Episode Transcript
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solve the case for up to 55% off
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your subscription. Hey Prime members,
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you can listen to Rabia and Ellen solve the
1:12
case ad-free on Amazon Music.
1:14
Download the Amazon Music app today. Hi
1:17
Rabia. Hey Ellen. It's Thursday
1:19
already or Wednesday for our Patreon.
1:21
Do you know our Patreon gets a double
1:23
drop a full day earlier?
1:26
Lucky folks, man. Yep, they get it all. If you're
1:28
here on Wednesday,
1:29
happy Wednesday. And if you're here on Thursday,
1:31
happy Thursday, which I used
1:34
to call Cosby Show Day. Did you watch the
1:36
Cosby Show when you were little? Yes, it was.
1:38
We loved it. We rushed home for it. Yeah.
1:41
On Thursdays. So speaking
1:43
of the Patreon, we have
1:45
a Patreon. It is up and running.
1:47
And I I think that we should call
1:50
our Patreon the jury box. Oh,
1:53
I like that. You do? I do like
1:55
that. And then they can deliberate there too. Yeah.
1:58
So join the jury
1:59
box.
2:00
do we like it?" And then I was thinking like our
2:02
patrons could be called like I just want to know Ellen
2:04
literally just dropped this on me. There was no consultation.
2:07
She's like, this is just how it's happening. What if you were
2:10
like, no, I hate that and I hate
2:12
you. Why are you still talking? I
2:14
just do whatever Ellen says. All
2:17
right. So it is settled with absolutely
2:19
no deliberation. It just came out of
2:21
my mouth. Insert dirty joke there. Yeah.
2:23
The jury box. Yeah. That's a dirty
2:26
joke came to my mind when when I saw both of those mics in your face
2:28
at the same time. I was like, what's happening in your studio? I'm
2:31
sorry. I'm a little tired. Wait,
2:33
I have to take a picture of this. Hold on, I'll post
2:36
this on the Patreon. This is Rabia and
2:38
her dirty joke. Okay, here we go. Wait, you can't even see
2:40
the whole unit. Oh yeah, you can actually. No, you can see well.
2:42
So join the jury box. All you
2:45
have to do is go to patreon.com
2:47
and search Rabia and Ellen. And there you
2:49
will find three tiers, everything
2:51
from bonus episodes to ad free episodes
2:54
to monthly Zooms with Rabia
2:56
and I, which we have scheduled.
2:58
We have our first monthly Zoom. When is
3:01
it Rabia? Our first live
3:03
Zoom just for our patrons is gonna
3:05
be this Friday, April 14th at 6
3:08
p.m. East Coast time. I'm excited.
3:10
That is the highest level of our
3:13
patrons. There's all kinds of stuff. Discord
3:15
access, there's also a SpeakPipe episode.
3:18
And what I really love about Zoom is we can
3:20
see everyone and talk to people.
3:22
It's not like when we're on a live. So our $15
3:25
tier gets you also
3:27
our monthly zoom. So if you
3:29
are listening to this on Wednesday or Thursday,
3:32
we're going to be chatting with you April 14th
3:34
at 6 p.m. Eastern. Yeah,
3:37
you guys got nothing going on. Come join us,
3:39
man. And we will record it and put
3:41
it on the Patreon just in case you are not
3:43
able to join us and you will be missed. And
3:46
we are knee deep in planning
3:48
our live show. Let me tell you, Rabia told
3:51
me yesterday, She said, Ellen, I've
3:53
never really done a live show. And
3:56
I'm not a performer. You are a performer.
3:58
This is what I'm showing to.
4:00
the world. I do keynotes, I do
4:02
commencements, I give lectures,
4:05
and Ellen, I think, is gonna make me do cartwheels.
4:08
I don't know what's gonna happen. She's like, I
4:10
mean, when I first heard the things you have planned,
4:12
I'm like, holy crap. I am gonna be like,
4:15
people would have pelt
4:17
eggs at me, but come watch it. Come
4:19
watch it. I was like, Robbie, two things. Are
4:21
you a soprano or an alto? And what's your
4:23
top note? I'm just, I'm writing out
4:26
a couple charts. We are planning lots
4:28
of special things for you. Holy moly.
4:30
She thinks I'm Joey Toronto.
4:32
She thinks I'm Joey, not Joey. May 4th
4:35
in Atlanta. We really hope you will join
4:37
us because this is not going to be our last
4:39
live show, but this is a one-time only
4:42
thing. This is a really great special guest.
4:45
So we have some great special guests. Can
4:47
I tell you a secret?
4:48
Somebody told me that maybe, maybe
4:51
a non might come. Stop
4:55
it. I'm serious. Like I- Great.
4:58
Then we canceled the live show and it turns into a Q and A. I
5:00
can't wait. But it really would mean the world
5:03
to see all of your beautiful faces. So please
5:05
join us. We are going to be at the punch line in
5:08
Atlanta, May 4th at 8 p.m. There
5:10
are still some VIP seats
5:12
available, though I think we're very, very close
5:14
to selling out. Almost sold out. And some
5:16
general admission. and we are planning
5:19
really special merch
5:20
for you as well. Right, Rabia? Oh, I'm so excited.
5:23
It's so cute. I will be just, we're just gonna wear all of it at the
5:25
same time. I can't wait. Well, enough
5:27
of the chitchat. We have a fantastic show
5:29
for you and a wonderfully deep
5:32
thought provoking case with James
5:34
Roday. I can't wait. Are you excited, Rabia?
5:37
I am, and I'm so glad James brought this
5:39
case to us. Yeah. Thank you,
5:41
James.
5:41
On with the show. Hi, Rabia. Hey, Ellen.
5:44
How are you doing? I am great. How are you
5:46
doing? I'm good. Is it
5:48
cold where you
5:49
are? Because you're indoors in a hat. I am always cold. Oh.
5:52
Great, how are you doing? I'm good, is it cold
5:54
where you are? Cause you're indoors in a hat.
5:57
I am always cold. You
5:59
know this. I'm
6:00
very small. I'm always cold. No,
6:02
I don't know that because you don't even wear socks to sleep, which
6:04
makes no sense to me if you were actually at the sleep. Well, let's
6:06
ask our guest today where he sits
6:09
on the sock debate. Sleeping
6:11
socks? Yeah. They're a thing. Before
6:14
we attack him with all of our questions, let's
6:16
introduce him. Go ahead, Rob. Yeah.
6:19
Oh my gosh. Like it
6:21
was a dream guest. I was like, do you think to our
6:23
producer, do you think we could get him? We got
6:25
him. We have today with us, James Roday
6:28
Rodriguez. Ah!
6:30
Welcome to the show, James. Thank you so much for
6:32
having me. It feels real good. He's
6:34
so excited. I love him. James,
6:37
listen, we don't mean to bring you into our
6:40
nonsense here, but...
6:41
I want to be in your nonsense. Okay.
6:43
All right. I demand, frankly, to be
6:45
a part of the non- He has a strong opinion on this
6:48
debate. I don't know what it is, but I know I have a strong opinion.
6:50
Let's do it. I am certain, James. Yes. Do
6:53
you sleep with socks?
6:56
Absolutely not.
6:56
Okay. Man. Do you
6:59
think the mere idea
7:01
of sleeping in socks is
7:03
banana pants? Listen. No, let him answer.
7:06
OK.
7:06
I would say
7:08
everybody's different. And I
7:11
personally run very hot, which means
7:13
I need to I needed to be cold when
7:15
I'm sleeping. And I know
7:18
I had no socks. Yeah. He
7:20
just texted me offline, Rabia, and said
7:22
anyone who wears socks to bed is a sociopath. That's
7:25
his words, not mine. I like to
7:26
throw a sociopath around as often. We
7:28
do too. We have this ongoing debate, this
7:31
crazy woman sleeps in socks. So fuzzy
7:33
socks were made for. They're called sleeping socks.
7:35
It is a thing. I will not accept it. I'm an American.
7:38
This is my constitutional right. They're
7:40
foot prisons.
7:41
Big, comfy, fuzzy socks. Sounds
7:43
for the right person like a dreamy
7:46
witch. They're hugs.
7:48
They are hugs for your feet. Anyway, okay. Thank
7:50
you so much for agreeing with me, James.
7:52
But we are really, really glad you
7:55
are here. I'm taking a Twitter poll. This is bullshit.
7:57
All right. Should we tell if everybody
7:59
knows the food?
8:00
hims as but should we do it yeah
8:02
thank dear thing lm well the you
8:04
know i think the word multi
8:06
high for net is really kind of over
8:08
used because i'm not an average man
8:10
renaissance yeah sure because
8:12
james kind of does it all acting
8:15
up writing directing
8:17
and i love that i think that every
8:19
aspect of performing is
8:21
amazing now i found this out
8:23
online did you go to n y u james
8:26
it did i am
8:27
a violent that's true yeah
8:29
and he has been
8:31
well he's currently on a b
8:33
c's a million little things
8:35
but he's also been directing
8:37
and writing he's written pilots for usa
8:40
and box and site by and
8:43
were just so happy you're here
8:45
is there anything fine you're doing right now
8:47
james in terms of performing
8:49
or anything creative that's really kind
8:51
of get you excited right now we
8:54
just robbed or the final
8:56
season things
8:59
oh okay graduations present
9:01
the death and fine with or was in the sixth
9:03
and final are we
9:05
showed up in vancouver were i seem
9:07
to shoot everything that you and
9:09
so we are in is
9:11
literally rumored a couple of weeks
9:14
and if you get back from a user
9:16
back to america
9:18
and it said through jones a short period
9:20
of finishing a one job
9:23
and to him to
9:24
reassess what life is
9:27
even what the next thing is not wanting
9:29
to rush into something to quickly because
9:31
it's appreciative as i am
9:33
to your been on to run a long run he shows
9:36
you have to kind of be ready for
9:39
you take a job with you'd run for that yeah
9:41
and i don't think i am at the moment so
9:44
i think i would say probably the next few
9:46
months will be a lot of
9:48
so
9:48
decompressing thinking about
9:50
what it is i actually wanna do with
9:53
my immediate future because truthfully
9:55
and again because i've been very lucky
9:57
i
9:57
haven't been in this position in quite some
10:00
burn it's a good problem to have to
10:03
wonderful wonderful champagne
10:05
from atlanta and i
10:07
find it very excited so i
10:09
know do a lot riding is a moyes
10:11
doing that but
10:12
as far as like what the next actual
10:15
see of acting gig are directing it looks
10:17
like i'm not entirely sure and i find
10:19
it predicts over
10:20
it yeah look if you ever want to write
10:22
a shell about to very
10:24
polar opposite podcast hers who
10:26
might investigate crime together to call
10:29
us also i saw you on instagram and
10:31
i've noticed that you seem to like animals
10:33
your big animal lover yeah i would say probably
10:35
like animals more than people
10:38
but most more ha i can get on board
10:40
with that when is your favorite
10:42
exotic animal i'm
10:43
a huge huge is any
10:45
and soft spot for elephants same
10:48
yeah they're running oh my gosh they're
10:50
so emotional or like
10:53
humans they have this a lot of same
10:55
as decent we go for empathy
10:57
for pairing off every
11:00
memory of in and they're vegetarians
11:02
and the the just ha beautiful
11:05
majestic how do you feel about
11:07
pandas well yeah i'm kind
11:09
of a panda girl is all
11:11
come for what they deserve those those
11:13
guys girls are especially interested i'll
11:16
out that i love elephants will dance
11:18
we play a little fun game called
11:20
three quick things and we each
11:22
ask your question not relating to
11:24
anything just a random question then we ask
11:27
all of our guests the same question
11:29
i feel
11:29
like i'm ready i'm is ready to get away so
11:31
aca don't know but what is the
11:33
most embarrassing thing
11:35
you've said in like a meeting
11:38
or and not dish a new any
11:40
thing in public with several witness
11:43
i
11:44
know that i've said things are far
11:46
more embarrassing and humiliating of this
11:49
but but the when it comes to mind
11:51
because i'm often reminded of
11:54
it or my best friend who's that i can't
11:56
i confidently said that's the
11:58
name of the the
12:00
1980 whatever hit song
12:02
by squeeze pulling muscles from
12:04
Michelle from a shell was
12:06
called pulling muscles for
12:09
Michelle That
12:13
you were so into that you and
12:15
we're doing you were going to your stops
12:18
you were literally pulling muscles to
12:20
get to this girl and I said
12:22
it's very very confidently in
12:24
a room full of of executives
12:27
including a music coordinator about.
