June 1, 2023 • 38 mins
16-year-old Skylar Neese was murdered by her two best friends in 2012, supposedly because of an argument over social media. What actually led these high school girls to commit such a violent act on a friend? We talk with podcaster and true crime writer M. William Phelps, host of 'Paper Ghosts' and author of books including ‘We Thought We Knew You’ and ‘Don’t Tell A Soul.'
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Speaker 1 (00:03):
You're listening to Facing Evil, a production of iHeartRadio and
Tenderfoot TV. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast
are solely those of the individuals participating in the show
and do not represent those of iHeartRadio or Tenderfoot TV.
This podcast contains subject matter which may not be suitable
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Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hello, everyone, welcome back to Facing Evil. I'm Rasha Pacuerero
and I'm Evet Genteeley. And this week we are talking
about the death of Skyler Nice, a teenager who was
murdered by the closest people to her, her two best friends, yes,
her two teenage best friends. And it's absolutely heartbreaking and
(00:51):
I'm sure everyone is wondering, how could this happen? Why
did this happen? That is the question that we're always
asking why. But today we are so happy to welcome
back our friend em William Phelps, investigative journalists and host
of the podcast Paper Ghost and Crossing the Line. Yes,
(01:15):
we like to call him Matthew, even though most other
people call him Phelps, and we're really looking forward to
talking to him today. But first our producer Trevor is
going to walk us through today's case. Ten years ago,
Skyler Nice came to this spot and never returned.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Now a decade later, her memory lives on and those
who knew her best.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
We never want anyone to go through what we went through.
It's the worst hell I've ever ever been through, no.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
Matter what she says now. But she was young and
she didn't know better. I'm sorry. Five and ten year
olds know not to commit murder.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Skyler Nice was a sixteen year old girl from Star City,
West Virginia, who was stabbed to death by her two
closest friends and left to die in a remote area
one state away. Skyler was described by most as a
good girl with nice friends and two loving parents in
a pleasant home in suburban West Virginia. She was just
(02:16):
eight years old when she met her best friend, a
girl named Sheila Eddie. Eddie had a troubled relationship with
her own parents, but grew to be very close with
Skyler's parents, who described her as a second daughter. Their
freshman year, Sheila transferred to Skyler's high school, and they
both started hanging out with a third girl, Rachel's Chouf.
(02:36):
The trio were inseparable, but when Skyler and Rachel started
getting close, Sheila got jealous. Skyler and Sheila began having
public arguments on Twitter, and in a tweet in August
of twenty eleven, Skyler alluded to having dirt on both friends.
She may have been alluding to a recent night when
she allegedly witnessed Sheila and Rachel making out. After raiding
(02:58):
Rachel's mom's liquor case. Sheila and Rachel now both turned
on their former friend and tried to smear her reputation
at school. They told classmates she was annoying and clinging,
but then they went a step further planning her murder.
When some classmates overheard them talking in school, they were
sent to the principal's office, but then sent back to class. Then,
(03:22):
on July fifth, twenty twelve, Rachel and Sheila invited Skuyler
out for a late night drive while her parents slept.
Skyler snuck out and the three drove to a remote
area just over the West Virginia border into Pennsylvania. There,
Rachel and Sheila brandished knives and stabbed Skyler nice until
she was no longer moving. They then dragged her body
(03:45):
to a nearby creek and hid it under some sticks.
Rocks and dirt. Skuyler's parents were alarmed about her disappearance,
but Sheila told them they'd drop Skyler off a few
blocks down the street. After the late night hangout, months passed,
during which Sheila spent a great deal of time with
the Nice family, crying over Skuyler's disappearance, and even hanging
(04:07):
up missing persons posters around the neighborhood. At school, Sheila
and Rachel grew reserved and only hung out with each other.
When they were questioned by police, Rachel acted nervous, but Sheila,
on the other hand, acted quote perky, one officer said, quote,
She'd look you in the eye and speak matter of faculty. Finally,
(04:27):
in January of twenty thirteen, Rachel's chauf had a mental breakdown.
After going to a psychiatric ward, she confessed to the crime.
She then led the police to Skuyler's body. Sheila Eddie
was at Skuyler's parents when the discovery was made, and
she cried along with Skuyler's family. When the police asked
Rachel why they killed their friend, she simply replied, we
(04:50):
just didn't like her. The two girls were arrested. Sheila
was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life
in prison. Rachel was sentenced to thirty fe years in prison.
And so what happened to Skyler Nice? How did a
friendship between teenage girls turn into a bloody murder? And
how does this story reveal a troubling mental health crisis
(05:12):
for teenagers which often leads to violence.
Speaker 5 (05:20):
A few months ago, we talked about the case of
Michelle McNeil with the one and only m William Phelps,
who is the true crime author and host of the
podcast Paper Ghosts and Crossing the Line. We are back
with we like to call him Matthew is in the house.
(05:40):
We are so excited to have you back on facing
evil and you know today we're talking about Skylar Nice,
so we'll get into that in a little bit. But Matthew,
tell us, you know what's been going on, what's coming
up next for you. I know we were just talking about,
you know, the world that we live in and all
the crazy things that are happening. That really takes a
(06:02):
toll on us. But you know, you're such a deep, sensitive,
wise human being and I know you always push forward.
So what's new with you? Tell us what's new?
Speaker 3 (06:13):
I'm working on season four of Paper Ghosts, my limited
series podcast, and I'm just getting ready to head out
to the Ozarks. There's a case out there of a
young girl who went missing in the late eighties and
she was found some time later, and I'm looking at
a couple of other cases that are similar to it
(06:35):
that could be connected to hers. And there's cause at
the time, late eighties, early nineties, that area of the country,
the Midwest, if you will, there was a rash of
you know, young teen girls going missing and some of
them found, some not found. So this case is really interesting.
(06:58):
I have a suspect that I'm really focused on that
hasn't been named, and no one knows. Yeah, we'll see
where it leads. You know. It's always interesting when I
go out there and spend a couple of weeks and
start knocking on doors and talking to people. So I'm
looking forward to that. I have a few other podcasts
(07:20):
that I'm in the process of developing and producing and
things like that that are similar. You know, one of
them is very different, but mostly they're similar to what
I do, which is investigative journalism.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
It's funny since we last interviewed you, Matthew, I have
to tell you, like, you're one of our very first interviews,
and we've interviewed you know, several people since, and it
makes me think, especially like how you got into the
true crime genre and how you're still like moving your
way through it, like this has been a calling, I
think for all of us, because we just want to
(07:58):
see the light in the darkness in this world. And
I know that's exactly what you do. And the more
and more that we're in this I'm like, oh, we're
supposed to be here, and I just feel like you
do that every single day. And I just have to
say it's very very beautiful and you're an amazing example
of what one person can do.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
Well, thank you very much. I mean, I appreciate that.
I'm humbled by that. I was recently watching something and
it's a metaphor really for what you just said. So
when the sun goes down, it doesn't get dark, the
sky doesn't get dark. What it is, according to physicists
and scientists is the light from the stars we see
(08:41):
hasn't reached us yet. That's why they look dim. It
hasn't reached us yet, So it doesn't light up the earth.
When the sun goes around us.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
I love that, you know.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
And then when the sun comes out, we can't see
we can't see any of them. So that little tiny
bit of light heading towards the earth to shine, I
look for that little tiny bit of light, you know,
and see where I can. I can just get in there.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
And that's why we love you.
Speaker 6 (09:09):
Amen to that.
