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Hey everybody, welcome back to our podcast. This is Murder With My Husband. I'm Peyton Moreland. And I'm Garrett Moreland. And he's the husband. And I'm the husband. Once again, we are in a different studio. So if you're watching on YouTube, it looks different again. We are at Cloud 10 Studios and it's awesome. I'm loving it. If you are watching on YouTube, please give us a thumbs up and leave a comment and subscribe. We love reading the comments on there. And if you are listening in on podcasts,
and are able to leave a review and subscribe, please do that. If not, we're just happy to have you here. - And I think next week we will be back at our normal house studio. - So if you're getting anxiety watching 'cause it looks different, don't worry, we are soon going to be back to normal. Gary, do you have your 10 seconds for this week? - I think I do. Actually this week I was just curious what everyone's different suggestions were as far as like TV shows. So if you have any good TV shows, please send them my way.
Other than that, I don't know. Peyton and I have just been hanging out with some family in California. Yeah. The problem is everyone's probably like me and is watching crime documentaries, which he does not want suggestions for. I do not want those. So if you have anything not crime related, then send those over. Don't send those my way. Send them my way.
Okay, our case sources this week are TimesReporter.com, MorningJournal.com, and an episode of House of Whore Kidnapped called The Road to Hell. Ooh, wow. Okay, our case begins on May 23rd of 2000. We are in the small town of New Philadelphia, Ohio.
Brandy Hicks and Liz Razor are best friends and having a celebratory sleepover at Brandy's house before their high school graduation this upcoming week.
They had met at church back in sixth grade when Brandy moved to town and instantly became best friends. That night, they attended Brandy's choir banquet at the Buckeye Career Center. And after they decided to drive to a local video store named Hollywood Video in the Newtown Mall, because just like everyone in the 2000s, they want to rent a movie. Good old blockbuster. Oh, my gosh. I love it.
loved blockbuster nights with my family like there was no better friday night than when my parents would pack us all up in the car and let us go pick a movie and we would stay in there for like 30 minutes and my parents would be like come on just pick your movie already it was fun brandy and liz make it to the video store and each pick out some movies on their way out of the store and back to the car they are approached by a man in a baseball cap with black curly hair sticking out
The man told the best friends that he was stranded and could they please give him a ride home. It would take roughly 10 minutes to get there and he would give them $20 if they will give him a ride home. Knowing that they were in a small town, the girls must have thought it was safe. They tell him yes and all three of them get into Brandy's car. As the man is directing the girls to his house, 10 minutes pass and he tells them just a little bit longer down the road.
It's now been 15 minutes and Brandy and Liz begin to worry. There were less and less houses the further out of town they drove and it was past nine o'clock. So it's dark outside. Okay. The girls ask him again, hey, how much longer? You know, just let us know when to turn. And he keeps telling them, oh, just a little bit longer down the road.
Yeah. Yeah.
He
He never pulled the gun out though. All he did was ask them. If it mattered if he had a gun, yes. And I think he was making it pretty clear like the way he was saying it. He was insinuating that he had a gun. Yeah, I guess I was wondering if he was bluffing or not. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. You gave me that look. Yeah.
So he leads them to a road that led to a hay filled off Harmon Hill Road and once on top of the small hill and they've been driving quite a ways. He tells Brandy to stop the car, cut the engine and put her hands on the steering wheel. Once under control, the man directs Brandy to take her shoes off and unlace them.
He then tells Liz to use Brandy's shoelaces and tie her best friend's hands to the wheel, and he would check them to make sure they were tight, which he did. What time of night is it again? It's like 9.30, 10 o'clock.
Okay, I guess I'm trying to think if there's other cars going past them. So they were in town when they first picked him up. And so I'm assuming they thought it was going to be safe. But he kind of made them drive farther and farther out of town to where there's not much houses. There's not much streetlights. So no, I'm assuming there's no one driving by at this point because they did drive up into a field. Yeah. After Liz ties up Brandy's hands, the man gets out of the car and
Oh my gosh. You have to think.
