RedHanded - Episode 123 - Christopher Foster: Behind Closed Doors

Episode Date: November 28, 2019

In the early hours of the 26th of August 2008, a fire ripped through Osbaston House a 5 bedroom mansion set in 16 acres of beautiful land in Shropshire, England. It was home to the Foster family. The investigation quickly revealed that the fire was indeed arson, and once the police stepped into the remains of the destroyed mansion, one by one the family's dark secrets started to surface... Spooky Bitch merch: RedHandedshop.com To get a 20% discount for Black Friday - use code SPOOKYFRIDAY (valid 28th Nov to 1st Dec)   See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can listen to Red Handed early and ad-free. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app or on Apple Podcasts. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey guys, quick announcement before we kick off with today's episode.

Obviously, you know that the Speaky Bitch merch is out, but it's not going to be out for much longer. We are bringing that down on the 2nd of December. But if you want to get yourself a Black Friday deal, I'm here to help you. So head over to redhandedshop.com on the morning of the 28th of November and enter the discount code SPOOKYFRIDAY, all caps, all one word. That is very important. It will not work otherwise. And get yourself a 20% discount. So that is SPOOKYFRIDAY, all caps, all one word for 20% off

from the morning of the 28th of November until the end of Black Friday weekend. Enjoy! I'm Saruti. I'm Hannah. And welcome to Red Handed. Right, before we kick off, guys, this is going out on Thursday, the last Thursday of November. And we have decided to extend the Spooky Bitch merch until the 2nd of December.

Is that right, Hannah? Yep, 2nd of December at 5.30 GMT. So all of you Americans, you need to get in there before you think you do. Because we are ahead of you. Yeah, because that's like 9.30 a.m. Pacific time. So yeah. Yeah, so get it done this week if you want them, by the way. Exactly.

This weekend is going to be your very last opportunity to do so. So get your merch. I promise you, you won't be disappointed. I'm wearing mine right now. I wear mine all the time. As ever, link to redhandershop.com will be in the episode description. Head on over and check that out. Last week's episode went down well. People were very confused about everything, which I found very entertaining because that's how we felt. Though we did learn that charismatic Christians are actually a thing. So good for them. That's fun.

I mean, you learn something every day. And I was going to say, oh, and we also learned what sheriffs actually are. But I've already forgotten. I think it's like somebody very kindly posted on the Facebook group about it. I think it's to do with the sheriffs have no jurisdiction within city limits. That's the police, I think. That's it. That's it. So they like have jurisdiction over all of the non-town parts

or something of a county, whatever that means. But thank you for that. And thank you for also kindly letting us off the hook by saying, we're not American, so. But some people just expect us to know everything. So thank you very much. It's almost like we've run a true crime podcast. But no, thanks, guys.

That was really good to know. And now we know. With that, let's move on to today's case. In the early hours of Tuesday, the 26th of August, 2008, which was just after the August bank holiday here in the UK, a fire ripped through Ostbaston House, a five bedroom mansion set in 16 acres of beautiful land near Mazebrook in Shropshire. I also found it very distressing whenever I was like reading about this case that they call it

like Shrops. What? Shrops? I know that other counties are called beds, hearts and bucks, etc. But Shrops? Yeah, Shrops does sound funnier, doesn't it? I don't know why I find it funnier, but I do. I don't like it. I don't like it. Don't call it Shrops. Don't call it Shrops. Sorry, everyone currently residing in the county of Shropshire. There are just some name places that just are too much when they're shortened. Like we were talking about it when I saw you and it was like, what is it? Shabu? No, no, don't do it.

I think some name places are too much when they're full length, like fucking Slough and Staines. Like they ran out of fucking name places when they named those two. Oh, we've got some great name places in the UK, though, haven't we? Oh, Fingering Ho is my favorite. And there's Wayward Ho as well, also has an exclamation mark. Amazing. Amazing. And if you don't know what Shea Boo is, it's Shepherd's Bush. Just call it Shepherd's Bush, don't call it Shea Boo.

Please, I'm begging you. Back to Shrops, which is where the majority of our case today is set. The family who lived in Osbaston House, the house that burnt down that day, were the Fosters. 50-year-old Christopher Foster, 50-year-old Christopher Foster, 49-year-old Jill Foster, and their 15-year-old daughter, Kirstie. The extent of the damage to the house and the surrounding land was so intense that it was clear to investigators from the start that this had been very intentional. When investigators arrived at the scene,

they were not only taken aback by the sheer spread of the fire, but the fact that the huge gates at the front of the property had been blocked from the inside by a horse box. And the tyres of the horse box had even been blown out. It was starting to appear more and more like an organized hit in the days immediately after the fire a 200 person major incident team was assembled to work at this case and i think that tells you just how fucking big this house is and at first the family and friends were terrified and confused where were the fosters christopher foster was a successful self-made businessman. But had he got himself involved in something, or someone, that he shouldn't have? Had someone done this out of revenge?

Or had he torched the place himself and run off somewhere with his family? Or maybe a new family? And if that was the case, why? Christopher Foster was rich. He hardly needed the insurance money. His mother, Enid Foster, whom Jill and Christopher had actually invited over that bank holiday weekend, was certain that they hadn't burned the place down and run off. Why would they have invited her over if they'd planned this all along? But someone had intentionally started the fire. Now, all anyone could hope was that whatever had

happened, the family was safe somewhere. Investigators knew that the answer to every question that they had lay in that burnt-down house. But it was going to be days before they would be able to enter the devastated property to find out. In the meantime, the police therefore treated the Fosters as missing persons. And there were sightings all over the country. Sightings even came in from overseas. And this gave the Fosters' extended family hope. And until any bodies were found, the police did have to consider all options.

So the police started digging around into Christopher's finances while they waited for the house to be deemed safe to enter. And it turned out that at the time of his death, Christopher Foster had assets of 3.1 million pounds, but debts of 4.4 million, including three mortgages on Aspaston House. Therefore, it obviously doesn't take a math genius to work out that Christopher Foster was up to his neck in it. Even with my scraped GCSE in maths, I know that that is bad news. So maybe it was an insurance scam after all. But that still didn't answer the question of where the family were. Belinda Fathers, that's a funny name.

