Matthew Cox | Inside True Crime Podcast - How Does Real Life CSI ACTUALLY Solve Murders | Crime Scene Confidential

Episode Date: October 29, 2023

How Does Real Life CSI ACTUALLY Solve Murders | Crime Scene Confidential

He was targeting sex workers, and he would solicit services. He would then beat them near to death and then leave them. And we had had this probably maybe four to five times that we would find these women beaten nearly to death. I encounter people on generally the worst days of their lives. Nobody calls a crime scene investigator if their days going well. Right. Right. And I don't encounter people that are happy to see me. If I'm lucky, the victims are living.

Hey, this is Matt Cox, and I am here with Alina Burroughs, and she is the host of crime scenes confidential. And she is an expert in forensic science. I've watched several of the episodes. Um, you know, I mean, I thought they were really interesting, a little, really kind of graphic, too, you know, like you really kind of get into the whole thing. And I, and I, the one I thought was interesting. Well, I mean, I guess it wasn't just the forensics, but it was the fact that it seemed like the police got on to one of, this is the guy that had like the furniture store. Yeah. It seems like they decided he was. was he was guilty, and then they just stuck with that. Yeah. That's a common thing that we see in some investigations,

and that's why I fell in love with crime scene investigation forensic evidence because it doesn't have a bias. It doesn't have an interest in a particular person, especially when we look at some older cases before forensic science really had a chance to evolve. You know, what you see is police get there. They make up their mind about something, and they kind of run with it. because, like I said, depending on the time, there may or may not have been forensic science that could come about with blood test results that supported one way or another. And that's the scary

thing when we look at cases that are a bit older. That's part of the reason why crime scene confidential exists. We want to look at cases under the eye of 2023 and look at decisions that were made. You know, the stakes are pretty high here. We have people that are still in prison that are saying they're innocent. And if they were put in prison in a time in which we didn't have forensic capabilities that we have today, do they still need to be there? Right. I mean, look at how many people, you know, DNA has proven that this was not the person. Right. You know, that they were 100% sure, like the, you know, all the, all the evidence pointed toward them. And then suddenly 20 years later, DNA comes out and it's like, oh, wasn't him. Exactly. That's why science is there.

people always have an interest in maintaining a perception and people lie, right? We know that for a fact. But DNA doesn't. It's going to be the 100% truth of what happened. And that's what the show does is, you know, we reexamine these cases that are highly controversial, that a lot of them are based on circumstantial evidence. And we look at them in 20, you know, 2023 eye, a current I, current forensics and say, was the forensics that was used at the time, still something that we hold valid today? And, you know, are the people that are convicted? Was this a proper conviction? Is this been a wrongful conviction? Is there somebody that's been released? Is it a wrongful release? You know, what are we looking at with these cases? Right. So, how did you get into this?

Where, like, your police, I mean, were your, sorry, were your parents, police officers, were were there law enforcement in your... Well, not law enforcement in the way that most people look at traditional law enforcement, but my father did train a lot of law enforcement in something that most people aren't familiar with, which is police promotional processes, right? We don't want police to promote people based on, hey, I know that guy. We should promote it. We want to have good promotional procedures that are based on picking the right person for

the job because they are the most knowledgeable, the most skilled, they have the best capabilities. And my dad is actually an industrial organizational psychologist who designs testing procedures to make sure that the right people are promoted for the right reasons, in effect, removing bias from that part of the process. So I did start working with my father when I was in undergraduate school. So while I was working in college, I worked for the family business. And that's where I became interested in crime scene. I started helping writing tests and looking at the crime scene procedures, and I said, I think this is really what I want to do. So I started working on my graduate degree at that point.

So what I did and what I advise everybody else to do because they always ask me how to be a CSI is you call the local agency where you want to work. And that's what I did. I picked up the phone and I said, I want to be a CSI. What does it take for me to get a job at your agency? and they said, well, we have, you know, this requirement that you either need to have six years of experience or you need to have, you know, as a CSI. I had none at that point. Or they said you need to have six years degree. And at that point, I had a bachelor's degree. So six years meant I need to have a master's

degree to get my foot in the door. So I said, okay, I hung up the phone and I enrolled in to work on my master's degree, and I did the master's program in three semesters. So I got my master's degree in about a nine-month period. Did it matter what your master's degree was in? Master of science, yes. It had to be a related, related field. So I got my master of science and criminal justice, came back and I said, got your six years right now, education, and can I take the test to be a crime scene investigator? And that's how the whole thing started. Okay. Well, I mean, where were, I mean, where were you born? I'm just letting you know, I know we're jumping backwards now, but where were you born and raised? Born and raised in Central Florida. So, yeah, a lot of the cases that have really been highly publicized, a lot of the high profile cases that I worked, like the Kaylee Anthony case or the Pulse Night Club shooting, are near and dear to me because those are, that's my hometown.

Right. Yeah, we've got some horrific crimes in Florida. Yeah. I'm in Florida. I was raised in Tampa. Well, I was raised in Temple Terrace, but nobody knows where Temple Terrace is, so I should say Tampa. Yeah, I actually, at one point, trained Temple Terrace Police Department, so I know where Temple Terrace is. Yep.

Yeah, I, so, I mean, did you have, like, where you're, are your brother, any brothers? sisters anything like that any yep i have a brother who's got a background in military and uh but on the law enforcement one in the family that uh went into investigations for sure it's funny because i i interview i'll interview police officers or you know former mobsters or whatever and in like it up in new york they're all they always say the same thing they're always like you know listen in the neighborhood it's it's very much like It sounds like something out of like a crime movie, but they all seem to say the same thing. They're like, look, you were either going to be a criminal or you were going to be, you know, law enforcement or work for the government in some way.

There was really only two paths. So I just, I'm just always wondering when I talk to law enforcement. Yeah. It always is. And then a lot of guys, like their family members will have, you know, military law enforcement, that sort of thing. Or at least sometimes just government, you know, they're in some form or another. work for the government somehow. Yeah.

So. Well, you know, I've considered many other jobs before I found my way into a crime scene. So I started to be an attorney. I considered, you know, being an attorney. I took the LSAT and I'd considered law school at one point. And I still actually toy with the idea, especially going through years of my time in the criminal justice system. I think it could be a step for me at some point, play around with the. idea, but I'm not an attorney, but I do get to play that part, think that through. As an

investigator, you have to think about all the steps, right? How is this going to play out in court? I don't know. I guess it depends on the kind of, the type of attorney you are. I know a lot of attorneys and they always just seem, it's just so frustrating. You know, because things sometimes, you know, they just don't go their way, especially criminal defense attorneys. Like, you know, you, you meet the guy you're representing, you're the defendant, you think he's okay, you think, you know, we can negotiate this. The next thing you know, he's got 20 years and you're like, wow, that just, he didn't deserve that or maybe deserved better than that or worse than that.

Yeah, there's not a lot of control in the criminal justice system, you know, whether or not your police officer or crime scene investigator or an attorney, I think as you enter that funnel that, you know, we call the criminal justice system. And I don't think a lot of people have a lot of control over any of those steps. So frustration is a common word that's used to describe that. You know, I don't have control over my cases. You know, people ask like, you know, how do you feel about these things? You know, I encounter people on generally the worst days of their lives.

Nobody calls a crime scene investigator if their days going well. Right. Right. And I don't encounter people that are happy to see me. If I'm lucky, the victims are living. Right. So how did the, I mean, how did you end up, you know, getting on the show or, I don't know, doing the show? Was it your idea or were you approached?

It's a serendipity, right? I've also, in my career as a crime scene investigator, I've done a lot of teaching. So I taught college forensic science. So I'm kind of used to being in front of people and translating forensic science and breaking concepts down, you know, things that can be relatively complex concepts like forensic genetic genealogy. And then, you know, breaking that down into a way there people want to hear about it. You know, people don't want to, you know, tune out. And I want to be able to keep the attention of a student that's in class. So I always taught that there are a couple different ways and different levels that you can instruct things. right? You can canoe or you can scuba dive, right? I can go across the surface and explain things like that. If you start scuba diving, you're going to lose people really fast. And so I think I learned how to explain topics in a way that makes it easy for people to understand and get interested and get on board and go, yeah, that makes sense. And I understand and maybe I want to know a little bit more about those things. So I learned that skill, I think, as a teacher, as a professor. And So I'm in front of people. I'm explaining concepts. I did a lot of public speaking at that point. And I was out doing public speaking and I had somebody approached me and asked if I'd ever considered, you know, doing something like a television show. And my thought process at that point in time was, you know, as a crime scene investigator, I want to impact families, right? I want to make a difference in the world. I'm one of those silly people that thinks that I might be able to change the world. And I, I can make that difference at a very small level as an investigator, or if I get to a larger number of people, maybe I can change the world at a bigger level. So I considered that. And I worked

with a production company. We thought about what we might want out of a show. And then, you know, out of, you know, maybe 18 months of talking about this, crime scene confidential was born. It wasn't called that at first, but, you know, it evolved into that. And it's evolved more in season two, I think, than it was in season one, like anything. I say that I have two children at season one and season two of crime scene confidential. And it really is my heart and soul that's put into this. So I'm still able to get involved in cases. I'm still able to research. I go through two to four thousand pages of documents on every one of these cases, personally researching everything. I'm still able to talk to family members and hopefully be able to provide them with something that gives them some closure.

