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3 Murders With INSANE Plot Twists · The conspiracy

0:00
Speaker 1: Think about the person that you trust most, the person
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Speaker 1: that knows all of your secrets, who sees you when
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Speaker 1: you're vulnerable and comforts and smiles. Now picture them sitting
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Speaker 1: quietly across from you, nodding and laughing while secretly deciding
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Speaker 1: how they're going to end your life. No break ins,
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Speaker 1: no warning, just betrayal, all wrapped up in a familiar face.
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Speaker 1: Because sometimes the last thing you see is that the
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Speaker 1: danger coming toward you. It's the person you thought would
0:29
Speaker 1: never hurt you. And once you realize the truth, well
0:32
Speaker 1: it's already too late. Crime, conspiracy, cults, serial killers, and murder,
0:38
Speaker 1: all things that I love to consume and I know
0:40
Speaker 1: you do to you sick, intellectually twisted, beautiful minded freak.
0:45
Speaker 1: Today we're getting into some m night Shamelama Ding dong
0:49
Speaker 1: true crime twisted stories. So without further ado, let's unbuckle
0:54
Speaker 1: our seatbelts, go mock five down the highway, slam on
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Speaker 1: the brakes, and bust through this windshield into the twisted
1:01
Speaker 1: true grime gazes together. David Castor lived a life that
1:25
Speaker 1: most people would consider quite ordinary. He was born in Syracuse,
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Speaker 1: New York, in nineteen fifty seven, and David just had
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Speaker 1: this overall steady presence, and he built his entire world
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Speaker 1: around him with good old hard work. He owned his
1:41
Speaker 1: own heating and air conditioning business and was pretty successful
1:45
Speaker 1: with it, and he would fill his free time with
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Speaker 1: outdoor activities like boating, snowmobiling, and anything to feel the
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Speaker 1: cold wind come.
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Speaker 2: Across his face.
1:54
Speaker 1: So all was well with David, but he was missing
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Speaker 1: something in his life, and that was Stacy. And when
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Speaker 1: he met Stacy, everything just felt right and whole, and
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Speaker 1: like David's life already, being with Stacy just felt comfortable
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Speaker 1: and practical because Stacy was really organized and reliable. David
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Speaker 1: had a really regimented life and she fit perfectly into that.
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Speaker 1: So Stacy basically had everything that seemed to complement the
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Speaker 1: life David had already built for himself. So they would
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Speaker 1: get hitched and mary in August of two thousand and three.
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Speaker 1: Now Stacy had two daughters from a previous relationship, so
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Speaker 1: when they got hitched, he moved Stacy and her two daughters,
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Speaker 1: Ashley and Brie, into his own life, though it was
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Speaker 1: not without friction because David had a life with no
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Speaker 1: kids and not any sort of responsibility in that way,
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Speaker 1: and now he had two teenagers that were well teenagers,
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Speaker 1: So David's relationship with the girls was rocky to say
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Speaker 1: the least. And like I said, David had a very
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Speaker 1: regimented life, so when he became a new stepfather, he
3:02
Speaker 1: was pretty strict, demanding that they follow all of his
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Speaker 1: rules without any sort of question. And as we know
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Speaker 1: with teenagers, they don't really respond to that very well.
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Speaker 1: It's like me when I was a kid with my stepdad,
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Speaker 1: I would just be like, you're oh, my dad, that
3:18
Speaker 1: was me slamming the door. Jay put in a door slam.
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Speaker 1: But still, from the outside looking in, this family seemed
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Speaker 1: pretty stable. You have a hard working man like David
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Speaker 1: and a very supportive wife like Stacy, and just this big,
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Speaker 1: blended family just trying to figure things out. But beneath
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Speaker 1: the surface, a darker reality was starting to take shape.
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Speaker 1: Because on August twenty second, two thousand and five, two
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Speaker 1: years after David and Stacy got married, Stacy would place
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Speaker 1: a very frantic nine to one one call, and David,
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Speaker 1: she said, had locked himself in their bedroom after an
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Speaker 1: argument and he wasn't answering, and when the police arrived,
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Speaker 1: Sergeant Robert Willeb knocked on the bedroom door, but nobody
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Speaker 1: would answer, so he would bang louder and louder, but
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Speaker 1: there was no response from David. So with nobody answering
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Speaker 1: and him being worried that something's wrong with David, he
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Speaker 1: would force himself in opening the door. And what he
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Speaker 1: would find would look like David had just taken his
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Speaker 1: own life, because when he busted through the door and
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Speaker 1: into the bedroom, he would find David just laying across
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Speaker 1: the bed, sprawled out, completely naked and deceased, and on
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Speaker 1: the nightstand sat a glass of bright green liquid alongside
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Speaker 1: a bottle of Apricot brandy cranberry juice, and on the
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Speaker 1: floor an open container of antifreeze and it was just
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Speaker 1: lying there, almost like too casually. And after the sergeant
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Speaker 1: broke in and examined the area, obviously Stacy came into
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Speaker 1: the room and would see David's body sprawled across the bed,
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Speaker 1: and Stacy would just be beside herself and collapse into hysterics.
