True Crime Campfire - Ensnared: The Murder of Katy Briscoe

Episode Date: August 2, 2024

Sometimes, danger comes in hot, with blazing red flags and alarm bells so loud they drown out everything else. Plenty of warning signs to activate the fight or flight instinct, put us on guard. But that’s not always the way it happens. Sometimes, danger slinks in silently, coiling itself around us without us even noticing, until it’s already around our throat—and any chance for escape is long past. Today, we have one of those stories, where a talented young woman didn’t realize she was in a killer’s sights until it was far too late.Sources:Daily Mail: https://www.pressreader.com/uk/daily-mail/20120726/282063389094525Cosmopolitan: https://www.cosmopolitan.com/uk/reports/a30199/time-to-ban-racist-porn/Borehamwood Times: https://www.borehamwoodtimes.co.uk/news/9839685.catherine-wynters-family-in-exclusive-interview-after-tony-bushby-sentenced-for-her-murder/Watford Observer: https://www.watfordobserver.co.uk/news/9836873.family-pay-tribute-to-catherine-wynter-as-murderer-tony-bushby-is-jailed-for-life/"Nightmare in Suburbia," episode "The Babysitter and the Cyber-Killer""When Kids Kill," episode "Catfish Killer"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/TrueCrimeCampfirehttps://www.truecrimecampfirepod.com/Facebook: True Crime CampfireInstagram: https://gramha.net/profile/truecrimecampfire/19093397079Twitter: @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. Sometimes danger comes in hot, with blazing red flags and alarm bells so loud they drown out everything else. Plenty of warning signs to activate the fight or flight instinct, put us on guard. But that's not always the way it happens. Sometimes dangerous slinks in silently, coiling itself around us without us even noticing

until it's already around our throats, and any chance for escape is long past. Today we have one of those stories, where a talented young woman didn't realize she was in a killer's sights until it was far too late. This is ensnared, the murder of Katie Briscoe. So, campers, for this one, we're in the English town of Borehamwood, the day after Christmas, Boxing Day, 2011. Sabrina Charles was getting frustrated, trying to reach her 19-year-old sister Katie. Katie was babysitting Sabrina's two kids, three and four years old, while Sabrina was in London for the night. Katie was an amazing auntie. She loved sitting for her niece and nephew, and she was

a certified genius at getting them to go to bed on time. When Sabrina had last spoken to her around 7 p.m., that's just what she'd finished doing. The kids were both asleep, and Katie was settling in for a peaceful rest of her night. The first couple times Sabrina called to check in after that, when Katie didn't answer, she figured her younger sis was probably just listening to music on her headphones. But after a few more missed calls, she started to get a little nervous. It wasn't like Katie to be incommunicado this long, especially since Sabrina had been leaving messages on the answering machine. So finally, Sabrina called their mom, Joy, and asked if she'd mind to go over and check on Katie and the kids when she got a chance. Just to make sure

everybody was okay. I mean, Sabrina wasn't too worried, but better safe than sorry. Joy was working that night, but as soon as she clocked out, she headed over to Sabrina's house. Walking up to her daughter's front door, Joy noticed something strange, a swipe of red on the doorframe. She leaned down to look more closely at it, and her heart dropped. Blood. She knocked, calling out for Katie to come let her in. Katie didn't come. But Joy heard a little voice pipe up from behind the locked door. Grandma, the little girl said. Katie's dead. Katie's mother felt her face flush hot and cold. But when she spoke to her face. she was careful not to let her terror come out in her voice.

Let Grandma in, she said calmly. The little ones opened the door. Katie's lying on the floor, they said, in the kitchen. Looking down at the floor, Joy could see a trail of blood drops. Panicked, she followed the dark red droplets to find Katie, lying on the kitchen floor in a pool of blood. Joy ran to her daughter, touched her. Her skin was ice cold.

Joy made a frantic call to 999, but when the paramedics got there, they realized immediately that there was no hope. Katie was already long gone. She'd been stabbed almost two dozen times, with her little niece and nephew right there in the house. It was a nightmare come to life. Katie was, as her mom would later describe her to reporters, a ray of sunshine, which might sound like a cliche at first, but if you watch Joy's face when she talks about her, you see it's true. Everybody, friends and family just light up when they talk about Katie. Their whole faces animate just with the memory of their girl. So the obvious question was, who would want to hurt her?

