KIDNAPPED: Denise Huskins

Summary

Summary of "KIDNAPPED: Denise Huskins" – Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore

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Podcast Information:

• Title: Clues with Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore
• Host/Authors: Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore
• Episode: KIDNAPPED: Denise Huskins
• Release Date: June 11, 2025
• Description: Delving into the harrowing true crime case of Denise Huskins and Aaron Quinn, this episode explores the complexities, investigative failures, and eventual justice surrounding their kidnapping ordeal.

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Introduction

The episode begins with the hosts setting the tone for an intense exploration of a notorious crime case.

• Morgan Absher [00:00]: Opens with vivid imagery of the crime scene, mentioning items like a black ski mask, duct tape, and NyQuil.
• Kaelyn Moore [00:18]: Highlights the lack of visible signs of disturbance in Denise and Aaron’s home, emphasizing the unusual nature of the case.

Key Quote:

• Denise Huskins [02:35]: “They went on national news to say that this was all a hoax and we were liars. So I didn't trust anything that was given to me.”

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The Kidnapping Incident

On March 22, 2015, Denise Huskins and her boyfriend, Aaron Quinn, experience a terrifying home invasion.

• Aaron's 911 Call [02:14]: Aaron reports that they were awakened by intruders who tied them up, drugged them, and took Denise hostage.
• Intruders’ Behavior [07:00]: The assailant uses pre-recorded messages, administers sedatives (NyQuil and Diazepam), and demands $17,000 for Denise’s release.
• Denise’s Abduction [08:43 – 10:49]: Denise is moved to another location, faces threats of sexual assault, and is eventually dropped off near her childhood home in Huntington Beach.

Key Quotes:

• Morgan Absher [08:10]: “These aren’t just headphones playing music. They’re playing pre-recorded messages with instructions.”
• Denise Huskins [10:27]: “You’re staring up at a camera in a corner, seemingly watching me. I just got told if I do anything, it’s not going to end well.”

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Initial Police Response

The Vallejo Police Department (VPD) initially mishandles the investigation, casting doubt on Denise and Aaron's credibility.

• Skeptical Police [12:29 – 13:35]: Officers question Aaron’s sobriety and suggest he might be lying about the kidnapping.
• Detective Matt Mustard [17:13]: Exhibits blatant bias, suggesting Denise might be recreating past trauma and painting Aaron as a suspect.

Key Quotes:

• Detective Mustard [17:24]: “I’m going to tell them that I’m not looking for a live Denise. I’m looking for a dead Denise.”
• Morgan Absher [17:35]: “He’s trying to make you look like a monster.”

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Public Misinformation and Press Conference

As Denise reappears, the public narrative shifts unfavorably against her and Aaron.

• Denise’s Release [21:34 – 30:46]: Denise contacts authorities, confirms her kidnapping via a phone call, but VPD label it as a hoax.
• Media Influence [32:31]: The release coincides with the popularity of "Gone Girl," skewing public perception further.
• Death Threats and Public Scrutiny [33:02 – 37:50]: Denise and Aaron receive death threats as media portrays them as liars, leading to severe PTSD.

Key Quotes:

• Morgan Absher [33:03]: “They say Aaron and Denise owe the community an apology.”
• Kaelyn Moore [37:50]: “We’re stopping this.”

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Discovery of the Real Perpetrator

A critical breakthrough comes three months later, linking Denise’s kidnapping to a similar home invasion in Dublin.

• Dublin Home Invasion [42:07 – 43:54]: A similar pattern emerges, leading police to Matthew Mueller through evidence found at the scene.
• Detective Misty Karasu [43:54 – 46:26]: Connects the dots between Mueller’s discarded items and Denise’s case, leading to Mueller’s arrest.

Key Quotes:

• Detective Karasu [46:26]: “Denise is not a liar. She’s not Gone Girl in real life.”
• Morgan Absher [43:38]: “He’s leaving behind his cell phone, which is the most important thing.”

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Legal Proceedings and Arrest

Matthew Mueller is formally charged and convicted, but the path to justice is fraught with systemic failures.

• FBI Involvement [47:52 – 55:20]: FBI steps in after recognizing patterns, ultimately charging Mueller with multiple crimes.
• Conviction and Sentencing [55:20 – 57:00]: Mueller receives a 40-year sentence for kidnapping and life terms for other home invasions.

Key Quotes:

• Kayla Moore [57:15]: “He needs his badge revoked.”
• Morgan Absher [55:20]: “Matthew has been charged and convicted appropriately.”

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Aftermath and Apology

Denise and Aaron pursue justice beyond the courtroom, leading to a successful defamation lawsuit against VPD.

• Federal Complaint [63:31 – 64:32]: They sue Vallejo PD for defamation, highlighting wrongful accusations and resource wastage.
• Settlement and Apology [64:32 – 65:04]: Awarded $2.5 million and receive a partial apology from VPD, acknowledging harsh and offensive comments.

Key Quotes:

• Kaelyn Moore [64:32]: “They proved to be unnecessarily harsh and offensive.”
• Denise Huskins [64:32]: “We know that something worked eventually.”

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Detectives’ Roles: Good vs. Bad

The episode contrasts the negative actions of Detective Mustard with the commendable efforts of Detective Karasu.

• Detective Matt Mustard [56:28 – 58:14]: Accused of misconduct, bias, and obstructing justice throughout his career.
• Detective Misty Karasu [58:14 – 60:00]: Praised for her diligent work in connecting cases and bringing Mueller to justice.

Key Quotes:

• Morgan Absher [56:28]: “This man is a menace to society.”
• Kaelyn Moore [58:44]: “Detective Karasu cared deeply and was willing to work with the evidence.”

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Interview with Denise Huskins

Denise shares her journey post-kidnapping, advocating for better policing techniques and trauma-informed practices.

• Advocacy and Book Release [65:04 – 74:32]: Denise and Aaron publish “Victim F,” emphasizing the victim's perspective and the psychological impact of trauma.
• Science-Based Interviewing [75:23 – 85:32]: Denise discusses the importance of respectful, trauma-informed interviewing methods and critiques traditional, coercive police interrogation techniques.
• Personal Life and Healing [85:32 – 97:33]: Denise and Aaron marry, welcome two daughters, and continue advocacy work, focusing on supporting other victims and influencing law enforcement training.

Key Quotes:

• Denise Huskins [66:34]: “We wanted to show the victim’s experience because most people go through some kind of trauma and it impacts every aspect of their life.”
• Morgan Absher [79:43]: “It feels like a type of training that it would be useful to do every few years as a good reminder.”

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Conclusion

The episode wraps up by highlighting the resilience of Denise and Aaron, the systemic issues within law enforcement, and the ongoing need for advocacy and reform.

• Final Reflections [98:25 – End]: Denise emphasizes the role of respectful treatment in victim recovery and the importance of continuous education for law enforcement.
• Hope and Change [97:30 – End]: The couple remains dedicated to making a positive impact, inspiring others, and fostering better relationships between victims and police.

Key Quotes:

• Denise Huskins [99:03]: “Everyone plays a pivotal role in the victim's experience and what you do and say matters.”
• Kaelyn Moore [100:09]: “Thank you so much for jumping on with us.”

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Notable Quotes with Timestamps:

• Denise Huskins [02:35]: “They went on national news to say that this was all a hoax and we were liars. So I didn't trust anything that was given to me.”
• Morgan Absher [08:10]: “These aren’t just headphones playing music. They’re playing pre-recorded messages with instructions.”
• Detective Mustard [17:24]: “I’m going to tell them that I’m not looking for a live Denise. I’m looking for a dead Denise.”
• Detective Karasu [46:26]: “Denise is not a liar. She’s not Gone Girl in real life.”
• Denise Huskins [66:34]: “We wanted to show the victim’s experience because most people go through some kind of trauma and it impacts every aspect of their life.”
• Denise Huskins [99:03]: “Everyone plays a pivotal role in the victim's experience and what you do and say matters.”

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Final Thoughts:

"KIDNAPPED: Denise Huskins" is a compelling exploration of a tragic case marred by investigative shortcomings and public misjudgment. Through Denise and Aaron’s harrowing experience, the podcast underscores the critical need for empathy, proper training, and systemic reform within law enforcement to prevent future miscarriages of justice. The hosts, Morgan Absher and Kaelyn Moore, adeptly navigate the complexities of the case, providing listeners with a thorough understanding of both the human and procedural elements involved.

For those interested in delving deeper, Denise and Aaron’s book, "Victim F," offers an intimate recounting of their ordeal and ongoing advocacy efforts.

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Follow Clues Podcast on Instagram @CluesPodcast and YouTube @CluesPod for more engaging true crime stories.

Transcript

[Morgan Abshur]

FOREIGN this is Crime House. There's a black ski mask, duct tape, black gloves. There's zip ties, rope, a half empty bottle of NyQuil.

[Kayla Moore]

The cops don't really see any signs of disturbance in the home. There's no broken windows, there's no drawers that have been rummaged through.

[Morgan Abshur]

Even that's not, not enough to convince the authorities that this is real.

[Denise Huskins]

They went on national news to say that this was all a hoax and we were liars. So I didn't trust anything that was given to me.

[Kayla Moore]

They just see a 30 year old man sitting at his kitchen table saying that his girlfriend is missing.

[Denise Huskins]

FOREIGN.

[Morgan Abshur]

Welcome back to another episode of Clues Guys where we sneak past the crime scene tape to explore the key evidence behind some of the most gripping true crime cases.

[Kayla Moore]

And these aren't just ordinary cases. They're complex puzzles where forensic science, investigative techniques and sheer grit collide in order to uncover the truth and deliver justice. I'm Kayla Moore and I'll be the one digging into the timelines, the backstories and the court files released on these cases.

[Morgan Abshur]

And I'm your Internet sleuth, Morgan Abshur. I'm going to be diving into the clues that really break this case, looking at the details that add up or maybe don't and having read it, help us along the way.

[Kayla Moore]

Each week on Clues, we're going to discuss how even the smallest pieces of evidence, I'm talking microscopic fibers, partial fingerprints, even a single strand of hair or a pair of goggles could even lead to groundbreaking discoveries and may even bring long awaited justice. These clues shine a light on stories that have been waiting, sometimes for decades, to finally be heard. Some so join us as we uncover the breakthroughs, the heartbreak and the relentless pursuit of answers behind these unforgettable investigations.

[Morgan Abshur]

And as always at Crime House, we really value your support. So please be sure to share your thoughts on social media and remember to rate, review and follow clues to help others discover our show. And if you want bonus episodes, early access and ad free listening, join our Crime House plus community on Apple Podcasts.

[Kayla Moore]

Today we're talking about the case of Denise Huskins and erin Quinn. In 2015, police received a call that Denise and Aaron were awakened by home invaders, tied up, drugged, and Denise was eventually taken hostage. But the more investigators dug into this story, the more it seemed to be stranger than fiction.

[Morgan Abshur]

Investigators quickly honed in on Aaron. Was he indeed a victim or was this an elaborate story to cover up something darker? With the public quickly hailing this a real life gone girl and an innocent woman quickly got lost as the focus. Let's open this case and get to the real story and clues that brought it to justice. Summer's here and Nordstrom has everything you need for your best dress season ever. From beach days and weddings to weekend getaways in your everyday wardrobe. Discover stylish options under $100 from tons of your favorite brands like Mango Skims, Princess Polly and Madewell. It's easy, too, with free shipping and free returns in store. Order pickup and shop today in stores [e-mail] or download the Nordstrom app.

