December 29, 2025 • 37 mins
As Nikki and Khadijah start to pick up the pieces, they discover the story is darker than they could have ever imagined. The shocking news takes them back to the very beginning, where they uncover a vital missing piece in the puzzle.
US resources for Violence and Sexual Assault: https://rainn.org/
International resources for Violence and Sexual Assault: https://nomoredirectory.org/
US Suicide & Crisis Helpline: https://988lifeline.org/
International Suicide & Crisis Helplines: https://blog.opencounseling.com/suicide-hotlines/
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hey, it's Nicky and you're listening to the final episode
of The girlfriends Untouchable. Before we bring this story to
a close, I wanted to give you a heads up
that while this episode will include some touching moments of hope, sisterhood,
and people coming together to fight for the city we love,
(00:20):
we'll also discuss violence, murder, suicide, and sexual assault. Some
of the victims are minors. There will also be some
strong language. If you or someone you love has been
affected by any of the themes in the show. We've
left some links in the description that offer resources and
(00:41):
support take care of yourself. All sorts of people roll
into a service station at night, shift workers coming to
fill up their tanks before long drive, teenagers trying to
buy drinks on their way to a party, and parents
(01:02):
looking for late night supplies. McCalls, a service station in Cuendero,
saw many people from across the community pass through its
stores in the nineties, including Tina Peterson, who started working
there after leaving her job at the women's shelter. She
described her time there in an Affidavid. Her words here
(01:24):
are read by an actor.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Initially, McColls was a good place to work and I
enjoyed speaking with the people who came to the station.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
It was all going well intil the station was sold
to a new owner, a guy named Cecil Brooks. According
to a legal statement Tina gave years later, Cecil, a
known drug dealer, was organizing what she thought were shady
meetings and questionable transactions, and from her perspective, he didn't
(01:52):
hide it.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Whatever arrangement Cecil had, I observed that he never seemed
to worry about getting caught or arrested. Despite this open
and an illegal activity at McCall's, the station was never
shut down or rated by the police. One of the
most frequent visitors to McCall's was Roger Gelubski. I would
see Gallupski almost every day, typically in the evening. He
(02:16):
would often park his car right on the lot and
Sae Seul will go out to speak privately with him.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Gellupski's job as a police officer was to fight crime,
including the illegal cell of drugs, but according to Tina's declaration,
he saw exactly what was going on at McCall's and
didn't do anything to try to stop it, and he
wasn't just turning a blind eye.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Gillupskey seemed to know everything that was going on at
McColl's and had free run of the station.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Hanging out with a criminal and seemingly protecting him was
one thing, but Tina witnessed something else during her evenings
at McCall's, something that made her wonder if there was
more to the service station operation than she first thought.
She was working a shift at the station one day
when Tina witnessed an unusual transaction.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I saw Cecil go to the cash register, pulled out
some cash and give it to Glubski.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
It seemed as if Glubski wasn't just protecting the notorious dealer,
but that he may have been a co conspirator and
something much bigger, an underground operation that involved more than
just drugs. What was really going on between the abuse
(03:32):
of cop and this powerful dealer? We were going to
have to find out?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Oh God, who.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
I'm Nicki Richardson and from the teams at Novel and
iHeart Podcasts, this is the Girlfriend's Untouchable.
Speaker 4 (04:04):
Big Guy.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Episode eight. It could have been us. We still have
so many unanswered questions. People we want to talk to,
(04:37):
like Tina Peterson. We tried to get in touch, but
we haven't been able to reach her yet, so we
don't have the full story from her point of view.
From what we found out, though, Tina tried to report
Roger Glupski's abuse to the k c KPD when she
was working at the women's shelter, she says the police
never got back to her. Tina then worked at the
(04:57):
service station owned by Cecil Brooks. She quickly realized that
it operated like a drug house and was frequented by
Roger Glupski, so she left because she no longer felt safe.
But it seemed like no matter how far Tina went,
Seesaw and Gelupski were always there. In the nineties, Tina's
(05:22):
aunt lived in a housing project on the northwest side
of Kansas City, a place called the Delevant Apartments. From
the outside, the complex seems pretty ordinary now. It's a
block of cream colored, three floor buildings. Each has their
own patch of grass in front of the yard, and
there are a few trees lining the road. But back
(05:44):
in the nineties it was kind of rough.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
When I was there, I observed that the complex was
overrun with illegal activity, including drugs.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
At the time, the Delevant Apartments were owned by Cecil Brooks,
one of the kingpins oft the drug trade in the Northeast.
Tina noticed a variety of men walking in and out
of those apartments, but there was a frequent visitor who
caught her eye. You've guessed it, Roger Glubski. It seemed
(06:17):
like he was either involved with or protecting the men
in the area involved with organized crime. Tina had seen
and heard enough to know he messed around with dangerous men,
and she wasn't surprised to see the apartment complex had
become a hub of illegal activity either. But what did
surprise her were the people she recalls hanging out there.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
I also noticed underaged girls there, which was very troubling.
I also saw Gelupski there with Cecil and noticed that
they seemed to socialize with the underaged girls.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
This is an allegation yet to be proven in court.
Then Tina's affidavit, she says that she was unsettled by
what she saw, but it would take years for us
to put the pieces together. It makes sense of how
those girls fit into the bigger picture of our story.
We'd already heard of Cecil Brooks. He's the drug dealer
(07:09):
Nico Quinn told us attacked her cousin Donielle in the
days before he was murdered. Cecil was the guy Gelupski
told Nico to stop mentioning. He's also the man Nico
says knocked on her door to intimidate her, and Cecil
himself signed an affidavid in twenty nineteen saying that he
knew the identity of Donielle's ro killer, a guy named Monster,
(07:29):
whom Nico said had beat her cousin up alongside Cecil.
We thought cecil Brooks role in this story stopped there,
but then a new federal case came up the USA
versus four men, including Cecil Brooks and Roger Gallupski.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
Lelupski has been indicted by a federal grand juria charges
of sex trafficking.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
When we first heard about the indictment back in November
twenty twenty two, we didn't think too much of it.
He'd already been arrested for sexual assault, and at the time,
it seemed like a new case came up against Gallupski
every couple of months. But as we tried to figure
out what justice looked like in the months after Gallupski's death,
(08:18):
Kadijia and I decided to read more about this trafficking case.
We wanted to understand just how connected Gallupski and Secil
really were. The federal indictment claimed that Brooks and the
other two defendants was quote protection and participation from then
(08:39):
detective Gallupski, held young women and girls at an apartment
complex owned by Brooks and forced the young women, through
beatings and threats of force, to provide sexual services unquote.
