Episode Transcript
Of the Law and Order franchises.
SVU is considered especially watchable.
Speaker 2We are the amateur detectives who kind of investigate the vicious felonies.
These episodes are based on.
Speaker 3These are our stories, done.
Speaker 1Done, all right, Happy holidays everyone, It's that's messed up.
Speaker 3We're back.
It's Christmas Eve Eve.
Speaker 2I'm one of your hosts, Kara Klink and I'm Lisa Traeger and yeah, thrilled you are here.
We talk sv actually not at all today, baby, different.
We are not talking SVU.
We are talking true crime, and we do have an incredible guest.
But we decided to do something different.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Speaker 1Famously, when Lisa mentioned being at a party with an alleged murderer, obviously, and I said, oh my god, I haven't seen that yet, and many of you wrote in and were like, I can't believe you haven't watched Death in Apartment six so three yet.
So that is what we did.
We watched it, and we got Nancy Schwartzman, the director, to come talk to us.
So that's coming up after we do a little bit of gabbing.
Okay, So it's Christmas Eve Eve, and I've seen some movies lately, I mean I'm by at this point, they're old as hell.
But this is because we're a little bit in the time machine because of the holidays.
Speaker 3Everybody.
Speaker 1I realized we never waged in on Wicked part two, and I know it's like at this point it's been out for.
Speaker 3Like a month.
Speaker 2We didn't actually talk about Thanksgiving at all, and I do have things to say, Oh you do, okay, great, let's try about Thanksgiving.
Speaker 3Well, So sorry to bring it up again.
Speaker 2I was coming home from the food bank and I totally forgot that I'd made these drunk plans.
So I fully forgot.
But I'm on the train and this woman says glitter cheese.
So I look at her and she goes, hey, I ran into you when you were doing this other thing.
I go, oh my god, remember that, and she goes, I keep seeing you.
I work for local NBC five affiliate.
I'm going to the floats and ballooms right now for the parade to do a piece.
I go, I was supposed to look at those.
You're allowed to look at them before they come out the next day.
So I should have stuck with her and gone with her.
Not that she invited me, but I got off.
I got to see all the floats.
It was panneda that was incredible.
I timed it wrong.
I had to walk this many blocks backwards, go across town, go forward.
I finally got to the official entrance there, Like it's eleven more blocks down and it's a two hour wait.
You should have come earlier.
It was like wild So I only saw a few of the balloons from the side.
But next year, I'll know to come early to be able to see them all laying there.
But I got to see the floats and like, like the construction crews were still putting stuff together.
But I saw the La Booboo float and all these floats in person before the parade, and it was whimsical and the fall leaves and you're Bicentral Park and it just felt really cool.
Speaker 1When I lived by in New York, I lived a block from where they set those up, so I used to be able to like show my ID and be able to go home and look at the floats and stuff, because I was like, I live down here, you.
Speaker 2Have to let me through helping.
Someone was going to recognize me because it was pandemonium, and I just kept looking at all the employees.
Speaker 3But anybody Netflix s for you anything.
Speaker 2Because I had worked so hard, I got thousands of steps trying to go.
I just made the wrong I should have gone more downtown instead of going back uptown.
But I was like, oh, I'll look at them again.
I fucked up, and so I was just wait.
Speaker 1Also, the night before, I got an antenna for my TV so that I can still get local channels so that I can watch like Oscars and like the Thanksgiving Day parade.
Speaker 3So I just got it the night before.
Speaker 1I like ordered it quick delivery so that I could watch the floats.
And then we watched some of the night before coverage and it looked like raining and kind of were you in the rain?
No, I was there the day before.
Look yeah, but the day before was like they were all warning ponchos.
They were like out on the street in ponn shows and it was raining.
I saw all these people doing a K pop Demon Hunter's rehearsal in ponchos.
Speaker 3Wet, honey, I missed the rain.
Okay, good for you.
Speaker 2Maybe I packed and I feel like maybe I packed an umbrella or something.
Speaker 3No, I was.
I was floating through life.
Speaker 1But we at my Thanksgiving my friend's really good friend works for Labooboo and she was supposed to be at our Thanksgiving but she had to go out and be at the parade with the Laboo float.
Speaker 3It was a gorgeous flow.
Speaker 2And then the next day it was at a Thanksgiving and people were making fun of it, and I go, I it's cool, and they go, you can't really think that.
Speaker 3I go, think that I took a selfie with it.
Speaker 1I was there to see the Laboo Boo float.
But they're you know, they don't get it.
They're not with the culture.
But the culture Thanksgiving weekend, I did see a lot.
I saw for good with my kids and some friends and that and my friend Lizzie, who's a comic who you know.
And it was fun going with her because I was with my kids, but they were just kind of watching it and I could like make little jokes aside to her, like we were having a fun time joking about it, because I'm sure you heard about Alphaba's sex cardigan, Like everybody was talking about Alphaba's sex cardigan.
So she and I kept going, when is the sex cardigan going to get?
And did you see it?
Speaker 3What was that?
You can't miss it?
You can't miss it.
Okay, I'm going to see it.
Speaker 1I think it's like Vulture obviously did like a piece about like we can't stop thinking about Alphaba's sex Cardigan, and then it was kind of all I thought about.
Speaker 3They really got in my head.
But I don't know.
Speaker 1My hot take on Wicked two is that it should have just been one movie.
The second movie doesn't really have that many bops in it except for for Good, you know, but it's still great to be in the world.
Speaker 3I love the world.
Speaker 1It's like to me, it was an an un just like that of a moo, Like I like to be in the world, you know, like I like to be all.
Speaker 2I'll have some opinions at a later date, but I am not rushing to go see it unfortunately.
Speaker 3You know.
I go with my heart.
I go with my heart.
That's how it's crazy.
Speaker 1Because the dress Oscar War for Halloween truly is like her big costume in that movie.
Was losing his mind.
He was like he was he was excited.
I was like, it's your costume and he was like yes, Like but he's locked in.
Speaker 3He doesn't.
Speaker 1He's not loud, He's like like locked in quiet watching the movie.
The whole time and that's a long ass movie and he was up into it, like, oh was that.
At one point there was a scary thing and she goes, I want to go home, and I'm like, your four year old brother doesn't want to go home.
Speaker 3We're safe, and then she was fine.
Speaker 2Guess who was in an episode of El Smith who David Cross?
Speaker 3Oh, get out of here.
Speaker 1We've been getting by the way, some people saying that they've also had run ins with him being a d so you're not alone.
Speaker 3We've been going.
Speaker 2Oh I've been.
He made a bartender cry in Brooklyn.
I mean this guy.
Speaker 3Oh.
Speaker 2Also, I think her name was Torri.
I did meet you at soul Cycle.
I don't know if I was being weird.
I am usually high out of my mind, but I hope I didn't turn you off from the podcast.
Speaker 3I think I was like weird.
Speaker 1I think I was like weird and you know, but I started a tailor ride so that was incredible.
Oh.
Speaker 2I did go Thanksgiving morning to my ninety minute ride and that was really exciting.
The Turkey burn and then there was a video that was like I can't believe it's twenty twenty five and the Turkey burns still around.
I was like, oh, I guess I didn't put it together with like diet culture.
I thought it was like cute.
Oh yeah, yeah it is.
I didn't think about off your burn, off your cali or whatever.
I know, I didn't think about it.
I just like really enjoyed it.
It went it flew by.
I made.
You know, I make my mashed potatoes every year.
That aren't my mashed potatoes.
