Dateline NBC - Talking Dateline: Secrets on the Emerald Coast

Episode Date: August 7, 2024

Keith Morrison and Andrea Canning sit down to talk about Keith’s classic episode, “Secrets on the Emerald Coast,” about the 2011 murder of young mother Marie Carlson in Florida. Marie vanished after allegedly leaving her baby with her pastor, James Flanders, and his wife, Tanya. The investigation into Marie’s disappearance revealed a tangled relationship among the three and a possible motive for murder. Keith shares a clip from the killer’s confession to investigators. Plus, Keith answers viewer and listener questions from social media and talks about his father, who was a minister with The United Church of Canada.Listen to the full episode of "Secrets on the Emerald Coast" here: https://link.chtbl.com/dl_secretsontheemeraldcoast

Hey, everyone. This is Andrea Canning, and I'm here with Keith Morrison, and we are talking Dateline. Hey, Keith. Hello, Andrea. All right. So let's dive in. This episode is called Secrets on the Emerald Coast. It's about the October 2011 disappearance of a mother of two named Marie Carlson and the web of secrets and lies police uncovered before zeroing in on an unusual relationship and an unlikely killer. If you haven't listened to the show yet, it's the episode right below this one on the list of podcasts you can choose from. So go there, listen to it, or if you want to watch it, you can stream it on Peacock and then come back here. And when you do come back, Keith has a clip he wants to play for us from The killer's confession later we're going to answer some of your questions about the show from social media so stay tuned for that okay keith let's talk dateline all right good so um

you grabbed me from literally the first line in the show where you called marie the dancing sprite what did you mean by that that's like it like such a Keith line, I feel like right now. I feel like you've had to have written that. Yeah. Well, I didn't get the chance to meet her, unfortunately. I'd love to have met her, but this was the description of the person who I was told about, that she was that kind of young woman. You know, Marie struck me as sort of kind of different sides to her, you know, where on one hand, she liked to have fun and she had this great relationship with her sister and she was beautiful. She was also a mother, but then she was also lost. She had some difficulty adjusting to life, if I can put it that way.

She was a free spirit. She was a lovely, talented, happy person. But then again, she could be depressed. She certainly welcomed the attention of the pastor and his wife and became a devout member of his church. And she really needed to feel at home somewhere. And they made her feel at home somewhere. And everybody in the church adored her. They thought she was wonderful. And as things progressed and got a little stranger, they continued to support her. Some people knew some things. Some people didn't know some things. The sermons got a little weird.

People in his church were a little puzzled when the pastor would bring up these verses that suggested polygamy wasn't a bad idea. There was polygamy going on in his own house. A lot of secrets in this one. A lot of secrets. Yes, indeed. But Marie got pregnant. And while Marie was pregnant, it was put out by the pastor and his wife that she had an abusive boyfriend. And to escape the abusive boyfriend, she'd gone to live with the pastor and his wife.

They were protecting her. And she was going to have the boyfriend's child. And then that child would be, at a certain point in its development, be adopted by the pastor and his wife. That story really started to fall apart, that boyfriend story. It did fall apart, all right. And eventually, the inner circle in the church learned that it was not a boyfriend's child, that the child was actually theirs, or the pastor's rather, and that they had used in vitro fertilization. And then it was a turkey based earth. And then it was okay.

Old fashioned. Yeah. And not only was it old fashioned and the real thing, but pastor's wife was there in the bedroom when it happened. I mean, like, what is she just, i was actually trying to visualize this um not trying to be uh crude here but i'm thinking to myself is is she sitting in a chair watching is she participating in this in some fashion do we know exactly how that went down yeah we don't know any more than just the fact that she said she was in the room watching as it occurred? They describe it as like a sister wife, right?

Like possibly another woman would come into the picture and they would all live happily ever after, which doesn't always work that way. Sure, it doesn't. But what happens, and this has happened before in other stories we've done, is that somebody who is maybe not quite as moral a preacher as one would like preachers to be began to read some material in the Old Testament, which suggested that having plural wives was not only a pretty good thing, but was a necessary thing for certain leaders of the community. And, you know, in the Bronze Age, that was a dandy idea. They had all kinds of weird things going on. But in modern world, we don't do that sort of thing, except that his sermons, and we read through quite a few of them, began to take on that character.

