0:00

This is a Glassbox Media Podcast.

0:34

Welcome to Crawl Space. I'm Tim here today

0:36

with Lance. Lance, how are you today? I'm

0:38

doing fantastic today. We are coming out of

0:40

the Christmas holiday. So I hope everyone out

0:42

there who celebrates Christmas or whatever you celebrate.

0:44

I hope you had a good holiday season.

0:46

And one of our last guests that we

0:48

have for 2023 is a really cool gentleman.

0:53

Really excited to share this with the audience.

0:55

But Tim, I want to share with the

0:57

audience as well how you are doing. How

0:59

was your holiday season? Are you feeling like

1:01

23 was a good year? I'm feeling great.

1:03

Thanks for asking. Yeah, 2023 was great. I

1:05

had a good time. A lot

1:07

of family to end the year, which

1:09

is always nice. And

1:12

this interview is with a

1:14

fellow named Jerry Colbert. He

1:17

is an Emmy nominee. And

1:19

he also hosts the Kids

1:21

Educational Podcast, Who Smarted, which

1:23

is a big hit. But

1:25

this conversation, Lance, is about

1:27

his new podcast called Slaycation.

1:30

Jerry is a seasoned television producer

1:33

who has teamed up with a comedy

1:35

writer and his wife, Adam and Kim, to

1:38

explore these crimes that happen while people

1:40

are on vacation, whether it's international or

1:42

domestic. And he talks about a

1:44

few of them here, some of the ones that stood out to

1:46

him. The show actually premieres in

1:48

January. So stay tuned for that. It's Slaycation.

1:52

And just a word of note here, Tim, do you

1:54

remember that I was on a bit of a delay

1:56

during this conversation? Yeah, I feel like

1:58

you're always on a delay, though. I am. Sometimes

2:00

the brain is on a bit of a delay, but

2:03

this was a technical delay as well.

2:05

So just for comedy purposes, you

2:07

really wanna listen to the end of this episode because I

2:09

leave the delay in. We talk about

2:11

the delay. So we didn't cut out the delay.

2:13

So you can hear the period of time that

2:16

happens after I say something to the reaction. And

2:18

I was cracking myself up, re-listening to it.

2:21

So just make sure you listen to the

2:23

entire episode. You'll have a good time. Okay,

2:25

good to hear, yeah. And Jerry is a

2:27

funny guy. So we do speak

2:29

about some crime. He's also

2:32

produced and developed Discovery ID's

2:34

show Homicide Hunter with Joe

2:37

Kenda, who I would imagine a

2:39

lot of the folks listening know who

2:41

Joe Kenda is. So this conversation is

2:43

a lot of fun, really. We go

2:45

through some of his TV history, and

2:47

then we speak about some vacation murders

2:49

or crimes that occur that they're gonna

2:52

cover on this location. All right, Tim,

2:54

and you know people can listen to

2:56

this episode if they want with the

2:58

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3:00

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make sure to follow us on social

3:22

media Crawl Space Podcast or Crawl Space

3:25

Pod, and we're gonna take a quick

3:27

break here, and we'll be right back

3:29

with Jerry Kolber. Before

3:36

we begin today's episode, you're about to

3:38

hear a word from our sponsors. These

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or click the link. link in our bio

4:01

to sign up. It's

4:30

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the danger. The object of

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while sitting down. Gay

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now. And

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a thank you to our sponsors. Back to the

5:18

program. Welcome to the podcast.

5:20

Jerry Kolber, how are you today? I am

5:22

great. I'm so happy to be here guys.

5:24

I love your show. Oh wow. Thanks.

5:28

That's one of the first things they say,

5:30

you're good in our book. So would you

5:32

mind telling the audience who you are, what

5:34

you do, why you're featured on this show

5:37

today? Happy to. My name is Jerry Kolber.

5:39

I am probably best known as the creator

5:41

and showrunner of a TV series called Brain

5:43

Games for National Geographic. My company and I

5:45

also produce shows for Netflix and Discovery. We

5:48

did a show called Brain Child for

5:50

Netflix that Was a science

5:52

series for kids. The Reason: I'm here with

5:54

you guys today is for a very long

5:57

time, my business partner Adam Davis and I

5:59

have been. Kind of obsessed with

6:01

vacation murders right? murders that happen on

6:03

vacation. We started thinking about this and

6:05

we are working on a Tv series

6:07

called Homicide Hunter a few years back

6:09

that sure was all about murders and

6:11

happening Colorado Springs I investigated by the

6:13

schedule kinda wasn't Wow, what a the

6:16

murders of the people on vacation. Rather

6:18

crowded with such an interesting. Thought.

6:20

Because when you're on vacation, your

6:22

guard down, you're having fun. You're

6:24

in a new place often times.

