Pod Insights The Binge Cases: Doctor Billions My Mother’s Lies | 1. The Hero Housewife Who Solved A Murder About this episode Citizen sleuth Susan Galbreath’s reputation is called into question when a British production company gets a hold of her investigation into the murder of Jessica Currin.
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Transcript 5,613 words · 25 speakers
0:00 Speaker 00 I'm Sarah Kalin. This season of ID's Who Killed Angel Harris investigates the 2011 unsolved murder of a 31-year-old woman in Gainesville, Florida. It was definitely shocking.
0:14 Speaker 01 Either it's a bullet hitting a bullet, or there's a lot of really strong coincidences here.
0:19 Speaker 02 More likely than not, this is a serial killer.
0:24 Speaker 00 Listen to Who Killed Angel Harris wherever you get your podcasts.
0:30 Speaker 03 Listen to every episode of My Mother's Lies ad-free right now when you subscribe to The Binge. You'll hear the entire series before anyone else, get exclusive bonus episodes, and unlock more than 60 other true crime podcasts. Just head to The Binge channel on Apple Podcasts and tap Subscribe, or visit getthebinge.com to listen wherever you are. The Binge: Feed your true crime obsession.
0:59 Speaker 04 The Binge.
1:06 Speaker 03 Every murder trial tells a story. What happened? Who did it? How did it happen? Even why it happened? When there's strong corroborating evidence, that story is anchored to fact. But when there isn't, when the physical proof is missing, when there's nothing to go on by eyewitness testimony, the story, that testimony, becomes the case. This series is about a story that was repeated, reinforced, and eventually accepted as truth. A story that may have mattered more than evidence to the contrary. And at the center of it all is the woman who helped write that story.
1:58 Speaker 03 It's August 1st in the year 2000. A balmy Tuesday morning in the small town of Mayfield in western Kentucky. Beyonce and the boy band N'Sync are dominating the airwaves. Gladiator and X-Men are playing at the local theater. At the local middle school, staff are now preparing for the coming year. Though nothing could prepare teacher Tina Schlosser for what was to come. She steps outside to water the plants near the back of the school when she sees something out of the corner of her eye. Something laying just behind the low brick wall. It's an item of clothing strewn on the grass. A single sandal.
2:42 Speaker 03 "Just laying there," she'd later say, "as if someone had just run out of it." Walking closer, she peers around the corner and stops in her tracks, standing rigid in horror. Before her lies the brutalized and partially burned body of a young black woman. The singed grass around her is a strange yellow color. Aside from the damage done by fire, the body is starting to decompose. Only later would they be able to identify the young woman as Jessica Currin. Her murder would shake this quiet town to its core
3:27 Speaker 03 and make headlines across the nation.
3:31 Speaker 05 Someone had murdered 18-year-old Jessica Currin, a local fire captain's daughter, a single mother. Her smile lit up her friends.
3:44 Speaker 03 Jessica was last seen by her parents, Joe and Jean Curran, on the afternoon of Saturday, July 29. They were taking care of her seven-month-old baby, Zion, for the evening.
3:55 Speaker 06 We got up Sunday morning and, you know, my wife said she already knew something was wrong because Jessie normally calls and checks on Zion pretty often. And she hadn't called at night. We got up that morning and went by her house, knocked on the door, and we didn't get an answer.
4:13 Speaker 03 They didn't have to wait long to discover the awful truth. Less than 48 hours later, the Mayfield Police Department, the local cops, were scrambling, trying to make sense of a chaotic crime scene. The police footage shows the half-clothed, partially burned body of Jessica Currin. Her dress is torn, underwear discarded. The sandal lying nearby suggests she might have been attempting to flee her attacker. Plenty of theories about what happened and who did this would emerge. But for the police, it was too soon to say.
4:51 Speaker 07 Police say 18-year-old Jessica Melissa Curran died from multiple blows to the body. Investigators say she was assaulted and her body set on fire. So far, police say there are no motives.
5:03 Speaker 03 In the archived footage of the crime scene, you can clearly see the yellow police tape blocking off the area. Tape is supposed to be a barrier between the crime scene and onlookers to protect the evidence from contamination. But it doesn't stop one curious Mayfield resident from getting closer than she should. Susan Galbreath. She's 40, white, slightly overlooked within the community, a little overweight with bleached blonde hair and a rough and ready charm, brazen even. She's not a journalist or a cop. She's a housewife. Exactly how she came to be at the crime scene is a matter of some debate.
