418: Man Obsessed with Sister-in-Law, GF Kills BF w/ Her Parents?, & Mom & Son Kill & Dismember Husband

This week on Headline Highlights: An Oklahoma stepfather who impregnated his 11-year-old stepdaughter has been sentenced to life in prison. New court documents allege that three women attacked and fatally stabbed Texas mother of five Caroline Peña, and all three now face murder charges. More than six months after 20-year-old Ethan Vernon was found dead in a burned truck in Ohio, his girlfriend and her parents have been indicted in connection with his death. After a shocking discovery in an Illinois lake, a man’s brother and sister-in-law were arrested after investigators uncovered disturbing details about his death. And a shocking New York murder case has taken a disturbing turn after a beloved teacher was accused of killing his young sister-in-law inside their family home…. If you’re new here, don’t forget to follow the show for weekly deep dives into the darkest true crime cases! To watch the video version of this episode, head over to youtube.com/@annieelise. .🔎Join Our True Crime Club & Get Exclusive Content & Perks..🎧 Need More to Binge? Listen to both of my weekly true crime series 10 to Life & Serialously with Annie Elise wherever you get your podcasts on the Annie Elise Channel!🍎 Apple Podcasts | Where you can also unlock access to 100+ and growing extra exclusive deep dives.💚 Spotify🔴 YouTube🎙️ All Other Platforms.🚩 Announcements 🖤 Want more Annie? Check out our Summer deals on our Subscription plans today!🖤🔎 Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/annieelise🎙️ Apple Podcasts: https://apple.co/3WpfSP8.📸 Follow Annie on Socials Instagram: @_annieeliseTikTok: @_annieeliseSubstack: @annieeliseFacebook: @10toLife.⭐SponsorsHelix: Go to http://helixsleep.com/serialously for 20% off sitewide, 25% off Luxe mattresses, and 30% off Elite mattresses. Our Place: Visit http://fromourplace.com/SERIALOUSLY and use code SERIALOUSLY for 10% off sitewide..👗 Shop Annie’s Must-Haves! ShopMY: bit.ly/AnnieElise_ShopMy Amazon: bit.ly/AnnieElise_Amazon.🫵🏻 Get Involved or Recommend a CaseAbout Annie: www.annieelise.comFor Business Inquiries: [email protected].📚 Episode Sources Abby Blabby | ABC New York | Help Honor Dalewayne Turner - GoFundMe | Illinois State Police | Justice for Ethan Vernon - GoFundMe | KATV | KBTX | KENS5 | KJRH - TV | KTUL | New York Post | People | WCIA | WV News••••••••••••••••••🚨Disclaimers1️⃣ Some links may be affiliate links, they do not cost you anything, but I make a small percentage from the sale. Thank you so much for watching and supporting me. 2️⃣ Sources used to collect this information include various public news sites, interviews, court documents, FB groups dedicated to the case, and various news channel segments. When quoting statements made by others, they are strictly alleged until confirmed otherwise. Please remember my videos are my independent opinion and to always do your own research. 3️⃣ The views and opinions expressed in this video are personal and do not necessarily reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organization, employer, or company. Assumptions made in the analysis are not reflective of the position of any entity other than the creator(s). These views are subject to change, revision, and rethinking at any time and are not to be held in perpetuity. We make no representations as to the accuracy, completeness, correctness, suitability, or validity of any information on this video and will not be liable for any errors, omissions, or delays in this information or any losses, injuries, or damages arising from its display or use. All information is provided on an as-is basis. It is the reader’s responsibility to verify their own facts.

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

• 0:00Speaker 00

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• 1:27Annie Elise?

  Hey, true crime besties. Welcome back to an all-new episode of Serially.

• 1:50Annie Elise?

  Hello, hello, hello, and welcome back to an all-new episode of Serially. With me, your host, Annie E. Lys. Happy Thursday. I hope all of you had a nice weekend, a long weekend, if you celebrate the 4th of July, and having a good week so far. Coming to you from New York once again, joined, no surprise...

• 2:12Speaker 04

  Surprise, surprise!

• 2:13Annie Elise?

  Amy of Arendale.

• 2:16Annie Elise?

  Is here with us today. And if you're watching the video version of this, you've already known for about 45 seconds because it's one camera angle. I should have been like. All we're working with. Back. I know. Yeah. Could you just get out of frame and then scoot in? Um, so welcome back. Today we are going through everything breaking this week in the true crime world. As a reminder for any of you new listeners, the way it works over here on Serial Listly is on Monday, I do a full deep dive with you guys, pick a singular case, we go to the trenches of hell and you know, research every single corner of it, do the full deep dive. And then on Thursdays, we come in headline highlights together where we're breaking down everything happening in true crime.

• 2:59Annie Elise?

  And let me just start by saying this before we get into today's cases. I have been receiving thousands of tags, DMs, emails, messages, wanting my take on what's going on in Ohio right now, the house of horrors.

• 3:18Annie Elise?

  Here's what I will say. It is coming. It's not going to be today, but it might be tomorrow, or it might be the next day. It's coming very, very soon. The thing is, because there are so many minors involved and because of the graphic nature of what happened there, and may, may, many of you may not be familiar with this, some of you might be, but I don't want to go off on a tangent too hard. But because of how sensitive this situation is, there is a lot of information that is not available to the public, such as body cam footage, certain, not police reports, but certain affidavits, we'll leave it there. So before I speak on it, we have been wanting to gather everything. So that's what we've been working on behind the scenes for over a week now.

• 4:02Annie Elise?

