Something Was Wrong - S9 Ep6: What The F*ck Just Happened?

Episode Date: September 9, 2021

After meeting, Kenji and Danielle made startling revelations about Ardie’s life, his debauched agenda, and just how depraved his mind can really be. Follow @SomethingWasWrongPodcast on Instagram  For free mental health resources, please visit SomethingWasWrong.com/Resources

Something Was Wrong is intended for mature audiences. Episodes discuss topics that can be triggering, such as emotional, physical, and sexual violence, suicide, and murder. I am not a therapist or a doctor. If you're in need of support, please visit somethingwaswrong.com slash resources for a list of non-profit organizations that can help. Some names have been changed for anonymity purposes. Opinions expressed by guests on the show are their own,

and do not necessarily represent the views of myself or audio chuck. Resources and source material are linked in the episode notes. Thank you so much for listening. Desperate to find out more information about Artie's real identity, Kenji finally decided to try and contact Danielle. I looked up Danielle's information online a few months prior. I knew she had family locally. I also knew she had a sister that was out on the East Coast.

I figured because her sister was so physically far away, she probably wasn't as involved with or aware of this whole situation with Artie, but maybe she would have a little bit of information she could give to me. At least I knew she wouldn't go running to Artie and let him know that I was contacting her. I sent a message to Anna on Facebook with the same kind of story I had told Linda that I'd contacted a couple months before saying, hey, this might be really weird, but I'm concerned about my family's safety, and I'm wondering if you have any information about a man that your sister is involved with named Artie.

And immediately, Anna replies, and she's like, oh, my God, we've been dealing with Artie for the past eight or nine years, and we don't know what to do about him. And I'm just floored at that point. Like, that was not the answer I was expecting. So that same night, Anna's like, we need to do a phone call with my parents. a conference call and we need to figure this out. That same night, we got on the phone with Anna and her parents, and they're kind of telling me the background with Artie,

and it's a mirror image of the story with Darcy. The same exact thing. British doctor at the time when him and Danielle had met, he was supposedly in residency at UCLA, but apparently they had a family friend who worked at UCLA Medical Center and said that they didn't know anyone by the name of Artie there. So early on, had kind of figured out that he wasn't really a doctor and wasn't in medical school, but

Danielle had kind of blown them off and accused them of trying to interfere with her relationship and kind of the typical thing that Arty had done. He'd kind of turned her and her family against each other to isolate her. Her parents didn't know what to do with Danielle either because the family had been kind of split apart because of Arty. So we decide that we need to stage this sort of joint intervention with Danielle and possibly Darcy to see if we can snap both of them out of this. And so I say, okay, give me a couple days. Let me see what I can do. And we'll get a plan together to meet later in the week and try and get both Danielle and Darcy in the same room.

A few days later on July 2nd, I tell Darcy, hey, I have something to tell you. You cannot let Arty know this. But I contacted Daniel's family and they want to talk to you. And Darcy surprisingly agrees. She says, oh, I want to meet them too because I want answers about Artie. and she wants to get to the bottom of all this. Kenji and Danielle's parents arranged a meeting between Darcy and Danielle, Fourth of July weekend, 2020. So I go with Darcy to meet Daniel at her parents' place.

And as you can imagine, this is a very awkward situation. Here's Danielle. I really thought at that point that they were going to sit me down and they were going to tell me that they suspected he was cheating on me. And what I didn't know is that it was actually much, much worse than that. I think that was like the longest 15 minutes of my life was waiting for them to show up. This couple shows up when I'm in the backyard. I'm obviously highly anxious.

