Snapped: Women Who Murder - BONUS: Father Knows Death (Accident, Suicide, or Murder)

Episode Date: November 6, 2024

Two unusual accidents that are two decades apart leave a family suspicious.Season 4 Episode 2Originally aired: Sat, Dec 3, 2022Watch full episodes of Snapped for FREE on the Oxygen app: https://oxygentv.app.link/WatchSnappedPodSee 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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Find what piques your imagination. Sign up for a free 30-day Audible trial, and your first audiobook is free. Visit audible.ca to sign up. Hi, stop listeners. We are bringing you a special bonus episode today from Oxygen's hit series, Accident, Suicide or Murder. You can also watch full episodes live or on demand on the free Oxygen app or on

Peacock by clicking the link in our description. Enjoy. A family suffers a tragic loss after a fire engulfs their home. Carl Carlson saved his three children from the side of the burning home. But he wasn't able to get inside to save his wife, Christina. Well she couldn't get out. Loved ones look to make sense of the horrific event. That might be fingernails. Why is that window boarded up?

Years pass without answers. It's down as an accident. And she said, you might want to look into that further. This is just all hearsay. There just wasn't enough hard evidence to prove otherwise. Until another grim incident brings to light the unthinkable. Just impressed! Oh my god! This is so awful!

Do we want to say this is a coincidence? That these are accidents? What really happened? On New Year's Day 1991 at 2 26 p.m. fire emergency services are called to a structure fire in Murphy's California.'s, California is a very rural area in the Redwood Forest region. It's very isolated from other towns in California. And when firefighters finally arrive at the house, they find a structure that's almost fully engulfed in flames. They're confronted by a frantic man who identifies himself as Karl Carlson. Karl said he just saved his three children from the side of the burning home.

But he says that he wasn't able to get inside to save his wife, Christina. Fire crews aggressively attacked the fire. After an hour, they're able to extinguish it. They enter the home. They know that Christine Carlson is reportedly inside the house. They find a lifeless body in the bathroom. It's a woman and she is in a prone position in the shower. woman and she is in a prone position in the shower. The woman appeared to be Christina Carlson, the wife of the man that they had spoken to outside of the home. First responders informed Carl of their fatal discovery. Carl was the man

who just lost his wife. He appeared to be emotionally distraught over that. But he was able to give first responders a synopsis of events leading up to this fire. Carl said that a few hours prior to the fire, the children had been put down for a nap. Christina was taking a bath. They were in a house that was improperly heated. It was pretty cold. The home is an old miner's bunkhouse dating back to the gold rush. There was a fan that carried heat from one part of the house to the other up in the attic.

So Carl says he actually went up into the attic to redirect the heat for her because it wasn't warm enough. And while he was up there, he brought a work light so he could see up into the attic. Upon coming down from that attic, he placed his work light on this cabinet that was in the hallway just outside that bathroom where Christine was.

And he went out to the garage to retrieve tools. And it was while he was in the garage that he heard his wife screaming, Carl, get the kids. And it was while he was in the garage that he heard his wife screaming, Carl, get the kids. He runs to the house, but by the time he gets there, the fire is already too advanced for him to make entry. So he runs around to the children's windows, and he breaks the windows, and he pulls out his two daughters.

And then he runs and pulls out his son Levi. That time, he tries to save Christina, but thickness of the fire stops him from being able to access the hallway where he could save his wife. He says he then went and tried to make entry from the outside. But he could not help her. So he watched helplessly as the fire continued. Without a phone, he had to leave his wife inside

and put all the kids in the car. And together, they drove to a nearby house to call 911. Carl discloses to investigators he has suspicions about how the fire began. According to Carl, the utility light that he'd been using to do some work may have dropped down on the rug right in front of that bathroom area.

And then the heat from the bulb could have started the fire. By 4.30 p.m., the county sheriff's office and a fire investigator arrive on the scene. Fire officials found the deepest char appears to be near the door of the bathroom. From the burn patterns, it was pretty clear that the origin of the fire was directly outside that bathroom where Christina Carlson was taking a bath. Also in the hallway was the work light that Carl mentioned may have started the fire.

