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- [00:07]
A
I'm Brett.
- [00:08]
B
And I'm Alice.
- [00:09]
A
And we are the Prosecutors. Today on the Prosecutors, Danny Serafini was a professional athlete and reality TV star. If only that had been enough. Hello, everybody. Hey and welcome to this episode of the Prosecutors. I'm Brett and I'm joined as always by my ringer of a co host, Alice.
- [01:10]
B
Awesome. Definitely not ringer on the baseball field or in any sport really. But podcasting may be. Maybe this is my, this is my varsity sport. Have I lettered in podcasting?
- [01:22]
A
You have, Alice. And you know, whenever somebody has a difficult episode, they should just bring you in to do it. Call to the bullpen. We need the ringer. We need Alice out on mound.
- [01:31]
B
This has nothing to do with me, but you know what? I am very. So you were talking about listening to our early episodes and how cringe we were. Some would say we're still just as cringe now. But what I'm very proud of you about, in five years worth of time, you have finally absorbed my love of having the descriptors match the case. Way to go, Brit.
- [01:51]
A
Finally, I will note this is the second episode in a row involving someone who was a former professional baseball player. So I don't know what that says. I think, I don't know, professional baseball player might be a little much for Barry Morphew, but in this case, Danny Serafini was absolutely an honest to goodness baseball prospect. I'm not going to call him a star because he wasn't that successful, as you will see. But that's probably enough run up. Let's actually tell you who we are talking about today. And this is a case that probably you haven't heard of unless you've just seen this in the news. I don't know that it's really been covered, but it was a case that really jumped out to me and I hope you guys enjoy it. I'll tell you why it jumped out to me in a second. But Daniel Serafini was born on January 25, 1974 in San Francisco, California. He attended Junipero Serra High School in San Mateo, California where he played as a pitcher on the school's baseball team. He was an extraordinary talent. He was a left handed pitcher, which is always something valuable. My son is left handed, so I'm going to have to like get him into the baseball.
- [03:02]
B
I don't think I knew your son was because my oldest is left handed and I'm like, come on, we get a golf, we got a, we got a bat pitch.
- [03:09]
A
Yeah, I mean, there you go. They can Play together on the baseball team, they'll be like, you know, 1 and 2 or whatever. But any of you who know anything about baseball, left handed pitchers are valued just because you don't see him that often. And it presents a little bit of a different challenge to batters. And he actually pitched a playoff no hitter in 1991, which remains the only one in the school's history. In fact, he was so good in 1992, he was drafted to the Minnesota Twins straight from high school. He was a first round draft pick selected as the 26th overall pick. That's pretty serious. The draft goes pretty deep and a lot of people get drafted. But when you're drafting the first round that high, that is the real deal. He began his professional baseball career on a rookie league team, which I'm just gonna be honest with you, I didn't even know existed. I knew about triple A and double A and single A, but apparently there's also these rookie league teams specifically for people who either are drafted from outside the United States or straight out of high school. He played for the GCL just now the fcl. So it used to be the Gulf Coast League, now it's the Florida Coast League Twins. And he was called up to the majors in 1996, where he pitched for the Twins until 1998, and then he.
- [04:31]
B
Was traded to the San Diego Padres in 2000. That same year, after recording an 18 ERA, he was traded again to the Pittsburgh Pirates. But he was released following spring training in March 2001. So we actually have several professional baseball players in our town. Did you know that, like, it's kind of a really big baseball town, so several of my neighbors played pro baseball. And that was one thing that I had not fully appreciated about being a professional sportsman is how much you get traded around. I mean, you truly are living like week by week, even if you're a phenomenal player, the trading among teams, if your contract's too high, all of these things I know presents a special challenge. Just having to move so often and if you have a family that much more, you know, difficult.
- [05:18]
A
And look, I think this highlights just how incredible really successful professional athletes are. Danny Serafini was clearly a talent. He had a lot of talent. He really stood out in California, which is obviously a place with a lot of people. You know, if you can make it there, you can make it anywhere type thing. But he goes to the pros and he's having some issues. I mean, at 18 eras, really bad. You know, you're wanting to be like, I Mean, if you're a one or a two, you're amazing, but you want it to be much lower than that. And you can see why it's being traded. He's trying to find his footing. He's trying to find his place in the major leagues. But because of all that potential and all that talent he obviously had, there are teams that are willing to continue to take chances on him. So, as Alice said, he keeps sort of moving around, but he's not really finding success.
- [06:05]
B
So he didn't play in the major leagues in the 2001 or 2002 seasons, instead returning to the minor leagues. He bounced around various minor league teams, even playing for the Chinese Professional Baseball League in Taiwan and later in the Mexican League. In August 2003, his contract was purchased by the Cincinnati Reds. After an unsuccessful run with the Reds, he was granted free agencies. From 2004 to 2007, Serafini joined Nippon Professional Baseball in Japan, and on July 31, 2007, he returned to the major leagues yet again. He initially signed a minor league contract with the Colorado Rockies until September 2007, when his contract was purchased by the major league club of the same franchise. But he again became a free agent when the 2007 season ended after recording a 54 ERA in three games.
- [07:01]
A
An ERA is an earned run average. So, you know, 54 is not great. Like I said, you want it to be much lower than that. If you're giving up 54 runs, it's gonna be hard for your team to win. And that's just not the kind of production that's going to lead to success. And look, at this point, he's been in the league where he was drafted in 1992, so he's kind of getting up there. So it's not necessarily surprising what happens next. In November 2007, he tests positive for performing enhancement drugs. So, I mean, basically, he's getting older. He's not having a lot of success. He turns to steroids to try and get an edge, to sort of get back to what he used to be. And he suspended for 50 games after he tests positive. Now he says, look, he was taking prescribed substances in Japan for medical reasons. He stopped taking them when he returned to the US and that this is what caused his test to turn positive. He actually was pretty successful in Japan. I think they won a championship and everything. That sort of springboarded him back into the major leagues, but obviously it didn't work out. Whatever his excuse was, the major leagues weren't listening, and this effectively ended his career, he still returned to the Mexican League where he played off and on until 2012. So that's about a 20 year career. He was drafted in 1992, plays his last game in 2012. And this is why being a professional athlete is so awesome. Because I think we can all say that Danny Serafini's professional career, not that successful. Over the course of it, he made $14 million. So not a bad return for someone.
- [08:45]
B
Who really isn't successful in the major league has to jump all over the world. And by the way, some of you were asking in the chat, was he Chinese or Taiwanese or Japanese, why is he playing all these international leagues? Well, the United States loves baseball. We tend to have better baseball players than the rest of the world where baseball is not like the sport of the national choice. And so oftentimes, like people who can't quite cut it here in the major leagues or even the minor leagues will get drafted to international teams because they're taller, they're faster, they've trained, you know, with the best here in the United States. So he doesn't have ties to those countries. I think the fact that he's going all over the world shows that he's trying to make it work. He's not giving up. A lot of people, by the way, when they're not making it and they have a 54 ERA season, they just step away from the game. But he keeps sticking with it.
