Latest / Murder Files Unsealed / The Chameleon Killer: How "Homicide Howie" Murdered His Co-Worker, Hid the Body

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The Chameleon Killer: How "Homicide Howie" Murdered His Co-Worker, Hid the Body · Murder Files Unsealed

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome back to the Deep Dive. Our mission today is, well,
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it's a tough one. We're taking you on a journey
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through one of the most psychologically complex and frankly heartbreaking
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vanishing and murder cases out of North Carolina.
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Speaker 2: It really is. And it all kicked off of something
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so Munnane, didn't.
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Speaker 1: It exactly a simple favor, just a ride home, asked
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on a really hot August afternoon, and that small act
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it just spiraled into this lifetime of tragedy, digital deception,
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and just agonizing mystery.
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Speaker 2: Yes, So today we're doing a deep dive into the
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disappearance of James Allen Chambers the second he was twenty eight,
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and we're looking at the well the incredible and horrifying
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duality of the man ultimately convicted of his murder, Howard
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Adrian Ashleman.
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Speaker 1: And when you look at the sources, the contrast between
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these two men initially is just staggering completely.
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Speaker 2: You've got James Chambers described as witty, carrying, muscular build,
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held down a steady job in construction near Fort Bragg, Fayetteville,
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even had a side gig right lifeguard at Lake Leman.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, he had structure, have routine a guy people liked.
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Speaker 2: And then there's Ashlman, the man who well, who took
1:05
his life just twenty one. At the time, he'd recently
1:08
moved from Illinois, and people who worked with him, they
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described him as, you know, agreeable, polite, soft spoken, just a.
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Speaker 1: Quiet construction worker. Seemed totally unremarkable on the surface.
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Speaker 2: Totally nobody saw the darkness lurking there, not at first.
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Speaker 1: So our goal today for you listening is to help
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you quickly and thoroughly grasp the chronological twists here. We're
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going to unpack how that simple ride home just blew
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up into this incredibly complex investigation.
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Speaker 2: And it involves so much the discovery of this shocking
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digital alter ego homicide, Howie Ashlman's later religious reinvention, which
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is just bizarre.
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Speaker 1: Right, and then the crucial role that espousal betrayal are
1:48
recording played and finally securing a conviction even without well
1:53
without the key piece of evidence.
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Speaker 2: We're not just looking at the facts of the crime, though,
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we're examining the sort of profound psychological effort it must
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to take in for this killer to maintain such a
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radical adaptive identity to try and evade justice. For years.
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Speaker 1: Okay, let's start at the beginning. Then that Friday in
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August twenty fourteen, the day it all went wrong.
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Speaker 2: So the day James vanished, Friday, August fifteenth, twenty fourteen,
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it started like any other workday for.
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Speaker 1: Him, completely routine, finished his shift at that civilian construction
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site near Fort Bragg. He had plans for the evening,
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you know.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, he needed to cash his paycheck first. Then he
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was planning to head to his second job, that lifeguard
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gig at Lakeleyman in Wallace. It's a bit of a
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drive from Fayetteville.
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Speaker 1: And this is where it gets just heart wrenching for
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his family. James's father, Pete Chambers, he actually owned the
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construction company.
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Speaker 2: Right, Pete saw his son needed a ride, and he
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spotted Ashleman, this young, polite worker who was about to leave.
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Speaker 1: Just a dad looking out for his son, you know,
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and trying to help out an employee too. Maybe, so
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Pete asks Ashman directly, all right, Howard, do you mind
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taking James home?
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Speaker 2: In Ashman's response, quick, seemingly genuine, no, I don't have
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a problem.
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Speaker 1: Just like that, that casual agreement happened around four pm.
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That was the very last time Pete Chambers ever saw
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his son James.
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Speaker 2: Alive, and the timeline right after that is really critical
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because it pretty much dismisses any idea that James just
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you know, took off voluntarily.
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Speaker 1: Absolutely, he was seen briefly by his roommate Brandy Sue
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Rue back at their apartment on Carroll Street later that evening.
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Speaker 2: And importantly the details there matter. He changed his clothes,
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that suggests settling in or maybe getting ready for his
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next thing. He fed his dog, grabbed his cell phone.
