Loading summary
Transcript117 lines
- [00:00]
Cindy Crawford
You're a hustler. You get things done, but you don't always do things for yourself. With JLO Beauty, it takes just a few minutes a day to look like facials are a regular part of your routine. JLo Beauty's Fresh and Flawless skincare kit includes six skincare products that work as hard as you do. They'll hustle to brighten, firm and hydrate your complexion morning and night. This skincare kit is a one and done solution that is clinically proven to visibly tighten and lift for instant and long lasting results. Cleanse, treat, moisturize, protect. The fresh and flawless Skincare Kit does it all. See why the kit's a bestseller today? Visit jlobeauty.com deluxe and get an extra 25% off your first shipment plus free gifts with code DELUXE. If you're not satisfied, return the bottles within 60 days for your money back. See the website for details. That's jlobeauty.com Deluxe to get that JLO.
- [00:53]
Jennifer L. Armentrout
Globlow Captivating and action packed, the Blood and Ash series by number one New York Times best selling author Jennifer L. Armentrout is a sexy, addictive series perfect for fans of Agotar and Fourth Wing. Chosen at birth to usher in a new era, Poppy's life is not hers. A maiden in solitary waiting for the day of her ascension, Poppy would rather be with the gods fighting the evil that took her family. The entire kingdom rests on her shoulders. When Hulk, a God bound to protect, enters her life, he tempts her with the forbidden a kingdom, blood and ash. A thrilling, steamy escape. Available in print, ebook and audiobook, the.
- [01:27]
Jen Swan
TikToks appeared on a Wednesday in late May. One of them began with the words, this is my friend Daisy. Maybe you can already picture it. The carnival ride, the neon colors, the high school graduation photo, and then the cut to photos of Victor. Each of the tiktoks had slightly different music and different photos and videos, but all of them told the same story. Daisy's life mattered, and the person who took it was still running free. An Instagram post was published the same day on a new account called justice for Daisy. This post contained a slideshow of photos of Victor. A lot of them were taken from his own Instagram. In one of them he wore a striped beanie, in another a bowler hat. Each of the photos showed off some identifying feature, gauged ears or a tattoo of what looked like big rats crawling up his ribcage. The text on the post was in all capital letters. If seen, please contact us. Wendy Daisy's former neighbor. She saw this post while she was scrolling through her Instagram feed one night.
- [02:38]
Wendy
And then I started seeing the viral video that went on TikTok. And I was like, what? Like, it was him. I was like, oh, my God.
- [02:47]
Jen Swan
Wendy knew who Victor was. She used to see him hanging around the apartment complex with Daisy.
- [02:52]
Wendy
It was shocking. It was very shocking because like I said, we didn't know what was going on in the beginning. And then after that, well, at least I took that out of my head that it was like dangerous that we had to be watching our backs for somebody killing women or raping them out there and stuff. But I was just mad at the fact that this kid did something like that and he was thinking that he was gonna be able to get away with it. It's like, how do you think you're gonna get away with, like you killed somebody. Like you didn't just hurt her. That was like, probably he got tired of hurting her where you know, till now that he killed her. That's what I was thinking. I was thinking a lot of things.
- [03:31]
Jen Swan
But she desperately wanted to see Victor held accountable for Daisy's murder. And so she used the tools at her disposal. She went to Instagram and shared the posts on TikTok. She reposted and reposted and reposted.
- [03:45]
Wendy
And I would go back and see all the videos because they would always come up on the for your page.
