← Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore
Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore
Blaze Bernstein: Justice, Resilience, and the Fight Against Hate
01:09:20
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- [00:00]
Kayla Moore
Foreign.
- [00:07]
Morgan Abshur
This is Crime House.
- [00:10]
Kayla Moore
Today we're going to be covering the heartbreaking case of a 19 year old chef, writer and Ivy League pre med student named Blaze Bernstein.
- [00:18]
Morgan Abshur
Blaze was talented, passionate and poised to achieve anything he set his mind to. But in 2018, while on winter break with his family in California, he vanished in the middle of the night and was never seen alive again. His death took investigators down a dark, disturbing rabbit hole that led to chilling revelations. Hi guys. Welcome back to another episode of Clues where we sneak past the crime scene tape to explore the key evidence behind some of the most gripping true crime cases. Also, are you subscribed? Be sure wherever you're listening watching, hit the subscribe button.
- [01:03]
Kayla Moore
Morgan and I can see that 70% of you guys join us every week and don't hit the subscribe button.
- [01:09]
Morgan Abshur
So hit it.
- [01:10]
Kayla Moore
Hit it please. I'm Kayla Moore. I'm going to be the one digging deeper into the timelines, the backstories and the court files released on these cases.
- [01:17]
Morgan Abshur
And I'm your Internet sleuth, Morgan Abshur. I'm the one who's diving into the Reddit forums to talk about some of those lesser known details and pulling out threads that just don't add up. At Crime House, we value your support. Follow clues and share your thoughts on social for ad free listening and early access, subscribe to Crime House plus on Apple Podcasts. And if you don't get enough true crime, go search and follow Crime House Daily, Crime House's twice a day show that's bringing you breaking cases, updates and unbelievable stories from the world of crime that's happening right now.
- [01:49]
Kayla Moore
Let's get into this case and the clues that defined it. This episode is brought to you by Vori. So Vuori is my new favorite loungewear. I must tell you, I just got a pair of the dream knit joggers and I'm completely obsessed with them. I never want to take them off. I can wear them to stretch in the morning, to run errands in the afternoon, but I also think they're just best when I'm lounging around the house at night. When I wear Vori, I still look put together despite the fact that the clothes are so comfortable. And what's great about Vuori is that it's not your typical gym gear inspired by the laid back coastal California lifestyle. Everything is designed to move with you, perform with you, and still look amazing. Amazing when you're out and about. These pieces are soft, they're lightweight, they stretch in all the right ways. It's basically like wearing a hug that lets you do whatever the day brings. Vuori is also perfect as we move from fall into winter. I can't believe I'm saying that. Already the year has flown by. They're really easy to layer. I have a couple tank tops that I can wear underneath their cozy sweatshirts and it's perfect. Vuori is an investment in your happiness. And for our listeners they're offering 20 off your first purchase. Get yourself some of the most comfortable and versatile clothing on the planet at vuori.com clues. That's V U-O-R-I.com Cluz exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions. Not only will you receive 20% off your first purchase, but enjoy free shipping on any US orders over 75 and free returns. Go to Vuori.comclues and discover the versatility of Vuori clothing. Exclusions apply. Visit the website for full terms and conditions.
- [03:15]
Morgan Abshur
This is going to be a tough one today.
- [03:16]
Kayla Moore
This one's really dark and there's a big Internet component to it and various rabbit holes. We're going to get into all of that today.
- [03:25]
Morgan Abshur
Very rabbit. Holy. Reddit comes into play quite a bit and it kind of hits close to home for us because this is right in our backyard. I mean where this happened is like an hour and a half hourish depending on the traffic here in LA away from us. So this one hits close to home.
- [03:43]
Kayla Moore
Yeah. For anyone listening to. I feel like there's, there's definitely parts of this story where I'm going to be asking the audience how they feel about things because there's just a lot of questions. I want to get your guys thoughts on some things. I don't know. Definitely this one, this one I feel like you're going to want to listen to with a fine tooth comb because we're going to be calling on you guys for comments and stuff for us to go through after. Absolutely. And just a quick reminder, if you're watching this on YouTube, you're going to see some photos, videos, maps that kind of help you visualize the case. And for anyone who's just listening to the audio, all of that's going to be over on our Instagram. That's at Clues podcast along with our.
- [04:17]
Morgan Abshur
Missing person of the week. We do highlight those on socials as well. We want you guys to share them, get the word out so you'll see those over there too. And we do have a quick content warning. This episode contains graphic descriptions of a hate crime as well as mentions of homophobic and anti Semitic content and organized hate groups. So please listen with care and with.
- [04:39]
Kayla Moore
That, let's kind of set the scene. So it's the night of Tuesday, January 2nd in 2018 in beautiful Lake Forest, California, which is down in Orange county, the Bernstein family is sitting down for a holiday dinner. Back in November, the family wasn't necessarily able to get together for Thanksgiving. I think that's something a lot of families deal with. And that's because the 19 year old son of the family, Blaze Bernstein, who's the eldest of three siblings, couldn't take time away from his studies at the University of Pennsylvania. But Blaze is really known as the chef of the house. He's got a serious knack for cooking. He's very good at it. In fact, he was promoted to managing editor for the university's food magazine called Pen Appetit, which is very punny. So thanks to Blaze, the whole Bernstein family that night is enjoying a gourmet feast to celebrate the holidays and light Hanukkah candles. After the big meal, Blaze's parents, Jeannie and Gideon, decide to go to bed early. Blaze, though, stays up. He's Snapchatting, he's texting, he's using his phone, he's swiping through matches on dating apps. And that following morning, Blaze's parents wake up. Jeannie comes downstairs. She notices, though on the way that Blaze's bedroom door is still closed. She figures that he's just sleeping in. She doesn't really bother to knock on the door. He's home for vacation too, so she doesn't really want to bother him. It's one of their last few days together. Before he heads to school, she wants him to get rest. So she decides that she's going to leave the house and go to a yoga class, figuring that she'll see him later because they have dentist appointments at the same place at the same time. Except when Jeie goes to this dentist appointment, Blaze is not there. And she waits a little while and he doesn't show up. And she kind of gets this aha moment of like, something is wrong. This is an important dentist appointment. It's like long overdue for Blaze. You don't really get to go to the dentist a lot when you're in college. So for him to not show up to this is a little odd. And so she ends up calling the housekeeper back at the house, and she asks if the housekeeper saw Blaze while she was cleaning that morning. Now, the housekeeper doesn't answer the phone initially. So Jeannie ends up leaving the appointment and that's when the housekeeper calls back and confirms that, no, I haven't seen Blaze this morning. Actually, she ends up calling her husband, Gideon. She relays this information to him, and they both start panicking. Jeannie runs home. Gideon leaves work, rushes home to meet her. It's really not like Blaye's at all to not call his parents for this long of time, but also to just not show up to things. So together, the parents go into Blaze's bedroom. He's not there. And they start searching. And that's when they notice something a little bit odd about Blaze's room. They discover that his wallet, his car keys, and his glasses are all still there. However, they don't find his cell phone. So they figure that wherever Blaze is, his phone must be with him. But why would he have left the house without his wallet or his car keys or his glasses? It's just weird things to have left behind and to only have left with your phone.
- [07:43]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. His mom, in an interview, even mentions, like, his retainer is still there. So even that, to them is like, well, he probably didn't come home at all the night before his retainer. He would have grabbed his retainers, likely for the appointment. So they note that just the smallest details, like they knew their son really well. They knew what these items being there meant, and none of it was good.
