A Cerro Gordo County, Iowa judge will hear arguments next month on a motion to unseal a search warrant in the Jodi Huisentruit investigation.
Senior Judge James Drew is expected to preside over a hearing set for March 3 at 2:00 p.m. in Mason City.
Two attorneys filed a motion on January 24 to unseal a 2017 warrant seeking GPS data connected to John Vansice. Nellie O’Mara and Jesse Marzen argued the warrant should be unsealed since Vansice “passed away in December 2024 and, as such, any ongoing investigation into this matter has now ceased.”
The attorneys, whom private investigator Steve Ridge said he retained, also argued, “The State has no right to conduct an investigation after a person is deceased.” Ridge said in a statement, after the motion was filed, ” I think it’s time to lift the cloud of suspicion that has hung over Vansice and his family for many years.”
County Attorney Carlyle Dalen said he can’t remember seeing a similar motion in the 30 years he’s been a prosecutor and would be shocked if the judge agreed to unseal the search warrant.
In his motion to keep the warrant sealed, Dalen argued, “State is conducting an ongoing investigation of the incident. The death of a person of interest, John Vansice, has not stopped or altered the investigation.”
“The State’s ongoing investigation would be severely compromised if the documents are not sealed. These documents contain information concerning essential facts in this investigation, and the investigation will be substantially compromised if information contained in the search warrant is prematurely released to the public… Iowa Code Chapter 22.7 (5) doesn’t just protect the rights of the person being investigated, it protects the integrity of the investigation. The records contained in the search warrant are the exact type of confidential records the statute was trying to protect during an ongoing investigation.”
The search warrant was first sealed in 2017 and has been resealed every year since. The GPS data being sought was for two vehicles manufactured after Jodi was abducted on her way to anchor the morning news at KIMT-TV in 1995. In a 2018 interview with “48 Hours” correspondent Jim Axelrod, Mason City Police Chief Jeff Brinkley said, ” We didn’t get any information that was useful.”
Anyone with any information on Jodi’s case should contact the Mason City Police Department at (641) 421-3636 or email Iowa DCI Special Agent Ryan Herman at rherman@dps.state.mn.us. You can always reach out to FindJodi.