6:26

Yeah, we we discovered people will

6:28

will murder a spouse or business

6:30

partner. On a vacation to a

6:32

foreigner Phoenician because they think they want

6:34

people to be investigated by the United

6:37

States police or get away with it.

6:39

So we started looking into it. We

6:41

realize like during a lot of the

6:43

like a disturbing number of people get

6:45

murdered and commit murder on vacation. And.

6:47

Adam. Came up

6:49

with a term for this which is slight

6:51

case of once. he said slay case and

6:53

I was like we gotta make the show

6:55

I don't care for the tv show or

6:58

a podcast. Ah we need to make location.

7:00

Adams wife Kim. I. Is the

7:02

third host on the show. She

7:04

is a absolute true crime obsessed

7:06

person. She listens, watches,

7:09

Any true crime think she's all

7:11

over it so she's are true

7:13

crime not on the show. Adam

7:15

is there as as location as

7:17

are. A bit of comedy relief.

7:19

He's learning the cases in real time. And

7:22

I'm there to them just I'm just

7:24

fascinated by it. what makes people kill

7:26

and also really fascinated by on our

7:28

show looking at the victims in a

7:30

through much more compassionate less than they

7:32

usually aren't true crime. so that's why

7:34

I'm that's that's why I'm here. Wow,

7:36

very cool. yeah sounds like are an

7:39

interesting idea. I can't wait to listen

7:41

to a when is it premiering of

7:43

show Premier's generate Nice! Okay great what's

7:45

the first case are going to cover?

7:47

The very first case we're doing is

7:49

similar to last year term killer Robinson.

7:51

I sent hello. Was in the news

7:53

a lot early this year and she

7:55

was young woman who had to Cabo

7:57

for vacation with a bunch of friends

7:59

from Atlanta. Did you start Russia? call

8:01

it or not on a podcast but

8:03

I definitely fall. The story in the

8:06

news shows a case where this young

8:08

we're down to cover with your friends

8:10

and is and of getting found a

8:12

dead in her hotel room. There was

8:14

a lot of conflicting information around what

8:16

happens leading up to her death. May

8:18

question was did she die from overdosing

8:20

on alcohol or hitting her head or

8:22

was she murdered. The case was initially

8:24

considered an accidental death but video came

8:26

out of of one of her friends

8:28

fighting with her and and actually. Physically

8:31

assaulting her the day she was found dead.

8:33

you know her friends sleep of alcohol poisoning.

8:35

but the autopsy and this leaked video suggested

8:37

like maybe there is something else going on.

8:39

We covered this case on the Honestly case

8:41

and we're looking at it now through the

8:43

lens of like it's not in the news

8:45

as much anymore. It's kind of his, you

8:47

know, fallen off the public radar, but her

8:49

family really doesn't have closure. You know it's

8:51

one of these cases where nothing really quite

8:53

added up so we be reexamined. It. And.

8:56

And try figure out what really happened. Pretty

8:58

amazing may you have. Meat. Is

9:00

one of the central themes to incorporate

9:02

the compassion element and make sure that

9:04

if any family members are listening. whatever

9:06

you can do to bring some sort

9:08

of closer you understand is important. Were

9:10

in the process was that decided upon

9:12

the very interesting question. So I worked

9:14

on Homicide Hunter. Homicide Hunter had run

9:16

one season it didn't do that well.

9:18

Discovery Id had seen a lot of

9:20

potential in it's Last me in and

9:22

the company was working with for that

9:24

at the time to be to take

9:26

a look and see if we can

9:28

be develop it. And. We did, We

9:30

made it became a number one show. But.

9:32

In the process of. Working. On

9:34

that show, I discovered I really, really

9:37

don't like the true crime genre in

9:39

general. Not. the genre but the way

9:41

that it's usually done i think joe kinda

9:43

brought a really beautiful sense of like care

9:45

for the victims and and the desired bring

9:47

closure to homicide hunter and i really respected

9:49

that a bit of the process of working

9:52

on that show we looked a lot of

9:54

other true crime shows a lot of them

9:56

are really exploitative the of the right word

9:58

where it's really talking about the

10:00

gory details and the sensationalism of the crime,

10:02

I just was really turned off by that.

