True Crime Campfire - Devastator: The Crimes of Christopher Hightower, Part I

Episode Date: February 17, 2023

In the late summer of 1991, the tranquil little town of Barrington, Rhode Island was stunned by the disappearance of an entire family: Ernie and Alice Brendel and their 8 year old daughter Emily. As the story unfolded, it just got weirder and weirder. Mafia hit squads, bizarre murder weapons, a mysterious figure called “The Lynx?” And the town was left to unravel a mystery that was truly stranger than fiction: A tale of greed, arrogance, and elaborate deception. Join us for Part 1--and Part 2 next week!Sources:Death of an Angel: A True Story of a Vicious Triple Murder That Broke the Heart of a Town, by Don DavisCourt papers: https://case-law.vlex.com/vid/state-v-hightower-895304220The Providence Journal: https://www.providencejournal.com/story/news/2021/01/26/rhode-island-murderer-christopher-hightower-killed-brendel-ernest-alice-emily/4264836001/LA Times: https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1991-11-10-mn-1885-story.htmlBritish true crime series "World's Most Evil Killers," episode "Christopher Hightower"Follow 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/TrueCrimeCampfireFacebook: True Crime CampfireInstagram: https://gramha.net/profile/truecrimecampfire/19093397079Twitter: @TCCampfire https://twitter.com/TCCampfireEmail: [e-mail]! https://true-crime-campfire.myspreadshop.com/Become 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. In the late summer of 1991, the tranquil little town of Barrington, Rhode Island was stunned by the disappearance of an entire family. Ernie and Alice Brandel and their eight-year-old daughter Emily. As the story unfolded, it just got weirder and weirder. Mafia hit squads, bizarre murder weapons, and mysterious figure called The Links?

And the town was left to unravel a mystery that was truly stranger than fiction. A tale of greed, arrogance, and elaborate deception. This is Devastator, the crimes of Christopher Hightower. So, campers, for this one, we're going to start out in Guilford, Connecticut, September 22, 1991. It was a Sunday evening, and Christine Scriobin and her husband Alex were hosting a dinner party for some friends. They were all gathered around the table, chatting, eating, and drinking, when suddenly there was an urgent knock at the door. This was weird. All the people they'd invited were already here, and they weren't expecting anybody else.

Christine went to see who it was and found a disheveled, harassed-looking man who introduced himself as Christopher Hightower. I'm a friend of your brother Ernie, he told her. He's in trouble. Christine was baffled. She'd never seen this man before, but the name rang a bell. Ernie had mentioned him once or twice. But both Ernie and this Hightower guy lived in Rhode Island. Why would he be coming to her? Christine's husband Alex popped his head around the corner, curious to see what was going on. Look, why don't you come in, Christine said to the visitor, ushering him into the living room. Sit down and here and relax for a few minutes.

We have guests for dinner, but we'll try and wrap things up as quickly as we can, and then we'll talk. Christine and Alex hurried their guests out the door as fast as they could politely do it, then went and sat down across from Christopher Hightower, who spilled out a story so bizarre they almost felt like they were dreaming. Ernie and his family, wife Alice and little eight-year-old daughter Emily, had been kidnapped, he told them, by the mafia. Christine and Alex sat for a moment stunned speechless. They've been what? By the who? It's true, Hightower said, and it got worse. They'd taken Hightower's wife Susan and their two little boys, too. Why, Christine wanted to know. Well, money, Hightower said. He was a commodities trader, and he and had gotten mixed up in some bad investments with bad people's money.

Now those bad people wanted their money back, and they were holding hostages to make sure they got it. Now, Christine and Alex didn't just fall off the turnip truck. These were smart, professional people, and I guess Christopher Hightower could sense that they weren't quite buy-in this story. He stood up and fished in his pocket. I can prove it, look, he said, handing Christine a wallet. Christine opened it up, and there was her brother Ernie Brandel's driver's license,

his library card, his social security card, plus a couple of gold rings she immediately recognized as her sister-in-law Alice's. Oh my God, she said. Clearly, something was going on here. Something bad. And Hightower had something else to show them, too. He walked them outside to the driveway, and there was Ernie Brandel's red Toyota. High Tower popped the trunk.

