July 29, 2020 • 38 mins
On the night of April 21, 2016 eight members of the Rhoden family were murdered in their homes. Episode one explores the crime that decimated an entire family and left residents of the small town of Piketon, OH reeling. We examine what lead up to the crime, look into the details of Ohio’s largest murder investigation, and the potential motives that drove the alleged killers.
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dot Com. Code Podcast fifty. Welcome to the piked in Massacre,
a production of iHeartRadio and Katie Studios. Can help answer dead.
(02:17):
It was an unimaginable crime. It was the second biggest
mass murder in twenty sixteen, behind the Pulse nightclub shooting.
Eight people dead, all from the same family. It would
become the largest criminal investigation in Ohio's history. Pike County
Sheriff's requested state help immediately after they got word. In
(02:39):
the early morning of April twenty, twenty sixteen, eight members
of the Rodent family were brutally murdered, shot to death
execution style in their homes. Eight victims, thirty two gunshot wounds,
three children left alive at the scenes. This is the
piked In massacre. I believe that there is a shooter
(03:03):
wherever they are. Episode one, Daddy's playing Zombie. Piked In,
Ohio is a rural town located on the Sciota River,
just sixty miles south of Columbus. It's home to twenty
two hundred residents and the people of piked And say
(03:23):
that because the town is so small, neighbors really look
out for each other and treat each other like family.
It was just it was a good, wonderful area to
grow up in. It was we lived in the country,
and you know, we rode horses on the road. We
(03:46):
rode bikes to each other's houses, and we we played,
you know, the kids and neighborhood played together all the time.
I slept the whole time I was a kid with
my window wide open. There's no way you could do
that now, there's no way. This place was wonderful. Everybody
took care of everybody, and now it's like a whole
(04:08):
different place. The Roden family lived in piked in for generations.
In fact, this close knit family all lived within miles
of each other and were a beloved fixture in the community.
It's part of what makes this story so heartbreaking and disturbing.
Eight members of the Roden family, ranging an age from
sixteen to forty four, were murdered, each killed execution style
(04:33):
over one night in four different locations. The only known
witnesses the three small children left alive. At the scenes,
the Roden family was literally being hunted. I'm Courtney Armstrong,
a television producer who helped make a documentary about the
case for NBC Universal's Oxygen Network in twenty nineteen. Since
(04:56):
it aired, the team and I at Katie Studios haven't
stopped thinking about the case. With trials on the horizon,
there are new details and theories to explore. By all accounts,
April twenty, twenty sixteen was an ordinary spring day in
rural Pike County, but that would be far from the truth.
Here's Barbara, longtime piked In resident. I'll never forget that day.
(05:19):
I'll never forget that day. I had gone into the
office at the high school to pick Brittany up for
an appointment. And when I walked in, they had a
TV on and everyone in there was sitting with their
mouths hanging open, and I was like, what's going on
in here? And the secretaries said, my god, there's been
(05:43):
a shooting. They said six people were killed, and she said,
we are very worried because little Chris Rodin didn't show
up today and we think he might be one of them.
Everyone was just in shock. So a little Chris law
enforcement because I couldn't find him. There was some speculation
(06:04):
early on that he might have been involved. For the
residents of piked In, there was little more than confusion
at this point. People knew there was a shooting and
that Chris Roden Junior, the sixteen year old freshman at
Pikedon High was missing. Where was the team. It was
at the home of Chris Roden Senior that the nightmare began.
(06:28):
Chris Roden Senior was known to be a strong, hard
working family man. He was, you know, a great father.
He was a good man, just like the rest of
the guys you know in that family. He would do
anything for anybody. He and Dana Roden were married for
twenty two years, and although they divorced, they remained close,
so close that Chris Senior had recently bought Dana at
(06:50):
a home on the same road he lived on Union
Hill Road. He did it so they could stay close
to their children. Chris Senior's cousin, Gary Road, was more
like a brother to him and often stated his place little.
Chris's aunt, Bobby Joe, who also lived nearby, was the
first to make the gruesome discovery at seven forty nine
am when she came to feed the dogs at Chris
(07:11):
and Your's house. Love One, Yes, I yes, you over,
He walked to the love boss. I can't my brother
Halls dead. Let's live all over the house. Okay, my
(07:34):
brother Halls, I think the patriarch of the family, Chris
Rodin was dead. He looked like he'd been beaten to death.
His cousin Gary, who was staying with Chris, was also dead. Yeah,
what's her name? Chris Gary d Gary Roden stars in
(07:57):
looks like the dead. Think they're both dead. I think
the great said the exone has been to suck out
of them. Okay, if there's anybody else in the house,
i't know us. Okay, the door was awfull. We got here,
but I have been. I went here and there letting
on the floor. Bobby, I need you to get out
of the house and way done out enough times now,
(08:19):
I'm okay. Just stay out of the house. Don't let
anybody gone in there. Okay, yeah, all right, we don't
depute even the way. Okay, I thank you. Yeah, just
(08:45):
watch this. Forty year old Christopher Roden was the only
one of the eight family members who was shot somewhere
other than they had, and he had mull of the
gunshot wos to the head, torso and it stres. We
found out, you know, the news broke overnight and saw
the emails, saw the alerts, you know, the initial news coverage,
(09:05):
and I knew this was we all knew this was
a big deal. James Pilcher, as an investigative reporter who
was assigned to cover this story. Chris Roden may have
been awake when the intruders came in, at least there's
some indication of that. He was shot nine times, but
he was shot in the forearm, which means which seems
(09:28):
to mean that he may have raised his arm in defense.
