True Crime All The Time - The Murder of Shanda Sharer

Episode Date: January 22, 2018

On January 11, 1992, Shanda Sharer was a 12 year old in middle school who had just switched schools and was thriving. But Shanda had started a romantic relationship with a 14 year old girl named Amanda which would lead to trouble. Amanda already had a 16 year old girlfriend named Melinda who was a very jealous person. Melinda would recruit three other teenage girls to help her murder Shanda.Join Mike and Gibby as they discuss the events surrounding the murder of Shanda Sharer. How did this teenage love triangle lead to murder? What would lead four teenage girls to murder an innocent 12 year old on that fateful day? You can help support the show by going to patreon.com/truecrimeallthetimeVisit the show's website at truecrimeallthetime.com for contact and merchandise information. Be sure to check out all of the new TCATT merchandise for sale.Big thanks to our sponsors:RX Bars - Go to www.rxbar.com and use the promo TCATT to get 25% off your first orderDaily Harvest - Go to www.daily-harvest.com and use the promo TCATT to get 3 items free in your first boxCredits:Writing/Research - Maggie DobschuetzSee 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 62 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. Gibby, what is going on? Man, that's the end of the week. I like the end of the week. Yeah, it's been a long week. For a four day a week for us, it has been a long week. Big long nights, man.

You've had long nights? Yeah. Do you want to, is this something you want to share? What night? Long nights like that. Okay. I didn't know where you were going with that. No, no, no. You mean just like the darkness? I can make a night long, but.

You just talking about the darkness or what? No, just a lot to do, man. Just a lot to do. Oh, yeah. Getting home late from work and then. Got work to do? You got podcast stuff. Podcasting to do. And then, you know. Taking care of the family. Family. I get it, man. Car issues with the family. They don't have to, some reason they don't know how to call AAA.

So I got to wait until I get home, take care of the issue for them. You're the man. It's just like, okay. fixed it and then moves on to another problem fixed it one problem after the other yeah well now let me cook dinner so do you just walk in your wife just hands you like a sheet of paper that says gibby's list text messages that came through on my way home no was it so hey you know what are you gonna do what are you good times man all right let's get into our new patreon supporters let's do it we had katherine schroeder astrid regelson block yeah came out to our highest level awesome

Alexa Ortega I like that Chris Galvin Or Chris Galvin Or Chris Galvin Yeah What I say? I was really stressing

That band, wouldn't I? You were Galvan Yeah We'll find out Steve Cantrell is back with us He's back And we'll actually hear from Steve later

He left us a voicemail We had Kathy Lutz Is she like related to the Amityville horror Amityville what? Horror Horror Horror

Yeah I mean that it's You know It is the exact same name, right? It was George and Kathy. Yeah. I know it's not the Kathy because Kathy passed away. She's in lying, bloodline of them. I don't know. I don't want to put that on

her. No, we need to take that back. Brace it. We just appreciate the support. K.L. K. We had Danielle Sampson Limke. Got to have a little limkey in your life. You need some. Yeah. Melanie Baker, Shantiana Leden.

Wow. Did you say it right this time? I hope. because, you know, she was a PayPal sponsor. Right. And reached out to me and said I was close, but kind of butchered it. So I hope I got it right this time. I hope so, too. Because now she's on Patreon. And we had Melissa Collins, Laura Richards jumped out at our highest level.

Sweet. And then if we go back into the Patreon vault. Do the slide back. What's the slide back? It's like the electric slide, but you go backwards. Don't you go backwards in the regular electrical vault? You probably do. It's been a while. Long while. The slide back. I'd love to see, I'd love to see a video of you doing the electric slide. And I good. I good. I good. That's right. I'm not even I am good. I'm just I good. This is going to be a long episode. We're not even through Patreon. Yeah. I can bust the move, buddy. Oh, I believe it. Yeah. My member's only jacket. You can bust a lot of thing. So we selected Anita Mitchell this week. Been with us a long time. Appreciate that support. We appreciate all of our new Patreon supporters, all the people that continue to

support us month after month. Yeah. It's awesome. Got make some babies so we can have some future ones. Well, listen to Gibbs, I guess. And then on PayPal, we had Robert Miel Martino. Easy for you to say. I hope. I hope I'm right. Yeah. And then we had Nicholas Perot. And I got to tell you this story, Gibbs, because... Like in Ross Perot? No, it's definitely not spelled the same way. Okay. He's a fishing boat captain. Sweet. Up in Maine. Yeah.

And wrote me this email about how he's got these speakers on his boat. Yeah. And he and the crew listen while they're fishing. Go out and get some. Yeah, got to say hello to the crew. Drop that bait. Send us some Maine lobsters in the mail. Man, I love me some lobster.

Do you like some lobster? You don't like seafood. I'm not a big seafood person. Oh, lobster and crab legs. I'll do it for the right person, but. I'm not going to just go out and do it on my own. That makes no sense whatsoever. So I operate, man.

You're going to eat lobster for the right person? It makes them happy. Okay. I might not like it, but I like, you're a pleaser. I'm a person pleaser, man. So we had Cliff, we had Dale Scarsit. These are all the people on the crew? No.

Oh, we're moving on. Sorry, these are other PayPal. All right. See you, crew. I don't know, he didn't give me all the names of the crew. Okay. But I did send him off some true crime all-time stickers. For the crew?

for the crew and himself, and maybe he'll have some on the boat. I wonder if you watched that movie, Perfect North or Perfect Storm. Perfect Storm is where my daughter went. Go skiing. Skiing. No, perfect north. Perfect storm. I wonder if they watched that while they're on the boat.

I doubt it because it doesn't end well. No, definitely freaky, you know, scary. But he's a good captain. He knows not to go in the eye. Turn the boat around. So amazing support from everybody. I love it, man. They're awesome.

You know, we always talk about all of our social media folks. Facebook, Instagram. Because Twitter. It's expensive, man, to do this. Oh, you mean the support? Yeah, the financial support for sure. Helps out. You know, when we first started out, it didn't cost us that much to put out the podcast.

Right. But the platform that we use is based on downloads. And so as this thing's exploded, yeah, it's gotten pricey. I know. But that's all right. We appreciate everything everybody does. And we're going to keep pushing it out. It really helps us.

So shout out to Maggie. As always. Yep, Maggie's wonderful. Definitely. And then make sure you check out Unsolved this week. We're talking about the murder of Andrew Kissel. Yep. And this one's a little different for us, Gibbs, and the fact that, you know, normally the

unsolved victims are, you know, wrong place, wrong time. These are people that haven't really done anything wrong. And I'm not saying Andrew was a horrible guy, but he made some bad decisions. Made some bad decisions. Hurt some people financially. was involved in some really high-level white-collar crime. Right. And so the story kind of takes off from there.

Yeah. All right. You ready to get into this week's episode? That's ready when I walked out the door, into this door. Walked out of one door. Into this door. Into this door. Here I am.

So we are talking this episode about the murder of Shanda Sherer. And I know there's a lot of people that are going to know that name, a lot of people that are probably familiar with this case, but this is a real departure for us, Gibbs, because we're talking about a number of women killers that happen to be teenagers. They were talking teen on teen crime. Exactly. There you go. And it's, it's a, it's one of those stories that you're never going to understand.

Right. And, you know, we'll talk about the motivation and, and all of that as we go along. but it is, it's just, uh, it's a, it's a heartbreaking story. But to try to figure out why these girls did what they did is so tough. But let's start off talking a little bit about Shanda. So Shanda Renee She was born on June 6th, 1979, born in Pineville, Kentucky. I know I go through there a lot. Do you on your way to where? Well, when I used, we used to Norse Lake, we'd take it that way. And also, you know, my dad, his family, they were all born and lived just 20 minutes from Pineville. Did they?

