MrBallen Podcast: Strange, Dark & Mysterious Stories - Moving Day (PODCAST EXCLUSIVE EPISODE)

Episode Date: August 10, 2026

On a cold night in November 2013, a woman sat in a hospital waiting room, wondering if her new husband would survive until morning. It was a cruel reversal – just months ago, she’d told him she was dying. And in fact, it was her terminal diagnosis that defined their marriage from the start. But now, it looked like she was the one who’d be making funeral arrangements.   You can WATCH all new & exclusive MrBallen podcast episodes on my YouTube channel, just called "MrBallen" - https://www.youtube.com/c/MrBallen If you want to reach out to me, contact me on Instagram, Twitter or any other major social media platform, my username on all of them is @mrballen Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for advertising.

On a cold night in November of 2013, a woman sat in a hospital waiting room wondering if her new husband would survive until the morning. It was a cruel reversal because just months ago, she had actually told him that she was dying. And in fact, it was her terminal diagnosis that defined their marriage from the start. But now, it looked like she was the one who'd be preparing for a funeral. But before we get into today's story, if you're a fan of the Strange, Dark, and Mysterious delivered in story format, then you've come to the right place because that's all we do,

and we upload two, three, even four times every week. So, if that's of interest to you, the next time the follow button is really struggling to fall asleep because they're scared, offer to tell them a very comforting bedtime story, and then proceed to tell them Bell's Canyon. Okay, let's get into today's story. Around 8 p.m. on November 3rd, 23rd, 45-year-old Will Walker taped up a cardboard box in the master bedroom of his home in Cleveland, Ohio.

He labeled it with a Sharpie and then stacked it with a bunch of other moving boxes in the corner that he had also made up. Will was in the middle of moving his family out of their current place in the city to a bigger house in the suburbs. And even though it did sort of seem like an upgrade, he had mixed feelings about it, in part because he'd invested a lot in this community in the city. He'd raised kids here with his first wife, and he also worked here as a lieutenant firefighter. But Will knew it was time for a big life change because his beloved new wife, Ulloma Curry Walker, had recently been diagnosed with cancer. And realistically, she actually didn't have very long left to live. And so Will wanted her to spend the time that she had left in a neighborhood that was more comfortable and more quiet than this one.

As Will began to pack one of those moving boxes he had made, he felt to stun him. growl. He was hungry. So before getting into really heavy packing, he stopped and he headed down the hallway to the living room where he found his wife laying on the couch wrapped in a blanket. And she was clearly on the phone with her 17-year-old daughter, Jackie. So Will and Yuloma both had previously been married and they both had kids from their previous marriages. But most of them were adults and they had moved out and they were living their own lives. Except for Jackie, the girl that was on the phone with Yoloma right now. She actually still lived with Yuloma and Will. But this evening, she was across down at her boyfriend's place,

but for the time being, she was just chatting with her mom on the phone. As Will approached the couch, Yeloma looked up at him and she waved and she smiled. And as she continued chatting with Jackie on the phone, she began coughing, just a small dry cough, but immediately Will was on edge because any time he heard his wife coughing or just acting like she was sick, he worried that like this was the start of the end. Is this her dying? You know, he was just so worried about her. But luckily the coughing passed, and she just kept on chatting away with Jackie. And so Will, he walked up to her and he sort of gently interrupted her and just said, hey, you want me to run out and grab us both some dinner.

I'm pretty hungry. Yeloma, she nodded and she smiled and she covered up the phone and said, yeah, I'd love to get some McDonald's. And then she just went back to her call with Jackie. And then Will, he bent down and he kissed her on the top of the head. He grabbed his keys and he had it out the door. McDonald's sounded great. A half an hour later, at 8.30 p.m., Will pulled back into his driveway and parked in front of the garage, he cut the engine, and then he grabbed the McDonald's bag off the passenger seat.

As he stepped out of the car, though, he paused and intentionally looked back out toward the street, just to make sure the coast was clear. So Will had lived in this block for decades, and it had always been sort of a rough neighborhood. But lately, it just seemed to be getting a whole lot worse. less than a month ago, Will had actually gotten into this really heated argument with a guy right here in his driveway. And it had been so heated that Will had actually brandished a gun to get the guy to leave. Will was still very much on edge about that, sort of worried this man would come back to, you know, exact his revenge or something. And in some ways, this was another reason why he felt like maybe it really was time to move out of here and get to the suburbs.