Kind of walk them through this journey. Maybe there's some healing that can be done. Maybe through this show I can put them together and have some conversations, some really powerful conversations take place on this show. Not just between me and the people that I interview, but between other people, key players in the show that have been introduced. you know in season two we see a man convicted of murder introduced to the son of the woman he's found guilty of murdering and conversations taking place between them because the son had things he needed to say to this man the man had things he needed to say to the son and that's just part of a journey there's an emotional aspect to the show and then there's the science aspect of the show so that i get to be the c s i get to be the c s i get to

to tell people the confidential aspect of crime scene confidential is that you should get to this glimpse of this is what a CSI does when they get to the to a scene here's how my mind sees things here's how it works this is how I process something this is what I'm thinking that doesn't make any sense if this then this and if that person said this doesn't that indicate that they knew this kind of walking through that process step by step um so you said 18 months of with the dealing with the production company like did the production company go to you know a and e or did they pitch the the project to to different uh your different networks and then get a budget to do the show yeah that's typically how it works is you know you work on a concept

and then a production company goes out to a variety of networks and then a network can pass on that or pick it up and investigation discovery, thankfully, said, yes, we would love to see that tattooed pink-haired lady come on and talk about crime scenes with us. Did you shoot a sizzle reel? No. Well, it was also during COVID. So COVID comes into play a bit with that as well. We're not really interacting as much with people.

So I did some Zoom interviews. So if you want to call that a sizzle reel. Right. how many episodes do you do you see um so the number of episodes also depends uh each time usually on a first season you get six episodes so it's kind of like a trial run to see how things go and see how well it's rated and if people like it and uh fantastically it rated very well people loved it we actually got season one got nominated for um an american reality television award for best new series so super thankful for that And then we got picked up for season two, which has eight episodes. Do you have anything to do with what makes the show? Because, I mean, you know, obviously they end up with 30, 40 hours of video that some video editor trims down. I mean, you must watch the episodes and just be like, you know, like, oh, that didn't make it.

Or, oh, that was a good, you know, oh, they didn't really explain that very well. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I have an amazing working relationship with the showrunner. And if there's something that I've said, first of all, he is fantastic. And he is always just so great at picking, you know, the bits like I remember, you know, when you explain this so well, or I remember this particular scene that was so touching or so poignant. And those cuts kind of always already make it in without me having to, you know, say anything. thing at all. He doesn't need my help. But if there was a moment where I was like, I really want this in there, then, you know, absolutely, we all kind of sit around and say, oh, but I would really like this in there. The hardest part, I think, for me, when I look at rough cuts of the show and then rough cuts get narrated to find cuts, you know, narrowed down to find cuts, and then, you know, what ends up becoming what people watch is there's so much more content that we have filmed

that I wish could make it in there. And it's just such a struggle for me because I'm like, oh, but what about this? And what about this? And I want to say, I mean, the show would be two hours long if I had anything to do with it because I'm so terrible at eliminating things from the show because I just want everything in there.

Well, I mean, it's like, it's like, you know, obviously everybody's heard this. You know, it's like reading a book and then seeing the movie. Like, it's just agony when you, you know, you know that. But the, you know, the viewer doesn't realize what's missing. so they don't miss it so they feel they're okay with what they see because they don't realize like, oh, we didn't even talk about the third, you know, perpetrator or the next door neighbor that, you know. So much content.

And, you know, really it has to be narrowed down just because it can get too complex and too hard to follow sometimes. You know, I looked at these cases and you're, I mean, there are nights. I'm there, you know, most of the time at my computer in my. my pajamas just, you know, going over these thousands of pages of things. And I have papers with handwritten drawings and diagrams and lists of weapons and arrows that go to these. I mean, it is like an insane person that where I have all these things. And I think, how are they going to make this easily translatable to a viewer when I have all of this spread out and I'm trying to think of, you know, all of the victims and all of the weapons and which bullet went to which. So, yeah,

there's, you know, there's this much, you know, there's this encyclopedia that we go through and then it kind of comes down to this nice, thin version for television. But you're absolutely right. I just am like, oh, I'm dying inside because I wanted all of these other extra beats to get in there. Thinking about the, you know, the, you know, all of the, all the documents that you have to go through, like, who acquires all that? Do you guys do like a Freedom of Information Act through or does like the producer go and and gather all that and how receptive are the is law enforcement or you know whatever the whatever whether it's state or U.S. attorneys you know and whether it's federal or state law enforcement

like how receptive are they for you to go and say hey we want to go ahead and run through your case again because you know they're like no no our case perfect yeah exactly need your help thank you good. They say, no, absolutely. Come on. Take a look. Yeah. Well, the good news about cases that are adjudicated already is that the information is available. We can look at all of this information that's out there. So we do have, you know, researchers and line producers that thankfully, they grab everything, right? Police reports and autopsy reports, lab reports, everything, right? So they gather it all. They put it in a Google Docs folder for me. And then I sit down with the biggest cup of coffee you've ever seen and I just opened it up and I start reading and if these

cases have gone to trial trial transcripts right um that's when I break out my glasses because trial transcripts depending on how many days a trial went on can be thousands of pages and you're just reading the prosecution and the witnesses and you're reading through everything but the way that I look at it is I can't have a knowledgeable interview with somebody I'm going to interview maybe a prosecutor, maybe a defense. I can't have a knowledgeable conversation with them. If I got a cliff note, you know, if I got cliff notes of the trial, I need to be able to show up on scene and say, in your closing arguments, you said this, you know, and have some sort of counter argument. So if they come back and they said, well, I did da-da-da-da, that I don't just sit there and

nod. Oh, okay. Good story. I need to be able to say, yeah, but you said this. And then they approach with it. Like, I have to have back and forth. And I can't do that if I, if I, just got somebody that read it and gave me a summary. I have to read every page of those trial transcripts. And that's why it's so important for me to go through every bit of this case on my own. So I open a blank word doc. I open all of these documents and I just start taking notes. This is what stood out to me. You know, this was great that they did this. Why did they do this? Maybe now this is available. This should be retested. You know, these are the questions I have. Did they ask this, this, and this, or if I was there, I want to know this, this, and this. Because when we start the show,

and I am boots on the ground in that city, on that crime scene, getting a new perspective, I want to have questions that I can ask that prosecutor. I want to ask that investigator. How did they behave when you were sitting down in that room with them? I want to be on the crime scene, which we are for all of these episodes of Crime Scene Comedential. I go to the crime scene. There is a perspective I get from being at a crime scene that I can't recreate by sitting there at my home office in my pajamas with my coffee. It's great to read that report. But I get so much more information from physically getting there. You watched our premiere episode. I am in the creek where the victim was found. It was, I think the water temp was somewhere around 30 to 33 degrees. It was about 25 degrees outside. I'm in

waiters. You can't wear shoes with those. so I've got a little socked feet inside those waiters. I was having trouble forming words in that episode because my face was so cold. There's a perspective you get from being out there that you cannot get from those documents. I don't feel like Chris Anderson would, he'd have stayed on the shore.

He'd have been like, that suit nice and sharp. He'd have been like, listen, I'm not going around down there. You send somebody else. I'm going to send this to Chris. He'd have been there in that sharp suit. He'd been like, this suit's going to stay nice and crisp from this shoreline. He was, yeah, he was a good interview. Yeah, this is fantastic.

Very, very likable, very funny, very jovial. He's a great guy. So, I had another question, but you were talking, and then I forgot what it was. It was, it was, I was wondering, like, or so, I mean, have you had any? any issues where they, I mean, I kind of asked, but you, you not really, like, have you actually had any issues with, you said that the ones that have been like adjudicated. You haven't had any where they, you started the process of saying, hey, here's a case what we want to do. And then it just went so bad. You guys were like, scratch that. We can't. They're not cooperating.

No, I don't think so. And I think that if, if it were that, it probably they wouldn't, it wouldn't make it to me because they know how intense I get into these cases. They probably wouldn't. release. If they give me a name, they know I'm going to start doing my research, so they probably won't even tell me a name until they know that this is good and solid for us. The good news about season two that we didn't have with season one. So season one, we filmed the whole season. Nobody knew about the show, right? We were a brand new show. Nobody knew what this was. So by the time we film a second season, we have a whole season that people can watch. We have a reputation. They look at it and they understand who we are, what we do.

So the access that we have in season two is unprecedented because people have seen it. And they are, I mean, such an honor that people trust me to the extent that they do, that I sit down and we have some just deep, powerful conversations. This season is just really up to the ante. Do you have any, are there any cases that stand out, not just in this season, but just, let's say, in your career, do you have any cases that stood out that were really exceptional or challenging or?

I think there are always cases that stand out to me for a variety of different reasons, and it's not always because they're the most gruesome or anything like that. I think there's cases that stand out to me because it was the most interesting out of the box kind of solve, right? You know, crime scene isn't something that you can just say it's fingerprints and shoe tracks and DNA.

Yeah, it's those things. But crime scene is such a, it can come in any way, shape, or form, right? It's about making matches between victim, suspect, and crime scene. And that can come in any capacity. It's not just in that box. So any case that I've made a match on something that's just been like, how did that happen?

