Transcript
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Speaker: This is True Crime
Speaker: You and have talked about this before, but the system being clogged and all, one of the ideas that I've always had in the back of my mind is that judges that sit on the bench, like, before they do anything on the bench, should go through a weekend at county jail.
Speaker: And you had mentioned that law enforcement should do it as well, and I think I agree with that. I think that everybody should experience... what they're a small amount of what they're doling out.
Speaker: And the reason for that is it's almost like, so they'll take it seriously. Right. that I'm not, I'm not thinking it's a punitive measure. I think that's the only way you understand what you're doing.
Speaker: Right. But, and it's not that I would say necessarily, you know, judges and law enforcement don't take things seriously. i just think that you get like a whole new perspective When you experience it. Think of all the industries I've worked in several different industries over the years. You don't start at the top.
Speaker: No, you've learned the job from the bottom. Prosecutors, judges, law enforcement are technically at the top. Everything else requires you to be a production assistant or to come in as a customer service rep or whatever.
Speaker: You come in you work that role up so that you understand the machine that you're working within. That's interesting because I've always looked at prosecutors, law enforcement judges as the other side as opposed to a hierarchy. But you're probably you're right, though. Power and resources wise, we've unfortunately got to a point. I was watching, i think North Carolina just passed a budget. There was another state that was the last holdout to pass a budget. And they were all padding these law enforcement
Speaker: Raises I and nothing personal if you happen to be in law enforcement, you don't need another raise But the idea is that you use the experience you have in law enforcement to get a better job You don't need sitting in a government job making six figures as a patrol officer and like I think one of the North Carolina things I saw was their ALE agents are getting 20% raise and And they're ALE from every, and I, like, this could be 10 episodes about ALE. What does ALE stand for?
Speaker: The Alcohol Law Enforcement in North Carolina. Okay. It's basically the place where all the cops who can't get jobs in other places because they've done something problematic go. Mm-hmm. And, like, they frequently have scandals. like Like, first of all, they, like, barely are an agency.
Speaker: But they have special agents there who have all the powers of other special agents, like the SBI. and Somebody made this up, didn't they? What, ALE? Yeah. yeah Yeah, they they made it up there. And I brought up North Carolina because, one, they were the last state of the 50 to pass a budget.
Speaker: But two, because ALE sticks in my craw a little bit because... They have that whole ABC program there. Like, they don't have normal liquor stores and normal liquor store permits. The alcoholic beverage. Beverage control, think. Control, yeah. Yeah. So, basically, that means in North Carolina you to get liquor, right?
Speaker: Yeah. I'm sure it's by content or something. You have to go to an ABC store. Correct. You like can't sell it elsewhere. Restaurants and ABC stores.
Speaker: Right. And in restaurants, you're ordering drinks, right? As opposed to getting a bottle of it, I think. Well, you can get like a, well, but like wine and beer and that kind of thing can be sold in grocery stores. Right.
Speaker: Right. Like, do you remember like a time when like certain places you couldn't sell it on Sunday? Yes, I do remember that. Is that still a thing? i don't know. I was thinking about that the other day. So I know that it used to not be sold on Sunday, and then they switched it to not being able to sell it like until after 11 or something yeah on Sundays.
Speaker: And i all of that was so stupid. We've recently were talking and like the New Jersey side of things for me. We were talking about inheriting liquor licenses.
Speaker: Do you know how all that works? Like you, people wait years to get a liquor license and and the state only issues so many. So one of the things that's gone on in our family over the years is like running different family members but like all together like catering events and then having an event space and then running floral and and doing all of the things for an event and part of that involved having a liquor license hu so the liquor license is really what you're selling when you sell the business that's because they can't get it elsewhere
Speaker: Yeah, that's that's really interesting. And that is like bureaucracy at its finest or worst, I guess, depending on how old you're classifying it. Usually ah all the wrong things go into who is getting a liquor li license, right?
Speaker: They do. And like, you know, there's there's so There's so much grease on the wheels in New Jersey in terms of... I think it's everywhere, though. It is. this is that's That's what you've experienced. Right. That's what I can see. we have this whole host of things happening law enforcement, prosecution-wise. They're not as separated in these places that we're talking about like to the point that...
Speaker: i don't I'm trying to find another word than industry, but they are an industry. and Yeah. it The state executive and judicial branches, they run their own economy.
Speaker: They do, really. And that's that's sort of why I was thinking that prosecutors and judges are at the top of the hierarchy because they have so many resources. Yeah, you're right. i I had just never thought of it that way before. I just see it as like citizens versus the state. But I also like, and and I've had to hold on to this because of life, I guess. It's crazy. If I had told myself 20 years ago, you know, that I was going to have to hold on to this viewpoint, like the citizens are...
Speaker: in charge of the state right as much as the most me as much as the officials don't understand that you know tax-paying citizens we make the state be able to be an entity right and it's amazing when ah like I don't even know what what a good example would be. But, like, I'm not intimidated by judges or prosecutors or law enforcement in theory, okay?
Speaker: Now, that's not to say that, you know, i wouldn't be intimidated by a circumstance that happened, right? But I'm saying that in theory, we want those people in place, right?
Speaker: to do the job that the citizens need done, right? Right, but we have to maintain the position of being their bosses. Well, right, and that's where, like, you know, your example of, you know, liquor license in New Jersey, that's tolerated, right? Yeah. And it's more nuanced than just, like, oh, we tolerate it But, you know, however it's structured out, you know, somebody was elected and somebody was appointed and...
Speaker: you know, they've allowed this to occur and it would probably be really hard to unravel, but it could be done, right? Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, like parts of the system have to be kind of dismantled at this point. And I was trying to think of a stopgap, and that is everybody who's on the bench, everybody who's a prosecutor.
Speaker: You can skip law enforcement for the moment because I think law enforcement in our country needs to be significantly downgraded. They do not need like military type equipment transports. They need like more training on the sort of like a counselor or a psychologist. Community policing. Yeah, community policing is ah is a huge deal.
Speaker: That's for me personally. And that's that's because that's really the only way that you weed out all the problematic police. And, you know, the apple, rotten apple. Spoiling the whole bunch. Yeah, that is particularly true in policing. and i I had to learn to talk to judges over the years because like I can remember a time in the 90s where I did not know how to talk to judges. Yeah. And then I can remember a time after that where I had to learn to talk to them on my own behalf because, like, I remember standing up and talking in situations that I had to defend myself or had to state my argument where I just sounded like I was rambling on.
Speaker: And, like, it took me a really long time to get used to doing that. And it shouldn't be that way. You should be able to walk in and talk to any judges, any prosecutors. Well, right. We elect them.
Speaker: Right. We should be able to talk to them and just have a totally normal conversation with them. It should not be the level of nonsense it's become. And i bring all of this up because we have multiple things that we're talking about. You and i have been following certain cases as we put these stories together.
Speaker: For instance, like we have never figured out what to do with the Holly Bobo case. Like yeah we have... I have probably single-handedly consumed more material about that case.
Speaker: like It's definitely in the top five. I think it's in the top three of all the things I've ever like tried to do. I've read every court document. I've listened to every trial transcript and every appellate hearing. Right.
Speaker: And I avoided it like the plague. Right. Yeah, we knew from the jump, and I think we stated this a long time ago, we kind of we kind of kiddingly point out in the season one of this show that like there's like similarities between what Israel Keyes did and what happened to Holly Bobo.
Speaker: The squatting down where they were, yeah. Right. We had this whole like crazy thing. We could never put him there, never made sense in time. Yeah, it was not Israel Keyes. Definitely not.
Speaker: But what it did reveal to the two of us in terms of our thinking was that it was a lone wolf type crime and that none of the lone wolf scenario played out in court.
Speaker: Well, right. And I've noticed, like, in general... If it's not a lone wolf situation, there's going to be a dominant character that gives ah that you're going to find out.
Speaker: I'm just saying only one person can keep a secret, right? Yeah, yeah. ah It's never going to be a situation where in the right circumstances, they're not going to give it. And it might be the wrong one that gives up the situation and blames the other one. I'm not saying that it always ah is the right person coming forward. However,
Speaker: I think we overestimate people's ability to, what, commiserate with a co-defendant? Yeah. The evil is just not there. Are talking about this case specifically or in general? No.
Speaker: and I'm talking about in general. Okay. The evil of doing these horrific, especially these horrific crimes. I'm not saying that like some some people can't, you know as a group, go and get into some trouble.
Speaker: But, in it well, for example, in Holly Bobo's case, the fact that like they've got this four-guy team is so stupid. with no leader, no capable leader...
Speaker: And like the the the way that the state presents the case, we find out much, much later. like I think it was last fall. You and I were listening to hearing this.
Speaker: um We were, we're listening to these people and we realized that like even the prosecutor in that case for the Zach Adams part of it, because of the way it all goes down, that's the main section of the trial we have. That's the only trial we have. Right.
Speaker: And um I just meant there's all this like appellate stuff from that. But the trial that we watched initially is Zach Adams. And it tells the story of all the defendants.
Speaker: And that prosecutor is now a judge. And she does not have any idea. Like she needed a month in county jail to understand her job.