Speaker 5 (09:10):
It's just so interesting how you you know, like Russia said,
we have interviewed so many different people, but there's just
certain people when you know you're of like mind and
like spirit, and we've felt that way with you from
the get because this is a you know, as we know,
this is a hard industry, you know, to be in
to talk about.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
This, it's heavy, too heavy, shiite.
Speaker 5 (09:33):
Yeah, But like you know, like I said before, if
we can just open you know, one person's mind right,
or help someone heal and move upward and onward, or
solve a case, you know, like you.
Speaker 6 (09:47):
You know, with bringing justice.
Speaker 5 (09:50):
I mean, it's these these things are so important, so
important in this world.
Speaker 6 (09:54):
You know.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
Bringing answers to families is really rewarding. That that really
keeps me going when I get with a family and
I say, look, I've spent a couple of years here
on this and this is what happened. This is what
you're never going to hear because law enforcement doesn't have
the resources, they don't have the budget.
Speaker 2 (10:14):
So here you go, like, please do something with this.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
Yeah yeah, right now, I mean they can know that
at least they have some information about what happened. Yeah, right,
there's a why. And actually I was talking to a
prosecutor interviewing a prosecutor the other day and he was saying, look,
you know, I'm happy to talk with you because you know,
no one else is going to do anything with this,
(10:38):
so you know, I'm very happy to give you what
you need to find out what you can, you know,
And that's that's pretty gratifying for me after a long
career of doing this, you know that the trust Yeah yeah,
there's a lot of bullshit podcasts true crime, you know,
makeup and TikTok and all of this out there, so.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
Right, we're all of us are trying our best to
do ethical true crime. Yeah.
Speaker 6 (11:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
To get back to the case that we're talking about today,
like you mentioned, you know, finding out the why. So
let's talk about the case of Skyler Niece. This is
not unsolved. We do know who did this? But what
were your first impressions about this case, about this young
girl Skyler.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
I've written many books about teens and murder, teens who kill,
that sort of thing, so I'm very familiar with the
psychology and what's going on. Right. So, all of these cases,
this one especially, they're devastating. Right. These are people who
(11:48):
haven't lived a life yet.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Right, their brain's not even fully developed.
Speaker 6 (11:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
What struck me was a touching scene that I read
about the dad and her and a tea party. That
was very touching.
Speaker 6 (12:02):
King and the.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Punchline is that you know he he he asks her,
you can't reach the water faucet. Where you getting the
water from that you've been that I've been drinking And
she said, oh, the toilet.
Speaker 6 (12:15):
Right, that's right.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
That really shows you know, love, you know, the love
between between them all. But the other thing that stands
out to me but doesn't surprise me, is in all
of these cases, you have a leader and a follower,
and very very rarely that will a team kill by
(12:38):
his or herself. Right. They always there's always someone else connected.
There's always someone else involved. Many times there's more than
one involved. Yeah, Right, this case also struck me as
the I will say. I mean, I can't diagnose anybody.
I'm not a psychologist. But one of these girls is
(12:59):
bona fide so show path, the other isn't. That's that's
clear to me here, you know.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
And the behavior after the murder right with their family.
Speaker 5 (13:09):
Yeah, this case, right, it's so baffling when you think
(13:32):
about it, because you think about teenage girls and you
know they should just be having fun going to a prom,
you know, living their lives, not this heavy, heavy duty
jealousy and anger. But you see it so much. It's
like I think about the cases that you know, we've
worked on in the past with Conrad Roy, that particular
(13:54):
case where it's Michelle Carter, you know, and even the
Shonda Shaer case. You know, it's a leader and a
follower and someone gets incredibly upset and then get someone
else to join and does these horrible things. I mean,
it turns into a paradox of violence.
Speaker 6 (14:15):
Right.
Speaker 5 (14:16):
The mental issues that these children have gone through that
have led to this moment that has a lot to
do with it, don't you think.
Speaker 6 (14:25):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
Let me ask you both a question, Yeah, how do
you feel social media played in this case?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Particularly huge yes, it's huge, and I have to say full, full,
full disclosure. I have been on social media since my Space,
and for me, you know, it's always been something that's
very prominent in my life. But I joined as an adult.
You know, I'm forty four years old, and I think
(14:54):
I started. I was on my Space whenever it started,
and I was already in my late twenties. I was
not a teenager. I cannot even imagine what these girls
were going through. And we know that, you know, Twitter
at the time had a lot to do with it.
And now Twitter now for me, of course, in twenty
twenty three, is not my favorite place. It makes me
(15:15):
scared for my daughter, who's eleven. Yeah, yeah, right, So
we must all think that social media has a lot
to do with it, right.
Speaker 3 (15:22):
Particularly here I'm looking at Sheila Eddie yep, and how
she says I feel great right now, Skyler answers, this
is the best night ever, right, and you know she's
about to be murdered.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
Let me just back up. They're talking during the day
on social media. Other people are piping in, amping up
the conversation, right, so there's all these influences coming in
that are just invisible right, invisible influences, right, yeah, kind
of stoking the fire if you will, yeah, yeah, And
(15:56):
she says at one point, it really, this is Skyler.
It really doesn't take much to piss me off. Right.
She talks about how stress will be the death of her,
about being bored, and I looked at that and I thought,
it's the classic confluence of peer pressure, right, the symptoms
of peer pressure. An environment for someone so young, a
(16:19):
mind so young, kind of in a social pressure cooker,
keeping up with her friends, trying to fit in, trying
to be popular, trying not to be bullied. And then
on July fifth, twenty twelve, Shila and Rachel invite Skyler
to go out. And what struck me here is this.
They pack knives, paper towels, bleach things to clean up
(16:41):
with and to shovel.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
They meditated.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
This is not an impulsive decision. Now, I remember I
did the slender Man case and it involved same age kids,
three kids, same age, three girls, and one was a follower,
one was a leader. You know, they did the same thing.
They packed a knife, they went out into the woods,
same thing. I don't know that this sort of thing
(17:08):
happened in my.
Speaker 6 (17:08):
Day mine either, Matthew.
Speaker 5 (17:11):
I mean, I think social media plays a big part
in it, and I think television as well. You know,
I think, how do they know to go and get
bleach and do this and do that?
Speaker 3 (17:21):
You know.
Speaker 5 (17:22):
I just think that we're bombarded with with all of
this evil, like twenty four to seven, that it's available
to these young minds and unless the parents, you know,
and obviously a parent can't monitor everything.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Now, you can't keep the kids in a bubble.
Speaker 5 (17:41):
But when it comes to social media, like I don't
have children, but I can tell you this now, Like
my niece Lee Lani, it's like she's like, I want Instagram.
I'm not a mother. I'm not a mother, but I'm like, no,
definitely not no TikTok, no Instagram, not till you're one.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Yeah, that's great because with that stuff, the more you
look at, the more you get. So it has to
have an effect on the mind of someone so young.
But the question, I think, if we're facing evil, the
question becomes cannot push a kid over the edge right
(18:22):
and to commit some sort of violent act. And the
big question in this case is what you started with me?
Is the why?
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Why?
Speaker 6 (18:31):
Why?
Speaker 3 (18:32):
Yeah, there's just a couple of things also that stood
out to me when I went through the case, and
that was the murder itself. How you know, of course
they tackled her, started stabbing her, they did all of
that stuff, and she fought back, right, And then there's
the comment, but Sheila kept stabbing her until she was
no longer moving and her quote neck stopped making gurgling
(18:56):
sounds end quote. So for a child to use those words,
that detail is significant. It's significant in the fact that
it tells me how active, aware and completely in touch
with what is happening and what they are doing. In
order to make that observation and then later talk about it,
(19:19):
you are in the moment, you know what's going on.
