Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - He Was an Actor, Now He's in Prison // The Daniel Wozniak Murder Story

Episode Date: October 5, 2026

In 2010, debt-ridden California community theater actor Daniel Wozniak executed a gruesome double-murder plot to steal $62,000 in combat savings from his neighbor, 26-year-old Army veteran Samuel Herr, to finance his own upcoming wedding and honeymoon.

How far is this broke community theater actor willing to go to pay for his wedding? Is he willing to kill someone? Now, the guy's name is Wozniak, and Wozniak is 26 during this time, living in Costa Mesa, California. And like I said, he's a community theater actor, and there's nothing wrong with that. But Wozniak has a problem. He's about to get married, but weddings cost money, and he ain't got no money. And he doesn't have a full-time job, he's struggling to pay his rent, he's about to get evicted, and he somehow needs to come up with enough to fund his upcoming

wedding and honeymoon. And that is where this guy comes in, Sam. Sam is the neighbor, he lives in the same apartment complex, and Wozniak knows him pretty well. So one day in 2010, Wozniak and Sam, they're chatting, and Sam mentions that he's been able to save up $62,000, because he's good with his money. He's very frugal, apparently. So Wozniak starts thinking, that he could just kill Sam and take everything he saved. And $62,000 is more than enough money to pay for his wedding and his honeymoon. So he puts this plan into motion. He goes to Sam and he asks him to come to the local theater where he performs and help him move some things.

And Sam, he's a nice guy and he wants to help his friend. So he's like, sure. So Wozniak drives him over to the theater. Once they're inside, he leads him up. to the attic. And there, he pulls out a gun and blam! Blam! He shoots him twice. And this, unfortunately, kills him. After that, Wozniak takes Sam's wallet and his ATM card, his keys, and his cell phone, and he leaves his body in the attic of the theater. Then he leaves, and he drives about 15 miles away to a different local theater. Because he's scheduled to be in a show

there, a local production of a musical called Nine, and Wozniak is actually the lead in this show. So just a few hours after murdering Sam for his money, Wozniak is on stage singing and performing in front of a live audience, like it's a completely normal night. And apparently the murder didn't bother him at all, because Wozniak nails his performance. He does a great job. It's just like any other night where he just shows up and gives it his all. However, he still has a major issue. He needs to figure out what to do with Sam's body. So he comes up with a plan to make it look like Sam is still alive, but on the run, because he committed some kind of crime. So after the show, Wozniak and his fiance, who was also in the show with him, they go back to their apartment. And at some point,

Wozniak takes Sam's phone and he finds a friend of Sam, who he had been in communication with. And Wozniak also knows this friend, and he knows that she and Sam are close. That friend is named Julie. So Wozniak texts Julie pretending to be Sam. And he says, Can you come over tonight?

At midnight, alone? Very upset. Need to talk. And Julie, she cares about Sam, and she doesn't want him to be upset. So around midnight, she shows up to his apartment. And Wozniak has access to Sam's apartment

because, remember, he stole his kids. keys. So right as Julie gets there, he meets her at the door, and he says something like, Sam's inside, follow me. So they go inside, and he leads her to the bedroom, and there, he pulls out his gun, and blam, he shoots her. And this unfortunately kills her. Then, and I won't get into detail, but he stages the scene to make it look like Sam sexually assaulted her and then murdered her. After that, he steals Sam's passport, because he's hoping that that makes it look like Sam left the country. Then he flees the scene. The next morning, Sam's dad shows up to the apartment to check on him, because he hadn't been answering his phone.

And there, he doesn't find Sam, but he does find Julie's body in the bedroom. And so pretty quickly, police come out, and they investigate all of this, and they end up searching through Julie's phone. And of course, they see all the messages sent to her from Sam's phone. asking her to come over alone at midnight. So police are like, yep, Sam is definitely responsible for this. Now, while this investigation is going on, Wozniak goes back to the theater attic where he left Sam's body and he cuts it into a few pieces

and he takes some of those pieces and he dumps them in a local park. He also leaves a big part of the body just in the attic of that theater. He just leaves it there. Regardless, he really doesn't want anyone to find Sam. because as long as police think Sam fled the scene, they'll continue thinking that he's responsible for Julie's murder. So now that that's taken care of, Wozniak can finally focus on the entire reason he did all this in the first place. Money for his wedding. So he reaches out to this teenager to help him, who will call 17, because he's 17. 17 is also involved in the community theater scene. That's how he

and Wozniak know each other. So Wozniak meets up with 17 and he gives him Sam's ATM card. And he lies to him and says that he's working for a bail bonds agency and he needs him to take that card and go around to a bunch of ATMs and withdraw money from each of them and then give him the money. And I don't know, his lie doesn't exactly make sense to me, but whatever, 17 believes him. And he takes the card and he starts hitting up ATMs in the Long Beach area. At the same time, Sam's dad has been check. Sam's bank account, hoping that that will give him clues to where Sam disappeared to. And looking at this bank account, he can see that money is being withdrawn every day in the Long Beach area.

And so Sam's dad, he doesn't know what to think or who's doing this. So he alerts the police that someone has been using his son's card. But he also starts calling around to Sam's friends, hoping to make some sense of this. And one of those friends gives him Wozniak's phone number. So Sam's dad calls Wozniak and he asks him if he's seen Sam. And Wozniak, he starts bullshitting him and he tells him that Sam had gone crazy because he had been dealing with some family problems. And Sam's dad is Sam's family. And so he knows that Sam hasn't been dealing with any family problems.

So he knows that Wozniak is lying. Meanwhile, police tracked down the person who had been using Sam's card. 17. because he had actually used the card to have a pizza delivered to his address. That's how they tracked him down. And so 17, he's just a teenager. And he doesn't have any allegiance to anyone involved in this. So he immediately tells police that Wozniak put him up to it.

And so police go looking for Wozniak, who's at his bachelor party. Because remember, he's got a wedding coming up. And so police find him at his bachelor party and bam, they arrest him. Here's his mugshot. Now at this point, police, they still don't know that Sam is dead. They still think that he murdered Julie and ran away. They also think that Wozniak is only somehow involved with stealing Sam's money. Not any kind of murder.

But while Wozniak is in jail, he calls up his fiancé, and he starts talking to her about some evidence related to Sam's murder that he doesn't want found. And fiancé agrees to help him. And of course, any call made for. the county jail is recorded. So now, fiance is implicated in this too. And so bam, she gets arrested as well. Here's her mugshot. And ultimately, fiance goes to trial and she's found guilty of lying to the police to cover up for Wozniak and she gets sentenced to 32 months in jail. While Wozniak goes to trial, he's found guilty and he gets sentenced to death.