Speaker: And even then, I don't know she would have got it. i Yeah, i don't I don't know that that would have helped. She's very far removed from what she's doing, and I was very embarrassed for her ah during the trial, when she especially like getting, I think she did the closing, and...
Speaker: Then I was sort of embarrassed for myself because i was like, well, i I apparently am the only one who sees this. I wasn't sure. but and I didn't watch the trial until much, much later. Right. Because it's all available online if people want to get into that one.
Speaker: Well, I... Like, I just couldn't, I can't even explain what happened with the Holly Bobo case ah for me personally, as far as going, like, I tuned you out every single time because I'm like, yeah, I'm not going down that pathway. And I don't know why because it's ah in ah it's an atrocious case, right?
Speaker: Right. It is one of, it's one of the most, ah evil and brutal things that could happen to any human being.
Speaker: And if you think about it, I realize that I, for some reason, it's sort of like, oh, people go missing all the time and all this stuff.
Speaker: Okay, well, yes, people, you know, are missing, but they don't get kidnapped. Not that way, no. From, you know, between their house and their carport.
Speaker: And the brutal it's not a normal case. it's The brutality is unbelievable, right? Yeah, if you if you even take away the victim part of it, because if honestly, the type of victim and like like what's going on in her world and where she lives is what keeps her on the front page as long as she's on there because she's still missing for that period of time. But if you remove her from the scenario, it is still a brutally evil crime for someone to be abducted like that, to go missing.
Speaker: And then like only like a little bit of like parts of her, which... you Like her remains aren't recovered entirely. And we end up, I say that part because we end up with this like crazy rape murder trial where we don't even know anything about the rape part.
Speaker: No, we don't. ah The only thing that they have basically is Jason Altry's testimony. Right, which is a different problem, and I guess he's just going to be in prison forever now, um because he got out.
Speaker: ah On this case, he got time served for like ah sort of a BS charge, if the story is true, but ultimately, we end up finding out that... like I mean, i say finding out, but I knew all the along, like his story didn't make any sense. It didn't fit like even the state's narrative.
Speaker: His story is fiction right based on the evidence. Right. Right. Right. And it is ah disastrous to the extent that the attorneys, his defense attorneys like wrote it.
Speaker: Right, right. From the state's evidence. From the state, because they wanted, so the defense attorney stepping in and saying, okay, we need to, you know, you're our client. We need to get the best outcome for you.
Speaker: I do not think that you're supposed to go to these extremes. ah I'm not sure why ah there wasn't more of a I get that it's an adversarial system, but it it's not supposed to be this extreme.
Speaker: Right. Like, so overall, and this should disc disturb people, this case in terms of how it rolls through the system while described in all these horrific ways, um, and the case itself is horrific because it's the, you know, the loss of a young life.
Speaker: Uh, it's, it's an overwhelmingly average situation. You don't have any super evil, corrupt prosecutors or super ineffective, uh, defense counsel or these defendants that have committed all these serial crimes. It's an overwhelmingly average case. And the prosecution to this day will tell you, I delivered justice to the Bobo family. And that's just not what happened.
Speaker: um so I don't even see how she thinks that that is what she did, honestly. well Nobody has ever been able to say even like what was Zach Adams, what were the actions he took that ended up having him be in jail, right? Nobody can explain a narrative that makes sense.
Speaker: Right. And see, i think I think that sentence is the problem with it. When you don't know what happened, the story that you make up is okay. And that's just not true, right? Right. That is 100% not true. um It just happens that it affects that case like way more than other cases because of the spotlight that was shown on it.
Speaker: And after i pulled my head out of the sand, because like I said, I avoided it like the play. I was like, not today, Satan, every time you brought it up. And after I pulled my head out of the sand, I have i have gone to some...
Speaker: like personal extremes, trying to figure out like, what could we do to make this, make light of this, make it work? Cause to me, this is, it how it sits is the most ah not justice it could ever be. It's an injustice, right? How it sits right now. And I'm, you know, I just don't have a good answer.
Speaker: Yeah. So the reason I brought that up is because we're going to be talking about a bunch of interesting court rulings, but we're not going to be talking about a court ruling in the Zach Adams case. Because for those of you who don't know, in 2025, there were a series of hearings. They weren't held in a...
Speaker: like cohesive fashion because they were parts. That's kind of like in law and order. Like the thing that you're not realizing if you're not watching the dates at the bottom of the screen is like most of that stuff while it spills out in an hour took place over a year.
Speaker: like if you watch the dates and what part it is in court. So the Holly Bobo trial itself, and then the appeals and the efforts have taken place over 10 years.
Speaker: So this section last year is supposed to have resulted in a ruling by now. ah I know at least one listener texts me about this frequently. We have a former guest who every time I speak with her she mentions that there's no ruling yet. And I know you and I have talked about it, like, because I think sometime last week you texted me, were like, why is there no ruling in the Zach Adams thing?
Speaker: Well, right. And it's, it so it's very specific ah by the law, which I have no doubt that his attorney is all over this. If, if it has in fact breached the deadline, but it's very specific in the law that the judge had like, I think it's 60 days with the possibility of having a one-time extension of an additional 30 days. So that would make it 90 days.
Speaker: And I remember when the judge got the case, essentially ah i think it was, does he, does Zach Adams need a new trial because evidence was withheld, right?
Speaker: Right.
Speaker: everything's presented to the judge and the judge has to decide and when he got the case he said i'm going to tell you right now you can count on the extension Right. That's what he got. Yeah. And we we realized there was going to be a massive amount of information is what he was getting at back then. Right. And I, there could be a way in the like calculation of the timing. Cause that can get really confusing sometimes.
Speaker: ah Like, you know, you don't count weekends or if it's this many weeks or that many weeks, it's you counted a different way. So I could be off, but I know 90 days has passed. Yeah.
Speaker: I'm sure of it. We're past it, even including like the holiday times that come up in the end of the year, in the early part of the year. We're definitely past it, but there's a like there's always a possibility that all parties have agreed behind the scenes that they're extending the deadline.
Speaker: What does that tell you? i Now, I don't have a problem with this, Judge. Okay. ah i So I don't want to like bust his chops too badly, but what does it tell you when, like...
Speaker: the law is the judge has to come back with the opinion and the ruling in a certain amount of time. And then like, even, you know, if they all agreed to it, he still didn't do that.
Speaker: I find that disheartening. Um, I think this is an incredibly complex set of circumstances.
Speaker: When you sit down and realize how jacked up it is. Well, and that's I'm kind of hoping the judge sees that. im i like I don't have any opinion on the judge yet. i will like I wanted to see some kind of ruling. I felt like he handled the proceedings appropriately. um Yeah, he was very fair, and he was listening. He was definitely listening, so that was good, because he's he was going to be the finder of fact in this particular leg of the...
Speaker: of the trial, right? Correct. But in the meantime, I'm very cognizant of the fact that, you know, Zach Adams has been sitting in jail or prison, I guess. I don't know where he's at currently. A mixture of the two, mostly prison at this point, um because it's been so long.
Speaker: And so ultimately, ah we i got, I don't know what the, why I was so repelled by this. I think it was just because it was a young girl and it was truly just an unimaginable case as far as what happened to her and I just blocked it out but we have seen through all the different proceedings that there's absolutely no question in my mind that the four accused of the Holly Bobo murder and
Speaker: murder ah and two with the plea agreements of guilty, one committing suicide and Zach Adams being found guilty, there's four men couldn't organize four person parade. Correct. Let's turn around and like have this very complicated kidnapping, abduction, murder, a rape murder. Like it is insane uh,
Speaker: that was ever even presented to anybody because it makes no sense. Yeah. This whole thing, like everything that went on here, um it has exposed a lot of interesting mechanisms that I knew to be true, but didn't know how to articulate them. And one of those was just like when there's disagreements between agencies and like,
Speaker: So interagency disagreements, but then also disagreements within the agency itself, intra-agency disagreements. You can have like a serious disaster that not only do you not get justice for the the state's witness or the original victim. In this case, it's a decedent. So it means someone's lost their life. You also like their families don't get justice.
Speaker: The defendants end up not getting justice and all the defendants' families end up not getting justice. Well, and one of the things that is always in the back of my mind is like, Holly Beaver's family thinks they got justice, right? Right. and i can't even begin to like, I don't understand why. I feel like maybe they've they've got blinders on, right? Right.
Speaker: to some extent, and that's why they've accepted it or whatever. But, you know, there was a whole thing where um Holly's mom, you know, she chastised ah Zach Adams from The Stand. And eisen I understood her. Well, I wouldn't say that I could understand her grief, but I didn't fault her for what she was doing. It was just sort of like, how can you not see...
Speaker: what's happening here. Right. Right. Right. And that made me really sad. and I've, and I've thought about that. I've thought about Clint Bobo and I've wondered like, well, do they really wonder like, are, are they set on this? Because part of my thoughts on like, what can we possibly do to expose this? It includes thinking about them and how this would affect them. Right. Right.
Speaker: So I'm waiting for the opinion. i find it just crazy that it has possibly exceeded the deadline. I don't know what that means for whatever's happening. ah It doesn't really matter, I don't guess, because in the event, you know, what do you do if they don't meet the deadline? You still don't have an opinion, right? It's not like you can do anything. Right.
