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Hi, it's Sierra Miller. I can't wait for you to check out my new collection of shoes and accessories at Designer Shoe Warehouse. If you love shoes as much as I do, then trust me, I got you. From cute sneakerinas to the perfect flip flops to stunning heels, these shoes are all style, no drama. It's a girls girl summer. And DSW has just the shoes. Shop the Sierra Miller Collection. Right now at your DSW store or dsw.com you're listening to this podcast, so I know you've got a curious mind. Here's a helpful fact you may not know yet. Drivers who switch and save with Progressive save over $900 on average. Pop over to progressive.com, answer some questions and you'll get a quick quote with discounts that are easy to come by. In fact, 99% of their auto customers earn at least one discount. Visit progressive.com and see if you can enjoy a little cash back. Progressive Casualty Insurance Company and affiliates national average 12 month savings $946 by new customers surveyed who saved with Progressive between June 2024 and May 2025. Potential savings will vary. You're listening to an Ono Media Podcast. Hey everyone and welcome back to the into the Dark podcast. I'm your host, Pete Moreland. I'm so glad you are here and listening. Thank you for supporting the show. Thank you for constantly supporting Just Murder with my husband in general. I love you so much for my 10 seconds for this episode. This weekend, my mom and dad and sister are all gonna come to my house. Me and my sister are gonna work on some dance choreography and I'm just excited to have everyone here. You know, when you live somewhere where you have no family, even in the same state as you, it is so nice when family does get to come visit. We're probably gonna, you know, just eat some good food, hang out. It'll be really fun and I'm really looking forward to it. But other than that, I don't really have much coming up this week. Garrett dropped a new bagel flavor. It's birthday cake and it is so. It is so good. Like so good. But yeah, other than that, that's all I have and I think we can get straight into today's episode. Trigger Warning. This episode includes discussions of domestic abuse. So please listen with care. It is important to have someone in your life who's always in your corner. Somebody who has your back no matter what, who supports you when you are going through rough times, listens when you need to vent and Lends a helping hand when you're in need. Now, for some of us, that person is a family member, like a parent or a sibling. For others, it could be a friend or a romantic partner. And sadly, sometimes the person you're closest to can let you down or even betray you. And few people understood that better than Heather Dewild did in 2003. Now, Heather, in 2003, lived in Edgewater, Colorado, which was also where she had grown up. So she was close to her parents and all of the people she had gone to school with. And this is a key detail. For her whole life, she had never been lucky in love. Okay, Heather always wanted a serious boyfriend, but for whatever reason, guys just never pursued her. And her first real relationship in her life didn't begin until a few years after she graduated high school, which was when she got involved with a man named Daniel dewild, who sometimes went by Dan. Now, Dan and Heather were both very young when they got together. They were in their early 20s. And right off the bat, Heather's family could tell that this relationship did not seem healthy. Dan could be jealous and possessive. He'd become angry when Heather went out with her friends or made plans without him. But this is her first relationship. She doesn't know better. But as time went on, Heather got sick of fighting about it, so she just stopped having a life of her own. She spent all of her time with Dan. She avoided everyone else, including her own family. Her parents thought Dan was isolating her, and this could have been a sign of more serious problems. And they also noticed the way Dan always insulted Heather and made cutting little remarks when they were together. He treated her like she was stupid, ugly, worthless, which felt like another huge red flag. So as time goes on, Heather's family begs her to break up with Dan and find someone new, Find a man who would treat her better. But before they could convince Heather to do anything, she realized she was pregnant. And because of this, she decided to stay with Dan and make things work. They were married in 1997 when Heather was just 24 years old. And unfortunately, once they tied the knot, their relationship just seemed to get worse. Dan put Heather down every chance he got. He made comments about how supposedly nobody else would ever want her, so she would never leave him because she'd be alone forever. I mean, it was just horrible. And it wasn't even a big secret. And on top of that, Dan never stuck to household budgets. He would spend tons of money without checking in with Heather to see how she felt. She had to struggle to make ends meet when there wasn't enough cash to cover basic necessities, even though there should have been if not for Dan's spending. And despite the fact that after all this