Episode 275
01:07:09 Share

Toyota's legacy has been standing tall for generations, from pioneering hybrid technology to redefining the standards of safety and efficiency. With each innovation, a renewed commitment to progress. And with Toyota's legendary lineup of trucks in stock at your local Toyota dealer, you can experience the legacy for yourself.

So check out the ultra-rugged new Tacoma, built for off-road adventure or everyday practicality. Or test drive a heavy-duty half-ton Tundra, decked out with modern tech and comfort, with a haul-anything attitude. And both Tacoma and Tundra are available with the i-FORCE MAX hybrid powertrain, giving your truck more power than ever before. Quality. Reliability. Efficiency.

That's the legacy of Toyota. Visit BuyAToyota.com, the official website for deals, to find out more. Toyota. Let's go places.

Are you holding back on travel plans this holiday break because you're afraid of the language gap? Well, no need to mind the gap if you have Babbel. With quick 10-minute lessons handcrafted by over 200 language experts, Babbel gets you talking a new language in just three weeks. And because talking is key to really knowing a language, Babbel is designed for real conversations. Wasting hundreds on private tutors is the old way of learning languages.

Babbel's tips and tools are inspired by the real-life stuff you'll actually need when talking. With a focus on conversations, you'll be ready to talk wherever you go. I, for one, cannot wait for my Romanian step-grandmother to visit us this Christmas. So even though my inclination is to say something embarrassing during the holidays...

Babbel's got me covered this year. With over 16 million subscriptions sold, Babbel's 14 award-winning language courses are backed by a 20-day money-back guarantee. So your gift to yourself or your loved ones is risk-free. Now here's a special holiday deal just for our listeners. Right now, get up to 60% off your Babbel subscription today.

but only for our listeners at babbel.com slash monsters. Get up to 60% off at babbel.com slash monsters spelled B-A-B-B-E-L dot com slash monsters. That's B-A-B-B-E-L dot com slash monsters. Rules and restrictions may apply. Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence and is not intended for all audiences.

Listener discretion is advised. I thought that maybe he just had an injury or maybe he had fallen or something like that. I wasn't expecting to see what I had seen when I got there. Hello, folks. This is a little something I like to call Sword and Scale, a show that reveals that the worst monsters are real. ♪♪

Hey, I don't know if you know, but we have a TV show. It's called Sword and Scale. And if you like this, you might like that. You can find it at swordandscale.com.

We just put up our seventh episode and we're getting ready to start delivering two episodes a month, which is quite an undertaking. So if you support what we're doing here, if you like true crime and you want to see more of it, head on over to swordandscale.com and consider joining us at the super supporter level. You can see all of the interesting stories we've covered there.

on sword and scale television it's um it's something i'll tell you so

Toyota's legacy has been standing tall for generations, from pioneering hybrid technology to redefining the standards of safety and efficiency. With each innovation, a renewed commitment to progress. And with Toyota's legendary lineup of trucks in stock at your local Toyota dealer, you can experience the legacy for yourself.

So check out the ultra-rugged new Tacoma, built for off-road adventure or everyday practicality. Or test drive a heavy-duty half-ton Tundra, decked out with modern tech and comfort, with a haul-anything attitude. And both Tacoma and Tundra are available with the i-Force Max Hybrid powertrain, giving your truck more power than ever before. Quality. Reliability. Efficiency.

That's the legacy of Toyota. Visit BuyAToyota.com, the official website for deals, to find out more. Toyota. Let's go places.

If you have Medicare and Medicaid, then keep listening. You may qualify for a dual special needs plan from UnitedHealthcare. It's time you feel confident you're managing your whole health. With a dual special needs plan from UnitedHealthcare, it's not just health insurance, it's healthy living. You deserve coverage you can count on, so why not see how a dual special needs plan from UnitedHealthcare may help you get extra Medicare benefits. If you live in the D.C. area, see your options today at UHCDualPlans.com.

Ladies, I have a question, and I know a lot of you listen to this show. Do you remember what it was like to be a teenage girl? I grew up around a bunch of teenage girls, cousins, and they always had some kind of drama or trauma in their life. It's probably where I get my flair for the dramatic. But I've heard that being a teenage girl is, well, hell at times. Much worse than boys.

Teenage girls hormones are raging. They are irritable, testy, and reactive. They're like a live wire. Everything is annoying to a teenage girl, especially her parents. So when you think back to those days, were you difficult? Were there things that you look back and regret on? Maybe things that you said to your parents when they wouldn't let you get your way?

Anything still haunt you to this day? How many times did you scream "I want to kill my dad" when he told you no? How many times did you wish your parents would disappear forever so you could just get on with your life free from the burden? Of course, you never really meant it, did you? But have you ever thought about what would have happened if that wish had actually come true?

On October 1st, 2021, 64-year-old Conrad Emmerowitz found himself at the hospital in Grand Blanc, Michigan. Yes, yes, yes, I know it's Grand Blanc or some shit. Nobody really cares. Just pay attention to the story, okay? Anyway, Conrad was in rough shape when he arrived at the emergency room. He had severe chemical burns all over his head, torso, arms, and legs.

