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E158: Meghan Marohn
5.5k Plays3 years ago
Meghan Marohn was a poet, a teacher, an advocate, a friend, and a soul who saw the interconnectedness of life in all its fragile intricacies. However, this woman who fought tirelessly against all that is wrong in the world went missing on Sunday, March 27th, 2022 in Lee, Massachusetts. Her remains were located a little over five months later-- on September 1st. Was her death the result of an tragic accident, or was she the victim of foul play?
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Transcript
Cherished Memories and Family Parallels
00:00:00
Speaker
I've spoken a lot on the show about my grandma, the stories and recollections, yet it's hard to find the words that can represent everything that she was to me. She would take me out on starry summer nights to watch meteor showers, lying on blankets side by side, gazing up at the spectacle of the universe. She was a bold stargazer.
00:00:24
Speaker
Every day when the weather started to warm, when I would get off the school bus and walk up the hilly blacktop road to her driveway, I would see my grandma crouched near the ground in her flower bed. Well, I would see her straw hat with the green visor, bobbing along among the flowers, pulling weeds, making sure the plants had what they needed to grow. She was a tender cultivator of life.
00:00:50
Speaker
At other times, in the fall and winter months mostly, she'd pull a book from her bookshelf and we would read together, books about nature, about animals, or we would work word puzzles. Then she would follow by asking me to write about what we had just read, a poem about leaves, a short story about the mongoose. She was a sharp weaver of knowledge. As her mind fell prey to dementia,
00:01:20
Speaker
I saw fear creep into her world. She began to feel that someone was sneaking into her home and moving things around. Sometimes she said they had taken the frozen corn she'd laid away for winter. Sometimes she said they'd rummage through her closet and pull things partially from the hangers. It wasn't until later that I heard from my dad what her greatest fear was, a fear that she needed to protect me.
00:01:50
Speaker
You see, I loved to stay the night at my grandma's house. Even during high school and college, I'd come home for the weekend just to stay a night with her like old times. She'd make an elaborate meal and a milkshake or apple stack cake for dessert. We'd watch Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy sit and talk about anything and everything. And then it would be time for bed. But once I was nestled under the heated blanket,
00:02:20
Speaker
That's when her fear crept in. I later heard from my dad that my grandma never slept on those nights. You see, she was so worried about that someone coming into her home that she would prop herself outside of my closed bedroom door, waiting and watching to ward off any danger. She was a sacrificial and resolute defender.
00:02:50
Speaker
I tell you all of this because all of the things my grandma was to me sounded just like what the person at the center of our case this week meant to so many. She too was a stargazer, an observer of the interconnectedness of life, a teacher, an example, a defender. This is the case of Megan Marone.
Introducing Megan Marone's Case
00:03:30
Speaker
Oh.
00:03:50
Speaker
Welcome to coffee and cases where we like our coffee hot and our cases cold. My name is Alison Williams. And my name is Maggie Dameron. We will be telling stories each week in the hopes that someone out there with any information concerning the cases will take those tips to law enforcement.
00:04:06
Speaker
So justice and closure can be brought to these families. With each case, we encourage you to continue in the conversation on our Facebook page, Coffee and Cases podcast, because as we all know, conversation helps to keep the missing person in the public consciousness, helping keep their memories alive. So sit back, sip your coffee, and listen to what's brewing this week. Well, that almost made me cry.
00:04:30
Speaker
Oh, I love my grandma. So sweet. So special. I know. And sad. And if I, I had no idea that she wouldn't, wouldn't sleep. She would just sit, stay awake all night long, sitting outside of my door. A testament to her love for you, I think. So Maggie, our case this week is a little bit different from our normal cases because number one,
00:05:00
Speaker
It is an extremely recent case. So there isn't a lot of information concerning theories, though I will share with you some potential ones and we can discuss them.
Megan's Life and Passions
00:05:14
Speaker
And number two, Megan Marone was a poet.
00:05:18
Speaker
And even the friends who wrote about her life were so impactful with their words that I'm just going to have to quote them a lot. Because if I tried to change the words, it would not
00:05:37
Speaker
have the impact. So I can provide the factual information for most newspaper accounts, you know, obviously as I normally do, but there is no way that I could provide a description of who Megan was in words more powerful than those who knew her best. So I'm going to be weaving between the two, the facts and those kind of poetic descriptions.
00:06:01
Speaker
I did attempt to contact both Megan's brother Peter and a friend of hers, Chris Hedges, for this episode, but I was not able to reach either of them for an interview. Okay. So this is just what I could glean from the research that I was able to do. And again, this is a recent case.
00:06:23
Speaker
Born in Albany, New York, Meghan's childhood was spent in Delmar, New York, where she lived with her mother Ellen, her father William, and her brother Peter, who was 12 years her senior. Wow. And that's like my brother and me because I am almost 12 years older than my brother.
00:06:50
Speaker
Well, my brother's almost 10 years older than me, so I guess it's not super abnormal. Right. Del Mar, New York is a suburb of Albany, New York, and the community of fewer than 9,000 people is split nearly in half by the road that leads into the much larger city of Albany. Del Mar itself is quaint, historic, and more rural.
00:07:19
Speaker
In fact, Meghan's brother Peter told Kayani Reed of NBC News that he and Meghan would often go on hikes and explore the wilderness. He enjoyed spending time with his baby sister and he made it a point to do so.
00:07:38
Speaker
which is great, especially with that age gap. The love he has for her, even when describing Megan, shows the pride that he has in being her brother. He praised in the NBC interview her talents. He said, quote, she played the piano. She played the harp. She was always performing, doing little skits, end quote.
00:08:06
Speaker
But oh, Maggie, those talents did not even compare to her love for writing. So how old is she right now?
00:08:16
Speaker
So yeah, I'm kind of describing her as a child and kind of her upbringing, but when this case takes place, which is just March of this year of 2022. Yeah. So that's why I said it's very recent. Megan was actually 42. Okay. So, um, but Megan,
00:08:42
Speaker
loved writing and she loved writing poetry, which is a gift. A gift. In fact, Megan began a poetry group called the Troy Poem Project in Troy, New York. That's cool. Yeah. And there are these images and I've included one for you to see.
00:09:06
Speaker
of Megan sitting in a chair, water behind her, a typewriter on a table in front of her. I know, I know. And she just has this sign, this simple Troy poem.
00:09:23
Speaker
sitting in front of her. So people passing by, they would come up and talk to Megan for a few minutes, tell her about their lives, their loves. And in about 20 minutes, she would reward them with a poem that she had written for them. Stop it. And it was typed on what looks like pieces of brown paper bags.
00:09:48
Speaker
And this isn't the only, there are several pictures of her typing or writing and in every one of them, her face is beaming. Yeah, she looks very happy. She does. And when I say that she was gifted,
00:10:06
Speaker
and she in writing and that she gifted those poems, they truly were works of art. And all of this was for free Maggie or a donation, but only if you chose to give that donation. So let me give you an example of one of the poems that she wrote that I saw in my research, just so you have a sense of her gift. Here was the poem.