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Speaker 1: Right, those aren't the actions of someone planning to disappear.
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That's routine. That's intending to come back or maybe just
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run a quick errand before heading to the lake job exactly.
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Speaker 2: So when James didn't show up for work the next day, Saturday,
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the alarms went off almost immediately, the sources say the
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family knew instantly this wasn't right.
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Speaker 1: He was just exceptionally reliable, had that structure we talked about,
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so just dropping off the map like that, it was
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completely out of character.
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Speaker 2: Structure. That reliability is what made the police take it
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so seriously right from the start. The family officially reported
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him missing on August twenty fourth, So nine days after
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he was last seen.
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Speaker 1: Okay, and Detective Mike Ballard took the case.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, and he recognized the severity straight away. He noted
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the total lack of the usual signs you might see
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if someone chose to disappear, you know, no history of
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drug problems, no mental health issues mentioned, no big financial troubles.
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Speaker 1: And Ballard's assessment, based on his experience, was pretty quick
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and well devastating. James's bank account untouched, completely untouched.
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Speaker 2: And his phone activity just stopped abruptly right near Fayetteville,
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went totally silent, no pings, no calls, nothing, just gone
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avoid Yeah, detected. Ballard's conclusion, drawn pretty swiftly from those facts,
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really set the tone for the whole investigation. He said,
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it was just like he fell off the face of
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the earth. Based on my experience, we weren't going to
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find mister Chambers alive.
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Speaker 1: Wow, so away the way the assumption was foul play.
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Speaker 2: Pretty much when someone lives by their phone and their
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money just vanishes like that, the investigation has to pivot
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immediately to foul play, and the focus it lands squarely
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on the last person known to.
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Speaker 1: Have been with him, which of course was Howard Ashlman.
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Speaker 2: So Ashlman was immediately the prime suspect. He was the
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last confirmed contact, and when the police brought him in
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for those initial interviews, he gave them a story, but
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it had holes.
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Speaker 1: What was his initial version of events, he.
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Speaker 2: Claimed, Okay, yeah, they stopped at a liquor store first,
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then they hung out for a bit at James's apartment.
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But then, according to Ashleman, James asked for another favor,
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something different from just a ride home. Okay, he said,
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James wanted a ride to go collect a debt from
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someone Ashlmann described vaguely as shady.
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Speaker 1: Hmm, shady debt collection doesn't really fit the profile of
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James we've heard so far exactly.
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Speaker 2: That's what raised red flags. The lack of detail. The
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sudden mission for James, a guy with a steady paycheck,
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to chase down some suspicious deay at night, and then
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Ashlan's story ended with him just dropping James off somewhere
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and driving away.
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Speaker 1: Didn't sit right with investigators, I imagine.
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Speaker 2: Not at all. Plus coworkers started talking and they quickly
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pointed to a possible motive, something that completely undercut that polite,
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agreeable persona Ashlman projected.
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Speaker 1: Right, you mentioned that earlier. What did they say?
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Speaker 2: They revealed there was bad blood between them, not over
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anything huge, apparently, but those petty workplace things, clashes over
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shared tools, maybe resentment about work ethic.
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Speaker 1: Okay, sort of low level friction.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, but one colleague specifically noted something quite telling. They said,
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Howard seemed jealous, jealous of James's easy charisma, his ability
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to connect with people.
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Speaker 1: Ah, So that suggests maybe a deeper insecurity, something that
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could potentially boil over, maybe triggered by a minor argument
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during that last ride.
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Speaker 2: It definitely points that way. It challenges Ashlman's later claim
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that the shooting was purely accidental. If there was already
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this undercurrent of resentment and jealous see, any conflict, even
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if it was about some debt, could have escalated way
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beyond just trying to scare someone.
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Speaker 1: Okay, So there's motive, there's opportunity. But the most damning
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thing he did right after the disappearance that was destroying
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the evidence.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, the calculated rapid destruction of his pickup truck. That
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just screamed guilt.
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Speaker 1: How soon after James vanished did he do that?
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Speaker 2: Just five days. Five days after Jones disappeared, which feels like,
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you know, a mix of panic but also clear headed calculation.