I had, we had a serial rapist who, was, he was going around, he was targeting prostitutes in the Orlando area and he was soliciting services from them. I should say sex workers. I'm from an older school that has to learn to change my word choice. He was targeting sex workers and he would solicit services. He would then beat them near to death and then leave them. And we had had this probably maybe four to five times that we would find these women beaten nearly to death. And they would give a description and they would say, it's just, all I can say is that it's a, you know, a white male. And I think he was driving a pickup truck. And this is all the description we have. So, of course,

everything is a cooperative joint effort. Law enforcement is out looking for a description of this vehicle. And they find a pickup truck and they think it could be related. They're not quite sure yet. they go out, they tow a vehicle somewhere. I simultaneously get called to a scene where one of these women had reported being drug into the woods and beaten. And I just happened to notice that there was in this area a tree branch that had been kind of broken off. And I thought, well, that kind of looks like maybe if a truck had driven into there,

maybe the truck had something on it that could have pulled a tree branch off. So I cut the tree branch and collected it. And when they found the truck, there was still a piece of tree branch sticking out of like a work ladder that was on the top of his truck. He had driven through there and it had broken off a piece of that. And so a tree branch connected this truck. Right. You knew that crime scene where that woman was raped and brutally beaten. And so a piece of a tree connected this guy.

I was just saying the moment you the moment the detectives talk to him and he says no I wasn't I wasn't in the woods no of course not and you know and then they're like oh okay that's it he just assumed himself now he's locked himself into a into an narrative that that the forensics don't support at all right and I'm downstairs unbeknownst right photographing this tree branch from the crime scene and this tree branch that I've taken out of the ladder on the top of your truck And there's a piece because it was like a, it wasn't a dead tree. It was a living tree. So it peeled kind of back this piece that is still curled back onto the piece from his car. And I placed it back right down into the branch from the crime scene. That's hard to explain. It's real hard to explain. And so those are the moments when I'm just like, this is why I love my job.

I live for those moments. I live for those moments because, you know, especially very, victims like that, a sex worker, might think maybe they're not going to listen to me because of who I am or because of what I've said. And so forensic science is now giving that voice to a victim and legitimizing her story and saying, yes, she's a victim. This is what happened. Everything that she is saying is true. And now we have a person identified that can now be shown in a line up to these five other victims. Do you know what the resolution to that case was?

Yeah. I don't remember exactly what he was sentenced to, but he was found guilty of multiple of those crimes. And obviously they stopped after that. Do you have it? Was this one that was, that was an episode on the show or this is? No.

So what's, we focus on death. on our show, for now. Right. So what's, which episode stands out to you in either season one or two? Because I don't know if you want to say in season two yet. Or maybe you do. I don't know.

I think instead of episodes, it's moments that stand out to me. You know, sitting down with, obviously, our premiere episode has me sitting down with a man that was convicted of killing a female. Those are very poignant moments, very powerful conversations. I have moments where I sit down with family members and ask them how they feel about maybe a parent that has been charged with a crime. And to hear a child say something about their parent,

shocked me you know you can make your own opinions as an outsider you know we can all make opinions as to you know the guilt or the innocence of somebody or how we feel about that but when you ask a child how they feel about the guilt or innocence of a parent you usually have an expectation right and i'll just say that you know the answers that that the children give me uh were were shocking So there are moments that that stick out in my head about particular interviews, for sure. Okay. I mean, are, is there, have you wrapped up season two, like all of them? Yes, all of season two has been filmed.

So season two starts, premiere episode airs September 6, that 9, 8 Central on ID, also streaming on Max. And then it will air every week. So all of September, pretty much all of October, everybody gets to see crime scene confidential. So I've been working, filming for some time to get these eight episodes done so that everybody can watch them. Do you have anything else you're working on? Um, yes. And I will let you know when I can tell you more. Okay.

Yeah, so like this may have blossomed into. something else into another type of. Well, that's always the goal. You know, this is, I want to engage. This has always been crime scene is, is my passion. And I love talking to people. I love engaging with people. And so I hope that I'm blessed with a long career of being able to do this.

Okay. Now, as far as more seasons of the show, you know, we don't know. We live season by season. That's the stress of being a television host, right? So if people like season one and want a season two, they have to just watch, right? That's all I can say is watch. So if you want season three, watch season two. We live in a ratings world.

You know, I interviewed two women that they live in L.A., and they had started. How did it start? It was a true crime series that had started as a series. I don't think they ever actually did anything. Like, you know, they, you know, there was a plan, you know, it just got to that that stage where it just wasn't greenlit. But everybody kind of involved liked it. And they basically said that, but the budget was, it's like, okay, listen, you know,

like it wasn't worth risking the budget for the crime scene show. And what they switched it to was a podcast. Yep. And now they do a podcast. Oh, it was called, um, I know I'm not I'm not I can't remember it was but it was it was something like I met my murderer online and it was about online dating and so it was online dating and how some you know somebody had met some some guy on it you know on a dating website and they dated for three months or six months and then he had ended up killing her in one case a guy. had met a woman online and he was leaving his wife for her and the wife killed the woman and then killed herself just to make sure that the her husband that was yeah you know just to make

sure that he was as miserable as possible like you know to me he's the one who's got to go but that wasn't the way the wife felt well there's a lot of twisted realities to people you know that it appears like people don't understand the concept of divorce you know that like you don't have to murder people you can just leave them right that is an option on this case she had she she was playing by a different set of rules uh but anyway yeah it had it had actually turned into um to a podcast so you know there it's like there's always it's funny because usually it's like a podcast that turns into a show. Right. That's the typical stepping stone. Television shows are hard, right? They're hard to get. And there are so many steps at which, you know, it can go

kind of end. Right. You know, and I happened to get into that process in the middle of COVID, which made it even worse because as soon as, you know, COVID and the lockdown, everything hit, everybody went, oh, wait a minute, you know, we're going to. Yeah, right. The brakes would put on yeah yeah um all right i mean so do you uh can you think of anything we haven't covered because listen i'm a talker we can go on forever i can talk about anything forever but this is about you trying to think if i've covered everything or not i mean that's interviews? You know, it's usually in spurt. So I have a lot of interviews right now because we're coming up to premiere. So I get real popular around the show premiere. And then, you know,

I'll also get probably real popular right after the show premieres and then people start watching it. And then when people go, oh, oh, now we found the show, we see, you know, what's going on with this. Then, yeah, I guess. you know, these little random uptakes. I also, you know, do some news coverage for, you know, any cases that do pop up in the news media. You know, people are very curious as to why the things that happen in our world happen. And, you know, I think that could be said for true crime in general. You know, one of the more common questions that I get is why are people and women in particular so interested in through crime? I think that question mostly comes from men that are

frightened as to why women are so interested in true crime and if they're trying to pick up tips and if they should be frightened by this. And generally what I say is that they should not be frightened by this. This is the outlet, right? And also something that I think men typically don't think about or take for granted maybe is that you probably don't think about where you park your car and if it's under a light and how you're going to get from that car to a building or from that building back or if you're going to go out late at night, you know, if you're in a a parking garage and you know there are if you're getting into an elevator are you frightened by who's on the elevator with you if you I'm a coward so that's I understand do you think about these things

I think about these things most men don't typically think about their safety as much as women have to it's become a part of what how we think if we're going jogging are we safe to go jogging where are we going to go jogging is it well lit if we're going to meet friends out what time is that function going to end and can we safely get back to our cars, to our homes. You know, all of these things have become such a part of how women have to think. And men kind of have a luxury of not necessarily having to think like that. And true crime does a lot of things. It, one, provides some trading. You know, women watch this like, you know, where did it go wrong? You know, I'm making mental notes, right? You know, you don't do that. You do that. Right. Oh, well, you know, she went jogging alone at night, right? Clearly,

that's the mistake. We don't do that. So it's almost like providing training. They also, you know, people in general, not just women, but they, we love to solve problems. We want to think about as an investigator, what would I have done? Where would I have looked or how would I have solved this case? Would I have come to the same conclusion? And one of the things that I do love about crime scene confidential is we, we love our viewers and we are not going to tell them how to think. I'm not there to say this is how you should feel about this case. I'm going to tell you this is what the evidence is. This is how it fits into the case. This is what the prosecution says and this is how the defense plays it. Here's the key people in this case and what they did. Here, maybe we're even going

to talk to the murderer themselves. But Alina's not here to tell you how this, how you should feel about this or what you should think about this. I'm here to present the facts and let you decide what whether or not this person should be found guilty or innocent. And what I love is hearing people say, gosh, I sat down and I had a conversation with my husband or my coworkers the next day and we think guilty. Well, we think innocent and well, but the evidence, this. Well, but yeah, but that. And that it's spawning these thought-provoking conversations about evidence, about bias.

