True Crime Campfire - Buried Alive: The Murder of Brandy Stevens-Rosine

Episode Date: February 27, 2026

Love is supposed to make you better. Your partner should push lift you up and make you want to improve yourself, improve life for you both. Sometimes, though, there are couples that do nothing but make each other worse. They become jealous, resentful, and cruel. Their relationship is a disgusting mire that sucks in the couple and everyone in their orbit. Everyone knows a couple like that. But today, we’re going to talk about a couple who committed one of the most heinous crimes we ever heard of to satisfy their own jealousy.Registration is now open for CrimeWave 2.0! Visit crimewaveatsea.com/CAMPFIRE to get your discount code for $100 off your cabin and a private meet-and-greet with us! The cruise is Feb. 8-12, 2027.Join us for Wet Hot Bad Magic Summer Camp '26, September 10-13. Go to badmagicproductions.com for more details and to buy tickets. Sources:How I Caught My Killer, Frenemies, S2E3, “Text, Lies, and Murder”A Stranger In My Home, “Mean Girls”HuffPost: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/brandy-stevens-rosine-murder_n_4065921https://www.brandyrosine.com/blogFollow us, campers!Patreon (join to get all episodes ad-free, at least a day early, an extra episode a month, and a free sticker!): https://patreon.com/TrueCrimeCampfirehttps://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/Facebook: True Crime CampfireInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/truecrimecampfire/?hl=enTwitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfireEmail: [e-mail]! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.comBecome a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/true-crime-campfire--4251960/support.

Hello, campers, grab your marshmallows and gather around the true crime campfire. We're your camp counselors. I'm Katie. And I'm Whitney. And we're here to tell you a true story that is way stranger than fiction. We're roasting murderers and marshmallows around the true crime campfire. True crime campfire is going to summer camp. Wet hot, bad magic summer camp, 2026, to be exact.

Every year, Dan and Lindsay Cummins of the podcast's Time Suck and Scared to Death host this incredible four-day event at a real summer camp. ground in Equinoct, Pennsylvania. It's more glamping than camping. You stay in nice cabins with like hot showers and bathrooms and stuff, but it's got all the fun things you'd expect to find at a summer camp, hiking, archery, canoeing and tubing, swimming, dodgeball, karaoke, kickball, and lots more. The food is supposed to be incredible, so we're really looking forward to that. And best of all, you get live podcast shows from Katie and Me, scared to death, and astonishing legends, plus stand-up comedy and live music.

vibes look amazing. We watch the recap videos from their past few summer camps, and it just looks like the kind of place where you'll feel like you've found your people. People from past years have bonded so much that they have little meetups all over the country to reconnect with their camp friends. This campground, the Acres, is absolutely gorgeous, and your ticket price is all-inclusive, meaning your cabin, your meals and snacks, unlimited drinks, a swag bag, and meet and greets with the podcasters every day. This year's camp goes from September 10th to 3rd, We are so freaking excited, y'all. So if you've been wanting to catch us live but prefer to stay on dry land to do it, go to badmagic productions.com for more info and to buy tickets. Hope to see you there.

Love is supposed to make you better. Your partner should lift you up and make you want to improve yourself, improve life for you both. Sometimes though there are couples that do nothing but make each other worse. They become jealous, resentful, and cruel. Their relationship is a disgusting Meyer that sucks them both in and everybody else in their orbit, too. Everyone knows a couple like that. But today, we're going to talk about a couple who committed one of the most heinous crimes we ever heard of to satisfy their own jealousy. This is buried alive, the murder of Brandy Stevens-Rosine.

So, campers, for this one, we're in Youngstown, Ohio on May 17, 2012. Brandy-Steven Roseanne's family was getting worried. Brandy was a social butterfly and was constantly updating her friends and family on her location and activities from her phone, but suddenly it just stopped. Her friends and family tried texting, tried calling, but it was like her phone had been shut off. Even more concerning, Brandy was a type 1 diabetic and she didn't have her insulin. Not only that, but Brandy always answered her phone and now every call was sent straight to voicemail. She told a friend that she was going on a quick trip or adventure as she liked. to call them, and she'd be back, but now she was gone without a trace.

