Let's Go To Court! - 201: Jodi Arias (Pt. 2) & Clarence Elkins

Episode Date: February 9, 2022

If you haven’t listened to last week’s episode, then sashay away. If you have listened to part one of Brandi’s Jodi Arias coverage, then Shante, you stay.  This week, Brandi tells us about the epic trial of Jodi Arias. Brace yourself for a dramatic make-under, a homemade t-shirt, and several plot twists. Our advice? BUCKLE UP. Then Kristin covers the legal battles of Clarence Elkins. Stay buckled, because this one includes an appearance on the Maury Povich show, drunken chore completion, and a prosecutor who can’t keep his grubby mitts off the evidence. 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: “Melissa Elkins” episode of I Solved A Murder “The Murder of Judith Johnson” episode of American Justice “Killer Instinct” by Sara James “Shadow of a Doubt: The Clarence Elkins Story” by Katherine Ramsland for Crime Library “Clarence Elkins” entry on Wikipedia In this episode, Brandi pulled from: “Jodi Arias Revised Timeline (UPDATED)” by David Lohr, huffpost.com “How an Inside Edition Interview Became a Key to Prosecuting Jodi Arias” Inside Edition “The Case Continues: Jodi Arias Pt. 1” episode Snapped “The Case Continues: Jodi Arias Pt. 2” episode Snapped “Arias Trial Timeline of events in Mesa murder case” The Associated Press, East Valley Tribune “Timeline: A look back at the Jodi Arias murder case” azcentral.com “In Saving Jodi Arias' Life, Kirk Nurmi Became the Most Hated Lawyer in Arizona” by Shanna Hogan, Phoenix New Times “Jodi Ann Arias” murderpedia.org “Murder of Travis Alexander” wikipedia.org 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 30+ full length bonus episodes, plus access to our 90’s style chat room!  

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 be talking about an eyewitness. And I'll be talking about the trial of Jodi Arias. Here we go, here we go. Hey, you're not even looking and I'm shaking my titties all over the place. I did see you shaking them. How could you not? I did. I'm so excited for the dramatic conclusion. Yeah. There was not enough ninja talk in our last episode.

I'm ready for there to be a lot more ninjas. Okay. All the ninjas. Should we talk about this isn't Let's Go to Court after dark? Well, but it's not. Okay. It is dark? Well, but it's not, okay. It is technically after dark, but it's not for like the fun reasons. No, it's because there's a snowstorm headed this way and we're trying to record ahead of it. Everyone's storms are brewing.

They're saying anywhere from six to ten inches. Six to fourteen inches. Oh, well that sounds stupid. Six to 14 inches. Oh, well, that sounds stupid. Well, anyway, we're just trying to be prepared like little Girl Scouts, you know? That's right. Yeah, we're bluebirds. What are the...

Bluebirds? I think that was like... Brownies. That's the... No, that bluebirds are like the adult... Like, that's when you've like maxed out. That's the Girl Scout maxi pad. So that's like Eagle Scouts and then you've got Bluebirds.

I think. Flying the coop. I could have just made that whole thing up. Well. Anyway, you want to hear about Jodi? We got to – like this thing is going to be – there's a lot of material to cover here. So I think we better snap to it. Oh, no.

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Am I allowed to tell my case now? Oh! Yes, you are. Okay, major shout out. Same sources in general as the part one. But super duper special shout out to David Lohr for the Huffington Post. He did like a super in-depth day-by-day trial coverage, which was quite helpful. Super helpful.

So shout out to him. Shout out to Snapped. Just because I love them. To God. Yeah. His family. Are you going to do like a Rocky and Bullwinkle recap of last week's episode? When we left off last week.

Oh, hell yeah. Jodi Arias had just been charged with the murder of Travis Alexander. And she was super innocent as I recall. No. Travis, Jodi's ex-boyfriend, was found brutally murdered in the murder of Travis Alexander. She was super innocent, as I recall. No! Travis, Jodi's ex-boyfriend, was found brutally murdered in the bathroom of his home. He'd been stabbed at least 27 times. His throat was slit from ear to ear, and he'd been shot in the head. He'd then been shoved in the shower stall in his bathroom.

I will say, you seem too excited. I know. I was trying to calm it down a little bit. I will say, you seem too excited. I know. I was trying to like calm it down a little bit. I apologize. All right, weirdo. Just slow down. Then he'd been shoved into the shower stall

in his bathroom and left there for several days until concerned friends came looking for him and made the grisly discovery. At the scene, detectives had located several pieces of evidence, including long, dark hairs,

a bloody handprint, and a camera with freshly deleted pictures that were extremely graphic in nature. Sex pics. That's right. Immediately, those close to Travis had given investigators Jody Arias' name as suspect number one. And after comparing the DNA that was left at the scene with the samples that Jodi Arias voluntarily gave them, it was a match. Jodi's hair, blood, and naked pictures were found at the murder scene.

Despite the mountain of evidence against her, Jodi claimed that she hadn't seen Travis in several months. Even when lead detective Esteban Flores confronted her with naked pictures of herself in Travis's bed on the day he was murdered, she stuck to her story. I mean, it did look like her. It does look like me. She stuck to her story. I mean, it did look like her. It does look like me. But finally, after some interrogation room karaoke and a couple of handstands, Jodi was ready to tell the truth.

She sang the dildo. Yeah, I'm sure Dido's never heard that one before, Kristen. Hey, dildo, I love your music. You know a guy has yelled that at her. Oh, constantly. No, I'm the first comedic genius to think of it. I hit a button in my hole. I don't even know where I am.

Yeah, dildo really threw you off, didn't it? I was thrown off by a dildo. You ever seen that hilarious video of where someone at a high school gym has stuck a suction cup dildo? Giant dildo above the door. Don't look at me like you're bored with me already. I showed you that video. Well, thank you, my friend. You're welcome. Finally, Jodi was ready to tell the truth.

She told Detective Flores that she had been present when Travis was murdered, but that she wasn't the one who had killed him. She wasn't the one who had killed him. He'd been attacked by two masked intruders, a man and a woman, and she'd run away and never looked back. And this was the story Jodi would stick to for quite some time. In September of 2008, after entering her not guilty plea, Jodi gave a jailhouse interview to Inside Edition. This was kind of the... Inside Edition? Yes. Inside Edition.

Now, I'm going to go into this interview. But before we do, my sincerest apologies to Inside Edition because I watched this clip many times. I read a whole story about this interview. I can find nowhere that the interviewer's name is mentioned. So he's a very nice gentleman, dark hair, wore a nice suit. I don't have a fucking clue what his name is. And I apologize, Mr. Inside Edition. That man was Mario Lopez.

If it was A.C. Slater, I'd fucking know it. So she gives this interview with Inside Edition, and this was kind of the first time that this story entered the mainstream media. In the clip, the interviewer asks her straight up, did you kill Travis Alexander? And Jodi responds, I absolutely did not kill Travis Alexander. I had nothing to do with his murder. I did not harm him in any way. Hmm. Mm-hmm.

Did she look sincere? She sure did. Wow. Yeah. Spooky. Mm-hmm. did she look sincere she sure did wow yeah spooky jody then shared the story that to this point she'd only shared with detectives she told inside edition i witnessed travis being attacked by two other individuals when asked who she responded i don't know who they were. I couldn't pick them out of a police lineup. The interviewer then asked her what happened, and she said, they came into his home and attacked us both. She explained that the two masked intruders had attacked Travis that day and that she'd fled but was too scared to call the police. She said, I'm not proud that I just left my friend there to be slaughtered at the hands of two other people. I'm not proud of that at all.

But the interviewer pushed back. He said, You understand that you look guilty here. Mm-hmm. But Jodi was ready. She replied, I understand that the evidence against me is compelling. Compelling.

Compelling. It's compelling. It tells the whole damn story. The whole damn story. Yes. From there, the interview continued. Inside Edition. What really happened in there?

Jodi. In a nutshell, two individuals took Travis's life. Two monsters. Inside Edition. You did not shoot Travis? Jody. No. I've never even shot a real gun.

Have you shot a fake gun? That's a weird clarification. Okay. Inside Edition, you did not stab him 27 times? Jody. Jody. I could – I would never. That's heinous. Inside Edition. Or slit his throat from ear to ear. Jody, I can't imagine slitting anyone's throat.

No matter how she was pressed, Jodi had her story and she was sticking to it. She told the interviewer, no jury is going to convict me. And when he asked why not, she said, because I'm innocent. And you can mark my words on that. No jury will convict me. Wow, that's really bold. Sure fucking is. And then she went on to say, I know I am innocent. God knows I am innocent. Travis knows I am innocent. Oh, that's fucked up. Yeah, it's super fucked up.

Around this same time, Jodi gave several interviews with local media, and eventually she gave one to 48 Hours. Each time, the story evolved a little bit. There were just a few more details here and here. Here and here. Here and here and there. It was June of 2009 when Jodi sat down with 48 Hours. And by now, her ninja story had really grown legs. Hold on. You told me last time that they didn't become ninjas until the 48 Hours interview.

It turns out that Jodi never calls them ninjas. It's the media that labels them ninjas. She only refers to them as masked intruders. Okay. Dressed in all black. And the media is the one who's like, she's telling a crazy story about ninjas. Which, I mean. How dare you take my ninjas away from me?

If it quacks like a duck. What's that saying? If it looks like a duck and it quacks like a duck, it's a duck. That's right. So she kind of expanded on her story a bit on that episode of 48 Hours or that interview with 48 Hours. And she admitted that she was present when Travis was murdered. But she said, she stuck to that story about how it had occurred during a home invasion. And this is how she laid it out in that interview.

She said she and Travis were having fun playing with his new camera. He was in the shower taking, she was taking pictures and then things took a sudden turn. She said, I heard a really loud pop. And the next thing I remember, I was laying next to the bathtub and Travis was screaming. At that point, I was just sort of trying to come around and kind of orientate myself as to what was going on. And I looked up and I just, I saw two other individuals in the bathroom

and they were both coming toward us. Were they masked? They were. Okay. They were masked. They were dressed in all black. It was clear that there was a man and a woman and one had a knife and one had a gun. She said at one point the man pointed the gun at her, but she was spared.

It was a miracle. She said in this 48 hours interview, he pulled the trigger. What? Nothing happened with the gun. And so I just grabbed my purse, which was on the floor at that point, and I ran down the stairs and out of there. And I left Travis there. I pushed past the man and his gun. And I just didn't look back. Wait, I thought last time the story was that they intentionally spared her.

That was the initial story. Yes, that's the story she initially told investigators. So now it's a bad TV movie. Yeah, they tried to kill her. But she was just standing with their knife poking themselves in the butt or something. I don't know. Busy at that moment. That's right.

That's right. Lucky. So she just kept on driving. Just just too scared to call the police. Sure. She said it was I was terrified and I was scared for my life. And I think there was this naive belief that I could pretend like it didn't really happen. You know.

Well, yeah. I mean, when I make stuff up in my head, I'm often like, you know what? That didn't happen. Obviously, as Jodi did more of these interviews, public interest in the case began to grow. But it wasn't actually until the actual trial that what seemed like the entire country would become enamored by this case. It had everything. Hot people. Sex.

Oh, yeah. Religion. And that thing where a woman brutally murders her ex-boyfriend and then says that ninjas did it. We call that the je ne sais quoi. Oh, my God. But as I've said before, the wheels of justice turn slowly. And this was a death penalty case. So whatever the opposite of double time is, that's what this case was moving.

And of course, there were motions, including one where Jody's public defender asked to be removed from the case. Really? More on that later. But that's all pretty boring. So I'm going to look myself in the mirror right now. That doesn't sound boring. I'm really excited about it. I'll get to that part. But the motions are all pretty boring.

All right. All right. I'll look myself in the mirror and say, let's go to court. And we're going to fast forward this thing. and say, let's go to court. And we're going to fast forward this thing. Just a couple of quick notes of interest on the pretrial motions along the way. In August of 2011, Jodi Arias told the judge that she wanted to represent herself.

Oh, my God. Yes. And Jodi's request was granted, but her public defenders were required to stay on as an advisory council. Oh, my God. Can you imagine? I can't. As it turns out, though, her time of self-representation would be limited because just about a week later, trouble arose during a pretrial hearing. Did it turn out that it kind of sucks to not have a law degree?

Uh-huh. Uh-huh. So it was August 26, 2011, and Jodi had submitted a motion to get some letters admitted as evidence. She claimed that Travis had sent them to her prior to his death. And in the letters, Travis Alexander admitted to being a pedophile. Oh, my God. Come on. So they did some investigating of these letters, and it turns out that they were proven to be forgeries.

Jodi's cell was searched, and they found note cards at a pen hidden inside a shampoo bottle where she'd been practicing Travis's handwriting. Oh, my God. Yeah. So that motion was denied. And after that ruling, Jodi told the judge that she thought she might be in over her head. Yeah, I think so. And then the judge reinstated the public defenders. That's amazing. You're going to murder a man and then frame him as a pedophile. Yep.

Mm-hmm. frame him as a pedophile. Yep. Mm-hmm. So this motion did give a glimpse of Jody's new defense strategy and now her third account of Travis's death. So this was detailed in these court documents that became public after this hearing. And it seemed that that was the way she was going to go, that this was self-defense and that Travis was abusive

and that Travis was a pedophile. Even though these were proven to be forgeries, that she's sticking to that story. Yep. She sure is. Yep. She sure is. Yep. Mm-hmm. Who did he abuse?

Her. No, but if he's a pedophile, who did he abuse? We'll see. We'll get into that. Okay, I'm getting ahead of myself. Mm-hmm. Yeah.

So that's the strategy moving toward trial, and that is what she would stick to. Okay. Yep. Mm-hmm. So finally, it was January 2nd, 2013, and the stage was set for the trial of the year? Mm-hmm. Decade? Century? No, not. Decade? Century?

No, not century. Perhaps? They always say century. They're always wrong. Anyway, it was a big damn deal. Okay. The trial took place in Maricopa County before Judge Sherry Stevens, and the prosecution was led by Juan Martinez.

And the defense was led by Kirk Nermy and Jennifer Wilmot. Oh, Kirk Nermy. That's cute. Oh, Nermy. It sounds like a, I don't know, like a Muppet character. Exactly. And Jennifer Wilmot would serve as the death penalty qualified defense attorney. defense attorney. In his opening statement, Juan Martinez told the jury, this is not a case, a whodunit. Whodunit is sitting here in this courtroom today. It's the defendant,

it's the defendant, Jody Ann Arias. He then went on to use Jody's own words against her. He offered a quote from Jody where she called Travis a good man and then said, as his reward for being a good man, she slit his throat. Oh. Mm-hmm. She slit his throat. Oh.

Mm-hmm. He then told the jury that she had referred to him as a blessing in her life. And he then said, in terms of blessings, well, she knocked the blessings right out of him by putting a bullet in his head. OK, well, that's too much. It's a lot. Yeah. Yet Mr.. It's a lot. Yeah. Mr. Juan Martinez is a lot. He sure is.

What button am I hitting? You ever used a computer before, ma'am? This is my first time! Back to the lab again. Oops. There goes gravity. Stop it! The prosecution then went on to show the jury gruesome pictures of the crime scene and Travis's body right there in the opening arguments.

And the prosecution told them that they were going to hear the defense say that Jodi did this in self-defense. But Juan Martinez pointed out that that was her third version of the story. Initially, she'd claimed to know nothing about his murder. She wasn't there. She hadn't seen him in months. Then there were the masked intruders. She'd been forced to flee. And now, finally, there was her

self-defense claim. That wasn't the truth any more than either of the other versions. Juan told the, I'm sorry, I probably shouldn't call him Juan. We're not buddies. I call everyone by their first name. But it's because I know everyone personally.

Her self-defense claim wasn't any more the truth than any of her other versions had been. It was just another lie to cover up the heinous and brutal murder of Travis Alexander. Then Juan Martinez offered up the prosecution's theory of what really happened. They believed that Jodi Arias had planned to murder Travis. She had driven to Mesa that day armed with a gun and a knife. She had dyed her hair brown so that she wasn't easily recognizable. She'd rented a car so she wouldn't be spotted. And when the rental place tried to give her a red car, she'd asked for one in a different

color, citing some statistics she'd read about how red cars are more likely to be pulled over. She had then borrowed and purchased plastic gas cans, filled them, and then put them in the trunk so that she could drive to and from Mesa without having to purchase gas. She didn't want to be caught on gas station surveillance cameras. There would be no record of her ever being in Arizona those days in June. Okay, I hate to say it, but that gas can stuff is not bad. Yeah. That's kind of the equivalent of space diapers right there. It really is. It really is. Why had she done it?

She was obsessed. She was angry. She was supposed to go on that trip to Cancun with Travis. she was supposed to go on that trip to Cancun with Travis. He had invited her earlier in the year. But as the trip neared, Travis let her know that he was going to take someone else, a friend or a woman he'd started seeing, Mimi Hall. So she'd gone to his house, arrived in the middle of the night, slept with him, taken pictures with him.