- [08:06]
Kayla Moore
So I'm not sure exactly what time it was when the Bernstein called the Orange County Sheriff's Department that day, but they do call to report Blaze missing. They say that the circumstances are a little weird. He was there last night. He left with his phone, but nothing else. And the deputy that they get a hold of tells them that, quote, 100% of the time, teenagers that unexpectedly stay out overnight are out on a booty call or something similar. Completely brushes it off.
- [08:36]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah, that's pretty.
- [08:37]
Kayla Moore
Even though he left with only his phone, this deputy seems to think he has it all figured out. Says it's just a booty call.
- [08:42]
Morgan Abshur
Quite the assumption to make.
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Kayla Moore
Beyond that, Morgan, he discourages the family from filing an official missing persons report so soon. And we've talked about this on the show. It can make such a difference, the timing in which you file that report. Yeah, Jeannie and Gideon are. I mean, this only fuels their panic. They know their son. They know Blaze. They insist that he is not the type at all to disappear like this. They know something is seriously wrong. I mean, say it was a hookup. He would have called. He would have let them know that he was out.
- [09:13]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah.
- [09:14]
Kayla Moore
And unfortunately, they are right. They do have that parental intuition. But before we get exactly into what happened and more into this case, let's rewind just a little bit and talk about who Blaze was. So, born on April 27, 1998, he was named for the pioneering French philosopher, writer, mathematician, inventor and physicist Blaise Pascal. And much like this philosopher, Blaze's parents hoped that he would make great contributions to the world. His grandmother on his father's side, Leah Bernstein, survived the Holocaust as a child in Romania. And after the war, she made it to California and became a language teacher. She said she wanted to see future generations grow up in a world where they could take pride in who they were without facing hatred and violence. And Blaze definitely did not hide who he was from the world. Blaze, again, like his French namesake, had many talents. From seventh to 12th grade, he attended the prestigious Orange County School for the Arts, a charter program that accepts only one in ten students to become part of their program. And that's where Blaise discovered his love for creative writing. But he also had a passion for the sciences. He participated in the Science Olympiad and he won the statewide chemistry challenge. He just strikes me as someone that was good at everything, so smart.
- [10:33]
Morgan Abshur
Like I took chemistry three times and I never made it past a withdrawal.
- [10:38]
Kayla Moore
Chemistry is the hardest of the subjects. I will stand by that. Outside of class, Blaze made time to volunteer with younger kids at his synagogue. And he loved traveling with his parents and his two younger siblings. And while Jeie and Gideon gave the kids a lot of freedom, they also kept a close eye on how their children used their cell phones and the Internet. They were very big on that. And that actually is how they found out that Blae was gay. When he was 13 years old, his parents were checking text messages on his phone. I'm curious if any parents to like now I know we have parents in the audience like if you're checking your kids phones, cuz like the phone is so scary to me. But they were going through text messages on his phone and they discovered private conversations that he was having. And in those messages he had revealed that he was gay. But if he was worried about coming out to his parents, he didn't necessarily need to be. His family embraced him and accepted him right away. They were very supportive. They told him they were supportive in a lot of different aspects of his life. And that meant supporting whatever career path that he wanted to take as well. Blaze had begun to make a name for himself as a writer even before he was an adult. In 2015, at the age of 17, he had a short story published in an online literary magazine. And between all of these creative gifts and academic achievements, Blaze was in really fantastic shape for college applications. And soon he just started getting accepted to all these universities. And he chose to attend the University of Pennsylvania, an Ivy League school with one of the country's top medical schools. And having that innate knack for science, he decided that he was going to enter Penn's pre med program as the class of 2020. Even though he was going to go pre med, he didn't want to give up on his creativity either. He soon came across an opportunity that really combined his love of writing with his passion for food and cooking, and that was through Penn Appetit, the university's student run food magazine. Blaise absolutely threw himself into this publication. First he was a copy editor, then he was a writer. And at the end of 2017, Blaise was elected managing editor for the first Pen Appetit issue of 2018. All of this to say, I mean, the reason that I bring all of this up is he had so much to look forward to, and he had this really, really beautiful life that he was cultivating for himself. And that just kind of begs the question even more. Why, on the night of January 2nd, did he vanish? Well, for as bizarre as Blaze's disappearance was, there were a few breadcrumbs that his family would be able to find that started painting a clearer picture of what happened that night.
- [13:17]
Morgan Abshur
Another one of this week's partners is Merit Beauty. Merit has become essential in my makeup routine.
- [13:24]
Kayla Moore
We've gotten a few products from Merit that I use every day. The Flush Balm is one of my favorites. Every time you see me on camera, I have the flesh balm on the bronzer stick. Bronzer. And the mascara. That's another fan favorite of mine that I probably wear every single day.
- [13:38]
Morgan Abshur
Oh, the lip. I cannot go anywhere without a Merit Lip on. And they have so many. They've got tinted, they've just got clear. It's not sticky. I feel moisturized. I got a nice glow. I'm pretty much obsessed with all of Merit's products. Merit is really this minimalistic beauty brand that makes elevated makeup and skincare designed to help you look put together in a matter of minutes. Right now, Merit Beauty is offering our listeners their signature makeup bag with your first order@merit beauty.com. that's me. R I T beauty.com to get your free signature makeup bag with your first order. Merit beauty.com One of this week's partners is Symbiotica Morgan.
- [14:17]
Kayla Moore
I was just telling you how much I like Symbiotica because you were saying you can't really swallow pills.
- [14:23]
Morgan Abshur
I cannot swallow pills, you guys.
- [14:25]
Kayla Moore
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- [15:02]
Morgan Abshur
And winter.
- [15:04]
Kayla Moore
And winter. I get sick every winter, so trying to protect myself. And now for listeners of Clues, we have a special deal with Symbiotica for you guys. You can go to symbiotica.com clues for 20% off plus free shipping. That's symbiotica.com clues for twenty percent off plus free shipping.
- [15:25]
Morgan Abshur
So back on Wednesday, January 3, 2018, police didn't really launch that large scale investigation. They didn't feel like they had enough evidence of foul play. So they essentially encouraged Jeannie and Gideon to kind of keep looking on their own, which is exactly what they did. Blaze's family tried calling the friends whose names and numbers they knew, but nobody had any idea where Blaze was. And so on someone's suggestion, they actually decided to go and dig through his social media for any clues. Which brings us to our first clue in this case, Blaze's Snapchat activity. So Blaze's 14 year old sister Bowie offered to help, you know, make sure the parents knew what they were doing on the apps. And Bowie was actually able to go into Blaze's icloud and retrieve his Snapchat password and get into his account. Snapchat messages do disappear within seconds after being read, typically unless you physically like, save them, but it does notify the other user if you save them. And so Bowie wasn't necessarily thinking that she'd find much. That's right.
- [16:33]
Kayla Moore
I honestly haven't used Snapchat since like 2016.
- [16:35]
Morgan Abshur
Haven't used it in years. But it does also have a feature that if you take screenshots, it notifies the other person. Got it.
- [16:42]
Kayla Moore
That makes sense.
- [16:42]
Morgan Abshur
So Bowie wasn't necessarily thinking that she'd find an Exact conversation or anything like that. But maybe there were some clues to her brother's whereabouts on this app. And she also knew that this is how he communicated with a lot of his friends. Like, I feel like that's a younger generation thing. Millennials. We text Gen Z, gen Alpha. They're on Snapchat.
