True Crime Campfire - Random Act: The Murder of Yancy Noll

Episode Date: April 29, 2022

John Adams once wrote that genius is sorrow’s child. A couple years ago, The Economist published an article called “The Curse of Genius” about the tumultuous lives of child prodigies. And how many times has Mensa come up on this show by now? About half a dozen, at least? Genius, it seems, is a double-edged sword. Some people are able to harness it to make spectacular leaps forward in art or science or technology. But for some, the expectations that come with that scary-high IQ can be like an anvil around their necks. Insecurity starts to fight with arrogance in those sharp-as-diamond minds, and resentment starts to brew. Combine a brilliant mind with a grudge against the world and you start to open some really dangerous doors. Join us for the story of Dinh Bowman, a guy with the potential to do anything he set his mind to, but chose to study murder instead. Sources:CBS News: https://www.cbsnews.com/news/48-hours-yancy-noll-death-dinh-bowman-student-of-murder/48 Hours Mystery: Episode "Student of Murder"The Sun: https://www.the-sun.com/news/4555033/who-yancy-noll-what-happened-to-him/Court papers: https://casetext.com/case/in-re-pers-restraint-of-bowman-1"Bunny and Snuggles" phone calls: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSLZMMK4Nd0ABC News, Bryan Robinson: https://abcnews.go.com/US/story?id=96770&page=1Follow 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] 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. John Adams once wrote that genius is sorrow's child. A couple years ago, the economist published an article called The Curse of Genius. about the tumultuous lives of child prodigies. And how many times has Mensa come up on this show by now?

About half a dozen, at least? Genius, it seems, is a double-edged sword. Some people are able to harness it to make spectacular leaps forward in art or science or technology. But for some, the expectations that come with that scary high IQ can be like an anvil around their necks. Insecurity starts to fight with arrogance in those sharp as diamond minds and resentment starts to brew.

Combine a brilliant mind with a grudge against the world and you start to open some really dangerous doors. This is Random Act, the murder of Yancey Knoll. So, campers, for this one, we are in the Emerald City, Seattle, Washington. Friday, August 31st, 2012. 42-year-old wine steward Yancey Knoll was driving home on Interstate 5 and his beat-up old Subaru. At some point, Yancey may have noticed that a BMW convertible pulled up and started driving along with him. So far, so ordinary. A couple minutes later, Yancey was off the interstate and had stopped for a red light at the intersection of 75th Street and 15th Avenue.

It was a gorgeous late summer day and this was a quiet residential part of town, full of nice houses and pretty trees. There was nothing to suggest the slightest possibility of violence. But then, Ansi noticed that same BMW convertible pulling up next to him at a red light. He glanced over at the driver of the car, and the last thing Yancey Noll ever saw was a gun pointed right at him. There was an explosion of glass, and an instant later he was dead. Witnesses described hearing a rapid series of pops, and then the BMW screamed forward, pedal to the metal, and swerved, tires screeching into on. oncoming traffic. The car sped away so fast that when it reached a hill, it went all the way airborne for a second. Now, this was a city intersection during the Friday rush, broad daylight,

so there were plenty of witnesses, and it quickly became obvious what those pops had been. Five gunshots fired in rapid succession, and fired, unfortunately, with pinpoint accuracy. Four of the shots had struck Yancey Knoll in the head. Only the fifth one missed. It went through a fence, through a window, through a lampshade, and very nearly through 88-year-old Patricia Schulmeister. It just barely missed her, instead shattering a picture of her much-loved cat, Miss BP, before finally falling to the floor. Some of the witnesses threw their cars into park and ran over to the Subaru, but it was too late to help Yancey Knoll. Blood was already spilling from the car onto the road. It only took a quick glance to see that he was gone. Police and crime scene investigators were on the scene fast, trying to make sense of this.

brazen, shocking crime. Patricia Schulmeister, who is clearly one of the most unflappable humans on the planet, walked out of her house and over to the scene, tapped a CSI politely on the shoulder, and handed him the bullet that it had the absolute audacity to mess up her picture of Miss BP.

