Jill | Betrayal Weekly

Summary

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Betrayal: Weekly – "Jill" | Betrayal Weekly

Host: Andrea Gunning
Guest: Dr. Jill Stoddard
Date: September 18, 2025

Overview

This emotional episode of Betrayal Weekly tells the story of Dr. Jill Stoddard’s family, focusing on her beloved younger brother "Jimmy" and the shattering betrayals that tore their close-knit family apart. The episode reveals the shock and devastation of discovering Jimmy had committed serious crimes, the complicated aftermath for the family, and Jill’s journey through confusion, grief, anger, and ultimately, resolve to break the silence around such betrayals. Jill, a clinical psychologist, shares how this personal tragedy altered her forever and why she chooses to speak out about the darkest parts of her story.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Jill’s Early Family Life

• (03:47–06:01) Jill reminisces about her nostalgic, seemingly "normal" Boston childhood. She was the eldest of three, with middle brother John and much-younger Jimmy.
  • “So I grew up in a suburb of Boston... It felt like a very normal, intact family.” – Jill Stoddard (04:28)
• Jimmy, the youngest, stood out—cute, lovable, bright red hair, happy-go-lucky personality, always eager to join in with siblings.
  • “He was just this very lovable, goofy, funny little guy.” – Jill Stoddard (06:01)

2. Jimmy’s Troubles Begin to Surface

• (08:23–11:11) Jimmy was doted on, but as a third child, received more relaxed parenting. He had undiagnosed ADHD and fell behind at school despite a high IQ.
  • Jill notes the family’s excuses for Jimmy’s repeated trouble, both at home and school.
• Jill left home for college when Jimmy was 11, maintaining a sisterly (not parental) distance.

3. Escalating Red Flags

• (11:34–14:54) Jimmy’s behaviors grew riskier: drug use, a staged college graduation, repeated lies to cover irresponsibility.
  • The family flew out for his graduation, only to discover he hadn’t graduated and had orchestrated an elaborate lie:
    • “All along, he knew that he wasn’t graduating.” – Jill Stoddard (14:19)
  • This realization was a turning point for Jill: “I was really angry… the anger was covering the harder emotion, which was like fear.” (15:05)

4. Adult Life and Continual Suspicion

• (15:31–18:04) Jimmy moved into jobs but displayed increasingly odd behavior (disappearing for hours, acting cagey).
  • “...He was just happy to be included, you know.” – Jill Stoddard, recalling his earlier innocence (06:33)
• At Jill’s wedding, Jimmy disappeared for hours, returning sweaty and anxious—family suspected drug use.

5. Catastrophic Revelation

• (20:55–22:20) The family’s worst fears were unexpectedly surpassed in 2013 when Jill learned Jimmy was arrested. At first, they suspected drugs, but soon after, Jill received a text: the police found child sexual abuse material (CSAM) on Jimmy’s computer.
  • “I just remember being on the ground, totally hyperventilating, having the only panic attack I’ve ever had in my life. If this could be true and I could have no idea, how on earth would I ever know who the monsters were?” – Jill Stoddard (22:20)
• Jimmy, as before, insisted he was framed. The evidence was clear: the images were of girls as young as six, some photoshopped with Jimmy’s likeness.

6. Family Falls Apart

• (24:39–27:00) Jill, her husband, and sister-in-law drew firm boundaries for child safety. In contrast, her parents preferred denial and minimization, attempting to rationalize his actions.
  • “Well, I mean, isn’t it not as bad because it’s only pictures?” – Jill recalls her parents’ rationalization (25:06)
• Jimmy lashed out cruelly by email when confronted: “He told me I should go kill myself.” (26:19)
• Family gatherings became battlegrounds over inclusion and secrecy.

7. Brief Reconnection, Familiar Patterns

• (27:00–29:48) After four years of silence, Jimmy’s return during their mother’s terminal illness seemed to show remorse. Jill allowed limited contact—no children present.
  • “He apologized for the mean emails...He was very sincere and we believed him. We believed that even if he still had this sexual proclivity, he wasn’t acting on it.” – Jill Stoddard (27:45)
• Within a year, erratic behaviors returned. Police raided his home on new evidence.