Speaker: Yeah, i I am just waiting on that one. And I brought it up because, so the next three things I'm going to talk about are kind of in, like, a different place.
Speaker: ah One of them is, like, far before this. It's, like, early on. It's literally a filing and something that we talked about. But the other two arrived in some interesting places.
Speaker: I don't have anything else on Holly Bilbo right this second. i don't have anything else on Zach Adams right this second. I'm just, like, pointing out that, like, You and I follow these things. And like, I could almost make a calendar out of everything we're following and what we're trying to do with it.
Speaker: There's a calendar in my brain. But do you have anything else on them right now? No, I'm just waiting on the opinion. I am trying to be patient, though. I did text you last week or whenever, but I'm not searching for it. I'm not trying to like, I know it's coming or it's supposed to be coming. And I'm just waiting.
Speaker: Well, the other person that's texting with me is less patient about it, so that's why I brought it up today. um The first phase of the other type of things that are going on in court cases that we've covered or talked about, depending on where we fall, did you see the Brendan Banfield defense team filing to have the guilty verdict set aside?
Speaker: Indeed, i did. So for those of you who don't know, you you should be following the Brendan Banfield trial. You should go back and watch the whole trial. It is all available online. Well, I was going to say, he's been convicted, so it's almost like it could be past tense, right? Yeah.
Speaker: Correct. Except it's not. Right. So we get this early May filing where they're trying to... ah So he's facing a mandatory life sentence. He was found guilty of the murder of his wife and the murder of completely innocent person.
Speaker: That for some reason, he decided, along with his au pair, Juliana Perez-Malgeles, that they were going to skip divorce in terms of brand Brendan Manfield and his wife. And they were going to not only murder her, but murder her in this bizarre fashion where they were... having a conversation with this person off a website over a fetish called CNC, which is consent, not consent, where they wanted it to look like this really horrific rape scene between this guy and Brendan Banfield's wife. And it doesn't go that way. that brief Meg and I found found out by listening to the trial that like,
Speaker: Apparently, Christine Banfield was very much alive as this was happening um and thought that her husband would clearly save her from this intruder in her home. Turns out to really be someone who thinks he's having ah consensual encounter with her.
Speaker: ah The trial is pretty horrific. We've watched ah hours of it and listened to hours of like other information about this. But the bottom line is his defense is now saying ah we would like there to be a set aside on the verdict, um which means they're going to immediately going to go to appeal um because he's facing this ah life sentence.
Speaker: But i don't think we have an official sentencing hearing yet. Right. It was post, it was postponed because of this. Because of the appeal. Right. yeah It was, I believe when he was convicted, I believe they set a date that was, you know, sometime probably around now, but ah again, they, that would be postponed or abeyance would be scott whatever it,
Speaker: ah to have a hearing on, so mo is it a motion? It's a motion to set aside. And so they're saying that three errors were committed in the trial that were preserved. And I think they're worried that maybe they didn't preserve them enough for the appeal. This, if, and I don't totally understand everything in in Virginia, So this may be the only time they can do this and that's why they're doing it. But there's three reasons or three errors that ah the defense attorney, John Carroll is saying, look, you've got to look at this before Senate saying, so the first one was basically they're saying this whole proceeding was a violation of Brennan Banfield's fifth and 14th amendment rights.
Speaker: And Like, they're they're saying that his silence to the investigators along the way as his case unfolded was used against them by the state, which may or may not be a thing.
Speaker: ah It may or may not be a thing except that he testified. He did, but the Commonwealth's attorney, I noticed in their response, they admitted to this.
Speaker: And they admitted to asking him why he never gave his account of events to investigators until he got on the stand. But she's say she the state's position through Jenna Sands, who's the deputy Commonwealth attorney involved in this, is that that doesn't violate his Fifth or Fourteenth Amendment rights. So,
Speaker: There's not a lot going on with the first error they say is committed. It's really like, does the appeals court think yay or nay? Does the judge think yay or nay?
Speaker: You have the right to remain silent, but once you're going to talk, then you can, like, she could ask him things like that, no?
Speaker: Ultimately, i think the way this would work was, like, like I think once you... Give up the Fifth Amendment right. you have to reassert it. That sounds like crazy, but I think that's really what we would be dealing with here. And I don't think that...
Speaker: It's such a weird technical thing on that. Well, right. But ah keeping in mind, like I don't know that you can half testify and then reassert your Fifth Amendment right. No, but the idea is you can testify but not answer questions that tend to incriminate you. Well, yeah, that would be pleading the Fifth.
Speaker: I think the defense is reaching with that first one. i tell't i don't i can't see a scenario where it makes sense for that to be the thing they set aside the verdict on. If or for me wrong if he hadn't testified, it would be different. I do know that there's case opinions. that Right, right. That talk about, you know, not holding silence against a defendant. So I think that he's just kind of, I think his attorney has merged two concepts here.
Speaker: I've been wondering if they're setting up an ineffective assistance of counsel kind of thing here. Because, like, sometimes... Sometimes that happens and it's not know that it needs to be set up. um But I think we're, I was getting ready say, I think we're already there. um I was kind of disappointed with the defense council in this case. And i I, think he would have done better with the public defenders up there, the Virginia defenders.
Speaker: The defense council was trying very hard. ah I could see, I don't necessarily think, I'm not saying he shouldn't ah plead that, but I don't necessarily think he had an effective assistance of counsel. I think that his attorney went to bat for him in ways that...
Speaker: I know a lot of defense attorneys would not have. so See, I felt like maybe that was bad in this case. Maybe. That's the first thing that they're arguing. And obviously John Carroll is making that argument here. I think maybe later on this is going to come back in a different way. And that's why they're setting all of this up. But I could be overthinking what they're doing.
Speaker: um The second way... that they're saying this verdict should be set aside because there's an egregious error is because they're saying the prosecution called a last-minute surprise witness during the trial.
Speaker: According to John Carroll, he believes in this filing that that violated Brennan Banfield's right to the exclusion of witnesses. The rule on witnesses' order prohibits any witnesses from watching coverage of the trial.
Speaker: That's a... that's a scenario that like kind of technically plays out a little differently. The idea is if you're going to be testifying for the most part, I think there's ah I think there's generally an exclusion for the lead investigator because they sit through all of it anyways.
Speaker: Right. But for the most part, the idea is you can't sit in the front row and listen to everyone else and tailor your testimony to combat or support the testimony of any other witness which is funny because typically expert witnesses are allowed to sit because they've got to know what's been testified to you so that they can have something to say about it Yeah, it varies in terms of which witnesses in which jurisdictions can sit where. But sequestration is what they're talking about here. They're ultimately saying that during the prosecution's rebuttal, they call this guy Thomas Patrick Smith to the stand.
Speaker: The whole reason Thomas Patrick Smith gets involved is because he heard Brendan Banfield's testimony. So John Carroll writes that learning of the testimony from watching on television, i think i think he actually said YouTube, but Either way, the way the deputy attorney general or deputy state attorney, commonwealth attorney, sorry, so many different terms. um The way they combat this is they say there's nothing specific in the testimony that Thomas Patrick Smith could have been combating something. I i don't know what this argument is about. It felt kind of weird. Do you remember him coming on to testify? Yeah. Yes, and his testimony was that um Brendan Banfield's testimony that there was a big meeting... Right....was not true. Really, it's sort of like the um the chicken and the egg, because, like...
Speaker: How could they prepare for because that's literally all he had to say is basically, I happen to, can I can testify that he did not have a big meeting that day. right And without him having testified in court, like he hadn't given a side of the story yet. So it's not like they could know that. Right.
Speaker: Right, and that's what i don't that's what I don't understand. So they bring him in as a rebuttal witness, which means after everyone has testified for the defense, the prosecution is allowed to rebut things that they're saying are false.
Speaker: Generally, it's like to impeach someone or to correct the record or because of certain testimonies, something arises that needs to be addressed by the state's case. I don't think that gets us anywhere on the Brendan Banfield side of things.
Speaker: But I don't know how a judge would look at that. And then there's the third thing, which I actually kind of agree with, but like I don't think it means what the defense attorney thinks it means. John Carroll says the last error is that the prosecution did not knowingly correct false testimony.
Speaker: So, Juliana Perez-Malgolese, she comes in and clearly has taken a plea deal. She is testifying against Brendan Banfield because of this plea deal.
Speaker: But then she gets on the stand, and like some of her testimony is so interesting. But like she largely checks out for a big part of it. I think you described it as you could see her kind of thinking in English, thinking in Portuguese, trying to figure out how to respond. There was a huge communication problem.
Speaker: I think there's been a huge communication problem since the jump with this woman. Right. And he, to my ah to my just... I couldn't even believe it when I was reading, but like he basically faulted exactly what I talked about when we talked about her testimony previously, where was was saying that she was saying she's refusing to answer my questions, right? Yeah. And I'm like, that's not what was happening at all. She was I don't know the answer to your question, which was the answer.