When she left, Brandy told her mom Carrie that she was going to meet a friend of hers, Riannon, to go out on an adventure. When Brandy stopped responding, Carrie reached out to Rianan to ask if Brandy was still with her. Riannon was confused. Brandy had never even come over. Finally, Carrie called the police. The police were not super concerned. They filed a medical missing person's report since she'd left her insulin and

at home, but no one really hit the pavement. You know the whole song and dance by now. Campers, yad, yada, yada, adults are allowed to go missing. Blah, blah, blah, blah, no imminent threat. Is too, because she doesn't ever freaking insolent. Anyway, it's just, oh, it's a tale is oldest time, and it always pisses me off. So who was Brandy Stevens, Roseanne? Born on November 30th, 1992, Brandy grew up with a close-knit family in Ohio. She was a smart, loving kid who loved playing the upright base and the electric base. She loved cats and go-karts and writing. Sounds like me, except for the bass bar. I love cats and go-karts and writing. One of Brandy's biggest challenges was that she was gay. Like many gay young people, she was terrified that her family would reject her.

She didn't need to worry, though. When she came out, her family accepted her. In fact, her mom told her she'd known before Brandy did. Being gay in Ohio was not easy. The U.S. was still several years from legalizing gay marriage on the federal level, and Brandy sometimes just felt isolated. That was why she spent so much time online. She felt like she could meet people like her and build a community of her own. She wanted to study sociology and psychology so she could help people. That was who Brandy was. She wanted to help. Brandy often used dating apps to meet women, and she wasn't afraid of distance. She'd drive her little blue Kia Rio miles to go on a single date. One friend said, She wanted to find the great love of her life.

I will say that this is not uncommon for, like, lesbian relationships. I once knew a girl who drove 200 miles for a first date. Didn't even stay over. Just spent the day and drove home. Randy's friends worried about her. Their concern was she felt like she wasn't a worthwhile person unless she was in a relationship. And that couldn't be further from the truth. But we've all known folks like that.

Some of us have been folks like that, you know. I think I was like that when I was a lot young. I thought, unless I was partnered up, you know, I just couldn't relax or something. And then I would get in the most horrific relationships. Oh, much better. Good job. Brandy was vibrant and funny and full of love. She deserved someone who would appreciate her for everything she was. The police's underwhelming reaction was unacceptable to Brandy's friends and family.

So they decided, as many loved ones of missing people do, to take it upon themselves to get answers. They printed out flyers and went door to door handing them out. But they had no luck until three days later when Brandy's friend Rihanna came clean about something. On the 17th, Brandy had texted her to let her know she was going to Cocherton, Pennsylvania to meet up with someone. She wrote, I have a funny feeling and told Riannon what address she was headed to. She said, this is where I'll be if something happens to me. She also swore Rianna to secrecy, which is why. Ryan didn't say anything until now. The final text she got from Brandy said,

I was sent to the wrong address, turning around to come home. One of Brandy's other friends, Christy Horvatt, took it upon herself to head to Cochranton to see if she could find any sign of Brandy. Brandy did know someone there, an ex of hers named Jade Olmsted. When Chrissy messaged her to ask if she'd seen or heard from Brandy, Jade said she hadn't. When Christy said she'd be heading to Cochranton, Jade responded, be careful, it's bear hunting season, and followed it up with, they don't like gay people around here. To Christy, who is gay as well, this statement felt strange and ominous.

Yeah, like it did not come across as a friendly warning. Christy drove through Cochranton. It's a rural town of about a thousand people, so there wasn't much around. As she headed towards the address that Brandy sent her friend, she searched for any sign of Brandy's Kia. The address led her down a long dirt road. As her navigation pinged telling her that she'd arrived, Christy's heart dropped to her stomach.

In front of her was a church. It must have been so spooky. And in like a area like that especially. Yeah. And it was like abandoned. It was very creepy. Yeah, like an old creepy church. Not finding anything, Christy turned around and went home.

