Comedy Of Horrors - Washington Township, Michigan

Summary

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Small Town Murder | Episode: Comedy Of Horrors - Washington Township, Michigan

Hosts: James Pietragallo, Jimmie Whisman
Release Date: December 18, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this wild and deeply researched episode, James and Jimmie take listeners on a grim, yet darkly comedic tour through Washington Township, Michigan—a seemingly idyllic suburb with a gruesome crime lurking beneath its manicured surface. This week’s case: the murder and dismemberment of Tara Grant by her husband, Steven Grant, amid suburban drama, jealousy, an ill-fated au pair, and the worst getaway in true crime history. The hosts balance gallows humor with empathy, never mocking the victims but skewering the arrogance and bizarre behavior of the perpetrator.

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Washington Township, Michigan: History, Flavor & Quirks

[06:03–13:46]

Quick Town Portrait

• Location: Southeast Michigan, 40 minutes outside Detroit (basically a suburb)
• Population: ~28,000, mostly white, high median income, strong family orientation
• Vibe: Suburban, leafy, safe, family-centric (43% Catholic, the "Baptists of the north")
• Notable Features:
  • Former orchard town, famous for peaches (Romeo Peach Festival, Blossom Time Festival)
  • Prized for mom-and-pop and chain store balance
  • Real estate: Trailers for $40k to mansion-style homes for $3 million
  • "Cold in winter, too much snow"—resident review
• "Not sure what future will bring." – Local reviewer (11:31)

Quotes

• James on local reviews:
  "The Eiffel Tower, the Great Wall of China, it’s all within walking distance, right there." (08:46)

Quirks & Festivals

• Beauty pageants for all ages, especially young girls—a running roast theme for James and Jimmie
• Bands with cartoonish names: "Dirty Mic and the Boys"—Jimmie:
  "Did you see The Other Guys? There was a team of homeless people called Dirty Mike and the Boys..." (18:51)

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Meet Tara Grant: Small-Town Overachiever

[20:31–47:37]

Childhood & Early Life

• Raised in the Michigan Upper Peninsula on a "hobby farm" with devoted but strict parents
• Classic overachiever: 4H champion, marksman, champion livestock raiser, first clarinet, pianist, athlete, varsity basketball player, cheerleader, hard worker
• Wanted "enough money to buy everything I want, live in a big house with a Jaguar parked in the garage." (39:53)
  • “She’s an achiever. That’s just all there is to it.” – James (32:24)
• Vowed never to let a man treat her as she saw her father treat her mother—“She would take no shit.”

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College & Meeting Steven Grant

[41:54–51:56]

• Tara meets Steven Grant (notorious for his bug-eyed "crazy eyes," wild facial expressions, and womanizer reputation) at Michigan State
• They start as friends, later get together after Steven shows up—uninvited—at Tara's grandmother’s funeral:
  • “[Steven] was entirely too worldly... just too fast for her.” – Alicia (Tara's sister) (49:54)
• Steven fails at a career in politics, ends up in his dad’s machine shop, marries Tara in 1996

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The Grants’ Marriage & Suburban Life

[53:08–59:48]

• Tara ascends corporate ranks (Washington Group International), eventually earning ~$170k+ as an executive, managing Puerto Rico operations
  • Steven makes $19k/year at a machine shop, acts as primary caregiver ("Mr. Mom")
  • “He prided himself on the Mr. Mom thing... that’s all he’s got, honestly.” – James (73:04)
• Marriage tension: absenteeism, career jealousy, Tara’s intense achiever-instinct transferred to parenting (over-driven with kids’ ballet, hockey, au pairs, etc.)
  • Ongoing marital strain, Steven's emasculation and suspicions

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The Last Days & Tara’s Disappearance

[78:30–85:53]

• In February 2007, Tara, commuting weekly to Puerto Rico, returns home; major fight ensues over work/life and jealousy issues
• Steven’s story: Tara storms out, catches a car to the airport, vanishes. He waits five days before reporting her missing—highly suspicious to police.
  • “Did you just say five days to report his wife missing?” – Sgt. Kozlowski, police detective (83:57)

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The Police Investigation & Steven’s Odd Behavior

[86:11–125:59]

Initial Police Interactions

• Steven gives melodramatic statements (“Maybe nerve gas! Maybe terrorists!”), secretly implicates himself with odd comments about affairs, the au pair, and willingness to take a polygraph (which he later avoids)
  • Quote:
    “My wife either has been exposed to nerve gas or has been kidnapped by terrorists…” – Steven, (90:23)
• Keeps a weirdly detailed notebook/log; arouses suspicion at every turn
• Media-hungry: Calls reporters for attention, cries on national TV repeatedly ("bipartisan crier")

Digital Forensics & Emails

• Police find glaring cell phone discrepancies (no call to the car service), frequent calls between Steven and 19-year-old German au pair Verena Dirkes
• Emails reveal Steven’s affair attempts (with both au pair and old girlfriend), suspicions, and amateur sleuthing on Tara’s emails:
  • “Naked girls are always good to see, especially if you haven’t seen them in a while.” (Steven, 120:05)
  • "What a dweeb." – Det. Kozlowski assesses Steven’s seduction technique (121:08)

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The Discovery: Dismemberment & Unraveling

[138:51–147:43]

• Tara’s remains found in multiple locations (park and family garage) after weeks of poor concealment by Steven (notably, her torso in a bin labeled “boys clothes” in their garage)
  • “Dog food, that’s right... that's all it is.” (145:11)
• Police search reveal dismemberment tools, blood evidence, metal shavings (from Steven’s machine shop)
• The get-away: Steven flees in a “bright yellow Dodge Dakota Sport”—possibly the most conspicuous getaway vehicle ever
  • “He’s driving a fucking Transformer.” – James (149:17)
• Au pair Verena confesses to having a brief romantic/sexual encounter with Steven, but claims no further involvement

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Steven’s Confession & The Gruesome Details

[151:41–179:41]

• On the run and suffering from hypothermia, Steven is arrested in northern Michigan
• Detailed confession: admits to strangling Tara during an argument, dragging her body to the garage, dismembering her at the machine shop (in 14 pieces), scattering and hiding remains ineptly, and constructing an elaborate false narrative
• Chilling quote:
  "As soon as I started going, it was like Keystone Cops—the sled took off and now I’m chasing after this sled that has my wife’s cut up body parts on it down a hill.” – Steven Grant, on body disposal (178:43)
• Motive: jealousy, emasculation, and a desire to avoid the consequences of Tara leaving him

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The Trial & Aftermath

[182:37–186:13]

• Steven convicted of second-degree murder after jury cannot agree on premeditation
• Sentenced to 50–80 years (first parole at 87), plus six years for mutilation of a corpse; described by the judge as “demonic, manipulative, barbaric, and dishonest”
• The Grants’ children raised by Tara’s sister; both now active advocates against domestic violence
• Story chronicled in several true crime books ("Slaying in the Suburbs," "Limb From Limb")

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

On Small-Town Reviews

• “Not sure what future will bring.” (11:31)
  James, laughing: “I dare you. Challenge that person!”

On the Murder Investigation

• “If you think I did something to my wife, do you?” – Steven
  “If we thought you were involved, we’d take you to jail right now.” – Sgt. Kozlowski (99:27)

On Steven's Escape Vehicle

• “Maybe the most conspicuous getaway vehicle in the history of murder—a searing yellow Dodge Dakota Sport… He’s driving a fucking Transformer.” – James (149:11/149:17)

On Steven’s High School Seduction Style

• “Naked girls are always good to see.” – Steven, to old girlfriend (120:05)
• “What a dweeb.” – Det. Kozlowski (121:08)

On the Dismemberment

• “So I started in on her legs… the hands, the feet, Tara’s head, everything.” – Steven’s confession (179:41)

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Timeline of Key Segments

• Town Introduction/Stats/History: [06:03–14:33]
• Tara’s Childhood/Family: [20:31–38:16]
• College, Meeting Steven: [41:54–51:56]
• Marriage & Work-Life Issues: [53:08–61:33]
• Fight and Disappearance: [78:30–85:53]
• Investigation & Police Suspicions: [86:11–125:59]
• Cellphone/Email Evidence: [108:07–124:56]
• Discovery of Remains: [138:51–147:43]
• Steven’s Confession: [151:41–181:03]
• Trial & Sentencing: [182:37–186:13]

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Final Thoughts

The hosts turn the spotlight on both the tragedy and absurdity of the case, expertly walking the line between respectful and riotously irreverent. Through forensic storytelling, spot-on comedic jabs, and a pitch-perfect dissection of small-town quirks, James and Jimmie reveal both the horror of the crime and the surreal banality of suburban life gone wrong.

“It’s one of the craziest we’ve ever told.” – James (186:19)

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For true crime with a comedic edge—brutal, thorough, and somehow hilarious—Small Town Murder continues to set the bar.

Transcript

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

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[James Pietragallo]

Zoe, this thing weighs a ton.

[Jimmy Whisman]

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[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Santa, did you get my letter?

[James Pietragallo]

He's talking to you, Bridges. I'm not. Of course. Of course he did.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right, Santa? You know my elf Drewski here. He handles the nice list.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

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[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Or give it as a gift.

[James Pietragallo]

And the best part, you can make the switch to T mobile from your phone in just 15 minutes. Nice. My side of the tree is slipping. Kimber. The holidays are better. AT T Mobile, switch in just 15 minutes.

[Jimmy Whisman]

15 minutes.

[James Pietragallo]

And get iPhone 17 on us. With no trade in needed. And now T mobile is available in US Cellular stores. Credits for well qualified customers plus tax and $35 device connection charge. Credit and balance due if you pay off earlier. Cancel Finance agreement. 256 gigs. $830. Eligible for it in a new line, $100 plus a month plan with auto pay plus taxes, fees required. Check out 15 minutes or less per line. Visit t mobile.com this week in Washington Township, Michigan. When an angry wife storms out into the night, a tale from the babysitter and a suspicious husband turn into a hunt for a body and possibly the worst getaway vehicle of all time. Welcome to Small Town Murder. Hello everybody and welcome back to Small Town Murder.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yay.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, yay indeed, Jimmy. Yay indeed. My name is James Petregallo. I'm here with my co host, Jimmy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'm Jimmy Whisman.

[James Pietragallo]

Thank you folks so much for joining us today on another crazy edition of Small Town Murder. This is a wild story. I mean, this is a wild story featuring a person whose picture is just as insane as their actions. It's crazy stuff. We'll get into all that and more. First of all, head over to shutupandgivememurder.com get your tickets for 2026. Every live show is available for purchase Right now I'm going to read the just the cities off and you can check the dates over at. Shut up and give me murder.com. these are in order of appearance though. Nashville, Durham, Atlanta, Phoenix, Salt Lake City, Denver, Buffalo, Royal Oak, Michigan, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Dallas, San Jose, Sacramento, Tarrytown and Boston. Those are the places. Any places that we obviously are not going that we haven't been in a couple years. I've. People have already messaged us. I know you hate here. It's not. No, no, no, no. That's not it at all.

[Jimmy Whisman]

We've tried everything.

[James Pietragallo]

We really tried. It's just they have to. Our recording schedule is pretty deep. So these, they have to line up very specifically these live show dates and if they don't, you know, there's not availability when we're available then that's the part that's the problem.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Because just because we want to be somewhere doesn't mean that everything's available. And what's available has to, has to match up with a time frame. But B it has to make sense just for accommodations and ability for everything.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Be able to get there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So it's so hard.

[James Pietragallo]

Thank you for everyone who's bought tickets so far. I think Salt Lake City is sold out. Buffalo is selling very fast. There's a few of them that are selling very fast already. So get in there and get your tickets right now. Shut up and give me murder.com also. Get yourself patreon. My goodness. Patreon.com crimeinsports gets you everything that we put out. First of all, ad free. Number one, crime and sports. Your stupid opinion. Small Town Murder, all ad free. But the bonus material, that's what you want to look at. Hundreds of bonus episodes you've never heard before immediately upon subscription. And then you get new ones every other week.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Every other week.

[James Pietragallo]

One Crime in Sports, one Small Town Murder and you get it all. This week. For Crime in sports we're going to talk about a crazy Australian cricketer guy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

All they have to say is Australia and cricket, you know, it's going to be funny. So there you go. We'll figure that out. Then for Small Town Murder it is Charles Starkweather part two, which if you heard the first one's amazing. It's him and his girlfriend, his 13 year old girlfriend. And they're differing sides of the story basically. And it is wild stuff. We'll get into that. Patreon.com crimeinsports and you get a shout out at the end of the show as well. So get in there and do that, that said, disclaimer time. This is a comedy show, number one, we're comedians, we're gonna make jokes. But this is also a murder show and all the facts are completely real. When nobody. We don't, you know, embellish anything to make it funnier or anything like that. That's none of that ridiculous stuff because you don't have to. There's crazy enough stuff going on to make fun of. And you go, well, how do you make jokes about murder? Very easily, the way we do it. We never make fun of the murder of the victim or the victim's family.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Why is that, James?

[James Pietragallo]

Because we're assholes. But, but we're not scumbags. It's real simple. That's how it works. There's plenty to make fun of. We make fun of the murderer. We make fun of some small town just because who cares? You know what I mean? We're all from somewhere that deserves to be made fun of.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Sure.

[James Pietragallo]

We all make fun of wherever we're from while we're there, so why not? So that said, though, I think it's time if you. Well, number one, if you think true crime and comedy should never go together, we might not be for you, but for everyone else that wants to hear a crazy story and have a good time, I think it's time everybody to sit back. What do you say here, let's all clear the lungs and let's all shout, shut up and give me murder. Let's do this, everybody. What do you say? Let's go on a trip, shall we?

[Jimmy Whisman]

We have to.

[James Pietragallo]

We are going on a trip to Michigan this week.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What a place.

[James Pietragallo]

Here we go. Washington Township, Michigan. Michigan. Oh, you know, the lakes, the trees, the potholes, land. It's all beautiful. It's all. All very lovely. This is in southeastern Michigan. It's about 40 minutes outside of Detroit. So it's a, it's a burb basically right there. We got about an hour 40 to Lansing. If you want to go to the Capitol to complain about the water supply, that's the way you do it right there. And the potholes. And about two hours government funding for them for your pothole problem. And about two hours to Coldwater, Michigan. Our last Michigan episode, episode 614, the Jeepers Creepers murder, if you remember that one that had the two most murdery looking people who've ever lived as the couple involved. That was a mess. Oh my goodness. This is in Macomb county. Area code 248. Really go back and listen to that Jeepers creepers. One, too. Do yourself a favor. And a little bit of history of this town. We'll find out. Area code here, 248, by the way. Little bit of history. Apparently this town was originally an orchard or a series of orchards.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Apples, I imagine.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, it was Westview Orchards. All different fruit. Actually, they had a lot of peaches, too. They grow here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, really?

[James Pietragallo]

And we know that because there is a festival denoting the importance of the peaches that we'll get to. So, yeah, they started it. They wanted it to be named after George Washington.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right.

[James Pietragallo]

It was organized in 1827, and they had a meeting at a guy's house. And when it came time to choose the name, one guy who presided over the meeting said, I move we name the town in honor of the father of our country. And that was that. And they all, everybody, this town, father, this country, unanimous. They all agree.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Never been here before.

[James Pietragallo]

Everybody was, oh, no, he knows nothing about this place. Wouldn't care about it if he knew. Well, he was dead now, but. Yeah. Yeah, long dead.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Couldn't drag a horse and carriage through this place and break it, too.

[James Pietragallo]

Too many potholes. That's the problem. Even then. Too many potholes. 1827 is the year of organization. It's also home to the historic Octagon House, which again, another town with an octagon house.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Boy, boy, do they love them.

[James Pietragallo]

Built by a guy named Lauren Andrus. Took two years to make an octagon.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Two years.

[James Pietragallo]

Well, I assume there was just one construction crew came in and they were like, what? They looked at the plans and they were like, we're not doing this. And then another one came in. They got halfway done and they're like, this is ridiculous. We can't finish it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So every three months they get a side up.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. One of those things. We'll find out, though. We've never been to this town, so we need to find out what other people think about it. What's there with some reviews. Let's dive into those here. Here is five stars. Everything is within walking distance of my house.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Everything.

[James Pietragallo]

Everything. That's awesome. The Eiffel Tower, the Great Wall of China, it's all within walking distance right there. The Domino's Pizza. It's all there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And the Walmart, they got Hot and Ready's over at the Little Caesars. Everything is within walking distance. It used to be rural when we moved in. And that's the thing. It went from orchards to slowly knocking the orchards down, building sub developments and housing and all that kind of thing. Everything's there and everything's within walking distance. We fought having all the big box stores coming to our town, but now I actually like the convenience.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'm glad I lost that argument.

[James Pietragallo]

I'm glad I complained and yelled and put signs on my lawn. And now I don't care. Our area has mom and pop stores, restaurants and bigger chain stores, restaurants. It's the perfect mix.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Mix. Mix it up.

[James Pietragallo]

Mix it up. Here's four stars. I love the area. Sure. Great. It's quiet and there isn't much going on. However, it can get boring because of that. And it takes a while to get anywhere interesting. Not to mention I can't get good Internet at my house because cable refuses to come out to us.

[Jimmy Whisman]

But I love the area.

[James Pietragallo]

How far out are you? It's only 40 minutes from a major metropolitan area. What are we doing?

[Jimmy Whisman]

They've drawn a line in the sand and it is 20 minutes outside of Detroit.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, it ends there. Wow. The Internet we do get is basically dial up, but with wifi. Okay. The speed of that. Three stars. The Romeo Family Diner is an alright restaurant. Romeo Romeo Family Diner is an alright restaurant. It is a pretty unique restaurant because it's not part of a chain and it is pretty popular around here. Teenagers can get a job here usually on weekends or evenings. It has regulars come in just about every day. So it's a pretty satisfying restaurant. That's a review of the town.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay. It's okay. The Internet sucks. But we got a Romeo's.

[James Pietragallo]

We got a Romeo's. We got the Romeo's. Three stars in this one. Brace yourselves, this might shock you everybody. Because you know places you hear about. If I say the bayou, you think hot and sticky. Sure. And if you think Michigan, you think obviously tropical paradise.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right.

[James Pietragallo]

So these people are very surprised by, quote, cold in winter, too much snow. That's their review in Michigan. Is that right? It's Michigan, you idiot. Yeah. What do you want?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Say again?

[James Pietragallo]

God damn it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What are you looking for?

[James Pietragallo]

And then finally, three stars. Maybe my favorite review of all time. Because you cannot argue with it. Some of these reviews, obviously you could have a difference of opinion.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I mean, everybody knows that Corona commercial was filmed in Michigan. So I can understand the confusion.

[James Pietragallo]

This person here, three stars, they are right. And there's no way of arguing, quote, not, not sure what future will bring. Not sure argue with that. I dare you. I dare you. Challenge that person. Challenge niche user. I dare you. That's their name on there. Okay. People in this town, 28,007. So not a, not a small town, not a huge metropolis.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Good sampling to know some things.

[James Pietragallo]

A good suburb. Yeah, it is. A few more guys than women here, which is odd for a town of over a thousand people.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You gotta be strong here it's about.

[James Pietragallo]

50.5% men, about 49.5% women. Median age here, 43.9. So a little above the national average, which is about 38 family here. This is like a. You move out here with the wife and kids or the husband and kids or whatever you want to do. If you're a woman, man, I don't know. But you're going out here and you're settling down and that's it. You're going to go play in the yard. 58% married, low divorce rate, low children that are with single parents type of thing. It's just very much family units in the suburbs outside of Detroit. Race in this town it is 89.3% white, 2% black, 1.1% Asian, 4.7% Hispanic. Religion. In this town it's 43% religious. And looking at all the stats here, Catholic is the highest one, which I'm surprised in the Midwest, but there you go. Catholics, as we know, are the Baptists of the north.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Of the north.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, they are there. They're gonna be everywhere. Let's see. Unemployment rate here is low actually, compared to the rest of the country. Yeah, there's a lot of jobs around here to have. Apparently the median household income here is high as well, which we get in these kind of outer suburbs, kind of inner suburbs. A little bit here. Here it's $89,466 a year, which is about $20,000 over the national average. Not bad. Median home cost here is also slightly above the national average. $387,700.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So good money.

[James Pietragallo]

Not bad. Not bad. And it's a lot of kind of, you know, leafy properties, big yards, that kind of thing. It's family type of deals. Yeah. For that kind of money. Well, you know what, maybe we've convinced you to move here despite the snow, despite the potholes. You want to go. Despite the Internet connection, Romeo's Diner. We have for you the Washington Township, Michigan real estate report. The average two bedroom rental here, 1400 bucks a month, which is above the national average a bit. Here is house number one. Three bedroom, two bath, 1056 square feet. And it's. It's a trailer. Let's be realistic.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's small.