I read that as Belinda's Fathers then. I was like, who the fuck is Belinda? We haven't met her yet. Sorry. Belinda's father? Who was the foster's housekeeper? Okay, I've got it. I've got it. Belinda's father's then. I was like, who the fuck is Belinda? We haven't met her yet. Sorry. Good. Belinda's father? Who was the foster's housekeeper? Okay, I've got it. I've got it. Belinda's father's, the foster's housekeeper, came forward to help the police. But when they questioned her, she told them that she'd last seen the family on the Friday before the fire. And she said that they'd seemed totally normal. How many days is the Friday before?

So it's the Friday she sees them, then it's the Saturday, Sunday, Monday bank holiday, and it's Monday night, Tuesday morning that the house burns down. Got it. OK. Finally, three days after the fire had started, the investigators entered the house and immediately the scene looked very bizarre. The Foster family lived in this absolutely massive house with acres and acres of land. So unsurprisingly, they had four dogs. Kirsty was obsessed with show jumping, so the family also had three horses.

I'm not sure if any child needs three horses. She did. How does she look after? I mean, I suppose they're on full livery somewhere, but like... They live in the house, like not in the house. They live in the stables on the property. But they must have people who help with that kind of thing. Oh, they'll have stable hands for for sure I didn't find it in my

research possibly and I'm not even sure if like if you're doing events if you're doing competitions surely you have your favorite horse the best one and you just event with that one what happens to the other two I mean I think it's a pretty big theme of this whole um story is just overspending overstretching I mean also the extent of my horse knowledge is selling Katie Price's equestrian clothing line at Olympiath for two years in a row. So that's basically it. If you want a Diamante bridal, I can show you how to get one. Maybe I can get you a discount. Don't worry about it. I was on her TV show as well. I have absolutely no idea. No idea about anything horsey at all. I'm scared of horses.

Are you really? I'm scared of horses. Their eyes are just so big and rolly and like stamp on me. I'm dead. Game over. Like, no. Maybe only if they get you in the head. Or the chest. They crack a rib maybe. Or the back. Yeah. Yeah. Depends what you did. Depends how naughty you'd been. I like them. I think they're like very knowing. And these animals were beloved members of the Foster family. Belinda Fathers, the housekeeper, cried in the police interview to gay police officers as she named the horses. So it certainly seems like there's a very strong emotional connection there, certainly for Belinda. But on the scene, forensic investigators made a brutal discovery.

They found the horses, all three of them, dead in their stables. And they'd been shot in the head. The dogs were found on the grounds of the house. And just like the horses, they too had been shot in the head. When the animals were found, most of the foster's friends and family were more sure than ever that the fire couldn't have been the family's doing. They never would have left their animals, let alone kill them. But the police weren't so sure.

Miraculously, the security camera footage from the house had survived the fire, and it confirmed what I think the police already suspected. In the footage, they could see a man walking around the property at 3.26am, and that was on the morning of the fire, and he had in his hands a rifle with a silencer attached. That man, in that CCTV, rifle with a silencer attached. That man in that CCTV looked a lot like Christopher Foster. And maybe it could have been argued at first that perhaps there was an intruder on the property and Christopher was simply investigating with his gun.

But soon the police made another discovery in the charred and burnt out house. By the fireplace in the living room room they felt something spongy it turned out that it was human remains isn't that horrible that you end up spongy i can't think of a worse descriptor for me to end up as i know that is the way that the forensic investigators describe it they're like they're walking around in i want to say the ground floor of the house but now very much the only floor of the house. And everything is just burnt. I can't even explain to you how charred and like destroyed this house is. And they're just like one bit felt a little bit different and it felt spongy. And when you see photographs of this house, it is completely black. All of the floors of the house,

as I said, have completely collapsed. So it's just imagine the aerial shots, the way they look is just the exterior walls are still standing, but everything else has just completely caved in. The house is just like completely imploded. So the fact, I think, that they even spotted the remains is frankly amazing. So as they moved the body, or, you know, the human remains that they find, unbelievably, underneath that body, or what was left of it, they found a second body. The bodies were carefully removed,

and it turned out that the body that had been on top was that of Christopher Foster, and the body that was underneath was his wife, Jill. And they were obviously so badly damaged that they could only be identified by dental records. And Dr. Alexander Jan-Oldrick Kolar, the home office pathologist who carried out the post-mortem examinations on both the bodies,

was able to confirm that Jill had died as a result of a close-range gunshot wound to the back right-hand side of her skull. She was already dead when the fire had started. But the fire burned so hot that when they examined Jill's bones, they had basically fractured as a result of the heat from the fire. You hear about people's teeth exploding in fires, don't you? Yeah. Like, I think it's possible, like, it's just that level of heat just, like, does all sorts of horrendous things to the human body. Dr. Kolar was also able to determine that Christopher Foster had been alive while the house was on fire, and since he could find no injuries like gunshot wounds, he concluded that Christopher Foster had died of smoke inhalation.

Although the bodies had been found on the ground floor, the remains of the couple's bed were all around them. They were surrounded by the springs of their mattress. They had been in bed when the fire was raging. The bed had then fallen through multiple floors before it hit the ground floor. And next to the bodies and the remains of their bed, the police found a.22 caliber gun. And this gives us a clear indicator of how much of a mess this house was. Because the police couldn't go from room to room to investigate. It's not like they're doing a walking tour that an estate agent would give you. The house is essentially a shell and multiple floors are all in the same

enclosed space. So it must have been an absolute nightmare to sift through all of this rubble, debris and destruction. And it would have been painstaking work. But now a clear picture had started to emerge. It had been Christopher Foster. He had set the fire, he had shot the horses and the dogs and it seems his wife. And although many of the family hoped and prayed that maybe Kirstyirstie had managed to escape. Three days later, the police found another body. Once again, in bed, and the body had fallen through two floors and landed on the ground floor of the house. The body was, of course, Kirstie, and given that she had been found in her bed, police were sure that she, just like her mum, must have been already dead when the fire had started. The forensics team had to work very carefully. The damage to her body was so extensive

that they couldn't move Kirsty. Her remains were so fragile. But eventually, they were able to confirm that Kirsty had also been shot. It's really sad about Kirsty. The forensic investigators who work on the scene say they couldn't even use metal instruments on her. They had to just use brushes. That's all they could do because her bones were just falling apart because of how hot the fire had burned. And what's really sad is they essentially found bits and pieces of her, like her skull, some larger bones.

