Episode 269

In April of 2009, 17-year-old Brittanee Drexel went to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for spring break. On the evening before she planned to return home, Brittanee went missing. Her disappearance remained unsolved for over a decade. Thirteen years would go by before Myrtle Beach Police and the FBI could determine that Brittanee had crossed paths with a monster.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence, and is
not intended for all audiences.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
Listener discretion is advised.

Speaker 3 (00:14):
This is the case you warn people about.

Speaker 4 (00:16):
It's your child walking down the street and being snatched
up by someone with malevolent homicidal proclivities.

Speaker 1 (00:28):
It's a Sword and Scale summer again, Go get your hat.
This is season eleven, episode two hundred and sixty nine
of Sword and Scale, a show that reveals that the
worst monsters are real. Didn't think I was going to

(01:09):
get those words in. Did you see a professional broadcaster
always HiT's their post. By the way, we don't do
this very often, but if you're in search for a
new app, check out the iHeartRadio app. These guys have
been really, really kind to us, even though we're canceled,
Super based, and they're actually the largest podcast network in

(01:30):
the world. Like two decades ago, they went around buying
every radio station in America, so there's lots of stuff
there that's exclusive iHeartRadio. So yeah, go check out their app.
Also check out our app at Sword and Scale dot com,
available in iOS and android varieties. Alongside the eastern edge

(02:13):
of South Carolina is a sixty mile strip of sand
and Ocean. This long stretch of beach is known as
the Grand Strand, and right in the middle of it
is the resort city of Myrtle Beach. I'm sure you've
heard of it. Myrtle Beach is mostly known for being
a destination for tourists. It's a vacation spot with golf courses,

(02:35):
beachfront boardwalks, huge arcades, an amusement park in one of
America's tallest ferris wheels. But for young adults, perhaps the
most attractive thing about Myrtle Beach is the nightlife. When
the sun goes down, the city offers karaoke bars, beach bars,

(02:56):
live music venues, nightclubs, and all the riff raft that
comes with it. For this reason, many college students in
America make Myrtle Beach their preferred destination for spring break.
Woo who Well, there is plenty of fun to be
had in Myrtle Beach. The city also has a dark side.

(03:18):
Like any other popular vacation spot, there's no shortage of crime,
and most of that crime is dealt with by the
Myrtle Beach Police Department. Back in April of twenty twenty two,
several police investigators in Myrtle Beach, along with a few
FBI agents questioned a middle aged woman named Angel Voss.

Speaker 5 (03:41):
During the course of.

Speaker 6 (03:41):
Our investigation, we were able to inters conversation, So.

Speaker 5 (03:46):
I'm gonna do it. I'm going to read to you
a couple of quotes, because if you try to accuse
you anything, then I'm happily involved it.

Speaker 7 (03:53):
Do I say, I think he didn't know I'm here.
That's what that was. I'm strike, we just know. I'm
straightforward to I don't think you did, and you're not
very involved in it. I was, yeah, I'm not with
you yet me, you know, I know.

Speaker 1 (04:13):
Shortly after investigators began asking their questions, Angel became very
upset and hurried out of the interview room. These questions
the investigators were asking related to a thirteen year old
cold case that was first opened in April of two
thousand and nine.

Speaker 3 (04:31):
Jon, I'm going to take.

Speaker 8 (04:31):
You back in time, back around April twenty second to
twenty third of two thousand and nine. I'm in not
a young individual named Britney Drexel. She's seventeen years of
age from Rochester.

Speaker 7 (04:41):
New York.

Speaker 8 (04:41):
The scientist she wants to come to Myrtle Beach around
the spring great time around in April with a group
of friends of hers from Rochester, she came and arrived
and had a good time for the most part.

Speaker 1 (04:51):
In April of two thousand and nine, seventeen year old
Britney Drexel drove to Myrtle Beach with two of her
girlfriends for spring break. On the night before they planned
a return to Rochester, Brittany went missing and the local
police were quickly notified. As part of the investigation, Brittany's
eighteen year old boyfriend, John Greco was questioned by police.

Speaker 9 (05:15):
Talk to me about about her.

Speaker 10 (05:17):
Well, we we have put up and down, but.

Speaker 9 (05:23):
Overall we were really a really good.

Speaker 11 (05:25):
Sat relationship, even though we argued and everything else. And
hurl law right, I mean I helped over the house,
I believe, and dinner with it.

Speaker 9 (05:38):
She talks about going to college. Yeah, she coming iron
and I mean to go through a computer she was
looking at work at HOS.

Speaker 1 (05:50):
Brittany Drexel was born on October seventh, nineteen ninety one,
and she had two younger half siblings. All of them
were raised Bytney's mother, Dawn and her adoptive dad, Chad.
The Drexel family lived in a middle class suburb of Rochester,
New York. Throughout her life, Brittany dealt with a condition

(06:11):
known as persistent hyperplastic primary vitreous. I think I said
that right. It's a mouthful, but in short, Brittany was
blind in her right eye, and she often wore contact
lenses to mask the fact that one of her eyes
would sometimes wander. By two thousand and nine, Brittany was

(06:33):
in her junior year at Gates Chile High School, where
she played soccer and loved it. With her senior year
just around the corner, Brittany was starting to think about college.
She planned to continue dating John Greco and hopefully attend
nursing school in whatever area John ended up going to college.

(06:55):
In April of that year, Brittany's high school let out
for spring break, and Brittany told John that she was
planning a vacation to Myrtle Beach with friends. She invited
John to go with them, but John's work schedule didn't
make that possible. When Brittany told her mom about her
vacation plans, Don Drexel quickly shut those plans down.

Speaker 12 (07:17):
She asked me if she could go and I told
her no, and she asked me why. I said, because
I don't know the kids you're going with. I don't
there's no parental supervision, and something's going to happen.

Speaker 1 (07:28):
Understandably, don Drexel wasn't about to let her seventeen year
old daughter drive down to Myrtle Beach without any adults.
That would be stupid. This led to a heated argument
between her and Brittany that ended up with Brittany storming
out of the house.

Speaker 9 (07:47):
I picked up her house that she's gone with.

Speaker 5 (07:52):
It was a huge argument if.

Speaker 11 (07:55):
She actually ran away from her house, and I think
she's really.

Speaker 9 (08:01):
She said, I'm going to Myrtle. I don't care what
my parents say.

Speaker 11 (08:04):
I'm going. I agree that you need a break because
her family life is terrible. It's absolutely he worked.

Speaker 9 (08:13):
I've seen this all. My mom has been going off
without a year. Yes, her and her mom never really
saw I.

Speaker 11 (08:23):
That I've known her, and that's typical her, Okay, but
it was a little bit more sting because her.

Speaker 13 (08:31):
Hands are going to divorce. I mean, I'm not saying
to show anybody under the bus with his parents because
your parents really don't care about her. Obviously, it's all
going through a difficult time too, you know.

Speaker 9 (08:41):
Oh everything is.

Speaker 1 (08:44):
Don and Chad Drexel were in the middle of a
divorce and Brittany was having an especially hard time dealing
with the whole thing. Her boyfriend John was aware of that,
so he encouraged Brittany to go down to Myrtle Beach,
clear her head, have some fun and just relax. So
Brittany lied to her mom and told her that she

(09:05):
would be spending spring break at a friend's house in Rochester.
Then Brittany linked up with two of her girlfriends and
the three of them made the fourteen hour drive to
Myrtle Beach.

Speaker 14 (09:17):
How did she end up coming down here with you, folks?

Speaker 15 (09:20):
She was originally supposed to go with another group of guys,
and then one of them veiled out to have enough
money and the other she didn't have cars, so and
then she like asked to come with us.

Speaker 5 (09:37):
When did you get here?

Speaker 16 (09:41):
Thursday?

Speaker 17 (09:42):
Around like nine time in the morning.

Speaker 11 (09:46):
Okay, and model until yesterday.