10:04

It's a very low hanging fruit way to

10:06

tell these stories. People like it, they want

10:09

to listen to it, it just isn't for

10:11

me. When we started talking about dislocation, it

10:13

made very clear right up front, both from

10:15

me and Kim, that we really wanted to

10:17

make sure that we talked about the victims

10:19

here and wherever possible, brain

10:21

closure. For Kim, that comes from her

10:24

background as a social worker with victims of

10:26

domestic violence. Unfortunately, that plays into a lot

10:28

of these cases. Emotional and

10:30

physical violence. So for her,

10:33

that was very important. For me, just from having

10:35

seen enough of these shows that don't do that,

10:37

I also, I've been a meditator

10:39

for many years. I actually got certified to

10:41

teach Buddhist meditation a few years ago. I

10:43

don't do it actively, but that

10:46

whole process just kind of put me a

10:48

lot more in touch with making sure that

10:50

every side of the story is told and

10:52

really being compassionate. So it was really baked

10:55

in from the beginning. How do you inject

10:57

a little bit of comedy into the show

10:59

as well? That's mostly Adam. Adam, who is

11:01

our business partner, Kim's husband and our third,

11:03

our third host. His background is

11:05

as a comedy writer. He's written a lot of

11:07

comedy screenplays. He's also an incredibly compassionate person. His

11:10

way of dealing with stressful or challenging situations is

11:12

to make a joke. The jokes are not at

11:14

the expense of the victims, but they are a

11:16

way to just lighten up what can be some

11:19

very heavy stories. Once in a while, Kim and

11:21

I have a good life there, but mostly the

11:23

comedy comes from Adam hearing the

11:25

stories in real time. In a

11:27

way, he's like a release valve because

11:30

these stories, they're fascinating, but they get pretty

11:32

heavy. So I think for Adam's role is

11:34

just letting a little pressure out. I think

11:36

it's good for the show. It's good for

11:39

the listeners also to just not feel like

11:41

it's just a constant barrage of heaviness. It's

11:43

such a unique carve out in the true

11:45

crime genre, focusing on murders that happen during

11:48

a vacation. I know you said that you'd

11:50

been interested in it, and I'm curious how

11:52

far back that goes. What got you interested

11:54

in that? How did you even find somebody

11:57

else who shares that interest?

12:00

So when Adam and I were making Brain Games

12:02

for Nachio, going back about a decade when we

12:04

first started doing it, Brain Games became a huge

12:06

hit. It became their Nachio's number one show. That

12:09

led to pretty much every cable network

12:12

that you could name calling us up

12:14

and saying, you know, we'd like blank,

12:17

you know, done by the Brain

12:19

Games Guide. So whether it was

12:21

Discovery Channel, Travel Channel, Animal

12:23

Planet, you know, everybody wanted

12:26

us to talk to them about what could their Brain Games

12:28

be. One of the channels that called us was Discovery ID.

12:31

During the process of trying to figure out what

12:33

a show could be for them, which we never

12:35

really landed on, like what's the Brain Games version

12:38

of a true crime show. But in the process

12:40

of doing that research, that's when we started noticing

12:42

a lot of vacation murders. A

12:44

couple of years after that, when we were working on

12:46

Homicide Hunter and really digging into those cases, we started

12:48

seeing more. So I think the

12:50

germ of it came from thinking

12:52

about this a decade ago. You know, man, I'm like, we

12:54

have a lot of ideas, but like, you know, there's a

12:57

few of them and I'll just stick in your head forever.

12:59

I don't know if you guys are like that, where it's

13:01

like, you know, I mean, your ideas guys, right? So

13:04

it's like once in a while, something gets in your head where

13:06

you're just like, you just think about it for years. And that's

13:08

when you know, you probably should do

13:10

something with it. So this

13:13

one's been percolating for for

13:15

a while. What would Joe Kendra think of

13:17

the show? Joe would

13:19

love this show. I'd love

13:21

to have Joe on the show at some point. Joe's

13:23

a really, really good, good

13:26

guy. I think Joe would love Slacation. You

13:28

know, it's got that investigative quality he loves

13:30

and the compassion that's really important to him.

13:33

How do you go about doing the research on these

13:35

stories? Is it the three of you primarily contributing or

13:37

does one of you kind of take the reins on

13:39

that? Was it Adam who doesn't

13:41

learn about it until it's time to record? He

13:43

kind of learns about it in real time? That's

13:45

correct. Yeah. So Adam's Adam's wife,

13:47

Kim, she takes the lead on the research. She finds the cases.

13:50

These are kind of true crime barometer.

13:52

I mean, she's like she lives and

13:54

breathes true crime. So for us, like if

13:57

she's excited about a case and we're excited

13:59

about it. She finds the cases and

14:01

does the initial research. Then she'll share the case

14:04

with me. I'll do research alongside of her and

14:06

support her. Adam literally does not even know the

14:08

name of the case or anything until it is

14:10

revealed to him while we are recording live, which

14:12

is, you can imagine, you know, it's a little

14:15

bit of a challenge because, you know, leaving her

14:17

notebooks all over their house, but we've made it

14:19

work. And that's another aspect of the show that's

14:21

really interesting is to have someone on the show

14:24

who's actually a proxy for the viewer. Like in

14:26

real time, hearing the details of the case and

14:28

trying to like, trying to figure out

14:30

what's happening. So, Kim and I know what's

14:32

up and Adam is totally in the dark.

14:34

Let's talk about Shanquella Robinson's case a little

14:36

bit more in-depth here, if you don't mind.

