Bryan Kohberger Faces Objection, Crypto Kidnappers Plead Not Guilty — and Danny Rolling Haunts ‘Scream’ Origins

Pop culture crime expert Doron Ofir stops by to break down how a 1990 murder spree in Florida became the blueprint for Scream. The defense in Karen Read’s retrial has rested, and the case could go to a jury by Friday. Also, talkbacks from the iHeartRadio app revisit past cases with burning questions. Tune in for all the details.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This program features the individual opinions of the host, guests,
and callers, and not necessarily those of the producer, the station,
its affiliates, or sponsors. This is True Crime Tonight.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to True Crime Tonight on iHeartRadio. We're talking true
crime all the time. It's Wednesday, June eleventh, and we
have a stacked night of headlines tonight. New twists in
the upcoming Brian Coburger case. Will his request for a
delay be granted by the judge? The defense rests in
the Karen Reid retrial. If you can believe it. I
can't say it, but I can believe it. So no

(00:40):
more witnesses. This is in the final stretch. And the
crypto kidnappers of Manhattan were finally arranged today and some
of their stories are just not adding up. And also
later in the show, Dorno Fear, our special guest pop
culture crime expert, is going to be sharing with us
the genesis behind the screen franchise, and honestly, there's so
much that more to unpack. I'm Stephanie Leidecker and I

(01:02):
head up KT Studios and I get to do that
every day with Courtney Armstrong, our producer and host and
body move in our crime analyst. Hello, Hello, hello, Hello,
So I mean this Brian Coburger situation, body fill us in.
These new developments are pretty are pretty so many. There
are so many new developments.

Speaker 3 (01:23):
So you know, there's about a dozen maybe there's about
a dozen new documents that we still kind of have
to go through and like analyze. But the ones that
we have gone through are the motion for continuance and
the state's response. As you all know, Brian Coberger has
asked to delay the trial. It's scheduled to happen August

(01:44):
eleventh right now, but they've asked to delay it, and
the state finally responded, this is breaking news. And so
what I've done is I've taken both documents, right, and
I kind of just wanted to highlight why the defense
is asking for a continuance and how the state responded
if that's okay, So there's if that's yeah, okay, So
that's that's what we're gonna do. So basically, in Submarine,

(02:08):
the defense wants to delay the trial because they say
they have an incomplete review of the discovery. There's so
much paperwork and video and pictures and everything that they've
received from the state to go through that. They haven't
had time to go through it all. The prosecution has
not properly identified any exculpatory evidence. Well maybe there just

(02:31):
isn't any, right Like, just because you have discovery does
not mean there's anything exculpatory in that.

Speaker 4 (02:36):
But I digress.

Speaker 3 (02:37):
So they say more time is needed to investigate leads,
including potential alternative perpetrators. Additionally, they there's ongoing life history
and mitigation that they want to do as constitutionally required.
An in depth investigation into mister Coberger's life history is
still underway, so they want more time to do like
basically mister Coburger's history, you know, like how he grew

(03:01):
up and what was he diagnosed with and things like that. Additionally,
they say they still need to find expert witnesses that
have yet to be identified. And then this is the
one that we've been talking about prejudicial pre trial publicity
a Dateline NBC episode in May that we have been
talking about a lot featured leaks and dramatized evidence. The

(03:22):
source of those leaks may be associated with law enforcement
or the prosecution, and they believe it's prejudicial and will
affect fairness. And then another one that we've been talking about.
The book, right, the book that James Patterson is that
right has written, is scheduled to come out like a
week before the trial begins, so they're concerned about that.

(03:43):
And you know, the death penalty does require heightened protection. Right,
This is a death ped this is a capital murder case.
So cases that need more time and more preparation. So
that's the defense's argument, Okay, and you know the state responded,
and Bill Thompson, the prosecutor, is kind of cheeky in
his response. The first sentence is it is time to

(04:05):
try this case. And that's really it's so true, right,
And that's really.

Speaker 4 (04:09):
With the show here.

Speaker 2 (04:10):
It is time to try this case. We've been hearing
this from Ann Taylor, Brian Coberger's defense attorney for so
long now. I feel like we were having this conversation
six months ago.

Speaker 4 (04:22):
We've had it a year ago.

Speaker 2 (04:24):
It is impossible for this family of any of the
victims to move on. They really can't. And at some point,
isn't more time just adding more exposure.

Speaker 3 (04:33):
Right, And that's kind of basically what the defense said.
The defense said, you've had over two years to prepare
since his arrest and your defense team.

Speaker 5 (04:41):
Prosecution I think said that right.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
Well, the prosecute I'm sorry, yes, yes, of course, what
they're saying is like the prosecution said, right, the prosecution
is said, I'm sorry, You're right.

Speaker 3 (04:51):
You've had over two years to prepare since the arrest.
And the defense and team includes three attorneys, two investigators,
a mitigation specialist in multi expert witnesses already the disclosures
that had been made sixteen guilt phase expert reports, six
penalty phase expert reports, twenty one hundred pages of mitigation material,
fifty five witnesses, one one hundred and thirty two exhibits

(05:14):
for the penalty phase. They also say this is a
delay tactic based on procedures. The motion was filed after
the deadline expired, so the state is saying, you can't
even really consider this motion because the deadline has expired.
So that's kind of maybe something that might stick, you know,
judges like to stick to procedure, right. The defense failed
to notify the court earlier or request extensions and pre

(05:36):
trial activities proceed without mention of needing more time. There
and then the kind of the crux of what we've
kind of been going about. Is that this pre trial
you know, prejudicial publicity like from dateline is manageable kind
of wik is key for me, Yeah, go ahead and
delay it, but it's it's still out there. It still happened,

(05:58):
the leak still happened. More time is not going to
help you in this case. Not only that, more time
is not going to help you. That information would have
come up anyway. I would have to assume they've looked
at his phone and know what the photographs were in
his phone, And maybe had we tried this case at.

Speaker 2 (06:13):
A more in a more timely way, these leaks wouldn't
have happened either. So again, more time gives more opportunity
for things to get spoiled, for jury pools to be spoiled,
and ultimately, I feel like this is just a tactic.
You know, first it was, oh, we have an alibi.
We got a ooh big, big alibi, and that alibi
kind of seems questionable. All that to be said, You know,

(06:36):
this is me talking yelling at the wall when we
say this to a defense attorney. You know the other
side to that is, of course, yeah, a person's life
is at stake, innocent until proven guilty this has been
a circus in the media, and you know, is that true?
Can he get a fair trial period, whether it's today, tomorrow,
or six months from now, that's you know, unanswerable at

(06:57):
this point.

Speaker 4 (06:58):
Right now it's up to twelve jurors.

Speaker 5 (07:00):
Well, well, when it goes finally to trial, it will be.
But you know, Bill Thompson, the prosecutor, was saying a
lot of what you said stuff, and I think it's
worth sharing a few more of his words. The publicity.
This is quotes. While the publicity surrounding this trial is
a challenge, defendant has not shown and cannot show, that
continuing this trial will make things any easier. It's just

(07:22):
as likely the delay will make it harder to seat
a jury, which only makes sense because the more time,
the more things do come out.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
Yeah, why not ride the clock if you're his defense attorney,
of course I want to ride out the clock. Of course,
I want there to be a disruption to kids in schools.
We got to move locations because of the high school
that the jail is near. You know, they've pushed and
pushed and pushed so many times. The leak is unfortunate
because it does fire, puts fuel into the fire, right,
but still let's get on with the show.

Speaker 5 (07:51):
Yes, we want to hear from you. Do you think
this trial deserves the delay? Give us a call eight
at eight three one crime or hit us on the
talkbacks on the iHeart Radio app and we actually have
a talkback right now.

Speaker 4 (08:03):
Ooh hi True Crime tonight.

Speaker 6 (08:06):
Thank you for covering the Brian Coburger case again today
as well. As you know, his fascination is Ted Bundy.
That was something I found interesting from the Dateline episode.
But it got me thinking. You know, as a true
crime fan, I google serial killers all the time and
I'm always listening to content about them. Makes me nervous
about my own Google search history. How damning do you
think this evidence really was? I mean, he was a

(08:28):
criminology major.

Speaker 3 (08:30):
Yeah, that's a pretty good question and something that I've
actually considered quite a bit because of my own Google history. Right,
I don't think that the Ted Bundy searches are going
to be prejudicial, or I don't really think they are prejudicial.
Because he is a criminology student, it would be normal
for him to download, you know, thesis papers on Ted Bundy,

(08:50):
as Dateline suggested. You know, he downloaded the WSU professor
paper Ted Bundy on the Malignant Being. So it's not
like completely unnecessary for him or unrealistic. I'm sorry for
him to be downloading or even watching videos of YouTubers
talking about Ted Bundy. Just in my opinion, I think
there was much more prejudicial information in the dateline leaks, like,

(09:15):
for instance, looking for the sheath on Amazon on November fifteenth,
two days after the murder.

Speaker 4 (09:22):
So I think that.

Speaker 3 (09:23):
There are way more prejudicial things in there than that
Ted Bundy search.

Speaker 4 (09:27):
But that's just my opinion. I could not agree with
you more.

