July 13, 2021 • 29 mins
Detective Ford interrogates Vann about his past and tries to determine how many Vann has really killed... And what can we learn from Vann's ex-wife, stepson, and ex-girlfriend?
Find out more about the case on twitter, instagram, or facebook. Follow host Ben Kuebrich on twitter @Ben_kuebrich. And reach out with any tips on Darren Vann, Big E, or crimes that might be related on social media or by leaving a voicemail at 888-501-3309.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely
those of the authors and participants and do not necessarily
represent those of iHeart Media, Tenderfoot TV, or their employees.
This series contains discussions of violence and sexual violence. Listener
discretion is advised. Previously on Algorithm. Four years after Thomas
(00:22):
Hargrove had tried to warrant Gary, Indiana that they might
have a serial killer, the police one town over in Hammond, Indiana,
arrested Darren Vaughan. How many people are you responsible for killing?
But it is a lifetime. How couldn't even two? Vond
led investigators to six bodies? And while the m O
matched one of the patterns, Hardroup had identified young women
(00:45):
who had been strangled and left in abandoned buildings, none
of these victims were on Hargrove's list. They were all
more recent murders that have been committed after Hargrove sent
the letter to Gary. But in a press conference, police
mentioned that On had confessed to murders going back twenty years,
and the Hammond mayor wrote, he'd confessed to a couple
(01:05):
of murders into and they told Hammond police that he
had been active going back to the mid nineties, and
I would take him at his word. So it was
Vond responsible for the killings that Hargrove's algorithm had picked
up on. Where was something else going on? This episode
we explore what Bond was doing back in the nineties
(01:28):
from I Heeart Media and Tenderfoot TV. This is algorithm.
I'm ben Key brick. Hard Grove's algorithm had identified fifteen
homicides between and two thousand seven. The first step in
figuring out if Vaughn was responsible for these murders were
(01:48):
other cold cases is figuring out where he was living
and what he was doing during that period. Von told
detectives that in the early eighties he was recruited into
a gang, the Gangster Disciples, by an older boy named
Big or Big Mike. The Bond's brother, Reginald didn't buy
this story. Ok, his friend Big Mike, he likes to
(02:15):
talk about talk about him and Big Mike grew up
in homes together him, Big Wings. He remember him, Big Mike,
Big Bad. But nobody and my family knows Big Mike.
Nobody's ever seen Big Mike. You know what I'm saying is,
come on now, it's not plausible. Big Money is a
fictional character as far as I'm concerned. Well, the last
(02:40):
thing he said I was with Big Mike. He just
like we get to talk about the old days and
stuff like that. He likes to build himself up to
be like I don't know, I don't put it man,
uh fucking guy complex. He tells stories and like, you know,
back in my day, I could have sold all these drugs.
You know what I'm saying. I could have been a
key opinion, isn't that? You know? Fred? You know what
I'm saying. But I'm talking to just sitting here, I'm
(03:04):
telling you a little around like you want to. I know,
it's not possible, you know what I'm It's not possible
that he exists. Yeah, yeah, I mean I mean that
you think this was possible? Really really trying to explains, Man,
we we don't we don't know you probably like you
know your brother. Yeah, I mean, that's why we're That's
(03:25):
why we're here. It's just like, all right, you you
talked to somebody and they come with this crazy yeas
story and they just have to want to up you
know what I'm saying. And when I talked to him,
sometimes I just started. Notice you know he does that.
You know what I'm saying. We had a conversation with
the fucking neighbor. He was like, yeah, I remember the
(03:47):
teacher got killed in Rosevelt. Roosevelt is one of the
high schools. And Gary like, you remember, you remember, you know,
trying to d you know, And I'm like, I don't
know you're talking about I don't remember no teacher getting
killed that Roselt. But that's the type that she does,
Like I didn't that conversation's park Uh, we were talking
(04:07):
about we were talking about white people. You care it's
finely yeah, you know, I don't want to you know,
don't worry about it. You know about it about so
you know, we were much have one of those conversations.
You know it's me and him and the neighbor who
you were talking about. No, that's not right. I don't remember. No,
(04:30):
tis a game Carol's house. Last time we get a
conversation with him. Let me ask you this what he
talks about Big Mike, because he ever see him and
Big Mike do this, or him Big might do that,
or know what's what's that conversation? If I gotta passed
pass you know it's about selling drugs and you know,
gag ship. You know what I'm saying is any game
(04:53):
says any game? Yeah? What was her? Sasonlin decides say, hey, man,
but as far as I could call him, and he
was the nerdy kid who wanted to be bad, like
he'd come home watch cartoons and danced movies and swearing
in the hard board. You know what I'm saying it
(05:14):
to me, It don't ain't no sense, you know. But
you brought up a good point though, like I ain't
picked this ship was possible. But I really don't think
Big Mike is a real person. When you started to
talking about Big Mike, you said, fuck it, here he
goes Big Mike. Why did the team Mike? That was
(05:34):
a lot of for years to let out. I mean,
kind of this life, I honestly don't believe it's this
dude is really okay, And it's borderline crazy to have
flashbacks of somebody who I ain't real okay. I I
(06:00):
don't see how include brother some of these these stories
of Grids him Hill. We still have keys and stuff
like that. And I've never seen more brother with more money,
you know than the average person. Von's lawyers also had
their doubts about some of Von's stories. Here's Goyko Cossage.
All of us, I think, at some point in time,
(06:22):
thought that Darren would tell us some things that were
either puffing or maybe just going ahead and obfuscating things,
because I mean, let's face it, the guy was charged
with multiple death pediment accounts and to expect a full
honest answer um. But he was in denial on some things.
We found some people who were at Thelmbal Marshall with him,
(06:43):
a couple of white brothers, and Darren would tell us
that he was not being bothered at Tholba Marshal because
he was physically stronger than the other people that were
Themba Marshall and they looked at us like we were.
