RedHanded - Episode 217 - Stephen McDaniel: The Killer with the Key

Episode Date: October 14, 2021

Lauren Giddings had a strange feeling; she couldn’t shake the sense that someone had been coming into her apartment. But nothing was ever out of place and nothing was ever missing, so she tried to put the scary thought out of her head. Less than a month later Lauren’s torso was found wrapped in a plastic sheet in the bins behind her building. UK TOUR 2021 - new dates added! Get your tickets here: https://linktr.ee/RedHandedthepod Book: https://linktr.ee/RedHanded_Book Subscribe to our new YouTube Channel: YouTube - Subscribe Pre-order a copy of the book here (US & Canada): Signed copies - US & Canada Pre-order on Wellesley Books Pre-order on Amazon.com Pre-order a copy of the book here (UK, Ireland, Europe, NZ, Aus): Signed copies - UK, Ireland, Europe, NZ, Aus Pre-order on Amazon.co.uk Pre-order on Foyles Follow us on social media: Instagram Twitter Facebook Visit our website: Website Contact us: Contact Sources: redhandedpodcast.com See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. 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. Hello, everyone. Before we get on with today's episode, I have a very quick, very exciting announcement to share with all of you. Hannah and I are starting a brand new podcast. It's called Sinister Societies. And Sinister Societies is a Spotify original that we have

worked with the lovely people at Spotify and Parcast to produce. New episodes are going to drop every single Tuesday, starting next Tuesday, which is the 19th of October. And it will just be me and Hannah, as it is on Red Handed except there we'll be taking a deep dive look every week at a different faith following religious organization secret club sinister societal organization and discussing how these kind of groups which are basically cults have managed to permeate into everyday society without being noticed and how many of us unwittingly have financially contributed to them. So if that sounds like something you might be interested in then head on over to Spotify

on Tuesday the 19th of October for the very first episode and then join us every single week after that. Thanks and on with the show. I'm Saruti. I'm Hannah. And welcome to a very special episode of Red Handed being recorded on Hannah's birthday. It is the day of my birth. I'm Hannah. And welcome to a very special episode of Red Handed being recorded on Hannah's birthday. It is the day of my birth. Happy birthday, Hannah. Thank you very much. We've got a live studio audience that is my dog. So if you hear it, she's a quiet dog, but if you do hear any noises, it's her. So forgive her for it. She's very old. I just wish our one studio audience could have a laugh track wouldn't that be a fun new experience for us but sadly she doesn't she just sits there and looks at us longingly for treats yeah I wish she

had opposable thumbs so she could text me and I could check that she was okay but unfortunately we haven't got to that stage where dogs can text but what we have got to is if you are listening to any episode where we talk about how much everyone in this office loves Magic Spoon, no one loves Magic Spoon in this office more than Puddle. Very true. Very, very true. She does love a bit of the Magic Spoon. She's had quite a lot. But yeah, happy birthday to Hannah. Please excuse any noises from our live studio audience. That's it. Shall we get on with it? Let's do it. Excellent. Hannah, have you ever come home from a long day at work school or whatever and had an eerie feeling that somebody had been there whilst you were out not in my new house and my sister actually she said she used to she has sleep paralysis sometimes and she used to have

it in her old house all the time and she hasn't had it once in my house so i think that's a solid it is not haunted oh that's good news yeah i mean it's only 15 years old so it would be a job to haunt it but no i think i have said this before my mom's house one of the bedrooms that i used to sleep in but i refuse to sleep in anymore i do hear breathing in the night and there's no way that it can be anyone because it just the sound sound just wouldn't carry. I hate that. Yeah. Yeah. And I had a funny feeling about that room when I was a kid too. So that one has a vibe. Other than that, no, I don't think I have ever, oh, apart from my extremely haunted Korean apartment, I felt like someone was there all

the time. That's true. The haunted cat. Yeah. And the haunted pulling the sheets off me in the middle of the night, whoever that was. Yeah. No, thanks. Actually, I've slept very well in my new house that we all thought was going to be haunted for sure yes actually we will talk about this because we have to to claim it as a business expense we went to go and see 222 a ghost story and we're not going to give away the ending because it is so good but it the theme a running theme is like young professionals buying up old houses in the east end and ripping their hearts out.

I just kept looking like side-eyeing Saru through the whole thing. But no, if you are in London and you can get tickets to go see it, what's it called? 2.22 A Ghost Story. Yeah. Definitely would recommend. It's a really good play and we had a really good time. And we actually met a couple of spooky bitches there.

So hello, whoever you are. I can't remember your names. Sorry. Yes. So not in my new house, but I don't think, I don't know. I'm pretty sure I so not in my new house but I don't think I don't know I'm pretty sure I've told you the story but I don't think I've told it on the show before and I won't do it here we'll save it for under the duvet about when I was in my third year of uni and how I definitely felt like someone was coming in and out of my room and out of my apartment

the shoes the shoes and the folder the folder the watch and I definitely and this is absolutely true on the advice of my mother started sleeping with a bag of flour propped up against my door so that if anybody had been coming into my room at night which I genuinely felt like was happening the bag of flour would get knocked over and I'd know that the door had been opened I thought you're gonna say she told you to put like salt over the threshold. That's probably what I would have done. Also, salt over the threshold and a bag of flour. The whole pantry just in front of the door just to make sure you're safe.

But no, I think we can all say that we've had that feeling probably at some point in our lives. And usually we just shake this off, rationalising that we're just being paranoid. I mean, the door was locked when you left and it was still locked when you came back, right? No windows were open, and nothing was missing. So it's just a feeling based on probably nothing. But saying that, maybe sometimes we should listen to these sorts of feelings, these sort of sixth sense inklings. After all, we could say that that feeling or that intuition is there to protect us. That's what Tommy Fury says. You've got to listen to your gut. That's why it's there. He was from Love Island before it got super problematic. Well,

it was problematic, but it got super duper problematic after that season. He's like Tyson Fury's cousin or whatever. He won. He yeah okay yeah yeah there we go guys top advice from the winners of Love Island and if Lauren Gidding had maybe listened to her feelings she might still be here today now of course this is not to blame Lauren because nobody sixth sense inklings or weird eerie spine tingling, goose bump inducing feelings, whatever, nobody could have predicted what was coming Lauren's way. After returning back to her apartment one night, Lauren had this same feeling that somebody had been in her apartment. And she even emailed her boyfriend, who was in another state at the time, saying that she was sure that some of her things had been moved around