But for now, you know, looking out to the road and the sort of surrounding areas, he didn't see. see anything or anyone that concerned him. So he closed his car door and with his McDonald's bag in hand, he crossed the driveway towards the back door of the house. However, when he slipped his key into the lock on the door, he heard footsteps coming up behind him. And as Will turned, there was a deafening bang. Inside the house at the same time, Ulloma heard the sound of what sounded like four gunshots echoing from outside. Instinctively, she leapt off the couch and ran over to the window, still clutching her blanket tight around her. And when she looked outside, she saw her husband's car in the driveway, but she didn't see her husband. Or anyone, for that matter,

nobody was outside. Then she heard the sound of someone moaning in pain, and it was like instinctively she immediately knew it had to be will. And so she ran to the back door, she's frantic, she opens it up, and there he was. 30 minutes later, around 9 p.m., Detective Tom Lynch of the Cleveland Police Department stood outside of Will and Yuloma's back door, staring down at a pool of blood on the ground. Behind him, an officer was cordoning off what was now a crime scene, while detectives and forensic specialist searched the area for evidence. Lynch had reached the scene only about 10 minutes ago, but already he had pieced together some basic facts. Will Walker, the victim, was a 45-year-old lieutenant firefighter, and he had been shot four times in his own driveway. His

wife, Ueloma had found him bleeding out by the back door and immediately called 911, and Will had been rushed to the hospital in an ambulance. He was obviously very badly hurt, but apparently he was still alive. Now, Lynch knew that because Will Walker, the victim, was a respected member of the community, he was a, you know, longtime firefighter, that very likely there would be increased pressure on Lynch and his team to figure out who did this. But in a neighborhood as rough as this one, Lynch knew that was not going to be an easy task. Now, as Lynch studied the outside of the crime scene, his gaze traveled from the pool of blood where Will had been found, to the bag of fast food lying a few feet away, and then up to the keys that were still dangling

from the lock on the door. It looked like Will had been ambushed while walking from his car to the house. It was a very short distance, which meant the shooter would have only had maybe a few seconds to make their move. Lynch heard someone call his name from behind him. And he turned around to see another detective just a few feet away pointing to something in the grass. And so Lynch walked over and then crouched down and saw that what they were pointing to was a 9mm shell casing. Then the detective pointed out another shell casing and then another and another. And they all led in a straight line toward the back corner of the garage, not inside the garage, but like the back exterior of the garage. And so Lynch, he followed the line of shell casings towards that corner, and he found there was this small gap between the back of the garage and the back fence.

In this area, there were no lights. It was very well shielded from the street. Like, if you were back here, nobody could see you, really. And so this was like a perfect hiding spot for the shooter. As Lynch took in all this new information, he tried to visualize what might have happened here. He pictured the shooter waiting right here behind the garage, not coming from the street, but over the same. here waiting, and then Will comes into the driveway, he gets out of his car, he makes his way towards the door, at which point the shooter comes out and starts shooting. It was an ambush,

which suggested that, you know, especially based on the location of these shell casings, like this was truly somebody waiting for Will. This was not like a botched robbery, this was not random. This was someone who likely knew Will was going to be back soon, and they waited for him, and then they shot him. And so at this point, Lynch felt pretty confident that this was a premeditated murder, or at least attempted murder, because at that point, it was believed that Will was still alive at the hospital. And if he was still alive, Lynch hoped he'd be able to identify the shooter. Two hours later, around 11.30 p.m., Lynch followed a nurse down a hospital corridor.

Will Walker was still in surgery, so in the meantime, Lynch was going to speak with Will's wife, Yuloma. The nurse led Lynch into a private waiting room for family members, and right away Lynch saw Yuloma sitting alone in one of the chairs. She was wearing a big coat and a scarf, but she kept rubbing her hands together and shivering like she was cold. Lynch nodded to the nurse to let her know that he could take it from here, and so she left to give them some privacy. Then Lynch went over to introduce himself to Yeloma.