They're Mike Rostine's mother's mashed potatoes that I got of the Recipeederman ten years ago.
I got the recipe from him ten years ago, and I've been used.
I've been making it every year and I really like it.
Maybe maybe twelve or fifteen, like honestly've been making it for so long.
And I went to like a twenty person Thanksgiving, so I thought, oh, I should be triple my recipe, one whole dish of my mashed potatoes untouched.
I forgot that, like, mashed potatoes are something people take like a scoop of, but they don't necessarily like people took it for leftovers and stuff like they were good.
Speaker 3It was just too much.
But I made a New York Times mac and cheese recipe that was a hit.
Wow.
It had a little bit of mustard in it, gave it a nice kick.
It was good.
Speaker 1It was one of their It was if anybody's wanting to know what it is people who hosted this, what was this?
Well including kids and stuff?
You know, it was like three families and then a couple, no, four families.
Anyway, the recipe if you're looking for it, of this mac and cheese, because the New York Times has a full article of all of their mac and cheese recipes, this is the one that has sixteen thousand positive reviews or whatever.
That's what they call it.
It's like they're like, this is our best reviewed mac and cheese.
Anyway, it was really good.
And then we and we saw Zootopia nine am Thanksgiving morning and it was awesome, awesome, so good, especially a redemption after how Mowanatu was a steaming pile of garbage last year on things.
Speaker 3Well, this is dream Works, is it not.
Speaker 1It's a difference, yes, but in general, just like a beloved property, animated property with a long awaited sequel.
Speaker 3But isn't Minions and like that all DreamWorks?
Speaker 4Yeah?
Speaker 3Is Disney?
Are you sure it is?
Yeah?
Speaker 4Oh?
Speaker 3My bad?
Oh?
Speaker 2So it is a true uh redemption.
I mean, yeah, they're nine years apart, these movies.
Yeah wait when was the first utop?
Well I just saw twenty sixteen.
Shit, but I love those sloths.
I love those sloths.
You're gonna get a great little bit of sloth.
And this next one, fortune Femester voices this beaver.
She does a great job.
Speaker 1Uh, Like it's just funny.
There's it's a good script.
Like, it's just funny.
There's good jokes, like it's a good plot.
It doesn't feel exactly like the last one at all.
Speaker 2Like, oh wait, I'm looking through everyone in it?
What's up with Kristen Bell's Christian podcast for Fox News.
Speaker 3The banging started?
Speaker 2Okay, I was complaining that it was cold in my apartment, the banging.
Speaker 3They just turn your heat on though, because you sent the text.
Speaker 2He said he was gonna check it out, and the banging just started.
And I you know, I was pitching so much last year about the banging and the heat and now to not have it, I mean, isn't that what life's about?
Learning I'd rather be butt naked sweating than my wearing two pairs of socks right now.
Speaker 3I can't believe I get to hear the banging.
Oh my god, I knew something was wrong.
Course, I hear it sizzling from the other room.
Yes, it's bad, maybe.
Speaker 2Because I you know, I already am like a slob and don't want to shower, and then to have the cold.
It's like it's it's so hard to get in there.
I am showering, I just don't wash my hair.
And I'm sorry to interrupt, but Kristen Bell is doing like a Christian podcast for Fox News or something.
Speaker 3What I hope it was fake.
Speaker 2Let's maybe it's a But also, Casey, do you have any Thanksgiving memories or Zootopia or movies?
Speaker 3Anything to say?
Speaker 5Well, I was just gonna say about the Kristen Bell Christian podcast.
So she recorded an audiobook in twenty ten and they're repurposing that audio for this podcast.
She had no idea.
Speaker 1Yes, she was the Life of Jesus podcast and she voiced the role of Mary Magdalene.
And it was originally recorded fifteen years ago as part of the Truth and Life Dramatized Audio Bible.
Speaker 3And then they're using it.
Of course.
Speaker 5Yeah, so I'm not exactly sure the legality of all that but it's not like she signed up to be in a Fox News Christians.
Speaker 2Okay, great, Yeah they said nobody, Yeah they say no one had no idea.
Yeah, okay, yeah she got Bambrian cox Is shocked.
Speaker 3Yeah, okay, she got bamboozled water shock.
Speaker 1No, but thank you anyway, Utopia too.
You're gonna love it.
I just think they they get like, it's a different enough story.
It doesn't feel like I'm watching the same exact thing over again.
And it's cool, it's funny, it's good.
I had a great time.
You're gonna love it.
Speaker 2Yeah, I'm excited to see it.
I'm may I might want to rewatch the first one before I go, if I'll be if I'm being on.
Speaker 1It, I mean, didn't have to because I've seen it so many times, but totally you should.
Speaker 3It's only seen it.
Speaker 1Gazelle's back, Shakira's back.
There's another Gazelle song.
It's very similar to the first song, but it is in your head after you watch it.
Speaker 3You see it.
Speaker 1There's like this line in the song that's like and we turned on the floor to a zoo ooh ooh, and like you're just gonna be walking around saying zoo ooh ooh over again in your head for days.
That's what happened to me, you know.
But that's the life of being a sexy gazelle.
The gazelle is a big butt too.
It's kind of weird, but uh, there's a great new snake.
Speaker 3There's a whole new angle.
It's good.
I like it.
Speaker 4You know.
Speaker 1Obviously, it has a seven point seven on IMDb, which is basically like a one thousand, right, because everything on IMDb is always awful, Like no one gives.
Speaker 3Good reviews on IMDb.
I wonder what you did rewatch?
Speaker 2I rewatched Thanksgiving the horror movie to celebrate things.
Oh, I like about that, you know, Black Black Friday Murder.
Speaker 3I like it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Speaker 1It's got a ninety two percent from reviewers in a ninety six from people on from audiences on wow, And.
Speaker 2It also had the fourth biggest opening of all times, like in China, it grossed over five hundred million.
Speaker 1Yeah, I read that.
It like blew all these records out of the water.
But truly, it's like, at least in LA they're giving kids, they get the whole week off, so that's like nine days you're home with your kids.
Like, of course I'm gonna take them to see any animated movie.
You could have told me, like everybody told me mo Wana two is bad, and I was like, have my tickets.
Speaker 4I'm going.
Speaker 3Wait.
Okay.
Speaker 1So when I was at many these movies, I saw a lot of previews for new movies.
What what what's happening with this Anaconda movie with Paul Rudd?
Speaker 3And I can't fucking wait, dude, I can't wait.
Speaker 1What is that.
Speaker 2We've talked about it.
I've brought them on this podcet.
Yes, because I came in thrilled.
I came in thrilled with the news.
Speaker 1Thrilled about that they're making a movie that's about making about making their own version of Anaconda.
Speaker 2Yeah, because at the end of the day, it's like it gets what it's doing and it's silliness and it's like, yeah, these people love Anaconda, and I think it's like a mid life crisis and they're gonna go make an Anaconda.
But then there's an Anaconda, Like yeah, let's do that.
Speaker 1I'm pissed sitting an audition, you know, I think I said that last time.
I Yeah, you know, I love animals with an edge.
I like deep Blue Sea, I like the meg like, I like that coking Bear.
It's a genre I am, and it started.
Why is placid?
It's called anaconda?
I think it should be called something different.
No one knows that there was a no original one like it.
Speaker 3They don't.
Speaker 2No people are gonna go bring their kid.
It's Paul Rudd, like, I don't know if we're Jack Black.
Speaker 1He's literally the most powerful man and children's entertainment.