- [09:31]
A
I mean, if I was making $14 million, I'd play as long as somebody wanted to, wanted me to. I mean, I don't know, it's hard to say when he made that, that might have been his rookie contract or those early contracts might have been a big chunk of that. But nevertheless, that's a pretty good career. If in your career you made $14 million in your job, you'd probably be pretty happy about it. But unfortunately, Serafini's personal life was about as successful as his professional baseball career. His love life was no better. He had gone through a bitter divorce, which he would later say ate up most of the wealth he had accumulated in the major leagues. I'm just going to go ahead and say that's not true. I'm not sure exactly how much money he lost in the divorce. He didn't lose $14 million. He might have lost a big chunk of it. He didn't lose $14 million. I think he probably spent that money on various other things as well. As we're going to see, he had expensive taste. But in January of 2011, as his baseball career is coming to an end. He finds love again when he marries Aaron Spore. And they had, by all accounts, a successful marriage. They had two sons together that same year, baseball careers ending. He's transitioning. He opens Throw like a pro baseball academy in Sparks, Nevada, which sounds like something that would be very successful. Everybody always wants their kids to be, you know, trained as baseball players. You have a professional guy play for 20 years is coming in. He wants to teach your kid how to throw. I would think that'd be pretty successful, but unclear how successful it was. He also had a sideline. In 2013, the couple opened a bar in Sparks called the Bullpen. Now, this is how I got to know Danny Serafini, because much like his first marriage and his baseball career, his bar also failed. And so he contacted one of my favorite people in the world, John Taffer of Bar Rescue, to come rescue his bar.
- [11:39]
B
So this is true. Brett texts me often during the day while I'm trying to work, saying, this is what's happening on Bar Rescue. This happened for weeks at a time until I finally said, like, is this people losing their bar licenses? What is happening? He's like, no. They literally go save a drinking bar that is not doing well as a business. Do you not watch tv? And I said, no, not the way you do.
- [12:03]
A
Bar Rescue is amazing. I used to watch it back when I lived in D.C. but now I have a television in my office, and it's always on. Like, I've always got the TV on something, right? Because I like to have noise while I'm doing things. So I'm, like, writing briefs and stuff. So sometimes, you know, it'll be on the news or ancient aliens or something like that. But Bar Rescue is also on throughout the day, so if I see Bar Rescue, I'll turn it on. And one thing I like to do. And by the way, I've flown in the same plane as John Taffer twice. He's the only famous person that I've ever flown on a plane with that I know of, other than the Bachelor. I was on a plane with a Bachelor once, and one time it was flying out of Vegas after Crimecon. He was on the plane, which makes sense because he lives in Vegas. And the other time, it was flying to West Palm Beach. I don't know what he was doing West Palm beach, but he was on that plane, too.
- [12:53]
B
So did you talk to him each time?
- [12:54]
A
I didn't. Because, you know, how could you not? John Taffer, the first.
- [12:58]
B
No idea who he is by the.
- [12:59]
A
Way the first time I was getting on the plane and he's on the phone and he's clearly talking about a bar they're rescuing because he's talking to some guy about like we need to do this, this and this. They need to do this thing. If he won't listen, then that's going to be a problem because he's got to change this. It's really. I was like, oh, it's like I'm right there. It's like I'm in the show. Anyway, so his bar was on bar rescue. And he claimed in the show that he had lost that $14 million through a series of bad investments and a divorce settlement. And then he convinced his parents to loan him $240,000 to buy the bullpen. At that point he was in about $300,000 in debt. Now on the show they do what they always do. They remodel the bar, they renamed it the Oak Tavern. And they always show at the end, sort of the six week checkup like how the bar is doing. And sales were up 50% after airing the show. So the thing I always do is Google it. I always google to see how was the bar doing? And you're probably wondering, why are we talking about this guy on a true crime show? Because when I googled it, what I found was there was a murder involving Danny Serafini, which is definitely one of the most interesting bar rescue updates I've ever read. Also, the bar closed, probably beside the point. But they did not have success, though that is important for the story we are about to tell. So you have the situation where Sarah Feeney, he had this somewhat successful major league baseball career, at least in the amount of money he made that. Then he loses all his money, his businesses are failing, he is in great debt and he's desperate to find any solution to his financial issues. Well, it just so happened that his in laws were very, very, very wealthy and he decided he was going to get some money from them one way or another.
- [14:52]
B
So let's dive into the timeline. June 4, 2021. Security footage captured Dan Serafini check into the Red Lion Inn in Reno, Nevada. According to the hotel's records, he checked into room 331 the next day. On June 5, Samantha Scott checked into the red line in early in the morning. She was Also in room 331. You may be thinking, wait a second, who's Samantha Scott? Haven't heard of her yet. I thought he married an Aaron Spohr. Serafini did marry an Aaron Spohr. And Samantha is not his wife. So that same day, Aaron Spoor and her children were visiting her parents in Westlake Tahoe. Now, according to the prosecution in this case, Samantha Scott picked up a package of cocaine for Dan Serafini and then drove Serafini from Nevada to Tahoe City. Serafini was carrying a backpack that contained.
- [15:48]
A
A gun and this cocaine thing. We talked about his expensive habits. Apparently over the years, steroids wasn't the only illicit substance he was taking. He also had developed a pretty serious cocaine habit and would often buy cocaine. And it seems like Samantha would help him out by picking it up for him. But, you know, she's there with him and they go for a drive. Now, remember Aaron, his wife and their children, they're visiting the in laws, they're hanging out at the lake, and in fact, they go out boating. So they get in the boat, they take off onto Lake Tahoe. While this is happening, surveillance footage that the police would later recover capture a person wearing a mask, a dark hooded sweatshirt, white pants and a backpack. And this person enters the Westlake Tahoe home of the spores around 3pm so while wife and children are out on the lake, this masked hooded person. Now remember, this is the COVID period, right? This is a year into the COVID pandemic. So seeing someone wearing a mask wasn't necessarily that unusual. Though seeing someone dressed like this entering a home probably would have been. Surveillance catches this. Unfortunately, no one else sees it. So this person enters the home. Thirty minutes later, everyone else returns from boating and they go into the house. This person is hiding in a closet and no one sees him. And this reminded me of the JonBenet Ramsey case because one of the things we speculated was that whoever committed that crime, this is going way back, actually came into the house while the family was at Fleet White's house and hid in the house waiting for the family to return, waiting for them to go to bed before they did anything. Now, you may disagree with that. You may think that's ridiculous. There was no intruder in this case. That absolutely happened. Whoever did this, they broke into the house, they're hiding in the closet as the family is doing their thing. The house.
- [17:56]
B
That's terrifying. That's like everyone's worst nightmare. Like, after this episode, I'm gonna go out to the rest of my house and make sure no one's been lying in wait.
- [18:05]
A
So this is around 3:30 now. We're gonna have a neighbor's video camera which is gonna catch a tan Subaru with damage on the left hand bumper parked on the street about a mile and a half from the victim's home. And in fact, this video would reveal Samantha Scott, who we just talked about. She shows up at this location, parks the car around 6:44. So this is three hours after, you know, the families come back from boating. She gets out and she sort of walks down the street, walks around. The camera does not see her again until around 9:22. So she arrives at 6:44. Somebody's in the house, but they don't know it. Aaron and her kids hang around for another four hours. So they get back, you know, at around 3:30 from boating and then hang around with the grandparents. At 7:45, a security camera captures them, Aaron and the kids saying their goodbyes to her parents, to their grandparents, and leaving. And Aaron, in fact left. This has been reported. It was either this day or a couple days beforehand. But either way, she left with a $90,000 check her mother had written to her and her husband Danny, because they had been having financial problems and frankly, throughout their marriage they'd had financial problems. And it wasn't just Danny's parents who were providing money to the couple. Aaron's parents, who were very wealthy, who had millions of dollars from some companies they had founded, work they had done throughout their lives. They, they were very generous with the couple and they would give money to the couple when they needed it. And this was another circumstance when that.