Conrad's fingers were so burned that the skin had peeled off, exposing the fleshy, raw red tissue underneath. Yum. His legs were turning green. He was hanging on by a thread. Conrad was also confused and drunk. Very drunk. Let's just say he blew almost four times the legal limit when he was admitted into the emergency room.

So, Conrad wasn't totally sure what had happened and everyone at the hospital was equally as confused as to what had caused his burns. Here's one of the nurses in the ER who dealt with him that night.

And even before Groveland brought the patient in, the paramedics approached me like, "Hey, we should probably take a look at this guy because we don't know what's the cause of these burns because we're concerned about possible chemical or some type of chemical exposure."

The physician at the time said that we should decon this patient, meaning we don't know what the offending agent is. So we put him into our decontamination room and started rinsing the patient down for any type of decommical materials or anything like that. - Have you ever done that before? - No, actually I haven't. - So 15 years, this is your first time? - Correct.

In the emergency room, Conrad was cleaned to remove any potential hazardous chemicals. He ached and moaned, but with the alcohol in his system and the severity of his burns, he was floating through the pain. Most of his nerve endings had been damaged by the chemicals, so he was falling into comfortable numbness. I was a paramedic as well, and so I've seen like house fire burns that were that bad.

As the nurses tended to Conrad, he tried to ask them what happened. I started asking him what was going on, what happened. And he originally stated that he's like, oh, I did bomb my house, used like an insecticide bomb a couple of days ago. He's like, maybe that's what caused this.

So the nurse called poison control to get more information. He said what I was describing was more like an alkalitic type burn. After I got off the phone with poison control, I reported my findings, what I spoke with from poison control to the physicians, and I received no further orders at that time. Were you able to stabilize him? I didn't get another IV like I wanted to, but his vitals were stable at the time. Okay.

Conrad seemed to sober up, and as the pain medication kicked in and the treatment soothed his skin, he was able to collect himself. Soon, two of his sons arrived at the hospital and the nurse overheard them talking with Conrad. They were trying to discuss, like most of us, what had happened.

At this point, the patient did seem slightly more responsive than when he first came in, discussing that he remembered his daughter throwing a white powder on him when he was on the couch. Conrad remembered that he'd gotten into a fight with his teenage daughter, Megan, in Meroitz. That's the last thing that he recalled. She threw something at him. The concerned nurse who heard this called the police and

reported the assault. As soon as they showed up, they wanted to talk to Conrad. Conrad said something had pissed Megan off. He wasn't sure. He remembered she had a hair appointment or something.

His memory was foggy, but Conrad's memory was often foggy. He was kind of a big drinker. Last night, I know she threw a bunch of stuff at me, got mad. What do you mean? There's a... She rearranged her bedroom, so there was a mattress on the wall. She did that and went crazy on that stuff. I've asked her to take out the garbage several times. That hasn't been working. But, um...

Is this kind of, I'm trying to gauge this. Is this a normal behavior that she would throw stuff on you to burn you? No. No, she usually gets an argument. You know, I get bad at her, she gets bad at me, bad mouth each other. It's about normal. Okay. Right? But this is, this is very, very good.

Conrad and Megan lived alone in a split-level home. They drank a lot, and she was your typical 18-year-old girl, always on her phone and often irritated with her father. They bickered a lot, but they also loved each other. I said I had half a cedar off, put the bottle down.

Put the cork back on. - Put the smear off? - No, just a little one. - Oh, the airplane size? - Yeah, no, the smear off, what do you call it? Smear off ice. - Oh, a beer, like the beer thing. - Yeah, yeah. - Yeah, like the seltzer thing. - The seltzer thing, right? Lemonade. So I watched the movie, shut off my phone, call it a night, pretty early.

I got all kinds of people in the house. Were you sleeping when this happened? Yes. No, I was sleeping. I wasn't in a conscious. I didn't have anything to drink.

I won't bother you that much. If you don't remember, you don't remember. All I just want to know is if you're going to your house to investigate, what happened? Go ahead. Okay.

Another nurse on the scene gave her two cents to the cops. I'm trying to... He said he was sitting on the couch. He doesn't know when it happened, and then his family friend found him in the room. So he was super drunk to be in the hospital. Okay. Alcohol, $300, which would be $0.3. Yeah. So, yeah, he doesn't have any money. He had laid in it for the rest of the month. Okay. So...

To be clear, if you're blowing a .3 blood alcohol level, you're almost dead. We're talking like 10 to 15 drinks. Although that was mere nothing for an immortal like myself back in my heydays of drinking.

To the average person, that would kill you. Most people would black out or end up with their stomachs pumped. But Conrad, he was a seasoned drinker. A real vet. Soon, the police found Megan at a hotel where she was partying with her friends.

She was nonchalant as they quizzed her. Do you know why we're here? I know that they told me that he had some kind of brain behind it. Okay. So when was the last time you were at the office? Around 10... I left around 2.30 maybe. Okay.