Yeah, up in the mountain up there. Okay. I don't really know where Pineville is, to be honest with you. So it's down there in the southeast corner. Okay. Right there were Tennessee and Virginia and Kentucky coming together. Is that one of those areas where you can do like a twister move and stand on all three at the same time? Yeah, there's an exit there.

You can get off and do that. but a big Cherokee area. So born at Pineville Community Hospital and born to parents Stephen and Jacqueline, but Shanda's parents would end up divorcing. Her mother would remarry and she would move with her new family to Louisville, Kentucky. Louisville. Louisville.

You say it your way. I'll say it my way. Okay. I think down there they're like Louisville. I think Louisville. Now, a lot more people will know. or have heard of Louisville than they would Pineville. Or Louisville.

For sure. So Shanda begins attending fifth, sixth grade at St. Paul School in Louisville. She would be involved in cheerleading, softball, volleyball. So she was active while she was attending school there. Sure. But her mother, Jacqueline's marriage does not last. So she's uprooted once again in 1991. They moved.

And this time, they moved. to a place called New Albany, Indiana. Yep, in there. I don't think it's that far from Louisville. Yeah, I think you're right. So Shanda ends up enrolling at the Hazelwood Middle School. Now, at this point in time, right, as these events are going to occur, Shanda Shara is, she's only 12 years old, but she was described as, you know, a girl that looked much older

than what she really was. And a lot of girls couldn't do that. There were people that said she didn't look 12. She looked more 15, 16. Yeah. That's what was said about her. But Shanda starts a relationship with a 14-year-old girl named Amanda Heverin. And Shanda's mother, Jacqueline, would later say that it was after this relationship began

And that Shanda's personality changed. You know, her grades dropped. She became detached. Now, I've got a 12-year-old of my own. She can be very detached at times. And I have a 17-year-old now that I would call detached at times as well. But you add in the other things, right? The dropping of the grades.

I think this was much more than just a normal teenage phase of wanting to be in your bedroom. listening to your music. But what's going to happen is that Jacqueline is going to discover some sexually explicit letters between Amanda and Shanda. So, I mean, we're talking about, you know, a lesbian relationship. I don't know at this point how physical it was, but these letters would lead you to believe it was. Yeah, exactly.

Because they were described as very sexually explicit. it. Because of this, Jacqueline pulls Shanda out of the public school and puts her into a private school by the name of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. So we're talking about a Catholic, private Catholic school. O-L-P-H. You think that's why they go by? O-L-P-H. Oop-H. O'P-H. But at this new school, Shanda's grades pick up, she starts making new friends. She joins the basketball team. she's doing much, much better in this new environment. But what her mother doesn't know is that she's still carrying on this relationship with Amanda Heverin. And what really complicates things

is that Amanda is all, was already in a relationship. She had a girlfriend by the name of Melinda Lovelace. And Melinda was a very, very jealous person. That might all, that might almost be an understatement of how jealous Melinda Loveless was because after Melinda learns about Shanda, she immediately begins threatening her. And at one point, Melinda forces Amanda to pick between her and Shanda. And Amanda ultimately chooses Melinda. And allegedly, Melinda told Shanda, quote, if you even try to talk to Amanda again, I'm going to fucking kill you. End quote. So I can't overstate this enough, Gibbs, about this extreme jealousy because it's going to play

a huge part in the tragic events that are going to unfold. Because it's really this triangle between the three teenage girls that's going to lead to everything. The lesbian love triangle. No, it really is. There's no doubt about that. But I want to talk about some of the other players in this case and their ages, right? So we touched on it.

Right. Shanda at the time was 12. Youngest one. She is the youngest. Amanda Hevren was 14. Melinda Loveless was 16. Okay. So this was the main triangle.

Right. Of jealousy and relationship. There's some gaps there. I mean, there's definitely a maturity gap between a 12-year-old and a 16-year-old. year old. Yeah, a couple of years between each of the individuals that were having the relationship. Sure. I say triangle, but it's really not a true triangle.

No, because it was only one person that was seeing both. Yes. Yeah. Shanda and Melinda were not having a relationship in any form or fashion. And we are going to talk about some other individuals. Lori Tackett, 17 years old. Tony Lawrence at the time was 15 years old. and a girl by the name of Hope Rippey was 15 years old as well.

Melinda Loveless was born to Marjorie and Larry Loveless on October 28, 1975. And she was actually born in New Albany, Indiana, youngest of three girls, Larry, her father, because we have to spend some time on this guy. He served in the army during Vietnam, was actually considered a war hero when he came back home, But his wife would have a lot of negative things to say about Larry. I mean, she called him a pervert, said that he liked to wear women's underwear. And I'm not talking about strangers. I'm talking about, it's not like he went out and bought some underwear at the local Walmart.

Yeah. He would wear her underwear. He would wear his daughter's underwear. That's weird. I mean, I know you've worn your wife's underwear, but to wear your daughter's underwear would be wearing. That's not right. Right.

That's crossing the line. Yeah, you stop at your wife's. You know, what two consenting adults do. Right. That's one thing. Yeah. And you're cool with it. I know.

He would wear their makeup. Now, you know, I'm not putting anybody down that wants to wear women's underwear or wear makeup. I don't give a shit about that. No, I've seen you with eyeliner on. Yeah, sure. Well, just a touch, you know. You got to put on a base, Gibbs. Yeah, I don't even know what you're talking about.

You got to have a base. I have zero knowledge. I got my Mac, my Ulta. See, you know. I got to have a base. You probably have your own. own brushes and everything. I listen to my daughters talk about that stuff so much. I'm almost, I can almost fake my way through it. I remember sitting up there and listen to your daughter

talk about the different types of brushes. I'm thinking, how many brushes does one need to put on makeups? And I guess there's 30 or 40. Yeah, there's a lot. Depend on what you're doing. So again, you want to be into that. A, be my guest. But when you start involving underage children, you're crossing the line. You know, even if it's, even if it's just wearing his daughter's underwear, that's creepy me. Don't put on your daughter's underpants. No, you just don't.

You don't do that. The dad's got to stay out of that. Yeah. But this is just the tip of the iceberg for this guy. Now, you want to talk about a piece of shit. We're going to find out this guy was an absolute POS. You know, his wife would also say he was constantly cheating on her, but apparently he was a cuckold.

A what? A cuckold. I had to look it up. A cuckled? He liked to watch his wife have sex with other men. And it's called a cuckold? Cuckold. Cuckold.

I don't know how you say it, but yeah. I think it would be called something different. Similar, but maybe a little harder on certain letters, but okay. I don't know. I didn't make up the name. Yeah. I just know that's what it is. Okay.

So he enjoyed watching the misses, getting down with the other men. And it said women. I left out women. I think there was, I think it was men and women. So he was a watcher. He was a watcher. Yeah. Now, when Melinda was five, and I know we're going to spend a lot of time on Melinda and her family,

they would become involved in this Baptist church for about two years. Okay. And so the family, and we're talking about our parents, kind of trying to change their ways, giving full confessions of what they did, giving up drinking. Talk about, I used to wear my daughter's underwear. and watched my wife have intimate relations with my neighbor. Giving up this open marriage. Apparently, her dad at one point became a preacher.