- [17:02]
Kayla Moore
On Snapchat.
- [17:03]
Morgan Abshur
And Bowie and her parents essentially kind of cracked this wide open when they found something they didn't expect. A bunch of unopened messages from someone her family had never heard blae mention before. Sam Woodward. Sam's Snapchat messages asked Blaze repeatedly, quote, where did you go? There was also a sent message, a message from Blaze that he had saved. And this message from Blaze, sent at 10:37pm was his home address. Which brings us to clue number two. A call with Sam Woodward. So Gideon messaged this strange seeming stranger, asked to speak on the phone. And this stranger ends up actually calling Gideon. On the other line is 20 year old Sam Woodward. And he is immediately admitting that, yeah, he was with Blaze the night before. At this same time, Bowie is recording this whole conversation from a separate phone.
- [18:05]
Kayla Moore
Side note, Bowie is a little FBI detective. She's so good in this whole case.
- [18:10]
Morgan Abshur
Unreal. Getting into the icloud.
- [18:12]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, Are you kidding me? Yeah, she like knows exactly where to go and like what to do all the time.
- [18:16]
Morgan Abshur
That's hard to do. Like Apple has like two factor authentication on a lot of their stuff. So props to Bowie. And so Sam goes on to actually reveal to Gideon that he knew Blaze from high school. Sam attended the Orange County School for the Arts for three years, but left school during his junior year for unknown reasons. We'll get into that later. And when Gideon questioned Sam about Blaze's whereabouts, Sam just seemed super off. It's hard to tell if he's nervous, worried, he, he's definitely apologetic and he kind of just stumbles over his words quite a bit. Gideon at this point kind of can tell he's uncomfortable and he doesn't want to lose this, only like, lead to where his son is. So he kind of just says like, hey, I know you're a good kid. I just want to find my son. And at this point Sam says, quote, I want to find Blaze as much as you do. And then he told a strange story. Sam said that he picked Blaze up from his family's house and then drove him to a Hobby lobby parking lot nearby to hang out and catch up. Sam claimed at that point, Blaze revealed he had invited another friend to join them. So Sam drove to Borrego park to meet up with this other friend whose name he didn't know. And now Borrego park is this well groomed little neighborhood park in lake forest. It's got a playground, a soccer field, a short walking trail. It also connects to Whiting ranch wilderness park, which is much bigger. It's a 2,500acre nature preserve. And so Sam essentially says once they got there, Blaze just went off on his own, leaving Sam waiting by the bathroom, and he just never returned. So Sam got in his car and left. But when the Bernsteins are hearing this story, it is not computing for them. This behavior doesn't sound like Blaze. And again, Gideon kind of picks up on that same nervous energy you can hear when you listen to the call. And so he kind of felt like maybe he was lying. Something was just off. And we're gonna play a clip of this call. Let me know what you guys think in the comments. Like, am I reading into this? Is he calm and collected? What do you think the vibe is? We haven't heard from him all day.
- [20:43]
Kayla Moore
He missed an appointment today.
- [20:44]
Morgan Abshur
And then we started getting concerned, and.
- [20:46]
Kayla Moore
I've been trying to figure things out. So you're the first real clue to the. To the puzzle here. Yeah, I. Honestly, I. You know, I'm sorry.
- [21:00]
Morgan Abshur
I don't mean to put any pressure on you. I know you're a nice young man, But I'm asking you for, you know, help on this if you can, if you've got the ability to do that.
- [21:12]
Kayla Moore
Absolutely. This is, you know, I want to find blood as much as you do.
- [21:16]
Morgan Abshur
So right after the call, Gideon takes the recording of it and the Snapchat messages and brings them to police. Now, hey, maybe they've got a little bit more to go off of. And they do agree with him. Luckily, something is weird here. And at the very least, Sam Woodward just admitted to being the last person to see Blaze alive. So at least they have something to go off of. Now police are concerned enough that they actually deploy a team of officers to follow Sam Woodward, 24 7, and they're hoping that he might just lead them to Blaze.
- [21:54]
Kayla Moore
So over the next couple of days, the community really comes out in full force to help search for Blaze. Sam Woodward's story maybe seemed sketchy to everyone, but as of this point in the investigation, that's the only lead that they have when it comes to Blaze's possible whereabouts. So the Bernsteins and everyone else they could get together were primarily searching around the park that Sam Talked about on January 6th. Four days after Blaze disappeared, law enforcement searched the entire park multiple times. And Blaze's dad was with them while they were doing this. He said, quote, I walked every square meter of that park. I was all over that thing yelling Blaze's name.
- [22:37]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. And when you guys see an image of this park, the park itself isn't very big.
- [22:43]
Kayla Moore
Right, Right.
- [22:44]
Morgan Abshur
It's not super expansive, and it's. There's not a lot of, like, trees. It's like you can kind of see from end to end, and then at the other end, there's, like, trees and brush and stuff, but it's not super big.
- [22:58]
Kayla Moore
Yeah. I'm looking at it now on a map, and it definitely is something that a group of volunteers could have searched.
- [23:04]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. And, I mean, Blaze's synagogue, the rabbi there, really organized a vast search. I mean, in the day or two after Blaze went missing, they had three thousands of missing posters printed. I mean, this was a big turnout from the community as well.
- [23:20]
Kayla Moore
Right. And, yeah, just looking at this park now, it's basically just a soccer field. Like, there's not. I know, really much that you can hide behind.
- [23:28]
Morgan Abshur
No. A little playground for kids. Like, not anything super big.
- [23:33]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, well, they basically say that, too. They say if Blaze was there, they were positive they would find him. But the big fear was that he might have made his way into the much larger neighboring area of Whiting Ranch Wilderness park, where mountainous terrain would really, really hamper a search. I mean, I. I guess at this point, they're really thinking, like, maybe what Sam said was right. Like, maybe he did go and meet a friend, and they walked off together into the wilderness park. Like, there's so many possibilities of what could have occurred. Yeah. And they just have really nothing but Sam's story to go off of. So these volunteer drone pilots show up to help search the nature preserve from the air. And while they're doing that, ATVs are following Whiting Ranch Wilderness Park's many hiking trails. Cadaver dogs are now involved, and police helicopters join the aerial search, too. They all find nothing. As the week went on, the Bernsteins also start appearing on any television news broadcast that would have them. Basically, they leveraged Gideon's career as a wealth manager to reach celebrities willing to help spread the word. And that really works for them at the beginning. As the first week of the search drew to a close, they get Kobe Bryant to say something. Charlie Puth says something. They're sharing information on the search for Blaze with their social media followers. People are really starting to hear about what happened. But ever since that weird phone call with Sam, the Bernsteins had this, like, sinking suspicion that Sam was somehow involved. Like, maybe even if not directly, maybe he knows something that he's not telling them. Like, maybe he does have a key to this. They really start thinking that he knows more than he's letting on.
- [25:19]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. Which brings us to our third clue. Sam Woodward's strange behavior. So we're gonna go back in time a little bit to January 4th, which is two days after Blaze vanished. This is when police asked Sam Woodward to come in for voluntary questioning. And during this, Sam, you know, he continued to express sympathy for Blaze's family, calling his parents really nice people. And during that interview, Sam still was sticking to that original story. Blaze had just wandered off in the park and never came back. But he also added some new details. He now says that after he left the park, he. He drove to his girlfriend's house nearby. It was about 20 minutes away in Tustin. And when investigators asked about speaking with her, Sam claimed that he couldn't remember his girlfriend's last name or where she lived.