Speaker 2 (09:30):
Yeah, I mean, I think any of our Google searches,
you know, if you're if you follow any cases and
you're just curious about the backstory or what have you,
of course that gets a little tied up, and there's
no way you could become a PhD student without doing
that in criminology.

Speaker 4 (09:45):
Agreed.

Speaker 3 (09:45):
I totally thank you for the talk back, and again,
please let us know if you have anything else you
want to say, hit that little microphone button and.

Speaker 4 (09:52):
Let us know. We get pretty instantly.

Speaker 3 (09:53):
So just a quick summary on some of the evidence
that we know they have against Brian Koberger so far
and This is just things that we just know about.
For instance, they have touch DNA that was found on
the knife sheet that was left in Mattie Mogan's bed.
They have eyewitnesses. Dylan Mortensen saw the intruder that night
and described him as being tall, with an athletic build

(10:15):
and having bushy eyebrows. This of course matches Cobrager, but
it also matches any number of men too, right. They
have surveillance footage which shows a white Hondai a Lantra
making suspicious movements around the victim's home at the same
time that the murders allegedly occurred. They have cell phone
evidence that shows that he was making suspicious movements around
the time of the murder. And you know, obviously he

(10:36):
turned off his phone during that timeframe and turned it
back on on the way home. They have Amazon records.
Now we don't know the details officially of the Amazon records.
We know the details of the Amazon records through dateline,
so that but we do know through court documents that
they do have Amazon records. But according to the Dateline records,

(10:58):
he searched for specifically a k bar sheath on November fifteenth,
two days after the murder a sheath only right, and
you're only really looking for a sheath if you already
have a knife and you need somewhere.

Speaker 4 (11:11):
To put it right and.

Speaker 5 (11:15):
Quadrant.

Speaker 3 (11:15):
It makes me wonder if if you had the knife
on the fifteenth.

Speaker 4 (11:20):
It makes me wonder. It's scary then, and where is
it now?

Speaker 3 (11:24):
You know, we learned at the last hearing that was
on YouTube, that was televised basically that the judge said,
you know, when you bring the knife in, we have
to make sure that it's in like a display case,
you know, because it's dangerous. You know, it's a weapon.
And you know there's this big flurry like, oh my god,
do they have the knife? Do they have the knife?
Or is it like some sort of demonstration knife.

Speaker 5 (11:46):
But it's all we're in the trial. We will continue
to follow this case. The defense rested today in the
retrial of Karen Reid. We have all the details for
you and we're going to dive into the prosecution sty
since we did the defenses already. The Crypto kidnappers were
arraigned today in Manhattan, and we are going to bring
you up to date on that and they're very serious charges.

(12:09):
And then we're joined by pop culture expert Dorono fear
he'll be breaking down what Hollywood films are inspired by
the creepiest true crime stories. Keep it here on True
Crime to night and don't forget to give us a
call eight to eight three one crime.

Speaker 2 (12:36):
This trial, it's at rest. What will possibly happen next? Courtney?
Fill us in.

Speaker 5 (12:42):
Yeah, as you said, the defense has rested in the
retrial of Karen Reid. If you have been living under
a crime free rock. Karen Reid is being retried for
backing over her police officer boyfriend Brian O'Keeffe with her SUV.
So the prosecution indicates it would not call any rebuttal

(13:02):
witnesses tomorrow. And that was late in the day. Change Actually, so, yeah,
that just happens.

Speaker 2 (13:08):
That's just happen instead too, we had heard differently earlier
in the day.

Speaker 5 (13:11):
That's right. And then you know there's going to be
the closing arguments, which I am rabid to hear, and
the case could be in the jury's hands by Friday.

Speaker 2 (13:21):
Wow, how is Karen Reid keeping it together? I would
be so messy in my head if I was preparing
to potentially go away for the rest of my life.

Speaker 7 (13:32):
That is.

Speaker 2 (13:32):
I mean, I guess she's been doing this now for
over a year and this is what our thirty first
day on trial and this retrial, so I mean, I
guess you have to kind of be built for it,
and you.

Speaker 5 (13:42):
Know, a day at a time, what's there is no
other option, that is. But what the defense rested on
was a biomechanical expert named Andrew Renschler, and it was
his second day of testimony. A couple of takeaways. When
he was shown an X ray of O'Keefe's arm, he noted,
which is bizarre. There there is no sign of fracture

(14:03):
or even bruising. And in his testimony he said that
if indeed your arm is struck by a car, that's
hundreds of pounds of pressure, way more than you would
expect to cause a break, so.

Speaker 4 (14:14):
That it killed you. And he didn't break anything, but
it killed you.

Speaker 5 (14:18):
Yeah, And he, you know, he said that that it
didn't match, So, I mean, that's what he's saying was
that this man was not hit by the car. Was
his expert testimony, and he said that his crash reconstruction
tests did not match with the prosecution expert, who indicated,
of course that yes, their results show that John O'Keefe

(14:41):
was hit by Karen reads Eshuv, that's to be expected.
Of course, it's prosecution defense.

Speaker 2 (14:46):
Your experts are Yeah, it's just expert versus expert.

Speaker 8 (14:50):
That's right.

Speaker 4 (14:50):
It's going to come down who do you believe?

Speaker 7 (14:51):
You believe?

Speaker 4 (14:52):
Yeah, who do you believe is more credible? Right? Right?

Speaker 3 (14:56):
And it's going to come down to, like probably how
they presented their education, any certificates and credentials you know
they've got. I mean, that's what's gonna come down to, right,
who's more believable.

Speaker 2 (15:06):
Yeah, or who just puts a little bit of doubt
in anybody's mind? Right, Because it does feel like this
trial has gone on for very, very long. So the
big ticket items, you know what, for you, Courtney, are
the big ticket items here at play.

Speaker 5 (15:19):
The big ticket items at play for me are honestly
a lot of the players involved in the house and
what was going on that night, what preceded John O'Keefe's dying.
I maintain that this, you know, poor man who has
lost this victim. There was no intention however he died,

(15:41):
whether it was Karen Reid backing over him, I don't
think that happened or just something accidental happened at this
house party with fellow police officers, with a lot of drinking,
with late nights, with kind of texts going around between
the group of you'd call them inappropriate if you're in

(16:02):
monogamous relationships, And it just seems like it was a
lot of mess at once, and I think things happened accidentally.
What what is your biggest thing in your mind?

Speaker 4 (16:13):
Body, Well, I believe she's guilty.

Speaker 3 (16:16):
You know, we disagree on that, and so the biggest
part for me is her backing up at the same
time basically his phone stopped moving.

Speaker 4 (16:24):
I think that's pretty damning. But hasn't that been debated?
It has been debated, But I believe debate.

Speaker 3 (16:31):
I believe the prosecution expert more than I believe the
defense expert. Fair and so like kind of like how
the jury would like, it's going to really depend on
who you believe. So who were the players that you
think are super significant? Let's just go through the little
list of that night. Okay, So read we have Karen
Reid and her you know, her boyfriend and by all,

(16:52):
by all accounts, he was the loveliest guy, so beloved
by his family, all of his friends loved him. So Johnna,
you know, this is somebody who's life we miss. They
are drinking at a bar with who the Alberts, right,
that's who owns the house that this event happened in
front of. We have Jen McCabe, Is she there, Jen McCabe, Yes,

(17:15):
Jenn McCabe is the friend.

Speaker 2 (17:16):
She's the one that rides with Karen Reid at the
scene when they actually the more governed his body. And
then there's this Brian Higgins. There's lots of Brian's in
this story, so that sometimes gets confusing.

Speaker 4 (17:26):
And they're all cops by the way.

Speaker 2 (17:28):
So Brian Higgins, he's always been a character that was
brought into the equation very early on.

Speaker 4 (17:34):
He was both a friend.

Speaker 2 (17:35):
He's also the one that was a cop that left
the scene to go to the precinct to fill out
some administrative paperwork under.

Speaker 5 (17:43):
One thirty am in the morning at the Canton Police Department.

Speaker 4 (17:47):
Why would he do that?

Speaker 2 (17:49):
That's fun, That's an interesting aside, right, And he also
was the one that was texting with Karen about how
hot she was and they were having like a flirty exchange.
Unbeeva beknowns to John O'Keeffe, So that is strange. She's
also seen on the surveillance footage at the bar when
they were all there boozing it up, preparing to leave

(18:10):
for the night. You could sort of see we talked
about this, say, you know, two nights ago, when you
could see them squaring off Brian Higgins and the victim.
They were either goofing around, either they were drunkards or
there was a little you know, undercurrent temper, yeah, or
like one of them is texting the other one's girlfriend.
So is there something happening under the surface there. I

(18:33):
don't know, Like some parts of that just doesn't add up.
And if police officers are the ones actually on the
scene of the crime, why would it possibly be handled
so messy?

Speaker 3 (18:42):
That's what gets me. I mean the solo cups, That's
what gets me. Is again, I agree the investigation was
horribly handled. And if listen, I think Karen Read's guilty.
I think she hit him with her car. I think
it was an accident. I don't even think she realized
she did it. But I do expect there to be
an guilty verdict in this case. And I won't be
disappointed because I don't think the prosecution did a great job.

Speaker 5 (19:05):
Well, I want to lay out a couple of the
prosecution's points because it's fair and balanced. It Yeah, did so,
and then we're going to get back into the players,
because I do think.