He sat down and he took out his notepad, and then he gently explained that he was leading the investigation into Will's shooting, and he needed to know everything she could remember about that night. Yeloma, who was still clearly very cold and shivering, she nodded, and in a weak voice, she explained that just before the gunshots, she'd been home alone. Will have been out getting them dinner, and her daughter, Jackie, was over at her boyfriend's place. Then at 8.30 p.m., she said she heard those four loud bangs. She'd run outside and found her husband bleeding out in the driveway, and so she called 911.

Lynch nodded as he jotted down everything she was saying, but nothing she was saying was particularly reveling. I mean, her story matched up with what he had seen at the crime scene and what first responders had told him about what they saw. So now, Lynch flipped his notepad over and he asked the question that in some ways mattered the most in terms of what Yuloma could offer him. Did her husband have any enemies? However, before Yuloma could answer, there was a knock at the door. And a second later, a pair of doctors came inside. And from their expressions, Lynch knew it was not good news. instinctively, Lynch stood up and stepped out of the way as one of these doctors came over to Yoloma

and they took her hand and told her that her husband, Will Walker, was dead. Around 9 a.m. the next morning, November 4th, Detective Tom Lynch stood in the wreck room of a Cleveland fire station speaking to three firefighters who were co-workers of Will Walker, who had been shot to death the night before. Lynch's conversation with Will's wife, Yeloma, the night before in the hospital, had understandably been cut short when she received the news. news of her husband's death. So now Lynch was trying to get information from anyone else who was close to Will before he ultimately went back and asked Yoloma that question about, you know, did her husband

have any enemies? And so for now, he was here at the fire station to find out if maybe any of Will's coworkers knew about any conflicts Will had with anybody. But so far from speaking with the guys who worked with Will, it sounded like he was like the most popular guy at the station. Everybody liked him. These firefighters kept telling Lynch what a hero Will was, and how Lynch needed to solve this case quickly because Will and his family, they deserve justice.

The community deserved justice. So Lynch was naturally feeling a lot of pressure to deliver here. But he was actually kind of optimistic for two reasons. First, because DNA had been recovered from the shell casing from Will's driveway. Now, the DNA didn't match anyone in law enforcement databases, but this was still a really strong development, because Lynch knew he'd be able to test any suspects against that DNA from the shells. And the second reason he was optimistic is because once he was finished here at the fire station, Lynch actually was heading to an interview with Yoloma. She'd had a little time

to process the news, and now, apparently she was ready to speak to him again. A half hour later, Lynch was sitting across from Yuloma inside of an interview room at the Cleveland Police station. She looked absolutely exhausted, and by now Lynch knew that it was not just from having been up all night, very likely, you know, dealing with the grief of losing her husband, but also because, according to Will's coworkers, Yeloma had cancer. And in fact, it was her terminal cancer diagnosis that had ultimately pushed Will to marry her after eight years together. Prior to the diagnosis, Will and Yuloma had sort of taken their time in terms of how they would define their relationship because they'd both been married before and they didn't want to rush into

anything because obviously their previous marriages didn't go well. But when Yuloma got really sick and it was clear she didn't have much time left, they decided, you know, enough waiting. Let's just get married. And so now Lynch picked up with Yuloma where they had left off the night before. He asked her again, did Will have any enemies? And after spending the entire morning, listening to Will's coworkers talk about what a good man Will was, Lynch expected Yoloma to say no. But instead, Yeloma nodded and said, yes, he did. But she also quickly said that it was definitely true that the vast majority of people loved Will,

her included. Like, he was a great guy. He was very popular at work, and he was beloved in the neighborhood. And he was very close with his kids and stepkids, and he was even on good terms with his ex-wife, Rita. But Yeloma said she could think of at least two men, Will definitely had not. gotten along with. Yeloma explained that the first man she suspected was actually her own ex-husband, Macklin Heinz. Yeloma described Macklin as an ex-convict with an explosive temper. She said Maclin had always been very possessive towards her, even after they had gotten a divorce,