- [03:49]
Jen Swan
The for your page. It's the homepage that shows this never ending scroll of TikToks from people who you may or may not follow. They're all served up by this super secretive algorithm to fit each user's individual interests. And these TikToks must have showed up on a lot of people's for your pages because there were comments from people shouting out their locations. People as far away as Texas and Washington and even Canada. They commented as proof of how far the TikTok had spread. And no one knows exactly how the TikTok algorithm works, but there's this popular thinking around it, which is that the more comments a TikTok gets, the more often it'll appear on for your pages. So people kind of just kept commenting as a way to sort of show how much the TikTok had spread, but but also to boost its visibility in other people's feeds. And it became this thing where people shouted out their locations all over Southern California. Southgate, Huntington Park, South Central, Long Beach, Riverside, San Diego. It was like this neighborhood watch assembling on the Internet in real time. There were Comments from people who lived in Daisy's neighborhood and people who were appalled that they hadn't heard about Daisy's murder until that very moment, including people who actually knew Daisy, like Lolly, her friend from middle school.
- [05:17]
Lolly
So I didn't find out about her death until I saw it on TikTok. And I was just, like, shocked. I was like, nah, like, it's a lie. You know, it's a lie. And I just got, like, the chills. And I was like, no, it's a lie.
- [05:28]
Jen Swan
When Lolly got over her shock, she was horrified.
- [05:32]
Lolly
You know, she was a good person. She didn't deserve it. I know. It broke me, and it broke a lot of people. And just like this case deserves a lot of awareness, so many other ones do as well, you know, like, so many things happen every day that people don't even find out.
- [05:47]
Jen Swan
Yeah.
- [05:48]
Lolly
And I feel like TikTok helps with that. You know, like, one person can post a little clip that they saw, and then it'll go viral. So I feel like, In a sense, TikTok helps more than the, like, news outlets and stuff like that. Like, we find out so much quicker through TikTok than anything else.
- [06:05]
Jen Swan
You know, Wally's in her early 20s, and, like, a lot of people in her age group that I reached out to for the story, she was distrustful of the media.
- [06:16]
Lolly
You know, sometimes they lie, sometimes they leave things out. Sometimes they don't even cover what's going on. So I feel like I rely more on. On TikTok to see what's going on. Like, what's going on around the world.
- [06:28]
Jen Swan
Yeah. Is there something that made you not trust the news or just saying that you felt like the stories you wanted to see weren't represented?
- [06:35]
Lolly
I feel just because they don't cover them enough, you know, they don't always cover them. Like, I could hear about, like, a person getting shot, let's say here, Huntington park, in the newspaper. And I'll just find out because someone posted, oh, this happened, or on TikTok, you know, so I feel like the news doesn't cover everything. It only cover whatever goes viral. Whatever.
- [06:59]
Jen Swan
I found Lolly's view disheartening, but I get it. I mean, in the instance of Daisy's murder, Lolly was right. The news only covered it once it had gone viral. Prior to that, the only article about the murder, it didn't even mention Daisy by name. It only referred to her as a Jane Doe. But once people learned Daisy's story, once they found out that she had a name and a life and friends and family who cared so deeply about her, they felt compelled to join the search party to help find her murderer. But vigilante justice can be a tricky thing, because once you spot the culprit or you know the person that you believe is the culprit, what do you do next? Do you call the cops? Do you alert the media? I mean, do you rely on these same institutions that have previously failed you? Or do you roll up your sleeves and deal with it yourself? Does violence justify more violence? What is the right way to deliver justice in The Age of TikTok? I'm Jen Swan from London Audio iHeartRadio and executive producer Paris Hilton. This is my friend, Daisy. Episode 5 Are you hiding him? It was a Sunday afternoon in early June of 2021, and Valerie Arellano was panicking. She was standing on the Metro light rail train platform when she spotted a guy with a skateboard in his hand. Valerie did a double take. He looked a lot like Victor.
- [08:47]
Valerie
I saw half of his face. It looked like him. Like, I saw like his eyebrows and his eyes because I feel like he has very unique features in that sense. And I did make eye contact with him and it freaked me the hell out. I feel like it was him.
- [09:02]
Jen Swan
You might remember Valerie. She grew up in Huntington Park. She knew Daisy back in high school. She never met Victor, but she'd been seeing photos of him all over Instagram and Facebook and TikTok. The posts had been circulating for a little less than two weeks, and because of them, Valerie had a pretty good sense of what Victor looked like.
