Crime Weekly - S3 Ep224: Marlene Warren: The Conflicting Evidence (Part 3)

Episode Date: July 12, 2024

On the morning of May 26, 1990, 40-year-old Marlene Warren answered the door of her upscale Wellington, Florida home to find a person dressed as a clown holding a flower arrangement and two balloons. As Marlene reached out for the gifts, the clown shot her in the face, leaving Marlene gasping for air on the floor as the clown calmly walked back to a white Chrysler LeBaron and drove away. While Marlene was rushed to the hospital in critical condition, a massive manhunt for the clown began. And as the investigation unfolded, it was revealed that Marlene had expressed fears that her husband, Michael Warren, was going to kill her. However, the police would soon find out Michael couldn’t be the killer—he’d been with a friend when Marlene was shot. But, as the investigation continued, disturbing information about Michael’s possible connections to the murder began to surface. Try our coffee!! - www.CriminalCoffeeCo.com Become a Patreon member -- > https://www.patreon.com/CrimeWeekly Shop for your Crime Weekly gear here --> https://crimeweeklypodcast.com/shop Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrimeWeeklyPodcast Website: CrimeWeeklyPodcast.com Instagram: @CrimeWeeklyPod Twitter: @CrimeWeeklyPod Facebook: @CrimeWeeklyPod ADS: 1. EatIQBAR.com - Text WEEKLY to 64000 for 20% off all IQBAR products and FREE shipping! 2. Smalls.com/CrimeWeekly - Use code CRIMEWEEKLY for 50% off your first order and FREE shipping! 3. LiquidIV.com/CrimeWeekly - Use code CRIMEWEEKLY for 20% off anything you order! 4. JoinDeleteMe.com/Crime - Use code CRIME for 20% off! 5. DailyHarvest.com/CrimeWeekly - Get $30 off your first box and FREE shipping!

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Selection varies by location. Hello, everybody. Welcome back to Crime Weekly. I'm Stephanie Harlow. And I'm Derek Levasseur. So today we're diving into the third and final part of the Marlene Warren case. And I'll get you a little bit up to date. While investigating the murder of Marlene Warren, detectives learned that her husband, Michael, was a shady guy, to say the least.

He and his mistress, Sheila Keene, were linked to a stolen white LeBaron, which just so happened to be the same LeBaron driven by the clown that had shot Marlene. While detectives were initially unable to gather enough evidence to arrest Michael or Sheila for Marlene's murder, they were able to get enough evidence to charge Michael with 66 counts of racketeering, running a chop shop, grand theft, and more. Michael was arrested, and that's when authorities announced publicly for the first time that they believed Michael and Sheila were involved in Marlene's murder. However, there were still no arrests made in the murder, and that's kind of where we left off last episode,

where we were talking about the statement the police made when they said, hey, we believe that these two people were involved, but there's not enough evidence to get a, you know, to get a conviction basically. And Derek kind of said, well, he believes that's because the police wanted or knew that Michael and Sheila were involved, but the DA or the prosecutor had said, hey, you know, we don't have enough to go to trial. And so they were kind of almost calling the DA's office out as in like, you know, let's get some public pressure on this. Calling them out, but also separating themselves as well without getting anyone in trouble.

A lot of the comments kind of confirm that as well. Looking at what people had to say last week, you have two things going on here. First off, the 66 counts against him. That's one way for the cops to charge him with something that they believe they had enough for in a way of getting him on minor, I guess, quote unquote, minor charges, right? In comparison to murder. But also in that second part there, like you just said, again, the statement for me, I feel like a lot of people listening to this episode or watching it feel like there is enough at this point. Yeah, it's circumstantial in nature, but you have the vehicle in question. You have allegedly the two people involved picking up the car, being dropped off by someone going to pick up the car that was allegedly using the crime. And they do know that specific vehicle was the one using the crime because

you have the orange fibers from the clown wig in there. And then also you have a female matching the description of Sheila buying multiple items, you know, the flowers, the balloons, and then also the picking up of the clown suit. So all relatively, you know, the clown suit was a month before the flowers and balloons were the day of or the day before. So not looking good for Sheila at minimum. And yet nobody was charged. So I felt like law enforcement was putting out this statement, not only to put pressure on the prosecutors, but also as a CYA, kind of saying, hey, here's what we have. But unfortunately, they're not being charged as of right now, which is maybe to most people, they're not going to

understand what that means. But anybody who's in the know or anybody who takes a second to look is going to know that the prosecution would ultimately dictate whether or not they were charged, not the police department. They're two separate entities. So if you read between the lines on that statement, I think that's what they were trying to say. Now, someone could come out and say I'm completely wrong, but it seems like the consensus amongst you guys who weighed in about this, you also agree.

Because it does sound like after everything you laid out, Stephanie, there was enough here to at least charge Sheila, if not both of them, but at least Sheila. Yeah, because Sheila was the one at the costume shop getting the clown costume. And Sheila's, the same stuff that was kind of on her clothes and on her boots was in that that lebaron that they found abandoned yeah so there was physical evidence that technically they could have tied her to it yeah i i could see a world where they're like we don't have enough for my for michael yet but you have sheila who allegedly was in the car with michael or getting into the car with michael because that employee of michael's had dropped them off at the lebaron who they later said they never received that car. But we don't, if we're to believe this one person that they grabbed, probably during some

of this investigation into the racketeering and all that other stuff, came forward and said, yeah, I drove them over there. They got out and got into the LeBaron. So you could make an argument for Michael saying, yeah, but he didn't pick up the clown suit. He didn't grab the LeBaron. Yeah. So you could make an argument for Michael saying, yeah, but he didn't pick up the clown suit. He didn't grab the flowers or cards. Sheila did this on her own. The fact that neither of them were charged is where I think police probably took a lot of exception with. And that's why I think this statement was put out because I will tell you, it's not often, and we said it, it's not often that law enforcement will publicly disclose who they think the suspects are. Without an arrest warrant.

Without an arrest warrant being charged. So the fact that they did that, it's not very common. Speaks volumes, yeah. They're saying a lot without saying too much. That was my takeaway. Yeah, well, remember that Sheila's son from a previous relationship, he's an adult at this point. His name's Joe. So as the investigation continued, Joe went to live with his grandparents in Las Vegas for three months. He then returned to Palm Beach County to start building his own life. And he later said, quote, when I came back, I moved out of my parents' home. I had a real hard time getting my stuff out of the

house. I don't know if Michael didn't want me to leave or what. A couple of things I bought for my mom, like some vases. He didn't want me taking any of what. A couple things I bought for my mom, like some vases. He didn't want me taking any of that. I did anyway, end quote. And at first, Joe worked at Michael's car lot, but that didn't last long. He quit and started working as a carpenter. He eventually built a home in Jupiter, Florida, in order to escape West Palm Beach. He felt like too many people there knew him and knew his story.

It was just too much to deal with. Joe was made executor of his mom's estate, which was worth quite a lot of money. In addition to their $175,000 home, the Warrens owned about $1 million worth of rental property. Hold on. $175,000 home with an airstrip. That's all they paid for it in West Palm Beach. $175,000. Is this what? Hey, different market today, man. Good Lord. You can't get a shed for $175,000. Is this what? A different market today, man. Good Lord. You can't get a shed for $175,000 now. Right. It wasn't even that long ago. All right. Well, so- Times have changed.

The $175,000 house plus the Warrens owned about $1 million worth of rental property. Now, Marlene's parents hired an attorney to represent Joe in the disposition of his mom's estate. However, Michael was not happy with this at all. He fought back and argued that much of the couple's property belonged to him, not Joe. For some reason, the probate case was never settled, so Michael started selling the couple's property, including their home. Michael's mother bought one condo and a business partner got another, and any property Michael couldn't make money on, he quit he quit claimed to Joe, which basically means he gave up ownership of the properties to Joe because they were worthless to him. But Joe was in his early 20s and he couldn't afford to pay the mortgages. So many of these properties ended up being foreclosed on. Throughout this whole time,

Joe was really struggling with the loss of his mother. And obviously, you know, being there when it happened, seeing what happened to her, everything that happened mother. And obviously, you know, being there when it happened, seeing what happened to her, everything that happened afterwards. And, you know, he turned to alcohol as a coping mechanism, as so many people do. Thankfully, though, he would eventually go to rehab and get clean. I mean, think about it. Can you blame him? You think about the guilt that goes into that. Obviously, he wants to know who's responsible for his mother's death but he was there he chased after the clown i'm sure as we all do as human beings you replay those things a million times in your head oh yeah and he's probably convinced himself spoiler alert this

is not true but he's probably he had probably convinced himself at one point that if i had answered the door this would have gone differently. There was something he could have done. Yeah. I could have gone faster. I could have, I could have chased him down. I could have chased this clown quicker and,

and maybe that person would have been identified immediately. Yeah. Cause remember Joe did pursue the clown car. That's right. That's right. I mean, he was fearless. He went right out right after this person.

