True Crime with Kendall Rae - Crypto Bro Kills for Cash!? The Case of Colleen Rebelo

Episode Date: June 19, 2025

In May of 2020, 58-year-old Colleen Rebelo was found dead in her home in the shower. At first, her death was not looked at suspiciously, but that changed when her 28-year-old son Andre tried cashing in on a $1 million life insurance policy on her. Andre and his girlfriend Grace, a local Australian model and influencer, were over $100k in debt, as the two tried to finance the lavish lifestyle they portrayed online with overdrawn credit cards and personal loans. — This episode is sponsored by: Factor Rocket Money Check out my foundation: Higher Hope Foundation: https://www.higherhope.org/ Watch my documentaries: 530 Days: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjUWkmOjNLk Apartment 801: https://bit.ly/2RJ9XXr  True Crime with Kendall Rae podcast: Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3rks84o Spotify: https://spoti.fi/3jC66pr Shop my Merch! https://kendallrae.shop Check out my other podcasts: Mile Higher (True Crime) @milehigherpod YouTube: https://bit.ly/2ROzJcw Instagram: http://instagram.com/milehigherpod The Sesh (Current events, a little true crime, pop culture, and commentary) https://bit.ly/3Mtoz4X @the_seshpodcast Instagram: https://bit.ly/3a9t6Xr *Follow My Social!* @KendallRaeOnyt Instagram: http://instagram.com/kendallraeonyt Facebook: https://bit.ly/3kar4NK True Crime TikTok: https://bit.ly/3VDbc77 Personal TikTok: https://bit.ly/41hmRKg REQUESTS: General case suggestion form: https://zfrmz.com/yg9cuiWjUe2QY3hSC2V0 Form for people directly related/close to the victim: https://zfrmz.com/HGu2hZso42aHxARt1i67 Join my discord to chat with other viewers about this video, it’s free! https://discord.com/invite/an4stY9BCN C O N T A C T: For Business Inquiries - [e-mail] Send me mail: Kendall Rae 8547 E Arapahoe Rd Ste J #233 Greenwood Village, CO 80112

Hello everyone and welcome back to another episode of True Crime with Kendall Rae. Thank you so much as always for joining me and if you're new to the show then welcome. I'm so happy to have you here. So today I'm going to be telling you guys about a maddening case, just absolutely ridiculous, makes zero sense. I'm going to be talking about the murder of Colleen Ribello, and what's so frustrating about this case, I mean, there are many, many reasons why it's frustrating. It was ridiculous, so unnecessary, makes zero sense, the killer is an idiot.

But what's really so frustrating about this is Colleen did absolutely nothing to deserve this. She was a wonderful person from everything I've heard about her, an incredible mother who only wanted to do right by her children. And I think one thing you guys are gonna take away from this case the way that I have and it's you know something that most of us know at this point, but often times the way that people portray themselves online is very misleading, very inaccurate to what is actually going on. It's not always how it seems, not always as perfect as it seems, especially when it comes to the classic influencer who's trying to display this perfect life. I think this is something that most people know by now that a lot of what we see from

influencers or people who are yeah trying to sell this vision of the perfect life and it's very aesthetic and Seems like they have it all. I think people have realized that most of the time that is fake It's a highlight real net. You're only really seeing The best I mean no one's going to post their troubling times. Well, some people do and credit to them for real. The ones that are shifting more into showing the reality of their lives, if you're gonna share. I mean, that's definitely the way to do it in my opinion. And normally I start out by telling you more about the victim and I will get into that here shortly,

but I wanted to start today by telling you a bit more about one of her sons, Andre. You're going to be hearing a lot about Andre in this episode and I think it's important that you get a little context on him and his situation before I tell you more about Colleen and what happened to her. So Andre Rubella was one of Colleen's two middle children and Homeboy was a self-proclaimed crypto bro, which I think probably tells you a lot about him right off the bat. He portrayed himself to be a decently successful