His cousin Gary got shot twice in the head and
once in the face, and one was execution style and
I had a muzzle stain. It was that close to
his temple. Even for a multiple murder scene disted out
as being particularly violent. Wood fragments found on Chris's body
(09:49):
indicate he was dragged through the house. Blood was everywhere.
Was it a robbery, a serial killer, a random thrill kill?
And if it wasn't random, why were these two men targeted?
I spoke with Mike Gallen, criminal defense attorney from Ohio.
Are you familiarity able to talk about the scenes themselves?
(10:12):
You know if you look at it, and it's all
from the autopsy reports. Chris seniors autopsy report says that
they believe that he was awake. One he was confronted
by at least one person with a gun. He got
nine gunshot wounds, and one of them apparently was a
defensive wound to his right forearm that shattered the bone.
(10:33):
He was also shot in the torso and cheek according
to that report. Then Chris Senior's cousin Gary, and they're
all kind of related. Here. He was shot twice in
the head and once in the face. One of the shots.
Reports indicate that the gun was pressed to the side
of his head, leaving a gunpowder mark that's called a
(10:56):
muzzle stain. I mean, those kind of injuries leaves no
doubt that this was an intentional or these all were
intentional killings, kind of designed to send a message to someone.
The muzzle mark sticks in my mind. You have to
be obviously arms reach. I mean, you are locking eyes
with the victim, it would seem. Does that paint any
(11:19):
kind of picture or indicate to officers or attorneys anything,
Sure it does, and maybe even closer than arm's length,
I mean, maybe just inches. That indicates that the shot
was fired right on top of the person. And it
indicates to me, at least, especially when you have the
(11:39):
number of shots like that here, that somebody was trying
to send a message. I don't think there can be
any doubt about that. It's personal. I mean it was personal,
and I think that's what that demonstrates. We're going to
stick a quick break here. We'll be back in a moment.
(12:00):
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At this point, Bobby Chose sees two people are dead
by twelve gunshot wounds. While waiting desperately for police to arrive,
she makes her way over to her nephew, Frankie's house.
She wanted to get some help and to tell him
what had happened to his father and uncle whose body
she had just found. Frankie Rodin was Chris Senior and
(15:59):
Dana his oldest son. The twenty year old was a
father to two boys, three year old and six month old.
Like his parents, Frankie was a hard worker. He loved fishing, hunting,
and demolition derby, but nothing so much as his family
and his fiance, nineteen year old Hannah Gilly. Hannah Gilly
was on the home coming court in high school, and
(16:21):
at that time she told friends she planned to go
to college, get a business degree, and open a daycare.
Frankie and Hannah wanted a lot of kids. They had
a bright future. The young family lived together just up
the street from Chris Senior, also on Unionhill, road. They
were looking forward to getting married soon. Here's reporter Jeff
Winkler recounting the details of what happened that night based
(16:44):
on his reporting. So, after Bobby Joe made the call
to nine one one, she went to Frankie's house near
right nearby. And the person who came to the door
with Frankie's three year old son and was as police
reports and newspaper reports showed, he was, you know, covered
(17:05):
in blood, and he, like any three year oldie, sort
of didn't fully understand what was going on. And he
told his aunt that, you know, his father was playing
zombie in the bedroom, and that's because the family were
fans of The Walking Dead, so you know, was in
there with his father playing zombie, which is, you know,
(17:30):
absolutely heartbreaking. Bobby picked up her nephew and made her
way inside. She finds two more victims. Frankie was shot
three times in the head. His fiancee, Hannah Gilly, was
shot five times in total, with one shot to her
left eye. They were both in bed with their six
month old baby. Thankfully, the infant was spared. Meanwhile, and
(17:59):
this is all happening around eight am on April twenty second.
Bobby Joe calls their brother James. She's in hysterics. There's
now two murder scenes, four people dead, twenty gunshot wounds,
two children left alive at the scenes, James immediately goes
(18:21):
over to his sister Dana's house to check on her
and the remaining kids. Dana Roden was a nurse known
for her gregarious nature and loving smile. She'd met Chris
Roden Senior when she was just in high school and
it was love at first sight. Even though they divorced
twenty two years later, they remained very close together. The
(18:44):
pair had three beautiful children, twenty year old Frankie, Hannah May,
and little Chris. She's goodhearted, a lot of fun, you know,
always laughing, cracking up. She was a very very good person.
She sent me a text slaved my grand babies here
and I said, well, congratulations, I said, she's beautiful. What
(19:06):
did Hannah Ma name her? She said Callie May and
I said that's so pretty. And that was the last,
you know, the last thing I ever heard from Diana.
This particular April seemed extra special because Hannahme had just
given birth to her second daughter five days prior, just
weeks before that, Diana threw Hannah May a big baby
(19:27):
shower at their new house. The pictures from the showers
show what a happy celebration it was. Sadly, James, Diana's brother,
was about to enter yet one more unimaginable scene. Dana
and her nineteen year old daughter, Hannah May were both dead.
Like the rest of the family, they were shot execution style.
(19:48):
Dna three times in the right side of her head
and once under her chin. Hannah was shot twice in
the head, lying in bed with her newborn daughter, just
five days old. The infant was spared alive, and thankfully
Hannah's older daughter, Sophia, just two years old at the time,
was not at the house at the time of the murders.
