True Crime with Kimbyr - Deadly TikTok Obsession: Cosplayer’s Dream Turns Fatal: Part 3

Episode Date: May 16, 2025

In the final chapter of this haunting case, True Crime with Kimbyr reveals the aftermath of Helen Hastings’ tragic death. Kimbyrleigha examines the courtroom drama, shocking testimony, and the community’s reaction as the truth about “Snow The Salt Queen” comes to light. Was justice truly served—or did the world of online personas shield deeper secrets? Join Kimbyrleigha for the emotional conclusion to this disturbing true crime saga, only on True Crime with Kimbyr. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Officers arrived at the scene and interviewed everyone who was present at the time of the shooting. There were five friends that witnessed the events unfold. According to the police report, the group of seven friends, including Snow and Helen, were watching Gotham, as I said. Well, there's a supervillain in that show, Oswald Cobblepot, who goes by the name Penguin and is based on the DC comic supervillain of the same name. He's one of the main antagonist in the show. He's a cunning, ruthless criminal who wants to rule Gotham criminal underworld, and he's willing and eager to kill anyone that stands in his way. But on the other hand, he can be patient, cunning, and methodical.

He's also the first version of the character that's openly interested in a same-sex character and has a complicated romantic relationship with fellow criminal and best friend, the riddler. It's more like he was yearning to connect with someone rather than anything sexual, but I'm sure you can see some of the similarities to Junco and even snow themselves in this character. And at some point that night, while they're all watching the show, Snow turns to her friends and tells them they have a gun that looks just like penguins. Snow went out to the garage of the home, grabbed the gun, and they explained that their ex-boyfriend had left it behind when he moved out. Now, this was not the first time Snow had taken out this gun and showed it off at a party. Almost every other time, at least one drunk friend would ask Snow to point the gun at their gun at their gun at their car.

head, which they did. The ex-boyfriend had allegedly deemed this gun as safe, having removed all the bullets in the magazine. And Snow usually put the gun right back into its case after messing around with it. But on this night, the outcome of the game, if you can call it that, would be anything but fun. According to those present, Snow picked up the gun and slipped it into their pocket and then headed back to join the group watching TV.

1 o'clock in the morning, Snow then pulled out the gun again and began playing with it, passing it around, waving it in front of the group, heavily intoxicated. At this point, one of Snow's housemates told them to pretend to shoot them. And Snow did. Then, before anyone knew what happened, Helen fell to the floor and blood spilled from a bullet wound on the side of her head. Initially, the friends stared at Helen in shock and disbelief, and moments later, one of them grabbed a large red and white teddy bear, which they held to the side of Helen's head to try to stop the bleeding. Snow then ran upstairs to get a towel, while another member of the group called 911. The operator instructed them to put the gun back inside the case and wait for help to arrive. Snow was detained and police wanted their version of exactly what happened that caused Helen to be shot.

Snow explained everything the same way I just did, except claimed that after the other friend asked to pretend to shoot them, Helen asked Snow to point the gun at her head. And apparently she said, oh, do me or, oh, shoot me, while laughing. Like, do me, do me. Snow then raised the weapon, put it against the left side of Helen. said and pulled the trigger. But instead of it being pretend, this was a very real gun, and it went off. Snow then made a formal statement. They told the police, quote, they were all drinking and got pretty drunk, end quote. And then they began passing the gun around for hours and playing with it.

Snow said they were sure that the weapon was not loaded, but they weren't paying attention hard enough because they might have been too drunk, but when Helen asked them to shoot her, Snow said, oh, okay, and the gun went off. Snow said they were in shock because it was supposed to be empty. They didn't load it, and they don't know how it went off. Snow said everyone in the house touched the gun that night,

but it was mainly in their front pocket, and they pulled the trigger. So Snow said it was their fault. They said all they were doing was pretending that they were different characters in Gotham, and everyone was doing it that night. Snow said that they never fired a gun before. And since they didn't think it was loaded,

they didn't see it as a danger. Allegedly, an ex-boyfriend who had owned the gun previously, left the gun there and told Snow it was empty. And Snow assumed this meant that all the bullets had been removed. He had shown them how to take the magazine out so it wouldn't shoot. But there was some confusion around the removal of this magazine at the time of the shooting. Some of the bystanders recall they had seen Snow removed the clip.