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Speaker 2: I mean, her brain new husband.
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Speaker 1: Was now dead, so she would just be screaming and sobbing,
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Speaker 1: just unable to control her emotions and telling the officers
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Speaker 1: that she didn't understand what happened, but she did say
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Speaker 1: that he was very depressed and had been drinking very
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Speaker 1: heavily recently, and the scene told the same story that
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Speaker 1: Stacy was putting forth. There was no sign of any
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Speaker 1: sort of struggle in the room, no bruises, no wounds,
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Speaker 1: just a manned and a drink. So an investigative team
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Speaker 1: would be called and they would start combing through the bedroom.
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Speaker 1: But as they were combing through the bedroom, they would
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Speaker 1: start finding tiny inconsistencies. Naturally, they would test for fingerprints
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Speaker 1: on the anti freeze glass, given that that's how.
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Speaker 2: They assumed he took his own life.
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Speaker 1: But they couldn't find his fingerprints on the glass, and
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Speaker 1: they also found that there weren't any of David's fingerprints
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Speaker 1: on the anti freeze either, and the only fingerprints that
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Speaker 1: they could find were Stacy's fingerprints.
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Speaker 2: But it was her room, so they weren't thinking much.
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Speaker 1: Of it yet. But then they found the turkey baster. Yes,
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Speaker 1: the turkey baster. So while investigators were searching the rooms
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Speaker 1: and the rest of the house, they would start digging
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Speaker 1: through the kitchen's garbage and investigators would find a turkey
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Speaker 1: baster and on the inside they would see a substance,
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Speaker 1: and they would find out that it was just sticky
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Speaker 1: with anti freeze and the tip was covered in David's DNA,
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Speaker 1: and this just painted a horrifying picture. Someone had clearly
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Speaker 1: taken this turkey baser and forced it into David's mouth,
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Speaker 1: just force feeding him poison until he passed. And investigator's
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Speaker 1: suspicions would deepen when they looked into Stacy's past and
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Speaker 1: found another husband. And her previous husband would be Michael Wallace,
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Speaker 1: and he actually died five years previous under mysterious circumstances,
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Speaker 1: but his death was just written off as a heart
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Speaker 1: attack at the time and an autopsy was request but
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Speaker 1: Stacy would deny it.
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Speaker 2: Strange and she would just.
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Speaker 1: Say that she was satisfied with the doctor's heart attack diagnosis.
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Speaker 1: I bet you were. In two thousand and seven, Stacy
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Speaker 1: actually invited her oldest daughter, Ashley, to join her for drinks,
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Speaker 1: and this would be an early celebration for her twenty
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Speaker 1: first birthday. So Stacey and her eldest daughter sat together
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Speaker 1: just laughing and relaxing and talking and then Ashley, naturally,
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Speaker 1: trusting her mother, drank what she was given. But seventeen
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Speaker 1: hours later, Ashley was found unconscious in her bed, and
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Speaker 1: she would be discovered by her sister brief and beside
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Speaker 1: Ashley would be a slewer slide note, and on the
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Speaker 1: note it would be just a long rambling confession taking
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Speaker 1: blame for the murders of both Michael Wallace and a
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Speaker 1: David Caster, and Stacy would make another frantic call to
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Speaker 1: the police. Yes, thank your joy, an entire battle of
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Speaker 1: that Ashley. She left the letter, Oh my god, this
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Speaker 1: is not happening.
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Speaker 2: And she was scared that her daughter had died, but
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Speaker 2: her daughter hadn't actually died.
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Speaker 1: Ashley luckily survived, and unluckily for Stacy. So when Ashley
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Speaker 1: woke up in the hospital, confused and terrified, she swore
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Speaker 1: she had no memory of writing any such note, and
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Speaker 1: forensic analysis later proved that that note had been typed
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Speaker 1: up at the time when Ashley had been sitting in
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Speaker 1: class miles away.
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Speaker 2: From the family computer.
