Let's Go To Court! - 23: Rolling Stone’s Most Outrageous Article & the Bever Family Murders

Episode Date: July 4, 2018

When Rolling Stone published an article about a gang rape at the University of Virginia, people were outraged. Not only had a young woman been assaulted — but her attempts to get meaningful help from university administrators went nowhere. The piece was as beautifully written as it was horrific. But was it accurate? Then Brandi bums us out with a story that starts with a 12-year-old boy’s call to 911. He told the dispatcher that his brother was attacking the family. Before he could provide more information, the line went dead. Police traced the call, but it was too late to save the family. By the time police arrived, five members of the Bever family were dead and the killers had fled the scene. 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: “A Rape on Campus,” Rolling Stone “‘Catfishing’ over love interest might have spurred U-Va. gang-rape debacle,” Washington Post “In Rolling Stone Defamation Case, Magazine and Reporter Ordered to Pay $3 Million,” New York Times “Key elements of Rolling Stone’s U-Va gang rape allegations in doubt,” Washington Post “Rolling Stone and UVA: The Columbia University Graduate School of Journalism Report,” Rolling Stone … and good old Wikipedia In this episode, Brandi pulled from: “One statement captured Bever jury’s challenge: How to compare two very troubled brothers” by Michael Overall, Tulsa World “Robert Bever breaks down in tears on witness stand in younger brother’s murder trial, says they acted together but ‘in (their) own ways’” by Michael Overall and Samantha Vincent, Tulsa World “Surviving Bever Sister Testifies In Brother’s Murder Trial” by Lori Fullbright and Taylor Newcomb, newson6.com “Medical Examiner, DNA Expert Testify In Bever Murder Trial” by Taylor Newcomb, newson6.com “Crime Scene Investigator Breaks Down During Bever Murder Trial Testimony” by Lori Fullbright, newson6.com  

One semester of law school. One semester of criminal justice. Two experts. I'm Kristen Pitts. I'm Brandi Egan. Let's go to court. On this episode, I'll talk about a sexual assault allegation that took the University of Virginia by storm.

And I'll be talking about the Bever family murders. I am so excited for yours. Mostly because you've been such a pill for months. You've been like, I have one in mind and it's in the news right now. I have to wait for it to wrap up. So I've been like, is it Cosby? Is it? I feel like I text you like at least once a week.

Like I figured it out. I figured out. I know what case it is. And you have not yet guessed it. But now today's the day. I'm thrilled. And I have not heard of the Bever family murder murder excellent and weirdly i'm excited okay i'll be sure to bring that down once i get into the brutal murders um i'm gonna bring it down real hard too oh excellent oh good this is

gonna be a real feel-good episode. Do you know the Rolling Stones story? Mm-mm. Oh, man. Prepare to be bummed. Okay. Yikes. Yeah. Let me center myself.

I like your military-style jacket, by the way. Oh, really? Thanks. This is the one that I put on, and Zach was like, excuse me. This is the one that I put on, Zach was like, excuse me, this is the one that I put on and I was like really feeling myself in it and like I went into Zach and I was like, what do you think?

And he's like, what's with the buttons? You look like a Civil War soldier. Which is precisely why I complimented you on it. I love that you said that. And it is a military style jacket. Yeah, it's called a military jacket. And you look like you're fresh from the Civil War. Fresh out of the Civil War.

Missing a leg. You've got one tin cup that you have not washed and you've shared with everybody. Just sideburns for days. All right, you ready for this i am okay bring on the sexual assault something we say so often all the time this story all began with a 2014 article in rolling stone um it's a beautifully written article. I remember where I was when I first read it, and it's absolutely horrific. It was called A Rape on Campus, A Brutal Assault, and Struggle for Justice at UVA. It's like 9,000 words long, and it took the reporter about five months to investigate it. It's a very sensitive subject, so obviously she uses a lot of pseudonyms.

So in general, I'm not using the person's real name. Yeah. And it's going to take me a while to sum up the article for you because this is all about this article. Yeah. And here we go. The story opens with Jackie. And Jackie's super excited.

College is going great. She's a freshman from a small town in Virginia. And she just met this guy, Drew, at the college pool where they're both lifeguards. And Drew is a junior and he's a member of this prestigious frat. And holy shit, I forgot to look up how to pronounce the frat name. I don't know these Greek letters. You do your best, and then I will tell you if you're correct. Pi Kappa Psi? Yeah, that's right. Man, okay, good. All right, so she's at a Pi Kappa Psi frat party with Drew,

and she's discreetly pouring the contents of her drink onto the gross frat house floor because she doesn't want to drink, but she doesn't want to look like a prince either. And at a certain point, Drew asks, hey, do you want to go upstairs where it's quieter? So she's excited. She follows Drew upstairs into this pitch black room. She calls out his name and someone bumps into her. She screams. All of a sudden, she realizes that this room is full of men.

One man knocks her backward onto like a glass coffee table thing and it shatters. Oh my gosh. Yeah. Another man is holding back her arms. She hears all these voices. She's terrified. One of the men puts his hand over her mouth to keep her quiet she bites it he punches her in the face all the guys start laughing yeah that's hilarious yeah

for a second she hopes maybe this is some kind of awful prank but then one of the guys shouts grab grab its motherfucking leg. It's? Yeah. Ugh. Yeah, this story is bad. Fuck. And she knew she was about to be raped. Mm-hmm.

So for three hours, five men took turns raping her while two watched. Oh, my gosh. They were shouting each other's nicknames and cheering each other on. And then as the last man began raping her, she studied his face, and she actually recognized him as this guy from her anthropology class. Oh, my gosh. And he actually looked upset, like he might cry. And he told the other guys, I can't do it.

He couldn't get it up, and so they started mocking him. And one of them said, don't you want to be a brother? We all had to do it. So you do it too. So he raped her with a beer bottle. Oh, my God. At 3 a.m., Jackie woke up alone. And she ran shoeless, beaten, and spattered in blood out of the frat house.

The party was still going on but no one seemed to notice or care as she fled the scene she called her three best friends two guys and a girl and she said something bad happened i need you to come get me they got to her as quickly as she could and her friend randall again not his real name was like we've got to get you to a hospital. Yeah. But her friend Cindy said, is that really such a good idea? Her reputation will be shot for the next four years. What? Yeah, what's your reaction to that? That she needs to go to the hospital? Yeah.

Reputation? That doesn't matter. Yeah. Her other friend, Andy, agreed with Cindy. What the fuck? The social costs were too high. No. Which, yeah, rape victims pay a social cost, unfortunately, sometimes. But that should not be what the friends are saying in that moment.

No, definitely not. And Andy was like, Randall, you and I both want to pledge frats. How is this going to affect us? What the fuck? Finally, Cindy summed it up. She was like, if we go to a hospital or if we report this, she's going to be the girl who cried rape and will never be invited to another frat party again.

Yep, that's the right decision. Ridiculous. So that's the opening of the article. The gang rape happened in 2012 and the reporter began talking to Jackie in 2014. And in the remainder of the story, the writer talked about how Jackie was obviously still struggling she received almost no support from anyone on campus and when she told her roommate she was going to talk to a reporter the roommate was like where's your loyalty this is going to make the University of Virginia look bad. Oh my gosh. So I'm going to read you a portion of the

article. It says, at UVA, rapes are kept quiet, both by students who brush off sexual assaults as regrettable but inevitable casualties of their cherished party culture, and by an administration that critics say is less concerned with protecting students than it is with protecting its own Holy shit. Yeah. So this was a huge problem at UVA, to the point that the federal government had taken notice. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. an even deeper compliance review by the Department of Education's Civil Rights Office. Wow.

So the university had a big problem that they were failing to address, and Jackie was on the receiving end of that problem. After the rape, she became suicidal, hardly ever left her room, was failing her classes. It got so bad that her academic dean called her into his office and jackie went to that meeting with her mom and her mom said that jackie had had a bad experience at a party the academic advisor a bad experience yeah i think that's an understatement yep yep the academic advisor gave jackie the contact info for Dean Nicole Aramo, the head of the UVA's sexual misconduct board. Jackie met with Nicole. And for the record, UVA declined to make Aramo available for comment for this article.

So she wasn't even able to do it. The article explains that Nicole is beloved by survivors. Sexual assault survivors at UVA all really love her. But a trip to her office isn't confidential. And most students don't know that. Each complaint goes into the federally mandated crime statistics. And Nicole can, at her her own discretion share details with school administrators wow wow yeah that's a problem why it's such a personal thing yeah a sexual assault and the fact that these victims are

brave enough to go speak to anybody about it. Yeah. I think there's an assumption of confidentiality when that happens. I agree. And so for that not to be the case. If there's not confidentiality, then they need to know right up front.

Like, hey, if you want a confidential conversation, you need to go to a therapist. Yeah, a therapist. This is not a confidential. Wow. So Nicole listened to Jackie's story and she told Jackie, look, you've got three options. Number one, you can go to the police or you can keep it within the school. Number one, you can go to the police or you can keep it within the school. From there, we can either one file a complaint with the sexual misconduct board in front of a jury of students and faculty.

