Decades of Deception: Part 1

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Dating Detectives – "Decades of Deception: Part 1"

Release Date: July 14, 2025
Duration: Approximately 63 minutes
Hosts: Mackenzie Fultz (Private Investigator) and Hanna Anderson (Comedian)

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Introduction

In the standout episode titled "Decades of Deception: Part 1," The Dating Detectives takes an unexpected but riveting turn by featuring a deeply personal story of familial deception and financial abuse. Unlike their usual focus on dating con artists, hosts Mackenzie Fultz and Hanna Anderson welcome Rob and Laura, siblings who share the harrowing experience of their father's entanglement with a manipulative stepmother, Phyllis.

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Background Story

Rob and Laura recount their upbringing in a rural area where their parents divorced when Rob was four and Laura was seven. Their father remarried Phyllis in 1991, and initially, the family dynamic appeared stable. Phyllis, their stepmother, was affable, often cooking their favorite meals and maintaining a pleasant household. The couple shared custodial time every other weekend, fostering what seemed to be a typical blended family environment.

Notable Quote:

Rob [05:08]: "Dad really believed that he and Phyllis had a pretty stable life. They purchased 10 acres of land, and he loved that land."

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Early Red Flags

As the siblings grew older, subtle inconsistencies began to surface, though they were initially dismissed as minor issues. Phyllis's financial instability was hinted at through persistent struggles despite both she and their father holding decent jobs—he worked for a local university, and she was a nurse. Rumors about Phyllis's past began to emerge, including allegations of embezzlement from a previous employer in the 1980s.

Notable Quote:

Laura [06:27]: "There were rumors that she had embezzled some money in the '80s from a previous employer."

Despite these whispers, no concrete evidence was presented to the siblings, leaving them unaware of the extent of Phyllis's deceit.

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Unraveling the Deception

The true nature of Phyllis's manipulation began to surface 27 years after their marriage. Initial suspicions were sparked by unusual financial activities, such as sudden changes in phone numbers due to frequent switching of service providers and repeated disputes with local service companies. These anomalies, while seemingly trivial during their youth, began to accumulate into significant red flags as the siblings matured.

Notable Quote:

Rob [16:57]: "As we got older, we had our own lives, and we started getting phone calls from these little payday loan places asking for Phyllis."

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Discovery of Financial Abuse

The turning point came when Rob and Laura started receiving unsolicited loan offers referencing their father, suggesting that Phyllis had listed them as references without their knowledge. This led to growing concerns about their father's financial management. Upon further investigation, they uncovered that their father did not actually own the 10-acre land he believed he did; instead, it was under the ownership of Blue Goose Manufacturing, linked to Jacob Stone, a known land developer.

Notable Quote:

Laura [21:23]: "I looked up the deed history, and it said Blue Goose Manufacturing. Jacob Stone, Phyllis Jacob Stone."

Their discovery revealed that Phyllis had been fraudulently maintaining control over their father's property and finances for decades.

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Impact on the Family

The revelation had a profound emotional impact on the family. Their father, a trusting and non-technologically savvy individual, was devastated to learn that his life's work—the cherished land—was not his own. The financial deceit extended beyond property ownership, encompassing embezzlement, forged documents, and unauthorized withdrawals from his accounts.

Notable Quote:

Laura [28:03]: "The look on his face, I'll never forget. This whole thing is just welded into my mind."

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Phyllis’s Methods

Phyllis employed sophisticated tactics to conceal her abuse. She manipulated their father's financial statements by intercepting mail, forging signatures, and creating counterfeit documents that appeared legitimate. This allowed her to present false information that their father could trust, effectively eroding his financial stability without his awareness.

Notable Quote:

Laura [47:31]: "She was putting the mail on hold, pulling out what she didn't want my dad to see, and adjusting the bank statements."

Her actions included forging checks, draining bank accounts, and misrepresenting property tax obligations, all meticulously hidden through fraudulent paperwork and controlled access to financial information.

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The Final Break and Divorce

Faced with overwhelming evidence of deceit, Rob and Laura intervened to help their father regain control over his finances. They secured his banking accounts, introduced him to digital banking tools, and began the arduous process of uncovering the full extent of Phyllis's financial crimes. The culmination of their efforts led to filing for divorce, ending a 27-year-long relationship marred by deception and betrayal.

Notable Quote:

Rob [58:43]: "So we filed for divorce two days before their 28th anniversary."

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Ongoing Consequences

Despite the divorce, Phyllis attempted to reintegrate herself into their father's life by providing superficial acts of assistance, such as cooking and laundry, to regain his trust. However, Rob and Laura remained vigilant, recognizing these gestures as manipulative tactics to facilitate further financial exploitation.

Notable Quote:

Laura [60:42]: "Phyllis started going back to my dad's house, crying and asking for help, trying to creep her way back into his life."

The siblings also discovered that Phyllis continued to exploit their father's finances by taking advantage of his lack of digital banking knowledge, ensuring that he remained dependent and oblivious to her ongoing schemes.

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Reflections and Lessons

Rob and Laura's story serves as a poignant reminder of the vulnerability individuals can face within trusted relationships, especially when combined with financial naivety and technological limitations. It underscores the importance of vigilance, financial literacy, and the willingness to intervene when suspicious activities are detected.

Notable Quote:

Emily [61:28]: "I feel so bad. Could you imagine if that happens to your parents? It must feel so helpless."

Their experience emphasizes the critical need for families to communicate openly about financial matters and to support each other in safeguarding against potential abuses.

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Conclusion

"Decades of Deception: Part 1" offers a compelling narrative of how prolonged manipulation and financial abuse can devastate a family. Through Rob and Laura's courageous recounting, listeners gain insight into the complexities of identifying and confronting deceit within close familial bonds. The episode sets the stage for a continued exploration of the aftermath and recovery in the subsequent part, promising further revelations and lessons on overcoming deep-seated betrayal.

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Stay Tuned: The story continues in "Decades of Deception: Part 2," where Rob and Laura delve deeper into the consequences of Phyllis's actions and the steps they took to rebuild their father's life.

For more insights and similar stories, consider joining The Dating Detectives community on Patreon and share your own experiences to help others navigate the treacherous waters of deceit and manipulation.

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Note: All personal information has been anonymized to protect the identities of those involved.

Transcript

[Hannah]

The following program contains names, places and events that have been anonymized or fictionalized for the purposes of protection and safety. The following program is provided for entertainment purposes only, and any commentary from the hosts are strictly conjecture and should not be held as making any definitive statements about the truth or identity of any particular individuals or circumstances. If you or a loved one are involved in an abusive relationship, please call the National Domestic violence hotline at 1-800-799-777, 233 for support.

[Emily]

Happy dating Detectives.

[Laura]

Monday.

[Hannah]

We have a very. Oh my gosh, this story is going to keep you up, you guys.

