Let's Go To Court! - 169: Cold French Fries & a Texas A&M Professor

Episode Date: April 14, 2021

Cindy Reese had a bad feeling. The second she opened her front door, she saw that her house had been ransacked. She called for her husband, Michael, but he didn’t answer. Clearly, something was wrong. So Cindy called the police. When they arrived, police discovered Michael Reese dead on the kitchen floor. He’d been shot execution style. Cindy was stunned. As she told it, she’d narrowly missed encountering the murderer herself. She and Michael had been to church that evening, and afterward they got some fast food. When they arrived home, Cindy remembered she needed some orange juice and ham from the grocery store. She told Michael to take their dinner inside. She’d eat with him after she got back from the Piggly Wiggly. But investigators didn’t buy Cindy’s story. Then Kristin tells us about the suicide of a Texas A&M professor. James Aune was a pretty big deal. He was a tenured professor who’d authored two books on rhetoric. He had the respect of his peers and his students. But James had a dark side. He spent a lot of time online, mostly in chat rooms. One day, he met an 18-year-old woman named Karen. James was smitten. He opened up to the teenager, and she did the same. Eventually, Karen confessed that she wasn’t 18. She was 16. James didn’t have a problem with that. In fact, he exchanged nude pictures with her. Then it backfired. And now for a note about our process. For each episode, Kristin reads a bunch of articles, then spits them back out in her very limited vocabulary. Brandi copies and pastes from the best sources on the web. And sometimes Wikipedia. (No shade, Wikipedia. We love you.) We owe a huge debt of gratitude to the real experts who covered these cases. In this episode, Kristin pulled from: “Web of Lies” ID show, titled, “Online Education” “The strange and sordid end of an A&M professor,” by Ross Dubois for Texas Monthly “Man accused of blackmailing Texas A&M professor pleads not guilty,” by Maggie Kiely for The Eagle “FBI says man was blackmailing Texas A&M professor before suicide,” by Maggie Kiely for The Eagle “Man gets year in prison for extorting Texas A&M professor,” Associated Press In this episode, Brandi pulled from: “Even The Devil Went To Church” episode Dateline “Cindy Reese” episode Snapped “Michael Reese’s Wife Shot & Killed Him to Be With Her Pastor” by Caroline Warnock, heavy.com “Church-goer and her pastor lover killed her husband so they could be together” by Gail Shortland, The Mirror “Cindy Reese sentenced to prison for 2015 murder of her Morris husband” by Ivana Hrynkiw, AL.com    YOU’RE STILL READING? My, my, my, you skeezy scunch! You must be hungry for more! We’d offer you some sausage brunch, but that gets messy. So how about you head over to our Patreon instead? (patreon.com/lgtcpodcast). At the $5 level, you’ll get 19+ full length bonus episodes, plus access to our 90’s style chat room!  

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A proud member of Wayne's Auto Group. One semester of law school. One semester of criminal justice. Two experts. I'm Kristen Caruso. I'm Brandi Egan. Let's go to court. On this episode, I'll talk about a Texas A&M professor.

And I'll be talking about a love triangle. The fuck did you just say? Bells, bells. I'm sorry. I just, I had a moment. You know what I realized all of a sudden? You don't have any lip lube?

I, my lips are dry. The driest lips this side of the Mississippi. That's right. That's right. And the people have let us know that they value

my lip moisture. A lot the people have let us know that they value my lip moisture. A lot of people have written in. Just oodles and oodles of mail. Very excited about yours. You know I love a love triangle. Never want to be a part of one. Love to hear about one. I feel like we've got a big development we need to talk about before we get to the cases.

Just what the hell is that? That we have both gotten vaccinated this week. Yes. Yes. Oh, my God. I'm so excited. Me too. I think Walgreens heard me talking about how much I love them on the podcast.

It's possible. And I got in at Walgreens for the Johnson & Johnson single dose vaccine this morning. You know who I think heard me talking? Who? Bill Gates. You know what's funny is that my cell phone reception was immediately better after I got my vaccine. All the conspiracy theories are true.

Are you watching the QAnon thing on HBO? I haven't started it yet. I haven't either. I'm dying to watch it. Okay. But I'm not sure I'm ready yet because I get real, real angry. Yeah, it's kind of infuriating. I started it

and in like one of the earliest scenes, you see a man, and granted it's been a while since I watched this, but I believe you see a man in a button down shirt. Okay, fine. And like, I think it was like tear away sweatpants.

What? I know, and I was like, already I'm too disturbed by these people. I can't. That's someone. Oh, I don't even want to hear about. That's someone who would testify in court wearing a zip-up hoodie. So that's who that is. That is.

And I don't even want to hear about someone like that. Also, Brandy, I have to apologize to you right at the top of the show. Why? I made fun of you multiple times. Oh! Oh, hold on! Let me make sure I'm fully prepared to hear this! Uh-huh.

You guys, she's got her head cocked to the side and she's folded her arms quite smugly. Multiple times on this show, I have made fun of you for watching the show Survivor. Oh, I believe I recall that. Yes. And in our Discord, someone was like, hey, Kristen, you know, like, you do like reality shows.

Like, you should probably watch Survivor. And it's like, well, yeah, I do like reality shows. So I had some free time this weekend and i thought why why not i'll just this is not an ad for paramount but they've got 40 fucking seasons of survivor this is terrible i put on a random season i was glued glued to the television norman came down at one point and I think this should be against the law because I started this sentence with I know this is dorky, but...

Okay, so they were in one of their challenges. They were doing their, you know, running and oh my God, can you carry the water? Okay. That was happening. I said, I know this is dorky, but my heart is racing right now. And he was like, what?

Your heart is racing and you're watching Survivor? Yes! I'm afraid so. Yes. I catch myself smiling at the television when the people I want to be voted out are voted out. Yep. Yeah. Yep.

It's, um, sorry, Brandy. I appreciate that. This is not the first time in our friendship where you have recommended something to me. I've made fun of you for it. And then like three years later, I'm like, so that's it. That's pretty good. It was pretty good. Anyway, I woke up early this morning to watch an episode. I'm serious.

I woke up early. You like peeked your eye open and you're like, I'm going to have TV to myself right now. I'm going to go watch it. Here's the thing. I normally wake up a little early on Wednesdays to like make sure I have enough time to read through the case. But Dottie woke me up super early. And for a second, I was pissed. And then I was like, I could get up and watch Survivor right now.

And that's what I did. Anyway, I'm so glad we saved all that for the top of the show. That's right. Because people, they don't all that for the top of the show that's right because people they don't tune in for the true crime stories they tune in for talk about 10 year old episodes of survivor all right you want to talk about a love triangle i do all right is this a good one you guys oh wait are you like starting off by telling us that you have a bad case today? No, it's pretty good. Oh, okay.

It's pretty good. Okay, okay. It's pretty good. Tune in, folks. You have a little issue with your eyeliner? I have a leaky eyeball, and now I have smeared my eyeliner. You got allergies? Yeah.

Yeah. It's raining outside, which means that the pollen is just being kicked up. Anyway, I'm very sensitive to pollen. Just a couple of cool chicks here. That's right. I took my allergy pill. I did a nasal. You know, one of those.

That's way too intense. Is that how you're taking your nasal? I thought I was going to do just like a little. Like the cutest. I thought I was going to do just like a little. Like the cutest. Do this little. Full on warthog dance.

You guys. I know that had to shock you all. Because when you think of me, you picture a supermodel, which is accurate. But sometimes even a superhot supermodels can sound like warthogs. Yeah, so I take an allergy pill at night and a nasal spray in the morning. Wait, why do you take it at night? Because all allergy medicine makes me drowsy.

Oh. Yeah. Maybe I should take it at night because all allergy medicine makes me drowsy oh yeah maybe i should take mine at night you might try it out i mean i wouldn't listen to me my fucking eyeball's still i was gonna say yeah you're what london has a watery eye too she's got a big old bubble butt and watery eyes. That's right. Okay, anyway, on to the business. All right, enough about butts. Shout outs to a Dateline episode that I won't tell you the name of. Okay, they ruin it.

Yeah, that's right. An Oxygen Show, which I will not tell you the name of. And an article for The Mirror by my girl, or guy, actually. I'm not really sure. Okay. Gail Shortland. I've used articles by Gail before. Why does your face look like that?

I was thinking judgmental things. Oh, okay. I personally feel Gail should only be a woman. I think it's a unisex name. It is. It is. I know. It is. And then I'm thinking, who the hell am I to tell someone that they've got to be... I was going to say, dudes

can be named Kristen, too. We knew a dude named Kristen. No, we didn't. Yes, we did! We went to high school with a guy named Kristen. He was super hot. Oh. No, that was Christian. No, his name was Kristen Well he was hot enough

He could get away with it Okay so if your name Is Kristen and you're a man You have to be super hot To get away with it I think in general If you've got a bad name You've got to be really hot

To balance it out Which is why parents Shouldn't do that to kids Because it's too much of a gamble You don't know how A kid's going to turn out And that's Kristen's Jeep why parents shouldn't do that to kids because it's too much of a gamble. You don't know how a kid's going to turn out. And that's Chris's

Jeep. All right. Here we go. Cindy Reese was no stranger to trauma, grief, and loss. When her

first husband died by suicide, she had been the one to find him. Following his death, she had fallen into a deep depression. For months and months, she hadn't wanted to leave the house or even get out of bed. Eventually, though, as the years passed and her grief became more manageable, Cindy's friends and family encouraged her to put herself out there, date a little. Her cousin even had the perfect guy for her. He was a friend of a friend named Michael Reese, and he'd gone through a loss of his own. It wasn't a death, but to Michael, it sure felt like one when he was blindsided by his first wife filing for divorce. Were they like, oh, my gosh, my last name's Reese.

Your name's Reese. Wow, we should get together. No, her married name is Reese. I didn't bother to look up what her maiden name was. Brandy, am I being shitty right now? Yes. I knew you'd fucking say that. I know you did. I 100% did. No, you didn't. I was like, oh, shit, I better go back and find out. And then you'd fucking say that. I know you did.

I 100% did. No, you didn't. I was like, oh shit, I better go back and find out. And then I was just like, I don't fucking care. That'll teach you a thing or two. Like Cindy, Michael had gone through an almost grief-like process mourning the loss of the life that he knew. But now he too was ready to put himself out there.

Do you have a rat tail? I'm sorry, I have a rat tail. Do you have a rat tail? Yes. A curl has escaped my ponytail. I thought I didn't need bobby pins today. I apologize. Anyway.

Sorry. Michael was ready for love. All right. And so their mutual friends arranged for Cindy andy and michael to go out on a date and they hit it off what year was this uh like 2010 okay okay yeah i kind of i mean yeah no i internet dating was around then yeah it wasn't the thing it is now right it was still a little embarrassing if you met online. Yeah. Whereas now it's super embarrassing. What if you met on a hookup site?

What if you were just looking for D and then D stayed around? And then the D stood for David. It's a love story baby just say yes would you like me to sing at the wedding i thought that taylor swift was in the room i know i know the thing is i will sing at your wedding for free taylor swift not so much what if i'm secretly best friends with taylor swift and you have no idea i would think you were lying. She's asked me to, like, keep it quiet.

Yeah, I'd be like, Randy, that's not a real friendship. If you were really friends with Taylor Swift, I'd be like, oh, that's great for you. You would see in my eyes that I wasn't happy for you. I'm super happy for you. You would see in my eyes that I wasn't happy for you. Cool. Have other friends. That's fine. That's healthy. I also have other friends.

Demi Lovato. I'd be super jealous. I know you would. I'd pick Demi Lovato because I knew you would be jealous. Anyway, the relationship quickly became serious. And before long, Cindy and Michael were married. Their friends and family said they were the happiest they'd ever seen them. They were sure they'd be married for the rest of their lives. By 2015, though, Cindy and Michael had been married for five years and they'd found themselves in a bit of a rut.

Cindy didn't feel as connected to Michael as she once had. Why did you say connected that way? I don't know. Okay. Okay. Because physically they were not connected. All right. All right.

She felt like every evening they came home, sat on opposite sides of the couch. Michael played on his phone. She watched something on TV. They never went out. They never had sex. Cindy was bored. Okay. went out. They never had sex. Cindy was bored and lonely. Finally, one day she broke down and told Michael how she was feeling, and they vowed together to put more focus on the relationship. It would be like a fresh start.

Cindy felt excited about their relationship for the first time in a long time. The couple even took a second honeymoon back to Disney World, where they'd originally honeymooned five years earlier. Lots of people do the honeymoon at Disney World. You better keep your judgment to yourself over there, Kristen. I know. Lots of people get married at Disney World. I know. Lots of people get married at Disney World. I know. That just sounds like your nightmare, doesn't it?