They took those away. They were able to, again, identify that it was her through dental records. But a lot of her bones were her skull, some larger bones. They took those away. They were able to again identify that it was her through dental records. But a lot of her bones were just left in the rubble. That's really sad. Because they never managed to find them. So it's like an archaeological dig more than a forensics investigation. Yeah, exactly. But it's just really tragic that so much of Kirsty's remains

just were never recovered from the site. They were just swept away with the rubble in the end which is tragic it's tragic this is um sounds unrelated but it kind of isn't you know dami's dad works on the crossroad for those of you who don't know dami is our mutual friend who was the one that introduced hannah and i and is the reason that we met each other i was talking to him about it once and he was talking about how, yeah, obviously everyone in London knows it's taking fucking ages. And he was like, well, the thing is,

like every time they find a Viking flip-flop, a team of guys have to come in and they dust it with feathers for a bit and they don't fuck off for six weeks. He didn't say fuck off. He's a very well-spoken man. But that was the gist. That's hilarious.

I have actually, I think I've read about that because I think they, not that I'm saying that Mr. Fajobi was doing this, but they use that as an excuse quite a lot for why they're so over budget and way past deadlines. It's all those Viking flip flops. It's got to be. And obviously, after the investigators found Kirstie's remains and were able to confirm that it was her, the entire family on both sides were devastated. Kirstie apparently had been the first girl born into the foster family for 65 years. And you could tell that they

all doted on her. Especially, apparently, her dad Christopher. According to his mum Enid. 65 years? I know. First girl. They're killing some baby girls, man. There's no way. 65 years? I don't buy that. But then I guess in 65 years, like, that's only a generation. Well, it's two generations, I suppose. Even still, I'm outraged.

Like, on both sides of my family, for my first cousins, I'm the only girl. All of everyone else is a boy. Yeah, and I suppose they would only be counting first cousins really, wouldn't they? We don't really fuck with second cousins in this country. I think they're probably only counting first cousins. But it sounds very grand when you say it, which is why I included it. But the point is, obviously they all doted on her. And I don't think that the people who say that her dad, Christopher Foster, doted on Kirsty are wrong.

Because investigators found all of the family's old photo albums out in the kitchen. So in this burnt out house. They seem to be right where Christopher would have been working to prepare the fire that night when he started it. And it certainly looked like Christopher had been sat looking at all of those photos the night that he had killed his entire family and belinda fathers their housekeeper said that she had been at the house as we said on friday and when she was there jill and christopher had been watching their wedding video and that they had both been incredibly emotional about it is that a thing people do?

I think so. Do people really sit and watch their wedding videos? Yeah. No shade if you do. I'm just interested. I've just never, I thought that's something that only happens in like Love Actually. I just didn't think it was something people actually do. I think it's something that happens in rom-coms and also clearly when you know you're about to murder your entire family.

Right. Fair enough. Yeah. I think that's it. Those are the only two categories. Those are only two times. So it is true, especially looking at the kind of expenditure, the lifestyle that the Fosters were living.

Christopher did indulge his wife and his daughter, Kirstie, on the driveway had been his and hers Porsches for him and Jill. And he'd also bought Kirstie, as we said earlier, kind of all the clothes and horses that she wanted. No one in the house wanted for anything but personally i can't help but feel that that was much more to do with christopher foster's narcissistic personality than i think like a real and deep and genuine feeling of love for his daughter and his wife but we'll come back to it it's reflective isn't it like yeah it's like oh i've got this perfect life in this perfect house and my wife is everything she wants and so does my

daughter and look at all of my lovely things like i think of course quite similarly to chris watts in a way i know we're going to come on to that later but like he sees them as possessions that are his that define his perfect life exactly they're extensions of him in the wider world. Right. Because he's like, without me, they can't exist. I feed them, I clothe them. And Jill didn't work. So he is, you know, he's the big man on house. Yeah, Billy Big Blonk's on house. Keep hold of that thought because we'll come back to it. Let's have a look at Christopher Foster's life as it stood. Shooting your entire family and torching your million pound mansion is unlikely to just come out of nowhere.

Even as a teenager, his mum Enid notes that Christopher was always very ambitious. And she proudly says that Christopher's dad nicknamed him Little Nero. That is horrifying. Like, does she know Little Nero. That is horrifying. Like, does she know who Nero... I feel like she does know exactly who Nero was. He was bananas. Nero kills his mum. Why are you being so happy about it?

Is he the one that shagged his sister as well? I can't remember. I get him and Caligula mixed up, but I think they were both at it. They were both pretty bad i know nero killed agrippina his mom and there's all that stuff about him being like the 666 and the number of the beast but apparently a lot of that has been debunked i watched quite an interesting documentary about it but still oh did you send it to me love that shit i will it's really interesting it's apparently because they translated his name using the numerals from Hebrew rather than Greek. Something like that. I'll send it to you. It's good.

Ah, schoolboy era. Classic. Classic classics. Oh, you did classics corner today. Well done. Thank you. But despite his ambitions, Christopher began his adult life fairly modestly. He was just an ordinary bloke from Wolverhampton. He worked as an ordinary salesman and lived in ordinary Telford in the Midlands. Telford, I'm sure you're lovely. It just fitted well in the sentence. But his life in the way he wanted to live it, ironically, given how it would end,

began in the flames of the giant Piper Alpha oil rig explosion of 1988. Piper Alpha was an oil production platform in the North Sea. Think of the thing that they work on in Armageddon. It's one of those. So this particular one was just off the northern coast of Scotland. So they were probably a bit less sweaty than they are in Armageddon. Because it's fucking freezing. And on the 6th of July, 1988, there was a catastrophic explosion on the platform.

