Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Taylor Swift testifies & Cops catch Chase Massner suspect

Episode Date: August 11, 2017

Taylor Swift told jurors a DJ had "a handful of my ass" while posing for a photo. The singer is defending herself against a lawsuit by the DJ who was fired after the groping was reported to his boss. Nancy Grace talks with RadarOnline reporter Alexis Tereszcuk about the case. The capture of Brad Clement, a suspect in the Chase Massner death probe, and the new crime novel "Final Girls" are the other topics in this episode. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

You're listening to an iHeart Podcast. On stage, but in a federal courtroom, Swift is being sued by former KYGO DJ David Mueller. Swift claimed Mueller's hand grabbed her backside inappropriately, and his radio station fired him. This TMZ picture showing the two together will be at the center of the trial. Look at where his hand is. It's an odd spot. My hand was never under her skirt. I never grabbed her. Taylor Swift on the stand in emotional and raw testimony. It seems to be getting worse as people in the courthouse are asking, why did this guy bring a lawsuit against Taylor Swift? And when you take a look at that photo, you can see her just cringing away from his hand on her bare backside. I mean, see, Grace, this is crime stories.

But first, a major development in the search for Chase Masner, the golden boy who goes missing, seemingly leaving his wife, his two little girls, and his mom behind in a cloud of dust. While authorities insisted he just was living off the grid, the family never believed that. Along with their friends dubbed Team Chase, they were right and police were wrong. We now know Chase Masner's body has been found buried in the backyard of a so-called best friend, Brad Clement. Clement goes on the run, but in the last hours, Brad Clement apprehended. Joining me from Channel 46, Daniel Wilkerson. Daniel, quickly, how was he arrested? He was found, Nancy, in a public parking lot. He had rented a U-Haul, I'm told, in a fictitious name.

When he didn't return that U-Haul in time, somehow cops were on to him. They traced that U-Haul, and the cops showed up there in the public parking lot and took him down. Whoa. The photo of him face down in the rain made me feel a tiny bit better. Not so for the family of Chase Mazda and his two daughters who will grow up without a dad. Joining me from Crime Online is Lee Egan. Lee, this was not a fly-by-the-seat-of-your-pants operation here. I mean, wasn't his car found at his mother's home with the tag changed?

It was when Detective Twiggs went out there initially. He did see Brad leaving in that car, so we thought maybe he would be in that car driving away, but obviously he wasn't. They traced him to a U-Haul van in the public's parking lot, and when he was walking out, I'm hearing he was barefoot walking in the rain. They grabbed him, arrested him,

and it came from tracing the U-Haul and possibly from tips that came in from other people. I want to thank right now everyone sending in tips from SiriusXM 132 and Crime Online. Your tips have been vital to this investigation. Authorities have arrested Brad Clement barefoot in the pouring rain, still unclear whether he knew cops were coming, whether he was tipped off, but he was leaving the grocery store parking lot when authorities spotted him having been living in a U-Haul on the run, attempting to leave the jurisdiction. And now, will we get answers regarding the death of Iraqi war vet Chase Masner? We are taking your calls, and I want to go first out to Sherry Dunn, who has been involved in the search for Chase Masner.

Sherry, weigh in. I'm, of course, over the moon that they have caught him. It should have been done a long time ago. I'm just more than thankful for you guys for not stopping and helping this family get answers. You know what? I'm with you on that. I'm just really relieved we've at least gotten to this milestone.

Kim Harris from Team Chase. Kim, when you learned that Brad Clement had just been apprehended, what was your first reaction? Relief. I was absolutely relieved and I won't lie, I loved seeing that picture. But the last six days have been gut-wrenching. The last three and a half years have been, but this last six days, Stephanie needed relief and she admitted to getting a sense of relief last night.