12:29
Like you should
12:30
do this song in
12:32
this episode because it's perfect.
12:34
It tells the story of- A
12:38
story that never existed James. A boy
12:40
chasing a girl. Everybody
12:42
laughed and thought I was doing a bit
12:44
and I wasn't.
12:47
That's what
12:49
happens when you don't go back to double-check
12:51
stuff that you thought you knew in the
12:54
sixth grade. You need to go back and make
12:56
sure that you.
12:57
I cherish that kind of stuff. I love
12:59
it. I think it's adorable and I think you should
13:01
just stick with it and just dig
13:03
your heels into it. I always love the
13:05
strong and wrong approach though. Like
13:07
when you really. You got to sell it. You
13:09
got your fake it. You make it right. But
13:12
in that particular case, I didn't even think I was faking
13:14
it. I just thought, hey, this is the perfect
13:16
song. Everyone's
13:18
going to think that I'm dope because I'm
13:21
pulling out this squeeze song at the right
13:22
moment. appreciate that your best
13:25
friend does not let you live that down because
13:27
that's what best friends are for. All right. My
13:29
question is completely unrelated. What
13:31
is the most memorable meal you
13:33
have had in your life and why?
13:35
Well, guess I'll have to combine
13:38
my heritage with some nostalgia
13:41
and say the last time
13:43
that my grandmother made
13:45
her homemade cheese enchiladas
13:49
is something that I'll always remember because I
13:51
think I've
13:52
had them so many times over
13:54
the course of my childhood, but the last time she
13:56
made them was also the last time she was well
13:58
enough to cook. So we were.
14:00
all incredibly hyper aware
14:02
of probably this being and
14:05
i can still take i can honestly still taste
14:07
of america now a little bit better
14:09
than eight ever been before ever our
14:11
and nothing else by compared mean i've been to every
14:13
mexican restaurant los angeles
14:15
and york city and i can
14:18
find anything else closer not
14:20
grandma how long i was that proof
14:22
that was the easily
14:24
eight years ago ah also
14:26
to be clear nowhere in
14:29
new york will you find mexican food
14:31
that remotely comes close to the mexican
14:33
food you get in california i will die
14:35
on this hell morning california
14:38
live in new york and
14:40
never
14:40
never in a million years have i found
14:42
mexican food like there is in california
14:44
but i'm sure your grandma did a better
14:47
world
14:47
my grandma was tex mex roka
14:49
as i grew up in texas which is it's
14:51
own wayne of mexican
14:53
it's all it's incredibly regional
14:55
isn't anybody your family who tried to
14:57
like who got the recipe and tried to replicate
14:59
it from is clear they all do like the
15:01
is locals and in my father's
15:04
wife and in the others it's
15:06
it's in the ball or sure but all
15:08
of it's that they didn't use as
15:11
much lord maybe it's that we
15:13
out where but there's really no lotta
15:15
love there's really no substitute for
15:17
the entire can of crisco
15:20
going into the and before we start
15:23
and
15:24
why not a thank you for sharing
15:26
the i love with story there's always some he did memories
15:28
like attached to all of our food stories on your regular
15:31
be able to taste those and to lot of fifty years without
15:33
selling your mouth i'm italian and robbie
15:35
as from pakistan but whenever i talk to anyone
15:37
he's not from a culture that
15:40
real
15:40
these centers around food you
15:42
know some like white european cultures
15:44
and things like more man easy cultures
15:47
and like they're they're world doesn't revolve around
15:49
you don't like what what do you guys do all that
15:51
i think they play darts the
15:53
bill was darts yeah and
15:55
the marianas and the drink a lot of your yeah
15:58
well my ex husband is English
16:00
and he was like, we eat curry or fish and
16:02
chips. I was like, curry is not yours. I
16:06
mean, to be fair, to be fair, when they
16:08
left the subcontinent, we followed them back
16:11
as payback
16:12
and now the UK is full of brown
16:14
people who have forced
16:16
their culture onto them. And I think that's
16:19
as fair. They really are. Yeah, you got to eat our curry
16:21
now forever. And now we've got the third question. Go for it, Ellen. This
16:23
is the one we ask all of our guests. How does true
16:26
crime fit into your life? My
16:28
major
16:28
connection to True Crime is that
16:31
I live with someone who is obsessed
16:33
with it. Okay, fair.
16:35
I listen to all the podcasts
16:38
and watch all the shows. Love
16:40
it. And so I am sort of kept
16:43
up to speed indirectly, but
16:45
enough that I feel like you name 10 True
16:48
Crime podcasts. And I may
16:50
have heard of five of them, even though I've never listened
16:52
to them, because she does. And it just so happened.
16:55
This was just dumb luck that we
16:57
were road tripping when the
16:59
request came in. So
17:01
I was three episodes in to this
17:04
podcast that I offered up at
17:06
the exact moment that the
17:08
request came in. It also felt very kismedy. I
17:11
was like, well...
17:11
What? You were listening
17:13
to our podcast? No, I think I'm about Cobble Ball. I was listening to
17:15
Cobble Ball. Oh, okay, okay, okay.
17:18
While we were driving somewhere for
17:20
two days. Amazing. So when the request
17:22
came in, I was like, maybe I'm supposed to do this because
17:24
I don't even have to like pick something and
17:26
start from scratch. I'm like halfway through
17:28
already.
17:28
It's so interesting that you say that
17:31
because when I heard the case you chose,
17:33
I was like, that's so niche because
17:35
it is a case that is getting more
17:38
attention. Actually, let's just jump in. James,
17:40
why don't you tell our amazing listeners the
17:42
case that you chose?
17:43
I chose the senseless murder
17:46
of Brittany Stikes in Ohio.
17:49
She was driving on a
17:51
two-lane highway with
17:53
her one-year-old child as she was driving
17:56
in a Jeep and someone shot from the
17:58
driver's side five times.
18:00
The car went off the road, hit a tree,
18:02
and two lost passers-by
18:05
stopped to discover that she
18:08
had been killed.
18:09
And here's the part that blows everybody's
18:12
mind. Her one-year-old daughter
18:15
had also been shot in the head,
18:18
was just sitting there
18:20
chilling with her head covered in blood
18:22
and her dead mother in the driver's seat and
18:25
lit.
18:25
Can I just say that because you said that you
18:27
felt kind of kiss my day, like, here's
18:29
the thing, I don't believe in coincidences, James, the reason
18:32
you
18:32
got that request as you're listening to that
18:34
and then chose this case is because we're here, we're going to solve
18:36
it. Okay, let's do it. Oh,
18:39
boy. Well, to
18:41
James's point, the culpable
18:44
podcast, I was texting with the
18:46
host, Dennis Cooper, and our dear friend,
18:48
Payne Lindsay, is one of the producers
18:50
of that podcast. It is a sensational
18:53
deep dive. So obviously, we're going
18:55
to give our Crash Course. The three of us will
18:58
chat a little bit about it, but if at the end
19:00
of this podcast, you feel like
19:02
you want to dive more in, it is a
19:04
phenomenal listen. And
19:07
for part two, we are actually
19:09
going to be talking to the Stikes
19:12
family about their journey and
19:14
where they are right now, because this case
19:16
that is almost 10 years old just
19:18
hasn't gotten a lot of national attention.
19:21
So we definitely want to hear your thoughts on that.
19:25
I have been drinking liquid IV for
19:27
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It is hard to get kids to eat what they need for all their nutrition,
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with making sure my kids take their vitamins.
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Well, I keep this bright yellow bottle
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And get your kids the full
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they need to grow into healthy adults.
22:35
So James, we're just going to take a couple minutes and
22:37
just pull our listeners up to speed.
22:39
We're going to read a crash course and then we'll dive
22:42
into, you know, some of the very,
22:44
very puzzling aspects of it.
22:46
Grief by definition is an emotional
22:48
process of coping with loss.
22:51
It's impossible to process grief intellectually.