They introduced themselves as Darcy and Kenji. Darcy sits across from me. And I say, oh, so you're the parents of the kids that Carrie's gone on plate it with, Artie. She says, yes, but judging by your reaction, that leads me to believe that you don't have the full picture. Everything after that is a little bit of a blur. I remember bits and pieces, but she proceeds to tell me that she'd actually been, dating already since October of 2019 and that they'd been living together. She said he had told her that he and I had split up when Carrie was three, that we were just

merely co-parenting together. She had no idea that we had been living together for over eight years. There were times where I would have these really bad dreams, and I would dream he was cheating on me. and I would always tell him about these dreams, and he would tell me I was being ridiculous. And at first, when I first started to have the dreams, you'd be like, you're just being silly. You know, I love you. That it just got to the point where he didn't even care anymore.

He'd just be like, stop with your nonsense. I guess in that moment, I was like, oh, yeah, I was having those dreams for a reason, and it was neither silliness nor nonsense. Daniel also learned from Darcy that she and Artie had even gone on a romantic getaway to Yosemite together that past February. Which was just so crazy because he liked to go camping in Yosemite and he always liked to go alone. He's like, you have your spa day with your girls and this is my alone time is going to Yosemite. And he would actually FaceTime me from Yosemite.

Well, it never occurred to me that he was bringing. somebody with him. She'd also said they had gone on vacation to San Diego together. I lived in San Diego for a year and a half, and he refused to go to San Diego. He just kept telling me how much he hated San Diego. She told me that she had met him at a bar locally and that everybody at the bar seemed to know the British doctor and that he had told her he lived in Manhattan Beach. and that he had a lot of money. He also did some production stuff. So he pretended that he produced films and things like that. Darcy was almost unemotional, to be honest. She was very matter of fact. I don't think I said too much except to ask her to clarify on some things.

Kenji wasn't saying a word. but that's when they tell me that after she had filed the restraining order for him assaulting her, it had happened while her kids were in the house. And Kenji had become pretty upset about this. Even though Darcy at this point figures out that we were living together, it's almost like it didn't matter to her. I mean, it didn't matter to me because I wanted a way out. She's figuring out that he's cheating and there's just nothing from her.

No emotion at all. No. Empathy, compassion. She was very matter of fact to the point where even my parents commented that something was off with her after she left. They didn't get a good impression of her while she was there. And I think part of that is because of her reaction. further on in the conversation.

So at this point, we aren't sure that this is his real identity or just another fake identity. But I do know that it shows that he also was not from the UK. He was not a doctor, had never been a doctor. And so now my mind is reeling. struggling to process the reality in front of her Danielle tried to connect the raising thoughts running through her mind her brain was flooded with so much information

it was hard to process everything that was rushing at her I didn't know the full story I just knew he wasn't Artie he wasn't from the UK and he wasn't a doctor and I realized that he put the name Artie on my daughter's birth certificate with the last name that he also made up. And that my daughter has his made-up last name. I'm not stupid.

I mean, he had a driver's license with the name already on it. He had a passport with the name already on it. I mean, he had all this documentation. And so all these thoughts are running through my head. Danielle, the whole time just as white as a ghost. I felt so bad for her. I could just see in her eyes as we were talking. talking to her and kind of telling her everything that's been going on the past six or eight

months that Danielle's looking like she can't process it. Like her whole life has just been turned upside down. And it was because it turns out she had no idea what Artie was up to. To be honest, I'm not even sure what I was thinking in that moment. I think my brain was just racing to connect these dots. And what I wind up saying to Darcy is, I don't understand how this fucking happens to me. I'm a fucking badass woman. And she looks at me and she says, I know you are because he tells me all the time how much better you are, like how talented you are and how much of a better mom you are than me. He tries to put me down by telling me how great you are. Then I start kind of digging and asking, you know, just more questions about stuff. I do remember

her showing me pictures of them, sort of kissing and stuff. She had told me that recently for her birthday, he had given her a gift box that she was pretty sure he didn't pick out himself. I connected the dots that it was the gift box that he had asked me to make for him a few months prior when he was like, oh, I've got these colleagues at work. And I want to give each of them one of your gift boxes since I owned an online customized gift box company. And so I made him three gift boxes for these women. And I told her this. And she says, I have one of your gift boxes. And I said, well, he had me make three of them. So who has the other two? Then she tells me that she also has his name tattooed on her. And I said, well, that makes two of us. And she said that he is. And she said that he

