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Romance and Crime Author Charged with Killing Motel Owner · Murder Files Unsealed

0:00
Speaker 1: Welcome to this deep dive. I mean, today we are
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getting into a story that, honestly, it sounds exactly like
0:06
a Hollywood script. Oh absolutely, it's almost too cinematic, right,
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but it is tragically and undeniably real. So for those
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of you listening, I want you to picture a really quiet,
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hot July afternoon, very hot, yes, suffocatingly hot, and we're
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in a Montana town of barely nine hundred people.
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Speaker 2: Right, tiny community exactly.
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Speaker 1: And in this town there's a seventy three year old grandmother,
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a woman who was just known locally for, you know,
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quietly riding her bicycle down main Street.
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Speaker 2: Just a totally normal, everyday site for the local.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, just the bicycle lady. But on the specific day,
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she walks into the lobby of this modest, little Hot
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Springs motel.
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Speaker 2: And she is not dressed for a back ride.
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Speaker 1: No she is not. She's wearing this hyper specific, almost
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theatrical outfit. Yeah, we're talking a leperprint sundress, a cowboy hat,
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and despite that extreme summer heat we just mentioned, she
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is wearing heavy leather gloves.
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Speaker 2: Which is just a staggering detail, it really is.
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Speaker 1: And within minutes of walking in, she basically acts out
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exactly what the protagonists of her self published rodeo erotica
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novels had been doing on the page for years.
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Speaker 2: Literally pulling the plot right off.
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Speaker 1: The page exactly. She bypasses the front desk, walks straight
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into a back office and pulls the trigger of a
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point three to eight caliber revolver.
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Speaker 2: It's just I mean, it's the kind of jarring, intensely
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visual scenario that completely short circuits the brain, oh for sure,
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Because when the line between a writer's violent fiction and
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their real world actions just collapses like that, the shockwave
1:38
doesn't just hit the victim's family.
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Speaker 1: Right, it hits everyone.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, It fundamentally fractures the reality of that entire community.
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Speaker 1: And that's exactly what we're unpacking today. We're looking at
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this July twenty, twenty sixth case of Kyle Annamarrow, this
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Montana romance novelist who allegedly turned her dark, lethal fiction
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into a very real homicide.
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Speaker 2: And we have a really incredible stack of soort for
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you today to help figure this all out.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, we've got extensive local reporting from journalists on the
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ground in Meager County.
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Speaker 2: Which is super helpful for getting the town's perspective.
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Speaker 1: Definitely, And we also have the actual probable cause affidavit
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filed by the Montana Division of Criminal Investigation.
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Speaker 2: The hard legal facts, right.
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Speaker 1: Plus we're going to be analyzing direct excerpts and plot
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summaries of the author's published novels.
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Speaker 2: So we can actually compare the fiction to the.
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Speaker 1: Reality exactly, because our mission today is to extract the
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actual facts of this case. We want to examine those
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eerie parallels, but also explore how a small town actually
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grapples with this sudden, violent shattering of its piece.
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Speaker 2: And I think it's important to state our analytical approach
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here right off the bat.
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Speaker 1: Oh absolutely, because I.
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Speaker 2: Mean the national headlines are aggressively pushing this sensational novelist
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turns killer narrative.
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Speaker 1: Which is going to get clicks obviously, right, it.
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Speaker 2: Generates clicks, But our goal is to cut through that noise.
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What's fascinating here is the concrete timeline of events. You know,
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we need to evaluate the physical evidence and really explore
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that complex boundary between artistic fantasy and real world action.
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Speaker 1: Okay, let's unpack this because to really understand this, we
3:15
have to start with the geography, the.
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Speaker 2: Physical space is so important here.
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Speaker 1: It really is. I mean you can't comprehend the magnitude
3:23
of this event without understanding White Sulfur Springs, Montana.
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Speaker 2: No, you really can't.
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Speaker 1: It's this town nestled in the shadow of the Little
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Belt mountains. And like I said, the population hovers right
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around nine hundred people.
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Speaker 2: Nine one hundred people. That is tiny.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, So in a municipality of that size, anonymity just
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does not exist, right. You don't just know your neighbors
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by their first names. I mean you know their.
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Speaker 2: Vehicles, you're their daily routines.
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Speaker 1: Exactly, and you know they're extended families.
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Speaker 2: And that level of geographic and social isolation, it breeds
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a highly specific type of community architecture.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, totally.
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Speaker 2: The town is that small and just surrounded by the
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vastness of the American West. It relies heavily on informal
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support structures.
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Speaker 1: Like local businesses exactly, the.
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Speaker 2: Local diner, the hardware store of the motel. I mean,
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these aren't just commercial.
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Speaker 1: Businesses, no, they're the community hubs right.
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Speaker 2: Where social bonds are continuously reinforced. Trust is basically the
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primary currency in a town like that, and.
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Speaker 1: The absolute heart of that local hospitality Network was the
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SPA Hot Springs.
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Speaker 2: Motel right there on West Main Street.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, for decades, it has served as this modest, comforting landmark.
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You know. It's known for its mineral.
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Speaker 2: Baths, simple accommodations, right.
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Speaker 1: And it's just this gathering place for weary travelers and
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locals alike.
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Speaker 2: And the owner was a massive part of that.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, Jeane Goodmanson. He was seventy eight or seventy nine
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years old, and he was just a fixture there, a
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man whose daily presence was completely woven into the fabric
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of the town.
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Speaker 2: Everyone knew, Gene everyone.
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Speaker 1: But shortly before two pm on the afternoon of July twelfth,
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twenty twenty six, that ordinary, the comforting setting was just
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violently transformed into a crime scene.
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Speaker 2: And if we look at the chronological timeline of what
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transpired that afternoon, it's our first major window into the
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psychology of the event.
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Speaker 1: It really is. It's chilling.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, Every movement recorded by witnesses in those surveillance cameras
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reveals a deeply, deeply deliberate sequence of actions.
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Speaker 1: So let's walk through those movements. Kylen Morrow, this seventy
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three year old local woman walks through the front.
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Speaker 2: Doors, and we have to talk about the outfit again.