And I, I mean, if you notice, I'm being more careful now because I'm on tilt. If anyone knows, that's a poker term where I'm not sure no longer there and you were so close to the incident. I can't imagine what that would be like for. I mean, he's he's he's in his 20s, but he's still young. And to think about not only what he witnessed and what he how the condition he saw his mother in, but the fact that if she doesn't answer the door or if nobody comes to the door and they maybe just look through the window or something, again, you start to replay

it in your head and think about all the different scenarios and the what ifs, I'm sure could drive someone crazy. Yeah. It's like that butterfly effect. Like if I just done something differently, like, yeah. And I mean, add to that, like at this point it's been made public knowledge that his stepfather who basically raised him may have been responsible for his mother's murder. So that's a whole nother level of trauma and just mental health problems. Yeah. So it's sad because like a lot of people, they'll turn to things to try to numb the pain. And that usually involves drugs and or alcohol. And so I'm not saying I'm OK with it or condoning it, but I can completely sympathize with how we got there. Like we're to the point you just want to crawl into a hole and never come out again.

It's very, very sad. But meanwhile, Joe's stepfather, Michael, was still facing trial for the 66 counts of racketeering, grand theft, and other charges. In August of 1992, he went on trial, and in the end, he was actually found guilty on 43 of the 66 counts. At sentencing, Michael's attorneys argued that he was only taken to trial because of suspicions he was involved in Marlene's death. And the judge actually agreed, stating that the case against Michael was total and complete selective prosecution. So the judge further said he believed that investigators had coerced witnesses and said Michael would have never gone on trial if Marlene hadn't been killed. And that's a stupid thing to say because law enforcement wouldn't even know who Michael was if Marlene hadn't been killed. So why would he go to trial on these racketeering charges when they you know, there's so much happening every day in Florida, like non nonviolent things like extortion and racketeering and all of this stuff that the police can't possibly keep up with all of it.

So, yeah, he wasn't even on their radar at that point. But when his wife died and they started looking into him for that, of course, yeah, he's going to he's going to come on their radar. So I think that was kind of a stupid thing for the judge to say, but what do I know? I'll say this because I said it last episode. It's true. It's true. And both can be true. Michael was put on their radar because he was under investigation for the murder of his wife. And law enforcement would not have known about him, at least at that point in time, if that hadn't happened. So once that did happen, they started looking to Michael, they looked into his other business dealings, and they started to find a lot of things that were not on the up and up. In fact, they were illegal. And when they went to Michael and

he probably started not cooperating and Sheila was not cooperating and they said, you know what? When you live in a glass house, you can't be throwing stones. Yeah, we've got some stuff we can put pressure on you about. So but it wasn't only him. You see what they're saying here? Coerce witnesses. Now to coerce witnesses. We're talking about his employees, honestly.

Talk about his employees. And I don't love the word coerce, but I can see as a former detective, I would say pressure, not coerce, where I would say they went in there and said, listen, your boss over here killed his wife and things are going to get really difficult around here for everybody. You guys have been kind of operating under this assumption that we're not going to look because what you're doing is, you know, it's not a serious crime. So we got bigger fish to fry. But now we know about you. And because of his actions, we're coming after everybody.

So do you really want to have loyalty towards this person right now when they're the one under the spotlight? Bingo. You really want to stick by his side? If you know something about this murder you better talk to us because we're everyone's going down but that's not illegal is it it's not that's that's it's not illegal that's the game we have to play it's a and i don't mind it at all if you're i said it last episode if you're committing crimes and you're involved in a group that's committing illegal activity if one of your buddies go down i'm going to use that card against you where I know

I have stuff over your head as well, where you've committed crimes. I didn't do that to you. You did it to yourself. So I'm just enforcing the law. That's my job. And that's what happened here, where I really feel like law enforcement was going after Michael and realized there was a lot more going on, not only at his work, but with his employees and his colleagues and all these other people.

So to get at Michael, they went after everyone, 66 charges, 43 of them stuck. That means they really put some time into this case. So I don't necessarily completely disagree with the judge. Actually, in fact, I agree with them. But as far as coercing the witnesses, you know, maybe I would use some different verbiage, but I get where he's coming from. And I think everyone is on the same page here. Michael was being looked at for a murder. They didn't have enough to get him on that. So they were going to get him on everything else with a lot lower of a threshold for those crimes. Yeah, I mean, I agree. And clearly this really affected the judge and affected his opinion on Michael and the crimes that Michael was charged with, because the judge could have sentenced Michael to anywhere between nine and 22 years in prison. But instead, he ended up sentencing Michael to 22 years, yes, years of probation instead, because he did not believe that Michael should go to prison. And this is why judges really need to have some sort of like accountability here. You know, they just make decisions without any threat of any repercussions if that's the wrong decision. And this was the wrong decision, in my opinion. And later, the state's attorney's office appealed the sentence. And then two years later, the Court of Appeals ruled that Michael should have received more than just probation.

And he was then sentenced to nine years in prison. And as Michael was being hauled away in handcuffs, he said, quote, they don't give people who do violent crimes this much. I could have raped a bunch of women and gotten less time than this, end quote. Which I think that statement is very telling of who Michael is, because he's kind of like, man, if I knew that I was going to deal with this and be slapped with this sentence, I would have really made it worth my while. That's what I got from it. I don't know about you. Well, I mean, just overall, 22 years of probation, what are we talking about? But it speaks to a bigger issue where you're right. You have one person, one individual dictating everything. Hey, you know what? You police

officers did a really good job and you built a very strong case against this individual. 43 of 66 charges were upheld. But even though you did your job, even though you dotted your I's and crossed your T's, even though you did your job, even though you dotted your I's and crossed your T's, even though you wrote good reports and the defense couldn't get rid of those charges, even though you're completely well within your right to do what you did, I'm going to give him the 22 years. But you know what? Probation sounds great to me because that's my F you back to you guys for doing your job, but using the system to carry out whatever you're trying to do. And by the way, you were going after a guy who you believe killed his own wife.

So even though you guys did everything right this time, ultimately I have the final say, and it's pretty bad when the court of appeals comes back and says, yeah, no, that's ridiculous. Not only should he have served time, but nine years, that's a big difference from no years, right? They could have came back and said, you know what? We're going to give you a year. They come back and said nine years. So it just goes to show you how far off that judge really was. And it's a testament to how horrible of a judge he is in that right, because he couldn't separate objectivity from emotion. He just felt like Michael had been wronged and he was going to use his power to show that. And here's the thing.

Some people might be like, well, who cares? You know, it was it was, you know, eventually rectified by the Court of Appeals. Yeah. But like that's two years after a and how many more how much more time and, you know, law enforcement resources and taxpayer money had to go into actually achieving that when that should have been the sentence to begin with. So that's kind of the issue where it's like, yeah, eventually it was rectified, but it should have been done right the first time. That's what these judges are for. And if they're consistently not doing their jobs and making

bad calls, we need to look at that, but we can't because they have immunity and it sucks and it's stupid. And we need to change that. Final thing I'll say on it, because it could be a whole episode and we just talked about it on the Crime Weekly News this week with Bianca Devins and Kim Devins. Although that's not the judge's job, when they get it right and they require the right amount of time to be served based on the crime committed, not only does it hold that person accountable, but it serves as a deterrent indirectly to anybody else who may be considering committing these crimes or is actively committing these crimes. Again, the judge's job is not to set up a sentence that serves as a deterrent. You're not supposed to punish one person to deter others.

However, if you do the right thing, it will innately deter others because they're going to go, holy shit, you heard about so-and-so? Yeah, you hope it does. And it would deter some of them, yeah. Some of them. Hey, they got nine years for doing what we're doing. Maybe we should do something different. There's a lot of residual impact on someone getting probation after being found guilty on 43 charges. So it's a bigger issue. Again, I'm sure you guys could go back and forth with us in the comments. There's two sides to every story. But yeah, overall, not great. But I am glad to see that this was corrected at a later date. Let's take a quick break.

