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Grandpa cheated, grandma got even with a shotgun · Murder Files Unsealed

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: Imagine for a moment you're living in a quiet, idyllic town,
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: you know, surrounded by perfect neighbors, tiring pine trees, just
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: living the good life.
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: Right, the classic American retirement dream.
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: Exactly. And statistically speaking, the most dangerous place for a
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: 72-year-old retired Little League umpire in that town isn't a
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: dark alley, and it's not some highway in a storm.
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: No, it's definitely not.
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: The most dangerous place, at least in the tiny town
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: of Plasterville, California... turned out to be his own bed.
• 0:31
  Speaker 1: Because while he was sleeping, his 70-year-old wife, who the
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: community literally called Grandma Kai, walked into the room, aimed
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: a 12-gauge double-barreled shotgun at his head, and pulled the trigger.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: It's, well, it's the ultimate collision of expectation versus reality.
• 0:46
  Speaker 2: You know, when we consume stories about violent, calculated crimes,
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: our brains naturally try to map those actions onto a
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: specific type of offender.
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: Right, like we expect a hardened criminal or a I
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: don't know, a volatile young person.
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: Exactly. A career sociopath. A grandmother baking cookies in a
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: mountain town simply does not compute.
• 1:06
  Speaker 1: And that failure to compute is exactly why we are
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: opening up today's source material. Because we're diving into a
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: stack of transcripts, police reports, and trial notes detailing this
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: shocking murder of Bob Harris by his wife, Colleen Harris.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: It's a massive amount of documentation.
• 1:24
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it really is. And the mission for us today
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: isn't just to you know, gawk at grisly crime scene photos.
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: We want to dissect this true crime source and completely
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: shatter the illusion of the sweet little lady. We are
• 1:36
  Speaker 1: looking at how a picture-perfect retirement turned into one of
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: the most cold-blooded crimes in Plasterville's history.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: And crucially, what it teaches us about the masks that
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: people wear.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Right. The dark intersections of ego, fatal empathy, and, well,
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: a 30-year-old secret. Okay, let's unpack this.
• 1:52
  Speaker 2: So to even begin to understand the mechanics of this crime...
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: We really have to establish the baseline. We have to
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: look at the psychological fortress this couple built around themselves
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: in that town.
• 2:02
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they had been married for over two decades. Right.
• 2:05
  Speaker 2: They were a blended family, deep into their golden years.
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: By all external metrics provided in the source material, they
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: were the absolute pinnacle of community stability.
• 2:15
  Speaker 1: And Bob, in particular, seemed to carry a ton of
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: social weight. Like, the source notes he was a retired
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: forestry service worker. So immediately you get this rugged, dependable,
• 2:25
  Speaker 1: steward of the land kind of vibe.
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: Very grounded.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Exactly. But he was also a volunteer sheriff's deputy and
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: most notably an umpire for the Little League World Series.
• 2:35
  Speaker 1: And I kind of want to pause on that detail
• 2:36
  Speaker 1: because umpiring for Little League, it isn't just a hobby.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: No, it's a highly specific social role. Right. What's fascinating
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: here is the sheer power of cognitive dissonance within a
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: closed community. Think about the psychological profile required to be
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: a successful umpire.
• 2:52
  Speaker 1: You're dealing with, well, kids, but mostly screaming parents.
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: Exactly. Highly emotional children and highly volatile defensive parents. You
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: have to possess this immense amount of patience, an unwavering
• 3:03
  Speaker 2: sense of fairness, and the emotional regulation to just be
• 3:06
  Speaker 2: screened at without losing your composure.
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: You're literally the community's chosen arbiter of the rules.
• 3:12
  Speaker 2: Right. So you have Bob, the ultimate protector and rule follower,
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: and then you have Colleen... who the source emphasizes was
• 3:18
  Speaker 2: nicknamed Grandma Key.
• 3:20
  Speaker 1: It's such a warm, soft, non-threatening picture, like a Norman
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: Rockwell painting.
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: It really is.
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: But I struggle with this concept. Like, how does a
• 3:29
  Speaker 1: community look at a couple like this and completely miss
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: the rot happening inside the house? Is it just willful ignorance?
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: Well, in places like Plasterville, social currency is everything. When
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: a couple adopts these deeply ingrained positive community roles... they
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: construct a halo effect. The brains of their neighbors literally
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: resist processing negative information about them.
• 3:52
  Speaker 1: So they just filter out the red flags.
• 3:54
  Speaker 2: Unconsciously, yes. The idea of Grandma Key being dangerous is
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: just too disruptive to their worldview, so they rewrite her
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: behavior to fit a safe narrative.
• 4:03
  Speaker 1: I see what you're saying, but I have to push
• 4:05
  Speaker 1: back a little on the age factor here. It's not
• 4:07
  Speaker 1: just that they were nice people, it's that they were
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: in their 70s.
• 4:10
  Speaker 2: That's a huge factor.
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: Right, because when you hear about domestic homicide... You picture,
• 4:15
  Speaker 1: I don't know, a young couple with a fiery, toxic dynamic.
• 4:18
  Speaker 1: There's this assumption that by the time you hit your
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: golden years, that kind of intense, violent passion just sort
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: of evaporates. We assume elderly people are emotionally declawed.
• 4:29
  Speaker 2: And that is a fundamental societal blind spot. We tend
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: to view the elderly as desexualized and devoid of intense,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: destructive emotional drives. You know, like raging jealousy or violently
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: bruised egos.
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: Just age out of it.
• 4:43
  Speaker 2: Exactly. We confuse the deterioration of physical energy with the
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: deterioration of psychological intensity. But the human ego does not retire.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: The need for control, the fear of abandonment, those emotional
• 4:54
  Speaker 2: drivers don't evaporate simply because you qualify for a senior discount.
• 4:58
  Speaker 1: Wow, that's a chilling way to put it.
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: And in some cases, as physical autonomy wanes, the psychological
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: need for control over one's immediate environment and partner can
• 5:07
  Speaker 2: actually become more concentrated. It becomes vastly more dangerous.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: And according to the source material, that need for control
• 5:13
  Speaker 1: was being severely threatened. Because beneath this perfect Plasterville surface,
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: the marriage was fracturing.