The defendants have said they were not trafficking women, but
(09:01):
were running a drug operation that they say the authorities
knew all about. The allegations yet to be proven in court,
but the indictment alone was painful for me and Cathesia
to read. Cecil Brooks and his associates had allegedly been
running a sex trafficking operation in Kansas City, with protection
from and participation by Roger Gulubski, a police detective. Assaulting
(09:27):
women was a disgusting abuse of power, but actively aiding
an alleged sex trafficking operation. The more we read, the
worse it seems to get.
Speaker 6 (09:41):
Wait what, Wait a minute, read that again. Let me
read that again.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Here's the allegation that caught us off guard. It says,
quote the girls held there arranged in the age from
thirteen years old to seventeen years old. The defendants selected
young girls who were runaways, who were recently released from
Beloit Juvenile Correctional Facility, and or who came from broken
(10:07):
homes and moved these girls into Delevan to use them
in criminal activities, including sex trafficking. Unquote. The case alleges
that girls were being funneled straight from the juvenile detention
system or difficult family backgrounds into sex trafficking. Oh my god,
(10:30):
we need to process this.
Speaker 6 (10:32):
Oh my god, it makes me so angry.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
They didn't have to scour the street.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
It seeks to the whole juvenile system and how they operate.
How do fuck They cover shit up. They cover up everything.
They won't tell you nothing when you have a loved one,
they won't help you.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
As you can hear, processing those allegations was pretty overwhelming.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
They discusflect, they cuts you out, They do everything they can,
and then they shift your kid own. I can't believe that.
That is wow. And it just speaks to how tough
this fight is all the time, all the time, because
the corruption is so deep, so entrenched, it's ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
The indictment paints a picture in which Gulupski was able
to use his police credentials to allegedly access and abuse
some of the most vulnerable children in Kansas City.
Speaker 7 (11:32):
Oh my god, that hurts.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
I don't know how to process that. We reached out
to Cecil Brooks, the other two defendants, and their lawyers
to ask about those allegations, but have not heard back
from them at the time of this recording. As we
tried to digest it all, we began to rifle through
our own memories. Kadezu recalled a conversation she had with
(11:57):
someone soon after Gallupski's death.
Speaker 6 (12:00):
The person that called me said that she quit that
juvenile detention center because of what was going on behind
the scenes, and she tried to speak out about it.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
There are a ton of people who allowed this to happen.
Anytime that you have crimes like this that go on
for years and decades, it is not done by just
one person, and so it was an organized effort and
they clearly had found a system that worked well for them.
Speaker 6 (12:28):
Is crazy to me that you will have a number
of people that actually work in the juvenile detention center
and watch this thing happen and follow through with it.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
We've heard so many stories of Roger Glupski targeting vulnerable
black women from poorer areas of our city, the kind
of women whose society is less likely to believe. But
the allegations in those documents suggest that both Galupski and
Cesel Brooks knew that young black girls were easier targets
and because of the way that society treats us like
(13:01):
adults when we're still children. It's called adultification bias, where
black and brown kids are treated like they're older, less vulnerable,
and more mature than they are. You see it all
the time. Sixteen year old Black boys hanging out on
the street like Lamt McIntyre are quick to being labeled
(13:23):
intimidating or thuggish. Fifteen year old Black girls walking home
from school like Stacy Quinn are quick to be labeled
fast and approached by older men because they're seen as
more mature. It's a cycle that leads them to be
perceived and punished like adults. We couldn't help, but wonder
(13:43):
if an organized operation like this would have been able
to take place in plain sight if it wasn't happening
to black girls. Kadijah and I didn't have perfect childhoods,
and even if we had, we're aware that so many
children are only ever just a few traumatic life events
away from being caught up in the criminal justice system
(14:04):
or having to flee a violent home. In short, those
girls could have been us.
Speaker 6 (14:15):
When I was looking at the case, I felt naive.
It opened my eyes. I think that's what really pushed
me was the ideal that I was so close to
danger and God protected me through all of the ideal
of what danger really could have been like for me.
And so I was one grateful that I was protected,
(14:39):
but I was angry that so many people weren't, and
that as easily as I can see myself in danger,
that's how easy it was for them to allegedly do
what they did to so many women.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
And it's just like I was just so close, you know,
and it's not just and that it was happening right
around me.
Speaker 6 (15:00):
Just wouldn't have never crossed my mind in that manner,
that magnitude, that much explosiveness. It angered me. Once I
realized that I could have been one of them, it just, yeah,
it blows my mind.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Leaving through the indictment made me feel sick. A part
of me just wanted to put the documents down and
walk away because the darkness was overwhelming. But Kadija and
I were already into deep and we were about to
put together the final pieces of the puzzle. We started
(15:56):
this series with the story of a shooting Niko Quinn's cousins,
how she was intimidated into bearing false witness, and how
LaMonte McIntyre was sent to prison for a shooting he
didn't do. We've learned a lot since then, but there's
something we've been wondering ever since. Why was Roger Glupski
(16:21):
so determined to frame an innocent boy for that particular murder.
Reading the indictment felt like coming close to an answer.
Since the beginning, Nico has been saying that she thinks
Cecil the Monster were involved in her cousin's shooting. The
men she alleges beat her cousins up and knocked her
on her door to frighten her the men. Gelupski told
(16:44):
her not to mention during her cousin's murder investigation. Neither
Cecil or Monster have ever been formally accused of the
shooting or charged with the crime. We reached out to
them and their lawyers to ask about those allegations, but
have not her back from them at the time of
this recording. But if the story laid out in the
(17:05):
indictment is true and Gallupski did work with Cecil Brooks
throughout the nineties, this story takes on a whole new light.
Why focus attention away from Cecil if not to avoid
exposing his connection to Gallupski to keep prying eyes away
(17:25):
from what was happening at the Delavan apartments.
Speaker 6 (17:32):
It speaks to motive and it gives credibility to many
other stories.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
He saw an opportunity to hit two birds with one stone.
He needs Cecil on the street so he can continue
to conduct business and have the protections that he needed,
and so it just makes sense for him to continually
wrongfully convict other people so he can continue that business relationship.
Gallupski is dead, But because there are several other defendants
(18:01):
in the sex trafficking case, they have all pled not guilty,
and the case is going to trial. In fact, by
the time you hear this, it might have already happened.