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Speaker 1: H I want to lander on her out for a moment,
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because it is just impossible to ignore the leopard print,
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the leopard prince and dress, the cowboy hat, and the
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leather gloves. I mean, my initial reaction to reading that
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and the police reports was that she was like playing
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a character.
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Speaker 2: Like she was in a play.
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Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, it feels like someone stepping onto a theater set,
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you know, cloaking herself in this hyper stylized persona before
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committing an act she just couldn't bring herself to do
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as quote unquote just Kyle.
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Speaker 2: It's a fascinating theory. But those leather gloves, they pull
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this out of the realm of just theatricality, don't they.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, they do, because it's a very practical choice.
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Speaker 2: Ultimately exactly, I mean, the leather gloves move this entire
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scenario from a psychological curiosity straight into a severe legal framework.
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Speaker 1: Because of the weather.
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Speaker 2: Right, consider the environment. It is mid July in Montana.
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Speaker 1: It's hot.
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Speaker 2: The ambient temperature makes wearing leather gloves incredibly uncomfortable and
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highly conspicuous. Yes, from a law enforcement perspective, a detail
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like that immediately signals a tactical decision.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, you wear leather gloves in the summer for basically
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two functional reasons, exactly.
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Speaker 2: To avoid leaving latent fingerprints on surfaces or weapons, or
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to prevent gunshot residue from embedding in the pores of
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your skin. Wow. It demonstrates this incredible forward looking awareness
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of forensic evidence.
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Speaker 1: Which speaks directly to the legal concept of premeditation.
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Speaker 2: It does it severely undercuts any potential defense argument that
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this was a spontaneous crime of passion, like she just snacked, Right,
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It wasn't a sudden snapping of the mind. The conscious
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decision to locate those gloves, put them on, and keep
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them on indicates a structured plan.
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Speaker 1: She knew exactly what she was doing, right.
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Speaker 2: It shows an individual operating in with the distinct awareness
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of the mechanics of the crime they are about to
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commit and the investigation that will inevitably follow.
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Speaker 1: So she approaches a front desk employee dressed in the
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striking outfit, and she asks a very specific question. Right,
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She asks if Annie and Jean are there now? Annie
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is Jean's.
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Speaker 2: Wife, and the employee responds right, Yeah.
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Speaker 1: The employee says that Annie isn't on the premises, but
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Jeane is okay, And upon hearing this, Marrow actually leaves
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the building briefly she walks back out. Yeah, Then a
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few minutes later she returns. She walks purposefully past the
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front desk, pushes through a swinging gait near the counter,
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and heads straight back to the private offices.
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Speaker 2: And that's what happens.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, moments later, a single fatal shot is fired. But
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I am struggling to interpret that brief exit and return.
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Speaker 2: It's a very strange detail.
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Speaker 1: Why ask for both of them leave and then come back?
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I mean, is it possible she was looking for a
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reason to abort the plan, like a moment of hesitation.
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Speaker 2: Let's analyze the possibilities, because that behavioral pivot is really crucial, right,
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Asking for both Annie and Jean suggests she is conducting
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like a real time environmental assessment.
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Speaker 1: Okay, that makes sense.
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Speaker 2: She needs to know the exact layout of potential witnesses
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or obstacles, so when she learns Annie is absent and
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Gene is present, the environment is suddenly defined for her.
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Speaker 1: The parameters are set.
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Speaker 2: Exactly, so leaving the building at that exact moment could
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certainly represent a psychological threshold.
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Speaker 1: Look, she got overwhelmed.
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Speaker 2: Maybe the crushing weight of transitioning a violent fantasy into
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an irreversible physical reality might have caused a brief retreat. Yeah,
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she may have needed to step outside to steady her breathing,
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or to mentally cross.
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Speaker 1: The rubicon, to just hype herself up for it. But
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to play Devil's advocate here, what if it wasn't hesitation
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at all? What if it was purely tactical and that is.
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Speaker 2: The secondary and frankly far more chilling interpretation. Yeah, she
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confirms her primary target is on site and vulnerable, so
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she steps outside, away from the eyes of the desk clerk,
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maybe to retrieve the revolver from her vehicle oh wow,
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or to chamber around, or simply to ensure she has
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a clear, unimpeded path upon re.
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Speaker 1: Entry, and her actions when she comes back in kind
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of support that.
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Speaker 2: They absolutely do the subsequent action.
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Speaker 1: She just walks right past the desk.
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Speaker 2: Right walking decisively past the desk through a restricted swinging
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gate and directly into the back office that supports the
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tactical interpretation.
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Speaker 1: There's no wandering around, no wandering.
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Speaker 2: No searching. It is a targeted, efficient movement toward a
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known destination, and.
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Speaker 1: The aftermath of the gunshot is just as disturbing as
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the build up.
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Speaker 2: It's surreal.
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Speaker 1: Marl walks back out of the office, she encounters a
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front desk employee and she delivers this statement. She says,
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he is the son of a bitch, I shot him.
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Speaker 2: Unbelievable, and then.
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Speaker 1: She simply walks out the front doors and drives away
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and her niece on frontier. She doesn't run, No, there
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is no frantic sprinting to the car, no attempt to
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hide her face from the cameras. She just offers this unsolicited,
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perfectly calm confession.
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Speaker 2: And the phrasing of that statement is a massive indicator
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of her internal psychological state. So well, notice what is
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absent from.
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Speaker 1: That state, right, there's no panic exactly.
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Speaker 2: No panic, no remorse, no shock at her own actions. Instead,
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there is a declaration of justification.
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Speaker 1: He is a son of a bitch, right.
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Speaker 2: That serves as her rationale, and it's followed immediately by
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the action I shot.
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Speaker 1: Him, yeah, Like it's just a matter of fact.
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Speaker 2: It suggests an individual who feels profoundly morally validated in
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taking a life. She has completely internalized a narrative where
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this outcome was not only necessary but.
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Speaker 1: Deserved, but strategically I mean, making a clean confession to
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an employee and then casually driving away in your own
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vehicle in a town of nine hundred people. It makes
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absolutely no sense.
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Speaker 2: It defies logic.
