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The Gruesome Betrayal of Army Sergeant Tyrone Hassel III · Murder Files Unsealed

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: So I want you to picture Benton Harbor, Michigan. It's 11.0 p.m.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: on New Year's Eve 2018. Right. And the sky over
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: this neighborhood, I mean, it should be lighting up with fireworks, right?
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: People stepping out onto their porches, getting ready to ring
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: in a new chapter, a new year.
• 0:18
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. The whole celebratory atmosphere.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Exactly. But instead, the street is just, it's pulsing with
• 0:25
  Speaker 1: these flashing red and blue lights from a massive police response.
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: Cruisers from multiple agencies are completely blocking the intersection.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: Just a heavy scene.
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And in the center of all this chaos, lying
• 0:37
  Speaker 1: in a driveway next to this dark pickup truck, is
• 0:39
  Speaker 1: a 23-year-old U.S. Army sergeant. And he is bleeding out.
• 0:43
  Speaker 2: Just an awful, awful image.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: It really is. His wife is kneeling on the freezing
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: concrete right beside him. She's clutching his body. She's completely
• 0:51
  Speaker 1: covered in his blood and just sobbing hysterically.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: It is a profoundly jarring image. And I think the
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: contrast is what makes the psychology of this specific scene
• 0:59
  Speaker 2: so heavy.
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: Yeah, for sure.
• 1:01
  Speaker 2: Because you have this young man on holiday leave returning
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: to the home he grew up in. And traditionally, I mean,
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: your childhood home is the ultimate symbol of safety.
• 1:10
  Speaker 1: Right. You're supposed to be secure there.
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: Exactly. But instead of a celebration of life and a
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: new year, investigators are walking into a scene of immense, brutal,
• 1:20
  Speaker 2: and just highly intimate violence.
• 1:22
  Speaker 1: And that's exactly what we're unpacking today. It's an investigation that,
• 1:27
  Speaker 1: at first glance, starts looking like a tragic street crime
• 1:30
  Speaker 1: on a really cold Michigan night. But it unravels into
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: something just unimaginably dark.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, the layers here are staggering.
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: So the mission for this deep dive is to guide
• 1:42
  Speaker 1: you through a case that really peels back layers of, well,
• 1:45
  Speaker 1: staggering family betrayal. We're going to examine the specific psychological
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: manipulation tactics used inside an actual interrogation room.
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: Which is fascinating to break down.
• 1:55
  Speaker 1: It really is. And we're going to follow the digital
• 1:57
  Speaker 1: breadcrumbs that shifted this entire investigation from a local mystery
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: to a cross-country conspiracy.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: And as you listen, you know, you are really going
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: to have to play the role of the detective here.
• 2:05
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you'll be sorting through human deception, shifting motives, and
• 2:09
  Speaker 1: just the chilling cognitive dissonance of the people involved.
• 2:14
  Speaker 2: To really understand the gravity of the violence in that driveway, though,
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: I think we have to establish the baseline of the
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: victim's life.
• 2:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's do that. Let's talk about the victim.
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: So 23-year-old Sergeant Teron Hassel III... And by literally every
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: metric available to investigators, he was just a massive success story.
• 2:31
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he really was.
• 2:32
  Speaker 2: Because Benin Harbor is a resilient city, absolutely, but it
• 2:36
  Speaker 2: has historically faced some significant socioeconomic hurdles.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Right, like high poverty rates, systemic challenges.
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, things that can make upward mobility incredibly difficult for
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: a young man growing up there.
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: But Tyrone didn't just navigate those hurdles. I mean, he
• 2:51
  Speaker 1: basically sprinted past them.
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: He really did.
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: Looking at the interviews with his family and his former coaches,
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: his strategy for survival was just relentless momentum.
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: Just keeping busy.
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: Exactly. He ran track. He played baseball. He maintained excellent grades.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: He essentially engineered this schedule that was so packed, he
• 3:10
  Speaker 1: literally didn't have the time to get pulled into any
• 3:13
  Speaker 1: of the negative elements in his neighborhood.
• 3:14
  Speaker 2: Which is a huge testament to his discipline, even at
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: a young age.
• 3:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah. And that momentum... earned him an academic scholarship to
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Grand Valley State University.
• 3:24
  Speaker 2: Which, you know, is a formidable achievement on its own.
• 3:26
  Speaker 1: Absolutely.
• 3:27
  Speaker 2: But while he was at university, he pivoted. He felt
• 3:30
  Speaker 2: this calling to enlist in the Army.
• 3:33
  Speaker 1: And in the military, I mean, career progression is highly structured, right?
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: Extremely. You don't just skip steps. It's a very rigid hierarchy.
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: But Tyrone, he shot up the ranks to sergeant at
• 3:43
  Speaker 1: a pace that surprised even the seasoned investigators from the
• 3:47
  Speaker 1: Army Criminal Investigation Division, or CID.
• 3:50
  Speaker 2: Right, because making sergeant in your early 20s, that requires
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: a level of discipline and leadership that is really a
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: statistical outlier. You don't see that often.
• 4:00
  Speaker 1: No, you don't. And his personal life seemed to be
• 4:02
  Speaker 1: tracking on that exact same upward trajectory.
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: Everything was coming together for him.
• 4:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he met his wife, Kamiya, while they were both serving.
• 4:10
  Speaker 1: And they actually deployed to South Korea together.
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: Right. And it's important to note here that U.S. Army
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: policy for married couples on deployments especially in a high
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: readiness zone like Korea, it is very strict.
• 4:22
  Speaker 1: Right. They were serving in separate units, living in different barracks. Yeah.
• 4:25
  Speaker 2: And that compartmentalization is standard procedure. It designs to maintain
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: unit cohesion, but it means their early marriage was heavily
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: shaped by this structured, heavily supervised environment.