We'll be right back. OK, so after Michael was sentenced to serve nine years in prison, he completely stopped speaking to his stepson, Joe, which meant that Joe had now lost his biological father, his brother, his mother and his father figure. Michael only served a handful of years in prison before he was released in December of 1997. He then disappeared from Palm Beach County. Marlene's family lost track of him as the investigation into Marlene's murder continued. Now, the case didn't go cold, but it was put on the back burner, and many years passed before there was any movement. In May of 2013, the Palm Beach County Sheriff's Office received a cold case grant, allowing them to perform enhanced testing on the evidence gathered in Marlene's case. And we know there's a ton of stuff found in that LeBaron,

you know, the fibers and the hairs and all of this stuff that can now be tested and we can get a better indication of where it actually came from. So that physical evidence was sent to the lab. And when an employee looked over the ribbons from the balloons, they found an orangish acrylic hair mixed in. Now, this was the first time anyone had ever noticed a hair on the ribbons. This hair, along with all the other hairs and fibers

collected back in 1990, were sent to the FBI for additional testing using advancements in technology. If you recall, back in 1990, investigators collected multiple hairs and fibers from the LeBaron. Several small orangish-red curly hair fibers were found in the area of the passenger seat, backseat, and driver's door. These fibers didn't look natural. They were acrylic, you know, like they came from, I don't know, a clown wig. Additionally, there were long brown human hairs found on multiple parts of the car and burgundy fibers found on the carpet. Remember that investigators also collected two pairs of black lace-up style boots from Sheila's apartment. These were boots that were consistent with the ones Joe said the clown was wearing when his mother had been shot. Investigators processed the shoes and recovered

various hair fibers from the bottom of the shoes, specifically orangish acrylic fibers and burgundy fibers. So these were the hairs and fibers that were sent to the FBI. It took many years for the testing on all of these hairs and fibers to be complete, but eventually the results were in. Let's start with the burgundy fibers. According to authorities, the burgundy fibers from the carpet of the LeBaron found in the Winn-Dixie parking lot and fibers located on the boots of Sheila concluded that they were identical in composition. This meant that Sheila's boots, which matched what the clown was wearing, had definitely been inside the LeBaron that she and Michael stole. Next, let's talk about the brown human hairs. Microscopic hair analysis on the human hair located in the LeBaron concluded that Sheila could not be excluded as the source of the hair. Further DNA

analysis on the skin portion of the hair root confirmed that Sheila was the source of the skin on the hair located in the LeBaron, which I think we all knew that, right? It's all pretty much laid out. You just needed some proof, some evidence, some actual scientific way of connecting Sheila to the fibers and the hairs. If anyone's watching YouTube, you can see my, this is my surprise face. There it is. A quick correction. Winn-Dixie, just so everyone knows, I didn't know this. And I guess you didn't know either, Stephanie. I guess it's a grocery store, not a gas station. People who are familiar with Winn-Dixie were quick to point that out. We had about 30 comments letting us know.

So Winn-Dixie is a grocery store for anybody who is wondering. Just so you know, we don't have Winn-Dixie's here. We don't. In the East. I mean, I don't have any in New York. You have any in Rhode Island? No, never. I'd never heard of it before.

Everything we talked about and discussed regarding Winn-Dixie still holds true. But, you know, you have people who are personally connected to these places. They want us to get it right. They're like, no, don't talk bad about Winn-Dixie. Don't, like, undervalue what it is to us, which I totally get. It's not a gas station. We have no way of knowing that. No, I know.

We're not going that deep. We're like, what is Winn-Dixie? But now, next time I'm in a place that has a Winn-Dixie, I'm going to go there out of respect and observation for how important it is to the people in the community. Absolutely. I'm going to be a Winn-Dixie regular if I'm traveling. That's only the place I'm going to get food. Yeah. And to bring it back more to a serious note, you will see this sometimes with DNA. Obviously, the skin was a little different, but what you'll find a lot of the times, they'll just say, hey, the subject that's being compared to this cannot be excluded. A perfect example of that is the Rex Hurerman case that's going on right now. You have Rex

Hurerman, you have his wife Asa, and you also have, I believe, their daughter. The dogs and the dogs too. There's dog hair, right? And so what you'll see if you go look at that most recent bail application that I discussed on an Instagram Live, what you'll see is they basically say, well, in regards to this hair, 99.6% of the population can be ruled out. The subject, Rex Herriman, cannot. The next one, 99.8% of the people can be ruled out. The subject, Rex Kuhlman, cannot. The next one, 99.8% of the people can be ruled out on this hair, but Asa cannot. So they're basically saying it in the reverse way, like it's a very high degree of certainty that this hair belongs to this individual. We can't say it definitively, but that's, when you think about it, 0.4% chance that it's not theirs is statistically

not very likely considering the area they're in and the fact that 99.6% of the population has already been ruled out. To think that that hair was found connecting to this person who has other circumstantial evidence surrounding them to not be able to exclude them when they are able to exclude most of the population. It says a lot without saying everything. And even in Sheila's case, right, with her hair being found in that car, she could say, well, that doesn't mean that I was the clown. You have an employee who says they saw me and Michael get into this car. So of course I was in the car. But that screws them up. They can't say that. They can't say that, right? If you remember, they could say, oh, we got in the car and we brought it back to

the dealership and somebody else took it. And they can't prove that, especially so many years later. Yeah, they could say that, right? They could say that, but then it hurts their credibility because based on what you told me last episode, this person, the people who own the car, the couple called and someone, air quotes here, told them, leave the car over here with the keys in it. We'll send someone to get it. When that couple went back, the car was gone. And when they called back Michael's location, someone, probably Michael or someone connected to him. The couple called back.

The couple calls back. They say, we never went and got the car. No one told you to do that. No one told you to leave the car there. What are you talking about? So they've been going on all these years saying that they had no connection to this LeBaron. Yeah, but that doesn't matter because that's not like a violent crime. They could just be like, yeah, we did.

You know, we took it. That's what we were doing. You know, Michael's been already served time for these horrible things he did with his business. Yeah, we did that. But it doesn't mean we use the car in a commission of a crime. We parked it with the keys in there and someone took it. Yeah. Good luck with that. The car that was connected to the murder of Michael's wife, you have been saying all these years.

Well, it could be someone setting him up. Like you've said before, somebody had a problem with him. Maybe one of his employees hated him and wanted to set him up and get him arrested because they were sick of his illegal activities. They legal activities. Like they could say anything if you can't like the trials are so full of gray areas, like you were talking about with Huberman, where it's like, OK, well, we can say that this is his hair. Ninety percent. The defense is still going to use that small percentage that says it's not his hair to try and throw, you know, some reasonable doubt. So, yes, that's what that's exactly what they do. That's the Jose Baez method. In hindsight, it would have been better at this point, if it turns out to be Michael and Sheila, it would have been better for them to say,

yes, we took the car, which would explain our DNA, but someone stole it off our lot. And that's why it was found at the Winn-Dixie. Yeah, in hindsight, but they're not smart. Yeah. Or if they were smart, they wouldn't have left it at the freaking Winn-Dixie. That too. But that's why this hurts them now, because as I said, they've been keeping themselves separated from this specific LeBaron for a reason. Now that their DNA is found inside, the fact that they've been saying all along that they never had any interaction with this vehicle, to go back now and say, oh, you know what? I was lying about the interaction with the vehicle. We did take it because, you know, we were doing all these other crimes, but I still didn't kill Marlene. In one sentence, you're saying that I can't be

trusted, but hey, trust me about this other fact, which has a lot more of an impact on my life and my freedom going forward. Clearly, I wouldn't lie about this. Right, right. So it's too much. It's too much to open that. You have to ride it now. And because they've already gone all these years saying that they never came in contact with that car, finding that DNA inside the vehicle that they said all along they never went inside, that's big. It's huge. Well, not only now do we tie Sheila to that vehicle, but we tie

the clown to that vehicle because we have the orangish acrylic hairs. Well, analysis on those hairs located in the car determined they were the exact same orangish acrylic hairs found on the boots located in Sheila's home. But not only that, they were the same ones found on the ribbon from the balloons at the crime scene. And not only that, the same ones from the wig that detectives had purchased at Spotlight Costume. Because if you remember when they went to talk to the employees at Spotlight Costume about who had purchased a clown wig and a clown costume, they bought the same exact wig that those employees said the clown bought. And this is why they did it. So maybe just because I'm a detective here,

I'm starting to think that Sheila might have had something to do with this. Are you sure? Just a guess. That's a real leap. You're stretching here. I know it's a risk here. I could be setting myself up for failure, but I'm going to go out on a limb and say,

Sheila probably has something to do with this. And if Sheila had something to do with this, it's not a far leap to say that Michael possibly did as well. Michael could have had something, at this point, could have had something to do with this, it's not a far leap to say that Michael possibly did as well. Michael could have had something at this point, could have had something to do with it, but also could be, remember I said first episode or second episode, top of second episode. It could be before Michael, i.e. Michael told her to go do this, or it could be because of Michael. Michael might not be involved, but because he has a relationship with Sheila, Sheila could say, I want to be with Michael. Only way to do that is to get rid of Marlene.

He's not going to do it for me, so I'm going to do it myself. And it's funny because I want to, we're going to take a quick break, but when we come back, I'm going to talk to you about what Sheila and Michael were doing after Michael got out of prison for his 43 charges. And they're still together.

