Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Parents Dismembered After Son's Web of Lies

Episode Date: January 26, 2022

Bart Halderson, 50, and his wife Krista Halderson, 53, are reported missing after their son, 23-year-old Chandler Halderson, says they didn’t return from a planned weekend trip to their cabin in Langlade County. Investigators find human remains and a bloody tarp in a wooded area in a remote part of Dane County. An autopsy confirmed that father Bart Halderson died from homicidal violence including a firearm injury. Krista Halderson is found days later. Their bodies had been dismembered. Chandler Halderson is charged with murder. Joining Nancy Grace Today: Kathleen Murphy - Family Attorney (North Carolina), www.ncdomesticlaw.com, Twitter: @RalDivorceLaw Dr. Jorey Krawczyn [KRAW-ZIN] - Psychologist, Faculty Saint Leo University; Consultant Blue Wall Institute, Author: Operation S.O.S.  Joe Scott Morgan - Professor of Forensics: Jacksonville State University, Author, "Blood Beneath My Feet", Host: "Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan" Alexis Tereszcuk - CrimeOnline.com Investigative Reporter, Writer/Fact Checker, Lead Stories dot Com, Twitter: @swimmie2009 Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. A beloved mom and dad go missing. Their young son anguished. Where are they? What happened to Bart and Krista Halderson? I'm Nancy Grace. This is Crime Stories. Thank you for being with us here at Fox Nation and Sirius XM 111. Let's kick it off. Take a listen to our friends at 3 News Now.

And so they got picked up and they all went up there by like another couple. Picked up here? Yeah, here at my house. Okay. Before I woke up, they had went up there by like another couple picked up here yeah here at my house okay before i woke up they had everything packed up jeez and do you don't know who they're who jeez that's uh i mean that that has happened before where they just kind of head out before i leave or i wake up you know i'm heavy sleeper i i'm on a schedule. I wake up at 6 to feed the dogs, and they were out before 6 to beat the rush to get to the North. So you were hearing the son, 23-year-old Chandler Holderson, describing waking up and his parents already gone that morning. With me, an all-star panel to make sense of what we know right now.

First of all, trial lawyer joining us out of North Carolina, Kathleen Murphy at ncdomesticlaw.com. Dr. Jory Crawson, psychologist, faculty, St. Leo University, consultant and author of Operation SOS. Joseph Scott Morgan, professor of forensics, Jacksonville State University, and author of Blood Beneath My Feet on Amazon. He's the star of a brand new hit series on iHeart, Body Bags with Joseph Scott Morgan. But first, I want to go out to Alexis Tereschuk, CrimeOnline.com investigative reporter joining us. You know, this couple, Bart and Krista Halderson, everything seemed just perfect. Have you ever been in those homes? And I don't mean, Alexis, that they have to be extravagant or over the top, but everything is in its place.

The cars are always perfectly clean. My minivan looks like a cyclone hit it. Like I can clean it out and wash it. The twins are in it two days. It looks trasheded totally trashed but those people that always have their car perfect and their yard is perfect and the inside of their home is perfect and if you go there at Christmas they've got the tree up and you hear Christmas music playing in the background and it smells like cookies and everything's all neat and perfect have you ever been in a home like that yes and that is exactly the home that they had.

I'm not knocking it. I'm a little bit jealous. No, it's a good thing. Yeah. They had everything going for them and their son lived with them. They were very nice parents. They even owned a second home. They were successful. They had purchased a lake home, a cabin out in the woods where they vacationed. What did they do for a living were they accountants yes they were okay so they managed to scrimp and save and they have this main home and then they get a little lake cottage is that right correct now okay the son chandler 23 years old got a good job lives at home with them And his routine is to get up at six in the morning and take care of the dogs. That was his job at in the home anyway. And they were already gone.

