The Girls: “This is my story to tell”

Summary

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Podcast Summary: Embedded – The Girls: “This is My Story to Tell”

Episode Date: May 21, 2026
Host: Kelly McEvers (NPR)
Reported by: Jess Clark (Louisville Public Media, Dig podcast)

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Overview

This episode, the fourth and final installment of the “The Girls” series—originally produced by Louisville Public Media’s Dig—chronicles the complex and painful journey of young women in Louisville, Kentucky, seeking justice against twin brothers Ronnie and Donnie Stoner and Zach Kilgore for alleged decades-long sexual abuse. The story blends survivor activism, legal strategy, and systemic critiques, focusing on the tension between survivors' need to tell their stories and legal advice to remain silent. It explores how failures in schools, policing, and prosecution left these young women to fight for accountability themselves.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Survivor Activism and Public Protest

[01:24–06:00]

• Survivors and their supporters, including Alexis Crook, Alyssa Foster, and Arielle Stoner, protest at Jefferson County Board of Education, demanding accountability from school officials.
• The Board almost silences Alexis Crook during the public comment session, echoing the long-standing institutional failures:

  "It made me queasy watching from the press section... the Jefferson County Board of Education had quite literally silenced an alleged survivor of child sex abuse." (Jess Clark, [05:46])

2. How Survivors Connected and Launched the Fight

[09:08–11:42]

• Alyssa Foster and Arielle Stoner found each other online after Alyssa posted about her abuse. Their mutual revelation that others were also victims sparked collective action.

• Multiple survivors joined a lawsuit, building a network of support and sharing their stories.

  "For years, Alyssa had assumed it had only happened to her. She couldn't imagine he would sexually abuse his own daughter... Now seeing that there were other girls, I was like, I can't just let that slide."
  (Jess Clark narrating/quoting Arielle Stoner, [10:17–10:59])

3. Legal Constraints, Police Investigations, and Victim-Lawyer Tensions

[11:42–16:39, 18:45–25:05]

• Detective Michelle Rush leads an investigation, highlighting both procedural shortcomings and friction between survivors, detectives, and prosecutors.

• Authorities press survivors to limit public discussion, fearing it will undermine legal cases, but survivors resist:

  "We didn't say anything for 10 and 20 years. I shouldn't have to wait another five to be able to speak on what happened to me... This is my story to tell."
  (Alyssa Foster, [13:55])

• Survivors feel the system is more invested in managing risk than empowering or informing them.

4. Why Prosecutions Stall: Interview with Prosecutors

[19:13–25:05]

• Jess Clark interviews Doris Lee Gilbert (child sex abuse prosecutor) and others about prosecutors’ hesitancy to bring charges without a high probability of conviction.

• Emphasis on legal standards: probable cause (charging) vs. beyond a reasonable doubt (conviction) create conservative prosecutorial culture.

  "If you push that and you go to trial on a case where you think that the chances that you'd win are 2% or less, sometimes the harm that you cause to the victim is outweighs what feels like the possibility that you could actually get a conviction."
  (Doris Lee Gilbert, [21:47])

• Prosecutors and advocates acknowledge police rarely do extensive corroboration; most cases hinge on delayed forensic interviews and limited evidence.

5. Systemic Failures in Child Sex Abuse Investigations

[25:05–29:28]

• Jess Clark analyzes 100 closed LMPD child sex abuse cases:

  • Most investigations are handled by phone
  • Long waits for forensic interviews (avg. 39 days)
  • Many cases closed without interviewing the child
  • Very few led to charges/arrests

• Survivors' experiences echo these findings: lack of urgency, cases closed after children didn’t immediately disclose, or after a caregiver recanted.

6. Breakthrough: Indictments and Continued Struggle

[31:49–40:12]

• After over a year of silence, Alexis Crook gets news the case is moving forward, possibly including charges for Ronnie, Donnie, and Zach Kilgore, and for multiple survivors.

  "She said, can you please talk to Alyssa and tell her to stay silent for now because there's a chance that we can prosecute Ronnie... If we want to get Ronnie out of JCPS, Alyssa has to shut up for a minute and talk to the prosecutors."
  (Alexis Crook, recounting Michelle Rush, [32:38])

• Survivors remain skeptical about the true motivations of prosecutors, seeing themselves leveraged as pawns to make cases stronger.

• Indictment is handed down (52 charges), but survivors learn about it late—after press and police.

  "My mom knew they were indicted before we did... And had I not sent a manic email and left manic voicemails, we wouldn't have been told. And I feel like this has never been fair for us."
  (Alexis Crook, [40:17])

7. Courtroom Drama, Disappointment, and Limitations of Justice

[41:16–52:57]

• At the first arraignment, survivors face defendants for the first time in years. The men are initially put on home incarceration rather than jailed.

• Bond is eventually set at $500,000 each (with 10% to post for release); the defense attorney reacts angrily, highlighting how old the allegations are.

• Survivors continue to feel frustrated and sidelined by the system, being asked to remove social media posts and feeling accused of seeking attention rather than justice.

  "I was so nice, and all I wanted to do was tell him to fuck off. And I was like, yes, sir. Okay, sir... It's just, it looks like, you know, you girls seen Abby's case come out in public, and you just wanted attention, and you just made it all up."
  (Alyssa Foster, paraphrasing prosecutor, [43:57])

• The support and connection among the women is highlighted as both a source of strength and healing.

8. Complex Aftermath: Healing Isn’t Linear

[53:44–End]

• Even after the indictments, challenges and trauma remain.

• The survivors experience continued anxiety, mental health challenges, and frustration with systemic inadequacies (e.g., lack of protection from Kilgore, fear of testifying, uncertainty about the future).

  "What are you scared of? — Everything going wrong the way it always has... The thought of going on the stand and ripping your whole life apart."
  (Alyssa Foster, [55:22])

• Arielle expresses deep ambivalence and self-doubt about coming forward, but acknowledges 10% of her feels proud for speaking up ([56:49]).

• The relationships the women form through this process become a core source of resilience.

  “Finding each other … We give each other strength… If your partner can’t give 50, 50 every day, it’s just 80, 20, I can. I know that there's two people who will pick up that 80 for my 20 always. ... Love is. The only thing I think that has kept us here is for us wanting each other to be able to truly heal from this and get justice from this and to be okay.”
  (Alyssa Foster, [57:58])

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Silencing at the School Board:
  “The Jefferson County Board of Education had quite literally silenced an alleged survivor of child sex abuse.”
  (Jess Clark, [05:46])

• Victims' Need to Speak:
  “We didn’t say anything for 10 and 20 years. I shouldn't have to wait another five to be able to speak on what happened to me when I was a 13 year old child. That is not fair to me. … This is my story to tell.”
  (Alyssa Foster, [13:55])

• Prosecutorial Reluctance:
  “If you push that and you go to trial on a case where you think that the chances that you’d win are 2% or less, sometimes the harm that you cause to the victim outweighs what feels like the possibility that you could actually get a conviction.”
  (Doris Lee Gilbert, [21:47])