They said he was the smallest kid there. He was tiny.
We had to pretended him. He was always getting picked
on and pushed around by the others, and and Darren
(07:05):
swears that didn't happen so in his mind, be it
from the organic injury or something he had convinced himself,
there were episodes in Darren's life that he remembered completely
different than what we had incredible evidence for happening in
another fashion. It's hard to know what to make of
all of this. It's clear that Vaughan isn't always a
(07:27):
reliable narrator of his own life, and many of his
stories sound crazy, but also many of the things that
he did do, like strangling seven women over the course
of a year, might have sounded made up as well.
This is a point in the story where I'd like
to reach out to you, to our listeners, I'd really
like to get in touch with someone who went to
(07:48):
the Thelma Marshall Home at the same time as Von,
where anyone who knew him or this big year, big
mic guy, please call and leave us a voicemail. You
can get the number in the show notes or at
the end of the episode, and maybe you can give
us the in road we need to help figure out
how much Von's story we can trust, regardless of whether
(08:09):
Big E was real or just a figment of Vaughn's imagination.
Vaughn was soon drawn away from Gary at sixteen. He
was reunited with his mom and your mother picked you
up getting back to Okay. Von's mother was now almost
thirty and she was living with a new partner and
(08:30):
two young children. Reginald Von's half brother, who you heard
from earlier, was just three at the time, and Regina
von step sister was just six. For Vaughan, it was
a big adjustment. I don't know about the family, and
soon after Vaughan rejoined his mother, the family moved to Lima,
(08:52):
a small rust belt city in northwest Ohio day where
I was coat shocked. They have no game at that time.
Lima might not have had gangs, but Bond's life was turbulent.
Even though his mother was older and more mature, she
still had issues. She suffered from schizophrenia and struggled with
(09:16):
addiction to hard drugs, and Vaughan was often running away
from home. Sometimes he hitchhike the two d miles back
to Gary. I ran away, called a truck while part away.
It came on my rapple out and they wore booking
for me in Ohio. Your grandpa keep you there And
now he called don't right. It's like, just come get him.
Don't mess one, because you know you're gonna get around.
(09:39):
Von stepsister. Regina was young enough that she didn't know
everything that was going on, but she told police Vawn's
mother was physically abusive. It was definitely, um abuseless. I
know she was abuseless. I know she was. We share Sidney,
and I know bought back. She was abusive to that
Sidney from a man she loves that's taking care of
(10:01):
that shot. I can only imagine what she had no
problem to all of a sudden at Dan taken Carol. Now,
when you say abusive, like verbally, abusive physically, I don't
recall all the different, but I know she will, right.
I mean, that's why we're asking, because you know it's
important for us, and also know where he's coming from,
because that might actually help us, you know, to find
(10:24):
a lot more things out about him. So um, so
she was definitely abuse to ze. Regina says that when
she got older, family members told her that when Vaughan's
mom got really mad, she'd make Vaughn cover his skin
with alcohol, presumably so that his wounds would sting as
she beat him. This laws grown up. I heard it
(10:46):
in the household from the other siblings, write telling you
about it, right, I really don't remember, But I don't
remember this alcohol. I thought it was a little different.
Vaughan graduated from Lima Senior High School and moved back
to northwest Indiana. He says that that's when he made
the first of what he calls his mistakes. Killings that
(11:06):
were not gang related were intended at all. So were
these the twenty year old murders that the police and
mayor were referring to. Vaughn first all detectives about these killings.
On the second night of the death March, he just
finished leading Detective Forward and Captain Hinajosa to three more
bodies and abandoned buildings and Gary being Hammond police. Ford
(11:29):
and Hinajosa asked Vaughn whether he had any murders to
confess to that had taken place specifically in Hammond. Vaughn
directed the police to a vacant lot in southwest Hammond
where a bar had once been located. Vaughn said he'd
robbed an older couple there sometime back in the early nineties,
that it only was abandoned then. Yeah, And so these
(11:50):
two people, why were they in the building? I'll robin, Well,
but how did you get him there? At the ground
the point, I'll robin, because they're why used to cut
through the hilty lite used to be a way to
cut through back order a mad gun point into the
bill right and then rob But what did you get
out of the robbery? Remember it was it was something small,
remember and I was like I said, I was like,
(12:11):
it was it just money. It's just money. That's all
of that. I was just a kid, damn. After walking
forward and Kinajosa through his memories of the robbery turned
double homicide, Von guided detectives to an alley between Tracord
and Becker Street. Von told detectives he'd gotten into a
fight there and ended up shooting a man. You said
(12:33):
that you shot him near the telephone pole that was
directly across right from there. How many times do you
think you shot hibouree three? Do you know what caliber
gun you had or anything like? Back then, I was
caring to I was going badly while I was covered
here in in nineteen nineties. I know who gave you
to remember that that was your sweet beat. That's what
(12:54):
they gave all of us. Meddle months. There's bag then
twenty food. The twenty five was running rapid, all of
you know, officers, I think these likely are the murders
that police referred to in the press conference after Von's
arrest when they mentioned crimes going back twenty years. But
it's a bit confusing because Vaughan says in the interrogation
that these murders took place around one and in the
(13:18):
account that the mayor wrote on Facebook, he said Vaughan
had confessed to murders in ninety four, and Vaughn isn't
great with dates, so maybe he changed his story at
some point as far as I can tell him, and
police have yet to connect these confessions to any reported crimes.
