Episode 9 - The Good Samaritan, The Lying Husband and The Hit & Run

In 1999, 21 year-old college student Justine Swartz was working as a cashier at Lowes to pay her way through school. Justine’s dream was to be an Elementary school teacher. Soon she met and hit it off with 26 year-old Eric Abshire, a former Marine who was a manager at the same store. After a six year courtship Eric proposed in 2005, and they were married in 2006. Shortly after the wedding, Justine began to pull away from her family who sadly had no idea how dark Justine’s world was about to become. 

Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.com

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
Crazy and Love is the true crime podcast that tells
love stories with a twist that he was still in
love with his ex, but could kind of explain why
he was hesitant to marry someone else. Sometimes. The twist
of a knife police's theory is that he test her
of the car so later he can go back to
the lot, take the car, and then use that car
to mow down Justine. Just because things start off with

(00:23):
once upon a Time doesn't mean everyone lives happily ever after.
This is Crazy and Love, the production of Katie Studios
and I Heart Radio. I'm Courtney Armstrong, a true crime
producer at Katie Studios, joined by fellow producers Stephanie Ledecker,

(00:43):
Jeff Shane, and Beth Greenwalt. We've all worked for years
on various crime podcasts and TV series, and as crime
producers we talk murder all the time. One thing we've
noticed is just how many of them stem from love.
We're exploring the story of the good Samaritan, the lying husband,

(01:03):
and the hit and run. In the rural town of
Blue Ridge, Virginia, lived Justine Schwartz. She was a petite
woman with blonde hair and blue eyes, and friends compared
her to Barbie, but Justine never wanted to be a
living doll. She was driven and focused on working hard
in college. At the age of twenty one, while working

(01:24):
as a cashier at Lows, she made Eric Abshire. Eric
was a former marine who dreamt of owning his own
construction business. At twenty six, he was still working to
save money for his goal, and at the time he
was the manager at the same Lows that Justine worked at.
Justine was attracted to Eric immediately. She described him as strong, decisive,

(01:48):
and determined. She told her friends that she respected him
and that that was very important to her. Justine was
the quintessential good girl, hard working and rarely drinking. On
the other hand, Eric was a bad boy. He skipped
college and admitted to picking fights in bars for fun.
In the beginning, it seemed like Barbie had met her ken.

(02:10):
After six years of dating, Eric proposed to Justine with
a beautiful five thousand dollar diamond ring at the end
of two thousand five. For a young couple who was
trying to save money, the ring seemed outside their budget,
but Justine loved it. On two thousand and six, the
pair got married on top of a hill overlooking the

(02:30):
vast Virginia landscape. It was a truly beautiful ceremony filled
with family and friends. Here's Jeff. Our goal is always
to shine a light on injustices and bring attention to
stories that we feel need to be heard. In our work,
we've noticed that many of these crimes stem from the
same thing, love, and that's why we decided to call

(02:52):
together some of the most egregious, shocking, and terrifying stories
of relationships that took deadly turns. Our hope is to
not only raise awareness about the victim and what happened
to them, but also help listeners learned to look out
for some of the warning signs in toxic situations that
arise in their own lives. Justine and Eric dated for
six years, and that might seem like a long time,
but it's actually only a little bit longer than the average.

(03:16):
We did a little research and I was surprised to
learn that most couples date for almost five years before
getting married. Yeah, that's longer than I would have expected.
And I think in this particular relationship, it might have
taken that amount of time for them to get married
because Eric was adamant that he did not want to
get married to Justine. He had previously been married and
already had two kids, and so doing it again was

(03:38):
really just not in his plan. Justine, on the other hand,
really wanted to have kids. She always dreamt of being
married and being a mother. The couple went back and
forth about this issue in the relationship that even broke
up a few times, until after six years of dating,
Eric finally relented and proposed Beth. Do you know what
the couple was up to as they were planning this wedding.

