MYSTERIOUS DEATH OF: John Bender
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High crime junkie on your host ashly flowers .

and I am bit .

and the story I have for you today is full of mystery, hence the name. This is the story of john bender.

It's the early hours of january eighth, two thousand and ten, just past twelve, I am, to be exact, and a guards supervisor named oval do is on the job, meaning this very large, very expensive and very controversial state belonging to john and an ender in coastal reka. Now things are relatively calm until a single gunshot rings out in the coastal k and jungle just moments before. And bender comes through his radio crime in for help.

So oswaldo, in one of his guards, immediately head over to wear and is up. But when they arrive, they have a little problem. The only way to get to end, she's on the fourth or is to go through the private elevator and that's been locked down for the night presumable to keep people out. But now they have to find a way in and IT takes a couple of minutes, and they they have to go back and forth with an on the rocky turkey.

But eventually they get the elevator unlock and they get up to where he is in her bedroom, but as well as not prepared for the grizly scene that he's about to walk into when he gets up to the fourth floor, he sees and nearing on the side of the bed covered in blood spatter, she's holding the hand of her husband john, who is laying in a pull of blood on the bed. And I don't know if an is talking to them or if she's just in shock and she's like mumbling stuff, allow trying to make sense of IT. But according to an outside magazine article, she's saying, quote, I tried to stop IT, but I couldn't no as oswaldo tsta closer look, he S A semi automatic nine millimeter rugger on the ground next to the bed, which he knows to be one of john's guns.

And he's got no clue what happened here. But john gun is on the floor and is in shock, and that shock is turning into panic, and he knows that he needs to just get her out of here and get the local authorities in. So he takes her down to the second floor, calls for help and while they weigh and takes a tranquilizer to calm down.

And then he begins to reach out to people to tell them that her husband is gone. I mean, he sends an email to her parents to let them know. And then he called her brother.

Can now, as all those not sure how those conversations on the other end are going, like he doesn't how people are taking the news, he's only getting side, but he's starting to piece together what might have happened when he hears and say to her brother, quote, he finally did IT. And when authorities show up, they have come with a whole host of people. There's the wires of publica, which is the local police, then the coast to weakens judicial investigation police, which is the O I J.

There's people from the red cross and then the corner. But I don't know why so many people are there, because IT doesn't seem like treat that much like a crime scene. I mean, I know they talk to and they get a statement from her, but honestly, that seems like more people come to check out this mega that y've heard so much about.

I mean, for most of these people, this is the first time that they ve ta a real glimpse of what's inside this multimillion dollar a state that without here for almost a decade by this point. And but I actually just show you a picture of this house. You can get what I am talking about because it's like a houses, even in the right word for this. Oh yeah.

I mean, my first thought was like a guy. Bo, but it's house size guide. O.

it's round a size. This thing is huge.

Yeah, yeah. I'm ford. That can you matter? Just like walking up to this in the middle of the rain forest.

I know. So listen, so john and an lived in his four story building on the property and according to reporting by Carol van for the coastal registry, there were also four additional smaller houses for staff to the property itself. It's like five thousand acres within the coastal gan rainforest and the house that ann john lived in was known as the pender.

Dom, like that's the big one and IT truly as I mean, you can see that but it's something out of like a disney movie. This is yeah a four story home with literally no walls at zo, no windows. It's just open to the jungle like my bug.

But they had exotic animals and exotic flowers. And it's basically become like an urban legend to people in coto rec at this point. So I think that people are shown less, less to help. And I I I know like like listen on everyone, like I know some people are having, but I should say some people are less there to help and more there to get a glimpse at this thing. Maybe even take some pics or snm souvenirs, which is very disrespectful. But that just gives you a small sense of, like how some of the locals might have felt about the vendors, like they see these White people moving in, laying claim ed to the coasts, weekend rain forest, and to then that is disrespectful in and of itself.

right? So what brought the enders two coasters go? Like where are they from where they hear?

yes. So there are from the U. S. And johnnie had bought this way on the same year that they met and gotten engaged.