Speaker 2Wait, have you seen the video of the Fanning sisters doing Vanity fair Lie Detectors?
And basically Dakota shows El Fanning a photo of Jack Black and she goes, you know, famously, you think this is the sexiest man on earth.
And Elle Fanning truly is like getting riled up.
She's just like, that's sex on legs.
He's so hot.
Like and then so the question is, would if Jack Black professed his love to you, would you leave your boyfriend?
And she was like thinking for a while, and Dakota's like, Elle, you can't really do that, and she was like, no, I wouldn't.
Speaker 3I wouldn't.
I wouldn't.
Like she really thought about it.
Speaker 1Whoa Elle Fanning is hot for Jack black.
Okay, yeah, okay in a really hardcore wait and you could tell it was it like I've watched it a few times.
Speaker 3The sister's doing this thing and that clip.
I liked it.
Speaker 1I don't know, but I'm pumped Frana Conda.
I'll probably go opening weekend.
I'll go at midnight on THEIRS and I'll bring mind.
Yeah, I'll bring my stuffed snake.
I'll wrap it around my neck.
I can't fucking wait.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Speaker 1I just saw the preview when I kind of was like, who is this for?
Because it seemed a little bit like too scary.
Maybe for my kids, but I guess maybe it's for like just kids that are a little bit older.
Speaker 2It's funny, but like me because I'm thirty eight, so it's people like me with maybe teens, like people who had kids in their early twenties.
Yeah, and the whole family will go.
I don't know who it's for.
I really don't know.
I know why I had to.
Speaker 1I guess the first hand a Conda I thought was like a hit, and Jared was telling me, He's like, no, it's I think it's more like a cult classic.
Speaker 2Well, I saw it in the theaters, but I was a movie going family, like, I don't know, Yeah, so I don't know.
Oh I actually I've been going to events events.
Take me to your events.
That's a Cat Cohen song if you're confused.
I went to Sarah Sherman's HBO special screening Eyeballs Everywhere custom toilet paper, I mean these free.
Eric Andre was there and he goes, this whole party is Sarah's freaks and then socialites, and it was it was like the hottest girls you've ever seen, and then just the wackiest like freaks everywhere, but eyeballs, she's so cool, she's so smart, it's so weird.
I really enjoyed watching it and I had a really really great time.
And it is crazy though it's crazy, and the end is really it's cool.
Speaker 3It's fucking cool.
Listen see what she does.
Speaker 2There's like prosthetic giant labias like there.
It's not anything that you can imagine, but if you know her in any capacity, but she looks gorgeous and I had such oh my god, the best part.
So then I see Josh Sharp, who I like, and then we hug and he goes, I gotta go to the bathroom, and then I do remember standing at the party being like, wow, I haven't seen him in a while.
I guess he went downstairs, like I wish I got to talk to him.
Next thing, you know, we're hearing drilling, we're hearing song.
He was stuck in the bathroom for a half hour and they'd to drill him out of there.
Speaker 1And then when he came out, everywhere was like wow what everyone clapped for his like escape, Oh my god.
Yeah, that's crazy.
So it was really Yeah, it was like a really fun night.
Speaker 2But I shot for survival that day, so I obviously said like an insane hair style, and I didn't know if I'd have time to do it all, so I kind of like changed it a little and I sent my friend Marshall photo and I go, hey, like do you think I could just wear this?
And she said, please go home and shower, and thank god, thank god, thank god I shower.
Thank got a shower.
I don't know what I was thinking, what was it.
I don't know what I was thinking.
It would have been psychotic.
I'd have to tell everyone about it, like I don't.
I honestly thank God for friendship, thank God for friendship and someone.
Speaker 3Okay, So I'll show you like I looked like this.
Oh my god.
Speaker 1So what she's showing me a photo of everybody is like that sort of like I mean, your character on the show, if anybody hasn't, it kind of has a history of like appropriating black hair styles, right, So.
Speaker 3This is how I helped me make it look a little more normal.
Speaker 1So it's like that sort of like hard wet look where it's like sort of pressed down in waves onto your head.
Liza, that would have been so insane for you to show up to something like that, But in my head, I was like, oh my god, I'm not gonna have time.
Speaker 3I'm not gonna have time.
Speaker 2And then Marshall goes, you have time, please go home and shower, and then I go, okay, and thank god I did, and I looked more normal and I felt better about myself, like obviously obviously obviously.
But then she was like, girl, it's a black hair style.
Yeah, And I go, I go, for sure, because I'm on set and everyone's treating me normal.
I forget that it's psychotic.
Yeah that outside of it that would be really really aggressive because everyone's acting normal.
And so thank god for yeah, thank god for friends.
It was amazing and I really had a great time at this special.
Speaker 3I can't believe I get to go to all these screenings.
Speaker 2And then the next day I went to George Severis's special party.
Oh George, yeah, I and everyone has matchbooks so his is called a sense of Urgency and I don't know.
And his party was super fun and cool.
So yeah, back to back parties, and I'm going to one to night.
I'm going to the production company who did my special.
They have a Christmas party every year.
Speaker 3Ooh, and so my season.
Speaker 1I have Ardens this weekend, so we'll see who I see.
I always see someone I know.
I'm sad I don't get to go to Ardens holiday party.
And then oh yeah, then my friend from Drag Race too, so we'll see who I see.
But just to close the loop, Anaconda made sixteen and a half million dollars it's first weekend and was opened at number one, and it grossed one point thirty two point eight million worldwide, so it wasn't a flop, but it is considered to have had a negative reception and became a cult classic later.
Speaker 3So I was we were half right there, like.
Speaker 1Ony, yeah, so people, but it was like a Razzi type of thing.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Speaker 1Oh, the guy who wrote who invented the Razzie and the Official Razzi Movie Guide said it's one of the hundred most enjoyably bad movies ever made.
Speaker 3So yeah, it's a good time.
That's a good time.
I like it.
We've really become a movie podcast, Yeah, we really have.
Speaker 2But you know, Charlie, but at least I went to some parties, so that's uh.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Speaker 1And if you're home and it's the break and you you know you've already finished all your holiday shopping, it's obviously too late to get any of our that's messed up merch for the holidays, But if you want anything for someone with a birthday or for yourself, Okay, let's get started.
I'm excited.
We've been on this podcast has been on for five years.
We started in December of twenty twenty and five years in we are doing our first episode that is not an SVU recap, but I'm really excited to recap and discuss death and Department six oo' three what happened.
Speaker 3To Ellen Greenberg?
Wait?
Speaker 2And then twenty three?
That's so funny.
Today is the twenty third of December.
This is coming out and we were truly talking about Thanksgiving.
Speaker 3Lol.
Speaker 1Yeah yep, so yeah, let's let's get into it.
And you can either do what you do with SVU.
You can either watch the doc before you listen to this episode or not, and we'll tell you about it and then we're gonna talk to Nancy Schwartzman.
So don't go anywhere.
Oh my gosh.
Today it's a first ever something different that's messed up history where we are not covering an SVU episode.
This is a special holiday time episode.
We wanted to do something a little bit different for you guys and well.
Speaker 2And I also want to say we mentioned this in an episode and we got a lot of commotion, I would say, from you guys.
Yeah you wrote, Everyone had opinions, people watched it, a.
Speaker 3Lot of your ears perked right up.
Speaker 1When Lisa casually mentioned did I tell you I was at a party with a murderer?
Which was a wild, you know thing to say.
I said, of course, no, you didn't.
I think I would remember.
And she was talking about this, you know, everybody was buzzing about this series, this docuseries called Death and Apartment six.
