with first degree murder, aggravated assault and third degree murder. To prosecutors the case appears to be open and shut. But before a trial date can be set, Danielle and George both submit motions to suppress their confessions and plead innocent to the charges. The police had interrogated her for hours. They were all just very soft, very defeated sounding. Yes and no answers. And the police took that to be a confession. After Danielle was arrested the counselors made arrangements to have a psychologist come in and meet with her. She had a hard life you know. She said that she had been sexually abused,

36:33Ron had taken her in and she was in trouble. A lot of people were really really really concerned that a jury was going to feel sympathy for an epithet for. So that was the most important thing. And this trial was that that she not get away with this. In April 2018 more than a year and a half after Ronald Beddigg's death, Danielle Gire and her uncle George Ischler stand trial for his murder. Danielle's case was joined with George Ischler's case. So whenever we went to court she had to sit at the same table as George. She had a look at George. It was very very intimidating. Danielle and George claim their confessions were coerced and are therefore inadmissible.

37:34But when the judge rules against them their attorneys must re-strategize. We not only had one but we had two defendants that testified and actually took the stand themselves. When George takes the stand the story he tells is different from the one he gave to investigators. He said that the professor actually committed suicide. George Ischler testified that when they were at the quarry wall at the cliff ledge that the professor literally almost like a cartoon character started acting delirious and audisords that he stood there and then he jumped off sideways. It was the craziest damn thing you've ever heard. Danielle Gire's strategy was much clearer. It was the paint George Ischler as a murderer and

38:38just an evil dangerous human that Danielle Gire was very afraid of. Danielle testifies she was unaware her uncle was planning to kill Ron and that he forced her to help cover it up. Danielle said there had been no agreement, no conspiracy. George acted on his own. As for the text message allegedly proving Danielle was the mastermind her attorney argues the prosecution is reading too much into it. I believe that the statement or her text message was I am pissed I'm so ready. The police read into that but she was so ready to kill the professor. That's not what Danielle meant by that at all. Yeah she was pissed. They had driven all the way from stay college to Rahobeth Beach and they had been in this motel room for several days. She was pissed at George for doing whatever George was off doing. She was ready to come back to stay

39:40college. On cross examination she admitted that the professor would have never gotten in the car. If she had not been there I asked her at the very end. Did I hear you say correctly that if you had not gone to Rahobeth Beach the professor bedding would still be alive and she said yes. After a six day trial the jury renders its verdict. Both defendants were found guilty of first degree murder and in Pennsylvania that's a mandatory life sentence without the possibility of parole. There was such relief you know I'm if you can call it relief you know you it doesn't bring anybody back but at least you feel like somebody will pay for what had happened. I believe that George Ishtler got what he had deserved in the end. I don't believe that Danielle to go our got what she

40:41deserved. Had the jury heard the psychological testimony I think the outcome would have been different. Why did Danielle snap? She lost custody of her kid in Florida and she needed money. She wanted that kid back desperately. She thought Dr. Bedding was a million dollar praise tag. I think that was part of the plan from the very beginning for her to get in there and form a fake relationship and gain his trust and then they were going to exploit it. Ron was a very intriguing and complex person and he had this one side of him that was like just brilliant intelligent just have this great sorrow what happened. You always look at things that way in hindsight and just say if only I had done this or if only I had done that but our whole family has tried as best we can to you know put the past in the past and to move forward and to instead celebrate the goodness that Ron brought this world.