- [09:21]
Valerie
He has, like deep set eyes. No. And like thick eyebrows. I seen a lot of people compare him to Richard Ramirez and I'm like, that's a good description. Yeah. What the. Especially when he had the long hair.
- [09:33]
Jen Swan
Richard Ramirez, the so called night stalker. He was notorious for breaking into homes and assaulting and murdering women in LA in the mid-1980s. When the police finally identified him and shared his mugshot with the public, it sent the whole city on a manhunt. Residents caught him attempting a carjacking just a day later. They beat him up so badly that when the police came and arrested him, he reportedly shouted, I'm lucky the cops caught me. But this was a much different situation. The police hadn't released a photo of Victor, but Valerie had little doubt that it was him.
- [10:14]
Valerie
I think I just heard through my friends, like, for sure it was the boyfriend because they said, said something about him being the last person that saw her. And yeah, at night time I believe. Yeah. So it was just already established, like, it. It's him, and why is he not being found? You know?
- [10:36]
Jen Swan
Right.
- [10:37]
Valerie
Like, if he's innocent, why is he not present? You know? And that's usually how it is with women that are unfortunately killed. They usually should be looking at the boyfriend or family members first.
- [10:52]
Jen Swan
Valerie's right. Some reports have found that more than half of all women killed in the United States were murdered by a current or former male intimate partner. That percentage goes up when the victim is a young woman of color. Valerie knew these statistics intuitively. And like a lot of people who had been following this case, she had been frustrated by the seeming lack of progress made by detectives and the lack of news coverage by the media. I mean, all she knew about it was what she'd been seeing on her social media feeds.
- [11:25]
Valerie
I heard on Instagram, girls saying that supposedly they had seen him and supposedly that he was trying to approach other girls on the station. I don't know if that's true. I never heard, like, someone say, like, oh, yeah, he approached me. I just heard people mentioning that. Yeah. And that's what made me feel like, oh, crap, it is him, because he's taking. He's being seen on the blue line by other girls, and they're probably, like, you know, scared and alone to, like, you know, want to call the cops or something like that.
- [12:01]
Jen Swan
Yeah, that sounds terrible. Valerie was also scared. Or as her friend Chantel Betrace put it, Valerie was freaking out. And at first, Chantel had no idea why.
- [12:11]
Chantel Betrace
I think when you saw him, I was looking another way. I was looking like, you know, just because I'm like, that.
- [12:16]
Jen Swan
I have adhd, dude.
- [12:17]
Chantel Betrace
Like, I'd be looking and staring off. So when you turn to me and you're like, oh, I think. I think you told me, oh, I think that's Victor.
- [12:24]
Valerie
Yeah.
- [12:25]
Chantel Betrace
And I was just kind of like, what? I did see somebody, like, slight, like, kind of. With the. With the. Like, the figure of him kind of, like, leaving. Yeah, but that was it. I didn't actually see what you saw. You saw him pass. Passed by you, then he went down wherever he went. But I remember you. Yeah. You were, like, very frazzled, you know, and obviously, I understood that.
- [12:43]
Jen Swan
Valerie desperately wanted Victor to get caught, but she didn't want to call 911. She remembered thinking, I'm not sure whether.
- [12:51]
Valerie
That'S appropriate to call the cops on someone who. I can't even see their face entirely.
- [12:58]
Jen Swan
Valerie, like, a lot of people I spoke with in Daisy's community, had not had the most pleasant interactions with law enforcement. She told me about a time early on in the pandemic when she was in a car with her aunt and her aunt's boyfriend. A cop pulled them over and insisted that their car was registered as stolen. Eventually, according to Valerie, the cop told them that the real reason he pulled them over was because he was looking for Valerie's uncle. The car had been registered to a house where he lived at one point.