- [19:49]
B
Happened, which is what makes what's about to happen even more devastating. They're so generous. I mean, walking out with like, you know, nearly $100,000 just given to them. Now, at 8:51pm gunshots were heard on security footage. And Shortly after, at 8:56pm the masked intruder is seen leaving the home. This is about just an hour after Aaron and the kids leave the home. Clearly the person inside the home was waiting for Aaron's parents to be alone. That is, at that point, what, six hours of lying in wait. The prosecution argued that the person who hid in the home and shot the spores was Serafini. And he then got into Samantha Scott's car where he threw out the mask, the backpack, and parts of a gun. In other words, in the car, he is disposing of evidence along the way. Shortly thereafter, a 911 call was made from the house with no one speaking on the other end. Presumably this is one of the spores who've been shot. Their last act, try to get some help, but they're too hurt to even say anything. Emergency services were dispatched and Placer county law enforcement found Robert sporer dead at 70 years old with a 22 caliber gunshot wound to the head. Wendy Wood had also been shot twice, once in the head and once in the wrist. But Wendy was clinging to life and was the one who had made that 911 call. So what this is telling me is both of those shots were to kill. When you shoot someone in the head, you're not just trying to injure them, you're not trying to incapacitate them. You are trying to kill them. But the fact that Wendy also has a wound to the wrist sounds to me like a defensive wound. Put her hand up or something, and the bullet grazed or hit her wrist. And the person wanted to still end her. Now, Wendy Wood was immediately transported to the hospital where she spent a month in the icu. And this is actually kind of miraculous. She doesn't die. She spends several weeks in the hospital, goes to rehab. And at 68 years old, she was forced to relearn even the most basic skills including walking, talking, and eating. But she does survive.
- [22:00]
A
And I'll say this, kudos to the 911 operator for actually sending the police out. I was, I attended a talk on the Lake and Riley case, you guys may recall. Young woman who was murdered at the University of Georgia. And as she was being attacked, either intentionally or on accident, she dialed 911 on her phone. And the phone actually, we listen to 911 call and you actually, you can hear the attacker say some things. But the 911 operator thought it was just a. It was just a butt dial. Even though there had been a 911 call earlier about a prowler in the area, they just dismissed it. They didn't send out the police. Now, probably wouldn't have changed anything based on what we know about that case. But nevertheless, this is the right thing to do. If you're out there, you're 911 operator. I don't even really care what the policies of your local precinct are. Never assume a 911 call is a butt dial. Just send the police. Send the police. Like wherever the call is coming from, send the cops. Right. And that's what they did here. The police show up and they find this and they're able to save Wendy's life. Unfortunately, the tragedy of this case continues. You know, Wendy, she's 68 years old. She's doing the best she can. She's trying to rebuild her life. But the challenge of losing her husband, who she said was like her other half and having to relearn everyday skills, it just became too much. She would take her own life later on as a result of what happened on July 5, 2021. And if you're curious, she had no memory of the events of that day, so she couldn't help police with whatever happened. She did not have a memory of those events, but she did eventually succumb to suicide as a result of this crime. And frankly, I'll just go ahead and tell you, this is an interesting legal question. To me, whoever did this should be charged with her murder because to me their actions are what killed her. Regardless of what happened in between, they should be responsible for it. That's my opinion. The law does not back me up on this. But that's what I would do if.
- [24:10]
B
I was to causality thing, chain of events. But for what happened to her, but for the crime which was meant to kill her by the way, it wasn't an accident. They went for the head, just. She was a fighter and survived. But. But for what she was having, can you imagine, I mean to not have a memory of that day but to have to essentially be learning everything. She was boating that day, she was clearly healthy, she was vibrant, you know, in the prime of her life. But having to relearn the most basic of skills and essentially, you know, feel like a shadow of yourself. I agree with you that chain of events that led to her death was clearly tied to this crime.
- [24:50]
A
This episode is brought to you by Progressive Insurance. Do you ever think about switching insurance companies to see if you could save some cash? Progressive makes it easy. Just drop in some details about yourself and see if you're eligible to save money. When you bundle your home in auto policies, the process only takes minutes and it could mean hundreds more in your pocket. Visit progressive.com after this episode to see if you could save Progressive Casualty Insurance company and affiliates. Potential savings will vary. Not available in all states. So Fast forward to June 2023 and something interesting happens and we actually don't know about this until later on but Adrian, who is actually Aaron's sister, she files a civil case on behalf of herself and her parents estate and she files it against Danny Serafini and her sister Aaron sporer. And between 1 and 10 does. This is interesting because basically in this lawsuit she is alleging that Danny and Aaron are responsible for for her parents death. At this point there have been no criminal charges filed. There's been nothing necessarily pointing at Danny Serafini as being the person responsible for this. But she's moving forward. With a civil case. And she's essentially saying Danny, Aaron and some unknown accomplices. That's where the does come in. Basically you file this, they're a stand in. And then once you realize who they are, you file a motion to substitute and you substitute the real people. And you can do this to avoid statutes and limitations just so you can move forward with the lawsuit. And as you learn stuff, you can add new defendants. But she files this and she is basically seeking to cut her sister and Danny out of any inheritance of her parents substantial estate. Now when she files this, she asks that the civil suit be put on hold until any criminal case is resolved. Did she have inside information? I don't know. But her filing would prove prophetic.
- [27:00]
B
So on October 20, 2023, Danny Serafini and Samantha Scott were arrested in connection with the murder of Robert Spohr and the attempted murder of Wendy Wood. Serafini was arrested in Winnemucca, Nevada and Scott was arrested at the Harry Reid International Airport in Las Vegas, Nevada. Now Serafini was charged with murder, first degree residential burglary, attempted murder and. And child endangerment. Remember, he was in the home with the gun for six hours with kids, his kids actually, who were still in the home. So that's, I presume, where the child endangerment charge comes from. Now the prosecutor for this case, Assistant Chief Deputy DA Richard Miller, argued that Erin Spohr was at her parents home with her children on the day of the shootings. And he alleged that while they were there, Danny Serafini sleep snuck into the house unnoticed and hid until Aaron and the kids left. All the while, Scott was waiting outside to be the getaway vehicle for whenever Sarafini was able to complete the murders.
- [28:04]
A
In September of 2024. The District Attorney's office confirms they're not seeking the death penalty in the case, which I don't really get because as I said, he's responsible for at least two deaths. He lay in wait to do this. This is a very. There's a lot of calculation and for money.
- [28:20]
B
I mean this is, this is just so the facts of these case. I mean, Aaron is leaving with a $90,000 check to both of them. And yet it wasn't enough. He wanted more. So much so that he was willing to kill the people who just cut him a $90,000 check.
- [28:35]
A
And look, I know this is a controversial position, but I just think it's. I think it's too hard to execute people in this country. I just think it is. I don't know exactly how to solve that problem because I don't want to execute innocent people. But like the fact that you don't even pursue it in a very strong case where you have two people who were murdered in such a vicious, calculated manner, it just tells you that it's like too hard. And we talked about this in the Brian Kohberger case about all the reasons not to pursue the death penalty. And those are all great reasons for not doing it. But the fact that those reasons exist tells me we have an issue. And Congress has tried to address this before. There's a statute called AEDPA, which is the Anti Terrorism Effective Death Penalty Act. And the whole purpose of that was to cut down on the length of time between when you receive a death sentence and when you're executed. Hadn't helped a lot. You know, we're still in a situation where very obviously guilty people who do really terrible things wait 10, 20, 30 years before the death sentence is carried out. And then you have situations like this where people don't even bother to bring it. And frankly, most of the states that have the death penalty, it doesn't mean anything. I mean, California has the death penalty. When's the last time California executed anybody? Been a long time.
- [29:55]
B
I mean, I will say, though, with the status of death penalty, we've talked about this before, I think it is a worse sentence to get life in prison without parole because you don't have access to all of the AEDPA appeals, you don't have access to all of the resources that suck up everything. That's less of a commentary on, like, the philosophy of the death penalty and more so on the system in the United States and how costly it is to keep people on death row and all the advantages. I know that seems strange, but the legal advantages you have with the death penalty. So I actually think it's a harsher sentence and worse for the defendant to get life without parole. Because of all the things you stated, you're probably not going to get executed in many states.
