February 5, 2026 • 54 mins
Patia tells Hannah the story of Oliver Karafa and Lucy Li, a married couple chasing fame and fortune who went on a deadly crime spree. Also, we have recommendations.
Recommended this week:
Valley of Shadows podcast
Heartwood by Amity Gaige (audiobook)
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Listen
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
The claims and opinions in this podcast are those of
the speaker and do not necessarily represent The Knife or
Exactly Right Media. Welcome to The Knife off Record. I'm
(00:30):
patia Eton, I'm Hannah Smith. If you've been listening to
the show and enjoying it, it would help us out
so much if you took a few minutes to rate
and review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen.
We're still a new show, so it really does help
to get the word out. Also, a quick reminder, we
have merch We have a really cute tote bag with
our logo on it. You can find that at exactly
(00:50):
rightstore dot com. So I have a story for you
today that involves some up to no good stuff, a murder,
and then they flee the country.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Wow. So this is sort of like what a hit? Yeah,
we're gonna hit every beat here. Okay, I'm ready. I'm
ready for a good story. And it's a tough one. Okay,
all right.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
So today's story begins in North York, Ontario. It's two
thousand and eight, and two students in different social circles
are in their final years of preparatory school.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Wait, is that like high school? Yeah, okay, it sounds
so much smarter. I know from Canada. It's preparatory Britory. Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
So one of these students is Lucy Lee, and she's
introverted and studious, and just briefly she dates this very
extraverted popular guy named Oliver Krafa. So, Oliver is actually
from Slovakia, but he's attending school in Canada. His whole
family moved there. He's from money. His parents owned bakeries
(01:55):
in Slovakia, and when he turns sixteen, his parents, who
are wealthy, decide they want to.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Move back to Slovakia. Yeah. Wow, Yeah, So was he
born in the US? No, hell, in Canada, Canada. He
is from Slovakia, I think, Okay, and so he's born there.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
They moved to Ontario. But when he's a teenager at sixteen,
his parents are like, we're moving back, and so what
do they do? They say, you can stay here at sixteen. Yeah,
So he and his two sisters get an apartment and,
according to classmates, basically had credit cards and free reign.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
Wow. And his sisters are younger than him, they're older, older,
so there's like a legal adult somewhere in there. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I think they were all teenagers, I think, but it
sounds like they were doing whatever they wanted and buying
whatever they wanted.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
It was a free for all. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
So all of our's relationship with Lucy ends pretty quickly,
and neither one of them seems to think very much
of it. They graduate and go about their lives. So Oliver,
after graduating, he starts partying, and not as surprise, not
as surprise or I heard, yeah, like, what do you do?
Speaker 1 (03:09):
You're sixteen. You have your own apartment and credit cards
at that age, so you graduate from high school and
now you're ready to like buckle in and go to
school every day. Not going to happen.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
So he's like all over the party scene, and he's
really into this idea being an entrepreneur and making a
lot of money. I mean, he watched his parents their
successful entrepreneur, so I see where he kind of got
the itch. And Lucy goes to university and she starts
studying and by all accounts is doing well there. And
(03:39):
so on April third, twenty twelve, after a night out
with friends, he's behind the wheel of his range rover.
He's been drinking heavily, and his friend David is in
the passenger seat, and Oliver hits the gas and the
car reaches speeds over double the speed limit, which was
about over sixty miles an hour, and he hits a
(04:01):
pole and the car, it's the rain driver, is a
huge car and it splits in half. My god, yeah,
and so half of the car ends up just on
the other side of the street. I mean, it's a
devastating accident. And Oliver walks away almost unscathed. He has
like a few scrapes, right, but David is dead.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Oh my god. Yeah, I mean it's terrible. And he
was drinking and driving. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
His blood alcohol limit was nearly four times the legal limit. God,
it's not just drinking but like wasted, never have been driving. Yeah,
And there's no like drinking and driving that's safe. But
she was belligerently drunk. So David was twenty four at
the time, and he passes away. He's killed instantly in
the crash. It's so sad. And Oliver is then charged
(04:48):
with criminal negligence causing death, dangerous driving causing death, and
impaired driving causing death. You know, the crash was so
severe that actually, even though David was wearing his seat belt,
he was projected from the vehicle God like it was
really bad. He was a personal trainer, That's how he
knew Oliver as Oliver was his client and they became friends.
(05:09):
And I actually saw the CCTV footage of Oliver being
walked into the police station that night after the crash,
and I'm not discounting anything about what he did, but
he looks like a child. I think he was nineteen
at the time that this happened. And thinking back to
how he's been living in this apartment alone since he
was sixteen.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
No adult supervision, really just sort of being allowed to
do whatever he wants to do for years. Exactly. It's
no excuse, but like you can see how life choices
would lead him to a place where he's reckless. Reckless, yeah,
totally reckless. And in this footage of him being walked
into the police station, he asks, is David okay? He's
(05:51):
told David is dead in that moment, and he seems
in the footage very upset, you know, he is, obviously,
but he doesn't seem like he thinks he's walking out
of there yeah, but according to friends of both of theirs,
because they knew a lot of mutual people because Oliver
was going to the gym David worked at, that crowd
(06:13):
started to say that Oliver was very quickly more worried
about if he was going to jail than remorseful about
causing the crash that killed his friend. Interesting, and so
were they or do we know, like were they talking
to him.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
I don't know that he was talking to them, but
I think that they were all still running in the
same social circle. Because although he was arrested and charged,
he gets a lawyer and he fights the charges.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
I think he ends up pleading, but does he get
out on bail? Yeah, So what.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
Ends up happening is Oliver is sentenced to five years
imprisonment and banned from driving for fifteen years. I'm pretty
sure he pled guilty to those charges and decided okay,
five years, and then he's banned from driving for fifteen years, which, like,
I'm fine with that. I mean that it's a clearly
(07:05):
long time, but it's also you did kill someone. And
so he was twenty one by the time he was sentenced,
and at sentencing he did express remorse and take responsibility
for his actions, and you know, I can't totally say
how I feel about the sentence. Nineteen is really young,
but yeah, like we're saying he lived without his parents
and any supervision from sixteen on, So that is a
(07:28):
recipe for disaster. But there's a lot of people that
grow up in difficult situations and they don't behave that way.
So so Oliver gets to prison and you know, although
he's expressed remorse at his sentencing he's killed his friend
by driving recklessly, he pretty quickly starts to just think,
how can I get out of here?
Speaker 1 (07:49):
How can I get out early?
Speaker 2 (07:51):
Yeah, he's not following the rules. He's attempting to smuggle
drugs into the prison, which allegedly his sisters were the
people that we're trying to help.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Him do that. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
And so still despite those things, he's granted parole in
twenty seventeen, so three years into his five year sentence.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Ooh yeah, that is so surprising.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
I was surprised by that too, because this is his
first offense, right, and he's only nineteen when he sentenced,
and so you think about how does our justice system
best function? Now this is in Canada, but like for
all of us universally. I think, if we're going to
put someone in prison for crime, let's make it count
so that they don't do this again, so that when
(08:34):
they get out there a changed person. There's a lot
of issues with prison systems all over the world.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
One could argue that has been never really rehabilt right people.
I'm in about never. But it's not like known to
be this great rehabilitation right situation. But yeah, it's so
complicated because obviously he was really young. A lot of
us have been really young and dumb and made bad choices,
you know, but his choice took the life of someone else,
(09:02):
which is a really big deal. And so three years
it just doesn't seem like that much to me.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
But yeah, I mean I can imagine how David's friends
and family felt about that for three years, especially when
he wasn't behaving in prison. Yeah, And so what we
start to see when this happens is, at least from
my perspective, Oliver sort of developing this really reinforcing this
(09:29):
idea that there are no real consequences.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Right, yeah, because like it's not like he got away
with anything. He still went to prison, But there is
a vibe about him that I don't know, right because
I only know what you're telling me, But I can
kind of imagine this kind of guy. He seems really confident, like, yeah,
he's got a range over it the world. Yeah, everything
(09:52):
has given to him. So there's a certain kind of
attitude there that you're like, do you think you're invincible?
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Yeah? You I think you're invincible. And so as soon
as he gets out, Oliver is ready to leave his
old identity behind. You know, I think he probably did
have some shame and embarrassment about the accident causing the
death of his friend and being sentenced to prison, but
it doesn't really seem to be enough to get him
to reflect about the kind of person he wants to be.
(10:19):
And he starts just like very quickly new business ventures.
He's thinking entrepreneurial, but it's fast and loose as far
as like business plans and money. There's a long list
of businesses he starts and they all fail. What kind
of businesses are we talking here?
Speaker 1 (10:37):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (10:37):
So on his LinkedIn, which is still up at the
time we're recording this, at least, the about me section reads,
I combine my passion for success with my passion for marketing, communications,
and storytelling, and as we get into it, I think
we'll see where the storytelling really takes Shaye, but he
opens a restaurant called Food Society on the ground floor
(10:59):
of a home hotel and attempts to be the sort
of brunch coffee shop situation. You know, you can kind
of see the tie back to like being from a
family that owns bakery.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
It fails very quickly, and he moves on to the
next idea, and that is something called Zen Home Mart,
which is a drop shipping business, and then something called I.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Think it's pronounced insul Act.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
I'm not sure, but the idea behind that third company
is that it's a subscription insulin to people.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
In the US. And it also quickly fails.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
So you can see like, Okay, you can kind of
make the connection with the restaurant and then you're onto
drop shipping and then you're onto insulin subscriptions.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
Yeah, it feels very much strange. Strange. I don't know.
I feel like there's drop shipping businesses. I don't even
know what that is. I feel like it's like every
time I'm advertised somehow, I don't know how this is
in my algorithm for like start a business and like
make a ton of money quickly, it's always drop shipping.
Oh okay, And I mean, like, you know, there are
(12:02):
people that have created very successful drop shipping endeavors. But
for some reason, it pings to me something about someone
who is a young entrepreneur who's trying to make money
quickly and thinks I'll just get into drop shipping, right,
but might not actually really know what he's doing.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Yeah, or maybe have taken the time to like learn
and maybe come up underneath someone else and shadow them
and understand the business, because, you know, to build these businesses,
he's taking on investors, he's getting money from people.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Interesting, and so it's not just funded by his parents. No,
I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
And that is I think one of the most perplexing
things about Alliver and so many people that we come
to learn maybe are not good business people is that
they have this charisma, they have this ability to raise money,
they have lots of ideas.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
It is so wild, how truly, if you want to
raise money for a business, you need charisma. And how
many people like actually aren't that good at business? I know,
maybe don't even have that good of a plan, but
are just able to convince people that they do and
that they're trustworthy and that yes, you should give me
your money. I mean it's like, yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
Yeah, because at this point, you know, this guy is
so young, he's in his twenties. Yeah, and he's already
gone to prison. I mean, if he can do it,
and so I can't HiPE right and son, And you know,
failure is part of being an entrepreneur, sure, and so
I don't want it to seem like these business failures
in and of themselves are indicative of anything. But yeah,
(13:36):
what it shows us is he's I think, hell bent
on making a lot of money really quick. And so
in twenty eighteen, Oliver reconnects with Lucy.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Oh okay, and you.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Know she was this introverted, studious girl from preparatory school.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
This is about ten years after they originally dated. Yeah,
a whole decade. Yeah. Interesting.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
So they're now adults and they're very different, but life
all of her. Lucy comes from a wealthy family, okay,
and her parents are financial advisors and business owners. And
after graduating at first, it seems like she's following suit, right,
she goes to university. She does really well she got
a job selling insurance, which acquired her to obtain this
(14:16):
accreditation to do that, and she starts working for her
mother as a financial advisor. But like one of Oliver's
money businesses, Lucy's career didn't quite last and she decided, Okay,
I'm going to take a few years off, and she
goes to her parents with this plan, I'm going to
take a few years off and try to figure out
what I want to do. She's really intrigued by social
(14:37):
media and fun fact, Lucy's a triplet.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah, so she has two sisters and they all look
very similar. They're fraternal triplets, but they look very similar.