Look, he told them. There was a huge bloodstain in the trunk, and another one in the back seat of the car. Alex Scriabin was a doctor and looking into the trunk he thought there's no way somebody could lose that much blood and live but for the moment he kept that thought to himself Christine ran into the house for a minute and came back with a Ziploc baggie and some damp cotton swabs like an experienced CSI she leaned into the trunk and rolled the cotton swabs into the bloodstains then snatched the evidence in the plastic bag

born camper this woman isn't that amazing to have the presence of mind to do that back inside the house Christopher Hightower laid out the reason he was here. The kidnappers wanted a $300,000 ransom for the safe return of both families. I can come up with $225,000 myself, Hightower told them, but that still leaves $75

grand. Can you raise it? Christine's mind was racing. This guy was throwing off bad vibes like a pitching machine throwing baseballs. She didn't trust him as far as she could throw him, but what if he was telling the truth? She needed to buy some time. Well, we don't have

that kind of cash, she told Hightower. It'll take us a day or two to get it from the bank. Hightower nodded. All right, you get started on that first thing in the morning, then I'll be back in touch. Oh, and don't call the police, he warned them. The mob will be tapping your phones. If they get the slightest whiff of police involvement, they're likely to kill all six of the hostages. High Tower stood up to leave.

Wait a second, Christine said. She picked up a camera from the side table, and before Hightower could protest, snapped a picture of his startled face. Later, she said she did it because the whole situation. situation was so surreal. She wanted to be able to prove to herself that it really happened, that it hadn't been some kind of crazy dream. And then, just like that, Christopher Hightower got in the red Toyota and drove away. I didn't know what to make of it, Christine said later, but I didn't think he was telling me the truth. It was just too bizarre, too far-fetched. She could sense something bad was happening, though, and it made her stomach clench.

Just a night or two earlier, she'd spoken to her niece on the phone, little eight-year-old Emily. They had a fun, favorite, niece, favorite auntie relationship, partners in crime, to the point where sometimes Ernie scolded her about being a bad influence. Emily was wanting to get her ears pierced, but Ernie and Alice thought she was way too young. So Emily called her Aunt Christine to try and get her on her side, maybe talk her into backing her up with mom and dad, that lots of girls already had pierced ears at eight. Emily was the best kid you'd ever want to meet. The thought of her being held somewhere was horrifying. Not to mention Ernie and Alice, both such smart, vibrant people who adored each other

and their little girl. As soon as they saw Christopher Hightower's taillights disappear down the street, Christine and Alex hauled ass over to their neighbor's house. They didn't know what was going on here, so they weren't going to discount the possibility of tapped phones, but they weren't going to sit on their hands either. From their neighbor's kitchen, they called the FBI. The feds would quickly discover that Ernie, Alice, and Emily Brindell were in fact missing, though Christopher Hightower's wife and kids were safe and sound at home, not being held hostage in some mobster's basement. The Brindell's house was quiet and still, but there were a few signs of trouble. A doorframe that looked like it had been crowbarred, a strange hole in the drywall

of the garage, and an odd chemical smell. An answering machine full of unreturned calls. Where was the family. And what was Christopher Hightower's role in all of this? They were hoping to find him and talk to him as soon as humanly possible. Hightower had a good reputation around Barrington, Rhode Island, where he and the Brendel's all lived. He was a well-to-do commodities trader, a popular Sunday school teacher and kid's soccer coach. His wife and her family were pillars of the community from way back. They lived in a gorgeous house in one of the nicest parts of town. Would Christopher Hightower really get involved with the mob? And if so, why? And why would he lie to the Scriabins about his own family being kidnapped too? Christopher Hightower grew up in Florida in the 50s, practically right

next door to Cape Canaveral. Grew up watching rocket launches and playing basketball and pretty much getting whatever he wanted from his parents, even though he had four siblings. It was a pretty standard issue middle-class childhood, except for one thing. When Christopher was in his teens, he found out the big family secret, that the man he thought was his father was actually his stepdad. His bio-dad ran out on his mom when she was 17 and a brand-new mother, and he never came back. Now, okay, I get that this would be upsetting to a kid, but for Christopher, it was way beyond upsetting. It was earth-shattering, to the point where it totally blew up his relationship with his stepdad, which is weird to me.

