Latest / Wicked and Grim: A True Crime Podcast / The Kuřim Case - Part 1

Transcript

The Kuřim Case - Part 1 · Wicked and Grim: A True Crime Podcast

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: In two thousand and seven, a man in the checked
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: town of Curim turned his baby monitor on, expecting to
• 0:12
  Speaker 1: see his own sleeping child, and instead what he saw
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: was a grainy feet of an unknown boy locked in
• 0:19
  Speaker 1: a dark room, bruised and terrified. That accidental glimpse of
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: horror pulled police into a secret world hidden behind an
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: ordinary front door, and by the time investigators uncovered the truth,
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: the case had spiraled into one of Europe's strangest stories
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: of abuse, deception, and calculated manipulation that no one could
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: have ever seen coming. This is the story simply known
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: as the Curum Case.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: My name's Ben, I'm Nicole, and you're listening to Wicked
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: and Grim, a.
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: True crime podcasting following you more mature audience listener. It
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: is frosty and foggy out this morning, and oh man,
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: it looks creepy. Did you notice that tree over there?
• 1:33
  Speaker 2: No, it's weird. We have the creepiest tree in the field,
• 1:38
  Speaker 2: like tree line that we've never noticed. But I think
• 1:41
  Speaker 2: it's just being hit right right now with the light
• 1:43
  Speaker 2: and it's like very eerie.
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, there's no leaves on it. It's like back lit
• 1:47
  Speaker 1: by white is white fog and then everything is like frosted,
• 1:51
  Speaker 1: so it's really standing out in like contrast, we didn't
• 1:54
  Speaker 1: really notice how creepy it looked before. It's almost as
• 1:56
  Speaker 1: creepy as the tree in our logo. It's the same
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: kind of tree, cottonwood tree.
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it's just a little bit smaller, I would I
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: would say it is.
• 2:04
  Speaker 1: It's not as it's not as creepy as our our
• 2:06
  Speaker 1: logo tree, but it is. It is very akin to.
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: Yes, and it's showing off today.
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: It is. Has anyone else started their Christmas shopping? Because
• 2:17
  Speaker 1: I know Nicole has. She's been in like full Christmas
• 2:20
  Speaker 1: shopping mode. And maybe it's all the frost that's hitting
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: those trees that's getting you in that mood. I don't know.
• 2:24
  Speaker 2: Well really only since like Sunday, I feel.
• 2:27
  Speaker 1: Like, yeah, and it's been full force.
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: Well, I think the reason behind this is because I
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: don't love how busy the shops get, Like the closer
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: you get to Christmas, Yeah, and they're starting to get
• 2:38
  Speaker 2: really busy, and I'm just like already a little bit panicking,
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: not panicking, but my.
• 2:44
  Speaker 1: People anxiety levels.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: You're already spiked your people's skills, your so I'm like,
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: I gotta get this shit done because I can't handle
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: this if it gets even more busy.
• 2:55
  Speaker 1: There needs to be a word for that. You're you're
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: peopling ability. I don't know. Yeah, I know you're saying,
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: but I.
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: Know what would be the word for that, Your.
• 3:03
  Speaker 1: Social level, your social media I don't know.
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, something like that capacity. There you go.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: I don't know. Anyways, Nicole may or may not be
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: getting sick, so she might sound a little interesting today
• 3:15
  Speaker 1: where we're still figuring out if it's just because she's
• 3:17
  Speaker 1: groggy because she just woke up, or if she's actually
• 3:19
  Speaker 1: getting sick. Hopefully it's not the latter.
• 3:22
  Speaker 2: I know I didn't feel great last night either, so
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: I think it's something. But we'll just see if it
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: amounts to much. Hopefully it doesn't.
• 3:28
  Speaker 1: Well, fingers crossed for you. Maybe we'll make you some
• 3:30
  Speaker 1: tea and some hot chocolate and soup and stuff like
• 3:32
  Speaker 1: that and make you feel better.
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I'm about to go clean a chicken coop after this.
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: You think that will that will help?
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Probably not. Well, I don't know if this case will
• 3:41
  Speaker 1: help at all. But it is a dang interesting one,
• 3:44
  Speaker 1: that is for sure. It is known as the Curum case,
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: and it was requested on Patreon.
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: So it sounds pretty interesting.
• 3:51
  Speaker 1: So we did a whole like request feed we do frequently,
• 3:54
  Speaker 1: like at least once a month, once a month or
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: so like something like that. We do requests and stuff
• 3:58
  Speaker 1: like that, and Julie actually requested this one. And Julie's
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: been a part of our Patreon family and all that
• 4:04
  Speaker 1: for a long time. And as soon as she drops
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: a case, I know it's going to be a good one.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: So right out of the gate it piqued my interests.
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: I started digging into it and I was like, damn son, So.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, and this is a two parters.
• 4:17
  Speaker 1: It not it is going to be two part well
• 4:21
  Speaker 1: it's in the title on part ten. It is a
• 4:23
  Speaker 1: two parter, so if you miss it in the title, yes,
• 4:25
  Speaker 1: this is the first part of the Kurum case. And
• 4:29
  Speaker 1: I don't know if my English translations of many of
• 4:32
  Speaker 1: these names and locations are going to be all that great,
• 4:35
  Speaker 1: but bear with me. I will be doing my best.
• 4:37
  Speaker 1: I have done like Google pronunciations and stuff on them,
• 4:40
  Speaker 1: so just an FYI own that, but even still, I'm
• 4:44
  Speaker 1: just gonna do my best. Let's pove it that way.
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: Well, I know, we get we do get flat for
• 4:48
  Speaker 2: that sometimes and we literally do Google pronunciation just so
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: everybody is aware.
• 4:54
  Speaker 1: Yes, but it steers us wrong many a times. Other
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: other times it's it's like, oh, well that's obvious, see
• 5:00
  Speaker 1: how you pronounce it, and it's still just wrong, like yeah,
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: you don't Google Google pronounce it because we're like, oh,
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: that's you know this, And then no, it's there's actually
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: an accent or that's a silent l or who.
• 5:10
  Speaker 2: Knows right, So oh yeah, absolutely. When you don't live
• 5:13
  Speaker 2: in the area, sometimes it's very hard to know how
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: some thing's pronounced.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: Right or sure, there's a lot of places in British
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: Columbia where we live that we know how to pronounce that.
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: I know people have pronounced horrifically wrong. Yeah, in podcasts.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: So it's just part of the nature of storytelling, it is. Yeah,
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: but I digress. I'm going to do my best, and
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: I think it's time to get into this.
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: O hey, let's do it.
