Juror Dismissed in Diddy Trial, Alexander Brothers Face Federal Charges, and the Pike County Murders Unfold — What’s Going On with "Billy" Wagner?

Vance Luther Boelter, the suspect in the Minnesota lawmakers shooting, allegedly had firearms and notebooks containing a list of 45 elected officials in his car. Seasoned criminal defense attorney Thomas M. Bell, who has tried nearly 70 major cases in his career, joins us to explain jury deliberations and the often-confusing verdict language in these upcoming high-profile trials. Tune in for all the details.

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Episode Transcript

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

Speaker 2 (00:19):
Welcome to True Crime Tonight on iHeartRadio, where we talk
true crime all the time. It's Monday, June sixteenth, and
we have a stacked night of headlines tonight. Diddy. We're
back in court and big developments there. Juror number six
is tossed. There has been no verdict yet in the
Karen Reid retrial. So I was completely wrong yesterday, but
we are standing by and have some updates on that

(00:40):
as well. And also we're going to be joined by
defense attorney Thomas M. Bell and he's going to join
us to really break down all of these cases and
what could possibly be happening behind closed doors in the
deliberation room, and what's happening behind closed doors in the
ditty trial, etc. I'm Stephanie Leidecker and I head of
KT Studios where I get to do that with Courtney
Armstrong and body move in. This whole thing works if

(01:03):
we hear from you, So call us anytime eight eight
eight three one Crime or you could always hit us
up on our socials, at True Crime Tonight's show on
TikTok and Instagram or at True Crime Tonight. So Karen Reid,
there's nothing on that. So I take it. I take it.
And Diddy Big day today, Boddy, what do you want
to tell us about the Ditty trial so far? Oh Diddy?

Speaker 3 (01:23):
I feel like every time I talk about Diddy, I
start with, oh Diddy.

Speaker 2 (01:27):
You know it appears he did, Oh Diddy.

Speaker 3 (01:30):
So two summary witnesses testify today, And if you don't
know what a summary witness is, it's basically a representative
from the government who provides a bunch of really complex
evidence but doesn't, like you know, introduce anything new. They
just explain a bunch of evidence at once. So in
this case, Anya Sandcar, she's a paralegal specialist with US

(01:53):
Attorney's Office in Manhattan, and she served as a summary witness.
And she showed charts showing correspondence of all of Diddy's
like most trusted staffers, chief of staff KK for instance,
Christina Korum, and bodyguard Damian d rock Butler. And then
we had de Lisa. I hope I'm saying that right, Lisa.

Speaker 4 (02:14):
I believe it's de Lisa Penland.

Speaker 2 (02:16):
Yeah, that sounds right.

Speaker 3 (02:17):
She reviewed evidence charts related to the alleged freak offs
and it included movies and like text messages, credit card
and travel reports and all kinds of things. She's going
to be back tomorrow to finish up her testimony. And
then the headline, right, the big headline is that a
juror was dismissed. Was dismissed forty one year old black mail.

(02:41):
He's a correctional officer. He was dismissed today after the
prosecution raised concerns about conflicting answers regarding where he lived.
He wrote that he lived in New York City and
New York Seat, New York City, but he also lives
in New Jersey. And the judge was like, you know,
we have serious concerns about your candor or and whether
or not you shaded answers to get on the panel.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
Right. Wow.

Speaker 3 (03:03):
Well, the defense opposed the dismissal of jursics and filed
a third motion for mistrial, citing racial bias.

Speaker 2 (03:11):
Well, look, I mean, just playing that out for one second,
you know, what is the makeup of that jury, because
you know everyone does count, they're at a pretty pivotal stage.
Is that implying that they were untrustworthy or that they
were faking their answers to fake a verdict? Is that?
Is that the assertion there?

Speaker 3 (03:30):
Well, the judge said, the changing answers and inconsistency give
the court worry about deception in lying.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
Wow, that's what he said.

Speaker 3 (03:39):
So basically, he said, the jurors not being truthful, so
we can't really trust, you know, anything they say moving forward.

Speaker 2 (03:45):
And the defense was like, this is.

Speaker 3 (03:47):
Racially motivated, you want to because he was replaced with
a white guy. Right now, it's four white, four black,
one Asian, and one Latino.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
Got it. That's that's based on this most recent swap
or wow? Correct?

Speaker 3 (04:01):
So the judgment men and for women, right, and the
US Attorney's office, you know, responded to that motion this morning,
and Alexandra excuse me, Alexander Shapiro in like a heavily
redacted you know, correspondence dated yesterday. Unfortunately, when considered against
that background, it is impossible to leave that this motion

(04:23):
is merely a good faith attempt to raise a valid
question about the jurors integrity, rather than an effort to
take advantage of an opportunity to strike to strike, yet
another black mail from the jury. So it's very interesting.
But the judge denied the motion and the juror was dismissed.

Speaker 2 (04:40):
So the juror like, it's much ado about their location.

Speaker 5 (04:43):
Right.

Speaker 2 (04:43):
They had put a certain location of where they lived
on an application, and then when they were interviewed they
had a different answer correct, a different state, a different state, right,
And then when put on the spot directly, it wasn't
answered fully. So that brought in some suspicion. Goes to
a Hollywood terrible movie. I just watched that movie The Juror,
where it like the person's bought off and they get

(05:06):
on this jury. It seems impossible, nor are we saying
that that's happening here, But that's where my brain goes.
So this person gets tossed. Now this alternate who has
obviously been paying attention, they just get dialed in and
that's the end of it.

Speaker 3 (05:18):
Yeah, yeah, Wow, they're gone. Wow, they're gone, and the
alternatives been brought in. So the jury is sad, it's done.

Speaker 2 (05:24):
Deal it.

Speaker 4 (05:25):
Honestly, it makes sense though, I mean, the judge said
that it would be an appropriate to base its decision
on race. I mean that think about what a slippery
slope it would be. So to me, it makes sense
that you would simply go with alternate number one, the
person who was next in line, right, and leave it there.
Otherwise you're gonna cherry a pick.

Speaker 3 (05:44):
I want a woman, right, But I understand we have
a talk back about Diddy.

Speaker 2 (05:48):
Can we hear? Can we hear the talkback?

Speaker 6 (05:50):
Hey, this is Matt. I heard Kanye West went to
visit Sean Puffy Combes at his trial. Anything I missed
about his appearance of court?

Speaker 2 (05:58):
Oh?

Speaker 3 (05:58):
Yeah, Well he didn't even make it into the courtroom.
He wasn't allowed entry into the courtroom and so he
got put in the overflow room with you know, the
regular public and media, and he left. He was in
there about ten minutes and he left, which is interesting, right.

Speaker 2 (06:16):
So why do we think he went there? I mean,
it's such a big appearance too, so it appears he
kind of came unannounced, although one of Ditty's sons met
him outside and escorted him in. I think the idea
was he would be let into the main room. That
wasn't the option, so he dipped and you know, I
thought he was coming in to sort of show support
for Ditty and was dressed in white and kind of

(06:38):
putting on a good face to show support for an
old friend. But Courtney yesterday had a very very clear
thought that why would he possibly wear white? Why would
he wear that when the white parties themselves are up
for so much conversation?

Speaker 3 (06:51):
And then I thought he went to intimidate Jane. Oh
and then you know he wasn't let in the courtroom,
right Jane's testifying, you know not.

Speaker 2 (07:01):
But can you imagine, by the way, was she testifying
when he went in or was she dumb? I can't
remember now, No, I think that tracks we can find
out real time. But that does make sense. And listen again,
this is all falling under the chatter category. That is
absolutely speculation. If he's representing to show support from a
friend or for a friend, is that the friend you

(07:22):
want at a very important time. You know, that could
go all kinds of ways. But yes, if you're sitting
on the jury or if you're testifying and your face
is exposed. Now these people are coming in very very
scary stuff. Luckily we have somebody to discuss this with.

Speaker 4 (07:38):
Oh yes, and now I think we have our guest
ready on the line.

Speaker 5 (07:45):
Well, hello, that's right Tom Bell here. How are you hi?

Speaker 2 (07:48):
Tom Bell? So thanks for joining us. We know how
many cases you've start, you know, you've literally tried so
many cases I'm seeing here in our research, over seventy
major cases. So you're just the person to ask about
what could be happening behind closed doors at some of
these high stakes trials.

Speaker 5 (08:06):
Yeah, well, first, thank you for having me. I guess
I should address the jury disqualification or dispiscial today that
that is a little bit unusual. Yeah, you don't really, Uh,
typically in federal court they'll have a number of alternatives,
and it's not altogether unusual to lose jurors along the
way for various reasons health and otherwise. But to have
someone disqualified after jury selection based on some indication that

(08:32):
they may not have been truthful during the process is
a little bit unusual. Was it a little curious about
how this came to the court's attention originally?