and that she feared someone had broken in and that she was afraid to stay there for much longer. Less than a month later, Lauren's decapitated torso was discovered by police, wrapped in plastic in the building's dumpsters. At the age of 27, Lauren Giddings had just graduated from law school at Mercer University, and her dream of becoming a criminal lawyer was so close to becoming a reality. All she had to do now was pass the Georgia Bar exam. It was the 12th of June 2011, and Lauren, like many of her classmates, decided to stay in town and not to return home to Maryland

for the holidays. Her apartment was opposite Mercer University in Macon, Georgia. She had told her family that she needed to study non-stop for the bar over the next few weeks, so when they didn't hear from her and she didn't respond to their texts or calls, they weren't that alarmed, they just assumed that she was focusing on her work. Lauren was the only member of her family to ever attend college, something they were extremely proud of. And they didn't want to distract her from studying for one of the most important exams of her life. And it was only after four days had passed, with nobody having heard from Lauren, that alarm bells began to ring. Lauren's sister Caitlin called, emailed and texted her in the week leading up to her disappearance,

but the messages weren't about anything serious. So when Lauren didn't respond, she didn't think much of it. Again, they're all just thinking that Lauren is incredibly busy studying for this exam. However, Lauren's friends from college, they had begun to worry about her well-being. And they'd actually even asked the police to check in on her. So officers went to Lauren's apartment. But when they couldn't see any signs of a break-in from the outside,

they decided to leave without any further investigation. That's not really a welfare check, is it? No, that's just like, oh, this apartment hasn't been broken into as far as I can tell from the outside. I feel like at the very least a welfare check you need to go inside. This is the thing. If the police have taken this request for a welfare check from her friends seriously enough that officers have gone to Lauren's door or to her building. And then why not just take that extra step further by like trying to get inside? So Lauren's close friend, Ashley Morehouse, phoned Lauren's sister and told her how nobody had seen

or heard from Lauren in almost a week, and that her phone was dead. Caitlin immediately phoned Lauren's boyfriend. Her friends, both in Atlanta and Maryland, had even phoned a number of hospitals in Macon, but nobody had any idea where Lauren was. So on the 30th of August, at Caitlin's request, along with a few other friends, Ashley went to check on Lauren at her apartment. They opened the door to Lauren's first floor flat with a spare key that Lauren kept hidden outside her door

and found absolutely nothing out of place. In fact, the apartment was immaculate. Her law books, keys and purse were on the table, which made sense seeing as her car was still parked outside. The odd thing was, Lauren wasn't there and it didn't seem like she'd been there recently at all. But as we said, purse, car keys, still in the flat, so something was definitely not right. Caitlin contacted her uncle, a DC police officer, and explained the situation. In a grave voice, he told Caitlin to tell Lauren's friends to leave the apartment, close the door behind them, and contact the police immediately. Police arrived to investigate the missing persons report,

and just like Ashley, they couldn't see anything out of the ordinary in Lauren's flat. There were no signs of forced entry, and it didn't look like anything had been stolen. And so, following standard procedure, the police actually used luminol to test for traces of blood, which I am surprised that they did that, early on when nothing's missing I guess maybe in a missing person's case I think she's been gone for a long time that's true I think if her keys and her wallet and her car were there and she'd been gone for like less than a day they would have been like she's probably just gone on a long walk and fallen down somewhere

but she's been gone for days yeah no this is true and i'm impressed that they did it i'm surprised that they did it even with the luminol test which i guess they were expecting to show something maybe some sign of a struggle that had been cleaned up but they found still nothing until that is they got to the bathroom in, the luminol lit up and it looked as though a massacre had taken place in there. At that moment, the missing persons investigation turned into a homicide case. The police were convinced that Lauren was dead and it didn't take long for their worst fears to be confirmed. Because later that day, during a search of the apartment building's bins outside, the police discovered a torso, as we said, wrapped up in a plastic sheet with its limbs and head missing not an enormous

effort to dispose of the body no having said that though bob ardella got away with that for years this is the thing it does seem like a very lazy way to dispose of a body but yeah we've seen time and time again that killers have just thrown bits of body remains into a bin. They get taken off to the tip. And then once they're there, there's no way to connect where that had come from. And it apparently was just down to a kind of stroke of luck that they even discovered the torso because the bin men were fortunately behind schedule on their route that day. So if they'd have been on time, the torso would have been gone. And if the police had searched the bins just an hour later, it's likely that Lauren's body would have just disappeared off to the tip.

Which again, I think just goes to thankfully her friends and family being on it, reporting her and the police actually turning up when they did. Oh, absolutely. Because once it goes to landfill, there's basically no hope. You don't believe in ghosts? I get it. Lots of people don't. I didn't either, until I came face to face with them.

Ever since that moment, hauntings, spirits, and the unexplained have consumed my entire life. I'm Nadine Bailey. I've been a ghost tour guide for the past 20 years. I've taken people along with me into the shadows,

uncovering the macabre tales that linger in the darkness, and inside some of the most haunted houses, hospitals, prisons, and more. Join me every week on my podcast, Haunted Canada, as we journey through terrifying and bone-chilling stories of the unexplained. Search for Haunted Canada on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music, or wherever you find your favorite podcasts. 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 mom'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

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 Podcastss or Spotify. The question on everybody's minds now, where was the rest of Lauren and who was responsible? There were 16 other apartments in the building and every single occupant was a suspect. But there was one in particular who stood out amongst the rest. This person was called Stephen McDaniel. He had been Lauren's neighbour and classmate since their first year of law school. In his application to Mercer University Law School in 2008,