5:47 Speaker 03 But here she is giving one version of events to a journalist some years later.
5:52 Speaker 08 A friend and I are sitting in a restaurant, and our waitress walked over and asked us if we had heard that there was a body that had been found at the middle school. As I'm heading towards home, I saw a crime scene tape. And I started walking through this grass. As I come through the clearing of it, I just look up and there I see the body of a black woman.
6:16 Speaker 03 People get fixated with true crime stories and sometimes citizen sleuths will jump in and try to solve or help the police, but they're doing it from afar. Susan lived in the same town where Jessica Currin was murdered, and Susan didn't know Jessica personally. In fact, she had no connection to her at all. And yet, she felt so compelled as to physically step into the crime scene. Her name is there in black and white on the official police log.
6:50 Speaker 08 I knew that it had grabbed me. I knew it because I could not stop thinking about her.
7:02 Speaker 03 Susan's motivations will be a matter of debate for years. No one could know how this case would come to haunt Mayfield for the next two decades, making Susan Galbreath a hero to some and a villain to others.
7:20 Speaker 06 If you get somebody like that on the wrong track, they could take the ball and go the wrong direction.
7:28 Speaker 03 What were Susan's real motives for trying to solve the Jessica Currin murder? She wasn't in it to help them find the killer that killed their daughter. How did the authorities come to trust this middle-aged housewife and her evidence?
7:43 Speaker 09 Is that normal for citizens to be walking around with case files, motions of discovery?
7:49 Speaker 10 It'd be very unusual.
7:52 Speaker 03 It's a question that has left many perturbed, including her son.
7:58 Speaker 11 It was just the lies. There are so many lies. So the narrative that's in front of us can't be the truth.
8:07 Speaker 03 Did Susan ultimately do more harm than good?
8:11 Speaker 10 Why in the world would you allow them to get this close, especially somebody that would have a motive?
8:19 Speaker 12 I remember somebody calling me, saying, "Man, you need to be on MySpace and look at this." I'm just like, "What do I do? Oh, my God."
8:25 Speaker 03 And perhaps the biggest question of all: Did she help convict an innocent man?
8:32 Speaker 06 I do feel like that they got the wrong people.
8:39 Speaker 03 From Sony Music Entertainment and Message Heard, you're listening to My Mother's Lies. I'm Beth Karas, a journalist and legal analyst who's been covering stories at the heart of our criminal justice system for decades. This is episode one, The Hero Housewife Who Solved a Murder.
9:11 Speaker 03 The stories I've covered include some of America's most high-profile trials. And as a legal analyst and podcast host, I try to provide listeners with deep legal insight and my perspective on these complex true crime stories. But I can tell you, there are aspects of this story that are unlike anything I've ever reported on. You know, we know there's a large and passionate audience for true crime stories, especially for the victims. But the action of one person in this story takes that passion to a whole other level, an incredibly dangerous level.
9:53 Speaker 03 Jessica Currin was from a well-respected Mayfield family, the daughter of a lieutenant at the local fire department. And in the summer of 2000, she was finishing her high school diploma with big plans to go to college in nearby Paducah. She'd also just become a new mom to her son Zion.
10:13 Speaker 06 She wanted to name it something holy, which is Mount Zion.
10:17 Speaker 03 This is Jessica's father, Joe, today. He's still a pillar of the community. The former firefighter once played defense for the Mayfield Cardinals' high school football team, and he's a dedicated churchgoer.
10:31 Speaker 03 It's been more than 25 years since Joe has lain eyes on his daughter, but warm memories of her are never far from his mind.
10:40 Speaker 06 She liked calling people and talking to them, relatives and friends, and she'd help with the pastries. And she made a chocolate chest of pecan.
10:50 Speaker 03 He's talking pie here. Apparently, it's just heavenly and a real southern treat.
10:56 Speaker 06 And I still ain't had one like that since. It was the best.
11:00 Speaker 03 By all accounts, Jessica was a compassionate soul, a natural caregiver. And Joe thinks that his daughter would have gone on looking after people for the rest of her life.
11:12 Speaker 06 She was signed up to go to college in Paducah. She had already signed up. I assumed she was gonna go most likely in the nursing. That's kind of what I figured, but she really liked helping people.