(13:50):
To briefly recap, after graduating high school, Vaughan returned to
Northwest Indiana in and he told police that around that
time he shot at least three people in Hammond. Then
Vaughn's life took a major shift, and in December, he
enlisted with the Marines. Vaughn was first shipped out to
(14:11):
San Diego, where he went through boot camp and got
combat training. Then he trained as a missile system operator
in El Passa, Texas, and from July to September he
was stationed in Cherry Point, North Carolina. Here's his lawyer, Cossage.
I think in North Carolina they got a big brawl
(14:33):
that he got hit and he with a chair, doesn't
remember what happened, and there were a couple of other
head injuries that he suffered in Vaughan received and other
than honorable discharge from the Marines. Let's just say that
in the military he got discharged because of an active
insubordination of some kind. It was really not related to
(14:54):
the case. It's the insubordination, that thing you mentioned earlier
with the head damage. No, no, I can't. You know
Darren didn't take orders. Well, you know, he he didn't
like being told what to do. And I think it's
gone throughout his entire life and goes all the way
back to age four. And at a certain point in
(15:14):
time they decided, okay, you don't want to take orders.
I guess we don't need you as a marine. And
he said, okay, fine. So that was that. How come
you get kicked out on disciplary behavior? Good soul is
you're bad at home? And they say, but what led
to this, uh discharge disappeared really disappearing. We don't fight,
(15:37):
nobody go home. So you just kind of went a
wall or whatever they call it. Or I told him
I was gonna be late coming back, but you know,
I still a wall. I don't be late. I'm in him.
I mean Geary, I'll get back. I mean, when I
you seem that a president, we're not at war. Vaughn
(15:58):
wasn't that interested in serving his country. Three. What he
really wanted was to die in the battlefield Vauntel detective Forward.
He'd taken out a big life insurance policy with the
hopes of dying in combat and then giving the insurance
settlement to his younger brother, Reginald that's already not joined.
Were supposed to be going to war. Okay, so you're
(16:21):
out in ninety three. Come back to Gary, come back
to hammn to Hammond, to heaven. So I living right
for man. Her real life was managed. Sometime around this point,
von met the woman who'ld later become his wife. Good woman,
very guy until I'll find Merry a terrible person. She
(16:42):
believe it. Yeah, she knows I have a terrible temper.
She said, I'm a good guy, so I'll take care
of the house and take care of I'll just have
a terrible temper. It was an unusual relationship for sure.
Vaughn would have been around twenty two years old and
the woman, Maria, was fifty one, twenty nine years older
than him. Maria was an Italian immigrant with kids nearly
(17:06):
Darren's age. Shortly after Von's arrest, she told The New
York Times that she'd met Vaughan through some mutual friends.
She described him as quote intelligent, very relaxed, very nice
to everyone. But what Maria saw as kind and quiet,
her son ed interpreted differently. Had spoke to CNN shortly
(17:29):
after Darren's arrest. First of all, I didn't like it
for her to marry ad almost my age. Number one,
number two. He was just a strange guy. I walked
in and I would see him talking to himself and
you're saying hello, He's like hello and looked down to
the ground. He was always in the thought, always like
he had something else on his mind other than what
(17:49):
he was. When a person walks around talking to themselves
and looked like the answering himselves as long with him
and then he was just says that he killed the
people alight. He finally topped around just a couple of
years after he'd started dating Maria. Vaughn says he got
(18:11):
sucked back into the gang life when his old mentor,
Big E, was killed. Vaughn says that during the time
he's spending the Marines. The gangster disciples had fractured and
split up into small, competing clicks. There was no longer
any need for gang enforcers, and Vaughan felt like an outsider.
(18:33):
France killing France killing bro Nobody one murder place because
all the killing that will years were running the streets.
Vaughn says he struggled to adjust to this new gang hierarchy,
and Maria, his fifty year old girlfriend, struggled with his
(18:55):
return to criminal life. Things came to a head when
one of the other gang members got arrested. Somebody else
had busted on her. They thought that person was gonna
tell on me, and they thought I was gonna tell you.
They tried to murder me. Von says some gang members
jumped him and started beating him. They busted open his head,
(19:17):
but he got away. When he got home, Maria was
terrified when my head got busted open. She wanted me
to tell on everybody. I thought, that's not how it work.
She was high as the say about it. That's how
I ended up in Texas. To escape, Von and Maria
moved to Austin and they married in city hall in
(19:39):
front of a few friends. I got married in Texas. Yeah,
year because the one important I'm married to rant I
told you want to give marries you know alone another chick.
I'm arey because she was a lot with me. She
married a person didn't love her. Try to take care
of me. But I know who I am. We all
are super told like you know your hoss, son of
(20:01):
a bitch. But she is like, oh yeah, he'll always
protect us, right, That's how she moved Daddy. They'll go
out his way to protective. Actually, without her, you would
probably call me years ago because she gave me Vince.
You don't need to do this. You got good mind work.
And maybe Maria did provide Vaughan with some balance and stability,
(20:22):
because for a while it seemed like Vaughan's life was
getting back on track. Vaughn says he got a job
in Austin working for Tell Computers. You work for Dell Computers.
What did you do assembly with the Futers together program
in Texas? Yeah? Nice? I work for Deal, I work
for Thanks, I worked I worked for some nice complet
(20:45):
to come. Maria's son ed though, remembered it souring quickly.
You know how it is when you first moved some
place as a new little relationship. He probably was in
the happiest moment of his life. I don't know, he
got some lady to marry him, Okay, but after that,
you know, I think he works for a chimp agency,
that kind of working on the tail. They fired him,
(21:07):
you know, and from that moment on he went down ill.
He became a creepy dude. You know, he wandered around
at nights. My mom didn't think und strange about it
about his mom her both friend or husband, whatever you
want to call him. He's running around at nighttime on runbird. Mom,
you know what kind of neighorhood that is. That's a
prostitution store. He was a strange dude. He was doing
(21:31):
something They need to be checking here at Austin. He
might have been doing something more than just that long gerard,
as we'll get into in the next episode. Von did
have at least one victim in Austin, and there are
cold cases in Austin that are worth exploring as well.