How dare? It was a nice little bit of evidence, right out of the gate. The investigators also got some useful info from a couple of guys named Kevin and Angelo, who had just gone through the intersection when they heard the five pops behind them, and saw the BMW swerving hell-bent for leather in front of them. Now, I don't know if these two dudes like to hang out and watch reruns of Starsky and Hutch or what,

but their reaction to hearing gunshots and then seeing a car clearly fleeing from the scene was to floor it and chase after the guy, which is just, wow, you know, but not for long, unless you have serious horsepower and skills, a sports car with a head start is going to smoke you every time. And before long, the BMW was over the hills and far away. So Kevin and Angelo headed back to 15th Avenue to wait for the cops to get there. So Yancey Knoll had been murdered in cold blood while stopped at a red light, and his killer had fled the scene with no immediate clues to his identity.

What just happened here? Who was Yancey Knoll and why would somebody want to kill him? Uncovering this was, of course, one of the first steps investigators took. Knowledge of the victim's life is almost always of vital importance in solving a murder. But in this case, it quickly became obvious that the answer to the question who would want to kill Yancey Noll was no one. Yancey was great, happy, good-natured guy with a ton of friends, a fiancé, and a dog. He liked fine wine, enjoyed his job, and loved to get out and go hiking in the hills and mountains with his doggy Lola. There didn't seem to be anyone who even disliked the guy, let alone somebody with the kind of grudge that might lead to murder.

So could this have been road rage? I mean, it happens, but when they spoke to his friends, they all said, no way. His friend Brad later told 48 hours, he drove like a grandma, and was so careful and mindful with how he interacted with people. And Yancey was anything but an angry person. He was just the opposite. He was not the kind of guy to seek out trouble. All this added up to one increasingly likely conclusion, and it was a scary one.

that this killing wasn't really about Yancey Knoll himself, that it was just a random act of violence. And that was a terrifying prospect, because killers like that hardly ever just stop at one. The crime scene revealed one odd detail. There was shattered glass all over the road beside Yancey Subaru, but his window was rolled down. The only explanation was that the driver of the BMW had shot through his own, passenger side window, which is seriously weird. Why not roll it down? The experienced detectives on the case had never seen it before. But this was important. Now the investigators knew the killer's car had a smashed side window, and they knew a little more about the car too,

thanks to Starsky and Hutch. I mean, Kevin and Angelo. They hadn't chased after the Beamer for long, but they both had an eye for cars and really good memories, especially for eyewitnesses. No kidding, right? They told the police that the BMW was silver with distinctive silver rims that probably cost a mint. And they thought the model was either an M4 or a Z4. That, combined with the smashed window, is damn good info for a B on the lookout. Kevin had been concentrating on the driver. On 48 hours, he described himself as being really, really, good with faces. And it seems like he was right because he was able to help a police sketch artist produce a detailed image of the shooter as seen from the side. A young man, either white or Asian,

in a white shirt with dark sunglasses and black kind of spiky hair. Damn, that's a solid start on the investigation. And you know, you would think that you'd expect this kind of thing, committing a murder in broad flipping daylight during rush hour. But hey, you know, I guess killers can't be expected to think of everything. Certainly not. So they had a description of the car and a description of the shooter, and both of these were spread far and wide. Tips rolled in, drivers were pulled over. It seemed like Seattle was suddenly bursting at the seams with dark-haired dudes and silver beemers. Thanks to Patricia Schulmeister's recovered bullet, investigators were also able to get a head start on identifying the murder weapon, a 9-millimeter pistol, probably a Glock.

Useful information, and if they could get a specific weapon to compare it with, that bullet could be powerful evidence. The apparently random nature of the shooting had the whole city on edge. Antony Knoll had been a good, regular guy. The fear was, if this could happen to him, it could happen to anyone. Yeah, this case is everybody's worst nightmare. I think about this case sometimes when I'm out and about, and it just makes the hairs on the back of my neck stand up. Yeah, it's terrible. That's pretty much how everyone was feeling, and the investigators were desperate for a break.

Then, on September 14th, two weeks after the shooting, they got one. An anonymous phone tip from a woman who gave them a name and an address, Din Bowman, a 29-year-old man who lived about 10 blocks away from the crime scene. And when investigators pulled up a picture of Bowman from Facebook, it was a pretty close match to the police sketch artist picture. Some further digging revealed that Den Bowman had at one time owned a BMW and had a concealed weapon permit and a license for a Glock handgun. The anonymous caller also told police that Bowman had anger management problems.