Stephen described himself as, quote, a level-headed, down-to-earth dreamer and a thinker and a highly competitive personality. I think everyone writes the same things, right? Everyone says attention to detail, calm under pressure. Great interpersonal skills. Yeah, exactly it none of it's true uh mission orientated goal orientated profit driven it's all a little look back at sruti bala's cover letters will show you all of those things i've not heard this combination though level-headed down-to-earth dreamer and thinker

highly competitive personality. Interesting. I can't remember what I wrote on my personal statement, but I imagine it was something of that ilk. No, absolutely no memory at all of what I wrote on that at all. But to be honest, if I live the rest of my days without ever having to do another job application, I have won. Oh God, if we have to do more job applications we've fucking failed hard so let's hope that we never have to refer to ourselves as highly competitive personalities yeah he also emphasized his drive to win in any situation which i suppose i've only

ever gone for supporting role jobs right apart from this one so that's not what you put on those type of applications on those applications you're like I do what I'm told and I like it you've got to tweak the bullshit for the job you're going for and if you are applying quick to learn and if you're applying for law school I can imagine that being a highly competitive person who wants to win at every opportunity is maybe just the right level of sociopathy that they're looking for i mean quite possibly i think it works slightly differently in this country because obviously there are solicitors and there are barristers and they're different i have a theory about solicitors which is going to upset people it's also the same theory that i have about accountants they just go and learn a secret

language right that's all law school is in this country they go and learn and accounting school whatever accounting clown college they go and learn the secret language and they can't tell anyone the secret language because then their power is stripped of them it's learning a secret language that you keep from everybody so they're under your thumb there you go guys you heard it here first hot takes on all accountants and solicitors there especially fucking conveyances oh god especially when you buy a house at auction and you can't even use a regular conveyancer. You have to go to a special auction conveyancer. That was stressful.

But the less said about my trauma, the better. But yeah, so Stephen McDaniel very much leaning in to the law school mentality. Yes, very much so. So going back to Stephen McDaniel in the section of the application for law school entitled employment Stephen said that after he earned a business degree the previous year he babysat his sister whilst quote taking steps to publish my first novel run away yeah I know they say that everyone's got one book in them it is not true i mean possibly but my favorite thing i thought you were gonna say i know they're always like put every job down

on employment history because it'll really like you know pad it out and feel plug those gaps for where you were and what you were doing maybe you know working on publishing my first novel okay maybe an employer would be okay with that but babysitting my sister yeah it's not a job is it no it's called being a sibling yes it's like when dads are like oh i've got to babysit the kids tonight no you've got to be a father i know that's the worst have you ever heard a mum say can't come out and say i've got to babysit the kids and then, he said he aspired to become a federal judge, but, quote, despite having a thorough plan of what lies ahead, I am not an overly optimistic person. There's like, I'm sure I sent you this. There's a TV show called Crazy Ex-Girlfriend, and they have a song in it called Don't Be a Lawyer.

I think I sent it to you ages ago where we were having some legal difficulties and dealing with some irritating lawyers. And there's this Don't Be a Lawyer song convincing this kid to not go to law school right and they're like oh but i'd really like to get on the supreme court and they're like you'll never get on the supreme court there's literally no chance that that will happen so there's no chance of stephen mcdaniel becoming a federal judge especially not because he i'm not with that attitude he's not a overly optimistic person apparently and it didn't do the trick because mercer waitlisted him um which doesn't necessarily like a friend of mine got waitlisted for harvard it means in my understanding which of course i am a moron so it could be wrong i believe waitlisted is like they just make you take a gap year it's not you're not in it's like you're not in this year okay maybe that is the

case because mercer did eventually decide to give Stephen McDaniel a place in their law school the following June and so that's when he moved next door to Lauren Giddings and Lauren was beautiful social and athletic in contrast sharp contrast to Stephen who was reclusive and weird, albeit seemingly very intelligent. He's a very like brainy guy, but quite odd. Obviously he left that out of his cover letter. So Lauren's friends would later tell police that Stephen had asked Lauren out multiple times, but that she had politely rejected him as she already had a boyfriend, and also because he creeped her the fuck out. And so coming back to the day that the police were discovering

this torso in the bins in the apartment building, simultaneously Stephen was busy giving an interview to a local news crew. And this video has since become very, very infamous. If you know anything about this case, the Stephen McDaniel case, you will probably already have seen this. It's bizarre and it's chilling to say the least. It's reminiscent of things like the Chris Watts video. And it starts off with Stephen airing his concerns for his good friend Lauren's well-being and also sharing his theories of what he thought might have happened to her. We can't play the whole thing, but we are throughout this episode going to play clips of Stephen McDaniel talking because he really puts himself out there. Yeah. There's a lot of it.

He gave us a lot of content to work with. Lots of content to work with and just strikingly not very socially adept. Uh-uh. Uh-uh. So let's have a listen now to that first interview he's giving to the news crew as the police are finding the torso at the same time yeah lauren was my neighbor um we're just trying to find out where she is at this point i mean no one has seen her since saturday i mean the last time anyone heard from her was an email that she sent out and no one's heard from her since. Did you see her hang out with anyone at the time or anything like that?

No, no one has seen her since Saturday. I haven't seen anything. I mean, I've always seen noise outside, but it's just people walking by pretty much. And she just recently graduated from Mercer? Yeah, she and I, we were both JD students. We graduated back in May. What kind of person was she? I mean, how did you, what did you see her as? I mean, she's as nice as can be. I mean, very personable, very much a people person. Do you know anybody that, any enemies she might have had, somebody that might want to hurt her?

No, I mean, we don't know where she is. I mean, the only thing we can think is that maybe she went out running and someone snatched her. I mean, we went over. One of her friends had a key. We went inside and tried to see if there was anything amiss. But, I mean, she had a door jammed that was sitting right by it. So there was no sign that anyone broke in. I mean, the door was locked when everyone got here i mean we just don't know where she is oh god you're listening to it and you're just like stop talking stop talking you know there's people who just talk to fill the space

oh yeah he just won't stop just will not stop which obviously people deal with shock in different ways blah blah blah and i'm always wary of being like what a suspicious response but like it is very very reminiscent of chris watts i'm just like well you know we just all really want her to come back and you know we just don't know where she is and here are so many details yes the details the devils in the details throughout the interview, Stephen seemed far more concerned about making it clear that he had no idea what had happened to Lauren and that there were no witnesses whatsoever. He was much more worried about these details than he was about displaying any sort of authentic grief or worry about Lauren. The interviewer said,

what about the parking lot area? I think that's where they've recovered the body. At this point, the interview takes a very definite turn and Stephen displays some of the most bizarre behavior you will ever see. So bizarre, in fact, that he immediately, inadvertently, put himself in the position of prime suspect. And Stephen's entire affect changes completely. And he kind of goes into this like weird catatonic-ish state. Yeah, because obviously we're going to play these clips, but again, not being a video format, it's really difficult to convey exactly the weirdness of this particular interview. All of this goes down in that first news, like conversation he gives