• Systemic Failure:
  “We’ve been through dark periods and been suicidal and been like, this is it, like this is the rock bottom. But something we’ve never done is stop to communicate, even for a day.”
  (Alexis Crook, [53:54])

• Complex Victory:
  “2023, when this first broke... we didn’t know each other and we didn’t trust each other ... from that to getting a 52 count indictment... that’s a hell of a thing for three girls that were told to shut the fuck up for two years to accomplish.”
  (Alexis Crook, [52:57])

• Bittersweet Resilience:
  "I do feel like I am proud of myself a little, just a little bit for speaking up."
  (Arielle Stoner, [57:33])

• On Friendship and Healing:
  "We give each other strength, you know what I mean? ... Love is. The only thing I think that has kept us here is for us wanting each other to be able to truly heal from this and get justice."
  (Alyssa Foster, [57:58])

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Timeline & Timestamps

• [01:24–06:00] Survivor protest and being denied a public voice at the board meeting.
• [09:08–11:42] Survivor connection and lawsuit formation.
• [11:42–16:39] Police investigation, instructions to stay silent, and frustrations.
• [19:13–25:05] Prosecutorial standards and system limitations explained.
• [25:05–29:28] Failure in local investigations and case review.
• [31:49–40:12] Indictment, survivors’ reaction, and continued systemic sidelining.
• [41:16–52:57] Arraignment, bond hearing, defense drama, and survivor support.
• [53:44–End] Aftermath, mixed emotions, lingering vulnerability, and the healing power of survivor solidarity.

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Conclusion

This penetrating narrative demonstrates the emotional cost of seeking justice after sexual abuse—especially for young women failed repeatedly by systems meant to protect them. The episode highlights not just legal battles, but the lifelong toll, the power of solidarity, and how hard-won progress can be bittersweet. The survivors’ stories—told in their own words—show both the incremental victories and the work that remains for true justice and safety.

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Transcript

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[Kelly McEvers]

NPR hey, I'm Kelly McEvers and this is embedded from NPR. Over the last few weeks we've been sharing a series from our friends at Louisville Public Media called the Girls. It's the latest season of the investigative podcast Dig. This episode takes us back to where the series began, the courthouse for the case against Ronnie Stoner, Donnie Stoner and Zack Kilgore for their alleged sexual abuse. As a reminder, Ronnie and Donnie Stoner denied all accusations and declined interview requests from reporter Jess Clark. Zach Kilgore is on the run from police so could not be reached. This episode gets into the complicated decisions lawyers have to make about which cases to take on. It also gets into a tension that can come up between victims of abuse and their lawyers and that is victims ideas of getting justice versus lawyers ideas about what is good legal strategy. Heads up that there is some cursing in this episode. Here's the fourth and final episode of the Girls

[Summer Dickerson]

Sandwich. Survivors on cover to cover Stand with survivors on Cover to cover there's just

[Jess Clark]

a handful of women protesting on the lawn outside the Jefferson County Board of Education building, but the crowd trickling into the meeting keeps its distance. The protesters are wearing matching red and white T shirts with a message that's hard to ignore. Stand with child victims, not pedophiles. One protester with purple hair shouts into a bullhorn.

[Summer Dickerson]

If we are not protecting our children, what are we doing? Our babies are the future and their own school district will not protect them. What are we doing? We have questions and we want answers. Jtps, we have questions and we want answers and we're not going anywhere. We will make everything so uncomfortable. Because you know what? These victims have to be uncomfortable every day.

[Jess Clark]

In the era of QAnon and political conspiracy theories that often involve child sex abuse. At first I thought they might be some kind of fringe extremist group, but I made my way over and introduced myself. And this is where I first met Amy Jones.

[Alexis Crook]

My daughter was raped by Donnie Stoner at Dupont Manual High School.

[Jess Clark]

And Alyssa Foster, who first told me about Ronnie.

[Alyssa Foster]

I was 13 years old. I was 8th grader at Newberg Middle School.

[Jess Clark]

And Alexis Crook, who told me there on the lawn that she was raped by both brothers.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

I played football with the boys actually, and it was their first job with children. They were my football coach.

[Jess Clark]

I didn't know it then, but the moment sparked more than 18 months of reporting about what happened to these young women who failed them and how hard they fought to tell their story. That's why they had come to the meeting of Alexis planned to address the Jefferson County Board of Education during public comment. She was nervous, but she knew what she was going to say and called ahead to make sure she was on the list of speakers.

[Jefferson County Board Chair Corey Scholl]

Is there a motion to receive the recognitions, Mr. Marshall? Seconded by Mr. Craig. All in favor?

[Jess Clark]

About two hours later, inside the boardroom, Amy, Alyssa and Alexis are still sitting quietly in their seats. Public comment comes at the end of the meeting, after district officials have made all their presentations. Finally, the chair of the board, a local pastor named Corey Scholl, opens public comment. Several students and community members approach the podium.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

If transportation is removed, who will attend these schools?

[Jess Clark]

A few weeks ago, we had Reggie,

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

our robot dog in here.

[Alyssa Foster]

However, the education acceptance our students receive at Central Gifts.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

It's time for multilingual learners to be represented at jcps.

[Jefferson County Board Chair Corey Scholl]

Thank you.

[Jess Clark]

But they never call Alexis's name.

[Jefferson County Board Chair Corey Scholl]

Is there a motion to adjourn?

[Jess Clark]

As board members start to pack up, Summer Dickerson, the protester with the bullhorn and the purple hair, stands up from her seat. We have a person that's on the list that has not been able to speak. She's on the list. So we would like to be able

[Summer Dickerson (continued)]

to have our three minutes as well, please.

[Jefferson County Board Chair Corey Scholl]

What is the name?

[Alexis Crook]

Alexis Crow.

[Jefferson County Board Chair Corey Scholl]

Alexis who? C R. Okay, okay. I don't have you on my list. And she was on the list.

[Jess Clark]

That's the whole reason why we were here.

[Summer Dickerson (continued)]

We called last week to get a follow.

[Jess Clark]

Scholl confers with the other board members. The superintendent, Marty Polio leans over to whisper in Shull's ear. You can't speak about personnel, polio is saying.

[Jefferson County Board Chair Corey Scholl]

Now, before you speak, let me be clear. You cannot speak about personnel.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

So remember, I don't have any names in my speech. It's just about an overarching issue.

[Jefferson County Board Chair Corey Scholl]

Okay?

[Jess Clark]

Okay. Alexis moves to the podium.

[Alexis Crook (public comment)]

Okay.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

Good evening. My name is Dr. Alexis Crook, and I stand here with victims and parents of victims of jcps, staff and coaches. It's truly unfortunate that I have to speak on this tonight. However, I would be remiss if I continue to hear the stories of sexual abuse from the same employees and remain silent.

[Jess Clark]

So today, as Alexis speaks, Shul and a second board member continue to pack up their papers. Another board member swivels in his chair.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

20 years is a very long time for the same predators to continue to have their pick of victims within the school. Moving staff to different schools or placements doesn't fix the problem. Myself and other victims have to deal with the trauma for this for the

[Arielle Stoner]

rest of our lives.

