July 22, 2025 • 45 mins
In this gripping episode, my son, Sam shares a chilling true story from his past—one that shook us all. What started as a normal friendship turned into something straight out of a crime thriller when one member of his friend group was arrested by the FBI for trying to hire a hitman on the dark web. We talk about how it all unfolded, the red flags Sam noticed in hindsight, and why listening to your intuition could be life-saving. This is a story about shock, fear, and ultimately, wisdom gained.
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xoxo,
Rianne
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
SPEAKER_02 (00:00):
Hello, and welcome back to All Is Not Lost podcast.
I'm your host, psychic medium,Rhiann Maldonado.
Did you know that 19 millionAmericans listen to true crime
stories every week?
While this podcast isn'tnecessarily a true crime
podcast, today we have a truecrime story for you.
(00:24):
I'm back in the studio todaywith my son, Sam, and he is
going to tell us an amazingly,shockingly true crime story of
something that happened to himand his friends.
And we will put a link to theactual news story because you
(00:45):
are not going to believe it.
So welcome and join me todaylistening to our very own
personal true crime story righthere on All Is Not Lost podcast.
SPEAKER_00 (00:57):
Spirit, does it stay?
does it go?
SPEAKER_02 (01:00):
The fact is, spirit does survive death.
Our loved ones are all aroundus.
Love survives.
Spirit survives.
All is not lost.
SPEAKER_00 (01:15):
Welcome to the All Is Not Lost Podcast.
Here's your host, psychic andevidential medium, Rian
Maldonado.
SPEAKER_02 (01:26):
Hi, Sam.
Welcome back to All Is Not Lostpodcast.
SPEAKER_05 (01:29):
Hi, thanks for having me again.
SPEAKER_02 (01:31):
I am so glad you're here.
I absolutely love hosting withyou and wish we could do it all
the time.
I think we would never run outof things to talk about.
So what makes today's episodespecial is normally we talk
about paranormal and spiritualand things like that.
We don't ever really touch ontrue crime, even though I am a
(01:52):
True Crime Junkie.
(02:21):
When you came home and told mewhat had been going on, it was
an utter shock.
So why don't you tell ourlisteners today your true crime
story?
SPEAKER_05 (02:35):
Wow.
So this has been prettyincredible.
I truly didn't think anythinglike this would ever happen in
my life.
Yeah, no joke.
And while the story itself isvery interesting, from my
perspective, the crazy part isthe buildup.
and the way in which you don'tknow what someone's capable of
or the people you associate with
SPEAKER_02 (02:56):
until
SPEAKER_05 (02:56):
it's too late.
SPEAKER_02 (02:57):
And how you should treat people because you never
know.
You
SPEAKER_05 (03:00):
never know.
And I think I have learned somelife lessons in this situation.
So I'm excited to share ittoday.
So...
It's a difficult story to justbegin because there's a lot of
moving parts.
SPEAKER_02 (03:14):
Right.
So you probably have to startwith the relationship, how this
person even came into your lifebecause of your multiple layers
of friends.
SPEAKER_05 (03:20):
So throughout my life, we've moved around a lot.
And I went to my last two yearsof high school in Spokane,
Washington.
You heard a little bit aboutthat in our last episode.
And from that, I left with twobest friends, my friends Alex
and Wyatt.
And we moved down to Californiaand then later back to Tucson.
(03:41):
And that's where I live now.
And through that whole time, Istill kept in touch with my
friends, Alex and Wyatt.
They went on kind of their ownpaths.
Alex went to college in Montanaand Wyatt went to college in
Washington.
Well, during his time, Wyattmade a group of friends at his
college.
And After they had graduated afew years later, they were still
(04:04):
chatting online.
And I was invited to join theirgroup, this group of friends.
So it was two friends I knew andsome people I'd never met
before.
SPEAKER_02 (04:11):
In your online chat
SPEAKER_05 (04:13):
group.
In an online group throughDiscord.
So in this online group, we allplayed video games.
We played Dungeons and Dragonsonline and these other things.
And we just kind of played gamesand hung out.
We're kind of nerdy friends.
And...
I think that it was really nicein the way that people move
around.
But now we have these tools to,you know, still be able to
(04:33):
participate with friends fromfar away.
SPEAKER_02 (04:35):
Yeah.
And stay in contact and stay ineach other's lives.
SPEAKER_05 (04:38):
And I felt that as opposed to maybe something like
social media, this was nicebecause we would schedule times
and be able to actually do likeactivities together.
Like we had these weekly gamenights.
Well, I quickly became friendswith some of the other people in
the group.
Um, funnily enough, One of them,his name is Daz, is now my
brother-in-law.
(04:58):
That's a whole nother story, butI ended up marrying his sister.
So in a way, this group actuallychanged my life in a couple
SPEAKER_01 (05:04):
ways.
SPEAKER_05 (05:06):
But at the time, most of them were pretty nice
guys and we quickly becamefriends.
And it came out that we'deventually want to like meet up
in person.
And that was because I hadgotten to know these people
pretty well, but I'm going to goback.
SPEAKER_02 (05:24):
Okay.
I want to know if he's in the
SPEAKER_05 (05:25):
group already.
So the only thing was there wasone guy in the group that I
didn't like.
SPEAKER_02 (05:32):
There always is.
SPEAKER_05 (05:32):
Everyone was nice, but there's this guy named
Scott.
And over the years that wetalked, because it was, it was a
couple of years that we talkedbefore we ever got together.
I always felt, like I was maybebeing a little mean in that
Scott was very socially awkwardand sometimes a little rude.
(05:54):
And I felt that I wondered whyhe kind of continued to be in
the friends group.
And I felt that even when hewould say something that wasn't
very nice, everyone would kindof give him a pass.
And I didn't know what theirrelationships were before I had
come in at the end.
So I also didn't really feellike I could say anything
SPEAKER_04 (06:15):
I
SPEAKER_05 (06:15):
just kind of assumed well you know maybe it's a
little weird and they try to benice to him and keep him around
so he also kind of seemed likehe started the online group like
he had the permissions indiscord to manage the group or
something and so I also feltlike oh maybe he's like a
(06:37):
founding friend of this group
SPEAKER_02 (06:39):
so you can't kick him out of his own group
SPEAKER_05 (06:41):
yeah so Honestly, I think it was just that Scott was
just honestly kind of not a, nota very fun person to be around,
but not like the worst you'veever seen.
And I didn't talk to him verypersonally.
We were on like the voice chat alot.
So there's a lot of times we'reall talking via voice and I
(07:01):
would talk to some of the otherguys, but I never like had a
conversation with Scottdirectly.
No, not once.
I, I, I had nothing to say tohim, but, um, We continue like
this, and I'm only gettingcontext clues about Scott.
Like, who is he?
What's his background?
I never asked anyone directlybecause it didn't really matter.
(07:22):
But I got a couple things.
One was he would always say thathe had assets.
And I was a little unsure whatthis meant.
I mean, we were four...
five years out of high school,it seems strange to me that
someone would talk about allthese mysterious assets they
have and how if they traded themin or something, they didn't
(07:45):
have enough money to buy a houseor whatever.
SPEAKER_03 (07:48):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (07:49):
Sometimes my friends, my mom knows this,
they're always competing forlike everything and especially
how much money they have.
So I kind of wrote it off that,you know, maybe he's just
bragging about something he has.
The other aspect I hear about isthat he wants this relationship
with some girl.
(08:09):
I really don't learn much aboutit other than he still is
interested in some girl whoseems to be ignoring him.
Was
SPEAKER_02 (08:19):
she like at his college?
SPEAKER_05 (08:20):
I don't know.
You don't know anything abouther.
At this time, I want to say Idon't know anything about
SPEAKER_02 (08:25):
her.
But he's saying these things,alluding to this girl, not like
you're hearing it from yourother friends.
SPEAKER_05 (08:30):
I'd only heard that them talk to him.
Like sometimes he would bringthis up or say something related
and they would go like Scott,like, Oh, you need to let it go.
Oh,
SPEAKER_03 (08:39):
okay.
SPEAKER_05 (08:41):
That's all I hear.
SPEAKER_03 (08:42):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (08:43):
And again, I'm like, okay, so he's got some personal
business.
I don't know.
And everyone was still prettynice to her.
Like, but they, it happened afew times of them telling him to
like, stop worrying about this.
SPEAKER_01 (08:54):
Interesting.
SPEAKER_05 (08:55):
And so at that point I'm like, I just don't like him,
but I don't think there's likeanything crazy.
So they organized this gettogether.
And I, maybe it's funny in, interms of our like modern life to
like meet people you've metonline in person, but my friend
Wyatt was going, who has been alongtime friend of mine.
(09:16):
And
SPEAKER_02 (09:17):
Wyatt knew Scott in person.
SPEAKER_05 (09:18):
And Wyatt knew all of these people from college and
he'd known them in person foryears.
They now live in differentplaces, but he'd known them for
years.
four plus years.
Okay.
I felt like in some way, they'renot total strangers.
They're not like someone we'veonly heard their voice.
Now they're going to show up.
SPEAKER_02 (09:34):
Right.
SPEAKER_05 (09:35):
Everyone
SPEAKER_02 (09:35):
here, you're being catfished.
SPEAKER_05 (09:36):
Yeah.
Every single person had hung outin person many times, except for
me with them.
SPEAKER_03 (09:41):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (09:41):
So I felt like I was just joining a group of people
who knew each other and I knewone of them.
And that felt you know, prettyreasonable.
And so one of the guys, his nameis Talon, his family owned a
house on the coast in WashingtonState in kind of a remote area.
And also because this waswintertime, the town was empty.
SPEAKER_02 (10:05):
It was
SPEAKER_05 (10:06):
just a complete off season for this little resort
town where some, there's a lotof Airbnbs and a lot of fancy
homes built right up on thesekind of sand dunes that lead up
to the ocean.
SPEAKER_03 (10:17):
And
SPEAKER_05 (10:19):
they say, oh, this winter, no one's using this
family house.
We're going to have this gettogether.
And I was really excited.
I, because I live in Arizona, Ididn't have any friends like
here at the time.
And so I really had spent a longtime since I'd seen another
friend in person.
And I
SPEAKER_02 (10:36):
love cold weather.
SPEAKER_05 (10:37):
And I loved cold weather.
It's going to get to go to theocean in Washington in the
winter.
This sounded really fun.
SPEAKER_04 (10:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (10:43):
And I become good friends with a lot of these
guys.
So we head up there and I meet.
My friend Talon at the airportin Portland, he lived on the
Washington side.
Portland's on the border.
He lived on the Washington side,but he picked me up in that
airport and a couple others.
And there was like another groupcoming from a different part of
the state and we're all going todrive out there.
(11:04):
And we drive in and we'regetting set up in this cabin.
SPEAKER_02 (11:10):
So there's like six or eight guys?
SPEAKER_05 (11:12):
So if I remember correctly, it's myself, Wyatt,
Talon, Jared, Scott, Daz, andthen Daz's friend, Daniel.
SPEAKER_02 (11:22):
So
SPEAKER_05 (11:23):
seven guys total, including myself.
And so they pick up some food ata grocery store, and there's one
grocery store quite a ways away,and there's one restaurant, and
we ate in the restaurant.
I still have a commemorative cupwe got.
We're having a really good time.
We're excited we're here forthis trip.
But Scott is there, and I feelbad.
(11:46):
Very judgy saying it.
But when I saw him, he did looklike kind of an interesting
person.
He had kind of a scraggly beard.
He was a little strange.
Socially awkward.
Socially awkward.
Again, I'm not going to be theperson to treat him differently.
I was never mean.
SPEAKER_02 (12:03):
But you got a vibe.
SPEAKER_05 (12:04):
But I got a vibe.
You
SPEAKER_02 (12:05):
got to trust those.
SPEAKER_05 (12:07):
He was even stranger seeing him in person than just
his voice.
And I feel like...
later when you see the mugshot,you'll understand what I'm
talking about.
So we get to the house andeverything, and we're setting up
for the first evening.
And people are playing games.
(12:28):
Some of my friends like to drinktoo much, and they're doing
that.