[Kayla Moore]

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[Morgan Abshur]

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[Kayla Moore]

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[Denise Huskins]

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[Kayla Moore]

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[Morgan Abshur]

It was, and I went into it not knowing anything and wow, was it a wild journey.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. Which we're going to talk about it today. But the doc doesn't even scratch the surface of some of the stuff that was happening in this case. It's a great way to hear Denise tell her story herself for there's a lot more going on that we're going to touch on today.

[Morgan Abshur]

A lot. And you got into her book?

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, we have her book. If you're watching on YouTube, you can see Denise's book. Actually, she wrote it with Aaron called Victim F, which is again, another great way to hear the story through her perspective and her words. She's also doing like a lot of victim advocacy. It's like really cool to see what she's been doing.

[Morgan Abshur]

Absolutely. So without further ado, let's get into this case before we do. For anyone who's watching this episode on YouTube, you'll see all the pictures and things we talk about. And don't worry if you're a listener because all of the images will be on our social media at Clues podcast on Instagram.

[Kayla Moore]

All right, let's set the scene a little bit. So on March 23, 2015, police officers from the city of Vallejo, California, just north of San Francisco, receive a 911 phone call. On the other end of the line, there's a 30 year old man, Aaron Quinn. He seems groggy and confused, not really panicky. But he tells the officers that the night before his girlfriend Denise Huskins was kidnapped. And the 911 operator looks at her clock and she can see that it's been 11 hours since. Aaron claims someone broke into their house and took Denise. And she asks him why he didn't call the night before. Well, Aaron says we were tied up and the intruders gave us sedatives. Police officers immediately get dispatched to the scene and they arrive at Aaron's house sometime around 2pm and, and when they get there, you know, they're already thinking this case is strange because the, the 911 call was strange. But the house seems even stranger because it was described as an intrusion and someone was kidnapped. But the cops don't really see any signs of disturbance in the home. There's no broken windows, there's no drawers that have been rummaged through. They just see a 30 year old man sitting at his kitchen table saying that his girlfriend is missing. Officers do notice a couple of strange things about the scene and they maybe take mental notes but it doesn't seem like there's much done about it. But they see that in the corner of one of the rooms in the living room there's a camera placed up like up in the corner up on, on the walls and there's tape outlining a box on the floor. But officers also see that there's glasses out and beer cans. And it seems like that's the thing that they're more concerned about in that moment.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, when you watch those tapes back of officers responding to Aaron's house, it is surprising the things they're questioning him on rather than, you know, more details specific to Denise. And I wouldn't want them to come to my house because I got a lot of glasses all over the place.

[Kayla Moore]

Right. And so they immediately start asking Aaron what happened. And Aaron says that the night before his girlfriend Denise had come over to stay the night. She's Aaron's age, she has a doctorate in physical therapy. She's so smart. Everyone that talks about her brings up how smart she is. And the two had met at work and the relationship had really progressed quickly over the last few months. Around 3am, after the couple had gone to sleep, they were still pretty groggy and all of a sudden they hear a strange man's voice coming from somewhere in the house. They kind of come to a little bit more and there's actually a man flashing a white light into their eyes and what looks to be lasers on the wall behind them, the light is so bright, the couple can't really see the man that well. But they can tell he's wearing a black ski mask, all black clothing, and it looks like he's carrying a weapon. Also, both Aaron and Denise get a sense that there's more than one person in the room, though they can only hear one person's voice. After waking them up, the man says in a calm and controlled voice that this is just a robbery. He doesn't want to hurt them. When the man tells the couple to go over to the closet, they do it. They don't really think that if they don't. They think that if they pay attention and follow his rules, that everything will be fine. But then the guy does something really strange. He actually takes out these blacked out swim goggles and he makes them put them over their eyes and. And then he puts headphones over their ears.

[Morgan Abshur]

And this is an interesting clue in the case, these headphones. Because these aren't just headphones playing music. They're playing these pre recorded messages with instructions. So clearly this is premeditated. This is planned. Yeah, it's this weird autotune voice telling them to stay calm. But the voice also says they're both about to be drugged and then they'll have to answer questions about their personal history and their finances. After the recording's done, the intruder comes back to the closet. He gives them both sedatives in a liquid form, a mix of Nyquil and Diazepam.

[Kayla Moore]

I remember reading, too, that he even asked them if they were allergic to either of those things before he gave it to them. Like he. He also just has these weird quirks about him as he's going about this.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah. Which is so interesting because, I don't know, it's not something you would expect a robber to do, like asking you if you have any contraindications to why you can't have this medication.

[Kayla Moore]

Right.

[Morgan Abshur]

It's interesting, but Denise and Aaron drink it. And then the guy takes Aaron to another room. He asks Aaron a bunch of questions, including his bank account numbers, his passwords, and personal and family info. But oddly enough, he doesn't seem to be asking Denise any questions. Instead, at some point, she's actually moved downstairs to the living room. She's sitting there on a couch, still tied up, wearing those blacked out goggles, when she hears the main guy speak to her. He says, there's a little bit of a problem. And then he tells her, quote, this wasn't meant for you. The man Says he thought Denise was actually Andrea, Aaron's ex. They both have long blonde hair and look pretty similar. So he tells Denise he needs a minute to figure out what to do. Clearly not a part of his plan. Eventually, the guy comes back with Aaron and tells them they're going to take Denise to another location for 48 hours and Aaron will have to complete a set of tasks in order to get Denise back.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, one of those things that he says is that Aaron's going to have to pay $17,000 for Denise's release. And he also mentions that he has installed surveillance cameras around home and is going to be watching his every move. And if Aaron tries to go to the police, he says that Denise will die. Then the intruder carries Denise to the trunk of his car, still blindfolded, and drives off into the night, leaving Aaron behind.

[Morgan Abshur]

Beyond terrifying. I can't even imagine.

[Kayla Moore]

And remember, he's like, fighting off sedatives because he was given the Diazepam and nyquil. So eventually he just passes out. There's not much he could do. And his hands are still tied and.

[Morgan Abshur]

He'S staring up at a camera in a corner, seemingly watching him. He just got told if you do anything, it's not going to end well.

[Kayla Moore]

Right.

[Morgan Abshur]

So all you can do is sit and wait. And so after the sedatives wear off, Aaron does eventually wake up. Around 11am on March 23. He manages to untie himself, checks his phone and sees that there's an email from the kidnapper. Email says that Aaron needs to go to the bank and get the money. Once he hands it over, they'll bring Denise back at a different time, which makes Aaron really nervous. What if he gives them the cash and then they don't bring Denise back? And that's when it really dawns on him. The kidnappers told him to not call the police, but they didn't say he couldn't call someone else for help. And as it turns out, Aaron's brother is actually an FBI agent. But when he gets his brother on the phone, he tells Aaron that he should absolutely call 91 1. Forget whatever the kidnappers told you. Call help now.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, you're not going to be able to settle that on your own.

[Morgan Abshur]

No. You're in over your head. So Aaron does call the police, and that's when the two Vallejo officers arrive at his house a little after 2pm so it's been about 11 hours since the intruders first broke in. The police hear this whole story and remember they saw that his house looks Relatively undisturbed. No forced entry, no broken windows. How did they get in? Well, looks like they walked through the door. And they are immediately really skeptical of this story Aaron is telling them. So one of the first things police ask Aaron is, were you drugged? And he says, yeah, and then explains the whole situation with the nyquil and everything. But they then proceed to ask Aaron if he was partying. And they really hone in on this. They notice those beer cans and how many drinks did you have? And do you take drugs recreationally?

[Kayla Moore]

And yeah, it looks like you were drinking last night.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, they're really starting to ask questions that it's clear where their. Where their thoughts are already going. And now Aaron insists, no, of course we weren't partying. I don't use drugs. That's not. That's not the case here. It's clear the police who are at Aaron's house kind of have a different idea than what Aaron's telling them. And, you know, he is already taking a risk by calling police, especially after this kidnapper told him, do not contact anyone. So when officers ask him to come down to the station, he of course says yes. He feels this is the best course of action. He just wants to do anything to get Denise home safely.

[Kayla Moore]

I remember in the inner or in the Netflix documentary, he also talks about how he's from, like, a nice neighborhood in Northern California. He was raised that, like, if you call the police, they will help you. He was. And so as we get further into his story, like, there's a few times where it seems like, hey, maybe you should get a lawyer. But, like, he really. That did not cross his mind.

[Morgan Abshur]

I mean, his brother is an FBI agent.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

The law was seemingly your friend.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, exactly.

[Morgan Abshur]

But when Aaron arrives that afternoon on March 23, they put him in an interrogation room. They even ask him to change out of his clothes. And they put him in prison clothes, striped pants and all.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

Right away it's clear they're sending a message. And things quickly get way more intense.

[Kayla Moore]

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[Denise Huskins]

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[Morgan Abshur]

Aaron is actually in this interrogation room for the next 18 hours. And I've watched a lot of this footage. It's in the Netflix documentary Aaron's Retelling how these Interviews went. It is intense.

[Denise Huskins]

The story you're telling here.

[Morgan Abshur]

I'm buying it all.

[Denise Huskins]

You got to think about how this.

[Kayla Moore]

Is all gonna play out.

[Morgan Abshur]

Anything to think about. I'm telling you what.

[Denise Huskins]

Listen to me. There ain't no frogman came into your house, nobody dressed in wetsuits, or it didn't happen.

[Morgan Abshur]

There's a detective named Matt Mustard, and he really goes in on Aaron from the beginning. Detective Mustard starts asking Aaron more questions about his relationship with Denise. And he learned something that makes him even more skeptical of Aaron. See, last night when Denise was over, the two were kind of sorting through a previous fight of theirs. It turns out that about seven months into the relationship in early 2015, Denise learned that Aaron was still talking to his ex fiance, Andrea. However, Aaron and Andrea had broken up in early 2014 when he learned that she had been cheating on him. A few months later is when he actually started dating Denise. And early on, he was kind of like, no, I don't. I don't know if I'm ready. I'm still kind of conflicted with my feelings. But, you know, Denise said she could tell he was a really good guy and wanted to give this a shot. And Aaron really made it seem like he was over his ex fiance and he was turning over a new leaf and starting this new relationship. So when Denise learned that he was still texting his ex, she's pissed, and rightfully so. She kind of says to Aaron, at this point, I need to know if you're actually committed to our relationship or not, and sort of gives him this ultimatum. And on the night of March 22, 2015, Denise goes over to his house in this part of Vallejo called Mare island so they can talk it out. She brings pizza, they have a couple beers. They have this really long and emotional conversation. And it seems like they both come out of it feeling really good. Aaron tells her he's Fully committed to her. Denise is willing to give him another chance. And this is what Aaron is telling detectives. Really trying to paint the picture of the night before.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. Thinking that if he, like, gives them this information, they'll see a bigger picture of how beautiful their relationship is.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah. I mean, every relationship goes through struggle and growing pain. Like, it's not abnormal. And he's being very forthcoming with them.

[Kayla Moore]

But that is not how this detective took this. No, no.

[Morgan Abshur]

Mustard took this as there was tension in the relationship and was really persistent. Asking Aaron if he was cheating Went so far. And this is one of the most inappropriate things I think he kind of alluded to, but he's like, oh, maybe you called the wrong name during sex. And Denise got mad.