It does. It really does. But all that. Like, do you have to have, like, Pluto show up at your wedding? Probably. And then you have to be, like, a grown-ass woman ass woman and be like oh I'm so excited Pluto's here. Yeah and you wear like Minnie Mouse

ears that have a veil on them. Right? We'd better stop talking about Pluto. Because I'm having a tough time holding back my judgment. Anyway it was a very exciting time for Cindy and Michael,

who loved Disney World, and they didn't share your weird feelings about it, Kristen. They loved other adults dressed up as cartoon characters. Yeah, that's totally normal. I think that's great.

You won't get any judgment from me on that one. Did I tell you? Okay, I'm sorry. I know this is a lot of tangents right off the top, but on the related note of me being a judgmental asshole, I got together with Kyla a couple days ago. And I told her about a new snack that I'm eating. And it's a package of goldfish crackers. Here's what I do.

Take off the top. I get a handful of cashews. Dump them in there. Mix them all up. And I mean, to tell you how to live your life, I do one cashew, two goldfish crackers in my mouth at the same time. Norm has been judging me for this snack. Thinks it's gross. So I told Kyla about it.

And she was kind of like, hmm, you know what I've been doing? Also with goldfish crackers. She tells me she's been taking off the thing open them up gets a handful of raisins yeah dumps them in there yeah and i was like ew and she got outraged because i was coming to her with my snack saying hey my husband's judging me and she goes you can't judge me i'm judging you yeah and we decided that's our family crest you can't judge me i'm judging you yeah and we decided that's our family crest you can't judge me i'm judging you so we start laughing about this okay so then easter sunday comes around and we tell my mom ha ha funny thing we came up with our family motto it's you can't judge me i'm judging you

and my mom no shit says well that doesn't really roll off the tongue. Judgment! She judged it! So anyway, if you're an adult who doesn't have kids and goes to Disney movies by yourself, I don't think

you're a pervert at all. Go ahead. Anyway, it was a very exciting time for Cindy and Michael, but that excitement would be short-lived. Because just a short time after they returned from their second honeymoon, Cindy Reese found herself standing in the front yard of her home, calling 911 to report what she believed was a break-in. It was February 18, 2015, and the evening had been pretty standard for Cindy and Michael. It was Wednesday, so they'd attended church, as they always did because they live smack dab in the middle of the Bible Belt in the small town of Morris, Alabama. After church, they'd stopped at Cindy's mom's house to put out her trash for her, and then they'd picked up dinner and gone home. Cindy had dropped Michael off. She told him she needed to go run a quick errand.

They needed ham and orange juice for the next day. So she told Michael she'd run up to the Piggly Wiggly real quick. Did she really go to Piggly Wiggly? She really went to Piggly Wiggly. Oh my god, I love Piggly. Okay. And that she'd be right back. When Cindy came home though, she had opened the front door to find that the house had been ransacked. The coffee table had been flipped over. There was stuff thrown all over the floor. She called out for Michael, but she got no response. Cindy called 911 and reported what she believed was a break-in. She told the dispatcher that she'd just come home,

found the house a mess, and that she couldn't find her husband. Police were on the scene in like the blink of an eye because Morris, as I said, is a very small town. And the police station was like right across the street from the Reese home. Okay. Cindy stood in the front yard and watched as the officers made entry into her home. Almost immediately, though, it was clear that something was horribly wrong inside the house. The officers found the inside of the home to be just as Cindy had described,

ransacked. But toward the back of the house, they made a shocking discovery. Michael and Cindy were in the middle of putting an addition onto the back of their house. When the responding officers made their way through the kitchen to the unfinished construction area,

they found the back door to the couple's home standing open. And there on the floor lay Michael Reese in a pool of blood. He'd been shot execution style in the back of the head. Initially, investigators thought Cindy's suspicions might have been correct. It looked like Michael had come inside after Cindy dropped him off and likely interrupted a robbery. But on closer inspection, investigators realized that there was no sign of forced entry. And it didn't look like anything had been stolen. And it was like a really weird time for a break-in.

It was like 8 o'clock in the evening. Not peak break-in time. When do people usually break in? When people are at work. Oh, well, yeah, okay. Yeah. Or late at night. Like not like, you know, right after dinnertime when everybody's at home.

Yeah, yeah, sure. This is very helpful because I've never robbed anyone, but I'm planning to. You're planning to. You're taking notes. I am. I see you over there. And then police kind of took a better look around and they thought that the scene maybe looked a bit staged. So why are people this stupid? Like, take the valuable stuff.

So initially when I read that in an article, I was like, what does that mean? Like, how could they tell it was staged? But then I saw footage of the house on one of the episodes of the shows that I watched. And let me tell you, this house was clearly just, like, a sloppy house. Like, they just lived pretty messily. And then it was, like, one table was pushed over. Because it wasn't just, like, papers and stuff on the floor. There was a pile of laundry and a pile of trash.

And, like, yeah, it was very clear that, like, this wasn't that out of the norm of their usual living conditions. Okay. Yeah. Okay. So that same evening, they sat Cindy Reese down at the station and got her official statement on what had happened that evening. And she walked them through her night. They'd gone to church like they always did on Wednesday night. They'd gone to put out her mom did on Wednesday night. They'd gone to put

out her mom's trash for pickup the following day. And then they'd stopped at Milo's Hamburgers, which is apparently an Alabama staple. It's a fast food restaurant that's only in Alabama. And they'd gotten burgers and fries. And then Cindy had dropped Michael off at home. It was like as they were pulling up that she realized they needed stuff for lunch the next day. And then Cindy had dropped Michael off at home. It was like as they were pulling up that she realized they needed stuff for lunch the next day. And so she was like, you go ahead, go inside, you know, get our dinner, plate it up. I'm going to run, pick up the stuff and I'll come right back home. That seems really weird to me. Yeah, doesn't it? I mean, honestly. Yeah, I agree. Well, you know how I am about food. Yes. If the food's there, I'm not leaving.

Okay, just hold on. I'm not going to go, oh, I must have orange juice and ham. And how long does it take to eat a fucking burger and fries? I would go in the house. Could you keep your fucking pants on? No, I can't keep my pants on. I cannot. They're off.

Their pants are right. I've torn them. They're breakaway sweatpants. They're breakaway sweatpants. Now I've just got this button down on. Am I not allowed to tell you? No, you're absolutely right. It's fucking weird.

It's super weird. But Cindy's just telling the investigators this. Like, it's like the most normal thing. And they're like, Cindy, have you ever had a hamburger before? You want to eat that hot. Okay. Just you wait, Kristen! Sorry, I'm sorry.

Investigators, like, listen to her tell this story. And they were like, okay, okay. They're, like, taking notes, you know. And then they asked Cindy if she knew who would do this to Michael. And she said, I have no idea. Honestly. Oh, that was a good accent, Brandi. Thank you.

Thank you. And they're like, okay, honestly, huh? Great. Wonderful. I'm glad you're being so honest. Because it's very clear when people say honestly that they're telling 100% the truth. Okay. Sometimes I have caught myself saying to be honest.

Yeah. And then I think, oh, my God, they think I'm'm lying I have done the same thing yes yeah and so then they're like okay does Michael have any enemies and Cindy says I I have no idea wait what you're fucking husband you would of course have an idea yeah it's yes or no. Right. Right? Does he have no... Oh, I just met the man. I met him at Disney World. Yeah, exactly.

No, this is your husband of five years. He was dressed as Pluto. And I just have always wanted to bang the shit out of Pluto. So, yeah. So, like, this is your husband of five years. They're asking you if he has any enemies. And your answer is, I have no idea. Maybe Mickey, he was eyeballing me, too.

So I watched some of this interrogation, and I can tell you that Cindy was doing that thing where her voice was a wavering, you know, like she was crying. But there was not a tear to be found. Yep. This came as no surprise to the investigators, though, because they had been suspicious of Cindy from the moment she sat down in that room. Yeah, because who leaves a hot hamburger to go wiggly wiggly? She gave them a statement which they deemed to be chock full of red flags. What had Cindy done

to make them so sus? You ask Kristen? Well, I'll tell you. Wait, was it really the hamburger? Fucking what? What? Just you fucking wait! I've never been more proud of myself. So as I mentioned earlier, Cindy Reese lived in a small town.

Morris, Alabama. Population 859. Goddamn. No, that's wrong. Population 1859. Less than 2,000 people. Pretty small town. Depends on who you ask.

Knock your ass warm. Less than 2,000 people. Pretty small town. Depends on who you ask. Not if you ask more. Well, you know what they say about small towns and rumors, right? Yes. I have no idea, but I assume that there's like several weird southern states about it. So insert your favorite one here.

Okay. Anyway, as it turned out, Cindy Reese was already on the investigator's radar because the police had been getting some complaints about her lately. What about her? So they had received several complaints about two people having sex in the parking deck where the county employees parked. Oh, God. At some sort of county building nearby. Yeah, like multiple complaints. Wait, like in a parking garage?

They're just going at it? Yes. In a car or outside of a car? That's the question. It is the question. It is the question. I don't know the answer. Gross.

Yeah. So they've gotten multiple complaints. And it turns out that Cindy, who worked as an accountant for the county, was one. Ew, wait. Wait, she was doing this at her own work. Talk about shitting where you eat. No kidding. She was one of the people that had been seen engaging in sex acts in that parking deck.

Gross. Can you fucking imagine? No, I can't imagine. You're in your parking garage for work. You're, oh, do-do-do-do-do. Just, you know. There's the fucking accountant Cindy just going at it with someone who was not her husband. I think that'd be the least of my concerns.

So, they have already, she's already on the radar because of this. And then when her husband is found murdered that day, the homicide investigator gets a call at home and they're like, hey, we have a homicide. Also, guess whose husband it is. It's that bitch who's been banging on the parking deck. And so like, oh, wow, it wasn't me. Like, oh, that's, you know, a problem because, yeah, it looks like, hmm, she was having an affair. That maybe seems like there's a very clear idea

of why Michael Reese was murdered. Not just an affair. I mean, that's like a gold star affair. Yeah. If you're banging in the work parking lot... I know! And I assume this guy

also worked with her? He did not. He came in an exterminator truck. Are you serious? Yeah. With one of them big old bugs on top. No. I don't know if it had a bug on top.

I'm imagining that it did and then you can't stop me. Don't even try. Don't even try to ruin this for me. So they're like, okay, we know this woman is having an affair. So right off the bat, all this stuff about rekindling her marriage and all of that, like, they're listening to her statement and they're like, bullshit, bullshit,

bullshit, bullshit, bullshit. Additionally, Cindy had made two comments in her official statement that the lead investigator believed were red flags. Okay, let's hear them. The first. I don't like hot french fries.

Was that they'd picked up dinner at Milo's and then she'd gone to the store to pick up ham and orange juice, which they needed for breakfast and lunch the next day. Okay. On this episode, the lead investigator breaks down why both of these statements are bullshit. Okay. First, the dinner from Milo's. According to this lead investigator, Milo's is known for their seasoned french fries. Famous for them, even.

This is advertising money can't buy. But any Alabaman worth their salt knows that those things must be eaten hot. It's practically the law. That's true of any French fries. You don't want to. Yeah. So the fact that Cindy had picked up dinner and then was just going to go to the store, leaving those famous Milo's fries to get cold.

Yeah. No. Well, that old dog just don't hunt, Kristen. Okay. So, no, you're completely right. The investigator was like, I'm sorry, what? You picked up fucking fast food and then you're like, let me run an errand? Yeah, no one does that.

No, exactly. Second, that emergency trip to the Piggly Wiggly for the orange juice and the lunch meat. Uh-huh. Everybody in this show has amazing Southern accents. So the bag from that grocery trip never made it into the house. Because, like, Cindy came home, opened the door, oh, the place has been ransacked, calls the police. So it never made it into the residence.

calls the police. So it never made it into the residence. But somehow, when police checked the fridge, there was an ample amount of both orange juice and ham in there. Okay.

Sorry. They didn't need either of them, Kristen. This is such a weird way to solve a murder case. I know, right? But if there was ever a case that I am capable of solving. You would have solved it. You knew it right away.

You're like, nope, uh-uh, absolutely not. And sure didn't look like they needed orange juice or ham. I just love it because, yeah, that's exactly what you said. And that's exactly what this lead investigator was like. And they're like, really? Not eating her French fries is what clued you in that she was like, and she's like, absolutely. Okay. Anyone who's confused by this is not living their life to the fullest i must say right have you ever been

like oh hot french fries no thank you i think i'll wait i think exactly exactly you don't have to go to the milo's i'm sure their food is lovely but anyone who's eaten french fries knows you eat them right away yeah yeah this is one of my great passions in life. So the investigator, like, calls Cindy on these bullshit statements that she's made. And she admits that she had been having an affair with Jeffrey Brown, the former pastor at her church. Brandy, you and these pastors. I know. I love a scandalous pastor do pastors ever just preach or do they only bang their congregants I mean for real according to this podcast

yes this affair had gone on for a couple of years wow yeah well they weren't too subtle about it, were they? Okay. No. They weren't subtle about it at all. So they had met when Jeffrey first came to the church and he was made like the lead pastor. Right. So at that time, Cindy was the choir director. And so they worked pretty closely together lining up the message of the sermon.

