July 9, 2025 • 49 mins
Welcome back, Spooky Squad! In this chilling yet vital episode of Scream and Sugar, we dive into the heartbreaking 2002 case of Gwen Amber Rose Araujo—a transgender teenager whose life was tragically cut short in a brutal hate crime. We explore Gwen’s life, the events leading to her murder, the trial that followed, and the lasting impact her story had on hate crime legislation and the transgender rights movement. Rest in peace, Gwen.
Case Notes:
Larry's Gourmet Coffee House: https://www.instagram.com/larrysgourmetcoffee/?hl=en
Gay Panic Defense States: https://lgbtqbar.org/programs/advocacy/gay-trans-panic-defense/gay-trans-panic-defense-legislation/
PA: https://www.palegis.us/legislation/bills/2023/hb637
Resources:
https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/04/10/nx-s1-5355126/trump-nih-trans-regret-detransition-research#:~:text=%22Regret%20rates%20for%20gender%2Daffirming,KFF%2C%20a%20non%2Dpartisan%20healthhttps://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/parole-granted-to-defendant-in-2002-murder-of-transgender-teen-gwen-araujo-in-newark/65252/https://www.ebar.com/story/76362https://www.hrc.org/resources/fatal-violence-against-the-transgender-and-gender-expansive-community-in-2023https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32345113/https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/04/10/nx-s1-5355126/trump-nih-trans-regret-detransition-research#:~:text=%22Regret%20rates%20for%20gender%2Daffirming,KFF%2C%20a%20non%2Dpartisan%20healthhttps://abc7news.com/who-is-gwen-araujo-timeline-documentary-transgender-murder/12451079/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2004-jun-23-me-transgender23-story.htmlhttps://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/chilling-time-line-of-a-killing-death-of-2668044.php
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/scream-and-sugar-true-crime-coffee-hour--6015946/support.
This content is not appropriate for all viewers; viewer discretion is advised. PS. Let's just umbrella all our content with a blanket statement: allegedly, supposedly! Stay spooky, squad.
Case Notes:
Larry's Gourmet Coffee House: https://www.instagram.com/larrysgourmetcoffee/?hl=en
Gay Panic Defense States: https://lgbtqbar.org/programs/advocacy/gay-trans-panic-defense/gay-trans-panic-defense-legislation/
PA: https://www.palegis.us/legislation/bills/2023/hb637
Resources:
https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/04/10/nx-s1-5355126/trump-nih-trans-regret-detransition-research#:~:text=%22Regret%20rates%20for%20gender%2Daffirming,KFF%2C%20a%20non%2Dpartisan%20healthhttps://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/parole-granted-to-defendant-in-2002-murder-of-transgender-teen-gwen-araujo-in-newark/65252/https://www.ebar.com/story/76362https://www.hrc.org/resources/fatal-violence-against-the-transgender-and-gender-expansive-community-in-2023https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32345113/https://www.npr.org/sections/shots-health-news/2025/04/10/nx-s1-5355126/trump-nih-trans-regret-detransition-research#:~:text=%22Regret%20rates%20for%20gender%2Daffirming,KFF%2C%20a%20non%2Dpartisan%20healthhttps://abc7news.com/who-is-gwen-araujo-timeline-documentary-transgender-murder/12451079/https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2004-jun-23-me-transgender23-story.htmlhttps://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/chilling-time-line-of-a-killing-death-of-2668044.php
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/scream-and-sugar-true-crime-coffee-hour--6015946/support.
This content is not appropriate for all viewers; viewer discretion is advised. PS. Let's just umbrella all our content with a blanket statement: allegedly, supposedly! Stay spooky, squad.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome back, everybody to another episode of Scream and Sugar,
your true crime coffee Hour, a podcast where we dive
into the darker side of humanity while I'm joining a
little sweetness on the side. I am your host, Sahara,
I'm Candace, and today we are going to be covering
the tragic case of when a rajo.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
He No.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Candace, how are you feeling today?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
I'm good, good, good to hear.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
How are you okay? If I sound a little sick,
I'm getting over something, so you'll have to bear with me.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Whatever.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
This is your throat, live frog in the throat, been
one of them, one of them weeks, I.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Guess I feel that on a spiritual.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Spiritual spirits the spirits are all up in me m hm.
So I also want to give a huge shout out
to those of you who have picked up some merch
from us. Thank you so much for repping it.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Yeah, y'all have the best.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
We are actually doing our absolute most right now to
try to afford our own equipment so we don't have
to do this at the school anymore because they have
that's over one too many times.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Well, and then their hours during the summer are so
short that it's like we have either Friday or Saturday
to do it, because apparently they're closed on Sundays and
we didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
We booked like four hours in here and then there
were just nobody showed up.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
So uh yeah, it was awful, okay.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
And Friday is technically I'm supposed to be in my job.
So here we are, here, we are so thank you
so much. Shout out to y'all. So today's case, let
me preface this by saying.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
What are we gonna do for coffee time?
Speaker 1 (02:15):
I'm gonna cover these guys, Okay, So today I'm going
to cover a little coffee shop that I ran into
in Carson City. Apparently they have locations in Dayton, Virginia
City in Carson City, but it's called Larry's Gourmet Coffee House.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Nice, okay.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
It was like one of those little drive up ones,
and it just was so quaint and adorable and cute,
and they had so many amazing options. I of course
got an Americano.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Actually they had one hundred options, and I chose.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
I panicked, I'm going to added cinnamon to my americanas
What can I say? I'm just a woman of spicy
girl I'm a woman of the world.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Larry's Gourmet Coffee Okay, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
It was really cute. The barista was super helpful.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
I'm choosing your Americana.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Well, I had asked about a bunch of different coffees
before Makana like a dick. So I'm really sorry, but
also thank you.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
I feel like I do that shit too, or I'll
be like what's this, what's this, and then I'll be
like I'll just get my chie without milk please exactly.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Well, it was like they had these options that sounded
so good, but then I was like, that's gonna be
so sweet, and I'm just not a sweet girl. But yeah,
they were just really cute. Me see if I want
to show you a picture. Basically, I was just I
was literally driving down the street going, oh god, I
need a coffee. Oh God, I need a coffee. And
then there was like a shining beacon in the night.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yeah, like, so ha, come to us for Americana siamon
cinnamon creepy.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
It was like, so Haarah calls her aid and Larry's
got coffee house well, and so it was beautiful, So
thank you Larry's Gourmet, And they have these cute little cards,
liamp cards, stamp cards, and it's like kind of neat
because it says it if you get six stamps you
get twenty five percent off, and then if you get
a full card, you get free drink. So it's like
(04:16):
a little happy medium.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, that's not bad.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
Oh and Larry Larry's has fresh doughnuts every day. I
did not get one. Sorry, I panicked. I'm also technically
supposed to be on a diet.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
No girl, All good.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Well, I'm gonna go ahead and jump into this case.
It's a pretty well known case actually, so I'm sure
many of y'all have heard it before. This was my
first time actually learning about it and hearing about it,
so it was very surprising to me that I hadn't
heard about it before. This case took place a in
(05:00):
October of two thousand and two, so it's quite a
bit older, I guess at this point, even though it's.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Like twenty three years ago.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
Yeah, but it was a case that really changed the
country and the perception of trans women and shed light
on you know, trans people in general in this country.
It was something that I think as a nation, the
idea of being trans was really very unheard of. Except
(05:30):
in very specific, you know, areas, and so it was
kind of interesting. I picked this case because technically it's
Pride Month. Obviously you guys will be getting this after
Pride Month is over, but I think it can be
really easy for us to forget why it's so important
to really look out for and protect our LGBTQA folks, PSA,
(05:54):
and just trigger warning right off the bat. This case
was absolutely brutal. It's gonna have some very heavy topics,
including violence against a trans woman. So if that is
something that you just don't have inside of you today,
I say, skipped the episode. We are going to go
into some detail about like what happened and what was
you know, done to Gwen. So it's just important to
(06:18):
you know, make sure you take care of your mental health.
So Gwen she named herself for her favorite singer, Gwen Stefani,
which Ye two thousand and two, Very two thousand and two.
She started transitioning at age fourteen, and she was viciously
murdered only three years later baby, So just absolutely just
devastating case. According to her mother, Sylvia Guerrero, who will
(06:42):
talk a lot about in this episode, the transition from
her sex assigned at birth to female was slow, very
slow for Gwen. So she came out to her mom
at around fourteen and said, hey, you know, I'm a girl,
and her mom was like, okay, like and was really supportive. Yeah,
it was very sweet. But Gwen did take her time
(07:05):
with transitioning, so she started very slowly. She really kept
wearing a lot of what would be considered like masculine clothes,
like hoodies, sweatshirts, things like that. But as she started
to change her appearance and let more of Gwen come out,
she started to really shine and be more herself, which
(07:26):
was for her mother at least, and for her siblings
was just a beautiful thing to see. But of course,
as you can only imagine, school was a struggle being
a trans woman in public school in the early two thousands,
I can only imagine. So she was pretty uncertain how
to proceed in society. You know, what bathroom do I
use at school? All that stuff, and it just gave
(07:46):
her a lot of anxiety, understandably extreme anxiety, I would say.
So her mother ended up pulling her out of school
and allowed her to safely just transition at home. That
was the plan, according to her sister. Like I said,
Gwen really never dressed like a girl quote unquote, though
her makeup was on point. Yeah, I'll have to show
you some pics. So, like I was saying, she never
(08:09):
really wore traditionally girly clothes, but unbelievably and horribly sadly,
the first time she wore a skirt was incidentally the
night she was murdered.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Holy shit, I know, poor baby.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
I can't even imagine.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
I feel like kid's gonna be so ruthless. So, there
was a trans girl in my high school. And I
won't go into too many details because I think some
of my high school class listens to this podcast, but
they were just like horrendously bullied.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
And yeah, it's like blows my mind when people think that,
you know, they're choosing this right right, I'm like, do
you have any idea that?
Speaker 2 (08:46):
And she's gorgeous to you, but it just makes me
so sad that, like, you are trying to be your
true self and.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
People make it their prerogatively, yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Just to go out of their way to fucking make
your life miserable when you've literally done nothing but exists.
It's crazy, it's fucked up. It's so fucked up. That
makes me mad, me too, girl.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
So on the night of October second, two thousand and two,
Gwen was attending a party at a notorious party house
of the Merrill brothers. So the Meryl brothers were Manny
who was the youngest, Jose who was the middle, and Paul,
who was the oldest. Due to the reputation of this house,
local youths would often like hang out there, they would party,
(09:26):
they would flirt. Two of these kids, Jaren Neighbors and
Michael Madgittson, were regulars at the house and they were
known to party there pretty often. In fact, Gwen had
met and hung out with Michael for weeks before she
was murdered, and Michael was the first person to invite
Gwen to the house, so she had been kind of
hanging out at this party house for a while. During
his interview, Jaren Neighbors tells Detectives that the guys who
(09:49):
were going to this house were really going there with
the intention of getting laid, so if there were girls there,
like those girls were kind of expected to put out gross. Yeah.