• 5:19
  Speaker 2: Deeply fracturing. Yeah.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: Bob's son, Andy, went on record saying he noticed deep
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: trouble brewing. Bob was incredibly unhappy. And the tension had
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: reached such a boiling point that Bob decided he needed
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: a massive amount of space. So he goes on a
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: work trip.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: To Mongolia, of all places.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: Right. Geographically and culturally, you cannot get much further from Plasterville,
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: California than Mongolia.
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: That choice of location is highly indicative of his mental state.
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: He wasn't just taking a weekend fishing trip to the
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: next county. He was putting an ocean and a continent
• 5:52
  Speaker 2: between himself and his wife, seeking absolute detachment.
• 5:56
  Speaker 1: But while he was seeking detachment, he ended up finding
• 5:58
  Speaker 1: something else entirely. During this time in Mongolia, Bob fell
• 6:02
  Speaker 1: in love with a much younger woman.
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: And this is the catalyst.
• 6:05
  Speaker 1: This is exactly where the story shifts from a sad,
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: deteriorating marriage into a highly active, volatile timeline. Because Colleen
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: discovers this affair. But the way she discovers it is
• 6:16
  Speaker 1: what we need to zoom in on.
• 6:17
  Speaker 2: She didn't just find a stray receipt or something.
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: No, not at all. During her interrogation, she freely admitted
• 6:23
  Speaker 1: to the police that she hacked into Bob's computer, found
• 6:26
  Speaker 1: his love notes to the woman in Mongolia, and used
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: that information to confront him. And wait, the source material
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: includes her exact quote. She told the police, and I'm
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: quoting here, it took me four hours, but I got
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: into his computer.
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: That specific time frame, the four hours, is the key
• 6:43
  Speaker 2: that unlocks her true psychological state.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I want you listening to really visualize this process.
• 6:49
  Speaker 1: Four hours is an eternity in digital time. I mean,
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: I get locked out of my email, I try three passwords,
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: get frustrated after 45 seconds, and just hit the forgot
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: password link.
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: We all do.
• 7:00
  Speaker 1: We are talking about 240 minutes. Of a 70-year-old woman
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: sitting in front of a glowing screen, methodically guessing combinations, birthdays, anniversaries,
• 7:10
  Speaker 1: names of pets.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: Hitting dead end after dead end. Right?
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: Getting error messages and refusing to stop. That completely annihilates
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: the helpless, sweet old lady trope. That is not the
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: behavior of a passive, fragile grandmother. That's a sustained brute
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: force attack driven by obsessive determination.
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: You are identifying the exact difference between a sudden crime
• 7:31
  Speaker 2: of passion and a methodical crime of control.
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: Say more about that.
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: Well, a true crime of passion implies a sudden, uncontrollable
• 7:39
  Speaker 2: loss of emotional regulation. You know, a snap. What you
• 7:43
  Speaker 2: just described, four hours of relentless digital probing, requires focus, stamina,
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: and a highly active analytical mind.
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: Right. She was entirely lucid.
• 7:53
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And this connects directly to the working theory presented
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: by the district attorney on the case, Joe Alexander. The
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: source mentions that investigators found Colleen's personal journals where she
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: had written entries like, I am so devastated inside. I
• 8:05
  Speaker 2: loved Bob more than life itself.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: Painting yourself as the heartbroken victim.
• 8:09
  Speaker 2: But Alexander dismissed it entirely. He referred to it as
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: a dear diary act. He argued that Colleen wasn't driven
• 8:17
  Speaker 2: by a sense of heartbreak or betrayal, but by a
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: profound toxic sense of ego. His quote from the source
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: is incredibly blunt. He said, if she wasn't going to
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: have Bob, no one was going to have Bob.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: OK, let's break that down because I think a lot
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: of people blur those lines. When we hear about spousal
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: homicide triggered by an affair, the default assumption is always
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: a crime of betrayal.
• 8:40
  Speaker 2: Right. Someone gets their heart broken, they lash out.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Exactly. But a crime of ego feels distinctly different. Walk
• 8:46
  Speaker 1: me through the actual mechanics of that distinction because, well,
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: on a police report, a dead husband looks the same
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: either way.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: The outcome is identical, yes, but the internal machinery driving
• 8:56
  Speaker 2: it is fundamentally different. A crime of betrayal is rooted
• 8:59
  Speaker 2: in a sudden, overwhelming emotional flood. The perpetrator's self-worth is
• 9:04
  Speaker 2: tied to the partner, and when that bond breaks, they
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: lash out from disorganized pain.
• 9:08
  Speaker 1: It's chaotic.
• 9:09
  Speaker 2: Highly chaotic. A crime of ego, however, is rooted entirely
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: in ownership and control. The emotional driver isn't sadness. It's
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: a furious indignation at the loss of control and the
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: insult to their supreme self-importance.
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: So the partner isn't even a person making a choice.
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: No, they are viewed as an asset, a possession being stolen.
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: The rage comes from the thought, you belong to me
• 9:32
  Speaker 2: and you do not have the authorization to leave.
• 9:34
  Speaker 1: Wow. And the source material backs up that control theory immediately.
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: Because look at her behavior after the four-hour hack. She
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: doesn't dissolve into tears on the floor or call her
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: friends to cry. she immediately asserts logistical control over Bob's life.
• 9:49
  Speaker 2: It's a very calculated next step.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the source says she was so angry that she
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: physically packed up all of Bob's belongings and moved them
• 9:56
  Speaker 1: out of their shared home and into his remote cabin
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: in Lake Tahoe. timing it right before he got back
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: from Mongolia.
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: That is a massive assertion of dominance. By packing his
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: bags and unilaterally relocating his possessions, she is dictating the
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: geographical and logistical terms of their separation.
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: She's completely controlling the environment.
• 10:15
  Speaker 2: It's a physical manifestation of her saying, you don't get
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: to come back to this house and negotiate. I have
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: already rearranged reality. You live over there now.