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: So they weren't really living like a traditional domestic life.
• 4:42
  Speaker 2: Exactly. They weren't coming home to the same apartment every
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: night and cooking dinner.
• 4:45
  Speaker 1: But despite that separation, they had a young son together,
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: Tyrone IV, who they nicknamed Junk.
• 4:51
  Speaker 2: Which is just a great nickname.
• 4:53
  Speaker 1: It is. And by December 2018, Tyrone III was finally
• 4:57
  Speaker 1: home for the holidays. He was out of that rigid
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: military environment, and he was ecstatic.
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: It was supposed to be his time to decompress.
• 5:03
  Speaker 1: Yeah. His father, Tyrone Jr., painted this picture of just
• 5:07
  Speaker 1: absolute domestic bliss that night.
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: Just a really warm scene.
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: Tyrone was literally dancing around the kitchen. He was thrilled
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: about his career in the Army... He was treating Kamiya
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: incredibly well, and he was super hyped for his dad's
• 5:20
  Speaker 1: New Year's Eve cooking.
• 5:21
  Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, the food.
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they had deep fried turkey, macaroni and cheese, dressing.
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: I mean, it's the quintessential image of warmth and safety.
• 5:28
  Speaker 2: It really is. The family gathered around, food on the stove.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: But then he runs out to grab some extra food
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: for Kamiya.
• 5:35
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: He pulls his truck back up to his father's house.
• 5:37
  Speaker 1: It's about 11 p.m. He steps out, and he is ambushed.
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: Just completely out of nowhere.
• 5:43
  Speaker 1: Four gunshots. two to the head, one to the neck,
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: one to the shoulder, and all of them at point-blank range.
• 5:50
  Speaker 2: It's just so brutal. And, you know, when investigators walk
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: into a scene like that, the physical evidence immediately tells
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: a very specific story.
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: Right, like an analogy I keep thinking of is a
• 6:01
  Speaker 1: rock thrown through a stained glass window. Like, it completely
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: shatters this picture-perfect narrative the family had.
• 6:07
  Speaker 2: That's a really good way to put it.
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: So when investigators walk into this scene, you have a
• 6:11
  Speaker 1: grieving widow covered in blood A victim with a pristine record.
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: Where do they even begin?
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: Well, in the absence of an obvious known enemy, investigators
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: work outward from the body in these concentric circles. They
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: basically test the most statistically likely scenarios first.
• 6:30
  Speaker 1: Process of elimination.
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And the primary motive for sudden violence in a
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: residential area, especially involving a victim with a really nice vehicle,
• 6:38
  Speaker 2: is robbery.
• 6:39
  Speaker 1: Which... given Benton Harbor's economic struggles, makes that a highly
• 6:42
  Speaker 1: plausible theory right out of the gate.
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: It's the most logical first step.
• 6:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Caron was driving an expensive truck. He wore nice jewelry.
• 6:50
  Speaker 1: The military association implies a steady income.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 6:53
  Speaker 1: So the logic is an opportunist sees an easy target,
• 6:56
  Speaker 1: a struggle ensues, and it ends in gunfire.
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: But the physical inventory of the crime scene debunks the
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: robbery hypothesis almost immediately.
• 7:04
  Speaker 1: How so?
• 7:05
  Speaker 2: Because Tyrone's wallet was still in his pocket and it
• 7:07
  Speaker 2: was full of cash. His smartphone was totally untouched. The
• 7:10
  Speaker 2: keys to the truck were still right there. Not a
• 7:13
  Speaker 2: single item of value was taken.
• 7:14
  Speaker 1: I've always found that to be the loudest alarm bell
• 7:17
  Speaker 1: at a crime scene.
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: It really is.
• 7:18
  Speaker 1: Because if a mugging goes wrong and a suspect panics
• 7:21
  Speaker 1: and shoots, they almost always grab the wallet before running, right?
• 7:25
  Speaker 1: Just to make the risk worth it.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly. You've already committed the worst crime possible. You
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: might as well take the money.
• 7:31
  Speaker 1: Right. So to fire four shots at point-blank range and
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: take absolutely nothing, that shifts the paradigm entirely.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: It screams that this was targeted.
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it forces the police to pivot to theory number two,
• 7:43
  Speaker 1: which was mistaken identity.
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: And this mistaken identity theory actually had some pretty compelling
• 7:49
  Speaker 2: circumstantial backing at first.
• 7:51
  Speaker 1: What did they find?
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: So police discovered that Tyrone's younger half-brother, Benny, who lived
• 7:56
  Speaker 2: in the area, ran with a pretty rough crowd.
• 7:58
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: He associated with individuals who are known to attract trouble.
• 8:02
  Speaker 2: And in high crime areas, violence is often retaliatory. And sadly,
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: it can easily spill over onto family members.
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: So the working hypothesis was that Benny was the actual
• 8:12
  Speaker 1: intended target of some kind of gang dispute. Yes.
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: And a neighbor actually fed right into this theory.
• 8:18
  Speaker 1: Oh, really? What did they see?
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: They called in a tip reporting a suspicious car parked
• 8:22
  Speaker 2: near the house a few days prior. It was parked
• 8:25
  Speaker 2: in the exact same spot, facing the exact same way,
• 8:28
  Speaker 2: just lingering.
• 8:29
  Speaker 1: Like someone casing the residence.
• 8:31
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And casing a house indicates premeditation. If Benny was
• 8:36
  Speaker 2: the target, someone watching the residence to track his movements
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: aligns perfectly with a planned retaliation.
• 8:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, I see the logic. Tyrone drives up in the dark,
• 8:45
  Speaker 1: steps out of the truck, and the shooter misidentifies him
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: in the shadows.