But while Maria's son Ed identifies Vaughn's firing from Dell
(21:51):
as the start of Von's downward spiral, Von himself identifies
another movement. It's the point where he snapped the incident
he could ever come back from. Sometime around the year
(22:19):
two thousand, Vaughn and Maria moved back to Gary. Vaughn
told Detective Forward he'd returned for a family obligation. I
came home because with another answer, didn't happened. I just
want to know Cuss got killed. We all came home.
The whole family came home. Let's just say, you said
it's your cousin that got killed. Right? Why did that
make everybody move home? Because who retaliation? Sound? Who was
(22:45):
that they got killed? Trying to think what they called
you don't know your cousins thinks, So I told him
I'm not family orientated. I only came back because my
other cousin they asked me to come back. At first,
it might sound like Von's bullshitting when he says he
doesn't know his cousin's name, But remember Von didn't meet
any of his family until he was twelve. Still, his
(23:09):
shaking this with these kind of details makes it hard
to pin down exactly where he was at a given time.
Von stepsister, Regina, says that after he graduated high school
in she lost touch with him, really got close back
two thousands I broke off my engagement. He stayed with
me for two months. I told you know, Dally appear.
(23:31):
He moved out. Regina says that at the time, Vaughan
was unhappy with his marriage. He was thirty two then
and wanted to have a kid, but his wife, Maria
was now over sixty. Maria told The New York Times
that this was when the relationships started to fall apart.
She said, quote, I didn't want to be with him anymore.
(23:53):
He had single friends. There were signs that he was
going with somebody else, and Maria was right. Von had
told his step sister that he'd met another woman, that
he was in love with her, and that his wish
to have a child was coming true. He had gotten
his new girlfriend pregnant. Vaughn's new girlfriend was a woman
(24:16):
named Sharita. She liked that he was smart and didn't
drink or do drugs. She told The Daily Mail that
his idea of a night out was going to Barnes
and Noble and reading books, usually science fiction or Harry Potter.
Sharita new Vaughn was married, but he and Maria were
living separately at that point, and he told Sharita that
(24:39):
he had only gotten married in the first place because
he hated being alone. But as Sharita and Vaughn's relationship progressed,
she learned that Vaughan had a dark side. He'd get
jealous easily, he didn't want her having her own friends,
and he became increasingly controlling. Sometimes he would lock her
(24:59):
in side the house when he went to work. She
said that one time, when they were visiting her mother's house,
he hog tied her and covered her mouth with duct
tapes so she couldn't scream. Sharita realized she had to
get out of the relationship, but when she would try
to end things, Von would threaten her and her mother.
(25:20):
One night, Von made Sharifa go out on a walk
with him. He took her out to a desolate part
of Gary and surrounded by abandoned buildings, he told her,
I could easily make you disappear. Accounts of what happened
next in Von and Sharitha's relationship are hazy. I tried
(25:43):
to reach out, but I couldn't get in contact with
her and her One published interview in The Daily Mail
doesn't address this point, but it appears that in two
thousand four, Sharitha and Vaughan had their child, but shortly
after the birth, something happened and the child died. And
around this same time, Tretha escaped from the abusive relationship,
(26:05):
left Vaughn and went into hiding. And this is where
Von says he snapped. He became enraged and blamed Tretha
for the child Stath because just snapped it that moment,
because we allowed the child and we're going through that
all morning period. She was out getting high and took
my money to the dope man. I was like, that's
(26:27):
just too bad. Damn what how like fuck if you
want to funk up like this, We're just gonna get
this ship over with. But we all went back out
of control again. I never made him back. And once
you I don't know how to flame. If y'all y'all
don't have the same merger, no way for me to
blame the murder rages. Once you started killing again, it
(26:48):
becomes it's like any other day. It's like if I was.
I'm not an alcoholic, but if I were and I
started to drink, You're off to the races, right. That's
basically because you have the urge the hunt. Some people
I talked to say they don't understanding, Like I went
to talk to a therapist, but he wanted too much
(27:09):
now because he said he had to report all the primes.
You know what I'm saying, So you can't. Really it's hard.
It would definitely be hard to explain your problem to
somebody who had so you can't go. I need to help.
What's your problems? Like killing people? He said, well, have
you killed emybody? And that's when their discussion is going
to get little fund next time on algorithm boost the
(27:36):
gas fight and they had the whole build and filled
with gas. I tried to take the girl on fire
and being on fire and go to building up all
the same kind Sometimes you went to scenario had to
went different than two thousands four and maybe some people
would still be alive. If you look at like police stories,
the police stories are almost always told from the perspective
(27:57):
of catching the wrong tour. My story starts, okay, you
caught him, Now what you know, what's the rest of
the story. I feel I should have got locked over. Yeah,
I'll beat her by right, Well, all right, standard y'all
call it right, but we don't call it right. Histories
like you pay here, So what is she complaining about.
(28:22):
This episode was written and produced by me Ben Keie
Brick Algorithm is executive produced by Alex Williams, Donald Albright,
and Matt Frederick. Production assistance and mixing by Eric Quintana.
The music is by Makeup and Vanity Set and Blue
Dot Sessions. Thanks to Christina Dana, Miranda Hawkins, Jamie Albright,
(28:44):
Rima L. K Ali, Trevor Young, and Josh Thane for
their help and notes. Hey, I hope you're continuing to
enjoy the show. If you do have any information about
Darren Vond or crimes that you think might be related
to this case, or if you just questions or comments
that you want addressed on the podcast, please call and
(29:04):
leave me a voicemail at a DAD eight five zero
one three zero nine. That's a D eight five zero
one three three zero nine. You can also reach out
to me on Twitter. I'm at Ben Underscore Key Brick.
