Trailer: The Journey

Why did a mysterious couple collect babies in a Los Angeles mansion? A five-part series from In the Dark, hosted by the New Yorker staff writer Ava Kofman, investigates. New Yorker subscribers get early, ad-free access to “The Journey.” In Apple Podcasts, tap the link at the top of the feed to subscribe or link an existing subscription. Or visit newyorker.com/dark to subscribe and listen in the New Yorker app. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.

• 0:01Madeleine Baran?

  One day last year, detectives knocked on the door of a multimillion-dollar mansion in Los Angeles County.

• 0:09Madeleine Baran?

  Inside, they found a strange scene: a dining area converted into classrooms with children and toddlers seated at rows of desks. All the kids had their heads shaved. Police wondered if they'd walked into some sort of daycare or school, but the couple that lived there insisted the children were theirs.

• 0:33Speaker 01

  It's a house that looks like a castle, but it's under investigation for being a possible factory, a baby factory.

• 0:41Madeleine Baran?

  The couple had 21 children, almost all born through surrogates, women who'd agreed to carry babies for them. But those surrogates had been deceived.

• 0:52Speaker 02

  I started crying. I was like, what the heck did I just get myself into?

• 0:57Speaker 03

  These were pictures of Sylvia in the same exact outfit, the same leather jacket. You just can't say, oh, no, that's not me. It is you, you know what I mean?

• 1:06Speaker 04

  Me and my coworker, we named her the surrogate pimp. She wanted to have a lot of surrogates at one time.

• 1:14Speaker 05

  We're here because we love families. We want families to grow.

• 1:20Speaker 06

  He was chasing her. Yeah, and that's the one time that we called the cops because she was screaming. And then he pulled out a gun. And I mean, it was kind of like a standoff.

• 1:29Madeleine Baran?

  I'm Eva Kaufman, a staff writer at The New Yorker. I've spent the past year investigating what was going on inside the Los Angeles mansion and how the American surrogacy industry allowed it to happen. Every bone in our bodies was to protect this child. And if we could keep her, we would. I was curious what you make of that decision, just given the fact pattern so far. That's insane. That is fucking insane. I mean, we're insane already. I'm keep going, but I mean, we're insane. I don't know what the next word will be. I'll have to go check my theosaurus or something. "The Journey" is a new series from In the Dark and The New Yorker, coming September 15th,

• 2:13Madeleine Baran?

  wherever you get your podcasts.