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Speaker 1: Everyone knows her, everyone knows her niece on Frontier. She
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had to know she wouldn't even make it out of
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the county.
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Speaker 2: And that paradox is exactly what defines a specific subset
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of offenders.
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Speaker 1: Really.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, the meticulous planning required for the event itself, the gloves,
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the targeting, the weapon, It completely disintegrates the moment the
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event concludes. Oh wow, It's like the cognitive bandwidth required
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to execute the homicide seemingly exhausted her capacity to plan
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for the next five minutes.
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Speaker 1: That's a crazy way to think about it.
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Speaker 2: Right, And it strongly indicates that surviving the aftermath or
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evading capture was just never part of her original calculus.
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The act of the shooting was the absolute terminus of
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her plan.
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Speaker 1: Which perfectly explains the chaotic nature of the immediate police
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response and her eventual arrests.
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Speaker 2: Because they found her immediately.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, as expected, the identification was instantaneous. Witnesses at the
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motel didn't just give a vague description of you know,
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a woman in a hat. They knew exactly who she
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was because.
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Speaker 2: She was a former employee of that very motel exactly.
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Speaker 1: And the surveillance footage corroborated the witness accounts, clearly capturing
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her entering with what appeared to be a small revolver
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and departing in her Nissan.
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Speaker 2: And in an isolated, tight knit jurisdiction like that, law
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enforcement response times and suspect identification operate on an entirely
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different scale. Oh I bet the Meager County Sheriff's office
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didn't need to launch a prolonged man hunt. They didn't
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need to process facial recognition data. No, they received a
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nine to one one call with a name, a vehicle, make,
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and a home address simultaneously.
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Speaker 1: Right, So, Meager County under Sheriff Jeremy West and a
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team of deputies immediately converged Onmorrow's residence and there she was.
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Her niece on frontier was parked right outside. So they
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attempted to establish contact. They're calling her repeatedly, but the
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calls went entirely unanswered, just silence. Yeah, and then after
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a period of tension, Marrow suddenly emerged. She gets into
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the Nissan.
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Speaker 2: And attempts to flee, but they were ready.
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Speaker 1: Right, because law enforcement had already established a perimeter. She
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was quickly intercepted and blocked in by the Montana Highway
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Patrol and local deputies.
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Speaker 2: He was over before it started.
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Speaker 1: And when they finally took her into custody and executed
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search warrants on her vehicle and her home, the inventory
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of evidence they collected, I mean it pains a deeply
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revealing picture of her state of mind.
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Speaker 2: Absolutely, The forensic inventory is the foundation upon which the
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prosecution will build its entire legal strategy, right, because what
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law enforcement recovers in those critical first hours dictates the
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trajectory of the criminal charges.
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Speaker 1: So let's break down what they found. Starting with the
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interior of the Nissan Frontier. Okay, the authorities recovered a
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partially full bottle of Jamison irish whiskey, an empty hand
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gun case, loose cigarette scattered about, and a lighter.
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Speaker 2: A very chaotic scene.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, when I visualize that scene, the open whiskey bottle,
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the loose tobacco, the empty gun case, it doesn't look
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like a master criminal making a.
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Speaker 2: Getaway, No, not at all.
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Speaker 1: It looks like a profound, spiraling crisis. What is the
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physiological and psychological mechanism happening in that car during the standoff?
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Speaker 2: Well, we are looking at the physical detritus of a
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massive neurochemical crash.
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Speaker 1: Okay, tell me more about that.
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Speaker 2: Leading up to and during the shooting, Morrow's system would
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have been flooded with adrenaline and cortisol exactly. The heart
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rate spikes, the senses narrow, the body prepares for extreme action.
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But once the trigger is pulled and she retreats to
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her vehicle, that adrenaline begins to rapidly metabolize.
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Speaker 1: And she crashes.
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Speaker 2: The physiological crash is often just overwhelming. So the presence
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of the jamison whiskey is a classic indicator of an
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attempt to forcefully depress the central nervous system, to calm
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down right, to self medicate the surging anxiety, or to
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artificially lower her inhibitions for whatever she planned to do next.
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And the loose cigarettes, the loose cigarettes and lighter point
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to a frantic, disorganized motor function. Her hands are probably shaking.
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It is the tableau of an individual whose internal reality
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is just collapsing under the weight of what they have
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just done.
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Speaker 1: Wow, and the evidence recovered from her home firmly anchors
15:26
the criminal charges.
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Speaker 2: What do they find there?
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Speaker 1: Investigators found a Smith and Wesson point three eight caliber revolver.
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They recovered the highly distinctive clothing matching the motel surveillance footage,
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the leopard print dress, the cowboy hat.
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Speaker 2: Though tying her directly to the scene.
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Speaker 1: But the most significant discovery was a collection of handwritten documents.
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Authorities described them as suicide or final arrangement notes, within
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which Marrow explicitly admitted in her own handwriting to killing
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Jene Goodmanson.
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Speaker 2: Well. From an evidentiary perspective, that is a prosecutor's ideal scenario.
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Speaker 1: It's basically a slam dunk.
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Speaker 2: This state possesses the suspected murder weapon, the clothing tying
16:04
the suspect to the visual record, multiple eyewitnesses, a spontaneous
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verbal confession at this scene to desk clerk, and documentary
16:12
evidence in the suspect's own handwriting acknowledging culpability. His overwhelming
16:17
accumulation of evidence is exactly why she was immediately charged
16:22
with deliberate homicide.
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Speaker 1: Okay, I want to pause on that specific charge, deliberate homicide.
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How does Montana law define that compared to say, first
16:31
degree murder in other jurisdictions.
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Speaker 2: It's a really important distinction.
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Speaker 1: Yeah.
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Speaker 2: Under the Montana Code, annotated deliberate homicide requires the state
16:39
to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that the defendant purposely
16:42
or knowingly cause the death of another human.
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Speaker 1: Being purposely or knowingly, Okay, right.
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Speaker 2: Unlike some jurisdictions that require proof of deep, long standing
16:50
premeditation or malice of forethought, Montana focuses heavily on the
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intent at the moment of the act. Got it purposely
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means it was her conscious object to cause death. Knowingly
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means she was aware that her conduct was highly probable
17:05
to cause that result.