- [13:24]
Valerie
And he did not like that. I was telling him, like, how can this car be stolen? Like, he was lying. And I did not like that. It was a bad experience. And we all felt, like, on edge. And also, he kept, like, touching his gun, too. And we're like, what the hell? You know, it's a Latino cop, but it's like, dude, I don't care if they're, like, Asian, black, okay?
- [13:45]
Jen Swan
So what Valerie is describing, it's known as a pretextual stop. It's basically when a cop pulls you over for something minor in order to ask you questions about a much larger, unrelated potential offense. It was such a widespread practice that California actually passed a law about a year ago banning it. So now when police pull you over, at least in California, they have to tell you exactly why they're doing so. All to say, when Valerie saw this skateboarder who looked like Victor, she did not immediately call the police. Instead, she sent a Facebook message to her best friend, the friend who used to live with Daisy and her family.
- [14:24]
Valerie
I wrote, I was by the blue line on Florence and Graham, and I saw someone that looked like him, meaning Victor. Does he skate? I'm gonna call the detective number. And then she said, yes, he does.
- [14:36]
Jen Swan
Wow.
- [14:36]
Valerie
And I wrote, I'm calling right now.
- [14:39]
Jen Swan
Valerie showed me the messages she sent to her best friend that day. They were dated June 6, 2021.
- [14:46]
Valerie
I called the detective. It left me on voicemail.
- [14:53]
Jen Swan
This is Ray Luko.
- [14:54]
Valerie Panado
Please leave a message.
- [14:57]
Jen Swan
Valerie found his cell phone number plastered all over the social media posts that Daisy's friends and family had made. And this number right there on the flyers. It seemed a lot more accessible, more appropriate than simply calling 91 1.
- [15:10]
Valerie
I left him a recording of what I saw. He quickly left on skateboard. And I put. He was wearing all black, a black beanie. And then I. I made a typo here. I put in a black stick ski mask, but I did not mean that. I meant a black bandana. So I had corrected that. And then I put. He left so quickly, but I saw half of his face, and I Looked at him and then I put maybe 5, 6, 5, 7 in regards to his height. And then I just reiterated again, it's on Florence and Graham, but he was covering his hair and half of his face.
- [15:48]
Jen Swan
And then he said he left quickly.
- [15:51]
Valerie
Yeah. And. Oh, and she was asking me if he had, if I could identify him by his, his earlobes. So she told me, did you see his ears by any chance? And I said, no, the beanie was covering it. He had like a beanie and then a hoodie and then he had a black bandana. So that looks suspicious to me. Cuz it's like, dude, it's hot as hell and we're like in an outside area. Why are you concealing yourself that much?
- [16:19]
Jen Swan
Lugo called Valerie back. She told him what she'd seen. Her heart was pounding, her adrenaline pumping. It was hard to get words out.
- [16:27]
Valerie
I think I, I was just so nervous. I said, ski mask. Cause it was scary that it was potentially Victor. And he did tell me, like, oh, we'll try to send cops to the area.
- [16:37]
Jen Swan
And did you stay? Did you see cops end up showing up?
- [16:40]
Valerie
No, her and I, I don't even.
- [16:42]
Chantel Betrace
Remember we were downtown LA for sure after that. But I remember how you were very obviously very upset, very frazzled, and you were shaking quite a bit. And yeah, obviously it's a very traumatic thing to see. Possibly, I mean, obviously we don't know, right, for sure. But possibly seeing somebody who killed this poor young girl, like, you know, and you know, when you, when you, when you experience something like that, it's just kind of like, it's jarring because like, what if it was him and he's just going about his day? It was really, it was a really emotional, intense day.