22:54
It's overwhelming and the journey is
22:56
unique to everyone. A sudden loss can be
22:58
shocking. No one expects tragedy
23:00
to be a part of their family story. The feelings
23:03
of being helpless and powerless are
23:05
expected. And usually closure
23:07
is an important piece of the complicated puzzle
23:10
that is grief. It provides us with
23:13
some way to process what's
23:15
happened. You know, okay, they had
23:17
cancer, their bodies could no longer sustain
23:20
life. We can at
23:21
least qualify this in our brain
23:23
in some way. For the senseless murder of someone
23:25
with virtually zero leads or
23:28
answers, I mean, how does a family
23:30
ever sleep again? On August 28, 2013, it started as
23:32
an exciting day. 22-year-old
23:37
Brittany Stikes had an online interview
23:39
for a job at the IRS, and it was
23:41
her father David's birthday. That morning,
23:43
Brittany sent her father a text to wish him
23:45
a happy day and that she would stop over that
23:48
night to celebrate with him. Brittany and her
23:50
14-month-old daughter Aubrey
23:52
spent the earlier part of the day at her mother-in-law's
23:54
home. Brittany and her daughter stayed there for
23:56
dinner and then and they headed out to celebrate
23:58
her dad's 49th birthday. they but sadly
24:01
britney would never make it to the celebration
24:03
that may written
24:04
he was the second of five children her
24:06
parents david and mary raise their family on a farm
24:08
in a small rural town of ripley ohio
24:11
the town had population of about fifteen hundred
24:13
and that is just the way britney like did she
24:16
loved country living she loved the simple
24:18
life she was a homebody that would skip a
24:20
party to stay home with her family and watch
24:22
a movie this family was close i
24:24
mean really close we're talking call a couple
24:26
times a day and spend a weekend playing board games
24:28
together close to hear the family speak of how
24:30
much they enjoyed and loved each other his
24:32
heart warming in
24:34
every single account of brittany everyone
24:36
spoke of her sunny disposition and maternal
24:38
support of nature when britain was twenty years
24:40
old she got a job working at subway and that's
24:42
where she met her future husband shane
24:44
steaks shane
24:45
was thirty six at that time asked
24:47
to out and it was only five months of
24:50
dating before britney got pregnant so
24:52
they decided to get married very quickly and casually
24:54
in their living room know
24:56
guess snow dj know crab dip
24:58
just the couple and her parents shane
25:00
had two children from a previous marriage and britney
25:02
love them like they were her own and four
25:04
months later she would become mama to the
25:06
beautiful baby girl operate they move to a home
25:09
not far from britain his parents until
25:11
then britney had happily lived at home slowly
25:13
but nice family noticed aggressive behaviors
25:16
from shane her sister emily said
25:18
that he drank a lot and were often take
25:20
out his aggressions on britney probably
25:22
in an effort to save her family the worry she
25:24
didn't share of much of this
25:26
part of her life at home with shane
25:28
but her sister emily was more like a best friend
25:31
and spent many nights and weekends with her older
25:33
sister she admitted that while in their home
25:35
she noticed their relationship was far from
25:37
perfect when britney became pregnant with their
25:39
second child she was absolutely
25:41
terrified to tell shame she knew
25:43
he didn't want another baby she put
25:45
off telling him and even went to her
25:47
old be appointments in secret till the time
25:50
came that she had to tell em when she did
25:52
he became irate and she called her
25:54
parents hysterically crying
25:56
but then miraculously one day
25:58
like a light switch he was
26:00
fine and excited for their new addition
26:02
to their life. Weird. The night of Britney's
26:04
murder, she texted her parents to let them know she was
26:07
on her way at 7.15 p.m. That
26:09
day she was driving Shane's bright yellow Jeep
26:11
Wrangler. Little later that night, around 7.30 p.m.,
26:13
Britney's Jeep is seen on security
26:16
footage at the Georgetown Police Department and
26:18
past a nearby McDonald's. Shortly
26:20
after 8 p.m., a man named Craig
26:22
LaBelle missed his exit and was driving
26:24
on U.S. 68, and he saw headlights
26:27
coming from the other started the highway. He thought someone
26:29
was having car trouble,
26:30
so he and his wife, Sandra, turned
26:32
around and walked off the highway to the car.
26:34
Once he was close to Britney's car, he heard music
26:36
playing and windshield wipers going off.
26:39
As he approached the car, he saw a young woman slumped
26:41
over the steering wheel. It
26:43
was a lot to take in, and he had no idea
26:45
what had happened. Then he noticed blood
26:47
on her, and she appeared to not be breathing.
26:50
Then
26:50
he looked over to the side and saw her baby
26:52
girl, Aubrey, right next to her whimpering
26:54
and calling out, Mama. Aubrey was
26:57
alive. He immediately flagged his wife to call 911.
27:00
Unclear as to the magnitude of their wounds, they
27:02
waited for about nine minutes for first responders
27:04
to arrive at the scene. When
27:06
they arrived, even police were unclear of
27:08
the situation. They thought it was a car accident,
27:10
but unfortunately it was far more gruesome.
27:13
The officer could see clear gunshot wounds on Brittany,
27:15
specifically one in her neck. And after
27:18
being shot twice, it was clear that Brittany
27:20
and her unborn child were deceased at the scene.
27:22
Even scarier, one of the fatal shots that killed
27:25
Brittany traveled through her body and
27:27
into baby Aubrey's forehead. They
27:29
rushed Aubrey to the hospital. Now, if you
27:31
don't believe in miracles, look up the picture of
27:33
a now 10-year-old ginger cutie named Aubrey
27:36
Stikes after four surgeries, lots
27:38
of strength, this little warrior survived.
27:40
That night at 11.30 p.m., police arrived
27:43
at Shane and Brittany's home and he was naturally
27:45
brought in for questioning and tested for gunshot residue.
27:47
Shane shared his alibi. He had been at the gym
27:50
where a handful of police officers were also working
27:52
out. Shane was cleared by investigators after
27:54
he was cooperative and passed two polygraph
27:57
tests. However, detectives have made it clear
27:59
that absolut-
28:00
and no one has been positively ruled out,
28:02
not even yet. In 2014, Shane
28:04
said that he believed he knew who the killer was. While
28:07
Shane didn't publicly identify the person,
28:09
he said it was someone known to him. Okay,
28:12
why are you not shaying
28:13
the murder of your daughter's mother? But, well,
28:16
I think I know why, but we'll talk about that. After
28:18
almost two years filled with many leads
28:20
and all leads turning to dead ends, finally,
28:23
in September 2015, a promising tip came in. It
28:26
was from a woman who claimed her ex-boyfriend,
28:28
and Tommy Lopez killed Brittany. The
28:30
witness also said that not only
28:33
did she know that Tommy murdered Brittany,
28:35
but she was with him at the time of
28:37
the murder. She explained how they saw a
28:39
yellow Jeep operated by Stikes at
28:42
a gas station, followed her, and
28:44
then he had
28:45
this police light that
28:47
could plug into a cigarette lighter, and
28:49
he used that light to pull over Stikes. She
28:51
went on to explain when they stopped
28:54
the Jeep, Lopez walked up to the yellow
28:56
Jeep and fired several shots. She
28:58
said her boyfriend killed Brittany in retaliation
29:01
for a debt that Shane Stikes owed.
29:03
She said he was paid $20,000 to kill her. And
29:06
even though Lopez was in custody on
29:09
drug-related charges, they executed a
29:11
search warrant by the Kentucky State Police.
29:13
During the search, investigators confiscated
29:16
several items, including cell phones,
29:18
GPS devices, weapons, letters,
29:20
notes, and computer equipment. Tommy was
29:22
never brought to grand jury or charged
29:25
with any crime pertaining to Brittany.
29:27
Apparently, according to my research,
29:30
this all appears to have been an elaborate
29:32
hoax. The devastating act of
29:35
tricking a grieving family to exploit
29:37
another person's emotions, whatever
29:39
would possess someone to do that. I mean, we
29:42
could go into the psychology of what
29:44
kind of a vile human would
29:46
do that, but I guess that's for another
29:48
time. But for this case, that
29:51
poor excuse for a human set this
29:53
investigation back about a a year
29:55
and you don't have to be an expert to know
29:57
that time is crucial and in abstract
30:00
irreplaceable. So what about
30:02
the husband?
30:03
It's usually in these kinds of cases, the husband. But
30:05
detectives confirmed that they interviewed him and conducted
30:08
lie detector tests. And although no one's
30:10
been officially cleared, they've always described
30:12
Shane as cooperative. The family, on the
30:14
other hand, seems they have been at odds with
30:16
Shane right from the time that Brittany was killed.
30:19
They've argued or disagreed on everything
30:21
from where she would be laid to rest to finances.
30:24
Shane apparently filed claims to receive money
30:26
for being the victim of a crime. It's messy. He's
30:29
taken several times to the radio on the Kid Chris
30:32
show to share his thoughts on Britney's family.
30:34
Our friends at the Culpable Podcast did a tremendous
30:37
investigation on this case and spoke to the family
30:39
at length. There's no online research
30:41
that's going to provide the state of mind or state of relationship
30:44
between Britney and Shane, but according to her sister,
30:46
Emily, Britney was planning on leaving
30:48
Shane.
30:49
Apparently mama Mary didn't even learn
30:51
about this until she went to go collect clothing
30:54
for the funeral and noticed that Britney's
30:56
clothes were already packed. I don't
30:58
think at the time she fully understood how truly unhappy
31:00
and scared that Britney was. There are many frustrating
31:03
aspects of this case. There were no shell
31:05
casings ever found, no eyewitnesses, no
31:07
clear motive. But 10 years out, this
31:09
is by no means a cold case. Investigators
31:12
in Brown County, led by Detective Quinn Carlson
31:15
currently on the case, says right now they're
31:17
using very new technology with
31:19
the hope of piecing together new leads.
31:21
He can't say what the technology entails,
31:24
but he said that they're putting together data
31:26
that could help pinpoint where people were
31:28
when Stikes died. And talk about
31:31
an engaged family. This family
31:33
has done everything
31:34
and will continue to
31:36
do anything. They have Facebook groups,
31:38
they respond to comments, they will take
31:41
any and every lead to help them bring
31:43
their sweet Britney justice. With
31:45
more questions than answers, everyone
31:48
close to the case can agree this felt targeted,
31:50
whether it was to Britney or Shane that
31:52
remains to be seen. But there's No way
31:55
that a random act of road rage could
31:57
produce such pristine shots.
32:00
Shane would not identify the person,
32:02
but he says that he knows
32:04
this person who did this to Brittany, just not
32:07
on a personal level. During this entire
32:09
investigation, detectives, family,
32:11
community, and countless podcasts and
32:13
Facebook groups struggled to understand why
32:16
anyone would want to shoot a pregnant mother
32:18
and her young daughter. She
32:20
had never been in any trouble with the law,
32:22
she didn't use substances of any kind,
32:25
and wasn't involved in any illegal activity.
32:27
Brittany was a sweet young woman with no
32:30
known enemies. There seemed to be no reason
32:32
why anyone would want her dead. After
32:34
hundreds of tips, investigators have made
32:36
no arrests, they have not recovered a murder
32:39
weapon, and it feels like just
32:41
a tiny bit of information is missing
32:43
to solve this case. Feels
32:46
like they're so close. So
32:48
why haven't we solved the case of the
32:50
murder of Brittany Stikes?
32:52
Let's talk about it.
32:56
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33:55
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34:50
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36:12
So
36:12
James, take it away.
36:14
What were your thoughts when you learned
36:16
about this case? What hits you
36:18
the most? Tell us. I
36:20
think
36:20
just how tragic it is because
36:23
it's so, I think
36:25
obvious that she had
36:27
absolutely nothing to do with why
36:29
she was killed. This was a decent
36:32
woman trying to get through a tough
36:34
time in her life, who by all accounts
36:37
was also a really good mom,
36:39
and had another one on the way, and
36:41
got caught in the crossfire of
36:43
some awful bullshit
36:46
that had nothing to do with her. So
36:48
I
36:49
think just the senselessness of it,
36:51
because she had no, she most likely had
36:53
no relationship with the person that
36:55
killed her at all, is what makes it extra
36:58
tragic, I think, to me. And any time
37:00
a child is put in that kind of danger,
37:03
it's just awful as well.
37:05
Did you end up listening to the entire series,
37:08
the culpable series on the case? I did. Did
37:10
you formulate a theory at the end of what you think happened?