It's laying on the floor. There was also some red flags that stood out. The window to the bathroom where Christina died was boarded up with plywood. It was nailed on from the inside. There's enough nails in that plywood that it wasn't going to come off easily. And that's why Carl apparently couldn't get his wife out of that house. There was also a heavy odor of kerosene in that area. Kerosene is flammable.

Kerosene will start fires. If a light falls on kerosene and ignites, it can burn down your house. Why would kerosene spill right outside the door where Christina's taking a bath? Why is that window boarded up? This dark convergence of events has investigators returning to Carl for answers, starting with the boarded up window. Carl tells us that days prior, Christina broke the window. They couldn't afford to fix it. His wife was complaining about the window making the bathroom too cold,

so he boarded it up with plywood. Another question they had for Carl was, how had kerosene gotten spilled outside the bathroom door? Carl said, the house is so old that it's heated by kerosene gotten spilled outside the bathroom door. Carl said, the house is so old that it's heated by kerosene. And because the pipes have been frozen in the dead of winter, Carl and Christina Carlson were bringing water in, in order to use the facilities. Christina had mistaken a jug of kerosene for a jug of water

and brought it into the house. One of the pets inadvertently knocked the kerosene over a few days before the fire. It had seeped into the carpet and the kerosene smell never really went away. On its face, it looks like it could be an accident. But when someone dies, the default is to consider it suspicious until you know better. The kerosene that was spilled in front of the door to the bathroom, the boarded up window

by themselves maybe didn't mean much, but when you put them together in context, it gave us some uncertainty whether this really was an accident. News of the Blaze quickly travels through this small rural community, reaching Christina's nearby family. Chrissy's sister pulled up to the house and came in. And as soon as I saw her face, I started screaming because I knew then that I had lost a precious child. Marlene just went ballistic. She couldn't believe what she was hearing. It's a time I'll never forget in my whole life.

Christina was a very bright little child. She grew up in Oklahoma and she moved up to Murphy's, California, and finished growing up there. She could bake, she could cook, she could dance. If you could watch her dance, it was awesome. It was just such a terrible thing. It was awesome. It's just such a terrible thing. I lost a child, I lost a daughter. That's awful. As Christina's family begins to search for answers, the morning after the incident, investigators

still have doubts regarding the cause of the fire. The investigators weren't going to just accept that this was an actual fire based upon Carl Carlson's story. So the autopsy was performed the following day. And investigators are looking for leads on the cause of the fire. Christina had soot covering most of her body. She had soot inside of her lungs. But her hair wasn't charred.

Her body wasn't burned in any places. The physician found no evidence indicating she was injured or incapacitated in that bathroom. The autopsy report is telling us that Christina Carlson died from smoke inhalation. And it shows that we have a death caused by the results of a fire. But it doesn't give us clear direction whether this death is an accidental death or it is a homicide. What was the actual cause of this fire and were we looking at an accident or something more sinister? Carl left that very next morning.

It became kind of a shock. Why is this quick escape from this area? Carl's trying to move on and he meets this new woman. It became kind of a shock. Why is this quick escape from this area? Carl's trying to move on, and he meets this new woman. But this guy had a lot of suspicious things that happened around him. 911. Yes, I think I need an ambulance. Less than 24 hours after a house fire cost Christina Carlson her life, investigators

in Northern California are dealing with a series of suspicious circumstances surrounding the inferno. Carl Carlson, the husband, basically comes out unscathed. He gives us a horrific story about how light might have fallen. It probably ignited and he saved the three children. But ultimately, Carl could not rescue his wife from the burnt house. Investigators wanted to know, where is the truth?