- [17:17]
Jen Swan
A few weeks later, a different woman, also named Valerie, was having an emotionally intense day of her own. She took to Facebook to let out some rage. She wrote in a public comment that she'd been hearing all kinds of rumors about where Victor was hiding. He'd been catching the blue line and sneaking around the LA riverbed, she wrote, and now she wanted to go hunt him down. We have to lay low to get him, she wrote. We need rope and a bat. Cause he won't go down without a fight. When I stumbled upon these comments posted In June of 2021, I was really taken aback by Valerie's aggression. This like take no prisoners attitude she had. It made me think about how so many people were terrified of running into Victoria and yet here she was seeking him out. I immediately wanted to know who was this woman? Why was she acting like this, you know, vigilante superhero? And how did she become so invested in catching a murder suspect?
- [18:24]
Cindy Crawford
Hi, I'm Cindy Crawford and I'm the founder of Meaningful Beauty. Well, I don't know about you, but, like, I never liked being told, oh, wow, you look so good for your age. Like, why even bother saying that? Why don't you just say you look great at any age, Every age. That's what Meaningful Beauty is all about. We create products that make you feel confident in your skin at the age you are now. Meaningful Beauty. Beautiful skin at every age. Learn more@meaningfulbeauty.com.
- [18:58]
Jennifer L. Armentrout
Captivating an action packed. The Blood and Ash series by number one New York Times best selling author, Jennifer L. Armentrout is a sexy, addictive series perfect for fans of Sarah J. Maas and Rebecca Yarros. Chosen at birth to usher in a new era, Poppy's life is not hers. A maiden in solitary, waiting for the day of her ascension, Poppy would rather be with the gods, fighting the evil that took her family. The entire kingdom rests on her shoulders. When hot girls, a God bound to protect, enters her life, he tempts her with the forbidden. A kingdom, Blood and ash, a thrilling, steamy escape. Available in print, ebook and audiobook.
- [19:33]
Jen Swan
On a sweltering summer day, I stood in the parking lot of a mobile home community near Compton. And when I spotted someone who looked like Valerie Panado's Facebook photo, I flagged her down. She was short with square black glasses, and she had a haircut that Daisy once had, a black bob with blonde bangs.
- [19:52]
Valerie Panado
Hey, I'm Jen. Finally. Nice to meet you.
- [19:55]
Jen Swan
Nice to meet you too. We walked across the blacktop and made small talk.
- [19:59]
Valerie Panado
Hot today, huh?
- [20:00]
Jen Swan
So hot. I know. Once we got to her place, she led me to a small wooden table in her living room. I don't know how to close this. I feel like, do you want this open? Eventually we got to talking about Daisy. Okay.
- [20:11]
Valerie Panado
Yeah.
- [20:12]
Jen Swan
So. So. And then tell me. Tell me how you first heard that. That Daisy had been murdered.
- [20:18]
Valerie Panado
Yeah, I first heard about it basically when it was being spread on. On Facebook, you know, and I think I was in a. Yeah, I think I was in like a punk group that, like, you know, you share like, flyers of shows and stuff, and usually someone who does get exposed for violent behavior. It's like we posted like, hey, watch out for this person. And yeah, his. His story, like, and her story ended up being posted in that group.
- [20:52]
Jen Swan
Valerie remembered looking at the photos and thinking that Daisy looked Familiar. She was pretty sure she'd seen her around, maybe at a punk show. It seemed possible they lived close to each other, and they seemed interested in the same kinds of music. To Valerie, Daisy's story felt personal.
- [21:09]
Valerie Panado
I started investing my time to, you know, get her justice, basically.
- [21:15]
Jen Swan
What did that look like for you?
- [21:17]
Valerie Panado
I feel like for me, it was, you know, going out there and trying to see where he was at, you know, look for him asking around, like, hey, have you seen this dude hanging around? Or, like, are you hiding him? Like, let me find out.
- [21:33]
Jen Swan
You know, you actually went to people's houses and said, are you harboring this person, Victor?
- [21:37]
Valerie Panado
Well, it was more like I would ask other punks, like, hey, like. Like, have you seen Victor? Like, are you hiding him? You know?