Stephanie, of course, is Chase Masner's mom. Very quickly to Brian Hopkins from Team Chase joining us. All Team Chase calling in right now in response to finally an arrest in this case. Brian Hopkins, what was your first thought when you saw that photo of Brad Clement face down in the parking lot? Just glad that it finally happened. This could have all been done a long time ago, and everybody could have been way past it. You know what, Brian Hopkins, that's a really good point. From the very beginning, he, Brad Clement,

was asked over and over by Team Chase to let them bring dogs in the backyard. He always had an excuse why they couldn't come in the backyard. Police did not follow up. With me also is Mike Swiger from Team Chase. Mike, thanks for being with us. When you look back and see all the signs that were handed to police on a silver platter, it's distressing. It's upsetting. That's true. But in the end, they got the guy. Now we're just waiting for the truth to unfold. What do you think? It's just an overwhelming feeling of victory and accomplishment. We found Chase. The bad guy's in jail and they're going to interrogate him. And I just feel like we really went all the way for Chase.

And I'm just very proud of everyone right now. You know what? You really did go all the way for Chase, and I'm just very proud of everyone right now. You know what? You really did go all the way for Chase. We're staying on top of the Chase Masner story. Daniel Wilkerson with us from Channel 46. Daniel, what's next? You've got to keep in mind, even though police have, a medical examiner, along with police, have told us that they are pretty sure this is the body of Chase Masner.

We're thinking that the Department of Defense, they're going to send those dental records at any point. But at this point, Stephanie, I spoke with her right after Brad Clement was arrested. Of course, she knows that this is Chase, and police are pretty sure of it as well. I can also tell you, Nancy, this wall went down in a shopping center, right, a public parking lot. It's one of those developments that they're building where they build a lot of the shopping center, and then they build all the apartments around it. I just happened to be in the same shopping center at Costco shopping when this went down. I heard the helicopter, didn't think anything of it. I then left Costco and went to Target, and as soon as I got into the Target,

I got the call from Stephanie that he had been found, that it's Brad Clement. We are on top of it and following the story very closely. We do know that Brad Clement, in court, will bring you the latest as the story unfolds. The question now really remains, was it intentional or was it an accident? We are switching gears now to Taylor Swift in court and joining me from RadarOnline.com, Alexis Tereszczuk. You know, Alexis, the more I look at that photo, it is very clear to me. She is cringing away from him. He's got his hand up her skirt for Pete's sake. And that's what she's alleging. He is, of course, says it's not true. And her mother made it so

clear to me because when I looked at the picture in the beginning, I thought, oh, yeah, you can see his hand is down low. But she points out that that dress was bunched up in the back. And she says Taylor doesn't have hips. She's as skinny as can be. And to me, that proves that this is it, that and Taylor's amazing testimony. When you say amazing testimony, it has been described so far as sharp, on point. Basically, the superstar Taylor Swift saying this DJ groped her in a devious and sneaky act. Those are her words, not mine. Give me a recap of what she has said so far on the stand. I'm talking about pop star Taylor Swift. She got on the stand. She was so confident. She was so calm and she wasn't afraid of the questions from her attorney or the man who she says, and she kept repeating,

this man grabbed my ass cheek. She would not back down. She said, this is fact. I know it happened. She said, he grabbed me. She tried to scoot away and she couldn't get away from him no matter what she tried to do. And she said, I knew it was him. I knew what he was doing. And like many victims, she said, I was basically frozen. I had no idea how to react to this. It had never happened to me before. I went on autopilot. I was so scared. Well, this is what she says. These are her words. She says, and I quote, I'm not going to allow you or your client to make me feel this way, to make me feel it was my fault because it wasn't. And she seemingly testified with a confidence, flashes of humor during a full hour on the stand. She kept repeating that the DJ, Mueller, put his hand up her dress

and grabbed her bare rear end as he posed for a photo with her. Don't you know, if this is true, Alexis Teres Chuck, what a big laugh he got with his buddies afterwards. Exactly, and that's the thing. And she said, you know, he was so crazy. Alexis, it makes me so mad I could chew a nail in half. I'm just so mad about the whole thing. And yes, Alexis, I have prosecuted rapes, sodomies,