[Emily]

So this is these. We have two guests, Rob and Laura. They are brother and sister. So they're not dating, they're brother and sister. And they're going to tell us a little bit about their dad. So it's a little bit of a different story.

[Hannah]

But yeah, I don't think we've, I can't remember a time where we've had two siblings on, but yeah, they're siblings. Their dad is the one that. Well, the whole family's getting dogfished, really. It's a big financial abuse situation, so be prepared for that. And they're fabulous. I loved Rob and Laura. You'll hear two voices just in case you get a little confused. But yeah, siblings, they're great. And, and I think this will be a great episode, especially if you or somebody in your family has dealt with this kind of thing because sometimes it hasn't happened to us directly, but we know someone who it's happened to and it's hard to know how to support them. It's a two parter because it's a lot. If you need more episodes in the meantime, you can join our Patreon. We do two. Yeah, just. I know we talk about it all the time, but if you've ever wondered what the Patreon bonus episodes consist of, this is what they break down to. So the episodes are guest updates. Sometimes we have guest stories like normal. Sometimes we have updates about previous stories. Most of the time it's email submissions. It's the ones that didn't make a full episode, but we still needed to discuss. And then the other kind. We started this last week of telling a scam story that isn't from a guest or kind of like mackenzie Undercover style, but yeah, like a famous scam in history that we tell the same way that we tell all the other stories.

[Emily]

I was so excited that so many people loved it. I was so, so excited to hear that they loved it.

[Hannah]

I mean, it's fun. I enjoy it. And I like looking into some of these stories. So send me any scam stories that you think are fascinating, that you think would be fun for us to dig. Dig into. That will only be, like, every now and then. But that's also gonna be on Patreon.

[Emily]

So interesting. And it kind of goes to show you, dog fishing isn't new, like, at all. So I thought that was. It was a good indication of that.

[Hannah]

Yeah. And it's kind of fun to hear about how it's influenced our world today. Like, did you know the Eiffel Tower was sold twice? The guy managed to do two sales and make double. Double the money. You know, like dogfish are. They're smart sometimes.

[Emily]

Well, and also they're making shows about it, like the Netflix shows that. What's it called? The. Anna Delvey.

[Hannah]

Anna Delvey. Yeah. Back to our story.

[Emily]

And really cool. So I'm so glad so many of you loved it.

[Hannah]

So we must discuss.

[Emily]

Yeah, totally. So thank you, guys. But let's get into. Let's hear from Rob and Laura. You guys have to hear their story. Just hold on to your freaking pants.

[Hannah]

I'm scared.

[Emily]

Okay. Right. Rob and Laura are here, and we are excited to hear you guys story.

[Hannah]

But anyway, I am grateful that you're both here. It's fun. We have two guys.

[Emily]

I know. Yeah, exactly. So take us away from the beginning. Let's hear it.

[Rob]

Well, so Laura and I grew up. Our parents divorced when we were real young. I was four years old. Laura was about seven. We grew up kind of in a poor area, rural. But in 1991, our father married Phyllis, our stepmother. As far as we knew, you know, we were kids, so we had just a pretty normal relationship with her. But we only saw our father and her every other weekend for the custody arrangement. I mean, we had no problems with her. She always cooked our favorite food when we were there. Even as we got older, we had a good relationship, you know, as any family was. It wasn't perfect. Nothing to really take note of. Typical family drama. She did have two sons of her own that were from a previous marriage, but they were a little older than us, so we didn't really interact with them a whole lot. But dad. Dad really believed that him and Phyllis had pretty stable life. They purchased 10 acres of land, and he loved that land. He loved keeping up with the yard. He loved weed eating, gardening, making it look extremely nice, as nice as he could.

[Laura]

It was that kind of grass where you would, like, take your shoes off. And walk in it.

[Emily]

And it was just, oh, the soft, beautiful, soft grass. I know what you're talking about.

[Laura]

I would pull up to the driveway and immediately take my shoes off to walk up to his house because it was just. It's gorgeous grass.

[Emily]

I love that.

[Rob]

He loved an immaculate yard, but I mean, overall it wasn't anything fancy. But he did build a shop and some patios and porches, and he loved being out there on the land. And as we grew up and eventually started our own families and stuff, we just thought our dad and Phyllis had a regular life. Not a luxurious life, but a good, simple life. And our story really doesn't start until 27 years after they got married, when we first started to figure out what was going on. But there were some weird things that happened before that, while we were growing up that were red flags. Although as kids, we didn't really realize it.

[Laura]

So, you know, like you said, we had a pretty good relationship. We spent a lot of time with. I mean, we would visit quite a bit, but, you know, they never really had a whole lot of money. They both had pretty decent jobs. My dad worked for a local university and she worked as a nurse at a doctor's office. So, I mean, decent, but they always just kind of struggled financially. But as kids, there were rumors about her in our family, there were rumors that she had embezzled some money in the 80s from a previous employer.

[Emily]

Oh, wow.

[Laura]

Yeah. But, you know, we were kids, so nobody really ever confirmed anything for us. We just heard the rumblings. Yeah, yeah.

[Hannah]

Like really young. Or were you old enough to be like. I know what the word embezzlement means.

[Laura]

Yeah, I knew what embezzlement. Cause I was 10 about when they got married, and we heard them all growing up into our adulthood, but nobody would ever really confirm anything for us. You know, we had heard that the doctor's office that she had worked for, she got fired because she had stole his credit card and went on a cross country trip with it. Oh, yeah.

[Rob]

Paid for gas. Yeah.

[Laura]

And actually we heard that from our grandpa. And we'll get into more of that a little bit later. But, you know, there was always some things that were just off. Like back during that time, it was like, if you switch cell phone providers, you had to switch cell phone numbers. And so it'd be like, well, we got a new phone number because this cell phone provider made us mad. And so we just decided we were done with them and we're going to switch. And that would happen over and over and over again. Like with the cable company or who provided their dumpster. Because we do live in a country town, you know, small rural area. But it was always stuff like that. There were rumors that I'm really fixing to show my age here, but do you remember the Finger Hut catalogs? Yes.

[Emily]

No, I. I think I still get them.

[Laura]

No way.

[Emily]

Yeah. I swear to you, I think we still get Finger Hut.

[Laura]

So it's basically like the Home Shopping Network where you can buy. Oh, like buy a thing and then. Yeah, like a QVC and then you make payments.

[Emily]

Magazine. And it's.

[Laura]

Yeah, it was a magazine. It was a book. Like, you get it in the mail.

[Hannah]

Yeah, that's a paper thing that you read for the kids that are even younger than me. Just so you know.

[Laura]

Oh, man. We really just aged ourselves.

[Hannah]

Laura.