That they did. And the music. You know, you want to hit the points with the right hymns, Kristen. So they started working pretty close together. And Cindy has to admit to you that she found him very attractive from the first moment that she met him. Okay. Those robes. What's underneath them? I don't think. Those robes. What's underneath them? I don't think they wear robes in Baptist church.

No? I don't think so. I think they just wear, you know, they're kind of more cash. You think so? See, I don't think of Baptist as cash at all. No, I agree. I agree. But I don't think they wear like a whole.

One time? One time. Yeah. Okay. Well, this, so my grandma's Southern Baptist. I know, I think this is a Southern Baptist church too. Okay, okay. You're right, I don't. Which is like the least cash of them all, but.

Okay, they don't wear robes though. One time, they had some young minister come in and he preached in jeans. He might as well have had his dong out the way they were talking. Oh, he might as well have testified in court wearing a zip-up hoodie. Oh, my God. You are your grandmother. I know. Oh, God.

Oh, no. You can't judge me. I'm judging you. Oh. God. Oh, no. You can't judge me. I'm judging you. Oh. Oh. So at first, they were just friends. And actually, Jeff and his wife became good friends with Cindy and her husband, Michael. Oh, I love that.

That's great. They hung out together a lot. Cindy and Michael didn't have kids of their own. So they watched Jeff and his wife's kids a lot. Cindy and Michael didn't have kids of their own, so they watched Jeff and his wife's kids a lot. And then one day, as they were looking through a hymnal, their eyes met and just sparkled. Brandi, are you making this? Yeah, I'm making that part up completely.

What hymn was it? I don't know. How Great Thou Art. And all he could think about was how great Cindy was in bed. Or in car. In car. In pest control van. With a giant roach on top.

You've got to be careful with those chemicals. You don't want those things to spray in. And you certainly don't want them in your downtown areas. That would be feel good. Brandi's so proud of herself, guys. Anyway, eventually it was like a full on affair. They were banging on the reg, but the rumors

about them banging in the parking deck, those had been greatly exaggerated. They never had sex there. No. Multiple people say you had sex in the parking deck. You had sex in that parking deck. That's not true. And she also

told the investigators that she had completely come clean to Michael about the affair. That she had called it off a couple months prior. That's when she'd come clean to Michael about how she was feeling about their relationship and feeling not close to him because it was as if someone was between them. And she had vowed to take her marriage seriously and they went on that second honeymoon and things were great and she had no idea who could have killed michael honestly this is the dumbest thing ever yeah also if you really wanted to reignite your marriage i'm sorry i know people love disney world but you don't think disney world the place to do it? Don't you think you could find a sexier place? No.

No, impossible. The sexiest place on earth. That is their slogan. You'll be rock hard. So she admits all of this to the investigator. They'd had an affair, but they'd call it off, and now they were just good friends. But she did say that night that Jeff had called her, and he said that he was at the gas station down the street, and he'd forgotten his wallet at home, and that he just needed some gas.

What? And so that's where she went that night. Oh, my God. No, this is so stupid. She went and met him at the gas station, gave him $15 for gas. He couldn't have called his own wife? They were in the middle of a divorce, Kristen. He couldn't have called anyone else?

Because he had ended his marriage to be with Cindy. Hmm. Mm-hmm. Hmm. Mm-hmm. ended his marriage to be with Cindy. So she's like, I did. I did leave. I let Michael go in the house. I left. I went to the gas station. I met Jeff. I gave him the money for the gas.

But that was it. That was it. We aren't having an affair anymore. I pinky swear. And I double pinky swear that I have no idea who could have possibly shot Michael. Well, then you're just stupid. Maybe it was the contractor who's

doing the work on the house because, like, he has a key and everything. And they're like, oh, yeah. So much motive. I'm sure. It makes so much sense. The investigator had one more question for Cindy. She asked why when Cindy had seen the state of the house and she'd called out for Michael and he hadn't answered, why hadn't she gone in and looked for him? Exactly. Wasn't she worried about him?

Yes. Wasn't she worried about him? Yes. And she told the investigator that the whole scene was triggering flashbacks to when she found her first husband dead. And she just couldn't go in there. Did she murder her first husband? Okay, so legit, they like, after this all comes out, they look into it and they weren't able to find anything that led them to believe it was anything other than a suicide but people had questions yes so yeah so that was one of the first things the fact that she didn't go into the house and look for her husband who she should be very concerned about right that was one of the first things that the police were like

because when they walked in the house were like because when they walked in the house like as soon as they walked in the house there was a clear view to the back that that back door was open yeah and they could see what they thought was like a foot on the floor yeah yeah so it didn't take like a bunch of searching around to find him well and if this sloppy house the only thing that was really out of place was an overturned coffee table, then I'm sorry, but you're going to keep looking. Yes, exactly. Yeah, she's like, no, I just couldn't go in there. I just couldn't go in there.

I was just having flashbacks to when I found my first husband dead. So at that point, they didn't really have enough to hold her on anything. They just had a bunch of weird shit and some pretty good suspicions. And so they let her go that evening and she called for a ride for somebody to come pick her up. And Jeff Brown came and picked her up. And they watched as they left the police station together with his hand on the small of her back.

Are you kidding me? Right? Right? And so they're like, yeah, Jeff, how about you come on in here and let's just have a little chitty chat real quick. But I was about to bang. Yeah, exactly. And so they bring Jeffrey Brown in and he's like, yeah, we've been having an affair. And I'm in love with Cindy.

I told my wife everything. We're getting a divorce. And they're like, wow, I can't believe you just. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So he's no longer the pastor at the church because a bunch of rumors had been going around town, and the elders at the church approached him, and they're like, hey,

people are saying that you're having an affair with Cindy. And he was like, not me. I would never. And they're like, hey, people are saying that you're having an affair with Cindy. And he was like, not me. I would never. And they're like, I don't know. Doesn't look good. And they're like, I think you should resign. And he was like, OK, I'll resign. And so now he was working as a exterminator.

He'd also held like a whole shit ton of jobs. He'd been a hairdresser at one point. He was like a handyman at one point. He was in the military at one point like i bet he was terrible at all those things um yeah that's actually what they say what the investigator says she's like yeah and what what's that saying she goes yeah what's that saying you know jack of all trades good at none good at none that's what she said she made it a little cuter and so so they're like

so you are actually getting a divorce then and he's like yeah I'm in the middle of a divorce right now and they're like so you're

do you think you and Cindy are gonna be together and he's like absolutely and they're like so how did you feel when Cindy

like went on a second honeymoon and didn't seem to be ending things with Michael? He didn't really have an answer for that. He's like, well, you know, she was getting around to it. She's getting around to it. And they're like, OK. And so then they're like, OK, we're just going to ask you the tough question here. Did you shoot Michael? And he says no.

And he goes, I wasn't even around. I wasn't even in town. I was over an hour and a half away doing whatever with no one. Like, yeah, he cannot back it up in any way. OK. He's like, yeah, I've been I was out of town. I was like an hour and a half away. And her story is that she was that he was at a gas station like 15 minutes away.

Okay, cool. And they're like, okay. These two should have spent less time banging and more time planning. Right? Because their next question is, what about Cindy? Did Cindy shoot Michael? And he goes, I have no idea. Oh.

Yeah. Ooh. Ooh. Ooh. oh yeah oh and then they asked him how he felt about michael the person standing between him and cindy being together being dead like how does that make you feel and there was the longest most uncomfortable silence ever after that. And finally he said, I have no words. What kind of weird fucking response is that?

Wow. Yeah. Yeah. So they ask him a few more questions. They only interviewed him for like 30 minutes that night. Towards the end of the interview, they circle back again and asked him if he'd killed Michael. And he said something to the effects of like, come on, I'm a pastor. I'm a father.

And he's like trying to go on about how he's like this great guy. And the interrogator like interrupts him. And he's like, you were having an affair. And it seems like you've got quite a history of, you know, unfaithfulness. And this fucking guy goes, don't hate the sin or hate the sin. Woo woo. No. He legit says don't hate the sin or hate the sin.

Yeah. Yeah. That's some Southern Baptist stuff right there right there yeah and they're like cool cool cool wonderful have a great night don't go too far like so he leaves that night and they're like well obviously cindy and jeff are up to fucking something which one of them did this or did they plan this together and so they get a warrant to search the house like to search cindy's office and stuff and they find a file in cindy's office in her home that she shared with her husband michael who is now dead no there is a file

that says jeff brown on it and inside that file is the lease to an apartment that she has leased for him. There's the paperwork to a car loan that she took out for him. There is a joint bank account that she shares with Jeff. Yeah.

Like all this stuff. And then in her office there's like an 8x10 picture of her and Michael. Mm-hmm. Together looking, you know, like a lovely couple. And then right under that is an 8x10 picture of her and Jeff. What? Right?

Yeah. Oh, my God. But they were just best friends. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Oh my God. But they were just best friends. Oh yeah. Yeah. I keep a lot of 8x10 glossies a year. So they subpoena like all of their phone records. Sometimes I just look at the switch.

I just look at them. So they launch a full investigation. I am not acknowledging this. I'm very uncomfortable. Brandy, I promise you. That you've never looked at my picture and touched yourself. Thank you. I promise you.

I appreciate that promise. I planned to, but then, like, I got the food. You don't want to waste the french fries. Right, right. That's right. So, you know, then that plan was dashed. Yeah. Anyway, so they're like, okay, so Cindy's telling us that, like, this relationship is over, but she's, like, helping support this guy.

She's got him in an apartment. She's got a car loan for him. Is this guy just, like, handsome as hell? I mean, no, he's not that good looking. And I didn't find him particularly charming in any of the footage I saw of him either. Hmm. Yeah. So then they start looking at their call history history and they're just talking constantly and sending.

Well, they're best friends. Sexting constantly, sending hundreds of nude pics back and forth. One of the investigators are like, they interview him on this Daylight episode. He's like, I can't tell you how many naked pictures I had to see. That poor guy. Yeah. that poor guy but what they note is that specifically

on the night that Michael Reese was killed while Cindy and Michael were at church together, Cindy received a text from Jeff that said, keep me posted. Mm-hmm. And it was, like, right as church was getting out. Yeah. And so to them, that's, like, a sign that, like, okay, they are putting a plan in action that night.

Mm-hmm. okay the play at the they are putting a plan in action that night and then a couple minutes later cindy places a call to jeff brown and leaves the line open for 30 minutes is a 30 minute call but during that time she would have been with michael the entire time they would have been with Michael the entire time they would have been making those stops and so it was just like a way for her to keep Jeff apprised of where they were so they're like this is it this is what we need they communicated that night they planned this together what they couldn't do was prove who had physically killed Michael who who had pulled the trigger. Probably that general contractor. Right? Yeah.

But in Alabama, it didn't matter. If they planned the murder together, they're both charged with the same crime. It doesn't matter who physically pulled the trigger. Is that kind of like felony murder? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Same kind of concept. Yep.

And so they were like, OK, I think this is enough. They had plotted this together. It was clear that they were in an affair. It was clear. What are you doing? What do you mean? What are you doing? What? What are you doing? Well, I think you're being really rude to these people because like they're clearly just friends. I think you're being really rude to these people because, like, they're clearly just friends. And they're just sexting. Are you sending me a nude picture of yourself right now? I am.

Oh, no! Everybody, I did that super sexy thing for you. Gosh, that looks like a really gross butt, doesn't it? It does look like it. She took a picture of, like, her arm. Yeah, you know, like, just the elbow fat. It does look like a gross butt. It looks like a gross hairy butt. Oh, and I've got that freckle.

It looks like a little mole. Now, Brandy, if you want to turn that into an 8x10 glossy, you go right ahead. Okay, I'll be sure to do just that. You'll probably have to take down some photos of your daughter. Are you playing with a picture of your fake butt crack? I'll be sharing that on Patreon. So the call history, all of that together. There's also a little thing came out that I didn't know this was a thing, but they listened to the 911 call again.

And this was like the last thing that proved to them that Cindy had been communicating periodically with Jeff through that open line during this whole time. Because when she called 911 from the house phone, what people don't know, I didn't know anyway about 911 calls, is they record from the minute the phone starts ringing. Yeah. So before the call has been answered, she says to someone, my cell phone's about to die. Yeah. And so they're like, she's talking to Jeff through that open line. And so they figured this is they're like, this is enough in the in while this investigation is going on.

They're being very brazen about their relationship. Michael has just been murdered and they're out on dates. It's like a month after Michael was killed and they are like on a lunch date when the police come in and arrest them both for the murder of Michael Reese. The police had made a statement to the local media that this duo had plotted together to kill Michael and that the murder

was a result of dark hearts, stupidity, and extreme selfishness. Yeah, okay. Yeah. I mean, this really is the extreme selfishness. Yeah, okay. Yeah. I mean, this really is the dumbest thing. Yeah. I mean, they knew it was them the night of the murder.