- [30:39]
A
I also don't know why they don't get rid of death row. I don't understand death. You should keep them in general population.
- [30:44]
B
I agree.
- [30:45]
A
And then when it's time to execute them, take them off and execute them. I mean, you got people in general population who are murderers, who are on life without parole. What's the difference?
- [30:54]
B
There's none.
- [30:55]
A
I think back in the day, there was this thought of, oh, they're so dangerous. You know, they're on death row because frankly, not many people Got life without parole. I mean, back in the day, either got executed or you got like a couple years and you're out, right there wasn't this. We're just gonna house people till the end of time, right, like you have now. But I mean, like Brian Coburger is gonna be in prison for 60 something years anyways. This is all on the side. I know we're trying to do this in one episode, but anyway, so they're not gonna pursue the death penalty. So. February 6, 2025, big event in the case of Samantha Scott, who clearly knows a lot about what's going on, takes a plea deal. And it's a pretty good one for her. Remember, she had been charged with murder, first degree residential burglary. She was charged essentially with the same crimes that Seraphini had been charged with. All of those are dropped. And instead she pleads guilty to a charge of being an accessory after the fact in the shootings. Now I will say this, I don't really think she was successful after the fact. I think she was accessory before the fact. But she's gonna tell some nice convenient lies that are going to support this position. She's actually released from jail at this point and is allowed to do some things. So she has to come back on April 18 for a review hearing and status update. Her sentencing has not yet been scheduled, but because of this dramatically reduced charges, she's only looking at between 16 months in three years in prison. And Seraphini's attorney wisely will use this and during the trial against him, will point out that really she faces as little time as time served or probation. Really good deal for her, which encourages her to lie. That's gonna be the argument of the defense. Can't trust this person because everything they say they owe the prosecution, they better put on a good show. That's why they gave her such a good deal.
- [32:48]
B
And part of it, if you look at the evidence just on what we have here, obviously we don't know all the evidence here. It's really. There's a lot of evidence against Seraphina. You have all the security footage of a person. You have to show that he is the person who's the hooded man who waits in the spore home for six hours. But Samantha, you'll see what her story is. We don't have anything except the cocaine and driving a getaway car. Both very bad things. But the knowledge element, remember with criminal cases you can't just be like wrong place, wrong time. You have to have knowledge requirement of what's going on. You, you can see based on what we see here so far, there's just less evidence tying her to the murders as there is for Serafini. So that may be part of the reason. And also of course, they want her to flip and you know, rat on Serafini here. So that brings us to May 19, 2025. Opening statements began in the trial for Dan Serafini. And throughout the course of the trial, the contentious nature of the relationship between Serafini and his in laws was revealed. Remember earlier we said that it looked like they had a great marriage. They had these two sons. I mean the in laws, Aaron's parents are writing them these huge checks. They're bailing them out financially. Their kids are going over to their home to hang out on the lake and spend time together. Seems like everything's great. But whenever you start digging, you begin to see a bit of a motive here. So a series of emails from 2016 to 2021 between Serafini and his father in law were shown to the jury and, and they were in what appears to be a years long argument over $1.3 million that Spore had lent to Aaron and Dan to start her horse business. Additionally, several people testified claiming that they heard Sarafini speak poorly of his in laws. I'll say that alone, may not say that much, but this is all building to that motive of seeing, you know, why he was able to do something like this. Now his own brother even took the stand recalling a time when Dan said to him that he would pay someone $20,000 to kill his in laws. Now his brother is just reporting what he was told by Dan, but the brother says, look, I interpreted it as a joke. Now it's up to the jury to decide whether it was in fact a joke. Not looking great here if in fact they end up dead.
- [35:07]
A
And this is sort of a testament to the entitlement in this case. So Serafini apparently, according to reporting and testimony, felt as though he was being quote unquote manipulated by his in laws. They were using their money to control him and they were always trying to tell him exactly what to do and exactly how to live his life and all this other stuff because they had all this money. When the reality of the situation, if I give you $1.3 million, I get to tell you, hey man, maybe you should lay off the cocaine. You know, maybe you should start taking things seriously. Maybe you need to work more like, you know, maybe you need to like not spending so much money. Like I get to Tell you that when I give you that much money, you're not entitled to my money. But Serafini obviously felt like he was and was deeply insulted that his in laws who were constantly funding his lifestyle and that of his wives would dare, dare to tell him how he should deal with this money. To the point that he's making jokes about hiring someone to kill them. Always a bad idea, particularly if they end up dead, because that's gonna come back to haunt you. But everybody's waiting, right? Because we want to hear from Samantha Scott. And on June 6, she takes the stand to testify. And what she would tell the jury is that she had met Dan through his wife, Aaron. She is sometimes described as the family's nanny, and maybe she was. I'm not really sure on that. But she would say that Aaron, who is an equestrian coach, remember, she has this whole horse farm business, and part of it is teaching people how to ride horses. And she would say that Aaron began training her in 2018 and that they became close friends and that she ultimately met Dan through her. In the months around the shooting, she and Dan had what she would describe as a, quote, intense sexual affair that lasted until they were arrested. Now, the sexual part may have lasted until they were arrested.
- [37:10]
B
It's just an interesting way to describe an affair. As you'll note later, usually an affair, I just assume there is sexualness in it. But the fact that she describes it as an intense sexual affair, you know, no shame here, saying it all on the stand.
- [37:24]
A
Cocaine.
- [37:25]
B
Cocaine, man.
- [37:26]
A
It's a hell of a drug. I don't know what's gonna do.
- [37:28]
B
It's terrifying.
- [37:30]
A
So anyways, when they get arrested, the sexual part ends, but the affair does not. She provided investigators with a letter that Dan had smuggled her during a 2024 court appearance. The red in part. Stay strong and fantasize daily. We will be free soon. I love you and always will. Such romance, like Titanic or Romeo and Juliet, all the great love stories all rolled into one. And during her testimony, she would claim that she initially lied to police about her and Sarah Feeney's location on the day of the murder. And then she provided her recollection of the 2021 attack. She basically said that she drove Serafini to the Tahoe area, but she believed it was for a drug dealer, which, I mean, do I believe her? No. Is it believable? Yes. Because Sarah Feeney was pretty heavily into drugs and that Seraphini had told her he needed to, quote, unquote, pick up a package. And she Described what he wore that day. Long pants, a long sleeve T shirt with a backpack and a mask. And this description is very similar to what someone was captured wearing on surveillance video and outside the victim's home.
- [38:45]
B
I mean, strange things to wear, like in July in Nevada, in the desert during the day. I know it gets cold in the desert at night. But if we're talking about Samantha's mens rea or her state of mind, the fact that she already picked up cocaine for him, that he's wearing like, you know, winter clothes and a mask to do. You know, what you don't do on a drug deal is wear a mask because they immediately assume you're going to rob them. So. So you don't do that. And she would know this because she is in the drug world if she just picked up a package of cocaine for him. So this is all going towards how much she knew. Look, she's not the one on trial here. She got that sweet, sweet plea deal. But I also have my doubts that sweet Samantha is really just there along for the ride for picking up a little bit of drugs. So Scott said that Dan had a gun in his backpack with a piece of PVC pipe to use as a silencer and a that stick. Some point during the drive, Seraphini had her pull over so he could actually test out his gun to, quote, make sure it was working. Again, if he's going around with a silencer, even stops to test out that the gun isn't jammed, that the silencer works. This doesn't sound like your regular sort of a drug deal. Even if it's a regular drug deal, it's a drug deal that's going to end in a death. So either way, she's driving him to a murder, right? Maybe not the murder. You know, it's one of those things where it's like, well, I didn't know who you were gonna murder. I don't have enough men's rea. Like someone was gonna die and she was driving him. If she's stopping to let him test the gun, it wasn't just for funsies.