Brandy's still sitting in the car with her hands tied to the steering wheel, just watching them walk away. I'm sure that was just like the most distressing, scary thing you could see. Now, warning, this next part is going to be disturbing for some listeners, so you can go ahead and forward if you want. But once leading her far enough away, Matthew proceeded to slit Liz's throat with a knife. Oh, my gosh. Seemingly unprovoked. Like, there's...
There's nothing really going on. He just takes her up there and does that. He then stabbed her so many times that he literally broke the knife he was using to stab her. Just for no reason. Yeah, like no reason at all. In the world. OK. So leaving Liz's dead body on the ground, Matthew walked back to the car where Brandy was tied up. And keep in mind, like Brandy doesn't know what just happened to her best friend.
He went over to the driver's side door, opened it up and yelled for her to get out. Brandy yelled back, you're an idiot. I obviously can't get out of here. You made my friend tie my hands up. Like she gets mad. What the heck? And this makes Matthew mad. So he grabs the knife and he slices the shoelaces to cut them and so that her hands are no longer tied. And then he pulls Brandy out of the car.
He's forcefully leads her up the hill and randomly stops up there and then begins just smoking a cigarette, not talking to her. They're both just standing there. And I think at this point he's thinking about what to do next.
For whatever reason, Matthew decided to lead Brandy back down to the car and put her back inside the vehicle into the back seat. He got into the driver's seat and began driving them away. So during the drive, very casually, he looks over at Brandy and he tells her, I just killed your best friend. Like just randomly. Yeah.
So Brandy doesn't react, I guess, how he wants her to react. Like he wanted a reaction. Yes. And I guess she just kind of sat there. OK. And so he tells her, just kidding. I actually let your friend go and I gave her directions to get back to town. So she's just walking back to town and she's fine. So while driving, Matthew notices a cop pull up behind them.
at a stoplight and he begins to panic. He tells Brandy that if she even attempts to open the door, he will shoot her and the cop. Okay. So Brandy doesn't do anything.
So Matthew then drives Brandy near riverbank of the Tuscarawas River and gets her out of the car. He begins leading her down some railroad tracks in the dark. Oh my gosh. There was nothing around, but he lied to Brandy as they were walking, telling her that if they kept following the railroad tracks, they would eventually get to the police station.
So at this point, I think he has like an idea of what he wants to do. Well, I think he has a sadistic reason for continuing to give like each of these girls hope and then seeing the look on their face when it's taken away because he's lying. There is no police like station down the road. And so why tell her that he did kill her friend. So why tell her? Oh, never mind. No, I didn't. Oh, he just wants some sort of reaction. I agree. Yeah.
So as they're walking, they come across like a railroad bridge. So a bridge over the river. Okay. And it's probably a 25-foot drop down. And Matthew just abruptly stops walking. Right after the bridge, there was an abandoned train car on the tracks. And so Matthew kind of stops here and asks Brandy if she has any jewelry on her. She's like, no.
these rings like cheap rings that i have and so he makes her give him the two rings she was wearing and then he asks her how badly she wanted to live and she's not tied up at this point right no she's just walking with him following him but she knows he has a knife correct she saw him use but he doesn't have a gun it sounds like he hasn't pulled back to the gun thing yes he hasn't pulled it out and so he asks her how badly do you want to live
Once again, it's just like he's trying to see her reaction. Yeah, he's just playing games. So Brandy says just a simple, more than anything. Like, I obviously don't want to die. At this point, Matthew makes Brandy take her own clothes off and then proceeds to sexually assault her inside the train car, the abandoned train car. Oh my gosh. Horrible. So he then made Brandy get redressed as he smoked another cigarette. Yes.