Is this an accident? Could this be a murder? So they start to have a conversation with neighbors, family members. Meanwhile, Christina's family meets with her husband Carl to hear his firsthand account of what happened. Carl said the house caught fire because the kerosene lantern fell over. Carl was talking about how the fire had burned his face and he said look at these burns. We didn't see any burns on his face. Nothing gathered up. Kept saying no it was an accident. I know it wasn't. I know it wasn't. I for one was really letting it be known

that I did not believe him. If you didn't know Carl the way we did, if you didn't know the circumstances of how he wanted to keep her under his thumb, then you could be easily surprised that this happened. Christina and Carl met when Carl was stationed with the Air Force, and they met at a military dance. Christina and Carl got married in 1984 and moved to New York where they were close to Carl's family.

The first child was Erin and then there was Levi and then there was Katie. While they were living there together as a married couple they were having really serious money problems and so Christina wanted to move closer to her family in California. She was raised in the country and loved the country and she thought that would be a better life for them. The family moved to Murphy's where they started renting a decades old house.

Christina Carlson is taking care of the home and taking care of the children, but maintenance is constantly required on this home to make it habitable. We talked once in a while, and I was learning that Carl would not leave her alone at any time. We all began to notice that strangeness there. Last time that I got to see her, he made it extremely uncomfortable for me to be there. And she wasn't being treated right. And I knew right then that there was something bad, something real bad going on. And unfortunately, we didn't quite gather, but it was starting to unravel.

As concern mounts in Christina's family, Carl makes a surprise announcement on the day following the fire. Carl started letting everybody know he was taking the children back to New York. And he left that very next morning. Carl moves 3,000 miles away. back to New York and he left that very next morning. Carl moves 3,000 miles away. Doesn't stay for any funeral services, doesn't purchase a headstone. He just packs up and leaves.

It's still very early on in the investigation. It became kind of a shock to the people looking into this fire. What is he running from? Why is this quick escape from this area? And that was even more confirmation that there was something wrong. Christina's family was so suspicious that they decided to collect their own evidence. About a week after the incident, we went out to the property and shot a video

of what the house looked like after the fire. This here is the bedroom where Christina was found. Here's where it got spilled here. That's where the abuser started. I could see what was left of that building. And there was nothing except plywood and the window. Why he didn't knock this out, there's no reason he couldn't have got to that bathroom.

No reason. There were indentations or scratch marks that could have indicated that Christina had possibly tried to pull the board off of the window. That might be fingernails. This is what's really hard for me. I knew that window was nailed shut, so she couldn't get out. The family turns over their video evidence and continues to voice their concern to the police. But investigators find following the Meltzer's lead is easier said than done.

Investigators in Calaveras County felt that there was something to this, but it's an area that's rural and it doesn't have a lot of money. Carl's in New York now and he had already made a statement. It's gonna cost a lot to send people to New York. They don't have a lot of resources to build a case to charge Carl Carlson.

On March 3rd, 1991, Christina's death was officially ruled an accident. There just wasn't enough hard evidence to prove otherwise. Unless you have a witness, it's hard to prove arson. It's basically a fire investigator's word against Carl's word. At that point, State Farm Insurance paid out a life insurance policy of approximately $215,000 to Carl Carlson. When we found out the insurance company

had ruled that it was an accident, with all the facts the way they were, with all the information that was available to them, we were flabbergasted. We were shocked. I've worked with insurance investigators. An arrest is not made. Insurance policies are not going to deny the claim.

Investigators are left only with questions. Was the money the motive for this crime? Or is it a little solace to a man who just lost his wife and the mother of his three children? The answers aren't readily apparent in the years following the incident, as Carl distances himself from the tragedy. Carl's living back in New York in his hometown,

and he's trying to move on. We stayed in contact with the grandkids, but we never were able to visit them after they moved back there. Carl purchases a section of arm from his parents, and he gets involved in different farming events. A year later, he meets this new woman. Her name's Cindy Best.

They meet while they're line dancing, and their relationship just takes off. Cindy just immediately falls head over heels for this guy. She sees a man who is a single father and a widower and he's doing the best he can for his three children. On November 20th, 2008, at 3.50 p.m. 17 years after Christina's death the local sheriff's department gets a call from a very frantic Cindy. For more than two centuries the White House has been the stage for some of the most dramatic scenes in American history. Inspired by the hit podcast American History Tellers, Wondery and William Morrow present

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The NPR Politics Podcast. Listen on Spotify. 17 years after Carl Carlson loses his first wife, Christina, in a freak house fire, tragedy strikes again, this time in Seneca County, New York. The truck's now on my stepson. The second wife of Carl Carlson calls 911 to say that their truck had fallen off the jack and their son Levi was pinned underneath it. He's not alive. Is he breathing? No. The 911 operator wanted them to start CPR.

