October 4, 2025 • 16 mins
It’s a true crime headline that seems nearly impossible to believe, and yet, 31-year-old Brittany Fortinberry has been charged with 47 charges including 14 counts of sexual misconduct with a minor. A 15-year-old boy came forward this past spring, and now 6 months later at least 10 underage boys have told similar accounts of being drugged, forced into sexual acts and threatened with violence. To make matters worse, Fortinberry’s husband apparently knew what was going on has been charged with intimidation and failure to report a crime.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Hey, there're folks. It is Saturday, October fourth, and one
of the big headline grabbing stories this week. A woman
is facing nearly fifty charges related to sexual misconduct involving
teenage boys, and she's a former teacher. Welcome to this
(00:23):
episode of Amy and TJ Robes. The details you hear.
Someone has been involved up to ten victims. She's a
thirty one year old woman. These are thirteen to fifteen
year old kids. And some of the details here. You
said it before I hit record. What the actual.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Fuck it's it's you can't even believe what you're reading.
In fact, when I first told you, when I saw
the headlines, when I started reading the details, you didn't
believe it. Oh yeah, he said, who's reporting that? Yeah,
that can't be real.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Oh THHW some national choire or something.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
So exactly so. She is an ex institute teacher now
at Eminence High School in Martinsville, Indiana. She also was
a middle school teacher correct as well math teacher. She
was arrested in the spring when one young man, one teenager,
came forward, but since then it has snowballed and the
details about what she is accused of doing, including having
(01:20):
and forcing group sex, and then forcing these teen boys
to wear the scream mask. You know, Ghostface, you know
the movie, that scary mask. She allegedly made them put
the mask on while having sex with her in front
of a group of teenage boys. And this didn't just
happen once. This happened apparently multiple multiple times.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
I cannot believe this story. Yes, that detail makes some
headlines and people, it's making its way around social media
and whatnot, but this is a disturbing, a scary, and
awful story at this point. Yes, these are allegations, so
we have to say that, but we are talking about
this idea of grooming, this idea of someone who we
(02:06):
trust with our children preying on our children, and this
we are talking multiple victims. This is one of those
things that snowball that we've seen cases before, where one
there's one victim and then somebody else feels comfortable coming forward,
and this thing snowballed.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
And now six months later after the initial boy came forward,
we have another one coming forward and so many in between.
So it's police aren't even sure how many victims you're
talking about, because imagine these young boys, some of them
in middle school, some of them in high school having
to go tell their parents. And there's a lot of
(02:41):
evidence according to police, cell phone pictures, videos, and certainly
they all had the same scary, creepy story to tell. Also,
we should point out Britney Fortenberry, that's her name, thirty
one years old. She's in the middle of a divorce now,
not shockingly her her husband divorced her, I believe, or
(03:02):
filed for divorce the month before the allegations came out.
But she also has a four year old child. And
get this, the husband is implicated in some of this.
He is actually facing charges himself in this. It really
is a hard to believe story.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And it's also hard to believe that robes. At least
according to the kids, this was something that was just known.
The kids knew that was happening. It was talked about
fairly openly. This wasn't a secret, at least among them.
Now we'll go back to March when that first kid
came forward. This kid was fifteen years old at the
time she was in but at the time she was
in the high school, was she or Okay, So this
(03:41):
is a fifteen year old kid. His grandmother comes forward,
tells police that her grandson had been having sex with
This teacher, claimed that she had sent naked photos to
her grandson, gave him drugs, specifically mushrooms, before having sex
with him on multiple occasions, and also told told this
(04:01):
kid that if he told anybody that she would kill herself. Now,
this is all according to this is what got the
ball rolling and got this story started. This was back
in March, so it was just one kid, and they said,
I thought this was an interesting thing to add. The
kid said he came forward because he didn't want it
to happen to any other kids, This fifteen year old.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
First of all, he's not old enough to give consent,
but meaning he didn't want to do it in the
first place. That is so sad and that is so
abusive and just disturbing. But yeah, unfortunately, his hope was
that she wouldn't do it to anyone else. But because
he finally had the courage to come forward, turns out
he certainly was not the only one. Another victim came
(04:43):
forward pretty quickly after talking about how he claimed Brittany,
his teacher, would put her own child to bed and
then had sex with him in the garage, then had
him sleep over and she went back into the bed
with her husband. I mean, just really egregious claim that
these kids are making. And of course probably the biggest
one was the group sex that supposedly was happening with
(05:07):
scream masks. Also, she was paying these kids, buying them
expensive gifts, actually giving them cash up to eight hundred
dollars for photos of their genitals. She would send them
naked photos of her. She wanted photos of them. I mean,
this was just it feels like it was non stop.