[Laura]

I am. I'm telling on myself big time. But there was a rumor that she had used the Finger Hut catalog and ordered all of mine and Rob's Christmas out of it, but used my uncle's credit. Like, used his name and purchased it through his credit.

[Hannah]

So I love that this is all rumors, too. I'm imagining your family. Yeah, no, like, at a party, kind of like, did you hear? And it just gets changed.

[Laura]

My dad has several brothers, and so it's not like it's a small family event. When we talk about rumors, I mean, it's like it's multiple people talking. One of the other brothers alleged that she stole his wife's wedding ring. Of course, she denied it. Dad denied. It was like, no, no, no. But they were the only ones in the house. You know, the wife went in and washed her hands after she used the bathroom. Laid it on a shelf.

[Emily]

Oh, yeah.

[Hannah]

Oh, no. I mean, but they confronted them.

[Laura]

They did. And of course not. She would never do that. You know, so we heard all these rumors growing up, but there was never anything definitive.

[Emily]

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[Hannah]

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[Emily]

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[Hannah]

Yeah, I'm more like your husband. Well, I'll fall asleep and I'll be like, why Is it so cold? And then I wake up and I'm like, why am I sweating like a crazy person? Like I before Miracle, I was all over the place. So this is, this is a miracle.

[Laura]

Yeah.

[Emily]

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[Hannah]

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[Laura]

In 2000 again. I'm aging myself. I had moved out and was living in another town. And my dad called me and he's like, phyllis really screwed up. And I was like, oh, yeah. And he said that she had wrote some hot checks and forged his name. And they came after him because it was his hot checks.

[Emily]

Oh, no.

[Laura]

And so, I mean, he almost went to jail. It was a whole entire thing. Yes. But he said that they got to the police station and the officer was basically saying, here are your options. You can pay these off or you can go to jail. And he said before he could even say anything, Phyllis was like, we'll pay him, we'll pay him, we'll pay him. So I guess she did or he did. I'm not sure I was gonna say.

[Hannah]

Is she paying them off?

[Laura]

I don't know. I mean, of course.

[Hannah]

Why'd she do that?

[Laura]

I don't know. And this is just a brief story from dad. We don't even know all the details because he just kind of, like, skirted around it. And I told him, I was like, well, you know, dad, let's just. The university that he worked at had a campus in the town that I was living. I'm like, cut ties. Just come move over here. I've got a huge apartment. You can come live with me. You know, start fresh and all that. And he was like, no, no, it'll be fine. She's getting some help. We later found out that help means she was reading a self help book. But, you know.

[Emily]

Stop, stop.

[Laura]

No, for real. Yeah, that's. Yeah. I don't even know if she made it through the book. But around that time. So the university that my dad worked at, he had to wear a uniform, and he started breaking out in this really mysterious rash. And he spent. I don't even know how many weeks he spent at the doctor. They were calls, you know, just. They couldn't. They took samples. They did all the things that doctors do. Couldn't figure out what it was. And so, as you can tell, my family wasn't a fan. And so I had an aunt that basically stood up and accused her of poisoning my dad.

[Hannah]

Wait, like, fully? At, like a dinner table? Stood up?

[Laura]

Or just started rumoring, I think it was to her face. Again, this was when we were kids, so we're hearing all this third hand, but the story was told to me by my aunt, but, you know, she administers his medicine even to this day. But the minute that she made the accusation, miraculously, the rash cleared up. So what? Yeah. So my dad had been through all the allergy testing. He had been through all the allergy medications. Nothing was working. And then all of a sudden, it just mysteriously clears up. But the excuse was that, oh, the laundry detergent they were using at the university to wash his uniforms, he was allergic to. You know, it was this long, drawn out story, and we were just kind.

[Hannah]

Of like, that's fishy.

[Laura]

It is fishy. But we're like, glad he's better, you know? And then several years down the road, my dad drove. It was a 1994. Is that right, Rob?

[Rob]

1994 Ford pickup truck.

[Laura]

Yeah. So it was an older pickup. And if you know anything about these older pickups, they don't accelerate or break as fast as what we drive now. But they were unloading, like a. A dresser or a desk. I'm not sure what it was. Onto the deck at dad's house. And so he got out and was given directions, like, you know, to back up or turn, you know, whatever. And Phyllis was driving, and all of a sudden she guns it. And my dad almost gets pinned to the deck. And of course he goes and he's like, you almost killed me. You almost killed me. And she said, I thought it was the gas. I thought it was the gas, but this.

[Rob]

Oh, she thought it was the break.

[Laura]

Yeah, she said she thought.

[Emily]

Yeah, she thought it was the break.

[Hannah]

She's like, oops, I missed. I just admitted it.

[Laura]

It was the wrong pedal.

[Hannah]

But, oh, my goodness.

[Laura]

The funny thing is, is that she pushed it so hard, it left ruts in the yard. Like, it wasn't just like she was trying.

[Rob]

That's what I mean.

[Laura]

We're assuming. Allegedly.

[Emily]

Allegedly.

[Laura]

But the thing is, is that Rob's driven the truck. I've driven the truck. It wasn't just like you had to push the gas to go. It wasn't like it was a simple little mistake. She got into the.

[Rob]

You had to make an effort to.

[Hannah]

Yeah, you have to want to.

[Rob]

Yes.

[Hannah]

Yeah. Ooh.

[Laura]

Yeah. And so we kind of always started with these red flags, but there were several instances along the way that kind of kept those red flags up.

[Hannah]

I want more. Tell me more. Give us all the flags.

[Rob]

So some more flags. As we got older, we had our own cell phones and stuff like that, our own lives. And we started getting phone calls from these little tote, the note loan places, asking for Phyllis, you know, those high.

[Laura]

Interest, unsecured payday loans, payday type loans and different things like that.

[Rob]

And Laura and I always talk, and we were like, surely dad has to know about all of these Loans that we're getting these phone calls on. How could he not, you know? So we also.

[Hannah]

Why are they calling you?

[Rob]

Yeah, right. So apparently she had put. Phyllis, had put us down as references on these loans.

[Emily]

Why would she do that?

[Laura]

Well, you have to have them for the application process.

[Emily]

But why would she put you guys.

[Laura]

I guess she thought that we would just say, okay, I don't. We're not going to do that. Oh, yeah, we know her.

[Emily]

It's fine.

[Laura]

Yeah. I don't know.

[Hannah]

Well, maybe she burnt the bridges with everybody else in her life, probably, or.

[Laura]

Didn'T want anybody else to know and thought that we would sweep it under the R. We kind of did.