- [21:47]
Jen Swan
And what did people say?
- [21:49]
Valerie Panado
They would just, you know, they'd be like, no, like, I haven't seen him.
- [21:52]
Jen Swan
But Valerie wouldn't take no for an answer. She was convinced that Victor had to be somewhere hiding, and if other people weren't going to rat him out, she'd find him herself.
- [22:02]
Valerie Panado
Definitely. Yeah, I would go look for Victor. Like, I actually, you know, I would be like, yeah, is he hanging around Long beach or in the trails? You know, really?
- [22:13]
Jen Swan
So were you just in your car, kind of like, scouting on the sidewalk? Like, oh, yeah.
- [22:18]
Valerie Panado
I would tell other people, too. Like, hey, you want to meet up and look for him? I'd be so down. I feel like street justice works better than the actual system. So, yeah, I would. I was keeping an eye out on the street for. For him because, you know, like, I don't know. That's, like, really scary to have someone that does. Does something so fucked up to someone else, you know, I couldn't allow that, not in my neighborhood.
- [22:50]
Jen Swan
What was sort of going through your head? Like, had you thought through what you would do if you actually saw her?
- [22:55]
Valerie Panado
Yeah, I was already thinking. I was like, I'm gonna beat the. Out of this guy. We'll call the cops and be like, hey, he's over here. But, yeah, no, I was. I was super angry. I was just mad. I was like, you know, like, how could you do something like that to her? Like, she didn't deserve it. You know, I felt like, yeah, I wanted to get justice for her. Like, just beat his ass, make him feel pain there.
- [23:22]
Jen Swan
It was that anger, that desire for revenge that I'd read in Valerie's Facebook comment. I was just as surprised by it in person as I was when I read it online. Surprised by the way that I don't know Valerie was willing to risk her own safety to take action against what she saw as an injustice. Not just in this instance, but in a bunch of others. She told me about. Like, she told me about this time that she hunted down and confronted a friend's boyfriend after she heard that he'd been abusive to her. And then there was this other time she climbed a ladder at a punk show and jumped off it to attack a guy she'd seen hitting girls in the pit.
- [23:55]
Valerie Panado
Seriously, I jumped off the ladder so fucking quick, and I started punching him.
- [24:00]
Jen Swan
Oh, my God. That's like a wrestling move. Wow.
- [24:03]
Valerie Panado
Yeah, I jumped off. He didn't even really notice, you know, because I was so short. And that's why I kind of have a scar on my eyelid. I think one of my eyelids has, like, permanently scarred.
- [24:14]
Jen Swan
Valerie showed me the spot on her eyelid where she said she got punched.
- [24:18]
Valerie Panado
And, yeah, after that, a lot of. A lot of girls, they would see me around at shows, and they be like, yeah, like, I'm. I'm so glad that you did that. They're like, you're crazy. Or they would say the same thing you did. Like, oh, you're so, like, tough, you know? And I was like, I. I couldn't just sit by and just watch that shit.
- [24:37]
Jen Swan
Tough felt like an understatement. I wanted to know what was behind it, so I asked her, how did you become so fearless?
- [24:45]
Valerie Panado
I think. I think I became fearless because, you know, of the type of environment I grew up and because I went to military school, so.
- [24:56]
Jen Swan
Military school, the kind that teenagers get sent to when their parents think they need to be straightened out. There are drill sergeants, physical training, the whole nine yards. It was so intense. Valerie said that she realized she could face anything after that. And then where did you get your sense of, like, justice? Like, it seems like you have a strong sense of, like, the community has this power that the police don't have. Like, where did that come from?