Yeah, I don't... Just get a divorce. Yes, yeah. I mean, that's the big thing. Just get a divorce. Yeah, just get a fucking divorce. Holy shit. They were both held on $100,000 bail, which I think is super low for murder.

Yeah. And Cindy posted bail and was out while she was awaiting trial. And so she's just, like, living her life in this little town. And, like, there's this guy. Okay, so I only heard this episode of Dateline. I listened to like the podcast version of it. And so I don't know who like what this man looks like.

But I can just I can picture him. You've got a sense. I've got a sense. And he's just like a man who lived in town. Uh huh. And he just had a couple of interactions with Cindy while she was awaiting trial. And he's just telling Dave. He's real happy to tell Dave.

And he's like, you know, I saw Cindy and I said, you know, what's that old saying? If the spouse is dead, look at the one that's breathing. First of all, that's not a saying. But it should be. Because that's true and then he's like so i saw cindy out there and i saw cindy and i said you know what cindy the first to squeal gets the best deal this guy has a lot of wisdom he does he does yeah and he's like so so he's telling cindy she needs to turn she needs to turn on jeff and this is kind of what the police were banking on.

They're like, one of them is going to turn against the other. We'll get one of their testimonies and, like, we'll know for sure what happened. Yeah, you don't have to explain it, Brandi. The first to squeal gets the best deal. And so he says this to Cindy Reese, and she says, no. She says, my lawyer says I don't have nothing to worry about. They can't prove anything. Oh, yeah.

And so not. No, I don't know. No, no. They can't prove anything. My lawyer says I don't have anything to worry about. So the Dateline correspondent asks him, you know, what did you think when you were when you were talking to her? What did you think when you were when you were talking to her what did you think when you were looking at her and he goes well i thought that i was looking into the eyes of a cold-blooded killer yeah probably yeah so finally it's august of 2016 and jeffrey brown

is like about to stand trial for the murder of Michael Reese. No, neither of them has turned on the other. Like neither of them has taken a deal. They're both about to go to trial. Jeffrey's trial was first. They are minutes from jury selection when Jeff turns to his attorney and he's like, I don't want to go to trial. Let's take a deal. Let's take a deal.

Let's get a deal. Whoa. Yeah. Okay. And his attorney's like, like right now? And he's like, yes. And so like they halted everything and they approached the prosecution and he agreed to plead guilty to manslaughter in exchange for testifying against Cindy Reese. All right.

And he was sentenced to 20 years as part of that plea agreement. Okay. So then in December of 2016, Cindy did go to trial. The prosecution said in their opening statements, they're like, this woman broke her wedding vows in a heinous, horrific, and deadly way. broke her wedding vows in a heinous, horrific, and deadly way. They said that Cindy had planned the murder, that it was a way to be with Jeff, but it was also a way to get some amount of life insurance from Michael. There wasn't a ton of life insurance, but there was some amount.

And their star witness was Jeff. He took the stand and he said that Cindy had often talked about killing her husband. He testified that she would say things like, I wish he was gone. And he also testified that she'd actually asked him to hire a hitman on multiple occasions to kill Michael. Jeez. So there actually was proof of this because at his exterminator job, he walked up to two guys like at the water cooler one day. And asked them, hey, would you kill somebody? Uh-huh. Oh, my God.

And they were both like, what the fuck? No. And they went and they made a report to the police, but it was in a different city. Different jurisdiction. Yes. And so it never got back to the people who were investigating. Yeah. Yeah. And so he testifies about that.

And then he also testified that many times Cindy had mentioned that maybe she could poison him. mentioned that maybe she could poison him and then maybe they wouldn't know or even if they did know she could plead insanity because she suffered from ptsd from her first husband's suicide well that's not exactly how that works no okay all right yeah yeah so the prosecutions told the jury that cindy had shot her husband when they had come back from church, when Michael was like at that back door letting their dog in. She then went to the Piggly Wiggly to have that whole story about how she wouldn't have been at the house when it happened and that she had actually met Jeff that night at that gas station. But she hadn't given him money for gas. met Jeff that night at that gas station, but she hadn't given him money for gas. She'd given him the murder weapon and he'd thrown it out along the highway. And he testified that that is what happened, that she gave him the murder weapon that night and that he threw it out somewhere

between the gas station and his apartment and it was never found. Oh, cool. Mm-hmm. The prosecution submitted to evidence all of those call records that they, Jeffrey and Cindy had talked like 18 times. There were 18 different phone calls between the two of them on the day of Michael Reese's murder. And they did present the information about the life insurance policy. There was a life insurance policy that Cindy was the beneficiary of, and it was like $50,000. Okay, so here's a really weird thing. And it took me a while to figure out what the point of this was, and then I think I figured it out at the end.

So Jeff testified that his relationship with Cindy was never sexual. They never had sex, but they were deeply in love and were going to get married. But they never had sex. Because during his interrogation video, he told the investigators that he believed that Michael was abusive to Cindy because she had bruises on the inside of her thighs. Sir. Excuse me. How are you seeing the inside of her thighs if you're not having sex with her? Well, although it's Alabama, it's super hot there.

Maybe she. Okay. Here's my theory. Okay. At the very end of this episode of Snapped that I saw on Oxygen, they do like the little like this is what's, you know, going on. Following Jeffrey being charged, but before he went to trial he married someone else oh yep yeah right there we go yes oh no i i was in love never had sex never had sex they're never nope nope we totally never just wasn't like that just wasn't like that huh Uh-huh. Yeah. Jeffrey. Jeffrey, come on. Jeffrey. So then. Then what happened?

Cindy took the stand in her own defense. Oh. Oh, sweet baby Jesus, this is wonderful. Bring that dummy up to the stand. What'd she say? So, initially, she seemed very defensive about the fact that Jeffrey said they'd never had sex. And she was like, what are you talking about? We had sex on several occasions.

We were lovers. We were constantly banging. And then I. I don't blame her for this. Right. Because it's like, okay, you're screwing me. Clearly this is what's bothering you. I'm going to be like, I could describe his dick to a skit artist.

I could draw it right now. Exactly. Exactly. And so she was like, and then, you know what? I decided I wanted to redevote myself to my husband. I called off the affair and Jeff became obsessed with me. He called me constantly. Oh, yeah.

He waited outside my house for me. He killed my husband. Oh, yeah. He waited outside my house for me. He killed my husband. That's right. He was so obsessed with me that he killed my husband. And he thought that that would be the thing that would get me to be with him. Yeah, that's like completely their defense. That's what she testifies to. Yeah.

And her defense team actually presented evidence that, I don't know, seemed to be a little bit compelling. Okay. So they brought a ballistics expert in to talk about the trajectory of the bullet that killed Michael. It killed Michael and it killed it traveled at a downward trajectory into his head, which would mean that the shooter would have to be taller than him, which Cindy was not. But Jeff was. Yeah. I don't to me I don't think it makes that

much difference about who fired the shot because I think that they very clearly worked together to kill Michael I don't think the defense's story of he was obsessed and he did it against Cindy's will I don't think it makes any sense at all and then like they're dating

in public like openly. No. For the month between when the murder happened and when they were arrested. No. Didn't happen. Yeah. No. The Cindy's trial lasted about a week and the jury deliberated just 90 minutes before finding her guilty.

Yeah. That seems like an appropriate amount of time. Mm hmm. Cindy was sentenced to 40 years in prison. After serving three years, Cindy was sent to a work release program. Oh, that was like in walking distance to Michael Reese's family. Whoa. Yeah. And so this made like made the news

and there was some very public outrage about this because like she was convicted of murder. Yes. And then three years later she's in a work release program

in like the town where the victim's family lives. Yeah. And so after that like public outrage, they were like, oh, it seems that there was some kind of clerical error

that happened here. And she was sent back to her original prison where she remains today. Several of Cindy's family members seem to believe the defense's version of what happened.

They believe that she wasn't involved in Michael's murder and that it was all the work of Jeff, whom they believed became obsessed with Cindy when she ended the affair to focus on her marriage. I don't buy that at all. No, no, no, no. Nope. Yeah, and that's the story of a love triangle.

Oh. Solved by French fries. Yeah. Yeah. I believe it. I do too. You know, sometimes we get this junk science. This isn't junk science right here.

This is just common knowledge. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Okay. Do you know anything about the case I'm about to tell you about? No, I don't think so. Thank you to Anya in the Discord for suggesting this case.

Shout-outs also to the show Web of Lies on iD. Oh, yes, I've heard of this show. I don't believe I've ever caught it. to the show Web of Lies on ID. Yes, I've heard of this show. I don't believe I've ever caught it. It's a little more up my alley

than your alley. Okay. So stay the hell out of my alley. I was going to say, my alley's much better. The episode is online. I thought you were

talking about your vagina. I didn't know you were making a West Side Story joke. Well, can't it be both? And now that I've sent you those sexy pics of myself, maybe you're more interested in my alley than previously. The episode was called Online Education.

Also, TheEagle.com, Texas Monthly. Love Texas Monthly. And Newspapers.com. Oh. Also, TheEagle.com, Texas Monthly. Ooh. Love Texas Monthly. Yeah. And Newspapers.com. Excellent. What kind of, who we got as an author from Texas Monthly? It was a really short piece, so I didn't give the full shout out.

I'll give the full link. Wow. That's fine. Do you really want to know? No. Because I can pull it up. Okay. No, I just wanted to act cool and be like, oh, yes, I'm very familiar.

It's not Skip. I knew it wasn't Skip or you would have said Skip. I'm smart enough to know that existed. Oh, my God. You guys, you ever want to see Brandy angry? Imply that I'm dumb. Which is not what I was aware I was doing. But it's what I was thinking.

I was like, this idiot. Jim Arnie was a pretty big deal. As you probably already know, he had a PhD. Pretty huge dick. Okay. Maybe, well, maybe he did. You don't know. I don't know.

Yeah. And I hope to never find out. Anyway. Anyway. It was in speech communication, which, fun fact, is the method I'm using to communicate with you right now. Thank you. Again, thank you for over explaining things because I was having trouble

following along. Jim made a name for himself at universities that, well, not quite Ivy League, were close enough to the Ivies that the students all pulled one of these. Harvard? Oh, yeah.

I got into Harvard, but I decided to go to Georgetown instead because Georgetown offered me more money. Again, I could have gone to Harvard, but I didn't want to. Hey, listen up, turds. I cannot stress this enough. Harvard didn't reject me. I rejected Harvard. Jim got his Ph.D. from Northwestern and began his teaching career at Tulane,

and then he went to the University of Virginia, which, fun fact, was founded by Thomas Jefferson, who actually designed all the original courses when he wasn't busy raping enslaved women. So great! Fun facts! One summer, Jim served as a visiting professor at the University of Iowa. And while he was there, a graduate student caught his eye. Oh. Her name was Miriam. She'd been assigned to make sure Jim got settled in okay in Iowa.

When she really made sure, huh? Let's all set aside our concerns about power imbalances here for a second and instead marvel at how quickly these two lovebirds got together. They met that summer. They began dating. By August, they were engaged. And by December, they were married. Wow.

Pretty quick. Pretty quick. Pretty quick. Pretty quick indeed. And as soon as they said, I do, they turned around and screamed, Ha! We beat you! Because evidently these two were in a race to get married. After

that, Jim got a job at the University of St. Thomas, which unfortunately is not located on the island of St. Thomas, but instead is located in St the island of St. Thomas, but instead is located in St. Paul, Minnesota. Wow, that's way less tropical. It's not tropical, but on the bright side, it is home to the sexiest accent you ever did hear, don't you know?

It's just a nonstop bone fest in Minnesota because everyone talks like this and the people just can't keep their hands off each other. Nonstop bone fest? That's bone fest. Yep. But after living in this sexually charged atmosphere of Minnesota for two years, Jim and Miriam were like, we got to get out of here. We're sore. And then Jim landed.

They were walking from side to side. You know that Ariana Grande. that. Is that what that means? That is 100%! Kids these days. She's been banging all night. She can't stand up straight anymore. No, it makes sense. Yes! You got me walking from side to side.

It's funny. She makes it sound sexy but you look like a pirate when you do that. So, that's what I'm telling you right now, Brandi. That I look like a pirate when you do that. That's what I'm telling you right now, Brandi. That I look like a pirate? You are. Thank you for telling me that. Boy, I feel just like a sweet, innocent young thing.

I sing along to that song. I had no idea what I was saying. Okay. I think we've all learned something here today. So Jim landed himself a job as a communications professor for Texas A&M University. Jim flourished. In his new job, he wrote a book, Selling the Free Market, The Rhetoric of Economic Correctness. He wrote another book, Rhetoric and Marxism.

Yes. He wrote another book, Rhetoric and Marxism. Was he one of those douchey professors who wrote a book and then assigned it for his students to purchase and read? Yes, 100%. Probably. Hate it! Yes. What I can tell you, for sure, is that he was well-liked by his students. He was funny. He was witty. He had shaggy hair and a big beard. What more do you want?