[Rob]

We kind of did we. For years. We were. Yeah. Well, I mean, we started getting older at this point, and for the most part, we let them handle their business. We didn't want to interfere. We never really brought it up with dad. We always knew they kind of had a little bit of money problems, and so we thought, you know, what if they need help paying their bills with these loans? Okay. But they just kept coming. And so Laura's family had put some of their horses out on my dad's 10 acres of land, and one of them was pretty injured at one point, and they had to do some treatments on that horse twice a day. And, you know, they. They'd go out and sit on the porch with dad and visit, and my nephew, Laura's son, would tend to the horses. But while they were out there one evening, Laura's husband happened to be with them, and he brought up to the fact that he was starting to get calls on his work cell phone about these loans and that it was becoming a problem. Even his boss had told him, now, let's not do that. My dad would always tell Phyllis about these, and then she would just tell him, oh, it's a scam. And so. Yeah, well, so they had actually had a voicemail that they had saved and played the voicemail for our dad so that he could hear how they were asking for Phyllis. Well, after they played the voicemail, dad kind of blew up and told us that he had warned her not to mess up, not to rack up more debts or he was going to divorce her. And so they kind of just sat there and let dad talk because he started spilling some more information that we hadn't heard of and didn't know. And he revealed that he knew she was on probation for embezzlement for $20,000.

[Laura]

Okay, that's not a little number.

[Rob]

Well, she said that it wasn't her fault. She blamed the office manager because she said she knew about her past of embezzlement in the 80s and took advantage of that and put all the blame on her.

[Laura]

But I will tell you, the embezzlement in the 80s she blamed on her ex husband, said he was abusive and he made her take the money. So that wasn't her fault either.

[Emily]

Well, it's always someone else's fault.

[Rob]

So during this conversation, dad was like, if I do decide to divorce her, I do not want to lose my land. I need to figure out whose name the land is in. So, you know, it really wasn't a shock when he was telling this because, again, we knew they weren't good with money. All the rumors we had heard growing up, but this was kind of the first time we've had the acknowledgement of some embezzlement and stuff like that.

[Hannah]

To be like, what? We had no idea. Or did he know y' all were talking?

[Laura]

No, we just kind of sat there because, I mean, he was word vomiting at this point.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Laura]

And I was just like, oh, yeah, really?

[Hannah]

Oh, you were like, oh, no.

[Laura]

Yeah, you don't say. And because it was just rapid fire. Just rapid fire information.

[Rob]

So our dad confronted Phyllis that night about the voicemail and the loans and the phone calls and stuff like that. And again, she denied it.

[Laura]

So the next day, I was just kind of doing what I do, and I was like, I wonder whose name the land is in. Oh, yes. I went on to the public information, the appraisal district, and I looked up the address, and it was not my dad's name. And so you can pull up the deed history. And on the deed history, it said blue Goose Manufacturing. Jacob Stone, Phyllis Jacob Stone.

[Emily]

Wait, what?

[Laura]

Yeah, so I was really confused by what I was seeing. And I even called the appraisal district, and I'm like, hey, can you explain this to me? Like, is this right? Has something not been updated? And they're like, no, what you're looking at is accurate. So I called Rob and I filled him in on what I was looking at. And I'm like, what is going on? Like, dad doesn't own the land. What is going on? So we're like, who is Jacob Stone? We don't know Jacob Stone. And Rob, being who Rob is, is at work, and he gets on Google. And Jacob Stone is a landowner and land developer in the bigger city closest to us.

[Hannah]

Oh, man.

[Emily]

What?

[Laura]

Yeah. So he calls Jacob Stone's office. Well, luckily, it's a small office. And Jacob Stone and the secretary are the only two people in that building. And Jacob Stone answers the phone, and Rob asks him, can you tell me about this? Do you know who this is? Are you familiar with this address? And he said, oh, yeah, I know who that is. I foreclosed on that land years ago. And she called me, and his words were bawling and squalling and begged me not to kick them off the land. And so we came to an agreement to pay $150 a month rent.

[Hannah]

Wait. Oh, my gosh.

[Laura]

What? Yeah.

[Hannah]

So she has been keeping this the whole time?

[Laura]

Yeah.

[Rob]

Yes.

[Laura]

And I'm talking, like, he foreclosed in the land in 1993.

[Emily]

What?

[Laura]

And this was 2018.

[Hannah]

He's like, yeah, these are my most reliable tenants.

[Laura]

No. He was like, she's always behind. She's always. He's like, that's how you always got bounce checks. She's been late. He's like, there was a time that she was ahead on the payments but got really behind. He's like, no. He goes, I remember it. And so we just kind of are like, what's going on?

[Emily]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

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[Laura]

But you know what?

[Hannah]

I'm just telling you what Paired makes happen for you and your Love life. I think it's great for couples to make time daily to connect and learn to communicate better. Open up more. Some of the topics are a little more difficult like finances, which we are obviously being reminded to discuss with our partners, or cute things like your morning routine. And you learn new things about each other. So head to pear.com datingdetectives to get a 7 day free trial and 25% off if you sign up for a subscription. Just head to P A I r e d.com dating detectives to sign up today.

[Emily]

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[Laura]

So I went that afternoon. You know, we had to go and treat the horses Again. And I told him what I found out. I won't forget that day because my dad really prided himself on that land. And to be the one to have to tell him that he didn't own it and he's been renting it for the last 20 something years.

[Emily]

Dude. Heartbreaking.

[Laura]

The look on his face, I'll never forget. Like, this whole thing, it's just welded into my mind.

[Emily]

Could you imagine?

[Hannah]

Your dad sounds like such a softy, too.

[Emily]

I know.

[Hannah]

Just, like, taking such good care of his home and, like, trying to believe that Phyllis is not dogfish.

[Laura]

Yeah. I can't imagine he's still like, I don't understand. How could that be possible? So Phyllis was at work, and of course he's texting her, and he's like, I have a deed. I don't understand. You know, like, I haven't.

[Emily]

How is this possible?

[Laura]

And so he went to the lockbox and he pulled out the deed. And it, I mean, wasn't like a piece of paper. It was an actual trifold thing, and it was notarized and everything. So I'm like, I don't know, dad, you know? And so I told him, here's what we found out, and you're renting the land. So he kind of was panicking, and he's like, well, I don't know what to do, because they had planned a trip to go out of town that weekend. And he's like, well, I don't want to leave her here with all my possessions, but I also don't want to go spend all this time with her over the weekend. Like, what do I do? And I was like, I don't. I don't know, dad. Like, this is your choice. I can't make this decision for you. And so he decided to take her with him.

[Rob]

Yep. So while they were gone on that trip, Lauren and I discussed what we should do because we were afraid for dad and wanted to see if there's any way we could protect him. And so we went and talked to a family member that was a lawyer for some advice. We told her the details we had at the time, and she was able to access court records and public records. So she pulled up Phyllis's name, and she told us that she was not on probation for $20,000 embezzlement, but for $135,000.

[Hannah]

Where did the rest of that money come from? That can't all be from. Wait, so it was the credit card that she took on the road trip?

[Rob]

No, this was embezzlement from an employer.

