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The Complex Case of Cyntoia Brown · 10 Minute Murder | Bingeable True Crime Stories

• 0:40
  Speaker 1: He would explain to me that some people were born whores,
• 0:44
  Speaker 1: and that I was one, and I was a slut,
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: and nobody want me but him. A girl told the
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: courts these are words that are so difficult to hear
• 0:54
  Speaker 1: in any testimony, let alone when we know that the
• 0:57
  Speaker 1: girl that spoke them was only sixteen years old at
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: the time she recalled them. Centoya Denise Brown was born
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, on January twenty ninth, nineteen eighty eight,
• 1:09
  Speaker 1: and she was born into desperate circumstances. The identity of
• 1:13
  Speaker 1: her biological father remains a mystery even to Centoya, but
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: in some ways we know all too much about her mother,
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: Georgina Mitchell. When Georgina was pregnant with Centoya, she drank.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: By her own accounts, she drank about a fifth of
• 1:29
  Speaker 1: a bottle of whiskey every day during her whole pregnancy.
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: After Centoya was born, Georgina then escalated to crack cocaine,
• 1:38
  Speaker 1: bipolar personality disorder, suicidal, manic, depressive. Georgina later listed some
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: of the conditions that she had been diagnosed with. Any
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: single one of those would have made things difficult enough
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: when trying to raise a daughter as a single parent.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: Maybe realizing that she was taking on too much for
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: what she was dealing with. Georgina then put Centoya up
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: for adoption, but in so many ways, the damage had
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: already been done. Although she would later grow into a
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: fiercely independent woman, her mother's drinking would deeply affect Centoya,
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: who'd been born with fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, a condition
• 2:16
  Speaker 1: that alters the mental and cognitive development in children. Centoya
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: was adopted into what seemed to be a good home,
• 2:23
  Speaker 1: but struggled anyway. She ended up dropping out of elementary
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: school and getting into trouble with the juvenile court system.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: In two thousand one, she spent two years in the
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: Department of Children's Services for committing crimes against a person
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: and crimes against property. During her time in DCS facilities,
• 2:42
  Speaker 1: including one called Woodland Hills Youth Development Center in Nashville,
• 2:46
  Speaker 1: Centoya escaped and went on the run several times. One
• 2:50
  Speaker 1: of those times, one that came in two thousand and four,
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: would be Centoya's last escape, and she left to live
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: on her own on the streets of Nashville. Sinoya first
• 3:01
  Speaker 1: managed to get by by living with friends, some of
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: which are allegedly already deep into drinking and drugs even
• 3:08
  Speaker 1: though they were still children themselves. And then she met
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: garyon mcloughin. His street name was Cutthroat, and even though
• 3:16
  Speaker 1: the twenty four year old first won Centoya over by
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: being kind and sweet, that was all about the change.
• 3:23
  Speaker 1: When Sentoya moved into a hotel room with Cutthroat, his
• 3:27
  Speaker 1: true nature finally emerged. The new couple now needed a
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: way to support themselves, and Cutthroat believed that he had
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: the solution. Sixteen year old Centoya would have to start
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: working the streets. Sintoya found herself going along with his plan,
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: and when she decided she didn't want to at any point,
• 3:46
  Speaker 1: he would threaten, beat her, and on multiple occasions, sexually
• 3:50
  Speaker 1: assault her. The best thing I could do was learn
• 3:53
  Speaker 1: to be a good whore, Centoya later testified. On the
• 3:57
  Speaker 1: summer night of August sixth to the thousand and four,
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: Cintoya found herself out working the streets again when she
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: was approached by a potential client, Forty three year old
• 4:08
  Speaker 1: Johnny Michael Allen, a real estate agent, local youth pastor
• 4:12
  Speaker 1: and Sunday school teacher. He approached Centoya in his car.