Elbow patches. Yeah, I bet you. That's what I want, Kristen. I want elbow patches. He had that professorial look of kind of the shaggy academic, so you know he had the elbow patches. Okay. All right. I bet you he smoked a pipe.

I was going to say, doesn't he need a pipe, too? He didn't even like pipes, but just smoked it anyway. Yeah. For. All right. I bet you he smoked a pipe. I was going to say, doesn't he need a pipe too? Didn't even like pipes. Yeah. But just smoked it anyway. Yeah. For the Luke. Michael Peterson. Stop.

The owl did it. It was that one from the Tootsie Roll commercials. Can I handle it? Can I do it for the podcast? Yeah, you could do it. Do it, Brandy. I don't know if I have the nuts. You've got the nuts.

She's got the nuts. She's got the nuts. Shama-na-ma-na-na. Yeah, okay. Here's an idea. Okay. Listen up and listen good. I'm listening.

What if you did a big one? Yeah. Like Michael Peterson and I do a big one and it's like the whole episode. Oh, yeah. You tell one. Yeah. You know. We could do that.

All right. Would the people revolt? I don't think so. Not if we're giving them the meat still. As long as they're getting the meat from us, Kristen, they'll be just fine. They love the meat. They love when we give them the meat. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Anyway. All right. They love the meat. They love when we give them the meat.

Anyway. All right. I'll consider it. Think about it. Soon enough, Jim got tenure, which is the academic equivalent of a full body orgasm. So his professional life was pretty awesome. Brandy, OK. OK. OK.

But life wasn't quite so smooth at home. See, when Jim and Miriam met, they were two academics. He had his Ph.D., then she got her Ph.D., so they were a pair of docs. Not a paradox, a pair of docs. So Miriam and I knew you would hate it. I hate it. I hate it so much. You don't think that's super cute that they were a pair of docs?

No. I've got more stupid jokes in here. So you're going to have to buckle up. There's more stupid jokes in here. So you're going to have to buckle. Can you just tell, by the way, this is starting, that I've really taken my time to mix in some great puns. You're going to just giggle. Puns aplenty.

So Miriam began teaching, too. But then she had their two sons, Nick and Dan, and both boys were diagnosed with autism. And it was rough. The boys needed a lot of attention and care. Dan was nonverbal and wore diapers, and Nick would sometimes have violent outbursts. So Miriam stepped up to the plate. She was like, okay, I'm going to stay home, take care of our sons. Jim, you make the money, which really seemed like the best division of labor, because according to Miriam, when it came to their son's autism, Jim was just at a loss. He seemed a little embarrassed by the boys sometimes, and he got frustrated because, unlike everything else in his life,

this was something he couldn't fix with a pen and a paper. Right. But even though they'd faced challenges, they had a lot of love in their house. The boys gave Jim a sense of purpose. Jim was a recovering alcoholic, and he told friends that his boys were another reason to stay sober. So the years passed by, and soon enough, it was November of 2007. And because Jim was a cutting-edge communicator, he of

course created a blog. Jim was super into blogging. He posted witty little thoughts and academic stuff and he networked on there and it was all so fun and innocent on the little old internet. By this point, the boys were 16 and 18, and although Jim was doing well professionally, Jim and Miriam weren't very stable financially. And then, during his annual physical, Jim's doctor became concerned about the size of Jim's prostate.

So the doctor referred Jim to a urologist, and the urologist did a biopsy. So there Jim was, waiting and waiting on the results of that biopsy, waiting to find out if he had cancer. The whole thing just sucked, Brandy. Yeah. And during this tumultuous time, he decided to do some research at the University of Austin's library. Texas A&M had a great library, but the University of Austin had different stuff, and he needed to go see that stuff and spend a weekend looking at that stuff.

Okay. Okay, so Jim took off for his business trip, which was definitely a business trip. Okay. Don't worry, he was going to the library. He wanted to take a gander at all the stuff. Okay. Okay, have you ever been to the University of Austin's stuff library? It's great!

You would love it! The library is great. You would love it. But two days later, when Jim came back from the library, he acted like a big weirdo. And Miriam knew something was up. She and Jim had been married for like 20 years at this point. And sure enough, like 10 minutes before Jim was scheduled to teach a class, he came clean. He said, when I was in Austin, I went to bed with a man.

Sorry, got to go teach. Okay. And then he, you know, just skedaddled. Yeah. And Miriam was like blindsided. Yeah. And devastated. And later that evening when Jim came home, she was like, um, hi, what the hell? I'd like more details on that library trip, please. Yeah. And so Jim confessed that he'd met a guy in Austin and the two of them had been secretly communicating for like a week. And then he'd gone out there that weekend and they'd gotten a hotel room and they'd had sex and Jim felt terrible about it. But I imagine Miriam felt worse because then Jim told her that what he really wanted

was to have her and the boys, but to also hook up with dudes on the side. It was a real have your cake and bang dudes too situation. I think a lot of people would sign on for that life. Have your cake and bang dudes too? Yeah. And eat dudes too. Yeah. You're looking like all you want is a sheet cake and some dudes.

And some dudes to bang. What more could I want? Elbow patches. The cast of NSYNC walks in. They're just wearing blazers with elbow patches. Each of the fellas is carrying a sheet cake. And that's your fantasy. To see.

So, you know, Jim presents this scenario that he wants, and Miriam's like, Sarah doesn't fucking work like that. You know, and obviously there are lots of different ways to have a marriage. You know, people can do what they want, but Miriam, this was not her style. She literally said,

I'm a very simple girl. I want all of you on my side of the fence no dongs on the other side get your dong back in the fence so i'm wondering like is the fence the marriage or is the fence the sexuality the fence of the sexuality and she's picturing him just like you know okay a real nice picket fence they've got a nice life right very real nice picket fence. They've got a nice life, right? Very. Real nice picket fence. And he's just got his dick between the slats. And there's some hot dude on the other side. Just lined up ready to, yeah. Yeah.

I get it. But see, like, you don't get to tell someone what they're interested in sexually. Absolutely not. Yeah. But you can say the marriage is the fence. Yeah, exactly. Yeah. Yeah, this is not the marriage that I signed up to, exactly. Yeah. Yeah, this is not the marriage that I signed up to be in. Yeah.

Well, we're a little too little too late for this whole thing. So anyway, this was like 2007. But anyway, just, yeah. Okay. So they were having this big discussion about betrayal and infidelity and sexuality and the evils of lying about libraries and what their marriage would look like going forward. And then they got the results of Jim's biopsy. He had prostate cancer. It all happened so fast. Jim confessed to Miriam on a Monday and then he got the diagnosis on a Wednesday. Miriam said she didn't even have a chance to be mad at him for cheating on her.

Because all of a sudden they're dealing with this life and death issue. Yeah. But the cancer diagnosis was a real clarifier for Jim. He told Miriam, hey, you know what? Forget what I said about the dudes. I'm going to take my dick off the fence post right now. That thing in Austin? One time thing, will not happen again. And even though Miriam was still upset and reeling from the betrayal, she said, okay.

She wanted to help her husband through his diagnosis. And they'd been through hard stuff before, and this was just another hard thing. So Jim had his surgery to remove his prostate, and in January of 2008, his doctors told him that they'd gotten all the cancer. It was great news. But it also came with bad news. As a result of the surgery,

Jim was no longer able to get an erection. And I don't have a single joke about how hard that was for him because I'm classy. And that's why they call me the Grace Kelly of podcasting. Do they? They do. Do they? So many people. So many people tell you that?

Around this time, Jim spent a lot of time on gay.com. I know. That's a website. That's just too straightforward. Gay.com. That seems like the lamest gay website. Are you kidding? Yeah.

Yeah. Like, if you're the most boring gay person on the planet, you go to gay.com. Yeah. That's exactly. Thank you for putting that into words on the planet, you go to gay.com. Gay.com. Yeah. That's exactly. Thank you for putting that into words. Yes. Just like gay.com. Yeah.

It just seems like the most vanilla gay website out there. You know what it is, though? It's. It's the entry level. Yes. Yes. Yeah. It's like, hmm, I'm in this marriage to a woman.

Yeah. I think I might be gay. Let me see what's out there. Let me go to gay.com a woman. Yeah. I think I might be gay. Let me see what's out there. Let me go to gay.com. Gay.com. And then he did the questionnaire. And then they were like, yes, here's the rest of the internet. You know what?

Are you going to gay.com right now? No, I'm going to go to straight.com. I want to know if that's a thing. Okay, I'm going to straight.com. The Georgia Straight. I was going to say, it's a thing. Okay, I'm going to straight.com. The Georgia Straight. I was going to say, it's just going to be bodies of water. That's really too bad. I don't know what I was expecting, like Fred Phelps redirect.

Yeah, that's right. So Jim went into a bunch of like gay chat rooms, which seems a little behind the curve for 2008, but whatever. And in those chat rooms, Jim went by the name Texas Top. Oh. I think that's pretty good. It is pretty good. I mean, he was a rhetoric guy. He chatted with manly hotties like Rodeo Rider, Bullhead, and Flirty Quarterback. I'm blushing.

You kind of are. You do look embarrassed. Brandi, these dudes don't want to talk to you. I know. I know they don't. No, that's not it. I'm just saying, like, I don't even try to imagine what my nickname would be and what my handle would be.

Your real name is so hot, you could just go by Brandy. Okay, if you had to talk to rodeo rider, bullhead, or flirty quarterback, who would it be? Flirty quarterback. I knew it. Why did I even ask? By the way, flirty quarterback thought quarterback was two words, which makes me think this fella knows even less about football than I do. Jim would get in those chat rooms and just chitty chat the day away,

and one day, flirty quarterback told him, wow, what a great beard. Would love to give you a bear hug. Which is a great thing to say in a gay chat room because it works on all the levels. Say what they call a double entendre. You know what I realized, though?

Okay. Okay. When I was watching this episode and the guy said, wow, what a great beard. Would love to give you a bear hug. I was like, oh, very clever. You know, I'm like applauding. I'm like, yeah, you told a bear you wanted to give him a bear hug. I was like, oh, that is great. A plus.

But then I started thinking about it. If you're a bear, do you hear that all the time? You probably do. He wasn't even impressed by it. Well, it would be like if someone came up to you and was like, why did the chicken cross the road? And then they just tell you the joke that everyone's heard before, you know? But, like, I'm hearing it for the first time. I'm like, not bad.

To get to the other side. Okay. Okay. Well played. You had me. So, Bears, let us know. Yeah. Is that a clever line or do you hear it just all the time?

You just get tired of hearing it. Are you like, oh. Is it the equivalent of. What? So you're here for a haircut today? Actually, I'd like a mall cut. Oh, do you hear that like all the time and do you have to laugh every time? Yep.

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Not so much now, but when I worked at chain salons. Yeah. Mm. Yep. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Not so much now, but when I worked at chain salons. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah, it's because you get a lot of dads in the chain salons, and they come in there with

their dad jokes. Actually, I'd like a mall cut today. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.. M-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m-m- But were these real screen names? Did flirty quarterback really tell a bear he wanted a bear hug? Or did these chat logs all come from the imagination of some producer at the Web of Lies television program? Well, if these chats were wrong, I don't want to be right. I hope they're real.

These chats were wrong. I don't want to be right. I hope they're real. I don't know. Sometimes you watch these shows and it's like, okay, are they just throwing in this footage or is this for real? I want to think that flirty quarterback really was a quarterback. Yeah. And he was just flirty. Yeah.

The one thing we know for sure is that Jim spent a lot of time online. Jim would get home from work, go straight to the computer in his study, and stay on the computer until bedtime. Wow. By December of 2012, he'd been promoted to the head of the communications department at Texas A&M. And I promoted a burp out of my mouth while I said that. So clearly Jim and I are both doing all right. So, you know, Jim's killing it professionally, but he was also just, I mean, logging a ton of hours in these chat rooms. It was in one of those chat rooms. One of them was called Mocospace.com. See, I hear chat room and I think like, you know, like 1995 dial up.

But this is like, these are the apps where, you know, you go cheat on somebody. That's where you go start and have an affair. I don't know anything about that. You know, I hear that when people do that, their life turns out great afterwards. I think I've heard that, too. It was in one of these chat rooms that someone special caught his eye. It was prettygirl1985 at yahoo.com Brandy, you may be asking yourself,

who the hell still uses a Yahoo email address? Well, keep in mind that this was 2013. Now, if anyone were to still have a Yahoo email address today, I think we can all agree that person would be a psychopath, right? Absolutely.

But this was 2013. So let's all go easy on pretty girl, the you, 1985. Should we tell them? You guys, sound the alarm. Brandy's fiance has a Yahoo email account. The first time he told me his email, I was like, it's fucking what? He was like, yeah. And I was like, that's a legit email account.

Like, that's an email account you currently use? He was like, yeah. Yeah, lots of people use Yahoo. Yeah, I've got Yahoo, and then I've got AOL as my backup. Pretty Girl 1985 told Jim, you've got a great smile. And he said, thanks. You've got a beautiful smile too. I'm Jim.

