Investigator Frank Stubbs tells “48 Hours” correspondent Peter Van Sant, “Her purse was still there, her keys were on the counter and her vehicles were still there.” Stubbs saw something startling while searching the home. “I found there was blood on the wall in an area that was kind of odd, there was blood and hair on a light switch,” he says.
AN AMERICAN DREAM TURNED NIGHTMARE
In the afternoon of March 1, 2019, after 29-year-old Andreen McDonald was reported missing by her mother Maureen, a Bexar County sheriff’s deputy arrived at the McDonald home in an upscale gated community in San Antonio.
Within minutes, the deputy saw that blood and hair on the light switch. And in the backyard, normally beautifully landscaped, another troubling clue: a random burn pile.
Maureen Smith: We found a … zipper from uh, Andreen’s blouse.
Peter Van Sant: It was Andreen’s blouse?
Maureen Smith: Mm hmm (affirms).
Andreen’s husband, Andre “Andy” McDonald, told the deputy that when he woke up, he got their daughter Alayna to school before reporting to Lackland Air Force Base, where he served as a cyber warfare analyst.
Once he learned Andreen was missing, Andre rushed back home. But he quickly headed out the door again to act on a hunch that Andreen, who suffered from migraines, might have gone to a nearby hospital for treatment.
Andre’s arrival to the hospital was captured by surveillance cameras, says lead investigator Frank Stubbs.
Frank Stubbs: On that tape … he comes in, you can see him … asking for McDonald … and they tell him … there’s somebody in Room 3 named McDonald.
Peter Van Sant: He arrives back to the house. What does he tell them?
Frank Stubbs: He tells them that she’s in the hospital.
But when the deputy called the hospital, he discovered that the McDonald who had checked in was not Andreen McDonald.
Andre told deputies that he rushed back home before seeing his wife because he had left his cellphone at home and wanted to let Maureen know he had found Andreen.
Sheriff Javier Salazar of the Bexar County Sheriff’s Office:
Sheriff Javier Salazar: There was some indication to him that she was there and injured to some extent.
Unfortunately, the major’s hunch turned out to be wrong.
Maureen Smith: When I heard, I was — oh, God, I was so upset … I was just thinking that she’s someplace that we can find her.
And for Andreen’s mother-in-law, Jackie Horne, who lived in Florida, there was uncertainty.
Jackie Horne: I had called Andreen’s phone about a thousand times already, saying, “Andreen, whatever it is, please, please, just call me back.”
What concerned everyone was the fact Andreen would never just disappear. She was known for her sense of responsibility and dedication to her family and business.
Peter Van Sant: How would you describe Andreen?
Maureen Smith: She knows what she wants. And she would never stop until she get it.
ANDREEN (video): I did come in before he did. Way —
ANDRE: Right, Andreen did defeat me, and she is so excited.
Andreen created an assisted living business in San Antonio called Starlight Homes when she was just 22. And, according to Andre’s close friend Andrew Russell, Andre bankrolled her dreams.
Andrew Russell: In order to start the business, Andre, he liquidated his 401K. … And .. he sold the BMW that he owned.
Jackie Horne: They were doing so well. They were doing everything that would make any mother proud.
Starlight Homes thrived, and under Andreen’s watch the tiny home-based business transformed into a multimillion-dollar enterprise in just seven years.
ANDREEN MCDONALD SPEECH: When I started my assisted living, I only started with three residents … Today, Starlight Homes Assisted Living, we have two locations in the San Antonio area.
Childhood friend, Mandy Hall, says Andreen’s success was born out of humble beginnings.
Mandy Hall: Growing up in Portland, Jamaica … we didn’t have a lot. … And, so, we figured if we wanted to get somewhere in life … it would be in America. … That’s where the dream was.
Andreen’s dream of coming to America came true at 19, when she met Andre. He was also a native of Jamaica, who at the time was a captain in the U.S. Air Force. Andre had returned home to Port Antonio, Jamaica, in May 2009 to attend a funeral where he met Andreen, who was 10 years younger.
Peter Van Sant: Was there an attraction right from the beginning?
Maureen Smith: She was excited when she met him. … excited about the captain in the Air Force. … they both decide for her to come to America.
They married that July.
Jackie Horne: I was happy to know he had met somebody that he could have a life with.
That life would soon include a baby girl, Alayna. Alayna was at the center of Andreen’s world, which made her disappearance so perplexing, says Horne.
Jackie Horne: I don’t think Andreen would just get up and walk away and leave Alayna, and nobody would hear from her.
That evening, a forensic crime unit examined those stains in the bathroom and confirmed the initial belief that they were blood.
Peter Van Sant: While you were going through the house, was Andre there?
Frank Stubbs: Yes, he was.
Peter Van Sant: Did you see any signs of bruising on his body, any signs of — of any injuries that perhaps he’d been in a struggle?
Frank Stubbs: Nothing that we could — that we could determine.
Investigators were hoping Andre had some answers. But he said the last time he had seen his wife was the night before, and they said what Andre described raised more questions than answers.
Frank Stubbs: He had told them they had come home from the tax preparers office, and that they had argued over the business and … he went up the road … got some gas and just cooled off.
Frank Stubbs: We were able to obtain video evidence of him going to the Shell station.
Andre said when he returned home, he and Andreen went to separate bedrooms.
But according to investigators, what Andre didn’t mention was the text exchange that happened at the gas station.
TATTOOS, TEXTS, AND A MARRAGE IN TURMOIL
For investigators, the text messages found on Andre’s phone revealed a marriage in turmoil, including allegations of betrayal.
Peter Van Sant: Accusations of unfaithfulness in these text messages, correct?
Frank Stubbs: That’s correct.
Peter Van Sant: We have a printed copy. Would you mind reading these from his phone?
Frank Stubbs (reading the text): Andreen responds … “If you bring up Aubyn again, I will divorce you myself.”
Aubyn Hall, a businessman living in Port Antonio, Jamaica, who according to investigators, was Andreen’s ex-boyfriend and, potentially, her current lover.
In response to Andreen’s threat of divorce, Andre texts: “I don’t care if you get a divorce. You brought Aubyn into our life.”
Aubyn dated Andreen when she was a teenager, say investigators. Andreen’s close friend Mandy Hall says the two rekindled their romance in 2017 during one of her philanthropic trips to the island.
Mandy Hall: Aubyn has always been that first love … It wasn’t something Andreen got over, emotionally.
Hall says they carried on their affair in secret until the summer of 2018 when Andreen got two new tattoos: an initial “A” tattooed on her hand and a date tattooed on her wrist.
Mandy Hall: Andy was definitely suspicious of what it meant.
With a suspicious mind, Hall says Andre went to work to solve this tattoo mystery.
Mandy Hall: He went, and he did his own digging.
It was on social media where Andre discovered an interesting photograph of Aubyn branded with the same exact tattoo that was also on Andreen’s hand.