  Sourcing interviews with people connected to the case. Getting a lot of that information that is not public yet and going through it with a fine tooth comb so that when I do speak on it, I can give you the whole story. And if you're like, Annie, I have no idea what case you're even talking about Ohio. What, what are you even saying? Just wait. It's horrific. It's horrific. A few more days and it'll be ready for you. Okay. Now, before we jump in, I did want to share some exciting news with you guys because it's that time of year. I've already seen the messages start trickling in, but our annual subscription sale is officially here. So if you've been on the fence or you've been thinking about joining our true crime club, whether that's on Patreon because you're a video watcher, you want the episodes ad

• 4:45Annie Elise?

  free, you want more access, you want behind the scenes, you want vlogs, giveaways, our 24/7 group chat, all of the things, now is the time. Also, if you are an Apple Podcast listener and you just want every single episode completely ad free plus bonus episodes, this is also for you. We only run this promotion once a year and it gives you our lowest pricing of the year, which is why I think so many people are asking like, when's it coming back? When's it coming back? Well, now it is. And for my Patreon users, like I said, you can choose the tier that's right for you. Depending on which tier you join, you'll get access to things like BTS content, bonus content, extra episodes, our 24/7 group chat, giveaways, merch discounts, so much more. And for all of my Apple Podcast listeners, you can subscribe through one click of a

• 5:27Annie Elise?

  button on Annie Elise Plus right in the Apple Podcast app. Just open up the show page, click the button and you will get all the bonus content over there, the extra episodes, which we have like over a hundred right now, plus every episode ad free, which I know you guys hate ads, so this is the way to get around all of that. However, the deal will not last for long. We only offer this discount once a year and it expires very soon. So if you've been on the fence, now is the time to, you know, jump in headfirst. Head to patreon.com/annieelise to join on Patreon, especially if you are more of a video consumer. Or if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, simply open the show page and tap the Annie Elise Plus subscribe button. More content, more access and no ads. Sounds pretty good, right? So go sign up.

• 6:12Annie Elise?

  It's ending soon. You're welcome. I want to start with this because Because this first case that we're going to talk about is actually a quick little update to a case that I already have talked with you about. It's been a little bit of time. We, I first discussed it back in, gosh, September of 2025. So some of you are OGs and may be familiar. Some of you who are brand new listeners may not know the backstory, so I'll give you a little bit of a recap, but it's an update that I know a lot of you have been waiting for. And so I wanted to just at least touch on it because this case was absolutely devastating from the very beginning. So like I said, I originally covered this back in September of last year,

• 6:51Annie Elise?

  but it all started in August of 2025 in Oklahoma. And this was after an 11-year-old little girl had been rushed to the hospital because she had just given birth. She had delivered a baby at home with absolutely no medical care, no support, nothing. And when the investigator started looking into what happened, not only how did this 11-year-old little girl get pregnant, but why did she deliver this baby at home? Why did she not have access to a healthcare team? To anything to protect not only herself, but the baby as well. What they found was that this entire time she had been living in what they described as quote horrific conditions. The home had no running water. It had animal feces all throughout it.

• 7:36Annie Elise?

  And then six children living there ranging from two years old to 11 years old. All of them living there under those conditions, most without clothes and without basic necessities. Now, at first, the girl's parents tried to claim that they had no idea that she was even pregnant. They had no idea how she got pregnant. They had no idea who the father was. They, you know, just neglectful and had no insight into anything. She hadn't seen a doctor in over a year. She had no prenatal care, nothing. However, as investigators started looking into what was happening, as it always does, the truth started coming to light. A DNA test was done and it showed that there was a 99.9%

• 8:16Annie Elise?

  chance that 35-year-old Dustin Walker, who by the way, was this little girl's stepfather, was the biological father of this Investigators also said that the girl's mother Sheri and her grandmother Michelle either knew about this pregnancy or should have known about the pregnancy and more than that, what was happening inside that home. The grooming, the assault, everything happening at the hands of the stepfather against this 11-year-old little girl, which when you do the math and break that down, who knows how far back it truly started, but even just the pregnancy itself, she would have most likely been 10 years old when she conceived. And I say

• 8:58Annie Elise?

  conceived as, you know, just the medical term, but you guys get what I mean. So prosecutor said that they later even learned that her grandmother was telling people that the baby's father was supposedly a 12-year-old boy that she used to babysit, saying, oh no, this other little 12-year-old boy used to come to the house, we would babysit them together, they must have been exploring and, you know, what sort I'm looking for, uh, not, not exploring, uh, experimenting, thank you. And, you know, he's the father, but obviously in those declarations, knowing that her granddaughter was pregnant. So once investigators pieced everything together, the arrests, of course,

• 9:40Annie Elise?

  came pretty quickly. Dustin, her mom, and the grandmother were all arrested on August 23rd, 2025. Dustin was charged with child sexual abuse and child neglect. Her mother was charged with child neglect and her grandmother was charged with six counts of child neglect. Now, as if that wasn't shocking enough, her mother was also pregnant with her seventh child at the time, when all of this came to light. And now, the reason I'm doing the update now is because 10 months later, we finally have a major update. On June 29th, Dustin was sentenced to life in prison. This is after he pleaded guilty back in March to the charges that he was facing and more

• 10:23Annie Elise?

  than that, the abuse of a child under the age of 12. Walker faces one count of felony sexual abuse and six counts of felony child neglect. His attorney, Ben Hilfiger, says they entered a blind plea, meaning-

• 10:35Speaker 05

  There was no agreement beforehand with the state.

• 10:38Speaker 06

  Normally, we will have a plea agreement when we go to plea our clients, but in this case, I didn't feel there was one that we could get that would be useful or helpful in any way.

• 10:49Annie Elise?

  So Dustin took what is called a blind plea, and we don't really hear about these too often, but they do happen. Usually when someone takes a plea, it's in exchange for something, whether that's the death penalty being removed from the table, a lighter sentence, whatever it may be. However, a blind plea is not that. It means that there is no plea agreement in place when he pleaded guilty. And on top of the life sentence that he received, he was also sentenced to an additional 27 years for the other six charges that involved the other children who were living in this horrific home and under these conditions. And the judge ordered that each of these sentences run consecutively, which means that Dustin will serve the 27 years for all of the child neglect charges first before his life sentence even begins.