So Lucy's mother agrees and she gives her an allowance
of five thousand dollars a month. What a dream, What
a dream. That's a great allowance. And Lucy's sort of
drawn to the limelight. And she finds her light on TikTok.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
Yeah, which makes sense because you said it's like twenty eighteen, yeah,
and she's in her mid to late twenties. So that
I feel like this all lines up with maybe feeling
a little disillusioned by the career path, wanting to do
something different and creative. Plus social media is popping off,
so totally all adding up. Yeah, Like, nothing wrong with that.
Go see if you can make money on TikTok. Like, great,
(15:23):
good for you.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Her and her sisters start a TikTok page where they
all take pictures together in similar outfits. Some of the
outfits are pretty risque. I don't really have an opinion
on that. I'm just giving you, you know, some imagery here,
Like she's promoting herself online a lot, and she's no
longer this quiet, introverted girl that she was when they
(15:45):
first dated. Actually, an article in the Toronto Sun called
her a rich girl social media darling. Yeah, so, I mean,
I don't know. TikTok is interesting, right. Sometimes I watch
those people where their a whole it's just them watching
someone else's video. Yeah, and I'm like, well, that's a
sweet gig. Yeah, You're just sitting there staring at the
(16:07):
camera and then you just you're done.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Yeah. But truly, it's like with the rise of TikTok,
I feel like we see people trying to figure out
what the thing is that will catch fire, and even
if it's a simple idea of like watching someone else's video,
and commenting on it. Someone had to be the first
one to think of that and then try it, and
(16:31):
then it's like, actually, there's a ton of people that
want to watch just this content, right, So you know,
I think it's kind of like Lucy sounds like she's
like of her time and generation where everyone, you know,
all these young people are sort of trying to figure
out how to get famous online. And the fact that
she's a triplet, she's kind of leaning into that little
niche thing.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Yeah, totally, and she's got a sweet allowance, so yeah,
go do it. See what you can make happen with that,
you know. I mean, at least she's doing something totally.
So twenty eighteen, they're back together, and oh they get
back together. Yeah, they get back together after they meet,
and it's pretty fast and furious, and they're both very
drawn to this idea of wealth and maybe a little
(17:14):
bit of fame, but I think money was something they
really connected on. Christine Okay, Yeah, and they move in
really quickly. One article I read about this said after two.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Dates, Oh my gosh, that is quick. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
I wasn't able to figure out if she lived alone
or with her sisters. But they move in together very quickly,
and of course all of hers still can't drive, right,
So she's driving him everywhere in her Mercedes I think,
some sort of luxury car that she owns. And everyone
is different and every relationship is different. This stopped me
in my tracks. I do not drive my husband. I
(17:49):
am there to relax and get feedback.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Okay, like I'm not going to be driving him. This
would be a deal breaker. It's a deal breaker. If
he loses his license, we are going nowhere. My gosh, Yeah,
I do enough. I do enough. You need someone in
the relationship who likes to drive. Yeah, you know, that's key.
But it sounds like she didn't really have a choice.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
She had to be the driver, like red flag. So
after two years of dating, COVID happens and Oliver and
Lucy decide they cannot stay in lockdown that is so boring.
(18:29):
They need a European vacation. Wow, but there's a problem.
Lucy can't travel due to travel restrictions because she's Canadian.
Oliver is Slovakian, and so he's allowed to travel to
Europe because the rules are different.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
Was there a travel restriction on Canadians not being able
to leave Canada.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
So there were travel restrictions on Canadian citizens and not
on Oliver. Yes Slovakians. And so they solve this problem
by getting married at the airport via zoom. Okay, So
I don't know how they pulled that off, but okay, yeah.
So so they go to the airport and that's how
(19:11):
they find out that she can't travel, and they're like, okay,
well we'll just get married right now, right now, and
then that should be able to allow her to travel immediately.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
I guess. So wow, yeah, you know, I got married
in my living room in between zoom calls. I'm not
knocking a zoom wedding, but it's quick, okay, Like that
is wild at in airport last minute. So those the
logistics of it alone, it's like how did they find
someone to marry them?
Speaker 2 (19:40):
I mean, you know, I know, anything's possible. Very again resourceful.
So they go and they go on this European vacation.
They're I think they're there for a couple of months,
and while they're over there, Oliver gets an idea. He's like,
here's a business I could get into. I could sell
personal protective equipment.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Okay, ppe, yep.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
In Europe there was a shortage. That's how he gets
the idea. And so when they get back, oliverur meets
someone named Tyler Pratt. Now Tyler Pratt, he's an alleged
drug dealer. He has a lot of money. You know,
I'll get into the alleged drug dealer part of this leader,
but for context, that's how he's got money, supposedly, And
(20:24):
he puts in a total of four hundred and seventy
thousand dollars. And they become fast friends, you know, they
get birthday gifts and lots of text back and forth.
They go on double dates because Tyler has a girlfriend
named Jordan Romano, and.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
All is well.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
But of course Oliver is not great at running businesses,
and pretty soon Tyler.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
Wants some money back.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Yeah, and they met allegedly.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
God, all right, I'm imagining this business is purchasing ppe
from somewhere and then selling it to people in Europe. Yeah.
But somehow, but somehow, he's the business is failing. Yeah,
I imagine that Oliver spent the money. Yeah. I feel
like something else is going on, because like this is
(21:12):
a pretty straightforward business plan. I mean, I don't know,
I haven't seen his business plan. But yeah, this is
something in high demand. Unless he thought he could do
it and then couldn't source it anywhere, it just doesn't
make sense. How is this an immediate failure? He must
be spending the money.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Well, allegedly Tyler met them because he was selling cocaine
to Lucy, gotcha. So I don't know what the extent
of their drug use was, but allegedly that.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
Is how he met Lucy.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Okay, But Tyler wants his money back and he's not
getting it, and Oliver's got a lot of excuses. Tyler's
a father, he has two daughters from a previous relationship,
and he is a very involved dad. He loves his kids.
And so Tyler is going to he's a victim in
(22:00):
this story. And so I just want to say, yeah,
he was an alleged drug dealer, but I think it's
relevant for a context, but it doesn't diminish what ends
up happening.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Yeah, all different kinds of drug dealers too, right now.
And it's a job, it's a job.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
And so Jordan Romano, Tyler's girlfriend, becomes pregnant, and after
Tyler starts getting the idea that you know, Oliver's not
being honest, because he's seeing documents come in that don't
necessarily look real. There are fake invoices and fake reimbursements
and just Tyler's no dummy.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
He's like, this has investment scam written all over it.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Yeah, And so eventually he's like, I'm going to put
a date on this, and you're going to pay me back.
And so that date is March first, twenty twenty one.
He says, you're going to pay me back by then
with interest, gotcha. But Oliver can't pay him back. He
has done something with the money.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
I don't know what.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
Maybe he's just a lazzy businessman. Maybe they spent it
on drugs and partying. But he's not paying him back.
So Oliver and Lucy hatch a plan and the plan
that I'm going to tell you that they carry out
when we get into this whole thing coming to light.
They have different stories on how this came to be,
but Oliver and Lucy do Oliver and Lucy, but this
(23:19):
is what happened. So, although Tyler wants his money back
from Oliver, probably like any smart businessman, Tyler is not
totally cutting Oliver off, right. He's trying to maintain the
friendship in a way.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
Because he doesn't want to just ghost him and never
hear from a Mercy his money again, I imagine.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
And so Oliver and Lucy decide what they're going to
do is kind of throw out this hail Mary one
more business idea for Tyler. And the idea that they
have is that they're going to lure Tyler to a
warehouse under the guise of the warehouse being a property
owned by Lucy's parents where they can maybe have a
(24:01):
marijuana growing operation. Okay, that's you know why I think
Tyler being an alleged drug dealer is relevant is that
this could be appealing to him, gotcha. And so they
plan to meet him there on February twenty eighth, twenty
twenty one, so right before this March first date. And
the plan is that they're going to meet at this warehouse.
(24:23):
They're going to look through it, kind of talk about
this marijuana grow operation, and then they are going to
go to dinner at this like celebrity hot spot. So
Jordan is with Tyler and they show up and it's nighttime,
and Lucy and Oliver are there, and Tyler and Jordan
are there at this warehouse and Lucy and Oliver get
(24:44):
there first, and there's a chain on the gate because
Lucy's parents don't own this warehouse. This is all completely
made up. This is just a remote location for them
to do something awful, and so Oliver cuts the chain.
They go to the door of this warehouse and Tyler arrives,
Jordan and their range over and.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
So is Jordan's still pregnant? Yes, at this time, I
think Jordan's twelve weeks pregnant. She's pregnant.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Yeah, So Tyler and Jordan arrive at the warehouse and
meet Oliver and Lucy there.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
As expected.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Tyler and Jordan go meet them at the door, and
then it's really cold outside. It's February and we're in Ontario.
So Jordan's like, I'm going to go wait in the
car because Oliver is like, I don't know where the
realtor is who's supposed to let us in and show
us the property, and they're taking forever. It's like sort
of strange, and Tyler's like okay, And so Jordan goes
(25:37):
and waits in the car, and Lucy's like, you know,
I'm gonna go wait in the car with you because
it's cold and apparently in the car, Lucy and Jordan
are kind of making small talk, but it gets kind
of awkward because Jordan's like, this is strange, and Lucy
gets then out of the car. What happens next is
Tyler is like, okay, Oliver, what's really going on here?
(25:57):
And Oliver then points out gun at Jordan in the
range rover and says something to the effect of get
out of here, Joe. But as he's saying that, he
starts shooting and he fires I think three shots at Jordan,
who's in the driver's seat of the car, and one
of the shots goes through her heart. Oh my god, Yeah,
(26:20):
it hits her right in the chest. Then of course
Tyler is like, what is happening. Tyler and Jordan were
not armed, right, They were there to meet their friends
for the night and explore this opportunity with them. Yeah,
And so in the next moment, Oliver shoots at Tyler.
I think he shoots five times, and Tyler falls to
(26:41):
the ground. It's terrible. He shoots him through the lungs
and his lungs begin filling with blood, and I think
it takes like an hour until he passes away.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
I mean, it's horrible.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
And while this is happening, it's unclear where Lucy is.
She goes on to say, oh, I was so far away.
I was there, but I'm like, well, you were sitting
in the car with Jordan, so.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Then you got out and where did you go? Right?
Speaker 2 (27:05):
And so what Oliver and Lucy do next is they
go to the car where Jordan is, where she's been shot,
and they take her out of the car and throw
her on the pavement. They go and get the cash
that Tyler had on him, which was twenty thousand dollars.