Speaker 2 (08:42):
Yeah, because this is this is.

Speaker 5 (08:43):
The type of issue that really should have been sorted
out at the beginning.

Speaker 2 (08:48):
Yeah, Like how did.

Speaker 3 (08:48):
They how did they even know he lied? Like why
why would they be re asking him his address?

Speaker 2 (08:54):
Right?

Speaker 5 (08:54):
Well, I mean I think you know, there are a
couple resources. I mean, typically you would have the address
provided you could run checks. Of course, you know, the
US Attorney's Office, with all its resources, can generally kind
of run background checks and typically do to criminal history
checks on all the perspective jurors when they come in.
So it's it's the type of thing you would generally

(09:17):
want to find out before you got started, But to
have all this unfold after the jury's been selected is
a little bit unusual.

Speaker 2 (09:24):
Well, so much testimony too, weeks and weeks and weeks
of testimony.

Speaker 5 (09:29):
Sure, and you've got a presumptive juror, and you know,
typically you have alternatives, You have alternates in the event
that people kind of lose their way, will get lost
along the way for various reasons. But this is pretty borderline.
And you know, you've got a presumptive juror with the
kind of mix that people are relatively satisfied with, and

(09:49):
you're replacing them for reasons saying, you know, the judge
obviously has a lot of discretion in these type of
issues to assess credibility, but you would hope there will
be a little bit more inclusive evidence of where he resides.
If he resides in New York, he's presumptively kind of
a legal juror. If he lives in jury, New Jersey,
then he shouldn't be on the jury panel at all.

(10:11):
I suspect how did.

Speaker 2 (10:12):
He even get summoned if he doesn't listen?

Speaker 5 (10:14):
In a good question?

Speaker 4 (10:16):
Yeah, many people receive mail in two locations. I mean true,
I don't know, and.

Speaker 2 (10:21):
It was both.

Speaker 4 (10:21):
It was the prosecution, by the way, that did bring
this to the attention.

Speaker 5 (10:26):
Yeah, I'm kind of curious what motivated them to. I
did see some report one of the some of the
background literature that I was provided that some other juror
brought it to the court's attention, But I don't know.
Presumably somebody had to check this out and investigate it.
Why they were doing so is an interesting question. And

(10:46):
although the judges have a great deal of discreestion and
these type of things, once you got a juror, kind
of the jurors is fat and it's going to be
difficult to just kind of throw people off for less
than compelling evidence.

Speaker 2 (11:03):
Yeah, and I even heard some rumblings before we came
to air that there's conversation in chatter about another juror
that might be up for a conversation. So we'll be
looking into that and tracking that tomorrow because from a
strategy perspective, that doesn't benefit anybody, does it. It just
slows the process and could just stump the process, right,

(11:23):
how many alternatives?

Speaker 5 (11:25):
Yeah, I saw some report of that and if that's true,
that apparently one of the jurors, and I'm not sure
how they found this out, may be self reported.

Speaker 4 (11:33):
This is True Crime tonight on iHeartRadio. I'm Courtney here
with Body Movin and Stephanie Leidecker and we will be
continuing this right after the break on True Crime tonight.

Speaker 2 (11:57):
So Courtney, where would you like to begin? And all
things Karen Reid other than me eating crow that I
was mistaken.

Speaker 4 (12:05):
Well, Jurors started and finished their first day of deliberations
in the retrial of Karen Reid, so they had started
on Friday but only got about two hours before they
were sent home from the weekend, and deliberations will continue tomorrow.
For anyone not aware, Karen reads accused of hitting her
boyfriend John O'Keefe, a Boston police officer, with her SUV

(12:26):
and the defense obviously is saying that is incorrect and
there is a cover up. But today the deliberations began. Specifically,
it was nine oh one am and it wrapped out
at four to twenty four. During that time, the defense
filed a motion to amend the verdict slip. So what
it said was that the existing slip has quote a
real potential to confuse the jury and cause errors. And

(12:50):
it was focused on count two, which is the drunk
driving manslaughter chorge. So for reference in the first trial
was the that was the charge that they could not
agree upon. The slip indicated that jurors can find her
not guilty of the charge and a series of included
included lesser offenses, or they can find her individually guilty

(13:12):
of three less serious crimes ranging from involuntary manslaughter to
drunken driving. This has been denied by Judge Cononi, so
it will maintain, you know, it will be status quo.

Speaker 2 (13:23):
And I'm so conducent. Happens the problem in the first
trial too.

Speaker 4 (13:29):
Well, I think that's exactly right. I mean, it did
come down not understanding the charges. But luckily we have
Thomas Bell, who is still with us season from a
defense attorney so hopefully you can help shed some light
on what goes on in deliberations and what about these
these jury slips, the verdict the jury slips.

Speaker 5 (13:50):
I wish I could provide a lot more insight into
jury deliberations, but of course that's one of the unique
things about the American system is usually that secret. And
and I wish I could tell you a lot more
about what happens inside the jury the deliberation room, but
I simply can't offer a whole lot of meaningful help
on that. I can say this jury instruction issue, in

(14:12):
vertict form issue is very fascinating. Presumably the judge has
provided the jury jury instructions that kind of track the
law on lesser included offenses, but somewhere along the line
the verdict that I presume the defense wants to make
the verdict form consistent with the jury instructions, so that is,

(14:32):
the jury goes down the list. For example, if they
reject the most serious charge and can't conclude beyond a
reasonable doubt that she was guilty of the most serious charge,
they moved down a notch to each lesser charge and
then work their way down to whatever they feel the
evidence supports. Or they can't aren't convinced that she committed

(14:55):
any crime beyond a reasonable without finder not guilty. Now,
I think, if I understanding this correctly, the defense wants
at each stage of the process an opportunity for the
jury to find her not guilty, which, from what little
I understand about the appellate process from the first case,
would preclude them from retrying her on the most serious

(15:16):
if they if they get down the list a little bit,
either get hung again or can't reach a decision, but
they found her implicitly or explicitly not guilty of the
most serious charges, that would prevent a retrial on those
for double jeopardy.

Speaker 2 (15:31):
Of course, of course I follow it a little bit better. Now,
Can I ask a quick question just before we get
too lost in the sauce, just for the layman in
the room, which is me, the dummy of the group.
So basically, if I'm in there, if i'm you know,
thank goodness, I'm not a juror, and I'm feeling confused
and not sure what my answer is, which, by the way,
I feel very conflicted over this case. And I start

(15:53):
at the top for the most serious charge, everybody either
agrees disagrees guilty not guilty. If that is found, say,
for example, not guilty, that just gets removed and then
we move to the next lower charge, right, And is
that just the process of elimination.

Speaker 5 (16:09):
Well, typically, yeah, that's how the jury instructions typically were. Now,
for example, if they work their way down, and some
times it's not unheard of that jurors will compromise. Well,
you know, I'm not going to find her guilty of
the most serious charge. I might find her guilty of
one of these lessers, and you know, whether theoretically they're
supposed to or not, the jurors will kind of reach

(16:30):
what's called a compromise verdict. But the kind of real
danger of that is you're supposed to have a unanimous
verdict of whatever it might be. And so theoretically, and
what little I kind of read is an anticipation of
this interview here. The first trial, they just declared a
mistrial on everything, and so the defense has been arguing

(16:53):
that since the jury seemed to be inclined to acquit
her of the most serious charges, they shouldn't be able
to retry her on that. Right, that's right, verdict form
will essentially if that were to happen again, provide an
opportunity for them to argue that the judge made a
mistake on appeal if she gets convicted, and help clarify
some of these Wesser included charge issues be the essence

(17:15):
of the case from what little I understand it.

Speaker 3 (17:17):
Right, I know, I think you, I think you have
it right now with the verdict slip though, doesn't the
judge Thomas, doesn't the judge pull the jury and say
is this your true verdict? So like he, like the judge,
she'll clarify with the jury, like this is what you
It's called the jury.

Speaker 2 (17:34):
Pull, right, all right?

Speaker 5 (17:35):
The pull the jury after after the verdict to make
each individual joy.

Speaker 3 (17:39):
So even if the jury makes a mistake, the jury
could be like, no, that's not what I meant right.

Speaker 2 (17:44):
Correct but in the last original trial, and correct me
if I'm wrong. I think in the first trial. Part
of the issue was, according to the defense, is that
Karen Reid was actually found not guilty in two of
the three charges, the main ones. But they they didn't
but they didn't specify that in this, like said slip.
The way they're organizing it perhaps now as a record

(18:06):
in a road map because honestly, after the fact, you know,
the defense attorney was like, we trying her again. Jurors
after the fact came forward and said that they had
come to an agreement and most charges so but because
it wasn't formally on the record, I think that got lost. Wow. God,
that makes much more sense to me. It's very unnerving

(18:28):
though that that is it could be so one.