And then when she had him in a vulnerable state, naked in the shower, she had attacked him. Juan Martinez concluded his opening statement by playing for the jury the inside edition interview where Jody said, mark my words. No jury will convict me. And Martinez asked the jury to mark Jody's words. That's pretty good. That really is. It's pretty good. That's a double dog, really is. It's pretty good. That's a double dog dare, yeah. It is.

And you can't say no to a double dog dare. Everybody knows that. Yep. During the defense's opening argument, Jennifer Wilmont acknowledged that Jodi had killed Travis Alexander, but said that the key question in this case was what motivated her to do that. She then told the jury that Jody had acted in self-defense. She said, Travis Alexander lunged at Jody in anger. Jody's life was in danger. He knocked her to the ground in the bathroom and there was a struggle.

If she did not have to defend herself, she wouldn't be here. I don't think it's very good. No. Yeah. I don't think it's a strong argument yeah i don't think it's a strong argument i don't i don't know the defense went on to say that travis had pressured jody into having what vaginal anal and oral sex with him that night or in Or in general? In general. Wasn't he the Mormon guy who had to be, like,

convinced? No, just you wait. Just you wait. You know, you're telling me that a lot. To hear about how Travis Alexander was a sex fiend.

She told the jury that they planned to call to the stand an expert who would testify about how Jody and Travis's relationship fit the mold of domestic violence. Yeah, it absolutely did because she murdered him. After opening arguments, the prosecution called their first witness, Mimi Hall. She testified that she knew Travis Alexander through church and that she'd gone on a few dates with him. She said that she always felt safe with Travis, never saw any sign of a temper.

And that was that. She also testified, I believe, about how she was one of the people that were there the night that his body was found. Oh, gosh. Next, prosecutors called one of the first responding officers to the scene, and he described for the jury what what a gruesome scene it was the worst he'd ever worked in his career next to the stand was detective esteban flores i just love his name i know it's so good so he's the homicide detective who led the case

and he talked about you know the different facets of the investigation. And then he kind of zeroed in on a phone call that he'd had with Jodi Arias. We talked about this call last time where he was like getting ready to call her. And then she called him and was like, hey, you know, have you heard anything? Like, do you need any help? Whatever. And so they played this recorded call. Yeah. in court. And in it, Jodi talked about how she was a good friend of Travis's and how she wanted to help the police in any way she possibly could. She told Detective Flores that she'd heard that

Travis had passed away and that there was a lot of blood at the crime scene. I think it's a really weird thing to bring up. She asked what type of weapon had been used. She asked if it had been recovered at the scene. And Detective Flores on the call was like, yeah, I'm sorry. That's not information we can discuss. Yeah, that's that's a lot. Super sus.

Uh huh. Yeah. And then he went on and, you know, to discuss the nature of her relationship with Travis. And she said, oh, you know, we dated for about five months and then we broke up and we just really like distanced ourselves. We stayed friends, but we're just like buddies. We're like real good buddies. But we're just like buddies. We're like real good buddies. We did remain like intimate, but I wouldn't say it was like romantic.

On the call, Detective Flores asked Jodi about the nature of the couple's breakup. How had it gone? Was everything, you know, was it contentious? You know, how did that all play out? Was everything, you know, was it contentious? You know, how did that all play out? And Jodi said that she had a suspicion that Travis was cheating on her. And she said that she just felt like she couldn't trust him anymore. So she broke up with him. So this is interesting because in other interviews, she always says that the breakup was mutual.

Which it never is. So you already know that's a lie. always says that the breakup was mutual. Uh-huh. Which it never is. Yes. So you already know that's a lie. Yes. As this phone call goes on, Detective Flores is heard talking to Jodi about how several of Travis's friends have mentioned that, you know, there was some

disturbing behavior on her part, that maybe she'd hacked into Travis's email. Maybe she'd, you know, been showing up at his house uninvited. Maybe she snuck through the doggy door. Yeah. She totally brushed this off. And when she did, Detective Flores is like, well, people felt like maybe you were taking advantage of him or maybe hanging out when you weren't wanted. or maybe hanging out when you weren't wanted.

And again, Jodi completely dismissed this on this tape. And she said, you know, I'm sure that's just stuff people say afterwards because I'm the ex-girlfriend. No, that's not how it works. And so again, Detective Flores pushed her. He pushed her, pressed her. He said, we need to know if someone had some type of beef with him or why someone would want to do this to him. This was an angry situation. Somebody went in there to hurt him.

And they did. They hurt him really bad. him and they did they hurt him really bad and Jody was like I don't even understand how someone could do that he was so strong how could someone overpower him but then she said you know I I did always tell him I was concerned about him because he never locked his doors like some stranger broke it and stabbed him 27 times. Right. Because that happens real often. No, we've all seen Law and Order. This

is personal. Also, this really doesn't make sense with her later story. I mean, Yeah. Why not bring up the ninjas now? Yeah, exactly. You know you're safe from the ninjas. Yeah. Mm exactly. You know you're safe from the ninjas. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Unless you haven't brainstormed them yet. Exactly. So following the conclusion of this recording, the witness was turned over to the defense for cross-examination. And Kirk Nermy asked Detective Flores if he'd ever seen a picture of the French maid outfit that Travis Alexander wanted Jodi to wear when she would clean his house. Ooh. And Detective Flores was like, no. I mean, Jodi did mention that she had cleaned Travis Alexander's house, but I've never seen a picture of the French maid outfit.

Not had the pleasure. Uh-huh. And then Kirk Nermy asked Detective Flores if he had seen the emails that Travis Alexander had sent Jody Arias. And Flores was like, yeah, I mean, there were some,

there were lots of emails back and forth between them, like 82,000. And Kirk Nermy was like, well, did you see the ones where Travis Alexander called Jody a bunch of names? Like slut and whore. And at that point, the prosecution objected and the judge allowed the question. And Detective Flores said, yeah, I saw those names mentioned in a few emails. And that was the end of his testimony. What's the point you're making there? That Travis was the abusive one.

Okay. What? I don't know. I don't think that makes a real strong point. Well, they don't have a strong point to make. There's no context to that. Well. What if they're sending dirty emails back and forth?

Yeah. Hmm. Then you wouldn't want to go into the context. Yeah, that's true. But yeah, it is interesting because if it was a really damning email, wouldn't you want it read aloud? Yeah. Rather than just highlighting a couple of words. Hmm. Hmm. Rather than just highlighting a couple of words.

A couple of medical examiners testified, a couple of crime scene investigators testified and just talked about the state of Travis's body. The medical examiner talked about specifically how it was impossible to know what order the attack took place in because of the state of his body when he was discovered. It was impossible to know if he was shot first, stabbed first, throat slit first. But that it wasn't really that important because any one of those could have been the fatal blow. The medical examiner did specify that the stab wounds to Travis were inflicted with major force and were very deep. So this kind of aligns with the story that this was like a personal attack. Like this was very personal.

There was a lot of feeling behind this. Was there a big size difference between Jodi and Travis? I mean, yeah. Considerable difference. But I guess if he's naked in the shower, he's in a pretty vulnerable state. So, yeah.

Yeah, I think it's not an accident that that's where the attack took place. Well, I mean, it kind of is, though, because those intruders came in. They didn't know he was going to be in the shower. I was more lucky on their part. Yeah, absolutely. I'm a big Judy Arias defender.

I guess. A forensic firearms examiner testified that there was a.25 caliber shell casing found at the scene. There was a bullet found inside Travis Alexander's cheek, but she wasn't able to match them up ballistically because no gun had ever been found. But it was a 25 caliber bullet and a 25 caliber shell casing. The next to testify was Ryan Burns. Ryan Burns, we mentioned briefly on the previous episode as Jodi's budding love

interest. So remember she was like, oh, I couldn't have possibly been the one to kill Travis because I never wasn't even seeing Travis. I was, I have a new guy. His name, you know, he lives in Utah and he works for PPL too. Yeah. So he got on the stand and he talked about how he was, you know, he had a brief relationship with Jodi and that she had come to visit him the day after Travis Alexander was murdered and that they'd had a steamy makeout sesh.

The trip was planned. She was supposed to come see him, but she'd shown up like hours late, like almost a whole day late. Yeah. Uh-huh. Weird. And she had a couple of small cuts on her hand. I bet she did.

Mm-hmm. And that they hung out like on a big beanbag. Like one of those ones that I want. Yeah. And they cuddled and he said we were talking and then we'd kiss a little bit. And every time we started to kiss, it got a little more escalated. Wow. I mean, things were really getting steamy on the stand.

Mm-hmm. He did say that the couple never removed their clothing, and he never touched her breasts or anything. There's a limit to what you can do in a beanbag. That's right. That's right. So this trip was planned. He testified that Jodi had showed up hours late,

and she told him that she'd gotten lost and then had had to stop to rest. And when he asked her about the cuts she had on her hand, she said that she had cut them working at Margaritaville in Wairika. Only there was no Margaritaville in Wairika. She couldn't name like any fast food place. Nothing. Yeah. Or even just say I was chopping veggies at home. Yeah.

No. And he also did note that she'd previously been a blonde and had suddenly dyed her hair dark. And he noted that she looked much better. Much better. Yeah. Because she had brassy roots. Clearly an at-home dye job. That's right.

Brassy as fuck. That's what he said on the stand. The prosecution also questioned Ryan Burns about, is that his name? Yeah. If you're messing up someone's name, that's my thing. You can't take that. They specifically questioned Ryan about up someone's name. That's my thing. You can't take that. They specifically question Ryan about Jodi's strength.

And he said she had a tight bod. Oh, she was fit. She had a six pack. Did she really? Yeah. And he said she's a lot stronger than she looks. That's right. So the next day they called this detective from the Wairika police department to the stand basically just to say there's no Margaritaville in Wairika.

And they're like, can you please tell us where the Margaritaville is located in Wairika? And he's like, yeah, there isn't one. No. It was a dramatic courtroom moment, Brittany. I wish I could. We wanted a Margaritaville in Wairika for years! Next, they called a police officer with the Wairika Police Department who had investigated.

Whether there was a margarita. No, a robbery call at Jody Arias' house. And he said he thought the whole thing was super weird because just like four things had been taken. And he was like, there was all kinds of stuff still in that house. There was a bunch of other guns. The gun was stolen from a gun cabinet where other guns were still there. And then the other thing that was stolen was like a cup of quarters. Well, you know, you don't want to get greedy.

That's the thing. He said on the stand, I believed it was unusual that small items worth money, for instance, the change was not taken. So like a little cup of quarters is missing. but then there was like a giant thing of change that wasn't taken. To me, it's weirder with the guns. You've got a whole gun safe. You're not going to take all the guns. He went on to say, I also felt it was strange that only one of the firearms was taken from

the cabinet. Yeah. cabinet. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Following his testimony, the prosecution played Jodi Arias' interrogation. Oh, boy. For the jury.

You know, the one where she did handstands and sang the dildo song and... Do not make that joke again. Do you think you've got... You've probably got to have pretty good core strength to do a headstand. Yeah. Yeah. She had a six-pack, Ryan Burns said. I was going to ask if you'd seen it. Well, I did see the naked pictures, but she wasn't like –

Flexing. Flexing. Yeah. She looked fit. I bet she did. Yeah. She had her hair in two braids. Uh-huh. And then they censored her nips and her crotch.

So, sorry. How did you feel about her hair? I didn't care for it at all. Uh-huh. Specifically, the portion of the interrogation tape they played was part where Jody said, I would never want to hurt him. If I did that, I'd be fully ready to face the consequences. I am all for the Ten Commandments. Thou shall not kill.

That strikes me as so weird. Yeah, it's really fucking weird. But I always think it's weird when people do the, I didn't do it, but if I did it, blah, blah, blah. Yeah. I would think you would just end at, I didn't do it. I didn't do it. I didn't do it. Also, if you're trying to think of a hairstyle that ensures that you don't leave behind a bunch of loose hairs at the scene, wouldn't two braids? Yeah, two braids would be a way to do it. That's a tip for all you criminals out there. Next to the stand was a man named Michael Gaglietti.

Huh? Mm-hmm. He ran the budget car rental location in Redding, California, where Jodi Arias rented that vehicle. She rented it on June 2nd, 2008, and she returned it after putting like 2,500 miles on it. And the floor mats were missing. And there were red stains all over the seats. Oh, shit. He assumed it was Kool-Aid and just cleaned it.

No. No. No. The floor mats are missing. And what are all these red stains? Must be Kool-Aid. She had to have played a part in that, right? Like been like, oh, my gosh, something happened. And there's like some stains on there.

I think there are a lot of people who are just like, none of my business, not getting involved. Oh, that's that's very possible. I think that's that. Yeah. Yeah. On January 17th, 2013, the prosecution arrested their case. They'd laid it out. All the parts were there. Following that, though, the defense filed a motion asking for a dismissal specifically of the premeditation charge.

They said, uh-uh, the prosecution has failed to present evidence of premeditation charge. They said, uh-uh, the prosecution has failed to present evidence of premeditation. What about those ugly braids? That's premeditation right there. Juan Martinez was like, what the fuck are you talking about? I showed all kinds of stuff about premeditation. The burglary of her home, the dyeing of her hair,

the rental car, the gas cans in the back of the car. His voice got higher each time. Poor Juan. And the judge said that she would review the motion. And like, I think like for like 12 days, the court was in recess while. Really?

That judge was taking a spa day or something. That's not that big a thinker. Ultimately, the motion was denied. Yes. And when the trial resumed, the defense started their case by calling Jody's ex-boyfriend, Daryl Brewer, to the stand. Daryl was a 52-year-old divorcee. Oh, my. Mm-hmm. With a teenage son.

He testified that he met Jodi in 2001 when she was about 22 years old. And they dated for about four years. He testified that they were in love, Chris. Is beautiful. Is that what you're going to say? Out of here yeah i mean he would have been not that old right how old would he have been um now i gotta do some math if he's 52 he would have been 39 and she was 20. Yeah, that's too old. That's too old. That's too old.

That's too old. Get out of here. So the defense talked about their relationship a little bit and, you know, how normalaryl Brewer if he recalled when he told investigators that Jody was pretty aggressive during sex. And he said he didn't recall that statement. I say it to so many people. But he did acknowledge that he and Jody had anal sex. What does that have to do with anything?

I don't know. It comes up so many times. The idea is that Jodi talks about how she was forced to do things that she didn't really want to do sexually with Travis Alexander. He pressured her to try things she didn't really want to try, but she thought that she had to do them to be with him. And so the idea is that by this ex saying, oh, yeah, we had anal sex, like Travis wasn't the first person to bring it up to you. Yeah, I don't really love that. I don't either. You can do something with one person and not want to do it with the next.

Absolutely. I don't either. You can do something with one person and not want to do it with the next one. Absolutely. During his testimony, Brewer said that he and Jodi had been together for about five years. They purchased a house together in 2005 in Palm Desert, California. They had discussed marriage at one point, but Daryl said he wasn't ready. He'd recently divorced. He needed more time to mature.

wasn't ready. He recently divorced. He needed more time to mature. He wasn't ready to get into another marriage following his divorce. There was also a line of questioning about how Jodi Arias got breast implants while they were together and that she had

done it to fit in with his group of friends. Did his group of friends all have breast implants? I don't know. I only hang out with women with breast implants. Again, what does that have to do with anything? I don't know. Is the point just she's a big slut slut?

No, I think the point is that she changes herself to fit in with different groups. Like, so she got a breast implants for this guy. She became a Mormon for Travis travis okay so he wasn't really pressuring her so much as this is just how yes this is how she does yes exactly she gets big fat titties yeah exactly um he oh now she's a mormon he also testified that he never really knew her to have a temper but what he did say was that she'd done some kind of creepy things. Like what? She had taken photos of him without his consent while he was nude, while he was sleeping, while he was in the shower.

No. Why? Yeah. Mm-hmm. Why? Exactly. Jodi, you big creep. No. Why? Yeah. Mm-hmm. Why? Exactly. Jodi, you big creep. Mm-hmm.

Ugh. Mm-hmm. He said that the couple's relationship deteriorated in the fall of 2006 when they stopped having sex because Jodi decided that she was saving herself for marriage. I do like that. Okay. Their house was foreclosed on in 2007. Jodi moved out. The couple remained in contact

as friends for some time and in May of 2008 she called him and asked if she could borrow some gas cans because she was taking a road trip. Are you kidding? I'm not kidding. And

he testified that he loaned her those gas cans on June 3rd, 2008. And he said he never got them back. So that's the real crime here. Yes. The defense centered their questioning of Daryl brewer around his sex life with jody this is someone she had been in a long-term relationship with they bought a house together kirk nurmy asked brewer did your sex life involve her wearing little boys underwear

wearing pigtails and schoolgirl outfits bending her over desk, ejaculating on her face, calling her a whore, a slut, or a three-holed wonder. Oh. This is on an actual court transcript. She's got more holes than that, I'm just telling you. Jesus. So all of these were in reference to behavior they claimed Travis had used to degrade Jodi. Yeah, I think we got it, Brandi. I mean, it would be really weird if it wasn't. And Daryl Brewer said, no.