Really? Her mom became a school nurse. So they were trying to turn their life around at some point. That's good. Didn't go quite as well as probably they would hope. Some improvements better than none. Because I think some of it was a sham. A farce?

A farce. Did you say farce? I did. That's a great. word. Yeah, I know. You know, her dad, Larry, would become a marriage counselor in this church. But he started to get this reputation of being too forward with women. I can see that. And then he was accused of raping one of the parishioners or, you know, people at the church. Sure. Not good. So the family had to pack up, leave the church. And from there, things went really downhill for the

Loveless family. And Larry in particular, because he couldn't hold a job. He worked on the Southern Railroad for a while. He worked as a probation officer for about eight months until he was fired because apparently he and his partner attacked an African American man. Okay. That Larry had accused of sleeping with his wife, which is pretty strange because he was okay with that stuff. It seemed like he was okay with it. Right. He carried the mail for a little bit in 1988. got fired after three months from that. Because it was said that instead of delivering the mail, he would just bring the mail home and burn it.

Oh. So it does make the job a hell of a lot easier. Yeah, well, you can just go sit on your couch while the mail's burning. Meanwhile, that last letter from that grandma that that little Johnny never got because he burn it. Mail's so important. You don't know what's in there. You don't know. I miss you. I'm sorry.

Take me back, baby. Yep. You know, I didn't want to text it to you. I wanted to send it to you to the mail. So, you know, this guy's a piece of work. You know, the mom worked sometimes. Now, when they were both working, they actually were kind of middle class. I mean, when they, when they were both holding down jobs, they were a middle class family. That's how it works. But when he was making money, he wasn't spending it on his family, didn't pay his bills. You know, it talked about the fact that he spent all of his money on guns, cars, motorcycles, you know, basically just a selfish person, just buying whatever he. He said, he talked about the fact that he spent all of his money on guns, cars, cars, motorcycles, you know, you know, basically just a selfish person. Just buying whatever he. He was. You know, he talked about he he wanted. Yeah. To the point where, you know, at one point he had to file for, for bankruptcy.

There were other members of Melinda's family that would say that she and her sisters would sometimes show up at their houses begging for food because they were starving. Because he didn't want to buy any grocery. No, because he was spending, he was throwing his money away on other stuff. Yeah. That's sad, man. No, it really is. And I don't want to spend too much.

It's important, though, to the story. Sure. And they picked up this open, what you'd have to call an open marriage. But it wasn't open. I think it was Larry forcing his wife to have sex with other men. Some of his coworkers. And what was said is she didn't want to do it. She found it repulsive.

That's a little strange all the way around. Yeah, I mean, I think, you know, again, to each his own, but that scenario only works if both people are into it. It's a little weird asking, you know, the guy sitting at the desk next to you, hey, man. man, you want to come over for dinner and my wife? Yeah, it's not going to work if it's just one person and the other person is repulsed by what you're doing. Yeah. There's a story about Marjorie, you know, being forced to do some of these acts that she didn't want to do. And at one point, it caused her to try to commit suicide.

I can understand. And it happened a number of times. She tried to commit suicide a number of times while the girls, her girls were growing up. But when the girls were young, it was alleged that Melinda's father, Larry, would rape her mother, Marjorie in front of the girls. And they were forced to sit there and watch in shock the whole time. You know, you would say that's crazy, but that stuff happens. Well, obviously it does. It happens.

You can't imagine it, but it does. Yeah, I know somebody that happened to, so I know it happens. And these are not stories. find out, I mean, these come out, you know, he gets charged later and I'll talk about it. But these come out in affidavits. Now, there's probably no way to fully confirm the, the entire amount of abuse that this guy inflicted upon his family. But like I said, there is some, there is some court testimony that that's going to occur later, that, you know, he fondled his daughters, apparently molested his wife's sister, molested a nephew. Now, Melinda would never say,

if her father had abused her directly. But there's no doubt that he was, you know, sexually abusive, verbally abusive to his children, fired guns in the house at him at certain points in time. But in 1990, Melinda's dad was caught by her mother, spying on her and a friend.

And this angered her mother so much. She finally had enough. She attacked him with a knife. And in the attack, he tried to grab the knife and wound up in the hospital. But this caused Marjorie to try to commit suicide again. Her daughters had to call the police to come and save their mother.

Can you get a sense of what this childhood was like? Oh, man. It was just jacked up. Very, very rough child. Very rough. So Larry would file for divorce and he would move to Florida. And after a short period of time of, you know, correspondence, he eventually cut all ties with everyone.

And even though this guy was a piece of, of shit. Melinda was apparently very hurt by this fact. Still her dad. That he didn't want to have anything to do with her. Yeah. As bad of a guy as he was. It was still her daddy. So again, I know I'd spend a little time on that, but, you know, knowing that Melinda is going to be part of the, a big part of this story, I wanted to really kind of paint a picture of where she came from. So Melinda and Amanda Heverin, they started dating in 1990. And Melinda's having to have a picture of, you know, and Melinda's having this hard time after her father left and her mother ended up remarrying. So Melinda's depressed. She was undergoing some counseling, but getting into a lot of fights at school, right? Acting out,

you know, just not doing the right things, rebelling. You know, we talked about it earlier on, but Melinda was a lesbian and she would tell her mother this. And apparently her mother was very upset about this at first, didn't understand it, but eventually would come to accept it. Then you get to Amanda and Shanda. And they actually met getting into a fight, but they would become friends while they were sitting in detention for this fight that they got in. And obviously, as we know, it's going to turn into a relationship that is more than just friends. So Melinda is very, very jealous. of this relationship. And apparently there was a dance that Amanda and Shanda went to.

Melinda confronted them at the dance. And ultimately, we know that Amanda picked Melinda in this scenario. So they didn't break up. They were pretty much dating this entire time, even though Amanda was having a relationship with Shanda. And at some point, Melinda started dating someone else as well.

It was a very strange kind of deal here, Gibbs. So now I want to talk about Lori Tackett. You know, Lori was born Mary Lorraine Tackett, October 5th, 1974 in Madison, Indiana. They called her Lori. Lori's mother was a Pentecostal Christian. Her father was a factory worker, convicted felon, back from some convictions he had in the 1960s. Now, Lori would say that she was molested when she was five and again when she was 12 years old. And I think the fact that Lori's mom was this really fundamentalist Pentecostal Christian, you know, it plays a big role because there's a story about Lori, you know, changing into jeans after she gets it to school, which my assumption gives is she wasn't allowed to wear jeans.

Most time it is normally a uniform only school. Or because of the religious aspect, she was supposed to wear a long skirt. Right. That's kind of where I was, what I was thinking. Sure. Her mother finds out about this, confronts her that night. They get into it. Her mother tries to strangle her, allegedly. Whatever happened, the social workers end up coming. They get involved to make sure that there's no child abuse. But there was a lot of talk about Lori getting into fights with her mom. I mean, they just could not get along. And one night she's at the home of her friend,

Hope Rippie, which we've talked about. She's going to be part of this story. And her mom, Mom finds out that Hope's dad had bought a Ouija board. You ever play with a Ouija board? I do not touch those, buddy. Never have? Nope. Oh, we used to play with one all the time. Oh, it's not good, man.

Don't mess with. Don't be open up doors you can't close. It was too late now. I did it when I was a kid. You might want to go back. Mike explains a few things in my life. Yeah, it might. I feel like there's somebody sitting on your shoulder.

But Lori's mom was so upset with this. I mean, she wanted this Ouija board, you know, like you, she thought it was the devil's play thing or whatever. There ain't no thinking, buddy. You think it is too. Don't mess with fire. Get burned. Don't mess with the bull.