This seems almost when you hear these reports and how
(05:29):
many times and how many young kids, it's as if
it was almost a second job. This took a lot
of time, a lot of effort, a lot of money.
And it looks as though her husband knew what was
going on.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Oh yeah, he's been charged with intimidation and something else.
He's not implicated in actually having any involvement in the
molestation of the boys. But according to police, the victims
told them he was aware the husband was and what
was it he threatened the kids?
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yes, so I can actually tell you. Detective Patrick Williams
of the Morgan County Sheriff's Office there in Indiana, testified
that her husband Nicholas was aware of his wife's criminal
activity and threatened the boys to stop having sex with
his wife until they were older. He threatened to kill
one boy in front of his family if he had
(06:21):
sex with his wife again, and that he had to
wait until he was sixteen actually gave according to this detective,
this young boy an age requirement to resume having sex
with his wife, but until then, if he did it again,
he was going to threaten that. He threatened this boy
with his life.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
So he is facing charge. You said he filed for
divorce before the initial charge.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
I believe he filed for divorce in February and the
charges came to light in March.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
So this story again shocking when you first hear about it,
and then there was an update several months later when
other boys came forward. And here we are in October.
This was back in March. Now here we are in October,
still having victims come forward. I wonder robes will there
be more, because officially there's at least eight victims I believe.
I don't know if you saw a higher account, but
at least that many.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
So when the first few boys came forward, police were
telling reporters they think as many as ten. It could
be more. Look in these types of cases where someone
has a position of power and can absolutely groom young children,
they oftentimes do have countless numbers of victims, many of
whom don't feel comfortable coming forward. They don't want to
(07:31):
be I get it. They don't want to be attached
to this story. They don't want people looking at them differently.
It's humiliating to think that this woman drugged them and
paid them. It's just not anything. I don't think anyone
wants to admit. So do we know if there are
more victims? Not technically, but is it likely? Absolutely?
Speaker 1 (07:52):
This is one we have to be and don't you
feel I don't know about the coverage necessarily, but when
we see it's a female teacher doing this to a
male student, it reads differently to a certain degree, or
if you will, than if it was a male teacher
with it. Can you imagine a thirteen year old thirteen
(08:13):
year old girl involved with a teacher.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, you should be a very different story. The point
being is there's still this and it's not fair, but
this idea of a hot teacher, that it's a young
boy's fantasy to have the hot teacher, make a pass
at him and have sex with him, and so it
almost seems like wink, wink, nod, nod, way to go,
young son. You know, you were able to fulfill every
(08:37):
young kid's fantasy of having sex with the hot teacher. So, yes,
it's unfair because we put that on the young boys.
It somehow it's a good thing, or it's an okay thing,
or it's something to laugh or not or wink at
or be proud of, almost in a way that it
would never be regarded the same way if the genders
were reversed.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Period. But that's important, and that's something that folks who
work in the area of child sexual abuse victims they say,
it's so important that you scream and scream and scream
on a case like this, that you need to understand
this is not voluntary. She did what is frankly typical
when you find child sex abuses. She groomed. These kids
(09:17):
were being manipulated and groomed, and unfortunately it comes off
as if it was voluntary. At least these kids were
gained for, they were getting some money out of it,
they were getting drugs. No, no, no, these kids are
absolutely abuse victims. And she groomed them and unfortunately what
we've come to know as the classic ways that people
(09:38):
go about grooming their victims.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah, and I think, you know, just to even know
that the husband was aware of it and intimidated the
young boys on top of it, that had to be
so scary. Not only are you now caught up in
this sexual situation you don't want to be in, but
now you have a grown man threatening to kill you
in front of your family if you tell anyone. He
also is facing charges for failing to report the crime.