[Denise Huskins]

Really.

[Morgan Abshur]

Really making a lot of strong accusations.

[Kayla Moore]

That's a leap. Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

And being inappropriate.

[Kayla Moore]

Right.

[Morgan Abshur]

You have someone telling you everything. Very forthcoming. So a little odd to me. And Aaron starts to get the impression that it's not going that well with this Detective Mustard. He notices that he's not really taking any notes down, even as, like, Aaron's giving him very specific details. And eventually it becomes very clear why. Mustard looks Aaron in the eyes and tells him that he doesn't believe the story coming out of Aaron's mouth. He thinks Denise is actually dead and wants Aaron to stop lying. He actually says to him, quote, I'm going to tell them that I'm not looking for a live Denise. I'm looking for a dead Denise. Further goes on to tell Aaron, quote, the frogmen obviously didn't do it. So who did it now? Well, it's the guy that I've been sitting here talking to tonight. So now I get out my puzzle pieces, and I start figuring it out, okay, how do I make it so you look like a monster?

[Kayla Moore]

How do I manipulate the situation so you look like a monster?

[Morgan Abshur]

You are supposed to be interviewing a victim, and this is the path you take.

[Kayla Moore]

Well, he's already made up his mind, and he's clearly just trying to fit the pieces to, like, fit whatever he thinks happened.

[Morgan Abshur]

Puzzle master.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

As he says. And Aaron just kind of asks, where do we go from here? And after hours and hours of already being in this room, Mustard just says, I don't know. I'm gonna. I'm going to take a break, and I'm going to figure it out. This kind of game goes back and forth of Aaron being left alone in the room. These accusations. It's very stressful to the point where you can kind of see Aaron's breaking down. He's like, what has happened? Like, did I forget something? Like what? He's genuinely starting to crumble because he.

[Kayla Moore]

Still thinks that the police are good guys that are going to help him.

[Morgan Abshur]

And all the while, Mustard and other officers are really hoping he'll finally cave and confess. But Aaron insists he didn't do it. His girlfriend is out there somewhere, probably alive, and he needs to get her home immediately. After a few more hours of this back and forth, Aaron's like, I want to talk to my brother. Bring. Bring my brother in here. What Mustard hasn't told him is that his brother has been at the station this entire time.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. Just withheld that from him.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah. I mean, these guys are thinking this is another Lacy Peterson case, and they aren't even going to look elsewhere. They've got their guy.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. They're like, oh, we already solved this.

[Morgan Abshur]

They've. So they think. So. Aaron's brother comes in to see him. He says that he knows Aaron is telling the truth, but that they need to get a lawyer asap.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. Finally, someone tells him to get a lawyer.

[Morgan Abshur]

Thank God, because Aaron is now being considered as a suspect in Denise's supposed murder. As Aaron starts to find representation, Denise's family actually makes their way up to Vallejo, where there is about to be a huge break in this case. Our first really big clue arises when a video of Denise being held hostage is emailed to a local reporter. Reporter gets it to the police. And in this video, Denise states her name, said that she's been kidnapped. She talks about some relevant news items that have been happening, and overall just seems to remain really calm, which has people speculating a lot more. The police, the reporter, everyone that sees this. How is she so calm? Is she staging this for some reason? Again, people are very confused by this. And this is where Denise's mom shares something that Detective Mustard says to her. He asked, has anything ever happened to Denise as a child? And her mom thinks about it for a second and just goes, well, yeah, there was this, you know, this time when she was molested as a child. And Mustard goes so far as to suggest Denise could be faking this whole kidnapping, this whole thing, as a way to relive what happened to her in the past.

[Kayla Moore]

And he tells that to her mother.

[Morgan Abshur]

Her mother. And he has since denied this, but her mom has been very vocal in telling this, talks about it in the Netflix documentary, and it is. I just don't see how you would pull that out of thin air.

[Kayla Moore]

No, no, it's. That's like one of the most heartbreaking parts of the whole documentary. The case is already shaping up to be pretty strange, and the general public doesn't know really what to make of it. And it only gets stranger from this point, because on March 25, 2015, 48 hours after this entire saga started, and also 400 miles away from Vallejo, police officers in Huntington Beach, California, get a 911 call that makes this case so much more baffling. They say that a woman calls them and explains that she's with her neighbor, a woman who is 30 years old, blonde, named Denise Huskins, and she's claiming that the kidnappers have returned her. So this shocks police in Huntington beach because this was a story throughout California. Like, every police pries inch knew about this. And once they hear the name Denise Huskins, they're like, oh, my God. And they contact the detectives up in Vallejo, and they basically tell Denise, like, you have to go back up to Vallejo and talk to the detectives up there so that they can start putting this together. So that's what she does. She goes up and she meets with Detective Mustard in Vallejo, and she starts filling in the gaps for investigators as to what happened after she was taken out of Aaron's home. She says that whoever was talking this, like, person who went into their house scooped her up and placed her in the trunk of a car. She said she was fully going into survival mode. And remember, she's a really smart person. Everyone talks about how smart she is. So as she's in the trunk of this car. And remember, she's fighting off the sedatives, too. But she has enough wherewithal to be like, I have to try to remember all the turns that the car is taking, like, what the texture of the road feels like, because maybe I'll be able to retrace my steps. But eventually, the sedatives do win, and Denise falls asleep in the trunk of the car. She wakes up eventually, and she thinks it's maybe been a few hours. She feels the car come to a stop. Then, because she's wearing the goggles, she can't really see anything. But she hears the trunk pop, as if someone's opening it. And then she feels two arms scoop under her body, lift her up and carry her into a house. While she's in there, she gets untied. And the voice, same voice that she heard in Aaron's home, tells her that she's allowed to take a shower. After that, he leaves the room. But he does tell her before he leaves that she can finally take her goggles off. She takes the goggles off. She looks around. She's just in this, like, normal bedroom. There's, like, nothing in it, really. He actually did say something to her, like, he wants to give her privacy because, quote, he doesn't want to dehumanize her more than he has to. And that is something that really, like, raises flags for her because. What do you mean, dehumanize me more than you have to?

[Morgan Abshur]

You just kidnapped me out of. Of my boyfriend's house.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, yeah. It's like you've already dehumanized me and. What do you mean you have to?

[Morgan Abshur]

Okay.

[Kayla Moore]

Like, there's just so many things about that phrasing that's just so weird.

[Morgan Abshur]

Would have stuck out as odd to me too.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. And so she really is just, like, kind of going into that mode of, like, I think I need to do what this guy says or he's gonna really hurt me.

[Morgan Abshur]

Well, she's in shock. I'm sure she's in shock.

[Kayla Moore]

And she's still like, I don't know. When I take Nyquil, I'm groggy for, like, three days. So she's still feeling that. So she ends up taking the shower. But when she's done, she puts the goggles back on because she doesn't want to risk it. The guy eventually takes her to a bedroom where he ties her to a bed with zip ties and a bike lock. He gives her more drugs in that same liquid form, and then he just kind of leaves for a while. At some point that same afternoon, March 23rd, still, her kidnapper finally comes back to where he's keeping Denise. And she still has these blacked out goggles on. She really can't see the person she's talking to. She has no idea where she is. But one thing about this kidnapper is he loves to yap. And he starts just talking at her, and he's telling her all of this information. He says that he is part of this organization. It's a black market startup company that collects personal and corporate debts. He doesn't really elaborate on that organization much, but he does tell her at one point that he used to be in the military, and now he actually suffers ptsd. To Denise, she doesn't really know what to believe. Like, he says he's in the military, and that sounds like it could be real. But then he's telling her about this, like, black market organization that doesn't. He can't really give that many details about. So that feels like it's maybe made up. She doesn't know if there's other people involved or if it's just him. Remember, she said that there were, like, multiple people in the house, but now it's just him in this house. So she. It's just, like, very confusing for her.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah. And how much credibility does your kidnapper have?

[Kayla Moore]

Right. And on top of that, remember, he said that he didn't want to dehumanize her, but at some point, he comes in and he tells her that he needs something to blackmail her with. And he says that the group he's with decided that they need to force Denise to have sex with one of them and record it as a safeguard. And after she hears that, she kind of gives up any hope that this person is telling the truth. She knows that this is completely out of her control. There's, like, really nothing she can do to win over this person. He's making up the rules as he goes. And it just, like, it kind of gets scarier from that point on. The guy also says if Denise tries to go to the police after they release her, he's gonna put the video on the Internet. And so, like, it's really important that they have this piece of blackmail. She feels totally helpless at this moment, but she goes along with it again. There's nothing she can do. And the sexual assault really doesn't end on day one. The following afternoon on March 24th, he comes back and he tells her that the video they recorded wasn't convincing enough this time, it needs to look like she's in love with him. And so he has them do it again. And according to Denise, she felt the need to, quote, perform to save her life. And at this point, she's going along with what this guy says because she doesn't know what else to do. But like I said, she decided that this guy's a liar. And she knows now that she has to get out of there. At one point, when he leaves the room, she has her goggles off, and she's looking around for anything she can use as a weapon to fight him off, just something she can do to take control of the situation. And she realizes there's nothing. And she's starting to, like, really give up hope. But she realizes, like, she's just gonna have to find another way to survive. So by 2am on March 25, it's been about 48 hours since her abduction. And Denise Huskins kidnapper wakes her up again, scoops her up in his arms, and carries her outside to a car. He removes the goggles that she's been wearing pretty much this whole time when he's been in the room, he tapes her eyes shut and he gives her sunglasses to put on top. Plus he gives her more of the sedatives he's been using. As the car ride starts, at this point, Denise has no idea where she's being taken. She can't help but fall asleep because she's fighting off the sedatives. It's not working. And again, she wakes up and she feels like it's been a few hours. So she feels the car stop. And then the kidnapper tells her that they've arrived at their destination. And she doesn't know what that means, but he says he's ready to release her. But before he does, he says that he knows she's going to try to talk to the police. But there are two things that she absolutely cannot tell them. One, she can't say that he and the others in the group are involved with the military. That's a big no. And two, she can't say that they've had sex. The kidnapper also warns her he knows where her family lives. He'll be watching them and her if she makes any wrong moves. Then once again scoops Denise out of the car, removes the zip ties, tells her to count to 10. And when she's finished counting, she removes the tape from her eyes and sees that she's in Huntington Beach, California, nearly seven hours from her home in Vallejo. But she realizes she's now on the very same street that she grew up on. And that's where her mom and dad still live, actually. And she can't believe this when she sees that.

[Morgan Abshur]

No, it's insane, because again, this was not his target.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, right.

[Morgan Abshur]

And so for him in those two short days to research and find out where her parents live, it kind of shows how dangerous he could potentially be.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, he's just like looking her up. He's figuring out information on her.

[Morgan Abshur]

Very jarring.

[Kayla Moore]

Drops her at her parents house, which is terrifying. She stumbles down the street. She makes her way to her parents front door, but no one's home. They were like on a trip at that point or some, but they just like weren't at home in Huntington Beach. So she goes and she actually knocks on her neighbor's door. And her neighbor answers. And she is so shocked and relieved to see Denise because she's been all over the news for the last two days as a missing person, a possible kidnapped person. They end up calling the Huntington beach police Officers who come to the scene. Denise tells them the whole story. But one thing that the officers do ask while they're there talking to her is if she had been sexually assaulted. And in Denise's mind, she remembers that, like, that's the one thing the kidnapper said to not tell anyone about. She can't say that they've had sex. So she decides in that moment to not say anything about that. They ask her if she's been sexually assaulted, and she says no. On the record. She lies to the police. And unfortunately, as we've kind of discussed in this case already, the police had these really weird misconceptions about sexual assaults, like saying that she was trying to relive the thrill of being molested.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah.