I mean, it wasn't his stepdad's fault, but after the cat was out of the bag about the bio dad, Christopher pretty much wrote his stepdad off forever and things got real, real tense. In every source we've seen on this case, when they go hunting around for some big traumatic event in Hightower's past, this is what they land on. Seems like a pretty lame origin story to set off a life of crime, but there you go. It's all we got to give you. And it's not super, like, rare. I mean, it's rare, but it's happened before.

It happened to Bundy. It's happened to a couple other serial cures. Yeah, I thought about Bundy, actually. It's a sort of similar situation. Which is like, yeah, it sucks, but like, you don't kind of murder anyone about it, you know? Calm the hell down. Yeah. I don't get to do this.

Calm the fuck down. But there was one more thing. Christopher had big ambitions. He wanted to be a rich doctor, such a rachel. such a raging success that he could shove it in his stepdad's face. But he just wasn't very good at stuff. He barely squeaked past the finish line to graduate high school, and the same thing happened in college, both academically and athletically.

He felt sure he was destined for capital G greatness, but he couldn't seem to get better than average at anything he tried. And that was on a good day. He just flat out sucked, for the most part. He was lazy, he got bored when he wasn't immediately good. at something, and he quit. It chapped his ass bad, and he started doing what a lot of narcissistic people do when they don't succeed. Blame it on everybody else and start nursing a little bubbling cauldron of rage. As Don Davis put it in his book, Death of an Angel, the people close to

Chris Hightower knew that there was a duality about him. On the outside, a non-threatening, affable dude who could get along with just about everybody. But on the inside, a storm was brewing. He got out of his parents' house the second he was old enough and literally, never saw his stepdad again, which most people probably wouldn't be capable of, in my opinion. I mean, the guy raised him like he was his own, but Christopher was able to just cut him off, just like that, and never look back. Cold as ice. He enrolled in college as a pre-med major and tried out for the basketball team. Basketball was the one thing he'd been kind of good at in high school, but he'd been a big fish in a small pond. In college, he stayed on the bench most of the time.

So he dropped out of school and decided to try the Navy instead, told him he wanted to be a doctor, so he got a cushy job working in a hospital in Bethesda. He got married while he was there to a pretty woman from Malaysia, but it didn't last long because, on a trip back home to visit her family, his wife disappeared. Now, I know you're raising your eyebrows at that, but apparently she went on the trip by herself, so, I don't know, it seems like he had nothing to do with it, probably, but she was eventually presumed dead, and that was pretty much that.

But it didn't take Chris Long to find wife number two, a pretty naval officer and pediatric nurse named Ellen. Oh, and he proposed to her with his dead wife's wedding ring, which tells you about half of what you need to know about him. And this will tell you the rest. He was in the Navy for about four years, and you want to know why he left? Because his new wife outranked him, and his fragile little ego couldn't take it.

Wow, that's embarrassing. So he went back to civilian life and started college again, this time majoring in zoology with the goal of applying to med school after graduation. By now, he and wife number two Ellen were living in Rhode Island, the tiniest state. It might be the size of a chees-it, but it's been home to some gnarly murders and more financial crimes than you could fit into a whole season of American greed, so perfect territory for Christopher. He did well his first couple semesters at the University of Rhode Island, but soon a pattern began to show, one that would pop up again and again as the years went by.

As Ellen's star rose in the Navy and she reached the rank of lieutenant, Hightower seemed to resent her more and more. After Lovebombing the crap out of her in the early days of their relationship, now he treated her like garbage and nitpicked everything she did, despite the fact that she was putting him through college on her salary and taking care of most of the housework. And he started to hit the skids at school. His grades fell like a busted elevator until Ellen started to wonder if he'd ever have a prayer of getting into med school.

He did graduate, but just barely. and after a couple of years working a medical sales job he hated and bitching and moan in the whole time, even through the birth of one daughter and another on the way, he told Ellen he wanted to go ahead and go to med school. He just up and quit his job without even consulting his wife, even though she was pregnant with daughter number two. Charming, right, and sent out a bunch of applications. One medical school accepted him despite his mediocre grades.