Now, we're probably never going to know who this lady was because she ended up actually telling the police that she was afraid to give her name because she was afraid that he might retaliate against her. But it sounds to me like it's somebody Den Bowman ran his mouth at. And she knew his address, so I'm thinking maybe. be a neighbor. So be nice to your neighbors, folks. God, Charlene would turn me in in a heartbeat if I gave her a reason. She's probably just been waiting for her shot since the day we moved in. You say that like you don't have the FBI tip line on speed dial for her. I'm not going to lie.

I mean, I would take a shot if I had one if I could catch her at something. She moved our recycling bins, Katie. The nerve. So detectives went to talk to Den Bowman's neighbors. She said, oh yeah, Din has a silver BMW. Weird thing, though, he usually parks it in the driveway, but it hasn't been there in a while. More than that, they said they hadn't seen Den himself around much lately either. Huh, interesting. So this was enough to get investigators very close attention. They needed to find out if Bowman still had that car. So they started to surveil the house he shared with his wife, Jennifer. For about a week, no joy. And then they were able to get a peek at a silver sports car through the garage door, somebody left partially open.

And that peak, along with the anonymous tip and Den's resemblance to the police sketch, was enough to get him a search warrant. And enough for Din to get a taste of the good old habeas gravis. He and Jennifer were stopped as they left the house in a second car, and Den was handcuffed and taken to the station. So, who was this guy? Well, at first glance, definitely not the kind of dude you'd expect to end up on the business end of a murder investigation. At the time of his arrest, Den Bowman was just under 30 years old.

an engineer with his own company that specialized in robotics. He was a smart guy and always had been. He started taking college classes when he was 12 years old. He'd been homeschooled since the third grade, and his parents just couldn't keep up. His mom said, Den was crying. He couldn't wait. He couldn't stand not learning. Now, apologies to Dugie Hauser and all, but I wonder if maybe a 12-year-old college kid

might not be the best idea. School isn't just about academics, sailing those always stormy waters of adolescent society can feel like hell on earth at the time but in some ways it's still valuable you know you learn how to connect with people and if you've got your eyes open you learn to spot all the various flavors of dipshit and asshole okay i'm submitting a formal complaint about your use of the word flavor in that context yeah i knew it was gross when i wrote it i just couldn't think of anything different so i don't know i mean i just wonder if you're missing out on some important stuff if you bypass going to school with people your own age. Of course, when you're that smart, you're kind of on the outside

looking in regardless, so I don't know. Yeah, I think it's like a terrible burden, like a lose-lose. You're either bored and under-enriched, which causes behavioral problems, like if you don't skip grades, or on the other hand, you're isolated and socially underdeveloped if you do skip grades. I think it has to be a different answer for every kid. And also, just a reminder, That Whitney and I are not parents. So our advice is about as useful as rubber lips on a woodpecker. Well, speak for yourself on that. I am an excellent advice giver to anyone and everyone about child rearing.

Yeah, that hesitation really sold it. My advice is flawless. Okay, yeah, definitely don't do anything that we say. We have no idea what we're talking about. Anyway, so obviously, Den Bowman was a brilliant guy, a boy prodigy, a legit. genius. In 2007, when he was 24, he met Jennifer Palm, a successful dentist, and they hit it off big time. Hearts and Flowers, Instant Connection, joined at the hip, etc. A year later, they were married. Jennifer was the main breadwinner in the household, pulling in over 250K at her

dentistry practice, which damn must be nice, right? DIN's engineering firm, vague industries, which I just find that name hilarious. Like, what do we do? Nobody's really sure, just industries? Definitely not murder, just, just industries. Vague industries. Vague industries never really took off. But that was okay. It gave him more time to pursue his hobbies. Did that sound ominous? Yeah, I meant for it too. So at the police station, they left in by himself in an interview room for two hours. As y'all probably already know, this is a pretty common technique to use on a suspect because, you know, it gives you a lot of time to think and just kind of sit there and sweat balls wondering what kind of evidence they've got on you.

And they told him he was being recorded in the room. And when you watch the video, it really seems like he's like hyper aware of that. It seems to me like he's playing for that camera, just trying to act like he was crescent-fresh, not worried about a single ding-dang thing. He was putting his feet up on a chair, just chilling with a cup of coffee they brought in, just, you know, acting like a guy without a care in the world. Which is weird, because even if I didn't do anything, if I am put in, interrogation room, I'm sweating regardless.