But plural wives in relationships is not that uncommon in some kinds of more informal preaching situations. And it generally ends up in some kind of difficulty. And this one, you know, while only involving three people, went really wrong. Where, you know, that jealousy comes in, perhaps, all kinds of issues. Well, yes, because Marie wanted to keep that child. She believed, I believe, that she was going to have the relationship with the pastor. The pastor would probably divorce his wife, and they would go on to have a happy life together. Marie's sister, she just had a strange feeling from the very beginning of Marie going missing.

She said something to you. She said, I watch a lot of Law and Order, and that's why she knew something was wrong. It is interesting when people tell us as well that they watch Dateline, and it's kind of the same thing, that they've learned something from it or that it has them thinking about things a little more than they might have otherwise. There are very similar kinds of behaviors that emerge. And when you see that sort of behavior emerging, you kind of know, pardon my use of a cliche, but that's a red flag. I had to watch that. Yeah.

It's like, you know, we always say, trust your gut, right? If something doesn't feel right, it probably isn't. Exactly that. Yeah. When we come back, we have an extra clip from the suspect's confession. I was so impressed by the detective on this case. She really latched onto it immediately. And coming from maternity leave and having just had a baby, she felt this connection. She had been back less than two weeks. She saw this case come up and she made sure she was on it. She was not assigned to it.

She kind of elbowed her way onto it. And she did because her first feeling was, I know how it feels to have a baby. I wouldn't leave my baby under any circumstances whatsoever. How could I believe this young woman would have left her baby? And she just didn't believe that was possible. And that's what drove her. And she was a star of the investigation. She was, however, the one who was so heartbroken that she had searched that backyard where Marie's body was eventually found and came so close but couldn't find it. And so then the three-year delay before they finally got the confession. I felt really bad for her when she talks about, I was there, and I missed it somehow, or I didn't do enough, or however she was feeling. She really beat herself up. Yeah, it was right under their noses,

you know, that piece of the puzzle. But eventually, the husband agreed to plead guilty to what manslaughter, I think it was, and took a 15-year sentence. The family was quite disappointed in the manslaughter charge in the plea deal. Not enough. Well, and when you look at the circumstances of what happened, the eventual confession, you can see why they would be disappointed. If a conviction for first degree murder requires no more than a few seconds of contemplation of what you're going to do, as we are told repeatedly by prosecutors is what it requires, then first degree murder would have been a reasonable charge to bring. And so I don't blame the family at all.

The trouble was they couldn't prove it. And I think that's why our detective was so upset with herself because had they found that body when they did, she felt they could have made the case. Well, yeah, if it's in the backyard, hard to explain that away. Do you think that James planned to kill Marie or do you think it was in the moment? He and Tanya, maybe especially him, realized they had a problem. And Marie had gone from being a delightful companion in their house to being problematic. She wasn't going to give up the baby. And that was a real problem. They had to figure out a way to make that happen.

Are there some people who think Tanya was involved that she knows way more than she's saying? Yes, there are some who I think would tell you to this day they were convinced she was involved, that she knew more. Yes. But there's no evidence for that. There's no way to prove it. And if she did, James certainly didn't throw her under the bus. No, no, not at all. You have more of James's confession to investigators that did not air in that episode.

Let's take a listen to that. Did you get her buried before Tanya came back? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I grew up on a farm, and the only thing I could do was dig. And I was with the dead in the hard dirt, and I died until I couldn't go anymore. And I just back to the house and I looked at myself covered in dirt and I took off my shirt and my panty shoes and I jumped in the shower. Well, that is raw, listening to him talk about that, those final moments there. Wow. A far cry from who he was.

You know, he's this cool pastor in the jeans and sneakers and a strip mall. He's on YouTube. Right. And again, loved by his congregation. And he was charismatic and he was a good preacher and he, you know, it was one of those kind of upbeat four square gospel type churches. But he was good. You know, he was an effective preacher. You can only imagine how explosive this must have been for the members of that church. It's not a church anymore. You know, it was a and it's it went back to being a strip mall after all of this and and his his official title was pastor yes would you say he's more like

a preacher they're interchangeable they give them different names my father was uh he would have called himself a minister he ministered to to people. And, you know, a minister of a certain church. It was the United Church of Canada, actually. You're familiar with it. But sometimes, you know, if the specialty was preaching great sermons, they'd get called preachers. If they were known for their ability with caring for people, they'd be pastors. And sometimes there's no formal definition.