Speaker 14 (09:51):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (09:52):
Brittany and her friends stayed at the Bar Harbor Motel.
But these two friends were more acquaintances to Brittany than
anything else. The three of them had partied with each
other before, but they weren't exactly close, and they didn't
stick together during the time at the beach. Instead, Brittany
met up with different friends from Rochester while she was there.

(10:15):
On the night before Brittany planned to return home, she
left her hotel to meet up with these other friends.
As she did this, Brittany was wearing a pair of
shorts that didn't belong to her.

Speaker 15 (10:26):
Okay earlier and on to get her say, and then
I was like, I'm my breast were fire farms to
war the other night?

Speaker 17 (10:33):
She said, she went job there.

Speaker 16 (10:40):
We were in a field.

Speaker 1 (10:42):
Brittany received a text message from her friend asking her
to return the shorts she was wearing. Brittany agreed to
come back to their hotel to drop them off, but
Brittany never made it there.

Speaker 17 (10:53):
No, so then we weren't down there.

Speaker 14 (10:55):
She wasn't there.

Speaker 15 (10:56):
Be how text messages of the night she never came
back to, or maybe that she'd come back in the
morning she went out with company.

Speaker 1 (11:05):
After Brittany was reported missing, Myrtle Beach detectives were able
to confirm that Brittany did arrive at and then leave
the Blue Water Resort hotel. Which was where her other
Rochester friends were staying. The surveillance camera in the lobby
captured Brittany walking in and then a few moments later

(11:26):
walking out. Presumably Brittany was on her way back to
her own hotel to drop off the shorts.

Speaker 8 (11:33):
We know when she leaves the Blue Water because at
eight forty eight pm we get to see mister Exel
leaves the Blue Water and we know she's perfectly fine
at that time, and that's the last time that we
get to lay eyes on the the Brittany DRUGSLM.

Speaker 1 (11:48):
The surveillance footage from the Bluewater Resort Hotel was the
last known sighting of Brittany. From that point, nobody seemed
to know where she went or why she never arrived
back at her hotel. That surveillance footage was captured on
the evening of April twenty fifth, two thousand and nine.

(12:10):
It would take Myrtle Beach investigators and the FBI thirteen
years to determine what happened after Brittany left the Blue
Water Resort hotel. In April of twenty twenty two, these
authorities revealed to Brittany's family and the public that when

(12:30):
Brittany left the hotel, she had the horrible misfortune of
crossing paths with a monster. In April of two thousand

(13:24):
and nine, seventeen year old Brittany Drexel was vacationing in
Myrtle Beach, South Carolina for spring break. Brittany was from Rochester,
New York shout out WATP, and she had traveled to
Myrtle Beach with two girlfriends even though her mom had
forbidden Brittany from going there. Brittany's boyfriend, John Greco, stayed

(13:44):
in Rochester because he had to work that week, but
he was in constant contact with Brittany while she was
in South Carolina. The couple texted each other continuously, according
to John. As spring break was winding down, Brittany reflected
on her vacation and realized that she really hadn't enjoyed herself.
She felt isolated by her friends and was eager to

(14:07):
come home.

Speaker 11 (14:08):
She said that she really wasn't wrong because I wasn't
found there with them. She said that she really looking a.

Speaker 9 (14:15):
Lot and that her friends would being terrible to her.
The friend that she came downdy coming down.

Speaker 1 (14:24):
During her time at Myrtle Beach, Brittany separated from the
girls she traveled with and linked up with other friends
from Rochester who were also vacationing there. On the night
before Brittany planned to return home, she walked about a
mile from her hotel to the Blue Water Resort hotel,
where these other friends were staying. But after she got there,

(14:45):
Brittany was called back to her hotel to return a
pair of shorts.

Speaker 8 (14:49):
There was a discussion about wearing a pair of black
shorts that another friend of hers was going to wear
that night, and then she needed to get back to the.

Speaker 3 (14:55):
Bar harbor to take those shorts backs or a friend
could wear them.

Speaker 8 (14:59):
We know this also because fortunately, I'm like so many
teenagers in this eight age.

Speaker 3 (15:05):
She loves to use her cell phone and she loves
a text message.

Speaker 1 (15:08):
Brittany walked along the Myrtle Beach strip back towards her hotel,
all the while she was texting her boyfriend, but their
text exchanges abruptly stopped. Brittany was no longer responding the last.

Speaker 9 (15:24):
I patched back and forth where her coming. She hated
it down there. She excremely avid her friend that.

Speaker 5 (15:32):
She was really outrack.

Speaker 9 (15:34):
So I touched her you know, be right, one more
data to good night.

Speaker 8 (15:40):
Her last text message acknowledges that she's on the way
back to the hotel and she's going to see him
for the night because she's going back to Rochester the
next day.

Speaker 3 (15:48):
That's the last.

Speaker 8 (15:48):
Electronic communication we know of family and friends. Within seven
to fifteen minutes, right away realized because she used her
phone so much that.

Speaker 3 (15:57):
That she wasn't communicating. They became concerned and wored about it.

Speaker 8 (16:00):
And the text message continue and continue, Brittany, where are you?

Speaker 3 (16:04):
Are you okay? Are you okay? She never responds.

Speaker 1 (16:08):
After about an hour of waiting for Brittany to respond,
John decided to tell Brittany's mom that he couldn't reach her.
At the time, Don Drexel didn't know that Brittany was
six states away in South Carolina. As far as she knew,
Brittany was spending the weekend at a nearby friend's house
in Rochester.

Speaker 12 (16:27):
We didn't find out that she was there until Saturday
evening when I got a phone call you know stating
that from John Greco that her which is her boyfriend,
stating that she was in South Carolina and that they
couldn't find her.

Speaker 1 (16:44):
After don Drexel was told that her daughter was in
Myrtle Beach, she spent the night trying to reach Brittany.
For the first few hours, her phone calls rang several
times before going to voicemail, but eventually they started going
straight to voicemail. This was obviously concerning, especially because Brittany
was known for being glued to her phone. The next morning,

(17:08):
Down and Brittany's boyfriend drove to Myrtle Beach, where they
spoke with local authorities after learning about the strained relationship
between Brittany and her mom. The prominent assumption among investigators
was that Brittany had simply run away, but John Greco
insisted that Brittany wouldn't do that without contacting them.

Speaker 9 (17:29):
She did not run, I think be suld you rule
out a relation to certain in her hand. She could
not not have come with.

Speaker 1 (17:44):
Brittany's boyfriend was concerned that Brittany might have accepted a
ride from someone while walking back to her hotel, and
maybe whoever that someone was had bad intentions. John knew
that Brittany was overly trusting and often impulsive, a very
bad combination, and he feared that she might have gotten

(18:06):
into a car with strangers or a stranger extremely coughing.

Speaker 10 (18:13):
That's what's very new and something offers. They drink and
arrived in for a group of good looking white guys.
They had a nice something and said, hey, you got
all right? We got drinks do here. She did play
very corgized when it.

Speaker 9 (18:33):
Comes to that.

Speaker 1 (18:35):
Shortly after investigators began their search for Brittany, they learned
that John's theory may not have been far fetched. Cell
phone data and cell towers were used to track Brittany's movements.
This data revealed that shortly after Brittany's last text message
to John, her cell phone began moving much faster.

Speaker 8 (18:55):
That phone is moving fifty five to sixty five miles
an hour southbound, heading down towards the pole Yard by
that time, by ten oh one pm, her phone, beyond
any reasonable battle is native to Georgetown.

Speaker 3 (19:07):
We don't know where she is.

Speaker 8 (19:09):
That we make the circumstantial assumption that she is with
her phone, and the phone ultimately comes stationary around around
the Poleyard landing More Santina River area for whatever reason.
At eleven fifty eight PM is the last ping contact
that we have at that phone. After that, all that
source of information is exhausted as a relation to her phone.