Where do they live? Windsor, Wisconsin. Where is that? What is that? It is a small town in Wisconsin. But they they live a couple counties away from where their lake house was. So what he said was his parents went away for the weekend. They had another couple, some friends. The four of them decided to go away for a holiday vacation weekend. The couple picked his parents up, and they went out of town. So he gets up in the morning around 630 to go walk the dogs. His parents aren't there, but he's not worried because they went out of town with some friends.

Nothing at all suspicious to him. Now, okay, I want to circle back to where these people live because, you know, Joe Scott Morgan, that has a big bearing on how we analyze the case. When you've got one person missing, it's one thing. When you have two people missing, it's a whole other animal. When one of those people is a man, that changes things because, A, you look at the man as a potential perp and or b who could overpower

a man and a woman and not leave a struggle behind so windsor is a village a former town in dane county wisconsin population 8700 at the last census Then they've got the whole lake house issue. Where's the lake house, Alexis? It's in another county. It's called Dane County. Okay. So essentially, much like Windsor, but even less populated, Joe Scott. All right.

Let's talk about that, Joe Scott. Oh, hey, Joe Scott, before you get started, and I guess Dr. Jory's going to jump in on this. You've got this couple and they're going to go do things with friends. I will never forget when I was about to graduate high school, my brother and sister had already gone to college and I found out my parents were starting square dancing lessons. I'm like, what? They're doing something without me. And my dad, God rest his soul, I miss him so much. He was quite the dancer. I actually found out, Jackie, that my dad, behind everybody's back, went and took ballroom dance classes. I just found that out recently. And he and I would dance all the time. But I didn't know he had ever gone to classes in his younger days so so he ropes

my mom in to go to square dancing and he of course was great and I went to one of their dances one time I had they were calling it sounded like an auctioneer calling out the steps and I looked up my mom was just wandering around in the circle and people were leading her around. My dad was such a great dancer. But, you know, when you hear Jory Croson, the parents leave the child to go do something on their own, that was practically unheard of for me because we did everything as a family growing up and we do everything with my family together. We don't split up and two go here and two go here. Never.

But you've got this son who's 23 now. I guess he can stay overnight by himself, right, Jory? Yeah, but it seems like the family's still very well connected together, involved in each other's lives. You know, the parents appear to be professional, and they're looking to help their son become that kind of career level. So there's a lot of interaction and connection with them there. So Joe Scott Morgan, when I first read, when I was first researching this case, that the parents left the son alone, I'm like, what? Why would you leave your son? Then I find out the son has his own job.

He's 23, and they have now started doing things with other couples now that he's grown. But at first, that was a red flag. I no longer find it a red flag. You see where I'm going with this, Joe Scott? Oh, yeah, you bet. You know, and reflectively, I think back, you know, I'm 23 years old. I'm already working as an investigator with the coroner's office. You know, so, yeah, he's he's, you know, arguably a responsible adult at this point in time. He has control over his life at this point in time. He just still happens to live with his mom and his dad. And he is the focal point relative to from an investigative standpoint, Nancy, as to when they were last seen.

You know, who who did they have contact with? And you make a very valid point here, Nancy, as to when they were last seen. Who did they have contact with? And you make a very valid point here, Nancy. This town, I think, what'd you say, 8,700, 8,400, in that neighborhood, what are the odds with that limited population, you're going to have two people that suddenly just vanish into thin air? It certainly gives you pause as an investigator. I know. Seemingly, if it had just been them and there had not been any prior domestic violence, I would have assumed in this small rural area that maybe they had run off the road somewhere or gone into a lake, that that's why they had gone missing. Okay, this throws a wrench in it.

Take a listen to Hour Cut 5. This is the son looking for his parents, speaking to News Now Channel 3. My last message I got from them, they were going to White Lake. There's some festivities that go around there, you know, better drink prices at bars, stuff like that. Yeah, White Lake, Wisconsin. And then their plan, or to my knowledge, they were going to Langland County to a cabin, their cabin. Along the way, they could have stopped many places. I wouldn't know all of them.