They take their phones from them, from Tyler and from Jordan,
(27:25):
and they take the Range Drover that Tyler and Jordan
arrived in and they're Audie. They're audi that they had
purchased right before this. And they leave and Oliver had
arranged for someone to buy both of these cars.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
So they just leave Tyler and Jordan laying there, Yeah,
for dead, dying. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:48):
They pulled Jordan out of the car so violently that
one of her like knee high boots came off. I mean,
if you've ever pulled off a knee high boot like
that's not easy to do. Yeah, And so they flee
and their whole plan is now really taking shape. Oliver
has pre arranged for.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
Someone to buy these cars in a shady deal for
really cheap to get them, she means it was premeditated.
Pre meditated, yeah, And so he sells these cars really
quickly to this person, and they go back to another
friend's condo. And they go to this other friend's condo
because earlier that day they had said, we need to
borrow your SIM card because they didn't want their cell
(28:27):
phones traced to this warehouse, okay, and the friend was
under the impression that they were going to this warehouse
for this big meeting that they didn't want Lucy's parents
to know about because they would be upset by it
for some reason. So they didn't know anything about these
murders taking place. They get their SIM card back, and
then they go to Lucy's condo. They're shared condo where
(28:50):
they live, right and they watch the news and they
see on the news that Jordan has flagged down a motorist.
She did not die, and that motorist called nine one
one and Jordan is alive. Oh my gosh. And so
they had already acquired fake identification, fake passports, already planned
(29:12):
I think to flee, but now they're like, oh, shoot,
she can tell them exactly what happened. So in theory,
because Jordan, you know, has been taken to a hospital,
we assume we don't even know, like she might have
already told authorities who.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
It was, right, Like, they don't know anything except that
Jordan didn't die, okay, which has to have been a
crucial part of their plan to keep this secret. Yeah,
And so they go around the city dumping any evidence.
I mean, their clothes or blood stained for example. And
Lucy had a wig on at some point, like a
blonde wig. And so they're going and they're dumping the
(29:50):
evidence and they flee. And their first move is that
they're flying to Montreal and from there they bought a
flight and get to Europe and they go to Slovakia
because that's where Oliver's parents live, and eventually to Hungary. Okay,
And they use these fake passports that they've acquired and
I'm not sure where they were obtained, but it was
(30:12):
obviously in preparation for these murders. Yeah, and so they
are wanted fugitives because Jordan has lived it is not
a secret what happened. And also just so idiotic, because
I'm sorry, but even in twenty twenty one, how do
you not know that taking someone's physical cell phone that
doesn't help you. All of your text messages can be retrieved.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Yeah, what are we talking about here? Yeah, like why
would they do that? You need to burn stupid, you
need to burn your phone for let then, Yeah, and
so they're on the run, and so authorities like very
quickly know exactly who they are and that they've done this,
but they've already fled the country.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
They've fled the country, and so eventually they're apprehended in
Hungary and Budapest, Wow, in this scene with lots of clubs,
lots of night clubs and fancy restaurants. And they're apprehended
in June of twenty twenty one. So remember this happens
(31:15):
at the very end of February. They're not apprehended till June,
so that whole time they're wanted fugitives.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
You have to wonder what's going on with the two
of them during that time. Yeah, And you know, I
would assume also because of the area they were found in,
that they were just living, you know, like nothing had happened,
going to clubs, like, can you imagine No? No, Like, wow,
I can't imagine at all. Actually, yeah, let alone under
(31:42):
these circumstances ever going to a club. Yeah, not at
this point in my life. Seriously.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
Yeah, and so Lucy agrees right away once they're arrested
to return to Canada. But all of our fights extradition
and so now they're being separated, and that was going
to happen anyway, whether or not one was extradited in
one wasn't. But for the months that they've been gone,
the story of you know, this murder and attempted murder
has been all over the news, as has a bunch
(32:10):
of camera footage of them on CCTV and elevators and
around the city dumping the evidence. So it's not a
secret we know who was there that night, but it's
just a matter of figuring out, Okay, what happened because Jordan,
she knows that Oliver shot her, and she knows that
Lucy was there, but after she was shot, it all
(32:31):
happened so fast. Yeah, it's not clear like did she
see Tyler get shot?
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Does she know the full.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
Extent of their business dealings?
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Right?
Speaker 2 (32:39):
Those are sort of the unknowns that I think Oliver
and Lucy begin to sort of see if they can
use to their advantage. Okay, But Lucy starts talking to
authorities right away, and she tries to place the blame
on Tyler Pratt, the victim, you know, the murder victim.
(33:00):
She's like, he's dangerous and my husband did not plan
to kill him. But her story is, as you can imagine,
poorly thought out and a total mess, and nobody believes her.
Speaker 1 (33:12):
I wonder if they found the friend who lent them
the SIM card. There's that piece. There's also the guy
that they sold the card to. I don't know if
they could find that guy.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
Actually, I'm glad you said that because it reminded me
the audi that Oliver and Lucy arrived to the warehouse
in that night. They had purchased that I believe from
a friend of Lucy's family, Okay, and they had purchased
it very recently before the murder.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Okay. So it's like, okay, so you buy a getaway
car right before. Okay. Yeah, there's a lot of evidence
that's coming together that shows this was premeditated.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
A lot, and so a bail hearing happens in December
of twenty twenty one, and that means, you know, they've
been in prison for that time, probably awaiting their trial,
trying to figure out if they're going to plead. And
Lucy's family really advocates for her to be allowed on
house arrest with bail. They swear up and down, you know,
(34:09):
we'll keep her in the house. You want have access
to credit cards or cars, and the court agrees.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
Unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Yeah, and I believe Lucy's bill was three million dollars.
It was one of the highest bills ever set there. Yeah,
and so what does she do on house arrest? She
violates her terms. Not a surprise, Yeah, not a surprise.
She goes to lunch with her sisters and a possible
witness for the trial. My god, I mean horrible, right,
(34:38):
And I think it also shows we'll touch on this later,
but Lucy sort of leans into being almost like ditsy,
like I'm, you know, the dumbest person in the room,
Like that word gets used, like she claims to be stupid,
Like I was totally coerced. But you see her making
these calculated efforts. I think you go to lunch with
(35:01):
your sister's and a possible witness, like is that a coincidence, probably, Yeah,
And so obviously the court does not think highly of
that decision, and she's ordered to stay in prison until
her trial.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
Okay. Yeah, And Oliver Carafa, Hungary and Canada come to
the terms of his extradition. He's extradited to Canada and
also now awaiting trial, and his story starts to be
I shot in self defense. Tyler's really dangerous. He's a
drug dealer. He's very dangerous, and he was threatening to
(35:34):
have people kill me and saying that if I reported
him to police for these threats. Well, he knew people
who were police who would protect him, and there was
no evidence of that. You know, Tyler's work may not
have been above board, but he did not come armed
to this meeting. He thought they were going to dinner afterward.
(35:56):
He was not threatening Oliver's life. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
So Jordan Romano, So Jordan survives, her baby does not survive,
and that is you know, you can't put it into
words how terrible that must have been for her, especially
because the father of the yeah child, her partners, she's dead. Yeah,
(36:21):
on this night she lost both Tyler and their baby. Yeah,
it's horrific over what.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
You know, money like greed. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (36:31):
I mean, it's there is no explanation, right, And so
her testimony at the trial is extremely important. She's a
witness to what happened, and she has an incredibly emotional
story to tell. And so when Jordan takes the stand
on the third day of trial, she says that she
made eye contact with Oliver as he was shooting at her,
(36:54):
and she said it seems like he was almost like saying,
get out of here, Joe. Oh, like he almost meant it,
but that he started shooting right away, so it wasn't
like he gave her a few minutes to get out
of there. He immediately started shooting. And she said they
had locked eyes when he shot at her, and he
didn't shoot just once. He shot multiple times. If you
(37:17):
shoot a gun at someone multiple times, your intention is
to kill them. Yeah, And I wasn't able to find
out if Oliver knew that Jordan was pregnant. It doesn't matter,
it's still awful, but just for the record, I wasn't
able to find that out. Okay, Now, Oliver and Lucy
have in a sense turned on each other, but they
both are saying Tyler's really dangerous and that was the
(37:39):
catalyst of all of this, is that we were scared
of Tyler. But Lucy says, I wasn't even there. I
was at least half a football field away, and I
didn't know he was going to kill him. And her
story changes so much she can't keep it straight. Oliver's
claiming self defense. It doesn't work, And on May twenty fourth,
twenty twenty four, they're both sentenced to life, which in
(38:01):
Canada means they will not be eligible for parole for at.
Speaker 1 (38:04):
Least twenty five years. And I don't believe that the
baby Jordan lost carried any separate charges, but I did
want to acknowledge that. Yeah, in Tyler's family, I watched
an interview with them outside the courthouse when the verdict
was delivered guilty, and they said that they were so
relieved that they were found guilty, and they spoke so
(38:27):
highly of the way the court handled the case and
the way that victim services helped them through this. Nothing
good comes of this, but I was like, Oh, it's
nice to hear a family feel like they were treated
that way through such were difficult experience. Really, Yeah, yeah,
for sure, because because of a trial of the murder
(38:49):
of your son, your brother. Yeah, I mean it's horrible,
and just even the attitude of both Lucy and Oliver,
and the fact that like Oliver had killed someone before.
Yes it was accidental, but it just the recklessness, the
like seeming lack of remorse. Obviously, I don't know if
(39:10):
they were remorseful or not, but them sort of trying
to blame Tyler, the person who was killed here. It's
so gross and the crime seems so clearly premeditated, so
horrible to cover up what was probably already an I
legal operation of an investment fraud. So it's just like good,
I'm glad they were caught. Like their behavior did indicate
(39:33):
that they were like gonna change their ways?
Speaker 2 (39:35):
No, yeah, not at all. And they're more dangerous together. Yeah,
I guess they're still married technically. I don't know if
that's like for any reason other than why bother if
you're going to spend the next twenty five years in jail,
I don't think so. But yeah, I mean neither one
of them had ever I think, faced real consequences.
Speaker 1 (39:53):
Yeah, that is such a wild story. I had not
heard that. I had no idea where it was going,
and and it's crazy. I mean, what a wild story.
And you know, I'm glad they were caught. I'm glad
that Jordan lived, Like I'm sure her life is different
than before forever, but that's amazing that she survived this. Yeah,
I mean to think of what it must have felt
(40:16):
like to see your friend shooting at you and then
have him and his girlfriend who was also your friend
or his wife pulling you out of the car and
leaving you there to die.
Speaker 2 (40:25):
I mean, that's unthinkable. And Jordan actually filed a civil
suit and won. I couldn't tell exactly how much she won,
but I think it was over a million dollars. It
doesn't seem like even today, Oliver Lucy has accepted responsibility.
They're both still trying to appeal. And yeah, like I said,
they're still married. So yeah, this happened in Stony Creek, Ontario,
(40:49):
and the way that they planned it together, even though
it was poor planning, they planned it and the court
talked so much about how stupid they were, and I
thought that was like kind of interesting, m m. They
pointed out, this is the stupidest plan, but they did
plan it. And I mean the wig, the sim card,
(41:10):
I mean, they're making all of these moves in plain sight,
you know, buying this audi, swapping the phone thing, showing
up at this warehouse.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
I mean, idiots. It's like they both have this same affliction,
which is inflated self intelligence or a few of themselves,
and clearly they're not good together. Like talk about toxic relationship. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
I read one report that when they saw on the
news that Jordan had lived, they went around looking for
her because she wasn't named, but they were like, it
couldn't be her, it couldn't be her, And then they
couldn't find her body because obviously she wasn't dead she
had been.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Wow, they went back to the scene of the crime
to try to see if your body was there.