Speaker 1 (19:32):
Brittany's phone pinged for the last time off of cell
tower in Georgetown, about forty miles south of Myrtle Beach.
While Georgetown is a city, the particular area of that
cell tower was quite isolated, rural, and extremely swampy. It
was a location where you're likely to find hunters, fishermen,

(19:55):
wild boars, snakes, and giant house flies, all the great
things that make the South the South. It certainly wasn't
a place that a seventeen year old girl on spring
break would likely want a visit. Within twelve hours of
Brittany's disappearance, this isolated area of Georgetown was descended upon

(20:15):
by multiple law enforcement agencies and volunteers. Large search parties
combed through thick brush and waded through alligator infested swamps
in hopes of finding Brittany or at least some sign
of her. Unfortunately, they came up mostly empty handed. The
only thing of note that was ever found was a

(20:38):
pair of knockoff produce sunglasses, which may or may not
have belonged to Brittany.

Speaker 8 (20:44):
Many many volunteer organizations were come in the woods in
the area around the pole yard ran.

Speaker 3 (20:48):
During that period of time, all of.

Speaker 8 (20:51):
Our local law enforcementations, the Sheriff's Apartment, Merby's Police Apartment FBI.

Speaker 3 (20:55):
Were working and searching and hopes that we could turn them.
As the months went by, it became were more concerning.
If there were no concrete ladies to determine where exactly
she went.

Speaker 8 (21:04):
We knew off the phone where we really didn't have
anything else, So the investigation turned a known associates video,
anything we could do to try to find out what happened.

Speaker 1 (21:14):
Investigators eventually turned their attention to the friends that Brittany
met up with at Myrtle Beach Again. Brittany didn't spend
much time with the girlfriends that she shared a hotel with. Instead,
she met with other friends from Rochester who were also
going on spring break. One of these friends was a
young man named Pete Brosowitz.

Speaker 15 (21:37):
I don't know him personally, but I know of him
to Rochester, so.

Speaker 7 (21:40):
He didn't come down with no she When we all
went out.

Speaker 17 (21:44):
I don't remember if it was Thursday or Saturday. He
left us sixth night, and she left everybody she loved
with him.

Speaker 16 (21:52):
He invited her own in her.

Speaker 17 (21:53):
Until I at fires and staff.

Speaker 1 (21:56):
Twenty year old Pete Brosowitz lived in Rochester, New York,
and worked as a nightclub promoter for his parents' company.
He was the kind of guy you might find on
an episode of The Jersey Shore if you watch that
sort of trash. You know the type, spiky gelled hair,
popped collar, overly proud of his bottle of Captain Morgan.

(22:20):
That kind of guy. Pete knew Brittany Drexel, and when
he ran into her at a club at Myrtle Beach,
he seemingly took a lot of interest in her. According
to Brittany's friends, Pete invited her to a VIP area
of the club and feed her drinks. The next day,
Brittany went missing after leaving Pete's hotel room suspiciously. When

(22:42):
the hours of Brittany's disappearance, Pete drove back to Rochester.
He left Myrtle Beach at two o'clock in the morning,
and had seemingly done so in a hurry. Hmm curious.
He left behind belongings and a hotel deposit, so concerning.
As soon as he got back to Rochester, Pete hired

(23:04):
a criminal defense attorney Huh.

Speaker 18 (23:08):
Myrtle Beach police say Peter Brosowitz was one of the
last people to see Britney Drexel before she walked out
of the Bluewater resort and disappeared. Rumors swirled about his behavior,
and Drexel's mother, Dawn, even wrote a letter to our
sister station in Myrtle Beach, questioning if he told police everything.
In the letter, she accuses Brosowitz of going home to
Rochester just hours after Drexel disappeared. She alleges he left

(23:32):
his belongings and a deposit behind and gave multiple stories
about what happened. According to the letter, Brozowitz quickly hired
an attorney and displayed no empathy or concern.

Speaker 19 (23:42):
The letter reads, my daughter.

Speaker 18 (23:44):
Made mistakes, and one of the largest ones she ever
made was when she trusted this group of people with
her life.

Speaker 1 (23:51):
When the police and the media questioned Pete about Brittany's disappearance,
it claimed that the last time he saw he was
when Brittany left his ho tel room.

Speaker 20 (24:01):
The last time I saw her she came up to
our hotel room. We were watching the Yankees Red Sox game,
and she was on the phone arguing with her friend
Jan about returning a pair of shorts. She said, I'll
give you a call later if I want to come
out and party, and she walked out, and that's the
last time I saw her.

Speaker 1 (24:22):
Pete was heavily scrutinized by Brittany's friends, family, and media.
His attitude and personality made him an easy target. Still,
the scrutiny of this young man wasn't completely unjustified. After all,
he gave a seventeen year old girl alcohol, invited her

(24:42):
to his room, and allowed her to walk the Myrtle
Beach Strip by herself. Not exactly a modeled citizen.

Speaker 20 (24:51):
Okay, First of all, I did talk to Brittany about
why she was walking the strip by herself, and earlier
that day, you know, he said, oh, for the last
three nights, I walk by myself.

Speaker 1 (25:03):
Oh, it doesn't bother me.

Speaker 20 (25:04):
I'm fine, I'm like and I'm like, well, I didn't
even go anywhere by myself because it's it's pretty bad
down there.

Speaker 21 (25:12):
I'm not I'm on spring break.

Speaker 20 (25:13):
I'm not there to babysit anybody.

Speaker 1 (25:16):
During his media interviews, Pete didn't do himself any favors.
He came across as arrogant and didn't seem to care
about Britney's well being at all, though he did have
a plausible explanation for why he left Myrtle Beach when
he did.

Speaker 20 (25:32):
As anything, I'm from New York Rochester. It's a you know,
a fourteen fifteen hour drive. We're there for a whole week.
Our checkout time was in the morning, Sunday morning, so
we decided to leave at two o'clock, because why would
you want to leave Sunday in the middle of a
day when it's a tourist town.

Speaker 1 (25:50):
According to Pete, he left Myrtle Beach at two am
simply because he wanted to beat the traffic. Makes sense.
I guess most some of us have done some early
morning driving to beat rush hour, right, but two in
the morning it's a weird time to suddenly pack up
and go. While still keeping an eye on Pete and

(26:12):
attempting to verify or discredit his story, investigators also looked
at several registered sex offenders in the Myrtle Beach area.
As you can imagine, there's quite a few of them.
There was one in particular that caught their attention, though,
forty nine year old Raymond Douglas Moody.

Speaker 22 (26:34):
Now taking a look at Moody's record, he's got quite
a pass. He's a registered sex offender for things that
happened while he was out in California, in which he
was charged with committing a leude act on a minor
under the age of fourteen. He also was charged with
asrodomy with a child under the age of fourteen, rape
and kidnapping to commit rape.

Speaker 23 (26:55):
Now for those charges, he went to prison for twenty years.

Speaker 22 (26:59):
Last August to Georgetown County Police and the South Carolina
Law Enforcement Division searched an apartment did they say that
Moody lived in at or around the time when Brittany
went missing. The apartment was at the Sunset Lodge Hotel
in Georgetown, which is pretty close to the cell phone
tower where Britney's cell phone last and gave off signal.

Speaker 1 (27:17):
Like Pete Brosowitz, Raymond Moody was heavily scrutinized by the
media after being named as a person of interest. In fact,
one reporter went to Moody's work and shoved a camera
in his face. Do you know anything about the missing teenager?

Speaker 24 (27:32):
Well?

Speaker 23 (27:32):
I do not.

Speaker 3 (27:33):
Can you tell us where you were?

Speaker 5 (27:34):
Back in April of nine.

Speaker 10 (27:38):
Good bye.

Speaker 23 (27:39):
Do you know what? Can you go?

Speaker 5 (27:40):
Fine?

Speaker 8 (27:40):
Do you tell us where you were on it?

Speaker 21 (27:41):
Bye?

Speaker 12 (27:42):
April of nine?

Speaker 3 (27:43):
Goodbye?

Speaker 22 (27:44):
Can you say it's a couple pluses?

Speaker 25 (27:47):
Right?

Speaker 3 (27:47):
Can we talk to you for a minute the police?
You better split? Can I got nothing to say?

Speaker 19 (27:54):
Don you understand that?