cryptocurrency trader and he made it appear that he had this insanely luxurious life. And of course one of the ways that he portrayed this is through social media, but not necessarily his own. It was actually through his girlfriend, Gracie Piscopo's account that the world got to see their so-called wealth. Now a little bit more on Gracie. She was and still is an Australian Australian based influencer with over a million followers

on Instagram and just over 300,000 subscribers on YouTube. And by 2020, she and Andre had been together for about eight years and they lived in a big family home just a few miles away from Colleen with their two year old son. And between the luxury trips and the designer clothing, the house, which was like all white and perfect looking, this giant fireplace and you know all the things, plus their Range Rover. I mean anyone who looked at their content back then would assume that they really did have it all, which is exactly what they wanted people to think. And in fairness to Gracie, this is kind of the classic model for influencers.

I mean it's how a lot of influencers are successful that they share this lifestyle that a lot of people couldn't imagine even having and aspire to have. And it's just kind of like eye candy to see it all. And I think that's how people like that rack up so many followers is it's like people living vicariously through them are just curious about what it would be like to live that way. And if you were someone who followed Gracie, and maybe some of you out there are, maybe you believed that she and Andre really had it all. The whole influencer, cryptocurrency, power couple vibe was strong.

And they also were doing family vlogging, including their kids and their content, or their son, actually, they only had one child. And I have a lot of thoughts on that. If you've ever watched my other podcast, The Sesh, that's where I talk a lot more about that. I am highly, highly against people putting their kids, especially in video, when it's monetized.

I think there's a giant problem with that. That's totally a conversation for another day. I'm sure a lot of you agree with me. So, you know, I have my issues with them for doing that on its own, but that's really irrelevant to what we're talking about today because it gets so much worse than that. You guys, summer is here, more sun, more light, more time to do all the things that make summer

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off plus free shipping. Once again, factor meals dot com slash TCKR50OFF. And eventually Andre really became Gracie's like business manager, you could say. So they were really giving off this dynamic duo power couple energy. But in the height of what happened to Colleen, I do believe the internet and influencing was a lot less transparent. But keeping up with their appearance was certainly important to Andre. I mean he went to extremes to keep it up. So with all that in mind now that you have a bit more backstory on those two,

and we will be talking more about all of that later on as well, let's talk about his mom, Colleen, and I think you'll be equally upset and pissed off as I am about how all of this played out, and honestly just shocked how the killer did this, is just next level stupidity Honestly just shocked how the killer did this is just next level stupidity makes absolutely no sense. I have no idea what he was thinking. It is just insane.

So let's go back in time to 2020. Imagine what it was like, right? The pandemic was kicking off, crazy times. And at the time, Colleen Rubello was a 58 year old single mother of four living in Perth, Australia. And her other three kids are named Julian, Monique, and Fabian. And by 2020, all of them were adults. However, Monique and Fabian were still living at home at this time,

which is a small but somewhat important detail. Now as for Monique, she had moved in temporarily while she was training to become a paramedic. And Fabian was 19, so I'm guessing he hadn't quite moved out yet. And from what I was able to learn, Colleen was really the type of mom who would do anything for her kids and really wanted to make sure

that they lived the best lives possible and would do everything in her power to make sure that they had everything that they needed in life. And I'm not too sure about her ex-husband's role in the kids' lives. There wasn't much information out there about that, but I do know that the divorce was pretty bitter. I also know that they had been divorced for quite some time and that she really seemed

to be doing most of the parenting by herself. But once her kids were mostly grown up and much more self-sufficient, pretty much all of them had left the nest, she was able to really start prioritizing herself again. And by 2019, she was enrolled in a master's program for health administration at Murdoch University, which I think is so cool when people go back to school later in life, especially to get a master's degree. I mean, it's definitely not easy after years of being out of school. It's a super, super challenging thing to take on.