A dean would act as the judge and it would result in a formal resolution. Or you can confront the attackers in my presence, tell them how you feel, and I'll make my own suggestions. Which to me is like, hey rapists, go get counseling. I don't know. Yeah. And that's referred to as an informal resolution, which I want to pause here and be like, I just don't understand why colleges

even attempt to take this stuff on. No kidding. Unless it's to help cover it up. Well, I mean mean i think from at least some portion of it has to be to cover it up minimize it you know i just i don't understand it at all like if someone's at work and they get sexually assaulted there they don't deal with that at work right i i don't get it no so the article goes into how in these situations administrators defend these options as oh the survivor has a choice which is important to give survivors choice i mean obviously they've

had no choice for a while but it generally results in not much, if anything, actually happening. Yeah. So the university gets to appear to support rape survivors, but nothing hardly ever happens to the rapists. And the bad press of a rape never gets reflected on the school. Parents don't hear about it. Students don't hear about it. It's like it never happened. Yeah. So then the article goes into crime statistics and how sexual assaults don't usually appear in the statistics. So I'm going to read to you again from the article.

In the last academic year, 38 students went to a RAMO about a sexual assault, up from about 20 students three years ago. However, of those 38, only nine resulted in complaints. The other 29 students evaporated. Of those nine complaints, four resulted in sexual misconduct board hearings. UVA wasn't willing to disclose their outcomes, citing privacy. Like most colleges, sexual assault proceedings at UVA unfold in total secrecy. Asked why UVA doesn't publish all its data, President Sullivan explains that it might not be in keeping with best practices and thus may inadvertently discourage reporting. Jackie got a different explanation when she eventually asked Dean Aramo the same question.

She says Aramo answered wryly, because nobody wants to send their daughter to the rape school. Yeah, I think that's the. That's the real answer. That's the real answer. So the article went on to detail a bunch of other stories, some going back decades about women being raped on campus and administrators either not caring or just being more concerned about how this would affect the school.

So Jackie's still trying to decide what she'll do with her three options. In the meantime, she starts going to a sexual assault support group on campus. And while she was there, she learned something really disturbing. That two other young women had also been gang raped at Pi Kappa Psi. Oh my gosh. Jackie became more vocal against sexual assault, and then she became a target. At one point, some guys recognized her

from a sexual assault awareness presentation and flung a bottle at her face. What? Yeah, she wound up with a big red bruise around her eye. Oh my gosh. So she made another appointment with Nicole. She wanted to discuss two things, the harassment and these other gang rapes

that she'd heard about. And for the record, neither of the victims wanted to talk to Rolling Stone. But when Jackie talked to Nicole, Nicole just seemed indifferent to the whole thing. So we're getting toward the end of the article now. It's clear this reporter has been looking into the story for a long time and trying to get interviews

with a lot of UVA officials. And the reporter learned that UVA had learned enough about her story that they were putting Pi Kappa Psi under investigation. Meanwhile, Nicole called Jackie back into her office. And Jackie brought a friend. And Nicole told them that she'd heard through the grapevine that all the boys involved have graduated. Jackie was like, but I just saw one of those dudes on campus.

Oh my gosh. So I'm just going to read you the end of the article. Jackie tells me of a recurring nightmare she's been having, in which she's watching herself climb those Pai Kappa Sai stairs. She frantically calls to herself to stop, but knows it's too late. That in real life, she's already gone up those stairs and into that terrible room, and things will never be the same. It bothers Jackie to know that Drew and the rest get to walk away as if

nothing happened but that she still walks toward that room every night and blames herself for it during the day everything bad in my life now is built around that one bad decision that i made she says all because i went to that stupid party oh my gosh yeah that's horrible yeah it's a horrible horrible story yeah um and when it came out in november of 2014 it was huge it got more than 2.7 million views which is more views than any rolling stone story ever that wasn't written about a celebrity. Yeah. It was... It was crazy. Mm-hmm. In the wake of this story, people were outraged.

Applications to UVA dropped. Uh-huh. Obviously. Obviously. Pi Kappa Psi was vandalized. People graffitied the house with things like UVA Center for Rape Studies,

which I just think is funny. And stop raping people, which is just more direct. Yes. And just good advice. Yeah. Really, that should be graffitied everywhere. Several windows in the house were broken. UVA President Teresa Sullivan suspended all Greek organizations

for a few months just so they could figure out what the hell was going on. Charlottesville police began investigating the gang rape. The fraternity voluntarily suspended itself for a while. But people obviously wanted more. They wanted justice. They wanted Nicola Ramo to resign. So the university was under scrutiny. Mm-hmm. The fraternity was under scrutiny.

Mm-hmm. And the article was under scrutiny. What? The author of the piece was Sabrina Erdely, a freelance journalist who had covered a bunch of high-profile issues. After this piece came out, a bunch of people wanted to talk to her, because this was like the hot piece of journalism at that time. And one of the first outlets she talked to was the Slate podcast.

I'm going to read you a transcript from that interview. Hold on. Drink your tea so you can spill the tea, Kristen. How dare you? This is warm water with lemon you can spill the tea, Kristen. How dare you? This is warm water with lemon and this is tea over here. Such a diva. Where are my candles? I demand white candles.

And only blue M&Ms. I knew you were going to say that. Actually. What? Let me take that back. I thought you were going to say only green M&Ms, but... Why did you think green? I don't know, because it's the girl M&M? I'm not being sexist here. I mean, I don't know why I thought green, but when you asked that, that's the first thing that popped into my mind.

I thought in the writers it was always blue M&Ms. It probably is. I don't know. Boy. Let's get Mariah carey on the phone i'm sure she's available okay so she talks to michelle is that her name um sabrina sabrina michelle whatever that was close so she goes on the slate podcast and slate asks did they respond about this they're asking her about the accused rapist yeah did they respond about this did they deny it what was their response to the allegations early there was never a need for a response until i stepped in apparently because it wasn't until I started asking questions that the university put them under some kind of investigation, or so they said. It was unclear to me whether there was actually an investigation.

The university said they were under investigation, but when I spoke to the Paisai chapter and also to the Paisai national representative, both of them said they were not aware of any kind of university investigation slate. But did the boys say anything to you? The thing about it is that everybody in the story seems to know who they are. Eardley, there's no doubt that people seem to know who these people are. I would speculate that life inside a frat house is a probably, you know, you have this kind of communal life where everybody is sort of sharing information. People are living lives closely with one another, and it seems impossible to imagine that people didn't know about this.

Slate. Did they try to contact you? Did you try and call them? Was there any communication between you and them? Eardley. Yeah, I reached out to them in multiple ways. They were kind of hard to get in touch with because their contact page was pretty outdated. But I wound up speaking with their local president who sent me an email.

And then I talked with their national guy who's kind of like their national crisis manager. Slate. But not the actual boys yeah earthly they were both helpful in their own way i guess all they said was they both claimed whoa whoa whoa whoa hold the fucking phone no no brandy let's just charge on through that's exactly what she just did. She didn't answer their question at all. And I'd like to go back a couple questions. How many times did she say investigation in her first answer? That's oh shit. Oh shit.

Word vomit. Oh my gosh. Okay. So they say, did you talk to the boys? And she's like, and so then i was talking to the chapter guy and he said i tried out this new shampoo and it's great and oh what the fuck yeah she fabricate this whole article we'll we'll get more into like what exactly happened oh but for now and again as a former reporter, this is fucking insane.

Okay, so at the very least, she only interviewed one side of this. Right, which anytime you're going to do an article that, even if you're using pseudonyms, which pseudonyms I think are stupid because in relatively small communities, everybody knows who you're talking about anyway. Yeah. But you've got to at least give somebody a chance to respond, even if they slam the door in your face and they say no comment. Yes.

So, again, the media is circling all around this story. The Washington Post ripped Rolling Stone a new one. In an opinion piece, they wrote, if they were being cited in the story for mere drunkenness, boorish frat boy behavior, or similar collegiate misdemeanors, then there'd be no harm

in failing to secure their input. The charge in this piece, however, is gang rape. Yeah! And so requires every possible step to reach out and interview them, including emails, phone calls, certified letters, FedEx letters,

UPS letters, and if all that fails, a knock on the door. Abso-fucking-lutely. No effort short of all that qualifies as journalism. Yes. No shit.

Yes. No shit. So journalists were shocked by this, that the reporter, and a very seasoned, respected reporter, failed to do something so basic. Yeah. That is like journalism 101. That is like basicest of bitches. But it wasn't just journalists who were asking questions. But it wasn't just journalists who were asking questions.

The fraternity obviously read the story and they were like, whoa, whoa, whoa. The article said the exact date that Jackie was raped. They start going back through their files. We didn't have a party that night. Mm hmm. and the way she described the frat house in the story wasn't accurate to the actual layout of the house holy shit and the idea that the gang rape was some sort of pledging ritual didn't seem right either because they don't pledge in the fall they pledge pledge in the spring. Oh, my gosh. And also, they were like, by the way, we would never do this as a pledging ritual.

Beside the point. Minor details. Minor details. All the gang rapes, we hold that for the spring. And that thing about Drew and Jackie meeting because they were lifeguards at the campus pool, the fraternity was like, none of our guys worked at the pool in 2012. Holy shit. Meanwhile, journalists dig deeper, and it doesn't take them long to find the real identities of the three friends who met up with Jackie immediately after the rape.

Guess what? The three friends say that the Rolling Stone article doesn't match what they saw that night. Yes, Jackie was distraught, but she wasn't bloody and she didn't seem injured. And she said she'd been forced to perform oral sex. Uh-huh. Oh, so that kind of changes things. None of them weighed the social consequences of reporting the rape they were like we know we wouldn't have said that yeah and also none of them were interviewed for the story here's something extra fucked up in my mind in article, the author implied that she spoke to one of the friends,

but he said he didn't want to do an interview out of loyalty to his frat. Wow. But the guy was like, that conversation never happened. Holy shit. So here's the thing. The reporter asked Jackie if she could talk to any of the three friends. And Jackie told her, Randall, I think was his pseudonym. Randall says, you know, oh, no, he doesn't want to be involved because out of loyalty to his frat.