Speaker 1 (27:56):
In most cases, I'd say it's completely unacceptable for a
news outlet to go to someone's job and put them
on the spot like that. But Ray Moody was a
convicted sex offender that raped a child, so fuck them.
In any event, The police had two potential suspects in

(28:18):
Brasuwitz and Moody, but in both cases they couldn't find
any significant evidence to link either one of them to
Britney's disappearance. Typically, when a teenager goes missing, the truth
about what happened to them comes out pretty quickly. Rarely
these days do these kinds of cases drag on. But

(28:39):
that was unfortunately exactly what happened here. The investigation into
Brittany Drexel's disappearance lasted for years, all the while Brittany's
mom pleaded for her daughter's safe return.

Speaker 12 (28:53):
Please give us back our daughter. I mean, we have
so many people that loved Brittany and her brother and
sister miss her dearly. It hurts me very much when
I see her. Younger brother and sister asked me. You know,
they say, Mommy, please bring Brittany home. We miss her,
we love her. Brittany may be scared. I don't know

(29:16):
what the you know, I don't know what they may
have done. If someone does have her, you know, I
want them to return her home. She's ours and we
need her.

Speaker 1 (29:27):
In June of twenty sixteen, over seven years since Brittany
went missing, investigators seemingly got a break in the case.
A prison inmate and FBI informant in South Carolina came
forward and claimed to know what happened to Britney Drexel.
This informant told investigators that Brittany was abducted and taken

(29:49):
to a drug stash house. Once there, she was raped
and murdered.

Speaker 19 (29:55):
In open court, an FBI agent testifies an informant Salt
and others raped the young girl at a drug stash house,
then she was killed and her body dumped into an
alligator pit.

Speaker 1 (30:08):
According to the FBI, their informant named twenty year old
tim Deshaun Taylor as the culprit behind Brittany's disappearance and murder.
Tim had a criminal history and was arrested in twenty
eleven for acting as a getaway driver for an armed robbery.
He pled guilty to multiple charges and was sentenced to

(30:29):
eighteen years of probation, but these charges were only resolved
in state court. After the informant named Tim accused him
of being responsible for the killing of Brittany Drexel. The
FBI charged Tim federally for the same crime so that
they could arrest him and question him, which is bullshit.

(30:52):
The FBI shouldn't be allowed to do that if you
believe in the constitution. That is, in any event, just
like Pete Broswitz and Raymond Moody before him, the media
dug their claws into Tim DeShawn Taylor, so they.

Speaker 24 (31:08):
Arrested you for this conspiracy. Regarding this prior, he said,
you had already been convicted of a state court. Yes, sir,
And were they asking you about that case?

Speaker 9 (31:16):
Not at all. What were they asking about Britta Drexel?

Speaker 3 (31:20):
Did you find that straining?

Speaker 1 (31:21):
Yes, sir?

Speaker 3 (31:23):
Did you kill Britney Drexel?

Speaker 9 (31:25):
No, sir.

Speaker 24 (31:26):
Were you involved in the kidnapping of Britney Drexel. Were
you with Britney Drexel the nighte she was she disappeared
in April of two thousand and nine.

Speaker 1 (31:37):
No, Sir Tim claimed that before Britney Drexel's disappearance, he
didn't even know who she was and that he had
never been in her presence. He explained that everything he
knew about Brittany came from the authorities and the media.

Speaker 24 (31:54):
You heard the allegations from this informant. He says he
saw you in this stash house sexual assaulting Britney Drexel.
You know, recounts this whole detailed story. What do you
What do you have to say about that story?

Speaker 26 (32:07):
There's not then too much that I can say about
the story. I just think it was not true. It's
very very disorientated.

Speaker 1 (32:15):
Okay, Forrest, why don't you tell us about your chocolates now?

Speaker 24 (32:17):
Anything that you would want to say to the family
of Britney Drexel.

Speaker 9 (32:21):
I would tell him deeply.

Speaker 26 (32:23):
I apologize for their loss, and I sincerely do apologize
for their loss, and I honestly hope that they find
who've done this and give them justice. But I honestly
don't have anything or have any information to help them,
because I honestly don't know anything.

Speaker 1 (32:40):
Tim was unwavering in his denial, and once again, the
authorities were unable to find any significant evidence to charge
him with any crimes related to Britney Drexel. More than
a decade after Britney's disappearance, the case remained unsolved and
quite cold. The Myrtle Beach Police and the FBI still

(33:03):
had no answers for Brittany's mom.

Speaker 20 (33:05):
Because I told them, I said, look, I said, Brittany
didn't just to scare up these there.

Speaker 16 (33:09):
She's down there somewhere. I mean, it's surprising that, you know,
none of the hunters or anything like that during hunting
season ever came.

Speaker 9 (33:17):
Across any remains or anything like that, you know what
I mean.

Speaker 16 (33:22):
I'm just so frustrated. I mean, at this point, it's
just it's.

Speaker 12 (33:26):
Just I want answers, and they better start coming, you know,
because you know, because to me, I mean, you know,
I've been in this for a long.

Speaker 16 (33:35):
Time, right along with you guys.

Speaker 1 (33:38):
Don Drexel was desperate, and who could blame her. Her
daughter left the house one day and never came home,
and nobody seemed to know where she went. Or why
what a nightmare can you imagine? In her desperation and
given the authorities were unable to provide any answers, Dawn

(33:59):
turned to the unorthodox and spoke to several self proclaimed psychics.
One psychic told Down that Brittany was still alive and
that she was being held captive by a clean cut
man in his late twenties.

Speaker 17 (34:13):
She had stated it Britney or when she was reading it.
She says she was randomly targeted. She says there was
a man setting in his chair offering the girls.

Speaker 16 (34:24):
Offering them a joint.

Speaker 17 (34:26):
She had said something about a drugphyut in.

Speaker 27 (34:28):
The drink, but she wasn't.

Speaker 17 (34:29):
Sure if it may have been a mixed drink or
maybe just a coke or something like that.

Speaker 16 (34:35):
She heard what she was instructed.

Speaker 17 (34:38):
He had made it, this gentleman that when she was
talking about Hidney contacts with all three of these girls,
he was watching her out. Okay, he's the young, he
is clean cut, and she looks like he's in the
age of twenty five to twenty eight. She is in
love with her. She doesn't want to hurt her. She

(35:00):
wants to make her his princess.

Speaker 1 (35:03):
I'd like to take this opportunity to say, fuck these people.
If someone wants to play make believe, pretend they have
magic thinking powers and con gullible people out of their money.
Gullible usually broke people, I might add, well, that's just
fucking gross. You're a piece of shit. Do you hear me,

(35:26):
I'm talking to you, psychic, Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know
your magic crystals tell you things. I know you can
hear the voice of your grandfather or some shit. That's
because you're mentally ill. Got it, good, Let's continue. When
you start blatantly lying and giving made up false hope

(35:47):
to desperate parents or suffering some very very real pain,
you've crossed the line of being a swindler, a grifter,
a whatever you want to call it, and now you've
become a full blown, absolute fucking monster. Shame on you

(36:08):
if you even know what that word means. These so
called psychics are sick people with no empathy, and they
should be called out at every fucking turn. Listen to
the desperation in Don Drexel's voice. Listen to the desperation

(36:28):
of this mother who would do anything to find her
missing daughter, and this piece of shit comes by to
grift on that How could anyone listen to that desperation
and decide to take advantage of it. It's just shameless.

Speaker 17 (36:45):
She's a well known, normal person.

Speaker 7 (36:49):
Believe me, I don't believe in but you know why,
you can.

Speaker 16 (36:52):
Give me some powers of my daughter and every single
one that we talked.

Speaker 17 (36:58):
She's alive.

Speaker 7 (37:00):
But I mean are making her? I mean I was
watching her you see before?

Speaker 16 (37:08):
Yeah, and then we're looking into you know, your mother
leaking her you know, I mean, you know I want
to pay her for my yars.

Speaker 7 (37:18):
You had a name, you know.