Speaker: And she kept, well, and part of what happened, and I think it's just the language barrier, but she kept trying to ask me,
Speaker: him, the defense attorney, like, if I am not 100% sure, can I tell you what I think? And he nobody would really answer that for her. And so she just said, well, then no, I don't know because I'm not 100% The judge said, ma'am, I just need you to answer the question. And so nobody was really giving her guidance to these very direct questions that she was asking. Now, granted, they're they're not supposed to right? the The attorney should, at that point in time, ah change up the question to address her concern, right? To your knowledge or in you know, whatever saying,
Speaker: whatever she was saying You've got to address it in the way you ask the question so she'll know whether to answer or not, right? And that wasn't happening. Like, none of that stuff was happening. In fact, it was, they basically were arguing. Right.
Speaker: Right. And it got to the point that like she looks at him and like whether you believe her or not, sort of irrelevant for this part. She looks at him and basically says, if you're going to keep asking these questions this way, I'm just going to keep having to answer. I don't know.
Speaker: Right. And he was saying that she was refusing to answer his questions. Right. Right. So at this point in the writing, in this motion that he's asked for a ruling on, which is the third quote unquote error, he's stating that the prosecutors have like spent a year interviewing Juliana and they should have known that she was going to give false testimony when she did not know the answer to something.
Speaker: I don't really see what he's talking about here. They definitely like John Carroll's interaction with Juliana Malkyrie's was the definition of adversarial. And it was terrible.
Speaker: He did not seem to know what he was doing with her. um There were lots of things they were having her read, but the prosecutions like their, their direct exam of her was not great either.
Speaker: And the response by the Commonwealth here is, absent any specific allegations, the Commonwealth is hard-pressed effectively respond to this allegation. However, defense has been provided recordings of every interview conducted by the common of Commonwealth with Ms. Perez-Malgoles, and as such has had every opportunity to impeach her testimony with her prior recorded statements had they felt she was being inconsistent.
Speaker: so What's interesting about that is, They're basically saying the defense did not object to anything they said was false. They got a lot of I don't knows. And if they're saying the I don't knows are the problem, that's not false testimony. That's just false.
Speaker: Like, kind of refusal to answer certain things the way the defense wanted them to. Well, but if she truly didn't know, and I think part of the point, what I think she was being honest, that she, like, legit, she could have speculated, ah probably an informed speculation. Like, did you do this or did Brendan do this? She could have taken a wild guess and, like,
Speaker: it was a 50-50 chance she was right. However, without somebody like going into more detail in their questions, she said, i don't know. i can't and it was a lot of repetitive actions that like they both had done. that sort like For example, did you send this text message? Well, she couldn't really remember all the text messages she had sent. She she knew that either she sent it sent but she didn't know right off the bat who it was. And it was that kind of thing that she was saying, i don't know to. And honestly, none of it mattered. I don't think any i don't think any of that stuff mattered. And I'm curious to see, i think this is coming back up in June, like June 5th or something like that. I think they're going to have a hearing on all of this.
Speaker: I'm interested to see how the judge rules on that. But you're saying... like they went to bat for him or whatever. And I don't disagree with your statement, but i stand by this, even though clearly there's this motion to set aside.
Speaker: I did not understand how we got to a trial in this matter. Like with him. I understand. Just his refusal to take the plea deal for life in prison. that what you think? I understand that, uh, Brendan Banfield thought he was going to talk the jury into, ah finding it was self-defense, right?
Speaker: yeah and unfortunately, there's just nothing charming about a potato, and he was kind of a potato in the sand. i It is the most... shot This really shouldn't have gone to trial. um He didn't... you know There was no denial of ah shooting ah Joseph Ryan. The idea was Joseph Ryan had stabbed...
Speaker: christine and he had shot joseph ryan self-defense and defense of others so there wasn't even like it was either self-defense or it wasn't right yeah and and there was a lot of evidence that it wasn't self-defense and then of course you've got his accomplice i guess testifying And, you know, even though she didn't know a lot of things, the gist, whether she knew which one of them sent the message, it didn't change the fact that one of them did send the message. Right. Right. And so none of that testimony was game changing.
Speaker: ah it might have slanted a little bit, but it seemed to me like it wasn't going to slant the way that he the defense attorney wanted it because she had, she went along with this, but she was not the mastermind behind this. There was no reason for this to be the mastermind. The biggest thing about her whole situation was like Christine told her to call 911 and she did.
Speaker: Right? Yeah. And you have to keep that in mind. And I'm thinking this poor, I mean, she did something bad, but like this poor kid, had she got in over her head.
Speaker: And I think she was genuinely shocked when Brendan killed Christine right in front of her. Yeah. and I mean, I think even if you're in on the plot at that point, you're going to be shocked when it happens.
Speaker: Well, right. And then, like, she you know she shot Joseph Ryan as well. And that's another thing that tells me she wasn't as in the loop of the plan as Brendan Banfield thought she was. i i just don't think she had a better understanding of what was going on.
Speaker: Yeah. And yeah to the point that, like, she had a really good plea deal early on. She he was going to be able to walk away if she would testify against him and she wouldn't do it.
Speaker: And so the outcome for Juliana Perez Malgalese is she ends up pleading guilty to involuntary manslaughter in October 2024. She agrees that She's going to testify against Brendan Banfield for the prosecution.
Speaker: So the idea was, like, if she had taken this plea earlier, she was literally going to walk. But because she waited so long, because that's 18, 19 months after the February 2023 murder.
Speaker: um Because she waited so long, she just gets the prosecution coming in and they say, after you go in and testify, we will recommend that you get time served, the time that you've done.
Speaker: um And that will be our our plea deal. We're making that deal for involuntary manslaughter, time served with you for in exchange for your testimony against Brendan Banfield. The judge, however, did not stick to the plea deal and ended up sentencing Juliana Perez-Malgolese in February 2026, so about a week after the trial was over, to 10 years from prison. So that didn't even go her way.
Speaker: Well, I think that there was some... I'm not sure exactly what happened. I don't know that she was surprised by that, especially after she testified, like Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. Anyways, my point is they they made a motion to set aside the verdict. And I'm telling this to people in case you want to watch something potentially interesting would be a judge ruling on this motion to set aside the verdict. And why? Because they don't focus on the judge. They focus on ah the prosecution's case.
Speaker: Well, and keep in mind, ah he was found guilty by a jury, right? Correct. And so everything, the what has been brought to the attention in this motion to set aside the verdict are technicalities, right?
Speaker: Yes. And it's... i It's grasping at straws. ah This is exactly this is is exactly what a defense attorney is supposed to do, except maybe not.
Speaker: I don't know that they have as much merit as the defense attorney puts forth. They may. i i did watch the whole trial, so so I don't know that there's a lot that I didn't wasn't privy to during the trial. I hope they show the hearings on television.
Speaker: Yeah, I hope they put him on YouTube. I mean, ultimately, I... That's our vision. Okay, well, then then i'm with you then we're just saying the same thing. I'm hoping to see this because I want to see how the sentencing goes. My gut says he just gets life in prison without parole and there's no verdict set aside, but I wanted to bring him up and so the if the judge So the judge, they'll have their arguments and the judge will rule on the verdict.
Speaker: I don't know that she'll rule like right then, but um hopefully so, because otherwise it's just going to be postponed again. Then he'll be, so i I think she's going to deny the motion and then he will be sentenced. And then from there they would appeal if so desired. Right. Yeah. I think, I think that this,
Speaker: is sort of a delay tactic that probably should be, like this can should be kicked on down the road. I'm not exactly sure. Like, I don't, maybe they had to, uh, to preserve it.
Speaker: Maybe if they didn't take it before the trial judge, they couldn't take it on. I'm i'm not really sure. I think this, I think these three things come up. I think you're right. Um,
Speaker: I think ultimately, i can't remember if they preserved all of these three things during the trial, and I think this is an end run around doing that incorrectly.
Speaker: Just doing it the way that they can at this point, right? Right, right. I mean, it's not correct, but still, it's interesting. I'm interested to see what happens. I don't think anything's going happen. I think that the situation is what it is. do not see...
Speaker: Brendan Banfield ah having his conviction overturned. I don't see any injustice in what happened ah as far as in court and all. Do you?
Speaker: This case is like, it's kind of running on autopilot. Like unless unless a judge rules that there's some reason to have a more extensive hearing about the trial,
Speaker: Like, maybe they look at it and go I think there's this other thing that we need to talk about. I doubt that's going to happen. it could. Well, having watched the trial, I feel like he got a fair trial.
Speaker: ah He got up and, like, his testifying— He's just very upset that bad facts exist. Well, i think that he thought it was going to go a different way. ah You can tell, by the way, you know, he testified in the testimony he gave. And, you know, there's a certain extent where I don't even like really like saying it out loud, but like sometimes you don't want to insult the jury, right? By thinking that they're going to believe what you're saying.
Speaker: because that could be insulting. I feel like that was sort of... a bor it Like his testimony was getting close to that.
Speaker: I'll say it that way. Yeah. and No, he he's like, that guy thinks he's way more charming than he is. is He is a potato. He is not a very smart dude. um He's like operating as a ah member of the IRS s with a gun and a badge, um which should give everyone a lot of pause about the IRS having people with guns and badges if they're all like Brendan Benfield or even half of them.
Speaker: Well, and his testimony was also, it was, a lot of it was not credible. um He got on the stand and was like, yeah, we've been married for 10 years, but we had affairs all the time. And like, Christine had affairs all the time. And, you know, to me, i was thinking, i guess that is was necessary for him to, you know, continue his narrative.