• 11:34Annie Elise?

  Now, as for the mom and the grandmother, they each pleaded not guilty back when this case first started. So their cases, they're still moving slowly through the court system, so I will definitely keep an eye on those, let you know where all of that shakes out, but at least this monster is locked up, put away. I'm hopeful that these, the mom and the grandmother are also going to be equally held accountable when their time comes. Because, I mean, when you think about it too, obviously, this was something, in my opinion, that was ongoing for years. And the fact that there were also so many other children living in the home, who's to say that there were not actions like that against those children? And that that wasn't, that that may have even been the goal.

• 12:16Annie Elise?

  And we've seen, like, I'm so, and I get it, he's the stepdad, he's not the biological father, but I am so sick of these incestual cases that we have been talking about lately.

• 12:26Speaker 04

  Cases, but also these people around that are watching this happen and are aware of it and not saying anything.

• 12:33Annie Elise?

  I know.

• 12:34Speaker 04

  It's disgusting.

• 12:35Annie Elise?

  I know.

• 12:36Speaker 04

  I don't understand.

• 12:37Annie Elise?

  I know. It's bad.

• 12:39Speaker 04

  All right, this next one is actually an update to a case that I covered last week during headline highlights regarding the murder of Caroline Penya. Caroline, if you remember, was a mother of five from Del Rio, Texas, which is a small town outside the border of Mexico, who was stabbed to death in broad daylight, originally was thought to have happened in this intersection near a Sonic drive-thru. Police had arrested three women in connection with the attack: 21-year-old Kitty Mia Diaz, her 19-year-old sister Amaya Cookie Diaz, and 21-year-old Kiandra Rene Faz. And at the time, though, if you remember, there were a lot of unanswered questions regarding

• 13:19Speaker 04

  what actually happened and what the motive was and how this all kind of came to be. Well, some new details have come out in a probable cause affidavit, and it's giving us a much clearer picture of what actually unfolded that day. According to the newly released information, officers were dispatched around 2:10 p.m. on June 25th after Caroline had shown up to the Valverde Regional Medical Center, suffering from multiple stab wounds. Witnesses had told police that she had been attacked at a home just five minutes away from the hospital, and that's where this investigation took a major turn. Investigators went to the home, and there they actually found surveillance from a camera that had captured the entire attack.

• 14:02Speaker 04

  And on this surveillance footage, Caroline was seen driving up to the house in a black Dodge pickup truck. Then, just a few minutes later, Kitty and Amaya pulled up in a black Chrysler 300. Police say that Amaya got out of the passenger seat, holding what they believe was a knife, before confronting Caroline. Investigators allege that she then stabbed Caroline in the back, and almost immediately there was blood on the back of her shirt. Now, from there, police say the surveillance footage shows Kitty and Kiandra getting out of the car, rushing over, and beating Caroline before all three women got back into the car and then drove away. After the attack, Caroline was then taken to the hospital where she later succumbed To her injuries and passed away.

• 14:48Speaker 04

  Now investigators were able to track that car that Kitty, Amaya and Kiandra were in back to a home about two miles away. And by the time the officers got there, they say that Kitty and Amaya had already changed their clothes. And in fact, one of the shirts was found inside of a washer. Both women had appeared to have just showered as well because their hair was still wet when the police got there. So obviously they were trying to clean something up. They were both arrested and Kiandra was arrested shortly after. All three were charged with murder and held on a $5 million bond. Now investigators believe Amaya was the one that was holding the knife. But all three women were facing charges because under Texas law, which I actually love this law.

• 15:30Speaker 04

  Someone who helps, encourages, or participates in a deadly crime can be charged as the same person who's accused of actually causing those fatal injuries, which we've heard this before. After getting a search warrant for the home, investigators say they found Kitty's pink halter style crop top sitting inside the washing machine. Real clever. It actually reminds me of someone which I want to talk to you about.

• 15:52Annie Elise?

  Jodi Arias?

• 15:53Speaker 04

  Yes, exactly.

• 15:54Annie Elise?

  Say less.

• 15:55Speaker 04

  Exactly. And because of that Kitty has now been hit with an additional charge of tampering with physical evidence. But still for the motive, they still don't understand. That is the missing piece and they don't understand. The affidavit says that Kiandra told investigators that Caroline showed up to her house looking for a fight, but police haven't confirmed exactly what led up to that confrontation or how these women in fact knew each other or if all three did know her. According to the Del Rio Police Chief, investigators are working through a good amount of possible motives and are making sure every lead is fully investigated before drawing any formal conclusions. But at this point, the police don't expect any other additional arrests.

• 16:40Speaker 04

  Kitty, Cookie and Kiandra are still each being held on those $5 million bonds. And Kitty is also facing that additional $50,000 bond on the tampering with evidence charge. So while investigators now know how this attack happened, they still don't exactly understand. And why, or again, any of the additional details, but it does sound like there's quite a bit of information out there and that they're going through it. So the answers will come about. My question was who took her to the hospital? Like, was there another fourth person? Did she have time to call or?

• 17:12Annie Elise?

  Right. Cause then witnesses at the hospital say they saw what happened.

• 17:16Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 17:17Annie Elise?

  I, I want to know who owns the house that they pulled up in front of, or was it a random house? Do they know each other? Or was this road rage where then Caroline say followed them, not making it okay, obviously, but like, cause how they're saying she was looking to start a fight, like got pissed because of road rage and then like pulled over at a house or I don't know, like, which maybe that's not it at all. Maybe they do know each other and maybe at the time of this episode releasing even more information will be out. But I do like, I'm curious what that connection is, if they really knew each other or not.