Speaker 4 (19:15):
There is I do too. They're very interesting.

Speaker 5 (19:18):
But the prosecution strategy, they're actually using clips from Karen
Reid's own documentary called A Body in the Snow the
Trial of Karen Reid. They're using snippets of that and
other media appearances against her. And in terms of their evidence,
they've presented several of the first responders testified that Karen

(19:38):
Reid said, quote, I hit him after she found O'Keefe.
That was explained away differently on the defense, but that's
the prosecution. They also showed the jurors pieces of Reed's
broken tail light, saying that it was damaged when she
hit O'Keefe. And they're experts, I mean, they are credentialed.
They also said DNA evidence showed that o'keef's DNA likely

(20:03):
match samples that was found on the broken tail light
and a cocktail glass near his body, which that doesn't
match the story of him walking out of the last
bar they were at before arriving at the house and
having a glass in his hand. And then one of
the last things is the data from Karen Reid's car
when she reversed and allegedly hit him. You know, she

(20:25):
was going twenty four miles an hour. I don't even
think that was disputed. Normally we reverse at about two
to five miles per hour, so that's a fast one.
And then Body you had brought up earlier that it
was within seconds of that backup on the lexus that
John O'Keefe's phone did lock for the last time. So

(20:47):
the prosecution I believe their stipulation is that he was
hit and the phone went out right.

Speaker 4 (20:53):
Two things to add to that.

Speaker 2 (20:55):
You know Jen da cabe, who was one of the
players we were just talking about, she's the one that
said on the stand that she heard Karen say I
hit him.

Speaker 4 (21:02):
I hit him.

Speaker 2 (21:03):
Basically, Karen and Jen McCabe arrived at the scene, they
went back looking for him and they ultimately find him
in the snow in the early morning. And that's pretty
damning testimony, right, like did she confess at the scene.
And then the other side to that is people are saying, no,
she said I didn't hit him. I didn't hit him,
it's you know, it's a blizzard, there is distance between them.

Speaker 4 (21:24):
It's hysterical.

Speaker 2 (21:25):
You know, these are hysterical scenarios, right, So is that
explain awayable?

Speaker 4 (21:31):
What about the darn dog?

Speaker 2 (21:32):
Why were all of these texts also being deleted amongst
the friends, right, all of them police officers. Why would
you do that? Why were their time lapses? Why was
the house not searched? You know, some of these basic
things that would have been happening in any other investigation. Frankly,
in a house full of cops, it just didn't happen.
And it's really to their detriment. Unfortunately, whether there was

(21:54):
risky business or any trouble in paradise behind closed doors
in that house, we'll never really know, but will really
never not know if they were involved, because they just
really handled it poorly.

Speaker 4 (22:05):
They handled it terribly cops. And I'm not a pilot.

Speaker 2 (22:08):
You don't expect me to land a plane, right, That
would be unsurprising if I crash a plane if I'm unlicensed.

Speaker 4 (22:15):
But like, honestly, these guys are pilots. You know.

Speaker 2 (22:17):
This is the people that know how to process a
scene better than anyone.

Speaker 3 (22:21):
Well, are they homicide cops or they like beat cops.

Speaker 4 (22:24):
I really don't know.

Speaker 2 (22:24):
There beat cops, I don't know. And ATF and like
very oh yeah, well trained. You know those are smart
by all accounts, seasoned, seasoned police officers. Yeah, exactly, this
was a major thing. And why not, you know, why
not call in more help. It's confusing to me. It's
so confusing to me that I feel more confused today
than I did thirty one days ago. Really, yeah, it

(22:47):
does confuse me. Do you think it was something that
happened inside the home? I do, really, whether accidentally or otherwise.
My personal opinion, By the way, you know, this is
an opinion of many, I'm sure. Please we want to
hear yours too, So call and disagree. Eight eight eighty
three to one Crime. I think there was something fishing
in the house.

Speaker 3 (23:04):
Well, we're going to be back more with more Karen Reid,
and we're going to deep dive some of the key
players that we were talking about. Then the alleged crypto kidnappers.
You guys, this is the update is kind of crazy.
I'm going to be breaking down all things Ted Bundy,
stay right here True Crime tonight.

Speaker 4 (23:30):
Back to Karen Reid.

Speaker 2 (23:32):
So, Courtney, you were kind of going through some of
the players here and we were all theorizing on what
could have happened.

Speaker 5 (23:39):
Yes, absolutely, we actually did just have a call from
the teen. Yeah, she wasn't able to stay on the line.
Her question was what's next if Karen Reid's found guilty?
What's next in the process, And Tina, that's a great question. Body,
you want to take just the real, simplified version of
what goes on.

Speaker 4 (23:59):
She goes to jail. I think she goes straight to prison.
I don't think so. She will Yep, she will.

Speaker 3 (24:03):
Be handcuffed in court and taken to jail, and then
they'll be you know, they'll be obviously there'll be appeals,
they'll be sentencing, there'll be all that. But she will
be handcuffed in court and taking the jail if she's
sound guilty. If she's sound guilty, that's right, And there's
no telling, there's no telling what's going to happen.

Speaker 2 (24:20):
But yeah, she'll go to jail forever. Honestly, like this
just goes think about that, Well, well.

Speaker 5 (24:24):
Then we'll see the whole sentencing. Yeah, there's a lot,
but yeah, Tina, we will be glued to what has happening.

Speaker 3 (24:31):
I mean obviously prior to that, you know her. You know,
they'll be closing arguments over the next couple of days,
probably by Friday, they'll have you know, the jury will
have it that matt might go a couple of days
and then she'll go to jail.

Speaker 4 (24:45):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (24:45):
So, Stephanie, we were talking about the players who did
not testify this time, and one of those is Brian Higgins.
He testified in the initial trial but not in this one,
and he is one of what the lynchpins for me
of why I actually think Karen Rei did not do

(25:07):
it because Brian Higgins atf agent who was at the
house party. He told the investigators, yeah, this was the
one am to complete the paperwork. But you see this
footage and he goes in, and the defense argues, I
feel successfully that the video suggests he was already orchestrating

(25:27):
the cover up at one thirty am that night. Also,
what solidified that for me was, I don't know if
you guys remember the testimony of Kelly Dever. She's a
former Canton police officer, so she initially told authorities that
she saw Higgins and the Canton Police chief in the

(25:49):
sally Port the garage for quote, a suspiciously long amount
of time after the death, and then later Kelly recanted
that that seems suspicious.

Speaker 2 (26:01):
Why would they be doing that in the middle of
the night, after a heavy night of drinking, in the
middle of a blizzard. Why would you go to your
office to do some administrative paperwork.

Speaker 4 (26:09):
That just doesn't add up.

Speaker 2 (26:10):
This is where, unfortunately, it's like almost both things can
be true, But why the cover up. Definitely something is
being covered up, right, So either they're piling on or
covering up. But the Shenanigans of that night, you know,
we had mentioned the solo cups earlier. They literally started
taking specimens from this said crime scene and put it

(26:31):
in red solo cups, like the kind you drink beer
from a keg out of those solo cups.

Speaker 4 (26:36):
That is not like sanitizing.

Speaker 2 (26:38):
Yeah, no, no, no, we don't do zippers and gloves
like you see in every episode of CSI. It's a
very sacred place, a death scene that has to be
handled properly and carefully. It matters so deeply for a
trial ahead. So why are they not doing a proper search?
Why is the homeowner's house up for sale. Why is
the dog? That's question suddenly gone. Why were there all

(27:01):
these butt dials too? Between the owner of the house
and this Brian And remember they were like on the
stand he was this is in the first trial. They
were like, uh, did you call anybody after the murders? No,
not a single person knew all these all these texts.
They're like, oh, there's a I was butt dialing everybody.
The whole house was butt dialing each other. It just
seems preposterous, and it seemed as though potentially this group
of men were above the law, and whether you are

(27:22):
part of law enforcement or not, that's never really the case.
And it's just so unfortunate because I know there's so
many hard working officers in that department and in that
area that are are you know now kind of there's
a stink on it, for sure, absolutely.

Speaker 5 (27:38):
And you know, Stephanie, you mentioned all the butt dials
going on and alleged data wiped from certain phones before
they were handed over. Another phone thing, and this was
Jennifer McCabe who were speaking about earlier. She is the
woman who in fact went with Karen Reid and was
in the car when Karen read when they came upon
John O'Keefe's body at approximately am. Riddle me this at

(28:02):
two thirty seven am. Why did she write this is
her Google search? How long? There's a typo? But how
long to die in cold?

Speaker 9 (28:13):
Right?

Speaker 4 (28:13):
This has been debated a lot too. Why googling that?

Speaker 2 (28:17):
But or you know, the tab There's like a lot
of back and forth about the science of this and body.
You're so much better at the computer stuff. But there
was a tab opened allegedly at the you know, two
thirty ish, and then they don't know if maybe she
was googling at later or the tab was just open
at that time.

Speaker 4 (28:34):
So again, tomatoes, tomatoes. It's hard to say.

Speaker 2 (28:36):
It just seems like a really strange Google search when
you should be freaking out that there's your dear friend
is dead in the snow. Why are we google searching
things like where are the cops? Where's the ambulance? Why
where's the hysterics?