14:38

What are your thoughts here without spoiling the

14:40

episode? Do you have some opinions you can

14:42

share in this case? One of the things

14:44

that we also try to do on this

14:46

show is when it's possible is to offer

14:48

some takeaway. I wouldn't call it a helpful

14:51

tip on how not to get murdered on

14:53

vacation, but something like that. On some of

14:55

these cases, there's some things that you could

14:57

do to make sure you're not

14:59

in the same situation. Unfortunately, this isn't really

15:01

one of them. This was one

15:03

of those cases where you're like, Shanquella Robinson

15:06

did everything right. She went on vacation with what

15:08

she thought were a group of friends. She's not

15:10

a big partier by anyone's

15:12

account. So it wasn't like she was

15:14

deliberately trying to get messed up and

15:16

put herself in a bad situation. And

15:18

in fact, everything that occurred occurred in

15:20

the hotel where she was staying with

15:22

her friends. Tragically, this is not one

15:24

of those cases where we're like, oh,

15:26

don't go to this place, or if

15:28

you've done this differently, or if you

15:30

turn back at this point. And honestly,

15:32

even with the tips, we're so careful.

15:34

It can't ever be about victim blaming

15:36

or somebody did something wrong. It's just

15:38

trying to learn from what happened. The

15:40

only thing I would say about this

15:42

one, in places like Cabo, we've noticed

15:45

in places like Cabo or some of

15:47

the safari destinations in South Africa where

15:49

murders happen, resort towns on

15:51

the Atlantic coast, anywhere that's a

15:53

vacation destination, there is a tendency for

15:55

the police and the coroners to

15:57

try and say things are, they lean

15:59

more. towards accidents than murder. You don't

16:02

want to be known as the murder

16:04

destination, right? You want to be

16:06

known as a place where people come to play

16:08

and sometimes people have accidents and bad things happen.

16:10

So my opinion is in this case,

16:13

the local police in the corner and

16:15

even the hotel to some degree, not that

16:18

they were being malicious, but they're automatically inclined

16:20

to look at everything through the lens of

16:23

party or got out of hand, drank

16:25

too much, hit her head and passed away. So

16:28

that's where they start. So it was very hard to

16:30

get them to move off of that. That was the

16:32

initial decision on what happened. In your opinion, do you

16:34

think the fight caused her death or led to her

16:37

death? I do think the fight had something to do

16:39

with it. Yeah, because she was getting beat up pretty

16:41

bad. The other part of it that was very disturbing

16:43

was that her friend, her air quoting,

16:45

her friends left Cabo as quickly as they

16:47

could. Nobody hung out to make sure things

16:50

were handled correctly. Like everyone just got out

16:52

of town. On the one hand, when we

16:54

talk about this on the show, it's like

16:56

on the one hand you make the argument,

16:58

if you're in a foreign country and

17:00

the police are closing in around

17:02

a death, someone's inclination

17:05

might be to leave as quickly as possible.

17:07

So you can kind of understand that. But

17:09

it's a really, really crappy thing

17:11

to do. For none of them

17:13

to have really stayed and

17:15

made sure that things were handled correctly. So

17:17

that seems a bit suspicious. It's suspicious, but

17:20

you can't really say it means anything because

17:22

they could have just been a bunch of

17:24

scared kids trying to get back to Atlanta.

