Become a Creator today!Start creating today - Share your story with the world!
Start for free
00:00:00
00:00:01
Season Six: Holiday Episode 19 (2025)
49 Plays51 minutes ago
This podcast was made possible by www.labrottiecreations.com Check out their merchandise and specifically their fun pop pet art custom pieces made from photos of your very own pets. Use the promo code CRIMEXS for 20% off a fun, brightly colored, happy piece of art of your own pet at their site.
Music in this episode was licensed for True Crime XS. Our theme song is No Scars from slip.fm
You can reach us at our website truecrimexs.com and you can leave us a voice message at 252-365-5593. Find us most anywhere with @truecrimexs
Thanks for listening. Please like and subscribe if you want to hear more and you can come over to patreon.com/truecrimexs and check out what we’ve got going on there if you’d like to donate to fund future True Crime XS road trip investigations and FOIA requests. We also have some merchandise up at Teepublic http://tee.pub/lic/mZUXW1MOYxM
Sources:
Various News Sources Mentioned by Name
Ad Information:
New Era Caps: https://zen.ai/dWeCYLHxxANOaZ6NcKocEw
Liquid IV: Link: https://zen.ai/45lYmDnWl1Z3cR66LBX5mA
Zencastr: Link: https://zen.ai/SFkD99OGWGNz_plc2c_Yaw
Recommended
Transcript
Introduction and Content Warning
00:00:00
Speaker
The content you're about to hear may be graphic in nature. Listener discretion is advised.
Hostage-taking and Episode Complexity
00:00:50
Speaker
This is True Crime XS.
00:00:59
Speaker
You know, there's a point in time in here where I just lose track of where we're at. Like, I just know we're doing holiday episodes. I have this giant list of episodes that we're doing, and I know it's about hostage taking, but sometimes I don't remember. So I make these lists. Do you make a lot of lists in your life, or no, you're not a list person?
00:01:16
Speaker
and I make lists, yeah. I make a lot of lists, particularly when it comes to doing this stuff. Right. Today's episode, we're going to space. I figured like that would be the the place to to make a hostage taking really interesting. i mean, we're not literally going to space.
00:01:32
Speaker
Probably the closest we're going to get in this series.
Challenges for NASA in 2007
00:01:35
Speaker
Yeah, yeah. And like, so there's an element of this episode, like I just haven't had a chance to talk about anywhere else and I've always wanted, but 2007 was a terrible year for NASA.
00:01:49
Speaker
um do you like So that's a long time ago. I was just realizing that's 18 years ago now. Indeed. Indeed. There are two major things that happened to NASA that year that are just kind of crazy.
00:02:01
Speaker
And I'm going to them together. They're not really tied together, but like one is almost a hostage situation and the other is definitely a hostage situation. Have you ever
Lisa Nowak's Background
00:02:10
Speaker
heard of Lisa Caputo? No.
00:02:15
Speaker
So um Lisa Caputo, she's born in Washington, D.C. back in May of 1963.
00:02:23
Speaker
Her parents are really smart people. One of them is a computer consultant. I think that's dad. Mom was some kind of scientist. She had two younger sisters. They grew up in Rockville, mary Maryland after being born in According to he quotes and stuff I found, back in 1969, she watched the Apollo 11 moon mission, and she became really fascinated the space program.
00:02:51
Speaker
So... She gets in in 1981 to the Naval Academy, the United States Naval Academy on Annapolis, Maryland. and they were...
00:03:07
Speaker
just starting to get into the the hang of having women in the classes there. Women were first admitted to an adolescent in 1976. And so she, you know, becomes a female midshipman.
00:03:20
Speaker
So she's still at a time when like women in those roles would be harassed a little bit. Well, women in roles still get ah harassed, but I think it's a little different now. Yeah.
00:03:32
Speaker
I mean, Like, more openly, and it was not... Like, you shouldn't be here. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And, like, that's exactly what some of the professors would say. Like, they would still be of the mindset, like, women don't belong here.
00:03:47
Speaker
Which is crazy to me that that was happening in the 70s, right? Right. Right. So she ends up on the track team there. She graduates from the United States Naval Academy, May 22nd, 1985. She has a bachelor of science in aeronautical engineering, and she's commissioned as a junior officer in the United States Navy as an ensign.
00:04:08
Speaker
For her first assignment, She is going to choose a second month, which is a six-month temporary assignment, to the Johnson Space Center.
00:04:19
Speaker
And she's going to work there as an aerospace engineer at the Ellington Air Force Base. During the time that she's going to be there, there are six space shuttle launches.
00:04:30
Speaker
And in December of 1985, she gets orders to Pensacola down in Florida, Naval Air Station Pensacola. And she starts flight training. Now, at the time she gets this assignment, women are still banned from combat assignments.
00:04:45
Speaker
Most of the jobs in the Navy that are centered around combat assignments are unavailable to women. And that's regardless of their aptitude or their ability. And there's still a lot of people in command. She finds it wasn't just the professors at Annapolis. It's the people above her in her chain of command saying, women maybe don't belong here.
00:05:08
Speaker
But getting in accepted into flight training was a huge deal. A lot of women that get accepted in the 80s are resented by the men who get passed over.
00:05:21
Speaker
So she completes her primary flight training at Pensacola. And she qualifies as a naval flight officer in June of 1987. She moves on to the electronic warfare school, which is over at Quarry Station.
00:05:35
Speaker
Quarry Station is um the less training side, more Navy side of the Pensacola station. And from there, she's going to go on to Lemoore, which is based out of California. It's in Kings County and Fresno County, I think. It kind of spills over the county line.
00:05:54
Speaker
And she gets married. April 6th of 1988. She marries one of her classmates, a guy named Richard Nowak. N-O-W-A-K. ah They get married in the Naval Academy Chapel and she changes her last name to Nowak.