00:10:33
Speaker
Drop the needle to the grooved thread of the record, repeating your long life, spinning out the songs of sorrow and joy, stories of adventuring through the fire and the fire ice. And above all else, in the retrospective view, we have come to love the love that emanates from you.
00:10:57
Speaker
kindness that is baseless and eternally repeating, creativity that defies all the end-dust defeating. Again, a round, a pause, a sound, a song of your love, blindly sustaining hope for us all. Was that not so good?
00:11:21
Speaker
So beautiful. And like, was that one of the ones she wrote when she just randomly. Yeah. I feel like that would take me several drafts to get to that. If ever. Yeah. If I ever got there. But Megan wasn't just a writer Maggie. She was also a teacher.
00:11:43
Speaker
We love those. Yes, we do. Megan and Peter's mother was also a teacher, which led to Megan knowing even when she was young that that was the path her life would take as well.
00:11:58
Speaker
Oh, I'm going to guess she taught English. Yeah, she did. So my guess is that her own educational journey had something to do with her passion for education.
Activism and Personal Struggles
00:12:08
Speaker
Also, I know for me, you know, usually those who go into teaching, we had teachers who impacted us. We loved, yeah.
00:12:18
Speaker
And Meghan had gone to St. Thomas the Apostle Elementary School, then to the Academy of the Holy Names, on to Russell Sage College, and then to get her master's, and later to teach as an adjunct professor at Fairleigh Dickinson University in New Jersey. And she had also taught high school English at Chatham High School in Chatham, New Jersey for 13 years.
00:12:44
Speaker
and had recently been teaching at Shaker High School in Latham, New York for the past three years. She has an impressive resume. Yeah. And I mean, she'd been teaching for around 16 years at the high school level. And from what I can infer, she took teaching as her mission. Her purpose was to care for students
00:13:11
Speaker
to teach them beauty, to help them find truth, and to show them how to question. I love that. Meghan's friend, which is journalist and acclaimed author, Chris Hedges, who I mentioned in the beginning, had this to say about Meghan's calling as a teacher. And this is kind of a long quote. But again, I warned you at the beginning, I would be quoting a lot because of the way these are worded.
00:13:39
Speaker
Quote, she was one of those unique, impassioned, endlessly curious and deeply caring teachers that transform young lives. In Troy, though chronically short of money, she could be found at the downtown diner at night feeding kids she mentored, who came from low income families. Megan would become hot with anger.
00:14:03
Speaker
at the focus in schools on vocational texts, designed to teach students about the real world, by which school administrators meant the world of technology, business, and careerism. This was not the real world to Megan. How were her students to discover and speak about love if they had not read Anna Karenina?
00:14:26
Speaker
Pablo Neruda and Romeo and Juliet. How were they to understand war if they had not read All Quiet on the Western Front and Johnny got his gun? How were they to grasp the mechanics of tyranny if they had not read George Orwell, Aldous Huxley, and Mikhail Bulgakov?
00:14:45
Speaker
How were they to explore race if they had not read W.E.B. Du Bois, James Baldwin, and Toni Morrison? How were they to cope with the capacity of human evil if they had not read the literature of the Holocaust, which she taught to high school seniors? How were they to begin to process the inevitability of despair, disappointment, and death if they had not read Anton Chekov, Emily Dickinson, and Sylvia Plath?
00:15:14
Speaker
She gave too freely of herself. She was an easy mark for anyone with a sad story. She should have built better defensive walls. She was too good for this world, too trusting, too caring, and too vulnerable.
00:15:32
Speaker
She paid for this by having her heart broken many times. She carried under her exuberance the weight of sadness that comes from loving without restraint." End quote. Okay. Everybody in this episode, such talented writers. This is why I said I have got to read this entire, I could not say it better than that.
00:16:00
Speaker
And also, I think that schools try to censor way, way too much what they let teachers teach. Because I do think there needs to be a really good balance of like that quote unquote real world. But then also you're balancing it with, you know, great literature, be a plath and Shakespeare. Yeah. All these classic things.
00:16:30
Speaker
And sometimes I think when people that are in education are making decisions about education, then education suffers. Mm hmm. Mm hmm. And I just kept reading. And of course, you know, these authors, I love these authors, you know, and so I'm like, yes, yes, Chris Hedges. Yes.
00:16:51
Speaker
And I kept seeing us in this quote as well. Yeah. That's what I was about to say. I think so many teachers are so similar. Like give so much of yourself, almost too much of yourself and yeah.
00:17:05
Speaker
I think we're very similar to Megan. Right. Listen, Sleuthhounds, you should see Maggie and me geeking out over literature. I mean, just like, oh, we got to my favorite scene in Hamlet today. Or I was saying, oh, I read my favorite chapter from A Tale of Two Cities out loud. And my students were like,
00:17:31
Speaker
read us another one, you know, because they're not reading it, you know, with those emotions and things like that. And then obviously, Maggie and I both taught literature of the Holocaust. And so, yeah, I think that when you read those texts, it shows you the depth of human emotion and humanity. And yeah, and even that comment at the end that he said, you know, she was
00:17:58
Speaker
too caring, too trusting, too vulnerable. I mean, Maggie and I are, we're the kind of people we give, you know, somebody their 132nd chance because we think maybe this time will be the time. Right.
00:18:14
Speaker
So Megan also practiced what she preached. She didn't just tell her students of the intricacies of the universe and that they should vocalize what they believe. She also did just that. In fact, Megan frequently participated in demonstrations. She was there for Occupy Wall Street.
00:18:40
Speaker
She also participated in the Extinction Rebellion protest, a demonstration that took place on the Brooklyn Bridge, where people would lie down across the road to block traffic. Wow. I know. So I wish I were more vocal, like Megan, in that respect. Yeah, we're brave. Mm-hmm. But it was during that demonstration that she was arrested, but again, for speaking up for her beliefs.
00:19:10
Speaker
But things had been shifting in Megan's life. She still saw the beauty. She still texted pictures to her friends of the cycle of the moon. She still spoke for the voiceless. She still found joy in words and in relationships, but some of those relationships were beginning to wear on her. Her friend Anna, it seems, saw it first.
00:19:38
Speaker
It was just after Megan's release from jail, when she was arrested during that protest, that she received word of a family emergency that she needed to get home. Megan first thought of her father who had cancer, but it was her mother who had suffered from a brain aneurysm. No, those are so scary.
00:20:03
Speaker
Mm hmm. That's what happened to my aunt. That's what happened to Rodney's mom. So scary. But that's what happened to Megan's mom and Megan's mom was on life support. And she found out about it right after she was released from jail. So Megan made it home just in time to say goodbye.
00:20:24
Speaker
Oh my God. The loss of her mother was devastating for Megan. And it was something that was always with her. Even after her mother's death, she would do things like she wrote prayers with her friend Anna Mercury on paper and then burned them in candles like this, you know, wish into the ether. She traveled to Ireland where her mother's ancestors hailed so she could pay homage to her heritage.