When he first met Gwen, he said that she was
really flirty with the guys and they were flirting back,
and it was at first just flirting. But over the
next few weeks when and a couple of the men,
for sure Michael Magetson and Jose Merrill ended up having
(10:11):
a sexual relationship. Apparently, according to Jaren, the guys would
find that it was very odd that the squirrel would
flirt all night with them and then never hook up
with them, quote unquote, like all the way vaginally the entitlement.
First of all, how could you say, like she was flirting,
but god, she just wasn't putting out as I'm real regardless.
(10:31):
Because of this, they actually started questioning Gwen's biological sex
as a group.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
So just also a reminder, Gwen was seventeen years old
at this point. These creeps were all over legal age.
So that Thursday night, Jared Neighbors who was nineteen, Jason
Cassaras who was twenty two, Michael Madgittson who was twenty two,
and the Meryll brothers including Jose Merrill twenty two, and
Paul Merrill's girlfriend Nicole Brown, were all at the house.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
Okay, so she's the only underage girl.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Girl, She's only under each person there. Yeah, although I
guess technically Manny the little brother was there, but we'll
get into that in a minute. So, according to Jaren,
everybody was sitting at the table playing dominoes and the
guy started to kind of gang up on Gwen, so
they were questioning her assigned sex at birth. They were
(11:26):
yelling are you a man? Over and over again, demanding
that she removed her underwear at the table and show
them Jesus Christ. Finally, yeah, Michael agreed to go to
the bathroom with Gwen to check in private.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
On your fucking business. I'm so sorry that the fuck
bro dude, that's terrifying too.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Oh, I could the humiliation, the fear Like this case
really hit me a lot because I remember, you know,
being that girl, like that young girl at a party
with like a bunch of older people, and I can
only imagine just the fear and the humiliation that would
have come with a night like this, Like you're going
(12:05):
over there for the first time too, like wearing something
new and trying to just be yourself, and it just
blows up on you and people are all of a
sudden just freaking out and I can't even imagine. So
they were in the bathroom for like thirty to forty
five minutes. Kind of a weird amount of time, right,
Then get this Nicole Brown. So Paul Merrill's the oldest
(12:27):
brother's girlfriend. She is sitting at the table, I guess,
and she's talking to the other guys and she's like,
I just have to know. She gets up, goes in
the bathroom, sees that Micha lnguyn are still there, but
he hasn't like done anything to Gwynn. And so she
goes over to this seventeen year old girl, pulls her
legs apart as hard as she can and reaches in
(12:48):
and grabs her genitals.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
Jesus Christ, brush shit.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Oh man, I can't even imagine. And like, as the
only other girl there.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
That's so yeah, you'd think that you would have some.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
So fucking gross.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
It's sort of like a an ally at least, I
don't know, no, you.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Would think, well, clearly this one is for sure. It
makes me wonderally if she wasn't feeling like kind of
jealous because she's older, and then.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Yeah, I'll have to see a picture of Gwen, but
I'm assuming she was a knockout.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Oh my god. Yeah, yeah, Gwen was absolutely a stunner.
So she grabs her genitals, and at this point Cole
just starts running out of the bathroom screaming, she's a man,
She's a fucking man. Yeah. As Gwen tries to leave
the bathroom as I can only imagine just humiliated, mortified,
scared as hell, Michael punches her in the face and
(13:43):
she falls to the ground. At this point, multiple men
hold her down and pull her underwear to the side
for everybody to see her genitals. Oh my god, a
seventeen year old girl. This case just honestly makes me
stick to my stomach, and I feel like a lot
of people who have heard or read about this case
are probably feeling the exact same way we are. Then
(14:07):
they allow Gwen to stand up. Michael, jarn and Jason
are all with Gwen while Nicole, Jose and the others
kind of break off, and Jose starts screaming, does this
mean I'm gay? Does this mean I'm gay? Yeah. The
(14:28):
former ADA on the case mentioned that he believed that
Jose may have actually been in love with Gwen, and
that he couldn't figure out because of that, how you're
not gay, she's a girl? Yeah, exactly, But because of
the times and the ignorance involved in this case, he
freaked out. So regardless, he could have realized that Gwen,
(14:51):
who they were calling Lida just FYI, she kind of
was going by leda with this group, was a human
being and a female, which would make him straight because
what happens next is honestly just absolutely horrific. So supposedly, allegedly,
according to Nicole's interviews, she said, Lyda, I think you
should go. So the men were getting really worked up,
(15:11):
so Gwen gets off the counter and she walks out
the door, out the front door. Immediately she turns around
and walks back inside, and when Nicole looks over, she
says that Jason, Jaren, and Mike all trailed her back
inside the house. So she tried to leave and they
kind of pushed her back in. Gwenn kept trying to
grab phones like a phone to call her mom, but
(15:33):
on multiple occaions the phone was ripped out of her
hand and throw it away. She also tried to leave
the house on multiple occasions, but was dragged back inside
each time. The multiple near escapes that Gwen made were
testified to by the youngest brother, Manny, who said at
one point he even tried to help her escape, but
was unable to get her past all the other guys
in the building. During this time, the boys took turns
(15:55):
beating Gwen over and over and over again as she
was pleading for her life. At one point, a witness
claimed that she tried to stop them by saying, please,
don't I have a family. According to a source, these
were her last words, but according to Jose Merril, he
heard her say I told you I was sorry, and
those were her last words, sorry for being myself. They
(16:17):
dragged her into the living room, where Jose began striking
her in the head with kitchen objects, including a frying
pan and a can of food, which dentted the can
and opened a cut on her head. Nicole claims that
when the fighting escalated and became confrontational, her boyfriend Paul
took off to another part of the house. Nicole went
to get Paul, but says that when she returned to
(16:37):
the kitchen, Gwen was nowhere to be seen and Mike
had blood all over his hands. At this point, Nicole
claims that she Manny, the youngest brother, and Paul, her boyfriend,
the oldest brother, left the house. She also says that
she saw Gwen bloody and sitting on the couch, but
neither she nor Paul did anything to help her.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Fucking assholes.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
I'd like, I can't. At this point, the boys got
together and had what Jaron called and he called it
this in a letter to his girlfriend, a soprano type
plan to kill the bitch and get rid of her body.
Jaren and Jason took Michael's check to get shovels and
a pickaxe, and when they returned, according to testimony, Jose
saw that Gwen was bleeding on his couch and told
her to get off my fucking couch. I get off
(17:17):
my couch, you're bleeding on it. Yeah, and then the
assault resumed. Jaren urged Michael to knock her out. Knock
that bitch out, That's what he kept saying, and Michael
hit her head against the living room wall with his
knee hard enough that she fell unconscious and it left
a dent in the wall and cracked the plaster Jesus Christ.
While she was down, Jason was kicking her, and at
(17:39):
this point Jose went to his room and began crying
before coming back out. Boohoo, you little fuck Yeah who
you're crying, Oh my god, I can't.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
You're a piece of shit.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
You're trash dude. They then took Gwen to the garage
after I believe wrapping her in like a comforter to
help her vent blood from get on their carpet. Likely
she was at least hopefully still unconscious while even more
horrifying things were done to her. She was bound by
her wrists and ankles with rope. According to Jaren, Mike said,
(18:12):
and I'll quote him here, I need a sharp knife
for some rope, So Jaren said, I gave him my knife.
They used the rope to tie her up. When the
blanket was wrapped around her, I saw her feet were tied,
and when they put her in the truck, I saw
she had a rope around her neck. Uote So Jaren
had left the room allegedly for the actual murder, but
testified that Michael had strangled her with the rope and
(18:33):
that Jason had hit her with a shovel. In fact,
Jaren said that Jason even complained that Gwen had urinated
after he hit her with the shovel and what they
believe may have been her final her killing blow. The boys,
specifically Mike had strangled Gwen by using the rope as
a garat twisting it around. So he put it around
(18:55):
her neck and then twisted it multiple times until after
some time she passed away. That takes a long time
to do.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
In several minutes. It's not not instant, not a couple
of seconds.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
They had multiple times, like there were multiple times here
where they could have walked away. Jason then hit her
with the shovel multiple times, and then he said that
he was doing that just to confirm she was dead. Supposedly, allegedly,
Jose didn't even know she was dead until he saw
her in the back of the truck, but also when
Nicole called Jose the following morning to ask what happened,
he replied, let's just say she had a long walk home,
(19:32):
So I don't know about all that. M h, Yeah,
I don't think so. I don't think so either. So
get this. The boys now have murdered Gwen. After beating
her horrifically over what I assume was ours. They then
load her into Mike's truck and they drive her body
(19:53):
four hours to El Dorado County near the Sierras near
us Kinda, where they bury her in the blanket she in,
so four hours they drive her. According to testimony, even
as they buried her, they continued to disparage her, with
Jose adding that he couldn't believe somebody could be that
deceitful and that he wanted to kick her a few
more times because of it.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Fuck you, fuck you, what the fuck?
Speaker 1 (20:17):
According to Jaren, they chose Silver Fork Road in Eldorado
County because they had camped there multiple times and they
knew there was only one sheriff in the area. During
the interviews, they call her her the entire time good
and I'm like, so you acknowledge that you acknowledge you
know that she's a girl? Yeah? Really pissed me off.
(20:39):
Of course, mother is no right. So Sylvia called Gwen's
sister and told her first thing in the morning that
she had a horrible feeling and that Gwenn hadn't come
home the night before. So her sister started calling hospitals
and morgues anywhere really to try to find her sister.
They reported her missing on Sunday, and for a week
there was nothing. No one had any information on where
Gwyn could be, no leeds, no thing at all. I
(21:01):
don't know if the parent, like her mom just didn't
know what how she was going to party at or what.
But one of these idiots did what they always do,
and they couldn't keep their mouth shut and they talked,
and thank god for that.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Right they bragged somebody about being a horrible piece of shit.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
Pretty much. Yeah. The former ADA on the case said
that they would likely have never found her if Jared
Neighbors didn't tell somebody about what happened. He told a
friend of his I kicked off a rumor that circulated
around the area. According to some sources, Jared Neighbors was
quote unquote distraught and had told a friend what he
and his quote unquote homies had done soon after they
(21:42):
came back. The friend actually is the one who went
into off the police, so at least somebody here has
(22:02):
a conscience. The police then convinced the friend to wear
a wier a wier. They convinced him to wear a
wire and record Jaren. After getting the confession from Jaren
to the friend, they immediately arrested him and he folded
like a lawn chair. He he admitted his involvement. He
(22:23):
tells his actor is exactly what happened that night, and
he also took investigators to where they buried Gwenn's body. Yeah.
The Alameda County Coroner's report concluded that Gwen had died
due to blunt force trauma to the head and strangulation.
