Going West: True Crime - Donna Scrivo // 81

Episode Date: August 13, 2020

In 2013, a series of devastating events caused a Michigan mother to move in with her adult son. Months later, that son would go missing. When his remains were quickly discovered, police could not believe who the main suspect became- and neither could their small community. This is the murder of Ramsay Scrivo, and the story of his mother, Donna Scrivo. BONUS EPISODES: http://patreon.com/goingwestpodcast LUMI CBD: http://lumicbd.com Use code "goingwest20" to get 20% off your purchase! BETTERHELP: http://betterhelp.com/goingwestpodcast Get 10% off your first month of BetterHelp by clicking the link above! CASE SOURCES: https://www.macombdaily.com/news/nation-world-news/sister-in-law-donna-scrivo-had-difficult-relationship-with-son-bad-temper/article_768071e0-c170-56ed-b268-38a31d94ed4b.html https://dailyentertainmentnews.com/breaking-news/donna-kay-scrivo-monstrous-michigan-mom-killed-dismembered-son/ https://www.theoaklandpress.com/news/nation-world-news/st-clair-shores-woman-was-distraught-over-son-s-mental-problems/article_29d3850e-5130-56f7-921b-fd2ff55af33e.html https://www.inquisitr.com/3885766/donna-scrivo-nurse-mom-who-murdered-dismembered-mentally-ill-son-ramsay-subject-of-tonights-snapped/ http://www.tributes.com/obituary/show/Daniel-J.-Scrivo-95824327 https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/125615420/daniel-j_-scrivo https://www.candgnews.com/news/details-emerge-dismemberment-case https://disability-memorial.org/ramsay-scrivo https://www.facebook.com/rscrivo1 https://www.websleuths.com/forums/threads/mi-ramsay-scrivo-32-found-dismembered-st-clair-county-27-jan-2014-1.233310/page-42 https://www.dailytribune.com/news/nation-world-news/woman-charged-with-murdering-mutilating-son-concerned-about-her-residential-properties-court-records-show/article_376c1e0b-92f3-5980-b691-838dda9bda7c.html https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/macomb/2015/05/06/donna-scrivo-murder-son-trial-opening/70905840/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What is going on through crime fans? I'm your host Teeth and I'm your other host, Daphne. And you're listening to Going West. Greetings all. Thank you so much for joining into going west today. We hope everyone's enjoying the last moments of summer. Heathen and I just went camping this weekend and probably only gonna be able to go a couple more times this year. Yeah yeah we're almost there. We're almost into the spooky season. Well last night Heathen and I were talking about Halloween decorations so we're already mentally in fall. Can't wait. Not only that, but we're also working on our second podcast, which we're going to release in early

October. So if you guys are interested in that, stay tuned. We got to let you know about our bonus episodes over on Patreon. We have about 22, I think, bonus episodes right now. So, and we're releasing more every single month, but if you just can't get enough of this show and you want some bonus episodes, head over to patreon.com slash going west podcast and subscribe. Yes, and as always, we want to let you guys know that we do give shout outs to everyone who gives us a five star review on Apple podcast. It's just kind of your way to give back to the show and our way to say thank you is by giving you a shout out in the very end of the episode, every episode.

Don't forget to leave your name and location if you guys give us a review so that we can give you guys a shout out. All right guys, this is episode 81 of Going West, so let's get into it. Breaking news now, a mother charged with her son's murder, Donna Scrivo, claiming someone else killed and dismembered her son. And the prosecutor just doesn't buy it.

The same Claire Shor's mother accused of killing and dismembering her son is back in court and just turned off of the stand. Take a look inside of the courtroom right now. That's a 61-year-old Donna Scribo testifying in her own murder trial as prosecutors grill her. Prosecutors trying to prove Scribo strangled her 32-year-old son Ramsey Scribo. Dismembred him in a bathroom in his St. Clair Shor's condo, then dumped his body parts along a country road back in January of 2014. Someone would have to be crazy too.

I'd only kill their own child, but then cut up their body and the way she distributed the body parts in St. Clair County, it was just shocking to people that how could someone do something like this. Donna Sheffin was born on February 4, 1954 in Dallas, Texas to Melba and Charles Sheffin, and she had a brother named David and a sister named Linda. Donna was always interested in becoming a nurse, so once she graduated Segoville High School in Dallas, she became just that, a registered nurse, and a pretty successful one of that. Because Donna was always described as a warm and caring person, kind of like a southern bell, so she really fell into nursing.

And in August 1978, she married the love of her life, Daniel J. Scrivo in Dallas, Texas. Daniel was born in 1951, so at the time of their marriage, he was 27 and Dana was 24. Just a couple months later, in November 1978, their son Jason was born in Michigan, and the new family of three settled into the town of St. Clair Shores, which is known to be a very safe and community-oriented suburban town of about 60,000 people that borders Lake Michigan, and it's just north of Detroit. Three years later, on May 10, 1981, Donna and Dan had a second son, and they named him Ramsey. Growing up, Jason and Ramsey attended Dale Sal Collegiate High School in the neighboring city of Warren, Michigan, which is an all-boys Catholic school.