Speaker: you I felt like jury wouldn't have taken kindly to it, even if it had been true. Right. Unnecessary details that I'm very sure he was lying. um He, i don't, see he made himself out to be like this smooth, I don't know, almost like a sort of a reserved playboy or something. And that just was not what was happening there at all. Right. Yeah. He had full details.
Speaker: ah He had fooled Juliana and he had fooled Christine, as far as I'm concerned, into thinking he was a good guy and he was not.
Speaker: Yeah, not even a little bit. i don't have a lot more on this one, but I'm encouraging people to watch or at least read about ah the sentencing hearing here because i think it's going to be important as to the future of the appeals in this case. Yeah. Right. And I, you know, this is the process. He has been convicted by a jury and this is the defense's prerogative. And I'm here for, I mean, I'm happy to watch what plays out and, you know, there's an explanation for everything that occurs. And I do think he's going to maximize his appeals and everything else he can do because he's
Speaker: He has nothing else to do. Well, he doesn't have anything else to do, but he genuinely probably believes that like eventually somebody is going to buy his story and that's not going to happen. We, everybody sees right through it.
Speaker: Yeah. And I, you know, i think if he had realized that everybody was going to see right through it, he never would have done this. So like everybody's going to see you through your story.
Speaker: Yeah. Don't do it. and Unfortunately, i I think he's just that kind of like potato. I think he's just like not as smart as he thinks he is, and this is just how it's going to play out. He's just going to have to keep poking at it until he gets what he wants, which... You know, sometimes people end up getting what they want. There's some kind of technicality that was in there or some piece of evidence that comes to light. i don't think this is that kind of case, though. Yeah, and I watched the trial, and I i would be shocked if if they if somebody was able to, you know wrangle something that was worthy of that. I just don't see it happening. It was a very fair trial.
Speaker: Well, i so I think it would have to be some of the pretrial nonsense that i like, I won't drag you through all of it because i know you know it, but, like, You know, there was one prosecutor there that was really drunk that had an issue. Yeah, we covered that. We talked about that here. And then there was this whole debacle that happened with some of the the shuffling of the Fairfax police in like their response to like the the technical analysis of the devices.
Speaker: What it had to do what with was training ah a tech... ah So a technology tech, I guess. I don't know what his official title was. He had been, would say, not trained properly, but I guess he had been trained a certain way to ah indicate in reports, ah for example, when he was examining Christine Banfield's phone. Right. As opposed to saying, you know, Christine Banfield's phone, he said Christine Banfield. Right.
Speaker: And so he didn't draw the distinction between the phone and the person. And I could tell ah from his testimony that like he won't ever do that again. But also, it was not done to be deceptive. It was not done to cause any problems. It was just the way he was referencing things. And never in a million years did he think that somebody would be like, oh, you said it was Christine Banfield. You couldn't have possibly just meant that it was her phone, right? Yeah.
Speaker: And so that caused a lot of confusion in the beginning, which I said when we talked about it, I was like, I can't wait to see. But like ultimately, you can't ever prove who's behind a device unless...
Speaker: There's other circumstances that show it. But essentially, the defense had taken the reports and said, oh, no, we've got this you know state's expert that has said it was Christine Banfield logging in. right And it wasn't just the device. And it was just a...
Speaker: It was semantics, basically. But they also had, you know, i don't know if it was his supervisor or the next guy came in and said, like, he was not following best practices in the way that he wrote the report. And he disagreed with how it was. But this is not a...
Speaker: It wasn't even an evidentiary matter. It was just a cohesive training thing that hadn't occurred, right? Like when you're referencing an item, make sure you are talking about an item, not a person who owns the item, right? Yeah. Yeah.
Speaker: So that was a little crazy, but most of those things could be explained away. And the attorneys had ample, the defense attorneys had ample opportunity to address that during the trial. And again, i just don't see anything about like what you've mentioned. It it was a little hairy, but again, we're talking about This is an example of a ah spoiled, I'm not really sure, im very confident man ah killing two people
Speaker: and Thinking he was going to get away with it. And then his family paying an attorney have him get away with it. Right. right and And so that is what is happening here. That's why all these things were being picked apart, which I'm not saying that's not what.
Speaker: should i mean, he is entitled to the very best defense any attorney can give him. Okay. The evidence will, will overcome it in the end. But I think that it's a hard reality that it didn't.
Speaker: And I think that's why we're going to continue to see this. I think, I think this will be one of those things that he will write every innocence project. And say all the things that he thinks he should be saying. And I think they'll all decline him. I think ultimately this guy does life in prison without parole. and Unless I'm missing something in terms of like like, I just don't see any way he didn't do this.
Speaker: Well, he hasn't even said he didn't do it. It's the narrative that is it was either self-defense or it was murder, right? i'm talking about killing Christine Manfield. i'm like i Okay, yeah, you're right. He did say he didn't do that. i think I think you're correct that he will go down every rabbit hole he can think of because you know he just thinks that's the way life's supposed to be.
Speaker: But I just don't i don't personally see a way that this turns out working in his favor. I don't either. I i feel like i they're going to try really hard, though. And you just don't normally see that from... He could not have convinced a public defender to go to trial. Which, you have a right to go to trial, right? If you're the accused, you have that right. This should not have gone to trial. oh he definitely he definitely could have convinced a public defender to go to trial, I think. I think that like they would have let him roll those dice because they're his dice to roll. Well, maybe I'm just thinking time. and i John Carroll is getting, I think that's his name, right?
Speaker: Oh, he's a paid attorney. yeah i but Okay. But what I'm saying is like, he would not be doing this stuff out of the goodness of his heart. He's being paid to be a defense attorney.
Speaker: There's no question. And there's a difference there, right? And, well, I can see a difference. I don't know that anybody else sees it. But there are attorneys that will go to great lengths to try every single loophole, technicality, and and that's what he's doing. It's just there's not – I don't think there's going to be one.
Speaker: Yeah, it can be a bit of an ethical morass for public defenders when you're you're really not allowed to suborn perjury. That's a thing. Well, sure, but if he never asks him, he's not.
Speaker: ah guess, yeah. and In fact, like I would say ah i would be very surprised if he had ever asked. um I feel like he doesn't know. And so if he does not know that he's lying under oath, he's not suborning perjury, right?
Speaker: And I mean, I don't know the ins and outs of that. it It could very well be that Brendan Banfield believes what he's saying, Yeah. Well, then they need to, if he ever gets a new trial, they need to explore whatever mental defect caused that.
Speaker: Right, but that's not going change the outcome, right? No, no. I mean, he still did this and thought he would. He is living in a state of shock that he did not get away with it, that Juliana turned on him, which, by the way, like, she didn't really turn on him. She just, you know, decided. Also got caught.
Speaker: Well, I don't think Juliana would be doing this without him. I think that he was going to be doing this either with or without him without her, right? Right.
Speaker: right Honestly, she didn't really need to be there to begin with. which Yeah, it's it's really a crime that he drug her down with him. You know, i mean, I wondered if he wasn't trying to ah get her to take the whole fall.
Speaker: I think he was. And that made a lot, that would make a lot of sense to like the the whole situation, but that didn't really come out right the way it did. um No, I just think, I think she was his fail safe. I can always blame the nanny. Hand the rocks the cradle style.
Speaker: I think that I, I mean, he could have done that all by himself. She didn't need to be in the house. It was weird. I guess he wanted a witness. I think that that yeah that that's where you landed. I think when we talked about those, you know, he wanted a witness and then she ended up shooting him because, ah she didn't understand. Yeah. I have two more things to talk about. You want to talk more about this one or you want me move on to one of the others?
Speaker: No, can move on. That's fine. i I will be back around to this whenever. i think June 5th is the hearing. Yeah. June 5th is the hearing on this one. Um, So I think people are painting this like it's sensational. I did not feel like it was sensational. I felt like it was pretty inevitable. you and I talked about this case at length, um moving on to like a ah different one.
Speaker: But I do think like there was some dramatic flair to how it was announced. It came out of nowhere. Yeah, the announcement came out of nowhere. The appeal had just been sitting with the state Supreme Court. You and I...
Speaker: we're coming at this from two different angles in terms of how we might get here. ah there's one piece of evidence that like, we've never satisfied ourselves as to what's going on there.
Speaker: And to be clear, the, uh, the opinion says we didn't have to get to any of that. Right, right, right. They're like, they, they picked the first thing and the first thing was the strongest thing. And for those who have not heard uh,
Speaker: Sentencing and convictions related to the murder of his wife and son for Alec Murdoch were overturned this week and caused all kinds of drama. But ultimately, the reason they were overturned is because of jury interference by the clerk.
Speaker: ah Mary Rebecca Hill who goes by Becky, Becky Hill. So Becky did it. Becky calls this. um She basically is now into the South Carolina taxpayers for about a million bucks for all of this.
Speaker: i would say it's going to be way more than that. Right. But, but ultimately the South Carolina Supreme court ruled that Alex Murdoch gets a new trial and the prosecution said, not only do they want a new trial,
Speaker: But the death penalty is on the on the table. And, you know, look, here's here's just a little hint of like advice for the for the prosecution of this case.