And the explosion, plus the oil and gas fires that burned for days after killed 167 people and caused £1.7 billion worth of damage. Christopher, who was sat at home watching the fires burn, came up with an invention that could potentially stop such tragedies occurring again. He came up with a new type of oil rig insulation and he called it Olvershield. Could have made it sound a little bit less like vulva, couldn't he? Jesus. Oh my god, honestly, whenever I read that, I thought it sounds like the name for a fucking dental dam. Yeah, or like a moon cup, the vulva shield. Oh my god, because it kind of sounds like vulva and it kind of sounds like uvula,

which is like in your mouth. So I feel like dental dam. Yeah, it's just like none of, no good. What? Yeah, you're right. You're right. No shade on moon cups though. Save the environment.

Go with it. Or dental dam. Yeah, be safe. Oh my God. I can't. I can't. I haven't even thought about a dental dam since like year 11. I don't think we even showed them at school. The only time I've heard it spoken about by another person is when I went to go and see that show a couple of years ago, Sex Workers Opera.

And they had like a bit in there about a kid confusing a dental dam with a condom. But like that, I mean, easily done. The packets look exactly the fucking same. I really sound like I know too much about this. I'm going to stop talking. Okay. Yeah, let's move on from this topic. So this Ulva Shield, which was not a dental dam or anything else. It was basically like oil rig pipe insulation. Much less sexual than what we're talking about. I don't know. You don't know what people's kinks are.

I mean, yeah, I'm not here to kink shame, whatever fucking does it for you guys. Some people are only here for the insulation chat. I thought you said, I'm only here to kink shame. Yeah, that is my entire vibe, guys. Sorry. But whatever this thing was, I'll have a shield. It was awarded the incredibly highly sought after, but notoriously hard to get, A1 fire test rating. Which, again, not necessarily necessary for a dental dam. Did the boy band A1 come in and test it? Is that why it's so difficult to get? Because they're so busy these days doing panto and musical theatre.

But basically, once Christopher Foster was able to prove that the Arvishield worked, his company started absolutely raking it in. The big oil companies went after his product in a big way. And pretty soon, he was no longer just a bloke from Wolverhampton. Christopher Foster wanted a new life. And everyone described Christopher as needing to be a winner. He wanted to be admired. He wanted status.

So now, with a bank full of Overshield cash, he moved his family out of Telford and into the 1.2 million Osbaston house in 2003. And this is really reflective of, I think, like how impulsive Christopher Foster is. They bought this 1.2 million house just days after Jill saw it in Shropshire Life magazine. They just like see it and then just go buy it. And that's bang in the middle of the repression, isn't it? Or is it? No, am I before that? No, no. 2008 was the year that the depression, the depression, the year that the recession kicked off because that was the year that I started my undergrad.

Oh, no, no, no. Wait, they bought it in 2003, not 2008. This happens in 2008. Yeah. So they did buy it before the recession then. Got it. Got it. But no, that's really interesting because we'll come on to talk about the... We'll come back to this. Put a pin in it for now. We'll come back to it. Because I was thinking about it and I was like, 1.2 million does not sound that much for a big house in the country. But then when I worked out that it was pre-recession, I was like, okay, that sounds about right.

So anyway, they bought this house now and that was it. There was no looking back. Christopher Foster had gone from working class bloke to lord of the manor. And he started to spend uncontrollably. He developed a taste for expensive cars, pheasant shooting and guns. And he often splurged on handcrafted guns for himself, once spending 100k on three guns. That is an outrageous amount of money, like almost 20 years ago as well. Like what the fuck? And it appears that after the guns entered the house, Christopher's darker personality started to emerge. And it's quite difficult to get guns in this country.

Like, you need a license, like a hunting license. You get a hunting license, yeah. Jill and Kirsty were animal lovers. Jill raised doves, which seems... You know they are just pigeons? Yeah, they're just white pigeons. But genetically, they're exactly the same, apart from that their feathers are white.

I think it's just like another thing that was in Shropshire Life magazine. No shade on Jo, you know, she's got some hobbies. Well, yeah, exactly. Not going to give her a hard time. I bet she had a dove cut. Oh, yeah. You must have done if you're raising doves, hey? For sure.

Do people race doves like they race pigeons? Can doves like send messages or are they just like the pretty dumb cousin? I don't know how dumb they are. I can't speak to their intelligence, but I think it's like old men raise pigeons and like posh women like Jill raise doves. Interruption. All right. So it's the class divide. I can get into that. That's fine. And maybe she trained them to like be released from people's hands at weddings. I feel like that's the only thing people use doves for really, isn't it? Yeah, I don't know what you use doves to do. Like, who knows? I don't know. I didn't look into it actually.

Next week's episode exclusively on doves. Special Patreon episode on how to raise doves and why. Why don't we be like that experiment at school when they give you a bag of flour and you have to keep it not broken for a week. We could just do, we get a dove each and the first one to make it die loses to make it die so as we said earlier kirsty had dogs and horses don't know how into the dove she was i think that was probably just her mum's thing and kirsty did have a favorite dog who was a black lab called holly but holly started chasing sheep and it became a bit of a problem. Christopher tried to

control the dog, but he couldn't. And he couldn't stand that. So one day he took Holly down a country lane and shot her. Didn't take her to puppy training school. Was just like, I can't deal with this with my own man hands. So I'm going to kill you. Yeah, that's it. That's it. I can't deal with this. I hate that you disrespect me by not listening. I'm going to kill you. Yeah, that's it. That's it. I can't deal with this. I hate that you disrespect me by not listening. I'm going to fucking shoot you. That's it. And it didn't seem like Kirsty would even be allowed to be angry about her dog being killed. By all accounts, Kirsty loved her dad, but she knew not to get on the wrong side of him.

So let's have another look at Christopher's spending. He'd bought the house, two Porsches, an Aston Martin and a 4x4 and a tractor. And then, of course, you can sprinkle in there as well a multitude of expensive holidays, membership to pricey clay pigeon shooting clubs and all the other fixings of a nouveau riche lifestyle. Oh, and don't forget the mistresses. Christopher apparently had up to eight and they do not come cheap. I imagine it to be like the house that Sophie's parents live in Peep Show.

Yeah, exactly. That's like, that's the life they're living, no? Just like loveless marriage. That's exactly it. Lots of things. No Nana's Cottage though, just the stables. No Nana's Cottage. Christopher's PA says that they apparently

had an open marriage, him and Jill. I don't know how much of a Jill was into the open marriage. I think. Yeah, fucking right. I think Christopher just did what he wanted. And there wasn't really anywhere else that Jill could go. So she just let him do what he wanted, I think. Yeah, right.