The whole thing didn't sit right with her. She wondered if Brandy had gotten lost too, if she felt confused and disoriented. And then there was the Jade connection. If Brandy hadn't gone to Cochranton to visit Jade, then who could she have gone to meet? Was she catfished on one of her dating apps, lured onto a small town where someone could hurt her? The police, who still weren't looking for Brandy and earnest, found that Brandy's phone had pinged in Mediville, Pennsylvania, four days after she had gone missing. They weren't going to look at it. but they called up Brandy's mom Carrie to give her a heads up.

Instead, Carrie and Christy and some of Brandy's other friends headed to Meadville to look for themselves. The street where Brandy's phone last pinged was near a wastewater treatment facility. When they called her again, there was no reply. They drove around to the hospital, the nearby stores, the police station, and handed out flyers. Again, they came up empty-handed. This failure kind of lit a fire under Carrie.

she was terrified and furious in turns. If the police weren't going to investigate Cochranton, then she was going to. Carrie and Christy headed towards Brandy's last known destination, determined to find out what happened. Carrie had more luck than Christy, and when she followed the GPS to the address that Brandy had sent, she found herself at a house, where she was greeted by the homeowner on the stoop, along with Jade Olmsted and another girl. Uh-oh, but Jade had said she hadn't seen Brae. She also hadn't mentioned anything about Brandy coming to see her.

So, oh God, Jade Olmsted. Jade and Brandy had met on a dating app and had briefly dated the previous year. If real life had dramatic foils, Jade was Brandy's. Brandy was social and Jade had such bad social anxiety that she dropped out of school. Brandy's family was loving and supportive. Jade's kicked her out when she came out. Brandy was calm while Jade was a little more high-strung. Where Brandy was a true lover girl, Jane was hot and cold.

Despite their differences, or maybe because of them, Jade and Brandy hit it off, but their relationship was extremely toxic. They would break up and make up frequently, posting lovey-dovey Facebook statuses one day and emo band lyrics the next. Brandy's friends told her that Jade was no good for her, but Brandy was helpless in love. Their relationship culminated in Brandy coming home from work one day to find Jade gone along with $300 in cash and Brandy's iPod.

Brandy was devastated. She loved Jade and she didn't understand why they couldn't work. Jade moved on quickly, meeting a woman named Ashley Barber. Christy said that her first impression of Ashley was that she wanted to be a badass, and that describes Ashley Barber pretty accurately. Ashley's profile pick on Facebook was of her with her little dukes up just glaring at the camera. You could picture her posting it with the caption about the two wolves, you know. But she's really not pulling it off.

She's like this pale kind of apple-cheeked girl, like Bobby Hill as a girl, basically. That profile pick might be the least intimidating thing I've ever seen in my life. You can imagine you're saying, why I ought to. Anyway, the address that Brandy last went to, the address that Carrie and Christy arrived at five days after Brandy went missing, was Ashley Barber's parents' house. I don't want to place judgment on anyone, but I do feel like you cannot be a badass if you live with mommy and daddy in a town of a thousand, where everyone remembers like that time you pissed your pants at Sunday school. Like, yes, yes, Ashley, you're very tough and scary. Did you bring an extra pair of jeans just in case? When Christy and Carrie got to the barber house, they confronted Jade about lying about Brandy coming over to her house.

Jade insisted that Brandy was never supposed to come over. Carrie responded, that's bullshit. I don't believe a fucking word you're saying. You tell her, Carrie. At that point, bad ass Ashley put her arm out and started getting in Carrie's face and said, don't talk to her like that. This was a weird reaction.

Like, a young woman is missing. Her last known whereabouts is your house. This is her terrified mom and you're trying to fistfight her? Really? Carrie showed Jade and Ashley the text message from Brandy showing that she was coming to the barber house and suddenly, their story changed. Well, Brandy was supposed to come visit, but they didn't know if she got there or not because Ashley fell down some stairs and had to go to the hospital. Ashley did have one badly bruised arm and the other was covered in bandages, and the hospital. and the hospital did confirm that she'd come in for treatment on the 17th.