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: That was the theory.
• 8:50
  Speaker 1: But wait, I have to push back on that mistaken
• 8:52
  Speaker 1: identity theory, just based on the mechanics of surveillance. Go on.
• 8:56
  Speaker 1: If a suspicious car is staking out a house for
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: three days... The occupants are learning the patterns of that household, right?
• 9:02
  Speaker 2: You would assume so, yeah.
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: They would know the physical differences between Benny and Tyrone.
• 9:07
  Speaker 1: They would know that an out-of-town guest had arrived. I
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: feel like prolonged surveillance drastically reduces the margin of error
• 9:14
  Speaker 1: for a mistaken identity hit, even in the dark.
• 9:18
  Speaker 2: That's a very valid point. And the father, Tyrone Jr.,
• 9:22
  Speaker 2: he rejected the theory too, but for a much more
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: visceral reason.
• 9:26
  Speaker 1: What did he say?
• 9:27
  Speaker 2: He pointed out the proximity of the shooter, the physical evidence,
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: the stippling and the powder burns from those point-blank shots.
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: It proved the killer walked right up to his son.
• 9:37
  Speaker 1: Oh, wow. Yeah.
• 9:39
  Speaker 2: Whoever pulled that trigger was close enough to see Tyrone's
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: face very clearly.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: So they knew exactly who they were executing. This was personal.
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: Extremely personal. And the detectives, you know, to their credit,
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: they didn't succumb to tunnel vision here.
• 9:51
  Speaker 1: Which is so easy to do.
• 9:53
  Speaker 2: It is. It's so easy for an underfunded department to
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: lock onto the gang retaliation gone wrong narrative. because it
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: fits the neighborhood profile. It's a neat little box.
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: They didn't do that.
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: No, they cleared the noise. They interviewed dozens of friends,
• 10:07
  Speaker 2: family members, and Binia's associates, and the streets were completely quiet.
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: Which is the ultimate debunking of the gang theory, really.
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. If a local gang had executed a hit meant
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: for Benny and accidentally killed an active duty army sergeant,
• 10:21
  Speaker 2: the street would be talking.
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: Yeah, the sheer heat brought down by murdering a soldier
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: would cause factions to turn on each other instantly.
• 10:28
  Speaker 2: Exactly. The silence indicated this just wasn't a local street dispute.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: So they'd hit a wall, no robbery, no gang hit.
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: When the physical evidence at a scene runs dry like that,
• 10:39
  Speaker 1: investigators really have to widen the net and wait for
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: human error.
• 10:43
  Speaker 2: Which almost always happens.
• 10:45
  Speaker 1: Yeah, and human error usually comes in the form of
• 10:47
  Speaker 1: someone who just can't keep a secret.
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: Right.
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: Which is exactly what happened when the tip line rang
• 10:52
  Speaker 1: at the St. Joe Township Police Department.
• 10:54
  Speaker 2: This is where the whole case turns upside down.
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: Yeah. An anonymous woman calls and delivers this highly specific,
• 11:02
  Speaker 1: actionable piece of intelligence. She tells the police to stop
• 11:05
  Speaker 1: looking in Benton Harbor and start looking at Tyrone's Gattalion
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: in Fort Stewart, Georgia.
• 11:10
  Speaker 2: Which just completely fractures the geography of the case.
• 11:14
  Speaker 1: We are no longer dealing with a local mystery at all.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: We are suddenly thrust into a military love triangle that
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: started halfway across the world in South Korea.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: It's a massive pivot.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: The caller alleges that Kamiya, the grieving widow who was
• 11:27
  Speaker 1: sobbing in the driveway, was having an affair with a
• 11:30
  Speaker 1: specialist in their unit named Jeremy Culler, who went by Quay.
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: And coordinating with the Military Criminal Investigation Division, or CID,
• 11:38
  Speaker 2: blows the doors wide open on this.
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: Because a military base is essentially a closed ecosystem, right?
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: Exactly. Secrets are incredibly difficult to maintain in a barracks
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: environment where everyone works, eats, and trains together.
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: So the CID gets involved. What do they find?
• 11:54
  Speaker 2: Well, other soldiers quickly confirm that the affair was basically
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: an open secret.
• 11:58
  Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah.
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: And CID uncovers that Tyrone had actually found out about
• 12:03
  Speaker 2: the affair and a verbal confrontation had already taken place
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: between Tyrone and Jeremy.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: So that establishes a documented motive of jealousy.
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: And a rivalry that had already escalated to a face-to-face confrontation.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: Right. And then the timeline really accelerates when another soldier
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: comes forward with this terrifying admission.
• 12:21
  Speaker 1: What did they say?
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: He admitted that he sold Jeremy Queller a Glock pistol
• 12:25
  Speaker 2: just two weeks before the murder.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: Okay. And here is where the criminal psychology goes completely
• 12:30
  Speaker 1: off the rails for me.
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: Oh, it's wild.
• 12:32
  Speaker 1: Because here's where it gets really interesting. You would assume...
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: Someone who just committed a cross-country targeted assassination would, I
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: don't know, go into hiding or at least keep their
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: mouth shut.
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: You would think so, yeah.
• 12:44
  Speaker 1: But Jeremy Kohler, he returns to base and he just
• 12:47
  Speaker 1: loudly brags to a member of his platoon.
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: He treats it like a weekend hunting trip.
• 12:52
  Speaker 1: Literally bragging about it at the water cooler. He explicitly says,
• 12:57
  Speaker 1: I did what I had to do. I went up
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: there and I took care of it. He details the
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: layout of the driveway, the type of gun he used,
• 13:03
  Speaker 1: and the exact number of shots fired.