But it's about three hours north of Madison or Dane County. And now let's hear more from our friends at WKOW. Bart and Krista Halderson of Windsor had plans. Their plans were going up with their friends and do some minor repairs on a cabin. That cabin is some three hours away from Windsor on a lake in a small community in Langlade County. Did you literally see them pulling out of the driveway heading out? No. Their son Chandler Halderson who asked to be off camera says whoever his parents were traveling with from this neighborhood were to do the driving.

He says he received a text from his mother. She got back to me on Sunday, said they made it safely. That's the last he's heard from his parents. So that means they likely didn't go into a pond or a lake or go off the road. I mean, do we know what the text said, Alexis Teresic? Did it say we made it okay or did it say this is where we're going? I believe that he did not reveal what the text said. He just said that he heard a text from his mom that they were there. Now we are hearing a little bit more detail about that text from the son Chandler. Take a listen to our cut six. Again, speaking to three news now. So that would have been the second right of July when they left. And that's the last you'd heard of them? Yes, it is. And then

was it yesterday that you called the sheriff's office or someone with your family called the sheriff's office just to... I go back on that. I actually got a text from them on Sunday telling me they were going to White Lake. Okay. I don't know when the text was sent because of reception issues that they would have and they usually turn

their phone off because of pay for roaming. Yeah. It could have been whenever they sent that message that they made it safely and they're going to white lake kathleen murphy did i just hear pay for roaming i mean what plan is he on unless you're out of the country you're like in egypt or something pay for roaming who pays for roaming do people actually still pay for roaming? What? Yeah, those little burger phones you get at Walmart. Okay, so people do pay for roaming. They do. Okay, I was with them about the bad reception because sometimes, you know, I'll get a whole bundle of emails coming in and I know they didn't all just happen. Okay, so I could see the text being delayed, but

I didn't know people still had roaming charges for pizza. Grace. It's so often we find ourselves parsing words and trying to determine exactly what happened. Because I mean, the reality is Kathleen Murphy, based on, as the son is saying, the bad reception where the cabin is. He's three hours away from home. We don't know when the text really came in. We don't know if they had made it to the cabin yet. Bottom line, it really doesn't help us. When I heard that there was a text from the parents, I thought, oh, okay. We can ping it. We can find out what time it was, how far they had gotten.

No, we can't. Well, I think this kid is giving good information to the police. He's in college. He seems to be pretty reliable. He's working. He's got a couple of jobs. And so I think... Yeah, he's had quite a few jobs. Wasn't he, Alexis, in school

at Madison Area Technical College? So he had been a student at Madison Area Technical College. Yes, that is true. So Kathleen Murphy, when you have horrible reception, you can't tell what time the text is coming in. That changes the timeline.

You can't really use that text as part of your timeline. Yeah, and you've got to have clear, clear timeline. And if it's a sketchy kind of information that's coming across, you cannot base your timeline on that in trying to find these people. And I mean, the reality is, Alexis Teresha at CrimeOnline.com, timelines can be based on things you would likely not imagine. For instance, remember in the O.J. Simpson double murder, where he did murder Nicole Brown and Ron Goldman? They started the timeline when they heard Nicole Brown's dog, and they called it a plaintive well. You remember that? Yeah. It was early. And that's when they started the timeline based on that because the neighbors had never

heard that before. So they really started the timeline right there. So hopefully, that's where I start a case is my timeline. We've already established who our victims are, Joseph Scott Morgan. We have established where they were going. I was hoping the text could be used as a building block, but it can't. So what else do we know? Take a look.

Chandler says he assumed his parents had turned off their phones to avoid roaming charges. And it wasn't until after the holiday weekend ended that he got nervous. Because this weekend it was packed. I get that. Packed. Maybe the weather wasn't great for messaging. Tonight, Dane County Sheriff's Office says there are too many unanswered questions to say anything. But then we find out that the cabin is not as we would have expected.