Speaker 5 (28:48):
That's right, And we actually have a caller, Oh, Maureen
who called in, Hello.

Speaker 7 (28:54):
Green, Hello lady, how are you good?

Speaker 4 (28:58):
How are you?

Speaker 7 (29:00):
I just happened to catch a show and I mid
show and I had the weigh in on something.

Speaker 4 (29:06):
We're so happy you're here. What's your question?

Speaker 7 (29:09):
I want to know is have any of you heard
that the house I don't recall the officer's name, the
house where the John is his name, Red John Reid's
body was found.

Speaker 2 (29:22):
Yeah, you're thinking of Brian Albert. Probably the home that
they were all in after hours.

Speaker 7 (29:27):
Yes, is that the house that's the sale?

Speaker 4 (29:30):
Yes?

Speaker 7 (29:31):
Yes, Well I want to know if you heard that
he had his whole basement floor dug up and refurnished
for a new concrete.

Speaker 4 (29:38):
And I did hear that. I think Turtle Boy talked
about that quite a bit.

Speaker 8 (29:42):
Actually, by the way, I following since the beginning, I've
just been picking up pieces here and there. I wish
I did fall up. In the beginning, I first thought
she was guilty as heck, she just seemed guilty to me.
And then all of a sudden, I start hearing things
and how floppy this is put together as a case.
And if I was John Read's family, I'd be so
upset at the police.

Speaker 3 (30:02):
Right, And I agree they have every right to be angry.
The John o'keef family has every right to be angry
with how terrible this investigation was. Yeah, that it came
out a while ago that it's possible that the basement
was re basically done and that somebody had procured the

(30:23):
carpet that was taken out of that home. But I
actually don't I didn't follow up with it, and I
don't know where it went.

Speaker 4 (30:33):
But I did hear that. I think it was from
turtle Boy.

Speaker 5 (30:35):
And turtle Boy is a blogger who's actually been in
the courtroom and been in some hot water as well. Yeah,
he was witness intimidation, right, witness intimidation, and he was
disallowed from being there for I believe only certain people's testimony.

Speaker 2 (30:55):
If Karen Reid is found innocent, then she could probably
think turtle Boy for starting this in the first place.
Because Maureen, just like you, I thought for sure she
was guilty as well. And again similarly, I was just
based on the top line that we were seeing in
the media. It seemed kind of open and shut, and
and then she had this like you know, congealiality issue

(31:17):
where she wasn't so like likable, She wasn't miss congeniality, right,
she was sort of a little cool, and you know,
I don't know, it didn't totally track for me. But
now that we're digging in. I feel so differently. At
the bare minimum, I think it was so mishandled that
we'll never really know the truth. And I guess that's
the worst part.

Speaker 4 (31:35):
We have another caller, Tina Hi, Tina, Hey, Hi, Tina Oh.

Speaker 10 (31:43):
Kenny Jeremy, I think it was Hey. I think it
was misunderstood earlier when I called him. My question was,
if Karen Reid is fail not guilty, what happens after
the fact, Will they will there be another will there
be something else that happens and they go, you know,

(32:07):
talk to someone else or whatever.

Speaker 3 (32:09):
Is right right? So who because if they if if
she's found not guilty, then who did it right? So
they have to find somebody to prosecute. I don't know
that the Commonwealth will. I don't know if the Commonwealth
will admit basically, Okay, well we got the wrong lady,
so we're gonna go arrest Brian Higgins now or you
know whoever that's going to be up for that that

(32:31):
it's a really good question.

Speaker 4 (32:32):
I don't know what's gonna happen.

Speaker 5 (32:35):
But for Karen Read it would be over.

Speaker 4 (32:38):
It would be over, she would walk free.

Speaker 5 (32:40):
That would be it and done. If the verdict comes in.

Speaker 4 (32:44):
Yeah, cue the book deal right exactly tells all right?
Right for a lot of money.

Speaker 2 (32:52):
I guess with you know, which is either totally applaudable
or totally gross.

Speaker 4 (32:56):
You pick.

Speaker 3 (32:57):
I can't imagine the Commonwealth would be like, oh, okay,
got it wrong. I think that they would just say no,
Karen Reid did it and we just didn't prove it,
and that would be the end of it.

Speaker 5 (33:05):
So yeah, and what do you think Tina guilty? Not guilty?

Speaker 10 (33:10):
No, I mean at the very beginning I thought guilty.
But the moral listen, I mean, I'm just confused. I
really don't know. I mean I don't so therefore I'm like,
I mean I don't But if she's found not guilty,
I mean, if there's somebody out there that's really guilty,

(33:30):
and I mean if they sign her guilty and she
starts sob or whatever and she didn't.

Speaker 7 (33:36):
Do it, do these people just go free? That was
my question?

Speaker 9 (33:41):
Is it just?

Speaker 10 (33:42):
I mean, if she's found guilty whatever.

Speaker 2 (33:47):
Right, you know, if she's found guilty, yeah it's over.

Speaker 4 (33:51):
And she's found not guilty.

Speaker 2 (33:52):
It's a great question because other names have been brought
up as suspicious and so far no additional charges.

Speaker 3 (33:58):
Right, Well, we want to hear your thoughts on all
tonight stories. Give us a call at eight eight eight
thirty one Crime to talk about Brian Coberger, Karen Read
and let us know how you feel about it all.

Speaker 2 (34:07):
Anyway, we were knee deep talking about these new headlines
that are hitting everybody's desks. So body, there's a big
update in this Travis Decker case.

Speaker 3 (34:17):
There is Courtney's gonna Courtney's going to go into that
a little bit. I'm gonna be talking about crypto real quick.
Oo right, so go ahead.

Speaker 5 (34:24):
Travis Decker a pressing headlines, dueling headlines. I know, time sensitive, listen.
Travis Decker is the man that is the focus of
a man hunt. It is alleged that he has killed
his three young daughters, and at a press conference just
a couple of hours ago, it's confirmed that the US

(34:45):
Marshals indeed are hot on his trail. They said that
male blood as in male female male blood was found
on Decker's car, but the DNA results have not come in,
so there's no conclusions we can jump to. So as
the US Marshall focus on this manhunt, the local sheriff's
office is working the investigation into the girls. So that

(35:08):
is what's happening. And let's hope that Travis Decker is found.

Speaker 3 (35:14):
Every time something breaks about him, I'm instantly glued hoping
that they found him. So they seem very dedicated to it.
They seem very dedicated to it. So let's wish them
all the luck. And if you're in the area, keep
your eye out for him. Google his name, find his picture,
get familiar with him.

Speaker 4 (35:28):
Stay alert.

Speaker 3 (35:29):
Yeah, I'm going to be talking about the crypto guys now.
This is really salacious and kind of why I'm a
little excited to talk about and jump the gun a
little bit. Did you guys hear about what's happened today?
So they were arraigned. We've covered the story in the past,
if you are not familiar with it, a guy from
Italy was basically kidnapped and held hostage for three weeks

(35:51):
in a Soho town home million dollar town home and
was allegedly tortured and what not to give up his
Bitcoin password. Well, today they were arraigned. The suspects were arranged,
the people who basically kidnapped him, William Duplessi and John Waltz,
and they're like crypto kings.

Speaker 4 (36:09):
Okay, they're like crypto boys.

Speaker 5 (36:11):
Right.

Speaker 3 (36:12):
Well, they pled not guilty, by the way, they pled
not guilty. They were denied bond. They're in jail, okay,
until all this gets scored away. However, TMZ This is Crazy.
TMZ released footage of the victim, Michael Carteron, allegedly participating
in like super wild you know parties. If you catch

(36:33):
my drift, we've been you know, the media style night
in question, the night in question during his supposed time
of activity of captivity for those three weeks, and that
there's some footage in this TMZ that they had to
like blur out, but you can like see what's going on,
and it is not wholesome.

Speaker 4 (36:53):
Tons of drugs they're part of.

Speaker 3 (36:54):
It doesn't mean he's not a victim, right exactly. Right
In one of the in some of the photos and videos,
he's basically being led around on a dog leash and
collar and there's like a guy sitting on the couch
with a knife in his lap. So we don't know
the context in which these images, you know, appear, but

(37:15):
it's leads.

Speaker 2 (37:16):
Wholesome danger is too, I mean, listen, it's so it's
so hard to look at because it's wild, right, and
we encourage you to do so. But it doesn't mean
he wasn't a victim. It couldn't just turn dark. So
you know, keep in mind there was a long stretch
of kidnapping. We'll be right back Doronto. Fear is joining
us later to talk to us about the origin of

(37:36):
Scream True Crime tonight, talking true crime all the time. So, body,
you're obviously a bit of a serial killer aficionado. Is
that how we would call it?

Speaker 4 (37:58):
I'm a hare?

Speaker 2 (38:00):
Yeah, we all agree on that we are officially serial
killer haters behaviors. Listen, when we talk about this a lot,
they are rare, and you know it's not every day
that there is a serial killer, you know, haunting us.
But Ted Bundy does go down in the book, says,
hands down, one of the scariest, and for me, he's
one of the scariest because he was an intellect, right,

(38:22):
He was very bright, he was very air quotes charismatic,
and people really liked him and he was charming and handsome,
and you know, he prayed on the good girl the
ones that were school you know, students and carrying their
books and sometimes he would even put on a fake
cast or something to pretend that he was like limping

(38:43):
hoping a nice girl would help him. And then as
she was helping him, he would just like attach her
to the car, right, all of a sudden she would
be handcuffed to the front seat and then she couldn't escape.
So you know, body phyllis in Oh Ted Bundy. So yeah,
this is Ted Bundy School. This is day one of
Ted Bundy School. So recently Dateline.