had, you know, agreed to get her name as well. And I said, yep, did that too, but he never did. And she told me he did with her that he had come home one day and he had the name Darcy outlined in cursive on the inside of his bicep area and showed it to her. And then later that afternoon, they had gotten into a huge fight. And the next time he had done, he had done. come back, he had a feather covering the tattoo. And he basically was like, well, you pissed me off, so I covered it up. I said to her, he picked that fight because he had to get it covered up, because he couldn't go home and have your name on his arm. And in fact, he made a huge point of showing me his new feather tattoo. This now makes three women that have Artie's name tattooed on them.

I remember saying, well, thank God he hasn't slept with me in three years. And as soon as I got out of my mouth, those words, it was like something in my brain goes, this girl is going to take that as some sort of sick confirmation that she's somehow special because he wasn't sleeping with me. I just sort of filed that in the back of my head and I hoped that that's not the situation. So I look at Kenji and I'm like, how are you doing? And Darcy actually jumps in to answer for him, which I thought was pretty rude. And she's like, oh, he's fine. It doesn't affect him.

And he was like, what are you talking about? Of course it affects me. You left after we had just bought a house. Then I figure out very quickly that they were still together when she got with Artie. And I don't remember much of what Kenji says after that. I'd connected the dots that she had left him for Artie and then is acting like it's no big deal. That almost like his thoughts and opinion in that moment didn't bother.

I actually had the thought that this might be the first time somebody had even asked Kenji how he was doing with this information. Completely shocked, Danielle tries to figure out what to do next. She finally feels like she has the support to leave Artie, but she also wanted to make sure she did so in the safest way possible. I'm still in the situation where he could come after me and my family. The whole point of why I didn't leave in the first place. We has access to guns. We had four or five rifles in our home, and at any point, he can come over. What am I going to do? I remember my stepmom coming out and she had put her hand on my shoulder.

She said, Danielle, your mother and your sister hired private security and they're here now. And I want to just have you say hello. And I remember feeling like a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders because I felt like I now could leave. and that my family would be safe. I had always suspected he was capable of violence. He had never been physically violent with me. Thank God. I do think that I said to Darcy

that he hadn't physically assaulted me and that part of that was because I was just so conscientious about not pushing him. And she did say that he had made a comment to her that, oh yeah, Danielle knows better than to touch my stuff or piss me off. And that made me feel really fucking small because if you know me, I'm super fiery. I am very successful in my career. And I'm definitely not known for being passive or passive aggressive or should. shy or anything remotely related to being submissive.

Very direct and outgoing. And so I guess in that moment, it was just like we're holding up this mirror in front of me. Darcy told Danielle about how during an argument, Artie had taken her eye watch and destroyed it. She ordered a new one to replace it, and when it arrived, Artie took the watch before she had even opened it. So I looked down at my wrist and I'm like, does this look like your eye watch? And she's like, I mean, probably. And I say to her that he had given it to me recently. And he had told me he had gotten it free from work.

I actually took it off my wrist and gave it back to her. And I said, here, this is yours. She said that they both had restraining orders out on each other at that moment. Sometimes he'd go to the gym for like three hours. It just seems so crazy to me. But the gym was nearby and she said that she had actually gone to the gym with him a few times. Even though when I was looking to get a gym membership, he told me he didn't want to go to the same gym as me. So he told me to get a membership at a different gym.