I don't drink.
But they're all kind of doingtheir things.
Scott disappears.
SPEAKER_02 (12:36):
Oh.
SPEAKER_05 (12:36):
For hours.
SPEAKER_02 (12:37):
Oh.
Outside?
Inside?
SPEAKER_05 (12:39):
I'll get to that.
So the way the house is built isthere's a living room, a
kitchen, and several bedrooms onthe first floor.
And then there's like adownstairs area that has just a
few more bedrooms and a smallliving room and a bathroom.
Well, he walks up from thedownstairs in the evening and he
goes, sorry, I was just coughingup blood.
SPEAKER_04 (13:02):
Okay.
And
SPEAKER_05 (13:03):
I was like, What does that even mean?
After being gone for hours.
How do you just casually mentionsomething that would be serious
and...
You might need help.
You might need help.
Okay.
And you've been gone and thenyou just reappear.
Okay, odd.
Okay, odd, right?
Everything that goes on with himis just a little strange.
(13:27):
And he continues to be kind ofawkward and I think...
Some of the people got a littleannoyed with him.
And then.
SPEAKER_02 (13:33):
Just more comments like this.
Just
SPEAKER_05 (13:35):
more weird comments.
SPEAKER_02 (13:36):
Trying to get people to engage.
And
SPEAKER_05 (13:37):
he often would sometimes pick a fight.
And even in some of the games,like with Alex or Daz, would
just kind of do something todisrupt what someone else was
doing.
SPEAKER_01 (13:46):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (13:47):
And my friends can sometimes get in little
squabbles, right?
So to put it lightly.
And so it's just things likethat, but nothing crazy.
SPEAKER_02 (13:56):
So he was like an attention seeker.
SPEAKER_05 (13:58):
Yeah, it just caused a little bit of a problem with
everything.
Well, then the next day, I getup, and some of my friends,
despite staying up into theearly hours of the night, are up
early.
SPEAKER_02 (14:12):
Remind me, weren't you sharing living space with
him?
Like, were you sleeping?
SPEAKER_05 (14:15):
I was sleeping in a bedroom with Wyatt, and he was
sleeping downstairs far away.
SPEAKER_02 (14:20):
Okay, so you weren't sleeping anywhere near Scott.
I wasn't
SPEAKER_05 (14:22):
sleeping anywhere near Scott.
And so we're getting up, and...
two of my friends, Talon andJared are already making
breakfast.
And I was like, oh, you know,thank you so much.
And I'm fixing my plate andwe're joking around.
And then Scott comes in and thenTalon goes, oh, Scott, I'm so
(14:43):
sorry.
Like, I forgot you're Jewish andwe got pork sausage.
I'm really sorry.
Do you want us to run to thestore?
We could get a differentprotein.
Cause they only had like sausageand eggs.
And I think they were reallyjust trying to be nice and
accommodating to him.
And I'm telling you, this islike the thing that comes into
play later.
He just looks at him dead in theeye and Scott goes like, well,
(15:08):
if I tell myself it's not pork,then there's nothing wrong.
SPEAKER_01 (15:12):
Oh my God.
SPEAKER_05 (15:13):
And he just fixes a
SPEAKER_01 (15:14):
plate.
SPEAKER_05 (15:16):
He's like, as long as he, in a way, I think he
elaborates, he's like, as longas I can make myself believe
that what I'm doing isn't wrong,it's not wrong.
SPEAKER_02 (15:24):
Yeah.
since I know the story, that'sterrifying.
SPEAKER_05 (15:28):
Exactly.
SPEAKER_02 (15:29):
Oh my God.
But I don't remember hearingthat part.
At
SPEAKER_05 (15:32):
the time, I think everyone thought that that was
strange, but again, you go,well, people can make their own
life choices.
It was about eating sausage.
And for most of us, that's not ataboo.
SPEAKER_02 (15:43):
And maybe coming, maybe he wasn't a super
practicing Jew and was okay withit.
We don't know.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (15:48):
So I think everyone could pass it off, but I've
talked to my friends andeveryone thought, that even if
they thought maybe he wasn'tsuper religious, it's a weird
kind of comment to make in theway he made it.
So we continue with the entiretrip.
And to be honest, while he canbe a little weird, nothing crazy
happens otherwise.
(16:10):
We kind of have a fun time andwe wrap up and we drive back to
the airport and I go home.
SPEAKER_02 (16:16):
There were just more of those comments throughout
though, right?
Because I think I remember youtelling me when you came home or
during the trip that it, It wasawkward.
There were a lot of awkward
SPEAKER_05 (16:24):
times.
I guess what I'm saying is hecontinued to be awkward.
He continued to be a littleconfrontational.
But that's how he always is.
SPEAKER_02 (16:31):
It wasn't out of the ordinary.
It was just whatever.
SPEAKER_05 (16:35):
I just went home and said I had a fun time with
everyone.
But as usual, like Scott justkind of made things a little
unfun sometimes.
Okay.
And I, you know, that was it.
But we were going to take a tripto California.
Shortly after I got back fromWashington, I remember knowing
that I had two kind ofback-to-back trips.
(16:56):
So we left for California when Igot back, and then we were
driving home to Arizona a coupledays later.
And we're driving home throughthe middle of the desert where
cell reception is spotty.
And I
SPEAKER_02 (17:08):
get a message.
Oh, my God, I remember this.
SPEAKER_05 (17:11):
My friend Talyn says, everybody, like, be on a
call tonight at whatever time, 8p.m.
I
SPEAKER_02 (17:17):
remember that.
SPEAKER_05 (17:18):
Like...
Just be there.
SPEAKER_02 (17:21):
And your mind went crazy.
Like, what
SPEAKER_05 (17:23):
could this be?
I feel that, you know, yourfriends can write things or
whatever, but for someone to belike, no, you must.
Everyone knows that theirschedules are going to be wild
and people are going to havedifferent things.
So just say, like, you must behere.
Figure it out.
was very strange.
And yeah, I had all thesetheories.
I could not figure
SPEAKER_02 (17:42):
out.
I think we talked about it thewhole way home.
SPEAKER_05 (17:44):
We talked about it, yeah, for hours.
But my cell phone died.
Or the cell service went out.
So I was like, well, I'm notgoing to make it.
I will ask them tomorrow whathappened.
SPEAKER_02 (17:53):
So we didn't make it home in time?
SPEAKER_05 (17:55):
No, we didn't make it home in time.
We clearly weren't going to.
So we speculated, but I kind ofwrote it off.
Well, I wake up the nextmorning.
The entire Discord group isgone.
Delete it.
And there's a new one withalmost nothing posted.
Discord saves everything that'sever been, so it kind of builds
(18:16):
over time.
There's nothing there now.
And I'm like, so what's goingon?
I message.
Well, I don't remember exactlywho I talked to.
I remembered better in the past.
SPEAKER_02 (18:28):
Yeah, I think it was Alex.
SPEAKER_05 (18:29):
But ultimately, I received news that Scott has
been arrested.
UNKNOWN (18:36):
Oh, my God.
SPEAKER_05 (18:37):
And slowly this story starts to unfold and it's
crazy.
So I get the news that Scott'sbeen arrested.
And I remember in myconversations, I did talk to Daz
as well, who in a way wasclosest with Scott.
SPEAKER_01 (18:53):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (18:54):
Scott's dad called Daz.
That's right.
And this is what initiatedeverybody kind of knowing the
situation.
Scott's dad calls Daz and isvery cryptic.
And asks him or says that Scottis in trouble and asks if he
will write like a letter.
Like a character letter.
A character letter.
But he doesn't call it that.
He's very vague.
SPEAKER_04 (19:15):
Scott
SPEAKER_05 (19:15):
says very vague.
So Daz is a little confused.
But Scott was his friend and Dazfelt like he maybe should do it.
So he begins.
I don't remember exactly whathappened, but Daz gets another
call from the dad.
And this time he elaboratesfurther that Scott, you know,
Scott's in trouble.
jail and they need thischaracter witness and all this
(19:38):
stuff.
And so I think everyone starteddoing some more research.
And when they
SPEAKER_02 (19:45):
found...
Because Daz was probably worriedabout writing a letter, not
knowing what the crime was.
SPEAKER_05 (19:49):
Yes.
So Daz kind of tells some of theother guys and they start doing
some investigating on their own.
Well, he's just not sure what todo.
It was very weird to talk to theguy's dad.
He's never...
talked to his dad before.
It's really strange that he getsa phone call.
SPEAKER_01 (20:04):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (20:05):
Well, they find like the indictment and it's insane.
So it was from the FBI because
SPEAKER_02 (20:12):
it was a federal case.
Federal case.
SPEAKER_05 (20:15):
And ultimately, like, here's what happened.
So just a few months prior tothe event.
SPEAKER_02 (20:23):
To you sharing.
SPEAKER_05 (20:24):
To us going
SPEAKER_02 (20:25):
into this.
Cabin.
SPEAKER_05 (20:26):
Cabin.
SPEAKER_02 (20:27):
With a murderer.
I'm
SPEAKER_05 (20:29):
going to back up a little bit.
SPEAKER_02 (20:31):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (20:31):
So it was sometime earlier, maybe a year or more
earlier, he met a girl onlinethrough a Facebook page for some
anime.
SPEAKER_01 (20:41):
Oh, boy.
SPEAKER_05 (20:42):
They're anime Facebook moderators.
SPEAKER_02 (20:44):
Oh.
SPEAKER_05 (20:44):
As you can already know.
Yeah.
This is already...
SPEAKER_02 (20:46):
Make some assumptions.
SPEAKER_05 (20:49):
Yeah.
And...
They quickly form a relationshipand she agrees to come visit him
in California.
I don't remember where she'sfrom, but some other state.
SPEAKER_02 (21:00):
So he's living in California.
SPEAKER_05 (21:02):
So I'll give the context.
He lives in Beverly Hills.
His parents are quite wealthy.
He lives in Beverly Hills,California.
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (21:11):
And this is all public record, so we're not
giving away anything.
You could read this
SPEAKER_05 (21:14):
in the FBI statement.
SPEAKER_02 (21:15):
We'll link to some of that.
SPEAKER_05 (21:18):
So she agrees to come visit him in California.
And it doesn't go well.
So initially my friends knewthat she came out to visit him.
She ended up going home earlyand then didn't want to talk to
him after that.
So I know in their mind, theydidn't know exactly what
happened.
And obviously he feels cheatedfrom the situation, but I think
(21:40):
they were like, you need to letit go.
Is
SPEAKER_02 (21:42):
this the same girl then that in your discord chat,
when he would be talking abouther, your friends would say, you
need to move on and let it go.
I
SPEAKER_05 (21:50):
didn't.
You didn't know back then?
I didn't know any of thesethings, and they're all coming
together at this moment.
So yes, she had visited him,left.
He had called her family, andher father got on the phone and
told him to stop calling.
Wow.
Nobody knew any of that.
SPEAKER_02 (22:07):
Sure.
SPEAKER_05 (22:07):
But according to the FBI report, the reason she went
home earlier, she said he wassexually violent.
That he tried to pressure herand it got violent.
SPEAKER_03 (22:18):
Oh, my God.
So she
SPEAKER_05 (22:19):
got on a plane and came home.
SPEAKER_03 (22:20):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (22:21):
She called her parents.
I think they got her to a hoteland they got her on a flight.
Wow.
So it was actually prettyserious.
Okay.
And the sad thing is, you know,when my friends were hearing the
story, they didn't know any ofthat.
Sure.
They thought that maybe shedidn't have a good time or
whatever and just broke up withhim.
UNKNOWN (22:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (22:36):
But the fact that he then continued to call her and
her family, and no wonder herdad told him to stop.
So it's a very scary situationfor her and her family already.
I can only imagine how
SPEAKER_02 (22:48):
horrible that was.
Right, you have four sisters.
Imagine if somebody was doingthat to her.
It would be awful.
SPEAKER_05 (22:52):
And that, you know, she thought she was going there
because she genuinely thoughtshe liked him.
And then their first encounter,this happens.
That's awful.
He obviously had some issues.
SPEAKER_02 (23:02):
Right.