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: So on May seventh, two thousand and seven, Kurum resident
• 5:38
  Speaker 1: Edward Trida was standing in his living room doing something
• 5:41
  Speaker 1: patentfully ordinary. Honestly, he was trying to set up a
• 5:44
  Speaker 1: baby monitor that refused to cooperate. He flipped through the channels,
• 5:48
  Speaker 1: going through the manual, and he's expecting, you know, the
• 5:50
  Speaker 1: usual static sort of thing, maybe a faint signal from
• 5:53
  Speaker 1: his son's bedroom down the hall to finally show up
• 5:55
  Speaker 1: as he's working on this, But instead of a picture
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: in from the familiar bedroom in his house, soon an
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: image sharpened that he didn't recognize. It was a small,
• 6:07
  Speaker 1: cramped space lit only by a harsh infrared light cutting
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: through the darkness. The picture was grainy, you know the
• 6:13
  Speaker 1: way old security cameras look, but clear enough to make
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: out a boy sitting there. He was thin, naked and
• 6:21
  Speaker 1: lying on the floor with his wrists wrapped tightly in tape.
• 6:24
  Speaker 1: He moved slowly, like every motion hurt, dragging himself inch
• 6:28
  Speaker 1: at a time. Edward froze. This wasn't his house, this
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: wasn't his son. It definitely wasn't a scene anyone ever
• 6:36
  Speaker 1: would expect to pick up on a baby monitor. He
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: waited for the image to glitch away, thinking it was
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: maybe a figment of his imagination, but it didn't. The
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: boy stayed there, shifting, weak and clearly in distress, for
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: a few moments, Edward tried to convince himself it was
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: some kind of I don't know, test feed, accidental crossover
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: from another device, like maybe a TV from you know,
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: a neighborhood, a neighbor in the neighborhood. But nothing about
• 7:02
  Speaker 1: this footage looked stage, fake or harmless. The longer he stared,
• 7:09
  Speaker 1: the more obvious it became that this child clearly needed help.
• 7:13
  Speaker 1: So he did the only thing that made sense. He
• 7:15
  Speaker 1: called the police. Officers arrived quickly and watched the same
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: disturbing image on the monitor, and based on short transmission
• 7:23
  Speaker 1: ranges of this device, they realized soon that the feed
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: would have to be coming from somewhere extremely close.
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: A neighbor basically, which is terrifying.
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: Exactly most likely a neighbor on the street. So when
• 7:37
  Speaker 1: officers approached that home and knocked, a woman answered calmly,
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: insisting that nothing was wrong. But at that same moment,
• 7:44
  Speaker 1: back in Edward's living room, the feed, you know, it flickered.
• 7:48
  Speaker 1: They could hear things that were happening in the house,
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: and yeah, it was clear this was the place. It
• 7:56
  Speaker 1: was enough for police to push past the front door,
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: and they didn't know it yet, but they were about
• 8:01
  Speaker 1: to uncover one of the strangest and most disturbing cases
• 8:04
  Speaker 1: in modern Czech history, one that began with a baby
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: monitor as we all know, and a boy no one
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: was supposed to see now before the investigation ever reached
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: that front door. Though the Minerva family seems unremarkable from
• 8:19
  Speaker 1: the outside, they were the kind of family people would
• 8:22
  Speaker 1: describe with phrases like quiet, you know, kept to themselves,
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: that sort of thing. Clara Marnova was born on January thirtieth,
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven, the middle of three sisters. She grew
• 8:33
  Speaker 1: up in Burnout, in the household defined by routine, strict
• 8:36
  Speaker 1: morals and a heavy dose of religion. Church wasn't an
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: option for them. It was an expectation. So were the commandments,
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: you know, obedience and the idea that God had a
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: plan for everyone.
• 8:50
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: Clara took that last part the most serious of all,
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: more serious than most do. In fact, her older sister,
• 8:55
  Speaker 1: Katerina was born in nineteen seventy three, and she did too.
• 8:59
  Speaker 1: As teenagers, the girls started talking about visions, dreams where
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: God actually showed up and singled them out, saying that
• 9:06
  Speaker 1: they were chosen for something far greater than most people. Now,
• 9:11
  Speaker 1: teachers kind of started noticing these shifts in behavior, these dreams,
• 9:16
  Speaker 1: if you will, and before long social workers would get involved.
• 9:20
  Speaker 1: Now the girls weren't violent, but their grand ideas and
• 9:23
  Speaker 1: intense religion fixations while it raised enough red flags that
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: officials suggested psychiatric evaluation, but nothing ever came of it.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: Their mother refused any treatment, saying instead that her daughters
• 9:35
  Speaker 1: were fine, effectively just turning a blind eye to the situation,
• 9:39
  Speaker 1: and so whatever was happening inside their heads was allowed
• 9:42
  Speaker 1: to keep unfolding, unchecked. The sisters eventually grew up, They
• 9:47
  Speaker 1: moved on, and, at least on the surface, settled into
• 9:50
  Speaker 1: adult life. Clara married a man whose name was Radic,
• 9:54
  Speaker 1: and for a while life was normal. She gave birth
• 9:57
  Speaker 1: to her first son, Jacob, at twenty and two years
• 10:01
  Speaker 1: later came Andre. She studied economics, worked in an office,
• 10:05
  Speaker 1: kept up with the bills in school schedules, just like
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: any other young mother would. But the intensity she carried
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: as a teenager, while it never really faded, and by
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: her mid twenties, the stress of marriage, motherhood, well, they
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: were enough to crack whatever stability that she built. She
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: started to become a bit withdrawn convinced once again that
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: she was meant for something far bigger, some bigger mission,
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: and that her husband and children were distracting her from
• 10:31
  Speaker 1: this mission. Arguments followed radic while he eventually found for
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: divorce with their marriage crumbling, and Clara took the boys
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: and left. This should have been a turning point where
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: she could potentially find balance or maybe you know, lead
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: on her wider family for support. Now she did lean
• 10:49
  Speaker 1: on family, but instead she drifted back to the one
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: person whose worldview mirrored her own, her sister, Katerina. They
• 10:58
  Speaker 1: moved in together and shared an apartment, two sisters, two
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: young boys, all under one roof, and for a short
• 11:04
  Speaker 1: stretch of time it worked. For this stretch, the Minerva
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: household looked like any ordinary one. After the divorce and move,
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: Clara settled into routine, one that actually made sense from
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: an outside. She worked, she parented, and she leaned on
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: her sister in any practical way that she needed to.
• 11:23
  Speaker 1: The two women lived in Burnho, sharing a modest apartment
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: and carving out that life. By all accounts, it didn't
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: raise any alarms. Clara handled her office job and continued
• 11:34
  Speaker 1: her studies, while Katerina worked as a manager at a
• 11:36
  Speaker 1: local youth center, the kind of place filled with you know,
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: craft tables, noise, and the after school chaos of kids
• 11:42
  Speaker 1: who don't really want to sit still very well, and
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: of course, the boys, Jacob and Andre, were thriving. Jacob
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: was the older brother of the two, and he had
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: a gentle, thoughtful streak. He loved dinosaurs, books, and baseball.
