Going West: True Crime - Barbara Beach Hamburg // 289

Starting point is 00:00:00 What is going on True Crime fans? I'm your host Teef. And I'm your host Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Hello everybody, big thanks to Shannon for recommending today's case. Some of you guys might be familiar with it because there was an HBO documentary that came out on this case about three years ago called Murder on Middle Beach. Actually, didn't watch it at the time. It was one of those that we just never got around to watching. But maybe you guys did, but for everybody else, maybe this will be a new story for you and then you could watch the DocuSeries after.

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Starting point is 00:01:45 Nothing is changing. Thank you very much. I think that pretty much cleared that up. Alright guys, this is episode 289 of Going West. So let's get into it. It's been 12 and a half years since Madison Hamburg last spoke to his mom Barbara, who was murdered in their Madison home on March 3, 2010. Barbara Hamburg's body was found by one of her children in the yard of the home she rented according to police.

Starting point is 00:02:33 Today, the medical examiner's office said Hamburg died as a result of blunt force trauma and stab wounds. Obviously, we have a great handle on this and officers are working around the clock on it. As for the person who murdered my mom, I just want to know why. And he has been trying to find out those answers for years, more recently in 2020, but an HBO series murdered on Middle Beach that examines Madison's journey to try to solve the case. I just have this vision over kind of finding her way out on the front yard. I just hope to catch the person that did it. Barbara Beach was born on April 29, 1961 in New Haven, Connecticut, and was one of six children born to Barbara and Richard Beach, alongside siblings Christopher, Conway, Catherine, Lewis, and Richard. As far back as

Starting point is 00:03:47 childhood Barbara was described as a bright light and a breath of fresh air. According to her obituary, she was quote, truly too good for this world. Barbara absolutely loved to spend time outdoors and maintained a very active lifestyle. She grew up close to her extended family and also had many beloved friends, so she was always surrounded by people who cared about her. But as the adventurous and fun person she was, she was known to make friends anywhere she went as well. In 1989, when she was around 28 years old, Barbara married successful businessman Jeffrey

Starting point is 00:04:26 Hamburg, and the couple settled in Alpharetta, Georgia. Her husband, Jeffrey, was promoted to CEO of the Southern Company, which is a gas and electric utility company that same year. Barbara and Jeffrey would go on to have two children, a son named Madison and a daughter named Barbara Alexandra, who just went by alley, so that's what we're going to call her. And Jeffrey also had a child from a previous relationship named Brian. Barbara's family remembers Jeffrey as charming, charismatic, and funny, and that they were quite the power couple together.

Starting point is 00:05:02 They loved to travel, they doated on their children, and they of course enjoyed Jeffery's multi-million dollar salary to the fullest. Parenting came easy and it came naturally to Barbara. I mean, she lit up around her children and was a warm and gentle mother. She just felt like they gave her purpose. In her daughter Allie's words, she said,

Starting point is 00:05:24 quote, she said, quote, she had a super infectious laugh. She made people happy. Everyone loved her. Barbara Sun Madison called her quote a superhero kind of archetypal mother figure and remembered quote,

Starting point is 00:05:39 our house was where all the misfit kids would come and hide out and my mom was always like a mother to everybody. After years in the state of Georgia, the Hamburgs eventually decided that they wanted to head back to Barbara's roots in Connecticut. So they purchased a beautiful home on Middle Beach Road West in Madison, Connecticut. Not to be confused with Barbara's son, Madison. Yeah, there's a lot of double names in this episode I realized. There really is.

Starting point is 00:06:05 Barbara's parents are literally Richard and Barbara. And then they have a daughter Barbara and a son, Richard. Exactly. Yeah. And then Barbara named her daughter Barbara Alexandra. But luckily she goes by Ali makes this a little easier. Yeah. So Madison is nestled on the Long Island sound about a 25 minute drive from Barbara's native city of New Haven. The property backed onto a golf course and was just steps from the beach. So it was incredibly picturesque. But things began to go downhill for the family when Barbara's husband Jeffrey came under fire for unethical practices at work.