child molestations, serial rapes, you name it, rape murders, murder rapes, the whole kit and caboodle. But for this guy, if these allegations are true, to then turn around and sue her, sue Taylor Swift after he grabs her rear end and when i say bear butt i mean that because i think she was wearing a thong so imagine a guy you don't know reaching up your dress and grabbing your bear rear end next to your private parts i mean and then he turns around and sues her and she has to go in court and look at his sorry face. I mean, I'm telling you, I could shoot a nail in half, Alexis. And she immediately took action. She went right to the security guard standing three feet away from her. And even that didn't protect her. This man still felt confident enough, she says, to lift up her skirt and put his hand

on her bottom. So she went to her security guard and she went to her mom and she went to her photographer and she said, this guy just grabbed me. What do we do? Her team immediately, they went and found him. They had given him the tickets for the radio station where he worked. They knew exactly who he was and they kicked him right out. And she called and complained.

She said she wanted to keep it discreet and quiet she didn't want to make it a big deal because she didn't want this to define her she wanted to to be something that she dealt with privately and he is the one that went public with me is alexis teres truck from radar online.com let's just let me just start at the beginning before we get to the trial for our serious listeners that are just tuning in right now. Take me to the beginning. Taylor Swift is at a concert. She has a meet and greet. Take it on, Alexis. She is at a concert in Denver, Colorado. It's 2013. She invites fans and friends and business associates to a meet and greet with her before her show. It's about a 20-minute event. People stand there. She takes a picture with them.

You say, hello. You did a great job. She says, thank you so much. Thank you for coming to my show. And you move on. This guy and his girlfriend come up to her. Taylor says she thought they were drunk. She says they were laughing really loudly, really inappropriately, and talking.

Okay. All right. Alexis, Alexis, now, you and I have been together many, many times on different stories. And I have to say as a non-drinker, it's very uncomfortable when you're around drunk people. I mean, I am certainly not afraid of a cocktail. Okay. I get that from my dear father, Matt Grace, but I just simply choose not to drink. So when you're around a lot of people that are, okay, drunk, it's a bad feeling. And from what I can tell of Taylor Swift, she seems to be pretty much on the straight and narrow in that, I mean, she's extremely, let's see, disciplined. Would that be the right word?

Her mom is her manager. As you told me the other day, and I didn't know this, Alexis, she has family and friends and a lot of key positions around her because she can trust them. And then, you know, she's having all this parade of people come back for meet and greets. And now here she, in her mind, here, these people show up drunk, loud, laughing. You know, she's trying to work. Okay, let's just get real about what's happening. Okay, go ahead. It was work.

You're right. It is work. She does the meet and greet before her show, not even after when she can relax. This is before her show. She treats her fans to this meeting with her. So she says, these guys are drunk. The girls stay next to her. And she, the guy, when he leans in for the picture, grabs her butt.

He's not standing next to her at all. He is standing. You can see his hand is way below her hips. And it's back behind her. And they take a picture. And she says, she just went on autopilot. She didn't know what to do. So she kind of looked at the carpet.

And she just said, thank you. And they moved on. And she was stunned. Nothing like this had ever happened to her. This is like Taylor's home, her arena. This is where she works. This is where she meets with her family. This is where she gets ready to perform, where she does a job that supports thousands of people.

They are all in that arena working with her to make sure that everything goes off smoothly, and this guy has the audacity to grab her. So she immediately grabs her security and her mom and says, this guy attacked me. Hold on, Alexis. Hold on. Hold on. Hold on. You put in the cart before the horse. One more thing.

His girlfriend is two feet away. His girlfriend, according to Taylor Swift, he grabs her bare rear end with his girlfriend right there. Yep, she is standing next to Taylor. She's on Taylor's right. She's as close as can be to Taylor. If you look in the picture, there's not an inch between the two of them. You see the picture of Mueller. He is about a foot away from Taylor, and all he has on her body is his hand on her rear.