00:06:11
Speaker
ah She qualifies as a mission commander and electronic warfare lead.
Journey to Becoming an Astronaut
00:06:16
Speaker
ah She has a great career. She gets over 15 hours of flight time, more than 30 different aircraft. She gets awarded multiple medals from the Navy.
00:06:25
Speaker
She ends up on June 15, 1995, being part of a really interesting scheme that NASA puts forward. So as a naval officer, Lisa can't apply directly to being part of this selection process of a new group of astronauts.
00:06:42
Speaker
But she can submit her application to a review board, and they will either approve it or deny it. And if they approve it, they do they will forward it onto NASA. NASA gets 2,400 applications and in early 1996 Lisa is informed that she's one of 150 finalists that are deemed highly qualified.
00:07:05
Speaker
She is asked to report to Johnson Space Center for a week of orientation. So she's going to go there, she's going go through a battery of tests, she's going to go through a lot of interviews and she's going to go through medical evaluations.
00:07:17
Speaker
On May 1st, 1996, NASA publicly announces 10 pilot candidates and 25 mission specialist candidates. And Lisa's name is on the list.
Space Missions and Family Life
00:07:30
Speaker
So the class of 1996 would have been the 16th group of NASA astronauts. It was the largest that had ever been selected. ah for the space shuttle class of astronauts since 1978. So in 1978, they had trained 35 astronauts, and that's what they're going to do again in 1996.
00:07:49
Speaker
ninety six So all of these people are ordered to report down for duty Johnson Space Center, and they're going to commence their astronaut training in August of 1996.
00:08:00
Speaker
and They're also going to be joined by multiple international astronauts that year. That was becoming a really big deal. She has a fine career. She moves over to Texas. She and her husband are, um they were both naval flight officers, but he leaves active duty in 1998. He continues to be a naval reserveman.
00:08:24
Speaker
And he finds a job working in space communications contractor for Berrios Technology, which is an aerospace company. He ends up working as a flight controller at the Mission Control Center there at Johnson Space Center.
00:08:38
Speaker
in In early 2001, Lisa gets pregnant with twins. She had been specializing in the operation of the space shuttle's robotic arm.
00:08:48
Speaker
Do you remember that? Have you ever seen that? have. I remember it from the movie Space Camp, but like the arm is in the bay and like it is able to move things around right it's ah it's a really big deal to be in charge of that And during an STS-100 mission in April 2001, she is part of installing a robot arm on the International Space Station.
00:09:15
Speaker
And then later that year, in October 2001, she gives birth to twins, both little girls. So Lisa and her husband, Richard, they start alternating their work schedules. So somebody's always with the kids because when you have two, like at the same time, it's, you know, double the everything.
00:09:35
Speaker
But Richard gets recalled in 2002 to participate in Enduring Freedom. So this is America going to war post 9-11. And that effectively leaves Lisa as a single mom with three kids.
00:09:51
Speaker
And along the way, she is still in the running, I guess you'd say, for different missions with a space shuttle. So December
Personal Complications and Affairs
00:10:03
Speaker
12th of 2002, NASA announces the crew for what they describe as STS-118, which is going to be a shuttle mission, so a space shuttle mission, which is going to have the Endeavor. i don't know if you remember the different names. that the i remember that, yeah.
00:10:21
Speaker
So Lisa's on that list, along with Scott Kelly as mission commander, Scott Parazynski, David Williams, I think, is on that, and Barbara Morgan. So it's a big deal.
00:10:35
Speaker
She goes on to participate in space flights and training for space flights. And for the most part, she just has this really amazing career.
00:10:48
Speaker
as an astronaut after having been a pilot. And you know once you go to space or a part of going to space, like you're kind of celebrated. You become a ah public figure of sorts, wouldn't you agree?
00:11:01
Speaker
ah do. Okay. So in 2006, things are not going well for Lisa and for Richard.
00:11:12
Speaker
She's been having this relationship with a fellow astronaut. It's kind of a big deal. Okay, so in order to tell you this next part, I have to tell you a little bit about another astronaut who has served as a pilot on several space shuttle missions.
00:11:30
Speaker
This gentleman's name is Bill Olyphen, O-E-F-E-L-E-I-N. hope I'm saying that right. He has a pretty interesting career.
00:11:41
Speaker
He starts out as a Navy officer. He's commissioned back in 1988, goes through flight training, and he ends up in the NASA Astronaut Corps as well back in June of 1998.
00:11:55
Speaker
Now, for his personal life, he gets married before he goes into the Astronaut Corps. And he meets in the astronaut corps, Lisa. This is in 1996.
00:12:08
Speaker
He becomes an astronaut candidate in 1998. And it turns out from 1998 to 2006, he's having an affair with Lisa. So they're romantically involved during training.
00:12:22
Speaker
Even though that is going on, he's still married. They've had two children together. But in 2005, Bill gets divorced. He continues his relationship with Lisa, even though Lisa is still married to Richard.
00:12:38
Speaker
But in November of 2006, he starts a relationship with a U.S. Air Force captain named Colleen Shipman. According to what we know now,
00:12:50
Speaker
There were racy emails exchanged between Shipman and Bill the whole time they were doing a December 2006 space mission. She's on Earth, he's up in space, and he's sending what they describe as racy emails.
00:13:07
Speaker
He ends up ending his relationship with Lisa in January of 2007. And that's sort of where we pick up again with Lisa. So her marriage has failed. She's getting separated and she's going to be divorced from Richard.
00:13:23
Speaker
She's officially separated by January 2007.
00:13:26
Speaker
But
Confrontation with Colleen Shipman
00:13:27
Speaker
she's still talking to Bill, even though Bill is seeing Colleen. And he's been seeing Colleen for couple of months at this point.
00:13:37
Speaker
Colleen had been an engineer at the 45th Space Wing over at Patrick Air Force Base, which is also done in Florida. Bill tells Lisa, hey, I am seeing someone else. She's like, who is it? And he ends up telling her it's Colleen Chipman from U.S. Air Force.