For sure. Like, it's such a weird response of like, oh, I have nothing to worry about. If you're in an interrogation room, you have shit to worry about. I'd be shit in a brick. Like, innocent, guilty, whatever. Like, I'm one of those people that I'm just perpetually, I feel like people think I'm doing something wrong all the time, even though I'm such a Girl Scout and I never actually do.

Like, I'm the kind of person that if they undercharge me at the damn grocery store and I notice it on the walk to the car, I'll go back in and be like, you didn't charge me. me for this eyeliner. Yes. Like, that's what kind of a dip shit I am. Okay? So when I walk through a store, I'm always thinking, do they think I'm going to shoplift something? Oh, God.

So if I were sitting in an interrogation room, for sure, I'd be sweating bullets. But Dinn was just, he was just crescent fresh, just chilling. But I did note, like, and you can watch some of this interrogation online, that he kept, when they came in to question him, like, bitching about how long they'd kept him waiting. Like, he was a customer in a restaurant or something. And I don't know if that was part of the act, too, to try to just seem like, oh, this is just all so annoying and it's just interrupting my day, or if he was just genuinely, you know, that, like entitled that he was annoyed. Anyway, so when the detectives finally came in to interview him, they asked if he wanted to talk to an attorney, and he immediately said that he did, like we said, smart guy. Yes, is always the right answer to that question, although I'm sure some of y'all are going to argue with me on that.

I had a long debate online once I'm with a detective about that, but it's like, dude, like, I get where you're coming from because you want me to talk to you for obvious reasons, but I'm saying, I want an attorney. So then the detectives told him he was being charged with murder, and Den's answer was interesting. He said, of what, of who? Strange little slip, right? Yeah. And I have a family friend that's a detective, and he told me one time, he's like, nothing you used to. say is going to help you. Exactly. It's nothing you say is going to help you. It will only hurt you. So, Whitney's right. Get a lawyer. Don't argue with her. Now, there were good reasons. The

investigators felt confident that this was their guy. In Din Bowman's garage, they'd found a silver BMW Z4 convertible. And right away, they checked the passenger side window. You know how in the corner of a car's side windows, there's a little square of information, like, usually with the manufacturer and some code numbers telling you what kind of glass it is. Right. Well, if you have to get that window replaced, the new one is not likely to match the original. And that was the case with Den Bowman's car. He'd clearly replaced that window. And when investigators opened the door, they found glass shards in the door jam, like still in there. Din had replaced this window recently.

And there was more. The garage reeked of paint. And it only took a moment for the detectives to figure out why. The BMW's distinctive silver rims had been spray painted black. The Bowman's house was kind of weird. Jennifer, remember, was making a quarter of a million dollars a year, but their home was startlingly bare. They were living like a couple of college kids in their first apartment, like no

bed, just a mattress on the floor. God, remember those days? The TV was sitting on the floor, too. I mean, it's fine. Whatever. Just not what you'd probably expect from people making that kind of scratch.

One part of the house had a more personal touch, though. The kitchen was plastered with post-it notes. Mostly from Jennifer to din. Stuff like, I hope these notes remind you that you're loved. You're the bestest bunny in the world.

Oh, God. Oh, here we go. Also, those Flemish giants are the best bunnies in the world, so jot that down, Jennifer. If you're curious about this bestest bunny stuff, do not worry. We are going to have more on that in a little while. Oh, God. God, help us all, will we ever? One of these notes, though, was nothing short of creepy under the circumstances.

It said, Happy birthday to the best shooter in the Wild West. Bang, bang, love, love. Yeah. And as they made their way through the house, the investigators found more intriguing stuff. The Bowmans had a small arsenal of weapons, and they found evidence that Dinn was making his own ammunition.

But much their frustration, they didn't find the main thing they were looking for, the 9mm Glock they believed to be the murder weapon. Unbeknownst to din while he was sipping his latte in the interview room down the hall, detectives Frank Clark and Dana Duffy were questioning his wife, Jennifer. Later on 48 hours, they'd refer to this as the, I'm not sure, interview. Apparently, Jennifer Bowman knew fuck-all about what was going on in her own life and marriage, because her answer to pretty much every question was, I'm not sure. Have you heard of any murders close to your home in the last few weeks?