(20:09):
This brings us back to when Dana's son, the high
school freshman Chris Junior, was nowhere to be found. It
took detectives several hours to locate him, but finally little
Chris was found in the home with his mother, Dana
and his sister Hannah May. He'd been shot four times
in the head. There's now seven people dead, thirty one
(20:32):
gunshot wounds, and three children left alive. At the scenes,
the once small and sleepy town became the epicenter for
grizzly crime and the subsequent complex murder investigation. When it
was all said and done, two families would be destroyed
and the town would never be the same. Here's Jeff Winkler.
(20:54):
It was a long form article he'd written on the
case that originally piqued our interest. And journalist based in Flyover,
so I cover a lot of stuff that happens away
from the coast. The road in case. I remember seeing
coverage of it in twenty sixteen as it was happening
on live TV, and there was a helicopter flying over
(21:17):
the property, and it was just one of those things
that seemed like it was straight out of southern Noire.
The crime is as complex as it is grewsome because
all the victims except for one were found on the
same sort of back road and piked in, and they
were all found gunned down on the same night and
all had gunshots to the head. This was a incredibly
(21:42):
well executed execution of several people. Here again is criminal
defense attorney, former prosecutor and judge Mike Allen. Ed did
this area like a ton of bricks? I mean, boy,
the local media down here. We're all over this thing.
I mean like white on rice. So yeah, it's big deal.
Do you have any theories because I've spoken to people
(22:03):
and they're all, I guess, just theories. But why do
you spare the children? Is that some line a killer
won't cross? Or what does that tell you? Yeah, and
it's a really good question. I guess it shows that
I don't know, the killers wanted to demonstrate that they
have some humanity left in them and just would not
(22:26):
kill infants. I guess that's small consolation, but I don't know.
It probably is some kind of code thing. But they
did find it within their hearts to spare the infants
and the children. You know. As brazen and as violent
as these killings were, I guess they just couldn't bring
themselves to do it to small children and an infant, Yeah,
(22:49):
five day old, I mean that's yeah, that's crazy for
the quiet town. The scene was unreal. Nearly seven hours
after the first bodies were found at one twenty six
pm in April twenty second, a final fatal discovery, Yeah
(23:13):
I need to day has been out to boast to
seven ninety nine left force. Okay, it's all this stuff
it's on the news. I just found, just found my
cousins was again shop wind. Okay, feeling life So no, okay,
(23:34):
I'll be staying out by the roadway going, Sir Donald thing, Donald,
sound a whole thing. Sound Yeah, I'm he says, what's
your name, Rod? Yeah, so prise, hurry out of the house.
(23:55):
I'm I'm out of the house right now. I just
went in horror nating and checked and okay, sure we're
going to get all right, chick mar. A few miles
(24:16):
down Union Hill Road was Chris Roden Senior's brother. Kenneth.
The forty four year old was shot once through his
right eye. Kenneth's cousin, Donald Stone, went to check on
Kenneth after hearing about the murders of their six other
family members. He'd failed to hear from Kenneth that day.
Here's Jeff Winkler. There were a lot of breaking news
(24:39):
moments during the first day, and the details just kept
piling up and piling up, and more police, more law
enforcement would show up, and the body count got larger
and larger, and then I think the real sort of
twist and the real sort of the heck has happened.
(25:00):
A moment was when, you know, nearly seven hours after
the first boys were found, at around one thirty pm,
there is finally another body of Kenneth and he was
found as well as the others. Is you know, shot
execution style and in this case, he was covered with
dollar bills that were strewn about his body. And it's
(25:23):
just sort of he's just got it. I mean, he can't.
You can't make this up. Let's stop here for another
quick break. We'll be back in a moment. How Deep
does a Mother's Love Run? Now streaming only on Hulu.
(25:44):
Experience for yourself a real life race against time by
four mothers who went undercover. My partner abducted our six
year old son and took him out of the country.
This was a mother's worst nightmare. I didn't know what
to do, and we'll stop at nothing. I knew something
better for the children they love. This is the mission
(26:04):
to get the child back. I was so scared I
would have to disguise myself to get him. You're not
keeping my child for incredible heart racing stories. I'm not
a detective. I just wanted my family back together. I
had to live a double life to save my son.
This is the last chance to get my kids back,
and that's when all hell breaks loose. It has to
be away. Up, go, go Go. Experience the stunning new
(26:26):
true crime docuseries Mother Undercover. I wanted him to know.
You mess with the wrong mother, now streaming only on
whover Search, Mother Undercover. You will fail, So what everybody does,
but your jim, your watch, your yoga pants, they pretend
(26:48):
you won't. So when you miss a day, eat the pancakes,
give up on a workout, you failed. Seriously, what the hell?
We're Body. We've a part of that too, but not
anymore at Body or rejecting perfection an embracing reality, not
in a Pizza Monday kind of way, in a loving
(27:10):
your whole life kind of way. In this workout is
fun and it's okay if I take a week off
kind of way, in an I'm eating healthy and it's
okay if I indulge kind of way, in a I
like myself. No matter what kind of way. Yeah, you
will fail, we all will. But we're not going to
let that be the end. Now, see that we're already
(27:31):
making progress. So let's keep going. We are Body. Start
your free trial at body dot com. That's bodi dot Com.
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at uns dot coo. By the time officials released the
names of the eight victims piked In, residents were reeling.
You know, they had snuck in in the night and
(29:25):
committed this, these murders, and nobody had a clue about
you know who or why, and that's really scary. There
were rumors about who had done the crime everywhere online,
in the coffee shops, you know, amongst the police, I
(29:48):
mean everyone was talking about who could have done it
and why they would have done it. Within two days
of the murder, officials would make another shocking announcement. All
let very sure, thank you very much. This is Mike DeWine,
then Attorney General of Ohio, at a news conference on
April twenty fourth, twenty sixteen. Let me go ahead, and
(30:11):
I think it's okay for us to confirm that we
did find marijuana in three locations. There's a grow operations.