8. Final Betrayal & Consequences

• (29:48–38:00) The extent of Jimmy’s sexual crimes escalated—now uploading material, possessing child-related objects. He attempted suicide by threatening to jump from a tree.
  • “That was really the moment I was like, oh my God, he’s a monster.” – Jill Stoddard (35:37)
• Jill read the harrowing FBI report despite her husband’s pleas not to:
  • “Of course he was right. It was the worst thing I could have done.” – Jill Stoddard (31:19)
• Jimmy was sentenced federally: 10 years in prison.
  • “The penalty for this is 10 years. So he was ultimately sentenced to 10 years...” – Jill Stoddard (38:00)

9. The Aftermath: Searching for ‘Why’

• (38:11–41:17) Jill, a psychologist, dove into research for answers—how can this happen in one family? How do perpetrators operate? How can she keep her own child safe?
  • “As an anxiety expert, what I know about what fuels anxiety is uncertainty, a lack of perceived control, and a high sense of responsibility. And those three things were so present for me as a mom when this happened.” – Jill Stoddard (38:48)
• She learned about perpetrator grooming, but never found full closure or comfort in the answers.

10. Living with Disenfranchised Grief

• (41:02–41:17) “There’s a word for this kind of experience. It’s called disenfranchised grief.” – Andrea Gunning
• Jill struggles with mourning someone who is alive but whom she cannot and should not welcome back.
  • “I think it’s made me hard, and I was not that way before this...It was just the most painful experience of letting yourself love someone so deeply. And to have that backfire.” – Jill Stoddard (40:05)

11. Finding Growth and Purpose

• (41:48–42:21) Jill finds meaning in advocacy and honesty—sharing the story, co-hosting the podcast "Psychologists Off the Clock," and speaking out to break the taboo.
  • “Some actually end up doing better than they were at baseline. I don’t know exactly where I fall on that spectrum, but I do think there has been sort of examples of growth or good or purpose through this.” – Jill Stoddard (41:48)

12. Why She Shares Her Story

• (42:21–43:11)
  • “This is not my crime. This is not my family’s crime…He, Jimmy, is the only one who did anything wrong and keeping it a secret is just protecting him, and he doesn’t deserve protection. Kids deserve protection. And so I just feel compelled to start having more of these honest conversations… sunlight is the best disinfectant and I have to be part of the sunlight.” – Jill Stoddard (42:21)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• [03:09] “If this could be true and I could have no idea, how on earth would I ever know who the monsters were?” – Jill Stoddard
• [14:19] “All along, he knew that he wasn’t graduating.”
• [22:20] “I just remember being on the ground, totally hyperventilating, having the only panic attack I’ve ever had in my life...How on earth would I ever know who the monsters were?”
• [25:06] “Well, I mean, isn’t it not as bad because it’s only pictures?” – Parental rationalization
• [26:19] “He told me I should go kill myself. Cruel lashing out emails the likes of which we had never seen.”
• [35:37] “That was really the moment I was like, oh my God, he’s a monster.”
• [40:05] “I think it’s made me hard, and I was not that way before this. Ooh, that just got me choked up.”
• [42:21] “Treating this like a dirty little secret. Like, this is not my crime. This is not my family’s crime. Keeping it a secret is just protecting him. And he doesn’t deserve protection. Kids deserve protection.”

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Timeline of Important Events

| Timestamp | Event | |------------|-----------------------------------------------------------------------| | 03:09 | Jill describes her panic attack learning the truth about Jimmy | | 06:01 | Early stories about Jimmy’s innocence and joy | | 14:19 | Jill learns Jimmy’s college graduation was an elaborate lie | | 22:20 | Discovery of CSAM, Jill’s overwhelming shock and grief | | 25:06 | Parental denial and minimizing the crimes | | 26:19 | Jimmy lashes out at Jill and her sister-in-law via cruel emails | | 27:45 | Brief reconciliation during mother’s terminal illness | | 29:48 | Second, more severe arrest; police find more disturbing evidence | | 35:37 | Jill realizes the full monstrosity of Jimmy’s actions | | 38:00 | Federal sentencing: Jimmy receives 10 years in prison | | 40:05 | Jill reflects on the hardening of her character | | 41:48 | Jill discusses post-traumatic growth and meaning-making | | 42:21 | Jill explains why she’s compelled to speak about the betrayal |

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Tone and Language

The episode is reflective, intimate, and candid. Andrea’s narration is empathetic, providing space for Jill’s raw vulnerability. Jill’s descriptions swing between gentle nostalgia for her brother’s childhood and the devastation of discovering his crimes. The language throughout is honest, unfiltered, at times clinical, but always anchored in the very human pain and questions that betrayal brings.