Speaker 2 (41:55):
One of the reports said that. But I couldn't figure
out how that happened after they ditched the cars, because
I heard that they ditched the cars right right, and
then took a cap and then went back to the apartment.
But for what is worth, I'm like, wow, imagine that moment. Yeah,
wild story. I'm glad that they were both found guilty
and finally facing consequences.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Me too, Thanks for telling me that story. Yeah, Okay,
so I have a couple quick recommendations. Oh, I would
love them. So the first one is a podcast. It
is a limited series. Not all the episodes are out yet,
so I have to say that okay as a caveat.
But I started listening to it. It's called Valley of Shadows. Oh,
I've heard of Value of Shadows, but I haven't listened,
(42:38):
so tell me. It's from pushkin. I heard about it
because one of the investigative reporters who's also one of
the co hosts. Two women who are both investigative reporters
reporting on the story, and they co host the podcast.
And one of them, Haley, is someone that I used
to work with years ago. Oh cool, Yeah, and she's great.
She's such a good reporter. I know that anything that
(42:59):
she works on is going to be just really well
done and thoughtful. So I feel like, I don't know,
I can fully stand behind this is going to be
like a well done show, And so I started listening
to it. It's interesting. It's basically they look into the
disappearance of someone who worked for the Sheriff's department. This
(43:20):
guy John Auja. I don't know exactly how to say
his last name. Some say his name is Oja. Other
people call him Auja, and he was a long distance
runner and would go on these like big long runs
out in the desert, and one day in nineteen ninety eight,
he never came back from a run. You find that
out like very quickly. So on the surface, it seems
(43:42):
like someone who went missing in nature, which we've covered
stories like that before. But there's a lot of questions
about if there was actually foul play and a lot
of questioning of the La County Sheriff's department handling of
like the search and rescue, which is interesting because if
(44:03):
you know anything about the La County Sheriff's Department, there's
been a lot written about like endemic problems and actually
gang membership within the Sheriff's Department since the seventies. You know,
there's been a couple of investigations. There's a fifteen part
podcast from Knock La that investigates like the history of
gangs inside the department. Oh wow, and how you know?
(44:26):
It's that like classic thing of you know, don't snitch,
and there's all like I don't know, and so obviously
it's not every person in the Sheriff's department, but that's
sort of the reputation that they have had in the past,
and so it makes you wonder and there's a lot
of questioning about like how they handled the case. So
this is their investigation, the host investigation into this, and
(44:50):
they go out to the desert, they interview a lot
of people. It feels in some ways like an investigative
podcast back when that was first a thing. Not to
say investigated podcasts aren't great today because they are. There's
so many of them. Not all of them are truly
investigative or someone's like boots on the ground looking into
(45:12):
a case. But that is how this one is.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
Yeah, and when I hear okay that someone who's a
long distance runner and he's going for a run in
nature and he goes missing, I would fully support any
reasonable investigation into one someone's disappearance and two possible off
houl play. Like that is why these law enforcement agencies exist,
is to figure out what happens to people and to
(45:37):
bring people.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
To justice when it's called for.
Speaker 2 (45:40):
But I have my own experience looking into and like,
I don't know what happened here. I haven't listened to
the show, but my knee jerk reaction is, did he
just go missing? And it reminds me of a story
I was working on before you and I left our
last company that we were working at. This young man
(46:01):
had gone missing on a hike, and he was a
very physically fit young person. I believe he's in his
late twenties, maybe yearly thirties, I think late twenties, and
he was well prepared for this hike, had set out
water drops, had made plans to meet his then girlfriend
at the end of the hike. And he was someone
(46:22):
who lived less conventional lifestyle. He was nomadic and traveled around.
But yeah, there was a huge search for him, and
no one found anything, and so it was like, well,
what happened to him? Did he owe someone money because
he was a gambler and there was some drug use happening,
(46:43):
you know whatever. So there were all of these suspicions,
right because they did this huge search, and this took
place in Joshua Trade and which like so much to search,
so much to search, but by all accounts, a very
thorough search. And this was someone who had done a
lot of hiking, hiked the Appalachian Trail many times. He
was a seasoned hiker, and so there were a lot
(47:05):
of sort of explorations into other possibilities of what had
happened to him. And I don't know that those were
formal investigations, but you know, there were a lot of
people asking questions, well, if he got injured or died
on the hike, well then why can't we find him?
And eventually another hiker stumbled upon his remains, and he
did die on the hike. It looks like he just
(47:27):
got lost and had a medical event. You know, if
you've ever been to Joshua Tree, there are areas that
have more vegetation, but you can look out and see
rocks right like so many rocks, but you can see
a long distance, and I think it gives you this
sense of I can scan this area. But you know,
when you talk about remains and animals and wildlife, you know,
(47:52):
taking things and moving things around, you could be three
feet away from a bone and not see it. Yeah,
And I think what ended up happening is someone spotted
a backpack because you know it looks out of place.
Your eye is drawn to this color that doesn't belong
in nature. And that was the same thing with the
Rachel Leduke hiker that went missing in Washington that I
(48:16):
mentioned in our Sam Sayers.
Speaker 1 (48:18):
Episode, Yeah, someone spotted her backpack. Someone spotted a backpack
or sleeping back something like that, because it's like not
a color of nature, right, and it also doesn't decompose,
so right, you know it's going to be out there.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
Yeah, And you know, she went years without being found.
I think over two years without being found, and she
wasn't that far from the trail. And you know, nature
is just ruthless.
Speaker 1 (48:43):
And so ruthless. I mean, we've talked about a lot
of stories of people both on the podcast and off
of missing people who went missing out in nature, and
there's just so many elements, depending on the environment, that
make it really difficult to find people. Wildlife, water, yeah,
rough turin, and it doesn't I mean, I really don't
(49:04):
think it matters if you are a seasoned hiker. I
agree with you, because, like we've seen that again and again,
sometimes people who are really seasoned overestimate their abilities and
underestimate the power of nature. Dehydration can do a lot
to you as well. I had the same thought about
this story, especially when I first started listening. I was like,
I bet he just died and hasn't been found. But
(49:28):
they do a good job of kind of bringing up
questions like there actually wasn't a very thorough search for him,
so the sheriff's department cut the search off prematurely and
came up with a story about what happened that doesn't
seem to be backed by evidence as far as we know.
So there are some things that make it weird, and
(49:50):
especially like a law enforcement officer and their organization not
going above and beyond to find someone is weird to me, right,
But also who knows, like it could literally just be nature.
I think that's one of the things that makes it
an interesting story because it's you're like, I don't know, Yeah,
you get to sort of decide for yourself. Are these
(50:13):
you know, the interviews.
Speaker 2 (50:14):
With people out there, Are they making you feel one
way or the other way?
Speaker 1 (50:18):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (50:18):
Yeah, I mean it's reminiscent two of the I think
it's in our second episode, I talk about the missing
person's case I looked into in Tennessee. And one thing
I always really appreciated about the law enforcement agencies that
were just local sheriff's department that worked on this missing
person's case, these two teenagers, right, is they didn't know
what happened to them. They ended up that they had
(50:40):
driven into this river, and their car with their remains
in it was later found in the river twenty some
years later. Right, But yes, there should have been a
more thorough search of the river. I think we can
all agree. But they never just said, well, they probably
went into the river.
Speaker 1 (50:55):
It was an open case.
Speaker 2 (50:56):
It was an open case, and many years later, right,
didn't have you know, the resources and the training and
the manpower to I think at the time, make the
right decisions or put the right people in place to
ask these questions and do these searches. But they never
gave up like that. Sheriff Steve Page in Sparta took
(51:17):
my call, yeah, and was like, okay, well what have
you found out, and was.
Speaker 1 (51:20):
Still invested in bringing answers to the community. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
And I just always thought that that was sort of
an underappreciated aspect of this particular case. When you're writing
an article about two missing people, obviously the focus is
just like what happened, Right, But I think that everyone
who worked on that case, one thing they did that
doesn't happen all the time is they didn't just say whatever,
(51:45):
we're done with this, We're not going to find them.
Speaker 1 (51:48):
Yeah, and you hear stories about investigators who, no matter
how much time has gone on with the unsolved case,
they're still invested in wanting to find those answers, especially
if they were working hard on it and then were't
ever able to solve it. There's usually a real desire
to find answers there. Totally. Okay, So my second recommendation
(52:09):
is sort of connected thematically, but it's fiction. So it's
actually a book that I listened to the audiobook of.
So I want to recommend the audiobook because you know,
if I'm not listening to a podcast, I'm probably listening
to an audiobook. And with audiobooks, I have a really
particular like standards, Okay, Like I really like a good reader,
(52:33):
and I also really enjoy when there's different voices, not always,
but when it's done well for the different characters. I
like that. And I thought this book did that really well.
It was an engaging and easy listen like I was
able to follow along really well with it listening. It's
called Heartwood by Amity Gage. It's a thriller and it's
(52:55):
about this forty two year old woman, Valerie, who is
hiking the Apple Trail and goes missing and so you're
following like the investigator who's looking for her, the search
and rescue as well as like some other people involved.
So it's fictional, but I thought it was really interesting
and well done and a story about like a missing person,
(53:16):
which I, you know, always find to be intriguing. Have
to check it out. Yeah, so those are my recommendations. Well,
thanks so much for those, and thanks everybody for listening.
We'll be back next week. If you have a story
for us, we would love to hear it. Our email
is The Knife at exactly rightmedia dot com, or you
can follow us on Instagram at the Knife Podcast or
(53:37):
a Blue Sky at the Knife Podcast. This has been
an Exactly Right production hosted and produced by me Hannah
Smith and me Paysia Ey.
Speaker 2 (53:45):
Our producers are Tom Bryfogel and Alexis Amarosi.
Speaker 1 (53:48):
This episode was mixed by Tom Bryfogel. Our associate producer
is Christina Chamberlain. Our theme music is by Birds in
the Airport Artwork five as a Lilac Executive produced by
Karen Kilgareth Georgia Hartstar and Daniel Kramer.
This story contains adult content and language. Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 2 (00:05):
The claims and opinions in this podcast are those of
the speaker and do not necessarily represent The Knife or
Exactly Right Media. Welcome to The Knife off Record. I'm
(00:30):
patia Eton, I'm Hannah Smith. If you've been listening to
the show and enjoying it, it would help us out
so much if you took a few minutes to rate
and review us on Apple Podcasts or wherever you listen.
We're still a new show, so it really does help
to get the word out. Also, a quick reminder, we
have merch We have a really cute tote bag with
our logo on it. You can find that at exactly
(00:50):
rightstore dot com. So I have a story for you
today that involves some up to no good stuff, a murder,
and then they flee the country.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Wow. So this is sort of like what a hit? Yeah,
we're gonna hit every beat here. Okay, I'm ready. I'm
ready for a good story. And it's a tough one. Okay,
all right.
Speaker 2 (01:11):
So today's story begins in North York, Ontario. It's two
thousand and eight, and two students in different social circles
are in their final years of preparatory school.
Speaker 1 (01:24):
Wait, is that like high school? Yeah, okay, it sounds
so much smarter. I know from Canada. It's preparatory Britory. Okay.
Speaker 2 (01:32):
So one of these students is Lucy Lee, and she's
introverted and studious, and just briefly she dates this very
extraverted popular guy named Oliver Krafa. So, Oliver is actually
from Slovakia, but he's attending school in Canada. His whole
family moved there. He's from money. His parents owned bakeries
(01:55):
in Slovakia, and when he turns sixteen, his parents, who
are wealthy, decide they want to.