And why? It was clear to investigators that Katie must have known and trusted her killer. There was no sign of forced entry into the house, and beyond that, no signs of struggle by the door. This wasn't a push-in home invasion type scenario. Katie had clearly led her killer into the house and, led them into the kitchen, possibly to offer them a drink or a snack. The attack had begun in the kitchen, and it was vicious, the kind of crime scene you can never unsee. A horrible thing for a mother to have to come across. For a little niece and nephew, too. As Katie's loved ones struggled

with this awful new reality, the investigators began the meticulous process of tweezing their victims' life apart bit by bit, looking for anything that might lead them to her killer. They took her computer and her phone, and they started talking to her family and friends, asking if they had any idea who could have done this. Katie Briscoe, called Katie Winter in some sources, I couldn't find out why, was a light in the world from the moment she took her first breath. She was the youngest child in the family, and she was just their rock. As our older sister, Sabrina, put it in one article, some people go up down, up down, but Katie was just one straight line, the same humble, quiet, peaceful-natured person.

Katie loved everybody, and everybody loved being around her. She was dedicated to her studies, her church, her friends and family, and her art. She had a passion and a real talent for drawing and design. She was always drawing in her sketchbook, and she loved doing custom pieces for people. Everybody prized the drawings Katie made for them, always thrilled to get one for Christmas or their birthday. She drew a beautiful scorpion one time for her cousin, and her cousin loved it. so much she decided to get it tattooed. After high school, she decided to take the next step toward turning her talent into a career.

She enrolled in West Hart's College, going for a degree in art and design. She stayed on for another specialized degree after that in design and illustration. This was 2010, and Facebook had really taken off as the main place to connect with friends online. And it was there that Katie met fellow Hart's College art student, 18-year-old Tony Bushby. I assume they'd seen each other around campus, but they didn't have any classes together or anything, so they didn't really connect until they found each other on Facebook. Tony was a year behind Katie in the design program, but they quickly discovered they'd both grown up in Borehamwood, so naturally they had some people and places in common.

They bonded over that, started commenting on each other's posts, then took it to the DMs. They started talking a lot, and before long, in the spring of 2011, Tony asked Katie out, to a movie. Tony Bushby grew up with his mom and sisters. His dad apparently left the family when Tony was still in grade school, a thing which I'm sure leaves some major scar tissue on a kid's psyche. He actually went to the same school as Katie Briscoe, but he was a year younger and they didn't really know each other then. If they had, they might not have been friends. Where Katie was friendly and extroverted, Tony was shy and quiet. His main passion in life was karate. He was good at it, a dedicated student who impressed his instructors.

By the time he met Katie, he was a black belt, training to be a karate instructor. He started at West Hearts in 2009. Their movie date went well, and Tony kept pursuing Katie. It's easy to see what Tony saw in Katie. She was pretty, she was talented, and she was just really a magnetic person. Her friends admired her for her happy attitude

and the fact that she seemed to get along with everybody. Whatever came up in Katie's life, She seemed to take it in stride. The people around her started to realize she was seeing somebody. They could just kind of tell. But she wouldn't really talk about it, especially with her family. To her friends, she's short of just wave it off like, yeah, I have a boyfriend. But she wouldn't say much more than that.

Katie's friends never saw her and Tony together. What they didn't know was that the secrecy was Tony's idea. He didn't want her to talk about him to her friends or family. Let's just keep this private. he told her. It's nobody's business but ours. Ugh, red flag. But, you know, you don't know that when you're 19 years old, do you? Especially when the guy's saying it to you is a good manipulator. And he probably made it seem romantic. You know, it's our little secret.

But you got to wonder why he doesn't want you to tell anybody, you know? Is he embarrassed about it for some reason? Is he already in a relationship and he doesn't want his girlfriend to find out? That's probably the one I would suspect. Or is there some other reason? Exactly. Katie did tell some people, though. She told a few of her friends that she was really falling for Tony. She told them they mostly interacted on Facebook, but they had a secret meeting place, IRL too, a little wooded park where they'd talk and make out a little.