37:14
I wish I had something that no one else
37:16
had thought of. I really do. I
37:19
mean, there's part of me that's like, okay, you
37:21
start with the vehicle, a bright yellow
37:24
Jeep that you can see coming from,
37:27
a mile away that you can identify from space,
37:29
right? If Shane
37:32
knew that he had beef with people,
37:34
if he knew that those
37:37
people were the types of people that could be
37:39
capable of this,
37:41
and everybody knows that Shane
37:44
drives a Jeep that you can see from space,
37:47
why would you ever let your wife,
37:50
your pregnant wife, and the mother of your
37:52
child drive that thing? That's
37:55
a question that's been gnawing at me from
37:57
the very first episode. That's just like, dude,
37:59
when
38:00
When they came to you, you spit out three names like
38:02
that. All right, it's one of these three guys because
38:05
I have beef with them. Well, think about the
38:07
people that you've had trouble
38:10
with in your life.
38:11
And do you think that any of them
38:14
are capable of murdering your spouse because
38:16
you got in an argument with them at a grocery store?
38:18
No, he had three names on the tip of
38:20
his tongue that he thought were
38:23
capable
38:24
of killing someone in cold
38:26
blood and he's letting your drive around
38:28
And the thing that is most distinguishable
38:31
as
38:32
something that is connected to
38:33
him. Did you think for a moment that if
38:35
it was a targeted killing, which I'm
38:38
actually not convinced about, I might have a
38:40
theory that people are going to hate me for, but if this was
38:43
a targeted thing, do you think those people might have been
38:45
like actually coming after Shane instead of her
38:47
killed her by mistake? The mere fact
38:48
that they could have been coming after
38:51
Shane and that Shane had three ideas
38:53
so quickly of people
38:55
he thought.
38:56
Shane, who are you hanging out with Shane? would
38:58
settle a score in that way. Right?
39:01
Yeah. Everybody knows
39:03
he drives that Jeep. Everybody knows that's his Jeep. So...
39:07
Well, you know, there was an interview in which he said that
39:09
she loved the Jeep so much, she primarily
39:11
drove it. Like she had cut, I don't know if it
39:13
had a second car,
39:14
but... I do remember some of
39:16
him saying that, which again, I was like,
39:19
I still don't know what to make of
39:21
him on the
39:22
whole. Yeah. But to
39:24
your point, it is yellow. It's not even
39:26
red. I think red is a really flashy
39:29
color. And we're talking about they live in
39:31
a town with 1,500 people. You
39:33
know, there are bigger towns surrounding,
39:36
but everybody knows, oh, there's shame.
39:39
I mean, I know 1,500 people, you know what they
39:41
drive. But I don't know if they lived in Ripley. Ripley
39:43
had 1,500 people. She was driving to Ripley
39:45
to see her dad on his birthday.
39:48
That's not where they live. I don't know what the town like where
39:50
they live, but you're right. Look, in these small towns,
39:52
people are gonna be like, oh, there goes the yellow
39:54
Jeep. It's not like we all kind of know that, right? Like in my
39:56
neighborhood, I know he's driving a Y. Even if there's nothing
39:58
suspicious about it, it's the people.
40:00
your level of your of irresponsibility
40:02
maha if you're running in those kind
40:04
of circles yeah and you
40:06
that people who don't like you that you
40:08
think you're capable of murdering people
40:11
i don't know if i would ever since my loved
40:13
ones out in a giant you
40:15
know yellow or at
40:17
basically announces that they're connected so
40:19
about the first thing that i had to get over
40:21
just a that i get like start thinking about
40:23
other people besides chain
40:26
beyond that the lopez thing
40:28
is mind blowing my
40:30
mind as it's so specific
40:33
and ah and she seemed to be
40:35
so willing the like whatever
40:37
you need i'll tell you weren't he very
40:39
stuff i'll tell you how he keeps
40:42
his stash of of photos
40:43
that he takes it is i will tell you
40:45
everything and then they start checking some of
40:47
it out in some of it's legit and and
40:49
that's why i was like what it has
40:52
to be this guy i that's of town yeah
40:54
there's more of those money it does
40:56
go back to shade so it kind of like
40:58
it stitches in with some of the previous
41:01
species and then the idea that this
41:03
person
41:03
would have concocted all of for
41:05
flat what what is the gay a me but i still
41:07
have it's all the time it happens all the
41:09
time she was so specific
41:12
when i heard that i thought oh no
41:14
the police dropped the ball why
41:15
didn't they at least take it to grand jury
41:18
and they just kind of left it and said
41:20
it was a hoax and as like what robbie of why
41:22
wouldn't they just see they did say
41:24
they didn't take it to grand jury they didn't take a grand
41:26
jury because they didn't have enough to get a grand jury
41:28
and remember grand jury will and died a ham sandwich
41:31
if you hear if you think your cases nah sprung
41:33
up to go to grand jury you have a rap you have
41:35
nothing and i am actually thankful
41:37
that they do their due diligence enough to say this
41:40
person is feeding us a load of crap none what's interesting
41:42
is when you look at a statement to the reason we all became
41:44
convinced that this person might be legitimate
41:46
as they said this informant first was
41:48
an informant when a person it becomes an informant
41:51
for the please it's usually cause they got a sword hanging over
41:53
that person's head the already trying to protect themselves
41:55
from something i've seen this in so many cases
41:57
so they are constantly trying to like save
41:59
their and feeding the police like stories
42:02
to make deals for whatever it is they need to do to
42:04
protect themselves. But when the police said that the informant
42:06
had new information that was never made public,
42:09
do you know how that happened? That happens because the police
42:11
have either invertibly or on purpose fed
42:13
that person information to legitimize
42:15
their story. This happens over and over and
42:17
over. That's how you end up with false confessions. People falsely
42:20
confess with all these details because the police
42:22
in their interrogation have been feeding them details,
42:24
sometimes without even knowing it. So the fact
42:26
that they were like, they took this person's story and
42:29
they tried to corroborate
42:30
it. They did a raid on the guy's house, right? They
42:32
could have closed this case if there was a there there.
42:34
I actually think they did do diligence and did the right thing
42:37
by saying, if we can't get a grand jury
42:39
indictment, there's really nothing there. We know
42:41
nothing about the guy, like whether or not he had an alibi
42:43
for that day, but I will say what I noticed about
42:45
his arrest record was
42:46
their drug charges. I don't see
42:48
violent crime charges. Let's follow
42:50
the line of reasoning that let's say somebody
42:53
hired him. Dude, there's gotta be a trail of breadcrumbs
42:55
there. You can't just hire somebody through sheer psychic
42:57
thought, You know, it has
43:00
to be like text messages, phone calls,
43:03
emails, some evidence they've
43:05
even met. There's been a transaction.
43:07
How did somebody find this random guy with
43:10
drug charges and say, hey, would
43:12
you do a hit? You can't make up stuff with
43:14
nothing to back it up. Yeah, it just was oddly
43:17
specific.
43:17
Like she had said it was $20,000, but
43:20
it was two $10,000 payments. Meaningless.
43:23
People add details like that when they think it'll
43:26
help legitimize their story. And a lot of times
43:28
it's just signs of them making shit up. I'm sorry. That's
43:31
my...
43:31
The last time they went back to talk to her, because
43:34
it
43:35
hadn't yielded an arrest or anything,
43:38
she was clearly deathly afraid
43:40
for her own life at that point. And that
43:42
to me is where it's like, the calculated risk
43:44
doesn't make any sense to me. It's like,
43:46
okay, so she was trying to get herself
43:48
off of some other charge or whatever it was. She
43:51
throws out this whole hoax theory. It didn't
43:53
work. So now the crazy dude
43:55
that you were in a relationship with knows
43:59
that she tried
44:00
to frame him for the murder
44:02
of a woman and an unborn child.
44:04
Like why would you take that risk? Because
44:06
now it's out there and if he is that
44:08
violent of a guy, like she's never
44:11
going to be able to stop looking over her shoulder.
44:13
Yeah, yeah, that's a great point. I know she had said
44:16
that she waited on the
44:18
information because she didn't come forward until 2015 and
44:21
she said she waited until he was behind bars.
44:24
But maybe she was trying to keep him
44:26
there for longer. Yeah, people do
44:28
crazy things. People confess to killing
44:30
people they haven't killed. So like people
44:33
do do crazy things. We kind of don't know what
44:35
the stressors, nobody's seen the interrogation
44:37
video with her and the police, like we just don't know
44:39
enough about, but what we do know is
44:41
the police and the prosecutor were like,
44:43
she ain't good enough, we got nothing
44:45
to back her, like the story. And I think
44:47
if they had even a crumb, they would have probably
44:49
gone forward at least taking it to the grand jury.
44:52
I don't put any credit in her account
44:54
at all. I just know that the way that they
44:56
described the stuff that they found
44:58
at his house and the way that they described his van.
45:02
This guy was the villain
45:04
in a true detective. He
45:06
was so creepy. He was so creepy. Get
45:08
a murder kit at home. Yeah. Yeah.
45:12
Let's just go over the scene of the crime
45:14
a little bit. There were five bullets
45:17
shot. Two went into Brittany
45:19
and three other ones missed
45:22
and went into the car. There were three bullets in the
45:24
door and two, The window
45:26
was like that plastic Jeep. What do you call
45:29
that? Is it like a casing?
45:31
It's like a soft top, so the windows aren't really
45:33
windows yet. Right, yeah. And it went
45:35
through. Now something to note
45:38
was that Brittany had $125 in cash on
45:41
her and some jewelry. So we
45:44
know this wasn't a robbery. She
45:46
also had no life insurance.
45:48
So there was no kind of thing that
45:50
we see over and over again, you know,
45:53
somebody trying to plot in that way.
45:56
And so let's talk
45:58
about Shane's alibi.
46:00
and what we think about that and
46:02
the timing of all that. Because I have a lot
46:04
of questions about the where and
46:06
the why and the how about his alibi.
46:10
We
46:10
also add that there are no shell casings or
46:12
residue, which eliminates the possibility
46:14
of a close range execution
46:17
style anything. We know that it was
46:19
while they were on the
46:20
road. Yeah. And
46:22
that's another reason that informant's story holds no water. I
46:25
don't know if we mentioned this detail, but the car was actually found on
46:27
the left side of the road, like in an embankment.
46:29
and it had impact, the car had impact
46:31
damage. She was going fast enough to kind of like
46:33
jump the embankment, land on the left side of
46:35
the road, not the right, if she had pulled over, cause somebody
46:38
was pulling her over, a cop was pulling over, she would've pulled over to
46:40
the right, which is what we all do. Every indication shows
46:42
that she was literally just driving whatever,
46:45
the speed, you know what I mean, just regularly
46:47
driving when she was shot at, the car
46:50
veered off to the left and ended up in that ditch.
46:52
Yeah, and again, for a visual, it
46:54
is a two lane highway. Someone
46:56
would have had to driven essentially into
46:59
oncoming traffic, there wasn't a high traffic
47:01
road, and come up next to her
47:03
because she was shot on the left.