You're not in some blind rage, you're not blacking out,
you know, you know exactly what you're doing and the
consequences of what is happening.
Speaker 5 (19:32):
So that's when we go back to and this is
the question, because there was no remorse, you know, after
this happened, Sheila was you know, confronting and you know, consoling,
I should say, the parents, and she knew what she did.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
As a sociopathic part right, so that.
Speaker 5 (19:51):
We could absolutely say Sheila is a sociopath without diagnosing.
Speaker 6 (19:56):
Of course.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Well, let's consider the situation for a minute. So what
you have is a true, unempathetic, cold person, And let's
look at what she's actually doing. She's in the family's house, Yeah,
consoling the family, handing out flyers, hanging up She's participating.
(20:17):
If we think back, who else did that?
Speaker 2 (20:20):
Michelle carter Yep.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
So it shows callousness, it shows deception, it shows well
thought out lies. Right, and it begins to borderline on
psychopathy and the characteristics of the sociopath. We can't deny that,
whether we're psychologists or not.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
It's there, yeah, right, yeah, right, it's.
Speaker 3 (20:41):
You know, you would look at it as sadistic, antisocial,
all of that stuff, all that bad stuff that goes
along with being a sociopath and being devious and manipulating
all the way until the end.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Right. And she was with the family when Skuyler's body
was discovered.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
If I'm not mistaken, yeah, she's she counseled the family.
Yeah said how said how sorry she was?
Speaker 6 (21:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
But let's put our attention to and this happens in
every one of these cases. So when you have a
leader and a follower, the follower always cracks.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
Right, yeh, which is what happened.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Followers the one with remorse, with guilt, with a conscience,
and the follower always goes in and cuts that deal first, right, right,
And that's exactly what you have here, I.
Speaker 5 (21:30):
Think Rachel, you know, yes, she did, you know kind
of deal, but it like really started to weigh on
her her psychological, her well being, Like she couldn't she
couldn't hold that anymore.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
She couldn't function.
Speaker 6 (21:46):
Yeah. The other girl, you know, Sheila, it was like nothing.
Speaker 3 (21:51):
Because she didn't feel. Yeah, she has no capability and
no feeling of love of what we talk about a lot,
which is that empathy putting herself in the parent's position. Yeah,
and it's very common in teens who kill that one
of them is like that, it is, yeah, yeah, And
you know, let's go back into their lives and we
(22:13):
can see how that has an effect on it. Because
Rachel talks about having a good upbringing, you know, parents
who loved her. That's whereas Shila talks about not having that.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Right, Yeah, that factors into it, for sure.
Speaker 3 (22:28):
It's different wires and all these wires start to cross,
and it's very rare that that happens, and it's sad
all around.
Speaker 5 (22:35):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, Like you said earlier, especially when
it's it's young kids, you know, young minds that are
doing these god awful things and hurting other young people
that it's just so heartbreaking. It goes back to mental
well being, you know, because there's something you know where
(22:57):
she's not one hundred percent Well that's awful, right, Yeah, she.
Speaker 3 (23:01):
Had an eating disorder, she was depressed. Yeah, there was
a lot of factors going on.
Speaker 6 (23:06):
There, a lot of things happening when.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
Her Bodi's found Skyler. Sheila even posts on Twitter, worst
day of my whole life.
Speaker 6 (23:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
Wow, with Shila, it's clear that there is no why.
There is no why. What it is is she wanted
to get back at this girl for something we probably
will never know, no, Yeah, and instead of just unfriending her, right,
she decided violence and murder was the way to do that.
(23:38):
That she had to pay a price for whatever she did.
And you know there's people out in the world like that, unfortunately,
that that's what they choose, you know, they choose violence
over just walking away.
Speaker 5 (23:53):
But I think that's where social media comes in again,
you know, and we can talk about this all day long.
Because when you're putting your stuff out there on social media,
as you know Skyler and Sila and Rachel were doing
on Twitter and saying things, you're putting it out there
for an audience. So now it's not just between the
(24:15):
three of you of what's going on, but now it's
like a boxing match, you know what I mean. Now
you're putting it out there into the world, and people
are festering on that and creating this evil.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
No, there's been studies about crowds and how crowds react.
So crowds, you know, will react one person, then ten people,
then twenty people started reacting a certain way, the whole
crowd will start following them. Yeah, right, because oh my god,
oh my god. Whatever. So in this case, you have
it on social media. But again going back to Shila,
(24:50):
Shila was using social media as a cover. Basically, she
was putting out lies on social media to cover up
what she did, and she was probably getting a high
off that. I'm sure she was getting an adrenaline rush,
because the one thing that sociopaths need more than a
lot of things is stimulation. They need to be stimulated. Yeah,
(25:13):
and that's like here, you have Sheila interacting with the
girl's family, so she's that's stimulating to her. She'd walk
away from that house guaranteed. Look what I got away
with today, telling herself, Wow, what it would a fix?
You know, what a high see.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
And I'm still sitting here with the why. I'm still
like why. I mean, they were friends from the time
they were little kids. It's not like that, you know,
Sheila and Skuyler had just met. Rachel obviously was new
to the click. That's a really hard question to answer.
It could just be, you know how people are jealous,
and jealous turns into hurtful and evil, and you just
(25:55):
don't know, and you don't know what happened in her past,
Like you said, she didn't have the upbringing that Rachel had,
Like you never know what triggered in her brain as
a young child that set her in this direction. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (26:11):
I remember I had been interviewing a serial killer for
at the time, it was about six years, and I'd
often try to rope him into talking about God and
evil and good and this and that, just to get
his sense of it. And he didn't believe in God,
of course, and so I said, let's talk about evil.
(26:32):
And he said this was his comedy. He said, well,
if there is evil in the world, I'm it.
Speaker 6 (26:38):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (26:39):
So he knew, right, he says, if we're going to
use evil as a word to describe something, that's me wow.
And for him there was no why. There didn't have
to be a why. There were triggers. There were triggers,
you know, a woman said something he didn't like or
whatever triggered him. But there never was no why other
(26:59):
than the fact that at this is a decision he made. Yeah,
you know, I'm going to kill this woman today, end
of story. In Sheila's case, she made that decision. It's
clear that they made that decision a long time before
they took carried out this murder because of all the
things they took with them, the pre planning, the driving
(27:22):
out to the area, and then everything after that, the
social media posts we miss you, where are you Skyler?
We miss you? Come home, handing out the flyers, getting
with the family. That's all part of the stimulation, the high,
the why, that's all part of the why why Because
she wanted to.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
And she thought she could get away with it, or
she just didn't care.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Most sociopaths, you know, when we look at their behavior later,
we're like Jesus, I mean, how the hell did you
think you could possibly get away with this?
Speaker 4 (27:58):
Right?
Speaker 3 (27:59):
But now let's put ourselves in their position. Their position narcissism.
I believe I'm.
Speaker 6 (28:04):
Smarter than everybody else.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
I believe what I'm doing. No one's going to figure out.
I can convince, I can trick, I can manipulate, I
can lie, and people are going to believe it. So
although it looks like kind of megalomaniac thinking to us,
it's how they think. This is how their brain spinds,
which makes them dangerous.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
So shifting gears a little bit, I do want to
talk to you about what you think about this. So
one issue in Skyler's case is that the amber alert
didn't go out for Skylert. But do you think that
law enforcement failed her because they just thought, oh, she's sixteen,
(29:10):
she ran away, so as you run away, yeah, she's
not a victim, you know, do you think that was
a mistake.