- [40:14]
A
I feel like this is like part of the patriarchy. People complain about the patriarchy. I feel like women get away with this. Right? Like, this is an absurd stuff.
- [40:24]
B
What does this one do with a silencer?
- [40:25]
A
Yeah, this is. She didn't believe that. There's no way she believed that. She knew exactly what she was driving to, but she, like, tells this cockamamie story and people are, oh, yeah, she just was confused. She didn't know she was naive. It's like, come on, give her the benefit of her intelligence. She absolutely knew what was going on here. Now the prosecution, obviously they're like, yeah, sure, uh huh. So what happened next? Right?
- [40:49]
B
But anyway, look, the prosecution just wants her to testify against Dan again. This is Dan's trial. I get what's going on, but like, we're talking about Samantha. Samantha has enough money to learn how to ride a horse. Those of you who may not know, equestrian is a very expensive sport, right? She's, I mean, maybe she's just dealing enough cocaine to be able to fund her equestrian habit, but she is not some like poor naive girl who's never seen the world. If you're equestrian ing, you're doing fine in life, you've seen enough of the world. And she is lying through her teeth. Okay, so she knows he has this PVC pipe, homemade silencer, totally illegal by the way. And she goes on to say that she dropped Serafini about a mile and a half from his in laws, though she didn't know it at the time. So she knows though that she is not dropping him off at the site where he plans to use the silencer and the gun. He has to walk a mile and a half. Why would you do that? Perhaps because you're about to go do something illegal and don't want to be seen dropped off. Yes, Brett, what do you think?
- [41:47]
A
I just got to note, I mean, I may be biased here or naive, but is Lake Tahoe really where you go to buy cocaine? I mean, maybe it is maybe like the wealthy suburbs of Lake Tahoe or where all the cocaine dealers live.
- [42:02]
B
But you go out of Tahoe to get it and you may bring it.
- [42:06]
A
Exactly. And then you bring it back.
- [42:07]
B
You bring it back with like your chateau and like do it there, but you don't buy it there.
- [42:12]
A
Go there to buy it.
- [42:13]
B
Because there are these multi million dollar houses everywhere. And by the way, that she knows he's a mile and a half from somewhere in a residential place on the lake with only very nice homes. He's not gonna go trick or treating for cocaine, that's for sure. Anyway, she drops him off and she says she waits around for him for hours. This is also really interesting because if in fact he was just going to go pick up some drugs, six hours is a really long time to wait. You know what I do? I think that he fell asleep somewhere. I'm just gonna get out of there because I know that he has a silencer and the drug deal went Wrong. He probably killed someone. I'm not gonna sit here around and wait for the police to come get me. Six hours, way too long. I'm out of there. She knew the plan. She knew that he was gonna hide in there until Aaron and the kids left or until the parents were alone and he was able to execute the murder. And he said to her, I'm going in in the middle of the day. Because during the middle of the day, that's when you go on the lake when there's still, you know, the sun is out. That's when people go on the lake. So I need to get that window of time to sneak in. And then they're very social people. People may be there until after dinner, so it might be several hours. Don't be surprised if I'm not here for six hours. And in fact, she waits. She doesn't get out of Dodge. She stays right there. This is all showing how much she knows, by the way, and how also calculated this is and how in advanced planning, Serafini made here. So she waits for hours until he does meet up with her. And that evening, they begin the drive down to Crescent Valley, Nevada, where Serafini had a trailer. Now, during that drive, she said that, remember, girlfriend just saw him test the silencer and the gun on the side of the road. Wait six hours, he gets in the car. And then she says Serafini started throwing things out the car window, like the PVC pipe, clothes, and possibly a gun and gloves. Gee, golly, jury. I just don't know why someone would throw away those sorts of things. That was a kind of a nice shirt. Guns are kind of expensive. Expensive. I thought he liked that PVC pipe. She knew exactly what he was doing. A murder had happened or murders had happened, and he was disposing of the evidence. So even though she claimed she had no idea what Sarah Feeney had done, she clearly did. It wasn't until a month after the attack that she said she began to suspect. Wait a second. I saw the news from the exact place where I dropped him off. For six hours, two people were shot in the head. One died immediately. One was clinging on to life and had to be transported to emergency surgery. Couldn't be him until a month later. She's like, you know what? I'm beginning to think Sarah Feeney had something to do with this. So she says that eventually Sarah Feeney told her about the murders, but she didn't come forward to the police with the information until after her arrest.
- [44:59]
A
I'll just say this like Imagine an attorney like Alan Jackson with this woman. He would tear her apart. Like, she is so obviously lying throughout her testimony. It's a little difficult because you're tearing her apart in a way that sort of implicates your guy. But if you just basically are just trying to prove, like, this is such an absurd story, like, she's so obviously lying to you, this can't be true. Like, none of this is true. None of it's true. And we know that because everything she's saying is ridiculous. There's no way she didn't know. You have to thread the needle for the jury, right? Like, you basically have to say, like, look, you've heard her. You want to believe her because she's telling you what happened. It makes it easy for you, and I understand that. But take a moment to think about almost the sort of what would you have to believe? Type thing, right? Like, what do you have to believe to think she's telling you the truth? Like, you have to believe that all this happened and she had no idea. That's what she wants you to believe. That's what she says. She tells you she had no idea that a month later she didn't know. She only knew when he finally told her. That's absurd. If you can't believe that, you can't believe any of her story. I mean, that's basically what you have to do. I mean, there are issues, right? I mean, obviously, why is she there in the first place with some masked man if she's not there with Dan Serafini? But nevertheless, she is given some openings for the defense to attack her on cross examination. On June 24, Aaron Spore will testify. Remember, she's Dan's wife. She is the daughter of the parents who were murdered, and she absolutely believes her husband is innocent. So what it's worth. She states that she and Dan, they had an open marriage. No big deal. She knew Dan was sleeping with Samantha. Didn't matter to her, though. She was shocked to realize that there were actually emotions involved. This was an emotional relationship, not just a physical one. And let me just say for you out there, I'm not saying there aren't people out there who are not capable of having this sort of relationship and not having emotions develop. But the simple fact of the matter is, if you have two people, which you usually have to have to be in a relationship, one of them is going to develop emotional attachments. Just know that if you're embarking on this world of some sort of an open relationship, you're going to run into this complication at some point, because that's just the way people are made. And in this case, obviously, Dan at least claimed to have an emotional attachment to Samantha. Though I'm going to go out on a limb and say that probably had more to do with the fact he really needed her to shut up and not talk and was willing to tell her anything, including that she loved him. So she described her own relationship with her parents as having highs and lows. And she estimated that their estate was worth around 23 million. And I think it was about $11 million in cash and a trust fund and then $12 million in various assets. Now, it wasn't entirely clear if Dan would have directly benefited from any inheritance, which obviously is the motive. And so there's some pushback by the defense on that, saying, look, there was no point in killing them because he wouldn't have gotten anything. They had one document that said he would not be entitled to anything, but that his wife would. And there was another document that said he would get 100,000 shares of a Washington corporation only after Aaron's death. And I just want to say, Aaron, if you're out there listening, just know you were next. If Dan gets away with this, you're next. He was going to kill you because that was the key to the money. So I'm glad that you still believe in your husband's innocence, but just know your life was saved by his arrest.
- [48:44]
B
I was gonna say you might want to watch her back.
- [48:46]
A
Yeah. The thing is, her sister has intervened. Her sister is not as forgiving as Erin is and wants to cut everybody out of this and support her in her effort.