Okay. And right now you're not in trouble. You're not under arrest. I'm just seeing what, you know, what happened. Okay. We heard there was a little scuffle. Okay. I left at 2.30, but I woke up at 10. And I realized that it was my hair appointment. And obviously my dad had to get me on a take-me-to-go on my own. And I walked over to him and I woke him up, but I could tell that he was a little drunk. So I got a little... I was upset, obviously. That's fine. But...

Conrad was too drunk to drive Megan to her hair appointment, so she got mad. But this wasn't just any hair appointment. This was Megan's 18th birthday and she had big plans to party with her girlfriends at a hotel.

And now her stupid father was drunk again, and he was screwing it up like he did everything. I just kind of got mad, and I'm like, all I threw at him was a bag of bread. And I know that didn't hurt him, because it's a bag of bread. As mad as she was, Megan swore that all she threw at Conrad was a bag of bread. That's it. So, I'm going to be honest with you. Your dad's in bad shape. So there's a lot of burning on your dad's

Okay. Consistent with chemicals, right? You said you were fighting with your dad, that's fine. You know, I totally understand if he's drinking, that's absolutely not how he should be running his household. Totally understand that, you know, but it's just not, it's not, I'm not understanding. Did he, is this self-inflicted? Like if you, I mean, picture, put you in my shoes. You two are the only people in that house.

The Amirowitz house was a mess. A complete pigsty. Alcoholism isn't just deadly, it's gross.

Maybe one of their many cats accidentally knocked something on him while he was passed out on the couch. Megan said she didn't throw anything harmful at her father. But when the police searched the Emmerowitz home, they found what had burned Conrad so badly. Lie. Yes, lie.

We all saw that movie Fight Club, right? The alkali chemical is found in everything from soap to silver polish and drain cleaner. Depending on its form, lye can be very dangerous. The entire couch was covered in the white powdery substance and the bottle of drain cleaner had been left on the cushion. There was no bread to be found, by the way. The whole story was messy and the only two witnesses were not very credible.

The man who was so intoxicated he blew nearly four times the legal limit. And a hormonally fueled teenager late for her birthday party who was kind of the main suspect. It was going to take a lot of digging to find out exactly what happened. But luckily for the police, others had shown up at the house after Conrad had been burned.

64-year-old Conrad Emmerowitz had ended up in the hospital after waking up on his couch covered in chemical burns. He was drunk when he showed up at the ER and confused as to what had happened. But as he sobered up, he remembered a fight with his teenage daughter Megan and that she threw stuff at him as she left the house on the day he was burned. It was determined that Conrad had been burned with lye.

which contains sodium hydroxide when in its pure powder form which is what it was when it was thrown at conrad lye burns are extremely painful and severe it was no different with conrad he had been doused in lye while he was sleeping on the couch and by the time he was found his skin was peeling off in fact it was a friend and neighbor of megan's named

Kayla Basquiat, who first found Conrad that day. Kayla was also planning to go to Megan's hotel party later that afternoon when she received a strange message from her friend on Snapchat. Megan sent Kayla a photo of herself crying. So you said you got a photo of her crying? Yeah. Okay. And then you talked to her then? Yeah. Okay. How did you converse with her?

I said that, you know, what's wrong? Well, let me ask you, did you send her a message? Oh, yeah, I texted her on Snapchat. Okay, and you said, what's wrong? Yeah. And then she said what? She said that her dad got drunk and that he didn't care because she had stuff to do today and she threw stuff at him. Okay. Do you know what was special about that day? It was her birthday. Okay. She was supposed to have a party that night, is that right? Yeah. All right. So she was crying in that photo? Yeah. Okay.

But Kayla didn't pick up Megan for the hotel party. She got a ride with someone else. But Megan did call Kayla later again that afternoon. Yes.

Kayla was familiar with the Amirawicks' house. She lived only a two-minute drive away, so she said she would stop by to get the card information from Conrad.

You said you've known this family for a while, right? Yeah. You've been over the house many times? Yeah. The house was pretty messy, wasn't it? Yeah. In fact, it was, let's describe it as dirty. Yeah. And gross. Dirty and gross is a bit of an understatement. Conrad's house was a wreck, a sliver away from a garbage dump. Here's Conrad's ex-wife and Megan's mother, Julie, describing the house. A lot of trash. You could not walk into the kitchen. There was trash bags.

Let's just say that Conrad sat and drank on his leather couch all day, every day. He didn't clean very much. He didn't cook very much. He just sat there and drank.

He often drank so much that he would relieve himself in plastic bags instead of getting up to use the bathroom. Yeah, it was that bad. These bags were often strewn around the living room. What a picture, huh? The bathroom, it needed good cleaning. And the downstairs, the lower level, the bi-level, the basement, it smelled a lot like cat urine, cat feces.

Brutal. So the house was utter squalor. But Kayla arrived and let herself inside like she usually did. She walked up the stairs and found Conrad in the living room. Can you tell us about how he was on the couch? He was kind of leaned. I don't remember which way he was leaned, but he had like one leg crossed over the other.

