← Twisted Tales with Heidi Wong
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- [00:02]
Heidi Wong
Hi Crime House Community, It's Heidi Wong and if you love digging into the most gripping true crime stories, then you need to listen to another Crime House original, Crimes of with Sabrina Diana Roga and Corinne Vien. Crimes of is a weekly series that explores a new theme each season from Crimes of paranormal, unsolved murders, mysterious disappearances, and more. Sabrina and Corinne have been covering the true stories behind Hollywood's most iconic horror villains, and this month they'll be diving into the paranorma. Listen to Crimes of every Tuesday on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music or wherever.
- [00:37]
You listen to your podcasts. This is Crime House. For centuries, stories of doubles or doppelgangers have haunted us, a perfect reflection walking the world beside you. Sometimes an omen, sometimes a warning, and sometimes a killer. Welcome to Twisted A Crime House Original. I'm Heidi Wong. Every week I'll take you deep inside the real stories behind horror's most terrifying legends. From vengeful ghosts to bloody slashers to alien encounters and more, these real life accounts are guaranteed to keep you up at night. But scary stories aren't any fun if you're telling them alone. If you've ever had a haunted moment or a twisted tale of your own, I want to hear about it. Drop it in the comments. The creepier, the better. Crime House is made possible by you. Follow Twisted Tales and subscribe to Crime House on Apple Podcasts for ad free early access. And if you're into true crime as well as horror, go search and follow Crime House daily, our team's twice a day show bringing you breaking news, updates and unbelievable stories from the world of crime that are happening right now. Today I'm diving into the terrifying world of doppelgangers and how this concept of a second self inspired Jordan Peele's modern horror classic us. I'll be diving into three real world stories where a second self created chaos and fear. First, a little girl in France who vanished, only to be found again under circumstances that defied explanation. Then, a young woman in Germany whose lookalike lured her into a fatal trap. And finally, a man in Kansas who lost nearly two decades of his life to a case of mistaken identity. Three different countries, three different eras, and three lives all torn apart by the same chilling idea that someone else can wear your face and get away with it. Have you ever passed by someone on the street and had to do a double take because for a second you were sure you were looking at yourself? Or maybe a friend has sent you a photo of a stranger saying they look exactly like you? It's a weird feeling, right? Most of us have played with the lighter side of doppelgangers, spotting celebrity lookalikes, debating who could pass as your twin. There's even the infamous Internet theory that Nicolas Cage is a vampire.
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Because it turns out there's a photo.
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Of a man from the 19th century who looks just like him. Okay, I don't know about you, but that picture almost has me convinced that Nic Cage has been alive forever. He long legs himself, like that's what really happened. But behind the jokes, memes, and celebrity lookalikes, the idea of a double has always carried something darker. And for centuries, people have thought that meeting your twin isn't just a coincidence, it's a warning. The term doppelganger comes from 18th century German folklore, literally meaning double walker. But the idea of a double self actually stretches back much further, including in Norse mythology, Celtic and Irish traditions, and all the way back to ancient Egypt. But while folklore treats doppelgangers as something supernatural, modern science points to real world causes for the phenomenon. Psychologists have linked the idea to Capgras syndrome, a delusional disorder where someone believes their loved ones have been replaced by by imposters. And neuroscientists have suggested that certain kinds of seizures can trigger the sensation of seeing one's double. But science isn't what makes doppelganger stories so scary. It's about the fear they awaken. The loss of identity, the horror of being replaced, the possibility that your face, the thing most unique to you, your most personal possession, might not be yours alone. And as the myths reshaped themselves in modern times, doppelgangers didn't just stay in folklore, they evolved, showing up in art, in literature, and eventually film. No story captured that fear for a new generation quite like Jordan Peele's Us a movie that turned the age old terror of doubles into something immediate, visceral, and unforgettable. At first glance, Jordan Peele's US looks like a home invasion story. A family on vacation is terrorized by intruders who break into their house. But then comes the horrifying the intruders aren't strangers. They're exact copies of the family themselves. They're called the tethered, a hidden population forced to live