From Jaren, they got the names of the other people involved,
including Mike, the main perpetrator and murderer. During his interview,
(22:43):
the detectives asked Mike, were you the one who put
the rope around her neck, to which he says, yes,
But I didn't mean for anything to happen though, Like,
what the fuck? Okay, bud okay, Oh the fuck you didn't.
Oh it made me so mad, dude.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
I was like, Mike, you didn't mean to be a
complete piece of shit and torture this poor girl to death.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Literally, it was planned. You guys went and got the truck,
he got.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
The shells and the pickaxe. Yeah, and they knew where
they were going to dune her body. Yeah, yep.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Jose, Mike, and Darren were all churged with first degree
murder and committing a hate crime on October eighteenth, two
thousand and two. A few weeks later, the force suspect
Jason Cassaras was also arrested. A famous human rights attorney,
Gloria Allred, actually represented Gwen's family, and everybody was like
waiting in suspense for this trial. The timing of the
case was also pretty wild. I feel like anybody who
(23:36):
was around in two thousand and two couldn't imagine gay
people were still the butt of jokes in almost every comedy.
Oh yeah, Like it was not a time for gay rights.
The average population's understanding of trans people was almost non existent.
This case was sensationalized in the national media, like all over,
(23:57):
how old are you in two thousand and two?
Speaker 2 (23:59):
It it was ten, it was like fourteen, fifteen.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
Yeah, I'm surprised. I'm pretty surprised we didn't hear about
this thirteen. Maybe we did.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
How many years old?
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I don't know, girl, early teens.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Yeah, I would have been thirteen.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Yeah, So I mean, I imagine this case would have been
all over. I'm surprised. I'm surprised I don't remember it.
Maybe because this is right after nine to eleven, A year.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
After nine eleven. Yeah, I would have been in Alaska.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
So we had one traffic light we did, and it blinked.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
It was a a blinking red light.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Oh man, oh shit. Well, it was sensationalized in the
national media because number one, when was very beautiful, she
had one of those faces that you really just like
it sticks out to you. She's really piercing eyes. And
also she's still a minor at this point, like, she's
still a minor. And the LGBTQA community was freaking outraged,
(25:04):
and rightly so. Right so on one side of the fence,
some and likely a large portion of the public were
asking this question like, well, wasn't she lying when she
presented herself as a woman. No, And of course that
answer is no, she was literally being herself a woman.
But because of the size and range of this case,
(25:24):
it started a lot of conversations between the general and
uneducated public and LGBTQA and TRANSWRID activists. Pronouns dead naming,
the concept of transitioning were new topics for so many people.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
Right, A lot of I'm sure conservative religious types that
just have no idea that there's anything outside of their
little tiny bubble.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Absolutely well, and just I feel like the average suburban household,
probably unless they knew somebody who was transitioning, just had
no idea. And an ironic twist, the Newark High School
was covering a play called The Laramie Project. I don't
know if you've heard of that or if I hadn't either,
but it's about the nineteen ninety eight murder of Matthew Shepherd,
(26:07):
a gay man living in Laramie, Wyoming. And if you
guys have have you heard of Matthew Shepherd?
Speaker 2 (26:13):
I feel like the name's familiar, but I can't say.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
That he's like he was that the case, but he's
like that beautiful blonde twink. They found him like beaten
and up on.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
The tree or a post. Yeah, okay, yeah, and.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
He was like a huge gay rights like moment. But yeah,
so Matthew Shepherd. They were doing a play at the
high school there about Matthew Shepherd, called the Laramie Project.
So normally I wouldn't even bring up this certain Kansas
fundamentalist preacher because I fucking hate him and God hates
him and you should hate him. So but I have
(26:49):
to because he's in this case. So you know, the
Westboro Baptist.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
Yeah, I do.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
The fucking the worst scum of the earth, the scum
of the earth.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
A little scummy pieces of.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Ship, those fucking cunts.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
I literally just show up to fucking.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
Just to be bastard.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Yeah, pretty much.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Their pastor spewed a lot of hate. He would protest
anything he seemed or deemed quote unquote sinful, and he
threatened to protest Gwen's funeral.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Do you know what's fucking sinful? Being a hate full bigot.
I was like, if you look back at sucking all
of those like sermons that Jesus gave allegedly, yeah, it's
like love your fucking neighbor and don't be a piece
of shit. And he's literally hanging out with like the
fucking lowercha fucking society. Like he's not hanging out with kings,
(27:43):
he's not hanging out with like fucking politicians and ship
He's the exact opposite of all this bullshit. Was probably, yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
A chill dude, and you, sir, are freaking not Westboro
Baptist can eat my ass, my whole ass, my whole ass, y'all.
So I doubt they'll ever hear this.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
But oh there's probably someone out there that has to listen.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
To send me a seasons eat me eat my whole ass,
so he both anyway, Sorry, No, no, you're right. Is facts,
cold hard facts. He and his followers made signs that
said predictably instigating hate speech, condemning GWNDE hell using slurs,
and calling for the genocide of lgbtq E.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Oh yeah, that's super fucking godlike very Christian.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
I feel like God's really impressed with you. He's thrilled.
That's sarcasm, I know, fucking idiots. I hope these people
eat shit.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
I hope they all or they all get on like
a fucking plane and like the pilot and all this
stuff are also Wesbroover Baptists, and they just fucking disappear.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
Yeah, they reap what they sew.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Yeah, there we go, like coming up weirdnari.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
I hope, I hope they all get on a bus
and then driving to Disneyland and.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Disneyland a protest fucking Disneyland for fucking being.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
But then they accidentally drive off a cliff and the bus.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
It rolls like ninety eight times.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
Yeah yeah, and it lands upside down and all their next.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
Break and they all die horrible, painful deaths. Oops, I
did it.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Okay, they can eat.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Way off fucking track. Sorry, no, you good derailed de
roil Okay, So I hope that they get on a train. Yes,
and then that train, never mind.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Derails you were saying though. So, though the Westboro Baptist
Church never did attend the funeral, they did protest the
Laramie Project play, and by doing so incited anti gay
and the anti transcripts to show up at one's funeral.
Speaker 2 (29:53):
Get a fucking wife, dude, you're literally picking on like
the smallest demographic literally is already struggling just to fucking exist.
Get a life, this fucking hobby other than sitting on
other people.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
Don't you focus on doing some charity work?
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Right? You're not anyway?
Speaker 1 (30:13):
In fact, that little bozo also showed up at Sylvia
When's mom's doorstep the day before the funeral and advised
that he was sending flowers. The flowers that arrived to
the funeral home also came with a note a bomb threat.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Shut the fuck up.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
M h.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
The flowers were then just brought to the back of
the building, to the parking lot in the back, where
everyone decided, fuck it, we're just gonna keep moving forward
with her funeral.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
Which, like, how did he not get arrested for.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
The Seriously, I think they couldn't like prove without a
reasonable doubt or something that was him, I don't know whatever,
fuck that guy. But Gwen's family, like I said, didn't
back down. They continued with her funeral, and to their surprise,
the outpour of love and solidarity from their community, from
their commune unity and other supporters was just super apparent,
(31:03):
with many people hearing and understanding Gwen as she was,
and attending and standing with Gwen and her family. So
that was really back to the trial, which occurred in
two thousand and four, over a year later. This trial
was highly publicized. While prosecution's case was very cut and dry,
(31:26):
right these guys killed, the defense relied heavily on the
idea that this was an emotional outburst or shock that
caused an unfortunate death, otherwise called the gay panic defense,
which would shift the liability of the murderers from murder
one to manslaughter. So the gay panic defense is one
(31:50):
that I've heard, like, come on, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Dude, sorry, I'm just shouting into the microphone.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
Come on, yeah, No, I mean it's fair to feel
that way, because what the fuck. The defense also pushed
the idea that what occurred between Gwhen and the men
was actually not a true consensual act because they did it.
What know that she was born male? I guess they
(32:18):
said that any rational person would feel betrayed and react
violently and rashly, which I.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
Just I don't can't believe that.
Speaker 1 (32:24):
Also, this is a fucking teenager.
Speaker 2 (32:27):
A teenager shouldn't have been hanging out with her in
the first place. Absolutely is my first thought. My initial
thought is like, why are you inviting underage girls to
your fucking house? And why are you with the with
the assumption that they're going to put out.
Speaker 1 (32:40):
Crazy, fucking crazy.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
And like Mary, she's just gross.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
A teenager like.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
Tory rape too, they come on.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
I think probably age of consent is sixteen would be
my assumption in California. But I agree that it is
not good. It ain't good. Baby. These guys were in
their twenties, Like in their twenties.
Speaker 2 (33:07):
Dude, they shouldn't be messed around teenage girls now.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
So I just I cannot, I cannot, I cannot. But
by that standard, people who, in my opinion, I find
out that their sexual partners are cheating or that they've
given them a surprise, std should be murdering each other
left and right.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
No, Hey, guess what age of consent in California is eighteen?
Speaker 3 (33:25):
Is it?
Speaker 1 (33:25):
Really?
Speaker 2 (33:25):
It really is?
Speaker 1 (33:26):
How were they not slapped with that?
Speaker 2 (33:28):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
That's fucking weird. Listen, any California lawyers out there, please
give us a heads up on how that's possible.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
No, that is age of consent to sixteen, which I
think is gross.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
I also agree anyway, freaky, Please let us know. Let
us know because we're curious on how the hell these
guys did not get slapped with a little bit of
It's a sexual assault of a minor, That's what it is.
Speaker 2 (33:53):
It would be statutory right that you shouldn't be even
like I'm I mean, I don't know if she said
she was older. Maybe, I don't think it matters.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
I'm pretty sor.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
But if you are engaging in sexual acts with a minor,
even if they do give you consent and their willing participants,
it is still considered statutory rape if they're under the
age of eighteen.
Speaker 3 (34:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
Yeah, So I don't know. Guys, uh, fucking weird. I
just cannot.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
I know. They probably just try to paint them as
the victims, which they often do, and try to make
out Gwen to be this.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Demon.
Speaker 2 (34:49):
No I wasn't gonna say demon, I was gonna say
that she's like falsey presenting herself. Yeah, exactly, as she's
the person that should be responsible for what happened to her,
which is victim blaming straight straight up, straight up.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
It's also worth noting that the defendants at this time
were all keeping their mouth shut except Jared Neighbors. Since
Jaren was the earliest rat, he got the cheese mm
per usual, so he received an eleven year man's letter
sentence for testifying for the prosecution against the other three defendants.
During the trial, Nicole Brown took the stand for the prosecution.
(35:28):
I assumed to get out of jail time. Probably that's
what I would imagine, allegedly supposedly to talk about while
the defense tried poking holes in her credibility, stating that
she has memory gaps difficulty remembering timelines and time frames.