That was in one thousand nine hundred and eighty eight. And they bought IT with money that john had made as a headphone manager. And then they officially moved to coasters get in two thousand, one when the construction on the enter done was finished. And as for why they're both animal lovers, and I think once they set their sites on this property, they were like, you like, let's just fully go all in, go live there.

let's make our dreams true .

yeah and I think there are ultimate planes were eventually start this refuge for wildlife there anyway, to go back to the crime scene that like I just kind of give you a sense of like what's happening at the time. No one is necessarily speaking ill of the dead in that moment, even though there's like, you know, the stuff happening in the background.

The people who are there to work ask and questions, and they ask questions of the security guards about what happened at night. The fact that john's nine millimeter rugger was in the bedroom room at all was apparently pretty unusual, given that part of their Normal routine was to round up and lock up all guns in this locked cabinet that they have on the first floor. Because this goes back to what I told you earlier about people not loving them being there.

IT wasn't uncommon for john to Carry a gun when he was outside of the dome for protect, especially after one day in particular, that traumatized them in April of two thousand, one, which is just shortly after they moved there. Apparently, ann and john were driving along a mountain road when armed men claiming to be police in an unmarked car pulled them over thread john with a gun and then threw them into their car to taken to jail. Now these men turned out to be playing closed officers, and john really was take into the local police station, but all the dramatic fan fair was just to serve him with a summer.

And then just months later, someone else tried to break into their home armed. So that's when they hire guards and bug guns, including this nine millimeter ruger pistol that is now sitting on their bedroom floor. IT is the gun that john always kept strapped to his side.

But even so, even there was always on him, even that got locked up, usually at night too. He never brought that gun or any gun to bed until that night. Now ian said that that night he was in and out of sleep, when always said he woke up and saw john lane next to her in the bed, pointing that gun at his head, which I mean, obviously something like this shock of a drina emp.

SHE said. He jumped up, he tried to get the gun from him. But in the struggle, the gun slipped, IT went off, and john got shot in the back of the head.

So no one was touching the gun and IT just went off.

Yes, he says that he drop the gun and that he never even touched IT.

So SHE saying he was going to take his own life and he was trying to stop him basically .

basically yeah OK, but isn't when they first met. So this is important to note. They both bonded over their shared struggles with mental health. So ann was taking medication to medicate the effects of her diagnosed by polar disorder. But john, who had also been diagnosed by polar disorder, was not taking medication. And apparently in the week's leading up to his death, he was in a very low phase, according to an like spiring, deeper and deeper in the depression.

And on the surface, like, okay, like some things are adding up for police is at least aligning with what waldo had heard her saying to her brother, right? But something about this whole thing is making authorities suspicious like they are not buying this as an accident like you don't seem sympathetic to either of their mental health conditions. So they decide, you know, we're like we're not going to like take things at face value they make and come down to the station to continue questioning her, though before they go, they first confiscate her clothing.

And I don't know that means they make maker take off like them in there or they will give her time to change. But he is allowed to put on some fresh clothes. They cover both her and then john hands and evidence bags and attempt to preserve any potential forensic evidence. And then by the time they get in to the police station is like eleven o'clock in the morning. And he tells them basically the same thing.

He told them at the house again, like he woke up to john aiming the gun at his head and like he said before, when he tried to rustle IT away from him, IT went off on its own shooting down in the back of the head and they take everything down, uh, again. But after an wraps up her interview, SHE makes a call to herpes chie atrix doctor lee sound out and an beggs ham to admit her to a hospital. And the doctor doesn't hesitate because it's more than just let her mental health concerns at this point more than just like the fact that SHE witness what SHE witnessed or was there, whatever.

SHE has actually been struggling with a lot more at the moment. Like when she's admitted, they say he looks too thin, like, I mean, sick and lifeless girls, about eighty pounds by this point. And an examination determined SHE is severely dehydrated and strAngely, her body is like covered in these allegations now in the forty eight hours documentary paradise loss and says that doctors gave her a forty percent chance of survival those first couple of weeks. We're in bad shape.

Yeah what's going on with her exactly? Like how did you get these lesions?