Starting point is 00:06:42 According to the case file, Jeffrey was being accused of brokering illegal deals outside of the country. While this was never confirmed, Jeffrey did travel frequently, reportedly possessing five passports. But Jeffrey called the allegations appalling and took his former employer to court, suing them for defamation, and he actually won $3.5 million. Though something in him changed after that, and Jeffrey apparently became absent and distant. He was traveling so much that Barbara claimed that she felt like a single mother. So in 2002, she filed for divorce from her husband of 13 years while in her early 40s. Barbara maintained primary custody of the children, as well as their residents on middle

Starting point is 00:07:27 beach road. And when Jeffrey wasn't traveling, he would stay nearby at a luxury condo or at a residence on Park Avenue in New York City, and he would see his kids Madison and Allie for visits. Though she kept it quiet, Barbara was struggling with alcoholism, and maybe as a way to deal with the strain on her marriage, in the massive change in her personal life, though that's obviously just speculation. Now her father Richard, who was often referred to by his nickname Sandy, we're going to call him Sandy, also struggled with alcoholism.

Starting point is 00:08:00 And after becoming sober, Sandy had actually established himself as a pillar in the Alcoholics Anonymous Community. His obituary credits him with inspiring hundreds if not thousands of people in AA, and it reads quote, On December 7th, 1964, Sandy stopped drinking and began a deep and lasting belief in the spiritual power of AA. Sandy became an inspired speaker in AA meetings large and small. He spoke about the principles of AA with a special blend of humor and wisdom all over the world.

Starting point is 00:08:37 He created and taught an AA spiritual recovery workshop for men known as the Far Corners, and says true to its name, men traveled near and far to learn from Sandy. So taking inspiration from her father, Barbara quit drinking in 2005, which was about three years after her divorce, and she definitely leaned on the support of Alcoholics Anonymous as well. At the time of her murder, she had spent five years in AA, where she found a lot of camaraderie and just a real sense of purpose in attending and leading meetings. And her son Madison actually still goes to a meeting once a year on Valentine's Day, which

Starting point is 00:09:20 is Barbara's sober anniversary, to pick up her annual chip. So while they were no longer together, Barbara and Jeffrey saw each other frequently in court over disputes about finances and their children. Barbara claimed that Jeffrey kept missing both his alimony and child support payments, while Jeffrey claimed that Barbara was defaulting on the mortgage. He told their son Madison later that Barbara had a dark side, few people knew of, saying, quote, your mother was a very complicated person.

Starting point is 00:09:51 Things that you may or may not have seen or witnessed or were even cognizant of. She had a life that I had no idea she had. But he didn't elaborate on what he meant by this. I think we might actually know if you're thinking the same thing I am, which we are going to get into. Yes, we will. So, unfortunately, while Barbara did her best to provide for her children with the most stable home possible in the midst of a tumultuous divorce, the kids bore the brunt of all of this. Like his grandfather and mother before him, Madison began escaping the uncertainty

Starting point is 00:10:26 of his home life with substance abuse and wound up getting expelled from his high school. Madison's guidance counselor at the time remembered him having a strained relationship with his dad, and that Jeffrey was controlling and angry. The guidance counselor even wrote a letter to the court stating that Madison did not want to have to stay at his dad's house. So tensions within the family were rising and there was no end in sight. Because in early 2010, Barbara and Jeffrey were still embroiled in a conflict over money that he owed to Barbara as well as to his kids. So despite the trouble at home, Madison, who was very gifted and creative, had gotten

Starting point is 00:11:07 into the Savannah College of Art and Design back in Georgia. And nurturing his early love of filmmaking, his parents had purchased a video camera for him one year for Christmas, and Madison had just fallen in love with it. In March of 2010, Madison was well into his freshman year of college and was just thrilled to be back in the south as well as getting a break from, you know, the turbulence between his parents back in Connecticut. On the morning of March 3rd, 2010, Allie had gotten out of school early, so her aunt, Conway Beach, agreed to pick her up.

Starting point is 00:11:44 Now, we're going to talk about Conway a bunch in the rest of this episode and just so you guys know she is the sister of Barbara. And remember Barbara has five siblings. Conway is one of them and Conway is Madison and Allie's aunt. Yeah and the reason why Conway was there to pick up Allie that day is because they couldn't get a hold of Barbara. Right. I mean so that day is because they couldn't get a hold of Barbara. Right. I mean, so basically what happened is they couldn't get a hold of Barbara like he

Starting point is 00:12:10 this saying. And then they arrived at the house at Ali and Barbara's house around 11 a.m. But they just knew immediately that something wasn't right. I mean, they were calling her a bunch. They just could not get in touch with her. But it's also said that Conway was living at the house at the time as well with Barbara and Allie, so we definitely question that. But anyway, back to when they get home.