Matthew decides at this point to tell Brandy that he's going to let her go. She can follow the train tracks and find the police department. What? They would need to backtrack a little bit back to the car so he could have some time to get away before she makes it to the police station. Does that make sense? Yeah. She's like, we're going to walk back the way we came. I'll get in the car and then you can go. But what are the chances? Oh, the original car.
car not like the broken down car no no okay they're at the broken down like train car he wants to walk back to her car okay got it as they were crossing back over the bridge to get back to the car plans change it has now been three hours since matthew had began terrorizing the girls and
Matthew at this point makes Brandy kneel on the edge of the bridge. So he pushes her to the edge of the bridge. There's like a railing, obviously. And he says, kneel down. So she kneels down. He then took her shoelace that he had gathered from the car and begins strangling Brandy from behind.
He thought she was dead, but Brandy eventually woke up because as we all know, it's a lot harder to strangle someone than it looks in the movies. So at this point, he tries to snap her neck three times, but couldn't figure out how. Because once again, it's a lot harder to snap someone's neck than it looks in the movies.
And this just pisses him off even more. Like at this point, he's getting aggravated. He's trying to kill her. She won't die of choking. Is she just on the ground or what's going on? Yes, she's going in and out of consciousness because he chokes her thinking she's dead. She loses consciousness but wakes back up. Okay. He began beating her up at this point, choking her until she's no longer breathing, basically doing anything he can to kill her.
And I will say this is an awful way to die and took a while. So I'm not going to go into detail here because basically you're just beating someone to death.
He then tried to lift her body up over the railing, but her feet got stuck when he tried to push her over. Oh my gosh, this guy is insane. Yeah, so she's just hanging there. Like he pushes her over, but her feet get stuck so she doesn't drop. Do you know what drugs and he was on? No, it didn't say. It just said that he was under the influence. Matthew then has to untangle the body of Brandy, like hit her feet as they're tangled up so that she'll drop into the water.
The body eventually fell headfirst, a 25-foot drop into the shallow river. Matthew spent some time on the bridge after killing Brandy and dumping her body into the river, and eventually he decided to just get back in the car and drive away. So it was the middle of the night when the girl's family realized they were missing. And a search party is sent out. And the next day, a man named Jeff Mullenix calls authorities claiming to have information about a murder.
So Lizzie...
Liz is for sure dead. Yeah, I mean, she had her. Do you know how many times she was stabbed? It didn't specify. And I'm I yeah, like I couldn't find a source on it. But so crazy. I mean, we slit the throat first. Yeah, we've talked about it before. It's when usually when it's that many times.
Like it's enough to break the knife. It's some sort of just crazy. Yes. It's a lot more intimate than just, you know, shooting somebody. Yeah. He says that together him and his brother-in-law through the piece of broken knife into the river. And then once alone, Jeff contacted police because he didn't want to spook Matthew while they were up there. Like while he's up there showing him, he didn't want to be like, dude, you need to go to police because, you know, he's scared for his own life.
Matthew was actually on probation for grand theft and forgery at the time that he kidnapped these two girls and killed them. So police arrested him immediately and held him on probation violation at the county jail while the county prosecutor and police reviewed the case and searched for evidence. So this is just like a couple like.
Okay. Okay.
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So yes, Brandy had survived the brutal attack and 25 foot fall into the shallow river. She played dead in the river and eventually pulled herself out and got to the road. And she hadn't been stabbed or anything, right? No, but she had been strangled, beat up. I mean, sexually assaulted. So earlier that night when Matthew had pulled the girls up onto the top of the hill and gotten out of the car, Liz and Brandy looked at each other in the car and cried.
Liz reached over and grabbed Brandy's tied hands on the steering wheel and told her she loved her. Brandy told Liz she loved her too and that she was so sorry that she picked the guy up. Liz told Brandy, no, no, we both decided to pick him up. It wasn't just your fault. And then Matthew opened up Liz's door. Oh, it's heartbreaking. Brandy told Liz everything was going to be fine and they would see each other again as Matthew pulled her out.