It all sounded pretty romantic, to be honest, secret makeout sessions in the park, like something from a romance novel. But it troubled some people that Katie was so secretive about the whole thing. If you're starting to get serious with this guy, why not bring him over to the pub sometime. Introduce him around. You know, let us get a look at him if you like him so much. Right. Of course, the couple of times Katie did introduce Tony to people in her life, it didn't go so well. Sabrina wasn't even 100% sure Katie had a boyfriend. She'd try to have what she called girly chats with her younger sis sometimes ask her, hey, are you seeing anybody? But Katie always said no. If she really

pressed her, like, come on, I know you're seeing somebody. She'd just kind of laugh it off. but one afternoon Sabrina was home doing laundry when Katie came home with a guy in tow Katie seemed surprised to see her like oh hey I thought you'd be at work it was an awkward moment

this must be the boyfriend Sabrina thought after a moment of cringy silence Katie said Tony this is my sister Tony sort of grunted hello then went over and perched on the edge of the couch he looked like a cat at a dog park and Sabrina was immediately

creeped out. She later told a true crime show that his presence made her uneasy. Sabrina excused herself to go put her laundry basket away upstairs. She'd be right back, she said, but by the time she came back into the room, Tony was gone. He'd just skedaddled. Couldn't even wait 30 seconds to say goodbye. I thought it was very, very strange, Sabrina said, and very rude. Not a good impression. Another time, Katie and Tony, holding hands, bumped into Katie's mom on the street. Katie stopped to greet Joy in chat for a minute, but Tony walked on a few steps, turned around and stared at them without saying a word. He didn't smile. He didn't make any attempt to engage in the conversation or introduce himself to Katie's mom. He just kind of stood there and glared.

It gave Joy a bad feeling. When she asked Katie about Tony later, so, you know, was that your boyfriend? Katie gave her the old He's my friend and he's a boy line Who boy Yeah I used that one on my parents a couple times back in the day too Katie refused to answer any more of Joy's questions about the boy

on the street and Joy dropped it I mean you know teenagers do this stuff sometimes But it wasn't all bad news Katie was getting to know some of his friends on Facebook The first one to reach out was a guy named Dan Tress He was best mates with Tony, Dan told her Has he mentioned me? No, Katie said.

Dan was charming. Katie liked him right away. And of course, she was beyond curious to learn everything she could about her new boyfriend from the people he hung around with when he wasn't with her. Dan lived in London. Super cool. And as she got to know him through Facebook instant messages, she started to suspect that Tony's best bud was into some shady stuff.

Drugs, it sounded like. As in small time selling as well as occasional recreational use. He made it sound kind of glamorous and exciting, like it was just part of the club life in London. It wasn't like he was some big scary cartel guy or anything. He was nothing but friendly to her, and he was full of funny stories about Tony. And before long, she'd befriended several more of Tony's inner circle on Facebook. Another guy, Shane, and two girls, Crystal and Cynthia, or Sin. They all seemed effortlessly cool.

Their social media posts were full of parties and fun. Sin was actually an ex of Tony's, which was kind of awkward at first, but she seemed super nice, and they were just friends now. All the friends lived in London. Tony would go visit them sometimes on the weekend, but he told her he was really trying to get away from the club scene, drinking and drugs. He just wasn't into that stuff anymore. Katie was probably glad to hear it. She'd never been into that scene herself, and she was glad to hear from Tony's friends that he really was distancing himself from that party lifestyle. he was really getting serious about life and about her.

They could all see it. She'd been so good for him. This was great. I mean, not only did Katie have this awesome new boyfriend, she was also making a whole new circle of friends online. They were all having fun bantering around in a group chat. And it must have felt good that Tony's friends were interested in getting to know her. Not that that was unusual for Katie.

Everybody wanted to be her friend. She'd always been popular. She was enjoying her new little circle of Facebook friends. Katie's mom and sister started noticing that she was always on her laptop around this time. It didn't really bother her mom. She just figured she was doing schoolwork, but she definitely noticed that the computer was eating up a huge chunk of Katie's time and energy. And Katie's friends were realizing that she was totally smitten with Tony Bushby.

I'm in love with him, she told one friend. And then, nine months into her relationship with her, Tony, Katie got a DM from Sin, Tony's friend slash X in London. So I've been trying to get Tony to agree to let me meet you, and he finally has, Sin said. So when you're free, I'm so looking forward to meeting you. Sin said she was willing to come to Borumwood, so all three of them could meet up and finally spend some time hanging out IRL. Now, who knows how Katie felt about this? I mean, sin was Tony's ex, so there might have been a touch of awkwardness about it. but Sin had never shown any jealousy or weirdness in any of their interactions online.

