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Putting Focus On The Sideline Stories What Happened To Her From Melissa Jeltsen · Arroe Collins Like It's Live

0:00
Speaker 1: Hey, even being in radio for 47 years, I don't
0:02
Speaker 1: know every single song, so it makes it even more
0:05
Speaker 1: fun when you get to do a show called Music's
0:07
Speaker 1: Lost History, the artist edition as well as the song edition.
0:11
Speaker 1: You can participate on arrow.net, A-R-R-O-E dot net, Music's Lost History.
0:17
Speaker 1: How much do you really know about the songs you're
0:20
Speaker 1: checking in with? Arrow.net, A-R-R-O-E dot net. Enjoy your exploration.
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Speaker 1: Good morning, Melissa. How are you doing?
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Speaker 2: I'm great. How are you?
0:31
Speaker 1: Absolutely fantastic. Have you worked out your message yet or
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Speaker 1: your speech yet for the iHeartRadio Podcasting Awards? Because this
0:38
Speaker 1: is award winning. What you're doing here just blows me
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Speaker 1: away with journalism. And I'm not going to be shocked
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Speaker 1: if someone says, well, I got into it because of Melissa.
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Speaker 2: Oh, Arrow, that's so nice.
0:50
Speaker 1: You have something about your writing style and your production.
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Speaker 1: I got to ask you where it's coming from. And
0:56
Speaker 1: was it something that you were missing in your own
0:58
Speaker 1: personal life to be able to be a storyteller like this?
1:01
Speaker 2: I don't know.
1:02
Speaker 3: I've always wanted to be a writer, like from when
1:04
Speaker 3: I was really, really little. So but I didn't move
1:07
Speaker 3: into podcasting until the pandemic. And it's such a fun
1:12
Speaker 3: way of writing. And I think it really fits my
1:14
Speaker 3: natural style, which was quite simple writing, you know, like short.
1:18
Speaker 2: Sentences and simple.
1:20
Speaker 3: So, you know, I, you know, I'll do it. I
1:23
Speaker 3: studied poetry in college, you know, I was into that
1:25
Speaker 3: kind of stuff. So I love telling these stories and
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Speaker 3: I love being able to have the space to really
1:31
Speaker 3: dig deep. I mean, I think I worked in print
1:34
Speaker 3: media for 10 years prior to moving over and there's
1:37
Speaker 3: not much space for investigative long form reporting anymore, except
1:40
Speaker 3: for in the podcast world where you can really spend
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Speaker 3: so much time exploring a story and bringing different facets
1:47
Speaker 3: of it to life through these voices and through different episode.
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Speaker 2: So I just love the form.
1:53
Speaker 1: And the listeners walk with you through every episode. That's
1:57
Speaker 1: what fascinates me about this entire thing here.
2:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's great.
2:02
Speaker 3: It's you really get to kind of replicate your own
2:05
Speaker 3: experience of learning this information and digesting it by the
2:09
Speaker 3: way that it's presented to the listener.
2:13
Speaker 2: It is it's very.
2:14
Speaker 3: You know, It allows you to really go in in
2:18
Speaker 3: a much deeper way and especially being able to hear
2:21
Speaker 3: from the people at the heart of these stories.
2:24
Speaker 1: Yeah, because I'm a firm believer that and I'd like
2:27
Speaker 1: to know what your writing style is in the way
2:29
Speaker 1: that that what I'm going to explain. And that is,
2:31
Speaker 1: is that I believe that writing is one thing. It
2:33
Speaker 1: is in the interpretation of where you are in your
2:35
Speaker 1: present place when you put it on the paper. But
2:37
Speaker 1: I don't get to hear your pitch, volume and tone
2:39
Speaker 1: and your inflection. But when I go in there and
2:41
Speaker 1: listen to your podcast, holy crap, now you've got my
2:45
Speaker 1: attention with the emotion.
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Speaker 3: Yeah. And I think the same with getting to actually
2:51
Speaker 3: hear from all the sources.