I want to pause very briefly to thank our partners, our partners that make our search for Chase Masner possible, make it possible for us to talk about crimes on women, make it possible to take your calls and to bring on our awesome guests. Are you hiring? Do you know where to post your job to find the very best candidates? Well, with ZipRecruiter, you can post your job to 100 plus job sites with one simple click. Then their technology efficiently matches the right people to your job better than anybody else. And that is why

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ZipRecruiter.com. Thank you. 2017 marks the 40th anniversary of the Summer of Sam. To mark the occasion, Pocketbooks is proud to release a special anniversary edition e-book of Son of Sam by Lawrence D. Klausner. This is an incredible story of how a single man, David Berkowitz, dubbed Son of Sam, the demon-haunted.44 caliber killer, killed six, wounded several others, and terrorized millions of New Yorkers over eight known attacks from July 1976 through August 1977. It's also the story of the greatest manhunt in the history of the New York Police Department, the intimate narrative of the men assigned to tracking down a lone killer.

The police task force investigated more than 3,000 suspects, some of them cops, before finally making an arrest. In the meantime, politicians watched a city writhe in panic, newspapers played upon the fears of their readers, and the criminal justice system showed itself incapable of coping with the man who committed such horrendous crimes. Download Summer of Sam by Lawrence D. Klausner today. Royalties earned from the sale of this book will be shared between the victims or their families and the author. In addition to breaking news in the search for Chase Masner and the very recent arrest of Brad Clement, we are closely following the trial involving Taylor Swift as it unfolds in

a court of law. Taylor Swift taking the stand. Now, you know, I'm just wondering how everyone reacted when she took the stand. And I gave our readers a little preview at CrimeOnline.com yesterday by combing through her deposition testimony in all my spare time, Alexis Tereszczuk, and she was pretty true to her deposition testimony. And I've got to say, you know, in so many pictures, Alexis, I couldn't really see the full shot, I mean, soup to nuts, head to toe of Taylor Swift in that picture. He was allegedly grabbing her rear end. I could only see part of it. But when I saw the whole thing, I think Alan Duke is with me.

Alan, are you still there? Yes, I am, Nancy. Okay, Alan, you know what's coming, all right? How does a guy think he can get away with this? And if you look at the picture, you can see her kind of like edging away. She's got this smile frozen on her face. And you can see his hand. He said, Alexis, jump in if I'm wrong.

One of his seven stories about what happened is that he touched her ribcage. His hand is not at her ribcage. All right? It's down in the booty area. I cannot imagine how a guy would, um, could think that he would get away with this. I mean, was he so drunk? I mean, I don't know that I've ever been that drunk and that's saying a lot, but how would you ever think that that is okay? And why didn't she just turn around and slap him right then I think that's probably what would have happened if I'd ever tried anything which I never

would okay I'm really not sure what you just said it's kind of like I said he should have been he should have yeah and that's what she's that's what's trying to go down in a courtroom right now you know every woman doesn't turn around and slap somebody. And another thing about that, Alexis Torres, Chuck, yeah, I hear what Alan's saying, and I'm not discounting it. People may say, why didn't you just turn around and slap him? You know, for Taylor Swift to slap him, the next thing you'd do would be sue her for assault and battery. What about that? You know, that was an issue she has to think about. I mean, in this world, I mean, Alan Duke, don't you watch TV for Pete's sake? Haven't you ever heard the word ambulance chaser? I mean, come on.

Really? Taylor Swift slapped somebody? Alexis Tereschuk. Alexis Tereschuk. If she had turned around and slapped him, what do you think the first thing would happen? What? He would have sued her in a heartbeat. But she said, you know what, I was so stunned. This had never, ever happened to me. And I didn't know what to do at all. And she is also a professional. She said she didn't want to ruin everything. There were so many other people

in line that were there for her. and she wanted to give them the same treatment that she would have given them had she not been attacked because she loved her fans and these people that came in. This was a special treat for them and so she wanted to make sure that she treated them well and then dealt with this man. And the only way she knew how, she went

to the people there to protect her. She had no idea that he was going to do this and she was stunned. She froze, she said. Well, this is what we know. It's turning into a he say, she say. But she does have corroborating evidence. And to me, the single most important piece of evidence is the photo.

