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Hello, everybody, and welcome back to Small Town Murder Express. Yay! Choo-choo! Oh, yay indeed, Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petrigallo. I'm here with my co-host. I'm Jimmy Wissman. Thank you, folks, for joining us so much all aboard the murder train. We got a crazy one for you. Even the town name is crazy. It makes no sense how they say it.
We'll get into all of that before we do very quickly. Top of the show. Thanks for all that you do for us. You're heroes. You are head over to shut up and give me murder.com. If you want to be bigger heroes and go to a live show. Oh yeah. April 5th, Sacramento, April 6th and San Francisco. First up of the year. First show dates. Get your tickets now for everything. They're going fast. There's dates that are sold out at the end of the year. So,
Definitely get in there. Minneapolis, you can be our biggest show ever. I can't wait. Make it happen. Also, April the 20th, Saturday night, April 20th, and it's available for two weeks after that. Two weeks? A full two weeks. You can do whatever you want with it. Watch it 100 times. Virtual live show, just like a regular live show. The Table, VGTV.
The pictures, the story, us. Themed up? Themed up because it's 420. I'll make Jimmy smoke out of crazy things that will scare the shit out of him. We're going to dress up in costumes. Get there. Come see it. We cannot wait. We're so excited for it. Shut up and give me murder.com. Quickly, patreon.com slash crime in sports is where you get all of the bonus material.
Great. There's so much bonus material, too, as we know. A couple hundred back episodes. Anybody that's $5 a month or above, a mere cup of coffee will get you. That money will get you so much more than a cup of coffee. Stretch your dollar. Our cup is so much deeper than a cup of coffee. And it runneth. It runneth way over. A couple hundred back episodes, and then new ones every other week. And this week is no different. What you're going to get is...
for crime and sports, which you'll also have access to. We're going to talk about Hans Nieman or Nyman, who was, he's a chess player who has been accused of having a vibrator up his ass to be signaled of chest, chest moves or so. It seems like something that'd be more handy for cards, but,
I guess chess too. Learning Morse code for this. You have to learn a lot for this. We'll talk all about that on other up-the-ass mechanisms people have used over time. Jesus. And then for Small Town Murder, D.B. Cooper. Let's find out what happened there. We'll talk about it. Let's talk about it. I've read so much about it. The guy obviously had a
and said he had a bomb and jumped out of a plane and never was seen again. So one of the biggest mysteries there are. We'll talk about all that and more. Patreon.com slash Crime in Sports. And you get a shout-out at the end of the show. You bet. The end of the main show. That said, let's get to this. Let's go. We got a lot of story. Let's do it. I think it's time, everybody, to sit back. Let's clear the lungs, arms to the sky, everyone, and let's all shout. Shout out!
Give me murder. Let's do this, everybody. Okay. Let's go on a trip, shall we? All right. We should. We're going to Bailton, Tennessee. Now, I say it like that with a little bit of skepticism in my voice because it is spelled Bail-E-Ton.
B-A-I-L-E-Y-T-O-N. And it was originally Bailey Town. And then they dropped the thing, I guess, because, you know, town is a lot to say. And they like to shorten things up in the south. So Bailey. Yeah. And then they said, what the fuck do we need the E for? Just Bailton. Screw it.
And here we are with Bailton, who doesn't look like Bailton. We don't even say it right. Nobody says it right. I'm sure that goes there. It's in northeastern Tennessee in that panhandle that comes out of the northeastern part of Tennessee, about an hour from Knoxville, five hours to Lawrenceburg, Tennessee, which was our last Tennessee episode, which was called Fat Salmon Crazy Crystal. I remember that one. That was a crazy one. Population of this town, 430 people.
What? Very small town here. Median household income here, $36,875, which is about half the national average. That is not good. Median home cost here, also very low, $156,800. Wow.
This is a picturesque. This is the hills up here. Yeah, it's picturesque. It's beautiful. If you flew over it, you go, it's beautiful. But there's not a lot going on down there. Right. It was originally called Laurel Gap when it was first settled. It was first settled in 1776.
Right. Back in revolutionary times here. That's a specific year. Very specific. That's a big deal. Yeah. A lot of people lived here were all farmers, everybody there. First, it was called Bailey Town, two separate words. Then it was Bailey Town, one word. Then, for some reason, the W was dropped in 1915, and it was just Baileyton. This was named after two brothers that lived there, Claudius and Thomas Bailey. And now it's just Bailton, they call it. Yeah.
beats the shit out of me those poor guys wow yeah they had their name just bastardized yeah it's not even about them anymore you imagine having your name a town jamestown they just call it jameton yeah well if it was my last name i'd be furious if it's named yeah drop some vowels i understand it's complicated but if it's named after you fucking pronounce my name give me the credit man it's not like it doesn't mean it's not petrogallo it's bailey it's very easy right
It's two syllables. Nope, too many. One syllable, Bailton, and that's it. So whatever, that's fine. It's your town. You can call it whatever you want. Just spell it right. Spell it. Yeah, that's a change to spelling like you did when you dropped the W. Reviews of this town. There's only one review here, actually.
And they love it. So let's find out. Really? Five stars. I've had a good experience in Bailton. I have grown up here all my life. Everyone is extremely nice and helpful, and they would help you out with anything. I like how everything is so close, like five minutes from Bailton School and eight from North Green. Wow. They're not even saying ten. They're going eight minutes. Exactly.
James, there are 400 people here. How big can the shit be? It can't have that much traffic either. You figure half the people don't have cars. Some are too old. Some are too young. I would like to see more things added to the Belton Park area. Maybe like a volleyball net or something like that. They're not asking for a lot.
Yeah, but you own a volleyball court in a town of 400. Head on over to Walmart and pick it up and stake it in the ground. Set it up in your yard. Yeah. But I mean, most of these are like, I would like to see more restaurants and a mall. I would like it to not be a small town. They're like, I'd like to see a volleyball net. Just put a net up. We don't even need, you don't even need to mark it out. We'll mark out the sides and everything. No, we don't want the sand. It's fine. So families could go have and play or have a picnic.
Other than that, it's a nice place to park and hang out, like for birthday parties or just to get together at. Okay. All right. Things to do. Not a lot. You've got to go to Greenville. The Greenville Iris Festival, which is in Greene County, and it's their annual Iris Festival, and they have...
Iris, not Irish. No, no, Iris, the flower. Not the Irish festival. All right. No, no, that's St. Patrick's Day. We have that already. This is just about flowers. You can shop at over 155 vendors. I don't know if they're only selling flowers or what, but you can also go to the Sundown on Depot, which it says, rev your engines and roll into the Sundown on Depot car show.
It's got a classic car show. And then for some reason at the end of all this, we're celebrating flowers, I guess, and things like that. There's an axe throwing and Renaissance fair. May as well. Channel your inner warrior as you try your hand at axe throwing a sport that combines precision and fun.
Yeah, I've done it. It's not so bad, but it does fucking hurt the next day. Yeah, who throws axes in your everyday life? Have we been lumberjacking? No, that's not a normal procedure. No one throws an axe normally. It hurts so bad for several days. You'll pinch a nerve. And you're not going to work those muscles out. You'd have to axe throw like four times a week to be able to not be sore.
And surprise, surprise, you're all shit at it. Everyone's shit at it. And if you were good at it, then what? What are you going to be? Turn pro? Who gives a shit? Great.