In 1999, Ramsey, who remember is the younger son, graduated from high school and then after taking a few years off school, went on to attend Wayne State University in Detroit to study accounting. In 2010, he earned his bachelor's degree and started working as an accountant locally. But shortly after he began his job, his supervisor apparently criticized his work ethic, so Ransi decided to quit. And with that, he gave up accounting altogether and changed his career path to the building trade, which would be somewhat like construction, where he worked various jobs over the years. Meanwhile, Donna and Dan remained living in

St. Clair Shores, while Donna worked as a home care nurse and director of nursing at a local hospital. And I read that in 2003, Donna had actually suffered from a heart attack and she almost died and she had a bunch of issues after her surgery and so she couldn't go back to working in nursing the way she wanted to in the hospitals. So after 2003 is when she became a home care nurse, which wasn't her favorite thing. She preferred working in the hospital, but after 2003 she was working as a home care nurse

because of her heart attack. Right, so maybe because at the hospital, they work a lot longer hours and being an in-home nurse would be less hours to work during the day. And probably kind of more chill because you're at someone's house and you're just kind of tending to their needs instead of running around the floors of a hospital where it's like more high energy maybe? Sure, that makes sense. So in the spring of 2013, Donna and Dan helped their

son Ramsey by a condo in St. Clair Sh shores. And they really liked having him close by because Ramsey was known to suffer from mental health issues. He was diagnosed as a paranoid schizophrenic and he also had uncontrollable anger and depression. And because of his anger issues, he one night got in a bar fight and he was convicted for a small assault charge

but he was quickly put on probation. So he kinda, when he didn't take his medication, he would get into a lot of fights. But apparently none of this was known by his coworkers and a lot of his friends, so it appears that he had it mostly under control, thanks to his medication. It was only when he didn't take his medication that he would outwardly struggle, which he sometimes skipped because of the awful side effects, which I know happens with a lot of people with schizophrenia, because there's really terrible side effects to the medication.

But again, he pretty much kept it under wraps. Apparently, when he did skip his medication though, he believed that people were trying to poison him him or that someone put a microscopic microphone in his teeth and were recording everything that he said. So he was actually really struggling with mental health at that point? Yeah, absolutely. So it was something that he dealt with his whole life, but because of the medication, he usually was fine.

And you know, it just really affected him with jobs he had a hard time keeping jobs absolutely and i feel like employers should keep that in mind if somebody has a history of mental illness you know like it was hard for him to keep jobs like you said so i wonder why they didn't take that into account any time there was an outburst or something like that well they probably didn't know and I feel like I can only imagine people with these kind of mental health issues. They might not feel comfortable telling an employer because maybe the employer will be discriminatory against them because of their mental illness. I know that there's a lot of kind of big gray area as far as employers and acknowledgement of a mental illness. And when I actually worked at a mental health facility,

I did see run-ins with this where employers were not comfortable once they found out that their employee had a mental illness. So I think a lot of people are just really not cool about that kind of thing. Yeah, hopefully that can change, or hopefully that is changing now. Yeah, absolutely.

So shortly after Dan and Donna helped Ramsey get this condo of his, on May 15, 2013, Dan's screvo passed away at the age of 61, at home due to his organs failing and partially due to the fact that he had a coronary artery disease. But Dan's death was of course very hard on his two sons, particularly for Ramsay. After Dan's death, Ramsay threatened to hang himself and was diagnosed with psychosis. So at that point, Donna filed for legal guardianship of Ramsay's so she could make sure that he took his medications. Because after his diagnosis, he refused to take anything and his depression got much worse. At this time, his brother Jason was living in New Orleans, so he wasn't around much for

any of this, but he was very aware of what was going on. Ramsay was then admitted to the Psychiatric Ward at the St. John Hospital in Detroit. Less than two months later, in July, Donna would move in with Ramsay after her house became damaged by a fire. An electrical fire had started in her basement, and Ramsay was actually the one to discover it. So Donna's plan was to live with him and watch after Ramsay while her house was being fixed up after the fire.