Alexis, tell me what you see in the photo. So you see Taylor Swift. She is with this Mueller's girlfriend. Mueller's girlfriend is on her right. She's standing so close to her smiling. You cannot see Taylor's arm. You can't see this woman at all. Then you see a big gap and you see Mueller and you see his arm. He's in a plaid long-sleeve shirt, button-down shirt, and his hand is not visible, but his arm is going down, and it is clearly not on her ribcage or her back. It is definitely on her rear end. But what you also see is her black dress is pushed up. It's not down smoothly.

It's not lying straight. And her mom had said she doesn't have hips. This is not the natural curve of Taylor. Of course, everybody has hips, but what she means is hers aren't. She doesn't have an hourglass figure. She isn't that curvy. She's stick men. And so this shows that his hand is underneath and pushing up her dress. You know, I'm looking at the photo right now. It's exactly as you say, except I think his shirt is more of a paisley-looking thing.

She is scooched up to the girlfriend, Taylor Swift, like holding onto the girlfriend. They're smooshed together. And the guy, the DJ's beside her to her left in the photo on the right, and he clearly has his hand on her rear end. I see what you're saying about the skirt being scooched up on the right. I can't tell how high up it is in the back,

but his hand is absolutely positioned. Jackie, come over here. It's positioned on her rear. Wouldn't you say that his hand is like on her butt cheeks? Smack dab. I mean, there's no way around it. And what's really killing me is the smile on his face. And don't you know, if these allegations are true, repeat,

he has not been found guilty in the court of law but don't you know he ran straight off and told everybody i grabbed taylor swift's a double s don't you know it 100 he absolutely and you're right it is more of a paisley shirt than a plaid shirt almost camouflage but he he absolutely, that grin on his face, he looks so pleased with himself that he's pulling off this stunt where he's grabbing her behind. But let's think about what will the jury be deliberating. I mean, when you look at this photo and she says one thing, he says another, but what else could a jury possibly infer other than he's grabbing a rear end?

I don't see anything else. I think what if playing devil's advocate, what they could say is his hand is on the back of her dress. There's not enough proof that it's on her naked rear. You know, another thing you got to think about,

Alexis, is when somebody grabs your rear end, where do they grab it? I mean, you grab somebody's rear end in certain regions and you're getting pretty darn close to their genitalia. I mean, I don't know about that. I don't know where he grabbed her or anything about it. And I know people think this is much, some people think this is much ado about nothing. But I disagree with that. Anytime a woman is taken advantage of, and I don't care if she's my favorite restaurant over at the Waffle House or she's superstar Taylor Swift. It doesn't matter.

And when people laugh about it and make fun about it and discount it, that all plays into the culture of it's okay. And Alexis, I've got to tell you, I've dealt with so many rape victims and sex assault victims. This really rubs me the wrong way. It's just like a tiny, tiny slice of assaults on women. I got to tell you, it's very upsetting to me to see that smile on his face, and then he turns around and sues her if these allegations are true, Alexis. And she went immediately to her family family and they went to his bosses first of all they had him thrown right out of the show and then they went and told us

office they said here is what happened now she says I did not tell them to fire him but I told them what he did to me and that was up to them and they clearly believed her what could possibly be in it for him to bring this lawsuit? I mean, why would he do it? He says that she has destroyed his name, destroyed his life. I mean, he has been unemployable since this happened. And it's not just a, oh, I crashed my car when I was drunk all by myself. It didn't hurt anybody.

This is lewd. This is something with like the one, probably the most famous pop singer in the world. And it was so creepy that he would do this to Taylor Swift in her house. Basically, you know, you've been invited for your job to come in and meet her and say hello. And her music gets played on your station all the time. You have a good relationship with her, and then you assault her.