00:13:53
Speaker
And he thought everything was okay. Like, from the outside, Bill says that it looked like things went well. Lisa was taking it well. And they were going to be buddies still.
00:14:03
Speaker
So they continued to train for a charity bicycle race called the MS-150. Okay. But Colleen found out that Lisa was storing things, including her bicycle for the race over at Bill's house, and it made her uncomfortable.
00:14:20
Speaker
On January 29th, 2007, NASA makes this announcement that a woman named Stephanie Wilson has been chosen as the mission specialist for a mission called STS-120, and she's going to be replacing Michael Foreman, who had been assigned out to STS-123, which would be in February later in the year. But Lisa had been on the list for Stephanie Wilson's mission specialist position,
00:14:49
Speaker
And according to a mission commander, Mark Kelly, who had worked with her, Stephanie Wilson had been chosen because she was a team player well-deserving, and Lisa was not known as much.
00:15:02
Speaker
So instead, lisa was assigned to Capcom duties for STS-123 instead. So she's put off to the February mission, and Capcom means she's going to be on the ground working out of what people know as the command center. Like in the movies when they say, Houston, we have a problem.
00:15:23
Speaker
That's who they're talking about. Mission control is Capcom. On February 4th, 2007, Lisa gets up and starts getting ready to do something.
00:15:34
Speaker
She packs up latex gloves, a black wig, a BB pistol, and they describe it as having ammunition with with it, which I assume means BBs, wouldn't you assume?
00:15:46
Speaker
I mean, seems right. She gets pepper spray and a hooded tan trench coat. She gets a drilling hammer, ah black leather gloves, an eight-inch Gerber folding knife, and a few other items.
00:16:02
Speaker
And she drives her husband's car from Houston, Texas, 900 miles to Orlando, Florida, to, quote, talk end quote, to Colleen Chipman. There's this whole thing, if anybody is going to remember this story, you're going to remember this, and that is, in early police reports, it was stated that she wore maximum absorbency garments, or MAG, which are adult diapers.
00:16:36
Speaker
Yeah, I remember this. Astronauts wear these on missions. She says she didn't do that. Police reports say she did. You be the judge of what you want to think there. was the point so she didn't have to stop anywhere? Yep. yeahp The point was so all she was doing was getting a little bit of gas, which I assume, depending on the car, she's got to get gas at least twice to do that trip.
00:16:58
Speaker
On February 2007, next day She goes to Orlando International Airport, and she waits for Colleen's plane to touchdown at around 1.05. Colleen comes to claim her suitcase.
00:17:11
Speaker
She's in the baggage claim. Her suitcase is delayed. She finally gets her luggage from the baggage claim office around 3.15, and she's going to take a shuttle bus to the parking area around 3.28. According to Colleen, she became aware of someone following her to the airport satellite parking. unit And when she gets in her car, just as she's about to close the door, she hears running footsteps and she slams down the lock on the door. And when she looks up, it's Lisa.
00:17:39
Speaker
Lisa smacks on the window. She's trying to open the car door She's asking for a ride. And then she's crying. Colleen, seeing what's going on, she rolls down the window just a couple of inches like to ask, are you okay?
00:17:55
Speaker
And as she does that, Lisa forces a can of pepper spray and into the edge of the window and sprays pepper spray into the car. Colleen manages to drive to the parking lot booth.
00:18:09
Speaker
From there, she calls the police. ah
Legal Aftermath and Court Appearances
00:18:12
Speaker
Multiple Orlando Police Department Airport Division officers arrive moments later, and an officer observes Lisa throwing a bag into a trash receptacle at a parking shuttle bus stop.
00:18:28
Speaker
So Lisa, at this point, gets arrested. this is at the airport. She's charged with attempted kidnapping, Battery, attempted vehicle burglary with battery, and destruction of evidence.
00:18:42
Speaker
Colleen Chipman is going to file for a restraining order, and in the handwritten portion of the restraining order, she refers to her as an acquaintance of her boyfriend. But she does not identify Bill.
00:18:55
Speaker
She claims that Lisa had been stalking her for at least two months. Lisa told investigators that she was having a relationship with Bill, which she described as being more than a working relationship, but less than a romantic relationship.
00:19:08
Speaker
There were presentations in the early round of like her first appearance and her bail hearing that she had elaborately planned to do something to Colleen Shipman. And prosecutors and the police asked the magistrate and the judge showing them all these disguises and these weapons to hold her without bail because they think she's going to do something and it's going to be awful.
00:19:32
Speaker
Two fellow astronauts come over to Florida to come to Lisa's arraignment, which is where she gets to plead guilty or not guilty. One of them is Captain Chris Ferguson. He was the senior active duty naval officer in the NASA astronaut corps at the time. He goes there as Lisa's boss, basically, her commanding officer.
00:19:51
Speaker
And then... They have the chief of the astronaut office, the senior astronaut, they show up as well. On February 6th 2007, they come in and speak to the judge. The state's assistant attorney argued that the facts indicated well-thought-out plan to kidnap.
00:20:10
Speaker
And the way they phrase it is perhaps, but they pretty much state that they believe kidnapping and either serious injury, maiming, or murder are on the table for calling shipment.
00:20:22
Speaker
At the hands of Lisa Nowak. In arguing for pretrial release, Lisa's attorney says, one's good works must count for something. That's an interesting quote to come in here.
00:20:35
Speaker
Lisa ends up being ordered released on $15,000 bail, but she's got to wear a GPS tracker. She's to have no contact with Colleen Chipman, which is pretty normal. Before she can get out, she has to agree to these terms.
00:20:48
Speaker
And they end up charging her with attempted first-degree murder. And they changed their mind about bail.