This was the American University of the Caribbean. But it was going to be pricey, and Ellen didn't want to give up her own job. moved to the Caribbean with two young kids and live on a shoestring. Christopher tried to talk his father-in-law into loaning him the money for tuition, and when he said no, Christopher was furious. With him and with Ellen. He got a job as a manager at a restaurant called the Newport Creamery, and just kind of fumed.

And it was there where he met Susan, also known as wife number three. Susan was a waitress at the creamery, gorgeous, smart, charming from a prominent family, and just 18, so young enough not to outrank him at anything. Unlike Lieutenant Ellen, who had also just finished a master's degree and was kicking ass all over creation. Good for her. High Tower, who was by now looking for an exit ramp from marriage number two, zeroed in on Susan like a heat-seeking missile. He told her a bunch of bullshit lies, like he'd been a race car driver, he was involved in underwater black ops missions in Vietnam, which, like, y'all, he literally spent the entire war

working in a hospital in Maryland, okay? But because she was 18, bless her heart, Susan bought every last one of his stories and thought Christopher Hightower was the most amazing man she'd ever met. And of course, he convinced her not to worry too much about the fact that he was already married. Ellen didn't understand him. All she cared about was her own career. She was so selfish that she'd intentionally derailed his dream of becoming a doctor. See, our boy was beginning to discover that he did actually have one talent. He was a terrific bullshitter. and he could be charming. Meaning, he could talk people into just about anything.

Yeah, I know what you're thinking, campers. This ain't going anywhere good, is it? No, no, it is not. At some point, Ellen realized Christopher was cheating on her. And then she found out something worse, that Christopher, behind her back, had been trying to sell their flipping house to get the money for med school.

Can you imagine? Y'all, I would kill this man in his sleep. I would beat him to death with his own face. But Ellen didn't want to ask for a divorce because he'd been getting more and more unpredictable lately. And a couple of times his temper had really scared her. So she gave him an ultimatum instead. If you decide to go to that med school in the Caribbean, you'll have to go without me. She gave him a deadline.

And by that point, Chris was ready to go. He had a sight set on Susan. And more importantly, Susan's well-to-do. prominent family. They could be his ticket to the kind of life he felt he deserved. Within a couple months of Ellen's deadline, Christopher was watching bride number three walk towards him down the aisle. Oh, and guess what she was wearing.

The same diamond Chris had given wives one and two. You are shitting me. Nope. He stole the ring from Ellen before they finalized their divorce and got a jeweler to take out the diamond. And that was the rock he gave Susan. So this is love. So this is love.

It's so romantic, isn't it? I can feel the romance. We are recording this on Valentine's Day. It's true. It is. I want a horrible case to record on Valentine's Day. Jesus, I know, peak romance. Just like he'd cut ties with his parents years before.

now he seemingly cut his little girls off just as easily, lied through his teeth to the divorce court too, said he was indigent, broker than broke, then went out and bought himself a brand new car. He'd given up on the med school thing by now, of course. But he and Susan both enrolled in graduate programs in Ohio, Susan and psychology and Christopher in biomedical sciences. He figured as long as he could have a doctor in front of his name, he didn't really give a shit. He and Susan bought a house in Ohio and had a baby boy. Everything seemed to be going great at first. But Hightower's same old pattern continued in grad school. He did well for a while doing research on lab rats and charming his classmates and professors. But before long, everybody started to figure out that his alleged brilliance was just smoke and mirrors. Like he'd do stuff like put his baby son on a countertop right next to a fragile experiment so his wife could change his

diaper. Dude. I'm not even a scientist and I know that's a bad idea. Holy shit. Yeah, and he was just a consummate bullshit artist, the type who can learn enough of the vocabulary to sound like they know what they're talking about as long as nobody asks any follow-up questions, right? And then he'd be lost like a toddler in a mega mall. He couldn't hack the coursework, no matter how hard he studied. And the more he struggled, the worse he treated Susan, criticizing everything she did. She wasn't doing the housework right. She wasn't taking care of the baby right. And then he started randomly accusing her of sleeping around, which was total nonsense, especially since by now, she was out to here pregnant with their second child. The program he was in was a master's to PhD type thing,