Take a listen to Tony Galley, WKOW 27. Neighbor Brett Schuster's reaction to the Holderson's disappearance. Wow. Wow. You know, my wife is pretty shook up too. I mean, they're very nice couple, very nice family. Detectives now go door to door here. While sheriff's personnel here in Dane County are checking for any and all information, the missing couple's son says law enforcement in Langlade County has checked on the family's cabin there. And he says that visit only adds to the mystery. The sheriff said it looked like there wasn't anyone home. Family and friends hope the Halderson's unexpected extended time away is just that

and not a sign they're in trouble. How much time had passed Alexis Tereschuk before? I mean, I know that the parents got a what a three day jump on it because they were gone. They were supposed to be gone for a three day weekend. The son didn't get worried until after, I guess, that Monday had occurred. So how long have the parents been away from the home? Then he still waited a couple of days before he alerted the authorities. So he waited about a week. So he says he woke up on the weekend, but he waited seven days before he contacted the police about them.

Okay, I don't like that at all. And I assume he was at work during that time? He may have said that he was at work, yes. See, the way you just said that, you know, do you remember Dr. Jory Croson, faculty, St. Leo University, consultant, it goes on and on, psychologist. Do you remember top mom Casey Anthony? And she actually had a universal uniform and she had the universal ID and key card oh yeah and she sat her rear end on the family sofa eating chips and letting her parents take care of kelly her daughter and pay all the bills and the car note and the everything and she'd just uh breeze in about six o'clock and

say hey what's for supper yeah i remember that very well, yes. They actually thought for years, I think about two years, that she was going to work at Universal. And then, hey, Alexis, tell Jory what happens at the end when they're checking out her job. So she's telling the police that are looking for her missing daughter, two years old, that she was at work. She's been at work at Universal. So they drive over.

They say, take us to where you work. They drive to Universal Studios in Orlando. They go. Now, wait a minute. Has anybody ever been to Universal? Yes. I didn't even know about Universal until I was doing the top mom trial. We were living down there, as you recall, Alexis.

And we would take the children to Disney, you know. And then I found out hey Universal's right up the street you have to park way out just like at Disney you have to either walk or get on a little bus to get you in you have to then go these the investigators would have to go into the bowels of Universal and then get to the offices, which tourists never see the offices. They're way off somewhere. So with that in mind, Alexis, top mom gets police investigators. They're in their car. They go to the security gate.

The security person says, Susie Smith? Yeah, I don't know that person. And so top mom explains her way out of it, and they get through security, and then what happens? So then they're walking through an actual office building. Again, this isn't the ride. This isn't Jurassic Park ride or Harry Potter ride. This is now an office building.

And so she's walking them through an actual office building, and they're saying, take us to your office. She finally gets stops in the middle of the building, and just turns to them and says, Okay, I don't really work here. Just fessed up that she was completely,

absolutely 1 million percent lying about working there. And she had walked through. She talked her way through the security guard, had two police officers walking through. People are probably just looking at her like, who is this person? Why are they here? The police officer. And then she has to just say, well, I don't really work here. Couldn't have said that at the front gate. Couldn't have said it at the office. She actually spoke to him. And what about the drive over? I mean, what kind of person does that, Dr. Jory? Alexis Tereshak is absolutely correct.

That's the way it went down. So they're investigating the disappearance of her two-year-old little girl Kelly and she's saying yeah well this is where I work. They drive all the way to the location Universal. They get through security. They go park the car. They get out of the car. They walk across the parking lot. They get in then start walking through the labyrinth, the maze of offices. They get all the way to a door. They get in. Then start walking through the labyrinth, the maze of offices. They get all the way to a door. They're like, and top mom goes,

okay, yeah, I don't work here. What is that? That's a nice bluff and a denial, but you notice how she handled and how she recovered from it. And the same way, you know. No, you tell me. Well, normally I don't work here and let's go.