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: He played the flute and was a kind of kid
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: that teachers described as being very polite. Andre, the younger
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: of the two boys, was two years younger, and he
• 12:06
  Speaker 1: had more energy than while their apartment could reasonably contain.
• 12:09
  Speaker 1: He liked hockey, running, and really anything that let him
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: burn through. All that restless enthusiasm.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: That's probably most common really.
• 12:18
  Speaker 1: Honestly, I think it, honestly is yes, that energy that
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: oh my god, he never stops and just go, go, go.
• 12:24
  Speaker 1: I think that is something very common.
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: I look at that often. I'm like, oh, I wish
• 12:28
  Speaker 2: I had that kind of energy.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Instead, I have the energy of, well, how our
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: dog is laying right now, She's just belly up, just
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: live in her best life.
• 12:38
  Speaker 2: She is a good vibe.
• 12:39
  Speaker 1: She does now. Friends and co workers who knew Clara
• 12:42
  Speaker 1: during this period. Remember her as a good mother. She
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: was a tentative, soft spoken, and reliable. She was someone
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: who asked questions at parent meetings, packed lunches, and genuinely
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: cared about providing stability for her two sons. If you
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: looked at them then nothing would have stood out, no
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: strange behavior warning, any sort of hints on what would
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: eventually take place in the home. In fact, she might
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: even admire her for how she would be parenting.
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 13:07
  Speaker 1: Even the dynamic between the sisters it seemed balanced. Clara
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: was well. She was a bit of the emotional one
• 13:13
  Speaker 1: in Katerina, she was the organized one. But under that
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: thin layer of normalcy, the old patterns were still there.
• 13:21
  Speaker 1: The grand beliefs, the unaddressed mental health issues, the religious intensity,
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: all the things at once made their teachers uneasy. It
• 13:29
  Speaker 1: had simply gone dormant underground for a while, and it
• 13:33
  Speaker 1: wouldn't stay buried for long, because in two thousand and five,
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: the sisters, while their quiet, predictable life changed moments a
• 13:41
  Speaker 1: new child entered the picture. It started with a conversation
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: that didn't sound unusual. Katerina mentioned a new girl at
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: the youth center, a quiet, thirteen year old named Anika,
• 13:54
  Speaker 1: who had just arrived from Norway. Her story, however, was
• 13:58
  Speaker 1: not exactly what one would call or. According to Katerina,
• 14:01
  Speaker 1: the girl had endured more in her short life than
• 14:04
  Speaker 1: most adults could ever imagine. Both of her parents were dead,
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: and she spent years drifting through harsh orphanage jiz and
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: the abuse was so severe it left her withdrawn and
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: extremely skittish. As if that weren't enough, she was now
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: supposedly battling leukemia on top of it all.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: Are you kidding?
• 14:23
  Speaker 1: And she's thirteen thirteen and doctors were unsure if she'd
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: even survived past sixteen years old.
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: Holy shit, what a life? No kidding, that's really not fair. Now.
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: When Clara finally met the girl, every detail reinforced this impression.
• 14:38
  Speaker 1: Annika appeared tiny for her age. She was unnervingly thin.
• 14:42
  Speaker 1: Her shaved head even explained the chemotherapy all of it.
• 14:45
  Speaker 1: She spoke softly, hiding her face. She clung to Clara
• 14:48
  Speaker 1: more than anyone else in the room. Actually, her behavior
• 14:52
  Speaker 1: was actually a little odd, childlike at moments and strangely
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: self aware the next. But trauma can warp a young
• 14:58
  Speaker 1: person in all kinds of ways, and Clara saw this
• 15:01
  Speaker 1: frightened child who needed stability, needed help, needed someone who
• 15:06
  Speaker 1: could give affection in overwhelming doses. And when Anika leaned
• 15:11
  Speaker 1: towards her, seeking attention, comfort and everything that you know,
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: she needed, Clara responded instinctively. I mean she was a
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: mother after all. Right. Within weeks, the girl had become
• 15:23
  Speaker 1: a near constant presence in her home and in her
• 15:25
  Speaker 1: thoughts too. What Clara didn't see, however, was how expertly
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: that girl adapted herself, how she shifted her behavior depending
• 15:34
  Speaker 1: on what could draw Clara closer, how quick she was
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: to request help or praise or even physical closeness, and
• 15:42
  Speaker 1: how she began acting as though Clara was the only
• 15:45
  Speaker 1: adult she fully trusted. It all worked exactly as this
• 15:49
  Speaker 1: girl intended, and it set the stage for a decision
• 15:53
  Speaker 1: Clara believed was both compassionate and divinely meaningful. She agreed
• 15:59
  Speaker 1: to begin the lead process to adopt this fragile, unlucky
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: child named Anka.
• 16:05
  Speaker 2: So I just have to say, like Honica has been
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: living her life in foster care and has learned how
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: to just like adapt to what other people want and
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: need from her, is sort of what you're saying.
• 16:18
  Speaker 1: Not quite. Let me explain. Okay, So what no one realized,
• 16:23
  Speaker 1: not even Clara, not the YOU Center, or the officials
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: that worked with her, or even officials that signed the
• 16:28
  Speaker 1: later adoption papers, was that this girl in front of
• 16:31
  Speaker 1: them was not a thirteen year old girl. She was
• 16:34
  Speaker 1: not a sick girl named Anica at all. Her name
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: was actually Barbara Scarlova, a fully grown woman deep into
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: her thirties, perfectly aware of the manipulation she was doing.
• 16:49
  Speaker 2: Seriously, Yes, and she was under care though correct. Oh wow,
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: okay I was. If I had a thousand guesses, I
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: don't think I would have guessed that.
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: I didn't think you would.
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: Now.
• 17:02
  Speaker 1: Whenever something in Anica's story felt off, which that's what
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: I'll be referring to her for for now, Anica, Clara
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: reassured herself that there was one thought in her head.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: A doctor was involved. And this doctor was a specialist
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: in childhood trauma and also the same man treating her
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: for leukemia, someone who supposedly understood the girl's pain better
• 17:23
  Speaker 1: than Clara ever could. But this doctor, well, he never
• 17:27
  Speaker 1: appeared in person per se. Every instruction came through emails
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: and text messages, always late at night too. And always
• 17:34
  Speaker 1: written with a strangely commanding tone. He framed himself as
• 17:39
  Speaker 1: both a therapist and medical guardian, offering guidance that sounded
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: scientific enough to be believable, at least at first. Then
• 17:47
  Speaker 1: eventually the advice deepened into some more uncomfortable territory. He
• 17:52
  Speaker 1: encouraged Clara to give the girl long, full body massages
• 17:56
  Speaker 1: under the guise of desensitization therapy. He insisted she keep
• 18:02
  Speaker 1: close physical contact, monitor the girl's reactions constantly, and maintained
• 18:08
  Speaker 1: relentless emotional reassurance. If Clara felt unsure, he shut down
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: any doubt immediately, saying, quote, trauma survivors deteriorate when challenged. Meanwhile, Anika,
• 18:22
  Speaker 1: while she behaved exactly in ways that reinforce his claims,
• 18:26
  Speaker 1: she stopped walking, saying her legs hurt too much. She
• 18:30
  Speaker 1: refused to eat unless Clara fed her directly. She was
• 18:34
  Speaker 1: startled whenever Jacob or Andrea came into the room and
• 18:37
  Speaker 1: whispered accusations that they teased her, they pushed her, and
• 18:42
  Speaker 1: scared her. Of course, no one ever witnessed these moments,
• 18:45
  Speaker 1: though it was only her who had seen it happen,
• 18:49
  Speaker 1: of course, and yet the fear she projected was so
• 18:53
  Speaker 1: convincing that Clara reacted automatically, disciplining her boys and pushing
• 18:58
  Speaker 1: them away. At the same time, Little by little, Clara
• 19:03
  Speaker 1: began shaping her daily routine and life around the girl's moods.