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Closing

Dr. Jill Stoddard’s story is a painful, honest confrontation with familial betrayal, trauma, and the hard path toward healing. She stresses the importance of shining light on hidden crimes for the sake of protecting the innocent and healing the innocent bystanders. This episode stands as a call to break the silence, dismantle shame, and foster resilience amidst the unthinkable.

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Transcript

[Andrea Gunning]

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[Jill Stoddard]

It was just my daughter and me, the TV and the laundry. And I just remember being on the ground, totally hyperventilating, having the only panic attack I've ever had in my life. If this could be true and I could have no idea, how on earth would I ever know who the monsters were?

[Andrea Gunning]

I'm Andrea Gunning and this is Betrayal, a show about the people we trust the most and the deceptions that change everything. Today we have a story about family, about what it means to love someone and to lose them. Not to death, but to something much.

[Jill Stoddard]

Harder to talk about. In some ways, it feels harder to grieve for a person who isn't dead.

[Andrea Gunning]

That's Dr. Jill Stoddard. She's a clinical psychologist, a mother, a woman with a close knit family and what she always thought was a safe, ordinary childhood.

[Jill Stoddard]

So I grew up in a suburb of Boston, stereotypical middle class, WASPy kind of upbringing. Mom was always home when we got home from school and even though dad worked hard, he was always home by 6 o' clock for dinner. So it felt like a very normal, intact family.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jill is the oldest. Then came her brother John, who was two years younger. And then when Jill was seven, her youngest brother was born.

[Jill Stoddard]

When my little brother was born, my mom would always say, well, we can't very well name you Jill, John and Bob. It just doesn't sound good. And so she named him Jim. And then all of our, you know, holiday cards, everything from that point on, whenever my parents signed it, it was their first names. And the three Js from the time.

[Andrea Gunning]

He was a baby, Jimmy stood out in the best way.

[Jill Stoddard]

We were all very average looking, brunettes, brown hair, brown eyes, and he had this bright orange hair and bright blue eyes and freckles and you know, he was so just stunning looking and adorable. I feel like he kind of always had a little bit of drool on his face for some reason when he was little and people would stop us on the street to comment on his hair and how cute he was.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jill adored her little brother. He wasn't just a cute baby, he was a happy baby.

[Jill Stoddard]

He was just this like very lovable, goofy, funny little guy. And one of his Favorite things that he would do on command is we would say happy face. And he would make this, like very big, bright, smiley happy face. And then we'd say mad face. And then he'd make this very mad face. And it just cracked us up.

[Andrea Gunning]

As he got older, Jimmy clearly looked up to Jill and John. They would lovingly tease him, and he played along too.

[Jill Stoddard]

We would yell the word servant, like, servant. And then he would hear pitter patter, pitter patter, pitter patter, pitter patter. And he would just come running and he'd say, go make me some chocolate milk. And he would like, happily, go run and make chocolate milk. Because he just, he was like, just happy to be included, you know.

[Andrea Gunning]

When the family got a camcorder, the kids filmed skits and commercials.

[Jill Stoddard]

One of the skits we would do was Mr. Rogers. And he would play Mr. McFeely and ring the doorbell and say, speedy delivery. Speedy delivery. And was just like always up for anything.

[Andrea Gunning]

Having Jimmy in tow made everything more fun. Besides his red hair, Jimmy's most defining feature was his laugh.

[Jill Stoddard]

Not only was he hilarious, but he laughed really easily. And that just always felt so good that even if you're not a person that everyone thinks of as being really funny, when you were with him, you felt really funny.

[Andrea Gunning]

Despite their seven year age difference, Jill loved his company.

[Jill Stoddard]

I don't ever remember there being a time where I was like, you're annoying. Get away from me. I think even as we both got older, he was still my baby brother. And we were very, very close. And he was always just sweet and fun and funny. And I'm sure that there were probably times that, you know, I closed my door and was like, get away from me.

[Andrea Gunning]

But those moments aren't the ones she remembers. When Jill thinks back on her childhood, there's Jimmy in the frame every time with his messy red hair and his huge smile. Because Jimmy was the baby Jill says, he got away with a lot.

[Jill Stoddard]

Our parents were a fair amount more permissive with him, which I think is pretty typical of their children. Maybe because you're tired, by the time you have a third child coming along, you're older. Kind of like been there, done that. You're like less worried, less anxious. As Jimmy got older, he got in trouble more often than we did. And a lot of the things he got in trouble for were not things that my middle brother and I weren't also doing. He just got caught more frequently than we did.

[Andrea Gunning]

Their mom had a hypothesis about why Jimmy always seemed to get in trouble at School.