Yeah. So the reporter just put that in. Like she had gotten that information directly from the source. Which was an assumption that Jackie made, not an actual quote from Randall. Well, and I think Jackie implied that she had actually talked to him and he'd said no. But, I mean, still,

you don't make it seem like you had the conversation with the person when you didn't. Okay. This is so. The journalist Kristen is getting so fired up. It's just wrong. Yeah.

And I just can't imagine being one of those students and seeing that said about you. Yeah. No, I don't want to talk about this gang rape because i'm loyal to my frat yeah and i'm sure there are people out there like that but this reporter didn't know that he was like that no and it turns out he wasn't because all three of these friends were like yeah if this reporter had come to us and said i want to talk we would have talked yeah wow okay i sounded like a gremlin when i said wow just now explains why i'm so scared right now a few weeks after they published this piece, Rolling Stone issued an apology. Here's some of it.

We have come to the conclusion that we were mistaken in honoring Jackie's request to not contact the alleged assaulters to get their account. In trying to be sensitive to the unfair shame and humiliation many women feel after a sexual assault, we made a judgment. The kind of judgment reporters and editors make every day. We should have not made this agreement with Jackie and we should have worked harder to convince her that the truth would have been better served by getting the other side of the story. These mistakes are on Rolling Stone, not on Jackie. And I want to jump in here because I think I'm reading an updated version of this apology. I think in the original version, that last line was not even in there.

Okay. And I have to say that even with the last line, they're blaming it on Jackie. Yeah. Which is bullshit. Yes. Yes. They blame,

blame, blame on Jackie. And then they say, by the way, we're not blaming Jackie. You are fucking blaming Jackie. Yeah. And I got to say, blame, blame on Jackie. And then they say, by the way, we're not blaming Jackie. You are fucking blaming Jackie. Yeah. And I got to say, if this reporter had talked to all these individuals and still, like, there was this mass conspiracy to lie to her, then, you know, okay, yeah, sometimes you get tricked.

That wasn't the case here. Yeah. They weren't dealing with some evil mastermind. Yeah. Holy shit. Yes. A month after that shitty apology. And by the way, everyone was like, great apology, guys.

Yeah. I don't know how you managed to publish a thinly sourced story and then be arrogant about it at the same time. No shit. But well done, Rolling Stone. Yeah. A month after that, Charlottesville police announced that they couldn't find

any evidence that the Rolling Stone story was true. People were pissed at the Rolling Stone. It was bad journalism and even worse, it fed into this notion

that we shouldn't believe people when they say they were sexually assaulted. Absolutely. Which, by the way, false sexual assault reports are really really low but when a story like this comes out people are like oh i know this happens all the time everyone turns into a gremlin so rolling stone publisher shit okay how do you say this name when it's a dude j-a-n-n is it yawn i think so okay yawn winner asked the columbia university graduate school of journalism to do

an audit of their editorial process and the agreement was basically look check out our process we'll print whatever you find here Here's what they found. This story was a journalistic failure. And it was a preventable failure. Well, I'm not a fucking journalist and I could have told you that it was a journalistic failure. Yeah, absolutely. And to me, the most important thing is

preventable failure. Because mistakes happen in journalism and just like in any industry but good god this really could have been stopped well okay so i don't know the process of like being a freelance journalist submitting a an article to be published is is there fact-checking that goes into that? At a magazine of this caliber,

there is fact-checking. Yeah. I mean, I've seen Almost Famous. They fact-checked the shit out of that article. And that was 100% accurate. Yeah, fact-checkers

are more common at big magazines. Usually, like, at a small newspaper, you have a copy editor, maybe an editor all in one yeah um but yeah like the smallest amount of fact checking here i feel like would have uncovered problems which then which should have led to a bigger investigation

into the accuracy of the article right yeah? Yeah. Yeah. Including just talking with your journalist. Yeah. So would you, just like the slate people did of like, so what'd these guys say? Yeah. Investigation, investigation, investigation. And then when she says that to you, you go, wait a minute. So you didn't talk. Okay.

so the the article said or the the audit said basically pseudonyms are very dangerous which i mean i think they should almost never be used because it's too tempting uh-huh you know she wouldn't have fudged some of this stuff i don't think if there was an actual name tied to it yeah yep because to say oh he wouldn't talk to me because of loyalty to his fraternity. That's a lot easier to do that to someone with a fake name than an actual student. Yeah. The other thing they said was you should have checked with the three friends. Duh. Yeah.

The other thing they said was you can't just ask important sources if they'd like to comment so here's what she did she like reached out to the fraternity reached out to the university and said something really vague like you know there was a sexual assault that took place i think she maybe even mentioned the month and the year and said do you have a comment instead of asking direct questions which i will defend her a little on this sometimes when you give too much information you're like giving them ammunition to try to cover stuff up or try to get out in front of the story but at the same time yeah if she'd been like so and so somebody says they were at a party at your frat on this date and something happened.

They could have at least said we didn't have a party on that date. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Huh. So the report came out in April. Mm hmm. And at that point, Rolling Stone finally retracted the article.

Thank God. About damn time. Yeah. No shit. The report raised more questions, though. Would Sabrina Erdely still write for Rolling Stone? The publisher said yes. Really?

Because according to him, the problem started with the source. Fuck that guy! No, you cannot blame Jackie! But she was a really expert, fabulous storyteller. Mm-hmm. Yeah, I mean, that's ridiculous. It's easy to be a really excellent storyteller when you're just making shit up or not backing shit up with sources. Mm-hmm.

Anybody can fabricate a great story or embellish a great story. That does not make a great journalist. She might have missed her calling as a novelist. So everyone at Rolling Stone kept their jobs. Wow. In my opinion, again, you know, they get this audit from Columbia, and it's like they don't even give a shit. Because I think they thought they would maybe be off the hook, or maybe they didn't care. They were just like, we were outsmarted by a 21-year-old. Come on.

But this is a court podcast. So you're probably wondering, where is the court shit? bring on the court shit. Hang on tight. Wait, do I need to buckle my seatbelt? Um,

in a minute, I will tell you when to buckle up. It is nuts. You think this craziest story right now, this craziest story, this craziest story this craziest story but is this story crazy that too keep listening to find out court go to let's here we go so do you remember uva associate dean nicole aramo yes who came off as an evil rape cover-upper in the article that's correct and a non-confidential right uh you know listener i'm also a non-confidential listener. So she sued Rolling Stone and Sabrina Erdely for $7.5 million.

Yeah. I could see that. She sure did. She said the article made me the chief villain in this story. Sure fucking did. And it portrayed me as uncaring and indifferent. The only people worse than her in the article were probably the three rapists well five rapists and the two watchers but at least they had students that's true yes her legal team was intense they said

sabrina the writer was more concerned about writing an article that fulfilled her preconceived narrative than she was about getting to the truth. That's exactly what it sounds like. It sounds the same to me, too. Yeah. She knew the type of article she wanted to write. Yeah. She just had to go out and find the puzzle pieces to plug it all together. Yep.

And that Rolling Stone was more concerned about selling magazines than getting to the truth. Also true. Nicole also had a big issue with a photo illustration that they ran of her that went with the article. So in the original photo, Nicole is talking to a student with a blackboard behind her. And she's got this pen in her hand and she's holding it kind of funny.

So it looks like she's giving them a thumbs up. Rolling Stone turned that into a photo illustration. What? I've seen this. Have you really? I have. I don't know this case at all. I have seen this illustration, though.

I was going to pull it up and show it to you again. Do you want to see it again? Okay, so just to keep explaining. So in the photo illustration, it looks like she's in an office now with protesters outside. And it looks like she's giving a thumbs up to a sexual assault victim. Mm-hmm. Okay. Man.

Oh, come on, Washington Post. I even got an account of them yesterday, and now they're being like, you're going to have to sign in. I already have an account. Damn it. um you're gonna have to sign in i already have an account damn it i must have seen a blurb or something uh just about this lawsuit where she sues uh-huh i cannot believe this is the first time i have ever remembered my accurate password oh i'm impressed okay let me show you this yes yeah yes i have seen this wasn't that worth it is there some kind of like did somebody do a tv show on this there has to

be it has to be like a segment on a on a 2020 or something like that okay that has to be where i've seen this so by this point i'll watch a lot of 2020 i don't mean to brag to you but i've seen a lot of 2020 seen a shit ton of dateline a lot of 48 hours what's the best of the crime shows would you say dateline's my favorite. I agree. Yeah. Although I wish, I wish Dateline would get more pictures. I know that's not always in their control, but you know how they have like three pictures

of the victim and they try to trick you out by like zooming in and zooming out and like kind of like having it askew on the table. Yeah.

I can see that. You're more a true fan. You're not gonna say anything negative about him I really enjoy it you got Lester who hosts it

Lester Holt yes big fan Lester Holt and then if you're lucky you get Keith Morrison oh my god

oh did he die really did you ever watch the SNL with Billy yes yes Did he die? Really? Did you ever watch the SNL with Billy? Yes, the Bill Hader show. Yes. That was so good. And he always looks, he does that creepy look like, oh, that's horrifying.