Here's Jeff Shane. We worked together on the case, and
he reached out to Jodi Barr, an investigative reporter who
was working in Cincinnati at the time of the murders.
(30:33):
Let's like run through some of the theories, like what
people were saying might have happened. So there were a
lot of theories. Jody has followed the crime an investigation
for years. We got all of these tips in and
we're trying to make sense of these tips, vet them,
see if there's anything that could indicate who did it,
why they did it, what caused someone to kill eight
(30:54):
people of the same family. So, you know, the one
theory that sort of became the veiling idea of what
might have happened here was the drug cartel theory. And
you know that came about because, you know, hours after
the murders, Attorney General Mike de Wine and Pike Countis
Sheriff Charlie Reader are standing at a press conference and
the Wine tells the public that they found commercial grow
(31:17):
operations at three of the four crime scenes. Another theory
was that the murders could have been the result of
a dispute with another family in the area. Here's Jody Barr. Again.
We had gotten word that a purely Chris junior had
some sort of road range or some sort of incident
with another family in the area some days before this,
and there were some messages, social media messages exchange that
(31:43):
could have indicated a possible motive. So that was one theory.
As I got on the ground over there and you
started talking to some of these family members and you
talked to some of the neighbors, some of the people
who knew the Rodents, it became clear that either people
knew or had a very good idea about what happened,
but they absolutely would never say it because I think
(32:07):
they were they were afraid because at that point in time,
whoever did this and not been arrested, there have been
no persons of interest named. So you know, if you
lived in that area, man, it was hush hush, you
were just kind of walking around looking over your shoulder
it seeing with some of these people not knowing you know,
who could be next who did it? This is again
(32:31):
Jeff Winckler. The majority of those theories rested on, you know,
as a cartel. It was a cartel hit because the
family was growing marijuana on their property. You know. Was
it day rival marijuana farm? The area? Was it where
the killings related to the family disputes that were going
on with various members of adjacent families, and no one,
(32:55):
no one quite knew, but they all had a bunch
of theories. With the town living in fear, investigators worked
around the clock to bring the killers to justice. Mike
Dwine is and again I know him, but he's not
a friend or anything, but he really is a professional
and he was a professional prosecutor. I mean that's how
(33:18):
he started his political life. And he ran this thing
like a prosecutor or a law enforcement officer would. And
I'll tell you what, there is just no way that
the sheriff's office or the prosecutor's office up there could
have handled this thing by themselves. And that's no knock
(33:40):
on them. It's just that they don't have the resources
for something like this. There were in some of the
news conferences sheriff reader without telling people to arm themselves
as a precaution in a small county like that, And
just the horrific nature of these things, I don't know
(34:02):
that that would have not been good advice. I mean,
obviously they'd have to do it legally with a concealed
carry license and the legal right to carry a firearm.
But people just didn't know what the heck was going
on up there. I mean, you know, you had all
the different theories bouncing around, and it's a rural county
up there. So if I were living out there and
(34:25):
I was legally able to carry a firearm, I think
I would. For two years, not a single arrest was made.
How could the largest massacre in Ohio's history, with so
much blood, so many bullets, and so many victims still
(34:48):
be unsolved. The questions abound, Who's doing this? Is that
many people? Is it won? How did they get away
with it? If the scene was so messy, how did
they clean up? The four crime scenes had dead bodies,
but the emmas were different. Chris and Gary's was the
most violent and bloody. Two of the other ones had
children left alive, and in the fourth, Kenneth was found
(35:09):
with dollar bills all over him. With the victims all
being shot at close range, we know that the killers
and victims were eye to eye. How did nobody hear anything?
Could it be a cover up and would another family
be next? And then on November thirteenth, twenty eighteen, well,
good afternoon, we finally got an update on the case.
(35:31):
We promised that the day would come when a rush
would be made in the Pike County Massacre. This is
Mike DeWine, the state's then attorney general. He's at a
press conference yesterday a Pike County grand jury and died
four individuals for aggravated murder with death pality specifications for
(35:54):
legilate committing this heartless, ruthless, cold blooded murder for the
town of piked In. With the alleged killers behind bars,
the nightmare may have been over, but the mystery has
just begun. Who is this family of alleged killers? Next
(36:23):
time on the piked In Massacre. Piked In Massacre is
executive produced by Stephanie Lydecker and me Courtney Armstrong. Editing
and sound designed by executive producer Jared Aston. Additional producing
by Jeff Shane and Andrew Becker. The piked In Massacre
is a production of iHeartRadio and Katie Studios. For more
(36:43):
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows, smart journalism, fascinating topics.
Words that describe CNN's podcast The Assignment with Audie Cornish.
I'm Autie Cornish, host of The Assignment, a new weekly
(37:04):
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might not want to bring up at the dinner table,
from the economy of sex, work to the politics school boards,
conversations with everyday people who don't make the headlines they
live them. Listen to The Assignment with Autie Cornish on
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Experience a Race against Time by four mothers who went undercover.
My ex partner abducted our six year old son and
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a production of iHeartRadio and Katie Studios. Can help answer dead.
(02:17):
It was an unimaginable crime. It was the second biggest
mass murder in twenty sixteen, behind the Pulse nightclub shooting.