(03:58):
Justine just got her dream job at an elementary school,
you know, she was a kindergarten teacher. And Eric was
really doing all this research to try and start up
his construction business. So it kind of seems like Justine
and all these plans for her life, get married, have kids,
have this job, and Eric was acquiescing and giving her
what she wanted, which was creating this dream life that

(04:19):
she always planned. He had already been married, he already
had two kids. You know, he didn't want to do
it again, but she wanted more than anything else to
have a family and to be a wife. So I
think he realized he had given to keep her. Yeah,
I read that when he proposed, he kind of had
the ring box and he kind of just said, you win,
let's do it romantic, but he seems like he was

(04:40):
maybe really determined to make this work. He bought her
this beautiful five thousand dollar engagement ring, and so he
really went above and beyond and got her her dream ring,
which speaks to maybe how serious he was about being
married to her. May have been less about the actual
wedding itself and getting married, and maybe more about the
expense of having a full, blowing up wedding, which he

(05:01):
maybe had had before. While for most couples, a wedding
in the newlywed stage is supposed to be the happiest
time of their lives, but for Justine and Eric, there
were immediate cracks. Justine's parents remember that at the wedding
she seemed removed and almost down. She certainly was not

(05:22):
a blushing and giddy bride, and Eric didn't even invite
his children to the wedding. Furthermore, following the reception, Eric
left on his motorcycle, leaving his new bride to spend
a night in the hotel suite alone. After they were married,
Eric immediately made plans to start building a new home
for Justine and him to live in. While building their

(05:45):
new home, the pair rented a small center block house
on Fredericksburg Road in Rutgersville, Virginia. It was nestled in
a heavily wooded area. Justine's sister Lauren, said it felt
like Justine was starting to pull away from her family
and friends. She stopped calling them as much and didn't
respond to text messages as often. She also wasn't going

(06:07):
to as many family events as she used to. When
Lauren confronted her sister about it, Justine assured her that
everything was okay. She claims she was just very busy
with work and building the new home with Eric. Here's Jeff.
What it looks like is that this is a classic
sign of Eric trying to isolate Justine, which is a

(06:28):
telltale sign of domestic abuse, from removing her from family
events to driving a wedge between people that she once loved.
Justine's family said they never liked Eric because it seems
like he wanted such different things out of life. Her
mom also said that Eric never seemed like he was
the one for Justine. According to loved ones, Eric was controlling.
There was one time, when Justine even rejected it okay

(06:49):
if Rosa's her friends had gotten her. Her explanation, Eric
doesn't like when you give me gifts, but they were
loving and supportive of Justine, so wanted to go along
with the person that she loved, Yeah, Jeff. Her family
felt adamant that Eric was bad news, but other family
members felt the opposite. Justine's cousin remembered that Justine was
always happy and smiling, and Eric's older brothers said that

(07:10):
despite the cramped quarters of this home, they made it work.
Why were they living in such a small house anyways?
The money was certainly an issue for the couple. We
were doing research and it definitely shows that Justine and
Eric were a bit underwater. Justine had some debt coming
into the relationship from graduate school, but very quickly they
hit troubled times financially. Justine had asked her dad for

(07:34):
forty dollar loan. When she asked her dad for the loan,
he said that he heard the desperation in her voice,
but he couldn't do it. I looked into it, and
Justine's parents were pretty successful. Her dad was a vice
president for a telecommunications firm and her mother owned an
upscale culinary boutique, so perhaps Eric thought they had enough
money to loan out. Eric was having problems getting a

(07:54):
bank loan. He said it was because of his divorce
and issues with his ex wife and her credit debt.
Justine's credit cards were completely maxed out and her checks
were beginning to bounce, and she began withdrawing money from
a retirement account that she had been saving. And it
also turns out that Justine had to buy her own
engagement ring, which is extremely significant. Wait, that beautiful five

(08:17):
engagement ring that Eric gave her, she paid for. She
purchased it herself. That's like insult to injury. It's like,
you don't want to really marry her. He probably was like,
get yourself a ring and I'll do it. It might
be antiquated to look at it this way, but the
man should pay for the engagement ring. That's just traditionally
what happens. And so for someone who wanted this traditional
life like Justine, that was probably a big blow and

(08:40):
kind of embarrassing and also a bit of a tell
because by all accounts, Justine had a very structured background,
especially financially speaking, So for her to engage in something
that was going to put her more in debt was
also considered out of character. She also led to her
family about it, which is very telling. On November two,