time, Heather is worn down and discouraged, she still stays with him. And over the course of the next six years, they have two children together, Jacob and Hannah. And one day, Heather finally hits her limit when Dan disciplined Jacob very harshly. I guess Jacob was acting up the way young children do. And Dan lost his cool, spanked Jacob, locked him in a room for a long time, and the little boy was screaming and crying on the other side. And when Heather witnesses all of this, she realized Dan isn't just only going to abuse me. He's starting to abuse the kids, too. And as time went on, he was only going to get worse. So it was at this point when Heather decided she'd had enough and she filed for divorce. Now, by this time, Jacob was 5 years old and Hannah was 3. So Heather was prepared to be a single mom just as soon as she broke free of Dan, which was hard for her to do because Dan, like most domestic violence situations, was not willing to let Heather go. He begged her to change her mind and stay with him. And when that didn't work, he began threatening her and having scary outbursts. I mean, as we've talked about on this show, statistically, the most dangerous time in a domestic violence situation is trying to leave. So Heather did not feel safe staying in the house with Dan. She needed to get her kids out, settle somewhere new. But unfortunately, thanks to all of the years of Dan's impulsive spending and bad budgeting, she couldn't afford a new house. She couldn't find a new apartment. So instead, she moved back in with her parents, and she took the children with her. Then, as the divorce negotiations moved forward, she demanded that Dan start paying child support. And she also fought for full custody of the kids because she doesn't trust Dan with them. She's the safer parent. She got out of this because of those dangers. In response, Dan complained Heather was being unfair, making his life difficult. He said that between child support and his other personal debts, he couldn't afford to cover the mortgage in his house. He was going to lose the home unless he found roommates to pay rent for him. Now, luckily, at the time, Dan's twin brother David and his wife Roseanne were looking for a place to live. So they agreed to move into Dan's house and help cover those expenses. Now, basically, his brother and sister in law were his lifelines, kind of solving his financial crisis. But he was still very angry about the situation, and he blames Heather for everything. This is a nasty, nasty divorce. Now, needless to say, Heather was anxious to finalize this divorce and get Dan out of her life for good. But by July 24, 2003, everything was almost finished. Heather expected the divorce to be official within a few days, maybe a week at most. And in the meantime, she was just focusing on being a good mom, living her life, which meant getting the kids enrolled in school and daycare and making doctor's appointments. And this was a problem because Dan still had the kids medical insurance cards. He told Heather he wouldn't give them back unless she came to his house and picked them up in person. And on top of that, someone had sent a check to his address recently, and it was written out both to Dan and Heather. And he claimed they both needed to sign it so he could deposit it. This is all very annoying. He's just trying to find reasons to get her over there in person. But it's one of those things Heather needed to take care of, like, she couldn't put it off anymore. So on the morning of the 24th, she planned to drive to Dan's house, Get the insurance cards, Sign the check, and then get back home. Except this day, this plan was giving Heather's father a bad feeling. His name was Dave Springer, and I'm gonna refer to him by his last name for this episode. He was a retired police officer who used to work with the Denver pd, And he had seen a lot of divorces go wrong, obviously. So Springer's instincts just told him that Dan is obviously bad news, Especially in this situation. He didn't think Heather was safe around him. So he's like, please, please don't go over there. Her dad, Springer said that there had to be some other way for her to get those insurance cards. But Heather didn't listen. She acknowledged Dan was dangerous and that it was. She didn't want to go over there, but she also believed Dan would never hurt her in front of their kids. So she told her dad that she was bringing Hannah and Jacob with her. That way, Dan would leave her alone. She could take care of errands and leave without any issues. With that, she got into her car with her children and drove toward Dan's home. And then hours went by, but she never came back. And this was all supposed to be a quick visit. Remember, there was no reason it should take her all day to sign a check or pick up an insurance card. So Springer's Gut told him something had gone wrong. So he begins calling Dan, asking, hey, is she still at your house? And when he answers, he says Heather was shopping. She'd apparently left the kids with him and she went out to run a few errands, which makes no sense to Springer because first she wouldn't have left the kids with Dan. She didn't even trust him. And plus, she was always good at sticking to