SPEAKER_05 (23:04):
So that's the background.
Well, he had obsessed about herfor this whole time.
Like a year, you were saying.
I think it's about a year.
And he's continuing to talk tomy friends and wants them to, in
a way, support that he still hashope for this relationship.
SPEAKER_02 (23:21):
And they don't know anything.
And they don't know anything.
They don't know how bad it was.
And so they're
SPEAKER_05 (23:25):
trying to be nice, but also trying to tell him, you
know, just let it go.
So just before we went to thecabin, like a week before...
He had had$13,000 in Bitcoin.
And that is what he wasreferring to when he talked
about the assets.
And if he had saved that, itwould have been worth millions
(23:48):
today.
Back then he had it and it wasworth$13,000.
And that he had bought over theyears.
And so he had taken that moneyand he went on the dark web and
tried to find a website forMurder for Hire.
SPEAKER_02 (24:03):
That's unbelievable.
SPEAKER_05 (24:04):
Which is absolutely insane.
It
SPEAKER_02 (24:07):
still baffles me that there is a dark web that's
actually a real thing.
You know, it sounds soconspiracy theorist.
It sounds old people.
It just but you hear about itenough that it really is there
and bad things happen.
But when you told me that I yourbrain just was like, what?
I don't need like me.
Normal, average mom.
I don't even know how to get onthe dark web.
(24:28):
I don't want to know, but Idon't like as
SPEAKER_05 (24:31):
a, as just a computer aficionado.
I, you know, I've done it.
There's, it's actually just acertain browser that you use.
Okay.
But, um, And there are somethings that aren't bad.
Like MIT has a website on there.
All it is is that everything onthe internet is considered like
indexed.
Meaning when you go to Google,it can find a website from a
(24:52):
search.
But that's only a smallpercentage of the internet.
The majority is unindexed.
Meaning you have to type thespecific URL.
SPEAKER_02 (25:00):
That's the dark web.
You have to know what you'relooking for.
SPEAKER_05 (25:02):
You have to know.
And so people can be verysecretive.
There are websites that are onlyopen at certain times of day.
SPEAKER_03 (25:08):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (25:08):
With certain passwords.
They can...
There's all of these...
Essentially, it becomes thisgreater and greater mystery, and
there's all these conspiracies,but it's something that can only
be accessed by knowing directlinks.
SPEAKER_02 (25:19):
Interesting.
So
SPEAKER_05 (25:19):
you have to go somewhere else to even learn...
SPEAKER_02 (25:21):
That there's a link available.
SPEAKER_05 (25:23):
To something.
SPEAKER_02 (25:23):
You've got to really know what you're looking for.
SPEAKER_05 (25:25):
So what's easily accessible are, like, chat
rooms, and then people in thosechat rooms share information to
get to deeper parts.
SPEAKER_03 (25:34):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (25:34):
That's how...
So...
What Scott does, he goes onthrough here, and the whole
point of the dark web is to tryto be anonymous.
While now it's like aninvestment, initially
cryptocurrency like Bitcoin wasto be anonymous.
When you spend it, it's put intothis, they call it a washing
machine, where it's put in witheveryone else's money, and
people withdraw money.
They're amounts from the pool.
SPEAKER_02 (25:56):
So the money isn't traced back to you.
So you can't trace back to youand what you did with it.
Yeah.
So
SPEAKER_05 (26:00):
that's what he's trying to do to cover his
tracks.
SPEAKER_02 (26:02):
I see.
SPEAKER_05 (26:03):
Well, he finds a website that claims that they do
murder for hiring.
Oh, my God.
And of his$13,000, he spends$12,000.
SPEAKER_02 (26:11):
To kill the girl.
To kill this
SPEAKER_05 (26:13):
girl that he had flown up to California and is
now no longer talking to him.
And even in the FBI report, itsays he briefly dated.
This is very short.
So he agrees, he sends them$12,000 and he uploads a photo
of a tattoo that she had thatwould have been under clothing.
(26:33):
Oh no, I'm sorry, I'm going toback up.
He uploads photos of her and herinformation and he says, send me
a picture of the body with thistattoo.
And everything that he writes,and you can read this in the
report, is very cold andanalytical.
SPEAKER_02 (26:50):
And that's what I wanted you to bring up was I
remembered you telling me somethings that were very robotic
and strange in histransactional, very
transactional writing.
SPEAKER_05 (27:02):
The big one that he wrote was that when the father
called him and told him to stopcalling, he said, consider this
matter closed.
And that's...
SPEAKER_02 (27:12):
That was his code for I'm going to have to murder.
And
SPEAKER_05 (27:13):
that was also what he said.
later in an email with thepotential hitman.
SPEAKER_02 (27:19):
Okay, so he goes on the dark web.
He searches for murder for hire.
He finds somebody who says,
SPEAKER_05 (27:25):
I'll do it.
I'll do it.
He pays them the money and hesays, I want evidence.
I want you to show me a pictureof her corpse.
And then this identifyingtattoo, which I think was
obviously used against him.
The fact that he very clearlysaid, wanted her dead and he
wanted proof of her death.
And he
SPEAKER_02 (27:44):
wrote
SPEAKER_05 (27:44):
it.
And he wrote this down.
SPEAKER_02 (27:46):
Oh my God.
SPEAKER_05 (27:47):
What this website was, was not murder for hire.
They were scammers and gray areado-gooders in that what they did
is they took his money.
SPEAKER_02 (27:57):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (27:57):
But then they send a tip to a newspaper in
California.
SPEAKER_02 (28:00):
It wasn't directly to the FBI.
SPEAKER_05 (28:02):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (28:03):
So what they
SPEAKER_05 (28:04):
do is they would bait people into giving them
money and then they would tellthem, but they keep the money.
SPEAKER_02 (28:11):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (28:12):
So, you know, you can have your opinion on that,
but it's just an interestingthing
SPEAKER_02 (28:15):
they did.
I didn't know that.
SPEAKER_05 (28:16):
So they reported it to a newspaper who immediately
called the FBI.
SPEAKER_02 (28:21):
Oh.
SPEAKER_05 (28:21):
So the FBI poses as the people from this website.
SPEAKER_02 (28:25):
So they worked with the dark web people.
SPEAKER_05 (28:28):
Or
SPEAKER_02 (28:29):
they set up their own.
The
SPEAKER_05 (28:29):
people who are on the dark web, like, disappeared.
UNKNOWN (28:32):
Disappeared.
SPEAKER_05 (28:33):
The FBI obviously is incredible because somehow they
were able to get in andimpersonate the people he was
talking with without making himaware.
SPEAKER_02 (28:41):
Without showing any difference in communication or
anything.
They
SPEAKER_05 (28:46):
had no access to the group that took the money.
SPEAKER_02 (28:49):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (28:50):
So the FBI couldn't find that group.
SPEAKER_02 (28:53):
Oh, interesting.
But
SPEAKER_05 (28:53):
they found, they got in communication with Scott.
So what they do is they say,yes, we'll do it.
they went out to her family andwarned her and her parents and
they staged her as a dead bodyshe had to dress up and they had
to stage a photo of the tattoo
SPEAKER_01 (29:13):
to make it
SPEAKER_05 (29:14):
look like she died I thought how incredibly horrific
is what they had to do and theysent it to him and they said you
know if you want If you want theproof, you'll have to send us an
additional$1,000.
The other$1,000.
Oh, okay.
Or it was like$1,000 or$2,000.
It was a portion of the money.
So he agrees.
And they got him.
(29:35):
He worked really hard to beanonymous, but he was dumb in
the end.
They said they wanted it througha money transfer through Wells
Fargo or something.
And an FBI agent arranged ameeting with him.
I saw the security photo.
He goes, he buys this moneyorder, and then he meets the FBI
(29:59):
agent.
Oh my God.
And then they take him in.
SPEAKER_02 (30:01):
They arrested him right then on the spot.
Oh my God, I had no idea.
SPEAKER_05 (30:04):
And he had written to the Murder for Hire people
all these very cold and negativethings about women.
And I thought it was reallyfunny.
A female FBI agent was the onethat did all this and caught
him.
SPEAKER_02 (30:14):
It was a female agent?
You can read
SPEAKER_05 (30:16):
her report.
And she totally took him downfrom start to finish.
SPEAKER_02 (30:20):
Wow.
Wow.
SPEAKER_05 (30:21):
So.
SPEAKER_02 (30:23):
So I remember vaguely you came home and, or
after that trip, you know, whenyou were telling me this and I
was like, oh my God, you sleptin a house.
SPEAKER_05 (30:32):
Yeah, just a few rooms down.
SPEAKER_02 (30:33):
With a guy who was plotting murder.
SPEAKER_05 (30:37):
Actively.
SPEAKER_02 (30:38):
In the moment.
Yeah.
And.
Your intuition from moment onewas, I don't like this guy.
There's something off about him.
But I remember we haddiscussions about how we justify
our feelings or we don't want tohurt people's feelings.
And this happens a lot.
This happens to people and thenthey get victimized that we feel
(30:58):
funny about somebody, but wedon't want to be rude or they're
friends of a friend.
So we're like, ah, it's just meor, oh, I'm just being
judgmental or whatever.
Well, we have to remember thatwe were programmed to be
judgmental.
And I don't mean that in anegative, nasty way, but we
judge every single day.
Do I take that road or thatroad?
(31:18):
Do I walk down that alleyway ornot?
Do I go to this bank or thatbank or that restaurant?
Like our brain is constantlyjudging our body.
You knew you had vibes aboutthis guy when it was literally
just online.
And then you stayed in a housewith him.
God only knows what else he wascapable of.
SPEAKER_05 (31:37):
Well, certainly, or what else he was doing at the
time.
SPEAKER_02 (31:40):
What was he doing down there for all those hours?
Who knows?
He's probably searching aroundfor somebody to kill this girl.
Can
SPEAKER_05 (31:46):
you
SPEAKER_02 (31:46):
imagine that?
Did you tell me the FBI waswatching that house?
They knew where he was at thattime?
SPEAKER_05 (31:50):
I think they later said because what happens is he
paid.
SPEAKER_04 (31:54):
And
SPEAKER_05 (31:55):
then he went on that trip.
So it's hilarious.
He's kicking back.
He's eating, he's drinking, he'splaying, he's having fun.
Thinking she's going to go getmurdered.
While he's anticipating, waitingfor the confirmation she's been
murdered.
Can you imagine if you had theintent to murder someone that
you, like, you'd think that'd bewhen you're most on edge.
But he was the most relaxed he'dever been.
SPEAKER_02 (32:14):
Oh my God, that's bone chilling.
bone chilling.
And I remember when you weretelling me this, I kept
thinking, you guys are so luckythe FBI didn't like come knock
down the door or that he didn'thurt one of you guys.
I don't know.
There was just so many thoughtsgoing through my mind that now.
So fast forward, he's, he's beenin prison.
(32:35):
He's almost about to get out ofprison.
And, and you guys never wrotecharacter letters.
SPEAKER_05 (32:41):
So I do want to say one further thing is that dad
didn't write the characterletter.
UNKNOWN (32:46):
Um,
SPEAKER_05 (32:47):
He has a second charge, and I think it was
dropped because he pled guilty,but he attempted to influence
witnesses from jail with money.
He was having people called,including Daz, and offered money
to write more of those characterwitnesses or provide him an
alibi.
And they caught him through thephone calls.
And again, he thought he was sosmart, but he was dumb in the
(33:09):
end.
But yeah, he continued.
So what this proves to me isthat when he's caught, He
doesn't even feel guilty.
SPEAKER_02 (33:16):
No.
SPEAKER_05 (33:16):
He was trying to orchestrate a way to get out of
jail while in jail.
SPEAKER_02 (33:21):
What's even scarier beyond that is he gets out next
year.
SPEAKER_05 (33:24):
And that's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_02 (33:25):
He only got five years, right?
He got five years plus he hadbeen in prison for a year
waiting trial.
So
SPEAKER_05 (33:31):
I, yeah, he was in prison starting in...
SPEAKER_02 (33:35):
So if our editing is a little bit weird...
right in this spot and ourenergy seems different.