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: Outings were canceled, family routines shifted, and the boys found
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: themselves blamed for well a lot of things more often
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: than not, and they were watched a lot more closely too,
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: and punished even more severely for things. The doctor never
• 19:21
  Speaker 1: backed off either. Each message nudged Clara a little further
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: towards the edge, and by then Clara was She was exhausted,
• 19:29
  Speaker 1: emotionally raw, and dependent on the two influences she believed
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: were guiding her, her sister and this unseen professional who
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: claimed to know exactly what this child needed. The possibility
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: that she was being manipulated will it never even registered
• 19:44
  Speaker 1: to her, But the pattern forming around her was. While
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: it was not therapeutic, it was strategic. The household was
• 19:52
  Speaker 1: slowly being reorganized around Anica, turning Clara into a servant
• 19:57
  Speaker 1: of someone she didn't actually understand, someone who had no
• 20:02
  Speaker 1: official identity. Actually, there were no documents that proved anything
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: about her past, no school file, no medical history, nothing
• 20:09
  Speaker 1: that tied Onnica to any sort of situation or institution.
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: And instead of seeing this as a warning sign, Clara
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: interpreted it as evidence of her life of hardship. Now
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: this doctor reinforces the idea too, explaining that years of
• 20:23
  Speaker 1: mistreatment and displacement had erased much of the girl's recorded history.
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: He insisted the only way to move forward was give
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: her an entirely new beginning. Now, for the adoption process,
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: authorities needed confirmation of the girl's age, So Clara brought
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: Anica to a hospital for evaluation. What Clara didn't witness
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: or didn't understand, was that someone else accompanied her Onnica
• 20:48
  Speaker 1: into the examination room. A genuine teenage girl stood in
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: for Onnica.
• 20:55
  Speaker 2: What, Okay, this is the most messed up thing I've
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: ever heard.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: Yeah, So doctor's examine in this teenage girl as the substitute,
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: and they reasonably concluded that she was around the age
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: of thirteen or fourteen years.
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: Old, which I could see happening quite easily. Definitely that
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: you would just assume, oh, that's like her mom or
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: the one wanting to adopt her. This as the teenager
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: and Yeah, that could work. I mean, I'm probably did well.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that assessment. It became the foundation of a completely
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: legal new identity. Is so now they had a forged
• 21:28
  Speaker 1: medical summary, a testimony from Clara and Katerina, and digital
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: correspondence from this so called doctor, and the court saw
• 21:35
  Speaker 1: no reason to doubt the case whatsoever. So judges and
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: social workers viewed Clara as a compassionate woman trying to
• 21:41
  Speaker 1: rescue a child who had survived unthinkable circumstances, and so
• 21:46
  Speaker 1: they approved the adoption and issued a birth certificate listing
• 21:50
  Speaker 1: the girl as Anica Mernova born December two, nineteen ninety three.
• 21:55
  Speaker 1: The reality, of course, was she was nowhere near thirteen
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: years old, was not exactly the person they thought she was.
• 22:04
  Speaker 1: You see, Barbara Scerlova, who was pretending to be this
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: thirteen year old Onika, was a person with a long
• 22:11
  Speaker 1: pattern of mimicking children in her history. She was actually
• 22:15
  Speaker 1: in her early thirties, mid thirties around there, and her
• 22:17
  Speaker 1: small stature, her youthful face, and hormonal growth disorder made
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: her disguise unusually effective. But it was her ability to
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: manipulate others that made the whole scheme possible. Once the
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: adoption was complete. Barbara didn't just have a place to stay,
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: she had a legitimate identity she could use anywhere. It
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: gave her freedom, protection, and a level of control over
• 22:42
  Speaker 1: Clara that went far beyond any sort of emotional dependence.
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: So now with it all official, the atmosphere inside the
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: Menova home changed in ways. The boys were too young
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: to understand. What had begun as minor tension grew into
• 22:57
  Speaker 1: a steady reorganization of the household, which quote unquote Anika
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: placed at the center and Jacob and Andrea pushed towards
• 23:05
  Speaker 1: the edges.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: See, I still don't I'm having trouble getting this because, like,
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: I just don't understand why. I mean, I'm sure it
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: will come very clear, but I don't understand why a
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: full grown ass woman, yeah, would want to do this
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: like you could. Why would you want to like just
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: become a child.
• 23:23
  Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know. People do a lot of
• 23:25
  Speaker 1: fucked up things, and this is definitely one of them.
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: Because I don't know, I'm just my brain is just
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: spinning because it just doesn't make sense.
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: Well, she's not wanting to become a child, per se.
• 23:35
  Speaker 1: I think I think it's more about the manipulation on
• 23:38
  Speaker 1: other people, so she gets free living, free food, people
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: who are caring for her, doting on her, and all
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: this sort of stuff.
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but I guess I just feel like it would
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: be so much easier to get a job and then
• 23:49
  Speaker 2: you can to get your own apartment and like.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: Live your life, and would definitely be the more legal
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: way of going yeah, the more ethical way of outgoing
• 23:56
  Speaker 1: about it. But instead she chose this for whatever reason.
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: I just feel like that would just be all around
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: a better choice. But okay, here we are.
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: Here we are now. The first major step was pulling
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: the boys out of school. Clara told teachers it was temporary,
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: you know, it's part of a home base program recommended
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: by this doctor. She repeated the same explanation to their
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: father and other relatives too when asked about it. But
• 24:21
  Speaker 1: the reality was she was eliminating outside influence. With the
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: boys at home full time, the household became a closed
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: loop where every interaction took place under the watchful eye
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: of the girl Clara believed she was saving. Their world
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: had narrowed down to the layout of the house, and
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: the emotional landscape was dictated by Anika. Whenever she appeared
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: frightened or upset, Clara redirected her frustration towards the boys.
