Crossing the Line with M. William Phelps

In Part 2 of a special Crossing the Line, Phelps and his guests get into what actually happened to 13-year-old Abigail "Abby" Williams and 14-year-old Liberty "Libby" German on that February day down by the Monon High Bridge, in Delphi, Indiana–and who is, without any doubt, responsible for their brutal murders.

This, despite all of the social media vitriol proclaiming the man convicted, Richard Allen, is ...

The double murder of 13-year-old Abigail "Abby" Williams and 14-year-old Liberty "Libby" German, known more commonly as the Delphi Murders, is one the most high-profile true crime cases of the past ten years. The girls were last seen alive on the Monon High Bridge, part of the Delphi Historic Trails, in Delphi, Indiana. The case went cold for several years before Richard Allen was arrested and charged in 2022 with thei...

A small suburban town in Minnesota experiences an unspeakable tragedy, a horrific murder, changing the community forever–and the killer is caught, convicted, sent to prison, and then set free. 

Welcome to a bonus feature here on the Crossing the Line feed. I come across all sorts of stories while researching books, TV series, and my iHeartMedia podcast, Paper Ghosts, in addition to the ideas you send me. A...

The Hatfield/McCoy deadly neighbor feud set the bar for how some neighbors respond to each other when they do not get along and tensions escalate. Fast-forward 100 years and that same revenge-driven temperament has not evolved or changed much. Here, in this week’s case, two neighbors begin to feud--and what at first seems like an old dude fed up with a young dude, and nothing more than words being slung, soon turns dea...

A woman known as the Chameleon is crisscrossing the Atlantic Ocean, stealing identities and leading police on a wild goose chase, taunting them with letters and promises of “you’ll never catch me.” Then a dismembered body is discovered in the Florida Everglades one day and police believe they have a serial killer at large.

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A blended family, James and Kristen Brock, James’ five-year-old daughter and Kristen’s 17-year-old, Sarah Grace Patrick, seem to be living life on life’s terms, with a few bumps in the road, as the New Year, 2025, comes to pass. Then, on the morning of February 20, 2025, the five-year-old wakes up and discovers a horrific scene inside the house, setting off one of the most unnerving double murder investigations within ...

Not much needs to be said about this iconic true crime case to introduce it. Phelps gives the Black Dahlia murder of Elizabeth “Beth” Short the Crossing the Line treatment—with one shocking twist! A man who says he’s solved the case and has connected Short’s murder to a second homicide some 1600 miles away, in Kansas City.

Check out Eli Frankel's book, SISTERS IN DEATH, for more information about Black Da...

Tara Breckenridge is working as a waitress at a popular men’s club in downtown Houston when she goes missing one night after work. With a host of serial killers active in the region, and a litany of missing and murdered females, is Tara’s case part of the bigger picture, or, a one-off committed by someone she knows?

If yo...

A man is shot dead inside his vehicle in the middle of the street. He is an up-and-coming professional wrestler with big dreams and big love for friends and family. The case is perplexing to law enforcement, who catch their man almost immediately, and yet his justification for the murder is most baffling. 

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A well-loved doctor, Margo Prade, is found murdered inside her van in the parking lot of her office one morning. Her ex-husband, an Akron, Ohio, Police Department Captain, is questioned and provides an alibi, pleading with his colleagues to find her killer. So who killed this mother of two just as she was close to getting her life back on track after a contentious divorce?

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A young, pregnant Amish woman in upstate Pennsylvania, Rebekah Byler, is home one morning alone with her two toddlers. When her husband returns to the house near noon, he walks into a brutal scene—yet his two young boys are left unharmed. Is he telling the truth? Or is it a ruse to throw off investigators?  

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Everything in your life seems to be on a perfect pace. Successful career. Long term marriage. Two beautiful daughters. So why would Susan Winters, without any warning or indication, kill herself with a poison not generally associated with suicide? Law enforcement wondered the same thing—and reopened a closed death investigation, revealing the dark secrets behind a seemingly idyllic life.

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A family is on vacation, snapping photos at the Colorado National Monument when they stumble across the remains of a middle-age woman. Meanwhile, a woman 15 miles away is reported missing by her live-in boyfriend. Are the two cases connected? And how does Walmart and a package of hot dogs play into this case? 

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Susan Marable fell into hard times during the late 1980's. After a series of life-changing, tragic events, she moves from Aberdeen to Yakima, Washington, where her life spirals—and soon, Susan's family stops hearing from her. Robyn Peery, Susan’s sister, has spent her entire adult life searching for answers in her sister's disappearance--with no help from Yakima law enforcement. 

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