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Speaker 1: And the gloves exactly.
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Speaker 2: The prosecution will rely heavily on the leather gloves and
17:11
the methodical navigation of the motel to establish that this
17:14
was a conscious, purposeful act, not a reckless or negligent one.
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Speaker 1: So she is currently being held in the Broadwater County
17:21
Detention Center on a one million dollar bond, with a
17:24
preliminary hearing scheduled for August eleventh, twenty twenty six, and.
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Speaker 2: She's facing a potential sentence of life in prism.
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Speaker 1: Right. But let's return to those handwritten documents for a second.
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The suicide or final arrangement notes. Yes, the presence of
17:38
those notes dramatically shifts the context of the crime, doesn't it.
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If she was actively planning to end her own life
17:45
alongside this murder, how does that impact the legal proceedings
17:48
moving forward?
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Speaker 2: This raises an important question because the existence of suicide
17:53
notes introduces a massive psychological variable into the legal equation.
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It forces the court to confront her men state, was
18:01
this intended to be an act of ultimate nehilistic finality? Right?
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Speaker 1: Was she just ending everything?
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Speaker 2: The defense council will almost certainly leverage these notes to
18:09
argue that Marrow was experiencing an acute psychiatric break okay,
18:13
or a severe depressive episode or some form of diminished
18:17
capacity at the time of the shooting.
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Speaker 1: So they'll use it to fight the purposely and knowingly
18:21
part exactly.
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Speaker 2: The legal battleground during that August eleventh hearing and in
18:26
any subsequent trial or plea negotiations will center on whether
18:30
her suicidal ideation negates her legal ability to act purposely
18:34
or knowingly. The prosecution will argue the notes prove she
18:38
understood exactly what she was doing and was planning for
18:41
the aftermath, while the defense will argue they prove she
18:44
was entirely detached from rational reality.
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Speaker 1: The juxtaposition here is just astounding to me.
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Speaker 2: It really is.
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Speaker 1: On one hand, you have a seventy three year old grandmother,
18:54
a familiar face in a tiny rural town, riding a bicycle.
18:58
On the other hand, you have a woman execut dutting
19:00
a highly structured, ruthless homicide and leaving behind final arrangement notes.
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Speaker 2: It's hard to reconcile.
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Speaker 1: It is to even begin to reconcile these two opposing images.
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We have to look away from the physical crime scene
19:12
and examine the alternate identity she spent years meticulously constructing
19:16
on paper.
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Speaker 2: And this is the juncture where the case transcends a
19:19
standard local tragedy and enters the realm of complex psychological profiling. Yeah,
19:24
the duality of her existence, the public citizen versus the
19:28
private creator, is the key to understanding the underlying pathology.
19:32
Speaker 1: So let's dealt into her background.
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Speaker 2: Let's do it.
19:35
Speaker 1: Kyle Ammaro grew up embedded in a fifth generation Ranching
19:38
family in the Missouri River Breaks.
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Speaker 2: Which is a very specific type of environment.
19:43
Speaker 1: Very for those unfamiliar with Montana geography, the Missouri River
19:47
Breaks is an incredibly rugged, isolated, and unforgiving landscape. It
19:52
is a region characterized by deep ravines, bad lands, and
19:55
a harsh climate.
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Speaker 2: It breeds a specific type of stoicism.
19:59
Speaker 1: Exactly and locally, she was known simply as just Kyle.
20:03
Sheriff John Lope actually noted that exchanges with her were
20:07
generally positive. She was a recognizable everyday figure, right, just
20:10
a normal local. But here's the biographical detail that really
20:13
demands closer inspection. In twenty eleven, this woman from the
20:16
Missouri River Breaks travels across the Atlantic to Wales. To Wales, right,
20:21
she enrolls at Aberystwyth University and earns a master's degree
20:25
in creative writing.
20:26
Speaker 2: That is just such a massive pivot.
20:28
Speaker 1: It is an incredible, almost absurd whiplash in a life trajectory.
20:33
What drives a woman deeply rooted in rural Montana Ranching
20:37
culture to seek formal international academic validation for her writing.
20:43
Speaker 2: Well, it reveals a profound driving ambition that totally contradicts
20:47
the image of this simple bicycle riting local.
20:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, she wanted to be taken seriously.
20:51
Speaker 2: The decision to pursue a master's degree in Wales is
20:54
highly strategic. It provides physical and psychological distance from her
20:58
deeply entrenched identity Montana. Right academic creative writing programs, particularly
21:03
in the UK, they focus heavily on the mechanics of storytelling.
21:07
Speaker 1: Character development, narrative structure.
21:09
Speaker 2: All that exactly. She wasn't just casually writing in a diary.
21:12
She was aggressively seeking the pedagogical tools to craft professional,
21:17
impactful narrative.
21:18
Speaker 1: She wanted the skills.
21:19
Speaker 2: She sought an environment where she was solely defined as
21:22
a writer, stripping away the generational baggage of being a
21:25
Montana rancher.
21:26
Speaker 1: And she took those sophisticated storytelling mechanics she learned in
21:29
Wales and brought them right back to the rugged terrain
21:32
of her childhood.
21:33
Speaker 2: Because she had a plan.
21:35
Speaker 1: Right, she decided to create a very specific niche Motivated
21:39
by the massive global commercial success of the Fifty Shades
21:42
of Gray franchise, she wanted to write a more gritty, authentic,
21:46
rural Montana equivalent. She actually coined the genre rodeo.
21:51
Speaker 2: Erotica rodeo erotica, and to.
21:54
Speaker 1: Write it, she adopted a pen name that is frankly
21:57
aggressively provocative.
21:59
Speaker 2: Boy, what is it?
22:00
Speaker 1: CE Pussybuck?
22:02
Speaker 2: Wow? Okay, that's a statement, right.
22:05
Speaker 1: I mean, going to Wales for a master's degree just
22:07
to come back to Montana and write rode erotica as C. Pussybuck.