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Speaker 2: Right.
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Speaker 3: Like so for all these years that I was writing
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Speaker 3: articles and I would have these really emotional and meaningful
3:00
Speaker 3: conversations with people and then I would just put their
3:02
Speaker 3: words down on the paper. And I mean, my husband
3:05
Speaker 3: said that to me. He's like, I'm so glad that
3:06
Speaker 3: people will now get to start to hear that. What
3:09
Speaker 3: it's like when you interview someone, because I would always leave,
3:11
Speaker 3: you know, you wouldn't ever hear the part, my side
3:15
Speaker 3: of the conversation in a print story, you know, it'd
3:17
Speaker 3: only be the answers. But now we can have a
3:20
Speaker 3: little bit more of that back and forth, which is
3:22
Speaker 3: really great.
3:22
Speaker 1: I love the way that you admitted right away that
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Speaker 1: you were a writer. And I'm thinking, of course you are,
3:27
Speaker 1: because I can feel it. I can hear it. But
3:29
Speaker 1: podcasting actually started from the writers. It wasn't the comedians
3:32
Speaker 1: and the musicians looking for the new MySpace. I mean,
3:35
Speaker 1: it was the writers that brought it forward. And to
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Speaker 1: see you rising where you are right now, I'm going,
3:39
Speaker 1: I knew it. I knew it. It had to have
3:41
Speaker 1: happened sometime because your writing now has a voice and
3:45
Speaker 1: a place.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a wonderful thing. And I'm so grateful that
3:51
Speaker 3: I get the opportunity.
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Speaker 2: To do this. And now with my new show, it's weekly.
3:55
Speaker 3: So I'm still kind of learning how to do a
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Speaker 3: weekly show, which is a very different cadence than sort
4:01
Speaker 3: of the limited series that I was doing before.
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Speaker 2: And, you know, we're still new with what happened to her.
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Speaker 3: But I'm really hoping that we will develop a strong
4:12
Speaker 3: following of people that are interested and invested in the
4:15
Speaker 3: show and they'll, you know, feed us ideas as well.
4:18
Speaker 3: And you know, the show will, will change as, as
4:22
Speaker 3: it gets its legs.
4:23
Speaker 1: Please do not move. We're about to get really super
4:26
Speaker 1: deep with Melissa Jeltsin from the podcast. What happened to her? Hey,
4:32
Speaker 1: thanks for coming back to the conversation. We're sharing a
4:34
Speaker 1: conversation with Melissa Jeltsin from the podcast. What happened to her? Well,
4:39
Speaker 1: you're a master at what I call the headlines punch.
4:42
Speaker 1: I mean, because just the name of the podcast itself,
4:44
Speaker 1: because everybody's always, you know, they're skimming the podcast. What
4:46
Speaker 1: do I want to listen to? What do I want
4:47
Speaker 1: to listen to? And then all of a sudden I
4:49
Speaker 1: come across what happened to her.
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Speaker 2: Oh, God.
4:51
Speaker 1: Oh, I've got to get into this one. Let me
4:54
Speaker 1: find out what she's up to.
4:57
Speaker 2: Yes, definitely.
4:58
Speaker 3: And, you know, so what we're kind of doing is,
5:03
Speaker 3: because it's weekly now, we're doing a mix of kind
5:05
Speaker 3: of one-off stories, but also interviews with other journalists who
5:09
Speaker 3: cover the same ground in terms of content and getting
5:14
Speaker 3: into some meta conversations about how do you report these stories?
5:17
Speaker 2: How does it impact you as a person?
5:19
Speaker 3: What are like the challenges and the obstacles that arise
5:22
Speaker 3: when you're telling these stories? But then we're also doing miniseries.
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Speaker 3: So you'll still get that long form investigative work. You know,
5:31
Speaker 3: every few months we'll do one. And we're in the
5:33
Speaker 3: middle of one right now.
5:34
Speaker 2: It's the case of this young woman in Massachusetts called
5:38
Speaker 2: Sandra Birchmore. That's it. That's her.