Speaker 1 (02:02):
Move back to Slovakia. Yeah. Wow, Yeah, So was he
born in the US? No, hell, in Canada, Canada. He
is from Slovakia, I think, Okay, and so he's born there.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
They moved to Ontario. But when he's a teenager at sixteen,
his parents are like, we're moving back, and so what
do they do? They say, you can stay here at sixteen. Yeah,
So he and his two sisters get an apartment and,
according to classmates, basically had credit cards and free reign.
Speaker 1 (02:33):
Wow. And his sisters are younger than him, they're older, older,
so there's like a legal adult somewhere in there. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:39):
I think they were all teenagers, I think, but it
sounds like they were doing whatever they wanted and buying
whatever they wanted.
Speaker 1 (02:48):
It was a free for all. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (02:51):
So all of our's relationship with Lucy ends pretty quickly,
and neither one of them seems to think very much
of it. They graduate and go about their lives. So Oliver,
after graduating, he starts partying, and not as surprise, not
as surprise or I heard, yeah, like, what do you do?
Speaker 1 (03:09):
You're sixteen. You have your own apartment and credit cards
at that age, so you graduate from high school and
now you're ready to like buckle in and go to
school every day. Not going to happen.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
So he's like all over the party scene, and he's
really into this idea being an entrepreneur and making a
lot of money. I mean, he watched his parents their
successful entrepreneur, so I see where he kind of got
the itch. And Lucy goes to university and she starts
studying and by all accounts is doing well there. And
(03:39):
so on April third, twenty twelve, after a night out
with friends, he's behind the wheel of his range rover.
He's been drinking heavily, and his friend David is in
the passenger seat, and Oliver hits the gas and the
car reaches speeds over double the speed limit, which was
about over sixty miles an hour, and he hits a
(04:01):
pole and the car, it's the rain driver, is a
huge car and it splits in half. My god, yeah,
and so half of the car ends up just on
the other side of the street. I mean, it's a
devastating accident. And Oliver walks away almost unscathed. He has
like a few scrapes, right, but David is dead.
Speaker 1 (04:20):
Oh my god. Yeah, I mean it's terrible. And he
was drinking and driving. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
His blood alcohol limit was nearly four times the legal limit. God,
it's not just drinking but like wasted, never have been driving. Yeah,
And there's no like drinking and driving that's safe. But
she was belligerently drunk. So David was twenty four at
the time, and he passes away. He's killed instantly in
the crash. It's so sad. And Oliver is then charged
(04:48):
with criminal negligence causing death, dangerous driving causing death, and
impaired driving causing death. You know, the crash was so
severe that actually, even though David was wearing his seat belt,
he was projected from the vehicle God like it was
really bad. He was a personal trainer, That's how he
knew Oliver as Oliver was his client and they became friends.
(05:09):
And I actually saw the CCTV footage of Oliver being
walked into the police station that night after the crash,
and I'm not discounting anything about what he did, but
he looks like a child. I think he was nineteen
at the time that this happened. And thinking back to
how he's been living in this apartment alone since he
was sixteen.
Speaker 1 (05:29):
No adult supervision, really just sort of being allowed to
do whatever he wants to do for years. Exactly. It's
no excuse, but like you can see how life choices
would lead him to a place where he's reckless. Reckless, yeah,
totally reckless. And in this footage of him being walked
into the police station, he asks, is David okay? He's
(05:51):
told David is dead in that moment, and he seems
in the footage very upset, you know, he is, obviously,
but he doesn't seem like he thinks he's walking out
of there yeah, but according to friends of both of theirs,
because they knew a lot of mutual people because Oliver
was going to the gym David worked at, that crowd
(06:13):
started to say that Oliver was very quickly more worried
about if he was going to jail than remorseful about
causing the crash that killed his friend. Interesting, and so
were they or do we know, like were they talking
to him.
Speaker 2 (06:26):
I don't know that he was talking to them, but
I think that they were all still running in the
same social circle. Because although he was arrested and charged,
he gets a lawyer and he fights the charges.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
I think he ends up pleading, but does he get
out on bail? Yeah, So what.
Speaker 2 (06:44):
Ends up happening is Oliver is sentenced to five years
imprisonment and banned from driving for fifteen years. I'm pretty
sure he pled guilty to those charges and decided okay,
five years, and then he's banned from driving for fifteen years, which, like,
I'm fine with that. I mean that it's a clearly
(07:05):
long time, but it's also you did kill someone. And
so he was twenty one by the time he was sentenced,
and at sentencing he did express remorse and take responsibility
for his actions, and you know, I can't totally say
how I feel about the sentence. Nineteen is really young,
but yeah, like we're saying he lived without his parents
and any supervision from sixteen on, So that is a
(07:28):
recipe for disaster. But there's a lot of people that
grow up in difficult situations and they don't behave that way.
So so Oliver gets to prison and you know, although
he's expressed remorse at his sentencing he's killed his friend
by driving recklessly, he pretty quickly starts to just think,
how can I get out of here?
Speaker 1 (07:49):
How can I get out early?
Speaker 2 (07:51):
Yeah, he's not following the rules. He's attempting to smuggle
drugs into the prison, which allegedly his sisters were the
people that we're trying to help.
Speaker 1 (08:00):
Him do that. Wow. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:03):
And so still despite those things, he's granted parole in
twenty seventeen, so three years into his five year sentence.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Ooh yeah, that is so surprising.
Speaker 2 (08:13):
I was surprised by that too, because this is his
first offense, right, and he's only nineteen when he sentenced,
and so you think about how does our justice system
best function? Now this is in Canada, but like for
all of us universally. I think, if we're going to
put someone in prison for crime, let's make it count
so that they don't do this again, so that when
(08:34):
they get out there a changed person. There's a lot
of issues with prison systems all over the world.
Speaker 1 (08:40):
One could argue that has been never really rehabilt right people.
I'm in about never. But it's not like known to
be this great rehabilitation right situation. But yeah, it's so
complicated because obviously he was really young. A lot of
us have been really young and dumb and made bad choices,
you know, but his choice took the life of someone else,
(09:02):
which is a really big deal. And so three years
it just doesn't seem like that much to me.
Speaker 2 (09:08):
But yeah, I mean I can imagine how David's friends
and family felt about that for three years, especially when
he wasn't behaving in prison. Yeah, And so what we
start to see when this happens is, at least from
my perspective, Oliver sort of developing this really reinforcing this
(09:29):
idea that there are no real consequences.
Speaker 1 (09:31):
Right, yeah, because like it's not like he got away
with anything. He still went to prison, But there is
a vibe about him that I don't know, right because
I only know what you're telling me, But I can
kind of imagine this kind of guy. He seems really confident, like, yeah,
he's got a range over it the world. Yeah, everything
(09:52):
has given to him. So there's a certain kind of
attitude there that you're like, do you think you're invincible?
Speaker 2 (09:59):
Yeah? You I think you're invincible. And so as soon
as he gets out, Oliver is ready to leave his
old identity behind. You know, I think he probably did
have some shame and embarrassment about the accident causing the
death of his friend and being sentenced to prison, but
it doesn't really seem to be enough to get him
to reflect about the kind of person he wants to be.
(10:19):
And he starts just like very quickly new business ventures.
He's thinking entrepreneurial, but it's fast and loose as far
as like business plans and money. There's a long list
of businesses he starts and they all fail. What kind
of businesses are we talking here?
Speaker 1 (10:37):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (10:37):
So on his LinkedIn, which is still up at the
time we're recording this, at least, the about me section reads,
I combine my passion for success with my passion for marketing, communications,
and storytelling, and as we get into it, I think
we'll see where the storytelling really takes Shaye, but he
opens a restaurant called Food Society on the ground floor
(10:59):
of a home hotel and attempts to be the sort
of brunch coffee shop situation. You know, you can kind
of see the tie back to like being from a
family that owns bakery.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Yeah, definitely.
Speaker 2 (11:09):
It fails very quickly, and he moves on to the
next idea, and that is something called Zen Home Mart,
which is a drop shipping business, and then something called I.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
Think it's pronounced insul Act.
Speaker 2 (11:23):
I'm not sure, but the idea behind that third company
is that it's a subscription insulin to people.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
In the US. And it also quickly fails.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
So you can see like, Okay, you can kind of
make the connection with the restaurant and then you're onto
drop shipping and then you're onto insulin subscriptions.
Speaker 1 (11:41):
Yeah, it feels very much strange. Strange. I don't know.
I feel like there's drop shipping businesses. I don't even
know what that is. I feel like it's like every
time I'm advertised somehow, I don't know how this is
in my algorithm for like start a business and like
make a ton of money quickly, it's always drop shipping.
Oh okay, And I mean, like, you know, there are
(12:02):
people that have created very successful drop shipping endeavors. But
for some reason, it pings to me something about someone
who is a young entrepreneur who's trying to make money
quickly and thinks I'll just get into drop shipping, right,
but might not actually really know what he's doing.
Speaker 2 (12:18):
Yeah, or maybe have taken the time to like learn
and maybe come up underneath someone else and shadow them
and understand the business, because, you know, to build these businesses,
he's taking on investors, he's getting money from people.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
Interesting, and so it's not just funded by his parents. No,
I don't think so.
Speaker 2 (12:37):
And that is I think one of the most perplexing
things about Alliver and so many people that we come
to learn maybe are not good business people is that
they have this charisma, they have this ability to raise money,
they have lots of ideas.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
It is so wild, how truly, if you want to
raise money for a business, you need charisma. And how
many people like actually aren't that good at business? I know,
maybe don't even have that good of a plan, but
are just able to convince people that they do and
that they're trustworthy and that yes, you should give me
your money. I mean it's like, yeah.
Speaker 2 (13:14):
Yeah, because at this point, you know, this guy is
so young, he's in his twenties. Yeah, and he's already
gone to prison. I mean, if he can do it,
and so I can't HiPE right and son, And you know,
failure is part of being an entrepreneur, sure, and so
I don't want it to seem like these business failures
in and of themselves are indicative of anything. But yeah,
(13:36):
what it shows us is he's I think, hell bent
on making a lot of money really quick. And so
in twenty eighteen, Oliver reconnects with Lucy.
Speaker 1 (13:45):
Oh okay, and you.
Speaker 2 (13:47):
Know she was this introverted, studious girl from preparatory school.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
This is about ten years after they originally dated. Yeah,
a whole decade. Yeah. Interesting.
Speaker 2 (13:55):
So they're now adults and they're very different, but life
all of her. Lucy comes from a wealthy family, okay,
and her parents are financial advisors and business owners. And
after graduating at first, it seems like she's following suit, right,
she goes to university. She does really well she got
a job selling insurance, which acquired her to obtain this
(14:16):
accreditation to do that, and she starts working for her
mother as a financial advisor. But like one of Oliver's
money businesses, Lucy's career didn't quite last and she decided, Okay,
I'm going to take a few years off, and she
goes to her parents with this plan, I'm going to
take a few years off and try to figure out
what I want to do. She's really intrigued by social
(14:37):
media and fun fact, Lucy's a triplet.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Yeah, so she has two sisters and they all look
very similar. They're fraternal triplets, but they look very similar.
So Lucy's mother agrees and she gives her an allowance
of five thousand dollars a month. What a dream, What
a dream. That's a great allowance. And Lucy's sort of
drawn to the limelight. And she finds her light on TikTok.