Eight people dead, all from the same family. It would
become the largest criminal investigation in Ohio's history. Pike County
Sheriff's requested state help immediately after they got word. In
(02:39):
the early morning of April twenty, twenty sixteen, eight members
of the Rodent family were brutally murdered, shot to death
execution style in their homes. Eight victims, thirty two gunshot wounds,
three children left alive at the scenes. This is the
piked In massacre. I believe that there is a shooter
(03:03):
wherever they are. Episode one, Daddy's playing Zombie. Piked In,
Ohio is a rural town located on the Sciota River,
just sixty miles south of Columbus. It's home to twenty
two hundred residents and the people of piked And say
(03:23):
that because the town is so small, neighbors really look
out for each other and treat each other like family.
It was just it was a good, wonderful area to
grow up in. It was we lived in the country,
and you know, we rode horses on the road. We
(03:46):
rode bikes to each other's houses, and we we played,
you know, the kids and neighborhood played together all the time.
I slept the whole time I was a kid with
my window wide open. There's no way you could do
that now, there's no way. This place was wonderful. Everybody
took care of everybody, and now it's like a whole
(04:08):
different place. The Roden family lived in piked in for generations.
In fact, this close knit family all lived within miles
of each other and were a beloved fixture in the community.
It's part of what makes this story so heartbreaking and disturbing.
Eight members of the Roden family, ranging an age from
sixteen to forty four, were murdered, each killed execution style
(04:33):
over one night in four different locations. The only known
witnesses the three small children left alive. At the scenes,
the Roden family was literally being hunted. I'm Courtney Armstrong,
a television producer who helped make a documentary about the
case for NBC Universal's Oxygen Network in twenty nineteen. Since
(04:56):
it aired, the team and I at Katie Studios haven't
stopped thinking about the case. With trials on the horizon,
there are new details and theories to explore. By all accounts,
April twenty, twenty sixteen was an ordinary spring day in
rural Pike County, but that would be far from the truth.
Here's Barbara, longtime piked In resident. I'll never forget that day.
(05:19):
I'll never forget that day. I had gone into the
office at the high school to pick Brittany up for
an appointment. And when I walked in, they had a
TV on and everyone in there was sitting with their
mouths hanging open, and I was like, what's going on
in here? And the secretaries said, my god, there's been
(05:43):
a shooting. They said six people were killed, and she said,
we are very worried because little Chris Rodin didn't show
up today and we think he might be one of them.
Everyone was just in shock. So a little Chris law
enforcement because I couldn't find him. There was some speculation
(06:04):
early on that he might have been involved. For the
residents of piked In, there was little more than confusion
at this point. People knew there was a shooting and
that Chris Roden Junior, the sixteen year old freshman at
Pikedon High was missing. Where was the team. It was
at the home of Chris Roden Senior that the nightmare began.
(06:28):
Chris Roden Senior was known to be a strong, hard
working family man. He was, you know, a great father.
He was a good man, just like the rest of
the guys you know in that family. He would do
anything for anybody. He and Dana Roden were married for
twenty two years, and although they divorced, they remained close,
so close that Chris Senior had recently bought Dana at
(06:50):
a home on the same road he lived on Union
Hill Road. He did it so they could stay close
to their children. Chris Senior's cousin, Gary Road, was more
like a brother to him and often stated his place little.
Chris's aunt, Bobby Joe, who also lived nearby, was the
first to make the gruesome discovery at seven forty nine
am when she came to feed the dogs at Chris
(07:11):
and Your's house. Love One, Yes, I yes, you over,
He walked to the love boss. I can't my brother
Halls dead. Let's live all over the house. Okay, my
(07:34):
brother Halls, I think the patriarch of the family, Chris
Rodin was dead. He looked like he'd been beaten to death.
His cousin Gary, who was staying with Chris, was also dead. Yeah,
what's her name? Chris Gary d Gary Roden stars in
(07:57):
looks like the dead. Think they're both dead. I think
the great said the exone has been to suck out
of them. Okay, if there's anybody else in the house,
i't know us. Okay, the door was awfull. We got here,
but I have been. I went here and there letting
on the floor. Bobby, I need you to get out
of the house and way done out enough times now,
(08:19):
I'm okay. Just stay out of the house. Don't let
anybody gone in there. Okay, yeah, all right, we don't
depute even the way. Okay, I thank you. Yeah, just
(08:45):
watch this. Forty year old Christopher Roden was the only
one of the eight family members who was shot somewhere
other than they had, and he had mull of the
gunshot wos to the head, torso and it stres. We
found out, you know, the news broke overnight and saw
the emails, saw the alerts, you know, the initial news coverage,
(09:05):
and I knew this was we all knew this was
a big deal. James Pilcher, as an investigative reporter who
was assigned to cover this story. Chris Roden may have
been awake when the intruders came in, at least there's
some indication of that. He was shot nine times, but
he was shot in the forearm, which means which seems
(09:28):
to mean that he may have raised his arm in defense.
His cousin Gary got shot twice in the head and
once in the face, and one was execution style and
I had a muzzle stain. It was that close to
his temple. Even for a multiple murder scene disted out
as being particularly violent. Wood fragments found on Chris's body
(09:49):
indicate he was dragged through the house. Blood was everywhere.
Was it a robbery, a serial killer, a random thrill kill?
And if it wasn't random, why were these two men targeted?
I spoke with Mike Gallen, criminal defense attorney from Ohio.
Are you familiarity able to talk about the scenes themselves?
(10:12):
You know if you look at it, and it's all
from the autopsy reports. Chris seniors autopsy report says that
they believe that he was awake. One he was confronted
by at least one person with a gun. He got
nine gunshot wounds, and one of them apparently was a
defensive wound to his right forearm that shattered the bone.