Let's go back home. It was no big deal to her at that time. To her. And you usually see that. No big deal to her. No. I mean, you lot of the cops have very often, I'm not proud to say, you may get a spanking. I mean, a booty beating right there. But apparently they did not retaliate against Top Mom for leading them on another wild goose chase.

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. So, Alexis Tereschuk, let's talk about, as Kathleen Murphy called him a kid, he's almost 24 years old. I mean, I don't know, do you still make up the beds for your children, Kathleen Murphy, even though some of them are grown? Yeah, you know the answer to that one. But you called him a kid. He's almost 24 years old. Yeah, that's true. Delete that part for me, okay?

Yeah, erase. Okay, so where Alexis Torres shot, I heard what you said, that he says he works at aerospace company space x and as a scuba diver and for american family insurance and he is attending madison area technical college did anybody here see harry potter yeah you all did you're laughing but you saw it, right? We also read the books. Remember when Hermione had the little time changer, she could go back in time and live the same moment or the same period of hours twice. That came in really handy for her. And she was taking all those classes. So is that what he's doing, Alexis Tereschuk? Because he's working at American Family Insurance.

I'm sure they're so proud. Aerospace company SpaceX. Wow. I would be impressed. And a scuba diver. Little known fact. That's what I wanted to do if I had not become a prosecutor, be a forensic scuba diver. And he's in school to boot at Madison Area Technical College.

Alexis Tereschuk, how is he doing all that? So it ends up that the school contacted his parents, and there was a meeting with the school, Madison Area Technical College, because Chandler had not been telling his parents the truth. They thought he'd been going to school for the last six months, but he had not been attending classes. And they found this out. Okay, that's not the end of the earth, okay?

Because I will confess, my sister, who was the valedictorian and all that, she could never, for a period of time, both my brother and sister were going to Mercy University. And they were both living at home at that moment before my sister went away to Pennsylvania to school. And she could never get her grades because my brother did not want our parents to see his grades because they were all Fs or incomplete or dropped out. So he would race to the mailbox, and he would get the grades

and hide them in his glove compartment in his car. My sister, who made all As, kept wondering she'd have to walk to the registrar's office to find out what her grades were. So lying about your grades, or let's just say obfuscating the truth, let's don't say lie, that's a little harsh. That's not the end of the world, Alexis. So, okay, so he had dropped out of Madison Area Tech and didn't tell his parents. What about his career at SpaceX? That also was not true.

His parents figured out that he did not work at SpaceX. He was not working for the American Family Insurance Company, and he was not a certified police scuba diver. All lies. Okay, Kathleen Murphy, you know, at trial, the judge is within his or her rights and must follow the law as to whether to instruct the jury regarding credibility, veracity, who is telling the truth. And isn't it true, Kathleen Murphy, that one particular charge says, if you find the defendant or a witness lying in part, you may, at your discretion, throw out all that witness's testimony. Their entire testimony means nothing.

Because a lie in part could mean a lie in whole. That is true. Isn't that true? And yet it continues day in and day out. And the courts really don't prosecute that, nor do they throw out that testimony. Love to see it happen. I'm just telling you, I don't like finding out a 23-year-old man, now almost 24, is living at home off the parents' dole, and he's not working. It brings up Totmom in my mind. Take a listen to our Cut 12, the Dane County Sheriff Calvin Barrett. When and where were these remains found that you're talking about?

They were found approximately July 8th. Do you know where? Yeah, in rural Wisconsin, rural Dane County. What community, Sheriff? It was in a rural area of Dane County. You can't say more specifically than that? No. Again, this is an ongoing investigation. We don't want to interrupt what we have going on right now. We want to ensure that the investigation is done thoroughly and is completed to the best of our abilities. And there's more. Take a listen to our cut 16. They weren't just killed. They were dismembered. Joe Scott, Morgan, hold, hold. Take a listen to our cut 16 WKOW 27. This afternoon, the Dane County Sheriff's Office now considers this to be a homicide investigation. That's because they found the remains of Bart Halderson late last week in a rural area of the town of Cottage Grove.