I'm not sure. What about the smell of paint in the garage? Where's that from? I'm not sure. Oh, my God. And so on. Jennifer did make a small show of cooperation. She didn't ask for a lawyer, and she consented to a search of a purse.

But if she was trying to convince the detectives that she had no idea what was going on with her bestest bunny din, she was doing a piss poor job. Given the severity of the crime Den was charged with and the fact that the Bowman's had plenty of money on hand, Den's bail was set at $10 million, which meant he was staying right where he was. So the only way he and Jennifer could stay in regular touch was via jailhouse phone calls. Now, these, of course, are always recorded, which campers is how we found out about bunny and snuggles. These were the nicknames the Bowman's had for each other. Den was Bunny and Jennifer was Snuggles.

And when they talked, and there were hundreds of calls recorded, they liked to baby talk. Now, y'all, you may think you know what I mean when I say baby talk, but let me assure you, I am not fucking around here, okay? This ain't just the odd, hey, schmopey. This is like baby Elmer Fudd after a hit of MDMA baby talk. Like, somebody's been sucking on a helium balloon and, like, is also drunk. It really has to be heard to be believed. So here, for your enlightenment and education, we would like to offer a dramatic reconstruction featuring snippets of actual dialogue between these two.

And I'm telling you right now, it's going to sound ridiculous and it's going to seem like we're exaggerating. I dare you to go watch the real thing because we're low ball in it. We call it Bunny and Snuggles, a love to make you vomit. Bunny, Bunny, how are you? I'm doing good. How's my little snuggle, Kate? I just wrote you an email. Yay!

I miss so many things right now. I know. I don't have a snuggles. You don't have a snuggle plum next to you. Oh, little snuggles, I'm a bunny. You're my snuggsy, hop, hop, love, love. You're my snuggster, I'm your bunny. Hop and we cuddle, yeah.

I love you, my little sweetheart bunny buns. Oh, that's my little cupcake. You make me think of cupcakes. Little pumpkin, pumpkin pie, sugar little muffin cake, sugar little muffin cake pumpkin pie. What's wrong, bunny? They're continuing with the trial. What the fuck is that about? That kills me every time.

So snuggles, I'm sorry, Jennifer, would drop out of character in like a hot second when shit got real. And although the sugar and sprinkles were flying in both directions, it does seem a little bit like bunny slash din was the more committed one to the bit, which raises a couple of as yet unanswered questions. Like, at what point during your dating life do you bring up the baby talk? Like, do you wait till you're married, you know, once you've got them locked down and then springing on them during the? honeymoon, I'm your bunny, hop and we cuddle, yeah. Like, was there a bunny costume anywhere in that house? Did they talk like this when they were doing it? I feel like we need to know.

Or maybe we really, really do not. Actually, you know what? I feel like the baby talk people probably just find each other somehow, kind of like how psychopaths tend to recognize other psychopaths. So, anyway, taking a fast train. from friggin' candy land back down to planet Earth, thank God. And y'all, you don't know how much Katie hated that. Like, it hurts.

She's probably physically sick right now. Yeah, I don't feel great. I was like, you know we got to act it out. She was like, please, no, please, please. The campers would never forgive us if we didn't. So investigators continued building their case against Dinn. His computer, as is so often the case, even with the allegedly smart killers, was a gold mine evidence, a treasure trove of books, articles, and videos about violence and murder that revealed

a years-long obsession. Now, I realize y'all are probably thinking, excuse me, you have a true crime podcast like pot, meat kettle, but we're not talking about a complete collection of Anne Rule and lots of cold case files clips. This was a vast collection of how-to guides, video tutorials, and ways to avoid getting caught. The vibe of Dens' obsession was more plotting and scheming than interested in what makes a killer tick. Seemed like he had that little detail down just fine. His focus wasn't on why people murder, his focus was on how. A few videos in particular caught the lead detective's eye.

In one, a firearms expert sitting in a car introduces his video like this. Today we're going to talk about shooting through glass. I've come into a situation where I feel threatened by someone off to my passenger side, and then he demonstrates how to quickly draw your pistol. and aim from the driver's seat and shoot several times through the passenger side window at a dummy beside the car.