47:06
Right.
47:06
And next to her long enough to
47:08
unload five times on the same
47:11
side of the car. Yeah, and
47:13
to get that shot while moving,
47:15
it all seems very 007 scary action
47:17
movie-like. Can
47:21
we talk a little about whether or not it was targeted?
47:23
Yeah. I actually don't believe it was targeted
47:25
at all. Okay, why? I'll tell you why.
47:28
First of all, for it to be targeted, there has to be
47:30
like some real motive is either like the
47:32
life insurance, that doesn't exist. He owed
47:34
money to people, no evidence of it. There's a hit
47:36
man again, no evidence of it. But also, you
47:38
know, Brittany did stuff that day. She
47:40
would have had to have been stalked
47:41
all day, right? She went to her mother-in-laws.
47:46
Somebody would have had to have been following her around all
47:48
day to figure out exactly where she's going to
47:51
be at that time
47:53
and get her right in the moment. They could have shot her
47:55
when she had stopped the car somewhere.
47:57
They could have shown, I mean, this is a rural area.
48:00
Like, who's going to take us? Who's going to be like, this is
48:02
the time I'm going to take her out, like a target. But
48:04
also how long? Nobody would know that
48:06
she's got this interview. She did this. She went to her mother-in-law's
48:08
place and she was she had left her mother-in-law's
48:10
to go to her parents when she was killed. She
48:12
went there to do an online interview for a position
48:14
at the IRS. And if somebody's stalking
48:17
her, they have no idea what she's doing in the mother-in-law's house. They don't know
48:19
how long she's going to be there. To play devil's advocate
48:21
on that, they're in a small town. You
48:24
know, she's going to go six places.
48:26
At that time, she was a stay at home mom. She had left
48:29
her job at Walmart. So to play devil's advocate
48:31
on that She's at her mom's her
48:33
mother-in-law's the grocery store
48:35
and all of those places are
48:37
so much easier to kill her than driving
48:40
next and doing it like this
48:42
because this kind of shot is like
48:44
like you said like it takes like a Professional
48:47
sniper or you know what I mean? Like somebody
48:49
take a successful shot like yeah But there were no witnesses
48:51
where they were but there would have been witnesses at the grocery
48:54
store I mean, but there are again, there's a lot
48:56
of other places. Here's the thing. For those of you
48:58
who have listened to Undisclosed, which
49:00
is the podcast I wrapped up last year,
49:02
our second season was about a case that
49:04
is almost identical to this. And the
49:06
defendant, Joey Watkins, was convicted
49:09
of driving alongside the victim, shooting
49:12
into that guy's truck, the truck
49:14
running off the road, the victim dying.
49:17
Joey Watkins has been in prison for like 25 years. We
49:19
just brought him home this year. He was finally exonerated
49:21
this year. And you know what it turned? probably
49:24
the likelihood was in that entire case, which
49:26
I think, this is my theory, was that
49:28
it was probably
49:30
random bullets from a hunter in the woods
49:32
that accidentally hit this guy on the road and
49:34
ended up causing the car crash. And it's
49:37
so crazy the parallels between that case and this
49:39
case, because the impossibility
49:41
of actually driving next to somebody
49:44
and doing that with such precision, the
49:46
driver couldn't do it. If there's a car next to that, it would
49:49
have to be like a passenger doing it, right? Sure.
49:51
Which is maybe a possibility. or somebody
49:54
off in the woods far enough away
49:56
that if they fired the weapon, And guess what?
49:58
The casings wouldn't show up. because
50:00
they're out there in the woods. And no
50:02
gun residue would show up because they're so far away.
50:04
James, are you familiar with guns
50:07
or shooting or hunting? Is that any part of
50:09
your life? No, it's not. I
50:11
can offer that. Oh, darn, no guns. Except to say that, I
50:13
don't like, to your point,
50:16
Robbie, maybe it wasn't a car that
50:19
drove up. I wonder how much
50:21
thought they've given someone being
50:23
in the woods, even targeted or no
50:26
targeted. Right, it could be a stupid kid
50:27
with a gun just shooting at something yellow. That's where
50:30
the shooter was either way, but it would
50:32
still have to be someone who's pretty damn good with
50:34
a long range rifle to hit
50:36
it five times while it's moving, which
50:38
is why if it's a hunter who's
50:40
shooting at something that's not the
50:43
car,
50:43
that means he has to randomly hit
50:46
a different target that he's not aiming at
50:48
five times while it's going 50 miles
50:51
an hour. Yeah.
50:51
Yeah. Well, one part
50:54
of the case that is very, that's been really frustrating
50:56
to us is we don't know
50:58
what kind of weapon was used.
51:01
This is an ongoing investigation and
51:04
part of the frustration
51:06
in trying to research this is there are some
51:08
things that are still classified. So could
51:10
not have been a rifle because a rifle
51:12
couldn't shoot off that many bullets
51:15
that fast to a moving target. Like James
51:17
said, I don't know enough about
51:20
guns to know. They have the
51:21
bullets, they don't have the casings. And the bullets,
51:24
and I know Elle and I were digging around, We could not
51:26
find any information online
51:28
about what kind of ammunition it was, but maybe
51:31
the family knows or maybe the, I'm sure
51:33
the police have the bullets, at least two
51:35
of them were in Brittany's
51:37
body, but it means they're not releasing
51:39
the information. So just the kind of
51:42
ammunition would help
51:43
narrow down the kind of weapon. So the police are just
51:45
not telling us. That's where that's at, I think. Yeah.
51:48
Your
51:48
question on Shane's alibi. I mean, the
51:50
way he described his life in
51:52
general was, I mean, let's just start
51:55
there. He's like, this is what I do. I get up,
51:57
I drive an hour and a half to work. but drive
52:00
hour
52:00
and a half to a gym. I
52:02
work out for three hours. I say
52:04
hello to my family. I go to bed. That's
52:06
what I do. That's what he does. That's
52:08
horrible.
52:08
Yeah. But what else is
52:11
sort of confusing to you about
52:13
Shane as a character? He's an easy
52:15
guy to point at because he's
52:18
a drinker. He has a temper.
52:21
She didn't feel totally safe around
52:23
him. And he apparently had some
52:25
previous stuff that he he was involved in that was
52:27
less than safe.
52:29
Do you know what that was? I actually haven't
52:31
listened to Couple Bowl, pain don't hate me. I
52:33
will listen to it, but do you know what Unsaved
52:36
Restock? Put that on the air, Rabia.
52:38
It's okay. I'm a foder to
52:40
be done. No, no, full disclosure, full
52:42
disclosure. But James, what was the- Pain is
52:45
one of our friends. It really
52:47
is a great podcast. You make so many shows, I don't want
52:49
time to listen to them all, man. You
52:52
know how many shows that man makes? Anyway. I know. So
52:54
James, what was some of the unsavory stuff? Like what
52:56
are you talking about? Like how serious are
52:57
we talking about? Can you allude to having
53:00
done some stuff in his past,
53:02
which I sort of made the leap that it was
53:05
either drug related or
53:07
like petty crime or whatever, and that he was
53:09
trying to sort of
53:10
make right. That
53:13
he was doing some things now to
53:16
make up for some of the shit that he had done in
53:18
his past. The fourth person
53:20
that he said, I know who killed her.
53:22
I know who killed her. I just
53:24
never names this person, but he says he knows him.
53:26
He says his local
53:27
wasn't happy with the fact that Shane
53:30
was trying to make things right.
53:32
It's all very fake. It
53:34
sounds like a gang thing, like trying to get out of a gang.
53:36
Yeah, what Shane basically gives us is, I didn't used
53:39
to be such a great dude. I'm trying to turn a
53:41
corner. I've turned over a new leaf. And this
53:43
person who I think killed my wife and child
53:46
didn't like the fact that
53:49
I was trying to go straight. There's a lot
53:51
of, I can't talk about that. Oh,
53:54
I get what? Yeah, I don't want to say
53:56
I don't want to say which I guess you have
53:58
to respect the investigation. about
54:00
what you're trying to learn things and research,
54:02
it's very frustrating. But he had said
54:04
that also there was a lot
54:06
of drugs in the community. Like we're
54:08
talking heroin. This is complete
54:11
speculation on my part, but like maybe
54:13
he had run with the circle, changed
54:16
his ways, and then
54:18
they were like, oh, what, are you too good for us now?
54:20
Are you ratting us out? Because he had
54:23
goals to join law enforcement.
54:25
But is that a thing? Like if you owe a drug
54:27
debt, let's say, you're trying to get out of a gang. I
54:29
mean,
54:30
are those people gonna come after like your
54:32
wife? Why don't they just come after you? Like,
54:34
I feel like I don't understand that. I don't think
54:36
I've seen that before. Like, we're gonna kill, it's not in the mafia.
54:39
We're literally, I'm gonna kill each member of your family one
54:41
by one to torture you, right? Like, that's mafia
54:43
type of stuff. I don't know. If he
54:45
did have a drug debt, he's no good debt. Yeah,
54:48
you're
54:48
not gonna get the money if you kill the person that owes
54:50
it to you. Yeah, but if you kill his wife
54:52
and child and ruin his life, that'll send
54:55
a message. I mean, we're talking about people who clearly
54:57
don't think the way that we do.
54:59
Well, look, we know that he has publicly
55:01
not named the person or people that
55:03
he thinks might be involved. And I actually
55:06
appreciate that. It is the responsible thing
55:08
to do, even though I'm the person who I'm
55:10
like, this is who I think killed him
55:12
and Leonid Nonskib. But we know for sure, I'm
55:14
sure he told the police. Of course he told the police. He's
55:16
told the investigators. And all these are decade
55:19
on. It's not gone anywhere for
55:21
them, right? It's not gone anywhere for them. Also,
55:24
it wasn't one of the first three names out of his
55:26
mouth. We should remember that. Like he landed
55:28
on this person that he's now 100% certain
55:31
did get it. But when they went to him the first
55:34
time, he rattled off three names, none
55:36
of which were this mystery person.
55:38
Okay, so there were three other people and now there's this
55:40
other person. Yeah. So
55:43
it makes his he was pretty sure
55:45
that it was the ex boyfriend for a second there.
55:47
He was 100% sure dusty. Yeah.
55:50
Yeah, I know who did it. It was dust. Yeah.
55:53
So, so he's, it seems like he kind of, as soon as one
55:55
is serious, disproved, he hops
55:57
to another. because this
56:00
this
56:00
mystery suspect has
56:02
not yet been disproved. I think
56:04
that's sort of where he's planted his flag.
56:05
Let me ask you both this question. Would
56:08
it ever fly in your family
56:10
not to go to your in-laws birthday
56:13
so you can work out at the gym? Hmm,
56:15
I was interested. I never thought about that. That says a lot about
56:17
where they were. But we also know that she had packed
56:19
up some boxes and was planning on leaving them. Sure.
56:22
So that kind of sizes up with,
56:24
I ain't coming to your dad's birthday. But
56:26
secretly, he didn't know if
56:28
this was behind his back.