Next to testify was Gus Searcy. He testified for the defense and he said he was a friend and mentor of Jodi's while they were working together at PPL. And he testified that Jodi always dressed feminine but conservative and she was never sexually inappropriate with him. I mean, to tell you the truth, I wish she had been. She didn't make eyes at me once. So they then tried to kind of attack the character of Travis Alexander by calling his ex-girlfriend Lisa Andrews Diodoni. She testified that she felt cheated and lied to in her relationship with Travis. She said she met Travis at a church function and that they dated on and off beginning in July

of 2007. She was 18 and Travis was 29. Ew. She said she broke up with him after she became suspicious that he was cheating on her with Jodi Arias. Fuck. Yeah. Hilarious.

Fuck. Yeah. After they broke up, though, Travis continued to call and email her. And eventually, when she felt she could trust him again, they got back together. But Lisa said she felt pressured by Travis to get married. And that was something she didn't feel ready for. So she broke up with him. Yeah, because she was a teenager. Yeah.

The defense then questioned Lisa specifically about an email she sent to Travis on September 23rd, 2007. In the email, Lisa told Travis that she didn't want him to text her or email her anymore. or email her anymore. She said in the email that when they were together, they would make out for too long and that Lisa felt Travis only wanted her for her body. She told Travis that she felt like he had a lot of sexual tension, which made her feel used and dirty.

And she wrote that she had asked Travis repeatedly not to grab her butt in public, but she didn't feel like he was listening to her. Yeah, that's super disrespectful. Yeah, absolutely. She also said that she had asked him not to talk about sex so much. It wasn't something she wanted to talk about. She felt dirty doing that, and he continued to do it anyway. And she said she didn't feel like he cared how she felt. Yeah. In the email, she went on to say that she felt like Travis was constantly asking her for

compliments, but that she didn't feel like he shared the same values that she embraced. She was very into her faith, very into the idea of chastity until marriage, and she felt like he was just constantly wanting to make out. And while they never had a physical relationship beyond making out, but she felt very pressured that that's where he wanted to go. he wanted to go. Yeah. She testified that after she sent that email that they discussed it at length and Travis said that he wanted to show her that he cared about her and he wanted to address all of

those issues in the email. And she testified that she had written the email in anger and that once they talked, she felt like the issues were resolved and they got back together again. This time, they didn't stay together for very long. They broke up for good in February of 2008, and she stopped communicating with him after that. On the stand, Jennifer Wilmot asked Lisa if she was shocked to discover after Travis Alexander's death that he was not a virgin. And she said yes. She was very surprised to learn that. Yes.

She was very surprised to learn that. My take on this is that like, yeah, it's not great behavior. But if you're trying to destroy somebody's character, like I don't know that this goes that far to do that. I don't know. I think, you know, if the picture you're trying to paint is this guy didn't respect sexual boundaries. Yeah. This guy was disrespectful. Yeah. I think this is a pretty good way to do it.

Yeah. Because it sounds like he was disrespectful. I do. I think it's at a different level than what Jodi Arias is claiming. Well, yeah. He's not climbing in a dog door and everything. Yeah, it's not great. Yeah.

A couple more friends of Travis's were called to the stand to testify about a trip Jodi and Travis had taken with friends to the Grand Canyon. So on the day that they were all supposed to leave, they were like standing around and like Travis's living room. And Travis apparently went to pick up Jodi's backpack. And he was like, he was mad that she'd packed too much stuff. He raised his voice and he told her that she'd packed too much stuff. And Jodi began to cry and she ran upstairs. Travis followed her and it was clear to everybody who was still in the living room that they were upstairs fighting. Finally, they came downstairs and when the group got in the car to leave, Jodi and Travis were not speaking to each other. And it was real awkward for everybody else in the car. But like after 30 minutes, it seemed that all had been forgotten and everyone had a great time on the trip.

That's so weird. You ever had a couple fight right in front of you, Norm? I just called you Norm. No, I've never had a super awkward life. Never. That's great. That's good that you've never had that experience. I bet it would be weird if you did.

It would be. It would be real weird. I don't know. Again, this is supposed to show that he has some great temper. I feel like every couple's had that argument, right? Yeah, absolutely. Why'd you pack so much stuff? Oh my God, stop yelling at me!

Yeah, I mean, it sucks that it happened in front of people. But I don't know that it's some huge thing. Yeah, I agree. And they had a shitty relationship. Yeah, exactly. So this is just cherry on top. Finally, we've come to the moment you've all been waiting for. Jodi takes the stand in her own defense.

Yes, on February 4th, 2013, the 13th day of her murder trial. Coincidence? I think not. Jodi Arias took the stand in her own defense and she would remain there for the next 18 days. Woo! In his first question, Kirk Nermy asked Jodi if she had killed Travis Alexander. And Jodi said, yes, I did. Shut up.

She did. He said, did you kill Travis Alexander? And she said, yes, I did. What? Yeah. And then Kirk Nermy asked her why. and then Kirk Nermy asked her why, and Jodi said,

the simple answer is that he attacked me, and I had to defend myself. Oh, my God. Oh, yeah. The fucking world went crazy. Oh, my God. By this point, this case is insane. Like, HLN is set up. They've got TV set up outside the courtroom because crowds have gathered every day to watch the trial.

And, you know, only a handful of people can get into the courtroom. So there's just crowds outside. They've got projectors set up so everybody can see it. Every night they're doing a recap on HLN of all the juicy testimony of that day. Also, by this point, Jodi Arias had undergone quite a make under. Okay. So we already know, you know, she's dyed her hair brown.

She stays with the brown, right? But she gets a real plasticky pair of glasses. She starts wearing real frumpy clothes. As the trial went on, her clothes got frumpier and frumpier. And she started sporting these little bangs, like these little wispy bangs. By the time she took the stand, she was sporting wispy bangs and a little half pony that stuck out the side of her head.

What? Yes! To make her look like a toddler? Yes! Oh. This is amazing. I mean, clearly I did not follow this story. Okay, so I read something.

This is the first time I had read this. That the reason for her baggy clothes, because all of her clothes were super baggy and all of the pictures of her, she wears these tight clothes to show off her hot little bod, right? Okay. So the reason she wore baggy clothes is because obviously as a defendant, you don't want the jury to view you as guilty, right? But she's in custody. And so they can't have visible shackles on her.

So they had thigh restraints on her. And they also had a stun belt on her. Because they were that worried? Yeah. Wow. A stun belt that at the press of a button would send like 50,000 volts through her body. Whoa. Yeah.

I learned that for the very first time. Researching this episode was very exciting for me. How would you dress for a trial? I mean, I'd probably play it up, too. She looked like a full-on schoolmarm with a half pony. I don't think you would. I probably wouldn't. You'd be like, I know what I like.

She even like ditched the makeup, which was like, I mean, they really probably had to convince her on that. Her defense team did. May I look? Yeah. Yeah. Look her up. Jodi Arias on the stand. Jodi Arias on the stand.

Okay. Images, please. Oh, yeah. Oh, man. Look at that little pony. Yep. Just sticking out the side of her head. Come on, Jodi.

It's so funny. It's such a dramatic make-under. No, I'm not a sex pot. She doesn't look like a sex pot. I know. She looks like the most boring fourth grade teacher. Yes. Wow.

Sorry. Now I'm going to look up Jodi Harris, just regular. Yeah. Look at her when she's a blonde and she's like. I want your bad. I want your bad. Hot bad.

Yeah. I've got to admit, if I look this hot, it'd be really hard for me to do a make under. Of course it would. I'd get up there looking like that fourth grade school teacher. But I'd turn to the jury and be like just so you know I'm really hot okay I've got to stop looking at oh did you see this one

where she's hugging a tree oh yeah I think we all have that picture where we're hugging a tree of course okay so the big bomb is dropped did you kill him yes I did in a nutshell it was to defend myself oh I'm sorry the simple bomb is dropped. Did you kill him? Yes, I did. In a nutshell, it was to defend myself.

Okay. Oh, I'm sorry. The simple answer is that I had to defend myself. No nutshells were mentioned. No nutshells. So that was kind of the end of that line of questioning for the moment. From there, they went and talked about her childhood. She talked about how she, like, until the age of seven, she had a pretty good childhood.

And then at the age of seven, I don't know, something happened. And all of a sudden she started being regularly abused by her parents. She testified that from the age of seven until she like moved out when she was like 14, the beatings became more and more intense and that her mother actually would carry a wooden spoon in her purse so that she could beat her with it whenever she wanted to. Did Jodi have siblings? She did. She had like two half-sisters and a brother or something like that.

Yeah. She has three siblings. Did any of them testify about – no? Okay. No. And her mom was there for her trial. She came every day for trial and supported her daughter. From there, her line of testimony turned to specifically the lies that she told following her arrest and leading up to trial.

So specifically, she said of the no jury will ever convict me line that she meant it not because she was innocent, but because she had plans to die by suicide. She said, I was extremely confident that no jury would convict me because I didn't expect any of you to be here. I planned to be dead. But she did say no jury would convict her because she was innocent. If you roll the tape on that inside edition. Let's not roll the tape. Let's just listen to whatever bullshit she has to say. On February 5th, Jodi's testimony centered on her relationship with Travis. She described how they met at the PPL conference and how she was very attracted to him.

But she had a boyfriend, the 52-year-old who she lived with in Palm Desert. And so following the conference, she went home and broke up with her boyfriend and started communicating with Travis. That same week, she said she went and stayed with Travis and some of his friends for a few days. She testified while she was there that Travis came into the bedroom that she was staying at and that like kind of everyone went to their rooms at the same time and she went to her room

and then Travis came in and they were talking and she said like they started kissing at this point. And then like at some point they were like laying down and kissing and Travis started taking her clothes off. And she said she didn't stop him. She said, I didn't want to tell him no. So I just kept going with it. I just kept going with it. She said that at that point, Travis took all of her clothes off and he performed oral sex on her and she performed oral sex on him. After that, they fell asleep together and she said that she was bothered by this experience. She said it felt like too much

too soon and it made her uncomfortable. She said that after that first sexual encounter with Travis, I'm sorry, that they went to church together like that next morning and then they went their separate ways. She didn't see him again in person until September. And then I, so I mean, a couple of weeks maybe. And at that time they met in California at a coffee shop. And during that meeting, they left the coffee shop and went out to her car and started making out. And Travis told her that he was horny and that he wanted her to perform oral sex on him. In the parking lot of the coffee shop? In the parking lot of the coffee shop.

And she said, I felt an attraction to him and the feeling was mutual and I wanted to. I just wanted to. I don't know. I wanted to do what he wanted to do. And so she performed oral sex on him in the car. And afterwards, he pulled up his pants and they left. Like he got out of the car and she stayed in the car and left. She said he refused to kiss me goodbye because he said it was gross.

Maybe because I had been performing oral sex, but he just kissed me on the cheek and then left. Well, I don't like that at all. I know. I don't like that either. Also, was it a Starbucks? I don't know. Brandy, what the hell?

All she said in her testimony was that they met at a California coffee shop. She said after Travis left, he left her a voicemail and in it he expressed displeasure with himself over the encounter. Why was he upset with himself? Because he shouldn't have done it. Because he's a good Mormon boy. God, religion really fucks with people, doesn't it? It does. Because his big mistake was, no, you can't kiss me.

Yeah, exactly. Jodi testified that despite this feeling that things were going too fast for her her relationship with travis continued to develop and her feelings for him continued to grow okay so during the third day of her testimony so by this time the courtroom packed right because she's talking about all this sexy stuff, whatever. So she told a packed courtroom about kind of this evolution of their sexual relationship. She talked about how Travis

had this view of sex that she likened to Bill Clinton's view of sex, that only actual, like, penis and vagina counts as sex. Oral sex doesn't count. Anal sex doesn't count. Anal sex doesn't count.

Because that's. That's so weird. Yeah. But, I mean, there are people who think that. Yeah. That's right. And so, like, he was all for doing any of that. She talked about how they would do things like grinding or what they called the Provo push.

It did take me a second. All right. Provo, Utah. Okay. And that they regularly engaged in oral sex. They, in fact, met at a hotel once very early into their relationship. They were not together at this point yet. This is when they just started having a physical relationship and that they'd met at a hotel somewhere in Arizona and that they had engaged in oral sex.

And she testified that she felt like a prostitute after that hotel encounter. She said, I felt a little bit used, but I knew I had gone there on my own willingly. She said that for a few days after that meetup at the hotel that Travis did not return her calls. She said she felt bummed out and she felt stupid. And then a week later, he finally called her. And then a couple days after that, he sent her a dick pic. Yeah. On February 11th of 2013, Jodi testified that one night in May of 2007, she spent the night at Travis's house and that she woke up to find Travis having sex with her. Oh, wow.

Kirk Nermy asked her, did you want him to penetrate your vagina with his penis while you were sleeping? And Jodi replied, it was nothing I had thought about. She went on to say that she was uncomfortable but did not tell Travis to stop. She said, I felt like I was partially responsible because I went to sleep next to him. I was wearing a t-shirt and cute shorts.

What do you think? I don't know. Ugh. Yeah, it's, I don't know because I, she's not credible is the problem that yeah yeah she's not credible and she's never told these stories before and there's no proof to back these stories up which i know like that sucks it sucks that i'm like questioning her version of events. Hmm. Yeah.

What do you think? I don't know. I think I'm dealing with the same things you are. Yeah. Like every other thing she's said is a lie. Yeah. But I think coupled with the 18-year-old stories about sexual pressure. Yeah, I agree. Now, this is obviously a huge escalation over that.

Yeah. But – Yeah. Oof. Yeah. I think part of it is it's not in my nature to like hear a woman tell a story like that and be like, you're a filth. No, I totally agree. And so there's kind of a I think the thing that I

have in my head is that essentially those two things, the pressuring of the 18 year old with the grabbing her butt and kissing her for too long is overlapping with this. This would be the same time period. So is he really like

having sex with this other woman and then like the most pressure he's giving this other girl is that he's kissing her too long and he's grabbing her butt possibly yeah i mean i it probably it is possible and again i'm i'm thinking of it through the lens of like really religious stuff of like you see the madonna and the whore yeah you're gonna maybe treat them differently right yeah and he had at this point already like labeled jody as not marriage material and but at the same time he's telling his friends that jody's a nympho and she's sending him dirty text messages so maybe she deserves it no that's not it. No, that's not what I'm saying.

That's not what I'm saying. What I'm saying is. No, that's what I'm saying is that could be his mindset. Absolutely. It could be. You're absolutely right. It's very complicated. Ew, I hate it.

I know. All right. Well, let's see what you think about this next part. Okay. All right. Well, let's see what you think about this next part. OK. One of the most memorable moments from the trial came later that same day when Jodi testified about a day in January 2008 when she walked in on Travis masturbating to the image of a young boy in his underwear. She said, I walked in and Travis was on the bed masturbating and I got really embarrassed. He started grabbing at something on the bed and I realized they were papers and one

fell and kind of floated and landed face up in front of me near my feet. And it was a photograph. It was a picture of a little boy. She said, I didn't know how to react. I ran. I got in my car and I started driving home. But she said she returned to Travis's house later that night and asked him to explain what she had seen. She testified that Travis told her that he had a sexual interest in children, but that he preferred sex with women because it made him feel more normal. And she went on to say that he seemed very ashamed of himself.

I'll be honest, I'd forgotten about where she wrote those fake letters. Now I'm back to thinking she's totally full of shit. There's something about the way the photo floats through the air. Like the plastic bag in American Beauty. It's the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. And then it's a little boy in his underwear. We've all been there. I think this never happened.

Yeah, I don't think so. Yep. Following that story, Jodi then testified about the abuse she claimed to have suffered at Travis's hand in October of 2007 she said she and Travis got into some kind of argument and Travis had pushed her down he called her brother a homosexual slur and she testified that he then kicked her in the ribs and they attempted to kick her again, but she blocked it with her hand. And when she blocked it with her hand and he like kicked her and the blow broke her finger.