Starting point is 00:12:34 So when Allie and Conway pulled into the driveway, Barbara's car was still parked out front. Her keys were hanging in the front door, but the door was still locked. They called for her inside the house, but it was dead silent. And then, Ali heard her aunt Conway screaming from outside, so she ran to the backyard to find her. And on the side of the house, in front of some bushes, Conway saw couch cushions covering something up. When she lifted one up, she saw what she described as, quote, mushed up hair and blood. So she kind of relaxed at this point for a second, just assuming it was an animal that had been attacked and maybe discarded there by a predator. But when she pulled back the second cushion,

Starting point is 00:13:26 she had the horrifying realization that it was her sister, Barbara. At 11.25 a.m., they dialed 911 to report the murder of 48 year old Barbara Beach Hamburg. So let's talk about this for a second because it's pretty weird. We have Barbara's car in the driveway. Her keys are in the door but the door is not quite

Starting point is 00:13:49 unlocked yet and then she is under couch cushions or under outdoor couch cushions outside. Yeah in the backyard. Yeah in the yard garden area. So it's just weird that like I'm trying to see the scene unfold and it's kind of hard to picture. Yeah, it is because you would assume that if she did make it to the front door, she put the keys in. If she was attacked, then she would have been attacked and like brought to the backyard to be killed

Starting point is 00:14:18 because they didn't go through the house. Right, meaning she was just killed outside. Like, it's pretty bizarre. Unless, you know, the killer had gotten the keys and locked the door themselves and left the keys in the door. Well, by all accounts, it does appear that she was killed outside. And I also just wanted to tell you guys,

Starting point is 00:14:36 I know we mentioned that there was a golf course behind her house. It's like past this little body of water. But the house is very private. It's up a driveway. So there's no neighbors that can be seen when you're standing in or outside of the house directly. Like it is a nice little private piece of property. Yeah, it's slightly secluded.

Starting point is 00:14:58 So it looks like the neighbors aren't super close by. But that also is important to note because it's like, well, then who would have gone up that driveway and killed her that morning? True, yeah. It must have been somebody that she knew. Absolutely. So Barbara's son Madison remembered the day like a bad dream.

Starting point is 00:15:18 He said, quote, I was at Chick-fil-A with a bunch of friends and my phone was broken that day. One of my best friends reached out to another friend who was with me to say that my sister really needed to talk to me. I thought she had gotten into trouble or something. And when I called, she said, Mom's dead. She was crying.

Starting point is 00:15:38 She said someone killed her. My initial response, which I now know as a part of grief, was, that can't be right, she's not dead. Put someone else on the phone. This isn't funny. Meanwhile, at the nearby courthouse, Barbara had been expected that morning, and had missed a court hearing in the case against her ex-husband, Jeffrey. At the time, Jeffrey stood accused of owing $153,000 to Barbara and stealing $324,000 from the trust in college funds that belonged to Ali and Madison. Now according to Barb's lawyer, Richard Callahan, he said, quote, there was no question he did not have the money on March 3rd.

Starting point is 00:16:21 Barbara had been expected at 9.30 that morning, but she had never shown up. Now some reports indicate that Jeffrey had been in as much as a million dollars worth of debt at this time. He had also quietly filed for bankruptcy in June of 2009. So that was the year before Barbara was murdered, but back to the crime scene for a second. So an autopsy revealed that Barbara had died of blunt force trauma and sharp force injury, and she had been brutally stabbed and beaten. And of course, her death was ruled a homicide. Now this was a time of great loss for the Beach family because they actually lost Barbara

Starting point is 00:17:03 sister Catherine just two months later. And not only them, but their picturesque, very affluent seaside town just really reeled from the shocking murder because, of course, they're wondering if they have a killer amongst them. Allie broke the news to her brother, Madison, like Heath explained to us, who took leave from school in Georgia to just move home to Connecticut and be closer to family. Madison said later, quote, my mom was my best friend, and there's not a day that goes by that I don't feel her absence. With a crime so brutal as Barbara's murder, it seemed obvious, like we said, that the

Starting point is 00:17:42 murder had to have known their victims, so police focused on Barbara's inner circle. And to no surprise, many acknowledged that her ex-husband Jeffrey seemed to be the only one with anything to gain from her demise. But seeming to get ahead of the accusations, Jeffrey obtained legal counsel immediately upon hearing the news of her death. While police never named him as an official suspect, his attorney said he, quote, clearly, was.

Starting point is 00:18:14 And there were a ton of unsubstantiated rumors like in any case, but one here that was very persistent claims that Jeffrey's phone was off the entire day of the murder, which just doesn't look good for him because like why else would that be, especially in modern age in 2010 when you can track cell phones. It just always looks weird in a case when someone's phone is turned off at the time that someone's murdered. I mean, absolutely, but also, you know, he's supposed to be in court that day as well. So it's like, why would his phone be turned off?