This is like one of the biggest question Marks, and I still in this whole thing. I don't know what the lesions are, and it's only mentioned by Carol van in her book called crazy jungle, love, murder, manage money and monkeys. Apparently john was routinely injecting, and with like dirty river water that he was convinced was gonna cure her line disease.

yeah. So I think she's sick with line disease. He is definitely making IT worse by putting jumble water into her and like that just not science and in turn was making her .

very freaking sick yeah like dirty river water injected into your body would yeah.

And again, I don't know how he felt about that. I don't know if he agreed. Like there's just a lot of no one really talks about this part of the story.

So I don't have a whole lot to fill in, but it's just like worth noting. So she's admitted immediately on a she's getting BIOS and flame metro's vitamins like ana guillen, pretty much everything they can have. And while he attempts to recover in the hospital, investigators start digging into some things that caught their eye back at the vender done. So for starters, let's talk about all of the James.

the James.

the James James that were lying about around the house. And it's not like, oh my god H I found something over here oh my god s something over here where i'm talking three thousand James, in this OpenAIr h ome W hite y eah. And not even in like a curated case of jewels and stuff like they are all over the place, like piled in backpacks and in some cases, and like summer on display, doesn't look even like an innocent collection to investigators.

Like the sheer amount of gems makes them suspicious that the penders could be involved in some kind of smuggling Operation, especially because they can't find any documentation like the oversees. Nothing for any of these games. Like where did these things come from? So wallets in the hospital, the O, I J takes custody of the gem, so they can start working on their case against her, because they are starting to build a case against her. And interestingly, they take much more than just the gems like they take pretty much everything in the house saying that it's evidence, but at a certain point in that they're taking just seems excessive. Like I mean, they even snag their microwave literally no reason at all, but they claim that they're just being thoro, especially when IT comes to those gems because if their theory is right, they think that ian killed her husband to steal the roughly twenty million dollars worth of gems that they found in that house.

But hold up. Since when do they think that he killed her husband?

Well, this is like the theory that they're building. And I mean, the jeans are kind .

of like what the catalyst yeah yeah.

But I mean, also they were getting a sneaking suspicion that something was off about the whole thing as soon as they got there because, I mean, there was stuff beyond just the jam that really, at least they say, didn't add up for them. So let's talk about john specifically.

So he's found in a Normal sleeping position on the bed with his left list hanging over the side of the bed, with blood pulling on the bed and and now they find the gun, like I said on the floor, like buy his left hand. They find a spent shall casing. But the spent shell casing isn't where investigators expected to be.

So it's not on the bed. It's not on the former gun. It's actually more behind the bed on the ground closer to side of the bed show case things .

like get ejected, right? Like that doesn't seem super uncommon or weird, right? I think it's possible .

also that was so many people that were in and out of the house that maybe I got accidentally kicked or something like if people weren't being super careful. But that's not the only thing that makes them money easy. So john also has ear plugs in, like I sleep with earplugs too.

And they say that makes some thing that he was intending to go to sleep, intending to end his own life. And then there is the gun powder residue, which is the biggie for them. Apparently, there is no trace of residue on john hands. And according to an article by redolence u. Martin, there was no stippling or tattooing on the back of his head, meaning that they say he had to have been shot from at least some kind of distance, like, not point blank, like what the investigative authorities would have expected in a suicide.

Would you expect to see either of those things if the gun fell? Like you said, though? right?

No, but this is kind of the reoccurring theme here. No one seems to be listening to, and they don't believe that the story she's telling is true. And on top of that, SHE told him that he wiped her hands off after everything happened .

when I guess I was .

sometime between when the gun went off and when osv aldo was like calling the authorities, which I like like, I know he was honey, you he told you whatever, but kind of like hone on this as proof like and that he would have had the evidence on her hands, but now does him because he was trying .

to cover IT up, like, yeah, but do they collect what SHE wipe her hands off, like the wash cloth or what on that? Yeah.

they do. So there are these naps that they collect from the second floor on a chair, but IT doesn't seem that goes are tested right away. And this is what you'll see throughout this thing like that seems like they kind of things.