To help alleviate this, the prosecution then asked to include
video footage of the interviews that they had with her
(35:49):
the previous year, but the judge did not allow that testimony. Interesting,
very interesting. Luckily they still have Jaren testifying and he
would at least tell the family what had actually happened
to Gwen. Many of them were not privy to any
details until the trial occurred, which I can only imagine
having to hear that many of them oops. The defense
(36:12):
even brought in a psychologist, not even a psychiatrist, a
psychologist to tell the court that a young man is
likely to panic and overreact with violence if he founds
out that the person he's sleeping with is you know,
a male or female when they say they're not irritating. Interestingly,
(36:33):
at the end of the prosecution's closing argument, the eightya
mentioned that Paul Merrill, the eldest brother, had also slept
with Gwen and had chosen a walk away from the
house that night. To be fair, I think Paul Cole
Brown's boyfriend. I think Paul's a piece of shit too,
just making that very clear for not stepping in and
doing something. But he also had had some sort of
(36:58):
sexual relations with when likely I believe a lot of
this was like oral and anal and he didn't beat
her up, didn't kill her, he walked away. And the
prosecution said that they could have done the same thing exactly.
Speaker 2 (37:14):
Well, he should have at least been the voice of
reason in that you would think and let her go.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
Yeah, they could have let her go the house multiple.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Times, multiple times she tried to leave.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Tried to call her mom, tried to just get away,
And yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
They chose. They chose to stop her. They chose to
beat her violently, ambitiously, and they ultimately chose to kill
her life. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
So I also think Paul's a piece of shit, but
I agree with the prosecution. They could have not done this.
So after nine days of jury deliberations, the case ended
in a mistrial. The jury was hopelessly deadlocked. So homophobia
has roots everywhere even now. The LGBTQA activists were stunned
(38:03):
by the news, and I mean, god, who wouldn't be.
One of them said, you know, justice delayed is justice denied,
and they called for a new trial immediately. Three days
after the mistrial, the first trans writes march in San
Francisco occurred where Sylvia the mother attended, and she actually
got up to speak about her daughter at the march,
and she learned at that time that she could talk
(38:26):
about Gwen and potentially help educate people. So she continued
to talk at schools, and she attended almost seventy schools
and talked to them all about Gwen in her struggles. Ironically,
the week after Gwen's death was the court hearing for
her official name change to Gwen amber Rose Arajo. For
the first time in California history, they approved that for
a transperson after death, which was really nice. A little step.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Yeah, well, too little, too late, but at least it's something.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
At least it's something. The second trial began almost a
year later. Gwen's mother, who was justice stunned by the
as trella as the rest of us, was absolutely terrified
of having to go through it again. She said multiple
times that she died in the courtroom and she might
as well still be there because she can't unsee or
unhear the things that were said, and.
Speaker 2 (39:14):
To have to go through that again, I'm few times
not having any sort of justice given for your daughter, Like,
oh my.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
God, I can imagine I like to have them say
the gay panic defense, Like to have to hear that
is unreal. Her still living daughter says that since Gwynn
was killed, she just hasn't been the same. She suffers
from postraumatic stress, she lost her job and unfortunately lost
her home. She's just not the same person. I feel
(39:45):
like I think we've mentioned this before. When people are
murdered like this, it often affects the family absolutely so much,
and they don't like the murders don't even realize how
far their actions go and how far how many people
they're actually affecting. It's really terribly sad. So still, the
(40:05):
ADA actually tried a new tactic this time. He told
the jury at the end of his opening that should
they waiver between first and second degree murder, as long
as they agree it's murder, they should come back with
a second degree conviction. And that was in an attempt
to not have to put the family through another trial.
(40:26):
And so even though they did go out get the shruck,
get the shovels, they clearly had plans to murder this girl.
They did find both Jose Merrill and Michael Maginson guilty
of second degree murder. So second degree and Jason's attorney
(40:49):
was able to plea out with manslaughter even though he
was the one hitting her with shovels. I don't fucking
get it. I don't know that none of the men
were convicted of a hate crime, which is fucking bonkers
to me. Bonkers. Both Jose and Michael received fifteen to life.
That's it, and Jason received six years in prison for
his manslaughter charge. These guys almost got the exact same
(41:13):
amount of time as Jaron, who turned States witness just crazy.
During their chance to speak, Jose did show remorse, so
he was apologizing to Gwen's family. He cried when the
family gave their victim statements. Michael the scumbag who had
already shaved his scumbag head in a scumbag go tee
(41:34):
in preparation for the scumbag white supremacists in prison.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
Oh my god, the fuck up for real?
Speaker 1 (41:40):
I don't know, but he sure looked like one.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
Dude.
Speaker 1 (41:43):
Oh yeah, allegedly Supposedly.
Speaker 2 (41:44):
You already had a fucking end probably.
Speaker 1 (41:46):
My opinion, probably dude, because he used fucking scumbag and
his statement was grueling. He claimed everything that they said
a trial was a lie, and he didn't receive a
fair or unbiased trial and it was everybody else's fault,
but his way way away.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
I just rolled my eyes so fucking hard, almost popped
out the backside of my head.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
Saw next year, dude. Yeah, that was his statement. So
he had nothing to say about Gwen to her family
or anything. He just threw a fucking bitch pit. Oh
in just a note, The gay Panic Defense was outright
band and placed into California law in twenty fourteen. The
law was signed by Governor Jerry Brown and states that
fear or surprise of a victim's sexual orientation or gender
(42:27):
identity may not be used as a legal defense to
justify an assault. Many states followed the suit, and I'm
proud to say that Nevada is one of them. Heee,
don't tried it on me, motherfuckers, But many still allow
that prejudice and homophobia in the courtroom. States that have
tried and failed include Arizona. They have an active bill
for it right now, Arkansas, which failed in twenty twenty three,
(42:49):
Florida active bill twenty twenty five, Iowa failed in twenty
twenty three, Montana failed in twenty twenty three, Pennsylvania failed
in twenty twenty three. Yeah, Wisconsin failed twenty twenty three,
Georgia failed twenty twenty two, Massachusetts failed twenty twenty one,
Nebraska failed twenty twenty one, North Carolina failed twenty twenty one,
and Texas failed twenty twenty. So don't be afraid to
(43:11):
ask your representatives to help pass those bands, especially right
now in those active states of Arizona and Florida. Feel
free to just give a little jingle jangle up to
your old representatives.
Speaker 2 (43:21):
We'll post those numbers for you to make it extra convenient.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
Yeah, I'll even write you a little blurb if you'd like,
if you want to email it. There you go, because
that's that's bonkers. So where are our scumbags now mised
on what was basically a slap on the wrist for them,
in my opinion, let's find out. Jason Casas guilty to
the voluntary manslaughter charge as part of his plea deal
in two thousand and five, and he was released from
(43:44):
prison in twenty twelve. Jaron Neighbors pled guilty to Man's
letter and in turn for testifying for the prosecution in
two thousand and six, was released from prison early in
twenty sixteen. Jose Merrill was found guilty in two thousand
and five for second degree murder and it was getting
granted parole oh shit, and was granted parole in twenty sixteen.
(44:05):
Sylvia and all of Gwen's family attended all these pearole hearings,
so Sylvia was supported Sylvia actually supported granting pearl to
Jose because she truly felt like he was really porceful,
but most of Gwen's family disagrees either way. He's out now.
Michael Madgittson has been denied parole three times since his sentencing.
He was most recently denied in August of twenty twenty four,
(44:28):
and he is the only one of the four still
in prison. His next pearole hearing is scheduled for twenty
twenty nine. So I was curious as to why he
was still in and I found an article. Okay ay,
So his first parole hearing in twenty nineteen, Mike said
for the first time that he took responsibility for Gwen's death,
and he admitted that he strangled her. He could have
(44:50):
saved her and he chose not to. This was also
the first time he ever said sorry to her family
but abou the news. So Sylvia said that she didn't
believe his apology was sincere, and he was denied parole.
During his second parole hearing, he let his true self
come out again. So he blamed his friends, his upbringing.
He blamed everyone else but himself. He also said that
(45:11):
he didn't like you know, the group's setting of these
parole hearings, and the parle board denied him again, this
time saying that he hadn't addressed any of his issues.
He hadn't addressed his anger management, his substance abuse, his
domestic violence, he wasn't attending any group classes, and he
was not taking any responsibility for what happened. Also, it
turns out, not surprisingly that Michael has a poor prison
(45:33):
record with many disciplinary violations.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Well rotten piss, I guess.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
Eat it, bitch. So to this day, trans people, trans
youth are persecuted by the public, and in our current environment,
parents are being attacked for supporting them. I think it's
important to note that eighty two percent of trans people
have considered suicide, with forty percent attempting it. That is
a huge number. The highest percentage of this number is
(45:59):
with trans gender youth, and a study conducted in twenty twenty,
eighty six percent of trans youth reported suicide suicidal ideation, Yeah,
suicidal ideations, with fifty six percent reporting a previous suicide attempt.
Oh and by the way, because I always hear this,
regret rates for gender affirming care are about less than
one percent. Way lower than basic procedures like lap bands
(46:22):
or joint replacements, and that that's what he was on
in twenty twenty five. So no, these kids are not
choosing this because they want to be cool.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
No, it's not a fucking fad. It's literally them knowing
what's best for themselves. And I think we need to
recognize that and be supportive.
Speaker 1 (46:40):
Absolutely, And the more that support it.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
It's phobic bullshit so bad. It doesn't fucking affect you.
It doesn't affect you.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
It's not you have nothing to do with you. Yes,
And I feel like the more understanding and open we
are as a society about this, less likely things like
what happened to when will happen in the future. So
when our laws and our schools are attacking them and
those who support them are being attacked, it makes sense
(47:08):
that these children are considering suicide. We have to be better.
We have to protect our trans friends and family. Period.
If you're a trans listener and you want to chat
with us about anything, we are always here and we
love you.
Speaker 2 (47:20):
We love you so much.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
Keep a check up, babe, you got this otherwise that
is our story. My god.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
Thanks for sharing that. I wanted to fucking I'm probably
gonna go cry now.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
This one like this one hit me. Dude, seriously didn't
deserve that. You're just a fucking teenage girl, dude. Well,
thank you all so much for joining us today. If
you have any case corrections, coffee, chefs, cases, snacks.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
If you want to bring us snags.
Speaker 1 (47:52):
You can always hit us up on Instagram at.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Scream dot and Dot Sugar Dot podcast.
Speaker 1 (47:57):
On Facebook, Scream and Sugar, True Crime Coffee Hour on TikTok,
Scream Dot and Dot Sugar, shoot us an email on
gmail Scream.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
And Sugar Reno at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
Thank you all so much for listening and we hope
to catch you in the next one. And remember today
spooky y'all a bye projects magic. Yeah, it sounds like Maggotson.