Speaker 3So three, what happened to Ellen?
Speaker 1Greenberg, which is a three part docuseries on Hulu that everybody seemed very invested in, and I had seen my friend had like interviewed the director.
Then I realized I'm friends with the director, and I was like, we got to cover this.
Let's do a little special docuseries recap for the pod.
So some of you have probably seen it or not, but I think we're still gonna have fun with it.
Speaker 3So yeah, But then.
Speaker 2You look into Nancy's career, the director, and she's done probably some of the most prominent documentaries about like sex crimes that we've had, so victims suspect that's about like the women that go to police stations go I've been raped and then they get arrested for false Yeah.
And then Roll Red Roll was like high school football culture, how a whole town tried to save rapists while women.
Speaker 3A girl is fucking yeah.
Speaker 2No, She's done this like incredible work and this documentary.
You know, So I'm at this party and I wish I had seen this before I saw this guy and if I see him again, I'm gonna say something.
I'm not scared of him.
But also, and we'll get into all this, but his statements at the end are same.
And then I found like a People article which is like where is he?
Speaker 6Now?
Speaker 2Well, I know where I saw him, but like I just wanted to read what's up and the like the way he talks about that, it just solidifies this this motherfucker and like I it's.
Speaker 3So suspicious and fucks, I feel so sad.
Speaker 2I feel so sad for this family and I'm glad they have like the people to fight for them and this documentary be made.
And fuck Philadelphia because I think about the House of Horrors and I think about the other cases and the cops just like being so bad at investigating, Like they are so bad at.
Speaker 1It, and it's like this strazy.
It feels like a really big cover up.
But let's get into it.
I want this other guy arrested.
I mean, yeah, you starre so this they're gonna start.
I'm doing something.
I'm scared.
Speaker 3I'm like nervous, Yeah, Lisa's nervous.
Speaker 1We're just gonna like recap the what happens in these three episodes of this documentary.
It's not gonna be as blow by blow and can't be as SVU, but you know, just in general so that you guys know what we're talking about.
Speaker 3As we discussed this.
Speaker 1So Ellen Greenberg.
She's the only child of Josh and Sandy Greenberg.
She grew up near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania.
She was their only child.
They wanted to have more kids, but she's their only child and they just like there's so much footage in this documentary of like her as a baby and like her as you know, like growing up.
She did like school news reporting, so there's all kinds of footage of her being like, hi, this is Ellen Greenberg for WHS News or whatever, like, and it's like there's you know, it's like a lot of times we just have photos of people, but we have like all this footage of her growing up.
She was born in nineteen eighty three, so you know, she's like a millennial, and so there's a lot of footage of her, and it's just it's really heartbreaking.
She goes to school to become a teacher, and the documentary talks about how much she wanted to find love, like all her friends were getting married.
She was very into supporting her friends as they got married and really being like when am I going to meet the one?
And then she meets this guy through a blind date named Sam Goldberg.
He's you know, Jewish, He's like perfect on paper.
They chat for a while, I guess they FaceTime and chat, and then their first meeting, he flies her down to South Carolina for a first date where he is on a business trip, and I think that's weird.
He works for sports, he works for golf, like you think he produces for NBC Sports or golf in some way.
And I'm just kind of like, why are you inviting someone to isolate them on a first date, and like you're on a work trip.
It's not like, oh, I have a house in that's very fancy.
It feels like to be like, oh, I've got a house in Bermuda, do you want to come there for the weekend?
Speaker 3But on your first date they've never met face to face.
No, for sure.
I think it was the cousin in it.
Speaker 2They have like talking heads obviously of all the people that loved her, but the cousin or the mom or someone told her like, well, if you end up together, it's a fun story for the kids.
And if you don't, then it's like, you know, then then it's like a story the other way.
And that's that like, so I don't know, but it is strange the isolation.
Yeah, it just.
Speaker 1Feels like weird to fly someone down to a state.
They don't know anyone, they don't have any like like resources, they don't have any community.
It just seems weird to be like for a first day.
But I guess they've been talking a lot, and so they knew they liked each other.
They fall in love, they get engaged, and they're living together in Philly in an apartment, an apartment six o three in the man a young neighborhood, which is apparently a pretty nice neighborhood of Philly, and their building is called the Venice Lofts.
Okay, immediately, I'll just tell you we don't ever get to talk to the boyfriend the fiance.
We never talked to him.
He declines all interviews.
He's not involved in this documentary at all.
And I hate him from the look of his face.
Like I don't know, I just don't like his face from like when I see him, he looks sort of date rapee.
I don't know, I hate to say that, like he just looks like a bro.
I guess I don't like the look.
So she's teaching at this school in Philly that's called Huniata or Juniata Park.
I was pronouncing it like it was in Spanish Juniata Park Elementary in Philly, which you know, is giving me sort of like Abbot Elementary vibes because that also takes place in Philly.
It's like it's a big school.
I think it's low income, high achieving.
Like there's five first grades.
They all have thirty to forty kids in them, which is like, for example, my daughter's in first grade and her class has twenty four kids and that's the biggest class in the school, and everyone's like, whoa, that class is so big.
So this class has thirty to forty kids, like it's and five first grades.
Speaker 3It's like a lot.
Speaker 1And actually one of our listeners wrote and said that her friend actually ended up taking Ellen's job after you know, spoiler alert, she doesn't have her job for much longer.
Speaker 2And Yeah, talks to the students and this doc and they're like crying, like you loved Ellen.
Speaker 1Yeah, and god, it's like obviously you're never showing pictures of somebody looking pissed off or moody, but everybody in the setup.
It's the classic kindest person would do anything for you.
Footage of her holding little kids, like great with kids, great with everybody, Like wanted to be an educator, you know, wanted to find love, just like a sweet girl.
So this job is tough.
She really doesn't like it.
It's really really hard for her.
And she just starts there in September, and all of the events of this documentary take place in January, so it's like, gosh, in the first four months of school, she like really hates it, and she's telling everyone, I want to leave, I hate it.
I don't like this job.
I read some stuff that was like she was scared, like worried about some of the parents doing parent teacher conferences.
She thought the parents were reading it mad at her, like all this stuff like one of her students try to choke himself.
Speaker 3I read in a place I don't know.
She just was not feeling it.
Speaker 1And her friends say that around that time January of and this is January of twenty eleven, she's her spark is gone.
They say she's not herself, she's not acting like herself.
And at one point she's texting with her fiance being like, I hate my job, and they show all these little bloop bloop bloop texts and he's like, oh, yeah, sorry, babe, And she's like, would you hate me if I quit?
And he's like, you're not a quitter.
And then there's like other conversations where she's like I really hate it and he goes, just do it or start trying to find something else.
And I know I'm putting a tone on that, but that's the tone of the text, like he's just basically like quick complaining or find another job.
Like he cannot be empathetic to her.
It feels like he can't just be like, oh that sucks, Like like what can I do?
You want me to take you want to go out to dinner after?
Like give you give her something to look forward to after she gets out of school, Like I don't know, don't be just like just fucking suck it up or go find another job, Like I don't know, dude, Like you could be supportive.
You're her fiance, love of her life.
Allegedly so on January.
Speaker 2Twenty, I said, there's like a point where her father goes, like, the person that loves my daughter wouldn't act like this, Yes, wouldn't sound like that because the nine one one call is what is the most obvious, But we'll get there obviously.
Speaker 3But yes, yeah, that's what the dad said.
Like if someone that's not how.