Starting point is 00:18:50 I mean, maybe because he was in court. Right. You could say that, but she didn't show up. So there wasn't a hearing anyway. So having your phone off, especially what if your lawyer needs to contact you, you know what I mean? It just doesn't look good anyway. And not to say that just because his phone is off means that he's behind this, but it just

Starting point is 00:19:09 looks bad. So also, another kind of bizarre thing is that an unknown caller had phoned Barbara that day to tell her that her court appearance with Jeffrey on the day of her murder had been moved to 2 p.m. which would leave more time for her to be attacked. Well, police requested Jeffries DNA and he permitted this, but the beach family feels police fumbled the handling of the DNA to the point that it may be unusable. Just hate when that happens. Yeah, and according to Barbara's sister Conway, Madison police encouraged the family to wait

Starting point is 00:19:45 for a new crime lab to be unveiled, which was promised to be one of the best in the country. But shortly after it opened, it had lost its accreditation. Not only that, but by then, the DNA evidence gleaned from Barbara's body and the crime scene had been idle for weeks, if not months. And Conway suspects that it may have been stored improperly, as investigators had put all their eggs in one basket with this new crime lab. Barbara was cremated quickly,

Starting point is 00:20:14 which obviously is extremely unfortunate in this investigation, just a week after her death. So there was no more DNA evidence to speak of. It's always really frustrating in murder cases when someone is cremated quickly because you just, you can't come back from that. And especially considering her murder wasn't anywhere near solved when they did it.

Starting point is 00:20:35 And I can understand if the family wants to like honor certain wishes or give their loved one a proper send off, but who knows how much it could have helped if they would have just waited or if they had buried her instead? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, it's just really, really unfortunate. So as is typical in murder cases, the entire Hamburg family was questioned in connection

Starting point is 00:20:58 with Barbara's murder. When police asked her son Madison who he thought committed the murder, Madison said that he didn't know. In the garden near where Barbara's body was found, there was a cigarette linked to her son Madison. But I mean that absolutely could have been from a visit prior to the murder. Under Barbara's fingernails, there was DNA that was as police described of male Hamburg lineage, but they said that it was not a direct match to Jeffrey. I want to know is if it wasn't a direct match because the DNA sample that they had taken

Starting point is 00:21:33 wasn't a good enough sample or because it wasn't like concretely was not Jeffrey because if if they're under her fingernails, there is male hamburger lineage DNA. Like who would that be from? We know the only two people that would have been in the house that day with her that are in the family are women, Conway, and Ali. So when would she have gotten male hamburger lineage DNA under her fingernails, especially under her fingernails, not just on her shoulder or under her fingernails. Right, that means that implies that she had

Starting point is 00:22:08 possibly scratched somebody and it got in defense. Yeah, exactly. So that's pretty alarming that they're not kind of putting two and two together there. You know what I mean? But that's why I want to know if the sample was strong enough or what this situation is with that, if we can concretely

Starting point is 00:22:25 say it was not Jeffries or if they just don't think it is or it did, like you said, it didn't appear that it was a direct match. But very interesting. Yeah, it definitely is. So in one of Madison's interviews with police, they asked if he suspected his father, Jeffrey Hamburg. And Madison said, quote, I've never seen him be violent toward anybody. The officer then asked, controlling, to which Madison responded, he's very controlling, and manipulative,

Starting point is 00:22:55 and selfish. But the question remained if he was capable of doing something so heinous to his ex-wife, who seemed to be beloved by everyone but him. And that's the question that Madison himself set out to answer. After taking a year off of school to heal from the sudden and tragic loss of his mother, Madison returned to the Savannah College of Art and Design in Georgia with the vision for a new project, and homage to his mother. In 2013, so about three years after Barbara's murder and during Madison's final year of college, Madison was completing a documentary film class. Now, he had been quiet on the details of his circumstances, explained that he quote, didn't want to be the kid whose mom was murdered.

Starting point is 00:24:12 Like, he wasn't telling people at school that this had happened to him, because… Right, he didn't want people to know him as just that. Exactly. But a class project that he had been working on fell through and he needed a subject. So Madison was inspired to dive into his mother's life. He explained that while he did want to see her case solved, of course, that wasn't necessarily the objective of the project. Instead, he called it, quote,

Starting point is 00:24:38 a documentary for anyone who has a mom. And while navigating what Madison called the darkest time of his life, his film kind of offered this solace from the unthinkable loss of the person who meant the most to him in the world. Madison explained, quote, film has always been like a coping mechanism for me.