(48:56):
He's a fucking maggot Mason, Maggotson Um
Welcome back, everybody to another episode of Scream and Sugar,
your true crime coffee Hour, a podcast where we dive
into the darker side of humanity while I'm joining a
little sweetness on the side. I am your host, Sahara,
I'm Candace, and today we are going to be covering
the tragic case of when a rajo.
Speaker 2 (00:50):
He No.
Speaker 1 (00:50):
Candace, how are you feeling today?
Speaker 2 (00:53):
I'm good, good, good to hear.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
How are you okay? If I sound a little sick,
I'm getting over something, so you'll have to bear with me.
Speaker 2 (01:02):
Whatever.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
This is your throat, live frog in the throat, been
one of them, one of them weeks, I.
Speaker 2 (01:08):
Guess I feel that on a spiritual.
Speaker 1 (01:13):
Spiritual spirits the spirits are all up in me m hm.
So I also want to give a huge shout out
to those of you who have picked up some merch
from us. Thank you so much for repping it.
Speaker 2 (01:31):
Yeah, y'all have the best.
Speaker 1 (01:32):
We are actually doing our absolute most right now to
try to afford our own equipment so we don't have
to do this at the school anymore because they have
that's over one too many times.
Speaker 2 (01:42):
Well, and then their hours during the summer are so
short that it's like we have either Friday or Saturday
to do it, because apparently they're closed on Sundays and
we didn't know that.
Speaker 1 (01:52):
We booked like four hours in here and then there
were just nobody showed up.
Speaker 2 (01:55):
So uh yeah, it was awful, okay.
Speaker 1 (01:59):
And Friday is technically I'm supposed to be in my job.
So here we are, here, we are so thank you
so much. Shout out to y'all. So today's case, let
me preface this by saying.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
What are we gonna do for coffee time?
Speaker 1 (02:15):
I'm gonna cover these guys, Okay, So today I'm going
to cover a little coffee shop that I ran into
in Carson City. Apparently they have locations in Dayton, Virginia
City in Carson City, but it's called Larry's Gourmet Coffee House.
Speaker 2 (02:30):
Nice, okay.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
It was like one of those little drive up ones,
and it just was so quaint and adorable and cute,
and they had so many amazing options. I of course
got an Americano.
Speaker 2 (02:46):
Actually they had one hundred options, and I chose.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
I panicked, I'm going to added cinnamon to my americanas
What can I say? I'm just a woman of spicy
girl I'm a woman of the world.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Larry's Gourmet Coffee Okay, yeah.
Speaker 1 (03:04):
It was really cute. The barista was super helpful.
Speaker 2 (03:08):
I'm choosing your Americana.
Speaker 1 (03:14):
Well, I had asked about a bunch of different coffees
before Makana like a dick. So I'm really sorry, but
also thank you.
Speaker 2 (03:23):
I feel like I do that shit too, or I'll
be like what's this, what's this, and then I'll be
like I'll just get my chie without milk please exactly.
Speaker 1 (03:30):
Well, it was like they had these options that sounded
so good, but then I was like, that's gonna be
so sweet, and I'm just not a sweet girl. But yeah,
they were just really cute. Me see if I want
to show you a picture. Basically, I was just I
was literally driving down the street going, oh god, I
need a coffee. Oh God, I need a coffee. And
then there was like a shining beacon in the night.
Speaker 2 (03:51):
Yeah, like, so ha, come to us for Americana siamon
cinnamon creepy.
Speaker 1 (03:56):
It was like, so Haarah calls her aid and Larry's
got coffee house well, and so it was beautiful, So
thank you Larry's Gourmet, And they have these cute little cards,
liamp cards, stamp cards, and it's like kind of neat
because it says it if you get six stamps you
get twenty five percent off, and then if you get
a full card, you get free drink. So it's like
(04:16):
a little happy medium.
Speaker 2 (04:17):
Yeah, that's not bad.
Speaker 1 (04:22):
Oh and Larry Larry's has fresh doughnuts every day. I
did not get one. Sorry, I panicked. I'm also technically
supposed to be on a diet.
Speaker 2 (04:34):
No girl, All good.
Speaker 1 (04:39):
Well, I'm gonna go ahead and jump into this case.
It's a pretty well known case actually, so I'm sure
many of y'all have heard it before. This was my
first time actually learning about it and hearing about it,
so it was very surprising to me that I hadn't
heard about it before. This case took place a in
(05:00):
October of two thousand and two, so it's quite a
bit older, I guess at this point, even though it's.
Speaker 2 (05:05):
Like twenty three years ago.
Speaker 1 (05:06):
Yeah, but it was a case that really changed the
country and the perception of trans women and shed light
on you know, trans people in general in this country.
It was something that I think as a nation, the
idea of being trans was really very unheard of. Except
(05:30):
in very specific, you know, areas, and so it was
kind of interesting. I picked this case because technically it's
Pride Month. Obviously you guys will be getting this after
Pride Month is over, but I think it can be
really easy for us to forget why it's so important
to really look out for and protect our LGBTQA folks, PSA,
(05:54):
and just trigger warning right off the bat. This case
was absolutely brutal. It's gonna have some very heavy topics,
including violence against a trans woman. So if that is
something that you just don't have inside of you today,
I say, skipped the episode. We are going to go
into some detail about like what happened and what was
you know, done to Gwen. So it's just important to
(06:18):
you know, make sure you take care of your mental health.
So Gwen she named herself for her favorite singer, Gwen Stefani,
which Ye two thousand and two, Very two thousand and two.
She started transitioning at age fourteen, and she was viciously
murdered only three years later baby, So just absolutely just
devastating case. According to her mother, Sylvia Guerrero, who will
(06:42):
talk a lot about in this episode, the transition from
her sex assigned at birth to female was slow, very
slow for Gwen. So she came out to her mom
at around fourteen and said, hey, you know, I'm a girl,
and her mom was like, okay, like and was really supportive. Yeah,
it was very sweet. But Gwen did take her time
(07:05):
with transitioning, so she started very slowly. She really kept
wearing a lot of what would be considered like masculine clothes,
like hoodies, sweatshirts, things like that. But as she started
to change her appearance and let more of Gwen come out,
she started to really shine and be more herself, which
(07:26):
was for her mother at least, and for her siblings
was just a beautiful thing to see. But of course,
as you can only imagine, school was a struggle being
a trans woman in public school in the early two thousands,
I can only imagine. So she was pretty uncertain how
to proceed in society. You know, what bathroom do I
use at school? All that stuff, and it just gave
(07:46):
her a lot of anxiety, understandably extreme anxiety, I would say.
So her mother ended up pulling her out of school
and allowed her to safely just transition at home. That
was the plan, according to her sister. Like I said,
Gwen really never dressed like a girl quote unquote, though
her makeup was on point. Yeah, I'll have to show
you some pics. So, like I was saying, she never
(08:09):
really wore traditionally girly clothes, but unbelievably and horribly sadly,
the first time she wore a skirt was incidentally the
night she was murdered.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Holy shit, I know, poor baby.
Speaker 1 (08:19):
I can't even imagine.
Speaker 2 (08:20):
I feel like kid's gonna be so ruthless. So, there
was a trans girl in my high school. And I
won't go into too many details because I think some
of my high school class listens to this podcast, but
they were just like horrendously bullied.
Speaker 1 (08:39):
And yeah, it's like blows my mind when people think that,
you know, they're choosing this right right, I'm like, do
you have any idea that?
Speaker 2 (08:46):
And she's gorgeous to you, but it just makes me
so sad that, like, you are trying to be your
true self and.
Speaker 1 (08:53):
People make it their prerogatively, yeah.
Speaker 2 (08:56):
Just to go out of their way to fucking make
your life miserable when you've literally done nothing but exists.
It's crazy, it's fucked up. It's so fucked up. That
makes me mad, me too, girl.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
So on the night of October second, two thousand and two,
Gwen was attending a party at a notorious party house
of the Merrill brothers. So the Meryl brothers were Manny
who was the youngest, Jose who was the middle, and Paul,
who was the oldest. Due to the reputation of this house,
local youths would often like hang out there, they would party,
(09:26):
they would flirt. Two of these kids, Jaren Neighbors and
Michael Madgittson, were regulars at the house and they were
known to party there pretty often. In fact, Gwen had
met and hung out with Michael for weeks before she
was murdered, and Michael was the first person to invite
Gwen to the house, so she had been kind of
hanging out at this party house for a while. During
his interview, Jaren Neighbors tells Detectives that the guys who
(09:49):
were going to this house were really going there with
the intention of getting laid, so if there were girls there,
like those girls were kind of expected to put out gross. Yeah.
When he first met Gwen, he said that she was
really flirty with the guys and they were flirting back,
and it was at first just flirting. But over the
next few weeks when and a couple of the men,
for sure Michael Magetson and Jose Merrill ended up having
(10:11):
a sexual relationship. Apparently, according to Jaren, the guys would
find that it was very odd that the squirrel would
flirt all night with them and then never hook up
with them, quote unquote, like all the way vaginally the entitlement.
First of all, how could you say, like she was flirting,
but god, she just wasn't putting out as I'm real regardless.
(10:31):
Because of this, they actually started questioning Gwen's biological sex
as a group.
Speaker 2 (10:37):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
So just also a reminder, Gwen was seventeen years old
at this point. These creeps were all over legal age.
So that Thursday night, Jared Neighbors who was nineteen, Jason
Cassaras who was twenty two, Michael Madgittson who was twenty two,
and the Meryll brothers including Jose Merrill twenty two, and
Paul Merrill's girlfriend Nicole Brown, were all at the house.
Speaker 2 (11:00):
Okay, so she's the only underage girl.
Speaker 1 (11:03):
Girl, She's only under each person there. Yeah, although I
guess technically Manny the little brother was there, but we'll
get into that in a minute. So, according to Jaren,
everybody was sitting at the table playing dominoes and the
guy started to kind of gang up on Gwen, so
they were questioning her assigned sex at birth. They were
(11:26):
yelling are you a man? Over and over again, demanding
that she removed her underwear at the table and show
them Jesus Christ. Finally, yeah, Michael agreed to go to
the bathroom with Gwen to check in private.
Speaker 2 (11:39):
On your fucking business. I'm so sorry that the fuck
bro dude, that's terrifying too.
Speaker 1 (11:44):
Oh, I could the humiliation, the fear Like this case
really hit me a lot because I remember, you know,
being that girl, like that young girl at a party
with like a bunch of older people, and I can
only imagine just the fear and the humiliation that would
have come with a night like this, Like you're going
(12:05):
over there for the first time too, like wearing something
new and trying to just be yourself, and it just
blows up on you and people are all of a
sudden just freaking out and I can't even imagine. So
they were in the bathroom for like thirty to forty
five minutes. Kind of a weird amount of time, right,
Then get this Nicole Brown. So Paul Merrill's the oldest
(12:27):
brother's girlfriend. She is sitting at the table, I guess,
and she's talking to the other guys and she's like,
I just have to know. She gets up, goes in
the bathroom, sees that Micha lnguyn are still there, but
he hasn't like done anything to Gwynn. And so she
goes over to this seventeen year old girl, pulls her
legs apart as hard as she can and reaches in
(12:48):
and grabs her genitals.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
Jesus Christ, brush shit.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Oh man, I can't even imagine. And like, as the
only other girl there.
