True Crime All The Time - Darren Deon Vann

Episode Date: February 4, 2019

Darren Deon Vann is a serial killer who confessed to murdering seven women in and around the Gary Indiana area. Vann was no stranger to law enforcement and had done stretches in both jail and prison over the years. But, when he moved back to Gary, Indiana from Texas, he began murder women over the next 15 months until he was caught in 2014.Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss the life and crimes of Darren Vann. He has hinted that he may have murdered many more women stretching back to the mid-1990s. In a rarity for the show, we have an interview with a Gary police officer, and a fan of the show, who had a terrifying encounter with Vann 10 years before he was caught.You can help support the show at patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for contact, merchandise, and donation informationSponsors:Start your free trial of the biggest selection of audio books by going to audible.com/truecrime See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

everyone and welcome to episode 116 of the True Crime All the Time podcast. I'm Mike Ferguson and with me as always is my partner in true crime, Mike Gibson. Give me, how are you? Hey man, I'm doing good about yourself. I'm doing great. Good. I am ready to get into what I believe is going to be a very fascinating episode of True Crime all the time. I believe you. And you got your specs on, man. I do. I picked up my new glasses this week. I'm not sure I'm used to them yet. My first pair of glasses I've ever had. Well, welcome to the Four Eyes Club that you've been in for for many, many years. Fifth grade, yes. So we put out a poll on Patreon and basically we've had a lot of new support, which is amazing. It is amazing. The numbers are staggering, the number of people,

but because of that, we're probably about five weeks behind if we did things the way that we've always done them. Yeah. Which is basically say the same Patreon supporters on each show. So I put out a poll asking people and overwhelmingly they said, you know, just do half and half. So that's what we're going to do. Which is great. You know, unsolved is growing anyway. I think finally people are jumping over to Unsolved. They've got caught up on T-CAD. It is growing big time. Now they're jumping over there and, you know, hitting the backlog and getting caught up. So we do say all the names on our kind of Patreon mini episode. Right. That way people will know it's your name is going to be on one of the other. So if you don't hear it here. Yeah, jump over to Unsolved. It'll be on there. So we had Steve Holt.

Hey, Steve. Cassandra Rupert jumped out of our highest level. Thank you, Cassandra. Abby Redding. Hey, Abby. Suzanne Flores. Thank you, Susan. She jumped out at our highest level. Suzanne does a good job. So did Timothy Meneer. Meneer. Meneer. Yeah. Jules. Hey, Jules. Ari Ansborough. R. E. Ari. Ari. Hey, Ari. Melissa Kecker. Kekker? Like kicker, but a keka? That's what I'm going with.

I can go a couple different ways there. Susan Gable. Hey, Susan. Michael Cowling. Hey, thanks, Michael. Maria Gibbs. Got the Gibbs. You know, that's good.

Ali Littman. Hey, Ali. Morgan Mills. Nicky Allen. Hey, Nicky. Jared, what's up? Marina Leith. Leith.

Stephanie. Hey, Stephanie. Sarah Winters. It's definitely your time of the year right now. Man, you ain't kidding. Andrea Hidalgo Wendy Holdbrooks Hey Wendy

Jason Yeager Thank you Yeager Meister Logan Stoll The stall master Sonia G Hey Sonia Or Sonia

Depending on how she is I don't know Kind of like Mikey G Could be Gibson For all we know You never know Gina Trow Treyo

I don't know Treyu That's another one I could go a couple different ways You're probably right Maybe she's just true Maybe

Catherine Mazer. Hey, Catherine. And then Ali G, who's been a Patreon supporter, jumped up to our highest level. I appreciate that, Ali. So if we go back into the ball, Gibbs. This week we selected Caitlin Tall. Thank you, Caitlin. Not only a longtime supporter, but a very big supporter of the show on Patreon.

Plus, she's got that famous dad. Who's that? Jethro. I knew you were going to say that, but I wanted to hear it. Yeah. So we appreciate that, Caitlin. very much. We appreciate all the new Patreon support. We had PayPal as well. Oh, I like that too. Grace Brunei. Ooh, Brunei. Kim Halamacheck.

Halamichuk. Jennifer Mosier. Hey, Jennifer. Michelle Mesmer. Hey, Mesmer. And Ted Perry. Our buddy Ted. We're going to do this moving forward, split up the Patreon, hopefully make it go a little faster and get people's names out there quicker. Don't forget, if you're buying your CrimeCon badges, use our promo code, crime all the time, 19. And we got unsolved. It's out right now as well. It's a good one. It's a good one.

It's on the disappearance and death of Jennifer Harris. Down in Texas. Down in Texas. You all for us down. For most people in the United States down. Some people over, but. Yeah. Shift left.

Shift right. But it's a fascinating case. It has all the hallmarks of our, you know, unsolved cases, got some twists, turns, has suspects to persons of interest to talk about. All that stuff. You're like it. Make sure you check that out. And speaking of true crime all time unsolved,

next week is a big milestone for us. Yeah, 100 episodes over there. It's the 100th episode of true crime all time unsolved. And we're going to go all out. And we're doing a very big case, a case that I've wanted to do from the beginning. I knew at some point we were going to tackle it. And I think this is the time.

And it's the case of the West Memphis three. You know, the unsolved murders of three boys, the conviction of what's known as the West Memphis three. And I know I'm going to get some emails. Technically, it's not an unsolved case. Right. I think it's okay to do an unsolved because I think most people that look at that case think, there's just no way those kids did that. Yeah.

So I think if you typically don't listen to Unsolved right now, you're going to want to jump over. And it's probably going to be a multi-episode. Oh, yeah, definitely. I want to jump over there and listen to it. Definitely. I don't know. It'll be at least two, maybe even three episodes. It's a lot.

There is a lot of information to tell it the way that we like to with all the detail and to digest all that. Yes. All right, Gibbs. Are you ready to get into this episode of True Crime All Time? Let's do it. So we're talking about Darren Dion Van. You know, it's lesser known, like some of the ones that we like to do quite often.

But Van's a serial killer. and just because someone is a little less notorious, that's probably a better way to say it. Sure. Doesn't mean he was any less horrific than a lot of more well-known killers. This guy was brutal. He confessed to murdering seven women. But this is a guy that lived in a bunch of different places over the years. Some of those places we'll talk about.

So I think this is another one of those case Gibbs where at the end of it, We're all going to be wondering, you know, how many more victims did Van really have? Sure. Yeah, he could have had some in all those different locations. He really could have, you know, either that he's not willing to talk about or police have no information on or the combination. I do think many people, probably most people, believe that he murdered more than what he has been willing to talk about. maybe many more over what could be a 20 year period. I think you for sure that you could back that up. We'll talk about it a little bit when we get into the case,

but he's made some hints. And I think that's where a lot of people, you know, they look at some things that he's hinted at and say, oh, you know, this guy did more than what he has told us so far. So Darren Van was born in Indiana, March 21st, 1971. He's about our age, roughly. In the ballpark. This is another case where there's not a ton of details on Darren Van's background.