You get the horns. That's right. That's what they say. But as Lori gets older, she becomes more rebellious. And after her 15th birthday, she starts to develop an interest in the occult. And she starts to hang out with a different type of group of friends. She starts saying that she's possessed by this spirit of some. vampire, but it's at this point that she also starts to self-harm. And this is going to be a theme

among many of these girls. They are going to harm themselves in various ways. One incident in particular with Lori happened after she was dating a girl who was engaging in the same type of behaviors. So I don't know if she learned it from this girl or this intensified, you know, the type of behaviors that she was exhibiting. But eventually her parents would find out and they would put her in a hospital. The staff put her on antidepressants. But eventually, you know, they let her go. But just a few days after being let go from the hospital, she would cut her wrists very deeply. And to the point where, you know, obviously she had to be rushed back to the hospital. And this time after being treated for the wounds, she was sent to the mental health ward.

They were extremely worried about her. Sure. She ended up being diagnosed with borderline personality disorder, told staff that she'd been having hallucinations since she was a child. Do you ever have those? Hallucinations? Sure. No, I don't even remember my dreams. Really?

Which is kind of sad. And Lori ends up dropping out of high school after her junior year. So in October of 91, she. She's bouncing around, staying with a bunch of different friends. She had met Melinda prior to this. But they would become really good friends later that year of 1991. As Lori moves back to Madison because her dad says that if she comes back, he's going to buy her a car. Oh, I'll buy you a car if you come back with your old daddy.

Yep. Okay. That's how it worked. But because of this, she starts spending most of her time with. Melinda, Loveless. Now let's talk about Tony Lawrence. Born in February of 1976, her dad was a boiler maker. I just thought that was a drink, Gibbs. I thought it was a Purdue football player. The mascot for, yeah, Purdue University. Yeah. He was an actual boiler maker. Yeah, he's actually doing it, huh? Yeah. Do you know what that means? He was making boilers? Oh, goodness. You asked me

the question. You're going to tell me the answer? I'm just going to leave it right there. But Tony Lawrence was close friends with a girl named Hope Ripy. They had been since they were kids. But again, Tony had a very rough childhood. She was abused from the age of nine, raped when she was 14 years old. What is going on in that part of Indiana? I don't know. But many of these girls, and that's why I'm spending time talking about it,

they grew up rough. They had very rough childhoods. And what was really sad about that incident when she was 14 years old, the police really didn't do anything about the person that they know raped her. The only thing they did was issue an order because this was another boy, you know, not an adult. He was a minor. Another minor.

So all they could say was, you know, you have to stay away from this girl. So he really got no punishment, it sounds like. So Tony would do some counseling. but she really didn't participate, right? And that's a common theme that you and I talk about. You know, counseling can be very good, but only if you're willing to put in the work and tend and do what you're supposed to do. Yeah, but you've got to be ready for it.

If you're not ready for it, you know, maybe she wasn't ready. And she was young. Yeah, she just wasn't ready to put that commitment in. But she would also, like some of the other girls, start acting out. It was said that she became very promiscuous, started to self-harm and even attempted suicide when she was in the eighth grade.

These girls are going through a lot. Yes, they are. Now, Hope Anna Rippey was born June 1976. Her parents divorced when she was about eight years old and she moved to Michigan with her mother and her siblings for about three years. Now, I don't know that her childhood was anywhere near the level of some of the other girls, but it was said to have been turbulent. You know, her parents would get back together,

break up, eventually get back together and move back to Indiana in 1987. And this is where she was able to start spending time with Tony Lawrence, Lori Tackett, again, because they'd all been friends from childhood. Now, what was said about Hope was that her parents thought that Lori Tackett was a very bad influence. And Hope did start. to self-harm when she was just 15 years old. Again, I don't know how much influence each of these girls is having on the other. Yeah. And it's something that we're going to have to talk about as this tragic event unfold. Were you a bad influence on people growing up? I'm sure I was. And I also

had friends that were probably bad influences on me. Okay. I think it went both ways. So you were a giver and a taker. I was a midnight toker and a joker and a smoker and a midnight toker. And a Midnight toker. You're a joker. All right, Gibbs, we got a couple of sponsors that we have to talk about. Okay. The first is our X bar. Yeah. Whole food protein bars with simple, real ingredients.

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1992 and Lori Tackett would drive her friends, Tony Lawrence and Hope Rippey, from where Lori lived in Madison, Indiana to where Melinda Loveless lived in New Albany, Indiana. And when the girls get to Melinda's house, and this is so strange to me, Gibbs. This was the first time that Tony had ever met Melinda. Hope had met her, I think, one time. So they don't even, they know Lori. They're friends. with Lori, but they don't really know Melinda very well at all. And when they get there, Melinda shows them a knife and comes out and says that she's going to scare Shanda share her with this knife. Now, get this. The three girls other than Melinda, they didn't even know who Shanda was. They'd never met her. But Lori knew of the plan ahead of time to scare Shanda because she was

is the only person that was friends with Melinda. So Melinda had keyed her in. Hope and Tony, they're hearing this for the first time when they get to Melinda's house. So they hear the whole story from Melinda's point of view. And it's about how, you know, she doesn't like Shanda because she was a copycat type of person. And mainly I think because she had. Took a girl. Yeah, Melinda felt like Shanda had taken her girlfriend, although she hadn't because, and that's the part I kind of struggle with. I mean, she did start a relationship with Amanda, but she didn't steal Amanda away. Right. And that is one of the things that's really hard for me in this whole thing.

And they're young. They don't, being possessive over somebody. They're good, man. If someone doesn't want to be with you, they don't want to be with you. You don't get jealous because someone that they want to be with somebody else, man. Yeah, I get that. And that's easy for us to say at our... Oh, I know.

That's why I say it's maturity. At our age and our maturity. You just learn, man. If somebody wants to be with somebody else, they can go. But I, to be honest with you, I don't fight for you. I remember being 14 years old and, you know, so in love with some girl that, you know, I would fight half the school if I had to. Really? Yeah.

I remember being like that. I said you either wanted or you don't. So basically, you were Magnum PI at the age of 14 is what you're saying? Cool. Collected. Hairy chest and all. A mustache. The comb won't even go through.

That I drew on. You just talk so big and bad. I just, okay, talking about time machine, I want to go back in time and hang out with 14-year-old Gibby. Hey, I was the boy in the corner with the jeans up to my belly button. And I want to see how cool he really was. Like glasses and bowl-shaped haircut and sitting in the corner eating my sandwich out of my brown little bag where my Buster Brown's on.

And your huskies. Grann animals. You probably were gar animals. Or I was the cool cat around the corner. You decide. You decide. I don't think it's that hard to figure out. So they leave Melinda's house.

And the four of them drive to Jeffersonville, Indiana. And they were going to where Shanda was staying with her dad. Because apparently she stayed with her dad on the weekends. Her mom and dad were divorced. They stopped along the way at a McDonald. to ask for directions. You got to remember, Gibbs. This is pre-ways.

This is pre-Google Maps. Yeah, this is the old days when you hit the gas station and say, hey, man. How do I get to so-and-so? And hope you got somebody that knew and not somebody was messing with you and said, oh, yeah, you got to go that way. Send you in the wrong direction. But they end up getting to the house, to Shanda's father's house, right before dark. And at this point, Melinda tells Hope and Tony to go to the door.