[Jess Clark]

We went that is the sound of Alexis's microphone being cut after her three minutes were up. It's board policy to do that for every speaker, but in this circumstance it felt wrong. The Jefferson County Board of Education had quite literally silenced an alleged survivor of child sex abuse. It made me queasy watching from the press section in the back. And that was before I knew what I know now after a year and a half of reporting that when the board silenced Alexis Crook, it was to her the latest betrayal in a long line of failures by Louisville schools, church leaders, law enforcement and social workers to keep Alexis and other girls safe from the very people charged with protecting them. This is Dig Season 3 from the Kentucky center for Investigative Reporting, I'm Jess Clark. Over the last three episodes you've heard how failures of schools, police and social services allowed two educators, Ronnie and Donnie Stone, to allegedly abuse girls in their care for nearly two decades in Louisville, Kentucky. This episode is about their accusers long fight for accountability. After everyone else failed them, a handful of young women decided to take matters into their own hands.

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[Jess Clark]

Alexis and Ariel Stoner found each other online. Alyssa saw on the news that Donnie had been reassigned from his position at Manual and and based on her experience with his brother, she suspected it had to do with sexual abuse.

[Alyssa Foster]

I just had a sick gut feeling.

[Jess Clark]

I met Alyssa and Arielle one evening in Alyssa's living room to talk about how they met. Their kids were there, so you'll hear them in the background. Alyssa posted on Facebook something brief about her experience with Rani when she was 13, and she says it blew up. The comments and reshares kept coming. One of the comments was from Arielle Stoner.

[Arielle Stoner]

I comment. Remember I commented under your post. I don't remember what I said.

[Alyssa Foster]

I think I said, yeah, I think

[Arielle Stoner]

I said text me.

[Jess Clark]

Alyssa and Arielle already knew of each other. They were both 8th graders at Newberg Middle School the same year, but back then they never interacted. Now Alyssa was nervous that Arielle, Rani's daughter, was going to hate her or think she was lying.

[Alyssa Foster]

I didn't want that to be the case. Like, so when I told you and you said, me too, my, my, like my heart has never dropped to my stomach so fast.

[Jess Clark]

For years, Alyssa had assumed it had only happened to her. She couldn't imagine he would sexually abuse his own daughter. Meanwhile, Ariel thought she was the only one her father was abusing. That's why she hadn't spoken out publicly before.

[Arielle Stoner]

Because I feel like I'm really strong and I tell myself this all the time. Like, of course it was wrong doing it to me. But also I was like, I'll be all right. I'll move past it. I'll forget about it. But seeing that it was other girls, I was like, I can't just let that slide. Like I have to do something. So that's really what made me, like, come out more. And just ever since I came out, I just haven't stopped because I don't want it to. I don't want him to get away with that.

[Jess Clark]

Arielle signed on to Alyssa's pending lawsuit, the one she started with attorney David Mauer. So did Alexis, based on her allegations against both Ronnie and Donnie from 2000, Lady Moore joined over Ronnie's alleged attempt to start grooming her. In 2014 in the hallway of Fern Creek High School. Two other women whose stories I have not confirmed also joined. In total, there were six women on board. You'll remember that Maurer failed to let Alyssa know JCPS wanted to talk to her about Ronnie. But Maurer did let the Louisville Metro Police Department know about the additional women who signed on to Alyssa's lawsuit in the summer of 2023. And that kicked off a new

[Arielle Stoner]

the

[Jess Clark]

detective was Michelle Rush.

[Detective Michelle Rush]

Hi, Alyssa. This is Detective Rush with the Louisville Metro Police Department Crimes Against Children Unit.

[Jess Clark]

How are you? Rush was a 10 year veteran with the police department. In one photo posted to social media, she's posing with a Golden Doodle, the therapy dog at the Child Advocacy Center. Her police badge on the waist of her jeans. I'm going to tell you now that Rush wouldn't see the end of this case. She died of cancer in June of 2025. This is her first call with Alyssa. I got this tape through an open

[Detective Michelle Rush]

records request, so kind of start me from the beginning of everything.

[Jess Clark]

We got Rush's file, and we can see that Rush got recorded statements from Alyssa, Lady Moore and Ariel Stoner. Most of her notes are scribbled on loose leaf paper. There's no investigative log documenting the steps she took. The file shows Rush pulled CPS reports on Ronnie Stoner. There's one for Lady Moore's incident at Fern Creek High School and a report Alyssa's mother made on Rani in 2022 when she learned about the alleged abuse from 2016. There's also a CPS report from Katrina Probus incident in 2018 at Newberg Middle when Ronnie told her he wanted to kidnap her. It's the first time any investigator had started connecting the dots on Rani. Alexis says Rush talked to her too, but LMPD didn't provide any files associated with Alexis's case. In all Rush's calls, she warned the women not to talk about the case.

[Detective Michelle Rush]

Everyone needs to stop talking about it, even with each other, because it'll start tainting each of your cases if you're talking about it amongst each other.

[Jess Clark]

Rush said it would help build a stronger case.

[Detective Michelle Rush]

We don't want his defense attorney to be able to say, well, so and so told so and so. This, that's how she knew. Does that make sense?

[Jess Clark]

This would become a recurring point of tension between the alleged survivors and the detectives and prosecutors working their case. Keeping quiet was hard for Alyssa and Arielle. They knew David Maurer had already cost Alyssa her chance to tell the school district her story. And they wondered if the police were also going to let them down. After speaking with Rush, Ariel and Alyssa were more restrained about what they said, but they never really stopped posting about it online.

[Alyssa Foster]

We didn't say anything for 10 and 20 years. I shouldn't have to wait another five to be able to speak on what happened to me when I was a 13 year old child. That is not fair to me. And once again, too, this is my story to tell. That's another reason I don't agree to shut up.

[Jess Clark]

In January 2024, about six months after the case was opened, Alexis says she got a call from Rush with an update.

[Alexis Crook (public comment)]

And she first asked me, could I tell Ariel and Alyssa to chill with like saying stuff on Facebook? Because the prosecutor was. Was upset.

[Jess Clark]

The prosecutor was worried that a defense attorney could use the accuser's comments against them, especially if they posted specifics.

[Alexis Crook (public comment)]

Well, we weren't posting specifics was my thing to Michelle. I was like, we're not posting specifics and they're pedophiles. Y' all are going to let them keep. I mean, we've had some. Me and Michelle had some heated conversations. And then she called me a second time about a week before the school board meeting and said, I talked to the prosecutor. You cannot keep talking about this. We are actively investigating.