I know he grew up in Indiana. He had at least one brother and one sister. And there were some records that indicated he lived in Ohio. Really? At some point. And actually graduated. from high school in Lima. Okay.

Ohio, which is, what, just a little bit more, a little bit more than an hour north of us? Yeah, about an hour, 20. Yeah, not too far. So Van joined the Marine Corps in the early 90s, but he just wasn't cut out for it. And let's face it. Gibbs, the Marines don't put up with a whole lot of bullshit from what I understand. I've never been in the Marines. I did watch a few good men the other night.

Did you? Mm-hmm. You get a K-bar. When you join the Marines? They used to, sure. That's like, that was their knife of choice, right? Weapon of choice. So I watched a few good men.

I will say, that movie holds up. That's a great scene. Well, there's a couple great scenes in it. Anything with Nicholson in it. You know, the parts where he's giving like the long dialogues. You can't handle the truth. Those are great. The back and forth between him and Tom Cruise.

And it's got Demi Moore in it too. Or Demi. Or Demet. However you want to say it. Yeah. But I will say, right? You watch movies like that. That's all I have to judge from.

I've never been in the armed services. But we know some Marines. My understanding is that's not a place that you go into if you can't tow the line. The expectations are extremely high. Everything's extremely rigid. Exactly. He was in there for less than two years and received in. than what was listed as an other than honorable discharge.

Okay. Now, I've heard of a dishonorable. Right. Discharge. This specifically said other than honorable. I don't know if that's a whole different category or if that is just a dishonorable discharge. Sounds like I just thought there was the two. I think maybe that's what it is.

I'm sure one of our fellow Marines. Fellow. Are you in the Marines? No. You know there's a stiff penalty for impersonating. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I take off the fatigues. Yeah.

But we'll find out. You're right. No, no. Somebody will let us. Yeah. I couldn't find the exact reason for the discharge, except for one statement that was issued by a spokesperson. And it said, Mr. Vann's premature discharge and rank are indicative of the fact that the

character of his service was incongruent with the Marine Corps's expectations and standards. There was a lot of big words in that sentence. It was. Incongruent. I've got a headache. I've got a headache just listening to it. But you boil that down and they're basically saying he couldn't hack it. Couldn't perform.

He was doing things that they don't put up with. Here's the minimum that we said we, you got to do to be with us. And you couldn't do that. So we're letting you go. After he left the Marine Corps. Corps, he ended up in Cherry Point, North Carolina. We know that because he was arrested there in 1993. But by 1995, Darren Van was in Texas.

And he married a woman in 95 named Maria Matlock. Ooh, Matlock. Matlock. That was a good series, if you like attorney stuff. But she was almost 30 years his senior. Oh, now there you go. So 95, he would have been. what, 24 years old, give her take, which puts her in the 53, 54 range.

Like sugar mama. They were together for about 10 years. They separated in 2005, but actually married quite a bit longer. The divorce was not finalized until 2011. When everything comes out, right, about Darren Van, the media talked to his ex-wife. And she said, I don't get it. this is not the guy that I knew. He never mistreated me.

She didn't see anything in him during what was a pretty long time, 10 years. Right. That would have led her to believe Gibbs that he was capable of the crimes that we're going to talk about. And that's so bizarre, you know, to know somebody as well as you think you do, you know. To find out that they had this other side of them that was so deviant. She was really shocked after hearing what he was accused of. She said, this guy didn't drink. He was always friendly.

He was a good protector. He was a good provider. Yeah. Always had a job. If for some reason he lost his job, he would get another one pretty quickly. She really had nothing but pretty good, nice things to say about him. Makes you wonder. It does.

But I will say that her son. tells a much different story about Darren Van. He said Van was strange. First of all, he didn't understand the age difference. 30 years. Yeah. When one is 24, the others, let's say is 54, you've got to figure that the son was probably around that age or maybe even older than his mother's husband.

Yeah, that's true. He could never understand why this guy was going to. after his mom, he's been quoted saying, the guy is a nutcase and I'd watch him. Well, these quotes are made after his crimes come to light. So he's not, easier said. You're not a big stretch to say, hey, you might want to watch this guy. Yeah, he killed seven women. But he said, I'd never allow him near my kids or in my home because he just freaked me out. So he's actually talking about a time before he, knew really what Darren Van had done.

The other thing that he added was that Van talked to himself a lot, which he found very odd. But it wasn't just him. A lot of people found this strange that Darren Van talked to himself what was described as most of the time. Really? He walked around creepy. You know, he was always in deep off, always like he had something on his mind, something else on his mind other than where he's.

was, you know what I mean? When you're talking, you say hello, he's like, hello, and he looks down to the ground. Or he starts, or if you turn around, he's like talking to himself slowly. I'm like, this dude, this really creepy. She's almost talking to himself. I think he thought he was creepy. I think so, too. He said it a couple times. Creepy. So Van was involved in an incident in Gary Indiana in 2004 that brought him face to face with police. In April of that year, Darren went to the residence of a man who was living with his ex-girlfriend, with Darren's ex-girlfriend. And apparently this guy was in a wheelchair.

Van went there to collect some money. And it wasn't a small sum. It was said to have been $7,000. Good chunk of change. That he believed his ex-girlfriend owed. him. Now, I do want to make note of the year, right? So, 2004 is when this happened. I just got done saying he was married in 95 and they separated in 2005. Right. So in 2004, he's trying to collect money from his ex-girlfriend. So that might have been, that might tell you a little bit about how the

marriage was going. Right. But even still, his ex-wife didn't badmouth him. No, I still find that very odd. No, she did not. So he's at this house. So Van's walking up to this guy's house, the boyfriend. And he's carrying a red gasoline can when the two encounter each other. And the boyfriend apparently said to Van, you know, why do you want to burn my family, innocent people over a woman?

Because I think he, he kind of has a clue here what he's doing with this can of gasoline. And it's not going to be good. Van allegedly replied back, give me the $7,000 and I'll leave and you can have her. He also told the boyfriend that he had some dynamite and he would, he'd blow him all up. If he didn't get his $7,000, he'll ignite it and blow him up. He's either going to set somebody on fire or he's going to light some dynamite. Either way, it's not going to be a good situation. And it started to escalate very quickly.

Van managed to get his ex-girlfriend out of the house. He grabbed her, pulled her out. But at this point, the police are on their way. But what he did next, Gibbs, was it's almost unbelievable. He took the gasoline, poured it on himself, poured it on his ex-girlfriend. Right. And he's walking around holding her with a lighter, threatening to light both of them on fire. Now, I got to take a step back.

This was a listener submitted topic, right? Darren Van. When I got the email, I looked into him a little bit and I decided that, yeah, we need to do him because it was a very interesting story. What just so happens that the listener that submitted the story was also a Gary Indiana police officer, which is cool. Yeah, very cool. And he agreed to do a quick interview with me because he was called to the scene. to the scene of this 2004 incident and had an encounter with Darren Van. At the time this happened, I was a Gary Police Officer.

