Law&Crime Sidebar - Idaho Murders TikToker Doubles Down, Claims Jury Will Believe Her ‘Evidence’ Against Professor

Episode Date: December 29, 2022

The Tiktoker being sued for defamation by a University of Idaho professor claims the jury will side with her in court and that her "evidence" connects the plaintiff to the student murders case. The Law&Crime Network's Jesse Weber and Constitutional Law Professor Kermit Roosevelt break down the severity of this lawsuit.LAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergVideo Editing - Logan HarrisGuest Booking - Alyssa FisherSocial Media Management - Kiera BronsonSUBSCRIBE TO OUR OTHER PODCASTS:Court JunkieObjectionsThey Walk Among AmericaCoptales and CocktailsThe Disturbing TruthSpeaking FreelyLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. They will see in court while it is true. A TikToker doubles down on her claims that a college professor is the real killer in the University of Idaho murder case. Constitutional Law Professor Kermit Roosevelt joins to discuss. Welcome to Sidebar, presented by Law and Crime. I'm Jesse Weber. You would think that after

being sued, you might quiet down and not double down on the behavior that you're being sued over? Well, that is not the case for Ashley Gillard. This is the TikToker who's claimed that a University of Idaho professor is the real killer behind the quadruple homicide case. I'm talking about the killings of

21-year-old Kaylee Gonzalez, 21-year-old Madison Mogan, 20-year-old Zaner-Kernodal, and 20-year-old Ethan Chapin, whose bodies were found in their off-campus rental home back on November 13th. Now, at the time of this recording, no arrests, no publicly identifiable suspect, no indication of the murder weapon's been recovered. And what this has generated is people online coming to their own conclusions and theories as to what happened. Well, Ms. Gillard has posted videos that Rebecca Schofield, an associate professor and chair of the history department,

was in a relationship with one of the victims. It seems like she's indicating it's Ms. Consolves. And then that she planned and carried out the murders of these four people. I haven't done readings on certain agencies and entities because that's kind of crossing the line. But just no, I'm not the only one who suspect Rebecca Schofield. They want both of them. Now, Schofield filed a defamation lawsuit against Giller. People just don't get it.

Like, I've been against people, vegan small corporations and giants and systemic. policies and racism in one. They all regret coming against me, all of them. Now Rebecca is going to be added to that list of regretful people. But that hasn't stopped the social media personality from doubling down on her claims. No, in fact, she sat down for an interview with News Nation. When I go to court and they see the evidence or they see how I connect the docs, then they'll make a decision as it pertains to whether they want to continue to live in blinders or believe it.

If they don't, that's, I don't care. Let me bring in Kermit Roosevelt. Kermit is a David Berger professor for the administration of justice and focuses on constitutional law. Kermit, great to have you here on Sidebar. Thanks. Thanks for having me. What do you make of her comments?

Well, you know, it suggests that she's just not taking a realistic perspective on this, particularly like if they don't believe me, I don't care. If they don't believe her, she's going to be liable for a lot of money. Again, I said that you would think that somebody who's hit with a defamation lawsuit, which is very serious, would quiet down. She has not. She is doubling down. My concern is, my concern.

And by the way, just to let everybody know, Moscow Police Department came out and said at the time of this investigation, detectives do not believe the female associate professor and chair of the history department at the University of Idaho suing a TikTok user for defamation is involved in this crime. A part of me is concerned that her going to court, her fighting this, is giving her a platform to further her claims. What do you think about that? Well, you know, if you're looking for a rational explanation,

for the way she's behaving. I think that's all it could be. You know, it's clout chasing. She's looking for publicity. She's trying to magnify her reach. And yeah, you know, getting involved in a controversy like this can do that. It's probably going to come at significant cost for her. So it doesn't seem like a good thing to be doing. It doesn't seem like a smart strategy, but I think that's the only explanation. Well, does anybody have a First Amendment right to go on social media and talk about this case? I mean, where do you think she might have crossed the line? Well, you can talk about the case. And, you know, you can even say, you know, I'm going to flip a coin. And if it comes up heads, I think that means that this person is the murderer.