You're good at a hobby. Terrific. I'm good at an exercise bike. Good for you. It's the same thing. There's no three-letter league for this shit. Go back to work. That said, let's talk about some murder because we're packed chock full of murder today here. Great. Well, it's just a wild story that's tragic on many sides. It's one of those. Here. Let's talk about some people first. All right. Yeah. Let's talk about some people. All these people are going to be from Kentucky.
Bailton is going to kind of be a stopover where something bad happens from people that are outside of it. Talk about a young lady first named Karen Howell. Karen, we're going to talk mainly about like 1996, 1997. She was born in 1979, late 79. So when all of this takes place, she's 17 years old. She's born in Ohio. Her family moved to Kentucky when she was three. I'm sure her parents got divorced when she was nine.
she says they got divorced because her mother was a Christian and her father wasn't. Either one of them would be tired of the other one's bullshit at that point. You know what I mean? They think whatever the other's doing is wrong. It's a miracle that they got along at all. If this is driving them apart in the first place, you know what I mean? It's crazy. That's true. I don't know how they got together or maybe she became more of a Christian, he became lesser. I'm not sure. Oh, okay. So some people fall out of it. I don't know. She had a
Her parents had some violent, nasty fights between them. She also says later on that she was sexually abused between the ages of five and ten by an uncle and a cousin.
Oh, two? Jesus. I don't know if it's the same time or... Oh, I hope not. Good Lord. I really don't want to know. But unsurprisingly, with beginnings like that, by 13, she started cutting herself. She's doing great. Yeah. Very well adjusted. Yeah, that's fucking... Oh, man. Poor thing. That sucks, man. Yeah, that's...
Unfortunately predictable with that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It comes with the territory, unfortunately. Yeah. She also attempted suicide a couple of times, twice by cutting her wrists and twice by ODing on drugs. Oh, Karen. She's had some stuff going on here for a young lady. Until 14, until she was 14, she lived with her mother and fought with her constantly and
And she's not good, everybody says, including school and everybody else. Not good with rules and regulations. Doesn't care for them much. Both of them are awful. Not liking that. And also has kind of a hard time functioning at school due to the – you've got to follow a lot of rules and regulations at school is the problem. Those do apply there. And if you don't like yourself anyway as evidenced by self-harm –
Who gives a shit if I succeed or not through this bullshit school that has all these rules and then comes along with the regulations? Well, she's also doing a lot of drugs at this time, too, which definitely changes. How old? 14, 13, 14, 15. She would run away all the time. Also developed an interest in witchcraft.
which she began by use. She would use her Ouija board and and auto quote automatic writing. Do you know what that is? No. OK, let's talk about automatic writing. That's we got to talk about that for a minute. This is right from Wikipedia. Also called psychography is a claim to psychic ability, allowing a person to produce written words without consciously writing.
So like something's channeling you and you're just, it's moving your hand to write words. I don't know. I wish you could channel that for English class. Yeah. You're lucky that the thing speaks English. Whatever's channeling you. They're not writing it in like ancient Sanskrit or something. You'd be fucked. Yeah. What does this mean? Jesus, what am I writing? Symbols and shit. Calligraphy. Yeah. Practitioners engage in automatic writing by holding a writing instrument and allowing alleged spirits to manipulate the practitioner's hand.
The instrument may be a standard writing instrument or maybe one specifically designed for automatic writing, such as a planchette or a Ouija board. Yeah. She would do that on there and the Ouija. Yeah. So her mother found some of these writings. Oh, boy. And gave them to ministers who then attempted to, quote, cast out her demons.
which I'm sure was great for her psychologically as well. As we all know, exorcisms really do a great job on people's psyches, as we found out over time. That ought to fix her. That ought to do it. So she claimed, though, that these weren't bad spells. She wasn't trying to do anything black magic or anything crazy weird. She just had created love spells to get two boys she liked to want to date her. That's what she was doing.
Which every teenager does that in some way, shape or form, whether they do it formally through automatic writing or they just try to conjure some positive visualization in their head. Or spray on some polo sport. Or just close their eyes and jerk off. One of the three. That's a good way for guys. Oh, I dated many a girl. All of them. All of the hot girls.
So that's how that goes. She also says she hears voices, which is a problem, obviously. She says she started hearing voices at age 13 and also claimed to have visual hallucinations of things such as snakes, spirits and demons.
Okay. But she's also on drugs. She's also on drugs. And yeah, by 15, she was starting to be sexually active voluntarily. She also was experimenting with a lot of drugs by 15, like, you know, weed and booze, as a lot of kids do. Sure. But also LSD, staking acid, dropping acid, alcohol.
doing PCP so she's doing dust this is the mid 90s dust is very I smoked dust in the mid 90s mixed with weed and blunts not for fun though right not on purpose yeah on purpose Jesus Christ you buy the little fucking beacon you buy the little red devil bags and you fucking you mix them with blunts and that shit was good yeah I was a fucking hooligan that's why you're fucking mine man
And also doing coke and shit, which I don't like any uppers of any kind. So that never my thing. Did that once. She's really trying. Wow, this is horrible. She's really trying everything except for meth. Yeah, I don't know how much meth there was in the mid 90s in a rural area, too. Good point. That was it's that was tough to find. Probably tougher than now. It's everybody's got it. I'm sure. Oh, God, it's fucking insane. She said she tripped about on acid about 14 times.
which is a lot. That's a good, it's a decent amount. I'll tell you whether or not you like it. I'm still, I'm still not sure how I feel about it. I'm on the fence. Let me try it a couple more. Let's get to 20. She said she had two bad trips, which two out of 14, not bad. That usually happens earlier. Then you learn how to set up your, set yourself up for success.
By like the fourth, fifth time you do acid, there's a whole plan and a structure for the night. You're going to be our sober person. Zero variables. Yeah. We're going to watch this. We're going to watch this. I bought these things to play with, and I got things to do. We're not going anywhere. We're locking the doors. Zero variables. Yeah. One time during a bad trip, she had a worse one than I ever had. She tried to chew her friend's arm.
Just like eat her friend's arm. I don't know if she had like a Bugs Bunny on a stranded, on an isolated island fantasy that her friend turned into a chicken or what. Jesus. Number one Bugs would be stranded. Every time. That turkey looked great. It looked so good in a big hamburger. I've never had a meal that looked as good as that. Or whenever they would be barbecuing a steak on a
It looks so good. The bone in the middle. The little bone in the middle. What is that? I don't know what steak. I don't know what cut that is. I've never seen that steak before. But I've been looking for it since I was three. I really have. I've never seen that steak in my entire life. If I find one, it's on. I'm going to eat that shit out of that thing. Boy, that's all I'll be doing is barbecuing cartoon steaks. It's probably some shit cut, right? It's got to be like something they throw in the trash.
Some terrible cut from the 50s. For dogs. It's made into good dog food now. That's what that is.
So the second time she had a bad trip, she sat alone on the bathroom floor for hours, which that'll give you a bad trip. You got to get around people. Yeah, you can't just sit in a room and stare at a wall. No, that's why you can't take too much acid because you have to be aware enough to go, you're on drugs. Yeah. You did this on purpose. This is what happens, yeah. This is what you wanted. Now this is how...
these are the steps you have to take to try to fix what's going on here and do positive things. You paid money for this. Yeah, and she's got to have friends. That's what you do with friends, too, because you look for your friends. You've got to look out for people if you're tripping. So if you see somebody sitting on the bathroom floor, you go, hey, hey, come on, Karen, let's go. Let's go do something. Come on. Yay. Also, at 14, you're not capable of handling this. I think it was like 15, 16 she was doing this.