But then when it was picked up by the officers, the magazine was inside the gun. Snow stated they were really, really drunk. That's a quote, really, really drunk. And quote, could have done it, end quote, meaning they could have put the magazine inside the gun before pulling the trigger. To confirm this, the police interviewed the other friends and they recalled it was making a clicking noise before it went off. One of them stated that their group was, quote, wild, dumb, and does jokes all the time, end quote. And they witnessed Helen, asked Snow to shoot her.

And they also assumed that the gun wasn't loaded. Snow was arrested and taken into custody at the time. Meanwhile, back at the hospital, Philip and Susan had been notified of the shooting, and they arrived to be by their daughter's side. When Susan was informed that it was snow that had pulled the trigger, she was in complete shock. It was eerie.

because Helen was not familiar with firearms. She had not grown up exposed to guns at all in just that week that she was shot. Her father actually inquired about whether snow or other housemates kept weapons in the home, and Helen said no. Her parents were even more shocked when they were told that Helen asked to be shot.

They didn't believe it. Apparently they could understand the rest of the circumstances, but not that Helen would have ever allowed a gun to be put to her head willingly. Susan said, quote, that is so not our Helen. If she were still capable of speech, she would never have said that, end quote.

Philip and Susan were shown an MRI of Helen's brain, and it was immediately clear that she was brain dead. At that point, they knew they would never see their daughter smile or laugh again. She was truly gone, and she was only 18. As hard as it was, Helen's parents, With their background in medicine and the body, they knew there was no use keeping her on machines. So they wanted to allow her to be taken off these machines and go peacefully while just holding her hand.

But what they didn't know was that Helen, as an adult now, had become an organ donor. And the hospital wanted to keep her on these machines that were keeping her alive until they could match recipients with Helen's organs. This was a very emotional time for Helen's parents. not everyone is okay with their child being an organ donor. But what was really disheartening was the fact that the hospital wanted to keep her on life support for three days.

Susan said she could only bear two. She could only see her daughter like this for two days and that was bad enough. She said, quote, I was never going to see her again. I want to just hold her hand, end quote. Finally, exactly two days later while Susan sang Helen's songs from the Beatles,

she was finally removed from life support and officially pronounced dead at 5.18 p.m. on January 19th, 2021. That same day, Snow or Marianne Oliver Snow, legal name, was released from custody on $20,000 bond, which allegedly was quickly paid by their father,

and they were charged with second-degree felony manslaughter, a crime that can result in up to 20 years in prison, and a $10,000 fine in the state of Texas. While out on bond, they had to wear an electronic monitoring device and had a curfew of 8 p.m. to 7 a.m. every day. They also had to undergo regular drug and alcohol screenings, and they were prohibited from being in possession of a firearm. Snow was also prohibited from having any contact with Helen's family.

It's not merely the circumstances of Helen's death, which are the most shocking in this case and why I wanted to cover it in my evil mind series. It's what Snow did after taking the life of someone they considered a friend, which gives us a much clearer picture of who they actually are. It's important to note that most people who witness the death of another person, even if it's not their fault, will experience some form of psychological distress. This can manifest as acute stress reactions, post-traumatic stress disorder, or other forms of emotional and mental burden. Witnessing such a traumatic event, can lead to symptoms such as flashbacks, nightmares,

severe anxiety, and uncontrollable thoughts about the incident. Imagine how much worse it would be for a person who caused that death, especially if they say or believe it's an accident. And how much worse would it be if you cause the death of a person who considered a friend? Well, for snow, that didn't seem to be the case at all. They seemed quite okay to get on with life as usual. Four days after shooting Helen, Snow posted on January 21st that they were taking a hiatus from social media.

But there was no mention of Helen or the circumstances of her death. Remember, this was a person who was apparently their friend and who was living at their home at the time of the shooting. And this little hiatus, it didn't last long. Dare I say that Snow was most likely addicted to social media or the attention that it brought. because two weeks later on February 10th, Snow was back on social media with a post. Quote, hiatus is over. Expect more Mekon tomorrow and please interact, end quote. This is in reference to a cosplay of another character from the same show that Junco was from.