That's horrifying. Gone. Which I think is kind of how we are. Like, oh, no. Did you know that Keith Morrison is Matthew Perry's stepdad Chandler from France? Really? No.

How do you know that? I don't know. How do you know any of this stuff? That's amazing. Yeah. Did he raise him or like, is this later in life? Oh,

that's later in life type of thing now we have to stop the podcast because i've got to think about this that's amazing yeah well i don't know about amazing i think i'm overusing the word amazing people get married it's uh it's interesting there you go okay so like i said by this point nicole had the full support of the university uh she had a really hard time after the article came out obviously yeah but by this point students alumni and administrators were pitching in to cover her legal fees against rolling stone they were like fuck these guys. As the lawsuit moves forward, the reporter had to hand over

all of her notes and recorded interviews. And the stuff in her notes was pretty damning. It showed that Jackie's story had changed over time. And there were other things. Jackie said that she'd gotten cut

on the glass table when she was raped and that she had scars on her back and at one point sabrina was like could i see the scars and jackie was like oh they're not distinct anymore and jackie's boyfriend was right there for that conversation he was like i've never seen scars on your back before there was another big thing jack Jackie said that two other students were gang raped at that frat house. A staff member at the university warned Sabrina that no one from the university had met these two mystery women. And of course, Jackie couldn't provide their contact info.

They also found in Sabrina's notes that she had formed a strong opinion about Nicole. She was like, these survivors love her. They think she she's so great but she's preserving the status quo she looks like she's helping victims but they hardly ever report after they talk to her okay are you ready for the buckle up section of this story okay hold on let me get my seat belt buckled okay i'm ready i'm disappointed you didn't make the click okay this this is fucking nuts okay and i thought i knew this story i did not know this part before the trial nicole's lawyers did a lot of digging, obviously. And one of the things they dug up and dug into wasn't just what was the reporter's mindset and did Rolling Stone vet this appropriately, but did the gang rape happen in the first place?

And who the hell is this Drew guy who was supposedly this ringleader? We've got to get to the bottom of this. Before we get to that, i want to talk to you about ryan duffin ryan was one of the three friends that jackie talked to the night of the assault he was the one who supposedly said oh i'm not talking out of loyalty to the fraternity jackie and ryan met freshman year and he sensed that she had a crush on him but he didn't feel the same way. He was polite to her, but pretty clear he wasn't interested.

A few days after Ryan first met Jackie, this guy named Haven Monahan started texting him. He was a junior in Jackie's chemistry class, and it was very clear that Haven was obsessed with Jackie. Couldn't stop talking about her. It's not real. It's Jackie, right? Haven was very upset because he wanted to have a romantic relationship with Jackie, but she wasn't interested. She was hung up on some freshman guy. Oh my gosh. I'm going to read you a text from the very real Haven to Ryan. Get this. She said she likes some other first year guy who doesn't like her and turned her down,

but she won't date me because she likes him. She can't turn me down for some nerd first year. She said this kid is smart and funny and worth it. Oh my God, it's not even well done. And you should know how many typos were in that one. I had to stumble over that. At one point, Haven is like, hey man, why aren't you interested in Jackie?

You need to be nice to her. Go easy on her. She has a terminal illness. What? So he immediately texted Jackie and she texted back, Ryan, it means I'm dying. Thank you for explaining what a terminal

illness is. Brandy, you do not seem very sympathetic. Because it's fucking made up, Kristen. Haven Monahan is not a fake name. Haven Monahan doesn't even seem a terrible fake name. Haven Monahan is just a nice guy who's obsessed with a freshman. And for some reason talks to other random freshmen about how he's obsessed. This is ridiculous.

Eventually she goes to that frat party with Haven Monaghan. And Haven Monaghan sexually assaults her. Haven Monaghan is Drew from the Rolling Stones story. her haven monahan is drew from the rolling stone story i cannot even right now kristin she got okay hold on hold on no what the fucking fuck yeah she got gang raped by a person she made up sounds horrible doesn't it this is crazy well and i should jump in and say that in light of all this a lot of people have come forward and said they do think something happened to her it just wasn't this yeah so i don't want to be like laughing too hard no no i mean this is this is insanely ridiculous there's a chance something

really did horrible did happen to her but not by haven monahan or whatever the fuck his name is because he does not exist brandy how dare you i'm gonna read you some more stuff and you're gonna bite your tongue, young lady. I doubt it. I am glad that I had my seatbelt buckled for that. So Jackie quickly forgave Haven for what he did to her. Which is easy to do when it didn't happen. When it didn't happen!

But after a while, Ryan got suspicious. He asked her, basically, does Haven Monaghan really exist? And she got pissed. She was like, yeah, because she's getting called out on her bullshit. Nobody likes that. I don't like that. Me either. So nothing ever happened between Ryan and Jackie.

so nothing ever happened between ryan and jackie and but these texts and emails were gathered by nicole's legal team in this search for the real perpetrator so they start looking into haven monahan weird does he have the same phone number as Jackie? It's an internet phone number? There's a whole bunch of stuff, but yada, yada, yada. No one in the history of UVA has had the name Haven Monaghan. Yeah, because nobody fucking exists with the name Haven Monaghan. You want to hear something funny? CNN even looked up to see if anyone in the United States had that name.

No one has that name. Ah, yes! It's a terrible fucking name! Name him John fucking Smith or something. Yes. We've got a lot of advice. 800 million John Smiths. The picture Haven sent of himself to Ryan was actually the picture of a guy Jackie went to high school with who she barely knows.

Ryan was actually the picture of a guy Jackie went to high school with who she barely knows which now this had to be weird for him because then they go and track that guy down oh gosh and he has to verify uh yeah that's me but I am not Haven Monahan and I haven't talked to Jackie in years and barely talked to her when I did know her holy Holy crap. Oh my gosh. So they submitted court documents stating that Haven Monahan was completely fake. The whole thing started because Jackie was catfishing Ryan. Mm-hmm. Ryan later said, had any of us been contacted, it never would have blown up like this. It's weird to think that an entire portion of my life was consumed by these events that looking back looks so dumb. Given the way everything's turned out, I don't think that's the way I want to describe it. But I had a lot of naivete three years ago.

It's just weird all around. I don't know that weird describes it. I get it, though. Like, you would just be like, holy crap. Holy shit. What is this? This insane lie that I was told a million years ago is now in Rolling Stone. And it's like the most popular article of the moment. Oh, God.

So the lawsuit's moving forward. They get a jury of eight women and two men. The trial lasted two weeks. The jury watched taped depositions from Jackie, which her lawyers tried to be like, no, don't depose her.

But the judge was like, yeah, we're going to depose her. Yeah, we're going to have to depose her. Sorry. They also deposed the. Sorry. Um, they also deposed the three friends. Ryan had to testify about the catfishing, which had to be pretty fucking weird.

Yeah. Here I am in a court of law. Talking about being catfished. Gosh, this was kind of a tough case because Nicole was considered a limited purpose, public figure. And you know, you can't, you can't say whatever you want about a private person, but public figures,

you have a lot more leeway. And so her lawyers wanted to prove that the author and that Rolling Stone acted with actual malice. And that requires that the publisher must either have known that the information was false or just had to have had a reckless disregard for the truth which i think they did uh i agree nicole took the stand and she cried as she talked she talked about how she lost self-confidence in her job after the article came out i mean obviously when you're basically painted as a she-devil. Yep. Who's like, he got raped. Yeah. She was especially hurt by... Thumbs up.

Yeah. Thumbs up. She was especially hurt by a line in the article where Jackie told the author that Nicole said, nobody wants to send their daughter to a rape school. Nicole was like, I never said that. I wouldn't have said that. Although it is true, no one wants to.

I mean, if I've got a choice personally. Her testimony was so moving that a few members of the jury cried. Wow. In case you wonder where they're leaning. Yeah. Rolling Stones lawyers were like, but did the article really damage your reputation? Because you've gotten two raises since it was published,

and now you're making $113,000 a year. You're fine. By the way, the Department of Education backs up our findings about how bad you guys are at handling sexual assault cases. is to me the frustrating thing about this because there was a lot of this article that was very valid and true well and brought to light yeah good like things that needed to be brought to light that yeah but then set the movement back a couple decades and lit everything in a dumpster fire. Yes, exactly. It was like two steps forward, 5,000 steps back. Two steps forward, then they got in a train in the opposite direction.

If they left the station at 8.34 a.m. And then they totally fucked themselves. So Rolling Stone tried to paint themselves as victims of a hoax at one point they're a term no

they don't get to be victims because they have a duty as a publication to fact check and make sure that they are but what if the story

they've got right now is really, really good? No! One of the things that a lot of people said was like, yeah, it was a really good story. It was a perfect story and like a little too perfect. Yeah. At one point, their attorney, Scott Sexton, said, this young woman was very good at telling this story. Dina Ramo believed her, yet we are the ones being tried, in a sense,

for having believed her. And at that point, some of the members of the jury cried, too. Did you make that part up? Yes. Can you imagine feeling sorry for them no oh you guys we tricked and i just want to say about this that woman's job i think is when someone says they were sexually assaulted yeah you do move forward believing them and you say here are your Yeah. And that's when things kind of get vetted, and you make some decisions. Yes, absolutely. But if you're in that position, it's not your job to be like, really?