So there may be something to this. But let's go to a quick break and we'll be right back. Okay, so as we're getting the results in, pointing towards Sheila being the clown killer. And this was just as detectives had suspected for the last 20 years. So they then start to look into Sheila, see what she's up to, where she at. And lo and behold, she had married Michael Warren in a Las Vegas chapel wedding on August 15th, 2002. The two then moved to Abingdon, Virginia, and they built a mansion. And Sheila, she changed a little bit. So she dyed her hair blonde and she was going by the name Debbie. So obviously, Michael and Sheila are not trying to be Michael and Sheila in Virginia. They actually were running a restaurant called The Purple Cow in nearby Kingsport, Tennessee. This was a drive-thru fast food restaurant with three life-sized purple cows out front.

Employees said they could tell that Michael and Debbie were in love. They worked really hard. They had a sprawling mansion on the lake and they treated their employees very well. They would take them on cruises and things like that. So, I mean, Debbie and Michael, I mean, Sheila and Michael, they're over here living the life. None of the employees or townspeople knew that Michael and Debbie were suspects in Marlene's murder. One employee did say that whenever he got the couple's mail, sometimes the mail would say Sheila Keene, but Debbie always claimed that was her mom's name. Based on everything they uncovered, detectives were now certain Sheila was the clown killer. She was the only person with the means, motive, and opportunity to kill Marlene. Detectives

had suspicions that Michael was involved as well, but there wasn't enough evidence for a warrant. However, they have publicly stated they find it hard to believe he knew nothing about Marlene's murder. I can't blame him. Yeah, obviously. I can't blame him, but this goes back to Liz Barraza, the case we were talking about last episode, where there is a world at this point, if I'm remaining impartial, although I agree with him, that Sheila could have taken it upon herself to do this because this life that they're now living together, this is what she was dreaming of. And she knew it would never be a possibility if Marlene's in the picture because as you said, episode one, Michael was never going to divorce her. It was too much work, too much chance of financial loss. And I'm sure he was voicing this to Sheila. We have a lot more to go, so I won't go too far into the weeds here.

But here's the problem with that. The idea that Michael didn't know. If we're to believe this employee from Michael's work, who now appears to have been telling the truth, Michael was also with sheila when they took the le baron so if he wasn't involved when that le baron became the suspect vehicle he would have came forward or he would have went to sheila and said did you kill marlene you killed marlene and and and he would if he was doing the right thing he would have reported this to police and said hey i'm not i'm not going down with you for this one.

But there would be no incentive or reason for him to take that LeBaron unless he knew it was going to be used in the commission of a crime. They dropped the car off after the fact. So it's not his M.O. Yeah, it's not like, well, yeah. And then they didn't they didn't file any they didn't file any insurance claims. It wasn't even theirs to file. So, yes, I agree. So he didn't chop any insurance claims. It wasn't even theirs to file. So yes, I agree. So he didn't chop it up.

He didn't get any money for it. They just allegedly picked it up and then dumped it right after the murder. It doesn't make sense. And I would think Michael would have had some questions, but he didn't. And he never reported to police that he did have contact with that LeBaron with Sheila. So Spidey sense tells me he knew what was going on to some degree. But I can understand at this point, I'll give prosecutors this, where you have all this evidence, compounding evidence against Sheila, you don't have as much against Michael, which

may have been by design. Yeah, I completely agree. And I mean, this is, once again, Michael's not like an upstanding citizen, okay? We know that he didn't have any problem doing some shady business dealings, breaking the law every chance he could. We know that he didn't have a huge moral compass. And we know, like you said, he wasn't necessarily happy with Marlene or being a good husband to her, but he just didn't want to rock the boat because he liked things as they were. Nothing is pointing to the fact that Michael was completely happily married and would not have

wanted Sheila to do this. So the detectives now have a lot on Sheila, but not a lot on Michael. So they presented their evidence about Sheila to the prosecutors, and on August 31st, 2017, a grand jury indicted Sheila on one count of first-degree murder with a firearm, and she was arrested on September 26th in Virginia. At first, the prosecution filed a motion to seek the death penalty, but they later rescinded this, and Sheila now faced life in prison. Following Sheila's arrest, Marlene's 87-year-old mother surely said, quote, I didn't think that it would ever happen. There's always hope, but I'd prefer to have her instead. She was a special young lady. It feels good that they found the killer, but it's taking me back to the memory of it, and it's kind of hard. I feel like crying now, but I'm glad it's over, end quote. Shirley said that she and her husband, who are Marlene's parents, they had long

believed Sheila was involved in Marlene's murder, and her arrest only confirmed their suspicions. But even with a looming trial after all these years, emotions were still very raw for Marlene's parents. Shirley said, quote, Sheila got away with it for so long. You can't tell me that Mike didn't know. No way in heck. If there's a hell, I hope she rots in it. End quote. Joe, Marlene's son, also said the news of Sheila's arrest was a big shock. However, it made him happier than he had been in many years. So this is good and it is a start. I don't know where we're going on this, but we're obviously going chronologically. And I think law enforcement and the prosecution's angle here, their strategy, if you will, is they got Sheila. They got her dead to rights.

So they're going to do what they can with her. And maybe hopefully the she turns on him. There you go. There you go. So what case are we talking about here? Like Catherine McManawa, where we had- McManawa, yeah. Charlie Adelson, yeah. Like the loyalty between these people, like there's no honor among thieves kind of thing. Like the loyalty between these people, like there's no honor among thieves kind of thing. That's right. The loyalty between these people only goes so far as your own life or your own freedom or your own livelihood is in danger. And then people become very selfish. That's right. And so they could go to her and say, listen, you're looking at the death penalty. However, if you work with us on this, you just do life in prison or something along that line.

But you got to give up Michael if you do. So that's that's what I think their approach is here. You have enough for her. You can't wait any longer. Get her in there. Try to turn a suspect into your best witness. So after Sheila was arrested, detectives then heard from someone who had contacted them during their initial investigation years before. And That person was Christopher DeSantis, the attorney who had previously represented Joe in an assault case. Now, if you recall back in 1990, DeSantis told the detectives that on one day in 1989, he and Michael were walking out of the courtroom when Michael asked, quote, if a husband were to kill his wife, what would happen to her

estate? End quote. And DeSantis answered the question honestly and told Michael that Florida law was peculiar. He said, quote, it really isn't an issue of whether a man kills his wife. The question is whether the man is convicted of murdering his wife, because if he's convicted of murdering his wife, he wouldn't inherit the estate. But if he were convicted of a lower charge, he would. Not only that, but if he had a friend who did it and they couldn't tie him as an accessory to the friend, he'd get away scot-free, end quote. So after Sheila was arrested in 2017, DeSantis called detectives and said he remembered something else he told Michael during that 1989 conversation. A killer dressed as a clown would likely get off because witnesses couldn't tell whether it was a man or a woman. Now, why it took DeSantis more than 20 years to remember that, I will never

understand. Yeah. And also, why a clown? Did DeSantis actually give Michael- Did he give him the idea? The idea. Yeah, literally. Did he say, for example, if you dress like a clown- Yes, it sounds like that. Yeah. And then Michael said, okay, noted. He took it literally. Yeah, and then you do the exact same thing that you now have somebody who told you to do that who can come out and be like,

hey, actually, the exact same thing that ended up happening was the exact same thing that I told him he could do. That's crazy. Maybe that's why he didn't come forward, where he was like, shit, I'm pretty sure that I told him he could do. You know, that's crazy. Maybe that's why he didn't come forward where he was like, shit, I'm pretty sure that I gave him his whole plot how he was going to carry this out. Like, I feel like I might be responsible in some way.

Yeah, like I'm gonna wait 20 years until the statute of limitations on accessories. They're going to come looking at me. So when DeSantis first, you know, heard this from Michael, he was like, my first impression is this guy's nuts. Like, why would you ask that question with your wife there? Because apparently when Michael asked this question, Marlene was right there. And then he said, well, then I took a look around and his wife wasn't there.