Speaker 3 (39:04):
Dateline aired an episode about University of Idaho murder suspect
Brian Coburger in May, in which they showed that Coburger
had searched for videos of Ted Bundy before his arrest.
Police also allegedly discovered selfies of Coburger wearing a black
hoodie similar to how Ted Bundy dressed in a couple
of YouTube videos that were like dramatized. And so that's

(39:26):
kind of why we're talking about this because the comparisons
have been made. So knowing all that this is what
this is why we're going to Bundy School. So Ted Bundy,
if you don't know, he was a very probably the
most famous serial cultory, right, yeah, probably, even though I
think like Gary Ridgeway was much more heinous, but I digress.
Ted Bundy super supernatorious. He confessed to murdering over thirty

(39:49):
women and girls in the nineteen seventies across several states.
It all started in the Pacific Northwest and it included Washington, Oregon, Idaho, Utah, Colorado,
and in Flame. So I mean this spanned the nation, right,
and you know, some experts believe that his victim count
could be higher, even potentially over one hundred one hundred women.

(40:12):
And they they gleaned this because after all was said
and done, Ted Bundy ended up on death row. And
part of you know, the the negotiations that were being
done was that he would speak about what he had
done with FBI guys. And this is all really well documented,

(40:32):
by the way, in a Netflix documentary called the Ted
Bundy Tapes. Yeah, so if you get a chance to
check that out, check it out, because he he tells
a lot of information about his crimes, but he does
it in like a third person kind of.

Speaker 4 (40:46):
Way, like, oh, if.

Speaker 3 (40:48):
I were to have done something like that, I probably
would have done this, you know, Like he does it
kind of very abstract. But we're checking out. But despite
all of his horrible crimes. He was really known for
being super charming and handsome, as you alluded to earlier
his appearance. He dressed well, he always had like, you know,
really nice tweed jackets, very like professory, right, like the

(41:10):
trusting guy. And he would lure women just like you
said using you know, he would prey on their kindness, right,
which made him just so terrifying. And you know notable
victims of Bundy, and now let me just say they're
all notable, right, All these women are notable. But the
reason I'm bringing this specific one up is because of
the comparison to Brian Coberger. Notable victims include the Kyomega

(41:34):
sorority sisters in Florida State University who he attacked and
murdered in nineteen seventy eight, and twelve year old Kimberly
Leech right after, which was his youngest victim, twelve years old. Twelve,
so gross awful. So here's a little bit about Bundy.
He was first arrested in nineteen seventy five for kidnapping
an attempted assault. That woman survived and she was able

(41:55):
to testify against him. But here's the crazy thing. He
escaped two time. Okay, So he was rested in Utah,
transferred to Colorado because of a he was suspected of
murdering somebody there. And while he was in Colorado, he
was granted the opportunity to assist in his defense. He
wasn't representing himself, but he was granted the opportunity to

(42:16):
assist in his defense. And while he was doing that,
he was given access to the law library in the courthouse. Right,
So he's like, I need to go to the law
library to prepare for my defense, and the guard's like, okay,
go ahead, I'm gonna go smoke a cigarette. The guard
goes and smokes a cigarette and Ted Bundy jumps out
the second story window.

Speaker 4 (42:34):
And escapes away. Six days six days he was on
the run.

Speaker 3 (42:38):
He basically went into like a cabin in the woods,
and then he needed to supply, so he stole a car,
and in that process he got re arrested and transferred
to another jail, where he escaped.

Speaker 4 (42:50):
In that jail.

Speaker 3 (42:52):
In that jail there was like an unsecure gate, like
great kind of thing, yes, And he lost a bunch
of weight, lost like twenty five pounds and snuck through
the ducks like a freaking movie.

Speaker 4 (43:04):
Stop it.

Speaker 3 (43:05):
He's when Eve like Diehard, like you know, like you
know how Ruce Willis is up and the ducks and stuff.
That's like Ted Bundy getting out of this jail or
the Breakfast Club or the Breakfast Oh my duck, I
love that movie Breakfast Club. Yeah, mental brain break that's
a nice thought. Yeah, that is a nice thought. Let's
say mind cleans army. Sorry, So Ted Bundy's like crawling

(43:29):
through these ducks, right and basically lands in a guard's apartment.
He wasn't there. This guard wasn't there. Again, Ted Bundy
totally looks out. He steals some clothes from the guard
like dresser, puts the clothes on and leaves. And then
this is the crazy part. That's crazy enough. The moral,

(43:51):
it's all nuts. But this would never happen today. After
I just got everybody seems to be escaping from prison.

Speaker 4 (44:01):
Just got out the other day. Sorry, I'm not I digress.

Speaker 3 (44:06):
No, that's a good point. But here's what I'm saying.
What happened today After escaping from that jail, through the
ducks and whatnot, he took a flight to Chicago. He
got on a plane that would never happen today.

Speaker 4 (44:17):
That's true. That is true.

Speaker 3 (44:19):
That's what I mean by this one housed so true.
He took a flight to Chicago and then took a
train to ann Arbor, Michigan, drove to South Atlanta or
I'm sorry south to Atlanta, and then got on a
bus to Tallahassee, where he ended up at the Kyomega
House where he This is where we get into the
similarities where he went to the Kyomega House and Brian Coberger.

(44:42):
Of course, at the Moscow, Idaho it was kind of
like all the girls were in a sorority. It was
an off campus house just like Kyomega. He went in.
There were four victims, two he killed and two he
beat up. So those are like the similarities as well
as you know Brian Coberger googling Ted Bundy and whatnot.

(45:04):
But I don't really think that's such a big deal
because he was a criminology student, right like I've googled
Ted Bundy, you know, it's not. I just don't really
find all that to be too much. I don't think
that that ties him to Ted Bundy. I think more
the things that bind him to Ted Bundy are the
Kyomega killings.

Speaker 4 (45:23):
I really do fair, That's totally fair.

Speaker 5 (45:26):
Yeah, so you guys, Ted Bundy has been someone who's
been on my mind since I'm a teenager. Oh really Yeah.
I would read kind of an odd amount of books
on different murders and Dominic Dunn. I think probably because
my mother was a fan of Dominic Dunn and she

(45:46):
got me into it. But Ted Bundy. I read several
books and one that really stuck with me. It was
called The Stranger Beside Me.

Speaker 4 (45:55):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (45:56):
It was written by a woman named Anne Rule, and
it terrified me so because the author and Rule turned
true crime journalist. She used to work the night shift
with Ted Bundy at a Seattle crisis hotline. People would
call sometimes they were suicidal or you know, in crisis,

(46:18):
and just the thought of being in this dark space
often the two of them alone together.

Speaker 4 (46:26):
Did she like him? Yes, she said she did. He
was like a nice guy too.

Speaker 2 (46:31):
I mean, I'm remembering this from the movie that I watched,
which randomly had who in it. It was like a
who's the actor from the Greatest Showman?

Speaker 4 (46:40):
He plays huge? No, the other one good close, the
younger one. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (46:46):
Zac Efron plays Ted Bundy in a film and it's
really the POV is really through his longtime girlfriend and
who was a single mother, and Ted Bundy was very
devoted to his daughter, and you know, kind of how
she had to reconcile these two different people was really,
you know, obviously worth writing.

Speaker 4 (47:06):
A book and making a movie about.

Speaker 2 (47:08):
And I think also the comparison to Coburger, which is significant.
It's just the idea of it being a random person.
You know, if what Brian Coberger is being accused of
is true, then he was lurking outside that house in
Idaho and just looking for a thrill kill if that's
the case, because there doesn't really seem to be a

(47:29):
super close reason or connection between the victims and the
alleged killer. And it sounds like Ted Bundy was very similar.
He had this need to kill. And yes, if you
haven't heard those tapes on the Bundy tape, good, Oh
it's it's actually too.

Speaker 4 (47:43):
Scary for me. And I don't scare easily, and I
have a very.

Speaker 2 (47:46):
Thick skin this job, I guess, but that was actually
too scary for me. Like he seems so like removed,
is your point, Like he does seem as though he's
psychotically able to compartmentalize, puts himself about outside of it.

Speaker 3 (48:00):
Right, if I were to have committed these crimes and
I and I killed her, I might have put her
skull here, by the way.

Speaker 2 (48:09):
And he's so casual about how he speaks some things
that are so disgusting in raw and brutal because he
was so brutal to his victims. And you know, I
think also the fact that he doesn't have an amazing
origin story to explain any of this either, you know,
he I think there was some allegedly some ancestual relationships
and his parents and his mother he had a little

(48:31):
bit of a twisted relationship with from a distance. Nothing
super super great though to point to as a cautionary tale.
And by the way, we're all raised to help the
person who has a cast who can't carry their books,
and he is a neighbor, exactly be a good neighbor.
So I'm a sucker for that kind of stuff. I
for sure would help the guy with the books to
get in his car and you know, be the first

(48:52):
one gone, especially if they had a dog, a lost
dog or something. I'm a sucker, a sucker.