(09:01):
two thousand and six, justine colleague said she looked distraught
at school. According to them, Justine's eyes were swollen shut,
her face was flushed, and it looked like she had
been crying. Justine didn't seem like herself, wearing sunglasses inside,
not talking to fellow teachers, and leaving right when the
bell rang. Hours later. She would be dead early the

(09:27):
following morning, on November third, two thousand and six, Eric
spoke to the police in a panic. On November first,
two thousand and six, Eric called the police in a panic.
Justine had been hit by a car on a Desolate road.
When officers arrived, Justine was dead. Eric filled an officials
on how she ended up there. According to him, Eric

(09:50):
came home that night and had a fight with Justine.
She said she needed to cool off and went for
a drive. She then called Eric with car troubles. He
told her to wait there, that he would come and
get her on his motorcycle. When he arrived ten minutes later,
she was about two hundred yards from her car. Dead,
Eric told police that, shocked, he picked up Justine's body

(10:14):
and put her in his lap. According to him, Eric
stayed with her like that for some period of time. Then,
despite having a cell phone in his pocket, he ran
to knock on doors, begging someone to call nine one.
When later asked why he didn't use his own phone
to make the call, Eric told police he was stressed

(10:34):
and forgot he had it. The crash was being looked
at as a hit and run. Justine was very close
with her parents, and when they got a call notifying
them that Justine was dead, they were devastated. However, that
sorrow turned to confusion as they learned more about the
circumstances surrounding her death. The way Justine died just didn't

(10:57):
make sense for variety of reasons, the first being why
was Justine out so late, walking on a desolate road
by herself? The teacher was afraid of the dark, so
afraid that her parents had one said, she was scared
of her own shadow. The idea that she would be
on this dark, twisty road, let alone get out of
her car on that freezing called night, just made no sense. Furthermore,
Justine's keys, cellphone, purse, and even a flashlight were found

(11:19):
on her two thousand and two Mustang. Why would she
not have brought those with her when she left the car.
The community of Blue Ridge, Virginia, a buzz with the
tragic story, was starting to cast a shadow of doubt
on the so called hit and run. Two days after
Justine's memorial service, her mother was eating at a local
diner when a waitress cryptically told her that Justine was

(11:42):
not killed in a hit and run. The waitress told
Justine's mom that she was murdered and Eric was the
prime suspect, while the waitress had no way of knowing
for sure. It was this type of gossip that quickly spread. However,
police did not have enough evidence to charge Eric with
any crime, so for a time, it was just small

(12:04):
town chatter. According to the autopsy, Justine died of blood
forced trauma and severe blood loss. She had a d
thirteen external injuries on her body. However, there were some
clear inconsistencies. According to the lead pathologist of the State
Medical Examiner, there was no gravel, sand, grit or debris

(12:27):
in any of Justine's wounds. Also, the fractures in her
legs were not consistent with being hit by a car.
On top of that, the injuries to her chest, head,
and pelvis would be very unusual to find in someone
struck by a car. Officials noted that Justine's injuries, particularly
her scalp and facial lacerations, would have caused profuse bleeding,

(12:48):
leaving lots of blood at the location where Justine was killed,
but police found just a small amount of blood at
the scene. Eric shared his concerns to the police about
catching the driver. Here's a portion of the audio. Whoever
did captive breasts away from Wow. So Eric knew right

(13:09):
away that there wasn't a lot of evidence in the
so called hit and run and was worried that it
would hinder the investigation. I feel like you could take
this two ways. The first thing that he was interested
in finding the killer. The other interpretation is that he
was just checking to see how much police actually knew,
hoping that the lack of evidence would stall their efforts
to catch the killer because maybe he was involved. We're

(13:31):
going to take a quick break. We'll be back in
just a moment. Here's Beth. Police had Justine's car checked
out by several independent technicians, and all of them said

(13:53):
the same thing. They were unable to find anything wrong
with it. And I believe one of the officers at
the scene even said that he put the key and
started and put into gear and it was operating just fine.
It had gas in the tank and again it quickly
started several times. Battery was fully charged. There weren't any
loose spark plugs or connections, and according to the mechanics,

(14:13):
Justine's car had no mechanical defects which would have caused
it to break down, So it didn't really make sense.
That seems like a major lie. He told the police
that she said the car was broken down, but the
car is not broken down. He's building an alibi. You
also have inconsistencies to her injuries, and now you have
inconsistencies to the story because the car was fully functioning.