Brandy says at this point in time they're panicking so they're both just saying I love you I love you everything's going to be fine as he's pulling her out of the car because they're just trying to reassure each other that it's going to be okay I just don't understand why I mean I guess he tried to kill both of them but by but one he stabbed X amount of times and the other one he just killed but
Didn't really kill? Yeah. Like he had to have known that there was a chance she would live. Well, when he threw her over, he thought she was dead because she had been like incapacitated for a while. Oh, okay. So I think he thought he had successfully. So she was unconscious. Yes. I think he thought he had successfully choked her. Got it. Because she was unconscious. Yeah.
Brandy sat in the car and waited and waited and waited while Matthew walked Liz up and spent the time killing her. She was horrified when Matthew came walking back down to the car alone without Liz.
She doesn't know why she yelled back at him when he told her to get out. She doesn't know why she said, you're an idiot. Yeah, but she felt like he was going to kill her as he walked her up the hill when he got her out of the car. She was worried about her family and friends and if they would figure out what happened. At this point, she's like,
I'm pretty sure Liz is dead and I'm pretty sure he's taking me up there to kill me too. And are our friends and family going to be able to find our bodies? Brandy had actually looked over and seen something on the ground and Matthew grabbed her face and turned it. Like when they got to the top of the hill, he grabbed her face and turned her head the other way. And she didn't realize at the time, but she was looking down.
At Liz's body on the ground. But she didn't know what it was. She just saw like a mound. What? Exactly. Wait, how did it get there? Because he had walked Liz up earlier and killed her. Oh, oh. I was thinking you did separate directions. Oh, no, no. He went separate directions. He walked like past Liz.
liz's body with so remember how i said earlier i think he's just like sadistic and wants to see her reaction i think the only reason he walked her up there and then turned right right back around was to see how she reacted to seeing her best friend's body it's like he wanted her to beg and wanted her to freak out but she wasn't doing that she didn't because she didn't understand that that was liz it was dark outside she didn't understand that that's what she was looking at
When Matthew said he had actually let her go, Brandy became concerned for the fact that she was still with him. So she believed him when he said, oh, just kidding. Just kidding. I gave your friend. She believed him. It's even more sad. Yeah. She didn't think that he had actually killed Liz because remember, she didn't know that that's who she had seen up on the hill. And so then she's like, oh, thank goodness Liz is all right. But then she's like, wait, if Liz is all right and he let her go.
Why am I still here? And then she's like, crap, I'm the main target. Like he kidnapped both of us because he only wanted me, which that would be like just terrifying. Matthew was making small talk with Brandy the whole time they were walking down the railroad tracks. And Brandy began talking about her friends and family in hopes of making him see her as a real person who mattered. And we've seen this before with survivors. They do their best to try to, you know,
humanize themselves in hopes that they play to the emotions of their killer of like, well, maybe I just won't kill her. I can't believe she's alive. I know. It's insane. I'll tell you how she survived. Brandy felt like the sexual assault lasted hours in the train car and she knows it doesn't, but that was completely horrific. And she actually remembers him throwing her clothes violently back on top of her after and saying, get dressed.
And she remembers how like how small that made her feel that after he had just done that, he just casually threw her clothes back on top. And you said he had three kids, correct? Yes. He's a father. That's horrible. So Brandy got dressed in the train car and then just stayed on the ground because she was scared about what was going to happen next.
Brandy didn't understand what was happening at first when he walked her back and made her get on her knees and he began strangling her. She didn't understand what was happening because it happened from behind. She just remembers that she couldn't breathe and then blacking out. When she regained consciousness, she realized that Matthew didn't know yet that she had just woke back up. So she decided to hold her breath in hopes that he would think she was dead. She begins playing dead. That's so smart. She said that Matthew began kind of like
tapping her body to see if she was awake. And so she just like kept her eyes closed and held her breath. And then he began kicking her and beating her up because I think he thought if she is awake, this will wake her back up if she's alive. Yeah. And so she tried her best to continue playing dead, even though she's getting beat up, like kicked, kicked.