• 13:05
  Speaker 2: It's crazy. But this is a textbook example of leakage
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: in criminal psychology.
• 13:10
  Speaker 1: OK, break that down for me. What is leakage?
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: Well, murder generates an immense amount of internal psychological pressure.
• 13:17
  Speaker 1: OK.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: And for individuals with narcissistic treats or just a desperate
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: need for external validation, containing that pressure is virtually impossible.
• 13:26
  Speaker 1: So they just have to tell someone. Yes.
• 13:28
  Speaker 2: They cannot stomach being the anonymous architect of a perfect crime.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: They need an audience to witness their perceived dominance and power.
• 13:37
  Speaker 1: They want the credit.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: Queller wanted the credit.
• 13:40
  Speaker 1: Wow. And his desperate need for credit-handed investigators, the exact
• 13:45
  Speaker 1: thread they needed to pull to examine his digital footprint.
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: And this is where the reality of modern forensics just
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: crashes down on him.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: Yeah, they pull his phone data. And they don't just
• 13:56
  Speaker 1: see who he called. They use time-distance analysis of highway
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: cell towers.
• 14:01
  Speaker 2: Let's explain the mechanics of that because it's so crucial.
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: Yep, please do.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: Even when you are not actively making a call, your
• 14:06
  Speaker 2: smartphone is constantly sending out a signal, a ping searching
• 14:10
  Speaker 2: for the nearest cell tower to ensure it has a connection.
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: Right, it's just checking in.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And as you travel down a highway, your phone
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: connects and disconnects from sequential towers.
• 14:19
  Speaker 1: Okay.
• 14:19
  Speaker 2: Investigators can subpoena those logs from the telecom provider and
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: map those pings, which creates a highly accurate digital timeline
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: of a person's physical movements.
• 14:29
  Speaker 1: So the cell towers tracked his phone moving from Chicago
• 14:33
  Speaker 1: straight into Benton Harbor on the days leading up to
• 14:35
  Speaker 1: the murder. Yes.
• 14:36
  Speaker 2: But they didn't just rely on the phone data.
• 14:39
  Speaker 1: What else did they have?
• 14:40
  Speaker 2: They utilized an ALPR, an automated license plate reader.
• 14:44
  Speaker 1: Okay, wait. Explain how those work. Are they just on
• 14:46
  Speaker 1: toll booths or what?
• 14:47
  Speaker 2: They can be. But ALPRs are these high-speed cameras that
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: are mounted on police cruisers, streetlights, highway overpasses.
• 14:55
  Speaker 1: Wow, they're everywhere.
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 14:56
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: And they use optical character recognition software to constantly scan, log,
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: and timestamp every single license plate that passes by.
• 15:04
  Speaker 1: So it scans every single plate.
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: Every single one. And it feeds that data into a
• 15:08
  Speaker 2: centralized database.
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: That is wild.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: And an ALPR caught Jeremy Quiller's car in Benton Harbor
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: mere blocks from the crime scene just hours before the ambush.
• 15:17
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's tally this up. Motive. Check. Weapon purchased. Check.
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: Cell tower tracking. Check. License plate reader. Check. Vulval confession
• 15:27
  Speaker 1: to a co-worker. Check.
• 15:29
  Speaker 2: It's a mountain of evidence.
• 15:30
  Speaker 1: Right. So military police arrest Queller immediately. But the guy
• 15:35
  Speaker 1: who couldn't stop bragging a few days ago suddenly remembers
• 15:38
  Speaker 1: his constitutional rights.
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: Funny how that happens.
• 15:41
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he invokes Miranda, he demands a lawyer, and he
• 15:44
  Speaker 1: just refuses to speak.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: Which, while legally prudent for him, creates a massive tactical
• 15:49
  Speaker 2: hurdle for law enforcement.
• 15:50
  Speaker 1: Because they had the trigger man, but they lacked the
• 15:52
  Speaker 1: scope of the conspiracy.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: Exactly. Did Kamiya know? Was she an active co-conspirator mapping
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: out the hit, or was she just a passive beneficiary
• 16:01
  Speaker 2: of her lover's violent obsession?
• 16:03
  Speaker 1: To get that answer, the focus snaps back to Michigan.
• 16:06
  Speaker 1: The police know they have to bring Kamiya in.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: And the ensuing interaction is just a terrifying display of
• 16:12
  Speaker 2: psychological violence. chess inside an interrogation room.
• 16:15
  Speaker 1: It really is. So the initial phase is isolation.
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: Right. Police contact Tyrone Jr. and tell him to bring
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: Kamiya down to the station.
• 16:22
  Speaker 1: And when they arrive, detectives immediately separate them. They tell
• 16:26
  Speaker 1: Tyrone Jr., Mr. Hessel, you can go home. It's going
• 16:29
  Speaker 1: to be a long night.
• 16:30
  Speaker 2: Which leaves him completely baffled. Yeah.
• 16:32
  Speaker 1: He still views her as a victim at this point.
• 16:35
  Speaker 1: He's been sheltering her in his home since the murder.
• 16:38
  Speaker 2: But removing the suspect from their support system is always
• 16:41
  Speaker 2: step one in an interrogation.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: So she is placed in a room with Detective First
• 16:45
  Speaker 1: Lieutenant Andrew Languski of the Michigan State Police.
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: And Kamiya starts by playing the devastated wife flawlessly.
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: She really leans into the narrative from the driveway, right?
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: She's telling the detective she loved Tyrone so much she
• 16:58
  Speaker 1: would never remarry.
• 16:59
  Speaker 2: But Languski doesn't charge in with accusations. He doesn't bang
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: his fist on the table.
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: No, he begins chipping at the periphery. He brings up
• 17:07
  Speaker 1: the rumors of the affair with Jeremy. From Fort Stewart.