Speaker 1 (15:02):
Yeah, which makes sense because you said it's like twenty eighteen, yeah,
and she's in her mid to late twenties. So that
I feel like this all lines up with maybe feeling
a little disillusioned by the career path, wanting to do
something different and creative. Plus social media is popping off,
so totally all adding up. Yeah, Like, nothing wrong with that.
Go see if you can make money on TikTok. Like, great,
(15:23):
good for you.
Speaker 2 (15:24):
Her and her sisters start a TikTok page where they
all take pictures together in similar outfits. Some of the
outfits are pretty risque. I don't really have an opinion
on that. I'm just giving you, you know, some imagery here,
Like she's promoting herself online a lot, and she's no
longer this quiet, introverted girl that she was when they
(15:45):
first dated. Actually, an article in the Toronto Sun called
her a rich girl social media darling. Yeah, so, I mean,
I don't know. TikTok is interesting, right. Sometimes I watch
those people where their a whole it's just them watching
someone else's video. Yeah, and I'm like, well, that's a
sweet gig. Yeah, You're just sitting there staring at the
(16:07):
camera and then you just you're done.
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Yeah. But truly, it's like with the rise of TikTok,
I feel like we see people trying to figure out
what the thing is that will catch fire, and even
if it's a simple idea of like watching someone else's video,
and commenting on it. Someone had to be the first
one to think of that and then try it, and
(16:31):
then it's like, actually, there's a ton of people that
want to watch just this content, right, So you know,
I think it's kind of like Lucy sounds like she's
like of her time and generation where everyone, you know,
all these young people are sort of trying to figure
out how to get famous online. And the fact that
she's a triplet, she's kind of leaning into that little
niche thing.
Speaker 2 (16:52):
Yeah, totally, and she's got a sweet allowance, so yeah,
go do it. See what you can make happen with that,
you know. I mean, at least she's doing something totally.
So twenty eighteen, they're back together, and oh they get
back together. Yeah, they get back together after they meet,
and it's pretty fast and furious, and they're both very
drawn to this idea of wealth and maybe a little
(17:14):
bit of fame, but I think money was something they
really connected on. Christine Okay, Yeah, and they move in
really quickly. One article I read about this said after two.
Speaker 1 (17:25):
Dates, Oh my gosh, that is quick. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (17:27):
I wasn't able to figure out if she lived alone
or with her sisters. But they move in together very quickly,
and of course all of hers still can't drive, right,
So she's driving him everywhere in her Mercedes I think,
some sort of luxury car that she owns. And everyone
is different and every relationship is different. This stopped me
in my tracks. I do not drive my husband. I
(17:49):
am there to relax and get feedback.
Speaker 1 (17:52):
Okay, like I'm not going to be driving him. This
would be a deal breaker. It's a deal breaker. If
he loses his license, we are going nowhere. My gosh, Yeah,
I do enough. I do enough. You need someone in
the relationship who likes to drive. Yeah, you know, that's key.
But it sounds like she didn't really have a choice.
Speaker 2 (18:09):
She had to be the driver, like red flag. So
after two years of dating, COVID happens and Oliver and
Lucy decide they cannot stay in lockdown that is so boring.
(18:29):
They need a European vacation. Wow, but there's a problem.
Lucy can't travel due to travel restrictions because she's Canadian.
Oliver is Slovakian, and so he's allowed to travel to
Europe because the rules are different.
Speaker 1 (18:45):
Was there a travel restriction on Canadians not being able
to leave Canada.
Speaker 2 (18:49):
So there were travel restrictions on Canadian citizens and not
on Oliver. Yes Slovakians. And so they solve this problem
by getting married at the airport via zoom. Okay, So
I don't know how they pulled that off, but okay, yeah.
So so they go to the airport and that's how
(19:11):
they find out that she can't travel, and they're like, okay,
well we'll just get married right now, right now, and
then that should be able to allow her to travel immediately.
Speaker 1 (19:21):
I guess. So wow, yeah, you know, I got married
in my living room in between zoom calls. I'm not
knocking a zoom wedding, but it's quick, okay, Like that
is wild at in airport last minute. So those the
logistics of it alone, it's like how did they find
someone to marry them?
Speaker 2 (19:40):
I mean, you know, I know, anything's possible. Very again resourceful.
So they go and they go on this European vacation.
They're I think they're there for a couple of months,
and while they're over there, Oliver gets an idea. He's like,
here's a business I could get into. I could sell
personal protective equipment.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Okay, ppe, yep.
Speaker 2 (20:02):
In Europe there was a shortage. That's how he gets
the idea. And so when they get back, oliverur meets
someone named Tyler Pratt. Now Tyler Pratt, he's an alleged
drug dealer. He has a lot of money. You know,
I'll get into the alleged drug dealer part of this leader,
but for context, that's how he's got money, supposedly, And
(20:24):
he puts in a total of four hundred and seventy
thousand dollars. And they become fast friends, you know, they
get birthday gifts and lots of text back and forth.
They go on double dates because Tyler has a girlfriend
named Jordan Romano, and.
Speaker 1 (20:40):
All is well.
Speaker 2 (20:41):
But of course Oliver is not great at running businesses,
and pretty soon Tyler.
Speaker 1 (20:47):
Wants some money back.
Speaker 2 (20:49):
Yeah, and they met allegedly.
Speaker 1 (20:51):
God, all right, I'm imagining this business is purchasing ppe
from somewhere and then selling it to people in Europe. Yeah.
But somehow, but somehow, he's the business is failing. Yeah,
I imagine that Oliver spent the money. Yeah. I feel
like something else is going on, because like this is
(21:12):
a pretty straightforward business plan. I mean, I don't know,
I haven't seen his business plan. But yeah, this is
something in high demand. Unless he thought he could do
it and then couldn't source it anywhere, it just doesn't
make sense. How is this an immediate failure? He must
be spending the money.
Speaker 2 (21:26):
Well, allegedly Tyler met them because he was selling cocaine
to Lucy, gotcha. So I don't know what the extent
of their drug use was, but allegedly that.
Speaker 1 (21:37):
Is how he met Lucy.
Speaker 2 (21:39):
Okay, But Tyler wants his money back and he's not
getting it, and Oliver's got a lot of excuses. Tyler's
a father, he has two daughters from a previous relationship,
and he is a very involved dad. He loves his kids.
And so Tyler is going to he's a victim in
(22:00):
this story. And so I just want to say, yeah,
he was an alleged drug dealer, but I think it's
relevant for a context, but it doesn't diminish what ends
up happening.
Speaker 1 (22:09):
Yeah, all different kinds of drug dealers too, right now.
And it's a job, it's a job.
Speaker 2 (22:16):
And so Jordan Romano, Tyler's girlfriend, becomes pregnant, and after
Tyler starts getting the idea that you know, Oliver's not
being honest, because he's seeing documents come in that don't
necessarily look real. There are fake invoices and fake reimbursements
and just Tyler's no dummy.
Speaker 1 (22:36):
He's like, this has investment scam written all over it.
Speaker 2 (22:39):
Yeah, And so eventually he's like, I'm going to put
a date on this, and you're going to pay me back.
And so that date is March first, twenty twenty one.
He says, you're going to pay me back by then
with interest, gotcha. But Oliver can't pay him back. He
has done something with the money.
Speaker 1 (22:56):
I don't know what.
Speaker 2 (22:57):
Maybe he's just a lazzy businessman. Maybe they spent it
on drugs and partying. But he's not paying him back.
So Oliver and Lucy hatch a plan and the plan
that I'm going to tell you that they carry out
when we get into this whole thing coming to light.
They have different stories on how this came to be,
but Oliver and Lucy do Oliver and Lucy, but this
(23:19):
is what happened. So, although Tyler wants his money back
from Oliver, probably like any smart businessman, Tyler is not
totally cutting Oliver off, right. He's trying to maintain the
friendship in a way.
Speaker 1 (23:34):
Because he doesn't want to just ghost him and never
hear from a Mercy his money again, I imagine.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
And so Oliver and Lucy decide what they're going to
do is kind of throw out this hail Mary one
more business idea for Tyler. And the idea that they
have is that they're going to lure Tyler to a
warehouse under the guise of the warehouse being a property
owned by Lucy's parents where they can maybe have a
(24:01):
marijuana growing operation. Okay, that's you know why I think
Tyler being an alleged drug dealer is relevant is that
this could be appealing to him, gotcha. And so they
plan to meet him there on February twenty eighth, twenty
twenty one, so right before this March first date. And
the plan is that they're going to meet at this warehouse.
(24:23):
They're going to look through it, kind of talk about
this marijuana grow operation, and then they are going to
go to dinner at this like celebrity hot spot. So
Jordan is with Tyler and they show up and it's nighttime,
and Lucy and Oliver are there, and Tyler and Jordan
are there at this warehouse and Lucy and Oliver get
(24:44):
there first, and there's a chain on the gate because
Lucy's parents don't own this warehouse. This is all completely
made up. This is just a remote location for them
to do something awful, and so Oliver cuts the chain.
They go to the door of this warehouse and Tyler arrives,
Jordan and their range over and.
Speaker 1 (25:02):
So is Jordan's still pregnant? Yes, at this time, I
think Jordan's twelve weeks pregnant. She's pregnant.
Speaker 2 (25:08):
Yeah, So Tyler and Jordan arrive at the warehouse and
meet Oliver and Lucy there.
Speaker 1 (25:14):
As expected.
Speaker 2 (25:15):
Tyler and Jordan go meet them at the door, and
then it's really cold outside. It's February and we're in Ontario.
So Jordan's like, I'm going to go wait in the
car because Oliver is like, I don't know where the
realtor is who's supposed to let us in and show
us the property, and they're taking forever. It's like sort
of strange, and Tyler's like okay, And so Jordan goes
(25:37):
and waits in the car, and Lucy's like, you know,
I'm gonna go wait in the car with you because
it's cold and apparently in the car, Lucy and Jordan
are kind of making small talk, but it gets kind
of awkward because Jordan's like, this is strange, and Lucy
gets then out of the car. What happens next is
Tyler is like, okay, Oliver, what's really going on here?
(25:57):
And Oliver then points out gun at Jordan in the
range rover and says something to the effect of get
out of here, Joe. But as he's saying that, he
starts shooting and he fires I think three shots at Jordan,
who's in the driver's seat of the car, and one
of the shots goes through her heart. Oh my god, Yeah,
(26:20):
it hits her right in the chest. Then of course
Tyler is like, what is happening. Tyler and Jordan were
not armed, right, They were there to meet their friends
for the night and explore this opportunity with them. Yeah,
And so in the next moment, Oliver shoots at Tyler.
I think he shoots five times, and Tyler falls to
(26:41):
the ground. It's terrible. He shoots him through the lungs
and his lungs begin filling with blood, and I think
it takes like an hour until he passes away.
Speaker 1 (26:50):
I mean, it's horrible.
Speaker 2 (26:52):
And while this is happening, it's unclear where Lucy is.
She goes on to say, oh, I was so far away.
I was there, but I'm like, well, you were sitting
in the car with Jordan, so.
Speaker 1 (27:02):
Then you got out and where did you go? Right?
Speaker 2 (27:05):
And so what Oliver and Lucy do next is they
go to the car where Jordan is, where she's been shot,
and they take her out of the car and throw
her on the pavement. They go and get the cash
that Tyler had on him, which was twenty thousand dollars.
They take their phones from them, from Tyler and from Jordan,
(27:25):
and they take the Range Drover that Tyler and Jordan
arrived in and they're Audie. They're audi that they had
purchased right before this. And they leave and Oliver had
arranged for someone to buy both of these cars.