Because remember, Shanda doesn't know who these girls are. So the plan is they're going to go up to the door. They're going to say that they're friends of Amanda and that Amanda wants to see Shanda at a place called the witch's castle. Sounds ominous. It does. And basically it was like a, it was an old stone house located on this creepy hill, which overlooked the Ohio River.

I have to keep telling myself, Gibbs, Shanda Shera is 12 years old. So she can't just take off out of the house at 12 years old and go riding around in these teenagers car. Be back later. Right. Yeah. Now, and she tells them that. She's like, my dad is awake.

I just can't leave the house. So she tells them to come back around midnight and then she'll be able to go. So the girls, they end up going to Louisville, Kentucky to some kind of punk rock concert for, a band named Sunspring, which I've never heard of. But I never really was into punk rock. You just did the, uh, piercings just because? Yeah, it was just, yeah, for the heck of it. But apparently Tony and Hope, they got bored with this concert and allegedly went out to

the parking lot and had sex with a couple of boys in Lori's car. Because that's what you do. As a dad of two girls. Be an, and oh. That'd be a big no. Yeah. But eventually they leave this concert. They're heading back.

to Shanda's dad's house and on the ride Melinda says that she cannot wait to kill Shanda to these other girls two of which Gibbs have just met her for the first time right now she also says that even though she wants to she's not going to she's just plain to use this knife to scare her they get to the house about 1230 a.m. And a couple of the girls not Melinda but a couple of the other girls go up and they get Shanda. And at this point, Melinda is in the back seat of the car. She's hiding with the knife. And the way that they got Shanda, again, was talking about Amanda, saying, hey, Amanda's waiting for you. She wants to see you at the Witch's Castle. And eventually Shanda does agree to go with them. But when they get inside of the car, Hope is the first one to start asking Shanda questions

about her relationship with Amanda. And at a certain point, Melinda springs up from the backseat, reveals herself, and she puts the knife to Shanda's throat, pulls her hair back, and starts grilling her about her relationship with Amanda. Again, this Melinda is a very, very jealous person. So they're driving along in the car. They're headed towards Utica, Indiana, which is apparently where this witch's castle was. and Lori is in the car talking about the legend of this place.

And as it goes, it's apparently the legend is that it was owned by nine witches. And the people of the town burned this down to get rid of the witches. So basically what is left is like an abandoned old stone house. Right. That was burned. Yeah, just a shell. Yeah. So when they get to the witch's castle, by this time, Shanda is crying.

she's upset. She's had a knife held to her throat. She has to be panicked at this point. And it's going to get worse because they're going to bind her arms and legs with rope. And all of this is going to come out later. But, you know, Melinda is making fun of her, talking about how pretty her hair was and asking her if she thought she would still be pretty if she cut all of her hair off. So I think about Shanda share at 12 years old in the middle of the night in the dark with these girls that are tormenting her away from home very scary very scary to think of and again it starts to get me pissed off as a dad of a 12 year old girl sure because i can't help it gibbs but go to that place where you know i'm putting my daughter in that position and thinking oh my gosh i can't imagine it me it was

said that, you know, they took off all of her rings. They're dancing around, taunting her, trying to scare her about saying that this place is full of human bones and, and basically saying that she's going to be the next victim to be left at the witch's castle. Because the one thing, I haven't said it, but it's probably pretty obvious. Amanda is not there. Amanda is not part of this. She's not waiting at the witch's castle. You know, they continue to try to scare Shans, But at a certain point, they're done tormenting her at this witch's castle. They put her in the car and they take off. Shanda is begging, pleading for them just to take her home.

But none of the girls are listening to her. Melinda at a certain point, makes Shanda take off her bra. She gives it to Hope who puts on the bra while she's driving the car. I mean, you're talking about tormenting, belittling, making fun of, You know, at this point, this is really what it's about degrading. I'm sure I can think of a bunch of other words, but at a certain point, the girls get lost. They have to stop at a gas station for directions. Lori goes in to get the directions while Tony calls a boy on a pay phone and is chatting to him,

not once mentioning the fact that she has helped to abduct and torture a 12-year-old girl. They get to the edge of a set of woods near where Lori Tackett was living in Madison, Indiana. And they go down this road that leads to a garbage dump. And Melinda and Lori get out of the car. They force Shanda to strip naked. Melinda is punching Shanda, slamming her face into her knee over and over. I mean, now it's starting to get very, very physical. You know, her mouth gets cut open because Shanda's wearing braces.

So these blows to the face cut her mouth badly. Melinda pulls out the knife and it's at this point that she tries to slit the throat of Shanda's share. But this knife that she has is too dull. It won't cut Shanda's throat. So what the girls do specifically, Melinda and Lori is they start stabbing. Shanda in the chest and they take turns, just continually stabbing her in the chest. They end up strangling her with a piece of rope until she passes out and they put her in the trunk. And at this point, what is said by one of the girls is they thought she was dead. You know, she had been stabbed

multiple times. Sure. She'd been strangled. And when she passed out, they thought she was dead. So with Shanda in the trunk, they drive to Lori's house to clean up. You have to imagine. You have to imagine they probably got quite a bit of blood on them, especially Melinda and Lori, who were the ones that thought to have done most of the stabbing. But they hear Shanda screaming from the trunk. And Lori actually grabs a pairing knife, goes back out to the car, opens the trunk, and stab Shanda several more times, comes back into the house, washes the blood off. And now that they're just hanging out. I mean, they are hanging out at Lori's house, trying to figure out what they're going to do next. And what Lori and Melinda decide is that they're going to go for a drive.

And at this point, Gibbs, and I don't know what these girls were thinking. Well, they freaking weren't thinking. Well, they weren't. But Tony and Hope, who didn't know Melinda or Shanda at all, got themselves into this mess. They decide that they don't want to go on this drive. They're just going to stay put. So Melinda and Lori, they're out. driving, again, they start to hear noises coming from the trunk. They pull the car over, open up the

trunk, and what is said is that Shanda sits up, but at this point, she can, she really can't even speak. And Lori Tackett takes a tire iron and, and beats Shanda until she stops making noises. This is a teenage girl. It's like the freaking Sopranos or something, man. That's what I'm saying. I don't get it. You know, we do these. stories about these psychopathic, vicious male killers. We are talking about some teenage girls. And it's hard for me to wrap my head around that. This is rougher that I thought it would be. Yeah, this is a rough one to do. I'm speechless. I really am. You are a lot. I'm really speechless. But this time, I think for an actual reason. And I get it. I get it. This is a tough one to talk about.

So eventually they make their way back to Lori's house where the others are. And they are laughing about what happened telling this story to the two girls that had stayed behind. And at some point, Lori's mother wakes up and she's yelling at her, wondering what in the hell these girls are doing at her house so late. So Lori ends up having to take the girls home. So again, now they're back in the car. And keep in mind, Shanda is still in the trunk of the. this car. But what they decide to do is drive to a local gas station. And one of the girls buys a bottle of Pepsi, pours out the Pepsi and fills the bottle with gasoline. And Lori Tackett is driving the car.

She drives to a grassy field located off Route 421. And it was said at this point that Tony didn't want to get out of the car. I have a feeling Gibbs that of all the girls, Tony knew. Tony knew. she had gotten herself into something really bad. I knew this was wrong. Yeah. Yeah. But couldn't get out of it at this point. Right.