where you could get your master's, then if you passed a bunch of exams, you could qualify to move on to the PhD program. Christopher barely squeaked through his master's program, but he must have known he didn't have a snowball chance in hell of passing those exams. and they were fast approaching. The pressure was on. Poor Christopher just couldn't catch a break. Just as he was gearing up for these big tests that he knew he wasn't prepared for,

sudden devastation hit. His and Susan's house caught on fire. Smoke and water damage everywhere. All fixable. And I mean, they got a big insurance check that really helped a lot with the financial problems they were having. But still, what a headache. Of course, when Chris told his professors about the fire, they felt like they had to give him more time to prepare for his exams.

I mean, it wouldn't be fair to expect him to take them on time, given the terrible trauma he'd just been through. So the fire was bad luck, but it did sort of happen at just the right time so Chris could pay some bills and get out of taking his test. So, you know, I guess the good lord never closes a door without opening a window or something. And then, dang if it didn't happen again, just a few weeks later. I shit you not, another fire. time it was like he had piled everything that wasn't smoking water damage like into the one like undamaged room of the house and that shit got on fire like so just like poof just spontaneous combustion i guess and that was convenient because the first one didn't quite pay enough to cover all

the bills what was susan having that second baby boy right around then racking up hospital charges now this time arson investigators were suspicious very suspicious so much so that they asked high tower to come in for a polygraph test. But he refused and stuck to his guns that the fire was an accident and the flipping insurance companies went right ahead and paid up again. Yeah, I know that somewhere in, you know, than 80s or whatever, some claims adjuster hit the fucking roof when the decision to pay that claim came through. Because it's the bit in Fight Club about companies determining whether it's more expensive

to go to court or to just pay off the victims is a thousand percent the case. So management was like, it's cheaper to just pay him $5,000 and make him go the fuck away. Sorry. And the claims adjuster was fucking furious. I can guarantee it. Yeah, the police were really mad too because they had his fingerprints. They found like two gas cans at the scene and his fingerprints were all over me. It was just like, I can't believe the insurance company paid.

It's crazy to me. The arson investigators weren't the only ones raising an eyebrow this time. Christopher's professors were starting to get sick of his bullshit too. Two fires in two weeks? Conveniently scheduled right around exam time. They were grumbling amongst themselves, and between them and the cops, I guess Hightower figured it was time to cut and run. He'd had enough of trying to be Dr. Hightower.

He was going to switch gears. Oh, and by the way, campers, I know this is going to shock you, so sit down if you need to, but later it would come out that Hightower had faked his transcripts to get into grad school in the first place. Used white out and a typewriter and changed all those icky Cs and Ds to A's, and Bada Bing, Bada Boom, he got in. it's amazing you couldn't do the work right it's like what did you expect dipshit and look no shade on anybody for not being up to a phd in biomedical sciences okay i wouldn't be able to do it

if you gave me a million dollars in a million years but if you know you can't do it then don't do it do something else you know do something you can do but christopher hightower was determined to shine he had to be better than his stepdad better than his ex-wife the navy brass better than his wealthy in-laws better than everybody. His ego couldn't survive anything else. So anyway, Christopher decided that for his next trick, he was going to take what he considered to be a surefire road to getting rich quick. Always a safe pit, right? He went on a quickie training course in commodities trading and started trying to sell himself as a broker. Now, I don't know how much you all know about commodities trading or futures trading, but the vast majority of people who get

involved in it, lose and lose big. In fact, the odds of getting rich from the commodities trade are even longer than the ones you're going to get in Vegas, okay, but Christopher, he wasn't interested in hearing any of that boring, negative Nancy talk. He was fired up. With his superb bullshitting skills, he was pretty good at attracting clients, too. It just goes to show if you say something with enough confidence, people are liable to believe you, even if you're spouting a bunch of made-up horse ducky, which is exactly what Chris was spouting. He bought a bunch of pricey software that would pick up all the info from the world markets every day, and he put together a fancy little presentation and started pitching to the people in the local investment club. And of course,