Speaker 1 (27:42):
So they just leave Tyler and Jordan laying there, Yeah,
for dead, dying. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (27:48):
They pulled Jordan out of the car so violently that
one of her like knee high boots came off. I mean,
if you've ever pulled off a knee high boot like
that's not easy to do. Yeah, And so they flee
and their whole plan is now really taking shape. Oliver
has pre arranged for.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
Someone to buy these cars in a shady deal for
really cheap to get them, she means it was premeditated.
Pre meditated, yeah, And so he sells these cars really
quickly to this person, and they go back to another
friend's condo. And they go to this other friend's condo
because earlier that day they had said, we need to
borrow your SIM card because they didn't want their cell
(28:27):
phones traced to this warehouse, okay, and the friend was
under the impression that they were going to this warehouse
for this big meeting that they didn't want Lucy's parents
to know about because they would be upset by it
for some reason. So they didn't know anything about these
murders taking place. They get their SIM card back, and
then they go to Lucy's condo. They're shared condo where
(28:50):
they live, right and they watch the news and they
see on the news that Jordan has flagged down a motorist.
She did not die, and that motorist called nine one
one and Jordan is alive. Oh my gosh. And so
they had already acquired fake identification, fake passports, already planned
(29:12):
I think to flee, but now they're like, oh, shoot,
she can tell them exactly what happened. So in theory,
because Jordan, you know, has been taken to a hospital,
we assume we don't even know, like she might have
already told authorities who.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
It was, right, Like, they don't know anything except that
Jordan didn't die, okay, which has to have been a
crucial part of their plan to keep this secret. Yeah,
And so they go around the city dumping any evidence.
I mean, their clothes or blood stained for example. And
Lucy had a wig on at some point, like a
blonde wig. And so they're going and they're dumping the
(29:50):
evidence and they flee. And their first move is that
they're flying to Montreal and from there they bought a
flight and get to Europe and they go to Slovakia
because that's where Oliver's parents live, and eventually to Hungary. Okay,
And they use these fake passports that they've acquired and
I'm not sure where they were obtained, but it was
(30:12):
obviously in preparation for these murders. Yeah, and so they
are wanted fugitives because Jordan has lived it is not
a secret what happened. And also just so idiotic, because
I'm sorry, but even in twenty twenty one, how do
you not know that taking someone's physical cell phone that
doesn't help you. All of your text messages can be retrieved.
Speaker 1 (30:36):
Yeah, what are we talking about here? Yeah, like why
would they do that? You need to burn stupid, you
need to burn your phone for let then, Yeah, and
so they're on the run, and so authorities like very
quickly know exactly who they are and that they've done this,
but they've already fled the country.
Speaker 2 (30:53):
They've fled the country, and so eventually they're apprehended in
Hungary and Budapest, Wow, in this scene with lots of clubs,
lots of night clubs and fancy restaurants. And they're apprehended
in June of twenty twenty one. So remember this happens
(31:15):
at the very end of February. They're not apprehended till June,
so that whole time they're wanted fugitives.
Speaker 1 (31:20):
You have to wonder what's going on with the two
of them during that time. Yeah, And you know, I
would assume also because of the area they were found in,
that they were just living, you know, like nothing had happened,
going to clubs, like, can you imagine No? No, Like, wow,
I can't imagine at all. Actually, yeah, let alone under
(31:42):
these circumstances ever going to a club. Yeah, not at
this point in my life. Seriously.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
Yeah, and so Lucy agrees right away once they're arrested
to return to Canada. But all of our fights extradition
and so now they're being separated, and that was going
to happen anyway, whether or not one was extradited in
one wasn't. But for the months that they've been gone,
the story of you know, this murder and attempted murder
has been all over the news, as has a bunch
(32:10):
of camera footage of them on CCTV and elevators and
around the city dumping the evidence. So it's not a
secret we know who was there that night, but it's
just a matter of figuring out, Okay, what happened because Jordan,
she knows that Oliver shot her, and she knows that
Lucy was there, but after she was shot, it all
(32:31):
happened so fast. Yeah, it's not clear like did she
see Tyler get shot?
Speaker 1 (32:36):
Does she know the full.
Speaker 2 (32:37):
Extent of their business dealings?
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Right?
Speaker 2 (32:39):
Those are sort of the unknowns that I think Oliver
and Lucy begin to sort of see if they can
use to their advantage. Okay, But Lucy starts talking to
authorities right away, and she tries to place the blame
on Tyler Pratt, the victim, you know, the murder victim.
(33:00):
She's like, he's dangerous and my husband did not plan
to kill him. But her story is, as you can imagine,
poorly thought out and a total mess, and nobody believes her.
Speaker 1 (33:12):
I wonder if they found the friend who lent them
the SIM card. There's that piece. There's also the guy
that they sold the card to. I don't know if
they could find that guy.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
Actually, I'm glad you said that because it reminded me
the audi that Oliver and Lucy arrived to the warehouse
in that night. They had purchased that I believe from
a friend of Lucy's family, Okay, and they had purchased
it very recently before the murder.
Speaker 1 (33:37):
Okay. So it's like, okay, so you buy a getaway
car right before. Okay. Yeah, there's a lot of evidence
that's coming together that shows this was premeditated.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
A lot, and so a bail hearing happens in December
of twenty twenty one, and that means, you know, they've
been in prison for that time, probably awaiting their trial,
trying to figure out if they're going to plead. And
Lucy's family really advocates for her to be allowed on
house arrest with bail. They swear up and down, you know,
(34:09):
we'll keep her in the house. You want have access
to credit cards or cars, and the court agrees.
Speaker 1 (34:14):
Unbelievable.
Speaker 2 (34:15):
Yeah, and I believe Lucy's bill was three million dollars.
It was one of the highest bills ever set there. Yeah,
and so what does she do on house arrest? She
violates her terms. Not a surprise, Yeah, not a surprise.
She goes to lunch with her sisters and a possible
witness for the trial. My god, I mean horrible, right,
(34:38):
And I think it also shows we'll touch on this later,
but Lucy sort of leans into being almost like ditsy,
like I'm, you know, the dumbest person in the room,
Like that word gets used, like she claims to be stupid,
Like I was totally coerced. But you see her making
these calculated efforts. I think you go to lunch with
(35:01):
your sister's and a possible witness, like is that a coincidence, probably, Yeah,
And so obviously the court does not think highly of
that decision, and she's ordered to stay in prison until
her trial.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
Okay. Yeah, And Oliver Carafa, Hungary and Canada come to
the terms of his extradition. He's extradited to Canada and
also now awaiting trial, and his story starts to be
I shot in self defense. Tyler's really dangerous. He's a
drug dealer. He's very dangerous, and he was threatening to
(35:34):
have people kill me and saying that if I reported
him to police for these threats. Well, he knew people
who were police who would protect him, and there was
no evidence of that. You know, Tyler's work may not
have been above board, but he did not come armed
to this meeting. He thought they were going to dinner afterward.
(35:56):
He was not threatening Oliver's life. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (36:00):
So Jordan Romano, So Jordan survives, her baby does not survive,
and that is you know, you can't put it into
words how terrible that must have been for her, especially
because the father of the yeah child, her partners, she's dead. Yeah,
(36:21):
on this night she lost both Tyler and their baby. Yeah,
it's horrific over what.
Speaker 1 (36:28):
You know, money like greed. I don't know.
Speaker 2 (36:31):
I mean, it's there is no explanation, right, And so
her testimony at the trial is extremely important. She's a
witness to what happened, and she has an incredibly emotional
story to tell. And so when Jordan takes the stand
on the third day of trial, she says that she
made eye contact with Oliver as he was shooting at her,
(36:54):
and she said it seems like he was almost like saying,
get out of here, Joe. Oh, like he almost meant it,
but that he started shooting right away, so it wasn't
like he gave her a few minutes to get out
of there. He immediately started shooting. And she said they
had locked eyes when he shot at her, and he
didn't shoot just once. He shot multiple times. If you
(37:17):
shoot a gun at someone multiple times, your intention is
to kill them. Yeah, And I wasn't able to find
out if Oliver knew that Jordan was pregnant. It doesn't matter,
it's still awful, but just for the record, I wasn't
able to find that out. Okay, Now, Oliver and Lucy
have in a sense turned on each other, but they
both are saying Tyler's really dangerous and that was the
(37:39):
catalyst of all of this, is that we were scared
of Tyler. But Lucy says, I wasn't even there. I
was at least half a football field away, and I
didn't know he was going to kill him. And her
story changes so much she can't keep it straight. Oliver's
claiming self defense. It doesn't work, And on May twenty fourth,
twenty twenty four, they're both sentenced to life, which in
(38:01):
Canada means they will not be eligible for parole for at.
Speaker 1 (38:04):
Least twenty five years. And I don't believe that the
baby Jordan lost carried any separate charges, but I did
want to acknowledge that. Yeah, in Tyler's family, I watched
an interview with them outside the courthouse when the verdict
was delivered guilty, and they said that they were so
relieved that they were found guilty, and they spoke so
(38:27):
highly of the way the court handled the case and
the way that victim services helped them through this. Nothing
good comes of this, but I was like, Oh, it's
nice to hear a family feel like they were treated
that way through such were difficult experience. Really, Yeah, yeah,
for sure, because because of a trial of the murder
(38:49):
of your son, your brother. Yeah, I mean it's horrible,
and just even the attitude of both Lucy and Oliver,
and the fact that like Oliver had killed someone before.
Yes it was accidental, but it just the recklessness, the
like seeming lack of remorse. Obviously, I don't know if
(39:10):
they were remorseful or not, but them sort of trying
to blame Tyler, the person who was killed here. It's
so gross and the crime seems so clearly premeditated, so
horrible to cover up what was probably already an I
legal operation of an investment fraud. So it's just like good,
I'm glad they were caught. Like their behavior did indicate
(39:33):
that they were like gonna change their ways?
Speaker 2 (39:35):
No, yeah, not at all. And they're more dangerous together. Yeah,
I guess they're still married technically. I don't know if
that's like for any reason other than why bother if
you're going to spend the next twenty five years in jail,
I don't think so. But yeah, I mean neither one
of them had ever I think, faced real consequences.
Speaker 1 (39:53):
Yeah, that is such a wild story. I had not
heard that. I had no idea where it was going,
and and it's crazy. I mean, what a wild story.
And you know, I'm glad they were caught. I'm glad
that Jordan lived, Like I'm sure her life is different
than before forever, but that's amazing that she survived this. Yeah,
I mean to think of what it must have felt
(40:16):
like to see your friend shooting at you and then
have him and his girlfriend who was also your friend
or his wife pulling you out of the car and
leaving you there to die.
Speaker 2 (40:25):
I mean, that's unthinkable. And Jordan actually filed a civil
suit and won. I couldn't tell exactly how much she won,
but I think it was over a million dollars. It
doesn't seem like even today, Oliver Lucy has accepted responsibility.
They're both still trying to appeal. And yeah, like I said,
they're still married. So yeah, this happened in Stony Creek, Ontario,
(40:49):
and the way that they planned it together, even though
it was poor planning, they planned it and the court
talked so much about how stupid they were, and I
thought that was like kind of interesting, m m. They
pointed out, this is the stupidest plan, but they did
plan it. And I mean the wig, the sim card,
(41:10):
I mean, they're making all of these moves in plain sight,
you know, buying this audi, swapping the phone thing, showing
up at this warehouse.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
I mean, idiots. It's like they both have this same affliction,
which is inflated self intelligence or a few of themselves,
and clearly they're not good together. Like talk about toxic relationship. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (41:36):
I read one report that when they saw on the
news that Jordan had lived, they went around looking for
her because she wasn't named, but they were like, it
couldn't be her, it couldn't be her, And then they
couldn't find her body because obviously she wasn't dead she
had been.