[Kayla Moore]

In this case, telling the police officers, no, I haven't been sexually assaulted. When you have, that's really going to hurt Denise later on in the investigation. After that, the police end up getting in contact with Denise's parents, who were actually up in Vallejo. And that night, at around 8:30, Denise gets on a flight to fly back up to Vallejo and be reunited with everyone. And when she lands, she actually sees that the Vallejo police are in the middle of a press conference because they've been informed as to what's happening. The Huntington police got in contact with them. And this press conference really changes everything in this investigation because now that Denise is clearly alive, there's no murder charges. So the police have to come forward and say that something else happened. And you would maybe think that a detective like Matt Mustard would go and see that Denise was alive and say, oh, wow. Our initial assumptions of this case were wrong. I assumed she was dead. I assumed she had been murdered by her boyfriend. But now that she's alive, we can actually investigate this whole thing.

[Denise Huskins]

Right.

[Kayla Moore]

I was wrong. Let's actually look into what happened. But that's not what happens at all. Instead, he doubles down on the fact that he was right. He thinks that the evidence now indicates that this was, quote, an orchestrated event and not a kidnapping. And he thinks that Denise and Aaron have staged this entire thing.

[Morgan Abshur]

Absolutely absurd to make that claim, to start putting that implication out there before really interviewing her. You know, I watched a lot of different news clips from this time where, you know, they show surveillance of her walking up to the neighbor's door and all this stuff. And, like, the police start sewing these. These seeds in the media's mind that Denise isn't cooperating with them.

[Kayla Moore]

Right.

[Morgan Abshur]

Further, kind of pushing this story that she doesn't want to talk to them because she planned it herself.

[Kayla Moore]

She's lying.

[Morgan Abshur]

She's lying.

[Kayla Moore]

She doesn't want to be caught in her lie.

[Morgan Abshur]

It's during these same press conferences that authorities actually start to paint Aaron as a liar as well. They're saying he's in on this, that they can't substantiate his claims about the kidnapping. And they go so far in this conference to accuse Denise and Aaron of wasting police resources and taking attention away from real victims. Real.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

They say Aaron and Denise owe the community an apology. You owe us an apology. Actually. Denise knows this isn't true. Aaron knows this isn't true. But the rest of the country actually seem like they start agreeing with the police after the press conference. All of these articles come out about the kidnapping, all of these news stories and these reporters are, are saying Denise is a real life version of the book and movie Gone Girl, which that.

[Kayla Moore]

It cannot be overstated how much of a cultural impact Gone Girl had at this time. Because in 2015, the movie had just come out and the book was out the year before and it was everywhere. It was like the biggest thing. Everyone I knew was reading that book. And in the book she's also this like pretty, blonde, upper middle class woman who gets bored with life and runs away. And so not only are the police like, oh my God, it's just like this movie I just saw with my wife this weekend. Like everyone in the country feels like that they're just like. Because it's top of mind with everyone. And so I almost feel like this would not be, this case wouldn't be unfolding this way if that movie hadn't come out that year. Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. With the price of just about everything going up, we thought we'd bring our prices down. So to help us, we brought in a reverse auctioneer, which is apparently a thing. Mint Mobile unlimited premium wireless. 30, 30 better get 30, better get 20. 20, 20 get 20, 20 better get.

[Morgan Abshur]

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[Kayla Moore]

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[Morgan Abshur]

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[Denise Huskins]

Speed slow after 35 gigabytes of network's busy. Taxes and fees extra.

[Morgan Abshur]

See mint mobile.com because of all this media, Denise is getting death threats. Before long, she's also starting to question her own sanity. I mean, she just went through this insane amount of trauma and now you have people calling you a liar, sending you death threats, comparing you to a blockbuster movie. She also really starts to feel like she can't trust police. And who could blame her? She doesn't really want to tell them anything. And at this point, she's really, really terrified that anything she does say will be weaponized and used against her. You know, she does get an attorney. And this attorney really does say, like, denise, this is the only real way to put this behind you to move forward. She does open up about the sexual assault. And so her attorney broaches this topic with police, like, hey, let's, you know, meet at the hospital. We'll get this sexual assault kit performed. Like, let's really investigate. And police kind of tell her attorney, like, well, have her come in. We'll interview her, and then if we deem it necessary, we'll do that.

[Kayla Moore]

But you have to do those kits fast. Right? Like, you can't shower before you do the kit.

[Morgan Abshur]

Like, time is of the essence. And they're essentially telling her to sit as she is. Don't shower after this horrible experience.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, maybe don't change your clothes. Just come on down and talk to us.

[Morgan Abshur]

No, it wasn't. It wasn't being taken very seriously.

[Kayla Moore]

But she still wants to cooperate with the investigation. So she does go to the police station to talk to them. And the very next day, that's where she goes to tell detective Mustard everything. Kind of as expected. At this point, he does not seem empathetic at all about what she went through. Instead, he starts asking her questions, like, well, did you think about fighting back? Did you think about escaping? And we've already talked about this. Like, she was looking around the. Yeah, mark. That as botched. She was looking around the room looking for a weapon. Like, she, in her mind, was gearing up to be like, if I have to kill this guy, how am I going to do it? But that's not enough for detective Mustard. He's like. He needs her to say to him in this moment, like, no, I didn't fight back, or, yes, I fought back. Like, whatever he's looking for, that's irrelevant.

[Morgan Abshur]

When you are in that situation, everyone handles this so, like. Like, so differently. Under stress, under trauma, like, yeah, to ask a victim these questions, no, it's really horrible.

[Kayla Moore]

I was looking up, like, sexual assault, common sexual assault, misconceptions in law enforcement and in education and just, like, all, like, misconceptions that people have about it. And some of the most common misconceptions are that, like, you can just fight it off, or, like, it's not really an assault unless it was like, like violent. And so there is all this evidence that you're more likely to have an assaulter prosecuted if, like, you're covered in bruises. And Denise wasn't. So it doesn't look like it was forced. Right. And so then there's, like, also not evidence that she, like, fought back, and they're, like, holding that against her. It's just, like, this really horrible situation.

[Morgan Abshur]

Terrible.

[Kayla Moore]

He keeps grilling her with these, like, really horrible re. Traumatizing questions. And even Denise's lawyer at that point starts realizing, like, this is not working out for her and things are really starting to go south. He basically tells everyone, like, we're stopping this.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, we're done here.

[Kayla Moore]

We're like, we can't move forward with this. And now Denise feels like she can't trust anyone because every time she tries to help the police or talk to Mustard, it's just, like, making the situation worse at this point, too, you know, like, the whole world is starting to feel like she's lying. But there's one person, and this is so weird, there is one person who really insists that she's telling the truth, and it is truly the last person you'd suspect. Which brings us to another clue that we have emails.

[Morgan Abshur]

We have emails. After that press conference on March 25, a crime reporter at the San Francisco Chronicle named Henry Lee gets a message. It's from huskinskidnappingotmail.com and it says, quote, Ms. Huskins was absolutely kidnapped. We did it.

[Kayla Moore]

You can't make this stuff up.

[Morgan Abshur]

The author claimed to speak for a group of male professional thieves based in Mare island, where Aaron lives. It went on to say that after spending time with Denise, they were ashamed and, quote, unspeakably sorry about what they did. The author even said the group was upset that she was now being victimized by the police. This author, her kidnapper, so upset over the police's treatment that he sends an.

[Kayla Moore]

Email, wants the police to know it was true and they did it, which is just very strange.

[Morgan Abshur]

Henry is shocked. This reporter is like, I've never seen anything like this. I mean, it's hard to believe a real criminal would risk getting caught just to defend their victim. I mean, you guys, this is 2015. We have the ability to track emails.

[Kayla Moore]

I know IP addresses. You can figure out exactly where it's being sent from. So the fact that, yeah, they're just shooting off emails to investigators and reporters is crazy.

[Morgan Abshur]

So Henry passes the email on to the police. But even that's not enough to convince the authorities that this is real. They actually think Denise and Aaron wrote the email.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, and don't really look into it past that.

[Morgan Abshur]

Botched, botched. I know. I'm like, I forgot to do it at the beginning, guys. Don't yell at me. So I'm like, I know. We have the fact they didn't believe Aaron.

[Kayla Moore]

Someone in the comments like, keep count, keep count.

[Morgan Abshur]

Keep the tally for me. Just insane. And luckily, these messages don't stop there. On March 28th, Henry receives another email. This one is from noneoware.com and it actually has photos attached, including one of the room where Denise was actually held captive. Like the first email, the kidnapper says he's furious with police for doubting Denise. Once again, Henry forwards the email to the Vallejo Police Department. But still, they have made up their minds. They think it's all a part of Denise and Aaron's elaborate hoax.

[Kayla Moore]

And as Henry the reporter is desperately trying to get the police to listen, Denise and Aaron still hadn't seen each other at this point. Their lawyers actually told them to wait until the heat died down, because, I mean, that makes sense. If they're seen together, it could be seen as colluding. After seeing how the police reacted, though, it seems like Denise and Aaron just can't wait anymore. So finally, on April 1, which was a full week after the kidnapping, they meet up at a local Vallejo hotel. Aaron's terrified about how Denise is going to react. She just went through this hugely traumatizing thing. He doesn't know how she's going to be, but honestly, she's just glad to see him. When they finally meet up, she collapses into his arms and they both just stand there and cry because the whole world seems to think that they're liars, but. But they know that they're victims and they're in this together. For the next two months, all throughout April and May of 2015, Denise and Aaron continue to be painted as liars by the police and the media. And if that's not bad enough, they're both really suffering from PTSD. Most nights, they'll wake up at 3am, which was the time of the attack. Their hearts are pounding in their chests. Denise actually sleeps with a hammer or a knife near her bed. They're both too traumatized to go back to work. They really can't function in their everyday lives.

[Morgan Abshur]

No. And you also get the impression that their work doesn't really want them there either. Like, there's so much scrutiny and people talking about them and saying they're liars. And this is a hoax. Aaron even mentioned in one interview that he started to feel pushed out of his job.

[Kayla Moore]

I can't even imagine, like you probably can't go out in public at all at that point because people recognize you and just think you're a liar. Aaron and Denise are also not entirely ready to give up yet because they know that there's actual perpetrators out there and they start to get really worried that these people or this person, whoever it was that did this, might attack again. Turns out they're not wrong because on June 5, 2015, three months after the attack on Denise and Aaron, there was a home invasion in Dublin, which is an eastern suburb in the bay area. At 3:30am the same time as Denise and Aaron's attack, an intruder breaks into the home of a middle aged couple who live with their adult daughter. Same thing. They're woken up by flashlights pointed in their eyes, lasers pointed at the wall. The intruder is wearing a black ski mask and all black clothing. And he says to them, quote, we have your daughter and she's safe. Similar to what he what happened with Denise and Aaron. He tries to tie them up, but the husband gets out of bed and just starts swinging on the guy, just really starts fighting back. And the wife is actually able to run away and she locks herself in the bathroom of their bedroom and the husband screams, go get our gun. They didn't have a gun. But even just saying that was enough for the intruder to flee the home, never ended up touching the daughter. Didn't really get involved with the family at all, just flees the home. But in his panic, he actually left a few things behind. And this becomes is really, really, really big.