Prove it. Really? Okay, I'm going to go talk to all your friends and try to confirm everything. Yeah. That's a reporter's job. Yes. Yes. So in closing arguments, Nicole's attorney pointed to the findings in the columbia school of

journalism's audit maybe rolling stone shouldn't have done that he was basically like the world of good journalism agrees that this could have been avoided it could have should have been avoided yes bottom line this was totally avoidable 100 They weren't tricked by some mastermind. No. You know. Yeah. An attorney for Rolling Stone argued that basically this was the worst thing that has ever happened to Rolling Stone. He said that Sabrina Eardley lost her job and her reputation.

She'll never write again. He said that Rolling Stones suffered. Oh. Oh. So terrible for them. Let me compose myself. So the jury deliberated for two hours. What do you think?

Guilty. Oh, Brandy. My goodness. Fucking give her a bunch of money. Give her all 7.5 million or whatever she's looking for she did not get that much because they had to throw out a few things here and there i it's a really hard yeah high burden yeah i didn't use any of those words right that's fine high bar is what it's a hard burden to bear when you're having when you're super high and you're trying to

find the bar and all you want are cheetos and you're just grabbing for the bars so they found that sabrina urtley was liable for two million dollars and that rolling stone and winter media were liable for $1 million. They said that Sabrina did act with actual malice and that Rolling Stone and Winter Media defamed her. The jury basically said that when Rolling Stone issued their initial apology about the article in December, they should have taken the article down. Yeah.

But they kept it up till April, and that was just wrong. I think that Rolling Stone should have been liable for more than the author of the article i don't why do you think so because it wouldn't have reached as many people had rolling stone not published it that's a good they are the reason it reached 2.7 million people that's a good point i should posted it on her fucking blog yeah i think though i don't know it's it's hard to me because i think you do have to put a certain amount of trust in your reporters and the mistakes she made i don't even want to call them mistakes. Again, they are the most basic thing.

Yeah. Particularly if you're going to paint somebody in a negative light, you have to give them an opportunity to talk to you. And I think these lawyers for Nicole were completely correct that she had in her head the article she wanted to do. And there were other rape survivors on campus who she could have talked to. But their stories weren't as gut wrenching. And I mean, I think she really, really fucked up.

Yeah, I don't know. I do too. I think she really, really fucked fucked up but you think that rolling stone is the reason it made such a big impact yeah because they brought the story to the masses but should but do you think that they had a reckless disregard i do by not fact checking it well they did fact check it not to the degree they should have with jackie yeah yeah i think they have a a bigger responsibility to when they're putting out a what a reputable publication. Yeah. They have a duty to ensure that what they're

putting out is the truth. Yeah. So I think they should have been held liable for more. OK, let's change it right now. Let's change it. This is what I'm getting at here. So to wrap up,

the fraternity also sued Rolling Stone for $25 million. Now, this is going to make you mad. But Rolling Stone for $25 million. Wow. Now, this is going to make you mad. But they settled for $1.65 million. I mean, I think they deserved more than that. I do, too. And I think that if it would have gone to trial, they probably would have been awarded more from a jury.

But I don't know i think it's a it's a lot of money yeah but it's not enough but i think 25 million is too much i i agree with that um i don't know what i would think is the right amount but i don't either and i guess i think of like it's such a huge organization yeah 1.65 million really doesn't seem like much yeah yeah that's true so in conclusion this was a shit show it was um an example of some really bad journalism and it set back i think sexual assault survivors and being believed and um yeah what a mess what ramifications if any do you think there should be against jackie hmm If any, do you think there should be against Jackie? Honestly?

It's a tough question. Well, I'm struggling with my answer because I want to say none. And part of that is because when I worked at my little rinky-dink newspaper, we would get tips from people all the time about scandalous stories. And it's your job to vet that stuff because people will people will tell all kinds of crazy stories and sometimes not even not even false stories but stuff that you just can't verify so your argument is that it's not her fault that her lie blew up to this level yeah because i because I'm telling you, like, every day, people call in and they have

some story that they think deserves to be covered and I mean, that's why journalists exist, in part, is to, like, try to figure out, okay, well, what's the truth here and does a story really need to be written? Yeah.

And I hope nothing really happened to jackie yeah partly so that i can feel good about laughing at this catfishing thing i mean it's ridiculous what i learned from this is that if you're gonna catfish somebody you gotta come up with a more realistic name you gotta come up with a better name yeah and then when rolling stone comes and wants to do an interview you say sorry sorry yeah and i think i think for jackie like so she was set up for this interview by a staff member who had heard this story and so the staff member connected you know jackie to rolling stone and you know that should have been jackie's point where she was like no but i think once she got the journalist to agree to use pseudonyms yeah

she's like i can make this she yeah then i'm fine i'm fine yeah yeesh what do you think jackie's punishment should have been if anything you know i don't know i feel like because i don't know if anything really happened to her yeah that's where i hesitate to say if anything should and that's the because i do think that there should be ramifications for falsifying a rape report because it's the reason that people aren't believed. Yeah. Sometimes. I mean, false reporting doesn't happen that often.

No, it doesn't. But it really doesn't. But if a false report blows up to this level. Yeah. Gosh, I don't know. Like you said, it sets. But then what if that scares people out of reporting even more?

It does. Because they're like, what if nobody believes me, which is likely. Yes. And then people say it's a false report. And then I. I know. That's what. That's exactly it.

Yeah. It's terrible. Yeah. Oh. Yikes. That was crazy. Yeah. With the exception of like that illustration i didn't know anything

about that case see i i didn't know the catfishing part yeah i i remember reading that article and just being outraged yeah about it yeah and then when initially people were like i don't know if this is truth i i was thinking how dare they not believe this young woman? Well, then more stuff comes out. I was like, oh, okay. You're like, oh, shit. Never mind. I take it back.

Oh, gosh. That was so crazy. Yeah. Man. In my notes this morning, I was so glad I caught this error. I accidentally called him Haven Montana at one point. Haven Montana. Which is even more fake.

I wish that was his name. I was thinking Hannah Montana. Another fake name. But anyway. Okay, I'm very excited. Are you ready for this? Yes, yes. You've ready for this? Yes. Yes. You've teased me for weeks.

So little, I'm going to start with a couple little disclaimers here. Okay. First of all, I was on a theme of old timey kidnappings. So next week I will return you to our regularly scheduled old timey kidnapping. But I had to cover this case as soon as it finished. And like Wednesday, last Wednesday, this case went to the jury. And so I like five o'clock in the evening and they came back with a verdict very quickly. So I was like, you know, what's a shame is we're recording this so far ahead. I know people won't know how timely you're being right now, but I'm being very quickly. So I was like, you know, what's a shame is we're recording this so far ahead.

I know people won't know how timely you're being right now, but I'm being very timely. I will also, my next disclaimer is that because this is such a fresh one to use your term, you owe me money. Now it was difficult to put an episode together because I had to write the fucking thing myself.

Cause there was no article that was had to write the fucking thing myself because there was no one article that was like overarching through the whole thing. I had to piece it together from all these fucking reports. And I am not a writer. So if this fucking sucks, I am sorry. We will judge you big time. And we'll put it in the Rolling Stone. That's right.

Usually, you know, I just find these good articles and copy and paste some stuff from them, add in a little tidbits of my own here and there. A little flair. I just sprinkle a little flair on top. I had to fucking write this whole thing myself. That's a shame. That is a shame. I did.

She's like sniffing my toes. Do you pass the sniff test? I guess I did. She's still sniffing my toes. Do you pass the sniff test? I guess I did. She's still sitting here. I did get my information from this from reports by Lori Fulbright and Taylor Newcomb for News on 6, which is a Tulsa area news station. And then also articles in the Tulsa world. I'm so excited. Okay.

Are you ready? Yes. For the Bever family murders. It's July 22nd, 2015. Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, which is a city of approximately 100,000 people just southeast of Tulsa. Gotcha.

It's shortly before midnight. A call comes in to the 911 dispatch center. Fucking nailed it. Dispatcher? The unidentified caller says, my brother is attacking my family. Then there is a commotion in the background and the line goes dead. After a return call goes unanswered, dispatchers trace the call and send police to the address. It's a large home in a quiet, upscale neighborhood.

Upon arrival at the address, police immediately notice blood on the front porch of the home. It's a large home in a quiet, upscale neighborhood. Upon arrival at the address, police immediately noticed blood on the front porch of the home. As the officers reached the front door, they were able to hear faint moans for help coming from inside and forced entry into the home. Inside, the officers were met with a gruesome scene. In the foyer, they found the 13-year-old daughter of April and David Bever. So a note here, she is named online by some news sources, but in court records, she's identified only by her initials, so I'm not going to call her by her name. Yeah, okay, good call.

She was covered in blood. her throat and stomach had been slit open oh god and she was suffering from multiple stab wounds to her arms and chest but she was alive what how oh my goders immediately called for medical assistance and backup. And they pull her from the house. They pull her out of the house. They don't know what the fuck's going on in there yet. And so they pull her out of the house, into the front yard, wait for medical crews to get there, and then they go back in.

The further they get into the home, the worse it gets. There's blood everywhere the walls the floors the ceilings there are knives everywhere there are various weapons including a hatchet strewn throughout the scene by the way i think in podcast, the sentence you say the most is, there was blood everywhere. I really like to paint a picture. I know you do. And you like a bloody one. I do.

I do. I like stabbings and I like them to be bloody. Sure. So this checks both those boxes. No wonder I liked this case so much. So there's blood fucking everywhere kristin and there were several more victims in all police located four more victims all deceased wow so the 13 yearold was the only survivor.