Having Donna move in with Ramsay wasn't ultimately a great decision, because according to Dan Sister, Alice and Furtaw, so Donna's sister-in-law, Donna didn't have a great decision, because according to Dan's sister, Alice in Furtal, so Donna's sister-in-law, Donna didn't have a very good relationship with Ramsay, and she apparently had a horrible temper. She tried to control every aspect of Ramsay's life, and even though Donna supposedly came from a place of love, it didn't always translate that way, and I read on a forum from someone who stated that they knew Ramsey from work and had even met Donna on a couple occasions, and they said that Donna be little Ramsey in front of a bunch of people and called him lazy and

useless, which was apparently super awkward for everyone there, and this person also stated that while working with Ramsey, they knew him to be incredibly helpful, respectful, and kind, but usually kind of kept to himself. And it's kind of shocking to hear someone say that because by all accounts, Donna seemed to be like this good, helpful person and very nice person, but I can't even imagine your mother belittling you in front of your co-workers. Yeah, it's super weird. And I also read some other statements from Donna's old co-workers who explained that Dan, her husband, and Jason and Ramsey were her entire life. And she was a woman of strong Catholic faith, and she was just truly like this wonderful person, and that Ramsay in particular

was her baby, like her pride and joy. One coworker in particular was so confused to read reports that she was nasty to Ramsay, because she apparently just wasn't that kind of person, and they wondered if she became that person after her husband Dan died. But I didn't read anything regarding how she was with him before Dan's death, so I can't confirm that. But I think Alison, the sister-in-law's statement is pretty reliable, because she was around, obviously Ramsey's whole life. And apparently, because of Donna and Ramsey's poor relationship,

it caused Donna and Alison to kind of have like a riff and they didn't talk for almost eight years. Wow, that's yeah, that's a long time. And I also wonder, you know, obviously Ramsey had this deep love for his father because of the circumstances that occurred after his father passed away. So like you're saying, I'm kind of wondering if maybe Dan passing away just put a lot of financial pressure on Donna and also now she was the one that had to kind of take care of Ramsey when maybe that was something that Dan did more often than she did.

And you make a good point about Ramsey really loving his dad because I also read that Ramsey had said before Dan died like a different point during his life that when Dan died, that Ramsay would kill himself. And so maybe he just had a really strong relationship with his dad and maybe not so much as mom. And now that dad's gone, there's a lot more pressure on Ramsay and Donna's relationship because Dan's not there to kind of help the situation. Yeah, a lot of tension kind of building up between the two. And I can kind of understand Ramsey's feeling

because I'm very, very close with my dad as well. And so I can only imagine being that close with a parent and then losing them, especially if you're battling a mental health issue, that's got to be really, really traumatic for you as a person. Yeah, absolutely. So I think that's why everything just kind of exploded at that time, especially for Ramsey,

which is why Donna was like, I gotta become his legal guardian because he needs someone to look after him because he's not doing well. And Ramsey actually spent 90 days in the hospital receiving mental health treatment and was released back into the care of his mother Donna at his condo. As we mentioned before, Ramsey had a pretty hard time keeping jobs due to his mental health

issues, so later that same year he began working at Allstate Insurance in Roseville, which is just outside of his hometown, while he tried to start his own lawn cutting service company for both residential homes and businesses called Michigan Maintenance and Restoration. But a few months later, Ramsay went missing. On Sunday, January 26, 2014, Donna reported her son Ramsay missing to the St. Clair Shores Police Department. She explained to them that the following evening, around 6.30 pm, he left the house on foot to get a pack of cigarettes and then he never returned.

She said that she checked the local bars and places that he usually frequented, but she couldn't find him there either. According to the neighbors, they had last seen Ramsay two days earlier on January 24, 2014. When Donna informed her sister-in-law, Allison, about Ramsey's potential disappearance, Allison suggested that Donna post to Facebook about it. But Donna said she didn't want to because Ramsey would be embarrassed if he wasn't actually missing. When Donna reported him missing to the police, she didn't provide them with a photograph

and didn't seem to be very worried or visibly upset about his whereabouts. So police didn't begin like a massive search or anything immediately because also he's 32 years old. So they're like maybe he's just gonna be back soon. Yeah and I knew that that would be the first thing that they would say. And I mean especially since she wasn't super worried they're like okay we'll kind of keep our ears open, but I'm sure he's fine, kind of thing. Yeah, that totally makes sense. I mean, if she's not worried about the situation

then why should they be, I guess. I think to them, she was kind of like, I'm just reporting him missing as a precaution, just so you guys are aware, but I'm not sure where he is. Like, she probably made it seem like it wasn't that big of a deal. And at that time, he hadn't even been gone for 24 hours. Two days later, Allison noticed that Donna had scratches on her wrists and her arms.

And Donna told her that she had gotten them from searching along Lake Saint Claire for Ramsey, apparently she'd come in contact with some branches. Four days after Ram Ramsay was reported missing on the chilly winter afternoon of Thursday, January 30th, a woman driving on a snowy rural road surrounded by bear trees in St. Claire, Michigan saw a collection of black trash bags along the road. And as she drove by, she saw what she thought was a human head near one of the bags, as if it had rolled out of a bag. There also appeared to be a human foot sticking out of another.