So he realized that Marlene had been there right with them before the question was asked. And then she sort of wandered off. And that's when Michael asked it as soon as she was out of earshot, which is, you know, obviously suspicious on its own. Concerning. It's definitely concerning. So specifically what DeSantis had said is that a killer dressed as a clown would likely get off because witnesses would not be able to determine whether the assailant was a male or a female. So yes, that is what he claims he told Michael Warren when he was re-interviewed by police in 2017. And it is a good question of why you did not remember that when you were initially interviewed. But like you said, and I kind of agree, he probably felt a little bit

as if he would be on the line. And I mean, he's a lawyer, so he doesn't want to be disbarred. He doesn't want to have a bad reputation as, you know, giving potential killers the exact perfect way to get away with the murder, because I don't really think that's part of his job is counseling because he wasn't even Michael Warren's lawyer, by the way. He was Joe's lawyer, Michael Warren's stepson. I think that he probably wouldn't want it to get out that like, oh, yeah, just as a casual conversation with the stepfather of my client, he asked, like, how can I get away with murder? And I gave him a step-by-step instruction manual on how to do so. It probably, for what his reputation-wise, he wanted to keep that close to the chest for a

while. Well, it's why as law enforcement officials and even podcasters or YouTubers, whatever you want, it's why it's important to continue to cover these cases. Do I think that Chris came forward because of a YouTuber or a podcaster? No. I don't even know the reason I'm about to say is true, but there could be a world where, like you just said, when he initially heard about this, Marlene, the clown, he might have said, Jesus, he might've had some guilt. He might've had a little deja vu, like, where did I hear that before? Oh, coming out of my mouth to Michael Warren. And as a lawyer, he might have said that's not enough to charge him with anything. However, as time progressed, and this case was continued to be covered and publicized,

when Sheila was finally brought in. And maybe he was afraid that Michael was next, and Michael would be like, well, it wasn't my idea. My lawyer, Joe's lawyer told me to do it. It could be that, but it also could just be the fact that he's been hearing about this so long it's been weighing on him and he finally decided to speak up. And although it wouldn't be the smoking gun, it could obviously be added to a plethora of circumstantial evidence against Michael if it went that way. So it's why it's important to keep cover of these things and for law enforcement to be persistent and continuously ask people, hey, if you know something, come forward. It's not always a case where the person

isn't aware of what they know. It might just take hearing or seeing the right thing to incentivize them enough to finally speak out. And for everybody, that reason could be different. But in this case, it looks like maybe there was some guilt, maybe hearing about what they had, maybe it was self-preservation on his part. Who knows? But obviously, Gladdy came forward because, although it's not going to be the final nail in the coffin, it is going to be something where you say it to a jury,

and it's going to raise some eyebrows. Just more circumstantial evidence to add to the pile. And obviously, we're just speculating about why Christopher DeSantis did or didn't say. Of course. Of course. Who knows? Only he knows. Yeah, only he knows. And there could be more that we don't know about that was discussed with the police. Who knows? But either way, he did come out eventually and do the right thing. And that's what matters at the end of the day.

Sure. So while the prosecution continued building their case, Sheila's defense began scrutinizing all of the state's evidence, and they quickly discovered that the state's case was not as strong as it appeared. The defense pointed out in court motions that the human hairs from the LeBaron were not a direct match to Sheila, as the state was alleging. The state claimed that, quote, microscopic hair analysis on the human hair located in the LeBaron concluded that the hair was identical to a sample of hair from Sheila, end quote. However, according to the defense, the truth was that the FBI concluded that two of the brown hairs in the car were consistent with Sheila's hair, but that, quote, the comparison of the microscopic characteristics in hairs does not constitute a basis for personal identification, end quote, which I feel like is just a disclaimer, but yeah, you get it. It's once again,

it's these all little gray areas that defense lawyers live in. They love those little gray areas where they can cast reasonable doubt. The defense stated that the FBI analyzed the shaft and the root of the hair found on the LeBaron's floor mat and the shaft of a hair found in vacuum sweepings. Regarding the hair from the floor mat, the state stated that, quote, DNA analysis on the skin portion of the hair root concluded that Sheila is the source of the skin on the hair located in the chrysolebarin, end quote. But according to Defense, once again, this was not true. In reality, the FBI found both male and female DNA on the root portion of the hair. The FBI concluded that Sheila could not be excluded as the source of one of the contributors of the DNA. However, the FBI's raw data indicated that a male is the major contributor of the DNA. In other words, most of the DNA found on the hair root belongs to a male, not Sheila. The FBI

concluded that this hair, quote, exhibits both similarities and differences to the head hair sample from Sheila Keene, End quote. It was not a direct match like the state said it was, which is odd that they would. It's odd that they would put it forth in such confidence, knowing that the defense is going to look for any reason to pick it apart. But I mean, maybe they were just, I don't know, hoping that nobody picked up on it either way. Some of it, I guess, is also interpretation of what the findings are. And the state looked at it one way and said, oh, this is it. Got her. And obviously the defense looked at it and saw something else.

But this is why, as you just mentioned a couple minutes ago, depending on whether you're on the prosecution or the defense, you're going to find a way to contort the narrative to fit whatever you're trying to promote. And that's their jobs. That's what they're there to do. And ultimately, they present their case to a jury and they decide who they believe is right. Let's take another break and we'll be right back. So going back to now this DNA and forensic analysis, there were even more issues when it came to the orangish acrylic hairs. The state said that in 2013, when the evidence was reexamined, an orangish acrylic hair was found on the ribbon from the balloons at the crime scene. But when the defense looked further into this hair, they realized that hair had never been found on the ribbon prior to the case being reopened in 2013. The lead investigator in 1990 said that when he collected

the balloons and ribbons, he checked them for any trace evidence like hairs and fibers and found none. Similarly, the lab employee who processed the evidence bag containing the balloons and the ribbons back in 1990 also confirmed that no hairs or fibers were found. However, the lab employee who examined the balloon ribbon evidence in 2013 reported that upon opening the package, she discovered a 6 to 8 inch fiber. She was the first to observe this, so she wrote it on the property receipt. The hair fiber was then sent off for testing along with everything else. Sheila's defense tried to figure out where this fiber had come from, and what they learned was actually pretty shocking. They uncovered a damning 1999 audit that had been conducted at the Palm Beach Evidence Unit in response to issues with the handling of evidence. The audit concluded that there were several issues with the evidence unit, one of which was that evidence bags were not always sealed properly. right here, this is the Achilles heel of the state's case that the defense can sort of like

poke at and pry at because now you have a, not just with this case, but with other cases, you have a reputation of not caring for evidence and not dealing with chain of custody issues in the way that it should be in order to maintain the integrity of the evidence and the investigation. So now you can just paint this entire police force as being irresponsible and not doing the right thing when it comes to evidence collection and storage. And now once again, we're living in those gray areas where you can cast reasonable doubt on everything else. That's the situation here. The defense's job is not to prove innocence. It's to defend. That's why they call the defense. So when your case is hinging on this hair fiber,

and as you just said, the defense can show reasonable doubt with how that hair got there. If that reasonable doubt is strong enough, then the jury will start to question the case as well. And if there's enough there, if that's how you can get someone off on a crime they committed or get a conviction overturned. So it's a problem. Chain of custody is a huge issue with evidence. And when the evidence is strong, the defense will turn to how it was obtained. That can start at the crime scene. We've talked about this before where how did the detectives involved find this piece of evidence? How was it

collected? How was it preserved? They'll start to take into question the entire process in which the evidence was first discovered to when it was tested at a lab. And they'll try to see if there was anything during that process that could be brought into question. In this case, it doesn't appear that it was that hard because there's documented evidence of it. We've seen this a million times when the defense can't prove or, you know, even show enough evidence that their client is not guilty. They'll go after the police force or even the prosecution and say, oh, well, the police, you know, didn't give my client enough privacy when they were speaking to their lawyer or they handled them improperly during arrest. Like the goal after anything to basically give their client a fighting chance and make it, you know, a little bit more balanced.

And here you've given them something that they actually can use that has a lot of weight behind it. And the Palm Beach Post actually wrote an article about the audit. And this article referenced multiple cases with evidence handling issues, including Marlene's. According to the article, quote, nearly 10 years after a clown murdered Marlene Warren, county auditors have discovered some of the evidence was improperly stored. Open bags containing a white clown glove, seven types of clown makeup, an orange wig and a bozo type suit linked to the Wellington murder were found this fall inside the sheriff's evidence room. The bags should have been sealed to preserve evidence, end quote. Following the audit, the department did not conduct any investigations to determine if any evidence had been contaminated.

They just kind of continued on business as usual, which, once again, that doesn't look great. Because if they'd ordered an internal investigation, if they'd made moves or hired external people who can come in and give the police force some sort of indication or advice on how to proceed and not have this happen again, it would look as if they cared more. Like, oh, we care that this evidence was handled improperly. We want to avoid it ever happening again. But what it looked like they did is sort of just like, oops, our bad. Let's not talk about this. Let's not do anything and hope that nobody ever finds out. You know, I applaud them for it because this is on the investigators and more importantly, the lab that's involved. And when mistakes like this happen, it's the defense's job to point those things out. And I don't see it as them finding a technicality or a loophole. This is a verifiable fact that the lab techs or whoever was in charge

of this, whether it was the investigators dropping off the bags, were not doing it right and were not doing their jobs. And when you put a half-ass effort in, you can end up having someone get off for a crime they committed. And then not only is your case done, but the victim and the victim's family do not get the justice they deserved because of laziness or ineptness. So either way, we need to hold all sides accountable. So I have zero issue with the fact that this was brought into question, because if it hadn't happened, the defense wouldn't have been able to go this direction. So kudos to them for doing their job.

