Criminology - The Westfield Watcher

Episode Date: October 31, 2021

In 2014, the Broaddus family encountered a nightmare after buying what they thought was their dream home in Westfield New Jersey. It was a home that they never even moved into. Shortly after buying the home, a mysterious letter appeared in the mailbox. Its tone was extremely ominous and it was signed by someone calling themselves The Watcher. Join Mike and Morf for their Halloween episode where they discuss the spooky case of The Westfield Watcher. More letters followed and the terror grew with each letter. The family decided not to move in after a few of the letters mentioned their children in a threatening way. There are many theories on who The Watcher could be but so far that person has yet to be identified. Netflix bought the rights to the story and is set to make something on it soon. You can help support the show at patreon.com/criminology An Emash Digital production Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

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Criminology is a true crime podcast that may contain discussion about violent or disturbing topics. Listener discretion is advised. Hello everyone and welcome to episode 181 of the Criminology podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson. And this is Mike Morford. Mr. Mike Morford. What's going on with you, buddy? Not too much.

I'm pumped up. It's Halloween week and I'm excited for Halloween because I love the holiday. It's my daughter's birthday the day before Halloween. So she's always excited too. And I'm always excited to do these Halloween episodes as well. Yeah, me too. And I think the audience will get a kick out of this one because I think it fits right in with Halloween. It's very mysterious.

And to me, just a really fascinating case. Yeah, and I like a touch of the paranormal too. I like that aspect of it. So it's pretty cool. And I'm sure listeners figured it out after hearing that haunting organ music that it's time for our annual Halloween episode. Yeah, that's some creepy music. And every time I hear it, I sort of get chills and it makes me want to turn the lights

on if it's a little bit dark. Morph, before we jump into this episode, let's give our Patreon shoutouts. We had donations from Rosalie Mintz, Jessica Wilson, Patty Moore, and Nikki Breen. So that's a lot of great new support. We really appreciate it. Yeah, thank you so much. That goes a long way to helping us put out the show. and we appreciate that very much.

And if anyone would like to help support criminology, they can do so by going to patreon.com slash criminology. All right, buddy, it's time to jump into this episode. And we're talking about a mysterious home with a strange reputation in the northeast part of the U.S., known for bizarre events surrounding it. Now, we're not talking about the Amityville House or the Lizzie Borden House. In this episode, we're talking about. the Westfield Watcher House in Westfield, New Jersey.

According to the Westfield, New Jersey.gov website, Westfield was settled by immigrants from Europe in 1720. The town was once a popular trail for the Lenny Lenape Indians, whose heritage remains in the names of many existing streets and parks. Originally known as the Westfields of Elizabeth Town, the community gradually took its own identity, and finally, in 1903, was incorporated as the town of Westfield. It's a developed community of over six miles with 211 acres devoted to parks.

Today, Westfield has a population of just under 30,000 residents. The town's website goes on to say that Westfield is noted for its beautiful downtown area, excellent school system, and convenient commute to New York City, which is just 16 miles away. It offers residents the attractions of fine suburban living within easy route to metropolitan. Metropolitan New York. The Victorian and colonial style homes that reflect its rich historical character complement the broad tree-line streets of this small picturesque community. Within this peaceful landscape, you'll find lush parks and golf courses and an endless array of recreational facilities for children as well as adults. What the website fails to mention is that you will also

find one very strange home in Westfield, one that has a shocking history. Despite Westfield being an upscale neighborhood with very little crime, it's no stranger to tragedy. Before we tell you about the sinister house, it's important to tell you about the dark history of the town. In 1971, John List killed his entire family there. List planned the murders of his family very carefully. Using two different guns, he killed his mother and his wife, and as two of their three children came home from school, he also shot them. He made lunch before he went to the bank and closed his accounts, as well as his mom's account. After the bank errand, he casually went and watched his son play soccer at Westfield High School.

After driving his son home, he shot it, the only victim to be shot multiple times, and apparently the only victim to have fought back or seen it coming. List then loaded his family's bodies into sleeping bags and put them in the home's ballroom, except for his mother, who he left in her upstairs attic apartment. He wrote a five-page letter addressed to his pastor, claiming that he killed his family to save their souls because he had seen too much evil in the world. List then cleaned the crime scene and removed himself from all of the family photos. Finally, he turned on the radio, so the house wasn't too quiet, tuned it to a religious station,

and left his home. List had also sent a letter to his children's schools and part-time jobs, stating that they would be absent for a few weeks while they visited family in North Carolina. He stopped deliveries of the milk, mail, and newspapers. The family was already reclusive, so no one really noticed that they were gone until the light bulbs, which had been on for a month straight, began to burn out one by one.

