MISSING: The Gospel Trio

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2:14Bigger small, we're here for all of it. Celebrating 125 years with new moments still at NordstromStores and at Nordstrom.com. Left for a gospel concert in South Carolina's low country. Witnesses saw them arrive, witnesses saw them leave. Then somewhere on the road home, all three vanished. Two days later, Linda's blue link and turned up abandoned at a rural crossroads, 20 minutes in the wrong direction. There were no signs of a struggle, no evidence, and no trace

3:14of Sarah Kimberly or Linda. What followed was a case filled with unanswered questions, a mysterious blue car, troubling allegations, strange sightings, and decades of silence. This is the disappearance of Sarah Boyd, Kimberly Boyd, and Linda McCord. And this is their story. Before we get into the disappearance, the investigation, and all of the questions that still surround this case, we need to talk about the three people at the center of it. Because Sarah Kimberly and Linda weren't just three names that would eventually appear together on a missing persons report. They had families, routines, and people who expected them to come home. Sarah Boyd was 32 years old and living in South Carolina's low country. She worked as an

4:19administrative assistant in North Charleston and was a mother to two-year-old Kimberly. The people who knew Sarah described her as the glue of her family. The kind of person who kept everyone connected and seemed to be at the center of things. And then there was Kimberly Janice Boyd, Sarah's two-year-old daughter. Kimberly was already participating in children's pageants, so there are photographs of her dressed up in those tiny pageant dresses smiling for the camera. She was just a toddler, completely dependent on the adults around her, which makes what happened next especially difficult to think about. The third person was Linda McCord, also 32 years old. Linda was a close family friend. Someone Sarah knew and trusted enough to spend the day with her and her little girl. So when we talk about this case, we're talking about two women who were only 32 and a two-year-old child. Three people who left together for what should have been an ordinary day, and then seemingly vanished. That was on Friday, April 3rd, 1987. By that Sunday, April 5th,

5:27Sarah's husband, Philip Boyd, stopped by Sarah's mother's house with the alarming news. He hadn't seen his wife Sarah or their two-year-old daughter Kimberly since Friday. This immediately set off alarm bells for Sarah's family. Sarah wasn't someone who would just disappear for a weekend without telling anyone where she was going. Her family was incredibly close knit. They stayed in touch. They knew what was going on in one another's lives. And this kind of silence was completely out of character. So the family just didn't sit around and wait. They went looking for them. They piled into several trucks and started driving, checking anywhere they could think of that Sarah Linda and Kimberly might have gone or where their car might have ended up. But think about what they were up against. This was the South Carolina low country in 1987. Rule roads, wooded areas, waterways, swamps, and huge stretches of isolated land.

6:30There was no GPS history, no cell phone data, no location sharing. There wasn't a digital trail telling them where to start. They were essentially searching for three people and one blue link in Continental across miles of rural South Carolina with nothing more than their own knowledge of the area and the place Sarah might have gone. It was the definition of looking for a needle in a haystack. Around this time police received a call from John McCourt, Linda McCourt's husband, telling them that his wife had left to go to a gospel concert with Sarah in Kimberly and had never returned. Because Sarah's family had started their search without reporting anyone missing, this was the first the police were hearing about anyone disappearing. John told police that the last time he'd seen Linda was 6.30 p.m. on Friday when she left to pick up Sarah in Kimberly. He also told police that he was extra worried because he'd located Linda's abandoned Lincoln

7:30that morning. It had been abandoned and found by a witness in Orangeburg, which was one county over from Dorchester. It had stalled out near an intersection where three major highways cross, one of them being Highway 15. The road they would have taken two and from the concert. But it was found 20 minutes in the wrong direction from where Linda would have dropped Sarah and Kimberly off. The witness who found the car contacted Orangeburg police, who ran the registration and saw that it belonged to John Boyd. Lieutenant Martin of the Orangeburg police was a friend of John. So he reached out to John personally about the car being found and John met him at the scene. Because the car had mechanical issues, something about a freeze plug popping out. The two of them had the car towed to an auto shop. With John's car at the auto shop and his wife Linda officially missing, this is when the investigation began in earnest. The police brought the state law enforcement division, aka sled, with them to the auto shop to examine the vehicle. But nothing stood out as