5:41
Speaker 3: Yeah, I've been following her case for a few years.
5:44
Speaker 3: She was 23 years old in her apartment in a
5:48
Speaker 3: blizzard in 2021, and she was 10 weeks pregnant. She
5:52
Speaker 3: was super excited about the baby. That night she was
5:56
Speaker 3: Googling baby clothes and buying them on Kohl's, and in
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Speaker 3: her apartment they found car seat in the box and
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Speaker 3: a big poster she had made with sparkly glitter pen
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Speaker 3: that was like said we're going to be parents she
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Speaker 3: was so excited um and she stopped texting anyone that
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Speaker 3: night and her body was found a few days later in.
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Speaker 2: Her apartment and from the outside it looked like.
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Speaker 3: She had died by suicide the local police who responded
6:26
Speaker 3: immediately wrote it down in their reports as a suicide
6:31
Speaker 3: And when they contacted the medical examiner, they said, no
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Speaker 3: foul play.
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Speaker 2: This is a suicide.
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Speaker 3: Her family, on the other hand, said this doesn't make
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Speaker 3: any sense. She was so happy. She was so excited.
6:42
Speaker 3: She was doing so much planning for the future. Now,
6:45
Speaker 3: we do know that people who die by suicide might
6:48
Speaker 3: have future plans. You know, it's a complicated thing, but
6:52
Speaker 3: it was an unusual circumstance that she was so planning,
6:56
Speaker 3: you know, even that day, you know, she was really
6:58
Speaker 3: looking forward to what her life was going to be, um,
7:01
Speaker 3: with her baby. And, you know, it really quickly came
7:05
Speaker 3: to light that she had been dating a married police officer,
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Speaker 3: police detective, Matthew Farwell. She had been telling people that
7:13
Speaker 3: he was the father of her baby. And when the
7:17
Speaker 3: local police went and investigated him, it was that he
7:19
Speaker 3: was in the police force, the town over, um, They,
7:23
Speaker 3: you know, they did it in a very casual way.
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Speaker 3: They didn't record it. They just chatted with him in
7:27
Speaker 3: a parking lot of an elementary school. And he said
7:32
Speaker 3: they also found footage from the lobby. So they saw
7:35
Speaker 3: that he entered her apartment building the last night that
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Speaker 3: she ever contacted anyone. And he left 28 minutes later.
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Speaker 3: He's wearing a COVID mask in the footage. And they
7:45
Speaker 3: talked to him and they said, he said, oh, yeah,
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Speaker 3: I went to her house.
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Speaker 2: I broke up with her.
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Speaker 3: And then I blocked her on all forms of communication
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Speaker 3: and I deleted our text messages.
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Speaker 2: And he said, you know, she was really, she was upset.
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Speaker 2: So maybe that's what happened.
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Speaker 3: And, you know, he was never treated as a suspect,
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Speaker 3: even as the family said, look, we've heard he was
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Speaker 3: really unhappy about the pregnancy.
8:09
Speaker 2: And, um, you know, it was, it was a.
8:12
Speaker 3: Huge stressor and threat on his livelihood and his marriage
8:16
Speaker 3: and his career. If anyone was to find out that
8:19
Speaker 3: this had happened and But they they.
8:22
Speaker 2: Closed the case. They didn't bring any charges.
8:23
Speaker 3: Now we have there is a hero in this story,
8:26
Speaker 3: which is the Stone and Police Department's female first ever
8:30
Speaker 3: police chief. She immediately opened an internal investigation when she
8:36
Speaker 3: found out that this young woman had been dating one
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Speaker 3: of her officers. And also Sandra had been involved in
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Speaker 3: this youth explorer program. So she had been in the
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Speaker 3: police department since she was 12 years old, learning about policing,
8:51
Speaker 3: you know, really admired policing and law enforcement. And so
8:56
Speaker 3: immediately this police chief, Donna McNamara said, we need an
8:59
Speaker 3: internal investigation. What actually happened with this young woman and
9:03
Speaker 3: my police department? And when that came out, it was
9:06
Speaker 3: discovered through looking through the text messages that he had deleted,
9:10
Speaker 3: but she had a Sandra's computer had a copy of that.