- [25:19]
Valerie Panado
I think for me, it came from, you know, living in domestic violence. So I grew up. Yeah, I grew up in a broken home, I guess you could say. Parents got divorced when I was nine, and just. Yeah, like, you know, my mom being a landlord, too, growing up, we would have instances where, you know, the neighbors, they would fight, and then I would hear some of them beat on their girlfriends. And as a child, you know, that mentally scars you sometimes. And I feel like, yeah, growing up, too, seeing women get beat, you know, like, all kind of violence. Yeah, it makes you want to. It makes me Want to caring and have justice for other women that go.
- [26:04]
Jen Swan
Through that, especially because of what she saw some of her own family members.
- [26:08]
Valerie Panado
Go through, I can honestly say. Like what? One of my grandpas, glad I never met him. He. He tried to kill my other grandmas with a machete. He left a scar on her forehead. So pretty much, yeah. It's a generational trauma thing.
- [26:25]
Jen Swan
Right.
- [26:25]
Valerie Panado
So I. That's why when I heard Daisy's story, I was like, I can also relate to that through my grandma's history because they, you know, they have almost gone killed. You know, I'm glad they were able to escape that. But. So, yeah, that's what. That's why I tell people you don't. You don't understand until you are in their shoes. And when you are powerless, when you don't have anywhere to go, you don't have anyone to defend you. That's what's going to happen. Yeah. So I hope people will realize that. That, yeah, like, sometimes you're. You just. Yeah, you just get put in a situation and. And your life just. Just goes like that. Yeah, women are just going through that every day.
- [27:15]
Jen Swan
Women like Valerie. She told me that at one point in her life, she found herself in a relationship that had become violent. And eventually she realized she needed to get out.
- [27:28]
Valerie Panado
It was a hard decision to make. I think it's hard because it's like you want it. You want to keep giving the person you love a chance, and then, you know, it's like that unconditional love you have for someone, but then it just kind of runs out where you can't take it anymore. You know, I finally decided to put my foot down and I said, you know what? This. I can't keep living like this. Like, I don't want to go to jail and beat his ass back. So, yeah, it was a hard decision. I just, you know, planned it, packed my. And then I escaped to a domestic violence shelter.
- [28:08]
Jen Swan
How did you find it?
- [28:10]
Valerie Panado
Well, pretty much like, I. I was already seeing a DV therapist. And then I just had told her one day, like, hey, I'm fed up. Can we like, you know, call some places? And she did. We called and pretty much, yeah. Then they accepted me.
- [28:30]
Jen Swan
You seem like, so proactive. Like, how did you have this knowledge to be like, oh, to even get a DV counsel, I think is something that. Or therapist is something that I think a lot of women or some women in that situation maybe wouldn't know to do. Like, how. Yeah. How did you navigate that?
- [28:47]
Valerie Panado
So this is. This Is the funny part.
- [28:51]
Jen Swan
What Valerie proceeded to tell me was actually not that funny, but I got the sense that she's someone who copes with difficult experiences through humor. She said that she never really wanted to enroll in therapy, but her caseworker knew she was struggling with housing insecurity because of domestic violence. And in order to maintain her government benefits, she was told she had to sign up for it.
- [29:11]
Valerie Panado
And at first I didn't want to. I was like, no, I don't need it. I could deal with my problems. But then he really pushed me to get it. And that's when I started going. I was like, all right, I needed it. I was just being hard headed, thinking that I can keep putting, like, I could deal with it myself. And. And I still tell my, my caseworker thank you all the time. Like, I'll text him sometimes I'll be like, you're. You're the, you know, you're. You're the. You're the shit, basically. And he was like, oh, thank you. You know, I'm glad that you, you actually listened to me this time.
- [29:48]
Jen Swan
Valerie said that the experience of doing it, of going to therapy and getting out of a bad relationship, it taught her a lot.
- [29:54]
Valerie Panado
It, like, shows you how strong you could be as a person, you know, like, it shows you, like, how much life tests you and see if you're like, make or break it type of shit pretty much, like. And it just shows you, like, yeah, how strong you are.
- [30:14]
Jen Swan
That is really what drew her to Daisy's story. It wasn't just that she was also in the punk scene and lived in the neighborhood. It was that she knew what it was like to be hurt by someone she loved.