So lots of respect to her for that. And she even started a new job at the health department in May of 2020, which she was super excited about. But sadly, Colleen never got the chance to live this new life, to start this next chapter for herself, because on May 25th, it was all brutally taken away from her for absolutely no reason. And that day started out super, super normal. At 10am, Colleen drove her son Fabian to work at their local supermarket, and she was planning

on picking him up when his shift ended at 2. But when 2 o'clock rolled around she was nowhere to be seen and that was very very unlike Colleen. She as far as I have heard really always showed up for her kids and that was very out of the norm for her. So Fabian starts texting her, calling her, hoping that there was probably just some type of miscommunication about when his shift was over. But he never ended up getting in touch with her, never heard from her, so he decided to

just walk home instead. And of course, at the time, he thought that was a little strange, unlike her, but he wasn't freaked out yet. However, the panic really started to set in once he got home. Because when he got there, he could hear that the shower was running, but there was no reply when he called out his mom's name. He even went as far as knocking on the bathroom door in case maybe she couldn't hear him

over the sound of the water. But he was met with total silence, so he made the decision to open the door himself. And that's when he found his mother slumped down, unresponsive in the shower. which I feel so bad that he had to be the one to See her like that to walk into a scene like that completely shocked not understanding at all what had happened And of course he immediately calls triple zero Which if you didn't know is the equivalent to 911 in Australia, and he also attempted to do CPR

But despite everyone's best efforts it was too late to save Colleen. She was gone. Now, to call this discovery shocking just honestly doesn't do it justice because Colleen, she did have a few health-related concerns, but by no means was she experiencing anything that serious or fatal. She had osteopenia, which is just low bone density, as well as Hajimoto's disease, which is a thyroid condition. I have it myself.

It's very common and very manageable. So neither of those things would have killed her. Generally speaking, she was actually very healthy for her age. She really took care of herself, did a lot of exercise, and for her to have just suddenly collapsed in the shower, it was shocking and just made no sense to anyone. And for the first couple of weeks, there weren't really any answers. Everyone was just totally confused. And the coroner wasn't able to pinpoint an exact cause of death, so they ultimately

ruled that she died of natural causes. But let me tell you, and I'm sure you have already guessed by now, there was nothing natural about Colleen's death. And it's actually thanks to an insurance company that any of this was figured out. And it turns out that in the weeks following their mother's death, Andre was acting, I'll call it suspicious. And for context, Julian, the oldest sibling, was the only one who didn't live in Perth.

So he had to fly in after their mother's death, and he did plan to stick around for a few weeks to sort of sort out Colleen's affairs and kind of get everything a little bit more organized and stable for the family. And he was the executor of her estate, so he was in charge of taking care of everything that they needed to. However, it looked like Andre was starting to take on roles that weren't his. Not only that, but he was doing it all in secret.

For example, Julian needed his mother's driver's license for something, but when he went to look for it, it was weirdly missing. Well, come to find out, Andre had taken it, and he told Julian that he had already taken care of whatever he was planning to do. And just being totally honest there, from what I understand, being helpful, helping at all,

was pretty like out of character for Andre. Plus it wasn't even his responsibility, it was Julian's. So the whole thing started to rub Julian the wrong way. And I think it would rub anyone the wrong way in that situation, right? And this is wild and incredibly stupid, but Andre also started having his mother's mail forwarded to his house, even though both his brother and sister

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Once again, rocketmoney.com slash kendelray. It turns out that this wealthy, I-have-it-all lifestyle that was being portrayed on social media wasn't what it appeared to be. Because Andre wasn't a successful cryptocurrency bro. Gracie was actually the real breadwinner of the family. Which to be clear is totally fine, in fact I think it's great. But it's more so the fact that Andre wasn't who he was portraying himself to be. Now, I'm not entirely sure how aware Gracie was of their financial situation, but they

certainly weren't raking in the dough the way that you might assume if you were to look at their social media, look at their YouTube, look at all their photos. It definitely seemed like things were going well for them, but that was far from the truth. She was pulling in like a few thousand dollars per Instagram post, which is pretty crazy. And she actually had one brand deal that paid her upwards of 80,000, which blew my mind. That is just insane money. But the amount that they were bringing in was actually less than they were spending,

which tends to be a big problem, right? When you're living beyond your means, especially when it's to keep up this perfect life, this appearance online and keep selling that to others. Now I have read that the highest amount of money that Andre had made in crypto was $22. Yeah, that's right. Which no shame in that.