17:26

Yeah, that's kind of a worst nightmare scenario

17:28

being jailed in a foreign country. What about

17:30

premeditation? In your opinion, was there any premeditation

17:33

there? I don't think so. There was no

17:35

indication that like anyone went down there with

17:37

the intention of killing Chonquila. It

17:39

just seems like things got out

17:41

of hand at some point. And that's

17:43

what's a little unclear because none of the friends are

17:46

talking. The autopsy, and I don't want to give away

17:48

too much because we get into this

17:50

on the episode, but the autopsy when the parents

17:52

and the family were able to look at it,

17:54

it is not totally consistent with saying that she

17:57

died of alcohol poisoning. There's just some other things

17:59

going on. on that they found with her

18:01

bones and body that suggests other things were

18:03

happening. This is an interesting case too because

18:05

her family, she's a big family and a

18:08

lot of friends and people that really love

18:10

her who really just wanted answers and wanted

18:12

justice done here. This stayed in the paper

18:14

for a while and the news for a

18:16

while, but it kind of fell out. I

18:18

mean, there was just a lack of ability,

18:20

I guess, for the US authorities to do

18:22

much because the Mexican

18:25

authorities pretty much said this

18:27

was, you know, this was their decision and

18:29

it's done. This is a very frustrating thing

18:31

we've learned making slant cation. If you get

18:33

murdered overseas in another country, it is exponentially

18:36

harder to not just have justice done, but

18:38

actually figure out what actually happens, which is

18:40

not to say don't go travel. I'm

18:44

curious why this was the first

18:46

one that you chose because it

18:48

is really difficult to cover a

18:50

story that takes place over

18:52

the border and has a lot of

18:54

these like nuances. I guess if

18:56

you're actually making a show, I'm answering my own

18:59

question here. It's kind of tough to do a

19:01

show about murders on vacation if you're not crossing

19:03

borders, right? You are definitely, yeah, you're definitely crossing

19:05

borders sometimes, although there's an awful lot of them

19:07

that do happen in the United States. The

19:10

reason we chose this one is it had been

19:12

in the news a lot. Kim and I have

19:14

been talking about it a lot. Both Kim and

19:16

I were really heartbroken for her parents and her

19:18

family and her siblings. It just felt so like

19:20

it just needed to be talked about in a

19:23

way that wasn't about Cabo, murder, you know, like,

19:26

but really like talk through it in terms

19:28

of like who was Chancuella, what really happened,

19:30

who was she, who was the family, really

19:32

talk about the people more than the actual

19:34

crime itself. When we started this, Kim and

19:36

Adam and I have not hosted a podcast

19:38

before. Adam and I, we do another show,

19:40

Who Smarted. In terms of a conversational podcast,

19:42

we hadn't done one. We think that they're

19:45

great, but they're also really hard to do,

19:47

to do well. As you guys know, like

19:49

it's it's a skill. Adam and Kim and

19:51

I have known each other for 20 years.

19:53

We figured that would count for something, but

19:55

we weren't sure. We decided let's pick a hard

19:57

case. Let's pick a couple of hard cases to start with because

19:59

if we can't. do those and make it work,

20:01

then we know we can make the show work. And

20:03

it worked so well. For us it was almost like,

20:06

yeah to your point, like we started with a pretty hard one to

20:09

test it and just, you know, kick

20:11

the tires. How many episodes have you

20:13

produced so far? Is it like broken

20:15

into seasons? We haven't broken into seasons.

20:18

We've done, we've recorded about a dozen so far.

20:20

And we're thinking of it as kind of an

20:22

always on show, you know, it's probably 35

20:25

to 40 episodes a year. We'll be right back after

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of the ones that really stands out for

22:33

me is the one that is titled What

22:35

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heard of the Third Reich. Adolf Hitler came

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to be called the Third Reich. What were

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what exactly is a Reich? I don't know,

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but I want to find out too. I

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23:08

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your podcasts. And a thank you

23:17

to our sponsors. Back to the program. Cool. And what's

23:20

the second case? The

23:22

second case is a case. It's Harold

23:24

and Tony Henthorn. This is a United

23:26

States case. This was a

23:29

wedding anniversary. Harold takes his wife,

23:31

Tony, on a wedding anniversary to

23:33

Rocky Mountain National Park in Colorado.

23:36

During the course of the anniversary,

23:38

they go hiking. And at

23:40

one point, she is, according to Harold, she's

23:43

taking, Tony's taking a photo and falls off

23:45

of a cliff. He

23:47

is able to get cell service, calls

23:49

the park rangers, actually goes to the

23:52

bottom off the cliff where she'd fallen

23:54

and gets down to her attempts. Life-saving

23:56

measures, but she does. On the face of it, it

23:59

just sounds like a... really horrible accident, like

24:01

a, just a terrible thing that happens.

24:03

It quickly becomes apparent that there might

24:05

be more to this story. I mean,

24:07

we actually have Harold's 911 call to

24:09

the Rangers. We play it on the

24:11

show. His tone of voice is so

24:13

not the tone you would expect of

24:15

someone whose wife is dying. It sounds

24:17

like he just, he knows

24:20

a lot about like the helicopters that should

24:22

be sent and the wind direction and where they

24:24

should land. Like it sounds very rehearsed. They then

24:26

find out that he actually had maps in his

24:28

car and they found from his cell phone that

24:30

he'd gone to this location before and

24:33

on the maps he had literally an X

24:35

marking the spot. So they start to piece

24:37

together. Maybe this wasn't an

24:39

accident. Not only that, but the

24:41

Rangers who came to do the

24:43

rescue described the location where this

24:45

happened as like a location

24:47

that they would consider difficult to go

24:49

to. It's not so, so off the

24:51

beaten path. It became clear pretty quickly

24:53

that there might be more going on

24:55

here. It might be foul play. They

24:57

discover there's quite a few life insurance

24:59

policies on her. And then the story

25:01

gets even stranger. And we get into

25:03

this on the show that his first

25:06

wife died under mysterious circumstances. There was

25:08

another woman who had some issues with,

25:10

you know, he'd actually accidentally dropped a

25:12

giant girder on his wife. Like

25:14

a year earlier when they were doing construction. This

25:16

guy had like this pattern. We got into

25:18

this and it's a very sad story, but

25:20

very interesting story. And also one that has

25:22

a lot of, we think a lot of

25:24

good takeaway for women in abusive relationships. Wait,

25:26

so he tried to, Harold tried to kill

25:28

Tony about a year before? Yeah, it was

25:30

considered an accident at the time, but in

25:33

retrospect, they are quite sure that it was

25:35

an earlier murder attempt. This case, guys, was

25:37

interesting because, you know, it's just a wild

25:39

story about what happened. But at the heart

25:42

of it is Tony, the woman who was

25:44

murdered. You know, this was her second marriage.