It's still a bit young, right? That's when I was doing it. Still, it's not. I wouldn't recommend it for kids. No. If you're listening and you're 15, I don't recommend acid for you for a long while. My kid's 15. I don't recommend fucking sugar for him. Yeah, yeah. I got to watch. He's out of control already. Yeah, you give my son a Sprite. It's on. Watch out.
Not even the caffeine, just sugar. Sprite and you've got to fucking pat down the hatches. Oh boy, Tasmanian devil on your hands. Yeah. Psychological testing indicates that Karen functions within the, medically I'm going to use this, quote unquote, borderline retarded range of intelligence. Her IQ is 78. Yeah.
Okay. Which Forrest Gump was... Did you take that test? Yeah. Forrest Gump is 72. So just to... Okay, so she's doing all right. I always do the Gump scale. Like, think of Forrest Gump. This is close there, so...
But did they take it on a day that she was drugged up? Do you know what I mean? Because no, this is a couple of different times. We'll talk about it. But that's that's the number. A psychiatrist stated that she does not suffer from a primary mental retardation, but and she has the potential to function within the average range of intelligence and has an ability to speak effectively, but does not function well under pressure and gives up easily.
She's got a host of problems. She's got a bunch of problems to her. Yeah, all stemming. She needs a lot of help is what she needs. So she had low grades and she said she never paid attention in school. And they said she probably also has ADD at the same time, too. Sure. She drops out of school at the age of 16. Why not? She started as a freshman at three different high schools, 14, 15, 16.
Oh, yeah. And then just couldn't pack it. Why would you even? Why would you? She did. After her first semester of high school, she moved in with her father. And that was, you know, they never really even talked, she said, which was weird. After a few months, she moved back in with her mother. And she said it was fine with her dad. It wasn't that bad. But she just wanted to move in with her mother. But she said she couldn't perform the required work in school. She couldn't do it. So she was going to try to get her GED.
She was also babysitting for her brother and sister-in-law every day, and her sister-in-law was helping her study for her GED. So her mother, by the way, has been diagnosed with bipolar disorder.
And has similar behavioral patterns to her, whereas the depression and then hyperactivity and rage and these waves. Her mother on her on her her grandmother on her mother's side and her grandfather were also diagnosed bipolar. So genetic. Yeah, certainly runs in the family. She she meets some new friends here.
Perfect. Yeah. Who is she going to attract? You know what I mean? Who is she going to look for as a kid that's rebelling? Yeah. She finds a young lady named Natasha Cornett. Natasha Wallen at the time. She'll later be Natasha Cornett when she gets married, when she turns 18 for like four months. So she's from Betsy Lane, Kentucky. And Cornett also likes witchcraft and also claims to hear voices. So they're a match made in heaven here.
Yeah, it's... Wow. It's a lot. They... She comes from a really tumultuous family here. Yeah. Her mother, I guess... Well, her mother was divorced and had a kid when she was born. She...
Her father, I guess, didn't realize that her mother was having an affair. And that's what she is. The product of was this affair that her mother didn't know about. So she thought her father was her father till she was five when she learned that a guy named Roger Burgess, who was a Pikeville, Kentucky police officer, was actually her father.
Oh, my God. So that's a little... You're starting on shaky ground when that's what you're finding out at five. Yeah, that's what made Manson. You can't... You gotta... Fuck, man. I...
Sometimes facts suck, but you gotta be honest with these kids, man. My God, Jesus, that's rough, man. You gotta tell them who and what they are. Fuck. Apparently one of her boyfriends, one of her mom's boyfriends, made an attempt to be a father figure to her. But when Natasha was seven, her mother left the relationship.
And I'm sorry, the guy left the relationship because her mother had persistent infidelities. So and violent outbursts because she's got mental illness that's untreated at that point. Yeah, she's a party. Natasha was smoking cigarettes by the age of five.
Okay. She found out her dad wasn't her dad and was like, let me tell you something, sweetheart. You think you got problems, honey? Yeah. I got it much worse, all right? I got kindergarten tomorrow. I'm doing mornings. I want to do afternoon. It was all full up. You know, I got a lot. I got a polyp over here. I got to get checked out later on. Hand me the Marlboros, would you? Hey, honey, would you hand me the Benson and Hedges, please? Thank you. I smoked the 120s. It's a better value.
Get more for my dollar. Get more for my dollar. So in 1985, her mom was treated successfully for breast cancer. So it's really a lot. Really, really a lot, I'll tell you. I mean, just a... She's got a lot of stuff. She's being put with different people. When her mom's sick, she's living with her grandmother and all of that. She was fascinated with her grandmother's discussions of the paranormal, apparently. Okay.
And she got into that from there and got into the occult. And, uh, her grandmother claimed that she could speak with dead people. So, Oh yeah. That's yeah. So her mother, then that year she went back with her mother and then her mother had a nervous breakdown and a back surgery. I wonder why. Oh my God. So then after having an affair with a married attorney in Pikeville, her mom filed a suit for sexual harassment against somebody else at her job or something. And, uh,
This finally at this point, her mom gets medication and some psychiatric counseling, which will help stabilize home at least. So that's good. Take somebody literally blowing her back out for. Yeah. It gets it gets some therapy. Fuck. Yeah. But Natasha, by the sixth grade, she's already dealing with bulimia and depression. Oh, my God. She lost 30 pounds and was hospitalized for an eating disorder in the sixth grade. Sixth grade.
Her clock is way sped up. She's smoking by five, having eating disorders by fucking 10, 11. This girl's 19. This is insane. She's 11 having problems with this. Right. So, wow. It's a lot. Um,
Her father, I guess, her real father, the police officer, his wife ends up dying. So he starts to show an interest in her and like calling her and stuff because this guy's wife didn't want nothing to do with his affair child. Right now. Now that lady's dead. That hates me for what I did. Yeah. Now I can do this. But that relationship was on again, off again. In elementary school, she's a straight A student.
Yeah, she'd have to take a few smoke breaks every day. But other than that, when she'd get in the classroom, she was really focused. She comes up with a thermos and a cigarette. Yeah, no shit. Thermos full of coffee. Smoke on. All right. Let's get to these fucking ABCs. What do you say? Let's go. I brought a nice egg salad sandwich for lunch. Smoking.
Yeah, yeah, the farmer and the dell. Yeah, the farmer and the dell. Yeah, yeah, a moo-moo here and a moo-moo there. All right. Jesus Christ. Bingo is his name. I'll play another one. I know the end of this one already. Come on.
Fuck you, spider. I don't care how big he is. Christ. It's a little bitsy. That thing ain't going to fit down the drain, you know. It's going to get clogged. You're going to have to call a plumber. That's, you know, $89 an hour we're talking. I don't know what you want to spend. It's $75 for him to show up. Just to get in the door at $75.
Blotch that motherfucker down the toilet. Let's get over it. So I feel terrible for this girl, honestly. Everybody said before the seventh grade she'd been a good student, polite, conservative in dress and that sort of thing. By sixth grade she's cutting herself and she's...
wearing dark clothing and black fingernails and dark eye makeup and lip makeup. But she's just dressed in gothy 90s, kind of Marilyn Manson-y at the time. Yeah, she's leaning into feeling like an outcast. Yeah, which would be fine to just, because everybody can express that, except her grades slipped and all that sort of thing. She's become sexually active at about 13 when she was a little young. Oh, yeah.