Speaker 1You act, that's just yeah, and especially like if she's she's struggling with her mental health, she's not.
I mean we get you know, nothing in documentaries is like absolutely near.
But she had been feeling really depressed, and like we said, some of her friends were concerned, like a lot of them said.
A couple of her friends said that they started to see her less and less when she got together with Sam, like they dated for two and a half years before his family.
Speaker 3Yeah, yeah, they were.
Speaker 1Off with his people all the time, and the friends were like, we were just kind of seeing her less and less.
It doesn't seem like anybody was super alarmed quite yet, Like.
Speaker 2They were not because she wanted to meet someone she like wanted to get married, so.
Speaker 3Like, yeah, that makes sense exactly.
Speaker 1But so the friends weren't alarmed, but they were clocking it right, like they were like, and I guess he was too, And they ended up going She ended up going to see a psychiatrist.
She saw a psychiatrist about three times, and she had been prescribed klonopin and ambient and that.
And according to the psychiatrist, she had nothing bad to say about Sam.
She was happy about her relationship, she was excited about getting married.
She was just like feeling depressed.
Which okay, she was born, so she's twenty seven at the time.
Okay, so it's not uncommon for people in their twenties to start having bouts of depression when it's not been an issue.
Speaker 3For them previously.
Speaker 1So she's taking this medication and so on January twenty six, eleven, and by the way, the psychiatrists prescribed her with an adjustment disorder, which is exactly what my therapist or most people's therapists put on their bit like their billing, like cause it's just kind of like general need for therapy, you know, like that, Like I remember that's always like I don't have any kind of diagnosis.
But she was always like, I'll just put you down for adjustment disorder because it's like I want to have therapy because it's good to talk about your problems, but I don't have a specific mental health diagnosis.
And these you know, Luigi Luigid for a reason, these companies are predatory and they have to put a code down so adjustment.
So I'm all that to say she was not diagnosed with like anything deeply concerning for her family or anything, but she was on this medication.
And then on January twenty six, twenty eleven, there's this huge snowstorm in Philly, And of course anything bad happening during a snowstorm reminds me of Cereal and Hayman Lee and odd No on Sai Ed.
So if anyone else's also was a ceial head, that might remind you because that crime happened twelve years earlier.
But it's like when there's a snowstorm, it just kind of feels like there's same with Karen Reid, that all happened during a snowstorm.
It just feels like the cops aren't working as well.
Evidence, people aren't aren't like getting in touch with each other as much.
Everyone feels like things are like, oh, well I didn't I just figured that they didn't show up because of the snowstorm.
Speaker 3But it's like, no, they were murdered, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1Like there's just snowstorms always have like I feel like murder attached to them for me, But they send them home from school.
Early, she comes home to her apartment.
Sam comes home later, and he goes to the gym, and he's gone to the gym for like thirty seven minutes or something, and then he comes back up to the apartment and the swing latch, like the kind of latch that you normally have in an apartment or a hotel room is shut, and he immediately sends her a bunch of shitty texts, Like he immediately sends her text, Hello, what are you doing?
Speaker 3You better have an excuse?
You have no idea.
Speaker 1These are some of the texts he sends her because maybe, like I swear to God, Jared wants to kill me because I instinctively like lock the door all the time, and sometimes he's out in the garage working and we leave the door open when he's doing that, and I just lock it, and he's always like, oh my god, you locked me out again.
He does not ever text me, going, you better fucking tell me why this is happening, like he was writing what the fuck?
Like it just seemed like crazy.
Like as far as the story goes, it's not like he's late to get to a dinner or something like that.
He's just coming back from the gym and his apartment is locked, like relax, you know, and he thought, he even told cops later, Oh, I thought she might be doing her hair or in the shower or doing work with headphones on.
Okay, so she's eventually gonna check her phone and come get you.
Why are you sending her these like, I don't know.
I don't like the tone of the texts.
So he goes back downstairs.
He tries to ask them if they will the building people, if they will open the apartment, if they can open it for him, and they're like, we can't, like get through a swing latch or whatever.
And then he goes back upstairs and he busts the door.
In some reports that I'm reading say that at the time of him busting, I also.
Speaker 2Want to say, they kept being like the doors latch, the door's latch.
This happened to me in a hotel room in Washington State where I left it.
When I came the I tried to open the door and the latch was on it and I couldn't get in.
Speaker 3But no one was in there.
I mean obviously, like I spiraled, but no one was in there.
I wasn't I with you?
Speaker 2Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I might help, but he had a tool and he was able to unlatch it.
But I'm just saying, like there is a possibility of the door being latched in other ways.
Speaker 1Yes, absolutely, and we'll get into it.
But whatever, there's a lot here that is like missing.
But yes, the guy, I think the guy said, I can't like leave my post to come help.
Speaker 3That's what it was.
Yeah, they had a new policy where they weren't allowed to leave the desk.
Speaker 1So he goes back upstairs and allegedly he's he had called Ellen's mom, he had called his uncle, a lawyer, and his cousin, and he was on the phone.
And the reports I read kept saying uncle slash cousin.
So I don't know if they lived together, but he was on the phone with his family member, his uncle.
Speaker 3I don't know.
Speaker 1People have different relationships with family members, but like, if I'm locked out of my apartment, like where are you calling your uncle randomly?
But when he busts the door down, apparently he's on the phone with them.
But because he has not cooperated with the documentary or with or and there was no investigation into this spoiler, we don't know whether he called them, whether they called him, what time they called, Like, we don't know any of that because his phone records were never like subpoenat because there's no investigation.
Speaker 3Well and not only that, I mean, this is it's actually this is the keep just keep going.
Speaker 1We have Ellen's phone records because her family gave it all over, Like, we have all the texts that come in from him, but we don't know when he We know when he called the mom because the mom offers that, but we don't know when he calls his uncle.
Speaker 3We don't know any of that.
Speaker 1So he's on the phone with his uncle slash cousin who knows.
He busts open the door, Like there's footage and photos of like the uh swing latch ripped off the wall kind of or or half off the wall.
He gets into the apartment and he sees sadly, they show a lot of crime scene photos this like his fiance slumped up against the cabinets in the kitchen, blood all over her, she's wearing sweatpants, she's wearing uggs.
You know.
Weirdly, a lot of her friends were like she was like a shoes off person, so it's kind of weird.
She was wearing her shoes in the apartment, but like she usually wore socks around the apartment, they said.
But anyway, he gets off the phone, I guess with these other people, calls nine one one, and this is what's so fucked up.
Speaker 3And I made Jared listen to this, and he was like, I don't.
Speaker 1Really get it because he doesn't have a sickness like we do, where we watch it out of you constantly.
Speaker 3So obvious.
It's so obvious.
Speaker 1But he was like, well, what's the big deal?
I go, if you came home, okay, let me just say.
He calls nine one one, and he goes, oh, my god, my fiance.
She's on the floor.
There's there's blood all over her whatever.
And then that he gets there, like what look at her chest.
It takes him a long time to notice that there is a knife sticking out of her chest and he goes, oh, she fell, she stabbed herself.
She fell on a knife.
And I like literally wrote in my notes, how is that your first thought?
Like how is that your first thought?
Like I personally would be like, oh my god, someone's in the apartment with me, Like the door was locked and my fiance is stabbed.
Why would your first thought be that she took her own life by stabbing herself through the heart.
Speaker 2Yeah, it's also like such a unique way to take your own life.
It's not really like part of the top five, I would say, But also for that to be your first instinct, Like he's calling nine one one and it's my girlfriend stabbed herself.