(10:02):
So it's you know, he's getting charged with intimidation, but
also he had a civic duty, a moral duty, a
moral obligation, a legal one to report that crime and
those crimes that he knew were happening in his own home.
That so I think, I think about the double intimidation
factor that it's your teacher and her husband knows and
(10:25):
he's threatening you, and what are you supposed to do?
You're a young kid, who do you turn to? Who
do you tell? And who's going to even maybe believe you?
At that point, there's a lot I can't even imagine
what would be swirling in these kid's mind.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
You said, who's going to believe you, even when you've
told me the details, I didn't believe what you were saying.
I'm like, this is nuts. This cannot be happening. Obviously
she wouldn't do this. And I know anybody, if you're
listening to the story, you're wondering, well, what in God's
name was she thinking? What is wrong with this woman?
And what possible defense could she have for herself? Well,
she has one, and her defense attorneys are giving us
an indication of how she is going to defend herself
(11:00):
in courts. Stay here and.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Welcome back to this edition of Amy and TJ. And
we are talking about a story that is so disturbing
and so bizarre it's actually hard to believe. But this
is happening in the state of Indiana. A former math teacher,
she was a high school teacher at one point, a
middle school teacher at another point, is now facing forty
(11:31):
seven counts after at least ten boys have now come forward,
underage kids, teenagers, some of them in high school, some
of them in middle school, saying that this teacher, their teacher,
drugged them and then sexually abused them. And there are
even allegations of forced group sex making these kids wear
(11:52):
scream ghost face masks while having sex with her, threats
of killing them, threats of killing herself, and these allegations
have continued to pile up over the past six months.
So all of us are thinking, she's thirty one years old,
she has a four year old child, she had a husband.
What is going on with this woman? She said a
couple of things. One of them she told the police,
(12:15):
according to a local affiliate, that she had just lost
one hundred and fifty pounds.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
You kept mentioning this.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
I didn't know this was wild, she said. She wished
She told the police she wished she hadn't lost the
one hundred and fifty pounds, because then she wouldn't have
behaved the way she behaved, almost implying or suggesting that
because she became thin and hot and felt sexy, that
she then felt empowered or wanted to do these things
(12:41):
because now she had a hot bod. That just seemed bizarre.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
That's one of a number of I want to say
after to over this story, and as awful as it is,
some of it is still just bizarre. The screen mask thing,
the one hundred and fifty pounds of some the husband
I just it doesn't make sense, and we're trying to
make sense of this. But her defense name maybe has
one reason for her behavior. And how could you not
(13:08):
think that someone who has done what she's accused of
isn't mentally ill correct, doesn't have something wrong. But they've
already indicated this is the direction they're going to go.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
But I think look, in most moments where you have
extreme acts of repugnance or even violence, a lot of
people would say, yeah, you snap in that moment. But
this was so repeated, this was so calculated, This went
on for months. This wasn't just a one off or
a one time thing, and it wasn't just with one teenager.
(13:39):
One of the boys said that he was coming over
and participating even though he was underage and could not
give his consent, but he stopped and wanted to stop
when he realized that she was having sex with a
number of underage boys, that he wasn't the only one.
I think he thought maybe he was special, and when
he realized, holy crap, she's doing this with a countless
(14:00):
number of kids, and he pulled away at that point.
But this is what her defense team has said. I'll
read you the quote counsel has a good faith believe
that the defendant likely suffers from a mental disease or defect,
but lacks the expertise to proffer whether the defendant appreciated
(14:20):
the wrongfulness of her conduct at the time of the offense.