- [26:14]
Kayla Moore
Red flag. That's huge.
- [26:17]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. I mean, you'd seemingly want to connect investigators to your alibi or you would.
- [26:22]
Kayla Moore
Remember your girlfriend's last name. That means if you had a girlfriend.
- [26:26]
Morgan Abshur
Exactly. And during this interview, investigators also noticed that Sam, like, he was not touching any door handles at the headquarters with his bare hands. Instead, he would, like, use his sleeve. And they kind of speculated maybe he's trying to avoid leaving fingerprints.
- [26:44]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, that's what I would think.
- [26:46]
Morgan Abshur
And something else strange happened that afternoon. Now, sources do kind of conflict on whether the following event happened before or. Or after he went into the station for an interview. But I'm maybe thinking it was before. And you guys tell me what you think, but here's why. That same day, Sam actually went to Borrego Park. He ran into an investigator there named Sergeant Dylan Jansen. And I'm not sure if Sam was there also claiming to want to help find Blae or if he had another agenda. But Sergeant Jansen recognized Sam as a person of interest in this case. And he also noticed that his hair was different from just a few days earlier. He'd now cut it and dyed it. He also appeared to be hiding his hands in his pockets a lot. And when Sergeant Jansen spoke with Sam, he did eventually get him to show him his hands. And when he saw them, he was very surprised. They were covered in bloody band Aids, and his fingernails were, quote, completely caked with dirt. And so When Jansen presses Sam on how he injured his hands, he says that he was in a fight club with friends and had fallen in a, quote, dirt puddle while sparring. Yeah, you've got a face over there.
- [28:14]
Kayla Moore
I just don't think fight clubs are real. I mean, maybe we talk about fight club, maybe I'm wrong, but just the idea that, oh, yeah, me and my friends just go to the park and we fight each other, I don't know, like, alarm bells would immediately be going off in my head, but maybe. I just don't know. 20 year old boys, I don't know.
- [28:32]
Morgan Abshur
You're not the only one who finds it suspicious. Officer Jansen does as well. And again, this day just keeps getting weirder because Sam let the officers at the park actually look inside his car. A Nissan Rogue. They saw hiking and camping equipment, plus a plastic bin and a black belt. But they didn't spot anything that seemed like obvious evidence. What did raise their suspicions was what Sam did when he got home later, because again, he's being followed. Still unaware that he's under round the clock surveillance, Sam cleaned his car thoroughly with a spray bottle and rag, paying special attention to the doors and rear bumper. At this point, everyone's on the same page. They're all agreeing that Sam is acting pretty odd, but they're not ready to arrest him just yet. There's still a chance that he might reveal more evidence that could actually lead to Blaze.
- [29:38]
Kayla Moore
Right, because they still don't know where Blaze is. So at this point, they need to get more information out of him.
- [29:44]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah, they need him to hopefully lead them in the right direction. And as they're waiting for this to happen, investigators get their fourth clue. Blaze's cell phone location data. As we know, Blaze's phone wasn't in his room, so authorities assumed it must have been taken with him wherever he went. But by the time his parents noticed that he was gone, his location services were turned off. So Blaze's iPhone wasn't showing up on that Find My app, which they would have easily seen because they were in the icloud.
- [30:16]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, Right.
- [30:17]
Morgan Abshur
And so it actually takes a few days for police to subpoena those records from the provider. But now they had confirmation that Blaze's last known location was a specific spot towards the rear of Borrego Park. And get this, when they run it next to Sam's cell phone data, it showed that the two of them had gone to that specific spot together. Meaning Sam's story about staying by the bathrooms and Blaze ditching him was looking like a lie. It was at that location that Blaze's signal abruptly disappeared, while Sam's continued on and eventually moved away. Investigators discovered all of this on Tuesday, January 9th, exactly one week after Blaze disappeared. So they are moving extremely quick on this one. And so on that day, the weather takes a turn. It's a cold winter day. Rain is soaking Borrego Park. And so investigators head back to the park and start looking one more time. And now they are armed with Blaze's exact last known location. Another one of this week's partners is Masterclass. We're just talking about holiday gifts and what to give all the special people in our lives. And I'm tired of buying people stuff they're not going to use or just giving them a nonchalant gift card. I'm going to give them experiences. This year everyone's getting Masterclass. That is a great idea.
- [31:47]
Kayla Moore
Can I tell you the best thing I've learned via Masterclass?
- [31:50]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah.
- [31:50]
Kayla Moore
So Chris Voss did a class on negotiating. He was an FBI hostage negotiator, but one thing he says is using a DJ voice. He says he always comes in really calm, really cool, and he uses his late night DJ voice when he's negotiating with terrorists. And he says you can do that when you're negotiating with your boss for a raise, which I thought was really smart. Okay.
- [32:11]
Morgan Abshur
Okay, Chris. There's over 200 different classes on Masterclass from things like home design to intimacy, how to connect with your partner, health, wellness, everything. So no matter what area of your life you think needs a little bit of a little refresh, Masterclass is going to have something for you or one of your loved ones for a holiday gift.
- [32:32]
Kayla Moore
And for listeners of Clues, we have a special offer. Now, Masterclass always has great offers during the holiday and sometimes it's up to as much as 50% off. Head over to masterclass.com clues for the current offer that's up to 50% off@masterclass.com clues.
- [32:48]
Morgan Abshur
This episode is brought to you by Aura Frames. I'm a last minute shopper. I definitely procrastinate my holiday list. But I don't have to worry about that this year because I already know what is on my list for everyone and it's aura frame I love or.
- [33:02]
Kayla Moore
A frame I think I've given it to three of my family members. Now. My grandma, I mean, I'm sure people can relate to this. My grandma is not good with technology. It's hard to even text her a photo to her phone because she does not know how to receive them. What's nice is I sent her an aura frame and now it's just set up so I can send her all of the photos I want her to see.
- [33:20]
Morgan Abshur
I love that you can even preload your photos on the Aura Frame for people before it even ships. So as they open it it's just this really thoughtful, meaningful gift. I love that you can send too. It's a great way to share pictures with your family that you might not want on social media. I know a lot of people aren't sharing their kids nowadays. It's a great way to keep family connected for a limited time.
- [33:42]
Kayla Moore
Save on the Perfect Gift by visiting or frames.com to get 35 dol off Aura's best selling Carver Matte frames named number one by wire cutter by using Promo Code Clues at checkout. That's a frames.com promo code clues. This deal is exclusive to listeners and frames sell out fast you guys. So order yours now to get it in time for the holidays. Support the show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply.
- [34:06]
Morgan Abshur
One of this week's partners is Aura Frames.
- [34:09]
Kayla Moore
I have been gifting Aura Frames to family members for like years now because I think it's such a perfect gift to be able to send photos to someone. 1 I have a mother in law who I'm not going to constantly text her updates and photos of our lives, but I love that we can just send the photos to an aura frame. She has a slideshow from her whole family of just images that she can watch throughout the year.
- [34:31]
Morgan Abshur
I also love that you can preload these photos before it even ships. So as your loved one is opening it up, it's ready to go and it's just so thoughtful.
- [34:40]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, it's grandparent proof in that way.
- [34:42]
Morgan Abshur
Grandparent proof. And especially if you don't want people sharing pictures of your kids online, you can give them pictures of your kids, keep updating it regularly, but then they don't get to share those photos on Facebook or wherever it's it's a really.