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He took his truck to a junkyard and had it crushed, demolished.
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Speaker 1: That's not what an innocent person does if you just
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drop someone off, Why.
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Speaker 2: Crush your truck exactly. It's a deliberate attempt to obliterate
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any potential physical evidence blood fibers, maybe shell casings, anything
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that could link him to whatever happened inside that truck.
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Speaker 1: Did the investigators manage to get anything from it?
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Speaker 2: They tried. They actually recovered a piece of the seatbelt
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from the wreckage, hoping for maybe some DNA or other
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forensic traces, but the destruction was just to complete. It
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yielded absolutely nothing.
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Speaker 1: So the physical trail went cold almost immediately.
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Speaker 2: It did, which forced detectives to pivot again. They started
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digging into Howard Ashlman's digital life, his online footprint, maybe
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hoping to find i don't know, financial clues, deeper conflicts, something.
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Speaker 1: And what they found was something else entirely.
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Speaker 2: Oh yeah, this is where the case goes from a
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standard tragic missing person investigation into this bizarre study of
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dual identity. They found out Ashlman maintained twelve separate fake
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Facebook profiles.
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Speaker 1: Twelve. Wow, that's a lot of effort. Not just wanting
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a bit of privacy, No, it.
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Speaker 2: Suggests a really profound investment in digital deception and the
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absolute core of this online world he built. It was
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centered around the most disturbing username, homicide.
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Speaker 1: Howie homicide Howie does chilling.
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Speaker 2: And it wasn't just a name. The posts associated with
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that profile. They were filled with this dark humor but
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really glorification of violence, lots of talk about Weppen's death.
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He was actively deliberately crafting this online image of himself
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as a quote thug or gangster.
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Speaker 1: It's such a jarring contrast, isn't it. The soft spoken,
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polite construction worker by.
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Speaker 2: Day and homicide Howie, the swaggering, violent persona online by night.
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It speaks volumes about a possibly fractured personality.
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Speaker 1: Like a deep internalized, dark fantasy.
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Speaker 2: Exactly psychologically, when someone puts that much energy into building
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and maintaining violent alternate identities online, it's rarely just, you know,
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harmless role playing. The homicide Howie persona, in hindsight, feels
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almost prophetic, like a rehearsal for the real world violence
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he eventually committed.
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Speaker 1: It suggests the polite exterior was just a mask, a
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very convenient mask for something much darker underneath, that he
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was living out digitally.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, and it's worth pointing out this crucial discovery finding
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the homicide how he profiles. It wasn't actually the police initially,
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oh who found it. It was a volunteer, someone from
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the Class Kids Foundation who was helping the family with
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a search effort, which really highlights how vital community involvement
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can be in these cases.
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Speaker 1: Sometimes that's incredible. I know Dateline covered this case and
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the correspondent Andrea Canning called that discovery one of the
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craziest twists I've ever seen.
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Speaker 2: And you can see why because with the body missing
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and the truck destroyed, proving Ashleman's state of mind, his
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capacity for violence became essential homicide. How he gave investigators
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that window into his psyche long before they had a
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confession about the actual act. It showed what he was
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capable of.
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Speaker 1: Okay, so the picture is getting clearer for investigators. They
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have a prime suspect to Ashleman. They know about his
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violent online persona homicide Howie. He destroyed his truck, but
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they hit a wall.
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Speaker 2: Right, a big one, the legal blockade. Ashleman knew he
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was the focus, so he did what suspects often do.
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He lawyered up immediately and completely stopped cooperating with the police,
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and the core problem remained nobody. It's the classic challenge
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in these kinds of cases, especially under North Carolina law,
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the time, without the victim's body, without a murder weapon found,
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without any firm forensic evidence tying Ashleman directly to a
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crime scene, prosecutors just couldn't meet that high burden of
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proof needed for a murder charge.
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Speaker 1: The whole corpus delicta issue proving a crime even happened.
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Speaker 2: Exactly, and that legal stalemate, that lack of physical proof,
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bought Asherman critical time.
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Speaker 1: And he didn't just use that time to lay low.
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He did something drastic.
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Speaker 2: Drastic is putting it mildly. He executed this radical, almost
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unbelievable identity shift. He quit his construction job. He vanished
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from North Carolina entirely.