I mean, if you're getting into something, it starts small, of course, and I don't know anything about crypto. But given what they were trying to portray, I do find that to be humorous. But he was telling Gracie that they were about to come into a significant amount of money, but the reality was they were in

debt. $112,000 to be exact. Some of it was his and some of it was hers, so it's possible that she knew a little bit, but as far as what Andre was doing to get them out of debt, Gracie truly had no idea. All we do know for certain though is that their bills were just not being paid and debt collectors were starting to metaphorically knock on their door. Which you really would have never known if you had just seen their pictures, their social media and their videos. It really did look like they had at all, but the truth is they had no assets in their names and the walls were really starting to close in.

And at least for Andre, the pressure was really starting to mount. And so what did he do? He took out three life insurance policies in his mother's name, totaling more than $1 million and then killed her to access that money. Which there's so much to unpack there, right?

I have so many thoughts. First of all, that killing your mother seems like the best solution to you, other than just maybe getting into a different field, working hard, trying to work your way out of the debt and maintain your lifestyle. It seems like there's many other better options than killing your loving mother

who had always been good to you your whole life. And then I also think about as a mom, it's hard to even wrap your mind around the idea of birthing a child Raising them and then they are the one in the end to take your life Now it's hard to say exactly when his big idea here his big plan his plot truly started But like I said, it was an insurance company that figured it out because when Andre started to inquire about that money, things weren't really adding up. So one of the insurance agencies who he had a $500,000 policy under decided to notify the police.

And when they started looking into things, it became pretty clear that Colleen had nothing to do with it. It turns out Andre had purchased all three policies less than a week before his mom died and he was listed as the sole beneficiary. Now why he thought that this would work? I mean truly, what a fucking idiot to take out these policies a week before he murders

her and I know I haven't even explained what he did and I will get there, but I just was blown away that he really thought he wouldn't get caught taking out those policies just a week out. It's insane. And it wasn't like he just got policies for everyone in his life. It was just for his mother. They also learned that he created a fake email, forged copies of her death certificate, her last will and testament, as well as forged

the coroner's report. And of course, he also made it so he was the sole beneficiary of everything in her estate, leaving absolutely nothing to his brothers and sisters. And the way that Andre did this was very cold and also incredibly calculated. Apparently he even used this like online AI software so that he could pose as his mom's psychologist. Yes, you heard me right there. He posed as his mom's psychologist. Of course, when he reached out to the insurance company, they obviously wanted to see her medical records, including her mental health history, just to make sure there wasn't any concern for her unaliving herself.

And he did try to get this woman to give him his mom's medical records, but of course, she refused. So he not only used that fake email and sent a forged medical report, but he also used a fake voice generator and left a voicemail for the insurance company pretending to be the psychologist. And this dude literally googled fake voice generator and best online deep fake voice. And the insurance company of course also asked for a copy of the death certificate to confirm her cause of death.

But when Andre was told that that could take up to nine months, he created his own and wrote down that she had died of a brain aneurysm. He literally just made that up and thought this was going to work, and then this dumbass literally forged the signature of the coroner. Now just take a look at Andre, right? He's a good looking guy conventionally, but as you can see, there's not a whole lot of thought going on behind those eyes. And by the way, it's believed that he called the

coroner's office multiple times pretending to be his brother because he was listed as Colleen's next of kin, which I imagine he did that so that he could receive updates on her autopsy. I mean that's the only thing that makes sense. And I'm not a hundred percent sure how this happened. I'm guessing it was when he forged her will, but Colleen's remains ended up being cremated even though she wanted to be buried. Like he even in her death had no respect for her wishes, no care for her at all. He just really wanted to use her for money and get rid of the evidence as quick as he could. So in October of 2020, they end up bringing in Andre for questioning.