Full transparency, we just hadto pause to call the police and
the neighbor was yellinghorrifically at a little girl
the same age as my youngestdaughter and saying things I
(33:59):
could never imagine saying to achild.
And this isn't the first timethat they've had the police
called on them.
And so while it feels awful tocome back and continue
recording, unfortunately, thepolice talked to the family and
the little girl and we heardeverything through the screen
(34:22):
and they decided to leave.
So there's a lot of feelingsgoing on right now because we're
really worried about this littlegirl.
It's not the first time.
And I really hate for her tobecome a statistic as we're
sitting here talking about truecrime.
So we're a little shaken.
Anyway, we're going to finishthe story about Scott.
(34:43):
Just know that our energy isdifferent for that reason.
And if we find out anything,hopefully that the little girl
gets some help, we would update.
So I think where we were leavingoff was when I was commenting
that Scott only got five years,but he was, if I understand
(35:04):
correctly, in prison already fora year, awaiting trial and all
of that.
So he's potentially going to getout next year.
He's being held in California,correct?
SPEAKER_05 (35:13):
Yes, I understand he's in federal prison.
They charge it as a federalcrime because it was over the
internet, so it's consideredcrossing state lines.
SPEAKER_03 (35:21):
Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_05 (35:22):
And so it was a Some of the state penalties for even
attempted murder for hire aremuch higher, but the federal
one's a little lower.
Oh,
SPEAKER_01 (35:31):
that's right.
And
SPEAKER_05 (35:32):
I did some research on that.
I also heard, I can't speak tothe absolute validity of this
with my friends, that Scott'sfamily are fairly wealthy and
they were able to hire some bigHollywood attorney that has
defended some other people inthe area.
SPEAKER_02 (35:49):
So to help get some lesser charges, maybe.
And
SPEAKER_05 (35:51):
they got the charge down a lot.
I think I wanted to include.
SPEAKER_02 (35:58):
While you're looking that up, didn't you find out
something about murder for hirehere in Arizona where we live?
SPEAKER_05 (36:04):
Yeah.
In the state of Arizona, if itactually is carried out, it's a
capital crime for both theperson who paid and both the
person who committed
SPEAKER_02 (36:14):
the murder.
So we still have the deathpenalty in Arizona.
SPEAKER_05 (36:17):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, while a lot of crimesdon't carry a mandatory capital
sentence, it's one of the veryfew, at least in the state of
Arizona, that does.
SPEAKER_02 (36:26):
That's interesting.
I
SPEAKER_05 (36:27):
think it's considered much higher than a
normal order because it's likean even added layer of
premeditation.
SPEAKER_02 (36:32):
Sure.
Because you have your crime ofpassion where you kill somebody
because you snapped, which iswhat I think happened with Jan,
the person in our Spokane house.
And then premeditated, you'remaking a plan.
But to go through to findsomebody else to hide...
your crime, to do your crime foryou and pay for it is a next
level sinister.
(36:54):
I
SPEAKER_05 (36:54):
think absolutely.
You know, they say that, uh,here in the, from a public
information officer from the FBIand the central district of
California, it reads quote,Burkitt's crime was not a
momentary lapse in judgment, buta premeditated plot to kill the
victim because she rejected hisadvances.
Prosecutors argued and sent in asentencing memorandum.
(37:16):
While attempting to take a lifeis serious enough, Burkett's
chosen method of carrying outthe crime, using the dark web to
hire a hitman andcryptocurrency, speak to his
sophistication, meticulousplanning, and attempts to
anonymize his illegal conduct inthe commission of this offense,
and are aggravating in nature.
So here the prosecution isarguing that specifically
(37:41):
because of all the steps hetook, it proves that it was Such
an advanced crime.
Yeah.
And they're saying aggravatingfor the sake of his sentencing,
even though it was reduced.
SPEAKER_02 (37:52):
But he only got five years.
That's insane.
Because it was California,correct?
SPEAKER_05 (37:56):
Yeah, it was California.
SPEAKER_02 (37:58):
And they're very different with crime and
punishment there.
We are from California and gladI don't live there anymore.
Wow, that's scary.
So the family of
SPEAKER_05 (38:09):
the girl and her parents...
I felt since I first learnedabout the true nature of the
case that the saddest thing washer and the life that she must
be living now, especially thathe's getting out next year.
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (38:23):
How's she ever going to feel safe?
SPEAKER_05 (38:24):
How would you ever feel safe knowing this happened
to you?
And then worse off that theoffender is free.
And he could
SPEAKER_02 (38:30):
do it again.
In
SPEAKER_05 (38:31):
a very short time.
SPEAKER_02 (38:32):
And I know that you guys have thought about you guys
as friends, quote unquotefriends, staying in that house
with him on the coast and alsonot writing letters.
SPEAKER_05 (38:41):
No one did.
SPEAKER_02 (38:42):
No one did.
That if this guy is as sick ashe seems to be, not to be
dramatic, but he couldabsolutely be angry at you all.
SPEAKER_05 (38:52):
I think so.
SPEAKER_02 (38:52):
At least at the people that he asked to write
letters for him.
SPEAKER_05 (38:56):
I'm most worried for Daz, who's my brother-in-law,
because Scott is specificallycontacted him as the one to
write the letter and in a laterphone call after finding out
this information Daz had torefuse to his father to do it
and when he was trying tosolicit people to change the
story he tried to contact Dazand Daz ignored the call
SPEAKER_02 (39:19):
wow that's really scary
SPEAKER_05 (39:20):
and going back to what he said at the breakfast
thing this is a man who claimsif
SPEAKER_02 (39:26):
I believe it's true if I
SPEAKER_05 (39:27):
believe that I'm not committing a crime or that the
crime is somehow worthwhile oris beneficial, I don't feel any
guilt.
And I believe that's why he wasable to be so relaxed that day.
He was able to do what hewanted.
SPEAKER_02 (39:39):
Because he thought he wasn't committing a crime.
He thought he had validatingreasons to kill this girl.
SPEAKER_05 (39:44):
I also believe that in his mind, because it was
murder for hire, because itwasn't his hand, he had no
guilt, that it was black andwhite like that in a way that no
one else would think.
SPEAKER_02 (39:53):
God, that's scary.
That's really, really scary.
Well, I really hope that...
I don't know.
I don't know what I hope.
I obviously hope he doesn't dothis to anybody else.
I hope everyone's safe.
I hope his family keeps an eyeon him or somebody does, or, you
know, I, I don't know becausefive years is not enough,
especially if here over theborder in Arizona, that's a
(40:15):
capital offense.
He'd be on death row right now.
SPEAKER_05 (40:16):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (40:17):
But because it's California, he's out next year.
I
SPEAKER_05 (40:20):
would say it just is federal, even though it's in
SPEAKER_02 (40:22):
a.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
That's right.
That's right.
That's right.
SPEAKER_05 (40:24):
But yeah.
Had he, Say he had found someonein Arizona and paid them in
person.
That's what the crime
SPEAKER_02 (40:31):
is.
Thank you for clarifying.
You're right.
I'm wrong.
Federal.
So federal is less than anyway.
But...
SPEAKER_05 (40:37):
Ew.
It just...
It's absolutely terrifying.
You never know.
Yeah.
You don't know how people aregoing to act.
And like you said earlier, itwas this thought of someone who,
from the very beginning, felt,you know...
Off.
Off.
Made...
Vague comments that weresomewhat concerning.
And everybody tried to give hima pass.
(40:57):
And it actually, in a way,facilitated this crime.
He
SPEAKER_02 (41:01):
was talking
SPEAKER_05 (41:01):
about the girl.
SPEAKER_02 (41:03):
Oh, my God.
And you guys unknowingly,unknowingly.
That's really scary.
And you guys still talk about itsometimes to this day.
It comes up, right?
More like we can't believe wewere in this.
SPEAKER_05 (41:14):
When it comes up, they won't even say his name.
They don't like, you know, theycall him Voldemort from
SPEAKER_02 (41:19):
the guy who will not be named
SPEAKER_05 (41:20):
because he's the guy who won't be named.
Like, they don't want to say hisname.
I mean, to my friends, theydeleted that whole thing,
started a new chat and said hedoesn't even deserve to be named
again.
even though they had beenfriends with him for years.
I mean, it was so clear cut.
The evidence was, there was nodoubt.
I think that's why he ultimatelyhad to plead guilty.
He
SPEAKER_02 (41:40):
was caught red handed by the FBI.
With it all in writing.
Let me ask, Wyatt was theclosest one to him.
Wyatt pretty much brought himinto the group.
Looking back, does Wyattremember having any, any vibe,
any instinct?
Was he just trying to be nice orwas he oblivious to it all?
SPEAKER_05 (41:55):
I don't remember exactly.
I know I asked them in a group,maybe not Wyatt specifically,
um, I was like, I just alwaysthought, I had a hard time with
it.
I didn't know why you guys
SPEAKER_02 (42:04):
kind of gave him a pass.
What'd they say?
SPEAKER_05 (42:06):
And yeah, they just thought he was a little weird.
And they said that he hadstarted the group, so they felt
like they couldn't kick him outof his own thing.
SPEAKER_02 (42:13):
And it would be mean to go start your own.
And
SPEAKER_05 (42:16):
everyone tries to be nice.
SPEAKER_02 (42:17):
Sure, sure.
I think most of us try to benice.
But lesson there, listen to yourgut.
Yeah.
Listen to your gut.
SPEAKER_05 (42:24):
And I also feel I'm like, man, how can I blame that
girl for going to visit him whenI went to a cabin and visited
the same guy?
SPEAKER_02 (42:31):
That's a really great point because a lot of
people do victim shame.
SPEAKER_05 (42:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (42:37):
Girls shouldn't have been wearing this or they
shouldn't put themselves in thatsituation.
SPEAKER_05 (42:40):
Especially meeting people online.
SPEAKER_02 (42:42):
Absolutely.
But.
I value that you as a man justsaid that you literally went and
stayed in a cabin with peopleyou didn't know.
SPEAKER_05 (42:50):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (42:51):
So you can't shame her.
And no one deserves this.
Even if they put themselves in abad situation, no one deserves
to have this happen to them.
SPEAKER_05 (43:00):
And that's what I think.
I think in a way in our modernworld, you'll probably meet
people online.
We're
SPEAKER_02 (43:07):
going to have to.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (43:08):
It's the way that things are going.
SPEAKER_02 (43:11):
We work with people online.
We do meetings online.
We, you know, companies now haveemployees all over the world.
SPEAKER_05 (43:17):
Yeah.
I'm like one.
I wouldn't have met my wife ifnot through the exact same
circumstances that I met Scott.
SPEAKER_02 (43:23):
So lesson is trust your gut.
SPEAKER_05 (43:26):
I think so.
SPEAKER_02 (43:27):
I think ultimately that's all you have.
Trust your gut.
And don't push it down.
Don't ignore it.
Don't justify it or rationalizeit away if something or someone
doesn't feel right.
And this goes back to less truecrime and more of my spiritual
side of all is not lost is youhave this internal compass.
You're born with it.
Stop ignoring it.
When you're little, people tellyou to ignore it or, oh, that's
(43:49):
not real or don't worry aboutthat.
But you feel something inside.
You need to listen because it'sthere for a reason.
SPEAKER_05 (43:55):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02 (43:56):
well thank you for sharing that story i um it's
hard not to say goodbye now witha yucky feeling uh especially
with why we had to pause theshow for a minute but also the
story itself is terrible thankgod the girl is alive and
SPEAKER_05 (44:15):
with her family
SPEAKER_02 (44:16):
yep and that those gray hat people on the dark web
um We're able to tell the newsand and hopefully there's more
people out there that do thingslike that, because I guess
there's never going to be ashortage of psychos that want to
do things like this.
So we need the people who stopthem.
SPEAKER_05 (44:34):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02 (44:34):
And the FBI agent, thank her for playing the part
and taking down this guy.
Good on her.
Wow, that's a little bit heavy.
I feel a little bit icky rightnow.
But thank you for being back inthe studio with me.
I love doing shows with you andI hope we can do more.