She almost gave off a sisterly vibe. Like, I just got to get to know my buddy Tony's new girl. So Katie, who never had a bad word to say about anybody, agreed. Sure, I'd love for all of us to meet up. It was Christmas time, so there was a lot of that anyway, meeting up with friends you hadn't seen in a while, catching up. There was one kind of weird thing, though. Sin wanted to meet up in a really out-of-the-way place, way out in the sticks, and after dark, too.

When Katie asked why, Sin said, yeah, I know it sounds weird, but trust me. It's a place Tony and I used to hang out all the time. We can chill out there as long as we want, be as loud as we want, and nobody will bother us. It'll be fun, you'll see. Well, how much of a ruckus are you planning on making that you need to go meet in a field? It's weird. Yeah, it feels like a lot of words for no one can hear you scream. Yeah. After a little bit of back and forth among the three of them, Tony, Sin, and Katie agreed to meet up on the evening of December 22nd. That evening, Katie's sister Sabrina, was all set to order food and settle in for a family movie night. That was their usual Friday night routine. But when she asked Katie what she wanted to eat, Katie said, oh, don't order anything from me. I'm going over to her friend's house tonight. Oh, okay, cool, Sabrina said, I'll drop you off. Oh, no, no, Katie said, I'm good. I'll get there on my

down. Sabrina side-eyed at her. You're lying, aren't you? She said, you're going to go see your boyfriend. As usual, Katie just laughed it off. Then she waved goodbye to her sister and headed out the door. Sabrina called me out as I was leaving, she told Tony when she met up with him a few blocks down the road. She knew I was going to see you. Katie was laughing about it, but Tony seemed oddly subdued. And then, sin didn't show up. Just stood them both. up. Once it became clear that something had obviously come up, Tony checked his voicemail and yep, found a message from Sin. She couldn't make it. Later that night, Sin messaged Katie on Facebook. I'm so sorry, she wrote. You must hate me. I just got the times mixed up. She'd miss her

train, but I still want to meet you, Sin said. Can we reschedule? Christmas Eve, maybe. Oh, I can't do Christmas Eve. Sorry, Katie said. But let's meet up after the new year. Katie being the sweetheart she was, reassured sin that she wasn't angry with her. It was okay. She was looking forward to meeting her too. A few days later, Katie spent a happy, peaceful Christmas at home with her family. They had no way of knowing it would be her last. Just a day later, Katie's mother would come home from work to find her beloved daughter lying in a pool of blood.

It took a little bit of digging for the investigators to find out about Katie's boyfriend. Her mom and sister knew she had one, but they weren't sure of his last name. Tony and Katie had really gone out of their way to keep the relationship on the hush-hush. But finally, they managed to get the last name from a friend of Katie's, and of course they wanted to talk to him as soon as possible. They quickly found his home address, but when they got there, he wasn't home. His mom answered the door, confused but willing to talk to the officers. She said Tony had gone out the night before, boxing day evening,

come back at one point to pick up his ID so he could get into the pub and then went back out again. He got home at about 10 p.m., his mom said, and man, he was in an awful mood when he got back. Just foul. Hmm. Interesting. When the detectives finally caught Tony at home, they asked him about his relationship with Katie. Tony bristled immediately. Like, what relationship? I'm not in a relationship with her. The lead investigator looked from Tony to his mom and back again.

This kid's 18 years old, he thought. Maybe he just doesn't want to talk about this in front of his mom. Tony, he said, why don't we talk about this down at the station? Tony said, sure, and once he was alone with the detectives, he admitted that, yeah, he did know Katie Briscoe. And, yeah, he'd spoken to her on Boxing Day evening. I was walking to the supermarket, he told them. Katie told me she was busy babysitting her niece and nephew all evening, so I just went to the market and then came back home. what time did you get in the detectives wanted to know about half past eight tony said half eight or eight thirty as we yanks call it that was a full hour and a half earlier than his mom said he got home that night that left a big chunk of his time unaccounted for right around the time of katie briscoe's murder and tony didn't seem to have an explanation for that the detectives also found it odd that he never asked them to explain why they'd shown up on his doorstep