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Speaker 1: Where did he go?
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Speaker 2: He needed to completely shed the identity of Howard Ashlman,
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the guy who drove that crushed truck. The guy who
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knew James Chambers. He needed to become someone totally new,
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someone seemingly beyond suspicion. He resurfaced hundreds of miles away
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in Hobe Sound, Florida. Okay, And this is where the
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story takes a turn into the truly bizarre showcasing his
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dark psychological manipula. He enrolled himself in Hobe Sound Bible College.
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Speaker 1: Wait, Bible College. The guy behind homicide, Howie, the very
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same man.
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Speaker 2: It's genuinely hard to wrap your head around it. The
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person posting online about weapons and death was suddenly presenting
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himself as this clean cut student wearing suits, attending religious classes.
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He even joined in saying hymns in a religious quartet
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at the college.
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Speaker 1: That's a staggering transformation, almost like a performance piece.
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Speaker 2: It absolutely feels like one. It's a case study in
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psychological survival, maybe extreme compartmentalization. This wasn't just changing location.
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He was attempting a deep moral and crucially legal purification
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by immersing himself in this environment totally dedicated to piety, faith, virtue.
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He was creating the ultimate alibi, not just for the police,
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but maybe even for himself, trying to rewrite his own
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internal story, perhaps wash away the guilt by performing this
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life of extreme goodness.
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Speaker 1: And while he was there, living this new life, he
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started dating someone.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, he began dating a seventeen year old fellow student,
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Anna Jones. He was embedding himself deeply within that college community,
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playing the role.
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Speaker 1: But he couldn't completely disappear, could he. James's family was
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still looking.
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Speaker 2: Relentlessly, particularly James's mother, Rachel Wellhauser. She never ever stopped
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searching following leads. Eventually she tracked Ashleman down to Florida.
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She's the one who tipped off the Fadebille detectives about
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his new highly suspicious, pious persona.
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Speaker 1: So the police knew where he was and what he
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was doing. But still no body, Still no physical evidence, right,
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They couldn't just.
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Speaker 2: Go down and arrest him based on his suspicious life change,
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but they could apply pressure. They worked with a private investigator,
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David Marshburn.
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Speaker 1: What did he do?
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Speaker 2: Marshburn went to the Bible College administration. He delivered this
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chilling warning, basically telling them you might have a wolf
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in sheep's clothing in your midst trying to rattle Ashlman's
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cage expose the facade.
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Speaker 1: Putting pressure on that fragile new identity he'd built exactly.
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Speaker 2: Detective Larry Donnaghane, one of the investigators, summed up Ashleman's
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ability perfectly. He called him a true adaptive identity seeker
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and said he will morph and change to whatever he
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needs to change into to survive. A chameleon, a true chameleon.
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He played that role of the devout student flawlessly for
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a time. It just shows an incredible capacity for sustained deception.
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Speaker 1: It's honestly terrifying just thinking about the constant psychological effort
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that must have taken living that lie day in day out,
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always fearing that the past, that homicide how he self,
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would somehow break through and shatter the holy image he'd
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so carefully constructed.
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Speaker 2: It really underscores that his primary driver above everything else
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seems to have been self preservation at any cost.
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Speaker 1: So Ashlman is living this double life, this performance in Florida.
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But eventually that pressure, that internal conflict, it became.
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Speaker 2: Too much, it seems, so the psychological weight just became
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unbearable for the facade to hold. After reversing himself in
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this religious environment, he actually married the young student he
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was dating, Hannah Jones.
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Speaker 1: He married her while hiding this massive secret.
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Speaker 2: Yes, and that intimacy, perhaps the perceived safety within the
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marriage bond, seems to be what finally broke the damn.
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The enormous burden of his buried guilt started clashing violently
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with the pious life he was so aggressively performing.
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Speaker 1: And he started talking to Hannah.
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Speaker 2: He did, over multiple conversations. According to the sources, Ashlman confessed,
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he told Hannah everything. Maybe he was trying to unburden himself,
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seeking some kind of absolution from his new wife, someone
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within that religious framework he'd adopted.