[James Pietragallo]

It's a trailer. That's what it is. It's A like a single wide trailer. The listing calls it a well maintained three bedroom, two bath home built in 2013. Built together and built is like in quotes.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. Is that when it was parked or.

[James Pietragallo]

That's when. That's when they spot welded it, the final pieces in place and shipped it on over to your fucking. To your lot number. So this is $40,000 for this thing though. Wow. I don't think it includes land though. I think you probably have to pay. And it's. There's like a walk in closet which is weird for a thousand square foot trailer. It's strange. Here's second house here is a three bedroom, two bath 161663 square feet on 0.56 acres. It is just kind of your standard family home, you know what I mean? You got a couple of kids, there's a couple of bedrooms for them. There you go. 329,900 bucks. That's the most average house you can think of. And then house number three is a gigantic. It looks like a museum, this house. It's crazy. Inside 5 bedrooms, 7 bath, T bowl for each and every B hole and then some 6085 square feet. A monster house. Tons of like marble everywhere. And like it's wild looking. It looks like the lobby of a nice hotel. That's what this place looks like. It's wild. $3 million though.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Ha. 3, $28,000.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

How do you do that?

[James Pietragallo]

I don't know who is moving there. I mean someone who works in Detroit doesn't mind driving 40 minutes. I guess that's all I can imagine. I don't even know where that money is in Detroit for Christmas or.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's remote. I mean you got to just be able just to be at home.

[James Pietragallo]

The president of GM lives there. It's all I can imagine. Anyway, things to do here. This Romeo thing must have got a.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Hold on this town.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. The title. There's a Romeo diner. This is the Romeo Peach Festival.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh.

[James Pietragallo]

That's why I think they grow peaches here based on this. And I'm looking at the schedule and it's big into pageants. That's what all these festivals around here. I looked at people who will be appearing here at this festival. The 2025 Peach Queen of Romeo, Olivia Lynn, who's an 18 year old from Washington Township and she is the 2025 Peach Queen.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Come get her autograph.

[James Pietragallo]

Yep. She's the valedictorian of Romeo high school. Also 2025's lil miss peach blossom also will be there. Who is four years old.

[Jimmy Whisman]

When are we gonna stop this is it coming soon?

[James Pietragallo]

No, I'll tell you right now. Nope, they're gonna keep doing it. And the 2025, Mr. Peachy King also who is five years old, Mr. Peachy King, he's gonna be entering kindergarten in the fall. So that's good news. It literally says that I don't know what's going on there. Then there's gonna be some performances. At 7 o' clock on the Friday night they're gonna have open mic night at Romeo Gold Studios. That'll be great. Then from 7 till 11 at the old Masonic Lounge we have Dirty Mike and the Boys. That's the band.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Dirty Mike and the Boys and not.

[James Pietragallo]

Dirty M I K E, Dirty M I C. Dirty Mike and the Boys. The new relatives and a quote special guest. So we'll all be waiting with bated breath to find out who that is. Then the next day, the Saturday, that was the Friday, there's all day long we got music two o', clock, Casual Smile will be playing. That's easy listening. If you didn't think that just from the name. At 5pm The Jukebox Junkies will be playing. Sure, they play shit from the 60s and 50s, easy listening. And then at 8:30 parallel fifth will be playing, which is party music. And then at the Masonic Lounge because that's at the Romeo Lions clubhouse. Then if you go over to the Mason, you can club hop. This night you go over to the Masonic Lounge and check out Mass Dispute with a special guest.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Dirty Mike and the Boys is the best one.

[James Pietragallo]

Dirty Mike and the Boys.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Did you see the other guys? The movie?

[James Pietragallo]

No.

[Jimmy Whisman]

There was a team of homeless people called Dirty Mike and the Boys who were having orgies in Will Ferrell's car.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh perfect.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's what that reference is from.

[James Pietragallo]

I got it. Okay. No, but it's Dirty Mic. Wonderful. There's also the Blossom Time Festival which is the oldest and largest multi community festival in Michigan. And guess what their big event is?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is it judging somebody?

[James Pietragallo]

It is the Miss Blossom Time Pageant.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's the one judging a gal on her looks.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh yeah. Well, they also have a Mr. Blossom Time. Oh, there's also a Ms. Teen Blossom Time. A Ms. Junior Teen Blossom Time. Hey, these girls just starting puberty, let's put them on a stage and have grown men judge them. Perfect. Then Miss Junior Teen Blossom Time, which is even younger people. Oh, and Bud and Bud Princess as well, which is like 4 year olds. So anyway, crime rate in this town, what we are interested in they stop.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Judging boys when they're about to enter kindergarten and then they wait to judge them until they're men. Is that what this is? But we'll judge girls all the time.

[James Pietragallo]

We'll judge girls. Yeah, we got to judge like the, you know, the 8 to 11 year olds. And then we got to judge like the 11 to 14 year olds then. Yeah, after that, you know, they're. They're growing into themselves. You got to have a different category for them. You can't have some chick with a C cup competing with an 11 year old. That ain't fair. You know what I mean?

[Jimmy Whisman]

We have no boys in those.

[James Pietragallo]

How are we supposed to. We're going to be distracted by this teen girl's huge rack. You know what I mean? We can't have that. I picture that's literally what people are saying, because I don't know what else.

[Jimmy Whisman]

We'll judge boys when they're cute and then we'll wait until they're virile and ready to really get it going.

[James Pietragallo]

Totally. Crime rate in this town, what we are interested in, property crime is about one quarter under the national average. Violent crime, murder, rape, robbery, and of course, assault. The amount rushmore of crime is about one quarter beneath the national average as well. How about that? It's a safe suburb. That's why people live here with their families. That said, let's talk about one of the most awful murders we've ever talked about. This is terrible. Okay, let us talk about a lady first here. Tara Lynn De Stramp. Now, she is born June 28, 1972. Tara is. She grew up in Perkins, which is in the southwest corner of the. Up in Perkins, Michigan. In Michigan. Yeah, the Upper Peninsula, you know, she's her family. Not a lot of money in the up there still isn't. And there really wasn't back in the day, in the 70s.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's not a luscious place to be.

[James Pietragallo]

No. And there's not a lot of industry up there, things like that. And in the 70s too, when the economy was shit, it was even worse. So it was hard. But I guess her family was doing pretty well. Very well. Her father, Geraldine, who never went by Gerald, he went by Dusty. Yeah, Dusty.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Jerry's right there, man.

[James Pietragallo]

Dusty. He's Dusty De Stramp here. Everybody likes Dusty. Dusty's a real chatterbox is what Dusty is. He likes to talk to everybody. He's a real friendly guy. He has a good job. He's got full benefits and a decent living. He's making at a Wastewater treatment operator is what he does at the Sawyer Air Force Base. Oh, so that's good. He's a, you know, civilian contractor at a. At an Air Force base. Sure. So his checks are going to clear. That's what that means all the time. That's. Yeah, they got to have that. I mean, wastewater treatment needs to be done at an air Force base, period.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It'll always be done all day.

[James Pietragallo]

That's it. So at this point here, when Tara was about 2 years old, and she's got a younger sister named Alicia who's a year younger than her. When Tara was two, Alicia's about one, the whole family bought a 28 acre farm.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Nice.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. So it's interesting. It's not a farm that you can support a family on the output of a farm income. Yeah, it's not that. It's considered more of a hobby farm, they call it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, we just do this for fun.

[James Pietragallo]

We like to do this. And, you know, you might sell a little bit, but it's not. It doesn't. You can't sustain it on itself, basically.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

With money. So her mother here, Tara's mother Mary, stayed home with the girls, and they grew vegetables in the garden and they had chicken coops and, you know, tons of animals and stuff like that. And that was. That would supplement the income. So they would do tap the maple trees to get syrup, too. Like, they were really working it. They had kittens and dogs and rabbits and all that. Sounds like a fun life for a little kid running around with Donald. All sorts of animals and all kinds of shit like that here. So. Yeah, they had their own. They also got, like, chores assigned to them young farm kids. Tara's sister Alicia said we had old McDonald's farm to a T, which you already knew. She said that because we did the show live. Just funny. Yeah, yeah, she said we had everything. Horses, you know, sheep, cows, pigs, goats. Guineas. Hey, fuck you. How's that?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Pigs or the.

[James Pietragallo]

They don't say. Just guineas.

[Jimmy Whisman]

We just had some guineas around.

[James Pietragallo]

Hey, Vinnie, they want to talk to you. They want to see how we treat you. How's it going? No, no, they bring us, you know, sausage and peppers on the weekend. It's not bad. You know what I mean? I got some peppers and eggs this morning. They brought me. It's all right. On this farm, you know, it ain't bad. You know, also rabbits, hens, chickens, turkeys, geese. You name it, we had it. She said, Tara and I growing up, we had a list of things that we had to accomplish in the day. And if the list wasn't done when my dad got home, there were consequences to be paid. Farm shit. It's not alluding to beatings, but we'll talk about dad and his kind of his personality, because it's an interesting guy from what we find out here. Well, I mean, any farm, someone comes home, the chores aren't done, there's consequences.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You got more chores to do, more chores.

[James Pietragallo]

You're not going out tonight or whatever. I mean, that doesn't matter when you're six, I'm sure, but not. So Tara loved making the maple syrup. That was her favorite thing, really. She is known, Tara, as a real talkative little kid. Real talkative, yeah. She's, I guess, just like her dad. Everybody says, always chit chat and all that kind of thing. They said even when she was an infant, she would always say hi to everybody and she's just very friendly.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Do we know what dad did?

[James Pietragallo]

Wastewater management.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, okay. That was. Okay, Got it.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

That's the air force base. Yeah. So in elementary school, she can't ever shut up, basically. Yeah. Her teachers would. She'd get report cards with all good grades, but it would be written. Talks too much, has to shut the fuck up, basically. She talks a lot. She's real smart, cute kid, smiley friendly. So the teacher said, you can't get mad at her, really, because she's not being.

[Jimmy Whisman]

She's contributing.

[James Pietragallo]

She's not being a dick or anything, but she's not trying to cause you trouble. She can't help it. But God damn it, if this kid could just dial it back 20%, that'd be terrific. So it would be frustrating. When she's a teenager, she gets into the 4H scene over here, the 4H club here. Both the girls started raising sheep for the state fair.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

Like, yeah. Real sheep to show off to people.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Show goats, show sheep.

[James Pietragallo]

Tara was raising cows, pigs, rabbits, chickens and sheep, which is pretty cool. Her parents were the four H group leaders.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

So you can't get more, like, just ingrained in everything in the farm and the town and the school and 4H. And your parents are doing this. This is some real small town America shit here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Her parents got her her own Appaloosa, which is a horse, right?

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's a horse.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Yeah. And she'd spend hours brushing the horse and riding the horse. And she's a teenage girl with a horse. I mean, what. Remember when you were a kid, all those, like, in sixth grade, all those kids who had, like, horses on their folders? All those girls, they didn't have horses.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And you don't have some sort of wildlife. What are you doing here?

[James Pietragallo]

What are you doing? Why? Why are you bothering?

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's awesome. She's riding a horse to the 4H meetings. What do they do?

[James Pietragallo]

They said the parents, the parents were the group leader. So they got every meeting. So she would do all of that. In 1990, when she was almost 18, she won the award for the grand champion market hog. She brought up the nicest market hog in the county. Market. Yeah. Yeah, that's right. And then fortunately for that hog, a spider saved its life, which was pretty impressive. It was good. Nobody, he was some pig. What do you want? So the 4H club got Tara into shooting as well. She's a good shot. Old Tara. Oh yeah. She was competing in tournaments around the state, bringing home all sorts of trophies for her shooting prowess. Yeah, yeah. Her team took the state title one year. The club's four member team took the state title with Tara as the leader of the group. Hey everybody. Just going to take a quick break from the show to tell you about the best holiday gift there is. An aura frame.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Auraframes.com oh my God.

[James Pietragallo]

It's the gift that keeps on giving because they're going to have it displayed right there in the most prominent place in their house with all the pictures on it of all the family stuff, all the gatherings. Trust me, I've gotten two this year because I've got so many other people. You have an aunt, you have even like you have people that just had a baby, somebody like that. Oh, they're going to love this. I'm telling your grandma. Anything like that, they are going to absolutely love this. I'm telling you, you gave somebody a gift last year that wasn't that fantastic or anything like that. You got somebody you want to really impress somebody in there. You need to give an extra special gift this year. This is what you need. An aura frame. All you have to do is just download the aura app, connect to wi Fi and it's unlimited. Free video and photos. Preload photos before it ships. You can keep adding from anywh anytime. Comes in an awesome gift box. It is so great. You need an aura frame. Don't wait. Win the holidays now with aura frames for a limited time. Save on the perfect gift by visiting auraframes.com to get $35 off Aura's best selling Carver mat frames named number one by Wirecutter by using promo code Small town murder at checkout. That's a U R A frame frames.com promo code. Small town murder. This deal is exclusive to listeners and frames sell out fast. So order yours now to get it in time for the holidays. Support the show by mentioning us at checkout. Terms and conditions apply.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Now back to the show.

[James Pietragallo]

Hey, everybody. Just gonna take a quick break from the show to tell you how to dress a little better with Fabletics.

[Jimmy Whisman]

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[James Pietragallo]

We love Fabletics. We've ordered a bunch from Fabletics and excellent, comfortable, stylish stuff. As a matter of fact, Jimmy wore his Fabletic suit on stage at a live show in Washington, D.C. you know, the clothes are good if you can. When you go on stage in front of 900 people. Yeah, you need confidence. You have to look good. Yeah, you need. You need confidence too. You need to. I feel good and I look good and I'm comfortable. Otherwise you're not going to be as funny. So that's the best endorsement we could give you is we'd wear it on stage. It is such good stuff. And if you like, if you live in like activewear, you know, it's hard because the good stuff is way too expensive.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Everything she does, she does it well, huh?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, she's an achiever. That's what she does. And we'll find out with her job and kind of how she gets into that. She's an achiever. That's just all there is to it. Every Christmas Eve, they had a big family tradition. Dusty took the girls out with a group of his friends and a bunch of dogs to go rabbit hunting in the snow. Come on, kids, let's go. Let's go kill the most adorable thing we can find in the woods. What do you say? Guys, I know people kill rabbits and eat them all the time, but it's just funny if I. I can't. If I. When my daughter was like nine, if I said, we're gonna go murder rabbits, now we're gonna go kill rabbits even if they're delicious or whatever, she would have not been okay with that. Really? Yeah. But no, I don't want to.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Even if I said hunt, I don't even need to allude to. No, they'll know. Yeah, but if I said we're going to go rabbit hunting, why. Why are we doing. We're going to go hunt them, to pet them. Why else would we do this?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. My daughter felt bad about a fish when we went fishing. She didn't want to take the fish because she said the fish have families and they do all that. And then I said, well, you love steak and hamburgers. And she said, well, she was 6. I love children. Logic. She said, well, cows want to be delicious for us. I was like, Want to At 6, you can twist your logic to get there, huh?

[Jimmy Whisman]

They literally eat foods on purpose to be nutritious for us.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. They understand going on. They go, I'm going to be so marveled. They go, I'm going to be so marveled and tender. This is going to be awesome. So they would do that every time.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And Alicia would. She and Alicia were both very good at this. Tara also hunted ducks and duck season, deer and deer season. She's a good shot.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Thing about rabbits, they are fast as. Oh, yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, they're hard. So yeah, they were. Tara or Tara was known for being able to do very good with bringing deer down with a single shot so you don't have to chase them and all that. So that's a good shot. Putting it right where you want it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Heart, long head.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Now Dusty isn't perfect either. No, no. Apparently Dusty known for having a bit of a temper, short temper. And being a little verbally aggressive with mom. Yeah, yeah. He would yell and all that kind of shit. I mean, I don't know. He's a up farm guy. I don't know if that's normal or.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What and shit filter. He's not gonna be a. Yeah, yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And Tara was. She always was upset that her mother would take it passively. Why don't you fight back? You know what I mean? Yell back at him. What the fuck?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Tara wouldn't take this shit.

[James Pietragallo]

So. Yeah, she wrote later on in a diary about how it was painful that aspect of her childhood and you know, it's tough. She vowed that that was never going to happen to her. She would take no shit. Oh, she said no, I'm never going to have a guy that's going to talk to me like that. And if he is, I'll take him in the woods and hunt him. Apparently, you know.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Well, that's part of the 4H credo too.

[James Pietragallo]

I'll give him a 2 minute head start. Yeah, it'll be like surviving the game or whatever. That's what we're going to do here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Ice T and Rutter.

[James Pietragallo]

Howard. Let's go, fuckers.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Get going.

[James Pietragallo]

Get going. Move. You got yourself 10 minutes.

[Jimmy Whisman]

But the 4H credo is just like how to live a healthy life and. And health is part of it. It's like the main thing.

[James Pietragallo]

Is it? Is that one of the H's? Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Health.

[James Pietragallo]

Is it? I don't have no idea. I thought it was like horses. Hay. I have no clue what the.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Horses, hens, hillbillies and.

[James Pietragallo]

Hey, perfect. Yeah, that's the 4H to me. That's honestly what I thought. You know, hillbillies, maybe I added that one on my own. But the rest of it, I thought that's what it was. Like horses.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'm gonna guess I know that health is one. Heart, hands, head. Bingo. Got all four. That's all four of them.

[James Pietragallo]

What does that have to do with cows? What does that have to do with cows?

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's how to be a well rounded person while taking care of your farm.

[James Pietragallo]

That could be anything.

[Jimmy Whisman]

The hands part is like Your larger skills.

[James Pietragallo]

So it's like therapy for the farm.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Just to keep you from fucking shooting a man that yells at your mom.

[James Pietragallo]

4H. Better help, I guess.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

This is wild. I don't know what's happening here. Wow. I was way off. I thought they just did farm shit. I didn't realize this was such a.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's an indoctrination of keeping children in the farm life, I think.

[James Pietragallo]

I think so. I think so. I don't know. I honestly. There was not really 4H.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I don't know when it start. It's all rural shit. But it's just. It's like a club to teach kids to keep kids really in.

[James Pietragallo]

It was like in a farm stuff and.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, yeah. But it's. It's community engagement via farm and.

[James Pietragallo]

Sounds nice.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I don't know when it started or why it started. It feels like it started because farm work ain't fun for kids.

[James Pietragallo]

It's remote and lonely. I would imagine so. Yeah. It's probably a way to get these kids together to have some sort of social scene, I would think. Right. Yeah. Otherwise you're just sitting on a farm.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Kids that do it, I can't imagine. It's just.

[James Pietragallo]

That's when they start having weird sexual dalliances with farm animals and shit. You got to get them together. So Tara in high school played varsity basketball and ran track. So she's an athlete. Mid Peninsula High. She went to. There's only 275 kids in the entire school. She was also a cheerleader as well. Wow. She's got a lot going on, this kid. This is in addition to all of her farm work and everything else and. Wow. So her and her sister Alicia were both cheerleaders. They both had big giant hair. Their friend and fellow cheerleader said, those were the days. The higher your hair, the better. This is the late 80s, so, I mean, this is the peak of Valley girl shit. And the big hair and everything like that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Dolly says, the closer to God you are.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. They had. Apparently all of them had this giant hair. And the one girl said, we called it the wall. All of us had this big wall.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh. All of us together create a wall.

[James Pietragallo]

If you remember, like 89, all the girls had like the bangs that were down in the front, but they had a big puff in the back.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Big thing, pull, push up before it went over.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. And then. Well, then there was a little bit of bangs under it. They would push the bangs down and have a big pop thing up there. She also. She sounds like, I don't know how she can do all of that. She was also first clarinet in the school band, but there's only 200, there's only 234 kids. She could have been playing a plastic recorder and they wouldn't have known the goddamn difference at that. How many kids out of 234 farm kids know how to play the goddamn clarinet? So I don't know, but she took lessons for years, so she did that. She's also a good pianist as well.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Nice.

[James Pietragallo]

So this girl has some roundedness to her. This is wild. That is a lot. And on top of all of that, which I'm exhausted already. In high school I had time to smoke some weed, chase some girls, play some basketball here and there, that kind of stuff. Very little time for actual work, schoolwork and definitely no time for clarinets and, and 4H clubs, coarse brushing and maple syrup, tree tapping and all this type of shit. On top of all this cheerleading. She also has a part time job too.

[Jimmy Whisman]

How?

[James Pietragallo]

I don't know. I don't know when she has time to work this job.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Where's she working?

[James Pietragallo]

At a shoe store. And she liked working at the shoe store. Really. And she thinking of herself as. She thought she could be a good businesswoman. She thought she was good at sales and could be a good businesswoman. She in her senior class, there was 44 in the class of 1990. In the school she wrote that one of her goals was, quote, to make enough money to buy everything I want, live in a big house with a Jaguar parked in the garage.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, she wants a Jag.