Speaker 5 (18:31):
Way they can handle that is essentially what they did
in the Weinstein trial last week was where they take compartial,
they take the verdicts. They took the not guilty and
the guilty, and they had a hung jury on the
third count. Theoretically preserves that I don't know why they
didn't do that the first time. I don't really know
enough about this interating. And I will add this though,
is when they typically they would have a jury instruction

(18:52):
conference where the verdict form would be discussed. And I
don't know why. Maybe this wasn't addressed at the Presumably
I guess somebody figured out that they wanted to kind
of try to make sure this was clean and address
this with a judge today to preserve it for appeal
if they need to. But that that seems to be

(19:13):
what's happening here from my best view.

Speaker 2 (19:15):
Can you imagine though, if you're on trial for your
life and then you find out because jurors leak after
the fact that they felt as though within the jury
deliberations many big charges were agreed upon, but that was
never messaged right or wrong. A that probably shouldn't be
public information because that's painful, that's tough stuff.

Speaker 3 (19:34):
I just feel like the Commonwealth needs to get their
act together, Like if this verdict slipped is so confusing
the second time around? Like how many cases this Commonwealth
doing this the Like why is it so confusing?

Speaker 2 (19:46):
It's confusing and we're paying such close attention. Imagine if
the odds are stacked against you and you don't have
a great lawyer because you can't afford one, and you're
being well roaded, God forbid, and you don't have press right.

Speaker 4 (19:56):
Yeah, how often do defense teams use these sort of
last minute motions?

Speaker 5 (20:00):
And it's hard to characterize them as a last minute
motion other than if you don't do it by the
end of the trial, it's kind of too late and
you've most appellate courts will consider that you've waive the argument.
And I think there's probably a misconception that defense attorneys
do what's sometimes characterized as sandbagging it, kind of saving

(20:22):
issues on appeal and dropping these last minute issues on
the judges and hopes that they'll gain some practical advantage.
I can tell you that's almost never true. Yeah, because
one judges don't like it and react very poorly to
these kind of last minute motions, and two appellate courts
will almost never grant relief on these type of things
if they perceive that the defense attorneys were kind of

(20:45):
intentionally doing it that way. It's more likely a matter
of they just wanted to make sure that the verdict
forms were consistent with the jury instructions, who avoid exactly
what they said, And I suspect the judge just felt that,
you know, for whatever reason, they didn't want to revisit
this issue.

Speaker 2 (21:02):
The attorneys seem pretty good as a defense attorney. You know,
I'm curious if if you've been playing along, her defense
team has done a pretty smash up job at least
making it confusing enough that I'm confused, and you know,
I've changed my mind about her guilt or innocence thirty times.
I thought they would have a verdict today, it would
be so black and white. The fact that it isn't.

(21:23):
That's also a bit of a tell.

Speaker 5 (21:25):
I've always resisted the opportunity to play Tower commentator because
it's a very difficult job. And yeah, lose lose a
lot easier to talk about it from the outside than
it is to be there. But what from little I've
seen of this, they seem to have done an excellent job. Yeah,
and I can say, if there's that much confusion about it,
what little portions of the trial I watched, isn't that

(21:45):
really what reasonable doubt's about to begin with?

Speaker 2 (21:47):
Correct alternate theories, right, reasonable doubt? That really is the
name of the game. And yeah, you've given us such
great insight. Thank you. Yeah, I no, really, Thomas, thank you.

Speaker 3 (21:57):
Like with this verdict, thing has been you know, all
the or on the internet the last couple of days,
and I think you've provided us some much needed clarification.
So coming up next on True Crime tonight, we're going
to be filling you in on a new development in
the Brian Coburger case, and later a deep dive into
the piped and massacre. Are you not familiar with case?

Speaker 2 (22:14):
We got the experts like literally with us, so stick
with us True Crime tonight. We have some talkbacks to
get to, but before that, make sure you stay with
us because we still got to get to a lot
of ditty updates. And also the dad still on the

(22:34):
loose who took the lives of his three kids has
not been found yet, so we want to share some
new developments in that case as well. Let's go to
the first talkback.

Speaker 7 (22:42):
Hey, y'all, Indy here from Oakland, California. I have a
question about Christina Korum. It's been said that she is
not going to testify in the Ditty chial even though
her name keeps being brought up over and over and
over and over and over again. That is Diddy's right
hand man or woman, as one would say, Why is
she going to testify? And if she doesn't testify, is
she going to be tried next after Diddy?

Speaker 2 (23:04):
What's gonna happen? You got to know such a good question, Indy,
because we've been tracking this for a while and you're
right KK. Christina, who is his chief of staff, a
former exec at bad Boy Records now is his chief
of staff. She's a big piece of this operation. She
gets likened to Gilain Maxwell. If you know Diddy and

(23:27):
Jeffrey Epstein were alike, she would be the air, quotes
Gilaye Maxwell again allegedly, allegedly. Allegedly, She claims complete innocence
to this and that she had no knowledge. However, we
are seeing in Silver lawsuits in these most recent developments,
including just on Friday, that her name is being brought
into it with knowledge of the freak offs of like

(23:48):
cameras arranging it, maybe arranging monies and payment for certain activities.
And you know, it's hard to say that you weren't
aware of this type of violent behavior if you were
also a part of the cover up. Again, she claims
no allegations, but if we're looking at racketeering as the
main charge, she would be a big piece of that equation.

(24:08):
So it's such a great question. Why is she not testifying? Frankly,
I thought she was working for the FEDS.

Speaker 6 (24:13):
I wondered.

Speaker 3 (24:14):
I kind of wonder because like, is it possible, like
Indy said, is she getting convicted or you know, charges next,
because she wouldn't testify for.

Speaker 2 (24:23):
Immunity exactly exactly.

Speaker 3 (24:25):
That's kind of what I was thinking, Like, well, maybe
she's she was offered you know, immunity to testify, and
she was like no, And so now if she's going
to be charged with something, of course I'm not going
to bring her on as a witness, right.

Speaker 2 (24:37):
And where does her loyalty lie and to what end?
And then do you think your life is in jeopardy
if you go against Ditty? Even just based on what
we've seen, She's been accused by many of the Ditty
accusers and said victims to have been really a piece
of the puzzle. And Cassie Ventura included that's Ditty's longtime
X and we've seen how he treated her. So you know, look,

(24:58):
is there a universe where she's also a victim and
is a dead woman if she dares go goes against him?
Because she knows where all of the air quotes's bodies
are buried, Not quite literally, but you know what I mean,
where the secrets are and what the truth is? Or
is she you know?

Speaker 3 (25:13):
I mean, I just can't monster reason why she wouldn't
be summoned the celebrities. Where are all the people that
are supposed to be wrapped up in this courtney?

Speaker 2 (25:22):
You have a question, Go ahead.

Speaker 4 (25:23):
I do, And I'm not reporting that these are the
same cases, but in Jeffrey Epstein, I'm not remembering if
his number two in charge Maxwell Gilaine Maxwell.

Speaker 2 (25:35):
Yes, she's referred to.

Speaker 4 (25:37):
Yes. So did she testify for Epstein? No?

Speaker 2 (25:42):
Is this something currently serving her sentence behind bars because
she was also tried as someone who was brought into
this you know human You know, I don't know her
exact charges. I don't want to get them incorrect, but
you know she has always been accused of being Epstein's
second hand or his rumor if you will. They also
dated for many many years and after his death, whether

(26:05):
that was by suicide or he was murdered, you know,
highly debated. I have no skin in that game. She
is now serving time. And remember the main accuser recently
took her own life, Virginia Dufrey. You know, may she
rest in peace. And you know it was a very
troubling circumstances for everybody around that case. She seems to
be the last one standing behind bars. But well, he

(26:27):
never gotten those records.

Speaker 3 (26:29):
Where are all the Epstein meccord me to your point too,
Like the reason she didn't testify at his trial is
because he died before it happened.

Speaker 2 (26:38):
The trait he'd never went to trial, right.

Speaker 4 (26:40):
Of course, that's right. Thank you for jogging my memory.

Speaker 3 (26:42):
No, it's totally fine, Like it's dude, it was years ago.
How could we ever, you can't remember everything? But yeah, no,
that's why. So this is like the first example now
that we have of this kind of operation, you know,
being played out in court.

Speaker 2 (26:55):
Exactly so interesting. We don't know.

Speaker 3 (26:57):
I mean, we're only a guessing that she's not being
called because she might be getting her own charges.