To be honest, none of that actually really hurt. It was like puzzle pieces just suddenly sliding together. It didn't feel like a betrayal. It didn't feel like a normal. You know, if you're in love with somebody, and you're in this relationship. And you suddenly find out that they're cheating and they've been doing all this stuff without you

with other women, with another woman, that you've been asking to do with them, but they've said no, but now they're doing it with this other woman. That's a betrayal that really hurts, especially if you are in love with that person. I just was like, oh, now it all makes sense. The group decided that they would do their best

to act like nothing had changed, until Danielle had a few days to try and process and figure out the safest next steps in her exit plan. Just kind of take a couple days to regroup and see how we're going to do this without him exploding and doing God knows what. She told me that he was able to track her phone and intact into her email and that she was pretty sure that he had done the same thing to me. I didn't shut my phone down immediately. He texted me just before she left. And he was like, oh, what are you up to? And I told him, oh, nothing, just doing some work.

What are you doing? And he's like, oh, I'm on a conference call, boring. I didn't answer. And then I couldn't shut my phone down right in that second. I knew I had to get a new phone right away. But I couldn't because it was my only phone. And I had to let people get in touch with me. We decide we're going to stay in touch, but she's going to go home and act like nothing happened until we can kind of figure out in the next day or two how to proceed.

We really didn't know what to do from there so that he didn't escalate into something crazy. I do remember that I called my boss pretty quickly that day because at the time, we were like, I've got to get out of town. I've got to figure out how to get out and do this. I wound up calling my boss because given the fact that the slightest provocation from Kenji had caused him to call Kenji's job and get him fired, I was like, oh, yeah, he's for sure going to try and do that to me. So I called her and I was just like, please don't fire me. I know I've only been on the job for three weeks.

And she was really, really great. The day that I found this off, like once security showed up, the security guy was like, let's go to your apartment and get the rifles out. Also, he had a restraining order. Living in the house was a violation of his restraining order. We had all these rifles. And I wanted to get them out of the house and get my cats out of the house because I knew that once he figured and connected the dots, that he would just lose a shit. Danielle had a quick moment to herself in the car. So she decided to call her best friend Christina to fill her in. I'm like, I only have five minutes. And I just found out that Artie's not who says he is. His name's not

Artie. He was never a doctor. He is not from the UK, which means he's been faking a British accent. We're not quite sure who he really is yet. There's a possibility that he might be Mexican. And he's got restraining orders out from multiple women. He's been living with this other. woman for like 10 months and I just start laughing hysterically. She's like, what? She's just like, girl, are you telling you, like you've been catfished. And I was like, no, I was like, it is so much worse than that. I'm a fucking lifetime movie. I think I did start sobbing a little bit in that moment, mainly because it was just like my brain was trying to factor all these things together. Like, the fuck just happened.

Remember when we were younger at the fair, those gravitrons? There's like that you go in this road. It's a circular thing. It just spins around and around. You're like, just the force of gravity, like, up against the wall. I guess I felt like that. I was just spinning around and trying to, like, move in all sorts of different directions. The force of gravity is just pulling me hard.

It just felt unreal. And real, that's the only way I can describe it. And it's honestly how I feel to this day. Danielle's first priority at this point was going with security to her apartment to get Artie's firearms out of their place. I knew that Artie was with Darcy. So I wanted to get there, get our rifles out of the apartment before he figured out anything at all. So the security guy follows me to our apartment with my dad. and basically stands outside watching

and Casey somehow shows up. So I got the rifles out, all the ammunition. He had like bow and arrows that he had picked up as a hobby for a total of like two months. But I just basically wanted any sort of weapon out of that house. I also got my two cats. I was really afraid that once he figured out I was gone, he was going to lose his shit and start throwing stuff and harm my cats in the process. So it was

really nerve-wracking. I felt like I was fleeing for my life almost. I just like threw a few items of clothing into a suitcase, just a handful of stuff. I honestly was just in this moment of panic and getting out of there before he figured things out and came looking for me. So we get everything, we go back to my parents' house, and I'm still kind of waiting. He still doesn't know at this point that I know everything. And that quickly changed the next day. I decided to stop taking all of his texts now that I had what I needed out of the apartment. he's the type of person where if I didn't answer a text right away, he would start going like ballistic.