When police arrived to the rural road to investigate the suspicious garbage bags, they discovered six bags scattered across the snow-covered area, all including human remains. Alongside the remains were a power-skilled jigsaw, four saw blades, a woman's sweater, jogging pants, charred gloves, socks, burned matches, a melted plastic bag, a Coca-Cola bottle, and men's pajama bottoms. The remains were immediately collected and brought in for identification, and an autopsy was then conducted. After collecting fingerprints, the FBI analyzed them and quickly determined that the remains they discovered were indeed those of 32-year-old Ramsey's ramsie's screvo, and during his autopsy, a medical examiner found that his cause of death was asphyxiation by ligature strangulation. They also found four times the typical recommended dosage of Xanax, which he was prescribed to, in his system, and could have attributed to his death, and potentially killed him on

its own if he had not been strangled. They also determined that his body was cut into 14 different pieces by an electrical saw and that they had all of their remains in their possession, except for his right arm. The medical examiner determined that Ramsey was drugged before being strangled, and the drugs would have caused him to be incredibly out of it or unconscious by the time the strangulation occurred, and then he was dismembered. It also appeared that someone tried to burn his body, but eventually failed. So now police started taking this whole case incredibly seriously.

They checked his cell phone records and determined that he hadn't made a call since January 24th, which was the last day he was seen by neighbors and two days before his mom reported him missing. But Donna said the last time she had seen him was on the evening of January 25th, so the day after his last cell phone activity. When police processed the scene where the garbage bags were found, a witness came forward stating that they had seen a white female in a gray or white SUV dumping the garbage bags there. So investigators drove around the area looking for businesses with security cameras.

And lo and behold, they found some at a nearby gas station. From that gas station security footage, they were able to get a better look at this woman who had just so happened to visit this gas station, and they couldn't believe who it was. The woman at the gas station in the SUV that matched the description by the witness was Ramsey's Music Donna Scrivo had a 1990s Chevy Blazer, and this was the very vehicle that police saw Donna in on the security footage at the gas station near the area where Ramsey's remains were found. It's also the vehicle that a neighbor told police they saw Donna loading black garbage bags in before Ramsey'sains were found. It's also the vehicle that a neighbor told police they saw Donna loading black garbage

bags in before Ramsey's remains were found. Weirdly enough, before police were able to search the Chevy Blazer, Donna removed her license plates and then donated the car to the Mother Wattles Car Donation program in Detroit. And according to the program manager, Donna had called him explaining that she wanted to get rid of her SUV as soon as possible. And just a few days before this, she had donated a 2006 Ford Focus to the same charity. And guess what? The Ford Focus belonged to Ramsey Scrivo. Uh-oh. So police started to think that maybe she donated the car so they would believe her narrative that Ramsay was missing. And the fact that his car was missing pointed to the possibility

that he had gone off on his own free will. But now they find out that it was donated. Another neighbor quickly came forward with information regarding said Ford focus saying that it had been broken down and they were going to help Ramsey fix it. But just before Donna reported Ramsey missing, he went over to the condo to talk to Ramsey about his car and Donna answered the door in a nightgown and a jacket. Donna explained to him that Ramsey never came home the night before, after going for a walk around 6.30pm. The neighbor, whose name is Tim, remembers Donna looking a bit of a mess. And a couple nights later, on January 29, Tim noticed something else suspicious.

It was a freezing cold night, and he saw the basement light on and a bedroom window open. It was late, so he wondered why someone would be in the basement and why the window would be open when he himself was shut in his home with the heater on because it was under 10 degrees Fahrenheit that evening or below negative 12 degrees Celsius. So he called Donna and asked her about it and she told him that she had woken up from a nightmare in a cold sweat, so she opened the window. And we'll touch back on that later. In the suspicions against Donna kept pouring in. As investigators continue to process the garbage bag scene, they found Donna's DNA on the

Coca-Cola bottle that was found in one of the garbage bags. And this isn't too incriminating since it's possible that that bottle had just been in Ramsey's condo or possibly in the trash bag that was used to dispose of his remains, but still an interesting find nonetheless. As we know, Ramsey's body was dismembered by an electric power saw. Well, get this. A witness came forward who worked at the local Lowes Home Improvement Store and stated that they believed Donna had come in on January 27, 2014, the day after reporting Ramsay missing to buy a jigsaw. She was apparently very nonchalant during her purchase, but seemed to be in a hurry. She then returned later that evening around 8pm and a hurry once again,

stating that she needed assistance immediately because the jigsaw that she bought earlier wouldn't charge. And at places like Lowe's, the employees are usually really knowledgeable about their tools and products, so employees asked Donna what she needed the saw for? Because Donna wasn't sure if it was the right tool for the job that she had. But Donna kept avoiding the question until later when she told him that she just had various projects around the house to do. And for those who aren't familiar with Jigsaws, they're the kind that you like put on a table that you usually use to cut wood. This isn't like a chain saw that has a big blade sticking out. So using a jigsaw seems like an incredibly odd choice to cut up a body with because it would be very, very difficult to do. And since she wasn't sure which tool she needed and she couldn't say why