I was a young Gary Police Officer. I had only been on the road by myself, as in not writing with another officer, a training officer, for six to eight months at the time. So I'm still learning the job. I know six to eight months in another job, it might, that might be enough to get comfortable and even consider yourself, you know, a veteran at what you do. But being a police officer isn't like that, especially not in a place like Gary. So I'm working afternoon shift at the time. I was on straight afternoon, so I know it was afternoon shift.

And call comes out over dispatch about a domestic disturbance. And at first, it's just domestic disturbance, which is a fairly common call. The units who were sent there respond, and a couple minutes later, we get another call about the same address, and it's now, this has escalated from just a male and female arguing to this male subject is now forcing, trying to force entry into the home where his ex-girlfriend is. The male subject is later identified as Darren Bann. So now that this is escalated from just a verbal altercation or what was perceived by us through dispatches of verbal altercation, to an actual subject trying to force entry into the home. Of course, most units start answering up more en route, whoever's available, being one of them. Here's a large city.

It takes you a couple minutes to get from point A to point B even if you're running with your lights and sirens. So as I'm responding to the call, it now comes out. The subject has forced entry into the home. Darren Van has forced entry into the home. Now is holding his girlfriend hostage, pulled her out of the home, and he's got a gas can with him. And so units start getting on scene with him, and he's walking her on the sidewalk down through the streets of Gary. And actually, this is literally only a couple blocks away from the PD, as a matter of fact, Air Tools Department. As he's walking her, he starts pouring gasoline from the gas can all over himself and her, and he's got a lighter in his hand.

And he's threatening to light her on fire. and at some point, just after he pulls her out of the house a couple minutes, I arrive on scene, and he's actually walking her across a part of U.S. Route 20, which in Gary is the main east-west thoroughfare through the north part of the city. I mean, it's a major three-lane, one-direction road, one-way road, three lanes. So we're having to block traffic because he's walking her through the city backwards through the streets, one arm wrapped around her upper body and one arm or one hand holding a lighter. And eventually, you know, there's so many cops that have arrived now.

There's probably at least 20 of us that have arrived. You know, he realizes that there's just, there's nowhere he can go. So what he does is, is he walks himself and backs himself up between the alleyway of two houses. And when I say alleyway, it's really not like an alleyway to drive a car. cards. You know, what we, some cities you would call a gangway, just a piece of sidewalk between two brick walls of homes that's big enough for, you know, a person to walk through. There's actually a picture of him holding her like this with, you can see a brick wall behind him. That's one of the houses. So at that point, we have at the time a captain who's on the SWAT team, he shows up and

actually he gives me a shotgun filled with beanbags when he tells me to go. He tells me to go. take up a position at the one end of the alley, the gangway. And if I get a shot to try to take a shot. And in the meantime, another officer shows up. And he actually is able to talk Darren Van down and release the female subject and bring this whole ordeal to a close. But I mean, I've seen a lot of crazy things as a police officer and Gary too. This was one of those calls that really.

really just, you know, it always stuck with you. And at the time, this was before Darren Van had started his killings for you, at least, you know, we all think. You know, it was an interesting call. It was like, holy cow, I can't believe that just happened, you know. But it wasn't, it was almost just an every other day thing, you know. After it was done, it was early in our shift. After it was done, we all talked about it.

The detectives came and they took Darren to the police department and they booked him on his felony charges, his girlfriend at the time was given medical treatment, and the rest of us, we all just went and want to, you know, there were other calls to answer. Gary's a big city, so, you know, it was on to the next call after that, not giving any thought to the fact of, you know, years later, I would turn on the news and here's this same man that, you know, we were involved in this call with who was now under investigation for being a serial killer. It was pretty crazy. So I thought that was cool, Gibbs.

You and I don't do a lot of interviews on true crime all time or unsolved, really, for that matter. Right. You know, since he suggested the episode and had this personal experience, I thought it would be really cool for him to talk about it. He did a good job. And so I want to thank him and thank his mom too because his mom is the one that turned him onto the podcast. Oh, that's awesome. Yep. All right, Gibbs.

Let's take a quick break to talk about our sponsor, Audible. Now, listen, we know that reading can make you a better. person. It can make you smarter. But we have a podcast audience. And we've heard people like to multitask. They like to do things while they're listening to the podcast. That makes Audible perfect for this group. With Audible, you get access to an unbeatable selection of audiobooks, including bestsellers, motivation, true crime, thrillers, and so much more. They have the largest selection of audiobooks on the planet. Right now, I'm listening to Past Tense. I'm a huge Jack Reacher fan. Past Tense. I'm a huge Jack Reacher fan. Past Tense. is the newest book out, just came out a few months ago, from Lee Child, a continuation in the

Jack Reacher series. But with Audible, you can listen on any device, anytime, anywhere, just like you do with the podcast. You'll also enjoy easy audiobook exchanges, roll over credits, and an audiobook library you keep forever, even if you cancel. So check it out. Go to audible.com slash true crime and get started with a 30-day trial. Or you can text True Crime. You can text True crime to 500 500. So that's audible.com slash true crime or text true crime to 500 500. A-U-D-I-B-L-E-L-E-D-I-L-E-D-L-E-L-L-S-T-RU-RECU-RECU-RILLI. So Van made a deal with prosecutors and he pleaded guilty to misdemeanor residential entry. So they dropped a charge of intimidation, which would have been a felony. and he was sentenced to a year in jail and a year of probation. Misdemeanor residential entry.

Fancy. Yeah. Where's the, I poured gasoline on somebody and threatened to light him on fire apart. But yeah, I get it. They have to do that stuff. But with Darren Van,

it's not going to take him long to violate his probation after he got out, after he had done his time. In 2005, he was sentenced to a. another 90 days in jail for a probation violation. Then you get to 2007. And in 2007, Vand sexually assaulted a 25-year-old woman in Austin, Texas. So apparently what happened was this woman went out to a home where Van was living on a service call for whatever company that she worked at.

Okay. when she got there, Darren Van brutally attacked this woman, beat her severely and forced her to perform oral sex on him. The woman got away from Darren and she went to police. But there's no doubt about what happened to her. She had red marks all over her neck where he had attempted to strangle her. she told police that at one point during the incident, Van said to her, I could easily kill you. And he meant it. Oh, he meant it.

Yeah. He meant it for sure. So it took a while, but he finally got convicted of this sexual assault in 2009 was sentenced to five years in prison. So this guy's no stranger to jail, to the law, to breaking the law, to prison. But he did his time. He was released in 2013, but the other thing that happened was in Texas. He was classified as a sex offender and forced to register, which he should have been. Sure.

He committed a very violent sexual crime. Needed to be on it for sure. But the strange thing to me was in their evaluation, the state of Texas deemed Darren Van as what they called a low risk. for violence. And this is a part I didn't understand. I mean, it really kind of seemed ridiculous to me. Given what he did to this 25-year-old woman, now he might have been a model prisoner. I don't know.

I don't think it even matters. I don't think it does either. I don't see how you can call him a low risk for future violence after what he did to this woman. Now, he served his time. He paid his price. if you want to call it that for doing what he did. But after getting out, I think Van thought, you know what, Texas is not the place for me.