Starting point is 00:25:00 My parents told me that they were getting divorced the day before Christmas when I was 11, and on Christmas Day, they bought me a handicap. And from that moment on, I sort of lost myself and just filming the world around me. It was sort of escapism at that point, but it helped me develop a language for communicating a lot of stuff that I can't properly articulate. For 8 years, while his mom's case grew cold, Madison recorded interviews,

Starting point is 00:25:28 conducted his own investigation, and turned the mirror on members of his own family, questioning their potential involvement. As the footage stacked up in the documentary basically took on a life of its own, Madison ironically never even completed the assignment because there was so much ground to cover.

Starting point is 00:25:46 Now, even though he didn't complete this project, his professor did award him an A anyway and insisted that Madison complete the project, and he decided that that's exactly what he was going to do. Talks with both police and members of his family seemed to lead him toward the same suspect, his own father. But Jeffrey was avoidant every time the subject was brought up. When Madison questioned whether he could speak with Jeffrey's lawyers which Jeffrey responded, no, let's just leave it at that. Which to me is really weird because like this is your son, you're talking about the murder

Starting point is 00:26:29 of his mother, you think that Jeffrey would be just denying it a lot more and saying, why would I do that? Of course I didn't do that. Like, why is he not giving him, not giving him what he wants to hear, but what he should be told if you are in fact innocent. Yeah, maybe just kind of putting his mind at ease, even. Yeah, he just has all these weird, cryptic answers. Yeah. So in 2016, six years after the murder of his mother, and three years after embarking

Starting point is 00:26:57 on his documentary film project, Madison, now estranged from his father, met Jeffrey for a drink in a bar in New York City. While he was wearing a microphone underneath his clothing just hoping to sneakly record an interview, Madison asked his father outright, did you have anything to do with it? And Jeffrey responded, I'm not going to talk to you about the murder. Before telling him definitively, I'm not capable of murdering anyone. But let's go back for a moment. The year after Barbara was murdered in September of 2011, Jeffrey was arrested on charges of grand larceny for stealing from his daughter Ali's college fund.

Starting point is 00:27:39 Then, on May 10, 2012, he was again arrested for failing to pay Barbara's child support and alimony payments. But he was released on bail both times. While Jeffrey has appeared to be the only publicly vilified person of interest, Madison poses multiple theories as to what could have happened to his mother. One is her involvement in a multi-level marketing scheme called Gifting Tables. So Gifting Tables began in 2008, a couple years before Bobro was murdered, and was primarily operated out of Connecticut.

Starting point is 00:28:15 It was kind of presented under the guise of being like a sisterhood for women in their communities, almost like a sorority, I guess you could say. So the women-only gatherings would start as lavish tea parties and dinner parties thrown by a host, and everyone would recruit a new member. Now these new members were required to bring a gift of $5,000 each. Once you joined and contributed your $5,000, you moved into the position called appetizer. You were then asked to bring two more people who would also contribute $5,000, which would bring you to the soup and salad level.

Starting point is 00:28:57 They would then recruit two women of their own to bring the cash gift to the next event, and you would move to the Entreetray level. And then finally, the dessert level where all eight recruits beneath you would give you their $5,000, leaving you with like a tidy sum of $40,000. And remember, this was during a time of the recession. The recession, exactly. So people were kind of finding out ways to make money through all of this like turmoil. Right, which is, this is just such a weird way to do it.

Starting point is 00:29:30 And it really did look like some terrible Ponzi scheme which I'm gonna get into. Well, yeah. Yeah, I mean duh. And people were convicted, so. It's true, and I'll go into that now. So it was founded by Donna Bello, who was a Connecticut woman in her 50s at the time,

Starting point is 00:29:46 and the group just mass-graded as a woman's empowerment and self-help group, but it seemed more like a way to buck the recession, and in some cases, promise that a portion of the profits would be donated to charity when it probably wasn't. In 2013, Donna was actually convicted of conspiracy because of gifting tables. Investigators argued that this was a simple Ponzi scheme hiding behind the veil of sisterhood and charity to avoid taxation. And she was sentenced to four years in prison for the organization, as was Barbara's own and Jill Platte.