what happened to Katie, how she died. Now, I know you true crime vets are pricking up your ears at that. It's a classic mistake. We've seen it a million times. Add that to the fact that the boyfriend is always going to be suspect number one, and you've got a guy who was suddenly finding himself under very careful scrutiny. His skill at martial arts put him in a good position to overpower Katie, and the fact that he was her boyfriend, whether he told his mom about her or not,

meant that she trusted him enough to let him into the house. Hi, I'm Darren Marler, host of the Weird Darkness podcast. I want to talk about the most important tool in my podcast belt. Spreaker is the all-in-one platform that makes it easy to record, host, and distribute your show everywhere, from Apple Podcasts to Spotify. But the real game changer for me. me with Spreeker's monetization. Spreaker offers dynamic ad insertion. That means you can automatically insert ads into your episodes, no editing

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So if you're ready to podcast like a pro and get paid while doing it, check out Spreaker.com. That's S-P-R-E-A-K-E-R.com. Now, if you're not from the U.K., you might not know this, but over there, the rules for arrest are a little different than they are in the States. In the UK, you can arrest someone on suspicion of murder without really a ton of evidence, and then you've got between 36 and 96 hours to hold them, question them, and continue your investigation before you have to either charge them or cut them loose.

That window is shorter if it's a less serious crime, but for murder, it's like 36 to 96 hours. On December 27th, just one day after Katie Briscoe's murder, the police arrested Tony Bushby. They booked him in, put him in a jail jumpsuit, started searching his house and its personal effects, and sat him down in an interrogation room for a chat. And Tony was up for it. He wanted to talk.

He handed them a prepared statement he'd written in his cell. He admitted that he'd lied to the investigators the day before. I was doing a favor for a friend, he said. See, he didn't know anything about Katie's murder, but he'd lied about his whereabouts because, well, He and his friend happened to be doing something else illegal at the time. Oh, well, what a quinky dink. Yeah, you know, my buddy and I were just up to some other crime-y stuff at the time,

and we didn't want to get in trouble for that, so I just lied and said I got home before nine. But that was all Tony was willing to say, right then at least. After a few more hours alone in his cell, he apparently had a change of heart and sent word to the investigators that he was ready for another round in the interrogation room. I'm ready to tell you what happened, Tony said. On Christmas Day, the day before the murder, Tony got a Facebook message from his friend, Dan Tress. Dan's a friend of Katie's too, Tony said. We all chat together on Facebook, and on Christmas Day, Dan said he needed a favor.

Sure, mate, Tony message back, whatever you need. So at about seven on Boxing Day evening, Dan showed up to pick Tony up. I lied to my mom, Tony said, told her I was going to the pub with a different friend. She doesn't like Dan. He's kind of got a reputation. In the car, Dan told Tony what the favor was he needed. I need you to pick up some stuff for me, he said. Stuff meant drugs. Tony wasn't thrilled about it, he told the detectives, but Dan had always been a good friend.

He was a solid guy and Tony didn't feel like he could say no. So he said, sure, man, I'll help you out. The pickup was scheduled for a little while later that night, so while they waited, they sat in Dan's car and talked. What did you do for Christmas? What have you been up to lately? Eventually, Dan brought up Katie Briscoe. How's Katie? Hey, you should call her up, see if she wants to go have a drink with us or something. So Tony called her, but the drink wasn't going to work out. Oh, damn, she's babysitting all night at her sister's house. Dan seemed to perk up at this, Tony told detectives. Baby sitting? Is she

alone? Yeah, Tony said, just her and the kids. He didn't really understand why Dan was so interested. And then the subject change. Dan said, let's go to the pub. And then it became all about how Tony didn't have his ID. So they had to go back to his mom's house and get it. And then they realized they didn't have time to go for the drink after all. It was time to go pick up the drugs. Dan drove him to the spot he decreed on with his supplier, a park bench in a woodsy area. okay mate wait here dan said i'll come back for you in a bit and then dan disappeared the drug guy showed up about 20 minutes later handed over the stuff and then tony sat there with the merchandise for another 20 minutes or so wondering when the hell dan was going to come back for him he was annoyed it was cold out finally dan showed back up thanked him for the favor and led him back to the car oi your hands look cold he said and handed tony a pair of gloves take these Thanks, Tony said, slipping on the gloves. But as soon as he had them on, he realized they were wet.