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Speaker 1: And the note also included mispronunciation for anti freeze as
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Speaker 1: anti free which was noted earlier in the police interview
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Speaker 1: girls just giving herself up. So the truth was now unmistakable.
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Speaker 1: Stacy Castor had poisoned her own daughter, trying to stage
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Speaker 1: a slewer slide and forged an entire confession, all to
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Speaker 1: frame her eldest daughter for her other crimes. So, given
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Speaker 1: all this information, investigators would exhume Michael's body, Stacy's previously
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Speaker 1: deceased husband, and forensic testing would uncover crystals of ethylene glycol,
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Speaker 1: which is the chemical found in let's all say it together,
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Speaker 1: Auntie freeze anti freeze, and it was preserved in his tissues.
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Speaker 1: So two husbands, same woman, same poison. Needless to say,
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Speaker 1: it wasn't a coincidence, it was an mo o. So
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Speaker 1: detectives set up surveillance on Stacy, tapped her phones and
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Speaker 1: watched her every move, and during a police interview, Stacy
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Speaker 1: made a critical slip.
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Speaker 2: She started to.
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Speaker 1: Say she poured her husband the anti I mean cranberry juice.
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Speaker 2: How could you phone that up, you dumb bitch.
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Speaker 1: I mean, I'm glad you did. But so it was
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Speaker 1: a simple stumble, but in a murder investigation it was
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Speaker 1: like a gunshot, and they made note of this interesting mispronunciation,
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Speaker 1: and in September of two thousand and seven, Stacy would
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Speaker 1: be arrested, and at her trial in two thousand and nine,
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Speaker 1: Stacey would actually stand in her own defense, and she
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Speaker 1: would even claim innocence, just spinning stories, trying to sow doubt.
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Speaker 1: But the evidence was just stacked against her, from the fingerprints,
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Speaker 1: to the turkey baster, to the toxicology reports to the
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Speaker 1: forged note, and it would take the jury less than
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Speaker 1: two days to find her guilty. Thank you, and Stacy
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Speaker 1: Caster would be sentenced to fifty one years to life
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Speaker 1: in prison. But this wouldn't be a sentence that she
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Speaker 1: would ever complete, because in twenty sixteen, while serving her
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Speaker 1: time at Bedford Hill's correctional facility, Stacy would die.
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Speaker 2: Of a heart attack.
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Speaker 1: And she would never confess, and she never apologized. She
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Speaker 1: just slipped away the same way her husband's had and
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Speaker 1: the same way she almost claimed her own daughter. So
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Speaker 1: the woman that everyone once saw as the perfect wife
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Speaker 1: had been hiding in plain sight, a predator, a manipulator,
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Speaker 1: a killer. And I say good reddance, bye bye waste
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Speaker 1: of oxygen. And with that, let's move on to the
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Speaker 1: next story. Travis Victor Alexander didn't have the type of
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Speaker 1: childhood you'd expect from someone who would grow up to
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Speaker 1: inspire people. He was born in nineteen seventy seven in Riverside, California,
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Speaker 1: And let's just say Travis's early life was rough, the
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Speaker 1: kind you survive and not live, because his parents both
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Speaker 1: struggled with severe addiction, so his home life was just
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Speaker 1: utter chaos all the time. So by eleven years old,
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Speaker 1: Travis just had enough and he would move in with
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Speaker 1: his paternal grandparents, and throughout his childhood he would just
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Speaker 1: search for something his birth home just couldn't give.
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Speaker 2: Him, which was stability.