Starting point is 00:30:24 Well, what's interesting here is Aunt Jill Platte. Well, what's interesting here is that Jill Platte was the one who first recruited Barbara to gifting tables, but Barbara seemed to be flourishing on her own. Apparently, at the time that she was killed, Barbara was in the dessert phase of the scheme and thus was poised to receive $40,000. Barbara had also been recruiting new women for gifting tables from her alcoholics anonymous meetings. Some have questioned if her death was in retaliation due to her involvement in the scheme,

Starting point is 00:30:54 especially since there was a crossover from AA. One theory posed the idea that a Madison police officer's family had lost money in the scheme, and their inability to solve the crime was willful ignorance as a means of revenge. There's another interesting theory that's the idea that someone, likely Jeffrey Hamburg, had hired a hitman to kill Barbara. This would prove Jeffrey's claim that he doesn't have the ability to kill someone, but it would also clear up the financial dispute that he was waiting in the

Starting point is 00:31:25 courtroom to resolve on the morning that barrow was unable to appear because of her brutal murder i still just don't get the dn anything like the dna under her fingernails being of hamburger lineage like yeah that still i i don't i wouldn't necessarily put the hitman theory behind me because i think it it's definitely potentially valid, but let's also remember that as far as cases we've covered in personally researched, Hitman don't usually like brutally beat and stab people

Starting point is 00:31:56 to death, they usually have like a cleaner modus operandi, you know? Yeah, I agree, I agree with that. But yeah, so to me, it just doesn't really feel like to me a hitman would go and do this outside in such a brutal fashion and then hide her body in such a bizarre way. Right, in the daylight. In the daylight under couch cushions, it's just weird to me. Does not click with that.

Starting point is 00:32:20 It does feel like really sloppy, I'll say. Yes, sloppy. But also at the same time, it's like, you know, is it possible that DNA could have somehow gotten under her fingernails? From a different occurrence? Yeah. Sure, but it's like, think about how much you wash your hands, you know?

Starting point is 00:32:38 True, yeah. It just doesn't feel like that would have been under her fingernails for, I mean, unless she wasn't scrubbing her nails, you know what I mean by? Sure. I don't know. It just, that really sticks out to me personally. Well, actually, one comment on a discussion form

Starting point is 00:32:52 about this hitman theory, even accuses Conway, who again is Barbara's sister, of having hired a hitman in the past to kill her sister. But the craziest part about this is that Conway even admitted to this. So here's what happened with that. In an interview with Conway, she admitted that back in 1996, so 14 years before Barbara's murder, Conway herself was battling substance misuse.

Starting point is 00:33:18 And this is what she said in a direct quote, I was out of control and Barb knew it. She took me to court. And during this time, the hammers actually took in Conway's son Tyler to live with them because Conway was evicted from her house. But for whatever reason, Conway was not happy about this entire situation. So here's another direct quote from an interview.

Starting point is 00:33:44 It says, My ulterior plan was to get all my money out of my 401k plan and get revenge against my baby sister, your mother, your father, and both of you, even Ali. This is, she's saying this to Madison. So she is telling Madison, she wanted to get revenge on him, on his sister, and on his parents. And the quote continues, I was so messed up, I didn't know what to do. I was so angry, my whole family wasn't speaking to me. And then she went on to basically explain that she asked everybody she came in contact with essentially like total strangers, bartenders, cab drivers, how she could hire a hitman.

Starting point is 00:34:26 And eventually she was able to put enough money together and had arranged a meeting with a supposed hitman. And she had rented this hotel room in Orlando, Florida to meet with this person. But once they met and she started drinking, she had blacked out and she woke up, quote, naked and penniless. So, so basically she tried to hire a hitman

Starting point is 00:34:49 to kill her sister and then she just got robbed. Yeah, she got robbed exactly. So then to this, she says, quote, I'm not proud of that. Like proud of trying to hire somebody to kill Barbara, but she like blatantly admits that this is something that she was trying to do. And even after this, Barbara took her sister Conway into her home to give her a place to

Starting point is 00:35:12 live while she was going through this detox situation and also while she was experiencing a lot of health issues. So Barbara did a really good and nice thing here, despite what Conway had planned for her. Yeah, and this is obviously very alarming because who in their right fucking mind hires a hitman to kill one of their siblings, like she just cannot be trusted. I agree, and obviously then we have to go back to the fact that Conway was the one that found Barbara and allegedly thought that she was an animal originally, even though that just feels kind of weird. Why would there be a dead animal under couch cushions when your sister is missing?