We reached out to the people involved, but neither the
lawyers or the people in the FBI who investigated it
are able to talk about an ongoing case, and to
(18:22):
our knowledge, all of the victims have made the decision
to remain anonymous. So the two of us talked about
what we hoped the trial might bring to light.
Speaker 6 (18:33):
My hope is that the prosecution closely looks at testimony
and the implications of other officers, because we know that
Roger Lucy did not act along. I would like to
see karma hit each and every one of these individuals
that saw it, knew what was going on, and actively
(18:54):
participated in harming people in Wyandot County.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
For information to just come out. I think now that
Glupski is no longer here, Cecil Brooks may be more
compelled to just lay it all out. I don't think
he has anything to lose at this point in his
life of just being honest and being truthful. So I'm
really hoping that that's what happens. You never want to
(19:23):
hear these stories, but you know that they have to
come to light. Our community deserves that light, it deserves
the truth. It's very easy for that to happen again
within Wandte County. The way our systems are set up
are still set up that way. Our housing authority has
a relationship with our police department, which has a relationship
(19:44):
with our juvenile correctional facility, And so if someone wanted
to get into the system and organize that same type
of sex trafficking pipeline, they very well could do that.
And so I really just want to to understand exactly
what happened so we can then start doing the work
(20:05):
to break that system down wherever it may still be standing.
We need the information so we can make sure that
it doesn't happen again. Glupski's victims and their families are
hoping the trial can bring about justice, give them some
sense of closure by proving he did what they say
(20:25):
he did. But we're all still reckoning with what comes
next now that Gallupski is dead. Lamont McIntyre got a settlement,
but he'll never get back the twenty three years of
his life that he lost in prison after he was
wrongfully convicted of murdering Niko's cousin.
Speaker 8 (20:42):
I can't change what happened with Gallupski now, no matter
how much anger, how much energy I give to it.
That's a final that's happened, right, So now I gotta
move on Courtly, I can't dwell on it no more.
I gotta just keep moving.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
We also asked Trina Cooper, who reinvestigated her mother's murder,
about how she was feeling in the wake of Gallupski's death.
Speaker 5 (21:07):
Justice would have looked like Klupski going to jail for me.
That would have been the biggest justice ever for me.
But of course that didn't happen, So now I really
don't know what justice will look like for me going forward.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
But she does want the community and authorities to focus
their attention back to the institution that allowed Gallupski to
operate the way he did. My hope is they shut
WANDOT down, shut the police department down.
Speaker 5 (21:36):
If it don't shut down, they clean it up. Clean
up all the corruption that's happening right up under y'all
knows that y'all know about.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
That's my biggest hope. In twenty twenty two, the current
Chief of Police, Carl Oakman, spoke out in a press conference.
Here's what he said.
Speaker 9 (22:03):
Roger Galuski has been charged with deplorable crimes. Although the
crimes date back twenty to twenty five years ago. He
did wear the uniform and calls pain to members of
this community and shame to the badge based on these charges,
Luski's tenure in law enforcement was a moral, ethical and
(22:27):
legal failure. Roger Glupski does not represent the culture, vision,
our mission of the current Kansas City, Kansas Police Department.
I would like to make it clear corruption in any
farm will not be tolerated on kck PD.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
It's good to hear that the KCKPD acknowledge the pain
Roger Gulupski caused and are taking the matter of corruption seriously.
But it's clear the story is not over. Remember why
a tribute Nico Quinn's friend who was last seen getting
into a car with Gazupski before being murdered. The investigation
(23:08):
into our murder has been reopened. The FBI are actively
following new leads and seeking out information for her case.
But Ronda is just one of the many murdered women
linked to Gulubski. There are so many other grieving family
members unsure if they'll ever get answers or any form
of justice. So how do you even end a story
(23:32):
like this? Kadejia and I are still trying to figure
that out. It's a conversation we had with our producer Rafio.
Speaker 7 (23:41):
We sometimes like to tell stories, podcasts, documentaries that end
with a happy ending, like justice happens as a resolution,
the bad guy gets caught. But this story doesn't tie
together as neatly, and the outcome hasn't been as satisfying
for you all, for the victims and survivors. So if
you were telling the story, how would you end up.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
In a way that's happy, in any way, in a
way that feels true.
Speaker 6 (24:07):
I often do fantasize a little bit, imagine what would
happen when this podcast comes out. And so when I imagine,
I imagine that we evoke something in the hearts of
people in Windotte County, and not just Windot County, but
across the world that evokes that Windotte County deserves this
(24:28):
type of change and it deserves the help of the
people to do that. And so I would hope that
this would be the next chapter in what we do
to make a difference, and that we produce great things
for the community that centers around healing, some form that
(24:49):
is community wide would break out from telling this story.
Even though we don't have the outcome we were looking for,
I just don't have hope.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
But one thing we've learned through this process is that
you don't always get justice through the legal system. Sometimes
the most important thing that can come out of a
story like this is culture change, a community coming together
to demand that something like this can never happen again.
Abuse thrives in silence, so we have to keep speaking out.
(25:29):
I think it would be a lie to sit up
there and say that this story is over it because
it's it's not. I believe the chapter of Glupski maybe
is over, but the story isn't. The work isn't. So
for us here in Wandette County, I believe it's to
(25:50):
be continued.
Speaker 5 (26:04):
I got you, I got you.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
It's been over forty years since Roger Glupski first assaulted
Nico's older sister, Stacy. Nico knows Gallupski will never face trial,
but she's determined to make sure that nobody forgets what
he did. She refuses to let the memory of women
who lost their lives fade away.
Speaker 4 (26:29):
I want these women to be remembered in a positive way,
not of what they were prostitutes or crackheads. And they're
not a homicide victim. These women had names. Let's say
they name and continue to say it, because they had
a hard life in life, Let's honor them in death.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
Nico's still trying to figure out what justice looks like
for her.
Speaker 4 (26:57):
I'm praying that everybody that was murdered, they're homicide be solved,
whether the person that did is deceased or whatever. And
I'm wanting these families to get closure. That's all I'm
asking for is closure, a sense of peace.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
She's been trying her best to live the kind of
life her older sister would be proud of by looking
out for her family, especially her nephew, Stacy's son Janelle.
Speaker 4 (27:32):
That is my baby. I love him to pieces. He'd
have made three babies, Finna be four. So I think
I did my part, and I'm still trying to protect them.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
They're close, but Nico often thinks about the families of
murdered women in her community who don't have someone looking
out for them. When she was younger, she used to
open her home up to women who needed her help.