[Hannah]

This is totally different.

[Rob]

Totally different. Yeah. She did tell us that she could see the embezzlement from the 80s, but she couldn't see all the documents and everything like that because they were too old to be digitalized at that point. But we did eventually go to the courthouse and pull the records, and it was for $193,000.

[Hannah]

Just the 80s one?

[Rob]

Yes.

[Hannah]

Oh, boy. Okay.

[Rob]

So the one in. In 2012, or actually it was 2010, was for the $136,000 or 135. I'm sorry.

[Emily]

Holy buckets. That's a lot of money.

[Rob]

It's a lot of money. So we asked her if there was any advice she could give us, but she said there really wasn't much that she could give us in form of what to do. She did tell us that she was currently on probation for the embezzlement. Kind of told us what the terms of the probation were, that she couldn't leave the country, let alone the surrounding counties, without permission from a judge. But we were well aware it is.

[Laura]

It was a big deal.

[Rob]

And we are well aware of several trips that they took out of town. She went out of state with my father. She actually even went out of the country on a cruise with me and my wife. And we did not know at the time that she was a felon.

[Laura]

But the funny thing was, on that one, you know, we were like, oh, are you excited? Are you going to get your passport? And she was like, no, we're just going to take our birth certificates and driver's license because it's just going to be a lot easier and we don't want to mess with the whole passport process.

[Rob]

But she couldn't get a passport.

[Hannah]

Yes.

[Laura]

Or she. Or they would have flagged her. Yes.

[Hannah]

They're like, why do you need a passport?

[Rob]

But we look back on it now and we say, man, me and my wife, we could have been possibly caught for aiding in a bed. Who knows?

[Hannah]

Oh, my goodness. Imagine getting caught for just helping a.

[Laura]

Felon go on a cruise and not knowing she was a felon.

[Rob]

That's horrible, right? Yeah.

[Hannah]

But she did have her. Your dad did know that she was on probation. For some. It was like she told a small truth.

[Rob]

Correct.

[Laura]

I don't know if he knew she was on probation. Like, I don't know when he was became aware of her being on probation. Because when she was on probation, when they got married and she didn't tell him then, like, it was five years into their marriage that she told him she was on probation. So I don't know if she had to, for whatever reason, I don't know. In her second stint of probation, how far into it she. She let dad know that she was on probation or he knew the whole time. We don't know.

[Rob]

Yeah. So they were heading back home from this out of town trip, and dad called Laura. Phyllis had called and straightened everything out with Jacob Stone's office. There was a clerical error, and it was not.

[Emily]

Praise God. I was worried.

[Rob]

And it was filed in the wrong county, but they were taking care of the issue. He said that they only owed $10,000 more on the land and it would be his. But Laura told dad. She was like, that's not true, dad. You don't own the land. She also informed dad about the embezzlement being for 135,000, not the $20,000.

[Emily]

Laura, how hard was that to tell your dad?

[Laura]

Yeah, at that point, I was mad, and I actually was at the gas station filling up my car to go to his house to again treat the horse. And so I was like, no, dad, that's not what happened.

[Emily]

So you're trying to get through to him?

[Laura]

Yeah. I'm like, you don't own anything. You don't own the land. You are a renter. You don't owe $10,000. You owe $150 next month for your rent. And I was like, oh, and by the way, she's not on probation for 20,000. She's on probation for 135,000. I was hot at that point.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Laura]

So I get it.

[Hannah]

Oh, my gosh.

[Laura]

Yeah.

[Rob]

Yeah. Well, then dad tried to call me and tell me the exact same thing. He said, oh, we called and got it taken care of. And I told him. I was like, dad, that doesn't sound right. And that's not what it says. So after I hung up with dad, I called Jacob Stone's office, and I asked him if they had spoken with anybody over the weekend regarding the land. And they both, him and his secretary confirmed that neither of them had spoken to anyone. So I called dad back, and I said, dad, she's lying to you. I spoke with Mr. Stone, and he said they did not talk to anybody. And my dad's literal words were, you've got to be shitting me.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Rob]

And so Laura and I again called each other and talked. And we headed out to dad's house. And as we got there, she. Or as I got there first, she was packing up her car. He was kicking her out of the house. And I think she had already left by the time Laura got to the house. But when we got in there, dad showed us a letter that he had received from Jacob Stone's office that stated the clerical error and apologized for the mistake. But at the bottom of this letter was a blue Goose, which had nothing to do with Jacob Stone's office. It was the manufacturer of the trailer house that they lived in.

[Emily]

Oh, no. Are you serious?

[Rob]

And it was a completely fake document. Like, she typed.

[Hannah]

She's like, nobody will know.

[Rob]

This looks official on Word document. And handed it to him. And she signed a secretary's name. That didn't even work for them. No, like, it was all fake Ford signatures made up fake names. It was completely fake.

[Laura]

The letterhead was really bad. I mean, you know, it was done in a Microsoft Word font. She even said it was Jacob Stone's company. It was the wrong name of the company. And then she put DBA as Blue Goose Manufacturing, you know, to cover. To cover that, because dad knew that that was on the deed history. But I always freak out about the Blue Goose because that means she left work when dad called her, went and found somewhere in our town a blue goose stamp because it's literally blue, and then tried to pass it off. It always blows me away.

[Hannah]

Does she think y' all are stupid, or does she think she's genius?

[Laura]

I don't know. I guess we should probably say that my dad. Because she took care of everything. My dad is not technologically savvy. You know, he's handed everything to her. So he didn't question it because it looked like letterhead from what he's seen for his entire life. And he didn't know to question it. He didn't know that she could do that on the computer, because he doesn't use a computer.

[Hannah]

Totally. And that's why it's so easy and sad when people target people like him. But see, none of this, you guys.

[Rob]

None of this made sense to us because we were like, surely dad has to see his bank statements and see that. That $150 a month is coming out. He told us that he balances his checkbook every month. And so we're like, okay, so how is that working? So we were just really confused and starting to really become upset with everything that we were uncovering. Yeah. But what happened next just kind of fell in our laps. Over the next few days, dad had a dentist appointment scheduled to actually get a tooth pulled. And so Laura said she would take him and run by the bank to put some safeguards on his Checking account and his savings account so that Phyllis couldn't drain them since he had just kicked her out.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Emily]

You guys, we just partnered with Skims, and we've been converted a hundred thousand percent. Like, I'm so excited about this. So whenever we work with a new company or a new advertiser on our podcast, we like to share our authentic, genuine thoughts. So they are like, okay, well, pick out a product that you want and try it. So of course, we both did.

[Hannah]

Oh, yeah.

[Emily]

And, Hannah, what did you get?

[Hannah]

So I got from the Fits Everybody collection, I got some underwear, and then I got two bralettes, the most comfortable ever. But I love. You were freaking out because you were like, wait, I've never found a bra that is like this. Yeah, talk about it, Talk about it.