Well, yeah, but the investigation was biased from the start. Yeah, but the evidence. right we're letting our viewers it's a choose your own adventure I'm here to present the evidence and the facts and let the viewer decide if you were the jury what would you find right I um like I said I watch a lot of so everything so there's like I have like two or three things that I thought of when you were talking so one is I told you I watch a lot of the of true crime and like cold case files is often

I'd say at least once or twice a month, I'll be somewhere with my wife and she has a, her daughter is Mary Shelley. Like we were at the beach a couple months ago and we're laying on the beach and Mary Shelley says, Mom, can I have the keys? And, you know, to the car, I want to go get my whatever out of the car. And she's sure, she gives her the keys. And as she's walking off, I looked at my wife and I'm saying, I'm telling you right now, this feels like the beginning of a cold. case file, you know, and that was the last time we saw her. Exactly. And then the image switches to a negative and you'd walk. Just don't say that. I said, I'm just saying I would think about going

with her because I said, this is definitely the scene. There were so many people. Nobody saw her. Again, never made it to the car. The keys were found two days later in the bush. I said she's like, oh, come on. I mean, but I think about that all the time. I'm like, something will happen. I'll be like, I don't know. I feel like I should call and tell someone that I changed. I'm not headed here. I'm now going to the law. I'm like, yeah, you know, let me text somebody that. I heard he was headed to get his haircut. And they never saw him again. They found the body, you know, in the woods two months later. I'm telling you. It's a thing, true crime training. The other thing is, and I've heard that whole, the whole thing about, you know, women, you know,

why do they like true crime and and this is the thing women tend to and i i think it's like 75% to 80% of true crime is consumed by by women but it's it's actually and which maybe this probably is even worse it's really the more violent true crime stuff that they they crave because my my channel which the bulk of my channel doesn't focus on any type of violence right Not that there's not some stuff that does that where I get, I have a discussion about some kind of a violent content, but very seldom, right? I'd say less than 5%, maybe less, at least less than 10. Most of it is credit card fraudsters. Yeah.

Scammers, you know, things like that. And so 82 to 83% of my viewers are men. Uh-huh. And only, and really only in the last year or so, have I gotten more female subscribers, which is weird, right? Like, it's, I think that's weird that's so many men are, they're just, you know, that they, they, they, I guess they shy away from the more violent. You would think men would be more interested in violence, but it's just.

They have an out. I mean, typically, very stereotypically, men have the outlet of sports for, you know, that side of things. And I also describe true crime as like the adrenaline rush. It's a mental version of a roller coaster, right? You know, why do people go on roller coasters? Because they know it's safe. But you get to experience this thrill that your body goes through in a safe environment.

And true crime is kind of that on the emotional side. You get to be safe at home, right? You're snuggled up. You're totally safe. And you get to have that, oh, my gosh, these adrenaline, you know, rushed feelings from a completely safe, controlled environment. And you get that feeling of. I'm safe. You know, that's, it's terrible for them, but you also feel better about your life because you're like, oh, thank gosh, that I'm in this safe place and I don't have to go through that, but you also get that adrenaline rush at the same time.

You're solving problems. You're learning life lessons. You're getting training. Why not watch True Crime? Right. I left that I had a, you know, guys will come here. And, and, uh, because I, a lot of my, probably once or twice, well, at least once a week. I have someone come and I, we do an in person. podcast, right? They'll come for two, three hours and leave. And I had a guy come one time. We did the podcast and he left. And my roommate, when he walked out the door, and the guy was, listen, he was off. He was, there was something not right. He felt there was a disturbing presence about him. And my roommate, when he left, he said, I'm telling you right now, that guy's going to come back and kill everyone in the house. He was, I'm telling you. And I said, I said, listen, I know. I understand. And he said, tell her right now, he said, I feel very uncomfortable. I don't like this guy knowing where we live.

I was like, wow. But yeah, I. There's a thing to that, though, you know. There's a, there's a vibe to people. There is, right? Like, like, I had heard that there was a study done where they had people that had, like, I don't know if they'd rob, they'd rob, like, they were robbers, right? Like, I don't know if they're purse snatchers or what they were, but they were basically

robbers. And they had studied people, and within like 80%, they could look at someone walking down the street and tell if that was someone that would rob or not. And like almost everybody they picked were people that had been robbed. And people that have been robbed are more likely to be robbed multiple times. Body language, micro expressions. I mean, I do some of that when I talk to people as well. There's like mirroring language. And there's a ton to that.

Sure. So was the other thing I was going to mention to you was, yeah, that's, I don't know, I guess it doesn't matter. It's, it's bizarre. But yeah, true crime is super, I don't know why it's fascinating to me. And I actually do watch the, even the violent ones. Like, I don't really like them that they're the violent ones, but I do love, I guess because I've written several books and I've done a lot of. research. Like, I'm very curious to know how these guys piece, you know, how the, the, I guess not just the forensic scientist, but the, but the detectives and, you know, how they piece it

together, especially when you've got people that are blatantly lying to you. And, you know, how do you see through that? And, uh, anyway, yeah. So interesting. I find it interesting. I really hope that you enjoy the rest of the season. I know that you will, especially after after we talked today. So you get all of September, all of our snowboard. Yeah. You know,

like I was going to watch them that. Like, after I watched those two, then my wife and I was, I was going to watch another one, at least another one. I couldn't get it to work. Yeah, well,

we'll resend the link so you can watch the, get that third one watched. It also, it also could have been user error, by the way. So, you know, like just on my, I'm not super tech savvy,

but I was amazed that. I got their work to begin with. So, okay, well, good. I, I really appreciate you, you know, taking the time to speak with me. And I mean, I hope it does well. And if you figure out, you know, what the, the next gig is that you feel comfortable with and you want to do a podcast on it, let me know. I'm available. Thank you so much. Thanks for giving me the time to talk about something that I'm super proud of, and I cannot wait to share with the world. So September 6th is coming up so soon. It feels like the biggest secret that I've been keeping for the longest time, right, since filming. So I'm excited for this moment to actually come out

and unleash season two crime scene confidential with the world. Oh, no one was going to ask you. Yeah. Do you get recognized? Yes. Okay. I was going to say, like, has that, like, like the first time somebody came up to you was it just like were you shocked or no i mean i have to consider i have pink hair so it's not like i can really not already so it's easy for them to recognize you yeah i'm a little more easily recognizable so there's that and you know it comes in waves so when the show is running actively running i get recognized a lot more um when it's not running, then, you know, it's a little less. I really enjoy talking to people. So I never mind. Everybody is usually really polite and they just, you know, come up and say hi. And,

you know, the only time that it freaked me out a little is I was out shopping, like Christmas shopping. And I was walking to my car in the parking lot. And they waited for me to get inside my car and then came up to the window of my car and knocked on it. And so I was like, I just, you know, would recommend maybe not knocking on, like, I, you know, could have thought it was a carjacking. So maybe don't approach in the carjacking kind of manner to somebody that is retired from the law enforcement profession. Just, you know, yell or wave or introduce yourself. I would be happy to say hi, but don't pretend to carjack me. Thanks.

Yes, A. All right. Well, that's kind of cool, right? You got to get, that's pretty cool to be recognized. Yeah. I love it. And I love just that people get excited. about the show in general.

So it's an honor. Hey, I appreciate you guys watching. And if you like the video, do me a favor and share it to your friends and family. Also, if you haven't subscribed yet, please subscribe to the channel. Hit the bell to get notified of videos like this. Leave me a comment in the comment section. Also, we're going to leave any links on the show in the description box. And we'll also leave any social media for Ms. Burroughs.

in the description box also. Really appreciate you guys watching. See ya. I am going to be interviewing former homicide detective Chris Anderson and we're going to talk about some cases and his book and some what he's been doing.

And so check out the podcast. I appreciate you coming on. Hey, no problem, man. I appreciate you for having me. So you were on Discovery channels, what was the name of the show? The name of the show was Reasonable Doubt. Reasonable Doubt.

That was for five seasons? Yeah, man, yeah. So, yeah, Discovery, yeah, going on to Reasonable Doubt was a, you know, it was a huge change in my career. You know, I'm used to, you know, investigating homicide cases and working cold cases and things of that nature. But getting the opportunity to go from, you know, as a homicide investigator and the being featured on first 48 and then going into my old show reasonable doubt and running it for five years man that that was you know that was a huge change it was life changing for me actually to see some of the cases that I've worked see some of the cases that others have worked and being able to

sit down and really get some people some help that that was one of the best things I've done in my career so I'm wondering when you go in and speak with so you go to re-investigate a case and you go and do the homicide detectives that had worked the case like are they are they okay with that are they irritated like hey this guy's you know looking over my shoulder or double checking my work or or they they open to it like man we want the help so yeah some of the cases i've looked into they they run the gamut of everything they just say it i've run into some cases where some guys have um you know, been very open to having somebody look at another case. I've had some guys that felt like I was looking over their shoulders and they had to critique their work and things of that nature. And I've had something that just flat out said, no, you know, you're not going to tell me, you know, my work is wrong.