Please let me tell you the right. So and is adamant that the story SHE told them was true. SHE didn't fire the gun. Who cares about wiping her hands? Like SHE said, the gun fell.

And even if they don't want to to believe her work because they think he is too much of a motive, or like her doctors chin here, they say that he was too sick at the time of john's death to even have the strength to pick up A U tencel, let alone a loaded gun and fire. But authorities just don't seem to care what anyone has to say. They have their story and their sticking to IT.

Okay, if her doctors are saying that she's so a week in capacity, you can even pick up A U tencel like a poor like how can SHE even struggle with john like that seems contradictory.

I I agree. Um I think you know if it's your if you to your husband and he is threatening ing to take his own life, think he might be like, I know componit SHE had able to move and so maybe that's what I was. I was just a sudden movement.

Maybe he thought he was asleep and it's surprise dime like I think what you bring up is valid. But just like everything in this is I think there is a potential explanation for IT. So in february of two dozen, ten is about a month after her husband died, while A N is still recovering in the hospital, they charge with recovery ring money launder ing and smuggling contraband, the contraband being those jewels.

And essentially investigators say they believe an was illegally acquiring gems on the black market and even importing blood diamonds and then selling them at these alleged millionaire parties that the bundles would host at the bender dome. And that's how they made their money. Big accusation.

Yeah, they have to have something that backs that up, right?

If they do, I don't know what that is because anne is denying all of IT and all of the staff at their stay even say, like, I don't know what like millionaire parties are talking about like that didn't happen here. But IT doesn't change authorities minds and no matter how much, and tries to reiterate to the detective that john really struggled with depression to an extreme extent, they do not care. They're not having IT.

So in the summer of twenty ten and is released from the hospital. And by August of twenty eleven, investigators feel that they have enough proof to show that and murdered red her husband in order to to gain plead access to all of their assets and all of their games, and that is when he is charged with first degree murder. What's ands .

explanation for all these, James, and where other wealth came from? I may decide .

a explanation like it's I mean, something that they can easily see that their wealth came from. John, he'd worked for the philadelphia stock exchange. Alan says that he created this new method trading, which allowed him to become one of the top traders, earning hundreds of millions of dollars.

And as for why they got the jam or wear whatever he said, like, they just like shiny things. They bought them because they like them yeah like they wanted to collect them plus their coastal region attorney and the vender, a state trusty. This guy told john and in that they should start investing in jewellery and James, because those things help their value. They be easily transported.

But worth noting, one might have been the wrong person to take advice from ian claims that apparently won had stolen from there seventy million dollar trust in one of his last emails to and john road, quote, I am a total fucking loser, forever getting involved with that total scum back talking about wan, and essentially with the unlimited power of attorney that the vendors had given him, he basically owns everything. Now that john's dead, including the money and the gems and all of this huge property, which they've named bora kon, it's like the name they've given there a state. And this dude, so like this, is work is so much more complicated. He is the one who picks out and lawyer, so she's feeling like he might .

be found yeah and I also think we found someone who might be your real suspect if .

there is a suspect, right? Like you would think if they're gonna look at and they would at least look at this guy too. But alas, IT is still in in prison.

And as he awaits trial, SHE actually move to take on the court for SHE VS a complained that he basically used the trust he was tasked with protecting the pay off credit card bills and buy whatever he wanted, including like, horses for his farm. And essentially he was like, using the money, like IT was his own. Now this does prompted investigation into wan, and eventually the court removed his name as the trustee of the Benjamin property.

But he doesn't dropping these charges anytime soon, even though at the end of the day, investigators do not believe he has anything to do with Jones dead. And they can write this guy off as simply like a shady business guy. And actually, not only do they not look at one, somehow they use this whole thing as even more proof of in an skill like they think that her attempt.

To put him in the spotlight was just to deflect focus off of her so in twenty twelve and charges for work tearing and money launder ing seeing to the suddenly be dropped though the contraband charges are still standing and a nonetheless per trial for the murder of her husband begins just months later in january of twenty thirteen. And this is the start of years in and out of the courtroom. A trial in coastal ga is very different than a trial here in the us.