But eventually she couldn't hold it anymore and he kicked her once and all the air came out. She gasped. She opened her eyes and he was like, oh, she's still alive. Oh, this is a nightmare. Yes. She says at this point, Matthew climbed on top of her. And this is when he tries to snap her neck. But obviously it's a little harder and he couldn't successfully do it. And she remembers seeing him just get mad that he wasn't strong enough or couldn't figure out how to do this.
She remembers hanging barely conscious from the bridge. Just like going in and out? In and out, in and out of all of this. Unbeknownst to Matthew, the current rain that happened a couple days before had raised the level of the river quite a bit that was running underneath. So when he finally pushed an unconscious Brandy into the water, she regained consciousness as soon as she hit the water. Yes.
And she didn't hit her head or anything. And so she was fine. And so as she woke up, she was like, oh, I think he pushed me off the bridge. Like she realized that he pushed her off the bridge and she was,
floating with her head in the water and she decided not to turn over i can't believe she didn't um scream or anything i guess if she hit the water yeah i guess she woke up natural reaction you'd be like oh my gosh oh my gosh and she immediately woke up and was like i have to pretend i'm dead like he thinks i'm he thinks he just killed me that's so crazy and so she just floats
floats in the water, like down the stream or down the river, pretending to be dead. And then how long did she float for? So she doesn't float very far because as she's floating along, she kind of goes under the bridge. Yeah. And as she's under the bridge, she reaches out and grabs a log. Oh, okay. Because she doesn't want to come out the other side and have him see her. She grabs a log, but just sits there. So in case he comes down, he'll think, oh, she just got snagged or something.
And slowly, inch by inch, she starts like pulling herself out of the water using the log, but not wanting to make any noise, not wanting to like cause a scene or anything. She could still hear Matthew's footsteps on the bridge above her. No way. So he was probably smoking another cigarette. Exactly. On the bridge. And she's hiding underneath the bridge. He thinks she's dead and she's
And she's like, I've got to be so quiet. I've got to slowly pull myself out of this river if I want to live. Wow.
I'm sure after what seemed like forever and it was forever, she sat in the water under the bridge for an hour. Okay. Pulling herself out. And was it cold? Yes, it's cold. It's nighttime. It's cold. I mean, I mean, it's September. Okay. But she finally feels like she can't hear him anymore. She thinks he's gone. And so she pulls herself like completely out. At this point, she decides that she's going to swim across the water to the other side and come up on the other side of the bridge.
just in case he's kind of close, still there and she can have a chance to run away. So she gets up, she climbs up back to the bridge and looks around for him. She can't see him. So once she feels like it's clear, she starts making her way, following along the railroad tracks, thinking there's a police station because that's what he told her. I would be so scared to move. I would too. Like just thinking, what if I run into him or something crazy happens? She had to pass...
by that train car that she was literally brutally assaulted in to get to where she thinks the police station. Do you know how scary that would be to pass back that car and be like, is he in there? Is he hiding? Is he waiting for me? Does he know that I'm alive? Did he think I was dead? Like that would be so scary.
She gets up, she gets to the railroad and she finally comes to a road. Like after walking the railroad, she finally, she never hits a police station. So she finally gets to a road, but at the road, a couple of cars pass by and no one stops and helps.
Because I think she just looks like a crazy person on the side of the road. Well, she was just beaten. Yeah, she's bloody. She's covered in blood. Poor girl. This is crazy. Struggling to walk. Like she's just fallen a 25-foot drop into a river. Finally, a truck pulls over for her and stops to check on Brandy. And she feels so relieved.
The man who stopped happened to be an off-duty police officer and drove 17-year-old Brandy directly to the hospital and actually stayed there with her.
with her the whole time. I think just so she was felt comfortable and she remembers feeling comfort out of the fact that that police officer stayed with her. Brandy eventually was able to give the police a description of the man. And when it was released, the sketch, when it was released, Matthew's mother actually contacted the police after his brother-in-law contacted the police and said, Hey, that's my son on that sketch.
So not only did his brother-in-law go to the police internment originally. His mom. His mom also did. So there was no family loyalty. Yeah, not at all.