David Bever, 52, suffered at least 28 stab wounds to the torso, face, neck, arm, and hand. April Bever, 48, had at least 48 stab wounds to the head, neck, torso, arm, and hands. Daniel Bever, 12, was stabbed nine times to the back, shoulder, and chest, and he was the 911 caller. Oh, my God. Oh. So he had made the call. He had locked himself in a room, made the call, and, like, as the attacker made entry into the room was when the line went dead.

Christopher Bever, 7. attacker made entry into the room was when the line went dead christopher bever seven no no oh my god why do you do this had six stab wounds to the back chest shoulder and leg the final victim he was seven oh my god the final victim was victoria bever age five oh my god she had 18 stab wounds what to her neck chest back and upper arm police discovered a two-year-old girl no oh my god the youngest bever in an upstairs bedroom asleep in her crib completely unharmed. Oh, my God. She'd slept through the whole thing. Whoa. Only 18-year-old Robert Beaver and 16-year-old Michael Beaver were unaccounted for.

16-year-old Michael Bever were unaccounted for. And though she was critically injured, the 13-year-old Bever girl was able to identify her brothers as the family's attackers. Oh, my gosh. Police believed that the brothers had escaped out the back of the house upon their arrival, so they brought in canine units to search the wooded area behind the home.

A short time later, the boys were located in the woods and were taken into custody without incident. The city of Broken Arrow, which averages less than one homicide a year, was shaken by the brutal crime. No kidding. Police called it the worst criminal event in the community's history. I would say easily, I'm sure. But neighbors said something always seemed off at the Bever home. David Bever worked in the computer industry while April stayed home with the kids who were homeschooled.

Okay. Explain the look. Did like a little head tilt and an eyebrow raise. Like, we all know what that means school day i don't know great so you're saying they brought this on themselves not at all what i'm saying just you always wonder about those homeschooled ones. I don't know.

Neighbors said they occasionally saw the kids outside, but only if April was with them and that they weren't allowed to play with any of the other kids in the neighborhood. Okay. Yeah, that's not good. Neighbors also noted that the family seemed very isolated to the point that they appeared to avoid community events um so in all there were seven bever children four boys and three girls the youngest the two-year-old that was um found unharmed was actually like a miracle baby she was born at like 23 weeks weighing like a pound oh my and then survived wow yeah and was a perfectly healthy two-year-old by the time that this happened oh okay yeah okay so back to back to the day of the crime the brothers were taken into custody in the early morning hours of thursday july 3rd 2015 and by that evening robert bever had given

a full confession he walked investigators through the events of the evening and showed little remorse as he recounted how he brutally murdered five members of his family and critically wounded the sixth. He also told investigators that these murders were just the beginning and that he had planned a series of killings outside of the family. What? Mm hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Ultimately, both Robert and Michael were charged with five counts of first degree murder and one count of assault and battery with intent to kill for the assault on the surviving sister.

Prosecutors announced that they would be trying Michael as an adult, but because he was 16, he would be spared the death penalty. after months of hearings and motions to suppress Robert's confession in court, the prosecution was still weighing the decision on whether to seek the death penalty against him. He was 18 at the time of the murder, so he was an adult. And they... were seriously considering seeking the death penalty. Well, sure. And it's Oklahoma. Yeah. You know.

Yeah. You know. Yeah. Finally, in July of 2016, the prosecution approached Robert with a deal. If he would plead guilty to all charges, he would avoid the death penalty and be sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole. Robert took the deal. Yeah. Wise choice. Yeah. deal uh yeah wise choice yeah district attorney um steve kunzweiler said the decision to offer robert the deal was a tough one but ultimately he felt it was the right decision for those surviving

siblings and this is what that's actually a good point yeah so this is what he said and i think this makes a lot of sense the single most important factor in my decision to resolve this case centered upon the needs of the surviving two children who lost everything in their lives those children Yep. Robert Bever deserves the death penalty for his savage actions. I feared that a death penalty prosecution would result in his teenage sister being forced to recount and relive the brutal details of the carnage that her brothers wrought again and again. The toddler sister, who mercifully was asleep and did not witness the horror, would grow up learning details of the carnage and repeated court hearings that could easily stretch into her teen years and beyond. That is such a good point. Yeah. The decision on how to proceed with this case rests upon my shoulders entirely. And I take responsibility for the decisions that I make.

The surviving teenage child requested that I make sure Robert Bever never gets out of prison. His plea and sentence guarantees that he will spend the rest of his days left to his demons behind the walls of a penitentiary where he will never draw a breath of free air again. I think that's such a valid argument. So Robert pleads guilty.

He's sentenced to life in prison without parole. So that leaves Michael. At the same hearing where Robert entered his guilty plea, Michael Bever's lawyer filed a motion to have the charges against Michael dismissed. They argued that it was unconstitutional for Michael, a 16 year old to be tried as an adult, because should he be convicted,

he could be sentenced to life in prison without parole, which they argued was basically a death sentence. The judge denied this motion and entered a not guilty plea on Michael's behalf when he refused to enter a plea. I think that's such a weird move. I covered a couple cases recently where they've refused to enter a plea. It's such a weird thing. What does that accomplish i have no idea because you know they're just gonna put something in yeah yeah but this is like i think the third case that i've covered where they've refused someone has refused to

enter a plea so they think they'll be like well okay all right i guess you're free to go. All right, I guess you're free to go. Damn it, he didn't play along. Yes. The road to Michael's trial would be a lengthy one. Both sides weighed how they would argue the case. It was believed early on that the defense would argue that Michael was not guilty by reason of insanity, as it was found that Robert was suffering from severe mental illness in prison and he had never received any mental health care prior to his incarceration in fact he said he'd never even seen a general practitioner for basic medical care that does not surprise me at all yeah Yeah. Given what the neighbors said. Yeah. Yep.

But as the trial neared, the defense revealed that they would not be seeking an insanity defense. Instead, they would offer a defense focusing on Michael's limited participation in the killings. Oh. I thought they were going to argue like, oh, he was under the influence of this older brother. And they kind of do. Okay. They kind of do. Finally, in April of 2018, almost three years after the murder.

So that's just how long these, like, proceedings take to actually get to the trial, which is just crazy to me. Like, oh, man, you're supposed to have a right to a speedy trial and sitting there for three years waiting for it to happen. Yeah, that's incredible. Yeah, it seems crazy to me. So in April of 2018, jury selection began for Michael Bever's trial. Attorneys for both sides spent two and a half days questioning potential jurors on issues such as pretrial publicity, the available range of punishment and their attitude attitudes towards homeschooling oh that was a big that was a big sticking point for the defense yeah so a couple of interesting things um here they pulled like the largest jury pool in in like the history of a trial here in this,

in like the Tulsa County area or whatever. Over 100 people were pulled for this jury pool. And like of them, only like three had never heard of the case. Uh-huh. And so they had to, they actually had to move the jury questioning into a different courtroom than where the actual trial would take place because they couldn't fit everybody to do this jury questioning. Both sides warned the jurors that the trial would be a really tough one to hear. Well, yeah. One prospective juror was dismissed after he learned that the youngest victim was five and he said he didn't want to

see any photos of slaughtered children i'm surprised you can say that i am too just because you know norman got called for jury duty and the judge was like i don't want to hear any excuses yeah this is your civic duty blah blah blah yeah I'm surprised it was that easy for someone to get out of it. I am guessing that he was dismissed by the defense after stating that opinion. Yeah, okay, you're right. Yeah, I'm sure you are. That would be my guess. Another prospective juror was seen crying in the courthouse hall after being dismissed.

Like, it's a terrible case it's a horrible scene you've got small children yeah who were brutally murdered it was rough yeah ultimately a panel of 11 women um yeah 11 women and three men wow so 12 jurors and two alternates were seated. I was surprised that it was so female heavy. I was going to say. Yeah. Do you think maybe both sides wanted women? I think both sides probably would think, I think it's easy for both sides to see places where women would be more sympathetic to their case.

I also wondered when you said they were nervous about how people felt about homeschooling, like I can see how if you were kind of, well, like if you had your reaction to homeschooling, maybe you'd be more inclined to be like, these parents put them in an environment that's not anything like the real world and so then maybe you'd be more sympathetic yeah yes which i think is what kind of the defense was leaning on okay yeah okay so they so weirdly you think they wanted people who weren't cool with homeschool oh man yeah oh okay yep because that's very much and i'll get into it a little bit i don't go into a lot but that's very much one of like the defense's uh sticking points was that like these kids were

isolated from everybody okay yeah yeah all right all right yeah so opening statements took place on april 20th 2018 you were so high at the time so i don't even remember it i was looking for that bar you were talking about earlier good luck man you were talking about earlier. Good luck, man. The DA laid out the sequence of events that led to the brutal attack on the Bever family, including a conversation Michael had with his 13-year-old sister a year before the attack, where he told her that he and Robert

were planning to kill the family, and he asked her to join them. my god the da also said in opening arguments that contrary to the defense's planned argument that michael was not oh so sorry i put the emphasis on the wrong the da also argued that contrary to the defense's planned argument that michael was not an active participant in the actual stabbings that dna analysis of knives victims and his own clothing would show that he was directly involved yeah in his opening statement chief public defender corbin brewster told the court that michael only participated in the killings with robert because he believed it was kill or be killed. He said Michael's first words to the police upon being arrested were, I hope they're okay.