Speaker 3 (29:16):
I see a lot of cases like this where a
team goes missing and immediately they just jumped to that
they ran away, they took off with a boy or
a girl, and they're they're you know, they're on their
way to Love finding the sunset from the beach, and
they'll be back. Most good law enforcement don't think like that.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
If they're under eighteen, they'll just issue the amber alert.
Speaker 3 (29:38):
Yeah, I mean, they'll just boom. And it should be
that way. It should just be automatic. Yeah, yeah, Okay.
If she ran away, okay, fine, then we'll find her
with the amber alert.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
Doesn't hurt anything, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:49):
What it does is get people involved in the present
moment of the day basically.
Speaker 6 (29:55):
Right, it's the community involved, exactly.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
It baffles the mind, you know, it baffles the mind
when I see stuff like that and it doesn't happen.
I think in this case, a law then gets enacted
because of this case.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Yeah, it's actually called Skuyler's Law. So it expanded the
date's Amber alert system to include any child who has
disappeared and is believed to be endangered.
Speaker 6 (30:20):
That's the silver lining, right.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
I have an amber alert story I can tell you of. Yeah,
case said, I wrote a book. So, all right, So
there's this woman who's eight months pregnant and another woman
decides that it's her baby.
Speaker 6 (30:35):
It's not.
Speaker 3 (30:36):
So she drives from Kansas to Missouri and she had
befriended this pregnant woman, and she drives there one day,
takes a pairing knife, cuts that baby out of her,
takes the baby, takes off. The sheriff shows up. Okay,
Sheriff ben Espy, great person that I've met along my journey.
(31:00):
He shows up and he wants to issue an amber
alert immediately. Of course, here's what he gets. He gets, Yeah,
we're not issuing an ambler for it's a fetus. I
don't know if it's a baby. They get into this hole,
back and forth, right, So finally he says I needed that.
He tells me, he says, I needed that Amber alert
(31:21):
to find that kid. I mean I needed to have
that amber I mean you put on an ambler alert
for a baby that's been born.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
That way, people are gonna be looking.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Yeah, and they're gonna notice. They're gonna notice something's wrong
with that kid, right, Long story short. He ends up
calling the congress person in his district and he says, listen,
he said, if you ever want to get elected again,
you're gonna get that fucking amber alert out tonight. Yep,
and bang, they put that amber alert out within a
(31:53):
couple hours, had all kinds of calls. Perpetrator was found
with the baby in her arms.
Speaker 5 (31:58):
Wow, you know, going back to Skylar's case, I mean,
it took them six months longer just to find her body,
you know, because they just assumed she was a runaway.
But the parents, you know, the parents were on them
to find her. So it's like, we need people in
the justice system, you know, in all of these communities
(32:21):
to really listen to what these families are saying, you know,
and care, like truly care.
Speaker 3 (32:31):
It's easier to love than to hate. We've said this before.
I think doesn't take anything to love somebody, but it
takes so much energy to hate so much.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
Matthew, I wish you had met our mom because my
mom always said something to me and to Evet, but
more to me because I'm the more sensitive one. She
would always say, Rashia, there's more good than there is
evil in the world. No matter how dark it gets,
you have to know that the light is always going
(33:02):
to shine.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (33:03):
Yeah, our mother was, you know, a bright light who
had a very very very hard and dark life. But
through all of that darkness, she fought for the light,
and she fought for the light, and therefore she instill that,
you know, in both Russia and I so to be here,
(33:23):
to be with you on this platform, with a like
minded soulmate, you know, is very empowering for us because
again I go back to this is not an easy industry.
You know, people a lot of people just like to
hear the brutality of it all, the sensationalism of it all.
But there's so much more to that, you know, because
(33:46):
it affects everyone. It affects the family, it affects the neighbors,
it affects the community, it affects the world.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
Yeah, you got to have responsibility talking about.
Speaker 5 (33:57):
This, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
So yeah, some people don't, but you know, I just
I don't pay attention to that.
Speaker 5 (34:06):
What is the light for you in this case? Like,
where's the hope? Where's the growth?
Speaker 3 (34:13):
Part of it is that Amber alert lag Skyler's law. Yeah,
so at least something good came out of it. The
other part of it for me was Rachel's behavior at
the end. How she takes responsibility. Yeah, she displays remorse,
she displays empathy, sorrow, and she takes responsibility. Yes, I
(34:34):
think that says a lot.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
It does.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
Well.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
It's been an amazing, amazing hour having you here on
this show, Matthew, again, we appreciate your light, your wisdom,
your heart, your intelligence, but most of all, we just
appreciate you for being you and being here on facing
evil with us.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate you asking
me again to come on. I'm very honored that you did.
And you know we're friends for life.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Now, that's right. Today's message of hope and healing goes
out to the Ohanna, or the family of Skyler niece.
Skyler's family remembers her fondly. She was a big reader
who loved the Twilight books and she was just getting
(35:29):
into the classics like Great Expectations. She was a girl
after my own heart.
Speaker 6 (35:36):
She loved hip hop.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
Tyler the Creator and mac Miller were two of her
favorite artists.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
Her family also said she had a wicked sense of humor.
Her aunt, Carol recalls that Skyler gave her the nickname
Sparky after she accidentally set some tissue papers on fire.
She even decorated a spark plug as a Christmas ornament
and gave it to her aunt as a guide gift.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
And while we know all these things about Skyler, the
truth was that she was still figuring out who she
was and something that she would never get a chance
to do.
Speaker 2 (36:16):
And so today's message of hope and healing goes out
to the memory of Skuyler and to her Ohana, her family,
onward and upward.
Speaker 6 (36:27):
Emua emua.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Well, that's our show for today. We'd love to hear
what you thought about today's discussion and if there's a
case you'd like for us to.
Speaker 5 (36:40):
Cover, find us on social media or email us at
Facingevil pod at tenderfoot dot tv.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
And one small request if you haven't already, please find
us on iTunes and give us a good rating and
a good review. If you like what we do, your
support is always cherished.
Speaker 6 (36:57):
Until next time.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
Aloha.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
Facing Evil is a production of iHeartRadio and Tenderfoot TV.
The show is hosted by Russia Pacuerero and Avet Gentile.
Matt Frederick and Alex Williams our executive producers on behalf
of iHeartRadio, with producers Trevor Young and Jesse Funk, Donald
albright In Payne Lindsay, our executive producers on behalf of
(37:36):
Tenderfoot TV, alongside producer Tracy Kaplan. Our researcher is Carolyn Talmadge,
original music by Makeup and Vanity Set. Find us on
social media or email us at Facing Evil pod at
tenderfoot dot tv. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio or Tenderfoot TV,
visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
(38:00):
to your favorite shows.
You're listening to Facing Evil, a production of iHeartRadio and
Tenderfoot TV. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast
are solely those of the individuals participating in the show
and do not represent those of iHeartRadio or Tenderfoot TV.
This podcast contains subject matter which may not be suitable
for everyone. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Hello, everyone, welcome back to Facing Evil. I'm Rasha Pacuerero
and I'm Evet Genteeley. And this week we are talking
about the death of Skyler Nice, a teenager who was
murdered by the closest people to her, her two best friends, yes,
her two teenage best friends. And it's absolutely heartbreaking and
(00:51):
I'm sure everyone is wondering, how could this happen? Why
did this happen? That is the question that we're always
asking why. But today we are so happy to welcome
back our friend em William Phelps, investigative journalists and host
of the podcast Paper Ghost and Crossing the Line. Yes,
(01:15):
we like to call him Matthew, even though most other
people call him Phelps, and we're really looking forward to
talking to him today. But first our producer Trevor is
going to walk us through today's case. Ten years ago,
Skyler Nice came to this spot and never returned.