He wasn't clothed, but there was a blanket across his torso. OK, so he was naked? Yeah. All right. When you got up the stairs, you saw him on the couch. How did he look? He looked very bad. He looked very out of it. He had-- I didn't know what it was at the time, but it was like burns or blood or bruises or something on him. It looked like it was on his head, on his chest, on his hands, on his stomach.

- His legs were very green. - Okay. - Is it green? - Yeah. - All right. - How did that make you feel when you saw him that way? - Very ill. I started to panic 'cause I had never seen anyone in a state like that before. - Did you know when it happened at that point? - No. - Okay.

Kayla was in shock. She'd never seen an adult man that injured and vulnerable before. As she helped Conrad look for his cell phone, her own phone started ringing.

And then I got a call from Megan. Okay, so Megan called you at this point? Yeah. All right. How long had it been since you talked to her last? Like, so maybe 10 or 20 minutes. It was like the last time was when I was about to leave my house. What happened? She asked me for the credit card number because, like, that's what she wanted. And so he started saying the credit card numbers, and she said that they weren't working, and then she hung up.

Kayla was panicking, so she excused herself and went out into the front lawn to call her mom for help. That's when Megan called again.

Austin Emmerowicz picked up his phone promptly. And unlike Megan, he was actually concerned when Kayla told him,

what was going on with his father. He got a ride over to the house from his friend and asked Kayla to call 911. I thought that maybe he just had an injury or maybe he had fallen or something like that. I wasn't expecting to see what I had seen when I got there. Kayla and Austin went to the hospital behind the ambulance. Meanwhile, Megan was still at the hotel struggling to pay for her party room.

She kept calling Austin. So while you were at the hospital, you talked to Megan on the phone? Yep. Do you recall who called who? She had called me. Okay, she called you. Yes, sir. What did she say to you when she called you? She had called me and it had gone that she was asking about if I knew Dad's pin or whatever. I told her no, why, because he's at the hospital. And that's when she was like, ah, and I just hung up and that was it. Megan was frustrated. She needed Daddy's card to work. God damn it. So she tried calling Kayla again.

And I told her we were at the hospital and she hung up on me. All right, let's take a little pause here. How much do you hate Megan right now? Are you just seething with rage at this entitled little brat? Or do you have any kind of glimmer of sympathy at all? After all, Megan was living in filth and chaos with an alcoholic father. And there is nothing easy about that. But...

To hear your dad is greatly injured in the hospital and have this kind of reaction? It's kind of despicable, no? And what about the bread story? Are you buying it? You got a lot of bread lying around the house and little individual baggies? The house was a total mess and Conrad blew a .3 when he arrived at the emergency room. It is possible, I guess, that he accidentally knocked over the lie onto himself.

It's not likely, but I mean, anything's possible. You also have to know that Megan and Conrad's relationship was complicated. When they were married, Conrad and Julie had a mix of biological and adopted children. Austin and Megan, the older two of the four kids, were adopted and ended up with Conrad.

after their parents' messy divorce and custody battle. The end product was that he had custody of the older two, Megan and Austin, 100% of the time, physical custody. I had physical custody of the younger two, Morgan and Ian, 100% of the time. Now the children could decide when or even if they wanted to see the other parents.

It was up to them. With the one exception being Christmas Eve, they had to be with their dad. And Christmas Day, they had to be with me. Meanwhile at the hospital, more family members arrived to check in on Conrad, including Julie, who pressed him to find out what had happened. He just kept repeating, I don't know. I don't know. And he actually showed me many of his burns.

Conrad's condition worsened over the next 24 hours and he was soon taken to a new hospital to further treat his injuries. While Conrad was being transported, the police found Megan at the hotel. First, she gave the whole bread story. We know that one. It's a riot. But then...

The lines started to change. Okay, so it looks like it could have been thrown over his head and it landed all over him.

Okay. Is there any reason why your fingerprints would be on there? I mean, I carry them in the grocery because that's my job. Okay. But we all do. You remember throwing anything at him that caused, like, this white powder to land on you? Not intentional. We're not saying you intentionally tried it. I'm just saying we're throwing things and then this landed on me. I don't think so. I mean, it was, like, make way. What kind of make way? Just be totally neutral, okay? Probably, like, water or something. I don't know.

Like a water bottle or a cup of water? It was a bottle like a bottle, yeah. When lye is mixed with water, it creates an extremely potent exothermic reaction. In other words, it fucking burns like a motherfucker. You don't want to experience it. Just take my word for it, weirdo. It burns your skin right off. So if you're into that sort of thing, hey, knock yourself out.

Start with your face. Anyway, Megan admitted that she got mad and just started throwing a bunch of stuff, but she wasn't sure what she was throwing. She was in that kind of possessed teenage girl rage.

The kind that cancels people for posting a meme. When you were throwing stuff, right? You're unintentionally throwing stuff. Not, you know, I totally get it. Like, they're not at him? It's just the ground? Right, that's fine. When you threw anything, because we need to help the hospital out here. They're trying to figure out what's going on because, like I said, he's in rough shape, okay? Was there any white substance that flew out of something when you threw something at him or anything? We're trying to help your dad out here. I think so, yeah. Okay.