Irritated, he pulled them off, and when he looked down at his hands, he saw that they were covered in red. Blood. What the hell, Tony said, and threw the gloves down on the floorboard of the car. Why are your gloves soaked in blood? Dan didn't answer. He just kept driving, staring straight ahead. The atmosphere in the car was suddenly heavy and tense. They made the rest of the car trip in silence.

When Dan pulled up in front of Tony's mom's house, Tony was grateful to get the hell out of there. He ran into the house, beeline for the bathroom, and washed the blood off his hands. Now, as he told this story to detectives, he said he didn't realize what was going on at first, but when he found out about Katie's murder, well, now he realized whose blood that must have been. Where Dan must have gone when he left Tony alone on the park bench for nearly an hour. It must have been Dan, he told them. Dan has to have killed Katie. Dan had met her in person once before, Tony said,

when he'd been in Borehamwood visiting and he'd seen Katie out on the town and recognized her from her Facebook pics. As far as he knew, that was the only time Katie had ever spent with Dan in real life. Had that been enough to spark a dark obsession? Investigators needed to find this Dan tress and fast. All they knew so far was that he was 19, he lived in London, and he was involved in the drug trade.

Oh, and he had a Facebook page, obviously. Tony filled in a few more blanks, that he drove a green VW golf and he was into karate. That's how they met in the first place at the dojo. But Tony didn't know Dan's birthday or his specific address in London, so the investigators set to work trying to find him. And very quickly, they discovered something shocking. After searching voter rolls, databases, motor vehicle records, and every other resource they could think of, they could find no one in the entire United Kingdom by the name of Dan Tress.

The guy didn't exist. This realization hit the investigators like a wrecking ball, and along with it came an even bigger realization, that if Tony would lie about this, if he'd invent a fictitious friend to pin the murder on, it could only mean one thing. And with the forensic search of Tony's computer, the picture got even clearer. All the new friends Katie had made on Facebook over the past six months, Dan, Shane, Crystal, and Sin, every last one of them was fake. It had been Tony Bushby behind these profiles all along, working on Katie, telling stories to big himself up, reeling her in,

and taking up more and more of her time, so she'd spend less with her real friends and family. family. Isolation. The number one tool of an abuser. Oh my God. Imagine being losery enough that you have to literally invent fake friends to try and impress your girlfriend. Dork Master General. Yeah, that is pathetic, my man. And Tony obviously put a lot of time and energy into these fake profiles. They were elaborate enough to convince Katie they were all real people with distinct personalities and real lives. And that wasn't the only disturbing thing they found on Tony's computer.

The guy was obsessed with violent porn. He had a special interest in the racist kind. His porn searches were full of stuff like submissive black girl, forced rape on black girl, and other grosser stuff I don't want to repeat. He was really, really into serial killers too, including the fictional Dexter.

God, not. another one of these dweaves obsessed with Dexter. It's Mark Twitchell all over again. Dexter would be disgusted with you, sir. Misinteresting Dexter is such an embarrassing thing to do, too. Like, what do you mean you want to be like Dexter? His whole thing is that he only kills bad guys. You're out here killing innocent people. Get your life together. I know. Katie could not be further from the type of victim that Dexter would pick. Like, she was an angel. Like, she's the sweetest girl. And look, we're not trying to be hypocrites here, okay? It's not like we're.

can claim we're not obsessed with murder. We have a true crime podcast, for God's sakes. But where we read this stuff to try and understand, Tony Bushby was more of a fan. When he researched killers, it was more about the how than the why. In the weeks leading up to Katie's murder, he'd also been searching how to get away with murder and how to dispose of a body, how to burn a human body to ashes, how to dig a six-foot hole. And there was more disturbing evidence to come. A phone call from Tony to Katie shortly before the murder. A chance for him to make sure she was home alone with her toddler, niece, and nephew. Police figured out that when Tony had come home to his mom's place,

supposedly to pick up his ID for the pub, he'd actually been there to pick up a knife. When they retrieved CCTV footage of the area around Katie's sister's house, they found footage of Tony walking down the sidewalk with a big black garbage bag slung over his shoulder. On the morning after the murder, December 27. The murder weapon, maybe, bloody clothes? We can't be sure. They never found the back, but they did find Katie's blood on the front door handle of Tony's mom's house.