Speaker 2 (12:58):
That's so yeah, you'd think that you would have some.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
So fucking gross.
Speaker 2 (13:03):
It's sort of like a an ally at least, I
don't know, no, you.
Speaker 1 (13:08):
Would think, well, clearly this one is for sure. It
makes me wonderally if she wasn't feeling like kind of
jealous because she's older, and then.
Speaker 2 (13:17):
Yeah, I'll have to see a picture of Gwen, but
I'm assuming she was a knockout.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
Oh my god. Yeah, yeah, Gwen was absolutely a stunner.
So she grabs her genitals, and at this point Cole
just starts running out of the bathroom screaming, she's a man,
She's a fucking man. Yeah. As Gwen tries to leave
the bathroom as I can only imagine just humiliated, mortified,
scared as hell, Michael punches her in the face and
(13:43):
she falls to the ground. At this point, multiple men
hold her down and pull her underwear to the side
for everybody to see her genitals. Oh my god, a
seventeen year old girl. This case just honestly makes me
stick to my stomach, and I feel like a lot
of people who have heard or read about this case
are probably feeling the exact same way we are. Then
(14:07):
they allow Gwen to stand up. Michael, jarn and Jason
are all with Gwen while Nicole, Jose and the others
kind of break off, and Jose starts screaming, does this
mean I'm gay? Does this mean I'm gay? Yeah. The
(14:28):
former ADA on the case mentioned that he believed that
Jose may have actually been in love with Gwen, and
that he couldn't figure out because of that, how you're
not gay, she's a girl? Yeah, exactly, But because of
the times and the ignorance involved in this case, he
freaked out. So regardless, he could have realized that Gwen,
(14:51):
who they were calling Lida just FYI, she kind of
was going by leda with this group, was a human
being and a female, which would make him straight because
what happens next is honestly just absolutely horrific. So supposedly, allegedly,
according to Nicole's interviews, she said, Lyda, I think you
should go. So the men were getting really worked up,
(15:11):
so Gwen gets off the counter and she walks out
the door, out the front door. Immediately she turns around
and walks back inside, and when Nicole looks over, she
says that Jason, Jaren, and Mike all trailed her back
inside the house. So she tried to leave and they
kind of pushed her back in. Gwenn kept trying to
grab phones like a phone to call her mom, but
(15:33):
on multiple occaions the phone was ripped out of her
hand and throw it away. She also tried to leave
the house on multiple occasions, but was dragged back inside
each time. The multiple near escapes that Gwen made were
testified to by the youngest brother, Manny, who said at
one point he even tried to help her escape, but
was unable to get her past all the other guys
in the building. During this time, the boys took turns
(15:55):
beating Gwen over and over and over again as she
was pleading for her life. At one point, a witness
claimed that she tried to stop them by saying, please,
don't I have a family. According to a source, these
were her last words, but according to Jose Merril, he
heard her say I told you I was sorry, and
those were her last words, sorry for being myself. They
(16:17):
dragged her into the living room, where Jose began striking
her in the head with kitchen objects, including a frying
pan and a can of food, which dentted the can
and opened a cut on her head. Nicole claims that
when the fighting escalated and became confrontational, her boyfriend Paul
took off to another part of the house. Nicole went
to get Paul, but says that when she returned to
(16:37):
the kitchen, Gwen was nowhere to be seen and Mike
had blood all over his hands. At this point, Nicole
claims that she Manny, the youngest brother, and Paul, her boyfriend,
the oldest brother, left the house. She also says that
she saw Gwen bloody and sitting on the couch, but
neither she nor Paul did anything to help her.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Fucking assholes.
Speaker 1 (16:56):
I'd like, I can't. At this point, the boys got
together and had what Jaron called and he called it
this in a letter to his girlfriend, a soprano type
plan to kill the bitch and get rid of her body.
Jaren and Jason took Michael's check to get shovels and
a pickaxe, and when they returned, according to testimony, Jose
saw that Gwen was bleeding on his couch and told
her to get off my fucking couch. I get off
(17:17):
my couch, you're bleeding on it. Yeah, and then the
assault resumed. Jaren urged Michael to knock her out. Knock
that bitch out, That's what he kept saying, and Michael
hit her head against the living room wall with his
knee hard enough that she fell unconscious and it left
a dent in the wall and cracked the plaster Jesus Christ.
While she was down, Jason was kicking her, and at
(17:39):
this point Jose went to his room and began crying
before coming back out. Boohoo, you little fuck Yeah who
you're crying, Oh my god, I can't.
Speaker 2 (17:49):
You're a piece of shit.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
You're trash dude. They then took Gwen to the garage
after I believe wrapping her in like a comforter to
help her vent blood from get on their carpet. Likely
she was at least hopefully still unconscious while even more
horrifying things were done to her. She was bound by
her wrists and ankles with rope. According to Jaren, Mike said,
(18:12):
and I'll quote him here, I need a sharp knife
for some rope, So Jaren said, I gave him my knife.
They used the rope to tie her up. When the
blanket was wrapped around her, I saw her feet were tied,
and when they put her in the truck, I saw
she had a rope around her neck. Uote So Jaren
had left the room allegedly for the actual murder, but
testified that Michael had strangled her with the rope and
(18:33):
that Jason had hit her with a shovel. In fact,
Jaren said that Jason even complained that Gwen had urinated
after he hit her with the shovel and what they
believe may have been her final her killing blow. The boys,
specifically Mike had strangled Gwen by using the rope as
a garat twisting it around. So he put it around
(18:55):
her neck and then twisted it multiple times until after
some time she passed away. That takes a long time
to do.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
In several minutes. It's not not instant, not a couple
of seconds.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
They had multiple times, like there were multiple times here
where they could have walked away. Jason then hit her
with the shovel multiple times, and then he said that
he was doing that just to confirm she was dead. Supposedly, allegedly,
Jose didn't even know she was dead until he saw
her in the back of the truck, but also when
Nicole called Jose the following morning to ask what happened,
he replied, let's just say she had a long walk home,
(19:32):
So I don't know about all that. M h, Yeah,
I don't think so. I don't think so either. So
get this. The boys now have murdered Gwen. After beating
her horrifically over what I assume was ours. They then
load her into Mike's truck and they drive her body
(19:53):
four hours to El Dorado County near the Sierras near
us Kinda, where they bury her in the blanket she in,
so four hours they drive her. According to testimony, even
as they buried her, they continued to disparage her, with
Jose adding that he couldn't believe somebody could be that
deceitful and that he wanted to kick her a few
more times because of it.
Speaker 2 (20:14):
Fuck you, fuck you, what the fuck?
Speaker 1 (20:17):
According to Jaren, they chose Silver Fork Road in Eldorado
County because they had camped there multiple times and they
knew there was only one sheriff in the area. During
the interviews, they call her her the entire time good
and I'm like, so you acknowledge that you acknowledge you
know that she's a girl? Yeah? Really pissed me off.
(20:39):
Of course, mother is no right. So Sylvia called Gwen's
sister and told her first thing in the morning that
she had a horrible feeling and that Gwenn hadn't come
home the night before. So her sister started calling hospitals
and morgues anywhere really to try to find her sister.
They reported her missing on Sunday, and for a week
there was nothing. No one had any information on where
Gwyn could be, no leeds, no thing at all. I
(21:01):
don't know if the parent, like her mom just didn't
know what how she was going to party at or what.
But one of these idiots did what they always do,
and they couldn't keep their mouth shut and they talked,
and thank god for that.
Speaker 2 (21:14):
Right they bragged somebody about being a horrible piece of shit.
Speaker 1 (21:19):
Pretty much. Yeah. The former ADA on the case said
that they would likely have never found her if Jared
Neighbors didn't tell somebody about what happened. He told a
friend of his I kicked off a rumor that circulated
around the area. According to some sources, Jared Neighbors was
quote unquote distraught and had told a friend what he
and his quote unquote homies had done soon after they
(21:42):
came back. The friend actually is the one who went
into off the police, so at least somebody here has
(22:02):
a conscience. The police then convinced the friend to wear
a wier a wier. They convinced him to wear a
wire and record Jaren. After getting the confession from Jaren
to the friend, they immediately arrested him and he folded
like a lawn chair. He he admitted his involvement. He
(22:23):
tells his actor is exactly what happened that night, and
he also took investigators to where they buried Gwenn's body. Yeah.
The Alameda County Coroner's report concluded that Gwen had died
due to blunt force trauma to the head and strangulation.
From Jaren, they got the names of the other people involved,
including Mike, the main perpetrator and murderer. During his interview,
(22:43):
the detectives asked Mike, were you the one who put
the rope around her neck, to which he says, yes,
But I didn't mean for anything to happen though, Like,
what the fuck? Okay, bud okay, Oh the fuck you didn't.
Oh it made me so mad, dude.
Speaker 2 (22:56):
I was like, Mike, you didn't mean to be a
complete piece of shit and torture this poor girl to death.
Speaker 1 (23:03):
Literally, it was planned. You guys went and got the truck,
he got.
Speaker 2 (23:06):
The shells and the pickaxe. Yeah, and they knew where
they were going to dune her body. Yeah, yep.
Speaker 1 (23:13):
Jose, Mike, and Darren were all churged with first degree
murder and committing a hate crime on October eighteenth, two
thousand and two. A few weeks later, the force suspect
Jason Cassaras was also arrested. A famous human rights attorney,
Gloria Allred, actually represented Gwen's family, and everybody was like
waiting in suspense for this trial. The timing of the
case was also pretty wild. I feel like anybody who
(23:36):
was around in two thousand and two couldn't imagine gay
people were still the butt of jokes in almost every comedy.
Oh yeah, Like it was not a time for gay rights.
The average population's understanding of trans people was almost non existent.
This case was sensationalized in the national media, like all over,
(23:57):
how old are you in two thousand and two?
Speaker 2 (23:59):
It it was ten, it was like fourteen, fifteen.
Speaker 1 (24:02):
Yeah, I'm surprised. I'm pretty surprised we didn't hear about
this thirteen. Maybe we did.
Speaker 2 (24:06):
How many years old?
Speaker 1 (24:09):
I don't know, girl, early teens.
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Yeah, I would have been thirteen.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
Yeah, So I mean, I imagine this case would have been
all over. I'm surprised. I'm surprised I don't remember it.
Maybe because this is right after nine to eleven, A year.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
After nine eleven. Yeah, I would have been in Alaska.
Speaker 1 (24:33):
So we had one traffic light we did, and it blinked.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
It was a a blinking red light.