When neighbors contacted police, responding officers made their way into the List home and found the gruesome scene. A manhunt began for John List, and news of his family's murders, quickly made its way around the town. Residents were shocked. That kind of thing just didn't happen in Westfield. List relocated to Denver, Colorado and started a new life under the name Robert Peter Bob Clark. Nine months after the murders, the List home burned down. The fire was later ruled arson, but no one was charged in the crime. Conlist evaded a police dragnet for decades until he was finally arrested in Denver in 1990.

He was later found guilty of the murders of his family and sentenced to five life sentences. List died in prison in 2008. Although the man responsible for the massacre of his own family at 431 Hillside Avenue have been brought to justice, it's been another house just over two miles away at 657 Boulevard that continues to attract unwanted attention to this day. The Dutch colonial home at 657 Boulevard, both six bedrooms and four bathrooms, it was built in 1905. And as you might expect from a home of that age, it's a large home with gorgeous architecture. The home has a recently finished basement and multiple fireplaces.

The home has more than one porch, including an enclosed sun porch, and there are multiple bedrooms and a bathroom on the third floor. This is the kind of home where if you, you saw it and you didn't know it's history, you might say to yourself, I could see myself living there. In fact, that's what a couple named Maria and Derek Broadest thought when they discovered the home. They wanted a spacious new home in which to raise their three young children. In 2014, the family purchased the $1.3 million home in Westfield. Derek had grown up in Maine, but Maria was raised just a few blocks away from their new home. Derek was a senior vice president of an insurance company in Manhattan

and had worked hard for years alongside his wife to build the best lives they could for themselves and their children. And they went from a working class family to being able to have enough money to buy a $1.3 million home in an affluent neighborhood. They had worked hard and the new family home was something that they were proud of. And 657 Boulevard was one of the largest and nicest homes in the town. Derek and Maria started to renovate their new home.

getting it ready for themselves and their children to move in. On June 5th, 2014, just three days after the sale of the home closed, Derek was painting the home at around 10 p.m. When he decided to take a break and stretch his legs, he walked out to check the mail and found a single letter in the mailbox. He noticed that there was no return address on the envelope. In the words, the new owner were scrawled in large hands. writing. Derek didn't think too much of the letter and walked back inside the house.

It was once he opened the envelope that things began to get strange. A typed letter inside the envelope started out pleasantly enough. Dearest new neighbor at 657 Boulevard. Allow me to welcome me to the neighborhood. The letter continued, how did you end up here? Did 657 Boulevard call to you with its force within? 657 Boulevard has been the subject of my family for decades now. And as it approaches its 110th birthday, I have been put in charge of watching and waiting for second coming. My grandfather watched the house in the 1920s, and my father watched in the 1960s. It is now my time. Do you know the history of the house? Do you know what lies within the walls of

657 Boulevard? Why are you here? I will find out. So a little creepy, morph, and understandably, Derek was a little creeped out by the words he was reading, and like I said, I think for good reason, the writer mentioned seeing contractors moving around the home. It said, you have children. I have seen them. So far, I think there are three that I have counted. Do you need to fill the house with the young blood I requested? Better for me. Was your old house too small for the growing family? Or was it greed to bring me your children? Once I know their names, I will call to them and draw them to me. Will the young bloods play in the basement?

The ominous words continued, Who am I? There are hundreds and hundreds of cars that drive by 657 Boulevard each day. Maybe I am in one. Look at all the windows. You can see from 657 Boulevard. Maybe I am in one.

Look out any of the many windows in 657 Boulevard at all the people who stroll by each day. Maybe I am one. Welcome, my friends, welcome. Let the party begin. The letter concluded with a scribbled signature, the watcher. All right, Morph. So, you know, let's break this down a little bit. You've just bought your dream home. I mean, obviously, this is a very nice house. You paid $1.3 million for it. And then all of a sudden, you get this letter. And like we said, it started out nice enough. You know, you might think, okay, somebody welcoming me to the neighborhood. Very quickly, though, the letter turns dark.

It turns ominous. And, you know, in my opinion, it turns threatening. Yeah, I can see why he'd be concerned because it mentions his kids specifically. I think if it was just mentioning him or something less, you know, ominous, that didn't mention his kid, he might just brush it off and say, okay, some whack job trying to scare me, no big deal, but I think any of us that have kids, you bring that in the equation and that's going to cause your concerns to rise. Yeah, I think it changes everything when you have somebody saying, I'm watching your kids. I know how many kids you have, this and that. I don't think