As long as you're pretty transparent about what you're doing and you're saying what the basis for your conclusions are. But, you know, she's putting out as assertions of fact claims that this woman is involved in the murders and there doesn't seem to be any evidence for that. It's a very strong defamation case against her. So you think in terms of it was the idea that if she had came out and said, you know, I just. suspect that it might be the professor. That might have been something different, because there are people online right now who have a ton of different theories and a ton of different speculation, and they're pointing the finger and they're saying, look at this piece of evidence, what would be your message to all those people out there? Well, you know, I guess I would say be careful,

but, you know, some of that is protected. If you're like, here are the pieces of evidence and here's what I think. Or if you're saying X percent of the time, it's the boyfriend. You know, usually it's the husband who kills the wife, something that's based on statistics about actual cases. All of that is protected. What you can't do is make factual claims about a specific person without a reasonable basis for them. And there doesn't seem to be any basis at all for this. It's just sort of wild accusations. So I should tell you that Schofield's attorney sent News Nation a statement denouncing this accusation, says, quote, the statements made about Professor Schofield are false, plain, and simple. What's even worse is,

that these untrue statements create safety issues for the professor and her family. They also further compound the trauma that the families of the victims are experiencing and undermine law enforcement effort to find the people responsible in order to provide answers to the families and the public. The impact that the statements had on Schofield and her family, how does that factor into the analysis? Well, that would factor into the damages. And it does seem there's the potential for serious reputational harm.

She's being accused of crimes and professional misconduct. And then worse, there's the fact that you get other people on the internet who make aren't very good at distinguishing truth from falsehood or well-supported claims from unsupported claims, who then take this and run with it. And so now the professor has a whole bunch of people on the internet coming after her. And she says that she's concerned about her safety. Here's the question that I have, though. And before I forget it, if Gillard truly, in her heart, believes that Schofield is the killer, this was different than other cases where we, you know, we say, didn't you know this wasn't true? And didn't you?

you know this was false, but you pushed it anyway, maybe for profit, maybe for attention. If she truly believes this, is that going to change anything? No. So truly believing what you're saying is not a defense to defamation. It depends on whether it's false, and it depends on whether you were negligent or reckless in not realizing that it was false. So if you're sort of deluded and you really believe what you're saying, but there's no reason to believe it, you're liable for that. And something that you hit upon that kind of strikes me is even if Schofield wins this lawsuit, even if there's a settlement, her reputation can never come back, right? Because we kind of saw

this in the Alex Jones case where even though Alex Jones eventually, you know, kind of backtracked on the Sandy Hook comments, there were people who still believed him and there were people who were still coming up to the families. There are people, like you said online, who are going to maybe have trouble distinguishing between what is reality and what is true. She has already come under the radar. She's already had to been looked at by the police. What happens if, I mean, do you think she'll ever be able to have the life that she had? Do you think that her reputation could ever be recovered? And I'm curious what someone in her position should do next. Well, you know, I hope she can have the life she used to have. I would say there's sort of two different levels on which this

operates. And professionally and with the police, I don't think there's a problem because I think everyone understands there's no basis for this. But then you have the crazy world of the internet where people are taken in by conspiracy theories. And there, yeah, it's very hard to undo something like this. And then the other problem, an interesting comparison to Alex Jones, is Alex Jones probably can't pay the full judgments against him, but he has a lot of money. And there's a lot of money available, and he's really going to suffer a serious loss from this.

But who knows how much money Ashley has? I mean, she might be relatively judgment-proof. So you can get a big judgment against her, but if she has no money, it doesn't really have any effect. Yeah. Well, what happens if she, wouldn't there be some order that she has to stop saying this? Or could that be a situation or not really? I mean, if she just keeps doubling down, let's say there's a judgment against her, but she has no money and she keeps pushing the falsehood. Well, eventually you can get an injunction against it. And then if she defies the injunction, you can get contempt of court. And so eventually it could turn into a criminal offense. Yeah, I mean, that's the part that I'm interested in because she seems to not be stopping. And I am curious about what a trial would look like. what evidence could she present on her side that might be beneficial? Well, I can't think of anything.

There's nothing I've seen in the videos. I mean, as far as I know, it's from tarot cards. And you can sincerely believe your tarot cards, but you are negligent at the least, you know, if you think your tarot cards have told you who the murderer is. But that was a line you never thought you'd end up saying. Kermit Roosevelt, thank you for taking the time to talk about this case. And hopefully we'll have you back on to see how it ultimately progresses. Thanks a lot.

And that's all we have for you, everybody. Thank you so much for joining us here on Sidebar. We really do appreciate it. Please subscribe on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, wherever you get your podcast. I'm Jesse Weber. I'll speak to you next time. You can binge all episodes of this long crime series. Add free right now on Wondery Plus.

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