This is one of those cases where it's pretty black and white. There was a mishandling of evidence. They weren't properly sealing the bags and the defense brought it out. Now, all that being said, do I think that Sheila's hair was more than likely in that bag the entire time? I don't think that that hair- No, the clown hair, the clown fiber on the ribbon. Yeah, the clown fiber. Do I think that it just jumped out of one bag into another? Probably not. Maybe it was just missed by the previous lab tech and not documented. But either way, there's no way to know now. Now it's forever tainted. So good on the defense for doing their job.

Yes, absolutely. What do they call that? Like, you know, fruit of the poisonous tree kind of thing? Well, fruit of the poisonous tree would be a situation where the police department, they found it through an illegal practice of obtaining that evidence, going into a house without a search warrant, opening a car door that they didn't have a consent to search for and pulling something out of the backseat. Would this sort of qualify in the way as in like they knew there'd been an evidence breach and there was an issue with evidence, but they didn't say anything? No, I think it could be more so of a Brady violation than a fruit of a poisonous tree doctrine exemption where you have a situation here where if the state knew about this and they knew that there was this issue with the evidence and they didn't disclose it, maybe you would have a Brady violation. I mean, I'm not an attorney, but I could see that being more applicable than, it doesn't seem like law enforcement was the issue

here. It seems like during that process of the exchange from detectives to the lab and then the processing of it at the lab is where the issue came into play here. Yeah, but that is law enforcement. No, it's not. Isn't the lab techs part of law enforcement? They work for the police station? No, they work for the state and it's a state crime lab. They can do a lot of different things, but they're not law enforcement entities.

They're supposed to be. Oh, I thought like CSI techs were considered law enforcement entities. Well, CSI techs are different from crime labs. I mean, you're talking about two different people. Crime scene investigators and a lab tech are two different things. Okay. But state lab techs can do a lot of things. They can process a lot of different types of information and it may not always be to implicate someone in a crime. It could be a lot of different things.

So, no, they're not necessarily sworn officers, which is a good thing because there's no incentive for them to kind of manipulate the evidence to support a certain narrative because they're separate from the investigators actually conducting the case. I think it's important to know, like, it's not like these people did this on purpose because we're talking about 1990. They didn't understand about evidence contamination. Forensic technology wasn't even to the place where you could really understand about like DNA transfer and things like that. They most likely had not been trained on how to properly store things in order to preserve the integrity of DNA evidence. This was kind of like early days and everybody was just doing their best. I don't think it was done on purpose. And I wouldn't even say that it was, you know, an intentional kind of like oversight. It was just, they didn't know what they were doing. I'd say negligence though. I would say negligence. And I don't know if it's the case here. And I think it's important to point it out. I haven't heard anything to say that the bag involving Sheila's, or I should say the orange acrylic hair, was not properly sealed. That's not what we're saying. What we're saying is there was a report that showed evidence that in other situations, bags had not been properly sealed.

No, there was a report in this case. That this particular bag? Yes, open bags containing a white clown glove, seven types of clown makeup, an orange wig and bozo type suit. That's game over. Yeah. Yeah. That's game over. So it's her specific case as well as others. Yes. And I must have missed that when you said that part, but that's, that's a pretty bad. That's pretty bad. Yeah. I'm so, I don't know where this is going, but I'll be shocked if this whole case doesn't get thrown out. Well, the defense now obviously is going to question whether the hair and fiber evidence in Marlene's case had been contaminated during the audit.

They wondered if, when the bags were open, a fiber from the clown wig in the unsealed bag could have somehow ended up in the bag with the balloon ribbon from the crime scene. And this seemed very possible to them. This theory became even more plausible during a court hearing about the evidence in Sheila's case. During this hearing, a lab employee was holding the evidence bag with the ribbon and the hair fiber when all the ribbons fell out of the bottom of the bag. It still, at that point, had not been sealed properly. Ugh. That's really, that's bad. I can't even defend these people at this point. Nope. we're in trouble. So after making all of these realizations, the defense motioned for bond for Sheila,

stating, quote, there's no reliable physical or testimonial evidence that implicates Sheila in this crime. To the contrary, the evidence indicates that Sheila did not shoot Marlene Warren. The state arrested Sheila based on assumptions and inferences drawn from purely circumstantial and inconclusive

evidence yet. The state has no direct evidence linking Sheila to the actual murder. The state avers that Sheila Keene Warren was having a romantic relationship with Michael Warren, so she must have been the person who killed Marlene Warren. The state has spent the last 30 years trying to force the evidence to match this loose motive, but the pieces don't fit the puzzle. Forcing the pieces into the wrong puzzle is futile and dangerous. This is precisely how you convict an innocent person, end quote. And I mean, this is obviously an emotionally fueled statement that's meant to scare people, regular people like you and me who are like, hey, like, is this an innocent person? Like, is it this easy to have contaminated evidence bring somebody on trial for murder like Sheila

is? Like, what if she's innocent? And additionally, throwing that 30 years in there is showing like how long this has been going on. Time is not on your side with forensics. Time's not on your side with police investigations. So it's kind of almost like the defense is saying, you know, you can't really tie her to this. You can't prove it. They've been trying like, let's just end this once and for all. Yeah, I see where they're coming from. And I don't disagree. It's one of those situations where for 30 years, as they're saying, you clearly didn't have that strong of a case against her because it took you a very long time. You've been pinning it on this person for almost the entirety. There's never really been any other suspects that we've known about. And they're trying to paint the picture that instead of following the evidence,

law enforcement came to the conclusion that Michael and or Sheila, or a combination of both, were responsible for this crime. And they were trying to reverse engineer how they were responsible for it instead of going after the quote unquote real killers. So then when you fast forward and you have a situation like this, where the most compelling piece of evidence against one of those two suspects is this hair and this acrylic fiber. And now there's a question about how this fiber was obtained and where it was obtained from. That's an issue. And we say it all the time, that old adage, the old saying, I'd rather see a hundred guilty men go free than one innocent man go to prison for a crime they didn't commit. I live by that. And I think we all should, because to think that someone could be in prison for any period of time

for something they didn't do is almost, it is worse. It, it's another crime, honestly. So you can't fight crime with crime. It's absolutely worse than the person who's actually responsible getting off. That happens all the time. And we all were okay because of it. Is it worse or I don't know? They both feel pretty bad to me.

I think about this. I think about this. If I was the detective on a case and I went after someone and I found out 10 or even five years later that I was the detective on a case and I went after someone and I found out 10 or even five years later that I was wrong and that person was in prison for five years that they had nothing to do with, that's going to haunt me way longer than working a case, knowing someone committed the crime and having a judge let them go because they didn't feel I had enough. It's happened to me.

There's guys walking the street right now, some of which have been featured on Breaking Homicide, who in my heart, I know they killed someone and I thought I did enough to prove it. And yet they're out there walking free right now. I still sleep good at night knowing that. But if I had found out that I was responsible for someone innocent doing any amount of time in prison for something they didn't do, that would bother me forever. I agree, obviously. And that's from like a subjective standpoint. Yeah, I mean everyone can feel different, yeah. But universally, like you really don't want to see either of these things happen.

Of course not. I choose option C, which is A and B. You're choosing the lesser of two evils. Yeah, I'm choosing lesser two. I can get over one. It's happened to me a lot. But the other one is like you just got to make sure you get it right because there's no going back. You can't give them their time back. In this particular situation, to kind of round it all out, if there's any doubt that this

person committed this crime, then you have to let them walk. So I don't know where this is going to go. I don't know if something else is going to come out of it. We're going to take one last break and then we're going to wrap up this episode and we're going to find out how this one ends. Great. We're back. So remember, the defense files this motion basically asking for bond for Sheila. And they're like, hey, this is terrible. You know, there's nothing here. The state's been going after her unfairly, trying to fit puzzle pieces where they don't belong, etc, etc. And in

this motion, the defense critically examined the prosecution's circumstantial evidence. They argued that even if the brown human hairs in the LeBaron did belong to Sheila and the vehicle was indeed the one involved in the murder, these findings do not clarify when or how those hair samples had ended up in the vehicle. Like I said, that's usually where they go, you know. They said Sheila could have been in the car any number of times in the days leading up to the murder. The defense noted that after the shooting, the police interviewed four witnesses, Joe, his girlfriend Jean, Jean's brother Wendell, and Wendell's girlfriend Mindy. Three of those witnesses identified the shooter as a male, while the fourth could not identify

the shooter's gender. Significantly, all four witnesses described the shooter as being anywhere from six feet tall to six feet and two inches tall, but Sheila is five feet and seven inches. So although she was described by employees of the costume shop as being tall, maybe they meant tall for a woman. I think average height for a woman is like 5'4", like me. And so I guess 5'7 would be a little taller for a woman. And the defense said detectives' interviews of the employees from Publix and Spotlight costumes were equally troubling. The two Publix employees did not identify Sheila as the person who bought the floral arrangement and balloons. Moreover, the employees from the costume shop said the female customer, who was supposedly Sheila, purchased a clown costume that was yellow-orange on one side and candy pink on the other.