It goes back and forth. What is true is that preachers, pastors, ministers, call them what you will. Priests are like other people. We put them on a pedestal and we believe that they're going to be perfect in every way and they're never going to do terrible things. And very few of them do, but some do. And in recent years, we've seen so many scandals of people who have supposedly been above any criticism that have been, you know, men or women of God, particularly men of God, and have abused children and have gotten themselves into all kinds of trouble. And also have ended up in a lot of Dateline episodes. And have ended up in Dateline episodes.

Killing people. I mean, we've done quite a few. We have. I shall never forget being in a prison in San Diego talking to a preacher who had murdered his younger plural wife because she had become a problem for them, and cut her up into little bits and took her out and buried her in a cairn in the desert. And when I was trying to question him about his views on various theological issues and how he managed to find a way to rationalize that sort of behavior.

He said, you know, I'm not that concerned about what will happen after I die. I'm going to meet my young wife again and we'll all be together. My older wife, my younger wife, and me and our children. We'll all be happy again. You might be going in another direction. You never know. You know, you might not be heading to heaven after that. I mean, Keith, I have to say you're, you are one of the kindest people I know.

And you are so, you're such a thoughtful person about everything. Do you think any of that came from being the child of a minister or was it? Oh, well, yeah yeah you know i i'm not compared to most people oh my gosh stop of course you are but it does yeah i mean uh my father was the sweetest man who ever lived yeah do you think you think that's like where not not to uh take away from your mom but i hope so i hope it's where it came from and you know my mother was wonderful too yeah but you know he yeah he was a he remains though he's been dead many years uh he remains um kind of guiding post of life for me well that's so nice did he do you feel like he impacted a lot of people in his time oh yeah yeah yeah. Yeah. He really did in his kind and charismatic way,

but kindness mostly. I'm so glad we have a positive example of a minister. Okay. After the break, we'll be back to answer lot of viewer questions about this episode this very salacious episode with that thruple element um mz cat 64 on the lines of the thruple says anything that has to be secretive is not good five exclamation marks poor marie carlson well you can only sympathize with that idea it's very true uh and and unfortunately it's a rule that gets broken all the time secrecy is pretty common when sexual relationships are involved uh all right this is from work right calm so So he killed Marie and buried her five feet deep before Tanya came back, and Tanya never noticed that her yard had been dug up, not buying it.

Reasonable speculation. Reasonable suspicion, I should say. I think a lot of people who saw this episode, myself included, were thinking the same thing. That it is hard to believe that tanya didn't know anything the story yeah as we did the story we were feeling that too it's hard to believe it may be but it's hard to believe and again she was never arrested never charged with anything right um this is from at den with four n's and two i's denny at den Denny. James doesn't deserve a deal, but anything to find

Marie's body at this point. That is exactly what the police thought. They didn't think he deserved a deal either, but they couldn't prove otherwise. So it was kind of like, let's get something here. You know, we may not get everything we want, but let's get him behind bars. We can find her body. We can give her family some answers and we can get something against him at least. Yeah. All right. Ron67592179, no wonder Marie wanted James. She just wanted someone to care for her after all those years. Very sad. Yeah. I'd agree. Yeah, it's like Marie was searching for something, I feel like, her whole life. And it almost started from when she was a little girl, you know, finding out that this man was her father. It just seems like, you know,

like I mentioned it right near the top that she was lost. Yes, I think that's a good way of describing it. She was, and they made her feel at home, but they were not to be believed necessarily. And who knew? I mean, your minister, your preacher, your pastor tells you that you're safe in this situation, and his wife, who's a wonderful woman, makes you feel safe too and the gradual um submission into a kind of a throuple relationship was didn't happen overnight obviously and um marie seemed to enter into it voluntarily not you know he was a vibrant interesting man and uh and apparently both he and his wife thought that was a great idea. So she did. You know, he's supposed to be safe in that role.

You know, this is supposed to be someone who can help you and listen to you and guide you. If you can't have faith in your pastor, who can you have faith in? All right, Keith, on that note, thank you for that fascinating episode. Well, thank you. It was pretty interesting, all right, to follow around. of fascinating episode. Well, thank you. It was pretty interesting, all right, to follow around. That is our Talking Dateline for this week.

Thanks so much, Keith. And thanks, everyone, for listening to us. Remember, if you have any questions for us about our stories or Dateline, reach out to us on social at DatelineNBC.

See you Fridays on Dateline on NBC. And also be sure to check out the newest season of our podcast, Dateline Missing in America, featuring missing person cases brought to our attention by our followers on social media. All episodes are available to listen to now wherever you get your podcasts. Thank you.