Sheriff Calvin Barrett says Halderson had a gunshot injury and his body was dismembered. Law enforcement found his remains last Thursday and no one has been charged yet in his death. The sheriff's office still does not know where Bart's wife Krista Halderson is. Joe Scott Morgan, when I hear dismemberment or staging, which of course dismemberment is, the staging of a scene could be as simple as covering up the body or covering up the face, moving the body. Dismemberment is certainly disturbing the crime scene. When I hear staging or dismemberment, I know it's not random. Explain.

No, it's not. And, you know, there's two ways you can look at it, Nancy. Either an individual that has dismembered a body is attempting to destroy evidence because the body at that point is, in fact, the central piece of evidence. Or you've got an attachment of a lot of anger that an individual could destroy an individual down to literally take them down to an elemental level, if you will, you know, by taking them apart. So you've got that convergence there where these two things are coming together. And you really have to begin to look at how dark this is. And then, you know, the idea is that when you dismember a body like this and you're attempting, you know, if you go along with my earlier thought about destruction of evidence, you're dispersing the body or bodies over a large, large area potentially.

So it makes the investigation all the more difficult. And to me, this goes to intent. It goes to trying to put the police off the scent, if you will. Absolutely. Yes, I had to digest everything that you were saying. Talking to you, Joe Scott Morgan, when we're talking about cases, it takes a minute for us regular people to take in everything that you just expound upon. It's a lot of information at once, but yes, I agree completely. When blood is found near the fireplace, there is an explanation for that, a fairly simple explanation.

Take a listen to our cut. 27, this is Marcus Arsvald at WEAU NBC. Chandler recalls the days leading up to his parents' disappearance. He remembers playing fetch with his dog and breaking the glass fireplace in the home, injuring himself in the process. He says causing him to bleed that one was approximately i see the glasses in there so i grab a tweezers and i pull it out and then it starts squirting out i got some on a little bit of the rock it wasn't that bad of the rock but it um i think the worst was that floor.

So there you have it. You're the forensics expert, Joe Scott Morgan. He says he was playing with the dog and broke glass, the glass fireplace in the home, injuring himself and bled on the floor. Let's think about that. Yeah, let's do it. Go ahead. Yeah, because, you know, with blood, you're going to have a specific identifier. You know, we're beyond the age, Nancy, in time where we're just simply doing ABO grouping now.

You know, where back in the day, you know, we do A, B, you know, O, AB. That doesn't work anymore. Now you're saying that this is the point of origin of this blood is from me. And, of course, you have to be able to stand fast and hold that, hold that position if that's what you're putting forth to the cops. Because let me tell you what the cops are going to do. First off, they're going to verify that that is in fact blood. And then once they get it, they're not just going to type it. They're going to dig into the DNA here and determine who that blood specifically points to. And if you find any other blood around the

house, and look, I've seen the injury this kid is talking about nancy and it's on his big toe how many of us have cut our big toe or our foot at some point in time and he's talking about what about not just the typing or the dna but the quantity of blood remember in the jennifer dulo's case where so much blood was found, the missing Connecticut Mama 5, so much blood was found in the garage. They knew from the quantity of blood that she had to be dead. There was no way there could be that much blood outside of her body and her still be alive. Alexis Tereshchuk, Crime Online, describe the home, the amount of blood found near the fireplace. So there was a lot of blood in the fireplace. It was also, I believe, in the basement.

But that's not all, Alexis. There wasn't just blood around the fireplace. And as you have accurately stated, in the basement. Take a listen to Eric Franke at News 3. It just so happens Stephen Greiber was in his driveway when he says he detected a strong burning odor. He said he thought it was just a fire pit, maybe somebody burning some firewood at first.