Speaker 1 (37:21):
For thirteen years, don Drexel did all she could in
hopes of one day being reunited with her daughter. For
thirteen years, she searched relentlessly for answers. Then in April
of twenty twenty two, she finally got some of those answers. Unsurprisingly,

(37:42):
they didn't come from a psychic. They came from the
girlfriend of the murderer. They came from the woman who
was dating Brittany Drexel's killer. By April of twenty twenty two,

(38:26):
thirteen years had passed since seventeen year old Britney Drexel
went missing while on spring break in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
Throughout the investigation, the local police and FBI took a
close look at several potential suspects, one of which was
Pete Brazowitz. Pete was twenty years old when Brittany went missing,

(38:47):
and he was the last person to see her before
she disappeared. Pete garnered a lot of suspicion through his actions.
He left Myrtle Beach within hours of Britney's disappearance, and
had seemingly done so in a hurry, leaving belongings and
a hotel deposit behind. He also hired a criminal defense
attorney when he returned to his home city of Rochester

(39:09):
and New York, and seemed to show no concern for
Britney's well being. Despite all this, authorities did eventually clear
Pete as a potential suspect.

Speaker 18 (39:23):
Myrtle Beach police say Peter Brosowitz was one of the
last people to see Britney Drexel before she walked out
of the Bluewater resort and disappeared, But new emails we
obtained detail why Myrtle Beach police say they eventually cleared him.
Police say it wasn't Brozowitz's decision to go back to Rochester,
and that while he did leave clothes behind, it was

(39:43):
only wet bathing suits on the balcony, and the emails
show they were at a party at Coastal Carolina, all
while Drexel's phone was heading south. Police also found nothing
suspicious in their room or cars. Eventually, authorities announced another
suspect in the case.

Speaker 1 (40:00):
Years later, the FBI began investigating a young man named
Tim DeShawn Taylor, who was named as Brittany's kidnapper and
murderer by an FBI informant. Eventually, it was determined that
this information was not true at all, and Tim had
nothing to do with Britney Drexel at all. Despite this,

(40:23):
the FBI never publicly set the record straight, and a
cloud of suspicion followed Tim for years.

Speaker 19 (40:31):
Tim was never charged in the Drexel case, but for
the next six years, the court of public opinion presumed
he was guilty.

Speaker 21 (40:38):
They wanted so badly for this to be Timothy and
his submedia didn't look for anybody else. It didn't look
for the real killers.

Speaker 19 (40:47):
Britney's father was horrified that the FBI had let them
believe Tim Taylor was responsible for all of these.

Speaker 3 (40:54):
Years the FBI specifically that they killed her.

Speaker 28 (40:58):
This is how they did and she's dead and oh yeah,
by the way, this really didn't happen five years later.

Speaker 1 (41:06):
Think about that one.

Speaker 4 (41:08):
That's where I get heeded?

Speaker 29 (41:11):
Are you?

Speaker 3 (41:11):
And they don't even want to talk about it.

Speaker 1 (41:14):
The accusations that the FBI made about Tim reaked havoc
on Tim's life and the lives of his family members.
But the FBI maintained that they did nothing wrong. And
I mean, let's face it, who do they have to
answer to anyway, So yeah, go fuck yourself.

Speaker 20 (41:34):
It wouldn't really be anything that the FBI would need
to apologize for because we didn't.

Speaker 30 (41:38):
We didn't leak that information.

Speaker 3 (41:40):
We're just exploring a whole investigative.

Speaker 19 (41:42):
They didn't leak the information, They set it in open
chort and never set the record straight, even after dropping
Tim as a suspect.

Speaker 21 (41:50):
If they would take the time, they wouldn't know us
a lot to apologize. We lost livelihood, we lost income,
I lost my job. They blasted us all over the world,
and you just don't do it as somebody will walk away.

Speaker 1 (42:03):
The disappearance of Brittany Drexel had a ripple effect that
devastated countless lives, and for over a decade there was
still no explanation of what happened to her. Then, finally,
in twenty twenty two, Myrtle Beach detectives were able to
crack the case. In April of that year, they were
able to speak to a fifty four year old woman

(42:25):
named Angel Vaz. According to yet another informant, there's lots
of them. I guess maybe everybody's an informant anyway. According
to yet another informant, during a night of heavy drinking,
Angel confessed to killing Brittany.

Speaker 8 (42:44):
A confidential source to come forward to law enforcement and
said that an intoxicated Angel Lass had made shockingly shocking
admissions to them, specifically claiming that she was concerned about
Raymond constantly being accused of things that he didn't do.
As a matter of fact, she knows he didn't do
it because she killed were and Raymond held hid the body.

Speaker 1 (43:03):
Angel Oz was the girlfriend of Raymond Douglas Moody, who
was another potential suspect that the police had not crossed
off their list. Moody was a registered sex offender who
had spent twenty years in prison for raping a child
in California in two thousand and nine, when Britney Drexel
went missing. Moody was living in an apartment not far

(43:26):
from where Brittany's cell phone signal died. After the police
were made aware of the admission that Angel made about Brittany,
they questioned her about them. At least they tried to.

Speaker 6 (43:39):
During the course of our investigation, we were able to
interced conversation between individuals, and these individuals was the person
that was responsible?

Speaker 5 (43:50):
Okay, okay, I saw how I'm gonna do it. I'm
going to read to you a couple of clothes.

Speaker 7 (43:57):
What if you try to accuse you anything involved in
and I say he didn't, Okay, I say he didn't
know about I'm not here, you are. That's what that
was about me. I'm straight No, I'm straightforward to I
don't think you did, and you're not very involved in.

Speaker 9 (44:14):
It with it?

Speaker 7 (44:19):
No, I'm not getting no, please, no, I got no.

Speaker 1 (44:24):
Before investigators could read the admissions that Angel allegedly made
to their informant, Angel stormed out of the interview room.

Speaker 16 (44:33):
No.

Speaker 1 (44:34):
Within minutes, she was convinced to go back inside, and
the questioning continued.

Speaker 7 (44:40):
Yeah, I did say what I see and I was
talking to care and a friend of mine and I
was highly dropping it hour and I drinking and she
kept asking me what he's about Ray and everybody that
I was a king and Ray. So yeah, I did
say nothing. No, I would never heard of anybody. No, no,

(45:01):
don't know, no truth. But I don't know if it
was that night, Like.

Speaker 5 (45:04):
There's no chance of getting an information.

Speaker 7 (45:07):
Don't want to promise you with my children's life. When
I lost the son of the guard, I don't know
where I don't want.

Speaker 1 (45:16):
According to Angel, the only reason she confessed to killing
Brittany was so that people would stop accusing her boyfriend
Raymond Moody. Sounds like a solid plan. Angel claimed that
she had no idea what happened to Brittany, but based
on her earlier admissions, the FBI pursued her and conducted

(45:36):
another search of the apartment that she shared with Moody.
During that search, something interesting happened.

Speaker 8 (45:44):
Nothing ab evidentry value was particularly found in the search
warm and what did happen is there was a face
to face conversation with mister Mudy and that BI agent's
concerning the direction of the investigation and the effort of
building a case towards MISSUS laws based on that, mister
Moody had retained an attorney and agreed to coming to
how to set down discussion with.

Speaker 3 (46:05):
Law enforcement OFSTROS concerning his involvement in.

Speaker 1 (46:07):
That Since the FEDS were pursuing his girlfriend, a now
sixty two year old Raymond Moody finally decided to come clean.
Throughout multiple interviews with authorities, Moody described the night that
he came upon Britney Drexel.

Speaker 3 (46:25):
He told this story.

Speaker 5 (46:27):
The only person I've ever told this story too is
my angel. Never even knew the real story.

Speaker 2 (46:36):
Anyway. Well, I was going down Ocean Boulevard and very
slow driving. I was driving and uh, I'm pretty walking.
She and I saw the jets were working on walking
on the sidewalking. I was smoking pot. She knows that

(46:56):
walked in through the dorm said.

Speaker 30 (46:57):
Something about us.