(14:36):
I would imagine that would immediately point the finger at
Eric as at least a person of interest. Additionally, as
detectives looked into the couples financial situation, it turns out
it was much worse than anyone ever thought. And it
wasn't just a few credit cards here and there that
were maxed out. It was literally every credit card that
the couple had. And furthermore, Eric was actually eighty five
thousand dollars in debt and for someone who is supposed

(14:59):
to be sponsible, which is one of the things Justine
loved about him, this is egregious. He's trying to start
a business, he's trying to start a life, and he's
almost a hundred dollars in debt. That doesn't add up,
and that also was a bit of a red flag
to authorities. So police began looking into Eric's movements basically
everywhere he had been prior to Justine's death, and his

(15:19):
ex the woman he had been married to and had
two children with. Her name is Allison. That's when she
came into the picture because she told officials that in
the days leading up to the death, Eric had called
Allison forty three times and on one call, specifically, at
eleven forty six pm the night of Justine's death, Eric

(15:41):
of course called Allison, and on that call, she claims
that he asked her if she would ever be with
him again, and she responded by saying definitely not, not
as long as you're married. And then seventy minutes later,
Justine was dead. So It's like he has a fair
amount of motive, you know, between financial problems and maybe

(16:03):
being in love with his ex wife. There's a lot
of reasons why Eric would want Justine dead on the
side of the road. And according to research by the FBI,
money is actually one of the top motives to murder.
And if he was pining for his X and it
was the only woman he was married to, it could
kind of explain why he was hesitant to marry someone
else if he was still in love with his ex.
Right back, you mentioned that Justine had asked her dad

(16:25):
for a loan, and now when you know that Eric's
eight dollars in debt, that request now kind of you
can look at that in a different light, like, was
she being put up by her husband to ask her
dad for that? And then when he said no? Did
Eric start to get desperate? If she was no longer
an a t M, if she was no longer providing
resources for him to open up his construction business, maybe

(16:47):
she wasn't abuse to him anymore. I wonder if he
stood to gain financially off of her death. Police continued
to look into Eric's life and discovered that he stood
to profit greatly off of his wife's death. Following their wedding,
Eric took out insurance policies on Justine that totaled one
point five million. He was the sole beneficiary. One of

(17:11):
the policies specifically granted a payout if there is an
accident involving an uninsured motorist. A hit and run would
fall under this umbrella. Detectives also found an insurance policy
on Justine that they believe had a forged signature in
Justine's name. While the case against Eric began to build,
it wasn't enough to make an arrest, but the more

(17:32):
police learned about Eric, the more he looked less like
a grieving husband and more like a conniving killer, adding
to their suspicion. Eric was not at all helpful during
the investigation. Here's a portion of a recording of him
being interviewed by police. The question, is any reasoning for that?

(17:59):
You know? They're at pointless to take forward. In this interrogation,
the police officer asks Eric if they needed it, would
he take a polygraph? Eric says no. That police officer
asks why, and he says, because they're inadmissible in court,
so it's pointless to even do one. He's not wrong.
According to the Virginia state law, polygraph tests cannot be
used as evidence in court. They are inadmissible in court,

(18:21):
but they also are viewed as a real indication of
a person's desire to be helpful to authorities, and although
they're not admissible, the findings are helpful for authorities at
the bare minimum. If you know you didn't do it,
taking a polygraph and passing it would probably take you
out of the line of fire for authorities to be

(18:43):
investigating you, so you would, of course do it. Polygraph
society just doesn't seem like he was really being of
assistance or have a driver or a passion to figure
out what happened to her, And that to me is
really strange. You lose the person that you know to death,
do us part. She died under such a horrific circumstances,
wouldn't Eric want to know what happened to her? And
that's a real tell about his character in fact, to

(19:06):
your point, bath after Justine's death, her friends and family
began comparing stories, and these stories they referred to as
quote violent Eric stories, and one family member remembers a
story about Eric storming into the apartment and he apparently
shoved Justine against Wall. Her other friends said that before

(19:29):
the wedding, Justine actually told her that she was afraid
of Eric, which is really hard to do. And there
were also always these rumors that Eric was actually cheating
on Justine. We also did some digging and found that
in two thousand and two, Eric had been charged with
malicious wounding. Malicious wounding basically means causing someone serious physical injury.