And they said this did not match the costume identified by any of the four eyewitnesses. So they're using the unreliability of eyewitness testimonies against the police and against the state in this case. If you recall, Joe said it was a gray color. Jean said it was bright colors. Wendell said the outfit was white with red hearts or diamonds. And Mindy said it was multiple colors with some blue dots on it. But no one said yellow and pink.

The defense wrote in their motion, quote, There's no testimonial evidence from any witnesses, and there's no credible physical evidence that Sheila is the very tall man dressed as a clown who killed Marlene Warren, end quote. And they make a pretty good case, don't they? Yeah, actually. And I could be wrong on this, but didn't we also say that the clown, the suspect clown was wearing makeup, but yet she purchased a mask or am I reversing that? No, she purchased a wig and makeup. Yeah. She said she wanted makeup. Well, the woman who purchased the clown costume said she wanted makeup that would cover her whole face. She wanted makeup, but didn't the witnesses say that the person was wearing a mask? If I remember correctly, a few of them said they couldn't remember. I think one of them said that the clown might have been wearing a mask,

and the other two said that there was makeup, there was clown makeup, Yeah. I would think it would be very obvious whether the person was wearing a mask or not. But hit me in the comments if I'm wrong on that one. I have to go refresh my memory after I finish this episode. I'll go back and check too. But that's where we are. So there's definitely some conflicting stories, nothing concrete. And just like you have circumstantial evidence that can lead to a guilty verdict, you also have a totality of evidence that could lead to a not guilty verdict. And that's the direction that the defense is going here. Absolutely. And the state actually appealed the motion for bond, right? They're like, no, we got her finally, man. Like, absolutely not.

They stated that even though Joe and his friends thought the clown was a tall man, the murder happened within seconds, which was far too quickly for them to get a good look. And like I said, witness testimony, eyewitness testimony, just historically and factually not super accurate. You could tell just from these four people they saw all different things. That to me is enough for the state to say, hey, none of these people even had consistent descriptions of what this clown looked like. So how can we use their descriptions as, you know, basis of fact when none of them even had the same recollection? Plus, the clown's wig and boots would have made the clown seem taller than they actually were. Also, the whole point of the killer dressing up as a clown, according to Christopher DeSantis, was to hide their gender, facial

features, etc. And that's why the clown didn't speak, because maybe the voice would have given them away as male or female. So it makes sense that no one could actually identify Sheila as the clown. The prosecution argued that what mattered was that the two costume shop employees positively identified Sheila as the person who bought a clown costume, wig, and makeup just two days before the killing. The prosecution then pointed out that after Marlene was murdered, Sheila moved out of state, married Marlene's husband, started living under an alias, started enjoying the financial benefits of what Michael had to offer. And in the end, Sheila was not granted bond,

and the case continued its way towards trial. Sheila would sit in jail for years. The whole time, her attorney maintained her innocence and questioned the prosecution's case. There was another problem that the defense faced, and it came up many times during the years leading up to trial. The problem was that the prosecution never gave the defense the clown sightings file. If you recall, immediately after the police announced that Marlene had been shot by a clown, detectives started receiving clown sightings and leads, all of which were placed in a clown

sighting file. But when it came time for the defense to work on their case, receiving clown sightings and leads, all of which were placed in a clown sighting file. But when it came time for the defense to work on their case, the clown sightings file was never given to them. They asked for the file multiple times over the course of multiple years, but they were always told that it couldn't be found. Then, right before the trial was set to start in May of 2023, the defense filed a motion to get the prosecution to give them the file. And then magically, they found it overnight and handed it to the defense the next day. When the judge found out about this, he admonished the prosecution and said things like this shouldn't happen. He then gave the defense an additional 60 days to investigate all of the clown sightings. So basically what we're saying here is or what was being sort of said without being said is implied.

Yeah. The prosecution is like, we don't know where this clown file is. Right. But then right before the trial starts, the prosecution's like, oh, here it is, hoping that it doesn't give the defense enough time to do the deep investigation into this file that would need to be done in order to have it benefit Sheila at all. So the judge is like, I see what you're doing here. I'm going to give them another two months with this file because you waited to the last minute and I kind of know exactly what you were doing and I don't like it. Yeah. Could be another situation, maybe a Brady violation where you have prosecutors not disclosing certain information that could

be exculpatory in nature. And the prosecution's not making themselves look good here, right? State's not making them. And we can understand why logically as people, because we've been following along with this case and both you and I are like, yeah, Michael and Sheila, man, pretty good for this. Right. And the police are feeling the same way. The prosecution's feeling the same way. But now's feeling the same way. But now it looks like you believe this so wholeheartedly, you almost have tunnel vision to the point where you're willing to bend and even break the law in some cases in order to get your guy. And that's the last thing that a judge or jury wants to see. Can't blame him either. I feel the same way.

Yeah, it's icky. It just doesn't feel right. It's like, I don't care how guilty these people seem to you. Like, you cannot cut corners like this and you cannot do shady things. Now you're no better than the side you're trying to fight against. Yeah. So after this debacle, Sheila's defense started working on a plea deal with prosecutors. And in my opinion, the prosecution likely realized that there was quite a bit of reasonable doubt in their purely circumstantial case. When they went to Marlene's son Joe to ask about a plea deal, he actually agreed with it. He later said he never thought they were going to have a conviction. It was a shock that Sheila agreed to plead guilty.

He said, quote, it just blew my mind, end quote. Tragically, the prosecution did not get to ask Marlene's mother her thoughts on the plea deal because she passed away on March 6, 2023, at 92 years old. She would never get to see justice for her daughter. On April 25, 2023, 59-year-old Sheila Keene pleaded guilty to second-degree murder, which is surprising, okay, that she just agreed to plead guilty to second-degree murder, so she must have been involved in some way, shape, or form. And she was sentenced to 12 years, but she received credit for the time she'd served while awaiting trial, which was over five and a half years. And with time off for good behavior, her attorney estimated that she could be released within a year, although the

prosecution anticipated it would probably be closer to two years. Now, Joe appeared via video conference at the plea hearing and told the judge he accepted the conditions but noted that he never once saw remorse from Sheila. After the plea hearing, the Palm Beach County State Attorney released a statement that read, quote, Sheila Keene Warren has finally been forced to admit that she was the one who dressed as a clown and took the life of an innocent victim. She will be a convicted murderer for the rest of her days, end quote. Sheila's attorney said, quote, this is an incredible win for Miss Keene Warren. The state of Florida originally wanted to execute her, but now she's going home in 10 months. While it was difficult to plead guilty to a crime she did not commit, it was kind

of a no-brainer when there is a guarantee that you will be home with your family, end quote. And based on the amount of time that she was in prison for, I guess it does make some sense that she may have said, oh, I'm guilty, even though she wasn't. But why wouldn't you take an Alford plea then? I don't know. Maybe it wasn't an option at that point. Maybe it wasn't an option, but I'm sure what the attorney said is accurate. If she was still claiming her innocence, they came to her and said, you've already done almost six years. If you take this guilty plea, we can get you out of here in less than a year. What's another year?