Speaker: Get to the bottom of whatever's going on with the DNA under Maggie's fingernails. Because if you don't get to the bottom of that, I don't think I can support what's going on here. But if they don't get the DNA sorted on this case,
Speaker: Like, I think it's more they have to go after the conspiratorial idea. And that means, like, new investigative efforts. And I know they spent, like, a million bucks on on the trial and then...
Speaker: on the appeal, I think I've read a number that was like, it's $800,000 or something. Ultimately, a lot of money. Ultimately the clerk is responsible for that. And i thought it was a little more minor what she did, but like she full on tampered with this jury and then ended up pleading guilty to multiple charges.
Speaker: Uh, yeah, it, so yeah, I watched the Murdahl trial. I think you did too, right? yeah And obviously, the the clerk's behavior wasn't so anything we could have seen from watching the trial, right?
Speaker: ah It's interesting because ah the clerk of court is an elected official, right? Yep. And so she's an a like she's in an elected position that ah I feel like any elected office is one of that exists mostly because of public trust, right?
Speaker: And so people have taken it upon themselves or they just don't know the difference. And you know she's been elected to that position. And it is shocking what came out.
Speaker: According to the testimony in the different cases, because there's multiple instances of her being accused of tampering with the jury. I have no doubt that she has probably tampered with every jury that she's encountered. I was about to say that. um but But Becky Hill told the jury in this case to, quote unquote, watch him closely, watch his actions, and not to be fooled by the defense or the evidence they presented.
Speaker: They're going to say things that will try to confuse you. don't let them confuse you or convince you or throw you off. This was highly inappropriate. Again, going back to what I said previously, where an elected position is one where you're entrusted like directly from voters to be in that position. It's shocking that that would have ever occurred to her.
Speaker: Okay, and her, like, I believe it's in the opinion from ah the post-trial hearing that somebody testified that she said that she was writing the book because she wanted to buy a lake house.
Speaker: Correct. Okay. It's just wrong. This is so wrong. It's so wrong. What the Supreme Court of South Carolina decided was... They were going to hold that Alec Myrdal's right to a fair trial by an impartial jury had been violated and that the post-trial court erred in denying his motion for a new trial. Now, they point out in here, in some of the articles, that Becky Hill pleaded guilty to four charges and they were obstruction of justice and perjury.
Speaker: I just want to say the jury tampering part of this has not really been dealt with. That's what she pleads to, but she ultimately pleads to those for showing a report of photographs that were sealed court exhibits and then lying about it.
Speaker: ah She got two counts of misconduct in office for apparently taking a bonus or multiple bonuses. I don't know what that was related to because I couldn't find the exact wording of what was happening there. But then another count of promoting a book that she had written about the trial through her public office. She has this whole statement that she reads to the court about the mistakes she made. But like, I think...
Speaker: that they should like tax her for this. like Financially, she needs to be facing a big fine for the fact that the people of South Carolina now have to foot the bill for a brand new trial. Obviously, she's a disgrace, right?
Speaker: I mean, this is the craziest. To me, like, it's almost sort of like, what? Because you couldn't even imagine i a clerk of court doing this. Like, it's almost unbelievable, right? Except apparently it happened. She doesn't even seem to deny it, right? ah she I think she was genuinely surprised when she learned.
Speaker: I would say that she should most definitely be fined at least the forfeiture of any profit she made off of that book. That's sort of what i was thinking. Yeah, that's what i was thinking.
Speaker: A clerk of court should absolutely never use their elected position to profit. I'm not really sure why I have to say that out loud.
Speaker: Yeah, and and like i the the response on the internet to this case, first of all, it's been crazy since the beginning. But the response to this ruling,
Speaker: like people don't seem to understand how fundamentally an egregious error this is. I mean, i can kind of see that.
Speaker: I'm not sure because, you know, deep down, like we would be like, well, she shouldn't be doing that. But in some cases, like this stuff happens and people get away with it. Right. Because it's just not that big of a deal. um But it is a big deal. Right. It absolutely is I would say almost unheard of for a clerk of court in, you know, small town, South Carolina to be like, I need my lake house. I'm going write this book and proceed to do so. And she, I haven't read the book. I wouldn't, I would not support something like that, but it didn't seem, she had no qualms with it. Like it wasn't even has she didn't even hesitate.
Speaker: Yeah, i I have issues with her for, like, different reasons than that. um I have issues with this case for different reasons. But I did notice that, like, I think one of the things that the defense put forward is interesting enough that it's going to it's going to come back to bite the state if they don't understand it. Because, because like, the state was immediately like, well, the death penalty is back on the table. And I was like, well, are you going to get, like – a fair trial towards the death penalty. Cause like I come out against the death penalty, even in cases like this, if I were to a hundred percent believe he was guilty, I would still come out against the death penalty for Alec Murdoch.
Speaker: Um, because i think there's a lot more going on there mental health wise and issues wise. don't necessarily think he's like actually a huge addict. I think he's like seriously mentally ill.
Speaker: Um, if he did it, he's that's kind of confirmation, but Well, but also, like, his, his, he just got granted a new trial because the clerk of court interfered with the jury. Right. It is ludicrous to say, well, we're going to try him again, and this time we're going to go for the death penalty. You, they need to, like, you know, slow their roll here. how about let's just get through without the clerk of court interfering?
Speaker: Well, the other issue with this case, though, is there. So I said the DNA evidence bothered me. And I think it bothered you from the get go. We talked about that. DNA evidence should have nullified. It is unbelievable he was convicted with unknown evidence.
Speaker: unrelated male DNA under Maggie Murdoch's fingernails. ah That needs to be explained one way or the other. ah it is, well, I would say inconceivable, but at the same time it happened, so maybe not so much. It is very weird for her to have male DNA under her fingernails that does not belong to Alec Murdoch. We need to know whose DNA it is.
Speaker: Yeah, I agree with that. But one of the things that didn't get you here, which would, in my opinion, preclude any kind of death penalty trial, aside from the fact that, like, you're going to have publicity problems.
Speaker: You're definitely going to have local publicity problems, like to the point that like you probably can't try them in the same place you did with the same people. um But that one of the other problems that is brought up in the appellate documents, but it's not ruled on by the South Carolina Supreme Court. And I firmly believe it would have been had it not been for this sort of.
Speaker: fatal problem with um like the whole trial is unfair because of the clerk tampering with things. But the financial crimes aspect of this, like all bringing in all the, bringing in all the financial crimes to this case and then not connecting them in any way to a good motive.
Speaker: um I think it this made the trial a lot longer. It made the trial super long, but I think the Supreme Court, even if they didn't have Becky Hill, ultimately would have ruled that caused it not to be a fair trial.
Speaker: So I think you have two major problems that you really should be addressing before you start with the the death penalty on the table. I mean, I get it. i understand that, you know, Alan Wilson thinks he can do a good job with all of this. Don't you think that was a knee-jerk response, though?
Speaker: Like, that was the stupidest comment I've It was dumb. If he hadn't have been like sending it out to all the news outlets before the ruling even really had spread and saying, he said, you know we're back to square one in this case. That means all our legal options are on the table, including the death penalty. Anytime you say that, it basically means you're terrible at your job.
Speaker: Yeah. like i that That's like me. If I'm at McDonald's and I'm like, I'm going to spit in your food, but I have to tell you that through the drive-thru microphone for some reason, that's basically the worst thing that can happen to me at McDonald's.
Speaker: And I don't eat McDonald's, by the way, or any fast food. But like if I'm saying that to you, it's because I'm terrible at my job. Well, right. And you know they went through...
Speaker: In the opinion, ah giving him a new trial, they talked about how the effect of what the clerk was doing. So the clerk of court was kind of like the jury wrangler, I guess you could say. Correct.
Speaker: Which, the way, I've never seen that. i don't know why they do that there. Well, the clerk is would be the one responsible for sending out ah like jury notices. and So there are some, like, I'm sure it's by statute and... ah I'm sure, yeah. For the state, that that's... I think she may have been a little more heavy-handed than normal because she was writing a book and wanted to be an influence, right?
Speaker: ah She was trying to sway... She thought that him being found guilty would... ah it would make for a more profitable book than him being found not guilty. But it, you know, she gave rides to jurors or at least one juror. I can't really remember, but she was doing a lot of very inappropriate things. And,
Speaker: The jury, ah they have them labeled as, I think, like X, Y, z And then there's a juror who is a number juror because they've sat... It was the egg juror.
Speaker: Do you remember? Yeah. Okay. And so they talk about all that stuff. So all the allegations against the egg juror were pretty much made up. um And the reason was...
Speaker: ah It seemed like Becky Hill had she felt like she was going to be, you know, she was going to cause a harm traumaic juror she's going to cause a hung jury. Well, then some of the other juries that speak like they actually took her Becky Hill's position as clerk of court as a position of authority and it swayed their opinion of the case.
Speaker: Like, they felt like, well, if the clerk of court thinks he's guilty, you know. And so it mattered. And I'm not so sure ah without that influence that he would have been found guilty.
Speaker: Even based on... you think just the hung jury part of that i I'm not even sure it would have been hung. i I'm not sure. because And again, that's exactly why he's got to have a new trial, because she weighed in and she was telling them things like, don't let his testimony fool you. And the jury the jurors that were part of this were like...