Also, she fought with her mother all the time. In 1993, she threatened to cut herself with a knife and her mother tried to take the knife away. So then she threatened to stab her mother with it. OK, so jail time, right? Well, yeah, her mom called the police and she was arrested. She was released by police into the custody of her father. While living there, she tried to commit suicide by slashing her wrists.
She's hospitalized for 11 days for psychiatric care at that time. Here's a couple diary entries from her, okay? Yeah. Oh, lucky me to rot in this godforsaken world. This is such a teenager. I mean... Yeah, this is just Winona Ryder and Beetlejuice at the moment. Yeah, that's what I mean. It could just be that because that's what she did too, but you never know. Right.
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Now back to the show. I am death. Look at me. I am hate. Do hate me. Never love me. No, for I am the unloved, untouched, and unwanted. Give me, take me, shred me away so I will not harm. Jesus, that's dark for a 14-year-old. That's...
She then writes,
I do not. What is said? I do not understand. Jeez. That's a lot. Uh, her diary that all this was written in is a pink book with a unicorn on it, by the way. That's what makes it fucking weird. That's really does. Um,
Wow. Is it ironic? Is she doing it ironically, like, I'll buy this cute, frilly shit and then write all this dark shit in it? I bet someone gave it to her for her birthday or something. She's like, well, I got a diary. I mean, it's pinkish. What?
Watch this. She could have sharpied it over. You know, I think she probably found the irony amusing. She seems smart by the by her writing. She doesn't. Yeah, that's that's the other part. She's a very, very sharp girl to understand those words. And also stuffed in her diary were two movie tickets from an October 22nd, 1995 showing of Halloween.
An anniversary release or one of those deals. So also her walls and ceilings in her mom's trailer in her bedroom in the trailer are covered with her writings. And she lets her friend write all over the walls. Oh, like written on it, not like a thumbtack paper. No, no, writing on the walls. Whoa. Covered like graffiti. She was diagnosed with severe depression and also bipolar disorder, was prescribed Prozac and lithium, which-
If you watch the Sopranos in the first season when Junior tries to have him killed, spoiler alert if you haven't seen it.
Tony's in this haze the whole time where he's just like, until that gunshot happens, there's this music and he's like this weird ethereal dream sequence. He's on Prozac and lithium at the same time. That's what's causing this. Lithium's heavy shit. He has. Especially for a child. Yeah, he's a 275-pound mob boss and he's having, there's a whole episode that's a lithium hallucination of a woman next door that doesn't exist. Remember, he had lunch with nobody. Right.
So she's got a lot of issues. She entered at 15 the Big Sandy Kentucky Impact Program, which was a treatment program designed to help children through school and cope with family issues. But she dropped out because she said it wasn't doing any good. She told a psychiatrist she believed she had lived prior lives and had out-of-body experiences and believed that her soul may have become pregnant at one point in her life, but not her body.
I didn't know you could get a soul knocked up, but that's a whole new level of scary for all you kids out there. That's a deep dick. You can get her soul pregnant. Wow. That's a big old cock. It's a hammer. She drops out of school before completing the ninth grade.
And by 14, she's arrested for the theft of a box of checks and for forgery. She gets probation for that. And then she's arrested for threatening her mother with a knife. And the court dismissed those charges. She's drinking. She's using drugs. She's even using like heroin and ecstasy and shit, too. Like she's not just having a little fun here. She also found crystal meth, too. So she got into she got into meth. She said she tripped on acid over 100 times.
At what age? 16, 16. Just a lot. That's dead serious, man. Yes. She married on her 17th birthday. She married Steve Cornette. That's how she ends up with that last name. And while Natasha, she said that they dress different. So they make a big deal out of the fact that they dressed in goth shit to get married. They were chained together by collars and shit, like all that shit. They were married like four months. That didn't go anywhere.
Chained together. Yeah. So Natasha had depression after that. You know, when you're a 17-year-old divorcee, that'll happen. Yeah, yeah. And then she moved to New Orleans where she panhandled on the streets with a girlfriend of hers. In the late 90s? In the late 90s. In 96, 97. Jesus. Master P is right next to her selling tapes out of the trunk of his car. And she's like, hey, I got five bucks. Let me get the new Mac. Hey, Percy, you got five bucks? Yeah.
She says she was raped on the street while she was there. Oh, God damn it. Horrible surprise. Yeah. But what ended up happening is she moves back into her home. She's having problems, but there's no supervision. Her mom lets her do whatever she wants. She's got a group of friends that she believes to have led the group in dark practices, she will say. Yeah.
She considers herself a vampire and named her black dog Malkavian after a blood-sucking clan in her favorite vampire fantasy board game. A kid from school described her as a dark soul who'd give you the willies. Yeah, so then there's a kid here we'll enter named Jason Blake Bryant.
He's 14. He's from Marrowbone, Kentucky. That is a real place. Marrowbone, not Marrow. One word, Marrowbone, Kentucky. Oh, one word. Marrowbone. Okay. Maybe that's the bone that's in the middle of that really good steak. It has to be. What would be in the middle of that bone? Marrow. It's a Marrowbone steak. Now, this kid is only 14 when he meets her in March of 1997 when she's 18.
Oh, Jason Blake Bryant is his name. Jason Bryant. He's 14. She picked him up on a street corner in Pikeville, Kentucky, and took her home with her, took him home with her while he was there. She gave him vodka and bourbon. Then they kissed and spent the night at her home. And she said she didn't know. Both of them said she didn't know how old he was until the next morning.
At 14, he's walking down the street, gets picked up by an older girl. She gives him booze and then makes out with him. Oh, my God. Who gives you booze and hangs. Yeah. Best day ever. None of his friends are ever going to believe this, by the way. Ever. Yeah, that's his big bitch story. Yeah, right. No, she was hot. She had like black lipstick and shit. It was awesome. It was all over my face. I had black thingies. All right, man. Sure, sure. Sure.
He has an IQ of 85, which again is, you know, average is 100. So, you know, it's approaching it, but still not great. They said one of the highest in Kentucky, though. Yeah, it's still pretty good for the panhandle region of Kentucky. Not bad. Not bad. Yeah. He has, according to test, the social skills of an 11 year old, though. Oh, so, yeah, he has also a history of drug and alcohol abuse.
From the age of – he began to use alcohol as early as the age of three, which I don't even know – No, you didn't. I mean, he might have said that felt good when I did that. I mean, somebody rubbed it on your gums when you were teething. That's not using alcohol. I don't know.
He said he used marijuana and other drugs since the age of nine. I feel like there's a lot of parental supervision going on here. It's going great. Yeah. He was arrested twice in 1996. The first charge was that he was, quote, beyond the school's control. I don't know what the hell that means. That's a charge. That's a charge. You get arrested for that.
Beyond the school. And also he was found to be a habitual runaway because he stole his sister's car and had a joyride to Indiana. Sweet Christ. States across the state line. Not going well. He is during his period of supervision for probation. After that, he passed drug screenings and all of this. But anyway.
He'll end up seeing Natasha again in April 1997. They don't see each other for a while after the first initial hookup. April 1997, though, they hook up again. And this time there's more people there we'll talk about, too. Now Natasha has her own boyfriend, so, you know, Bryant's not going to hook up. Edward Dean Mullins, who's 19, he's from Toler, Kentucky.