- [34:56]
Kayla Moore
Nice feature and you can send unlimited free photos and videos too. For a limited time you can visit Oraframes.com and get $45 off of Aura Frames best selling Carver Matte frames named number one by Wirecutter by using Promo Code Clues at checkout. That's a U R A frames.com promo code clues. This exclusive Black Cyber Monday deal is their best of the year, so order now before it ends. Support the show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply. Captain Jack Ackerman was among the officers searching Borrego park in the pouring rain on January 9th. And as he walked along this steep, muddy embankment at the edge of the park, he noticed that there was an area that they all had missed before where the ground looked like it was a little bit raised. It was almost like the rain had maybe piled up dirt around an object. Like maybe that's the reason they missed it was because the rain was able to reveal something in the dirt. There was a fallen tree branch that was resting on the raised spot. Captain Ackerman approached the area, he moves the branch to the side, and that is when he sees that there is a human leg. Lying in the soil beneath was the body of Blaze Bernstein, buried in a shallow makeshift grave that had been exposed by the rain. His cell phone was buried in the same spot that he was underneath his body. And after that, officers were dispatched to notify Blaze's family. And the Sheriff's department officially changed the case from a missing persons investigation to a suspected homicide. Which they were probably thinking at that point anyways, with just how weird everything was going. But that meant that the search was officially. But now the investigation was just getting started.
- [36:47]
Morgan Abshur
And that brings us to our next clue. Clue number five, Blaze's autopsy. Blaze's cause of death was multiple sharp force injuries. He was stabbed 28 times. There were 14 stab wounds in the right side of his neck and five on the left side of his neck. He also had injuries to his face and a stab wound in his left knee. Defensive wounds were found on his right palm and fingers, showing that Blaze had really done his best to try to fight back against his attacker. Based on the autopsy results, Sergeant Jansen believed the murder was motivated by, quote, hate and rage, mainly because multiple stab wounds tend to be associated with an existing relationship between the killer and victim. These attacks are a lot more personal. And so after Blaze's autopsy, police felt certain that. That he was killed in a very targeted way. And now they needed to look for more evidence to prove it.
- [37:46]
Kayla Moore
On the same day that Blaze's body was found January 9, prosecutors served a search warrant on the Woodward family's home in Newport beach, where Sam was still living. At this point, they, I mean, felt pretty confident that Sam Woodward was the killer and also that he had acted alone. I mean, they have so much evidence besides, I guess, any real physical evidence, but there's so much circumstances, substantial evidence leading to Sam. Yeah, and because it's. They don't have this physical evidence, they feel like they need a little bit more Proof before they can actually make an arrest. Like, one of the things that they feel like they need is a motive. If they can nail that down, they can prove definitively that it was Sam. And also, when you have a motive, you can dramatically affect the sentencing of a case. We found a little bit of context on this. Specifically, in California, how it works. To convict a person of first degree murder in California, the government has to prove that they acted with something called malice aforethought. Basically, what that means is the person either intended to kill the victim or they had a plan that they knew might lead to the death of a victim. And so one common defense strategy that gets used is to claim that the killing happened in the heat of the moment or the heat of passion, meaning that the killer flew into an uncontrollable rage under circumstances that would cause someone to lose self control. And that's a very different type of crime. If the defense is successful in that argument, the charge would then get dropped to voluntary manslaughter instead of murder. And the maximum sentence for voluntary manslaughter In California is 11 years, and the maximum sentence for murder is life. That is all to say exactly why Blaze was killed. The circumstances surrounding it leading up to it could make a huge difference between his killer being freedom within, like, 11 years or staying behind bars forever. And that means that the police needed to search the Woodward home for both evidence of guilt and also evidence of motive.
- [39:46]
Morgan Abshur
Well, they got one of those almost immediately. Which brings us to our six clues, plural. When an investigator opened a drawer in Sam's bedroom, they noticed a folding knife with stains that appeared to be blood. They also found blood stains on a sleeping bag found outside of Sam's bedroom window. And they found blood on the driver's side visor of his Nissan, the car he did admit to picking Blaze up in. There was also this skull mask in the car which appeared to have blood on it, too. These items were immediately collected and sent off for DNA testing. Now, upon further investigation, detectives spotted their first hint into a potential motive. They spotted a swastika on Woodward's notebook. And when they moved on to his cell phone, it really started to confirm their suspicions. Without even unlocking the phone, they could see that Sam's wallpaper was an image referencing a violent extremist neo Nazi hate group called AdamWaffen. This group goes back to 2015. They're really trying to achieve this purity through racial, religious, and ideological homogeneity. And they do this through violent conflict. They kind of have this leaderless social Resistance, which basically means that each member acts as independent agents and they're encouraged to carry out acts of extremist violence on their own without any instructions or approval. They did, however, follow a handbook. Their handbook calls for white men to commit acts of terrorism in order to bring about a race war. So if the rest of the phone's contents revealed that Sam had been influenced by this group whose members promised to, quote, do away with homosexuality for good, it would certainly reveal the motive police were looking for. But a lock screen image alone wasn't enough to prove anything. And they needed full access to all of Sam's devices.
- [41:56]
Kayla Moore
And while they were working on getting that, the results came back for the blood stained items that were found in Sam's home and in his vehicle. And they tested positive for Blaze's blood on the knife and a combination of Blaze and Sam's blood in Sam's car. So obviously after that comes back, the investigators can move incredibly quickly. They get a warrant, they don't even wait for Sam to come home. That day, police ended up intercepting his mom's car and pulled her over. And Sam was inside of the vehicle with her. At around 1:15pm on Friday, January 12, 2018, that's 10 days after Blaze disappeared, Sam Woodward was arrested for the murder of Blaze Bernstein. We talked a little bit about the stuff that was found, at least initially on Sam's phone, but maybe it's worth going a little bit more into Sam's background, maybe what led the 20 year old to commit something like this. So Sam grew up in Newport Beach, California. It's a wealthy coastal suburb of Orange County. His parents, a commercial real estate vice president and therapist, raised their family as Catholic. They attended mass almost daily. Now, according to his mother, Michelle, Sam had some difficulties as a child, including sensory sensitivities. He showed signs of emotional dysregulation. He had a lot of trouble picking up on social cues amongst peers. And also he had interests that like very quickly devolved into something very dark. So initially he was very interested in things like spiders and airplanes. And that kind of turned into a love of global history eventually. But by fifth grade, this global history fascination he had gave way to a fascination with specifically Nazis and Nazi era Germany. This did not make him popular pretty much wherever he went. Sam hadn't made even one friend by the end of elementary school. So his parents hoped that by starting the seventh grade at the Orange County School for the Arts, he could get a fresh start. Despite some of his social difficulties, Sam had enough talent to get into the prestigious school. That's where he met Blayes. But Sam didn't fit in at this school either. In fact, from things we read about Sam, it seemed like he was actively trying to not fit in with anyone. He had, like, an art project where they had to, like, just draw something innocent, and he chose to draw a Confederate flag. He also would scribble racial slurs all over copies of books that he got from the school. One of the books was Raisin in the sun, which is a seminal African American play. He would doodle guns in his notebooks. His classmates started to get worried that he was potentially a future school shooter. I mean, he was a very, very dark and disturbed guy. The one time he seemed actually engaged in his schoolwork was, at least according to some of his classmates. In this one acting class, he was assigned to perform a monologue from Quentin Tarantino's World War II movie, Inglourious Basterds. I'm sure many listeners have seen that movie. We can all imagine what monologue he was maybe reading, and it was probably not the actual, like, bastards that he was reading.