And there it was.

A confession. I mean, we're both smart individuals. I didn't think a powder alone could do that. Well, you said you threw water, too, right? You see how the water and the drain open next? Okay. So, you know, at this point, I'm going to have you turn around. You are under arrest, okay? All right, so turn around. Place your hands behind your back, okay? We'll try not to make it a big scene. You don't like this, do you? Okay.

So there in the parking lot of her own 18th birthday party, Megan was arrested. After a week in jail, she sent this video to a friend.

who later shared it with police. So how are y'all doing?

Megan went on about how now she has to live with her mom and at least she can be the girl she's destined to be. Teenagers. What a pain in the ass, right? Yeah.

But everything would not turn out so good. Conrad was soon transported from one hospital to a burn unit specialist at another hospital. He spent 151 days in that burn unit, being treated for wounds on 41% of his body. He was put on dialysis because his kidneys were shot.

His burns became infected over and over again to the point where both of his legs had to be amputated. He had a tracheotomy. Then, after five months, he decided he wanted to be taken off life support and go home on hospice. Conrad only made it three days. He died in March of 2022, and everything changed.

All of a sudden, Megan was not just a little brat who may or may not have burned her father in a hissy fit. She would soon be on trial for his death. When Conrad Emmerowicz was taken to the emergency room for severe chemical burns caused by a bottle of lye, no one expected that his teenage daughter Megan would be responsible. It was Megan's 18th birthday and she had a hair appointment before her party.

But when Conrad got too drunk to drive her to the salon, she had a fit and threw a bottle of lye at her father. Conrad's injuries got worse over the course of five months in the hospital, and then he died. Megan was now facing murder charges. The Amirowicks family had become even more broken than they already were. Conrad's eldest son, Austin, became super protective of his father before he died.

not allowing his mother to visit Conrad in the hospital. And I ended up calling Austin and he told me that a plan was put in place where no one could come up there except for himself and one other. And you had to have the passcode or the password in order to get any information or to visit.

And he told me I better not ever try to go around that. He goes, I know you're good at talking your way into things and not to ever come up there or do anything or you're done for. At first, Megan was looking at murder charges, but the prosecution put it down to domestic violence and the unlawful possession of harmful devices or irritants causing death. The state had a tough case to prove.

No one saw Megan throw the lie at her father. Her confession was half-baked, at best. In June of 2023, Megan showed up in court to face the consequences of her alleged actions. She remained quiet beside her lawyers wearing a paisley blue sundress and little makeup on her round face. She didn't smile. She barely opened her mouth as the prosecution began their opening arguments

and the media turned on their cameras. Criminal cases are always about choices and consequences. A person will make a choice to do something, and the consequences ensue. In our society, we hold people accountable for the choices and for the consequences of their choices, and that is why we are here today. Because on October 1st, 2021, Megan Amiroids made a choice to act, and the action left the death of her father, Conrad Amiroids. Megan turned 18 on September 29th, 2021.

She was supposed to have a birthday party on the night of October 1st, 2021. She'd also made a hair appointment that day, so she was going to go and get her hair done and then go to this birthday party. So she woke up at home on October 1st at the home she shares with her father, Conrad, and that was in Ortonville, Michigan, here in Oakland County. Now, Megan does not drive, so she needed Conrad to take her to the hair appointments. So she goes to get him.

And she finds what I think you're going to hear is a familiar sight, which is that Conrad, even at 10 o'clock in the morning or so, was drunk. And he was actually so drunk, he was effectively passed out. And this made her enraged. Megan scowled and hung her head as the prosecutor, Jason DeSantis, continued telling the jury her story. And she starts throwing things at him, just everything that's lying around. And you're going to see in the photos, there was a lot of stuff lying around.

But one of the things that you're going to find out that she admitted to throwing at him was water. And another thing that she's going to admit to throwing at him, as you're going to see on a police interview video, is a white powder, a cleaning agent, that she's going to say got, you know, got in around his legs. The product, of course, was lye. And I think you're going to find that

statement that there was a little bit of white powder was probably an understatement that she made up to it herself because it was not just a little bit of white powder.

Lye, of course, is a common product. It's an alkali. We use it in tons of things, soap, fertilizer, but it's also a household cleaner. It's available at pretty much any store. You can buy it at Ace Hardware, and it's used very commonly for drain cleaning. It is dangerous to humans. So she puts this on him, and it gets everywhere, and it's all over his skin because, unfortunately, Conrad was asleep on the couch, and he was effectively naked at the time.

So all of this got in direct contact with his skin. Now, Megan has a friend come and pick her up and she leaves to go to her hair appointment. Conrad is still passed out. So this stuff is just sitting on him, eating away at his flesh for a very long time. The state was very strategic in its charges. They wanted to hold Megan responsible for her father's death, but this wasn't an intentional murder. This wasn't even a crime of passion. In fact,

They couldn't even use the word murder or manslaughter. So the elements of the offense are the things I have to prove. They're the only things I have to prove. Now, you've probably heard of words like motive. I don't have to prove motive. I think we will, but I don't think I have to. What I do have to prove is that on or about October 1st, 2021, in Oakland County, Michigan, the defendant placed, used, or released a substance. That that substance then was that she possessed, placed, used, or released was a chemical irritant.