And so for eight and a half years, I couldn't even like go outside without taking my phone with me. Because if I didn't answer for God forbid 20 minutes, he would start going off on me and causing me a whole lot of stress and just start answer your fucking phone. You never answer blah, blah, blah. And who wants to deal with that? So I literally had to have my phone attached to me at all times. He was texting me and I wasn't responding. And so he started to get crazy. And I shut off my phone.

Danielle knew that Artie was checking Darcy's phone and intercepted her messages and used her phone to pretend to be her and text her contacts. She couldn't take any chances with her phone or laptop. So she replaced them both right away. Obviously, I changed all my passwords on everything so that I could lock him out of everything if he was getting into all my stuff. Danielle, Kenji, and Daniel's family were keeping one another updated in a group chat as things progressed. Kenji was getting any information he could from Darcy and giving it to all of us in this group text. So at some point already takes off somewhere.

We don't know where. And he had somehow figured out that stuff was missing. He had a suitcase that was a lot. And when I went to get the guns, I remember grabbing that suitcase because I wanted to see what the fuck was in there. And ironically, he did a really shitty job of locking it. So all I had to do was unzip it. And there was really nothing in there except a couple of resumes with what we believe to be

his real name, but weren't sure at this point in time. And the resumes had him working as a personal assistant, working as a server. I think he like might have worked as an assistant at a law firm of some sort. They all said he went to college somewhere, the local college, which I didn't even think that was probably true. He was probably lying about that on his resumes. So that's really all I had. But I do remember getting an email about how his suitcase was missing and his private information and all this stuff. Of course, I'm not really responding to anything. He had figured it out because I wasn't answering and he went home and realized there were things missing. And he had confronted Darcy. And she had admitted that she told me, I don't know what their exchange was like, but at this point, he's figured it out.

Unfortunately, on the ride home, Darcy's talking to me and she says that she feels bad for Artie and she feels that something horrible must have happened to him in his life to do this or to come up with this fake identity and to act this way. She starts painting a picture in her mind that he's some sort of victim and someone that if she just says the right things and does the right things, that she can fix him. I didn't expect her to kind of go in deeper and start to feel bad for Artie and try and justify his behavior that way. She also says that she kind of feels relieved.

She feels like, well, Danielle said that they hadn't been intimate in a couple years, and they didn't have much of a relationship left. So she felt like Artie wasn't really cheating on her with Danielle. She felt like she was his main girl, and Danielle was just kind of someone he kept around. It was just the complete opposite reaction of what any of us expected. Darcy didn't come right out and say that she was going to continue this, relationship with Artie. The next few days were tumultuous.

The following day on July 3rd, 2020, Artie began sending threatening text messages to Danielle, Darcy, Kenji, and Daniel's family. So everyone's looking forward to Fourth of July, and then here comes this shitstorm with Artie flipping out, and everyone's legitimately concerned for their safety. None of us know if he's still got a gun on him in his car, because he claimed to, and nobody knew where he was. Later that night, Arty's... Artie decides to switch tactics a bit. The evening of July 3rd, Artie texted Darcy a picture of himself in the hospital. I have the picture.

You don't even see his face. It's just shot of his body in a hospital gown on a bed with a wristband on and some monitors hooked up to him. And the text messages, he claims that he took a bunch of pills and he's trying to kill himself because he's so upset by all this. And it works because Darcy feels bad for him. She was like, I don't want him to die. I don't want him to hurt himself, but he won't tell me where he is, all kinds of stuff. So he sends Darcy a picture of himself in the hospital.

He won't tell Darcy where he is, what hospital it is. I think she tried to call around and figure out where he was. She couldn't find him. Gardy also tells Darcy that another one of his female friends named Barbara is with him because she's the only one who cares about him or something. He's just doing whatever you can to make Darcy feel bad to feel jealous. And she's basically like, he's in the hospital. he's attempted suicide.