[Jill Stoddard]

The teacher's writing on the chalkboard and all the little kids in class are chit chatting and she turns around to see who the culprit is and you're looking at a sea of brown and blonde heads. You know, your eyes are naturally drawn to the bright orange haired kid.

[Andrea Gunning]

There was some sense in it, but it didn't explain why Jimmy was falling behind in school.

[Jill Stoddard]

At some point my mom told me that she had all three of us IQ tested. She never told us the results or the scores, but she did tell us that Jimmy had the highest iq, which is not surprising. Like he was very naturally intelligent, but he probably did the worst in school, which I would guess is probably because he had untreated ADHD until he was in high school. And then by then, you know, I think when you have a history of like kind of always doing the wrong thing because you have untreated adhd, you sort of stop trying to do the right thing.

[Andrea Gunning]

By high school, Jimmy developed a pattern of making excuses. It was hard to tell it was just Jimmy being Jimmy and what was cause for concern. But Jill was hardly around for those years because she left for college when Jimmy was 11. She studied psychology because she wanted to know how people tick. She called her parents every week and they would give her updates about Jimmy. She remembers one story in particular that gave her pause.

[Jill Stoddard]

He got in a fight with a classmate in high school, I don't remember why. And we like smashed a tennis racket. I think he might have physically assaulted the kid because I remember my dad saying that the family was threatening to sue. So it was more than just an angry outburst that ruined a tennis racket. And so that kind of thing was like the start of us seeing there's something going on with him.

[Andrea Gunning]

At the time, Jill was focused on getting her master's degree. And despite being a troublemaker in high school, Jimmy ended up getting accepted to the same college as his two older siblings.

[Jill Stoddard]

I think I thought of it at the time as like, I'm not his mom, I'm his sister. Like it's not my job to figure out how to get him in line.

[Andrea Gunning]

When Jill was accepted into a PhD program, it meant she would need to move back to Boston. So she packed up to move across the country. On the way she planned to stop at her parents house for the night.

[Jill Stoddard]

I had driven cross country with my boyfriend at the time and we ended up arriving one day ahead of schedule and we arrived at night to my parents house and my parents must have been out of town for some Reason. And Jimmy was having a party. And I walked into the kitchen and there was cocaine on the table. You know, there's a rolled up dollar bill.

[Andrea Gunning]

She'd never seen cocaine in real life. Jimmy told her to relax. He was 20 at the time.

[Jill Stoddard]

It's not like he was a child. But to me, no matter how old we got, he was always my baby brother. And so it just felt very shocking.

[Andrea Gunning]

As Jill started her PhD program, Jimmy was in college.

[Jill Stoddard]

This was a time where I was working 12 hours a day, seven days a week. There was always some 35 page paper do.

[Andrea Gunning]

But as busy as she was, she wouldn't miss Jimmy's college graduation. When the time came, she bought a plane ticket and traveled a few states north.

[Jill Stoddard]

I have no time and no money, but this was a really big deal that he was graduating. And so my entire family flew out and got up early and were sitting in the auditorium waiting for him to cross the stage. They're reading the names alphabetically and they go right past where he should have been. And we waited and were very confused. And he never walked across the stage.

[Andrea Gunning]

The family got in their rental car and drove to Jimmy's apartment, concerned.

[Jill Stoddard]

So we knocked on the door. He answered the door looking very sleepy, all the lights were off. And he started ranting about his stupid effing roommate who must have turned off his alarm. And we were so upset. We spent all this time and money and effort to get out to this big event. And like he couldn't even be responsible enough to show up to the graduation, you know, it turned into a fight and we decided to go home early. It just felt like it was an escalation of irresponsibility and unreliability.

[Andrea Gunning]

Their family wondered if Jimmy actually graduated at all. Her parents asked him directly and he.

[Jill Stoddard]

Said, no, no, I definitely graduated. And they had no way of proving it. They're paying for his school, but they don't have access to his school records. So there was nothing they could really do to confirm whether this was the truth. And I think ultimately they just opted to believe him.

[Andrea Gunning]

But Jill still had her suspicions about what really happened that weekend.

[Jill Stoddard]

It was years later and we were having fun and having drinks and I asked him, I said, tell me the truth, like what was the real story? Did you graduate? And he was like, well, don't tell mom and dad, but no, I didn't graduate. So the whole thing was actually premeditated. And the lie about the alarm clock and his ire, that how dare we leave him when this wasn't his fault. It was all an act. All along, he knew that he wasn't graduating.