he lied through his teeth about how much money he was making and promised huge returns on their money, and bless their hearts, people bought it. He took in more than 100K in investment money, and for a while he sent them all these glowing monthly statements, which of course were fake, showing how well he was doing for him, and it all went great. Until, of course, course, one of his investors needed to get his money out. And then another. And Chris couldn't do it. And the investors started talking amongst themselves and getting real, real nervous. Finally, they all just showed up en masse at his office and got the truth out of him that he'd lost their money, aka stolen their money. Sorry. But you knew it was a risk when you signed up. So

what do you want me to do about it? That was basically his attitude. And he sort of had a point. I mean, sure, he'd lied to them on their monthly statements, but they gave the money willingly, and he'd been up front from the get-go about not being officially licensed as a traitor. In a situation like that, a lot of people are too embarrassed to go to the police. But between one thing and another, the fires and the failed PhD and the whole, you know, investment fraud thing, things were getting sort of inhospitable for our boy in Ohio. Time to move on again. Back to Rhode Island, where they could move into Susan's parents' big, gorgeous home and start all over. And it was there, in the pretty town of Barrington, where Christopher really found his niche.

For a few years, at least. With the veneer of respectability, Susan's popular family offered him, he put down brutes in the community. He and Susan joined a church, and Chris started teaching Sunday school classes. He was good at it. He signed up to coach his son's soccer team, and he started high-touching. Tower Investments Incorporated, with his very own office downtown. It all seemed pretty impressive from the outside, unless you happen to know that Susan's dad had to help pay the rent on the office space because Chris didn't know what the fuck he was doing. His business floundered from day one, but he flat out refused to get a regular job to

support his family. Susan had to get one instead, so he could keep playing an investment banker. But Chris was determined to keep plugging away. This was a town with money. He felt sure he could score some rich clients eventually. And then, as if the patron saint of arrogant assholes was looking out for him that day, a friend introduced him to a local attorney named Ernie Brandel. Ernie and his wife, Alice, had a pretty idyllic life in Barrington.

They were still very much in love after years of marriage, and their eight-year-old daughter Emily was the light of their lives. Alice was a librarian at Brown University. Ernie had his own practice. They lived in a pretty neighborhood where Alice could go jogging every day and Emily was involved in all kinds of fun after-school stuff at the Y. They weren't like rich, rich or anything, but Ernie and Alice both did pretty well financially,

and they'd made some smart investments over the years. So they were what you'd call well-off, upper middle class. plenty of discretionary income to invest in commodities trading. And as soon as Christopher got wind of that, he turned the full force of his charm on Ernie and his family. And they hit it off, became friends, even to the point of going on a couple of family trips together, kids and all. Chris would come over and help Ernie with home improvement stuff around the house, they'd talk sports and wine, you know, just bros being bros. But from day one, Hightower had his sights set on Ernie as a client

slash victim. I don't know which. I mean, on one hand, Chris must have realized he didn't have what it took to make actual money for his clients. He hadn't managed to do it yet, and he'd left a big smoking crater in the middle of his old investment club in Ohio.

But at the same time, I think he's one of those narcissists who's really good at believing his own bullshit. So maybe he thinks, thought he just needed somebody to give him a chance, and he could make his business work. I don't know which it was. An intentional fraud or just a delusional jackass, maybe a little both. Yeah. And that doesn't make him any less of a piece of shit, by the way. I mean, whether he was stealing from people on purpose or just incompetent, he was totally willing to put other people's

livelihoods on the line. Right, and never his own. Like, he wasn't investing a dime of his own money. So anyway, he kept working on Ernie Brindell, giving him his whole line of bullshit about how much money he was making trading futures and showing him a bunch of fake paperwork to back up the lies. And eventually, probably because of their friendship, I suspect, the normally cautious Ernie gave in. And he brought a few friends with him too. He invested about 11 grand, and that's in 1990 money, plus 40 grand more from his friends. And he fronted Chris some money for new equipment. And the results were predictable. And Ernie, who was as sharp as nails attorney and not a guy to be trifled with, looked into it and discovered all the bodies in Chris Hightower's wake, all the former investors he'd screwed over, who all told him, look, this dude fakes his monthly statements, okay? He's a fraud. And Ernie Brandel was pissed. Not only about the money, though that was bad enough, but about the betrayal, too. And about being made to look like a gullible dumbass. Nobody likes that. And unlike the former investors in Ohio, Ernie was determined to do.