a schedule. It's completely out of character for her to drop them off and then be like, I'm gonna just go run errands and not tell anyone. Plus, she'd left her wallet with all of her cash and credit cards in it and at her dad's home, which meant there was no way she was out shopping because he knew she didn't have any way of paying for anything. So in that moment on the phone with Dan, this ex cop, Springer knew something had definitely happened to his daughter Heather. And Dan was lying about it right now on the phone. So he hopped in his car and drove all the way from his house to Dan's and then back again. He was hoping to see something on the road that might tell him what had happened to Heather. Maybe. Maybe she was in a car accident, Maybe. Maybe something. But the whole time, he was hoping and praying that he was wrong, that he would pass her car, see her behind the wheel, and realize, nope, everything's fine. But he didn't see a single trace of her alive or dead. So next, Springer went back home and waited just in case Heather did come back later with some type of explanation. He obviously doesn't want to jump to conclusions, so despite feeling like something's wrong, he's just trying to hold out hope that she's okay. But an entire night passed. She didn't return, she didn't call or text, and it was impossible at that point to say what had happened to her. Now, finally, the next morning, Springer and his wife went to the police station to report their daughter Heather missing. Now, the officers took the case extremely seriously. I mean, when her father explains what's going on, it doesn't look good. Heather had disappeared just days before her very toxic divorce was finalized. And she'd been at Dan's house. He had a history of abuse. All signs pointed to the idea that he had hurt her. So a team actually goes straight to Dan's home to look for Heather. And as soon as they knocked on his front door, he said he'd hired a lawyer and he didn't want to talk to them. And then his twin brother roommate David came to the door and Dan immediately was like, don't talk to police. Don't say anything. Almost like he was worried that David knew something or was going to say something. Of course, he had the right to hire a lawyer and refused to talk to police. Many legal experts say that that's exactly what you should do in this situation, even if you're innocent. But overall, like, he's the last person who saw her. He was acting very evasive and suspicious, like he had something to hide. She just left the kids with him. However, he did let the police search his house that day. All right, you guys, it's summer and that means we are bringing out our summer clothes. Which of course is why it's time to talk to you about Quince. I love quince. They know high quality essentials like breathable linen, soft organic cotton, washable silk, but without the luxury prices for all of those. It is the perfect balance where you can look elevated and it's easy. 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Factor shops, preps, cooks and delivers straight to your door. Head to factor meals.com dark50off and use code DARK50OFF to get 50% off and free daily greens per box with new subscription only while supplies last until 927 2026. See website for more details. The detectives went through all of his property. They found no trace of Heather. She is literally missing after going to his house. There was also no signs of a struggle. Forensic teams failed to find any blood, hair, or honestly, any indication that Heather had even been there. Except when they went through Dan's video collection. They found some home movies he had made and specifically it was sex tapes from before Heather broke up with him. And the officers confiscated them even though there was no sign that the footage had anything to do with the investigation. But I think they were just trying to figure out more about this couple's history. In fact, there was nothing to connect Dan to Heather's disappearance, honestly. So after they gathered all of the videos, they just simply leave. But Springer, her father, keeps noticing red flags. For example, Dan signed up for a dating site pretty soon after Heather went missing. On its own, this is obviously not a big deal. They were about to be legally divorced and he had the right to date other women. But on Dan's account, he didn't list himself as divorced. His account said he was a, quote, widower. Literally. He signs up for a dating site and writes that his wife was dead. But at this point, nobody knows if Heather's dead. Remember, she's just missing again. It made Springer think Dan knew more than he was letting on. And to make things stranger, Springer learned that someone was still using Heather's bank account. They had been writing checks from it to pay for things, but the signature on the checks wasn't a match to Heather's. So after he and his family flagged it for the bank, they did an investigation and learned it was Dan. He had been stealing Heather's money. The theft had begun almost immediately after Heather's disappearance. In total, he had already taken $16,000 from her account. This was serious enough for the police to actually charge him with forgery. He's signing