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Speaker 1: So it was in that new home, under the strict
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Speaker 1: but loving care of his grandmother, that Travis found two
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Speaker 1: things that would define him, ambition and faith. So eventually
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Speaker 1: he would become a very devoted member to the Church
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Speaker 1: of the Jesus Christ of the Latter day Saints, and
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Speaker 1: from there he would just start to dream big and
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Speaker 1: he would succeed at most things that he did. And
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Speaker 1: by his early twenties, he was a rising star at
12:08
Speaker 1: the prepaid legal services so he was a part time
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Speaker 1: salesman and he was also a part time motivational speaker,
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Speaker 1: just pulling people left and right into his orbit with
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Speaker 1: his sheer charisma. And people would say Travis was funny, ambitious,
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Speaker 1: and charming and that he always just wanted to make
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Speaker 1: something of himself. So he had become very successful in
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Speaker 1: his job, and one day he would have to go
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Speaker 1: to a conference in Las Vegas, and this was in
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Speaker 1: two thousand and six, and at this conference he would
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Speaker 1: meet Jody Arius and that's when his whole life turned
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Speaker 1: upside down and everything changed. And Travis's close friends say
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Speaker 1: that their chemistry was instant. Jody was beautiful and magnetic
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Speaker 1: and Travis was just hooked from the start. So right
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Speaker 1: after that conference, they would start a long distance relationship,
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Speaker 1: stretching between Mesa, Arizona, and Palm Desert, California. But eventually
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Speaker 1: they didn't want to do long distance anymore. She would
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Speaker 1: move to Messa to be closer to him, and Jody
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Speaker 1: would even go so far as to convert to Mormonism,
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Speaker 1: and Travis himself would even baptize her. So they were
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Speaker 1: in love and happy, but that wouldn't last forever and
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Speaker 1: cracks would begin to show. Friends of Travis would notice
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Speaker 1: how Jody just clung to Travis all the time. She's
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Speaker 1: very codependent. And not only was she codependent, she was
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Speaker 1: also very jealous and very possessive of Travis. And Scott Hughes,
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Speaker 1: one of Travis's closest friends last remembered warning him, quote unquote,
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Speaker 1: I'm afraid we're gonna find you chopped up in her freezer.
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Speaker 2: Ooh, that's not good.
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Speaker 1: And it was just a joke at the time, but
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Speaker 1: unfortunately it wasn't a joke for too long. So their
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Speaker 1: relationship would get a little rocky and they would kind
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Speaker 1: of be off and on through the years, but they
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Speaker 1: would never really sever tize. Even when they broke up,
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Speaker 1: they would continuously keep talking and sleeping together, so it's
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Speaker 1: almost like a friends with benefit situation when they weren't
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Speaker 1: actually together. But it was at some point during this
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Speaker 1: weird friends with benefit relationship thing that Jody's behavior kind
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Speaker 1: of went off the rails. She kept popping up uninvited
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Speaker 1: and reading his emails and quite literally stocking him. And
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Speaker 1: Travis's friends were terrified because Travis was telling them what
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Speaker 1: was happening, and they're like, what, what the are you doing?
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Speaker 1: So Travis was just in the middle here, caught between
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Speaker 1: guilt and affection, especially because Mormonism forbid premaritals.
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Speaker 2: But it couldn't seem to pull him away from Jody.
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Speaker 1: But no one, not even Travis, could have guessed just
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Speaker 1: how far things would go. So on June ninth, two
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Speaker 1: thousand and eight, after days of unanswered calls and missed meetings,
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Speaker 1: Travis's friends broke into his home because they didn't know
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Speaker 1: where he was and the scene inside the home was
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Speaker 1: their friend's worst nightmare. They would get into the house
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Speaker 1: and they would see a blood trail that led to
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Speaker 1: the master bedroom, so they would follow the blood trail
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Speaker 1: into the master bedroom, and that's where they would find
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Speaker 1: Travis slumped in a very off position in a pool
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Speaker 1: of blood inside of.
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Speaker 2: His own shower.
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Speaker 1: And at this point he had been dead for days,
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Speaker 1: so naturally the friends would call the police, and when
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Speaker 1: the police arrived, even seasoned investigators were shocked at the
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Speaker 1: sheer violence of the whole scene, because Travis had endured
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Speaker 1: twenty seven stab wounds, a throat so deeply cut it
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Speaker 1: was nearly severed, and a bullet wound to the head
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Speaker 1: just overkill, beyond overkill. So whoever had done this wasn't
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Speaker 1: just trying to kill Travis, they were trying to destroy him.
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Speaker 1: And friends were obviously very quick to point fingers at Jody,
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Speaker 1: so they would tell police about Jody's obsessive behavior. The
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Speaker 1: break ins and the pure jealousy that was just constant
15:45
Speaker 1: in their relationship. But at the time it just sounded
15:47
Speaker 1: too obvious because wasn't it always just the crazy X.
15:51
Speaker 1: So police would tread carefully and open up an investigation carefully.
15:56
Speaker 1: So they would go on and examine the house, and
15:58
Speaker 1: they would actually find a damn imaged camera in Travis's
16:02
Speaker 1: washing machine, and they were actually able to recover photos
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Speaker 1: from the camera, and the images that they would see
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Speaker 1: from this camera were so disturbing because the images would
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Speaker 1: show Travis in the shower alive, and not just alive,
16:15
Speaker 1: but right before he was murdered in the shower. And
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Speaker 1: through searching the house, DNA evidence would pop up as well.