there's a parent listening that would not take that with a great amount of concern, right? That's just not something that you can brush off because somebody's talking about your children in a threatening way. And I think because of those details, Derek immediately became aware that the person who had written this letter might be watching him. He frantically turned all the lights in the house off and called Westfield Police. When officers came out and examined the mysterious letter, they were dumbfounded. While the letter was creepy, there weren't any direct threats. Police told Derek not to mention the letter to anyone because at that point, all of the neighbors were suspects. Investigators also advised him to move the construction tools and equipment that was outside because someone could

throw it through one of the windows and cause damage or hurt someone. Police asked Derek if the family had any enemies, but he couldn't think of anyone who would do this to them. And although they had lived elsewhere in Westfield before buying their dream home, they were new to the street and didn't know anyone there. So obviously, this was not a pleasant experience. So, soon after moving in, and if it was a cruel joke meant to scare the family, it worked. Derek canceled a work trip so that Maria and the children wouldn't be alone. He then tried to contact the Woods family, who had previously owned the home. Andrea Woods told Derek that she had received a note from someone signing as the watcher,

but that she didn't think anything of it. She had just thrown the letter away. she didn't feel threatened by the letter at all. In the 23 years that Andrea and John Woods had lived in the home, that was the only letter from the watcher they had ever received. Unfortunately for Derek and Maria, it wasn't as easy for them to dismiss the letter as it was for Andrea Woods. Maria was overly vigilant of what her kids were up to at all times.

She would call out for them if they went too far into the yard, even the backyard. According to an in-depth article about this case on the cut.com, titled The Haunting of a Dreamhouse, a neighbor touring the home looking at some of the renovations told Derek, it'll be nice to have some young blood in the neighborhood, which further set them on edge. And they would stay on edge anxiously waiting to see if any more letters would come. And as it turned out, one did. On June 18th, two weeks after the first letter arrived, a new letter came, this time addressed to Mr. and Mrs. Bradis, spelled incorrectly,

the watcher claimed that he or she had been doing what they were meant to do, watching the home. The watcher knew that the Bratiss family owned a Honda minivan and knew about contractors visiting the home for renovations. The letter read, You don't want to make 657 Boulevard unhappy. I see already that you have flooded 650s, 657 Boulevard with contractors so that you can destroy the house as it was supposed to be. The workers have been busy, and I have been watching you unload carfuls of your personal

belonging. At first, Derek and Maria Broadus wondered if someone was upset that they had not been able to purchase the home and decided to torment them since they got to live in the house. The first letter had been postmarked June 4th, which was before the sale of the home, was public knowledge. Andrew Woods confirmed for Derek that she had never placed a four-sale sign outside in the yard when she decided to sell. Contractors arrived on June 3rd, but their renovations were on the inside of the home. It seemed that despite no outward appearance of the home changing hands, the writer knew that it had already happened. An anonymous writer rambling about their new home was one thing, but most disturbing to them was that the newest letter again referenced the broadest children. this time listing them by their nicknames and even including their order of birth,

all of it laid out accurately by the writer. Most terrifying to the broadest family, the watcher asked about one of the children in particular. Is she the artist in the family? Which seemingly referenced an easel that one of their daughters had set up. This easel could only be seen from the back of the house. Bushes and the house itself obscured the view from other angles. This letter talked about things hidden in the walls of the home, asking, had they found what is in the walls yet?

The author of the letter seemed angry that the broadest family was performing renovations on the home, apparently feeling that they were damaging the old house. The watcher also talked about who was in which room, stating, it will help me to know who was in which bedroom. Then I can plan better. A sign that a contractor had hammered into the ground in the front yard had been ripped out sometime in the night. The watcher warned about letting the children play in the basement of the home, stating, If you were upstairs, you would never hear them scream. They had no idea who the watcher was, and it could have been any of their neighbors, who they didn't know yet.

The broadest to stop all renovations, and the children were never brought back into the home for their own safety. the family decided that the best course of action was to abandon the home and refuse to move in. Considering the content of the letters and the fact that they had three little children to protect, it may not be surprising that they would decide to flee. I'll tell you right now, Morph, it's not all that surprising to me at all. I mean, you know, there is a little bit of a Amityville horror feeling here. Now, we only have letters. We don't have, you know, some of the strange,

occurrences that that happened in the Amityville case, but the letters alone, I think would be enough for me to really think about, you know, having to put the safety of my family first. And I think we need to break down the second letter a little bit more. You know, the first letter was ominous. You could call it threatening. I would call it that. The second one, I think, no doubt. When it comes to the children is extremely threatening. Just the part about, you know, are they going to play in the basement? No one will be able to hear them scream. I just don't know how you can take that any other way as a threat. Now, is it an overt threat, a direct threat? Probably not in the eyes of police, but veiled? Absolutely. Yeah. It does have a very amity of a horror feeling to it.

the fact that they fled and chose not to stay there. Now, the Lutz family that lived in the house when they had their experience at Amityville, they lived there for a month and then fled. This family never technically moved in. But just the fright of knowing that if we move into this house, who knows what's in store for us? I can't blame them for not moving in. Now, I'd like to think if I was in their shoes that a letter wouldn't scare me off.