And is not facing a jury of her peers. SHE is testifying in front of a panel of three judges assigned to her case, and her defense team, you know, not won. Her new defense team focuses on her experiences both on the night john died and even before, as you probably have gathered by now, the life SHE paints with john is not all sunshine and waterfalls and rainbows in paradise.

The time leading up to john's death was bleak for the couple and tells the judges that just two months before john died, he had tried to jump off their OpenAIr e levator a nd h e w as f eeling p rogressively m ore d epressed. He told me that he wasn't in a good person and his emails to her got really intense. So there's actually one they have put out that I think you should read just a kind of people a sense.

okay. First, don't these people live in the jungle together? Why are they email?

I don't know, I could never find out why so much like their communication is document and over email. I don't know. I don't know schedules rely. I don't know if this is just .

if there is like travel and stuff, it's just like how they yes.

I don't know.

Okay, it's as quote, i'm losing my family mind right now, first sick again and now this. Today is a total fuck nightmare and tomorrow will get worse. Just when I was feeling I could learn to be happy. Now I get this and I want to be dead. I feel so further, I want to kill everyone and then me, I deserve to die and quote.

I know it's not ever clarified what he meant by now dish and like, now I get this so like, I know what thing was going on. I don't know that was the one thing I don't like even have a date on this, but IT does show you just dark of a place that he was in in the time leading up to this. Now he also told in that he was afraid he was going to hurt somebody most likely harm.

She's the one with him all the time. They spent so much time together and he told her before, like SHE would be safer without him. According to reporting for outside online by net semen and maintains the same story SHE has been telling over the last three years with some more specific details.

The night john died, SHE had gone to bed before john, and by the time he came to bed, he was in analysis. But SHE immediately woke up when he heard him say, quote, you don't know how IT feels to wake up with your spouse half dead next year. And quote.

wasn't he the one killing her with dirty river water? But I don't get IT or the line .

disease or just like kick into that, he couldn't make her Better. I don't know, honestly, I don't know that I ever made sense to her either. I think SHE believes IT was just kind of manannan station of his mental illness. But then SHE goes on to tell the same story, right? Like they struggle, the gun goes off, but the prosecution pokes holes in and story, and they present their theory and their evidence. John, wearing earplugs, the trajectory of the bullet where the gun ended up, and the prosecutor says it's just not pauses for a lefty ended person to shoot themselves behind their right ear, and then for his gun to be on the floor by his left hand.

So how are they so certain is impossible if they were struggling or SHE was trying to get the gun from him .

or whatever. They bring in two experts. So they have a forensic expert and a police inspector who both argue that there was no sign of a struggle. I think that's one of the big reasons that they don't buy her story. So so if there's no signs of a struggle and then they're saying these things don't point to a suicide, then the only other option in their mind is that SHE killed him and they come to trial with one more piece of evidence.

They claimed that while I an didn't have gunshot residue on her hands, the cloth that he was wearing, the ones that they took from her at the scene, did show gun powder residue but i'll say before you do like he doesn't disprove the story that non gave but ah I can again if they have the story that present he does fit into theirs right she's a gun power on her close but he wiped her hands whatever whatever but in spite of their best efforts, it's not enough to convict in because this case is circumstantial as hell and the judges see that so in january two thousand and thirteen, he is unanimously acquitted. And according to an article in las sian, the judges do provide reasoning for their acquittal so they say that the evidence doesn't prove that an murder, john, but IT also doesn't prove that john took his own life. He could have shot himself with his right hand even though he was not handed.

They can be certain that his body wasn't moved or that the gun wasn't handled by a witness, like pictures for super secure crime. Cy, maybe what have helped with this, but like the things were very slob kab, in the beginning of this investigation, I think they didn't dust the gun for fingerprints. They didn't take anyone's prints at the scene, at least not for like a few hours after people had been there. And they also didn't take any crime scene photos until after things had been moved around and .

basically tampered with. Which why not like, why is all this like missing and messy?

What they say, they had to wait for sunrise for lighting reasons because even though this house was t four hundred, liam set are scattered around like, I guess there wasn't enough of like the right type of light that they needed to capture IT all like they say that those photos a maybe, but they weren't good quality. And O S don't capture the small details like the blood at they're trying to point to.