- [48:56]
B
Yeah, absolutely. That was a smart play, just to, like, force the hand of something to happen. Remember, there were no criminal charges at the time that she filed that civil case, but it's certainly made known. And also, I think when there's a pending lawsuit like that, it ties up the estate, too, so that they can't run away with the money, because obviously, money is fungible. If it disappears, you can't go get it back. Not that I'm giving you legal advice to file civil suits for wrongful death against your other inheritance members. But that was smart, especially in this case, because this criminal case is not looking great, at least for Serafini. So on June 26, 2025, the prosecution rested its case, and then on June 30, the defense rested his case, but they did not bring any witnesses or present any evidence. That actually is not that uncommon for a defense, especially in this case, although I will say, at least sometimes you'll just use like, character witnesses. Just to show the jury we have people who are willing to speak on behalf of Serafini. For example, some random guy was like, I played baseball with him. Great guy, right? Nothing to do about whether he could commit murder. Other people was like, oh, he's such a great loving father. He loves his wife, he loves his family. To not have any of that is a little surprising. But of course, the prosecution has the burden of proof. Defense doesn't have to present any witnesses or any evidence of their own. So on July 8, 2025, there are closing arguments and the jury begins deliberating that day at 4:15pm which is almost exactly four years after they were shot. Wendy didn't die until later. But that this crime was committed on July 14, 2025. It was the third day of deliberation and Dan Serafini didn't get off, thank goodness, is all I have to say. I was a little nervous when I was reading this, but Dan Serafini was found guilty of murdering his father in law and attempting to murder his mother in law. So the jury also found that Dan was guilty of the special circumstances in the attacks, such as lying in wait, the use of a gun, and first degree burglary. The jurors also found that there were some other enhancements that were to be true. Those included discharging of a firearm to cause great bodily injury. I can see why they died, you know, by gunshot wound to the head, lying in wait, which we have on security camera. And that the attack was woeful, willful and premeditated. He waited in there for six hours, I think. Absolutely. They found correctly that he premeditated and was incredibly willful. He could have turned around at any point in that six hours. He could have gotten cold feet. He didn't. He sat there. Just think of this, guys. He sat there the entire drive with the Samantha Scott, who had no idea what he was doing, even pausing to make sure his gun didn't jam, that his silencer worked. And then he sits there waiting for six hours with nothing but murder on his mind. I mean, this is as willful as a case as I've seen. Now, the one bone they threw him was he was found not guilty of child endangerment.
- [52:12]
A
I thought the prosecution brought that charge just so they could really hammer home that his own kids were in the house for all that time. And there was no argument that it wasn't relevant because there's a charge.
- [52:21]
B
It's dead. Yeah. And also the fact, like the human side of it, Right. Like the grandparents were there with the grandkids all day, giving them a great day, what great grandparents they are. And he's robbing society of these two people, but also robbing his own children of this beautiful relationship they have with their grandparents. I mean, I understand why they brought it. I also understand why the jury did not ultimately find him guilty of it.
- [52:44]
A
So Serafini's sentencing was supposed to take place in August 18, where he will face up to life in prison without parole. But the sentencing was delayed when his attorneys filed a motion for a new trial. Now, the basis for that motion were alleged juror misconduct. Now, the motion is pretty vague. And what that is is based on statements made in a post conviction interview by the jurors and not helpful at all. The defense didn't actually cite any particular statements in that interview that are problematic. So we're going to have to see, I guess, in future evidentiary presentations what exactly they're arguing. I will go ahead and tell you this motion will fail. And sentencing is now scheduled for October. And I would be shocked if Serafini does not receive life without parole. Particularly the jury findings are damning. They included all those special findings for a reason, because that is what would justify a death penalty case or in this circumstance, life without parole. So they're giving sort of all those reasons why the judge should impose that sentence. And frankly, I hope that he will. And just a little piece of trivia as we wrap this up. This makes the second bar rescue episode that has ended in Murder. The first episode, which actually never aired, the day before the episode was supposed to air, the owner of the bar shot someone in the head for smoking in the bar. So a little bit more directly, I.
- [54:20]
B
Think I see why it needed to be rescued. If that's the way you run a bar. Geez, yeah.
- [54:26]
A
And that was one of the things John tried to deal with, was the owner had a fiery temper, as you might see. But you can't fix everybody in one 60 minute episode. There's only so much even a genius like John Taffer can do. So we'll keep you guys updated when we find out what the final sentence will be. We will let you know. And I'm also interested to see how this civil suit goes, which continues. It's just sad. I mean, you see, if you go back and you watch this bar rescue episode, which is still available, in which they still air on television, like I said, I saw it. You'll see. Dan you'll see, Aaron. And it's really interesting to watch them knowing what's going to happen in the future and sort of how they react to various things.
- [55:07]
B
So one thing that I. You know, the sister obviously filed the civil suit against both Dan and her sister. And at first I was like, why, Aaron? Other than the fact that there's probably money motive there. She's $1.3 million in debt to her parents. She's leaving with a $90,000 check. All bad things. But because of the way that I think the will is working, I think she had to bring it against Aaron because if it were just against Dany, and it might be, maybe she has other knowledge. But if it were just Danny, I could see it potentially getting dismissed because he would not inherit the estate, but rather it would be inherited through Aaron. So maybe in some ways, her filing the civil suit is also saving Aaron's life.
- [55:41]
A
And look, I mean, she's standing behind him, right? So, yeah, I think you're right. I think basically she needs to divorce him, and then maybe she's not in the suit. Maybe the suit even goes away if she divorces him. I don't know if her sister thinks she was involved or not, but look, if she went over there with her two kids while her husband was hanging out in the closet and his lover was outside in the car, then she is a psychopath of the heist. I don't think she is. I mean, Aaron is naive, obviously, and has been manipulated, obviously. I don't think she was involved in this crime.
- [56:14]
B
Right, right. But I think Adrian brought it against both of them.
- [56:17]
A
Makes sense.
- [56:17]
B
Probably because she was like, no, he's totally innocent. And she's like, dude, he's gonna murder you, too. And this was the only way to protect the inheritance and in some ways protect Aaron and the kids.
- [56:28]
A
And even if he doesn't murder her, he still benefits from it if they're still married. Right. I mean, it becomes his property, too. So that makes perfect sense. Wow. She would be involved.
- [56:36]
B
This is some free legal advice for you, Aaron. Yeah, but really, be careful, Aaron.
- [56:41]
A
He did it. He did it.
- [56:42]
B
He totally did it.
- [56:43]
A
He totally did it.
- [56:44]
B
And Samantha totally knew.
- [56:46]
A
She totally did. And it's unfortunate that she's gonna get.
- [56:48]
B
She's got a sweet, sweet deal.
- [56:50]
A
But look, I mean, that happens all the time. Like, if, you know, information that can put the shooter away, the trigger puller away, it's the best place to be. Which, by the way, as we've talked about many times, this is why it's usually not more than one person in any of these murders we talk about because the other person, if they're ever arrested for anything, have a huge chip they can play in any kind of negotiation. So. And she played it here despite love. Love did not conquer all in this case. Thank goodness. All right. Well, we did it. Yeah. And so I'm just gonna say, if you enjoy this, let us know, because we do a lot. My preference, as I have told you many times, is unsolved cases. I prefer unsolved cases. I love mysteries. But I know a lot of you are interested in this solved stuff. If you like cases like this that are solved and we can just sort of go through the whole thing and sort of wrap up at the end, let us know. I'd be interested to know how many people enjoy these kind of cases. If you hate these kind of cases, I'd be interested to know that, too, because to me, it's kind of like, great. The whole thing, soft. We're finished. That's boring.