9:14
Speaker 3: They had, he had began a sexual relationship with her
9:17
Speaker 3: when she was 15 years old. So we can see
9:20
Speaker 3: in the text messages, this evidence of grooming. He talks
9:23
Speaker 3: about how he wished it was sooner when he first
9:26
Speaker 3: started taking her to the library to study. And we
9:30
Speaker 3: can see that it went on for a really long time.
9:32
Speaker 3: And so he lost his police certification and lost his job.
9:36
Speaker 3: But the internal investigation wasn't looking for, you know, any
9:40
Speaker 3: criminal behavior. And so he still wasn't charged with anything
9:43
Speaker 3: involving her death. And then three and then but in
9:47
Speaker 3: the background, you know, we found out later the FBI
9:50
Speaker 3: got involved and they looked at the exact same evidence
9:53
Speaker 3: that the state police did um, around Sandra's death.
9:58
Speaker 2: And they came to a completely different conclusion.
10:00
Speaker 3: They saw that they believe, and they alleged that he
10:04
Speaker 3: went to her house that night and killed her and then.
10:07
Speaker 2: Staged it to look like a suicide.
10:09
Speaker 3: And, um, they, their claim is that he did it
10:13
Speaker 3: to conceal that she had been a victim excuse me
10:18
Speaker 3: of of his sexual abuse and that there's evidence that
10:22
Speaker 3: as she was getting older she was 23 years old
10:24
Speaker 3: she was pregnant she was working at a school where
10:27
Speaker 3: you know you learn a lot about if you're working
10:29
Speaker 3: with kids the appropriate way to interact with children boundaries
10:35
Speaker 3: even taking a child to the bathroom you know you
10:37
Speaker 3: learn how important it is to be respectful and clear
10:41
Speaker 3: around children and adults and And so she was kind
10:44
Speaker 3: of having an awakening around what had happened to her.
10:48
Speaker 3: I mean, she met Matthew Farwell when she was 12,
10:50
Speaker 3: 13 years old. And she was starting to understand that
10:55
Speaker 3: what had happened to her was not only immoral and unethical,
10:59
Speaker 3: but also criminal, right? It was aggravated statutory rape. And
11:03
Speaker 3: so they alleged that she was likely to start to
11:07
Speaker 3: report that. And so in order to stop her from
11:12
Speaker 3: revealing um his criminal behavior um he went to her
11:16
Speaker 3: apartment that night and chose to to end her life
11:19
Speaker 3: in order to protect his so it took three and
11:22
Speaker 3: a half years but they he was ultimately charged and
11:24
Speaker 3: he's currently in federal court in boston i went there
11:28
Speaker 3: for the opening statements and um you know for her
11:32
Speaker 3: family this has been such a long time coming um
11:35
Speaker 3: but everything is coming out in the open now. Um, there's,
11:39
Speaker 3: you know, more stuff we can tell a lot of
11:42
Speaker 3: what they have in their case based on the trial
11:44
Speaker 3: brief and other things that have been released, but we're
11:46
Speaker 3: hearing a lot more about, um, what had happened in
11:50
Speaker 3: this abusive grooming relationship.
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Speaker 2: And it's absolutely devastating. Um, but it's, you know, at
11:58
Speaker 2: least it's all sort.
11:59
Speaker 3: Of finally coming to the surface after being sort of
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Speaker 3: just written off as a suicide for so many years.
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Speaker 1: If I were the lawyer or the judge, you're going
12:07
Speaker 1: on that stand. You know exactly what's going on in
12:10
Speaker 1: this story. I would put you on that stand in
12:12
Speaker 1: a heartbeat because I mean, and that's the thing about it.