[Andrea Gunning]

The conversation made Jill see her brother a little differently. Before this moment, she knew he could be irresponsible, but she didn't know he had the capacity to lie like this.

[Jill Stoddard]

I had a pretty complicated emotional reaction to that. I was really angry. It was sort of like, how dare you? Like, how can you do this to us? You know, I think the anger was the thing that was covering the harder emotion, which was like fear.

[Andrea Gunning]

Fear of who her brother really was and what he was capable of.

[Jill Stoddard]

So after his fake graduation from college, I remember him kind of like job jumping a fair amount. Cause he always had a terrible boss, you know, that kind of thing. And that was kind of the extent that my middle brother and I knew.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jimmy became an arborist, a tree expert, and he started his own landscaping business.

[Jill Stoddard]

He ended up moving back to New England and lived in the same town as my middle brother and his family. And so they started to see more of him and to see some behaviors that were concerning. He was going to go out and get his truck washed and he'd be gone for hours. And then he would come back and his truck wouldn't be washed. But he would never explain where he was or what he was doing.

[Andrea Gunning]

Every year there'd be one good visit with Jimmy and one visit where Jimmy was clearly up to something.

[Jill Stoddard]

Despite the irresponsibility and the frustration, I still adored him. And we were still very close. Like, I was frustrated by his behavior, but pretty quick to forgive him. And partly that's because he's my baby brother and he wasn't always like that. And that cute little, sweet and enthusiastic and happy little boy. Like he was still that in so many ways. I even remember while I was in graduate school, having a conversation with one of my friends, that classic question of like, if you were going to be stranded on a desert island with five people, who would be on your island? And he was at the top of my list.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jimmy was there when Jill got married in Vegas. It was an intimate wedding, a house party.

[Jill Stoddard]

But the next morning, Jimmy was taking someone to the airport and he disappeared for hours. And when he finally came back, he was like sweaty and anxious and claimed it was because he was lost. I just remember my brother, my sister in law, my husband and I all being like, something is going on here. No idea what it is, but it's got to be drugs, right?

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[Andrea Gunning]

After years of Jimmy's strange behavior, Jill and her other brother John assumed that he must be secretly using drugs. It was the only logical explanation. By 2013, Jill had achieved some big life milestones.

[Jill Stoddard]

I was working as a professor in a graduate school for psychology My daughter had just turned one, and I was working on my very first book.

[Andrea Gunning]

One day she was home alone with her infant daughter.

[Jill Stoddard]

I was in my family room, TV on, daughters playing on the floor, and I was folding laundry. And I got a text message from John that said he was on his way to go bail Jimmy out of jail. Of course we're speculating back and forth. What do you think this is? It's gotta be drugs. Because this was on the heels of some of this bizarre, suspicious behavior. So we thought, okay, this is our confirmation he's using drugs. I was like, all right, just keep me posted. And so he started texting me with updates as he got them. I don't remember what all the texts said, but I do remember the one that came through that said it's a class C felony. A felony? Either he has, like a large amount or he was distributing or selling.

[Andrea Gunning]

But then Jill got the text that changed her life. The police had confiscated Jimmy's computer, and they'd found photos of underage girls.

[Jill Stoddard]

What made it a felony was that the children in the images were clearly under the age of 12. They were prepubescent. And I remember, like, falling to the ground, having the only panic attack I've ever had in my life. My husband wasn't home, and it was just my daughter and me, the TV and the laundry. And I just remember being on the ground, totally hyperventilating. Oh, this to this day. So it's been 12 years. I just remember feeling so panicked that if this could be true about my brother and I could have no idea. How on earth was I ever going to keep my daughter safe? How on earth would I ever know who the monsters were?

[Andrea Gunning]

Jimmy insisted that he'd been framed, just.

[Jill Stoddard]

Like he told us. He graduated and his alarm didn't go off. We didn't believe anything he was saying.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jill formed an alliance with her sister in law, John's wife.

[Jill Stoddard]

And so she and I, we would get on the phone for hours and hours and hours and talk about all of this ad nauseam. Because we were on the same page and we were both new moms. All we cared about was making sure that our kids were safe. Nothing else mattered. So my sister in law ended up actually going to the courthouse to get access to whatever records were public. And so she was able to see what the arrest was for. It listed the file names of the content that they found on his computer.

[Andrea Gunning]

It wasn't a lot of information, but it was enough. These were photos of girls as young as 6. Jimmy had photoshopped himself into some of the images. But when it came to his sentencing.

[Jill Stoddard]

The consequences were not significant. I think he maybe spent a couple weeks incarcerated and then he was on the sex offender registry.