Speaker 3 (01:31):
Now a decade later, her memory lives on and those
who knew her best.
Speaker 1 (01:35):
We never want anyone to go through what we went through.
It's the worst hell I've ever ever been through, no.
Speaker 4 (01:41):
Matter what she says now. But she was young and
she didn't know better. I'm sorry. Five and ten year
olds know not to commit murder.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
Skyler Nice was a sixteen year old girl from Star City,
West Virginia, who was stabbed to death by her two
closest friends and left to die in a remote area
one state away. Skyler was described by most as a
good girl with nice friends and two loving parents in
a pleasant home in suburban West Virginia. She was just
(02:16):
eight years old when she met her best friend, a
girl named Sheila Eddie. Eddie had a troubled relationship with
her own parents, but grew to be very close with
Skyler's parents, who described her as a second daughter. Their
freshman year, Sheila transferred to Skyler's high school, and they
both started hanging out with a third girl, Rachel's Chouf.
(02:36):
The trio were inseparable, but when Skyler and Rachel started
getting close, Sheila got jealous. Skyler and Sheila began having
public arguments on Twitter, and in a tweet in August
of twenty eleven, Skyler alluded to having dirt on both friends.
She may have been alluding to a recent night when
she allegedly witnessed Sheila and Rachel making out. After raiding
(02:58):
Rachel's mom's liquor case. Sheila and Rachel now both turned
on their former friend and tried to smear her reputation
at school. They told classmates she was annoying and clinging,
but then they went a step further planning her murder.
When some classmates overheard them talking in school, they were
sent to the principal's office, but then sent back to class. Then,
(03:22):
on July fifth, twenty twelve, Rachel and Sheila invited Skuyler
out for a late night drive while her parents slept.
Skyler snuck out and the three drove to a remote
area just over the West Virginia border into Pennsylvania. There,
Rachel and Sheila brandished knives and stabbed Skyler nice until
she was no longer moving. They then dragged her body
(03:45):
to a nearby creek and hid it under some sticks.
Rocks and dirt. Skuyler's parents were alarmed about her disappearance,
but Sheila told them they'd drop Skyler off a few
blocks down the street. After the late night hangout, months passed,
during which Sheila spent a great deal of time with
the Nice family, crying over Skuyler's disappearance, and even hanging
(04:07):
up missing persons posters around the neighborhood. At school, Sheila
and Rachel grew reserved and only hung out with each other.
When they were questioned by police, Rachel acted nervous, but Sheila,
on the other hand, acted quote perky, one officer said, quote,
She'd look you in the eye and speak matter of faculty. Finally,
(04:27):
in January of twenty thirteen, Rachel's chauf had a mental breakdown.
After going to a psychiatric ward, she confessed to the crime.
She then led the police to Skuyler's body. Sheila Eddie
was at Skuyler's parents when the discovery was made, and
she cried along with Skuyler's family. When the police asked
Rachel why they killed their friend, she simply replied, we
(04:50):
just didn't like her. The two girls were arrested. Sheila
was convicted of first degree murder and sentenced to life
in prison. Rachel was sentenced to thirty fe years in prison.
And so what happened to Skyler Nice? How did a
friendship between teenage girls turn into a bloody murder? And
how does this story reveal a troubling mental health crisis
(05:12):
for teenagers which often leads to violence.
Speaker 5 (05:20):
A few months ago, we talked about the case of
Michelle McNeil with the one and only m William Phelps,
who is the true crime author and host of the
podcast Paper Ghosts and Crossing the Line. We are back
with we like to call him Matthew is in the house.
(05:40):
We are so excited to have you back on facing
evil and you know today we're talking about Skylar Nice,
so we'll get into that in a little bit. But Matthew,
tell us, you know what's been going on, what's coming
up next for you. I know we were just talking about,
you know, the world that we live in and all
the crazy things that are happening. That really takes a
(06:02):
toll on us. But you know, you're such a deep, sensitive,
wise human being and I know you always push forward.
So what's new with you? Tell us what's new?
Speaker 3 (06:13):
I'm working on season four of Paper Ghosts, my limited
series podcast, and I'm just getting ready to head out
to the Ozarks. There's a case out there of a
young girl who went missing in the late eighties and
she was found some time later, and I'm looking at
a couple of other cases that are similar to it
(06:35):
that could be connected to hers. And there's cause at
the time, late eighties, early nineties, that area of the country,
the Midwest, if you will, there was a rash of
you know, young teen girls going missing and some of
them found, some not found. So this case is really interesting.
(06:58):
I have a suspect that I'm really focused on that
hasn't been named, and no one knows. Yeah, we'll see
where it leads. You know. It's always interesting when I
go out there and spend a couple of weeks and
start knocking on doors and talking to people. So I'm
looking forward to that. I have a few other podcasts
(07:20):
that I'm in the process of developing and producing and
things like that that are similar. You know, one of
them is very different, but mostly they're similar to what
I do, which is investigative journalism.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
It's funny since we last interviewed you, Matthew, I have
to tell you, like, you're one of our very first interviews,
and we've interviewed you know, several people since, and it
makes me think, especially like how you got into the
true crime genre and how you're still like moving your
way through it, like this has been a calling, I
think for all of us, because we just want to
(07:58):
see the light in the darkness in this world. And
I know that's exactly what you do. And the more
and more that we're in this I'm like, oh, we're
supposed to be here, and I just feel like you
do that every single day. And I just have to
say it's very very beautiful and you're an amazing example
of what one person can do.
Speaker 3 (08:18):
Well, thank you very much. I mean, I appreciate that.
I'm humbled by that. I was recently watching something and
it's a metaphor really for what you just said. So
when the sun goes down, it doesn't get dark, the
sky doesn't get dark. What it is, according to physicists
and scientists is the light from the stars we see
(08:41):
hasn't reached us yet. That's why they look dim. It
hasn't reached us yet, So it doesn't light up the earth.
When the sun goes around us.
Speaker 2 (08:50):
I love that, you know.
Speaker 3 (08:51):
And then when the sun comes out, we can't see
we can't see any of them. So that little tiny
bit of light heading towards the earth to shine, I
look for that little tiny bit of light, you know,
and see where I can. I can just get in there.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
And that's why we love you.
Speaker 6 (09:09):
Amen to that.
Speaker 5 (09:10):
It's just so interesting how you you know, like Russia said,
we have interviewed so many different people, but there's just
certain people when you know you're of like mind and
like spirit, and we've felt that way with you from
the get because this is a you know, as we know,
this is a hard industry, you know, to be in
to talk about.
Speaker 2 (09:30):
This, it's heavy, too heavy, shiite.
Speaker 5 (09:33):
Yeah, But like you know, like I said before, if
we can just open you know, one person's mind right,
or help someone heal and move upward and onward, or
solve a case, you know, like you.
Speaker 6 (09:47):
You know, with bringing justice.
Speaker 5 (09:50):
I mean, it's these these things are so important, so
important in this world.
Speaker 6 (09:54):
You know.
Speaker 3 (09:56):
Bringing answers to families is really rewarding. That that really
keeps me going when I get with a family and
I say, look, I've spent a couple of years here
on this and this is what happened. This is what
you're never going to hear because law enforcement doesn't have
the resources, they don't have the budget.