Speaker 2 (27:03):
Isn't that able? And the loyalty running deep in her
denying all claims until the bitter ends, you know. So
there does seem to be some coad you know, also
d Rock the bodyguard or security, is also somebody who's
you know, being brought into this who was again a
close ally at the bare minimum. Is it possible that
you could know a person one way and have them

(27:24):
also be completely another way? To so many you certainly.

Speaker 4 (27:29):
Have seen that of time and time again. I feel
like we are talking talkbacks. This one was on p Diddy.
We have a couple of more. Give us a call
at eighty to eight through one crime. We want to
hear your thoughts. It can be Karen Reid or any
other crime on your mind. We look forward to hearing
from you. And with that, I think let's go to
another talkback. Hi, It's Cynthia from Canada calling. I'm just

(27:52):
wondering why the.

Speaker 3 (27:53):
Police officer destroyed their phone.

Speaker 2 (27:56):
It would have been police issued at least that's the
case in Canada.

Speaker 1 (28:00):
So why wouldn't they have just went in and had.

Speaker 3 (28:02):
Their phone number changed, had there some card changed and
problem solved?

Speaker 2 (28:07):
That phone being destroyed is so like what the heck?

Speaker 3 (28:12):
Right?

Speaker 4 (28:12):
Like it was amazing to see.

Speaker 3 (28:14):
The ATF agent, Right, Brian Higgins, He basically drove right
to a military base and disposed of this phone, like destroyed.

Speaker 2 (28:24):
It in the middle of the night after he turned
up dead on the bottom of the street and he
was flirty texting with the now woman accused for that death.

Speaker 4 (28:33):
And he testified about this, right, he testified about this.
And he also so he had it destroyed, as you said,
at a military base, and he did so without consulting
anyone or without receiving a written cancelation of the preservation
order for his phone. So he should not have done that.
That was a very bad thing he did.

Speaker 2 (28:54):
Why would you do that? Like we have what is
any explanation for that that would make sense?

Speaker 4 (28:59):
Nothing that would make sense to me. And defense attorney
questioned Higgins about the process, and he said, you know, quote,
then you drove to a military base and you threw
both the destroyed SIM card and the phone into the dumpster,
didn't you. Yeah, he believes he put that destroyed SIM card.
So we did those two things. And furthermore, he did

(29:19):
not transfer anything from his old phone to his new phone.
Who allows you that? Nobody does? That includes photos, videos,
and oh, by the way, possible text messages with members
of the Albert family who owned the home in front
of which John O'Keeffe died.

Speaker 2 (29:35):
Not to mention. Many times on the stand this came
up too, where they were like, nobody texted anybody, and
they were like, uh, that was a pocket dial and
when the whole house was pocket dialing each other, how
is that even possible? Like that is you know, just
downright suspicious. Who has the wherewithal the time and the
energy at that hour in a blizzard to even pull
some of this stuff off? Like what's the motivation at

(29:56):
that point?

Speaker 3 (29:57):
That is such a good question. The talk back in
I wish I knew the rationality behind this, but it's
s us, right, like this is just super sus and
it's not.

Speaker 2 (30:06):
It doesn't look good for the state. And that's just
my opinion.

Speaker 3 (30:09):
And you guys know how I feel like about Karen
Reid and whatnot, and I will, I will, you know,
agree though, that this just looks really bad and I
just it's upsetting. But I have a Brian Coberger update
that I kind of wanted to talk about. So, you know,
we kind of wrestled with us, right, we sure did
about whether to bring this up, and I think we're

(30:30):
just going to you know, be as transparent as possible
and just let everybody know that this is something that
we're actually struggling with talking about, yeah, because we can't
verify it, right, and it seems pretty credible through what
we have verified, but you know, since we can't really
verify it, we're just going to touch on it briefly,
let everybody know that we do know about it, and

(30:52):
then once we can verify it, bring out the full information.

Speaker 2 (30:55):
Right. But what's being said.

Speaker 3 (30:58):
Is that the edged DoorDash driver was arrested back in
September well for a d y okay and when she
was in the interrogation room, basically sobering up. She was
telling the intake officer a story about her life, and

(31:18):
one of the things she said was, and now I
have to testify at the college kid's murder trial because
I'm the DoorDash driver and I saw Brian. So that's
that's what's happened. We don't know the authenticity of it.
We don't really we don't know if she's telling the truth,
you know what I mean, Like, there's no way to
verify that she's truly the DoorDash driver because this is

(31:41):
a really closely guarded secret of who this DoorDash driver
is by the prosecution and defense. And listen, this isn't
like big news because her identity has been so closely guarded,
everybody kind of already figured she probably saw him, right,
like we've all thought that. But now that it's possibly
being confirmed, you know, allegedly, allegedly allegedly, and the reason

(32:03):
that we struggle bringing it up is obviously number one,
week we can't verify it. Number two, you know, does
this is this another brick in the wall of evidence
that Brian Coperger might need a delay?

Speaker 2 (32:15):
Exactly right? And you know what's to what end? You know,
are we just all just putting out information that could
interrupt an investigation or impact a trial? Is it our business?

Speaker 7 (32:25):
You know?

Speaker 2 (32:26):
So we were struggling with the share, but it's circulating everywhere.
So we would also be remiss not to you know,
be a sage and acknowledge it. But you know, alongside
other media outlets, we're all doing an epic deep dive
and we'll keep you posted.

Speaker 5 (32:41):
Right.

Speaker 4 (32:42):
Yeah, this case has really it has had more than
its fair share of leaks and people unknown to unknown
I think, to everyone who are breaking their gag orders.

Speaker 3 (32:52):
And I mean left and right, and then you know,
and then the book is coming out, right, this book
is coming out eleven days before the trial in which
he you know, alleges to have talked to grand jury
members and like, I mean, it's all just too much,
like we're breaking all kinds of laws. Basically, you know,
it's a grand jury member talking to an author like.

Speaker 4 (33:13):
That, No bueno. But listen, we want to hear your
thoughts on tonight's cases. Give us a call. We're at
eighty today, three to one crime. We can talk about Diddy,
we can talk about Karen read anything crime related on
your mind.

Speaker 2 (33:25):
I know you have an updating story that you're going
to share with us.

Speaker 4 (33:27):
Now I do, and I don't know there is such
a proliferation of sex trafficking making the headlines. But I digress.
This case is about that luxury real estate sky ons,
the Alexander brother or scions Alon Orin who are twins
and tall. Those are the three brothers. They're facing a

(33:47):
federal charge, federal charges including sex trafficking and conspiracy. And
this is in connection with exploiting women and minors for
commercial sex. The indictment, yeah, it's bad. The indictment alleges
that the brothers used forced they used fraud, they used coercion,
all of that to lure victims across state lines. And

(34:11):
Tal and Alan are also charged with trafficking a minor.
If convicted, these guys could face decades in prison. And
they're really high profile, these trio of real estate agents.
They have prominent prolific figures in the luxury real estate industry,
including Kim Kardashian. Oh, Kanye West is brought up again tonight.

Speaker 2 (34:33):
He took himself out the big leagues and Steve Madden
and actually two of the brothers were featured in Forbes
thirty Under thirty for real Estate a couple of years ago. Ohow,
and where is this taking place?

Speaker 4 (34:47):
This is I believe it's Miami. It's in Florida. I
believe it's in Miami. And listen, these guys, if they're convicted,
they could face a maximum sentence of life in prison.

Speaker 3 (34:59):
So is something the story kind of reminds me of
the Tate brothers. Are you guys familiar with Andrew Tate?

Speaker 2 (35:05):
Not so so much? Do tell? It's similar.

Speaker 3 (35:08):
So they're US citizens, but they took up space in
Romania for a little while because they're also like they're
like dual citizen. I don't really know for sure, but
they're like dual citizens. And they were arrested in Romania
for the same charges. And like Andrew Tate is like
one of those like alpha male kind of guys that's like,
this is what you need to do to women to

(35:29):
be a man. Yeah, And he talks about his basically
his cam girls and how he manipulates them to have
sex with him.

Speaker 6 (35:38):
What.

Speaker 3 (35:38):
Yeah, And so he was arrested in Romania and he
got in he was going to be sent to the
United States, I believe and Trump parted.

Speaker 2 (35:45):
Him or something.

Speaker 3 (35:46):
But now but now they're being transferred to Britain England
to face charges there. It's similar, it's it's like very
similar to this is all alleged by the way, but yeah,
it kind of reminds me the Tape Brothers a little bit,
like the whole racket, you know, the whole racket, the
sex trafficking, you know, the business everything.

Speaker 2 (36:07):
It kind of reminds me of that.