Dejected again, Carrie and Christy left and started the drive back home. This next part really drives home what kind of geniuses we're working with here. On the drive home, Carrie got a call from Jade. When she answered, Ashley responded saying, this is Jade. Carrie was like, no, it isn't. You're Ashley. Then Ashley said, Randy's car is here. It's in your best interest to come pick it. up. Oh my God. Oh my God. First of all, in your best interest, girl, fuck you. Where do you get the audacity?

Second of all, I mean, it's probably clear that we're not dealing with a couple of geniuses in this case. Truly some of the dumbest, dumbest criminals I've ever seen. It's in your best interest to shut the fuck up for I beat you to death with your own face, you pasty little poser. There are two wolves inside you and I'm going to knock both of them out. Now, I'll, Why on earth would they tell Carrie that Brandy had never arrived, only to call her like an hour later to take it back? Well, because at the same time, Ashley's mom called the police to let them know that there was a strange car in her garage. Now, none of this is confirmed and is my pet theory, but I think Ashley and Jade told Ashley's parents some lie or another about the car in the family garage and they bought it. But then when Carrie and Christy showed up asking about a missing person, Ashley's mom,

who had at least a few IQ points on her daughter, put two and two together and told her daughter she was calling the cops. Now, this is a juicy piece of evidence, but because for some dipshit, inexplicable reason, the cops were determined to do jack shit in this case. They just sent someone to the barber property to check it out. They didn't even get a warrant. So he couldn't enter the garage.

He just looked through the windows. It was like, yep, blue key or Rio, yep, yep, just like the missing diabetic. who doesn't have her insulin, right at the liar's house who lied about seeing her. Anyway, better get on my way. Then they told Brandy's mom that she could go pick it up if she wanted. Excuse my French, but are you fucking high? What do you mean?

Pick it up. I'm still baffled by the police reaction to this case. You don't have to be Benoit Blanc to see that something is seriously wrong here. The cops mentioned that Brandy's car was completely clean. undamaged and Brandy's family was stunned. Brandy's car was never clean. Like, she lived in that thing. There was always Diet Mountain Dew cans and clothes and papers, but now it was clean. They told the cops that, but they were like, hmm, yeah, that's weird. Anyway, we're going to go set up a speed trap or something. Anyway, bye. Like, just jaw on the floor. I cannot. It's horrible. The trooper did

interview Jade and Ashley, who changed their story again. They said that Brandy, Andy got a phone call and went about cleaning her car saying that she was meeting a girl and didn't want her see how messy she was. So she was embarrassed. But then, after a little bit, she said she was getting picked up and then walked down the road to meet her date. Before she left, Brandy told Jade and Ashley that she didn't want anyone to know where she was and asked if she could leave her car there. The couple agreed to keep her secret and hide her car. Now, surely at this point, the cops are going to be like, wow, that's the worst lie I've ever heard and actually start to investigate. Right?

Right? No, wrong. Incorrect. This soggy piece of Wonderbread said, it didn't strike me as odd at the time. I really don't know what they're teaching state troopers out east, but if someone says that a missing person made them double-pinky promise that they wouldn't tell anyone where they were,

and also that someone is in possession of that person's vehicle, I think you're supposed to do more than just doff your comically large campaign cap and skip on out of there. These might be the worst cops I've ever seen. Like truly no curiosity or sense of urgency about a missing woman, just vibes, I guess. Yeah, it reminds me so much of the cops in that Joy Ehler case where they literally, like, somebody got shot at. And they were like, meh, what is wrong with you? Like, why do you people get into the police in the first place? Aren't you interested in solving crimes?

And what's crazy to me about this is that the troopers involved all gave interviews. And they're the ones telling us about everything that they did not do. Like, this is embarrassing. Aren't you embarrassed? I would be embarrassed. I watched like three shows about this case. And they're interviewed for, I think, most of them. I think at least two of them.

And like, I kept having to rewind their statements because I was like, you know this makes you sound bad, right? Like, you know this is bad. I mean, yeah, they're just fine with it, I guess. And so, like, the trooper had called Carrie and was like, okay, yeah, yeah, yeah, her car's there, confirmed. They said that she left with some chick. I don't know about that. I don't know about lesbians. Ew, gay, right?