Things have not gone well for me in Texas. I'm going to move back to Indiana. He had grown up there. He had some family there. So he did. He moved back to Indiana. And he moved in with his sister in Gary. But one thing I do want to talk about, it appears to me that the.

system worked as it should have, right? Aside from this weird, strange classification that I talked about of him being a low risk for violence, he notified the Texas authorities that he was moving to Indiana. And they in turn reached out to their counterparts in that state to let them know. And he actually did register as a sex offender in the state of Indiana. And there's evidence that the police made their checks to the different addresses that he listed, and they confirmed that he lived there. So they were checking up on him. But even so, over a period of about 15 months, Darren Van murdered seven women after moving to Indiana. But through it all, he kept complying with the sex offender registration requirements.

In fact, it was noted that he checked in with authorities just a month before he was captured and all of these shocking crimes that he committed would come to light. So I wanted to point that out because I think in other episodes, Gibbs, we have talked about where people didn't comply or they complied but the state didn't do the checks that they were supposed to. Yeah, we talked about that. I don't think that happened here. But even still, it can't stop everything, right?

There's no way. That's impossible to check on someone once a month or whatever the frequency is. There's no way that you can know exactly what they're doing at all times. And it was on October 17th, 2014, police were called to a grisly scene at a motel six in Hammond, Indiana. They found 19 year old Africa Hardy naked in the bathtub with the shableness. shower still running. They saw that she had red marks on her neck, which indicated that she had been strangled. One of her fingernails was broken. They found a shirt button as well as a condom wrapper

on the floor of the motel room. And they knew there had been a struggle in that room. You could tell just from the way that the beds were, I guess they were just a mess pulled away from the headboards. you know, everything was definitely some scuffling. Oh, yeah, they had a fight in that room. So it came out that Africa Hardy was dabbling in escort work. Escort services. Escort service. Yeah.

Along with another woman, they were advertising on a website called backpages.com. And this was actually Chicago Backpages. I think this was, I don't know if this is still around, but I think this is one of those like Craigslist where they have a different one for every city. Oh, I got you. So it was the way that the research made it sound was like it specifically was Chicago Backpages. Okay. But I don't think it was limited to Chicago. And not limited to Escorts. Oh, no. I don't think it was just for. It was just like classified ads, basically. Well, I don't know. I don't know what Backpages.com was. I don't think it was just escorts. What did you use?

wasn't backpages. Yeah. But this is what they were doing. They were essentially running these two women running a little escort service by advertising on this backpages.com. So this other woman that was working with Hardy in the business, she got worried. Because you know, Gibbs, they probably had a system where one was supposed to notify the other after, let's say they met a client. Well, Africa didn't reach out and her friend tried to get a hold of her multiple times, no response. Texts, phone calls. And then at one point, the woman received some strange text messages that said they were from Africa, but she knew they weren't.

Didn't sound like her. You know, it wasn't the way that she would have talked. So she got really worried. And she called up a friend and they went to the motel six and they were actually the ones that first discovered Africa's body. They called in the police. But it really didn't take the authorities long to zero in on Darren Van. For one thing, this woman had his cell phone number. He had used his cell phone to call the number that they used to advertise. Wasn't that hard for her to go back and figure out who called. A pretty simple process of elimination. Yep.

So she was able to give that to police. Now, what I did find interesting was that she remembered this guy calling. I think she had taken the call. And she said that the man used the name Big Boy Appetite. Big Boy Appetite. I don't know if it was on a call or on the web. I'm not sure how.

But it came out that he was referring. to himself as big boy appetite. Well, kind of similar to yours. I do have a big boy appetite. I don't think the way that Darren Van had a big boy appetite. No, I think it's much different. I do when it comes to pizza, things like that. Yeah.

So police trace the number to Van. It's very simple process, really, right? Once they have that information, they also obtain the security camera footage from the motel. Always helpful. Always helpful. And it showed Darren Van. It showed his car. So the very next day.

So this happened on a Friday night. The very next day on Saturday, they arrest Darren Van in Gary, Indiana. And it didn't take long during the police interrogation for Darren Van to admit to the murder of Africa Hardy. They had a lot of evidence against him. The cell phone number, the surveillance video footage. I talked about the button that they found in the motel. Well, it just so happened that he was wearing the same shirt the next day when he was arrested. And it was missing that button.

The same button. Yeah. Yep. Probably should change your shirt, at least daily. Just like you do your boxers. And especially after you commit a heinous crime. Yeah, I mean, I would have burnt the shirt. Well, don't tell everybody how you do your stuff.

No, I mean, they listen long enough. they know some of my inside some of your strategies so van reportedly told police officers that he quote messed up and added that he was shocked at how quickly they were able to locate him he messed up well you know everybody makes mistakes but yeah killing a 19 year old woman is just a tad bit more than messing up. It's huge, man. It's life-changing for everybody. It's going to be. And we'll talk about Africa's mom a little bit. But it just, it struck me that that's the word he used in confessing to the murder. Hey, man, I, you know, I messed up. I messed up, man. Just had a bad day. I mean, that's, that's what you say when you transpose a

number on a report at work. Why are we talking about me again? Well, well, we always go back to me. But right, you say something like that. Oh, that's my bad. I messed that up. You don't say that in talking about the murder of someone. Gee, sorry. But again, did he view it as that much different? I don't know. Maybe he didn't. Maybe that's why he used those words. Well, and I think we've, we've covered enough of these terrible, terrible killers that some don't, they just don't have that feeling. They don't have that remorse. They don't, it's like, hmm, that they've really done something wrong. Sorry. I miss, it's like when you misplace something. Sorry. That's how they're, they're with this. Sorry. So Van told police that he responded

to an ad on Chicago back pages to meet someone named Octavia for sex. He said they began having sex at the motel room, but that the woman who was Africa Hardy, she started to fight him when the sex got a little rough, or probably a lot rough. I shouldn't say a little rough. And those were his own words. I think he initiated that. She didn't like it. She started to fight him. And he strangled her first with his hands. And then with a brown extension cord that he brought with him. So let's talk about that. Heat of the moment, you do something horribly wrong, strangle someone with your hands. Yeah.

You don't in the heat of the moment bring an extension cord with you beforehand. Pull it out your back pocket. Let me get my, uh, let me get my extension cord. Traveling extension cord. I mean, you don't bring an extension cord unless you're planning on doing something bad. I mean, if you're a killer, right? if you're a handyman, okay, you're going to plug your drill in. But this is not what the situation is with Darren Van.

He's going to meet a woman for sex at a motel room. What's he need the extension cord for? Kind of games is. Don't answer that. But he doesn't, right? The point is he brought it for one thing and one thing only. He knew that he was going to strangle someone. Yeah.

Because it wasn't just the extension cord. he also brought some things along to help him clean up. Oh, cleaning kit, huh? Yeah. Okay. So no doubt this was thought about beforehand. He was on a mission. It didn't just get out of hand.