11:23 Speaker 03 Jessica and her son had also recently moved out of her parents' home to their own apartment. Jessica was beginning to stand on her own feet and make a life for herself. Charlotte Chabarras managed Jessica's apartment back in the summer of 2000.
11:39 Speaker 13 She was respectful. She was very sweet. Her neighbors said she was very kind. She wasn't loud. She's some girls when they first get out, you know, remember how you were young. They wanted to, you know, maybe fill their oats a little bit and have little parties or something. She did not do that. When she was out there talking to her neighbors, her baby would be right there in this little carrier.
12:11 Speaker 03 Her son Zion came from a fleeting one-off encounter with a local man, 20-year-old Jeremy Adams. But this was a fact Jeremy contested at the time. He was just a peripheral figure in Jessica's life, a friend of a friend, or more specifically, a friend of her new boyfriend, Carlos Saxton. Carlos and Jeremy were both involved in local drug circles. According to her then 16-year-old cousin, Venetia, Jessica was kept on a pretty tight leash by her parents.
12:46 Speaker 14 Jessica stayed in the house all the time. It was like when she wanted to go to hang out with her friends or go see certain family members, a lot of the time she couldn't do that. She had to stay at home, right? Because mommy there just didn't want her out there like that. Cooped up in the house all day, every day, going to school, church, school, church, school, church.
13:01 Speaker 03 Venetia says her cousin was at an age where she wanted more freedom.
13:06 Speaker 14 Jessica wanted to live her life. She didn't want to be living the life, standing under her parents' rules all the time, 24/7, and she didn't.
13:14 Speaker 03 Then again, from Joe's point of view, Venetia's relationship with Jessica was not exactly straightforward.
13:21 Speaker 06 Venetia always seemed like she needed help or somewhere to stay or some food or some money to get something to eat. And she felt sorry for her.
13:31 Speaker 03 Jessica felt sorry for her cousin, that is.
13:34 Speaker 06 And here's the other part of it. Venetia was not a friend. Venetia couldn't stand her. She was one of the ones that felt like Jessica was trying to be acting like she's better than them. But she wasn't. She was just being herself.
13:49 Speaker 03 What is clear is that Jessica's cousin, Venetia, would be one of the last people to see her alive. Joe recalls that day vividly.
14:02 Speaker 03 On the late afternoon of Saturday, July 29, Joe dropped by Jessica's apartment to pick up his grandson. He thought he'd just be taking care of baby Zion for one night, not a lifetime.
14:15 Speaker 06 Jessie told us that when she'd come by Sunday morning, she might go to church with us. But while I was there, it was Venetia and a few other girls that I didn't know, and they were talking about going somewhere. And she was talking about going to Venetia's house to play cards.
14:33 Speaker 03 According to Venetia's early police statements, after drinking and playing cards, Venetia called around, hoping to find a ride home for Jessica. But eventually, Jessica decided to walk the mile and a half home herself.
14:51 Speaker 04 Was that great? Oh, sorry. She was at Aunt's house, yeah. She was there with my mom. She had a little bit, a little less of a drink.
15:02 Speaker 03 Now, that old police tape is hard to hear. But Venetia described her evening with Jessica at her aunt's house. After they left, Venetia waved Jessica goodbye on the corner of South 14th and Walnut Streets sometime after 1:00 a.m. By mid-morning, Joe and Jean Curran, who are babysitting Zion, are already worried they've heard nothing from their daughter. Over the course of Sunday afternoon and into Monday, the Currins drive all over town, asking friends if they've seen Jessica.
15:36 Speaker 06 She's 18, lived on her own, in her own house. You can't really turn them in as missing until so much time passed by. We started checking around town and everybody we thought that she might know or might have some information, and we didn't find her.
15:54 Speaker 03 Which brings us back to that Tuesday morning behind Mayfield Middle School.
15:59 Speaker 06 We had heard a story from the neighbor down the street that they had found a body behind the middle school in Mayfield. And that's when we, you know, we went over there, but they wouldn't let us into the scene.
16:16 Speaker 03 The man in charge of this crime scene was Mayfield Police Department's Tim Fortner, one of the first law enforcement officers to arrive. At the time, he was a newly-made detective with zero experience in handling homicide cases, let alone a murder that would become as high-profile as this.
16:36 Speaker 10 They put somebody in charge, I can't even imagine why, that had never investigated, barely been a police officer, been a deputy jailer, when they had other people that could have done that, or even...