- [45:14]
Morgan Abshur
There were also several of Sam's classmates that talked to reporters and confirmed that he did express openly, very openly, extremely homophobic views during high school alongside other bigoted ideas. I mean, according to one classmate, he had a reputation of being racist, homophobic, sexist. There's even a source. I saw that his father pulled him out during his junior year at Orange County School for Arts because of multiple reports of Sam being homophobic towards gay students. And so Woodward actually finished his junior and senior years at Corona del Mar High School. There's also this creepy Reddit theory about Sam creating a fake Facebook account using the name Harold Gershner. Allegedly, this Harold Gershner user was going to groups. Blaze's family had started to help find him and was taunting Blaye's mom there. Many think it's Sam because this Harold seemed to know things that nobody else could know about the murder. But again, this is kind of all speculative and has not been proven.
- [46:25]
Kayla Moore
Well, it seems like a lot of people were creeped out by Sam, and they considered him potentially capable of murder, even long before Blaze was killed. Even Sam's mother, Michelle, said that she mostly communicated with Sam through letters because of his frequent episodes of rage. Though things seem to be a little bit better lately, since Sam was living back at home and he would go places with his mom. But I guess in the past, these episodes of rage included physical violence towards his family and destruction of property. Although Michelle Took some of that back when she was questioned about it later. All to say that Sam's history did not do him any favors in this investigation. Between the bloody knife in the dresser, the blood in his car, and the long history of troubling behavior, the defense was going to have a really hard time putting a case together for him. And with the story now making national headlines, prosecutors were motivated to push hard for a guilty verdict and a maximum sentence. The best possible case scenario for Sam was to convince the jury that this was voluntary manslaughter, which we talked about earlier, the difference in California and not first degree murder. So on February 2, 2018, exactly a month after Blaze disappeared, Sam Woodward pleaded not guilty on charges of murder. The judge set bail initially at $5 million. Sam did not post this, but eventually his bail was just fully revoked.
- [47:53]
Morgan Abshur
Now, with Sam behind bars, investigators had some time to really build their case for the longest sentence possible. Which brings us to our seventh clue, Sam's online hate activity. When investigators finally gained access to Sam's cell phone, they found even more horrifying evidence. Now, Sam didn't just follow this neo Nazi group online. He was actively a part of it. We don't know when he originally started communicating with this group, but we do know that he first read the handbook in April of 2017. He did so at the urging of an online friend that he met through Skype chats for a different white supremacist group. And shortly thereafter, Sam and this online friend both abandoned this initial white supremacist group and joined this neo Nazi group. So at the age of 19, Sam had already been a part of at least two Neo Nazi hate groups. But this commitment to Atomwaffen was on a different level, because, as the police soon learned, Sam had extensive contact with this group in the real world, too. In fact, several months before Blaze's murder, investigators discovered that Sam had actually moved to Texas to live in motels and shelters for a summer in order to attend this group's training camp. It's their version of a corporate retreat, but it also has the name hate camp, so it tells you exactly what it is. Sam also traveled to Colorado together to meet the founder of this group. I mean, like, heavily, heavily involved in this group. And while Sam did eventually move back in with his parents, him and this friend actually worked together to run a Southern California branch of Atomwaffen. Some of these local chapters also would host their own hate camps, like the one Sam attended in Texas. There, during these hate camps, they trained members for their desired race war, A New ethno state with no lgbtq, no black people, and certainly no Jewish people.
- [50:10]
Kayla Moore
So Sam got pretty deep into the neo Nazi world in a relatively short amount of time. But as police were digging through his phone and his email accounts, investigators learned that this white supremacist Persona had been developing for years before he even joined a group. And so he had a lot of activity on this Russian owned meme site. And I didn't really know a lot about this site before we started doing the research on this, but apparently organized neo Nazi groups are using meme sites like this to recruit young boys and men into hate movements. And that's according to the Counter Extremism Project. But he was making a lot of really weird posts on this Russian meme site. And one of the posts that he made was actually about his attraction to his English teacher. And it was kind of surprising when police found this because she was Middle Eastern. Sam used, I mean, incredibly offensive language to say that he would like to have children with this teacher, despite his beliefs that interracial procreation was wrong. And later, when he would go on to join more neo Nazi group chats, he would often make similar, but far more extreme posts about sexually assaulting women of color to forcibly impregnate them. A lot of these sites have been taken down. I mean, I'll give a little bit.
- [51:28]
Morgan Abshur
Of credit where credit's due.
- [51:29]
Kayla Moore
Like, a lot of these sites have been taken down and the posts have been cleaned, but some of these sites are still around, including the meme site that he was on. You can still go on it and, like, look at stuff, and it's all horrible. But not all of this stuff has been taken down off the Internet. And it's still this place where young men can be recruited into these hate groups. So it's just. It's just, like, really shocking to see.
- [51:50]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. And while investigators did gather a lot of kind of info on Sam and maybe potential motive through these memes and hate forums, there was another clue that really gave detectives the most insight into Sam and his motive, which is clue number eight, a diary. Sam had actually been sending emails to himself. I'm not sure how far back the email's date, but one email included this statement, quote, the Jew will always destroy the society in which he resides, end quote. A bigger theme in the diary was Sam's interest in toying with gay or bisexual men who he called, quote, sodomites. He described connecting with other men, flirting for a while, potentially sending pictures of himself, and then either unfriending them abruptly or announcing that they had been pranked. This pattern of flirting and then withdrawing started years before Sam joined any dating apps that at least if his high school classmates are to be believed. There was an interesting post on Reddit that I was able to partially get back through the Wayback Machine. Someone claiming to be a former classmate of Sam's at OCSA writes, quote While at ocsa, which has a large liberal slash left population, Sam would preach his conservative and homophobic views. An unwise move. Now we all remember it. On top of this, his social skills were off. Although not totally inept, I know any form of empathy never truly clicked with him. However, after leaving ocsa, he contacted a well known homosexual classmate in hopes of finding answers on how to deal with all caps his own homosexuality. What started as a crutch for support grew into a passionate fling, going so far as to send his own dick pics. I don't recall the outcome to a tee, but I do know it ended without backlash. Obviously Sam didn't know this person had shown fellow classmates the DMs, or I'm sure there would have been. Sam could easily have transferred his self prejudice to Blaze and killed a part of himself he was ashamed of. Now this post was anonymous, as all of Reddit is basically, but later reporting did confirm most of it, and including the part about Sam having a flirtation with an openly gay student at OCSA that did include sending explicit pictures of himself. From this interaction, it really did seem that Sam's behavior just escalated over time. He eventually downloaded Grindr, a hookup app primarily used by gay men, and started threatening his Grindr matches. In addition to his Tinder matches, one of his diary emails read, quote lmao. They think they are going to get hate crimed and it scares the bleep out of them. Priceless. End quote. It seems this strange hobby of his could have been what led Sam to reconnect with Blaze years after losing touch. Which brings us to clue number nine, some Tinder messages and some final texts. So you see, detectives actually are able to learn from both Sam and Blaze's cell phone activity that the two of them had matched on Tinder not once but twice. The first time was in June 2017 when Blaze sent a super like to Sam and messaged him. Quote Wait, Sam Woodward, is that you? After they matched, Sam made an excuse for why his Tinder profile was open to male matches. He told Blaze he was mostly using the app to have sex with women, but that he was also hoping to Meet a man willing to be his spotter on deer hunting trips.