NASA's Response to the Incident
00:20:55
Speaker
They go back to the judge and they say, we're upgrading these charges. What can you do?
00:20:59
Speaker
so she ends up being held for a period. But her lawyer alleged that police and prosecutors were unhappy that Lisa had been granted bail and that they had pressed the more serious charges solely to keep her in jail. And I can tell you right now they did.
00:21:13
Speaker
I don't. I don't doubt that she was going to harm her, but that's the whole reason that they pressed those charges so quickly. So she has a second arraignment where she's formally charged with attempted first-degree murder with a deadly weapon.
00:21:29
Speaker
And the judge raises her bail by $10,000. So he only raises it to about $25,500.
00:21:38
Speaker
She gets out, and Colleen at this time, she was going for a restraining order, but by February 15th of 2007, she's going to drop the request for restraining order.
00:21:52
Speaker
Now, obviously, NASA is one of those places where if you do something like this, like it seems like something is very psychologically wrong with you, and they have to react to it publicly. Wouldn't you agree?
00:22:04
Speaker
Yeah. So at this point, they placed her on a 30-day leave from NASA, and she's sent home from Orlando to Houston on a commercial air flight on February the 8th.
00:22:19
Speaker
Upon arrival,
Public Reaction and Legal Developments
00:22:21
Speaker
she is taken by police escort to Johnson Space Center, and they put her through a full barrage of medical and psychiatric evaluation. By March 7, 2007, her assignment to NASA as a serving United States Naval officer is terminated.
00:22:36
Speaker
There is a widespread public reaction to her being arrested and then being terminated, largely because up until this moment in time, NASA's astronaut selection and screening process is has been considered second to none in the United States.
00:22:55
Speaker
Some people in the press at the time, you can go back and read multiple articles, they basically said that people doing basic work in space on a ship did not deserve to be heralded as heroes when they came home, and that NASA was part of the problem for presenting them that way.
00:23:14
Speaker
There's quite a bit of evidence that's presented April 10, 2007, Florida prosecutors start releasing, like very publicly, what they consider to be the evidence in the case.
Evidence and Legal Implications
00:23:25
Speaker
The trial judge does agree to unseal some documents and some of the things that have been found in Lisa's car after her arrest.
00:23:33
Speaker
Among these items were a handwritten note on the USS Nimitz, which is an aircraft carrier, stationary. So it's like, you know, it's kind of gift shopping stuff that lists calling shipments, flight information, and then a flight controllers log paper, which is like what a flight controller would use to, it's kind of gridded paper with, it almost looks like an Excel spreadsheet.
00:24:02
Speaker
um It has 24 items listed in the columns, including sneakers, plastic gloves, contacts, cash, an umbrella, black sweats. There's a floppy disk containing two photographs of Lisa riding on a bicycle race and 15 images depicting an unidentified woman in different stages of undress, which...
00:24:23
Speaker
Never gets fully explained for me, but I find that interesting that it's there. And evidence reported on March 15th indicated that all of these photographs and drawings appeared to depict some level of bondage.
00:24:36
Speaker
They also find quite a bit of cash. They find 69 orange pills that are not publicly identified and several USB flash drives in the car that seem to contain digital movies and family pictures and NASA-related materials.
00:24:52
Speaker
According to the investigators later, they're going to say that a lot of this stuff didn't have anything to do with this alleged kidnapping and alleged attempted murder. Now, Bill had given Lisa a cell phone that was like the 2007 version of a burner phone that they could communicate secretly. Because remember, these two people had both been married for most of their relationship. Phone records show that she called him at least 12 times and sent multiple text messages the day after he returned from a space shuttle flight on December 22, 2006.
Personal Communications Investigation
00:25:24
Speaker
And he did not retrieve any of these messages until December twenty fourth
00:25:29
Speaker
On December 24th, it was reported that they had had a seven-minute phone conversation. There were over 100 calls talked about between December and January, although they never really make it clear, even through the court proceedings, who's calling who and what's going on.
00:25:47
Speaker
But under questioning by NASA and DOD investigators, including NCIS, everybody gets involved here, Bill stated that he had ended their romantic relationship.
00:25:58
Speaker
He did, however, state that he had lunch with her in his apartment at least once in January and that they had been going to the gym together and they had continued to train together for this MS-150 bicycle race.
00:26:12
Speaker
May 11, 2007, authorities start releasing surveillance video, which included Orlando International Airport Terminal footage showing Lisa waiting for nearly an hour, standing near the baggage claim, putting on her trench coat, and then following Colleen Chipman as she went through the process of retrieving her own bags.
00:26:31
Speaker
So this story is largely known as the Diaper Astronaut. But... the ending of it all was basically February, ah Lisa had pleaded not guilty. March 2nd, they filed several formal charges against her. I think it was attempted kidnapping with intent to inflict bodily harm or terrorize, burglary of a conveyance with a weapon, and battery, I think, were the charges. They
Final Legal Outcomes
00:26:55
Speaker
ended up declining to file the attempted murder charge that had been recommended by the Orlando police because they recognized that the Orlando police had overstepped.
00:27:04
Speaker
Like, they didn't think the actual actions toward attempted murder had taken place. She did have this electronic monitor on. There's a pretrial hearing that happened July 17, 2007. More hearings scheduled for later in 2007, where the defense makes arguments to try and suppress some of the evidence that had been obtained on the day of her arrest.
00:27:24
Speaker
She ends up getting her ankle monitor off August 30th of 2007. A few documents were released along the way late summer that showed that because of those psychological evals she had had, multiple psychiatrists sort of thought something was seriously wrong with her in terms of lifelong mental health concerns. So the document tended to reveal that it looked like Lisa was going to pursue a insanity defense or try and get an NGRI, not guilty by reason insanity. um Her statements are suppressed. So the statements that she spoke
00:28:08
Speaker
said to the police they're suppressed. The judge ends up in November 2007 suppressing all of the evidence found in her car. And a lot of people don't realize that that's what happened there. Prosecution appeals that ruling in November, and then it's going to take a full year for that hearing to occur. It's going to take place in October 2008.