Speaker 1 (41:51):
Wow, they went back to the scene of the crime
to try to see if your body was there.
Speaker 2 (41:55):
One of the reports said that. But I couldn't figure
out how that happened after they ditched the cars, because
I heard that they ditched the cars right right, and
then took a cap and then went back to the apartment.
But for what is worth, I'm like, wow, imagine that moment. Yeah,
wild story. I'm glad that they were both found guilty
and finally facing consequences.
Speaker 1 (42:17):
Me too, Thanks for telling me that story. Yeah, Okay,
so I have a couple quick recommendations. Oh, I would
love them. So the first one is a podcast. It
is a limited series. Not all the episodes are out yet,
so I have to say that okay as a caveat.
But I started listening to it. It's called Valley of Shadows. Oh,
I've heard of Value of Shadows, but I haven't listened,
(42:38):
so tell me. It's from pushkin. I heard about it
because one of the investigative reporters who's also one of
the co hosts. Two women who are both investigative reporters
reporting on the story, and they co host the podcast.
And one of them, Haley, is someone that I used
to work with years ago. Oh cool, Yeah, and she's great.
She's such a good reporter. I know that anything that
(42:59):
she works on is going to be just really well
done and thoughtful. So I feel like, I don't know,
I can fully stand behind this is going to be
like a well done show, And so I started listening
to it. It's interesting. It's basically they look into the
disappearance of someone who worked for the Sheriff's department. This
(43:20):
guy John Auja. I don't know exactly how to say
his last name. Some say his name is Oja. Other
people call him Auja, and he was a long distance
runner and would go on these like big long runs
out in the desert, and one day in nineteen ninety eight,
he never came back from a run. You find that
out like very quickly. So on the surface, it seems
(43:42):
like someone who went missing in nature, which we've covered
stories like that before. But there's a lot of questions
about if there was actually foul play and a lot
of questioning of the La County Sheriff's department handling of
like the search and rescue, which is interesting because if
(44:03):
you know anything about the La County Sheriff's Department, there's
been a lot written about like endemic problems and actually
gang membership within the Sheriff's Department since the seventies. You know,
there's been a couple of investigations. There's a fifteen part
podcast from Knock La that investigates like the history of
gangs inside the department. Oh wow, and how you know?
(44:26):
It's that like classic thing of you know, don't snitch,
and there's all like I don't know, and so obviously
it's not every person in the Sheriff's department, but that's
sort of the reputation that they have had in the past,
and so it makes you wonder and there's a lot
of questioning about like how they handled the case. So
this is their investigation, the host investigation into this, and
(44:50):
they go out to the desert, they interview a lot
of people. It feels in some ways like an investigative
podcast back when that was first a thing. Not to
say investigated podcasts aren't great today because they are. There's
so many of them. Not all of them are truly
investigative or someone's like boots on the ground looking into
(45:12):
a case. But that is how this one is.
Speaker 2 (45:15):
Yeah, and when I hear okay that someone who's a
long distance runner and he's going for a run in
nature and he goes missing, I would fully support any
reasonable investigation into one someone's disappearance and two possible off
houl play. Like that is why these law enforcement agencies exist,
is to figure out what happens to people and to
(45:37):
bring people.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
To justice when it's called for.
Speaker 2 (45:40):
But I have my own experience looking into and like,
I don't know what happened here. I haven't listened to
the show, but my knee jerk reaction is, did he
just go missing? And it reminds me of a story
I was working on before you and I left our
last company that we were working at. This young man
(46:01):
had gone missing on a hike, and he was a
very physically fit young person. I believe he's in his
late twenties, maybe yearly thirties, I think late twenties, and
he was well prepared for this hike, had set out
water drops, had made plans to meet his then girlfriend
at the end of the hike. And he was someone
(46:22):
who lived less conventional lifestyle. He was nomadic and traveled around.
But yeah, there was a huge search for him, and
no one found anything, and so it was like, well,
what happened to him? Did he owe someone money because
he was a gambler and there was some drug use happening,
(46:43):
you know whatever. So there were all of these suspicions,
right because they did this huge search, and this took
place in Joshua Trade and which like so much to search,
so much to search, but by all accounts, a very
thorough search. And this was someone who had done a
lot of hiking, hiked the Appalachian Trail many times. He
was a seasoned hiker, and so there were a lot
(47:05):
of sort of explorations into other possibilities of what had
happened to him. And I don't know that those were
formal investigations, but you know, there were a lot of
people asking questions, well, if he got injured or died
on the hike, well then why can't we find him?
And eventually another hiker stumbled upon his remains, and he
did die on the hike. It looks like he just
(47:27):
got lost and had a medical event. You know, if
you've ever been to Joshua Tree, there are areas that
have more vegetation, but you can look out and see
rocks right like so many rocks, but you can see
a long distance, and I think it gives you this
sense of I can scan this area. But you know,
when you talk about remains and animals and wildlife, you know,
(47:52):
taking things and moving things around, you could be three
feet away from a bone and not see it. Yeah,
And I think what ended up happening is someone spotted
a backpack because you know it looks out of place.
Your eye is drawn to this color that doesn't belong
in nature. And that was the same thing with the
Rachel Leduke hiker that went missing in Washington that I
(48:16):
mentioned in our Sam Sayers.
Speaker 1 (48:18):
Episode, Yeah, someone spotted her backpack. Someone spotted a backpack
or sleeping back something like that, because it's like not
a color of nature, right, and it also doesn't decompose,
so right, you know it's going to be out there.
Speaker 2 (48:32):
Yeah, And you know, she went years without being found.
I think over two years without being found, and she
wasn't that far from the trail. And you know, nature
is just ruthless.
Speaker 1 (48:43):
And so ruthless. I mean, we've talked about a lot
of stories of people both on the podcast and off
of missing people who went missing out in nature, and
there's just so many elements, depending on the environment, that
make it really difficult to find people. Wildlife, water, yeah,
rough turin, and it doesn't I mean, I really don't
(49:04):
think it matters if you are a seasoned hiker. I
agree with you, because, like we've seen that again and again,
sometimes people who are really seasoned overestimate their abilities and
underestimate the power of nature. Dehydration can do a lot
to you as well. I had the same thought about
this story, especially when I first started listening. I was like,
I bet he just died and hasn't been found. But
(49:28):
they do a good job of kind of bringing up
questions like there actually wasn't a very thorough search for him,
so the sheriff's department cut the search off prematurely and
came up with a story about what happened that doesn't
seem to be backed by evidence as far as we know.
So there are some things that make it weird, and
(49:50):
especially like a law enforcement officer and their organization not
going above and beyond to find someone is weird to me, right,
But also who knows, like it could literally just be nature.
I think that's one of the things that makes it
an interesting story because it's you're like, I don't know, Yeah,
you get to sort of decide for yourself. Are these
(50:13):
you know, the interviews.
Speaker 2 (50:14):
With people out there, Are they making you feel one
way or the other way?
Speaker 1 (50:18):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (50:18):
Yeah, I mean it's reminiscent two of the I think
it's in our second episode, I talk about the missing
person's case I looked into in Tennessee. And one thing
I always really appreciated about the law enforcement agencies that
were just local sheriff's department that worked on this missing
person's case, these two teenagers, right, is they didn't know
what happened to them. They ended up that they had
(50:40):
driven into this river, and their car with their remains
in it was later found in the river twenty some
years later. Right, But yes, there should have been a
more thorough search of the river. I think we can
all agree. But they never just said, well, they probably
went into the river.
Speaker 1 (50:55):
It was an open case.
Speaker 2 (50:56):
It was an open case, and many years later, right,
didn't have you know, the resources and the training and
the manpower to I think at the time, make the
right decisions or put the right people in place to
ask these questions and do these searches. But they never
gave up like that. Sheriff Steve Page in Sparta took
(51:17):
my call, yeah, and was like, okay, well what have
you found out, and was.
Speaker 1 (51:20):
Still invested in bringing answers to the community. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (51:24):
And I just always thought that that was sort of
an underappreciated aspect of this particular case. When you're writing
an article about two missing people, obviously the focus is
just like what happened, Right, But I think that everyone
who worked on that case, one thing they did that
doesn't happen all the time is they didn't just say whatever,
(51:45):
we're done with this, We're not going to find them.
Speaker 1 (51:48):
Yeah, and you hear stories about investigators who, no matter
how much time has gone on with the unsolved case,
they're still invested in wanting to find those answers, especially
if they were working hard on it and then were't
ever able to solve it. There's usually a real desire
to find answers there. Totally. Okay, So my second recommendation
(52:09):
is sort of connected thematically, but it's fiction. So it's
actually a book that I listened to the audiobook of.
So I want to recommend the audiobook because you know,
if I'm not listening to a podcast, I'm probably listening
to an audiobook. And with audiobooks, I have a really
particular like standards, Okay, Like I really like a good reader,
(52:33):
and I also really enjoy when there's different voices, not always,
but when it's done well for the different characters. I
like that. And I thought this book did that really well.
It was an engaging and easy listen like I was
able to follow along really well with it listening. It's
called Heartwood by Amity Gage. It's a thriller and it's
(52:55):
about this forty two year old woman, Valerie, who is
hiking the Apple Trail and goes missing and so you're
following like the investigator who's looking for her, the search
and rescue as well as like some other people involved.
So it's fictional, but I thought it was really interesting
and well done and a story about like a missing person,
(53:16):
which I, you know, always find to be intriguing. Have
to check it out. Yeah, so those are my recommendations. Well,
thanks so much for those, and thanks everybody for listening.
We'll be back next week. If you have a story
for us, we would love to hear it. Our email
is The Knife at exactly rightmedia dot com, or you
can follow us on Instagram at the Knife Podcast or
(53:37):
a Blue Sky at the Knife Podcast. This has been
an Exactly Right production hosted and produced by me Hannah
Smith and me Paysia Ey.
Speaker 2 (53:45):
Our producers are Tom Bryfogel and Alexis Amarosi.
Speaker 1 (53:48):
This episode was mixed by Tom Bryfogel. Our associate producer
is Christina Chamberlain. Our theme music is by Birds in
the Airport Artwork five as a Lilac Executive produced by
Karen Kilgareth Georgia Hartstar and Daniel Kramer.
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by Audiochuck Media Company.
Betrayal Season 5
Saskia Inwood woke up one morning, knowing her life would never be the same. The night before, she learned the unimaginable – that the husband she knew in the light of day was a different person after dark. This season unpacks Saskia’s discovery of her husband’s secret life and her fight to bring him to justice. Along the way, we expose a crime that is just coming to light. This is also a story about the myth of the “perfect victim:” who gets believed, who gets doubted, and why. We follow Saskia as she works to reclaim her body, her voice, and her life. If you would like to reach out to the Betrayal Team, email us at betrayalpod@gmail.com. Follow us on Instagram @betrayalpod and @glasspodcasts. Please join our Substack for additional exclusive content, curated book recommendations, and community discussions. Sign up FREE by clicking this link Beyond Betrayal Substack. Join our community dedicated to truth, resilience, and healing. Your voice matters! Be a part of our Betrayal journey on Substack.