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: According to accounts. He then asked Centoya if she was
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: hungry and up for any action. Saintoya said yes to
• 4:24
  Speaker 1: both questions. She got into Johnny's car and left the
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: car park with him. They first ordered food before Johnny
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: took her to his house, where the two of them
• 4:33
  Speaker 1: negotiated that Centoya would have sex with him in exchange
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: for one hundred and fifty dollars. Friends and families say
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: that Johnny would never have approached Centoya looking for in
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: exchange of services. In fact, they later argued it was
• 4:48
  Speaker 1: more likely that Johnny was just trying to help the
• 4:51
  Speaker 1: struggling teenager. The prosecution and other witnesses disagreed with his statement,
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: and several teenage girls would come forward to testify that
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: she Johnny would often hit on them in public. Cintoya
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: herself also had a different version of events. She said
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: that during her time at Johnny's house, he continuously talked
• 5:10
  Speaker 1: about his guns. He allegedly told her that he'd been
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: a sharp shooter in the military and was an incredible shot.
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: Cintoya said that she had been terrified and wanted to leave,
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: but the visible gun cabinet in the corner of the
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: room had made her stay. Put, although she claims that
• 5:27
  Speaker 1: the two of them never actually had sex. That evening,
• 5:30
  Speaker 1: the two of them ended up in bed. Johnny was naked,
• 5:33
  Speaker 1: and after alleged accounts where he violently grabbed Centoya by
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: the genitals, he turned around and began reaching for something
• 5:40
  Speaker 1: under the bed. Cintoya claims she thought that he was
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: reaching for one of his guns, and that she simply
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: shot first in order to defend herself. Cutthroats had given
• 5:52
  Speaker 1: Centoya a gun to protect herself with when working, and
• 5:57
  Speaker 1: as Johnny had been reaching for something that Centoya could not,
• 6:00
  Speaker 1: Cintoya spun around and shot him in the back of
• 6:03
  Speaker 1: the head. Then, allegedly, terrified of showing back up at
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: home empty handed, she stole one hundred seventy two dollars
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: from Johnny's wallets and a couple of his firearms before
• 6:14
  Speaker 1: jumping into Johnny's truck and driving off. She abandoned the
• 6:18
  Speaker 1: truck in a wal Mart parking lot before hitchhiking her
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: way back home. This was the version of events that
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: Centoya told the investigators and the courts, but as everyone
• 6:29
  Speaker 1: would find out, things were rarely black and white, with
• 6:32
  Speaker 1: Centoya still only a homeless runaway child who'd been forced
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: into prostitution by her older and abusive boyfriend. Cintoya seemed
• 6:41
  Speaker 1: to take killing Johnny in stride. She called up a
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: neighbor the next day asking for a lift to that
• 6:47
  Speaker 1: same car park where she'd abandon Johnny's car the night before.
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: I shot somebody in the head last night and blew
• 6:54
  Speaker 1: his brains out. Detectives took down a witness statement from
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: this neighbor claiming that Cento Zoya had then asked him
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: to drive her to Johnny's house. She also apparently said
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: that she'd stolen fifty thousand dollars and some guns from
• 7:08
  Speaker 1: the man she'd killed. The neighbor refused to take Centoya
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: to Johnny's house, and once she found out that her
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: neighbor had reported her to the police, she called him
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: up to threaten him. You'd better stop running your effing
• 7:20
  Speaker 1: mouth about my business, or I'll get to you too,
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: she warned him. But instead of killing her neighbor, Centoya
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: actually called nine to one one and confessed to killing Johnny.
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: She was arrested and charged with murder. There was no
• 7:34
  Speaker 1: question of her guilt, but the system needed to figure
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: out if Centoya would be tried as a miner or.
• 7:39
  Speaker 1: As an adult, she was still only sixteen years old,
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: but her crime had been a big and serious one.