She did not want to get out of the car because I think she knew what was about to happen. And apparently Lori opened the trunk and Hope sprayed Shanda with some wind decks. And they're taunting her. You know, they're saying things like, you're not looking so hot right now, are you? And Lori and Hope they wrapped Shanda in a blanket and they carried her out to this field and what was said was that Lori made hope pour this Pepsi bottle full of gasoline onto Shanda and they set her on fire and Melinda was not sure if Shanda was dead at this point. So apparently they stood there for several minutes and then Melinda took the rest of the bottle

and poured all of the gasoline on to make the fire stronger. So tough Gibbs. Shanda shares was beaten unconscious multiple times would come to they would you know would beat her again at one point she was sodomized with the tire iron that they also used to beat her you know they had choked her with cord they had sliced her legs at different points with a knife i mean this was torture that went on right it wasn't just an incident that took five minutes this this drug out for an extended period of time. They tried to cut her throat. They couldn't. They stabbed her multiple times in the chest and they eventually burned her alive. And this was done by four teenage girls. And over what? Because somebody thought she was jealous over another girl, man. Jealousy.

You took some little girl's life because you didn't want some girl. It probably didn't even want anything to do with you anyway down the road, but you wanted her all to yourself and you didn't want somebody else to look at her. Whatever. This just, this ticks me off. Obviously, Melinda Lovelace spearheaded this, right? She was the one that was jealous. But the fact that these other girls went along with it, it's tough to reconcile in your head. Weak individuals, man. What is heartbreaking is that it would ultimately come out that Shanda's last word was mommy. And if that doesn't hit home, I don't know what does. That just cements the fact that this is. a 12-year-old girl. She wants her mother. She is a child. But remember, she was supposed to be staying with

her father. And the next morning, he gets up, notices early in the morning that she's gone. And he calls the police and reports her missing. Now, that morning, the 14s, they're at McDonald's, eating breakfast, around 9.30 a.m. They are sitting around making jokes. And some of the jokes are that Shanda's burned up body looked like the sausages they were eating. You know, they're going to burn a hell, man. Oh, there's no doubt about that. But the one thing that they talk about at this breakfast meeting or whatever you want to call it is that they make a pact and agree that if they all keep quiet, they would never

be linked to the killing. Nothing would ever, you know, bad would happen to them. So Lori drops off Tanya and Hope at their houses. and then she goes back home with Melinda. And once they're back at Melinda's house, they call Amanda and they tell Amanda that they have killed Shanda. And they make plans with Amanda to pick her up later that day. Thought they just made a pact that they weren't going to tell nobody.

Well, except for Amanda, I guess. Yeah. We're going to find out it's not a really strong pact against or between four teenage girls. Yeah, exactly. Because at one point, Melinda's friend comes over and she, she tells her that she's killed Shanda. People like to talk about things, man. People are not good at keeping secrets.

So now they've got another friend in the mix. They all go pick up Amanda, bring her back to Melinda's house. And what Amanda would say later was that she didn't believe this story, right? She knew Melinda was a jealous person. She knew that she was not very happy with Shanda, didn't like her. But she never believed that she had really killed her. But at a certain point Gibbs, she's forced to believe this story because they end up showing her the trunk of the car. And inside this trunk, I mean, there's bloody handprints from Shanda.

Her socks are still in the trunk. And at this point, Amanda gets very upset. And she asks the girls to take her home. And they do. And Melinda drops her off, kisses Amanda, tells her that she loves her. but she begs Amanda not to tell anyone, and Amanda agrees to that. She promises that she's not going to tell anyone. And it's that same morning Gibbs, January 11th, there's two bird hunting brothers, Don and

Ralph Foley, that stumble upon the body of 12-year-old Shanda Sherer in the woods near this isolated gravel road. And they would later say that, you know, as they're walking up to her body, they thought that what they were seeing was something like a department store mannequin. But as they got closer, they realized that it was the charred remains of a human being. So they quickly call the police. And one of the responding officers was a guy named David Cam. And this guy is kind of interesting from the standpoint that he would later be charged

in the murder of his entire family, but would be acquitted. So it's kind of a side note. But the police start to collect evidence from the scene. And initially, what they believe is that, you know, this is some kind of a drug deal gone bad. There's all kinds of scenarios running through their head. But I guarantee you the one that's not is that four teenage girls did this. Right. There is no way that that's where their head would have been going.

But the good thing is that they're not going to have to wait long to figure it out. Because so this pact we talked about at McDonald's. didn't last long. That very night, Tony Lawrence broke down. And Tony told her mother everything, everything that had happened. And they went to the police that night. And she gave a statement confessing to everything. And I'm not surprised, right?

She's the one that didn't want to get out of the car. She knew what was going on was wrong. So, I mean, I think she finally broke down and, you know, knew that she needed to do the right thing. Yeah, I agree with you. But she wanted to. come clean. Yeah, I agree with you. Of all the girls from the research, she's the only one that I really got the sense that at some point knew it was wrong. It was said that she was hysterical, crying, not making any sense, couldn't hardly get any words out. That's how upset she was. But eventually

she was able to tell police that, you know, the victim was Shanda. And she knew. She knew. named her three friends that were with her. Not even friends isn't even the right word. She wasn't even friends with all these girls. Cohorts. And the police were able to match the body to the missing person's report filed by Shanda's dad. And then they would be able to confirm it was Shanda through dental records. Now, Melinda and Lorry were arrested the next day. And most of the evidence against them came from the statement of Tony Lawrence. But you know, they had some physical evidence, too, once they got to the trunk of that car

because there would have been a lot of blood. And it was decided early on that the teens were going to be tried as adults because of how horrific this murder was. Each of the girls accepted a plea bargain so that they could avoid the death penalty. And I think we spent a lot of time talking about the troubled,

childhoods of these girls. Right. And I do think some of that was taken into account from what you read. There was people that talked about the fact that they thought they were given lighter sentences than most people would have received. So the thought is they looked at their upbringing, they looked at their home life, and that played a part in it. True or not, that's a lot of what's out there.

I don't know if they deserved a lighter sentence because of that, based on this type of severity of crime. No, I get what you're saying. It doesn't excuse what they did in any way, but they did. I can't emphasize enough. They had some rough childhoods. But a lot of people have rough childhoods don't go on to murder a 12 year old girl and set her on fire. No. They're old or nothing to know what was right and wrong. Melinda and Lori were given 60 years. So this is 1993. Okay. They got 60 year sentences. In 94, they both tried to, appeal their sentences, but they were upheld. Hope Rippy was originally given 60 years, but after appeal, hers got dropped down to 35. And she was actually let out, paroled in 2006. So, you know,

do that math, Gibbs. She spent 13 years in prison. Originally 60, got dropped down to 35, was paroled after 13 years. Barely one. I mean, just one year more than. than the age of the victim of the shanda yeah yeah i told you you're not going to be super happy about the way this turns out tony lawrence was given 20 years but was released in 2000 so ultimately she served about seven years and i she was the more helpful of the bunch i mean at least she came forward yeah she is the one that came forward gave up everybody else participate but as much as the other, but she was still there. But I mean, I guess if I had to say, I get it, this is the one I can say I get. I understand. More so than the others. Yes. I get you. I get you. So Lori Tackett is

now 43 years old. She spent 24 years in prison. She was just released Gibbs on January 11th, 2018. Last week. Yeah. That's how timely this part of the story is. She's got to live with this man. And January 11th was the 26th anniversary of the murder of Shanda. Wow. Because the murder, the murder occurred on the morning of January 11th. They couldn't wait a day to let her out. Isn't that? Is that a coincidence? She's paroled on January 11th. I suppose we didn't look at that and said, we probably don't want to let her out on this day. It's seems strange. Yeah. Early Thursday morning, Lori Tackett, one of the girls who committed the crime was released from prison after serving 24 years.