00:28:26
Speaker
On December 5th, 2008, the Florida 5th District Court of Appeal held that Lisa's Miranda rights had been violated, but they said that the search of her car was valid, and they allowed some things back in. The case gets sent back for trial, and a pretrial status hearing is scheduled in June 22nd, 2009. Remember, we started this in 2007, in early 2007. The judge orders Lisa to go through two new psychiatric evaluations and And 15th, it's reported that she's not going to claim insanity after all.
00:28:58
Speaker
The attorney who had been doing the early motions, he goes back and withdraws that previous motion, which would have left open the opportunity to use an insanity defense.
00:29:11
Speaker
October 7, 2009, a judge in Orlando rules in favor of allowing her attorneys to take a second deposition from Colleen Chipman to inquire whether the pepper spray was actually used on her.
00:29:25
Speaker
because a medical report by paramedics raised some questions as to the factual basis for those statements. If it was found not to have occurred, they would have wanted the assault and battery charges dropped before the trial began. So the trial gets set.
00:29:38
Speaker
It's going to be December 7, 2009. And as many trials do, we've learned this year, if no other year, it ends, instead of with a bang of a trial, with a whimper in November 2009.
00:29:51
Speaker
Because Lisa enters a guilty plea to felony burglary, and misdemeanor battery as part of a massive plea deal. She's sentenced to a year's probation, and she gets time served for the two days that she had to stay in jail. In
Speculation on Intentions and Mental State
00:30:04
Speaker
March of 2011, she petitions the court to seal the record of her criminal proceedings, and that motion is granted.
00:30:12
Speaker
So that's not really why we're here. There's no hostage there, but there was going to be. Right. Well, hell hath no fury. Yeah, i like, what do you think she was going to do? I'm not sure. and you know, I would actually really like to know what actually happened. She wasn't up to any good. no Having traveled there.
00:30:32
Speaker
why not get a real gun, though? It's possible she was just going to try and dissuade her from seeing... Bill? and Yeah, the boyfriend. I have a feeling that she it and she could have maybe lost it temporarily. But again, i don't think she had like a long term mental problem. It was because she blew up her life and then he decided he wanted Colleen. Yeah.
00:31:01
Speaker
and she was going to take care of that problem. Yeah. oh I mean, okay, so I guess our public service announcement in the middle of Christmas holiday hostage-taking episodes is...
00:31:14
Speaker
If you have to you don't want that take the paramour of your affair partner hostage while wearing diapers, it's probably a terrible idea to continue the relationship that you're doing all of this for. We don't know exactly what happened. So i preface it by saying I don't think she was up to anything good. However, i don't know that the elements of the crimes that she was especially... Not after she was, like, upcharged. But I don't know that she actually committed those crimes, even just based on what was said, because, like, it sounded like to me there was a confrontation, sort of.
00:31:54
Speaker
Right.
Case Implications and Mental Reflections
00:31:55
Speaker
But you can't, because it didn't get very far, we don't actually know what happened. But I would say she did very little as far as actual crimes go. Yeah, she did a lot of planning. there was yeah i mean, yeah I think you could have gone for like attempted kidnapping, probably some stalking.
00:32:14
Speaker
Well, maybe, yeah. Just depending. The one incident, though, isn't going to do stalking. like No, no, no. Not this one incident. But I was thinking, like, if if there was obvious evidence that she had been, i don't know. There probably isn't any. it doesn't really seem it.
00:32:31
Speaker
Well, that's what I'm saying. Like, to me, like, she went to great lengths to even just get there to be able to do anything, right? Yeah. But when she got there, seemed like all that really happened was a confrontation, possibly pepper spray. Now, in that case, she would be 100% the wrong if she sprayed pepper spray into her car.
00:32:58
Speaker
But if she didn't, she rolled down the window and if they were just communicating like c there's a lot of nuances to it however i don't know what her intent was but i would say that i'm sure it wasn't good but she didn't get to carry out anything pretty much so i don't know how long did she get in jail none no time No time in jail, just time served. Yeah, time served for the two days she spent. like So she spent the initial day, goes for her arraignment for his appearance, and then that second day, because they pulled the stunt of while she's getting bail, they pulled the stunt of filing the attempted murder, and then she has to be held overnight for another arraignment. The attempted murder charge was, it was too much. It was a stunt. Yeah, it was a stunt. It was like, it was BS. I don't know why they did that. Like somebody in the police force must have overstated something on a report where there was a prosecutor who just like had that overreach button that some prosecutors have. My understanding is spraying someone with pepper spray would never amount to attempted murder. Correct.
00:34:09
Speaker
And so because of that, it makes it all confusing because. Agreed. Yes. And then it comes up later, like, well, did she even spray the pepper spray? And so I would say like, if it, without the pepper spray being sprayed, like there was literally nothing that happened. There was a, she tried to have a confrontation that was stopped.
00:34:31
Speaker
basic rights Correct. Correct. Okay, well, that doesn't even warrant police
Incident at Houston Space Center
00:34:35
Speaker
involvement. But these are two high-ranking Navy and Air Force officers having this, which is hilarious to me. Well, I mean...
00:34:43
Speaker
Clearly, but there's i hell hath no fury like a woman scorn. And that is exactly what's being demonstrated here.
00:34:54
Speaker
yeah I hope she moved on with her life. I don't know what it I do remember this case. I don't remember her name, though, for whatever reason. But I do remember this happening because you're exactly right. They talked about her wearing diapers. Yeah. and that was the reason that it like became such a big deal.