So Brandy thinks if she had actually known what happened to Liz, if he hadn't told her, just kidding, I let your friend go, she doesn't think she would have survived being beaten and dropped. Like she, I think she says the thought of Liz still being there and her family still being there is what kept her fighting, hiding under the bridge for an hour, like holding on. Yeah. She says that she was forced to grow up that night. Like in one night she was forced to grow up and see the reality of the world and
And for years, she struggled with why she got the opportunity to live when her friend didn't. It's always the worst about the hard part about survivor stories. Yes, yes. Well, and a lot of times survivor stories we do, it's just one survivor. Yeah. But, you know, she's going to have this survivor guilt now because her friend was killed. At court, Brandy confronted Matthew about her best friend Liz. So instead of getting up there and being like, you beat me, you hurt me, she gets up and says...
You killed my best friend Liz and you don't know what a beautiful soul you took off of this earth. That's what she says during her victim impact statement. Brandy asked the prosecution to not seek the death penalty in this case. And so Matthew was sentenced to a 96 year long prison sentence.
According to Kimberly Hagelberg, he will be eligible for parole in 2096. Oh, so it's... No, he will die. He'll die before. Okay. Brandy went on to get happily married and love spending time with her three kids. Awesome. Good for her. She named her firstborn daughter Emma Elizabeth after her best friend Liz.
Brandy knows that her kids are the reason she's still here. So she said that question went unanswered about why Liz and not her until she had kids. And then she realized the reason I'm still here is because I'm going to raise these kids. I just don't understand. Like, like what a psycho. What a psycho. Like what an absolute just crazy person. Just out of nowhere. They're just driving home. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. According to Katie Alberti with thetimesreporter.com, Brandy says,
From that point on, I decided that any chance I got, I would show people how to get out of that kind of situation. I want to try and help as many people as possible by sharing my story. That's so awesome. Which is why we are resharing her story here today. According to Lee Elliott with TimesReporter.com, Liz's family has gone on to write a book called Through My Tears, A Wash in Forgiveness. And this is about her family's decision to forgive Matthew for killing their daughter that night.
Liz's mom, Becky, says, I had a choice. I could agree or disagree, and I chose forgiveness because it freed me from whatever I was going to have to face. It gave me the peace and strength to move forward. So in memory of Liz and our prayers go out to Brandy and Liz's family, that is the story of Brandy and Liz. Man, I like these ones, survivor ones, because people survive, but...
One person didn't. So it's kind of just I like listening to the story. All I could just was feel so bad for the fact that she survived and she was like, oh, I'm a survivor. Like I'm a survivor. But that also comes along with this guilt of the fact that. Yeah, there's just so much more to it. And he also spent so much more time with Brandy than he did with Liz.
I think I contributed to the fact that he was just maybe under the influence and was... Yeah, not like thinking clearly and obviously just not a good person. Yeah, obviously a complete crazy person. Yeah. Oh my gosh. Awful. That's so crazy. Yeah.
And he actually had no prior history of violence. Which is weird. Yeah, like none of his past charges, nothing like that was ever violent. Well, last week's was kind of the same. Exactly. And then he goes on to what he thinks. He thought he killed both girls. He didn't know that Brandy had survived. Well, he probably thought he was going to get away with it. Well, I don't think so. You don't think so? He brought his brother-in-law up to the body the next day. I think he was trying to get help.
Not realizing that his brother-in-law was going to turn right back around and go to the police. Yeah, what did he think was going to happen? Yeah.
All right, so that is our case this week. And we just want to say thank you to all of our new listeners and all of our original listeners. We seriously, I know we say it all the time, but we love you guys so much. Sometimes we just sit and read our reviews and our comments. And it really is just, it's what keeps us going. Like, it's like, sometimes we're like, why are people so nice to us? Yeah, and Peyton puts so much time into this, so...
thank you to her obviously i just kind of thank you to you guys i just kind of sit here and watch her so okay and we will see you guys next week with another episode i love it and i hate it goodbye