I know we have some more topicswe want to cover together and I
hope to see you back soon.
SPEAKER_05 (44:57):
Thank you.
Hello, and welcome back to All Is Not Lost podcast.
I'm your host, psychic medium,Rhiann Maldonado.
Did you know that 19 millionAmericans listen to true crime
stories every week?
While this podcast isn'tnecessarily a true crime
podcast, today we have a truecrime story for you.
(00:24):
I'm back in the studio todaywith my son, Sam, and he is
going to tell us an amazingly,shockingly true crime story of
something that happened to himand his friends.
And we will put a link to theactual news story because you
(00:45):
are not going to believe it.
So welcome and join me todaylistening to our very own
personal true crime story righthere on All Is Not Lost podcast.
SPEAKER_00 (00:57):
Spirit, does it stay?
does it go?
SPEAKER_02 (01:00):
The fact is, spirit does survive death.
Our loved ones are all aroundus.
Love survives.
Spirit survives.
All is not lost.
SPEAKER_00 (01:15):
Welcome to the All Is Not Lost Podcast.
Here's your host, psychic andevidential medium, Rian
Maldonado.
SPEAKER_02 (01:26):
Hi, Sam.
Welcome back to All Is Not Lostpodcast.
SPEAKER_05 (01:29):
Hi, thanks for having me again.
SPEAKER_02 (01:31):
I am so glad you're here.
I absolutely love hosting withyou and wish we could do it all
the time.
I think we would never run outof things to talk about.
So what makes today's episodespecial is normally we talk
about paranormal and spiritualand things like that.
We don't ever really touch ontrue crime, even though I am a
(01:52):
True Crime Junkie.
(02:21):
When you came home and told mewhat had been going on, it was
an utter shock.
So why don't you tell ourlisteners today your true crime
story?
SPEAKER_05 (02:35):
Wow.
So this has been prettyincredible.
I truly didn't think anythinglike this would ever happen in
my life.
Yeah, no joke.
And while the story itself isvery interesting, from my
perspective, the crazy part isthe buildup.
and the way in which you don'tknow what someone's capable of
or the people you associate with
SPEAKER_02 (02:56):
until
SPEAKER_05 (02:56):
it's too late.
SPEAKER_02 (02:57):
And how you should treat people because you never
know.
You
SPEAKER_05 (03:00):
never know.
And I think I have learned somelife lessons in this situation.
So I'm excited to share ittoday.
So...
It's a difficult story to justbegin because there's a lot of
moving parts.
SPEAKER_02 (03:14):
Right.
So you probably have to startwith the relationship, how this
person even came into your lifebecause of your multiple layers
of friends.
SPEAKER_05 (03:20):
So throughout my life, we've moved around a lot.
And I went to my last two yearsof high school in Spokane,
Washington.
You heard a little bit aboutthat in our last episode.
And from that, I left with twobest friends, my friends Alex
and Wyatt.
And we moved down to Californiaand then later back to Tucson.
(03:41):
And that's where I live now.
And through that whole time, Istill kept in touch with my
friends, Alex and Wyatt.
They went on kind of their ownpaths.
Alex went to college in Montanaand Wyatt went to college in
Washington.
Well, during his time, Wyattmade a group of friends at his
college.
And After they had graduated afew years later, they were still
(04:04):
chatting online.
And I was invited to join theirgroup, this group of friends.
So it was two friends I knew andsome people I'd never met
before.
SPEAKER_02 (04:11):
In your online chat
SPEAKER_05 (04:13):
group.
In an online group throughDiscord.
So in this online group, we allplayed video games.
We played Dungeons and Dragonsonline and these other things.
And we just kind of played gamesand hung out.
We're kind of nerdy friends.
And...
I think that it was really nicein the way that people move
around.
But now we have these tools to,you know, still be able to
(04:33):
participate with friends fromfar away.
SPEAKER_02 (04:35):
Yeah.
And stay in contact and stay ineach other's lives.
SPEAKER_05 (04:38):
And I felt that as opposed to maybe something like
social media, this was nicebecause we would schedule times
and be able to actually do likeactivities together.
Like we had these weekly gamenights.
Well, I quickly became friendswith some of the other people in
the group.
Um, funnily enough, One of them,his name is Daz, is now my
brother-in-law.
(04:58):
That's a whole nother story, butI ended up marrying his sister.
So in a way, this group actuallychanged my life in a couple
SPEAKER_01 (05:04):
ways.
SPEAKER_05 (05:06):
But at the time, most of them were pretty nice
guys and we quickly becamefriends.
And it came out that we'deventually want to like meet up
in person.
And that was because I hadgotten to know these people
pretty well, but I'm going to goback.
SPEAKER_02 (05:24):
Okay.
I want to know if he's in the
SPEAKER_05 (05:25):
group already.
So the only thing was there wasone guy in the group that I
didn't like.
SPEAKER_02 (05:32):
There always is.
SPEAKER_05 (05:32):
Everyone was nice, but there's this guy named
Scott.
And over the years that wetalked, because it was, it was a
couple of years that we talkedbefore we ever got together.
I always felt, like I was maybebeing a little mean in that
Scott was very socially awkwardand sometimes a little rude.
(05:54):
And I felt that I wondered whyhe kind of continued to be in
the friends group.
And I felt that even when hewould say something that wasn't
very nice, everyone would kindof give him a pass.
And I didn't know what theirrelationships were before I had
come in at the end.
So I also didn't really feellike I could say anything
SPEAKER_04 (06:15):
I
SPEAKER_05 (06:15):
just kind of assumed well you know maybe it's a
little weird and they try to benice to him and keep him around
so he also kind of seemed likehe started the online group like
he had the permissions indiscord to manage the group or
something and so I also feltlike oh maybe he's like a
(06:37):
founding friend of this group
SPEAKER_02 (06:39):
so you can't kick him out of his own group
SPEAKER_05 (06:41):
yeah so Honestly, I think it was just that Scott was
just honestly kind of not a, nota very fun person to be around,
but not like the worst you'veever seen.
And I didn't talk to him verypersonally.
We were on like the voice chat alot.
So there's a lot of times we'reall talking via voice and I
(07:01):
would talk to some of the otherguys, but I never like had a
conversation with Scottdirectly.
No, not once.
I, I, I had nothing to say tohim, but, um, We continue like
this, and I'm only gettingcontext clues about Scott.
Like, who is he?
What's his background?
I never asked anyone directlybecause it didn't really matter.
(07:22):
But I got a couple things.
One was he would always say thathe had assets.
And I was a little unsure whatthis meant.
I mean, we were four...
five years out of high school,it seems strange to me that
someone would talk about allthese mysterious assets they
have and how if they traded themin or something, they didn't
(07:45):
have enough money to buy a houseor whatever.
SPEAKER_03 (07:48):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (07:49):
Sometimes my friends, my mom knows this,
they're always competing forlike everything and especially
how much money they have.
So I kind of wrote it off that,you know, maybe he's just
bragging about something he has.
The other aspect I hear about isthat he wants this relationship
with some girl.
(08:09):
I really don't learn much aboutit other than he still is
interested in some girl whoseems to be ignoring him.
Was
SPEAKER_02 (08:19):
she like at his college?
SPEAKER_05 (08:20):
I don't know.
You don't know anything abouther.
At this time, I want to say Idon't know anything about
SPEAKER_02 (08:25):
her.
But he's saying these things,alluding to this girl, not like
you're hearing it from yourother friends.
SPEAKER_05 (08:30):
I'd only heard that them talk to him.
Like sometimes he would bringthis up or say something related
and they would go like Scott,like, Oh, you need to let it go.
Oh,
SPEAKER_03 (08:39):
okay.
SPEAKER_05 (08:41):
That's all I hear.
SPEAKER_03 (08:42):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (08:43):
And again, I'm like, okay, so he's got some personal
business.
I don't know.
And everyone was still prettynice to her.
Like, but they, it happened afew times of them telling him to
like, stop worrying about this.
SPEAKER_01 (08:54):
Interesting.
SPEAKER_05 (08:55):
And so at that point I'm like, I just don't like him,
but I don't think there's likeanything crazy.
So they organized this gettogether.
And I, maybe it's funny in, interms of our like modern life to
like meet people you've metonline in person, but my friend
Wyatt was going, who has been alongtime friend of mine.
(09:16):
And
SPEAKER_02 (09:17):
Wyatt knew Scott in person.
SPEAKER_05 (09:18):
And Wyatt knew all of these people from college and
he'd known them in person foryears.
They now live in differentplaces, but he'd known them for
years.
four plus years.
Okay.
I felt like in some way, they'renot total strangers.
They're not like someone we'veonly heard their voice.
Now they're going to show up.
SPEAKER_02 (09:34):
Right.
SPEAKER_05 (09:35):
Everyone
SPEAKER_02 (09:35):
here, you're being catfished.
SPEAKER_05 (09:36):
Yeah.
Every single person had hung outin person many times, except for
me with them.
SPEAKER_03 (09:41):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (09:41):
So I felt like I was just joining a group of people
who knew each other and I knewone of them.
And that felt you know, prettyreasonable.
And so one of the guys, his nameis Talon, his family owned a
house on the coast in WashingtonState in kind of a remote area.
And also because this waswintertime, the town was empty.
SPEAKER_02 (10:05):
It was
SPEAKER_05 (10:06):
just a complete off season for this little resort
town where some, there's a lotof Airbnbs and a lot of fancy
homes built right up on thesekind of sand dunes that lead up
to the ocean.
SPEAKER_03 (10:17):
And
SPEAKER_05 (10:19):
they say, oh, this winter, no one's using this
family house.
We're going to have this gettogether.
And I was really excited.
I, because I live in Arizona, Ididn't have any friends like
here at the time.
And so I really had spent a longtime since I'd seen another
friend in person.
And I
SPEAKER_02 (10:36):
love cold weather.
SPEAKER_05 (10:37):
And I loved cold weather.
It's going to get to go to theocean in Washington in the
winter.
This sounded really fun.
SPEAKER_04 (10:43):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (10:43):
And I become good friends with a lot of these
guys.
So we head up there and I meet.
My friend Talon at the airportin Portland, he lived on the
Washington side.
Portland's on the border.
He lived on the Washington side,but he picked me up in that
airport and a couple others.
And there was like another groupcoming from a different part of
the state and we're all going todrive out there.
(11:04):
And we drive in and we'regetting set up in this cabin.
SPEAKER_02 (11:10):
So there's like six or eight guys?
SPEAKER_05 (11:12):
So if I remember correctly, it's myself, Wyatt,
Talon, Jared, Scott, Daz, andthen Daz's friend, Daniel.
SPEAKER_02 (11:22):
So
SPEAKER_05 (11:23):
seven guys total, including myself.
And so they pick up some food ata grocery store, and there's one
grocery store quite a ways away,and there's one restaurant, and
we ate in the restaurant.
I still have a commemorative cupwe got.
We're having a really good time.
We're excited we're here forthis trip.
But Scott is there, and I feelbad.
(11:46):
Very judgy saying it.
But when I saw him, he did looklike kind of an interesting
person.
He had kind of a scraggly beard.
He was a little strange.
Socially awkward.
Socially awkward.
Again, I'm not going to be theperson to treat him differently.
I was never mean.
SPEAKER_02 (12:03):
But you got a vibe.
SPEAKER_05 (12:04):
But I got a vibe.
You
SPEAKER_02 (12:05):
got to trust those.
SPEAKER_05 (12:07):
He was even stranger seeing him in person than just
his voice.
And I feel like...
later when you see the mugshot,you'll understand what I'm
talking about.
So we get to the house andeverything, and we're setting up
for the first evening.
And people are playing games.
(12:28):
Some of my friends like to drinktoo much, and they're doing
that.
I don't drink.
But they're all kind of doingtheir things.
Scott disappears.
SPEAKER_02 (12:36):
Oh.
SPEAKER_05 (12:36):
For hours.
SPEAKER_02 (12:37):
Oh.
Outside?
Inside?
SPEAKER_05 (12:39):
I'll get to that.
So the way the house is built isthere's a living room, a
kitchen, and several bedrooms onthe first floor.