22:10
Speaker 2: It's wild. But the selection of that specific pseudonym is
22:14
a critical psychological mechanism. Tell me more, the concept of
22:17
the alter ego allows an individual to safely partition their psyche.
22:21
By writing a C. Pussybuck, she could explore taboo subjects,
22:25
deploy aggressive and explicit language, and navigate themes of hypersexuality
22:30
and violence without that darkness bleeding into her daily interactions
22:34
at the local grocery store. That's mass The pen name
22:36
acts as a shield. It signals a deliberate, conscious desire
22:40
to push societal boundaries, announcing to the reader and perhaps
22:44
to herself, that she is entering a psychological space where
22:47
the conventional rules and moral constraints of just Kyle no
22:51
longer apply.
22:52
Speaker 1: That makes a lot of sense, So let's examine the
22:54
actual literature she produced under this persona, which she actively
22:57
promoted on her personal website Kyle Montana dot com and
23:00
sold on Amazon What Are the Books Like? In twenty sixteen,
23:03
she published her debut novel, belt Buckle Bunny Okay. The
23:06
protagonist is a woman named Ship Sheehan, who, in a
23:10
classic case of art imitating life, is also a writer
23:12
of rodeo erotica a very meta yeah, and the narrative
23:16
is fueled by a volatile love triangle, chaotic rural mayhem,
23:20
and culminates in the discovery of a dead body following
23:23
a rodeo event. It is just drenched in rough as
23:26
humor and explicit encounters.
23:28
Speaker 2: So belt Buckle Bunny basically serves as the foundational text
23:32
of her alter ego.
23:33
Speaker 1: Yeah.
23:33
Speaker 2: It sets the stage, It establishes the specific formula she
23:36
would continually revisit. High stakes, interpersonal conflict and isolated rural setting,
23:43
explicit sexuality and a close, almost casual proximity to death
23:48
and extreme violence. She is building a world where violence
23:52
is just a natural byproduct of.
23:53
Speaker 1: The environment, but the evolution of that violence becomes glaringly apparent.
23:57
In her second novel, Black Iron Brandy, which was published
24:00
in twenty seventeen, How does it change? The tone shifts
24:03
significantly darker. The protagonist, Kat mckinna, is trapped in a
24:07
marriage to a profoundly abusive man, whom she refers to
24:10
in the narrative simply as fuckface.
24:12
Speaker 2: Okay, that's a taperry.
24:13
Speaker 1: The husband has committed horrific acts, including violating her daughter,
24:17
and the opening pages of the novel do not just
24:19
hint at violence. They dwell obsessively on the granular mechanics
24:23
of lethal retribution.
24:24
Speaker 2: Oh wow.
24:25
Speaker 1: The protagonist meticulously contemplates the logistics of killing him, weighing
24:29
the pros and cons of arranging an quote unquote accidental
24:32
death versus a direct execution.
24:35
Speaker 2: She's planning it out, Yeah.
24:36
Speaker 1: And when the narrative presents the opportunity, she does not hesitate.
24:40
She kills him.
24:41
Speaker 2: We must dissect the narrative engine of Black Iron Brandy
24:45
very carefully.
24:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, please do.
24:47
Speaker 2: The contemplation and execution of murder is not merely an
24:50
incidental plot device deployed for shock value here now. It
24:53
is the central driving thesis of the entire book. The
24:57
fantasy of lethal retribution is explored with forensic detail, right Crucially,
25:03
the protagonist feels entirely, unconditionally morally validated in her violence.
25:09
The narrative structure is designed to make the reader agree
25:12
that the murder is not just acceptable, but necessary.
25:15
Speaker 1: It's justifiable homicide exactly.
25:18
Speaker 2: It is a profound exploration of justifiable homicide.
25:20
Speaker 1: And the pattern continues in her third published novel, Two
25:23
Crow Omen More violence, Oh Yeah. This book features a
25:27
heroine who finds herself in a tense, escalating confrontation and
25:31
ultimately fires a pistol into the flank of a man's
25:34
red corvette. Firearms again, always firearms, sudden explosive violence, the constant,
25:40
lingering thread of death. These elements are woven inextricably into
25:44
the DNA of her entire bibliography.
25:46
Speaker 2: It's a consistent theme.
25:47
Speaker 1: She even had a fourth book titled Barbed Wire Haywire
25:50
listed on her website as forthcoming. Okay, So, when you
25:54
take the plots of these novels, the justified shootings, the
25:56
detailed planning of murder, and you stack them directly against
25:59
the events of July twelfth at the motel, the human
26:02
brain demands that we draw a straight, unbroken line connecting
26:07
the fiction to the reality.
26:09
Speaker 2: It is an incredibly powerful, almost gravitational pull to draw
26:13
that line. The thematic overlap is undeniable and deeply unsettling. However,
26:19
we really must apply rigorous analytical breaks here.
26:21
Speaker 1: Okay, why from a legal.
26:23
Speaker 2: And historical standpoint, fiction remains fiction? Right? Obviously the canon
26:27
of Western literature is overflowing with authors who have penned grizzly,
26:31
deeply detailed, and entirely justified fictional murders for centuries. True,
26:36
the act of an author utilizing their imagination to explore
26:39
the darkest corners of human behavior is not in itself
26:43
a crime scene. A novel, regardless of how violent or specific,
26:48
cannot simply be entered into a court of law as
26:50
a definitive blueprint or confession of future intent. It's just
26:54
a story, exactly. It represents an exploration of a theme,
26:58
a working out of psychological on paper.
27:01
Speaker 1: But I have to push back on that slightly. Go ahead,
27:03
because these books were not written in a vacuum. You know,
27:06
they weren't locked away in a desk drawer in the
27:08
Missouri River breaks. Sure, she wasn't a reclusive hobbyist keeping
27:12
her dark thoughts entirely private. These novels were public commodities.
27:17
Yes they were, and they weren't just sold on the
27:19
anonymous expanse of Amazon. Here's where it gets really interesting.
27:23
They were physically displayed and sold right in the lobby
27:26
of the SPA Hot Springs motel, the exact geographic location
27:31
where she would later walk in and pull the trigger.
27:33
Speaker 2: That is just chilling.