00:20:52
Speaker
She felt like her mother's spirit was always around her. Several months after meeting Anna, Megan had called to say that she had fallen in love with a man in Washington. According to Anna, quote, he said her mother's spirit guided them together. He wanted her to come out to be with him for the pandemic and she wasn't sure whether or not to go, end quote.
00:21:22
Speaker
So a couple things one sluetowns if you hear thunder that's because apparently it's raining outside and that was I think
00:21:33
Speaker
We paused the show because I thought I heard the tornado sirens and then we weren't sure if they were. I'm pretty positive it was because then we stopped. But anyways, we're carrying on, so it's fine. But did she just meet this guy online and he says your mother's spirit led us together? I don't think she met him online, but yes, it was fairly soon, I think, after meeting him that he made that comment.
00:22:01
Speaker
Which is kind of weird. I try not to judge him, but it's weird. Yeah. I'm going to try to I'm going to try to hold my judgment in. Right. Well, and the fact that I think, you know, she told her friend Anna that she wasn't sure whether or not she should go says that she was also kind of feeling iffy about that comment. Yeah. She went anyway. She drove days actually to be with him.
00:22:28
Speaker
But in less than a week after getting there, this was in March, 2020.
Workplace Challenges and Disappearance
00:22:35
Speaker
Okay. She like right during the beginning of the shutdown. Exactly. So in less than a week, she knew that what he had promised her and reality were not the same thing.
00:22:51
Speaker
In fact, Anna even went so far in a tribute that she wrote to Meghan that was called Fragments of Meghan Maroon to say that her friend was afraid of her partner. Hmm. So I don't know the exact details, but her friend Anna at least said, you know, she goes from him saying her mother's spirit guided them together to Meghan actually being fearful of him.
00:23:20
Speaker
in like the span of a week. So Anna begged and begged Megan not only to come home but to actually stay with her for a bit and Megan listened. Okay. Of that homecoming
00:23:34
Speaker
Anna wrote, quote, she arrived with her enormous jacket, the color of a sunrise in Utah. She arrived with all her books. She arrived and made us rose tea with cardamom, honey, and almond milk. She arrived and found the trail behind my mother's house led into a forest where she'd walk barefoot and light sage.
00:24:01
Speaker
We held a ceremony with her family and friends over the phone to honor the anniversary of her mother's death." End quote. So Megan just seems like a very free-spirited top gal. Absolutely. Yes. She was very much at one, I think, with nature and feeling like, I think, reality and the fullest extent of humanity happens when we are
00:24:31
Speaker
in that state, away from consumerism and commercialism and those sorts of things. So Meghan came home, but as her friend soon came to acknowledge, Meghan still seemed in pain. They would sometimes go for drives together just to have the feeling of being uninhibited by life, even for just a brief moment. But always with Meghan, she had bun, which was her stuffed animal rabbit.
00:25:01
Speaker
Aw. I know. And that stuffed animal, a staple, according to so many people who knew Megan, was essential to her. Anna even said she put it, quote, to her nose and would breathe in like the smell of safety, end quote. Listen, I totally understand that. When I was like, I don't know, somewhere between
00:25:27
Speaker
we'll say four and seven. There was this elderly lady, Ms. Johnson, who lived in my neighborhood and her daughter, whose name was Vadi, which is a very, I feel like Eastern Kentucky name, but had a mental disability. I'm not sure exactly what it was, but like it was
00:25:48
Speaker
the mom had to take care of her. And when my mom and I would go on walks, Ms. Johnson would always be sitting out on the front porch and the body would be there and she would always go inside and get me a Kit Kat bar.
00:26:04
Speaker
And I would eat that like when we would walk back home and after her mom died, body couldn't take care of herself in the house by herself. So she, um, actually went to a nursing home and she gave me a teddy bear that was like Robin hood. I'm pretty sure. But of course it was body bear to me. And, um, he went everywhere with me, like went to college with me, Central Kentucky. He moved with me.
00:26:32
Speaker
He's now like in a china cabinet in my living room. And sometimes if I'm like really overwhelmed, I get him out and just sit him. Like if I'm working on something, he just sits there. Cause it's like my, yeah, it's my comfort. I love that. Yeah. So Megan, Megan would do that too. I mean that, that makes complete sense to me. You know, even as adults, we have those things.
00:27:00
Speaker
whether it's a stuffed animal or it's something else that bring back those memories. But Maggie, even at this point, and again, we're in around 2020, 2021, even teaching was wearing on Megan. And Maggie, you and I understand this feeling completely. Because especially during the pandemic, it was very,
00:27:30
Speaker
wearing and draining. But her brother Peter told Dateline, quote, being in the classroom with the kids, that was her thing, end quote. But Peter also stated, quote, there's more pressure on teachers these days. When she first started, compared to teaching now, things have changed
00:27:56
Speaker
dramatically and amen. I feel like I'm at church. Right. Preach it. Peter. I know. I was like, yes. And also yes. Yeah. Do those things. But despite all of the pain that Megan had been navigating recently, there was something else. Another issue that was much more pressing, something that would cause her to temporarily leave teaching
00:28:24
Speaker
in order to escape. And this was happening in 2022. So we're now up to the present time of the case. An incident had happened at work between Megan and a married coworker where he was making inappropriate comments and making sexual advances that she repeatedly turned down.
00:28:52
Speaker
Not okay. Never okay. Peter said of that person that Megan had indicated to him that she turned him down and that he quote, didn't like it. End quote. Well, she probably didn't like being sexually harassed every day. Right. Yeah. So take it. Yeah. She had actually told her administrators about the harassment, but they, they had done nothing about it.
00:29:21
Speaker
Also, not okay. Yeah, again, also not okay. He was still working there and she was having to face him every single day. And this constant exposure to this person was traumatizing to Megan.
00:29:39
Speaker
And her friend, retired teacher Ruth Ross, for whom Megan had student taught and who remained in touch with Megan over the years, said that in March, just before her leave of absence, Megan had had a quote, many nervous breakdown, end quote, because it wasn't just having to face this man at school. He was also sending her emails and texts that were suggestive and inappropriate.
00:30:06
Speaker
And her school did nothing? School did nothing. Okay and so now it's not even just confined to school.
00:30:14
Speaker
You know, it's even when she's getting emails and getting texts. So she needed to escape him. Something that became especially clear when, as she told her friend Ruth on March 24th, Megan had seen that coworker drive past her house. Oh no ma'am. And she told her friend that she believed he was stalking her. Yeah.
00:30:41
Speaker
Her brother did not use light words when describing her encounters, nor did Megan's friend, Chris Hedges, who wrote an article about Megan saying that Megan told him that the coworker, quote, brutally harassed and intimidated me because I wouldn't sleep with him, end quote. Oh, my God. OK. People are disgusting.