[James Pietragallo]

All right, so she's not saying I want to have a big farm and I want to do that. I want a big house with a Jaguar, which is not farm goals, you.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Know, And Jaguar maintenance money. That's what I want.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. I need money to pay for that shitty English electrical system in that car in 1990. Now they're fine because like they're not even. They're fine.

[Jimmy Whisman]

They're fine. They're beautiful.

[James Pietragallo]

Back then they were known for being very temperamental still at the time. So in college, Dusty and Mary weren't ready for her to go off to a big school for college. They wanted her to spend two years at the community college at home before going off. Which also is a more economical way to do it because you can get all of your, get your prereqs out the way, all that out the way and pay. It's the same credits, but you're just gonna pay way less money for them.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A tenth of the money?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, but I mean, part of it is going to be on your own and social and that's part of the college experience too. But they want her to stay around. You know, they're farm kids, they're not used to having them gone. So she attends the Bay Dinoc Community College.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

So she goes there for a little while and then she ends up though transferring to Michigan State, which is where she wants to be. That's where she wanted to go to begin with, but they said university stay here. Yeah. So she studied marketing and loves marketing. So 92 is when she transfers to MSU and begins a business degree or a business administration degree. That's what she wants to do.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is that the mba?

[James Pietragallo]

That would be a Master's of Business Administration, I think, if I'm not mistaken. So I think it's a postgraduate thing. So she ends up there and, you know, she's hanging out in college and for the first time, she's living out of a small town, she's off the farm, she's tons of kids and she's kind of in no.

[Jimmy Whisman]

4H. No FA, none of that in the city. Goddamn city.

[James Pietragallo]

No clarinet lessons, none of this shit. So she spreads her wings a little bit and she meets a guy that she likes. Yeah, he's into political science, he likes politics.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Marketing and politics.

[James Pietragallo]

Beautiful man. Talk about full of shit. Between the two of them, not that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

They can't listen to a word they got.

[James Pietragallo]

No, if a couple comes up, I'm in marketing, he's in politics. He goes, jesus Christ, guys, please.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You're both about to lie to me.

[James Pietragallo]

So you're gonna sell me Amway? What are we talking about here? You're gonna try to recruit me for a multi level marketing. So Stephen is his name, Steven Grant. And this guy's picture is amazing. His fucking eyes. Oh, boy, I can't wait to show everybody on social media this guy's picture. Because we did this for a live show. When you put his picture up, a thousand people laugh immediately, right away, he's.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So.

[James Pietragallo]

You don't have to say anything. Just say, Steven Grant picture and a thousand people laugh. You're funny looking. That's just the way it is.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And it's just. There's nothing really that stands out about his face and his hair and his ears and his nose.

[James Pietragallo]

It's just these facial expressions.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Fucking crazy eyes. They're so big.

[James Pietragallo]

It's. His facial expressions are always weird. Every one of them is weird. I've seen 20 different pictures. They're all weird. Everybody Normal.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Surgically had his eyelids removed.

[James Pietragallo]

It's just to be. He's one of those guys that you can see the whites of his eyes way too much around his eye. Like, it's really, really so much white. It's strange shit. Yeah. It's to the point where if there was like a. Let's say there was a picture with 25 people in it, your eyes would immediately be drawn to him with his big stupid eyes. They're so weird.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What's going on with those eyes?

[James Pietragallo]

So. But he's handsome. He's tall. He's like an athletic guy. He had just graduated from msu. He's like two years older than her. Now, Grant is a friend of one of Tara's roommates. That's how they met, you know, in college. You meet people like that. Oh, yeah. And he immediately began pursuing her. He liked her. He thought she was hot shit. He was a huge partier and womanizer is what he's known around. He's a college kid and he's already graduated, but he's still hanging out at college and hanging out at college parties.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Why is that?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Why are you still here?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. You like college girls and booze, College pussy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's why you're here.

[James Pietragallo]

Yep. He's got a girlfriend at this point, but basically he's known as someone who. He'll go to a party and cheat with any girl he can find. He's no fidelity whatsoever. He tell his friends that he's an atheist and he's going to hell anyway, so he might as well enjoy the ride.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wait, hold. That's not how it works.

[James Pietragallo]

That's not. And first of all, I'm not aware of cheating on a girlfriend even in the most religious circles as a hellbound thing. It's not your wife or, you know, you didn't, like, suffocate your grandma. This is.

[Jimmy Whisman]

If you're an atheist, then you don't believe that shit exists, man.

[James Pietragallo]

That's the other thing, stupid. I'm an atheist. I'm going to hell. You are confused, sir. You're confused how. Shit, I don't think you're an atheist. I'm going to say that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, I think you're very religious.

[James Pietragallo]

To be honest, based on that statement, you're at least agnostic. We're going to bump you up to certainly not atheist.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Borderline Christian.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. I mean, you're almost there. So he and Tara meet at a party, and this was just. I guess there was apartment complexes that had parties all the time, and all the kids Would get together. Yeah. So he told her that he graduated from college and he was taking an aim at a career in politics. He's not running for shit with those eyes, I'll tell you that much.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I mean, with the womanizing, he's certainly qualified.

[James Pietragallo]

He's qualified there, but you look at his eyes and he looks like he's. His eyes look like he has not seen a woman in 20 years and he just saw a giant pair of tits. That's what his eyes look like. Yes, but all the time. So you can't do that. He takes a temporary job as an aide in the Lansing office of a state senator named Jack Van Faxon, who was out of a Detroit suburb of Farmington Hills. And he just wanted to get his foot in the door, get some experience to move up. And that's how you do it in politics.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Farmington Hills is beautiful. That's the rich place.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So Grant was thinking, you know, if I do this right, if this guy gets reelected, I'm going to end up, you know, probably a paid staff member at that point. He also loves to party because he hangs out at college but doesn't have any actual schoolwork to do, so.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right.

[James Pietragallo]

All he does is party and try to hook up the chicks. That's all he does. Which is interesting. Now Steven and Tara date a couple of times. Tara likes him, he's good looking, she thinks anyway, confident and all that kind of shit. But the relationship doesn't really go anywhere. They remain kind of just buddies that run into each other at parties and stuff like that and know each other, but they don't really hook up or have any kind of romantic thing going on. That is until 1994. In August, Tara's grandmother dies.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh no.

[James Pietragallo]

Which obviously makes you horny, clearly. No, it doesn't. But somehow this is gonna spark a relationship.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Really?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. The family unites for the funeral and Steven showed up. He spent the entire day driving up from Lansing and surprised Tara. And he called her to say at her parents house to say, hey, I'm in town where the funeral is. I'm going to come to the funeral home if you don't mind. Which that's a long drive to go. Hey, I'm coming if you don't mind. No, turn back around and drive back down. So yeah, he's there. So Tara said, yeah, sure, come to the funeral home. He came to the funeral home. Tara's there with her boyfriend. Oh yeah. So Steven's like, okay, this is interesting. But Steven and Tara are. They have A good back and forth. That pisses the boyfriend off, obviously, so he's gonna act jealous, and he's probably some small town dipshit goober or something. So, you know, he didn't go to college with her and all that kind of stuff. So she probably looked at him as, you know, just kind of just a local guy who gets jealous and who knows? But either way, she is impressed that Steven drove all the way from Lansing to be here. She's very impressed. She said, huh, maybe I underestimated this cat here. Maybe he's just, you know, maybe he's that kind of guy, you know what I mean? Kind of guy you could depend on who will drive hours to your grandmother's.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Funeral on spec without asking, is there a guy there?

[James Pietragallo]

That's what I mean, not even asking. Hey, not saying, like, then we can go out to dinner later. Just, I wanted to go pay my respects and make sure you're okay. That's nice. So Grant was invited. Steven gets invited out that night to the family dinner. Okay, so if you bring him along too. Family doesn't like him at all. Nobody likes him. No, they do not like him. Alicia despised him. The sister couldn't stand him. She was disgusted by the fact that Tara was, like, liking this guy and laughing at his jokes and shit like that. Not into him at all. She said he was. The way she put it was, he was entirely too worldly.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What does that meaning?

[James Pietragallo]

He's been around too much.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, got it.

[James Pietragallo]

He works for a politician. He's doing it. He's a little too fast for her is the way she put it, basically. But it doesn't matter if Tara likes him. Tara likes him. So after dinner, he got back on his car and his car and drove home. And that was that. So Tara's sister said she was never into Steven at all. Alicia said, absolutely not. She said he was a guy who bellowed when he talked. He always has a lot to say and always. Showman thing. Yeah. Yeah. At a dinner table of, you know, a family after a funeral, you don't really need that. So Alicia said also, he always had to have the last word no matter what. So that's her impression. But, I mean, there's a lot of siblings that don't like their siblings.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, man.

[James Pietragallo]

Husbands, wives, girlfriends, boyfriends. That's just. That's. That kind of comes with the territory here. So after a few months of dating, they go back down and start dating here. She moves in with him. So this comes out of nowhere. No one expects this, that she's going to move in with him. So he must have quite the wrap.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's doing it.

[James Pietragallo]

Never mind her doing sales. He can do some sales.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's selling. Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

He is selling hard. Now, the guy he was working for got reelected in the fall, but basically he doesn't get offered a job. Oh, shit, no. So he must have been shitty at his job.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Terrible.

[James Pietragallo]

No one offers him a job. None of the guys he didn't even like say, I don't have room for you. But this guy, they just drop him. Fuck him. So he gave up his apartment and he moved to Detroit to work in his father's machine shop in Mount Clemens. That's what he's gonna do. Tara moves with him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's not politics at all.

[James Pietragallo]

No. That is a machine shop where they make ball bearings.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's failure, right?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. If you set out to be in politics and now you're working college for it. Yeah. Now you're working in a machine shop in Mount Clemens. I would say probably failure.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Whoops the daisy.

[James Pietragallo]

Even if working in a machine shop is great and fine, it's not what you want to do.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

It's not what you were trying to do.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You went to college for nothing. Machine shop oriented.

[James Pietragallo]

Nothing at all. So there. Now you're making ball bearings, which sounds, yikes. For a guy who seems to like to do things and you know, has interaction with bubbling and politics is an adrenaline kind of all that to say, okay, now make the same ball bearings every day, forever.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You're turning it into a balanced ball, a very small one, over and over and over again.

[James Pietragallo]

Here's big metal. Make it into smaller pieces of metal, but real smooth.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Like make them roll.

[James Pietragallo]

Right? Yeah. So September 1996, Steven and Tara are married in a little country church by her hometown. There, Stephen had proposed on a bench in front of Detroit's Institute of Arts. So that's nice.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Real romantic.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. At the time of the proposal, he had was trying to do something better. He's trying to better himself now. I don't know what. He works at a machine shop in Mount Clemens. I don't know what he needs all these skills for, but he wants to get himself to be a more cultured person.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Like what?

[James Pietragallo]

Like fine. He wants to learn about fine wines and learn about like fancy foods and fancy ingredients. And you work at a machine shop. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Who gives a shit?

[James Pietragallo]

And you can't afford to be a foodie at this moment in time.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Not like that. Not French wines and shit.

[James Pietragallo]

But that's what he wants. He wants to learn how to cook fancy foods and all that. And he actually becomes good at it. He knows his wines and he learns how to cook some decent food. And, you know, he's a good talker. She's a good talker. If you go over to their house, you're gonna have a fun night. They're gonna make some food, there's gonna be some wine. They know how to talk, they know how to bullshit. Yeah, it's good times.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's setting himself up to be a really great host.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, yeah, he's trying to be. He said, well, if I can't do what I want for a living, I'm just gonna be a general bon vivant of fucking life, you know what I mean?

[Jimmy Whisman]

My own mater d at home.

[James Pietragallo]

That's it. I'm just gonna be this fucking. Yeah, I'm gonna be this man of the world and live well.

[Jimmy Whisman]

During the day, I make ball bearings. At night I eat soft cheese.

[James Pietragallo]

Soft cheese. He also affected a way of smoking a cigarette while holding it from underneath it like that, backwards in the fingers. And a slight French accent, Just very slight. If someone asked him something, he'd go, mm hmm. Little, very small things. That's all.

[Jimmy Whisman]

But the cherry at his thumb and forefinger.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, little things like that. So Tara has trouble finding a job, and Steven's the one supporting them financially at this point because she's having a hard time finding a job. But then she gets a job with a company called Kelly Services, which provides workers on a temp basis to different businesses and industry. It's a temp company, you know, that sort of thing. Now she's placed in one of her assignments in a local office of a company called Morrison Knudsen, which is an engineering firm that built the Hoover Dam and the Transatlanta Alaska pipeline. Not the Transatlanta pipeline, that's a different pipeline.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Transatlanta, when it goes through the Transatlanta.

[James Pietragallo]

All the way, it's only through Atlanta. It's a very short pipeline. It just goes through all the Peachtree streets, all of them, which is all of Atlanta. So.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That'S the funniest misspoken thing you've ever done. Just on image of it is amazing.

[James Pietragallo]

The Transatlanta pipeline is amazing. Yes, it is. So now the company is not really doing as well as it was. The Hoover Dam was built in like the fucking 40s, so.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Sure.

[James Pietragallo]

It's been a while worn on now. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Although I've heard that the concrete's still curing in the middle. Have you heard that?

[James Pietragallo]

I have heard that, yeah. Still corpses in there. And the lowering concrete in the middle. So many people died in that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Probably a body sized void in a couple spots.

[James Pietragallo]

A few spots, yep. That's just putrefaction is what they call that in the middle of all that concrete. It's not dry. So the company's about to be bought by the Washington Group, which is a giant big engineering and construction company with worldwide operations and more than 20,000 employees. Wow. So they're about to be bought out. Now Tara sees this happening and wants to latch on permanently with this company because she sees if we get folded into this company, there's going to be room for advancement.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So absolutely.

[James Pietragallo]

Her big thing is she wants to do it. And she has great work habits, obviously, as we found out. She can really manage time, obviously. Great personality and all that sort of thing. So she ends up being taken on by the company and taken away from the tent company, which is great. And she starts moving her way up the ranks of this company quickly, real quickly. November 2000, she gives birth to their first child. They have a daughter named Lindsay. And then in. And she couldn't be more thrilled. She wants to have a job, have a career, also be a mom though that's a big deal to her. She wants to do all that stuff. Her sister said she was ecstatic. Lindsay was just the sparkle of her eye. Sure. And then two years later, 2003, they have a son named Ian. Great. So yeah, they're building their little family. Two kids, a boy, a girl, move out to the suburbs, to Washington Township and they're gonna live quite the Life here. In 2003, after the son was born, Tara was named System. Well, one of the systems managers of this company, which yeah, gives her a bump in salary and all that kind of thing. And it gets better from there. By 2006, she became. They offered her the full time posting in Puerto Rico. Oh yes. Now you go, oh Christ. Puerto Rico. We live in Detroit. That's going to be tough. But the salary is. And this is in 2006 money. $168,000 a year. I mean you don't tell them no, you take that. In 2006, if someone offers you 168 grand to do anything, you're doing it period.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Today that's incredible money. Then it was much better.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh yeah, today it's still good. But then it was like holy shit, you're rich. At least, you know, real comfortable at that point, very well off. So she, the families doesn't Want to move to Puerto Rico though, so that's a problem. So she decides that she, she can commute. She can do five days a week in Puerto Rico and then come home on Friday nights, spend the weekends in Detroit with the family or in Washington Township with the family, get back to Puerto Rico on Monday morning. That is her goal. Weekends in Detroit, my word, weekdays in Puerto Rico. She also gets accepted into the program at her company, which is considered pretty. A hot shit program. It's geared at those with a shot at the upper, upper management. It's like an upper, like a. Yeah. An executive officer one day. Yeah, you could say it was called the Leap program and it was offered each year to just 15 of the employees in the company. And she's one of them out of 20,000 employees. Yeah. This is a big deal. So she is in on that. Now she has a. Tries to have a work life balance. She really does. Which it's hard. But for that kind of money, that's a tough spot for anybody to be put in because you're thinking, okay, I'm not going to be that great of a parent or partner or anything like that. But at the same time, this is providing for your family and for your family's future. This is college money you're making for your kids. This is, you know, this is big stuff here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And you're making three average people's salaries every year.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's. It's worth giving it a go.

[James Pietragallo]

And Steven still makes a few bucks on the side at the machine shops.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Working for dad, so he's probably making a decent living.

[James Pietragallo]

They're doing very well for themselves. And with two small children, you look at well, fuck, that's part of my responsibility. And that's absolutely. And that's why it's hard to be a parent, to balance all of this.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You get it?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. That's everything.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Now you're seeing why it's not smart to have a baby at 21 years old.

[James Pietragallo]

That's why it's hard life planning. She wanted her kids to be well rounded like she was.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Apparently the elementary school that Lindsay goes to doesn't offer Spanish to first and second graders. And she's upset.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Really.

[James Pietragallo]

She wants the kids to learn Spanish when they're sick. Yeah, yeah. But they don't teach kids that in elementary school. You got to put them in a class.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. Because that's when their brain could do it. Right.

[James Pietragallo]

Exactly. It'd be much easier if you taught them all that shit when they're five. They learn it quickly. So she wanted them to be bilingual, though, that way. Also, she'd come down to Puerto Rico, bring the kids down. She was also okay and happy because one of the au pairs that they hire, because they have to keep hiring a series of au pairs to come in and help with the kids because Steven does his work too, and whatever. So one of them was Spanish. So she would tutor the kids as part of her duties.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Terrific.

[James Pietragallo]

Tara also stays very on top of the household things while she's in Puerto Rico. She would call him to make sure that he had taken the kids to ballet, stuff that they were doing, and also to the actual ballet, because they need to learn culture as well. She's got a chart of what these kids need to know.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's, did they go to ballet? And also tonight you have the Nutcracker to go watch.

[James Pietragallo]

You gotta go watch that. Yeah. She wanted Lindsey to take dance lessons. And she also, at five years old, got Ian to start taking hockey lessons.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is that right?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, that's. That. That might be a little. That might be a little much. I mean, she doesn't know it, but like, obviously, but like, you can fuck that kid up. Yeah. Well, putting young girls in dance a lot of the times too. I know there's tons of young girls who did dance, but a lot of times. And you'll know that because all the girls that you did this with probably did this. A lot of that leads to eating disorders a lot of the times. Yeah. Somehow there's a correlation mathematically. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Between those clothes and being able to do the things and.

[James Pietragallo]

But more of that. It's. It's an. It's. It's a kind of. Not an intrusiveness, but it's. That achiever thing also works with kids brains when you tell them, achieve this and achieve that and dance when you're four and dance that. But if you're that kind of person that did that naturally, like Tara is, you don't even think about it like that. You're thinking about it as, that's what I wanted.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's what I did. Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And I loved it. So Tara started taking golf lessons, by the way. Really? Because a lot of business gets done on the golf course. And she figured that part of that executive program would be, I'm going to take some initiative and do that. She would also plan events. She would like her like a family event. She'd have like several notebook pages dedicated to things and lengthy lists of gifts and other shit for birthday presents and Christmas presents and all that. And a lot of that too. I'm sure she felt, as any parent would, guilty for not being there all the time. So you want to give your kids stuff like that? Yeah, she. In 2007. In early 2007, like January, because she's generous with Steven. Also, she was already planning the details of a special surprise for him. A combination birthday Christmas present for him in December, which would be a completely lush, luxurious Napa Valley tour.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, for all those wines he loves.

[James Pietragallo]

Yep. Stephen can get into all the expensive wines and they can, they could stay at a bunch of real fancy hotels and drink fancy wines and that's of kind. Gonna lead to fancy fucking and shit. Yeah, it's gonna be a fun time.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh my God.

[James Pietragallo]

Hey, everybody. Just gonna take a quick break from the show to tell you a better way to feed your cat with Smalls.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, Smalls.com oh, get in there.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Now back to the show.

[James Pietragallo]

Thanks to Home Serve for sponsoring this episode.

[Jimmy Whisman]

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[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

A warning.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Now back to the show.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

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[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Too late.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Who cares?

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Now back to the show. Belly full of screaming eagles and then anal.

[James Pietragallo]

Come on, a cake bread. Yeah, that's why she needs the cake bread. She's like, oh boy, I better loosen up. So she. Stephen has some expensive tastes. Even back then he had a $2,500 mountain bike, which is really pretty expensive if you're not like in competition. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's probably more than that. Something. Something we've never heard of. Probably some shit we never heard of. Grant. In 2006, Steven made $18,900 at the machine shop.

[Jimmy Whisman]

For the year.

[James Pietragallo]

For the year. That's all he made. Tara's year end bonus was $28,000, so.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, man.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, more than he made all year. But I mean, also he's the fucking primary caregiver of the kids. If you flipped them, you wouldn't be going, she only made 19 grand. What a loser. You'd go, oh yeah, she's taking care of the kids. What do you want?

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'm such a bitch.