27:34
Speaker 1: That physical reality links the fictional violence directly to the
27:38
victims in a way that feels far more tangible than
27:41
just thematic overlap.
27:42
Speaker 2: Your point regarding the physical geography is absolutely vital, Yeah,
27:47
because it represents the collapse of the partition.
27:49
Speaker 1: She had built after ego Wall.
27:51
Speaker 2: Exactly, the safe, isolated realm of c pussy Buck was
27:56
physically imported into the daily, mundane reality of Just Kyle.
28:00
When those books were placed on the counter of the motel,
28:03
the alter ego in the daily life began to occupy
28:06
the exact same physical space.
28:08
Speaker 1: And the reason those books were on that counter is
28:11
a testament to the complex social dynamics of a small
28:14
town that we talked about earlier, right the community support Yeah,
28:17
Meager County Sheriff John Loppe provided context, reporters noting that
28:21
Jeane Goodminson and his wife, Annie explicitly allowed Morrow to
28:25
place her novels in their lobby for sale.
28:28
Speaker 2: They were just helping her out, exactly.
28:30
Speaker 1: As the sheriff stated, I think Jean's wife just did
28:32
it to help her sell books. They were actively supporting
28:34
a local author. They were being good neighbors.
28:37
Speaker 2: And that leads to a really disturbing piece of evidence,
28:39
doesn't it.
28:40
Speaker 1: Oh, it does. There is a specific digital artifact stemming
28:43
from this arrangement that is frankly one of the most
28:46
haunting details of this entire case.
28:49
Speaker 2: Yes, the public review. It completely encapsulates the profound tragedy
28:53
of the betrayal.
28:54
Speaker 1: Here so on Marrow's official author website, prominently displayed was
28:58
a warm, enthusiastic and highly personal review written by Annie
29:02
Anderlous Goodminson, herself, the victim's wife. Yes, and the tone
29:06
of this review is crucial to understand the dynamic between
29:09
these women. Annie wrote, Hey, Kyle, just want to let
29:12
you know that I started reading your book Black Iron Brandy,
29:14
and I'm hooked love it. Kyle, You're amazingly funny.
29:18
Speaker 2: She was a genuine fan.
29:20
Speaker 1: She details how she and another local woman, Eileen, purchased
29:23
the books and how they were actively encouraging motel guests
29:27
to buy them as well.
29:28
Speaker 2: They were promoting her.
29:29
Speaker 1: And then she concludes with this line. She says, Jane's
29:32
interested to read it after I'm done so far. Thanks
29:35
for the good read, my friend, Annie, and she puctuates
29:38
it with a bright red heart emoji.
29:40
Speaker 2: The cognitive dissonance generated by reading that review and the
29:42
wake of the homicide is staggering.
29:44
Speaker 1: It really is. It's like finding a cheerful thank you
29:47
card left it a demolition site.
29:49
Speaker 2: That's a perfect way to put it.
29:50
Speaker 1: That review, complete with the heart emoji, is a frozen
29:53
artifact of what appears to be genuine, supportive friendship. It
29:58
is an expression of pure small town camaraderie, and.
30:01
Speaker 2: It ended with the author walking into the reviewer's business
30:04
and executing her husband.
30:05
Speaker 1: How does the human mind, how does an entire community
30:08
even begin to process that level of dissonance?
30:12
Speaker 2: Well, the psychological phenomenon you were describing as profound. Yeah,
30:16
when a community experiences an event that violently contradicts their
30:20
established understanding of reality, it triggers massive cognitive dissonance. The
30:26
brain struggles to hold two opposing truths simultaneously. You know, Kyle,
30:30
is our quirky neighbor who writes funny books, and Kyle
30:33
is a calculated killer.
30:34
Speaker 1: You can't reconcile them.
30:35
Speaker 2: No, for the victim's family and for the town at large,
30:38
Annie's review highlights a catastrophic betrayal of trust. Annie was
30:43
publicly championing a piece of literature that centered on the
30:46
detailed fantasy of lethal violence, entirely unaware that the author
30:51
would soon direct lethal violence at her own family.
30:54
Speaker 1: It's horrifying.
30:55
Speaker 2: The trauma of that realization extends way beyond GRIEFKI is
31:00
a deep pervasive paranoia.
31:02
Speaker 1: Because you start questioning everything.
31:04
Speaker 2: If we connect this to the bigger picture, it forces
31:07
every resident to retroactively question their own judgment, to wonder
31:12
what dark, hidden turmoil might be simmering beneath the friendly
31:15
exteriors of everyone they know.
31:18
Speaker 1: And that lingering paranoia is compounded by the glaring absence
31:22
of a publicly known motive.
31:23
Speaker 2: Because we still don't know why.
31:25
Speaker 1: Right now, multiple agencies, including the Montana Crime Lab, the
31:29
Department of Fish, Wildlife and Parks, and the Highway Patrol
31:32
are conducting an exhaustive investigation.
31:35
Speaker 2: They're digging through everything.
31:36
Speaker 1: Yeah, they are digging through years of digital communications, financial records,
31:40
and employment history trying to find a definitive.
31:42
Speaker 2: Catalyst, because there has to be something, because.
31:45
Speaker 1: As of this moment, no specific interpersonal conflict, no heated argument,
31:50
no financial dispute has been detailed to the public.
31:53
Speaker 2: Nothing.
31:54
Speaker 1: Why Gene Why that day?
31:55
Speaker 2: The absence of a clear, easily digestible motive is the
32:00
black hole at the center of this narrative. It creates
32:03
a vacuum the human nature abhors, and true crime speculation
32:07
immediately rushes in to fill it.
32:09
Speaker 1: Everyone has a theory, right.
32:11
Speaker 2: Was there a deeply buried, long simmering employment grievance from
32:15
her time working at the motel? Maybe was there a
32:17
perceived slight or a personal dispute that escalated entirely outside
32:22
the public eye. Or or and this is the most
32:25
terrifying theory, did the violent fantasies she meticulously cultivated over
32:29
years as c. Pussy Buck finally accumulate so much psychological
32:32
mass that they demanded real world expression.
32:35
Speaker 1: Which is what everyone wants to know.