That's b E N Underscore k U E B R
I C H. And that contact info is also available
(29:28):
in the show notes for the episode. Thanks
The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely
those of the authors and participants and do not necessarily
represent those of iHeart Media, Tenderfoot TV, or their employees.
This series contains discussions of violence and sexual violence. Listener
discretion is advised. Previously on Algorithm. Four years after Thomas
(00:22):
Hargrove had tried to warrant Gary, Indiana that they might
have a serial killer, the police one town over in Hammond, Indiana,
arrested Darren Vaughan. How many people are you responsible for killing?
But it is a lifetime. How couldn't even two? Vond
led investigators to six bodies? And while the m O
matched one of the patterns, Hardroup had identified young women
(00:45):
who had been strangled and left in abandoned buildings, none
of these victims were on Hargrove's list. They were all
more recent murders that have been committed after Hargrove sent
the letter to Gary. But in a press conference, police
mentioned that On had confessed to murders going back twenty years,
and the Hammond mayor wrote, he'd confessed to a couple
(01:05):
of murders into and they told Hammond police that he
had been active going back to the mid nineties, and
I would take him at his word. So it was
Vond responsible for the killings that Hargrove's algorithm had picked
up on. Where was something else going on? This episode
we explore what Bond was doing back in the nineties
(01:28):
from I Heeart Media and Tenderfoot TV. This is algorithm.
I'm ben Key brick. Hard Grove's algorithm had identified fifteen
homicides between and two thousand seven. The first step in
figuring out if Vaughn was responsible for these murders were
(01:48):
other cold cases is figuring out where he was living
and what he was doing during that period. Von told
detectives that in the early eighties he was recruited into
a gang, the Gangster Disciples, by an older boy named
Big or Big Mike. The Bond's brother, Reginald didn't buy
this story. Ok, his friend Big Mike, he likes to
(02:15):
talk about talk about him and Big Mike grew up
in homes together him, Big Wings. He remember him, Big Mike,
Big Bad. But nobody and my family knows Big Mike.
Nobody's ever seen Big Mike. You know what I'm saying is,
come on now, it's not plausible. Big Money is a
fictional character as far as I'm concerned. Well, the last
(02:40):
thing he said I was with Big Mike. He just
like we get to talk about the old days and
stuff like that. He likes to build himself up to
be like I don't know, I don't put it man,
uh fucking guy complex. He tells stories and like, you know,
back in my day, I could have sold all these drugs.
You know what I'm saying. I could have been a
key opinion, isn't that? You know? Fred? You know what
I'm saying. But I'm talking to just sitting here, I'm
(03:04):
telling you a little around like you want to. I know,
it's not possible, you know what I'm It's not possible
that he exists. Yeah, yeah, I mean I mean that
you think this was possible? Really really trying to explains, Man,
we we don't we don't know you probably like you
know your brother. Yeah, I mean, that's why we're That's
(03:25):
why we're here. It's just like, all right, you you
talked to somebody and they come with this crazy yeas
story and they just have to want to up you
know what I'm saying. And when I talked to him,
sometimes I just started. Notice you know he does that.
You know what I'm saying. We had a conversation with
the fucking neighbor. He was like, yeah, I remember the
(03:47):
teacher got killed in Rosevelt. Roosevelt is one of the
high schools. And Gary like, you remember, you remember, you know,
trying to d you know, And I'm like, I don't
know you're talking about I don't remember no teacher getting
killed that Roselt. But that's the type that she does,
Like I didn't that conversation's park Uh, we were talking
(04:07):
about we were talking about white people. You care it's
finely yeah, you know, I don't want to you know,
don't worry about it. You know about it about so
you know, we were much have one of those conversations.
You know it's me and him and the neighbor who
you were talking about. No, that's not right. I don't remember. No,
(04:30):
tis a game Carol's house. Last time we get a
conversation with him. Let me ask you this what he
talks about Big Mike, because he ever see him and
Big Mike do this, or him Big might do that,
or know what's what's that conversation? If I gotta passed
pass you know it's about selling drugs and you know,
gag ship. You know what I'm saying is any game
(04:53):
says any game? Yeah? What was her? Sasonlin decides say, hey, man,
but as far as I could call him, and he
was the nerdy kid who wanted to be bad, like
he'd come home watch cartoons and danced movies and swearing
in the hard board. You know what I'm saying it
(05:14):
to me, It don't ain't no sense, you know. But
you brought up a good point though, like I ain't
picked this ship was possible. But I really don't think
Big Mike is a real person. When you started to
talking about Big Mike, you said, fuck it, here he
goes Big Mike. Why did the team Mike? That was
(05:34):
a lot of for years to let out. I mean,
kind of this life, I honestly don't believe it's this
dude is really okay, And it's borderline crazy to have
flashbacks of somebody who I ain't real okay. I I
(06:00):
don't see how include brother some of these these stories
of Grids him Hill. We still have keys and stuff
like that. And I've never seen more brother with more money,
you know than the average person. Von's lawyers also had
their doubts about some of Von's stories. Here's Goyko Cossage.
All of us, I think, at some point in time,
(06:22):
thought that Darren would tell us some things that were
either puffing or maybe just going ahead and obfuscating things,
because I mean, let's face it, the guy was charged
with multiple death pediment accounts and to expect a full
honest answer um. But he was in denial on some things.
We found some people who were at Thelmbal Marshall with him,
(06:43):
a couple of white brothers, and Darren would tell us
that he was not being bothered at Tholba Marshal because
he was physically stronger than the other people that were
Themba Marshall and they looked at us like we were.
They said he was the smallest kid there. He was tiny.