And to this day, her finger is still crooked. And she held that crooked finger up to show the cherry. Okay. Okay. Yeah. I don't know. I don't know, man. The next day, Jodi testified about the final hours leading up to Travis's death. Travis's death. Jodi said that she had been planning a trip to Utah in June to meet to go see that her new boyfriend, Ryan Burns or whatever, and that she told Travis and Travis was like,

come see me. Don't go see him. And she said Travis was being very sweet. He wanted me to come see him. And so I said, all right, I'm going. She said she left Pasadena, California on June 3rd and drove to Travis's house in Mesa and arrived there on June 4th, sometime between 3 and 4 a.m. She said it was still dark, but it was early morning. I parked in the same spot I always park in when I'm at his house, which was the center spot on the driveway. She said she went in and they watched dumb videos on his laptop and he showed her this new punching bag that he'd recently purchased. She said he was really proud of it. He was showing how he was punching it and he was showing off. And then the two went to sleep in his bed. She said she woke up about 1230 p.m. on June 4th and Travis woke up about 30 minutes later and they engaged in a little light bondage play.

She said that Travis tied her up with a decorative rope and that he cut the rope with a knife that he retrieved from the kitchen. So he brought the murder weapon into the room. Mm-hmm. Did he also get the gun for the light bondage play? Mm-hmm.

Yeah, no rope was ever found, just for the record. Okay. Mm-hmm. Kirk Nermy asked Jodi if she wanted to be tied up, and she said, it's not my favorite thing to do, but it's not unbearable. tied up and she said, it's not my favorite thing to do, but it's not unbearable. She said that she was naked when Travis tied her up, but that Travis was dressed in his LDS temple garments. She said that Travis performed oral sex on her and that she asked him to stop because he hadn't shaved and his face was scratchy. After a short bondage session, Jodi said that they had sex, took some videos, took some photos, and then they deleted all of it. She said she then took a shower and got dressed and was going to leave to go on her road trip to Utah.

And she gave Travis some CDs that had some photos on them from some trips that they had taken previously. And Travis went to, like, look at the CDs and they were scratched and they wouldn't work and he got really mad. So he flung one at her head. We all love to look at vacation pics and when we can't do that, we lose our ever-loving shit. That's right. Maybe he didn't intend to throw it at her head.

Maybe he was throwing it at the wall and it ricocheted off and hit her in the head. Either way, she testified, I thought I had done something stupid again and he was getting angry. She said he seemed very pissed off. He grabbed her by her arms, smacked her in the face and spun her around. And then he bent her over the bed and they had sex again. She said he ejaculated on her back and then told her to go wash up. And she said, I felt used when he said, go wash up. After cleaning herself up, Jodi testified that she went back to Travis's bedroom and they took more photos of each other.

And she said that Travis had really been working out and he was really proud of his body. And so he was open to taking pictures of himself. That was kind of the end of the testimony that day. It would pick up the next day kind of in the same spot and talked more about what happened following that. So she testified pretty calmly during this part. She cried a couple times, but she said the photo sesh eventually moved into the bathroom. He was in the shower posing for pictures. And at one point she dropped his camera and Travis became so enraged that he lunged at her and body slammed her to the floor.

She said it was like mortal terror. I pissed him off the worst I'd ever seen him pissed off. She said she ran to his closet. We talked about this a little bit on the previous episode. From the bathroom, you could either go down like a hallway or around into the primary bedroom closet. And so she said, I ran from him to the nearby closet to escape him. She said, I was scared. He was freaking out. I was freaking out. I could hear his footsteps chasing me. I didn't want him to grab me again. She said, I was scared. He was freaking out. I was freaking out. I could hear his footsteps chasing me. I didn't want him to grab me again. She said at that time, she remembered that Travis had a gun in his closet. And so she grabbed it to protect herself. She said,

I thought pointing the gun at him would stop him. But he grabbed my waist and the gun went off. I didn't mean to shoot him or anything. I didn't even know I shot him. She said, She said, the next thing I remembered, I was in the bathroom. I remember dropping the knife and it clinked to the tile and it made a big noise. And I just remember screaming.

I don't remember anything after that. She said she might have put the knife in the dishwasher after she'd stabbed Travis Alexander. She said she then fled his home and drove into the desert where she disposed of the handgun. She said, I was scared and I couldn't imagine calling 911 and telling them what I'd just done. I was scared of what would happen to me. Following her arrest, Jodi said that she didn't know what to say to police, so she just denied it. She said, I guess I didn't understand that I could be quiet and not say anything at all. She said, I guess I didn't understand that I could be quiet and not say anything at all. She then went on to talk about the interview she gave with media and how she had planned to commit suicide, but she didn't talk any further about the murder itself.

And following that line of questioning, Kurt Nermy announced that he was done with his direct examination. On cross-examination, Jodi's attitude seemed to change a lot. She was kind of this meek little thing who'd been pressured into this deviant sexual relationship about which she remembered every single detail. But suddenly, when she faced off with Juan Martinez, she got snippy and almost snarky. And lots of people speculated that this was the real Jodi coming out. Jodi couldn't seem to remember many details when being asked questions by the prosecution. And Juan Martinez pressed her about this. He said, you have a lot of memory for a lot of events involving sexual instances with Mr. Alexander, but you seem to be having problems with your memory here today. And he went on to say, what factors influence you having a memory problem?

problem. And Jody said, usually when men like you are screaming at me or grilling me or men like Travis doing the same. This cross-examination would go on for like six hours and Jody did not come off great. Yeah. I bet the prosecution was just loving it. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. And comparing the prosecutor to the guy who evidently deserved to be murdered. Yeah, it's putting them on the same level. It really shows the jury, well, I don't think this guy's that bad. Maybe the other guy isn't bad either. Yes, exactly.

Yeah. Maybe the other guy isn't bad either. Yeah. Yes, exactly. At the end of this day's cross-examination, so like six hours had gone on where he's just like grilling her and she can't remember anything. And she's talking about how she didn't even realize. He has her go through like the murder again and she can't remember anything. And then all she remembers is she came to. It was like she blacked out and she came to and she was in the middle of the desert.

Her hands were covered in blood. And then she wasn't even sure what she had done. So at the end of this, Juan Martinez actually changed the questioning to these magazines that Jodi Arias had tried to smuggle out of prison or out of jail to a friend who was visiting her in August of 2011. OK, so this friend had come in and she tried to, like, get her the sneaker, these magazines. Well, the friend had been caught leaving with these magazines. And Jodi had written secret messages inside, like the the binding of the magazine. And one of them, it read, you fucked up. What you told my attorney directly contradicts what I've been saying for over a year.

Get down here ASAP and see me before you talk to them again and before you testify so we can fix this. Oh, wow. Yeah, that's not good. And again, you're seeing the real her. Yes, this is the real Jodi. Oh, fuck. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm.

So that was the end of that day. The cross-examination continued. The next exam continued for several days. And like, Juan Martinez did not let up on her. A lot of people thought that he went too hard on her. And he probably did. And he didn't need to. Yeah.

The case was great. He didn't need to do this. But like, he needed to do this for who he was. I was going to say, he was probably so sick of her shit. Can you imagine? He was. And also, he was probably so sick of her shit. Can you imagine? He was. And also, he was loving the attention. The dude was signing autographs outside the courthouse every day.

I think that's so gross. He's not a great dude. Okay. Spoiler alert. All right. All right. He was loving every minute of it. And, like, any time he was sitting at the prosecution table, he had a little smirk on

his face. And just, like, I remember at the time being like, oh, yeah, get him one. Get her one. And then, like, when I rewatched this footage, I was like, oh, my gosh. This is terrible. Yeah. Yeah. Anyway, so, like, the next day he presents her with some images of Travis's dead body.

And she cries and whatever. And he's like, what are you crying for? And she's like, I don't know, you know, whatever. And he's like, were you crying when you were shooting him? And she said, I don't remember. And he said, were you crying when you were stabbing him? And she said, I don't remember. And she said, how about when you cut his throat?

Were you crying then? And she said, I don't know. And then Juan Martinez said, the last memory you have of him is after you shot him, right? And Jody said, yes. And he said, you say you went into a fog. You know, you tell us that you went out into the desert, you were in a fog and you needed to get rid of the gun.

And he said, wouldn't you agree that if you didn't know what you were doing in the desert, then there'd be no need for you to get rid of the gun. And she said, I would not agree with that. And he said, why would you even think of taking the gun unless you really knew what was going on? And she said, I can only speculate because I don't remember taking the gun. She said the next thing she remembers is that she was about an hour from the Hoover Dam. She had all the blood all over. She washed it off with bottled water. And then she left Travis Alexander a voicemail checking up on him.

Mm-hmm. Lord almighty. And Juan Martinez said, that fog is not so deep that it stops you from attempting to fabricate evidence, is it? Oh, he's good. He is. He's good. And she said, that would be correct. Oh, shit.

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. I bet she hated that. Oh, yeah. And then he said, all of these lies are meant for your benefit so that you can escape responsibility. Right. And she said, yeah, so I could escape whatever for the time being. And then he played for her the 48 Hours interview where she went on to talk about, you know, she wouldn't be convicted.

No jury would convict her. She said that on both the Inside Edition interview and the 48 Hours interview. And he said, you believe you're going to be acquitted because you came in and told these stories, don't you? And Jodi said, I can't predict the future. Following the end of her questioning, so this kind of wrapped up her questioning, Jody fielded questions from the jury. I mentioned this last episode. Arizona is one of only two states that allows the jury to submit questions to a witness who testifies at the end of their testimony.

So the jury submits the questions. The judge reads through them and eliminates ones that are not pertinent or not appropriate. They had like, I don't know, like 160 questions for Jodi. And most of them hinted at the fact that they didn't believe her or didn't find her credible. Here's just like a sampling of them. Why are you always lying? Yeah. After you shot him, why not run out of the house? And she responded, after the gun

went off, he lunged at me. It's hard to describe fear. I really thought he had intentions to kill me. I don't remember any specifics of what happened after that point. Another question was, did you try to clean up the scene? And she said, based on evidence, I believe I did. Another question was, why delete photos off the camera after you killed Travis? She said, I don't have a specific memory of that. That's convenient. Why did you put the camera in the washing machine? I don't have a memory of that.

Why did you take the rope and gun with you? I knew that something bad had happened and I felt I had done something wrong. She's contradicting herself. Yeah. What happened to the knife? I don't know. It didn't go to the car with me. Why do you have no memory of killing Travis?

I can't explain why my mind did what it did. I really don't know. blame why my mind did what it did. I really don't know. How is it that you remember so many details of your sexual encounters, including your ex-boyfriends, but you do not remember stabbing Travis and dragging his body?

Yeah, so these questions really, like, gave a view of how the jury was seeing Jodi Arias. And you think not good. That's correct. So, following her questioning, the defense put a psychologist on the stand, Richard Samuels, who testified for like six days. And he said that Jodi had likely been suffering from acute stress at the time of the murder and that it had sent her body into fight or flight mode to defend herself.

And this caused her to stop retaining memory. That explains the whole thing. And then he diagnosed her with PTSD. Mm-hmm. So on cross-examination, Juan Martinez tried to tear down this guy's credibility and he accused him of bias because he had previously testified that he felt compassion for Jodi Arias. And so they talked about that a little bit and then he also questioned how it is that this Richard Samuels reached a PTSD diagnosis. And so this is what Juan Martinez says. So Juan Martinez, her first scores on the post-traumatic stress disorder scale confirmed the presence of PTSD, right? Dr. Richard Samuels, yes.

And then Samuels concluded that Arias suffered from amnesia from the trauma of the attack. Dr. Richard Samuels said, it's clear from the research, a large percentage of individuals who are in such settings do not remember or have cloudy and foggy memories of what has transpired. Juan Martinez went on to say, how many hours did you spend with her? And Dr. Richard Samuels said, between 20 and 30 hours and then juan martinez said now you confirmed the presence of ptsd based on the story of the intruders oh you spent 25 to 30 hours with her when she was still telling the intruder story. So even though you know now that that story was a lie, can you still confirm the presence of PTSD? And Dr. Samuel said, perhaps I should have re-administered the test. Yeah.

Mm-hmm. Wow. Yeah. She said, do you believe in your expert opinion that Jodi was a battered woman or is a battered woman? And LaViolette said, yes, I do. And Jennifer Wilmot said, how would you characterize their relationship at this point in time given your expertise in the area? And she said, I would call it a domestically abusive relationship. And Jennifer Wilmot said, does he call her names like bitch? And LaViolette said, yes. And does he call her whore? And LaViolette said, yes. And does he call her whore? And LaViolette said, yes.

He's grabbed her by the shoulders. He's thrown her to the ground and told her she wasn't going to leave. He's done all of these things that are domestic violence. On cross-examination, Juan Martinez, this woman and Juan Martinez sparred verbally. Like they went at it. Juan Martinez said, you are, in fact, biased in favor of the defendant, aren't you? Oh. And LaViolette said, I don't believe I'm biased.

You're mischaracterizing what I do, Mr. Martinez. And he said, one of the questions here is why you felt the need to coddle her. And LaViolette responded, Mr. Martinez, are you angry with me? And he said, ma'am, is that relevant to you? Is that important to you? Does that make any difference to your evaluation, whether or not the prosecutor is angry? difference to your evaluation whether or not the prosecutor is angry and love you let said if you were in my group i would ask you to take a time out mr martinez so after several days of kind of this sparring back and forth the prosecution was able to get her to admit that Travis Alexander

was actually extremely afraid of Jodi Arias. Juan Martinez said, isn't it true that Mr. Alexander was extremely afraid of the defendant based on her stalking behavior? And LaViolette responded, he was afraid of her. Yes. And Martinez asked her if that was because of her stalking behavior and LaViolette responded

that's correct. So based on her expert analysis of their communications and their relationship she believed that Travis Alexander was afraid of Jodi Arias.

Yeah. The jury asked dozens of questions of this expert like more than they asked Jodi Arias. Yeah. The jury asked dozens of questions of this expert, like more than they asked Jodi. Oh, I didn't realize. So I thought that the jury could just ask questions of the defendant. Anyone who testified. Wow. So they had more questions for her of her diagnosis that Jodi had been abused by Travis.

One juror asked her why she often looked at Jodi across the courtroom and smiled. And she responded, I've actually tried to avoid looking at Miss Arias. I think that's a really weird response. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know how to respond to that. See, this is making me kind of understand why Jerry shouldn't ask such a stupid question. So the most telling question asked of this expert witness was if a female could abuse, batter and terrorize a man to the point of killing him.

And LaViolette responded, yes, women can be perpetrators. The defense then rested their case and the prosecution began their rebuttal phase. So they put a clinical psychologist on the stand who testified that she had found no evidence that Travis Alexander had ever abused Jodi Arias and there was no evidence to her of PTSD or amnesia in Jodi Arias. She testified that the long stretches of time that Jodi claimed to have experienced were actually inconsistent with traumatic amnesia associated with PTSD. She said that manifests typically in shorter gaps in your memory. Hmm. Okay. She actually went on to say that it was her belief that jody suffered from borderline personality disorder and that she showed signs of immaturity and an unstable sense of identity

she said people who suffer from such often have a terrified feeling of being abandoned by others. That would certainly line up. It sure would. In closing arguments on May 4th, Jodi's defense argued that the premeditation theory just didn't make sense. Well, yes, it did. No, what happened in that moment in time, that relationship, it was a relationship of chaos and it ended in chaos. There's nothing about what happened on June 4th in that bathroom that looks planned. What about the gun?

No. What about the gas cans? No, no, no, no. Here's what happened. Jodi simply snapped. So at this point, they've basically given up the self-defense claim. And they're like, she snapped and she's guilty of manslaughter and nothing more. And then Kirk Nermy went on to do the thing that I love.

He's like, you know what? This case is not about whether or not you like Jodi Arias. Oh, yeah. You know what? Nine days out of ten, I don't like Jodi Arias. Thinks she's the biggest piece of shit I've ever seen. That's right. In the prosecution's closing argument, you know, they talked about their theory.

You get a blah, blah, blah. And then Juan Martinez described to like the extent and the variety of Travis Alexander's womb. This is his final thing before the the jury was handed the case to deliberate. He said there is no evidence that Travis ever laid a hand on her, ever. Nothing indicates that this is anything less than a slaughter. There was no way to appease this woman who just wouldn't leave him alone. The jury deliberated for 15 hours and they found Jody guilty of first degree murder. She cried when she was found guilty. So following the conviction, also like the crowds outside the courthouse went nuts, like the whole world went crazy.

You went nuts. I sure did. I remember when the verdict when it was announced that the jury had come back with a verdict, I went home so I could watch it live on TV. I was at work. I was like, I got to see this. Emergency. Emergency at home. So the next step would be an aggravation phase.

So this is where the prosecution is like, hey, these are the aggravating circumstances. This is why we feel this case requires the death penalty. And so then the jury has to be like, oh, yeah, we totally agree. Or no, we don't in order to seek the death penalty. And so they did this. seek the death penalty. And so they did this. And basically the only evidence they put forward was the evidence of a medical examiner who talked about how brutal Travis Alexander's death was.