25:46

And this is something we really dig

25:48

into on the show is that she was someone who

25:50

had been married before. This was her second chance. She

25:52

was in her forties and saw this as like the

25:54

relationship that she was going to be in for the

25:56

rest of her life. You know, Harold did a lot

25:58

of things early on that. were just

26:00

red flags, like cutting off

26:03

communication between her and her friends, moving her

26:05

away from where she lived, where she had

26:07

her successful doctor practice, to another place, isolating

26:09

her physically. There was just a lot of

26:11

red flags in terms of his behavior that

26:13

he was not necessarily a safe person for

26:15

her. Kim actually was able to speak to

26:18

this much more eloquently than me because of

26:20

her work with domestic violence survivors. You know,

26:22

we talk about this a lot on the

26:24

show. Just things to look for. Not that

26:26

any of it could have necessarily been prevented,

26:28

but there were there were a

26:30

lot of red flags in this one. Yeah, do you find that

26:33

when you're speaking about these domestic violence

26:35

cases that the red flags are so

26:38

subtly occurring and spread out that the

26:40

survivor or the victim of the domestic

26:42

violence doesn't really see them happening because

26:44

it's so gradual? Have you had experience

26:47

with stories like that? Like it feels

26:49

like big red flags to us, but

26:51

to them, they probably don't realize it's

26:53

even happening until it's far too late.

26:55

That's absolutely right. Like there's not like

26:58

a giant flashing red light. It's more

27:00

of a small red flag. And so

27:02

what we try to do with cases like this

27:04

is to just highlight for people. She's someone who

27:06

might not even have never thought in a million

27:09

years. And I don't think most

27:11

women or men who are in abusive relationships, everything,

27:13

I'm likely to be in one of these, right?

27:15

So you're not really looking for it, but you're

27:17

absolutely right. It was like this little thing and

27:19

this little thing and a bigger thing and another

27:21

little thing. And people on

27:23

the outside, some of Tony's family,

27:26

were very concerned. They

27:28

saw it. Oftentimes the person in the relationship doesn't

27:30

because they're so subtle. We see that

27:32

a lot. Did Tony's friends and

27:34

family figure that something was wrong

27:36

here like right away? Yes, they

27:39

did. Yeah. Yeah. Some

27:41

of them immediately assumed that Harold

27:43

had done it. Yeah. There'd been

27:45

enough little things. My God, I

27:47

can't imagine. It strikes me as

27:49

like total evil, just like to

27:51

go through the steps of planning

27:54

and traveling to and looking at the maps

27:57

and making all that stuff. Like.

28:00

You're planning the whole time to kill your

28:02

partner that you're living with? Are you kidding

28:04

me? Not only was he planning to kill

28:06

her, right, which is so so deeply evil

28:09

He was also grooming another woman to

28:11

be murdered and who he was probably

28:13

planning on making his next wife Also

28:15

is related to the earlier

28:18

wife He killed and he had taken out insurance policies

28:20

like there's a whole other piece of this story that

28:22

we get into on the show that's just man,

28:25

it's complicated and diabolical and You

28:28

know, yeah, it doesn't make you realize

28:30

like some people are actually evil. Does

28:32

that make him a serial killer? I

28:34

don't know what the technical definition of

28:36

serial killer is, but he's

28:38

killed at least two people It might be

28:40

three but in the same way like with

28:42

the same kind of MO Yeah

28:45

So he's close if not if not there

28:47

I had heard of this and I just

28:49

had to Google it to see if he

28:51

was Or when he was found guilty and

28:53

he was found guilty Do you have like

28:55

a follow-up episodes anytime like there are updates

28:57

with the stories that you talk about often?

29:00

The story has already, you know when we're

29:02

talking about it It may have already been

29:05

concluded in terms of the the trial We're

29:07

just revisiting the and telling the story from

29:09

from a different angle a different perspective with

29:11

the victims in mind You know the case

29:13

for someone the trial is still ongoing or

29:16

something is outstanding We will do

29:18

follow-ups and as you mentioned it must be

29:20

easier for a murderer in this

29:22

case to Get away

29:24

with it if it's in a foreign country

29:27

I guess what's the ratio of cases that

29:29

you're covering that are ones in in domestic

29:31

and foreign countries? That's a good question. I'm gonna look

29:33

at my list right now and tell you let's say

29:35

our first ten Four

29:37

or five of them are US based and

29:40

four or five are overseas Wow Okay, and

29:42

with the overseas ones are those mostly the

29:44

person got away with it. No You

29:47

know, I'll throw out one more interesting wrinkle that

29:49

we get into on this vacation is we also

29:51

get into cases Where there

29:53

is an assumption that it was murder,

29:56

but it might not have been right? So there's the

29:58

reverse like most of the time someone's trying

30:00

to make it look like an accident, but it was a

30:02

murder. Sometimes people are accused of murder,

30:04

but it might actually have been an accident.