You could hear Carl actually in the background of the call. Carl, do you know who she is? Justice, press! Both Carl and Cindy are just out of their mind, borderline hysterical at that point when she calls. Oh my God! This is awful! Upon receiving this call, Seneca County sheriffs and other emergency personnel respond to the scene. The house of Carl Carlson is a farmhouse located in a very rural area. When first responders arrived at the scene,

Carl and Cindy showed them the body. Just off the main house in this garage type barn was the body of Levi Carlson. Next to him was a half-ton pickup truck that Levi had apparently been working on. His injuries were to one central area of his chest. He had a crushing compression-type wound, two, three, four inches wide and deep.

He was a very bluish, purplish color, all indication that he had perished hours ago. Sheriff's deputies questioned the grieving parents of the 23-year-old victim to find out what they know about the tragic scene. According to Carl and Cindy, Levi had been over that day. Carl asked Levi if he could help work on the brake lines underneath this farm truck that used the haul stuff around, used the plow. The vehicle had been jacked up by Carl Carlson with a single post railroad jack. Farmers around

here use those, they're common around here. The bad part of them is they're they're pretty wobbly because they're tall. According to Carl, it was around noontime. Levi was alive and working on the truck. And Carl and Cindy went to attend a funeral. A relative of Cindy's had passed away. They went to a reception after the funeral. They came back home approximately four hours later. When he went into the garage to check on Levi,

the truck had come down off the jack. Levi was underneath it. He's cold to the touch. Carl said he then jacks up the truck, pulls Levi out, and he yells to Cindy to call 911. A devastating turn of events. Levi's father and stepmother are left to mourn a life beset by tragedy. Levi Carlson was the son of Carl Carlson's former wife,

Christina, who had died a decade and a half earlier. All the kids were less than five years old when Christina died, and Carl rescued them from the house. Growing up without his mother took its toll on Levi's relationship with his father. They fought a lot. They were very different personalities. Levi, from everything I know, was introverted,

was quiet, had trouble in school, had financial difficulties. Levi was a very young father, starting his own family and trying to move his life in another direction. And over the past couple of years, it seemed he was doing just that. He had gotten a job and he overcame a lot of challenges that he'd had in his life so far.

It clearly looked like an accident to everyone. Young man working underneath the truck and the truck fell off the jack on top of him. The family doctor signs off and the death is accidental. There's no autopsy done. Basically the case is closed. Any further investigation into the death of Levi Carlson is ended at that point.

And the family just has to live with that reality that they lost their brother and their son. Members of Carl's family reach out to Levi's grandparents 2,000 miles away in Northern California to inform them of the news. I felt really bad, but I didn't think it was an accident. I thought it's happened again. It looked like Carl could get away with murder a second time,

but we couldn't do anything about it. We just had to roll the punches and believe that eventually Carl would have to pay for the crime that he committed. Four years pass and Carl Carlson and his family continue to move on in New York until a call comes in to the Seneca County Sheriff's Office that could crack open the mysteries surrounding these accidental deaths once and for all. February 2012, I received a phone call, and it's a woman who says she has information about a death that occurred in our county. She asked me first, did you investigate the death of Levi Carlson back in 2008?

So I looked it up on the computer, and I said, yeah, I see it here. It was never turned over to investigations. It's down as an accident. And she said, you might want to look into that further. There's a good chance he was murdered by his father. In February 2012, investigators in Seneca County, New York, are blindsided by a huge lead claiming that Carl Carlson had a hand in the tragic death of his 23-year-old son Levi four years prior.