00:31:08
Speaker
As a result, Megan requested temporary leave from her teaching position. Now you understand why. She's like, I've got to temporary leave, but I cannot continue to see this man every day. Her mental health was more important for sure. According to Peter, several of Megan's friends had actually urged her to get out of town to
00:31:35
Speaker
escape back into the things that she loved so she could feel safe again. Both Ruth and Anna had even suggested that Megan come to stay with them. But instead, Megan decided to stay a week at an inn that she loved with plans to move in with her friend Anna's mother in June.
00:31:57
Speaker
and start fresh after this trip. So Anna would be in New York in May. So we're in March right now, end of March. So she has plans to be in New York in May, Anna does, and she was going to help Megan pack up all of her things. And then they were going to drive West together. And it was with that plan in place, just a couple of months away,
00:32:22
Speaker
that Megan began to look for solace until then. So if you think about it, I mean, school is ending just a few months after her leave. So I guess in my head, the temporary leave, I guess, would be until the next school year, potentially. So you've got several months built in there. So Megan checked into the Red Lion Inn in Stockbridge, Massachusetts on March 24, 2022.
Search Efforts and Discovery
00:32:51
Speaker
with plans to check out on March 30th. So she's gonna stay. Okay, so she's not staying super long. Yeah, just about a week. The Red Lion Inn was originally constructed as a tavern and- Oh my God, it's so cute. I know. I had to include a photo in there for Maggie. Yeah, it was built in the late 1700s, which you can tell by the architecture.
00:33:17
Speaker
And it is now a member of the historic hotels of America and it is beautiful. So I want to live there. Yeah. I can see why she felt it calling to her again. You know, she'd stayed there before why you would want to go back to a place that's beautiful. Megan's brother Peter actually texted Megan the evening of Saturday, March 26th. She, of course, let him know that she had checked into the N
00:33:46
Speaker
And it seemed as though this respite was just what Megan needed. And her brother also acknowledged that Megan needed a break to rest. So when Peter communicated with her that evening of the 26th, she was sitting in bed, reading, eating some soup. And she said, you know what? I'm going to get off the phone, but I'll be back in touch with you the next day. But that sounds like an amazing day to me. Sit in bed. Yeah, me too.
00:34:16
Speaker
Yeah, maybe some potato chips. Yeah. However, when Peter texted Megan multiple times the next day on March 27th and received no answer, he felt like something was wrong. And initially, when I was reading the research, I was like, why would he be so concerned so quickly?
00:34:39
Speaker
You know, because it was just a few messages that went unanswered. But Peter told Lee Egan of crime online that Megan was always one to respond to texts, even though it was also in her character to go off on adventures into nature or other trips alone. So it's very much her character to go on these
00:35:01
Speaker
trips by herself, but it's also very much in her nature to respond to sex, which I feel like in hindsight, I should probably get to be much better at that.
00:35:16
Speaker
That's what I was about to say too. I'm like that person, for example, Allison texted me today and I read it and I was like, when I go on a break, I'll respond back to that. And then I forgot to until about 10 minutes before we recorded. And I was like, I'll just talk to her when we record. But I feel like I need to do better about that.
00:35:33
Speaker
I'm horrible. Sometimes I'm really good and I'm on it and I respond right then and then other times, like you Maggie, I see the text and then I get busy with something else and then I'm just really bad at it and I'm horrible at calling people back.
00:35:50
Speaker
And then I feel like they'll never know if I'm missing, because they'll just think that I've gotten consumed with something else. Yeah, you just ghosted off. Yeah. So I mean, at least because Megan was so prompt in her response to texts, her brother knew almost immediately that something was up. So after getting no text back from his sister after multiple tries on Sunday, he called the inn.
00:36:20
Speaker
on Monday and asked... So is this now the 28th? Yes. Yes. This is now the 28th. And he asked that they send someone to knock on her door to check on her. And what they found, Maggie, was a clean room, bed made, Megan's things still in the room.
00:36:41
Speaker
So candles, clothing, toothbrush, toiletries, and books. She had Sing, Unburied Sing by Jasmine Ward, The Heights of Machu Picchu by Pablo Neruda, The Mists of Avalon by Marion Zimmer Bradley, Tripmaster Monkey by Maxine Hong Kingston, Howard's End by Ann Forrester, and Favorite Folk Tales from Around the World, edited by Jane Yolen. So I mean, obviously she planned on doing a lot of reading during this trip.
00:37:10
Speaker
And so all of her things are there, but no Megan. Hmm. Since Allison and I don't work together anymore, recording our podcast became harder until we found Zencaster. Zencaster is podcast recording the way it should be, web-based, and as easy as creating a link and clicking to join a recording session.
00:37:32
Speaker
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00:38:01
Speaker
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00:38:19
Speaker
Go to zencaster.com forward slash pricing and use our code coffee and cases, all one word. You'll get 30% off your first three months of Zencaster Professional. We want you to have the same easy experience we do for all our podcasting and content needs. It's time to share your story.
00:38:42
Speaker
So you know what this kind of reminds me of? What's that? A little bit is the November Fool Patreon on Craig Williamson. Remember the guy that just like disappears from his hotel room and collar all day. Yes. This is kind of what this, this giving me Craig vibes. So if you don't know what we're referring to, make sure you check out some Patreon. Yes. You'll know. But yes, it absolutely does. It seems like there's nothing wrong, but she's not there.
00:39:11
Speaker
So upon hearing the news and still getting no response in his attempts to reach Megan, Peter went on Tuesday, March 29th to file a missing persons report with the Bethlehem police department back in Delmar, New York, since that was where Megan was living at the time. But potentially she's been gone since maybe even late that night of the 26th.
00:39:40
Speaker
We'll get a few more details, but yes, as far as he is concerned, that is the last time he spoke with her was the night of the 26th. So it isn't until the 29th
00:39:52
Speaker
that he finally files that missing persons report. And so of course he files it in his hometown, which is where Megan was living, which is Delmar, New York. However, that information was passed along to the Massachusetts state police since Megan had actually disappeared in Massachusetts and not in New York because she was staying at that red lion inn.
00:40:16
Speaker
On Sunday, March 27th, so we're going to backtrack a couple days. So the very next morning after she'd been corresponding with her brother, on Sunday, March 27th, around 10 a.m., Megan had come to the lobby of the inn and had asked a worker for directions to Church Street.
00:40:41
Speaker
So while she didn't tell the employee why she was asking, right off of Church Street is a hiking trail, Long Cope Park, which is a 46 acre nature preserve. So something that Megan would definitely have drawn to, especially when she was trying to relax. She had stayed at this inn before, so maybe she was
00:41:08
Speaker
like just familiar enough with the area to know that the preserve was there but didn't know how to get to it.
00:41:16
Speaker
be my guess. Okay so we know for sure she is accounted for the morning of the 27th. Right around 10 am. We came to do that she is more than likely going on this hawking trail because that's just something that seems very Megan-ish and she would know of this trail because she's been at this inn before she's been in the area. Though by the next day on the 28th that is when the
00:41:44
Speaker
hotel employee goes to the room and there's no Megan. And there's no Megan. So fairly quickly, information had also come in concerning, after this missing persons report was filed, information had come in concerning a car that matched a description of Megan's car.