she needed it, Lowe's just replaced the 7.2 volt power jigsaw that she had purchased earlier that day. So same saw, just one that charged. But the same brand and type of jigsaw that she purchased that day was found in the garbage bags along with Ramsey's body. They couldn't match it for sure because of an issue with the serial number, but

we can probably all agree that that can't be a coincidence. Yeah, and what an idiot trying to use a jigsaw to cut up a body. That's definitely the worst type of saw to use. In the beginning, when I was first hearing about this case and I was doing research on it, I didn't know what a jigsaw was. I was picturing a chainsaw or something like a chainsaw. And then I decided to Google what a jigsaw looked like. And I was like, oh, that's the kind of thing that you put on a board and you just move around and it cuts the wood.

That's not something that you use in the air to like cut human flesh. Like how the hell did that work? Yeah, to be honest with you, I don't actually know how that was even done, because it would take a long time to use a jigsaw to dismember a body. Like thinking about like how long that blade actually is, and then thinking about the like diameter of Ramsey's leg, which he was kind of a bigger guy.

I don't even know how you do that. Yeah, and into 14 different pieces. So it's just, it's really eerie to think about anyway, but it's just, it also doesn't make any sense. And if you need a visual, just Google Jigsaw and you're gonna be like, what? It's possible that another tool was used alongside of this Jigsaw, which is what I actually believe,

but that's not confirmed. Well, the weird thing about that is, I think if that was true, they would have found evidence of it unless they had gotten rid of this other power tool, but obviously she went into lows to buy this jigsaw the day after she reported Ramsay missing. So really weird timing. And then to me,

that just means she obviously didn't have any kind of electrical tool that could have done that job in her possession. And then for this jigsaw to be in the bag along with his remains, like, it's just weird. Yeah, it's really weird. I just don't even understand, it must have taken a really, really long time to do that job. So at this point, there was just too much pointing to Donna being involved in Ramsey's death. So on January 31, 2014, just one day after Ramsey's remains were discovered, 59-year-old Donna Scrivo was arrested by the McComb County Sheriff's Office for mutilation of a corpse and the removal of a dead body without permission from a medical examiner since

they couldn't quite pin the murder itself on her get, and her bond was set at $250,000. After her arrest, the police obtained a search warrant for Ramsey's condo, and as soon as they entered the home, they smelled bleach, which is always a red flag. Always a big telltale sign there. So as they searched the home, they saw multiple things pointing to Ramsay being murdered there, including a large white spot on the upstairs carpet that appeared to have been from bleach.

In the bathtub, they noticed charring, as if someone had been burned inside the bathtub, they noticed charring as if someone had been burned inside the bathtub, and they immediately thought of how different parts of Ramsey's body had been charred as well. So now they're thinking that maybe he was burned in the bathtub, like somebody tried to dispose of him by burning him up. Exactly. And what a terrifying discovery to go in the bathtub and see this charred, or sorry, go into the bathroom and see this charred or sorry, go into the bathroom and see this chart bath tub

because that's not a typical site. You don't see like burned bath tubs ever. That's not a thing. Yeah, that's definitely not a thing. And not only this, but they could also smell a faint burnt chemical smell. And by the way, we posted the photo of the bath tub on our social media accounts if anybody wants to see that.

It's not gruesome, so just remember the dark spots are burns, and they're not actually blood. And even earier to see the burnt tub, and then remember that Ramsey's remains were partially charred because someone attempted to burn them and kind of put two and two together, like, ugh. This whole case is basically that, it's basically putting two and two together, like, ugh. This whole case is basically that. Like, it's basically putting two and two together

in all angles. I mean, first you have the jigsaw, then you have the burnt tub, like, what else, you know? Yeah, and I don't know the layout of the condo, but I bet that the bedroom window was open, not because Donna had a nightmare and woke up in a cold sweat, but because she was trying to air out the house

of those smells. Because remember, the window was witness to be open by Tim the neighbor just one day before Ramsey's remains were found when the act was all said and done. Oh yeah, she was definitely trying to cover up either the smell of the body or the remains being burnt in the bathtub. Because I can only imagine trying to burn a body in a bathtub is going to create a pretty foul smell. Well, that and the bleach. So putting two and two together, especially that when police went into the house, they

smelled everything immediately. So obviously she didn't do a very good job of airing it out. But why else would you keep the window open when it's your house is probably cold with the window closed. So even if you woke up from a nightmare, probably not going to be hot when it's less than 10 degrees Fahrenheit outside, like your house is probably not going to be hot inside. So she definitely went through the effort to try and cover up something. Wonder how she thought of that so fast. Oh, the nightmare woke up in a cold sweat, probably not very unlikely. And something to make the whole bath tub scenario even stranger is that