[Andrea Gunning]

To Jill, it seemed like a slap on the wrist, but the interpersonal cost was immeasurable because after Jimmy's arrest, our.

[Jill Stoddard]

Family kind of fell apart.

[Andrea Gunning]

A stark divide formed in the family. Jill, her husband and her sister in law wanted to cut Jimmy out of their lives, but her parents weren't on the same page.

[Jill Stoddard]

And I remember them saying things like, well, I mean, isn't it not as bad because it's only pictures? They wanted to find a way to explain it, a way that wasn't as horrific as what the reality was. A lot of just mental gymnastics and denial and what resulted from that. I think it was pretty clear to Jimmy that he could fairly successfully manipulate my parents. He told them that his addiction to Adderall is what caused him to do this. And I had several conversations with them, you know, as a clinical psychologist saying being high on Adderall very likely led him to feel disinhibited so that he was more likely to engage in these behaviors. But the drug itself did not cause him to be attracted to little girls.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jill and her sister in law drew a firm boundary that they would not interact with Jimmy. They both had young daughters to protect. And in response, Jimmy lashed out.

[Jill Stoddard]

And so he sent me and my sister in law very nasty messages. He told me I should go kill myself. Cruel lashing out emails the likes of which we had never seen. We had not seen this side of him.

[Andrea Gunning]

That year, their parents invited Jimmy to the family reunion.

[Jill Stoddard]

And we were like, what? No, there are going to be children there. He can't be there. And I remember saying, finally, like, I will tell everyone, I am not allowing him to be around children without the parents knowing. My parents didn't want anyone to know. They wanted to keep this a secret. So I think they ultimately just told him he couldn't come.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jill didn't talk to her little brother for four years. That was until their mom got sick when it became clear that she was near the end of her life.

[Jill Stoddard]

Of course, my little brother also wanted to say goodbye to his dying mother. And we were all there together. And so my dad asked our permission basically to let him come. Honestly, it was a hard decision, but it wasn't, you know, it was like, of course he has the right to see his mom and say goodbye to his mom. And there were no children present for any of that. So we Let him come. And this was the first time we saw him.

[Andrea Gunning]

When Jimmy walked in the door, he looked like his old self. He seemed clear eyed and genuine.

[Jill Stoddard]

He assured us that he was clean. His behavior was quite different. He apologized for the mean emails that he sent to my sister in law and me. He apologized for the terrible way that he had treated all of us. He was very sincere and we believed him. We believed that even if he still had this sexual proclivity, he wasn't acting on it.

[Andrea Gunning]

After that, Jill and Jimmy were on speaking terms again.

[Jill Stoddard]

We agreed to try to repair the rupture in our relationship, but of course with like gigantic boundaries that he would not be ever unsupervised around kids or anything like that. And that lasted for a year, exactly one year.

[Andrea Gunning]

It was their grandmother's 99th birthday party.

[Jill Stoddard]

He was there and it became instantly obvious that something was wrong. He's acting super cagey. He's being weird, he's sleeping a lot. He's being very aggressive and hostile. He got in a fight with someone in a bar. I mean, just kind of back to a lot of the old stuff. And I remember leaving the weekend and my sister in law and I talking and just saying like, the other shoe's going to drop. We're just waiting for the call, the call's going to come. And then sure enough, shortly after that, we got the call.

[Andrea Gunning]

A few months earlier, the police had received another tip about Jimmy.

[Jill Stoddard]

They executed a search warrant at his house. They confiscated his computers. They also found several thumb drives in various pockets of his clothing.

[Andrea Gunning]

He wasn't home during the search. His roommate called to tell him that the police were looking for him. But Jimmy was nowhere to be found. So the police tracked his cell phone to try and make the arrest. When they finally found him, he had.

[Jill Stoddard]

Climbed up a very high tree. He was a tree guy, an arborist, so he had equipment to climb trees. And the police all came and he was demanding a letter that he would not be held responsible for what they found. And if they didn't give him that letter, that he was going to jump and kill himself. They ultimately talk him down out of the tree and they arrest him.

[Andrea Gunning]

This time the FBI was involved. Jimmy insisted again that he had been framed. Jill knew it was a lie, but she didn't have the FBI report. She didn't know exactly what he'd done, and she was determined to find out.

[Jill Stoddard]

We had a close family friend that was friends with my middle brother since like third grade. And he's a private investigator actually, this family friend was able to get access to this very detailed FBI report. He emailed it to me, and my husband begged me not to read it. He begged me.