Now she wants to extend that safe place out to
their families and loved ones by starting a support group
(28:02):
she calls the Spiritual Sister Circle.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
To help the victims their children to learn how to
cope or live with the traumatizing things that happen in
their life, and to try to move in a positive direction,
help and get them work ready and ready to change
their lives.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Niko's been a professional truck driver for over twenty years now.
She loves her life on the open road, but it's
not the life she originally planned out.
Speaker 4 (28:37):
I was going to get my nursing license.
Speaker 1 (28:40):
She wanted to fulfill the dream her older sister Stacy
wasn't able to. But she needed to make some extra
money to support her kids while she did it.
Speaker 4 (28:48):
So I started looking into the trucking and then I
went in to get my trucking license. My kid is
always Mammy, were never home. You always worked two jobs,
and I said, I had to provide for y'all.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
But there was more to it than just money.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
My thought process was what's the best thing to do
to get away from this man? Then to hide over
the road. I wanted a truck in because I just
wanted to get away from everybody, and mainly to get
away from him.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Nico spent long days on the road trying to outrun
her memories of Roger Glupski and the shadow he cast
over her hometown.
Speaker 4 (29:27):
I was able to clear my mind. I was able
to forget about what I was going through. It stayed
in the back of my mind, but I knew I
was safe on the highway. I didn't too much have
to look over my shoulder or worry about somebody following
me or things of that nature.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
It's been almost a year since Gallupski died, but Nico
hasn't moved back to Kansas City, Kansas. She lives on
the Missouri side now because while she's come a long way,
the grief of knowing what Gelupski did to her sister
and so many of the other women she loved hasn't
left her. She's not sure if it ever will.
Speaker 4 (30:12):
Now a lot of people ask me, well, how do
you feel? So, I don't know if you're familiar with
solanch the song She Got Cranes in the Sky.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
It's a song about heartbreak and all the things you
can do to try to numb, avoid and navigate pain.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
It's just there until somebody remove it. So how do
we get rid of the pain? You dance, you sing,
you change your hair, you change your style of dress.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
In the song, Solon sings about how you can try
to drink the pain away, run it away, write it away,
or even drive around seventy states in hopes that moving
around might make you feel better. But in reality, the
pain doesn't ever truly leave. You just learn to live
with it.
Speaker 4 (31:00):
I try so many things to get rid of the pain,
and the pain is still here. But a lot of
people say, how do I feel about her being gone?
First of all, I know where she is. Second of all,
she's not cold, she ain't hungry, she ain't hurt no more.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Twenty twenty five marks the twenty fifth anniversary of Stacy's death.
Nico recently got a new headstone to mark Stacy's grave,
and she and Joanelle went to plan a celebration to
honor Stacy's life.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
I want to throw her big party. I just want
to get the family together, and because a lot of
them haven't seen the headstone, so I want them all
to go out and look at it and take pictures
and put some flowers down, have a few family and
friends there, do a big dinner, a prayer, another balloon release,
(32:02):
and let her go. The spirit is already telling me
that's going to be a nice day.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Nico's not sure how to navigate the lasting pain of
her grief, or how to reckon with the justice she
and her sister won't get. But once the memorial has
taken place, she wants to finally move on.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
I was talking to my nephew and he said, Anie,
I'm tired. I'm tired of keeping on reliving this. So
because of his wishes, and I think everybody wishes, I'm
gonna let my sister go ahead and be peaceful, give
her that piece that she needs, because I think every
(32:49):
time we talk about it, we're not doing number digging
these people up.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
It hasn't been easy for her, but Nico wanted this
story to be told. She wanted you to know what
happened to her, her cousins, her friends, and her sister
in her own words, so they would never be forgotten.
But the time for grueling legal investigations, depositions, and podcast
(33:16):
interviews is over. After thirty years of rewinding the tape
back to nineteen ninety four, Nico has made the decision
to close the chapter.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
After all this is said and done, and we get
done with what we're doing, I'm gonna give my sister
a sense of peace. She didn't hunt it Gluski enough.
She didn't time to him enough. It's time for her
to sleep and have some type of peace because she
needs it. Because if she had a rough life in life,
(33:56):
I'm gonna let her rest in death, close that casket.
I'm gonna let her wrist because it's time.
Speaker 1 (34:43):
The series may be over, but there's more to come.
Next time. In the first of our bonus episodes, I'll
be taking a deep dive into the area where this
story takes place, Quindero, and looking at its unique and
remarkable history and the fight for freedom.
Speaker 10 (35:00):
There were a bunch of families seeking freedom in Kansas,
and there was talks of an underground railroad through that area,
and they were able to just walk across that river
to safety. And then they had to be hitting when Daryl,
it means bundle of sticks. One stick by itself is
easy to break, But you put a bundle of sticks together,
(35:20):
and that's harder to break. If we stick together, it's
harder to separate us.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
The Girlfriend's Untouchable is produced by Novel for iHeart Podcasts.
For more from Novel, visit novel dot Audio. The show
is narrated by me Nicki Richardson. It was written and
produced by Rufao Mazarua. The editor is Joe Wheeler. Our
assistant producer is Mohammed Ahmed. The researcher is Zaiyana Yusef.
(35:53):
Production management from Shari Houston and Joe Savage. The fact
checker is Fendell Fulton. Sound design, mixing and scoring by
Daniel Kimpson with additional engineering by Nicholas Alexander. Music supervision
by Rufaro Mazurura, Nicholas Alexander and Joe Wheeler. Original music
by Amanda Jones. The Girlfriend's theme was composed by Amanda
(36:17):
Jones and Louisa Gerstein. The series artwork was designed by
Christina Limcool. The voice of Tina Peterson was read by
Ebanie Janelle. Story development by Olivia Smart and Nel Gray Andrews.