After Africa Hardy was dead, Van put her body in the bathtub, turned on the water, and he left. But what's amazing about this interrogation was that that's not all that he admitted to. He told police he had murdered six other women since moving back to the Gary Indiana area. Wow. And I kind of mentioned it a little bit earlier. He didn't stop there. He also hinted at other possible murders dating back to the 1994-1995 time frame. And that's why people think, you know, could this have been 20 years worth of murders? whatever that number may be. Right.

One a year, 10 a year. Who knows? He admitted to murdering seven women in 15 months. Yeah. That's a victim once every two months. Yep. I mean, you extrapolate that out over 20 years. 20 years.

The number could be pretty high. But the thing is, he never admits to it. He doesn't come out and give names. He hints at it. But I want to talk about Gibbs how quickly everything moved from the police discovering Africa Hardy's body on a Friday, Friday night, really. I think it was like 9, 930. Right. The very next day, you know, they arrest Darren Van and he confesses. He starts telling them about these other women that he murdered. They find he basically leads

them to another body that very night. Saturday night, they find the body of 35 year old Anith Jones. And then the next day on Sunday, he leads authorities to the bodies of the other five women. So in a weekend, all of this happens from Friday night to Sunday. The speed of it is astounding. Yeah, it's so rapid. So we've mentioned Gary, Indiana a couple times. We want to talk about Gary just a little bit. Been through there many times. Yeah. Yeah, I have two. And I think being as close as we are, we've heard the stories about Gary, probably a lot of people around the country have. And during the late 90s, it was routinely called the murder capital of the U.S. Not in sheer numbers, but per capita.

The murder rate there was off the charts. So then you get to 2014, the year that Van has caught, Gary, Indiana had a population of about 80,000 people, which was down from, let's say, 180. It's a big drop. Yeah. People didn't want to hang out there. Well, it was a kind of a thriving steel city at one point, and then it declined. Yeah, I mean, it definitely fed the auto industry.

It's not the same as where we live, but, you know, when General Motors pulled out of Dayton, Ohio, it hurt. It made a huge difference in people's lives. But that's not the part that really blew me away. The part that blew me away was that in 2014, it was reported that Gary, Indiana had as many as 10,000 vacant, abandoned homes. And they said the poverty rate in the city was about 40%. Those strong numbers there. Those are, those numbers are astronomical. You've got a population of 80,000 people, and you have 10,000 abandoned homes. And that also means that 30 plus thousand people are living below the poverty line. That's scary, man. I mean, we've seen, I know I have and I believe you have too with our jobs.

Previous job or job for me is just streets of rows of abandoned homes. I mean, literally, you could drive down a stretch of neighborhood and just see one after the other. Yeah, yeah. And every now and then you'd find just one that somebody was still living with, but all the other ones were empty. So I mentioned they'd lost about 100,000 people, right, over the years. So that's part of it. That's how you get so many abandoned homes. But the other thing was losing that many people, that's losing a lot of taxes. Oh, it's killing the city budget. So they didn't have the money to demolish all of these abandoned houses. They even developed a program where they were offering them up for sale for like a dollar. They just wanted some warm bodies in there that we're going to pay the taxes

on the property. Fix it up, do whatever. You can get any of these houses you want. You can buy this whole street if you want for about $12. Every house on the street. They were in a bad way. But the reason I bring it up is because as Darren Van is telling authorities where to find all these bodies, that's what he used. He used this massive amount of abandoned houses. to hide his victims. Police held a press conference, and I want to play just a little bit of that where you can hear the police chief

talking about the victims. Beginning with locations where they were found, the Sixth Gary Victims, 413 East 43rd Avenue, victim identified as 35-year-old Maraville resident, Anith Jones. The second one, 1,800 East 19th Avenue,

victim identified as 28-year-old Gary resident Terrea Beatty. Third one, 2,200 Massachusetts victim, unidentified African-American female. The fourth one, 4,300 Connecticut. Victim identified as 36-year-old Gary resident Christine Williams, and two victims found together 400 East 43rd Avenue, two unidentifiedified African. American females. All the victims were found in Gary, except the one obviously at Motel 6 in a city of him. So this was pretty early on after he had admitted to the murders.

It was days after. They hadn't even identified all of the victims yet. The one thing I didn't like about that clip was the chief keeps saying the next one. He keeps saying one, this one, that one, in referring to the victims. I thought it was a little impersonal. but yeah that's maybe me nitpicking so they haven't identified all the victims it was said that some of the bodies were significantly decomposed which made you know identification pretty tough but they eventually would identify all seven women police were using cadaver dogs around the neighborhoods

where the bodies were found they were looking for more victims i think their thought process was Okay, he's told us about seven victims. What's he holding back? What's he not telling us about? But they didn't find any. So I think at least in the areas that they searched, he was pretty truthful. Obviously, he was truthful about seven. Right.

Because they found seven victims. So Darren Van was charged with the death of 19 year old Africa Hardy. In 35 year old, Anith Jones, Hardy was from Chicago. Jones was from Marival, Indiana. The other women that he admitted killing were 27-year-old Tanya Gatlin from Highland, Indiana. And then the rest were all from Gary, 28-year-old Tierra Beatty, 41-year-old Tracy Martin,

36-year-old Christine Williams, and 52-year-old Sonia Billingsley. But he wouldn't be charged with these murders right away. Just the two. It would be years later that they would charge him with the rest. So we talked about how Van called this backpages.com number. Right. To set up a date with Africa Hardy.

She was only 19 years old. Young one. Barely out of high school. She had lived in Colorado for a number of years with her mother. She really just only recently had moved back to Chicago before this happened. Her mother had no idea that she was involved in an escort business. Right. In Chicago.

Probably most mothers don't. No. And she was shocked, obviously. Not only that her daughter was dead, but that police and the media were saying these types of things about her. But she said something that you and I often talk about. As all this stuff came out in the media about her daughter, she said, you know what? It doesn't matter.

She was shocked. about finding out that she was doing this stuff. But, and she said she didn't raise her daughter like that, but that was her baby. And didn't matter what she was doing. She didn't deserve to die the way she did, regardless of, you know, being an escort or whether it was against the law or any of that. Who cares what you're doing. It doesn't give anybody a right to kill you.

Her mother had expected Africa home for Thanksgiving the following month. And it was heartbreaking. She said she was my best friend. When I didn't have anything, she was all I had. I can't tell her I love her anymore. I can't give her hugs. I can't give her kisses. Mom and daughter, Bond, man.

It's pretty, it can be very, very strong. Yeah. You know, mom and daughter at one moment could be at each other's throats. And you could be shaking your head like, this is bad. and then go get a glass of water and come back and they're laughing about something. So I'll tell you what happens in my house because I have two daughters. They go at it, right? One of my daughters will be going at it with my wife and they're, you know, they're just

arguing with each other. Right. But the minute I step in, if I take, if I even try to take a side, immediately they gang up on me. Oh, yeah. And it's like they're instantly connected in their hatred for me because I'm trying to step in and stop this. And they're done that.

I walk away like, I used to be like, damn, you know, but now I walk away like, yeah, you guys both can thank me. I took the heat off. You guys are all good because of me, you know? But it goes to your point. It can change, you know, in an instant. Oh. It can be an all-out verbal war to the next thing is you can't separate him.