The law defines that as a solid liquid or gas that through its chemical or physical properties alone or in combination with one or more other substances can be used to produce an irritant effect in humans, animals, or plants. Third, that the defendant possessed, placed, used, or released the chemical irritant to frighten, terrorize, intimidate, threaten, harass, injure, assault, batter, or kill Conrad Amirovitz. Fourth...

The possession, place, and reuse or release of the chemical irritant resulted in the death of Conrad A. Meroz. You do not have to all agree upon which intent of the list that you have there that it is. One of you may think it was to scare him, one of you may think it was to hurt him, one of you may think it was to kill him. You don't all have to agree on that part. A verdict has to be unanimous. But your rationale for getting there here does not. You only throw things at someone when you want to hit them with it. You only do that when you're angry. And you only throw things or put things on people

Megan's defense was what you might expect, and it involved a lot of blame on Conrad's problem with alcohol. Apparently, alcohol makes you throw things around the room at yourself. Now,

What happened on that day was tragic, no question. But there's some more facts you need to know. His son, when he went to the hospital to talk to him, his statements were, I don't remember what happened. Mr. Amirowitz said that. His blood alcohol level was very high. And his son said, look what he told me, him and Megan had a fight. Okay. They had a fight, they had an argument. She admitted she threw some bread at him and a couple other things.

But that doesn't mean that she threw this stuff at him. This is a tragic situation. Throughout all the medical records, and I think we're going to admit the medical records, there's a total of probably 20,000 pages. Never once does he say, I remember what happened. Never once does he say, Megan did it. Never once does he say or blame anyone for this. Now, he went through a horrific experience.

but he was also an extreme alcoholic. So this is a bad situation. You're going to have to look at all the facts, all the situation, listen to all the testimony and make up your mind. Megan's trial was long and highly publicized. Her brother Austin and former friend Caleb both testified for the state, whereas her mother Julie got up to support her daughter.

In fact, Julie was one of the only people who was on Megan's side. A little bit of that cluster B, you know? We don't know what happened that day. There's no fingerprints from the bottle. When I returned with Megan on the Wednesday after this happened for her retriever stuff, when we were escorted by a state trooper, the bottle was sitting on the couch and

It was still there. Anyone could have touched it. Why was a more thorough investigation not done? These are my questions of how, you know, the two plus two with all the facts that are known, the actual facts, not the hearsay or the testimony, but the physical facts, two plus two is just not able for...

This trial wasn't just about whether or not Megan threw the lie on her dad, but her behavior afterward. Both Austin and Kayla testified after they told Megan and Conrad was in the hospital, she just huffed and continued to harass them for his credit card pin. All she cared about was her birthday party. A selfish teenager. Isn't that an oxymoron? Now let's do 180. Put yourself in Megan's shoes for a second.

Would you react like this if you found out that your dad was in the emergency room? What if he was just a drunk piece of shit? Nah, that changes things, doesn't it? Or maybe not. Maybe you drop everything and just rush to go see him. Maybe that's the kind of person you are. What if your dad hit you? Ooh, I'm not saying that this dad did, but what if he did? What about then? Would you change your behavior at all? What if he hurt you emotionally? What now?

It's not so black and white sometimes. But it doesn't take long for the jury to decide Megan's fate. Thank you, everyone. You can be seated. Ladies and gentlemen of the jury, I understand that you have a verdict. Is that correct? I'm going to ask that you hand the envelope to my clerk, Ms. Torres. Ma'am, if you could please stand and read the verdict to the courtroom. Guilty of chemical irritants, unlawful use, causing death.

Megan hung her head and clutched her coat to her chest as the guilty verdict was announced. The state asked to remove her bond and Megan's lawyer began scrolling through his phone trying to figure out what dates were best for sentencing. Megan began to sob and the camera zeroed in on her face. But it just looked like forced tears. Like she knew the world was watching and they sure were.

When it came time for sentencing, Megan chose to read a statement. Sometimes in life, we are faced with trouble. Those we don't wish for and most aren't ever met. Yet we face them anyways. 19 years ago, I was placed into the arms of the first man to ever love me. The man I'm lucky enough to call my dad. Growing up, he became so much more. He was a storyteller, a tooth fairy, a friend and hero.

But through it all, the one thing that never changed was that he was mine. One of the biggest things overlooked in this case is that me and my siblings lost our dad too. That loss has severely broken us. My little brother was diagnosed with severe depression, and at his age, that will probably take over most of his life. He wasn't allowed to say goodbye to my dad. He's 15 and not only has to live with that scar, but at the same time, has to watch his big sister face to come home.