her name. But they still couldn't connect this theft with Heather's disappearance. Basically, he's a thief. He's dishonest. This is very disgusting. If he had nothing to do with the disappearance. But it also doesn't automatically mean he was a kidnapper or murderer. And nobody could act on their suspicions until they found harder evidence. However, days went by, and it never appeared. And honestly, it felt like the investigation was stalling out until about August 4, 2003. Now, by this point, Heather had been missing for just a week and a half, and someone called the police with a new tip. They'd seen a car parked in the street near their apartment, and it hadn't moved for a while. So when the officers came out to look at the car, they confirmed it was Heather's. She was not inside. And once again, the investigators didn't see any sign of a struggle, no blood, no evidence that anything bad had happened inside Heather's car. And unfortunately, like, yes, they found her car, but it doesn't get them anywhere, and it takes another month until September 4th for anyone to find a new clue. Now, tragically, it was on this day that investigators actually found Heather's body. She was buried at the side of a road outside of Denver, Colorado. She was hidden well, she hadn't been discovered until some department of transportation workers were surveying the area for other reasons. Heather was tied up and wrapped in garbage bags, and an autopsy showed that there was some kind of trauma on her head, like something had hit her hard. There was also a rope wrapped around her neck as though she'd been strangled. But, I mean, at this point, her body was pretty badly decomposed. It was impossible to say what exactly had killed her. However, there was one clue that really stood out to the officers once they found Heather's body. It had to do with the way Heather was tied up. Now, as you'll remember, the police had confiscated Dan and Heather's sex tapes. And one of those recordings actually showed Dan tying Heather up, and he wrapped the rope around her and tied the knots in a very particular, specific way. And when police find her body, it was identical to how her body was bound. Now. Now, obviously, this doesn't seem to really move anyone forward in the investigation because it's still not hard evidence. They know Dan had a motive. They know he had opportunity because he was the last one with Heather on the day of her disappearance, and he'd almost Certainly lied about her going shopping when her father had called. He'd also stolen money out of her checking account, like, knowing that it wouldn't matter. He claimed Heather was dead on his dating profile. I mean, the list goes on. They even knew he could tie the specific kind of knots that were on her dead body. But in spite of all of this, officials argued it's. It's not enough to charge him without DNA or blood or security camera footage, like, something. Where did she. Where is the crime scene even at? They don't think it's at the house. They don't think it's in the car. They were like, we just don't think we can get a guilty verdict. So since they didn't have a smoking gun, they do nothing. And this was incredibly frustrating to Heather's family. They could not understand how Dan is still a free man, which, like, rightfully so. But they kept waiting and waiting for another two years. This was until the next election. And this mattered because the district attorney's seat was now up for grabs. The district attorney, or D. A. Is the person who decides which cases are strong enough to go to trial. Like, the police go to the D. A. And they tell them what they have, and the DA Is like, yeah, we can do it, or, no, we can't. Now, this year, someone knew one. And as soon as he was sworn in, Heather's family asked for an appointment. Obviously, they laid out all of the evidence and explained, listen, everyone knows Dan did this. He needs to go to prison. And the D. A. Was moved by their arguments. He couldn't imagine waiting for years for your loved one to get justice, Especially when it's pretty obvious who did it, but you just can't prove it. So he made a deal. He said solving Heather's murder was going to be a top priority to. But also, he agreed. At this point, there's still not enough evidence, But I'm not giving up hope. Rather than delaying, he encouraged the police. Hey, keep digging. Take a closer look at Dan. Find something. Find clues that point to him. And at one point, they did yet another search of his home. And this time around, they brought dogs with them to try and pick up on Heather's scent. And their hope was that if Heather had died in Dan's house, the dogs would find the trail. And sure enough, they did signal at one point. Specifically, they picked up Heather's scent in a car. But it wasn't Dan's car. It actually belonged to his roommate and twin brother, David, who lived there at the time of the Murder. Now, before I move on in this story, I want to be clear. David and Dan were incredibly close. They weren't just brothers. They were best friends. They had been born 90 seconds apart from one another, and from that day onward, they had been inseparable as adults. They had actually worked in the same industry, sometimes