"I Can't Blame No One, Because I Don't Know": Wesley Shermantine in Sheriff's Custody, March 1999

Name: "I Can't Blame No One, Because I Don't Know": Wesley Shermantine in Sheriff's Custody, March 1999
Uploaded: 2012-06-24
Duration: 7 min 40 s
Description: The day after his arrest, Wesley Shermantine was told Cyndi Vanderheiden's blood was in his car. He said he did not know how it got there, gave his account of the night she vanished, and asked for a lawyer.

The day after his arrest, Wesley Shermantine was told Cyndi Vanderheiden's blood was in his car. He said he did not know how it got there, gave his account of the night she vanished, and asked for a lawyer.

Subject: Wesley Shermantine
Recorded: March 18, 1999
Runtime: 7:40

Content warning: A detective questions Shermantine about the disappearance of a young woman whose blood was found in his car.

The Interview

On March 17, 1999, San Joaquin County sheriff's detectives arrested Wesley Shermantine and his childhood friend Loren Herzog and charged them with murder. In this clip, dated the next day, a detective tells Shermantine that the odds that the blood in the trunk of his car is not Cyndi Vanderheiden's are "169 million to one". Shermantine replies that he does not know it is her blood and does not know how it got there, and says that if he had had anything to do with her disappearance he would have been "gone a long time ago".

Historical Context

Shermantine and Herzog grew up together in Linden, in San Joaquin County, California. Cyndi Vanderheiden, 25, disappeared from nearby Clements on November 14, 1998, after an evening at a local bar. When DNA tests matched her blood to stains in Shermantine's car, both men were arrested. Newspapers later called the pair the "Speed Freak Killers" because of their methamphetamine use.

Circumstances of the Interview

Herzog was questioned at length in the days after the arrest, and The Record posted clips of both men's interrogations on the same day in 2012 (see Related Content). This clip is an edit: it opens in the middle of the questioning. Near the end the detective notes the time as "0831" and confirms that Shermantine has asked for a lawyer, and closes by telling him that the information and evidence the police hold will soon "come to light".

What the Interview Covers

Asked to go back to the night Vanderheiden disappeared, Shermantine describes stopping at Herzog's house, being told Herzog was at the bar, and joining him there. He says Vanderheiden and a man he takes to be her boyfriend came in at around midnight or 12:30, that Herzog played pool with the boyfriend and talked to her, and that he himself sang karaoke. He says they closed the bar, that Herzog's motorbike would not start, and that he gave Herzog a ride home and slept on the floor of his house. When the detective suggests that he may be blaming Herzog, he says, "I can't blame no one because I don't know." The detective sets out the possible sentences for murder and for being an accessory, and asks whether Herzog has threatened him. Shermantine says Herzog has "threatened a lot of people".

What Makes the Recording Significant

The clip records the account Shermantine gave at the start of the case: that he was with Herzog and Vanderheiden at the bar that night but had nothing to do with her disappearance. A jury rejected that account. On February 14, 2001, he was convicted of four murders, those of Cyndi Vanderheiden, Chevelle "Chevy" Wheeler, Paul Cavanaugh and Howard King, and he was sentenced to death. Seen beside the Herzog clips, it shows the two men's accounts beginning to point at each other.

Archival Importance

The Record made the tapes public in 2012, after Herzog's suicide in January of that year and after Shermantine began giving maps of burial sites to bounty hunter Leonard Padilla. Searches that year recovered remains including those of Cyndi Vanderheiden. Shermantine died on California's death row on September 17, 2026, without having been executed. This clip is a primary record of his own words as the DNA evidence was put to him.

Important Caveats

What Shermantine says in the clip is his own account; the jury convicted him of Vanderheiden's murder. He and Herzog later blamed each other. Several of his phrases are not clear in the recording and are marked as unclear in the transcript, including what he says Herzog did to him when asked whether he had been threatened. How The Record obtained the tapes is not documented.

Detective: You tell me, what are the possibilities of Cyndi's blood being in your trunk?

Wesley Shermantine: I don't know that it is Cyndi's blood.

Detective: We're telling you, it's 169 million to one.

Wesley Shermantine: And I don't know how it would have got in there.

Detective: It's your car.

Wesley Shermantine: Yes, it is.

Detective: You have to make a decision in your own head to decide whether or not you really want to come forth with whatever happened, if you're not responsible. If you're responsible, you know what, you know, there's not, there's, you know what I'm saying?

Wesley Shermantine: If I had something to do with Cyndi's disappearance, I [unclear: "probably" (Whisper only)] would have been gone a long time ago.

Detective: Are you afraid of anybody out there, somebody threatening you?

Wesley Shermantine: No.

Detective: So let's go back to that night. What happened?