and that possessiveness had only intensified after she had recently married Will just four months ago. Yoloma said she didn't know if Macklin was jealous enough to have committed murder here, but she knew he was definitely capable of violence. And she said that she had not heard from Macklin in several days. The second person that Yoloma said Will had issues with was actually a man from the neighborhood named Eugene Cray. According to Yuloma, Eugene was friends with their next-door neighbor. And whenever Eugene came by to pick up his friend, the neighbor,

he would sit out in his car smoking weed, blasting music, and blocking Yuloma and Will's driveway. And Yeloma said this had really bothered Will. And a few weeks before the murder, he'd finally lost his patience. One afternoon when Eugene had shown up again with his car, blocking the driveway, blasting his music, smoking his weed, Will had pulled out his handgun and stormed out of the house to confront him. Now, Yeloma said she hadn't seen what happened next,

but she heard shouting and then the sound of Eugene speeding away. And when Will came back inside, clearly amped up from the story. confrontation. He just told Yuloma that he had handled it, and Eugene would not be back. And so at this point, Lynch stopped for a second and just thought about what he had been told. In terms of this Eugene's story, it sounded like Will had really lost his temper. And if he had maybe embarrassed or threatened Eugene, that was the kind of thing that could turn into a grudge that could lead to murder. And so at this point, to Lynch, Eugene was sounding like a really, really good suspect, especially since his recent argument with Will had actually

taken place in the same area where Will was ultimately killed. Three days later, on November 7th, around 6 p.m., Detective Lynch walked through a big candlelight vigil on Yuloma and Will's street. A massive crowd, hundreds of neighbors, firefighters, and police officers had come out to honor Will. Lynch scanned the crowd and he eventually found Will's family, and they were clearly speaking with reporters. Will's two adult children were standing there beside this woman who Lynch guest was Will's ex-wife, Rita Walker, and then a few feet away from them was Yuloma, looking very frail as she leaned on her teenage daughter, Jackie. And for Lynch, I mean, seeing this vigil and seeing, you know, Will's bereaved family just standing there in the middle of all this just sadness,

it was heart-wrenching. And in part because he knew that despite his early optimism, the investigation into Will's killer was really not going particularly well, at least not so far. For the past couple of days, Lynch and his team had been trying to contact Eugene by phone and at his home, but he seemed to have just vanished. And to make matters worse, Lynch's other main suspect, Yeloma's ex-husband, Macklin Hines, hadn't panned out. It turned out there was actually an extremely good reason why nobody had heard from him for days around the time of the shooting. It was because Hines had actually been in jail on the night of Will's murder. Like, he literally couldn't have done this.

Now, of course, it was still possible that he could have hired someone to do it, but as for now, it seemed like Macklin was not as good of a suspect as they once thought. And now, as Lynch stood there at this vigil among so many mourners, he knew that if his investigation didn't start delivering answers soon, a lot of people were going to be very disappointed. And to get those answers, Lynch knew they needed to find. behind Eugene Cray. More than a month later, Detective Lynch was back inside of the police station's interview room sitting across from a skinny, scowling man.

This was Eugene Cray, and he'd walked into the station earlier that morning, demanding to know why the police were leaving flyers with this photo all over his block. And Lynch had actually been kind of amused that Eugene was acting so indignant, because for more than a month, police had been doing everything they possibly could just to contact the sky. They'd knocked on Eugene's door, they left messages, asked Eugene's neighbors for help. But there had not been one single peep out of Eugene that entire time, almost like he didn't want to be found. But the flyers seemed to have flushed Eugene out, and now Lynch sat across from him, waiting for him to explain why he'd apparently been in hiding since the night of Will's death.

But Eugene just folded his arms and said he didn't have anything to do with the shooting. He said he'd been at home in bed that night listening to music with his headphones on. So he said he hadn't even heard the gunshots. And, you know, he lived in the same rough area, so he would have, but he didn't because he was in bed with headphones on. Now, Lynch thought this was a very poor alibi because, you know, Eugene didn't have anybody who could confirm that he had been at home, in bed, headphones on at the time of the murder. It was just his word against everybody else's. And so instead of trying to, you know, dig into the alibi, Lynch just asked Eugene, about that confrontation he had had with Will a few weeks before the shooting.