underground, mirroring the lives of those above. They eat scraps, wander in silence, and lie in wait until the day they rise to the surface, scissors in hand. Jordan Peele explained that the idea was very personal to him. He had a childhood fear of doppelgangers that followed him into adulthood. He was always worried about the moment when he caught his reflection at the wrong angle or saw someone who looked a little too similar from across a subway platform. Eventually, that anxiety grew into a story about doubles that don't just look like us, but want to replace us. And there's more beneath the surface. And because the tethered aren't just monsters, they're metaphors, Peale wanted them to embody the invisible and oppressed, the people forced to live in the shadows while others thrive. Their uprising isn't only a horror set piece, it's a reflection of social inequality, of what happens when the ugly truth finally claws its way out into the world. Visually, Peele drew from the long history of doppelganger stories, from the chilling twins in the Shining to centuries old myths of doubles as omens of death. He knew he was working within a pantheon of doppelganger tales, but wanted to forge something. A horror story where the enemy is not a ghost or a demon, but yourself. Peele successfully turned an ancient fear into modern horror. But the terror he captured isn't just for fiction. Because off screen there are people who have faced their own doubles, not in the safety of a theater, but in their real. Brittany, France. April 1922 the Picard family lived on a farm in a small country village. Fields of rye and barley stretched out from their property. Stone walls lined the dirt roads, and neighbors called out to each other by name. Brittany had its own distinct culture and identity, and the Picards reflected that Their family consisted of mother Marianne, Francois and their nine children. Despite living in France, only Francois spoke French. The rest of the family spoke Breton, the language unique to the region, which is more than just a fun fact. This will play a major role in the story. And most of the people around the Picards also only spoke Breton. It was a tight knit community, the kind of place where kids roamed around unsupervised. That's what two year old Pauline Picard was doing on the afternoon of April 6, playing by her family's farmhouse, just a few yards from her parents. And then, in the span of just a couple minutes, something horrible happened. Pauline's mother went inside and when she came back out, Pauline was gone. The Picards searched everywhere. First the yard, then the fields, then the woods. By nightfall, over 150 neighbors had joined the hunt, carrying lanterns, shouting Pauline's name into the darkness. The search stretched through the night, and in the days that followed, the authorities widened their efforts, combing the countryside with dogs and mounted police. But Pauline was nowhere to be found. Villagers whispered that she had been taken by travelers, succumbed to the cold, or had fallen into the river and been swept away. Meanwhile, the Picards lived with unbearable silence. No ransom demand, no sign of a struggle. It was like Pauline had simply vanished. Then, on May 6, 1922, exactly one month after she had gone missing, the police got a lead. 200 miles away, in the French town of Cherbourg, a little girl was found wandering the streets. She was about 2 years old, disheveled and couldn't explain who she was. She was taken to a local hospital, but still said nothing. The only clue the authorities had was her face, which bore a striking resemblance to Pauline Picard. When the unidentified girl's description was sent to Brittany, the Picards were overwhelmed. She looked exactly like their Pauline. Pauline's parents traveled to Cherbourg to confirm her identity. And when they saw her, they were certain this was their daughter. In the moment, no one wondered how a 2 year old was able to travel 200 miles from home. They were just thrilled that Pauline was alive and reunited with her family. However, once the Picards returned to their village, something about Pauline seemed off. At first she wasn't talking at all, which the police and her family chalked up to trauma. But as the days passed, she still didn't improve. And it went beyond not talking. Pauline didn't recognize her own siblings. She was indifferent to her parents affection. Most puzzling of all, she couldn't speak or understand Breton, the language her family spoke. Neighbors started to Was this really Pauline or was she an imposter? But the Picards ignored the whispers. They had their daughter back and that was all that mattered. However, in late May 1922, just a few weeks after they had celebrated Pauline's return, the Picards fairytale ending turned into a nightmare. A farmer walking his fields less than a mile from the Picards home stumbled onto a gruesome a decomposing, mutilated body. There were tattered clothing next to the remains. The same outfit Pauline had been wearing the day she disappeared. Even more concerning was the conditions of the girl's body. She was found completely naked, with