#364: Teen Couple Killing Everyone That Won’t Let Them Be Together, Then Host Party In The Murder House
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Get your quote today at Progressive.com to join the over 28 million drivers who trust Progressive. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and Affiliates. Price and coverage match limited by state law. The steps are pretty simple. You aim, pull the trigger, and you shoot. And then you repeat.

It's pretty standard. The first few times that Johnny is doing this, he's struggling a little bit. But the practice rounds, the more he does it, it's helping him get into the groove. It's helping him understand how to be one with the gun. And now this time, it's going to be so much easier. It's locked.

loaded, ready to go. Johnny's girlfriend, Cassandra, is scrunching up her nose in disgust. She's got her arms stretched out as far away from herself as possible, and she's just pouring bleach onto the bathroom floor. Listen, home renovation is typically not the ideal way that couples want to spend their time, but they're about to host this massive party and they need the house to be somewhat presentable.

They're scrambling to get all these little mini projects around the house done. I mean, Cassandra has used so much bleach. The bottle is empty by the time that she's done with one bathroom. And now this very strong scent of bleach and whatever else she was originally trying to clean up is so overpowering. It's piercing through her nostrils. At this point, if she stays in the restroom any longer, she's going to get high on the fumes. But that's where Johnny's gun comes in handy.

His cock gun. Cassandra closes the door halfway behind her. Johnny walks up and he's got this tube-shaped dispenser. He pulls the metal trigger and this thick white silicone-y liquid comes out. I mean, it's basically an industrial form of a white silicone glue and it's gonna seal the entire seams of the door. I mean, the directions are pretty easy. Aim, pull the trigger, and shoot.

The silicone parts, they start flowing out of the caulking gun. He repeats the process across the perimeters of the interior doors. Effectively, he glues the doors of the entire house shut.

Every interior door into the bedroom, into the restroom. He's super glued it so that you cannot open it. He glued every single door to every single room in the house? Shut. Except for maybe like one restroom. He's glued everything else closed. And so you can't open it? No. Even if you want to get inside, you can't get inside. If you're inside, you can't get out. Huh. Okay. And the two, Cassandra and Johnny, 17-year-old Cassandra, 19-year-old Johnny, they're crossing their fingers. I mean, hopefully...

Hopefully. None of the guests at the party would be able to smell the two dead bodies upstairs. Not after the bleach. Not after they glued the doors shut. Right?

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As always, full show notes are available at rottenmingopodcast.com. Now, some brief disclaimers before we start today's video. Some names have been changed for privacy for different individuals and witnesses involved, and some statements have been condensed for time. There are mentions of CSA as well as relational violence, and perhaps the biggest theme throughout this entire episode is self-exit attempts.

If anyone you know or if a loved one you know is struggling or if maybe you are, resources will be linked in the show notes. And with that being said, let's get into today's video.

There was something really odd happening in a suburban town outside of Atlanta. In the span of a week, there had been a series of attacks. Three couples had been attacked in three separate homes. Which, you know, okay, maybe the investigators believe that some serial killer is on the loose targeting random couples in homes. But interestingly enough, there are no signs of a break-in in any of the homes.

April 2nd, 2017. Couple A is found attacked in their beds at night. No signs of a break-in. The entire house is ransacked and they are left with their throats slit. Six days later, April 8th, 2017. Couple B are attacked right when they walk into their house. They're sprayed with bear mace. It's like pepper spray, but stronger. It's for bears. They're sprayed with bear mace and beaten over the heads with a metal bat.

And then just a day later, couple C is found slumped on top of each other in a bathroom covered, just smeared in blood, unconscious. The investigators working the case, they would find some very interesting things. These were clearly not random attacks. Couple C was found to have been driving couple B's car.

So couple C and couple B are connected. Couple C's intimate videos were found on couple A's phone. So couple C and couple A are connected. But how are all three couples connected? And what set off the sequence of events that would kill two of them and almost leave the other four dead?

The investigators believe couple C are the ones linking all three couples together. They are the connection. They have couple B's car, their videos are found on couple A's phone, and they had just been discovered by the authorities in the restroom, unconscious, covered in blood. I mean, they're bleeding out. They need to be rushed to the emergency room ASAP, and if they don't make it out, if they don't live, there's going to be so many unanswered questions.

so now all the police can do is wait for 19 year old johnny ryder and 17 year old cassandra borge to wake up listen love is about loving every little part of your partner i mean even the stuff that other people might think is just not as exciting and johnny finds every little thing about cassandra so absolutely perfect like it's kind of cute that all of her phone passwords are just one two three four

She likes it so uncomplicated, but at the same time, she herself is so complicated. She's like this short little five foot, three inch ball of energy. And you would expect with her short little height, she's not going to be a fighter. But then you find out that she takes tansudo. It's a Korean martial arts. She's been doing it for like six years of her life. And she knows how to do a knife hand strike where you strike and break the concrete blocks with the edge of your hand.

Or like a roundhouse kick where you can spin your full body, jump up with your foot in the air and strike something or someone. She even took Shaolin Kung Fu, Chinese Kung Fu. I mean, she's so good at it that she went on these international trips in China to compete in tournaments. Yes. Really? Actually, very good. And she's so just so cool.

But then she had to quit. She had to give it all up because, you know, she said her emotions and feelings were all over the place. She wasn't able to sit there and really focus on the movements and be in that headspace that you need for martial arts. And Johnny felt like there's something that he could help with. He could save her from that.

to johnny, i mean cassandra's kind of the perfect girl. the definition of a soulmate. and even though they had only been dating a few weeks, he felt like they had been together for a freaking lifetime. he's sitting on the ledge of a parking lot in downtown atlanta and cassandra's right next to him and they see the whole city. i mean it's so beautiful, it's peaceful, it's a parking lot so it's not a tourist attraction. they're basically alone and for a while they're talking, they're listening to music but then there's this there's this moment of silence

where they're just taking in the view and Johnny turns to look at Cassandra. She looks at him and he just sees this burst of purple around her. And he's like, I don't think I'm on drugs right now, but maybe I am. But I don't think so. It's like an aura, a glowing light orb radiating out of her body, a light bursting out of her. Like she's the center of the universe, the core of this parking lot. And the world just revolves around Cassandra, right?

and he's just staring in awe. of course cassandra starts to feel a little bit self-conscious like wait what is it? why are you looking at me like that? why are you just staring at me? it's a very intense look. i see purple all around you. purple is a sign of love and i think this is love at first sight. johnny is hooked. he knows from that moment deep down, that moment forward, cassandra is the girl that he cannot live without.

Which is crazy considering Johnny and his ex-wife just divorced two weeks ago, but that's fine. Did he just met her or? Yeah. Oh, they just met. Basically. He cannot live without 17 year old Cassandra. He's 19. Yeah. He just divorced. Just divorced. Okay. The cops are standing there staring at the front door of this random residential house and the front door has been cocked shut. It's been glued shut.

The police force their way into the house and it's not looking good. The entire first floor is trashed. There's cigarette butts scattered throughout the living room, the garage, on the couch, partially burnt, which honestly probably a fire hazard, but that's the least of their worries right now. There's prescription bottles filled with cigarette butts just laying around. Multiple tubes of caulk just on the ground, likely the ones that glued every single door in this house shut. There's mason jars on the ground. In the kitchen, there's just a

mound of fried rice on the floor next to the sink. Not on a plate or in a container on the floor, just a mound of fried rice on the floor directly. There's rotting food everywhere. There's dishes with remnants of moldy food piling up in the sink. I mean, the place looks completely ransacked. The police head upstairs and some of the interior doors in the house also glued shut, just like the front door. Strange. They break into each of the rooms and now they understand why.