And Eugene told him pretty much the same story that Yoloma had, that he had been outside, he'd been sitting in his car. According to him, he was minding his own business. When Will suddenly appeared, you know, storming out of his house, waving a gun in the air, yelling for Eugene to turn down his music. And Eugene said, just from the look on Will's face, he seemed mad enough that he might actually use the gun. So Eugene said he just sped off as fast as he could.

Lynch studied Eugene as he was saying this. And there was just something about this guy's demeanor that it seemed unlikely that Eugene would have let their conflict end right there. That, you know, Will came out, he yelled at Eugene and Eugene drove off. And that was it. Like the idea that Eugene was just going to go on with life and not be upset with Will, it just seems sort of far-fetched. And so he really wanted Eugene's DNA. That way, he could just test it against the showcasing DNA and find out the truth.

But Lynch knew that Eugene had a history of prior arrests and seemed to know his way around a police interview. So Lynch guessed that if he pressed for a DNA swab right now, Eugene would refuse and very likely lawyer up. But Lynch at the same time felt like he really did need this swap. Like he just, he had to ask. So doing his best to not seem too eager, Lynch leaned back in his chair and as casually as possible asked if Eugene would submit a DNA sample, just so they could rule him out as a suspect. And to Lynch's surprise, Eugene just shrugged and said,

OK. About three months after the murder in February of 2014, Detective Lynch sat at his desk reading through a thick stack of financial documents. Now, by this point, the Will Walker murder investigation had pretty much stalled out because Eugene Cray's DNA did not match the DNA on the shell casings' at the scene. Still, Lynch had pressed on and questioned everyone he could think of, Will's neighbors, his coworkers, his kids, his stepkids, and even their romantic partners. Lynch's team had also poured through hours upon hours of security camera footage,

collected from the homes and businesses that were near Will's house. But even after all that effort, Lynch was nowhere closer to solving this case. So now, with really no other ideas, Lynch was just going through all of Will's financial records that he could get his hands on. Bank statements, loan documents, mortgages, and Lynch's eyes were starting to glaze over when a stray form suddenly caught his eye. It was an addendum to a $100,000 life insurance policy for Will. According to this form, to this addendum, in the event that Will died, that money would not go to Yuloma or his kids or like his immediate family.

it would go to his ex-wife, Rita Walker, who he hadn't been married to for nine years. The following afternoon, in February of 2014, Detective Tom Lynch led Rita Walker into an interview room at the Cleveland Police Station. And Rita seemed very confused about why she was being questioned again, three months after her ex-husband, Fire Lieutenant Will Walker, had been murdered. So immediately after the killing, Rita, along with Yoloma, and all the kids and stepkids, they had all been interviewed pretty much right away. And at the time, Lynch hadn't even considered Rita a suspect. So this time, when Lynch sat down with her, the questions were different,

because now there appeared to be a clear motive for Rita to want to harm Will. So he began by asking Rita where she was on the night of the murder. And right away, Rita's expression sort of tightened. She paused and then said that she couldn't really remember all the details, But she said that she had stopped by Will and Yoloma's house around 1 p.m. to pick up her son, who had spent that morning helping Will and Yeloma pack. And this information sort of caught Lynch off guard. I mean, he knew that, you know, Will was shot at night, and Rita is describing being

at Will's house in the afternoon. So hours before the shooting. But here she was admitting that she was there on the day of the murder. She was at the scene of the crime. So Detective Lynch moved on to the real reason he had asked her to come. down. And he asked about that life insurance policy that listed her rather than Yaloma or anybody else in the family as the beneficiary. And Rita, she sat back for a second and just stared at Lynch. And then she nodded and said, of course she knew about that, because that was how it was

meant to be. She explained to Lynch that Will had taken out that policy as a safety net for his kids. And he had named Rita as the beneficiary because he trusted her to divide the money. between their kids. And to Lynch, he had to admit this did sort of make sense. But he also had a different theory. He suspected that Will had just never gotten around to updating the form. But with his recent marriage to Yuloma, it was probably on his to-do list. And if Rita had figured that out, it might have pushed her to have Will killed before