Novel's director of development is Selena Metta. Willard Foxton is
Novel's creative director of Development. Max O'Brien and Craig Strachan
(36:40):
are executive producers for Novel. Katrina Norvel and Nikki Etour
are the executive producers for iHeart Podcasts, and the marketing
lead is Alison Cantor. Special thanks to Will Pearson and
his special thanks to Carley Frankel and the whole team
at w M E
Hey, it's Nicky and you're listening to the final episode
of The girlfriends Untouchable. Before we bring this story to
a close, I wanted to give you a heads up
that while this episode will include some touching moments of hope, sisterhood,
and people coming together to fight for the city we love,
(00:20):
we'll also discuss violence, murder, suicide, and sexual assault. Some
of the victims are minors. There will also be some
strong language. If you or someone you love has been
affected by any of the themes in the show. We've
left some links in the description that offer resources and
(00:41):
support take care of yourself. All sorts of people roll
into a service station at night, shift workers coming to
fill up their tanks before long drive, teenagers trying to
buy drinks on their way to a party, and parents
(01:02):
looking for late night supplies. McCalls, a service station in Cuendero,
saw many people from across the community pass through its
stores in the nineties, including Tina Peterson, who started working
there after leaving her job at the women's shelter. She
described her time there in an Affidavid. Her words here
(01:24):
are read by an actor.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
Initially, McColls was a good place to work and I
enjoyed speaking with the people who came to the station.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
It was all going well intil the station was sold
to a new owner, a guy named Cecil Brooks. According
to a legal statement Tina gave years later, Cecil, a
known drug dealer, was organizing what she thought were shady
meetings and questionable transactions, and from her perspective, he didn't
(01:52):
hide it.
Speaker 2 (01:53):
Whatever arrangement Cecil had, I observed that he never seemed
to worry about getting caught or arrested. Despite this open
and an illegal activity at McCall's, the station was never
shut down or rated by the police. One of the
most frequent visitors to McCall's was Roger Gelubski. I would
see Gallupski almost every day, typically in the evening. He
(02:16):
would often park his car right on the lot and
Sae Seul will go out to speak privately with him.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Gellupski's job as a police officer was to fight crime,
including the illegal cell of drugs, but according to Tina's declaration,
he saw exactly what was going on at McCall's and
didn't do anything to try to stop it, and he
wasn't just turning a blind eye.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
Gillupskey seemed to know everything that was going on at
McColl's and had free run of the station.
Speaker 1 (02:44):
Hanging out with a criminal and seemingly protecting him was
one thing, but Tina witnessed something else during her evenings
at McCall's, something that made her wonder if there was
more to the service station operation than she first thought.
She was working a shift at the station one day
when Tina witnessed an unusual transaction.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
I saw Cecil go to the cash register, pulled out
some cash and give it to Glubski.
Speaker 1 (03:11):
It seemed as if Glubski wasn't just protecting the notorious dealer,
but that he may have been a co conspirator and
something much bigger, an underground operation that involved more than
just drugs. What was really going on between the abuse
(03:32):
of cop and this powerful dealer? We were going to
have to find out?
Speaker 3 (03:40):
Oh God, who.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
I'm Nicki Richardson and from the teams at Novel and
iHeart Podcasts, this is the Girlfriend's Untouchable.
Speaker 4 (04:04):
Big Guy.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
Episode eight. It could have been us. We still have
so many unanswered questions. People we want to talk to,
(04:37):
like Tina Peterson. We tried to get in touch, but
we haven't been able to reach her yet, so we
don't have the full story from her point of view.
From what we found out, though, Tina tried to report
Roger Glupski's abuse to the k c KPD when she
was working at the women's shelter, she says the police
never got back to her. Tina then worked at the
(04:57):
service station owned by Cecil Brooks. She quickly realized that
it operated like a drug house and was frequented by
Roger Glupski, so she left because she no longer felt safe.
But it seemed like no matter how far Tina went,
Seesaw and Gelupski were always there. In the nineties, Tina's
(05:22):
aunt lived in a housing project on the northwest side
of Kansas City, a place called the Delevant Apartments. From
the outside, the complex seems pretty ordinary now. It's a
block of cream colored, three floor buildings. Each has their
own patch of grass in front of the yard, and
there are a few trees lining the road. But back
(05:44):
in the nineties it was kind of rough.
Speaker 2 (05:50):
When I was there, I observed that the complex was
overrun with illegal activity, including drugs.
Speaker 1 (05:56):
At the time, the Delevant Apartments were owned by Cecil Brooks,
one of the kingpins oft the drug trade in the Northeast.
Tina noticed a variety of men walking in and out
of those apartments, but there was a frequent visitor who
caught her eye. You've guessed it, Roger Glubski. It seemed
(06:17):
like he was either involved with or protecting the men
in the area involved with organized crime. Tina had seen
and heard enough to know he messed around with dangerous men,
and she wasn't surprised to see the apartment complex had
become a hub of illegal activity either. But what did
surprise her were the people she recalls hanging out there.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
I also noticed underaged girls there, which was very troubling.
I also saw Gelupski there with Cecil and noticed that
they seemed to socialize with the underaged girls.
Speaker 1 (06:48):
This is an allegation yet to be proven in court.
Then Tina's affidavit, she says that she was unsettled by
what she saw, but it would take years for us
to put the pieces together. It makes sense of how
those girls fit into the bigger picture of our story.
We'd already heard of Cecil Brooks. He's the drug dealer
(07:09):
Nico Quinn told us attacked her cousin Donielle in the
days before he was murdered. Cecil was the guy Gelupski
told Nico to stop mentioning. He's also the man Nico
says knocked on her door to intimidate her, and Cecil
himself signed an affidavid in twenty nineteen saying that he
knew the identity of Donielle's ro killer, a guy named Monster,
(07:29):
whom Nico said had beat her cousin up alongside Cecil.
We thought cecil Brooks role in this story stopped there,
but then a new federal case came up the USA
versus four men, including Cecil Brooks and Roger Gallupski.
Speaker 5 (07:52):
Lelupski has been indicted by a federal grand juria charges
of sex trafficking.
Speaker 1 (07:58):
When we first heard about the indictment back in November
twenty twenty two, we didn't think too much of it.
He'd already been arrested for sexual assault, and at the time,
it seemed like a new case came up against Gallupski
every couple of months. But as we tried to figure
out what justice looked like in the months after Gallupski's death,
(08:18):
Kadijia and I decided to read more about this trafficking case.
We wanted to understand just how connected Gallupski and Secil
really were. The federal indictment claimed that Brooks and the
other two defendants was quote protection and participation from then
(08:39):
detective Gallupski, held young women and girls at an apartment
complex owned by Brooks and forced the young women, through
beatings and threats of force, to provide sexual services unquote.
The defendants have said they were not trafficking women, but
(09:01):
were running a drug operation that they say the authorities
knew all about. The allegations yet to be proven in court,
but the indictment alone was painful for me and Cathesia
to read. Cecil Brooks and his associates had allegedly been
running a sex trafficking operation in Kansas City, with protection
from and participation by Roger Gulubski, a police detective. Assaulting
(09:27):
women was a disgusting abuse of power, but actively aiding
an alleged sex trafficking operation. The more we read, the
worse it seems to get.