Wesley Shermantine: I stopped by Loren's house, and [unclear: "his old lady" / "it was all they"] said he went to town. She called the bar. Uh, they said he wasn't there. She called again, they said he wasn't there. She called back, gave the phone to me, and he got on the phone, and he told me he was over there drinking, shooting pool. "Come on over." So I went over there. Cyndi and, uh, the one guy came in around, uh, 12:30, maybe 12, and, uh, they [unclear: "sat middle ways of the bar" / "said middle ways to the bar"]. Fred was still there, 'cause me and him was talking. Loren was sitting behind us at a table. He went over and, uh, shot pool with, uh, whatever his name is, her boyfriend, and, uh, talked to her. Then, uh, Fred left. I was singing karaoke with Pam. And then Cyndi and them left, and the karaoke, well, karaoke wrapped up. Cyndi and them left. [unclear: "I felt like Sheffield" / "I told TCH Sheffield"]. I don't know what they left in, what they were driving or anything.

Wesley Shermantine: And Loren and Pam were standing outside the bar there when they, uh, walked out together, all of them. They left. Loren came back in, and Pam. Then we had a couple more drinks, and just getting close to closing time there. We closed down the bar and we left. And then I got my car turned around, 'cause my [unclear: "car" / "park" / "far"] was headed towards Stockton, 'cause I came down Flood Road. I turned around, started to head back up to the hills, 'cause that's where I was headed. And, uh, me and Loren talked about me staying the night at his house, you know, 'cause I'd been drinking so much. So I had to turn around and go back down Flood. When I start down the road, see, his bike didn't start, 'cause the light didn't come on. And I was no further than, oh, maybe the church right there. It's on the left-hand side.

Detective: By Loren's house?

Wesley Shermantine: No, no. The church on the, from where the bar was.

Detective: Oh, all right.

Wesley Shermantine: I turned around, went back. Pam was out there trying to help him push-start his bike. She went back in the bar. I helped him try to push-start it, and it never would start. We pushed it over, well, he pushed it over behind the pizza parlor and left it over there at the Quonset hut. I gave him a ride home.

Detective: Okay. So you get to Loren's house, and what do you do at Loren's house?

Wesley Shermantine: We go into the garage, walk to the side door of the house, in there, and I crash out on the floor right there.

Detective: Earlier you mentioned Loren. Loren might be responsible for Cyndi's blood in your trunk?

Wesley Shermantine: I didn't say that.

Detective: Okay.

Wesley Shermantine: I don't know.

Detective: I thought that's where you were going.

Wesley Shermantine: I can't blame no one, because I don't know.

Detective: Is there somebody else involved, that night?

Detective: The fact is, Wes...

Wesley Shermantine: I wish I'd never stopped at that [masked word in machine transcript, apparently "fucking"] bar that night.

Detective: No, you're not the only one. So do we. [unclear: "We wouldn't" / "We could"] be here right now.

Wesley Shermantine: I'm sure. Everybody else.

Detective: The scenario is this. Cyndi's blood is in the back of your car. No question about it. It's, it's proven scientifically. First-degree murder is 25 years to life, or can be. Second-degree murder, 15 years to life. Being an accessory, or, uh, withholding information in regards to a murder, straight up, and assisting someone in some way or another after the fact, something like three to five years. Big difference. Straight up, the question is, where do you fall? [unclear: "Yeah" (Whisper only)] If Loren is responsible and you're just trying to help your childhood buddy, trying to protect him, if that's what you're doing, and you, if you want to, you want to go down [unclear: "the boat" / "with the boat"]...

Wesley Shermantine: [unclear: "I'm not trying to help him" / "Come on, try and help him"].

Detective: Has he threatened you in the past?

Wesley Shermantine: Loren's threatened a lot of people.

Detective: Well, has he threatened you?

Wesley Shermantine: Yeah, he's [unclear: "pulled a gun on me before, too" / "supposed to get on the report, too"].

Detective: If there's something that happened that night, you have to tell us now. It's as simple as that. We can't make it any simpler for you. If you lied in the past, I don't care about the lies. I want the truth of what happened that night. There's blood in your car. There's a simple explanation. He knows it. I know it. It's there. Take the opportunity.

Wesley Shermantine: [unclear: "Oh, my Lord, I praise you" (Whisper) / "L... present" (captions); possibly a request for a lawyer, which the detective refers to at 07:05].

Detective: Okay. So nothing [unclear: "get said" / "is said"] is wrong. It's 0831, and you, you said you wanted a lawyer present?

Wesley Shermantine: Mm-hmm.

Detective: Okay. I tried. I, I really tried to, okay? And, um, it won't be long before, uh, things will come to light in regards to what information and evidence we have. ---