But again, coming back to the kid, it's hard to, discount that and not be concerned about the safety of your family. Well, and I think that's the big difference, right? If it was just you, you might say, yeah, okay, bring it on. Some people might say that, right? But three young children who play outside, every parent knows as much as you watch your children, there are times, even if it's just for a matter of seconds, when they're out of view, do you really, do you really really want to take that chance. Because if somebody's watching, that means they know.

When a child is outside, they could snatch them up. That's apparent's worst nightmare. Yeah. And you have to make the decision. Is this person just some sick joker that's just trying to mess with me? Or is this person someone that's capable of doing something violent? The cut.com quotes Maria Broad us as saying, we weren't going to put our kids in harm's away.

Instead, the broadest family stayed nearby at the home of Maria's parents while they contemplated what to do next. Derek set up webcams in the home at 657 Boulevard and spent nights hiding in the dark, surveilling the home waiting for the watcher. Weeks later on July 18th, another letter arrived at the now abandoned home. The watcher asked in this letter, where have you gone to? 657 Boulevard is missing you. The Broadest family continued to cooperate with the Westfield Police Department investigating the case. Detective Leonard Lugo was the officer in charge of finding out who the Watcher was and trying to find out why the Watcher was targeting the Broadest family.

DNA testing on the envelopes from the Watcher letters revealed that it was a woman who had sealed the envelopes. Police tested Maria's DNA, but it didn't match her. Derek Broadus even tried to get the agent who inspired her. Claire in the movie's Silence of the Lambs to investigate the case, desperate to figure out who the watcher could be. Former FBI agent Robert Lennahan was hired to do a risk assessment on the letters, and he determined that the writer, the watcher, was probably older due to the word choice, and the fact that they had double spaced after periods in the text. According to him, the author was erratic, but didn't actually seem overly threatening to the family.

The analysis pointed out that the first letter was dated Tuesday, June 4th, even though the fourth was Wednesday. There was not much profanity in the letters, even though the watcher was clearly angry and bitter. The letter seemed to be written by a voracious reader who was not very masculine. And Linnahan theorized that maybe the writer was a woman. The watcher seemed to be angry at wealthy people. And in particular, people with not. new money, asking, are you one of those Hoboken transplants who are ruining Westfield?

Robert Leonard, a forensic linguist, was hired to look on local websites for any patterns in language or vocabulary that could be a match for the watcher. But all of those efforts were in vain. In 2015, the Broadus' home was listed for sale at $1.25 million, less than the Broadest family had paid to purchase it. In 2015, the Broadest's sued John and Andrea Woods, claiming that they knew about the Watcher and didn't warn them prior to selling the house to them. The lawsuit alleged that the Woods had received a letter from the Watcher

toward the end of May 2014 and still let the Broadest family buy the home on June 2, 2014, without saying a word about the threatening stranger. The lawsuit claimed that the Watcher had claimed ownership of the home. It also demanded that the Woods refund the entire person, purchase price with interest while also allowing the broadest family to retain fee title to the home. If the woods were unwilling to pay this, the broadest family was demanding damages in the sum equivalent to the difference between the purchase price and the present market value of the

home with interest, along with compensatory damages, consequential damages, reasonable attorney fees, cost, and interest, and any other relief the court deems just and equitable. The Broaddus family requested a jury trial. The Woods family countersued the broadices, claiming that they were just trying to smear their reputation with the lawsuit and the publicity they were attempting to get for the suit. Now, we've talked about in other cases, whether or not homebuyers have to be notified of prior issues related to the history of all. home like murders that occurred there or even hauntings. But laws regarding this vary from state to state.

In the neighboring state of New York, for example, someone selling a home is required to report any kind of trouble related to its history, but in New Jersey there was no such law. So a judge dismissed the broadest lawsuit. In the suburbs of D.C., a woman fails to show up for work and is found brutally murdered. I wonder what's emergency. We just walked in the door and there's blood in the foyer. For the next two decades, the case remained unsolved until new technology allowed investigators to do what had once been impossible. A new series from ABC Audio in 2020, blood and water.

Listen now, wherever you get your podcasts. In 2016, the broadest family stuck with a home that they feared moving into wanted to tear it down. and redeveloped the plot of land into two smaller lots. But they didn't get their plans approved because the smaller lots were deemed out of character for the neighborhood. The watcher sent another letter, angry that they would think about causing harm to the home. In 2019, the home went up for sale again. This time priced at $1,125,000. And this time it did sell.