Like what wouldn't you go someone stabbed her or fell on a knife.
Speaker 1Yeah, like been stabbed.
Oh my god, there's a knife in her heart.
Oh my god, Oh my god.
Like and then they're like, they're like, can you do CPR?
And he goes, I guess, I guess I have to, which the parents really hated hearing.
They were like, oh my god, you like aren't going to give CPR to our daughter?
Speaker 3Like, but she was gone.
Speaker 2Also in that call, he goes, she's on her back, and yet the crime scene photos and how we find her is sitting up against the lower cabinets.
But he said she's laying on her back, So who moved the body?
Speaker 1And supposedly there was like a bit of blood that goes across her face that like if she was sitting up, it wouldn't have dripped that way.
Speaker 3It wouldn't have congealed.
Speaker 2There's concealed blood, yeah, which means like this because if she was up, it would have been dripping down.
Speaker 3Yeah.
So at six forty pm I killed her.
Speaker 2He went to work out to think of a plan, called his fucking family, and there was no fucking cameras in the hallways and elevators.
Speaker 1Yeah, so this so there's yes, I should have mentioned that at the Venice Loss there are cans in the entry points of the building, but they did not have any cameras in elevators or in hallways at that point.
I bet they do now, but they didn't then.
So at six forty pm on Sadly, Ellen Greenberg is pronounced dead from twenty stab wounds, including ten to her back and neck and one that like goes up into like her like cranial area.
Really like she has eleven bruises in various stages of healing on her body, on her arm, her abdomen, her leg and yeah, there's all these bruises that are not part of the death and healed in varying time frames, which as anybody that watches MEO is like, yeah, that feels like a sign of abuse.
Speaker 2Like but again, but not only that, you won't give CPR to your fiance, you won't even touch her.
You say, oh, she stabbed herself.
She stabbed herself.
She did this to herself, Like why would that be your instinct?
It's the craziest thing I've ever I listened to the nine and everyone said she never had suicide ideations.
Speaker 1Like it's just well, okay, so, but the police fuck at all.
I mean, at the end of the day, they listen to this motherfucker immediately they go to the scene and they go, well, isn't isn't the boyfriend always the first suspect, Like, I don't understand how they just listen to him and we're dallying with it.
The crazy thing is that the cops did not even know that she had more wounds on her back, Like they didn't even know and they just saw the heart, like the chest wound with the knife, and we're just like up.
They got there and and the fiance tells them that the door was closed and latched, and because of that, they immediately realized like they look at like there's no fire escape in the building.
There's a ledge outside the window, and there's snow on it that's unders so nobody Spider manned into the building and got in and left.
Speaker 2For them to not have investigated him or arrests or taken him immediately is crazy.
Speaker 3I mean.
Speaker 2The thing is also like to just question him at the police department of more detail, like they did nothing.
Speaker 1He said she killed herself.
They went, all right, well, I was watching it with Jared on the couch.
Checks to me and I go, the only thing that's stumping me is like, how did the lock get closed?
Even though I know cases like you can honestly manipulate those locks.
But there's also no cameras he could have used.
There's so many no.
Jared goes, he could have literally just broken it that way from the inside.
He could have just like you, there's a mill.
He could have broken that down before he killed her.
Even like and I was like, oh my god, you're so right.
I didn't even realize that, like, yeah, like there's there's ways that that could have been done.
Speaker 2So he because they interview like the homicide team, who straight up goes, yeah, we didn't get called it was a suicide.
We don't get called if it's a suicide that was that was arrived.
Speaker 1Now ruled it a suicide, not even knowing the awareness, not even having awareness of half of the wounds that were on her back, because that might have raised some red flags.
Speaker 3How do someone stab themselves in the back?
Speaker 1And they just ruled it a suicide on the scene, and because of that there was no investigation done.
Speaker 3I mean, they said.
Speaker 1The father had an interesting quote where he goes in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, suicide is not a crime, So no crime.
I wonder if in states where it is still technically isn't it still technically a crime?
Dun states, But I wonder if states you would investigate even a suicide.
I'm just wondering out loud.
But the investigated based on what they saw.
Speaker 2Of course, for them to not have seen to disturb the crime scene like the way they did, to not even take any evidence at all.
Speaker 1They said there was no sign of a struggle on said, there was no the building manager.
Speaker 3The building manager are the only photos of the crime scene.
Speaker 1Yeah, she went in and took photos of the crime scene later, but there there was this crime scene was not disturbed.
Although the butcher block of knives was turned over, there was no defensive wounds on her hands, There was no Yeah, there was just nothing was stolen.
So they were just like, oh, yep, pretty cut and dry suicide.
She was locked in the apartment by herself.
She did this to herself and that's it.
So the crime scene team never goes out and they like, I said, no cameras, no footage.
I love the concierge, like he like he's doing all these talking head uh interviews, like not the concierge, like the doorman, the security guy as they called him concierge though, so they called him a concierge.
Okay, okay, I love this guy who's the concierge at the place.
He's like such a sweet man.
He talks about this day as like a day that chaanged his life, and he like he liked Ellen.
He's like, she was so happy about the engagement party and the wedding, and he did not understand the suicide part of it, which, let's be frank, the suicide is not always uh something that is telegraphed loudly to everybody.
The people said, oh, but she filled up her car on the way home.
Why would somebody do that if they knew they were going to go home and take their own life.
They pointed out a lot of times these things, these are snap decisions that have Sometimes it's planned for a long time, and sometimes it's a snap decision.
Sometimes there's suicidal ideation before, sometimes not.
Speaker 3So I can understand.
Speaker 2There was a professional that said, like, sometimes it's a choice, it's a decision in the moment.
Speaker 3Yeah, so totally I understand that.
Speaker 2Like when everyone's like we couldn't see it, and it's like that I didn't take as evidence of her feeling that way or not, or this being a possibility.
But none of this has anything to do with there's a bloody body.
Why are you listening to this man?
Wise enough, doesn't matter if he's saying it, there's there's a bloody woman with a knife in her, Like, I don't understand how you just pile it up and that like to not question at all, like the number one person that usually kills women as their partners, Like I just don't understand.
I just and I came up with this a few episodes ago, or I like the way, but it's like, yeah, when the investigators and cops and the criminals have the same view of women, this is what happens, like worthless.
Speaker 3They don't even give a fuck.
They didn't even give a fuck, And I don't know.
Speaker 2And this is someone that's like white luxury building doorman, you know, they were saying it was like a gentrifying neighbor, like it was a very nice building.
Yes, and so if that can happen, like you know, it's understandable.
How like minorities and like women that aren't just teachers in the community in a doorman building.
Speaker 3Yeah, And I just thought of this actually, but like.
Speaker 1You know, immediately I thought to myself, well, not that it's impossible to stab, like they said they've seen people stab themselves to take their own lives.
Not on the back, they said they'd never seen that, But how could you do that?
Even the regular stabbing to the front.
It's like women tech Like the National Institute of Health says that women tend to take their own lives in less violent methods, overdosing on drugs, carbon monoxide, you know, like there's other ways.
She had just been prescribed clonopin.
You can overdose on clonipin.
Why wouldn't you have just taken her whole bottle of pills?
She chose to stab herself to death with steak knives in her kitchen.
It makes no fucking sense to me.
I just it's just like it does not pass any kind of smell test for me at all.
So the next day, Lisa, would you like to tell them what happened?
The next day when two people decided to when a person decided to swing by the apartment, So the lawyer uncle.