56:31
I thought the sister said that he knew she was gonna leave him,
56:33
no? No, they had gotten in some arguments,
56:36
but she just said she had packed up
56:38
because she was going
56:40
to do it in secret. They had gotten in fights
56:42
and he had been like, fine, go then, I'll
56:45
pay your child support. They had had that
56:47
kind of really toxic back and forth,
56:49
but there were no plans. He's claiming
56:52
there was no issue. I'm just saying,
56:54
unless you have something really pressing
56:56
that's pulling you from
56:58
a family event.
57:00
The
57:00
gym? And he
57:02
stayed at the gym till nine
57:05
p.m. He says he closed up
57:07
the gym. And then he went home.
57:10
He didn't even swing by for like a cake
57:12
and some Neapolitan ice cream. Did
57:14
he know
57:14
there was Neapolitan? Yeah, fair
57:17
question. I mean, I'll do some crazy
57:20
shit for some mint chip. I'll tell you that. Yeah,
57:22
it sounds like it wanted nothing to do with that family
57:24
or celebrating anything. I
57:27
mean, he said on several occasions that
57:29
the family didn't much care for him before Brittany
57:31
was killed.
57:32
If a 36-year-old man was
57:34
trying to get with my 20-year-old daughter, I
57:36
can understand that. I was a little bit alarmed
57:39
with this whole dynamic. He was 36 when they met
57:41
when she passed. Right,
57:45
but I'm saying initially, because he said
57:47
that they weren't too excited about the whole relationship
57:49
anyways. 20 and 36, I
57:51
mean, and he's got kids from before.
57:52
He also didn't want the new
57:54
child, the child that she was carrying.
57:57
went off on her when she thought she was afraid. It's
58:00
never great when you're afraid
58:02
to tell your partner that you're pregnant.
58:04
But then when she did, his reaction
58:07
was pretty ugly. And then I guess he did
58:09
in a bow face, which might point
58:11
to some semblance of decency
58:14
in him that he realized that it was a really
58:16
shitty thing to do and took it
58:18
back and said, I got to get on the straight and narrow
58:20
here. I'm going to be a dad again. We'll figure it out.
58:23
We just don't know what to think of, Shane.
58:25
What
58:25
do you guys think about the fact that he passed two polygraphs?
58:28
I don't care. Polygraphs aren't admissible
58:30
in court and they're not admissible in my life. Thank
58:32
you, Counselor. Thank you, Counselor. James, how do you feel about
58:34
that? They don't matter.
58:37
Both ways. Both ways. If you
58:39
gave me a polygraph right now and asked me
58:41
what my name was, you would say, and
58:43
I said, Ellen, it would say, I'm lying. Because
58:46
I'm crazy. Here's my
58:47
best argument for why he had
58:50
nothing to do with it, if I'm going to play both sides.
58:52
Even if he wanted her dead
58:55
and didn't want another kid and
58:58
another mouth to feed, why do you
59:00
do it while you know she's in the car with
59:02
your one and a half year old? You're not just eliminating
59:05
the problem of divorce you don't want to have to
59:07
pay for and another child you don't want
59:09
to have support.
59:11
You're killing the child that you have that's already
59:13
here that he's now co-raising
59:15
with her parents
59:17
for the rest of her life.
59:19
And he seems like a really good dad, by the way.
59:21
I mean, the daughter's- Yeah, it takes the level of dark
59:24
diabolical, premeditated
59:26
murder to a whole, that's weird
59:28
to me, that if it was him,
59:31
even if he had it contracted, he knew
59:33
that he was gonna be killing his entire family,
59:35
not just his pregnant wife.
59:37
Yeah, and again, jumping
59:39
on board with your devil's advocacy,
59:41
James, you can be a shitty
59:43
husband and even a shitty dude and not
59:45
be a murderer. So we've,
59:48
the Scott Peterson of it all, Oh God, I
59:50
said his name on our podcast. I'm sorry, Rabia,
59:52
we're gonna get letters. I think about Scott all the time. Listen,
59:55
here's where I land on the polygraph stuff. The reason
59:57
it's not admissible, of course, because it is very easy
59:59
to produce.
1:00:00
false results that indicate that somebody's guilty
1:00:02
or they're lying because of the fact that we all respond
1:00:04
like weird when we're under stress, right? I think
1:00:07
it's much harder to produce a false
1:00:09
result when somebody passes. And
1:00:12
when it's being used in court, it's almost always being
1:00:14
used to show that this person
1:00:17
is guilty because they failed a polygraph, not necessarily
1:00:19
to show that they are not guilty. It's almost never
1:00:21
used in that capacity. But to be able to pass
1:00:23
a polygraph and it'd be a false result,
1:00:25
I think is a much harder thing. And you're right, a sociopath
1:00:28
might be able to do it. There
1:00:30
aren't that many sociopaths in the world. I know we like to
1:00:32
think there are, but it takes a level of
1:00:34
like, you got to like be trained, maybe
1:00:36
like a, you know, like an
1:00:38
Israeli Mossad agent trained
1:00:41
in like, you know, how to pass these things.
1:00:43
You're not going to like be just somebody off the street who can
1:00:45
just do it like that easily. That's why, even
1:00:47
though I understand where you're at, I know that if
1:00:49
he had failed both of them, a lot of people
1:00:52
would be like, Oh, we'll see. But I think the fact that he passed
1:00:54
actually does say something to me. And I also think
1:00:56
about the fact that he's, he has been not just greatly
1:00:58
cooperative, seems like he is constantly
1:01:00
pushing the investigation. Yeah. And to me,
1:01:02
that is probably one of the biggest signs that, like, a
1:01:04
person who does not want to uncover the truth
1:01:07
is
1:01:07
going to be much more reluctant to push an
1:01:10
investigation over and over again. And
1:01:12
the detective who's now in charge,
1:01:14
who is a different Quinn Carlson,
1:01:17
did make it a point to say he has been
1:01:19
extraordinarily cooperative.
1:01:21
I do somehow
1:01:23
take issue and it's totally just my
1:01:26
emotions that the family and he
1:01:28
don't really get along. James, you made a great point
1:01:30
that I just wanted to reiterate they do
1:01:32
legally share custody now. The
1:01:34
Dodson family and Shane
1:01:37
share custody of baby Aubrey and
1:01:40
I know that they put their differences aside
1:01:43
for the baby, which is amazing,
1:01:45
but
1:01:45
Shane goes on that radio
1:01:48
station every once in a while
1:01:50
and talks about the botched
1:01:52
investigation and talks about
1:01:54
the family. I just go back
1:01:56
and forth. It's upsetting. You just would hope
1:01:58
that they would could all be
1:02:00
better for each other. Don't you guys think it
1:02:02
is a crap investigation? I think that's the most frustrating
1:02:04
thing to me about this case. We're not talking about, we're
1:02:06
talking about 2013.
1:02:08
You know, 2013 they should be able
1:02:10
to use cell phone technology to pinpoint where every person
1:02:12
of interest was. Like I don't understand
1:02:14
why this has not been, like they haven't figured this out. Do
1:02:17
you think it has something
1:02:17
to do with like the resources
1:02:20
and training and love investigating
1:02:22
back and forth? back in the back of the country that
1:02:25
exists in a place like that versus a
1:02:28
big city. Is that a real thing? It is 100% a real
1:02:30
thing. But here's the thing. If
1:02:33
that's the case, what you do is you can
1:02:36
call in state agencies. You can call in
1:02:38
federal agencies for assistance. They will step up.
1:02:40
If you're the kind of agency or the kind of person
1:02:42
who's running the executive of the agency
1:02:44
is like, no, we got this, and like
1:02:47
the John Bonave case, and they clearly don't got
1:02:49
it, then that also means you suck. I mean, either
1:02:51
way, like, I just think this was, should have been
1:02:53
an eminently solvable case that investigators
1:02:56
did botch. Yeah.
1:02:57
The other thing to consider with Shane
1:02:59
is that if he is convinced that
1:03:02
his wife and unborn
1:03:04
child are dead because of something that did have
1:03:06
to do with him, if it was some
1:03:08
sort of beef that went back to him,
1:03:11
it would also illustrate why he's so
1:03:13
driven to keep pushing the case forward
1:03:15
because probably when's
1:03:16
the last time he slept?
1:03:19
Like if he honestly, that something
1:03:21
that he did cost her life, then
1:03:24
I would be pushing the case too, just because
1:03:26
how do you deal, how do you
1:03:28
live with that guilt? It would still mean
1:03:30
he did, but he feels like some- It would still mean
1:03:33
he didn't do it. At some point- He didn't do it. Is
1:03:35
the reason why it happened. Like that's gotta be
1:03:37
a lot to carry around. That's quite a burden.
1:03:39
Shane didn't really speak publicly
1:03:42
for many years. He
1:03:44
also had a really big, I don't
1:03:46
know if they talked about this in the Couple Bowl podcast,
1:03:48
but he had a really big lawsuit to get
1:03:50
the Jeep back. Yeah, they did.
1:03:53
It was 2017. They
1:03:55
had his car since the
1:03:57
accident and he wanted it
1:03:59
back. and that he was saying, which
1:04:02
I thought was interesting, they were saying, no, that's evidence.
1:04:04
And he was saying, keep the casing,
1:04:07
keep the window, keep anything
1:04:09
that is evidence. And then people thought
1:04:11
it was really suspicious that he was
1:04:13
fighting for his car back. And
1:04:16
then
1:04:16
he paints a picture that the car means so
1:04:18
much more than just a car, that that's where
1:04:20
he had really met, that there were, you
1:04:22
know, he and his dad bonded
1:04:24
over making Jeeps and she loved
1:04:26
that Jeep. And I think that car
1:04:29
belonged either to his father or his grandfather. There
1:04:31
was some sentimentality to that. It wasn't
1:04:33
like he had just bought it himself. It had been
1:04:35
passed down to him from his dad or granddad. Well, it
1:04:37
was a 2000. It wasn't like vintage
1:04:40
or anything. Right, but still. And like if it's your
1:04:42
dad's, you know, never known.
1:04:43
But he said it was a lot of happy
1:04:45
memories that he wasn't willing to let go of because
1:04:48
of the one
1:04:49
bad thing that happened in it, which I was sort
1:04:51
of like, well, it's a big bad thing. Like someone
1:04:53
broke their collarbone. Yeah. It
1:04:55
was a really, really, really bad thing. But
1:04:58
he did win that lawsuit. The other thing
1:05:00
that's probably worth mentioning with regards to the
1:05:02
family is he also applied for financial
1:05:05
assistance that you can get in the event of a sudden
1:05:07
death when there's no insurance involved and
1:05:10
was granted $50,000. Yeah.
1:05:14
He gave seven
1:05:16
to the funeral home to cover
1:05:18
exactly half
1:05:19
of the expenses of the funeral, that
1:05:22
the family covered the other half and kept
1:05:24
the rest.