[Emily]

Okay, so listen. So with the bras, I have been up to £300. Now I'm down to £139. Like, I've lost a lot of weight. I've been so many weights in between. My body isn't a hard body. It's very soft. And so there's a lot of squeezes happening, and I think a lot of women can relate to that. And so all the bras and panties that I find are very squeezy. So when you put on your clothes over them, you can see the lumps and bumps, and it's very like where your underwear hits at the waist or where the bra comes under your arms.

[Hannah]

Or you've got the line digging into the wrong section to the side of your boob.

[Emily]

Yes.

[Hannah]

And you're, like, scooping and scooping as much as you can. It's not working. I get that.

[Emily]

And so I was so skeptical. I was like, all right, let me try a bra and a panties. And I got the Fit Everybody collection, and I got the cheeky briefs. And when I tell you this stretch around the waistband especially, it doesn't do the super squeezy thing. It just fits you perfectly.

[Hannah]

It sits right there.

[Emily]

Even if you have. Even if you have a soft belly or like a soft. Like, my butt is kind of, like, squishy. You know what I'm talking about? And so I just feel. Feel so pretty and so comfortable. And I just feel like it's some great basics to have that actually make me feel pretty, even under my clothes. After having my son, my breasticles got. My breasts got a little soft, and they change their shape, and so I need a lift. Like, I need an underwire. And their underwire bras, that T shirt bra is just it fits perfectly. It doesn't do the squeezy thing and make your fat pop out everywhere. It is so perfectly comfortable and everything is just so perfect. Shop Skims the Fits everybody [e-mail] and after you place your order, be sure to let them know that we sent you. So select podcast in the survey. Be sure to select our show in the dropdown menu that follows.

[Laura]

So he was really worried about that dentist appointment. And he was like, you know, what am I going to do? She was supposed to take me to the dentist. And I'm like, I've got you, dad. I'll take you to the dentist. No big deal. So we went to the dentist, and he's retired from that university. And he had been retired for about five years at that point. And he was on disability as well because he'd had a pretty substantial back injury. And so while they were out of town, his retirement check was supposed to have posted. So he was very concerned about making sure that his money was safe. And so we got to the bank and there was maybe $100 in the account.

[Hannah]

No.

[Laura]

No. So I had the bank teller pull the most recent statement transactions, and I asked him for a pen or a highlighter so I could mark the transactions that dad wasn't aware of. And I started asking dad, I'm like, do you recognize this one? And he's like, no. And we started highlighting, and it ended up being almost the whole entire page.

[Hannah]

So it wasn't that she had just drained it right then. It was just that she, over time, that he never noticed. Yeah.

[Laura]

And well, and here's the thing. She wasn't on the account. It was his account only. And so. Oh, yeah, that's. How did. That's the question that we were starting to ask. So when I started highlighting, you could see the look on the banker's face was like, oh, no. And so I just looked at him and I was like, can you pull the last four years of statements? Because that was where that last indictment was. And that's as far back as I could think in that moment was, well, let's just go back to her indictment. And so they moved us over to a desk and they printed out four years of statements.

[Hannah]

They're like, they need to stay here a little while.

[Laura]

Yeah. It ended up being like two or three reams of paper. I mean, you know, it's like it was stacked high. And dad is looking at me and he's like, I don't understand. He goes, I have my statements. I don't Understand what's going on. And I'm like, I don't know, dad. Let's just figure this out and we'll go from there. Like, let's just get this and we'll go home. So he's looking. I mean, he now has very little money in the bank, you know, was just supposed to have been paid. And he's like, you know What? I've got $8,000 at the credit union. Let's go to the credit union and see if I can withdraw some money. He said, but it's being held by the IRS because she messed up on her taxes. And let's just see if we can talk to somebody and withdraw the money or, you know, how long it'll be. Of course, before we left there, we changed his account. We put every safeguard on it we possibly could and started driving over to the credit union. And we get to the credit union and sit down, and his savings account is overdrawn by $5. And so, of course, dad is sitting there talking to this gentleman and was like, you know, supposed to be the IRS is holding the money. And he's like, no, sir, they don't do that. And he's like, but my statements say that the IRS is holding my money. And he's like, no, sir. And there had never been $8,000 in that account.

[Hannah]

Oh, my goodness.

[Laura]

My dad sat there and his mouth was hanging open and, you know, that bloody gauze in his mouth like, he, yeah.

[Hannah]

Oh, my gosh, that's the worst day ever.

[Laura]

He just. God, he couldn't even process what was going on. Well, neither could I. So I was like, can you print me the last four years of statements? And they did. And so I got to looking, you know, as the banks was printing out the documents, I could see where, you know, how you get the little photocopy of the checks you write on the back of your statements. She had been writing herself checks for cash and forging my dad's name. And it was amounts like $1,200, $800.

[Emily]

Oh, my God, that's a lot of money.

[Laura]

Yeah, Sometimes it was $30, but she was constantly writing herself checks. And my dad's like, I do not understand what is going on. And I was like, I don't either, dad. But because we had those forged checks and he was mad enough and I was mad enough, we instantly drove back to our county and I took it to the sheriff's office, and I'm like, look, these are forged. She's not on the account. Like, what? What can we do. And they said, there's nothing you can do because it's considered marital property. And if he gave her access to his debit card, even one time, it's considered access.

[Emily]

Yep.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Laura]

So there was nothing we can do, so.

[Emily]

Oh, no.

[Laura]

We started driving back to my dad's house, and I called Rob, and I was like, I need your help. Because at this point, I had a stack of papers that was probably 2 foot tall of bank statements. And so the whole way home, my dad was just like, I don't understand. I have my statements. I'm like, we'll figure it out when we get home. Dad, like, I don't know. And he's like, I just don't understand. I just don't understand. And.

[Emily]

Oh, I bet he was devastated.

[Laura]

It was. He was very confused. And of course, he was texting her the entire time. And she's like, I don't know. It's a mistake. Something's wrong. I don't know. She had a million excuses or. I don't.

[Emily]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

And she's not living at the house right now. Right. She'd left.

[Rob]

She had been kicked out.

[Hannah]

She'd been kicked out. But he's. She's still denying stuff.

[Laura]

Wow. Oh, yeah.

[Hannah]

Wow, wow, wow.

[Laura]

So we got there, and dad was so just confused that he had a filing cabinet in this back bedroom, and he just went and took everything out of the filing cabinet and just put it on the table. And there was a shoebox that he had that he had kept his statements for the last seven years for tax purposes in case he needed it. And we got to looking at them, and they were word documents with the bank's logo on it. And you could see the typos, where the dates were wrong, or there were.

[Hannah]

Like, you know, like, the font's a little different. It's not that hard to do that.