Van told police that a friend of his offered him $300 in cash and some eight balls of crack to get rid of Anith Jones. What amounts to maybe what? $500 worth of money and drugs. He killed a woman. Now, he was a killer, so he probably wanted to kill her anyway. So what Van told the police was that the friend had some kind of court date coming up. And apparently, Anith Jones was set to play some type of role.

either she was going to testify against him, something that the friend didn't want to happen. She was last seen on October 8th and reported missing two days later. Well, they would find her car just about a half mile up from where Van lived, abandoned. Yeah, they found abandoned. But of course, you know, at that point, they didn't know who he was. I mean, well, they didn't know he was a serial killer. They weren't looking for him. Van told police to go to a specific abandoned house.

and look under some tires and a teddy bear. And that's where they found the body of Anif Jones. He admitted meeting her at a house for sex. He strangled her with the same brown extension court that he took and used on Africa Hardy. Then he put the body of Anith Jones in a garbage can and transported her to the abandoned house. So he didn't kill her there. but that's where he ultimately left her body underneath tires and a teddy bear. Christine Williams was a mother of four.

And she hadn't been seen or heard from since February of 2014. But like we hear in a lot of cases, Gibbs, she was never reported missing. Her family later came out and said that she often disappeared. So they had been through this many times before and they thought it. was like any of those other times, she would come back whenever she was ready. Yeah, it's kind of like the unsolved we did last week where they just thought the, you know, the young girl ran away again. Yeah, very similar.

But the problem was she didn't come back because she met a bad, bad person. Yeah. Police found her body under some plastic sheeting in an abandoned house right where Van said they would find her. He said he beat Christine to death because. She owed him money for drugs. Then you talk about Tierra Beatty. She was a 28-year-old mother of a two-year-old son.

And in an interview, her mother said that the last time she talked with her, she was crying. And she said she was scared, but she didn't say why. And with this one, you had the same problem, right? The family was used to her disappearing now and then. for extended periods of time, and then reappearing. So they just thought this was another one of those occasions. The difference with Beatty was that her mother said in interviews that she had a mind like a 12-year-old.

She was very trusting of people, and that made her vulnerable. And people can pick up on that, and they can play that to their advantage. And I'm sure maybe that's what he did. I'm sure he did, because he told authority. that he lured Tierra Beatty to the abandoned house where police later found her body with the promise of crack in exchange for sex. And he strangled her with a rope. But again, you know, she had a mind like a 12 year old.

She had some mental deficiencies. There's no doubt about it in reading some of the things that her mother has said about her. They loved her. She was very sweet, but she was too trusting. She never thought that anyone would ever do anything wrong to her as long as she didn't do anything bad to them. Right. That's the way she trusted people as in as long as I don't hurt anybody or say anything mean to anyone. They won't hurt me. But we know that's not the world we live in. It doesn't work that way, unfortunately. Darren Vand strangled both Sonia Billingsley and Tanya Gatlin with some type of rope. They were the victims that were found in the same abandoned house. I think you heard it in the in

clip. It was said that you could see this house from the house where Anith Jones's body was found. So very, very close. Billingsley was reported missing by her family right away. She was a little older than the other women. She was 52. She had a 30-year-old daughter who was on her own. Sonia lived with her mother in order to take care of her. She didn't drive. And it was on a Friday morning in February of 2014, very early in the morning.

It was I think like 7 o'clock in the morning. She got on the bus and went to the grocery store to get some groceries. She got back home around 8.30. And it was said that she made a phone call. And then all of a sudden she left the house in a hurry. And her daughter told papers that she still had curlers in her hair. So they knew that she didn't plan on going somewhere for very long. She wasn't planning on being gone for a long time.

She hadn't even taken the curlers out of her hair. She just jot it off to take care of something real fast. Yeah. But that was the last time they ever saw her alive. And with most of these women, if not all of them, Gibbs, the families didn't find out what happened to them until the Darren Van story broke. Can you imagine? Can't. And I never even saw.

I don't know if they were all contacted by the authorities. Because I have to imagine that the media broke the story very quickly. It wouldn't be out of the question for some of these families to maybe have heard it before. The police could even call them. I don't know. I'm speculating. Either way, it's horrible. Yeah.

But I think to hear about your daughter, your mother, your sister, your aunt's death on the news like that, for that to be the first way that you're notified if it ever happened that way, that would be horrible. It would be horrible. Tanya Gatlin was a mother with a two-year-old son, just like Tierra Beatty. Her mother last saw her in January of 2014. Tanya struggled with addiction for a long time, about 10 years. But her family said she was a fun loving, very sweet person. They said when she wasn't doing drugs, which I think was mostly crack, she was great.

They loved her. But when she got on the crack, messes people up, man. She would disappear. And because of her addiction, she couldn't take care of her two-year-old son. The state actually took him away, gave him. to her mother. But again, you know,

because of this, much like some of the other women, she would leave for extended periods of time. Her mother said that sometimes she only showed up for holidays. Wow. Or, you know,

special events. So at first, her family wasn't concerned. You know, they didn't file a police report. They had gone through this a lot over 10 years, as my assumption.

But then she didn't show up for her son's birthday. And they knew that wasn't right. That's when they knew they had a bigger problem. Yep. That's when they began to worry. Van told police that he lured Tracy Martin to the house where her body was later found, much in the same way as Tierra Beatty.

I think it was based on the idea of sex for money. He beat her, he strangled her. Unfortunately, I couldn't find much information on Tracy at all. She was released from prison on June 26th and reported missing five days later. She never reported to her parole officer as she was supposed to. And that's obviously because she met Darren Van and he killed her. So Van goes to his very first court appearance. And for some reason, he refused to talk to the judge at all.

Wouldn't answer any of her questions and got held in contempt of court. It was bizarre, Carol. The magistrate came in. The Lake County prosecutor himself was in the court. from then the defendant, Darren Van, came in and said, will you tell the whole truth, nothing but the truth? And he didn't respond. And the magistrate asked him again, and he didn't respond.

And she asked a third time, and he didn't respond. Then she warned him that if he does not respond and speak in this initial hearing, that he will remain in jail forever. Those are the words that he used. She said, we'll try this again in a week. He'll come back in a week here, do the same thing again. What is a big legal question that we have, and we're reaching out to our legal analyst to find out,

is he could face the death penalty here in the state of Indiana if he is convicted of these murders. So is this a way that he could actually legally, you know, never, never be put on death row? If he doesn't say anything, Carol, in this initial hearing, he will stay in jail forever. So it was absolutely bizarre. So at first I wasn't going to play that much of the clip,

but then I really started to think about what the reporter was saying. Right. And I thought, now I'm going to leave, you know, a little bit more in so that you and I can talk about it. This is very first court appearance. He's not going to go to trial for a number of years. But Indiana has the death penalty. The judge says, you know what? Until you answer me, we can't move forward. You're just going to stay in jail on this contempt of court charge. So I thought the question was very interesting. I never found the answer, unfortunately, but I'm sure. somebody out there probably knows, what would happen? Could you literally stay in jail for the rest of

your life on a contempt of court charge? Wow. And never make it to your trial. A trial where you could technically be given the death penalty. I just thought it was fascinating. I guess it's not that big a deal when you're going to sit in jail regardless, whether it's for contempt of court or because you're awaiting a murder trial. Right. It's no big deal to him. Why's he care? No.