[Morgan Abshur]

After the attack, the family In Dublin calls 911 and officers rush over. They notice that the perpetrator left behind a few pieces of evidence, including three zip ties, a black wool glove. But most importantly, he left behind his cell phone.

[Kayla Moore]

I don't want to hear that he's part of some black ops operation if he's leaving behind his cell phone, which is like the most important thing.

[Morgan Abshur]

Police traced the phone back to a woman who says, yeah, that phone belongs to my son. And she gives them a name, Matthew Mueller. Apparently he's been staying at their family cabin in South Lake Tahoe, just a couple of hours away. Dublin police get a search warrant and three days later, on June 8, they pay a visit to the cabin. There's only one person there, a man who looks to be in his late 30s who identifies himself as Matthew Mueller. When the officers place him under arrest. Matthew doesn't argue. He's cooperative and says he actually knows why they're there. And once he's in the police cruiser, another detective named Misty Karasu takes a look around the cabin. And that's when she finds a bunch of really concerning stuff. There's a black ski mask, duct tape, black gloves. There's zip ties, rope, a half empty bottle of nyquil. Detective Karasu takes all of this into evidence. But there's one other place she wants to look. You see, there's a white Ford Mustang parked outside near the cabin. She goes, pops open the trunk, where she finds our fourth clue. In the trunk are swim goggles with black duct tape covering the lenses. And there, caught in the tape, is a long strand of blonde hair. She also finds some Nerf guns painted black and a male blow up doll dressed in black. Now, Detective Kerasu was already convinced the home invasion in Dublin was not Matthew Mueller's first crime. But when she sees this hair, she realizes there has to be another victim out there. And she's blonde. The hair has got the wheels turning for Detective Karasu. And after looking through the rest of this car, she's wondering, is this actually his car? So she runs it through a database, and it turns out the car is actually stolen. It belongs to a medical student who lives in Vallejo on Mare Island. He reported it missing in March 2015, right around the same exact time that Denise Huskins went missing. And when Detective Karasu looks at the Denise Huskins case, everything clicks into place for her. Not only does she have blonde hair, the details of the kidnapping sound a lot like what happened to the family in Dublin. Detective Carisu feels it in her bones. Denise is not a liar. She's not Gone girl in real life. And Matthew Mueller is the man who actually took her hostage.

[Kayla Moore]

Once Detective Carisu has this realization, she immediately calls Vallejo Police Department. She tells them that she is a person of interest in the Dublin home invasion who might also be involved in the Denise Huskins case. And it takes a while for her to get someone on the phone and take her seriously about this, but when she finally does, they apparently tell her that, oh, the case has been handed over to the FBI, so she's going to have to contact them if she wants anyone to look at this. So she does. Detective Caruso contacts them next, and thankfully, they do agree to look into Matthew Mueller. They send someone over to collect all of the evidence from Detective Caruso's team, including what was in the car and what was in the cabin. But that's when they realize that they've made a mistake. This whole time, the FBI was siding with the Vallejo Police Department. Now they're starting to realize maybe they shouldn't have been. On June 23, three months to the day since Denise was taken hostage, the FBI meets with the Dublin police, and they discuss the similarities between Denise's kidnapping and the Dublin home invasion. And both parties agree that the evidence is overwhelming. These two cases are definitely related to each other, and they need to expand the scope of their investigation. Six days later, on June 29, the FBI gets an arrest warrant from Matthew Mueller. And while he's in jail facing charges for the Dublin kidnapping, they also charge him with Denise's kidnapping.

[Morgan Abshur]

Now let's talk about who Matthew Mueller is. He actually has a pretty wild backstory and seemingly is coming out of left field. Matthew Mueller was born in 1977, which makes him almost 38 at the time of the kidnapping. He grew up in the suburbs of Sacramento and joined the Marines after high school. There is that military clue. He told Denise.

[Kayla Moore]

There was a military connection.

[Morgan Abshur]

He was honorably discharged for some mental health issues and eventually went back to school.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, I remember reading that he, like, really suffered from bipolar disorder. He would have intense depressive episodes while he was in the military.

[Morgan Abshur]

He was really struggling, having active hallucinations and a lot of paranoia. But he was able to get his undergraduate degree from Pomona College, and then he went on to Harvard Law School. He gets married, he's working as an immigration attorney, even moves to Silicon Valley to work for a law firm there. But around 2008, 2009, his life really starts unraveling. He's really struggling with his mental health again. And a couple of Years later, in 2012, his wife divorces him. Shortly after that, he's also disbarred, and he cannot work as a lawyer anymore. Clearly going through a lot. And he's not getting the help he so desperately needs. For the next couple of years, he bounces around California doing odd jobs like tutoring kids after school. And in early 2014, he lands on Mare island in Vallejo. He moves into a house that was actually a block away from Aaron's house. He starts dating someone new. But she leaves him later that year. And that breakup sends Matthew into an even deeper spiral. In early 2015, he moves into his parents cabin in South Lake Tahoe, where he becomes even more paranoid and reclusive.

[Kayla Moore]

Right, and when we talk about his spirals, it's not necessarily just the Depressive episodes, like when he was an emotional immigration lawyer, he started feeling like the government was always after him. Like he, he was defending a client. And then he would feel like people were tapping his phone and putting surveillance equipment in his house and his cars and just really always felt like there was someone after him. And he could kind of mask that for a while as a lawyer because, you know, sometimes people are not necessarily surveilling, but like, I don't know, the government's involved, like maybe you have a high profile client, whatever. But like he really started to feel like that intense, intense paranoia. And it was just affecting every aspect of his life. And I actually. So I did some more digging on him, just kind of combing through some old records. Turns out that this was not Matthew's first brush with the law either. In the years before Matthew's arrest, there were several other cases that shared similarities to Denise's. And these are all before even the Dublin home invasion happened. The first one that happened was this one in Mountain View, which is another suburb of the Bay Area. It was in 2009, the same year that he moved to Silicon Valley for that law firm gig, when his life kind of started unraveling. What happened there was an intruder had broken into a 27 year old woman's home, tied her up and put blacked out goggles on her eyes. He said that he was a part of a group of criminals that planned to steal her identity and wire money abroad. Later he did try to sexually assault her, but she begged him not to and he stopped. The woman also said that he was oddly polite during the entire encounter. He would apologize, like just very strange behavior. And Matthew wasn't actually named as a suspect at the time, but he was investigated in connection with another home invasion which happened just a month later. This one was in Palo Alto and the details are almost identical, except this time the intruder did drug a woman with NyQuil. Matthew Mueller was listed as a suspect in this one because he was seen walking late at night near where the victim lived. But when police checked his DNA against evidence that was found at the crime scene, it wasn't a match. That was maybe by design though, because before leaving, the intruder did tell the woman that he had planted evidence to mislead authorities, whatever that meant. But he was never like, confirmed through DNA to be involved in that one.

[Morgan Abshur]

Which, that alone is an insane piece of information. Yeah, you're planting fake evidence.

[Kayla Moore]

Wow. Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

Eventually the FBI noticed all of these similarities between these cases, and it's enough for them to at Least issue a press release. On July 13, 2015, they announced that Matthew Mueller has been charged in connection with Denise Huskins kidnapping. Afterwards, Denise and Aaron hold their own press conference. While they're relieved Mueller is finally being held accountable, they also haven't forgotten how they've been treated by authorities. They say the Vallejo PD owes them an apology. It takes another few weeks for the Vallejo police to come to their senses a little, if you call it that. The chief of police sends letters to Aaron and Denise apologizing for the department's comments, but he isn't taking full accountability. He writes in this letter, quote, while these comments were based on our findings at the time, they proved to be unnecessarily harsh and offensive. End quote. Doesn't sound like an I'm sorry.

[Kayla Moore]

No, it's like such a backhanded apology.

[Morgan Abshur]

And while he admitted this kidnapping was a hoax, he refused to publicly apologize until Matthew was indicted, which is insane to me. And maybe it's a personal preference.

[Kayla Moore]

It's a botched apology. So it.

[Morgan Abshur]

Botched apology, it counts on my list. I mean, after the comments that were made, the wasting of resources, you owe us an apology.

[Kayla Moore]

The doubling down in the wrong direction because they wanted to prove that they were right, even at. As evidence, like the video of Denise being sent to them was coming to light. Yeah, yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

The bare minimum was a genuine apology.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

You want to be political in how you say it. Sure. But it should be public, not this letter privately.

[Kayla Moore]

No. And this is. That's exactly what Denise and Aaron felt, too. It was still kind of hard for them to get only that as an apology, but they felt that at least the law was finally on their side. And on September 18th of 2015, Matthew Mueller pled no contest to the Dublin home invasion. And three days later, he's arraigned for Denise's kidnapping. Come October 1st, he's indicted by a federal grand jury and charged with one count of kidnapping. He's not sentenced until two years later, though, on March 16, 2017. And that's when a judge gives him 40 years. And he was 37 at the time. 38, 39. Ish. So he'll be late 70s, early 80s.

[Morgan Abshur]

That's good, man.

[Kayla Moore]

If he serves the whole time. During the proceedings, Denise and Aaron read victim impact statements that are online. You definitely can read them. They're really impactful, very powerful. But by then, they were not the only ones that were looking for justice. Because Remember, there were two other home invasions that happened in 2009. The one in Mountain View, the one in Palo Alto. Well, in December of 2024. Yes. We are jumping in time to last year, like, six months ago. The Santa Clara County DA Day brought forth additional charges against Matthew Mueller for those crimes as well. Finally, and a month later, in January of this year, 2025, Matthew pled guilty to those. And in March, he was sentenced to two consecutive life terms for home invasions with the intent to commit sex crimes in Mountain View and Palo Alto. It is. It's interesting that, like, he did commit a sex crime and a kidnapping, and that wasn't a life sentence, but then the home invasion with intent to commit sex crimes was a life sentence.

[Morgan Abshur]

That's interesting.

[Kayla Moore]

Our legal system, sentencing can be kind of, like, finicky like that.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah.

[Kayla Moore]

Which is. Yeah. Yeah. It's just wild. Yeah. I don't always understand that. And so I wanted to include a little section here before we wrap this up, because we talked a lot about Detective Mustard in this case. He was the one saying the wild claims about sexual assault victims and really, like, leading the charge in. Aaron being guilty and then Denise being a liar. And so I just wanted to have a little popcorn quiz, see what you guys think about maybe what he's up to today. Because I looked into this guy, and I. I had to see what he was doing. So, pop quiz. After it comes out that Detective Mustard got everything wrong in this case, do you think he, A, was fired from being a police officer, B, had to go to training to unlearn some of the beliefs he had about sexual assault victims, kidnapping victims, women, etc, or C, continued to have a career as a police officer that was heavily defined by other scandals.

[Morgan Abshur]

I'm gonna go with option C. It.

[Kayla Moore]

Was C. It was absolutely C. So I just wanted to run through a quick list of other things that Matt Mustard has been accused of as a police officer. Like, this is just stuff that's come out throughout his career.

[Morgan Abshur]

Subjective information.

[Kayla Moore]

So first off, he was named Officer of the year in 2015, which was the year he investigated Denise's case, which is also the year it came out that he was wrong about Denise's case. Very strange to me.