Speaker 3 (46:58):
I was likely we.

Speaker 10 (47:01):
Yeah, you want some?

Speaker 3 (47:02):
Sure?

Speaker 16 (47:03):
Damn?

Speaker 3 (47:04):
She hopped right in her back.

Speaker 5 (47:06):
Problem.

Speaker 3 (47:08):
Did she asked for a rider? Did you ask her
for and you asked.

Speaker 4 (47:11):
Her if you wanted to ride?

Speaker 2 (47:12):
You remember, I was sure she might required this.

Speaker 3 (47:14):
Okay, She's sure when she had a vehicle with you know,
it was for bad purpose.

Speaker 4 (47:19):
No, not at all.

Speaker 5 (47:20):
Had you even crossed my mind?

Speaker 9 (47:22):
Okay?

Speaker 1 (47:24):
According to Moody, he was driving on the main Myrtle
Beach Strip with his girlfriend Angel, who was in the
passenger seat. The traffic was so bad that night that
they were only moving at a walking pace. Moody claimed
that Brittany noticed them and from the sidewalk jokingly called
them out for smoking pot. When Moody offered Britney some weed,

(47:48):
she willingly climbed into the back seat of his suv. Supposedly,
Angel didn't have a problem with this because she and
Moody had an open relationship.

Speaker 5 (47:59):
To other plays like were you an Angel would be
there's nothing wrong with that.

Speaker 14 (48:02):
She paid up, grew and we had done that before,
so we ended up we end up relatively open entire relationship.
We have very strust in relationship.

Speaker 1 (48:12):
Now that Moody was cooperating with the authorities, Angel Vaz
did as well, and she also provided her version of
what happened that night. According to both Angel and Moody,
after Brittany got into the suv, the three of them
drove to Georgetown. During that drive, they collectively got to
know each other.

Speaker 7 (48:32):
I know there was a conversation like, hey, my name
is so and so.

Speaker 5 (48:36):
You know, we introduced your sale.

Speaker 3 (48:38):
And then she said about where she's just from River,
New York. That's about he is.

Speaker 6 (48:42):
And she says about where she.

Speaker 3 (48:43):
Went to Soul.

Speaker 7 (48:45):
What did show? She said, she was like eighteen or
something like that, and you know, but it was.

Speaker 5 (48:50):
Just like manner party a little bit with this. We
get some cocaine, you know.

Speaker 9 (48:59):
She sure.

Speaker 2 (49:01):
Driving, We're just driving around, was fucking talking. Yeah, I
went right in Georgetown, went right. She spot where we
used to camp out down by the river.

Speaker 1 (49:15):
Moody, Angel and Brittany arrived at a desolate campsite in Georgetown.
Not long after they got their Angel recalled that her
son had the keys to her apartment and she needed
to get them before the night got ony. Later, I
called my.

Speaker 9 (49:30):
Son, or he called me.

Speaker 3 (49:31):
I can't remember the called you, but he had the
keys to the apartment. So after a little bit I
walked back to call. We all walked back to where
the like the.

Speaker 31 (49:40):
Car ripon parks and I said I had to meet
him to get the keys, and h I said, out
went back in a little while, and nobody said anything.

Speaker 32 (49:50):
Doesn't know all from anybody, Brian, And so you'll get
in a car with her and you drive out fine,
and then you have to leave, right, So what is
that conversation?

Speaker 3 (50:02):
Well, I'd just say him in her I was like, yeah,
well we're I'll staying there.

Speaker 7 (50:06):
When I left, I just said it up.

Speaker 12 (50:08):
I had you go to meet my son to get
keys before he went back over to the races, and
I just wanted me and.

Speaker 3 (50:17):
I got a car and drove off.

Speaker 1 (50:20):
Angel drove away, leaving seventeen year old Brittany alone with
a forty nine year old convicted child rapist. Within ten
minutes of Angel leaving, Raymond Moody was raping Brittany.

Speaker 5 (50:36):
When I made a decision? Did you have any inclination
at that point? When Angel left?

Speaker 25 (50:42):
What was going to happen next?

Speaker 5 (50:44):
What can you describe it all? Just kind of what that?

Speaker 29 (50:48):
What happened there?

Speaker 25 (50:49):
Was it?

Speaker 3 (50:50):
I want the words in your mouth?

Speaker 25 (50:51):
But was it?

Speaker 23 (50:53):
Sunnan?

Speaker 9 (50:54):
There's something just like.

Speaker 5 (51:00):
I knew that I was that I wasn't really like
I have that character at.

Speaker 1 (51:10):
Moody described that Brittany was terrified as he forced her
to remove her clothes and that she tried to resist
him as he raped her. When the assault ended, Moody
realized that what he had done was probably going to
put him back in prison for the rest of his life.
The only way he might be able to protect himself

(51:31):
was to silence Brittany forever. So he strangled her.

Speaker 25 (51:37):
To death and they take her clothes off.

Speaker 5 (51:44):
He is she saying?

Speaker 25 (51:48):
Specifically at that time she still did you start the
aspxr Did something happen to stop that?

Speaker 23 (52:01):
I did?

Speaker 7 (52:01):
Yeah?

Speaker 25 (52:03):
Yeah?

Speaker 14 (52:04):
Do you remember what she was like at a point
after you rader?

Speaker 9 (52:07):
Or she.

Speaker 5 (52:13):
And then afterwards it happened?

Speaker 9 (52:14):
Did she?

Speaker 29 (52:15):
Did?

Speaker 14 (52:15):
She say?

Speaker 9 (52:16):
Like? What cost? Did it?

Speaker 5 (52:18):
Other than VERA had began?

Speaker 14 (52:21):
Because I started just playing the whole thing through my mind?
What was gonna have I was you know that a
prison again and the rest of my life? When you
strangled with Brittany with it? Did you use your hands
or did you use part of her clothing?

Speaker 5 (52:35):
Or did you have to hold her down at all?
Or was she just pretty compliant or traveling?

Speaker 1 (52:47):
Brittany fought for her life, but Moody overpowered her. He
wrapped his hands around her neck and squeezed until Brittany's
life left her body. She was dead. Realizing that Angel
would be returning at any minute. Moody carried Brittany to
a nearby wooded area and dumped her behind a.

Speaker 5 (53:09):
Tree out where they had of like roway treees and stuff,
you know. And true, I was all shook up because
what had happened. I didn't want to do.

Speaker 14 (53:24):
I'm trying to her an almah shits back. So I
came out this story at I can't remember exactly that
she hooked up show with her friends of the phone.

Speaker 5 (53:37):
And they came and picked her up.

Speaker 14 (53:39):
When I got to the.

Speaker 3 (53:40):
Pole yard, he was standing in the parking lot of
the pole yard. I asked him where she was.

Speaker 28 (53:47):
He said that she.

Speaker 7 (53:48):
Called somebody or somebody called her.

Speaker 3 (53:51):
Was there a way I don't remember, uh.

Speaker 6 (53:53):
And she left and I said okay, And we left
the pole yard and went to the apartment.

Speaker 3 (54:01):
Do you remember anything about after, like after you got
to the apartment.

Speaker 16 (54:06):
I would be.

Speaker 1 (54:08):
After Angel went to bed. Moody returned to the scene
of the crime, collected Brittany, and took her body to
a heavily wooded area about two miles from his apartment.
Once there, he dug a shallow grave and buried Brittany.
Angel claimed that She initially believed Moody when she said
that Brittany's friends picked her up, but she began questioning

(54:31):
that story when Brittany's face appeared on the news.

Speaker 31 (54:35):
Never made me suspicious one a little bit until things
came on TV and I'm like, okay, what's going on?

Speaker 3 (54:41):
And he said, I told you was she there? And
that was my answer I got every time I want
to say anything about it, because even to this day,
if I asked him anything, he would eat straight out
tell me was she there when you got there? And
I'm like, no, she wasn't there, And he said, I
told you she left. He never said one word about
the night or anything after that.