(10:33):
He was also shot in the torso and cheek according
to that report. Then Chris Senior's cousin Gary, and they're
all kind of related. Here. He was shot twice in
the head and once in the face. One of the shots.
Reports indicate that the gun was pressed to the side
of his head, leaving a gunpowder mark that's called a
(10:56):
muzzle stain. I mean, those kind of injuries leaves no
doubt that this was an intentional or these all were
intentional killings, kind of designed to send a message to someone.
The muzzle mark sticks in my mind. You have to
be obviously arms reach. I mean, you are locking eyes
with the victim, it would seem. Does that paint any
(11:19):
kind of picture or indicate to officers or attorneys anything,
Sure it does, and maybe even closer than arm's length,
I mean, maybe just inches. That indicates that the shot
was fired right on top of the person. And it
indicates to me, at least, especially when you have the
(11:39):
number of shots like that here, that somebody was trying
to send a message. I don't think there can be
any doubt about that. It's personal. I mean it was personal,
and I think that's what that demonstrates. We're going to
stick a quick break here. We'll be back in a moment.
(12:00):
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How Deep does a Mother's Love Run? Now streaming only
on Hulu, Experience for yourself, a real life race against
(13:07):
time by four mothers who went undercover. My ex partner
abducted our six year old son and took him out
of the country. This was a mother's worst nightmare. I
didn't know what to do, and while stop at nothing,
I knew something better for the children they love. This
is the mission to get the child back. I was
so scared I would have to disguise myself to get him.
(13:29):
You're not keeping my child. Four incredible heart racing stories.
I'm not a detective. I just wanted my family back together.
I had to live a double life to save my son.
This is the last chance to get my kids back,
and that's when all hell breaks loose. It has to
be away, Go Go, Go. Experience the stunning new true
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(13:52):
mess with the wrong mother, now streaming only on hul
Search Mother Undercover, You will fail. So what everybody does,
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Start your free trial at body dot com. That's bodi
dot com. Smart journalism, fascinating topics. Words that describe CNN's
podcast The Assignment with Audie Cornish. I'm Audie Cornish, host
of The Assignment, a new weekly podcast from CNN. We're
going to talk about things you might not want to
bring up at the dinner table, from the economy of
(15:17):
sex work to the politics school boards, conversations with everyday
people who don't make the headlines, they live them. Listen
to the Assignment with Audie Cornish on the iHeartRadio app.
(15:38):
At this point, Bobby Chose sees two people are dead
by twelve gunshot wounds. While waiting desperately for police to arrive,
she makes her way over to her nephew, Frankie's house.
She wanted to get some help and to tell him
what had happened to his father and uncle whose body
she had just found. Frankie Rodin was Chris Senior and
(15:59):
Dana his oldest son. The twenty year old was a
father to two boys, three year old and six month old.
Like his parents, Frankie was a hard worker. He loved fishing, hunting,
and demolition derby, but nothing so much as his family
and his fiance, nineteen year old Hannah Gilly. Hannah Gilly
was on the home coming court in high school, and
(16:21):
at that time she told friends she planned to go
to college, get a business degree, and open a daycare.
Frankie and Hannah wanted a lot of kids. They had
a bright future. The young family lived together just up
the street from Chris Senior, also on Unionhill, road. They
were looking forward to getting married soon. Here's reporter Jeff
Winkler recounting the details of what happened that night based
(16:44):
on his reporting. So, after Bobby Joe made the call
to nine one one, she went to Frankie's house near
right nearby. And the person who came to the door
with Frankie's three year old son and was as police
reports and newspaper reports showed, he was, you know, covered
(17:05):
in blood, and he, like any three year oldie, sort
of didn't fully understand what was going on. And he
told his aunt that, you know, his father was playing
zombie in the bedroom, and that's because the family were
fans of The Walking Dead, so you know, was in
there with his father playing zombie, which is, you know,
(17:30):
absolutely heartbreaking. Bobby picked up her nephew and made her
way inside. She finds two more victims. Frankie was shot
three times in the head. His fiancee, Hannah Gilly, was
shot five times in total, with one shot to her
left eye. They were both in bed with their six
month old baby. Thankfully, the infant was spared. Meanwhile, and
(17:59):
this is all happening around eight am on April twenty second.
Bobby Joe calls their brother James. She's in hysterics. There's
now two murder scenes, four people dead, twenty gunshot wounds,
two children left alive at the scenes, James immediately goes
(18:21):
over to his sister Dana's house to check on her
and the remaining kids. Dana Roden was a nurse known
for her gregarious nature and loving smile. She'd met Chris
Roden Senior when she was just in high school and
it was love at first sight. Even though they divorced
twenty two years later, they remained very close together. The
(18:44):
pair had three beautiful children, twenty year old Frankie, Hannah May,
and little Chris. She's goodhearted, a lot of fun, you know,
always laughing, cracking up. She was a very very good person.
She sent me a text slaved my grand babies here
and I said, well, congratulations, I said, she's beautiful. What
(19:06):
did Hannah Ma name her? She said Callie May and
I said that's so pretty. And that was the last,
you know, the last thing I ever heard from Diana.
This particular April seemed extra special because Hannahme had just
given birth to her second daughter five days prior, just
weeks before that, Diana threw Hannah May a big baby
(19:27):
shower at their new house. The pictures from the showers
show what a happy celebration it was. Sadly, James, Diana's brother,
was about to enter yet one more unimaginable scene. Dana
and her nineteen year old daughter, Hannah May were both dead.