[Laura]

Nope. But you could see where my dad very diligently took that piece of paper and balanced his checkbook. According to the fake statement. She even went as far. So what we found out that she was doing, she was putting the mail on hold, like a vacation hold. And then she would go to the actual post office, pick up the mail, pull out what she didn't want my dad to see, take the time to adjust the bank statements, because even on the savings account statement, she went as far as to calculate the interest so that every month my dad could see interest gaining on the account.

[Emily]

That's so much work.

[Laura]

So much work. But she would make the bank statement, put it in an envelope Put the bank's logo on it, run it through the postage meter at work. So it had the little red mark on it.

[Emily]

Oh, my God.

[Laura]

Drive it home when my dad wasn't there and put it in the mailbox. So my dad, when he checked the mail, had this unopened envelope where he could balance his checkbook with.

[Emily]

And he didn't think nothing of it?

[Laura]

Well, no. Why would you.

[Hannah]

I would never. Oh, my goodness gracious.

[Laura]

Wow. And how long.

[Hannah]

So we had documents going back how far of her doing this the whole time?

[Laura]

Well, he had seven years of statements I only had four years of. But my dad had never seen a real bank statement. So we're talking probably 27 years.

[Emily]

Oh, my God. This wins longest dogfish maybe.

[Hannah]

I mean, seriously, this is wild. Okay, that's crazy.

[Laura]

As far as we can figure, he's never seen a real bank statement the entire time he was married to her. So we poured through. I mean, took.

[Rob]

It took us a long time.

[Laura]

And in the meantime, I'm having to teach dad, like, how to buy groceries and how do. We had to show him how to use the banking app so he could see what was coming and going and how to use his ATM card. He had no clue how to use his ATM card or how it worked.

[Emily]

So the certain generations are so focused on the statements, and it's so anti digital. It's very paper. And for her to recreate all of that, first of all, takes forever. Could you imagine?

[Hannah]

And I'm sure she kept him that way. I'm sure she was like, no, no, you don't need to learn how to use that.

[Laura]

It was controlled 100%. It was.

[Emily]

Yeah, yeah.

[Laura]

It was so controlling. So after we found that out, we found on one of the statements that there was a $38,000 deposit. And we didn't know where that came from. And then after sitting down and really figuring out it came from the retirement company that paces retirement, and then There was another $10,000 payment from the Social Security office. Right. And I asked dad about the 38,000. He's like, well, where did that come from? And I'm like, it says the retirement company. He said, but I took the full annuity. I didn't take a lump sum. And so we called the retirement office and they said, yes, you took a two year lump sum payment. He's like, no, I did not. I took the full annuity. And they said, well, we have here that you took a two year lump sum payment. And I'm like, send me the paperwork.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Laura]

So what she had done, she had dad fill out all the paperwork as far as he needed to. Like they notarized it at his office that he was retiring and this is what he was going to get. But then she added documents to it, and you can see we have copies of all of this. I kept everything. I have a Dropbox.

[Emily]

She got receipts.

[Laura]

I do, I do. I've got it all. But she had added documents after the ones that my dad had signed for the lump sum payment. And you can see the pencil marks where she was doing the math to figure out how much less a month my dad was going to get in his retirement payments. What? Yes, she did.

[Emily]

Oh, my God.

[Rob]

So she's stealing from him for the rest of his life?

[Laura]

Yeah, for the rest of his life. So she also wanted to make sure that they didn't contact my dad. So she signed, forged some of the documents. And you can always tell when she forges because my dad's left handed, so his signature tilts to the left, hers tilts to the right. But she's very good at that signature.

[Hannah]

So other than this, she's gotten a lot of practice. It sounds like a lot.

[Rob]

A lot.

[Laura]

So if it wasn't for the tilt, you almost couldn't tell which signature was which. So she wrote a letter to the retirement company and said, dear sirs, which is how she starts all these letters that we've been finding. I elect not to purchase the rollover service. Like, she wanted to make sure that nothing was done, you know, that would contact dad for any, any information. And then she signed it and put my dad's Social Security number. And that was part of the paperwork. So that $38,000 went into the bank, and then the $10,000 was back pay for his disability payments, and he never saw any of that money at all. And looking through the bank statements, it was what I think we calculated under, yeah, the money was gone two months, but we don't know where the money went.

[Hannah]

I was going to say at that point now it's like, okay, we know she's stealing a lot. What's she doing with it?

[Laura]

Exactly. But there's no proof of it. They don't live in a nice house, they don't drive nice cars. You know, we discussed, like, if she was an alcoholic at some point there would have been some kind of indication or if she was a drug addict, if there was some kind of something going on like that we would have known at some point.

[Rob]

Maybe gambling debts, we don't know.

[Laura]

We don't know. So I spent two weeks in the car with dad because every bill that you could possibly imagine was completely behind his cell phone was about to be shut off the dumpster. They were about to come pick that up. His property taxes were 10 years behind.

[Emily]

Ten years, because she had also.

[Laura]

And the sad thing is, is that the taxes there wasn't a lot because all he was paying on was that he lived in a little bitty trailer house because the land he didn't owe, so he wasn't paying property taxes on the land. So it was maybe $250 a year.

[Rob]

But she was faking it and making it seem like he was paying the taxes on the land.

[Hannah]

I was gonna say. So she was just. She was the IRS to him. She's collecting.

[Laura]

Well, she made a fake statement. She.

[Hannah]

Oh, my God.

[Laura]

Every year she would make a fake property tax statement, but she would blow the numbers up. So she would say that every year he owed, like, $1,800 or something like that. And he would write the check. And then we later found out she would tear the check up, go get the cash and keep it herself.

[Hannah]

That's crazy.

[Laura]

Yeah, crazy. So dad and I were in the car, and, you know, they had just went on that trip out of town, and we went to the insurance agency, the car insurance, and he had the card, but his policy had lapsed. He didn't have insurance. And.

[Hannah]

And so. And these people calling him for these late bills and whatnot. She's probably just in her, like, getting in the. She's blocking him.

[Laura]

She's taking them. I took care of that. They were wrong. You know, she's got it.

[Hannah]

It was a mistake for everything.

[Emily]

She's like, oh, my God, she's intercepting everything.

[Laura]

Yes. And it's all like, oh, well, I've got it. You don't worry about it. I'll take care of this. It's the same sweet, you know, I'm taking care of you type of vibe. And my dad was like, okay, she made it easy for him, and he thought she was doing it out of love. You love me so much. You're going to take care of this. You know, the part that absolutely broke my heart is we had been just. The bills were just racking up the past due, and we went to the insurance agency, and after we found out that he didn't have insurance, and we had to completely restart a whole new policy for him. And, you know, he never questioned that because he had the insurance card that said it was valid in the car. Like, who questions that he got in the car and he was like, I don't know what I'm going to do. He said, I do have a CD in the bank. It has some money in it. And he said, but that was for y'.