• 17:48Speaker 04

  And I actually don't think, I don't stand by my theory from last week.

• 17:52Annie Elise?

  What was your theory?

• 17:52Speaker 04

  That it was maybe a gang thing.

• 17:55Annie Elise?

  Oh, yeah.

• 17:55Speaker 04

  Doesn't really sound like that.

• 17:56Annie Elise?

  Yeah.

• 17:57Speaker 04

  It does sound like they were kind of, I don't know if the word hunting is the right word, but it's like you get out of the car with a knife already. And then you have like backup.

• 18:06Annie Elise?

  Well, if, I mean, backup, they could have all three, but it was in the middle of the day. They could have all three just been like, not joyriding, but like even if they went to Sonic to pick up food or something.

• 18:15Speaker 04

  Yeah.

• 18:15Annie Elise?

  Not like intentionally having backup, but yeah, I wonder what the connection is. That's interesting.

• 18:20Speaker 04

  And who took her to the hospital?

• 18:21Annie Elise?

  Yeah. All right. I feel like we need to just have an honest conversation here in the circle of trust. Can we talk about how literally everything seems to be getting more expensive? Groceries, gas, rent, you name it. And apparently your wireless bill wants to join in on that party too. But here's the thing, it doesn't have to. Mint Mobile is making it so much easier to stop overpaying for wireless with plans starting at just 15 bucks a month. And you're not sacrificing quality either. All plans include high speed data, unlimited talk and text, and access to the nation's largest 5G network. You can also use your current phone and your current phone number. You just sign up online and you are good to go. Now I changed carriers probably a year and a half ago at this.

• 19:06Annie Elise?

  Point to Mint Mobile. And when I tell you, not only was it the best decision of my life, I now have like service in places my husband doesn't even have service, but it was so easy. It took me 15 minutes, kept my phone, kept my phone number. It was the best. So for a new wireless plan, starting at 15 bucks a month, go to mintmobile.com/ae. That's mintmobile.com/ae. $45 upfront payment required, equivalent to $15 per month. New customers on first three month plan only. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. Okay, so this next case, it's one that isn't brand new. However, it is making a ton of headlines right now because there has been a very big turn of events. And when I first read about these updates, I almost couldn't believe it, but I'm so happy

• 19:50Annie Elise?

  that they finally have some like forward momentum going. But back on December 11th, 2025, 20-year-old Ethan Vernon left work to go visit his girlfriend, 24-year-old Sarah Hayning. This was at her home in Athens, Ohio. Now, it wasn't supposed to be anything out of the ordinary. However, later that night, Ethan never made it back home. By the next morning, his mom Glenna knew that something just was not right. So she started calling hospitals, law enforcement agencies, friends, people that they knew, just trying to figure out where her son was. Then, while searching online, she came across a Facebook post about a pickup truck that had been found burned on the side of the road about 12 miles from his girlfriend Sarah's house.

• 20:34Annie Elise?

  So the authorities went out, they wanted to check out this truck, see where it was, see what was going on. And when they started looking a little bit closer, they made a heartbreaking discovery, because there was a body inside this truck. The body was so badly burned that it couldn't be identified at the scene. So because of that, DNA testing was done. And after 11 weeks, the testing confirmed that the burned remains belonged to Ethan. Now, his family had said at the time that they already knew, or at least had that gut feeling that it was Ethan. Just heartbreaking, kind of that feeling of losing hope and just knowing in your gut that that is your loved one. But, and his mom even said, "We knew, but we didn't want to believe it." According to investigators,

• 21:16Annie Elise?

  Ethan's body was found in the backseat of the truck and there was a gun in the front seat of the truck. Now unfortunately, because this fire had caused so much damage, the medical examiner could not determine exactly how Ethan died. Investigators said that the circumstances were suspicious, yes, but at the time, there wasn't enough evidence to officially call it a homicide. With a gun in the front seat, it could have possibly been self-harm. It could have been something else. It was too difficult to get the manner of death, cause of death, everything just kind of rolling into one. So the detectives got to work and over the next several months, they served more than 50 search warrants. They also collected cell phones, online account records, went door to door talking with people

• 21:59Annie Elise?

  in the area, looking through as much CCTV footage as they could find in the area and just really trying to build not only a timeline, but figure out who was he last with, where was he last seen, is there anything suspicious on surveillance and try to piece together what truly happened to Ethan. Meanwhile, Ethan's family never stopped believing that somebody was responsible for this, that this was a homicide. They knew that this wasn't an accident. They knew that this wasn't self-harm. It just wasn't possible. Well, now, more than six months later, police say that they have finally reached a huge turning point in their investigation. And this is what I had to like go back and double check because I couldn't even believe that I was reading this right.

• 22:41Annie Elise?

  But on July 1st, authorities executed a search warrant at a home in Athens. And when they did, they took three people into custody. Ethan's girlfriend, Sarah, her dad, 65-year-old Randy, and her 63-year-old mother, Beverly.

• 22:58Speaker 04

  Wow.

• 22:59Annie Elise?

  I know. A grand jury indicted all three of them on multiple felony charges, including murder, arson, tampering with evidence, gross abuse of a corpse, and obstructing justice. Now, according to prosecutors, Sarah, his 24-year-old girlfriend, she was indicted on 49 counts in total. Forty-four of those were for repeatedly giving false information to the investigators so that she could hinder the investigators. She was also charged with destroying or concealing physical evidence, tampering with evidence, arson, gross abuse of a corpse, and murder. Her dad Randy was indicted on 11 counts while her mom Beverly was indicted on nine.

• 23:40Annie Elise?