Starting point is 00:35:56 They're also got to say animal hair is very different from human hair. It really is. And of course, she was a person of interest like we said the entire family was questioned and she told investigators even that she had tried to hire a hitman in the past but said that in Barbous actual murder she had nothing to do with it so she is claiming innocence but it does feel hard to trust her. I mean absolutely but the craziest part here is that there's so many fingers being pointed in so many different directions because Conway had a theory of her own and that was that Barbara's own daughter Ali had murdered Barbara Now while there was little evidence to support this claim Conway says that Ali's relationship with her mother was strained at the time and it's possible that Ali being a young and volatile

Starting point is 00:36:44 teenager had killed her mother in a fit of rage was strained at the time. And it's possible that Ali, being a young and volatile teenager, had killed her mother in a fit of rage. Right, so her kind of theory would be that before she went to school that day, she killed her mom and then left. Yeah. But it just kind of feels like what? It sort of feels like deflection a little bit, you know? I would agree with that.

Starting point is 00:37:01 So after Barbara and Jeffrey's divorce, Ali initially chose to live with her dad, which Jeffrey remembers is actually hurt Barbara's feelings. Now finding him to be too controlling once she lived with him, Ali changed her mind and wanted to move back in with her mom. Jeffrey explained that Ali was suffering from both borderline personality disorder and Graves disease, which is an autoimmune disorder, and attributed the decision to her apparent unstable mental and physical health at the time.

Starting point is 00:37:29 When Ali did move back in with Barbara, Jeffrey accused Barbara of coddling Ali to ensure that she didn't move back in with Jeffrey. And Conway actually agreed with this assessment, claiming that Ali was, quote, abusing alcohol, drugs, and boys. Conway claims that Ali may have been erratic enough to have gotten into a fight with her mother that was so violent that it ended in murder. While Ali acknowledges that they didn't always get along, she swore she never would have hurt her mom.

Starting point is 00:38:01 Saying, quote, mom was so good to us. I think that in my crazy teenage years, I might have taken advantage of it. She believed in us even though we were filled with problems. She believed in us. I wish she was still here, but I definitely feel like she's still with me. After graduating high school,

Starting point is 00:38:18 Ali left the United States for a break from the very bleak circumstances that her family was dealing with, and decided to go backpacking through South America. But while she was there, she fell in love with Argentina and also met her husband, so she moved there permanently. In their recorded conversation for the documentary, Madison tells his sister, Ali, that he's proud to be her brother. Madison has also been very open about his substance abuse,

Starting point is 00:38:47 leaning heavily on opiates to cope in the aftermath of his mother, Barbara's death, saying very frankly, quote, I was acting out a lot. I've gone to rehab twice. My whole family is in recovery. But despite all these fingers being pointed in so many different directions, I also want to talk about another theory.

Starting point is 00:39:07 So it was mentioned in different articles that I was reading that the day before Barbara was murdered, she was actually at home with one of her friends from AA, and they had seen a man in a ski mask walking through her front yard. So this is obviously very alarming. It was never reported to the police, but I do find that very interesting that there was a person in a ski mask like kind of perusing around her property.

Starting point is 00:39:35 Yeah, and this is a story that came from one of Barbara's AA friends. So she's the one who started discussing this. Obviously it hasn't been officially substantiated, but this is what she's the one who started discussing this. Obviously it hasn't been officially substantiated, but this is what she's saying. So I don't know why she would lie about that. But kind of interesting, you know, this whole thought that there was somebody

Starting point is 00:39:54 probably possibly casing the house in a ski mask. I mean, that, and then, you know, the next day, Barbara's murdered. Right, so some people think that was this person and the ski mask behind her murder and maybe saw that she was with a friend and decided not to go through it, was this person, somebody from gifting tables,

Starting point is 00:40:14 like somebody who is desperate for money or somebody who had been kind of scorned by this Ponzi scheme and was for whatever reason, trying to take it out on Barbara. Like that is an angle, a possible angle of this case. Yeah, I mean, there are a lot of questions regarding this ski mask person. But that is really all we know about this particular situation with somebody in a ski mask.

Starting point is 00:40:39 There wasn't anything else that came out or any other real theories around it. Because again, the only person who said this is the AA friend um, it doesn't appear that they call the police about this person so Definitely definitely wonder about that but Mac are back to Madison's documentary So his documentary is kind of like part love letter to his mother and part investigation into not only her murder love letter to his mother and part investigation into not only her murder, but the less than presentable parts of her private life as like a beautiful and flawed individual. The four part series which we talked about in the very beginning of this episode in our intro is called Murder on Middle Beach, and it premiered on November 15th 2020 on HBO

Starting point is 00:41:23 and it is still up to watch. But unfortunately, even though there was just rave reviews about this and a ton of viewership, it has not been able to get the case solved. Madison says he still doesn't know who killed his mother. When asked outright if he thought it was his father, he said, quote, I haven't exonerated him but I don't know. The last time they spoke was on a recorded phone call for the documentary.