that no one prompts him to. No one made him do it's such an unforced error so when you watch it you'll see the police are basically like looking for the remains in the dumpster he's talking to the news crew saying all the stuff we just played in that clip where he's like we just don't know what happened to lauren blah blah blah and then the news reporters are like oh we've just heard news just in they found a torso and then he just prangs out and then like runs to the grass on the side of the road and sort of is like doubled over like he's having a panic attack i guess at that point it does look to people watching like he's just horrified because he thinks they found his friend's body what's actually happening because he is at that point displaying authentic grief

but it's not for lauren it's for him because he realized the bin men are fucking late and they found the body and so after he's done being you know freaked out and having his little moment on the side he then comes back and resumes the interview which again why not just say i'm feeling very shocked by what we've discovered i'm just going to take a time out and leave no no he gets back to the interview. I guess it's that highly competitive nature. That need to win. This time, while he's speaking to the reporters, Stephen appears far more emotional than he did the first time round, even appearing to cry as he continued to speak about Lauren. And you guys know we've talked about Dr. Grande before. He has, in my opinion, an excellent YouTube channel. Yeah, he's my boy. He's great.

He's so great. And if you haven't watched him, we'll leave a link below. Definitely go check it out. And Dr. Grande, he analyzes the Stephen McDaniel case in one of his YouTube videos. And he analyzes specifically Stephen's behavior. And he points out that Stephen seemed as though he was mimicking emotions that he had observed in others. And this is really interesting. We've talked about this before,

but with Stephen, his emotional state does feel very like melodramatic. Yeah. Yeah. You know, again, Dr. Grande isn't diagnosing anybody, but he does say that that kind of behavior can be conducive with a schizotypal personality. Just to explore this again a little bit further because you know the guy's given us a lot of content let's use it. Let's listen to another clip. I don't know anyone that would want to hurt her. She was as nice person as there is.

What's going on in your mind right now? What are you thinking? Why would anyone do this? Did you hear anything? No. Did you see anybody? I heard something. Maybe I could have helped. Okay, don't worry. Do you want to sit down for a second?

Get something to drink? Do you know if a bunch of our friends are getting together? It's that bit where he says, I know it's not the clearest audio, but where he says, maybe I could have done something. Like, again, it's just that casting himself as like this would-be hero the protector the protector the defender even though spoilers obviously he knows what he's done after he makes this histrionic scene he begins to cry before beginning to explain how he and some of lauren's friends had searched her apartment the night before. Notably, his tears disappear almost as quickly as they came. That's how I found out that she was missing. A bunch of her friends came over yesterday night around midnight

and they hadn't seen her since Saturday so they were trying to find out where she was. They were knocking on neighbors doors and stuff? I know they went in, they had a key to her apartment and they checked around, didn't see anything out of place and it was locked when everyone got there. That was midnight? Yeah, around midnight and then we went over to law school, see if maybe she was over in the library studying or something,

and we looked up in the study rooms on the third floor, and there was no one there, and we came back, we looked around, and just tried to find anything to figure out where she was. He then goes on to say, if only she had told him about the time she thought somebody had broken in, then he would have gladly lent her one of his handguns, I suppose we are in Georgia, of which he claimed to have two for self-defence. Joe, he got onto her computer last night to see if she'd say anything. She'd sent an email out to some people that afternoon talking about like going out to eat or something

and the last thing that anyone there was an email that she sent out after 10 that night where she she sent to i think it was someone in atlanta a friend of hers in atlanta and he she said that she she was afraid in her apartment that she thought someone had tried to break in on Thursday night and she she was afraid to stay in there but what did you hear what did you hear that from from Joe he pulled it up and we read it off the screen. She had said that to a friend in Atlanta? Yeah, I can't remember his name. And you hadn't heard anything on Thursday night? No, no.

She never came to you to tell you anything? No, I mean, if she had, I could have done something. I could have lent her a handgun. I've got a little handgun that I have for defense. Of course you could have slept over or something. Yeah, I mean, something. If she was afraid in her apartment, then, I mean, get her out of there. That's what she said in the email.

She thought that someone had tried to break into her apartment. She said, like, Megan Hoodlums tried to break into my apartment on Thursday night. Hoodlums? I know. I know. She's not a 60-year-old woman. He's just cannot... Again, this is the theme with Stephen McDaniel.

He just cannot stop talking. No, and it's very like, oh, I've heard someone blame this type of situation on a hoodlum before, and that's the word they use, so that's the word I'm going to use in this situation. And this troubling interview drew the attention of the police straight to Stephen McDaniel. They found him quite rightly strikingly suspicious. Police questioned some of McDaniel's classmates who described him as quirky,

which is not the word I would use to describe someone who wore chain mail to class. Not a joke, my friends. Fact. A lot of people wore a lot of weird. Not a joke, my friends. Fact. A lot of people wore a lot of weird shit at my university. I could see that. Not one chain mail. Full headdress, no problem.

People who just looked like they hadn't washed. But did you know that SOAS is the only university library in London that is not 24 hours because the SOAS students were living in it so it closed even in exam period it closed at 10 because we couldn't be trusted to just not live in the library oh wow okay I did not know that no people definitely weren't wearing chain mail or headdresses to my university well at least not to not to economics. But a lot of, well, there were only like probably about 20 girls in the class. But the girls very much big swept over fringe. Oh, look classic. The deep side part.

Lots of bronzer. Big handbags. Big Paul's boutique handbags. Uh-huh, yep. The bigger the bag, the smaller you look. That was the rule. Ugg boots and leggings and hoodie Jack Wills Jack Wills hoodies Abercrombie and Fitch absolutely colors G-Lay

I can see it now it's everything and the boys lots of again Abercrombie Fitch Jack Wills etc and or they would just turn up in their hockey or their cricket gear my favorite is when we did have sports teams but not in the same sort of way but I've heard tell of normal universities when people don't show up in their sports kit they wear the hoodie just so you know oh yeah all the hoodies all the hoodies absolutely everybody lived actually everybody lived in like University of Birmingham merch or their sports hoodies I never never understood that. I mean, yeah, it was a look. It was a look. So besides the chain mail situation, he was described by his classmates as intelligent, reliable, hardworking, but also eccentric, awkward, misfit, and bit of a

creep. Some of his class mentioned that he would regularly ask people how they would commit the perfect murder, which is something I ask people, but I don't wear chain mail. No, and I also think read the room. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. 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. Claudian 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. 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 LA in 1983, there were many questions surrounding his death. The last person seen with him was Lainey 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. And apparently there was a running joke amongst his classmates that Stephen was dangerous, and apparently Lauren had even joked once that if Stephen was dangerous, then she would be the only one safe, because she was always so nice to him. That hurts. Yeah. When speaking to Stephen, police noticed that he had scratches on

his face and stomach but he said that they had been self-inflicted in his sleep you're not a baby yeah yeah okay okay steven so suspicious officers conducted a search of steven's room later that day and he insisted that he should be present during the search. It was impossible to ignore during the entirety of this expedition how nervous Stephen was. He's reported to have been sweating profusely and behaving somewhat manically and unhinged as officers looked through his things. Apparently he even drank at least 10 bottles of water during this time. So, you know, not being super chill and unsuspicious. No, and if you're sweating profusely, the last thing you want to be doing is drinking loads of water.