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Speaker 1: But in doing that and confessing.
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Speaker 2: To her, he handed the prosecution exactly what they had
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been missing for years, the explicit details of the crime,
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straight from the killer himself.
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Speaker 1: What did he tell her? Did he admit to murder?
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Speaker 2: He admitted to the killing, yes, but he immediately tried
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to frame it in a way that lessened his culpability.
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He claimed the shooting itself was accidental, accidental. How his
15:55
story to Hannah was that he only intended to scare James.
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They were arguing, supposedly over that drug debt. James allegedly
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wanted Ashwoman to help collect. He said, he just wanted
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to frighten him.
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Speaker 1: That sounds like a pretty standard legal defense strategy, admit
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the action, but deny the intent needed for first degree murder.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, But the actual physical actions, he described, the deliberate
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steps he took, they really contradict that claim of it
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just being an accident, you know how, So he told Hannah,
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he stopped the truck on a rural road. Then he
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didn't just wave a gun around that was already there.
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He got out, went to the truck bed and specifically
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retrieved a point two two caliber rifle.
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Speaker 1: That sounds intentional, premeditated, almost not a spontaneous flash of
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anger with a weapon already in hand.
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Speaker 2: Precisely, it was a deliberate choice to introduce a deadly
16:44
weapon into that situation. And that choice of weapon. The
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point two two rifle is interesting too. Why it's a
16:50
smaller caliber often used for target practice a small game,
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but in a crime it can be efficient for concealment,
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less noise, less flash than big guns and fired inside
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a truck cab. Well, he claimed he only meant to
17:05
scare James, but the bullet hit him right in the
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head killed him instantly.
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Speaker 1: And his actions immediately after the shooting. They don't sound
17:12
like someone panicking over an accident, do they not?
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Speaker 2: At all? What he described next wasn't just panic. It
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was a calculated, multi stage effort to permanently erase James
17:21
Chambers from existence.
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Speaker 1: What was the first stage?
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Speaker 2: Phase one happened right away, driven by panic, yes, but
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it still required immense, gruesome effort. He drove James's body
17:30
to a remote spot out and weighed North Carolina. And
17:33
he didn't just bury him initially.
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Speaker 1: What did he do?
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Speaker 2: He tried to burn the body first, dust it with
17:37
gasoline and set it on fire, probably hoping to destroy
17:40
identifying features, any potential evidence, before burying the charred remains
17:45
in a shallow grave.
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Speaker 1: My god, but that wasn't the end of it.
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Speaker 2: No, the fear of discovery must have gnawed at him,
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because weeks later he went back. He returned to that
17:56
burial site to execute phase two, and this part shows
17:59
a truly chilling level of cold blooded resolve.
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Speaker 1: What did he do in phase two?
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Speaker 2: He dug up the decomposing body. He then used a saw.
18:08
He dismembered the remains, cut the body into pieces, Oh no,
18:11
he stuffed the parts into garbage bags, and his final
18:14
active disposal he drove to the Keener Road bridge and
18:17
dumped the bags over the side into the Cape Fear River.
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Speaker 1: Just toss them into the river into.
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Speaker 2: The dark, powerful currents, hoping the river would carry them away,
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scatter them, hide them forever. That whole sequence, the shooting,
18:29
the burning, the burying, the exhuming, the dismembering, and then
18:31
the river dump. It shows this terrifying progression from maybe
18:36
initial panic to calculated, methodical malice, all aimed at ensuring
18:40
James could never ever be found.
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Speaker 1: And there are other details too, weren't there that showed
18:44
his coldness.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, small things that reveal so much. He admitted he
18:49
stole one hundred dollars from James's wallet right after killing him.
18:51
Speaker 1: Which added robbery to the charges exactly, robbery with a
18:55
dangerous weapon made his legal situation much worse.
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Speaker 2: But then there were there's this moment of just disturbing arrogance.
19:04
He apparently bragged to a marijuana dealer he knew, showing
19:07
off the cash, saying it belonged to a dead person.
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Speaker 1: That just sounds like the homicide Howie PERSONA breaking through again,
19:13
that coldness, that bragging completely.