Starting point is 00:41:51 And about this, Madison explains, quote, I have still not talked to my dad. I would like to have a relationship with my dad, but it's up to him as far as I'm concerned, because I've been over backwards to give him every opportunity to participate, to give his side throughout this entire process. And talking to him over the past eight years, the things that he has consistently said is he's been dealt a bad hand

Starting point is 00:42:15 and nobody ever talks about that. They all just point fingers. I'm here if he ever wants to take that opportunity. I want a dad, you know? And if he wants to be take that opportunity, I want a dad, you know, and if he wants to be that to me, unfortunately, he's got to address the elephant in the room, so I'm ready whenever he is. After the conclusion of the documentary, Madison's next goal was to obtain the case files containing pertinent information regarding Barbara's murder.

Starting point is 00:42:42 But with the document sealed, the Madison Police Department was not budging on the issue. In October of 2022, Madison posted an update on Instagram that read, quote, in two days, the Connecticut Supreme Court will hear oral arguments about whether or not to release case files pertaining to my mother's homicide, more than three years after our initial request. Back in October of 2020, and compliance with the orders of the Freedom of Information Commission, the Madison Police Department turned over a number of files to me and my team, claiming this should be everything.

Starting point is 00:43:19 Upon closer examination, files and records seemed to be missing from what was given to us. We made a list of what we could ascertain was missing and requested these files from the MPD. The MPD then appealed the release of the records altogether, and in their appeal, admitted to withholding the most important pieces of the case file. They said that they would comply and told us that they were giving us everything only to admit that they lied in withheld information. Why? They're appeal went to the Superior Court last year, which ruled in favor of releasing

Starting point is 00:43:53 the files. Then it went to the Appellate Court at the end of last year. During mediation in the Appellate Court, the Connecticut Supreme Court decided to take the case. Two days from now will hopefully be the end of a three-year long endeavor for the truth. It's been 12 and a half years since my mother was killed. I've been told by officials time and time again that this case is cold and investigators are stuck as recently as May of this year.

Starting point is 00:44:23 As her son, I want to know what was and wasn't done, I want checks and balances, I want to trust the people in charge of her homicide investigation, and most of all, I want her case solved. After a certain amount of time, the release of information can only enhance the chances of a cold case ever being solved, as stated in the Superior Court decision. What's in it for the MPD to act this way? While it took almost three years since the release of the documentary, Madison was finally awarded access to the files, and he and his team have been dutifully pouring over the

Starting point is 00:45:01 information. However, he's also careful to honor the delicate nature of the material and the fact that it is still an ongoing investigation, saying, quote, this stuff is on the cusp of being publicly available. That comes back to the unique part of this. I don't want pictures of my mom's autopsy on the internet.

Starting point is 00:45:23 While a season two has not yet been confirmed, Madison says he will continue the investigation whether or not it's on camera. If you have any information about the murder of Barbara Beach Hamburg, you can submit a tip anonymously at barbrahambergtips.com or by calling the Madison Police Department tip line at 203-245-6591. Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening to this episode and on Friday we'll have a new case for you guys, an all new case for you guys to dive into. Yes, and if you guys have theories or thoughts on this case, as we always say, we love looking at all your comments on our social accounts.

Starting point is 00:46:23 So head on over to our Instagram at GoingWestPodcast, Twitter at GoingWestPod, and we're also on Facebook. We have a discussion group, which is a private group that you can join in Heath and I jump into conversations a lot, or just our regular Facebook group. That's also where you can find photos

Starting point is 00:46:38 of every case, including this case, in case you want a visual. And also, don't forget, if you want more episodes of Going West, we have our bonus series called Real Crime. You can find that on Patreon, that's p-a-t-r-e-o-n.com, slash Going West podcast, or if you're an Apple user, those will be in our main feed, but you can subscribe right there on Apple Podcasts.

Starting point is 00:47:02 And that is just bonus episodes. We do two a month over there on Apple and on Patreon. If you guys want to check that out, that's also where we do a lot of international cases. If you're interested in that, so thank you for checking it out. Thank you for listening and we will see you next time. All right guys, so for everybody out there in the world,

Starting point is 00:47:21 don't be a stranger. Thank you. you

Going West: True Crime - Barbara Beach Hamburg // 289

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