My little sister is still traumatized from having her car surrounded and her sister taken away. And worst of all, until the police blurted out our dad was gone, we had no idea. She too was kept from saying goodbye and is also struggling as she watches me go through this. My mom lost him too. Nobody sees that, but that's true. They were loved ones. She mothered his kids and she lost him. And then there's me.

It's been two years and I haven't been able to mourn. I refuse to think he's gone because no part of me can handle losing him. Megan saw through her entire statement. It was hard not to feel a little bit bad for the girl. She was, after all, a child. By law, she was 18. But we all know that doesn't make you mature. Not mature enough to understand the real world. The harsh cruelty of it. The fact that things...

aren't always fair and stay that way. And there's not a goddamn thing you can do about it. Megan barely lived in the adult world. And now here she was in a courtroom begging a judge to see how she too lost her father, even if the state did believe it was all her fault. "The state can every believe of love and hope and happiness and destroy it."

I am the best part of him. I'm his daughter. But without him, I don't know who I am anymore. He was my reason. And now every day I battle with such harm. When I was younger, I'd count the days until I could live with him, with my dad full time. And when that day finally came, and the first time in my life I could finally exhale,

He was my best friend and the person I talked to about boys. The one who knew every single thing about me and my favorite person to laugh with. My dad has always been the one constant in my life. That alone and that created an unbreakable bond between us and no one, not especially Mr. DeSantis, can take that away from me. I never got to say goodbye and that's a scar I'll never be able to lose.

To close her tearful statement, Megan turned her focus on the female judge presiding over her case and turned up the waterworks.

Once upon a time you dreamed of being a judge and part of me believes it's because some people deserve another chance. You've accomplished your dream and I guess now I'm asking for you to help me accomplish mine. In a world full of wrongful judges, I'm asking you to be the change. To believe in me the way my dad did. I'm gonna ask for the lower end of my guidelines, but even lower. Impossible. I'm not a threat to society, but an asset for the future.

Megan begged for freedom. She needed to finish high school. She had big dreams of becoming a marine biologist. Don't all girls dream of that? She was so young. She made a mistake and she didn't want to be locked away forever. She didn't want consequences to her actions. Ms. Samirowitz, case number 2022-281-519FC. Harmful devices...

Irritants, unlawful possession, or use causing death. With regard to this matter, the court has reviewed the PSI, has reviewed your COMPAS score and your prior criminal history. The circumstances that you have endured during your adolescent life are somewhat detailed in the PSR. The report indicates physical abuse and attempted sexual assault by a friend of a sibling which was not addressed by your parents.

Your adoptive parents separated when you were eight and a half years old. You had endured both physical abuse and while you indicate that you were raised by both of your parents, the court does recognize that your father was a severe alcoholic. His disease could not make him a fit parent.

and he always put you in harm's way. Your childhoods would line with abuse, the inability to grow mentally as a child. Your only criminal history was driving offense that your father was unable to drive you.

The PSI indicates that he would pick you up while intoxicated and that you had to quit your job to care for your father. Your father described you as an angel, making it clear that you do not have malice. It is clear that your father's addiction and the denial of his addiction alienated his family. Your parents divorced when you were approximately eight and a half years old.

Your younger siblings could not endure visiting your father anymore. Your younger sister testified that the last time that she was at the house, she shared a bathroom with your father and that there was vomit in the shower, in the sink, and toilet paper all over the bathroom. The first responders could not attend to your father because of the filth inside the house, that it was not fit for habitation.

Garbage bagged and unbagged garbage filled the home. The home was infested with visible fleas and bugs, and the PSI describes plastic bags filled with urine near the couch. Your mother testified about human feces around the couch as well. Your mother, your younger siblings, and your older brother all left the home, leaving you with the daunting task of caring for your father. The denial of the disease from your father and your brothers believed that your father was not an alcoholic weighed on your shoulders.

You did not have the luxury of being a child as you indicated that you had to be an adult in the house. This is a serious crime that you have been found guilty of. The court does not believe that a child your age knew or understood the consequences of throwing the items at your father or the damage that it would cause him. At the time of the incident, you were barely 18 years old. You were three days past your birthday. It is clear that your brain is not developed.

The United States Supreme Court in Roper v. Simmon, a 2005 case, recognized that juveniles have less culpability and are less deserving of the harshest punishments due to the inherent immaturity and vulnerability. The court recognizes that you have indicated that you have professional goals of becoming a marine biologist and that you plan to open a rescue for marine life after completion of high school and college and that you would like to start a charity to help recovering alcoholics.

With regard to this matter, the court is going to sentence you to one year in jail with 506 days credit. That was it. One year in jail. She spent longer in jail waiting for trial than she did for her actual punishment. What's that old saying? A slap on the wrist? Well, Megan barely got touched on the wrist. She barely got a tap. She sure was lucky with the sympathetic judge there, wasn't she?

I wonder if she'd be just as sympathetic if she was a 7-foot, 250-pound black man. Makes you wonder. Not everything is fair, is it? Sometimes it just stays that way. I want you to understand that with regard to this opportunity, that if you are not successful with regard to probation, the prison term of 5 to 25 years is on the table. Megan served her year in jail and didn't waste a moment of it.