There are two dead bodies in two separate rooms of this home. In one of the bedrooms, they find a man's body laying on the bed. His right leg is hanging off the bed. I mean, it appears that he had been attacked in his sleep. Attacked badly. There's evidence that he's beaten, stabbed, his throat is slit. There's bloody shoe prints embedded onto the bedsheets indicating that whoever did this to this man hated this guy so much that they physically stomped on him to inflict more injuries.

On him where? On his face, on his torso area, primarily where most of the injuries were inflicted. Above the headboard where the man is laying, there's a pair of just bloody handprints stamped onto the wall. The attack was so vicious, there's blood splatter all up on the walls, on the lampshades, on the ceiling. The ceiling fan has blood. It's a very gruesome crime scene.

The officers then head to the restroom, where they find another body, the body of a woman on the bathroom floor. She too has been beaten and her throat has been slit. The door to the restroom had also been glued shut. The entire upstairs of this random, calm, peaceful residential house in the middle of a normal neighborhood is covered in blood. Bloody drag marks left on the floor, blood on the walls. The house the police had broken into was where Cassandra lived.

The bodies belong to couple A, Wendy and Randall Björk, Cassandra's grandparents. And left next to Grandma Wendy's body is a little bottle of empty bleach. The day after Cassandra's grandparents' bodies are found, Johnny Ryder, Cassandra's boyfriend, leaves his mother a voicemail. In it, his voice sounds very weak. He's barely audible. "'Hey, Ma, it's Johnny. I'm crazy. I'm evil.'"

And then he whispers, so low that you can barely hear him. I'm sorry. Forgive me. I'm sorry. I'm not well. I'm mentally crazy. I'm dying as we speak. I love you. I'll see you later, okay? I love you. Bye.

What is he asking forgiveness for? The voicemail will be sent right before Johnny Ryder and his girlfriend Cassandra are found unconscious on the floor of a restroom. A few days after they're taken to the emergency room, Cassandra wakes up in the hospital bed. She almost died. And the first few people that she's talking to since coming back to, since becoming conscious again, are detectives. They're asking her, what the hell happened in that restroom? I tried to, um, I tried to self-exit.

The detectives try to ask, why would you do that, sweetie? Tell me why. I couldn't take it anymore. I didn't know what else to do, where else to go. I just got really angry and depressed. And I don't know, I just kind of felt like the whole world was collapsing on me. I know you know why. I'm here. I just need to understand why, Cassandra. Talk to me, please. What I can't do, I can't talk to you unless you are being honest with me.

Cassandra sounds like she's in a lot of pain while she's forcing herself to remember all the little details of how she witnessed her grandparents' murder. Cause she was there when it happened. Johnny, my boyfriend, picked out which knife he wanted. Which one did he choose? It was the sharpest one, it was like the biggest one, and then he started using it on my grandpa, and then, and then, and then we just slit his throat. Pause there. You said, "We?"

Oh, he. I didn't touch my grandpa. I didn't. Back to the night of the murder. It's the middle of the night, maybe just past midnight. Cassandra is in the room with her grandma, Wendy, and grandpa Randall is asleep in a separate room. They sleep separately. Cassandra is in grandma's Wendy's room when she freezes.

Wait, what was that noise? She strains to listen, but it's no use because the noise is getting louder. She can hear it. It's like grunting. The sound of a fist hitting flesh. Like imagine if you were to punch a bag of meat. It sounds like someone's getting beat up in the next room. That's what it sounds like. Someone is in a lot of pain. They're yelling and the screaming starts and she knows exactly what she's listening to. Johnny, her 19 year old boyfriend, is beating her grandfather to death.

Cassandra freezes. I mean, what is she supposed to do? Oh my God. Oh my God. Her grandpa is going to die. Johnny is going to kill her grandpa. What can she even do right now? Suddenly she starts feeling this overwhelming rush overtake her entire body. It's like a tingling sensation. And she turns to her grandma, Grandma Wendy, grabs the tire iron in her hands.

and whacks her grandma on the back of the head. A week after the murders, Cassandra and the two other people, they've got bags of McDonald's with them. A few orders of fries, milkshakes, and burgers. They're setting up the little table to get ready to eat family style. They're gonna lay all the fries out. They're putting the milkshakes down, putting in the straws. And Cassandra's telling the two people about how sick of hospital food she's been. Yeah, I bet, I bet. I mean, there was one point where I couldn't even eat anymore.

briefly the two others that are with cassandra decide to step out for a moment before they start eating. cassandra glances around, she checks out the room. it's a pretty small room, bare. just a door leading into the hallway. there's no windows, there's no artwork, no paintings, just empty space. she's completely alone now. she looks to her left, then to her right, and then she looks up, and then she looks straight in front of her where there is a camera pointed eye level at her face.

And she just stares into the camera. No emotions on her face. Her face is completely blank, but her eyes are wide, so alert. It almost looks like she's going to go cross-eyed. Like she's trying to peer into the soul of whoever is watching on the other end of the camera. It's like Cassandra has broken the fourth wall. For how long? A few seconds. I mean, it feels like eternity as I was watching it.

She's wearing this dark forest green jumpsuit. Her hair is tied up in a messy bun. She looks like a teenager that just woke up. She's got these giant casts around her arms that come almost up to her elbows. Like she's wearing oven mitts and they're tied together. She's got a giant bandaid on her neck and she just stares into the camera. And she's alone in the interrogation room with, I guess, us.

the camera and she stares before leaning down and slowly using her mouth to vacuum up a french fry because she can't use her arms and she just starts crunching crunch crunch crunch and stares into the camera glances around

then leans back down, vacuums up another french fry, crunch crunch crunch, then another, then she leans down and takes a sip of her milkshake, and then she decides, you know what? I'm just gonna go for it. She uses her cast like a giant scooper, scoops up the burger, and just starts eating in silence while periodically staring into the depths of the camera. Welcome to Cassandra's interrogation tapes. Cassandra will matter-of-factly share her side of the story of why she chose to kill the only people that ever cared for her.

This is her version of events. There are very few reasons why someone might torture another person. Most of the reasons don't make sense. They could just be sadistic. They get off on the power that they hold over the other party and the pain that they're eliciting from this person is thrilling. It's exciting. They're getting off on it. Perhaps it's vengeance. Maybe the person that they're torturing has done something so unspeakable, so heinous that even death wouldn't be good revenge.

Or, I mean, that sounds like it's just in the movies. The most common reason I imagine to torture someone is to extract information. If you have information that the CIA wants, they might subject you to what they call, quote, enhanced interrogations, a.k.a. torture, in most people's opinion.

Stress positions so painful that your body is shaking in agony. They'll put you in these boxes, in these contorted positions where every second feels like there's needles sticking into every part of your muscles. There's just nonstop pain. They'll play loud music to the point where you cannot get a single second of sleep. It is so all-consuming. You can't even think straight. Sometimes they use frequencies to do that. You feel like you're losing your mind. You want it to stop. Honestly, you would do anything at this point for it to just stop. Please just stop it.

Sometimes if they're really desperate, they will allegedly waterboard you so you feel like you're drowning. But they say that there is no greater torture than when you're forced to watch your loved one die.

that's why in all the movies they tie up the heroes loved ones and they say give up that information or else we're gonna kill this person it's a torture so vile that i doubt that the cia would even take part in it which is saying a lot cassandra drags her grandma's bloodied body into the room next door she's leaving these bloody marks behind and she joins johnny and her grandpa

look, they did not bring a backpack with duct tape, a tire iron, and throw dirty old t-shirts across their mouths to cover their faces to walk out of this house with nothing. we need the safe code. johnny looks at cassandra. can you grab some knives?