00:35:12
Speaker
Because she wanted to get back at her ex-boyfriend's mistress so badly, she wore diapers to drive there. Yes. And ultimately, i don't know what ended up happening with them long-term. Did Colleen and Bill get married? So Lisa gets divorced officially in June 2008. She ends up getting full custody of their three kids.
00:35:35
Speaker
She did get the NASA spaceflight medal on August 2006, and again on June 5th, 2007, which is after the in incident. She unfortunately has to go before a naval board of inquiry, but it takes a while. August 19th, 2010, they recommend that Lisa be discharged after a reduction in rank from captain to commander under other than honorable conditions, which is unfortunately, it's a black mark that you can never get over at that age.
00:36:07
Speaker
And the panel's recommendation had to be reviewed personally by the Naval Personnel Command. And then ultimately, the Secretary of the Navy had to make a decision, at least the office of the Secretary of the Navy. So on July 28, 2011, Assistant Secretary of the Navy, Juan Garcia III, he confirmed the sentence.
00:36:26
Speaker
um He said that her conduct fell short of what is expected of Navy officers and demonstrated a complete disregard for the well-being of a fellow service member. So she retired from the Navy officially with an other than honorable discharge ah and the rank of commander September 1st, 2011. And I don't know how that would affect her retirement, but I heard that like she did not do well. I heard that it was very difficult for her to get hired. I did not hear anything specifically about like did she end up in a relationship with those people
00:37:00
Speaker
like like coming back to her husband or the other. She's still alive as far as I know. And she, like, I've tried to look up a little bit about her life and it looks like she has decided she does not want to be seen a in public ever again. i mean, it's terrible. I don't, I don't have a ah good answer for that, but I did find something that happened like in the middle of all this that like went pretty much under the radar.
00:37:26
Speaker
And it is a hostage ticket. Right in the middle. So April 20th, 2007. So if you look at the timeline of Lisa's case, she's arrested and everything happens in...
00:37:38
Speaker
February. And that case peaks, as far as I'm concerned, in April. On April 10, 2007, it peaks in the news because they start releasing evidence and reports in that case. So we get that, that huge peak.
00:37:54
Speaker
And there's a shooting at the Johnson Space Center down in hous Houston,
William Phillips' Actions and Motivations
00:37:58
Speaker
Texas. So this is where Lisa and Richard and everybody was based off of. According to the What you can find about this, a guy named William Phillips, he is 60 years old. He's not married. in ah ah All accounts say that he basically just lived by himself, quiet guy.
00:38:17
Speaker
He's an employee contractor of Jacobs Engineering, which is a technical professional services firm based out of Dallas that does a lot of work for NASA. He has been a NASA contractor at this point for almost 13 years.
00:38:31
Speaker
The director of the Johnson Space Center said that until very recently, William Phillips had been a really good employee. And something had happened where either in his personal life or just in his professional life, he had started to get the attention of his supervisor in bad ways.
00:38:52
Speaker
Like when they start saying, we need to talk about something. So what ends up happening with him is April 20th, 2007, so about 10 days after all the documents are released related to Lisa's case.
00:39:06
Speaker
Around 1 p.m., William Phillips enters into a conference room, and this detail bothers me. He either had a.38 caliber or a.357 caliber snub-nosed revolver, and the fact that nobody knows which one it was is ridiculous.
00:39:24
Speaker
Like, it's not reported anywhere which gun he had. Those are two very different guns. So he points it at one of the people in the conference room, and he tells everybody to get out. The person that he's confronting is a guy named David Beverly.
00:39:37
Speaker
And David Beverly is apparently, according to police and to the folks interviewed at Johnson Space Center, he is the guy who said to William Phillips, I got to give you a bad review because your work is not up to snuff.
00:39:53
Speaker
So according to people who see this happening, they say that he confronts David Beverly, William Phillips does, and he says, you're the one gonna get me fired. They're talking for several minutes. Then 40 minutes later at 1.40 p.m., three gunshots are heard.
00:40:11
Speaker
According to the police reports, what happened was William Phillips shot David Beverly twice. But while he was leaving the conference room,
00:40:22
Speaker
he realized that David Beverly was getting back up off the floor. So he shoots him again. And that shot puts him down. And David Beverly is going to die there.
00:40:36
Speaker
At this point in time, Phillips grabs a random employee, a contract worker with MRI Technologies, And bounds her to a chair with duct tape inside this conference room area. And then pulls her down the hallway, barricades her like and himself in the second floor.
00:41:00
Speaker
And they're going to be in there for the next three hours. According to interviews after the fact, Fran Crenshaw did all of the things that you do to humanize he yourself. She was able to hold her together.
00:41:13
Speaker
And she's basically like saying to William Phillips, like everything is going to be okay. You can't do this. You have to let me go. and we have to get out of here. Over the next three hours, she's held hostage in here. And she is able to free herself from the duct tape.
00:41:29
Speaker
And let authorities know what's going on. But a SWAT team had already surrounded the building. So this is building 44 among a bunch of buildings in the Johnson Space Center complex.
00:41:40
Speaker
And they've ah eve evacuated building 44. And the four immediate nearby buildings have also been evacuated. And then they've put multiple other NASA employees on lockdown to stay in place.
00:41:54
Speaker
So by 5 p.m., the SWAT teams are trying to communicate. with William Phillips when they hear a single gunshot.
00:42:05
Speaker
And they take Fran Crenshaw to St. John's Hospital by ambulance. They start clearing the building. And she's treated and released by the Houston Police Department. I noticed several places like wanted to point out that like she walked out on her own. she She was like, nothing was wrong with her.
00:42:21
Speaker
But while they're clearing Building 44, they find that William Phillips has shot himself. And they conclude over the course of this investigation that this is ultimately some kind of dispute between David Beverly and who was a 62-year-old electrical parts specialist employee of NASA, and this contractor, William Phillips from Jacobs Engineering, there's some kind of dispute between them over Phillips' continued employment.