I mean, I guess it dehydrates you quite a lot to sweat buckets. I know, but like, it's just going to make you sweat more. That's what my dance teacher used to say. She was like, no water, girls. Oh, God. No water, no sweat. Jesus. Good old Madame Fiona. girls oh god no water no sweat jesus good old madame fiona steven doing all his sweating and all of his pacing he was right to be nervous inside his apartment police not only uncovered

the blood-stained packaging to a hacksaw that they believe had been used to dismember lauren's body but also a master key that unlocked the doors to every single apartment in that building. I hate it. I also hate it. I had a very hysterical conversation with the management company of my building recently. Sorry, this episode is really talking, turning into house owning woes. The front door, the front door of my building, which is like usually a fob. Like I asked the management company, I was like, I never actually got a key for the front door and they were like there is no key for the front door

and I was like well there's a lock on it so I think you're lying but how can there be no key for the front door so I just have to rely on the fob system forever there's no backup plan. Wow that's ominous. Yeah no I do not like any of this. I feel like keys, deadlocks, deadbolts, everything, all the time, please. And it only got worse because it wasn't just the master key and the blood-stained Hacksaw packaging. The police also found a pair of Lauren's underwear with both her and Stephen's DNA on it. Ruh-roh. Yeah, bad times. And they also found a memory stick containing personal photos of Lauren.

And just when the police thought that it couldn't get any worse, they also found another memory stick in Stephen's apartment filled with images of children being sexually assaulted by adults. Stephen. Because we don't say child porn on this podcast. It's not pornography. It's a crime scene. Stephen, you're giving the weirdos a bad name. The worst thing about him is he's such a like an archetypical weirdo. Yeah. That people would accuse of having all of this crazy shit and having done this kind of thing. And he is. There are plenty of weirdos who are extremely

nice. Exactly. But they're getting a bad rep because of people like Stephen McFucking Daniel. The police continued this search and they also found three firearms, some swords and a number of condoms. The condom struck the police as unusual because Stephen had told them that he was a virgin. Again, stop talking. Why are you telling the police who are searching your house that you're a virgin. I mean, yeah, firstly that. And secondly, I don't think it's weird to have condoms. What about a posh wank? Well, there you go. There you go.

All right, judgy police. Chill out. Maybe I was just having a posh wank. Yeah, don't tell me you've never had a posh wank. PC dangerous. I don't know. It's because in my head I went posh wank to danger wank. Got it.

Got it. In a bizarre move, but maybe the only card Stephen had left to play, he told the police that all of the various items they'd found in his house weren't his. He had stolen them from other apartments. Stop talking. I know. For the love of God, stop talking. Just close your mouth.

This guy's training to be a lawyer. Stop talking. My God, stop talking. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Listen to be a lawyer. Stop talking. My God, stop talking. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Listen to literally one class. This is the thing. Coming back to the fact that he is a law student, I think it is really strange.

This is one of the things that struck me as so odd about this case. Stephen McDaniel is a law student and he is also, by all accounts, a very smart one. So why is he here talking so much to the police and even admitting to burglary without so he here talking so much to the police and even admitting to burglary without so much as being pressured to by the police he hasn't even been interviewed by the police yet they're just finding things be quiet why does this man make so many mistakes and also why does a man who is this smart and a law student dump a torso in the bins of his own

apartment and then keep all of this incriminating evidence in his own flat. Officers made sure to thoroughly go through Stephen's internet search history, which seems like an obvious move, and it gave them a dark insight into the depths of Stephen's obsessive and sexually dysfunctional nature. A couple of months before Lauren had gone missing, Stephen googled Nude Lauren Gidding. Does he not understand how the internet works? For fuck's sake.

She's not a famous person. It's not like he's Googling nudes of... Jennifer Lawrence. Exactly. She is just like a normal fucking person who is his classmate who lives next door to him. How does he think this works? He's just going to go into Google and Google nude Lauren Giddings. And there's suddenly just going to

be random pictures of his classmate on there naked his non-famous classmate what the fuck like there's just a catalogue of every naked woman in the world every woman in the world has to do one naked photo and it's easily googleable easily googleable just again this guy is meant to be intelligent what's's happening? I don't know. And after he did the nude Lauren Gidding search, just one moment later, a minute later to be precise, he visited Lauren's Twitter feed. Presumably after he realised that there were no naked pictures of Lauren Gidding just randomly on the internet.

Presumably when he realised how the internet functions. That very same morning on the 28th of April 2011, Stephen made three varying google searches of i mean different iterations of the words molest sleeping girl what does he want like an like a keep it simple stupid idiot's guide like to the internet to to the internet and also how to be a molester all of his internet history from april to june 30th, that's the day Lauren's torso was found, showed Stephen's deep obsession with his neighbour. On almost a daily basis, he'd spend hours on porn sites, dating sites, searching for local escorts, reading erotic fiction and searching for celebrity nudes. This is why his novel didn't get anywhere.