Cassandra runs downstairs to the kitchen, grabs the three biggest knives that she can find, butcher knives, runs back up, hands them to Johnny. What's the safe code, Grandma? They're questioning Grandma Wendy, and they know that she has a safe in her closet, but they need the code to get it.

to show her, Grandma Wendy, that they're so very serious about this. They're not messing around right now. Johnny grabs the knife and in front of Grandma Wendy starts stabbing Grandpa Randall in the stomach once, twice, three, four, five, more than five times. And Grandma Wendy starts pleading with them, her own granddaughter. "I'll give you the money. I'll give you my keys. I'll give you anything you want."

Cassandra says Grandma Wendy was mumbling through the duct tape, but they could still somewhat understand her. She says, and I quote, I mean, she was mumbling through the duct tape. You could still understand her, but at the same time, you couldn't, you know?

Regardless, none of that mattered. All that mattered is Grandma Wendy is about to give her the safe code. And once she gets those magical numbers, she runs into Grandma Wendy's closet to unlock the safe. She clicks in the safe code, enter the safe, unlocks the door, swings open, and there are just envelopes stuffed with cash. Holy shit. Grandma Wendy was not lying. She was telling Cassandra the truth. Cassandra smirks because...

Now, Cassandra and Johnny, they're about to be very, very, very rich. In the interrogation room, Cassandra will tell the two investigators that she was actually quite shocked at how much money was in Grandma's safe.

I go in there checking out the stuff. I grab the book bag and I just start stuffing the book bag with everything. You know, like there were envelopes just filled with money. There was probably like a thousand dollars that we found in that safe that they were just saving. A thousand dollars? A thousand dollars. In envelopes? Yes. Did you know about that money or you just found... Cassandra starts smirking a little. And you know, it was kind of weird because...

like she was kind of giving me an idea about it before my grandma was saying what if i just gave you a thousand dollars would that just make the world a better place and i'm like no i don't want a thousand dollars so she kept saying that and then i was like when i saw it i was just like wow she actually had a thousand dollars in her safe like that's crazy there are a lot of moments like this in the interrogation where it is such a weird mixture of such an evil crime mixed with such immature almost childish qualities she

she's talking about killing her grandparents but then she's amazed that somebody has a thousand dollars in a safe which don't get me wrong is a lot of money but you cannot flee with that kind of money after a double homicide it's not gonna get them very far which by the way they're gonna spend it in a full week but at this point Cassandra thinks that she is set for life practically she's standing in front of this safe with a giant smirk on her face she's emptying out all of the envelopes into the black back

back that they brought along she runs back into the room where johnny is watching over her nearly dead grandma and grandpa they're still alive she's holding the little book bag filled with cash hey i got the stuff johnny nods turns to grandpa randall and slits his throat right next to grandma wendy

They then drag Grandma Wendy into the restroom. And by this point, Grandma Wendy has been beaten within an inch of her life with the tire iron by her granddaughter. But she's still alive, which is crazy, as Cassandra puts it, because she was, quote, dead.

beating her head with the tire iron. In the interrogation room, she shows the investigators how she's doing it. And it's just this weird casual. She's just using both of her arms to swing over. She says, beating her head.

Cassandra says when she first attacked her grandma back in grandma's room right when they start the killings She wasn't feeling any sort of mercy or hesitation She says I start hitting my grandma and you know Johnny's doing his thing and you know I stopped hearing Johnny doing whatever and so he comes into the room and me and my grandma are in and he helps me tie up my grandma with the duct tape Cassandra and Johnny they tie up grandma completely by her arms ankles. They wrap the duct tape around her head just in circles and

And after Johnny helps Cassandra tie up Wendy, Cassandra drags her into grandpa's room. They torture, essentially torture her for the safe code. They kill grandpa with the knife, slit his throat in front of grandma, then drag grandma into the restroom. And Cassandra would periodically check up on grandma. And she noticed that grandma Wendy, according to her beliefs, was pretending to be dead.

because she could still feel a pulse on her. But Grandma Wendy is not talking. She's not pleading. She's not breathing that loudly. She's just laying there motionless. Cassandra thinks she's freaking faking it. She runs over to Johnny. What the heck, Johnny? She's still alive.

johnny walks into the bathroom and according to cassandra, he grabs the tire iron and aims for the top of grandma wendy's spine. he slams it into the base of her neck at the top. this is a very fatal injury. a lot of the times this can cause full body paralysis. it's very hard to survive an injury like this, especially if you don't get immediate medical attention. cassandra said it was the last fatal blow.

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Well,

The whole situation was starting to freak Cassandra out, not because her boyfriend just murdered her grandparents, but she said it was kind of creepy because she was like starting to die. And I think she was scared to die. She shit herself and peed herself. It's kind of gross.

Wow, these kids are sadistic. Johnny would grab the knife and slit Wendy's throat as well. When they were certain that both of them were dead, they cleaned themselves up, washed all the blood off their faces, changed into a fresh pair of clothes, and drove grandpa's car to the local supermarket. Kroger. It's like Ralph's. They grabbed something to eat, and they brought it back home to Cassandra's grandparents' house to eat and quote, just kind of like chill there.

During interrogations, it's best for police to get answers on any questions that they might have. There's a few unanswered questions that are bothering them about this case. One being: Why the hell did they find a gallon of milk in the trunk of the car when they arrested Cassandra and Johnny? Why do you just have a gallon of milk in the trunk of the car? What the hell are you doing with a gallon of milk? What are your plans? There was a voluntary study done of people volunteering to get sprayed with pepper spray.

they rated their discomfort on a pain level, 0 through 10, a 9.6 to a 9.7 out of 10. But at least they were pepper sprayed. There is actually something that hurts so much more than pepper spray. Statistically, twice as more painful.

bear spray which makes sense one netizen said pepper spray is meant to stop maybe cause decent irritation to a human being while the other one is meant to stop a freaking bear to give you context an average human weighs 150 pounds and can sprint what an average of 12 miles per hour the average bear weighs anywhere from 600 to a thousand pounds and can charge on average 30 miles per hour if bear mace

is supposed to knock a half ton grizzly bear onto its butt. I mean, the effect that it's going to have on a human, tenfold, tenfold. Redditors who have accidentally sprayed themselves with both pepper spray and bear spray said, trust me, bear spray is so much worse. It's designed to nuke everything in a 30 foot radius without prejudice. Doesn't matter if you're a bear or not. It's so strong, so debilitating that it can be used as a self-defense tool, I guess. But if you accidentally get it in your face,

First, it's the shock. You're disoriented. That lasts not even a full second before the excruciating, intense, impossible-to-deal-with pain. You want to rip your face off. The stinging of the eyes, the watering, the pressure in the throat. One netizen said, anything associated with mucous membranes, it feels like you're being singed with fire. Eyes, nostrils, sinuses, lips, tongue, soft palate, tonsils, all the way down your throat, even your heart.

All of a sudden, it feels like it's a blaze, like somebody threw ground up glass shards into your eyes. But the worst part is when you instinctively take a big gulp of air from the shock of the pain and it feels like the bear spray gets into your throat and the hacking and coughing is going to start to the point where you feel like you're about to throw up your insides. One person said, "'The pain and torture was so bad. I was so desperate for any sort of instant relief. I didn't have time to fill up the bathtub or even to hop in the shower.'"

I dunked my head into the first body of water I could find. My toilet. It's that painful. Another netizen stated that a gunshot to their thigh was less painful than getting a face full of bear mace. A friend who witnessed someone getting sprayed said, "His face looked like a giant red emoji, like a giant red beach ball. His eyes were just these tiny black weeping slits because you can only see the eyelashes."

They said even if you think you're over the pain, after a few hours, if you think the symptoms have subsided, you're very wrong. Hours after, a singular tiny droplet of sweat drips into your eye or near your lip and the pain starts all over again. And this can last for days.

After impact, you might be dealing with redness, burning of the skin, temporary blindness. You will be in no state to do anything, let alone even just lay there being in pain is unbearable. Melissa and her boyfriend are both college students, so they have to find any opportunity that they can to spend time together after a long day of classes. And that particular night, April 8th, they decide to grab some takeout. They're going to head home to Melissa's and eat together. And maybe they'd watch their favorite show or they just catch up with each other. They don't really know yet.