Speaker 1 (24:43):
Oh man, oh shit. Well, it was sensationalized in the
national media because number one, when was very beautiful, she
had one of those faces that you really just like
it sticks out to you. She's really piercing eyes. And
also she's still a minor at this point, like, she's
still a minor. And the LGBTQA community was freaking outraged,
(25:04):
and rightly so. Right so on one side of the fence,
some and likely a large portion of the public were
asking this question like, well, wasn't she lying when she
presented herself as a woman. No, And of course that
answer is no, she was literally being herself a woman.
But because of the size and range of this case,
(25:24):
it started a lot of conversations between the general and
uneducated public and LGBTQA and TRANSWRID activists. Pronouns dead naming,
the concept of transitioning were new topics for so many people.
Speaker 2 (25:37):
Right, A lot of I'm sure conservative religious types that
just have no idea that there's anything outside of their
little tiny bubble.
Speaker 1 (25:46):
Absolutely well, and just I feel like the average suburban household,
probably unless they knew somebody who was transitioning, just had
no idea. And an ironic twist, the Newark High School
was covering a play called The Laramie Project. I don't
know if you've heard of that or if I hadn't either,
but it's about the nineteen ninety eight murder of Matthew Shepherd,
(26:07):
a gay man living in Laramie, Wyoming. And if you
guys have have you heard of Matthew Shepherd?
Speaker 2 (26:13):
I feel like the name's familiar, but I can't say.
Speaker 1 (26:15):
That he's like he was that the case, but he's
like that beautiful blonde twink. They found him like beaten
and up on.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
The tree or a post. Yeah, okay, yeah, and.
Speaker 1 (26:27):
He was like a huge gay rights like moment. But yeah,
so Matthew Shepherd. They were doing a play at the
high school there about Matthew Shepherd, called the Laramie Project.
So normally I wouldn't even bring up this certain Kansas
fundamentalist preacher because I fucking hate him and God hates
him and you should hate him. So but I have
(26:49):
to because he's in this case. So you know, the
Westboro Baptist.
Speaker 2 (26:53):
Yeah, I do.
Speaker 1 (26:54):
The fucking the worst scum of the earth, the scum
of the earth.
Speaker 2 (26:58):
A little scummy pieces of.
Speaker 1 (27:00):
Ship, those fucking cunts.
Speaker 2 (27:01):
I literally just show up to fucking.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
Just to be bastard.
Speaker 2 (27:06):
Yeah, pretty much.
Speaker 1 (27:08):
Their pastor spewed a lot of hate. He would protest
anything he seemed or deemed quote unquote sinful, and he
threatened to protest Gwen's funeral.
Speaker 2 (27:18):
Do you know what's fucking sinful? Being a hate full bigot.
I was like, if you look back at sucking all
of those like sermons that Jesus gave allegedly, yeah, it's
like love your fucking neighbor and don't be a piece
of shit. And he's literally hanging out with like the
fucking lowercha fucking society. Like he's not hanging out with kings,
(27:43):
he's not hanging out with like fucking politicians and ship
He's the exact opposite of all this bullshit. Was probably, yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
A chill dude, and you, sir, are freaking not Westboro
Baptist can eat my ass, my whole ass, my whole ass, y'all.
So I doubt they'll ever hear this.
Speaker 2 (28:03):
But oh there's probably someone out there that has to listen.
Speaker 1 (28:06):
To send me a seasons eat me eat my whole ass,
so he both anyway, Sorry, No, no, you're right. Is facts,
cold hard facts. He and his followers made signs that
said predictably instigating hate speech, condemning GWNDE hell using slurs,
and calling for the genocide of lgbtq E.
Speaker 2 (28:26):
Oh yeah, that's super fucking godlike very Christian.
Speaker 1 (28:30):
I feel like God's really impressed with you. He's thrilled.
That's sarcasm, I know, fucking idiots. I hope these people
eat shit.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
I hope they all or they all get on like
a fucking plane and like the pilot and all this
stuff are also Wesbroover Baptists, and they just fucking disappear.
Speaker 1 (28:48):
Yeah, they reap what they sew.
Speaker 2 (28:50):
Yeah, there we go, like coming up weirdnari.
Speaker 1 (28:55):
I hope, I hope they all get on a bus
and then driving to Disneyland and.
Speaker 2 (28:59):
Disneyland a protest fucking Disneyland for fucking being.
Speaker 1 (29:02):
But then they accidentally drive off a cliff and the bus.
Speaker 2 (29:05):
It rolls like ninety eight times.
Speaker 1 (29:07):
Yeah yeah, and it lands upside down and all their next.
Speaker 2 (29:11):
Break and they all die horrible, painful deaths. Oops, I
did it.
Speaker 1 (29:16):
Okay, they can eat.
Speaker 2 (29:22):
Way off fucking track. Sorry, no, you good derailed de
roil Okay, So I hope that they get on a train. Yes,
and then that train, never mind.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
Derails you were saying though. So, though the Westboro Baptist
Church never did attend the funeral, they did protest the
Laramie Project play, and by doing so incited anti gay
and the anti transcripts to show up at one's funeral.
Speaker 2 (29:53):
Get a fucking wife, dude, you're literally picking on like
the smallest demographic literally is already struggling just to fucking exist.
Get a life, this fucking hobby other than sitting on
other people.
Speaker 1 (30:07):
Don't you focus on doing some charity work?
Speaker 2 (30:09):
Right? You're not anyway?
Speaker 1 (30:13):
In fact, that little bozo also showed up at Sylvia
When's mom's doorstep the day before the funeral and advised
that he was sending flowers. The flowers that arrived to
the funeral home also came with a note a bomb threat.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Shut the fuck up.
Speaker 3 (30:29):
M h.
Speaker 1 (30:29):
The flowers were then just brought to the back of
the building, to the parking lot in the back, where
everyone decided, fuck it, we're just gonna keep moving forward
with her funeral.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
Which, like, how did he not get arrested for.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
The Seriously, I think they couldn't like prove without a
reasonable doubt or something that was him, I don't know whatever,
fuck that guy. But Gwen's family, like I said, didn't
back down. They continued with her funeral, and to their surprise,
the outpour of love and solidarity from their community, from
their commune unity and other supporters was just super apparent,
(31:03):
with many people hearing and understanding Gwen as she was,
and attending and standing with Gwen and her family. So
that was really back to the trial, which occurred in
two thousand and four, over a year later. This trial
was highly publicized. While prosecution's case was very cut and dry,
(31:26):
right these guys killed, the defense relied heavily on the
idea that this was an emotional outburst or shock that
caused an unfortunate death, otherwise called the gay panic defense,
which would shift the liability of the murderers from murder
one to manslaughter. So the gay panic defense is one
(31:50):
that I've heard, like, come on, yeah.
Speaker 2 (31:55):
Dude, sorry, I'm just shouting into the microphone.
Speaker 1 (31:57):
Come on, yeah, No, I mean it's fair to feel
that way, because what the fuck. The defense also pushed
the idea that what occurred between Gwhen and the men
was actually not a true consensual act because they did it.
What know that she was born male? I guess they
(32:18):
said that any rational person would feel betrayed and react
violently and rashly, which I.
Speaker 2 (32:22):
Just I don't can't believe that.
Speaker 1 (32:24):
Also, this is a fucking teenager.
Speaker 2 (32:27):
A teenager shouldn't have been hanging out with her in
the first place. Absolutely is my first thought. My initial
thought is like, why are you inviting underage girls to
your fucking house? And why are you with the with
the assumption that they're going to put out.
Speaker 1 (32:40):
Crazy, fucking crazy.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
And like Mary, she's just gross.
Speaker 1 (32:46):
A teenager like.
Speaker 2 (32:48):
Tory rape too, they come on.
Speaker 1 (32:50):
I think probably age of consent is sixteen would be
my assumption in California. But I agree that it is
not good. It ain't good. Baby. These guys were in
their twenties, Like in their twenties.
Speaker 2 (33:07):
Dude, they shouldn't be messed around teenage girls now.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
So I just I cannot, I cannot, I cannot. But
by that standard, people who, in my opinion, I find
out that their sexual partners are cheating or that they've
given them a surprise, std should be murdering each other
left and right.
Speaker 2 (33:21):
No, Hey, guess what age of consent in California is eighteen?
Speaker 3 (33:25):
Is it?
Speaker 1 (33:25):
Really?
Speaker 2 (33:25):
It really is?
Speaker 1 (33:26):
How were they not slapped with that?
Speaker 2 (33:28):
I don't know.
Speaker 1 (33:32):
That's fucking weird. Listen, any California lawyers out there, please
give us a heads up on how that's possible.
Speaker 2 (33:39):
No, that is age of consent to sixteen, which I
think is gross.
Speaker 1 (33:41):
I also agree anyway, freaky, Please let us know. Let
us know because we're curious on how the hell these
guys did not get slapped with a little bit of
It's a sexual assault of a minor, That's what it is.
Speaker 2 (33:53):
It would be statutory right that you shouldn't be even
like I'm I mean, I don't know if she said
she was older. Maybe, I don't think it matters.
Speaker 1 (34:03):
I'm pretty sor.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
But if you are engaging in sexual acts with a minor,
even if they do give you consent and their willing participants,
it is still considered statutory rape if they're under the
age of eighteen.
Speaker 3 (34:16):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (34:31):
Yeah, So I don't know. Guys, uh, fucking weird. I
just cannot.
Speaker 2 (34:36):
I know. They probably just try to paint them as
the victims, which they often do, and try to make
out Gwen to be this.
Speaker 1 (34:48):
Demon.
Speaker 2 (34:49):
No I wasn't gonna say demon, I was gonna say
that she's like falsey presenting herself. Yeah, exactly, as she's
the person that should be responsible for what happened to her,
which is victim blaming straight straight up, straight up.
Speaker 1 (35:05):
It's also worth noting that the defendants at this time
were all keeping their mouth shut except Jared Neighbors. Since
Jaren was the earliest rat, he got the cheese mm
per usual, so he received an eleven year man's letter
sentence for testifying for the prosecution against the other three defendants.
During the trial, Nicole Brown took the stand for the prosecution.
(35:28):
I assumed to get out of jail time. Probably that's
what I would imagine, allegedly supposedly to talk about while
the defense tried poking holes in her credibility, stating that
she has memory gaps difficulty remembering timelines and time frames.
To help alleviate this, the prosecution then asked to include
video footage of the interviews that they had with her
(35:49):
the previous year, but the judge did not allow that testimony. Interesting,
very interesting. Luckily they still have Jaren testifying and he
would at least tell the family what had actually happened
to Gwen. Many of them were not privy to any
details until the trial occurred, which I can only imagine
having to hear that many of them oops. The defense
(36:12):
even brought in a psychologist, not even a psychiatrist, a
psychologist to tell the court that a young man is
likely to panic and overreact with violence if he founds
out that the person he's sleeping with is you know,
a male or female when they say they're not irritating. Interestingly,
(36:33):
at the end of the prosecution's closing argument, the eightya
mentioned that Paul Merrill, the eldest brother, had also slept
with Gwen and had chosen a walk away from the
house that night. To be fair, I think Paul Cole
Brown's boyfriend. I think Paul's a piece of shit too,
just making that very clear for not stepping in and
doing something. But he also had had some sort of
(36:58):
sexual relations with when likely I believe a lot of
this was like oral and anal and he didn't beat
her up, didn't kill her, he walked away. And the
prosecution said that they could have done the same thing exactly.