I find that hard to believe. When you're threatening a
kid with either their harm or your own harm self
harm by trying to get them not to tell anyone
to me, that means you can reason by that act
alone that what you're doing is wrong. If you're telling
(14:43):
someone and threatening someone and paying someone to not tell
on you, so to speak, that means you know what
you're doing is wrong.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I wh no how a defense lawyer with uh, because
I know that's come up before. I'm trying. I was
trying to remember, I've heard this exact thing before, Like,
you can't claim mental illness or a mental break when
you are look at all the planning that was involved
for the covering up. You had plenty of time. So
I don't know what a good defense attorney would say
in response to that, But yes, they are going after
a mental illness defense, at least indicating early on. But
(15:14):
she at this point is she's not out I think
they set bond at a maybe up to two hundred
thousand dollars or something, but I didn't see she was out.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Do you know what's wild? She's been These charges keep accruing,
so she keeps getting charged and then rearranged. Like the
initial charge. I think it was a six hundred dollars bond.
Think about how low that was, and then to find
out it has escalated to the scope and to the
level it has. Yes, so now we're talking a much
bigger bond and her husband is in fact leaving her.
(15:44):
But my goodness, this is just it's hard to get
your head around this story.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
It's a heartbreaking story, and we might not be done
hearing about victims again. Britney Forton Berry is her name,
thirty one years old, a former substitute teacher in Indiana,
now charged with forty seven counts related to having sex
with underage boys up to ten. I think you just
said it's ten.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Yes, that's the latest count. I mean, it's sad when
you lose count because there were so many different moments
when these boys came forward.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
All right, but this is again in Martinsville, Indiana. Will
keep our eyes on this story. But again A crime
story this week that was making a lot of headlines
that we wanted to hop on and tell you true
crime junkies about so that folks always appreciate you hanging
with us. From Miss Samy Robaka, I am TJ. Holmes.
See y'all soon.
Hey, there're folks. It is Saturday, October fourth, and one
of the big headline grabbing stories this week. A woman
is facing nearly fifty charges related to sexual misconduct involving
teenage boys, and she's a former teacher. Welcome to this
(00:23):
episode of Amy and TJ Robes. The details you hear.
Someone has been involved up to ten victims. She's a
thirty one year old woman. These are thirteen to fifteen
year old kids. And some of the details here. You
said it before I hit record. What the actual.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Fuck it's it's you can't even believe what you're reading.
In fact, when I first told you, when I saw
the headlines, when I started reading the details, you didn't
believe it. Oh yeah, he said, who's reporting that? Yeah,
that can't be real.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
Oh THHW some national choire or something.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
So exactly so. She is an ex institute teacher now
at Eminence High School in Martinsville, Indiana. She also was
a middle school teacher correct as well math teacher. She
was arrested in the spring when one young man, one teenager,
came forward, but since then it has snowballed and the
details about what she is accused of doing, including having
(01:20):
and forcing group sex, and then forcing these teen boys
to wear the scream mask. You know, Ghostface, you know
the movie, that scary mask. She allegedly made them put
the mask on while having sex with her in front
of a group of teenage boys. And this didn't just
happen once. This happened apparently multiple multiple times.
Speaker 1 (01:43):
I cannot believe this story. Yes, that detail makes some
headlines and people, it's making its way around social media
and whatnot, but this is a disturbing, a scary, and
awful story at this point. Yes, these are allegations, so
we have to say that, but we are talking about
this idea of grooming, this idea of someone who we
(02:06):
trust with our children preying on our children, and this
we are talking multiple victims. This is one of those
things that snowball that we've seen cases before, where one
there's one victim and then somebody else feels comfortable coming forward,
and this thing snowballed.
Speaker 2 (02:20):
And now six months later after the initial boy came forward,
we have another one coming forward and so many in between.