Which, I'm sure you're thinking, was chillingly similar to how Yancey Knoll was killed. Another video showed Den driving a sports car at terrifyingly high speed around a track. Another showed helmet cam footage

of Den at a firing range, moving through a course and shooting really quickly and ambidextrously at the targets. And that was a weird one. It really looks like the footage from like a first-person shooter video game, like some kind of lethal robot just moving and shooting.

Dinn was creepily good at both the driving and the shooting. Fast cars and gunplay. It probably won't surprise you to learn that Dinn was obsessed with James Bond. 007 seemed to take up a lot of his headspace. And he spent a lot of time practicing the skills he thought would turn him into a killing machine. Investigators were starting to think that Dyn's obsession with spy-themed violence might have been the reason behind Yancey Knoll's murder. He'd spent years honing his skills, researching how to kill and get away with it,

and it kind of makes sense that for a certain kind of person, just practicing wouldn't always be enough, that he might be desperate to try the real thing, just waiting for an opportunity to fall into his lap so he could see what it felt like to kill. The brazen nature of the shooting, in front of witnesses, followed by a high-speed escape, only made this theory more likely to the detectives. It was exciting. It was like a movie. The kind of murder the experts call a thrill kill.

Thrill killings are pretty much exactly what they sound like. Murders where the motive is pretty much just for funsies, as sick as that is. In an ABC News article from 2006, Jack Levin of Northeastern University's Brutnik Center on Conflict and Violence says that thrill killers tend to be driven by the need for power and control, and that need originates with a deep feeling of powerlessness. Yeah, and the interesting thing about that is you don't have to be a disempowered person to feel this way. Levin says, a person can appear outwardly successful to others, but for some reason he may feel like a failure. Maybe they feel like they fall in short of their goal, they don't feel like they're in control, and they erupt in a way that's some kind of sadistic thrill. The frightening thing is, some of them never talk about it.

They never let you know what's coming. So here we've got a guy who grew up a child prodigy, homeschooled until he's 12, and then thrown into college with people almost a decade older than he is. I wasn't a prodigy by any means, but I was a smart kid, you know, gifted TM. And even I can tell you, that's a lot of pressure. pressure. When gifted kids hit adulthood and they're no longer adorable little novelties, the pressure's on at that point to do something spectacular and knock everybody's socks off. And it can get to be a lot. And also, we've got his wife as the breadwinner, which, I mean, that's

how it is in my marriage. We love it that way, but some guys can get a complex about it. So I don't know. It just makes me wonder what was going on in Den Bowman's head. Yeah. And there aren't always clear warning signs because a guy like Den can be really good at manipulating people. in hiding behind a mask. If anybody could have seen this coming, though, it would have been Jennifer. Did she know her hubby was planning to take the first chance he got to kill somebody? Or did she just find out after the fact? We don't know what Din told Jennifer about the shooting, but we do know that the very next day,

the two of them drove down to Portland to get the BMW's shattered window replace. Now, if Din was guilty, it makes good sense to go to another sense. to get the work done. The shooting was big news in Seattle, and there was a decent chance a local repairman would know the police were looking for a silver BMW with a broken window. Definitely.

Bunny and Snuggle's story was that they had just gone to Portland on a fun little day trip. And the Beamer Side window had been broken by a thief while they were having lunch. But a restaurant receipt recovered from Jennifer's purse had them eating just after 7 p.m. not lunchtime. Clearly, this window-smashing thief never really existed. And a few weeks later, the Bowman's had gone to a Seattle tire store.

Dinn gave his name to the employees there as Peter, no doubt for some genius spycraft-related reason, and Jennifer just stood there looking miserable and staring at the ground. Sounds like somebody was starting to feel the walls closing in. Yeah. Their visit stuck in the minds of the tire store employees because Dinn had made them replace his expense. expensive, high-grade, good-as-new BNW tires with cheaper ones, which made no sense to them at all.