They pull into the driveway of a very quiet neighborhood, unlock the front door of Melissa's parents' house, walk in, and they head straight for Melissa's room. So far, nothing is amiss. Nothing is out of the ordinary.

They open the door to Melissa's room, flip on the bedroom light. The entire room is ransacked. Melissa's drawers are opened. Clothes are hanging out of them. It looks like a disaster zone. Everything is thrown out. The closet looks like a tornado has gone through it. All of her purses have been rummaged through as if somebody took them, turned them upside down and just shook everything out of them onto the bed. Her jackets are thrown around. I mean, what the hell is going on? Melissa's already on the phone dialing 911 when she turns around and sees an orange mist.

inside the house. What the hell is going on? And then it hits. The stinging in her eyes, the overwhelming sensation overtakes her entire body. Her face feels like it's on fire, like somebody is pressing her face down onto a hibachi grill. Her eyes feel like someone is squirting a combination of lemon juice and jalapeno juice straight into them. Melissa and her boyfriend are squinting through the pain, coughing, almost gagging. And Melissa sees through the orange haze a girl

A girl that looks familiar, but she can't really, in this moment, she can't really connect the dots in that split second. And this girl is coming at her with a baseball bat in her hands, ready to swing straight at Melissa. The bat smashes into Melissa's back. She tumbles over onto the ground. Not even a second later, she feels the bat crashing down onto her head. She can practically feel her skull pulsing as blood starts to flow out. And the girl is just standing there in the orange mist,

And then she kicks Melissa straight in the stomach. If Melissa didn't want to throw up before, she definitely wants to throw up now. She looks over and her boyfriend is being attacked too. There are two people coming at them. One at Melissa, one at her boyfriend, going at their heads, beating them, spraying bear repellent straight into their eyes. Melissa and the girl are struggling to gain control over the bat. Melissa tries to grab it from her, but she kicks Melissa in the head. Then she tries to start stomping on Melissa's stomach. Melissa slides away from the attacker and honestly,

She's probably pissed now. She's bleeding. She's burning. She's so fucking done with whatever is happening. So she reaches up and yanks the girl with a bat by a fistful of her hair and yanks her around by her hair. She grabs the bat mid-swing, wrestles it out of the girl's arms, and then turns her attention to the attacker hitting her boyfriend.

The attacker releases Melissa's boyfriend and Melissa hands her boyfriend the bat, but the attacker lunges for it and now all four of them are tangled up in this mess, yanking each other around in different directions, trying to get control of this bat. Melissa's boyfriend almost has it, but suddenly he lets go, lets the attackers have the bat. Instead, he grabs a glass beer bottle and threatens the attacker. Stop. Let us go. The attacker responds, I will never let you go.

With nothing to lose, considering the severity of the situation, Melissa's boyfriend brings the beer bottle up and slams it down onto the attacker's head, shattering it. For a second, it feels like there's a power shift. But the attacker is eerily calm. He just had a beer bottle shatter on his head. He's staring at Melissa and her boyfriend, but he's talking to the girl that he came with. The girl that attacked Melissa. Go get the hammer.

The fight continues and only stops when the door opens and Melissa's mom walks in. And Melissa starts screaming, they're trying to kill me. They're trying to kill me. Help mom, please. They're going to kill me. The two attackers run off, leaving Melissa covered in blood. She would need seven stitches, seven staples to close the wound on her head. She had welts all over her body from the bat. And her boyfriend has injuries all over as well with a badly chipped tooth. I mean, the unsettling part of all of this was Melissa,

It was only Melissa's second time meeting her brother's girlfriend and she attacked her with a bat. And it was kind of freaky because whenever her brother's girlfriend Cassandra hit her, there was something in her face that just appeared so calm. And as for the other attacker, Melissa didn't even recognize him anymore. Her brother Johnny. She just remembered them fleeing, running out of the house, and that girlfriend Cassandra was wearing a shirt that read, "'Good vibes only.'"

Do you think you can pinpoint when a plan starts falling apart? Because for Cassandra and Johnny, it's now. They're both wanting to pour milk straight into their eyeballs. They're coughing up a storm driving off from Johnny's family house. I mean, the original plan was to get Johnny's family one by one. They would, quote, wait for each of them to get home and knock them out one by one, a.k.a. kill them one by one. But obviously, that didn't happen.

So they steal Melissa's car and they're fleeing this scene. And it's Cassandra's second time meeting Johnny's sister, which is kind of a bummer to her because it doesn't seem like they're going to be getting along anytime soon. So truly, nothing is going according to plan. Wait, so they are getting hit by the bear. I imagine they thought it was like pepper spray. So pepper spray, as long as you're not in a windy area, it comes out in a consistent stream.

Because you're trying to get an attacker. You don't want to get any witnesses or people on the side. You don't want to get passerbys. But with bear spray, it's very hard to estimate where a bear is going to attack. So it's a mist. It's a fog. Johnny is covered in bear mace and it's stinging his entire body. He's going to get Cassandra to go buy a gallon of milk so that he can go take a quote milk shower to ease the stinging.

But the biggest downfall of this plan, the single biggest mistake is they left their original car that they had driven to Johnny's house. During the attack, the car keys had fallen out. They were misplaced. And as they're leaving that rush, that's something that they don't have time for. They don't have time to look for the damn keys. They just took whatever they could find, which was Melissa's car keys. They flee in Johnny's sister's car and they just leave Grandpa Randall's car parked at the house.

When Johnny's mom calls the police, they come to take their statements. They run the plates on the car. Randall Bjork, which is interesting.

There was a wellness check request out for him and his wife, Wendy. About a week ago, April 2nd, 2017, relatives of Wendy's had called the police station requesting a wellness check, stating that their 63-year-old sister and her husband, Randall and Wendy, were not picking up their phones. They were sending text messages, but it just didn't sound like them. It was very odd. They suspected that somebody else was impersonating them and sending text messages from Wendy's phone.

The police had gone to their house, but because they don't really have a special reason to break in to perform the rest of the wellness check, this is the first call, the last time the family heard from them was a day ago, they just leave. But now? Now they have a very, very good reason. A very big reason. They're gonna force their way into Cassandra's grandparents' home. Back in the interrogation room, Cassandra tells the two detectives that truly nothing, nothing is going according to plan now.

What was the plan? Okay, so the plan was that we were both going to get both of our families. But first we got our grandparents and that's when we went over to Johnny's house and we attacked his sister and her boyfriend because he wanted to kill his family too. But it didn't work out at all. It just went downhill from there. But how did the plan even start? Who started it?

And this is according to Cassandra because Johnny does not want to talk to the police. Cassandra and Johnny were at the park. This is before they killed anybody, before they killed Cassandra's grandparents, before they attacked Johnny's sister and her boyfriend. Cassandra had run away from home and they were living in Johnny's car. Cassandra says that she didn't run away. She said she was kicked out. I don't know how much of that I believe, but her version of events goes, I was out chilling with Johnny and my other friends.

But then she came home from curfew. Grandma's asleep. Grandma wakes up hearing Cassandra come in and she storms out of her room and just starts losing it on Cassandra. And Cassandra says, my grandma just got really mad at me saying things like, oh, you know, if you don't like it here, we're just going to find somewhere else for you to stay. She just said that out of the blue. Like we just she got mad for some reason. And so I was just like, if you're going to find another place for me to stay, I'm just going to leave. I'm just going to find somewhere else to go.

And she kept bringing up stuff about my mom. And, you know, she kept saying things like, I could easily send you back to your mom's house. I don't know. It just got to the point where I just couldn't take it anymore.