32:36
Speaker 2: While the theories are endless, responsible legal and forensic analysis requires
32:41
absolute patience.
32:42
Speaker 1: We have to wait for the evidence.
32:43
Speaker 2: The multi agency task force is utilizing digital forensics to
32:48
reconstruct the invisible architecture of their relationship, searching for the
32:52
hidden fracture. We cannot allow the sensationalism of her prose
32:56
to replace the hard, evidentiary facts we still lack.
33:00
Speaker 1: Which brings us to the fundamental question that continues to
33:02
echo through this entire analysis. It is the question that
33:05
fascinates us the most. Did the violent themes deeply embedded
33:09
in her books actually predict the real world crime? Or
33:13
is that perception merely a trick of the mind, an
33:15
illusion strictly created by the benefit of hindsight.
33:18
Speaker 2: It's the ultimate question.
33:20
Speaker 1: Because when we look back from the vantage point of
33:22
July twelfth, the progression from writing about murder to committing
33:25
murder feels terrifyingly inevitable. But was it?
33:29
Speaker 2: That is perhaps the most difficult question to answer definitively,
33:33
because it requires us to untangle the complex interplay of
33:36
human psychology, statistical coincidence, and the fundamental nature of artistic expression.
33:41
Speaker 1: Well, there is an incredibly high profile parallel case that
33:45
everyone in the media is immediately pointing to.
33:47
Speaker 2: Right now, I know exactly which one you mean.
33:49
Speaker 1: The case of Nancy Crampton Broofy for context for those
33:53
who don't know, she was the Oregon romance writer who
33:56
famously penned an online essay titled how to Murder Your husband,
34:00
and years later she was convicted of doing exactly that,
34:03
shooting her husband for life insurance money. It's a very
34:06
famous case, and the internet algorithms are already aggressively linking
34:10
Brophy and Morrow, presenting them as a distinct, unified phenomenon
34:14
of writers acting out their plots.
34:16
Speaker 2: The comparative analysis is entirely predictable, and on a superficial level,
34:21
it is a fair comparison.
34:23
Speaker 1: They seem very similar.
34:24
Speaker 2: Both involve older female authors of romantic fiction who wrote
34:28
about spousal murder and were later accused or convicted of
34:32
similar real world violence. Right, however, the legal system demands
34:37
nuance Sheraflopp has been highly disciplined in his public statements
34:41
regarding this.
34:42
Speaker 1: What did he say?
34:43
Speaker 2: He readily acknowledges the thematic overlap, stating we knew that
34:47
those were subjects that she wrote a lot in her books, so.
34:49
Speaker 1: They aren't ignoring it, no.
34:51
Speaker 2: But he firmly insists that investigators are looking at the
34:54
whole picture. He is categorizing the novels as contextual background information,
35:00
not as the definitive smoking gun.
35:02
Speaker 1: And if we zoom out to look at the broader
35:04
cultural context, Western literature has a massive, deeply ingrained tradition
35:09
of exploring these exact themes. Oh absolutely, from the penny
35:13
dreadfuls and old pulp westerns of the nineteenth century to
35:17
modern cowboy erotica. The genre is practically built on a
35:21
foundation of hard living, romantic entanglements and sudden, explosive quote
35:26
unquote frontier justice.
35:28
Speaker 2: It's a staple of the genre.
35:29
Speaker 1: The trope of the aggrieved party taking the law into
35:32
in their own hands with a firearm is a staple
35:34
of the American mythos.
35:36
Speaker 2: Precisely, the literary tradition of the American West is thoroughly
35:39
soaked in the concept of lethal retribution as a form
35:41
of moral balancing. Therefore, choosing to write about a woman
35:45
shooting an abuse of husband doesn't make an author a
35:48
psychological outlier. It simply makes them an active participant in
35:51
a highly established, commercially viable literary genre. If we apply
35:55
a strict statistical reality check, the overwhelming vast majority of
36:00
authors who write about murder from Stephen King to your
36:04
local mystery writer, never commit an act of violence, That's
36:07
very true. Conversely, the vast majority of individuals who commit
36:11
homicide have never written a novel, let alone published three
36:14
of them.
36:15
Speaker 1: But knowing the statistics doesn't seem to stop our brains
36:18
from drawing the connection.
36:19
Speaker 2: We can't help it.
36:20
Speaker 1: When the public sees a writer of violent fiction accused
36:23
of a violent crime, we instantly, almost involuntarily collapse the
36:28
distinction between the art and reality. It's like a reflex yea.
36:31
When the public sees a writer of violent fiction accused
36:34
of a violent crime, our brains instantly collapse the distinction
36:38
between art and reality. Are we biologically wired to look
36:41
for these narrative patterns even when they might just be coincidences?
36:45
Speaker 2: You are describing a psychological phenomenon known as apafenia.
36:49
Speaker 1: Apenia Okay, it's.
36:50
Speaker 2: A human tendency to perceive meaningful connections and patterns between
36:54
entirely unrelated or random things.
36:56
Speaker 1: Oh what.
36:57
Speaker 2: The human brain is essentially a highly involved pattern recognition engine.
37:02
We are deeply biologically uncomfortable with chaos, randomness, and senseless violence.
37:08
Speaker 1: We want to reason exactly.
37:10
Speaker 2: When an event like this occurs A seemingly inexplicable murder
37:14
in a quiet, safe town. Our brains scramble desperately to
37:18
impose order and meaning onto the chaos.
37:21
Speaker 1: We need it to make sense.
37:22
Speaker 2: Right, we look at the author's books, We see the
37:24
word murder, we see a firearm on the cover, and
37:27
our apaphenia triggers. We say, ah, a pattern, a cause,
37:31
and a direct effect.
37:31
Speaker 1: It feels good to find the pattern.
37:33
Speaker 2: It is a textbook manifestation of confirmation bias. We conveniently
37:37
ignore the tens of thousands of authors who write about
37:40
murder and never kill anyone, and we focus obsessively on
37:43
the singular data point that confirms our narrative.
37:45
Speaker 1: It makes me think of an analogy I heard regarding
37:47
how we judge professions.