for the same company at the same time. I mean, they're just those twins that grew up to do everything. And even though David didn't have any reason to want Heather dead, the police are like, as his twin brother, best friend, would he have helped as a favor to Dan? So the officers decide to pull David's cell phone records. They saw that on the day Heather went missing, David's phone was pinged near the apartment complex where her car was later found, exactly like what you'd expect if he had driven there and then abandoned it. So this puts the twin brother, David, abandoning her car. But things got wilder because the police also learned that David had married his girlfriend, Roseanne, just a few days after Heather's disappearance. Now, they hadn't been engaged or planning their wedding for long. In fact, Roseanne claimed that he walked up to her one day and asked if she wanted to get married. She said yes, and they just headed straight to the courthouse then and there. She claimed they did this because they were sad that Heather was missing, and it made them think about what was important in life, and they decided not to put off important things like getting married. But the police know something else. It's that the law says people couldn't be forced to testify against their spouses in court. Basically, if you know your husband or wife committed a crime and you don't want to be a witness against them, you can refuse. However, you don't have that right if you're just dating. So the police are like, hmm. Was Roseanne involved, too? She may have known what had happened to Heather, and David might have rushed to marry her to protect himself legally or protect them. But they still didn't have any solid evidence. Some police officers pulled David into an interrogation. They told him, hey, you need to cooperate. Otherwise, we're going to charge Dan with murder and both you and your wife with being accessories. And I guess this is when twin brother David decided it was time to tell the truth. Chime is changing the way people bank. They offer the most rewarding fee free banking. This is fee free banking built for you. They're not like traditional old banks that charge you overdraft and monthly fees. 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He says, listen, all three of us were home. Dan, David, and Roseanne. They were home on July 24, the day of Heather's disappearance. She did come over with the kids, and Roseanne volunteered to play with them in another room so they'd be out of the way. Then Dan tried to get Heather to go into the garage alone with him. And according to David, Heather didn't want to. She said it didn't feel safe. So it was at this point that he reminded her he still had sex tapes they'd made during their marriage. And he promised Heather, if you come to the garage, I will let you take them home. You can keep them, destroy them, I don't care. But you have to come to the garage. If she didn't cooperate, he said he was going to do whatever he wanted with them, maybe show them to other people or post them online to embarrass her. So Heather decides not to resist. She says she's gonna go into the garage with him. And David claims at this point, he knew she wasn't going to come out alive. Dan had already talked to him about how he had wanted to murder Heather. So David, I guess, at this point, actually pulls his brother aside and is like, listen, you don't need to go through with this. He didn't have to hurt or kill anyone. But Dan doesn't listen. And David, according to him, decided if Heather was going to die either way, he might as well have his brother's back. So he actually goes into the garage with Dan and Heather. And as soon as the door closed, David says Dan grabbed Heather and threw her to the ground and began to beat her. Heather yelled for help, begged David to step in and save her, but he says he just sat there. Heather walks through and she says, what did you want to show me out here? And my brother walks through, closes the door, grabs her by, like, both shoulders, throws her down hard. And she goes to get up like this, and she looks at me. Tragically, Heather's screams were loud enough that the kids did probably hear even from the other side of the house, which means Roseanne Heard, too. Except then Dan grabbed a hammer and hit Heather in the head, and she goes totally silent. But Dan wasn't done yet. He hanged her from the ceiling with a noose. And once he was sure that Heather was dead, he tied her up and wrapped her in trash bags. I guess he wanted to try and stage it so it would look like she died in a, like a sex accident. Although it's hard to tell how that would have thrown the police off his trail. They'd still find her body, want to know how she died, and they would have known she was last seen heading to his house. The point is, Dan hadn't done a very good job of thinking through the COVID up. So this is when David stepped in. He volunteered to dispose of Heather's car and bury her body at the side of the road. And while he was taking care of those things, Dan could be with the kids and talk to people on the phone. That way he could establish an alibi. So now the police were like, hey, we have the truth about what