Speaker 3 (36:08):
It's something you should look into. The Tape Brothers, it's all.
It's a it's a big thing on the internet.

Speaker 2 (36:12):
In this case too. You know, if they're looking to
traffic young girls, is the assertion here that there's also
sex workers involved? Or are they like partying out and
playing on South Beach and drugging women? You know, these
are horrifying allegations.

Speaker 4 (36:28):
Well it was commercial sex, so I think that is
prostitution right.

Speaker 2 (36:31):
Oh, well, more on this to come. We'll be following
that closely. We have more talk facks come in your way.
We're excited to hear from you true crime tonight. We
talk true crime all the time, So lots of headlines

(36:53):
to continue to unpack in the coming days as well.
Courtney Armstrong take it away.

Speaker 4 (36:59):
Well, unfortun Actually, the manhunt for Travis Decker still rages on.
Travis Decker is the man. He's a former Army and
National Guard veteran, and he's accused of murdering his three
young daughters, all under ten in Washington State. So, as
of right now, because we have been keeping tabs on
this manhunt, the County Sheriff's office posted on Facebook quote,

(37:24):
deputies remain on watch for Travis Decker, so it is
very much still ongoing, and the deputies and the regional
Tactical Response Team members are still active. They're in the
border area of our country, so it's kind of between
where we meet Canada and near us the last believe
location of the suspected murder Travis Decker.

Speaker 2 (37:48):
And it's worth noting that he was suffering allegedly from
mental illness and required medication. Was said to have gone
into the wilderness after taking the lives of his kids,
barefoot or with flip flops on, unprepared, despite the fact
that he does have you know, outdoors survival training, et cetera.

(38:08):
So there's no happy ending to this.

Speaker 3 (38:11):
My friend, my friend Tina was mentioning something today She
was saying something like maybe he got into a car,
you know, and I think that's something that's a possibility.
I have total faith in the US Marshals. I mean,
these guys are professional, and this is what they do.
They hunt people, right, I mean, this is what they do.
I have absolute confidence that the US Marshals are going

(38:32):
to apprehend him.

Speaker 2 (38:33):
I really do. I don't think he's going to be
able to sneak into Canada. I just don't. I don't either,
especially disheveled, et cetera. And again, like this mom, his
ex wife and the mom of these three girls. You know,
she feels as though he just had a snap. His
brain just must have collapsed on itself, and you know,
again he needs help.

Speaker 4 (38:54):
Yeah, Decker's wife, she did mention that it was borderline
personality disorder and that he was unmedicated. So that is
serious stuff. It's serious stuff. It's a it's a bad combination.
And this has been going on for seventeen days. Seventeen days,
that's right.

Speaker 2 (39:10):
Oh my gosh, yep, what does he what I mean,
do we think he's still alive?

Speaker 4 (39:16):
Well? I do. It's funny. I was speaking with someone
else and they said kind of off the cuff, it'll
be hard to find him if he's dead, And I said, no,
I don't think it will actually, because he's being tracked
and you know, with dogs and all of the resources.

Speaker 2 (39:31):
So it's very dense though. That's that kind of pretty hard.
And by the way, if he's medically not well and
you come to your senses and you realize what has happened, and.

Speaker 3 (39:43):
Am I understanding too, like you know with drones, because
that's how they're they're utilizing a lot of technology to
try to find him. And like with drones, if the
canopy is so dense, the drone can't like really penetrate
like you know, like heat detection and whatnot. CA don't
really penetrate that canopy. And this is a really rural area, right,

(40:04):
This is like a beautiful foresty kind of areas. There's
a lot of canopy that I don't think the drone
right like penetrate.

Speaker 2 (40:12):
Right.

Speaker 4 (40:13):
No, it's a really really tough situation. And there has
also there's been some blood found on his truck. So
the truck was found located and there was human male
blood which has been not id'd by DNA results, and
there was also non human blood. Decker's husky mixed dog

(40:35):
was also found. He was found close to these poor
young victims, and for what it's worth, he was taken
into the Humane society.

Speaker 2 (40:46):
So it's important we'll just keep so there's no belief
that it's the dog's blood, right like it No, maybe
it was like a rabbit, like maybe he'd made dinner
or something, you know, like something like that.

Speaker 4 (40:57):
Exactly. It's the wild cness, you know, it could be anything.
But listen, body, I think you have some other headline
to fill us in on.

Speaker 2 (41:04):
I do.

Speaker 3 (41:05):
This is involving the shooter, the killer who killed the
lawmakers in Minnesota over the weekend.

Speaker 2 (41:13):
How tragic is this? Right?

Speaker 3 (41:15):
Well, today in Saint Paul, acting US attorney Joseph Thompson
great last name by the way, described Vance Butler's actions
as the stuff of nightmares as he laid out the
case against him in his first federal court appearance. So
he's being tried in federal court. Butler is accused. I
don't not say, am I saying that?

Speaker 2 (41:32):
Right? Butler?

Speaker 3 (41:33):
It's b o l At Butler. I thought it was Bolter,
Oh Bolter, Yeah, that makes more sense, Boulder. That's how
that's how I have heard it, that makes more sense. Yeah,
Bolter is being accused of basically assassination right of Democratic
state Representative Melissa Hortman and her husband Mark in the
attempted assassination of state Senator John Hoffman and his wife Yvette.

(41:55):
Boltler is facing federal charges including stalking and firearms charges
in state charges including first degree murder. He was arrested yesterday,
So he was apprehended basically last night while we were
on air, Right, that was like breaking for us. And
he was like in a field kind of near his farm,
and he had like a like a vest on. He

(42:17):
was fully closed. He looked fairly clean, which I thought
was interesting, Like I think he would be like a
lot more dirty if he was like running around the fields.

Speaker 2 (42:25):
But okay, and again it was a major manhunt. He
was so close to home. That seems so strange, right.

Speaker 3 (42:33):
So he it was reported very early on that he
left a manifesto, right, and of course, me with my
manifesto hyperfixation was.

Speaker 2 (42:41):
Like, oh, what's this about.

Speaker 3 (42:43):
While we learned today that the manifesto is not anything
like a Ted Kaczynski style manifesto or anything like that.
So while disappointing for me. It's probably good for the
prosecution that this didn't happen, but allegedly it. Brian Enton
actually tweeted pictures of a couple pictures of the man
off quote unquote manifesto, and it's like two side by

(43:04):
side pictures of a notebook. This is all they know
so far, okay, of a notebook, And it was like,
you know, ben verified spocheo. If you can't find them there,
look at you know, home ownership records, look up the
county assessor's office. He's basically writing down how he's going
to find these you know, victims, these politicians addresses, and

(43:26):
he's just like documenting it like you know, true people
search dot com and Spochio dot com and like websites
that you look you could type people's names and to
find out where they live. So apparently he had a
list of forty five elected officials.

Speaker 2 (43:41):
In these notebooks.

Speaker 3 (43:42):
It's the names included were Governor Tim Waltz, Senator Amy Klobashar,
and Representative Elon Omar.

Speaker 2 (43:51):
It's really unfathomable no matter what your politics are, this,
oh yeah, you can't be hunting lawmakers period anybody. And yeah,
it goes without saying I mean he yeah, right, like,
thank you for the clarity, no hunting anybody, but it
is really horrifying here you are, you're a public figure,
You're putting yourself out there, and you're that easily findable.

Speaker 4 (44:13):
Right, it seems from what I've heard, and I know
this is still unfolding, but as of right now, it
does seem like he was working alone. I had I
had read or seen I forget a text that he
had sent that Bolter had sent to his childhood best friend.

Speaker 3 (44:34):
I saw that and text, Yeah, he had like a
group text too, and it really he tried to make
clear that he was acting alone from what I understand, No,
you're right, And he also sent a text to a
family group chat after the shootings. This is interesting that
said dad went to war tonight. I don't want to

(44:56):
say more because I don't want to implicate anybody. And
that was a very similar text that he sent to
his friend that you were mentioning Courtney.

Speaker 4 (45:04):
That's right, I don't want to implicate I.

Speaker 2 (45:06):
Don't want to implicate you, is what he said to
his childhood Thanks for putting that in a text and
implicating me, just by virtue of this text chain. I mean,
this is an indication of a lot of mental illness.
I would have to tell him as well, and I
would agree it's such a again, so senseless.

Speaker 3 (45:22):
So he allegedly stalked his victims, by the way so
and took notes. So what I'm taking from that is
that in this quote unquote manifesto, which really I think
is just a notebook of his notes. You know, it's
not really a manifesto, I don't think, but that's what
they're calling it. I'm guessing they have evidence of him,

(45:44):
you know, like came home from work at five thirty,
brought in groceries, you know, went grocery shopping on Sunday
at seven. You know, things like movements of his victims.
He was stalking these people, which is horrifying.