Speaker 5 (49:00):
But I think part of what has kept his notoriety
so high for so long is his trials were publicized
and they were televised, and that really, you know, that
was not common. And during his trial, I don't know
if you guys remember seeing this on any docks, but
during his trial for the Kimberly Leech murder, he proposed

(49:21):
to his girlfriend Harrol Anne Boone in the courtroom.

Speaker 4 (49:25):
You know, it's so weird.

Speaker 3 (49:27):
Ted Bundy was really smart. He represented himself and he
knew that if he proposed in court and she said yes,
they didn't they didn't even have to have a wedding.
They're married. He knew that, Like he's a he's he
was a very very smart.

Speaker 4 (49:40):
What does that mean? Really? What does he not have
to have a wedding?

Speaker 2 (49:43):
They're just if she says yes, in not to cut
her court, really done in court and she says yes,
and it's like, okay, it's done done.

Speaker 4 (49:50):
Isn't that wild? Yes?

Speaker 3 (49:51):
Yeah, so they didn't even have to have a wedding.
That was so calculated of him. He's very smarting. He's
very smart. I mean, you don't get to get you
thirty women, you convince people if you're a dummy, you
have to be some kind of smart about you, and
he was a very smart man.

Speaker 5 (50:06):
He was even the judge said that if the circumstances
had been different, he would have been a good lawyer potentially.

Speaker 2 (50:12):
Right, we have a special guest who you know, he's back.
He was with us last week and he is back
again now our true crime pop culture expert Doron o Fear,
and he's going to give us this origin story about Scream,
the movie, which obviously was this huge Hollywood franchise, and
I didn't realize it was actually based on a true story.

Speaker 4 (50:30):
So Doron welcome, Hello, Hello, Hello, Hello.

Speaker 2 (50:35):
If anybody wants to ask a question to Doron or
join the conversation, please call us eight eight eight three
one crime or hit us up in our socials. So
Doroan tell us a little bit about Danny Rollin and
why is he so scary?

Speaker 9 (50:48):
You know, when I started to put together my thoughts
for this specific episode, I decided to sort of dub
it to Scream behind the Mask. And I don't know
if you all know the story behind Danny Rollin. I
tell it was a one man murder spree in Gainesville,
Florida that actually inspired the movie franchise Scream. Which then

(51:09):
created a ripple effect and inspired others to do more.
So it's canonized as probably one of the more twisted
stories behind pop culture and murder.

Speaker 4 (51:18):
So tell us when this all happened. Yeah, give us
a little of the backstory.

Speaker 9 (51:22):
Okay. So Jamie Rawlings was drifter, and he had a
very violent past, and he was not somebody who was
killing for any ideological reason other than shock and all.
And in August of nineteen ninety in Gainesville, Florida, that
became his hunting ground. So for about four days he
murdered five college students. He murdered Christina Powell Sonya Larsen,

(51:46):
Christina Hoyt, Tracy Powells, and Manny Toboda. And these five
beautiful students were stalked, raped some and mutilated others. He
was so graphic that he hosed their bodies. He decapitated
a victim. Another was displayed seated upright surrounded by mirrors,

(52:06):
like some kind of a prop and a horror movie.

Speaker 4 (52:08):
Oh my god.

Speaker 9 (52:09):
Yeah, he used a military he like staged it. He
staged them like marionette puppets. He used a military style
carbar knife and he broke in silently, and he killed
with precision, and this horrified the whole state went into lockdown,
and the whole world froze at the story of these
beautiful college students stalked and murdered and created into some

(52:33):
sort of fantasy set dressing. There was never a robbery,
there was never a motive. It was straight up spectacle.

Speaker 5 (52:41):
Doron, excuse me if you said this, but when when
in time did this happen?

Speaker 9 (52:46):
In August of nineteen ninety.

Speaker 5 (52:48):
Nineteen ninety, and how was he caught?

Speaker 9 (52:51):
So it took him a year. They didn't catch him
for a year, and he was and looked crazy about
it was he was already in custody for armed robbery.
And when they were able to actually figure out that
that was him, he eventually confessed. And he didn't do
it like a normal human being. He did songs and
poems that he recorded in prison. So you're parking the

(53:11):
straight psychopathy.

Speaker 2 (53:16):
Like he sings or he's doing poetry that has this
confession within that yess.

Speaker 9 (53:21):
And so when I did last week's episode and I
talked about the first monster, you know, and you guys
led into this with the Ted Bundy thing, So you know,
killers do things for different reasons, and what makes my
skin crawl is the ones that do it where you
don't know the reason. There was no rhyme or reason
for this. There was no link to Satanism or that

(53:42):
he you know, had some sort of assorted past. There's
very little known about him. And the crazy thing about
Danny Rollins is that, like that crime didn't just stay
in Florida. It became part of the cultural mainstream. And
when Kevin Williamson, who was the writer and director of
the original Saw movies, you know, Danny Rowling was nicknamed
the Gamesville Ripper and it was what inspired him, Yeah,

(54:04):
the game Ripper, and that's what inspired him to write Scream.
And when Scream came out, you know, that was sort
of a meta horror movie, and being being the pop
culture fan that I am, it combined slap slasher, gore
with humor and sort of the rules behind horror and
in terms of film, and that's where he based Ghostface,
which is the killer in the screen movies that is

(54:25):
always a different killer, but it's the killer behind a mask, right,
And so Rollings kind of his like shadow even stretches
deeper because the theory behind Rollins is also that he was,
and it's never been proven, but from a pop culture
historian lever level, it's reminiscent of the movies that came before,
which was movies like Black Christmas from nineteen seventy four

(54:45):
or the Sorority Horse House Massacre in nineteen eighty six.
The other one was The House and Sorority Row and
even Halloween in Friday the thirteenth. So all of those
movies combined a very specific point of view, which was
stalking and killing college dude. And what Danny Rollins did
was but he staged them for maximum shock value, and
that also was part of the theme and Sorority House Massacre,

(55:07):
so you can't. It's sort of the overlap is undeniable,
you know, helpless young women, voyeurism, stalking, ritualistic violence. Like
he encapsulates the worst part of what I consider serial
killing spreeze well.

Speaker 5 (55:22):
And also just the scariest, like you said, of when
there is sort of no rhyme or reason. How did
Roling want to be remembered? Did he want to make
his mark? Is that why he was doing all this
theatrical stuff like a villain.

Speaker 9 (55:35):
I'm going to leave I'm going to leave that for
you as the experts to weigh in either in the
future or even get callers in to kind of tell
us that there are people that are out there that
really know the backstory behind this, because the truth is,
you know, for me, my impetus to all of this
was the fact that a movie in pop culture inspired
or potentially inspired him to do what he did. And

(55:55):
the other part of this is that it didn't end
there because after the Danny Rowling killings in Gainesville, they
were copycat killings. And when Scream became a phenomenon with
Scream one and obviously we're up to Scream ten at
this point, there were others and when the copycats followed.
It started first in nineteen ninety eight in California where

(56:15):
Mario Padilla and Samuel Rodrigue Ramirez sorry, they were teenage
cousins and they murdered Padilla's mother. She was stabbed forty
five times, and when they were captured, they cited Scream
and Scream two is their inspiration. They said they wanted
to become ghost based and serial killers, just like the
movies they loved.

Speaker 4 (56:34):
A demented you know, it's funny.

Speaker 2 (56:35):
Dorani and I were talking about this several months ago,
you know, we were doing the Idaho Massacre podcast and
you know, we've been working on the doc and we
were kind of, I'm a little obsessed with the idea
of imprints. We learned about this from a guy named
Steve Hodell, whose father was the Black Dahlia and allegedly
and he kind of he was also a former detective

(56:56):
and mental imprints things. You know, we know what our
fingerprints are like, but what does our mind see? And
in Brian Coberger's case, the accused in the Idaho college
murders his sister.

Speaker 4 (57:07):
He has two older sisters.

Speaker 2 (57:08):
One became a therapist, but one used to be like
in a B movie and it was like a slasherflick,
and the theme of this particular movie was that these
co eds go out into the wilderness and not all
of them come back, and it's a scary, screamy movie
and it's you know, young people and you know all
the frenzied noess that we know from those types of movies.

Speaker 4 (57:29):
And much has been made about this.

Speaker 2 (57:31):
In no way am I making the suggestion that because
of that and his sister that had anything to do
with his spree, but it does potentially shape things that
we just see in the atmosphere. You know, if you
see Scream, yeah, of course it's going to have an influence.

Speaker 9 (57:44):
Well, it actually does. And what's even more sort of
blood curdling or makes your blood run cold, is that
In two thousand and six, also in Idaho, Casey Joe
Stoddart was sixteen and she was killed during a sleepover.
Her classmates Brian Draper and Tony adamsick based out or
to death and they not only stabbed her, they recorded
themselves before and after, and the whole time they were

(58:05):
doing it, they were saying it live, that we're making
real life horror movie. And upon their incarceration, their whole
thing was that they were Their whole tone was that
it was casual, it was giddy, It was as if
it was prescripted. And they also said that they wanted
to mimic Scream.