We had to pretended him. He was always getting picked
on and pushed around by the others, and and Darren
(07:05):
swears that didn't happen so in his mind, be it
from the organic injury or something he had convinced himself,
there were episodes in Darren's life that he remembered completely
different than what we had incredible evidence for happening in
another fashion. It's hard to know what to make of
all of this. It's clear that Vaughan isn't always a
(07:27):
reliable narrator of his own life, and many of his
stories sound crazy, but also many of the things that
he did do, like strangling seven women over the course
of a year, might have sounded made up as well.
This is a point in the story where I'd like
to reach out to you, to our listeners, I'd really
like to get in touch with someone who went to
(07:48):
the Thelma Marshall Home at the same time as Von,
where anyone who knew him or this big year, big
mic guy, please call and leave us a voicemail. You
can get the number in the show notes or at
the end of the episode, and maybe you can give
us the in road we need to help figure out
how much Von's story we can trust, regardless of whether
(08:09):
Big E was real or just a figment of Vaughn's imagination.
Vaughn was soon drawn away from Gary at sixteen. He
was reunited with his mom and your mother picked you
up getting back to Okay. Von's mother was now almost
thirty and she was living with a new partner and
(08:30):
two young children. Reginald Von's half brother, who you heard
from earlier, was just three at the time, and Regina
von step sister was just six. For Vaughan, it was
a big adjustment. I don't know about the family, and
soon after Vaughan rejoined his mother, the family moved to Lima,
(08:52):
a small rust belt city in northwest Ohio day where
I was coat shocked. They have no game at that time.
Lima might not have had gangs, but Bond's life was turbulent.
Even though his mother was older and more mature, she
still had issues. She suffered from schizophrenia and struggled with
(09:16):
addiction to hard drugs, and Vaughan was often running away
from home. Sometimes he hitchhike the two d miles back
to Gary. I ran away, called a truck while part away.
It came on my rapple out and they wore booking
for me in Ohio. Your grandpa keep you there And
now he called don't right. It's like, just come get him.
Don't mess one, because you know you're gonna get around.
(09:39):
Von stepsister. Regina was young enough that she didn't know
everything that was going on, but she told police Vawn's
mother was physically abusive. It was definitely, um abuseless. I
know she was abuseless. I know she was. We share Sidney,
and I know bought back. She was abusive to that
Sidney from a man she loves that's taking care of
(10:01):
that shot. I can only imagine what she had no
problem to all of a sudden at Dan taken Carol. Now,
when you say abusive, like verbally, abusive physically, I don't
recall all the different, but I know she will, right.
I mean, that's why we're asking, because you know it's
important for us, and also know where he's coming from,
because that might actually help us, you know, to find
(10:24):
a lot more things out about him. So um, so
she was definitely abuse to ze. Regina says that when
she got older, family members told her that when Vaughan's
mom got really mad, she'd make Vaughn cover his skin
with alcohol, presumably so that his wounds would sting as
she beat him. This laws grown up. I heard it
(10:46):
in the household from the other siblings, write telling you
about it, right, I really don't remember, But I don't
remember this alcohol. I thought it was a little different.
Vaughan graduated from Lima Senior High School and moved back
to northwest Indiana. He says that that's when he made
the first of what he calls his mistakes. Killings that
(11:06):
were not gang related were intended at all. So were
these the twenty year old murders that the police and
mayor were referring to. Vaughn first all detectives about these killings.
On the second night of the death March, he just
finished leading Detective Forward and Captain Hinajosa to three more
bodies and abandoned buildings and Gary being Hammond police. Ford
(11:29):
and Hinajosa asked Vaughn whether he had any murders to
confess to that had taken place specifically in Hammond. Vaughn
directed the police to a vacant lot in southwest Hammond
where a bar had once been located. Vaughn said he'd
robbed an older couple there sometime back in the early nineties,
that it only was abandoned then. Yeah, And so these
(11:50):
two people, why were they in the building? I'll robin, Well,
but how did you get him there? At the ground
the point, I'll robin, because they're why used to cut
through the hilty lite used to be a way to
cut through back order a mad gun point into the
bill right and then rob But what did you get
out of the robbery? Remember it was it was something small,
remember and I was like I said, I was like,
(12:11):
it was it just money. It's just money. That's all
of that. I was just a kid, damn. After walking
forward and Kinajosa through his memories of the robbery turned
double homicide, Von guided detectives to an alley between Tracord
and Becker Street. Von told detectives he'd gotten into a
fight there and ended up shooting a man. You said
(12:33):
that you shot him near the telephone pole that was
directly across right from there. How many times do you
think you shot hibouree three? Do you know what caliber
gun you had or anything like? Back then, I was
caring to I was going badly while I was covered
here in in nineteen nineties. I know who gave you
to remember that that was your sweet beat. That's what
(12:54):
they gave all of us. Meddle months. There's bag then
twenty food. The twenty five was running rapid, all of
you know, officers, I think these likely are the murders
that police referred to in the press conference after Von's
arrest when they mentioned crimes going back twenty years. But
it's a bit confusing because Vaughan says in the interrogation
that these murders took place around one and in the
(13:18):
account that the mayor wrote on Facebook, he said Vaughan
had confessed to murders in ninety four, and Vaughn isn't
great with dates, so maybe he changed his story at
some point as far as I can tell him, and
police have yet to connect these confessions to any reported crimes.
(13:50):
To briefly recap, after graduating high school, Vaughan returned to
Northwest Indiana in and he told police that around that
time he shot at least three people in Hammond. Then
Vaughn's life took a major shift, and in December, he
enlisted with the Marines. Vaughn was first shipped out to
(14:11):
San Diego, where he went through boot camp and got
combat training. Then he trained as a missile system operator
in El Passa, Texas, and from July to September he
was stationed in Cherry Point, North Carolina. Here's his lawyer, Cossage.