But the judges are like, you didn't do IT like it's just not there. I get what you're saying, but you can't prove what you're saying. And so all in all, there is just too much doubt in this case and basically ends free from all the mysteries surrounding that night on anyway eight, twenty ten.

The thing is, when ands release, he can just go back to her home. There is still this legal battle going on between her and one, or like one and the trust in a state. And SHE can't leave costa rica either because her passport was compensated due to her own legal stuff.

So once and is released, SHE has to move into the small apartment in a suburb, santos. But SHE has people to rely on like her friends and her family. And she's got a new boyfriend named greg who support her in her new found freedom, which actually wouldn't last very long because eight months after and is released, the coaster weekend court of appeals overturns her acquittal. Le, and a new trial is ordered. So SHE basically is getting tried for johns murder a second time.

Oh, they don't have double .

jeopardy there. nope. And if a prosecutor or defendant doesn't like the outcome, they can just appeal and they can go back and do IT again and again. I mean, they can even use the exact same evidence and witnesses and charges like nothing has to change, just like I want .

to do this over and as many times as they want.

Yet the only difference in anything is that they'll get a new panel of judges and less in this second trial is practically like the first. But there are a couple of new witnesses to try and sweet in the deal on each side, and IT ends very differently. So the trial asked about a week total.

And on may twenty seven, twenty fourteen, this time ian is found guilty of murdering john bender and he is sentenced to twenty two years in prison. And everyone on team and is shocked when they were like, no one was expecting this to go this way. And an's boyfriend greg is immediately outspoken and telling the media that he doesn't think and will survive in prison.

I think she's still dealing with the disease. And overall, I think he still does not appear to be in a healthy state. But the court doesn't care, and the judges reasoning for their guilty vertical this time boils down to the blood patterns in the crime scene photos. They say.

I thought you couldn't see those blood patterns in the .

photos girl is gonna say, like, it's got me twisted because I don't think you really can like they showed some of the scene pictures in the forty eight hours episode. And IT is super dim.

I don't see a whole lab, but I also don't know exactly what i'm looking for because they don't really point to anything specific in their ruling about the blood pattern as best as I can put IT together like something about the way he's lying down and that the blood is pulled under him, which to me makes sense if he was lying down to begin with. But I I don't know. They do say this is the one thing.

So in this new trial, there was something new that they do point to that made them go to this guilty verdict. There was like the first thing that made me be like him. So the prosecution says that there was a hair in a pillow case near john's head with gun powder in IT. So they think that he'd been shot with the pillow held up against his head.

And according to the tio times, they don't feel like the gunny is simply slipped during the struggle, hit the pillow and then went off like and claims, because apparently there was no smoke or burn patterns on the pillow, meaning that the gun couldn't have been touching the pillow, but there still is this tair. So the only explanation they say that there is, is that the gun was further away from the pillow. And john's had when I went off, like, which is making enough sense. But then I am, even if you look at IT closely and you can at least make an equally compelling argument the other way, like a very free game thing.

I guess I just can't figure out the motive. Here they were, their jumps SHE owned them too. He was stealing from who they were hers.

I know. I think maybe this is why that i've had to such A A hard time with the story from the beginning is because IT does not make sense to me. The prosecution insists they don't need a motive, which they don't like bright. That's the same way here. You don't have to prove a motive to prove that someone did something.

But to your point, like you have the games, you have the haps, you have the money, like you didn't need to kill your husband to have access to any other yeah, why? Why would you? Now, after ann's guilty verdict, SHE is transfered again back to the hospital because she's still in such a bad state, and the prosecutors have to decide whether or not to place her in a psychiatric care unit to serve out her nine months prevented detention, which is something that the core orders for her to serve while her sentencing is under review, because they think she's a flight risk eventually, though, and is sent to prison to begin serving her twenty two year sentence.