- [30:24]
Valerie Panado
That's kind of the reason why I wanted to get justice for Daisy. Like, that was my whole point of looking for Victor and all that. Because I saw something in myself that I saw in her, I guess you could say, not only, like, personality, but just her, you know, Like, I was like, yeah, I can't let, I can't let that shit slide like that. It really, like, touched the core in me.
- [30:52]
Jen Swan
Yeah. What was when you say you saw something in her that you saw in yourself was it was sort of how she looked or also just like, her situation.
- [30:59]
Valerie Panado
Her situation mostly, you know, like, she got hurt and she, you know, unfortunately, like, she couldn't get her life back. And, you know, I didn't get justice for some of the things that happened to me, but I'm still alive. So I was like, you know what? I'm going to get justice for her, just as I wish somebody would get justice for me.
- [31:26]
Jen Swan
But as much as she looked, and as determined as she was, Valerie never did find Victor. Nobody seemed to know where he was hiding, including the detectives. But all of these social media posts, they were doing something. They were getting more eyes on the case, more community involvement. They were building public pressure, the kind of pressure detectives couldn't ignore. Next time on My Friend Daisy.
- [31:58]
Valerie Panado
They put out something on social media, so. And they put out my cell number.
- [32:03]
Lolly
So I'd get called in the middle.
- [32:04]
Valerie Panado
Of the night all the time.
- [32:07]
Cindy Crawford
Hi everyone, this is Paris.
- [32:09]
Jen Swan
Thanks for listening to my friend Daisy.
- [32:11]
Cindy Crawford
If you or someone you love is.
- [32:13]
Jen Swan
Experiencing abuse, you are not alone. Help is available 24. 7Contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline. For free confidential support, call 800-799-7233, text START to 88788 or visit thehotline.org your safety matters. Reach out Today My Friend Daisy is a production of London Audio with support from Sony Music Entertainment. It's reported, written and executive produced by me, Jen Swan. I'm also your host. Our executive producers for London Audio are Paris Hilton, Bruce Gersh, Bruce Robertson and Joanna Studebaker. Our executive producer for Sony Music Entertainment is Jonathan Hirsch. Our associate producer is Zoe Culkin. Production assistance and translations by Miguel Contreras. Sound design, composing and mixing by Hans Dale. She our fact checker is Fendal Fulton. Our head of production is Sammy Allison, and our production manager is Tameka Valance Kolasny. Special thanks to Steve Akerman, Emily Rosic and Jamie Myers at Sony, Ben Goldberg and Orly Greenberg at UTA and Jen Ortiz at the Cut. And I wanted to let you know about the statistics that I cited in this episode. They come from the CDC. They were published in July of 2017 and you can find them online under the title Racial and Ethnic Differences in Homicides of Adult Women and the Role of Intimate Partner Violence. And if you're interested in reading more about the link between intimate partner violence and homicide, there's another study that I read called Examining Intimate Partner Violence Related Fatalities. It was published in the Journal of Family Violence in January of 2023. Thank you so much for listening.
- [34:25]
Valerie Panado
When you haven't found love, it can feel like everyone else has. It's in every movie, every song and all the PDA Looking for love sucks. Thankfully, California psychics can give you the guidance you need to find the one we guarantee if your reading isn't life changing, it's free and new customers receive 20 minutes for just $20, visit californiapsychics.com and experience the joy of certainty. California Psychics did you know that parents rank financial literacy as the number one most difficult life skill to teach? Meet Greenlight, the debit card and money app for families. With Greenlight, you can send money to kids quickly, set up chores, automate allowance, and keep an eye on what your kids are spending. With real time notifications, kids learn to earn, save, and spend wisely. And parents can rest easy knowing their kids are learning about money with guardrails in place. Try Greenlight Risk Free today at greenlight.com iheartra.