Juan Martinez showed photos of Travis Alexander's body to the jury and pictures of the crime scene. And then he took a two-minute moment of silence to illustrate how long it would have taken Travis Alexander to die. Oh. Yeah. And after three hours of deliberation, the jury determined that Jody Arias would be eligible for the death penalty. So then came the penalty phase and the prosecution called Travis Alexander's family members to give victim impact statements. And it was super emotional. His sisters testified about, you know, what

what this meant for them and how he missed out on having a life and how he wouldn't have children and he wouldn't be a part of their children's lives. And, yeah, super, super emotional. and he wouldn't be a part of their children's lives. And yeah, super, super emotional. And then Jodi Arias offered her allocution. So this is where she talks about basically why she should get a life sentence rather than a death sentence. So following her conviction,

she had actually done like an interview with fucking local media and was like, actually, I would just prefer it if they put me to death because I believe death is the final freedom. And I just rather have my freedom as soon as possible. Sure, Jan. She got up and she was like, I know that you guys have heard me say previously that I would prefer the death penalty, but I can't stand here before you and say that I mean that I would ask you to give me life because there are things that I can do with my life in prison. As a survivor of domestic violence. And she paused and said, I know many of you don't believe that I'm a survivor of domestic violence, but I am. And I can start programs in prison to help other survivors. And then she like unfolded this T-shirt that she'd made that said survivor on it. And she's like, I can make these T-shirts and I could sell them and the proceeds could go to victims of domestic abuse.

It was so fucking weird. The jury has already told you they don't believe your story. Like that's what your conviction means. But what about those T-shirts? No, she's going to raise money for victims of domestic violence. I mean, sadly, I think there would be a really big market for domestic violence survivor t-shirts made by Jodi Arias. Yeah. Oh for sure.

Her art was selling online by this point. Her prison art. Good God. Do you want to know her next thing that she would do in prison? Yes please. She would grow her hair out and donate it to Locks of Love. You know what? Honestly she would have been better off with a reverse psychology.

Yeah. Yeah. Put me to death. It's what I want. Yeah. Yeah, I agree. Rumor has it you don't have the nuts to put me to death. Yeah.

Yep. Yeah. So the jury deliberated and deliberated and deliberated and deliberated. And finally, they told the judge that they were deadlocked. They couldn't reach a decision. And so the judge declared a mistrial only of the penalty. Yeah. OK.

But the jury was devastated. They didn't know that's what would happen if they – What did they think would happen? I don't know. Did the judge be like, all right, I'll take over from here. Yeah, so they said they didn't understand that a mistrial would be declared if they remained deadlocked. So they were split eight to four in favor of the death penalty.

So a mistrial was declared. And so then a new jury was seated and a new penalty phase was done. This took a couple of years before they got like a year and a half until they got to that. Same, you know, same story, same exact process, whatever. I'd like to hear it all again. No. story, same exact process, whatever. I'd like to hear it all again. No. And this

time the jury deliberated and deliberated and deliberated and they were deadlocked too. This time they split 11 to 1 in favor of the death penalty.

And these jurors were pissed. They said the holdout had an agenda to not murder somebody. Yeah, exactly. And so in Arizona, you got two chances to go for the death penalty. And if it doesn't happen, it gets taken off the table. And so finally, in April of 2015, Judge Sherry Stevens sentenced Jody Arias to life in prison without the possibility of parole. So Jody has appealed her sentence and her conviction, claiming prosecutorial misconduct

because Juan Martinez was really aggressive and had some kind of unique ways of arguing things. So an appeals court looked over this in October of 2019. And in March of 2020, they upheld her conviction and sentence. However, they did agree there was prosecutorial misconduct. But instead, they said it didn't impact the outcome of the case. The evidence is there. The proof is there. It wouldn't

have changed the outcome. So your conviction stands. Your sentence stands. However, we are turning those concerns over to the bar of Arizona. So these complaints were sent down to the Arizona Bar Association. And in 2020, Juan Martinez was disbarred.

So not directly, not only because of this, but there were also some sexual misconduct allegations against him, some sexual harassment allegations against him. From the prosecutor's office, there was all kinds of stuff. And they were like, you know what? Why don't you just give us that license? Yeah. Okay. Our other main player in this case, Kirk Nermy, he says this case ruined his life. Yes.

So he, as if you'll recall early on, he asked to be taken off this case. He did not vibe with Jody Arias. Right. He actually quit the public defender's office because he thought that would bolster his request to get taken off the case. It did not. Jody Arias specifically wrote to the judge and is like, I need Kirk Nermy and no one else.

And this is what I want. And he was required to stay on against his will. He said the public perception of him following this trial, he became like the most hated man in America because it seemed like he believed Jody's claims that Travis was a pedophile and abusive while no one else believed those claims. And there was no proof of them. And he said he didn't believe them. He actually tried to disprove them so that he wouldn't have to support that defense. But he was unable to. And so ethically, he had to support the defense that his client wanted to put forward. Hmm. I was actually just going to get his license. According to him, he was actually just going to get his law license suspended for three years. And he said, you know what? You take it.

I have no interest in ever working with the law ever again. She has taken the love of it from me. He actually got cancer during the course of the trial. And he said it was his he believes it was his body's physical response to all of the stress that he went through. Defending Jodi Arias. Yeah. And that's the story of the trial of Jodi Arias. And I'm fucking done with this case.

And I'm never reading about it ever again. What if she does something new? What if she makes that donation to lots of love? To lots of love. What if some kid gets that horribly bleached hair? That's been so damaged. Oh, shit. I have summited Everest.

Brandy, well done. Holy shit. Very well done. Thank you. Brandy, this might be the meatiest one we've ever done. Oh, my gosh. That trial was real long. Sure was.

Are you ready? Do you know anything about my case no do I know anything about an eyewitness no I called dibs on it earlier I didn't pay any damn attention to me I didn't did you like the sexy pic I sent you

I did everyone Damn attention to me. I didn't. Did you like the sexy pic I sent you? I did. Everyone, if you're boring and a friend does you a favor, you say thank you. If you're cool, you take a super up-close pic of the crack between your two fingers. And you tell them it's a sexy cake. You didn't know. You were like, is that top of the butt crack? No, I knew immediately it was your fingers. Top of the vagine.

You had no idea. Anyway, thank you to Fierce Mama Llama in the Discord for suggesting this case and giving me all the sources. Oh, wonderful. Shout-outs to an episode of American Justice, an episode of Dateline, which I read but did not watch. Oh, pull the real brandy, didn't you? Also that Crime Watch show with Chris Hansen. Yep. Also Crime Library.

Yeah. Library. Library. And, yeah, basically, are you even a true crime show if you haven't covered this case? You're not because there was a 48 Hours episode. I just ignored it. Oh, wow. Okay.

That's right. Gave it the cold shoulder. Picture it. The year is 1963, and we're in a cinder block building in McKaysville, Georgia. A woman is delivering a baby with help from the town's only doctor, Dr. Thomas Hicks, a wonderful man who is truly doing the Lurds' work. Absolutely. And since I've seen labor depicted on TV, I know that there's some screaming and grunting and sweat,

and it's all over in about two minutes. Brandi, can you confirm? That's incorrect! Four minutes, my mistake. As soon as the baby was born, the doctor took the baby out back, where a couple from Ohio was waiting eagerly in the parking lot, car still running. They were so excited! They were about to have a baby! They handed Dr. Hicks $1,000, and he handed them a little girl who they named Melinda.

And Dr. Hicks gave them a birth certificate with both of them listed as the baby's parents. Don't make faces. I'm telling you a heartwarming tale. No, this is somebody else's baby. Are you not familiar with how adoption works? It's not how adoption works. There was no record of the baby's birth parents because paperwork is boring. And so the couple drove home to Ohio where they welcomed the baby girl into their home.

Oh, Jesus. Everyone, on the bonus episode, which you can access on Patreon at the $5 level. I teased Brandy. I told her she always says that they welcome the baby into the home. She claims that she doesn't say the in the home part. Yeah. She is full of shit. Please come forward, everyone.

People have weighed in on this. They say it's the Mandela effect. No. One person has come forward and agreed with me. And that's why I'm saying this on the regular feed. Okay. Brandy, this may surprise you, but this is not how adoption is supposed to work. But, you know, Dr. Hicks wasn't your standard doctor.

He liked to think outside the bun. Oh, like Taco Bell. That's right. Bun and box. I mean, it just sounds... Either way. Anyway. In fact, for years, from the 1940s through the 1960s, Dr. Hicks sold approximately 200 babies to couples who didn't want to mess with interviews, background checks, jumping

through hoops. Where are the babies coming from? Is she stealing people's babies? Good question. Okay. And you're being kind of nosy. Okay, he's a doctor, so please don't. Is she telling people their babies died and then?

Oh, boy. You've got a real dark imagination, don't you? Here's how he did it. Dr. Hicks put up ads for illegal abortion services in like phone booths, under bridges, in bus stations. And so desperate women would come to him for an abortion. And he did provide abortions. Sometimes. Other times, if the woman was really desperate desperate he would talk her into carrying the

pregnancy to term and he was like so sweet about the whole thing because there was nothing in this for him he would just pay for the women to stay at a nearby hotel and in the meantime he'd focus on finding someone anyone really who wanted to adopt a baby. He charged anywhere from $200 to $10,000 for the service. Jesus. It's a little like we're expected to get 6 to 14 inches of snow tomorrow. The price really depended on what he thought the couple could afford. Sometimes the pregnant women knew what they were getting into. They knew they were placing their babies for adoption and there wouldn't be any kind of paper trail.

And, you know, maybe that's what some of them wanted. Other times they gave birth and Dr. Hicks left the room with the newborn and then he came back and was like, bad news, your baby died. Uh-huh. So just as I suspected. See ya. Mm-hmm. Oh, my gosh. Dr. Hicks did this for decades, and his little human trafficking ring stayed a secret for decades.

But in the 90s, that secret began to unravel. Some of the children who'd been adopted from the Hicks Clinic, I mean, I'm putting that in quotation marks. Absolutely. Oh, I'm sorry. Am I boring you? I'm sorry. No, it's just, I'm sorry.

I just talked for three hours. And it's getting quite late. Oh my God, it's almost 11. Yeah. Brandy. I apologize for my yawn. It's not in regards

to your story, I promise. Listen, if I have to sex it up, I will. I'll take one tit out. But I won't do the second one. Well, exactly.

You're not going to yawn when I've got... And it's so warm in here. It is warm in here. I mean, I could fall asleep right now. It's really nice. We got that candle going. It's kind of romantic with the... You got one tit out and a candle is burning.

What more do you want? Meanwhile, you're not showing me shit. All this stolen baby talk, getting me all hot and bothered. So some of these children who'd been adopted from the clinic were told by their adoptive parents, hey, just so you know, you aren't our biological child, we adopted you. And that's exactly what happened with baby Melinda. When she was like 10 years old, her mother, Judy, told Melinda that she was adopted and that her adoption had been unusual. And Melinda was a curious person, and as she grew up, she became even more curious.

She wanted to know more about her birth parents and whether she had any biological siblings. She also wanted to know more about her adoption process. Melinda didn't yet know it, but she was what is commonly referred to now as a Hicks baby. Probably a better term is a Hicks survivor, but tomato, tomato. So in 1997, a woman named Jane Blasio wrote a memoir called Taken at Birth, Stolen Babies, Hidden Lies, and My Journey to Finding Home. It was about her experience as a Hicks baby and her investigation into Dr. Hicks. The story became big news. By this point, Dr. Hicks was dead. In fact, he lost his medical license in 1964 because he'd been caught

performing illegal abortions. Yeah. Mm-hmm. And he died in 1972 when he was 83. Oh my gosh! He was still doing abortions like 10 years before that?

I know, it's, you know, almost admirable, right? Oh, my gosh. He was 70s. I'd be pretty scared. I mean, it's scary enough to get an illegal abortion, I'm sure. Exactly. Let alone a geriatric old man. I know.

a geriatric old man. So Jane and a few of the other Hicks babies, including Melinda, became focused on getting the truth out about what Dr. Hicks had done and also wondering what role DNA might play in finding their birth families. Yeah. Brandy is also curious. I am! So as Melinda became an adult, she eventually became a wife and a mother, and she wanted desperately to find her birth parents. By this point, Melinda had been married to her husband Clarence for 17 years.

They'd been high school sweethearts. They'd gotten married at 18, and now they had two boys whom they'd welcomed into the home. They welcomed the first one. They were dicks to the second one. Her desire to meet her birth parents had nothing to do with her feelings about her adoptive family. She loved her family. She had a sister, April, who she was very close to.

She had an adorable six-year-old niece named Brooke. And Melinda was super close with her mom, Judy. And Judy was fully supportive of Melinda's quest to find her birth parents. They did media interviews together and in 1998 they went on the Maury Povich

show together. You are not her mother. Is that what he said? Because that'd be pretty rude. And she's like, okay, adoptive parents are I am her mother. Is that what he said? Because that would be pretty rude. And she's like, okay, adoptive parents are. Yeah, I am her mother. I am her mother. Maury learned a lot that day. It was a very special episode.

For the taping, Melinda wore a leopard print skirt with a black blazer featuring, what's this? A leopard print collar. I love the 90s. They were full of those little matching, little matchy-matchies. Judy wore all black. Snooze fest. Okay. Sounds hot to me.

You're wearing gray today, which I was like, oh, my. You said I'm not showing anything. Brandy's really... Everyone, she has one tit out. I was like, oh my, Brandi's really milked. Everyone, she has one tit out. We just frankly what you owe me. I have one hot shoulder exposed. Seems inappropriate.

We should really have a dress code for this podcast. Oh yeah, you could have your tit out, but my tiny exposed shoulder is inappropriate. It's a matter of taste, Brandi. It's a very classy tit and a very slutty shoulder. It's a very classy tit. It has a top hat on. What is that? Top hats covering both nips.

No, a top hat and then googly eyes. A lot of great ideas. The Maury show hadn't aired yet, but Melinda and Judy were excited for it to come out. Are you still laughing? You're googly-eyed tit I am. Melinda kind of needed a win. Yeah. She and her husband, Clarence, had been having some problems over the years. It wasn't uncommon for them to separate for a while. Usually, like once a year, Melinda would be like, that's it. I'm going to stay with my mom for a few days. And she would. She'd go to her mom's house for a few days and tell her mom

what was going on. But Melinda and Clarence always reconciled. But the relationship between Judy and Clarence was kind of tense. And when the arguments between Clarence and Melinda became physical, that was the final straw. Judy was like, fuck this guy. Except she for sure didn't say fuck this guy. Send this gentleman straight to Hades. But Melinda and Clarence... Yeah, I'm not playing in that sandbox with you. Yeah, I'm not playing in that sandbox with you.

But Melinda and Clarence stayed together. Then came June 6th, 1998. The Maury show featuring Melinda and Judy still hadn't aired yet. And one of the boys was sick, so Melinda was taking care of him. And meanwhile, Clarence was drinking beer and doing chores. Oh. Helpful. Mm-hmm. Clarence drank eight or ten beers over the course of the day as he did his chores.

Yep. That's a lot of beers. Yeah, I don't know how good a job he was doing on those chores. If you're ten beers deep. Hey, eight or 10. 8 or 10. My mistake.

And then that night he went out to a bunch of different bars. What? He'd only had 8 or 10 beers. He stayed out until like 2.30 a.m.

Drinking. Drinking. Having a good time. If I had 8 or 10 beers I wouldn't be making it to a bar. You sound like a real loser, Brandon. You seem like the kind of gal who has a little bit of fireball and pukes in her front yard. Okay, Clarence was a champion, all right? Okay.

So, you know, he's drinking, drinking, having a good time. And then he came home. Melinda was up when he came home. She was still taking care of their sick child. Yeah, and you're like, you fucker, you've been out at the bar, and I'm here taking care of our sick kid. Yep. I'm going to my mother's.

As Clarence stumbled off to bed at around 3.15, Melinda said, Hey, thanks for all your help today. She didn't really. That's just the kind of shit that I would say. Oh, my gosh. I was like, good for her. You ever pull that passive-aggressive shit? Yep.

Hey, hey. Yeah, I really appreciate that. Oh, I wrote on your to-do list to drink 10 beers today. And you did it. We should have checked that one off. Good job. Thanks. Really went above and beyond when you went to all those bars.

So, you know, Melinda stayed up for the rest of the night with their son. Yeah. She maybe dozed off for a few minutes, but other than that, she was awake all night. And the next morning, police showed up at their home. Why? I'm not going to say. No, tell us!

Did you color your eyebrows? I did. Can you tell? They look so good! Oh, thank you. Okay, so last time when I colored them with my, you know, online kit, I went too hard, looked a little like Bert. I scaled it back a bit. They look amazing. Thank you.