I think in North Carolina they got a big brawl
(14:33):
that he got hit and he with a chair, doesn't
remember what happened, and there were a couple of other
head injuries that he suffered in Vaughan received and other
than honorable discharge from the Marines. Let's just say that
in the military he got discharged because of an active
insubordination of some kind. It was really not related to
(14:54):
the case. It's the insubordination, that thing you mentioned earlier
with the head damage. No, no, I can't. You know
Darren didn't take orders. Well, you know, he he didn't
like being told what to do. And I think it's
gone throughout his entire life and goes all the way
back to age four. And at a certain point in
(15:14):
time they decided, okay, you don't want to take orders.
I guess we don't need you as a marine. And
he said, okay, fine. So that was that. How come
you get kicked out on disciplary behavior? Good soul is
you're bad at home? And they say, but what led
to this, uh discharge disappeared really disappearing. We don't fight,
(15:37):
nobody go home. So you just kind of went a
wall or whatever they call it. Or I told him
I was gonna be late coming back, but you know,
I still a wall. I don't be late. I'm in him.
I mean Geary, I'll get back. I mean, when I
you seem that a president, we're not at war. Vaughn
(15:58):
wasn't that interested in serving his country. Three. What he
really wanted was to die in the battlefield Vauntel detective Forward.
He'd taken out a big life insurance policy with the
hopes of dying in combat and then giving the insurance
settlement to his younger brother, Reginald that's already not joined.
Were supposed to be going to war. Okay, so you're
(16:21):
out in ninety three. Come back to Gary, come back
to hammn to Hammond, to heaven. So I living right
for man. Her real life was managed. Sometime around this point,
von met the woman who'ld later become his wife. Good woman,
very guy until I'll find Merry a terrible person. She
(16:42):
believe it. Yeah, she knows I have a terrible temper.
She said, I'm a good guy, so I'll take care
of the house and take care of I'll just have
a terrible temper. It was an unusual relationship for sure.
Vaughn would have been around twenty two years old and
the woman, Maria, was fifty one, twenty nine years older
than him. Maria was an Italian immigrant with kids nearly
(17:06):
Darren's age. Shortly after Von's arrest, she told The New
York Times that she'd met Vaughan through some mutual friends.
She described him as quote intelligent, very relaxed, very nice
to everyone. But what Maria saw as kind and quiet,
her son ed interpreted differently. Had spoke to CNN shortly
(17:29):
after Darren's arrest. First of all, I didn't like it
for her to marry ad almost my age. Number one,
number two. He was just a strange guy. I walked
in and I would see him talking to himself and
you're saying hello, He's like hello and looked down to
the ground. He was always in the thought, always like
he had something else on his mind other than what
(17:49):
he was. When a person walks around talking to themselves
and looked like the answering himselves as long with him
and then he was just says that he killed the
people alight. He finally topped around just a couple of
years after he'd started dating Maria. Vaughn says he got
(18:11):
sucked back into the gang life when his old mentor,
Big E, was killed. Vaughn says that during the time
he's spending the Marines. The gangster disciples had fractured and
split up into small, competing clicks. There was no longer
any need for gang enforcers, and Vaughan felt like an outsider.
(18:33):
France killing France killing bro Nobody one murder place because
all the killing that will years were running the streets.
Vaughn says he struggled to adjust to this new gang hierarchy,
and Maria, his fifty year old girlfriend, struggled with his
(18:55):
return to criminal life. Things came to a head when
one of the other gang members got arrested. Somebody else
had busted on her. They thought that person was gonna
tell on me, and they thought I was gonna tell you.
They tried to murder me. Von says some gang members
jumped him and started beating him. They busted open his head,
(19:17):
but he got away. When he got home, Maria was
terrified when my head got busted open. She wanted me
to tell on everybody. I thought, that's not how it work.
She was high as the say about it. That's how
I ended up in Texas. To escape, Von and Maria
moved to Austin and they married in city hall in
(19:39):
front of a few friends. I got married in Texas. Yeah,
year because the one important I'm married to rant I
told you want to give marries you know alone another chick.
I'm arey because she was a lot with me. She
married a person didn't love her. Try to take care
of me. But I know who I am. We all
are super told like you know your hoss, son of
(20:01):
a bitch. But she is like, oh yeah, he'll always
protect us, right, That's how she moved Daddy. They'll go
out his way to protective. Actually, without her, you would
probably call me years ago because she gave me Vince.
You don't need to do this. You got good mind work.
And maybe Maria did provide Vaughan with some balance and stability,
(20:22):
because for a while it seemed like Vaughan's life was
getting back on track. Vaughn says he got a job
in Austin working for Tell Computers. You work for Dell Computers.
What did you do assembly with the Futers together program
in Texas? Yeah? Nice? I work for Deal, I work
for Thanks, I worked I worked for some nice complet
(20:45):
to come. Maria's son ed though, remembered it souring quickly.
You know how it is when you first moved some
place as a new little relationship. He probably was in
the happiest moment of his life. I don't know, he
got some lady to marry him, Okay, but after that,
you know, I think he works for a chimp agency,
that kind of working on the tail. They fired him,
(21:07):
you know, and from that moment on he went down ill.
He became a creepy dude. You know, he wandered around
at nights. My mom didn't think und strange about it
about his mom her both friend or husband, whatever you
want to call him. He's running around at nighttime on runbird. Mom,
you know what kind of neighorhood that is. That's a
prostitution store. He was a strange dude. He was doing
(21:31):
something They need to be checking here at Austin. He
might have been doing something more than just that long gerard,
as we'll get into in the next episode. Von did
have at least one victim in Austin, and there are
cold cases in Austin that are worth exploring as well.