Procrastination station for Stephen. I bet his novel was about fucking elves or something. And chain mail. And on top of that, Stephen spent a lot of his time looking at guns and their favourite companion, sex toys. A couple of weeks after Lauren and Stephen graduated from law school

on the 30th of May, Stephen once again googled her name. And a few days later, he looked at her Amazon.com wishlist. A few days after this, Stephen spent a few days later he looked at her amazon.com wish list a few days after this steven spent a few hours browsing lauren's instagram page and her linkedin and her facebook uh simultaneously while he was watching violent pornography i'm not like trying to help steven mcdaniel but i'm like why would you not delete delete everything it doesn't matter though they can find it that's true it's go anywhere. Yeah. He's just like, why? I'll just leave. I'll just leave

this footprint, this footprint trail of porn. Follow the footprints of porn straight to my guilty conviction. Yes. And that's basically exactly what is about to happen. So apart from his obvious obsession with Lauren Giddings, Stephen's search history also made it obvious to police that he had been planning to do something for at least a couple of months. And by something, we mean something violent. On the 1st of May, he had searched escape prison. The guy fucking studied law again. He's just googling escape prison. Like what? How to escape from prison. Everyone knows how to escape prison. You get the blueprints tattooed all over your body and then you go to the same prison as your brother

and that's how that works. And then you fall in love with the doctor and pretend you're a diabetic. It's the trident tested plan. That's it. Nailed it. After the day he searched escape prison, he searched choked unconscious how long wake up. This man is lost.

He's lost. He's lost. I also, I am guilty of not googling in complete sentences oh no no not googling in complete sentences is the least of my concerns with stephen fulton to be honest if i was going to put it past anyone it wouldn't be you i know i didn't say i thought it yesterday but i was like oh look a lovely little press release about us i was like oh it's grammatically incorrect i can't help it oh. Oh, man. No, she really can't. It's like a compulsion. Early on the morning of the 24th of June,

Stephen researched the door jamming burglar bar that Lauren had recently installed in her apartment. If you remember from the earlier clips that we played, you guys, you'll have heard him say the door jammer was by the side and like nothing looked like it had been broken in. I am pro this door jamming invention. I might actually buy one. Interesting. Now, but yes, there you go. You can't stop people apparently sitting around on the internet Googling how to disable it though. I don't know if he was successful.

Again, suspicious Google searches piling up. And around four hours before Lauren's torso was uncovered, Stephen was once again on the old google.com. And this time he was searching, and you're gonna love this, how to erase browsing history. You can't. That's the answer. That's the only answer. Burn your laptop. Even then. Burn it. Put it in a lead-lined safe. Sink it. That's it. After he had done this particular search, Stephen McDaniel went out and helped Lauren's friends search for her, pretending that he had no clue where she was or what had happened. According to various reports, Stephen was arrested the same day on unrelated burglary charges and only later charged on suspicion of the murder of Lauren Giddings,

along with charges of burglary and several counts of child sexual exploitation. So yeah they find all of this stuff but he just says he's like stolen it so they have to arrest him on burglary and then pretty swiftly they realize that's not really the whole story. Now there's a video of Stephen McDaniel's interrogation available on YouTube and I know we said that the television interview of Stephen we gave earlier was some of the most bizarre behavior you'd likely ever witness. But we were kind of lying because this interrogation tape takes things to a whole new level. But you're going to have to wait. We'll come back to this.

Pins out. It's out the pincushion into Stephen McDaniels' pupil. Meanwhile, continuing their search for the apartment, police opened a locked closet in the building's laundry room, discovered a hacksaw along with a sheet stained with Lauren's blood. He's not even trying. But potentially the most damning evidence against Stephen came when the police managed to recover a deleted video from his camera's memory stick. The video was taken by Stephen after he taped his camera to a long wooden pole and used it to film inside,

like fucking American Beauty, to film inside Lauren's apartment through the blinds of her windows as she slept. It's all just so scary, isn't it? It's all just so scary. This man who lives next door, she's classmates with. Everyone thinks he's weird, but she thinks, you know, I'm being nice to him. Like like hopefully he just leaves me alone and we can pass

the bar and then get the fuck out of here and the fact that he is doing these things and lauren doesn't know but the fact that she has this feeling that she's being watched it's so like horror movie-esque and this stalking behavior we see this time and time again with people who go on to kill and that's why stalking behavior needs to this time and time again with people who go on to kill. And that's why stalking behaviour needs to be taken so seriously because it's absolutely a precursor to violent behaviour. And it's also evidence of Stephen's voyeurism and although voyeurism is classed as a paraphilia most people with voyeuristic tendencies don't have voyeuristic disorder. To be diagnosed with voyeuristic disorder, someone has to experience

persistent and intense sexual arousal from the fantasy or act of watching an unsuspecting person who's naked, partially disrobed or sexually active for at least six months. So the timeline is important. And when it comes to Stephen McDaniel, we don't have enough evidence to know exactly how long he'd been secretly recording Lauren. So we can't really say whether he had the disorder or not. And also we're not doctors, but we are doctors. This is the thing. With anything that goes from being just a kink to being like a paraphilic disorder, we talk about this in the book.

When it crosses the line to becoming a disorder is when it causes harm, distress, or upset to the person who is dealing with that disorder or to other people. And also these timeline situation. So I think it's not at all about, there's nothing to do with kink shaming. This is about a man who was on the fucking edge. And so the police, armed with their, frankly, fucking mountains of evidence

that Stephen McDaniel has just handed over to them, they began this interrogation. And as we said, the behavior becomes incredibly bizarre incredibly quickly. Stephen McDaniel goes into this incredibly weird sort of autopilot mode which again could be very indicative of a schizotypal personality disorder and he speaks in this kind of monotone voice and responds to everything that the police officers ask him with very short answers denying every accusation thrown at him. So obviously we can't show you the video of this for obvious reasons but let's play a little clip from this interrogation. Just tell me what happened brother. I don't know. Well where's she at? I need you. I'm asking you for your help. I'm a detective, and I'm asking you for your help.

Can you help me? I don't know. What do you mean you don't know? You can't help a friend out? I don't know what you need. I need to know where Lauren's at. I don't know. Do you even care that no one can find her? Yes.

I mean, I don't know. Do you even care that no one came out? Yes. I mean, I don't know, do you? Yes. You got your ass on that fucking news and stood out there and gave a media report that her mother saw about her missing daughter. And you want me to sit there and tell them that you don't know. Is that what you want me to tell them?

Because you're all over the news. You sure stood out there and ran your mouth to the news media. But now you're going to get out here and you don't fucking know. You know. You know you're just a sorry piece of shit that don't give a fuck. Right? Yeah. Well, why'd you tell the media everything? Do you need to see what you told the media today?

It was on 11 o'clock news. Well, I'm asking you. Tell me. I want to know. I don't know where she is. That ain't what you told the media. You heard her, Steven. No, I didn't. Yeah, you did.

Do you remember moving the body? No. Yes, you do, Steven. Why, man? Why? Tell me, bud. I didn't do it. Yes, you did, Steven. We want you to tell it so that way people understand you're not a monster. Things just, you got out of control.