Like the rest of the family, they were shot execution style.
(19:48):
Dna three times in the right side of her head
and once under her chin. Hannah was shot twice in
the head, lying in bed with her newborn daughter, just
five days old. The infant was spared alive, and thankfully
Hannah's older daughter, Sophia, just two years old at the time,
was not at the house at the time of the murders.
(20:09):
This brings us back to when Dana's son, the high
school freshman Chris Junior, was nowhere to be found. It
took detectives several hours to locate him, but finally little
Chris was found in the home with his mother, Dana
and his sister Hannah May. He'd been shot four times
in the head. There's now seven people dead, thirty one
(20:32):
gunshot wounds, and three children left alive. At the scenes,
the once small and sleepy town became the epicenter for
grizzly crime and the subsequent complex murder investigation. When it
was all said and done, two families would be destroyed
and the town would never be the same. Here's Jeff Winkler.
(20:54):
It was a long form article he'd written on the
case that originally piqued our interest. And journalist based in Flyover,
so I cover a lot of stuff that happens away
from the coast. The road in case. I remember seeing
coverage of it in twenty sixteen as it was happening
on live TV, and there was a helicopter flying over
(21:17):
the property, and it was just one of those things
that seemed like it was straight out of southern Noire.
The crime is as complex as it is grewsome because
all the victims except for one were found on the
same sort of back road and piked in, and they
were all found gunned down on the same night and
all had gunshots to the head. This was a incredibly
(21:42):
well executed execution of several people. Here again is criminal
defense attorney, former prosecutor and judge Mike Allen. Ed did
this area like a ton of bricks? I mean, boy,
the local media down here. We're all over this thing.
I mean like white on rice. So yeah, it's big deal.
Do you have any theories because I've spoken to people
(22:03):
and they're all, I guess, just theories. But why do
you spare the children? Is that some line a killer
won't cross? Or what does that tell you? Yeah, and
it's a really good question. I guess it shows that
I don't know, the killers wanted to demonstrate that they
have some humanity left in them and just would not
(22:26):
kill infants. I guess that's small consolation, but I don't know.
It probably is some kind of code thing. But they
did find it within their hearts to spare the infants
and the children. You know. As brazen and as violent
as these killings were, I guess they just couldn't bring
themselves to do it to small children and an infant, Yeah,
(22:49):
five day old, I mean that's yeah, that's crazy for
the quiet town. The scene was unreal. Nearly seven hours
after the first bodies were found at one twenty six
pm in April twenty second, a final fatal discovery, Yeah
(23:13):
I need to day has been out to boast to
seven ninety nine left force. Okay, it's all this stuff
it's on the news. I just found, just found my
cousins was again shop wind. Okay, feeling life So no, okay,
(23:34):
I'll be staying out by the roadway going, Sir Donald thing, Donald,
sound a whole thing. Sound Yeah, I'm he says, what's
your name, Rod? Yeah, so prise, hurry out of the house.
(23:55):
I'm I'm out of the house right now. I just
went in horror nating and checked and okay, sure we're
going to get all right, chick mar. A few miles
(24:16):
down Union Hill Road was Chris Roden Senior's brother. Kenneth.
The forty four year old was shot once through his
right eye. Kenneth's cousin, Donald Stone, went to check on
Kenneth after hearing about the murders of their six other
family members. He'd failed to hear from Kenneth that day.
Here's Jeff Winkler. There were a lot of breaking news
(24:39):
moments during the first day, and the details just kept
piling up and piling up, and more police, more law
enforcement would show up, and the body count got larger
and larger, and then I think the real sort of
twist and the real sort of the heck has happened.
(25:00):
A moment was when, you know, nearly seven hours after
the first boys were found, at around one thirty pm,
there is finally another body of Kenneth and he was
found as well as the others. Is you know, shot
execution style and in this case, he was covered with
dollar bills that were strewn about his body. And it's
(25:23):
just sort of he's just got it. I mean, he can't.
You can't make this up. Let's stop here for another
quick break. We'll be back in a moment. How Deep
does a Mother's Love Run? Now streaming only on Hulu.
(25:44):
Experience for yourself a real life race against time by
four mothers who went undercover. My partner abducted our six
year old son and took him out of the country.
This was a mother's worst nightmare. I didn't know what
to do, and we'll stop at nothing. I knew something
better for the children they love. This is the mission
(26:04):
to get the child back. I was so scared I
would have to disguise myself to get him. You're not
keeping my child for incredible heart racing stories. I'm not
a detective. I just wanted my family back together. I
had to live a double life to save my son.
This is the last chance to get my kids back,
and that's when all hell breaks loose. It has to
be away. Up, go, go Go. Experience the stunning new
(26:26):
true crime docuseries Mother Undercover. I wanted him to know.
You mess with the wrong mother, now streaming only on
whover Search, Mother Undercover. You will fail, So what everybody does,
but your jim, your watch, your yoga pants, they pretend
(26:48):
you won't. So when you miss a day, eat the pancakes,
give up on a workout, you failed. Seriously, what the hell?
We're Body. We've a part of that too, but not
anymore at Body or rejecting perfection an embracing reality, not
in a Pizza Monday kind of way, in a loving
(27:10):
your whole life kind of way. In this workout is
fun and it's okay if I take a week off
kind of way, in an I'm eating healthy and it's
okay if I indulge kind of way, in a I
like myself. No matter what kind of way. Yeah, you
will fail, we all will. But we're not going to
let that be the end. Now, see that we're already
(27:31):
making progress. So let's keep going. We are Body. Start
your free trial at body dot com. That's bodi dot Com.