[Andrea Gunning]

What was in this report would determine the future of her family. The four years that she'd been estranged from Jimmy tore her family apart. They'd just gone back to speaking terms. If Jill was going to put her father through that again, she needed to see it with her own eyes. So she opened the FBI report.

[Jill Stoddard]

And I knew I shouldn't. I knew. I knew it was the worst idea and I couldn't not read it. I mean, we had just been sitting in so much uncertainty and bewilderment that it felt intolerable. I was just compelled, upheld. Like I just had to know. And of course he was right. It was the worst thing I could have done.

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Bring the boom XBoom tired of flipping through apps to find something good? Meet TiVo plus your one stop free streaming network. No credit card required. With over 300 free channels, you get binge worthy movies. Movies from action and comedy to Indian award winners. Plus top TV shows, live news, sports, highlights and family programming all in one place, watched live or on demand right from your home screen. Free no signups, no fees, just press play. That's TiVo plus free, binge worthy and always on. Check us [e-mail] I'm Glenn Washington, the.

[Glenn Washington]

Host of KQD's Snap Judgment podcast. And at Snap, we don't just tell stories, we live them. Every week a different journey, like on a plane with Rihanna. A racetrack in Tijuana. A year inside an Oakland homeless encampment. Real people, real voices with original music and cinematic sound. Snap Judgment from kqed. New episodes every Thursday. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jill was in the car with her husband when she received a copy of the FBI report on Jimmy. And despite her husband's pleas, she read it. The report started by describing not pictures, but videos and objects found in Jimmy's house.

[Jill Stoddard]

It was sickening. The detail in this report will be burned on my brain forever. There were things happening in these videos that I couldn't have even imagined in my world. Worst nightmare. Jimmy had clearly escalated. He was not only downloading material, he was also uploading material.

[Andrea Gunning]

In his home. The police seized a child sized sex doll and multiple pairs of children's underwear.

[Jill Stoddard]

That was really the moment I was like, oh my God, he's a monster.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jill spoke to him one last time. And on that phone call, he wasn't remorseful. He was defiant.

[Jill Stoddard]

He said to me, well, at least I'm not part of a ring or anything.

[Andrea Gunning]

She's often wondered if he was telling on himself in that moment.

[Jill Stoddard]

And it was like, what a little kid would do, you know, it's got chocolate all over the face. Did you eat a cookie? No.

[Andrea Gunning]

It's important to note that in crimes like this, where perpetrators are seeking to consume csam, there's often a limit to how much someone can download before they're required to create and upload their own content.

[Jill Stoddard]

Knowing the depths of what these perpetrators are capable of doing really sent me into a spiral. As a mom, a switch flipped in Jill's reality. After the first arrest, I could still see both sides of him, like he was still my little baby brother who I always loved and was very close to, who had this. This sickness, this horrible proclivity. I even had some compassion for him because I recognized that he wouldn't want this or wouldn't choose this. But I think after the second time, my capacity for compassion largely disappeared. Once I read that report, all I could think about was what happened to those little girls. And when he got caught the second time, the girls in those images were the exact same age as my daughter. And that's all I could think about. That's all I could think about was like, if he had had access to her, that was really the point of no return for me.

[Andrea Gunning]

This time it wasn't a slap on the wrist for Jimmy because he'd been trading videos and the FBI got involved. He was charged with a federal crime.

[Jill Stoddard]

Because they have these federal minimums. The penalty for this is 10 years. So he was ultimately sentenced to 10 years in a federal correctional facility.

[Andrea Gunning]

She'd seen the darkest parts of humanity in her own brother.

[Jill Stoddard]

And so after this happened, all of us were just. How? Why? What possibly could have caused this? How could the same family, you know, raise my middle brother and me to be who we are, but also have this person be a pedophile? It just did not make any sense.

[Andrea Gunning]

She began obsessively researching and studying perpetrators like her brother.

[Jill Stoddard]

If I could just understand this enough, then I would have the tools to protect my children. As an anxiety expert, what I know about what fuels anxiety is uncertainty, a lack of perceived control, and a high sense of responsibility. And those three things were so present for me as a mom when this happened.

[Andrea Gunning]

She learned how perpetrators often groom the parents first and how they select their targets.

[Jill Stoddard]

Perpetrators groom children by connecting with little kids over things that they like. They test them by sharing secret. You know, saying to a kid, telling them or doing something that their parents wouldn't approve of, and saying, this will be our secret to then see. Did the kid tell the parents it was a secret? And if not, that might make them a good victim.