And then there's like adownstairs area that has just a
few more bedrooms and a smallliving room and a bathroom.
Well, he walks up from thedownstairs in the evening and he
goes, sorry, I was just coughingup blood.
SPEAKER_04 (13:02):
Okay.
And
SPEAKER_05 (13:03):
I was like, What does that even mean?
After being gone for hours.
How do you just casually mentionsomething that would be serious
and...
You might need help.
You might need help.
Okay.
And you've been gone and thenyou just reappear.
Okay, odd.
Okay, odd, right?
Everything that goes on with himis just a little strange.
(13:27):
And he continues to be kind ofawkward and I think...
Some of the people got a littleannoyed with him.
And then.
SPEAKER_02 (13:33):
Just more comments like this.
Just
SPEAKER_05 (13:35):
more weird comments.
SPEAKER_02 (13:36):
Trying to get people to engage.
And
SPEAKER_05 (13:37):
he often would sometimes pick a fight.
And even in some of the games,like with Alex or Daz, would
just kind of do something todisrupt what someone else was
doing.
SPEAKER_01 (13:46):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (13:47):
And my friends can sometimes get in little
squabbles, right?
So to put it lightly.
And so it's just things likethat, but nothing crazy.
SPEAKER_02 (13:56):
So he was like an attention seeker.
SPEAKER_05 (13:58):
Yeah, it just caused a little bit of a problem with
everything.
Well, then the next day, I getup, and some of my friends,
despite staying up into theearly hours of the night, are up
early.
SPEAKER_02 (14:12):
Remind me, weren't you sharing living space with
him?
Like, were you sleeping?
SPEAKER_05 (14:15):
I was sleeping in a bedroom with Wyatt, and he was
sleeping downstairs far away.
SPEAKER_02 (14:20):
Okay, so you weren't sleeping anywhere near Scott.
I wasn't
SPEAKER_05 (14:22):
sleeping anywhere near Scott.
And so we're getting up, and...
two of my friends, Talon andJared are already making
breakfast.
And I was like, oh, you know,thank you so much.
And I'm fixing my plate andwe're joking around.
And then Scott comes in and thenTalon goes, oh, Scott, I'm so
(14:43):
sorry.
Like, I forgot you're Jewish andwe got pork sausage.
I'm really sorry.
Do you want us to run to thestore?
We could get a differentprotein.
Cause they only had like sausageand eggs.
And I think they were reallyjust trying to be nice and
accommodating to him.
And I'm telling you, this islike the thing that comes into
play later.
He just looks at him dead in theeye and Scott goes like, well,
(15:08):
if I tell myself it's not pork,then there's nothing wrong.
SPEAKER_01 (15:12):
Oh my God.
SPEAKER_05 (15:13):
And he just fixes a
SPEAKER_01 (15:14):
plate.
SPEAKER_05 (15:16):
He's like, as long as he, in a way, I think he
elaborates, he's like, as longas I can make myself believe
that what I'm doing isn't wrong,it's not wrong.
SPEAKER_02 (15:24):
Yeah.
since I know the story, that'sterrifying.
SPEAKER_05 (15:28):
Exactly.
SPEAKER_02 (15:29):
Oh my God.
But I don't remember hearingthat part.
At
SPEAKER_05 (15:32):
the time, I think everyone thought that that was
strange, but again, you go,well, people can make their own
life choices.
It was about eating sausage.
And for most of us, that's not ataboo.
SPEAKER_02 (15:43):
And maybe coming, maybe he wasn't a super
practicing Jew and was okay withit.
We don't know.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (15:48):
So I think everyone could pass it off, but I've
talked to my friends andeveryone thought, that even if
they thought maybe he wasn'tsuper religious, it's a weird
kind of comment to make in theway he made it.
So we continue with the entiretrip.
And to be honest, while he canbe a little weird, nothing crazy
happens otherwise.
(16:10):
We kind of have a fun time andwe wrap up and we drive back to
the airport and I go home.
SPEAKER_02 (16:16):
There were just more of those comments throughout
though, right?
Because I think I remember youtelling me when you came home or
during the trip that it, It wasawkward.
There were a lot of awkward
SPEAKER_05 (16:24):
times.
I guess what I'm saying is hecontinued to be awkward.
He continued to be a littleconfrontational.
But that's how he always is.
SPEAKER_02 (16:31):
It wasn't out of the ordinary.
It was just whatever.
SPEAKER_05 (16:35):
I just went home and said I had a fun time with
everyone.
But as usual, like Scott justkind of made things a little
unfun sometimes.
Okay.
And I, you know, that was it.
But we were going to take a tripto California.
Shortly after I got back fromWashington, I remember knowing
that I had two kind ofback-to-back trips.
(16:56):
So we left for California when Igot back, and then we were
driving home to Arizona a coupledays later.
And we're driving home throughthe middle of the desert where
cell reception is spotty.
And I
SPEAKER_02 (17:08):
get a message.
Oh, my God, I remember this.
SPEAKER_05 (17:11):
My friend Talyn says, everybody, like, be on a
call tonight at whatever time, 8p.m.
I
SPEAKER_02 (17:17):
remember that.
SPEAKER_05 (17:18):
Like...
Just be there.
SPEAKER_02 (17:21):
And your mind went crazy.
Like, what
SPEAKER_05 (17:23):
could this be?
I feel that, you know, yourfriends can write things or
whatever, but for someone to belike, no, you must.
Everyone knows that theirschedules are going to be wild
and people are going to havedifferent things.
So just say, like, you must behere.
Figure it out.
was very strange.
And yeah, I had all thesetheories.
I could not figure
SPEAKER_02 (17:42):
out.
I think we talked about it thewhole way home.
SPEAKER_05 (17:44):
We talked about it, yeah, for hours.
But my cell phone died.
Or the cell service went out.
So I was like, well, I'm notgoing to make it.
I will ask them tomorrow whathappened.
SPEAKER_02 (17:53):
So we didn't make it home in time?
SPEAKER_05 (17:55):
No, we didn't make it home in time.
We clearly weren't going to.
So we speculated, but I kind ofwrote it off.
Well, I wake up the nextmorning.
The entire Discord group isgone.
Delete it.
And there's a new one withalmost nothing posted.
Discord saves everything that'sever been, so it kind of builds
(18:16):
over time.
There's nothing there now.
And I'm like, so what's goingon?
I message.
Well, I don't remember exactlywho I talked to.
I remembered better in the past.
SPEAKER_02 (18:28):
Yeah, I think it was Alex.
SPEAKER_05 (18:29):
But ultimately, I received news that Scott has
been arrested.
UNKNOWN (18:36):
Oh, my God.
SPEAKER_05 (18:37):
And slowly this story starts to unfold and it's
crazy.
So I get the news that Scott'sbeen arrested.
And I remember in myconversations, I did talk to Daz
as well, who in a way wasclosest with Scott.
SPEAKER_01 (18:53):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (18:54):
Scott's dad called Daz.
That's right.
And this is what initiatedeverybody kind of knowing the
situation.
Scott's dad calls Daz and isvery cryptic.
And asks him or says that Scottis in trouble and asks if he
will write like a letter.
Like a character letter.
A character letter.
But he doesn't call it that.
He's very vague.
SPEAKER_04 (19:15):
Scott
SPEAKER_05 (19:15):
says very vague.
So Daz is a little confused.
But Scott was his friend and Dazfelt like he maybe should do it.
So he begins.
I don't remember exactly whathappened, but Daz gets another
call from the dad.
And this time he elaboratesfurther that Scott, you know,
Scott's in trouble.
jail and they need thischaracter witness and all this
(19:38):
stuff.
And so I think everyone starteddoing some more research.
And when they
SPEAKER_02 (19:45):
found...
Because Daz was probably worriedabout writing a letter, not
knowing what the crime was.
SPEAKER_05 (19:49):
Yes.
So Daz kind of tells some of theother guys and they start doing
some investigating on their own.
Well, he's just not sure what todo.
It was very weird to talk to theguy's dad.
He's never...
talked to his dad before.
It's really strange that he getsa phone call.
SPEAKER_01 (20:04):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (20:05):
Well, they find like the indictment and it's insane.
So it was from the FBI because
SPEAKER_02 (20:12):
it was a federal case.
Federal case.
SPEAKER_05 (20:15):
And ultimately, like, here's what happened.
So just a few months prior tothe event.
SPEAKER_02 (20:23):
To you sharing.
SPEAKER_05 (20:24):
To us going
SPEAKER_02 (20:25):
into this.
Cabin.
SPEAKER_05 (20:26):
Cabin.
SPEAKER_02 (20:27):
With a murderer.
I'm
SPEAKER_05 (20:29):
going to back up a little bit.
SPEAKER_02 (20:31):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (20:31):
So it was sometime earlier, maybe a year or more
earlier, he met a girl onlinethrough a Facebook page for some
anime.
SPEAKER_01 (20:41):
Oh, boy.
SPEAKER_05 (20:42):
They're anime Facebook moderators.
SPEAKER_02 (20:44):
Oh.
SPEAKER_05 (20:44):
As you can already know.
Yeah.
This is already...
SPEAKER_02 (20:46):
Make some assumptions.
SPEAKER_05 (20:49):
Yeah.
And...
They quickly form a relationshipand she agrees to come visit him
in California.
I don't remember where she'sfrom, but some other state.
SPEAKER_02 (21:00):
So he's living in California.
SPEAKER_05 (21:02):
So I'll give the context.
He lives in Beverly Hills.
His parents are quite wealthy.
He lives in Beverly Hills,California.
Okay.
SPEAKER_02 (21:11):
And this is all public record, so we're not
giving away anything.
You could read this
SPEAKER_05 (21:14):
in the FBI statement.
SPEAKER_02 (21:15):
We'll link to some of that.
SPEAKER_05 (21:18):
So she agrees to come visit him in California.
And it doesn't go well.
So initially my friends knewthat she came out to visit him.
She ended up going home earlyand then didn't want to talk to
him after that.
So I know in their mind, theydidn't know exactly what
happened.
And obviously he feels cheatedfrom the situation, but I think
(21:40):
they were like, you need to letit go.
Is
SPEAKER_02 (21:42):
this the same girl then that in your discord chat,
when he would be talking abouther, your friends would say, you
need to move on and let it go.
I
SPEAKER_05 (21:50):
didn't.
You didn't know back then?
I didn't know any of thesethings, and they're all coming
together at this moment.
So yes, she had visited him,left.
He had called her family, andher father got on the phone and
told him to stop calling.
Wow.
Nobody knew any of that.
SPEAKER_02 (22:07):
Sure.
SPEAKER_05 (22:07):
But according to the FBI report, the reason she went
home earlier, she said he wassexually violent.
That he tried to pressure herand it got violent.
SPEAKER_03 (22:18):
Oh, my God.
So she
SPEAKER_05 (22:19):
got on a plane and came home.
SPEAKER_03 (22:20):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (22:21):
She called her parents.
I think they got her to a hoteland they got her on a flight.
Wow.
So it was actually prettyserious.
Okay.
And the sad thing is, you know,when my friends were hearing the
story, they didn't know any ofthat.
Sure.
They thought that maybe shedidn't have a good time or
whatever and just broke up withhim.
UNKNOWN (22:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (22:36):
But the fact that he then continued to call her and
her family, and no wonder herdad told him to stop.
So it's a very scary situationfor her and her family already.
I can only imagine how
SPEAKER_02 (22:48):
horrible that was.
Right, you have four sisters.
Imagine if somebody was doingthat to her.
It would be awful.
SPEAKER_05 (22:52):
And that, you know, she thought she was going there
because she genuinely thoughtshe liked him.
And then their first encounter,this happens.
That's awful.
He obviously had some issues.
SPEAKER_02 (23:02):
Right.
SPEAKER_05 (23:04):
So that's the background.
Well, he had obsessed about herfor this whole time.
Like a year, you were saying.
I think it's about a year.
And he's continuing to talk tomy friends and wants them to, in
a way, support that he still hashope for this relationship.
SPEAKER_02 (23:21):
And they don't know anything.
And they don't know anything.
They don't know how bad it was.