do something about it. He told Chris he expected every thin dime of his money back, otherwise he'd see him in court. Even worse, he made a formal complaint about Hightower to the federal agency that monitors commodities trading, the CFTC. This was bad. This could mean the end of High Tower Investments, Inc. And it couldn't have happened at a worse time for Christopher. Everything was falling apart for him lately. First of all, he was up to his eyebrows in debt, behind on the rent for his office, and he'd had some of his fancy computers. equipment repowed, and on top of that, Susan was threatening to leave him, the bitch. Things had started sliding downhill between them even before they moved back to Rhode Island,

and lately the slide had hit avalanche levels despite months of marriage counseling. From Sue's perspective, of course, this was because all he ever seemed to do was bitch at and criticize her, if he paid attention to her at all. Most of the time, he just hit out at his office or lays around the house watching the godfather or good fellows for the zillionth time to satisfy his weird obsession with gangsters. He flat out refused to carry his share of the financial responsibility for the family, and sometimes he'd get into a mood that scared her to death, this ice-cold silent treatment where she could sense something pitch dark going on behind his eyes.

But from his perspective, he couldn't imagine why she'd want to leave him. It's not like he hadn't started his life over before, but this time it was different. He'd built a reputation in this town. He was the chair of the Board of Christian Education at church, for God's sake. He was a flippin' cubs scout leader. The idea of letting these people find out what a failure he really was, it would be worse than death. And I mean, obviously, none of it was his fault, anyway. It was the unstable economy, and stupid Susan always trying to make him get a real job,

and the asshole landlords at his office building who were just greedy, selfish pricks, and above all, it was fucking Ernie Brendel and his stupid fucking complaint to the CFTC. What with all this nonsense, Chris was feeling pretty sorry for himself. So much so that he even wrote a little poem about it. Now, before you get too excited, I couldn't find the full text of this thing, and I know it kills me too. I'm still not over it. I'll never be over it. But I do have a few lines to share, courtesy of Don Davis's book. And Don, if you're listening, man, why didn't you? Why didn't you include the whole poem? Would it kill you? I wanted it so bad. Come on. I know. Don, my man.

Anyway, it's a self-pitying little freestyle about how life is a circus where you can lose a bag of popcorn when the dive bomber comes crashing down. It gets better. The bumper cars of life can cause you knocks and bruises, and God help you if the Ferris wheel stops on top of the world. Me, you know, the subject matter actually fits really well because every move this man makes is absolute clown shoes. Do they even have bumper cars at the circus?

hell no or ferris wheels he's getting the circus confused with the county fair this mess can't even do poetry right oh my god this is btk level and i don't even have the full poem it is i'm mad also i'm very i'm still mad isn't it okay isn't it a good thing when the ferris wheel stops at the top like that's a good that's that's the best part that's the fun that's where you get the great view what's the point of being on the bottom of the ferris wheel yeah you're just like 12 inches off the ground this man is bad at everything the ferris wheel stops at the bottom like Yeah. Come on. Some consistent narrative in your poem. Like, come on, dude. Yeah. F minus. Must try harder.

Yes. Clearly, Hightower was hanging by a thread. And the last straw was just about to land. Despite his efforts to sweet talk her and to giving him another chance, showing up at her office with a smarmy card and a rose, Susan had had enough. When he saw her at home that evening, she said she wasn't up for giving a little. another go. She wanted a divorce. Christopher was furious. He'd given her a goddamn flower and promised to do better. Shouldn't that be enough to smooth everything over? That was how you were supposed to handle women, wasn't it? What was wrong with this bitch? He just kind of seethed for a day or two, barely spoke to anybody and shot creepy looks at Susan. And then the next time he and Susan were alone together in the house, the kids upstairs asleep and the in-laws out for the

night, he poured himself a glass of whiskey, sat on the couch for a while, just silently glaring. And then out of the blue, he looked up at Susan and said, What do you know about guns? The hairs on the back of Susan's neck stood up. What do you mean? she said. Christopher twirled the ice in his whiskey glass. What do you think a human life is worth? He'd spoken to a guy, he told her.