And if Taylor can't, if you can't stop Taylor Swift from being assaulted, then nobody can stop it. People can just grab you on the street. They can grab you in your office. They can grab you in your house. This is such a violation of her private space, and it just shows that this man had just no regard for her as a person at all. You know, another thing, if she had not fought back, you know, in a lot of corporate cultures,

you get a lawsuit and it's just settled. And I understand that. I understand it because it costs so much, so much money for a corporate giant, you know, a big, big operation like Taylor Swift. She's not just Taylor Swift. She's Taylor Swift, Inc. You know, it's multi-million dollars at stake all the time. It's a machine.

For them to have to go to trial is very, very expensive. I'm talking about hundreds of thousands of dollars. It's easier, so much easier and so much more cost effective to settle, you know, settle it for $50,000 instead of trying it for half a million. Really, seriously, especially when you take into account her time, all her lawyers, everybody in court. That is a lot of money. She's not doing that. She's not agreeing to a settlement to make him go away. She's saying no.

And she's standing up in court. So what's going to happen next, Alexis Terescha? Oh, let me ask you one more question before I get to the trial. Alexis, let me ask you one more question before I get to the trial Alexis let me ask you this if she hadn't fought back can't you see the field day online all the memes all the jokes about Taylor Swift I mean it's going to be a cold day in HE double L before some other dude sneaks up behind her and grabs her rear end. I mean, really? It actually worries me that people are going to try to start doing this with other people. Because even if she wins, when she wins,

I feel that this is going to be a great victory for her. But I feel like people then get creepy ideas and they're like, well, he almost, you know, and they are just going to try to do it. It really worries me for everyone's safety. And I don't understand why people just think it's okay to touch anybody at all. And certainly not somebody in a professional situation and in a sexual assault situation, but she, she, you're right. She had to fight back. She never could have settled this at all. It would have been admitting a guilt. And she says, I knew a hundred percent exactly what happened. This man grabbed me and I'm not going to let him get away with this. And she said she

dealt with it very quietly. She never went public with this at all. They quietly called the radio station. He lost his job. She didn't, she says she didn't. What I'm saying is this is not just about Taylor Swift. No. This is about women everywhere, every day that get assaulted, that get sexually harassed, that get underpaid, that get talked down to the works. I mean, come on, Alexis, you're in the news business. I'm in the law business. How many times do you just suck it up and keep going because it's too much of a D-A-M-N bother to lead yet another crusade? I mean, you know, and it just wears you down. And I don't know all your stories, although we're friends. We talk about good things,

stories, our children. But I don't know of a single woman in the business world that has not encountered this. And I'll just start with my mother. She worked her way up from a bank teller to a CFO of a company. And you can only imagine the crap she put up with. And people are, that is why Taylor Swift standing up for herself is basically saying a message to all people. Men and women really stand up for yourself. I, you know, she obviously has a lot of money and can fight this. Not everybody is in her position, but if you see the way that she has been questioned in this, it is probably the most respectful sexual assault case I've ever covered. And I know you've prosecuted so many, but for the ones that I've covered, there are always questions about, well,

why was she wearing a thong underwear? Why wasn't she wearing boy shorts underneath or any different kind of underwear? Why was she wearing a dress why couldn't you wear pants nothing like that has been brought up this time it is 100% been about please do not go to the underwear please just listen because you know Alexis you haven't been on every single show we've done on Taylor Swift most guys call in wanting to know, was she wearing underwear? Exactly. And then when I, and then they want me to explain the whole song thing.

Okay. I was doing laundry the other day. My son came in, he said, mom, you've got to get some new underwear. I said, John David,

when I get you through graduate school, son, then I'll buy some new underwear. Okay. When you have a nice fancy job doing something awesome, then you can buy me a new pair of underwear. And now go do your reading assignment. So please don't start with the underwear, okay? I never imagined those words coming out of my mouth. Okay. Alexis Tereshchuk, we're standing by at the courthouse waiting for the latest in Taylor Swift. Thanks, friend.