It's a sickness. So the interview basically continues like that for quite a long time with steven continuing the entire time to deny everything the police officers didn't really need a confession from him they had enough evidence to charge him with lauren gidding's murder along with charges of burglary and child exploitation like we said so it wasn't really that important and i would like to play one other clip from this particular interview which i think really again says a lot about steven you did to her so we just want to know what you if you're gonna tell us or not

i didn't do anything that's what you say but we know different so you're fucked either way yeah and i feel like possibly that is a feeling that steven mcdaniel realized and that's possibly the answer to why someone who is yes socially disconnected but intelligent would have left so much evidence lying around just this feeling of maybe he already knew i've done it i'm I'm fucked either way. I don't know. Because part of me is like, he didn't even try and get away with it. So, you know, maybe he wanted to get caught. But then also maybe it is this like,

fuck it, it doesn't matter what I do. They're going to find me. But then why speak to the press so like, I mean, you can't waste your time trying to understand something that's not logical. No. And possibly also, you know, you do get a feeling from something that's not logical no and possibly also you know you do get a feeling from steven that he has possibly been a person who has been ostracized

socially his entire life because of his like difficulties to connect with people but has maybe spent a lot of his life feeling like he's more intelligent than everyone around him so did he just think that he could trick the news and did he just think that even if he had all that evidence in his apartment, no one would ever suspect him because he was too intelligent to get caught? I don't know. Everything else he does seems really calculated in the run-up to the murder, but everything after seems like a totally different person. So after this, it took almost three years for Stephen to finally accept a plea deal,

in which he provided a full confession of what really went down the night that he murdered Lauren and in exchange he'd have the charges of burglary and child sexual exploitation against him dropped. So on Monday the 21st of April 2014 Stephen stood up in a courtroom in front of Lauren's family and finally told the true story as much as he is probably capable of doing so. He said that it was 4.30am on the 26th of June 2011 when he, dressed all in black, wearing a mask and gloves, used his master key to open Lauren's apartment door as she slept. According to Stephen, he stood at the far end of her bedroom, just watching Lauren sleep for a while.

But then she woke up. And this is a quote. She saw me and said very calmly, get the fuck out. I leapt across the bed onto her and grabbed her round the throat. We tumbled out of the bed onto the floor and in her struggle to get away, she moved her legs and lower body under the bed, preventing her from getting away or being able to kick me. In the midst of the frantic struggle, Lauren managed to rip the mask from Stephen's face, screaming, Stephen, please stop. But he didn't. Stephen tightened his grip around Lauren's throat and choked her for about 15 minutes until life left her body. Strangling

takes a lot more force and a lot more time than a lot of people think it does. Stephen then dragged Lauren's body into the bath and left her there. According to his confession, he then locked Lauren's apartment, returned to his place next door, and he claims to have spent the rest of the day on his computer, no prizes for guessing what he was looking at. Then he returned to Lauren's apartment the following evening with a hacksaw and plastic sheets to dismember the body into five pieces. He said, I removed her limbs and head, wrapped them in several black trash bags separately and discarded them in the Mercer Law School dumpster. Stephen said he left Lauren's torso in the apartment's trash cans on the 28th of June, two days before it was discovered.

During his confession, Stephen vehemently denied having raped Lauren, and this was confirmed by the chief medical examiner on the case, who said that there were no signs of sexual assault on the corpse. We see this time and time again,'t we like killers who have done like the most abominable things but they'll always hold on to like one or two things that they are really really morally stringent about like I did not do that and I don't want anybody thinking that I raped her. All I did was stalk her for months, break into her apartment and murder her. But I'm not a scumbag I didn't rape her. And then I hacked her body up and left her in a bin, but I definitely didn't rape her. The court also heard how Stephen had spied on Lauren for months before her murder, using a camera he had taped to that six-foot-long wooden pole.

And as for how casually he had continued attending classes, and even joined in with the search party for Lauren. Stephen said that he had been in a quote dream-like delusional state and had actually managed to convince himself into believing that Lauren was still alive and well. Which again maybe, maybe there is an element of magical thinking here that he is able to delusionally convince himself that it didn't happen. I don't know. And in an attempt to justify his crime, Stephen said that he was divided in mind, unable to account for how he could have committed these horrible acts, and at the same time, also been able to carry on with his daily

routines. It's like he's disassociating. Oh yeah, that's 100% what it is. And when asked why he had done this, what was the motivation for what he did, he said, quote, it's difficult for me to explain why I killed Lauren and attempted to conceal my deed the way I did. I know it was very wrong. I'm not delusional or without all morals or decency. Well, that's a relief. Yeah, exactly. You kind of are, mate. But he goes on to say, something in my makeup, my psychology, my neuropathy, my own particular pathology, perhaps,

must explain it, saying it's not his fault, it's the way he's made. Stephen claimed that he grieved daily for Lauren, but he doesn't expect forgiveness from her family, which you won't be getting, mate, so don't worry about it. During the trial, the court heard how Stephen had somewhat panicked after learning that Lauren was planning on moving within just a few days as her lease was running out, and this is believed to be the main catalyst for him deciding to take her life. Lauren was planning on staying with a friend until she found a job and a place to live. Dr Grand Grande, our YouTube homeboy, believes that Stephen's thinking was something along the lines of, if I can't have her, then no one can. Lauren's decision

to move away was essentially destroying the fantasy that Stephen had built up in his head over the previous few months. And that was something he just couldn't allow to happen. This is the thing. I think there are parts of Stephen and Stephen's crimes that make him look like a very organised killer, but then the's crimes that make him look like a very organized killer. But then the majority of it makes him look like a desperately disorganized killer. Absolutely. Like we have to ask, why didn't he dispose of the murder weapon, like the hacksaw, all of this? Why did he just keep it there in his apartment to be found?