Once again, no mention of Helen. As a matter of fact, unless you were part of Helen and Snow's small circle of very close friends, you are not privy to the details surrounding Helen's death. Oberlin College released a statement on their site and via email to all their students, memorializing Helen. And it started by saying, the Oberlin Review extends our deepest condolences to the family and friends of college first year,

Helen Hastings, who died January 18th, 2021 in Houston, Texas. Then it pays tribute to her personality, but it makes no mention of how she passed. This led to her. to the assumption that Helen took her own life. And I see that a lot when either the cause of death has not been released or the family wants the details to remain out of the media.

By then, Snow had been indicted by a grand jury for manslaughter for unlawfully and recklessly causing Helen's death. Snow's father, who was allegedly a wealthy businessman, could afford a high-end lawyer named Brent Meyer, and none of the witnesses at the house were ever charged with any crimes. But of course, the manslaughter charges,

and the bond release, that didn't make it on Snow's TikTok account? No. They didn't talk about that. Snow's content following her killing another person didn't mention anything significant and even happened in their life, or that they literally put a gun to someone's head and pulled the trigger. The only noticeable change was that Snow's content actually took a slightly darker turn, if that's even possible. In the weeks and months following Helen's shooting, the videos on Snow's profile, profiles heavily focused on death, dying, dead bodies, but the videos weren't doom and gloom. Many of them made light of dying and several even joked about hiding bodies and killing someone for love. It was almost like Snow was bragging about the role in Helen's death. In April,

just three months after Helen was killed, Snow posted on Instagram cosplay as Yano Aishi, the protagonist of the game Yondri Simulator. They held a bloody baseball bat with bloody handprints on their cheeks, and they're staring into the camera with the caption, quote, updated a Yano cosplay, what do you think? End quote. It's like nothing ever happened. And in another, snow used audio, which include the lines, quote,

my insides are red and yours are too. And the red on my face is matching you. Goodness, you're bleeding. What a wonderful feeling. You're down and you're pleading. My head is just reeling." And quote. Snow continued to attend cosplay conventions

and posted frequently on their TikTok. At this point, like I said, they had 1.6 million followers and none of them knew what happened to Helen or what Snow had done. Throughout this time, news reports about the incident only stated that a young person had died in a shooting in Houston.

The details about the incident were sketchy with no mention of the victim or the shooter or the circumstances. It wasn't until many months later that the truth of the situation started to become clear. In August of 2021, was the first time that Snow started to feel any negative impact from the killing. This was when their bond was revoked. Due to them violating the conditions of their home release, these breaches included failing to report to pretrial services,

failing to comply with curfew restrictions, and letting their electronic monitor die on three separate occasions, which meant that their location was unknown for us. hours. Their court date was set for October 21st, 2021. Now you see, if Snow hadn't violated these conditions, the world might have never known that they were the person responsible for Helen's death. But these details were made public on the court's website. And when the bond cancellation notice was released publicly, people began to connect Snow's name with the identity of the shooter in the manslaughter charges. And then when Helen's friends posted a series of TikTok videos,

clarifying that Helen had been killed by Snow in Snow's house at point-blank range. Now, these videos have since been removed from the platform, but at the time, as the words spread online about Snow's involvement in Helen's death, the public became more and more outraged, with comments saying things like, quote, what a huge slap in the face to the families of the victims to be posting like this, end quote. Snow immediately shut down all forms of social media except for their Instagram for some Rezen. Snow didn't bother to hide any Instagram content, including a post from early 2020, showing Snow posing with a toy gun. Other posts show Snow dressed in anime costumes covered in

blood. But again, Snow's hiatus from TikTok and YouTube didn't last long. In mid-20203, Snow reactivated all their accounts and began posting again, but this time under a new name, the name Yandri Freak. Now Yandri is a Japanese term. that describes a character who is sweet and caring on the outside, but hostile and aggressive on the inside. Andrity characters are often obsessed and possessive with their love interests and may express their devotion in extreme, violent, or even psychotic ways. In some cases, they may even kill to prevent others from interfering with their personal or romantic goals. So they're kind of like two and one. They're sweet, but they also want to kill you.

This is the persona that Snow was embodying now. Snow might have had a new handle online, but there was nothing new about their content, except this time the audience's response to Snow was different. The cosplay community shared their disgust that Snow had ignored Helen's death and then carried on as though nothing happened.

Snow made no attempt to correct anyone who thought Helen took her own life. Online commentary about Snow was consistent, quote, The fact that they are cosplaying this archetype, and after the manslaughter incident, we're trying to market themselves more using it, that's what got so much backlash from the community. It's one thing to be edgy.