Speaker 2 (10:14):
So here you go, like, please do something with this.
Speaker 3 (10:17):
Yeah yeah, right now, I mean they can know that
at least they have some information about what happened. Yeah, right,
there's a why. And actually I was talking to a
prosecutor interviewing a prosecutor the other day and he was saying, look,
you know, I'm happy to talk with you because you know,
no one else is going to do anything with this,
(10:38):
so you know, I'm very happy to give you what
you need to find out what you can, you know,
And that's that's pretty gratifying for me after a long
career of doing this, you know that the trust Yeah yeah,
there's a lot of bullshit podcasts true crime, you know,
makeup and TikTok and all of this out there, so.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
Right, we're all of us are trying our best to
do ethical true crime. Yeah.
Speaker 6 (11:05):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (11:06):
To get back to the case that we're talking about today,
like you mentioned, you know, finding out the why. So
let's talk about the case of Skyler Niece. This is
not unsolved. We do know who did this? But what
were your first impressions about this case, about this young
girl Skyler.
Speaker 3 (11:26):
I've written many books about teens and murder, teens who kill,
that sort of thing, so I'm very familiar with the
psychology and what's going on. Right. So, all of these cases,
this one especially, they're devastating. Right. These are people who
(11:48):
haven't lived a life yet.
Speaker 2 (11:50):
Right, their brain's not even fully developed.
Speaker 6 (11:52):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (11:53):
What struck me was a touching scene that I read
about the dad and her and a tea party. That
was very touching.
Speaker 6 (12:02):
King and the.
Speaker 3 (12:04):
Punchline is that you know he he he asks her,
you can't reach the water faucet. Where you getting the
water from that you've been that I've been drinking And
she said, oh, the toilet.
Speaker 6 (12:15):
Right, that's right.
Speaker 3 (12:18):
That really shows you know, love, you know, the love
between between them all. But the other thing that stands
out to me but doesn't surprise me, is in all
of these cases, you have a leader and a follower,
and very very rarely that will a team kill by
(12:38):
his or herself. Right. They always there's always someone else connected.
There's always someone else involved. Many times there's more than
one involved. Yeah, Right, this case also struck me as
the I will say. I mean, I can't diagnose anybody.
I'm not a psychologist. But one of these girls is
(12:59):
bona fide so show path, the other isn't. That's that's
clear to me here, you know.
Speaker 2 (13:04):
And the behavior after the murder right with their family.
Speaker 5 (13:09):
Yeah, this case, right, it's so baffling when you think
(13:32):
about it, because you think about teenage girls and you
know they should just be having fun going to a prom,
you know, living their lives, not this heavy, heavy duty
jealousy and anger. But you see it so much. It's
like I think about the cases that you know, we've
worked on in the past with Conrad Roy, that particular
(13:54):
case where it's Michelle Carter, you know, and even the
Shonda Shaer case. You know, it's a leader and a
follower and someone gets incredibly upset and then get someone
else to join and does these horrible things. I mean,
it turns into a paradox of violence.
Speaker 6 (14:15):
Right.
Speaker 5 (14:16):
The mental issues that these children have gone through that
have led to this moment that has a lot to
do with it, don't you think.
Speaker 6 (14:25):
Absolutely.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
Let me ask you both a question, Yeah, how do
you feel social media played in this case?
Speaker 2 (14:31):
Particularly huge yes, it's huge, and I have to say full, full,
full disclosure. I have been on social media since my Space,
and for me, you know, it's always been something that's
very prominent in my life. But I joined as an adult.
You know, I'm forty four years old, and I think
(14:54):
I started. I was on my Space whenever it started,
and I was already in my late twenties. I was
not a teenager. I cannot even imagine what these girls
were going through. And we know that, you know, Twitter
at the time had a lot to do with it.
And now Twitter now for me, of course, in twenty
twenty three, is not my favorite place. It makes me
(15:15):
scared for my daughter, who's eleven. Yeah, yeah, right, So
we must all think that social media has a lot
to do with it, right.
Speaker 3 (15:22):
Particularly here I'm looking at Sheila Eddie yep, and how
she says I feel great right now, Skyler answers, this
is the best night ever, right, and you know she's
about to be murdered.
Speaker 1 (15:35):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
Let me just back up. They're talking during the day
on social media. Other people are piping in, amping up
the conversation, right, so there's all these influences coming in
that are just invisible right, invisible influences, right, yeah, kind
of stoking the fire if you will, yeah, yeah, And
(15:56):
she says at one point, it really, this is Skyler.
It really doesn't take much to piss me off. Right.
She talks about how stress will be the death of her,
about being bored, and I looked at that and I thought,
it's the classic confluence of peer pressure, right, the symptoms
of peer pressure. An environment for someone so young, a
(16:19):
mind so young, kind of in a social pressure cooker,
keeping up with her friends, trying to fit in, trying
to be popular, trying not to be bullied. And then
on July fifth, twenty twelve, Shila and Rachel invite Skyler
to go out. And what struck me here is this.
They pack knives, paper towels, bleach things to clean up
(16:41):
with and to shovel.
Speaker 2 (16:43):
They meditated.
Speaker 3 (16:44):
This is not an impulsive decision. Now, I remember I
did the slender Man case and it involved same age kids,
three kids, same age, three girls, and one was a follower,
one was a leader. You know, they did the same thing.
They packed a knife, they went out into the woods,
same thing. I don't know that this sort of thing
(17:08):
happened in my.
Speaker 6 (17:08):
Day mine either, Matthew.
Speaker 5 (17:11):
I mean, I think social media plays a big part
in it, and I think television as well. You know,
I think, how do they know to go and get
bleach and do this and do that?
Speaker 3 (17:21):
You know.
Speaker 5 (17:22):
I just think that we're bombarded with with all of
this evil, like twenty four to seven, that it's available
to these young minds and unless the parents, you know,
and obviously a parent can't monitor everything.
Speaker 2 (17:39):
Now, you can't keep the kids in a bubble.
Speaker 5 (17:41):
But when it comes to social media, like I don't
have children, but I can tell you this now, Like
my niece Lee Lani, it's like she's like, I want Instagram.
I'm not a mother. I'm not a mother, but I'm like, no,
definitely not no TikTok, no Instagram, not till you're one.
Speaker 2 (18:00):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:01):
Yeah, that's great because with that stuff, the more you
look at, the more you get. So it has to
have an effect on the mind of someone so young.
But the question, I think, if we're facing evil, the
question becomes cannot push a kid over the edge right
(18:22):
and to commit some sort of violent act. And the
big question in this case is what you started with me?
Is the why?
Speaker 2 (18:31):
Yeah?
Speaker 1 (18:31):
Why?
Speaker 6 (18:31):
Why?
Speaker 3 (18:32):
Yeah, there's just a couple of things also that stood
out to me when I went through the case, and
that was the murder itself. How you know, of course
they tackled her, started stabbing her, they did all of
that stuff, and she fought back, right, And then there's
the comment, but Sheila kept stabbing her until she was
no longer moving and her quote neck stopped making gurgling
(18:56):
sounds end quote. So for a child to use those words,
that detail is significant. It's significant in the fact that
it tells me how active, aware and completely in touch
with what is happening and what they are doing. In
order to make that observation and then later talk about it,
(19:19):
you are in the moment, you know what's going on.
You're not in some blind rage, you're not blacking out,
you know, you know exactly what you're doing and the
consequences of what is happening.
Speaker 5 (19:32):
So that's when we go back to and this is
the question, because there was no remorse, you know, after
this happened, Sheila was you know, confronting and you know, consoling,
I should say, the parents, and she knew what she did.