12:15
Speaker 1: I've talked with more lawyers about what we're doing with
12:18
Speaker 1: true crime podcasts and things. And those lawyers, they have
12:21
Speaker 1: physical words. This man told me just this past week
12:23
Speaker 1: and he goes, I am afraid of the true crime
12:25
Speaker 1: podcasters because they are finding things out we can't get
12:29
Speaker 1: our hands on. And I'm just, Melissa, you just, you
12:32
Speaker 1: amaze me.
12:34
Speaker 2: Oh, that's so nice, Sarah. I'm just doing my job.
12:37
Speaker 3: I mean, this story means a lot to me. I've
12:40
Speaker 3: learned about Sandra's death years ago before anyone was ever charged. And,
12:46
Speaker 3: you know, I've been kind.
12:47
Speaker 2: Of watching it and it's just devastating. She was this tiny,
12:50
Speaker 2: she was 4'10. I think Matthew Farwell is like six.
12:54
Speaker 3: Five, like little itty bitty girl. And her, she's suffered
13:01
Speaker 3: some really tragedies early in life. Her mother died when
13:04
Speaker 3: she was 18 and then her grandmother died and her
13:07
Speaker 3: father was never in the picture.
13:08
Speaker 2: So her main sources of support just died rapidly when
13:13
Speaker 2: she was just, you know, such a young person.
13:15
Speaker 3: And I just feel that she was taken advantage of and,
13:21
Speaker 3: and just used and kind of discarded. And it's, it's, it's,
13:24
Speaker 3: it's absolutely, you know, it's just the worst thing ever.
13:28
Speaker 3: And I want, you know, her life to, I want
13:31
Speaker 3: people to know who she was and, you know, regain
13:36
Speaker 3: some dignity to her life.
13:37
Speaker 1: Well, that's where you're going to get your respect from,
13:39
Speaker 1: from everybody, including women, especially women, because I mean, you're
13:42
Speaker 1: putting attention on those women that have been put on
13:45
Speaker 1: the sidelines. And the reason why I say that is
13:48
Speaker 1: because my wife's mother was murdered. They never solved it. Never.
13:51
Speaker 1: And to this day, she still holds onto that. And,
13:54
Speaker 1: and I, and we've said that she's on the sidelines
13:56
Speaker 1: and that's why nobody wants to look into this case. So,
13:59
Speaker 1: I mean, for you to step through, it's like, that's
14:01
Speaker 1: a damn calling is what that is. Someone is calling
14:04
Speaker 1: out to you from beyond where we are.
14:08
Speaker 3: Yeah. I mean, I, my biggest fear is just not,
14:13
Speaker 3: not doing it in a way that the family feels,
14:16
Speaker 3: you know, really represents their loved one.
14:18
Speaker 2: And so I make a lot of effort to, To
14:21
Speaker 2: make sure.
14:21
Speaker 3: I'm moving in a sensitive and kind and loving and
14:25
Speaker 3: empathetic way.
14:26
Speaker 2: Because, yeah, that's what matters.
14:30
Speaker 1: That's a beautiful gift to be able to do that because,
14:32
Speaker 1: I mean, you can't just instantly turn a light switch
14:35
Speaker 1: on and all of a sudden you've got empathy for people.
14:37
Speaker 1: That means your heart is solid and it's very much
14:40
Speaker 1: open to receive.
14:43
Speaker 3: Yeah, I think that's the way that I was raised,
14:45
Speaker 3: was to be really empathetic to everybody. And you never
14:49
Speaker 3: know what anyone's going through. So you got to approach
14:52
Speaker 3: them from a place of kindness.
14:54
Speaker 1: Now, how are you doing, though? Because I know what
14:57
Speaker 1: it's like to go in there and do the research
14:58
Speaker 1: on these things. And I know how deep we can
15:00
Speaker 1: get into it. And it affects us emotionally. I have
15:03
Speaker 1: to defrag every day in a journal and break things
15:06
Speaker 1: down and put my life back together again. What about you?