But then, after five minutes or so, Greiber says the smell changed a bit. In his words, quote, more in line with what he thought was someone barbecuing. Kind of became real strong, kind of like a pungent smell to the point that I actually walked down my driveway half the distance. I kind of looked up and down the street to see if anybody was doing anything like grilling or something else was going on. I didn't see anything at that point. Later, a special agent from the Department of Justice's Arson Bureau said he detected a grilled meat smell from the fireplace.

Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Alexis Tereschuk, that's what we call karma. When your front-door neighbor is actually a former detective investigator for the district attorney's office and actually pays attention, like a trained observer that smells smoke. And goes to look for the fire. And then smells what he believes to be a barbecue. Go ahead. Yeah, he goes to look for the fire and smells what he believes to be a barbecue go ahead yeah he goes to look for the fire he's not a neighbor who says well i smell smoke but then i just went back to watching tv he actually started walking around the neighborhood to see where the smell was coming from because it was such an odd smell barbecue but but not

a good barbecue not a sweet barbecue smell He describes it as pungent. So he starts walking around investigating because it's ingrained in him. This is his job. This is just something his brain automatically thought, I have to go figure this out. And Joe Scott Morgan joining us, Professor Forensics, what else was found in and around the fireplace? Yeah, Nancy, it gets really gruesome, very dark, very quickly. And I'll frame it by saying this, the arson investigator actually related that if you're looking at the fireplace on the right-hand side, there was kind of a greasy residue.

They believe that's consistent with the bodies literally, or the bodies literally being rendered down in that area. That's fat coming off the bodies, Nancy, in the fireplace. And then as they dug further, they had to dismantle this thing. What do you mean by that, rendering down? Well, as bodies begin, as any kind of organic tissue that has fat on it like this, this tissue, it begins to render down. It literally begins to melt. And the only way to describe it is like barbecue. It drips onto this metal surface,

which holds the wood. And you could actually see in the crime scene images, you could see this dark, stained area, Nancy. And that was indicative of almost like a grease fire had been created. And that's how horrible this is. And as they went through the evidence there, they began finding fragmented pieces of what they determined were human skulls. Now, what's so important about this is that the skull had burned at such an intense level temperature-wise that you could see the skull had begun to come apart. And you could see the actual matrices or the structure of the bone itself where it began to fall apart. This is something that we would see normally in a cremation just prior to the body being completely pulverized.

And just to frame it for you, cremations actually take a sustained temperature of 1,800 degrees Fahrenheit. Someone would have had to have sat there and tended this fire to get it that hot in an indwelling fireplace in a private residence. You know who this reminds me of? The process you're describing, Joe Scott Morgan, is the young victim in her 20s, Teresa Halbach, the photographer that went to go take photos for the auto trader Stephen Avery. He went on to be the subject of a huge documentary called Making a Murderer, claiming that he, Avery, was innocent. But family, blood family, and friends, neighbors, saw him tending an outdoor pit fire overnight,

burning it overnight, all night long, never leaving it. And then investigators later found teeth of Teresa Hallbacks and the studs off the back of her Desi Fuentes jeans that didn't burn down. Everything else was gone to Scott Morgan. What you're describing is the constant tending of the fire to maintain that extremely high heat. Yeah, you're absolutely right. And you would have to continue to apply it. Nancy, you would have to have a fuel source. The body's not the fuel source. You have to, when you say tend, you have to roll the fire over, keep it burning, and then add ongoing fuel like paper or certainly wood to maintain this. So you'd have to have a constant supply. And this goes to thought,

doesn't it, Nancy? You know, when you're thinking about somebody sitting there rendering down human remains in a home and they're piling wood on top of it to keep the fire going. Why is the only question. Take a listen now to our friends at WEAU NBC 15. Before the jury was sent to deliberate, each side had one last opportunity to prove its case. We know that Bart and Krista went into that home and never came out, at least as whole people. That their bodies were found dismembered, discarded, and hidden. Chandler Haralderson killed his parents. Do you know how Bart was killed?