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: And Bob actually confirms this dynamic. The source outlines a
• 10:27
  Speaker 1: phone call Bob makes to his son, Andy, a few
• 10:30
  Speaker 1: days after he gets back. Bob says he and Colleen
• 10:33
  Speaker 1: are having severe marital problems. He confirms he is now
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: living full time in the Tahoe cabin while she remains
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: in Plasterville. And he says they are going to try
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: to work on their issues.
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: He was trying to manage the situation?
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he specifically tells his son not to worry, that
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: he thought everything would eventually work out. And honestly, reading
• 10:51
  Speaker 1: this part of the transcript makes me want to scream
• 10:54
  Speaker 1: at the page. Because the separation was successful. Bob was
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: out of the house.
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: The distance was established.
• 10:59
  Speaker 1: Exactly. The volatile element had been removed from the pressure cooker.
• 11:03
  Speaker 1: But then a totally random medical issue drags him right
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: back into the blast radius.
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: It is a devastating twist of fate. Life intervenes. Colleen
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: requires hip surgery. And suddenly, the protective geographical boundary that
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: Tahoe provided is completely obliterated.
• 11:18
  Speaker 1: But wait, explain the logic here. She just found out
• 11:21
  Speaker 1: he has a young girlfriend in Mongolia. She spent hours
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: hacking his computer. She was angry enough to literally evict
• 11:28
  Speaker 1: him and move all his earthly possessions to a cabin.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 11:32
  Speaker 1: Why on earth would Bob leave the safety of Tahoe
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: and move back in with the woman who just threw
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: him out?
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: Because of the single most dangerous weapon a manipulator can
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: wield against a good person.
• 11:43
  Speaker 1: Obligation. Obligation.
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: The source notes Bob felt an overwhelming sense of duty.
• 11:47
  Speaker 2: Remember who we established Bob to be? He is the
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: Little League umpire, the volunteer sheriff's deputy, a man whose
• 11:53
  Speaker 2: core identity is built around being a protector and a caretaker.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: So when she has surgery, she becomes physically vulnerable.
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: Exactly. She needs someone to help her walk, to manage
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: her medications, to maintain the house. If we connect this
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: to the bigger picture, it's a perfect example of how
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: manipulators weaponize empathy.
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: Bob's inherent goodness becomes his fatal flaw. He looks at
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: the situation and thinks, you know, our marriage is falling apart.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: She's furious with me, but she is physically helpless right now.
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: I cannot abandon an injured woman.
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: It is an incredibly noble instinct. It speaks volumes about
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: his character.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: But it placed him directly into a psychological trap. Because
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: while her physical vulnerability, the healing hip, was medically real,
• 12:34
  Speaker 1: the way she utilized that vulnerability was pure emotional leverage.
• 12:39
  Speaker 2: Manipulators possess an incredible radar for conscientious people. They know
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: a person bound by a strong internal moral code can
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: be easily controlled by invoking their sense of duty.
• 12:50
  Speaker 1: And the source makes it explicitly clear. Colleen did not
• 12:53
  Speaker 1: view this recovery period merely as a time to heal
• 12:56
  Speaker 1: her hip.
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: No, she viewed it as a closing window of opportunity
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: to win him back, to reestablish total control over him
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: before he could return to the woman in Mongolia.
• 13:05
  Speaker 1: Imagine the claustrophobia of that living situation. You have Colleen
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: physically dependent on him, but psychologically calculating every move, constantly maneuvering.
• 13:14
  Speaker 2: And Bob, physically healthy, fully capable of leaving, but emotionally
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: chained to the house by his own conscience.
• 13:20
  Speaker 1: But as the weeks go by, hips heal. The physical
• 13:23
  Speaker 1: dependency she is using as an anchor is slowly evaporating,
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: and it becomes apparent to her that the tactic isn't working.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: Bob is still planning to leave.
• 13:31
  Speaker 1: Right. He is still planning to return to Tahoe, and
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: eventually perhaps to the new woman. The trap she set
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: with her recovery is springing open and the prey is
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: about to walk out the front door.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: And that impending loss of control is the ultimate trigger.
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: In a crime of ego, the realization that you have
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: definitively lost, that your manipulation has failed, is the most
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: dangerous moment.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: Which brings us to the specific event that prosecutors say
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: ignited the powder keg. It wasn't a screaming match. It
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: was a phone call. Earlier that evening, Colleen overheard Bob
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: talking on the phone with a new girlfriend in Mongolia.
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: Think about the devastating insult to her ego in that moment.
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: She has orchestrated this entire scenario. She has him captive
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: in her home, playing the vulnerable wife, and he is
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: utilizing that time to nurture a relationship with her replacement.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: It shattered the illusion entirely. So she waits, and I
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: really want to emphasize that detail. She waits until he's asleep.
• 14:26
  Speaker 1: She doesn't confront him while he's on the phone. She
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: doesn't throw a plate at him in a fit of rage.
• 14:31
  Speaker 2: She bides her time.
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: She waits hours until he's unconscious, entirely defenseless. She walks
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: into the bedroom, points a 12-gauge double-barreled shotgun at his head,
• 14:41
  Speaker 1: and fires. Now, I am not a firearms expert, but
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: a 12-gauge shotgun is not a subtle weapon.
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: It is arguably one of the most devastating weapons available
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: at close range. The mechanics of a shotgun blast are catastrophic.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: At the distance she fired from, within the confines of
• 14:58
  Speaker 2: a bedroom... it causes massive instantaneous trauma.
• 15:02
  Speaker 1: And operating it takes effort, right?
• 15:03
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. Operating a shotgun requires deliberate physical actions. It is heavy.
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: You have to retrieve it. You have to ensure it
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: is loaded. You have to physically raise it, aim it,
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: and pull a heavy trigger. It requires a sequence of
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: intentional physical steps.
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: Which makes the story she tells the police during her
• 15:20
  Speaker 1: interrogation absolutely mind-boggling. When they ask her what happened, she
• 15:24
  Speaker 1: doesn't invoke self-defense. She doesn't say they struggled over the gun.
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: No, she goes a completely different route.