And, you know, that's kind of like the mindset of a homicide investigator. You don't want people, you know, critiquing your work. You know, and you always want to maintain one of the worst things that could happen to a police officer and even a homicide investigator especially is to have someone come in and say that someone you were responsible for convicting. Your investigation was responsible of convicting. The worst thing to say was that guy was wrongfully convicted. So I can understand some of these guys and I won't meet a comment question. But on the other hand, I look at it like this. there have been lots of cases where people have been drawn for the convicted and as a matter of fact there are innocent people that are sitting in prison now whenever an investigation has been done and a trial has been conducted and you have more questions that still remain that answers then you should be willing to open up the books and let's re-investigate let's re-look into what happened in this case and see if maybe we got this one wrong yeah I so I've you know I

have spoke with a lot of of law enforcement. And I always, it's funny, like, with my opinion of homicide detectives are that, like, they're very, they tend to be very focused on, on not convicting, but, but solving that crime. Like, because, you know, there's no, there's no worse crime than murder, obviously. and it's funny you tend to get you know those are the guys that raise up through the ranks you know what I mean

like they have a goal that's what they want to do they want to get to become a homicide detective usually like the best the best guys and a lot of times that I've just noticed that they're super driven and they don't care about anything else it's like look like all these other crimes are

you know almost a joke in comparison to murder it's like oh you're the guy had a gun okay great the guy was smoking pot okay great the guy had look i don't care about any of that i'll take any help you know i want you know i want to solve this crime and i could care less about anything that i have to do to get to that point or who i have to deal with and talk to because those other crimes don't mean anything right so which i like about that what i don't like is what you're saying like that that would upset me it's like okay i get you feel like the guy committed the crime right but do you really

really know it. Right. And yeah, so you're absolutely right. I mean, homicide investigators are extremely driven individuals. You have to be driven. You have to be extremely focused because when you're not focused and when you're not driven, when you get tired, you're going to go home, you know, if you're not driven. If you're not focused, when you're looking at those cases and walking through the crime scenes and having to process, the millions of bits of information that are coming to you without warning, if you're not focused, you'll miss something that's extremely important. So, yeah, most homicide investigators that I've known, that I've met in my career,

they were extremely focused, they were extremely driven. These were the guys that were the cream of the crop in their police departments, and they ascended to the hikes of a homicide investigator. and it takes a lot I mean in my department it took a lot for a guy to to get into that unit they didn't just

just end up in that unit by a happenstance there were supervisors that were looking for a particular skill set for the individuals that they brought into that unit so when did you where were you

raised so I was raised in my city that I worked in Birmingham Alabama I grew up in Birmingham. I grew up in one of the roughest parts of Birmingham. I don't know if you're a fan of the show First 48, which I was one of the investigators that was featured on First 48 also. And a lot of the cases that we found on First 48 were cases that happened in my neighborhood where I grew up. So yeah, I came up through Birmingham. I'm a second generation police officer. My mom was a cop here in Birmingham. And she was brought into the department during a time where, you know, there weren't a lot of females in police work and not a lot of black females in police work. So she's always been a trailblazing, a hero to me. So when she went into police work, I was probably about four or five years old. And, you know, when I got of age, I think I was 21 when I started with the department.

I didn't want to work anywhere else but the Murray Air Police Department because it's where I grew. grew up. That's why I wanted to make, you know, the most of impact. Was your father around? Yeah. Yeah. So my father was around. My father was the victim of an assault, a serious assault, when I was, wow, there's probably a year or two after my mom became a police officer. And he was seriously injured and handicapped for the rest of his life. He's still alive today, but he was handicapped.

during that time and he never could really hold out a job or anything like that. So my mom, while she raised three boys, she also had to take care of her husband. You know, she was a breadwin of all the family after my father was almost

murdered. So, I mean, what are your, you have what, two brothers? I have two brothers. I have an older brother. I'm the middle child of us three. I was probably anyone that knows me and my family I was the one that was least likely

to anyone could ever see me being a law enforcement officer I was that one that didn't make the great grades I was the one that I always stayed in trouble you know if there was any one of my mother's children that probably should have ended up in prison it would have been so you know but you know God had a different calling for me

at a different path. I ended up by going into police work at a young age. My brothers, they're both very successful, and you know, now we look after our parents. They're not in law enforcement? No, no. I was the only one

of my mother's children that went to into law enforcement. How long were you on the force before you became a homicide detective? What made you, and what did you want to become one in general? Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. So going into law enforcement and having a mother like mine who was very well known, very well respected within the department, I wanted to carve my own way and not walk. I'm going to have to walk in her footsteps, but I wanted to carve my own way. And one thing that she never wanted to be was an investigator. You know, she always loves school resources. She always loved being, you know, a supervisor,

things of that nature. So she was great at everything she did. So me, I wanted a different paths. So, you know, I went into law enforcement at 21 and I did about five years in patrol. And my time in patrol was probably some of the greatest times that I've had in police work. But after about five years in patrol, I think the year I hired only in 1995, there was four years. I hired on in 1995, in 1999, I was promoted to, which I did a little stiff in narcotics. Narcotics really wasn't for me. But I ended up getting promoted into our burglary unit. And from there, in 1990, 1999, I want to say it was.

And from 1999, all the way up to about 2011 or 12, about Alex. in investigations. I moved around to several different units, but I went to homicide in 2005 and stayed there until I was promoted to sergeant in 2011. I spent the most time at homicide. Was you, were you gunning for homicide? Like, was that was like, or Jeff? Oh.

Absolutely. Homicide, the way that we run out to our, we run our department different than a lot of police, some of the police departments, I won't say a lot, but some to be police departments. you know, we have investigators that we have burglary investigators, then we have robbery investigators, and then we have homicide. And, you know, we have investigators that specialize in certain types of crime. So, whereas most, you know, police departments don't work like that. If you work burglaries, if you're a detective, you work all of them, burglaries, and

homicide. We didn't work like that. So I knew pretty early in my career that homicides, that homicides, you know, you know, was where I wanted to be. It was the tip of the sphere. As far as investigators, they were always the sharpest. They were always the most cutting. They were always the, you know, the guys that I came up under,

they were the guys that you wanted to be in police work. So I always knew I wanted to go to homicide when I was young. And I went into investigations that, I mean, I was probably in my early 20s. and I think I got promoted to homicide right at about 20, you know, 28, 29 years old, I want to say. I can't remember exactly, but yes, I was pretty young in police work and, you know, seeing all of that in a young husband, a young father, you know, I got kids, you know, I got babies now, you know, and as a homicide investigation, you spend a lot of time and work, a lot of time at work, missing out on football games and having. having to leave out of your daughters, ballet practice, or there are recitals, you know, because you're getting that call. But I was driven, man, and I wanted, it's just something that I wanted to do. So from the time that I was at homicide, and it happened a lot when I was in robbery

too, but when I was in homicide, my wife was almost a single wife, you know, she had to raise our kids, she had to go and do all of it, handle the house and everything. So, yeah, but it was a great time in my career. I wouldn't, there are certain parts of it. I wish I could do over again, but I wouldn't trade it for the world. That experience was amazing for me. Do you have, are there any cases that stand out that? I got plenty of them, man.

I've got plenty of cases that stand out to me. I've worked. I've worked almost nothing that you could show me in a crime scene would surprise me. So I've worked everything from child murders, children being, you know, slain and then all the way up to, you know, elderly people being, being, you know, murdered and thrown out on the side of the road. So I've got plenty of cases that really touched down. affected me in different ways. And that's one thing that I love about homicide, no two days are the same. Never. It's never the same. And that's what some of the things that were, a lot of investigators get burned out because, you know, it's just the monotony of everything

that's happening. But you can never say that when you're a homicide investigator. You know, no two days are the same. So I had a case that I actually wrote about in my book called the case. And I talk a little bit about how I, you know, move through our police department. I talked about how the impact of my mother had on me as an investigator, as a young, you know, police officer. And I talk about this one particular case that I investigated here in Birmingham. And it's a true story. I mean, you know, I chased a lot of the names and things of that nature in the case. But, you know, It was a real case that actually happened here in Birmingham. It was the investigation, what happened during the investigation, the drive, you know, it almost, work in that case almost cost me, you know, while I got it solved, got the people arrested, got justice for my victim, I almost lost everything that was important to me.

That's my wife, like she is my family. you know but it was just it was one of those things that that just happened man and it helped me after working that that particular case it helped me become a better father, better husband and a better detective also what was a case what helped okay I'll tell you about yeah so yeah I during that time my wife and I were on the you know we were on a rough patch I was kind of new with homic I had been at homicide for maybe a year or so And, you know, I'm still trying to make my way. I'm trying to, you know, learn, gather all this information and learn how to do this job as well as I could.

And I had gotten a pretty good go at it. And, but during that time, you know, I kind of left my wife and all my kids and then, you know, I wasn't around like I should have been. And she had gotten fed up. And plus, you know, I was doing all kinds of other stuff. You know, I wasn't the most, you know. Faithful guy, let's put it like that. Right. So, you know, it happens like that.

So, uh, we get out and, um, my wife, I come into the house and I, and she's, she's already tired because I told I was coming home and ended up not getting home for hours. My kids were waiting up for me. She had made dinner for me. And, uh, you know, I'm like, okay, I'm sick of it right now. So I go upstairs, you know, I talk to my kids for a little while, I don't eat my food. And me and her about to get into it.

argument and I get a call. Now, I'll tell you what, what, uh, what really helped me to become really why this case was so touching to me. So I get a call, uh, out of that a young lady's, a young girl that's been murdered. Uh, and, um, they asked me to come out to the crime scene, which I'm going to go anyway, because I'm the lead investigator at night, um, get out to the crime scene. And I'm looking at this vehicle, this, this vehicle, this, vehicle, say like a 2004, 2005, or a BMW. It's lodged up on the side of a wall and the tires are still engaged because the victim, she's been shot inside of her vehicle and she tried to drive away from her attacker and he shot one time through the car, strikes her in the back

of her head and she dives instantly. So the car ended up wrecking and it's lodged on the side of a wall and we couldn't get it out of out of gear before I got out there and you know until we could take some precautions to not screw up the crime scene excuse me excuse me at any rate I get out to the crime scene and the whole while there I'm thinking to myself you know I need to try to straighten this stuff out with my wife because I'm not I'm not doing what I'm supposed to do as a father I know that I'm not being a husband I should be So I get out to the crime scene and I'm not spending enough time with my kids and those were the most important things of my life. Get out to the crime scene and I'm taking down my notes and I'm looking in the car at the victim.