And as if the spending wasn't enough, Christopher Foster also started to make business cock-ups. In 2003, he contracted a UK firm called DRC to make his Olvershield. And it was clear in the contract this was to be an exclusive deal. Only they would be allowed to manufacture this product. But by 2005, Christopher Foster's debts were far higher than his assets. So he turned to an American manufacturer who could produce his Olvershield more cheaply but he soon found himself very fucked very fast

because he had gone and had this American manufacturer make a shit ton of his product and then realised that he couldn't sell any of it because he had sold DRC, the UK company, the patent. Rookie error. Keep the patent yourself, mate. That's rule number one. Honestly, I don't know. I don't know. This man needs to watch some Dragon's Den. What's happening? Stay tuned for us appearing on Dragon's Den, by the way. I really feel like we should.

I know. I really, let's go on Dragon's Den. I think we can do it. I'm going to do it. I'll look up the application. It's got to be out there somewhere. I just want Deborah Meaden to notice us. Like, Deborah, I'll give you money. We love you, Deborah Meaden. Just please, Deborah, can I come and live in your house? I just want to give her a hug, if nothing else. I love her. Is she definitely still on it? Oh, yeah. Yeah, yeah, for sure. But after this fuck up, Foster did get sued by DRC, but he didn't actually lose all his money at this point. Actually, once DRC took charge and essentially pushed him out, but he was still getting money from the business, they actually acted more sensibly with dealings and the business started flourishing again.

But now, essentially kicked out of his own company, Christopher Foster found himself with not much else to do but sit at home, and that made his spending intensify quite significantly. So despite his initial riches, Christopher spent so much so fast that by the time of his death, the Foster family were largely living on credit alone. And Jill didn't have a clue. But there's no doubt that Christopher was fully aware of the hole that he was digging himself. In the spring of 2008, he went to his GP and told his doctor that he was feeling depressed and suicidal. He was prescribed antidepressants, but financially,

the situation was just too far gone. And in August 2008, the bailiff started knocking. Have you ever had a bailiff experience? It's fucking scary. No, I haven't. But I think it's a really horrible thing. There was that story, was it last year, of that really young boy, I think he was like 15, who had somehow managed to get himself into online debt. And the bailiffs were constantly coming to his house, coming to his house, coming to his house, and killed himself. I think that's actually a really common thing that happens. and I don't know like my mum will watch things like can't pay will take away and I'm like oh mum this is so like fucking unethical I hate this I hate it

that's bad I had like through no fault of my own I was house sitting one summer while a friend of mine uh went traveling to India and she didn't realize that so she'd graduated her BA and she was going to go and do a law conversion but she didn't realize that the summer in between those two things she counted as not a student so she didn't pay her council tax because she thought she was still a student but for those months she wasn't but because she was away and I was housing her flat I was the one getting like big red letters from the bailiffs being like we are coming to your house and I was the one getting like big red letters from the bailiffs being like we are coming to your house and I was like well what happens if they get in because it's my shit they're gonna take but luckily like it was in like a block of flats and they had to get through two doors and

a lift before they got to my door and like the chances of them but like I mean I don't know if it's true but you hear about like you know if they if you leave a window open they're allowed to come in that way. But I was on like the fifth floor, so it was nothing happened, basically. Oh, but I rang them and I tried to explain the situation. And this guy was like, doesn't really work like that, sweetheart. Great. Thank you very much. It was traumatic for however old I was, 21-year-old Hannah.

Mine pales in comparison. I think the closest I've ever come to an experience like that is when we were students. We just didn't pay our TV license. We used to watch loads of TV. You animal. And then we would like just be constantly scared that the TV license people would come around and like fine us. That was it.

You are so rock and roll. I pay my TV license now. It's fine. Can we just talk for a second about the Prince Andrew interview? Have you seen it? I haven't watched it yet, but I have enjoyed the memes. He is a fucking... Okay, again, not to go on a royalist rant. I won't do it. You already know how I feel about it. Fuck that guy. He's like, no, I didn't rape all those girls. I was in a pizza express in Woking. And I'm not joking.

That's what he says. That's what he says. He's never been to Woking, let alone a Pizza Express. Come on. Punch that man in the face, somebody, for the love of God. Anyway, back to this. A business associate of Christopher's, his name was Mark Bassett, said that Chris confessed to him about the financial distress he was in

and told him that he could not subject his family to a, quote, degrading change of lifestyle. Mark reports that Chris also told him, quote, they're not having my stuff. I'll top myself. They'll carry me out of this house in a box. And by the end of the month, Christopher Foster had made up his mind. He was going to top himself. He wasn't going to leave his family behind. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to life some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle.

And in 1985, they announce they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space aboard the Space Shuttle Challenger, along with six other astronauts. But less than two minutes after liftoff, the Challenger explodes. And in the tragedy's aftermath, investigators uncover a series of preventable failures by NASA and its contractors that led to the disaster. Follow American Scandal on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. Experience all episodes ad-free and be the first to binge the newest season only on Wondery+. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.

Start your free trial today. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near L.A. in 1983. There were many questions surrounding his death. The last person seen with him was Laney Jacobs, a seductive cocaine dealer who desperately wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite.

Together, they were trying to break into the movie industry. But things took a dark turn when a million dollars worth of cocaine and cash went missing. From Wondery comes a new season of the hit show Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of The Cotton Club Murder early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. Harvard is the oldest and richest university in America. But when a social media-fueled fight

over Harvard and its new president broke out last fall, that was no protection. Claudine Gay is now gone. We've exposed the DEI regime, and there's much more to come. This is The Harvard Plan, a special series from the Boston Globe

and WNYC's On The Media. To listen, subscribe to On The Media wherever you get your podcasts. Can we also just say like this point, I did do some reading into what happens if you declare bankruptcy. It's not a nice thing to do, but it lasts like a year. They take all of your non-essential assets to pay your creditors. And then you get to start again I'm sure it's a horrible experience and I wouldn't wish it on anybody but like there was a way out for Christopher from this situation there was a way out but he didn't choose to take it because of the degrading change in lifestyle yeah he just clearly saw it as not an option exactly to be seen as someone who'd lost it all.