• 15:29
  Speaker 1: She claims she was in a, quote, real, quiet, brave fog.
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: She miraculously claims she had absolutely no memory of retrieving
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: the gun, aiming it, or pulling the trigger. And here's
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: the detail that made my jaw drop. She tells the
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: detectives that when she saw the aftermath, she thought Bob
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: was simply having a nosebleed.
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: A nosebleed.
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: A nosebleed. Here's where it gets really interesting, because I
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: need to try to understand the logic of this defense.
• 15:55
  Speaker 1: On its face, it is insulting to human intelligence. If
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: I'm standing next to an exploding building and the shockwave
• 16:01
  Speaker 1: knocks me over, I cannot look a police officer in
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: the eye and say, gee, I thought a balloon popped.
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: The sensory experience is impossible to ignore.
• 16:07
  Speaker 1: Exactly. The sensory experience of a 12-gauge shotgun going off
• 16:11
  Speaker 1: in an enclosed room is deafening. The concussive force alone
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: is jarring. The physical reality of the crime scene would
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: be horrific.
• 16:19
  Speaker 2: Fun mistake.
• 16:20
  Speaker 1: The audacity required to sit in an interrogation room and
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: claim you confused a point-blank shotgun blast to the head
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: with a bloody nose. I mean, how does a defense
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: attorney even begin to articulate that in a courtroom with
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: a straight face? What is the actual legal mechanic they're
• 16:36
  Speaker 1: trying to exploit here?
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: To understand the nosebleed claim, you really have to look
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: past the absurdity of the statement itself and look at
• 16:43
  Speaker 2: the legal framework of culpability. They are attempting to attack
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: the concept of mens rea.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: OK, I hear mens rea on legal dramas all the time,
• 16:51
  Speaker 1: but break it down for me. How does claiming a
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: fog negate it? If she's holding the gun and the
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: gun went off, isn't she guilty regardless?
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: Not necessarily in the eyes of the law. In the
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: American legal system, to convict someone of a severe crime
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: like first-degree murder, the prosecution typically has to prove two
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: distinct elements beyond a reasonable doubt. First, the actus reus,
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: which is the guilty act.
• 17:13
  Speaker 1: The physical pulling of the trigger.
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And she doesn't deny she was in the room
• 17:16
  Speaker 2: holding the gun, so the act is somewhat conceded. But
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: the second element is the mens re, the guilty mind.
• 17:23
  Speaker 2: The prosecution must prove that she had the conscious intent,
• 17:27
  Speaker 2: the premeditation, and the cognitive awareness to commit the murder.
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: So the defense is saying, yes, her physical body held
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: the gun, but her consciousness wasn't in the driver's seat.
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: Precisely. By claiming she was in a real, quiet, brave fog,
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: a disassociative or fugue state, the defense is arguing that
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: her conscious mind was entirely absent. If she had no
• 17:49
  Speaker 2: cognitive awareness of what she was doing, she couldn't possibly
• 17:52
  Speaker 2: have formed the intent to kill him.
• 17:54
  Speaker 1: It's a way to bypass premeditation.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: Exactly. If a jury believes she truly thought it was
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: a nosebleed, they might believe she was profoundly detached from reality,
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: which legally short-circuits the requirement for premeditation. It's a desperate strategy,
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: but in cases where the physical evidence of the act
• 18:09
  Speaker 2: is insurmountable, attacking the mental state is often the only
• 18:12
  Speaker 2: card the defense has left to play.
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: Okay, I understand the legal theory, but logically... It falls
• 18:18
  Speaker 1: apart almost instantly. Because if I experience a genuine psychological break,
• 18:23
  Speaker 1: a true fugue state where I am so disconnected from
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: reality that I mistake a gunshot for a medical issue,
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: my behavior after the event should reflect that massive cognitive malfunction.
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: It should be chaotic. Right.
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: I should be wandering the streets in my pajamas or catatonic. Yeah.
• 18:40
  Speaker 1: I certainly wouldn't be capable of organizing a highly complex,
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: multi-phase logistical operation.
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: And that is precisely the fatal flaw in her defense.
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: True amnesic episodes or profound disassociative states are incredibly disorganized.
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: The individual is confused, frightened, and completely incapable of sequential planning.
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: Which brings us to the massive gaping hole in Colleen's narrative.
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: The timeline between the murder and the police arriving.
• 19:05
  Speaker 2: The nine-hour gap.
• 19:06
  Speaker 1: Yes. The source material outlines this nine-hour gap. Bob is
• 19:09
  Speaker 1: shot in the late evening or early hours in the morning.
• 19:12
  Speaker 1: But one call reporting his death doesn't happen for at
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: least nine hours.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: A huge window of time.
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: The victim is lying dead in his bed, and his wife,
• 19:20
  Speaker 1: who claims to be in a confused fog, is totally
• 19:23
  Speaker 1: unaccounted for. What on earth is she doing for nine hours?
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: Well, she's certainly not paralyzed by shock. According to cell
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: phone tracking data and the timeline established by the prosecutors,
• 19:34
  Speaker 2: at roughly 7.30 in the morning, Colleen Harris leaves her
• 19:38
  Speaker 2: house in Plasterville, gets in her car, and embarks on
• 19:41
  Speaker 2: a 200-mile drive to San Francisco, heading to her son's house.
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: Let's just sit with that for a second. Leaving your
• 19:47
  Speaker 1: murdered husband in the bed you shared, you wake up,
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: the sun rises, and you don't call an ambulance. You
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: don't call a neighbor. Instead, you start packing the car.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: And the items she chooses to pack are incredibly telling.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: Prosecutors call this the dash and stash.
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: The dash and stash. She didn't just grab a purse
• 20:03
  Speaker 1: and flee in a panic. She loaded two heavy storage
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: bins filled with Bob's extensive and valuable coin collection. She
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: took Bob's gun, and perhaps most chillingly, she took Bob's
• 20:14
  Speaker 1: cell phone.
• 20:15
  Speaker 2: If we analyze those three specific items, they completely dismantle
• 20:19
  Speaker 2: the idea of a woman lost in a fog. Each
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: item serves a highly distinct, rational, and strategic purpose for
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: a guilty mind looking toward the future.