  So like I said, they were charged with a slew of things, all three of them. Investigators, I will say this though, still haven't said exactly what they believe happened to Ethan, or what evidence led them to these indictments. So there's still, while there is forward movement, there are still a lot of questions left unanswered. But after months of waiting, Ethan's family is finally one step closer to getting those answers, and hopefully getting the justice that they've been looking for. It's just figuring out what happened? How did, why would his girlfriend be involved? How did she enlist her parents to potentially help her with this and help with the cover up? What truly went on? And you know what? There's going to be a digital trail, no matter what.

• 24:24Annie Elise?

  Because I think that young kids are stupid enough to where they're going to Google things. Their, her search history, I'm sure is probably riddled with things. Text history, who knows? But also, I would imagine, while some adults are savvy and smart, if this was a quick cover up, because it's not a calculated murder, they're boomers, you know? They're not going to be savvy enough to not know to like do a single Google search. So I'd imagine, especially with this many charges, that they have a lot of evidence. It's just a matter now of piecing together why, not even what happened, but like, why did this happen? Was he lured there? Was it an accident? Then they tried to cover it up to protect their daughter so that she didn't like lose the rest of her life? You know?

• 25:07Annie Elise?

  But my point is, I'm happy that Ethan's family finally has some answers, although that's got to be a devastating blow to know that this was, yeah, that this was so close to home and it was his own girlfriend and her parents involved. But I will definitely be following this closely and I'll let you know as soon as we have updates.

• 25:24Speaker 04

  I'm curious to know because it took a while for them to make that arrest. And if there's all this, these charges and perhaps evidence, like what took so long? Was, were they not even, was she not on the radar at all? And then something came forward or have they been looking at her the whole time?

• 25:40Annie Elise?

  I'm sure they've been looking at her for a while because the fact that they're saying so many of those charges are from multiple false statements and lying to the police to hinder the investigation. I'd imagine she had been interviewed probably multiple times.

• 25:53Speaker 04

  Conflicting stories, maybe.

• 25:55Annie Elise?

  Yeah. And in the grand scheme of things, what, that's six or seven months? It's long, but it's not like a crazy amount of time when you think about it. Cause they are gathering evidence and they want a rock solid case and to charge three people. It's like, you want to make sure that your stuff is like concrete, but I guess we'll figure out the why soon.

• 26:14Speaker 04

  What are these family coverups?

• 26:16Annie Elise?

  Family ties. Yeah.

• 26:19Speaker 04

  Okay. This next one, I'm not just saying this, this is like out of a horror movie. It doesn't even feel real. And it's one that we saw a lot of DMs coming in. And actually we have a team member that lives very close to this area. And has said, this is unfortunately not the first case of this happening. This all started as one family's relaxing summer vacation. And like I said, ended in what feels like a horror movie. On the evening of June 28th, people enjoying a summer day at Lake Mattoon in Illinois, spotted what looked like part of a human arm floating in the water. Now at first they thought it was maybe a dead fish and they were going to move it away from their boat. But as they got closer, they saw that it was actually a man's arm.

• 27:04Annie Elise?

  I'm like getting the visual right now of looking over the boat and thinking it's like, what's that fish? Like a fish, like a bass, like a big fish floating.

• 27:11Speaker 04

  We'll wait till you hear how they figured out it was an arm.

• 27:13Annie Elise?

  Okay.

• 27:14Speaker 07

  My dad handed me an oar from the boat and he said, hey, there's uh, some dead fish coming by. Why don't you uh, get those away from us? I said, okay. But after getting a closer look.

• 27:24Speaker 04

  I was like, I don't.

• 27:25Speaker 07

  Something's not right and I got looking closer and I saw the tattoo.

• 27:29Speaker 04

  One of the boaters, Sammy Flynn, immediately called 911 and the marina and dispatchers told her to use an oar to keep the arm from floating away until the authorities arrived. So imagine you're with your family on a boat and those are the instructions given all while this is probably very shocking. Sammy later said that that whole thing felt unreal, like something you would have seen in a movie that you could never even imagine happening. And listen to her account here.

• 27:58Speaker 07

  Unreal. You see it in movies, you see it, you know, happen at other places, but not this close and not to you or your family or friends that are with you. I don't know if, you know, it'll be a while before we come back to this lake because this is one of the lakes that my mom and her friend, they take this boat out on the lake, this lake a lot. So it may be a while before that happens.

• 28:21Speaker 04

  Investigators found Sammy and her group on the water and quickly noticed two distinctive tattoos on the arm. One showing a skeleton holding a Green Bay Packers helmet and another which was made up of either letters or numbers. The next day, Illinois State Police released photos of these tattoos, hoping that somebody would recognize them and they would be able to help identify the victim. And amazingly, it did not take long. Within just a couple of days, the authorities confirmed that the remains belonged to 38-year-old Dalewayne Turner of Plainfield, Illinois. Then, almost as soon as they figured out who the victim was, the investigation took another shocking turn.

• 29:02Speaker 04

  On July 1st, authorities arrested 26-year-old James Adam and 62-year-old Robin Turner, and they were both formally charged with concealment of a homicide and dismembering of a human body. And investigators have already said they're expecting additional charges to be filed as this investigation continues. Now, at first, a lot of people were wondering how these two suspects were connected to Dalewayne, and some early reports even say that Robin was his mother. But on July 4th, James's cousin, Crystal, tried to Clear up the rumors in a Facebook post and actually there's a lot of stuff on Facebook in these community posts. According to Crystal, James was Del Wayne's younger brother. She said that

• 29:46Speaker 04

  after their own mother was murdered 12 years ago, Del Wayne became James' legal guardian. She also made it clear that Robin was not Del Wayne's mother, but was actually, get this, his wife, despite their significant age difference. So, Del Wayne, as a reminder, 38, Robin 62.

• 30:05Annie Elise?