It makes no sense, that is, unless you've just done a murder and then seen a news report about tire tracks left at the scene. When Detective Clark asked Jennifer why Dinn had gotten new tires, she said, of course, I'm not sure. But come on, I think she knew exactly what was going on here. din had also turned off his cell phone and bought a burner right after the shooting and they paid for both the window replacement and the new tires with cash no paper trail jennifer was a smart girl she could read between the lines as good as anybody her bunny was pulling some tray shady shit right under her nose investigators later found the original BMW tires in din's engineering workshop

They would never find the murder weapon, but they did find the slide for a Glock hidden in a storage container at the house. Prosecutors thought the case was solid enough to move forward. Din, Bunny Bowman, was going on trial for first-degree murder. By the time the trial started, Dinn had undergone the traditional defendant makeover. The spiky hair and smug smile were gone, replaced with a preppy blue sweater and a white shirt combo. He looked 30 going on 13, like a kid going to chess club practice with nothing more nefarious on his mind than hoping for an accidental glimpse of bra strap. Remember those days? Good times. The prosecution's theory was that Den had become obsessed with the idea of killing, that after years of, I guess you'd call it, study, he'd gotten to a point where fantasy wasn't enough anymore.

He had to find out what it felt like to kill for real and prove to himself he could do it and get away with it, which good job, man. broad daylight, rush hour traffic, and you didn't bother to roll your window down first. Well played. Professor Moriarty couldn't have done it any better. I don't know whether Din was a member of Mensa, by the way, but I know he was smart enough to be, on paper, at least. So I think we can chalk this one up as yet another example of a genius TM who, you know, wasn't. Anywho. So the prosecution used the evidence from Dyn's computer to build their motive for Yancey Knoll's killing, his giant library of videos and books and articles on murder. It would be hard to argue that the guy wasn't obsessed. This stuff was

clearly living rent-free in his head. Den's defense attorney, interestingly enough, was John Henry Brown, who once upon a time had defended Ted Bundy, something he'd probably hope nobody in Den's jury was aware of. Being the guy who defends monsters might not do your clients any favors. Although now that I think on it, I don't know. Brown wrote a book about defending Bundy, so it's not like he's exactly shy about it in that book y'all have you read it kate it's yeah it's it's interesting because how could it not be but you know brown clearly thinks of himself as some kind of like bohemian freedom fighter which just cracks me up coming from a guy as like rich as he is first of all it's like calm down bro like i get that you're a necessary part of our system and god bless you for it but you're not

nelson flippin mandela just settle down yeah i mean i think every every lawyer that defended one of our, like, I hate saying it like this. Classic serial killers wrote a book like that. And I get it, guys. It's tough. It does, like, people are always like, how could you defend monsters like that? Blah, blah, blah, blah. We need defense lawyers.

But you don't need to write a book talking about how you're basically, you know, Abraham Lincoln. All right, I get it. And also, he just enjoyed it way too much. Yeah, he was really into it. I hate him. His vibe is not, I'm a key part of it. integral cog in the system and I'm doing my job because we need to have an adversarial system.

His vibe is like, wee! Like, I really think he's really proud of himself about it. So anyway, Brown claimed that Dinn, the one-time boy genius, was just collecting a sort of universal library on his computer, just gathering information on all kinds of different topics, which just coincidentally happened to include a whole lot of stuff about killing. Hmm. He argued, just because these materials were on his computer didn't mean that he'd read them or watched them, right? So, sure, he'd managed to perfectly recreate that video on shooting through a passenger window, but I mean, that doesn't mean he saw it. I mean, come on, right? That's ridiculous. So as you can see, the defense was on pretty shaky ground here, and sometimes campers, when the

defense is on the ropes, that's when they decide to take a gamble. Bunny Hop Hop was taking the stand. Lord have mercy. Oh, boy, here we go. Yeah. So, Dyn's story was that he killed Yancey Nol in self-defense, that they'd gotten into an altercation when Dinn cut Yancy off on the interstate, that Yancey had followed him to the traffic lights, and when they both came to a stop, started yelling at him. He said, as their argument escalated,

Yancey suddenly picked up a bottle of wine and threw it, hidden Dinn in the head. Now, Dyn was driving a convertible, remember. So the story was that Yancey had just kind of winged that wine bottle over the top and into the cab of the car. And that, Den said, was when, afraid for his life, he pulled out his 9mm and shot Yancey Knoll. John Henry Brown walked his client through his version of events on the stand. That Dyn was scared, he thought Yancey might have a gun, that yes, he'd intentionally shot the guy, but no, he hadn't meant to kill him.