• 20:29
  Speaker 1: Taking the cell phone is brilliant in the most malicious
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: way possible. Think about it. If she leaves the phone
• 20:34
  Speaker 1: in the house, it's going to ring. Bob's son Andy
• 20:36
  Speaker 1: might call to check in. The girlfriend in Mongolia might call.
• 20:40
  Speaker 1: And if he doesn't answer, people get suspicious. Someone might
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: drive over to the house and discover the body before
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: Colleen has her cover story ready. By taking the cell
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: phone with her on a 200-mile road trip, she's controlling
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: the flow of information. She is ensuring that Bob appears
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: temporarily unreachable rather than dead.
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: It is a highly calculated move to buy herself time.
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: Information control is a hallmark of premeditation and awareness.
• 21:04
  Speaker 1: And then you look at the two bins of the
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: coin collection. Coins are heavy.
• 21:08
  Speaker 2: Extremely cumbersome. Moving them requires physical effort and intent. Securing
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: those assets indicates a mind that is actively planning for
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: a financial future without her husband. That is not the
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: behavior of someone trapped in suicidal ideation or disassociative shock.
• 21:23
  Speaker 1: It's a financial contingency plan.
• 21:24
  Speaker 2: Exactly. She drives all the way to San Francisco and
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: hides these items in her son's garage and Effectively removing
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: crucial evidence and high-value assets from what she knows will
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: soon become a heavily scrutinized primary crime scene.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: But here is where the story takes a turn into
• 21:40
  Speaker 1: the absurd. Her entire defense, this carefully constructed narrative of
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: being a confused, fragile old woman lost in a fog,
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: isn't undone by a brilliant detective finding a fingerprint. It
• 21:52
  Speaker 1: is undone by a mundane inconvenience on the drive back
• 21:54
  Speaker 1: from San Francisco.
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: The ultimate twist of irony.
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: Her car breaks down off Highway 80. So what does
• 21:59
  Speaker 1: the sweet, confused grandma do when her car dies? She
• 22:02
  Speaker 1: does what any rational, functioning adult would do. She calls
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: AAA for a tow truck. Not once, but twice.
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: And this is where modern infrastructure becomes the prosecution's greatest asset.
• 22:13
  Speaker 2: Calls to dispatch centers like AAA or insurance providers are
• 22:17
  Speaker 2: standardly recorded for quality assurance.
• 22:20
  Speaker 1: And when the prosecution subpoenaed those records, they struck absolute gold.
• 22:25
  Speaker 1: Let's look at the transcripts of those audio recordings from
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: the source material, because they are devastating to her defense.
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: Completely devastating.
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: The AAA operator asks standard questions. Are you in a
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: safe location? What happened to the vehicle? And Colleen responds
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: with absolute clarity. She tells the operator, I just started
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: swerving on the freeway, and then all of a sudden
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: I kind of did a complete flip, and the car
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: won't start now.
• 22:47
  Speaker 2: Very specific details.
• 22:48
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and then she effortlessly pinpoints her exact geographical coordinates.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: She says, I'm off of Highway 80. I can see
• 22:55
  Speaker 1: a sign ahead of me. It says UC Davis, Sacramento.
• 22:58
  Speaker 1: I live in Plasterville, so I have no way to
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: get home.
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: As an analyst looking at cognitive awareness, that recording is
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: a benchmark of lucidity. Listen to the processing power required
• 23:07
  Speaker 2: to have that conversation.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: She's totally present.
• 23:10
  Speaker 2: Fully oriented to time and space. She articulates the specific
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: mechanical failure of the vehicle, the swerving and the flick.
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: She visually scans her environment. reads a highway sign, and
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: contextualizes her physical location relative to both the nearest landmark,
• 23:26
  Speaker 2: UC Davis, and her ultimate destination, Plasterville.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: And then identifies her logistical need for a tow truck.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: It's incredible. Audio recordings of totally mundane tasks, ordering a pizza,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: calling a plumber, or in this case, calling a tow truck,
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: are the silver bullets for prosecutors dealing with an amnesia defense.
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: Because you can't fake it.
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: Right. You can sit in a police interrogation room and
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: fake tears. You can pretend you don't understand the detective's questions. Yeah.
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: You cannot fake the functional, practical lucidity required to navigate
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: a roadside breakdown with an insurance operator. As the prosecutor
• 23:58
  Speaker 1: pointed out during the trial, her voice on that tape
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: was crystal clear. She wasn't slurring. She wasn't rambling. She
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: was executing a task.
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: It completely eviscerates the narrative she tried to construct. It
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: provides empirical, objective proof that during that critical nine-hour window
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: that Her brain was functioning normally, rationally, and defensively. The
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: fog was a total fabrication.
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: So, AAA helps her out, she gets the car situation sorted,
• 24:23
  Speaker 1: and she finally returns home to Plasterville. She pulls into
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: the driveway of the house where her husband is still
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: lying exactly where she left him.
• 24:30
  Speaker 2: The clock has run out.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: Exactly. You would think that upon returning, she would realize
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: the nine hours are up. It's time to initiate the
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: distraught widow routine. The logical next step for someone trying
• 24:41
  Speaker 1: to play innocent is to run inside, scream, and immediately
• 24:45
  Speaker 1: dial 911.
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: That would be the standard playbook for establishing an alibi
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: of sudden discovery. But she defies expectations yet again. Upon
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: returning to the active murder scene, her very first phone
• 24:57
  Speaker 2: call isn't to 911. It isn't to paramedics.
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: Her first call is to her criminal defense attorney, a
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: man named David Weiner. And it's not just a quick
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: consultation over the phone. Weiner actually drives out to the
• 25:08
  Speaker 1: house in Plasterville.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: To an active crime scene.
• 25:11
  Speaker 1: He crosses the threshold of an active, unreported murder scene.
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: And he spends an hour and a half alone with
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: Colleen inside that house before law enforcement is ever notified.
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: 90 minutes. Just the defense attorney, the shooter, and the victim.