Are you going to sing Lone Star is Amazed to me now? No. Because of my glorious one tit out and my wonderful eyebrows? I'm amazed by your googly tit maybe when those googly eyes meet feeling inside me brandy we have no time okay we have no time i like how you said I'm sorry when I was the one who was saying it. You're right. So the police showed up at their home. And the police arrested 15-year-old Clarence Jr. for the murder of his grandmother, Judy Johnson. And then they were like, oh, wait, hold on.

You're Clarence Jr.? And then they were like, oh, wait, hold on. You're Clarence Jr.? And then they were like, oh, my gosh, wrong one. We have fun, don't we? They weren't really laughing, Brandy. I'm just... And they took the cuffs off of him and arrested Clarence Elkins Sr. for the murder of his mother-in-law. Oh, my gosh. And that was how Melinda found out that her mother had been murdered.

Holy shit. Mm-hmm. And as she later found out, her mom hadn't just been murdered. She'd been beaten with a blunt object. She'd been raped, sodomized, and strangled. Her jaw, nose, skull, and collarbone were all broken. Oh, my gosh. Yeah, it had been terrible. And the eyewitness to the crime, six-year-old Brooke, Melinda's niece, had already told investigators that Uncle Clarence did it.

Melinda was devastated. Yeah. And so confused. Clarence told the police, hey, hey, I'll help in any way I can. And they were like, we don't need help. Investigators were pretty pleased with themselves. Clarence had committed a terrible crime and boom, like a few hours later, they'd caught him. Nothing like the feeling of getting a bad guy off the streets.

Oh, no. They were right to feel relieved. What had happened at Judy Johnson's home the night before had been horrific. This is rough. Judy's six-year-old granddaughter, Brooke, had always spent just a ton of time with Judy. She called her Maymaw. And Judy babysat Brooke after school, and Brooke slept over at her house a lot. Brooke loved spending time with her grandma.

They liked to play dice together and watch TV. And she was even friends with some of the kids in her grandma's neighborhood. So on June 6th, the night before the crime, Brooke and Judy went to a birthday party together. And afterward, they decided that Brooke should stay over. So they went back to Judy's house. They watched Judy's favorite TV show. I don't know what it was. Kills me that I don't know.

And they went to bed. Did you even do any research? I'll be honest. I'm phoning this whole thing in. So Judy fell asleep on the living room couch and she gave Brooke her bed. And sometime between 2.30 and 5.30 a.m., someone got into the home and attacked and killed Judy. At 3 a.m., someone got into the home and attacked and killed Judy. Brooke had been sleeping in her grandma's bed, as I said, and she woke up to the sounds of a struggle. She got up and went to the kitchen and saw a man in there attacking her grandma. She was scared, so she ran back into the bedroom, pulled the covers up over her, and pretended to be asleep. Oh my God. strangled her and left her for dead oh my god but brooke didn't die she regained consciousness a few hours later she woke up covered in blood found her grandmother dead in the living room and as

soon as she was able brooke called a family friend i'm sorry i've got goosebumps this is just such a horrible oh my gosh she got the woman's answering machine. And here's the message that she left. June, I'm sorry to tell you this, but my grandma died and I need somebody to get my mom for me. I'm all alone. Somebody killed my grandma. Now, please, would you get a hold of me as soon as you can? Bye.

Oh, my gosh. It is heartbreaking. Yeah. And also, I mean, it's kind of impressive that this little six-year-old girl, she picks up the phone. She knows she needs to get help. After she left that message, she went to a neighbor's house, still in her nightgown, covered head to toe in blood. She had a huge bruise on her face. She told the neighbor, Tanya Brazil, that someone had killed her grandma.

Tanya knew Brooke. Her three daughters played with Brooke quite a bit. And so Tanya was like, OK, just wait on the porch. I'm cooking breakfast for my kids. And so Tanya was like, okay, just wait on the porch. I'm cooking breakfast for my kids. And 45 minutes later, when Tanya was finished cooking breakfast, she came back out on the porch and drove Brooke home. Are you kidding me?

What? She didn't get the police immediately? She was in the middle of cooking breakfast for her kids. No! I don't fucking care. There's a bloody six-year-old on your porch and she said her grandmother's been murdered what the fuck are you doing cooking breakfast no okay you don't just interrupt me yes you do for a bloody six-year-old who just says her grandmother was murdered yeah do you maybe invite her in too yeah or do you keep the bloody six-year-old on your front porch for 45 minutes?

Yeah. Oh, my gosh. Mm-hmm. Tonya asked Brooke some questions about what happened, and Brooke told her that the man who attacked her and her grandma looked like her uncle Clarence. So they got to Brooke's house and April Sutton, Brooke's mom, answered the door and was horrified. There stood her little daughter wearing her mother's blood-soaked nightgown and Brooke said, Mayma is dead. Oh my gosh. Brooke said, Mayma is dead.

Oh, my gosh. April asked her who did it, and Brooke said, someone. April asked, who? And Brooke said, Clarence. April was shocked. She couldn't believe it. Her husband went to his mother-in-law's house, and he called 911 from the house, crying. He told the dispatcher, my mother-in-law has been stabbed.

My little girl spent the night here and the neighbor just brought her home and said that my mother-in-law was laying on the floor dead and I come up here and she's laying on the floor. So police arrived on the scene. They took Brooke in for medical treatment and at that time they asked her who'd done this. She said she didn't see, but later said Uncle Clarence. They asked, how do you know it was your uncle? And she said, it looked like him. So with Clarence under arrest and Judy dead and poor Brooke trying to recover, Melinda called her sister April and was like, what is happening?

Clarence was home with me. You know Clarence. You know he wouldn't do this. April was in a horrible position. It was very hard to imagine that Clarence could do this. But she said, being a mother, you have to believe your children. Five days later at Judy's funeral, the two sisters sat together and held hands. And afterward, they said goodbye.

They didn't speak for the next three and a half years. Oh, my gosh. Melinda was standing by her husband and April was standing by her child. Yeah. Tell me about this neighbor. She got a husband? No. Okay.

All right. Continue on. She's got a common law husband. Oh. Does he look a little bit like Clarence? I mean, some could say that. Fuck. Okay, continue.

That's so funny that that's where you went. So funny. So, investigators collected more than 100 items from the crime scene. Blood samples, hair samples. I mean, it was a terrible scene. There was a lot there. And none of it matched Clarence. The kind of limited, rudimentary DNA testing they had at the time couldn't link Clarence to the crime scene.

They searched the Elkins' home. Hmm. Didn't find anything incriminating there either. But whatever. They had Brooke's statement. That would have to be enough. So Clarence was charged with aggravated murder and rape. And prosecutor Michael Carroll decided to seek the death penalty. Clarence's trial began on May 20th, 1999 in Akron, Ohio.

You look horrified. No, I hate it. Horrified. The prosecution contended that Clarence raped and murdered his mother-in-law because he wanted her to stay out of his marriage. You know how that is. No! What? We've all been there.

Oh my gosh! In-laws getting nosy. The only thing you can do is rape and murder. I wish there was a better way. There's just not. Oh, my gosh! Yeah, so on the night of the crime, Clarence drove in a drunken rage to his mother-in-law's house.

He didn't expect the child to be there. He was probably surprised by her, but, you know, he raped her and beat her up, too. No, this is terrible. Yeah, it's terrible he did this. No, this is a terrible case like this. You heard the motive. Solid! Solid

like a rock! The prosecution called some of Judy's friends to the stand who were like, yeah, Judy and Clarence, you know, they didn't always like each other. Tanya testified about Brooke coming to her porch and identifying Uncle Clarence as the killer. Did she mention how she made her stand out there for 45 minutes and then didn't call the police, like just drove her home, kind of asked her some questions on the way home, maybe mentioned that the attacker looked like her uncle Clarence. Maybe she fed her that information. You know, people react differently in times of shock. And, you know, maybe Tanya's rude.

Okay, maybe you would bring the traumatized six-year-old into your home. Maybe you'd welcome her into the home. Maybe you'd bring the traumatized six-year-old into your home. Maybe you'd welcome her into the home. Maybe you'd call 911. Not Tanya. Rude. Or an accessory. Well, I don't know where you're getting that. Well, I don't know where you're getting that.

They called Brooke to the stand and Brooke testified that her uncle killed her grandma and that he punched her in the cheek. But the defense pointed out that it was kind of weird that in her first time speaking about the crime, you know, they had that voicemail message. Brooke didn't say it was her uncle who killed her grandma. She said someone killed my grandma. She said, someone killed my grandma. Yeah, information was fed to her. And the defense claimed that this was because Brooke didn't know who the murderer was. Correct. It wasn't until later that she became certain that her uncle had done this. Yeah, because the neighbor was like, oh, your Uncle Clarence, huh?

The prosecution was like, redirect! And they asked Brooke, are you sure it was your Uncle Clarence? And she said yes. And they asked, how do you know? And she said, because of his face. Which is how I know that you're you. Shit. Okay.

Once she finished her testimony, the prosecution rested. The defense, which was led by Lawrence Whitney, made the point that the only evidence against Clarence was the word of a traumatized six-year-old. Yeah. Evidence against Clarence was the word of a traumatized six-year-old. Yeah. There was no physical evidence tying Clarence to this murder. We're fine with that. We're just going to give him the death penalty.

It had been so brutal. There had been blood everywhere. And yet there wasn't any blood in his car, nothing in his home. It's totally cool. We've got to get this guy off the streets. in his car, nothing in his home. It's totally cool. We gotta get this guy off the streets. This guy seems like the kind of guy who drinks

eight or ten beers and claims he's doing chores all day. We gotta get this guy off the streets. We gotta get this guy off the streets. I hate this. Hair tests and DNA tests showed that none of the evidence matched Clarence. That's fine, too. Also, the timeline didn't really make sense.

You know, friends testified that they'd been with Clarence drinking until like 2.30 a.m. Melinda knew he came home around 2.30 a.m. and he didn't leave the house afterward. They had these, like, I guess kind of yippy dogs. And she was like, you know, if anyone would have been coming or going those dogs would have that's my impression of a dog yeah that's very good thank you

you know what your impression of a dog says I know dogs you know what my tan says I go outside plus they lived like an hour away from Judy. It would have taken a lot of time for him to drive there, commit this horrible crime, and drive back undetected. Yeah, we're cool with that, too.

We're just going to go ahead and find him guilty and sentence him to death. I'm like a bird. I fly to the crime scene. Completely undetected. Oh've had like 10 beers. The jury deliberated for like 14 hours. The crowd in the courthouse that day was very divided. So when the jury found Clarence not guilty of aggravated murder, some members of the crowd cheered. Brandy, I wish everyone could see your face. It's like the comedy and drama max. Because you're like, oh, what's going to happen now? Then the jury found Clarence guilty of murder.

And those same people who'd cheered began to scream. The jury had compromised. I'm one of those people in the courtroom screaming. Before he was taken away, Clarence turned to Melinda and said, I love you. And she said, I love you. This isn't over. Oh, my gosh. Two weeks later, Clarence was sentenced to life in prison.

Okay, well, at least they didn't give him the fucking death penalty. Well, yeah, they couldn't because they found him not guilty on the first one. But don't worry, he'd be eligible for parole in 2054. Jesus! That time's gonna fly. No! He was gonna grow out his hair. He was gonna make t-shirts.

Donated to locks of love. And the jury was like, we can't put this guy to death. He's got such a good head of love. And the jury was like, we can't put this guy to death. He's got such a good head of hair. Oh my gosh. Melinda was like, hell no. She knew he hadn't done this.

This wasn't justice. This wasn't justice for Clarence, not for Brooke, not for Judy. So Melinda decided to fight. But she didn't have many resources. The trial had nearly bankrupted her. I'm sure.

She'd lost her job, lost her house. She was in debt. Also, I mean, she had no training. Yeah. Zero investigative experience. She'd graduated high school, and that was the extent of her education. What was a gal to do? She needed to learn about crime scenes.

And she needed to learn from the best. So she ordered a textbook from my favorite textbook author. Too expensive. What's cheaper? The library. She watched a shit ton of forensic files oh shit episode after episode after episode and she began to learn stuff well yeah she started looking into people her mom's house hadn't been broken into so her killer had to have been someone her mom kind of knew. Like her neighbor. So Melinda made a list of everyone her mom knew.

Like the neighbor. She talked to everyone. Did she talk to the neighbor? She became an expert at handling DNA samples. She became an expert in neighbors. She would meet up with guys at bars, people she thought might have killed her mom, and she'd flirt with them, buy them a drink, make conversation. And the second they walked back to the bathroom, she'd take their glass, or she'd take a cigarette butt, or she'd take a used Kleenex. I knew you would have a strong Kleenex.

Look, I'm willing to do some stuff. That's too far. I'd rather take your used condom than your used Kleenex. Really? Yeah. Why? I don't know! You act like I shouldn't even ask you that question.

Like someone else is going to know the answer to that. That's the way my brain works. She was constantly just collecting samples, samples, samples, samples. It got to the point that her freezer started to look like, you know, Crime Lab freezer. There was no room for frozen pizzas. Which is a real shame. I know. These frozen pizzas are delicious in a pinch.

Or not in a pinch. Just, you know, a Friday night. Every now and then, normally. So we've got that pizza in the freezer. Be ashamed if someone heated that thing right up. We currently have a lasagna in our freezer, so. Don't brag. There are people with used Kleenexes in their freezer.

But Melinda ran into a problem. She had all these samples. With no way to test them. Well, no, she wasn't going to test them herself. She figured out that it costs like thousands of dollars just to test them. Well, no, she wasn't going to test them herself. She figured out that it cost like thousands of dollars just to test one sample. Yeah.

She didn't have that kind of money. Forensic files had been quite helpful, but she knew she now needed an expert on her side. So she hired Martin Yant, who is a private investigator who specializes in wrongful convictions.

Does he wear a dick gun? How dare you, Brandy? Only Ken puts his gun right above his dick. Okay. Like, I don't give a fuck. If I blow my own dick off. If that's how it goes, that's how it goes.

Something's gonna blow my dick off at one point or another. And might as well be my own service weapon. Do you want to open that door so I can get some air? Yeah, I'm so hot. I think it's those curtain bangs. I think it is, too. Thank you, ma'am.

Oh, my God. Don't be bragging about how cold you are. Oh, my gosh. I almost wore a really thick, chunky sweater, but I remembered how hot it gets in here. You know, we run our mouths for upwards of three hours. I'm very entertaining, and I'm to the point. You, on the other hand, you start bringing up songs like Amazed by Lone Star. And I'm like, can we stick to the stories?

You know, I come here for the stories. That's right. And for the one tit out. Okay, back to this. Okay, so she's got Martin Yant on her side. Yeah. And there's nothing he Yant to do. Oh, man, I was trying to think of something stupid like that.

I'm so sad that you came up with it before me. I even said his name again, hoping it would trigger something real fast. Nope, don't have it. Okay, anyway. At this point, Melinda was pretty sure she knew who'd actually killed her mom. It was 27-year-old Ryle Rush. Ryle Rush? Yes.

Is that not the worst name? It's not a great name. Ryle. Ugh. Okay. I hate it in the same way that I hate the name Kyler. Mm-hmm. I should do that case.

Yeah, you should do that case. Do you have the nuts? You talked last week about your big old balls. I think my balls are shriveled up now after these two weeks. Well, maybe they'll get replenished at some point. They're like little tiny raisins.

Ryle lived near Judy and he had a crush on her. And he... What? How old is he? He's 27. She's 58. Welcome to Cougar Town.

It's adjacent to Flavortown. Also, Ryle looked like a magician. Did he have a mustache? No. Here's what he had. I can't look like a magician. You're thinking of like old-timey magician. I mean like the douchey new kind of magician.

Oh, like a Criss Angel type of guy? So he had dark hair, very carefully sculpted facial hair. He liked to wear a vest over button downs and, you know, several top buttons undone for pleasure. Over button downs and, you know, several top buttons undone for pleasure. And no offense to Clarence, but Rao kind of looked like Clarence. He did? I mean, kind of, yeah. Clarence doesn't look like a magician.

Okay. But he did always wear a top hat, which was just odd. Had a dead dove in it. Ryle looked like a working magician. Clarence wasn't out of work magician. By this point, at the private investigator's urging, Melinda had reconciled with her sister April. Melinda. What? I don't know.

You gave me a look. You know what the problem is right now? What? We're getting that. It's loopy. It's like slumber party vibes. It's like, okay, it's three a.m. Now everything's funny. So Melinda showed up Now everything's funny.

So Melinda showed up at April's house after three and a half years of not speaking. And April opened the door, and at first she turned away, but then she turned back around, sobbing, and hugged Melinda. Because Melinda said, turn around. Every now and then. You know my heart's into the truth. Turn around. I can't decide if it's too stupid to be offensive or just offensive and stupid. Just offensive and stupid, I think. So they started talking and it was like those three and a half years hadn't happened.