[Morgan Abshur]

Beyond laughable.

[Kayla Moore]

Officer of the Year. Later on, he would go on to push for lower promotion standards within his department so that he could promoted to sergeant. And that is because he was unable to pass a written portion of the exam he needed to take for a promotion. So he pushed for that bar to be lowered so that he could.

[Morgan Abshur]

The bar is underground.

[Kayla Moore]

It's underground.

[Morgan Abshur]

You have standards for a reason.

[Kayla Moore]

Yes.

[Morgan Abshur]

Do Better.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

Or don't become sergeant.

[Kayla Moore]

Well, he became sergeant. He also was accused of making racist comments towards black officers. He was accused. This one really gets me. He was accused by a forensic pathologist of pressuring her to fit the facts of an investigation to his theory of the case. So he showed up to a scene where someone had choked on their food, and the husband was there and was like, oh, my God. I don't like, this woman choked. This is devastating to me. And Matt Mustard asked the forensic pathologist, quote, what will it take for you to call this a homicide?

[Morgan Abshur]

Oh, my God.

[Kayla Moore]

Literally asking her to her face like, how can you massage this so it looks like he killed her?

[Morgan Abshur]

He's trying to make anything fit for homicide.

[Kayla Moore]

Absolutely. And then one time, he also lied about the evidence in a sexual assault case so that he could attribute that case to the wrong person rather than finding the actual perpetrator. And I just wanted to include a footnote here, because I know this will make us all feel better. But in 2021, he made $263,000 for his salary, and in 2020, he made $274,000 for salary.

[Morgan Abshur]

This man is a menace to society.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

He is not protecting and serving.

[Kayla Moore]

No.

[Morgan Abshur]

He needs his badge revoked.

[Kayla Moore]

But then there's, like, Detective Karasu in this case, who cared so deeply and really came at it with an open mind and was willing to work with the evidence that she had to piece everything together and go through. Go through old crimes from 2009 and really build out the case in a way that she found the guilty person. So, like, there's bad guys in this case, and there's also good guys in this case, which is important to remember. And I want to add, too, that she was promoted to lieutenant. So the good guys did kind of win in this as well.

[Morgan Abshur]

Okay.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

Makes me feel a little better.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

There is one other thing I do want to point out with this investigation that I just find very odd. There is actually an FBI agent who worked on this case, Agent Sesma. This fact really, really disturbed me. This agent had actually dated Aaron's ex, Andrea. And Andrea has already been, like, very involved in this case. She's never publicly spoken about it. I don't want to drag her further into it because it wasn't her responsibility to state this conflict of interest and take themselves off the case. That was Agent Sesma. Like, that was such a conflict of interest, and he never should have been working on a case that seemingly at the time might have involved an ex of his. Like, that is so inappropriate. He should have recused himself. But as far as I know, nothing, you know, disciplinary happened to that agent and still working for the FBI.

[Kayla Moore]

Wow, I didn't read about that.

[Morgan Abshur]

There's a lot with this case. It feels like there's kind of a lot of loose ends and people have a lot of theories. There's still quite a few mysteries to explore because, you know, if we think back to Aaron and Denise's early statements about what happened, they felt there were multiple people in that room.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. And Right. So when they looked into Matt Mueller's house, they found that blow up doll. And so investigators started thinking, well, he probably brought the blow up doll with him. And that's what everyone thought was like the second person, quote, unquote. But reading Denise's book, like she goes into detail about the other people in the house. Like she saw four legs, like two, two sets of legs. When she was like laying down on the ground, she could see that there was another person there. She could, could feel like you were bringing up how like Matt was bringing her down the stairs and she could feel another person walking up the stairs. Like, Aaron talks about hearing footsteps in other parts of the house while Matt is talking to them, but no one else ever spoke. There's no like verbal confirmation that someone was there.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

There was another source I saw too, where Denise recounted hearing a car drive up at the cabin too, but Mueller was already inside, seemingly so.

[Kayla Moore]

And we don't know who the those people or that person would be.

[Morgan Abshur]

No. And I mean, I, I do think they were. They're right. Like, I, I don't, I don't think you can just imagine that or a blow up doll can replace people's feet walking or brushing past you. So that is another part of this case that is very, just mind blowing. It's very eerie. It's just leaves you with a lot of unresolved feelings.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. And another thing that some people feel is still unresolved is like Matt's back, Matt Mueller's backstory because there is that elaborate story that he told Denise. He mentioned something about being this like black market, like actor, like some sort of belonging to some sort of black market operation. And we know that that's a total lie. It was maybe some paranoid delusion that he was having, but it turns out that he was maybe wanting to get a payday out of this after all. Because remember he asked for the $17,000 for Den. He didn't get that because they were already investigating. And during and after the crimes Matthew has always maintained that his goal was to get the money. That was the whole motivation behind this. But while he didn't actually get that ransom from Aaron, he didn't seem overly concerned about getting it or not getting it, which really makes investigators think that he wasn't actually in it for the money alone. And there's another strange detail in all of this, and this is something like we've talked about a lot. It does seem like he actually was there for Andrea, like he wasn't there for Denise. When he put the headphones on them when they, when he was kidnapping Denise, the pre recorded message she was hearing was using Andrea's name. It wasn't using her name like, hi, Andrea, I'm going to be doing this. Which is just so strange.

[Morgan Abshur]

And it would make sense if, you know, he lived a block away from their house. You know, Aaron and Andrea, from sources I saw, bought that house together, Right? And then after the breakup, you know, know resolved it. But if that was his neighbor who he saw it, it could make sense why he targeted her.

[Kayla Moore]

And they were both blonde. Like maybe he didn't know that he wasn't going after Andrea, that it was actually Denise. He was kind of known for casing out the, like outside of the houses of his victims before he would attack. So maybe he had been doing that with Aaron. You know, another thing that they held against Aaron was like, when he and Denise first got together, Andrea was still living in the house. So there was a little bit of overlap where like maybe she hadn't moved out all that long ago from when Matt was like planning his attack. We can at least say one thing in all of this when it comes to Matt Mueller, is that at least justice was served. That's like the one nice thing that's come out of this.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, absolutely. By 2016, Denise and Aaron were still waiting for that public apology from Vallejo Police Department. And the more time passed, it seemed less likely that they were going to get it. So in March 2016, they took matters into their own hands. They filed a federal complaint against the Vallejo Police Department and sued for defamation. The lawsuit says, quote, because of the police department's allegations that Huskins kidnapping was untrue, their reputations were tarnished and they were forced to move out of the town where they had worked. They were able to subpoena text messages and get records between the former police chief and a former Vallejo police captain where the Chief Badot had instructed the captain to delete messages from his cell phone that directed park, who was one of the main spokespersons during this to, quote, burn that bitch. In regards to Huskins. Clearly there was a case here. I mean, there's a lot that went down, as we've discussed.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Morgan Abshur]

And luckily, two years later, in 2018, Denise and Aaron won the lawsuit and were awarded $2.5 million total. And their story has an even. A few months after winning that lawsuit, Denise and Aaron got married. They actually invited their lawyers, Detective Carouso, everyone. That kind of made them able to have this life together. Today they live in Monterey County, California, and have two daughters. I know one of Denise's and Aaron's daughter was born on the anniversary Denise was released.

[Denise Huskins]

Wow.

[Morgan Abshur]

And she talks about this quite a bit. She says it's. It's kind of this new chance for her. It's. It's really. It has a lot of meaning for her.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. That's symbolic.

[Morgan Abshur]

Very. As we've mentioned, they also wrote a book about their experience called Victim F, which was published in 2021.

[Kayla Moore]

Yes. And buying it is a great way to support Denise, if you're able to.

[Morgan Abshur]

Hi, guys. So we actually recorded a totally new outro for this. We reached out to Denise, and she was willing to come on and talk with us and update us where she is at.

[Kayla Moore]

So we thought we would include this little tidbit from our conversation where Denise really gets into some of the advocacy work that she's been doing these last few years. Check it out. Thank you so much for hopping on with us. Like, we were talking about this all morning. Morgan and I have been texting about this for days. Just how excited we are to be able to talk to you. I guess where I kind of wanted to start was we have your book here. We loved reading it. It. This was really a case that was, like, so misinterpreted and misconstrued to the public from the beginning. There's this whole narrative that was spun that was, like, completely wrong from what was really happening. But, like, in the last few years, you've done such an amazing job of, like, reclaiming that narrative. You have the book. There's all the work you've been doing recently, giving your talks. There's the documentary where you're speaking. Can you kind of talk a little bit about what it was like to make that decision to start reclaiming the narrative? Like, how that all kind of came to be?

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah. I think even really early on, Aaron and I would talk about how we would share, if we would share, when we would share, and considering how it was also Publicly misrepresented over and over again. Even after Mueller was caught, there was still incorrect narratives about what was going on. We knew that the best way to really share the entirety of what happened is by writing a book. Because we saw news reports in the 2000 and 20s and datelines and all the things, and no matter how well intentioned they may be, they have to edit, they spin things. It's all very sensationalized. And we knew that the truth of what happened to us would never be fully represented unless it was given through our voices and through our experience. But that process took a really, really long time. You know, we didn't speak publicly, do a public interview until three years after the kidnapping. And that's because we had to wait for the criminal cases and the civil case to come to a close. And that's what I think a lot of people don't understand about, like, the reality of, like, how these real life cases and situations happen. I mean, at first we were being threatened with prosecution, and so we were with our defense attorneys preparing to go to court to defend ourselves. And so of course, you can't speak publicly preparing for that. And then Mueller gets caught and then it's all of a sudden, okay, well, now we need to focus on the criminal case and we don't want to speak publicly about anything that could then derail the sentence that he's going to get. And then we had the civil lawsuit against the Vallejo police and similar reasons. We need to wait for that to play out. So once we settled with Vallejo, and we also too, it was supposed to stay private, but then we saw that, I think people on their end were leaking stuff with the narrative of like, oh, they're taking taxpayers dollars away when it was them who did that. So we knew we wanted to at least do an interview, and we decided to do it with 2020. But then that was it. You know, we, we then waited and the next three year process was figuring out how to write a book and figuring out, like, how to find a co author that would help represent what we went through. And it was hard. Like we had one co author that we were going to work with that wanted to make it into, like a psychological thriller and give Mueller a voice. And it's like, that is absolutely not what we're wanting to do with this. And I don't even want to claim to know what's going on in this guy's head. And, and that's not. And so much of like, true crime and how these things were portrayed focused so much on the perpetrator and like highlighted the perpetrator and sensationalized them. And for us, we wanted to show the victim's experience because most people go through some kind of trauma and it impacts every aspect of their life. And so we really wanted to not just show like all the bits of the violent crime, but what like the human aspect of dealing with it and then trying to come through it and basically start a whole new life. And I think a lot of people could identify with that on some level.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, absolutely. I mean, I think it's so important you came out and told your story through your own words. I mean, the book, the documentary, it's, it's, it's important you did. And as our team was kind of doing research, I mean, there's still sites and articles out there that have not, not posted corrections to things. So I'm just kind of curious if, from your perspective, if there's anything that journalists and media outlets could do better when reporting on cases like yours.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, I mean, the culture of journalism has shifted so much because it's very much about like the 24 hour news cycle and clicks and likes and followers and I mean, even at the federal sentencing for Mueller back in 2017, and we stood up there and we gave our victim image impact statement and like the, the court was dismissed and like reporters are sprinting out to like be the first one to tell the story and you're just kind of like, I mean really there's a human aspect to what you're reporting on. And I think it's important for journalists to remember that because it's, it's real life, you know, suffering that's, that you're playing a role in and you can be influencing. And it's important to remember that you're not going to have all the information. So being very careful about how a story is being presented. But that's again where it's like really tricky because to get people to like binge watch or whatever, like they need those big swings. Even in the documentary that we did with Netflix, there was still that like kind of bait and switch of did Aaron do it, did I do it? Thing. And the goal is to get people engaged and to keep watching. So, so it's hard as a subject to have to kind of compromise, not kind of fully compromise and understand that dynamic. Because the whole point of trying to advocate for change and show systemically the issues that so many victims face is for people to be aware of it and for them to be aware of it, they need to be entertained on some level, to be able to keep watching or listening. And so it's, it's just like a hard reality of, of that aspect of it. So again, that's like why we feel good that we've got the book as like a resource so people like can get the information there. But then, you know, it's, it's helpful to try to, to get it out on. Obviously Netflix is a huge.