Now they've got everything set up to where I can be close enough to it and take down my notes before they remove the body from the car. And I'm writing out my notes and the guy, I asked the guy and said, what's her name? And he says, Kayla. and I stopped for a second, you know, her name is what? My daughter's name is Kayla. This young lady is not too much older than my daughter. So from that point, you know, I'm already struck him because I had to spend time with my kids, you know, I'm already going through this, this mental thing that we go

through it as homicide investigators, you know, and from that point on, everything that I saw, everything that I did, every picture that I looked at, I didn't see my victim's face. I saw my own child's face. And I thought about everything that was going, that was happening about, you know, how I wasn't spending any time with her. And I thought about my victim's family, you know, they let that daughter go out of the house just for a few minutes and, you know, a couple of hours. And now she'll never be seen again. I didn't want to be like that. So, yeah, yeah, I started working this case, and it was like investigating my own child's murder.

You know, I picked up a really good relationship with my victim's mom, which I talked to her and her brother, and I don't talk to her father as much, but I talked to, you know, my victim's mom and brother, we're friends today. and they know my kids her family and we just kind of connected and I think that connection was brought about by one of the most

traumatic events that any person could experience and that's murder so you know I'm just giving you a preface of the case I don't want to hear everything that happened but yeah man it was one of working that case helped

me to realize that every day is special. Every day, you need to do something to make tomorrow better. So I started after I finished the case up, and you know, if you're interested in seeing the book or reading the book, it's on Amazon now. It's been doing book sales. I've been doing pretty well, but I, you know, I always can use another person buy one more book. So, yeah, I take you through all the emotions that I went through. And I take you. through everything that was happening with me and my wife and my kids during that time, you know, the nights that I left and slept in my office and, you know, the nights of being out on the streets or trying to, you know, be at home and spend time

with my kids, but mentally I'm not there, you know, I'm physically there. Mentally, I'm still at work trying to find these fuckers that kill my child, you know. So, yeah, it's, there's a, there's a lot of, of, there's a lot of PTSD that happens with, with law enforcement that a lot of people don't know about, a lot of people don't talk about. And it goes, some of it comes about by some of the things that you see here and do on a daily basis. And I think that's what happened with me during that time. Do you know how many cases you work?

Yes. Yeah. So I've investigated, I think last count where I led, I've led in over a hundred cases. The last count of cases that I've, you know, I've investigated murder cases that I'm investigated well over 300. And it may not sound like a lot, but that's a lot. Yeah, that's got to translate a lot. I was going to say like what are our try to think what are the more complicated cases

the more complicated so because most aren't most murders like it's kind of random it just happened it gets out of control or to me like if someone really methodically thought out the crime like that's a difficult case right so the ones they're all difficult in some way, shape, or form. Even some of the ones that most people would think are easier cases, the domestic violence type cases. What's going on YouTube? Ardap Dan here, Federal Prison Time Consulting.

Hope you guys are all having a great day. If you're seeing and hearing this right now, that means you're watching Matt Cox on Inside True Crime. At the end of Matt's video, there will be a link in the description where you can book a free consultation with yours truly, Ardap Dan, where we can discuss things that could potentially mitigate your circumstances to receive the best possible outcome at sentencing or even after you started your prison sentence.

Prior to sentencing, we can focus on things like your personal narrative, your character reference letters, pre-sentence interview, which is going to determine a lot of what type of sentence you receive. You've already been sentenced. We can also focus on the residential drug abuse program, how you can knock off one year off of your sentence.

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Peace. I'm out of here. Back to you, Matt. So here's the thing when you think about homicide investigations. The one thing that's helped me out the most is almost three quarters of the murders that happen in the U.S., they are caused by someone that has a relationship with the victim, you know, that there's some sort of relationship,

some sort of connection with the victim. Most murders are not random acts of violence, the majority of them. So when you deal with homicides, if you go into it with that mindset, you can usually maneuver through you, and you know how to take your investigation. It all starts with the background of the victim.

It's called victimology. And I don't think enough schools teach enough about victimology and learning victimology, because especially when it comes to homicide investigations, because like I just said, three quarters of every case that you'll work in this country are committed by someone that's connected to you a bit. So, yeah, they're all complex in that sense because you have to unravel each piece. It's like a, like an onion. You know, you have to peel back so many layers until you get to where what actually the

root cause of what happened. And usually, nine times out of ten, it's usually something, someone that's connected to a victim. So, yeah, they are all, but they all have a level of complexity that, you know, only, you can only understand it if you've been through it or conducted an homicide investigation. Do you, I mean, so do you, but do you have any one in particular that's interesting that, that, that was complicated that you eventually put it together for,

some you know what I mean like yeah yeah so so the ones that that are usually the most complex are your serial cases uh and I've only had one of those because those are not usually your serial cases are not you know they're not I can up they are those random acts of violence right person this person sees someone that they think would make would become a They could be an easy target. They do whatever, you know, and they commit the murder. So those are the ones that you have to, that are extremely hard to put together because it usually takes a lot of working, moving parts.

And I had one like that. And this one wasn't, yeah, this one was, it was kind of random, but there was a connection between a victim and a suspect. So I had this young girl She was 17 years old at the time that she was murdered So here's this scenario Her that mom had been on some really bad terms And when she gets out of school

She was responsible for going to her mom's job Sitting down with her for about two or three hours And then riding home with her mom for work Because her mom just didn't trust her in the house by herself She's a little bit of this year So on this particular day, this girl had been on punishment for on this punishment that her mom had and, you know, enforced all the, she was, had to get off the bus and come to sit up there with her at work until her mom got off and then her mom would take her home. But on this day, the mom said, allows her to go on home, you know, go to the house a little bit early because she was going to, her mom had to work some overtime. And this young lady had to do some hallwork.

allowed her to go home. Mom comes home about four hours later, finds her daughter, she's been murdered. And she had been strangled to death and then the suspect cut her throat. And he cut her throat after she was murdered. Her body was positioned and posed in a way that

you know, it wouldn't have happened if, you know, it wasn't just random. You could tell that the body had imposed. So the way that she was posed, it led me to believe that, you know, it was somebody that was kind of close to her. She had a boyfriend who I had some witnesses who said that, you know, they had seen the guy lurking around the house earlier that day. And so I'm thinking, okay, this is my guy. I need to go pick him up. You know, he's where I need to start. pick the guy up, bringing him in for questioning,

he doesn't confess, like he doesn't admit to anything. But I get the witnesses in who says that, okay, they can identify him as the person that was working around the house that day. But nothing, that was it.

You know, he was very convincing in the interview room, and I didn't feel right about putting him in jail at the moment. The mom's pissed off. She was totally pissed off with it. I didn't feel right about putting him in jail. So I didn't. And I didn't have enough probable cause charging with anything.

But, you know, I said, let's just give me time. I'm going to work this case. And I'll find out who's responsible if it's him and he's going to jail. If it's not him, let me find out who's responsible. I worked that case for three years, three years. I mean, and doing something on it at least on a daily basis or going back out to the crime scene, you know, talking to people that knew the girl.

And this is during a time where DNA evidence wasn't as prevalent as it is today. Like you can do DNA test and get it back within a couple of hours now. You know, back then it took months and to years sometimes. I mean, you could even get it unless you had, you know, a suspect. So at any rate, during those three years, a lot of things happened. And, you know, that's when DNA and the collection of it and processing of it, went in the overdrive. So what here in Alabama,

which they've done now nationwide, they started taking samples, DNA samples from everyone that was in prison. Yeah. So when our first started this case, you know, we never, we didn't, they didn't do that. But I had DNA that was connected to this victim.

So at any rate, three years later, I get a DNA hit from this guy. They completely random guy The mom, nobody knew that the victim And this guy had been seeing each other Had been talking on the phone Anything like that.

She had, and actually, they had just met earlier that day. And she ended up bringing him back to the house And he ended up Was the one that was responsible for the murder. He was in prison For murderings, another young woman That happened in another municipality,

Just, you know, a few miles miles away from where my department was. And, you know, I went over and talked to him. He wouldn't talk to me, but I had the DNA evidence, you know, against him. He had gotten life in prison for the other young girl's murder because he did hurt. The actual actually, he got convicted before I even knew he was responsible for my murder. He had been convicted of two murders. So that's why it became a serial case.

He had killed three young ladies over the span of about, I want to say it was over about the span of a year. And the only thing that connected him in my case was the DNA evidence. And he had no reason to be at the house. It was in a vagina. And, yeah, you know, he was responsible for that murder. And those are some of the cases that, you know, it was completely random. There was nothing that that suggested this girl and this guy had a connection.

And that makes it extremely hard when you're investigating homicide cases. It's just those random acts of violence. Yeah, I was going to say the serial killers, you know, that is the whole thing. There's some long-distance truck driver. They swing into it and they'll go after somebody who's vulnerable anyway, a prostitute or somebody get in the car. Nobody sees them get in the car. they find the body like how are you going to how are you going to track this back to one of the 10,000 truck stop that boy drove through through that date 10,000 trucks that drove

through right without something like DNA that's why they get away with so many I always love the books if you ever read James Patterson where he's got a detective crossed uh huh is the homicide second. So, you know, I forget the name of his, like, nemesis, but they always make him seem so, you know, of course he's a sadist, but, you know, they always make him seem so brilliant and so, and he thought everything through. And the truth is most of these guys, they're just, they're, you know, not that they're stupid, but they're, they're so over, or so driven by just, you know, instinct. They make huge mistakes, but they get away with it because there's, like you said, there's typically no connection between them and the victim. So even though they made all these major mistakes, the truth is, is it's just difficult to pin them down.

