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July 22, 2025 6 mins
# Riding Shotgun with Detective Em Carter: Inside America's Serial Killer Cases

Join Detective Em Carter for a gripping exploration of America's most chilling unsolved murders and serial killer investigations. This episode takes you beyond the headlines into the gritty reality of law enforcement's battle against society's most dangerous predators.

Discover the unfolding mystery of Little Rock's "River City Ripper," whose brutal attacks on vulnerable victims continue to elude authorities despite witness testimonies and security footage. Then, dive into fresh revelations about the infamous Candyman killings as accomplice Elmer Wayne Henley Jr. breaks decades of silence in a rare interview.

Detective Carter examines the troubling pattern of highway deaths across New England, where the line between coincidence and serial predation remains disturbingly blurred. She also celebrates forensic breakthroughs in Illinois where genetic genealogy finally put names to Jane Does after fourteen years.

Unlike polished true crime shows, this podcast reveals the authentic investigative process—from methodical evidence collection to the psychological profiling that helps track killers. Carter brings her professional expertise to each case, showing how patterns emerge and how killers operating on society's margins often escape justice longest.

Whether you're a true crime enthusiast or fascinated by criminal psychology, this unflinching look at America's ongoing serial killer cases offers rare insights into cases that remain open wounds for communities and investigators alike.
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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
You are writing Shotgun with Detective m Carter, and buckle up.
It is going to be a wild shift through some
of the latest and darkest updates in America's ongoing dance
with serial killers and the cases chasing them. I need
you to picture a beat up folder crammed with headlines,
cop notes, news clippings, and the kind of half whispered
rumors you hear at diner counters and police briefings. We

(00:22):
encounter the persistent unknown, the chilling familiar, and the forensic
marvels and mix ups that define how real law enforcement
gets things done. Think of me as your lens on
the field, sometimes wide eyed rookie, sometimes jaded just from
the material, but always locked in with a curious mind
and a detective's need for straight facts. Serial Killers the

(00:43):
phrase still slices through the noise, even for those of
us on the job. Now. I know Netflix made all
of you true crime hobbyists, but the reality what really
keeps detectives, lab techs and beat cops up at night
is a living, shifting puzzle. None of this is neat.
Headlines make things seem clean, but if you were sitting

(01:04):
in a squad car beside me, you'd smell the sweat
and frustration that comes with every unsolved homicide. We may
have high speed computers, DNA swabs, and citywide camera coverage
these days, but every new case can still put the
whole department right back at square one. Let's cruise through
some of the new and most pressing stories, then weaving
together the grave with the gritty, and sharing how each

(01:26):
case fits into those larger patterns drummed into my head
at the academy. As we dig in, Remember these are lives,
not just statistics or promos for the next true crime podcast.
For detectives, each name, each case matters as if it
was their own recent headline, Little Rock's Phantom, the uncaught
River City Ripper. Sometimes danger isn't a stranger in the shadows.

(01:51):
Sometimes it walks right past you on a street that
looks just like yours. No one in Little Rock, Arkansas
is likely to forget the summer of twenty two zero
and the months that followed that summer, bodies started showing
up in the quiet corners of Little Rock. The names
Larry mc christian, Jeff Welch, Marlin Franklin probably mean little

(02:15):
to outsiders, but to local cops and their families. They
mean a serial killer is out there, uncaught and free.
I have pored over reports that tell me Larry was
found stabbed, his absence reported only a few days prior.
Just a month later, another body, Jeff, dead on a porch,
wounds nearly identical. This wasn't a random mugging or a

(02:38):
drunken brawl taken too far. You get to April, and
somehow Deborah Walker survives an attack that leaves her with
fifteen stab wounds. She tells police about the assailant's gender, size, race,
and even helps draw composite sketches. And yet the next day,
another unhoused man is killed by the same brutality we

(02:58):
talk about m os a detective's favorite term, modus operendi.
This one's clear, quick repeated stabbing attacks, mostly on unhoused
or vulnerable folks. The River City Ripper still at large,
Still an open wound for anyone who cares about catching
real monsters, not just the boogeymen from TV. What makes
this scarier? Despite all this security footage, even vigilantes, no arrests. Listen,

(03:25):
you spend time in homicide, and you realize cereals thrive
when their victims are on society's margins. Why less immediate pressure,
fewer powerful advocates. But every city has its detectives and
civilian watch dogs who will not forget. There's every chance
this will be the case to break wide open, and
not because of some Netflix dock or a clever online sleuth,

(03:46):
but through slow, stubborn legwork and fresh forensics that won't
accept cold case as a final answer. Serial Killer Legends revisited,
The Candy Man Case sees the light again. History buffs
and true crime fans know the name Dean Coral, the
so called Candy Man Killer, the man who left Houston
reeling in the early nineteen seventies as at least twenty

(04:08):
eight young men disappeared and died. Here we are, more
than fifty years down the line. An investigation discovery is
dropping a whole new look at Coral's case, called The
serial Killer's Apprentice. The reason this is turning heads for
the first time in decades, Elmer Wayne Henley Junior, the accomplice,
opens up in a deep dive interview. This documentary is

(04:30):
more than archive footage. It lets listeners step into the
shoes of a cop interrogating a man who helped orchestrate
what was then called the largest mass murder in US history.
Sometimes you hear an accomplice and ask yourself, why did
they go along with it? Henley's conversation with criminologist doctor
Catherine Ramsland could finally crack that enigma from inside the

(04:50):
killer's inner circle. It is history, but in police work,
even decades old crimes can spark new leads and fresh
questions for current cases, especially when signature and patterns resurface
in active cases. Today New England's mystery manhunt or mass hysteria.
Here is a story with all the elements I learned
to watch for. The unsolved killing streak, the pressing fear

(05:11):
fueling local rumor mills across Massachusetts, Connecticut and Rhode Island.
A number of bodies have appeared around highways in recent months.
Police insist many deaths show no clear evidence of foul play,
may be exposure, overdose, or suicide. Still, when patterns form, online,
detectives and retired FEDS no to lean in and demand

(05:31):
closer scrutiny. Is there really a serial predator operating in
New England? Or is this the echo chamber of Internet
sleuths hyping themselves up for the headlines. This happens more
than you might think the theory the killer could be
using major highways for easy getaways and to dispose of evidence.
This is classic criminal mobility, something I studied over and

(05:53):
over at the Academy. Dump sight, proximity, transient zones, jurisdictional seams.
The only constant is the uncertainty. Law enforcement often prioritizes
the facts physical evidence, forensics, witness statements before declaring a
case serial. But as history has shown, where there is smoke,

(06:14):
there
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