30:07

And so we do some of those as

30:09

well. And those are, especially if they're overseas,

30:11

even more complicated. But yeah, we have found

30:13

resolution with some of the overseas ones. There's

30:16

actually a handful of them that are just

30:18

really tragic that don't have resolution, where in

30:21

some cases people haven't even been found

30:23

or, you know, they've been found dismembered

30:25

and the ability to like really untangle

30:28

what happened is really tough. So we,

30:30

you know, some of those have become

30:32

actually two part episodes for us because

30:34

there's so much to cover. And we'll be right

30:36

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Thanks to our sponsors and now we're back to the

32:54

program. And how about some rabbit

32:56

holes that you might have gone down. You've covered,

32:58

you said about 30 cases so

33:00

far? We have about 30 that we've

33:02

researched. We've recorded a dozen so far.

33:04

Okay, so out of the

33:07

30 or so that you've researched and the ones

33:09

that you've recorded, which one is like the one

33:11

that was the rabbit hole? That you go to

33:13

bed at night and you're just like, I can't

33:15

get this one out of my head? There was

33:17

one, this one was just awful. Yeah, this one

33:19

was really tough. It was a spring break story

33:21

in Myrtle Beach and it was a young woman

33:23

who was 17. She

33:26

was a college kid. She went

33:28

to Myrtle Beach for spring break and

33:31

disappeared, vanished. I mean, they had her on cameras

33:33

at one point when they were looking to try

33:35

and figure it out and then she was just

33:37

gone. The really tragic part of the story is

33:39

she wasn't even supposed to be there. In fact,

33:41

her mother had forbidden her to go. Her mom

33:43

had said, I don't know who you're going with.

33:45

I don't know these people. I don't want you

33:48

down there. Just, you can't go. And so she

33:50

concocted a story and went very far away from

33:52

home to this place she'd never been. And

33:55

yeah, this one was really tough. They

33:57

eventually found her about 10 years

33:59

later. It was over 10 years later. They

34:02

found her in a grave and

34:04

were able to piece together what

34:06

happened and figured out who did it. But

34:09

that one was just really hard. Just on every

34:11

level, just a young person,

34:13

the mom, just the tragedy of the mother

34:15

having been so adamant that she not go

34:18

on this trip and then she snuck away.

34:20

Just the total lack of closure for the

34:22

family for a decade. And then what the

34:24

closure is is not, I mean, kind of

34:26

know where it's going, but it's still just

34:28

horrible. And what made this one really tough,

34:30

I think of all of the ones we've

34:32

done so far, there's just no good

34:35

takeaway from it. There's no,

34:37

hey kids, don't go on trips if your mom says

34:39

not to, but it's like, this shouldn't happen to anybody.

34:42

None of this should happen to anyone. But that one

34:44

was just, that one just hit us really hard, really

34:46

hard. Was that a case where there

34:48

was someone that she traveled with that did it

34:50

or was that something that happened

34:53

while she was there? No, happened while

34:55

she was there. Someone she didn't know

34:57

abducted her, assaulted her and murdered her.

34:59

That's awful. Do

35:02

you have any plans for

35:04

a TV version of Slacation

35:06

with all your TV background?

35:09

Absolutely. We would love to do a TV

35:11

version of this show. The original idea was a

35:14

TV. We originally could see this in the

35:16

TV show for Discovery ID back in the

35:18

day. This version of it, where the three of

35:20

us are talking about the cases, is wildly

35:22

different than what we'd pictured a decade ago and so

35:25

much better. It's so much richer and

35:27

more interesting. I hate

35:29

to say there is something fun about the way we

35:31

go through the stories. Yeah, it would be a great

35:33

TV show. It's

35:36

just endlessly fascinating. Each story is

35:38

so different. When you really get

35:40

into the details and really start

35:42

thinking about the victims and the families, there's

35:45

so much to each of these stories that doesn't

35:47

get told. What about a live version? Have you

35:49

ever thought about taking it on stage? Yes, actually.