[James Pietragallo]

I think he's supposed to have more.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, that sounds awesome to me. But to him as like a political science major and swinging dick on the campus even when he didn't even go there. This is probably emasculating to him. He probably hates.

[James Pietragallo]

Possibly. Maybe, yeah. I mean, I don't know. Sometimes you would. He might just be thrilled for his wife. Who knows what I mean? I would be for her. Rooting for her. Yeah. Good for you. So they live in a comfortable home in Washington Township. It's real nice. She's making, you know, almost 200 grand a year commuting between Detroit and San Juan. This is early 2007. That's how it's doing. And Steven, everybody said he prided himself on the Mr. Mom thing. She loved it. He would be at the. You know, the soccer dad on the field when the kids were doing soccer, he was like one of the coaches. And a local newspaper reporter said he took them to all their appointments and soccer games and appreciated getting the accolades for that. Okay, I am a good dad. Because, I mean, that's all he's got, honestly.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

It's either that or I make really smooth ball bearings. What the fuck else? You know what I'm saying?

[Jimmy Whisman]

There is something about being told, you're a great dad. Dad. That feels so fucking good.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, that's what I mean. You're trying to do that. So Tara's running this office in Puerto Rico. She's an operations manager by this point. And it's very interesting. She works for the Washington Group International, which is based out of Idaho. Hires people in Michigan to work in Puerto Rico. It's a very confusing thing here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Makes you worry that shit's shady, right?

[James Pietragallo]

It sounds like a lot of places to hide things. Yeah, exactly. You're not gonna find the queen. I'll tell you that much right now. So. February 5, 2007. There is a letter that Tara wrotes. She writes. Did I just say that? I literally looked at my notes, and it says, tara wrote a letter. And I wrote. And I said a letter that Tara wrote as I'm reading that because I'm.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A moron, she built that Transatlanta pipe. It's all right.

[James Pietragallo]

It's okay. Tired. My throat hurts. I had my guy. I was at the dentist for three hours yesterday. My mouth open, so I have that dry throat thing going on. It's not good, man. So this is all right. She can rote all she wants. In this letter, she apologized for always making Stephen feel wrong, for not loving him as well as she should, and for sometimes pushing him away when he was, as the way she put it, quote, the one person who has fully committed to me and to love me unconditionally. She wrote that she wanted them to renew their wedding vows so that she could have a clear mind and an open heart to fully love you for the incredible human being you are. Wow.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So you think she feels guilty for having a successful job, but it takes her away from the family as much?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, And I think she's busy. And sometimes, probably as anybody would feel, you feel like you're kind of, I don't know, you're busy doing stuff and you feel like, oh, I've kind of. I kind of abandoned this person almost. And I need them to make sure that they know that they're part of my life here.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, but you also feel a little bit guilty if like your boy's soccer team wins on Friday and you were on a plane from exactly God knows where.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, yeah, all of it. You just feel like you're not a part of it. I'm sure that she has similar feelings about. To the kids, you know what I mean? About. I feel bad and. And whatever. So she doesn't give him this letter. It's in her notebook. Okay.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

So as of 2007, like I said, they had a series of au pairs come in and help them. And 2007, in July and January, February, they have a particular one named Verena Dirkes. D I E R K E s she's a 19 year old, tall, blonde German girl.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

That's who you hire to be at your house while you're gone five days a week, right?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Would you. That is like, basically if you had a wife and you're like, I'm gonna be gone five days a week. I hired this shirtless, glistening man with tremendous pectoral muscles to help you around the house. He needs to be oiled up every like two, three hours though, he gets dry. So you might make sure you oil him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

20 year old Brent from Malibu.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, Here he is, he comes over and they're like, brent, you don't have a shirt on. And he goes, I don't have any shirts, bro.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I don't know. I don't own it.

[James Pietragallo]

I don't have any, man. Yeah, I just don't. I don't have any shirts. I do have this oil. Can you get my back on the spot right here?

[Jimmy Whisman]

My back feels dry.

[James Pietragallo]

Feels dry, you know, as he's just rubbing it all over his chest.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You can't reach back there.

[James Pietragallo]

Similar move. That's a tough move. You gotta trust your husband. Put it that way.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Anyway, kids, get your soccer gear.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, that's. Wow. So she'd been with the grant since August. She really likes Steven as far as finds him to be like kind of a fascinating older guy, you know, he's 37, he's smart, he knows wines, he knows politics, all that. Also he runs long distance. He's in good shape. Also, he's six foot tall. You know, he's fine. She's only been in the States for a Year or two. And she's a pretty girl, still a teenager. She just graduated the year before from a school that catered to top students in her hometown of Osnabruck, Germany. Yeah. She so far is the best au pair they've had in the series of them that they've had here. They work with a company called Au Pair in America, which is a London based company with US headquarters in Connecticut that also employs people in Puerto Rico, Michigan and Idaho.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right. It's a UK place that places German students in the United States in Michigan, specifically Detroit.

[James Pietragallo]

Well, but they're based out of Connecticut. Right, Right. Yeah. So you gotta add that in there too. With headquarters in Connecticut.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

So for a fee of $7,400, the company would screen potential au pairs.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's their hiring fee.

[James Pietragallo]

That's 2006 money. Wow, that's a lot of money to do that. Now, Verena's contract called for her to be paid $285 a week, plus room and board for 45 hours of work a week. That's the deal they make with.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's pretty good.

[James Pietragallo]

That's pretty good. But they had to pay like 10 months of salary right up front to get her in there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, Right.

[James Pietragallo]

So the contracts are for one year and they can be renewed as well here. Now, February 9th, 2007, it's a Friday. Tara is on her way home from Puerto Rico. Yeah, she's ready to come home from Puerto Rico here for the weekend like she always does. She has a layover at Newark Airport, which sounds just brutal that year. Yeah, just brutal.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That airport was not great back then.

[James Pietragallo]

No, they've definitely improved it now. It was shitty back then. And so she talks to her sister Alicia during the layover. Why not? She has extra time. And so for about 40 minutes they just have normal chit chat, gabbing and bullshitting gal talk there. Alicia said she seemed upbeat. She was talking about. She later plans out to Alicia about returning to Puerto Rico on that Monday, as usual. Some plans maybe for the weekend, what we're going to do with the kids and all that kind of thing. So she arrives back to the Detroit Metro Airport. And she called her home in Washington Township at one point as well. She calls the house phone and I believe then calls Steven's cell phone, calls her phone too. So they talk on the. I'm on my way home. Yada, yada, whatever you want to get out of that. So Tara's sister Alicia said she spoke with her sister not only at the airport, but also when they were when she was on her way home as well, so. And a lot of people, when they're driving, they like to talk on the phone because it keeps them kind of awake and everything like that, Especially if you've just traveled. It's been a long week and it's starting. I think it's. She doesn't get home to like nine o' clock at night too. So. She said that her sister, though, seemed to be in a perfectly good mood. She did say that the constant travel gets old and you get tired. Yeah, that sounds like a brutal schedule to do every week. That's just a lot. So Alicia said that her sister told her that her visit that weekend, you know, she's looking forward to it and she'd be going back on Monday. That was that. Now she gets home, apparently, according to Steven, that she's not even unpacked yet. When they're talking and he's saying, listen, this is too much. You're on the road too much. You need to be home more. The kids need you. I need you to cut back. I don't care if the income is less. We can do on a lot less. We can get by on a lot less. We don't need all this shit, whatever. So he says that she said, no, mind your business. Basically, I'll do what I want. The fight escalated to her repacking her shit, making a phone call at some point to call for a car service to come get her. And then at 11:15pm she takes her suitcase and gets into a dark sedan at the end of her driveway.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Nice.

[James Pietragallo]

And says, I'm going. That's it. I'm going back early to Puerto Rico and I'm not putting up with your shit all weekend, essentially. And that's what he said happened. So he said she left and he didn't know if she was gonna go right back to Puerto Rico or if maybe she was just gonna go to a hotel and cool down or whatever for a while, just hang out at the Newark Airport. She just. The Auntie Anne's at the Newark. She said that. He said that, you know, they've had fights before where she would go away and cool off for a minute. And so this was kind of not unheard of that he wouldn't hear from us for a day or two after this. Yeah. But then a few days goes by, days goes by, and apparently it goes all the way till the next week. And on Valentine's Day, Stephen decides he's better report her missing because he hasn't heard from her since that night of the 9th, and apparently she missed a work meeting in Puerto Rico. And so he waits 24 hours after she misses this work meeting and is notified by the work people. That's when he says, okay, something's wrong here. She's missing. So I don't know why it would take five days. And if she missed a meeting.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

You would call immediately, wouldn't you?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. If you haven't seen her and she missed a meeting and she should be.

[James Pietragallo]

There and she's not, where is she then?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is he going with the 24 hours since I last. Since she was. But if he does that, that's the ninth.

[James Pietragallo]

That's. It makes no sense.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He could have still called right now.

[James Pietragallo]

He could have called a while ago. So it makes no sense. So he ends up going down to the police station. Okay. To chat about this with the cops, to tell the desk sergeant. Yeah, it's. You know, it makes you look more urgent. Yeah, maybe.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

If I. If I'm here in your face, you'll actually look for. Whereas if I call, you might just write it down and it's a slip of paper that gets.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You can't tell.

[James Pietragallo]

Shuffled off the desk.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Urgent. This is based on my eyes?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Unless I'm in front of you.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, yeah. How large my eyes are. So there's a detective nearby as he's giving the desk sergeant the details. And the detective is listening because it's pretty entertaining shit. So he's just listening from the side here. So anyway, the detective is a guy named Sergeant Brian Kozlowski. And he is in way before he's supposed to be there today because there's a staff potluck lunch. Oh, boy. Oh, the old fucking Valentine's Day potluck down at the police station.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. Why are they doing that at Valentine's Day?

[James Pietragallo]

I don't know. It's romantic. So he is walking past this and he hears the desk sergeant say, how long has your wife been missing? And the guy say, steven say, it's been five days. So this Kozlowski guy actually stepped outside his doorway and looked like. Did this guy just say five days to report his life missing? What the. He said, I saw a work week. He popped out of his office and looked at the guy and just kind of stared at him and was like, this guy is out of his fucking mind. And he said, I can't wait to read that report that this dude's taking because something is weird here. Literally. That's what he said. But he went to his potluck Lunch. Anyway, he said, I got to do that, but later on I'm going to read that report. So Stephen rambles, and he's just talking. He said his wife's been getting home, was getting home late on the 9th. There was a snowstorm on the east coast that delayed flights. And that he'd had a couple of beers while he waited for her and that they argued over the phone about her change in plans. Because he said what precipitated the fight was she said she was going to go back to Puerto Rico on Sunday instead of Monday. And that pissed him off because he said, what, are you going to have one day with your kids? You need to be here more. And she said, don't tell me what to do. And as soon as she got home, the fight resumed. They had had it over the phone earlier. She said they yelled back and forth for maybe 20 minutes. She had made a call on her cell phone, told someone to pick her up and that she'd be out in a minute. He didn't know, but he thought maybe it was the limo service that she uses all the time to get to the airport. I think her company has an account. But that was it. The last thing she said to her, she turned around angrily to him and said, don't forget to take my 2002 Isuzu Trooper to the dealership Monday to get that dent fixed. And she left. Odd.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'm tired of you. Maintain my.

[James Pietragallo]

I'm leaving. Make sure to get my dent fixed. So the au pair Varina, she gets home, he said, 10 minutes after Tara left. They almost crossed each other there. So the desk sergeant said, if your wife is missing on the 9th, why are you here today?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And he said, well, her boss had asked him to come. He said he left messages on her cell phone Saturday and Sunday. When he didn't hear from her by Monday, he called her boss, Lou Trundle in Puerto Rico. And, yeah, he said that Lou asked him to hold off a bit with the police because he wanted to have a meeting with her boss in Puerto Rico to discuss it first. I don't give a fuck about your company or what you're discussing. My fucking wife is missing. I'm going to find her. What are you talking about?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Lou told me to wait.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, you worked for Lou, too. And the cop didn't follow that logic either. He was like, this is okay. But he keeps talking. Now, Grant. Steven keeps consulting a notebook. After a while, he's got a notebook here. He said, I guess he wrote down everything that happened in Order. He said Tuesday, he called Tara's sister Alicia in Ohio, and her mother, Mary, and both of them hadn't heard from Tara either. So Steven said that he told the sister he'd be happy to find out at this point because he was worried about her. He said, I'd even be happy to find out if she was off with some guy in a motel.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Really?

[James Pietragallo]

Better than her, you know, floating in an ocean somewhere or whatever. So he thought that, you know, he thought that they were all lying to him. He told the cops. He said, I thought that Lou and Tara's mom were both lying to me and that she had something going on. In fact, he said Tara's family had told him in the past that they were worried that Tara and Lou were having an affair. Oh. Now, he said he didn't believe it at first, but he's been getting suspicious lately.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So Lou told me not to get the cops involved.

[James Pietragallo]

Lou said, let me talk about this with my people first. All right, hold on. So at that point, he said he's been talking to his dad, and his dad told him that the first person that police always suspect in these things is the husband. Right. So he said, I figured I gotta be above board and just come down here and tell you everything. Which is interesting. Yeah. He's just trying to defuse a bomb here. See, I realize that you're going to look at me. I know you're looking at me first. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Also, I'm the last person that saw. Also, we got in an argument, but.

[James Pietragallo]

I didn't do the other thing. But I didn't do anything. I don't know anything about it. He also said that at this point, he breaks off from his, my wife is missing, and I'm real worried. And says, also, I know I have a warrant out for an unpaid traffic ticket.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He said, oh, really?

[James Pietragallo]

They were like, huh, There you go. We can handle that another time.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What?

[James Pietragallo]

The cops said, yeah, we can deal with that. We'll figure that out. That's fine. But this is, you know, this is pressing. This is important. Yeah. Yeah. So he said they'd been to marriage counseling, but it didn't seem to help. He said he was even thinking of hiring a divorce attorney. Oh, he was now, four days earlier, before she left, remember in the fifth, she was writing him this letter about how she wants to renew the vows and she hasn't loved him the way she wants to go to a Napa. It's. Yeah, we're going to Napa in December. It doesn't make any sense. At all here. So she didn't talk about marriage problems, he said, with him. She talked about them with Lou. Old Lou.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Goddamn Lou.

[James Pietragallo]

Fuck, there's always a Lou, isn't there?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Still trap. That Lou.

[James Pietragallo]

That fucking Lou. He also said that Tara's company, Washington Group International, was involved with chemical weapons and Lou was involved in that project. Now, he said, this is a long shot, but I have two scenarios that are possible here. Maybe she had been exposed to nerve gas. That's a very specific. And now who knows where she is. Yeah. Or. And this one is, it's less far fetched than the nerve gas, but you know what I mean. So this really bears looking into. She's probably been kidnapped by terrorists, I would imagine. He tells a small town police desk sergeant that my wife either has been exposed to nerve gas or has been kidnapped by terrorists, International terrorists, mad about her corporate chemical weapon.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Have you seen the ruck? Perhaps she got one of those green balls shoved in her mouth or. Hear me out. Maybe she.

[James Pietragallo]

So ridiculous.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Maybe Arnold Schwarzenegger and his shenanigans.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, the desk sergeant is literally trying not to laugh at this point. Yeah, he said later he said he was finding this entertaining as fuck. Like, he was like, God, I wish all the other cops were listening to this. Cause this is so funny. I'm not gonna be able to. I'm not gonna be able to tell it like this guy is. You know what I mean? I just can't. I can't tell it like he can.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And look, you gotta understand, he said it with these eyes. It was crazy.

[James Pietragallo]

It's crazy the whole time. You gotta see social media. Smalltown murderer on Instagram. You gotta see these eyes. So Hughes said, well, let's call Lou. Yeah, Lou seems to have all the answers here. Unlock. He might know of a terrorist cell that was after her. So Steven gives him the number in Puerto Rico. And this desk sergeant calls Lou right, while Steven's standing there. Oh, he said because he wanted to see how Steven would react to shit.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right.

[James Pietragallo]

Just, you know, because he didn't. He probably didn't expect this to happen right in front of him. So the cop said that Lou seemed genuinely concerned and offering to help in any way he can. Yeah, he said he was empathetic about, you know, the kids are probably missing their mom. And he was also like saying, Tara's not taking off on her own. She wouldn't leave her kids. She wouldn't just not show up for work. She's the most responsible person we know here. Yeah, that's crazy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And by the way, I'm not sleeping with her.

[James Pietragallo]

No. And I didn't bang her at all, swear to God. Now I'm Lou, but I don't bang everybody. You know what I mean?

[Jimmy Whisman]

I got my own gamar.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. I got my own thing going on. It's Puerto Rico down here, you know what I mean? There's a lot of beaches. I go down there. There's bikinis walking around, I find myself some ladies, you know what I mean? You know, all this, the tequila, the rum, forget about it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I live by the motto, you don't shit where you eat.

[James Pietragallo]

You don't shit where you eat. I know tequila is Mexican and rum is Puerto Rican, but I assume when people come from Michigan, they go, let's get some tequila. Everyone's speaking Spanish. We must have tequila here somewhere.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is gin a thing? I'll drink that.

[James Pietragallo]

I'll drink that. So he said while he's jotting down the notes, Stephen is standing there smiling at him the whole time. He gets off the phone with Lou, and Steven asked him if he wanted to call Tara's parents now. Yeah. And this guy said, nah, I'll leave the detectives to do that. He was just calling this guy just to fuck with Steven and see how he reacted. So then Steven brings up the au pair again. And this guy's like, why does he keep bringing up this fucking au pair? So he said, he asked him, are you having some kind of relationship with this au pair?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And Steven gives him like a kind of like one of those elbow nudging, guy to guy smirks, you know what I mean? And he goes, quote, she'll never tell what. He was joking.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

You know, like, hey, I'm joking. But this guy. Yeah, the desk sergeant's like, that's not really funny right here. This is.

[Jimmy Whisman]

We're looking for your wife right now, man.

[James Pietragallo]

Why are you joking about banging your au pair?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right?

[James Pietragallo]

You're just joking your way into getting investigated as a kidnapper at this point. This is bad. That's a real weird thing to say. And he said, is it all right if we send some detectives over to the house later to talk to you? Because I'm just taking your initial shit. Stephen said, sure, no problem. So they send detectives over there. And he said, they talked about the fight, they're going back to Puerto Rico early and all this type of thing. And Stephen said. She also said that I could explain to the kids why she's not there in the morning. She left in a car service, black sedan. She also told me I need to take her truck to Tamaroff on Monday, Saturday, Sunday. No contact. I phoned and left her messages on her mobile phone and sent text messages. No response from her. Because he wrote all this out. He said he called Lou in Puerto Rico on Monday. Lou said, quote, no worries, Tara wasn't due in until later in the day. He said he would tell her to call me or he would call me himself to let me know that she was there. I hadn't heard from him by 7:30pm on Monday the 12th. So I called him. He said he hadn't heard from Tara and I said I needed to do something. I called the mother in law, called police something. And Lou said, hang on a minute. Oh, let it, let it sit as that was the famous Lou say. And no, he said he didn't want me to do anything until Tuesday morning. He said it would only worry them. Okay, so he said lou called me 9:30am Tuesday, February 13, saying he hadn't heard from her. She didn't show up for a meeting in Puerto Rico. He then left a message Steven did for Alicia and called also Mary, who he said, he said that Mary told him all caps not to call the police. Don't call the cops. She would send a message to Sarah and have her call Tara or Tara. Did I say Sarah? Yes, Sarah's my wife. So that's. That'll come out once in a while. So it's very interesting. Um, so she said he wrote down, Steven did. Someone knew where she was. I thought the same thing with Lou as I did with her mom. I told Mary if I heard nothing by 4pm Tuesday the 13th, I was going to the police. I talked with my sister whose friends with a detective and she called him to ask what was the rule for reporting someone missing. He, the detective had told her he should wait till Wednesday the 14th in the morning to report her. That seems pretty arbitrary. Don't know why. Now, the desk sergeant who took the whole story, his supervisor whose name is Sergeant Larry King, no relation, multiple marriage.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Larry King.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, that's the guy. The incident was classified as not a crime other service when it gets filed the desk sergeant's report here. But they said the stilted language that Stephen wrote shit down in the way he talked. They said who writes the date every time he mentions a day? So they just thought it was weird. Very strange, he said. Also it seems like something like prepared excuse you make when you call in sick to work is what he said. It was very, very fucking strange. But who knows? Now while this is going on. Another call comes in. This is a Lieutenant Darga. He takes a call from a woman identifying herself as a sergeant at the state police headquarters in Lansing. Oh, she wasn't calling in an official capacity, but as a friend of a woman named Alicia Standifer, who is Tara's sister.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And she said that this Tara. Alicia had told her that Tara's supposedly missing for five days, and the husband, Stephen, is just now getting around to doing something. So can you guys look at this? So while he's at the desk making that guy suspicious, there's another detective overhearing him talk and being super suspicious about that. Then there's a lieutenant getting a phone call making him also super suspicious.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Everybody at this department.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. So then this lieutenant calls Kozlowski, the guy who originally overheard Stevens talking and said, I want you to get on this thing immediately. And he goes, oh, is that the guy from the desk? Yeah, I'm interested in that. Yeah, that sounds awesome. So they go over the report, and they said the first thing they noticed in the report was the word au pair. The detective didn't know what that was.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, I mean, he. He thought it was a couple things, right?