Speaker: That made me think that everything he said was a lie, and i gave credence to what I was being told by ah the clerk, right? Yeah.
Speaker: And I don't see why anybody would have thought differently. Like there was never a situation where any of that was going to be okay. Right. And she, an elected official should have known to keep her mouth shut.
Speaker: Everybody could write books about things. Everybody could sway people, right. With their positions. You don't do it because it's wrong.
Speaker: Yeah, I mean, you can write the book after the fact. You can't, but I don't know if it's like a wanting to know more information or wanting to be a part of it or wanting to have influenced something. All of those things you really can't do.
Speaker: Like, you can do the research, but you can't just stick your nose in the door of the jury deliberations and find out what's going on. and You certainly can't talk to them privately and tell them to disregard everything the defense is saying. i mean, if you're doing that, like, not only should you not be a clerk of court, but you should not work at a McDonald's.
Speaker: like you Like you shouldn't be – like you are you're displaying such a lack of critical thinking skills at that point. And it's such a lack of good decision making.
Speaker: It's unbelievable almost. And again, i watched the trial, and ah obviously none of this stuff was what we saw, right? Granted, um it's come back now a little bit where I think the media was – sort of eyewitness to it and they were baffled by her behavior. They witnessed like bits and pieces of what the jury experienced. Right.
Speaker: They weren't exactly sure what was going on. I think a lot of them just like chalked it up to like small town, South Carolina. ah you know, that's why it was happening. But so it didn't go completely unnoticed. I just, I'm not sure anybody got the full picture until, you Yeah.
Speaker: i have a feeling it had to do with ah there was another county clerk who had come in to assist yeah And I think, again, I'm speculating here, but I think that that clerk was probably key in bringing at least, like, you need to look into this to light, right? Yeah. Because they have they would know how to do their job, right? And they were there just to assist, but they would have, if it was, you know, a respectable county clerk, they would have picked up on it immediately and they probably couldn't
Speaker: do anything to stop it because this happened like while the trial was occurring right this was like a six week trial yeah it it was was trial i mean and now they're gonna have to go through this all over again because she weighed the scales and don't get me wrong like there's a there was a lot to that case that i feel like It actually made sense that they felt some pressure from the clerk because otherwise I couldn't figure out why they didn't care more about, especially the DNA issues, right?
Speaker: Yeah. So I remember talking about this and at that time I didn't know that there had been interference. Yeah. I didn't know that actually for a while. But to me, it actually makes sense because i thought it was odd that it could just be overlooked like that.
Speaker: Maybe it wasn't. you know Maybe we don't even know that he would have been convicted without this interference. So I feel like it's not just a matter of going through the motion again to find him guilty again. i think that it actually deserves deliberation, right? 100%.
Speaker: all hundred percent Yeah. Without that influence, and I'm not saying ah that Alec Murdaugh is ah not guilty or guilty. I'm not saying anything about any of that. I'm talking about the process here, right? They should ah evaluate the evidence, which in the last trial included male DNA under Maggie Murdaugh's fingernails that did not belong to Alec Murdaugh nor anybody that Maggie Murdaugh was related to.
Speaker: And ah it was unidentified. And it remained that way. And that's weird. Yeah. Yeah, it is weird. It's one of those things that... And by the way, people, the opinion is like 30-some pages? It's 27 pages. 27 pages, okay. um it's It's online.
Speaker: ah You should speak It's worth a read, definitely. You should read it. Yes. You should read it, if nothing else, from the perspective that, like... ah I thought about just setting aside an episode where you and I just read the opinion and talk about what those things mean.
Speaker: but I think people should do that on their own first, and we probably could do that. Well, sure, because it gets into very – I thought it was explained very well. This is an infamous case, right? Yeah. And they they so this is the Supreme Court of South Carolina – they took the time to lay it out, right?
Speaker: Yeah, this and they're you know this is a unanimous decision. oh yeah, 5-0, right? This is all five justices agreeing with this. So it's not nothing. There was no question that her behavior would never have been acceptable, ever. Correct, correct. It it was insane. In fact, I'm pretty sure that the lower court that – This stems from... Because i think that they had to have had some sort of post-conviction hearing. But anyway, they it was a situation where like there was no way they could deal with it. It had to go to the Supreme Court, right? Because...
Speaker: A clerk of court interfering with the jury making the decision to convict is a violation of the defendant's right to a fair trial, right? It's a constitutional issue. And so it had to be decided at a different level. Like it's not going to come out of the trial court, right? Or whoever was there. I'm pretty sure that um the trial judge... ah recused him. so I'm not really sure, but I know that the Supreme Court has ruled. They ruled unanimously, and Alec Murdaugh is going to get a new trial for the murders of Maggie and his son, Paul. Now, it's interesting because...
Speaker: The DNA is scientific evidence and could be the answer. It could also be the conclusion that Alec Murdaugh is guilty if they came up with a viable explanation.
Speaker: This is just in my opinion, right? Yeah. But it's interesting that it's going to come back around. Now, he's in jail for his financial crimes regardless, right? Yeah. There's so much stuff he's in jail for that's sort of like unrelated directly, but the state thinks might be part of the motive.
Speaker: Right. And, you know, i can't say... definitively that I think Alec Murdoch is guilty. i there's it There's some evidence that suggests he might be. It doesn't really make a whole lot of sense that somebody else would have done it, but that DNA has got to be explained. And depending on the route they take a new trial, there may be other things too. Yeah. Right. And they point that out in the decision. They point out that like some of the stuff that went on during the trial maybe needed some guidance from the Supreme Court as well, including like how they introduced evidence and whatnot. But like here's when I knew like I said I'm with you on the DNA thing.
Speaker: That's sort of what puts me down the path I'm on. And here's how I like look at it. I can't decide if he did it, didn't do it or maybe hired somebody to do it because of some of the wacky things that went on along the way.
Speaker: But the fact that I'm still asking those questions after watching the whole trial and looking at all the evidence, probably not a good thing. Right. So i I don't think that he hired anybody. um I think that that could have actually been found.
Speaker: ah Potentially. Like, I just think, I'm just saying, like, I guess maybe hired is the wrong word. Like I think of it as conspired with maybe somebody else that's like dirty in his life. That's already doing crimes. Cause like he's been found along the way to have connections to people that can get him drugs and help him move money. Like there's a lot of stuff going on in his life where like potentially he's like held somebody to the feet to the fire and they help out.
Speaker: Well, right. And so once he was convicted, um and because this is not my fight, you know what I'm saying? Yeah, okay, yeah. This isn't like this huge case for me where I want to... I mean, Alec Murdoch has every capability of getting himself justice, right? Correct.
Speaker: ah He was an attorney. But I wondered, I felt like his... drug addiction story, ah whatever excuse. I don't really know what to call it. i I don't really believe that.
Speaker: And that was a big problem for me because that was like the basis of his defense, essentially. Yeah. And so because I didn't believe it It caused all kinds of issues for me, but maybe he's telling the truth. I don't know. There were a lot of things that, you know, rubbed me the wrong way about him. But at the end of the day, I'm never going to get through that DNA. Like, it's, it's, there should not be that DNA there.
Speaker: Uh, and somebody's got to explain it. I'm not even sure at this point they can. so, so Without that, I can't say beyond a reasonable doubt that Alec Murdoch did it. ah I'm not sure if the DNA didn't exist, I'd probably be leaning more towards he did do it. But why is that DNA there?
Speaker: Well, that's what makes these like second trial situations so interesting. I think that ultimately you and I decided that they'd throw the death penalty words into that statement because they're trying to force him to plea.
Speaker: Absolutely. I think that there's no question they will try and force him to plea. I do not see that happening. I think that even if he he was guilty, i don't know that he can reconcile that in his brain, especially if he really was on drugs, right? Correct.
Speaker: Because he's not on drugs now, I would imagine. Correct. um You can get drugs behind bars. It's more complicated. It's not it's not as plain and clean as like the prescription pill mills he was basically getting his either stolen or legitimate prescriptions from. um yeah but But the other part about that with having a second trial is you get to see the state like completely tell a different story, and that's always fascinating to me.
Speaker: Well, I don't see, the i mean, I don't know how much they can vary here. Well, if you have to lose the financial crimes, because they pretty plainly state in this opinion, you't need to lose the financial crimes.
Speaker: So if you lose those and you don't have the clerk helping you behind the scenes, what what does that change? I don't know that don't know that the clerk thought thought of her actions as helping the state, but I guess maybe, yeah, I mean, it lended towards a guilty verdict, right? so it It doesn't really matter if she thought they helped. Like, theyre like she she was how her well she she can't overcome the burden of it appearing to be her tampering with the case.
Speaker: In fact, she got off lightly. She needs couple charges of tampering in here. Well, Yeah, and see, we don't know all the ins and outs of what's happening there. Is she still in office? She can't possibly be in office. No, no, no, no. She resigned. She resigned from Collin County, and she took a deal last, want to say December 2025, she took a deal. And, like, it sort would have went under the radar with any other case the time that they released But, like, ultimately, it was... um
Speaker: it was not going to go into the radar with the amount of scrutiny and a spotlight that this case is getting. Oh yeah. No, it was, a this case is a huge case. It's probably going to come back around because if they do another trial, I think we have to like cover at least our covering or trying to watch it coverage.