And Jim spelled you've, you apostrophe V-E, because even though he was a communications professor, he was on the interwebs and he knew to keep it cash. Just keep it cash. It's fine. And Pretty Girl 1985 said, you're making me blush. Oh, I hate it. I hate it. Nice to. My favorite. I can it. I hate it. It's so uncomfortable. I can't look directly at you. My favorite thing to do with these is to say the things directly to you. So this is one downside of this being an audio thing.

It's like, Brandy, pretty much you memorize your stuff, so you're always talking directly to me. I'm usually reading, but on these, I know you get get so uncomfortable so I like to look directly at you and say you're making me blush. Nice to meet you, Jim. I'm Karen. Oh no. What's wrong? It's so uncomfortable.

Karen told Jim that she was an 18-year-old trans woman. And Jim, who was in his 50s, was like, uh-huh, excellent. Yep, nothing going on here. He told Karen that he was a professor at Texas A&M University. And she said, wow, I've never met a professor before professor jim i hate it stop looking at me i can't do it you know i'm not really her i'm not really karen what do you make of this so far i hate it okay well i can't i can't even elaborate beyond that.

You are so red right now. I can handle it. Keep going. Okay, so she tells him, you know, like, oh, I've never met a professor before, Professor Jim, which is like the biggest ego stroke ever. Obviously. And of course, Jim opened up like Brandy's legs

at a Sugar ray concert in 2002 i've never even been i've never even been to a sugar ray concert but i wanted to go so bad. Mark McGrath was fucking hot. With his frosted tips and his bad boy chats. Oh. I have been waiting to say that. You. It's a good

thing you didn't go to a Sugar Ray concert in 2002. How old would your child be? Because you would have for sure gotten pregnant at that thing you would have been a teen mom before it was cool that's right oh man if you'd been on teen mom then I could have been like your friend who you talked to about problems when you take me to the hibachi grill. Yeah. Those girls are always going to the hibachi grill. Always going to the fucking hibachi. I know.

I know. And their eyeliner is crazy. Yes. You and I have had some crazy eyeliner in our time. Oh, for sure. Why am I trying to audition us for Teen Mom when we're both in our 30s? That ship is sailing. I had dreams.

We're going to be on MTV's new show, Geriatric Mom. I told Norman, like, hey, if it were to happen for us, it would be a medical miracle. Got one fallopian tube. Yeah. Did I tell you my new rap name? What is it? One fallope. Sounds pretty hardcore, huh?

It is. One fallopian tube. Yeah. 35. Yeah. I mean, my God. My God. They'd write about me in the tabloids.

Okay. So, you know, they're talking more and more more and jim said you're so easy to talk to i find it hard to open up but i feel i can be myself with you and she said you can always be yourself with me no thank you what isn't it sweet how this like 50 yearold predatory man is going after this 18-year-old? I think it's so sweet. Yeah. So the two of them got more and more vulnerable with each other, which I think we can all agree is nothing short of heartwarming.

And then Karen made a confession. She wasn't 18. She was 16. Oh, fuck. Yeah. That's a good reaction. Yeah. Oh, screech!

Yeah. Hey, you know what? This was already pretty bad. Have a great day. Go get yourself a lollipop. But did Jim say that? No. He probably said

oh fuck that's hot. Yeah. Yeah. Basically. So they kept talking and things got heated

and by heated I mean totally gross and inappropriate and by totally gross and inappropriate I mean completely against the law. Uh-huh. Because pretty soon, Jim was sending her pictures of his limp biscuit,

and Karen was sending him pictures of herself naked. Oh, no. I don't know if it was limp in the pictures, but I mean... It's probably neither here nor there. Yeah. So that's right. Jim, a college professor in his 50s, was exchanging nudes with an underage girl. Wow.

It was all fun and games until one day when Jim got a phone call. The caller was, da-da-da-da, Karen's dad. Yeah. And he yelled at Jim to, Karen's dad. Yeah. And he yelled at Jim to, stay away from my daughter. She's only 16. Jim freaked out. Yeah.

He'd been caught. He could practically hear Chris Hansen walking in from the other room with the chat logs in hand. Yeah. When Jim got home, he tried to delete the evidence of his conversations with Karen. But you know, those are kind of a two-way street. Yeah, come on, Jim! Yeah, and it was 2012 and he was still using chat room, so I don't know how tech-savvy this guy was.

I mean, is that not the dumbest thing? Oh, yeah! I procured child porn online. You know what? I'm just delete! Boom! I'm gone! I'm know what? I'm just, delete. Boom. I'm gone. I'm all set.

Better go talk to Karen and see if she'll delete my Limp Bizkit pic. That picture of Fred Durst, I sent her. What if it really was just a picture of Fred Durers? His dick was a backwards red baseball cap. But like a really hardcore. Pretty soon, Jim got another message from Pretty Girl, 1985. And it was a real boner killer. It said, in part, this is Karen's father. Karen is severely traumatized by everything you've put her through. I finally got her in a good place and now she's off the rails. If I don't get her help soon, she's going to have a breakdown.

This is all your fault. She's young, vulnerable, and impressionable. I need to take her to see a therapist. I can't afford it, but I know my daughter needs help. You're going to pay for the therapy. Jim was shaking in his pervy little space boots. He immediately agreed. Yes, he would pay for Karen's's therapy the thing what what what brandy what karen's not really a 16 year old girl is she oh what she's like an extortion plot what

stop it stop it right now yeah okay anyway so you know jim's like yes i will pay for the therapy thing is jim didn't really have the money evidently he had stacks of dick pics laying around but no stacks of cash it's unfortunate how that works tenured college professor yeah i kind of was thinking the same thing. Okay. Now I feel like I'm watching an infant put a puzzle

together. What the hell is that? I was just gonna quietly put the lid back on while, you know, and not interrupt you at all, but clearly I grabbed the wrong lid, Kristen. You guys, she has two beverages

and it's very clear by the color of the cap. Which one? It should have gone in the color. The funny thing is, Brandy's so good at... Oh, gosh, I just bumped the mic. Brandy's so good at, like, puzzles and all that stuff. That should show you how distracted I was by your amazing story. Wow.

All of my focus was on you. Brandy, how did it feel to feel stupid? I felt terrible. Is there a worse feeling for you? No. I gotta say, I feel stupid all the time. I don't care. Never really bothered me.

I'm so stupid, I don't mind. So, Karen's father... Okay, yeah, let's talk about the money thing. Yeah, I mean... Right? I feel like... Tenured professors making a pretty good living, right? I guess so.

You know, in the show, they made it seem like maybe the sons needed surgeries and stuff. So that, I mean, that can be rough. Yeah. And, you know, if Miriam can't work, which, you know, it does sound like that, she was taking care of the sons. Yeah. I can see things being tight. All right. So Karen's father, he didn't want to hear that.

He messaged Jim again and said, listen up, you dirty old perv. I'm not playing nice anymore. What's wrong, Brady? I'm pushing it a little. You dirty old perv. D dirty old perv. I'm not playing nice anymore. What's wrong, Brady? I'm pushing it a little. You dirty old perv. Dirty old perv. Karen's dad demanded five grand by the end of the month. And that demand came with a threat. He wrote, or else I'm telling everybody what a sick pedo you really are.

The university, the police, your wife, everyone will find out. Hmm. Okay. Jim scrambled. He was about to be exposed. He needed money fast. So he joined an MLM. I'm just kidding.

No, didn't he just like go like borrow from his 401k or something? He's a tenured professor. You know, that's a really good question. Why didn't he do that? Yeah. Honestly. Yeah. He could probably pretty easily do that and his wife wouldn't know.

I agree. I hadn't even thought about that. Maybe he's one of these folks who doesn't have a 401k or doesn't have enough i don't know i don't know man yeah so again jim and miriam didn't have much money and what little they did have was all controlled by miriam she paid the bills she oversaw everything she would for sure notice if a big chunk of it went missing. Yeah. But Karen's father was relentless. He was like, I want money. I want you to put it on a green dot

bank card. So Jim gathered what money he could and told Karen's dad, I've got the cash. We'll load the card. You should get it by the end of the day. Again, I'm so sorry. Jim paid him about $1,500. But then he broke the bad news.

He was like, I'm having trouble getting the rest of the money, but I will try. Around this time, Miriam obviously didn't know anything about Karen or Karen's dad, but she did notice that something was going on with Jim. He'd been sober, but now he wasn't. She found alcohol hidden around the house. She found empty cans in his car. Clearly, something was wrong with Jim. Now it was January of 2013.

something was wrong with Jim. Now it was January of 2013. It had been a few weeks since Karen's dad confronted Jim, and now he was losing patience. Jim didn't know what to do, but then he made a decision. He wrote a suicide note and wrapped it around a picture of Miriam in her wedding dress. Oh, shit. He left it at the house for Miriam to find. And sure enough, she did. And the second she saw that picture, she got a bad feeling. That picture of her was one that Jim always kept at work. What was it doing at the house?

She read the note, and as soon as she realized what was going on, I believe this is all how this went down, she got a hold of Jim, and he confessed the whole thing to her. He said he'd been talking to this 16-year-old girl online. He'd sent her pictures. She'd sent him pictures. Her dad found out. Now the man wanted money. And Jim confessed that he'd sent the man their mortgage payment

and that within a few days, the man expected another $1,500. Miriam listened to all this and, of course, got upset. And then she started laughing. What? And then she started laughing. What? Yeah. I wish we had more time with Miriam because I find her really interesting.

Yeah. She seemed to think that this was all really stupid. Yeah. Like, I think she had the exact reaction that you did of, like, this, you're being played here. Yeah. exact reaction that you did of like this you're being played here yeah she said if this had been on an episode of law and order jim would have gotten up and left the room because it was so stupid he wouldn't have kept watching it she's like this is clearly blackmail this is not for therapy this is some scheme yeah and from there miriam went into take charge mode she hired an attorney she talked to some of jim's colleagues at the university and arranged for him to take And from there, Miriam went into take-charge mode. She hired an attorney.

She talked to some of Jim's colleagues at the university and arranged for him to take a leave of absence. But here's the thing. Miriam could see that this was all a scheme. Jim couldn't. Soon, Karen's father started messaging Jim again. And again. He wanted money. He wanted it now.

The threats got more intense. He was like that J.G. Wentworth guy. What is that? It's my money and I want it now. Is that a local commercial? I have no idea. The threats got more intense. Call me or my next call will be to the university.

Jim only had a few more days until his leave of absence would go into effect. And in that time, Karen's dad did call the university. He left messages, something about Jim assaulting a student. On January 7, 2013, he texted Jim, If I do not hear from you, I swear to God Almighty that the police, your place of employment, students all over the Internet, all of them will be able to see your conversations, texts, pictures you sent. And if by some miracle you get away with this, I will use every chance I get to make sure every person, every place or person associated with you knows and sees what you have done. Last chance.

You better make the right move. Damn. He told Jim that he had until noon the next day to pay up. But again, Jim didn't have the money. Yeah. pay up. But again, Jim didn't have the money. The next day, he texted Jim telling him to check the comments on Coofers.com. Coofers, not Cougars.com. This sounds like the most terrible website name ever. K-O-O-F-E-R-S. Coofers. What is it? Did you go there? Sounds like it's a place for queefing cougars. No, it's...

No, I did go there. And it's like... It's an academic site where people can post about professors and stuff. Oh, that's lame. Yeah, it's not like gay.com. It's even lamer than gay.com. Gay.com does seem really... It is the lamest of the gay websites.

You know what? I'm going there right now. Let's do it. Gay.com does seem really... It is the lamest of the gay websites. You know what? I'm going there right now. Go. Let's do it. Gay.com. Oh, it's just... It redirects to the Los Angeles LGBT Center. Well, now I feel bad. I thought it was going to be something a lot sexier than this.

I bet you back in 2013 it was like so you're thinking about dudes da da da da da da but now you know, yeah, it's probably better that they've changed it. It is. This is a good first stop

on the gay train. Okay. So Jim This is a good first stop on the gay train. Doot doot. Okay. So Jim went on this site and saw that Karen's dad had left a comment. It was simple, but it was also pretty fucking ominous. The comment read, taught Karen so much. Ooh. Mm-hmm.

That morning, Karen's dad texted Jim at 9.12 a.m. and told him he had three hours to come up with the rest of the money or he'd start making calls. Jim felt like he'd run out of options. He'd done a terrible thing, and he didn't have the money to make it all go away. So he went to a parking garage on Texas A&M's campus, and he went to the top story. And at 10.29 a.m., he messaged Karen's dad one last time. He wrote,

one last time. He wrote, killing myself now and you will be prosecuted for blackmail. And Jim jumped to his death. Oh my gosh. Okay, so I'm going to pause there.

What do you make of all this? Holy crap. Well, I hope that that's true. I hope they are able to prosecute someone because obviously that he's been being extorted. Yeah. And he likely. Gosh, this is such a tough thing because I didn't believe he was interacting with a 16 year old, but he likely never was. Right.