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: And Kamiya immediately pivots.
• 17:12
  Speaker 1: She admits to a close relationship, but she furiously downplays it,
• 17:16
  Speaker 1: claiming it wasn't sexual. Right.
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: She paints this picture where Tyrone was emotionally abusive and
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: Jeremy was simply a friendly ear who just listened to her.
• 17:25
  Speaker 1: She is trying to justify an emotional affair to make
• 17:28
  Speaker 1: it seem like a harmless coping mechanism rather than, you know,
• 17:31
  Speaker 1: a motive for murder.
• 17:33
  Speaker 2: Exactly. But Linguski has an incredible advantage here.
• 17:36
  Speaker 1: Oh, yeah.
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: He wasn't just a random detective assigned to the room.
• 17:40
  Speaker 2: He is actually the chief of the polygraph unit for
• 17:42
  Speaker 2: the state police.
• 17:43
  Speaker 1: Which is huge. Huge.
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: So he asks Kamiya if she would be willing to
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: take a polygraph test to clear her name.
• 17:50
  Speaker 1: And suspects who believe they are smarter than the police
• 17:53
  Speaker 1: frequently agree to this.
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: They do. They assume refusing the test implies guilt. And
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: they are arrogant enough to think they can somehow control
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: their physiological responses.
• 18:03
  Speaker 1: Now, I know polygraphs aren't admissible in court as direct
• 18:06
  Speaker 1: evidence of guilt, right? Because the science is highly debated.
• 18:10
  Speaker 2: Correct.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: So why do police even use it?
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: Well, it is not used as a literal lie detector
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: in this context. It is used as a psychological weapon
• 18:19
  Speaker 2: to break confidence.
• 18:21
  Speaker 1: How does that work?
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: So before asking about the murder, an examiner uses a
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: control question test. They ask a broad question that almost
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: everyone will lie about, such as, have you ever lied
• 18:30
  Speaker 2: to get out of trouble?
• 18:32
  Speaker 1: Oh.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: When the suspect inevitably lies, the machine records their physiological
• 18:36
  Speaker 2: baseline for stress, their heart rate, sweat gland activity, respiration.
• 18:41
  Speaker 1: And then they mix in the relevant questions about the murder.
• 18:44
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And when Kamiya's physiological responses spike on those questions,
• 18:48
  Speaker 2: she fails the test. Deception indicated.
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: But the machine itself is almost a prop, right?
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: Totally. The true power is when the detective unhooks the suspect,
• 18:58
  Speaker 2: walks back into the room, and states as an empirical fact.
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: The machine says you are lying. Wow. Yeah. The suspect's
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: perceived control over their own narrative just instantly evaporates. This
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: environment of inescapable surveillance is established.
• 19:14
  Speaker 1: And this sets the stage for what I like to
• 19:16
  Speaker 1: call the bluff.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: The master stroke. Right.
• 19:18
  Speaker 1: Lenguski walks back in. But instead of aggressively attacking her,
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: he executes this maneuver straight out of the Reed technique.
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: He does a complete 180 degree turn.
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: He offers her sympathy.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: And the Reed technique heavily utilizes the strategy called minimization.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: Break that down. What is minimization?
• 19:35
  Speaker 2: Well, if you confront a suspect and call them a
• 19:37
  Speaker 2: cold-blooded monster, their self-preservation instinct kicks in immediately. They raise
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: their defenses and they stop talking.
• 19:43
  Speaker 1: They just lawyer up?
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: Exactly. But if you provide them with a morally acceptable
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: face-saving excuse for their actions, they are far more likely
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: to accept it just to relieve the immense pressure of
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: the interrogation.
• 19:56
  Speaker 1: So it's like a high-stakes game of poker. Langusky intentionally
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: shows her a fake winning hand to force her to fold.
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: That's a perfect analogy.
• 20:06
  Speaker 1: He looks her in the eye and tells a complete
• 20:08
  Speaker 1: fabricated lie. He says, Jeremy is in custody. He is
• 20:13
  Speaker 1: talking and he is throwing you under the bus. He's
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: saying this whole hit was your idea.
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: He is creating artificial urgency here. He's isolating her emotionally
• 20:22
  Speaker 2: from her co-conspirator and fostering this profound sense of betrayal.
• 20:26
  Speaker 1: Then he hands her the gold parachute. He says, I
• 20:28
  Speaker 1: know you didn't plan this. This guy, Jeremy, he got
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: into your head. He manipulated you. You are not the
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: one pulling the trigger. You need to get out in
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: front of this to save yourself or your son.
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: It is a brilliant application of psychology.
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: It really is.
• 20:39
  Speaker 2: He is offering her the role of a victim. He
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: is basically telling her, you aren't a murderer. You were
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: just manipulated by a bad man.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: It reminds me of pulling blocks from a Jenga tower.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 20:49
  Speaker 1: Languski didn't take a swing at the whole structure. He
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: patiently pulled out her alibi. He pulled out her trust
• 20:55
  Speaker 1: in Jeremy. He pulled out her confidence in her own deception.
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: Until she collapsed under her own weight.
• 20:59
  Speaker 1: Exactly. Exactly. The bluff works flawlessly. Believing Jeremy has betrayed her,
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: the floodgates open, and she confesses.
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: However, the details of her confession completely obliterate the manipulated
• 21:14
  Speaker 2: victim narrative Lenguski used to coax her into talking.
• 21:17
  Speaker 1: Because the reality she outlines is one of staggering, cold-blooded premeditation.
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: She wasn't just a passive pawn at all.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: No. She admits this wasn't a spur-of-the-moment crime of passion.
• 21:29
  Speaker 1: She and Jeremy planned the assassination for weeks.