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: This raises an important question, not just about her mindset,
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: but about legal ethics, boundaries, and the potential staging of
• 25:32
  Speaker 2: a crime scene. When the police eventually did arrive, the
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: cover story provided to authorities was that she called him
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: because she was completely distraught allegedly on the verge of suicide,
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: and she needed him to come counsel her.
• 25:45
  Speaker 1: Okay, I have to stop you there because I am
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: not a lawyer. But that excuse falls apart under five
• 25:49
  Speaker 1: seconds of basic logical scrutiny. If an attorney truly believes
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: his client is actively suicidal, leaving them alone at a
• 25:58
  Speaker 1: crime scene with a functioning firearm, which we know was
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: still in the house, is completely unthinkable.
• 26:03
  Speaker 2: It's a massive liability.
• 26:04
  Speaker 1: You don't act as a crisis counselor for 90 minutes,
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: decide she's fine now, and then just step outside to
• 26:09
  Speaker 1: let her call the cops while she sits next to
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: a 12-gauge shotgun.
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: No, it is a professional impossibility. An attorney is an
• 26:15
  Speaker 2: officer of the court, not a psychiatric first responder. If
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: a client is actively suicidal and a body is present,
• 26:24
  Speaker 2: the ethical and legal mandate is to involve emergency services immediately.
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: So what were they actually doing?
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: The far more likely, albeit highly speculative, scenario is that
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: those 90 unrecorded minutes were utilized for strategic choreography.
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: Strategic choreography. I like that. You mean getting the story straight?
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: Precisely. What do we say to the police when they arrive?
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: What is the official narrative regarding the timeline? How do
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: we explain the trip to San Francisco? When a defense
• 26:51
  Speaker 2: attorney is present at a fresh, unreported crime scene, it
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: creates a massive, nearly impenetrable gray area.
• 26:58
  Speaker 1: Because of privilege.
• 26:59
  Speaker 2: Everything discussed between them inside that house is protected by
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: attorney-client privilege. Law enforcement can never compel them to reveal
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: what was said. But the physical reality remains, they had
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: an hour and a half to align their narrative before
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: the first detective ever stepped foot in the door.
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: It just makes you wonder about the sheer logistics of
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: that decision. Why call this specific attorney? Plasterville is a
• 27:20
  Speaker 1: small town. Why David Weiner? Was he just a family friend?
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: Did she frantically flip through the yellow pages at a
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: gas station on the drive back from San Francisco?
• 27:28
  Speaker 2: It Definitely wasn't random.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: No. Because at the top of the show, I promised
• 27:33
  Speaker 1: you a bombshell about a 30-year-old secret. And here it is.
• 27:37
  Speaker 1: The jaw-dropping reason Colleen Harris had David Weiner on speed dial.
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: This wasn't a recommendation from a neighbor. This was history
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: repeating itself in the most terrifying, literal way imaginable.
• 27:49
  Speaker 2: It is the twist that elevates this case from a tragic,
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: isolated domestic homicide into a glaring structural failure of the
• 27:56
  Speaker 2: criminal justice system.
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: According to the source material, in 1985, exactly 30 years
• 28:01
  Speaker 1: prior to the morning, Bob Harris was found dead. Colleen
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: Harris was accused of murdering her previous husband. His name
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: was Jim Batten.
• 28:09
  Speaker 2: And the circumstances?
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: The circumstances of that 1985 murder are almost a carbon copy.
• 28:16
  Speaker 1: How did Jim Batten die? She shot him with a shotgun.
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: Where was he? He was lying in bed. And the
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: location of the crime? A house right around the corner
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: in the exact same sleepy little town of Plasterville.
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: It is the definition of lightning striking twice in the
• 28:31
  Speaker 2: exact same spot under the exact same meteorological conditions.
• 28:35
  Speaker 1: But it gets worse. Because her defense attorney back in 1985,
• 28:39
  Speaker 1: the man who represented her for the murder of Jim Batten,
• 28:42
  Speaker 1: was none other than David Weiner.
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: The same lawyer.
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: And her defense strategy three decades ago. You guessed it.
• 28:49
  Speaker 1: Complete and total amnesia regarding the killings. coupled with a
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: claim of self-defense, alleging her husband was violently sexually assaulting her.
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: It is the exact same playbook, dusted off 30 years later.
• 28:59
  Speaker 2: The identical weapon, the identical vulnerability of the victim in bed,
• 29:02
  Speaker 2: the identical small town, the identical lawyer, and the identical
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: psychological defense of amnesia.
• 29:07
  Speaker 1: So what does this all mean? I want you to
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: absorb how insanely rare this is. We consume a lot
• 29:12
  Speaker 1: of true crime. We hear about serial killers who have
• 29:15
  Speaker 1: a specific modus operandi. But for a Black Widow-style killer...
• 29:19
  Speaker 1: to repeat the exact same highly specific, deeply messy, loud
• 29:23
  Speaker 1: domestic crime down to the exact legal defense and the
• 29:28
  Speaker 1: exact same lawyer three decades later in the same zip code.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: It implies a staggering level of confidence and hubris.
• 29:36
  Speaker 1: I am struggling to understand how a jury buys the
• 29:39
  Speaker 1: I forgot I shot him defense. twice. More importantly, how
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: on earth was she walking the streets as a free
• 29:45
  Speaker 1: woman able to marry Bob Harris in the first place?
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: Walk me through the 1985 trial. How did you get
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: away with it?
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: To understand how she was free to marry Bob, we
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: have to examine the legal failure of the 1985 trial.
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: The source explains that the prosecution back then made what
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: is legally known as a fatal strategic error in their
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: charging documents. They went for a strategy commonly referred to
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: as first-degree murder or bust.
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: Explain the mechanics of that. Why is that a mistake?
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: Don't prosecutors always want the highest possible charge?
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: They do, but it involves immense risk. When a criminal
• 30:14
  Speaker 2: case concludes and goes to a jury for deliberation, the
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: judge provides them with specific instructions and options. In many
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: murder trials, a jury can convict on the primary highest charge,
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: like first degree premeditated murder. Right. However, if the prosecution
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: offers it, the jury can also choose to convict on
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: a lesser included offense, such as second degree murder or
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: voluntary manslaughter.