That's alleged, sorry. I'm not suggesting that the troopers are homophobic. Okay, don't sue me. Actually, what I was thinking, it might be because everyone involved as a girl. Like, not because of what they were lesbians, but because, you know, women killing women, is actually pretty rare. So it just might not have even occurred to them that that would be a possibility. That's very fair, actually.

Misogyny. Girls can kill people, too. We broke the murderer glass ceiling before there was written history, y'all. Come on. And so, anyway, the trooper was like, yeah, Carrie, Brandy's mom, you can come pick up the car anytime you want. And she was like, that is evidence. What are you talking about? Like she's been missing for a week. What are you doing? And then the trooper said, I could tell she's very concerned. And as any mother, I'm sure wanted more to be done. And there's only so many things we can do until we get more out of the investigation. How do you get more out of the investigation? How? Explain to me what the process is by which you acquire more information. Osmosis. They sit in their cars and then the wind tells them,

who's who the murderer is. And it's like, sure, trooper Dufa, sure. But I think Carrie's frustration wasn't so much that she wanted more to be done, but rather that she wanted anything to be done at all. Like, no offense, but by my tally, you've done somewhere between Jack and shit so far. Like, I would argue that a missing person's vehicle being found at their last known location is at the very least circumstantial and probably deserves a little more than a cursory glance

at a thumbs up. Carrie had had just like us had just about enough of the local authorities and decided to call the FBI. Her daughter had crossed eight lines and gone missing, so surely they could stick their big federal noses into the case. And, you know, I think for once calling the manager was the right thing to do. Yeah. Asking to speak to the manager was correct because it did something. because less than an hour after she hung up with the feds, the troopers returned to the barber home to check on Jade and Ashley,

except, they weren't there. To this, the trooper told how I caught my killer. It started to add up that maybe there was something more than just a run-of-the-will-missing person case. At that point, it started to arise some suspicion. Well, look who just woke up. God. I just can't knot with these dudes. It's like, what do you mean by that now?

Now you think it might be a little weird. The killers in this case are so laughably stupid, but I think the investigators are giving them a run for their money because that is the craziest statement I've ever heard. You've got these two people just changing their story left and right. Just I can't. Anyway, Jade and Ashley had taken off, and Ashley's parents had no idea where she was.

The state police finally started searching for Brandy and Ernest, along with both Jade and Ashley. One trooper was getting off his shift, had changed into his civvies, and was heading home when he saw two girls wearing all-black goth attire, walking under an overpass, carrying plastic bags full of clothes,

talking to a guy in a car on the side of the road. When the trooper drove by, the girls turned away conspicuously, hiding their faces. That set off his spidey senses, and he stopped to question them. They looked like two of the girls that he'd gotten a bowl,

on earlier that day. When he asked their names, one identified herself as Jade Olmsted, while the other gave a very obviously fake name. My name is Splashley Harker. The trooper straight up asked her, are you Ashley Barber? And she kept insisting she wasn't until finally she admitted she was. Tumass. The trooper observed that Jade seemed like the more submissive of the two. She kept looking to Ashley for guidance and reassurance, clearly nervous. Ashley, on the other hand, was a confident liar and didn't seem anxious at all. Red flag. The trooper asked if they'd come to the barracks for questioning and they said, yeah, sure. The driver

was dismissed pretty quickly. He didn't know Brandy and wasn't involved. Meanwhile, the investigators descended onto the barber house and the land around it. A few hundred yards behind the house, one of them came across a patch of freshly turned soil. They called in the medical examiner and his team to dig that spot. As he dug around, the Emmy found green leaves buried 10 inches in the soil, indicating that this ground was disturbed very recently, likely within the last few days. 20 inches down, the Emmy uncovered the lower portion of a person's face. As they cleared the dirt, it became clear that the person was brandy, buried in a shallow grave far from home. It was clear that there had been some kind of a struggle.