[Kayla Moore]

Right.

[Denise Huskins]

Huge network. Yeah. So I mean, I think it was like 70 million views or something all around the world. And people all around the world are going, going like I've experienced something like this too on some, in some version. So you know, it's, there's positive and negatives of, of it all.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. Was that like even as you were doing interviews with 2020, like as you're first coming out and telling your story, was it a thing where people were maybe promising you, oh, we're gonna tell this version of your story, and then you're watching it back and they've edited it or they try to make it more salacious, like it wasn't really the version you were promised missed.

[Denise Huskins]

When we finally agreed to do 2020, we, I mean we had like, we'd spoken to all the major networks and we were trying to be very selective about who we worked with and we made them work to basically like sell it to us, like we're going to do right by you. And, and some of that was them telling us like some of the behind the scenes investigative work that they were doing. And so when we finally sat down for an interview with them and, and and had those conversations, I think that they did a good job with it. Early on in 2015, there was an initial 2020, a dateline, I think of 48 hours and say like all the things and none of us or our families spoke on those and for all the reasons I said before and those were not great, to say the least.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Denise Huskins]

And it's hard because like your instinct is to want to let like scream and shout and correct the narrative and go out there and then you get reporters basically trying to manipulate you and be like, now's the time to tell your story. No one's going to be interested in a few years time. And so they try to get you to speak on their time, what works best for them. And thankfully, like, we had good attorneys to turn to. We had each other to turn to and our families and we were just, and Aaron and I talked about it a lot and we're like, we're just Going to wait on it, and it needs to be right for us for the case. And so I think it was the best choice to wait it out. So then we can really vet people and figure out the right direction to go.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, it's really important. And I mean, you really describe kind of this rock and a hard place of like, you want to do the advocacy and get your story out there, but, like also having to buy into a little bit of the entertainment factor. And I mean, your Netflix documentaries, that's the first time I had even heard about your case. So it really did do amazing work of getting the word out there and correcting the narrative and giving you this platform to then make an even bigger impact. Which kind of leads me to my next question about the science based interviewing. Kind of Since March of 24, I think you've been speaking on this science based interviewing. You just did a symposium in Lake Tahoe a week or so ago. So I'd love to know a little bit more about that. Like, first off, like, what is science based interviewing? What does it even look like?

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, so like you were saying, I mean, one of the best things about the documentary that coming out and being on Netflix and having that exposure was we finally got people in law enforcement interested to hear from us and asking us to come and speak. And that's all we wanted from the beginning. You know, I think initially, because we sued the police and everything and spoke openly about what happened to us. Us people's knee jerk reaction is like, oh, they're critical of police, therefore they're against police. And that's absolutely not the case. You know, Aaron's brother is an FBI agent. And so we wanted the chance to like, sit in a room and have a conversation with them. And so one of this chief of police invited us to come speak in Monterey county, and we jumped at the opportunity. And then the El Dorado DA of South Lake Tahoe, where I was held captive, he was there. And he invited us to speak at the Science based interviewing symposium last year. And so then he invited us again this year. And then we've had a number of different other conferences that we've spoken at, often like sexual assault conferences. And I mean, for science based interviewing, it was the. When we went last year and sat in and watched, it was like one of these bittersweet moments where like, wow, this is so great that they're doing this, that they're training people in a different way than how Aaron was interrogated and how I was treated. But at the same time, like, with Our experience in physical therapy and our training and education in physical therapy and understanding of psych, like, hearing them talk about psychology, like basic psychology was kind of like, oh my God, like, why is this revolutionary? Like, why is this. I mean, they get a lot of pushback and a lot of resistance, and so they're really trying to crusade for change, but like, it just seems so very lacking in progress, you know. So I, again, I was like encouraged to see the changes. I mean, the biggest difference is, and just like the shortest summary is that the idea is that you treat people with respect and dignity and people will be more likely to want to open up and talk to you if you do that. Whereas, like the other ways, the old outdated ways of interrogation, I mean, Aaron was isolated in a room, kept from his family, in an air conditioned room, windowless room. He didn't have his keys, his id. He was lied to, he was manipulated, he was left alone for hours. And then they came in. And the primary goal with that outdated training was they go in with a guilt presumptive mindset. They believe that he is guilty and that they're gonna go in there and do whatever they can to break him down and get him to confess. Of course in his situation would be falsely confessing, but it happens because you're broken down psychologically and a lot of people break down within like hours. And Aaron was interrogated for 18 hours. I mean, what was like the most terrifying thing for me when I heard about how Aaron was interrogated and treated, I saw so many parallels to how I was treated in captivity. Again, like the isolation, the manipulation, the threats, the degradation, stripping you of your identity and your worth. And you are powerless to these people who have control of your life. And I just don't think that that should be how you know people. The good guys should be treating people to get what they want. So the science based interviewing is again, just like, don't lie to them. Treat them with respect and dignity. Try to understand where they're coming from. So like from a religious standpoint, from a cultural standpoint, based on their past experiences in their, in their life. Don't make assumptions. You know, again, the outdated interviewing is under this belief that you're a human lie detector and you can tell if someone's lying by like the direction of their eye gaze or how they're sitting and holding themselves, or then like using a polygraph, which is pseudoscience. So it's just looking at the research and human behavior and psychology to, to interact with suspects.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah. Does the training for this then include a bit more psychology than someone in law enforcement would typically get just to become an officer. Like, does that become a big part of this?

[Denise Huskins]

Yes. And that's another thing that I. It still kind of blows my mind that some baseline of psychology isn't taught from the beginning. And I don't know the exact curriculum and I'm sure it changes from local to federal. But I feel like you're dealing with people who are going through a trauma. They're going through the worst moments of their life, whether they're the victim or the perpetrator. So I think you should have a little understanding of how trauma impacts the human brain, the human body and that dynamic of human behavior. Like, I feel like that's just, that should, it should be entry level.

[Morgan Abshur]

It should be basic.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Denise Huskins]

You know.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah.

[Denise Huskins]

So it was nice to go to the science based interviewing. And I'm like, oh good, there's actual psychologists up there talking like, that's great. And it should be a multidisciplinary approach because it's, there's no way that any one group of people or discipline can handle all the things, you know, from a legal standpoint, from, you know, I mean, they need the tactical training. They need to be able to defend themselves and be trained with weapons and, you know, how to take control. But the de. Escalation part and, and having people feel comfortable again, whether it's a victim or suspect, you know, the victim's not going to speak to you if they don't think that you're going to protect them. Not just physically in this moment, but like after, through the court process, you know, are you going to value what they're going through emotionally?

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. I was telling Morgan earlier, my cousin is like in the middle of cop training right now. He's like doing the six month program to become a cop. And so I've been talking to him about, about the things that he's learning and he's like ex Marine, he's like super well trained, but he's like, Kaylin, I am in class with people who have never fired a gun before. So we have only six months to go through this and we have to teach the basics. Like we don't have time to be. And then you have to learn the specific laws of your area. Like there's just not enough time to go through psych courses and interpersonal relationships.

[Morgan Abshur]

And like trauma informed.

[Kayla Moore]

Trauma informed and like EQ and that stuff. And it, to me, it seems like that kind of training is something that you don't, you shouldn't just do once. Like, hearing your story, it seemed like a lot of the officers you encountered, too, were, like, maybe part of it is just being jaded from working at that force for so long or whatever it is. But it seems like a type of training that it would be useful to do every few years as, like, a good reminder of how to behave and do these interrogations in, like, a more interpersonal way, I guess. Guess.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, I mean, I think. I mean, obviously it's tricky to, like, integrate all those things, you know, but I think at least something. At least a class, a little bit, like, you know, 10 minutes a day or something of, like, yeah, this is, you know, this is a little bit of psych. This is what you might encounter. This is why, you know, people behave differently again. It's. It keeps them safe, too.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Denise Huskins]

To understand how other people might react and respond, and then you can gauge your decision making based off of that.

[Kayla Moore]

One thing I wanted to ask, too, is, like, you guys encountered some really awful officers who were, like, painting totally wrong pictures of what was happening. But there were also detectives and officers in this story that really wanted to solve this case and, like, really did some good detective work and, like, brought justice. So I was wondering if you, like, were. If you guys were able to tell kind of in the moment when you're talking to someone, are you able to get the sense of if they have your best interest at hand? Like, if someone that's listening was ever, like, interrogated, do you feel like that's something you can have a sense for? Or are people. Do you just have to kind of wait and see eventually if, like, the person you're talking to is actually going to, like, advocate for you?

[Denise Huskins]

Well, I mean, our case was. I don't know if it's different, but I spoke to Huntington beach police for an hour and a half, and then the first phone call interaction from the lead detective in Vallejo is offering me a proffer of agreement, which would be immunity. So I'm going into. And I have to get a criminal defense attorney. And then even just the interactions of trying to set up sitting down and being interviewed by Vallejo police, they were really dismissive. They refused to set up a SART exam until I went in to talk to them. They went on national news to say that this was all a hoax and we were liars. So I didn't trust anything that was given to me.

[Morgan Abshur]

No.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, right.

[Morgan Abshur]

It's crazy because you don't. Like hearing you tell. It's like, we know it was that quick. But like, it was genuinely that quick where you're getting, oh, here's immunity. It's like, what?

[Denise Huskins]

Well, and then that's the thing too. It's like, then it's fun that I'm going, I'm lawyering up, I'm going to get an attorney. And that's supposed to be some stamp of guilt, but of course law enforcement doesn't tell media. But by the way, we offered her a legal, like, legal offer. Like, I don't know what that means. Of course I'm going to get an attorney.