Which if you came out of that fucking house, you know that they're not okay. Yeah. And he argued that Michael lived an isolated life where Robert was his only friend. Anti argue that Michael lived an isolated life where Robert was his only friend. The prosecution's star witness was the surviving Beaver sister, now 16. So, gosh, I think this is rough because it was the whole reason they did the plea deal for Robert was to keep her from having to testify. And here she is having to testify against Michael. And here she is having to testify against Michael. To avoid being in the same room with her attacker, she testified in another courtroom and the testimony was shown to the jury on a TV.

Yeah. She recalled that on the night of the murders, the family had gone out bowling, come home, had dinner together. And after dinner, she'd gone into her brother's room to tell them that their mom wanted them to clean up the kitchen when she walked into the room she said she heard one of the brothers say are we going to do this now and that robert and michael were dressed in protective body armor oh my god but apparently they wore this stuff a lot it was something they collected and so it wasn't anything that was like alarming to her yeah they were a couple of weirdos yeah she said michael called her over to show her something on his computer and that was when robert walked up behind her slit her throat and slit her open across the stomach oh my god she testified that she felt blood pouring out of her throat and that she had a metallic taste in her mouth.

Oh, my God. She said that after a moment of confusion over what had happened, she began screaming. It was then that Robert began stabbing her in the chest, arms and neck. Their mother, April, came in the room and tried to intervene and Robert attacked her too. Oh. It's fucking terrible. Yeah.

The teenage girl attempted to run from the house for help and set off the alarm upon exiting the front door. But she collapsed on the front porch and Michael pulled her back into the house.

Michael also managed to disarm the security system before an alert was sent to the monitoring company and the police were alerted. Of course. She said she remembered laying in the foyer, fading in and fading out, and then heard a knock at the door and realized it was a police officer and she moaned for help she said the next thing she remembered was waking up in

the hospital i think that that had to be some powerful testimony yeah that's hard to hear second hand no shit oh yeah yeah and i man thank goodness she was allowed to sit in another courtroom and they were able to yeah because that would have just been i think cruel and unusual punishment to make her sit up in front of her brother. No kidding. That'd be horrible. It would be horrible. So in my opinion, the prosecutor's next most powerful witness was the crime scene investigator who photographed the scene.

Though the defense successfully argued to keep autopsy photos out of court. So the judge agreed with the defense that there was no question as to whether or not the family was stabbed so autopsy photos were eliminated they weren't allowed to be brought up in court the jury did see more than 200 crime scene photos showing the victims covered in blood they also showed the surviving sister's injuries photographed in the hospital. The crime scene photographer took the stand and testified that he had taken some 600 photos of the crime scene and that he had previously processed upwards of 1500 crime scenes. He walked jurors through photos of the scene. And when he got to a photo of seven-year-old Christopher and five-year-old Victoria huddled on the floor of the bathroom covered in blood, he broke down crying on the stand.

Oh, my. He had to leave the courtroom to collect himself before he could continue. That's how brutal this crime scene was. Yeah. Someone who had processed 1,500 crime scenes. Broke down. Broke down. I don't blame him. I don't either.

They said that the jury was crying. I mean, it was just terrible. They, I think, had to call a recess and everybody had to kind of gather themselves before they could continue on oh my god and that i think michael was crying as well you fucking better be right this isn't really that funny of a case it Not that I thought it was going to be funny. Isn't it funny how we'll do these cases and then we're like, oh, shit, this is a bummer. Yeah, this is horrible. Maybe if I put like a little pep on it.

And then the prosecution also called DNA expert Grace Helms. No, Brandi. This is just horrible. It's fucking terrible. Yeah. So DNA expert Grace Helms testified that she found Michaelael bever's dna on the handle of a knife the blade of that same knife had the blood of david daniel and christopher bever oh well okay supporting the prosecution's claim that michael actually did play a part in the stabbings and

directly contradicting the argument of the defense that while he had been present, he hadn't actually had a hands-on role. Why did you do that? I had to liven it up a little bit. That was you livening it up? Yeah, it was the best I could do. Boy, thank you for that now we're all feeling good now we're all laughing after calling more than 13 witnesses over several days the prosecution rested

the defense then called their star witness who do you think their star witnesses the big bad brother right yeah robert bever took the stand in his brother's defense do you like how bad i am with names up to this point michael bever's defense had repeatedly blamed robert for most if not all of the bloodshed and robert accepted this blame he told jurors that he did all of the stabbing and slashing and said he never saw michael attack anyone i'm not denying that we acted together he told the court but we acted in our own ways i think meaning you know yeah he pulled the sister back in he turned the alarm off you know whatever so he did help but he says that he never that michael didn't do any of the actual stabbing

um wearing a prison jumpsuit and sporting a lwop5 knuckle tattoo. What does that mean? Life without parole times five. Ew. Yeah. Are you fucking kidding me? Yeah. Robert began his testimony by describing a lonely and sometimes violent childhood for both him and Michael,

who he said had a speech impediment and also likely had dyslexia what he's that's just his own take on it apparently wow great we could go months without leaving the house except to buy groceries robert said adding that his parents often talked about the rapture and the biblical apocalypse as a retribution thing for everything they hated about the world. When asked by defense attorney Brewster if he had an interest in mass killings and the apocalypse, Robert cracked a smile, laughed a little, and said, I took an interest in it, yes. Ew.

Yeah. Ugh. i dabble um and one article that i read like they made a good point like he's heavily medicated by this point so like if this is how he is on the stand heavily medicated yeah imagine how he was with just rampant mental illness and no medical care of any kind it's a terrifying thought yeah and it's sad for him i think a little bit yeah sad for everybody it really is yes yeah i'm still stuck on that tattoo you're not planning on getting one a knuckle tattoo anytime soon it's just the pride yeah i have to feel to get oh it's complete pride because people don't tattoo like bed wetter themselves please don't call out my tattoos on this podcast kristin brandy's got all her insecurities in a big neck tattoo that's why she wears her hair down so much

uh at least i don't have a chest tattoo have we talked about that on the podcast okay so to seriously lighten things up yes like i want to say a month ago my friend christina texted me and asked me if i got a chest tattoo which is the most ridiculous question i've ever been texted because I'm afraid of needles. I can barely get like just normal vaccinations, like a chest tattoo. Yeah. Okay. It's pretty extreme.

So I was like, what are you talking about? She said she went to our website. This is all just a plug for the website. This never happened. And she was like, yeah, it looks like you've got a chest tattoo okay turns out she

was just seeing part of my gray cardigan sweater the farthest thing from a chest tattoo it's like one extreme to the other no my gray cardigan is very hardcore, Brandi. Super hardcore gray cardigan. I go hard. My gray cardigan. Next, it's a knuckle tattoo for you. Oh my God, yeah. What would be the lamest knuckle tattoo you could get? Oh man, I don't even know.

Just love? Safe driver. Safe driver. Responsible citizen. You can see it when you're at two and two. It's a reminder and I'm proud of it. Oh, God. Maybe we should get back to this horrible trial i really enjoyed talking about tattoos that i don't have for a few minutes so that we could not talk about stabbings oh gosh so on the stand

um robert said that his parents even warned the children to stay away from the windows in the house to avoid being seen. They told us that the world was full of people who wanted to hurt us. But inside their home, his father would punch and kick the boys and casually remind them that I can kill you anytime I want to, Robert said. See, I hate stories like this because I want to know the truth i know and there's no way yeah to know the truth in this well what about the daughter the 13 year old what'd she say i saw a slight mention that she said that there were some heavy disciplinary things going on in the house but it's hard to know okay yeah damn it yeah so partly as a result of those threats robert began to stockpile body armor and often wore it in front of his parents okay but here's my question if you have a kid who is so isolated and is kept in the home all the time,

where does he get any money to be buying body armor? That's a good question. Because I know he's ordering it online. He mentions some other things later on, but where's the money coming for it? Yeah, I mean, obviously the parents had to had to be funding it yeah um and i would think that if the dad was super into being violent against his kids he wouldn't want them to have any kind of that's exactly what you're thinking especially when i

tell you this next thing okay this says that robert on the stand said that he would put on his body armor and he would go to his father and say this is my life preservation rig with this on you can't kill me okay and he said on the stand every time i put the body armor on i was empowered i don't know i know it's so hard to know okay it's rough this whole thing's fucking terrible yeah thanks in case we haven't gotten good that it's really good stuff oh gosh i was so excited you were coming over and now i'm like this is over yet are we at lunch yet so finally robert got to the night of the killings in his testimony he said the stabbing started in their broken arrow home after 11 p.m when michael

distracted their 13 year old sister by pretending to show her something on his laptop i put my hand over her mouth and i held the blade to her throat robert testified i felt the blood start running down my hand and i was like oh shit he said he expected her to die quickly and quietly, but she fought back. From the moment she didn't drop dead from being stabbed in the throat, it was just chaos, Robert testified. He described experiencing a mental shift that he called flipping the kill switch, telling the court he grabbed an orange knife and stabbed his mother, April Bever, when she came into their room to intervene. Robert also detailed how he stabbed 10-year-old Christopher as he came running toward the commotion, which was around the time that the 13-year-old managed to make it outside and briefly triggered the home security alarm,

to make it outside and briefly triggered the home security alarm which michael turned off as michael was pulling the sister back into the home he warned robert that their father was coming toward them he charged at me like he was gonna overpower me so i stabbed him in the chest a bunch as he was stabbing him his father asked why are you doing this and robert said because i must to which his father replied no you don't those were his last words oh my gosh next this part's fucking terrible what how? How is it going to get worse? I think this is the worst part. Next, Michael tricked three of his siblings into unlocking doors by claiming that Robert was trying to kill him, too. Oh.