Speaker 2That Sam called, decided to drop in the building.
Go hey, got to pick some stuff up for the funeral.
Not a blood relative at all.
He walked in, took all her electronics and left.
Speaker 1Laptop, phone, everything, took all that stuff, got.
Speaker 2It out of that and he was the one that handed it to the police however long later, so there's no chain of custody.
He could have added whatever, he could have done whatever.
It is a lawyer, and it is so crazy.
Totally could have wiped stuff.
He's a lawyer, Like, it's not the same thing.
He didn't just go in and clear sartake electronics.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Yeah.
Speaker 1And the building manager asked the cops like is this okay?
And they were like yeah, no problem.
And then they were like, well, we're going to clean this up.
And they let a company called crime Scene Cleanup.
Well, I watched the lad Bible video about it, you know.
Speaker 2Yeah, remember it was like the people that clean the crime scenes after they get the evidence, so they're very good.
So they had professional crime scene cleaners without getting any evidence.
Yeah, and the parents say this a lot, and this is why it's like dangerous.
But the parents are like, well, of course, we trust the cops.
We were taught to trust the cops.
We got to trust the cops, Like why would we not, they're professionals.
Yeah, and the cop poor.
Speaker 1Parents did an affluent white man and said, he's you know, he's.
Speaker 2Not watching him pace in the lobby after the workout that is at I can't.
Speaker 3Yeah.
Yeah, So.
Speaker 1Like my mouth was like on the floor, my jaw was on the floor.
Like they caught watching watching a bunch of cleaners in their white protective gear wipe away all the evidence of a girl who was killed yesterday.
Like they didn't even let any time go by to be like, let's just check a couple things out.
Let's see what the autopsy says.
Like what if they got an autopsy and her body was filled with fucking poison, Like who fucking knows?
They just let professional cleaners in there.
And the building manager like Lisa mentioned took a video.
She said the apartment, aside from the blood, looked pretty normal.
There was like blueberries in a bowl, there were there was a laptop there, which I guess the guy came and took later.
Speaker 3Maybe it was Sam's laptop.
Her engagement ring was there.
Speaker 1She had not been like wearing it, I guess because it like rolled herund on her finger or something like that.
And then they just fucking wiped away all the evidence.
So it's it's called not a held crime scene.
They did not hold the crime scene, they did not establish it as a crime scene, and therefore it was simply turned back into a rental or a place where he was going to go back and sleep.
Speaker 3I don't even know what is the rush to clean this place up.
Speaker 2Because also if it's your fiance, you'd go, no, she couldn't have done this.
We need to investigate, we need to investcaate what happened, because that's what a lot of her family kept saying, Like he's just had no curiosity because then questions.
Obviously a rise, there's stamp wounds in the back, but it's just like he just no curiosity of what happened to his fiance.
Speaker 1And I wrote in my notes, not even related to Ellen, about the unk, I wrote, I'm.
Speaker 3Fuming, Like my question is how is the uncle?
Speaker 2And I'm going to ask Nancy this, can we can he not be arrested for tampering with evidence?
Speaker 3Why is he not being arrested?
No criminal investigation?
Speaker 1Oh yeah, so he can't be you know, like if it's it's basically he's just like I went into my future nieces in law or whatever their relation is.
I went into my nephew's apartment to get some some electronics and that's it.
And like, you know, he is a lawyer, Like this guy knew what he was allowed to do.
Probably, And the next day the parents call some of Ellen's friends.
They start telling each other and the friends start, like you know, talking amongst themselves, and one of them calls Sam and the first thing he says to her is she did this to herself.
Speaker 2And the friend is like, why do you think that?
Like why are you saying that to me?
Like why is the first thing you say is are you okay?
I can't believe this has happened.
Speaker 3This is so sad.
I can't believe what we're gonna do.
She did this to herself.
Yeah.
Speaker 1So, like I said, twenty stab wounds, half of them on her back.
The cops don't even know about them until the autopsy experts are saying, we've seen stab wounds, we've seen self inflicted stab wounds.
Speaker 3We've never seen them on the back.
Speaker 1And that's not that no one's ever seen them ever, but these experts have never seen them.
And right away the medical examiner, doctor Marlon Osborne, rules it a homicide.
And Ellen's funeral is two days later.
It's packed, the snowstorm is still raging.
Like now that's a Jewish thing.
You get people, yes, round fast, yes.
So the funeral was very quick afterwards, and then there's you know, the seven days of Shiva, and there was a clear divide at the funeral, apparently like it was Sam's family and Allen's family, and the friends describe it as just like an awkward feeling, like the vibes were off.
And her coworker, this man that was her coworker, he says that he saw Sam at the funeral and that he'd never seen somebody's face contorted in anguish like that.
Speaker 3He's like, I've never seen it in my life.
Speaker 1He was he looked like devastated, and another friend that said Sam was wailing in the church.
So I don't know if this is guilt or true being truly being upset.
I don't know so now or an act who knows.
So now it's all over the Philly news during the funeral that it's been ruled a homicide.
And the family didn't even know.
This comes out at the funeral.
The dad announces it in the temple.
At the funeral, he's up at the temple like making a eulogy, and he announces, by the way, they've ruled this homicide, and everyone is stunned.
This is like from a TV show, Like you're like, oh, they said it while they were doing the eulogy, Yes, he did.
So they were talking about how in the Jewish religion there are like certain women that prepare the body, and that they were prepared the women that prepared Ellen's body, like it got out what they saw and nobody believed it was a suicide anymore.
So that's how the first episode of this ends.
So the top of the second episode, there's a funeral.
After the funeral, there's a shiva at Ellen's grandmother's house.
Sam's family shows up like an hour late, which people are kind of like okay, But after the homicide has switched the uncle who's gone into the apartment, whose name is James Schwartzman coincidentally the same last name as the director of the episode of the of the series, but not related, a prominent Philly attorney.
Speaker 3He turns over the.
Speaker 1Devices to the police after they've switched it to a homicide.
He's like, oh, I didn't realize I had evidence.
Here you go, but again, change I.
Speaker 3Even have it?
Like did you did he even make a slide show?
Speaker 1Like why would did you even make a slide show?
Speaker 2Like why would the why would the uncle of the fiance get the laptop?
Speaker 3It's like psyched.
I know, I know, and but he's got it to me.
It's like I don't know, I have.
Speaker 1I have a lot of uncles.
I love my uncles.
They're not the first person I would call.
They're not like even the tenth person I would call any of my uncles.
I know, people have different familial relationships, but it feels like he's the uncle you call when you did something fucked up because he's a lawyer, you know what I mean.
Like so in now, one of Ellen's aunts, who's featured throughout the documentary.
Speaker 3She's like so.
Speaker 1Like not excited, but she's happy for the police to come and interview her.
She's like, great, we're going to get some information, We're going to get some answers.
They're really going to look into this.
And she goes, they came in, they asked me six questions, and then they left.
And then in March, two months after the death, the emmy declares it a suicide.
They flip flop back that it's a suicide, and they in the In the documentary, now this is where they talk to a few of her students who are now grown up, because this documentary is coming out, you know, fourteen years later.
So these these kids are like twenty one now, and they're so sad.
They're crying.
They really loved their teacher and they remember like the trauma of finding out that their teacher was not coming back and was not alive anymore, and it was like, it is really sad.
The parents start talking to Thomas Brennan Junior, who's a former Pennsylvania state trooper and a private investigator.
Speaker 3Now he reviews the file and he's like, this is murdered.