But the broadest family lost $440,000. in the transaction. The purchase of what they thought was their dream home had turned into a nightmare and a costly one at that. Netflix bought the rights to the broadest story that year, so maybe they will be able to make up that loss on a documentary in the future. It was announced in early October 2021 that a Netflix limited series is going into production soon, starring Naomi Watts and Bobby Can of All.

The story was highly sought after, with six studios bidding on the rights to the story of the watcher house. It's been reported that Netflix will pay seven figures for the rights to the story that first appeared on the cut.com. So obviously, more, there's a lot of money here going out for the rights to this story. And I do think this is kind of one of the theories that you see pop up online quite a bit when you research this case. And it is another tie-in to the Amityville horror story.

You know, the Lutz's made some money off of selling the rights to their story. Now, they took a loss on the home. Did they make it back up? I don't know the exact figures, but that is a theory in this case as well. You'll see people throw it out there that the broadices came up with this because they thought that they could make some money down the road by selling their story. Now, you know, for me, that's a tough one. because you're really kind of betting a lot that things are going to happen a certain way.

And in the meantime, you're taking a bath on this dream home that you bought. So I don't know. What do you think about that? Well, I know, I don't know the full financial situations for both the Lutz family and the broadestes. I think the Lutz family at the time when they sold their home or when they fled their home, I don't think their finances were in a great situation, so I think their credit, their money was in a bad way at the time. The broadest sound like they maybe were a little bit more financially stable. But both couples would have no way of guaranteeing that their story would ever become a book or a movie or anything like that.

So I think, like you mentioned, it would be a big bet to say, hey, I'm going to pull this off and make this hoax. and someone's going to come along and buy this story from me. I don't see any guarantee of it. Now, I know that when the Amityville horror happened for the Lutz family, horror movies and ghost stories and things like that were sort of booming at the time. So they might have felt that they would take a chance and do that, and it might pay off. But I think when this happened in Westfield, there wasn't a lot of that going on.

there wasn't this hysteria over hauntings and ghost stories and things like that. And we're not talking even a ghost story. We're talking letters here. So I think it's even less likely that the broadest family would do something like this as some kind of hoax thinking it would result in money or something like that. Yeah, I absolutely agree with you. I also go back to the fact that the previous owner received a letter. Okay. So in that scenario, prior to the sale, that would mean that the broadices would have had to have concocted that letter as well with the thought that they would get the home.

So, I mean, there's a lot goes into it. I don't discount that theory when it comes to the Lutz's because I think that's a possibility. I think it's a little more far-fetched in this one, to be honest with you. In 2019, Westfield Mayor Andrew Skibitsky stated that the Westfield police had conducted an exhaustive investigation into the threatening letters. But it turns out that most of the neighbors had never even been talked to by police about the watcher. A letter to a local newspaper called the Westfield leader stated, we are confounded as to how a thorough investigation can be conducted without talking to all of the neighbors. with proximity to the home.

The fact police didn't question all of the neighbors was important because it was later revealed that another family on the street actually received a letter that was similar to the ones that the broadest family received from the watcher around the same time that they received the first letter. Just like the Woods family, this family threw the letter away because they didn't find it threatening. Now, they found it odd, but not threatening. The only evidence of this is a now.

deleted Facebook post, but if it's true, there may be even more letters from the watcher out there that were just simply disregarded. Some of the former neighbors on Boulevard received handwritten letters, accusing them of speculating inaccurately about the Broadest family. They had been signed friends of the Broadest family. These letters were hand-delivered, and they were sent to those who were vocal against the Broadest family on Facebook. The letters were simmering with resentment, which is no surprise because Derek Broadest later admitted to a reporter that he wrote the notes because he was so fed up with watching silently as people threw accusations at his family. It's pretty odd that Derek would have used the same method that he had been harassed with

to do the same thing to his neighbors. Even Derek himself said that he wished he hadn't done that. As odd as this case is, a stranger watching or harassing a home or its owners, is not unheard of. from 1984 to 1993. Bill and Dorothy Wacker were harassed and stalked in their Stark County, Ohio home. By January 1985, their home had been ransacked three times. And Bill finally called the police. Dorothy was attacked while she was home alone after she led a young man who said his car had broken down inside to use the phone. The few items were stolen from the house and strangely, they were returned one by one to,

the Whackers. These items included a gun, an antique watch, and a radio. The Wackers also received harassing phone calls. Sometimes the caller would leave threatening messages. Other times, there would just be heavy breathing. The calls didn't stop, even when the Wackers changed their phone number. They also heard banging on the side of their house, but couldn't find anything when they would go outside to look. So they installed a security light, only to start receiving harassing notes. One note tauntingly read, Your lights are a laugh. No fingerprints were able to be lifted from any of the notes. And police believe that they were written by someone using their non-dominate hand