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: If they laughed too loudly, she said it distressed the girl.
• 24:52
  Speaker 1: If they touched something, she considered hers it while she
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: took it as an attack. Even small disagreements became evidence
• 24:59
  Speaker 1: of malice, fed by anxious trembling Anica sitting in the
• 25:03
  Speaker 1: corner scared now. Punishments initially started small, you know, early
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: bed times, some scoldings, but they quickly escalated, and soon
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: they became abuse, things like being forced to kneel for
• 25:17
  Speaker 1: extended periods, standing perfectly still for long stretches of time,
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: or being deprived of meals for minor infractions. Clara viewed
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: these consequences as simple discipline. In fact, they were something
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: the doctor approved of, even or even encouraged. The boys
• 25:34
  Speaker 1: began living their lives filled with caution, unsure what might
• 25:38
  Speaker 1: set off the next round of consequences and discipline. More
• 25:42
  Speaker 1: physical punishments soon followed two things like discipline with a
• 25:46
  Speaker 1: wooden spoon or a belt, or even open handed strikes
• 25:50
  Speaker 1: delivered in moments. When Clara believed the boys had frightened Anica,
• 25:54
  Speaker 1: she didn't seem to notice that Onnica never really displayed
• 25:57
  Speaker 1: fear around anyone else, nor did she ever flinch when
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: adults were near. The reactions appeared only when Clara was
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: alone with her sons, as if performed for an audience
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: of one person. The boys, as a result, grew quieter. Andre,
• 26:12
  Speaker 1: the younger of the two, started flinching at sudden sounds.
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: Jacob adopted a very careful routine of speaking minimally, completing
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: chores quickly, and avoiding eye contact whenever Anica entered the room.
• 26:25
  Speaker 2: That's so sad for them. She's basically ruining their childhood
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: and their life.
• 26:29
  Speaker 1: She is, she's manipulating the whole thing, and these young
• 26:32
  Speaker 1: boys that they're starting to understand that their safest moments
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: are when they go like unnoticed, when attention isn't paid
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: to them.
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: My gosh, I hate that.
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: It's heartbreaking.
• 26:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 26:44
  Speaker 1: Now, during this period, Anica became steadily more demanding. She
• 26:48
  Speaker 1: even rejected the boys entirely. She refused to share space
• 26:53
  Speaker 1: with them and positioned herself as someone delicate enough to
• 26:56
  Speaker 1: require constant supervision. And the doctor's message, of course, reinforced
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: all of this, describing the girl as emotionally fragile and
• 27:04
  Speaker 1: easily traumatized by any sort of disturbance, and Clara, well
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: already overwhelmed and exhausted, believed it all. She saw herself
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: as the one balancing both the care for a damaged
• 27:16
  Speaker 1: child and the discipline of two boys she thought were
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: becoming more increasingly hostile. But the real breaking point came
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: when the family left the house altogether and moved temporarily
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: to relocate to Bruno or just outside. It was a
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: place that the adults would soon call the cottage. It
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: marked a clear transition from functional parenting to something far
• 27:39
  Speaker 1: more controlling and deliberate. Clara and Katerina referred to it
• 27:43
  Speaker 1: as a place for re education, but the reality was
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: the setting here well, it was where the world around
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: the boys would completely collapse. The cottage sat away from neighbors,
• 27:55
  Speaker 1: surrounded by trees and quiet roads. It was the kind
• 27:57
  Speaker 1: of place where no one would hear shouting or screams,
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: or noticed children not stepping outside to the group. That
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: isolation wasn't a drawback actually of this place. It was
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: the entire point of this place. They wanted privacy for
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: what they claimed were tests, corrections, and purification exercises. Those were,
• 28:18
  Speaker 1: of course words, not from the boys, but the adults
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: in the home. Inside that home or a cottage, everything
• 28:27
  Speaker 1: and I mean everything was controlled. The adults locked Jacob
• 28:30
  Speaker 1: and Andre into cramped metal dog cages. Neither cage allowed
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: them to stand comfortably what The food arrived irregularly, Their
• 28:38
  Speaker 1: toilet was a bucket, and they were forbidden from speaking
• 28:41
  Speaker 1: to each other and punished if they did. Sleep came
• 28:45
  Speaker 1: in very short, broken intervals, to interrupted by shouting, cold
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: splashes of water, or sudden orders and demands for them
• 28:52
  Speaker 1: to do something or tasks or chores. These punishments were
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: not random oltbursts. They were structured. Each adult participated. When
• 29:00
  Speaker 1: I'm saying adults, I want to make it clear I
• 29:02
  Speaker 1: am including Anica in this as well. So when I
• 29:05
  Speaker 1: say adults from here and out, it does include her too.
• 29:09
  Speaker 1: The sisters may think she's a child, but she is
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: an adult and she is very much so taking part
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: in many of these disciplines and abuse situations too.
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: This is like so messed up. Yeah, it is, I
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: am having trump. We've ben listening to this because it's
• 29:25
  Speaker 2: just it's fucked.
• 29:27
  Speaker 1: I can't believe it got to this point. I don't
• 29:31
  Speaker 1: understand it, But here we are because like.
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: The two like the two boys are her flesh and
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: blood here, but.
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: She's being manipulated to think that they're misbehaving, and then
• 29:41
  Speaker 1: her religious upbringing a mixed with her delusions of grandeur,
• 29:46
  Speaker 1: are allowing her to think that she needs to do
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: these outlandish discipline structuring whatever you want to call it,
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: to fix them while she's trying to take care of
• 29:57
  Speaker 1: this new fragile.
• 30:01
  Speaker 2: I know, yeah, like it makes sense in a way,
• 30:04
  Speaker 2: but it also just doesn't you know.
• 30:07
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I get you the path, how we got here,
• 30:12
  Speaker 1: I can see it, but it is so fucked up.
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, like it. I mean it probably it took some
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: time and stuff to get here. I get that, but
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: also it's just like unfathomable to me that it did
• 30:25
  Speaker 2: get here.
• 30:25
  Speaker 1: Well, manipulation does a lot, right, I mean, yeah, that
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: it's manipulation for a reason.
• 30:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: Now, some beatings with these two boys came with belts
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: or woulden't implements, as I kind of mentioned already, But
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: other times the boys were forced to kneel until their
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: legs shook, or remain naked in a corner while the
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: adults lectured them about obedience. Loud industrial music was played
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: for long stretches too, not for entertainment, but to disorient them,
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: specifically drowning out their crying and keep them awake and
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: prevent any sort of sleeping. One incident occurred where Jacob
• 30:56
  Speaker 1: was forced to lie in a shallow pit outside a
• 31:00
  Speaker 1: hole the adults referred to as a grave. He was
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: not to move, He was to lie there, not breathe
• 31:08
  Speaker 1: too loudly, and stay as still as he could, as
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: if he were dead. Then Andre, who believed everything he
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: was told at that age, was ordered to start burying
• 31:17
  Speaker 1: his brother, shoveling dirt onto him.