Brooke walked into the room and she kind of hesitated. But then she went over and hugged Melinda. Melinda could barely speak. All she did was tell her, I love you. And then Brooke told Melinda something that shocked her. She said she was no longer certain that it had been Uncle Clarence. And, you know, Melinda about crapped herself because now she wondered how Brooke would react to seeing a photo of Ryle Rush. She about crapped herself.

That's what they said in Crime Watch Daily. Or maybe that was Dateline. Yeah, it sounds like Dateline. Keith Morrison, she about crapped herself.

Later, April took Brooke aside and showed her a photo of Ryle Rush. And Brooke burst into tears. She screamed, I'll never forget those eyes. Because she had previously told her mom, the guy who did this had brown eyes. But Clarence had blue eyes.

Shit. And that's how, in January of 2002, Brooke recanted her testimony. She was 10 now. The new defense team had Brooke come in for a tape deposition. And here's how the questioning went. Defense. Why, if you even know, why did you say it was Uncle Clarence? Brooke.

Because it looked like him. Defense. It looked like him. But do you think it was Uncle Clarence? Brooke. At first, yeah. Defense. At first, yeah.

But do you think so today? Brooke. no. A few months later, the defense argued for a new trial. Yeah, but they've already fucking got him. The sole witness had recanted her statement, and they had a more viable suspect in mind because nobody likes a magician but the prosecution was like no this recantation is super sus this child is being pressured she's being coerced by her family also the family had had her undergo hypnosis and the prosecution was

like that's a bunch of hoo-ha we already already have somebody in jail, and that's all that we care about, so please get the fuck out. Mm-hmm. Good day, sir! Anything about our criminal justice system, once we got you, we want to keep you. Yeah. And the judge sided with the prosecution. Of course.

Evidentiary hearing denied. Mm-hmm. I wonder if people, people, can you hear Kiki eating food? Kiki needs to eat. She's fine. That food smells terrible. It smells like BV. Tell me it doesn't.

I got the seafood medley because I was like, I bet the cats would like that. Man, you open those cans up. Sorry, Kiki just looked. That's rude. I'm talking about what you're eating. All right. But Melinda was undeterred. She fired that defense team and hired a new defense team.

This time she hired Jana DeLoach. She's got one of those fancy last names. It's like capital D, lowercase e, capital L, you know. Yeah. You know, I think that's so fancy. It is fancy. Do you want to be Kristen DePitt? How dare you?

Class it up a bit? I mean, anything would class it up, wouldn't it? I mean, anything would class it up, wouldn't it? Melinda also got the help of a new legal clinic at the University of Cincinnati Law School. It was called the Innocence Project. Oh, shit! Oh, ever heard of it? Yeah, thought so!

That's the kind of energy that the Ohio Innocence Project brings to all our cases. Absolutely. Real big dick energy. BDE, if you will. So the new team began looking into this case, and although court had traditionally not gone the Elkins way, they did get one small victory. They were granted access to DNA that had been taken from the crime scene. Yay! But they'd have to be the ones to pay for all the testing.

Oh, fuck, who's paying for that? Yeah, well, Melinda didn't have money. But that didn't stop her. She talked to media outlets, she held rallies, she held fundraising efforts, and she raised quite a bit of money for DNA testing, which is good because it's, like, crazy expensive. Yeah. And then, two months later something kind

of weird happened the prosecution called up the defense and they were like what's you doing would you like to run a DNA sample from rile rush just to see if he's the one who did it. And the defense was like, okay, sure. Ryle gave his sample willingly. He was like, it wasn't me. Here's some spit. You're welcome. Now watch me pull a rabbit out of my hat. Which is weird because he wasn't wearing a hat.

So he had to then like pull a hat out of his ass and then pull a rabbit out of the hat. And people were impressed. They were like, this is why you are Akron, Ohio's best magician. Also, we should talk about how it's pronounced Akron. Really? My apologies. Kiki, are you supposed to eat that bowl too? Isn't that Boo's bowl?

Wow. I mean, it is. I started to feel a little like every, like, I mean, this, this never happens, but like once every five years, Norm's like, are you eating that? Didn't you already? And it's like, that's how I feel about you talking to my cat that way. I'm not fat shaming your cat. I'm concerned that Boo won't have enough food.

Oh, Boo will be fine. Well, Kiki's going back to the other. I'm sorry. This is not interesting to the listeners at all. Real fuck. People are like, hmm, interesting. Do I care about this murder? No.

Let's hear what whole Kiki's eating. By this point, technology had advanced, and now labs could run a male-specific test, one that only examines male DNA. This test was considered super helpful in cases where there would be a ton of female DNA present that you didn't need to test. So they ran the tests against Ryle's DNA and against Clarence's DNA. They couldn't afford to test all of the crime scene evidence. That would have been nuts. So they took the pieces of evidence that they thought would be the most damning. Brooke's underwear and samples from Judy's body.

Guess what? It didn't match either of them. None of it matched Clarence. And none of it matched Ryle. Yeah. And it didn't matter because he had disappeared. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry.

Jesus. He'd been cut in half. So they had to decide, are we really gonna lock up half a man if we can't find him and then which half do you lock up they couldn't find

the other half some beautiful lady had cut him hoping she wasn't talking okay anyway anyway shit I was hoping she wasn't talking. Okay, anyway. Anyway. Shit.

So that last part was kind of shocking, both the magic trick and the fact that Ryle didn't match. Clarence's supporters had been so sure Ryle had done this. Yeah, but Clarence didn't match either. Exactly. That's what defense attorney Janice said, with her fancy last name. She was like, hey, we've got something here. We just ran this crime scene through more rigorous DNA tests, and it shows that Clarence's DNA wasn't there. So maybe this is the first step toward exoneration.

So they petitioned the court for a chance to show off their hot new findings. Yeah, and the court was like, nah. Except for the judge said yes. Oh, good. You can do that on December 1st, 2004. Come on in. Don't listen to Brandi Egan. She's a friggin' high school student. Actually, no, you weren't at this at you had graduated.

No, I wasn't. I had already graduated in your face. At the hearing, Janna showed the testing they'd done was new and relevant and therefore a real game changer. Transformers. More than meets the eye. Thank you. Yeah. I like how you gave me a look like you weren't going to participate and then you couldn't resist.

Prosecutor Michael Carroll, a.k.a. that same old bitch from the first trial, was like, um, judge, none of this matters. Clarence wasn't convicted on forensic evidence. We never had any forensic evidence on Clarence. Clarence was convicted based on the statement

of an eyewitness. Who has recanted their testimony. Thank you for bringing that up, Prosecutor Michael the Bitch or whatever your name is. No, that wasn't allowed. Remember, that had been, you know, disallowed. Yep. Not allowed. So this DNA stuff was a bunch of hooey.

Judge Judy Hunter asked the prosecutor about the testing from the trial, saying, What were those precise results at trial? And he said, I'll give you the bottom line. All the testing, nothing included Clarence Elkins. The physical evidence, the forensic evidence, did not include him. But this is not a case based on the forensics. It's a case based on the forensics. It's a case based on the child victim.

How can you say this is not based on forensic? You've got forensic evidence there. You've run the new DNA tests. He does not match the male DNA at the scene. Clarence was sitting at the hearing listening to all this, and he was kind of like not quite smiling, but definitely nodding like, yeah, none of the physical evidence linked to me. None of the forensic evidence links to me. Is everyone seeing this? Are you all listening to this?

But Prosecutor Michael had no shortage of bullshit to spew that day. He was like, look, the only reason these new tests were even conducted was to figure out if Ryle Rush was the one who did this. And we figured out that he didn't. The fact that those same tests also rule out Clarence Elkins is irrelevant. It's not, though! Yeah, that's

It's not irrelevant! Oh, that makes me want to scream. Yeah! How can it not be relevant when it just got another guy off? Yeah. Oh, the judge asked, is it not significant that no comparison to Ryle Rush was made and no comparison to this defendant? And Michael said, no, it's significant that no comparison was made to Ryle Rush, but the evidence at the trial did not make a comparison to this man. There's footage of Clarence's friends

and family laughing and shaking their heads during this hearing because it was so ridiculous. Defense attorney Jana stood up and said, been in prison for six and a half years and it's wrong they need to give it up yes michael the prosecutor later told the media the whole point of this exercise was to show that ryle rush did this and they couldn't do it so now they want to take the results and use them for something else no they're showing that the wrong person is in prison. And you don't give a fuck because you don't give a fuck about justice. Oh, my God. 27 days later, the judge handed down her ruling.

She sided with Clarence. He could have an evidentiary hearing. Ever done for her. So now it's March of 2005. And once again, we're in the courtroom of Judge Judith Scheindler. Judith. They've taken it. They started with Maury and they ended with Judge Judy.

We're going to all the greats. The defense now had to prove that if this new evidence had been presented at trial, it could have created reasonable doubt. You know, blah-biddy-blah, new trial time. You know how that works. Mark Godsey, a defense attorney with the Ohio Innocence Project, talked about the DNA

testing. He said that male DNA was found at the crime scene and it did not match Clarence Elkins. Can we say it again for the people in the back? Yeah! He said that male DNA was found at the crime scene and it did not match Clarence Elkins. Can we say it again for the people in the back? Yeah. He said this trial was all based on the eyewitness testimony of a traumatized six-year-old. I'm sorry. I need chapstick.

Lube up your anus. Brandy, you think that just because I showed you one tit, I'm going to show you my butthole, too. Look, lady, it's not your lucky day. You got googly eyes on it, too? Fart that thing off into oblivion. Be a waste of a perfectly good googly eye. But you know what Prosecutor Michael said? DNA, shmeanae.

Just working that into every episode now? I love it. He said we had to stick to Brooke's original testimony, which was that one person committed this crime and that person was Uncle Clarence. Why do we need to stick to that? You don't need to stick to that. He's been – the DNA shows it's not him and Brooke is saying, I was six then.

I wasn't sure. Yeah, so that's the thing is eyewitness testimony is notoriously faulty. Yeah. Also, this happened in the dark. Yeah. She was six years old, and she was knocked unconscious. Oh, my gosh. This is so infuriating.

It's going to get worse. You ready? Oh, no. Michael did acknowledge that there was male DNA on the evidence that had been collected from the crime scene, but it was not connected to this crime. Where the fuck did that male DNA come from then? The male DNA found in Brooke's underwear and inside Judith's body was not connected to this crime.

Okay. Well, that's... we're getting there. We're getting there. The defense called forensic analyst Cassie Johnson. Are you going to be okay? No. And in her testimony, she explained the testing procedure. She said, you know, what's already been said a thousand times.

Clarence DNA was not present. It did not match the male DNA. Found at the scene. Blah, blah, blah. OK. Prosecutor Michael, he's in a tough spot now, right? It looked like a bit of justice might be happening. And no one wants that.

So he argued that perhaps this evidence had been contaminated. That's how it's not relevant. It's been contaminated. He had – OK. This next part is nuts. I'm going to need you to buckle up. Click. He had a piece of the evidence in a brown bag and he asked Cassie about the state of the bag when she received it.

She was like, yeah, it was folded, whatever. So they're going along and then he said, and contained in the brown paper, the pink panties. And as he's talking, he's unwrapping the paper and he grabs the underwear and lifts it with his bare hands. And Cassie goes, I'd request that gloves be put on when handling the evidence. And he says, I'll take my chances. Oh, my gosh. It's not for you, you fucker. Exactly.

No one is. Oh, my God. No one's worried about you, dude. I'll take my chances. So then there's this commotion in the court and people are like, what the fuck? And you can hear a woman say, sir, sir. And he and he tries to keep going. He's like, these are the pink panties.

And the defense objected. And the judge said, I object too. Would you put those back down? And if we're going to handle evidence, we're going to do it with gloves on. Oh, my gosh. So then, Michael, who did look embarrassed, I mean, can you fucking imagine? I can't imagine. He turned back to Cassie and was like, well, were you aware that at trial these items were handled?

And Cassie was like, look, man, I don't know what happened to these items before I got them at my lab. I just know you need to get your grubby mitts off of them, you fucking weirdo. Oh, shit. Also, don't say panties. It's gross. Say underpants. And that's what she said at this hearing. So then the defense called the DNA lab director.

And he told the court that another bag of evidence, which contained Judy Johnson's fingernails, arrived at the lab sealed from the day of the murder. So that kind of flies in the face of this idea that like, oh, it had all been opened and tampered with. And he also said that Clarence Elkins was excluded from every piece of evidence that they tested. I don't know how many times a person can say this. Yeah, how many times does it need to be said? In his closing argument, I don't know that they call these closing arguments, but you

know, whatever. You know, whatever. Prosecutor Michael reiterated that this whole thing was irrelevant because the DNA that was found at the crime scene wasn't related to the crime somehow months passed. And finally the judge made her decision. She denied Clarence's motion for a new trial. Are you fucking kidding?

I am not. See, this is where it gets me because this stuff is all about technicalities. And it's like, okay, technically it all came down to at trial this eyewitness testimony. So the fact that we now know he is innocent is not a reason to overturn the verdict. Exactly. That doesn't matter. You could only have this overturned for errors at trial. But that's fucking ridiculous.

Yes. If new testing comes along and shows that you absolutely didn't do it, then let the guy go. Oh my gosh, this let the guy go. Oh, my gosh. This is infuriating. Melinda said, I just couldn't believe it. My thought was, what is it going to take?

They want me to hand this murderer on a silver platter to them? Well, by damn, that's what I'm going to do. Go, Melinda. So she went back to trying to find her mother's killer. She reviewed all her past research, and one day, an article in the local newspaper caught her eye. It mentioned Tanya Brazil. I was going to say, was it about the neighbor? Tanya, you may remember, had been her mom's neighbor.

She'd been the woman who, when Brooke was bloody and traumatized, had been like, hey. Mayer, stand outside for 45 minutes. We remember. And Brandy remembers. And Pepperidge Farm remembers. Melinda always thought that it was super weird that Tonya did that. Why not call 911? Thank you!

Well, the newspaper article said that Tonya's common-law husband, Earl Mann, had recently been charged with three counts of rape of children under the age of 10. Yeah, let's get a DNA sample from Earl Mann! Tonya had also been charged with child endangerment, if you can believe it. I can believe it. So Melinda began looking into this guy. He had a long track record. That's a track record.

It's because it's late. We're over three hours. It's a track and record. We have to combine words. We have no choice. Listen, on the bonus episodes, we'll say all the words,

every bit of every word. But, you know, in this situation, we just can't. What time is it? Hang on, I'm checking. Oh, my God, it's almost midnight. It's almost midnight. Brandy, okay.

So, he had a long track record of violent sexual crimes. And get a load of this, he'd been let out of prison two days before the murder. Oh, weird. So Melinda was like, well, shit, I've got to get this guy's DNA. But how do I do it? He's in prison. She decided that her best bet was to catfish him.

So she started writing him letters trying to get him to respond. Oh, my gosh. And thinking maybe he'll lick the envelope. Maybe he'll send me his panties. And that lovely prosecutor will come over and be like, I'll take my chances. Yeah. Yeah, thanks, dude.

No, she was perhaps thinking that he would lick the envelope. Yeah, I got you. Yeah. She wrote him 18 letters, but Earl didn't respond to any of them. But then Earl was transferred to a new prison, the same place where Clarence was imprisoned. And holy shit, Earl got transferred to Clarence's same cell block. Shut up. At this point, defense attorney Jana was Clarence's same cell block. Shut up.

At this point, defense attorney Jana was in the loop, ready to help. And in a meeting with Clarence, she said, hey, does Earl smoke? And Clarence said yes. And she said, that's it. Get a cigarette butt. But that wasn't easy. Clarence was trying to secretly get a DNA sample from a violent offender and then smuggle the sample out of prison. Out of prison, yeah. He worked at this for five months.

Why don't you just head to the moon while you're at it? But he did it. He saw Earl smoking. And when no one was looking, he picked the cigarette butt out of the ashtray. He went back to his cell with it and stuck the cigarette butt in his Bible. And a few days later, Earl Mann got transferred to another prison. Oh, my God. I know.

I know. Fuck. Two weeks after that, Clarence got his hands on a clean Ziploc bag. So he used that to smuggle the cigarette butt out of the prison in a letter to Jana. In a Jana to letter. In a Jetter to Lana. Oh, no. Jana immediately took it in for testing.

And it was a match. Yeah. They'd found the real rapist slash murderer. Well, they should have talked to me. Okay, so this is what is so funny, is like, it's so obvious. So obvious, right? Yeah. You're going to be shocked by how much more obvious it's about to become.

Okay, so Melinda was thrilled. Oh, my God, Brittany. Melinda was thrilled, but Clarence's defense team wasn't confident. They were confident in their evidence. They were confident that Earl was the murderer, but Prosecutor Michael had proven himself to be a total dipshit. Yeah. And the other people in the local district Michael had proven himself to be a total dipshit. And the other people in the local district attorney's office were equally dipshitty. Yes.