It was more about the, is that really a legal strategy? Would it, would it ever work? My assumption is no. Eventually the judge is going to have to say, you know what? We're just going to have to move forward. You won't talk. You won't talk. You're going to have to go before a jury of your peers at some point and be sent to

big boy prison. Right. Exactly. You can't stay in jail for the rest of your life. No. Justice system. I mean, you have to go through. the proper. Right. Yeah. I just thought it was very interesting. But he does come back in a week

and this time very different. He answered the judge's questions, was said to have been very polite. You know, yes ma'am, no ma'am in talking to the judge and he entered a plea of not guilty. Now, he might have been polite in that second appearance, but by all indications, Darren Van was not a great inmate while sitting in the late county jail awaiting his trial. So one day as officers were passing out the food trays, you know, that little slot in the door. Yes. Slot comes down. The tray goes in.

The slot gets closed. Well, when the officer opened the slot to Darren Vancell to put his tray of food in, Darren grabbed the door, the slot door. trapped away. And he wouldn't let it go. Hmm. So he got the food, but he's holding on to this door and the guard wants to close it and he can't. Right. So another guard comes over. They're wrestling with Van and this door trying to get it shut. Meanwhile, Darren Vann's got a big old container of his own piss and shit. And he throws it through the door on these guys. A little piss shit cocktail. That's not right, man.

No, it's not right. But it's just trying to do their job. It happens all the time. I'm sure it does. in that arena. A little silence of the lambs action. That was even worse, but... Yes. Yeah, that was even worse. But this couldn't have been good.

Nobody wants body fluids. Any body fluids thrown on them. Well, there's a freak out there somewhere that's like, no, I would. I just think about these guys, you know, they're trying to do their job. There was no indications that they were mean to him or had done anything to him that I could find. They're just trying to do their job, deliver food. And the next thing, you know, they're taking a shower. probably real quick, really quick.

So he caught additional charges for that. And on top of that, he got some more charges because a woman came forward with some information about an incident that occurred in 2014. The woman said that she was working as an escort at that time. She had a drug habit. She was doing that to get her drugs. She arranged to meet Darren Van for sex on February 19. of 2014. As soon as she got to their agreed upon meeting place, he pulled a knife, man. He did.

pulled a knife on her, put it to her throat. He tied her hands behind her back and he raped this woman several times. So authorities added rape. They added attempted murder charges to what he was already facing. Again, he's facing murder charges. He's facing the death penalty. I'm not so sure he was worried about those additional poopy charges or the charges related to the sexual assault that he committed, you know, early in that right. But I don't doubt for one minute, Gibbs, that he did it. There's no doubt in my mind that this woman that came forward was telling the truth. Well, sure. Knowing everything that we know. So the prosecution did seek the death penalty. Vann's attorney was fighting that. They argued that it was unconstitutional. They got shot

down at a couple levels, you know, a couple court levels. It's just going to delay the trial, though. And it did for a long time. Yeah. I mean, that fight alone made it all the way to the Indiana Supreme Court. Now, they ultimately denied to take that case. But as you said, all it did was delay things for a long period of time. You know, another thing that delayed his trial was the fact that the prosecution wanted to try him for the two murders that he was charged with together just one trial. His defense attorney wanted it broken up into separate trials. So I just want to spend a little bit of time talking about the timeline, right, arrested in 2014,

committed, I think the majority of the murders in 2014. His original trial date was sometime around the middle. middle of 2015. But all these things, the death penalty is unconstitutional. We want separate trials. Many delays. Many delays. This thing went all the way to 2018. He's getting ready to go to trial. And as it started to get closer, the two sides started talking about a plea deal. And they worked, they worked one out. And it was that Darren Van would plead guilty to all seven murders. Because at some point around 2016, they charged him with the other five. Maybe they started to get mad because everything was taken so long.

I don't know why they didn't charge him with all five in the beginning. But it's probably similar to what you and I talk about sometimes where the case was better against the two. And they were going to get the death penalty anyway. So what did it matter? So they take the best ones up they can. But eventually, you know, a couple years down the road, they do charge. him with all seven. So he's to plead guilty to all seven. And in exchange, they would remove the death

penalty. And instead of death, he would get life without parole for all seven murders. He'd get seven life sentences without parole. But what's interesting to me about this is they talked to all seven families about this. They, you know, explained the situation in detail. They talked about what could go wrong. Even if they were to get the conviction, which they most likely would have, especially given the fact that it's a death penalty case, there is always the chance. And prosecutors explain this to the family that something could get overturned on appeal, you know, a technicality, whatever it was.

But the families weighed everything and they unanimously agreed with the plea deal. And one family member came out and said, Gibbs, death was too good for him. They wanted him to wake up every day in prison and have to think about what he did to their loved one. It's not a bad suggestion, you know? I mean, let that person sit in his five-by-whatever cell with no enjoyments of life.

He'd get his one hour out in the yard every day, and that's it. Let him be just miserable for the rest of his life and dwell on all the bad stuff that he did. How many of them you think really do that? I think maybe, I think they go through a period of time that they might do that, but I think eventually they don't. You know, I think they, I don't know how long they dwell on it. But I think, well, I think a lot of them dwell on it.

My question is, I guess what we mean by the word dwell. Well, you're right, because I think some people dwell on it. They're making out and get an enjoyment of it. Right. They're reminiscing. They are kind of reveling in what they've done. I don't know how many of these really horrible serial killers sit around and think, man, I wish I hadn't had done that. Yeah.

You know, I feel bad about that. Sorry what I did to do in the family. You know, a lot of them don't even have the capability to care to, yeah, to empathize or to say, I feel bad about that. They're emotionalists, man. But I think at that point, it had dragged on for four years. I think the family was ready to get it over with. Closure, for sure.

They wanted this guy to be. sentence, they wanted him to just go away, be done. Until then, you're reliving what happened. You can't heal yourself. Right. But on top of that, they probably didn't want the drawn-out trial because it was just going to add more of that. Sure. Right? Details. Yeah. Yeah. Of hearing it again and again and just move forward. You know, if you're okay with life in prison without the possibility of parole. And it means that you don't have to sit in the courtroom and listen to the details of what happened to your daughter. I can't say I wouldn't opt for that, too, in a certain situation. Or this would be a good candidate for the death wish, like in the movie.

Oh, where Charles Bronson takes care of it for you? He just does it. Oh, I'm all for that. Yeah. We're 100% sure he did it. Yep. Okay. That's my problem. Ten years ago, I feel like I would, was more certain about the death penalty. Today, with advances in DNA, there's too many people that they're finding out didn't commit these crimes. Yeah. It scares the bejibis out of me. But when they raised their hand and said, I did it. And here's the bodies, go find them. Well, yeah, yeah. You know, that's that. But so, okay, counter argument, there have been a lot of people that have said, yeah, I did it. Yeah. I'm not saying they led, led police to the. I think that's the difference, right?