[Jess Clark]

Alexis says Rush told her she had made some progress. She had been to Evangel Christian School and talked with administrators. But Rush was less optimistic about Ariel and Alyssa's cases. The timeline is fuzzy for Ariel and Alyssa, but at some point they say they learned that their cases would be closed. Alexis says she remembers Rush saying that Ariel's affidavit, the one she signed recanting her allegations, made her case non starter. As for Alyssa's case, in a short write up Rush eventually wrote for the prosecutor's office, the detective said she was unable to retrieve any correlating evidence because the alleged abuse happened so long ago. She noted that Alyssa had gone on, quote, multiple social media and media platforms discussing the case. She also wrote that Alyssa was not returning her phone calls. Alyssa says she's not aware of any calls from Rush that she missed or ignored. But she wasn't always able to afford to keep her phone plan active during that time, and she had to change numbers once. It's not really clear to any of them or to me what happened to Arielle. And Alyssa's cases. The fact that I have their case files suggests that LMPD did close their cases at one point. The department doesn't usually fulfill records requests for open investigations, but those records also show that Rush referred Alyssa's case for prosecution. The prosecutor's office will not answer questions about what it did with that referral. Whatever happened with their cases, it's safe to say that six months into the investigation, Ariel and Alyssa were not satisfied with the progress or communication, and they were all getting antsy, so they decided to start protesting.

[Summer Dickerson]

Ronnie and Donnie Stone are like little girls Emmanuel High School Music Y' all are.

[Jess Clark]

This audio comes from a video posted to social media by Riot Hart, a local live streamer. The women are gathered on the street corner next to Manual High School, a massive Gothic style building near downtown Louisville. For the first time, these women are speaking out in person, not just online, and it feels good to be seen, to confront real people, to scream and to be asked questions by the media.

[Alexis Crook]

Their childhood's been stripped. Their childhood's been stripped and it's all happened under the eye of JCPS and dupont. Manual High School.

[Jess Clark]

School lets out and students start to stream out of the building. Some kids gather across the street and watch others cross the street to snag the T shirts the women are handing out, printed with those hard to ignore messages like Stand with child victims.

[Arielle Stoner]

Y' all want a shirt.

[Jess Clark]

The women left invigorated. Summer Dickerson, the organizer with the purple hair, got a video of the girls after the rally. They're all sitting on a low brick wall along the sidewalk. An Ariel Stoner is who sticks out to me. She looks full of emotion.

[Alexis Crook]

I feel great.

[Arielle Stoner]

I feel a little overwhelmed, but great overall because we got a lot of support here like they said.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

So overall, I'm excited.

[Jess Clark]

I love this ride. They were so energized they decided to hold another rally a week later at the Jefferson County Board of Education. That's the meeting you heard at the beginning of this episode, the one where Alexis got to address the board. But Alexis says the prosecutor was not happy. She says Assistant Commonwealth Attorney Kristi Foster called her in the middle of the protest to tell her to stop. It was the last time she would hear from police or the prosecutor's office about the case for more than a year. Hi, I'm here for the Jefferson County Attorney's Office.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

What's your name?

[Jess Clark]

Jess Clark. On the Last day of February 2025, I walked into the sleek modern lobby of a highrise in downtown Louisville. I was a year into reporting this story, and I had a lot of questions about these cases, especially Ariel's. I had seen the police file from her 2021 disclosure, the one that police and prosecutors closed after Ariel signed an affidavit recanting the allegations. I'll take you to this conference room.

[Alyssa Foster]

Okay, thank you.

[Jess Clark]

I was there to see Doris Lee Gilbert, a local expert in child sex abuse prosecution. Today, Gilbert is the chief of the Special Victims unit in the Jefferson county attorney's office, working mostly on misdemeanor domestic violence cases. But before that, she was an assistant commonwealth attorney, the kind of prosecutor who would have screened felony cases like Ariel's. For years, Gilbert focused almost exclusively on prosecuting child sex abuse.

[Summer Dickerson (continued)]

It is at times the most rewarding work and at other times, the most devastating kick to the gut that you could ever imagine.

[Jess Clark]

I told Gilbert I was looking into years of allegations against Ronnie and Donnie Stoner. Gilbert said she couldn't comment on the case, but as a former commonwealth prosecutor, she could offer general insight on child sex abuse investigations. My key question was this. If prosecutors didn't feel like they had enough to go after Ronnie in 2021, what did they need? And Gilbert's answer was complicated. Under the US Constitution, in order to bring charges in any alleged crime, prosecutors have to have what's known as probable cause. It's kind of a squishy concept, but basically it means that there is a reasonable basis for believing a crime has been committed.

[Summer Dickerson (continued)]

It's a relatively low legal standard, but it is the requirement. Practically, often what prosecutors want is slightly more than probable cause, because ultimately the burden is to prove beyond a reasonable doubt.

[Jess Clark]

For a prosecutor, beyond a reasonable doubt is what the jury needs to give a guilty verdict. It's a higher legal standard. Gilbert says believing you have enough to convince a jury beyond a reasonable doubt is especially important in prosecuting child sex abuse because of the toll prosecution can take on the victims themselves.

[Summer Dickerson (continued)]

Because we know that this person has already been victimized in the most horrific way imaginable. And testifying, if you go to court and you have to testify, is reliving that experience. And it's reliving it in public, and it's reliving it in front of the person who did it to you, and it's reliving it potentially in front of the mom or the sister or the uncle or whoever's siding with them.

[Jess Clark]

Gilbert says deciding whether to bring charges is a balancing act. The prosecutor is weighing the benefit of prosecution against the impact to the victim, which she says can be damaging. And what often tips the scale is the likelihood of conviction.

[Summer Dickerson (continued)]

What we never want to do because these crimes are so traumatic for the people who are involved and because and often, for example, especially when it happens in a family. I can't tell you the number of cases I've seen where a child is abused and mom sides with the abuser. And it's difficult for the child in so many different ways that are just hard to watch and hard to believe. But if you push that and you go to trial on a case where you think that the chances that you'd win are 2% or less, sometimes the the harm that you cause to the victim is outweighs what feels like the possibility that you could actually get a conviction.

[Jess Clark]

Essentially what Gilbert is saying is that if a prosecutor doesn't believe they can win the case, they don't bring charges, even if they believe a child was sexually abused. If you've listened to season one of this podcast, this might sound familiar to you. Prosecutors in Jefferson county have the same approach when it comes to adult victims of sexual violence. Season one of Dig found prosecutors declined 40% of rape cases, allowing alleged rapists off the hook without so much as an arrest. I wondered if this approach was specific to Louisville, so I called around and other prosecutors have the same standard for child sex abuse cases. They have to believe they can obtain a conviction. I talked to Summer Steffen, district attorney for San Diego county and the former president of the National District Attorneys Association.

[Summer Steffen / Victor Vieth (Prosecutors)]

There's many cases that we know in our gut that something is terribly wrong, but the standard remains the same. The standard is prosecutors must believe that they can obtain a conviction on a beyond a reasonable doubt standard.

[Jess Clark]

And Victor Vieth, a prosecutor with the Zero Abuse Project, which provides training to investigators and prosecutors. If I think the case is shaky and I don't really have a good

[Summer Steffen / Victor Vieth (Prosecutors)]

faith belief that I can prove it

[Jess Clark]

beyond a reasonable doubt, even if I

[Summer Steffen / Victor Vieth (Prosecutors)]

personally believe the child, it would be unethical for me to proceed.