her hands and feet missing. But her stomach remained intact. Normally animals go after that first, so it didn't seem like the work of a scavenger. All signs pointed to murder. Even stranger, next to her was the skull of a fully grown man, which begged the question, was he the killer or a victim too? Unfortunately, time would never tell. Both sets of remains were too degraded to officially identify. But the girl's tattered clothing led the Picars to believe this was Pauline. But given the technology of 1922, authorities had no way of knowing for sure and they had no idea who the skull belonged to. Without any other evidence, the search for answers turned inward towards those who had crossed paths with Pauline in the days before her disappearance. An early suspect was a man named Christophe Karamond. He worked as an umbrella salesman and did odd jobs on the Picard farm. But background checks weren't really a thing back then and Christophe had some skeletons in his closet. He was once convicted of rape and spent five years in prison. Not the kind of guy you want around your kids. It's unclear if the Picards knew this, but it seemed unlikely because on the morning of Pauline's disappearance, they invited him into their home for breakfast. Reportedly, when Christophe came over that morning, he was in a joking mood. But his jokes weren't exactly funny. He laughed as he cuddled Pauline and reportedly said that he would find a good home for the two of them in another town. In fact, at around 1pm on the day of Pauline's disappearance, someone saw the two of them alone together. So he took her. He was the one. Ladies and gentlemen, it was freaking Kristoffe. We can stop the search. It's the creepy man cuddling the two year old. They also apparently overheard Kristoff say Pauline was going somewhere with him. However, eyewitness testimony placed him miles away from Pauline at the same time she was last seen. So he wasn't arrested or even charged with anything. But Christophe Karamond wasn't the only possible suspect. A nearby farmer, an older man named Eve Martin, visited the Picard farm after discovering Pauline's body had reportedly been found. He supposedly told the family, are you sure it's Pauline? Followed by God forgive me, I am guilty. So we got a creepy guy and also another creepy guy with a full confession and we're like, she's back, she's home. Then he ran away, cackling to himself. If I heard that, I would definitely be suspicious. The next day, Eve was taken to an asylum. Later it came out that he had suffered from a head injury, which might be why he had those disturbing outbursts. Still, given his actions, he naturally became a suspect in the murder case. But in the end, he wasn't arrested either. Were these simply the ramblings of a lunatic? Or was the man who murdered the Picard's daughter standing right in front of them, confessing his sins? Or maybe the real answer was less nefarious. It's possible Pauline was just wandering off after playing and died of exposure. Investigators wondered if her injuries could have occurred once she was already dead. As unlikely as it seemed, sadly, the Picards would never know. The only answer they had were the bones of a little girl and the memory of a family that would grieve her forever. But of course, there was still another, more pressing mystery. Who the hell was the girl that Picard had taken in, thinking she was Pauline? On June 13, 1922, a court ordered the girl be transferred to a hospital in Cherbourg. Over the next two months, she seemed to improve. She even began speaking in Breton, which reignited speculation. Could this really be Pauline? Still, prosecutors in the family didn't reopen the case, which is really sketch that the family did not reopen the case. Instead, the little girl went to live with some local nuns. French newspapers nicknamed her the girl with the pretty smile, and the court gave her the official name Marie Louise Pauline. Sadly, her story ended in tragedy. In January 1924, at just four years old, Marie Louise died from a measles outbreak. Her death meant the mystery of her true identity died with her. Whatever answers Marie Louise had were lost forever, cementing the case as one of the greatest unsolved tragedies of the era. Some theorized that the Picards had been too blinded by hope and had misidentified the girl. Others argued the authorities had just wanted to close the case and pressured the family into believing their daughter had returned. Whatever the truth was, the Picards believed the little girl who was found dead was Pauline. They buried her near the family farm. The story faded from the newspapers, but the mystery endured. The disappearance and reappearance of Pauline Picard left a trail of uncertainty that has never been cleared. It was a story that blurred the line between mistaken identity and something stranger. A shadow self stepping into another's life. But doppelgangers aren't just figures of folklore or century old mysteries. In 2018, in Algeria, the legend of the double resurfaced. This time in the digital age with a beauty blogger whose life was stolen by her own lookalike.