In fact, she became good friends with Jennifer Crumbly, and the media went crazy. For those of you who don't know, Jennifer Crumbly is the mother of Ethan Crumbly, the Oxford high school shooter who murdered four students and injured seven while on a rampage in November of 2021. Ethan's mother, Jennifer, was charged with involuntary manslaughter for purchasing the handgun that her son used to kill his classmates.

Anyway, Megan and Jennifer really hit it off in the slammer. Not sure why, but they just did. Here's Megan. I had no idea who she was when I first got there, but she had sent down a little care package for me. And that was the first time she's ever done anything like that. So I thought it was really kind of her. Well, when I moved in with her, we were, you know, together 23 hours a day.

And when I moved out, every day for my hour, I would just stand at her door and talk to her. And we'd talk through the vent. Like when I was in my cell, we would yell and talk to each other like that. And we'd always find a way to talk to each other every single day. In all the interviews she did, whether it was on some YouTube channel or some major news network, Megan said the same thing.

She only threw bread at her dad. She was innocent. All that stuff she told cops, she was just, she was coerced. I was really scared. I had thought that my dad had hurt himself again. And I didn't want him to get in trouble for anything because they would have taken him away and put him in a mental hospital. And I was just really freaked out. I...

Megan also thinks maybe her dad put the lie on himself as a suicide attempt. Weird way to commit suicide, but drunks have done weirder things, you know. I know that...

Megan knows her truth.

but we will never know the truth. There were no witnesses, but a part of me thinks Megan did throw the lie. I think she knows deep down that she did. I don't think she really expected it to burn him that badly, and I don't think she expected it to lead to his death, but she threw it, and she knows she threw it. That part, I'm pretty sure about. Could be wrong,

And it's just my opinion. But that's how I see it. Be curious to hear how you see it. Leave a comment. JordanScale.com Megan was frustrated. She was angry. I mean, why wouldn't she be? She was living with a bumbling drunk in a filthy, disgusting house. She must have finally just snapped. She didn't deserve to live like this. She didn't deserve to have this be her life. She didn't deserve this drunk in her life.

But there he was, ruining her 18th birthday party. I don't blame her for that, actually. I blame her mother for allowing Megan to live in such squalor with someone she knew had a severe alcohol problem. Julie's kind of a shitty mother, and Megan didn't really deserve that either. This whole family could have been saved if they had just attended a couple of meetings. I still think about it a lot.

As the judge said, Megan Amirwicks was just a kid when she lost her father because of her unhinged actions. But Megan was living in a highly stressful situation that no kid her age should have to be in. Taking care of a drunk all day, day in and day out, is just too much for most grown adults to bear, let alone a kid.

an 18 year old. She was tasked with the impossible and did not understand what a burden her father's alcoholism was on her mental well-being until it was too late. But Megan, believe it or not, was lucky. She got a sympathetic judge who looked at her horrible upbringing and also felt kind of bad. I don't know if a year in jail was enough for Megan to really fully understand the consequences of her actions.

Only she knows if she threw the lie on her dad or not, whether she intended to or not. That's all something she's got to struggle with for the rest of her. She has to come to terms with that somehow in her brain. Maybe it'll just self-destruct like her father's did. The thought of what she may have done intentionally will eat away at her, like the lie did on her father's skin for eternity.

And that's probably just about the worst punishment a daughter can have. It's amazing how shitty humans can be, huh?

Well, that does it for another episode of Sword and Scale. Thank you so much once again for joining us. Remember, Sword and Scale television is available right now at swordandscale.com. There's seven episodes available right now and plenty more coming. You can go watch it 24-7. You don't even need permission from the dick suckers at Reddit. It starts at just $20 a month and you get all of our content. Commercialized.

commercial-free, early access in a high-bandwidth audio feed. Oh, and our TV show is also 4K, of course, but we're going to be launching some feature improvements to the app soon that'll allow you to cast to your actual television set so the whole family can watch together all of the horrible, horrible murder stories of decapitation and dismemberment that we tell here at Sword & Skeletal. It's a family-building exercise.

Throw some popcorn in the microwave. Turn the lights down. Make sure to lock your doors and watch Sword and Scale television right now. Swordandscale.com. We have widgets and whatnots available in our store, store.swordandscale.com. And I know I'm forgetting something. Oh, yeah. Stay safe.

so

so

Toyota's legacy has been standing tall for generations, from pioneering hybrid technology to redefining the standards of safety and efficiency. With each innovation, a renewed commitment to progress. And with Toyota's legendary lineup of trucks in stock at your local Toyota dealer, you can experience the legacy for yourself.

So check out the ultra-rugged new Tacoma, built for off-road adventure or everyday practicality. Or test drive a heavy-duty half-ton Tundra, decked out with modern tech and comfort, with a haul-anything attitude. And both Tacoma and Tundra are available with the i-Force Max Hybrid powertrain, giving your truck more power than ever before. Quality. Reliability.

That's the legacy of Toyota. Visit BuyAToyota.com, the official website for deals, to find out more. Toyota. Let's go places.