  Okay, let me make sure I'm following this. James is the 26-year-old. So it was James 26 and Robin 62 who murdered and dismembered him. Del Wayne was James, yeah, but it was James' older brother and legal guardian because their mother was murdered years ago. And then his, so it was basically his wife and his son brother.

• 30:27Speaker 04

  Son brother.

• 30:29Annie Elise?

  Wow. Is that because there was a relationship with the son brother and the mom?

• 30:33Speaker 04

  Well, well, well.

• 30:34Annie Elise?

  26 and 62, come on.

• 30:37Speaker 04

  No, I know. It's wild.

• 30:38Annie Elise?

  I like an older man, but like, and Jer's younger than me.

• 30:42Speaker 04

  Have you seen the photos?

• 30:43Annie Elise?

  No.

• 30:44Speaker 04

  You need to see the photos.

• 30:45Annie Elise?

  I'm gonna Google the photos. Keep going. You talk while I Google the photos.

• 30:48Speaker 04

  So, Crystal, Del Wayne's cousin, said that Del Wayne was last seen during the first week of June and that the family still has no idea how his remains ended up in Lake Mattoon. Investigators also recovered additional evidence from the home where Robin lived that they believe is connected to the case, although they haven't said exactly what it is that they found.

• 31:09Annie Elise?

  I don't like it. I got the pictures.

• 31:11Speaker 04

  Okay. No, I know.

• 31:12Annie Elise?

  Here's the thing, though. I will say this, and we'll obviously have the photos on screen for those of you watching YouTube. Let me describe it for the audio listeners. It's not as bad as I thought.

• 31:22Speaker 04

  Really?

• 31:22Annie Elise?

  I mean, it's not good. It's not good, but it's not as bad as I thought. The 62-year-old woman, she has what looks to be platinum blonde hair right around to like her mid-chest area. She... Looks sixty-two, but not like a hard sixty-two.

• 31:37Speaker 04

  Are we looking at the same photo?

• 31:39Annie Elise?

  Yeah, I mean, maybe I'm just being a little nice, I guess. And then he looks kind of just like...

• 31:43Speaker 04

  He looks like an average guy.

• 31:45Annie Elise?

  Your average Doug Dynasty kind of guy, right?

• 31:48Speaker 04

  Yeah, I mean, he, yeah, he doesn't...

• 31:50Annie Elise?

  You think she looks like a rough sixty-two? I maybe because I've been looking at all the photos from the Ohio House of Horrors that like, that is a rough... She does look a little evil and like, trying to be young, I guess.

• 31:59Speaker 04

  Mean people look older.

• 32:01Annie Elise?

  They do.

• 32:02Speaker 04

  That's why we look so nice.

• 32:03Annie Elise?

  But, okay, it's the botox. Um, I still think twenty-six and sixty-two is crazy.

• 32:10Speaker 04

  No, I know. I can't even imagine.

• 32:13Annie Elise?

  Yeah.

• 32:13Speaker 04

  So for now, both Robin and James are in custody while investigators are continuing to piece together what happened to Del Wayne. And like I said, authorities are expecting there to be more charges based on the evidence. Del Wayne's family has since made a statement saying that he was somebody with a huge personality and an even bigger love for the Chicago Bears. They said he was always the loudest person cheering the games and making people laugh and was the kind of person that would always go out of his way to help people who needed it. Hey, guys. Okay, I'm recording this after we filmed the episode for this week, but wanted to give you an update that just came out in this case because it is truly wild and unbelievable.

• 32:55Speaker 04

  So court documents have now been released and they give us a much clearer picture of what investigators believe happened to Del Wayne. According to those documents, police made the biggest break in this case on the night of June thirtieth, when a man called into the Illinois State Police and told them that his half-brother, James Adams, and his sister-in-law, Robin Turner, had just confessed to killing and dismembering Del Wayne. He told investigators that James admitted, quote, "I killed Dale. He's in the freezer." And when detectives interviewed him, he said that James and Robin claimed Del Wayne had been physically violent a couple of weeks earlier. James allegedly said that he grabbed a knife and stabbed Del Wayne multiple times, killing him. And according to the witness, James and Robin then decided to dismember Del Wayne's body,

• 33:38Speaker 04

  put it in a freezer, and later dumped most of the body parts in Lake Mattoon. So it was that 911 call that is what actually set everything in motion on that case. Now, as we talked about earlier, investigators had already started looking into this case after Del Wayne's arm was found floating in Lake Mattoon. But these new court documents say that it wasn't just the arm that was recovered from the water. Over the next couple of days after that, authorities actually found several black trash bags full of human remains in the lake, as well as weights and concrete that investigators believe were used to keep those bags underwater. So as investigators were working on trying to figure out how these body parts ended up there,

• 34:20Speaker 04

  it was actually surveillance footage and license plate reader cameras that helped them piece together what happened. Police say that James was caught on surveillance at a Walmart in Mattoon buying weights, duct tape, and a change of clothes before putting on those new clothes in the store bathroom and throwing the old ones away in a dumpster. Detectives also say surveillance from a Menards showed James and Robin buying 20 bags of concrete just a few days earlier, and license plate reader cameras tracked their truck heading towards Lake Mattoon with large tote bins in the bed. Those bins were later found abandoned in a ditch less than a mile from the lake. Then, get this, when investigators searched the family's home, they found Del Wayne's head, neck, and torso

• 35:04Speaker 04

  still inside a freezer that had allegedly been sealed shut with duct tape, covered with a blanket, and weighed down with cinder blocks. They also said they found blood-like stains throughout the entire home, Del Wayne's cellphone inside the truck, and it looked like parts of the home had even been recently remodeled. Police also searched Robin's phone, where investigators say they found text messages between her and James talking about cleaning supplies. According to these court documents, one message from Robin said, "Be sure to fully delete everything." Detectives also said they found Google searches dating back to as early as June, including things like asking if you can die from different kinds of overdoses. Do you have a body embalmed?