Definitely, because before we move on, let's unpack all of this information for a minute. Because I think the level of narcissism that we see in this case with Christopher Foster is so extreme. Christopher Foster screams to me of like a deeply insecure man. Status and success and image completely consumed him he was willing to bankrupt himself and his family to maintain a lifestyle that allowed him to mix in the circles he wanted to belong to that he felt entitled to and i don't doubt that he probably like loved his family on some level narcissistic people can like love as long i think as they are getting something out of it in return and his family like you said earlier Hannah gave him respectability they were like his property to send out into the world to be a reflection of him they were an extension of him as a person

of him as a man and there are different types of family annihilators which is very much what Christopher Foster is consider as Hannah brought up earlier Chris Watts and we covered him a while ago and if you haven't listened to that case if you don't know about that case go listen to that episode. He killed his entire family so that he could start again with his mistress. There is also a Dr. Phil podcast about this called The Devil Beside Me. I've just finished listening to it. It's worth a listen for sure because there's been a lot more information that's come out since Hannah and I covered the case like way, way back at the start of the year, almost immediately as soon as the trial finished. And another fun fact about Dr. Phil that we learned this week, he is worth more than Beyonce. Yes, yes. So much money. Significantly. Look it up. Shocked. Hannah and I sat in a pub the other day and played Net Worth Top Trumps.

Where we just guessed people's net worth. I also loved that we were playing that game while Owen Jones, the most anti-capitalist man in London, was sat like two tables away from us. We also looked him up. Yeah, that made it extra special. I'm not sure we'll ever capture that ambience of Net Worth top trumps again. We'll just have to follow Owen Jones around. We will. We will.

It will never be as fun as it was when you're playing it sat next to him. So Chris Watts, like we said, he killed his whole family. But in that case, that Chris spared himself. Because I think there are multiple reasons. I think in my opinion, firstly, he had a very different motive. He had a mistress. He wanted to start a new life with her. But also, I think secondly, I really believe that Chris Watts is a psychopath.

He felt no remorse for what he did. He's never shown any remorse at all for what he did. He feels no guilt. He's like so sociopathic that when you watch him even now, he isn't even able to mimic what he thinks a normal person would feel in that situation. He can't even get that right. He's so shit at this. And by saying this, we're definitely not letting Christopher Foster off easily. All I'm saying is I don't necessarily think that Christopher Foster is a psychopath. I think that he's a narcissist. And this is obviously just my

opinion. Because narcissists, unlike psychopaths, when they do something wrong, they feel shame. Whereas psychopaths, when they do something wrong, they don't really feel anything. And like we said, Chris Watts never displays any shame, any remorse, anything to this day. But I do think Christopher Foster's actions are reflective of shame to some degree. Oh, I completely agree. Chris Watts is more than happy in prison with his new pen pal wives. I think he really thought he'd get away with it. And if he didn't, he's like, oh, damn.

Yeah. All of the research pretty much shows that psychopaths don't really respond to punishment so i think he's just probably annoyed that he's being deprived of his freedom but it's not really going to be impacting him in the way that we would like it to and i'm pretty sure that's why christopher foster killed himself a narcissist couldn't stick around and risk having everyone know what he'd done and what a failure he was. Narcissists need to be admired. A psychopath is not really bothered with what other people think of them. And Foster couldn't just kill himself and leave his family to discover what a mess of the finances he'd made, because by all accounts, Jill had absolutely no idea

about the monetary hole that they were in. The fact that he even invited his mum over that weekend as well. I think that he fully intended to kill her as well. And that way, she isn't left thinking badly of little Nero either. So the best thing for Foster to do in his own narcissistic mind was just to burn everything down to the ground and be done with it. We spoke briefly about the different types of family annihilators in the Chris Watts episode, but let's take another look at it, especially since I think Foster falls into a totally different category. Newsweek did a really interesting article on family annihilators called Inside the Mind of Family Annihilators, and we'll link it in

the episode description so you can have a look at it for yourself. The article examines a 10-year study that has been carried out on familicide. The research has been incredibly useful on providing insights into this type of crime. Neil Webstale, a professor at Northern Arizona University who wrote the book on family annihilators, and it's called Familiocidal Hearts, the Emotional Styles of 211 Killers, and he says that most annihilators have a few of the same traits firstly they're almost always men and they are almost always white and they generally feel that they have failed to live up to society's expectations of them as a man webbs dale also discusses what separates different types of family annihilators. He calls one group livid, coercive killers and the other group civil, reputable killers.

And I think that we can think of these in the following way. Livid, coercive killers are driven by rage and control. Civil, reputable killers are driven by a sick sense of altruism. And how Christopher Foster fits into this category, in my opinion, is uncanny. Richard Gelles, who is the dean of the, or was the dean when this article was written, of the School of Social Policy and Practice at the University of Pennsylvania,

describes this type of killer, so the civil reputable killers, as a man whose entire identity is in his family the father will almost always consider suicide as the only escape from a financial crisis and murdering his family is a way of rescuing them from the hardship and shame of bankruptcy and his lone suicide it fits perfectly it's exactly what christopher foster said about the whole like not wanting to give them this degrading lifestyle change exactly he's like how could they possibly live without me and if we compare this to chris watts who in our opinion is absolutely a livid

coercive killer he felt such rage towards his wife sh. And there is actually a new book that has come out like really recently, I think. And it's called Letters from Christopher. And it's basically like this woman called Sherilyn Cadel, who has been sort of like pen palling with Chris Watts in prison. And he's written her all these letters where he essentially like completely told her the whole story of what happened. And she's turned it into a book. And I't know like I guess go read it I feel a bit conflicted because Shanann's family are like really pissed off about the book they're not happy at all

that it's been published but it is out there and it is like a thorough from his perspective story of exactly what happened in this book from the letters that he writes Cheryl in, Chris Watts talks about the day when he kills Shanann and drives her out to the oil rig to dump her body. And he dug this shallow grave and he pushes Shanann. And remember, at this point, she's basically like, I think she's like something like ridiculous, like seven or eight months pregnant. She's like, very, very pregnant. And he digs the shallow grave and he sort of like throws her body into it. And he says in the letters that she landed face first into the shallow grave. And it's really horrific. It's in the Dr. Phil podcast as well. He refers a lot to