It's more complicated than that. Really? Mm-hmm. Okay, tell me everything. Okay. So investigators did look into this. So I believe they didn't spell this out in the episode, but judging from other interviews that Miriam did,

it seems like they probably notified Miriam, and Miriam said, okay, here's this case we have going on. So she filled them in. They started investigating. And they looked into the idea that Jim had died by suicide because of blackmail. They got a hold of Jim's cell phone and listened to the voicemails and, of course, heard a voicemail from Karen's dad. It was threatening and very angry. And then they got on Jim's work computer and began looking through all of his correspondence with Pretty Girl 1985. They looked at the money

that Jim had put on the green dot com on the green card dot green dot card. Is that what it is? They looked at the money that Jim had put on the green dot card. Yes. They looked at the money that Jim had put on the Green Dot card. They discovered that the Green Dot card had been used at Lowe's. They got very blurry security footage from Lowe's. But it did capture a white guy with nothing left to lose. He had on a flannel shirt, unbuttoned, white shirt dog tags hat on backwards jeans turns out the guy was oh boy it seems like a french last name daniel

de blazer d-u-p-l-a-i-s-i-r oh shit i know we're gonna call him daniel yeah Oh, shit. I know. We're going to call him Daniel. Yeah. So he was from Louisiana. Oh, it's for sure French then. Oh, yeah.

Oh, I know. It's French. And I also know I have no idea. Sure enough, he did have a young female relative. And the young female relative was the girl from the photos. Hmm. But that girl's name wasn't Karen. And when an investigator spoke to her, she didn't have a clue who Jim was. But she knew what was up. Because about a year and a half earlier, Daniel had been arrested for aggravated incest and oral sexual battery on her.

And when she was interviewed at the state's Children's Advocacy Center, she told the staff that Daniel had taken nude photos and videos of her and used those images to scam men on the Internet. Oh, my gosh. So, yeah, it really was, you know, an underage girl. Wow. But it wasn't as simple as. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. She said Daniel used her images to create fake accounts online, interact with people. And then once he took them, he would call them and say, oh, I'm her dad. I'm so upset. You need to pay for her therapy. So here's the thing that's strange to me. It's a little unclear what happened after that initial

arrest um maybe he's gonna face charges on that later i don't know but with jim now dead daniel officially had to face some consequences in march of 2013 he pled not guilty to extortion and making threatening communications. One source said he faced up to 20 years in prison. Another source said he faced up to two years in prison. Wow. And that sounds more likely. Yeah.

He was expected to go to trial in late May, but instead, Daniel changed his plea to guilty. Oh, wow. but instead, Daniel changed his plea to guilty. Oh, wow. At his sentencing in November, he told Judge Lynn Hughes that he did a horrible thing, and he promised that he'd never do anything like this again. Oh, yeah? Miriam, Jim's widow, also addressed the court and said that Daniel had destroyed so much and paid so little.

She said that she had fought for justice for her husband as a final tribute to the love of her life. How much time do you think Daniel got? Oh, gosh. Not enough. What do you think is appropriate? See, I don't really know. what do you think is appropriate i'd see i don't really know um i don't really know see because that's that whole question it's like how responsible is he for the choice that oh that's not even the question. Yeah.

Because he's not... No, I know. He's not facing charges for... Yeah, it's just... Yeah, it's just the extortion. Yeah, and I don't think that carries probably that much time.

No. My issue with this is I was feeling one way this whole time. Uh-huh. And... So basically. I am mad at him for abusing this young female relative. Yes.

Taking these images, all that stuff. Yeah. I think he needs to, you know, just lock him up, throw away the key on that. Yeah. But honestly. you know just lock him up throw away the key on that yeah but honestly if if it was just if jim willingly had this this interaction with someone he believed to be a 16 year old girl and then the person said hey give me money i don't i know it's wrong yeah i don't really care yeah yeah i can absolutely do

that yeah yeah yeah the i agree that the terrible thing here is the is the thing that was done to the young female yeah relative yeah and i think it's terrible that this college professor interacted with someone online who he thought was 18 in a sexual way. It's even worse that he continued it when he thought the person was 16. Yeah. And it makes me really suspicious that this was like like, the first time anything like this happened. Oh, yeah. You know? Yeah.

But I feel bad for Miriam. She seems like a very smart person. And it seems like she's been through a shit ton in her life. Mm-hmm. I liked her. But I... Yeah, I think your theory that this is not the first time is probably backed up by his extreme response to it. Because to me that says like, oh, what else are they going to find out potentially? But even then, like it's just bad enough as it is.

Oh, absolutely. I don't know. Yeah. it's just bad enough as it is oh absolutely i don't know yeah i think it's weird enough that he was a visiting professor and then he and miriam started dating so like you're starting off on a weird thing and then yeah yeah i mean that's a predatory behavior from the get-go yeah yeah uh so daniel was sentenced to one year in federal prison just for extortion yeah okay and that's the story of a texas a&m professor's suicide wow so no idea what happened to this daniel guy for the incest charges or whatever so i i tried looking into him some i couldn't find anything new on that and it's the thing that makes it tough is so in this episode which i obviously did not repeat

this information but in this episode they gave the name of the victim and the way she is related to Daniel, which I thought was kind of like, wow, you usually don't do that with a victim of a sex crime. So, you know, I kind of made note of it, but I was like, I don't know that I'm going to share that. And then I noticed in all the other articles, they do not name this girl. And I thought, you know what? Yeah, I'm not going to name her either. So I thought that was very strange.

That is very strange. Huh. Whew. Weird case. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know, man. That's pretty terrible. Yeah. Yeah. I don't know, man. That's pretty terrible.

Yeah. I mean, I don't feel bad for. I know. That's where it gets uncomfortable. It is really uncomfortable. Yeah. I don't like extortion at all. I'm not pro extortion.

No. But, you know, if you're going to lay out an extortion scheme that I'm not going to be too mad about. Yeah. Extorting. It's a 50-something-year-old man who's been engaging in sexual communication with a 16-year-old girl. Yeah. Yeah. That makes me so uncomfortable.

What makes you more uncomfortable? That or just hearing the chat log stuff? Oh, I hate. Brandy, you're making me blush. Stop it. Hate it. Hate it. You don't like making me blush?

I know. You know what we haven't talked about one little bit? No, I have no idea what you're talking about. Our Patreon. Oh, what's that? Here's the deal, Brandi. If people want more of us, they want to listen to bonus episodes. Like 21 bonus episodes.

They just sign up at the $5 level on our Patreon. They get all those episodes right away. Plus, they get into the Discord to chitty chat the day away. And then at the $7 level, kick it up a notch. You get all that, plus bonus videos every month. You get a sticker. You get a card with our autographs.

You get inducted on the podcast. And Brandi, what the hell happens when you get to that $10 level? Oh my gosh, that is the Bob Moss level. You get all that stuff we already talked about. Plus, you get ad-free

episodes and you get them a day early. Plus, plus, Kristen, stop interrupting. I'm not done. I can't stop. You get 10% off merch. Whew. So many benefits. I'm out of breath. can't stop. You get 10% off merch. Whew. Whew. So many benefits, I'm out of breath.

And we're out of benefits, so that's good. So should we head on over to our Discord and take some questions? I think we should. Oh. Okay. Caitlin wants to know, since Kristen is such a big wife swap fan, have you ever considered doing a real life wife swap? Brandy runs Kristen's home for a day and Kristen runs Brandy's home for a day. Absolutely not.

We've never considered that. But what would it be like if we Freaky Friday'd? Oh. Oh, man. I'd just run. I'd just run nonstop. Really? Yeah, because I would have your body that enjoys running.

Okay. Yeah, and wouldn't you go cut hair? Yeah, but I'd do a terrible job. No, what if you get the armor, Jeffrey, Freddie, you have the skill. Like, I have the skill to run like you can. Oh, man, I'd be thrilled. You would. You would just be marveling at your own work.

You guys, you should, when Kristen watches me cut hair, she's like in a trance. I love it. I find it very relaxing, very satisfying to watch. And you know what? I would do the thing that you don't have the fucking nuts to do. You'd start your ASMR style YouTube show about it. Yeah, I would. And you know what?

I'd become a fucking billionaire. And it would go in your bank account, so I guess that really wouldn't show you shit. Oh, that's a good question. Damn it, Brandi wants to know, has London met Dottie yet? No, they haven't met. It's been a weird year.

Yeah, yeah. That'll be really cute when they get to meet. That will be. It's also weird because I feel like under normal circumstances, I would have seen London a lot. A lot, yeah. Like, I haven't seen that little kid in a long time. London hasn't gone anywhere, really. Yeah, and she shouldn't.

Yeah. That little party animal. Andrea wants to know, did you two ever make packs together when you were young? If so, did you stick to them? Did we ever make packs? I don't think so. I mean, we did sacrifice the blood of a lamb that one time. No!

We shouldn't have done that to that lamb. But it was cuter than me, and I just can't tolerate that. No, I don't think we ever made any packs. I don't think we did either. Man, how lame. You're so lame. Tracy Lou Freebush wants to know the worst thing that ever gave you the burps.

So I used to take these like herbal supplements. Have you ever taken an herbal supplement? I don't think I have. An herbal supplement just like sits there in your stomach and you have the herb burps all day long. Hold on, hold on, hold on.

It's terrible. First of all, why were you taking herbal supplements? I can't even remember the purpose of them. I'm sure it was some weird like gimmicky, you know, weird diet gimmicky thing. Drink some cinnamon shit. Yeah. That's disgusting. Cinnamon flavored shit.

Yeah, I'm sorry. I realized the way I said it sounded awful. Yeah, I was like, this is the cure to all your problems. You'll never crave sugar again if you take this herbal supplement. And that was the year you gave up sugar. That's right. Can you believe there are people who do that? Oh.

Serial killers. Well, I mean, I think. No. I think people do it for a year. Yeah. And they're real smug about it. And they tell everyone. And then, oopsies, they have sugar again.

And they're like, this is what I've been missing the whole life. Oh my gosh. Fudge Dragon says, Have you ever ate so much at a restaurant that you puked after? My BFF puked after Applebee's half-priced apps after a heartbreak. Oh, my God. Okay. So, David.

This is not my story. But David and his younger sister make fun of their older sister because like they have this sushi place that they all love. And they go there and they get sushi. What's the name of it? It's called Aso. OK. And so they go there and like for lunch they have half price rolls. So you get a shit ton of sushi for cheap.

Yeah. And sushi is typically pretty expensive. Right. Right. And sushi is typically pretty expensive. Right, right. And so, like, one day they went and, like, Sarah was just going to fucking town on the sushi rolls. Just nom, nom, nom, nom, nom.

Yeah. And, like, they left there. Caitlin and Sarah left there. And Sarah made Caitlin pull the car over so she could throw it off because she ate too much sushi. And it wasn't like that she ate bad sushi. It was just purely the volume of sushi. Okay. Here's the thing. There is a sushi place by us that on Monday nights, they do half-priced sushi.

Yeah. Norman and I, this is how I feel like I could, I see myself in that situation because, yeah, sushi is normally pretty expensive. I see myself in that situation because, yeah, sushi is normally pretty expensive. So when there's a deal, it's like, well, I better eat my body weight in sushi right now. Yep. And if I don't live to tell the tale, then so be it. Yep.

Nugget Falling Out of Pants wants to know, in relation to my Gilmore Girls love that I've recently confessed about on the podcast. Yes. Nugget falling out of pants asked, did you watch the Netflix four episode revival? Okay. Oh. Oh. Oh, hold on. You bet your ass I watched it.

In fact, it came out on Black Friday. Uh-huh. What'd you do? Cancel all my plans? Casey and I had a watch party. Oh, my God. We were in our pajamas. Uh-huh.

We had snacks to the max, and we just binged that thing all in one day. It was the best day ever. That does sound pretty good. It was. What kind of snacks did you have? I made cookies. Oh, my God. We had, I don't know, every chip you can imagine. Because they famously eat a lot of junk food on the show.

Okay, sure. It would have been sacrilege not to. That's right. Yeah. That's amazing. Unity Gooch asked a question that initially I was a little offended. I was like, why are you asking me? Then I remembered, oh, I've talked about waxing my lady mustache in last week's episode.

She wrote, Kristen, ever thought of laser hair removal? I just took the plunge and it was life changing. I've done laser hair removal. So have I. What? I didn't know that. Where have you had it done? Okay, I did it on my lip.

Brandy. But you don't remember this, I did it on my lip. Brandy. But you don't remember this? I did this in high school. What? You have no recollection of this. No. Okay. No.

Yes. Go with me on this journey. I think you'll remember it. Okay. I got it as a present, like a Christmas present when I was in high school. Okay. And so I had like three treatments down my upper lip. It was wonderful.