[James Pietragallo]

He thought it was a typo. He thought it was supposed to say a pair. Like a pair two of something. And he said he read that and thought a pair of what? He didn't know what they were talking about.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He thought children that she watches.

[James Pietragallo]

Dude, this is all fucked up. Yeah. So he. Wow. So anyway, he reads the report and goes over that Steven said that he told Tara that the. During an argument, that the kids would be disappointed if she went right back to Puerto Rico and everything like that. And also about all the family members think that she's having an affair with Lou. Lou says they didn't have an affair. It just seems interesting. And also the fact that he said that he would regard it as good news if he found out Tara was in a hotel with a boyfriend somewhere.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, that's bizarre.

[James Pietragallo]

He also in the notes wrote, quote, steven further stated he owns a handgun, which is a strange, strange thing to just disclose at this point in time. Means nothing to nobody.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I got one, too.

[James Pietragallo]

Real weird. So at one point, he blurted out, which is fucking funny to the detective, you don't think I did something to my wife, do you? Is that what you're thinking?

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's kind of my job because.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Kozlowski said, if we thought you were involved with the disappearance of your wife, we'd take you to jail right now. Yeah, he said this is. I'm not going to bullshit you, basically, so don't worry about it. So they said, we're going to come. You mind if you want to come take a lie detector test tomorrow? How about that? And Steven said, sure, no problem. What time? They said, 11. And he said, oh, yeah, no problem. Yeah. He said, do you mind if we send an evidence tech out tonight? We'd like you to take some quick pictures. And he said, yeah, sure, no problem. So the police visit Stephen, do the evidence test tech. People are coming here. And, you know, he gives the same story because they keep asking him the story over and over. He gives the same. They're trying to figure out if his story is going to slip, basically, because that's how you do things. If you watch a murder interrogation, they ask the guy to tell a story 12 times to see where he fucks up. Now, the Detective Kozlowski said, Mr. Grant answered the door, and I could tell he was afraid we were there. Whereas he's our complainant and we're here to serve him and help him, but he's afraid of us. Yeah. So they thought that was weird. So Kozlowski said that we were trying to establish a reason for her leaving. Was it an argument? Was it something prearranged, you know? And then he gives the story about everything like that. In another room, while they're talking to Steven, Another detective, Pam McLean, is talking to Verena.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh.

[James Pietragallo]

Now, Varina said, yes, I was out of the house that night. I didn't see anything that happened. I came home and it was just Stephen and the kids here. I was out with my friends. She was out at a bar that night with her friends or a restaurant doing something, hanging out. So the detectives put away their notebooks and they asked Stephen if he'd come down to the sheriff's office to the next day for this lie detector test that he already agreed to, but now they're going to see. And Kozlowski said that Stephen asked him, quote, do you think I'm going to be in trouble for any of this? Well, any of what, Steve?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Any of what. What'd you do to get in trouble? So Kozlowski said back, trouble, meaning what, Steve?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

What kind of trouble could you possibly be in? And he said, you know, I didn't have anything to do with this. And then he started crying. Oh, started sobbing. He said. He started, I mean, heaving sob, like a five year old who is just overtired. And he just dashed their hopes of getting the snack they want.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, tears just went out the window.

[James Pietragallo]

Totally gone. Yeah, fucking. Someone stepped on his Teddy Grahams. He's fucked. So he's. They said tears are popping out of his eyes like he's going crazy. So they said, okay, we're going to leave you to your tears. Good night. See you later. So as they walk down the driveway, McLean and Kozlowski walk into their cars. He looks. She looks at Pam, McLean looks at Kozlowski and said, he did it. They don't even know what it is yet, but they're like, he did something. And he said, we just don't know how or where she is. But whatever the fuck reason her gone, it's his fault for sure.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Guys, thanks for helping me carry my Christmas tree.

[James Pietragallo]

Zoe. This thing weighs a ton.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Drewski, live with your legs, man.

[James Pietragallo]

Santa.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Santa, did you get my letter?

[James Pietragallo]

He's talking to you britches. I'm not. Of course he did.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right, Santa, you know my elf Drewski here, he handles the nice list.

[James Pietragallo]

An elf? I'm six' three. What everyone wants is iPhone 17 and at T Mobile. You can get it on them. That center stage front camera is amazing for group selfies. Right, Mrs. Claus?

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'm Mrs. Claus's much younger sister.

[James Pietragallo]

And AT T Mobile, there's no trade in needed when you switch, so you can keep your old phone or give.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It as a gift.

[James Pietragallo]

And the best part, you can make the switch to T Mobile from your phone in just 15 minutes. Nice. My side of the tree is slipping, Kimber. The holidays are better. AT T Mobile switch in just 15 minutes and get the iPhone 17 on us with no trade in needed. And now T Mobile is available in US cellular stores with 24 monthly bill credits for well qualified customers plus tax and $35 device connection charge credits and imbalance due if you pay off earlier. Cancel Financing Agreement 256Gates $830 eligible board in a new line. $100 plus a month plan with auto payments, taxes and fees required. Check out 50 minutes or less per line. Visit t mobile.com and so the detective tells the evidence tech to grab a digital camera, go to Steve's house there, take a shot of the scratch on his nose and a scratch on his hand and a bruise on his leg.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

Stephen told him how he got the scratches and said he didn't know how he got the bruise. So anyway, there works in a machine shop.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's easy.

[James Pietragallo]

He could bump into something. Yeah, who knows? Then they went through Tara's notebooks. One was filled with letters she'd written as part of a training exercise she'd taken part in at a self improvement seminar in Phoenix four months earlier.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, that's nice.

[James Pietragallo]

Corporate thing. One to her parents, one to her sister, and then the one to Stephen about renewing their vows. And that caught his eye. She was apologizing for, quote, never getting over an old boyfriend named Pete and wrote that she needed to get over Pete so she could get whole with Steven. Oh, wow. She wrote that in a letter that. That's been. She's had Pete on her mind this whole time?

[Jimmy Whisman]

This whole time.

[James Pietragallo]

It's time to flush Pete out of the system. When you got two fucking kids in a house, lady?

[Jimmy Whisman]

I mean, you got a six year old and an eight year old, Is that what it is?

[James Pietragallo]

I don't mean to besmirch a missing woman, but sure, if this was a guy with a notebook going, I just gotta get over Tammy. Like, you know, I should be able to get over my ex girlfriend Tammy so I can be cool with you. We'd be going, oh, you fucking jackass. Why'd you get married to begin with? Yeah, so they don't know and the cop doesn't know what to make of this. Is she having an affair with Pete? Is that what's going on? That's what he's trying to put anything together.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Where's Pete?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Are these notebooks now? Do I have a motive for why Steven would have been mad at her, but he didn't. She didn't give that letter to Steven, so who knows?

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's weird she not leave Steven and Pete's pissed about it.

[James Pietragallo]

Who the fuck knows? Either way, when Stephen is expected for this lie detector test, instead they get a fax.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A what?

[James Pietragallo]

It's a fax from a defense lawyer saying, quote, because of the tone of your February 14th interrogation of Mr. Grant at his home, it is my humble opinion that it's necessary for me to provide a buffer between your department and Mr. Grant. Just as Mr. Grant answered all your questions last night, he will continue to answer all of your questions in the future. I believe it's necessary, however, so there are no misunderstandings, that all of your future questions be submitted in writing, which will in turn be immediately answered in writing. David Dream, defense attorney.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Send us an email and we'll email you back.

[James Pietragallo]

Send us your questions in writing and we'll send them back in writing. But you're not gonna sit and watch my client's eyes get so huge and it freaks everybody out.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Watch his fucking. His dead giveaways let you have it.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, it's his tell, babe. His tail's big. So the detectives are hot on Tara's digital trail now. They said, okay, we gotta find this out. They knew she's also, they said now she hasn't used her cell phone, laptop or credit cards since she walked out down that driveway. According to Stephen, hadn't talked to her family. But they also said if she wanted to disappear, she's a pretty sophisticated traveler. Yeah, she would probably know how to do it without leaving a trail. She could buy a burner phone and use cash and a prepaid debit card. Who knows? You could do anything. They said maybe she's just cooling off somewhere. There is still hope for that, but starting to get a little bit weird here now. Tara's cell phone, like I said, shows no calls to anyone she worked with that weekend. They said if she had a change in travel plan, seems like she would have called someone from work about that and say, I'm coming back a day early. Also, the black sedan, the call she made, there's no records showing any calls made around that time to any company that sends cars anywhere. Oh, which is not great. Her last call had been an 18 minute call to Stephen at 9:47pm on her way home from the airport. Come get me.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I'll be right out front.

[James Pietragallo]

That's not there. Eventually they found out that in the last year of weekly travel, she had only used that service one time. Also once every other time she drove herself to the airport and back. So Grant had told them, Stephen had told them that she uses that all the time, every week for the airport when she'd only used them once this year. So they're like, why would you lie to us about that? Let's look into Steven's cell phone records, why don't we?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Who's he calling?

[James Pietragallo]

Well, around the call that he got from his wife at 9:47 were four calls to Verena, the au pair.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Four calls?

[James Pietragallo]

Four calls. One starting at 9:08pm and ending at 10:32pm all the various calls, which is interesting. I mean, the cops are looking at this going, I mean, that's not incriminating. He might be asking her to pick up milk. Where'd you put this? Who knows? You know what I mean? It's just could be logistical.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Details, kids, information.

[James Pietragallo]

And they look up the records too. All day they're back and forth on the phone with short calls. It's probably about the kids and, you know, that sort of thing. So they write on the whiteboard the log of the calls that night. Okay. Steve calls Tara. 1 minute. 11:00pm Tara calls Steve. 11:04pm5 minutes. 11:32, Steve calls Tara. 3 minutes. 12. Steve calls. This is starting from early in the day, not p.m. this is AM 12pm Steve calls Tara. Six minutes. Tara checked her voicemail at 12:47. At 1 o', clock, Tara's flight leaves Puerto Rico 60, was it? 4:20pm At Tara checks her voicemail, arrives in Newark at 4:20. She checks her voicemail immediately calls Steve at 4:27pm they talk for two minutes. She checks her voicemail again. She checked her voicemail twice in eight minutes. I've never done that in my life.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What's she looking for then?

[James Pietragallo]

Steve? Maybe somebody called while they were on the phone and went. She put it to voicemail. Steve calls Tara for six minutes. At 4:34, Tara calls Steve for three minutes. At 5:11, 5:55, Tara calls Alicia for 42 minutes. That's the Newark layover call. She checks her voicemail after that, then call Steve back for one minute. At 6:38, 6:41, Tara calls Steve for seven minutes. Now we get to 21. So what is that? 9:08 yeah or no? It's yeah. 9:08pm Steve calls Verena. One minute. 9:10pm Tara checks her voicemail. Then she calls Steve for one minute. 8:29. Steve calls Verena. 30 seconds. Tara pays for parking at the airport. Two minutes later, Steve calls Verena. Four minutes. Steve calls Tara. One minute. Steve calls Tara. 18 minutes. This is the last call to be. That's at 9:47. The last call to either be answered or made by Tara's cell phone is that call. Then 10:07, Steve calls Verena for two seconds. I don't know what that's about.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Missed the call.

[James Pietragallo]

Then at 10:32, Steve calls Verena for two minutes. So on Saturday, the next day, when she's gone, Steve called Tara cell phone six times without a response. Which is interesting. Very interesting. Here are the. This is 2:17am this is after she left Tara. It's Steve. It's after two by now. It's a quarter after two. And I just want to know what the fuck's going on. I think you owe me at least your kids. At the very least. Call me. Bye. Just call and let me know what the hell's going on.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Your kids. Not our kids.

[James Pietragallo]

No, your kids. 9:29. Which is absolutely too. If you've ever been yelled at by a woman, the mother of your children. Anything you miss for two minutes, it's going to be your kids at that point. It's just the way people weaponize their children. Either way. I'm just saying, that goes both ways. Either side. Anybody. You can use it for anybody. It's wonderful. It's a wonderful way of being shitty. You can use it for anybody.

[Jimmy Whisman]

But it shows a level of frustration with someone when you say it like that.

[James Pietragallo]

It definitely does. 9:29am Next morning. Hey, it's me. He says this is on her voicemail. I'm just trying to find out what's going on this morning. If you're still leaving today, if you're leaving tomorrow. What's going on? If you're planning on coming by, just tell me so I can make plans. Make sure the kids are here because they want to see you. Uh, give me a call by then. At 11:56am Hey, I get that you're at me. Um, I just left the house. I have to go to the bank for my dad. Um, Verena's at the house with the kids. Please, at least call your kids. Um. It's ridiculous, Tara. It's not right. Just call, please, so I can talk to you. They didn't get to see you last night. Please. By 6:30 or 6:03pm it's me. It's, um. You need to call us. Just let us know what's going on. The kids and I would like to talk to you. Please. I just. I don't know what's going on, what the deal is, so just call me. We're here. We're just ordering pizzas for dinner, so we'll be here. I'm just going to have to have it. I think I'm just going to have it delivered. I think so. Call us. Bye then. 11:11pm Hey. I get that you don't want to talk to me, but you don't have to hit the ignore button every single time I call. I was simply calling to let you know that you left your glasses here. If you need me to ship them down there, I just need your FedEx number or whatever the hell you want me to do with this. I just need to know if you need me to go buy a bottle of wine. Or if you did, you said you would, but I don't know if you did. You owe your kids a call. Please. They keep asking. Please call by then. 1:43 on Sunday afternoon. Tara, Next time I call you, pick up your phone. Please do not hit ignore. It's bullshit. It's absolute bullshit. That you can't call me or your kids. It's bullshit. Pick up your phone or call the house. Call somewhere. Call me. Call my cell. Call the kids. This isn't this bad. I know you're mad. I'm mad. This just isn't right. Just call me. Bye. Then Monday morning. Hey, it's me. Once again, if you don't hear back. If I don't hear back from you in 15 minutes, I'm going to call Randy, get Lou's cell number and find out what the fuck is going on. This is nonsense, Tara. You owe me a phone call. You owe me at least to know what the fuck is going on between us. Please call. So then he called once more Monday, and he called once on Tuesday as well. Now, they thought, the detectives thought it was odd because Wednesday the 14th is when he came in. And he didn't even try to call her that day.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

He didn't even give it one last chance before he goes. You think before you walk out the door to the police station, you go, one more call just to make sure I'm not going down there for nothing. Yeah, maybe I'm just lazy, but, you know, I'm not making a trip for no reason. They said. You'd think you would have left a message or two that day, which is fun. Then they find some other shit here. Okay. They find eight emails passed back and forth between Steven Grant and his old girlfriend.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, no.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, yeah. These start Thursday, January 25th, which is 15 days before Tara goes missing. While Tara was in London on business. Oh, okay. This is fucking amazing. I guess they spent a few days going casual back and forth on email. What have you been up to? Long time no see. Oh, wow, you've been doing that. Oh, that's interesting that you do that for work. He doesn't really do much of that. It's only really. Right away he sends her an email telling her that he has suspicions that Tara is having an affair with someone he called the geezer. I don't know. I guess that's Lou. I don't know. And then he writes, quote, I hope you keep at the nursing thing. You never know when I might need a sponge bath. If you want to practice, let me know what she counters to that email replies. You are married. You shouldn't talk like that. How would you feel if Tara. Oh, she spells it T E R A T E R dash A Tierra, or Tara, which is her term. That's whenever she says Tara, that's how she writes it. Tear, like it's some making fun of her in some way. How would you feel if she was talking like that to the old geezer? Steven said I was only being helpful with the offer to be a test subject. I was just being supportive, not dirty. I don't care about being married. I never have. Is that a no conscience thing? What she said? You have not changed one bit. This is just why we broke up. Essentially, yeah. Don't you worry about being burned eternally by the devil? Oh my God.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh boy.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. Okay. Why did you get married in the first place? Seemed like a cool thing to do. Okay. Grant says the answers are in order. No love and no. So not worried about the devil. Got married for love. Didn't think it was a cool thing to do. He said. I think you misunderstand though. I like being married. I just think of marriage vows like speed limits. Sometimes you have to break them and sometimes you get caught. Whoa, this is a terrible email. When your wife's missing, it just says you just need to keep an eye on the road to avoid detection and sometimes you get pulled over and blah blah, blah. And he goes on to that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Sometimes you need a radar detector.

[James Pietragallo]

You know, sometimes someone flashes their bright lights at you a couple times and that means that you can. You gotta watch out cause you're about to get caught. Fucking smokey out there. There's a bear in the air. So she asks him if he's on his home or work computer. He says he's at work and then complains that the Internet access there sucks. He says my work computer sucks. It's actually the connection at this site. I have no high speed access. I was using one of the neighbors connections via wireless until their IT guy saw a slowdown on the download speed and put up a firewall. All caps. Bastard. Someone put a password. Yeah, stuck a password. The girl ex girlfriend said, funny, you are still a little thief. Some things never change. She's not impressed with him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

She does not. She didn't give a fuck about this guy.

[James Pietragallo]

She's saying you're still the same scumbag I broke up with.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You're scamming for pussy and stealing things and stealing Internet.

[James Pietragallo]

You're a shortcut taker. You're a fucking fence jumper as we put it back in the day. So he said, quote she said to him, so what are you doing about your. About the cheatin wife cheating with an apostrophe there? Also, would you mind changing your email setting so it includes the thread? Sometimes I forget what I said. Hey, that rhymed. Okay, she then she writes, I'm so frickin bored today.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, boy.

[James Pietragallo]

He writes back, don't know yet. The problem is she says things in code and because of that I don't know what's actually going on. But he says that I can read Tara's emails though, because of a guy I know. He said, Brian is a vice president at a computer. Computer company and one of his techs helped out a bit, if you know what I mean. Straight up NSA shit, if you get my drift. Actually, he had some software over the counter, stuff you can buy at CompUSA that did the trick. It sounds cooler the other way. Oh, God, yeah. You just bought tracking software that people get for their teenagers.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Real NSA shit.

[James Pietragallo]

He then said, if you're so bored, because she said she's so freaking bored. I'm still in need of some excitement in my life. Wink, wink. He wrote out the words, wink, wink.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Holy.

[James Pietragallo]

Tara flew to London yesterday till Friday night. And I'm all alone with no one to play with. I do want to see you naked. Naked women are always good to see, especially if you haven't seen them in a while.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Naked women are always good to see.

[James Pietragallo]

I love checking out some tits. They're great.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He is so desperate. He's this guy he's regressing into college kid.

[James Pietragallo]

Wink, wink. What are you doing? He's got. He's a guy who. His game in like junior year of high school through college worked. That just doesn't work on adults, though.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He didn't. You have to regress. He's been out of the game for eight years and.

[James Pietragallo]

And now he's. He's going right back to his college game. And these girls are like, you're irresponsible and annoying. Like they're not into that anymore.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Did you just say wink, wink?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. They don't want a 37 year old man who steals Internet. You know what I'm saying? That's not what they're into.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And calls the people bastards and says.

[James Pietragallo]

I really want to see a girl naked.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Naked girls are good to see.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, that's amazing. I like naked girls. And the cops who are reading these thought it was so pathetic. Kozlowski said, quote, what a dweeb is what he called him. This guy's a fucking. He has no game.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Guy said, naked girls are good to see.

[James Pietragallo]

I like seeing naked girls. Wow. That is fucking amazing. That's the funniest thing I've ever heard.

[Jimmy Whisman]

From a grown man.

[James Pietragallo]

Ugh. Later, they found an email that he had sent to Tara on February 1, an email he called Sorry, that was the subject line. And somehow they said he managed to be both apologetic and accusatory at the same time. Wow. While coming up with a cover story of how he could have found out what she was saying, saying to Pete without having planted a bug in her computer, he said, I'm sorry, I keep fucking up and I don't know why. I was not looking for anything on your old computer, I swear. What happened was. He literally said what happened was I was going through documents and settings for work related stuff to delete. For some reason, MSN Live kept popping up. Every time I hit X or close, it would come back. He told her the last time he tried to close out the window that popped back up was one of her old emails. Oh, it just picked up a random old email and showed.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It just showed me a question of emails.