8:34odd inside the vehicle. No signs of struggle or evidence of foul play. The police then began to focus their investigation on the remote area where the car was found. Wells Crossroads. The nearest establishments to this intersection were a church and a department of transportation office. This might seem promising because there are only two places to check out, but both of them were closed at the time the women were returning from the concerts. With no witnesses or clues at Wells Crossroads, the police began to investigate John McCord, someone who had been on their radar even before the women went missing. You see, the police had previously been called to John and Linda McCord's home for what was described as a domestic dispute on more than one occasion. With that in mind, Linda had filed more than one police report against John for domestic violence. At this point, John and Linda had been married for about 10 years, but they had married quickly after they met at a picnic. Linda's family says that Linda had a history of befriending, quote, the wrong people,

9:36and they felt that John was that kind of person. After John and Linda got married, her family saw less and less of her. Also, not long before she went missing, Linda and John's house had burned down under mysterious circumstances. They ended up having to move in with Linda's mother. One of Linda's cousins says that the last time she spoke to Linda on the phone, Linda seemed scared. The cousin goes on to say that Linda confided in her that John was abusive and had threatened to kill her multiple times. The cousin also says that John allegedly had put a gun to Linda's head once and made her lay her head on a pillow. Another cousin talked about seeing Linda with black eyes. Both of these cousins pleaded with Linda to leave John, but she was too frightened of John might do if she did leave. Those of us in the true crime space know that one of the most dangerous times in a domestic violence situation is when the abuse tries to leave. On top of all of what the cousins disclosed, John was known for following Linda when she left the house. When police interviewed him, they knew all these details about his marriage with Linda, but

10:39during that interview, John seemed forthcoming and willing to talk to the authorities. He spoke with them for more than an hour and he disclosed with no issue what he had been doing the night that Linda went missing. He says he got home from a job laying cement around 7.30 pm and noticed that Linda hadn't come home yet. The concert she had attended was only supposed to last half an hour or so, so that meant that Linda was half an hour late from the time she called John she would be home. At that point, John went to the store and bought some beer. While this is illegal, he did disclose that he drove around and drank said beer while looking for Linda. After he couldn't find her, he assumed that Linda would show back up at home at some point. She was known to stay with friends when they were fighting, so he decided he was better off waiting for her at home and when home himself. Sarah Boyd's relationship to her husband, Phillip Boyd, was much different. The two of them had known each other forever. Their families were close and Sarah and Phillip had grown up almost right next door to one another. These were childhood sweethearts who had eventually gotten married.

11:44Their daughter Kimberly was Sarah's pride and joy and overall Sarah had seemed to be happy in her marriage to Phillip. One of Sarah's sisters did mention that there was sometimes some tension in Sarah's marriage. Not necessarily abuse but emotional distancing between the two of them when they were at odds. While Phillip could be cold sometimes, he was known to have a huge heart. However, there was one thing that stood out to family members in the aftermath of the women going missing. He seemed almost dismissive at one point when someone suggested he be more helpful to authorities in the investigation. His response was something along the lines of sometimes women just go off. But Phillip did become more involved as more time went on and it became clear that something bad had happened to Sarah and Kimberly when they didn't return. People remembered him seeming devastated by the disappearance. Another thing known to the police was the fact that John McCord and Phillip Boyd knew one another because they worked the same cement plant, which is very notable

12:51because how often do the wives of two guys who work together drop off the face of the earth. But police said they were never as suspicious of Phillip for wrongdoing as they were of John. Mostly because Phillip volunteered to take a polygraph test, which he got a passing grade on. He did fail to answer one question truthfully about an affair he allegedly had, but that overall didn't affect his passing grade. So the police ruled out Phillip almost immediately. John, on the other hand, was being uncooperative with police. He refused to take a polygraph and basically wouldn't talk to police about anything concerning his wife's case. Insurance isn't a one-size-fits-all and shopping for it shouldn't feel like squeezing into something that just doesn't fit. That's why drivers have enjoyed progressive's name your price tool for years. With the name your price tool, you tell them what you want to pay and they show you options that fit your budget.

13:52Enough hunting for discounts, trying to calculate rates and tinkering with coverages. Maybe you're picking out your very first policy or maybe you're just looking for something that works better for you and your family. Either way, they make it simple for you to see your options. No guesswork, no surprises. Ready to see how easy and fun shopping for car insurance can be? Visit progressive.com and give the name your price tool a try. Take this stress out of shopping and find coverage that fits your life. On your terms, progressive casualty insurance company and affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. This episode is brought to you by Nordstrom. For 125 years, Nordstrom has been part of your story. The stylists who found the perfect outfit for your big interview. The first pair of walking shoes for your one-year-old. The tomato soup you shared with your sister at the cafe. These are the moments that make Nordstrom. Nordstrom. Bigger small. We're here for all of it. Celebrating 125 years with new moments still add. Discover it all in Nordstrom stores and at Nordstrom.com.