Speaker 2 (37:14):
Well, he should have at least been the voice of
reason in that you would think and let her go.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
Yeah, they could have let her go the house multiple.
Speaker 2 (37:22):
Times, multiple times she tried to leave.
Speaker 1 (37:26):
Tried to call her mom, tried to just get away,
And yeah.
Speaker 2 (37:30):
They chose. They chose to stop her. They chose to
beat her violently, ambitiously, and they ultimately chose to kill
her life. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (37:42):
So I also think Paul's a piece of shit, but
I agree with the prosecution. They could have not done this.
So after nine days of jury deliberations, the case ended
in a mistrial. The jury was hopelessly deadlocked. So homophobia
has roots everywhere even now. The LGBTQA activists were stunned
(38:03):
by the news, and I mean, god, who wouldn't be.
One of them said, you know, justice delayed is justice denied,
and they called for a new trial immediately. Three days
after the mistrial, the first trans writes march in San
Francisco occurred where Sylvia the mother attended, and she actually
got up to speak about her daughter at the march,
and she learned at that time that she could talk
(38:26):
about Gwen and potentially help educate people. So she continued
to talk at schools, and she attended almost seventy schools
and talked to them all about Gwen in her struggles. Ironically,
the week after Gwen's death was the court hearing for
her official name change to Gwen amber Rose Arajo. For
the first time in California history, they approved that for
a transperson after death, which was really nice. A little step.
Speaker 2 (38:50):
Yeah, well, too little, too late, but at least it's something.
Speaker 1 (38:54):
At least it's something. The second trial began almost a
year later. Gwen's mother, who was justice stunned by the
as trella as the rest of us, was absolutely terrified
of having to go through it again. She said multiple
times that she died in the courtroom and she might
as well still be there because she can't unsee or
unhear the things that were said, and.
Speaker 2 (39:14):
To have to go through that again, I'm few times
not having any sort of justice given for your daughter, Like,
oh my.
Speaker 1 (39:21):
God, I can imagine I like to have them say
the gay panic defense, Like to have to hear that
is unreal. Her still living daughter says that since Gwynn
was killed, she just hasn't been the same. She suffers
from postraumatic stress, she lost her job and unfortunately lost
her home. She's just not the same person. I feel
(39:45):
like I think we've mentioned this before. When people are
murdered like this, it often affects the family absolutely so much,
and they don't like the murders don't even realize how
far their actions go and how far how many people
they're actually affecting. It's really terribly sad. So still, the
(40:05):
ADA actually tried a new tactic this time. He told
the jury at the end of his opening that should
they waiver between first and second degree murder, as long
as they agree it's murder, they should come back with
a second degree conviction. And that was in an attempt
to not have to put the family through another trial.
(40:26):
And so even though they did go out get the shruck,
get the shovels, they clearly had plans to murder this girl.
They did find both Jose Merrill and Michael Maginson guilty
of second degree murder. So second degree and Jason's attorney
(40:49):
was able to plea out with manslaughter even though he
was the one hitting her with shovels. I don't fucking
get it. I don't know that none of the men
were convicted of a hate crime, which is fucking bonkers
to me. Bonkers. Both Jose and Michael received fifteen to life.
That's it, and Jason received six years in prison for
his manslaughter charge. These guys almost got the exact same
(41:13):
amount of time as Jaron, who turned States witness just crazy.
During their chance to speak, Jose did show remorse, so
he was apologizing to Gwen's family. He cried when the
family gave their victim statements. Michael the scumbag who had
already shaved his scumbag head in a scumbag go tee
(41:34):
in preparation for the scumbag white supremacists in prison.
Speaker 2 (41:37):
Oh my god, the fuck up for real?
Speaker 1 (41:40):
I don't know, but he sure looked like one.
Speaker 2 (41:42):
Dude.
Speaker 1 (41:43):
Oh yeah, allegedly Supposedly.
Speaker 2 (41:44):
You already had a fucking end probably.
Speaker 1 (41:46):
My opinion, probably dude, because he used fucking scumbag and
his statement was grueling. He claimed everything that they said
a trial was a lie, and he didn't receive a
fair or unbiased trial and it was everybody else's fault,
but his way way away.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
I just rolled my eyes so fucking hard, almost popped
out the backside of my head.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
Saw next year, dude. Yeah, that was his statement. So
he had nothing to say about Gwen to her family
or anything. He just threw a fucking bitch pit. Oh
in just a note, The gay Panic Defense was outright
band and placed into California law in twenty fourteen. The
law was signed by Governor Jerry Brown and states that
fear or surprise of a victim's sexual orientation or gender
(42:27):
identity may not be used as a legal defense to
justify an assault. Many states followed the suit, and I'm
proud to say that Nevada is one of them. Heee,
don't tried it on me, motherfuckers, But many still allow
that prejudice and homophobia in the courtroom. States that have
tried and failed include Arizona. They have an active bill
for it right now, Arkansas, which failed in twenty twenty three,
(42:49):
Florida active bill twenty twenty five, Iowa failed in twenty
twenty three, Montana failed in twenty twenty three, Pennsylvania failed
in twenty twenty three. Yeah, Wisconsin failed twenty twenty three,
Georgia failed twenty twenty two, Massachusetts failed twenty twenty one,
Nebraska failed twenty twenty one, North Carolina failed twenty twenty one,
and Texas failed twenty twenty. So don't be afraid to
(43:11):
ask your representatives to help pass those bands, especially right
now in those active states of Arizona and Florida. Feel
free to just give a little jingle jangle up to
your old representatives.
Speaker 2 (43:21):
We'll post those numbers for you to make it extra convenient.
Speaker 1 (43:24):
Yeah, I'll even write you a little blurb if you'd like,
if you want to email it. There you go, because
that's that's bonkers. So where are our scumbags now mised
on what was basically a slap on the wrist for them,
in my opinion, let's find out. Jason Casas guilty to
the voluntary manslaughter charge as part of his plea deal
in two thousand and five, and he was released from
(43:44):
prison in twenty twelve. Jaron Neighbors pled guilty to Man's
letter and in turn for testifying for the prosecution in
two thousand and six, was released from prison early in
twenty sixteen. Jose Merrill was found guilty in two thousand
and five for second degree murder and it was getting
granted parole oh shit, and was granted parole in twenty sixteen.
(44:05):
Sylvia and all of Gwen's family attended all these pearole hearings,
so Sylvia was supported Sylvia actually supported granting pearl to
Jose because she truly felt like he was really porceful,
but most of Gwen's family disagrees either way. He's out now.
Michael Madgittson has been denied parole three times since his sentencing.
He was most recently denied in August of twenty twenty four,
(44:28):
and he is the only one of the four still
in prison. His next pearole hearing is scheduled for twenty
twenty nine. So I was curious as to why he
was still in and I found an article. Okay ay,
So his first parole hearing in twenty nineteen, Mike said
for the first time that he took responsibility for Gwen's death,
and he admitted that he strangled her. He could have
(44:50):
saved her and he chose not to. This was also
the first time he ever said sorry to her family
but abou the news. So Sylvia said that she didn't
believe his apology was sincere, and he was denied parole.
During his second parole hearing, he let his true self
come out again. So he blamed his friends, his upbringing.
He blamed everyone else but himself. He also said that
(45:11):
he didn't like you know, the group's setting of these
parole hearings, and the parle board denied him again, this
time saying that he hadn't addressed any of his issues.
He hadn't addressed his anger management, his substance abuse, his
domestic violence, he wasn't attending any group classes, and he
was not taking any responsibility for what happened. Also, it
turns out, not surprisingly that Michael has a poor prison
(45:33):
record with many disciplinary violations.
Speaker 2 (45:35):
Well rotten piss, I guess.
Speaker 1 (45:38):
Eat it, bitch. So to this day, trans people, trans
youth are persecuted by the public, and in our current environment,
parents are being attacked for supporting them. I think it's
important to note that eighty two percent of trans people
have considered suicide, with forty percent attempting it. That is
a huge number. The highest percentage of this number is
(45:59):
with trans gender youth, and a study conducted in twenty twenty,
eighty six percent of trans youth reported suicide suicidal ideation, Yeah,
suicidal ideations, with fifty six percent reporting a previous suicide attempt.
Oh and by the way, because I always hear this,
regret rates for gender affirming care are about less than
one percent. Way lower than basic procedures like lap bands
(46:22):
or joint replacements, and that that's what he was on
in twenty twenty five. So no, these kids are not
choosing this because they want to be cool.
Speaker 2 (46:31):
No, it's not a fucking fad. It's literally them knowing
what's best for themselves. And I think we need to
recognize that and be supportive.
Speaker 1 (46:40):
Absolutely, And the more that support it.
Speaker 2 (46:43):
It's phobic bullshit so bad. It doesn't fucking affect you.
It doesn't affect you.
Speaker 1 (46:47):
It's not you have nothing to do with you. Yes,
And I feel like the more understanding and open we
are as a society about this, less likely things like
what happened to when will happen in the future. So
when our laws and our schools are attacking them and
those who support them are being attacked, it makes sense
(47:08):
that these children are considering suicide. We have to be better.
We have to protect our trans friends and family. Period.
If you're a trans listener and you want to chat
with us about anything, we are always here and we
love you.
Speaker 2 (47:20):
We love you so much.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
Keep a check up, babe, you got this otherwise that
is our story. My god.
Speaker 2 (47:28):
Thanks for sharing that. I wanted to fucking I'm probably
gonna go cry now.
Speaker 1 (47:32):
This one like this one hit me. Dude, seriously didn't
deserve that. You're just a fucking teenage girl, dude. Well,
thank you all so much for joining us today. If
you have any case corrections, coffee, chefs, cases, snacks.
Speaker 2 (47:50):
If you want to bring us snags.
Speaker 1 (47:52):
You can always hit us up on Instagram at.
Speaker 2 (47:55):
Scream dot and Dot Sugar Dot podcast.
Speaker 1 (47:57):
On Facebook, Scream and Sugar, True Crime Coffee Hour on TikTok,
Scream Dot and Dot Sugar, shoot us an email on
gmail Scream.
Speaker 2 (48:04):
And Sugar Reno at gmail dot com.
Speaker 1 (48:06):
Thank you all so much for listening and we hope
to catch you in the next one. And remember today
spooky y'all a bye projects magic. Yeah, it sounds like Maggotson.
(48:56):
He's a fucking maggot Mason, Maggotson Um
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