[James Pietragallo]

I can't help it. He said, I'm sure that you can figure out my next course of action. Sorry, all caps. You had said when we talked about me taking it to CompUSA that you were afraid it might have private info. I took that to mean confidential, work related. But seeing the login, I wondered what else might be there, so I looked. I love you, Tara. And I was hurt by what I read. I know we've gone through this already, but I was not expecting to read what I read. Really. I was simply overwhelmed. I could not even think when you called that night. I really couldn't. So it makes sense that she's saying I do have to get Pete out of my system, why she'd be writing that letter. He said, I will never in the writing say anything about him or that situation again. I did not and had not thought about it in a long time. Really. I trust that you are true to me, but I do worry. But you must help me out a bit. I know you have to travel for work and I get that and I'm proud of you for all you've done and earned at this job. But you're on the road a lot and you do drink sometimes too, and drink too much when you get out. In college, she was a real big partier too. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So he's like, it lowers your inhibitions. That's how I fucked you.

[James Pietragallo]

That's how I fucked you. Now you're in Puerto Rico and it's a lot of music playing. It's fun down there. He said, I of all people. Yeah, I of all people. I'm not pointing the finger about drinking, but when people drink Everyone, they sometimes forget who they are for a time and do things that they do not do otherwise. Do I think you have? I do not know. I am only being honest. But in reality, I can never know except in my heart. And the answer is no. I love you. I was just hurt by what I read and had to tell you. So he's been spying on her and he busted her talking to an old boyfriend.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He found something he didn't like and.

[James Pietragallo]

He reacted so poorly that he's somehow apologizing for it. Think about how poorly you have to play that. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You overplayed your hand so hard. You gotta call her and be like, baby boy, did I take that information the wrong direction?

[James Pietragallo]

And I shouldn't have snooped also. And I wasn't really snooping. Listen, if I was cheating or doing some shit and Sarah found that shit, I wouldn't be. And I said, well, why were you snooping? That would not even be. We would gloss right over that. She'd go, that doesn't matter. Why are you talking to your old girlfriend? That would be the main point of the fucking thing. So it's interesting. Now, Stephen is not talking to the cops anymore, remember, only through his lawyer. But he sure likes talking to the press, though.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, really?

[James Pietragallo]

He does. Tons of prep. Please, my wife, she's missing. If anyone knows where she is, please bring her home. Tara, please call me if you're around. And he's on everything. He cried with Greta Van Susterence.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, wow.

[James Pietragallo]

On the record. He went on Nightline and cried. He went on MSNBC and cried. So across the political spectrum, he just cried. Cried on everybody's shows there Bipartisan crier. They also said that someone from the Nancy Grace show was reaching out. Of course they are, man. It's a lot. So he tells the press of, we appreciate you guys. We appreciate all you've been doing, doing. And who's everybody that's been helping now? Amber Hunt is the crime and courts reporter for the Detroit Free Press and was surprised that Steven was constantly calling reporters on their cell phones and calling newsrooms. And yeah, she said, initially, you think, oh, well, the guy really wants to find his wife. Then after a while, hmm, maybe that's not what he's looking for.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What is he looking for?

[James Pietragallo]

Attention. In weird ways and kind of an alibi, almost something. So they said that Kozlowski. And they're investigating and they're watching his press appearances, taking notes and listening to what he says here. And all that kind of thing he said in the media, quote, everybody gets into an argument with their spouse. Tara would say things. I would say things. Was it bad? No, not even close.

[Jimmy Whisman]

No.

[James Pietragallo]

February 15th. The next day, all this is happening very quickly.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

Alicia arrives in town. Sister and her and her husband drove five hours to meet with Kozlowski and. Yeah, and to also put up missing person posters all over the area. It's at this point, too. Remember that. That ticket that he had that he has a warrant for, the cops remember that? And they pull him over and they bring him. They arrest him for the ticket, and they bring him in just to fuck with him. They deny they're fucking with him? No, they said it was perfectly standard thing to just pull this man over.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Standard operating procedure.

[James Pietragallo]

See, he has a warrant, we arrest him, and we keep him for six hours on an unpaid parking ticket. That's totally normal. That's what we do all the time. And then we also ask him questions about other things he might have been involved in, which is interesting. His lawyer's pissed. His lawyer said, I thought this was something that went out in the 1950s. What's called a pretext arrest, arresting a person for one purpose, but it's really for another. They really want to question him. He also said, this lawyer, that Steven Grant has gone, quote, above and beyond the call of duty in cooperating with authorities.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is that right?

[James Pietragallo]

He talked to them once. That's plenty. That's enough.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And then refused to do a polygraph.

[James Pietragallo]

And won't let them come search his house either. He did allow evidence text to take pictures of his house, but he didn't allow anybody to come in with, like, Lumenol and shit and really look around, really search it. He said that he's willing to cooperate, but everything's gonna have to be in writing so there'll be no misunderstandings. Now, is he a suspect? Well, the Macomb County Sheriff Support Department says, yeah, we did pull him over, and we arrested him for an outstanding traffic violation. And, yeah, that was the day after he reported his wife missing. And we did sit him down and try to talk to him, but we weren't doing it for that. It's all just serendipity. You know what I mean? Yeah. So more cops come in here. One cop said, we're not calling him a suspect at this time. We're looking at all the avenues and possibilities at this point. There's no cooperating with us from him. Oh, they also, it's reported to the press that when he's pulled over on February 15, he was carrying more than $3,000 in cash, which he said was from a paycheck he'd cashed, and the rest was to pay his lawyer. Now, a $3,000 paycheck would mean he only gets paid six times a year because he makes $18,000 a year. So he gets paid every other month. That says. But he said that was all to pay his lawyer. So that's why he had cash. Because, you know, lawyers only take cash, right? Yeah. If you could put it in like a dirty paper bag that you bought a 40 of Crazy Horse in too, that would help. You could put it in there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

They are very expensive, those lawyers, though.

[James Pietragallo]

That's what they. Yeah, they are. Now, Tara's sister says, I've gotten a phone call from Steve and Tara's missing. And he hadn't heard from her in five days because she's talking to the cops as well and to the press, too. She said, Tara would never leave her children and not let us know where she was, and she would never miss anything. With her employer. In 10 years working for the same company, she didn't miss a day, not one day. That just tells you from all of our stories, 657 stories, reliability will get you murdered. Because nobody that's ever been murdered when they talk to their job, no one ever says, I mean, she calls in, like, probably twice a month. I mean, she's always got something wrong with her. She's very undependable. So we didn't think anything. It's always never missed a day, ever. She's the one who unlocks the office because we know she'll be there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Save your own life. Take a day off.

[James Pietragallo]

Wow. And she also says, though she's standing by her brother in law at this point, says, I'm not saying he did anything, but she wishes she could get past that question of him not taking a polygraph. She said, it's a major roadblock. I just want detectives to get beyond finger pointing. So if he would just take that, then we would know for sure to look somewhere else. She said that her sister's marriage was like any other marriage. It had its ups and downs, but that, you know, she kept her private life private. And that's it. She said, I talked to Steve on February 13, the evening before he reported her missing. And she said, the conversation that we had started out with, you know, him telling the story, and it very quickly changed tones. And he said to me, he said, you know what? He said, she's probably shacked up in a hotel. And those were his exact words. Shacked up in a hotel around the corner with some guy. And I remember at that instant, I said, stephen, I said, she could be in the slums of Detroit in serious trouble. There could be black people around, Steven. Don't you understand? Good Lord. Not that she could be dead. I mean, you know.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Well, if she's around black people, you know, anything's possible.

[James Pietragallo]

Jeez. She said, I didn't trust this man. Something was off. I didn't know what. And if you saw his picture, you'd know exactly what. Quickly.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, that's what's off. Yeah, something's off. So his lawyer says, Listen, this is February 17th. Police. You shouldn't even. Don't even bother looking anymore. Just. You guys take a break. You guys work hard. I want you to sit down and relax, because we hired a private investigator, so he'll figure it out.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, that's great.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, they're gonna take care of everything.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Do PIs generally go find her, Take jurisdiction over the police?

[James Pietragallo]

Absolutely. They'll find her. You don't need to worry about it, fellas. Okay. And the lawyer also said that this is Steven's lawyer, that Tara was helping shut down the office in Puerto Rico and was about to lay off 50. She could have been nerve gas. Kidnapped by terrorists, overtaken by 50 angry Puerto Ricans. One of the three. It could have been anything.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Or be in the slums of Detroit, murdered by a bunch of black people.

[James Pietragallo]

One of the. It's terrorists, black people, or Puerto Ricans, though. One of the. Or nerve gas. We don't know. He said, I'm not suggesting anything. I just think it's something worth noting. So Alicia, that night, Saturday night, the 17th, she makes plans to go over to Steven's house for pizza night. Saturday is pizza night. Because remember, he called saying, we're having pizza, too. It's pizza night. So Alicia said, we drove up the driveway and Steve came out of the garage and proceeded to hug me in a very uncomfortable fashion. Just boner pressed against my hip bone. You know how that goes. Just hard as a rock. I tried to pull away, and he would not allow me to pull away. He buried his head. He's like a dog that just came. He turned around and he's fucking facing the other direction. He buried his head in my shoulder and he was crying. Also, his tone with the press changes. He said, a couple of years ago, Tara and I did have a problem in our marriage with the. I don't want to call it infidelity, but pretty close to an Infidelity, Right.

[Jimmy Whisman]

A singular one.

[James Pietragallo]

He's being, by the way, interviewed by Hank Winchester, who's a local reporter. That's the most local reporter name of all time. Hank Winchester, NBC.

[Jimmy Whisman]

This is the beginning and the end of the story.

[James Pietragallo]

Hi, I'm Hank Winchester. That's him. He said, well, Hank said, what's pretty close to an infidelity? I don't understand what that means. Right. And Steven said it was going there, it was going there, it was heading there. He started calling her an AWOL mom that was more concerned about her career and her frequent flyer miles than her family.

[Jimmy Whisman]

God dang.

[James Pietragallo]

He said, I get that she has to travel for business, but too much is too much. And that was too much. That's right. Now, Amber Hunt, the reporter, the crime reporter for the Detroit Free Press, said watching all this was weird. She said he was a victim or he was evil and there really wasn't much in between.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. You can only be one or the other.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. You're either really sorry for this guy or he's the worst person who's ever lived. Real weird shit here. Now, February 20, she talks about how Alicia's talking to the press, saying, we still know nothing. We have no new leads, we have no new anything. We just want to find Tara. So this is 11 days she's been disappeared here. Steven does all this press shit. He's always crying. Please call anybody. Call the police. Call me, call my in laws. Just call somebody. Save Tara. Oh, God. He also says, the authorities have called me, their number one suspect. This is terrible. February 21st, Varina has gone back to Germany.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, she went back.

[James Pietragallo]

Not. Not of her own. She wanted to stay with the job. But the company, who's a very fancy company, says, you're in the house with a guy who's being investigated for murdering his wife. You're coming home.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You gotta go.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, we can't. What if you get murdered? Then we get sued, probably. So that's our fault? Yeah, that's our fault. So they pull her out and it's a publicly messy thing. And every time they talk about they have an au pair through this company, it's not good publicity. So they pull her out of her house against her will, send her back to Germany on February 21st. It's very interesting here. So they go into all this. Amber Hunt, the local reporter, said, the people that we came across pretty much acknowledged that he was kind of a strange bird, meaning Stephen, he didn't bring home nearly the amount of money that she did. So I don't know how that plays into somebody's psyche when you're pretty much left working for your dad and helping raise the kids. The cops are watching Steven this whole time, by the way, because nothing he said has panned out so far. They want to search the house, but they don't have any new leads. So they decide we can search a park nearby. Right? And this is very fucking interesting because it's a park that she runs in all the time and so does Steven. And it's a very important thing that this park because Steven has mentioned several times how important this park is to them, like just all the time. Oh, we bought the house here because of that park and we love the park and we're always at the park and all this type of shit. So they said, okay, we gotta search the park. They also said to the press, quote, he's not a suspect, but his actions are suspect.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's not a suspect, but he sure is sus.

[James Pietragallo]

He sure is a bit sus. Yeah. February 24th, police conduct a four and a half hour search of the Stoney Creek Metro park and surrounding wooded areas. That's the park where they all run. Yeah, they said it was just a hunch. We just didn't want to sit back. They said because he kept mentioning Stoney Creek too much and it's a. As we know from this, people can't help but say that weird thing they shouldn't say.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, they tell on themselves all the time.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, it's fucking crazy. So he said the main reason we bought the house was because that park was there. I mountain bike there, I run out in Stoney Creek all the time. We love that park. Those are all quotes. So they were like, we gotta do this. So they do. They said that they're gonna look around and search this park and we'll see. They're gonna have so many people. For more than six hours, more than 150 searchers, dogs, even a helicopter above scoured a three mile grid of the park and found nothing.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Nothing.

[James Pietragallo]

Nothing. They found nothing. February 27, 2007, an ex au pair contacts that a young Ukrainian woman named Victoria Prokhoda. She said, hello, I am an exopair of the Grant family or of the family Grant. She actually said, yep, I've been with this family from February 2006 to May 2006. If you have any questions to me, you're welcome to call. My year in US is over and I'm in Ukraine now. I will be glad to help if I can. So they call her Back. And she tells the cop about her time with the grants. Stephen in particular. They said, well, what was so wrong with the grant? With the grants? And she said, it wasn't anything in particular. He just struck me as creepy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Creepy.

[James Pietragallo]

Too nosy. Too interested in what I did after my workday ended and who I was going out with, or am I going on a date? Who's the lucky guy? That sort of thing. He said it was kind of none of his business and he just always kept at it. And she didn't like it. She said the real reason she quit, though, is because she had a feeling. Every time she was in her bedroom at night, she had a weird feeling. She said she didn't have proof and she never spotted him. But she had one of those feelings that you get when someone's watching you all the time.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What the fuck is that?

[James Pietragallo]

And she said she was sure of it. It wasn't just a feeling, she said every night. And that's why she quit. She said I could always feel he was watching me when I was in my room. Then they thought about the layout of the house. And the master bedroom is on the other side of the wall from the au pairs. There's a large closet that they have that shares the wall with the au pair. So they're wondering, we go back to that house, we better check and look for a peephole, see if this fucking guy is creeping on this chick. Because that's interesting. February 28, 2007. It has been almost 20 days. 19 days. Okay. A woman here named Sheila Werner, who's a dental hygienist, decided to go for a walk in the woods by her house. Isn't that nice? Same section of the park that the cops had thoroughly searched. She said, quote, I had no intention of finding anything. Oh, that's some foreshadowing there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Never have intention.

[James Pietragallo]

As she was walking, though, back came up the rise toward the dirt road. She saw a one gallon Ziploc bag. Yeah? She said, quote, I had a mitten on and I went over and picked up the bag. Why? What's in there? That's a treasure. Or is it litter?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is it full of blueberries? Why'd you pick that up?

[James Pietragallo]

What? I mean, what are you doing? She said, and you could see blood just pooling to the bottom of the bag. I knew about the disappearance of Tara Grant, but I had no idea what it could be. So she brought it home with her.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, for fuck's sake.

[James Pietragallo]

Hey, honey, I found a bag of blood. I brought it home. She put it on top of her freezer in the garage with the Amazon packages and, you know, decided to call the sheriff's office. So they come out and they said they found a Ziploc bag with some gloves in it and some metal shavings in it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, that's interesting.

[James Pietragallo]

Wonder who's around. Metal shavings and all. So, yeah. Blood at the bottom. There's also other plastic bags balled up, a pair of latex gloves and what looks to be metal shavings. Yeah. Interesting. Now he works in a machine shop making ball bearings and they needed to find out if it was human blood. That's a big deal. Also, they find out it is human blood in there. By the way, the bag also contained four plastic clear garbage bags, one pair of latex gloves, one 711 bag and another Ziploc bag. And they all had human blood on them.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Jesus.

[James Pietragallo]

And metal shavings and some hairs too.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh.

[James Pietragallo]

So they said this gave them probable cause to go to Steven's house and search it because there's human blood in it. It's by the park. Now they're going to search. So March 2, 2007, they get a search warrant that allows them to go in. 5pm Friday, March 2, here they come. They should all arrive. They don't expect to find shit. Nothing. It's been over three weeks. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

There's nothing in there.

[James Pietragallo]

Any murderer worth their salt would have cleaned up by now, obviously. So they're like.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Especially if there's a.

[James Pietragallo]

They have an opa. They have help. Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And there's a murder accoutrement in the park. It's probably not here.

[James Pietragallo]

Exactly. So that's what they did. And all of the press is there. Like Steven pulled up as this was going on.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And there was a reporter that looked into the camera and said, he's getting out of the car.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's here.

[James Pietragallo]

And they took him out of the car. They patted him down. They said they're patting him down. It's right in the view of the camera. Everyone can see it, but he's not under arrest. And they said at that point we didn't have probable cause, we were just searching. We have nothing. But the crews of the news are getting ready to set up an interview with Stephen. Stephen asked Hank Winchester to come out to the house. Now, Hank said he wanted me to do the interview in the garage of the house. And I asked him why the garage? And he said, well, the garage will give you a look into what I saw that day. Because I was looking out of one of the windows when I saw Tara leave in the town car. But the interview never happened. I was in the Poor Hank.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So, you know, it's a good point.

[James Pietragallo]

Yep. Definitely not in the garage, by the way. We'll talk about this. So Stephen, you know, looking back, looking all around, he, you know, leaves the area and he goes out by the reporters because he's not allowed inside the house or anything like that. So, yeah, he's detained by deputies and then allowed to go wander. They search him at first. He's got nothing on him. So there he goes. About 90 minutes into this search here. Kozlowski is just getting tired. You search for a while. So him and the other five detectives, they go into the garage just to get out of the way of the crime scene techs. Basically, people just collecting technical shit. They're like, all right, we looked around, we saw all we can see. Let's get out of the fucking way. Basically, you know, smoke them if you got them. All right, sure. So he's looking around the garage just to see if anything had changed since the first time he was there on the 14th. And he's looking around, he sees a Rubbermaid tub. He's like, was that there before? And he can't remember, but everything like that. Yeah, there's a tag on the Rubbermaid bin that says, boys, clothes. You know, it's all the clothes. He in it outgrown. And so casually, he's just bored because he doesn't remember if it was there or not. He goes over to the container, Kozlowski, and tries to pop the lid, and it doesn't want to pop up, so he really grips it and rips it and pops it off. And there's a big black garbage bag in there. Oh, and he says, dog food. That's right. Yeah, a tub dog. This makes sense. He said, that's all it is. It's the dog food container. And he was gonna put the lid back on, and he said, let me just see what this is. This is. So he rips over and rips the small hole in the bag just so he could see kibble and then feel better about himself. Inside, though, is another black garbage bag.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

He rips a hole in that one. There's another black garbage bag, triple bagged. He rips that. There's another black garbage bag.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Quadruple wrapped dog food.

[James Pietragallo]

That's nuts. I don't. No one needs their okanuba that fucking.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Not to be that fresh.

[James Pietragallo]

No. So he rips a hole in that bag, too. And he can see colors inside that one. The light's not good. The hole's small. But he can see a flash of red and some plastic. Not another bag. But he said he doesn't know what it is. He thinks a deer carcass. He's a hunter. It's fucking. That's what it is. It's a deer carcass. He stuffed him into these garbage bags. And that makes sense. He said, so. Wow, this is crazy. He's ripping it up. So he goes. I go through each bag, ripping them apart with my hands. And I stuck my bare hand in there, and it was moist. No. Oh, ladies, now I know why that word is so gross.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Did he finger feel around?

[James Pietragallo]

I saw what I thought was blood and plastic, and then I could see, you know, what was a bra.

[Jimmy Whisman]

No.

[James Pietragallo]

And I don't know if you know, this deer don't generally have any support for their breasts. None. So this is swing.

[Jimmy Whisman]

And now he's got it all over him.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. He said he looked at his hands. They're red and wet. And he said, what the fuck? He screamed. Literally. It was like, what the shit? He said all the other cops were like, they were just bullshitting. They weren't even looking around the garage. They heard him and they ran over there, and he said, that looks like blood. And there was a shitload of blood. And they said, holy shit. He said, get the fucking text. Get in here. And they said, by the way, go put cuffs on that asshole outside.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Right?

[James Pietragallo]

Go put cuffs on that motherfucker. And they open it all up. They don't even know what it is, but they know it's something. Cuff him before it's too late. Get the evidence text, cut the bag open further. And there's a female human torso in there.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Damn it.

[James Pietragallo]

No head, no arms, no legs.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Just the torso.

[James Pietragallo]

Just a fucking torso. So they were like, oh, my God. So they said. An interviewer later asked Goslowski, did it all click together for you at that moment?

[Jimmy Whisman]

No.

[James Pietragallo]

He considered, no, I'm a moron. Yeah. No, I'm a complete moron who made murder detective by not knowing my ass from a hole in the ground or not knowing a Rubbermaid dog food container to a corpse from a corpse. He said, I looked. And I said, that's her. And then he said, I left the scene. So they said, cuff his ass. Cuff his ass right fucking now. They go out, he's gone. They can't find him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He left.