00:42:49
Speaker
And i have seen it listed as he was shot four times in the chest, but I've also only seen where they document the three gunshots, and then the fourth gunshot they document and casing and in the gun that they don't know the caliber of for some reason, is actually William Phillips shooting himself.
00:43:12
Speaker
So this goes completely under the radar. It's talked about briefly because i think it's really just talked about because I noticed a lot of their news articles, they say that the Space Center School was locked down. But that's it. They
Comparisons and Workplace Safety
00:43:23
Speaker
don't talk about like the rest of it.
00:43:24
Speaker
There's only a couple of little articles that pop up. And I think I saw one... Yeah.
00:43:34
Speaker
that like talks about it very briefly but they're little blurbs ah the bbc news ran an article that just said nasa killer had bad job review and then that's it for like major news coverage and i thought that was absolutely strange It is, but they were trying to keep it to a minimum, I guess. They'd already had all that other bad press. That's what I was going to ask you. Do you think that they squashed releasing a lot of detail on this? And the reason we don't even know the caliber of the gun is because the that diaper-wearing astronaut story was still like hot in the news.
00:44:07
Speaker
Well, I'm sure. And honestly, in these types of situations where, like, this was very childish, right? Oh, yeah, yeah. And I feel like a lot of times people just don't want to give anybody any ideas, you know? Yeah.
00:44:21
Speaker
But, you know, I don't know if he, like, demanded that the review be changed or I'm going to shoot you, which is, it's classic bullying, right? Right. ah Obviously, I'm going to change someone's review. If I don't, they're going to shoot me, right? Yeah.
00:44:41
Speaker
Because it's just not worth that. And unfortunately, the victim here died for a really stupid reason. Because the guy... Yeah. He just... I guess it's hard to ever know, though. To know what? When do you know that, like, it's going to be that guy that comes in with a gun? i mean, because, like, do you think it like if he was, like...
00:45:02
Speaker
talking to him in that 40 minutes and said, look, dude, I will change your review. I will fix it. Do you think like that stops everything? Well, until he, if he knew that the outcome was going to be being shot, yeah, it would change everything. But if he was just in there trying to get the review changed and didn't make the threat no i mean because you can't just change you know because if you if that's the way it works you strong arm everybody into everything and that's just not how that would work and you know the space center you know how they're buying parts i imagine they have very specific criteria right yeah
00:45:47
Speaker
And he wasn't, hit I don't know, like he wasn't hitting the mark for whatever it was he was doing. And up until the point he's going to kill somebody over it, the supervisor, the buyer, what whoever, you know, whatever the relationship is, they have to call the person out on the mistakes, right? Yeah. Oh, yeah. And you should, because otherwise you're just being bullied into accepting garbage, basically, because it it doesn't fit the need for what you're trying to accomplish.
00:46:19
Speaker
But at the same time, like I, I completely understand what's happening here because he probably was relentless and like, yeah, no, I'm not changing your review and we're not going to be using your parts. They don't come up to standard or whatever, whatever the case was. And he was like, okay, fine then. And then, you know, he shot now granted,
00:46:44
Speaker
There are a whole lot of other things that probably should have occurred. Like, for example, if he was he worked for a company that contracted to them to the Space Center. yes and is It's weird that the company, because you would review a product, right? Not the person who, you know, anytime in business, it's always about like the conceptual thing or the tangible thing. It's not about the person who did it, right?
00:47:13
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, but I am picturing, i agree with what I think you're about to say. Actually, let me shut up and let you talk for a second. Well, was just going to say that. So it's weird that he even knew...
00:47:27
Speaker
That. Like if he was let go. Right. From his job. Did they say that for sure? Or did he just say. No, no, no. He. I think the review was like one of those things that had just happened.
00:47:42
Speaker
And the company probably had a zero tolerance policy for something in the review. So he knew by the time it got up the chain of command, because Jacobs Engineering is like responsible for you know NASA stuff and they're responsible for multiple different types of like nuclear reactors and things like that. That's what the company does. I am sure that like that level of scrutiny...
00:48:05
Speaker
And him being sort of a peon or cog in the wheel meant that, like, he knew 60 years old he was going to have to find a new job because this guy, who's only two years older than
Analysis of Actions and Broader Implications
00:48:15
Speaker
him, had just found his work deficient and, like, had been kind of whatever, probably just honest in the review, and it was going to get him fired.
00:48:25
Speaker
Right. And so to me, it's odd that he knew who it came from, like that kind of stuff. Because again, it's my experience that like, if there's a problem with the parts, you know, ah the space center goes to Jacobs engineering,
00:48:40
Speaker
And they say this, that, or the other, but it wouldn't necessarily fall, the blame wouldn't fall on him specifically, right? Yeah, I was thinking it would be like a services contract where his job was probably to provide support for the parts on site.
00:48:55
Speaker
And like they probably were like, this guy doesn't know this new part, so I'm going to write him up because like he doesn't seem to be staying on top of... like the level of customer support we need from our engineers on site or whatever. And like, that's probably the thing that was going to get them fired. And it was probably true.
00:49:13
Speaker
Well, I have no doubt that it was true. And part part of the reason I have no doubt is because, like, he went and killed the guy. yeah A lot of times, people are just irrational. Yeah. And that everything about this situation is irrational because... But it kind of gives you an insight into what his attitude was like because... Yeah, I mean, if he wrote on there, like, for some reason this guy is suddenly hot-tempered, he's, like, yelling at everybody and making threats about everything, and he seems like to really be on edge, we're worried about him. So if that was the review, then I think that, like, the review is not only deserved, but, like, probably should have moved faster. Yeah, and then, you know, most of the time when you're working a job and –
00:50:02
Speaker
especially with your customers, you should be like, okay, show me what I'm doing wrong. Like, let's get this remedied, right? There's no argument to be had. If customers are the people who pay, ultimately, their invoices that keep your company working, right? 100%, yeah. So because of that, anytime there's something up with that within reason, like you have to do what they want. So you keep them as a customer, right? Otherwise, everybody's going to be out of a job. Right. And so the reaction like would be like, oh, how can I help? Like, what can I do differently? And then I don't think that that guy ever had that reaction ever.