So it's police aren't even sure how many victims you're
talking about, because imagine these young boys, some of them
in middle school, some of them in high school having
to go tell their parents. And there's a lot of
(02:41):
evidence according to police, cell phone pictures, videos, and certainly
they all had the same scary, creepy story to tell. Also,
we should point out Britney Fortenberry, that's her name, thirty
one years old. She's in the middle of a divorce now,
not shockingly her her husband divorced her, I believe, or
(03:02):
filed for divorce the month before the allegations came out.
But she also has a four year old child. And
get this, the husband is implicated in some of this.
He is actually facing charges himself in this. It really
is a hard to believe story.
Speaker 1 (03:18):
And it's also hard to believe that robes. At least
according to the kids, this was something that was just known.
The kids knew that was happening. It was talked about
fairly openly. This wasn't a secret, at least among them.
Now we'll go back to March when that first kid
came forward. This kid was fifteen years old at the
time she was in but at the time she was
in the high school, was she or Okay, So this
(03:41):
is a fifteen year old kid. His grandmother comes forward,
tells police that her grandson had been having sex with
This teacher, claimed that she had sent naked photos to
her grandson, gave him drugs, specifically mushrooms, before having sex
with him on multiple occasions, and also told told this
(04:01):
kid that if he told anybody that she would kill herself. Now,
this is all according to this is what got the
ball rolling and got this story started. This was back
in March, so it was just one kid, and they said,
I thought this was an interesting thing to add. The
kid said he came forward because he didn't want it
to happen to any other kids, This fifteen year old.
Speaker 2 (04:22):
First of all, he's not old enough to give consent,
but meaning he didn't want to do it in the
first place. That is so sad and that is so
abusive and just disturbing. But yeah, unfortunately, his hope was
that she wouldn't do it to anyone else. But because
he finally had the courage to come forward, turns out
he certainly was not the only one. Another victim came
(04:43):
forward pretty quickly after talking about how he claimed Brittany,
his teacher, would put her own child to bed and
then had sex with him in the garage, then had
him sleep over and she went back into the bed
with her husband. I mean, just really egregious claim that
these kids are making. And of course probably the biggest
one was the group sex that supposedly was happening with
(05:07):
scream masks. Also, she was paying these kids, buying them
expensive gifts, actually giving them cash up to eight hundred
dollars for photos of their genitals. She would send them
naked photos of her. She wanted photos of them. I mean,
this was just it feels like it was non stop.
This seems almost when you hear these reports and how
(05:29):
many times and how many young kids, it's as if
it was almost a second job. This took a lot
of time, a lot of effort, a lot of money.
And it looks as though her husband knew what was
going on.
Speaker 1 (05:41):
Oh yeah, he's been charged with intimidation and something else.
He's not implicated in actually having any involvement in the
molestation of the boys. But according to police, the victims
told them he was aware the husband was and what
was it he threatened the kids?
Speaker 2 (05:59):
Yes, so I can actually tell you. Detective Patrick Williams
of the Morgan County Sheriff's Office there in Indiana, testified
that her husband Nicholas was aware of his wife's criminal
activity and threatened the boys to stop having sex with
his wife until they were older. He threatened to kill
one boy in front of his family if he had
(06:21):
sex with his wife again, and that he had to
wait until he was sixteen actually gave according to this detective,
this young boy an age requirement to resume having sex
with his wife, but until then, if he did it again,
he was going to threaten that. He threatened this boy
with his life.
Speaker 1 (06:41):
So he is facing charge. You said he filed for
divorce before the initial charge.
Speaker 2 (06:46):
I believe he filed for divorce in February and the
charges came to light in March.
Speaker 1 (06:51):
So this story again shocking when you first hear about it,
and then there was an update several months later when
other boys came forward. And here we are in October.
This was back in March. Now here we are in October,
still having victims come forward. I wonder robes will there
be more, because officially there's at least eight victims I believe.
I don't know if you saw a higher account, but
at least that many.