[Jess Clark]

Sex abuse, especially child sex abuse, is notoriously hard to prove. And and that reputation may lead prosecutors to decline cases they could win with good police work and the right strategy for prosecution. Veith, Stefan and Gilbert say police can get warrants to search children's bed sheets for semen and electronic devices and social media accounts for photos and texts. They can help victims stage pretext calls and prompt the abuser into an admission on the phone while police are listening. Even if there is no DNA or witness. Stefan says police can work to corroborate other Aspects of a victim's statement to bolster a child's credibility to a jury,

[Summer Steffen / Victor Vieth (Prosecutors)]

even down to, you know, we stopped at a McDonald's, he bought me a hamburger. We need to be able to potentially get video evidence of that event or a receipt or something like that.

[Jess Clark]

But as you might remember from the last episode, none of that happened. When police investigated Ariel Stoner's allegations against her father, and the only evidence collected was her forensic interview, I wanted to see how detectives treated other cases. So I looked at the last 100 child sex abuse cases closed by LMPD. I requested the investigative logs and letters for each of these cases as of July 2025. What I found is that detectives do most of their work by phone. In most cases, all the detective did was try to set up and attend a forensic interview. The average time it took to get a child in for that interview was 39 days, leaving weeks for abusers to destroy evidence and pressure a child into recanting. Of the kids who did make it in for the interview, almost 3/4 did not disclose the suspected abuse originally reported. Detectives closed those cases. They also closed more than a dozen cases at the request of a child's non offending caregiver or because the caregiver said they didn't believe the child. Detectives closed many cases without ever making contact with the child or the family. They left a couple voicemails, sent a letter, and if they didn't hear back, they closed the case. In one case, a child called the police from a neighbor's apartment to say a man who had come to buy drugs from her mother had raped her. Officers came to the scene to take an initial report. But the Crimes Against Children unit detective waited four months to reach back out to schedule a forensic interview. He called the child's guardian, her grandfather, and left a message. Then he sent a letter, but he never heard back, so he closed the case. In the end, only four cases out of a hundred resulted in charges or arrest. Two of them were rare instances in which children were forensically interviewed within 48 hours of the report. I asked LMPD for an interview to help me understand these findings or put them in context. They declined. Elia Mihu Fox with the Child Advocacy center did provide some context for why it can take so long to get kids into that forensic interview. For one, it's a model that relies on the cooperation of families and their availability to bring kids into the center. The detective and the CPS worker are supposed to be there, as well as and finding a time that works for all parties can delay the interview. Mihu Fox says she supports decreasing the time it takes to get kids in and notes that a few other states have guidelines for how quickly officers are supposed to refer kids to the cac. In Mississippi, for example, officers are supposed to refer a child to the center within 72 hours of the allegation. LMPD does not have any protocol in their standard operating procedures governing the timing of the forensic interview. But remember the multidisciplinary team from the last episode? They have a public protocol and it says officers can request an immediate forensic interview. In so called emergency cases in which a child is at risk of imminent danger or further abuse, there appear to be some procedures LMPD hasn't made public. In an unrelated records request, we found an interview in which Michelle Rush described her unit's practices to an internal investigator. Rush told the investigator that only certain kinds of cases require so called emergency forensic interviews. In those cases, the detective gets an interviewer right out to the scene or to the hospital, or takes the child immediately to the cac. But they only do this in cases where the alleged abuse has happened within 96 hours. For other cases, there's not the same urgency. It's kind of like setting up a doctor's appointment. Detectives see what times and dates the CAC has open over the next several weeks and what time works for the family to come in. When I asked an LMPD spokesperson about that emergency forensic interview procedure Rush described, he said it was not a department policy. I'm not sure what to make of that. When we come back after more than a year with no word, Alexis Crook finally gets an update on her case. This is Digg.

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[Jess Clark]

This is Dig. I'm Jess Clark.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

Is it okay if I record this call? Is that all right? Absolutely. Okay, I'm recording.

[Jess Clark]

Thank you. A week and a half after my interview with Doris Lee Gilbert at the Jefferson County Attorney's Office, Alexis Crook got word that a police officer was trying to reach her.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

I called the number, and it was Michelle Rush.

[Jess Clark]

Alexis had changed her number months ago because of harassment and threats by her estranged husband.

[Summer Dickerson]

And.

[Jess Clark]

And Rush had been trying to reach her all week.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

She said the prosecutors still want to move forward in charging him and want me to come talk to them tomorrow. Holy shit. Yeah.

[Jess Clark]

The prosecutors were the same ones charging Donnie over his alleged abuse of Abby Jones at Manual High School. Now, after more than a year of silence, they wanted to bring Alexis's case into the mix and maybe Alyssa's. But they had a familiar ask.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

She said, can you please talk to Alyssa and tell her to stay silent for now because there's a chance that we can prosecute Ronnie. Because she said, now we only have Donnie even with you. It's a little bit Ronnie, but it's mostly Donnie. She said, but if we want to get Ronnie out of jcps, like Alyssa has to shut up for a minute and talk to the prosecutors. And I said, well, I'll tell them that we all have the same thoughts about. Nobody really wanted to help us, you know?

[Jess Clark]

Alexis herself was wary of even taking the meeting with the new prosecutors, but decided it was worth the risk.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

It pains me because, like, if they say, okay, Alexis, you have a case, but Ariana listed does it. Like, then I feel like they don't get the justice that they. You see what I'm saying? It seems a lot to me. Like, they need me for Abby's case as well as they want to file formal charges in my case. But I wonder how I could use that to my advantage to be like, yeah, but let's talk about Ariel and Alyssa, too.

[Jess Clark]

Alexis is not naive to how the legal system works. She comes from a family of cops. She suspects that the prosecutors are suddenly interested in her case because they want to use it to bolster their existing case against Donnie for allegedly abusing Abby Jones at Manual in 2023. Prosecuting Donnie for alleged crimes against Alexis in 2005 could show a pattern of abuse and make a conviction more likely. But Alexis feels a responsibility to Alyssa and Arielle. She thinks they all deserve justice.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

Even if they filed charges and the jury said, not guilty, like, I would still feel some kind of maybe closure or some kind of, like, victory, like, at least we tried. And I think that that would be very healing for me and for them not to get the same would break my heart for them. I would rather them get it than me, their babies, you know?

[Jess Clark]

So she decides to leverage her position to get prosecutors to pay attention to their cases, too.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

I'm about to try to play the Commonwealth. I am. I swear to God, I'm gonna be like, you want to use me as a pawn? I'm used, y', all, too. I'm smart as. Like, if you need me, then I need you to do me a favor. You know what I mean? Yeah. And I don't feel like I'm wrong. Their stories make me more upset than my own. Like, I'm 35. I'm already fucked up about it. Like, they're 21, you know, and they could. This could really help them in healing.