16:48 Speaker 03 That's John Poole, an ex-cop and private investigator, who'd come to know this case inside out. Curiously, according to Jessica's parents, Detective Fortner openly expressed doubts to them about his own capabilities.
17:05 Speaker 06 They appointed Tim Fortner, who came to our house and told us he'd never done this before. He said that to us. He said, "So, excuse me, because I'm learning on the job. I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know why they made me..." A detective.
17:23 Speaker 03 We reached out to Tim Fortner, who doesn't recall this conversation, but he did confirm that it was effectively his first day on the job as a detective. In fact, he was told to go home and get changed out of his uniform. Are you kidding me? He literally went from his uniform to a suit as a detective? The first hours of a murder investigation are critical. Sadly, as it turns out, putting a rookie detective in charge of a major homicide investigation was only the beginning of the problems with this case. The crime scene was next. The Mayfield Police seemed to make one mistake after another. Now, it's important to know that the chain accusative evidence, items collected at the scene, for example,
18:08 Speaker 03 must be clearly established in order for it to be admissible at trial. When there's a problem with that chain, the risk is that the evidence can't be used. And that's exactly what happened here. Evidence wasn't collected properly, if at all, or labeled correctly. That meant much of the evidence that was in police possession was contaminated or unusable. Here's Miranda Hellman. She's a Kentucky-based attorney who knows this case well because she would later represent one of the suspects accused of killing Jessica.
18:42 Speaker 15 It was almost like a puzzle that you didn't have a picture of and you were missing half the pieces. Every piece of evidence had multiple evidence numbers on it. Anything from the state lab didn't correspond back to our original Mayfield Police Department file. Having the local police department handle the crime scene in a place that is not Louisville or Lexington, we're talking a very small local police department handling a massive, sort of, from the beginning, high-profile murder investigation was, to me, highly unusual.
19:15 Speaker 03 It took years, but the Mayfield Police Department would eventually manage to build a case, bringing charges against two suspects. Now, it's well-known that in more than half of female murder cases, the perpetrator is a boyfriend, husband, or an ex. In the case of this Mayfield Police investigation, they charged both a current boyfriend and an ex. But, on February 12, 2003, at a pre-trial hearing against Jeremy Adams and Carlos Saxton, Detective Fortner made a fatal error when he failed to hand over some key documents to the defense. And since this discovery violation was on the eve of trial, the judge, in an unusual
19:58 Speaker 03 and frankly shocking move, dismissed the whole case against Jeremy and Carlos.
20:03 Speaker 16 A grand jury indicted Curran's boyfriend, Jeremy Adams, but when a judge learned Mayfield Police withheld information from prosecutors and the defense, he tossed out the indictment.
20:16 Speaker 03 Just to correct the news reporting you just heard, Jeremy Adams was not Jessica's boyfriend. He was actually the father of her son. Jessica's boyfriend was Jeremy's co-defendant, Carlos "Lolo" Saxton. Anyway, after the public embarrassment of having the case thrown out, Tim Fortner was removed from the case, and he resigned. Shortly after that, the Mayfield Police turned the entire investigation over to the Kentucky State Police. When Jamie Mills, the new lead detective, saw the original case file, he was stunned. Even he could not understand why the case was so poorly handled, a fact he later told news reporters.
20:56 Speaker 17 My first reaction when I read through the case was, is this really a murder case? You know, when I think of a murder case, and when you're reading a murder case, you're thinking hundreds of pages of documents. And I would venture to say that the case report itself probably contained less than, I can't recall for sure, but less than 10 pages. I mean, just the actual narrative, the investigative part of the report.
21:23 Speaker 03 Whether through incompetence, negligence, or whatever else, after four years, the murder of Jessica Currin was still an open case. Enter the citizen sleuth, Susan Galbreath, ready to take matters into her own hands.
21:40 Speaker 18 Somebody had to do something. And if it, somebody was me, so be it.
21:58 Speaker 03 In the spring of 2004, Susan Galbreath was 44 years old, and her life was drifting. Fate hadn't always dealt her a fair hand. She was unemployed, collecting disability, and coming out of a bad relationship.
22:15 Speaker 03 Susan, by all accounts, was a bit of a character, but otherwise, unexceptional. Remember, she's the one who stepped into the crime scene when Jessica Currin was first found. She's not a cop, a private investigator, or a journalist. And yet, apparently, she felt so passionately about the murder of Jessica Currin, she decided to take matters into her own hands. If the cops couldn't solve the case, maybe she could.
