"Wes Is Going to Go With or Without You": Loren Herzog Questioned, February 1999
Six weeks before his arrest, a detective told Loren Herzog that DNA would identify the blood in Wesley Shermantine's car and urged him to break with his friend. Herzog said he did not know where Cyndi Vanderheiden was.
- Subject
- Loren Herzog
- Recorded
- February 1, 1999
- Runtime
- 7:27
Content warning: Concerns the disappearance and murder of a young woman whose body had not then been found.
The Interview
On February 1, 1999, San Joaquin County sheriff's detectives questioned Loren Herzog about the disappearance of 25-year-old Cyndi Vanderheiden. He had not been arrested. In this seven-minute clip a detective tells him that today is his chance to "separate yourself from Wes Shermantine", and that DNA can show "exactly whose blood that is" in Shermantine's car. Herzog insists he does not know where Vanderheiden is, says he would tell someone "without the money" if he did, and describes Shermantine as "very intimidating".
Historical Context
Herzog and Shermantine were friends from childhood in Linden, California. Cyndi Vanderheiden, 25, of nearby Clements, disappeared on November 14, 1998, after leaving the Linden Inn bar with the two men. Detectives began questioning Herzog that November. When DNA tests matched her blood to stains in Shermantine's car, both men were arrested and charged with murder on March 17, 1999.
Circumstances of the Interview
This is part 1 of a clip The Record labelled February 1, 1999. The detective is not named. Herzog was being questioned as a witness and possible suspect, six weeks before his arrest. The detective appeals to him as "a man with a family and with children", says of Shermantine "This is not the first time" and "this won't be the last", and asks whether Herzog knows what Shermantine said in the Chevelle "Chevy" Wheeler case thirteen years earlier.
What the Interview Covers
The detective presses Herzog to say what Shermantine threatened him with and where Vanderheiden's body is. Herzog says Shermantine "tries to be intimidating" and stopped trusting him, and that he would have told someone if he knew. He asks how Shermantine "got off that last thing", and the detective answers with an explanation of DNA. Herzog says he does not want to be "in the trunk of that car"; the detective replies that he is not hearing anything to show Herzog has decided not to stand with Shermantine. Near the end Herzog says the detective is "giving me no choice".
What Makes the Recording Significant
The clip records part of the questioning, begun in November 1998, that led to Herzog's statements against Shermantine. About six weeks later, after his arrest, he implicated Shermantine in several killings. His own convictions, for three murders in 2001, were overturned in 2004 because confessions from the days after his arrest were found to have been coerced. Whether this February interview was among the statements the court considered is not stated in the sources seen.
Archival Importance
The tapes were made public by The Record in 2012, after Herzog's suicide in January of that year. In February 2012, after Shermantine gave information to a bounty hunter, searches in Calaveras County recovered remains including those of Cyndi Vanderheiden. The clip shows the detectives' early effort, more than a decade earlier, to find her body.
Important Caveats
Herzog's statements in the clip are his own denials. He was not under arrest. Some of his replies are hard to hear, and a few passages are marked unclear in the transcript. The clip is part 1; part 2 is not covered here. How The Record obtained the tapes is not documented.
Detective: Loren, you have, today, because I have drug you in here kicking and screaming, you have an opportunity to separate yourself from Wes Shermantine. Wes is going to go with or without you. And today is the time and the place for you to decide which it's going to be.
Loren Herzog: Well, yeah, I ain't going. I've done [unclear: "nothing" / "this"]. He ain't going with me. He ain't taking me with him.
Detective: Okay.
Loren Herzog: You know what I'm saying? I ain't done nothing to be going [unclear: "for" / "both"].
Detective: Loren, I sure hope you're telling me the truth, because I see you as an opportunity to do something that we probably will not have an opportunity to do unless we get lucky, and that's get Cyndi's body back. Because Wes will never...
Loren Herzog: I can't help you there. I don't know.
Detective: Okay.
Loren Herzog: I swear, I told you [unclear: "guys this" / "what that is"]. You know, if I knew, [unclear: "this is the truth" / "it's the truth"], I don't give a [inaudible], I would have told somebody. [unclear: "Then they came up with" / "didn't make him up with"] $20,000. Hell, I could use $20,000. [unclear: "I turn whatever" / "I turned Wes into a pig. Whatever"]. But I swear to God, if I knew where she was, I'd tell somebody, without the money. Money not being a factor.
Detective: Okay.
Loren Herzog: I'd tell somebody.
Detective: All right.
Loren Herzog: If I really knew, I would tell somebody.
Detective: And, Loren...
Loren Herzog: I wish I could.
Detective: And why would you tell? What would motivate you to tell if you knew where Cyndi's body is? What kinds of things have gone on in your mind since this thing started?
Loren Herzog: You know, [unclear: "it's a family thing" / "it depends"]. And just, you know, her mom. [unclear: "That I'm, man" / "[word masked in machine transcript] that. My mom, man"]. I got kids. [unclear: "One of my kids is missing" / "How much is missing"].
Detective: Okay.
Loren Herzog: [unclear: "I don't want to deal with him, man" / "I don't think you know what I am, man"]. I['d] self-destruct.
Detective: Loren, this is a sick man. This man has not... This is not the first time. And if, and if he's not stopped, this won't be the last.
Loren Herzog: I know.