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, like the trauma that would be coming from
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: this one.
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: Hundred percent these adults, they told him that he had
• 31:28
  Speaker 1: poisoned Jacob, and the point was not to teach anything.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: In fact, it was to break both boys at once,
• 31:34
  Speaker 1: as one brother is basically believing he's burying his dead
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: sibling that he is responsible for killing, and now he's
• 31:41
  Speaker 1: going to be going through all this alone, as the
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: other brother is forced to stay there and watch what
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: his other brother is going through, and he's being what
• 31:49
  Speaker 1: he might think is buried alive. It is so beyond messed.
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: And like just sad too.
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Now, Jacob did eventually climb out of that pit,
• 32:00
  Speaker 1: but it wasn't played off as we were joking or
• 32:03
  Speaker 1: he was alive the whole time. Instead, he was paraded
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: in front of Andrea as if he had like returned
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: back to life.
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: Oh wow.
• 32:11
  Speaker 1: And the adults treated this as a successful lesson in
• 32:14
  Speaker 1: obedience somehow, But for the boys it obviously became another
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: moment that they didn't have like the cognitive capacity or
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: vocabulary really to even explain. Their physical injuries piled up fast. Bruises, cuts, burns,
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: and in one case, a wound on Andre's lower body
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: that became a major focus of the following investigation. You see,
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: at some point during this re education, as they called it,
• 32:39
  Speaker 1: Andrea suffered a wound to the back of his thigh
• 32:41
  Speaker 1: in kind of like his lower butt area. Not an
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: accidental kind of wound either, but something inflicted very deliberately.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: An incident occurred where the adults in the home cut
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: a piece of his flesh from his body, following instructions
• 32:57
  Speaker 1: they claim came from this mysterious. Later medical examinations with
• 33:04
  Speaker 1: this whole case, they documented the trauma entirely and it
• 33:08
  Speaker 1: was consistent with a sharp, controlled cut, not a fall
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: or random accident. The scar pattern supported Andre's account that
• 33:17
  Speaker 1: the tissue was removed intentionally by the adults in the home.
• 33:22
  Speaker 1: Now where the truth becomes clouded is exactly what had happened,
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: how this went about, and what happened next. Some early
• 33:29
  Speaker 1: statements suggests the piece of flesh was burned, while others
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: said it was actually eaten as part of a purification ritual,
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: though cannibalism has never been definitively proven in this case.
• 33:41
  Speaker 2: I just can't with this fucking case. Yeah, is this
• 33:44
  Speaker 2: just making me so angry? That would have been so painful.
• 33:47
  Speaker 1: It would have been and so fucked up now, regardless
• 33:50
  Speaker 1: of this incident though, or what they went through. Even
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: the boys had no allies in this home, every single
• 33:56
  Speaker 1: adult that was present, they enforced the same rules every
• 34:00
  Speaker 1: adult participated. Clara's role was particularly devastating because her son
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: still expected her to intervene, you know, stop the torture,
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: the pain, the suffering, to protect them like a mother should,
• 34:12
  Speaker 1: but instead she echoed the very same ideas as the others.
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: She convinced that she was correcting them for their own good.
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: By the time the group returned to the city months later.
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: Both boys were weakened, frightened, and conditioned to expect punishment
• 34:29
  Speaker 1: for even the most minor action. The cottage had served
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: its purpose in the eyes of the adults. At least,
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: the boys were compliant, traumatized, and entirely under their control.
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: But the next stage of this ordeal wasn't about breaking
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: both the children. It focused almost entirely in Andre instead,
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: who became the center of this group's escalating cruelty once
• 34:51
  Speaker 1: they moved into the new house in Kurum. Now the
• 34:54
  Speaker 1: new house was a two story place with a modest yard.
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: It had neighbors who minded their own business, and absolute
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: nothing about it suggested that one of the rooms had
• 35:03
  Speaker 1: been turned into a miniature prison. The inside of the
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: home was arranged with a very specific intention to monitor,
• 35:11
  Speaker 1: to confine, and isolate a child without attracting any sort
• 35:15
  Speaker 1: of attention. Now, Jacob at this point was kept elsewhere
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: part of the time, sometimes at a youth facility and
• 35:22
  Speaker 1: sometimes under the watch of other adults connected to this group. Now,
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: this group isn't exactly innocent in all of this either.
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: They certainly had their share and involvement in the story
• 35:33
  Speaker 1: as well. As influence of care of these boys. Now,
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: Jacob was the older of the two, and he was
• 35:39
  Speaker 1: becoming harder to manipulate than Andre. He had become increasingly
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: protective of his younger brother too, so separating them made
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: the control much easier. The heart of this new arrangement
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: was a narrow storage space beneath the stairs that wasn't
• 35:54
  Speaker 1: large enough for a bed. It had no window, and
• 35:57
  Speaker 1: the door had been reinforced and secured with a bunch
• 36:00
  Speaker 1: of different locks that allowed adults to steal it from
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: the outside. Inside there was only a thin mat, a
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: small blanket, and a bucket. The space was so cramped
• 36:11
  Speaker 1: that even a child couldn't stretch out fully, and it
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: was too dark for him to see anything beyond the
• 36:16
  Speaker 1: faintest outlines when the door was shut.
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: Is that small of an area.
• 36:20
  Speaker 1: Yes. A security camera was also mounted inside and pointed
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: down directly at the floor of the covered space. Its
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: wireless feed transmitted to a receiver in the house, where
• 36:30
  Speaker 1: the adults could observe Andrea at any moment of the day.
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: Life for Andrea inside this curum house followed a predictable
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: cycle of unimaginable abuse, confinement monitoring brief release, then punishment
• 36:45
  Speaker 1: for something that he probably hadn't even actually done. The
• 36:49
  Speaker 1: adults left him bound at times when they were out,
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: and sometimes they kept him naked to prevent misbehavior. Meals
• 36:56
  Speaker 1: were inconsistent, water was withheld as a form of discipline,
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: and he slept on the hard floor in the cramped
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: darkness with just that thin mattin blanket, sometimes for hours,
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: sometimes for days, depending on, honestly the mood of the
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: adults in the home. Outside of that dark, copboared space,
• 37:13
  Speaker 1: the home remained deceptively normal, as if they were, you know,
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: just living a normal life, and what they were doing
• 37:21
  Speaker 1: wasn't something completely horrific. Clara went shopping, Katerina visited work,
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: Anica or Barbara in her carefully maintained disguise, moved through
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: the house as if she were a fragile teenager needing
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: constant protection and care.
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: She makes me sick.