to disguise their handwriting. Bill passed away in 1999 and Dorothy later passed away in 2010 without ever finding out who was harassing them. We've actually talked about harassing letter writers on this show before. Episode 153 with the case of the Circle Ville writer has some similar elements to this case. In 1976, residents of Circleville, Ohio, began receiving obscene and threatening letters that contained details and rumors regarding some of the residents in town. Over 1,000 letters were written, targeting many of Circleville's residents, but seemingly targeting one resident more than the rest. One man, Paul Fresh Hour, was convicted of

attempted murder and sent off to prison. It was thought, that he was the Circleville writer, and handwriting analysis of some of the letters seemed to back that up. But people continued receiving letters after Paul went to prison, something that the warden insists was impossible. This case involves an affair, a possible murder, and just some general jealousies. Sometimes when everyone has a motive, the true responsible party is hard to find. There are some cases where mysterious harasser or stalker have been identified. In 2011, a couple bought a home in San Diego County, in California's Carmel Valley, and quickly, weird things started happening. Mail to the home suddenly stopped with no explanation.

The home was listed for sale online, but not by the new owners. Books and magazines came to the house, over $1,000 worth that no one in the home had ordered. Around Valentine's Day, at least 8.000. of their neighbors received letters intended for the married woman of the home, enraging their husbands, one of whom actually confronted Jerry Rice, the new owner, and the apparent sender of the letters. But Jerry had no idea what his neighbors were talking about. Around this same time, Jerry found online advertisements encouraging men to go to his home and perform sexual favors on his wife, all while he would be at work and his wife would be home alone.

Understandably, Jerry went to the police asking for help to end the harassment. 53-year-old Kathy Rowe was found to be behind the letters, the advertisements, and all of the weird things happening around Jerry Rice's new home. Roe was upset that she had been outbid on the home by Rice and everything that happened to him was all part of her revenge plot. She was charged with two felony counts of solicitation of rape and sodomy and a misdemeanor count of harassment. But after pleading guilty to stalking,

she was sentenced to one year of home electronic surveillance and five years of probation. She was also ordered to stay away from Rice and his wife for 10 years. In the case of Jerry Rice, the person harassing him was very real. But many believe that in the Westfield, watcher case. The letters are hoax, and the broadest family sent the letters to themselves. There's many theories about why the broadest family would have sent the letters to themselves.

One main theory is that they realized they could not actually afford a million dollar home and wanted to get out of the sale. Another theory centers around simple buyer's remorse. They could afford the home, but they simply didn't want it anymore. Insurance fraud of some sort has been tossed around, though the watcher only ever sent letters and never actually. damaged the home. Others think of Amityville horror, as we talked about earlier, and believe that the broadest family wanted a movie deal. But the family turned down several media offers and actually sent a cease and desist to the makers of the Lifetime movie The Watcher. Mike, I know you were in the mortgage business. Did you ever hear of any unusual plots or plans

people came up with to get out of a home or get out of paying for a mortgage? Yeah, I was in the mortgage business for a long time. And I have never heard of anything even close to this being done by someone, a family to get out of paying their mortgage. I think a lot of times people just don't pay. You know, if they get in a situation, they let the house go into foreclosure or they just sell it. And I think that's a big thing here, Morf. That opportunity was always there to sell the home. They did. Now they lost money, but I don't see how the broadest is writing notes to themselves, you know, creating this hoax would actually get them out of paying the mortgage. I don't see how that helps them at all in that respect.

Yeah. So when you call the bankups, I can't make my payment this month because I'm getting some spooky letters, the mortgage company is not going to accept that? No, they really don't care. It's sad to say, but, you know, banks, mortgage companies, they really don't care about stuff like that. They want their money. They gave you money. They want their payment.

I'm not trying to be callous about it, but let's be honest. That's the truth of the matter. But to me, the bottom line is when it comes strictly to a plot to get out from under a mortgage, this one doesn't seem to make any sense. I just don't see how it would have helped them at all. Yeah, it was noteworthy to many that the broadest family had a $315,000 mortgage on their first home. And just 10 years later, they were able to purchase a $1.3 million home. But I think this can be explained by the simple rule that applies to a lot of people.