19:16
Speaker 2: But the key, the absolute lynchpin for the investigation was
19:20
Hannah Oh. She was horrified by what he was telling her,
19:23
the escalating, gruesome details, and she made this incredibly brave decision.
19:27
Speaker 1: She recorded him.
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Speaker 2: She secretly recorded one of their conversations where he was
19:31
confessing these things.
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Speaker 1: Wow. That took immense courage.
19:35
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and her mother then took that recording to the
19:38
police in Florida. They immediately contacted the detectives back in Fayetteville.
19:43
Prosecutor Robbie Hicks, who'd been grappling with that nobody problem
19:46
for years, basically admitted the case was pretty weak before
19:49
that tape surface.
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Speaker 1: The recording changed everything everything.
19:52
Speaker 2: It provided the motive, the method, the location of the
19:55
initial burial, the dismemberment, the river disposal, all of it
19:59
directly from Ashelman's own mouth. It made the lack of
20:02
a body almost secondary for proving the murder charge itself.
20:05
It was a triumph really of moral courage over calculated deception.
20:09
Speaker 1: So once that recording existed, Ashlman had to know the
20:12
game was up. His whole performance, the Bible College, the
20:15
pious life, it was over.
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Speaker 2: Completely exposed, so he shifted strategy again, now claiming remorse,
20:23
seeking redemption, or perhaps more cynically, just trying to get
20:26
the best possible legal deal for himself. He hired lawyers
20:30
in both North Carolina and Florida. His intention was clear, surrender,
20:34
pleaded guilty, but negotiate for a reduced.
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Speaker 1: Sentence, and those negotiations took a while they did.
20:39
Speaker 2: It lasted over a year. Prosecutors had the recording, which
20:42
is powerful, but a trial always carries risks. You know,
20:45
the defense could still argue it was accidental, maybe self defense,
20:48
sort of plant doubt, so they had to weigh that
20:50
risk against the certainty of getting a conviction through a.
20:53
Speaker 1: Plea deal, and a key part of that deal involved
20:55
finding James right.
20:57
Speaker 2: That was the crucial condition, the absolutely requirement for the
21:00
deal to go through, was that Ashleman had to lead
21:03
searchers to James's remains, justice and recovery.
21:07
Speaker 1: Okay, So the rest finally happened. When was that?
21:10
Speaker 2: February twelve, twenty eighteen, nearly four long years after James disappeared,
21:16
Ashlman was arrested up in Randolph County, North Carolina on
21:19
charges of first degree murder. And robbery with a dangerous.
21:22
Speaker 1: Weapon, but the plea deal was already in place pretty much.
21:26
Speaker 2: Just eight days later, February twentieth, twenty eighteen, he stood
21:29
in Cumberland County Superior Court and as agreed, she pleaded guilty,
21:33
but to the lesser charge of second degree murder along
21:36
with the robbery charge, so.
21:37
Speaker 1: He avoided a potential life sentence for first degree murder.
21:40
Speaker 2: Correct that was the trade off for the guilty plea
21:42
and the promise to lead them to the body and
21:44
the sentence. Judge James Amas Junior handed it down. Ashlman,
21:48
who was twenty four by then, received a significant sentence,
21:51
a minimum of fifteen years and six months up to
21:53
a maximum of nineteen years and eight months in state prison.
21:56
Speaker 1: And there was extra time added too.
21:58
Speaker 2: Yes, the judge added in six extra months, specifically because
22:03
of the delay, the years he let the family suffer
22:05
before finally coming forward. Acknowledging the emotional torture he inflicted.
22:09
Speaker 1: His defense attorney made a statement about.
22:11
Speaker 2: Closure, yeah, claiming Ashelman wanted to give them, members of
22:15
mister Chambers family some closure, an opportunity if they can
22:19
to be at peace. That was the official justification for
22:22
the plea, justice served and hopefully peace for the family
22:25
through recovering James.
22:27
Speaker 1: But this is where the story takes its most tragic turn,
22:30
isn't it the recovery effort.
22:31
Speaker 2: It is the ultimate enduring injustice for the Chambers family.
22:35
Ashelman did technically fulfill his part of the bargain. He
22:38
led the search teams. He took them to the initial
22:40
burial site and wide. He pointed out the specific areas
22:44
near the Keener Road bridge where he claimed he dumped
22:46
the bags containing James's dismembered remains.