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: Visitors saw nothing out of the ordinary. No one imagined
• 37:40
  Speaker 1: a child was locked just a few feet away, watching
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: the edges of a camera lens as his only connection
• 37:45
  Speaker 1: to the outside world. One of the most disturbing aspects
• 37:49
  Speaker 1: of this period is how seamlessly the group functioned around
• 37:52
  Speaker 1: that confinement. They cooked meals, cleaned rooms, and entertained the
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: girl they believe they were protecting, all while it ignoring
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: the fact that a boy was Clara's boy was trapped
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: beneath their staircase. Like think Harry Potter living under the
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: stairs and the treatment he had versus cousin, except way worse.
• 38:11
  Speaker 1: Like Harry Potter had a good compared to this, And
• 38:14
  Speaker 1: that's honestly fictional, but this was very much so real.
• 38:19
  Speaker 1: Andre adapted in the only ways he could. He learned
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: to keep quiet. He monitored the adults through their footsteps
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: walking through the house as he sat in the dark.
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: This was his life. Now, He's on his only tie
• 38:32
  Speaker 1: to the outside. He's thinking, Okay, their footsteps are here,
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: I'm safe. Their footsteps are coming close now, fear would grow.
• 38:39
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, that is just so sad.
• 38:42
  Speaker 1: What he didn't know, though, what no one knew, was
• 38:45
  Speaker 1: that that camera watching him had an open signal and
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: it was about to broadcast to more than just the
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: people in that home. On May seventh, two thousand and seven,
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: within that seemingly ordinary Cureum neighborhood, the camera signal drifted
• 39:00
  Speaker 1: past the walls into another home. Edward, the man who
• 39:04
  Speaker 1: lived nearby, was trying to set up a device, a
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: baby monitor, so he could check on his infant son
• 39:09
  Speaker 1: in another room. As he was setting it up, the
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: monitor flickered, adjusted, and then instead of showing his own child,
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: it revealed a dim, unfamiliar space. A small boy sat
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: hunched on the floor, shirtless, thin, and visibly shaken. The
• 39:24
  Speaker 1: image shown was low quality and grainy, but the distress
• 39:27
  Speaker 1: on the child's face was unmistakable. At first, Eduard assumed
• 39:33
  Speaker 1: he'd picked up a stray signal from a nearby home
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: where a parent was briefly disciplining a child, you know,
• 39:39
  Speaker 1: just like a timeout situation or dealing with a tantrum maybe,
• 39:42
  Speaker 1: But the more he watched, the less it resembled anything normal.
• 39:46
  Speaker 1: The child wasn't moving freely. The room itself looked like
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: it was an improvised prison cell, with bare walls, no furniture,
• 39:52
  Speaker 1: with a bucket in the corner. At one point, the
• 39:55
  Speaker 1: boy even recoiled from an unseen sound and pressed himself
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: up against the wall, as if expecting the do or
• 40:00
  Speaker 1: to open and receive a blow.
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: It's worse than a prison, really, it is.
• 40:05
  Speaker 1: Edward watched this all in horror, and he didn't know
• 40:08
  Speaker 1: what to make of it. He was hoping that the
• 40:09
  Speaker 1: camera feed would shift back to his son's crib, but
• 40:12
  Speaker 1: it didn't. The thought at first was he must be
• 40:16
  Speaker 1: seeing like just making this up in his head. He's
• 40:18
  Speaker 1: seeing something, but the image didn't disappear. He fought with
• 40:23
  Speaker 1: himself and maybe it's a prank, a movie, someone's TV
• 40:26
  Speaker 1: that's crossing a feed you know, from some maybe it's
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: a hoax, anything except reality. But as he stared at
• 40:35
  Speaker 1: the image on the screen, the longer he did, the
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: more he realized this was real, and soon he called police.
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: It's honestly like a miracle that they set it up
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: that way that it would be open, right, Yeah, that
• 40:49
  Speaker 2: he came across it and took it seriously, because I
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: think a lot of people would just you know, like,
• 40:56
  Speaker 2: this isn't real kind of thing and just try to
• 40:57
  Speaker 2: shift to like to get their own child exactly. So
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: a lot of things had to like align and work out, So,
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: I mean, which is amazing.
• 41:07
  Speaker 1: Imagine are imagine that they that he didn't get this
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: feed on the baby moment? Yeah, how long could this
• 41:12
  Speaker 1: have gone with being unnoticed?
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: Well, yeah, the child might have died.
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah now. Officers responded to the call immediately, they too
• 41:20
  Speaker 1: were unsure whether they were dealing with a malfunctioning device
• 41:23
  Speaker 1: or an actual, genuine emergency. They brought with them equipment
• 41:26
  Speaker 1: to track the source of the transmission, and they knew
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: immediately that the range of the monitor was very limited,
• 41:31
  Speaker 1: which helped narrow down the possibilities right away. So as
• 41:34
  Speaker 1: they moved through the neighborhood trying to locate where the
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: signal was coming from, they picked up a faint audio
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: as well. There was some footsteps, muffled voices, and a
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: repetitive mechanical hum that was coming out of this baby monitor,
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: a sound they knew would help identify the location once
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: they were actually inside. Now, the signal also helped guide
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: them the whole way. If they moved too far, the
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: image got worse and it was harder to connect to.
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: But if they they got closer, the signal got stronger
• 42:01
  Speaker 1: and clearer. It was sort of like a digital hot
• 42:04
  Speaker 1: cold kind of scenario. So as they did this, the
• 42:08
  Speaker 1: signal consistently grew stronger outside the Minerva home, and when
• 42:12
  Speaker 1: officers approached and knocked in the front door, Clara and
• 42:15
  Speaker 1: Katerina appeared on the other side of that door. They
• 42:17
  Speaker 1: were very calm and polite when they answered. Officers asked
• 42:21
  Speaker 1: about a child in distress, and while the two sisters
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: denied it, and they insisted that the officers were mistaken,
• 42:27
  Speaker 1: but something about their demeanor raised suspicion, and the police
• 42:30
  Speaker 1: requested entry now for clarification. Under Zech law, immediate intervention
• 42:36
  Speaker 1: is allowed when a child is believed to be in danger,
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: so it wasn't something they could refuse. Okay, they didn't
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: need a warrant to enter that home. If they believed,
• 42:44
  Speaker 1: you know what, this child is in this home, they
• 42:46
  Speaker 1: can enter now. Once inside, officers heard a faint echo
• 42:50
  Speaker 1: of that very same humming noise captured on the monitor.
• 42:54
  Speaker 1: That sound led them towards a small door beneath the staircase,
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: a door secured with there are more locks and hardware
• 43:02
  Speaker 1: than any ordinary storage space was required. Clara right away
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: tried to block the hallway, insisting the police had come
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: to the wrong house, and she repeated that her children
• 43:12
  Speaker 1: were safe, that nothing unusual was happening, but her nerves
• 43:15
  Speaker 1: gave her away.