1:05:24
I had never heard of that.
1:05:26
He applied for some violent
1:05:29
crime victim financial
1:05:31
assistance or something. Had you guys heard
1:05:33
of that before? He got $50,000. In
1:05:36
the state. Yeah. I know a different state. There are,
1:05:38
I have heard of funds like that before. Like, yeah,
1:05:40
there are funds like that. I don't know how, but I think they're like
1:05:42
state specific. Not that I think it's a bad
1:05:45
thing. It's great. You know, if the family needs
1:05:47
it, it, needs it for funeral expenses, outstanding
1:05:49
medical bills, but they didn't have outstanding
1:05:51
medical bills. Well, Aubrey
1:05:53
had many, many surgeries.
1:05:54
That's true. She was on
1:05:56
like Medicaid. It was all covered.
1:05:59
Okay.
1:05:59
Basically,
1:06:00
he just, he pocketed the majority
1:06:02
of that cash. Yeah. Family.
1:06:03
What do you think about that? I think he was entitled
1:06:05
to it. He did. He probably was like, there's no love
1:06:08
lost here. They
1:06:09
don't like me. They think I killed her. Why
1:06:11
am I gonna give him? Why
1:06:12
am I gonna give him? What do you think about his sentimentality
1:06:15
to the G? Do you buy it? From
1:06:19
a guy who goes to work, works out
1:06:21
for three hours and goes to bed, maybe, maybe.
1:06:24
Yeah. I mean, I think that's hard to gauge.
1:06:26
I just think, I mean, I'm more concerned about
1:06:28
like the facts. Does this alibi check out or not?
1:06:30
You know, there's no gun residue on him. James and
1:06:32
I are just a little more emotional over here. Okay.
1:06:36
You're not quite convinced about his alibi
1:06:38
either. That's the thing, right, Ellen? My understanding
1:06:41
is that it did actually check out. Not everybody
1:06:43
is checking out his alibi. Not
1:06:45
everybody is going down, like
1:06:48
going to Vegas with his alibi. I
1:06:50
don't feel like he did
1:06:53
it. I don't
1:06:53
feel like he pulled the trigger. I
1:06:55
think the people that question his alibi
1:06:58
are like saying that it felt a little performative.
1:07:00
And the reason they don't trust the alibi is
1:07:02
because it was such a planned alibi
1:07:05
as opposed to yes, I think
1:07:07
it's documented that he was at that gym and people
1:07:10
saw him and that all checked out. But the
1:07:12
fact that he stayed there for so long, I think
1:07:14
is why people were questioning.
1:07:15
But did he still but was that a pattern? Is that what he did every
1:07:18
day? Like we don't have any Yeah, but did he
1:07:20
backs it up by saying this is what I did. This is my
1:07:23
if that was his pattern, that's fine. Which is weird
1:07:25
because everybody is different but
1:07:27
every parent I know who goes
1:07:30
to the gym is like I gotta get
1:07:32
my workout, get you know my steam
1:07:34
room, have a pee in the shower and then
1:07:37
get home. Oh no, Ellen. They're all
1:07:39
boys. Boys are disgusting. They're gross. Multipet
1:07:42
again. But also
1:07:44
it just seemed like it was in no hurry to get home.
1:07:47
I know, look I'm at the gym every single day but I
1:07:49
am in and out because I don't got time because I'm a good
1:07:51
mom. I like how you just slid that in there. I liked him
1:07:53
every single day. I met the gym. I'm
1:07:56
a warrior. Well, but
1:07:58
there are people who are there every...
1:08:00
day. There are people who are like, if I'm here in the morning,
1:08:02
you're here. If I'm here in the evening, you're here. There are people who
1:08:04
literally just search a gym around. We get it,
1:08:06
Rabia. You're hot. Okay.
1:08:08
We get it. Oh my God. Do you see
1:08:11
this part? She's constantly like, Ellen,
1:08:13
watch me flex. Watch me flex.
1:08:16
Wait, but here's my thing, Rabia. You want to
1:08:18
go back to the facts. And we talked
1:08:20
about this before the episode. The exhaustingly
1:08:23
irritating part of this case is
1:08:26
the facts are very limited. So
1:08:28
what else do we have to
1:08:30
go on? How are they ever going to catch
1:08:32
who did this to Brittany? Well, I'll tell you what
1:08:34
I think they're going to do. I think the technology they're
1:08:36
using right now is going to be
1:08:37
like, they're probably trying to get information
1:08:39
from all the different cell phone companies to
1:08:42
see who all's phones were
1:08:44
in the area at the time. Do you locate
1:08:46
anybody who was in the area who could have been within
1:08:48
range and then just kind of like work backwards
1:08:51
from from there, get this list of people. I
1:08:53
mean, that's the only thing I can think about. That's
1:08:55
the only thing I can think of in terms of like new technology
1:08:57
that could help them solve this. I think there's probably a lot of
1:09:00
facts and we just don't know them. And that's one of the frustrations
1:09:02
for me about this case was that I kept like, I was
1:09:04
like, where's the source documents? There are none and there
1:09:06
will be none online. So James, we,
1:09:09
every week in our show, we provide
1:09:11
as many source documents
1:09:11
for our listeners as possible. Like
1:09:14
police reports, witness statements. Police reports when
1:09:16
we did Malcolm X, we had declassified FBI
1:09:18
documents. We try and get autopsies.
1:09:21
There is so little available
1:09:23
information about
1:09:25
this case. Rabia, this is like
1:09:27
the least amount of actual physical
1:09:29
evidence out of any case. It's an open case, that's
1:09:32
why. And I get that. I mean,
1:09:34
they shouldn't be putting stuff out there until it's
1:09:36
closed. Yeah. This can blow us off
1:09:38
like this. No, but can I ask you, how do you guys feel about
1:09:41
my theory though, that this might not have been targeted,
1:09:43
this could have been a random act. It could have
1:09:45
even been a complete
1:09:46
accident or an idiot just shoot, like a kid shooting
1:09:48
off a gun from the side of the road. Wait, I
1:09:51
can't do the side of the road thing because there's no
1:09:53
way that a moving target can get
1:09:55
hit five times with any kind
1:09:58
of gun that's not like an
1:10:00
AR-15, is that what it's called? An AR-15?
1:10:02
We don't know it wasn't that. We don't know it wasn't
1:10:04
that. But here's my question. One more
1:10:07
thing was that Shane
1:10:10
said that Britney had
1:10:12
gotten into some kind
1:10:14
of an argument with someone at a gas station
1:10:17
that morning. Remember that, James? There
1:10:19
was
1:10:19
a van that ran her
1:10:21
off the road. The reason the Tommy story
1:10:24
had so much traction was
1:10:26
it kind of matched up. Do you remember
1:10:28
about that? The Silver Mini
1:10:30
van ran her off the road, both
1:10:32
cars stopped,
1:10:34
words were exchanged, and then
1:10:36
the van drove off.
1:10:38
She texted her buddy in very
1:10:41
colorful language. This person
1:10:43
just ran me off the road, I can't believe it didn't tell Shane.
1:10:46
Shane found out later, I
1:10:48
think from the friend or something that
1:10:50
had occurred. But it's strange
1:10:53
that on the day that she was killed,
1:10:55
she had a run-in like that, definitely.
1:10:58
would someone go and say, hey,
1:11:00
let's go get some guns and kill
1:11:02
this lady? We know that that happens all
1:11:04
the time with gangs, gang violence. All
1:11:06
you gotta do is spill a drink on somebody in a club
1:11:09
and you end up having your car shot until 100%.
1:11:11
I mean, people get killed in road rage stuff
1:11:13
too. It could have been a, I don't know what the altercation
1:11:16
was about, but. And again, in such a small
1:11:18
community, there was obviously no
1:11:20
recognition there wasn't someone that
1:11:22
she knew. So it was just a couple
1:11:25
of thugs passing through town
1:11:27
and this woman
1:11:28
pissed him off and they didn't like it,
1:11:31
they could have gone back and killed her. If you had
1:11:34
to give a theory today, what would it be?
1:11:37
If I had to give a theory today, I
1:11:39
would say you have to point
1:11:41
at the mystery person that
1:11:43
Shane is still so convinced. Mm-hmm.
1:11:46
The person
1:11:46
with it. Because if that person is,
1:11:49
in fact, a person of interest and
1:11:51
hasn't been cleared, well, there's
1:11:53
more smoke, There's generally more
1:11:56
smoke at least.
1:11:57
So I would say if that... the
1:12:00
person that
1:12:01
they're kind of they put all their eggs in
1:12:03
that basket and that's where the majority of the
1:12:05
energy and the resources and the investigation are
1:12:08
headed, they
1:12:08
must think that they have
1:12:11
something. But both of you riddle me this.
1:12:13
James, do you have kids? I do not, but
1:12:15
I do have kids. What's that baby? They're
1:12:18
so cute. What's his name? Claude.
1:12:21
Oh, I love animals with human names. Like from
1:12:23
hair. If someone hurt
1:12:25
either of your partners or loved
1:12:27
ones, now, because I have to ask you You are both
1:12:30
highly rational people, it seems,
1:12:32
and I am, you know, in space.
1:12:34
Still see a change, too. Yeah,
1:12:36
exactly. No, I just, in
1:12:39
what world do you not say,
1:12:41
everybody
1:12:41
gather around with a microphone
1:12:44
and let me tell you who this son of a bitch is
1:12:47
and let's put pressure in that 10 years you're
1:12:50
sitting on the person. In the world that you don't
1:12:52
want to get sued for defamation and slander, girl.
1:12:54
I'm like, you'll get, I mean, keep. But if you knew.
1:12:57
as long as he provided the name to the investigators, that's a
1:12:59
responsible thing to do. It would be really
1:13:01
crazy
1:13:01
for him to do that. Because sitting, I
1:13:04
would not be able to get
1:13:06
a night's rest. Also, what if
1:13:08
he's like, he's going to take me out next?
1:13:10
You'd be scared. I just don't, I don't know. I just, I
1:13:12
can't imagine sitting for 10 years,
1:13:14
you know, looking at that guy, going to the
1:13:16
same pigly wiggly, seeing him
1:13:19
and being like, that's the guy. It would just eat
1:13:21
me inside. I
1:13:22
don't understand that. What piece of
1:13:24
evidence are they waiting for? Like, that's... That's
1:13:26
the question. Like, what
1:13:29
what you is going to drop when they're finally
1:13:31
like, all right, we got them. Exactly.
1:13:33
I just don't get I that is
1:13:36
again, I know I'm I know I'm emotional, Rabia,
1:13:38
but I just can't imagine
1:13:40
not, you know, ringing every
1:13:42
alarm and sitting for 10 years.
1:13:46
Look, girl, I've been told for 23 years, don't say who
1:13:48
you think killed him in late. Like, you can't you can't because
1:13:51
you're gonna get sued, you are gonna get sued,
1:13:53
you're gonna get sued. But do you say it anyway? Yeah,
1:13:56
I always say this, that if I headed the investigation,
1:13:58
the suspects I would look
1:14:00
at first to eliminate would be these people.