Speaker 2 (19:48):
As a sociopathic part right, so that.
Speaker 5 (19:51):
We could absolutely say Sheila is a sociopath without diagnosing.
Speaker 6 (19:56):
Of course.
Speaker 3 (19:56):
Well, let's consider the situation for a minute. So what
you have is a true, unempathetic, cold person, And let's
look at what she's actually doing. She's in the family's house, Yeah,
consoling the family, handing out flyers, hanging up She's participating.
(20:17):
If we think back, who else did that?
Speaker 2 (20:20):
Michelle carter Yep.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
So it shows callousness, it shows deception, it shows well
thought out lies. Right, and it begins to borderline on
psychopathy and the characteristics of the sociopath. We can't deny that,
whether we're psychologists or not.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
It's there, yeah, right, yeah, right, it's.
Speaker 3 (20:41):
You know, you would look at it as sadistic, antisocial,
all of that stuff, all that bad stuff that goes
along with being a sociopath and being devious and manipulating
all the way until the end.
Speaker 2 (20:56):
Right. And she was with the family when Skuyler's body
was discovered.
Speaker 3 (21:00):
If I'm not mistaken, yeah, she's she counseled the family.
Yeah said how said how sorry she was?
Speaker 6 (21:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (21:06):
But let's put our attention to and this happens in
every one of these cases. So when you have a
leader and a follower, the follower always cracks.
Speaker 2 (21:15):
Right, yeh, which is what happened.
Speaker 3 (21:17):
Followers the one with remorse, with guilt, with a conscience,
and the follower always goes in and cuts that deal first, right, right,
And that's exactly what you have here, I.
Speaker 5 (21:30):
Think Rachel, you know, yes, she did, you know kind
of deal, but it like really started to weigh on
her her psychological, her well being, Like she couldn't she
couldn't hold that anymore.
Speaker 3 (21:45):
She couldn't function.
Speaker 6 (21:46):
Yeah. The other girl, you know, Sheila, it was like nothing.
Speaker 3 (21:51):
Because she didn't feel. Yeah, she has no capability and
no feeling of love of what we talk about a lot,
which is that empathy putting herself in the parent's position. Yeah,
and it's very common in teens who kill that one
of them is like that, it is, yeah, yeah, And
you know, let's go back into their lives and we
(22:13):
can see how that has an effect on it. Because
Rachel talks about having a good upbringing, you know, parents
who loved her. That's whereas Shila talks about not having that.
Speaker 2 (22:25):
Right, Yeah, that factors into it, for sure.
Speaker 3 (22:28):
It's different wires and all these wires start to cross,
and it's very rare that that happens, and it's sad
all around.
Speaker 5 (22:35):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, Like you said earlier, especially when
it's it's young kids, you know, young minds that are
doing these god awful things and hurting other young people
that it's just so heartbreaking. It goes back to mental
well being, you know, because there's something you know where
(22:57):
she's not one hundred percent Well that's awful, right, Yeah, she.
Speaker 3 (23:01):
Had an eating disorder, she was depressed. Yeah, there was
a lot of factors going on.
Speaker 6 (23:06):
There, a lot of things happening when.
Speaker 3 (23:08):
Her Bodi's found Skyler. Sheila even posts on Twitter, worst
day of my whole life.
Speaker 6 (23:15):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (23:15):
Wow, with Shila, it's clear that there is no why.
There is no why. What it is is she wanted
to get back at this girl for something we probably
will never know, no, Yeah, and instead of just unfriending her, right,
she decided violence and murder was the way to do that.
(23:38):
That she had to pay a price for whatever she did.
And you know there's people out in the world like that, unfortunately,
that that's what they choose, you know, they choose violence
over just walking away.
Speaker 5 (23:53):
But I think that's where social media comes in again,
you know, and we can talk about this all day long.
Because when you're putting your stuff out there on social media,
as you know Skyler and Sila and Rachel were doing
on Twitter and saying things, you're putting it out there
for an audience. So now it's not just between the
(24:15):
three of you of what's going on, but now it's
like a boxing match, you know what I mean. Now
you're putting it out there into the world, and people
are festering on that and creating this evil.
Speaker 3 (24:29):
No, there's been studies about crowds and how crowds react.
So crowds, you know, will react one person, then ten people,
then twenty people started reacting a certain way, the whole
crowd will start following them. Yeah, right, because oh my god,
oh my god. Whatever. So in this case, you have
it on social media. But again going back to Shila,
(24:50):
Shila was using social media as a cover. Basically, she
was putting out lies on social media to cover up
what she did, and she was probably getting a high
off that. I'm sure she was getting an adrenaline rush,
because the one thing that sociopaths need more than a
lot of things is stimulation. They need to be stimulated. Yeah,
(25:13):
and that's like here, you have Sheila interacting with the
girl's family, so she's that's stimulating to her. She'd walk
away from that house guaranteed. Look what I got away
with today, telling herself, Wow, what it would a fix?
You know, what a high see.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
And I'm still sitting here with the why. I'm still
like why. I mean, they were friends from the time
they were little kids. It's not like that, you know,
Sheila and Skuyler had just met. Rachel obviously was new
to the click. That's a really hard question to answer.
It could just be, you know how people are jealous,
and jealous turns into hurtful and evil, and you just
(25:55):
don't know, and you don't know what happened in her past,
Like you said, she didn't have the upbringing that Rachel had,
Like you never know what triggered in her brain as
a young child that set her in this direction. Yeah.
Speaker 3 (26:11):
I remember I had been interviewing a serial killer for
at the time, it was about six years, and I'd
often try to rope him into talking about God and
evil and good and this and that, just to get
his sense of it. And he didn't believe in God,
of course, and so I said, let's talk about evil.
(26:32):
And he said this was his comedy. He said, well,
if there is evil in the world, I'm it.
Speaker 6 (26:38):
Wow.
Speaker 3 (26:39):
So he knew, right, he says, if we're going to
use evil as a word to describe something, that's me wow.
And for him there was no why. There didn't have
to be a why. There were triggers. There were triggers,
you know, a woman said something he didn't like or
whatever triggered him. But there never was no why other
(26:59):
than the fact that at this is a decision he made. Yeah,
you know, I'm going to kill this woman today, end
of story. In Sheila's case, she made that decision. It's
clear that they made that decision a long time before
they took carried out this murder because of all the
things they took with them, the pre planning, the driving
(27:22):
out to the area, and then everything after that, the
social media posts we miss you, where are you Skyler?
We miss you? Come home, handing out the flyers, getting
with the family. That's all part of the stimulation, the high,
the why, that's all part of the why why Because
she wanted to.
Speaker 2 (27:42):
And she thought she could get away with it, or
she just didn't care.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Most sociopaths, you know, when we look at their behavior later,
we're like Jesus, I mean, how the hell did you
think you could possibly get away with this?
Speaker 4 (27:58):
Right?
Speaker 3 (27:59):
But now let's put ourselves in their position. Their position narcissism.
I believe I'm.
Speaker 6 (28:04):
Smarter than everybody else.
Speaker 3 (28:06):
I believe what I'm doing. No one's going to figure out.
I can convince, I can trick, I can manipulate, I
can lie, and people are going to believe it. So
although it looks like kind of megalomaniac thinking to us,
it's how they think. This is how their brain spinds,
which makes them dangerous.