22:49
Speaker 1: And the authorities launched a massive search.
22:51
Speaker 2: Every resource imaginable. Divers went into the Cape Fear River,
22:55
which is deep, murky, treacherous. Cadaver dogs searched the river
22:58
banks meticulously. They even use ground penetrating radar at the
23:02
first burial spot.
23:03
Speaker 1: And they found nothing.
23:05
Speaker 2: Absolutely nothing, not a trace. It was as if the
23:07
river had just swallowed James, completely erased him.
23:11
Speaker 1: Even years later, there was a potential lead.
23:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, in twenty twenty two, some human remains did surface
23:16
near that area. It must have been an agonizing flicker
23:19
of hope for the family.
23:20
Speaker 1: Oh that wasn't him.
23:21
Speaker 2: No dnahs came back and it wasn't James. So the
23:26
body remains lost. James Chambers has never been found, which
23:30
denies his family that most fundamental basic right of closure,
23:34
a proper burial, a grave site, a place to physically
23:37
mourn him.
23:38
Speaker 1: The sources describe their ongoing pain as living on a
23:42
bridge to unresolved grief. They have the conviction, they know
23:45
who did it, they know how, but the physical absence
23:48
is just this constant, open wound.
23:50
Speaker 2: It's unimaginable. And James's parents, Pete and Rachel Wallhauser, showed
23:54
such incredible strength and resilience throughout those years of searching
23:57
and fighting. Rachel spoke about her fury over ashwoman's whole
24:00
Bible College act, how worried she was for Hannah Jones,
24:04
the young woman he manipulated, and Pete.
24:06
Speaker 1: The father, still haunted by asking for that ride.
24:09
Speaker 2: Yeah, endlessly replaying that single casual moment, that simple favor,
24:13
that unknowingly set off this cascade of unending sorrow.
24:17
Speaker 1: So, after all that, after the conviction, the failed search,
24:22
where is Howard Asheleman, Now, what's the status of homicide
24:26
Howie Well?
24:26
Speaker 2: As of this year twenty twenty five, Howard Adrian Ashman
24:29
is thirty two years old. He's currently serving his sentence
24:33
at Columbus Correctional Institution, which is a medium security prison
24:36
in North Carolina.
24:37
Speaker 1: And when might he be eligible for release?
24:40
Speaker 2: Given his minimum sentence of just over fifteen years, he'll
24:43
become eligible for parole sometime the twenty thirties.
24:45
Speaker 1: And has there been any sign of genuine remorse since
24:48
the plea deal any further efforts to help find James.
24:52
Speaker 2: The sources indicate no, not publicly anyway. Once the legal
24:56
necessity of the plea deal cooperating to find the body
24:58
was technically met, even the unsuccessful there's been no reported
25:02
further cooperation or public expression of remorse beyond what was
25:05
required legally at the time. It really reinforces the idea
25:09
that the confession and cooperation were likely calculated legal moves,
25:12
not necessarily born of true guilt or a desire to
25:15
help the family find peace.
25:16
Speaker 1: What about Hannah, the young woman he married and confessed to.
25:19
Speaker 2: Hannah Jones showed remarkable strength herself. She divorced Asherman after
25:24
his conviction. She did the incredibly brave thing by recording
25:27
him and insuring justice for James, and then she understandably
25:31
separated herself from that trauma and betrayal. Details about her
25:35
life now are kept private, as they should be.
25:38
Speaker 1: Looking back at this whole case, it feels like such
25:40
a dark cautionary tale. What are the main lessons we
25:44
can take away from it?
25:45
Speaker 2: There are several powerful ones, I think. First, it's a
25:48
stark reminder about the potential darkness hiding behind online personas homicide.
25:52
Howie wasn't just some edgy joke or avatar. It felt
25:55
prophetic almost, it really did. It underscores that we as
25:58
a society and investigators especially, need to take these kinds
26:01
of radical, violent online identities seriously. They could be genuine
26:06
indicators of deep seated issues and tragically predictors of real
26:10
world violence.
26:11
Speaker 1: And the second lesson it seems to be about guilt.
26:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, the corrosive power of guilt, even when someone tries
26:17
desperately to bury it or perform their way out of it.
26:20
Ashelman's extreme shift to performative piety at the Bible College
26:24
was this elaborate attempt at self redemption and let's be honest,
26:28
legal evasion, But the sheer weight of what he'd done
26:32
ultimately cracked that facade. The truth had to come out,
26:36
and it did through his relationship with Hannah.
26:38
Speaker 1: It also highlights the importance of police work, doesn't.
26:41
Speaker 2: It absolutely the critical necessity of relentless investigative perseverance and
26:45
also seamless interagency and interstate cooperation. You have the Fayetville
26:50
Police Department, the North Carolina State Bureau of Investigation, the
26:53
Randolph County Sheriff's office, all working together. That collaboration, combined
26:58
with the incredible moral curge of one witness, Hannah, prove
27:02
that even when the killer does everything possible to destroy
27:05
physical evidence, justice can still be achieved through other means,
27:08
digital trails, confessions.
27:10
Speaker 1: But Detective Balor's early observations still hangs heavy. Doesn't it
27:13
that some vanishings just haunt forever?
27:16
Speaker 2: Pinfully true? In this case, Even with Ashlman convicted and
27:19
behind bars, the deepest wound for the Chambers family remains
27:23
open because James's final resting place is still unknown, lost
27:27
somewhere in the Cape Fear River.
27:28
Speaker 1: This deep dive, by laying out the timeline, the psychology,
27:31
the investigation, it at least ensures that Ashleman, this chameleon killer,
27:36
this adaptive identity seeker, his story is known, he can't
27:40
easily morph or deceive again in the same way.
27:42
Speaker 2: True, the legal system held him accountable, but for the family,
27:46
that crucial physical closure, the ability to finally say goodbye properly,
27:51
is still devastatingly missing. Hashtag tag tag outro synthesis in
27:55
final thought.
27:56
Speaker 1: So wrapping up this deep dive, it's covered four incredibly
27:58
agonizing years from that seemingly innocent offer of a ride
28:02
at a construction site to a man ultimately pleading guilty
28:05
to second degree murder.
28:06
Speaker 2: Yeah, the key takeaways are really the speed of James's
28:08
initial vanishing, the absolute shock of discovering that homicide Howie
28:12
digital trail.
28:13
Speaker 1: The sheer audacity of his near successful reinvention down in
28:16
Florida at a Bible College of all places.
28:18
Speaker 2: And ultimately the absolute necessity of Hannah's recorded confession. Without
28:24
that recording, this case might still be unsolved today, despite
28:28
everyone knowing who likely did it.
28:30
Speaker 1: It really forces you to think about the level of
28:32
performance Ashlman maintained for years, living those two completely separate
28:37
lives just to survive to evade capture. It definitely makes
28:41
you question how easily profound darkness can be masked by
28:44
a polite first impression, doesn't it just our sources? They
28:48
leave us with that haunting image of the Chambers family
28:50
is still clinging to hope. They're pain described as that
28:53
bridge to unresolved grief, and that brings us to our
28:56
final and I think necessary provocative thought for you to consider.
29:00
Speaker 2: Ashleman got his plea deal. Part of that deal was
29:02
contingent on him leading authorities to James's remains. He went
29:06
through the motions, he pointed to locations, but he failed
29:09
to deliver the body, maybe through continued deception, maybe simply
29:12
because the river truly did claim James forever.
29:15
Speaker 1: So it forces the question what really defines closure In
29:19
a situation like this, You have the killer confessing to
29:22
every horrific detail, you have the conviction, but the victim
29:25
remains physically lost, perpetually missing.
29:28
Speaker 2: And following on from that, what ongoing moral or ethical
29:32
responsibility does a convicted murderer have to keep help and
29:36
keep trying to locate the remains even after the legal
29:39
terms of a plea deal are technically met, but the
29:41
body still hasn't been found. Does that responsibility ever truly end?
29:46
Speaker 1: Legal justice was delivered here, but emotional closure for the
29:49
Chambers family remains tragically elusive, tied to the currents of
29:52
the Cape Fear River, something to definitely think about.