[Morgan Abshur]

I think that does kind of play back though to, you know, your question, Caitlin. It's like, how do you get a read of like, is this a safe space? Can I, can I, you know, present my story? And I think that goes back to, you know, what you're saying about the, this science based interview. And it's like, if you treat people with this basic dignity and just humanity from the jump, like you are creating that safe space. And it, it, I mean, it's, it feels like it should be a common sense approach, but it's, it's obviously not. But it would be easy to see how that would instantly lower someone's defenses and maybe get the conversation to a better, more honest, open, open space.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah. And I had just spent two days in captivity with someone who was surface level polite, but stealing my body, threatening my life, threatening my, you know, my loved one, my loved ones. Like, the entire time was like him trying to manipulate me, like, in the politeness was so obviously fake and just to try to get a certain response from me. But I had no choice but to play along with whatever his game was or because I was trying to get out of the situation alive. And so then I go and I speak to the authorities and I'm sitting there and thankfully I have a criminal defense attorney next to me. So like, I don't, I feel like some measure of safety, like someone's, you know, looking out for my best interest. But like, these officers and detectives, like, I felt the same energy with them that I felt with this, the perpetrator. And, and that's where I think that old type of interviewing and interrogation and, and having that manipulation and lying and deceiving. Like, people pick up on that, but they're the police or the FBI. Like, so it's being in that seat and seeing it. You can't be like, well, you're full of. Because, because they're the person that you're turning to for help. There's nowhere else to go. So they inherently have that power over you. And, I mean, that's what happened with Aaron. He's like, this is crazy. And he didn't ask for an attorney for 18 hours because he's like, I need them to help. And so then that's just where it gets really complicated and messy. And obviously, it put them in complete wrong direction. And then they just put their blinders on and refuse to look at the evidence and see anything beyond what they believed. And that's, like, another piece of training that I think would be really helpful. Again, it doesn't have to be, like, in depth, but continuously telling people entering this field, like, you have implicit bias. Every person has their own biases based on where they grew up, what their life experiences were. And you need to understand on some level what those are when you're going to interact with all different kinds of people. And that's where it's hard, because if you don't have that baseline understanding and you go into a department like Vallejo, who have these seasoned officers who've had this mindset for decades, and, like, this belief that, like, yeah, I can go in there and I'm going to be the guy who gets the confession and all of that, I mean, it really changes how you're going to operate and how your cases are going to be handled and.

[Morgan Abshur]

Absolutely. I think a culture of a place, I mean, you can. You can have one good apple put in a bucket or basket of others. With a culture like that, a negative culture, it could really impact it.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah. Did you feel like the officers had a very specific idea of, like, what a woman in your situation, like, how they would behave or. Obviously, there's tons of myths about, like, sexual assault, about. About, like, sexual violence against women, like. Yeah. Could you feel that bias in the questions you were being asked?

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, I mean, I kept. I told them all, like, in the beginning, like, what happened the night of the home invasion through captivity, the trunk of the car, like, the assaults, how that happened, what was said, what was done, why I did what I did, like, every step of the way. And then even after all of that, I get asked by, like, the lead FBI agent. So you're like, oh, he should be. Be well trained. He's like, yeah, yeah. But, but did. Did you scream? And I'm like, no, no. Did you fight? Well, no. Did you think about it? Well, yeah, I thought about it, yeah. Like, I've thought about every possible thing that could get me out alive, but based on the circumstances, this is what I had to do.

[Kayla Moore]

Right.

[Denise Huskins]

And Years later, like talking to an expert and, and crime behavior. She was telling me about the fawn response. So there's fight, flight, freeze. And she was like, you know, there's another innate defense, which is to fawn, which is when you're trying to like, befriend or pacify the abuser to keep you from more harm. And that's what I did. Like, sometimes, especially as a woman, like, I'm like, and I even told this to police. I'm like, I know, like, I go running with Aaron, I can't keep up with him. I run, but I'm not a fast runner. I know I can't out fight a man. And I. Here I am being drugged and threatened. So like, what good choice was there other than like, let's just try to minimize the damage and see, Like, I don't want to provoke this person and give him a reason to kill me. And so I used the only weapons I had available, which is to be empathetic and compassionate towards him and hope that he chooses not to kill me. And like, you see it in domestic violence cases. You. I mean, this is not uncommon. This is not unheard of.

[Morgan Abshur]

It's very under talked about. The fawn response.

[Kayla Moore]

Yes.

[Morgan Abshur]

It's, you know, you hear fight or flight. They don't.

[Kayla Moore]

I've never once in my life been like, oh, I could fight or I could run. Like, I always feel like I should just pacify the situation. And I think so many women feel.

[Morgan Abshur]

That way from a sociological standpoint. I think that's in culture and I think it's. Yeah, it's very common.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah. I mean, it's ingrained in us because that's, I mean, it's just, that's what we've had to do. So it's hard when a group of men have this idea of how you should respond. I think I was asked too, like, did you urinate in the trunk? And I'm like, no. And then I'm thinking, oh my God, should I have? Yeah, you know, like, should I. Is that mean? Is there something wrong with me? You know, all these questions made me question myself and did I not do. Do this correctly? And like, you know, I'm sitting there in the SART exam, the, the during the rape test going like, God, maybe I should have fought back. So there was more obvious injuries for them to believe me. But then at the same time, I know that if I did that, I can't trust where that violence would have led.

[Kayla Moore]

Of course. Yeah, you're like putting yourself at risk you don't know what this person's capable of, so you're not going to do anything to put yourself in more, more risk and just. It's so frustrating.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, I mean it is a crazy, crazy line of questioning, but I think it, it speaks to that implicit bias they very clearly had and how maybe a victim should respond rather than what reality actually is. I'm kind of curious, since doing all of these symposiums and you know, talking about this technique, what has the response been? Are people ready and willing to take this on and learn? Like, what does that look like? Has it been pretty positive?

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, everyone is very positive directly to us. I don't, I'm sure there's a group that is not. Yeah, but in general, you know, at least what I tell myself is I'm going into a training where they are trying to learn and do something different hopefully. And I'm sure some of them are being told to go to these trainings and maybe there's some resistance, I don't know. But in general we get a very overwhelming positive response. And people who've been like working on this for decades and getting all the resistance and pushback and then hearing us speak and they're like, oh, I'm re energized to keep this fight going and this is why I'm doing this. And so that all has been really, really encouraging and rewarding and, and to feel like we're not on the outsides, but we can actually like connect with people within law enforcement and see if we can like work together to make a change. But yeah, they're working against a lot of those, those biases and that cultural dynamic as well.

[Kayla Moore]

No, I think that's so amazing. I hear from like my friends in law enforcement and even friends in medicine, like one of the hardest things can sometimes be the fact that like your relationship with the victim ends after the investigation. So you don't ever get to see the long term effects of how the crime affected a victim. So I think even you just being able to like have a continuous conversation with these people so they can see like if we do small things at the beginning, it can have a huge impact on this person's overall quality of life for the rest of their life.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, absolutely. That's like one of the big things that we talk about in our, in our talks is, is everyone plays a pivotal role in the victim's experience and what you do and say matters and how you treat victims. And two, it's really important if you feel like help victims feel safe and heard and understood so they can feel safe enough to participate in the court process because that process is incredibly difficult and re traumatizing and re victimizing just in and of itself. So, you know, you're not gonna get anywhere if the victims don't feel comfortable to come and report and don't feel safe enough to continue on.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah, I think it's been nice to see your relationship with Misty too. I like saw your story today and it was. Auntie Denise is so good at face painting and it is really nice and your kids are beautiful. I just wanna end, you know, kind of wrap this up with where are you at today? You're still, still practicing PT and you know, anything else going on right now?

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, I mean, it's been a decade since the kidnapping, so life still continues, still moves on. Aaron and I got married in 2018.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, congrats.

[Denise Huskins]

Thank you. Yeah, it's. I mean, it's an incredible gift to have a partner that can understand you and be flexible with you and you know, like, there's some days where, where like he takes charge and is a strong one and, and other days it's me and other days it's us together and other days we're just like, okay, we're done. Like, yeah, you know, so it's nice to not have to like over explain and just have someone see you for who you are and, and accept what you're going through. And yeah, we, we welcomed our first daughter, Olivia on March 25, 2020, which was five years to the day that I was released from the kidnapping, which is like an insane full circle moment. And then we have our second daughter, Naomi. And so right now they're two and a half and five and I mean, they are our world. You know, it's. Parenting is crazy and amazing and they're just hilarious. Like just to see their little personalities and their dynamic and interaction. And I have Olivia and Marshall Arts and. And I love that.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah, definitely, I love that aspect.

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah. And I'm doing self defense and boxing and you know, I mean it's emotionally helpful, but also physically helpful. Still working as a physical therapist. Both Aaron and I are. And so like our day to day is just like any normal parent and which is lovely. And then, and then we have these little moments where we go travel and can speak to law enforcement and hope that we can make some. Some difference.

[Morgan Abshur]

You definitely are.

[Kayla Moore]

Yeah.

[Denise Huskins]

Naive or something. But you know, you just like hope that if you go through something awful that somehow you can give it a positive spin and help other People through their own issues as they move forward. So that's what we're trying to do.

[Kayla Moore]

And I think it'll encourage other victims to come forward and continue the conversation with law enforcement. And, and like, it's just so positive overall because if you have this whole chorus of people that still want to stay involved, still want to speak and educate like you, you just can't ignore that. And I think that's going to bring about hopefully some, like, amazing change in the future.

[Denise Huskins]

Well, I hope so. Yeah. Thank you for that.

[Morgan Abshur]

I think it is. I mean, even seeing your posts on your Instagram, I mean, you talk so you're so open and so vulnerable. And I think, you know, I just read your Mother's Day post talking about ptsd and I think you are just such a good person for anyone to, you know, look to for strength. And you sharing your story has, I think, has made a big difference and I think it will continue to do so. So I again, just want to say thank you so, so, so much for taking the time to chat with us. I know it's not an easy feat to rehash some of these things, but it is so appreciated. Do you have any tips for maybe agencies that want to get involved in this? Like, I know, I know, you know, a lot of police organizations do have continuing education requirements and so do they reach out to like, a certain organization or how can maybe a listener get involved if they want to?

[Denise Huskins]

Yeah, I mean, there's so many amazing foundations and organizations that focus on the trauma informed training. I mean, that's, I think, really, really important. We've met a lot of people in law enforcement who do different training. So, like the trauma informed training, the science based interviewing training, the.

[Morgan Abshur]

There's.

[Denise Huskins]

We spoke last month at End Violence Against Women International. It's a conference that housed people within law enforcement, but then also survivors, prosecutors, judges. So there's. There's a lot of opportunity out there to connect and, and make change. I think just being aware and listening and just being open to having those conversations.

[Kayla Moore]

Thank you again, truly, so much for jumping on. I feel like I learned so much just from talking for the last, like 40 minutes with you. So this is so great. I think our listeners are really gonna get a lot out of this. Tell Aaron we say hi. We're telling everyone to buy the book and really like to hear the story from you both. I think that's the most important thing and it seems like the book is probably the best way to do that. So, yeah, just wanted to really say thank you so much for jumping on.

[Morgan Abshur]

Yeah. And for anyone out there who wants to follow along with Denise's journey, all of her links will be in the description of the show notes her Instagram highly recommend following. You share some amazing, amazing things on there, especially all your conferences and symposiums and things you're working on. So be sure to check that out, you guys. But Denise, thank you so much.

[Denise Huskins]

Thank you. Appreciate it.

[Morgan Abshur]

Well, that's all we have for this case. We do just want to thank Denise again. Everyone be sure to check out the book by Aaron and Denise, Victim F.

[Kayla Moore]

And you can follow the show wherever you get your podcasts. We are also on Instagram at Clues podcast and thanks for joining us on.

[Morgan Abshur]

This one at Crime House. We value your support everyone. Be sure to share your thoughts on social media and remember to rate, review and follow clues to help others discover the show.

[Kayla Moore]

All right, that's all we have for this week. We'll see you next week. Bye Bye.