So in order to prove that he isn't lying, he has his friend Barbara send a text message to Darcy. And in this text message that Barbara sends to Darcy, Barbara is sending two photos. And one of the photos is Artie, but it's just his arm. You can see a piece of the hospital gown, You can see an IV in his arm and the hospital bracelet.

And then the second picture is just Barbara. And she's holding up a post-it with the date and time, as if to prove that this is all real. So I knew immediately this was total bullshit. I mean, she wasn't even in the picture with him. So I was like, what the hell is this supposed to even prove? But of course, none of us believe it, except Darcy. Things got even scarier for Danielle and her family that evening.

I think he knew that nobody believed him because that night, it was late. It was probably around 11 o'clock, but we were still up in the living room. And we had a new security guard that was out front. She was new. At night, the security guards would stay in the car overnight, and we would bring them coffee first thing in the morning and make sure they had everything that they needed. This woman, she was out front,

but suddenly we had put the chain on my parents' door, one of those little chain things that goes in, and the door opens, and it's arty. And luckily, that chain was on there, and my dad was right next to the door. He stands up real quick to push it shut. and I grab my daughter and my siblings and I'm like, get into the back bedroom now. So they do.

And I go back there, but I hear my dad open the door and Arty's like, is Danielle here? My dad's like one second and shuts the door with the intention of calling the cops, but also we're wildly like texting the security people. why is this woman not responding? And it turns out she'd actually fallen asleep. And she didn't notice because he didn't even drive his car. He was being sneaky. He had parked around the corner and basically snuck up.

I think Ardy figured out that we were probably calling the police and he took off. Later, I don't know if it was that night or the next morning, but my stepmom got a text from Artie because at this point I'd shut down my phone. I wasn't answering. He texted my stepmom, you guys needed to let me see my daughter, or else nobody in this family is going to be safe. The police issued an emergency protective order, but I still needed to serve him with it.

So the next day comes around and Artie's discharged from the hospital. I know he gets back in contact with Darcy and they start talking again. Darcy seems, for my conversations with her at the time, She seemed like she was pretty determined to end the relationship this time. Darcy contacts me in the afternoon and asks me if I can watch our kids for a little while so she can go return Artie's things to him. And I ask her, I can't you just leave his stuff on the doorstep and tell him to come get it? And she tells me, no, I need closure.

I need to end things my way. I want to return his stuff to him and just kind of go our separate ways. She kind of jokingly tells me, if I don't come back in an hour, call the police. And I was legitimately concerned for her safety. This was a guy that just threatened us less than 48 hours before, threatened to basically kill everybody, hurt everybody. And I didn't think it was a good idea for her to go meet up with him. But she did. I had the kids with me and were just kind of hanging out waiting.

An hour goes by. I don't hear anything from her. Two hours go by. Still no word from Darcy. Supposedly, she was just going to a Starbucks nearby to return his things and then that was it. So after two hours, I started getting a little nervous. And I text her and just ask her, hey, is everything okay? I don't hear a response.

I then tried to call her. No response. I'm going straight to voicemail. And then three hours go by and I'm like, okay, something's wrong, right? I didn't know if already had hurt her, kidnapped her, what he had done to her. So I decided to call the police. And I explained the situation. I asked him, hey, my ex was supposed to meet this guy to break up with him and to turn her things,

but I can't get a hold of her. I feel like something might have happened to her when I told them where she was supposed to be. And then I also told them where she lived and asked if they could. could just go look for her and see if she was okay, do a wellness check on her. They said they would. About an hour or two later, I get a call from one of Darcy's close friends saying, hey, I just heard that Darcy and Ardy just got arrested and they're at the local jail. That's next time on Something Was Wrong. Something Was Wrong is an audio chuck original.

Thank you so much to our team. Executive producer Ashley Flowers. Coordinating producer Mike McDonald. Mixing and mastering by Kyle O'Connor. Created, reported, and hosted by me, Tiffany Reese. Our theme song was originally composed by Gladrags, covered this season by Midwest Originals. So what do you think, Chuck? Do you approve?