Speaker 2 (45:57):
There's nothing more horrifying. And again just a reminder people,
information is out there, real to He's so careful and
you know that this is never going to be the answer.
What a miserable ending for everyone. Horrible, Like chiavious, he
was trying not to get caught. He was in a costume,
he was dressed as a you know, law enforcement. He
was wearing that weird latex face. Oh, that was terribly

(46:17):
scary to see you on the ring camera. So this
was very thought out and thought through. I mean to
say that you think you're at war. No, no, this
is a war in your head. Right.

Speaker 3 (46:27):
So he he has children of his own too, He
has he has a father of five who worked for
decades in the food industry and also at funeral homes.
And there's a there's a video. I don't know if
you guys have seen any of him giving a sermon
over in Africa and the Congo. He went over to
the Congo and like gave a sermon and he was
doing something over there. And in fact, court and you

(46:49):
mentioned the interview with his childhood friend, and in that
interview he talks his friend talks about that trip that
he went over to Africa and was getting everything set
up over there. He was, you know, very religious, and
he was apparently anti abortion and was again this is
all alleged, you know, this is being reported on New

(47:11):
York Times allegedly very very anti abortion. And it's possible
that he was targeting lawmakers that were, you know, pro
choice when in fighting for pro choice laws in the country.

Speaker 4 (47:24):
You know, Stephanie earlier you had asked, is it possible
this was regarding Diddy, but is it possible that you
see someone one way and then they're totally different in
another way? And you know this is an indication of yes.
I mean this man who obviously was stalking and planning assassinations.

(47:44):
Not only was he a father of five, but he
was a businessman. He worked decades in the food industry.
He worked at funeral homes so many times, many sides
to all of us. But listen, we are going to
be talking about the piked In massacre, which is an
unimaginable story about a family. It's for Wagners who allegedly,
although so we can take that off, killed a family

(48:07):
of eight, the Rodents.

Speaker 2 (48:08):
We wanted to sort of do a little bit of
a deep dive into the recent updates in Pie County
the piked In massacre. If you've not heard of this
case or the podcast, it's really this case in Pie County, Ohio.
That is something that we've been following very very closely.
We've done many seasons of the podcast. And essentially eight
family members of the Rodent Gilly families were killed by

(48:31):
a neighboring family and that family is named the Wagners,
and they were accused of murdering essentially their best friends.
And we followed that from the very beginning. Three of
the four have already been sentenced and now we're waiting
on the final trial of Dad and there's been lots
of delays. It's been delayed now again and court you

(48:52):
had some new developments for us.

Speaker 4 (48:54):
Yeah. So just last week the prosecution appealed the removal
of the death penalty. And this is ahead of the
last trial that Stephanie just mentioned. That's for the father
in the Wagner family, Billy. So the death penalty was
removed from the case by the judge last November. He
was concerned that continuing the capital litigation was causing so

(49:15):
many trial delays, which, as you guys know, I mean
we've talked I think even here about how much death
penalty cases.

Speaker 2 (49:22):
Yeah, now imagine four of them.

Speaker 3 (49:24):
There's so much more bout right, There's so much more
that goes into those cases, right, I mean, a life
is on the line, they have to take it.

Speaker 2 (49:31):
I mean all I think all trial murder trials are.

Speaker 3 (49:33):
Taken seriously, but when you're going to be basically taking
someone's life, there's a lot more that goes into it,
and special attorneys have to be defending you, you know.

Speaker 2 (49:42):
So it's a it's a bigger it's a bigger process
and really unique to this particular case, and it's magnitude. Again,
it's one of the largest investigations in Ohio history. You know.
They allegedly killed eight different people at four different locations.
They planned it, They plotted it. That's mom, dad, older brother,

(50:03):
younger brother. So four people together had little murder meetings
allegedly that mom was in charge of holding. And this
went on for months and months and months. And the
dad on the killer side and dad on the living side,
they were best friends victim side, youngest daughter son on
the accused killer side, they had a child together, and

(50:25):
a lot of this was because of custody and they
were all very, very very close. So Courtney and I
have been tracking this since the very beginning when the
murders happened. And really unique to this is not only
did this family of four get arrested together and is
charged with conspiring together like an enterprise to murder eight people.

(50:46):
Mom took a plea deal, youngest son took a plea deal,
and in that plea deal, they took the death sentence
stipulations off of the remaining two.

Speaker 3 (50:56):
Right, because the death penalty will be used often to
base clean, negotiate right, correct, correct, right.

Speaker 4 (51:03):
But in this case, what's so terrible is, as Stephanie said,
the plea deal came with that removal. But now that
the judge has just said, hey, this is just going
too slow, and for the fourth and final trial, or
I guess only two have gone to trial because two
pled for the last trial, Billy Wagner, We're just going
to take it off. But then part of removing the
death sentence was the two who pled out mom and

(51:27):
younger son, they had to agree to testify against the
remaining two. It was quote to the satisfaction of the prosecution,
which is what it was like.

Speaker 3 (51:38):
That was, we don't know that, and we don't know
what the satisfaction of the prosecution means, do we.

Speaker 4 (51:45):
Well, it seems like it was testify reasonably. And I'm
only guessing that because in George Wagner, the other older
son who actually seemed to have the least skin in
the game out of everyone, because he was not the
person who fathered the child that Stephanie mentioned where the
custody issue happens, but mom and brother testified against him.

(52:09):
Stephanie and I were at his trial in Ohio. You
guys went, mm hmmm, oh okay, but really that testimony
was I mean, Stephanie, I don't know if you agree,
but I think it was one hundred percent the lynch
pin of the case that the prosecution set out.

Speaker 2 (52:24):
Yeah, and it's like, not only is it life and
death stuff, but like, here you are, you're testifying against
your only brother, the person you love in all the world,
and you're testifying against him and sealing his fate, or
your mom and you're testifying against your own son so
you can get a plea deal and be off in
thirty years, that really happened. And now there's a fourth
trial of Dad, and everybody's story agrees on one thing.

(52:48):
Dad was there. Like there's so many versions of testimony
to who was doing what in this particular case, but
in all scenarios, Dad was there and potentially a trigger
puller all scenarios. So some always said, why are we
even having this trial? Everybody else has either pled or
have been found guilty. It's a waste of resources. Now

(53:08):
it sings like there it might even be an alternate ending.
And now there's a peal appeal appeal. So not to
get too lost in you know, the sauce. It's definitely
an interesting case when it comes to four people being
tried for the same thing. How does each plea or
trial affect the other? So listen, you guys promised me
a manifesto. What's the deal. Well, it's funny enough. Courtney

(53:31):
and I were at that event that we met you
at in Crime Con and we were doing we were
actually doing a panel about the piked in massacre the podcast,
along with Joseph Scott Morgan who was with us last night,
discussing the forensics, and they had a big crowd and
it was, you know, lots of important questions being asked
by the people who attended. And then afterward they were

(53:51):
doing a little like signing and stuff, and this gentleman
comes up to Courtney and I and is like, look,
I work at the prison that the accused j Wagner,
who had taken a plea deal to get the remaining
death sentences off the table for his family. He's also
the one that had the kid with the so he's
like a main guy he's like the main character here.

(54:12):
He according to this prison guard, he is writing a manifesto.
He's going he's losing his vision. So he's in prison
and apparently is writing in very small print, front and back,
front and back paper. And you know, he said to
us a manifesto, and Courtney and I looked at each
other and I was like, I don't know what a manifesto?
What does that mean? What exactly does that mean? And

(54:33):
we want to know more about what's happening in the
manifesto because anything he has said on the stand has
been incredibly unsatisfying. And we'll talk more about that at
a later date. So the manifesto is still to come,
and we've tried to get it and so far, no luck.
Are you in communication with him. We have definitely reached
out to all of them many many times, and no,

(54:54):
we are not in communication. And there was some like
chatter about interviews and things, and we're not paying for
any of them.

Speaker 3 (55:01):
And I don't blame you. You know, it's not in
the cards for us. Refresh my memory. I listened. I
drove to Reno one time. It's like it's like a
nine hour drive. I drove there and back eighteen hours
and I listened to the entire piked in Masacre the
entire time I was driving.

Speaker 2 (55:15):
It was so good.

Speaker 3 (55:16):
Fifty I forget, I forget did this this k this murder?
It all happened at like the same time, right, Like
it was coordinated, Is that right?

Speaker 4 (55:24):
It happened yet it was in the course of one
faithful night. And this was in April, the night of
April twenty first and to the morning of the twenty second,
back in twenty sixteen. And it was over four different locations.

Speaker 3 (55:39):
So they were all in four different places, correct, that's right,
And it was it was all family members, so right.