00:42:05
Speaker
About two days after she was last seen by that hotel employee, so on the 29th, the very day that the missing persons report was filed, a call had been logged by law enforcement about a seemingly abandoned vehicle, a black 2017 Subaru Impreza that hadn't been moved since Sunday the 27th. Hmm.
00:42:35
Speaker
So this was a match for Megan's car. Yeah. The car in a Facebook post by Massachusetts State Police was identified as Megan Marones. And it had been, quote, found parked on Church Street at Longcope Park, a heavily wooded hiking area in South Lee, end quote.
00:43:04
Speaker
So where we guess she would be. Exactly. So obviously this car was there on Sunday, the 27th, which is the very morning that the hotel employee tells her how to get to church street. And she asks where church street is. Her car is here at this long coat park and a call comes in on the 29th saying that it hadn't moved in two days.
00:43:31
Speaker
Hmm. This park was about an 11 minute drive from Red Lion Inn and her car was parked at the trailhead. Well, I hope they start searching the park. They do. Immediately a search began from there for Megan. The social media post noted that law enforcement conducted, quote,
00:43:54
Speaker
extensive searches of that area and other areas of interest in Lee by state troopers, local police officers and firefighters, and a civilian search and rescue team," end quote. And Megha's brother Peter had actually been one of the members of that search, hiking the surrounding woods, looking for any sign of his sister.
00:44:19
Speaker
And they did not take the search lightly, Maggie. They also dispatched canine teams, drones, air wing helicopters, and even kayaks with side scan sonar and underwater cameras in their search. However, none of those searches led to finding Megan. At least law enforcement now had Megan's car, though.
00:44:47
Speaker
and what information it might potentially provide. Oh yeah, so like maybe some DNA, some fingerprint. Right, something to give them a lead. So the car was tested for DNA, but the only DNA that came back was Megan's. It did not appear. But you know, honestly, at this point, that could potentially be a relief.
00:45:11
Speaker
That is just Megan's because maybe she just wandered off this trail. She's locked somewhere. Maybe even fell and broke a leg or something and can't get help. And we're going to find her and we're going to save her. It did not appear from looking at the inside of the car that there had even been a struggle. So again, that was probably a relief to friends and family because it doesn't look like there's foul play.
00:45:40
Speaker
But there were details that didn't make sense, knowing Meghan, according to her brother Peter. The first was that her car was found unlocked. Peter told Reed of NBC News, quote, she always made sure that the car was locked before she went out on a hike and the car was unlocked, end quote.
00:46:09
Speaker
And I mean, he would know because they'd gone hiking together. So he would know, you know, this is something that she does. He also noted equally as strange, especially if she had planned on going on a hike when she left her car, was the fact that her hiking boots were still in the car. Okay. So my question with this is,
00:46:38
Speaker
what, which we may not know, but I wonder what type of hiking this is because I'm thinking like if it's breaks interstate park, the trails are, you know, really clearly marked. You could do those in like a good pair of tennis shoes, you know, like a good trend of pair of tennis shoes. Or is this like over Thanksgiving break, my dad took me, um,
00:47:05
Speaker
to the picture. Yeah, it was so so fun to the place where like his house was when he was little until they moved into the house where like my grandma that my grandma still has and then up and around over the hill to the place where my grandfather was born. And that was really cool. But that was like, we had to have hiking shoes because there was no trail. And so I'm wondering, you know, those are two different things I can see the hiking boots being left behind if it was a
00:47:34
Speaker
clearly kept trail. But if it was something like that, you're going to need those hiking boots. Because I would have ate dirt several times. Yeah. I mean, this was a large nature preserve. So I imagine that there were both trails and obviously much space that was not a clearly marked trail. In my mind, Megan is the type, though, who would go off the path.
00:48:03
Speaker
Yeah, and I think she would wear the boots just in case she did decide to go off the path. Right, right. So that is very odd to me. Then there were the pings of her cell phone. The last of which was around 3 p.m. on March 27th.
00:48:23
Speaker
As her brother Peter detailed to Dateline, quote, we were able to obtain through her Google account, her Gmail account, and a couple of cell phone pings to the cell towers. There was three either GPS or cell phone pings for the rest of the day, all on private property across the road from Long Cope Park, end quote.
00:48:49
Speaker
located in an area of quote streams, ravines, and dense vegetation, end quote. So I wonder if she knew it was private property or did she maybe think it was part of the park and she went over there, you know, off trail. And like you said, maybe fell into a ravine. She's got a broken leg. See, I think, I don't know. I think it's really weird because she, I think she would have been on enough trails that she would at least recognize
00:49:18
Speaker
where the trail and nature preserve were and she's parked at the trailhead. So obviously that's where you enter. And it's that detail of paying locations. Again, it's odd because it didn't ping, her cell phone didn't in the park itself, which if that was her destination, as we would assume that it was. And why is she on the private property? Yeah, across the road.
00:49:47
Speaker
That doesn't make sense. A little over two weeks after Megan's disappearance, law enforcement in Lee asked assistance from the Massachusetts State Police, the Albany County Sheriff's Office, who had special crew who were trained in searching densely wooded and hard to navigate terrain, and the Berkshire County search and rescue squad to aid in the investigation. So they're getting, it's like all hands on deck.
00:50:17
Speaker
Mm hmm. Right. Just a couple of weeks after her disappearance by May 11th, Lamar advertising had donated a month of free billboard space in both the towns of Lee and Linux for the Marone family to post a picture of Megan and a call for anyone with information to call 911.
Theories and Investigations
00:50:39
Speaker
Because she's just gone. Unfortunately,
00:50:45
Speaker
on Thursday, September 1st, 2022. And this is why I said, again, this is an extremely recent case. We're talking right at three months ago. Like three months ago. A civilian was walking through a densely wooded area in Lee, Massachusetts near Fox Drive and stumbled upon human remains.
00:51:11
Speaker
This is not, and I mean obviously every week we say this, but this is not how I wanted this case to go. I know. I really wanted this to just be like
00:51:22
Speaker
Megan is still out there. We don't know where she is. Like that's what I was really hoping would happen. And in best case scenario, this breaks my heart that we are not going the way I was. I know. Hoping that it would because I wanted Megan to come home. I know. So, you know, and this just beautiful spirit that she is. Mm hmm.
00:51:44
Speaker
So these remains were found near Fox Drive and Fox Drive is a dead end gravel road about a mile away from where her car was found. Hmm. Anywhere near where the cell phones pinged or do we know? Well, we'll talk about the pings here in just a second. Okay.
00:52:06
Speaker
Massachusetts state police on Friday, September 2nd announced their belief that the remains were that of quote, 42 year old Megan Marone end quote, saying that the evidence collected at the scene made the remains highly likely to be hers. And days later, the office of the chief medical examiner confirmed their belief.