Exactly how he was killed. Do you know how Krista was killed? Do you know if it was an awful accident? Do you know if it was intentional? Do you know if there was someone else involved? You don't. What if there had been an awful accident, Kathleen Murphy? Then, I mean, think about it.

Just like it was argued in top mom Casey Anthony's case, if there had been a horrible accident and little Kelly had died in the family's pool? Why would George Anthony have scooped up her body, put it in a plastic bag after wrapping duct tape around her head, and throw her out in a swampy forest area? No, that wouldn't happen. So if this were an unintentional accident, then why would their bodies be dismembered and rendered down and burned? It wouldn't happen. And you have to think about how could this person actually rendered down

his own parents if there wasn't something significantly wrong with his makeup? So the parents, apparently Alexis Tereschuk had caught him in his lies. Explain what happened. They confronted him. They caught him. They said, you are not working. You're 23 years old. This isn't you're 16 years old and you got fired from your first job and you're lying about it. You are 23, almost 24 years old, and you have been lying about where you work, even lying about going to school, even lying to us about everything.

As a matter of fact, Alexis Tereschuk, hadn't he constructed an entire web of email lies? He did. A whole world where he was creating emails back and forth about these jobs that he supposedly had, like complete fantasy that he created. What do you mean back and forth about his jobs? With different people that he was pretending that he worked for. There would be like an email from a boss and then he was writing back to them, like showing that he was pretending that he worked for. There would be like an email from a boss, and then he was writing back to them, like showing that he was doing actual work when none of it was actually happening. Seen anything like it, Kathleen? It's a huge level of deception. I see it every day. Every day.

And that's why we create these parent portals, so I don't have to look at all these lying emails. They're put in a portal, and then that email sticks, and you can see it, and you can share it. But this is a huge level of deception. To Dr. Jory Crawson, joining us, psychologist at St. Leo University's faculty. Dr. Jory, I don't get it. You give your child everything their whole life, and then this?

I can see where he caught up and was confronted with it and then made a decision. I don't believe in the insanity rules, but he made a decision to deal with it. And then basically in cutting up the bodies, it became evidence that he had to get rid of it. It was just another problem to be solved.

It's cold-blooded, but that's really the way I see it. Why not just confess and go get a job? Probably not in his personality makeup. He saw different routes possibly that, hey, if they're gone, I have control of the house. I have this. I got access to their money. You know, could be all kinds of motivations there.

And it's amazing to me, Kathleen Murphy, that he managed to keep up his lies like Tottenham did throughout the entire investigation. Let's now recut 28 WEAU. At this point, Chandler doesn't know remains have been discovered or that he's considered a suspect. That is until the very end of questioning when he's arrested. I can't tell you what we know, but we know you're not telling us the truth. We know your parents are no longer with us. Okay. And we know the reason why. Okay. You need to tell the truth. Listen, listen, you need to tell the truth about what happened and just tell us why it happened. Okay. In the two hours of questioning, Chandler confirms he visited the cottage where we located on the 4th of July where the remains were found.

Today, we also learned more on how detectives came to find the second set of remains found in the town of Roxbury belonging to Chandler's mother. Throughout all the questioning, the closest he got was that he had visited the Cottage Grove property around the time his parents went missing. I mean, he stuck to his story till the bitter end. Would a jury believe it? Take a listen to our Cut 30 WEA. We, the jury, find the defendant Chandler M. Halderson guilty of first-degree intentional homicide as to Barday Halderson. We, the jury, find the defendant Chandler M. Halderson guilty of first degree intentional homicide as to Bardae Halderson. We, the jury, find the defendant Chandler M. Halderson guilty of first degree intentional homicide as to Krista R. Halderson. Two hours, 13 minutes.

That's how long it took the jury to decide 23-year-old Chandler Halderson was guilty of killing his parents. Alexis Tereschuk, has he been sentenced? Not yet, but he is facing, I believe, life in prison for this. We wait as justice unfolds. Nancy Grace Crime Story signing off. Goodbye, friend. This is an iHeart Podcast.