Speaker 4 (55:46):
The victims as they were as they were found by
police was it's a little complicated, but to stick with
for just a second. But in one home was Chris Rodin.
He's the patriarch of the Rodent family. And he was
found with his really close cousin Gary, who would often
stay with him, okay, or they were found by a relative.

(56:09):
That relative called nine one one then went pretty much
next door. It was on the same property and there
found the son of Chris Rodin, Frankie Rodin, twenty years old,
prime of his life, sleeping with his beautiful fiancee. Yeah,
Hannah Gilly and they two they were found second, so

(56:30):
then that's four and their three year old child was
left as well as their six month old child. They
were left unharm oh okay. Then in the third home
was the matriarch, Dana Rodin, who was found with her
sixteen year old son, Chris Junior. And then also Hannah

(56:52):
May Rodin, who is the I mean girl woman. She
was nineteen years old that Stephanie mentioned earlier, and she
is the victim who shared custody. She's the child the right, Okay,
that's correct, and she was found with her. She had
a four day old baby.

Speaker 2 (57:09):
Stop.

Speaker 4 (57:10):
That baby was left unharmed. So that is the third house.

Speaker 2 (57:14):
Armed left for a day, left for dead brother nursing.
Sorry everybody trigger alert by the way, but allegedly done
by her own father.

Speaker 4 (57:25):
Yeah, really despicable and that I mean, yeah, there are
many that's hard details and we saw, you know, some
of this on the stand as people were testifying about it,
so it's all on the record. And then the fourth
and final home was Kenneth Roden, who was patriarch Chris
Rodin's brother, and he was found further down the road.

(57:46):
But those first three clumpings of homes were all close.
The Rodents were a really tight knit family. They just
loved each other and were real assets to everyone.

Speaker 3 (57:58):
And they all die, Like was it was it with
hours of each other? Like did they split like the
four I'm asking so many stupid questions. I'm sorry, was
it all split? Like did all four of the suspects
or the people that did this? Did they all go
to their separate ways and do it at the same time?
Great so that nobody could be.

Speaker 2 (58:14):
Called or allegedly not, but that was a theory at
one point. And they did take phones, moms stayed at
home or on this we just scratched in the surface.
That's right.

Speaker 3 (58:25):
Stick around because next we have more on the Piked
and Masker. Good because I got a lot of questions
and it's missing Person Monday and we need your help
to crack the case.

Speaker 2 (58:33):
And don't forget to call us.

Speaker 3 (58:34):
At eight eight eight thirty one Crime with your thoughts
on the Piked and Masker or any of Tonight's stories.
Really keep it here True Crime Tonight.

Speaker 2 (58:51):
So we're talking about the Piked in massacre. We did
the podcast We Meet the Doc and this case is
still unfolding, and we've gotten a few listeners who have
asked us to cover it, and it's a long one
to cover. So if you're just hearing about this case,
we're giving such a brief overview that it might be
a lot to track. So I promise we'll we'll bring

(59:14):
more of that because it's a deep, a deep case,
but if you do know it, we also want to
make sure you're getting the most recent developments as well.

Speaker 4 (59:21):
So Courtney, Yeah, So the one thing I did leave
out in terms of the most recent is that the father,
the accused father, Billy Wagner, he is slated to be
back in court on June twenty seventh, and we'll see
what the judge has to stay about moving forward and
when and where this trial will happen. There's a lot

(59:42):
to dig into with that. There's many, many complications, and
the judge has really trying not to be biased, but
it sure seems like he is against the prosecution from
all really well the stipulation, for example, when he had
pulled off what's definitely mentioned of the agreement that the
state made and saying okay, death penalty is off. You

(01:00:05):
just have to testify well, if he's now saying it's
just going to be off the table, period, then in
this moment, it's unclear to me, Stephanie, you may know,
it's unclear to me if Mom Angela accused, Mom and
son Jake Wagner both admitted murderers, if they have to
testify at all, and if that's the case, there is
a very little forensic evidence in this.

Speaker 8 (01:00:28):
Case, oh against him, I guess my dad specifically, that's
rather than and I think it's worth mentioning in this
case too, there's very little forensics evidence, which is pretty shocking,
giving that it was for people going house to house
hunting people that they knew so well, and they knew
their comings and goings.

Speaker 2 (01:00:45):
These were friends, right, These were people. We've seen photographs
of them all super chummy, you know, arm in arm,
hanging out at each other's weddings, et cetera. So we're
talking super tight. Now that this sentencing is getting all,
you know, pushed all over the place, have to remember
this was a crazy overkill. The people who did this
to the Rodent and Gilly families is such a monster

(01:01:08):
beyond words. Now times that by four Mom is saying, hey,
I wasn't even there. Sure I planned it, but you know, listen,
I knew they were gonna go out and kill that night,
but I wasn't there, And in fact, I took a
sleeping pill and went to bed, even though I knew
full well that my sons and my husband were going
to go murder eight people in one night. She takes
a plea deal, she'll be out in thirty years potentially.

(01:01:29):
Then the youngest one who's at the center of it,
who had the most skin in the game, and by
his own admission, says he killed five of the eight victims.
He killed himself and likely his beloved, the mother of
his child. Allegedly he took her life and left this
child to nurse on it its dead mother on his watch. Sorry,

(01:01:52):
trigger alert, but that's just to share the gravity that
we're talking about right now. So you mean to tell
me the woman that decided that that shit happen is
going to get out in thirty years, that's insane. Well,
what about him?

Speaker 4 (01:02:05):
It's Karen Reid.

Speaker 2 (01:02:06):
We're talking about this one. It had eight people murdered
on her murder meeting in the city. It's like insane.

Speaker 3 (01:02:13):
Well, Jacob Wagner has it taken off away from him too,
and he was like the one, like you said, the
most skin in the game and repositioned Mom.

Speaker 2 (01:02:20):
Yeah, right, like he was expected. He was like surprised himself.
It looked like Courtney correct me if I'm wrong when
we watched the hearing. I don't think he was expecting
to get out of prison anytime soon, nor did it
appear that he was even complaining about it. He was like, yeah,
I'm doing the good things behind bars, you know. He
found God all the things, obviously, and it seemed as
though the judge made the decision game time to sort

(01:02:42):
of well, we'll see maybe he should get parole.

Speaker 4 (01:02:44):
Why yes, because this judge, and this is on his records,
the death penalty, he doesn't think it should be personalms
his personal opinion and also overly long. You know, life
with no parole does tend to drive with this judge.

Speaker 2 (01:03:01):
Either, despite the fact that he has a admitted to
it on records, had also testified to it at his
brother's trial, put his own brother behind bars based on
this testimony, and Mom is getting a cakewalk, gig who
and how do you make it to five of them? Yes,
by his own admission, which only leaves three left. Which

(01:03:22):
now everybody kind of points to Dad allegedly, allegedly that's
the trial that's still to come. Dad is like, yes,
sign me up. Seems like everyone's lost their minds up
in here. I should just start asking for all kinds
of crazy stuff. So yeah, sure enough, it all works.
There's a trial delay. They're trying to get a change
of venue. YadA, YadA, YadA, YadA YadA. Eight people. How
could this be that complicated? Right? And I would imagine

(01:03:44):
they still have to testify, We don't think so, I
mean that into that right now. That was the agreement,
which appears the judges, now the new judge has maybe
overruled on that.

Speaker 4 (01:03:54):
That's what the whole issue is exactly. So if that,
you know, the agreement was Okay, we'll take the death
penalty if well, huh huh, judge shook it off. So
there is no if it's crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:04:05):
So first they were looking to change the venue, which
is really a difficult thing because in this you know community,
this was an incredible, incredible loss you know, by the community,
you know, eight people. You could imagine everybody in the
town knows somebody connected to this case. Quite literally, So
if they're going to move the venue, that just means
the people that are working really hard every single day

(01:04:27):
in Pie County can't attend the trials and be there
for their you know, standing up for their families who
can't speak for themselves because their lives were taken by
these animals by their own admission, or they had to
take off of work and you know it's not easy
to do that and slep an hour and a half
to another courthouse. So like, that's unfortunate. That's being appealed

(01:04:47):
real time. And then if mom and youngest son Jake
Wagner are not compelled to testify against Dad, is that fair,
Like they should have to face their peers. Yes, and
the family members, like, you don't get to just pick
a new venue and not have to face the Rodent
and Gilly families. Ida I, because that's probably what their

(01:05:07):
biggest fear is about going to court, is they have
to look people in the eyes who they've lied to
to nauseum. They even went to the funerals, the boys,
the gentleman of the family, the killer accused killer Dad
obviously his trial hasn't happened yet. And then George Wagner
or oldest brother. He was found guilty, sentenced to life.
And then Jake, the youngest one at the center of it,

(01:05:27):
he took this, you know, forcoctapleviial. They went to the funerals. Unbelievable.