• 43:16
  Speaker 2: Now she realizes something's wrong, that she's doing something wrong right.
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: Now, Katerina stepped in beside her as well, attempting to
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: divert the officer's focus by bringing Anna Cut into the room,
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: who was trembling and clung close to the sisters as
• 43:29
  Speaker 1: she she cried like she was terrified of the unfolding
• 43:32
  Speaker 1: scene with officers in the house. Now, these officers had
• 43:36
  Speaker 1: already made their assessment, though they knew something was up
• 43:39
  Speaker 1: and they weren't going to be distracted from it, so
• 43:42
  Speaker 1: they moved past the women to the lock door, and
• 43:45
  Speaker 1: immediately when they were there up against it, a foul
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: smell steeped through the frame, sour sweat, stagnant air, and
• 43:52
  Speaker 1: something heavier they couldn't immediately identify. When they broke the
• 43:56
  Speaker 1: locks and pulled the door open, the reality became undeniable.
• 44:02
  Speaker 1: Andrea lay inside that cupboard, filthy, skeletal, shaking in fear.
• 44:08
  Speaker 1: His wrists and ankles were bound, his skin marked with
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: layers of injuries that didn't come from a single day,
• 44:13
  Speaker 1: not even from weeks, but probably months and even beyond.
• 44:18
  Speaker 1: When that door was opened, the sudden brightness even made
• 44:21
  Speaker 1: him recoil. His first instinct wasn't relief, It was fear.
• 44:26
  Speaker 1: Children in prolonged cat captivity often react this way. The
• 44:30
  Speaker 1: door opening and the light usually meant attention, and attention
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: usually meant punishment, abuse and pain.
• 44:37
  Speaker 2: Oh my gosh, it's just just like breaking my heart.
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: The officers slowed their movements the moment they saw him
• 44:44
  Speaker 1: curled up in the dark. They didn't rush in and
• 44:46
  Speaker 1: grab him right away. They spoke softly, using calm tones,
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: doing what they were trained to do when a child
• 44:51
  Speaker 1: is an acute distress like this off. One officer crouched
• 44:55
  Speaker 1: low to come closer to his eye level, careful not
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: to crowd him, and another assessed the bi in the
• 45:00
  Speaker 1: state of the room. They gave him time to understand
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: that the adults now standing in front of him were
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: not the ones who had been hurting him, and they
• 45:08
  Speaker 1: were there to help him and not harm him.
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: That would be so hard because you'd literally want to
• 45:14
  Speaker 2: just like scoop this little boy up, I know, right,
• 45:16
  Speaker 2: and just like tell him everything will be okay, But
• 45:19
  Speaker 2: you can't.
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah. When they finally did lift him out, they handled
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: him with the kind of care usually reserved for medical emergencies,
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: because that's exactly what this was. He weighed far less
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: than an eight year old should and this honestly is
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: a medical emergency. The police formed a protective circle around
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: him as they moved through the house, instinctively shielding him
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: from the chaos of the arrests and from the sight
• 45:40
  Speaker 1: of the adults responsible for his condition. Outside, paramedics took over,
• 45:46
  Speaker 1: Andrea was placed on a stretcher, wrapped in blankets, and
• 45:48
  Speaker 1: rushed straight to the hospital. Doctors later described him as
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: severely malnourished and dehydrated, with clear evidence of long term trauma. Jacob,
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: his older brother, was found shortly after as well, and
• 46:01
  Speaker 1: he too showed signs of fear, withdrawal, and physical neglect.
• 46:05
  Speaker 1: He was removed to safety with the same urgency and care. Meanwhile,
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: inside the house, the adults were detained immediately. Anica, still
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: presenting herself as a frail, frightened thirteen year old well,
• 46:18
  Speaker 1: she too was treated as a victim. Shelter staff and
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: social workers believe she was another vulnerable child caught in
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: a violent household of abuse, so they provided her a bed, food,
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: and a quiet place to rest. No one suspected that
• 46:33
  Speaker 1: this young girl was actually an adult woman with a
• 46:35
  Speaker 1: history of manipulation, or that she had helped orchestrate this
• 46:39
  Speaker 1: entire system of abuse that fell upon these two boys.
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: And that's where we're going.
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: To leave off for today. Okay, I knew it. Oh, Okay,
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: I knew it was coming, But this case just has
• 46:52
  Speaker 2: me on the edge of my seat because well, we
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: obviously know that it's figured out who she is, but
• 46:59
  Speaker 2: I just can't with her like she is, just I
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: don't know, she's going to keep me awake at night.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: Really, she's a monster in every ounce of the world.
• 47:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and it just makes no sense either. So I'm yeah,
• 47:11
  Speaker 2: the fact that we have to stop is kind of
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: a piss off, But I get it.
• 47:14
  Speaker 1: There's a lot to this case and it's going to be. Yeah,
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: it's gonna be a full two parter, so be prepared.
• 47:20
  Speaker 1: What a case.
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: This is? Unreal, right, huh.
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: So shout out to Julie fort As this case, no kidding. Yeah,
• 47:29
  Speaker 1: hopefully enjoyed this at least will not necessarily enjoyed it,
• 47:32
  Speaker 1: but hopefully enjoyed the story. We're all true crime people.
• 47:35
  Speaker 1: We get it. Many people we talk to who don't
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: get it, we can't say enjoyed when it comes to cases.
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: Of this, well, I mean, like it's it's a fascinating
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: story to listen to and to try to comprehend. But
• 47:46
  Speaker 2: it's not necessarily that we like enjoy what's happened. It's
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: just this shit has happened, though, Yeah, and it's like interesting,
• 47:53
  Speaker 2: I guess, to learn about it and to give like
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: voice to the victims and stuff.
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: So well, honestly, imagine the world where we just pretended this.
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: Didn't happen, no shit, and just walked around being vulnerable
• 48:06
  Speaker 2: all the time.
• 48:06
  Speaker 1: Well, not only being vulnerable the respect that would give,
• 48:09
  Speaker 1: yeah to two victims that it's as if your your issues,
• 48:14
  Speaker 1: your your trauma, none of it matters.
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: It's not even real under the carpet, and move on
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: with your life.
• 48:19
  Speaker 1: Yeah. I think that's far worse in my opinion, but anyways,
• 48:22
  Speaker 1: I digress. Thank you for being here. You guys are amazing.
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: Don't forget to check out the description for all our
• 48:27
  Speaker 1: links and all that good stuff. Don't forget to give
• 48:30
  Speaker 1: us a review if you like the show. We're a
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: indie podcast, produced, researched, written, hosted all of it by ourselves,
• 48:38
  Speaker 1: with our dogs and our chickens outside too, and we
• 48:41
  Speaker 1: just live in our tiny home doing our best and
• 48:43
  Speaker 1: we get to do it because of you. We sure
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: do so, thank you so much
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: Thank you for being here, and until part two, stay wicked.