- [16:20]
I've learned the hard way that taking care of your mental health can be just as important as your physical health. There was a point when anxiety and stress were piling up and I needed therapy. But trying to find someone who actually accepted my insurance felt impossible. That's why I'm so glad I found Rula.
- [16:35]
Rula works differently.
- [16:37]
They partner with over 100 insurance plans, so their average copay is just $15. And depending on your plan, it could be $0. They connect you with licensed in network therapists who fit your goals, preferences and background. No guessing, no waiting weeks for an appointment. You can often see someone as soon as tomorrow. Beyond affordability, Rula sticks with you every step of the way, from scheduling appointments to checking in on your progress. Their network of therapists and psychiatrists ensures your care is truly tailored to your needs. It's mental health support that actually works with your life and your budget. Thousands of people are already using Rula to get affordable, high quality therapy that's actually covered by Insurance. Visit rula.com twisted to get started. After you sign up, you'll be asked how you heard about them. Please support our show and let them know we sent you. That's r u l a.com twisted. You deserve mental health care that works with you, not against your budget.
- [17:32]
Karamo
Hey friends, it's Karamo, talk show host, life coach, and your next best friend. You just don't know it yet. I'm hosting a new podcast called start it on WhatsApp brotherhoods. We're going around the world to explore male friendships and all the wins, challenges and bonds that are made in WhatsApp group chats. And that's exactly where you can listen to it right in the app. It's streaming on the official WhatsApp channel. Just open the app and go to the Updates tab to start listening. While you're at it, message your best friend and make sure they listen too. I'll see you there.
- [18:06]
Heidi Wong
Most of us are on TikTok. If you know me, you know I definitely am. If you are too, you've probably seen your fair share of beauty influencers. They walk you through their makeup, their hair, showing you how to look and feel like the best versions of yourselves. But what if someone watching that video thought the best version of themselves was the person on their screen? That's what happened when a woman named Sharaban was scrolling through Instagram and came across a woman who looked uncannily like her, a beauty blogger named Khadijah bouch. At just 23 years old, Khadijah was beginning to carve out a space as a beauty influencer, posting makeup tutorials and snapshots of her world. She grew up in Algeria, where but in her early 20s, Khadija did what so many of us do in pursuit of a dream. She packed up her life and left everything she knew for the promise of a brighter future elsewhere. And by 2022, she had successfully made a new life for herself in Germany. She was undeniably beautiful, had a warm smile, dramatic eyeliner, and a personality that shone through her videos. But on another screen, hundreds of miles away, someone was doing more than just watching her. Referred to as Sharaban K. She was a 23 year old beautician from Munich. She was the same age as Khadija, looked a lot like her, and even styled herself with the same long dark hair and heavy makeup. But unlike Khadija, her star was not on the rise. She was dealing with a failed marriage and a bitter dispute with her family. There aren't a lot of details about what led Sharaban to concoct her insane, insane plan. But one thing is clear. She was desperate to escape her circumstances. A real life attempt to erase herself by becoming someone else. That is never gonna work on me. I feel like every single person who knows me would know in two seconds if I was replaced by someone. Prosecutors explained Shah Ruhan's chilling scheme was as follows. She wanted to get off the grid by faking her own death. And to do that successfully, she would need a body that looked exactly like her own. Girly did not know what a DNA test was, so she went to the app that so many of us turn to to find our peers, Instagram. She began scrolling through it every night, creating fake accounts and messaging women who looked like her. She slid into the DMs of dozens of people. But when she found Khadijah, the resemblance was so uncanny, she knew she found her perfect target. The lore was simple. A free cosmetic treatment, something a beauty blogger might go for. Both women lived in Germany, and Khadija agreed to meet Sharaban. On