So instead of going to them, Clarence's defense team went to the state attorney general, Jim Petro. And Jim, get a load of this. He was one of these real wild people who, like, believes in DNA evidence. And so he did a six-week investigation and during that investigation earl admitted to being in judy's home on the night of the murder he hadn't committed the crime though when he left everything was fine okay yeah so his dna matches yeah and he admits to being there the night she was murdered. Yeah. Come the fuck on. At this point, Jim was like, okay, we've got a DNA match.

He's putting himself at the crime scene. This is like Brandy in her hoe phase. Too easy. But Jim didn't have any direct authority over this case. So instead, he made the unusual and deliciously bitchy decision to call a press conference and put pressure on the local DA to exonerate Clarence. And the DA's office was like, no. Yeah, can you believe this? No.

So the defense team is like, fine. You know what? We're going to gather even more evidence. We're going to make this embarrassing for you. Yeah. They knew they had a pubic hair from the crime scene. So in December of 2005, they tested the pubic hair against Earl's DNA and it was a perfect match. Of course it was a perfect match.

Of course it was. So they had Earl by the short and curlies, as they say. But now they had to get the local DA's office by the short and curlies, as they say. Yeah. You know? They knew just how to do it. Set up a waxing stand outside of the courthouse. Jesus.

Offer free Brazilians to anyone in a power suit. Boom. Done. Why Melinda and the defense team didn't do this, we will never know. Instead, they called a press conference. Lame. Super lame. But just a few minutes before the press conference began, Melinda got a phone call.

The prosecution was dropping all charges. They were letting Clarence go. Yeah. So on December 15, 2005, Clarence Elkins finally walked out of prison. He'd been locked up for seven and a half years. Oh my gosh. He got to have Christmas with his family for the first time in eight years. Oh.

But he still had a lot to unpack emotionally. He said, I'm angry Oh. not easy to deal with. He clarified that he has never felt any anger for Brooke. He said, I knew she was making a mistake from the get-go. I never once held it against her at all, and I don't today. But Brooke still struggles with guilt. She said, I still feel guilty, even though they tell me it's not my fault, because I put him in there. It was me. No, it wasn't. No, it wasn't. No, it wasn't.

Nope. Investigators need to do their fucking jobs. Yeah. Prosecutors need to do their fucking jobs. Absolutely. Absolutely. Around this time, Brooke was also interviewed on Larry King, and she talked more about how the false identification occurred.

Yeah, because she was coached by the neighbor. Well, OK, let me read you what she says. OK. She goes, well, the morning I found, I woke up and I found my grandma dead. I went to a next-door neighbor's house and I told her that it looked like my uncle Clarence and it sounded like him. So she took me home and she told my mom that, what I told her, and then everyone just started freaking out. And then my mom and dad called the police and my mom and dad told the police that it was my uncle Clarence who did it. Well, I told people that it looked like him and they just went like it was him.

They didn't even listen to what I was saying. I think Tanya knew exactly what she was doing. I 100 percent think Tanya knew what she was doing. Yeah. Clarence and Melinda divorced not long after his release, but they remained friends. Melinda said it was hard because, you know, everyone wanted this like Hollywood ending for them, but it just wasn't in the cards. And this wasn't over because even though they'd let Clarence go, the powers that be

still hadn't charged Earl Mann with anything. Oh, my gosh. And they really should have. In fact, they should have done a lot of things because around this time, a police officer came forward and was like, hey, I have this memo from 1999. Get a load of this. Four months before Clarence's trial, a police officer arrested Earl Mann for robbery. Earl was drunk. He was belligerent.

And he asked the officer why he hadn't been arrested for the murder of Judy Johnson. Holy shit. That officer wrote that down and sent it to the detectives who were working Judy's murder. And they never did anything with it. Yeah. And somehow Clarence Elkins' defense team never found out about this. Wow. Yeah. He'd been with a wild woman. And later, when Brooke knocked on the door, he told Tanya not to let Brooke in and not to call the police. So, yeah, give me a fucking break. She knew exactly what she was doing.

Finally, in 2008, Earl Mann got a plea agreement. If he admitted to aggravated rape of Brooke and Judy and the aggravated murder of Judy Johnson, he'd be spared the death penalty. He was sentenced to 55 years to life in prison. He'll be eligible for parole when he's 92. There are two major civil suits that came from this case. Clarence settled with the state of Ohio for $1.75 million. with the state of Ohio for 1.75 million and he also sued the police department because he was like, yeah, my defense team should have known about that whole thing. And they were like, no, we shouldn't have.

The police department's legal team tried to get this thrown out of court and the judge was like, hmm, nice try. Now we're going to keep it. We're going to keep it right here. And eventually they settled for $5.25 million. What? I have a question, but it might be a shitty question. No, that's okay.

Does Melinda get any of that money? I sure as fuck hope so. Yeah. I really hope so. Yeah. Because he would not be out without her. Yeah, I really hope so. Yeah. Because he would not be out without her. Yeah, I really hope she gets some of that. Clarence and Melinda have both remarried.

Clarence, interestingly, he ended up marrying a lady who worked for the attorney general's office and who had been like reading up on his case and stuff. They're still involved in exonerations and, you know, blah, blah, blah. The attorney general's office and who had been like reading up on his case and stuff. They're still involved in exonerations and, you know, blah, blah, blah. I've been talking for a long time. So, you know, they're just very involved. And after all of this horrible mess was somewhat behind them, Melinda got back to what she'd been searching for. Did she find her? Yeah. She renewed her search for her birth family.

She renewed her search for her birth family. She went to Hicks Baby reunions and she uploaded her DNA to Ancestry.com. And that's how she found her brother, Terry Griffith. He'd uploaded his DNA to Ancestry.com after he learned that his mom had placed his sister for adoption years ago. So he lived in Nashville. She went out to meet him. They look so much alike. It's amazing.

Unfortunately, their biological parents had died by this point. But Melinda was so excited to meet her brother. She said, I never gave up. I knew that if I just kept chipping away that it would eventually happen. My mom would be so happy. Oh. And that's the story of the murder of Judith Johnson. Oh, my gosh. That was infuriating.

I have to admit something. What? I kind of was hoping that you would assume that the Hicks baby stuff was related to the murder stuff. You know, some of those true crime shows do the thing that I hate of like they don't mention that Tanya was a big fucking weirdo. Yeah. And let this six-year-old sit out on her front porch for 45 minutes. Which, yeah, really does make it seem a little more mysterious. It would, yeah.

But that... How the fuck do you not make that connection? Yeah. Ugh. Anyway. That's my story. Oh my gosh, that was so good oh my gosh let's take some questions from our discord and you have to be the one to tell them how to get in there okay uh to get in our discord all you have to do is join our patreon at the five dollar level or higher and then you

get into this like little chat room thing to chitty chat the day away. Ooh, Nat Likes Cats wants to know what are your feelings on Valentine's Day? Any great or terrible Valentine's Day stick out over the years? Gee, Brandy,

what you got? Gee, let me see. I filed for divorce on Valentine's Day. So that would be a negative memory. But you know what I did the very next Valentine's Day. So that would be a negative memory. But you know what I did the very next Valentine's Day? Got your ass blasted.

Sorry. I'm so sorry. No, Kristen. In fact, I found out that the baby I was carrying in my womb was a beautiful baby girl. I'm so sorry. And then I got my ass blasted. I'll tell you what we did last Valentine's Day. So, oh gosh, this is actually the one year anniversary of Peanut dying.

Yeah, so she died February 1st last year. And because I cannot live without a dog, we got Dottie on February 11th. Yeah. And so, and she was, like, such an anxious dog. Yeah. And she, like, didn't like to be left alone, didn't like to be off of the living room couch. That was like her safe zone. Oh, yeah.

That was her safe zone. So for Valentine's Day, we decided – I remember it was like snowing out. We decided, well, we won't leave Dottie for long. We'll just go grab pizza. And we thought it will be good. We're going to be gone for like 10 minutes picking up this pizza. Yeah. It will be a good just little experiment for her to just be, you know, we'll confine her

to the kitchen. Yeah. Ten minutes. Okay. We went, we got a heart-shaped pizza. I don't mean to brag to you. And also a bouquet of buffalo wings. Yes.

Romance. So I blasted my own ass. We got back. We had put up a pet gate and we'd blocked the kitchen door with two chairs. Dottie had like free willied over that whole thing. And she had taken a dump in the living room on Valentine's Day. Well, you know. We'd been gone ten minutes!

She got her ass blasted that night. So that's our romantic Valentine's Day memory. I love it. My uncle was skin. Was what? My uncle was skin. Was what? My uncle was skin.

Was skin? Listen now, have you watched Yellow Jackets? David and I binged it this week. I have no idea what that is. Oh my god, are you okay? Kristen. Yes? Yellow Jackets is the harrowing tale of a high school soccer team who is flying to the championship game.

Oh no. Does the plane go down? And the plane goes down. It's a girls soccer team, isn't it? Yes. Oh, I've been wanting to see that. It's so fucking good. What's it on?

It's on Showtime. Oh, that's why I haven't seen it yet. I don't have Showtime. Well, you gotta get Showtime. Fine. Watch Yellow. David and I watched it in three days. Okay.

It's only one season so far. Ten episodes. Oh, my God. It was so good. Yeah, I've heard very good things. All right. Watch it. Oh, Team Car it was so good. Yeah, I've heard very good things. Ugh. Alright. Watch it. Oh, Team Carmex wants to know

what's your worst snow story? Do you have a bad snow story? No, I love snow. I do too. Yeah. I got nothing. I got nothing against snow. Norm gets so upset about snow. Well, yeah, he's a southern boy. Well, yeah, but we stay indoors.

We're indoor cats. We get to just look out at how pretty southern boy. Well, yeah, but we stay indoors. We're indoor cats. We get to just look out at how pretty it is. Yes, beautiful. Oh, we have to talk about this because you and I had a conversation about this well last week and I was – Anyway, okay, Tuscan potatoes. Once – no. Have you watched Cheer Season 2? Oh.

Okay. Okay. So we talked about this when I was doing your hair last week, right? I thought that I had finished the season. What? I had not finished the season. And you asked me a question that I'm not going to reveal to the listeners because I don't want to spoil anything. But I was like, yeah.

And I was like, did that happen? I don't remember that happening. Okay. I'm glad you brought this up because I was like, she is terrible at discussing this. I feel like I know I'm very passionate about this show, but she's really not bringing the goods. It's the last two episodes. I never finished it. Oh, my gosh.

So when you said that, I went back and I was like, well, no fucking wonder I didn't know what she was talking about. Oh, my gosh. I was talking, well, no fucking wonder I didn't know what she was talking about. Oh my gosh. I was talking to you about who won Daytona. And you were like, derpy, derpy, derp. Jeez. Yes. So in conclusion, we have watched it. We enjoyed it very much.

Love, cheer. Gooch, Liner wants to know, what podcasts are you listening to right now? Okay, so I just caught up on Maintenance Phase. I was way behind. Yeah. Have you listened to this week's episode? Yeah, I have. I listened to those the day they dropped.

Well, it came out today. Yeah, I know. And I listened to it today. Oh, good. I listened to it the day they dropped. Well, it came out today. Yeah, I know. And I listened to it today. It's so good. I listened to it today, too. Also, of course, my trivia podcast that I love, Triviality, they also come out on Tuesdays. So I also listened to that episode today. Okay.

The only thing that was a little bittersweet for me about the episode that they dropped today on Maintenance Phase, which was about, I think her name's Belle Gibson. Yeah. about the episode that they dropped today on Maintenance Phase, which was about, I think her name's Belle Gibson, the Australian health nut who claimed to have, you know, really killed herself with cancer. With just healthy eating! That's right. That's not a dangerous message to spread. I had kind of wanted to cover her

for the podcast. I had like, I had watched that 60 Minutes thing. Michael did a great job. You know, yeah, I'm not going to. I'm not going to. It was very good. Yeah.

Except there wasn't a single Mel Gibson reference in that whole episode. Real missed opportunity. It is. Her name was Belle Gibson. I just spat everywhere. Yeah, they really missed that one, didn't they? They sure did. I can't believe you're not talking about your new favorite podcast, though. What's my new favorite podcast?

You just told me. Joe Rogan. You asshole. Everybody, Brandi loves Joe Rogan. She goes to him for all her medical advice. Do not. Great expectations. Once again, Brandi, we just started watching Yellowstone.

What are your favorite and least favorite characters? Favorite character? Jimmy. Jimmy is a new cowboy. Just learning the ropes. I love Jimmy so much. Also, obviously, big fan of Rip. Everybody is.

Least favorite character Jamie. You know what? Enough said. Okay, so you had said you love Yellowstone. Yeah. And I'd been like, I should, you know, I should watch that. Yeah. Did you hear what Norman said to me that made me not want to watch it? White people love Yellowstone?

He? I feel sostone. He? I feel so manipulated. He's the Jody Arias of this relationship. Because he'd been like, I don't know. And then finally he's like, yeah, white people love that show. And I was like, oh, pass. Schmarles Barkley says, after dark, please tell me there are adult beverages involved.

No, we didn't drink while we were recording. Yeah, we did have one margarita each at dinner. And I think it showed. I did have two, well, no, just one refill on my trusty water bottle. On your water? Yeah, we both hit the water real hard during this recording. Well, that's because we went out and we had the chips. Yeah.

It got all salty. My lips are... Oh, my God. We're working on three hours and 39 minutes. This is real long. Good God almighty. Crisp Graham wants to know, are either of you left-handed?

I can't believe you asked that question. Listen, I don't mean to roast you, Kris Krim. I think that's kind of a lame question. But yeah, I am left-handed. Yes, Kristen is left-handed. All right, let's wrap this up and head on over to our Supreme Court induction. Oh, wee. Which I have not pulled up.

Look at me, ready to go. I already had mine pulled up. Wow, is this like a sassy march? My name is Brandi and I'm here to say I've got my inductions up and I'm okay. Oh, boom, there goes the boom. Ready or not, yeah, here I am. Bitches.

All right, everybody, at the $7 level, you get inducted onto our podcast. The Supreme. Oh, God. Just words are coming out. I don't know. We've been recording for three hours and 42 minutes currently. I'm tired. We've got to wrap it up.

It's currently 1223 a.m. We are reading your favorite cookies. Katie Eichenberger. Casey's General Store Caramel Chocolate Chip. Oh, I've never had the pleasure. I've never heard it. Jesus, words are hard now. I've never heard anybody call it Casey's General Store.

You haven't? No, I know that's the official name, but doesn't everybody just call it Casey's? Katie is obviously a very formal gal. Jocelyn. Those pink and white circus animal cookies with the sprinkles. Know exactly what you're talking about, Jocelyn. Yep. Ida. Chocolate chip with macadamia nut.

Andrea Bell. Thumbprint shortbread cookies with cream cheese filling. Brandy's making judgmental faces. She doesn't want your thumbs anywhere near her cookies. Krista Sandstad. Danish wedding cookies. Amy Barker. Wagon

wheels. Ivy Martini. Chocolate and macadamia nut cookie. Caitlin A. White chocolate macadamia. Tom G. Garage cookies. Any homemade cookies from the freezer in the garage? Oh, okay.

All right. Victoria Scott. Chips Ahoy Thins. Mmm. Amanda Ball. PK and Sandy's. Elliot Perotti Anderson. Swedish Haulingrad.

This is wonderful. It says Raspberry Caves in parentheses. That doesn't clarify anything. Well, it's a raspberry cave. Don't you wax that every now and then? Jesus. Christy Kroll. High school giant underbaked chocolate chip.

Oh, yes. Yep. Absolutely. Ivy O'Neil. Classic frosted sugar cookie. Amber Johnson. Chocolate chip. Claudia. Ivy O'Neil classic frosted sugar cookie Amber Johnson chocolate chip Claudia my friend's mom's recipe

for the best chocolate chip cookies ever sorry Brandy oh in your face Brandy your fucking face Hattie take that in your raspberry cave Jesus dark chocolate digestive

dipped in English breakfast tea guess where I'm from? Minnesota. Jen Murlock. My award-winning white chocolate chip cranberry oatmeal cookies. Jen, that's a lot going on in a cookie. Wow. Food reviewer.

Food, food reviewer. Jerrica. Oatmeal cookies. KCK. Frozen Thin Mints. Oh. Welcome. To the Supreme Court.

Lord almighty. Holy shit balls. This was a long one. Thank you for all of your support. If you've made it to the end of this, congratulations. We tip our hats to you. If you're looking for other ways to

support us, please find us on social media or on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Reddit, Patreon. 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

American Justice, an episode of Dateline, an episode of Crime Watch Daily with Chris Hansen, and the Crime Library. Also Wikipedia. I got my info from an article for the Huffington Post by David Lohr, Snapped, the Phoenix New Times, Murderpedia, Wikipedia, and AZ Central.

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.