1:14:02
And I have two at the top of my list. I say it all the time.
1:14:04
Those are the two suspects that were not properly eliminated.
1:14:07
That's what I say. I don't say I think X person
1:14:09
killed. And I think that's safe. That is legally
1:14:12
safe to do. But that's not somebody who put
1:14:14
a bullet through your baby's forehead. But this
1:14:16
random list, if we combine Ravi's
1:14:18
randomness theory with the person that ran her off
1:14:21
the road, if they were crazy gang
1:14:24
people or whatever. Dangerous people. And
1:14:26
they said, said, we're going to go we're going to kill that bitch because
1:14:28
she yelled ugly things to us. Maybe
1:14:30
they needed to go get the
1:14:32
weapons that they were going to use to do it.
1:14:34
Maybe they waited for on
1:14:37
that road to come back to the opposite direction.
1:14:39
The other thing they might not
1:14:41
have known is that there was a child in the car
1:14:44
because car seat levels,
1:14:46
they never saw inside, which means they wouldn't have
1:14:48
actually known they were shooting at a
1:14:51
child at all. There's
1:14:52
something about the randomness of that
1:14:55
that helps me wrap my brain around it as
1:14:57
opposed to someone knowing that they were going to kill
1:14:59
a woman who was driving a one year old. So
1:15:02
they didn't know that we're the one year old in that car, because
1:15:04
they never saw one year old, they just thought they were
1:15:06
killing a woman pissed them off. And
1:15:08
they're awful killers. And maybe they
1:15:10
waited and they waited for her to
1:15:12
drive back on a stretch of road where there would be no
1:15:14
witnesses and they know,
1:15:17
I know, there's a lot we don't know because they're not telling
1:15:20
us. I think at this point the police probably
1:15:22
have a lot more information about the direction of the bullets.
1:15:26
Even the directionality of the bullets hit
1:15:28
her slightly upward. Maybe somebody was in the embankment.
1:15:31
I just think there's a lot of information
1:15:33
that we don't know. And I
1:15:35
actually think that this case is going to get solved. I
1:15:37
really do think so. So then if you
1:15:39
had to solve it right now, James, Rabia, what
1:15:42
is your solution? Solution?
1:15:44
How do you solve the case? What happened? Tell us what
1:15:47
happened.
1:15:47
are targeted. Just let's let's James random
1:15:50
or targeted. Where do you land on there? We've
1:15:51
got you for two more minutes. Yeah,
1:15:55
I would say it's 60% targeted, 40% right.
1:16:00
Are you fully on random, Rabia?
1:16:02
I am fully on random, yeah. And
1:16:04
I think even if it was the people who she might have
1:16:07
had an altercation with, to me also, they
1:16:09
might have targeted her on that day. I
1:16:11
don't believe in the premeditated theory
1:16:13
of somebody was... There was a
1:16:16
debt owed and vendettas. I don't believe
1:16:18
that. But I actually am mostly on board with
1:16:21
somebody on the side of the road shooting a gun
1:16:23
like an idiot and hitting this car, this yellow...
1:16:26
I mean, we have no idea how far she was going. She could have
1:16:28
been going 25 miles an hour. That's where I land.
1:16:30
But I actually think this case was good. I think
1:16:32
the investigators are gonna solve this case. I agree that
1:16:34
they're gonna solve but I
1:16:36
think it was targeted. I do.
1:16:38
I think it was targeted and I wish
1:16:40
that she some fuzzy socks. I
1:16:43
wish them all the luck in solving this
1:16:45
and I cannot wait to talk to the family
1:16:48
and yeah, that's where I land. But James
1:16:50
Roday, we are so happy
1:16:53
that you came and thank you for
1:16:55
your empathy and for choosing this
1:16:57
case. I love that you chose this
1:16:59
case
1:17:00
and that it's a little bit more under
1:17:02
everyone's radar So we can get some more eyes
1:17:04
and ears on the case for this family.
1:17:06
I love that
1:17:07
you're talking to the family That's that's
1:17:09
great for you to and thank you for doing that And
1:17:11
I'm sure they're gonna be really appreciative as well
1:17:14
and I'll be listening to so
1:17:15
I hope you have a great Next
1:17:18
few months respite as you decide
1:17:20
what to do next what? Mountains
1:17:23
to climb next but where can folks find you online?
1:17:25
Let's see Well, I've got six or seven
1:17:27
episodes left of the little things so
1:17:29
you
1:17:29
can you can watch those I think those are
1:17:32
Such a horrible self-apart. I think
1:17:34
it's on Wednesday nights. I know it's on
1:17:36
ABC and I believe it's Wednesday nights
1:17:39
I don't know what time it comes on But
1:17:41
I think we're about we're about halfway through the final
1:17:43
season So there's that I recently
1:17:45
got hacked on Twitter by someone
1:17:48
who was using real Twitter
1:17:50
emails but then text
1:17:53
was the hacker
1:17:54
and I was distracted and watching the
1:17:57
NCAA tournament, which is, you know, a
1:17:59
fair... So you clicked it
1:18:01
and you followed the whole thing. I clicked
1:18:03
it. I ended up typing in a code and then
1:18:05
I got a text that said, you can
1:18:07
have it back for 25K Bitcoin.
1:18:10
Oh my gosh.
1:18:14
Whichever played, I'm good. You
1:18:16
heard it here. James Roday has Bitcoin
1:18:19
everybody. If you need to... Where
1:18:22
is Twitter? You need to call the folks at Twitter to fix
1:18:25
this. They can get it
1:18:25
back for you. You know what? I
1:18:28
did. I did send a thing. out of form, we'll
1:18:30
see what happens. But the truth is, if
1:18:32
I'm no longer on Twitter, I completely
1:18:37
get off of Twitter in 2024. Yeah. Yeah.
1:18:39
But I am my name. I met James
1:18:41
O'Day on Instagram. I don't post
1:18:43
much, but if you want to see some
1:18:46
pictures of
1:18:47
very handsome dogs, you can go
1:18:49
there. That's awesome. Thank you all so much
1:18:52
for grabbing me on and shining a light on this
1:18:53
case. Thanks for picking me. It's a great
1:18:55
case. Thank you. We hope to see you soon, and thank
1:18:58
you so much. We appreciate it. You've been
1:19:00
an awesome guest. Thank you so much for coming on, for
1:19:02
saying yes. Yes. And thank you to your partner.
1:19:05
We love her.
1:19:05
Absolutely. I will try. All
1:19:07
right. Thanks, James.
1:19:12
So, Ellen, we landed on completely opposite
1:19:14
sides on this case. I know. I
1:19:16
do agree, though. I do believe that they will solve
1:19:19
it. And obviously, there's
1:19:21
no winning here. Right. But
1:19:24
I am right.
1:19:26
Yeah. So we'll see. But
1:19:30
we thank James Roday so much
1:19:32
for coming. I am really consumed
1:19:34
by this case. And I mean what I said at
1:19:36
the top. If you want to dive more in, culpable
1:19:39
as Dennis Cooper is the host. And
1:19:42
also we should say that anyone with
1:19:44
information about Brittany's murder
1:19:47
is asked to call the Brown County Sheriff's
1:19:49
Office at 937-378-4435. You can ask
1:19:52
for Detective Quinn Carlson
1:19:54
and his extension is 1-2-3. Now
1:20:00
there is
1:20:03
a $50,000 reward for information
1:20:05
leading to the arrest of the person
1:20:07
who killed Britney but just a handful
1:20:09
of months ago that reward was $20,000. Do
1:20:13
you know who added the 30, Rabia?
1:20:15
No, who did? The people who produced
1:20:18
the culpable podcast, Tenderfoot
1:20:20
TV and Resident Recordings
1:20:22
added $30,000 to that reward making it $50,000. Good
1:20:28
people, man. leading
1:20:30
to the arrest. Pain
1:20:32
is a wonderful person, by the way. Leading to
1:20:34
find out who happened, and the family
1:20:36
was so very touched, and we
1:20:38
are going to have an opportunity to chat
1:20:40
with them. So stay tuned for part two
1:20:43
when we talk to the Dodson family,
1:20:45
and tell them where they can find us, Rabia. They
1:20:48
can find us at Rabia and Ellen on
1:20:50
Instagram. We have a private Facebook group.
1:20:52
I think it's called Rabia and Ellen, it's called The
1:20:54
Case. That's the name of our podcast. Good job,
1:20:56
Rabia. It is. And you know what? Here's the thing,
1:20:59
I have noticed sometimes
1:21:00
people want to get in the group, but they don't answer all the
1:21:02
questions. You guys got to answer all the questions that
1:21:04
will let you in. We have to make sure there's no bots
1:21:06
among us. Yes, and so we're going to have
1:21:08
to decline you. So if you've been declined, try again,
1:21:10
answer all the questions and join us there with
1:21:12
a Patreon. Yeah, join us
1:21:14
on our Patreon. We have three levels,
1:21:17
everything including ad-free episodes,
1:21:20
to getting episodes early. We
1:21:22
have an early access option. We also
1:21:24
have an option where we are going to do
1:21:27
a monthly Zoom where we just sit and
1:21:29
hang out. We ask questions, talk,
1:21:31
chat, maybe we'll do watch parties, but
1:21:33
that is all available on patreon.com.
1:21:36
When you look up Rabia and Ellen,
1:21:38
we have tons of bonus content. We have extras
1:21:41
for you. It's all there at every
1:21:43
price point. And if you want more of
1:21:45
us, we'd love to see you on the Patreon. And
1:21:47
we'll hopefully see a lot of you in Atlanta, May
1:21:49
4th. And May 4th, yes,
1:21:52
our live show, 8 p.m. at
1:21:54
the punchline in Atlanta.
1:21:57
and we will be with our dear friend, Payne.
1:22:00
It's gonna be a blast. And
1:22:02
if you have anything to email or
1:22:04
ask us, you can email us at Rabia
1:22:06
and Ellen at Gmail. You can also leave
1:22:08
us a voicemail at speakpipe slash
1:22:11
solve the case. And Rabia
1:22:13
wears socks to bed and she's
1:22:15
a weirdo. Okay bye, okay bye, log off. Okay
1:22:18
bye, bye bye bye bye bye. Do you know who else is gonna be
1:22:20
in Atlanta? I just found out. Rebecca Lavoie.
1:22:22
Yes. Our girl Rebecca
1:22:24
Lavoie, who has a lot to say
1:22:27
about owls. That's all I'll say. But
1:22:29
until
1:22:30
then, thank you all so much for listening and
1:22:32
hang on for part two. Love you guys. Love
1:22:34
you Ellen. Love you.
1:22:36
Bye. Okay.
1:22:52
Trying to grab all the groceries in one trip. Not
1:22:55
how you would have done that. You know sometimes
1:22:58
less is more. Like when you drive less and save
1:23:00
with the USAA annual mileage discount.
1:23:03
USA Act get a quote today.
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