[Jess Clark]

Alexis took the meeting two days later. It didn't go well, Alexis said. The lead prosecutor, Andrew Reinhart, admitted he hadn't read her file, and she got the feeling they were assessing her appeal to a jury. They asked a lot of questions about her education and medical practice, she said. Reinhart seemed focused on how Alexis could help Abby's case against Donnie and uninterested in Alyssa and Ariel's claims. Alexis said she expressed her Concerns that Alyssa and Arielle need a chance to see justice, too. But she agreed to keep talking. Months later, in June, another blow. Michelle Rush, the detective who worked Alexis's case, died of cancer at age 30. Five weeks after that, one of the prosecutors, Morgan Perfumo, sent Alexis a list of names by email and asked her to provide contact information. Many of them were people Alexis thought Rush had already talked to. There were 30 people on the list, including football players, friends, and faculty at Evangel. Alexis hadn't had contact with many of these people in decades. She was confused why they couldn't get the information from Rush's files, and frustrated she felt she was being asked to be her own detective. Alexis says Reinhart would later admit to her that the original police work was so poor, the prosecutor's office was having to take up the slack. Then, in July, Alexis asked me to call her again. She had a major update.

[Alexis Crook]

They're planning to file an indictment together with Ronnie, Donnie and Zach Kilgore, with me, Alyssa, and Ariel as victims. And they're planning on taking it to the grand jury in the next two weeks.

[Jess Clark]

Abby Jones would also be included in the indictment. This was huge. After years of fighting, this was the first real opportunity Alyssa, Arielle, and Alexis would have for justice. It was the first time Ronnie would face any legal ramifications for his alleged abuse. Alexis wasn't sure what made the prosecutors change their minds about Alyssa and Ariel's cases, but she had been pushing for it in their meetings for months. At one point, Alexis says she told prosecutors she wouldn't cooperate unless they at least called and talked to Alyssa and Arielle. There was a hitch in Alexis's case. Today, under Kentucky state law, it's a crime for adults in positions of authority, like a teacher or coach, to have sex with their 16 and 17 year old students. But that wasn't the law when Alexis was in high school back in 2005.

[Alexis Crook]

So even though he wasn't a position of power, he was on staff at Evangel. He was my football coach. None of that matters when I was 16. So the only thing they can charge Donnie, Ronnie, or anybody with or acts that were committed when I was 15, the law didn't change till 2007. Does that make sense?

[Jess Clark]

Yeah. I mean, so yeah, it makes sense, but it doesn't make sense.

[Alexis Crook]

Oh, I cried. I cried on the phone. I was like, so this is. This is insane.

[Jess Clark]

Reinhardt said the only acts he could charge Ronnie, Donnie, and Kilgore for after she turned 16 were for times when she was physically forced. Alexis says that happened once after she turned 16, that time when she says Donnie and Rani forced her to have sex with Zach Kilgore in his van. Reinhart also called Alyssa and Ariel and got some basic facts that they had already shared with Rush. Two weeks later, Reinhart brought 52 charges to a grand jury, who decided to indict. This should have been a major moment of victory for the women, something they had been working towards for years and stewing on for decades in Alexis's case. But that's not how it went down. Their first hint that the men had been indicted was when an LNPD detective reached out to Ariel Stoner's sister. He was looking for Ronnie, who had an arrest warrant out after the indictment. None of the alleged survivors even knew the indictment had happened. The women freaked out, thought someone might be messing with them. Alexis called her mom, a retired police officer who worked her contacts, to find out that the Stoners and Kilgore might have been. Alexis left the prosecutors frantic voicemails and emails asking for an update. What was going on. Reinhart called back to confirm, yes, the three men were indicted. Less than an hour later, his office sent out a press release.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

Twin brothers and former football coaches Ronnie

[Jess Clark]

and Donnie Stoner were coaches at former JCPS.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

Coaches face more than 50 total counts of sex crime charges.

[Jess Clark]

I hopped on a group call with Alexis, Arielle and Alyssa that evening and asked how they were doing. They all felt differently.

[Arielle Stoner]

I don't feel relieved.

[Alexis Crook]

I'm, like, numb. I don't know, I haven't cried or nothing. I just. I don't know, I have the slightest sense of relief in the sense of something has finally really been done in our case. I felt like for the past few years, we just go around and round and round and no real progress is made. I feel like this is at least progress. And for that, I have a little bit of relief.

[Jess Clark]

But Alexis was sick about how out of the loop prosecutors had left them.

[Alexis Crook]

My mom. My mother knew that they were indicted before we did. Amy, Abby's mom, knew they were indicted before we did. And had I not sent a manic email and left manic voicemails, we wouldn't have been told. And I feel like this has never been fair for us.

[Jess Clark]

For all the talk there is these days about making sex abuse investigations victim centered, it sure doesn't feel that way to Alexis. It's another reminder that prosecutors and law enforcement aren't working for the victims. Ultimately, they're working for the commonwealth, for the state and sometimes that leaves victims feeling like observers, pawns and even inconveniences in the pursuit of accountability for what happened to them.

[Alexis Crook]

So, I mean, I'm not overly excited. I think it's a good small step, but I think that. I just don't think we should be the last to know. I agree with you.

[Jess Clark]

Reinhart told them they didn't need to be at court for the arraignment three days later, but that was out of the question for these women. Days later, the elevators open on the seventh floor of the hall of justice and the twins emerge. Ronnie first, then Donnie. Their outfits are identical in the way the brothers are so similar and yet distinguishable. Both are wearing red polo shirts, but Donnie's is faded and Rani's is bright crimson. We've been here before. You remember this moment from episode one. It's where we started the season of Dig. This is the arraignment. The women are lined up outside the courtroom like a kind of gauntlet, faces hard. It's the first time Alexis has seen the brothers in years. Alyssa hasn't seen Ronnie since she was 14. Ariel Stoner is finally facing down her own father. Abby Jones is here, too, the youngest alleged survivor. And when Donnie makes eye contact with her, big tears fall in straight lines down her face. Zack Kilgore never shows in the courtroom. The four alleged survivors sit on the same bench in the gallery, second from the back. Alexis, still in her doctor scrubs, puts her arm around Ariel. The proceedings begin. It's not going their way. The defense attorney is making arguments that make Ariel want to stand up and shout. There are things they want the prosecutor to say that he is not saying. The judge, new to the case, says he doesn't have enough information to make a bond decision today. He puts the brothers on home incarceration. No handcuffs, no jail. Alexis puts her head in her hands. Her dark curls fall forward. Court is adjourned. The brothers have a security detail of sheriff's deputies who follow them out. As Rani steps onto the elevator, he throws his arms up and flexes like a bodybuilder. Kimberly Burns, Alexis's mother, is trying to keep her daughter calm, but it's not working.

[Arielle Stoner]

Tell my mom.

[Jess Clark]

Don't tell me to calm down. Don't do it.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

Don't tell me to climb.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

I'm Paul with the.

[Jess Clark]

I get a whole security key.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

You have deputies that'll take you to the car. I don't want a deputy.

[Jess Clark]

I wanna.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

Well, you have me.

[Jess Clark]

Outside the courthouse, Alyssa is fuming.

[Alyssa Foster]

No, I'm not happy. I'm not leaving her happy or satisfied. I'm leaving mad as. And something better be better next week. That's all I got to say. I'm not playing, Alexis. I had to leave. I had to walk the outside.

[Jess Clark]

She was crashing out, and that's not where the disappointment ended, Alyssa says. The next day, the prosecutor, Andrew Reinhart, called each woman individually to tell them to take down their social media posts.