22:48 Speaker 03 Susan wasted no time in looking for support. She wrote to Jerry Springer, Oprah Winfrey, even appealing to celebrities Jay-Z and Julia Roberts, perhaps hoping for an Aaron Brockovich-style intervention. If that sounds fanciful, I can tell you, I get letters and emails like these all the time. Sometimes I respond, and though I wish I could, I just can't take up their causes. I don't have the bandwidth. But in the case of Susan Galbreath, someone did exactly that. Tom Mangle, award-winning British investigative journalist and broadcaster.
23:24 Speaker 18 I'm writing you in hope you can help see that this young woman's murder is solved and that all those involved in the events that followed will be brought to justice. I have nothing to gain from writing you except knowing that this young woman's...
23:36 Speaker 03 Miraculously, Tom not only replies, he flies out to Mayfield on his own dime to aid her investigation.
23:46 Speaker 03 They form an unlikely friendship. Tom is the first to look past Susan's lack of formal education or investigative experience and recognize her potential. He takes Susan under his wing. Together, they conduct interviews and chase down leads. Suddenly, with Tom by her side, phone calls are returned and doors are unlocked. People are taking Susan seriously. In just one week, with Tom's clout and Susan's local knowledge, they quickly identify a new prime suspect. Reflecting on it some years later, by Tom's own admission, it wasn't even that tough of a case to crack.
24:30 Speaker 19 And I'd love to say we were great investigators who solved the case in days, but the truth is, the evidence of who was behind the murder of Jessica was actually lying all over Mayfield. A seriously nasty drug dealer called Quincy Cross.
24:48 Speaker 03 Quincy Omar Cross, a small, softly-spoken 24-year-old black man from Tiptonville, Tennessee, who was just passing through Mayfield for the night. He had a criminal record, repeat low-level felonies, including an assault conviction and a couple of drug charges. But in the early hours of July 30th, he was found on a rural roadside, high on cocaine, driving someone else's car, and smelling of gasoline, just two days before Jessica Curran's burned body was discovered. In a town desperate for answers and with few other leads to go on, newly-appointed state police investigator Jamie Mills was open to Susan's ideas.
25:32 Speaker 20 I mean, she was a nice person. She could get information. I took the information and put it together with all of the other stuff, and I tried to find where it might fit. And then I would try to find who's the next person to go talk to in relation to that. So she was a good investigator. I think she just loved it. She loved doing it.
25:55 Speaker 03 As Tom heads back to England, Detective Mills works closely with Susan. But with a lack of any physical evidence, there just wasn't enough to charge Quincy. Weeks turned into months, months turned into years. Susan continued her sleuthing. But by 2006, the state's case wasn't any closer to a resolution. That's when Jessica's father, Joe, made an emotional appeal to the Attorney General's office. And in response, the Kentucky Bureau of Investigation steps in, the third law enforcement agency to investigate Jessica's murder. When agents finally arrive in Mayfield, Susan Galbreath is standing by.
26:37 Speaker 03 She greets them armed with a thick case file assembled over the past two years. And by this time, she also has witnesses ready to testify to her theory. As one KBI agent later reflected, Susan's assistance was invaluable.
26:54 Speaker 21 A fantastic lady by the name of Susan Galbreath that we came to know. She was a person that was out front, that took this case single-handedly and decided that she was going to try to do everything in her power to help find out what had happened to Jessica Currin.
27:17 Speaker 03 Within six months, the new investigators arrest Quincy Cross, along with four accomplices. All of them initially denied any role in the murder. Quincy's case was finally set for trial in 2008.
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28:08 Speaker 00 I'm Sarah Kalin. This season of ID's Who Killed Angel Harris investigates the 2011 unsolved murder of a 31-year-old woman in Gainesville, Florida. It was definitely shocking.
28:23 Speaker 01 Either it's a bullet hitting a bullet, or there's a lot of really strong coincidences here.
28:28 Speaker 02 More likely than not, this is a serial killer.
28:32 Speaker 00 Listen to Who Killed Angel Harris wherever you get your podcasts.