• 21:31
  Speaker 2: They'd actually tried to kill Tyrone before.
• 21:33
  Speaker 1: Wait, really?
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Jeremy had staked out a local nightclub in Benton
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: Harbor a few days prior. He was waiting in the
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: parking lot with the Glock, but he aborted the mission
• 21:41
  Speaker 2: because the crowd was too large.
• 21:43
  Speaker 1: So he got cold feet.
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: Right. But that sustained effort removes any defense of a
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: momentary lapse in judgment.
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: For sure. But the most chilling detail to me is
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: her digital participation on the night of the murder.
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: Oh, this part is just horrifying.
• 21:58
  Speaker 1: While Tyrone was out picking up dinner for the family,
• 22:01
  Speaker 1: Kamiya was sitting in her father-in-law's house, actively feeding Jeremy
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: his exact movements.
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: She was a spotter. Yes.
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: She used Snapchat and text messages to tell the killer
• 22:12
  Speaker 1: when Tyrone left, when he was on his way back.
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: Effectively acting as a spotter for a sniper.
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: And the medium she chose amplifies the horror. She is
• 22:22
  Speaker 1: using Snapchat, an app famous for, like, Silly filters and
• 22:27
  Speaker 1: disappearing photos to leave a permanent digital trail of a
• 22:31
  Speaker 1: murder conspiracy against the father of her child.
• 22:33
  Speaker 2: The cognitive dissonance is profound.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: It's hard to wrap your head around. And when Langiski
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: presses her on why she went through with it, her
• 22:40
  Speaker 1: initial defense mechanism is just absurd.
• 22:43
  Speaker 2: What'd she say?
• 22:44
  Speaker 1: She claims she didn't call it off because she felt
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: Jeremy would be mad at her.
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: Mad at her.
• 22:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, she said she didn't want him to be upset.
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: Unbelievable. She is still desperately clinging to that minimization tactic
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: Languski offered her earlier, trying to frame herself as this
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: passive participant who is just too intimidated to stop it.
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: So what does this all mean? She treated her husband's
• 23:03
  Speaker 1: life like a dinner reservation she was too awkward to cancel.
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: That's incredibly dark, but accurate.
• 23:09
  Speaker 1: It's an insult to human intelligence. Mm-hmm. And Langusky aggressively
• 23:13
  Speaker 1: corners her on this logic. He forces her to confront
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: the absurdity of choosing an active duty sergeant's life over
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: a boyfriend's temporary annoyance.
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: And that pressure squeezes out the undeniable foundational motive for
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: the entire conspiracy. Right.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: The financial windfall. Let's be real. It was always about
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: the $ 400, 000.
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: Yes. The military life insurance policy.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: This is where we have to dive into the mechanics
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: of military benefits. When you enlist in the U.S. military,
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: you are automatically enrolled in the service member's group life insurance,
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: the SGLI.
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: And the standard death benefit payout is $ 400, 000. $ 400, 000.
• 23:49
  Speaker 1: That was the calculus.
• 23:52
  Speaker 2: We see this motive frequently in true crime, unfortunately.
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: We do.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: But the psychology behind a 22-year-old weighing human life against
• 23:59
  Speaker 2: a financial payout is always chilling. She didn't want a divorce.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: Because a divorce entails military bureaucracy, splitting whatever meager savings
• 24:07
  Speaker 1: a young sergeant has... and dealing with custody.
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: Right. A murder, however, allows her to bypass the messy divorce,
• 24:14
  Speaker 2: maintain the social standing of a grieving military widow.
• 24:18
  Speaker 1: And instantly acquire nearly half a million dollars tax-free.
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: It was purely a transaction to her.
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: Only at the very end of the interrogation, when the
• 24:26
  Speaker 1: reality of her admission really settles in, does she drop
• 24:29
  Speaker 1: the facade. Lengoski asks how she feels, and she finally says,
• 24:34
  Speaker 1: I feel just as guilty as hell.
• 24:36
  Speaker 2: Now, a recorded confession is a prosecutor's dream.
• 24:39
  Speaker 1: Oh, absolutely.
• 24:39
  Speaker 2: But moving into the trial phase, Kamiya's defense attorney realizes
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: that the only way to save his client is to
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: put the detective's psychological tactics on trial.
• 24:48
  Speaker 1: Right, the courtroom battle. Optics versus reality.
• 24:51
  Speaker 2: The optics were wild. The prosecution decides to try Kamiya first,
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: but they are incredibly nervous about visual bias.
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: Which is a huge factor, right?
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: Massive factor in jury trials. Because when Kamiya walks into
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: the courtroom, she does not look like a hardened mastermind.
• 25:06
  Speaker 1: No, she doesn't.
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: She is diminutive. She's dressed and styled to look incredibly young,
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: almost infantilized, like a teenager who just wandered into the
• 25:15
  Speaker 2: wrong building.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: And a jury looks at a young, quiet woman and
• 25:19
  Speaker 1: subconsciously struggles to reconcile her appearance with the extreme violence
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: of a point-blank assassination.
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: Exactly. And Kamiya's demeanor was entirely flat.
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: Tyrone Jr. actually testified that she sat there for days
• 25:33
  Speaker 1: staring blankly. never once making eye contact with the family
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: that had taken her in.
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: Just completely detached.
• 25:39
  Speaker 1: Defense attorney Chris Kessel recognizes this visual advantage and leans
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: entirely into it.
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: His entire legal strategy revolves around attacking the Reed technique.
• 25:48
  Speaker 1: He portrays Kamiya as a traumatized, grieving widow, exhausted from
• 25:52
  Speaker 1: days of mourning. who is dragged into an interrogation room
• 25:55
  Speaker 1: in the middle of the night.