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: Sort of a fallback option.
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: Exactly. It acts as a safety valve. If the jury
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: believes the defendant is guilty of killing the person, but
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: they aren't 100 percent convinced it was meticulously planned out
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: in advance, They can still hold the defendant accountable with
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: a lesser charge.
• 30:51
  Speaker 1: Big kid compromise.
• 30:53
  Speaker 2: Right. But in the 1985 trial for the murder of
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: Jim Batten, the prosecution arrogantly provided the jury with no
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: safety valve. They gave them a binary choice. They essentially said,
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: you either find her guilty of first-degree, highly premeditated murder,
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: or you must let her walk free entirely. There was
• 31:09
  Speaker 2: no option for manslaughter conviction.
• 31:11
  Speaker 1: And because she had that claim of sexual assault attached
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: to the amnesia, that money's the waters, right? Even if
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: a juror looked at the evidence and thought, she definitely
• 31:20
  Speaker 1: killed him, she's lying about the fog. If they had
• 31:23
  Speaker 1: even a shadow of a doubt about whether she planned
• 31:25
  Speaker 1: it days in advance, they legally couldn't vote for first-degree murder.
• 31:29
  Speaker 2: Precisely. Overcharging a case is a massive gamble fueled by
• 31:34
  Speaker 2: prosecutorial hubris. The prosecution assumes the jury will be so
• 31:38
  Speaker 2: repulsed by the physical reality of the crime that they
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: will convict on the top charge regardless of the nuances.
• 31:44
  Speaker 1: But the defense just needs a sliver of doubt.
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: And David Weiner injected just enough reasonable doubt regarding the
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: specific element of intent. The jury is legally bound by
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: their instructions to acquit. The jury in 1985 may very
• 31:57
  Speaker 2: well have believed she was responsible for Jim Batten's death.
• 32:00
  Speaker 2: But because they weren't convinced of the first degree premeditation
• 32:03
  Speaker 2: and because they had no lesser option, they were forced
• 32:06
  Speaker 2: to render a not guilty verdict.
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: And she walked out of the courtroom a free woman.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: We really need to unpack the psychological effect of that
• 32:15
  Speaker 1: 1985 acquittal on Colleen. Because she didn't just beat a
• 32:18
  Speaker 1: murder rap.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: No, she validated her entire methodology.
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: She essentially learned that her specific amnesia and a shotgun
• 32:25
  Speaker 1: playbook was legally foolproof. The justice system taught her that
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: she was smarter than the police, smarter than the prosecution,
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: and that David Weiner was the ultimate shield.
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: It emboldened her in the most dangerous way possible. A
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: lack of consequences is the greatest fertilizer for future violence.
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: When an individual successfully manipulates a high-stakes system like a
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: murder trial and avoids prison, the lesson they internalize is
• 32:52
  Speaker 2: one of profound invincibility.
• 32:54
  Speaker 1: Like she had hacked the system.
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: She believed she possessed a get-out-of-jail-free card printed in 1985.
• 33:00
  Speaker 2: And she kept it in her back pocket for 30 years,
• 33:03
  Speaker 2: ready to deploy it the moment she felt her control
• 33:06
  Speaker 2: slipping again.
• 33:06
  Speaker 1: Which makes the tragedy of Bob Harris's death so much heavier.
• 33:10
  Speaker 1: Because this wasn't a secret kept completely in the dark.
• 33:13
  Speaker 1: Bob didn't go into this marriage entirely blind. The source
• 33:16
  Speaker 1: material reveals a heartbreaking conversation between Bob and his son, Andy.
• 33:20
  Speaker 2: Andy had heard the rumors. Yeah.
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: He had heard the rumors in town about the 1985 shooting.
• 33:25
  Speaker 1: He knew about Jim Batten. He knew his father was
• 33:27
  Speaker 1: dating a woman who had killed her previous husband. And
• 33:30
  Speaker 1: Andy explicitly confronted his dad, asking him, how are you
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: dealing with that?
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: And Bob's response to his son is the absolute crux
• 33:37
  Speaker 2: of the tragedy. It perfectly encapsulates the danger of the
• 33:40
  Speaker 2: halo effect we discussed earlier.
• 33:42
  Speaker 1: Bob dismissed his son's concerns completely. He told Andy, well,
• 33:46
  Speaker 1: you know she had a hard life and it was
• 33:48
  Speaker 1: self-defense and I love her and I'm not going to
• 33:51
  Speaker 1: let that stop me from marrying her.
• 33:52
  Speaker 2: This is one of the most painful recurring themes when
• 33:55
  Speaker 2: studying domestic homicides involving manipulators. It highlights exactly how they
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: isolate their victims. A truly skilled manipulator doesn't just hide
• 34:04
  Speaker 2: their past traumas or their past violence.
• 34:06
  Speaker 1: They weaponize them.
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: They actively weaponize them to garner sympathy. Colleen didn't hide
• 34:10
  Speaker 2: the 1985 shooting from Bob. She repackaged it. She convinced
• 34:14
  Speaker 2: Bob that she was a victim who had been forced
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: into a terrible corner. She painted a narrative of a
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: hard life and justifiable self-defense.
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: And Bob, being the quintessential good guy, the littly gumpire,
• 34:26
  Speaker 1: the community protector... Well, his empathy completely blinded him. He
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: looked at a woman who had demonstrably shot a man
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: in the head with a shotgun while he slept, and
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: he didn't see a threat.
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: He saw someone who needed his protection.
• 34:39
  Speaker 1: He thought his love and his stability could shield him
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: from a literal, documented history of lethal violence.
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: It is the dark side of empathy. Empathy is a vital,
• 34:48
  Speaker 2: beautiful human trait, but without strict boundaries and objective critical thinking,
• 34:53
  Speaker 2: it becomes a severe liability.
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: You have to look at the facts.
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: Bob allowed his compassion to override established patterns of behavior.