Cassandra really does not like the alleged threat of being sent back to her mom's house. Now, side note, we don't know if this is even what Grandma Wendy said to her. I highly personally doubt it. With everything I could find about Grandma Wendy, it feels like she wanted to protect Cassandra at all costs against whatever she had been experiencing back at her mom's.

About a year and a half before Cassandra and Johnny's plan, Cassandra's grandparents filed for emergency custody over Cassandra from their own daughter, Cassandra's mom. From the records that I could find and the grandparents' neighbors' statements to the police, allegedly Cassandra was potentially being sexually abused by her stepdad, and her mom was allegedly not doing anything about it. A neighbor said, this all started and came up maybe a year and a half ago when, um,

I just let Wendy tell me and she wanted to talk about things. Wendy and Randall had found out about Cassie being sexually abused by her stepdad, Sean. And so at that point, they filed for emergency custody because Amanda, Cassandra's mom, wasn't doing anything about it.

And then over the past, I'll say, three weeks, I was over at their house and Wendy had told me that Sean and Amanda were being investigated and they had bought all new computers and phone and devices so that they didn't leave any evidence behind. But that Cassandra had written a bunch of information down, a bunch of journaling information. And she said, Wendy told me, what I thought happened in my head was nothing compared to what actually happened.

and i just never really... i didn't ask questions beyond that. i didn't want wendy to talk about it unless she wanted to. i kind of felt like it was maybe a cp thing? i don't know. it was happening under everybody's nose and once wendy found out, she filed for custody for cassandra.

then there were stories that cassandra had to take out a restraining order against her stepdad because he starts stalking her at school and quote checking her out of her classes cassandra said that she had to start online school because her stepdad would go through the classes literally prowl through the campus trying to find her and check her out which is interesting that cassandra has this insanely tense painful relationship with her mom and her stepdad but she kills the two people in the world that tried to help her and protect her from them her grandparents

The police had gone through Wendy and Randall's house and they saw that the entire place filled with pictures of Cassandra. Clearly, they love her. The investigators, of course, they pick up on that and they ask Cassandra, "Was your mom part of the plan?" AKA, "Were you gonna kill your mom next if we hadn't caught you?" "Was your mom part of the plan?" "Of killing them?" "Yeah."

Yeah. No. But I wanted to. We did discuss it. But Johnny was like, we can't waste our time on them. And I was like, OK. But I wanted to. Johnny. Johnny kind of told you not to. Yeah.

really know what's going on with my parents you know like i mean we drove over their house the other day they have new cars you know i don't know what guns they have in their house you know i don't really she says you know a lot by the way so she's not shaken up at all right now no she keeps saying you know as if this is a very normal reaction very normal response she's almost trying to get the detectives to nod and agree with her like yeah of course we know but no cassandra we don't know

i don't really know what's going on in my parents house so yeah you didn't you didn't know what you would have been met with is that what you're saying whereas your grandparents you knew it was kind of a safe bet to kill them correct exactly because she hadn't been at her mom's house in a while she didn't know where they had their weapons she didn't know if they had new guns what kind of cars they drove it was very hard to i guess stalk them

Back to the original plan, though. Cassandra said that she came home after hanging out with her friends. Her grandma starts randomly arguing with her, fighting her. And it's after this argument with grandma, she just leaves, goes to stay with Johnny in his car. They're sleeping in there, just driving from one place to another. And she said, we were just all over the place, really. Just trying to find something to do. Just keep, you know, having something to do. We didn't want to just sit around and do nothing. We would find people to chill with, go to the mall or something. They end up at the park where they're sitting, sitting.

Staring up at the trees, and according to Cassandra, Johnny turns to her. Are you afraid? What? Are you afraid to die? No, are you? No. You know we could run away together. Wouldn't that just be the dream? I guess it would be, Johnny. Would you like to kill your grandparents? What? Why? I don't know. I mean, because of everything?

Cassandra said that she understood. Johnny knew everything about her situation with her family, everything that she had gone through, and all she wanted to do was get away from everything, move on with her life, and things with her grandparents had gotten so bad recently. She had broken her grandfather's ribs, she was on probation for assaulting her grandparents. I mean, so much has happened.

which is why at the park, the two decide to start over with their lives, start fresh, get away from everyone and everything. And the few problems that they were facing were one, Johnny's ex-wife. Cassandra said,

but thankfully she lives out of state so they don't really have to deal with her anymore not that there was anything to deal with to begin with it seems like johnny's wife had no care for either of them but other than that their only other problem was they need money and they need their family members dead

The reason for needing them dead is very unclear because I imagine they could have gotten the money without killing them, but it does appear that they didn't like the fact that their parents or their families did not like them being together. Which, side note, the reason they need the money is so that they can move to Pensacola, Florida and start a new life, which is about a 5 hour 32 minute drive from Atlanta, Georgia, and that's not a far distance to flee after a double homicide.

but Cassandra says, "it was just somewhere where we could escape to. escape reality." the detectives ask, "escape reality or kill grandma?" Cassandra responds, "no no no no no, not kill them. just kind of like escape from everything, you know? just start my life. I don't know. like I just wanted to move on from everything. just my family. I couldn't be around them anymore just because everything we've all been through, it's just so much betrayal."

So they're not that smart either. They don't have some crazy plans. No. Just all vibes. All vibes, all super gluing doors, $1,000 to flee a double homicide.

Yeah, there's not even like crazy motive. Just evil. Just plain evil. They solidified it in their minds. This is what they want to do. How they want to go about it. It's their master plan. They start thinking it actually might be simpler than we originally thought. Everything they could possibly need is already in Johnny's car. Cassandra would poke fun at him. It's like a Mary Poppins car. So much stuff in there. You think surely he's not going to have a tire iron in there. And then he does.

so the plan is settled kill anyone who stands in their way of being together both their families hate them dating and for that they would have to die the plan is kill cassandra's grandparents then johnny's entire family his mom his two sisters they all need to die five people are on their little hit list so that they can run off and be together and start a fresh life they'd only been dating for two months at this point

Romeo and Juliet is probably one of the most well-known stories in the world. Boy loves girl, girl loves boy, their love is forbidden. No one else believes they should be together except them. It's the two of them against the world and they'll do anything to stay together. It's quite dramatic too. They want to stay together even if blood is shed, even if their own blood is shed, even if that means they need to die in order to be together.

Back in the interrogation room, the detectives have more questions. There is a week-long gap between the time that they murder Cassandra's grandparents in cold blood and when they attack Johnny's sister and her boyfriend. The investigators want to know exactly what they did in that week. Is this part of the plan to wait a week? Did you schedule that in? What were you spending the week doing? Preparing for the next attack? Is that it? Cassandra said they didn't really have a plan. They were just taking it, quote, day by day. So for a week, they just stayed in her grandparents' home.

They slept, ate, ordered Chinese takeout, went to Steak and Shake, blew $200 at Zoomy's, the skateboard clothing store, went on shopping sprees, spent the entire $1,000 they just got from the safe, but also spent every last dime in grandma's bank account, did drugs, filmed intimate videos on grandma's phone in the house with their dead bodies laying upstairs.

What? They brought all their sheets and blankets downstairs into the living room because they don't want to sleep upstairs with the dead bodies. They spent a week in that house. Not fleeing. No. I don't know. Is that like more scary or it's less scary? Because they're not trying to get away, I guess. They're just hanging out there like they don't care or not afraid about the consequences. I think that's more scary. Right? Like they're not worrying about consequences of their actions. They're also not emotionally disturbed.

By their actions. If they're able to stay in that house. Yeah. And it's not even strangers. I think it would be, I don't think it's understandable, but I think it would make a little bit more sense in most people's heads. Okay. If they're strangers, maybe they just killed them for a place to stay. Yeah. Which is not acceptable, but. Yeah. And one week is a long time and they didn't even have a moment of realization. And the smell is bad. The caulk and the bleach is not going to fix it. So it's a constant reminder of their actions. The scent. Yeah.