[James Pietragallo]

He left. They let him take off.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, boy.

[James Pietragallo]

Which is exactly what Chad Dabel did. When they were finding corpses in his yard. But they stopped him 100 yards down the road. They let this asshole go. They have no idea where he is. Wow. And Kozlowski said, I am very angry at this. He said, I'm going to get this guy. By the way, inside the tub. Also an extra small shirt from Ann Taylor, a black Jillian and o' Malley bra, size unknown. And a black V shaped bikini underwear from Victoria's Secret. That's what the corpse was wearing, the torso. So Stephen's disappeared. Yeah, he has disappeared. Luckily, though, he doesn't want to use his car. So he asks a friend of his if he could borrow his car. And this guy's like, I don't know if I should let him borrow my car. But he doesn't know how to tell him no. He says, well, it's a company car, so I can't really lend it out. And eventually he says, you can borrow my truck. I guess that's mine. You can borrow that. So a few minutes later, he gives him the truck. The truck that Steven is now driving, maybe the most conspicuous getaway vehicle in the history of murder. A eye, searingly fucking yellow. Bright yellow Dodge Dakota Sport quad pickup truck with a big black stripe down the mid. It's a tr. He's driving a fucking Transformer.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's Bumblebee.

[James Pietragallo]

And the Sport is ridiculous.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Painted mirrors, painted bumpers. It's all yellow.

[James Pietragallo]

The extra exhaust, too. So you hear him coming from farther away. It's so jimmy. It's so, so yellow. You can see this shit from space. It's insane. So that's what he's on the road in. Is that so? That's fucking crazy. Now they call Alicia, the sister who's in Ohio, and they go, listen, weird question for you. They don't tell her we found your sister's torso. But they go, weird question for you. Do you feel like Steve would ever harm you?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Harm? Define.

[James Pietragallo]

I mean, she said, I mean, I don't know. I don't think so. And they said, we'd like you to come right now back to Michigan so we could protect you. And she said, It's 11 o' clock at night. You want us to drive to Michigan with my kids? And he said, yeah, we think he might come there and kill you. So, yeah, he should probably come with us. So the next morning, that's when they told Alicia when she got there that Tara was dead. This is when all this is going on. Verena decides to make a phone call from Germany. She makes a German Phone call. And Detective Kozlowski said, I recognized it right away as being an international call. The other end, it's Verena. She was crying. And Kozlowski said, I had the sense to reach for my recorder and record the conversation. And there is audio from this conversation that we're not gonna play here, but I will pretend to be a 19 year old German girl, I'll tell you that much.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Let's go. Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

She says, quote, and this is after a bunch of back and forth and prodding. Every thing he said was a lie. Everything. And I believed everything. That's what she said. For the next 30 minutes, she tells a story. She said, he told me it was an accident. Uh oh.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Uh huh.

[James Pietragallo]

He said, she smacked me and she yelled at me and I pushed her back and she banged her head and she was dead. Yeah, that's it. That's all. That's what she said. She said that she'd always believed the story, that the wife had walked out. She said she had no idea that he'd actually killed Tara and that the detective told Varina that he believed her. So they said also, she had been confronted by rumors and stories from the au pairs. Friends and everything. Say, I've heard from your friends that you two are a little closer than you should be. Said, is there anything you want to tell me about your relationship with Steve? And she said, there is nothing.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Nothing.

[James Pietragallo]

There is nothing. So they said, you're absolutely certain about that, Verena? And she says, yes. So eventually though, he gets a little more. A little more. And she says, we liked each other.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yes, we did.

[James Pietragallo]

We liked each other more than we should. And it started about four weeks ago. Uh. Oh. How did it start? I don't know. It was. It was just talking. I don't know what. Maybe because Tara was always gone and then it was just happened. But it was never physical. Never on that, I swear.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

So he goes, blah, blah, blah, back and forth. And he goes, I don't believe you. And she's like, okay, there's more.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is there more?

[James Pietragallo]

She says, we kissed, but that's all a little more going on. And she said, okay, fine. Oral sex we had.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh boy.

[James Pietragallo]

She said, but it was just one time. And it was before that happened to Tara. It was before February 9th. And they said, okay, was it mutual oral sex or just him? And she said, it was just him. That means he only gave it to her.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wait, what?

[James Pietragallo]

Not the other way around. Yes, I have the details of how this shit started. Oh, wow. Apparently at One point. This is how it started. A friend of the family named Michelle was coming by with her kids. Steve told Varina that Michelle's girl was going to play with his girl and Michelle's boy was going to play with his boy. That's how it works. They're about the same age. And then he smirked and he must. And he said, and you and Michelle can play. God, I'd love to see that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, Jesus.

[James Pietragallo]

19 year old foreigner, man. Come on. You know what? America has a shitty enough reputation as us being perverts and assholes. You're gonna make it worse.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Maybe you could go down on that girl for me.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, she laughed though. She thought it was funny. She said she thought Steve was funny and it made him feel good that she laughed. So she liked it. And so Tara was in London on business, which is when he was emailing that ex girlfriend. And they were talking in the house and all this type of shit. And he and Verena were talking about all this bullshit. They found each other fascinating, obviously. And Verena said he told her that he wanted to kiss her. And she said, oh, I can't believe you said that. And they kept talking for another 20 minutes. And then the next night or the night after, she was in a room getting ready for bed, and he came to the doorway and said, you're so beautiful. I want to sleep with you. And she laughed and they started talking and they talked for four hours before going to bed in their separate bedrooms at 2am Steven, you're not a teenager, you dipshit.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He really still thinks he's in college.

[James Pietragallo]

He really does. It's the only game he has. It's the same. That's some shit that would have worked with 19 year olds. He's like, hey, my audience, this is my crowd.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I sat here for four hours. I earned a blowjob.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, this is like a comic who finds a dumb crowd that'll laugh at their shit jokes. And they're like, oh, they're idiots. They love this. I can tell. I can just tell them shit they've already heard five times from other people. Then one day she was on the computer typing an email to her brother when she heard Steven behind her say, quote, I'm going to take a shower. Want to join me?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, Jesus.

[James Pietragallo]

And so she was getting more and more intrigued. She said, no at the time. But then another night after she went to bed, he texted her from another room in the house and said, I want to have sex with you. Which he went, I'm tired.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Of beating around the bush.

[James Pietragallo]

I tried. Maybe you're German. You don't get nuance. I don't know what it is. You German. Germans. I hear you're real straightforward. So, tell you what. See this thing I got? I want to stick it inside you. Any hole. I don't care.

[Jimmy Whisman]

You understand what being in the shower with me means? Here's what it is. I want to have sex with you.

[James Pietragallo]

Want to have sex with you. She typed, no. Yeah. Okay. That was that. Then on February 7, after she went into her room for the night, he stuck his head in and said, good night. I love you.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh.

[James Pietragallo]

Then he came out in and sat down on her bed. He said, I won't repeat those three little words again, But I am falling in love with you. So they hugged and cuddled for a few minutes.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

Then Steven stood up, took her by the hand, pulled her up to her feet, led her to his room, where he leaned her back on the bed, pulled down her underwear. And gave her oral sex.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

Fucking went down on her, and he didn't even want anything else. He said, that's all I wanted to do. Yeah, that's it. Just doing that for you. I'm good.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's for you. Now you know I love you. Go to bed.

[James Pietragallo]

There you go. Go to bed. Now I'm up for a real good fucking coming soon. Here. I'm setting the trap.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So I'm gonna tug like crazy in here about this.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, totally. Yeah, I'll be tugging. Oh, I'll be tugging. So about 11:30 on the night of the 9th is when Verena pulled her car into the driveway. She walked in the side door, and she heard someone coming down the stairs. And she was like, oh, what's going on? And it's Steven. And he says, what the fuck are you still doing here? Go. Just go. He yells. Then he realizes it's Farina and apologizes. And he said, is Tara still out there? And she said, no. Where is she? She's not outside. And then Steven starts crying and said, tara got home an hour earlier. Unpacked her bag. We had a big fight. She took off.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay.

[James Pietragallo]

That's how it is. Then after that, she goes in her room. And there's a note on her pillow that says, you owe me a kiss. She goes into his room. He's on the bed naked, which is how he sleeps. He's always naked when he sleeps. She gets into bed with him, holding him and consoling him. Before the night's over, she goes back to her room. There. And Steven gets up before her and all that kind of shit. And she didn't see Tara the next morning. And he also said. This is her quote. He said he's sorry for what he told me, you know, what I told you, that Tara left. I didn't know what happened. I believe everything he said. I believed everything. And he said he wanted me to call the kids. To tell them he loved them. And he's sorry for what he did. So I don't know where he was, but it was like, goodbye. Because that's why she's calling now. Because she's saying. He just called me in Germany and told me this shit.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, wow.

[James Pietragallo]

She said he was crying and it was everything he said. He said he didn't want to go to. I don't think he wanted to go to prison. I think he's going to kill himself. So that's the idea. He said, what happened when you came home? And then she explained again that, you know, what the fuck? And all that kind of shit. So he called her.

[Jimmy Whisman]

While he's on the run.

[James Pietragallo]

While he's on the run. She said the next morning she woke up and, you know, had. The kids were up early. And she was talking to the kids. And Stephen had woke her up because he had to leave. And that was that. Then they said, has he done anything out of the ordinary? And she said, well, he did it. He confessed. He told me. He told me this morning that it was an accident. He said it was an accident. He said, she smacked me and yelled at me. And I pushed her back and banged her head on the. And she was dead. So that's it. So they're looking for Steven. They have some pretty good clues. They have information pinging off cell towers left and fucking right.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

They know he's headed north. And Verena knows the area code he called from. And that is in northwestern Michigan. So they know where they're. They know the vicinity of where he's headed. And it's north.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, he really glazed over how he killed her because she fell. Usually your arms and head don't pop off when that happens.

[James Pietragallo]

No. Well, we'll find out because we're gonna have a full description of it. He stops at a Myers department store. He goes in and picks up a box of razor blades. And some over the counter sleeping pills. These. Sylvia Plath collection is where he got that from. What the fuck is that?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Jesus Christ, laying a bathtub. And open these up after a whole bunch of sleeping pills.

[James Pietragallo]

Wow, that is something if you buy Just those two items together?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Someone should have to hit a button under the counter, like one of those. But it's just like mental health counselors come out everywhere to make sure you're all right. So that's really weird. Headed down the road, he bought a phone that needs 48 hours to activate the phone, so he couldn't use that. He's just an idiot. He's a fucking idiot. He also. He has a red plastic cap gun. And he uses a black Sharpie to paint the gun black. Cause he's thinking, if I change my mind about the sleeping pills and the blades, I can maybe get a cop to shoot me if I pull gun out. Susan, my cop.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. That's easy. So he's thinking about that. Then he thinks, hey, I'm in a bright fucking yellow transformer car. Maybe I should trade this in. Then he said, I kept seeing yellow trucks, though.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh.

[James Pietragallo]

So I started saying, maybe this is a popular color of truck, and nevermind. Maybe I'm blending in. Fuck it. I'll keep the truck. And I don't know how to steal a car anyway, so nevermind.

[Jimmy Whisman]

But you always see the vehicle that you're in fucking everywhere.

[James Pietragallo]

Exactly. You'll see it repeatedly. So then he takes out his notepad with lined paper and he writes, lindsay and Ian as kids. I know that you don't understand yet what's happened to mom and I. When you get a little older, Aunt Kelly can explain better. For now, though, just know that I love you both more than anything in the world. Because I don't want to put anyone through any more suffering. I've decided to end my life. I know that it hurts to lose me now after mom getting taken from you, but it is better in all caps now. No one has to go through what happened between mom and I over the past few years. Things are getting worse and worse between us. And ended up with a physical fight where I hit mom and she ended up hurt very badly. I was afraid of losing you too, so I ended Mom's life in a panic. I am sorry. He writes that in his notebook.

[Jimmy Whisman]

So what happened to, he's using the wrong mom and I, by the way, but it doesn't matter.

[James Pietragallo]

Yes, because that would be. I was just gonna say people thank you because people would go, james is no drama Nazi, but yeah. Think about what has happened to I. Does that make sense to you? No, that's how you work that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

But also what happened to me.

[James Pietragallo]

So glad you said that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yes, he's making himself a victim. Granted, he's he's writing this out that he's gonna. About to commit suicide. But yeah, you're not a victim, dude.

[James Pietragallo]

No. Not even a little bit?

[Jimmy Whisman]

No.

[James Pietragallo]

So he crumples the page up and doesn't like what he wrote, so he tosses it in the front floorboard of the Dodge.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Maybe it was the market thing.

[James Pietragallo]

Maybe he's like, ah, that's wrong. I can't cross that out. And your suicide note, you can't have cross outs. Why didn't I buy white out when I bought those sleeping pills? That would have really helped a lot. So he gets out of the truck, he's up in some fucking. He's up in like this cabin, wilderness area with a bunch of these cabins. And he just gets out and starts running into a snowstorm, which seems unwise. Like Jack Nicholson shining Action. Right? So anyway, and Verena has called. They find his getaway vehicle up there because they know where he is. So they find the getaway vehicle. It's the Wagashant State Cabins in Wilderness State park in northern Michigan. And they go, okay, well, there's his fucking. There's his truck. That's good. But where's he. Oh, thankfully it's snowing, so there are footprints going wherever the fuck he's going, heading into the woods.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's a painful ass suicide.

[James Pietragallo]

Well, yeah, well. And he's running. He's a runner, long distance runner. So they see the way the feet are paced. He's running in the snow. I guess it's a way to keep warm too. So they get a tracking dog and they do all that, but they just follow the footprints really. They let all the air out of the tires of the truck just in case he like circles back and gets out of there. It's now turning into a blizzard outside. 35 mile an hour winds, it's 14 degrees and fucking super deep snow getting deeper by the minute. This is not good. They end up finally finding him dead tired. We don't know if he's full of sleeping pills or not, but tired, suffering from hypothermia, but alive, sitting under a tree. Just gave up. Jack Nicholson in the Shining, just. You would have found icicles hanging off him if he came later. So the Kozlowski said, I personally think he was gonna end his life. But when it really came down to it, he lacked the courage to do it.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He couldn't do it.

[James Pietragallo]

No, he couldn't limp either. Even on his frostbitten feet. So they had to carry him pretty much.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wow.

[James Pietragallo]

They got him out of the woods, put him on a sled, and had to tow him by snowmobile to the edge of the lake. This is a hilarious sight where a helicopter picked him up. A coast Guard helicopter picked him up and dangled him around in fucking 35 mile an hour winds as they brought him up. That must have been hilarious after being.

[Jimmy Whisman]

On the back of a sleep. Snowmobile sled, they plucked him out of the house.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, man. Now Grant is talking to these guys, talking about what might happen to him back at the county jail in Macomb. And the one cop said, dude, if you did what we think you did, you're going to have superstar status is what he said. Oh, like, don't worry about it. You'll be fine. People will be more curious. So they get him back to, like, the hospital room and all this. And they said, steve, do you want anything from Wendy's? We're all hungry. We're going to Wendy's. And he said, sure. A single cheeseburger in a medium frosty. What a pussy. Really? The cop said, quote, dude, where you're going, this might be your last chance for fast food. You might want to think about a value meal.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's the whole order.

[James Pietragallo]

He said, even if you get second degree, you're gonna be gone a long time. Get the large frosty.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Opt for the large fry, too. Shit. Get some hot nuggets.

[James Pietragallo]

Come on. Come on. Yeah, those spicy nugs are fucking good. They're not bad.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

So it's at this point, by the way, that his lawyer quits. I'm not your lawyer anymore. I give up. Yeah, he quit. He's like, oh, I'm fucked now. I was defending an innocent guy. So Kozlowski races up there to talk to him. Okay, and they are gonna talk right away. He says, you do understand that you are in fact, under arrest right now for sure? Yeah. He said, I kind of figured that. Yeah, for the murder of your wife Tara. And he says, yeah, yeah, yeah, I gotcha. So they bullshit back and forth. They talk about what happened. We started a fight in the master bedroom. I accused her of not spending enough time at home. And so in the middle of unpacking, she goes downstairs for something, comes back up, stands in the bedroom doorway, and she tells him she's thinking of leaving on Sunday, going back to Puerto Rico. He says, it's not okay. She said, well, I need to go on Sunday. Lou's going Sunday, so I need to go, too. It's important. He said, you don't need to go. Down there with Lou. You spent too much time with fucking Lou already. You don't spend enough time with us. You're going. You're only going down there because Lou's going. And they went back and forth about Lou and why she has to travel so much and why she wants to hang out with Lou. And he said he thought he was fighting for his family, but she always acted like he was whining. Finally she said, fuck off. I've got to do what I have to do in my job, and it's none of your business. So he said, are you fucking him? And she said, fuck off, and slapped him. Yeah. So Steven said he hit her back and hit her in the side of the neck. And he said he can't remember if it was an open hand or a fist, but it was hard enough that she fell back and banged her head against the floor in front of the bedroom tv. He said. Then she screamed, that's it. I'm gonna take the kids. You're gonna be fucking homeless. You're a piece of shit. And he said, you hit me first. And she said, it doesn't matter. I'm calling the police. I'm gonna ruin your life. Your life is over. She's yelling that if a man hits a woman, he's going to jail. And then she gets the kids in the house and everything, so, screw you. You'll never see your kids again. He's saying. She's saying all this stuff you're doing, and she's just berating him and berating him and berating him.

[Jimmy Whisman]

It's a much stranger Michael Bolton song.

[James Pietragallo]

But yeah, yeah. When a man strangles a woman. Yeah, yeah. So he says, she thinks she's sitting. He falls to his knees. And thinking she's gonna shut the fuck up. He said, he's gonna shut her up. He locks his hands around her neck and starts choking her. She doesn't really fight back. And he thinks, oh, shit, I'm gonna go to prison for choking her. She's gonna tell the cops I choked her. I mean, if she didn't like getting smacked, she's sure not gonna like getting choked. So he has to keep choking her, keeping her from talking. So he grabs her hands. She grabs his hands, scratching the back of one of them. He knows he can't stop. He's got to choke her till he stops moving. He said, I just kept squeezing, squeezing, squeezing and wouldn't let go. He said he held her long enough to be able to. He had to cover her face up with a Gray T shirt or gray underwear that were hanging around. So he didn't look at her. He didn't want to look at her. So she said her body relaxes. He lets go and walks downstairs and starts crying. He grabs his phone and texts Verena to not come home. She's out with friends at a bar and restaurant in Royal Oak. Which we will be in May 30, by the way, if you want tickets for that. They'd been texting back and forth all day and whatever. So he goes back upstairs to move her. He wants to get it out of the bedroom, obviously, her body. He's texting Verena also, while this is all going on. Holy shit, by the way. He's naked, by the way, at this point, because he was ready for sleep. He sleeps naked, which is weird if you have like a 19 year old in the house that you know isn't part of your shit. So what he did is he wraps a belt around her neck.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

And cinches it tight and tugs on the belt. Leans back, awkwardly hoisting her body up so only her feet drag as he pulls. His elbows are high and bent outward. And she's thumping down the steps. He then drags her out the side door into the garage. Races back upstairs to check on the kids. Make sure they're sleeping. That they haven't been awakened by the screaming or the thumping. They both have their eyes closed. They're lying there motionless. So he goes, okay, they're asleep. He goes back down the the hall, gets a piece of paper, writes a note. You owe me a kiss. Puts it on Verena's pillow. Heads back to the garage. Drags Tara over to her white Isuzu Trooper. Barely enough room here between the car and the garage door to do this. But apparently, I guess he's trying to do it. He yanks her up off the ground, straining to get her high enough to wrestle her into the back of the trooper. But the belt snaps in half and her body falls. Her head slams into the concrete. He said it was the most disgusting. Like it sounded like dropping a watermelon on cement. There was no movement. There was no nothing. I knew then that I had killed her. I didn't know what to do. You were going to put an alive person in your trunk?

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah. You drug an alive person to Billy Batts?

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah. The only thing I could do, think to do was hide her. So he gets her into the trooper, gets her on her side, one leg pulled up. Verena's coming home soon. If she pulls her car into the garage. Tara's got a silver blouse on. The garage door opens with headlights on you. While you're standing there with a naked. With your wife's corpse in the back of her Isuzu trooper wearing a shirt.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Like a disco ball. It's gonna get some.