• 35:49Speaker 04

  And concrete mixer. So when Robin was questioned, she said that on June 30th, James told her that he and Del Wayne had had a fight about sports cards a few days ago, and Del Wayne said that he was going to stay with a friend. She told investigators that when she came home, he was gone, but that she did notice a faint smell of bleach throughout the house. James told her that he had stabbed Del Wayne multiple times and put his body in the freezer. And when James was questioned, all he said was, "The one thing I'll say is that I did it, but I did it out of self-defense. I will tell you guys that." So at this point, James and Robin are still in custody on charges of concealment of a homicide and dismembering of a human body.

• 36:32Speaker 04

  But again, investigators say that more charges are expected to come as the case moves forward. So we will certainly keep you updated as we learn more. And hopefully, we will get some more answers on the motive to this crazy crime.

• 36:49Annie Elise?

  That's really sad. I mean, Chicago's a Bears fan, yes, but also he had a Packers tattoo, so pick a team. No, I'm just kidding.

• 36:56Speaker 04

  Well, so it's interesting because they say they don't know how his remains ended up there. So I'm sure that's part of the evidence they're collecting is.

• 37:03Annie Elise?

  They probably threw him in the lake. Like dismembered and put him in a bag.

• 37:06Speaker 04

  So like, or he wasn't seen since the first week of June, and this was the end of June, so.

• 37:13Annie Elise?

  And is it confirmed that son, brother, and wife were romantically connected? Okay, so that's just me speculating. But still, if they were not romantically connected, what on earth would motivate you both to team up against him and kill him unless?

• 37:30Speaker 04

  There is a romantic.

• 37:31Annie Elise?

  No.

• 37:31Speaker 04

  He's what?

• 37:32Annie Elise?

  They're gonna split the life insurance.

• 37:34Speaker 04

  Well, and I was just thinking. Yeah, I mean, once this all uncovers, it'll be, it'll be interesting to see what actually happened and what the manner of death is. But I mean, and what an ultimate betrayal it was. Because if he was aware of what was happening and if there were secrets uncovered, like this could be huge.

• 37:52Annie Elise?

  I know.

• 37:53Speaker 04

  But so sad. And who knows if there's other situations happening in that area. I mean,

• 38:00Annie Elise?

  Well, while we're on the topic of betrayal,

• 38:03Speaker 04

  Okay.

• 38:03Annie Elise?

  let me tell you about this next case. Because this next case is right in our backyard at the moment, out of New York. And it's one that has left a family completely shattered. It is so awful, and it makes me physically ill thinking about it. So on Monday morning, June 29, around 8:45 a.m., 911 dispatchers received a call from a 31 year old man named Joseph Horner. He was asking for an ambulance for a quote, dead woman inside his home. Now, when first responders arrived, they found 25 year old Victoria Castle unresponsive. They immediately started CPR before then rushing her to the hospital. Unfortunately,

• 38:44Annie Elise?

  though, she was pronounced dead less than an hour later. Now, Victoria wasn't a stranger. She wasn't a friend. She was Joseph's sister in law, and she lived in the downstairs apartment of the house while Joseph and his wife lived upstairs. Now, I don't know the exact layout of the house, but for anyone who's unfamiliar with New York, and again, this may not even be logistically the setup. But oftentimes, if you're in a brownstone or a version of, there is like a redone downstairs apartment level in the basement level that you can either rent out, mother in law quarters, things like that. When I first moved to New York, I rented out the whole bottom floor of like, a lovely couple who owned the actual house. And so it's not uncommon. And this was also family. So it's not like they were renting

• 39:28Annie Elise?

  it out to a stranger. So I'm just trying to paint the visual of like, what the setup could have looked like. So anyway, as I said, Joseph and his wife lived upstairs. And Victoria, the sister-in-law, lived downstairs. Family and friends described Victoria as incredibly bright, lovely, sweet, beautiful. She was a PhD student at Stony Brook University. She was studying geosciences and just had her entire life ahead of her. And as for Joseph, he was a tenured elementary school music teacher in the Oceanside School District, who, according to the district, he was really well-liked by both students, coworkers, faculty, all of the people. He had been married to Victoria's sister for three years, and he seemed like a pretty

• 40:10Annie Elise?

  normal guy, but investigators say that what happened that morning was anything but an accident. According to prosecutors, Joseph told the police that his wife was away on a bachelorette party, so he had asked Victoria to come up to their level of the house and help him move a piano in the upstairs area of the home. However, once she was there, he allegedly grabbed her from behind, put her in a chokehold until she lost consciousness, took off her clothes, and then sexually assaulted her. Then he called 911 on himself, changed clothes, and waited for the police to arrive. Now, here's where it gets wild as we get into motive and what really transpired, because

• 40:53Annie Elise?

  prosecutors say that Joseph admitted everything at the scene to the investigators. He didn't try to lie, he didn't try to say it was some stranger who came in and burglarized the house or attacked her, he admitted to everything. They also said that this was not something that just was a crime of passion and happened on impulse. Prosecutors allege that Joseph had been obsessed with Victoria since 2017, which that was just a year after meeting her and his now-wife. He said that he used the opportunity of his wife being away on that bachelorette party to finally act on these very sick urges that he felt toward Victoria. And you may have seen this in your feed already, being dubbed as the obsessed brother-in-law case, but think about that.

• 41:38Annie Elise?

  He marries this woman, all the while, marries her after becoming fixated on Victoria, after meeting Victoria and his wife, still goes forward with marrying her. Victoria's sister all the while while being fixated and obsessed with Victoria then offering to have her live in the home with you.

• 41:56Speaker 04

  Oh.