And so they're
SPEAKER_05 (23:25):
trying to be nice, but also trying to tell him, you
know, just let it go.
So just before we went to thecabin, like a week before...
He had had$13,000 in Bitcoin.
And that is what he wasreferring to when he talked
about the assets.
And if he had saved that, itwould have been worth millions
(23:48):
today.
Back then he had it and it wasworth$13,000.
And that he had bought over theyears.
And so he had taken that moneyand he went on the dark web and
tried to find a website forMurder for Hire.
SPEAKER_02 (24:03):
That's unbelievable.
SPEAKER_05 (24:04):
Which is absolutely insane.
It
SPEAKER_02 (24:07):
still baffles me that there is a dark web that's
actually a real thing.
You know, it sounds soconspiracy theorist.
It sounds old people.
It just but you hear about itenough that it really is there
and bad things happen.
But when you told me that I yourbrain just was like, what?
I don't need like me.
Normal, average mom.
I don't even know how to get onthe dark web.
(24:28):
I don't want to know, but Idon't like as
SPEAKER_05 (24:31):
a, as just a computer aficionado.
I, you know, I've done it.
There's, it's actually just acertain browser that you use.
Okay.
But, um, And there are somethings that aren't bad.
Like MIT has a website on there.
All it is is that everything onthe internet is considered like
indexed.
Meaning when you go to Google,it can find a website from a
(24:52):
search.
But that's only a smallpercentage of the internet.
The majority is unindexed.
Meaning you have to type thespecific URL.
SPEAKER_02 (25:00):
That's the dark web.
You have to know what you'relooking for.
SPEAKER_05 (25:02):
You have to know.
And so people can be verysecretive.
There are websites that are onlyopen at certain times of day.
SPEAKER_03 (25:08):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (25:08):
With certain passwords.
They can...
There's all of these...
Essentially, it becomes thisgreater and greater mystery, and
there's all these conspiracies,but it's something that can only
be accessed by knowing directlinks.
SPEAKER_02 (25:19):
Interesting.
So
SPEAKER_05 (25:19):
you have to go somewhere else to even learn...
SPEAKER_02 (25:21):
That there's a link available.
SPEAKER_05 (25:23):
To something.
SPEAKER_02 (25:23):
You've got to really know what you're looking for.
SPEAKER_05 (25:25):
So what's easily accessible are, like, chat
rooms, and then people in thosechat rooms share information to
get to deeper parts.
SPEAKER_03 (25:34):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (25:34):
That's how...
So...
What Scott does, he goes onthrough here, and the whole
point of the dark web is to tryto be anonymous.
While now it's like aninvestment, initially
cryptocurrency like Bitcoin wasto be anonymous.
When you spend it, it's put intothis, they call it a washing
machine, where it's put in witheveryone else's money, and
people withdraw money.
They're amounts from the pool.
SPEAKER_02 (25:56):
So the money isn't traced back to you.
So you can't trace back to youand what you did with it.
Yeah.
So
SPEAKER_05 (26:00):
that's what he's trying to do to cover his
tracks.
SPEAKER_02 (26:02):
I see.
SPEAKER_05 (26:03):
Well, he finds a website that claims that they do
murder for hiring.
Oh, my God.
And of his$13,000, he spends$12,000.
SPEAKER_02 (26:11):
To kill the girl.
To kill this
SPEAKER_05 (26:13):
girl that he had flown up to California and is
now no longer talking to him.
And even in the FBI report, itsays he briefly dated.
This is very short.
So he agrees, he sends them$12,000 and he uploads a photo
of a tattoo that she had thatwould have been under clothing.
(26:33):
Oh no, I'm sorry, I'm going toback up.
He uploads photos of her and herinformation and he says, send me
a picture of the body with thistattoo.
And everything that he writes,and you can read this in the
report, is very cold andanalytical.
SPEAKER_02 (26:50):
And that's what I wanted you to bring up was I
remembered you telling me somethings that were very robotic
and strange in histransactional, very
transactional writing.
SPEAKER_05 (27:02):
The big one that he wrote was that when the father
called him and told him to stopcalling, he said, consider this
matter closed.
And that's...
SPEAKER_02 (27:12):
That was his code for I'm going to have to murder.
And
SPEAKER_05 (27:13):
that was also what he said.
later in an email with thepotential hitman.
SPEAKER_02 (27:19):
Okay, so he goes on the dark web.
He searches for murder for hire.
He finds somebody who says,
SPEAKER_05 (27:25):
I'll do it.
I'll do it.
He pays them the money and hesays, I want evidence.
I want you to show me a pictureof her corpse.
And then this identifyingtattoo, which I think was
obviously used against him.
The fact that he very clearlysaid, wanted her dead and he
wanted proof of her death.
And he
SPEAKER_02 (27:44):
wrote
SPEAKER_05 (27:44):
it.
And he wrote this down.
SPEAKER_02 (27:46):
Oh my God.
SPEAKER_05 (27:47):
What this website was, was not murder for hire.
They were scammers and gray areado-gooders in that what they did
is they took his money.
SPEAKER_02 (27:57):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (27:57):
But then they send a tip to a newspaper in
California.
SPEAKER_02 (28:00):
It wasn't directly to the FBI.
SPEAKER_05 (28:02):
No.
SPEAKER_02 (28:03):
So what they
SPEAKER_05 (28:04):
do is they would bait people into giving them
money and then they would tellthem, but they keep the money.
SPEAKER_02 (28:11):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (28:12):
So, you know, you can have your opinion on that,
but it's just an interestingthing
SPEAKER_02 (28:15):
they did.
I didn't know that.
SPEAKER_05 (28:16):
So they reported it to a newspaper who immediately
called the FBI.
SPEAKER_02 (28:21):
Oh.
SPEAKER_05 (28:21):
So the FBI poses as the people from this website.
SPEAKER_02 (28:25):
So they worked with the dark web people.
SPEAKER_05 (28:28):
Or
SPEAKER_02 (28:29):
they set up their own.
The
SPEAKER_05 (28:29):
people who are on the dark web, like, disappeared.
UNKNOWN (28:32):
Disappeared.
SPEAKER_05 (28:33):
The FBI obviously is incredible because somehow they
were able to get in andimpersonate the people he was
talking with without making himaware.
SPEAKER_02 (28:41):
Without showing any difference in communication or
anything.
They
SPEAKER_05 (28:46):
had no access to the group that took the money.
SPEAKER_02 (28:49):
Okay.
SPEAKER_05 (28:50):
So the FBI couldn't find that group.
SPEAKER_02 (28:53):
Oh, interesting.
But
SPEAKER_05 (28:53):
they found, they got in communication with Scott.
So what they do is they say,yes, we'll do it.
they went out to her family andwarned her and her parents and
they staged her as a dead bodyshe had to dress up and they had
to stage a photo of the tattoo
SPEAKER_01 (29:13):
to make it
SPEAKER_05 (29:14):
look like she died I thought how incredibly horrific
is what they had to do and theysent it to him and they said you
know if you want If you want theproof, you'll have to send us an
additional$1,000.
The other$1,000.
Oh, okay.
Or it was like$1,000 or$2,000.
It was a portion of the money.
So he agrees.
And they got him.
(29:35):
He worked really hard to beanonymous, but he was dumb in
the end.
They said they wanted it througha money transfer through Wells
Fargo or something.
And an FBI agent arranged ameeting with him.
I saw the security photo.
He goes, he buys this moneyorder, and then he meets the FBI
(29:59):
agent.
Oh my God.
And then they take him in.
SPEAKER_02 (30:01):
They arrested him right then on the spot.
Oh my God, I had no idea.
SPEAKER_05 (30:04):
And he had written to the Murder for Hire people
all these very cold and negativethings about women.
And I thought it was reallyfunny.
A female FBI agent was the onethat did all this and caught
him.
SPEAKER_02 (30:14):
It was a female agent?
You can read
SPEAKER_05 (30:16):
her report.
And she totally took him downfrom start to finish.
SPEAKER_02 (30:20):
Wow.
Wow.
SPEAKER_05 (30:21):
So.
SPEAKER_02 (30:23):
So I remember vaguely you came home and, or
after that trip, you know, whenyou were telling me this and I
was like, oh my God, you sleptin a house.
SPEAKER_05 (30:32):
Yeah, just a few rooms down.
SPEAKER_02 (30:33):
With a guy who was plotting murder.
SPEAKER_05 (30:37):
Actively.
SPEAKER_02 (30:38):
In the moment.
Yeah.
And.
Your intuition from moment onewas, I don't like this guy.
There's something off about him.
But I remember we haddiscussions about how we justify
our feelings or we don't want tohurt people's feelings.
And this happens a lot.
This happens to people and thenthey get victimized that we feel
(30:58):
funny about somebody, but wedon't want to be rude or they're
friends of a friend.
So we're like, ah, it's just meor, oh, I'm just being
judgmental or whatever.
Well, we have to remember thatwe were programmed to be
judgmental.
And I don't mean that in anegative, nasty way, but we
judge every single day.
Do I take that road or thatroad?
(31:18):
Do I walk down that alleyway ornot?
Do I go to this bank or thatbank or that restaurant?
Like our brain is constantlyjudging our body.
You knew you had vibes aboutthis guy when it was literally
just online.
And then you stayed in a housewith him.
God only knows what else he wascapable of.
SPEAKER_05 (31:37):
Well, certainly, or what else he was doing at the
time.
SPEAKER_02 (31:40):
What was he doing down there for all those hours?
Who knows?
He's probably searching aroundfor somebody to kill this girl.
Can
SPEAKER_05 (31:46):
you
SPEAKER_02 (31:46):
imagine that?
Did you tell me the FBI waswatching that house?
They knew where he was at thattime?
SPEAKER_05 (31:50):
I think they later said because what happens is he
paid.
SPEAKER_04 (31:54):
And
SPEAKER_05 (31:55):
then he went on that trip.
So it's hilarious.
He's kicking back.
He's eating, he's drinking, he'splaying, he's having fun.
Thinking she's going to go getmurdered.
While he's anticipating, waitingfor the confirmation she's been
murdered.
Can you imagine if you had theintent to murder someone that
you, like, you'd think that'd bewhen you're most on edge.
But he was the most relaxed he'dever been.
SPEAKER_02 (32:14):
Oh my God, that's bone chilling.
bone chilling.
And I remember when you weretelling me this, I kept
thinking, you guys are so luckythe FBI didn't like come knock
down the door or that he didn'thurt one of you guys.
I don't know.
There was just so many thoughtsgoing through my mind that now.
So fast forward, he's, he's beenin prison.
(32:35):
He's almost about to get out ofprison.
And, and you guys never wrotecharacter letters.
SPEAKER_05 (32:41):
So I do want to say one further thing is that dad
didn't write the characterletter.
UNKNOWN (32:46):
Um,
SPEAKER_05 (32:47):
He has a second charge, and I think it was
dropped because he pled guilty,but he attempted to influence
witnesses from jail with money.
He was having people called,including Daz, and offered money
to write more of those characterwitnesses or provide him an
alibi.
And they caught him through thephone calls.
And again, he thought he was sosmart, but he was dumb in the
(33:09):
end.
But yeah, he continued.
So what this proves to me isthat when he's caught, He
doesn't even feel guilty.
SPEAKER_02 (33:16):
No.
SPEAKER_05 (33:16):
He was trying to orchestrate a way to get out of
jail while in jail.
SPEAKER_02 (33:21):
What's even scarier beyond that is he gets out next
year.
SPEAKER_05 (33:24):
And that's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_02 (33:25):
He only got five years, right?
He got five years plus he hadbeen in prison for a year
waiting trial.
So
SPEAKER_05 (33:31):
I, yeah, he was in prison starting in...
SPEAKER_02 (33:35):
So if our editing is a little bit weird...
right in this spot and ourenergy seems different.
Full transparency, we just hadto pause to call the police and
the neighbor was yellinghorrifically at a little girl
the same age as my youngestdaughter and saying things I
(33:59):
could never imagine saying to achild.
And this isn't the first timethat they've had the police
called on them.