[Alyssa Foster]

I was so nice, and all I wanted to do was tell him to fuck off. And I was like, yes, sir. Okay, sir. Hey, Alyssa, can you do me a favor? I need you to take everything that you've posted on social media down and refrain from posting on social media further. It's just, it looks like, you know, you girls seen Abby's case come out in public, and. And you just wanted attention, and you just made it all up.

[Jess Clark]

I talked to Reinhart a little about this, and he told me he advises all victims not to talk about their cases publicly, that he's not trying to silence them. He's trying to win the case, and he's worried the defense will use the women's words against them. He's explained that to them, but he's asking the women to trust a legal system that's let some of them down in the past. It's also really hard for Ariel to be told. It looks like she's glomming on when she went to police for help years before Donnie allegedly abused Abby Jones. This is something Ariel said outside the courthouse.

[Arielle Stoner]

I'm not trying to downplay Abby and them, but, like, I get it. We said something way before them. We said something. Just because y' all didn't know that don't mean it didn't happen.

[Summer Dickerson]

We been said something.

[Jess Clark]

Arielle herself has been saying something since February 12, 2021, the day she ran away from home and told police her father had been sexually abusing her for six years. Years. Lady Moore said something more than 10 years ago when she told high school administrators Ronnie propositioned her in the hallway. Katrina Probus said something in 2018 when she told her assistant principal that Rani came on to her at her middle school. Alyssa had been saying something since 2022 when she tried to file a lawsuit over Ronnie's alleged abuse when she was 13. They had all been saying something, only now people were finally listening.

[Alyssa Foster]

Let's do it.

[Jess Clark]

A week later, Ariel, Alyssa, and Alexis are back on the seventh floor of the hall of justice for the Stoner's bond hearing. The judge needed a week to review the case before deciding how much money the twins would have to provide to avoid waiting in jail for trial. Prosecutors are asking for half a million each. The women are not optimistic it will go their way, given the way everything seems to go for them. And they're prepared for a repeat of disappointment. Not to mention Zachary Kilgore, the man who Alexis says raped her in 2007, is still on the run again. The elevators open again. Rani and Donnie emerge again. The accusers take their seats along the same bench, second from the back.

[Arielle Stoner]

All right,

[Jess Clark]

but something's different today. For the first time in years, it's not just Ariel, Alexis, Alyssa and Abby. Lady Moore is here too, in her medical scrubs. And another alleged survivor who hasn't been in contact with the group in months. Lady said seeing on the news that for the first time in more than 10 years, Ronnie was facing some kind of accountability gave her the strength to rejoin the fight. As the prosecutor Reinhart begins his argument, he gestures to the bench. It can hardly contain the six alleged survivors and their supporters. Good afternoon, Judge Andrew Reinhart. Morgan Perfumo for the Commonwealth. In the gallery are numerous victims on this case. The judge, Mitch Perry, looks over his reading glasses and clocks the full bench. The Stoner twins are both lawyered up. Ronnie has Greg Sims, a tall man with thick curly hair, seated to his right. An older man in a loose, rumpled suit stands up next to Donnie. This is Rob Eggert, a well known Louisville defense attorney known for bombast in the courtroom and success. He's the same attorney who worked with the family to set up Ariel's affidavit recanting her allegations against Ronnie in 2022. Eggert is trying to get Judge Perry to lower the bond and he argues Donny has no criminal record prior to the charges in Abby's 2023 case and that he's made his court dates.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

And I think there you can see, I don't think there's anything, anything there that would indicate anything of what my. That the Commonwealth alleged here at all. He works, he supports his son and his.

[R]

What is he doing now? You say he's Was a truck driver

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

at this point, sir? Was truck driver. And there's just nothing to indicate that he would flee. 0.

[Jess Clark]

Sims makes a similar argument on behalf of Ronnie.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

I would just like to make sure the court understands that Ronnie Stoner lives with his partner Jamie for the last 10 years here and is well rooted in the community and still has work here. If the court were to allow him to remain on hip and allow Him. Work release. Thank you, your honor.

[Jess Clark]

But Perry is not convinced. He keeps the bond at half a million each, but allows the defendants to put up 10% to avoid jail, a common practice in the court system. That's 50,000 each. And it pushes Eggert over the edge.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

You're talking 50,000?

[R]

Yes.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

Cuz they don't have 50,000, Judge. And these charges go back to 2005.

[R]

That's my decision. That's the bond.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

Please note my objection, Judge, because I think this is a grandstand political move where they've gone back 20 years to put these men in jail. 20 years. They can't post 50,000. They don't.

[Jess Clark]

Eggert continues until he draws his first rebuke from Perry.

[R]

That's my decision. And you did sit quietly. Do you understand?

[Jess Clark]

But despite multiple warnings, Eggert goes on.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

Well, Judge, we don't have a bit of discovery, not one bit of discovery for acts going back and on. It's an abuse of the grand jury process.

[Jess Clark]

And on believe a word that they've

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

said about new evidence they've had, whatever they.

[Jess Clark]

And on.

[Courtroom Speaker / Prosecutor or Defense Attorney]

They'll be laughing and drinking tonight, putting people in jail who come to court, who've never been convicted, who.

[Jess Clark]

Finally, Perry's had enough.

[R]

You're invited again to sit quietly and stop being disrupted. I hope you understand the seriousness of my tone and my long history with your behavior and antics. Sit quietly, Mr. Eggert, please.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

I am.

[Jess Clark]

The next hearing is set. A door on the left side of the courtroom opens, and a sheriff's deputy in a brown uniform ushers Ronnie and Donnie through. They're on their way to jail.

[Arielle Stoner]

All right.

[R]

Anything else? All right, see you on the 19th.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

Thank you.

[Jess Clark]

Alyssa is gleeful as she exits the courtroom. But Arielle and Alexis look dazed. All of the survivors and their closest supporters squeeze into one elevator. Can we all fit?

[Alexis Crook]

All right.

[Jess Clark]

When the doors close and the elevator starts to descend, lady speaks up.

[Summer Dickerson]

This was a conversation really started as

[Jess Clark]

they would ever fucking. It's here, baby. That's Summer Dickerson, the activist who's worked with the women for years, saying she's proud of them. The elevator opens on the first floor. The women spill into the lobby. Alyssa dances past the metal detectors to the outer doors.

[Alyssa Foster]

God, did I could twerk outside of twerk.

[Jess Clark]

No, she can't.

[Alexis Crook (phone call)]

Hey.

[Jess Clark]

Go, lady. Alexis's mom, Kimberly Burns, a tiny woman usually the picture of restraint, says she can barely contain her need to gloat, like Ronnie appeared to do at the last court date.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

I have to tell you prosecutors, my desire to flex on them when they look back was really strong. I had to keep my fingers folded because when they glanced back, it was I was going to be really out of line.

[Jess Clark]

Thank you, Judge Berry.

[Summer Dickerson]

Thank you, Andrew.

[Alyssa Foster]

Thank you, Mr. G. Oh baby, oh baby, oh baby. Last time we left with our tears.

[Jess Clark]

Bad tears.

[Alyssa Foster]

It's good tears this time.