It's another thing to be edgy about someone losing their life, end quote. Snow's attorney has publicly stated that Snow is incredibly remorseful about what took place, and that they're so traumatized, they're unable to speak about the entire event. But apparently, Snow wasn't traumatized enough to apologize, or even to stop posting online. However, their lawyer went on to say, quote,

whether this was their attempt to deal with the trauma on their own, I can't say for certain. But what we know for sure is that they did not receive any psychological help or counseling for this incident, end quote. I'm not sure that's a good thing. I think that that should be mandated. In 2023, Snow pleaded guilty to manslaughter, and you might be thinking there would be some jail time associated with putting a gun to someone's head and pulling the trigger causing their death. But you would be wrong. Apparently, if it's an accident, the same rules don't apply. Snow was sentenced to five years of community supervision, which is effectively the same as parole. They must have a job, not leave the country without permission, are forbidden from owning a firearm,

and they consent to random drug testing and must undertake 100 hours of community service. That's it. And I say that's it because I personally think it's truly shocking. So long as Snow abides by all the terms of their release, once the five years is completed, the manslaughter conviction will be removed from their record completely. Friends of Helens have spoken out, and many of them don't believe Snow's version of the events that happened that night. Because, as Dolly Lace put it, quote, it's the absolute textbook gun safety PSA story. end quote. As in snow should have known better. Most of us have at least heard you never point any gun at anyone, especially pull the trigger, unless you intend to shoot them and you consider every gun loaded.

Dolly went on to say, quote, most cosplayers don't use real guns whatsoever. And yet we know all the rules to pose with a fake one and have it look convincing. It was an accident that could have been avoided with 10 different steps, end quote. And they believe the truth is somewhere in between this, in between it being an accident because of how preventable it was. Helen's mother, Susan, has also been quoted explaining her doubts about the truth, saying, quote, there was some time when these folks were at this house before the police got there. So whatever was going to happen, they were going to have their story together, end quote. And Susan blamed Snow and their friends for blurring the lines between reality and pretend. But in the end, Susan said,

quote, it just doesn't matter. Two lives were ruined. Helens was taken, and Snow, their life was ruined too, end quote. Susan was hoping, like many other people, that Snow would go somewhere where they could not hurt anyone else again, even though she truly harbors no ill will towards them. But we know that didn't happen. But I want this story to be about Helen, because of course, we had to hear about snow, but Helen should be remembered for her kindness and her positivity. I want to quote one of her closest friends, Ross Kish Levine, a fellow Oberlin college student. This is what they said about Helen. Quote, Helen was just an incredibly warm person, just incredibly friendly, kind, open to people, forgiving, willing to meet people where they were at and be very welcoming. We didn't really have an

orientation or anything so making friends was a little difficult. I think the first thing she said to me was complimenting my jacket or something and from then on we became close friends really quickly because she was just such a bright, warm person. She was always super excited about how cold it was in Oberlin whenever it snowed she was delighted which was really sweet to see. I think she was going to study neuroscience to cure misophonia. She also drew. She cosplayed a lot. She was just really creative. She loved the color pink. She had her hair dyed pink. She helped me dye my hair. She gave me my first quarantine friend haircut. I want her to be remembered as a real person who is more than just a story or an event as who she was. A wonderful friend. A bright person. A full, deep, complex person, a good person, a

great person. And more than that, because people are more than what they can do for each other and what they can do for the world. just who she was as herself. Entirely original. Someone who meets you and instantly strikes you is like, wow, you are yourself. And that's an amazing thing to be, end quote. And I, too, want to remember Helen as not just a story or a TikTok video

or even this YouTube video. She was a person. And I always want us to be able to take something away from these cases. And what we can take away from Helen's story is that it's a reminder that not all virtual connections, social media connections are positive. It's not always a safe and pleasant place. We've heard plenty of romantic connections which end badly, but this was a friendship.

The type of relationship, which is meant to provide support and encouragement, and instead what started as a seemingly innocent interaction and shared experience eventually turned, deadly. So please proceed with caution, especially if you're a parent. I know it's hard, but do your best to monitor what your teen is doing and who they're connecting with online. Because it can be a very scary place. I thank you all so much for being part of this community and being supportive and loving and kind. Make sure you keep that in mind in the comments. And thank you so much for being here for Helen Story. I will see you in my next video.

Bye.