00:52:34
Speaker
Now, because this is such a recent case, there have not been details released concerning the state of her remains. And there has been no indication as to the cause of death. And since that announcement has not been made, while her death could be accidental, it doesn't rule out the possibility of foul play.
00:53:03
Speaker
And it makes me almost think that it potentially could be foul play because I would think if it's accidental, that's not something they would restrain, you know, refrain from saying. Right. Yeah. Yeah. I totally agree. Part of me feels like since we are now months out from the discovery and no autopsy has been released, that there must be some part of, you know, the law enforcement belief that her death could be
00:53:34
Speaker
the results of foul play or else why would they not have said, you know, we can tell that she died in a tragic accident. Right.
00:53:44
Speaker
At the beginning, police were not shy in stating that they didn't believe that there was evidence of foul play. So at the beginning, they said, we don't believe that there's foul play. However, in the last couple of months, when asked about that possibility of foul play, they have either declined to comment or have indicated that they are open to exploring all potential theories concerning her death.
00:54:13
Speaker
which to me says, okay, there has to be something that makes them think that foul play is a possibility. So let's talk about some of those theories now. Theory one. So do we have, or will we talk about what her family and friends believe happened? Yeah, kind of as we go along, I'll tell you, especially her brother, which ones he thinks are a possibility or not a possibility.
00:54:40
Speaker
So theory one is suicide. There are some who suggest that Megan came to Red Lion Inn with a plan and that's why she came to a place that she felt connected to and went out into nature and did not go to stay with friends instead.
00:55:04
Speaker
Those close to Meghan remember how worn she had been with everything that she'd been dealing with recently from her mother's death to the breakup, to the stalking, to having to step away from her love teaching to escape some of that pain. So they question, was she distraught enough to have committed suicide?
00:55:29
Speaker
Those who support this theory even brought up that writer Virginia Woolf, who was one of Megan's favorite authors, had committed suicide on March 28th. Oh, so they're saying she potentially did that the same day. Right. Plus, Megan, by all accounts, was someone who felt emotion to her core.
00:55:54
Speaker
Now, I'm about to give you a long quote from Megan's friend, Anna Mercury, again, because her words about her relationship with Megan just
00:56:06
Speaker
are embodied in font when I read you this quote. So here's what she wrote of Megan. Quote, she'd laugh at herself, at her incongruity and the world around her. But beneath all the laughter, there was always pain. Pain at the men who had hurt her, pain at how bad the world is, pain at how the pandemic
00:56:32
Speaker
was impacting her students, paying at not having children of her own. One last year of teaching turned into another, one more year, she said, and then she'd come back west to Washington and we'd help her get set up in a new life. She never finished out the school year. Megan was haunted as long as I'd known her. She was haunted by Ellen.
00:57:01
Speaker
and the spirits of so many other loved ones lost by capitalism and the grinding stress of making it through each day, by the men who had assaulted her physically and the dozens of others who'd assaulted her heart and her mind with their utter failure to understand a thing.
00:57:20
Speaker
She was haunted by the racism and Troy, by the school system, by the chronic ache of feeling so alone. She was haunted when one of her students was shot to death. She was haunted by the tension in the school with the administration and the faculty and one dang coworker whose name I got so sick of hearing. If you're reading this, you know who you are. F-U.
00:57:48
Speaker
By the start of this year, it was clear the Meg I knew had all but given way to pain. Her messages were waterfalls of disjointed emotion. Something in her was broken, shattered by loving too much and seeing too much and being too right. And a world gone wrong.
00:58:10
Speaker
I watched her press herself against that wall of suffering, try to use its force to set herself upright, until some new act of quotidian cruelty would come and knock the wind from her again." Well, and so it's just
00:58:36
Speaker
I think Anna hits on how deeply Meghan felt all emotion. And of course, you know, I changed the curse words in there, but it's clear here, the anger that Meghan's friend Anna feels toward that person who drove her from teaching. Right. But let's play devil's advocate here. If she were trying to emulate Virginia Woolf,
00:59:04
Speaker
wouldn't she have waited until the same day to do it? Because we don't know. The last anybody saw her was on the 27th. Which I guess, you know, it could have just been, she wanted to spend a couple of days in nature, which she potentially could have done. And that's totally her. And then, cause she left on the 27th, right? And then she could have just stayed like overnight. And then on the 28th committed suicide if she wanted to,
00:59:35
Speaker
emulate wolf. But she had those long-term plans though. She did, yeah. Remember, she and Anna were going to pack up all their things in May and move west and Megan was going to live with Anna's mother. And all of that was supposed to happen shortly after she returned from this trip because she's staying until the end
00:59:56
Speaker
of March and then she has other kind of short term plans. So why would why would she make those plans a couple months in the future if suicide were her plan all along? And if this were a suicide, where were her things? So I mentioned how many of her things were left in her hotel room. Yes. But there were also things that were missing.
01:00:25
Speaker
including her work laptop, her stuffed bun. Oh, which she would not have left. No, she would not. And her car keys. Which also she, well, they weren't in the car either? Nope. Hmm. And they're not right there by her body.
01:00:47
Speaker
And at least two of those objects are big enough that they would be accounted for either in or around her car or her body, the laptop and the stuffed bun. And even though Megan felt deeply, she also still saw beauty and she fought back again and again against all that she saw wrong in the world. So she just doesn't seem the kind to me who would just give up.
01:01:18
Speaker
And finally, her brother does not believe this theory. According to an interview with Peter, included in an article in the Daily Mail by Ruth Basinski, he stated, quote, The scenarios are endless. Do I suspect foul play? Is it on my radar? Yes.
01:01:37
Speaker
Is it possible she got abducted? Yes. Did she get injured? Did she hit her head? End quote. But one theory he refuses to accept is that of suicide. That is one that is completely off the table for him. And he reminded everyone who asks him
01:01:58
Speaker
that Meghan was a gifted writer and in his mind he said if she had planned on suicide, she of all people would have left a note.
01:02:13
Speaker
And honestly, I think, I mean, you know, obviously I don't know Megan, but from the, on a personal level, but from what I've learned of Megan, just through this episode, I feel like she is aware enough of her mental health needs that she would have sought help. I think if it got to that point, I mean, she's leaving a career that she loves.
01:02:38
Speaker
before the school year's out, which is so hard to do as a teacher because you make so many people mad, you burn so many bridges. But she's doing that because she realizes she needs to step away for her own health. And so I think if she got to that point, she would seek help. I think so too. Theory two was that her death was an accident.
01:03:05
Speaker
The day Megan went out was also the day of an ice storm that was passing through. So could she have fallen and hit her head and either the fall or later hypothermia, if she was incapacitated, have killed her? Quite possibly.