happened. The problem is this is an eyewitness account. There's still no, you know, evidence. There was no DNA placing her at Dan's house. No security camera footage, you know, no witnesses other than the brother. All the police had was David's word. And we know people can give false confessions, so they weren't sure what to do with this. They hoped they could convince Dan to confess. Now that they knew so much, they're like, maybe we pull him in and kind of confront him with what David said. And sure enough, Dan replied that David had been lying. Dan says, no, no, no, you've got it wrong. David is the real killer. And then Dan explained that David had an ex wife, someone he had divorced before he got together with Roseanne. He and his brother had been talking one day and they'd come up with a plan to murder each other's friends, former spouses. Apparently, David would kill Heather, and Dan would establish an alibi to avoid suspicion. And then Dan would kill David's ex, too, and vice versa. The two prepared for the pair of homicides by watching a ton of true crime documentaries. They studied all of the ways killers had been caught in the past, so they would know what not to do. He said they also knew how to destroy all of the DNA and other hard evidence in the house. Apparently, they learned what chemicals and cleaning methods to use. They thought of every angle. At least that is what Dan is now confessing to police. And then the fateful day arrived. Dan said he didn't know exactly what had happened, because he's like, I didn't. I didn't witness the murder. But he knew his brother David and Heather went off alone together. And then the next thing he knew, Heather was missing. He says he lied to her father about her going shopping because he knew his brother was responsible, and this was part of the plan and he was going to protect him. Except Dan told the police, yeah, we had this plan, but I hadn't actually wanted to hurt anyone. He had no plans to hold up his end of the bargain or even kill David's ex wife. And at worst, he was guilty of planning the murder. But he was like, I didn't. I wasn't even in the room. I should not be held responsible for Heather's death. Now, even though police didn't have a full confession from Dan, he. They did decide to still move forward with charging him. After all, it was 2011 by this point. It had been eight years since Heather's murder. It was time for her to receive justice. But during the trial, they realized they had a big problem, and it was that there was still no evidence to speak for itself. All they had was David's confession. And meanwhile, Dan claiming no, David was the killer. The whole trial hinged on one who the jurors believed. Dan and David both testified on the stand, pointing the finger at one another. And sure enough, after two days of deliberations, the hearing ended with a hung jury. Ten of them said they believed Dan had killed her, and two said they thought David had. And nobody was willing to change their stance. So the judge declared a mistrial, and Dan was supposed to face his charges for a second time in early 2013. I don't know if he was nervous about going to trial a second time, or maybe he had doubts about whether he'd managed to get a not guilty verdict. Because right before the hearing, he actually agrees to a plea deal. He admitted he'd committed the murder and was sentenced to 74 years in prison. And as part of a separate deal, his brother David was convicted of conspiracy to commit second degree murder. Because he'd been so cooperative, David was Only sentenced to 12 years in prison, and he was released on parole in 2020. Now, as for the wife, Roseanne, the police decided not to charge her with anything because they just couldn't prove she'd even known what David and Dan had planned. It's hard to imagine she didn't hear Heather's screams while she was playing with the kids. Or that after the fact, when Heather went missing, she didn't have some type of suspicion, but it wasn't enough to build an entire case around. Neither Dan nor David said she was involved. So she and David are free, and Dan is serving out the remainder of his sentence. Now, as I wrap up, I have to admit this case is alarming. It's hard to imagine being willing to help someone commit a murder or dispose of a body. No matter how close you are to someone there, there just seems like there should be certain lines you don't cross. But Dan and David, I believe, were willing to kill for one another. And sadly, that now means Heather's children will grow up without a mother. She'll never see them graduate from school, get their first jobs, start their own families, grow old. She'll never fall in love again or even get to live the rest of her life. She deserved unquestioning support too, someone in her life who would have done anything for her. Instead, she was taken advantage of, isolated, lied to, mistreated, and her story ended with tragedy. And that is the case of her murder. Thank you guys so much for listening to today's True Crime episode. I know I've said it before, but I'm really grateful you're here. I will see you next time as we go further into the dark together. Goodbye.
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