00:50:40
Speaker
Yeah. Like, I think he was like, no, you're wrong. Right. Which a lot of people I mean, I've i've met a lot of people that are that way. that they never do anything wrong. Well, you do things wrong.
00:50:52
Speaker
I think there's probably like, I know you're talking about the world. I get that. And I've bumped into them too. There's probably an additional level of the type of people who like think they can do no wrong, but also an additional level of scrutiny when it comes to stuff. That's like literally leaving earth and going to space. Well, that's true. I haven't worked with the space industry, but have with the air with the aviation. Yeah.
00:51:16
Speaker
And it is very, it's too red taped almost. Yeah. And so it may have been blown out of proportion, but see when it's your customer, it doesn't matter. Like you have, you either have to follow the guidelines that you have to follow in order for them to pay the invoices you send or don't be their supplier. Right. Yeah.
00:51:36
Speaker
There's no negotiating. But it seems like he just kind of took it upon himself to go take care of this situation. And it's really sad. Oh, it's terribly sad. Like this whole thing, um it's tragic for David Beverly and his family. I also happen to think that it's tragic for William
Tragic Outcome for Phillips and Victim
00:51:52
Speaker
Phillips.
00:51:52
Speaker
I don't know that there was a lot of family out there. I think this guy was probably fairly lonely. based on what little is reported. And I could be proven wrong on that. like I'm just going by like the reports that like he seemed to be kind of a hermit who didn't have a lot. And I think that makes a difference in how you react to something where you know your routine is about to change and you're five years from retirement.
00:52:13
Speaker
um It's probably a huge deal. Well, right. And you he probably should have been doing a better job. Yeah. I have one more um piece of information here. So because you said something about the other folks, I i went and pulled up Bill's, he's got a Wikipedia. So i pulled two paragraphs from that to put a cap on the other story. It's at the end of the Johnson Space Center shooting, but I think it's okay to put it here because we're still talking about astronauts.
00:52:43
Speaker
So five months after he completes his only space mission and three months after this whole incident with in February 2007, NASA terminates Bill's service with the space agency May 23rd, 2007. And that's going back to the boyfriend. Right.
00:53:01
Speaker
And they state that NASA and the U.S. Navy made a mutual decision that his service with the NASA Astronaut Corps was no longer required. So they reassigned him to the U.S. Navy,
00:53:13
Speaker
Bill and Lisa are the first astronauts to ever be dismissed by NASA. And in response to all of this nonsense and their termination, they create a written code of conduct for the NASA Astronaut Corps.
00:53:27
Speaker
And that's really bizarre. Yeah, that is bizarre. than I get it. I understand it. But, like, yeah, it's bizarre. No, I get it and I understand it. It's just without her little outbursts,
00:53:41
Speaker
in Florida that she didn't even really get to do. Yeah. Except like none of that comes to light.
Bill Oefelein's Life After the Incident
00:53:49
Speaker
Yeah. According to what I've read about from these couple of paragraphs, and this is just from the Wikipedia, I didn't go crazy. ah Bill retires from the Navy fall of 2008. So about a year and a half after all this happens.
00:54:01
Speaker
And he returns back to Alaska to start a business called adventure, right? As a freelance writer and photographer. In addition to that, on July 10, 2009, it's reported that Bill and Colleen are living together in Alaska, and they announce their engagement.
00:54:18
Speaker
They get married in summer of 2010, living in Wasilla, Alaska. They have a son who was born in 2012. And that Colleen is now an author under the pen name CM McCoy, who released her first novel December 2015. And in September 2011, Bill survived a small plane crash out in Alaska.
00:54:40
Speaker
So still don't know much about Lisa. But that gives you like the other side of the story here a little bit. Well, I mean, it was, I guess, sort of worth it that he decided to end things with Lisa and be with Colleen if they got married and they're happily married. And yeah it's just a whole bunch of garbage as far as I'm concerned. Like all of it is, you know? Yeah, it is it is a wild story. But I thought I would wind all of that together because we were doing these hostage taking up episodes. And I've actually always wanted
Relationship Fallout Reflection
00:55:07
Speaker
to cover that, but I've never really had like a lot of questions about it. So it fits better in the holiday times. Sure. Yeah. it's It's going to some extreme lengths, but that is exactly why the phrase that hell hath no fury like a woman scorn, I mean, you can see examples of that everywhere, including that case, which sticks out again because of the adult diapers. Yeah.
00:55:31
Speaker
And in some ways, Lisa was sort of holding herself hostage by wearing those diapers on her way to that confrontation, which is a completely different type of hostage situation than we've talked about so far.
Conclusion and Holiday Wishes
00:55:54
Speaker
Yeah, and that's really, that's all I got on this one. I was going to just point out that if you're in your own hostage situation, like you're about to go to your in-laws or you're already at your in-laws, we do have at least like five or six more episodes for you guys to listen to about other hostages. so hopefully you'll feel better about what's happening in your life for Hanukkah or Christmas or the New Year's, depending on how long you've got to be there.
00:56:18
Speaker
Special consideration was given to True Crime Access by LabradiCreations.com. If you have a moment in your favorite app, please go on and give us a review or five-star rating.
00:56:30
Speaker
It helps us get noticed in the crowd. This is True Crime XS. s
00:58:34
Speaker
True Crime Access is brought to you by John and Meg. It's written, produced, edited, and posted by John and Meg. You can always support True Crime Access through Patreon.com, or if you have a story you'd like them to cover, you can reach them at TrueCrimeAccess.com.
00:58:52
Speaker
Thank you for joining us.