• 41:56Annie Elise?

  Probably watching her stalking her, who knows if he like kept tabs on her, watched her shower.

• 42:02Speaker 04

  Dating.

• 42:02Annie Elise?

  Went through her underwear drawer and look, none of this is proven. I'm just saying like somebody who like that who's like building up these urges and they're festering to where then he finally acts. Clearly there must have been some escalation going on in the last years.

• 42:14Speaker 04

  When you're living with someone, you're you're around their laundry, like you said, everything. So you see all of their behaviors.

• 42:20Annie Elise?

  It's so incredibly sick and imagine, not that she should feel any sort of guilt whatsoever, but imagine what her sister is feeling in these moments, like her sister killed by her own husband because he was sexually fantasizing about her. He couldn't, he wanted to act on these impulses and these urgent like it's so devastating and tragic. So Joseph was arrested on scene and he was charged with second degree murder. He has since pleaded not guilty and he's being held without bail, but if convicted, he is facing 25 years to life in prison. After his arrest, the Oceanside School District announced that he had been placed on administrative leave effective immediately.

• 43:02Annie Elise?

  Meanwhile, Victoria's loved ones are left grieving the loss of this young, beautiful woman whose life, bright future, education, everything was ripped away from her and just tragically cut short, selfishly cut short.

• 43:16Speaker 04

  But I mean, there's so many things that are terrible there, but your betrayal is how you started. But yeah, could you imagine you come home from your trip after being with your friends and then it's like you found out not only that this terrible thing happened and you lost your sister, but that your husband was at his hands and he planned this whole thing. And also you had all this time to like.

• 43:38Speaker 04

  Come up with this plan and your best plan was come help me move a piano. I mean, not that that's relevant, but I just figure like he's so sloppy about it. It feels like this was something he clearly had been thinking about, but just not well thought through.

• 43:52Annie Elise?

  It also doesn't really sound right now, at least that there's any remorse. The fact that he admitted to it right away, that this is something that I was gonna act on. It seems like it's like one of those things where like, I hate to sound so cross, but like all he was thinking with was his dick and like he was gonna do this no matter what. And maybe he didn't intentionally mean to kill her. Maybe he was doing that until she lost consciousness so that he could act out the assault and then it went too far. Who knows? And then that's why he called the police or maybe he did have a re-intention to kill her. I don't know. Um, it's disgusting.

• 44:24Speaker 04

  It's, that's wild.

• 44:26Annie Elise?

  Yeah. Okay. So now before we wrap up the episode, we are going to do our phone booth, confess to your BFF slash ask for advice. As a reminder, if you are brand new and you haven't listened to one of these, when we were at Crime Con a couple of months ago, when we weren't at the booth, we set up a phone where you could leave a message and either leave a confession or ask for advice. And so at the end of each headline highlights episode, we have been playing one of those and responding appropriately. So let's go ahead and play it. Hi, Annie and Amy. This is Shamey. Met you here at Crime Con. It was amazing. You guys are incredible. Of course, beautiful, but incredible and so nice in person. The

• 45:09Annie Elise?

  cases I cannot get over, like unbelievable, are the two Michaelas. Uh, the one of course with her dad raping her and torturing and all that stuff. And then how he gets off,

• 45:20Speaker 04

  like, how is that possible with her committing suicide? It should be more proof. Anyway, that just is so heartbreaking and unbelievable. And, uh, the other Michaela as well. And I love your information and your whole entire cereal-ly, cereal-ly, and tent to life. Bye. I remember this person. She was a volunteer at- Crime Con, super sweet. And she came out to our booth like during one of her breaks because she was so excited to meet you.

• 45:53Annie Elise?

  Yeah. Um, I'm just gonna say this. I agree with all of your sentiments. And I know this isn't an ask advice or confess, but I agree with you. That is a case that I have not been able to stop thinking about either. We talked about it a little bit last week, how it was basically a slap on the wrist. And for those of you who aren't familiar with this case, go listen to the episode last week, last Thursday, you'll hear all about it. It is disgusting. This father is a predator. He had, I don't want to even say had sex. He sexually assaulted his own biological daughter for four hours in such a violent, horrific and brutal way that she had to be physically carried into the ER by her uncle. Then he's tried to claim that it was consensual.

• 46:36Annie Elise?

  He had been feeding her booze all night, that they both agreed to this, which hi, when you're under the influence and you're underage, you cannot consent. I don't care what anybody says. And the fact that this is like a whole incest thing as well. It's disgusting. She ended up taking her own life over it. And now this guy got a slap on the wrist, a year in jail, which he'll probably be out in a couple of months because of overpopulation in California and the jail system and on the registry for, I believe, 20 years. But like, nothing close to a just punishment. And so this is definitely one that keeps me up at night as well. And warning, if you are going to go listen to that episode, I just want to give you like a huge blanket warning right now. It is so incredibly difficult to listen to when you hear all of the details.

• 47:20Annie Elise?

  And so, yeah, we talked about it last Thursday. Um, and I think I did a deep dive on it like a month or so ago when it all happened. So. All right, guys, that is it today for headline highlights. Thank you so much for tuning in with us. I will be back on the mic with you first thing Monday morning with an all new case. Cough cough. You probably know which one it is based on the beginning of this episode. So make sure you tune in. If you are not following the podcast yet, all you have to do, open your podcast app, press the little follow button. If you're watching on YouTube, press the subscribe button so that you do not miss the new episodes. And other than that, that's a wrap.

• 47:57Speaker 04

  That's a wrap.

• 47:58Annie Elise?

  Stay safe, be nice, don't kill people, and stop having sex with family. Period.

• 48:04Speaker 04

  Amen.

• 48:04Annie Elise?

  Why do I even need to say that? Period. All right. Bye.

• 48:19Speaker 01

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