Joining me right now is a guest I have really been looking forward to talking to. It's author Riley Sager, which is a pseudonym. It's not Sager's real name. And he is the author of the best thriller I've read in a long time. It's called Final Girls, and you know how hard it is for me to make time to read a book. When I'm reading a book, I feel so guilty because I'm supposed to be writing my own book, but I've just got to say, I loved it. I'm talking about Final Girls, and it's the first thriller from Riley Sager, which I said is a pseudonym. Riley, native of Pennsylvania, writer, editor, graphic designer, who now lives in Princeton, New Jersey. Now, Riley Sager, I'm not giving away the author's identity yet,

loves to read, loves movies, loves to bake. Now, Riley Sager, I'm not giving away the author's identity yet, loves to read, loves movies, loves to bake. Okay, Riley Sager, identify yourself. Hello there. Yes. Wait, wait, wait. So you're not a girl? No, I'm not a girl. And a lot of people get confused about that, unfortunately.

Hey, you know what? I don't care if you're a little green man from Mars. This book is awesome. I love the book. Okay, but first, let me understand this. You went under a pseudonym because? There were many reasons. One of them was, I mean, because you're a published author, you know how publishing can be weird sometimes.

Publishing can be great. Yeah, it really can. And it can be weird. And, you know, there's so many books out there and it's really hard to like sort of break out from the pack. And in my previous books, I was not breaking out of the pack, if you know what I mean. I was like at the back of the pack. And once you get in that position,

you sort of need to just switch things up. And so my agent and I were like, you know, let's hit that reset button on your career and, you know, come up with a pen name. And so that's sort of how it was born. Okay, so Riley Sager is not a woman. But I've got to tell you something. I would never know it from reading Final Girls.

The name of his first thriller, Riley, the plot line behind this, it's all about college student. I'm going to get back about how you picked the name line behind this, it's all about college student. I'm going to get back about how you picked the name Riley Sager, but I've got to get into this book. Quincy. Quincy Carpenter goes on a vacation with five of her friends and comes back alone. She's the only survivor of a massacre. And I mean a massacre like a chainsaw massacre, movie horror style massacre. And in one instant, she becomes a member of a club that nobody wants to be part of. A group of similar survivors known in the media as the final girls.

One of those final girls is Lisa, and this reminded me of the Ted Bundy case down in Florida who lost nine sorority sisters to a college dropout's knife. Okay. I can't help but attach real cases to the cases you made up. Sam, who goes up against someone called the Sack Man during her shift at the Night Light Inn. I love that name, the Night Light Inn.

And now Quincy, who runs bleeding through the woods to get away from Pine Cottage, and the man she refers to now only as Him, with a capital H. So she's one of the final girls left over from murders. And then suddenly, those girls start dying. One turns up dead, I believe it's in a bathtub. So where did you get the idea for final Girls? Well, the term Final Girl is actually film study speak for the girl that's always standing at the end of a horror movie. And the best example is always Jamie Lee Curtis in Halloween. and I was actually watching Halloween on Halloween and started thinking about the concept of the final girl.

She's a survivor, and it's always a happy ending for her, and the movie ends on an upbeat note normally. And I started thinking about what it must be like for that last woman standing and how it's really not a happy ending at all yes she survives but all her friends are dead and she just has years and years of trauma and struggling ahead of her and so that was really something that interested me to see like what is the life of a final girl like 10 15 years after this massacre happens wow when you were just talking everything that ran through my head from um living through my fiance's murder to that feeling when i walked away from my dad's casket

to tons of crime victims that I have represented over the years that, yes, you win the case, knock on wood, but then you walk out of the courthouse and it's just you and the world and this memory of this traumatic experience that you live with every single day. And I've got to tell you, and I'll just keep referring to you as Riley Sager, but that feeling of it just being you when you said the final girl. Wow.

You know what? I've never, I know that feeling, and I know that feeling crime victims when the case is over and everybody leaves the courthouse and they're just standing there and looking at you like somehow I'm going to fix it. Yeah, like it's over, but it's not over. It's never over. No.