And he is at this point in the process of getting his GED. He doesn't really drink, doesn't do any hard drugs. He smoked weed a few times. That's pretty much all he does here. No criminal record.
I don't know where she's... How they're hooked up together. That's what I mean. He's like a guy in a romantic comedy that's like, her wild spirit, I don't know, it just takes me away. She's so free. It's weird. She says what's on her mind. I quit my job at the insurance company and we're driving cross-country. I don't know. Gotta take your chances sometimes. Gotta do it. He worked at a grocery store for a while and that sort of thing. But he ends up moving in with Natasha.
And his family did not like his interest in her because they said he had negative changes immediately in his behavior. He used to attend church and then he became involved with her and all of that sort of thing. They're going to they're planning to be married, by the way. These two. Why not? Joseph Lance Reisner from he's 20 years old from Paintsville, Kentucky. He is dating Karen Howell, the first girl we talked about there. OK, he's born in Hazard, Kentucky.
Wow. Him and the Duke boys, I guess. Yeah. No juvenile record either. He's had kind of a tough life too. He's never met his biological father. His mom was married a couple of times, but he said he had a good relationship with his stepdad, so nothing too terrible there. Nothing awful. He did, he started to use, he started, his parents started to do drugs a lot, which kind of, I guess, fucked him up. Yeah.
Yeah, there's and then his father had an affair or stepfather had an affair with one of his mother's close friends. Oh, boy. That blew up the whole family and that wasn't great. So that's not good. He also uses weed, you know, weed, booze, does some acid, does shit like that. Said he first did acid at 11, which is a little too little too early. He had sexual relationships with babysitters by 12.
Oh, boy. He was hooking up with the babysitters and flunking out of seventh grade, basically, by that time. Yeah, I mean, you get a taste of adult woman. Why are you going to go to school? This is dumb now. Yeah. It's hard to learn about Abe Lincoln's hat now. It's not going to work. Then he gets a stepdad. The stepdad ends up crashing into somebody and pleading guilty to charges of reckless homicide and second-degree assault and getting sent away for prison.
Holy shit. So that screwed him up too. As a guy he was finally close to, this happens. June of 95, Reisner joined the army, but gets kicked out immediately for testing positive for weed. So he doesn't even make it through basic training here. Dishonorable. Dishonorable. I don't even know if he's discharged. I don't even know if he got a uniform yet. We didn't even issue you anything. Just fuck off. We'll just tear the paper up and throw it in the garbage. It never happened.
The hell out of here. So, yeah, he's got some issues, we'll say here. But he's actually doing good in school at this. He started doing well in school and that sort of thing. So, yeah, he was doing all right. But then he's dating this girl and things start to go downhill. Also, Krista Rena Sturgill. She's 18. It's got to be Sturgill. Sturgill. S-T-U-R-G-I-L-L.
Yeah, that sounds like Sturgill. Sturgill, yeah, it probably is. Especially there, they're going to call it Sturgill. That's how Sturgill Simpson spells his first name. So it's got to be Sturgill. There you go. Yeah, I think it has to be. That's a good point. So she's in her senior year at Betsy Lane High School in Betsy Lane, Kentucky. That's a town, Betsy Lane, Kentucky. Yeah.
It's after Betsy Lane. Betsy Lane. It has to be a big deal. She planned to go to Murray State after graduating. Oh, wants to major in child psychology. She's very good in school. She does well. No criminal record or anything like that. One time she did receive an in-school suspension for smoking in a locker room. Yeah.
And she was once suspended for three days for fighting on the school bus with a girl who she thought was picking on her younger brother. I hope she won. That's good. That's good character to me here. She's involved in the Future Homemakers of America organization. Does that still exist? In the 90s in Kentucky, apparently. She hoped to marry her boyfriend, Patrick Charles, as a means of leaving home. So this has really rewound the clock 30 years from where they were here.
She also accused her stepfather of sexually abusing her. She claimed the abuse started when she was four years old. Oh, my God. What the fuck? And by 13, her stepfather was having sex with her. But then he stopped when she started dating this boy she wanted to marry.
Oh, so she's going to hold on to this guy like grim fucking death, whether it's good or not, because at least it's not her stepfather jumping up and down on her. This is what it's that about. Do you think it's woof, man? Um, she told, I guess her staff, her guidance counselor about the abuse and everything too. So, yeah. So then she was placed in some other home in a foster home and she stopped attending school when she made the allegations that basically sent everything into the toilet. Um, yeah, not great. Uh,
That's supposed to fix your life. God fuck. Then she had moved to Arizona for some reason and ended up coming back and everyone had turned her down as a place to live. She had nowhere to live. So she called Natasha Cornett just because she knew people were allowed to crash at her house all the time. She didn't even know her that well. She didn't even like her. And Natasha said, sure, you're more than welcome. And her mom didn't care. So there you go. And that kind of made her part of that. Now, by this time,
Karen Howell and Tasha Cornett, they're really close friends. They say that
Cornette said she could communicate with Karen during out-of-body experiences. So they can communicate with each other from separate places. She also described Karen as her soulmate, but not in a sexual way, she said. Yeah, just best friend. Yeah, and stated that they cut themselves and drank each other's blood, too. Oh, Jesus. So, yeah. In April of 1997 here...
They went to a motel, the Kali Motel in Pikeville, which is closed now. It's 30 miles east on the West Virginia border of Kentucky. Oh, I'm sure it's lovely. They were in. It's a $27 per night motel. Okay. So even now it would be 69 bucks, which is not okay. That's great. That's a terrible hotel. Unacceptable. Not going to be good. You're taking home bed bugs. Just know it. Know it.
No luggage. Burn your clothes on the way out. Yeah. You're going to have ringworm. Oh, for sure. That's without saying. I'm just bed bugs or, you know, you never know. So they're in room seven. And I guess this night they were they said that they her mother, Natasha's mother, later said that they, quote, did something in a hotel room that unleashed a powerful demon spirit on them.
That's what her mother says. The very religious Natasha Garnett's mother. It's very weird. But they gathered up to burn black candles and do some kind of bullshit, we'll say here. Apparently, that night, Jason Bryant, the 14-year-old who made out with Natasha there for a while, said,
They tried to burn, I guess he carved something in his skin that night. And also they attempted to burn 666 into the hotel room's carpet. Which teenagers do dumb shit? Okay. They thought that because of this, the next day they were like, oh, fuck. We're going to get in trouble for fucking this room up. So they instead stole some shit from the office and attempted to take off. They're on the run. They're on the lam.
Why not just complain and say this was already here? Oh, there's a big 666 burned in the carpet. Why would you give me this room? This place is crazy. No, instead they stole a television set from the office and several pairs of work boots.
Okay. Okay. So, same inventory. Very odd here. So, then they went to a campfire, but there was a bunch of other kids there, and they wouldn't talk to them. They were just like by themselves, sat around a fire. Then they stole, they broke into two homes in Paintsville taking two semi-automatic pistols.
Okay, now it's getting real bad. Yes. So they go from Kentucky. The plan was go to New Orleans because Natasha said we can go to New Orleans. I know stuff down there, okay? Yeah. So they have a 9mm and a .25 caliber pistol, and they're on the run here. So...
They realize their car, though, Joseph Reisner, has a piece of shit Chevy Citation, which if you've ever seen one of those, it's a piece of shit. They didn't even make that in the 90s. No. Oh, it's like an 83 Citation. Right. It's an old car. It's a shit box. The wheels will fall off. Never mind. It's not going to run down to New Orleans. It's a bad thing.