Speaker 6 (09:41):
Wait what, Wait a minute, read that again. Let me
read that again.
Speaker 1 (09:47):
Here's the allegation that caught us off guard. It says,
quote the girls held there arranged in the age from
thirteen years old to seventeen years old. The defendants selected
young girls who were runaways, who were recently released from
Beloit Juvenile Correctional Facility, and or who came from broken
(10:07):
homes and moved these girls into Delevan to use them
in criminal activities, including sex trafficking. Unquote. The case alleges
that girls were being funneled straight from the juvenile detention
system or difficult family backgrounds into sex trafficking. Oh my god,
(10:30):
we need to process this.
Speaker 6 (10:32):
Oh my god, it makes me so angry.
Speaker 1 (10:36):
They didn't have to scour the street.
Speaker 3 (10:37):
It seeks to the whole juvenile system and how they operate.
How do fuck They cover shit up. They cover up everything.
They won't tell you nothing when you have a loved one,
they won't help you.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
As you can hear, processing those allegations was pretty overwhelming.
Speaker 3 (10:59):
They discusflect, they cuts you out, They do everything they can,
and then they shift your kid own. I can't believe that.
That is wow. And it just speaks to how tough
this fight is all the time, all the time, because
the corruption is so deep, so entrenched, it's ridiculous.
Speaker 1 (11:23):
The indictment paints a picture in which Gulupski was able
to use his police credentials to allegedly access and abuse
some of the most vulnerable children in Kansas City.
Speaker 7 (11:32):
Oh my god, that hurts.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
I don't know how to process that. We reached out
to Cecil Brooks, the other two defendants, and their lawyers
to ask about those allegations, but have not heard back
from them at the time of this recording. As we
tried to digest it all, we began to rifle through
our own memories. Kadezu recalled a conversation she had with
(11:57):
someone soon after Gallupski's death.
Speaker 6 (12:00):
The person that called me said that she quit that
juvenile detention center because of what was going on behind
the scenes, and she tried to speak out about it.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
There are a ton of people who allowed this to happen.
Anytime that you have crimes like this that go on
for years and decades, it is not done by just
one person, and so it was an organized effort and
they clearly had found a system that worked well for them.
Speaker 6 (12:28):
Is crazy to me that you will have a number
of people that actually work in the juvenile detention center
and watch this thing happen and follow through with it.
Speaker 1 (12:41):
We've heard so many stories of Roger Glupski targeting vulnerable
black women from poorer areas of our city, the kind
of women whose society is less likely to believe. But
the allegations in those documents suggest that both Galupski and
Cesel Brooks knew that young black girls were easier targets
and because of the way that society treats us like
(13:01):
adults when we're still children. It's called adultification bias, where
black and brown kids are treated like they're older, less vulnerable,
and more mature than they are. You see it all
the time. Sixteen year old Black boys hanging out on
the street like Lamt McIntyre are quick to being labeled
(13:23):
intimidating or thuggish. Fifteen year old Black girls walking home
from school like Stacy Quinn are quick to be labeled
fast and approached by older men because they're seen as
more mature. It's a cycle that leads them to be
perceived and punished like adults. We couldn't help, but wonder
(13:43):
if an organized operation like this would have been able
to take place in plain sight if it wasn't happening
to black girls. Kadijah and I didn't have perfect childhoods,
and even if we had, we're aware that so many
children are only ever just a few traumatic life events
away from being caught up in the criminal justice system
(14:04):
or having to flee a violent home. In short, those
girls could have been us.
Speaker 6 (14:15):
When I was looking at the case, I felt naive.
It opened my eyes. I think that's what really pushed
me was the ideal that I was so close to
danger and God protected me through all of the ideal
of what danger really could have been like for me.
And so I was one grateful that I was protected,
(14:39):
but I was angry that so many people weren't, and
that as easily as I can see myself in danger,
that's how easy it was for them to allegedly do
what they did to so many women.
Speaker 1 (14:53):
And it's just like I was just so close, you know,
and it's not just and that it was happening right
around me.
Speaker 6 (15:00):
Just wouldn't have never crossed my mind in that manner,
that magnitude, that much explosiveness. It angered me. Once I
realized that I could have been one of them, it just, yeah,
it blows my mind.
Speaker 1 (15:19):
Leaving through the indictment made me feel sick. A part
of me just wanted to put the documents down and
walk away because the darkness was overwhelming. But Kadija and
I were already into deep and we were about to
put together the final pieces of the puzzle. We started
(15:56):
this series with the story of a shooting Niko Quinn's cousins,
how she was intimidated into bearing false witness, and how
LaMonte McIntyre was sent to prison for a shooting he
didn't do. We've learned a lot since then, but there's
something we've been wondering ever since. Why was Roger Glupski
(16:21):
so determined to frame an innocent boy for that particular murder.
Reading the indictment felt like coming close to an answer.
Since the beginning, Nico has been saying that she thinks
Cecil the Monster were involved in her cousin's shooting. The
men she alleges beat her cousins up and knocked her
on her door to frighten her the men. Gelupski told
(16:44):
her not to mention during her cousin's murder investigation. Neither
Cecil or Monster have ever been formally accused of the
shooting or charged with the crime. We reached out to
them and their lawyers to ask about those allegations, but
have not her back from them at the time of
this recording. But if the story laid out in the
(17:05):
indictment is true and Gallupski did work with Cecil Brooks
throughout the nineties, this story takes on a whole new light.
Why focus attention away from Cecil if not to avoid
exposing his connection to Gallupski to keep prying eyes away
(17:25):
from what was happening at the Delavan apartments.
Speaker 6 (17:32):
It speaks to motive and it gives credibility to many
other stories.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
He saw an opportunity to hit two birds with one stone.
He needs Cecil on the street so he can continue
to conduct business and have the protections that he needed,
and so it just makes sense for him to continually
wrongfully convict other people so he can continue that business relationship.
Gallupski is dead, But because there are several other defendants
(18:01):
in the sex trafficking case, they have all pled not guilty,
and the case is going to trial. In fact, by
the time you hear this, it might have already happened.
We reached out to the people involved, but neither the
lawyers or the people in the FBI who investigated it
are able to talk about an ongoing case, and to
(18:22):
our knowledge, all of the victims have made the decision
to remain anonymous. So the two of us talked about
what we hoped the trial might bring to light.