[Andrea Gunning]

But no matter how much she learned, the anxiety didn't go away. All the research in the world didn't give her an answer about how or why her own little brother became this person. She's had to accept that her brother's actions have fundamentally changed her.

[Jill Stoddard]

I think it's made me hard, and I was not that way before this. Ooh, that just got me choked up. It was just the most painful experience of letting yourself love someone so deeply. And to have that backfire.

[Andrea Gunning]

What hurts the most is thinking back to the happy little boy she loved so much.

[Jill Stoddard]

It feels impossible that those people are the same person. It just feels impossible that human body is still walking around on the earth. But I lost my brother that I knew years, years ago.

[Andrea Gunning]

There's a word for this kind of experience. It's called disenfranchised grief.

[Jill Stoddard]

And so I feel like I have never really been able to properly grieve any of this because I don't feel like I'm allowed To feel grief for someone who's a pedophile.

[Andrea Gunning]

Jimmy's now out of prison. Jill isn't in touch with him and doesn't plan to be. Just knowing he's out there brings all these emotions to the surface once again. But Jill is committed to finding meaning in the wreckage. Today, she writes and speaks publicly about her story, including the Darkest parts. Jill co hosts a podcast of her own, Psychologists off the Clock. It's a place where clinicians talk about real life grief, shame, and what actually helps.

[Jill Stoddard]

In psychology, there's a concept of post traumatic growth. Some people experience trauma and they kind of rebound back to baseline. Some never really rebound, and some actually end up doing better than they were at baseline. I don't know exactly where I fall on that spectrum, but I do think there has been sort of examples of growth or good or purpose through this.

[Andrea Gunning]

We end all of our weekly episodes with the same question. Why do you want to share your story?

[Jill Stoddard]

I think as much as this feels scary and uncomfortable, we have to be willing to say the hard thing. Treating this like a dirty little secret. Like, this is not my crime. This is not my family's crime. Like, none of us did anything wrong. He, Jimmy, is the only one who did anything wrong, and keeping it a secret is just protecting him. And he doesn't deserve protection. Kids deserve protection. And so I just feel compelled to start having more of these honest conversations, even if they're not popular. Like, sunlight is the best disinfectant and I have to be part of the sunlight.

[Andrea Gunning]

On the next episode of Betrayal Weekly, I get a call and it's a detective. He said, jacqueline, we got an anonymous.

[Jill Stoddard]

Call from a gentleman stating that you were being scammed and they felt sorry for you. My head exploded thinking, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.

[Andrea Gunning]

Before we end the episode, I have some exciting news. Betrayal will be doing our first ever live show as part of the Virgin Voyages True Crime Cruise. We'll be answering listener questions and discussing them live on stage with Stacy and Tyler from Betrayal season three, as well as Caroline from season four. So if you have a question for us, please email [e-mail] with the subject line listener question. And if you want to join us on the Caribbean cruise, there are still spots available. Search virginvoyages.com truecrime if you would like to reach out to the Betrayal team or want to tell us your Betrayal story, email [e-mail] that's betrayalpodmail.com or follow us on Instagram betrayalpod. You can also connect with me on InstagramdreaGunning to access our newsletter, view additional content and connect with the Betrayal community. Join our [e-mail] we're grateful for your support. One way to show support is by subscribing to our show on Apple Podcasts. And don't forget to rate and review Betrayal. Five star reviews go a long way. A big thank you to all of our listeners. Listeners Betrayal is a production of Glass Podcasts, a division of Glass Entertainment Group in partnership with iHeart Podcasts. The show is executive produced by Nancy Glass and Jennifer Faison, hosted and produced by me, Andrea Gunning. Written and produced by Monique Laborde. Also produced by Ben Federman. Associate producers are Caitlin Golden, Olivia Hewitt and Kristen Melchuri. Casting support from Curry Richmond. Our iHeart team is Ali Perry and Jessica Krynczyk. Audio editing and mixing by Matt d' Alvecchio Additional audio editing by Tanner Robbins Betrayal's theme composed by Oliver Baines Music Library provided by MIB Music and for more podcasts from iHeart, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcast.

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[Glenn Washington]

I'm Glenn Washington, the host of Snap Judgment from KQED. Every week we don't just tell stories, we drop you inside them. Real people, real voices, real moments that split a life in two. What do you believe? What do you risk? What do you want? Snap Judgment. New episodes every Thursday. Wherever you get your podcast.

[Andrea Gunning]

This is an I heart podcast.