Detective: And he has no feeling in here about it whatsoever. None at all. [silence] Has he ever even jokingly said to, to you, you either fall in line... Loren, what was the threat? Even if it was [word masked in machine transcript], what was the threat?
Loren Herzog: He's not open, you know. Kind of just gives me an [unclear: "ideal" / "idea"]. He tries to be intimidating. He is very intimidating. And you can never, there ain't no telling, you know, which way he [unclear: "turns or go" / "you turn your throat"], right? You know what I mean? That, and that ain't... He ain't always been like that.
Detective: No.
Loren Herzog: And, uh, but when he started that, when it was like, I've known him for so long, and he didn't trust me no more.
Detective: Mhm.
Loren Herzog: And it's like, that's when we weren't friends anymore. When he stopped trusting me, and it was like, okay, now I know he's [word masked in machine transcript]...
Detective: Loren, I'm telling you that the person that brings you to those, to being Wes Shermantine and Loren Herzog, Wes Shermantine and Loren Herzog, it's Wes that brings you to these investigations, not the other way around. Do you understand what I'm saying? Because when Wes gets cornered, who does he say he's, who does he say he's with? Do you know what he said in the Chevy Wheeler case thirteen years ago? Do you remember being interviewed on the phone by [unclear: "a sergeant" / "Sergeant"] [inaudible]?
Loren Herzog: No. [unclear: "It's up front in my house" / "It's a friend of mine"]. He['s] talking, he talked to him. That was, that was the only time I talked to him about that.
Detective: Okay. But do you see what I'm saying? This is how, this is part of how you keep ending up in these cases.
Loren Herzog: Yeah. But he [unclear: "can't even talk to me" / "even talked to me"], and I don't know why.
Detective: He has no problem using you as an alibi. But, Loren, I don't know for sure how much, how much Wes might have had on you, or how much he does have on you. Loren, for all that you're a cool dude sometimes, you have your stupid moments, too. And Wes seems to always be around to take the biggest advantage of Loren when he's being at his dumbest. I see you as possibly our only opportunity for ever recovering Cyndi Vanderheiden. And that's the truth. When I sat down and looked at this case, because I don't know for sure if you truly don't know where she might...
Loren Herzog: Okay, I'm just telling you. I'm trying to be honest with you. You want me to sign my name in blood? I mean, you just need... [unclear: "I knew where she was, I'd tell you" / "I knew where she was. I knew how to tell you"]. I mean, I tell you, you need to understand what I'm, what I'm thinking and what I'm [unclear: "working on" / "bad"]. [unclear: "I don't even know how bad"] I wish I knew where she was. Okay? Because then I could say, "There it is. You got it."
Detective: Then, Loren, tell me...
Loren Herzog: You know, if I only knew.
Detective: Tell me something you do know.
Loren Herzog: If I only knew.
Detective: You've been dancing around me all the time we've been in here.
Loren Herzog: [unclear: "I'm not smart" / "I got smart"], and I don't know how to play this [unclear: "shit"] system game.
Detective: It's not, it's not a game. It's not a game.
Loren Herzog: It seems to be, 'cause every time, you know, [unclear: "half the time"] it goes like this. And you know what? How in the hell did he [unclear: "shit"] get off that last thing he was in, or whatever? Can you tell me that?
Detective: If I...
Loren Herzog: Can you tell me that?
Detective: If I wanted to get you...
Loren Herzog: Can you tell me that?
Detective: You need to listen to this. If I wanted to get you...
Loren Herzog: You said [unclear: "you'd ask any question" / "I could ask any question"]. Can you tell me how he got off that last thing?
Detective: We don't, we don't know. This is 1999. Do you know what DNA is? Do you know what DNA is? DNA is, that is the signature in everybody's cells that shows that your mom and dad, you are a mixture of your mother and father. Do you understand what the technology is like nowadays? We can tell you exactly, we can tell you exactly whose blood that is.
Loren Herzog: Cool.
Detective: Okay?
Loren Herzog: Cool. [unclear: "That's how I want to hear it" / "That's I want to"].
Detective: Loren, you have got to ask yourself, do you want to be part of what's in the trunk of that car?
Loren Herzog: No.
Detective: Because you, by your own statements, are in that car.
Loren Herzog: No, I don't want to be in the trunk of that car.
Detective: [unclear: "I know you don't" / "No, you don't"], Loren.
Loren Herzog: And I don't, you know, I don't [unclear: "want to"] be in the trunk of that car.
Detective: I don't know that, Loren, because I'm, I'm not hearing anything from you that tells me that you have decided not to stand with Wes anymore. [noise]
Loren Herzog: [unclear: "What do you want me to tell you?" / "I want to tell you"]
Detective: The truth. [unclear: "Right here."] Loren, what I've always wanted from you.
Loren Herzog: [unclear: "I never want to see him get in my life" / "I've always wanted to see you in my life"].
Detective: You're going to [unclear: "see" / "stand"]...
Loren Herzog: But I can see, one more time. Yeah. You're pushing it to where it's going to come to... You know it's going to come to what I'm going to have to do now. You['re] giving me no choice.
Detective: Loren, you have a choice. The choice is to talk to me.
Loren Herzog: If you keep putting me in [unclear: "there" / "their word"], it's like you're giving me no choice.
Detective: No, you always have the choice. You are a man with a family and with children and parents that love you, Loren. You always have a choice. [recording ends] ---