Speaker 6 (18:33):
My hope is that the prosecution closely looks at testimony
and the implications of other officers, because we know that
Roger Lucy did not act along. I would like to
see karma hit each and every one of these individuals
that saw it, knew what was going on, and actively
(18:54):
participated in harming people in Wyandot County.
Speaker 1 (19:00):
For information to just come out. I think now that
Glupski is no longer here, Cecil Brooks may be more
compelled to just lay it all out. I don't think
he has anything to lose at this point in his
life of just being honest and being truthful. So I'm
really hoping that that's what happens. You never want to
(19:23):
hear these stories, but you know that they have to
come to light. Our community deserves that light, it deserves
the truth. It's very easy for that to happen again
within Wandte County. The way our systems are set up
are still set up that way. Our housing authority has
a relationship with our police department, which has a relationship
(19:44):
with our juvenile correctional facility, And so if someone wanted
to get into the system and organize that same type
of sex trafficking pipeline, they very well could do that.
And so I really just want to to understand exactly
what happened so we can then start doing the work
(20:05):
to break that system down wherever it may still be standing.
We need the information so we can make sure that
it doesn't happen again. Glupski's victims and their families are
hoping the trial can bring about justice, give them some
sense of closure by proving he did what they say
(20:25):
he did. But we're all still reckoning with what comes
next now that Gallupski is dead. Lamont McIntyre got a settlement,
but he'll never get back the twenty three years of
his life that he lost in prison after he was
wrongfully convicted of murdering Niko's cousin.
Speaker 8 (20:42):
I can't change what happened with Gallupski now, no matter
how much anger, how much energy I give to it.
That's a final that's happened, right, So now I gotta
move on Courtly, I can't dwell on it no more.
I gotta just keep moving.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
We also asked Trina Cooper, who reinvestigated her mother's murder,
about how she was feeling in the wake of Gallupski's death.
Speaker 5 (21:07):
Justice would have looked like Klupski going to jail for me.
That would have been the biggest justice ever for me.
But of course that didn't happen, So now I really
don't know what justice will look like for me going forward.
Speaker 1 (21:23):
But she does want the community and authorities to focus
their attention back to the institution that allowed Gallupski to
operate the way he did. My hope is they shut
WANDOT down, shut the police department down.
Speaker 5 (21:36):
If it don't shut down, they clean it up. Clean
up all the corruption that's happening right up under y'all
knows that y'all know about.
Speaker 1 (21:47):
That's my biggest hope. In twenty twenty two, the current
Chief of Police, Carl Oakman, spoke out in a press conference.
Here's what he said.
Speaker 9 (22:03):
Roger Galuski has been charged with deplorable crimes. Although the
crimes date back twenty to twenty five years ago. He
did wear the uniform and calls pain to members of
this community and shame to the badge based on these charges,
Luski's tenure in law enforcement was a moral, ethical and
(22:27):
legal failure. Roger Glupski does not represent the culture, vision,
our mission of the current Kansas City, Kansas Police Department.
I would like to make it clear corruption in any
farm will not be tolerated on kck PD.
Speaker 1 (22:48):
It's good to hear that the KCKPD acknowledge the pain
Roger Gulupski caused and are taking the matter of corruption seriously.
But it's clear the story is not over. Remember why
a tribute Nico Quinn's friend who was last seen getting
into a car with Gazupski before being murdered. The investigation
(23:08):
into our murder has been reopened. The FBI are actively
following new leads and seeking out information for her case.
But Ronda is just one of the many murdered women
linked to Gulubski. There are so many other grieving family
members unsure if they'll ever get answers or any form
of justice. So how do you even end a story
(23:32):
like this? Kadejia and I are still trying to figure
that out. It's a conversation we had with our producer Rafio.
Speaker 7 (23:41):
We sometimes like to tell stories, podcasts, documentaries that end
with a happy ending, like justice happens as a resolution,
the bad guy gets caught. But this story doesn't tie
together as neatly, and the outcome hasn't been as satisfying
for you all, for the victims and survivors. So if
you were telling the story, how would you end up.
Speaker 1 (24:03):
In a way that's happy, in any way, in a
way that feels true.
Speaker 6 (24:07):
I often do fantasize a little bit, imagine what would
happen when this podcast comes out. And so when I imagine,
I imagine that we evoke something in the hearts of
people in Windotte County, and not just Windot County, but
across the world that evokes that Windotte County deserves this
(24:28):
type of change and it deserves the help of the
people to do that. And so I would hope that
this would be the next chapter in what we do
to make a difference, and that we produce great things
for the community that centers around healing, some form that
(24:49):
is community wide would break out from telling this story.
Even though we don't have the outcome we were looking for,
I just don't have hope.
Speaker 1 (25:01):
But one thing we've learned through this process is that
you don't always get justice through the legal system. Sometimes
the most important thing that can come out of a
story like this is culture change, a community coming together
to demand that something like this can never happen again.
Abuse thrives in silence, so we have to keep speaking out.
(25:29):
I think it would be a lie to sit up
there and say that this story is over it because
it's it's not. I believe the chapter of Glupski maybe
is over, but the story isn't. The work isn't. So
for us here in Wandette County, I believe it's to
(25:50):
be continued.
Speaker 5 (26:04):
I got you, I got you.
Speaker 1 (26:09):
It's been over forty years since Roger Glupski first assaulted
Nico's older sister, Stacy. Nico knows Gallupski will never face trial,
but she's determined to make sure that nobody forgets what
he did. She refuses to let the memory of women
who lost their lives fade away.
Speaker 4 (26:29):
I want these women to be remembered in a positive way,
not of what they were prostitutes or crackheads. And they're
not a homicide victim. These women had names. Let's say
they name and continue to say it, because they had
a hard life in life, Let's honor them in death.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
Nico's still trying to figure out what justice looks like
for her.
Speaker 4 (26:57):
I'm praying that everybody that was murdered, they're homicide be solved,
whether the person that did is deceased or whatever. And
I'm wanting these families to get closure. That's all I'm
asking for is closure, a sense of peace.
Speaker 1 (27:20):
She's been trying her best to live the kind of
life her older sister would be proud of by looking
out for her family, especially her nephew, Stacy's son Janelle.
Speaker 4 (27:32):
That is my baby. I love him to pieces. He'd
have made three babies, Finna be four. So I think
I did my part, and I'm still trying to protect them.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
They're close, but Nico often thinks about the families of
murdered women in her community who don't have someone looking
out for them. When she was younger, she used to
open her home up to women who needed her help.
Now she wants to extend that safe place out to
their families and loved ones by starting a support group
(28:02):
she calls the Spiritual Sister Circle.