Brandy was badly beaten, her face almost unrecognizable. Her fingernails were broken and she was bloody. The autopsy would later reveal that Brandy had suffered from blunt force trauma, had 15 lacerations on her scalp, and had a skull fracture. In addition to that, she was covered in bruises and horrifically, worst of all, dirt was found in her airways, indicating that she'd been alive when she was buried. Her cause of death was suffocation.

With the news that Brandy's body had been discovered, the investigators spoke to Jade and Ashley. At first, they told the investigators that Ashley's dad had overheard Brandy talking about dating a girl, and in a homophobic rage, he'd beaten her to death. Thankfully, the investigators were really starting to get the hang of this whole investigation thing by this point, and they didn't believe that for a second. For one thing, Ashley's dad had two lesbians living in his house. It would be weird if he decided that Brandy was a bridge too far. For another thing, he wasn't the one that had been lying to the police for days.

So, Jade and Ashley came clean. You see, Ashley was a jealous hag, and she didn't like that her new girl was close with Brandy. Despite being broken up, Jade and Brandy maintained a friendship, and they talked all the time. Brandy still carried a candle for Jade, and Jade absolutely played into it. One time, Jade told Brandy she was coming to visit, only to ignore Brandy when she got there and leave to hang out with another girl. Jade also told everyone in their circle that Brandy was abusive. Obviously, we will never know the truth on that, but no one ever saw Brandy hurt Jade, nor did any of Brandy's other exes ever say a word about abuse. And as a reminder, you know, false allegations of abuse are rare, but we do run a show about bad people doing bad things.

So, you know, it comes up. Despite all of this, Brandy wanted to stay friends with Jade. Once, after Jade's dad kicked her out, Brandy let Jade live with her for a while. until Jade stole her stuff, obviously. In April of 2012, Ashley called Brandy from Jade's phone and warned her to back off. Got her little dukes up, I'm sure, you know. Letting the bad wolf out. A month later, Jade contacted Brandy to apologize for Ashley's behavior,

and she invited her to come hang out with them. She told Brandy that she thought she'd get along great with Ashley. On May 17th, Brandy headed out for the visit. When she got there, Jay told her there was an old fort in the woods behind Ashley's house and asked if Brandy wanted to go look at it with them. I wonder if she had a bad feeling. But we want to believe in the people we care about. So Brandy said, sure. As Brandy walked ahead of Jade into the woods, Jade hit her in the back of the head with a shovel.

Then Jade and Ashley started punching and kicking Brandy. She fought back, hard, but they overpowered her. At one point, Ashley grabbed her. grabbed a length of rope and tried to strangle Brandy but got tired after a while and gave up. Brandy begged for her life and they ignored her. Then, as Ashley restrained her, Jade beat her with a shovel. Jade's aim wasn't great though and hit Ashley repeatedly, resulting in cuts and bruises on her arms. They thought Brandy was dead and rolled her into the grave they had dug prior to Brandy's arrival.

Oh, God, that's creepy. They heard her take a breath and poured water on her face in an effort to drown her. Then, when that didn't work, they took a huge rock and dropped it on Brandy's face. After that, Brandy still didn't die. She was still breathing when they covered her with dirt. They didn't anticipate Ashley getting injured, so they staged a fall down the stairs in a trip to the hospital to account for the wounds on her arms. Obviously, this is a horrific crime and possibly one of the most brutal murders we've ever covered, but it did bring me a small modicum of joy to imagine Jade hitting Ashley repeatedly.

with the shovel. Yeah. Because A, she had it coming, and also, that's like maybe the stupidest shit I've ever heard. God Almighty. I know. It's like that one moment where I'm like, oh, she had it coming. Good. I'm glad.

I hope it hurt. Absolutely. Jade and Ashley admitted to the whole thing. Later, journals were found that show exactly how they felt about Brandy and their actions. Four days after Brandy's murder, Ashley wrote in the form of a letter to Brandy's mom. Dear Miss Rosean, I fucking murdered your 20-year-old mistake. I beat her head into the ground.