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Speaker 1: They would actually find a bloody pomp print on the wall.
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Speaker 1: It would contain two DNA profiles, one was Travis's and
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Speaker 1: the others was you guessed it, Jody's, and this would
16:32
Speaker 1: obviously be enough to bring her in. So investigators would
16:35
Speaker 1: bring Jody in and they would interview her, and when questioned,
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Speaker 1: Jody just played it cool as a cucumber. First she
16:43
Speaker 1: denied ever being there at all, and then when pressed
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Speaker 1: even further, Jody came out with the truth. She told
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Speaker 1: them that masked intruders had actually broke into the house
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Speaker 1: while she and Travis were there and killed Travis, but
16:56
Speaker 1: that ended up letting her go, and police were curious
16:58
Speaker 1: about this, but they were hesitant on buying it completely
17:02
Speaker 1: because the evidence was starting to stack up. So without
17:04
Speaker 1: any proof that intruders actually came into the house because
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Speaker 1: they couldn't find footprints or other DNA evidence, they would
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Speaker 1: charge Jody with first degree murder, and only after her
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Speaker 1: arrest did the truth actually come out. And this is
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Speaker 1: what actually happened. June fourth, two thousand and eight. So
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Speaker 1: Travis was in his house and Jody would show up
17:25
Speaker 1: unannounced and uninvited, but Travis would let her in nonetheless,
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Speaker 1: and after talking for a bit, they would slip into
17:31
Speaker 1: old habits, having intercourse, laughing and taking some photographs, and
17:38
Speaker 1: at around five twenty two pm, Jody would pick up
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Speaker 1: Travis's brand new camera and start taking pictures of him
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Speaker 1: in the shower, and this would be that last photo
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Speaker 1: that we would ever see of him alive. And something
17:50
Speaker 1: at this point had shifted. Maybe Travis said something that
17:54
Speaker 1: she didn't like, or maybe he told her that this
17:57
Speaker 1: was really the end of their relationship, but whatever it was,
18:00
Speaker 1: Jody completely snapped and in a sudden explosion of violence,
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Speaker 1: she attacked Travis with everything she had in her, stabbing
18:09
Speaker 1: him repeatedly, and Travis would naturally fight back, trying to
18:12
Speaker 1: get away, and he would leave those bloody handprints on
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Speaker 1: the wall in the process. But she was relentless and animalistic,
18:19
Speaker 1: and she would go on to slash his throat so
18:22
Speaker 1: deeply he was nearly decapitated. Then after he was almost dead,
18:26
Speaker 1: she would shoot him in the head as well, and afterward,
18:29
Speaker 1: in a panic, she would try to clean up the scene,
18:31
Speaker 1: deleting the photos and throwing the camera in the washing machine,
18:34
Speaker 1: and then she would get in her car and drive
18:36
Speaker 1: off to Utah for a work conference, and she would
18:38
Speaker 1: even go so far as to meet another man in
18:41
Speaker 1: Utah and take pictures smiling next to him. Just days
18:45
Speaker 1: later and later, during interviews and in court, Jody would
18:48
Speaker 1: lie again and again, just changing her story constantly, and
18:52
Speaker 1: she would eventually change her story to self defense, but
18:56
Speaker 1: the evidence told a completely different story. It was basically
18:59
Speaker 1: chalked up to old blooded, calculated revenge from a woman
19:03
Speaker 1: who couldn't let go, and she would eventually break down
19:05
Speaker 1: in court as the prosecutor recounted the details of the
19:08
Speaker 1: stabbing and slashing, and in twenty thirteen, after a sensational
19:12
Speaker 1: trial that gripped the nation, Jody Arias was found guilty
19:15
Speaker 1: of first degree murdered and she was sentenced to life
19:19
Speaker 1: in prison without parole in twenty fifteen, and Jody continues
19:22
Speaker 1: to serve her sentence to this day. But despite the verdict,
19:25
Speaker 1: people still love her for some dup reason, and she's
19:29
Speaker 1: even selling some artwork from behind bars.
19:32
Speaker 2: Let's take a look at that. This is so weird.
19:36
Speaker 2: I hate all of this. I hate it.
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Speaker 1: Mostly because she murdered a you know person, so I
19:41
Speaker 1: won't be buying, won't be purchasing. She would also appeal
19:44
Speaker 1: in October of twenty nineteen, but the original conviction was upheld,
19:48
Speaker 1: and in the end, Travis Alexander escaped his broken childhood,
19:51
Speaker 1: only to be caught in a nightmare he never saw coming,
19:55
Speaker 1: and the person he once hoped to share his future
19:58
Speaker 1: with became the architect for his own violent end. Though
20:01
Speaker 1: there are many that maintain Travis was not as innocent
20:04
Speaker 1: as many versions of the story try to paint him.