She testified at one of the hearings that she knew it was her destiny. She had always known it was her destiny to murder someone and to spend the rest of her life in prison. I didn't go into that evening knowing anything was going to happen. But in a jailhouse interview, Tackett seems to show remorse. It's something that should have never happened. Tackett even sends a message to share his mother. I do want Shanda's mother to know how much I regret my actions and what happened. Whatever.

I knew you were going to say that. Whatever. So 43 years old, she has to live the rest of her life with the knowledge of what she's done. Now, I don't know if she's sorry or not. I really don't. Well, I don't think we're ever going to know directly. I mean, of course, she's going to say she's sorry. Sure.

She wants to get out. Is she really sorry? I still think you at the issue. Now, she was older, right? was like 17. At the age of 17, she knew what she was doing. She knew right from wrong. I truly believe that. But at 43, you definitely know what you did. Well, she's out there now, man. So I hope that she makes up for all her terrible things she's done in her life and honors her freedom. I don't know. You know, I'm not happy about this. No, and I knew you wouldn't be. I know you, I know you're not.

You know, she'll never make up for what she's done. Can't. Right? You can't write that wrong. I get the whole forgiveness and I have a hard time with this one because it's not like they just killed somebody, which is bad. But because they torment and torture. Oh, I mean, this is not. That's a whole other level.

Right. This is not you're driving too fast and the roads are slick and you wreck and you kill somebody. And knowing she pretty much had her hands on every event. of that night. Oh, she was deeply involved. Yeah. There's no doubt about it. So, I mean, this was torture. This was sadism. But just to think she just got out last week. Now, we have to talk about Dr. Phil. I know he's your favorite. And I say that sarcastically. But in 2011, she was actually on the Dr. Phil show. A bunch of them were. And Shanda's mother was on. Shanda's sister, older sister was on. And what Lori said was that if she could go back, she would have never been there that night,

would have done whatever she could have to make sure it didn't happen. Sure. She wants to be up for parole. Yeah, I think it goes back to your point. You know, at that stage, she's going to say whatever she needs to say to make herself look good to put her in the best life. She's going to be, I'm reformed. I found the Lord. and I'm sorry and passed the mustard.

You know, she would go on to say she didn't go into that night thinking anything like that was going to happen. And she talked about peer pressure. And I want to say that towards the end, but that is something I want to talk about. You know, she said it spiraled out of control. It was something that never should have happened. Well, no shit. It never should have happened.

The problem is it did happen and you can't take it back. Now, Shanda's father passed away from alcoholism in 2000. He was only 53 years old. And it was said that he was so depressed after Shanda's murder that his wife said he basically drank himself to death. I don't know if I'd even lost that long, man. Something like that happened to my little girl. I just don't think I don't know. You don't know how you move forward.

People find the strength to do it. Yeah. And we're going to talk about Jacqueline Shanda's mom a little bit and what kind of strength she has. But first I want to talk about Melinda's father. Larry. We spent quite a bit talking about him. He ended up getting charged with 11 counts of child sex abuse for things that happened between 1968 to 1989. That's 21 years. I mean, this guy was a freaking predator. And we talked about some of the awful things that he did. And some of the details that would come out in the court affidavits were actually

probably worse than some of the things we talked about. You know, It came out that he had once chained three girls together in his garage. What the hell? I mean, raped them. What is wrong with people, man? These affidavits also alleged that he once penetrated a girl with a loaded handgun. That's just a weak person.

This guy's a piece of shit. We should be doing a whole episode on this son of a bitch. Somebody really weak does that. If you're taking a handgun to penetrate somebody, to show power, you are extremely weak. Now, let's talk about something good. It's hard to find the good in this type situation. But in January of 2009, the Shanda Shara Scholarship Fund was established.

And the fund will give a scholarship to two students from Prosser School of Technology in New Albany. That's great. One will go to a student who wants to continue their education. and the other will go to someone who's beginning their career, helps them buy like work tools, equipment, things like that. And then, and I told you, I mentioned we were going to talk about Shanda's mother, Jacqueline, and what kind of strengths she had.

So in 2012, fairly recently, she ends up making not direct contact, but indirect contact with Melinda Loveless. And you know, Melinda was the ringleader. she was the one that made this happen. No matter how much these other girls participated in it, I truly believe without Melinda,

it doesn't happen. So this story goes that apparently Melinda Loveless in prison, she starts working with training dogs for this thing called the Indiana Canine Assistance Network. It's called I Can. So basically, they train dogs to be service dogs to be given to, be given to people with disabilities to help them out. That is a good thing. And she's been working

in this program for some time. Jacqueline finds out about this from the, I believe it was a breeder who supplies the dogs for this I can program, decides she wants to donate a dog. Really? And it happens. And the dog's name is Angel. And basically she says that she wanted to do. this because again, she wants something good to come out of this bad thing that happened. And she's not going to just donate this one dog. She plans to donate a dog every year in the memory of Shanda. That's amazing, man. I'd have a hard time doing that.

But, uh, well, knowing that the person that essentially murdered your daughter is the one kind of working in this program. But I found a clip of, of a newscast. And I want to play it. Prosecutors say the 18-year-old loveless plan, the murder of 12-year-old Shonda Shera, sentenced 60 years for murder. I want my baby back. I was the monster.

I'll never get her back. So I'd get it. I was the bad person. I had many times said that if you want to see as close to a person that has absolutely nothing inside of them, look in Melinda's eyes because there's nothing there. Jackie never wanted contact with any of her daughter's killers. You know, all I've ever said is I just wanted to serve their sentence. That's all I've ever said.

But a breeder who supplies dogs to the ICAN program at the prison forged an unexpected connection. I liked it because it wasn't planned. Charlie Petrizo, a burn victim like Shanda, convinced Jackie to watch a videotape of the new Melinda. I was really taken back. I could never, ever imagine having my own child and something happened. I saw someone who was almost reborn.

So Jackie Vaught did something remarkable. She took up Charlie, the breeder, on his idea to donate a puppy in Shanda's honor and let Melinda Loveless train her. When you found out, she said yes. Yeah. What? You know what? I didn't believe it. Not until the puppy, Angel ran into her arms the first one. the first time they met in a crowd of people.

Good girl. What do you doing? That's the one Jackie had touched, had held, had named, and I said, wow. Jackie has faced criticism over her decision to let Shanda's killer honor her name. Good job. But if you don't let good things come from bad things, then nothing ever gets better. And I know that's what my child would want. My child would want this.

She helped me to actually, he'll forgive and grow. Rather, she wanted that or not. She did a good thing. And I would think her. Couldn't think her enough. So in that clip, you can hear Melinda. You can hear Jackie. Now, they're never in the same room together.

They're being, you know, interviewed separately. And again, Gibbs, I don't know how sincere Melinda is. If you watch the video, it seems like she is. But I don't really care as much about that. What I take away from this is kind of what I mentioned before. It's Jackie Vott string. And you heard it mentioned in there like she received criticism. Who in the hell is criticizing this woman that lost her 12-year-old daughter?

Get the F out, man. She can do whatever the hell she wants. If she wants to donate a dog and her daughter's honor. Something like that happened to your kid, then you can criticize. That did kind of rub me the wrong way when I heard that on the clip because, I don't know, man, we criticize people too much, but you cannot criticize this woman. Just if you don't... She thinks she's doing a good thing.