Cops stopped using them. They're pieces of shit. They're terrible cars. So they decided they should probably steal a car from a parking lot or a dealership or something. So they have wheels that work, right? Dealership, brand new. Brand fucking new. But that might draw a lot of attention. So they're like, maybe we'll just steal one from a parking spot somewhere. So they go to an Interstate 81 rest stop near the Baileyton, Tennessee exit.
of the interstate where they encounter a van they find and they're like, look at that fucking van. There's six, there's a bunch of us. A van would be great for this. The van is not sitting there unoccupied though. There's people that drove the van there. The Liliad family, or sorry, Liliad family, L-I-L-L-E-L-I-D-S or L-I-D-S is the whole thing. Liliad. So you got Vidar who's 34 years old
He's the hotel bellman in Knoxville. He's from Norway. He moved here 10 years ago. He met his wife, Delfina, who is a New Jersey native whose parents are from Honduras. He met her in Miami. They got married in 89 and moved to Knoxville in 92.
The man came from another country, shacked up with a beautiful woman, I imagine. You don't find a lot of Honduran chicks in Norway, probably. So he's like, this is great. This is way different. The man is doing it. That's the American dream. And they're very, very much devout Jehovah's Witnesses.
They are on their way back from a big Jehovah's Witness day-long assembly in Johnson City, Tennessee. That's why they're in the rest stop because Delfina, who's 28, that's his wife. They also have two kids with them, Tabitha, who's six, and Peter, who's two. They needed to use the bathroom, so they stopped at the rest stop because, as you know, every rest stop you're stopping at.
Road trips are a nightmare with young kids. So Vidar, while the wife is in the bathroom with the kids, sees these young people over here that look troubled.
Yeah. They're wearing gothy stuff. It's written right on them. He goes right up to them and goes, Hey guys. And starts trying to, you know, preach to them basically. And, and, you know, tell them shit and talk about religious views. Um, it'll help them. Yeah. Then he has his son, Peter with him. And eventually, so he's first, he approached Cornette and Howell. So the two girls there, Natasha and, uh, Karen, then Reisner and Bryant come over and join in the conversation by then, uh, Delfina, uh,
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We get support from Dove. Hey y'all, it's your girl Kiki Palmer, host of the Wondery Podcast. Baby, this is Kiki Palmer. Let me cut to the chase. Did you know that in many states across the US, it's still not illegal to discriminate against people based on the way their hair grows out of their head? To deny black folks from jobs and opportunities because they have braids, locks, twists, or bantu knots? That's messed up.
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And after a time, everybody, they're all talking. The whole family's talking with these people. At some point, Reisner pulls one of the guns out. This guy thought he was making progress with them. And instead, Reisner says, quote, I hate to do you this way, but we're going to have to take you with us for your van. And he told them to get in the van.
Dad said, hey, you don't need to take my wallet, take my keys, it's all yours. Just leave me alone with my kids. And he said, or just take me, leave the wife and kids. And they said, no, no, everybody's going to go. Okay. So Vidar drove the van while Reisner sat in the passenger seat with a gun on him. Oh, no. Yeah. Mullins and Sturgill, everybody's in the van except for Mullins and Sturgill who are following in the citation. They brought the piece of shit, too. They brought the piece of shit. Yeah. So...
The mother, Delfina, starts singing to the kids to try to relax them. And Bryant points a gun at her and tells her to stop singing, which is ridiculous. In front of children. Tells him to go off the interstate and then turn onto a secluded road off the next exit. Okay. Now, at this point...
There's claims that Bryant, this is what all of them will say later. Bryant, the 14-year-old, took charge of the situation. So a 14-year-old with an 85 IQ is going to dominate a situation wrought with adults.
Why not? The kid thinks he's invincible. He got to make out with a girl when he was 14. That's true. A woman. So Reisner claims he handed the gun to Cornette also, his gun to Cornette, saying that he couldn't do any more about this. He was ordering a woman to stop singing a minute ago. Now his conscience is getting to him. Cornette says that she placed the weapon on the floor of the van while Brian, who had the .25 caliber, ordered the family to stand in front of a ditch.
According to everybody but Bryant, they were pleading for their lives, the family, and especially for the lives of the children. Just let our kids go, for Christ's sake. I mean, Jesus. Kids too. They're saying, we won't call the cops. Let's go. They said, we're religious people. The Lord will do whatever. We don't care. They were literally saying that, like, we won't get the cops involved. They said that all of the kids except for Bryant say that Bryant said no because
And then that Karen and Natasha pleaded with Bryant to let them go. That's what they say. But according to everybody else, nope. Bryant said, no, no, no. They're going to call the cops. They got to die.
Bryant then he told the girls that I won't hurt the kids. So Natasha and Karen said that they returned to the van where Reisner was the whole time. Then they heard a rapid succession of gun gunshots. Oh, my God. Some say that the father was the first to be shot. Some say it was Delfina that was the first to be shot. So all say that when the shooting stopped, Bryant returned to the van and said they're still fucking alive.
He then grabbed the other gun and emptied that one too. Oh my. They said, then they said he laughed and bragged about it. After the shootings, Reisner went to his car and removed a license plate, the license plate and the registration from his car. And then he says that as he was trying to get out of there with the van, he accidentally ran the bodies over. Oh dear Christ. Get the fuck out. Interesting. Cause the Bryant guy ordered him to turn the van around. You know,
You know, because he's in charge. And accidentally hit the whole family's dad, James? No, we'll talk about it. Oh, my God. Bryant says it was Reisner who ordered them out of the van, directed them to stand by the ditch. He said that Reisner first shot Vidar with the .25 caliber, then slapped Mullins on the shoulder, and then that Mullins also shot at him, too.
Bryant claims that he kept his eyes closed during the shootings, that he never fired either weapon. He says that Mullins and Reisner ordered the others into the van after the shooting. So the sound of these shots are heard by a nearby, there's a house nearby. Yeah. They also heard, not only that, laughing and hollering, something like a party. Oh.
So he thought kids were out there having a party shooting off guns, so he called the cops. Well, that lends to one kid not doing it all. Nope. And the cops, when they get there, they expect to see kids fucking around in a field. And instead...
They don't see that. They get there. They find a fucking massacre. They find bodies about 260 feet from the abandoned Chevy Citation that they left there. The adults are lying on their back with their feet extending into the road. Vidar's pants and Delfina's shin-length khaki skirt had tire tracks on them. Oh, God, Jesus. Tabitha.
The daughter was lying across her father's chest, still alive but unconscious. Oh, God. With her shoulder twitching. A bullet entered near her left ear and traveled through her brain, exiting on the right side of her head. She was pronounced brain dead at the hospital. And she'll die. Together, they had all been shot roughly 17 times put together. Good Lord. They also said the bodies were arranged in the ditch.
They said they laid the parents out, laid the children over them in the form of a cross, then got in the van, turned around and came back and intentionally and maliciously ran them over. That's what the cops will say due to the evidence on the crime scene there. Holy shit, man. Now, Peter, the two year old, was cradled in his mother's lap. He'd been shot in the eye and chest, but survives. He's listed as stable in stable condition the next day and will survive his wounds.