- [55:47]
Kayla Moore
That's odd.
- [55:48]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. This is also Southern California. There's not many deer hunting places nearby. And now some speculate that Blaze was kind of blown away to find this homophobic former classmate on Tinder looking for men. And so he supposedly sent screenshots to multiple friends who also remembered Sam from high school. And they were equally as stunned by this reveal.
- [56:14]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, this would be like a shocking arc for the students that he went to high school with.
- [56:19]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. And so Blaze ended up kind of keeping these friends of his updated on progress with Sam. He would text them about coaxing his former classmate with compliments to see if he would reveal that he was looking for more than a hunting buddy. Eventually, it did work, and Sam complimented Blaze on his looks. Blaze texted one of his friends a one word update, quote, acquired. But Sam unmatched with Blaze, basically right after this interaction, kind of ghosting him as he described these interactions that he would pull on people in his diary. Then came January 2, 2018, eight months after they last had spoken on Tinder. And that's when Blaze was home for winter break and the two young men matched again. Sam apologized for their previous encounter and said that he was straight, but, quote, might make an exception for Blaze. Blayes was skeptical. This time, messaging, quote, we've already done this prank, Sam. But Sam talked Blaze into moving their conversation to Snapchat, where messages, as we know, disappear. Whatever Sam said, he must have seemingly convinced Blayze that he was serious about being interested in him, because, you know, as we know, at 10:37pm Blaze sent Sam his address. And then at 11:36pm Blaze sent his best friend Lily the final text of his life. He said, quote, I did something really horrible for the story, but also, no one can ever know. End quote. Lily responded obviously, like, concerned about Blaze. Like, wait, what?
- [58:06]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, what could that mean?
- [58:07]
Morgan Abshur
What could that mean? But by the time his phone lit up with her response, Blaze was unable to respond.
- [58:19]
Kayla Moore
After learning about everything that was found on Sam's cell phone, prosecutors filed a hate crime enhancement to the murder charge. They argued that Sam intentionally lured Blaze to the park that night to kill him simply for being gay and Jewish, two marginalized identities that are protected under California's hate crimes law. Also, two minority groups that this neo Nazi group that Sam was a part of were known to target. However, prosecutors chose to focus on Blaze's sexuality for the purpose of the court case because there was ultimately more evidence pointing to a homophobic motive than an Anti Semitic one, though they did believe it was both. If proven in court, that hate crime enhancement would call for an increased sentence. That would be life in prison, but without the possibility of parole, rather than having a chance at parole after just 15 years, which is crucial.
- [59:14]
Morgan Abshur
Crazy. 15 years.
- [59:17]
Kayla Moore
Yeah.
- [59:17]
Morgan Abshur
It's like nothing that was shocking for.
- [59:20]
Kayla Moore
A crime so egregious. 28, and a hate that runs so deep in you that, like, you would just go on to commit another crime afterwards that doesn't get stamped out after 15 years in prison. Such a threat to the community that just gross, horrible. Prosecutors definitely wanted to go for this more severe punishment because of the extreme brutality of this crime. And it seemed like both sides were basically prepared to go to trial. But then there was this series of unexpected delays that hit the case. First, Sam's public defender removed himself with the judge's permission. We're not entirely sure why this happened, but this meant that a new public defender would need some time to get up to speed on the entire case. And by the time the case went back on track, I mean, Covid hit, it slowed the whole court system to a crawl. It ended up pausing this trial for years before the jury selection even started. And this is so strange. We don't have a lot of information on this, but we know that half of the jurors were seated on the trial, and Sam had some sort of outburst in court. There's not a transcript of what he said, but the thing he said caused the entire jury process to start over, the selection of the jurors to start over. That also raised some questions about Sam's mental capacity, like maybe his ability to stand trial. That was ultimately raised by his lawyer around mid July 2022. And so a judge ordered two experts to evaluate, and while he met with one, he refused to meet with the other. And so that also delayed any, like, follow up until October 2022. However, in late 2022, they do decide that Sam is competent to stand trial. Blaze's family at this point, had been stuck in limbo for six years. His mother, Jeannie, even put off having cancer surgery because she was scared that she would be unavailable if the trial suddenly began. Finally. Then on April 9, 2024, the trial began. And since his arrest, Sam Woodward's appearance had changed pretty drastically. Have you seen the photos?
- [61:27]
Morgan Abshur
Drastically is an understatement.
- [61:30]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, he basically walked into the courtroom looking like Charles Manson. His hair was all grown. His beard was scraggly. He looks so scary.
- [61:39]
Morgan Abshur
Has anyone seen the movie the Ring? The little girl with the hair just covering her face.
- [61:43]
Kayla Moore
Samara.
- [61:44]
Morgan Abshur
That was him.
- [61:46]
Kayla Moore
Yeah. The thing is, it does seem like Sam was trying to actually look like Charles Manson, because I was reading about how a lot of Charles Manson's writings are kind of like required reading for the neo Nazi group he was a part of. So he wanted to basically look like their hero and show up in court and, I don't know, have that picture taken so it could be sent to all of his neo Nazi friends and they would be really proud of him.
- [62:10]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. And I will say something extremely sad about this case that his parents touch on quite a bit in their interviews is the fact that after Blaze's murder was linked to this hate group, they were celebrating in online forums.
- [62:24]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, absolutely. They still celebrate to this day.
- [62:27]
Morgan Abshur
And so just like you hear that from his mom, it's just like this.
- [62:31]
Kayla Moore
Is a huge win for them, unfortunately.
- [62:33]
Morgan Abshur
It's just tragic.
- [62:33]
Kayla Moore
Tragic. Yeah, It's. It's ridiculous. The prosecution's case leaned very heavily on Sam's history of participating in all of these different hate groups. There was a testimony from a sheriff's forensic examiner about the, quote, thousands of homophobic and anti Semitic images that Sam had on his phone and his computer. The hate diary that you were talking about earlier and its claims of. Of baiting gay men were also featured prominently in the prosecution's case. I mean, that basically was a playbook for the way he was going to commit this crime.
- [63:07]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah.
- [63:08]
Kayla Moore
And Sam's most homophobic and violent entries were actually read, and I'm glad they did this too. But they were read word for word for the jury to hear because they needed to hear, like, the severity of the hate that this guy harbored for other people. There was also another disturbing revelation that came from Sam's phone, and that was a text that he sent at 2:38am so we know that it happened after the murder had taken place that night. And it read, quote, hey, man, life is good. End quote.
- [63:40]
Morgan Abshur
The defense told a different story and in an unusual move, actually put Sam on the stand to testify to this story. I hate that I have to be the one to read this part because it just really pisses me off.
- [63:57]
Kayla Moore
Yeah.
- [63:57]
Morgan Abshur
But Sam takes the stand, tells his side of the story, and Sam goes on to say that he used cannabis while he and Blaze were sitting in his car at Borrego Park. That caused him to drift off into a light sleep. And then Sam said he woke up to see Blaze unbuttoning his pants while holding a camera phone. Sam told the jury that he was a closeted gay man, and terrified of being outed, he flew into a rage and stabbed Blaze repeatedly with a folding knife that he always carried. The defense also leaned heavily on a potential autism diagnosis.
- [64:35]
Kayla Moore
This part always gets me. I hate this part.
- [64:36]
Morgan Abshur
So much of this, it's coming from his mom, who. It's purely. As far as we know. And what was presented speculative.
- [64:45]
Kayla Moore
Yeah.