Now, sometimes in interrogations, the detectives will ask suspects questions, questions that they know the suspect are going to lie in the answer. But they ask it anyway, because the point of the question is not to learn the truth. It's to catch the suspect in the lie. The investigators are curious. Did you call some people and say, hey, if you want to come over, not for a party or anything, but just like I got some money, grandparents are out of town. Do you want to come over?

Cassandra says, nope. I would just tell people like, hey, you know, like I have a free crib, but I wouldn't have people come over. If you guys are trying to chill, I'll come meet up with you. I wouldn't like, I don't let them go to the house.

Besides, Cassandra tells the two officers she only has two friends because quote, I don't like chilling with a lot of people because I don't really trust a lot of people. Regardless, Cassandra tells the officers that they would just go and meet up with their few friends outside of the house. They agreed, her and Johnny agreed, that having someone over at the house was a big quote, no, no. The investigators are nodding because yeah, I mean, that makes sense. It makes a lot of sense. But the detective brings out his phone and starts playing Cassandra a video. Come take a look at that.

Cassandra's body tenses. She leans forward, her eyebrows are all scrunched together, she's staring at his phone. "That's you and him, right?" Cassandra doesn't speak. She just gives a short nod. "That's you and Johnny. At your grandparents' house?" She doesn't respond. He replays the video and she just leans down further, sticking her head closer to the phone. "Sure looks like it. Like the living room at your grandparents' house?" Cassandra's voice is briefly, oddly robotic.

How could that be possible? Who's taking that video? She starts aggressively shaking her head. No, that couldn't be at my grandparents' house. There was no one at my grandparents' house. So that couldn't have been at my grandparents' house.

The detective is no longer playing around with Cassandra. They're no longer burger eating buddies. He points to his phone. "Well, I didn't shit that out." "That's what I'm saying." "Who?" "I mean, it sounds like." "Wait, let me watch it again. I gotta—that must have been before." Cassandra tries to look the detectives in the eyes to show them that she's being honest. But one mistake, the other detective points out. "Well, it couldn't be before because your grandparents don't like Johnny and he wasn't at your house much."

He didn't go to my house at all. I mean, Cassandra catches her second mistake. I mean, that couldn't have been at my house. That had to be somebody else's house because we had no one at my house. It was just me and Johnny. She's staring at the detectives through her lashes. Her eyebrows are raised, her eyes are big as if she's trying to convince them. But what is she trying to convince them of? They have the video in question.

the video in question shows Cassandra sitting cross-legged on the living room floor of her grandparents house she is in the middle of rolling a joint Johnny is right next to her leaning in his gaze is just transfixed on her like he can only see her in the entire room it honestly might have been cute or one of those couple videos "oh my god look at the way he looks at her" but of course hindsight is 20/20

He looks at her with puppy dog eyes, does not take his eyes off her face. Even when she breaks eye contact, which is the majority of the video so that she can continue rolling her joint, Johnny is just staring. People have a lot to say about you. Like you, I don't listen to those people though. Like I love you. You kick ass.

the clip cuts. it's a super short clip, or at least the one that was made public was. but none of the video content is actually that important, other than the fact that johnny and cassandra are rolling a joint in her dead grandparents house. this video is taken after their murder, and someone else is taking the video. someone else had been at that crime scene.

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a few days after Cassandra's grandparents murders one of Cassandra's best friends receives a snapchat from her asking her to come over hey my grandparents are out of town they went to Florida for a few days I've got an open crib plus they left me like a thousand dollars you want to come over? that's not happening first of all it's 8:30 p.m. she can't just go over she's already laying in bed she's 17 her mom's never gonna agree to it but more than that something in her gut is telling her not to accept this invitation do not go to Cassandra's house

the whole situation is just so weird. it didn't make sense. why would her grandparents leave her that kind of money? they're also not the type of people to just randomly pack up and go on vacation, especially not now when cassandra is going through a lot, running away, hanging out with johnny, whom they hate.

The investigators, they know this already. They've interviewed all of Cassandra's friends and by some ironic miracle, almost every single person Cassandra invited over for a massive rager at the house after her grandparents' murder rejected the invitation. In the interrogation room, the investigators break her down. "We got a problem, man. As you know, I'm a cool dude. So is she." The detectives are talking to Cassandra.

I've been doing this a lot longer than you've been alive, okay? So I'm not a bullshitter. I don't know what those DA investigators, what type of, you know, they are, how many times they talk to you, but I'm cool as shit with you as long as you're cool as shit with me. They're really trying to play into this 17-year-old. They sat there and ate McDonald's with her. Do you think it's working, though, for Cassandra? Yes, absolutely. So she actually wants that kind of relationship. It's almost...

Very bizarre. The way she's so callously talking about her grandparents' murder is so cold. You wouldn't even expect that from a full-grown adult of how heinous and evil it is. But her yearning and desire for the detectives to like her is almost childlike.

When children will say anything to try and fit in, it's very bizarre. The mixture of that, something so evil, and then this very bizarre childlike quality is unsettling. He says, I'm cool as shit with you as long as you're cool as shit with me. But once lying and stuff like that starts, I've got a problem. I believe that people were at that house, okay?

Unfortunately, you're in this. There's no saving face right now. I'll be honest with you, dude. We heard a conversation that took place in there where somebody was bitching about the smell and Johnny's like, no, dude, it's just sewage. There's a sewage problem upstairs. Cassandra would never admit to this, but it was later confirmed by the people that were over because she invited a bunch of people over. Only two people came, her drug dealers. So the drug dealers came and they took videos of them rolling a joint. Yes. Yes.

Now, none of them knew that her dead grandparents were upstairs, but they could smell something disgusting in there. Cassandra and Johnny tried to play it off as a sewage issue that they couldn't flush the toilet. And Johnny took a big poo and tried to flush. It didn't flush. So it had just been sitting there for days.

During the interrogation, Cassandra states that Johnny just starts randomly telling her to pour bleach all over her grandparents' bodies to help with the smell. And he starts randomly gluing the door shut inside the house. She said, he went in my garage and found, I don't know what it's called. Like the, I don't know, the caulk? Yeah. And then glued the doors.

She tells the officer she didn't know what the point was. He didn't tell her why he was doing it. He just grabbed it and started doing it. And she was, quote, just like, yeah, OK, you got it. And just watched him. But later, she would admit that she invited people over. They wanted to throw a party. And in order to do that, she would have to pour bleach on her grandparents' body to hide their decomposing smell. And Johnny caulked the door shut so that they could have people over.

Just to give you a recap, they kill her grandparents, attack Johnny's family, get sprayed with bear mace. Johnny's mom calls the police and they're on the run. Jason opens the door to his apartment and he's face to face with Johnny and a girl named Cassandra. Shirtless Johnny. Johnny's eyes are bloodshot. It looks like he'd been crying. Well, no, it looks worse than that. There's just red marks all over his face and body. Do you mind if we come in, Jason? My mom and I fought again. She pepper sprayed me.

Jason lets Johnny and his girlfriend Cassandra in. Jason had been friends with Johnny since they were in middle school, but it was a little strange. He was just showing up unannounced. They hadn't really been close since middle school. They naturally grew apart. Jason stayed with their original group of friends and Johnny started hanging out with this different group doing drugs. They never really had like this big fight or anything, but...

they just didn't fit together anymore. But now Johnny has showed up explaining to Jason that he got into this huge fight with his mom and he cannot think of anywhere else to go. This was the first place that popped up into his mind. He lets them in and they end up spending the night.