She says her name is Jackie Heimel, and she's actually Levi's cousin. I asked her why she felt that this was more than an accident. She said she had some reasons. She had been in touch with Cindy and the Carlson case I asked her why she felt that this was more than an accident. She said she had some reasons. She had been in touch with Cindy and the Carlson kids over the past couple years. Based on conversations with them, she had heard some things that had raised her suspicions. According to Jackie, this guy had a lot of accidents.

There's a lot of suspicious things that happen around him. She goes on to explain that there was a suspicious fire in California where his first wife died. She talks about the fact that Carl had made money off of Christina's death and that Christina's children had never seen any of that money. No one in Seneca County had any idea about Carl Carlson's past, why he was living here after he had moved here from California. But the biggest revelation from Jackie involves her cousin Levi. Jackie had told us, Cindy had told her that she believed Carl had killed Levi for insurance money by dropping a truck on him.

for insurance money by dropping a truck on him. So Cindy and Carl were estranged, and Cindy had moved out a month before. At that point, I promised Rad to look into it, so we did. At this point, this is just all hearsay. We as investigators now, this is where we step in, and we want to investigate every aspect of Carl's life. We started collecting data. What really broke it open for us was when we got some of the insurance information. Everything Jackie said to Lieutenant Clear, we found out to be accurate.

We find life insurance policies that were taken out a short time prior to the death of both Christina and a short time prior to the death of Levi Carlson for hundreds of thousands of dollars in both cases. The recipient of this big cash reward is Carl Carlson. There was something going on here. The unthinkable question remained. Could Levi's accidental death truly be a cold and calculated murder for money? I make the decision to reopen the case into Levi Carlson's death. What are we going to do with this, right?

We've got some circumstantial evidence here, but we still don't have anything concrete. We need somebody on the inside that knows Carl. So on April 9th, 2012, we took a chance. We made a cold call to Cindy Carlson. It was a little bit of a risk. We knew from Jackie that she was estranged from Carl, but we weren't sure what the relationship actually was, what state it was in. And after I introduced myself,

I said I had reopened the investigation into her stepson's death, Levi. She said, thank God you called. She agreed to come down, and that began a series of many interviews with Cindy that occurred over the coming months. Now Cindy starts describing to us a person who is extremely narcissistic.

She said, I was more like a mother to him than a wife. Carl would want me to take care of him and that he was very emotionally abusive. Given Cindy's level of cooperation, investigators zero in on the events surrounding Levi's death and what would possibly drive Carl to murder his son. According to Cindy, Levi and Carl had been at odds for quite a while.

Carl did not approve of the woman he married or the house that he bought. She said recently, though, they had started to get along. It seemed that Carl was making some overtures to Levi to fix their relationship. It was Carl's idea to get the life insurance policy, and he kind of dragged Levi there to go along with it. Levi didn't make much money.

Carl took him to the insurance agent. Carl paid cash for the policy, and Carl was the sole beneficiary of that policy. The policy was taken out 17 days before Levi's death. And he got over $700,000. She said she didn't find out about it until after Levi was dead, and that Carl had pretty much

blown most of the money on a get-rich-quick scheme. Cindy reveals how her relationship with Carl spiraled in the days prior to leaving him. So Cindy Carlson has become suspicious of her husband, so she hires a private investigator. The private investigator looks into the insurance matters, calls her back, and drops a bombshell on her. There's an insurance policy on her for over a million dollars.

The private investigator says, I think you might be next. Cindy Carlson claims her estranged husband, Carl, killed his son Levi and his first wife Christina for insurance money, and she fears she may be next. But outside of damning allegations, police in Seneca County, New York have little proof that this is true. We have filled our files with information, but not of the truth of what happened. Lacking jurisdiction in California, where Carl's first wife, Christina, died in a suspicious house fire,

investigators in New York focus on the accident that took the life of Levi Carlson. This was a four-year-old case that most of it had been expunged, destroyed. And Cindy Carlson was now working with us on a daily basis. Cindy came in one day and says, I can't believe it. He told me he killed Levi. He said he pushed the truck over on him because Levi was a burden to the family.