And actually, they brought in all of his siblings, and it was super clear that none of them were aware of what he had done, at least not the full extent of it. His sister Monique, for example, had actually heard from the psychologist who just straight up asked her why documents were submitted on her behalf. And at the time Monique was super confused and had no way to explain that. And she actually went ahead and asked Andre what the psychologist was talking about and he told her that she must have mixed up patients.

So they knew pretty early on that something was off here, something was really weird, but they didn't really see the whole picture. But of course, when they were brought in for questioning, they all started to see that picture very clearly because it was that very same day that they were questioned that Andre ended up being arrested on several fraud charges. And they also had executed search warrants on both his house and his mother's house, during which they collected a bunch of electronic devices.

Now, they found some pretty incriminating information on his devices specifically, which I will get into later on. But as for Gracie, they were confident that she had no involvement. In fact, investigators ended up installing a listening device in their bedroom and living room between September and December, just to be sure. So that device was in there before he was arrested and they kept it in there after he posted bail. And they did this to, you know, see if they would say anything that implicated her in any of this. And even though at first they were mainly listening for any fraud

related conversations, they now were starting to believe that Colleen's death was pretty suspicious. And they were also listening to hear if he said anything about that. But all in all, there was nothing that pointed to Gracie being involved. I mean, she seemed to be absolutely shocked and quite frankly pissed at him for what he did. And that's before she actually knew the full extent of what he did. She could be heard saying things like, what have you done? You put us into so much shit.

And why would you do that? To which he assured her that everything would be okay. He was basically like, don't worry about it baby, everything, this is a giant misunderstanding and we're gonna be back to living our fancy life and sharing it with the masses before you know it. And I guess she was mostly worried about him going to jail and having to become a single parent and I totally get that. I mean, that's a very valid fear to have.

And Andre told her that he wasn't going to jail. And again, I have to reiterate, at this point, Gracie had no idea what he had actually done. She was just concerned about the fraud element and how that was going to affect them. But he said he was going to get his money and then leave the country before anything bad happened, before he was arrested

and she ended up having to be a single mom. To be clear though, he didn't do that. He ended up staying in Perth for the next two years and was living almost as if nothing had happened. And obviously he still was facing the fraud charges, but things were moving slowly, which I have to imagine the reason it was moving so slowly is because they were also starting to put the pictures together and were looking into him for the murder of his mother. And so by November of 2022, investigators were confident that they had enough to make an arrest. So that month he was arrested and taken back into custody on the charge of first degree murder. And here's what they ultimately think happened.

When investigators started to dig into Andre's finances, they saw what I already explained to you, that they were living well beyond their means and he was in a very significant amount of debt. And they think that he lied to Gracie about how much money they had and Continuously, you know fed into a false narrative that he was earning money in Crypto and they think that he lied to her and said that he was about to come into a bunch of money But it wasn't actually going to be from crypto Instead it was going to be his mom's life insurance money that he had planned to collect

after murdering her. And it was money, of course, from those three policies that he had taken out fraudulently less than a week before she died. And to help prove this, investigators pointed to the fact that between December of 2019 and July of 2020, Andre had deleted almost his entire internet search history. Which again, this guy is such a fucking idiot, right? I mean, he really thought you can just delete it and it's gone and no one's ever gonna see it.

It blows my mind that like 2020 beyond or even before that, people think that that is how it works, that you can just delete it and it's gone and investigators are never gonna find it. Like, nice nice bro, super, super smart. Because yeah, some of those searches were recovered and they found that he was looking up things like coroner's aneurysm causes, which this suggested that he may have been plotting his mom's murder as early as five months before he actually did it. And they also pointed to the fact that Andre was at his mom's house in the time frame it was believed she was killed.