• 35:01
  Speaker 2: He chose to believe the narrative she was selling over
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: the glaring, objective red flags of a dead body in
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: her past. He paid for that empathy with his life.
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: Fortunately, the justice system did not make the exact same
• 35:13
  Speaker 1: mistake twice. When it came time for the trial regarding
• 35:16
  Speaker 1: Bob's murder, the courtroom became a massive legal battleground over
• 35:20
  Speaker 1: one specific issue. Whether the 1985 case could be mentioned
• 35:23
  Speaker 1: at all.
• 35:24
  Speaker 2: Of course. Colleen's defense attorney naturally fought tooth and nail
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: to keep the jury from hearing about dead husband number
• 35:30
  Speaker 2: two during the trial for dead husband number three.
• 35:34
  Speaker 1: Introducing prior bad acts, like a previous unconvicted murder, is
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: always legally contentious, right?
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: Very. The standard rule of law is that you cannot
• 35:44
  Speaker 2: introduce a defendant's past actions simply to prove they have
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: a bad character. It can unfairly prejudice a jury. However,
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: there are exceptions.
• 35:53
  Speaker 1: Like when it's literally the exact same crime.
• 35:55
  Speaker 2: Exactly. In cases where the modus operandi, the specific method
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: of operation, is so strikingly identical, a judge can allow
• 36:02
  Speaker 2: it to be admitted to prove a pattern, to prove intent,
• 36:06
  Speaker 2: or to prove the absence of an accident or mistake.
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: Basically saying it wasn't a nosebleed because she did the
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: exact same thing 30 years ago.
• 36:13
  Speaker 2: Exactly. The defense of amnesia and confusion is completely dismantled
• 36:17
  Speaker 2: when you prove she has utilized the exact same defense
• 36:19
  Speaker 2: for the exact same physical action in the past. It
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: proves a pattern of calculated behavior rather than a sudden
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: psychological break.
• 36:26
  Speaker 1: And the judge agreed. The judge allowed the 1985 case
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: to be introduced into evidence. The jury got to hear
• 36:33
  Speaker 1: the whole unvarnished story. They saw right through the brave
• 36:36
  Speaker 1: fog defense.
• 36:37
  Speaker 2: They had all the pieces.
• 36:38
  Speaker 1: They listened to the highly lucid AAA calls where she
• 36:41
  Speaker 1: identified highway signs and mechanical failures. They learned about the
• 36:46
  Speaker 1: 1985 acquittal and the sheer audacity of repeating the crime.
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: And after all of that, They convicted Colleen Harris of
• 36:53
  Speaker 1: cold-blooded murder.
• 36:54
  Speaker 2: Which brought a mandatory sentence of 50 years to life.
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: Given that she was 70 years old at the time
• 36:59
  Speaker 2: of sentencing, that is definitively, undeniably a life sentence. She
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: will never leave the prison system.
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: The source material ends by noting the profound relief of
• 37:08
  Speaker 1: Bob's children, his daughter Pam Sterling, and his son Andy.
• 37:12
  Speaker 1: Pam stated it gave her great peace knowing that Colleen
• 37:14
  Speaker 1: will die in prison and can never hurt anyone else again.
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: It's a somber, heavy victory, but a necessary one.
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: It is a victory for public safety and a measure
• 37:23
  Speaker 2: of closure for a family that fought hard for justice.
• 37:26
  Speaker 2: But the void left by Bob Harris and that community remains.
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: What an incredible, winding, infuriating journey this deep dive into
• 37:33
  Speaker 1: the source material has been. We started with a pristine
• 37:36
  Speaker 1: picture of an umpire and a sweet grandma in the woods.
• 37:39
  Speaker 1: And we uncovered a reality that spanned from a Mongolian
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: affair and a four-hour digital brute force attack to a
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: 200-mile joyride with a trunk full of stolen coins.
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: We covered a lot of ground.
• 37:51
  Speaker 1: We broke down the mechanics of the amnesia defense, the
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: fatal flaw of legal overcharging, and we unearthed a 30-year-old
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: identical murder right around the corner. It is a staggering
• 38:01
  Speaker 1: sequence of events.
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: For you listening, I think the most crucial takeaway from
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: analyzing this source material isn't just about spotting a murderer.
• 38:08
  Speaker 2: It's about the absolute necessity of critical thinking in our
• 38:12
  Speaker 2: own lives, particularly in how we evaluate our personal relationships.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: Empathy needs boundaries.
• 38:17
  Speaker 2: Exactly. This case is an extreme, violent outlier, but the
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: underlying mechanisms of manipulation are terrifyingly common. We have to
• 38:25
  Speaker 2: be deeply careful about letting our empathy override objective reality.
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: When someone's established pattern of behavior contradicts the victim narrative
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: they are selling you, you must believe the pattern.
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: Believe the pattern. I love that. Before we wrap up,
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: I want to leave you with a chilling question to
• 38:40
  Speaker 1: mull over. Something to explore on your own that builds
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: on the psychology we've just discussed.
• 38:46
  Speaker 2: What's the thought?
• 38:47
  Speaker 1: Think about the timeline. If Bob had never taken that
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: work trip to Mongolia, you know, if he had never
• 38:52
  Speaker 1: had the affair that bruised her ego so profoundly, would
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: Colleen have found another reason to eventually pull the trigger?
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: Or was she simply a dormant pathology sitting there quietly
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: for 30 years in the idyllic town of Plasterville, just
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: waiting for the exact right combination of bruised ego, threatened control,
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: and physical opportunity to erupt again?
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: It is the ultimate question of pathology versus circumstance. Was
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: she a killer actively waiting for an excuse, or a
• 39:19
  Speaker 2: wife pushed to a break? Given the history, the identical weapon,
• 39:22
  Speaker 2: and the identical lawyer, the patterns strongly suggest the pathology
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: was always there, waiting in the dark.
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: It's a terrifying thought to end on. but that's exactly
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: why we do these deep dives into the source material.
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: We want to thank you for joining us on this
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: exploration of the masks people wear, the lies they tell themselves,
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: and the truth hidden beneath them. Until next time, keep
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: questioning what you see.