Speaker 4 (01:05:33):
Yeah, one thing I wanted to clarify because it's so important, Stephanie.
You touched on the murder meetings. So these were actually
and this is all court record. Angela, the mom we
were talking about who homeschooled the two sons. She literally
would have, you know, meetings at the kitchen table, and
she was tracking several of the victims via social media

(01:05:57):
and other and it was plotting and planning the wins
and the way. And not only steph you mentioned, oh
mom wasn't there, but was aware of it and masterminded
so much so that she literally bought her son's shoes
to wear that night, like she was setting them off
to summer camp.

Speaker 2 (01:06:13):
Yeah. No, Like you know how hard that is, Like,
you know, you get school shoes for yourself when you
start school, remember those days. Imagine as a mother, you're
doing that for your sons, your adult sons, so that
they could go murder people. Even if you were such
a sicko that that was even on the menu of
something to do. Why would you put your boys in
that position. It's like such a double sicko thing. It's

(01:06:34):
unbelievable to me. So she just went to sleep. She's
like Manson, she just like put the idea together and
then let them all go do her dirty work and
have to, you know, face the consequences. The youngest son,
you know, as we mentioned earlier, is the one allegedly
writing this manifesto. Who cares, I guess is at its lead.
These are people who did very depraved things and the

(01:06:54):
community was really shook and it's a really loving place
and they're just trying to rebuild now again all of
the he's like trials getting pushed and trials getting pushed
and delay, delay, delay, it's like a little bit of
a joke on the system, like jokes on who the
family gets nobody back. They really get the trials ripped
away from them. So it's even harder to attend. It's

(01:07:15):
very hard to keep up with if you're not, you know,
full time paying attention to these trials. If you're a
family member, How did they do it?

Speaker 4 (01:07:22):
Yeah, there's so much this case. We will absolutely be
talking more and in depth. But right now, body, you
have something very important tell us about you.

Speaker 3 (01:07:32):
Yes, person, I'm talking about a missing person. His name
is Jeremy Jordaine and he is He went missing in
twenty sixteen on Halloween night and he was last seen
at a Halloween party in bemy Gd.

Speaker 2 (01:07:46):
I don't know how to pronounce that.

Speaker 3 (01:07:48):
That is a mouthful Minnesota, yep, around min Okay, this
is kind of strange. Around midnight, he unexpectedly stood up
and said he didn't want to be there anymore, and
he took off running from the house. He just stood
up and said, I don't want to be here anymore,
and just took off running. Police dogs last tract is
sent to the middle of the street near an apartment
complex and he hasn't been seen since.

Speaker 2 (01:08:07):
Now, it's important to know.

Speaker 3 (01:08:10):
That you know Jeremy is described he's being kind of
like a goofy kid who was nice and funny. He
was like really close to his nieces and nephews. He
loved playing basketball. They've received the police investigators have received
hundreds of leads and they've searched by air, water and
land to find him, and there's been no sign of him.
Since July of twenty twenty four, Jeremy has appeared on

(01:08:32):
billboards across Minnesota, and it's important to know that if
you wanted, if you wanted to read about Jeremy, you
can go to the Department of the Interior for the
Bureau of Indian Affairs, because he is a missing and
murdered Indigenous person.

Speaker 2 (01:08:46):
And you know, when you know, we.

Speaker 3 (01:08:48):
Have talked about missing and murdered in America here, and
you know, there are usually cases that unfortunately the media
doesn't really grasp onto and give any attention to. So
we want to kind of talk about that and bring
light to those cases, you know, shed some light on
these cases. He would now be about twenty six years
old at the time of his disappearance. He's very tall.

(01:09:10):
I mean, he's going to stand out. He's six' five
around seventy five, pounds so he's very. Lanky he has
brown hair and brown. Eyes he Is Native american and
a part of The Minnesota chippewea Tribe Leech Lake, band
so that tribe is looking for, him and you, know
hopefully this get out. THERE i really want people to
search his. Name his last name is spelled g O

(01:09:32):
U r d AI. N and his first name Is, jeremy.

Speaker 4 (01:09:36):
And he and his family could use all the help
you can.

Speaker 2 (01:09:38):
GIVE i feel like we don't even scratch the surface
half the. Time we have more anymore to still get To,
Tomorrow Karen, reid there might be a. Verdict there might
be a verdict. Tomorrow body is shaking her. Head, No,
courtney do you think tomorrow was too?

Speaker 4 (01:09:51):
SOON i MEAN i was shrugging my. Shoulders, WELL i
tell you WHAT i do. NOW i know YESTERDAY i
said there would be One monday. Today, yeah so both
of us are wrong For grat's. Body, however now that
it hasn't been NOW i think it could potentially extend
long because if everyone didn't go in with their minds
made up to, unpack unravel and untangle everything it's at

(01:10:15):
the prosecution. Defense it's a. Lot SO i think NOW
i think it'll go.

Speaker 2 (01:10:19):
On oh it's so confusing because if you're waiting for someone's,
fate and you, know we were just talking about the
Piked in, murders and you, know maybe that's why we're
also infuriated by This Karen reid, conversation because you, know
again In Pie county mom who put together a plan
to murder eight. People she's going to get off in thirty.
Years And Karen reid with this crazy botched investigation From Nowhere's.

(01:10:44):
Land you, know she could be looking at. Life so it's,
SENTENCING i guess is so, interesting. Right SO i don't
envy the. JURORS i think they have a really tough
job ahead of, them AND i guess you've just got
to hope that they can be as thoughtful without the training, wheels,
right because some of this stuff is a little in the.
Weeds so if they're going through, now which you, KNOW
i would assume they would have, to and you would

(01:11:05):
want them to to go through all the different pieces
of evidence and going back in, time and and and
and is it hard to do that if their gut
isn't one way or the. Other it's, tough, right we
have a talk back About Karen. Reid let's see what
kind of what can of? Worms this.

Speaker 4 (01:11:21):
Opens, hey it's every From New.

Speaker 6 (01:11:22):
York i'm loving your podcast AND i have not missed
an episode Of True grime. TONIGHT i am so curious
what's going on with the deliberations for The karen. Retrial
if each of you are on the, Jury what evidence
or witnesses would you be focusing. ON i don't wait
to hear.

Speaker 2 (01:11:38):
No, no a whole episode. Tomorrow this is a whole
on as a guest. Tomorrow, yeah that's the that's a
good question about dropping a. Bomb oh my.

Speaker 4 (01:11:48):
God all right Now i'm going to study up for.
TOMORROW i want to give a really good.

Speaker 2 (01:11:53):
Answer that's that's a really good. Question, actually it is
an excellent it's a really good. QUESTION i think It's
Brian higgins and We proctor back on the. Stands it's the.
Phone let's just. Jump It's john's. Phone, JOHN i Want
proctor on the stands for.

Speaker 4 (01:12:06):
Me it's the woman who changed her testimony and changed
it to oh mistaken. Memory that and the fact that
there are no medical kisses on either.

Speaker 2 (01:12:15):
Side you can't use trial. One you. Can't you can
only use trial two to base this.

Speaker 4 (01:12:20):
On, yes just like just like a, DRE i am
speaking Just i'm LIKE i am A jurt, now but,
no speaking from only what has occurred in This she
was Testified Kelly dever. EXTENSIVELY i watched the whole, thing and, no.

Speaker 2 (01:12:38):
WILD i don't even know Why i'm here Because i'll
tell you, why because your boss may have been part
of a big cover, up and you kind of alluded
to that in the first, trial and now all of
a suddenly forget all of. It she was, LIKE i
plead the fifth or LIKE i don't even know that's
a option for, you, Woman but, yeah that was like
just more embarrassing than it was potentially. Worth you, know

(01:13:00):
even if there was no cover, up she sure made
it look. Shady that's exactly.

Speaker 4 (01:13:04):
Right so all, right we'll dig in more.

Speaker 2 (01:13:07):
Tomorrow, NO i really want to dig into that, question
because make sure you send us some talkbacks for tomorrow
or leave us message eight eight eight three one crime
or hit us up on our socials At True Crime
tonight's show on TikTok And, instagram or At True Crime
tonight On. Facebook and, tomorrow the trials, continue our friends
continue to talk About Karen, Reid we're talking about The dad.

(01:13:30):
Case we're also going to be unpacking the latest developments
in The Travis decker. Case and, yes we want to
hear from, you so join us back. Tomorrow we'll be
here live for two Hours True Crime, tonight Talking true
crime all the. Time