• 25:56
  Speaker 2: Right. Kessel's argument is that this young girl was isolated
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: and psychologically battered by a highly trained expert in deception.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: And he gets Languski on the stand and forces the
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: detective to admit, on the record under oath, that he
• 26:10
  Speaker 1: manipulated the situation by lying about Jeremy confessing.
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: Which is technically true.
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: I think Kessel made a massive miscalculation here, though.
• 26:18
  Speaker 2: Why is that?
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: Because... Showing the jury that a cop is highly trained
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: in interrogation doesn't inherently prove Kamaya is innocent. It just
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: highlights the sophisticated tools needed to break a sophisticated liar.
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: That's a fair assessment. But Kessel is hoping the jury
• 26:36
  Speaker 2: sees coercion. He wants them to believe she just told
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: the cop whatever he wanted to hear to make the
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: psychological pressure stop.
• 26:43
  Speaker 1: And to be fair, false confessions born of exhaustion and
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: coercion are a documented reality in the justice system.
• 26:50
  Speaker 2: They absolutely are.
• 26:51
  Speaker 1: But the prosecution, led by Steve Pierangeli, knew they had
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: to counter the narrative that Kamaya was a victim of
• 26:57
  Speaker 1: police bullying.
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: And their counter move was simple but devastating.
• 27:01
  Speaker 1: What did they do?
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: They didn't just read the transcript of the confession. They
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: played the entire 45-minute video for the jury straight through.
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: Which is so important. Reading a transcript removes all tone
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: and body language.
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: Exactly. The video allowed the jury to see her unedited reality.
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: She wasn't screaming. She wasn't sobbing hysterically.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: Langiski wasn't threatening her physically.
• 27:22
  Speaker 2: No. She was calmly, methodically explaining the logistical planning of
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: her husband's murder.
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: But the prosecution saved an even more devastating piece of
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: evidence for the very end. The nail on the coffin.
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: The jailhouse home call.
• 27:35
  Speaker 1: This part is just crazy to me. Right after Kamaya
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: was arrested and booked into the Berrien County Jail, she
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: used the inmate phone system to call her mother.
• 27:43
  Speaker 2: And the prosecution plays this audio.
• 27:46
  Speaker 1: Her mother is on the line. Clearly devastated, confused, begging
• 27:51
  Speaker 1: to know what is happening.
• 27:52
  Speaker 2: And Kamiya?
• 27:53
  Speaker 1: Kamiya, sounding annoyed, petulant, and entirely self-centered, snaps back. But
• 27:58
  Speaker 1: did y'all think I was going to win today?
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: It's so arrogant. Jailhouse phone calls are a fascinating psychological
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: blind spot for offenders.
• 28:05
  Speaker 1: They really are. Because an automated voice explicitly warms them
• 28:08
  Speaker 1: at the start of the call that the conversation is
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: subject to recording and monitoring.
• 28:12
  Speaker 2: Literally tells them, you are being recorded.
• 28:15
  Speaker 1: Yet the desperate need to connect with the outside world
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: overrides their logic, and they speak freely.
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: It is the ultimate unmasking.
• 28:23
  Speaker 1: It really is. I mean, imagine sitting in the gallery
• 28:25
  Speaker 1: as the family, watching the woman who cried in your
• 28:28
  Speaker 1: driveway completely devoid of emotion. The jury is listening to
• 28:32
  Speaker 1: a woman who just orchestrated the murder of her husband,
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: and she expresses zero remorse.
• 28:38
  Speaker 2: No pity for Tyrone. No sorrow for her son losing
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: his father.
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: Just sheer irritation. that she lost the game and got caught,
• 28:46
  Speaker 1: it completely obliterated the defense's portrait of a manipulated, traumatized widow.
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: Unsurprisingly, the jury didn't need long to deliberate.
• 28:54
  Speaker 1: No, they didn't. They returned a verdict of guilty on
• 28:57
  Speaker 1: charges of first-degree premeditated murder and conspiracy to commit murder.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: And under Michigan law, first-degree murder carries a mandatory sentence
• 29:05
  Speaker 2: of life in prison without the possibility of parole.
• 29:08
  Speaker 1: So Kamiya's fate is permanently sealed. But Jeremy Keller, the
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: man who physically pulled the trigger... still had to face
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: the court.
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: Though Jeremy's legal position was completely indefensible.
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: Yeah, he didn't have a confession he could claim was coerced.
• 29:21
  Speaker 2: No, he was buried under an avalanche of objective digital
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: and physical evidence. The cell tower data tracking him across
• 29:28
  Speaker 2: state lines, the ALPR capturing his vehicle, the testimony regarding
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: the Glock, and his own arrogant bragging to a fellow soldier.
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: Knowing a trial would be an absolute slaughter... Jeremy takes
• 29:40
  Speaker 1: a plea deal.
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: Right. He pleads guilty to second-degree murder and accepts a
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: sentence of 65 years in prison.
• 29:47
  Speaker 1: He won't even be eligible to apply for parole until
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: he's 90 years old.
• 29:50
  Speaker 2: So legally, the system has worked. The perpetrators are locked away.
• 29:54
  Speaker 1: But emotionally, there's an incredible coda to this story.
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: This is one of the most tense parts of the
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: whole narrative.
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: Before Jeremy is transferred to the state penitentiary, he submits
• 30:04
  Speaker 1: an unusual request. He asks for a face-to-face meeting with
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: Tyrone Jr., the father of the man he killed.
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: Which is shocking.
• 30:11
  Speaker 1: And Tyrone Jr. agrees. This meeting takes place inside a
• 30:15
  Speaker 1: small room in the jail and lasts for 50 grueling minutes.
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: Just the two of them.
• 30:20
  Speaker 1: Listen to the details of this encounter. I'm in absolute awe.