August 16, 2022, Shahraban and her boyfriend at the time identified as Shakir K. Picked up Khadija in Shahraban's black Mercedes. Then they drove her towards the woods outside the town of Ingolstadt. Deep in the forest, Khadija was pulled from the car and stabbed more than 50 times. The killers targeted her face to obscure her features. Afterwards, the body was placed in Shahraban's black Mercedes and left parked on a street in Ingolstadt, not far from Shakir K's apartment. At first, the deception worked. When police discovered the car and mutilated body inside, they believed it belonged to Sharaban. Since the victim's face was so badly disfigured, they were mainly going off her long black hair and body type, which was nearly identical to Khadija. Then came the autopsy and the illusion was shattered. The body in the car wasn't Sharaban. It was Khadija. Newspapers gave the chilling crime the moniker the Doppelganger. Murder. German police were baffled. They'd never encountered a case like this before. To kill your double, then use her body to vanish. During the trial, prosecutors argued that Sharaban had been desperate to flee family conflicts. Killing Khadija was her only way out, a calculated attempt to leave her life behind and start fresh. After 53 days in court and testimony from more than 100 witnesses, the verdict was clear. In December 2024, both Sharaban and Shakir were found guilty of murder and sentenced to life in prison. The court labeled the crime particularly serious, meaning they probably won't be paroled anytime soon. At least 15 years. For Khadija's family, the verdict was bittersweet. Her killer would face justice, but they would never get Khadija back. It's a chilling case for many reasons, but one of the most terrifying is Khadijah's death wasn't a legend. It wasn't folklore. It was a modern doppelganger tale where the double didn't just look like her, she hunted her. But doubles don't always come strapped with knives. Sometimes they appear much more subtly, slipping into your life so slowly you don't even realize until one day, their face becomes your prison. And that's exactly what happened in Kansas City, where a man named Richard Anthony Jones lost two decades of his life. Let's go back in time to Kansas City, Kansas. During the summer of 1999, 28 year old Tamara Scherer was walking around a Walmart parking lot on the outskirts of the city when suddenly a man tried to steal her purse. He wasn't able to get the bag, but he did take Tamara's cell phone before escaping into a waiting car. Tamara fought back and ended up scraping her knees. Because of that, police classified the crime as an aggravated robbery, which carries a much longer jail sentence. Several witnesses saw the attack unfold, and when the police asked for a description, they all had the same a light skinned black or Hispanic man, medium build, with short hair pulled back. Luckily, one witness managed to jot down the license plate from the getaway car. Police quickly tracked the owner down, who admitted he'd picked up a man named Rick earlier that day. According to the owner of the vehicle, Rick was the attacker. From there, police took the owner to the precinct, where they combed through booking photos. They were looking for men named Richard or Rick who matched the witness descriptions of the man in the Walmart parking lot. The owner identified Richard Anthony Jones as as the assailant. And then later, in a preliminary hearing, the victim did as well after all, he fit the description. Skin color, build, facial hair. Who else could it be? Richard Anthony Jones, then just 25 years old, was no stranger to law enforcement. He had a prior record for petty crimes, but he insisted he had nothing to do with the robbery. In fact, that night, he was miles from the crime scene at his girlfriend's birthday party. The next day, he stayed to help her clean up. Several people backed up his story. There was no way he could have committed the aggravated assault. However, alibis don't always hold up in court. What mattered in this case were the witnesses to the crime itself. And when the time came, they all pointed to him. There was no DNA, no fingerprints, no weapon, not a single piece of. Of physical evidence tying Richard to the crime. But in the end, his face was enough. Richard was sentenced to nearly 20 years in prison for a robbery he swore he hadn't committed. That is more than for murder that we covered earlier in this episode for robbery with no evidence. The California Innocence Project reports that mistaken eyewitness