Ray William Johnson: True Story Podcast - This Christian Singer Hired An Assassin - The Tim Lambesis / As I Lay Dying Story

Episode Date: July 15, 2025

In May 2013, Tim Lambesis, frontman of the Christian metal band As I Lay Dying, was arrested in Oceanside, California for attempting to hire a hitman to murder his estranged wife Meggan, allegedly motivated by disputes over custody and financial settlement

So the lead singer of this Christian band tried to unalive his own wife. So the singer's name is Tim, and Tim is 32 during this time, living in California, and the dude is super religious. In fact, he's so religious that he's the lead singer of this popular Christian metal band called As I Lay Dying. But one day, around 2010, his life starts to change. Because Tim, who has always been fairly thin, decides he wants to get fit. And so he starts working out and lifting a ton and trying to get as swole as possible. But I guess working out isn't quite enough because he starts taking a bunch of roids.

And it works. Of course it does. It definitely helps him get bigger. And pretty quickly he goes from this to this. And he gains about 50 pounds of muscle. And so the steroids are obviously working and doing exactly what he wants them to do. However, they're also starting to change his personality. and his behavior, as such things are known to cause irritability and aggression,

aka, roid rage. And so Tim is getting a bit of roid rage, and apparently his wife, this woman, Megan with 2Gs, Megan with 2Gs, starts to notice these changes in him. I mean, sure, he's buff now, but he's acting like a different person, like he's super angry all the time. Not only that, but he also spends a lot of time at the gym now, like an unhealthy amount of time at the gym.

Like, he's obsessed with it. Plus, he's spending like thousands of dollars on getting new tattoos and getting new cars, and he's not really keeping his focus where she feels like it needs to be on their three kids that they have. And in addition to the steroids, Tim apparently starts to dabble in other vices associated with rock stardom. Like he's doing much harder drugs like heroin and cocaine. He also's hanging out with a bunch of strippers and smashing with women who are not his wife. So, Bro is changing a lot. And while Megan is worried about him, I guess he loves his new life.

And the only real problem he has is his wife, Megan, with two G's. He's just not really feeling her anymore. So one day, while Tim is on tour with his band, he decides to send Megan an email telling her that he doesn't love her anymore and that he wants to end the relationship. And also, he says that he's no longer a Christian. And Megan is shocked. Like what? Her husband suddenly doesn't love her anymore? Plus, he's no longer a Christian? He's the lead singer of a Christian metal band.

How is that going to work? And this change in particular is huge, because Tim has always been extremely religious. Like he was literally voted most like Jesus by his classmates back in high school. The dude was like the Ned Flanders of his school, and now he's suddenly not? Oh yeah, and just a quick side note.

It's not just Tim who's no longer religious. The whole band, as I lay dying, stopped believing in any gods. But despite that, for years after this, the band continues to market themselves as a Christian band. Because, you know, it's working. It's selling records. And, you know, you got bills to pay.

You got to make that money. Anyway, his relationship with Megan. Soon after she gets that email from Tim, Megan learns that he's been having a bunch of affairs with multiple women and that he also has a secret girlfriend in Florida. And that is just too much. for her. She decides she's done with his bullshit and in 2012 she goes and she files for divorce. But see, Tim is still just like angry all the time about everything. It's a roid rage.

And as the divorce progresses, he starts getting pissed off about how long this whole process is taking because you know, divorces take a while. And he starts to blame Megan for it. Like she's the one being difficult and making it impossible to finalize the divorce. He also blames her for spending all this money on divorce attorneys, and he accuses her of being controlling when it comes to his visitation rights with the kids. So he starts to ask himself, is Megan deliberately making it hard for me to see my own children? And he becomes convinced that she's trying to keep them from him.

And he doesn't want to lose his kids in all this. He'll do anything to protect his relationship with them. And that is when he comes up with an insane plan. He decides to hire a hitman to get rid of Megan, as so many people do in my videos. The problem is, Tim doesn't know any hit men, as most people don't. Like, where the hell do you even find a hitman? So he goes to one of his gym buddies, and he asks him, Hey, do you know of anyone who would be willing to unalive my wife for money?

And I guess that friend is like, nah, bro. But word gets around. And eventually this news gets back to one of the personal trainers at the gym. this guy who will just call Traynor. And the next time Traynor sees Tim, he's like, don't ask me to kill your wife, please. So of course, Tim is like, oh yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. But do you know anyone who would be down to assassinate my wife?

Now, Traynor is obviously freaked out by all this. I mean, he's not trying to assassinate anyone's wife, nor does he know any wife killers. In fact, he doesn't want to see anyone get murdered. And so he decides to set up a little trap to catch Tim. And the next time Traynor meets with him, he tells him that he actually does know a guy who might be willing to unalive his wife. A hitman named Red. Here's the dildo.

Traynor doesn't actually know a hitman named Red, because there is no hitman named Red. He just made all that up. And so after talking to Tim, he goes to the county sheriff and he tells them about Tim's assassination plan for Megan and about how he told him he knows a hitman named Red who might be willing to do it. And immediately the sheriff's department gets to work. They put together like a little sting operation where one of their detectives is going to go undercover and pretend to be Red the Hitman. So then Tim goes to meet this fake Hitman Red, aka Undercover Detective, and they meet up at this bookstore. And Tim and Red discuss the hit.

And they go over the plans, and of course, fake hitman is wearing a wire. And Tim gives him an envelope, and inside this envelope is $1,000 in cash as a downpour. photos of his wife Megan, her address, and other stuff like that. He also apparently gives fake hitman instructions on how to carry out the job, which doesn't really make sense to me? Like, wouldn't the instructions just be like, murder her without getting caught? Like, aren't you a hitman? Shouldn't you know how to do this?

But anyway, Tim also agrees to pay the guy $20,000 once the hit is done. That's a good price. Now, unfortunately, even though Tim is being recorded and all this is pretty damming, evidence, fake hitman really needs Tim to use specific words like kill or dead to make this whole thing incriminating enough to bust him. But Tim isn't using those specific words. He keeps dancing around it like, I want her gone. I want her to never ever come back. And stuff like that. And fake hitman will be like, so you want your wife of eight years gone? But Tim won't elaborate. He'll just be like, Yep.

But I guess fake hitman does his job and he keeps pressing him on it. And finally, just as they're leaving the place, Tim is like, Just to clarify, I want her dead. And the second he says dead, that is all the police who are listening need to hear. And so... Bam, they arrest him. And I don't have a mugshot, but here's a picture of his inmate ID card. And he eventually pleads guilty and he gets sentenced to six years in prison,

but two years later in 2016, he actually gets out on parole. And he gets out and he gets back together with his band. And they've changed their lineup over the years and there's like all kinds of drama behind it, but as I Lay Dying still makes music to this day. No, it's no longer Christian metal. I guess it's just like regular metal, but they're still out there doing it, so you know, good for them.