And this is when he needs her support team more than ever. But unfortunately, that team starts to the window, because in november twenty four, an's boyfriend greg dies in his bed under. Mysterious circumstances now obviously A S in prison so while both deaths are quote, mysterious investigations aren't even looking at her as a suspect but that doesn't stop the media from comparing greg and john's debt until they can ultimately share that greg died of an asma attack in his bed when he was just four years old, despite being like just kicked and knocked down and is not backing down from a fight, her defense team files an appeal against her guilty vertit.

Because, again, you can do this as many times as you want. And in february of twenty fifteen, the decision is made on that appeal and her conviction is thrown out. According to reporting by caron, pick to the court of appeals upholds the filing, and the court declares the conviction sentence to be invalid and therefore and should be immediately released, so ends out again, but not completely free, because authorities still have her passport.

So SHE basically has to go in weekly to let them know SHE hasn't left the country. And he was at this point that and caught the attention of forty eight hours. And while they were a great source for us while researching for this episode, they actually also play an inner gal part, in any case, because they brought in their own experts to trying decide what happened at january night, five years earlier, these forensic experts, salma and Richard egan, bomb pour over all of the evidence.

They even go to this big estate to try and get a Better understanding of the crime scene and what happened there in two thousand. And because the house is still there, still a abandoned still in legal limbo, i'm assuming they're hoping they can be useful in ends upcoming third trial. So when the time comes, sala is allowed to testify and she's there to help poke holes in experiments that the prosecution has done.

And most alarming to both salmon in Richard is that authorities never looked at the trajectory of the bullet to tell where the alleged shooter could have been in relation to john laying on the bed. IT seems like they only when they talked about projector, he was only because like where the sheltering or whatever was found. They also claim that it's likely john's body did move after his death just based on the way that blood had pulled around him on both sides.

But move from where? Like from a completely different room, or just like slightly moved .

on the bed? No, I I think everything happened in this like condensed area of the bedroom on this bed. Basically, the icon bombs are saying that they did a blood pressure analysis, and what they found supports the hypothesis that there was a struggle before john was shot. Like, that's what they are talking about.

just like an's been saying this whole time.

right? And they believe that if an was trying to get the gun from john, it's completely reasonable that I could have mistakenly gone off. John was shot and he fell back against the bed, causing blood to pull on both sides of him.

But that's about all the new information that was brought in to trial. Number three. And in september twenty fifteen, this is less than a month after the trial began. A N is absence ta or absolved for a second time? When is IT actually done that?

If everyone can just appeal an appeal and appeal to wear blue in the face.

she's making sure done because after this second acquittal and is like, get me the ad, he, her and her and her parents and her brother, who had been down this whole time for the trial, they immediately buy ticket home to the us. The U. S.

Consulate in kastoria had given her a new passport that would get her out of the country. But when he tries to go get her boarding pass at the airport, she's denied because apparently she's on costly because no fly list. So like that.

All this back and forth, SHE reaches out to her lawyer. They learn that and is still listed as a person awaiting trial in the system, which we just like why she's on the no fly less, which obviously isn't true. They have to jump through like a bunch of like legal loops they get off the list.

And finally, he is able to escape this nightmare in the rainforest that is essentially been going on since two thousand and one when they got there. So SHE flies home to the states, specifically to florida, where he hopes you get to stay for a very long time. Though all is not resolved in coastal ka, unfortunate.

There's hardly any details about the outcome of her fight against wan other than, like I know, he got removed as a trusty in twenty twelve, but I don't actually know if you ever regained access of the trust or got the money back that he spent, according to the teco times. And jams are still in legal limbo, like while they try to determine ownership, or like if taxes or do or whatever. And A M comes to a verbal agreement to basically pay one point five million dollars in taxes like that the center customs office claim he owes on wait for IT the seven million .

dollar value of the James seven is a lower number than before. Wasn't IT originally valued at like million?

Yeah, allegedly at the beginning. Now, after all these years, he appears the gems in their custody are considerably less valuable. Maybe there are less gems to estimate the value of, like depending on if you think the costly and government has been fair and true to the vendors this whole time, maybe there's something else going on.