And if that's what she believes. That's whatever she wants to do, man. You know, you're not walking in her shoes. It was kind of a touching story, not so much from Melinda's point of view. I took it from Shanda's mom's point of view. So if you look at online records, right, they show that Melinda could be released September 5th, 2019. So she probably has another couple of... years. She's the only one left. But in the next couple years, she'll be free as well, most likely,

unless she were to do something really bad in prison. Well, it is what it is. I just hope these girls for all the bad that they did, and it was bad, that they can try to do something good out in the world. With the rest of their life. Or the rest of their lives. That's all they can do at this point. But we get back, and I did want to save this kind of towards the end, just to talk about it a little bit. how could they do it? You know, how could, so putting Melinda aside, because she's the one that had the beef, how did she get these other three to go along with her? You know, was it really as easy as saying, you know, was it peer pressure?

Was it these girls wanting to fit in? Because I know there's a lot of that at that age. That's why kids sometimes try drugs. They think they're being cool. We've all done things that we knew wasn't right or we shouldn't. be doing, but we did it because we wanted to, you know, fit in with some group. Run with the, run with the rest of the folks we were with. Didn't want to be that one that said no. Yeah, but you,

you and I both did that, but didn't include murdering a 12 year old girl and setting her on fire. Yeah, I mean, you draw the line somewhere. But they didn't. That's my point. They didn't draw that line. Yeah. So, I mean, they crossed that line and I can't figure out for the life of me how they could have done that. Again, we try to make sense of things that you really just can't make sense up. And peer pressure is a very powerful thing. It is. It really is. I mean, everybody's different, right? Some people are weaker than others on their willpower or whatever you want to call. Willingness to stand up and say, hey, this is not right. Yeah. And they all came from back, a lot of them came from backgrounds that weakened. I think so. You know, their, their spirits,

they're whatever because of what their people in their life did to them. Yeah. Still doesn't justify what they No, nothing could. Nothing could. But when you tell the story, I thought it was important to tell their backgrounds, because I do think it helps to paint that picture. Doesn't make it right, doesn't make it better, doesn't make it anything other than paint that picture? Paint that picture. Other than this is where they came from. That's it. That is the story of the murder of Shanda sharer, you know, extremely sad. Yeah, God rest of soul. Definitely. All right. It's hard to transition Gibbs, but I guess you have to do some voicemails to see if we can cheer me up. Yeah, I think we are going to have to play some voicemails just to kind of clear out the palette a little bit.

Yeah. Let's hear some. Hey, Mike and Gibby. This is Angie. I'm from Denver, Colorado. I'm a graduate student. And first of all, I want to say that your podcast gives me through a very long tweeting drive. And it keeps me sane with the insane.

but I wanted to let you guys know about a story that I read. I don't usually read people magazine, but for some reason, I mean, getting the subscription to my house and I have no idea how to get rid of them. But on the cover, there was, like, raised by a serial killer. And it's the story about how this daughter basically turned her dad in for being a serial killer because he had been moving around, like he's been moving the family around forever.

And anyway, it's Edwards. Wayne Edwards is the guy. You guys should totally look him up. It's a crazy story. He really killed his own son to collect insurance money. Look it up. Okay. Well, thanks, guys.

Bye. All right. Thanks for the voicemail, Angie. Closet people reader. Closet people reader. I don't know how that prescription magazine got here. I think it's a subscription. Yeah, what I say?

You said prescription. Prescription? You need a prescription after reading that subscription. I got a fever. And the only prescription is more Cal Bell. More Cal Bell. Prescription. Colorado.

We love Colorado. Hey, Mike. Gibby. I want to wish you guys a happy new year. This is Max in Atlanta. Just finished listening to the Lockhart episode. As usual, very good episode. Kind of heartbreaking. The backup officer was stuck on another job. His guilt must be unbelievable. It kind of makes me think of the Dahmer officers that kind of tossed that young kid back to Dahmer, where they were a little bit negligence, still the guilt must be astronomical. Well, that's really all I got. I want to give a shout out to, I believe it's Byron, who's made some great New Year's changes, it seems like,

in the fit category. Good luck to you, buddy. And Gibby, put on your seatbelt. You've got to keep your own time ticket. Take care, fellows. Bye. Oh, man. We love Max.

Max always... As soon as I heard, I knew it was Max's voice, man. Yeah, you knew it was Max, and always leaves a great voicemail. Talked about the new T-Cat fit. But I have received so much this week, Gibbs, from people talking about me getting you to wear your seatbelt. Well, you know, so here's a funny, like, part two of that story. Mm-hmm.

So later in life, right, I work for UPS for a little bit when I was in college and right out of college and stuff. And it was a driver. And I actually was hit at an intersection in the city of Piqua and the brown truck, you know, and, you know, we're supposed to have her seatbelt on, but I didn't wear my seatbelt because you're always jumping in and out real fast. And the pants that you wore like those, I don't know, polyester nylon, whatever. They're slicker than, you know what.

Yeah, I watched King of Queens. And you watched King of Queens. And the fabric on the driver's seat is like super slick as well. Well, when I got hit, I didn't have my, I had my little side door open. I slid out of that too out on the intersection. It was something to see. Yeah, there is so many people saying, hey, get Gibby to wear his seatbelt. I know.

I wear it now. But you just talked about last episode that you don't. I wear it now sometimes. You literally. Eventually the ding, ding, ding, ding, ding, ding drives me crazy. A week ago, I used to, this is an honest story, when I was younger, I had a car that did that, but it never shut off. And so this is how bad I was.

I would buckle it and then sit on top of it. Really? I've had friends that went out. That's an idiot. Cut, seatbelt clip off. Just to stick it in there to make it quit doing that. I mean, literally, I'm calling myself an idiot for doing that. Yeah.

Hello, Mike and Judy. This is Diana from Illinois. And I just wanted to say thank you for the podcast. And also I actually found you guys because I was researching about the Menendez brothers murders. So I found you guys through that. And so I started actually started out with that episode. I started listening from episode one. And that was actually like back in November, October or something like that.

So I'm actually caught up. I only have two more episodes. And I'm about to listen to episode 60. So I was really excited and to call you guys. And I just want to thank you for all the research that you guys do. And also to Maggie. And great job. Keep it up.

And you guys are funny. Sometimes I catch myself laughing in the house when I'm cleaning, listening to you guys and everything. So just keep up the good work. And thank you for everything. And keep your own time taken. Bye-bye. All right. Diana.

Thanks for the voice. We appreciate. She from Illinois. So. It's funny that you say that because somebody sent me an email that said they were from Illinois. And I think in parentheses it said something about tell Gibby. There's no, you know, the S is silent or what I forget, but I get a kick out of it. Back in the day when they originally named the state Illinois, it wasn't silent.

It wasn't. It was later that they decided to make it silent. So I go retro. Okay. And that is what it is. All right. Call me retro. Retro man.

Retro Gibby man. I want you to cite the legislation or the proclamation that changed it from the declaration. The declaration. Yeah, four score and seven years ago. Oh, you're a trip. Hello, Joe. You're a great year. Short and voicemail from Steve, but we're so glad he's back and having a good 2018.

He had a rough end of 2017, but he sounds good and like he's doing. You're back, brother. He's doing all right. Keep all moving forward. All right, Gibbs. I think that's it for. us. That was a rough story. It took a lot out of me. Yeah, me too. I do want to say, make sure you check out our ex-bars, check out Daily Harvest. You know, they're supporting us. We need your help in supporting them. Keeps us going, helps us get new sponsors. And we thank them for sponsoring the show. Absolutely. Right. So that is another episode of True Crime All the Time. So for Mike and Gabby, stay safe and keep your own time ticking.

Thank you.