Yeah, I mean, you guys be careful because people just want notoriety. Sometimes they just want to be that person. But if they can actually, like, lead you to locations where the bodies are, then that's pretty... Or things that nobody but the killer would know. Exactly. That's it. That's the case of Darren Van. I found it interesting on a number of levels.

Number one, there was some information out there about the victims. A lot of times we don't get that. Right. You know, and the research can be tough in some of these cases where there's a lot of information about some of these well-known killers. Very little information about the victims. In this case, there was actually some out there about the victims. You know, they were mothers.

They had children, things like that. Very little about his background, though. And, you know, you and I like to dig into background. Lately, there's been some cases where it's just not there. So it's kind of hard to, for sure, say there was something in his childhood that may have caused him down the road. Maybe the guy's just evil. Yeah, there's a lot of that going around now. I just think there are some people that are evil, right?

Definitely. We've talked about a handful of it more. And then the second reason was just because, you know, it was a listener's suggestion. And that listener had a connection with the serial killer. You and I get those a lot, but we usually get them after the episode has already aired. Not very often do we get it before so that we could actually talk to someone and hear. And the fact that this guy was a police officer and encountered van, I just thought that was fascinating. Yeah, I loved it, man.

I thought it was cool. All right, we got some voicemails. You want to check those out? Let's check it out. Hey, Mike and Gibby. I really enjoy your program. The podcast is great. I'm a big fan.

I've listened to most of the episodes. and look forward to more. Thanks for turning me on to that television, the Netflix production mine hunters. The cars alone are worth watching it, but the content is good, and it does help to listen to your podcast to follow along with some of these stories from the 70s,

especially. That's when I grew up, and, again, good work. I can't believe I'm calling your voice now. Bye. But you did. He did call it. I can't believe he's calling it either, Gives. But, you know, he's right on the money.

Number one, Mayan hunters is amazing if you haven't watched it. Good stuff. They're not paying us to say that. It's a great show. It is good. But I got my guest appearance on the second episode. Oh, the second episode of the second season? Okay.

I'm on 2-2. 2.2. Yeah. But he touched on the cars. I never really thought about it. But I do like that. You know, when you have these series that are made today and they're set in the 50, 60, 70s, even 80s, 90s now, you know, they got to go out and find those cars and the way they dress

and it's all pretty cool. Cool cars back then. I was watching a bullet the other day with my son, man. Was Steve McQueen? Yeah. It was a great, great car chase, man. Those cars in there are unbelievable. Now, those were actually the cars back then.

Yeah. But I'm just still just to see those cars and how badass they were. Right, yeah. His was a Mustang, right? You know what he drove? Oh, yeah. Like a fast back or something? Yeah.

Yeah, cool move. Steve McQueen was cool. He was a cool guy. That coolness led him to die, but... All the good ones do, right? Die young. Die young? That's what they say.

Hey, Mike, you, Debbie. This is Megan Rosario. I'm calling in from Pinsville, Ohio. It's my second voice from off left for you guys. I just got done listening to the Skylar Needs podcast as you guys just set out. I loved it. I've heard of the case.

I've listened to a few podcasts about it in the past. I love the way you guys covered it. I just want to know your thoughts. If you knew that your kid had a diary or journal something that they wrote in daily, would you sneak a peek at it every now and then? All right. Well, I'm always team Mike and Gibby. Keep us good work, guys, and keep your own time with cooking.

So it's actually a really good question. To the point, his daughters are upstairs and we're reading them right now. Yeah. No. So I do try to respect my daughter's privacy, but I think as a parent, that only extends so far for me, you know, whether it's text messages or Snapchat or Facebook or Instagram, whatever it is. Well, you're not their best friend. You're their parent always first.

If I had a thought that something was wrong and I needed to do it, I think I would do it. Yeah. If the suspicion's heavy enough. Yeah. I don't have that thought. And I don't know that they have diaries anyway. But I don't know. It's a tough one because you're trying to balance that line between, you know,

personal privacy, but I think that ends at a point. And I've never read your diary. You shouldn't. You try to read my journal, but I never read your diary. You shouldn't. You couldn't anyway, because it's a, it's a cipher. You don't have the key. Yep.

Yeah. Mine's open. It's just an open journal. Nobody can make sense of it anyway. Well, that's it. You got to be able to read and understand my jargon. Looks like that guy from Kevin Spacey's character and or Joseph Nassau's writing, maybe.

Ooh, there you go. Hi, Mike and Gibby. My name is Cindy. I'm from Salt Lake City, Utah. I just wanted to let you guys know that I love your show. And I think you guys are doing a really great job. And I will suggest it to anyone that needs to know a good true crime podcast. You guys crack me up.

You're awesome. I love you. Thank you so much for everything that you do. I wish you the best. And I will keep listening. Thank you. Bye. Bye.

All right. We appreciate that. Yes, Cindy. Thank you for that. Good morning, Fergie and Givie. This is Candace coming out of Atlanta. I just want to say, I love you guys' podcast. It keeps me entertained all day while I'm at work.

I work for a big soda company. I'm a vendor for them, and I listen to you guys while I'm pulling big old pallets of water into your sodas all day. But once again, I love the podcast. You guys just keep it going. keep doing what you're doing. I love you guys, chemistry. I am team true crime all the time all day.

No team giving, no team furry. I love the both of you guys. Keep doing what you're doing. And once again, stay safe and keep your own time picking. ATL, the house. Yep. So what soda company you think she works for between the two big ones? Well, be the one that's kind of headquarters in Atlanta?

I was going to say, use your detective skills. but you're way ahead of me. I know it. If I had to put money on it, I would bet it was coke. I would think so. But you never know. She's in there helping them bottle them up.

Now, I will say her voicemail was a lot longer. She actually had some pretty interesting things to point out about the Stephen McDaniels case. But it was so long ago that, because I think she might be a little further behind. Some things about the hair and other things. But it was two longs, I had to cut it. But we appreciate the voicemails.

and we appreciate everyone listening and telling their friends, all of that stuff. We need you. Keep it up. So we had mailbag. Oh, yeah. Well, I thought we had mail back. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Here we go.

I opened up some mail. Yep. It was from our good friend, Freya Buchanan. Thank you, Freya. Over in Holland. Yeah. And she sent a magnet. Okay.

From Amsterdam. It's really cool. It's like the red light district. That'd be really expensive because the shipping alone is, you know. Cost four times what the magnet did. But it's like the red light district. It's the little windows, apartments. It's really neat.

But then I opened up the card and it was addressed to morphine. Yeah. Oh. On criminology. I'm out. So I'll come back when you're done with this. But I know she listens to True Crime all time. She's a big fan.

And we don't really give that type. We don't say that stuff on criminology. So I just said I'd say it here. That's cool. And it is a cool magnet. It is very cool. And we appreciate it. Thank you.

All right. That is it. Gibbs. That's it. That's it for the episode on Darren Van. That's it for another episode of True Crime All the Time. So from Mike and Gibby, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.