he could remove her from his own policy. But that was really just a hunch that he kept to himself. And Lynch also knew he really didn't have to have. have the evidence to charge Rita with anything here. And after almost half an hour of questioning, Rita was still very confidently sticking to her story. So eventually Lynch told her that she was free to go. Then Lynch, he got up and he walked Rita out to the front of the building. But as he watched Rita get into her car and pull out of the parking lot, his eyes narrowed because he suddenly realized he recognized Rita's car from somewhere. Lynch's mind immediately began to race as he

ran back to his office and turned on his computer. And once the computer was on, he pulled up the security footage from Will's neighborhood. And after scrubbing through a dozen files, he found what he was looking for. A security camera had captured footage of Rita's car just a few blocks away from Will's house right before he was killed. This was clearly not that afternoon visit that Rita had already told Lynch about. This was a second visit to Will's neighborhood that she had not mentioned at all. Less than half an hour later, Rita was back inside the interview room, and Lynch was staring her down as she frantically tried to explain herself.

Now that Lynch had confronted her with this footage, Rita had totally changed her story, admitting that she had actually gone back to Will's house that night. But she said it was just to pick up some shoes her son had left there and that she'd left long before Will's murder. But what Rita really couldn't explain was, if this was so innocent, why hadn't she mentioned it before? And so now, Lynch just stared at her, letting his silence pressure her to keep on talking. He was hoping Rita would slip up or crack or confess. But as the interview went on, Rita just kept insisting again and again that this was an

honest mistake, that that second visit meant nothing. She was just getting shoes, and she didn't know why she didn't bring it up. And this was a problem for Lynch, and the whole whole investigation. Because even though the facts did look quite bad for Rita, she had a motive, she had been at the crime scene close to the time of the murder, and she'd failed to tell the police about being at the crime scene. But Lynch knew that he still didn't have enough to charge her with anything. And so Lynch sat there hoping that Rita would, you know, offer up something that would allow him to charge her like a confession or just, just anything. But she stuck to her story again and again, and eventually, once more, he had to let her walk out.

Nine months later, in December of 2014, Detective Lynch was in his office when his phone rang. He answered, and the station receptionist said a man from Will Walker's neighborhood had just come into the precinct, claiming he had vital information about the murder. Apparently, this man was being escorted to an interview room, and Lynch could go question him when he was ready. Lynch said thank you and hung up the phone, but then he just sort of sighed and sat back and rubbed his forehead because he was not optimistic about this new lead. Because one month ago, the Cleveland Firefighters Union had announced a $24,000 reward for information leading to the arrest of Will's killer.

And ever since then, the station had been flooded with false tips. And so Lynch and his team, they'd spent weeks chasing down basically rumors that went nowhere, and it was really frustrating. So even though he figured that, you know, whoever this guy was waiting for him in the interview room was very likely going to go nowhere. It was going to be another dead end. He still felt like, you know what, I got nothing else to do. I'll go see, you know, what he knows. So he stood up, he left his office, he made his way down the hall, he walked into the interview room, and sure enough, there's this guy he didn't know who's sitting behind the table. And so Lynch, he sat down as well, and he just said, okay, what do you know about what happened to Will Walker? And this man, instead of

of saying anything in response to that question, just pulled out his phone, put it on the table, and hit play. And when Lynch realized what he was listening to, his eyes went wide, because the audio on this man's phone had just cracked the case wide open. Based on the evidence that was collected at the crime scene and on witness testimony, the following is a reconstruction of what police believe happened to Will Walker on the night of November 3, 2013. At around 8.30 p.m., the killer, who was very nervous, was hiding in the shadows behind Will Walker's garage. They were doing their best to try to calm themselves down, to be ready for what they were about to do, but they knew it was going to be very risky for them.

Just then, the killer heard a car pulling into the driveway. And as the engine cut off, the killer leaned out of their hiding spot, and then, the killer leaned out of their hiding spot, and saw Will Walker step out of his car with a fast food bag in one hand and his keys in the other. The killer took a deep breath at this point because they knew this was it. And as Will began walking across the driveway toward the back door, the killer drew their gun, rushed out of their hiding spot and began shooting. And they ran as they shot. And as Will fell to the ground, a flash of red in the air told the killer that they had hit him.