Speaker 2 (28:48):
So shifting gears a little bit, I do want to
talk to you about what you think about this. So
one issue in Skyler's case is that the amber alert
didn't go out for Skylert. But do you think that
law enforcement failed her because they just thought, oh, she's sixteen,
(29:10):
she ran away, so as you run away, yeah, she's
not a victim, you know, do you think that was
a mistake.
Speaker 3 (29:16):
I see a lot of cases like this where a
team goes missing and immediately they just jumped to that
they ran away, they took off with a boy or
a girl, and they're they're you know, they're on their
way to Love finding the sunset from the beach, and
they'll be back. Most good law enforcement don't think like that.
Speaker 2 (29:35):
If they're under eighteen, they'll just issue the amber alert.
Speaker 3 (29:38):
Yeah, I mean, they'll just boom. And it should be
that way. It should just be automatic. Yeah, yeah, Okay.
If she ran away, okay, fine, then we'll find her
with the amber alert.
Speaker 2 (29:47):
Doesn't hurt anything, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (29:49):
What it does is get people involved in the present
moment of the day basically.
Speaker 6 (29:55):
Right, it's the community involved, exactly.
Speaker 3 (29:57):
It baffles the mind, you know, it baffles the mind
when I see stuff like that and it doesn't happen.
I think in this case, a law then gets enacted
because of this case.
Speaker 2 (30:08):
Yeah, it's actually called Skuyler's Law. So it expanded the
date's Amber alert system to include any child who has
disappeared and is believed to be endangered.
Speaker 6 (30:20):
That's the silver lining, right.
Speaker 3 (30:22):
I have an amber alert story I can tell you of. Yeah,
case said, I wrote a book. So, all right, So
there's this woman who's eight months pregnant and another woman
decides that it's her baby.
Speaker 6 (30:35):
It's not.
Speaker 3 (30:36):
So she drives from Kansas to Missouri and she had
befriended this pregnant woman, and she drives there one day,
takes a pairing knife, cuts that baby out of her,
takes the baby, takes off. The sheriff shows up. Okay,
Sheriff ben Espy, great person that I've met along my journey.
(31:00):
He shows up and he wants to issue an amber
alert immediately. Of course, here's what he gets. He gets, Yeah,
we're not issuing an ambler for it's a fetus. I
don't know if it's a baby. They get into this hole,
back and forth, right, So finally he says I needed that.
He tells me, he says, I needed that Amber alert
(31:21):
to find that kid. I mean I needed to have
that amber I mean you put on an ambler alert
for a baby that's been born.
Speaker 2 (31:28):
That way, people are gonna be looking.
Speaker 3 (31:30):
Yeah, and they're gonna notice. They're gonna notice something's wrong
with that kid, right, Long story short. He ends up
calling the congress person in his district and he says, listen,
he said, if you ever want to get elected again,
you're gonna get that fucking amber alert out tonight. Yep,
and bang, they put that amber alert out within a
(31:53):
couple hours, had all kinds of calls. Perpetrator was found
with the baby in her arms.
Speaker 5 (31:58):
Wow, you know, going back to Skylar's case, I mean,
it took them six months longer just to find her body,
you know, because they just assumed she was a runaway.
But the parents, you know, the parents were on them
to find her. So it's like, we need people in
the justice system, you know, in all of these communities
(32:21):
to really listen to what these families are saying, you know,
and care, like truly care.
Speaker 3 (32:31):
It's easier to love than to hate. We've said this before.
I think doesn't take anything to love somebody, but it
takes so much energy to hate so much.
Speaker 2 (32:41):
Matthew, I wish you had met our mom because my
mom always said something to me and to Evet, but
more to me because I'm the more sensitive one. She
would always say, Rashia, there's more good than there is
evil in the world. No matter how dark it gets,
you have to know that the light is always going
(33:02):
to shine.
Speaker 3 (33:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 5 (33:03):
Yeah, our mother was, you know, a bright light who
had a very very very hard and dark life. But
through all of that darkness, she fought for the light,
and she fought for the light, and therefore she instill that,
you know, in both Russia and I so to be here,
(33:23):
to be with you on this platform, with a like
minded soulmate, you know, is very empowering for us because
again I go back to this is not an easy industry.
You know, people a lot of people just like to
hear the brutality of it all, the sensationalism of it all.
But there's so much more to that, you know, because
(33:46):
it affects everyone. It affects the family, it affects the neighbors,
it affects the community, it affects the world.
Speaker 3 (33:55):
Yeah, you got to have responsibility talking about.
Speaker 5 (33:57):
This, yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (34:01):
So yeah, some people don't, but you know, I just
I don't pay attention to that.
Speaker 5 (34:06):
What is the light for you in this case? Like,
where's the hope? Where's the growth?
Speaker 3 (34:13):
Part of it is that Amber alert lag Skyler's law. Yeah,
so at least something good came out of it. The
other part of it for me was Rachel's behavior at
the end. How she takes responsibility. Yeah, she displays remorse,
she displays empathy, sorrow, and she takes responsibility. Yes, I
(34:34):
think that says a lot.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
It does.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
Well.
Speaker 5 (34:38):
It's been an amazing, amazing hour having you here on
this show, Matthew, again, we appreciate your light, your wisdom,
your heart, your intelligence, but most of all, we just
appreciate you for being you and being here on facing
evil with us.
Speaker 3 (34:59):
Well, thank you so much. I really appreciate you asking
me again to come on. I'm very honored that you did.
And you know we're friends for life.
Speaker 2 (35:08):
Now, that's right. Today's message of hope and healing goes
out to the Ohanna, or the family of Skyler niece.
Skyler's family remembers her fondly. She was a big reader
who loved the Twilight books and she was just getting
(35:29):
into the classics like Great Expectations. She was a girl
after my own heart.
Speaker 6 (35:36):
She loved hip hop.
Speaker 5 (35:38):
Tyler the Creator and mac Miller were two of her
favorite artists.
Speaker 2 (35:44):
Her family also said she had a wicked sense of humor.
Her aunt, Carol recalls that Skyler gave her the nickname
Sparky after she accidentally set some tissue papers on fire.
She even decorated a spark plug as a Christmas ornament
and gave it to her aunt as a guide gift.
Speaker 5 (36:02):
And while we know all these things about Skyler, the
truth was that she was still figuring out who she
was and something that she would never get a chance
to do.
Speaker 2 (36:16):
And so today's message of hope and healing goes out
to the memory of Skuyler and to her Ohana, her family,
onward and upward.
Speaker 6 (36:27):
Emua emua.
Speaker 2 (36:33):
Well, that's our show for today. We'd love to hear
what you thought about today's discussion and if there's a
case you'd like for us to.
Speaker 5 (36:40):
Cover, find us on social media or email us at
Facingevil pod at tenderfoot dot tv.
Speaker 2 (36:47):
And one small request if you haven't already, please find
us on iTunes and give us a good rating and
a good review. If you like what we do, your
support is always cherished.
Speaker 6 (36:57):
Until next time.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
Aloha.
Speaker 1 (37:16):
Facing Evil is a production of iHeartRadio and Tenderfoot TV.
The show is hosted by Russia Pacuerero and Avet Gentile.
Matt Frederick and Alex Williams our executive producers on behalf
of iHeartRadio, with producers Trevor Young and Jesse Funk, Donald
albright In Payne Lindsay, our executive producers on behalf of
(37:36):
Tenderfoot TV, alongside producer Tracy Kaplan. Our researcher is Carolyn Talmadge,
original music by Makeup and Vanity Set. Find us on
social media or email us at Facing Evil pod at
tenderfoot dot tv. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio or Tenderfoot TV,
visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen
(38:00):
to your favorite shows.
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