Babies are so resilient. How is that possible? Vidar had been shot a total of six times, one to the right side of his head and five to his chest. First shot traveled... He shot him in the right eye and it entered out of his ear. It was fucking horrible. That's disturbing as fuck. Yeah, there's all sorts of... And he has .25 caliber and 9mm rounds in him. Delfina was shot eight times
All eight bullets were recovered. Six from the nine millimeter, two from the 25. The first of the three shots shattered the bone in her left arm. Second shot from a nine millimeter shattered the thigh of her left leg. Jesus, that's painful. They said that these shots would have caused severe pain but wouldn't have killed her. And but she wouldn't have been able to stand. Then she was shot six additional times while she lay on her back.
Imagine that with a child, a mother with a child. You're just going to dump a clip into this fucking person. Three shots in the stomach in a triangular pattern. It's fucking horrible, man. It's absolutely fucking horrible. Six-year-old Tabitha was shot once in the head. It entered her head on the left side, traveled downward, exited behind her right ear, causing brain death. Jesus. Oh, by the way, she was able to donate her heart, liver, gallbladder, kidneys, pancreas, spleen, and adrenals.
That's nice. I mean, that's horrible, but other kids got to live. Silver Lane, yeah. At least there's that. She saved maybe upwards of six lives. I don't know. I guess Peter somehow, he remained in the hospital for 17 days, then was transferred to a rehabilitation center.
Good Lord. These idiots now, these assholes, take their van to a gas station where they buy a road map. They stop at a Waffle House while traveling through Georgia. But they didn't eat because a group of police officers arrived to eat, so they took off. So they said, fuck New Orleans, let's go to Mexico. Okay. So they get to the border. They're denied admittance because they didn't have proper forms of identification and, you know, a couple of them are children. But they somehow found a way into Mexico.
What? Don't know. You can get into Mexico if you really want to that bad. Yeah.
So somehow there, the 14-year-old Bryant is shot in the hand and leg in Mexico. That's worse than getting syphilis from a Tijuana brothel. I think I'd rather have that. It's disputed how he got it. Bryant said that Reisner asked him to take the blame for the shootings because he was a juvenile, which that kind of makes sense the way they're all saying it. He said that when he hesitated that Reisner shot him in the hand and the leg.
Well, the rest of them said that Bryant shot himself in the hand and the leg. Okay. I believe Bryant. Yeah. So they're stopped by Mexican authorities. They claimed they're lost. They ordered him out of the van and searched. This is the Federales. Oh, no.
They found a knife and a photo album belonging to a family that clearly they weren't a part of. So they ordered them to go to the border to go back to the United States. They said, go back, get out of here. They're lucky. They're lucky they didn't end up in a Mexican jail. So then the U.S. Customs people did a license plate check and alerted that the van was stolen and they found out how and everybody was taken in at that point. Oh my God.
Natasha was carrying two wallets, one that was hers and one she referred to as the shared wallet or the community wallet. The second wallet, though, contained the Social Security guard issued to Tabitha, the six year old baby. Yeah. And also a 25 caliber slug found on Cornette was fired by the same gun used to kill them as well.
They found the gun inside the seat back cushion of a chair behind the driver's seat in the van as well. And the nine millimeter was also found there. Sturgill was carrying a key chain and keys she denied knowing the origin of or how they got in her pocket. But they were Delphina's keys. I have no idea. Yeah. Used for the front door of their home. So also, oh, Howell was found carrying Peter's social security card as well. What the fuck, man?
So they take him back to Tennessee. There's some delay on extradition. The juveniles fight extradition, but eventually everybody's taken there. They're also going to be charged. The two adults are also going to be charged with custodial interference with Karen Howell and Jason Bryant, who are minors. Yeah. They're all going to be charged with that. That's not good.
When they take them for their initial court appearance, there's a huge crowd outside. It's like a lynch mob that has gathered outside yelling murderers and child killers and they have to protect them. Yeah. They're all shackled up and getting someone yelled out murderers. You're all going to die.
The county sheriff said, it really doesn't surprise me, the crowd yelling. Yeah. There are a bunch of unruly hillbillies around here, so this is going to happen. They won't even say the full town name. I can't control them. But he said, a crime such as this really upsets a community, especially with children involved. That's understandable. Yeah. He said, I can understand, but we have our criminal justice system to go through, and we're going to do that. We're not going to just hand them over to the crowd. Yeah.
Cornette's mom said that she talked with her daughter on the phone and told her that her daughter said she was scared. She said, I told her to get her Bible and pray. She also said that there are three Natashas. This is good.
There is the sweet, caring little girl I raised. There is the girl who would do anything for her friends. By the way, that didn't raise that one. The sweet one is the one she's responsible for. The language is very telling here. It's very specific, yeah. And then there is a dark side that likes to play on the Ouija board and do seances and play vampire games, whatever that is. I got nothing to do with that kid. Yeah. She said, my heart goes out to the families of those killed. It breaks my heart to think of my daughter shooting babies. Jesus fucking Christ.
So, Cornette, when she's in jail, she does a press conference from jail. What? Saying that Satan will aid me and that all the youth around the world should raise hell while they can before the world ends. She also said that, quote, I guess it was my calling, evil meaning. She said the spirits and demons started talking to me when I was two years old and they raised me to be an occultist.
So she said, I've had a lot of rough times. I looked to God and he didn't help. But the demons did. Now, her attorney, who's a fucking idiot named Eric Kahn. This is his idea.
To do the press conference? He's never done a criminal case before, by the way. This is a death penalty case. He's shooting from the hip. He doesn't know what the fuck he's doing. Yes, that's exactly what it is. He's trying to go for an insanity plea. He says, quote, every aspect of the case involves the occult. Every single aspect. You cannot separate any part of it because the occult was the driving force for the children's trip. It's the driving force behind anything and everything that might or might not have happened in this case.
So they asked her if she's insane since they're talking about insanity. She said, sometimes I feel crazy, but no, I don't think I'm insane. Yeah. She also ruined her. Your lawyer hates you. Yeah. She says she talks about her friend Karen and said, she's my soulmate. We've kissed, but it's not like that. And she said, it's not we're not a cult. We're just a group of friends interested in the mystical.
Yeah. She said, quote, for all the children of the world to stand up for their rights and beliefs and to raise hell while they can. The world's going to end soon. My father, Satan, will aid me. Oh, boy. So her attorney ends up getting kicked off the fucking case. It's a dumb thing to do. The judge says, you don't know what you're doing. You're going to. This is a death penalty case. This is going to get hard appealed. Yeah. So he said this, quote, she believes he said this in court.
She believes that Armageddon has already begun, that in the year 2000 all of mankind will no longer exist, and that she and these other antichrists will reform the world into this new being, new shape until the year 2012, and then life will begin anew under a new control. Evil will become greater than it already is and will rule everything.
Holy shit. So, yeah, they ended up saying, get the fuck out of here. After that, I feel like that has tainted so much with the trial because that's what they all think, that the new lawyers make a deal with the prosecutors because now the prosecutors are like, we can't fucking try these kids on the death penalty. It's all fucked up. So he offers them a deal to plead guilty. So they get a deal. We'll get to it in a second here.
Now, yeah, the attorney, by the way, that's the judge. Imagine what he said to that guy. You fucking dipshit. The admonishment must have been so rad. So they plead guilty. And here is what the judge says to Karen Howell. I'm going to give you what the judge says here. They say that he says, number one, in mitigation, it says that you were abused and neglected as a child, that you have a borderline retarded IQ of 78, which is not what you want in court documents. Yeah.