Speaker 4 (58:22):
So you know the Slenderman. Yes, slender we should do
a story, we should be narrative.

Speaker 9 (58:31):
But what's crazy about it is that, like in two
thousand and six, this happened in Idaho, and the Scream
movies and the franchise may not have inspired it, but
it sort of brought it back so it starts in Gainesville.
You know this this this the town in Scream is
sort of Illinois, and then it goes to California, then Idaho,
and then back to idahoad again because the Idaho killers.

(58:51):
You know that happened what November thirteenth of twenty twenty two,
and again for University of Idaho students to death off
campus housing kids.

Speaker 4 (59:01):
No motive yet, no really known motive. It's not revenge.

Speaker 2 (59:04):
It wasn't money necessarily, it wasn't like unrequited love. Well
maybe that was the kid, don't Maybe he felt rejected
in his head.

Speaker 9 (59:11):
I don't know.

Speaker 2 (59:12):
They certainly weren't all buds.

Speaker 9 (59:14):
There was there was no fourth entry, right, no robbery. Right,
there was a brutal murder. Whether whether it is Brian
Coberger or not, it's still these things have a pattern.
And me as somebody who watches pop culture and wonders
about it, you know, this conversation happens all the time
about you know, video games and gaming and whether that

(59:35):
increases violence. And you know, my theory about this is
is that once something becomes imaginable, it's no longer unimaginable,
and that's when you start to see ways of creating
it and becoming more perverse. And that's the fear that
we're headed to. And you know, as part of a
horror movie genre. You know, I talked about it a
little bit last week. It reflects the fears of society

(59:58):
and they're cyclical, so you know when you talk about
you know, we left off last time talking about the
seventies and why suddenly were you know, women as the
final girl and they were always teenagers and it had
a lot to do with sort of sexual promiscuity and
kids having fun. And that was in an era where
women's liberation was growing and the pill happened and sexual freedom,
and so there was a reaction to it. And the

(01:00:20):
lead up to that, strangely, in the early seventies was
a lot of religious horror because people were afraid that,
you know, America was losing its moral compass, and that's
when you had the exorcystem the Omen and all of
these movies that sort of dealt with, you know, these
religious themes, which then followed the birth of the slasher
movies full on. Because although Psycho might have been the
first slasher movie, there was a lull in between. But

(01:00:40):
by the time the late seventies happened. It was all
slasher all the time until we hit into the late
eighties and nineties. Then and when you think of the
time of that, with videotape and all of that, we
entered a world of found footage, harror, so Blair witch
and you know, paranormal activity where video even yeah, feels
proven to be video. So you know, my fear now

(01:01:02):
is that we've circled back into an environment to fear
where people are not afraid of the unknown.

Speaker 3 (01:01:08):
Uh.

Speaker 5 (01:01:09):
Doron, you are the best and we're very excited that
you will be sticking around and joining us for what
we're all watching. And we've got some great tips on
that for you. Give us a call eight a eight
three to one Crime and keep it here True Crime Tonight,
we're talking true crime all the time.

Speaker 2 (01:01:40):
Our special pop culture guest, Dorano Fear he's joining us
for this next segment as well. We also have a talkback,
so thank you by the way, if you want to
join the show eight eight eight three to one Crime,
or you could always leave us a talkback.

Speaker 4 (01:01:53):
Let's go to the one that just came in.

Speaker 11 (01:01:55):
Hi, my name is Sarah, and pertaining to the new
England serial killer theory. I'm kind of wondering if there
could be a couple of them in the area. And
it's not necessarily that there's one serial killer or thirteen killers,
but I'm thinking of like how the Hillside Stranglers were
active at the same time as Rodney Alkala in California.

(01:02:17):
Like those things complicate stuff. Let me know what you think.

Speaker 2 (01:02:21):
Can we just discuss how smart our listeners are. I mean,
listen the crime crew out there. Every question we've been
getting has been so clever and thoughtful and smart. So
keep coming please eight eight eight three to one Crime. Yeah,
what a smart question.

Speaker 5 (01:02:37):
You know.

Speaker 3 (01:02:38):
They call that like a cluster when there's more than
one serial killer active in the same you know region.
And I might be wrong about that, so let me
know if I'm wrong. I'm sure you'll have no problem
letting me know. But I believe it's called a cluster,
and it's a really rare occurrence, but it does happen.
As our talkback just mentioned, it also happened with Ed
Kemper famously, right or was in mind Hunter? You know

(01:03:02):
he killed his grandparents and.

Speaker 4 (01:03:04):
His mother or something. Oh yeah, the other one too scary.
He did, we'll talk you. We have to cover him.
It makes me not just too much, we have to
get him.

Speaker 3 (01:03:12):
But you know, he was called the coed killer and
in Santa Cruz and there was also Herbert Mullen working
at the same time, and it caused a lot of
confusion for the investigation because there were two serial killers
and I thought there was one. So to answer your question, yeah,
and it's something I didn't actually think about until you
said it. And it's really smart because there could be

(01:03:33):
I mean, it's again, it's a cluster and it is
pretty rare, but it definitely does happen. It is something
that we should probably think about.

Speaker 9 (01:03:39):
And one of the things that is making the New
England serial killer problematic is that they're saying that the
motives or the methods in which these people were found
are they're they're not cohesive, they're not which could lead
that there's either multiple killers through coincidence, or that they're
working together to sort of buddy up the investigation.

Speaker 2 (01:03:58):
Oh and that would be or that would have aten
for killing and you know somebody else is doing it
in the area that might get caught or you know,
cover your tracks a little bit.

Speaker 4 (01:04:08):
And why not.

Speaker 2 (01:04:08):
You know, maybe you jump in geographically to a similar
location knowing that they're hot on someone else.

Speaker 4 (01:04:14):
But then you would probably try to match it a
little bit.

Speaker 9 (01:04:17):
And that was you know, going back to my segment,
that was what Scream was about. Because remember Scream was
not just one killer, so you know, it was two
and so you know, these things again mirror, you know. Unfortunately,
when I said that the unimaginable becomes imaginable is when
people start to see these things, it can lead to inspiration,
and that's a really scary thought.

Speaker 2 (01:04:37):
How do we prevent that? I think that's why you know,
we're so excited to be able to unpack this stuff, right,
because it really does fishtail these very extreme cases. They
have bits and pieces of you know, regular person lives, right,
It's relationships, it's you know, the person next door. You know,
how do we find ourselves safe in the world, and
how do we keep ourselves safe if we don't talk

(01:04:58):
about this stuff. So on the one hand, yes, it
kind of puts almost like a little bit of a
spotlight on people who do very bad things, and maybe
that's like a form of celebration, which of course we
don't want to do.

Speaker 4 (01:05:11):
And frankly nobody wants to do.

Speaker 2 (01:05:14):
And then on the other side of that, if you
don't talk about it, then how do you prevent it?

Speaker 3 (01:05:18):
Well, I don't know that talking about it it does
prevent it. I believe it makes it.

Speaker 4 (01:05:23):
I feel better.

Speaker 3 (01:05:24):
Well, I think it makes us feel better to talk
about it.

Speaker 9 (01:05:27):
It does, think it feel better. It also gives you awareness,
and it allows you to understand motivation and concept You
may not be able to imagine what it's like to
be a serial killer, which would obviously lead to psychopathy,
but it allows you to understand what you can do
to avoid it or to become a victim.

Speaker 2 (01:05:44):
Yeah, how do you avoid the serial killer? You know
mosttant Yes, you can. I think you can a little bit.
If you don't know that there is somebody in the
world that can do something that terrible, Yeah, Like, then
you have to just be alert.

Speaker 4 (01:05:58):
A little bit.

Speaker 2 (01:05:58):
This is not to say that victims are not alert,
but like, if you don't hear this stuff, then you
don't even know that you should be looking over your
shoulder or you know, how to make sure that you're
in your.

Speaker 3 (01:06:08):
Life looking over your shoulder all the time.

Speaker 9 (01:06:11):
Like, that's just my belief it's not only that. Like
if you go back to when was it nineteen seventy
seven when a Ton Pots the Little Boy vanished to
New York. That was the first time that the whole
concept of Jennifer Generation X kind of had to wake
up and bring your kids home. And that's on the
whole milk carton thing. Once people understood that you could
be aware and you started to teach kids about stranger danger,

(01:06:34):
it was an unheard of crime and it wasn't a
crime that hadn't happened before, but it had. It had
become mainstream in everyone's thought patterns because every little kid
became a ton Pops and you know, he it's and
then they had all those movies you know, my name
is Stephen, and they had all of this kind of
culture around it as well. That was so, you know,

(01:06:54):
but we now know, so you raise your children today
to know about stranger danger that you know, you scream,
you yell, you don't just get into a van. You know,
this stuff seems so common to us now, but it
wasn't always like that. And it's the stories of these
true crimes. It's the stories of the terrible incidents that
make you go Okay, I'm not going to do that.
I'm going to trust my instinct. You know, women don't

(01:07:15):
just walk on the streets alone without some sort of
understanding that they need to put their keys between their hands.
They need to have made that. Now, phones have pre
recorded messages on them so that when you talk out loud,
it sounds like you're like, husband's a cop. You know.