The more you make, the more you spend. As you move up in any company or in any job, especially to senior vice president, as in Derek's case, you're paid more. and the broadest family refinanced their mortgages and had upgraded to a $770,000 loan in between their first home purchase and the one at 657 Boulevard. So I don't think there's anything really shady about this. No, I don't either. I think in a span of 10 years, you know, that's quite a bit of time. A lot of people progress rapidly in companies, they get promotions, they make more money. And like you said, it's pretty universal for a lot of people.

the more you make, the more you spend. And a lot of times that spending centers around your home, the place where you spend the bulk of your time. Yeah, some people might think that perhaps they were borrowing above their means and due to mortgage companies being overzealous about giving out lots of loans to a lot of different people, that was sort of regulated. By the time the broadest family purchased this home, there were more regulations in place so that lots of people couldn't get,

loans that they couldn't afford. Yeah, this was after the real estate bubble burst. So there were a lot of regulations. I believe at this time. So I doubt that they were able to get a loan that they couldn't afford. Did it happen? I'm sure it did. But it wasn't like 2005 where, you know, everybody was getting whatever loan they basically wanted. Over the time that the broadest family owned 657 Boulevard, they paid about $100,000 in property taxes. They were denied any relief. They paid for all of their private investigators, maintained the home, paid the mortgage. They shiled out money for renovations on top of losing, you know, $400,000 on the resale. They did have some renters in the home for a period, but the rent never covered the mortgage.

So, I mean, I think in saying all of this more, if this was a long con for cash, for money, it failed. They never lived a day in the home they paid for, and they were ridiculed because of their experiences. There have been some interviews over the years with neighbors on the street who grew up nearby, unfazed, and the house doesn't seem to hold any mystery to them. Bill Schaefer's family owned the home in the early 1960s, before they sold it to the Bakes, who sold it to the woods.

There was nothing sinister driving any of the same. As far as the police are concerned, the Woods family who sold the home to Derek and Maria were apparently clear to suspects in the letter writing campaign. Andrea Woods was asked for a DNA sample and her 21-year-old son was interviewed. It seems that no one in the Woods family was connected to DNA from the letters in the Watcher case. The Watcher had included a bit of reminiscence in the letters. remembering when they ran room to room imagining life with the rich documents there.

It's interesting to note that 657 Boulevard had once been used as a social center, housing a literary club and hosting weddings. It's possible for someone to have memories of the home and accurate knowledge of the layout from simply having been there in the past, but never actually living there. It turns out that there was one family on the street that some people including the Broadest family suspected of being involved in the Watcher letters, and they live right next door to the Broadduses, the Langford family. Detective Lugo had actually interviewed Michael Langford before the second letter was sent.

Michael's mother, Peggy, who was in her 90s, still lived in the home, and several of her adult children in her 60s lived there too. Their family has been described as odd, but harmless. Michael denied knowledge of the letters, but he still considers suspect because a lot of what he said matched the narrative of the letters. The Langford's had lived on Boulevard since the 1960s when the watcher's father started watching the home. And Michael's father, Richard, had been dead for 12 years, which matches the need for a new watcher. The Langford home was located at one of the very few angles that the easel on the porch could be seen from.

Michael's brother, Sandy, has stated that Michael was diagnosed with schizophrenia when he was young. and admitted that he had scared newcomers to the neighborhood by looking in their windows during renovations or walking through their backyards. However, some neighbors remember Michael as a kind young man, incapable of writing the taunting letters. Derek believes that only a few homes are close enough for the watcher to have been able to see everything they mentioned and hear Maria call out the children's names. and the Langford home is one of the few.

Detective Lugo interviewed Michael again, but still he denied writing any letters. And this time, his sister Abby, accused the Westfield police of harassing her family. The broadest is, suspicious of the Langford family being involved in writing the mysterious letters, came up with a plan to prove they were involved.

They sent a letter to the Langford family, announcing false plans to tear down the home at 657 Boulevard. They knew that if the watcher replied and referenced these false plans that the Langford's would be to blame, but nothing happened. Attention also fell on Abby Langford, who was a real estate agent, and her water bottle was actually taken to be tested for DNA, but it didn't match the sample of the watcher's DNA. So more of when I think, you know, you boil this story down, it comes down to who is the watcher?

What did they want? And did they accomplish what they set out to do? It remains to be seen if those answers will ever be known. I have a little Westfield Watcher story myself that I just wanted to share. I have a crime blog that I've not posted on ages, Truecrimeguy.com, but I posted an article in April 2017 about this case. I was interested in it being from New Jersey, and I had heard rumors about the case. I was from South Jersey, and this all happened in North Jersey,

but it's still spread to my part of the state. So I wrote this article and posted it, and less than two hours after I hit the publish button, I got a call on my cell phone, and when I looked down, I saw the town name Westfield on my phone, and the hair's on my neck stood up. I let the phone ring,

and after a couple of rings, I picked up the phone and said, hello, there was only silence on the other end. I tried to call the number back, and it rang, and rang, and rang and after no one answered, I looked it up on Google, but I couldn't find anything connected to that phone number. But to this day, I still have a screenshot of that phone call on my website. Okay. So a little Halloween, scary, possibly watcher connected story there. I can see why that would make the hairs on the back of your neck stand up. I mean, obviously, you probably worked on this story for

some time right after you hit the button to put it online, you get this call. Nobody's there. Hmm. That would be a little creepy. I got to be honest. Yeah, it was strange. I've never received a call from Westfield. I didn't know anyone there.