20:08
Speaker 1: In a Reddit post, somebody actually claims that Travis wasn't
20:11
Speaker 1: who he claimed to be essentially, and you can read
20:15
Speaker 1: the post here if you want to. But either way,
20:18
Speaker 1: killing is wrong, and I don't think it's ever justified
20:21
Speaker 1: unless it really is in self defense. Just a sad,
20:25
Speaker 1: horrible situation all around. But with that, let's move on
20:29
Speaker 1: to our last case. Betsy Faria was the kind of
20:40
Speaker 1: person you just don't forget. She was born on March
20:43
Speaker 1: twenty fourth, nineteen sixty nine, and she was warm, bubbly,
20:48
Speaker 1: and a little scatterbrained, but who is you know. She
20:50
Speaker 1: was a bit short on cash, but she was rich
20:53
Speaker 1: in laughter and in friendships. Betsy actually worked at a
20:56
Speaker 1: local gas station, which gave her the time.
20:59
Speaker 2: To pursue her passions.
21:01
Speaker 1: Because Betsy actually ran her own dj business called Party Starters,
21:05
Speaker 1: which is very fitting for a woman who could just
21:07
Speaker 1: light up any room with her smile. And Betsy also
21:10
Speaker 1: had a ton of hobbies. She loved to spend time outdoors.
21:14
Speaker 1: She loved to play tennis, she loved to go camping,
21:17
Speaker 1: and she also loved cards and board games. And to
21:19
Speaker 1: top it off, she met somebody that she fell in
21:22
Speaker 1: love with, and in two thousand she would marry Russ Faria,
21:26
Speaker 1: and together they would raise their two beautiful daughters, and
21:28
Speaker 1: he would even utilize his computer expertise to help with
21:32
Speaker 1: her business, and he would actually create a computerized DJ
21:35
Speaker 1: playlist for Betsy. So they were able to live together,
21:38
Speaker 1: work together, and it was just a harmonious relationship. Life
21:41
Speaker 1: wasn't necessarily perfect when is it, but it was good.
21:44
Speaker 1: But a decade would go by and things would start
21:47
Speaker 1: to change because Betsy would be diagnosed with breast cancer
21:51
Speaker 1: and Betsy being Betsy, didn't want to waste the time
21:53
Speaker 1: that she had left because she already lived life to
21:56
Speaker 1: the fullest, so she was going to do that when
21:58
Speaker 1: she was given the diagnosis, so she made plans for
22:01
Speaker 1: a celebration of life cruise with Russ, their daughters, and
22:05
Speaker 1: their friends. And in late twenty eleven, before they took
22:08
Speaker 1: their cruise, the news actually got worse because her cancer
22:12
Speaker 1: had spread to her liver and the doctors told her
22:15
Speaker 1: the clock was ticking. So Betsy chose to take advantage
22:18
Speaker 1: of the time where the effects of treatment were minimal,
22:20
Speaker 1: because he once you start treatment for cancer, you just feel.
22:23
Speaker 2: Sick most of the time.
22:24
Speaker 1: So they would go on this cruise and she would
22:27
Speaker 1: laugh and have fun with her loved ones, and she
22:29
Speaker 1: would focus on memories and not endings. And there was
22:32
Speaker 1: one friend in particular who stepped up during Betsy's battle,
22:36
Speaker 1: and her name was Pam Hup, and the two had
22:38
Speaker 1: actually met years earlier at a state farm office and
22:42
Speaker 1: they would just kind of hit it off and become friends.
22:44
Speaker 1: And after Betsy's diagnosis, Pam started driving her to her
22:48
Speaker 1: chemotherapy sessions, and Betsy was so grateful. Pam was just
22:52
Speaker 1: helping out whenever she could and was just a very
22:54
Speaker 1: comforting presence and was just a loyal, steady friend, and
22:58
Speaker 1: obviously she had help from her hus and her daughters
23:01
Speaker 1: as well. So December twenty seven, the twenty eleven, felt
23:04
Speaker 1: ordinary enough. That morning, Betsy went to Siteman Cancer Center
23:08
Speaker 1: for her chemotherapy, and later that afternoon, Betsy would text
23:12
Speaker 1: Russ to say she didn't need a ride home because
23:14
Speaker 1: her friend Pam had offered to give her a ride
23:16
Speaker 1: in his stead.