Dyn says that after that wine bottle hit him in the head, he just opened his eyes and kind of saw the gun in his hand. And in a panic, he stepped on the gas and fled, and a little while later threw away all the evidence in his car. including the gun and the wine bottle Yancey had thrown at him. Now, y'all are probably seeing the same holes in this story that the prosecution did, because you know they're big enough to drive a truck through. And they wanted to make sure the jury saw them too. You threw away the wine bottle? So the one piece of evidence that might support your story?

Yeah? Well, whoopsie doodle, right? So you shot in a panic, at least partially with your eyes closed, didn't mean to kill Yancey No, but managed to hit him four times in the head out of the five shots you fired? Huh, what are the odds of that? And in your supposedly panicked getaway, you drove skillfully at high speed, even managing to evade pursuit? Seems a tad unlikely, sir. And, of course, there was the fact that Dinn, who claimed to be a victim, not only never went to the police about the incident, but went to great lengths to avoid getting caught. And forensic

investigation showed that both Yancey's hands were on his steering wheel when he was shot. So how exactly was he posing any imminent danger? Unsurprisingly, the jury didn't buy Din Bowman's defense and found him guilty. Now, y'all are going to love this. The other really notable thing from the trial was that Jennifer, Din's little snuggle plum cupcake, was conspicuously absent. She and Dinn kept in contact by phone, and Dinn claimed he'd asked her to stay away to protect her from, quote, prying interests. But to me, this sounds a lot like a lady looking for an exit ramp. The snuggster wanted out.

And a few weeks after, Dyn was convicted, Jennifer filed for divorce. No, not bunny and snuggles. I thought their love was spotless and eternal. All right. That's it. Love is dead. Yeah, it's a, it's a shame. By the way, we Googled Jennifer Bowman's dental practice just out of curiosity. And one of the reviews, one of the reviews said, I shit you not.

Dr. Bowman's baby talk really put me at ease. Okay, so like, was this a joke? Like, was this a reference to the murders? or was this woman pulling out the bunny hop-hop snuggle biscuit stuff with her patience? Like, can you imagine? Oh, my God. Like, I would beg for the nitrous just to stand the second-hand embarrassment. Ugh.

Okay, now. Now we're going to dwell into the widow cavity wavity. No, God, it's so awful. If you take a look at your x-way. Oh, it's terrible. It's so good. Oh, my God. Okay. Din Bowman was sentenced to 29 years in prison for Yancey's completely senseless

murder, and the sentencing was both heartbreaking and infuriating. Dyn's mom was just a broken woman, just sobbing and begging the judge to let her take Dyn's punishment herself. Oh, man. It was hard to watch, and it's a good reminder of just how wide the damage done by a murderer spreads. It's not just the victim. It's their family, their friends, their co-workers. And then on top of that, the killer's family and friends.

Usually they had nothing to do with the crime, but they still suffer a lot in the aftermath. Absolutely. As for the infuriating part, well, that was Dinn himself. Surprise, surprise. When the judge gave him the chance to make a statement, all he said was, I'm disappointed the jury didn't believe me.

Ugh. No regret. No remorse. No words of comfort for his mother. It was all about Dinn. Mr. Double Dope, seven, himself. Yancey's fiancé Jody, plus a ton of his friends and family, didn't hear that. Not that they missed much. As soon as Dinn opened his mouth, they looked down and put their fingers in their ears. Fair enough, if you ask me, what possible value could this little chodes half, statement have for them. Even if he'd apologized with all his charred little heart, it wouldn't bring Yancey back. That's right.

Much to the frustration of the detectives in the case, the state's attorney never brought any charges against Jennifer Bowman, despite it being pretty damn clear that she helped in cover up the crime. She's changed her name and cut all ties with her one time, Bunny Bunny. And you know, honestly, we're kind of grateful for the Bunny and Snuggles part of this case for bringing just the tiniest little shred of light into a pretty damn scary. story. Yancey Knoll was a good guy, a friendly, loving person who made life better for the people around him. He did not deserve this. Who knows what he was thinking about in the car that day, maybe looking

forward to dinner with his fiancé or going for a walk with his dog? At Den Bowman's arraignment, 45 of Yancey's friends packed into the courtroom to get a look at this little creep. That's how many people he connected with. And then, he just cross paths with the wrong dude, and boom, he was dead. and he could have been any of us out for a drive on a sunny afternoon he could have been me or he could have been you so that was a wild one right campers you know we'll have another one for you next week

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