- [64:46]
Morgan Abshur
And to me, I mean, they're grasping.
- [64:47]
Kayla Moore
At straws so hard, and everything they try to say to defend this guy, and so they just throw it. What if it was his autism?
- [64:55]
Morgan Abshur
They're throwing mud on the wall. Like, they're just, like, trying to just poke doubt, reasonable doubt, you know, as the defense is supposed to do. But to just drag Blaze through the mud like this in the process is horrible. Horrible. And Blaze's parents are sitting in this courtroom. They're furious. His mom had to actually get up and excuse herself out of the room at one point because she's a grieving parent who has waited six years for justice. And I can't believe she sat in there at all.
- [65:25]
Kayla Moore
That's so heartbreaking to have to go through all of this.
- [65:28]
Morgan Abshur
It's just. It's horrible.
- [65:30]
Kayla Moore
And to hear all of the. Yeah. All of Sam's excuses for why he did this.
- [65:33]
Morgan Abshur
And there's no evidence at all that Blayse had done anything. But the defense still tried to drag him even further, bringing up his mental health history, past breakups, just anything to try to attack his character. And, you know, they were able to retrieve the phone. Like, to me, this is maybe my hot take of the day. Like, if Blaze would have done this story, wouldn't there have been evidence on the phone? Like, yeah, come on. Just. It's a bit. It's a little bull for me. And the judge did eventually rule that most of this evidence had to be excluded. So Sam's own testimony, the testimony of his mother, Michelle, kind of became the centerpieces of the defense's case. Except that didn't go exactly as planned. The defense tried to get Michelle to say that her son experienced homophobic abuse as a child, specifically from his authoritarian father and his bullying brother. But Michelle kind of expressed a different point of view. According to her, her family wasn't homophobic. They were just worried about Sam having a more difficult time in life if he turned out to be gay. And this really didn't play into the defense's strategy. Like, again, they're trying to portray Sam as this closeted gay man terrified of what would happen if his family found out. And Having called Michelle and Michelle was kind of going against this.
- [67:08]
Kayla Moore
Yeah, it was very conflicting, very different.
- [67:11]
Morgan Abshur
Like, a lot of people on Reddit kind of are like, she was really trying to protect the overall family. Like, protect the family and their image.
- [67:19]
Kayla Moore
Seems like she's doing a lot of, like, image recon throughout the whole thing.
- [67:22]
Morgan Abshur
Yeah. And because the defense had called her to the stand as a witness, it also meant the prosecution could cross examine her on all of these statements. Prosecution used this opportunity to get Michelle to talk about Sam's anger problems as he was growing up. And so the trial ended on kind of a down note for the defense. Not much had really gone their way. And their only hope for a lighter sentence was if the jury believed Sam had testified truthfully about killing Blaze in a sudden unplanned fit of rage, which.
- [67:56]
Kayla Moore
Again, would give him, what did we say, 11 years.
- [68:00]
Morgan Abshur
I mean, it could go to manslaughter, it could go to like second degree murder, which is again, parole after 15. Like it. It just really changes the game compared to life without the possibility of parole.
- [68:14]
Kayla Moore
Yes.
- [68:15]
Morgan Abshur
But overall, the question at this point for everyone is had the prosecution done enough to prove for the jury that this was indeed a murder motivated by a hate crime? Well, on July 3rd, 2024, the jury found the then 26 year old Sam Woodward guilty of first degree murder. With the hate crime enhancement.
- [68:39]
Kayla Moore
Yeah. So the sentencing hearing came on November 15, 2024. Just a bit over a year ago there, Genie made an impact statement on behalf of the Bernstein family. She began by expressing her anger at Sam Woodward and his defense team, mainly for accusing Blaze without evidence of sexual misconduct and forcing the family to sit through a horrible six year wait. Jeannie closed her statement by speaking directly to Blaze, saying, quote, blaze, we did the best we could for you. We figured out who did this. We brought him to justice. We saw justice carried out. We kept this world safer. We also continue to make this world a better place in your honor. And for that, we are grateful. We love you, our sweet boy, and we will miss you always. After that, Sam was sentenced to life without parole. And Jeannie did keep her promise by making the world a little bit safer. In the wake of his sentencing, Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer issued a powerful statement. He said, quote, to hate someone simply for who they are is a hate like no other. It targets our identity and our self worth in an attempt to render us worthless. But every one of us has worth and meaning, and every one of us brings value to our collective table of who we all are. And who we want to be as a community. The acceptance of hate by one of us is a condemnation of all of us, because silence is what allows hate to flourish. In the wake of Blaze's murder, his parents have changed the Help Us Find Blaze Bernstein group on Facebook into a group that's meant to honor Blaze's life. Called Blaze it Forward, they ask everyone who comes across the group to honor blaze every January 17th by doing a random act of kindness in his name. Some have included paying for a stranger's groceries, things like buying gloves and socks for young unhoused men, and beautifying Borrego park, where Blaze ultimately died. At least one member was so inspired by the Blaze It Forward movement that he got a tattoo honoring the group. And the Bernsteins also created two funds. There's the Blaze Bernstein Memorial Fund and a scholarship fund that accept donations in Blaze's honor. The memorial fund supports charities that Blaise cared about, while the scholarship helps Orange county students who embody Blaise's values pay for college. Today, people who visit Borrego park bring hand painted stones honoring him and they add them all to a memorial display at the base of a tree across from where his body was found. It serves as a reminder that love always outshines hate.
- [71:11]
Morgan Abshur
And on that note, we move on to our Missing Person of the Week. This week we are highlighting the case of James jablonski. James was 13 at the time of his disappearance. He disappeared from Reedsburg, Wisconsin. The description we have is 5 11, 120 pounds, a half inch scar on the back of his neck. He was last seen June 12, 2023 at about 10:30pm when he was wearing red shoes, blue jeans, an unknown shirt and an unknown baseball cap.
- [71:44]
Kayla Moore
Video captured James leaving his home early in the morning of June 12, 2023 and then driving off in his father's van. The van was eventually seen parked along Highway 12 and Baraboo and about 100 yards into the forest next to the highway. Investigators did find a campsite that had closed toiletries and James's father's phone that James had on him. But James was nowhere to be found.
- [72:09]
Morgan Abshur
James's father, Bill, has done everything he can to keep getting the word out there, and he urges people to even reach out to him via email if you know anything. His email is william yablonskyahoo.com but anyone with information is asked to contact the Sauk County Sheriff's office at 608-355-4495 or the Sauk County Crime Stoppers at 1888, Tip S A UK otherwise known as 1-888-847-7285.
- [72:44]
Kayla Moore
And with that, I think that's all we have for this episode of Clues. Yes, we hope that you will remember Blaze the way that his family asked everyone to remember him by doing random acts of kindness and his memory. And if, if you've participated in the Blaze it Forward movement or something like it, you can let us know. On social media, we're always reading through the comments. We want to hear from you now. Your thoughts, your theories, feedback, all of that is what makes this community so special.
- [73:09]
Morgan Abshur
At Crime House, we value your support. So please again share your thoughts on social media and remember to rate, review and follow clues and subscribe, subscribe, subscribe to help others discover the show. That's it until next time, guys.
- [73:24]
Kayla Moore
Thanks guys.
- [73:25]
Morgan Abshur
Bye bye.
- [73:32]
Kayla Moore
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Morgan Abshur
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Kayla Moore
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Morgan Abshur
Cut the camera.
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Kayla Moore
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- [73:54]
Morgan Abshur
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