Speaker 1 (55:03):
If Angel's story was true, it means that she kept
quiet for thirteen years and never told police that she
saw Brittany on the night that she disappeared. Nonetheless, the
agreement that Moody and Angel made with the authorities was
that they would cooperate if and only if Angel didn't
face any consequences. Of course, there's always consequences.

Speaker 2 (55:29):
I did this, Angel would have been a victim of
mind for a long fucking time.

Speaker 5 (55:35):
Okay, Yeah, of course that's the kind a piece of
shit that I am. I didn't turn into a good
person until.

Speaker 25 (55:44):
Two.

Speaker 3 (55:48):
I can be a man of my word, and you
all can be a man of your word.

Speaker 9 (55:54):
You can be a man of your word.

Speaker 5 (55:57):
Then I'll shay, I'll take him. I really lock you
because I feel like you in an org. Never get
that body.

Speaker 1 (56:03):
Moody claimed that the recent birth of his grandchild transformed
him into a good man all of a sudden. It's
kind of like when some of you say I can't
listen to those stories about kids because I have kids.
You're assuming that everybody that doesn't have kids doesn't give
a shit. It's kind of insulting. Anyway, This so called

(56:24):
good man used the hidden location of his seventeen year
old murder victim as a bargaining chip to save his
own ass. Raymond Moody was, is, and will always be
a disgusting and evil piece of shit.

Speaker 8 (56:44):
After that interview with law enforcement was completed, he agreed
to take investigators most of the Pullyard and point of
the campsite locations, and he agreed to go to the
area off Penny rail Road and pointed to investigators still
location where he placed instructures. Morever remains her mortal remains
will prove be on a reasonable doubt to be hers
through general records as well as DNA testing.

Speaker 23 (57:06):
Tonight from Myrtle Beach, investigators say they have found the
remains of missing teenager Brittany Drexel. It has been thirteen
years since she disappeared. Police arresting a man last week
who they say was once a person of interest in
the case. Well today they confirmed that man Raymond Moody,
is responsible for her death.

Speaker 4 (57:26):
This is the case you warn people about. It's your
child walking down the street and being snatched up by
someone with malevolent homicidal proclivities. Raymond Moody had no prior
connection to Britney Drexel.

Speaker 1 (57:43):
In May of twenty twenty two, thirteen years after Brittany
left for Myrtle Beach, her mother, Don Drexel, brought Brittany
back home to Rochester, New York.

Speaker 12 (57:55):
I've been waiting for this day for thirteen years, ever
since the you know, the day Brittany disappeared.

Speaker 3 (58:03):
I never thought we would get to this place.

Speaker 12 (58:06):
And we're finally here, and now I can get Brittany
back and lay her arrest.

Speaker 1 (58:11):
Dawn finally got some answers about what happened to her daughter,
but not everything made sense? How could it? The respective
versions of events given by Angel and Moody were mostly consistent,
but there seemed to be some potential contradictions in what
they told police. For one, both Moody and Angel told

(58:33):
investigators that Brittany initially took an interest in them because
they were smoking pot. Yet according to her friends and
her boyfriend, Brittany didn't smoke weed at all, and she
was one of.

Speaker 9 (58:45):
The party ear that I do when you say partyville.
Were just talking drinking or we talked in a little
bit of everything or anything.

Speaker 11 (58:55):
Everything was probably she never never smoked on marijuana, never
done anything.

Speaker 1 (59:02):
Also, according to one of the girlfriends who went to
Myrtle Beach with Brittany, when the option to smoke weed
was offered, Brittany declined.

Speaker 14 (59:11):
I'm not an I don't know.

Speaker 15 (59:13):
I actually asked her a professional figure and I asked
her as a J.

Speaker 21 (59:15):
Saul.

Speaker 7 (59:17):
She was like wow, that she show me.

Speaker 5 (59:18):
Anything, She's like wow.

Speaker 1 (59:22):
If Brittany did get into Moody's SUV willingly, it seems
very unlikely that marijuana was her motivation. It's possible that
Moody simply offered Brittany a ride and she accepted, but
it's also possible that she was abducted off the street.
If Brittany was abducted, it means that Angel was a

(59:42):
willing participant in the crime and now she had immunity.
Something else that didn't make any sense was that Brittany
didn't text or call anyone while she was with Moody
an Angel. This was extremely out of character for her.
Brittany was constantly on her phone like most teenagers, and

(01:00:06):
almost always texting her boyfriend. Yet both Moody and Angel
claim that they never prevented Brittany from using her phone.

Speaker 3 (01:00:15):
Did she have her phone the whole time? Or did
someone take her phone and she hit an answery?

Speaker 5 (01:00:19):
I never told her one time.

Speaker 2 (01:00:20):
She didn't answer if he never told her, she'd been answering.

Speaker 3 (01:00:23):
Okay, Now, her phone riding a couple of times, but
she didn't answer it, and but she said it was
her boyfriend or something and she would call him.

Speaker 1 (01:00:32):
Was set back her again. These potential problems with their
respective stories suggest that Angel may have acted as Moody's accomplice,
but investigators were able to use Angel's phone records to
confirm that she did in fact leave the campsite where
Brittany was supposedly murdered and returned a short while later,

(01:00:55):
So part of her story seemed to be true. Other
than that, everything else remains a mystery. Did Brittany get
into Moody's suv willingly or was she abducted off the street.
If she did go willingly, why maybe she was tired
of walking and accepted a ride. Maybe she felt she

(01:01:15):
was safe because there was another adult female in the
passenger seat. But if that was the case, why did
she suddenly stop using her phone? Why didn't she tell
her boyfriend that she had accepted a ride from two strangers?
It doesn't really add up.

Speaker 8 (01:01:32):
Unfortunately, we may never never know exactly what happened that
day because mister Exel can't tell us what happened. So
to some degree we are compelled to listens to the
version is provided by mister Moody, and then it's incumbent
upon law enforcement to determine the credibility or not on
certain points and not certain points.

Speaker 1 (01:01:50):
The consensus among law enforcements seemed to be that Brittany
did get into Moody's suv voluntarily, but the only thing
they could say with certainty was that Moody did murder
Brittany Drexel. His confession and the fact that he led
investigators to the body were the final pieces that allowed

(01:02:10):
investigators to close the case and hand things off to prosecutors. Ultimately,
Moody didn't fight the criminal charges against him. He pled
guilty to kidnapping and murder, and with those pleas came
the inevitable impact statements from Brittany's parents.

Speaker 3 (01:02:28):
When I found out that she went missing, I didn't
know what to think. I didn't know. I just felt wrong.

Speaker 30 (01:02:39):
I mean, I'm gonna be here, adopted did I won't her?

Speaker 33 (01:02:43):
At first I thought she would be found because like
Don don and mentioned that she was going down there
in searching, They're going to bring her home, and that's
what I thought would happen. However, days turned the months,
and those months turned into years, years of torture, wondering
where my daughter was. Now, thirteen years later, I find

(01:03:07):
out the horrible, disgusting and senseless.

Speaker 3 (01:03:10):
Way she was abducted and murdered.

Speaker 28 (01:03:14):
Every part of my being wants to say and do
something about that, but my heart knows that I will not,
and Brittany would not want me to go to jail
over that, so I internalize it.

Speaker 30 (01:03:27):
That's all I do is it's sickening. The defendant was
and is, and I'm sorry, a perverted, sick monster.

Speaker 1 (01:03:40):
I think we can all agree that Brittany's adoptive dad
has absolutely nothing to apologize for. After Chad Drexel addressed
the court, it was Brittany's mom's turn to do the same.

Speaker 31 (01:03:54):
For thirteen years, I have searched for Brittany and suffered
the loss of a child. Today we know the truth,
and today, mister Moody, you face the consequences for that.

Speaker 3 (01:04:08):
That's all I have left.

Speaker 31 (01:04:10):
That's all we have left after what you did to her.
Brittany was a beautiful seventeen year old with her full
life ahead of her from the moment I gave birth
to her.

Speaker 3 (01:04:23):
Brittany was my life. She had a beautiful soul. She
was our soccer star.