the day before Ramsey's remains were dumped and discovered on that roll road, Donna went to visit her in-laws and she asked them if she could take a shower. When investigators discovered this, they felt that she had only asked this because she probably couldn't take a shower in Ramsey's condo because his body was sitting in the bathtub. Traces of Ramsey's blood was found in the bathtub, on the bathroom and bedroom walls, on the front porch, and on the hand railings in the house. So there was a lot of evidence here. Although investigators didn't quite have a motive for why Donna would want to brutally murder her son, everything

pointed to her being the culprit. But she outright denied it every time she was questioned. She acted so horrified that they were even accusing her, yet after they informed her that her son's dismembered remains were found before they arrested her, she showed no emotion. Even the neighbors were dumbfounded, they just didn't think Donna could ever do something so horrible, which I don't think any of us can fathom such a crime, but you know, people in the neighborhood obviously knew both Donna and Ramsey since they had been living there together for many months at that point and they were all just so shocked. Donna's trial began in May of 2015 and during the trial Donna changed her story. Always a red flag never changed your story.

Never a good thing. She stated that on the morning of January 26, 2014, so hours before she reported Ramsay missing, a masked man went into Ramsay's room stating he was going to kill him. She said that she had been in the basement doing laundry and when she returned upstairs, the front door was open, and that's when she saw the man in Ramsey's room. The mass man tied her to the bed while he killed Ramsey and then forced her to help him dispose of the remains, and if she didn't comply, he would harm her or other family members. And she testified this in court to the jury. She said she never saw his face and couldn't describe any of his physical features because

he never removed his mask. So she was pleading not guilty to all of the charges. She put all the blame on this masked man. But how odd to bring this up 16 months after Ramsay was killed. Like if this was true, how was it not the first thing that she told police? You know she says it was because she was afraid that her family would end up paying for her talking about the masked man, like that if she brought him up that he would go in

her family. But then suddenly she blabs the whole story in court so much later. It just doesn't make sense. And that is the zaniest. That's the zaniest story. Like what, what a whack-a-do. That's such a zany and strange Like out of the ordinary story like first of all who is who wants to kill Ramsey

Why would they go into his home to kill him while his while his mother is there and then why would this mask man ask Ask his mother to cut up his body and why wouldn't he just kill you? Why wouldn't he just kill Donna then? Is it everything you're saying is like exactly what the prosecutor said? Okay, so here's what she said happen. She stated that she threw up while the mass man made her help saw her son's body. So she said that it was like such a horrible experience and that the mass man was the one to make her go to Lowe's and get the saw, and that while she was inside, he was sitting in the backseat of her car. She then explained that he directed her to a rural area and forced her to pull the garbage bags out of the car

and put them on the side of the road as fast as she could. Donna said that while this was happening, she was crying, and that the man kept screaming at her to hurry up. When she wasn't doing it fast enough, he pushed the rest of the bags out of the car and they drove and headed for a car wash. Once they got the car cleaned and emptied it out, the masked man apparently made her change the car's title and donate the car so police couldn't search it. And the prosecutor really gave it to Donna regarding this whole car donation thing because he was just an utter disbelief that after getting rid of the bags, the first thing that this

masked man wanted to do was get the car title changed and have the car donated. Like it just seems so silly. It's just the most far-fetched made-up story that anybody could possibly put together. Right. And I mean, you made a really good point. Like, why didn't he kill her? It just...it's so silly. Like, there's no reason to keep her alive and then try to save both of you by donating the car and changing the car title. This guy would just kill them both and be off. Along with this potential suspect, aka the masked man, her defense also pointed out that investigators failed to pursue any other suspects, even

though there were a couple of other suspicious people in the story. Their neighbor, Tim, had witnessed a young woman driving a Chrysler sea-bring, peering into the Scrivaux basement window around the same time that Ramsay went missing. Donna said that this was an in-law and that she was suspicious to her. There was another suspicious person around the Scrivaux house around this time reported by neighbors, and also on top of that there was another suspicious person that was seen at Donna's nearby home that was still being repaired

from the fire. They also pointed out that Donna has absolutely no history of violence or aggressive behavior and that she was a beloved nurse who helped people her whole entire life. On top of that, 60-year-old Donna Scrivo was frail and small and weighed about 110 pounds or 50 kilograms, while Ramsey was five foot nine inches tall and weighed around 230 pounds or 104 kilograms. So a lot bigger than Donna. So people questioned how she would have been able to kill him and then transport his body to her car. Yeah, and her defense team really weighed heavily on that because if you look at pictures of her

and then you look at pictures of her and then you look at pictures of him, it does seem really weird. It seems like how would she be able to accomplish such a task? She was 60, he was half her age, so they really leaned on that whole fact. But the evidence was far too damning. They had so much going against Donna and and for her to change her story to something so unbelievable, made things even worse for her. When they really questioned her about this story, they noticed all the holes.