23:17
Speaker 2: And at around seven.
23:18
Speaker 1: Pm, Pam had dropped Betsy off at her house in Troy, Missouri,
23:22
Speaker 1: and Russ meanwhile was at his usual Tuesday night game
23:25
Speaker 1: night with his friends, just laughing and snacking and watching movies,
23:28
Speaker 1: so Russ would finish up with his friends and that
23:30
Speaker 1: he would get into his car and head home, and
23:33
Speaker 1: supposedly he grabbed some fast food before arriving, and it
23:36
Speaker 1: was at around nine forty pm that Russ would walk
23:38
Speaker 1: into the front door and his world would be shattered
23:42
Speaker 1: because Betsy was lying on the living room floor covered
23:45
Speaker 1: in blood, a knife still protruding from her neck, and Russ,
23:49
Speaker 1: being completely frantic and horrified, would dial nine point one
23:53
Speaker 1: just sobbing, telling the dispatcher it looked like his wife
23:57
Speaker 1: had kicked herself because she had been depressed about her
24:00
Speaker 1: cancer after all, so he didn't know why she would
24:03
Speaker 1: but it was definitely a possibility because who else would
24:06
Speaker 1: do this to her. But when the police arrived, it
24:08
Speaker 1: was very clear to them that this wasn't a slewer slide.
24:12
Speaker 1: Betsy had been stabbed fifty five times, so whoever had
24:18
Speaker 1: done this had been furious, So naturally the investigators would
24:22
Speaker 1: zero in on Russ immediately. It was Betsy's husband, she
24:26
Speaker 1: had cancer, there was insurance money involved.
24:28
Speaker 2: It just made sense.
24:30
Speaker 1: But despite the fact that he had an air tight
24:32
Speaker 1: alibi because he had witnesses, because he was at that
24:35
Speaker 1: game night that night, and he also had a time
24:37
Speaker 1: stamped Arby's received from a stop on his way home.
24:40
Speaker 1: Police would barely look beyond him, and Russ would be
24:43
Speaker 1: detained just days later. The essentially just ignored the witness
24:47
Speaker 1: statements that he was with his friends the entire evening
24:50
Speaker 1: and ignored the alibi receipts. So Russ would go to trial,
24:53
Speaker 1: and there would be numerous witnesses, one of which was
24:57
Speaker 1: Betsy's best friend, Pam, and she testify against Russ, painting
25:02
Speaker 1: a picture of an angry husband who wanted Betsy's life
25:05
Speaker 1: insurance money, and naturally, the jury bought it, and in
25:08
Speaker 1: twenty thirteen, Russ Faria was convicted a first degree murder
25:12
Speaker 1: and sentenced to life in prison. Case closed, or so
25:15
Speaker 1: it seemed, because two years later cracks in the case
25:18
Speaker 1: started to show. New attorneys picked up Russ's appeal and
25:22
Speaker 1: uncovered staggering problems because they found evidence suggesting Betsy's life
25:26
Speaker 1: insurance had been changed just four days before her death
25:31
Speaker 1: and the name of the soul new beneficiary, Pam Hup
25:35
Speaker 1: and allegedly they were just worried about how Russ would
25:38
Speaker 1: handle the funds, but they would find proof that Pam
25:41
Speaker 1: kept the entire one hundred and fifty thousand dollars payout,
25:44
Speaker 1: despite promising it would go to Betsy's daughters, and there
25:47
Speaker 1: were records of Pam showing that she was giving inconsistent
25:50
Speaker 1: stories about where she was that night, first claiming she
25:54
Speaker 1: never went inside Betsy's house at all, and then admitting
25:57
Speaker 1: that she had. But it all pointed to one chilling direction,
26:00
Speaker 1: and that was Pam Hop, not Russ, who was currently
26:04
Speaker 1: in jail. So in twenty fifteen, Russ was granted a
26:07
Speaker 1: new trial, and at this time the truth unraveled very
26:11
Speaker 1: quickly and without Pam's extremely misleading testimony and with clear
26:15
Speaker 1: evidence that he could never have been at the scene,
26:17
Speaker 1: Russ was thankfully acquitted and he would walk out of
26:20
Speaker 1: prison a freeman. But for Pam Hop, the walls were
26:23
Speaker 1: slowly closing in, and in twenty sixteen, Pam would make
26:28
Speaker 1: another move, one even more bizarre in horrifying. Pam would
26:32
Speaker 1: go on to lure a man named Louis Gumpenberger into
26:36
Speaker 1: her home, and Louis would have mental and physical disabilities
26:39
Speaker 1: from a car crash, but she would bring him in
26:41
Speaker 1: nonetheless under the pretense of being a dateline producer offering
26:46
Speaker 1: money for a reenactment, which is ironic given this whole
26:50
Speaker 1: case I believe was actually on dateline, but I digress.