37:49
Speaker 2: Let's hear it.
37:50
Speaker 1: If a master plumber tragically commits a violent crime, society
37:53
doesn't immediately blame the copper pipes in his truck or
37:56
assume his knowledge of water pressure drove him to violence. Right,
38:00
we easily separate the manual trade from the morality of
38:02
the individual.
38:03
Speaker 2: That is a brilliant analogy because it highlights exactly where
38:07
our logic fails regarding artists. Yeah, we easily separate the
38:11
plumber from the pipes, because plumbing is an external, mechanical trade.
38:16
Speaker 1: But writing is different.
38:17
Speaker 2: Because writing originates entirely from within the mind, because it
38:20
deals with emotions, philosophies, and internal desires. We falsely assume
38:25
that a novel is a direct, unfiltered window into the
38:29
author's soul.
38:30
Speaker 1: We take it literally.
38:31
Speaker 2: We struggle to accept that a writer can mechanically construct
38:34
a violent scenario for purely narrative or commercial purposes without
38:39
actually endorsing the violence.
38:41
Speaker 1: And this is a massive butt. While we must protect
38:44
the boundaries of art, we also can't be naive no
38:47
in this specific case, Kyle an Morrow's fiction does not
38:51
exist in an isolated vacuum.
38:52
Speaker 2: It does not, and that is where the legal and
38:54
psychological analysis most pivot. Legally, the boundaries of artistic expression
38:59
are heavily protected by the First Amendment. You cannot and
39:02
should not prosecute an individual for the contents of their imagination. However,
39:07
when you couple the highly specific, violently retributive plots of
39:10
black iron brandy with the concrete physical evidence recovered on
39:14
July twelve.
39:15
Speaker 1: The gloves, the gun.
39:17
Speaker 2: Right, the premeditated use of leather gloves in summer, the
39:20
targeted execution in the motel office, the pre written suicide notes,
39:24
and the disturbingly calm confession to the clerk. The fiction
39:28
ceases to be merely art.
39:30
Speaker 1: It becomes something else entirely.
39:32
Speaker 2: It transitions into a haunting, highly relevant psychological backdrop. It
39:37
strongly suggests that she had spent years actively inhabiting and
39:40
cultivating a mental architecture where lethal violence was not just
39:44
a plot device, but a justifiable, practical solution to a
39:48
real world problem. Wow, the fiction didn't necessarily cause the crime,
39:52
but it provides a terrifying map of the terrain her
39:54
mind had been traversing for years.
39:56
Speaker 1: And recognizing that an individual living quietly in your community
39:59
has been traversing that dark terrain for years is a
40:02
profoundly terrifying thought.
40:04
Speaker 2: It really is.
40:05
Speaker 1: So what does this all mean for you? This case,
40:08
as much as it reads like the plot of a
40:10
thriller novel, serves as a stark, sobering reminder of how
40:14
little we truly know about the complex interior lives of
40:17
the people we interact with every single day. We only
40:20
see what they show us exactly. The eccentric neighbor you
40:23
wave to as she rides her bicycle down the street.
40:26
The local business owner. You buy your morning coffee from
40:29
the seemingly friendly person selling self published books in the
40:32
lobby of the local motel.
40:34
Speaker 2: Right.
40:34
Speaker 1: We interact with their public personas we accept the versions
40:38
of themselves they present to us, but we rarely, if ever,
40:42
see the person underneath until something catastrophic shatters the surface.
40:46
Speaker 2: It is a deeply humbling realization about the limits of
40:49
human perception. Yeah, the residence of White Sulfur Springs believe
40:52
they knew justs Kyle. She was a fixture of their reality.
40:57
But they were entirely blissfully unwaware of the immense psychological
41:01
pressure building beneath that familiar, everyday exterior.
41:05
Speaker 1: And now that's all gone.
41:06
Speaker 2: And now the illusion of that familiarity has been broken,
41:09
and they are left to navigate the emotional wreckage.
41:11
Speaker 1: Right now, the spa Hot Springs motel remains closed or
41:14
heavily restricted, a crime scene replacing a community hub. Yeah,
41:19
a tight knit town of nine hundred people is left
41:22
grieving the loss of a pillar of their community, completely
41:25
confused by the betrayal, and forced to endure the agonizing
41:28
weight as the slow methodical legal processes of discovery, preliminary hearings,
41:34
and potential trials slowly unfold.
41:36
Speaker 2: The justice system takes time.
41:39
Speaker 1: The comforting, predictable clock of their small town has stopped ticking,
41:43
and they are currently stuck in a profound, heavy silence.
41:46
Speaker 2: In that silence, dictated by the pace of the justice system,
41:49
will likely last for many months, if not years, as
41:52
the court's attempt to legally codify and process a tragedy
41:56
that utterly defies simple explanation.
41:58
Speaker 1: Before we conclude, I want to give you with a
42:00
final thought to mull over, one that expands on the
42:02
details of this tragedy. Okay, think back to Annie Goodmanson's
42:06
glowing supportive review on Kyle Marra's website.
42:08
Speaker 2: The one with the heart.
42:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, thanks for the good read, my friend, followed by
42:13
that little red heart emoji. In our modern, hyperconnected age,
42:17
we leave permanent digital footprints of our relationships everywhere we go.
42:21
We do. We leave five star reviews for our friends businesses,
42:24
we comment on their photos, We leave casual, cheerful text messages.
42:27
Speaker 2: On their phones, digital artifacts.
42:29
Speaker 1: But if a relationship suddenly turns toxic, or in this
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extreme case, turns fatal, those cheerful digital artifacts don't update
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to reflect the new reality. No, they remain frozen in time,
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completely ignorant of the tragedy that followed, serving as digital
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ghosts of a trust that was violently broken. What digital
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footprints are you leaving behind today, and how wildly, how
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tragically could their meaning change if the story of your
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life took a sudden, entirely unexpected turn.
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Speaker 2: It is a sobering perspective on the absolute permanence and
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the profound fragility of our digital echoes.
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Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us on this deep dive. We'll
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be back next time to unpack another stack of sources.
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Take care of yourselves and pay close attention to the
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story's unfolding right in front of you.