Speaker 31 (01:04:29):
She was loved by everyone in our family, by her
friend's classmates.

Speaker 3 (01:04:33):
In an entire community.

Speaker 31 (01:04:36):
What gave you the right to put your hands on
my daughter? You are a serial rapist and a child predator.
The criminal justice system has failed my daughter. As it
continues to fail so many other victims, and frankly, mister Moody,
it failed you because you never should have been released
from prison. The loss of my daughter has ignited a

(01:05:00):
fire and meat and set me on a mission to
strip away the rights and freedoms of people like you.
My daughter's tragic and senseless murder has inspired me. Britney's
life and memory are now the driving force behind the
initiative to make changes in sex offender laws and to
keep monsters like you where they belong, in cages so

(01:05:23):
they can never harm again.

Speaker 1 (01:05:26):
Raymond Moody will indeed spend the rest of his life
in a cage, which is exactly where he should have
remained after being convicted the first time for raping a child.
For fuck's sake, how are we not electing better people
to run this shindig. In the case of Britney Drexel,

(01:05:50):
Moody was given two consecutive sentences, thirty years for kidnapping
and another thirty years for murder. If Moody wants to
see the outside of a prison, he'll need to live
to be one hundred and twenty two years old. Good luck,
shit bag. The Britney Drexel case took thirteen years to solve,

(01:06:11):
and that long investigation, as well as its resolution, offers
plenty of lessons and takeaways. For one, the general population
is way too quick to presume guilt. The mild association
that Pete Brozowitz had with Brittany Drexel has all but
defined his life even to this day, and despite the

(01:06:35):
resolution of the case, you can't Google him without seeing
his photo next to a picture of Britney Drexel. There
are countless blogs about him, probably a bunch of Facebook groups,
and I can't even imagine what's on Reddit. Many of
the authors of these comment areas are completely certain that

(01:06:56):
Pete murdered Brittany despite all the evidence. Okay, okay, granted,
Pete didn't do himself any favors. I mean, during his
media interviews he came across as arrogant and uncaring. He
was really easy to dislike. But then again, what twenty
year old isn't a little self centered and kind of

(01:07:18):
an asshole. I mean, I haven't met one yet. Also,
Pete was in a no win situation. If he feigned
sympathy and offered to help, he would have been accused
of trying to get inside information about the case. Pete
was crossed off the potential suspect list very early on

(01:07:38):
in the investigation, and frankly, the authorities should have made
more of an effort to make that clear. The same
is also true for Tim DeShawn Taylor, but in his
case things were much worse. Not only had the court
of public opinion pretty much convicted him, but so did
the FBI. Tim committed a robbery before he was investigated

(01:08:00):
for possibly murdering Brittany. He pled guilty to that robbery
charge in state court and was sentenced. When that kind
of thing happens, the FEDS should not be allowed to
reuse the same crime as leverage against someone and charge
them again. That's a very very dirty practice, and the

(01:08:22):
FBI knows it. But again, who's going to stop them anyway. Finally,
and perhaps the most frustrating element of this case is
that Raymond Moody was a registered sex offender and a
previously convicted child rapist. Once again, we have a case

(01:08:44):
where a predator is released from prison and surprise, surprise,
they sexually abuse another child. It's almost like we can
predict that it's going to happen. It's almost like it's
a given. It's almost like we've known this for decades. Huh.
This is a complicated issue that we have covered extensively

(01:09:09):
in prior episodes of this show, and there are many
conflicting opinions on how child rapists should be dealt with.
A wood chipper is a popular suggestion, But one thing
is clear. The system we have in place right now
simply isn't working, and our kids are paying the price

(01:09:29):
for that failure. Again, why pay for a safety net
if there's no safety In this particular case, seventeen year
old Britney Drexel paid the ultimate price. She paid with
her life, her parents paid with their grief. And until

(01:09:50):
we make reforms to the way that our government handles
child sex offenders, this kind of thing is going to
continue to happen again and again again. And you could
be anywhere in the country, anywhere, because once these predators
are released in whatever state they're released in, they travel

(01:10:11):
to whatever state they want to and maybe that's where
your child is. Maybe one of those times it happens again,
it'll involve a child that you know, Maybe, just maybe
it'll be your child. And I'm not saying that to
scare you. I'm not saying that to scare monger. I'm

(01:10:32):
saying because it's fucking reality. If you look around for
half a second, it's just the world we live in now.
Bad decisions lead to bad outcomes, and here we are.
The Drexels were a typical suburban family, and the events
that led to Britney ending up in Myrtle Beach is

(01:10:54):
a story as old as time. She lied to her
mom about where she was. Kids do that all the time.
I mean, hell, I did it. All my friends did it.
I don't know anybody who didn't do it. Actually, now
that I think about it, everybody lies to their parents.

(01:11:15):
Everybody goes out and sneaks out and does stuff when
they're a teenager that they shouldn't be doing.

Speaker 14 (01:11:21):
So.

Speaker 1 (01:11:22):
The thought that it can't happen to you is a
dumb one, no matter how good your kid is. Usually
when kids lie about their whereabouts, things don't end badly
like they did this time. But every once in a
while a monster comes along and waits for the perfect

(01:11:43):
opportunity to strike on their prey. The frustrating part is
that it's not just any monster. It's a monster we
can see coming. It's a monster that our laws and
our government released from a cage. Don't be sad. This

(01:12:28):
isn't the end. There's more true crime available at swordscale
dot com. Go check out Sword and Scale Television episode
four Angeli bloods Oh boy, Even when you're doing well,
sometimes you're not doing well, you know what I mean. Anyway,
it's an amazing story that our television team put together.

(01:12:49):
They get in an RV, they stuff in all their
cameras and all their gear, and they travel all around
the country, all year around to do this. You've got
to check it out.

Speaker 9 (01:12:59):
Stay sick.

Speaker 29 (01:12:59):
Guess why do I have to upgrade from plus to

(01:13:32):
plus two to watch season Learn to listen to season two?

Speaker 27 (01:13:36):
That makes no sense.

Speaker 29 (01:13:37):
I've been paying ten bucks this whole time, and then
you put out a new episode for season two to
listen to.

Speaker 7 (01:13:44):
But yeah, you want me to upgrade.

Speaker 3 (01:13:46):
To twenty bucks now, Like, what are we doing here?

Speaker 5 (01:13:49):
Guys?

Speaker 16 (01:13:52):
Oh my god, people kicks up fuck over it.

Speaker 27 (01:13:59):
I understand that you are limited in what you can
say on air and in private to those very special
customers that you have that don't seem to understand that
you don't get more shit without paying for it.

Speaker 3 (01:14:17):
You know, there's a thing called inflation, and there's things.

Speaker 17 (01:14:20):
The thing called people need to make a living, and
that's what Mike in.

Speaker 16 (01:14:24):
History do and that's why he's created more tears.

Speaker 27 (01:14:27):
So I thought i'd talked directly to them so that
you didn't have to and I could say some of
the things that we should all know.

Speaker 7 (01:14:37):
If you can't afford it, you can't afford it. But
get with the time.

Speaker 17 (01:14:43):
You are going to get what you used to get
for the same price.

Speaker 16 (01:14:47):
Things are changing.

Speaker 7 (01:14:48):
It's called life, it's called progress.

Speaker 27 (01:14:51):
The number of sort and scale episodes on your feed
for regular subscriber and plus subscriber has not changed. The
shows that are additional in your seed are the offerings
and hard work of Mike and his team on new

(01:15:13):
projects that, if you so please, you can listen to
for an appropriate expense.

Speaker 17 (01:15:21):
I'm so sick of him people complaining on social media and.

Speaker 14 (01:15:26):
On the voicemails about what hopeing you bok boss here?

Speaker 7 (01:15:30):
Get that buck over it?

Speaker 27 (01:15:33):
How do I put this gently? You fucking idiots. You
can't get a bunch of more shit for free. Mike,
keep doing what you're doing. We'd love you for it.
Don't listen to our special friends

Speaker 9 (01:16:03):
Incl