The next morning, it does kind of feel like they're all back in middle school again. Johnny's talking to Jason's mom while she's preparing breakfast for everybody. They've always had quite a close relationship. Johnny's cracking jokes with Jason. Jason's drinking coffee on the balcony. He goes out to walk the dog. And that's when he starts noticing something's not right.

parked directly in front of their apartment unit. And Jason knows just about every car in this parking lot. There is a new car, but the plates are temporary, meaning a neighbor did not just buy it or lease the car. If that was the only odd thing though, it wouldn't be that alarming. However, the car is suspiciously parked directly in front of Jason's unit, practically staring into the ground floor windows.

And it happens to be a fully blacked out suburban SUV straight out of an FBI undercover surveillance operation. That's the vibe it's giving. It's strange, but what is Jason going to do about it? He just takes a mental note of, oh, that's a little bit strange, but it's not something that he can really investigate.

Eventually, he makes his way back into his room when all of a sudden it's a voice booming into the unit. It feels like it's coming from the sky itself. Unit 184, Johnny Ryder, come outside. Like a megaphone? A megaphone. Jason's like, what the hell is going on? Then it happens again. Unit 184, Johnny Ryder, come outside. It is 10 a.m. on a Sunday morning. Is Jason asleep right now? Is he dreaming? No.

Jason walks out into the living room and he looks down and there are red dots on his body and on the walls.

Wait, on Jason's body? Yes. This is real. Very, very real. He's got to get his sister and mom out of here. He has no idea what's going on, but he knows that they got to leave. As they're about to step out, he sees from the corner of his eye, Johnny grabbing a knife from their kitchen and walking straight towards Jason and his family. What the hell is he about to do? Is he about to stab them? Johnny walks straight up to their faces, leans in closer and closer, and then gives Jason a hug.

I'm sorry, man. So sorry for everything. I love you. I wish I didn't bring this on to you and your family. He drops the knife, leans over, and says the same thing to Jason's sister and gives her a hug. And with that, Johnny lets them walk out of the unit.

walk straight into a swarm of SWAT teams that circle them. Jason said it felt like he was walking into basically every cop in the county. He found out after leaving his apartment that his childhood best friend had tried to kill his sister and her boyfriend, and that he and his girlfriend had murdered both of her grandparents.

And now with Jason and his family gone, the two of them are trapped inside of this apartment unit. With SWAT teams outside, police shouting their names, threatening to break in. They're cornered. If they're gonna go out, they're gonna be arrested. If they stay in, how long is that gonna last? They can't just sit there like ducks waiting to be arrested. So what the hell are they supposed to do?

I would say that the most popular group within the police force are the canine dogs. But second to them, also with four legs, are likely the explosive ordnance disposal devices. They're basically robo-cops. They're

they're robots that specialize in going into dangerous crime scenes to figure out what's going on, they're programmed to neutralize explosive devices, and they most commonly are named Spot and Roscoe, like dogs. they can see, hear, basically sense things around them and respond accordingly, but their most valuable feature is their expendability.

They're completely disposable. What do they look like? Is it one of those like, like, do they look like a dog or? It looks like a steamer, a clothing steamer, like a tripod.

And it's all controlled by the SWAT team from a remote-controlled joystick. This is what they send into Jason's apartment. The cops are not taking any risks on this one. They both know Cassandra and Johnny are armed and dangerous. They can't risk sending in humans or their dogs. This is the perfect situation to test out the robo-dog. They

They send it in, they start maneuvering through Jason's house, they're spinning, the camera is rotating as it advances, looking for clues on where they are. Are they planning something? Are they planning on bombing someone? They don't know anything. On the screen that displays the camera feed, the authorities watch as the robot moves through the empty apartment and advances down the hall and comes towards a door. And immediately they are alarmed because there is a stain on the outside of the door and it looks like blood.

Johnny, Cassie, say something. There's a microphone on it. Radio silence. Nothing. They have to be in there. The officers have no idea what they're about to walk into. Did one of them turn on the other? Did they harm each other? Did they harm themselves? What are they doing in there? They use the robot to swing open the door and slumped on the tile floor of the restroom in each other's arms, soaked in a growing pool of blood are the bodies of Cassandra and Johnny. They had tried to self-exit together.

Authorities rush in and rush them to the hospital. A lot of netizens liken Cassandra and Johnny to be a sick Romeo and Juliet couple. Not so much objectively, but maybe the narrative that they probably felt themselves. Nobody wants to see us together, so we have to kill them all. Our love is stronger than all. We will die without each other. That's what she said? That's what netizens feel like they felt. But Cassandra would later tell the investigators at the park when they were planning these mass murders—serial killings, really—

Cassandra claims Johnny told her, "Let's be Bonnie and Clyde." He said that to you? Yeah, I was like, "Okay." An interesting part of this interrogation is the detectives ask if she's seen the movies and she shakes her head no. "Of course!" "You have or you haven't seen the movies?"

While shaking her head? Yeah, aggressively shaking her head no. That's weird. The other detective says, oh, I'm just saying I'm 29 and I haven't seen the movies. Yeah, my mom was really into old movies. So when I was a child, I used to watch a lot of oldies.

Interesting. Regardless, some netizens think they're sick wannabe versions of Romeo and Juliet. They themselves think they're sick wannabe versions of Bonnie and Clyde. And it all hinges, both couples, Romeo and Juliet, Bonnie and Clyde, hinges on the fact that they are loyal to nobody but each other.

During the interrogations, both Johnny and Cassandra seem to be very concerned about each other whenever they're brought up. During Cassandra's questioning, she's asked about how she feels about Johnny now after they killed together. And she says, I still have feelings for him. I care about him. I guess I'm going to ask a corny question. Is it love? Yeah. I talked to Johnny a couple days ago and Cassandra perks up. She looks concerned. She looks stressed. Is he okay? Yeah, he's fine. He sends his regards and all that stuff. Is he like, is he doing okay? Yeah.

No, he's fine. He's actually better off than you, you know? His cuts weren't that deep or anything. Really? I could've sworn he did worse than me. Because I remember when we were in the bathroom, he just kept going and I kept telling him to stop. Yeah, maybe just tougher skin. I don't really know. The police asked Johnny about his feelings towards Cassandra. Is that your girlfriend Cassie or is it just a friend or what? Is she okay? Yeah, no, no, no. She's fine. Johnny sounds genuinely relieved.

how long have you guys been dating? a lifetime it feels like i can't live without cassie like i don't know why i never felt this about any other girl

they'd only been dating a few weeks before they decided to kill everyone in their lives. but this is how they talk about each other. which side note, cassandra's interrogation video has gone viral for how absurd her behavior is. in the sense that she's not outright acting crazy in the video per se, but in the fact that she's oddly calm and she has these moments where her mask drops and she just seems very unhinged, it's terrifying to a lot of people.

From the get-go, there's this really uncomfortable moment in the interrogation room where one of the detectives, there's two in the room with her. One of them is trying to rip off her zip ties since she's in cast. They can't handcuff her. They're trying to use scissors to get her zip ties off and maneuver between her giant cast. And he tells her he's trying to get the scissors away from her face so he doesn't accidentally. And she finishes her and she finishes his sentence. Stab me.

it's just this very weird awkward moment but the detectives try to breeze past it and then all three of them the two investigators and Cassandra decide to eat quote family style according to the detective and during that she asks one of the detectives who's already finished their fries if they want some of hers

at one point in the interrogation she's asked about how the plan came to kill her grandparents came about and she brings up the previous charge against her grandparents that she has that she's currently on probation for for physically assaulting her grandparents and she says "I fought them, you know? I might have broken my grandpa's ribs when you know for that charge for simple assault and simple battery" and it just got really worse we just kept arguing all the time and then I don't know I guess things just seemed different they didn't look at me the same anymore

she's saying her grandparents did not look at her the same anymore like they didn't-- i don't know what was their vibe like they have this vibe they didn't really know what to do they didn't really like know how to be around me i guess which first of all she keeps saying you know as a way to make it seem like her actions are much more understandable but no we don't know in addition it's crazy that she's shocked that her grandparents are treating her differently after she broke her grandpa's ribs and physically assaulted them

In another notable part of the interrogation, Cassandra is asked about her controlled aggression. The investigators know that she grew up with martial arts and they were intrigued. Martial arts is all about controlled aggression. Did Cassandra feel controlled aggression when she went to kill her grandparents or was it an emotional decision in that moment? Cassandra tells them it was a mixture of both, that she just started feeling very sad for herself.