01:03:25
Speaker
There is also a theory within the accident hypothesis that Megan could have gotten hurt, and again, this is an accidental theory, while geocaching
01:03:40
Speaker
which is- I need someone to explain what this is. I know it's like some type of activity, but like I do not understand. Yes, it was an activity that she was known to take part in and I didn't know what it was either. So I looked it up and it's basically a game. So clues that are related to landmarks are hidden within stories.
01:04:03
Speaker
And so it would be like you're trying to find an apple tree and this apple tree could be in a story about this particular area. Yes. And so once you figure out the landmark, you would use GPS to find the coordinates and there you would find often a plastic container
01:04:28
Speaker
with items in it from others who are participating in this activity. And when you find this plastic container, you are supposed to take an item from it and then leave one of equal or higher value, which is super exciting because it's like a treasure hunt, right? And you don't know what other people have left.
01:04:52
Speaker
Yeah, but I think this is way over my rain capacity. Right, right. I would definitely have to have an assistant. So it was super exciting, though, to kind of see what was left behind, what eclectic thing you might gain for your collection. And so it seems very agony, though, I could see why she would like it. Right. But sometimes these tubs, they were placed in treacherous locations.
01:05:21
Speaker
And so there's a theory that her death could have been accidental because it was in some sort of like treacherous or hard to reach location. And maybe that is at least what led her to areas near but not in Longcote Park.
01:05:44
Speaker
Oh, so maybe why she was like across the street or whatever. Right. Yeah. So at least that theory, like you said, would explain maybe why her car is parked there, but she, her cell phone was pinging because maybe she's looking up GPS coordinates in an area across the street.
01:06:14
Speaker
So there's that. But again, where is her laptop? Where is bun? Where are her car keys? We still don't have answers to those things. Theory three is foul play. I mentioned before that Megan's car was parked at the trailhead, but even the way it was parked has led many who were involved who knew Megan to suspect foul play.
01:06:45
Speaker
As cited in Baschinski's article, Peter said of the car, quote, it was suspect how her car was parked. It was pulled directly into the trailhead, blocking the entrance. Her car keys, hotel key, school-issued laptop, and a little stuffed animal she always traveled with was missing, end quote.
01:07:11
Speaker
So it wasn't even as though she pulled into the parking lot and parked in a regular spot. It was like she pulled in and blocked off the entrance to the trail, which again is not a Megan move. But we know unless they wipe down like the steering wheel and stuff that her DNA is the only DNA that's in that car. That's what they said. Yeah.
01:07:39
Speaker
I also find it confusing if we're supposed to believe that it's foul play, why the cell phone pings were tracked to the private property across from the nature preserve in a residential area less than a mile from where her car was found. But I didn't read anything about law enforcement recovering that phone from on or around her body.
01:08:08
Speaker
So where her phone was pinging, was it in like a wooded area or was it like, you know, like a subdivision? I saw both. It said residential, but then I also read that it was where there were ravines and dense vegetation. So I'm not, yeah, I'm not sure. And I'm curious if the phone were not found, where could it be?
01:08:35
Speaker
Right. And then what was the distance between those pings and where her body was found, especially since the phone wasn't found inside of her car. And I wonder if they have the phone. We just don't know that they have. Right. Yeah. Because I didn't read it in anything. And I'm also stuck on the fact that the last ping was at 3 p.m.
01:08:58
Speaker
since we know her brother had been trying to communicate with Megan all day long on the 27th. Right. And she usually answers him back. So if she had service enough to like be looking at GPS coordinates, she would have service enough to answer her brother's text messages. So why not respond? And she had asked for directions around 10 a.m. Nobody saw her after that, that we can confirm after 10 a.m. And the drive to Longcote Park is only 10 minutes.
01:09:28
Speaker
Right? Which means she's at Longcote Park. She's last seen in the lobby of the hotel at 10 a.m. It takes 10 minutes to get to Longcote Park. So she's arriving at Longcote Park, let's say, between 10, 10 and 10, 15. So what happened between 10, 10 and 3 p.m. when the last cell phone pings? I mean, what time did the first cell phone ping? Do we know that? That I don't know.
01:09:58
Speaker
But why wouldn't she have responded to Peter during that time? I mean, that's five hours. Right. She would have stopped for, you know, lunch or something. And sending a text takes two seconds. And Peter even questions the choice of Longcote Park. He stated that it didn't show up on a Google search of hike friendly parks.
01:10:26
Speaker
she had obviously asked for Church Street by name, so she must have known of it somehow. He figures since the namesake of the park, Dana Longcope, is the cousin of poet William Alexander Percy. Peter and the family have speculated that maybe that's how Megan learned of the park itself because of that literary connection.
01:10:50
Speaker
But Meghan's friend Anna believes that Meghan may have meant a different Church Street, one that was in Stockbridge, Massachusetts and not the one in Lee. And why would she ask the person in Lee for directions to Church Street in a different town?
01:11:11
Speaker
Well, because Stockbridge is close to Lee. And so maybe if she didn't know that there was also a Church Street in Lee and she said, can you tell me how to get to Church Street? Right.
01:11:24
Speaker
Meghan's friend Anna thinks that Meghan actually meant the one in Stockbridge because she believes that Meghan may have wanted to walk among the tombstones because there's a big graveyard there because Meghan, quote, often liked to walk to be with spirits, end quote. So could someone else have maybe mentioned this park? Was she meeting somebody there?
01:11:53
Speaker
The parking obviously is abnormal of her car. It's hurried, but why? And if she had left the car unlocked to go scope out the trail, planning to come back to retrieve her hiking boots and lock the car, then why had she gone into the residential area across the street instead of going into the park? Or maybe she was looking for that graveyard?
01:12:19
Speaker
You know, not knowing that there were two different church streets. And she's like, this is not, I was, I wasn't looking for a, you know, to hike, but she had her hiking boots with her. So obviously she knew of some other plan. Yeah, but that still doesn't answer the question. Like where's bun? Yeah. Where are all of her personal things that were never recovered? And that's the part that makes me question foul play.
01:12:45
Speaker
law enforcement have told Peter that they interviewed her workstalker and that he quote, checked out okay. He's obviously not okay because he's harassing women, but it's fun. I didn't read any more on what his alibi had been or how he quote, checked out okay. End quote. But I don't
01:13:12
Speaker
maybe he said something but why that word okay you know that doesn't seem a solid alibi or a solid answer to me it checked out okay and like even if he wasn't involved in her death he's still not okay yeah and so like
01:13:34
Speaker
Did she see his car? Is that why she parked hurriedly? I mean, but then if you're in your car, I don't know if you would get out of your car to escape somebody. I feel like you drive faster. But there are other possibilities. I mean, this could be someone whom she had met up with, you know, and trusted. It could be a past partner or even a stranger.
01:13:57
Speaker
That's true. The last time that Anna saw Megan, which was about a month before her death, she had come to see Anna in New Orleans. Quote, by then Anna wrote, everything about her felt different. She was so thin, so anxious, talking nonstop and jumping like a rabbit at every little noise. End quote.
01:14:23
Speaker
So was there cause of a pain that she felt she needed to hide from everyone? Was she scared of someone?