Found out some very useful information about what it costs to hire a hitman to kill somebody. Like, for example, a wife who's threatening to take the kids and leave. Pretty cheap, he said. Only four grand, plus an extra thousand to make it look like an accident. I already paid it, Chris said. And I'll send the guy after you if you file for divorce. Susan sat frozen in fear. She'd never seen him like.

this before. He sounded like he meant every word. And not just you, Chris told her. He had a whole hit list. If she tried to take the kids away and divorce him, he'd have her whole family killed. And then, getting unsteadily to his feet, Chris threw his whiskey glass at the fireplace, where it shattered into a million pieces. The noise was like a slap in the quiet room. I don't know about you, he said, but I'm going to sleep well. tonight, you fucking whore. And then he went up the stairs to crash in one of the guest rooms. Oh, God. When Susan's parents got home, she told them everything. And she'd made up her mind. She was going to go see a divorce lawyer in the morning. Maybe ask about getting a restraining

order. Yeah. She was terrified, but tonight had proven it. She had to get away from this man. And she had to get her kids away from him. Chris Hightower was unraveling. Later that same night as everybody else in the family slept, he dragged himself out of bed and went for a little walk, all the way over to the Brindell's neighborhood, got stopped by a cop on the way, because it was so weird for anybody to be out and about that late in that part of town. The cop was suspicious. There had been some break-ins in the area lately, but Chris managed to talk his way out of it like he usually did. Oh, I'm just out for a walk, you know, to clear my head.

the cop didn't like it but he went on his way Christopher Hightower wasn't the kind of suspect he was looking for too bougie looking too nerdy looking too too middle-aged and middle class and once the squad car disappeared down the street Chris turned back to what he was doing making a little hiding spot in the bushes across from the Brindell's house using a couple of metal yard spikes to mark where it was so he wouldn't forget

and then he hunkered down for a while to walk watch and think. A well-hidden window here, the door to the garage there. At one point he ventured out from the bushes and crept over to the house, trying the garage door to see if it was locked. It wasn't, but Chris startled back when he heard an alarm chirp. He hadn't realized they had a security system. He could have sworn Ernie had said he didn't want the expense. He scuttled back to his vantage point in the shrubbery and watched the lights go on inside the house. Ernie, checking to see what had trip the alarm, obviously. But there was nothing there now, and soon the happy little family inside started going about their day. Christopher made a note of the time their red Toyota pulled out

of the garage, Ernie driving Alice to work and Emily to the school bus stop. He'd come back home alone after that. Then Chris emerged from the bushes and walked home again, slunk back into the house before anyone knew he'd been gone, and after he dropped his boys off at school, he went to a sporting good store, to look at crossbows. now don't be mad but we gotta leave it there for part one campers this is a big story and we just couldn't fit it all in one episode but don't worry we'll have part two for you next week for now lock your doors light your lights and stay safe until we get together again around the true crime campfire and today we want to send a special thank you shout out to listener emily lamaster who suggested this case to us on our facebook page

we fell down the rabbit hole immediately and just could not learn enough about this unbelievable story so Emily, thank you so much for recommending it. And as always, we want to send a grateful shout out to a few of our lovely patrons. Thank you so much to Jessica, Maureen, Jen, Carrie, Jason, Melissa, Allison, and Keely. We appreciate y'all to the moon and back. And if you're not yet a patron, you are missing out.

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And for great TCC merch, visit the true crime campfire store at spreadshirt.com. I also want to send a shout out to two campers, John and Addy. John and Addy, hi. You guys, they sent us some really lovely messages and it just made our day. It was, we get a lot of messages that make our day, but it was just, it was just so sweet. We love, we loved getting those ones. So shout out to you, too. They were voice messages, and we love hearing y'all's voices, especially when you have cool access.

Yes. So, hi, John, hi, Addy. They call this proper cool. So, you know, we're- Proper cool. Nobody can tell me nothing anymore now that I know I'm proper cool. Yeah, so they're behind. So they might, we'll have to let them know. We gave them a shout-out in this episode, but they're catching up.

Yeah, we'll have to tell them. Thank you.