[Hannah]

All.

[Laura]

He said, that was for you and Rob, man. Sorry.

[Hannah]

No, he started, you know, I can't imagine.

[Laura]

He started sobbing in the car. He was like, I wanted to leave that to y', all and I didn't want to have to use that. He's like, certainly not to do this with it. And so I had to sit there and watch my dad cry for quite a while. And, you know, if I would have had the money to fix it all, I would have. And same for Rob.

[Rob]

Absolutely.

[Laura]

Sorry.

[Hannah]

No, don't apologize at all.

[Emily]

That is terrible.

[Hannah]

And also, it's like just another reminder that when people do something like this, it does not affect one person.

[Laura]

No.

[Hannah]

It's such a ripple effect.

[Laura]

And my dad's a really strong guy and to see him break like, that was just. It was about all I could take. So we finally, you know, we got through all of it. Looking through the paperwork, we saw where she was writing the checks to herself, but she would also go to the ATM almost every day and take out the daily maximum, which was like $600.

[Emily]

Oh, my God.

[Hannah]

Did she even have a job? Did she, like, go to work or was this her full time job?

[Laura]

Yeah, no, she. Well, she had several jobs along the way. You know, she had the doctor's office, which, you know, we heard rumors that she got fired for stealing the doctor's credit card. She worked at a real estate agency where she said she quit because she was working up front in the office and they wanted to give her more responsibility and she didn't want that. So she quit. And there she was taking photos of the houses and delivering their magazines that they had. So she quit that job. And then she had the property management company that she actually embezzled from, but she told us that that company got bought out, so she had to find another job.

[Hannah]

But then she's got an excuse for everything.

[Laura]

She's got an excuse for everything. She found a job at a local television station in the bigger city that's next to us, and she's worked there since.

[Rob]

She's still there?

[Laura]

Yeah, no, she's. She was gainfully employed. So it. I mean, it was crazy. But we couldn't track down where the cash was going. Like, where. Where was the money? I mean, there's literally nothing to show for it. There's no Toys, No.

[Emily]

Fancy cars, no. Boat. Nothing.

[Laura]

Not even, like, fancy shoes or purses, like. Or personal care, like, hair make, like, none of that. There was nothing to show for the money at all. So he did go ahead and get the money out of his CD to take care. Because it was just too much. It was. There was just too much piling up. And so he did go ahead and take the money out. And we did get him on some solid footing. You know, we got him bills paid and property taxes. We got those settled. I mean, at one point, we. We told him, we need to pull your credit because we need to find out exactly what's out there, what you owe. And his credit score was like a 300. I didn't even know that that number existed. I didn't even know that number existed for a credit score. He probably thought it was good because.

[Hannah]

She probably gave him a report.

[Emily]

Yeah, terrible.

[Laura]

So we were working to get everything taken care of for him, and he did want to file for divorce, which. Thank God.

[Hannah]

Yeah.

[Laura]

So the lawyer that we worked with to get the information previously that we told us about her probation, all that she did help us try and get him divorced.

[Rob]

Yeah, we filed for Phyllis, like, we.

[Hannah]

No, I didn't do any of this. Did she fight it?

[Rob]

Oh, she was. Swear. Still denying everything.

[Laura]

Hardcore.

[Rob]

Hardcore.

[Hannah]

And she didn't. Did she want to get a divorce or. She.

[Rob]

Told our dad that despite what the paperwork says, she's still married to him. She was like, I don't care that.

[Laura]

It doesn't mean anything to me.

[Rob]

It doesn't mean anything. Yeah. They filed for divorce two days before their 28th anniversary.

[Laura]

It became final.

[Rob]

Yeah.

[Laura]

Yeah, yeah.

[Hannah]

Thank God. Wow, That's a long time.

[Laura]

Yeah.

[Rob]

Yeah.

[Emily]

This is wild.

[Rob]

So, okay, so Phyllis. Yeah, Phyllis started actually going back over to my dad's house, and she would cry to him and tell him that she didn't have any money for food, that she didn't have money to go do her laundry at a Laundromat. And so she would need to come over. And we were told by dad that, oh, it's just on Sundays that she's coming over to do her laundry, and while she's there, oh, she cooks breakfast for me. You know, she's starting to do these little things, and we started to see her leaving things at the house, and so she started creeping her way back in and leaving things and moving in. And Laura and I, we would go over there quite often, and she would constantly be texting him while we were there. And as soon as we Left. She would be coming over to his house because we would pass her on the highway sometimes.

[Hannah]

My gosh. That's like a movie.

[Rob]

And that was the start of her finding a way back into our dad's life and our life as well.

[Hannah]

Oh, no.

[Laura]

Oh, my God.

[Emily]

Phyllis.

[Hannah]

Phyllis. Jinx. I can't the. Believe it or not, there's more to this because this is a 27 year long dogfish story.

[Emily]

That's why we had to make it two parts, you guys. Can you imagine 27 years? It's gotta be a record based on.

[Hannah]

What you've heard so far. I am definitely curious if you have any theories about what's coming next, if you have any thoughts on Phyllis's motivations.

[Emily]

What?

[Hannah]

You know, a little. Obviously, like money. People want money. But like a little bit deeper because I. Oh, I'm interested in what you guys think because this is awful. But I do really love Rob and really love Laura and love that they're listeners too.

[Emily]

I just, I feel so bad. Like, could you imagine if you're. That happens to your parents and that must feel so helpless. What do you do? Like, you're just kind of stuck.

[Hannah]

I. Yeah, I. I'm sure other listeners are gonna sadly be like, yep, been there. And also, just like elderly people are so. Are so easy to manipulate in this way.

[Emily]

Even if you go back to, you know, 25 years, 30 years like that he wasn't as old then. Like, he wasn't. You know what I mean? Like he's agent from the beginning. And you just think about how over that time, like she. You get to know somebody and you just learn how to manipulate them better. And that's terrible.

[Hannah]

Oh, there's. And there's only more to come, so. Oh, in the meantime, we'll see you on Patreon. We'll see you on social at Dating Detectives Podcast all. All the places. And you should email us your stories, especially if you feel like so many times. I love that people are just like, we just want other people to hear the story in case it will help somebody.

[Emily]

Yeah.

[Hannah]

It's just so special.

[Emily]

So I. I love that so much.

[Hannah]

Hit him with the email, girl.

[Emily]

It's Investigate Dating Detectives podcast dot com.

[Hannah]

We love you guys and we need to discuss. Like we just. We need to discuss. So comment DM us. Write us on Patreon.

[Emily]

Keep the conversation going on social and we want to hear what you think's coming next.

[Hannah]

And we will see you on Monday for part two.

[Laura]

Thank you.

[Hannah]

And as always, trust your feminine.

[Laura]

Sam.