Vigil and Raising Awareness
01:14:33
Speaker
So Maggie, what are your thoughts? Did we talk to this man that she went and stayed with for the week? I did not read anything about him in my research.
01:14:47
Speaker
Because if she was scared of him, you know, that would be something I would hope they would follow up on. Right. Just as much as they would about this stalker at work.
01:14:57
Speaker
I don't really know. Initially, I was thinking it was accident, you know, something happened to her accidentally. But then there's things that make me question if that could really be it. Like, why was she not in the actual park when the cell phones pinged? Like, where are some of her things that should have had have at least been in the car? Right? There's just some questions that
01:15:22
Speaker
kind of throw a wrench in all those theories. Right. Or even if those things aren't in her car, they would be back in her hotel room. Right. And they're neither place. At a vigil for Megan Marone shortly after her disappearance, many of her past students attended to share the difference that she had made in their lives and in helping them find their own voices in the world.
01:15:47
Speaker
They ended the vigil by blowing bubbles, which, according to CBS 6 Albany, were, quote, messages to the universe, end quote, for her safe return. Is this frivolity and love of life amidst the pain? That is what her friend Chris Hedges meant when he said that Megan lived in that real world.
01:16:10
Speaker
It's not the one that we normally see when going through the motions, but the deeply interwoven one that contains both all sadness and all joy. At least now, Megan is reunited with her mother, Ellen. They're now together, shouting their lasting memories in the minds of all who knew them or were moved by them.
01:16:35
Speaker
In the quiet, we have to listen for their voices and bring them up in conversation.
01:16:41
Speaker
Additionally, what Megan Marone's death should lead us into conversation about, regardless of the cause of death, is precisely the direction her friend Hedges took in his article about Megan. That there are far too many women, more than a quarter of a million, who go missing each year, many of which are linked to, as Hedges notes, quote, male perpetrated violence, end quote.
01:17:09
Speaker
Hedges goes on to write this, quote, this epidemic of male violence against girls and women is not a law enforcement priority. It is also not, as it should be, part of our national discourse. But Meghan, whom I knew, like all these girls and women, should not be allowed to become statistics, end quote. It is up to us to ensure that her story, just like her words and her spirit, live on.
01:17:40
Speaker
This is what her friend Anna is doing, telling the fragments of Megan that remain, like this memory. Quote, Megan is, or more likely was, the flower that springs up through the cracks in the sidewalk. The childish enthusiasm for a sacred world, the way children are conduits of God before their prayers are trampled over.
01:18:08
Speaker
The girl with enough love never to question love's reality, forever furious at the world for pretending it isn't what it is. The way the moon, like the womb, holds all that pain and pulls the tides to remind us that we're water and crying is the way we let the truth out." End quote.
01:18:35
Speaker
Peter and the rest of Megan's family and friends are still very interested in anyone with a dash camera, home security camera, or business security camera facing the streets in either Lockbridge, where the N is located, or in Lee, where the trail is located to see if Megan or her car can be seen on Sunday, March 27th if that data is still available.
01:19:01
Speaker
Anyone with information concerning Megan Marone should call Massachusetts State Police at 508-358-3100 or the Lee Police at 413-243-2100.
01:19:22
Speaker
Again, please like and join our Facebook page, Coffee and Cases podcast to continue the conversation and see images related to this episode. As always, follow us on Twitter, at casescoffee, on Instagram, at coffee cases podcast, or you can always email us suggestions to coffeeandcasespodcastatgmail.com. Please tell your friends about our podcast so more people can be reached to possibly help bring some closure to these families. Don't forget to rate our show and leave us a comment as well. We hope to hear from you soon.
01:19:51
Speaker
Stay together. Stay safe. We'll see you next week. It's love notes for Maggie and Allison. Oh my gosh.
01:20:20
Speaker
I love your singing Maggie. So much love is going out to Amanda, Lindsey, Sandy, Shane, Rebecca, Nancy, Anna Noelle, Tiffany, Lori, Miranda, Julie, and Becky for reaching out to us on social media these past two weeks. It's a long list because we took off the week of Thanksgiving or for recommending us in a Facebook group or on Instagram.
01:20:48
Speaker
And of course we're sending out tons of love to our old new Patreon member, Autumn, who is rejoining the CNC fam on Patreon. So we're happy to have you back there. And to our new new members, Jennifer, Amber, Mary, Addison, and Anna.
01:21:05
Speaker
That's amazing that so many of you have joined Patreon to help support the show. We would obviously love to see even more of you over there. So if you are interested, just go to www.patreon.com forward slash coffee and cases all one word.
01:21:24
Speaker
where until December 31, so we are about a month away from the steel ending, you can join for only $5 a month. It will go up after that. So please check us out before the end of the year. And those who actually join at the higher tiers, at the $12, $15 or the $20 level,
01:21:47
Speaker
and are there for three months, so December through February. You will also get a swag box in February. And this time, so those who are getting the swag boxes this month, mailing those out tomorrow, just printed the labels today.
01:22:06
Speaker
You all got the same thing because it was our very first swag box ever. But starting with the next swag box, the amount of items in your swag box will depend on your level. So one cool item for the $12, two items for the $15, and then three swag items at the $20. Plus, no matter what level you join at, you are going to get a full Patreon episode each month, three mini
01:22:35
Speaker
Patreon episodes and your own shout out on the show. Which, what more could you want? Exactly. And we do have some final love to give to Sharon, who is not on social media, but wrote us such a sweet email saying, quote, I don't have social media, but I wanted to share how much I love your podcast. Just had to tell you after episode 113 with the intro about Kentucky that was spot on,
01:23:02
Speaker
Keep up the great work." End quote. Oh, that was super nice. And I almost forgot to mention another one of our listeners who emailed us just a few days ago, Tony, who by the way, answered one of our questions from episode 156. Yes. And said, I did a quick search on the difference between male and female fingerprints. Remember how we said with Betty Gail Brown, like how do they know?
01:23:32
Speaker
It seems, this is what the email says, quote, it seems that ridge density is the factor that they look at when determining the difference. So apparently the ridges, yeah, the ridges on our fingerprints will tell male or female.
01:23:51
Speaker
Is that not fascinating? Interesting. I know. Yeah. So thank you, Tony, for that helpful information. And thank you, Sharon, for those sweet words. And speaking of sweet, I have one final comment here, one final shameless plug. And that is that Maggie and I have just opened an Etsy shop with merch. Yes, we did. Just in time for the holidays.
01:24:16
Speaker
The sweetness of this deal is that there is free shipping when you spend $35 or more. So make sure you check out- You can't beat that. I know. $35 is not a lot, especially when you're going to buy yourself a little something something for doing all that Christmas shopping that you've already gotten done. You deserve it.
01:24:39
Speaker
So, $35 gets free shipping. Make sure you check out our Facebook page for the link to our Etsy shop. And with that, all of our love is going out to each and every one of you. Until next week, sleuthounds.