You could be here for another five or ten years if this continues to go down the road and they find more information. So what's one more year? You can do it. You'll be out of here in ten months. Let's take it. And maybe that's the impression they were working under and the assumption that her legal team was working under that this woman was innocent. But based on the offer that was being put out there, this was the right option for her. Yeah. I mean, but what do you think? Like, would you plead guilty to shooting somebody dressed as a clown if you weren't guilty,

even though like, I don't know, it's hard to really. If I want to get back out with my life, knowing that if I was truly innocent and I had already done six years and I knew that if I just said, yes, I did it, I would be labeled as a murderer, but I would be out in less than a year. Honestly, I'd probably take it. Yeah. And I mean, Marlene's son, Joe, actually told, I think it was ABC News. He said, Sheila Keen Warren was the murderer of my mother. I was there. I saw her eyes. And I'll tell you, they're the eyes. I'll never forget them. That's what he claims now. So, I mean, it makes sense. She pleaded guilty to second degree murder in exchange for a sentence that would have her out soon. And Joe said, you know, he knew that he wasn't going to get exactly the outcome he wanted,

but because of all the work he had done since the death of his mother, because of the dark things that he'd gone through after her death, he knew that no matter what the outcome was, he was going to be at peace with it and he was going to be okay. And after he appeared via Zoom for this hearing, he actually went to his mother's grave and he said, I told her we finally got truth. We were finally getting closure. But is that the full truth? And that's kind of what I want to talk about, because Sheila's attorney said that after she's released, she's going to join Michael back home in Virginia. The attorney said, quote, Mike Warren is excited to have his wife home and they know that there's some finality to this, end quote. Michael Warren was

never charged in relation to Marlene's murder, and when the media asked if he had anything to do with Marlene's murder, he said no. When asked if he suggested that Sheila dress up like a clown, he responded, quote, Who says she even did that? I don't think she had anything to do with this. If I thought she had something to do with this, I wouldn't have been with her, end quote. He said that any accusations that he was involved in are reckless and shameful, and he doesn't believe Sheila is guilty, and he's glad she'll be home soon. But like I said, Joe, Marlene's son, he is sure that Sheila was the killer. He says he recognized her eyes, and he was able to visit his mother's grave and finally give her some

closure and talk to her. But at the end of the day, I find it hard to believe, as you had said previously, that Michael Warren had no idea that Sheila was doing anything like this. And especially with Christopher DeSantis coming out and saying, hey, I told Michael that, you know, you could have an associate or a friend or something dress up like a clown because then nobody can tell who they are, even if they're a male or female. DeSantis did not say that to Sheila. He said it to Michael. So Michael would have had to have relayed that message to Sheila at some point. And he could even say, oh, yeah, I just told her like, you know, as a side conversation what DeSantis had told me, but I didn't suggest that she go and do it. He could have even said that. But there's no

way that Sheila would have known to dress up like a clown when DeSantis had told this to Michael when Marlene and Sheila were not present. That Michael was the only person who knew about this conversation besides Christopher DeSantis. Yeah, I think two things can be true. And this is just our opinions at this point. can have a situation where we may personally believe that Sheila and Michael are responsible for Marlene's murder, but also on the other hand, say this case is weak. And because of how long it took, because it seems like the prosecution and the investigators were not working together because of the chain of custody issues, because of some of the tactics that were deployed by the prosecution during trial. There's a lot of issues here and they're lucky that they got even

what they got with Sheila pleading guilty to the second degree murder. Because if she would have fought it and decided to stay behind bars until it was done, she may have been acquitted altogether. So I think in this situation, both sides won. You have someone who more than likely killed this woman, who's now free, and you have the prosecution. Well, Sheila's not free yet. Well, she's, okay, so she gets out when? Well, we don't know for sure, you know, because they'll say good behavior. She'll have to go in front of a parole board, all of that. But it was just in 2020. Yeah, she'll be free within a few years. Yeah. So she'll be she'll be free. And you also have on the other side where Joe has the opportunity to go to his mom at her burial site and say, we got we got him. You know, will Michael ever be charged?

Maybe. Who knows? I mean, she just went to court last year. So it's possible. I highly doubt it. All right. Come on. Stop taking your hope away. Listen, I highly doubt it because I think the only connection to the murder would be would be Sheila. And now that she was interesting and sort of just like, I don't know, kind of blatant. So remember that after Marlene's murder and after Michael gets out for his racketeering crimes and all of that, he and Sheila move to Virginia. And then they start running this restaurant, the Purple Cow in Kingsport, Tennessee. Well, according to employees at the restaurant, Sheila actually dressed as a clown one year during Halloween, and the employees sent detectives and police pictures of Sheila dressed up as a clown with clown makeup on. So it's kind of like Sheila's got this tendency of dressing

like a clown. She dressed like a clown before Marlene's murder. She confessed to dressing like a clown to murder Marlene. And even after she's still donning this clown costume, what's the deal with her and these clowns? I don't know. But I think it's pretty kind of like rubbing salt in the wounds to be still dressing up like a clown. And clearly you don't feel bad about what you did. However, I also want to state, looking at the fact that Michael Warren and Sheila got married, is this because they were so in love? Is this because they just couldn't live without each other? Or is it because Michael set up the perfect murder, gave himself an alibi where he was in the car with somebody on the way to horse races while Marlene was being murdered? woman, this one person who can tie him to this murder and take away everything. He can't have her just be out there free. He's got to marry her. He's got to keep her close to him. He's got to keep her happy forever because now she can turn on him at any time. And she still could, right?

Even when she goes home, even when she's with him, this, this, and that, she still could at any time. If he makes her mad, pisses her off, she just goes to the police. Or if he senses that she might do that or that she might want to do that, well, Sheila could be the next person getting a knock at a door and being faced with a clown holding some balloons and flowers. She should be very careful. I know she wants to have a happily ever after and, you know, whatever. Everybody's entitled to want that. But she should be very careful with Michael Warren because two can keep a secret if one of them's dead. My takeaway, final thoughts, is means motive opportunity.

It looks like Sheila had the means, the motive, and the opportunity to carry this out. And it does, if you take the evidence at face value, in spite of some of the chain of custody issues, if it's all on the up and up and it was just an honest mistake, there is a lot of evidence that suggests she was the shooter. And I do think on one hand, you could say she took the guilty plea because she wanted to get out. On the other hand, you could say she took the guilty plea because she did it and this was the best deal she was going to get. So I feel like the evidence against Sheila is pretty convincing and compelling as far as her being the shooter, which is obviously good. But as far as Michael's concerned, I could see a world where when we talk about means motive opportunity, he didn't have the means or the opportunity because he was in the car. But I could see a world where Sheila took this upon herself to kill Marlene

because she wanted to be with Michael. I could see that world. Sure, but then he doesn't even put two and two together. Here's my problem with it. I could see that world if it wasn't for an impartial witness putting both Michael and Sheila in the suspect vehicle. If not for that piece of evidence, it would be a lot more compelling to me to where Michael could have been the reason behind the murder, but not necessarily involved. The fact that he has come out and said, oh, if I thought that she was involved in this, I wouldn't be with her. Then if you thought she was involved when you guys took the LeBaron for whatever reason,

some false pretense that you weren't aware of, you would have came out. You told her about your conversation with DeSantis about dressing like a clown. All of these things will be falling in place for him. He may be an immoral, low-level criminal, but he's not dumb. It's hard for me to believe

that he didn't know what happened but we have no proof we have no proof when we talk about getting him convicted of a crime not right now not with what you have not right now and so whether it was intentional or just lucky what do we always say if criminals were smart we wouldn't catch them sometimes it just takes a little luck. And that could be the case here. They could still be dumb because clearly he got convicted on 43 of 66 charges. So he's not the best criminal, but he may have just gotten lucky here where you had

some unfortunate mishaps within the investigatory process involving the evidence. And it served to the benefit of not only Sheila, but also Michael. It also helped that if he was involved, he had someone who was loyal to him all the way through where Sheila might've been in prison for a crime that they conspired to commit together, knowing that she was going to get off and they were going to get to be together, which might've been her ultimate goal. So. Well, whatever he did to make her that ride or die. Okay. I would like to know because this is an interesting case for us because we don't usually have them like this, where

there's some resolution, there's some closure, but it doesn't feel like, no, it doesn't feel good. It doesn't feel good. No, it doesn't feel good. I don't need this one feeling satisfied. It doesn't feel resolved. No, I don't feel satisfied. I'm not like, yeah, justice was served. You know, not at all. I agree. I have to tell you, you got me here because I did not see this case ending like this. I thought either it was going to be all or nothing. Could still be.

Like I said, it was just last year that she was put on trial. Who knows? They could have find more friends. I don't like at this point, the forensic evidence is going to help nobody. No matter how good the evidence gets, the evidence itself, the DNA evidence is always going to be in question. Now it's compromised. That sucks.

That sucks. So that's it. Good job, guys. Yeah. So here we are. Any final words from you? No, I have no final words. Final words from me?

I had said it on Crime Weekly News. Crime Con Cruise in November. We will be there. So if you'd like to join us, it's going to be leaving out of Miami. We've never been on the cruise, so we can't say how good it's going to be. I've never been on a cruise. Well, yeah. Guys might want to go just for that.

But we will be there. If you want to come, you can go to the CrimeCon website. We have it on our website as well. You can go on there, and you can use our code CRIMEWEEKLY, and you'll get a discount on your pass or your room, whatever, whatever's left. I believe VIP is already sold out for it's a much more smaller, intimate setting. Uh, there's only a few things going on. I believe Stephanie and I will be speaking a couple of the days instead of there being like a podcast booth,

we'll actually be speaking at the event. So if you can make it, we'd love to see you there. But in the meantime, everyone stay safe. We'll have a new case next week for you guys. We're not going to tell you what it is, but we already have it done. And yeah, until then, just everyone enjoy the rest of your week. Yep. Stay safe out there and we'll see you next week. Bye.