Eventually, though, he does get her jewels back, or at least all that the customs claims they have of her collection and SHE regains access to the bender on the entire state, which he promptly puts up for sale like she's definitely not going to need that because he never intends to go back. But SHE might not have a choice because even though he is back in the us. Bit, they come for her again. okay.

I'm not saying SHE did IT or SHE didn't do IT, but and I feel like you but there has to be some kind of accountants here.

right? No, I mean, like immediately her lawyers appeal. But the fact that an was able to get home, I think, is what is the biggest in her favor, because apparently coastal ga does not allow trials. When people are not there, you have to be present in the court room in in close to riga, four trials .

to proceed. I mean, extra data. Well, they could.

And they do have an extradition treaty with the U. S. But since she's already gone through three trials, her lawyers and other legal experts don't think that the us. Would actually extract her. And they prove this when coastal kan authorities issue and arrest warrant for in january of twenty, twenty and no extradition occurs and SHE is now totally out of the woods because in twenty twenty two, coastal reka faces some of their own reform to their criminal procedure code that prohibits double jeopardy. According to the coastal reka a star, in twenty twenty three, the constitutional court orders the end of criminal proceedings against anan, and shortly after that, there is a final dismissal sentence in her favor after thirteen long years of fighting to maintain her innocence during all this.

Did john still have family who around at that the day, what do they think?

There's actually not a lot of mention of john's family and any of the source material like IT. IT seems like I was just john and and against the world when they moved to coastal ka, but I know IT wasn't for a lack of trying like on johns families part. It's mentioned in Carolines book, once john started strugling with his mental health, he eventually kind of just shot his parents out of his life completely.

He stopped replying to their concern emails. And I know john's dad does support, and he wrote a letter for her. And Johnny friend supported her too. He was also aware of john's mental health condition.

And I mean, this is where I think it's important to say like bipolar disorder can be difficult to talk about, especially when IT is a friend or a loved one who's experiencing IT. However, it's not just people struggling who can call for help as a supporter of someone. You can also so call or text the suicide and crisis lively at nine eight eight here in the U. S. They're available twenty four seven to anyone experiencing a mental health crisis or anyone who needs assistance supporting someone in a crisis.

You can find all the source material for this episode on our website, crime junky podcast dot com.

and you can follow us on instagram crank dcs.

Don't forget to follow because we'll be back next week with a brand new episode and stick around because we have some good idea.

Another crime junkies, another month that has come and gone, which means another .

other good segment has hit your feel right. This weekly have a pretty cool submission, really highlighting and showing the impact that true crime content can have. IT says, hello, my name is cody sharman on pronounce like sharman in the toilet.

Pak, I have listened to you guys the past several years. Do you show we have changed our policies and missing persons and runways in dispatch? One, we do not believe in the twenty four hour, bro. Two, all person's, no matter the age, are entered missing into N, C, I, C. We do not send bowl ws or attempt to locate those do nothing what entering persons into N, C, I, C, an actual hit or delayed hit will be sent to dispatch when that person's vehicle or name is ran so we know they are actually missing or may cause harm to themselves, blows and its are overlooked and the officers just have to remember the information which honestly is nearly impossible several hours into your shift, if dispatch enters said person and we received a laid hit, we at least have an approximate that that person was last seen in or at least where their plate was in whether IT was by an officer plate reader or traffic camera my goal is to implement this nationwide bolos don't save lives. Dispatchers do so the the party.

you don't be the party letter set of but as he I assume he works for like a dispatch, like a laender cement office .

yeah and to see someone like this in this position, take the initiative to put something like this in place.

I'm always surprised how these stories effective from people and it's cool to see somebody who's like, okay, I see everything that happened and it's what I talk about all the time, right? Like we don't like say all the bad things just to like like hammer on people and say you're doing a bad job. It's like if we would have done X, Y.

Z, we want to see change.

right? Like how would the outcome have been different? And so for somebody who's actually in a position to make change and to put in policies that would make something different and then like do IT, but because of our show is like absolutely unbelievable.

Cody, you're the free and best. Wish you all the best. Thank you for your service and forever thing you do. Crime junkie is an audio chuck production, so what do you think, chuck do you prove?