What tip did the GBI miss in the Tara Grinstead case?

Former lead agent Gary Rothwell tells Andrea Canning that after the arrests, Find Tara organizers Andy and Janice Paul told him the names had come up years earlier. A partygoer had reported two young men at a bonfire bragging that they killed Grinstead and burned her in a pit. Local deputies checked it, judged it a joke and marked it unfounded, and the GBI never followed up itself, which Rothwell calls a mistake.

• An Army acquaintance of Bo Dukes also says he reported a confession to police, who say they have no record of it.
• Rothwell says he cannot know whether acting on the tip would have changed the trial outcome.

▸In their words

“And we did not follow up ourselves. And that was a mistake.” Gary Rothwell · at 19:22 — open in the transcript →

Source: our own transcription of the episode. The full conversation is on Dateline NBC (2026-11-04). Read the whole episode summary →

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