15:01The Hulu original series The Kardashians is back. Season 8 isn't it great? This year has been insane. Have you dated anyone privately? Let me just say this. I can't control myself. What about you? I'm single. I might be ready to mingle. Or is I'm getting more action than Glowy? I think I walk around with this smile on my face for nothing. Oh my god. Season 8 premieres October 8, streaming on Hulu and Hulu won Disney Plus for bundle subscribers, terms apply. John told police that he'd been involved in another incident before. One involving vehicle theft that required him to take a polygraph, which is why he was being so resistant to taking one again. He told police that in this prior case he was innocent, but he failed the polygraph. Investigators soon shifted their focus to the last known movements of Sarah Linda in Kimberly and the day they went missing. Linda's mother told police that she saw Linda earlier in the day of the day she went missing. She'd seen her in the parking lot of

16:03Hampton Street Auditorium where the gospel concert would be later held that evening. Linda's mother said that Linda was talking to someone in a beat up blue car. A car her mother didn't recognize. Linda was seen again later that evening picking up Sarah in Kimberly around 630 pm. And witnesses also confirmed that all three of them made it to the concert. They were seen inside the auditorium as well as leaving after the concert was over. There is a rumor that circulated that either Sarah or Linda had a possible thing with someone in the gospel choir. Now Linda's family said that this rumor may have come from John's own jealousy. Apparently he hated when Linda went to see gospel quartets, which were made up of two men and two women. Even the idea of Linda being around other men made John angry. John's issues with jealousy were nothing new. Even Linda's family knew about them because in Linda's earbooks, he crossed out the faces of any boys or men that she was pictured with. It's also noteworthy to point out that there was never any

17:08proof that Linda carried out any extra marital affairs or that any of these jealousy issues were founded. It was strictly Holen John's head and a hymn issue. All that to say after the concert was over, Linda's Lincoln was spotted driving down the highway by a preacher and his wife who attended the same concert that night. Aside from noticing Linda, they also noticed a beat-up blue car that was following close behind Linda's car. Both cars were driving very slowly. This could explain the freeze plug problem that was later discovered in the vehicle. While it was Linda's car, the preacher and his wife couldn't necessarily confirm that she was the one driving or not. Another piece of information that police kept relatively quiet was information from a witness who said that during the concert, a man entered the auditorium and hung out in sort of a suspicious way. They were kind of loitering around in the back of the building for a few minutes before abruptly leaving. The description of this man matched none other than John Accord.

18:10Now listen, this wouldn't be the first kind of this suspicious activity from John if it really was him in the back of that concert hall. One relative even tells a story of how they caught John tampering with Linda's car in a parking lot. He was messing around with the engine, supposedly to mess with it, make it so she needed him to save the day and fix the car. Obviously, if he's the one that did tamper with it, he would know exactly how to fix it again, too. Again, end up being the hero of the day. We should also note that police couldn't ever really do anything with this story of John perhaps being this individual that was spotted in the back of the concert's venue, because the witness was never really able to offer anything concretely that confirmed that it was definitely John or identified that it was John specifically. Three weeks down the road in the investigation with no sign of Sarah, Linda or Kimberly, and police are hitting one dead end after

19:16another. At this point, Linda and Sarah's mothers decided to meet for the first time so that they could share information with one another that might help out the case. And by the way, neither mom felt like the police in either county, Dorchester or Orangeburg was doing much to find their daughters. They weren't impressed with the way the investigation was going. And I mean, they hadn't even searched the Wells Cross Road area where Linda's car had been found yet. As they collaborated at put pressure on law enforcement and the Orangeburg police finally searched Wells Cross roads on April 26, 1987. The only thing they were able to find in the search though was a few marijuana fields. The case remained somewhat stalled at that point, but then police received an anonymous call that sent them in a completely different direction and literally to a completely different place to search. This caller urged police to look at the local racetrack, the Dorchester Speedway.