Okay. And so I had like three treatments on my upper lip. It was wonderful. And then like on the fourth treatment, they like cranked the laser up to 11 and they burned the shit out of my skin. I had burns on my face as a high school girl. Oh, no. Horrible. My mom like called them and yelled at them.

They ended up giving me like my money back. Oh, my God. I had burns on my God. Yeah. I had burns on my face. You don't remember this? What year was this? Hmm. Probably junior year?

I'm not remembering that. Yeah. Well, I mean, I think I don't, I probably didn't tell anybody at the time, like, what the burns were from. Yeah. And, like, probably just caked, like, real heavy makeup on. Probably. Because I found it very embarrassing as a teenage girl. I don't think you told me that.

I maybe didn't. I maybe didn't. Secret secrets. That's right. Are no fun. So when I was in Elizabeth City, see, now, this is, I'm going to say this story. This is totally my fault. So I got my pits done. story. This is totally my fault. So I got

my pits done. Your Kristen pits. My Kristen pits. But the thing is, like, I did no research beforehand. Yeah. And so I thought it was going to be magic. I would go in, beep boop beep, they'd laser off the pits,

and then I'd be done with shaving for the rest of my life. No. Does it work like that? Come to find out you've got to go in for multiple sessions. It's a whole thing. Yeah. And I was pissed about that. Yeah.

And I was like, well, can we make it faster? And I remember like the lady being like, well, but we've got to wait for like the hair to grow back and like we've got to wait for these different stages. Yeah, you've got to do the growth cycle. And I was such an idiot. I was just like, but I want it fast. And so I had them like do the treatments too fast. Bump the treatments up.

I'm looking back at myself like, what a fucking idiot. Anyway, so I probably lost like four armpit hairs and a ton of money. And that's the story of that. Each armpit hair more expensive than the next. I don't know. I would probably do it again. I just, it didn't work for me.

But again, that was my fault. Yeah. But I'm looking at you. You've got a hairless lip. Yeah. I get like a pretty fine, a little fine fuzz grows in there every now and again. It's not perfect because I didn't get the full treatment because they burned my face off. They should have called it a chemical peel.

Yeah, that was free. We threw that in. We threw it in. I said good day, sir. 305. Any good celebrity meat stories or sightings? I met T.I. at Ruby Tuesdays in Fayetteville, North Carolina. I went to a human resources conference

with my HR class. I was the only one who knew who he was, but my professor so graciously asked him to take a pic with me and obliged. She got his attention by saying, excuse me, Mr. T.I. I love that. I think I've shared my Travis Barker story

on the podcast before where I yelled at Travis Barker and got him to sign his drumstick. So I have a celebrity story that's not mine. It's one of my clients, a story a client told me. So one of my clients was the hostess, was one of the hostesses at the Bristol, like down in like the Power and Light area. Yeah.

It's a restaurant. Yeah. It's like kind of a fancy-ish, like seafood-y restaurant. Anyway. night area yeah it's a restaurant yeah it's like kind of a fancy-ish like seafood-y restaurant anyway uh ludacris came in and like it was she was in charge of like making sure that he was like happy and everybody stayed away from him and whatever yeah and so like they seated him you know wined him dined him whatever and like at the end of the night like at the end of his meal you know he like wasn't leaving and like, you know, just kind of like there was an awkward moment. And she was like, you know, have we done everything to your satisfaction?

He's like, absolutely. You guys, I mean, you guys are taking great care of me. We all got exactly what we wanted to eat. It was wonderful. Made sure that we had, you know, privacy, all that. He's like, the only thing you haven't done was offer to comp my bill. Oh. Oh, no.

Yeah. And she was like, my client said she was just like so taken aback by that. She was like, oh, okay, let me go talk to the manager. Shit. And so the manager came out and was like, yeah, I mean, as long as you take care of the waitstaff, we'll comp your bill. Yeah!

I hate that. I know! Oh, that's tacky. Isn't that terrible? Oh, I hate it so much! Ew! Yes! Yeah.

Yeah, that's what she said. She was like, I just thought it was, like, super tacky. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's so funny. Okay, so when I was a waitress, I had somebody ask for free food once. Uh-huh.

And obviously they weren't a celebrity or anything. Yeah. But it's just, like food once. Uh-huh. And obviously they weren't a celebrity or anything. But it's just like the tackiest thing ever. Yeah. Ugh. Uh-huh. Are you surprised by all the stuff about Ellen DeGeneres? What? No, I'm not that surprised by it yeah i'm not either yeah i think it's disappointing

but i don't think it's that surprising no yeah doesn't it make you wonder about the celebrities who seem nice but maybe it does it really does. Yeah. Absolutely. Ooh. Parent impact studies. I would like to know, what's your favorite chip and dip combo? Ooh. Ooh.

Okay. Okay. I am a huge fan. What you got? Of chips and dip in general. Well, yeah. I was going to say, I mean, be still my heart. I don't know that I can just pick a fave. I like a buffalo chicken dip.

Oh, hell yeah. With a Frito, a scoop, Frito scoops. Yeah, yeah, you got to do the scoops. My sister eats them with Doritos. She eats buffalo chicken dip with Doritos. The nacho cheese flavor ones. Okay, that is probably good. First glance, it seems like too much. Buffalo chicken dip with Doritos. The nacho cheese flavor ones. Okay.

That is probably good. Yeah. First glance, it seems like too much. Too much. Also, I don't know if that's a strong enough chip for the buffalo chicken dip. I know. I think you've got to have a sturdy dip. You need a half.

Yeah. You need a chip with some half to it. Yeah. I also like okay what am I about to judge you I think maybe because it's maybe like the okay Fritos makes this little

oh no I knew exactly I like the jalapeno one has to be cold you have to refrigerate it oh my god the second The pico one has to be cold. You have to refrigerate it. Oh, my God. The second you put your hands up in just that little shape, and I was like, oh, my God, no. No, I've seen those in the grocery store, and I'm always like, yuck.

Oh, you eat it cold. Yeah, I like it cold. Yep. Well, you know that I dip ruffles in cottage cheese. So who the fuck do you think you are? I'm the baddest bitch in the whole damn world.

Also, you can't overthink queso. No. I mean, come on now. Did I tell you that I tried to make Jose Pepper's espinaca dip? Did you put Greek yogurt? No, no. I found a recipe online

that was not like, oh, this is my healthy attempt. No, it was like, some people say this is even better. Lies. It was good. Wasn't Jose Pepperppers? No. And you know why? They do it really good?

Because, like, we, so my mom had bought some Jose Peppers espinaca dip for, like, some get-together. And we were like, this is amazing. And I was like, you know what? I bet I could make that. Well, I was like, we love it so much it'd be great if we could find the recipe and bam it's part of every event just like a family member the jose peppers espinacid yeah i you save it a seat at every table i i tell you what it i made a massive crock pot no one complained everyone enjoyed but it was not the

same not the same maybe you gotta find a different recipe or maybe i just need to just buy it from the store maybe this is not a question but someone just like right this man joined the discord with cord with the name truck glitzara. Yes! Yes! Okay. I'm going to address this. Anna wants to know, when did Brandy start bullying Kristen

about the size of her ears? It's been for about 25 years now. Now, only in the last few years have I made comments about them in jest. She's called me Dumbo for years. In jest. Because they are perfectly normal ears.

They are perfectly normal ears. They are not giant ears as Kristen would lead you all to believe. Would I lie to you, baby? I bet if we did this. Oh, Brandy, give me a break. No, if we measured. Break me off a piece of that fancy face. Break me off a piece of that earlobe.

That's what I want to say to myself. No, my ears are much larger than yours. All the better to hear you with, my dear. I think your ears are perfect. Thank you. You're welcome. I will trade you straight up. You've got those good swingy lobes.

Nobody wants their earlobes to really go a-swinging. You know what? So for... Like a speed bag. So for Easter, I did a little Easter egg hunt for my niece and nephew. And I went and got like some, you know, dumb little toys. Yeah. One of the dumb little toys was this like, kind of looks like a gun thing, but it's like,

God, how do you even describe this thing? It's like this thing that shoots out and grabs things. Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like a little grabber gun. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's like a little grabber gun. Yeah. But like, it can't really grab onto hardly anything. Yeah. Turns out, you know what it can grab onto? Your big lobes. My earlobes

and my dad's earlobes. Because I have my dad's huge ears. You know what my nieces and nephews got at our little Easter? What? Rubber chicken slingshot thingies. I got my niece some of those. You put your finger in the head, pull the body bag.

So I got my niece some of those for Halloween because, like, you know, Halloween, COVID Halloween, not fun. So I did, like, a trick-or-treat scavenger hunt. Anyway, so here's the thing. I got her little unicorns. Oh, those exact same things they shoot across. But Norman and Jay were having so much fun shooting them. And Allie was like, you know, that's my present. Could I play with it?

And they told her no. Not a chance in hell, kid. I fucking love it. Did you guys do the adult Easter egg thing? We did. We did an adult Easter egg hunt this year. It was so fun. My sister, Jennifer, got these giant Easter eggs.

Okay. And we put little bottles of booze in them. And then my nieces and nephews hid them for us. And then all the adults were just like, my parents did it. That's so fun. Yeah. We had a really good time. Yeah. It was very fun. Did you puke on the lawn?

No. I only made one drink afterwards. I made a Malibu and pineapple. How old are you? 22? That sounds delicious, by the way. It sounds so good.

It was so good. It sounds really, really good. We did find a bottle of Fireball in one of our eggs. And you just shoved it. I gave that away as quickly as I could. I can't even look at it. What would, okay. Let's say I had fireball.

$40 to do a shot of fireball. Would you do it? Yeah, I'd probably do it. $20. One shot? Yeah. Yeah, I could do one shot. $10. Yeah. $5. No. Okay. Yeah. I see. Alright, let could do one shot. $10. Yeah. $5. No. Okay. Yeah.

I see. All right, let me change it up. You and I are going on a booze cruise. Okay. All right. And it's like, it's going to be a great time. Food is provided. It's delicious.

It's, you know, just, oh, great times ahead. Yeah. The only beverage you can drink is Fireball. Do you come along? I probably wouldn't. You wouldn't even come? Can I have water? I mean, to chase it down, sure.

But I have to drink Fireball. Yeah. Honestly, I'd probably come just because of my FOMO. I know. And I'd want to go with you so bad. I was going to say, I just don't see you be like, nope. I would. The other thing about Fireball, I think, you get a few shots in and you're like, this isn't so bad.

This isn't bad. And then you're puking off the side of the... Exactly. At least I'd be puking off the side of a boat and not in my own lawn. There you go. That's classy. Yeah. Way classier.

That's why they call me the Grace Kelly of the Classy. Don't you dare come for my title. Hey, should we do some Supreme Court inductions? Oh, I guess so. Oh. Of course, I'm not ready at all. Nor am I, nor am I. This week we will be continuing with reading people's names and favorite cookies.

Yasmin. Red velvet cookies with white chocolate chips or macadamia nuts. Randy. Peanut butter cookies. Ariel. Chocolate chip with Reese's Pieces. Okay. Michelle M.

Kitchen sink cookie from Panera. Holly Lawrence. Holly surprise cookies by my mom. Named this because it was always a surprise what she would add to her chocolate chip cookie recipe. Miss you, Mom. Aw. Amanda P. Hot cocoa cookies.

Chelsea Roy. Chocolate chip. Leslie LaRue. Raspberry white cocoa cookies. Chelsea Roy. Chocolate chip. Leslie LaRue. Raspberry white chocolate cookies. Keisha Marie. Butterscotch cookies. Jackie Huff. Frozen Thin Mints.

The only way to eat them. Lori Ziegler. Samoas. CP. Snickerdoodles. Erica B. Chocolate chip oatmeal. Anna Johnson. I don't really like cookies, but love LGTC.

What? I'll allow it. As long as you love us. Okay. Lisa T. Lisa T. Salty. Salty chocolate chip. Hunter O.

Triple chocolate chip. Slow down, Hunter. Erin. Thin Mints. Trish S. Chocolate chip Mints. Trish S. Chocolate Chip. Hannah. Peanut Butter Oreo.

Emily Ann. Warm Peanut Butter. Mmm. Welcome. To the Supreme Court. Thank you for all of your support. We appreciate it so much. If you're looking for other ways to support us, please find us on social media.

We're on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit. Please remember to subscribe to the podcast wherever you listen. And then head on over to Apple Podcasts. Leave us a five-star rating and review. And then be sure to join us next week when we'll be experts

on two whole new topics. Podcast adjourned! And now for a note about our process i read a bunch of stuff then regurgitate it all back up in my very limited vocabulary and i copy and paste from the best sources on the web and sometimes wikipedia so we owe a huge thank you to the real experts i got my info from an episode of Web of Lies titled Online Education, plus reporting from Texas Monthly, TheEagle.com and Newspapers.com. I got my info from an episode of Dateline, an episode of Snapped and articles for AL.com, Heavy.com and The Mirror. For a full list of our sources, visit LGTCpodcast.com. Any errors are, of course, ours, but please don't take our word for it.

Go read their stuff.