Christopher and Victoria had locked themselves in a first floor bathroom, and Michael frantically knocked on the door saying, let me in, let me in. He's going to kill me. And when one of the children cracked the door, he kicked it open. And then Robert went in and stabbed them. He said he hesitated before stabbing the small children and then decided that he quote has got to finish the mission michael then played the same trick on 12 year old daniel who had locked himself into the father's home office and called 9-1-1 after getting the door open michael reportedly said all yours ew and daniel pleaded don't kill me i love you oh before robert plunged the knife into the boy's stomach don't kill me i love you it's fucking terrible that can be heard in the background of the 911 call. Ew. Yeah.

God. Yeah. Robert said he began planning the massacre at least as early as June 30th, 2015, after he realized that he could buy weapons and ammunition online. So this is something that he had had an idea of for a long time, but when he realized that he could actually, like the stuff necessary to complete it without actually having to go to a store yeah he put his like a serious plan in place the idea was to kill their family and then drive toward the state of washington while killing random people along the way. The two decided on the date, July 22nd, because Robert expected to receive a shipment of ammunition

the next day and didn't want his parents to see it. So at this point, he's talking over this plan on the stand of how they're going to, you know, go on this killing spree. And every place they go, they want to shoot and kill five people and then just go on this killing spree across the country. And then he's like realizing how stupid of a plan it was because he did. He ordered these guns online that he had to go to a gun store to pick up. But you have to be 21 to buy a gun. And he's 18.

And so he's like, not only am I not 21 and had no way to claim these guns at the store, I didn't have any money to pay for these guns. What was I thinking? Like, he's saying this on the stand. Oh, my God. This is so weird. It's so weird. And then he says, imagine us trying to carry all that around during a shooting spree.

He said, laughing on the witness stand and throwing his hands up in exasperation. I just realized how fickle this plan was. What? Yeah. Then he wondered aloud how other mass killers, including the 2012 Aurora, Colorado theater shooter and the Columbine school shooters, had carried their ammunition. I can't figure out how the others did it, he said in apparent fascination. On the stand. Oh, my God.

This guy is so fucked up. So the only time that he showed any emotion other than like this laughing stuff. When he's like, what a zany plan. Yeah. Oh, what were we thinking? Was when he was shown a picture of a hatchet that was used in the attack. And the hatchet is like covered in blood. And he started crying.

Why? And the defense attorney's like, why are you getting emotional over this? And he's like, there's just so much blood. And I just don't know what I was thinking. And at that point, Michael put his hands in his, his hands over his face and was crying at, at the defense table as well. at the defense table as well. I mean, it's just, it's so weird. And like, it's so apparent that their, that mental illness was such a huge role in this.

It's just terrible all around. What was he diagnosed with? There was like a psychosis and then like severe depression and anxiety. Psychosis and then like severe depression and anxiety. But it had just gone like completely on. Yeah. Undiagnosed, unmedicated.

Yeah. Yeah. When you're not going in for a physical, you're not going to. You're not. Yeah. Yeah. In their closing argument, the defense painted a picture of Michael as a boy who just wanted his driver's license, Michael was torn between fear, love, and admiration for his brother

and that he didn't actually kill anyone himself. In the state's closing argument, they quoted a journal entry of Michael's that read, once upon a time, there were two brothers named Michael and Robert who hated their family, so they killed them. The end.

Oh. Yeah. And I assume they also brought up that knife that had. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And they said that Michael and Robert wanted to become famous mass

murderers at the expense of their family. And they asked jurors to use common sense to find Michael guilty. of their family and they asked jurors to use common sense to find michael guilty they finished by playing the 9-1-1 call from david where he could be heard begging his brothers not to murder him oh on may 9th 2018 so a fresh one that's a real fresh one fresh one the closing arguments like finished at five o'clock and the jury went back to deliberate they delivered a verdict that night they deliver it deliberated for something around like four hours i think the jury found michael bever guilty on all counts yeah in one small act of leniency or perhaps a sign that they believed some of

what the defense argued the jury recommended a sentence of life with the possibility of parole though the likelihood of him ever getting paroled is small the jury had the choice of recommending life without parole and they didn't i think they did what i would have done yeah yeah for a 16 year old yeah i i don't think i'd put him away forever because he has five life sentences and he also they also sentenced him to 28 years for the assault on the surviving sister. Was there a sexual assault? No. Okay. No.

They, he will have to serve so many years before he would even be eligible for parole. It's not likely that he'll ever be paroled. I'm cool with that. I am too. And that's the horrible tale of the bever family murders that was terrible it's crazy what are your thoughts um i think that probably the isolation of the boys led to the family being the outlet for this rage and mental illness but i think probably had michael not been subjected to robert he probably never would have done this yeah but i think that robert probably

even under normal what i'll say is normal and air quotes upbringing would probably done some form of yeah criminal act yeah yeah um so the 13 year old and the two year old are we're taken into state custody and i think are living with foster parents god i hope they're doing okay me too yikes sorry to do such a terrible one i started doing it and i was like working on it last night and i was like god this is fucking terrible i was like why was i so excited

to cover this case i mean it is an interesting case. It's interesting. And I think that it's so horrifying. And I think that like outside of like the Tulsa area didn't get a lot of media coverage, which is crazy to me because. How did you hear about it? I just stumbled on a Google alert. I just stumbled on a on a news blurb about it. And I was like, oh, oh what's that a whole family murdered let me hear more where they stand oh even better

can't go about my day without hearing more oh my god Oh my God. Oh, that's rough. So I think I would like to wrap up here by saying that Daniel, the kid who made the 911 call, he saved a lot of people's lives. Because had the police not come and stopped them, they would have been gone on some kind of killing spree. Who knows what they would have been able to do without, you know, being able to get the guns or whatever. But they were able to wipe out a whole fucking family in 10 minutes. I think they would have found guns. I think they would have found some way. They would have made a way. Yeah.

And so that was something that they made a point of. Yeah. That he was like the hero here. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, God. Why? of at yeah that he was like the the hero here yeah yeah oh god why and now i'm gonna throw it over to you kristin to tell us a story to bring us all up you know what i can't stop thinking about what this is true this is so gross have you seen the show age gap love on netflix no okay freaking norman so we put it on one time just as like what the hell is this yeah and it's this british show about couples with big creepy age gaps gaps, as you might imagine. How big of an age gap is creepy, Kristen?

I would say 30 years, 20 years, 40 years. I mean, yeah. All right, that's a lot. Yeah, big time age gaps. Yeah. So. I was going to say, because you're like, you're kind of a cougar. Okay, Norman has said that he wants to apply for the show.

And his application would be, I'm 30, my wife is 32, we want to be on Age Gap Live. I wanted to punch him when he said that. But no, this show is so creepy. I am not recommending it to anybody um so this is not a glowing recommendation no no it's awful i'm saying i was scarred so we watch we start watching one episode and i was like hey hey i can't we gotta switch to the office we we can't watch this so i come in there last night because i was working on the episode i come in he's watching it again and this episode was like a train wreck i mean you could not look away there

was this one guy oh my god this is so gross the woman was 60 he was like 28 and he's like giving her a pedicure oh it was too was too much, too much, too much. But I couldn't turn it off. Anyway. Was he giving her a pedicure with his tongue? Okay, here's what he did. And I don't know why this was so bad, but this was when I really lost it. So she's laying in bed.

You know, he's, God, this is disgusting. He's like rubbing on her feet he's got the nail file out and he's like sanding down those claws and then he bends down to her foot and goes to like blow off and for some reason when he did that, I was like, no! That's where you draw the line. I could not handle it. Yeah, that's pretty gross. Yeah, so I don't know if that's lightening it up. It absolutely is. Okay, okay.

I loved it. I'm not going to watch that show, though. Do not, because seriously, I can't stop thinking about it. It's so gross. It's in there in your brain now. It can't stop thinking about it's so gross just in there in your brain now it's it can't leave and then i got kind of weirdly attached to one of the cougars she's like did you relate to her being a cougar yeah she's 32 no she's like this um zach and i are the exact same age so well we're seven days apart so good luck making fun of our age

who's older zach is seven days older than i am i really can't make fun of that anyway so this there's this like 68 year old lady. She keeps herself in good shape, but she has these massive fake boobs. Like we're talking balloons. If you had to guess a cup size. She said her cup size. I think it was like an F. That's pretty big.

Oh, yeah. And I mean, she's not a big lady. She's like a petite woman who looks like she's she's not a big lady she's like a petite woman who looks like she's about to fall over yes and um far be it from me to say this but she wears too much makeup i feel personally attacked by you right now listen you and i both enjoy some makeup but this lady i'm looking at her like you can't have the eyeliner going all the way around your eye and do the cat eye like there's got to be a limit there's got to be some kind of limit but anyway she all she wants is a toy boy which i guess is what they call them in the uk they don't say boy toy toy boy toy boy yeah i kind of like that but

i was kind of rooting for her yeah i've had a lot of weird feelings last night well if this podcast has given you weird feelings which i'm sure it has sure it has um find us on social media. Give us a like. Give us a follow. Head on over to iTunes. Leave us a review and a rating. And join us next week. When we'll be experts on two whole new topics.

Podcast adjourned. 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. For this episode, I got my info from The Washington Post, The New York Times, and The Rolling Stone. I got my info from reports by Lori Fulbright and Taylor Newcomb for News on 6 and articles for TulsaWorld.com. 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.