So without stopping to check for a pulse, you know, to make sure Will was at, actually dead, the killer turned and ran to the fence, climbed over it, and jumped down into the alley behind the house where the getaway car was waiting. The killer leapt into the back seat right as the driver began peeling out of the alleyway, and as they're speeding along, the person sitting in the front passenger seat turned around and asked the killer, is Will dead. And when the killer, who was still laying in the back seat, composing themselves, they nodded and said, yes, he was. The person and the passenger, seat just turned back around, pulled out their phone, typed a text, and then hit send.

That text message confirming the shooting went straight to the person who had actually orchestrated this hit on Will Walker. And when the text came through to the architect's phone, that person was actually standing over Will as he bled out. The architect was also the same person who called 911 and who would cradle Will as he lay there dying. Because the master's of this murder was Will Walker's beloved cancer-stricken wife, Yoloma Curry Walker. Except Yeloma was not at all what she seemed, starting with the fact that she didn't actually have cancer. From the very beginning, Yeloma's cancer diagnosis had been a big, elaborate lie. Police believe she fabricated the illness just to convince Will to finally marry her, because that way

she could, one, be put on his health insurance policy, and two, if he were to die, she could collect on his life insurance policy. But Yoloma didn't realize that Will's life insurance policy was still in Rita's name. But despite that oversight, it did not stop Yoloma from putting a tremendous amount of planning into the plot to murder Will. In fact, if you remember that phone call that Yoloma was having with her daughter, Jackie, that when Will walked in the living room, there was Yoloma, she's on the phone, and he asked her if she wanted dinner and she's like, yeah, go to McDonald's. Well, that phone call with Jackie is the one that actually sealed his fate.

Because the instant Will left the house to go get their dinner, Yeloma, who's still on the phone with Jackie, told her daughter that, hey, he just left. And Jackie, who knew the plan, she passed that message along to her boyfriend, Chad Padgett, who was sitting in a car right down the street from Will's house waiting for this message. And he was there, along with his getaway car driver and the man he had hired to actually carry out the shooting. The shooter was Ryan Dordy, a young man from the neighborhood who had agreed to kill Will for $800 and some marijuana. And the getaway car driver was actually just a friend of Chad's who thought they were there to buy drugs. Yeloma had promised to pay Jackie and Chad for finding people to kill her husband for her,

but Chad was very sloppy, and one of the people he offered the job to was later caught on tape talking about it. And that recording is how the investigators came to learn that Chad, Jackie, and Yoloma were all involved. And at first, I mean, they really couldn't believe it. Because Yeloma's performance as a cancer-stricken, dying widow had been so masterful. No one had looked close enough to see who she really was. Yeloma Curry-Walker was arrested on September 8, 2015, and she was ultimately sentenced to life in prison for her role in the murder plot. As for the people she convinced to participate in this plot, they were convicted on a range of charges

and spent between two years and life in prison. And then as for Rita Walker, Will's ex-wife, she was not involved in the murder in any way, so her story was absolutely true, and she would eventually receive that life insurance payout, just as Will had planned. A quick note about our stories, they are all based on true events, but we sometimes use pseudonyms to protect the people involved, and some details are fictionalized for dramatic purposes. The Mr. Ballin podcast, Strange, Dark and Mysterious Stories, is hosted and executive produced by me, Mr. Ballin.

Our head of writing is Evan Allen, produced by Jeremy Bone and Cole Ocasio. This episode was written by Andrew Kelleher. Story editing by Luke Baratz. Research and fact-checking by Shelley Shoe, Samantha Van Hoose, Evan Beamer, Abigail Shumway, Camille Callahan, Alex Paul, Fasiano. Research and fact-checking supervision by Stephen Ear. Audio editing and post-produced by Whitlocasio and Jordan Stidham. Production support by Antonio Manata and Delana Corley. Artwork by Jessica Clogston Kiner, theme song Something Wicked by Ross Bugden.