It's both honestly when I was there, I don't know just all my emotions just kind of came out Like I wasn't just angry I was sad But I was heartbroken at the same time because it was just like why did all this stuff have to happen with my family? You know, like why did I have to deal with all this bullshit? I just kind of got really tired of it. I couldn't handle it anymore. I just kept Exploding inside almost I just wanted to run away and be by myself with someone and start a new life

Other notable moments include when Cassandra is asked about her shopping spree. She stated that she took her grandma's debit card and they asked, do you remember what kind of bank it was or anything? Oh, it was a Visa credit card or debit card. Do you remember what color it was? It was gray. Gray? And it had it had writing on it. It said like C-I-T-I. Oh, Citibank.

Yeah, city. Cassandra makes this weird face where she sticks out her tongue and rolls her eyes like shaking her head like duh, how could she not know duh and she looks slightly embarrassed. Cassandra tells the detectives that she only used the money found in her grandma's wallet because she could not locate her grandpa's. She says, "I couldn't find his wallet so I had no idea where his wallet was. I just had my grandma's wallet in her purse." The investigators tell her, "He hid it underneath the bed. We found his wallet."

Cassandra's nostrils literally flare and she starts smirking. You did? She throws her head back and rolls her eyes and she has this smirk on her face like almost unbelievable. This guy. Smart guy. We almost didn't find his wallet and his cell phone. They were under his bed. Really? Wow. Yeah, I mean, I guess that's where he started hiding it.

This is so creepy. Yeah. Like she is so unbothered. It's like a game. Yeah, she's having a blast. Having fun. By the time that the case is ready to go to trial, the media could not call the two, Romeo and Juliet, or even Bonnie and Clyde, not because they deserve those titles though, but because the couples, they turn on each other. They had broken up since their arrest and were now blaming each other for their crimes.

Both of them plead guilty and receive two life sentences plus 21 years. However, they are both eligible for parole in 60 years. Now, one of the biggest debates in the courtroom was would they have committed this without the influence of each other? And it seems that most netizens believe that Cassandra was actually the driving force. Even Cassandra's friends say

Cassandra is... I was really close with her. However, she's always just been a very selfish person. She always has been the type that doesn't care about anyone but herself. She just wants to do her own thing. She would get into violent fights with people and she just always has this "Oh, I don't care. I'll defend myself" attitude. I mean, the cops had to have been called out to her house a bunch of times. She was on probation during the time for hitting her grandma.

do you think that Cassandra was in love with Johnny? the police asked one of her friends honestly Cassie's the type of person to use anyone she possibly could to get what she wanted I mean I did love Cassie as a person but honestly very very selfish she only cared about herself I don't know what was going on in Johnny's mind because I've only met him a couple of times and a lot of people did know him they said he didn't seem like the type to kill anyone or anything he just wanted to get by in his life he was pretty nice

a lot of people speculate that cassandra fed johnny whether it was lies, exaggerations, or a story about how evil her grandparents and her whole family was. perhaps johnny with his drug addiction and his add and his depression disorder, perhaps he felt like he had to protect her is what some people say. i'm not defending johnny at all. i think what both of them did is insane and heinous.

now as for the remorse, I think both of them have differing levels of remorse and it's Cassandra's grandparents who are killed Cassandra said "I mean I feel like a terrible person, I feel like the worst person on the planet" but at the same time it was just kind of like, I don't know, I mean I feel heartbroken but I don't know, it's really weird like I'm just really sad about it and that's like one of the reasons why I wanted to you know kill myself you know and just overdose because there was so much stuff going on between me and my grandparents already like I couldn't handle it anymore

She has most remorse for herself. During the sentencing, Johnny, Johnny's statement is a little bit unhinged, if I can be honest with you. He said he found God in prison, which is, and this has nothing to do with religious preference or affiliation, but I think he chose the worst possible time to bring up his newfound love for Jesus Christ.

During his statement to the court, Johnny says, I would like to express my deepest apology to the Bjorg family. I'm so sorry for the pain and grief that I've caused you all. There's absolutely no justifiable reason for the circumstances of why I'm here today. When I look back, I see what was truly lost and I was searching for love from the wrong source. And yet I know what I have done is evil and is deserving of hellfire. I have not been a responsible person in the past, but I would like to start if I could right now.

He continues, please, I beg you all, I beg you all, forgive me for what I have done. It is with a deep desire that my foolishness not be the reason for all of you to be unforgiving and have a hardened heart for what is written. For if you forgive men for their trespasses, your heavenly father will also forgive you. But if you do not forgive men for their trespasses, neither your father forgive you and your trespasses.

Basically, to put it simply, he's telling the victim's family to forgive him unless they want to burn in the vast depths of hell for the rest of eternity. He's saying, "God told you so, so you better forgive me or else you are gonna be the one that goes to hell and not me."

Which is the most unhinged thing to say during your statement for a double homicide. But he continues, I would now like to address another murder that has taken place. The murder victim was a male. He was honestly a great role model for everyone and anyone who looked up to him. I tortured him. I laughed at him while he died. I beat him to the point of knowing no one could recognize him. Is he talking about how he pummeled Randall with his fist until he passed out? Then he grabbed a knife and stabbed him and then slit his throat?

Is that what he's addressing right now? Johnny continues: "That man's name is Jesus Christ." What is going on? "He was sent by God to die on the cross and shed his innocent blood so that we could be forgiven for all of our sins. We as the human race can now have fellowship with God, our Father, through his son Jesus, who dies but was risen by the power of God."

The judge was not having it. She said,

Many of Wendy and Randall's family members felt a very deep, cutting sense of betrayal when they found out what happened to them. One of Randall's siblings would say, "Their devotion was so profound, it makes the betrayal even more devastating. I wake up in the middle of the night and begin to be haunted by what happened. Was Randall awake when he was attacked? Was he frightened? Was he in agony long?

He had endured so many physical trials in his life. Did he die quickly? Did Cassie see his face? Did he see Cassie's face? Someone he loved so much, someone he had been so proud of, and someone he had given so much to.

My heart is still broken thinking about it. At night I wake up and I see dear Wendy. How did she die? She must have died inside first. Seeing Cassie looking into her eyes must have crushed her spirit, the one person that she was so devoted to. Did Wendy die inside then? Or was it when she saw her high school sweetheart laying dead next to her? I can only hope that shock numbed her.

Johnny and Cassie brutalized her little body and her spirit. What level of disregard and disrespect does it take to do something like that? How could anyone be so maliciously inhumane? I wonder what lack of compassion compels someone to act out such a heinous murder. I want to forget Wendy's slippers on the fifth stair leading up to the death rooms. Wendy had such tiny feet, and those little slippers stayed there, perched there, for days after the murders.

Did they stay there while Cassie and Johnny were partying with their friends? I don't want to know. And that is the case of 17-year-old Cassandra and 19-year-old Johnny. What are your thoughts on it? I just keep getting shocked by these teens that's just so cold-blooded and... It makes me scared to have children.

I mean, I do think that there perhaps were things that happened along the way, not by Wendy and Randall, but maybe it was influence of peers environment. I don't know, but it's just terrifying because these are your flesh and blood. This is your children. These are your children's children, your grandchildren. How can they turn on you like that? Especially when it's so undeserving. I don't know. What are your thoughts? Please leave it in the comments. Be safe. And I'll see you guys in the next one. Bye.