Just listen to this. On May 25th of 2020, Andre had made plans to go get lunch with Gracie and Gracie's cousins, who happened to be visiting. However, sometime in the late morning, Andre just sort of vanished. He didn't tell anyone he was leaving, he didn't tell her, and he also wasn't responding to any of her texts or calls, and she was frantically trying to reach him. I mean, believe me, she truly tried. Between 1110 and 1134, she called him a dozen times and left several angry text messages

saying things like, Answer your fucking phone, where are you? Oh my god, I swear to god, Andre, do you not have a phone? What is wrong with you? Answer for fuck's sake. I am fuming at you, I'm so angry. But all of these messages went unanswered. And it wasn't until about an hour later, around 12.30-ish,

that Andre did use his phone, and he used it to text his mom. And he wanted to know if she would be around to watch his son either that day or the following day because he had to go like run some errands. And it's pretty obvious what he was doing here. I'm sure all of you have already put the pieces together. He is trying to set the scene that he believed his mother was alive and is reaching out to her like normal and just kind of cover his tracks, right?

And soon investigators and eventually prosecutors suggested the same, that he was trying to cover his tracks and make it seem like he had no idea his mother had died. And then at some point that day, and sources on this case aren't super consistent about exactly when, but at some point, he just strolled on into their house and acted completely normal, like he hadn't just gone completely dark

and ghosted her for all of that time. He just casually walked in and asked where Gracie and her cousin wanted lunch, as if everything was totally normal. Now apparently it wasn't totally out of character for him to have his phone on silent, but this wasn't like the other instances where he would keep his phone on silent. Investigators believe it was on silent so that he could fall through with his plan

and stay focused, right? And not have any trace of where he was at that time. However, that didn't really work so well for him because his phone did end up pinging on a cell tower that was right by Colleen's house in the time frame that it was believed she was murdered. And not only that, his super luxe white Range Rover was actually seen outside of her house approximately when investigators think that she died.

And this is interesting too, Colleen's sister actually lived nearby and drove by the house in that same timeframe and remembered seeing his car out front. And when you think about it, even though the autopsy couldn't definitively point to a cause of death, there really isn't another explanation. There were no signs of a break-in to suggest that a stranger killed her,

and she had nothing medically that would point to her death being accidental. Plus, unaliving herself just was not on the table, at least according to her psychologist. And these were all things that were pointed out during his trial. So, let's talk about that. The Truth of the Stranger that. When Andre was arrested in November of 2022, he, not surprisingly, pleaded not guilty. And because of the seriousness of the charge, he ended up being denied bail. So he sat waiting for his trial to start, which began in November of 2024.

And this trial was actually supposed to be for both the fraud charges and the murder charge. They ended up just combining it all into one. However, just before trial began, Andre ended up confessing to the fraud, or at least some of it. Basically what happened was he said that he did forge all those documents

and pretended to be the psychologist, but not for the reasons that they were saying. This idiot tried to say that leading up to his mom's death, she had actually asked him to help her get life insurance. He claimed that she was worried about approaching 60 and wanted to have life insurance to protect her kids and her grandkids. Which that part isn't suspicious, that's very normal. But she also supposedly told him that she was nervous about COVID and a family history

of cancer, so this was just a layer of protection for her loved ones. Now as for how he explained why she would ask him to do it, Andre said that it was because he was tech savvy. Of course as a crypto bro who earns like 20 bucks. Super tech savvy. But anyway, according to him, she thought that he would be able to help her to get the best deal. And then he said that the reason he had created that email in her name had something to do with Gmail being easier for her to use and that he got her three policies from three

different agencies because that's how he could get her the most coverage. And obviously everything he's saying here is a total load of shit, but this is legitimately what he was trying to say was the reality. It's just comical that he really tried to push that narrative. But why forge everything after the fact? Well, according to Andre, he said that he believed his mother took her own life. And he knew that if she did,

they never would have gotten the money. Because he knew, of course, that her policy wouldn't cover that. So everything he did was in his version of the story to protect his siblings. What a nice guy. And he said that he didn't want them to know that their mom did this to herself and wanted to be sure that they all got their money.