20:17This is where he, the caller, claimed that Linda, Sarah and Kimberly were murdered. The police took this call very seriously because whoever this caller was had knowledge that only someone close to the case could have. On May 2, 1987, police, along with 75 volunteers, searched 50 acres around Dorchester Speedway. Once again, they came up empty handed and yielded nothing new. Police then continued on with smaller searches around Dorchester and Orangeburg. They brought in the FBI and a radar team to search marshy swamp areas of the surrounding low country, but that also didn't yield anything new. Years passed and the families began to lose hope of ever seeing Sarah, Linda and Kimberly alive again. They also felt like the police didn't explore all the leads that were available to them. One example of this was something Linda's mother remembered about Linda the day after she went missing. On this morning, Linda's mother saw John

21:17and a nephew of John's come into the house around 6.30 a.m., both of them sweaty with workboots covered in mud. This siding conflicts with John telling the police that he had been alone when Linda went missing. Sarah's family also said they had strange encounters with John in the years after the case went cold. One of Sarah's sisters said she once spotted John following her around in his car. This sister also witnessed John walking around in her backyard. Another incident happened to Sarah's mother. The day she returned to work after Sarah, Linda and Kimberly went missing. Someone she worked with first into tears when she saw Sarah's mother. This co-worker told Sarah's mother that she knew something that she couldn't tell her or, quote, they'd kill her. Sarah's mother pleaded with this co-worker to tell her what she knew, but the woman wouldn't tell her anything. On that same day, Sarah's mother said that John picked up the co-worker from work and Sarah's mother never saw her again. The case remained silent for a while and then in 1990,

22:22police were alerted that Sarah's credit card had been used at the local mall in Dorchester. The signature on the receipt was indecisurable. When police checked the store's security camera footage, the image was so poor that they could only tell that it was a woman who used Sarah's card and she used it to buy luggage. The case remained cold for more than a decade before something peculiar happened to Sarah's family around 2001 or 2, a man that claimed to be an FBI agent knocked on Sarah's mother's door. He told her that he was an undercover agent investigating John and that he was going to one's and for all help the family find out what happened to Sarah and Kimberly. Two weeks later, the man returned with a woman he we said was his wife. During that visit, he told Sarah's mother that he sat around a fire with John and some other people who were all drinking and that John said at this fire, quote, killed two birds with one stone. The man said that John went on to say that he killed Sarah first, then tortured Linda for a long time before finally

23:23killing her as well. This man promised Sarah's mother that he would return after they made an arrest and he left a business card with the number on it. A family member later tried to call that number on the card because they hadn't heard from them but all they got was a busy tone anytime they tried to call. The family decided to look a little deeper into who this might have been and when they checked in with Dorchester and Orangeburg police departments, they had no idea who this person might have been given all of these strange occurrences centering around John. Police to this day believe that John had something to do with Sarah, Linda and Kimberly's disappearance. They just haven't had enough proof that would allow them to arrest him. In the years since the disappearance, John has faced other charges. In 1988, he was arrested and charged with pointing firearms at a person. In 1993, he was arrested and charged with assault of battery. He has since passed in 2018. After many years of the case being at a standstill and they only suspect having passed in June of 2020,

24:25someone called the police and told them that Sarah, Linda and Kimberly's bodies might be buried in concrete that John had laid for a house in the nearby town of San T South Carolina. This is about eight miles from Wells Crossroads. This wasn't the first time that police had received a tip about concrete either. Early in the investigation, police searched one of Linda's cousin's houses because John had laid concrete there. Of course, they hadn't found anything there, but the idea of their bodies being concealed with concrete was something that was on their radar. In that same year, the police were able to dig up that concrete at the San T House over a period of three days and didn't find anything. Police has still never located Sarah Boyd, Kimberly Boyd, or Linda McCord. People in Dorchester still remember the missing person's case well and treat the disappearance of the gospel trio as a kind of small town ghost story. When approaching Wells Crossroads at night, people will speed through that area because of the stories they've heard of sightings of apparitions standing in the middle of the road. For the families, the missing three are still very

25:28real to them and their disappearances still haunt them to the stay. After so many years gone, Linda's family doesn't believe in a rest will ever be made, but they do believe that there's still someone around who knows what happened that night in 1987. They want everyone to know that Sarah, Linda, and Kimberly were real people who lived lives and that they were loved. Both families believe that now is the time for someone to come forward if they have information about what happened. John McCord is long dead. He can't harm anyone now. There's nothing standing in the way of finding justice for this trio. If you or someone you know has information about this case, contact the Dorchester County Sheriff's Office at 843-832-0300. That's 843-832-0300. That's it for this week. Be sure to follow us on social media at the Murder Diaries pod where everywhere, TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube where we have both tragic Hollywood and docky file

26:32segments, full videos for everyone to watch. If that's your thing, don't forget our schedule is Monday's tragic Hollywood Tuesday's docky files and Thursday's a true crime case that needs your attention. Thanks for being here. Until then, stay safe. Bye. Nicole Scherzinger.

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