• 7:47
  Speaker 1: A juvenile court judge eventually ruled that Centoya's case was
• 7:50
  Speaker 1: too much of a risk to the community for her
• 7:52
  Speaker 1: to be tried as a miner. Centoya kept claiming self
• 7:55
  Speaker 1: defense and that she'd believe Johnny had been reaching for
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: a gun. The acution argued that there had been no
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: firearm in Johnny's bedroom, and that, judging by the position
• 8:05
  Speaker 1: he'd been found in, he'd actually been sleeping at the
• 8:08
  Speaker 1: time of the shooting. Cintoya, they argued, hadn't felt like
• 8:13
  Speaker 1: she'd been in danger that night. She'd killed Johnny simply
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: so that she could rob him. The defense claimed that
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: Johnny had been much much more than what he'd seemed
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: to be on the surface. They said that what he
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: was was a forty three year old predator, and his
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: prey had been the sixteen year old girl that he'd
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: been intent on sexually assaulting that night. To prove this,
• 8:34
  Speaker 1: they produced a witness who claimed that Johnny had brought
• 8:37
  Speaker 1: her to his home one night, just like he had
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: with Centoya. He then began kissing and fondling her, but
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: when the girl had said that she didn't want to
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: have sex with him, Johnny raped her. The jury heard
• 8:49
  Speaker 1: evidence both for and against Centoya's claims of self defense,
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: but ultimately they ruled that Centoya's motives had not been pure.
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: She was found guilty a first degree murder, and because
• 9:02
  Speaker 1: she was being tried as an adult, her punishment would
• 9:05
  Speaker 1: be much more severe than if she were being sentenced
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: as a minor. Centoya was facing life in prison with
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: the possibility of parole after fifty one years, meaning that
• 9:15
  Speaker 1: she would be at least sixty seven by the time
• 9:17
  Speaker 1: she saw the outside world again. But Centoya got to
• 9:21
  Speaker 1: work making the most out of her sentence. She first
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: earned her ged, then a liberal arts degree, then a
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: bachelor's degree, both of which she actually graduated with a
• 9:31
  Speaker 1: four point zero GPA. It looked like Centoya was doing
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: everything she could to turn her life around, despite the
• 9:38
  Speaker 1: over half century she would have to wait to put
• 9:41
  Speaker 1: any of her new degrees to good use. And then
• 9:44
  Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen, words spread about Centoia and what had
• 9:49
  Speaker 1: happened to her. Rhianna, Kim Kardashian, Snoop Dogg, and many
• 9:53
  Speaker 1: others made social media posts in support of Centoya after
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: hearing her story in a documentary. They helped put the
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: public pressure on the system to grant Centoya her freedom.
• 10:04
  Speaker 1: She found herself in a clemency hearing with many people
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: testifying on her behalf and arguing for her release, including
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: the prosecutor, Preston Ship, who had helped put Cintoya behind
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: bars in the first place. But she also had people
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: arguing against her release, including Charles Robinson, the lead detective
• 10:23
  Speaker 1: on Johnny's case. He told the board that he didn't
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: believe that there was any physical evidence to support Centoya's
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: claims of self defense, or even that she was being
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: trafficked in the first place. The boards split into three.
• 10:37
  Speaker 1: They were those who supported Centoya, those who wanted to
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: keep her in prison for the rest of her term,
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: and those who wanted to reduce her sentence. While the
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: board continued to debate Centoya's future, the Tennessee Supreme Court
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: was wrestling with the same question. Was it right to
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: lock up a sixteen year old and throw away the key?
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: Governor Bill Haslam didn't think so, and an his final
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: month in office, he commuted Centoya's sentenced to fifteen years,
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: which she had already served, plus ten years of supervised parole.
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: She was released from prison in the summer of twenty nineteen.
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: That's ten minute murder for today Brief and binge Able
• 11:26
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• 11:30
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• 11:32
  Speaker 1: let me be honest with you, I have not watched
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: that documentary about Sentatoya Brown, and you would think doing
• 11:40
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• 11:43
  Speaker 1: to come at this from, I would have watched that documentary,
• 11:46
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• 11:49
  Speaker 1: I almost did, but then I started thinking about the
• 11:51
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• 11:56
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• 12:00
  Speaker 1: lot of evidence they didn't put in that documentary on purpose.
• 12:03
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• 12:10
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• 12:13
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• 12:17
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• 12:20
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• 12:22
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• 12:25
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• 12:28
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• 12:30
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• 12:33
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• 12:36
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• 12:39
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• 12:43
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• 12:46
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• 12:48
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