And eventually it's got to take something like DNA and they're already got five convictions. And they go ahead and a bit to another 10 because they know they're about to be put into the electric chair or something. Right, right, right. Yeah. I mean, you know, look, it's complex within itself. But I think the technology and investigations has helped us out a lot as detectives. But you cannot be a good detective that's just going to get out there and beat the pavement and talk to people and be able to communicate with people.

Well, I was going to say, even with cameras being everywhere, you still have to go to the bank. You still have to go to the convenience store. You still have to go and, you know, you still have to, it's still all that running around to say, well, if he went this way, he probably would have crossed. this liquor store and they've got a camera so let's go there you just don't put all those things together then you have to sit there and look through 12 hours of tape or 120 hours of tape or whatever the case may be and then you know everything it's just um i was going to say it's like uh you know i've like i've like i said i've talked to a bunch of law enforcement they're like

it's it's just like extreme bored and boredom with these spikes of adrenaline it's like being soldier it's like you're nothing happens for you know three months straight and then you're in a battle for four days straight and it's just exhausting as you say i was in um you know i i when i was locked up and i would do all this research on guys and i'd order the freedom of information act like it would be hours and hours of printing documents paperwork ordering docket sheets reordering documents and then the spike in adrenaline would be you get mail and you open up the transcript

and on page 7 you're like oh you're running right like I would feel like I had solved the case I'm running around and going oh my gosh she was driven in black worst vanity is you know whatever it would no

it always works out like that man you know we would have there would be days like we would we would be going for for two or three days. I remember I had a case on first 48 a couple years. Well, it was probably

oh man, this was in 2010, I want to say it was. This case was on first 48. Man, we had, I mean, during the initial phases

of the investigation, so what happened was we had this victim that was inside of her home, some guys break in on her and put her down on the ground in and shoot, killing a murderer inside her house. And then to the store and got gas and poured gas all around the house,

set the house on fire, tried to burn the body up. Done the thing ever. And so during the initial phases of the investigation, you know, I thought it was just going to be a random, I mean, a completely, you know, kind of normal if that's the word that you can use, a homicide case which you normally can't use. I thought it was just going to be like a routine investigation. So,

while we're out on the scene some of the family members come to the house and they start asking about the woman's child. She said her child should have been inside of the house and we haven't seen a child. There's not a child inside of the house. So now

the case switches from just a routine investigation to now we are looking for an imperfect child. So we just we go, we run for hours and hours. hours and hours. And then we ended up locating a child, you know, at a, at a friend of her's house. So, you know, and then we go back into the routine of investigating the case. And maybe two or three hours after that, we get a big leader where the victim's property may have been or whatever.

You know, we run and go start investigating that force. And so that's like that's, you're, you're very right that that's the the the the ups and downs of the homicide investigation you know you're sometimes you move a little bit slow sometimes you're running your tail off for hours and hours and sometimes you're running the tail off for days you know and it's that's the way it works and you got to be able to adjust your body and your mindset to doing it like that uh um man i was going to, I, you had said something and shoot, now I can't remember. Um, yeah, uh, so, oh, no, it was we've, um, by the easy, we just always joke, um, about, you know, your, your co-defendant getting arrested. And it was always like, well, you know, you, you know, you're always going to say

something. No, he's not going to say another. No, he'll say something. No, he won't. And, and, and I, You've seen the first 48. They're all talking. They're all going to, like, every one of the gangsters that walks in there ends up crying his eyes out within two hours and saying, you know, oh, you don't understand. Friend and so. I'm glad you brought that up because that reminds me that actually it was the same case

I just told you about. You know, when I got the guys that were responsible for the murder, got him into the room. There was one guy. I can't remember what his name. That's, geez. He's like, I remember this joke, but he taken me out so bad. He was just the hard, and he wanted to be so hard.

That's like, look, man, you charged with capital murder. You know, he'll believe that yourself. I'm too pregnant to go to jail. Oh, okay. This is what he's saying. And the camera crew, they get all that. They eat that shit up. You know, so they get all of it on camera, and they post it on the show.

And I'm like, I was ticked off about that case myself because, you know, what they didn't show was, two days after he's charged now and now he's over at the county jail he's had his preliminary hearing and you know they're not letting him go he doesn't have a bond he got to sit there until a trial because he's charged with capital murder it's starting to sink in uh yeah yeah in a in a big way i got call after call after call from jail people saying hey hey uh detective anison he wants to talk to you. And the same guy that walked out of my office saying that I'm too pretty to go to jail, you don't believe that yourself. You know, he's all big, band, bow, sat right there and told me the entire thing of how this robbery went down, you know, and it was too late then because his partner

had already snitched all everybody and told everybody, you know, what had happened. But yeah, he told him, he sat there and tried to confess to everything. And then he tried to, with draws confession later on but you know that's a whole other story but the point that i want to make is on first 48 and all these other shows they try to seem so hard so violent but when you get them in that room in that box that's what we called it the box when you get them in the box 90% of them break down and will tell every single thing that happened they will tell you things that you weren't even investigated you know they'll tell you about crimes they've committed that you didn't even know that they were responsible for you know

just to get out of that especially when it comes to murder if they committed robberies oh my god they will tell you about 30 robberies that they committed that they can get out of this homicide that they look at it but i mean at what so if you just killed so you can't possibly think you're gonna you're gonna talk your way out of it i mean they do that i mean that that you're You know, that's how that face tells me, well, they do. They try. I mean, you know, you think about it. So the way our criminal justice system is set up in most states,

I know what Alabama is. Alabama wants the most culpable person. They want the person that, who was the one that actually pull the trigger, who was the mastermind behind it. So if you come in and you're the first person to say, well, he was the mastermind behind it and this is how we did it. You know, sometimes they are more lenient towards you in your sentencing phase. Right.

So, you know, look, a lot of people will say, don't, you know, don't go in and talk to the police. Okay, you have a right to not make any statements to law enforcement. That's your constitutional right set out by the government of the United States of America. but if you are involved in a case and sometimes you know you might want to if you're not as culpable as the next person first off you don't want to do the crack just don't do the crime right you know that's the first thing

but if you're involved and you know look there's a lot of deals being slung around especially if you're with someone that that if you are a co-defendant this co-defendant is nine times out of ten co-defendant is gonna talk they're going to talk i mean so if you're not about that life don't do the crime but you know if you if you're not about that life don't do the cry with somebody else you know that's probably some of the best that why it's like um it's funny i always so listen i'll tell you something you might find funny and anybody like watching this these guys have heard me talk about this before

so you know i have all all these i've done all these podcasts right so you've got a all the scammers out there think that I'm, you know, like a scam guru or I'm going to, I'm going to make them rich or, you know, they need to hook up with me or talk to me or something. And, you know, I would get these emails offering me money if I just talk to them. And I'm like, you know, no, no. And I actually had a guy one time who, you know, was texting me. Just kind of like on a, hey, I watch your stuff. I like your stuff. You know, so we're going back and forth. So you, you, even though I've never met the guy, you know, you kind of, I don't want to say necessarily a friendship, but, you know, you respond. Well, at some point, this is, we're talking about months later,

six months later of talking on and off. He, he flies to Tampa. He tells me, hey, I'm actually, my girlfriend lives in Tampa, we're going down there. Okay. Hey, I'd love to buy here to some Starbucks. Okay, I'll meet you for Starbucks. So, I meet him. And he tells me, he tells me listen I wanted to fly down and he'd been locked up before too in New York and he said look I was

locked up in New York you know like I did like I forget three or four years I never told on nobody I'm like okay and he's like so I wanted to come down I wanted to let you know that you know I'm a solid guy and I was like okay and he said

but I need some help man like if I could you could help me out like if I could get like half a million. I forget what the amount was. He actually had like a specific amount like 400,000 or something. He said, you can help me get 400,000. You got to get 800. He's like, I'll split it with you. He's all you got to do is tell me how to do it. I'll go in the bank. I'll go and sign the papers. I'll do this. And he's going on and on and on. I'm like, right, right, right. And I said, okay. And I said, well, you understood. I said, I'm basically already. I said, once you get caught, I'm already on the indictment. And he goes,

was, what do you mean? I said, he was, no, man, I would never say nothing. I would, I'll just take it. I said, no, no, no, no, let me explain something. I said, let's say you never bring my name up. Once they grab you. I said, and they will grab you. I said, so they're going to get you. I said, you're going to tell someone. No, I would never tell somebody. I said, stop something. You're going to tell somebody. You're going to brag. It's going to get, it's going to end up connecting to you somehow. I said, you know what they're going to do? They're going to pull your phone records. They're going to see that we've spoken on the phone. phone, they're going to see that there's text messages,

they're going to look me up, they're going to go into a grand jury, they're going to add my name to the conspiracy, or to the list of conspirators, I said, because this is something I'm known for. I said, so they're not going, I said, it doesn't, they're going to read my record, they're going to read the transcripts,

they're going to see that you've come down here, they're going to see that both our phones were at our Starbucks for 45 minutes. I said that you flew back the same day, and then three months later there was, you stole a million I said, I'm already done. I said, and you know what? I said, I can't even go to trial because I can't take the stand in my own defend. I said, because I've got a history. So I have to sit there while they read off all these things and they allege that I've done something, even though right now I'm telling you, get on the plane and fly back to New York. I said, that's just the way it is. I said, I'm already done. I think, so I don't need to give them any additional information. And I said, I said, I And that's if you keep your mouth shut.