identifications are a leading cause of wrongful convictions, with as many as one in four stranger IDs turning out to be wrong. So why are they still used? Well, jurors see them as powerful evidence, which makes it easier for law enforcement to close a case. The problem is, memory isn't a video recorder. It's subjective and often unreliable. We get details wrong all the time, especially under stress, like when someone is attacking you and trying to steal your purse. Your impulse isn't going to be to stop and examine every detail of your assailant's face. You're in survival mode. You just need to get out. Eyewitness identifications, as unreliable as they are, became the cornerstone of the case against Richard. The jury was convinced, because what could be more persuasive than someone saying, that's the man I saw. And for Richard, the mistake cost him nearly two decades of his life. He was taken from his parents, his children, his friends, his community. They continued on with their lives while Richard watched from prison as birthdays, holidays, and milestones came and went. Years passed, and Richard stayed firm, repeating time and time again that he was not the assailant. Then, after 15 years behind bars, whispers began to circulate. There was another man in Kansas City who matched the assailant's description. In fact, he was in the same correctional facility as Richard, and he was his spitting image. His name was Ricky Amos. Same build, same complexion, even the same first name. Inmates at Lansing Correctional Facility often mistook one for the other. In 2015, Richard Anthony Jones reported the confusion to the University of Kansas School of Law Project for Innocence. Interns Chapman Williams and Chad Neswick took his case. And when they pulled Amos mugshots, they were stunned at what they saw. Williams said the two men looked so alike that they could have been twins. Even Richard admitted that once he saw their mugshots side by side, the resemblance was undeniable. And it made sense why so many others confused the two of them. The Kansas University team partnered with the Midwest Innocence Project to complete Richard's case. They dug into old evidence, and when the two men's images were finally shown in court, the effect was devastating. Even the victim admitted she could no longer tell them apart. By June 2017, after 17 years in prison, a judge overturned Richards conviction. He was released immediately. For the first time in nearly two decades, he was free. In 2019, the state of Kansas awarded him $1.1 million for the wrongful conviction, one of the largest settlements of its kind. It was money, yes. But as Richard said himself, it could never buy back the years he spent watching his life vanish through the bars of a cell. Money is not enough. It is literally not enough. That's crazy. As for Ricky Amos, the real Rick, in this case, the statute of limitations had already expired. He will never face trial for the robbery. But as of this recording, he is still in prison for failing to register as a sex offender. That doesn't erase all the years that Richard Anthony Jones lost. He spent 17 years in a cell serving the sentence that belonged to a another man. His case is haunting, not only because of shadows or spirits, but because of something far more ordinary and far more terrifying. His double didn't just stalk him in the night. He didn't lure him to the woods. He simply existed. And that was enough to destroy a life. From a quiet French village to the woods of Germany to a Kansas courtroom, the stories may seem worlds apart, but together they remind us that the idea of a double isn't just a superstition or a folk tale. It's something that can touch our lives in devastating ways. Horror films like us capture this terror on screen. Real life has shown us the same nightmare, only without the comfort of it ending when the screen cuts to black. But with all these stories, one chilling idea lingers. That maybe the most frightening part of a doppelganger isn't that they just exist somewhere out there, but that they're waiting to take your place. Thanks for joining me on this episode of Twisted, a Crime House original. I'd love to hear from you. What did you think of today's stories? Anything you're dying for me to COVID Leave a comment or review wherever you're tuning in. And be sure to follow twisted tales so we can keep building this community together. I'll be back next week with another unbelievable true story. Until then, stay curious and remember, there's no reason to fear the dark unless you try to hide from it.