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: of Tyrone Jr. 's psychological fortitude.
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: It's superhuman.
• 30:27
  Speaker 1: If we connect this to the bigger picture, it takes
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: superhuman strength to sit across from the man who blew
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: a hole in your son's head and simply talk to him.
• 30:37
  Speaker 1: He walks into that room seeking to understand the why.
• 30:41
  Speaker 1: He wants to look the killer in the eyes.
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: A meeting like this echoes the principles of restorative justice,
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: where victims confront offenders to seek closure or answers.
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: Right.
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: Jeremy does not offer genuine accountability in this meeting.
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: Of course not. Confronted by the father, Jeremy immediately resorts
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: to deflection and minimization.
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: He throws Kamiya straight under the bus.
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: He tells the grieving father, she wanted me to do it.
• 31:05
  Speaker 1: She knew what she was doing. She wanted the money.
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: He attempts to frame himself as a naive pawn.
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: Claiming he was blinded by love and too stupid to
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: realize Kamiya was just using him as a tool to
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: collect $ 400, 000.
• 31:18
  Speaker 2: It is the final desperate act of a narcissist trying
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: to salvage his ego. Even after pleading guilty to murder,
• 31:24
  Speaker 2: he refuses to carry the moral weight of the act,
• 31:26
  Speaker 2: attempting to offload all the culpability onto the mastermind.
• 31:30
  Speaker 1: The audacity of Jeremy is staggering. When Tyrone Jr. brings
• 31:33
  Speaker 1: up Kamiya crying over the body in the driveway, Jeremy
• 31:37
  Speaker 1: actually scoffs and coldly calls her a good actor.
• 31:41
  Speaker 2: Oh, man.
• 31:42
  Speaker 1: Sitting across from a man displaying that level of sociopathy
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: requires an unfathomable amount of restraint.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: It really does.
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: Tyrone Jr. admits the rage he is feeling. He looks
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: at Jeremy, the man who was around his young grandson,
• 31:55
  Speaker 1: and tells him directly, I can see why people would
• 31:57
  Speaker 1: want to burn your house down.
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: But the father reclaims his power in that room. He
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: is no longer the passive victim of a secret conspiracy.
• 32:05
  Speaker 1: No. By enduring that conversation, he strips Jeremy of any
• 32:08
  Speaker 1: remaining illusion of control.
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: And he ends the meeting by dictating the reality of
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: Jeremy's future.
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: It isn't a screaming threat. It is a quiet, pragmatic warning.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: Tyrone Jr. looks at him and says, I don't know
• 32:19
  Speaker 1: how much you know about us. Benton Harbor is a
• 32:21
  Speaker 1: tight community. The Hassel family is very popular.
• 32:24
  Speaker 2: He is laying out the facts of prison life.
• 32:26
  Speaker 1: He informs Jeremy that the prison system in Michigan is
• 32:30
  Speaker 1: populated by people from those exact communities. 90% of the
• 32:34
  Speaker 1: inmates Jeremy will encounter are going to know exactly who
• 32:38
  Speaker 1: he is and exactly what he did to a hometown hero.
• 32:41
  Speaker 2: In the rigid hierarchy of prison culture, a man who
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: murders an active duty soldier for an insurance payout is
• 32:46
  Speaker 2: going to find himself incredibly isolated and targeted.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: Tyrone Jr. leaves him with a haunting calculation. You're going
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: to do 365 days for 65 years.
• 32:56
  Speaker 2: Every single day will be a conscious exercise in survival.
• 32:59
  Speaker 1: It's chilling. As we step back from the granular details,
• 33:02
  Speaker 1: the overarching tragedy is just devastating.
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: It really is. A father poured his energy into guiding
• 33:08
  Speaker 2: his son past the pitfalls of a tough city.
• 33:11
  Speaker 1: He watched his son become an educated man, a sergeant,
• 33:14
  Speaker 1: a father, and a friend.
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: And that triumph was erased in an instant.
• 33:18
  Speaker 1: Not by a random stranger in a robbery, not by
• 33:20
  Speaker 1: a faceless enemy in a combat zone, but by the
• 33:23
  Speaker 1: mother of his grandson, all for an insurance payout and
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: a workplace romance.
• 33:27
  Speaker 2: From an investigative standpoint, it serves as a stark warning
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: about the illusion of anonymity in the modern world.
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: You can't outsmart the grid.
• 33:34
  Speaker 2: No. Criminals often operate under this hubristic belief that they
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: are invisible, but the grid is omnipresent. The cell towers
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: tracking your velocity, the optical sensors reading your license plates.
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: The data logs of your social media apps?
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: They form an indestructible digital shadow. Every text, every highway
• 33:54
  Speaker 1: toll camera, every Snapchat leaves a permanent mark.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: You cannot outsmart the math of a time-distance analysis.
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: But beyond the forensic science, this case leaves us with
• 34:04
  Speaker 1: a deeply unsettling psychological reality.
• 34:07
  Speaker 2: We spend our lives building fortresses, right?
• 34:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah. We install security cameras. We lock our deadbolts. We
• 34:13
  Speaker 1: view the outside world as the source of danger. And
• 34:16
  Speaker 1: we view our partners as our ultimate safe harbor.
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: But the chilling question is how you process the reality
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: that the architect of your destruction could be the person
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: sleeping beside you.
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: How well can you ever truly know the inner architecture
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: of someone else's mind, even when you share a life,
• 34:31
  Speaker 1: a child, and a home?
• 34:33
  Speaker 2: It's a terrifying thought.
• 34:34
  Speaker 1: It really is. Something to mull over. Thank you for
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: joining us for this deep dive. Stay curious, stay observant,
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: and we will catch you on the next one.