28:47 Speaker 03 The air in Hickman County Circuit Court in western Kentucky is heavy and humid despite the AC humming overhead. The 12 jurors shift uneasily in their box. This is a major case for a rural courtroom. The clerks and bailiffs survey the crowded public gallery. The Curran's are front and center. They've waited a long time to see justice for Jessica. Finally, the judge takes the bench and the trial begins. Commonwealth of Kentucky versus Quincy Omar Cross.
29:23 Speaker 23 On or about July 30, 2000, in Graves County, Kentucky, defendant Quincy Omar Cross, acting alone or implicitly with Tamara Caldwell and/or Jeffrey Allen Burton, committed the offense of capital kidnapping when he unlawfully restrained Jessica Carter with intent to-
29:47 Speaker 03 That is prosecutor Barbara Whaley. She's outlining the charges against Quincy Cross and his co-defendants. These include Tamara Caldwell, Jeffrey Burton, and Austin Leach. There are others, too, who were charged in relation to the murder, those who wouldn't stand trial at this point, others because they took a deal, pleading guilty to lesser charges. One of them was Jessica's cousin, Venetia Stubblefield. The same cousin you heard at the beginning, just 16 at the time, who had been with Jessica the night she disappeared. The same cousin who claimed to have waved goodbye to her as she walked off into the night. That Venetia. As the prosecution continues, the full horror of the defendant's alleged crimes is revealed.
30:32 Speaker 03 This may be difficult to hear.
30:34 Speaker 23 Committed the offense of sodomy in the first degree, rape in the first degree. Committed the offense of abuse of course by performing sexual acts or aiding or
30:45 Speaker 03 The story that is laid out for the jury is one of unimaginable violence and deprivation. According to the prosecution, in the early hours of July 30, 2000, Jessica was picked up in a car, beaten, raped by the defendants, before being strangled to death with a belt by Quincy Cross. They believe her body was stored in a shed for two days. And then, early in the morning of August 1, Jessica's body was transported, discarded, and burned outside Mayfield Middle School. Although there is a distinct lack of physical evidence connecting him, Quincy is convicted as charged, primarily on the strength of eyewitness testimony.
31:30 Speaker 03 The prosecution's two star witnesses are Victoria Caldwell, another young black teenager in Mayfield, and Venisha Stubblefield, Jessica's cousin. We'll come back to Victoria and Venisha later. Their names will come up again and again in this series. Quincy Cross is sentenced to three life terms without any chance of parole. Following Quincy's conviction, Jeff Burton and Tamara Caldwell both take plea deals. The final defendant, Austin Leach, stands trial and is found not guilty. So, after eight long years, the currents finally have some closure. Although in my experience, there really is no closure for families.
32:15 Speaker 03 There may be a measure of justice, but these wounds never heal.
32:21 Speaker 03 At the time, Jessica's father, Joe, lauded the efforts of amateur investigator Susan and journalist Tom Mangold for identifying Quincy and his accomplices after they had been missed by law enforcement.
32:35 Speaker 24 This gentleman had come over here and investigated about a week or 10 days on this case. He had found several pieces of information that hadn't been discovered and hadn't been checked out when the Mayfield police had the case.
32:48 Speaker 03 Susan is celebrated for her three-year investigation, which provided officers with the crucial information and the witnesses to finally secure a conviction. She was even given an Outstanding Citizen Award by the Kentucky Bureau of Investigation. Here's a newscast of her at the time.
33:09 Speaker 05 Through sheer persistence and nerve, this Kentucky housewife helped give justice to Jessica Currin.
33:16 Speaker 03 It's a feeling warmly shared by KBI agent Bob O'Neill, who, even years later, maintained Susan's value in solving the case.
33:26 Speaker 21 Here was a situation where her involvement was so great and so appreciated that in the middle of this case, we stopped and took a moment to recognize her for a job well done. I don't think that we could have broke the case without Susan.
33:46 Speaker 03 Over the following years, Susan's incredible story continued to gain attention. The hero housewife who solved a murder. The tale of an ordinary woman pursuing the great American dream. The idea that if you work hard enough, want it badly enough, you can achieve greatness. Susan appeared on various networks and even gave an interview on Japanese TV. Along with press articles and a BBC radio documentary, Tom Mangold had big plans to help turn the Susan and Tom story into a movie. He even traveled back to Mayfield with a big-time Hollywood producer to discuss a screenplay.
34:28 Speaker 03 But before that dream could come to fruition, Susan Galbreath suddenly died of a stroke in 2018.