this book. He says that she gave birth, the unborn baby kind of like came out as well. And he's just saying this so matter-of-factly in the letters, saying that she's face down in the mud. And he goes, and I was so angry at her that I didn't even want, he didn't basically didn't want to reposition, I didn't want to move her into a less humiliating position. Because of the anger and the rage that he felt towards her, his pregnant wife that he had just murdered. For not letting him have an affair like he wanted to exactly this fucking bitch it's unbelievable do all family

annihilators work in oil by chance i did actually i did think that when i was doing this it's very weird connection i suppose it's big money isn't it big money big power quick rise to the top which is interesting because it's also heavily linked to like the financial downfall for both of them though because Chris Watts was in huge amounts of debt so was Chris Foster which is again quite interesting to the point you raised that in this 10-year study that they did they also tried to link it to like financial recessions and like when the market shrinks does that lead to an increase in familial size. They couldn't really conclusively show that but I think in a micro level, absolutely financial distress is a huge indicator of family annihilation for sure. Especially when

you think it's linked back to a man not sort of feeling like he's lived up to society's expectations of him. But enough of Chris Watts, let's get back to our story and get back to the day of the fire. So on that bank holiday Monday, the Foster family had gone to a neighbour's barbecue and shooting party like they did every year. The Hughes family who hosted the barbecue said that they thought Chris Foster seemed pretty normal, chatty and jovial, just like he always was at the event. But Foster's true mood started to surface as they left the party. When they returned home, the Fosters that is, on the CCTV you see Jill get out and go into the house. Kirstie goes to let the dogs out of the kennels and Christopher parks the car in the garage. It's so chilling to watch because you know that Christopher Foster already knows what he's going

to do. And his family have got no idea that in just a few short hours, they'll be dead. When they got in, Kirsty went straight to her room, was chatting with her mates on MSN and Bebo. Fucking hell, Bebo. I haven't thought about that in literally 15 years, maybe even more. I think I only had it for a very brief amount of time. Yeah, I didn't really use Bevo, but MSN, MSN Messenger, oh yes. Good times. But not really also awful times. Chris came into Kirsty's room to check on her a bit later on

and I think he realised that she was still awake and he told her to go to sleep and then went back to the master bedroom. In the master bedroom, Jill was already asleep, so Foster pulled out the gun and shot her. And imagine the feeling at that point. He knows it's all over,

he knows it's done, and there's absolutely no turning back now. So when he shot Jill, he had shot her with a silencer on the gun. So Kirsty, who was on the same floor,

but like, it's a massive fucking house, she's like miles away, but even then, she just doesn't hear anything because of the silencer. So she has absolutely no idea what's happening. So she's still on MSN. But suddenly, the internet went out. And Kirsty text her friends saying her dad had turned the internet off.

So she was going to bed. Her friend text back, telling her to just turn it back on. But Kirsty replied saying, he's too close, I'm scared, goodnight, love you. Foster had obviously cut the internet. I think to get his teenage daughter to go to sleep. So that he could kill her. And once Christopher Foster was sure that Kirsty was sleeping,

he snuck into her room and shot his daughter in the head. Christopher Foster shot both Kirstie and Jill between the hours of 12.14am and 3.12am. And I was honestly surprised by how large a window of time that is. It's over three hours between when he first shoots Jillill and when he shoots kirsty i mean i guess perhaps he's waiting for kirsty to fall asleep but it does absolutely show that he did not snap he had time to stop time to change his mind but he did it anyway how has she not heard it i know he's got a silencer but they're not a hundred percent i think it's just a massive house as well like i'm pretty sure there's another word for it we're gonna get loads of gun people

telling us we got it's not a silencer you know i think it's got another name i think whatever i don't know about guns that's what they call it in all the articles uh yeah i think it's a very obscure gun fact so after he'd shot his, Foster then went outside and calmly set four fires, two inside the house and two outside the house. CCTV footage taken between 3.12am and 3.49am showed Christopher Foster starting these fires and then moving the dead dogs that he'd shot. Then he moved the horse box in front of the gates and shot out the tires. The security video then shows him walking away from the barn as it exploded so he's obviously moved the horse box in front of the gate so no one can get in and help

exactly which is also very interesting because it's like they're both dead so it's not like someone can come in and save them so what is he stopping people from being able to do put the fire out of the house but you're all going to be dead. Like, they're both dead. I think it's maybe getting there while he's still alive is something he doesn't want to do. Yeah, I guess so. I guess so. That makes sense, yeah. So now for the house. To make sure that the destruction would be absolute,

Christopher Foster laid pipes from an oil tank which he used to fuel his oil-run central heating system. And then he ran these pipes into the stables the garage and the main house he ran the oil through the pipes using 200 gallons of it and boom after he was sure that the fire had taken hold christopher foster walked up the stairs of his burning mansion and climbed into bed beside his wife jill and let the smoke kill him to override your like survival instinct like that is really something how much he's being driven by a need to complete this over and above his like natural biological urge to run away from that fire is alarming it really so terrifying

but again let's consider all this information. Why the absolute destruction of the house? What does that say about Christopher Foster? I also wonder if putting the horse box in front of the gate was, A, like you said, very good point to stop anybody from being able to save him or get there before he's done what he needs to do. Or is it also to stop anybody putting the fire out because he wants the house to be completely destroyed? Because he puts all these pipes in, he pumps 200 gallons of oil into the property to make sure that fire rages. He shot his wife and his daughter. What's the fire for? It's not to conceal a crime. The crime's very obvious. It's, in my opinion, i think it says about him exactly what

he said about himself when he was still alive if he couldn't have it no one was gonna have it not even the dogs why did he fucking shoot the dogs why not just let him go it's not like they can tell on him is it i genuinely think it's so no one can have anything that was his and i also think with the 200 gallons of oil, it was completely destroyed, this house. I think it was because he didn't want anyone living in that house after him. That's his house. It's going with him. He wanted everything completely raised to the ground. Everything and everyone had to be annihilated. And like we said earlier in the episode, when someone does something like this, there are, of course, red flags along the way.