And so while it feels awful tocome back and continue
recording, unfortunately, thepolice talked to the family and
the little girl and we heardeverything through the screen
(34:22):
and they decided to leave.
So there's a lot of feelingsgoing on right now because we're
really worried about this littlegirl.
It's not the first time.
And I really hate for her tobecome a statistic as we're
sitting here talking about truecrime.
So we're a little shaken.
Anyway, we're going to finishthe story about Scott.
(34:43):
Just know that our energy isdifferent for that reason.
And if we find out anything,hopefully that the little girl
gets some help, we would update.
So I think where we were leavingoff was when I was commenting
that Scott only got five years,but he was, if I understand
(35:04):
correctly, in prison already fora year, awaiting trial and all
of that.
So he's potentially going to getout next year.
He's being held in California,correct?
SPEAKER_05 (35:13):
Yes, I understand he's in federal prison.
They charge it as a federalcrime because it was over the
internet, so it's consideredcrossing state lines.
SPEAKER_03 (35:21):
Oh, okay.
SPEAKER_05 (35:22):
And so it was a Some of the state penalties for even
attempted murder for hire aremuch higher, but the federal
one's a little lower.
Oh,
SPEAKER_01 (35:31):
that's right.
And
SPEAKER_05 (35:32):
I did some research on that.
I also heard, I can't speak tothe absolute validity of this
with my friends, that Scott'sfamily are fairly wealthy and
they were able to hire some bigHollywood attorney that has
defended some other people inthe area.
SPEAKER_02 (35:49):
So to help get some lesser charges, maybe.
And
SPEAKER_05 (35:51):
they got the charge down a lot.
I think I wanted to include.
SPEAKER_02 (35:58):
While you're looking that up, didn't you find out
something about murder for hirehere in Arizona where we live?
SPEAKER_05 (36:04):
Yeah.
In the state of Arizona, if itactually is carried out, it's a
capital crime for both theperson who paid and both the
person who committed
SPEAKER_02 (36:14):
the murder.
So we still have the deathpenalty in Arizona.
SPEAKER_05 (36:17):
Yeah.
Yeah.
You know, while a lot of crimesdon't carry a mandatory capital
sentence, it's one of the veryfew, at least in the state of
Arizona, that does.
SPEAKER_02 (36:26):
That's interesting.
I
SPEAKER_05 (36:27):
think it's considered much higher than a
normal order because it's likean even added layer of
premeditation.
SPEAKER_02 (36:32):
Sure.
Because you have your crime ofpassion where you kill somebody
because you snapped, which iswhat I think happened with Jan,
the person in our Spokane house.
And then premeditated, you'remaking a plan.
But to go through to findsomebody else to hide...
your crime, to do your crime foryou and pay for it is a next
level sinister.
(36:54):
I
SPEAKER_05 (36:54):
think absolutely.
You know, they say that, uh,here in the, from a public
information officer from the FBIand the central district of
California, it reads quote,Burkitt's crime was not a
momentary lapse in judgment, buta premeditated plot to kill the
victim because she rejected hisadvances.
Prosecutors argued and sent in asentencing memorandum.
(37:16):
While attempting to take a lifeis serious enough, Burkett's
chosen method of carrying outthe crime, using the dark web to
hire a hitman andcryptocurrency, speak to his
sophistication, meticulousplanning, and attempts to
anonymize his illegal conduct inthe commission of this offense,
and are aggravating in nature.
So here the prosecution isarguing that specifically
(37:41):
because of all the steps hetook, it proves that it was Such
an advanced crime.
Yeah.
And they're saying aggravatingfor the sake of his sentencing,
even though it was reduced.
SPEAKER_02 (37:52):
But he only got five years.
That's insane.
Because it was California,correct?
SPEAKER_05 (37:56):
Yeah, it was California.
SPEAKER_02 (37:58):
And they're very different with crime and
punishment there.
We are from California and gladI don't live there anymore.
Wow, that's scary.
So the family of
SPEAKER_05 (38:09):
the girl and her parents...
I felt since I first learnedabout the true nature of the
case that the saddest thing washer and the life that she must
be living now, especially thathe's getting out next year.
Right.
SPEAKER_02 (38:23):
How's she ever going to feel safe?
SPEAKER_05 (38:24):
How would you ever feel safe knowing this happened
to you?
And then worse off that theoffender is free.
And he could
SPEAKER_02 (38:30):
do it again.
In
SPEAKER_05 (38:31):
a very short time.
SPEAKER_02 (38:32):
And I know that you guys have thought about you guys
as friends, quote unquotefriends, staying in that house
with him on the coast and alsonot writing letters.
SPEAKER_05 (38:41):
No one did.
SPEAKER_02 (38:42):
No one did.
That if this guy is as sick ashe seems to be, not to be
dramatic, but he couldabsolutely be angry at you all.
SPEAKER_05 (38:52):
I think so.
SPEAKER_02 (38:52):
At least at the people that he asked to write
letters for him.
SPEAKER_05 (38:56):
I'm most worried for Daz, who's my brother-in-law,
because Scott is specificallycontacted him as the one to
write the letter and in a laterphone call after finding out
this information Daz had torefuse to his father to do it
and when he was trying tosolicit people to change the
story he tried to contact Dazand Daz ignored the call
SPEAKER_02 (39:19):
wow that's really scary
SPEAKER_05 (39:20):
and going back to what he said at the breakfast
thing this is a man who claimsif
SPEAKER_02 (39:26):
I believe it's true if I
SPEAKER_05 (39:27):
believe that I'm not committing a crime or that the
crime is somehow worthwhile oris beneficial, I don't feel any
guilt.
And I believe that's why he wasable to be so relaxed that day.
He was able to do what hewanted.
SPEAKER_02 (39:39):
Because he thought he wasn't committing a crime.
He thought he had validatingreasons to kill this girl.
SPEAKER_05 (39:44):
I also believe that in his mind, because it was
murder for hire, because itwasn't his hand, he had no
guilt, that it was black andwhite like that in a way that no
one else would think.
SPEAKER_02 (39:53):
God, that's scary.
That's really, really scary.
Well, I really hope that...
I don't know.
I don't know what I hope.
I obviously hope he doesn't dothis to anybody else.
I hope everyone's safe.
I hope his family keeps an eyeon him or somebody does, or, you
know, I, I don't know becausefive years is not enough,
especially if here over theborder in Arizona, that's a
(40:15):
capital offense.
He'd be on death row right now.
SPEAKER_05 (40:16):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (40:17):
But because it's California, he's out next year.
I
SPEAKER_05 (40:20):
would say it just is federal, even though it's in
SPEAKER_02 (40:22):
a.
Oh yeah.
Yeah.
That's right.
That's right.
That's right.
SPEAKER_05 (40:24):
But yeah.
Had he, Say he had found someonein Arizona and paid them in
person.
That's what the crime
SPEAKER_02 (40:31):
is.
Thank you for clarifying.
You're right.
I'm wrong.
Federal.
So federal is less than anyway.
But...
SPEAKER_05 (40:37):
Ew.
It just...
It's absolutely terrifying.
You never know.
Yeah.
You don't know how people aregoing to act.
And like you said earlier, itwas this thought of someone who,
from the very beginning, felt,you know...
Off.
Off.
Made...
Vague comments that weresomewhat concerning.
And everybody tried to give hima pass.
(40:57):
And it actually, in a way,facilitated this crime.
He
SPEAKER_02 (41:01):
was talking
SPEAKER_05 (41:01):
about the girl.
SPEAKER_02 (41:03):
Oh, my God.
And you guys unknowingly,unknowingly.
That's really scary.
And you guys still talk about itsometimes to this day.
It comes up, right?
More like we can't believe wewere in this.
SPEAKER_05 (41:14):
When it comes up, they won't even say his name.
They don't like, you know, theycall him Voldemort from
SPEAKER_02 (41:19):
the guy who will not be named
SPEAKER_05 (41:20):
because he's the guy who won't be named.
Like, they don't want to say hisname.
I mean, to my friends, theydeleted that whole thing,
started a new chat and said hedoesn't even deserve to be named
again.
even though they had beenfriends with him for years.
I mean, it was so clear cut.
The evidence was, there was nodoubt.
I think that's why he ultimatelyhad to plead guilty.
He
SPEAKER_02 (41:40):
was caught red handed by the FBI.
With it all in writing.
Let me ask, Wyatt was theclosest one to him.
Wyatt pretty much brought himinto the group.
Looking back, does Wyattremember having any, any vibe,
any instinct?
Was he just trying to be nice orwas he oblivious to it all?
SPEAKER_05 (41:55):
I don't remember exactly.
I know I asked them in a group,maybe not Wyatt specifically,
um, I was like, I just alwaysthought, I had a hard time with
it.
I didn't know why you guys
SPEAKER_02 (42:04):
kind of gave him a pass.
What'd they say?
SPEAKER_05 (42:06):
And yeah, they just thought he was a little weird.
And they said that he hadstarted the group, so they felt
like they couldn't kick him outof his own thing.
SPEAKER_02 (42:13):
And it would be mean to go start your own.
And
SPEAKER_05 (42:16):
everyone tries to be nice.
SPEAKER_02 (42:17):
Sure, sure.
I think most of us try to benice.
But lesson there, listen to yourgut.
Yeah.
Listen to your gut.
SPEAKER_05 (42:24):
And I also feel I'm like, man, how can I blame that
girl for going to visit him whenI went to a cabin and visited
the same guy?
SPEAKER_02 (42:31):
That's a really great point because a lot of
people do victim shame.
SPEAKER_05 (42:36):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (42:37):
Girls shouldn't have been wearing this or they
shouldn't put themselves in thatsituation.
SPEAKER_05 (42:40):
Especially meeting people online.
SPEAKER_02 (42:42):
Absolutely.
But.
I value that you as a man justsaid that you literally went and
stayed in a cabin with peopleyou didn't know.
SPEAKER_05 (42:50):
Yeah.
SPEAKER_02 (42:51):
So you can't shame her.
And no one deserves this.
Even if they put themselves in abad situation, no one deserves
to have this happen to them.
SPEAKER_05 (43:00):
And that's what I think.
I think in a way in our modernworld, you'll probably meet
people online.
We're
SPEAKER_02 (43:07):
going to have to.
Yeah.
SPEAKER_05 (43:08):
It's the way that things are going.
SPEAKER_02 (43:11):
We work with people online.
We do meetings online.
We, you know, companies now haveemployees all over the world.
SPEAKER_05 (43:17):
Yeah.
I'm like one.
I wouldn't have met my wife ifnot through the exact same
circumstances that I met Scott.
SPEAKER_02 (43:23):
So lesson is trust your gut.
SPEAKER_05 (43:26):
I think so.
SPEAKER_02 (43:27):
I think ultimately that's all you have.
Trust your gut.
And don't push it down.
Don't ignore it.
Don't justify it or rationalizeit away if something or someone
doesn't feel right.
And this goes back to less truecrime and more of my spiritual
side of all is not lost is youhave this internal compass.
You're born with it.
Stop ignoring it.
When you're little, people tellyou to ignore it or, oh, that's
(43:49):
not real or don't worry aboutthat.
But you feel something inside.
You need to listen because it'sthere for a reason.
SPEAKER_05 (43:55):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02 (43:56):
well thank you for sharing that story i um it's
hard not to say goodbye now witha yucky feeling uh especially
with why we had to pause theshow for a minute but also the
story itself is terrible thankgod the girl is alive and
SPEAKER_05 (44:15):
with her family
SPEAKER_02 (44:16):
yep and that those gray hat people on the dark web
um We're able to tell the newsand and hopefully there's more
people out there that do thingslike that, because I guess
there's never going to be ashortage of psychos that want to
do things like this.
So we need the people who stopthem.
SPEAKER_05 (44:34):
Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02 (44:34):
And the FBI agent, thank her for playing the part
and taking down this guy.
Good on her.
Wow, that's a little bit heavy.
I feel a little bit icky rightnow.
But thank you for being back inthe studio with me.
I love doing shows with you andI hope we can do more.
I know we have some more topicswe want to cover together and I
hope to see you back soon.
SPEAKER_05 (44:57):
Thank you.
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