And that was the final nail in Tony's coffin. In July of 2012, he went on trial for Katie's murder. Tony pled not guilty, but the jury heard all the evidence, including the fact that as soon as he got home on the night of the murder, he'd searched how to delete your Facebook profile and how to archive old Facebook messages. The jury saw through his pleas of innocence. They convicted him of Katie's murder and the judge sentenced him to life in prison

with a minimum term of 25 years. That's about as harsh as it gets in the UK. At the sentencing, the judge said he felt sure Tony's motive was sexual, even though there was no overt sexual assault. There's plenty of evidence that some killers get their sexual jollies from stabbing rather than actual sexual contact, and Tony's prolific consumption of racist porn definitely suggests that he might be one of those.

If you have any doubts, I've got one more disgusting little detail for you. Back at home, just an hour after stabbing Katie to death, he watched more violent porn. I think he'd been planning this murder for a while, possibly from the very beginning. Why else would he tell Katie not to talk about him to her friends or family? Why keep the relationship a secret? And why put so much time into catfishing her with all these fake friends? Joy Briscoe, Katie's mom, told the court that she believed the catfishing was a game to Tony Bushby, a way to manipulate and control her.

I agree. In fact, I strongly believe he intended to kill Katie all along and all this catfish stuff was some kind of sick foreplay. Just a way to keep her on the phone. hook while he stoked his creepy fantasies and thought out different ways of killing her and getting away with it. Of course, we have no way of knowing for sure. We can't know what goes on in somebody else's brain, but it fits with other sexually motivated killers we've studied over the years. The fantasy is a huge element for them. It's not all about the actual act of killing. A lot of the pleasure comes from the fantasy. Eich. And this was definitely no crime of passion. It was a lot of

an in the moment kind of thing. This guy had the patience to plan and wait for his moment. Yeah, exactly. Like when it didn't work out the first time he tried it, when Katie told him her sister had guessed who she was going out to meet that night that they were supposed to hang out with sin, he called an audible and sent Katie home alive. This is not a killer who couldn't control himself. So I think we're all very lucky this little shit stain got caught on the first try. Yeah. If he hadn't, I think he'd have had a long career ahead of him as a killer. After Katie's murder, her sister Sabrina thought a lot about how she'd called the house several times that night, left messages on the answering machine,

which must have been audible all through the house. Did my sister hear my voice? She wondered. Did he hear it? That's just one of the things that haunts Katie's family. Katie's family have also been vocal since her murder about the prevalence of violent racist porn, which they believe was a factor in the case. The story is a story of pure light meeting pure darkness. Katie was a bright spirit, somebody who saw the good in everybody. She couldn't have conceived in her wildest nightmares that this guy she loved was harboring the kind of evil fantasies he was harboring,

planning the kind of horror he was planning for her. And for that matter, neither could anybody else in Tony's life. During his trial, his karate instructor spoke about how baffled he was by the case. He knew Tony as a dedicated student, a soft-spoken guy who was always respectful to his teachers and teammates. He couldn't imagine the young man he knew doing something like this. It's a story we've heard time and again, the skill with which evil can hide itself. It's scary. Scary, too, that Tony Bushby will have his first chance at parole when he's younger than I am.

He'll be 44 years old. Who will he be by then? If she'd lived, Katie would be 32 today. About your age, KT. Her niece and nephew are both in their teens, having grown up without their favorite auntie. Seems unfair that he might get to walk out of prison one day, still young enough to have a full life ahead of him when Katie's gone forever.

There are times when I feel like I've been asleep for two years, Katie's mom said on a true crime show in 2013, I wish someone would just wake me up and tell me I've been having a nightmare. I'd be so grateful to that person So that was a wild 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

A very special happy birthday this week to Abby with love from Jacob Very cool, it was my birthday this week too Hope you had a great one And as always, we want to send a grateful shout out to a few of our lovely patrons Thank you so much to Laura, Haley, Abby, Gail, Julie, Jesse, Christy, and Christina. We appreciate y'all to the moon and back. And if you're not yet a patron, you're missing out. Patrons of our show get every episode ad-free, at least a day early, sometimes even two, plus tons of extra content, like patrons-only episodes and hilarious

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