(19:49):
The charges stemmed from an issue that Eric had had
with his ax Alison. He claimed that it was in
self defense, but police clearly didn't see it that way.
The malicious wounding charge from July two and two was
certified to a grand jury before it was eventually dropped
after the victim moved away and left no forwarding address.
It's also important to note that Justine's parents found out
about these charges just one day after their daughter died.

(20:12):
The abuse wasn't just physical. Justine's close friend also remembered
a time when they visited Eric while he was working
at a local best buy. During the visit, he called
Justine quote stupid and dumb multiple times. Eric also had
a terrible nickname for his loving life. The thing so

(20:35):
Aside from this, there was also some other things that
started to come out that would make it look pretty
bad for Eric. About two weeks after Justine was killed,
a potential new clue surface. Apparently a black Ford Expedition
STV was reported stolen from a local car dealership. The
car was reported stolen on October, just five days before
Justine's fatal hit and run. And now this might seem irrelevant,

(20:57):
but it comes back into play because on November eleven,
almost two weeks after Justine's death, that stolen SUV was
found in an empty storage unit located in the same
storage facility where Eric was renting a unit. That storage
facility is located also just a mile from the spot
where Justine was found dead. When the police found the car,
they immediately went to the dealership and questioned who had

(21:18):
the car and how did the car get stolen? And
according to the dealership's records, the last person to test
drive the car before it was stolen was Eric Abshire
on October. The dealership officials told police that he took
the car for a test drive and after he returned
back to the dealership, he said that he lost the key.
They accepted this and let him go on his way,
but a few days later that STV was stolen up

(21:39):
the lot. Police began to believe that this expedition was
the same car that killed Justine. He actually was plotting
this and he stole the car. Police's theory is that
he tested her of the car to steal the key
so later he could go back to the lot, take
the car, stash it at his storage unit, and then
use that car to mow down Justine. What don't that

(22:00):
be a real tell to police, or at least a
starting place to look into this. If they have identified
him as the last person to have driven that car,
wouldn't they just go straight to his house and do
an investigation. It seems like a lot of circumstantial evidence
and nothing concrete at this point, but the police would
eventually get something that was much more concrete. Let's stop

(22:23):
here for another quick break. A major break in the
case came in April two, nine, five months after the
night Justine was killed. A man named Cecil Roebuck was

(22:45):
watching the news and remembered something that could possibly help
the police. The story is kind of confusing, so I'll
try to keep it on both Cecil recalled that on
the night Justine died, he was lost on an unfamiliar,
dark country road. He was turning around in a driveway when,
according to him, out of nowhere man flagged him down
asking for help. The man told Cecil that his car
was about to run out of gas and asked him

(23:05):
if he could follow him to a gas station in
case he ran out of gas on the way. Cecil
was lost, so this was great because the gas station
was on the main road, so he could help the
man but also get himself back on track. Cecil pulled
out and began to follow the car. A few miles
down the road, the man he was following pulled over
and said that his car ran out of gas. He
asked Cecil if he could just drive him home instead.