Speaker 2 (07:10):
So when the first few boys came forward, police were
telling reporters they think as many as ten. It could
be more. Look in these types of cases where someone
has a position of power and can absolutely groom young children,
they oftentimes do have countless numbers of victims, many of
whom don't feel comfortable coming forward. They don't want to
(07:31):
be I get it. They don't want to be attached
to this story. They don't want people looking at them differently.
It's humiliating to think that this woman drugged them and
paid them. It's just not anything. I don't think anyone
wants to admit. So do we know if there are
more victims? Not technically, but is it likely? Absolutely?
Speaker 1 (07:52):
This is one we have to be and don't you
feel I don't know about the coverage necessarily, but when
we see it's a female teacher doing this to a
male student, it reads differently to a certain degree, or
if you will, than if it was a male teacher
with it. Can you imagine a thirteen year old thirteen
(08:13):
year old girl involved with a teacher.
Speaker 2 (08:16):
Yeah, you should be a very different story. The point
being is there's still this and it's not fair, but
this idea of a hot teacher, that it's a young
boy's fantasy to have the hot teacher, make a pass
at him and have sex with him, and so it
almost seems like wink, wink, nod, nod, way to go,
young son. You know, you were able to fulfill every
(08:37):
young kid's fantasy of having sex with the hot teacher. So, yes,
it's unfair because we put that on the young boys.
It somehow it's a good thing, or it's an okay thing,
or it's something to laugh or not or wink at
or be proud of, almost in a way that it
would never be regarded the same way if the genders
were reversed.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Period. But that's important, and that's something that folks who
work in the area of child sexual abuse victims they say,
it's so important that you scream and scream and scream
on a case like this, that you need to understand
this is not voluntary. She did what is frankly typical
when you find child sex abuses. She groomed. These kids
(09:17):
were being manipulated and groomed, and unfortunately it comes off
as if it was voluntary. At least these kids were
gained for, they were getting some money out of it,
they were getting drugs. No, no, no, these kids are
absolutely abuse victims. And she groomed them and unfortunately what
we've come to know as the classic ways that people
(09:38):
go about grooming their victims.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah, and I think, you know, just to even know
that the husband was aware of it and intimidated the
young boys on top of it, that had to be
so scary. Not only are you now caught up in
this sexual situation you don't want to be in, but
now you have a grown man threatening to kill you
in front of your family if you tell anyone. He
also is facing charges for failing to report the crime.
(10:02):
So it's you know, he's getting charged with intimidation, but
also he had a civic duty, a moral duty, a
moral obligation, a legal one to report that crime and
those crimes that he knew were happening in his own home.
That so I think, I think about the double intimidation
factor that it's your teacher and her husband knows and
(10:25):
he's threatening you, and what are you supposed to do?
You're a young kid, who do you turn to? Who
do you tell? And who's going to even maybe believe you?
At that point, there's a lot I can't even imagine
what would be swirling in these kid's mind.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
You said, who's going to believe you, even when you've
told me the details, I didn't believe what you were saying.
I'm like, this is nuts. This cannot be happening. Obviously
she wouldn't do this. And I know anybody, if you're
listening to the story, you're wondering, well, what in God's
name was she thinking? What is wrong with this woman?
And what possible defense could she have for herself? Well,
she has one, and her defense attorneys are giving us
an indication of how she is going to defend herself
(11:00):
in courts. Stay here and.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Welcome back to this edition of Amy and TJ. And
we are talking about a story that is so disturbing
and so bizarre it's actually hard to believe. But this
is happening in the state of Indiana. A former math teacher,
she was a high school teacher at one point, a
middle school teacher at another point, is now facing forty
(11:31):
seven counts after at least ten boys have now come forward,
underage kids, teenagers, some of them in high school, some
of them in middle school, saying that this teacher, their teacher,
drugged them and then sexually abused them. And there are
even allegations of forced group sex making these kids wear
(11:52):
scream ghost face masks while having sex with her, threats
of killing them, threats of killing herself, and these allegations
have continued to pile up over the past six months.
