‘This is one that I’ll never forget’: Myrtle Beach Police chief reflects on Brittanee Drexel case

GEORGETOWN COUNTY, S.C. – Loved ones of Brittanee Drexel who packed a courtroom this week to hear a man plead guilty to killing the teen were joined by a key player in helping them get justice.

Reporter Ashley Boles from WMBF, an affiliate of News10NBC, sat down with Myrtle Police Chief Amy Prock, who worked on the case day in and day out from 2013 until Drexel’s body was found a little more than five months ago.

Prock was assigned to the case in 2013, four years after Brittanee left her Chili home for a spring break trip to South Carolina – and disappeared. On Wednesday, Prock listened as Raymond Moody admitted to kidnapping, raping, and killing Drexel.

Prock still remembers the initial phone calls she had with Dawn Pleckan, Brittanee’s mom.

“Introduced myself as a new supervisor in the unit, and a lot of questions: what’s happening now, those sorts of things. Also contacted Chad [Drexel] as well, Brittanee’s adoptive father, and just introduced myself, let him know who I was and my expectations of our team,” Prock said.

Throughout the years, there were change to Prock’s team, but she stayed. While there weren’t daily breakthroughs, there were leads to follow.

“We were constantly getting hundreds of tips and needed to clear those, which is why we had someone assigned to that case and needed to clear them,” she said.

Ashley Boles: “And how many of those tips included Raymond Moody’s name?”

Chief Amy Prock: “I couldn’t give you a number off the top of my head, but we continued to work on those, including the hundreds of other tips all in different directions.”

Each tip was vetted until it had to be put to rest, but the case as a whole remained active.

During Moody’s plea hearing Wednesday, Deputy Solicitor Scott Hixson filled in some answers to the dozens of questions that have come up throughout the years.

Ashley Boles: “Yesterday he talked about the timeline, but he put in the timeline according to Raymond Moody. We don’t have the timeline according to Brittanee, she’s not here to tell her story. Do you believe the timeline that Raymond gave?”

Chief Amy Prock: “I believe parts of it. I will definitely tell you this: I think it’s important as law enforcement to try to do as much as we can to vet what we can, and that’s what we will continue to do.”

She knows she and other law enforcement officials may not ever know everything that happened between when Brittanee disappeared – and that closure may never come.

Ashley Boles: “Do you think that you got closure more so in early May when her body was found, or more so closure yesterday?”

Chief Amy Prock: “Being able to see Brittanee’s family and know that they could take her home was definitely helpful, because I know that just in conversations with Brittanee’s family, that was something they desperately wanted, so that was helpful for me.”

But the closure piece is not what upsets Prock the most. In court, she was one of the people physically closest to Moody outside f his lawyers. She looked right at him several times: a man who should still be in a California prison if he had served his full 40-year sentence for sodomizing a child.

“It frustrates me that he was let out early. More than anything as a parent, as a mom, as an aunt, as a daughter, I would never want that to happen to anyone and it frustrates me he was let out early,” Prock said.

Ashley Boles: He brought that up when he spoke.

Chief Amy Prock: “Absolutely he did. Is there frustration? Absolutely. But not everything is perfect in the criminal justice system. We have areas that we need to work on and I know that from being in it for 26 years.”

In her nearly three decades in law enforcement, Prock has seen many cases open and close. While this case moves to the closed pile, it’s one Prock says will stay with her for the rest of her life.

“When you have a case like this – and many others – but this is one that I’ll never forget.”