But let's not forget here that Mr. Andre did list himself as the sole beneficiary. So that's, you know, not lining up with everything else he's trying to push here. But don't worry though, he did have an explanation for that too. He said that he thought only one person could be the beneficiary. So he was totally planning on giving them their money afterwards, but he had to put himself as the sole beneficiary because that's just how he understood it had to be done, okay? Yet, of course, that never happened.

But for as much as he was admitting to, which he admitted to on the stand when he testified, he adamantly denied killing her. Here's what really trips me up, though. This was all stuff that he denied when they were originally questioning him. And they actually played that interview for the jury, the one where he said he didn't commit fraud. And if he lied once, who's to say that he's not lying again? And plus, let's be honest, this news story just doesn't make any sense.

Why wouldn't he just immediately tell his siblings about the policies if it was as innocent of an explanation as he was now claiming, right? And he said that it just didn't come up, but I'm sorry, why not bring it up? Also, why wouldn't he tell anyone that he was with her right before she died? I mean, that would be something you would tell your siblings immediately, right? And remember how I said he went AWOL, just disappeared for a bit that morning and his phone pinged at her house. Well, since there was so much proof that he was there, he just couldn't reasonably deny that at this point. So instead, he tells the jury this story about going over there to have coffee with his mom.

And this dummy really thought that the jury was actually going to believe that she coincidentally just died shortly after you had your nice little coffee with your mom. I mean come on dude why are you even trying to sell this bullshit? The whole thing was just insane and he really did have an excuse for absolutely everything. Not good excuses but he had prepared excuses and the thing was is he was so sloppy and made several key mistakes, particularly as related to staging her body. When Colleen's body was found, she was still wearing all of her jewelry and her hair was still up in a ponytail or bun. And there wasn't even like a bath mat or a towel down outside of the shower,

which suggested that she wasn't planning on showering. And I know I've already said this a few times now, but Colleen really was a healthy person. She exercised a lot, she really took good care of herself, and this was actually proven in the testimony from her doctor during the trial. Now the defense pointed out that Colleen did have a slight abnormality in her heart, so of course they tried to suggest that her cause of death could have been from cardiac arrhythmia. Which technically can be fatal, yes, but the whole undetermined cause of death thing

goes both ways. The coroner might not have been able to say definitively that she was murdered, but he couldn't definitively say that she wasn't. Plus, it's worth mentioning that she had bruises on her hands, her arms, her shin, her knee, as well as blood spots on her eyes that were consistent with suffocation. Granted, some of these wounds were already healed pretty much, suggesting that a few of them were unrelated. But yeah, it's hard to imagine that this was just a coincidence, right? There's just no way.

And the testimony from Andre's siblings really pointed to the fact that all his behavior following their mom's death was just not normal. The sudden interest in being involved and going behind their backs to get her mail and all of that is totally fucking weird. And get this, apparently he even spoke to a realtor about selling her home, which by the way, if you remember from earlier, two of his siblings were still living in it. I personally don't understand how any of this could be excused, but I guess when there's an Andre, there's a way.

Now as for Gracie, she took the stand as well and she was questioned pretty thoroughly and was even accused of trying to protect him. She had initially told investigators that Andre was with her that whole day and never mentioned his little disappearing act. But of course we know for a fact that this isn't totally true

and her response was basically that she didn't think that that information was important at the time, which I do kind of understand to some degree, especially because they were questioning her about fraud and nobody at that point knew anything about a possible murder. And I do feel for her in a lot of ways because the media has really not been kind to her and just people on social media in general and None of this in my opinion is really her fault I mean she truly had no idea but on the stand she said that she remembered Andrei telling her that he was running errands that morning and so it really does genuinely seem that she was

Just as blindsided about all of this as everyone else was, but nobody, and I mean nobody, was as blindsided as Colleen had to have been. So in the end, after a three-week trial, the jury found Andre guilty of first-degree murder. And apparently, this sicko sat there with a raised eyebrow and slight smile on his face, but besides that, he showed zero emotion. And his dad was actually there in court that day to support his son, but none of his siblings were. And I don't blame them.