How do you know that? I mean, have you been a victim of crime? How do you know that feeling? Because it's the strangest feeling, and I felt it after every jury trial. I'm not a victim of crime, but it was born out of a really, really bad year when just like everything just sort of like went off the rails. You know, there were deaths in the family. There was, you know, like a job loss.

There was, you know, it just was like this year of accumulating just bad stuff. And by, you know, the end of it, I'm like, I'm just so tired of this. Like, why is everything going wrong? And I really, even though our journeys are very different, you know, Quincy survived an unspeakable thing and these girls all did. But in a way, and these girls all did. But in a way, I could relate to that.

I could relate to their anger and their frustration. Even the sense of the character of Quincy is very much in denial. She puts on this veneer of sweetness, and she's a baking blogger, and she has a beautiful apartment, and she tells everyone, I'm fine, when she's a baking blogger and she has a beautiful apartment and she tells everyone I'm fine when she's so not fine and I was doing the same thing in my own life and so that really helped me understand and relate to her character and it made it a lot easier to write her wow okay I'm just soaking in every single thing that you're saying now Now, I have an issue, not a problem, but an issue. I haven't quite identified it yet because I haven't slowed down long enough to think about it. The boyfriend, her boyfriend, who is a public defender,

she has a problem with him representing people who clearly are guilty. He says they have a right to be represented, they're both right where did you come up with his character i thought that he would be a very good counterpoint for her um because she you know went through a very traumatic thing at the hands of a specific person. And, you know, I think she's drawn to the safety of his profession and he's, you know, a very solid presence. But at the same time, there is this aspect of he's defending people who have done horrible things. And that sort of really does cause a rift in their relationship. You know, I never let myself get close to very many defense attorneys in all the years.

Because I may like, you know, some I have. But I may like them, you know, on a personal basis, but it's really, that's a tough pill for me to swallow, that they know they're getting guilty people out of jail, and anecdotally and statistically, when people get out of jail, they kind of do the same thing again. It's just like releasing someone out that you know is going to hurt an innocent person. Again, that really weighed heavily on me. Let me ask you a question. Your star, Quincy Carpenter, is she patterned after any particular person? No, not really.

I wanted to, you know, when you're writing, like, the characters sort of form as you go along, and it's a very weird process, and it sounds weird when, you know, I'm talking about it. But no, she really kind of just developed and evolved during the writing process. So she wasn't based on any one person or especially any one survivor. You know, just hearing your voice, it just, I don't know what I was expecting, I guess. You're just so real. And guys, with me right now is author Riley Sager, pseudonym. Read about that in the Wall Street Journal and he is talking about this incredible new book

Final Girls his very first thriller by Riley Sager and I've got to tell you as a fellow writer I certainly don't put myself in the same league with you and other greats but I'm really knocked out by Final Girls and your thinking

behind it when you describe Jamie Lee Curtis and that last person standing and now what she's going through I've got to tell you it's an incredible book and all I can say is I'm really I know you don't want to think about this right now, but I'm really looking forward to your next book. Oh, thank you. It's, it's a lot of pressure. I have to admit, I was, I was working on it when all of the, the buzz started to build and, you know, we were getting some really wonderful things said by really incredible authors. And I just was like at my laptop going, oh my gosh, I'm never going to top this, am I? But, you know, you got to keep working and soldier on and write the best book you possibly can.

So I hope it's working. I got to tell you, I'm in line at the bookstore right now. OK, I can't wait. Thank you so much for being with us, everybody. The author of Final Girls. And it is just, it's incredible. I actually broke down and I went and hid from the twins and read your book. And I just, I love it.

You're awesome. Thank you for spending a little bit of time with us. And God willing, we'll meet again. Oh, yes. Thank you so much. It was great. Bye, friend. Bye-bye.

Nancy Grace, Crime Stories, signing off. Goodbye, friend. You're listening to an iHeart Podcast.