[James Pietragallo]

Unbelievable. Yeah. So he doesn't know what to do. So he looks around the garage. He'd taken the liner out of his black 2006 Jeep Commander to wash it. And it's sitting there on the side on top of a storage bin. He grabs it, wedges it on top of her body and closes the door. Said, okay, it's hidden for now. Turns off the light, goes inside. Just then, he hears the click of the garage door system. And it is Verena. That's when he says, oh, I have a plan. He says, why the. What the fuck are you doing here? Why don't you just go pretending it's. He thinks it's Tara. That would mean he thinks she's alive. At that point, he said, I was thinking as fast as I could. My brain was going a mile a minute. I kept thinking, we've got a body in the garage. I don't know who the fuck we is in this one. You have a body in the garage, sir. What the hell do I do with a body? So he goes upstairs, talks to Verena Varina. Asks him about a scratch on the nose. Which is a nick that Tara had inflicted while he was strangling her. He said, tara slapped me. Then he calls Tara a whore and said that she popped him on good. Verena goes to bed. He thinks, I think she bought that. I did it. I think that's good. He also calls a friend named Brian. Gets his voicemail and says, quote, the shit's hit the fan. He then goes to sleep, wakes up the next day. He said he'll get up in the morning and go hide the body. Okay, that's what he's gonna do. He's gonna get up late Saturday night while everyone's away. But it's really cold. He didn't know what to do. He had to figure something out. Hide the party, hide the body, hide parts of it. What do we do here? So he loads up a big green Rubbermaid storage bin. And some garbage bags and a big sheet of plastic. That's the boy's clothes. One here. Steve thinks about buying more plastic tarps. But he's worrying someone's gonna. Worried someone's gonna see him buying big sheets of plastic. Which, yeah, that doesn't look good.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

About to be Dexter. He then gets her. He said he needs to get her smaller is the problem. She's too big then. So smaller than she is with a leg and an arm jutting out in opposite directions. So he loads up his big bow saw, too, and drives to his father's shop. Bo saw, puts down a tarp, puts shit on the floor, all this stuff. He spreads out the tarp, gets Tara out of the back, and her body's frozen from rigor and the cold. It's been sitting in a cold garage, one arm jutting out one way, one leg the other way. And this guy's saying, what do you want from me? Impossible to get a good balanced grip. He doesn't know what to do. He's slipping. Finally gets her out of the truck, pulls her down on the tarp, grabs some pieces of steel, weighs down the corners of the tarp. Now he's like, what am I gonna cut with? So he gets the bow saw and starts cutting her wrist. It's a small thing. Try to see how it works. It doesn't work well. She's so hard. It's like trying to saw through steel. He says the bow saw is good for saplings, but not for human arms. Apparently, he said. So he panicked. Oh, yeah. He washes his hands, goes to the trooper, pulls out a pint of booze he'd brought from home, and starts drinking. Okay. So now he's like, all right, I have to make all of her stuff disappear. And her body. I'm gonna say she went back to Puerto Rico. So he gets her briefcase and gets all the papers inside, including documents, business cards. Puts it all through the shop shredder, and pours the pieces into a large paper bag. He's like, okay, now I can do this. Goes back to the body, takes her laptop over to the band saw in the shop and cuts it into pieces. The disk drive, something shatters into a million pieces that hurl themselves around the shop. And now he's like, fuck, now I got to clean that up. Also as a silver piece of steel pokes him in the finger. He pulls it out with a tweezer, and he's bleeding. He's like, fuck, now there's blood here. Now I'm really fucked. I'm making this worse. So he takes all the shredded shit and takes it out to the cardboard box. He needs a better tool. He's looking for a hacksaw, something small but tough and sharp. He sees the band saw and says, ah, fuck. That would Be fine. But he can't use the band saw. It's going to be too much of a mess.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, that'll be ugly.

[James Pietragallo]

So he'd seen a band saw flinging wood chips and metal chips all around and he doesn't want that to happen. So he's like, okay. He said, I remember my dad making a make do hacksaw out of pieces of a broken band saw. The band saw blades are carbon steel, which 10 with 10 teeth on an per inch. Perfect cutting tools. So he had. So he takes an old used saw blade, breaks it in two, snaps off another piece, wraps it around the. Wraps the end in a blue towel to give him a grip and start sawing.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He just. Just the blade.

[James Pietragallo]

Just the blade.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Like he's in prison with a shank. Good Christ.

[James Pietragallo]

This is fucking insane. He cuts off one of her hands.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, Jesus.

[James Pietragallo]

It works pretty easily. Starts hacking on the other wrist, but the saw blades already getting dull.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

So he grabs a new blade and breaks that into pieces and it works a lot better. After both hands are cut off. He takes off her forearms, then moves up to her shoulders, laying the body parts down on the tarp as he works. He's not whole arm. The arm is in fucking multiple pieces. Wow. He says the lack of blood surprises him and makes it easier to do. But he still throws up and drinks whiskey and throws up again. He says, look, if you don't do this, you're going to prison for the rest of your life.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Had a real stern talk with himself.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah, he did. I was talking to. He can't get her pants off, so he rips the pant leg up to the waistband and starts in on her legs. The cloth keeps getting caught in the teeth of the blade. So now he has a collection of body parts on the tarp. He puts one of them into the plastic bins that he's brought from home, but they're the cheap ones, too thin for this. So he looks around the shop and finds some industrial bags with much thicker ply, puts several parts into them and stuffs them into the big Rubbermaid bin marked girl's clothes.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Holy shit.

[James Pietragallo]

All that's left on the tarp now is her torso and there's a lot of blood that's congealed in the torso like thick, syrupy. Thinks. And he throws newspapers on the blood and wraps the torso and blood in the papers and tarp and fits them into the Rubbermaid on top of the other stuff. This is. He says he did a good job. He thinks, I think I did Good. This is. He said, then it'll be really. This is genius. I'll call Tara's cell phone saying, pick up your phone. It's fucked up. You won't call me? Yeah, that'll be cool. I can do that, right? That seems normal. This is his fucking plan. So then it gets worse. Okay, it gets worse. I'm gonna read all that he did from there. Okay? So he's got his wife cut into many, many, many pieces at this point. And now he doesn't know what to do with them is the problem. So he drives back to the house with her in there, puts her in the back of the suv, has a nice Sunday afternoon with the kids and Verena. He said, I tried to make things as normal as possible for everybody. I even continuously flirted with Verena because I thought it was the only way I would get through this. Then that Sunday night, 3am, he loads up a kid's plastic red sled in the Isuzu and drives off looking for a place to dump the parts. He ends up at Stoney Creek Park. He couldn't help but give himself away by talking about that park constantly near some big overhead power lines. He dumped all the parts onto the kid's sled. He pulled Tara through the snow to the open fields. And this is a quote from him, quote, as soon as I started going, it was like Keystone Cops. The sled took off. And now I'm chasing after this sled that has my wife's cut up body parts on it down a hill.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Oh, Jesus.

[James Pietragallo]

Now if this was in a fucking Coen Brothers movie, it would be hilarious. But this is insanity, man. This is some Fargo shit. Yeah, this is what happened in Fargo. This is crazy.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He said, just took off going. And he had to chase it, chase.

[James Pietragallo]

It down a hill. Finally, it stopped when it fell over and broke. So now all of these pieces are all falling all over the place.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

So Tara's torso, I took it and buried in the snow. Then the pieces I put on the sled and buried that in the snow. But he didn't think it was very good. He said I'd done a very bad job of hiding anything. It's right there in the open. So the next day, Tuesday at dusk, he returned to the park, retrieved all the body parts, wrapped in clear plastic bags, cut them open, and scattered the remains here and there under fallen trees. He said, and I quote, the hands, the feet, Tara's head, everything.

[Jimmy Whisman]

All of Tara.

[James Pietragallo]

You said he just rolled a head. The hands, wow. He left a One gallon Ziploc bag stuffed with all the plastic wrap by a tree near the road. And he was good. But then he heard more than a week later that the sheriff was going to search the park. So he said, I thought, I'm screwed. They're going to find it because the torso at this point is still buried in the snow. So that morning, hours before the search, he went back to the park to recover the torso. He had to get there ahead of the cops. Imagine if they showed up while he's carrying a torso out of the woods. He said, I had to dig it out. It was frozen in the ground. I said, how'd you carry it out? He said, I threw it over my shoulder and carried it. That's it. He said that that's what he did. Wow. That's insane. He said he returned to the car with the body, shoved it into plastic garbage bags, drove once again to his father's machine shop, hid the torso behind the boxes in a loft space beneath the ceiling. But he worried that the remains would start to thaw. And smell. So five days later, he went and got a green plastic container, put the torso in that, drove it back to his garage, put it in there, crossed his fingers and said, I hope they think it's fucking dog food.

[Jimmy Whisman]

I did great.

[James Pietragallo]

He went to the. He said, and I kept thinking, quote, I got away with this. I can't believe I got away with this. What the fuck are you thinking? You have cops all over you. You didn't get away with shit.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Yeah, cops all over the place. Just because nobody saw you do what you did doesn't mean you got away.

[James Pietragallo]

Kozlowski was asked, how do you keep from just going for this guy and throttling him at this point? And he said, I guess I should be credited for that. Cause there's more than one time I would have liked to have done just that.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That deserve a lot. Yeah.

[James Pietragallo]

Wow. So, yeah, this green tub. Meanwhile, back at the park, search teams are finding this, and they said, we started finding some pretty gruesome discoveries. They found out by the way he had cut his wife into 14 pieces. They found 11 parts marked by. They marked them on this map, but they never found all the parts. Animals had gotten there first. That's fucked up. So in the interrogation room here. So they said, okay, that puts us now. He said, can I ask what I found? Like, the pieces. Steven Grant's in there. He goes, can I ask what you found? What pieces you could find? Then he said, maybe I can help. Maybe I can help. You find them. So they were talking about what parts to find. And they told Alicia about all this. And she said when she read the transcript of the confession, she said, the devil is what came to mind. It is nothing more than the devil's work. So he's arraigned and by the way, they gave him this old timey black and white striped jumpsuit. He's in a wheelchair with literally fuzzy bunny slippers.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Amazing.

[James Pietragallo]

And the sheriff said he got the prisoner's stripes. He selected it personally for maximum humiliation for Steve. He wanted to fuck him good. So anyway, the trial comes along. Come on. Come on, man.

[Jimmy Whisman]

What are you doing?

[James Pietragallo]

The prosecutor said, have you ever wondered what goes through the mind of a man who's just murdered his wife? He said, sex. That's what's going through this guy's mind. They have so much evidence. They have his confession, they have. Verena flies in from Germany. Even though she had said she wasn't going to, she still flies in, tells all about the confession, all about him fucking going down on her. They play a four hour confession tape of him dryly giving that recitation of everything, closing arguments. The prosecutor said, come on, what do you think? Right. No, they did a. He said it takes about four minutes to kill a person by strangling them. He said they should be unconscious. After 15 seconds he got the loudest ticking 60 minutes alarm clock he could ever get and put it on the jury box and played it. After 15. Tick, tick, tick, tick. After 15 seconds, he said, she's unconscious now. Then let it tick for 3 minutes and 45 seconds and said, she's finally dead. That's how long he had to change his mind. The verdict comes in. This is first or second degree murder. Now, just like the Brian Walsh guy in Massachusetts. That just got thing just got done with his wife. The jury deliberates for three days. Oh, they find him guilty.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Okay, good.

[James Pietragallo]

Of second degree murder.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Is that right?

[James Pietragallo]

Not even first.

[Jimmy Whisman]

They just didn't want to say it was premeditated.

[James Pietragallo]

There was a split in the jury that said they premeditation. They weren't positive about it, which is crazy. The prosecutor said, I wanted first degree murder, but what I want more than anything is to make sure that Stephen's off the the streets. So during the sentencing, there's victim impact here. They bring in Alicia, they bring in all of Tara's relatives, saying what a nice woman she is and how wonderful she is and how her children now have no fucking parents. The judge says, you sir, may fuck off. 50 to 80 years in prison. First parole hearing at 87 years old.

[Jimmy Whisman]

First time.

[James Pietragallo]

First time. The judge exceeded. Yeah, the judge exceeded the state's sentencing guidelines and handed down this sentence. Yeah, it was 15. The defense asked for 15 to 25. He got 50 to 80, plus 6 to 10 for mutilation of the body as well. The district judge later on called his actions demonic, manipulative, barbaric and dishonest. If that's all not enough for you, he's also a liar.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Andy Liesel.

[James Pietragallo]

The kids have been doing amazing things. The kids are doing well. They were raised by Alicia. They're doing. They're really nice kids that are really into honoring the memory of their mother and also fighting against domestic violence as well. Both Lindsay and Ian, they have. They do all sorts of things with domestic violence awareness and everything like that. He appeals a bunch of times, but it does not matter. You're fucked. Mr. Denied. Keep on keeping on. There's been several books about this. One, A slaying in the suburbs. The Tara Grant murder by Andrea Billups and Steve Miller. Another one called Limb from Limb.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Jesus Christ.

[James Pietragallo]

Written by Detroit News crime reporter George Hunter, who covered it from the beginning. And then the book that I got some of the stuff on some background. Anyway, Blood in the Snow. Listen to this title, it's so long. Blood in the Snow. The true story of a stay home dad, his high powered wife and the jealousy that drove him to murder.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Limb from Limb.

[James Pietragallo]

Just put the whole book on the COVID why don't you?

[Jimmy Whisman]

What do we need to read it for?

[James Pietragallo]

Stephen is not eligible for parole for a fuck of a long time. And obviously I don't think Steven does well in prison, let's just put it that way. With his bunny slippers and his stupid eyes. So there you go. That is Washington Township, Michigan. That's a goddamn insane story. Arn's one of the craziest we've ever told. So thank you for listening to that. Very quickly, head over to shutupandgivemerder.com get your tickets for live shows. Gonna read the cities again very quickly. Nashville, first up, that's February 21st. Everything else, no dates. Durham, Atlanta, Phoenix, Salt Lake City, which is sold out. Denver, Buffalo, Royal Oak, Milwaukee, Minneapolis, Dallas, San Jose, Sacramento, Tarrytown, Boston. Get your tickets right now, shutupandgivemerder.com they make tremendous holiday gifts.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Sure they do.

[James Pietragallo]

Also follow us on social media. MallTownMurder on Instagram, SmallTown Pot on Facebook. Get yourself Patreon. $5 a month or above. You get everything we put out ad free. You get hundreds of bonus episodes you've never heard immediately upon subscription. New ones every other week. This week, Charles Starkweather Part 2. Listen to him and his girlfriend argue about who actually did all this shit. And we're gonna talk about a crazy Australian cricket guy for crime and sports, which is hilarious. Cause we don't know shit about cricket. It's very funny. So check that out. Patreon.com crimeinsports and you get a shout out at the end of the show, which is right now. Jimmy, hit me with the names of the best people in the fucking world who keep this show going and would never, ever, ever move our body parts around from place to place until the cops found them. Hit me with them right now.

[Jimmy Whisman]

This week's executive producers are. Chris Zoha, Melissa Warburton. Gary. Gary Howard. In Dallas, Peyton Meadows. Thank you, Peyton. That's another one that.

[James Pietragallo]

That.

[Jimmy Whisman]

All the time.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Peyton Meadows. Vasquez, Janice Hill. They're always around. I can't thank you guys enough. Jesse Lambert.

[James Pietragallo]

Gary Howard.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Jesse Lambert is coming to see us in Minneapolis. And.

[James Pietragallo]

Terrific.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Just found out right now. Merry Christmas.

[James Pietragallo]

September 19th. Yeah, there we go.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Just found out. We just broke the news.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, my goodness.

[Jimmy Whisman]

There you go, Jeff.

[James Pietragallo]

Happy birthday.

[Jimmy Whisman]

We ruined. Merry Christmas. We ruined Christmas.

[James Pietragallo]

We'll see you then.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Cam Cashwara. Cam, you're the best.

[James Pietragallo]

Thanks, Cam.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Him and his dad, they're good people. Hooter, Stump. Orville Pig Decker.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, good people.

[Jimmy Whisman]

James, I don't know if you know.

[James Pietragallo]

Always good people. Yeah, it's obvious.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Amanda Barry gave us a bunch of inheritance money. That was very sweet.

[James Pietragallo]

Thank you so much.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Very kind of you. I wonder if it's the one that was. I don't think it's that. Amanda Barry, right?

[James Pietragallo]

I don't know.

[Jimmy Whisman]

From Cleveland. Isn't that a name?

[James Pietragallo]

I don't remember hoping. Yeah, I'm hoping nobody else dies. Thank you.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Other producer. Yeah. Oh, yes. Christ, it's. She's been through a lot this year, is the point. Other producers this week. Mama Jojo. Tinkler.

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, yeah, obviously.

[Jimmy Whisman]

The Tinkler. The Tank. The tanks. Happy hour, checking in. And Marrero, Louisiana, he's back home. Steffi with no last name. Levi Wickert. Jesse. Nope. Jessica. Solar Chick. Neo. The Prophet. Demetra C. Caroline Cavalcante. Rare Jeans. Claudia with no last name. El Renee Robertson Hansen. Gemma with no last name. Patrick o'. Kane. Is that not a fucking hockey player?

[James Pietragallo]

Oh, I think it's just Kane. Kane. It's regular Kane. He's the Guy got accused of a lot of rape, but I think he got away all right. I think it was like.

[Jimmy Whisman]

He's a large mouthpack.

[James Pietragallo]

Yes. Yeah, exactly. I don't think they landed him in the boat.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wriggled off the hook is what he did.

[James Pietragallo]

Yeah.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Amos with no last name. The best college football podcast. I don't know which one that is, but it's the best one. Joe with no last name. Brian Woodleaf, Sandra Blackburn, Civ with no last name. Kathleen McCaffrey, Katie Byrne, Nicko, Princess Debbie, Lex Watkins, Susan Corel, Coryell, Jenna with no last name. Tyler with no last name. Steven Taylor, Chris with no last name. Julie Martinez, Hayes, Dave, Emily, Chris and Storm. Oh, that's his pop. Andrea, lj, Danielle Pepper, Jen Bodeker. Bodeker, Jason Gavin, Lauren Rushing, Ted with no last name. Emily Evans, Courtney chermac. Pig Snatchers. That's fascinating. Matt Waters, Alicia Sideshow, Ali Wotherspoon. I don't know what that means. P. Per Dia. Dude, what's a per Dia?

[James Pietragallo]

Per diem.

[Jimmy Whisman]

No. Perhaps he thinks that. I don't think he gets one. No, because he said per diem. Karen Ruzzi, Kevin Krueger, Becky Smith, Emma Kohler, John. Oh, Geddes. Like Ann, Ron with no last name. Casey Marshall, Jake B. Shayce. Shayce Ziegler, Danielle husband, Pickles McGraw, Jacob Morin, Jay Pickles McGraw. And we move along like that's somebody's real name. JD with no last name. Travis Finn, Ash P. Logan Kramer, Jesse Reinbeck. BGM Deidra with no last name. Rachel, no last name. Christine with no last name. Lisa. Lisa Lou. Lissy. Lou Keely. Keela. Kelia Lewis. Kim with no last name. Bocephus Ray.

[James Pietragallo]

Ray.

[Jimmy Whisman]

That's fascinating. We'll talk about it later. Tim Smart. It doesn't matter. Adam Harms, Dennis with no last name. David Boutel, Nicole Raffle. She's a raffler. Heather Grove, Alexandria Holder, Tila. Tila Haley, Tila Hale, Tyella. Jennifer Russell, Jess with no last name. Kiki with no last name. Aquila with no last name. Jennifer Loudermilk. Carl Turchin, Shelly Guerin. Okay. Michelle Legg. Tiffany Jungie, Junji Jigoo Papa Bear. Angela Lopez, Thomas Roundtree. Amanda Waski, Joseph Fitman, Manders, Ganderberg. John ron bad brains. 88 Ashton with no last name. Glenn Reed, Catherine McKeith, Kim Bird Allen with no last name. Eric Price, Jake Haged. Hagedorn. Annie B. Hollywood. No last name. Jenny Mansell. Carrie Ann, Dennis Wallace, Mindy McElori. What is this? Ryan Staples, Benjamin Scorvan, Ian Fleming, Joshua Estel, Kenzie G. Vagina Whisperer, Sasha Connors, Johnny Loves Tammy, another guy who wrote James Bond.

[James Pietragallo]

They both give a US money this time. That's great.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Wilma Dickfit, probably not Eden Ray, Kathleen Edinger and everybody that's seen a live show this year because you support this show as well and every patron. Thank you all so much.

[James Pietragallo]

Thank you so much everybody for all that you do for us, you wonderful, fantastic bastards. We can't tell you how much we appreciate it. Keep coming back and seeing us. Head over to shutupandgivememurder.com for your tickets and follow us on social media. Drop down menus take you where you want to go. So keep coming back, keep seeing us, tell your friends and until next week everybody, it's been our pleasure.

[Jimmy Whisman]

Bye. Everyone deserves to be connected.

[James Pietragallo]

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[Jimmy Whisman]

Turns out mom didn't know she needs.

[James Pietragallo]

A new car this year.

[Jimmy Whisman]

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