Especially since during these five days she was living in the house and supposedly dismembering her son's body, she went to Lowe's and to see her car insurance agent regarding the car donations. So why not ask for help then instead of going along with doing such an unspeakable act? Like you would think if your son's already dead and you haven't dismembered him yet, if there's a man making you do it, you tell someone so that you don't have to do that, just seems really odd. Also she had stated that the masked man hurt her, but when neighbors saw her during those

five days, she didn't appear injured at all. And it didn't make any sense to the court why this masked man would have let Donna live, just like Heath brought up earlier. During the trial, over 30 people testified, and a few being Donna and Ramsey's neighbors. And one woman reported hearing a saw being used during these five days. She wasn't very suspicious of it because apparently Ramsey did a lot of projects, but during this project, she also smelled a burnt chemical odor coming out of the condo, which was very, very odd to her. And I'm assuming it was the same smell that the investigators smelled in the bathroom.

And remember when we said that Dan Screvo died of organ failure? So it turns out that Donna had been giving him a vitamin B12 shot, and the shot site eventually became infected. This infection was left untreated, and then multiple of his organs failed because of this. On top of that, he did have coronary artery disease, which is a well-known heart disease caused by plaque buildup. But according to Allison, who again is Dan's sister, Dan had been suffering from hepatitis C since he was in his 20s. He had gotten it from using an infected needle in the days that he was addicted to drugs,

so hepatitis C was something he had been dealing with for years. But a couple of weeks before Dan's death, he had complained to his sister, Allison, about his side hurting where Donna had given him the shot. And when Allison asked Donna about it, she told her that she knew that the site was infected, but Dan wouldn't go to the doctor. Soon after this, Dan did in fact go to the doctor to get this wound checked out, and they discovered that he had blood poisoning and a really intense infection, causing his organs to fail really quickly. Dan died the very next day, but ultimately, it's unknown whether or not Donna purposefully

contributed to Dan's death, but we honestly wouldn't put a pastor. Yeah, it's known that he also wasn't prescribed vitamin B12 shots, so it's also unknown to us why she was giving him them in the first place, but obviously it wasn't the B12 itself that harmed him since it's nothing more than a beneficial vitamin. You know, it's not like she was drugging him, but to me, it kind of seems like the infection was likely an accident because I feel like if she was going to purposefully kill him, like why not inject him with rap poison while he thinks he's getting his usual B12 shot or something, unless that would have been too obvious.

Yeah, I feel like that would be way too obvious if she was going to use the rat poison. They would have detected that right off the bat. So I think she probably used the fact that she was a nurse to help Dan believe that he was being treated or cared for when in reality she was probably killing him or trying to kill him all along. I can't confirm this, but honestly if she's willing to cut up her son and dismember her son, I kind of could see her doing something like that to her husband. I agree. My only question is how would she get an infected needle? I mean, I don't know. Maybe that's an easy thing to do is to infect a needle or just make it not sanitary and put it into someone and hope it gets infected,

but if she had also been telling him to go the doctor and he did in it, just, I don't know. I don't know if she did on purpose. But my point is also that it's possible that she was telling Dan, hey, if you're feeling any pain in that side, don't worry about it. That's just a side effect of this helpful drug that I'm giving you. Yeah, I mean, it's definitely possible.

Anyways, back to the trial. The jury deliberated for just two hours, and they determined that Donna Scrivo was guilty of the first degree premeditated murder of her son Ramsey Scrivo, and she was sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. The weird thing is that they never discovered any blood or skin cells that directly put Donna at the scene of the murder, and they really couldn't figure out a motive. There was no evidence that Donna was abusive towards Ramsey, and there wasn't any kind of big insurance payout for him.

But Jason Scrivo, her eldest son, apparently believes that she was behind it, which says a lot. And he didn't even show up to any of the trial dates, so it didn't seem like he supported her in her fight for justice at all, since he didn't believe in her innocence, apparently. My theory is that Donna was having a really hard time with Ramsey after the situation with the house being burnt up and the fact that she had to move in with him. I think that things came to a head

and she really just couldn't deal with him on a daily basis like that. You know, and I know you're saying people were skeptical of how she could have done it since she was 110 pounds and he was 230 pounds, but I feel like Given this situation. I mean anything is really possible Especially if she has a saw and I know that that saw is kind of hard to use to dismember a body

But it's definitely also possible and I think that since neighbors had heard the situation going on It's very likely that she had drugged him with the Xanax, realized that he wasn't dead, or possibly drugged him with the Xanax to put him out, and then strangled him so he would actually die, because she didn't want him to go through any pain or anything like that, and then dismembered his body. Well, I saw some theories online that she was trying to collect insurance from the house fire and from Dan's death and Ramsey found out and was gonna out her so she killed him,

but I didn't find anything supporting any kind of big insurance money at all for Dan's death, the fire or Ramsey's death. So I just can't imagine why she would do such a thing and do it so sloppily, unless, like you said, she was just really struggling watching after Ramsey because of his declining mental health and she wanted him gone. But the crime was just so intense and horrific that I can't imagine like a normal person just casually doing this. So I feel like something was just very wrong inside of her nonetheless.