Before, we heard lots of rumors, but nothing substantiated. But now, Carl's admitting he killed Levi. I asked her why Carl would admit to killing anybody. And she said, well, he's trying to get back together with me. He wants to meet with me. I felt that this is an opportunity that we should take. We have a weakness that can be exploited. He wants her back.

What we decide to do is wire her up with professional equipment. She meets Carl at a restaurant. There's several investigators inside acting as customers. And we just let it play out and we let Cindy have that conversation. Can you just tell me how things went that day. Part of me feels like I'm walking into a booby trap.

Carl is suspicious right off the bat. He comes right out and tells her he feels like he's getting set up. A trap? Like what kind of trap? I get so irritated because I want this to work. You just tell me. I said, alright, I'll drag it up. And it was wobbly.

When was this? Before we left. And then one thing just led to another. That's not what you told me, Carly. No, it isn't. I asked you if you pushed the truck, and you said yes. I didn't push the truck. After it had happened, then I kind of saw the opportunity.

I took advantage of the situation once it happened. What parent considers the death of their child an opportunity? At that point, I knew he was what we thought he was. At that point I knew he was what we thought he was. Ultimately, Carl doesn't come out and give us the direct confession that we want, but he gives us enough of an admission that it is time that we now pick up Carl Carlson and we bring him to the Seneca County Sheriff's Office for an interview. Sheriff's Office for an interview. I think how do you know, deep down, that this day was going to come? No, because I didn't have anything to do with it.

I really did not. Kyle is an interesting individual with a lot of issues, but one issue he does not have is a reluctance to talk. He likes to talk. What we know to be true is you pushed that arrow, right? I did not. Well, you confessed to your wife. Do you have her wired?

Yes, we do. I thought you did. It's all recorded. I lied in my life. Okay, you guys don't know what happened that day. He's pretty confident at the beginning of that interview. And Carl tells his first version of what happened with Levi. The day that my son died, we had a funeral.

Come back, a little extra form, and went out there, and I found him dead. Carl sticks with that for a while. There's no way I could kill my son. There's no way. I stuck up for him and did everything. What did you mean when you told Cindy that one of the reasons that you took the opportunity

to do it was because he was a bird? I did not kill him. There's no way I could have. But he was dead when I went in there. Carl switches gears at one point and says, OK, he was dead before I left. He said he sees Levi underneath there, and he walks out on his son who's being crushed and walks out of the garage, gets in the car where his wife is sitting in the passenger

seat, goes to his wife's aunt's funeral. I just like... I mean it was an accident. Now that's a bombshell for us. Right? Because right away we know that nobody is just going to walk away and leave their son dead lying on the floor and then go to dinner and go to a funeral. So I would say that metaphorically the gloves kind of come off in the interview. It gets a little more intense. Stop it. No. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. Stop the glove. kind of come off in the interview. It gets a little more intense. At this point, he breaks down, starts version three. I opened the truck door. OK.

And then they did it. He says that he stepped into the truck and caused it to fall. And then he freaked out, and he left. And I just f-----. Like, left him there. Yeah. I don't believe it for a second that he accidentally dropped the truck on his son, but for legal purposes it doesn't really matter at that point.

Because under New York state law that's depraved indifference murder. That's murder second degree. So the truck fell on your son and instead of jacking it back up you ran. I'm scared as f***. and your son, and instead of jacking it back up, you ran. That's scary as ****. Had he lifted the truck off Levi, the likeliest Levi would have lived and been fine. So your son was still very much alive, and you could have saved him.

Carl didn't really stop the interview. We did. It had gone nine and a half hours, so we thought it was time to call it. Well, come with me, you're under arrest. After the interview of Carl Carlson, within days I indicted him on two counts of murder and a second degree in insurance fraud. At that time, Carl realized that he had been caught

and that he had no other choice but to take a plea deal for second degree murder. and that he had no other choice but to take a plea deal for second-degree murder. As a consequence, Carl Carlson was sentenced to a term of imprisonment of 15 years to life. When Carl pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and showed who he really was, we were very, very happy and thankful he would be convicted and he would go to jail. I cried. How he could do such things to his own children. New York investigators have revealed