I wouldn't want to be there. What he did is just evil. I mean, beyond unforgivable. And for what? Money? To keep up the facade for social media, to pretend that you're this successful cryptocurrency trader. I don't even know what the official term for that would be, to pretend that you're this successful cryptocurrency trader.

I don't even know what the official term for that would be, but that was enough for you to kill your mother. It's hard to even wrap your mind around how someone could actually come to that decision. I mean, I bet if he had just asked his mom for help with money, she would have given it to him, even if she herself didn't have that much money I mean, I'm sure she would have helped him as much as possible from what I understand She was an excellent mother who just wanted to do everything she could to support her children Or at least I think she would have brainstormed a way to help him if she didn't have the money herself But instead of just admitting the truth about what was going on and asking for help, he did the most cowardly,

evil, sick thing a person can do, and that is kill your own mother. And what makes it even sadder is that Colleen had confided in a few people that she was worried about Andre when it came to his so-called business. She just didn't see the longevity in social media and obviously didn't really understand cryptocurrency either. She didn't understand how any of this could support her son and his family for a lifetime. Now obviously we know that being an influencer and having a career on social media can be very lucrative, but she's right, for a lot of people influencing doesn't last forever. And then yeah, the whole crypto thing, that obviously wasn't working out well. But it really is eerie to think about how on point her intuition was.

And I just hate that everything she was concerned about ended up costing her her life. Thankfully, though, Andre was definitely held fully accountable for his actions and he won't have the opportunity to do this again or at least I hope not. Because pretty recently, April of 2025, he was sentenced to life in prison but with the possibility of parole in 25 years. It's hard to imagine that he might walk free one day. He certainly could.

Maybe he will. Maybe not. Time will tell. I certainly hope that is not the case. 25 years is not enough. But it is encouraging that his sentence was life in prison. This whole case is just incredibly depressing and upsetting and unnecessary, infuriating. I mean, what a little prick to do that to your own mother, to do that to your siblings, to take her away from everything

that she was about to start doing. I mean, she's just getting back and is starting this new chapter of her life and he is that selfish. He takes it all away and for money, for the facade of the internet, believing that they're living this dream life, it's just, it's sick.

How sick do you have to be in the head to think that this is a good option? Colleen deserves so much better than that. His siblings deserve so much better than that. Gracie deserved so much better than Andre and not to mention now his son is without a father. Although I will say I think he's probably better off without Andre as a father. I wish he could have had a better father than Andre from the beginning, but I'm just glad at the end of the day that hopefully he will spend the rest of his life

behind bars regretting his actions. And I hope his mom and what he did to her stays in his mind forever, haunts his dreams, and that he lives the rest of his life miserable. Hey man, maybe you can do some like cryptocurrency stuff in jail. Maybe you can teach some classes to the other inmates. I'm sure he'll figure out a way to try and make money because he's sick like that. And that seems like it's all he cares about.

But yeah, super frustrating one. Just hard to even imagine what would actually bring you to do something like this to your mother. So sick. I truly send my best to everyone who loved Colleen, all of her family, all of her friends, all of her children, and to Gracie as well, and their son. I don't know if he's still on the internet. I actually didn't look if they've posted anything recently.

But yeah, I wish the best for everyone. This is just horribly tragic and I'm sure has been incredibly traumatic for everyone involved. But really to Colleen, God, there's just, there's no words. The idea of being murdered by your own child is, I don't know. I just, I really can't, I don't know. I just, I really can't. I don't know if I even have words. It's so sick. That is going to be it for me today, guys. Thank you for joining me for another episode and make sure you follow the show on Spotify and Apple podcasts.

It really does help me out. If you want to watch the video version of this show, you can find it on my YouTube channel, which will be linked, or you can just search Kendall Rae. I will be back with another episode soon, but until then, stay safe out there.