And the truth is, I said, once you're locked up, and they say, look, you can get two years. You're looking at eight now. You'll get two. We know Cox's, all you have to do is say that he helped you. Yeah. And I literally got up and we left. And he was going, no, no. I was like, stop.

So you don't understand how the electronic surveillance alone connects everyone. But if I was on the jury, I wouldn't think I wasn't a part of it. Right. So it's, it's, you know, it's tough. It's very real. It's very, it's happened to own multiple cases to you. I mean, the case that, the cases I wrote about in my book, you know, that were, even though I only, you know, where I was able to indict the people that were responsible

for her murders, there were a lot of other names that came up in connection to these guys. that, you know, we found information that helped close other cases on. I mean, people don't understand, I guess, you know, some people see television and they think that, you know, when an investigator's working a case, that's the only case that they work, and that's just not true. I mean, I found that the guys that we, that I arrested for Kayla's murder, they were responsible for 12 other. carjackings because that's how she got murdered they were trying to carjack her vehicle and uh they

were responsible for 12 other carjackins but there were other people you know sometimes it would be those three sometimes it would be two of those guys and another guy you know or sometimes it'd be just one of one guy and two other people but a lot of those folks got charged because you know when we work cases like this, we don't just work that one particular cases. There are multiple other cases that we usually get closed with every homicide investigation. I was going to say, it's funny, that's like committing a crime. And let's say I commit the purpose, me and three guys, we go and we commit this perfect little conspiracy.

We get a couple million dollars. We're thrilled. We walk away. That's great. You walk away or I walk away. But then two years later, one of those guys, commits a crime and it's serious

and he says you know and the detective says look you can help yourself out like you could do five years or you could do you could do one year you know you know anything well you know what yeah

they're gonna take on deal right you gotta be in prison for a long period of time so the best thing to do is don't do the crime don't do it yeah um yeah it's it's insanity now

nowadays there's the technology, DNA, cameras, everything. It's rough. You know, I need to make sure I say this. You know, I love the way the technology has helped out investigations. It's not a, but it's not a end-all, be-all, especially DNA, you know, with the way that they're collecting it now. It's actually become kind of dangerous, in my opinion, in certain aspects that is, you know, because like, there's no way you can go in any place and not leave something of you in that place.

I'm talking about like the restaurants, you know, your friends' house. There are certain investigative theories. And not theory. They're actually facts that say that, you know, each time you enter in a room, you take something away and you leave something there. So with that premise, and the way that DNA is being collected, you know, it can become dangerous. And we've seen that in some of the cases that I've investigated, especially some of the cases we looked into are reasonable now. It was going to say, what was the term transference where you...

Yeah, transference. Yeah. That theory is called the Lecar principle. But, yeah, that's what he's. speaks of, it's, especially like your skin cells from your hand and things of that nature that can be pulled, you know, you need a minimal amount of skin cells can be pulled and you can get a DNA profile for her. And that becomes kind of dangerous because if, you know, if you find someone's DNA inside of a certain area where it shouldn't have been or inside of a

crime scene and it comes back to a certain person, that doesn't mean that that person is responsible for that murder. That means that you need to look at that person that either eliminate them or find enough evidence that convicts them. And we've had cases where some of that evidence has wrongfully convicted. I was going to say there was the, this was recently, I want to say like maybe a week ago, a buddy of mine mentioned it to me that some guy had committed a murder and one of his family members had gone on ancestry DNA. and uploaded their DNA and they were like, look,

a relative of this guys come into that murder. And so they sure enough, the detectives connected it all and said, okay, boom, that's our guy. That's the next door neighbor. And a week after the killing, he moved across the country. You know?

Yeah. There have been a couple of cases I've researched. One of them was, ah, man, upset. It was, I think it was a murder or a serial killer and I think it was like California or something like that that they were able to connect his DNA or a close relative of his.

They were able to connect his DNA to those murders. You know, I never got lucky enough to do nothing like that. Because Jesus Christ, that would that would have been easy. But, you know, yeah, it's... Oh, yeah, but I'll bet that was still That was still a lot of phone calls, a lot of phil out of paid a lot of ways. A lot of, you know, somebody had to put that together.

Somebody has to be, a couple of guys got to be sitting in a room with their banging their head against the wall. And somebody says, you know what? This was a long shot. Yeah. What if we did this? So all that, you know, first they run the DNA through it and then they go, ah, well, let's see if we can get a relative. Maybe he didn't do it. He's not going to upload his deed.

Maybe a relative. Okay, run it again. yeah yeah it is uh yeah the technology and investigations is completely going way in a direction that me when i was working cases i never would have imagined it or something like that but i wish i had it because there are a lot of cases that i well i left quite a few cases that were uh that i would love to see saw finished, you know, a lot, quite a few. So what are you doing now?

So right now I serve as the chief of police at Talladega College. It's my alma mater. And, you know, of course, all campus police departments have. They're all in particular police departments. And I was, you know, I was blessed enough to get the opportunity to go back and work at my, my institution. after I retired from, you know, law enforcement and there was a change in the leadership. So they asked me to come on and see if I can help out with the security measures there. And I love police and at a college.

It's much different than, you know, what I'm used to. So, you know, now it's more mentorship than enforcement, you know. So, yeah, and I'm an instructor. I also teach from a little. Investigations there at the college. Okay, that's perfect. Yeah, man. Yeah, man.

It's been a great. It's been a great. It's been a great. Rise since retired. Okay. So, any, no, any, any,

so there was, you were on the first 48. And, then you did reasonable doubt. Was that anything? Yeah. Okay. My memory is horrible.

So, reasonable doubt. So, I mean, are there, are there any other projects along those lines like that you're looking at or pitching or thinking about? So I don't think that we're done with reasonable doubt. I think that that show was so beyond its time. There have been certain television shows that have tried to do something like a reasonable doubt. But I just think that the way that we did it was, it was great. It wasn't just television. It's really, we would try to write some of the wrongs that happened within our criminal justice system. It was just way more than just television for me.

So I would love to see if we could to try to get, you know, another show kind of like reasonable doubt back all. But, you know, other than that, that's all I'm doing. I make appearances. I've made several appearances on all kinds of, all. all the news media stations as an expert in criminal investigations and homicide investigations

and I've made several appearances on different crime shows to talk that as an expert also as far as a television show that you know I have a few things that are in the worst nothing major but I would love to get back on television

okay any new books you're working on yeah I'm actually I actually am uh this fall I am working on a book called man you are crazy I am a co-author in that book with the guy that I think you're familiar with Evan Donaldson Katie yeah that's my book that's my dude man Katie and I um we actually met on the media circuit doing podcasts and and our publicists put us together, man, to talk about some of our, some of the PTSD

that's involved in law enforcement, which is never, it's never really looking to. It's actually shunned upon them to even mention that you may have received some PTSD from working at law enforcement. But our goal is to destigmatize that,

destigmatize that mindset because I believe that you respond to PTSD. People respond to PTSD in different ways. And, you know, if you don't get help for it, don't understand how to navigate through it, you usually respond in a negative way. So that's our goal to write the book, help to destigmatize and talk about, you know, how can we go about destigmatizing the mindset that PTSD does exist in law enforcement? And we need to do more. in order to to solve the problem.

I did, I interviewed both of them. Okay. We all went to dinner. He met my wife. Who else was there? Gosh, John A-Light was there. So was Mike Dowd. Do you know who that in?

Yeah, Mike Dow, yeah. So he was there. And there was a bunch of people there. So we all had dinner. And then I, we did the podcast, I think, the next day. And listen, what a horrible podcast. Like, I mean, they're in tears. I'm in tears. I'm in tears. Like, I'm borderline, I borderline cry most of the day anyway, just in general. You know, and these two guys, you know, they're, they're tearing up and I'm tearing up. It was, it was, like, I, I typically in the middle of the day, like, don't want to take a, like, I'm not the kind of guy that's like, oh, I'm going to go take a nap. Like, I mean, I wanted to go crawled in bed and just sleep for like, you know, hours. It's emotionally draining. Yeah, yeah.

Katie is my guy, man. He's a good, he's a really good guy, real police. I flew up to his city a couple months ago to do his podcast, man. And it was a great experience. I love doing this studio stuff. I just, you know, unfortunately, I just, you know, it takes a lot of time out of my schedule to fly up and do things. Yeah, he, a couple months ago, he asked me,

hey, when are you going to be in, in New York? I think it's in New York, right, or New Jersey. he asked me, well, yeah, so he asked me, well, wait, you're going to be up here anytime soon? I was like, no, man, what the fucking, no? I was like, you know, I just go to, I just go to Jersey all the time. Yeah, like, how is that? It's funny because I actually have another podcast I need to do. I got to see, the problem isn't, I don't know, there's actually like three podcasts in that general area.

The problem with that general area, in my mind, you know, New York City and that general area is not that big, but the truth, but it is big. There's like three, you know, like from one podcast, like New Jersey to, you know, there's like this, this guy, so I tracked it. I went on Google Maps and it's okay, this guy's address is this, this, well, that's four hours. Like if this guy's an hour and 45 minutes, like I,