(23:26):
Cecil told the man he didn't mind taking him to
get gas and then bringing him back to his car,
but the man insisted his house was so close by.
Cecil then told police that he dropped the man off
at a small cinder block house on Fredericksburg Road. He
was also able to positively identify the man as Eric Abshire,
so it seems like Eric was driving two or from
the scene of the crime and needed to ditch one

(23:46):
of the cars and you, Cecil do it. It's really
wild to think that Eric would have this whole plan
to kill his wife, and part of that plan would
be to rely on the idea that a stranger would
come by and help him finish the job. The way
I justified that in my head is that the original
plan was for Eric to just do everything on foot,
but he got tired, perhaps his adrenaline was running out,
and he saw cecilso just decided to get a ride

(24:08):
and make the whole name much easier. The defense argued
that the prosecution star witness had a reason to lie.
There was a fifty dollar reward for information offered by
Justine's parents, and that Cecil needed money and was also
hoping to receive favorable treatment from prosecutors in connection with
two charges he was facing for a different matter. However,
Cecil testified that he didn't seek or receive any special

(24:29):
treatment for his tip about Eric. Such a weird move, though,
if you're a killer, to actually have somebody a be
able to identify you and also be able to identify
you in and your home. But he's also spent so
much of his life lying, you know, he lied to Justine.
He lied to his acts. He's a liar and so
he probably thought they'll just believe this one other lot.

(24:51):
And you know, he's gotten away with it so far,
so why wouldn't he continue to get away with everything?
He says. Finally, police also looked at Eric's cell phone
records to herman his whereabouts the night of Justine's death.
He had previously told police that he was visiting his
mother in the hospital until about PM before coming home. However,
his phone didn't ping off any tower near the hospital.

(25:15):
In fact, according to the records, he was in the
vicinity of his home and the scene of the crime. Also,
detectives found that between November two and November three, Eric
made three phone calls. Just to note, the average person
makes around five phone calls a day. Eric clearly talked
on the phone a lot, but in between twelve o

(25:36):
eight am and one nine am on November three, he
didn't use his cell phone at all. Now, in a
normal circumstance that might not seem weird, but for Eric,
who was on the phone all the time, it was strange.
This time period was right when Justine died. Police surmised
that he couldn't be on his phone because he was
busy killing her. Also, remember Eric told police it took
him a while to call nine on one because he

(25:56):
was running around trying to find someone who could call
for him. He had supposedly forgotten his cellphone was in
his pocket. To someone who uses their phone three ninety
seven times in one day just suddenly forget they have one.
As we also know, cell phone records are so often
a lynch pin and nailing a suspect, and as we
see here, Eric Abshar was no different. Cell Towers and
collogues don't lie. It's impossible for even the most skilled

(26:18):
liar to get around them. With all of the pieces
in place, officials arrested Eric and charged him with murder.
This was nearly four years after Justine Abshire's death. The
prosecution laid out their theory. Eric beat Justine to within
an inch of her life. He then drove her to

(26:40):
a desolate road in her car. From there, he ran
a mile to the storage unit and got the stolen expedition,
which he used to run Justine over. He then drove
the car back to the storage unit and on his
way home, hitched a ride with Cecil Roebuck Once he
was home, Eric drove back to the scene on his
motorcycle and called on one one. The case was built

(27:03):
around the idea that Eric murdered Justine for monetary gain.
He ended up filing for bankruptcy in two thousand and nine.
The jury also heard how in the months leading up
to the fatal night, Justine had changed. She had once
been kind and loving, but became with John and a
shell of her former self. She was under Eric's abusive

(27:24):
and controlling spell. Additionally, the prosecution had an expert testified
that Justine's cause of death was not from being hit
by a car, but rather being strangled to death. At
five pm Tuesday, October two thousand and eight, a jury
of eight women and four men found Eric Abshei are
guilty of first degree murder. He was sentenced to life

(27:48):
in prison, with their daughter's killer finally behind bars. Justine's
parents have urged domestic violence victims to come forward before
it's too late. If you're enjoying Crazy in Love, listen
to seasons one and two of the piked in Massacre,
another Katie Studio's production, and follow us on Instagram at

(28:08):
Katie Underscore Studios. Crazy in Love is produced by Stephanie
lie Decker, Beth Greenwald, Chris Graves, Lisa d Giovine, Jeff Shayne,
Tim Hamilton, and me Courtney Armstrong. Editing and sound designed
by Jeff Tis. Additional editing by Davy Cooper Wasser. Crazy
in Love is a production of I Heart Radio and

(28:29):
Katie Studios. For more podcasts from I Heeart Radio, visit
the i heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you
listen to your favorite shows.