Why didn't he delete his search history? Even if it had meant that the police would have found it eventually eventually why didn't he take that step to at least delete it and it's odd because in some ways he kind of is trying because if he wasn't trying at all then he wouldn't have cleaned up all of the blood and he wouldn't have taken in the dextroplastic sheet so like he thinks he is making attempts anyway to clean up after himself and to like destroy the evidence but he's not doing it in any sort of way that is going to actually help him so obviously Lauren's family are completely broken you know what could they even say their daughter who they were so proud of first one in their family to go to university she was about to sit the bar

and she was so intelligent and capable she absolutely would have passed and it's just so tragic that again it was very reminiscent of like the kim val case it really reminds me of that this man who just sits pathetically desperately sitting in his own flat like wanking and crying over child pornography and snuff films and violence like that against women and then just snuffing out this innocent person's life and then dumping her like rubbish i know like at this point like obviously we talk about this kind of thing every single week but it's cases like this that it's just so senseless all for the sake of the sexual gratification of this one man lauren giddings no longer exists and if that just doesn't chill you to your core then nothing will yeah and it's also

quite reminiscent of lorena bobbitt even though no one died in that particular instance that case is filled with this rhetoric of a man's penis being worth more than a woman's life and that kind of is the overarching theme that pervades so much of true crime unfortunately so yeah obviously Billy and Karen Giddings Lauren's family are absolutely devastated they said we've lived going on three years now in an unimaginable nightmare, wondering what kind of horror our daughter endured, talking obviously about prior to Stephen's confession. And then when he was found guilty,

Lauren's family actually requested that Stephen not face the death penalty and asked rather that he should spend the rest of his life behind bars. Lauren's dad said, we don't want him in our thoughts anymore. I hope he lives a long life in the worst way possible. Stephen will technically be eligible for parole in 2041,

but the district attorney David Cook said that he fully expected Stephen McDaniel to spend the rest of his life behind bars. In April 2019, Stephen, who was 33, attempted to appeal his sentencing by means of a long shot petition. The habeas corpus. Give me a fucking break.

I'm so sick of it. This is law school wanker business. That's what he's up to now. He claimed that the police who investigated him had violated his rights by failing to advise him of his rights in a timely fashion. He also claimed that the search for his apartment had been improper you were there fucking sweating and drinking buckets of water exactly and to top it all off he decided that he was gonna represent himself uh during this appeal the classic exactly the ultimate classic he also claimed his guilty plea had not been voluntary claiming his two lawyers

were not providing him with effective counsel which interestingly in the uk you cannot do yeah and this is actually a thing i think we've mentioned before but like you know i think people snark on the american justice system a lot and rightly so in many ways because of the prison industrial complex that kind of thing but absolutely the appeal system in the us is far far superior to what we have in england because yeah, like Hannah said, you cannot say that you had improper counsel and use that as a basis for appeal. So there is no accountability. No, if you're a bad lawyer, you can stay one forever. And we also don't have discovery because you know, that's another fun little thing.

Also, just I'll put this out there, but we'll talk about it on either in the news or under the duvet. Guess who else is now appealing and going to represent himself in a classic move? Derek Chauvin. Uh-huh. Yeah, we'll talk about that later. Carrying on. So yeah, Stephen actually had the opportunity to question these lawyers

who he thought had done a bad job in 2011. And this time his lawyer was permitted to break attorney-client privilege and told the courtroom how Stephen had told him in detail about how he had, quote, carved up Lauren's body and how he had, quote, sat down and cut off every finger and bone and appendage on her hands and threw them all in the toilet and flushed it in one go. During his rather unconvincing and pointless appeal,

Stephen focused on conveying the point that he felt he had been wronged by the justice system and improper police work, rather than arguing his own guilt or innocence. He's basically saying, doesn't matter if I did it or not, I didn't have a safe conviction. Yeah, yeah.

Which, you know, is most people's last ditch attempt, you know, and as is their right. I mean, you're going to have a crack, aren't you? You've got fuck all else to think about in prison. No, absolutely. And you've got all that law knowledge in your head floating around. Why not? And I do genuinely think this was just another way for Stephen to exercise some sort of like

intellectual curiosity on his part. Let's see what I can do. Let's see what I can get away with. And Stephen also said, quote, the police had the opportunity to do a proper investigation but instead they saw the skinny long-haired weird-looking kid with dark circles around his eyes and thought let's make it him so he's going here for the memphis three argument he's saying all of this incredibly damning evidence they're actually framing me needless to, the judge was unmoved by Stephen's words and denied his appeal, saying,

I don't know that I've heard a single shred of evidence or testimony that would compel me to grant an appeal. Neither Stephen nor his parents, who were present throughout, showed any visible reaction to the judge's words. His parents left the courtroom, and 15 minutes later, after gathering his papers, Stephen McDaniel made his way back to prison. Where long may he stay? Absolutely. So yeah, that is the case of Stephen McDaniel. We will leave the links to the full interrogation and also where you can find these audio clips and have a listen for yourself because the watching of the police interview is something that I would absolutely recommend. He is a strange, strange man.

And we know he just prejudices strange people, but he's also a fucking killer. That's the kicker, isn't it? That's the key to it. Not a harmless weirdo, a very harmful one. Absolutely. So yeah, that's that, guys. So if you would like to come listen to us talk about various other things, head on over to patreon.com slash red handed now and become a member we'll be doing under the duvet immediately after this as we do every single week also have bonus patreon episodes

last month this month whenever we are we did raul moat which is a very british institution of a case if you'd like to listen to that for the month of november we've got a really fun one lined up so head on over if you want to check that out also as we said at the top of the show we are launching a brand new podcast with spotify it is called sinister societies where hannah and i talk about cults but we can't always call them cults so we call them sinister societies secrets commerce capitalism cults sex abuse it's all over there on spotify it's a spotify exclusive we're that kind of people now we are and it launches next tuesday which is the 19th of october and you can hear it not wherever you listen to your podcasts only on

spotify so check it out it's called sinister societies and it's hosted by me and hannah and it's a fucking riot so with that let's say thank you to some lovely people who became patrons at some point last year so thank you to shane demney sarah spooner jodie craker maddie mohan emma helena bobby burrell adrian crosby emily boswell jasmine steffensen anastasia mcnally kerry taylor b kimberly ackers porter jamie hostelta joey clark tara stole tiffany Joey Clark Tara Stoll Tiffany Davis Kimi Shelby Wallstrom Katie Peralto Bethany Caballero Kathy Duvall

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When is it story swap time? Yes. It is. It is. It's story swap. Our world famous Halloween specials make their return next week. So make sure you do a wee before you listen to it because they're that scary that you might have to do an involuntary urination.

And no one wants that. If you are going to do that, wee before, like Hannah said, and don't drink any water, a la Hannah's ballet teacher. So thank you guys so much and we will see you soon. Bye. Bye.

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 Combs. 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. But 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. 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 announced 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 Plus. You can join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify. Start your free trial today.