But while Maria's son Ed identifies Vaughn's firing from Dell
(21:51):
as the start of Von's downward spiral, Von himself identifies
another movement. It's the point where he snapped the incident
he could ever come back from. Sometime around the year
(22:19):
two thousand, Vaughn and Maria moved back to Gary. Vaughn
told Detective Forward he'd returned for a family obligation. I
came home because with another answer, didn't happened. I just
want to know Cuss got killed. We all came home.
The whole family came home. Let's just say, you said
it's your cousin that got killed. Right? Why did that
make everybody move home? Because who retaliation? Sound? Who was
(22:45):
that they got killed? Trying to think what they called
you don't know your cousins thinks, So I told him
I'm not family orientated. I only came back because my
other cousin they asked me to come back. At first,
it might sound like Von's bullshitting when he says he
doesn't know his cousin's name, But remember Von didn't meet
any of his family until he was twelve. Still, his
(23:09):
shaking this with these kind of details makes it hard
to pin down exactly where he was at a given time.
Von stepsister, Regina, says that after he graduated high school
in she lost touch with him, really got close back
two thousands I broke off my engagement. He stayed with
me for two months. I told you know, Dally appear.
(23:31):
He moved out. Regina says that at the time, Vaughan
was unhappy with his marriage. He was thirty two then
and wanted to have a kid, but his wife, Maria
was now over sixty. Maria told The New York Times
that this was when the relationships started to fall apart.
She said, quote, I didn't want to be with him anymore.
(23:53):
He had single friends. There were signs that he was
going with somebody else, and Maria was right. Von had
told his step sister that he'd met another woman, that
he was in love with her, and that his wish
to have a child was coming true. He had gotten
his new girlfriend pregnant. Vaughn's new girlfriend was a woman
(24:16):
named Sharita. She liked that he was smart and didn't
drink or do drugs. She told The Daily Mail that
his idea of a night out was going to Barnes
and Noble and reading books, usually science fiction or Harry Potter.
Sharita new Vaughn was married, but he and Maria were
living separately at that point, and he told Sharita that
(24:39):
he had only gotten married in the first place because
he hated being alone. But as Sharita and Vaughn's relationship progressed,
she learned that Vaughan had a dark side. He'd get
jealous easily, he didn't want her having her own friends,
and he became increasingly controlling. Sometimes he would lock her
(24:59):
in side the house when he went to work. She
said that one time, when they were visiting her mother's house,
he hog tied her and covered her mouth with duct
tapes so she couldn't scream. Sharita realized she had to
get out of the relationship, but when she would try
to end things, Von would threaten her and her mother.
(25:20):
One night, Von made Sharifa go out on a walk
with him. He took her out to a desolate part
of Gary and surrounded by abandoned buildings, he told her,
I could easily make you disappear. Accounts of what happened
next in Von and Sharitha's relationship are hazy. I tried
(25:43):
to reach out, but I couldn't get in contact with
her and her One published interview in The Daily Mail
doesn't address this point, but it appears that in two
thousand four, Sharitha and Vaughan had their child, but shortly
after the birth, something happened and the child died. And
around this same time, Tretha escaped from the abusive relationship,
(26:05):
left Vaughn and went into hiding. And this is where
Von says he snapped. He became enraged and blamed Tretha
for the child Stath because just snapped it that moment,
because we allowed the child and we're going through that
all morning period. She was out getting high and took
my money to the dope man. I was like, that's
(26:27):
just too bad. Damn what how like fuck if you
want to funk up like this, We're just gonna get
this ship over with. But we all went back out
of control again. I never made him back. And once
you I don't know how to flame. If y'all y'all
don't have the same merger, no way for me to
blame the murder rages. Once you started killing again, it
(26:48):
becomes it's like any other day. It's like if I was.
I'm not an alcoholic, but if I were and I
started to drink, You're off to the races, right. That's
basically because you have the urge the hunt. Some people
I talked to say they don't understanding, Like I went
to talk to a therapist, but he wanted too much
(27:09):
now because he said he had to report all the primes.
You know what I'm saying, So you can't. Really it's hard.
It would definitely be hard to explain your problem to
somebody who had so you can't go. I need to help.
What's your problems? Like killing people? He said, well, have
you killed emybody? And that's when their discussion is going
to get little fund next time on algorithm boost the
(27:36):
gas fight and they had the whole build and filled
with gas. I tried to take the girl on fire
and being on fire and go to building up all
the same kind Sometimes you went to scenario had to
went different than two thousands four and maybe some people
would still be alive. If you look at like police stories,
the police stories are almost always told from the perspective
(27:57):
of catching the wrong tour. My story starts, okay, you
caught him, Now what you know, what's the rest of
the story. I feel I should have got locked over. Yeah,
I'll beat her by right, Well, all right, standard y'all
call it right, but we don't call it right. Histories
like you pay here, So what is she complaining about.
(28:22):
This episode was written and produced by me Ben Keie
Brick Algorithm is executive produced by Alex Williams, Donald Albright,
and Matt Frederick. Production assistance and mixing by Eric Quintana.
The music is by Makeup and Vanity Set and Blue
Dot Sessions. Thanks to Christina Dana, Miranda Hawkins, Jamie Albright,
(28:44):
Rima L. K Ali, Trevor Young, and Josh Thane for
their help and notes. Hey, I hope you're continuing to
enjoy the show. If you do have any information about
Darren Vond or crimes that you think might be related
to this case, or if you just questions or comments
that you want addressed on the podcast, please call and
(29:04):
leave me a voicemail at a DAD eight five zero
one three zero nine. That's a D eight five zero
one three three zero nine. You can also reach out
to me on Twitter. I'm at Ben Underscore Key Brick.
That's b E N Underscore k U E B R
I C H. And that contact info is also available
(29:28):
in the show notes for the episode. Thanks
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