It's just hard to imagine why she would do this to her own child. But I did read that the prosecutor on her case actually had a theory that she had begun a new relationship in Dallas, Texas, where she's from, and wanted to like start over. So she killed Ramsey to kind of get rid of that burden. But I don't know what evidence the prosecutor had that she had a relationship in Texas. And I know the prosecutor asked her in court, like, oh, did you hire a guy to do this?

You could start over because if Ramsey's dead, then you get a whole new life, don't you, kind of thing. And of course she denied it. But I thought that was kind of interesting theory that maybe she was like, okay, I just wanna get away from this and have a new life kind of thing. I don't know. Yeah, I mean, that definitely makes sense, especially if there's something that's like

you said, you know, Ramsey's this burden to her at this point because now she's living with him. She doesn't have any space from him. And she has to take care of him because he's got mental health issues. And so putting all that together with the fact that she has a take care of him because he's got mental health issues and so putting all that together with the fact that she has a new relationship, I mean that could definitely make sense in my mind. The funny thing is, is she was the one who was like, I need to be his legal guardian so

that I can watch after him. Like she's the mom in the situation, so for her to then kill him based on him being a burden, you know, she was the one who put herself in that position. So if she wanted to just leave, she could have just left. Why do you have to brutally murder him? Well, maybe she thought that she could take care of the situation and she also thought

that maybe people would judge her if she wasn't the one to step up in the situation and take care of Ramsey since Jason was living in New Orleans. Right. You know what's really just silly, is that there's so many cases like this that we talk about where somebody murdered their wife or their husband or whatever,

just because they wanted to be divorced, they wanted to be a loner, that they were a burden or whatever. And it's like, oh my God, just get a divorce, just leave them. Like, how do you think that murder is going to fix this? Because you're always going to get caught. Yeah, exactly. You know, more often than not, you're going to get caught. For her to think that she's going to get away with this and that she would be able to start a new life is kind of crazy to me. Obviously she had some big issues if she's going to be

all casual about dismembering her own son's body. So clearly we're not talking about someone who's really in the right mind because someone who is would never do something like that. The lengths that she went to to lie about this situation and to try and cover her tracks is honestly some of the the craziest lies I think we've ever talked about on this show. I know that they tried to paint her as this the defense tried to paint her as this frail 60-year-old woman who could how could she possibly move this 230 pound man? Well that's what the saw was for. She cut up his body put them into different bags so that she could

easily out-remove them from the house, put them into the car, and then go dump them. I think that her first, the first thing that she did was that she tried to burn the body and realize that that just really wasn't working, because she thought that that would be an easier way to get rid of the bodies, and she obviously couldn't pick him up and physically remove him from the house.

But when she realized that that wasn't working, that's when she went for the jigsaw. That actually makes a lot of sense. I think that if anything, the dismemberment points to her more because it's not like we're talking about this big dude or these two people working together where they could have carried the body and gotten rid of it that way, but it points to her even more doing it because he was dismembered, meaning of course she couldn't carry this large man so she had to cut him up. And yeah, just like you said, she probably wanted to burn him and thought she could just like incinerate him as if she has like a freaking cremating machine and realize, oh wait, that's like not that easy to do with just

a freaking match book, which is what she used. There was matches found in the trash bag. It's not that easy to burn a body. I think what she was thinking is that she was going to pour some chemical that was extremely flammable on the body, use the matches to light the matches and then throw them on the body. But I mean clearly that was not effective. And obviously she did that in the matches and then throw them on the body. But I mean, clearly that was not effective. And obviously she did that in the bathtub and that's why the bathtub was burned. So it clearly didn't work. So she had to resort to buying the jigsaw,

which she did two days after he was last seen, likely two days after he died. She realized, shit, I have to dismember him so I have to go buy a saw from freaking lows and then she went on with it Seriously, I they just think she's a she's a fucking liar That's in my opinion. She's a liar and she got caught so many different times even though her physical evidence wasn't there Everything else points to her. Well, unfortunately, you know to this day She maintains her innocence and still says that

the masked man in dark clothes is behind the whole thing, which I hate when people do. Like you're in prison for life just tells the truth. So even though there's so much pointing to her being the one behind it, we may never know why she actually did it and exactly what happened that night. Donna Scrivo is currently 66 years old and is still incarcerated at the Women's Huron Valley Correctional Facility in Ipsilanti, Michigan, where she will remain for the rest of her years.

Thank you so much everybody for listening to this episode of Going West. Yes, thank you guys so much for listening. This one was a roller coaster. Next week we'll have an all new case for you guys to dive into. Alright guys, it is time for the shoutouts. First, I would like to thank Beach Life Angel. You said some really nice things. I don't know your name or location, but thank you so much.

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