- [57:51]
B
People will probably love this because it was one episode, too.
- [57:54]
A
I know, but I agree with you.
- [57:56]
B
I'm like, I. I don't feel like that's our expertise in being able to bring, you know, like, I think we shed some light on Eren and the civil suit and. And Samantha, what she really knew. But, like, thank goodness Dan was convicted. So there's not, like, much I'm bringing to society is what I feel in this case.
- [58:12]
A
Yeah, we're just telling you a story about a guy who murdered people, which is a great story. I mean, I'm surprised this hadn't been covered more because this is like a me talk about, like, you know, rise and fall, like, flying too close to the sun. All the sort of various metaphors of somebody with everything. And this goes to show if you're out there and, like, you know, never, never be envious of people because of their talent or their Facebook page or how many people follow him on Twitter or whatever. I mean, this guy coming out of high school had everything. It was all ahead of him. Millions of dollars he was going to make. Even if he failed, which he did, he was going to make millions of dollars. Everything was there. And honestly, it probably ruined him. Like, if he had not had that, who knows if. What path he would have gone down.
- [58:55]
B
And not just that he, like, got so many bites of the apple. Right? Like, not only did he have really, by all accounts, success in his sport of choice, even if he wasn't, you know, like, the greatest player of all time. He still had success. When it didn't go well, he still married like a multimillion dollar heiress. And that wasn't enough for him. If he just sat back and drank beers all day and maybe not do so much cocaine, he would have had a paid for life. He did have a paid for life. She left.
- [59:24]
A
They were going to die.
- [59:26]
B
He didn't have to open a bar. He didn't have to open an equestrian center. Literally. He could have sat on his lazy bum and lived a great life and not murdered anybody.
- [59:34]
A
He absolutely could have done that. They were never going to let their daughter live in poverty. That wasn't going to happen.
- [59:40]
B
He had insurance, he had kids with her.
- [59:41]
A
I mean, look, the hedonist in me is like, dude, you're married to a very attractive woman who is going to inherit $10 million eventually and she doesn't care if you sleep with the nanny. What is wrong with you?
- [59:58]
B
What is wrong with you? And you have a beautiful lake Tahoe has to go hang out at. Not as the murderer. You know what, like you're probably invited.
- [60:05]
A
Just be polite to your father in law who gave you millions of dollars.
- [60:09]
B
Is it that hard, sir? That's it. Talk about him to your nanny girlfriend later.
- [60:14]
A
Exactly.
- [60:15]
B
Like, don't shirt your head.
- [60:16]
A
You're so wonderful. Thank you for the money. I really appreciate it. Like, humble yourself just a little bit. I don't know, I mean, instead you hide out in the closet for six hours and then shoot two people. Like, what is wrong with you?
- [60:28]
B
Those are your kids, grandparents.
- [60:29]
A
Why your kids are there.
- [60:30]
B
Those are your kids grandparents. What a way to mess up your kids, man. Like, they know. They have eyes, they have ears. They're gonna know you did this. Even if right now they may not know. They're gonna read this when they're like adults and be like, wow, my dad totally killed my grandparents, whom I saw. Like they died within an hour of me leaving. If I stayed there, they wouldn't be dead. Yeah, I mean, how crazy is that? Like, if they spent the night, they'd probably still be alive. I mean, he would just wait until the next morning because it didn't matter. He was going to kill them no matter what. So, kids, it's never your fault. Never your fault. But my point being, you robbed them of their life.
- [61:05]
A
And I mean, I get it, we talk about sometimes. Obviously killers are not logical people or they wouldn't be killers. But nevertheless, it's like you failed at life and you're dumb. I mean, goodness gracious. Anyway, well, so that's that story. Shoot us an email Prosecutors pod@gmail.com if you like this story, you want to hear stories like it, let us know. We're always taking suggestions. I have a very long list of them, but please continue to send them to the email address. That's the best way to get them to us at Prosecutors Pod. For all your social media, join us on the gallery if you want to discuss this or any other case. If you want to watch us record these episodes, please pay $3 at Patreon and you can see our smiling faces at least once a week, oftentimes like two or three times a week. If that dissuades you from wanting to join Patreon, because I can certainly understand that you can also get your episodes early and ad free and without our faces. Also for as little as $3 a month. All right, Alice, do you want to answer a question? Are you ready to sail off into the sunset? It's really up to you. $25 for our only fans where you can hear Alice sing. Yeah, you got quiet there all of a sudden. Alice, are you still.
- [62:17]
B
My leg. Hit the. Hit the thing.
- [62:19]
A
Oh, I see now. Can you hear me?
- [62:21]
B
Sorry.
- [62:21]
A
Much, much louder now. Okay.
- [62:26]
B
Maybe too loud the thing. And. And then you guys were having to pay the 25 to hear the rest of my sentence.
- [62:31]
A
There you go. That was. That was really a way to increase. If you don't want to join only fans, but you do want to get more of our content, don't forget we also have the True Crime Times, which is our sub stack you can read.
- [62:41]
B
All talking about only fans.
- [62:43]
A
Yeah, okay, fine, fine. We're just doing substack. You can read our words, our naked words. You can read them and enjoy them. Join the substack True Crime Times. Lots of fun. They're always good stuff on there. And if you're interested in writing for True Crime Times, we're always looking for good people to write articles.
- [63:02]
B
And also, like as you're listening, our hundred friends here in the chat, we're going to be at CrimeCon in like days at this point. By the time you listen to this in September, crimecon will have passed. But which we are days away.
- [63:14]
A
I say this for those of you who are here. Disappointing news.
- [63:18]
B
I know.
- [63:18]
A
Say a prayer for Leo. He's back in the hospital, is going to have emergency surgery tomorrow, so he's not going to be coming to Crime Con. It's very disappointing for all of us. Disappointing for him because I really wanted him to have the opportunity to see all the people who supported him. But we're still going to be there. We're still going to tell his story and.
- [63:35]
B
But also hope he's okay. This is.
- [63:38]
A
I know we were going to so much.
- [63:39]
B
I mean, we would have. He was fine, like, a day ago, you know, as. As these.
- [63:43]
A
Getting ready to leave. Like, he was gonna leave today.
- [63:45]
B
Yeah.
- [63:46]
A
Because he was gonna drive, but yeah. Okay. Maggles. Maggles wants to know if you could meet. This is a. This is always tough, tough question. This is the kind of question you get asked in a job interview and you just don't know. If you could meet one person, dead or alive, who would it be? I'm just gonna go ahead and say Jesus. You can't say Jesus.
- [64:07]
B
I was literally just thinking Jesus.
- [64:09]
A
You can't say Jesus or any of the saints. Sorry. Cutting all the saints out, no apostles.
- [64:15]
B
You're attacking the Catholics here.
- [64:17]
A
You can't meet Buddha or Muhammad either.
- [64:20]
B
I do hate this question because there's, like, no good answer. And a lot of good answers, too. Okay, wait, so what was that? We've answered this question before.
- [64:28]
A
Well, I think we've said if you could have dinner with, like, three people, you know, but this is. If you could just meet one person, dead or alive, who would it b.
- [64:38]
B
Do you have an answer? This is hard.
- [64:41]
A
This is hard. I mean, there's so many great options, right? Like, you know, I mean, I've said HP Lovecraft before in answer to this question just because, you know. But he's probably a pretty boring dude to talk to. He's kind of a loser in real life. Hey, everybody. He definitely hates you, Alice. He probably hate me, too. He's sort of a. He's just a hater. He's just in general. Okay, so also. Yeah. And you have a universal translator. I'm changing this so you can be anyone who speaks any language. Who would it be? Oh, God. Oh, man. I mean, there's so many good. So, like. And there's all sorts of.