34:37 Speaker 03 Following her death, Tom continued pushing for the film deal memorializing Susan's story. In the early 2020s, a British production company, Blink Films, agreed to produce a documentary series. This has all the makings of a true crime classic: The Odd Couple Who Cracked a Cold Case, The Veteran Newsman, and The Citizen Sleuth. But that's where the hero's story ends, and our story really begins.
35:11 Speaker 03 So it's nice to see you again, Alice.
35:13 Speaker 09 Good to see you, Beth.
35:15 Speaker 03 Why don't you introduce yourself to our listeners and tell them who you are, how you're connected to this story?
35:20 Speaker 09 So my name is Alice Arnold. I'm a documentary journalist and podcaster, and I've been working on the Jessica Currin story for about four years now.
35:31 Speaker 03 Alice was originally brought on as a producer for the TV documentary, and she was one of the first to realize Susan's investigation had a lot of holes in it.
35:41 Speaker 09 There's plenty of evidence, but nothing linking Quincy to that crime scene, and no evidence of Jessica being in the car that Quincy was driving. So sure, you can prosecute without forensics, but then why was Quincy prosecuted, which led me to the witnesses.
36:00 Speaker 03 Venetia Stubblefield and Victoria Caldwell. Let's just say, things didn't quite add up. We'll get to those details later. Meanwhile, Alice and her colleagues kept digging.
36:13 Speaker 09 It blew my mind. I've been brought on to tell this story of Susan's successful investigation and the prosecution of Quincy Cross, but nothing I was finding was leading me to that story.
36:37 Speaker 03 For the past three years, Alice has continued her digging, and her results will be featured throughout this series. We're going back through Susan's investigation, through 25 years of documents, interviews, and rumors, to understand exactly what impact Susan had on the conviction of Quincy Cross. How does a private citizen become so involved with an official investigation? Was altruism truly at the heart of Susan's involvement? Did Susan just end up way over her head? Or did she have ulterior motives from the start? She died years ago, so we can't ask her. But in this series, we'll speak to those who knew her best,
37:20 Speaker 03 like her only child, Ray.
37:23 Speaker 11 The mother-son stuff that I've dealt with my whole life, that I can deal with. I've learned to deal with that. But to know that she possibly covered up a murder for somebody...
37:36 Speaker 03 As Ray says, did Susan's actions allow the real killer to go free? We'll talk to people who investigated the case themselves.
37:45 Speaker 15 There were red flags having to do with the police department, red flags having to do with the evidence. But by far, the biggest stack of red flags all came back to Susan Galbreath.
37:56 Speaker 03 People whose lives she had a hand in destroying, wittingly or not.
38:02 Speaker 12 What's so crazy is I've told the people what they do. This is a made-up fucking story, man. It is.
38:10 Speaker 03 At time of release, we have not received a response from the Kentucky State Police, Carlos Saxton, or Jeremy Adams regarding allegations reported in this episode. The Mayfield Police Department responded, saying, "None of the investigators that worked on the current case 26 years ago remain employed by the department." And the police department was, quote, "Not in a position to respond to the allegations."
38:44 Speaker 03 This is My Mother's Lies, an original production of Sony Music Entertainment and Message Heard, hosted by me, Bath Charis. From Message Heard, Alice Arnold is our investigator producer, Robyn Simon, our producer, Macalester Bexon, our series producer, Thiago Diaz, our assistant producer. Alan Lear is our supervising sound editor, supported by sound editors Lizzie Andrews and Ivan Eastly, with original composition by Mike Maines. From Sony Music Entertainment, our executive producers are Catherine St. Louis and Jonathan Hirsch. From Blink Films, our executive producer is Justine Herschah. And a big thanks to the whole Sony Music Entertainment team.
39:33 Speaker 00 I'm Sarah Kaelin. This season of ID's Who Killed Angel Harris investigates the 2011 unsolved murder of a 31-year-old woman in Gainesville, Florida. It was definitely shocking.
39:48 Speaker 01 Either it's a bullet hitting a bullet, or there's a lot of really strong coincidences here.
39:52 Speaker 02 More likely than not, this is a serial killer.
39:57 Speaker 00 Listen to Who Killed Angel Harris wherever you get your podcasts.
Previous Out Now: Crime Scene Weekly — Unforgettable True Crime Stories Next My Mother’s Lies | 2. My Mom, Susan Page updated October 30, 2026 · transcript and summary are machine-generated