[Jess Clark]

Look at that smile. Outside, they hug, light up a few black and milds and take selfies together. Arielle and her mom, Genethia, make plans to celebrate over lunch.

[Arielle Stoner]

It's National Wing Day. I'm finna go eat.

[Jess Clark]

Arielle's quick with the humor but reserved about sharing how she really feels. I'm happy, she says. For now. Alexis still looks dazed in the crowd. I haven't seen her smile yet. It's hard to savor the moment when all you can think about is what's next. But that mindset is also a big reason why the women got this far. About a month and a half later, I met up with Alexis and Alyssa at Alyssa's house to check in and take some photos. By then, a court date had been set for a trial in August of 2026. Alexis was finally able to reflect on how far they've come since the Women connected online two years ago.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

2023, when this first broke, when Alyssa

[Alexis Crook]

made a status and Ariel made a

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

status and I was connected to them and we didn't know each other and we didn't trust each other. But from that to getting a 52 count indictment with charges from 10 to 20 years for some of them, like I feel like that's a hell of a thing for three girls that were told to shut the fuck up for two years to accomplish.

[Jess Clark]

That's what gives Alyssa hope.

[Alyssa Foster]

Because if we did all this from scratch, not having any schooling behind it, not having any knowledge or ever being involved with courts or detectives or news people or anything to from the ground up, make them give us justice and give the world justice. That's where the hope comes in. Because obviously we won't give up.

[Jess Clark]

Arielle was supposed to be here too today, but she didn't show. She'd gotten more and more withdrawn recently with Alyssa and Alexis and with me. Alexis was worried.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

We've been through dark periods and been suicidal and been like this is it, like this is the rock bottom. But something we've never done is stop to communicate, even for a day.

[Jess Clark]

When I first envisioned this final scene of this last episode, my idea was to end on an uplifting note. Ariel, Alexis and Alyssa together talking about how proud they are of themselves and each other and how far they've come. And that is a true part of their experience. But the whole truth is a lot more complicated. The whole truth is that none of these three women were doing very well. After the bond hearing, Alexis was on medical leave from her job because her mental health was so fragile, she was living in constant fear of Zach Kilgore. Alexis says a detective told her Kilgore had managed to evade police twice and was still on the run. She told me he offered her a hundred thousand dollars to recant her rape allegations against him, but she turned it down, and she was afraid of what he would do next.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

People think you cut the head off of the snake and it'll fall if we're not around. Because a lot of this, even though they have evidence for some of us, some more than others, still, a lot of this relies on, like, what we say happened.

[Jess Clark]

She'd asked police and prosecutors for protection. They said police would keep an eye on her home. Meanwhile, Alyssa was suffering from nightmares and anxiety. What are you scared of?

[Alyssa Foster]

Everything going wrong the way it always has. There being, like, a plea deal offered. That doesn't really. That's not justice, just the ball being dropped. Prosecutor not doing or saying the right things. They're a lawyer.

[Alexis Crook (public comment)]

The.

[Alyssa Foster]

The going on the stand. The thought of going on the stand and then ripping your whole life apart and calling you every nasty thing that they can think of. That one's. That one's difficult for sure, to, like, prepare yourself for. How do you even prepare yourself for someone to pick apart your whole life and everything you've ever done wrong?

[Jess Clark]

I met up with Arielle outside her apartment a few days later.

[Alexis Crook (continued) / Kimberly Burns]

Oh, yeah?

[Jess Clark]

That's great.

[Summer Dickerson]

Yeah.

[Jess Clark]

She was tired. Tired from working third shift and tired of talking about what happened to her as a kid.

[Arielle Stoner]

I get in these moods sometimes where I just want to be left alone. I don't want to talk. That's why. I don't know, you probably be feeling like I'm ghosting you, but I really don't be ghosting you. I just be, like, in my moods where I don't want to talk to nobody. I just shut down and just be by myself.

[Jess Clark]

We sat on her stoop and talked a little more about what she'd been up to, what she's looking forward to, the holidays, her daughter's third birthday party in January, maybe going back to school. And then I asked her a question I've been wanting to ask her for weeks. Do you ever feel proud of yourself for what you did?

[Arielle Stoner]

Oh, no. Well, yes and no. Mostly I would say 90% no. Sometimes I feel like, am I doing the right thing? Sometimes I question myself and I double back and I be like, I don't know if I should be doing this or I. Like, I second guess myself.

[Jess Clark]

Arielle says most of the time she's filled with self doubt and worries what will happen if Rani isn't convicted. Wonders if she's doing the right thing, dragging it all out in the open and putting herself through this. But there's a small part of her 10% she says, that glimmers through.

[Arielle Stoner]

I do feel like I am proud of myself a little, just a little bit for speaking up.

[Jess Clark]

The power of her relationship with Alyssa and Alexis is that they foster that little glimmer of hope or pride or self worth in each other.

[Arielle Stoner]

Meeting them, I'll never trade that for anything.

[Jess Clark]

That's how Alexis and Alyssa feel too. And Alyssa says that kind of relationship is rare for them.

[Alyssa Foster]

All of our lives, we've kind of been conditioned not to trust anybody, not to put all your cards into somebody, not to. To love anybody with your entire being. Because that just gets you. I mean, it gets you nowhere. It gets you hurt, it gets you traumatized. Finding each other and like, this is just what I feel. We give each other strength, you know what I mean? Like, there's been times where, you know, I was like mortified and wanted to break down and wanted to cry, but one of them was going through something as well that day. And so at that point, it's not even a thought in your mind. You just lift your head up and you just go and you just do it and you just be strong. It's, I mean, the same as a romantic relationship, right? If your partner can't give 50, 50 every day, and it's just 80, 20, I can. I know that there's two people who will pick up that 80 for my 20 always. And it will always be vice versa. And that is strength. That is strength. Love is. The only thing I think that has kept us here is for us wanting each other to be able to truly heal from this and get justice from this and to be okay.

[Jess Clark]

For now, that's what they're working on, being okay and spending time together, doing things that have nothing to do with the case. Making holiday cookies, picking pumpkins, finding the solace they can before things ramp up again ahead of next year's trial. In the meantime, I'll continue to follow the case. If you have information or you think there's something I should know that I haven't reported here. Please get in [e-mail]. DIG is produced by the Kentucky center for Investigative Reporting at Louisville Public Media. This season was reported by me, Jess Clark, and edited by Jake Ryan and Laura Ellis. Special thanks to Morgan Watkins, Michelle Tyreen Johnson, Roberto Roldan, Amina Elahi, Joe Sanka, Kelly Wilkinson and Laura Atkinson. Kojun Teshiro created our theme music with assistance from Ryan Marsh, photos by Justin Hicks and Gisele Roden, and illustrations by Effie Chalikapulu. Our work is community funded. Visit kydig.org and click donate to help make reporting like this possible.

[Kelly McEvers]

Hearing stories like this one can bring up painful feelings and memories, especially if you're a trauma survivor yourself. If you need to talk, you can reach the Rainn National Sexual assault hotline at 800656. Hope you'll find that number and more mental health resources in our show.

[Ollie Advertiser]

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