I don't think I've ever received one since. And it's funny earlier, I said that I don't know if I'd be scared off by a letter, but here I am scared of this phone call that happens to be from Westfield. So I guess unless you're in someone, shoes that's going through this, you don't really know. Well, and it wasn't like Westfield was the next town over from where you lived. I mean, it was a good ways away, right? Yeah, it wasn't like I was afraid someone was going to come over to my house and I was

two doors down from the watcher house. I was a good distance, but it was just the, the eeriness of getting a call from Westfield. And my phone number wasn't listed. So I don't know how anyone could have found me on my cell phone, but creepy nonetheless. Well, I think that makes it even more creepy. But I think everything about this case is a little creepy, right? It's why we selected it for the Halloween episode. When you boil it down, I still don't know for me what is the most likely scenario.

You know, I know a lot of people have opinions on this case that range from, you know, the broadest family did this on purpose, made it look like someone was harassing them. Two, it was the neighbors or one of the, you know, one set of neighbors. I think one of the big questions I have is what was the purpose of the letters? Was it to drive the broadest family away? Was it somebody that was outbid? Like in one of the stories that we talked about and they were just trying to get a little

bit of revenge because they actually wanted the house? I don't know. you can go down a number of different avenues in this case, but I can't get to, I believe it was this. I just can't get to that point. I just don't know if I have enough information. Yeah, for me, it just doesn't point to any one specific theory or one person. But if anything, to me, it points away from the broadnesses because, again, what did they have the gain? There was no guarantee they'd get some book deal or movie deal out of this.

and according to the previous owner, she had gotten a letter before they ever purchased the home. So then again, someone might point out that she got that letter recently, not long before the sale. So maybe they were already in negotiations and they were setting up for this long con and they wanted to lay a backstory with the previous owner to sort of cover their tracks.

So someone could make that argument. But it still doesn't guarantee that they're ever going to get a book or movie deal out of this. Yeah, I go back to the money. And is there a lot of money to be made in potential book and movie deals? Well, sure, there absolutely is. But you are taking a huge gamble with a lot of money that you're going to get something on the back end. And like you said, there's just no guarantee. I just can't imagine that that was the plan here. Now, I could see it if you, if you didn't have any money, And you just wanted to take a shot to see if you could make something happen. I don't think that was a situation with the broadices.

I think they were doing okay. But, you know, who knows? We've seen some very strange things come to light in cases. It would be very interesting if they could ever really figure it out. But I'm just not sure how they'll ever know unless the watcher comes forward and just says, hey, I did it. And this is why I did it. Well, the interesting thing in this case is they do have DNA that they actually used from the envelopes to sort of rule people out.

Now, theoretically, they could probably do genetic genealogy and build a family tree like they do for some of these serial killers and link it back to the right person and figure out who this was. But the ethics are sort of, we're not going to use that technology for cases that don't include violent crimes. There's been some of that in the news that police did that in one or two instances and caught a lot of heat for that. So I think they're reserving that for truly the worst of crimes. And I don't think this case rises to that level where they would ever use genetic genealogy. Well, and I absolutely get that because you and I have talked before about the fact that there are so many cases that probably could be solved today with the right resources. money, time, things need to be tested. Is this really where we want to be putting our resources?

I mean, personally, I'd like to know who it is, but I'd much rather see the authorities focus on, you know, catching killers, solving serial rape cases, things like that. And processing those types of DNA cases has to take priority. Yeah, I'm with you. I'd love to know. but on the flip side of the coin, there's always certain little mysteries that perhaps we'll never figure out

and they're sort of, they present some kind of lure or some kind of legend status. This might be one of those cases, but it would be cool to know who did it and why and how they got away with it. Thanks goes out to Sunny Landon for writing and research assistance in this episode.

As always, if you love the show and you haven't done so, take a minute, go out, give us a five-star rating, you can leave a review. Keep telling your, friends. That word of mouth about the criminology podcast really goes a long way. If you want to find us on social media, we're on Twitter with the handle at Criminology Pod. You can also find us on Facebook by searching for criminology podcast

or by joining our Facebook discussion group, Criminology Podcast, Discussion and Fans. So more if that is it for our episode on the Westfield Watcher, but we'll be back with everyone next Saturday night with a brand new episode of Criminology. So in Until then for Mike. And Morf. We'll talk to you next week. Happy Halloween and take care.