Christopher Foster was the eldest of two brothers, but he and his brother Andrew were never really close. Andrew Foster even mentions that he thought it was really odd when Christopher asked him to be best man when he married Jill. I personally think that it was because he didn't really have many other close friends and i think obviously appearances are very important to a narcissist so he asked his brother to be best man yeah and weddings are so political i know so many people who've had to have a cousin as the bridesmaid who they fucking hate like i i know so many people who've got like shithead brothers who they have no interest in but they're like my mum will literally never die a happy woman unless like and if it was this then that was the very last time they ever really basically ever really hung out because andrew says that after that wedding the two barely spoke for the next 16 years and andrew says that there were many times

during those 16 years when he thought about visiting his brother, but he decided not to. And he told his wife, quote, I wouldn't because I'd get a 12-bore thrust at me. I knew him better than anybody. And after the fire, he made a very disturbing revelation about his brother. Andrew told officers that when he was 11 and Christopher was 15 or 16, Chris told him about the facts of life. And apparently this went on for a while.

But soon, Christopher was showing his little brother pornographic magazines. And after that, Andrew alleges that he started to sexually abuse him. So that's Christopher sexually abusing Andrew, not the other way around. And Andrew said that this happened at least once a week for years. And Andrew, speaking to the press, said, quote, this explains why Chris and I didn't see each other much as adults. I want people to know the truth. Some people think I was envious of Chris, but I've never been. But I never have been. The abuse was about control, and I had to break away from him. He always denied it but there was a pattern in Chris's life and it revolved around controlling other people.

And I think Andrew's right. I think he did know Christopher better than anybody else because I think that sums it up. So yeah, that is the story of Christopher Foster, a family annihilator but very different, I think, from Christopher Watts. Oh, I think it's a very different story. It's quite White House farmy in a way

but sort of less of a mystery. Yeah, very White House farmy. Definitely, definitely. Which is actually a big case study for family annihilations whenever you sort of Google that and look into that story. Again, if you haven't listened to our story on the White House farm, God, we did that fucking years ago, but it's in there somewhere. Go have a listen. I think it's episode like eight or something. Please forgive the sound. I really like that episode. That was one of my most like interesting cases, I think that we've covered.

So yeah, go have a listen. Apart from that, you guys know the drill. Spooky bitch merch. Link is in the episode description. You won't hear this again from us because this is the end of that particular run. So don't say we didn't warn you.

Aside from that, you can also, of course, follow us on all the social medias at red handed the pod you can also head on over to patreon and we gave a lovely explanation of what patreon was at the start of last week's episode if you would like to be a part of that please head over to patreon.com slash red handed and you can make your pledges there. Here are some wonderful people who have done so. So, thank you very much. Lizzie, Nim Derringer, Laura Sanford, Son Shu, Ashley Hastings, Harley Gomez, Heidi McCauley. Macaulay, it's like a Korean wine.

It's gross. Tiffany Bozeman, Rita Basil, but also, oh, sorry, she's put how to pronounce it. Thank you, Rita. Rita Basil, Jessica Hamilton, Tiffany, Georgie Riddle, Megan or Megan Crafton. Definitely Megan. No one's called Megan. Yes, they are. It's a really common name in Australia.

No way. way yes it is no way Jose I did my masters with a girl called Megan and she told me and I thought oh what an interesting name and she was like

oh in Australia there were like 10 girls in my class called Megan it's a really common name so there you go I win this round I think Sissy

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Ashlyn. Ashlyn Stringer, Alize Navke, Lizzie, Laura, Nailess, Sarah Haynes, and then it is Hannah's turn. Tatiana Larson, Charlotte Collins, Kathy Margulies, Gabby Zofie with a Z, Leslie, Imani Gandhi, Kiran Bra, Kate Carman, Denise Thomas, Florencia M, Sarah Campbell, Alison Graves, Jennifer Sharp, Lisa Slangalang, Alejandra Elizondo, I think, Crystal Atkinson, Marley Gray, Clara Schiffman, Jodie Umansky. Are you related to Kay Umansky, the authors of the, what's the name of, Pongwiffy, the witch books? If you are, please Instagram me because I love Kay Umansky. If if you're not i'm sure you're still great um colleen skisorski alexis hamner maya lorraine mitch augard uh laney goodman

bambi haggins laura dundarvin courtney ross antonia malloy john den denya eleanor disney oh um got that disney money coming in um stephanie pinchler and amanda fontaine thank you guys for that thank you yeah thanks for for that for all of that it's great do you know what i had a look at the um we need to put a one sheet together for something that's a secret but i was looking at the old one sheet we did sort of January time this year, which was before we signed for our agent. We put that one together. And in that one sheet, it says,

Red Handed is supported by Patreon donations of $1,900 a month. And now we are at over $12,000. And that is down to you in how many months since March? That's crazy. You guys are amazing. Honestly, like, obviously obviously we went on about it quite a lot in last week's episode, but genuinely,

it is just me and Hannah. And it just makes the world of difference to us. Because, yeah, got to pay all that tax and got to pay all those bills. So you guys are really helping us with that.

So thank you. Thank you, guys. You are the best. We will see you next week. When it will be December. Oh, fuck that noise, man. No, but we have got a very exciting December for you. We will see you next week. When it will be December. Oh, fuck that noise, man. No, but we have got a very exciting December for you. We've got a case. Yes, we do. We've got one that you've all been waiting for. And it is Christmassy. Those of you who are listening to

the very end and those of you who are hardcore will already have guessed. So yes. But we're not going to give you that in the first week of December. We don't want to give you that. It will be like week three or something. I can't remember. But we'll see you next week for something else. Bye. Bye. Bye.

I'm Jake Warren. And in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mum's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now exclusively on Wondery Plus. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey to help someone I've never even met. But a couple of years ago, I came across a social media post by a person named Loti. It read in part, Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him.

This is a story that I came across purely by chance but it instantly moved me and it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding and this this time, if all goes to plan, we'll be finding Andy. You can listen to Finding Andy and Finding Natasha exclusively and ad-free on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. He was hip-hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune, and the music industry. The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Cone. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about. Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so.

Yeah, that's what's up. But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down. Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom. I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real. From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace, from law and crime, this is the rise and fall of Diddy. Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery Plus.