That you subordinate yourself to the needs of others in the group and that you have shown remorse. The mitigating evidence, though, is overcome and rebutted by the credible facts of the case that for a long time before this occurred, you'd been doing drugs and participating in things of an occult nature. And the occult mark continued on this case throughout the events that transpired. That doesn't make any difference, though. That's the thing. Like...
This is like West Memphis here. Like, it doesn't make, that shit doesn't matter. Did you do it or not? Is he saying that or is he saying, is he leaning it on the occult or is he saying, like, you are twisted and you're doing twisted shit? Well, then he gets into the facts of the thing. You helped steal guns and money. You helped initiate.
the plans for the trip with Ms. Cornette. You were at the picnic table at the rest area with the Lillilids when they were kidnapped and when they were crying. You were outside the van watching them be murdered. You did nothing to stop it when a weapon was available to you because she said she claimed she had it. You deliberately and knowingly participated in every aspect of the killings and the things that led to them, including the getaway and cover-up
You, ma'am, may fuck off. Life in prison without parole. Oh, boy. Yeah, she's 18 right now. Was 17 at the time. Oh, my God, that's so long. That's forever. That's a long fucking time. Yeah, they talk about Cornette here, Natasha, and they talk about all of her psychological stuff from the past.
And they said, yeah, you've got some mitigating circumstances, but quote, not only do the statutory aggravating circumstances outweigh those, but those mitigating circumstances are in fact rebutted by the facts of this case. A history of some violent behavior, the fact that you had killing on your mind when you left Kentucky, not necessarily a ringleader, but the evidence shows that you were the instigator and orchestrator of the trip and the things that led to the
Oh, boy.
Edward Mullins, you had positive gunshot residue on your sweater. I think Brian's telling the truth, by the way. Yeah, I think so, too. I think he did. You participated in all the events in Kentucky. You left the rest area with the family and Mr. Reisner's automobile. You didn't have to do that. It was a deliberate knowing act following the van. You guys could have turned off if you didn't want to. And you started this whole fucking thing. He said, and there's really no proof of it.
but the proof is that Delfina and Tabitha were crying at the picnic table before they got in the van. And it seems to me that conversations with them about that, it's illogical to assume beyond a reasonable doubt that you had to know something was wrong. You participated in the getaway and cover-up. You were in the van for two days with their property, a baby seat under your feet. Mmm.
children's toys. You had chances to get away, to do something about what was going on, to report that a child had been murdered and a baby left for dead. You did nothing. You were a participant in it by your own actions and your non-actions, and I find, therefore, that the sentence should be in each of the three counts of first-degree murder life without the possibility of parole. Yes, sir. May fuck off. Jason Bryant. He's 15. Oh, boy.
Quote, I find that you were aggressively urging others on to do things at that time that you personally carried one of the guns. That, in fact, you were a shooter. I don't know who all were the shooters. I think there was more than one. I have seen no real remorse or emotion displayed by you.
I find the evidence shows that you were aggressive in the killings, that you helped use the gun. I helped use a gun to kidnap them in the first place. You had gunshot residue all over you. You were in the van for two days with their property under your feet, including a baby seat. You bragged about the crimes while you were in jail in Arizona. Oh, boy. You have a history of drug abuse and a callous attitude. You, sir.
may fuck off life without parole oh he's a baby wow uh reisner uh again you sir may fuck off life without parole he said you were a leader not the leader but a leader you had the presence of mind to take the tag from your car your papers and clothes at the scene yeah it's like he's never heard of a vin number what a dork that's exactly it's leave his car sitting there
And then finally, Crystal Sturgill, they said there's some mitigating circumstances, but they said there was a lot of talk in Kentucky about death and killing before you set out. You were present. The rituals, the burglarizing, stealing, getting the guns and preparing. Tabitha and Delfina were crying before you left. Just like I told Mr. Mullins, you may not have pulled the trigger. You may have been horrified by this, but everything that you did showed that you adopted this and gave it your name.
Oh, my. You left a baby for dead at the crime scene. Used, ma'am, young lady may fuck off life without parole again. Oh, my God. All six of them. Every single fucking one of them. Life without fucking parole. Wow. That's the deal they made.
One of the cops involved said, I know one thing. They're getting what they deserve. Every one of them. Because anyone who would shoot a kid point blank and he shook his head and said, they're getting what they deserve. Absolutely. That's cold fucking blooded, man. They said the prosecutor said it's never entirely clear exactly who shot them or in what way or when. Doesn't matter. He said when it was all done, they got back in the van and went to Mexico.
Right. So that's that. They said by getting away, by getting away wasn't what most what was uppermost in their minds. I think it was the notoriety they wanted. What's the point of doing this if no one knows? 2001, by the way, authorities alleged that Natasha Cornett tried to help her friend Chris Krista Gail Pike, who was on death row also for murdering or was on death row at the time for murdering an 18 year old woman, kill another woman in prison. They said that they tried to strangle her with shoelaces.
What the shit? Okay. Little Peter, by the way, moved back to Sweden with family. Left, huh? Yeah. Yep. They said he was doing fine in 2007. He was full of life and doing okay. Mm-hmm.
It's wild. By the way, letters in prison, Howell and Sturgill write letters to each other, to the newspaper. And one of them said, I'm no longer the broken shell of a girl who is too afraid to stand up on that gravel road. I still struggle with the scars that so many years of abuse have left with me. But the woman I have grown into would have done more to hide her face and cry that day. She would fight more than that. She would fight for what she knows is right, even if it put her in the path of danger.
I don't care. These kids are definitely not all equally guilty. No. I don't think. If you've ever been in a group, you know there's some people that are just going along. And by a lot of their past, they really didn't have the tools to, you know. But still, you can't shoot babies in the face. We can't have that. We can't do it. 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court found the courts couldn't make mandatory sentences of life without parole for juveniles.
What? The court found that the child's circumstances had to be carefully weighed. So it couldn't be automatic, but you can sentence them to that. Okay. It can't be an automatic thing. So all the people who are juveniles are filing cases for that that are still going on because they're all still in prison. 2017, Peter was still living in Sweden. Yeah, Sweden now. He was from Norway originally. They asked him what he thought of Tennessee, and he said it seemed like a nice place. I don't know.
Haven't been there. Why would you ask him that? Jesus Christ. 2019, he moves to the U.S. to work in the IT field. Really? He got married in 2020, has a wife named Caitlin, and they settled in Sanford, Connecticut. Good for him. Suburban New York City. Yep.
He said he has nothing to say to the murderers, but to the people of eastern Tennessee, he said, thank you. Thank you for everything you did. It played out very well in the end, as well as it could have. He has no recollection of the
of the shooting. He lost an eye and has neurological damage forever because of it. So that is Bailton, Tennessee. Holy shit. Maybe pronounce it and bad shit won't happen there. Yeah. I blame the name. So there you go. If you like that, leave a review on whatever app you're listening on. Shut up and give me murder.com virtual live show for 20 Saturday night, April 20th available for two weeks after that April 5th, Sacramento, April 6th,
San Francisco. Get your tickets right now. All available. Shut up and give me murder.com. Patreon.com slash crime in sports. Get in there this week. Crime and sports vibrator up the ass chess guy, DB Cooper for small town murder. You know, you want that shit. Get in there. Keep hanging out with us. Keep coming back and partying with us. And until next week, everybody, it's been our pleasure. Yeah.
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