I've never been so alive. I just want to do it again and again. Why lie? I'm addicted. I don't feel guilty. I feel like I have a purpose. Jade's journal reads, Yesterday was the beginning of a whole new life.

I found my calling, a new addiction. Do I feel guilty? No, not an ounce. I'm proud. Oh my God. Yeah. And I find it weird that the word, the verbiage and the wording is so similar. And I wonder if they, like, talked about it or, like, wrote them together.

I don't know. Yeah. I think Jade is very much a follower. So, yeah. It doesn't surprise me that she would use similar language. Pennsylvania does have the death penalty, and Jade and Ashley saw the writing on the wall. They took plea deals. Both of them pled guilty to take the death penalty off the table.

They were both convicted and sentenced to life. prison without the possibility of parole. Much is said in this case about how online Brandy was. I think the instinct for a lot of journalists who cover this case is to point at it as a factor of Brandy's death, but ultimately, I don't really think it mattered. Brandy built a life for herself online. In a world where she didn't feel accepted or loved, she found friendship on the internet. And ultimately, it was her connections that helped solve her case.

Her text messages to her friend helped her family force the authorities into action. Yeah, and it just puzzles me why people say this. I mean, I get that the internet and dating apps and everything have made it possible for us to connect with people that we might never meet in real life. I mean, that's very true for me. I met my husband on the internet. I was here. He was in Scotland at the time. You know, I get that.

But it's not like you couldn't meet somebody in a bar or at a party and have the same outcome. So to me, that's just in Brandy's case, especially because, you know, small town, lesbian, like, They could have easily just met through mutual friends and the same thing could have happened. I don't see how her being online a lot has anything to do with it, honestly. No, you could meet someone tomorrow and they could have it out for you. Absolutely. You know, it doesn't matter. No.

It's clear that Brandy was loved deeply. Her family keeps a website that talks about her story, not just what happened to her, but her life and her loves, her hobbies. and her passions. They even archived her MySpace blogs from when she was like 13 and 14. It's adorable. And you can go look at them now at Brandyrosine.com. The posts are such a wonderful look into who Brandy was. I found myself scrolling for a long time, just learning about who she was as a person. Brandy loved deeply and everyone in her life loved her back. She was ripped from this world by two people who were so toxic and vile that Brandy's mere existence revolted them. They killed her over an imagined love triangle. Instead of making them better,

their love made them worse. And the world is a duller place for it. Yeah, and I wonder if the love triangle was just Ashley's excuse. Because based on that letter that she wrote to Brandy's mom, I really suspect she'd been thinking about doing something like this for a while. Like, I do not think that this suddenly cropped up in Ashley's mind. Brandy, I think, was just a convenient target because she was somebody she was jealous of and hated. All right, so this is my chance. Jade, on the other hand, is a classic follower, somebody so pitiful that they'll traips along behind anybody who shows them a little attention.

These two just became poison together. And Katie, you talked about dramatic foils earlier. I think where these two were steeping themselves in darkness, Brandy was always looking for the light. And I'm going to quote one of the poems she put on her blog way back in 2006 when she was 14. and it's called I'm that kind of girl. I'm the girl who will put her head on your shoulder, not because she's sleepy,

but because she wants to be closer to you. I'm the girl who wants to be kissed under the stars. I am so sorry that these two idiots took that away from her. So that was a sad one, right, campers? You know, we'll have another one for you next week, but for now, lock your doors, light your lights, and stay safe until we get together again around the true crime campfire. And as always, we want to send a grateful shout out to a few of our lovely patrons.

Thank you so much to Katie, Neil, Lauren, Kira, and Jennifer. We appreciate y'all to the moon and back. And if you're not a patron yet, you're missing out. Patrons of our show get every episode ad-free, at least a day early, sometimes more, plus tons of extra content, like patrons-only episodes and hilarious post-show discussions. We've had some great extras lately. Really, really fun. And once you join the $5 and up categories, you give you more cool stuff.

A free sticker, a rad enamel pin or fridge magnet while supplies last virtual events with Katie and me and we're always looking for new stuff to do for you. So if you can, come join us at patreon.com slash true crime campfire.