So all of us are thinking, she's thirty one years old,
she has a four year old child, she had a husband.
What is going on with this woman? She said a
couple of things. One of them she told the police,
(12:15):
according to a local affiliate, that she had just lost
one hundred and fifty pounds.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
You kept mentioning this.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
I didn't know this was wild, she said. She wished
She told the police she wished she hadn't lost the
one hundred and fifty pounds, because then she wouldn't have
behaved the way she behaved, almost implying or suggesting that
because she became thin and hot and felt sexy, that
she then felt empowered or wanted to do these things
(12:41):
because now she had a hot bod. That just seemed bizarre.
Speaker 1 (12:46):
That's one of a number of I want to say
after to over this story, and as awful as it is,
some of it is still just bizarre. The screen mask thing,
the one hundred and fifty pounds of some the husband
I just it doesn't make sense, and we're trying to
make sense of this. But her defense name maybe has
one reason for her behavior. And how could you not
(13:08):
think that someone who has done what she's accused of
isn't mentally ill correct, doesn't have something wrong. But they've
already indicated this is the direction they're going to go.
Speaker 2 (13:18):
But I think look, in most moments where you have
extreme acts of repugnance or even violence, a lot of
people would say, yeah, you snap in that moment. But
this was so repeated, this was so calculated, This went
on for months. This wasn't just a one off or
a one time thing, and it wasn't just with one teenager.
(13:39):
One of the boys said that he was coming over
and participating even though he was underage and could not
give his consent, but he stopped and wanted to stop
when he realized that she was having sex with a
number of underage boys, that he wasn't the only one.
I think he thought maybe he was special, and when
he realized, holy crap, she's doing this with a countless
(14:00):
number of kids, and he pulled away at that point.
But this is what her defense team has said. I'll
read you the quote counsel has a good faith believe
that the defendant likely suffers from a mental disease or defect,
but lacks the expertise to proffer whether the defendant appreciated
(14:20):
the wrongfulness of her conduct at the time of the offense.
I find that hard to believe. When you're threatening a
kid with either their harm or your own harm self
harm by trying to get them not to tell anyone
to me, that means you can reason by that act
alone that what you're doing is wrong. If you're telling
(14:43):
someone and threatening someone and paying someone to not tell
on you, so to speak, that means you know what
you're doing is wrong.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
I wh no how a defense lawyer with uh, because
I know that's come up before. I'm trying. I was
trying to remember, I've heard this exact thing before, Like,
you can't claim mental illness or a mental break when
you are look at all the planning that was involved
for the covering up. You had plenty of time. So
I don't know what a good defense attorney would say
in response to that, But yes, they are going after
a mental illness defense, at least indicating early on. But
(15:14):
she at this point is she's not out I think
they set bond at a maybe up to two hundred
thousand dollars or something, but I didn't see she was out.
Speaker 2 (15:22):
Do you know what's wild? She's been These charges keep accruing,
so she keeps getting charged and then rearranged. Like the
initial charge. I think it was a six hundred dollars bond.
Think about how low that was, and then to find
out it has escalated to the scope and to the
level it has. Yes, so now we're talking a much
bigger bond and her husband is in fact leaving her.
(15:44):
But my goodness, this is just it's hard to get
your head around this story.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
It's a heartbreaking story, and we might not be done
hearing about victims again. Britney Forton Berry is her name,
thirty one years old, a former substitute teacher in Indiana,
now charged with forty seven counts related to having sex
with underage boys up to ten. I think you just
said it's ten.
Speaker 2 (16:08):
Yes, that's the latest count. I mean, it's sad when
you lose count because there were so many different moments
when these boys came forward.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
All right, but this is again in Martinsville, Indiana. Will
keep our eyes on this story. But again A crime
story this week that was making a lot of headlines
that we wanted to hop on and tell you true
crime junkies about so that folks always appreciate you hanging
with us. From Miss Samy Robaka, I am TJ. Holmes.
See y'all soon.
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