Carl's role in the murder of his son Levi. But questions still remain regarding his involvement in the fire death of his first wife Christina. This is someone who is a killer and a planner and a very greedy man. We need to use what we now know from New York to charge and convict Carl Carlson of killing Christina Carlson in 1991. Investigators in New York have successfully convicted Carl Carlson for the death of his son Levi. But justice proves more elusive when it comes to his involvement in his first wife, Christina's mysterious fire death in 1991. At this point, Investigator Jeff Onor from the State Police

is really digging into the information out in California. All the evidentiary material, all the documents, had been pretty much expunged in California. But I learned that one investigator was hired to do a forensic investigation. So I called and I got this man on the other end of the line. He said, I can't believe this day has finally come. It was like this praise God moment. He was just almost in tears elated.

The original Larson investigators didn't view it as an accident. However, Carl left the state within three days of his wife dying, and the investigation kind of didn't go anywhere out there because of that. Thankfully, this miracle investigator had photocopied every document of that investigation, and he had it in a box in his basement. Now we can rebuild the California investigation. photocopied every document of that investigation, and he had it in a box in his basement. Now we can rebuild the California investigation. As authorities piece together the information

and missing reports, the true cause of the fire finally becomes clear. We learn at that point that there's clearly evidence that there was a second fresh pour of kerosene poured just moments before the fire was lit. They determined that by testing the carpet for how far the kerosene had spread. There was also a U-pattern in the hallway indicating that it had been deliberately poured shortly before the fire and not accidentally spilled. The fire investigator was able to test the work light that Carl mentioned may have started the fire.

There wasn't even power to the light, nor was the filament broken that could even cause the fire. So a person clearly lit the fresh kerosene. It wasn't accidental. What's the alternative? Carl said it. At the time, back in 1991, Calaveras County didn't believe that they had enough evidence in this case to get a conviction. But now through the lens of what we now knew in New York, we felt we could get this case into a courtroom in front of a jury.

I took it upon myself to write a basically a hundred page document and put together the piece of the investigation and I emailed the district attorney in Murphy's County to say please please don't let this guy get away. On December 8th 2012 the Calaveras County District Attorney's Office officially reopens the investigation into Christina Carlson's death. After eight years of building their case against Carl Carlson, he was charged with the death of his wife Christina.

Carlina and I looked at each other and said, Neil, it's about time, but thank God that it is happening. We're gonna take care of this. The trial finally comes to fruition in 2020, nearly 29 years to the day after Christina Carlson's death. They decided to extradite Carl back to Calaveras County to face judgment for her murder. And on February 3rd, 2020,

a jury finds Carl Carlson guilty of first degree murder in the death of Christina Carlson. Carl Carlson is sentenced to life in prison without the possibility of parole for the murder of his wife Christina. My heaviness, I felt it lifting off of me. Arlene just started crying with jubilation, uncontrollably.

We had to hold her up, she was about to collapse when she heard it. It was finally the end of her journey. Took 30 years to accomplish, but we got the result we wanted. It took 30 years to accomplish, but we got the result we wanted. Had they investigated and done what their job would have been done, Levi would be alive today. That's the hard part.

I carried that pain in my heart, oh, all those years. I miss you, baby. Mama misses you. I'm so sorry. Christina did not deserve what she received. Levi did not deserve what he got. Carl Carlson was an evil man doing evil deeds. Dracula, the ancient vampire who terrorizes Victorian London, I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy.

I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy.

I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy.

I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. I'm so happy. this wonderful snapshot of the 19th century, but it also has so much resonance today. The vampire doesn't cast a reflection in a mirror. So when we look in the mirror, the only thing we see is our own monstrous abilities. From the host and producer of American History Tellers and History Daily comes the new podcast,

The Real History of Dracula. We'll reveal how author Bram Stoker rated ancient folklore, exploited Victorian fears around sex, science, and religion, and how even today we remain enthralled to his strange creatures of the night. You can binge all episodes of The Real History of Dracula exclusively with Wondery+. Join Wondery+, and the Wondria, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.