Speaker: i absolutely. Yeah, I agree because this is a, I mean, it's a big deal. Yeah. um I don't have a lot more on it today. i just think it's shocking. I mean, the truth is I could sit here and talk for five hours about it, but like some of my conversation after this gets to be a little less informed without me sitting and going through the document to explain my sources.
Speaker: um Did you have a lot more on this or anything else you want to say on this? Yeah. I mean, I can talk about the opinion at some point if you want, but ah I'm not surprised ah that, uh,
Speaker: he's getting a new trial. Uh, I am, i was not aware of what was going on behind the scenes when the trial was taking place. And I still thought he would eventually, ah get a new trial for a variety of reasons.
Speaker: And so that's that's the other thing I wanted to mention. This happened fast. Everything about his case has happened fast. Like, it went to trial fast.
Speaker: We're already back around at a retrial now. That's a little unusual. Well, but he also is sort of... I mean, I'm not going to say he's connected, but, like, they know how this system works, right? he's Yeah, definitely. He's an attorney, or he was an attorney, so um he's also got really good defense attorneys.
Speaker: Yeah. ah Even if they're... they they're a little bit eccentric at times, I think, but they're fighting the good fight. And I think they actually believe that he's not guilty.
Speaker: i don't, I don't know their state of mind. I haven't heard them address it, but they're obviously fighting the hell out of this case. um I have one more thing. I know we were running kind of long, but I have one more thing. um Do you have time for me to do one more?
Speaker: Go for it. So two of the cases that I've been really deep into in terms of death penalty cases, um one was the Robertson case out of Texas. you remember that one? The chicken baby case? Yeah.
Speaker: Yeah. He almost got put to death twice in a row, like consecutive years. Right. Right. So there was another one similar to that Oklahoma that we covered. And that was Richard Glossom.
Speaker: have yeah Have you seen there was news? Yes. Okay. um So Richard Glossop, for those of you don't know, we covered this two years ago, I think, when we did a bunch of death penalty cases in the fall.
Speaker: um Shortly before dawn, January 7th, 1997, there's a murder at this best budget end motel in Oklahoma City. a man named Justin Sneed is murdering Barry Van Treese, who is the owner of this motel.
Speaker: And in order to avoid the death penalty, Justin Sneed agrees to testify against a man named Richard Glossop, who is the manager of the motel. He ends up implicating him in a murder-for-hire scheme. So allegedly, Richard Glossop, this motel manager, paid Justin Sneed to kill the owner of the hotel.
Speaker: So Glossop is going to be convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of Barry Ventress. At the time of the murder, Justin Snead was living in this like room in the motel, and he was engaging as a kind of informal handyman.
Speaker: He had like ah a meth problem and a history of violent crimes. Now, after Glossett goes to trial, he appeals on the concept that he received ineffective assistance of counsel.
Speaker: because he's sentenced to death. ah The attorney didn't show the jury a video of the police ah where they were kind of, i maybe the wrong word, but coercing or attempting to coerce Justin Sneed into making up this story about it being a murder for hire, which is so weird to me.
Speaker: um But finally 2001, an appellate court agrees they grant Richard Glossop a new trial, There were quite a few questions about justice need being reliable as a witness.
Speaker: Turns out over time, they're going to discover that like, there's a lot of stuff that's not, uh, brought up about justice need. And again, at retrial glosses of attorney doesn't show the footage of this police interrogation, but the appeals court by this point, they think it was strategic.
Speaker: Um, The summer of 2022 comes along, Richard Glossop's attorneys get hold of several large boxes of the prosecutor's file. There's material in here that appears to be the state like sort of changing the story as they go with Justin Sneed.
Speaker: And the state ends up disclosing to Richard Glossop's counsel that they believe Justin Sneed told prosecutors he was prescribed lithium by a psychiatrist, which contradicted his testimony on this stand in the second trial, maybe. He stated he was not under the care of a psychiatrist and that he had only ever erroneously been prescribed lithium. So the attorneys filed a new application for post-conviction relief. Uh,
Speaker: like raising issues about like not only a psychiatric psychiatric treatment of a witness, but also a suppression of this note with the lithium comment on it. We covered this in detail.
Speaker: So it was argued before the Supreme Court, October 2024. And think... and i think Maybe Gorsuch had to recuse himself because he hadn't been involved at a lower level.
Speaker: They order a new trial for Richard Glossop back in February of 2025, maybe. Anyways, there's news in this case, for those of you who have not followed all of this.
Speaker: um Richard Glossop is free. So he's out on bail. He basically got a $500,000 bond, which was paid for by ki ker Kardashian. She paid $50,000 for him to be able to walk out. So even though he's almost been put to death multiple times, he walked out of jail all Thursday this week for the first time since 1997.
Speaker: um There was a judge's order that came setting bond. So they've had two trials. He's set up for a third trial. So this is after two trials, two fully independent investigations, a lot of hearings.
Speaker: um Judge Natalie May ordered that they... the Oklahoma cannot deny bail to Richard Glossom. We're just totally correct.
Speaker: He's maintained his innocence, said there was never a murder-for-hire plot. He was able to walk out of jail. I think all he has is a curfew and an electronic ankle monitor. But his legal case will go forward as to whether or not like somehow he hired Justin Sneed to murder Barry Buntreus. And this is one of the reasons like it's difficult for me to behind the death penalty.
Speaker: this type of case because I've not seen anything along the way that makes me go, yeah, Richard Glossop definitely hired Justin Sneed to kill Barry Bontrese for no reason. Well, and that was one of the most bizarre things. We know that Justin Sneed killed him.
Speaker: Right. Right. And confessed to doing that. And so the weirdest thing was like, I mean, I know that he, Glossop had nothing to do with it. Right. and it seems like it was odd to add the detail for no reason, right?
Speaker: It sounds like something a bipolar person that needs lithium would do. Well, and I wondered, i wasn't sure if maybe investigators thought like he couldn't have pulled it off, but I'd always seen it as like a...
Speaker: you know, a meth binge or something to that effect, right? It was yeah something stupid that happened. And, you know, obviously it it doesn't make any sense that Glossop would have paid Sneet to kill his boss and owner of the place that he worked. Right.
Speaker: It never made sense. Right. I, I am so excited that he got out. We've covered this case in depth before. So I'm really just, this is just me announcing that he's out.
Speaker: find it weird that Kim Kardashian paid his bail. um i didn't know if you had any thoughts on this part. i don't have any thoughts. I mean, good for whoever wanted to put it up. Good for them.
Speaker: ah He should have never been charged to begin with. And, you know, he's going to go I think they've taken the I think the prosecution, the prosecutor's office has stated they're not going to seek the death penalty again. Yeah, I yeah, I believe that they're stating they're not going to seek the death penalty. And i think the new trial has some hearings coming up. I'm just glad this guy's getting a little taste of freedom, freedom right now.
Speaker: Right. And i hope i hope that the prosecutor's office can evaluate the evidence and make sure that, you know, this is really still a case that needs to be brought um as opposed to, i don't know maybe just understanding Justin Snead is solely responsible for it.
Speaker: It kind of goes back to what I was saying. Like, you don't have commiserate evil come together very often, Right. That is 100% true. And it definitely usually doesn't come together like this unless there's like pretty obvious reasoning.
Speaker: um i never saw anything that indicated Glossop was involved in this. so Did Sneed eventually say that he had lied?
Speaker: no? Um... i think I think Sneed's being a liar is never a question.
Speaker: Okay. I think, i can't remember. Except that it is because he was charged, right? Well, but I'm saying, like, I think it's it's made obvious all along the way ah that that like, he's clearly lying.
Speaker: So do you think that in this situation, a different set of investigators, like there's none of this happens except... Yeah. yeah like Yeah. This is one of those like zebras and horses situations. Yeah. Like you have a murder, you take that guy, you charge him with the murder, you move on.
Speaker: um that He tried to lessen his sentence, which I don't fully understand, but I saw that there was a thing about this that caught my attention very long time ago, and I think it was Sister Helen Prejant.
Speaker: You know what I'm talking about? Dead Men Walking? Yeah. think that
Speaker: had some letters with the family or letters that Snead wrote his family or something that... pretty clearly outlined what had happened. But the problem was that like, no one believed anything Snead said. So even when he said he wasn't lying, they just assumed he was lying about not lying about lying. Yeah.
Speaker: yeah I mean, that makes sense. Cause at one point I remember reading that like, that there were witnesses that were technically jailhouse snitches who said, you know, Sneed laughs about lying about this all the time.
Speaker: Yeah. So um I'm glad that this case is like, I hate that this guy's been behind jail for 30 years, been behind bars or in jail for 30 years. I'm glad that this case finally like seems to be turning in a way that like maybe he gets out for part of it.
Speaker: Hopefully he doesn't have to go back. That's that's specifically is what I'm saying. This has been, um there is enough ah generations of change out of prosecutors that somebody can do the right thing. Correct.
Speaker: I don't have a lot more on this one. This one's going to come back up if it goes fully into a new trial. Wow, we're coming up on two hours here. Did you have any more on this one?
Speaker: No, I think we should probably give everybody a break. That was kind of a lot.
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