26:52
Speaker 1: But as we know, Pam was not a dateline producer,
26:55
Speaker 1: and she would just shoot Louie in the head and
26:59
Speaker 1: then she claim self defense. A police, thankfully would quickly
27:03
Speaker 1: realize it was all bullshit and it was staged, and
27:06
Speaker 1: they would also find a hastily written note on his body,
27:09
Speaker 1: and it was clear that this was an attempt to
27:11
Speaker 1: create a fake kidnapping tied to Russpharia. So Pam would
27:16
Speaker 1: naturally be arrested, and when the arrest occurred, Pam would
27:20
Speaker 1: request to use the restroom. This woman has plan ABCDEFG
27:25
Speaker 1: I swear to the Lord, Oh my God. So she
27:28
Speaker 1: would go to the restroom and then she would proceed
27:31
Speaker 1: to stab herself with a ballpoint pen in the neck
27:34
Speaker 1: and the wrists, in an act described as consciousness of guilt.
27:39
Speaker 1: So glad you realize that you're a piece of shit
27:42
Speaker 1: in trying to take the easy way out. And after
27:44
Speaker 1: all that she was still alive, she would go on
27:47
Speaker 1: to get her mug shots with the bandages around her
27:50
Speaker 1: neck and wrists and moving on to trial, prosecutors would
27:53
Speaker 1: seek the death penalty for her, and she would initially
27:56
Speaker 1: plead not guilty, which like how at her trial in
28:01
Speaker 1: June twenty nineteen, she entered a al Ford plea, And
28:04
Speaker 1: this is where one pleads guilty to accept a plea bargain,
28:08
Speaker 1: but maintains that they're actually in fact innocent, just the
28:12
Speaker 1: piece of shit plea basically because people only do this
28:15
Speaker 1: because they see the evidence stacked against them and they
28:18
Speaker 1: know that they would be basically, so she would take
28:21
Speaker 1: the plea, but she would be sentenced to life in prison.
28:25
Speaker 1: So thel Ford plea basically just allowed her to avoid
28:28
Speaker 1: the death penalty. And in July of twenty twenty one,
28:31
Speaker 1: nearly a decade after Betsy's murder took place, Pam was
28:34
Speaker 1: officially charged of the first degree murder of Betsy while
28:37
Speaker 1: she was already serving the sentence for the murder of
28:40
Speaker 1: Louis and Pam's story garnered so much attention that it
28:44
Speaker 1: inspired a true crime drama called The Thing About Pam,
28:47
Speaker 1: which was an NBC limited series starring Renee Zelwigger.
28:51
Speaker 2: That cover is crazy. I can't get over that cover.
28:55
Speaker 2: Oh my god, that is so scary.
28:58
Speaker 1: So Betsy spent her last day surrounded by friends she
29:01
Speaker 1: thought she could trust, and the person she trusted most,
29:05
Speaker 1: the one who drove her home that night, the one
29:08
Speaker 1: she believed was helping her this whole time, just turned
29:10
Speaker 1: out to be the one who betrayed her in the
29:13
Speaker 1: most brutal and unimaginable way. Pam Hop wasn't just a friend,
29:17
Speaker 1: she was a killer in plain sight. So that concludes
29:21
Speaker 1: our three true crime stories.
29:24
Speaker 2: I'm just glad justice was served in all of these.
29:27
Speaker 1: They're all absolutely terrible, but I mean, the most common
29:30
Speaker 1: thing is the people that are closest to you, so
29:33
Speaker 1: watch out. My heart goes out to the families involved,
29:37
Speaker 1: and I'm glad all these people are rotting in jail
29:41
Speaker 1: hopefully thinking about what they've done every single day of
29:44
Speaker 1: their lives, and I hope it ruins them and haunts
29:48
Speaker 1: them constantly every second of the day. But anyway, I
29:51
Speaker 1: appreciate you all. If you have any other cases you
29:54
Speaker 1: want me to check out, let me know down to
29:56
Speaker 1: the comments below. I always read your comments. I very
29:58
Speaker 1: much appreciate it, and be safe out there all right.
30:02
Speaker 1: I will see you in the next one.
30:04
Speaker 2: Bye.