35:51

A few people have suggested we do that and

35:53

we are 100% open to it. We

35:56

haven't figured out how and when to do that

35:58

yet, but that's definitely in... In the cards would

36:00

you would you want to come see us record the

36:02

show? Well, that's kind of what I was getting at I

36:04

was looking for some free tickets. It's like I I feel

36:07

like I need to have I should have some tickets for

36:09

you guys right now like But

36:11

uh, yeah, we'd love to do it. We'd love to

36:13

have you guys there. Yeah, that'd be a blast. Yes

36:16

Will you try to focus like

36:19

a different version of this for tv

36:21

again? Yeah, so what we're gonna focus

36:23

on first is building a fantastic podcast

36:25

and a great community around the podcast

36:28

That's our focus now We've also found

36:30

that we love podcasting because we

36:32

have this direct relationship with our fans that we don't

36:34

have when we make a tv show I would love

36:36

to just spend a while building the show up and

36:38

building up a community and really hearing from our fans

36:41

What they love giving them more of what they love

36:43

getting feedback and you know Eight months

36:45

a year down the road when we're you

36:47

know crushing it and uh, the numbers are

36:49

huge We'll talk we'll talk about tv

36:51

and we'll figure it out But our focus now

36:53

is is making a great podcast and like getting

36:56

a great community of fans All right, so you've

36:58

put all of this work into the production you've

37:00

recorded a bunch of episodes. It's gonna go live

37:02

in january You yourself

37:05

it feels to me could use a

37:07

vacation. So where is your dream vacation?

37:10

Is there a place that you are planning to go

37:12

or maybe? Saving up

37:14

for like this is this is my place that i'm

37:16

not gonna get murdered if I go Yeah, and who

37:18

would you go with too? I feel like that's such

37:20

a big part of this So

37:23

I I actually am going on a dream

37:25

vacation a couple weeks after this launches I'm

37:28

going to south africa with my husband

37:31

And one of our best friends from germany

37:33

skymano Uh, we're going down

37:35

there for our friend. Robert. Robert's getting married to

37:38

katie In cape town or near

37:40

cape town. I see you're given all

37:42

these details Yes, see this is

37:44

my thing. I can't I can't talk about anything

37:46

without details Wait

37:49

a second mono sounds a little bit like

37:51

a bond villain A

37:55

german guy named mono. Yeah. Yeah, he's he's

37:57

definitely not a bond villain. Uh, it's a

37:59

nickname So yeah, but

38:01

we're going down there and yeah, I'm not

38:03

gonna get murdered I'm going with

38:05

people I trust so far as you know, I'm

38:08

hung up on mono's nickname. How did he get

38:10

the nickname mono? I've

38:15

known mono for years. I've traveled all over

38:17

with him and I have

38:19

no idea how that where that nickname comes from All

38:23

right. Well, we'll need to know next time

38:25

you're here on these airwaves you want to

38:27

follow up episode It'll be all about mono

38:33

We'll just ask him in person when you take us

38:36

to South Africa with you Okay, okay. So

38:38

you guys are coming to South Africa then we're gonna do a

38:40

live show You're coming to that

38:42

and then you coming back on cross face. Awesome

38:46

It's the whole thing. Well in person. I don't speak

38:48

in a delay by the way That

38:54

would be kind of wild if you do Would

38:58

be really wild, you know, if

39:00

this is the weird thing to The

39:07

delay is so annoying Person

39:12

is like this is my friend Lance his

39:14

thing is he talks with the delay So

39:17

just just wait a few seconds after he

39:19

speaks And

39:22

then speak and then wait a few seconds delay

39:27

delay Mono

39:32

and I could have a show together delay in mono The

39:37

mono and delay show Mono

39:40

and delay show it's so weird to say something and

39:42

then watch the two of you not do anything for

39:44

like three seconds And I'm like, okay.

39:47

Well, thank you for being in

39:49

real time. I Thank you for

39:51

that as well Yeah,

39:53

this has been a great chat any

39:56

other cases you want to mention here

39:58

honestly, there's no specific cases Every case

40:00

we do on slakation is absolutely wild and

40:02

interesting. And even though I know the details,

40:05

I'm still sitting there on the edge of

40:07

my seat. I would just say tune in,

40:09

man. We'll be there

40:11

with the new slakay every week. Very

40:13

cool. Well, thanks so much for

40:16

joining us. This has been a lot of fun meeting

40:18

you. Thank you, guys. Yeah, this has been a lot

40:20

of fun for me too. I appreciate it. The

40:47

holidays start here at Kroger with a

40:49

variety of options to celebrate traditions old

40:51

and new. You could do a classic

40:53

herb roasted turkey or spice it up

40:55

and make turkey tacos. Serve up

40:57

a go-to shrimp cocktail or use simple

41:00

truth wild caught shrimp for your first

41:02

Cajun risotto. Make creamy mac

41:04

and cheese or a spinach artichoke fondue

41:07

from our selection of Murray's cheese. No

41:09

matter how you shop, Kroger has all

41:11

the freshest ingredients to embrace all your

41:13

holiday traditions. Kroger, fresh for

41:15

everyone. This is

41:17

the Glassbox Media Podcast.