Speaker 5 (01:07:29):
It's so true that talking about all of this doron
really does make an impact ultimately. And now we're going
to take a little turn into what we are watching. Stephanie,
what is hot on your list?

Speaker 2 (01:07:41):
The Gilgo Beach I mean that was super scary, the
Peacock documentary that we were talking about, the Gilgo Beach
Killer House of Secrets, and it really does highlight the
accused Rex Humerman's wife in her in her own words,
And I almost don't want to ruin it, unless you
guys don't.

Speaker 4 (01:08:01):
I have not started it. It's interesting, I do want
to know, really interesting. I really recommend it. Really, Okay,
it's excellent.

Speaker 5 (01:08:09):
I actually I was so I had literally have twelve
minutes left to watch because I was watching it up
until we came to the studio.

Speaker 4 (01:08:17):
Really, and yeah, it's good.

Speaker 5 (01:08:19):
But yeah, let's give everyone a little bit of time
to watch it.

Speaker 3 (01:08:22):
But it just came out yesterday, right like we I
haven't had any time to see it yet.

Speaker 4 (01:08:27):
I'm dying to see it and think about it.

Speaker 2 (01:08:29):
Just the stakes there, you know, regardless of even taking
Rex Humor Mini accused Long Island serial killer out of
it for a moment, just imagine your you know, have
you ever been in a relationship of any kind where
you were a little bamboozled or you you had a
spidy sense about something but maybe didn't act on it.
Obviously this would be a very extreme example of that.

(01:08:51):
But I think, you know, like her, dislike her regardless.
I think that piece of it is a little relatable
and I think also ticks back to our our first
conversation about, you know, how to keep ourselves safe and
talking about this stuff respectfully and ethically. Yeah, trust your
spidey sense, everybody, Please trust that feeling. When you have

(01:09:11):
the hairs in the back of your neck go up.
Listen to that, and don't get in the car. Your
chances of survival go down fifty percent if you get
into the car.

Speaker 4 (01:09:19):
Do not get in the car.

Speaker 2 (01:09:21):
You kick you scream, you scream fire and you fight
to the death.

Speaker 4 (01:09:25):
You do not get in the car, that is my.

Speaker 9 (01:09:27):
If you're in the back of a cab or a
ride service, do not drink the water that's provided ever.

Speaker 4 (01:09:34):
Ever, ever, ever. Oh, that is a great thing.

Speaker 5 (01:09:38):
That's honestly something.

Speaker 2 (01:09:39):
That's a general note too that I would say, do
not drink out in public if you didn't open it yourself,
be really careful. I mean, we're seeing that in the
Ditty case and much more, you know, different circumstances.

Speaker 4 (01:09:51):
But you know, alcohol being spiked or.

Speaker 2 (01:09:54):
Drugged is becoming increasingly more a thing, and sometimes it's tasteless.

Speaker 5 (01:09:59):
Ps A. These are very important darn what about Yeah.

Speaker 9 (01:10:05):
Well, you know I linked I okay, So for me,
I'm going to recommend the case that made us all
questioned the justice system to begin with and gave birth
to the true crime documentary as we know it. So
what I started to revisit now was Paradise Lost and
the child murders of Robinson Lakes nd of it. And
when you met you mentioned it. That was the first

(01:10:27):
documentary clime that I had ever seen me too, and
I wanted to watch it now to see if it
holds up and you know what, it holds up brilliantly,
and it's a it's a three parter now because Paradise
Loss came out in what nineteen ninety six and it's
available on HBO Max. Then Paradise Lost to the Revelations
came out what fourteen years later in two thousand and
then Paradise three Lost three Purgatory Who came out in

(01:10:48):
twenty eleven. Plus there's been follow.

Speaker 4 (01:10:50):
Up movies and we really good too, by the way, yep.

Speaker 9 (01:10:53):
And the thing about that is that that's another case,
you know, it's never really truly been solved, but that
was into trial and you know and and sort of
whole accusations. It's a little bit of it's blanking on me.
The Crucible, you know.

Speaker 4 (01:11:09):
Panic of the nineties, right.

Speaker 9 (01:11:11):
Panic panic and false you know confessions, false confession you know,
you know Metallica Like it makes you say, absolutely so
those poor little boys because you know what the documentary
is about. You know, it's you know, three eight year
old boys in West Memphis, Arkansas are found dead and
they're not and they're killed brutally and then teenagers and
are are you know, basically rounded up for Damon Eccles

(01:11:34):
becoming the main one, James Baldwin and Jesse Ms Kelly
Junior and those three, you know, they spend time for it.
And the West memphisis three also is one of these
that resonated with pop culture because all these pop culture
people entered the fray. Johnny Dad happened? You know, there's
free any better? Yeah, And so it's a fascinating look
at how somebody can how how true crime can influence

(01:11:58):
the judicial system and help public opinion can sway a
court case.

Speaker 4 (01:12:02):
Oh you're speaking my love language. Yeah, it's so true.
My favorite body and eyes are just like lit up
right now. I know there's a twinkle.

Speaker 5 (01:12:11):
I'm gonna I'm really busy couple of days watching all
of these. Well, listen, Doron, we thank you from the
bottom of our hearts for being here. Hopefully we'll have
you back as soon as you're able. And yeah, as
a reminder, tickets are available now for La Comic Con
and you can and should follow Doroan on his socials

(01:12:32):
at Doran o fier Cast.

Speaker 2 (01:12:35):
So you know, again, what are we all watching? I know,
body any big ideas.

Speaker 4 (01:12:39):
Mind over murder?

Speaker 3 (01:12:41):
You guys, I don't know if you if you've even
heard about it, because nobody ever really talks about it,
but it's.

Speaker 4 (01:12:47):
It's about it's about false confessions.

Speaker 3 (01:12:49):
And it's so funny that Doron was talking about that
with Paradise Loss, because that's how I got kind of
introduced to false confessions. But yeah, it focuses on a
small town in Nebraska and six pe people are all
confessing to the same murder, and you really learn about
the science of false confessions and police interrogation techniques and

(01:13:10):
how people are broken and are basically kind of convinced
that they did something they didn't do. It is a
fascinating documentary. I've watched it twice now and I just
rewatched it this weekend, which made me remember, oh God,
I got to talk about this because it's so good
and nobody ever talks about it. It's on Hulu and

(01:13:31):
Apple TV, and I just can't recommend it enough, especially
if you're interested in how people get caught and how
people how could you ever false confess to something that
you had nothing to do with, Well, this explains it,
and it's super interesting. It happens way more often than
you think, and you know a lot of the police
interrogation techniques kind of are questioned in today's world because of.

Speaker 4 (01:13:54):
Things like this movie or this documentary. It's great, really good.

Speaker 3 (01:13:57):
Yeah, Mind over Murder Check it Out is really good.

Speaker 4 (01:14:00):
What about you, Courtney?

Speaker 5 (01:14:02):
Oh well, this was one American Nightmare. It's on Netflix
and it tells the story of Denise Huskins and Aaron
Quinn and this young couple. I don't want to ruin it,
but they experience a home invasion and there's a kidnapping involved.

(01:14:22):
And this series, it's three episodes, tells the story from
grossly different perspectives. The three parts are called the Boyfriend,
Gone Girl and the others. So it's really herm and
it's beautifully done, and it's also an example of unbelievable

(01:14:44):
detective work.

Speaker 3 (01:14:45):
And I have to tell you the people that made
American Nightmare are the same people that made Donnof for Cats.

Speaker 4 (01:14:51):
Oh, you had mentioned that, I'm really proud of really
nice job, no question. We also have a talk back.
Oh do we want to go ahead? Let's play that.

Speaker 12 (01:15:02):
This is Kim from Kentucky and I was wondering all
thoughts on this with the Gabby Window case. If potentially
the law would I would go after the Laundry family
to sue them for resources used searching for Gabby when
they have indeed announced that they knew that Brian had

(01:15:23):
already taken her life.

Speaker 2 (01:15:25):
Great question, Another incredible question on the Gabby Patito case
if you think it's possimiliar, Yeah, if you're not familiar
with the case, just as a heads up, Gabby Patito
was the beautiful girl who was with her boyfriend doing
van life across country and her life was taken by him.
He goes home with out said van and allegedly maybe

(01:15:47):
confesses to mom and dad, we don't know this for sure,
and then he takes his own life. And you know,
the question is will will the parents be charged? Potentially
such a great question if they misled police.

Speaker 4 (01:15:59):
And they they could be charged.

Speaker 5 (01:16:01):
They could be charged absolutely and have to pay restitutions
for you know, money is lost and.

Speaker 2 (01:16:08):
It's basically abstruction, right I think, yeah, it's a great question.
I think we should dig a little deeper into that
because so much has been you know, made suspicious about
Brian Laundry's parents, and you know, what would anybody do?
Do you do you give shelter to your child after
a terrible confession or do you turn them in? You know,
I guess is the is the choice. Well, we're going

(01:16:30):
to dig into so much more tomorrow. We have Diddy.
We haven't been talking about puff Daddy in a couple
of days now, so tomorrow's the day. Also, Karen Reid,
there could be a huge development tomorrow, so make sure
you tune in. We will be following it so so closely.
It's been an extraordinary night. We've been so happy to
have you here. True Crime Tonight.

Speaker 4 (01:16:48):
Good Night,