Since her role as White House correspondent, Caitlyn Collins has
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at uns dot coo. By the time officials released the
names of the eight victims piked In, residents were reeling.
You know, they had snuck in in the night and
(29:25):
committed this, these murders, and nobody had a clue about
you know who or why, and that's really scary. There
were rumors about who had done the crime everywhere online,
in the coffee shops, you know, amongst the police, I
(29:48):
mean everyone was talking about who could have done it
and why they would have done it. Within two days
of the murder, officials would make another shocking announcement. All
let very sure, thank you very much. This is Mike DeWine,
then Attorney General of Ohio, at a news conference on
April twenty fourth, twenty sixteen. Let me go ahead, and
(30:11):
I think it's okay for us to confirm that we
did find marijuana in three locations. There's a grow operations.
Here's Jeff Shane. We worked together on the case, and
he reached out to Jodi Barr, an investigative reporter who
was working in Cincinnati at the time of the murders.
(30:33):
Let's like run through some of the theories, like what
people were saying might have happened. So there were a
lot of theories. Jody has followed the crime an investigation
for years. We got all of these tips in and
we're trying to make sense of these tips, vet them,
see if there's anything that could indicate who did it,
why they did it, what caused someone to kill eight
(30:54):
people of the same family. So, you know, the one
theory that sort of became the veiling idea of what
might have happened here was the drug cartel theory. And
you know that came about because, you know, hours after
the murders, Attorney General Mike de Wine and Pike Countis
Sheriff Charlie Reader are standing at a press conference and
the Wine tells the public that they found commercial grow
(31:17):
operations at three of the four crime scenes. Another theory
was that the murders could have been the result of
a dispute with another family in the area. Here's Jody Barr. Again.
We had gotten word that a purely Chris junior had
some sort of road range or some sort of incident
with another family in the area some days before this,
and there were some messages, social media messages exchange that
(31:43):
could have indicated a possible motive. So that was one theory.
As I got on the ground over there and you
started talking to some of these family members and you
talked to some of the neighbors, some of the people
who knew the Rodents, it became clear that either people
knew or had a very good idea about what happened,
but they absolutely would never say it because I think
(32:07):
they were they were afraid because at that point in time,
whoever did this and not been arrested, there have been
no persons of interest named. So you know, if you
lived in that area, man, it was hush hush, you
were just kind of walking around looking over your shoulder
it seeing with some of these people not knowing you know,
who could be next who did it? This is again
(32:31):
Jeff Winckler. The majority of those theories rested on, you know,
as a cartel. It was a cartel hit because the
family was growing marijuana on their property. You know. Was
it day rival marijuana farm? The area? Was it where
the killings related to the family disputes that were going
on with various members of adjacent families, and no one,
(32:55):
no one quite knew, but they all had a bunch
of theories. With the town living in fear, investigators worked
around the clock to bring the killers to justice. Mike
Dwine is and again I know him, but he's not
a friend or anything, but he really is a professional
and he was a professional prosecutor. I mean that's how
(33:18):
he started his political life. And he ran this thing
like a prosecutor or a law enforcement officer would. And
I'll tell you what, there is just no way that
the sheriff's office or the prosecutor's office up there could
have handled this thing by themselves. And that's no knock
(33:40):
on them. It's just that they don't have the resources
for something like this. There were in some of the
news conferences sheriff reader without telling people to arm themselves
as a precaution in a small county like that, And
just the horrific nature of these things, I don't know
(34:02):
that that would have not been good advice. I mean,
obviously they'd have to do it legally with a concealed
carry license and the legal right to carry a firearm.
But people just didn't know what the heck was going
on up there. I mean, you know, you had all
the different theories bouncing around, and it's a rural county
up there. So if I were living out there and
(34:25):
I was legally able to carry a firearm, I think
I would. For two years, not a single arrest was made.
How could the largest massacre in Ohio's history, with so
much blood, so many bullets, and so many victims still
(34:48):
be unsolved. The questions abound, Who's doing this? Is that
many people? Is it won? How did they get away
with it? If the scene was so messy, how did
they clean up? The four crime scenes had dead bodies,
but the emmas were different. Chris and Gary's was the
most violent and bloody. Two of the other ones had
children left alive, and in the fourth, Kenneth was found
(35:09):
with dollar bills all over him. With the victims all
being shot at close range, we know that the killers
and victims were eye to eye. How did nobody hear anything?
Could it be a cover up and would another family
be next? And then on November thirteenth, twenty eighteen, well,
good afternoon, we finally got an update on the case.
(35:31):
We promised that the day would come when a rush
would be made in the Pike County Massacre. This is
Mike DeWine, the state's then attorney general. He's at a
press conference yesterday a Pike County grand jury and died
four individuals for aggravated murder with death pality specifications for
(35:54):
legilate committing this heartless, ruthless, cold blooded murder for the
town of piked In. With the alleged killers behind bars,
the nightmare may have been over, but the mystery has
just begun. Who is this family of alleged killers? Next
(36:23):
time on the piked In Massacre. Piked In Massacre is
executive produced by Stephanie Lydecker and me Courtney Armstrong. Editing
and sound designed by executive producer Jared Aston. Additional producing
by Jeff Shane and Andrew Becker. The piked In Massacre
is a production of iHeartRadio and Katie Studios. For more
(36:43):
podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or
wherever you listen to your favorite shows, smart journalism, fascinating topics.
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