- [65:14]
B
Like, there's so many things I know. So in one sense, I'm like, no famous people. Like, I would just want to know how someone in my exact station of life, right. Lived in another part of the country, maybe same time or in a different time. Like, what would my life have been if it were 300 years ago? And. Or what is my life, like, if I. You know, I actually have cousins on, like, five continents. It's kind of crazy. It's amazing. We're all of the same, like, family tree. We share a lot of the same characteristics, right. In the sense of, like, same parents, a lot of the same DNA. But we grew up on wildly different environments and our lives are so different because of that. I think that's fascinating because I really do think that my life is what it is because of where I was born, kind of by accident. My parents didn't really even mean to be in the United States. It just happened because my dad was going to school here. And then I ended up being an American, which was never the plan. I think my parents did not plan to stay in the United States. So I think something like that, where it's like a parallel life, seeing what my life would be like, would be really interesting. And then there's the answer of, like, famous person.
- [66:20]
A
Yeah. I think when we answered this question last time, we talked about sort of like, I said something like, I'd like to meet the person who decided to come to the new world. Because that, like, that decision. There's a great song, by the way, if you've never heard it. It's called God Said no by Dan Byrne. Check it out, because it's all about this guy, he's talking to God and he's like, hey, send me back in time so I can talk to this person and tell him all these things. And God says no, and he explains why he wouldn't matter. It's great song, should listen to it. It's sort of like this because I was thinking, like, maybe you go back and meet Hitler, but kill him. Right? But I don't know if that's allowed in the sort of beating them or if you can, like, change. I mean, obviously Plato, you know, it would be cool to talk to Plato.
- [67:03]
B
And be like, would it? He would just riddle me this all.
- [67:06]
A
The time, asking you questions. I know, I know, but look, dude, just tell me, was it.
- [67:10]
B
Just tell me what's in your mind? And he's like, well, what is in your mind? What is the mind? And I'm like, oh, man, just tell me. I don't have that much time.
- [67:17]
A
Maybe you could get him to, like, give you all his stuff and you could write it all down. So we had. Cause, you know, we lost so much of that stuff. And that's the other thing. You could meet someone historically, who probably.
- [67:26]
B
I mean, okay, I'll say this, so getting all sentimental. So my husband's grandmother, my children's great grandmother, is currently still alive. She's 104. She is amazing. Like, objectively, she's one of the coolest people I've ever met. She has a martini every single day. I think I've talked about her before. She was given 24 hours to live. This week was not gonna make it. Everyone said their goodbyes, and she was like, heck, no, I'm not dying. I just got a text, like, while we are recording right now that says she's going home. Like, the doctors are like, what? You're not supposed to be alive. So she was born 104 years ago, and it was really sweet. When we got married, she gifted us her wedding silver, which makes her wedding silver. She got married at, like, 16, like, 95 years old. Right. Like, her stuff is so old. And the world she was born into is not just, like, a generation away from my kid's life. It's, like, literally a history of lifetimes away from what my kids experience. It would be so cool to go back in time to when she was a child, like, when she was my kid's age, 7 years old, and what her life is like. I mean, not. We're not even talking about, like, yes, women can vote all these things. So much more than that. Right. She didn't even speak English, even though she was in the United States. She spoke French. So, like, she's an amazing woman. The fact that she's literally kicking it and being like, get out of my hospital room and she's going home, and she, like, talks, dances all the things, and has her mind fully with her, I would love to see, like, what makes someone able to do that at 104. It doesn't start at 104. It starts at, like, age 5, 10, 15, 25, 30. Like, all these decisions along the way and her life made her that way. I think that'd be fascinating to go back and see what she was like at seven.
- [69:16]
A
Yeah. Along these same lines. That's a great one, because, you know, when you think about people you'd want to talk to and people in your own sort of family history. So my grandfather, he died a few years ago, like, five years ago, and his father was 12 years old during the Civil War. That's just, like, tells you, like, how short time is. So basically, my grandfather was his youngest son, so he had him late in life, but my great grandfather was 12 years old during the Civil War. Right. So, like, talking to him, you don't even have to go that far back. Like, just the things he saw sort of along the lines of what you're saying, you know, and people who were that old. My grandfather, you think about people who were in their. Their hundreds, people who Lived through the first flight. Right. Both world wars. I mean, these people existed. Both world wars landing on the moon.
- [70:10]
B
Like, the things you saw, like the Internet industrialization, cars. Like, all of these things.
- [70:17]
A
If you were born in 1900 and lived a hundred years to 2000. Wow. The things you saw. Insane. Yeah. Anyway, so those are good answers. So thank you for that question.
- [70:28]
B
Thank you for that excellent question.
- [70:29]
A
All right, well, this has been fun, but I have to tell you, especially about 20% of you. This is the last episode in September, which means October is coming. Probably, like, tomorrow when you're listening to this. And that means Halloween is upon us. I look, this is the first day of September as we record. This is the last day of summer for me because it's Labor Day. Tomorrow is Halloween. Like, from tomorrow until at least November 1, November 2, because we have All Souls day, too. It's Halloween for me. We're going to be celebrating. We're looking forward to doing four episodes because there's only four weeks, four Tuesdays in October this year. But next week will be our first October episode.
- [71:19]
B
I'm going to do a prophecy, a prophetic rendering of what will happen. People were so tired of West Memphis 3 and checked out for so many months that our drop will be lower in October because people will be like, well, at least it's crime. We're coming back. At least. It's a different case each week. So I'm going to predict that our drop is lower this year because you all have missed us, at least. I'd like to think that.
- [71:41]
A
I just want to say we're gonna do four episodes. Three of them are crimes. Okay. One of them is a little, you know, whatever. But three of them are crimes, so there's no reason to leave. It's not gonna be super spooky, supernatural. It's just gonna be true crime with a little bit of a Halloween flavor. Think of it as, like, pumpkin spice true crime. Right? Everybody loves pumpkin spice.
- [72:07]
B
True crime. I can't wait for my pumpkin spice latte. Yes. That is me. I'm okay with it. I'm gon me one on the way to Crimecon.
- [72:14]
A
There you go. And by the time you hear this, Crimecon will be well over. But we're so excited to see you all there. All right, well, we are done for this week. We'll be back next week with our first October episode. But until then, I'm Brett.
- [72:31]
B
And I'm Alice.
- [72:32]
A
We are the prosecutors. You know, I'm listening. Well, number one, I'm a little sick.
- [72:56]
B
So oh, no, that's what happens when you go to the beach. Like, isn't it terrible? Actually, I know he would go on vacation.
- [73:03]
A
I'm actually. I'm not really sick anymore. I've just got the after effects or whatever.
- [73:08]
B
I'm sorry.
- [73:08]
A
Yeah, I was sick the whole time we were at the beach.
- [73:10]
B
That stinks. You would think that. Don't people, like, go to the sea air to get better?
- [73:14]
A
Yeah, well, I did get better eventually, but. Yeah, but I was. I was listening to old episodes and we're getting nostalgic. No, because we've got that thing and. And I'll tell you what. I mean, y'. All, some of y' all are all loved the first, you know, couple years or whatever. Talk lovingly about them. We've gotten a lot better since then. I mean, we've gotten a lot better.
- [74:44]
B
I can't listen to, like, old world episodes. Oh, cringe.
- [75:32]
A
This September, CBS hits are streaming free on Pluto tv.
- [75:36]
B
I'm coming in hot.
- [75:37]
A
For this month only, you can watch full seasons of the CBS shows you love, from the courtroom drama of Matlock to the heroics of Fire Country. Go back to where it all began in NCIS Origins, or watch the hilarious hauntings of ghosts. All for free. Full seasons of the CBS shows you love this month only on Pluto tv. Stream now. Pay never.