Speaker 4 (28:05):
To help the victims their children to learn how to
cope or live with the traumatizing things that happen in
their life, and to try to move in a positive direction,
help and get them work ready and ready to change
their lives.
Speaker 1 (28:26):
Niko's been a professional truck driver for over twenty years now.
She loves her life on the open road, but it's
not the life she originally planned out.
Speaker 4 (28:37):
I was going to get my nursing license.
Speaker 1 (28:40):
She wanted to fulfill the dream her older sister Stacy
wasn't able to. But she needed to make some extra
money to support her kids while she did it.
Speaker 4 (28:48):
So I started looking into the trucking and then I
went in to get my trucking license. My kid is
always Mammy, were never home. You always worked two jobs,
and I said, I had to provide for y'all.
Speaker 1 (29:03):
But there was more to it than just money.
Speaker 4 (29:07):
My thought process was what's the best thing to do
to get away from this man? Then to hide over
the road. I wanted a truck in because I just
wanted to get away from everybody, and mainly to get
away from him.
Speaker 1 (29:19):
Nico spent long days on the road trying to outrun
her memories of Roger Glupski and the shadow he cast
over her hometown.
Speaker 4 (29:27):
I was able to clear my mind. I was able
to forget about what I was going through. It stayed
in the back of my mind, but I knew I
was safe on the highway. I didn't too much have
to look over my shoulder or worry about somebody following
me or things of that nature.
Speaker 1 (29:48):
It's been almost a year since Gallupski died, but Nico
hasn't moved back to Kansas City, Kansas. She lives on
the Missouri side now because while she's come a long way,
the grief of knowing what Gelupski did to her sister
and so many of the other women she loved hasn't
left her. She's not sure if it ever will.
Speaker 4 (30:12):
Now a lot of people ask me, well, how do
you feel? So, I don't know if you're familiar with
solanch the song She Got Cranes in the Sky.
Speaker 1 (30:22):
It's a song about heartbreak and all the things you
can do to try to numb, avoid and navigate pain.
Speaker 4 (30:29):
It's just there until somebody remove it. So how do
we get rid of the pain? You dance, you sing,
you change your hair, you change your style of dress.
Speaker 1 (30:41):
In the song, Solon sings about how you can try
to drink the pain away, run it away, write it away,
or even drive around seventy states in hopes that moving
around might make you feel better. But in reality, the
pain doesn't ever truly leave. You just learn to live
with it.
Speaker 4 (31:00):
I try so many things to get rid of the pain,
and the pain is still here. But a lot of
people say, how do I feel about her being gone?
First of all, I know where she is. Second of all,
she's not cold, she ain't hungry, she ain't hurt no more.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Twenty twenty five marks the twenty fifth anniversary of Stacy's death.
Nico recently got a new headstone to mark Stacy's grave,
and she and Joanelle went to plan a celebration to
honor Stacy's life.
Speaker 4 (31:42):
I want to throw her big party. I just want
to get the family together, and because a lot of
them haven't seen the headstone, so I want them all
to go out and look at it and take pictures
and put some flowers down, have a few family and
friends there, do a big dinner, a prayer, another balloon release,
(32:02):
and let her go. The spirit is already telling me
that's going to be a nice day.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
Nico's not sure how to navigate the lasting pain of
her grief, or how to reckon with the justice she
and her sister won't get. But once the memorial has
taken place, she wants to finally move on.
Speaker 4 (32:26):
I was talking to my nephew and he said, Anie,
I'm tired. I'm tired of keeping on reliving this. So
because of his wishes, and I think everybody wishes, I'm
gonna let my sister go ahead and be peaceful, give
her that piece that she needs, because I think every
(32:49):
time we talk about it, we're not doing number digging
these people up.
Speaker 1 (32:54):
It hasn't been easy for her, but Nico wanted this
story to be told. She wanted you to know what
happened to her, her cousins, her friends, and her sister
in her own words, so they would never be forgotten.
But the time for grueling legal investigations, depositions, and podcast
(33:16):
interviews is over. After thirty years of rewinding the tape
back to nineteen ninety four, Nico has made the decision
to close the chapter.
Speaker 4 (33:34):
After all this is said and done, and we get
done with what we're doing, I'm gonna give my sister
a sense of peace. She didn't hunt it Gluski enough.
She didn't time to him enough. It's time for her
to sleep and have some type of peace because she
needs it. Because if she had a rough life in life,
(33:56):
I'm gonna let her rest in death, close that casket.
I'm gonna let her wrist because it's time.
Speaker 1 (34:43):
The series may be over, but there's more to come.
Next time. In the first of our bonus episodes, I'll
be taking a deep dive into the area where this
story takes place, Quindero, and looking at its unique and
remarkable history and the fight for freedom.
Speaker 10 (35:00):
There were a bunch of families seeking freedom in Kansas,
and there was talks of an underground railroad through that area,
and they were able to just walk across that river
to safety. And then they had to be hitting when Daryl,
it means bundle of sticks. One stick by itself is
easy to break, But you put a bundle of sticks together,
(35:20):
and that's harder to break. If we stick together, it's
harder to separate us.
Speaker 1 (35:29):
The Girlfriend's Untouchable is produced by Novel for iHeart Podcasts.
For more from Novel, visit novel dot Audio. The show
is narrated by me Nicki Richardson. It was written and
produced by Rufao Mazarua. The editor is Joe Wheeler. Our
assistant producer is Mohammed Ahmed. The researcher is Zaiyana Yusef.
(35:53):
Production management from Shari Houston and Joe Savage. The fact
checker is Fendell Fulton. Sound design, mixing and scoring by
Daniel Kimpson with additional engineering by Nicholas Alexander. Music supervision
by Rufaro Mazurura, Nicholas Alexander and Joe Wheeler. Original music
by Amanda Jones. The Girlfriend's theme was composed by Amanda
(36:17):
Jones and Louisa Gerstein. The series artwork was designed by
Christina Limcool. The voice of Tina Peterson was read by
Ebanie Janelle. Story development by Olivia Smart and Nel Gray Andrews.
Novel's director of development is Selena Metta. Willard Foxton is
Novel's creative director of Development. Max O'Brien and Craig Strachan
(36:40):
are executive producers for Novel. Katrina Norvel and Nikki Etour
are the executive producers for iHeart Podcasts, and the marketing
lead is Alison Cantor. Special thanks to Will Pearson and
his special thanks to Carley Frankel and the whole team
at w M E
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