15:10
Speaker 3: You know, I was saying this to someone the other
15:12
Speaker 3: day that I've actually, it's actually much harder for me now.
15:15
Speaker 3: I think when I was before having kids, I have
15:17
Speaker 3: two young girls, like nine months old and almost three.
15:22
Speaker 3: And before having them, there was, I could have a
15:25
Speaker 3: lot of distance somehow in reporting these cases. I was
15:28
Speaker 3: very focused on, you know, gathering the facts and understanding
15:32
Speaker 3: it and putting it together.
15:32
Speaker 2: And it wouldn't really impact me as much personally.
15:36
Speaker 3: And now it's like, layer has been disintegrated, and there's
15:41
Speaker 3: not as much distance, and I can become much more
15:46
Speaker 3: emotionally impacted by these stories. So yeah, I mean, I
15:51
Speaker 3: think I just, you know, it's rewarding in its own
15:56
Speaker 3: to have these conversations that have these connections with the
15:58
Speaker 3: family and people that I'm doing this work with.
16:01
Speaker 2: And that's what what keeps me going.
16:05
Speaker 1: So do you have those moments where everybody's around the
16:08
Speaker 1: kitchen table and somebody over in the corner of the
16:10
Speaker 1: table says something and your ear catches it immediately? And
16:13
Speaker 1: because your awareness is so high because of what you're
16:16
Speaker 1: doing with the investigative reporting, it's like you can hear
16:20
Speaker 1: a fly hit the wall. Because I don't know what
16:24
Speaker 1: it is about journalists, but it's like you think that
16:26
Speaker 1: their attention is over here on this conversation, but they're
16:29
Speaker 1: listening to everybody around them. Yeah. Yeah.
16:36
Speaker 2: You know, I listen, I listen to everything.
16:38
Speaker 3: I'm always looking for what could be the next great
16:44
Speaker 3: narrative story.
16:44
Speaker 1: That's what we do. I would love to see your
16:46
Speaker 1: research because do you have yellow pads or what are
16:48
Speaker 1: you doing with your research? Because that to me is
16:51
Speaker 1: also a story. I love looking at people's scribbles.
16:54
Speaker 3: Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I'm mostly just I'm gathering so
16:58
Speaker 3: many documents and, you know, filing all the FOIA requests
17:02
Speaker 3: out that I can and then putting it together, always
17:05
Speaker 3: building a timeline. That's really important to the process. And
17:09
Speaker 3: then I try to identify, OK, let's make a list
17:12
Speaker 3: of everywhere where things went wrong, you know, and. Yeah,
17:19
Speaker 3: and then it's just mostly building out. the, the characters,
17:23
Speaker 3: the people, and really trying to understand them.
17:25
Speaker 2: And that's hard to do in a single conversation, right?
17:27
Speaker 3: You need to have multiple conversations over many months to,
17:30
Speaker 3: to build up, um, your better understanding.
17:34
Speaker 1: Where can people go to find out about you, Melissa?
17:36
Speaker 1: Because 20 minutes with you, as you can tell, it
17:38
Speaker 1: goes by that fast and it just wasn't enough. So
17:40
Speaker 1: where can people go to find out more about you?
17:43
Speaker 3: Well, you go to what happened to her, my podcast,
17:46
Speaker 3: you can find it on Apple, Spotify, wherever you listen
17:49
Speaker 3: to your podcast. And then, um, I have a website, melissajelton.com,
17:54
Speaker 3: where you can see some of my other work as well.
17:57
Speaker 1: You got to come back to this show anytime in
17:59
Speaker 1: the future. The door is always going to be open
18:00
Speaker 1: for you.
18:02
Speaker 2: Thank you, Ara.
18:03
Speaker 1: You be brilliant, okay? And you keep doing what you're doing.
18:06
Speaker 1: And make sure you write that speech for your award
18:08
Speaker 1: that you're going to get at the iHeartRadio Podcast Awards.
18:11
Speaker 2: Oh, thank you. I'll see you there.