Speaker 1Duh, and Brennan.
They're like, Okay, what's this going to cost us?
And he goes, I don't make money off of people's griefs, so my time is free.
And I love this guy immediately, and he tells them like, we're going to have to fight Philadelphia though, like this clearly feels like we're going up against like the institutions within the city of Philadelphia.
So he Brennan goes through some of the details that he finds in the file, like when she's found she has no defensive wounds, he thinks her body's been moved.
He mentions that she has seen this psychiatrist, but that she never had anything bad to say about Sam.
But and the bruising was apparently from over time.
But she never said anything to the doctor about any physical or verbal altercations with him.
And so they got like three times yes her and the psychiatrist.
Yeah right, So yeah, I know.
In twenty fifteen, a prosecutor in Filly named Guy DeAndrea starts looking into the case on behalf of the family.
Speaker 3I think they know people in common or something.
Speaker 1He gets the Emmy file, the medical examiner file, he gets the district attorney file, and he gets the homicide file, and he says, from the beginning, it just felt wrong, like he was like the nine one one call is.
Speaker 3Like he's like, I've listened to thousands and I've never heard anything like that.
Speaker 1Yes, he goes, I've listened to thousands of nine one one calls.
I've never heard anything like this.
He tells an entire story before he says help my fiances on the floor.
He's like, I went down to the gym and when I came back, the door was shut.
He's got a whole fucking story instead of like fuck, fuck, help or help or helper, Like you know, that would be the first thing on anyone's mind if they saw someone lying on the floor with a knife sticking out of their chest.
And the family, as we said, feels that this call is from someone who does not love their daughter, Like they can't believe the thing about the CPR.
Speaker 3They can't believe that.
Speaker 1He immediately says that she did it to herself, Like it's like, your mind is wild if you jump to that and are like, she's been a little sad in the last few months, and she's gone to a psychiatrist and she's gotten some medication, and your mind jumps immediately to that you're either extremely warped about mental health or you're hiding something, you know.
And so now here's where we talk about some of the changes that we're talking to some of the friends and they're like, look, there were some changes in Ellen when she got together with Sam.
You know, she went from shopping at Nord's Drum to shopping at Neeman's.
And I was like, interesting, interesting jump, Like and there's you know, the the doc does have some reenactments.
There's a girl that you see in silhouette very often who's Ellen, and she's trying on like a nice dress, and you know, her friends are like, we're seeing less and less of her.
Speaker 3She's with him and his family a lot.
Speaker 1She doesn't always wear her ring, which I kind of get, like, if you're working at like a low income school in Philly, not wanting to like flash your big ass diamond around every day like that seems like it kind of and you're working with kids, like your hand is in paint and shit, I can understand why she's not wearing her ring.
But they asked Sam why she wasn't wearing it, and she said he said it was because she didn't wear it to school.
Speaker 3That seems to me a little bit lo like nothing of a nothing.
Speaker 1But he gives the timeline, saying she came home around one thirty, she was really unhappy, telling him how she wanted to quit her job.
He says he never said he told authorities that she never heard her say anything about taking her own life, and that she never made any attempts.
And she did ask him, would you still love me if I was crazy?
And the friends are like, that's a pretty wild thing to say.
Why didn't you call any of us?
Why didn't you call her mom?
Why didn't you let anybody know that she said that?
You know, as far as we know, he's the only one that she said this crazy thing too.
Right, So now big time jump.
Here we're to the fall of twenty seventeen, and this is six years after the crime, and I'm calling it a crime.
Speaker 3He's just the love around.
Speaker 2He's just bouncing around, like why not just be safe than sorry, lazy motherfuckers.
Speaker 3And I wonder if it's what you mean with like the snowstorm.
Speaker 1Yes, And I think it's just like if this had been a person of lower income or another race.
I'm sure they would have done more to look into it.
I think they were just like, oh, no, what a tragedy.
This poor young man is life is going to be ruined.
His fiance killed herself, you know, like it's just like, that's that's the mentality I feel like.
So the media gets involved in the Fall of twenty seventeen because Stephanie Farr, who is a journalist who's featured throughout the documentary.
Speaker 3She's a journalist for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Speaker 1Which it's so funny to me because whenever I hear Inquirer, I think, oh, that's probably a piece of shit, like the National Inquirer.
But I think there are good inquirers.
She's a journalist for the Philadelphia Inquirer.
She gets interviews with law enforcement, which I she's kind of surprised that she does get these interviews with two law enforcement police told the reporter they're like, yeah, we believed it was a suicide, and they said they had never seen a stabbing case without defensive wounds.
And then she reaches out to Josh Shapiro's office.
Now, Josh Shapiro, as we all know, is the current governor of Pennsylvania and a presidential hopeful for twenty twenty eight I'm reading and he at the time is the Attorney General in Pennsylvania and his office is contentious.
Speaker 3Okay.
Speaker 1They say that they went on Ellen's computer and found searches for quick suicide and painless suicide from the month before her death.
Nothing like that is found in the original report.
Nothing that says that is in the original report.
Nothing that guy DeAndrea saw had anything about these suicide searches.
And also very obviously, what many of us are thinking is you looked up quick, and you looked up painless and stabbing yourself with a steak knife is what time?
Yeah, not quick, not painless, not you know, and like this is not for anything because obviously, but like her friends all.
Speaker 3Say that she was like a neat nick.
Speaker 1She was like a very into like shoes off in the house, everything in its place, very clean, and it's just of course, if you're having a moment of psychosis, you can take your life in any way.
But a lot of them are just like I just don't believe that she would just be like, yeah, I'm just gonna stab myself standing here in the kitchen, like it's just not it's I do think it makes sense to consider someone's like general personality and who they are.
Speaker 3Just consider it if it ends up.
Speaker 2But then it was it was, but like, how dare you claim it's that without any investigating Yes, and not agree, like seeing that these are suspicious circumstances, right.
Speaker 1And I don't trust a goddamn thing on that uh, on that device because as there's a person in the documentary who's an expert who goes, yeah, the chain of custody was broken when the uncle took the electronics.
And he's a lawyer, like he would know how to add.
He would know or know people who knew how to add search histories.
And you can actually change the time and the date stamp of these search histories if you basically know Taru.
I bet that guy has a Taru guy, you know what I mean, Like he knows someone.
So Stephanie Farr, this journalist drops a big article in March of twenty nineteen, so's this one's been working this case like it now has happened eight years ago.
She'd been working on it for two years.
And that's when people realized how fucked up this case was.
And this journalist was like, you know, I've covered a lot of cases.
Speaker 3But I was nervous the day that this dropped, Like I was nervous that, like what.
Speaker 1Was going to happen, because you know, you're going up against the Philly Police Department, the Medical Examiner's Office, You're going up against a lot of the Attorney General, like a lot of institutions that are powerful, and I think she just didn't know how it was going to go.
At the very least, she felt the Greenbergs were not getting the answers that they were asking for from the city and that she was doing a lot of this for the Greenbergs.
And then this is when the true crime community also comes in hard of course, Like there's always a point in documentary now where you show all the posts of people being like, well, actually and read it's popping off and everyone is, you know, they literally solved the crime in Don't Fuck with the Cats, right, like, so sometimes internet sleuths are getting to the bottom of this shit.
At the end of this episode, of course, it says that Sam did not respond to requests to be interviewed.
He gave a statement to CNN in twenty twenty four, and there is in my show notes source notes there is a big CNN article that's very long and detailed.
If you want to like look into this and see photos and stuff like that.
But the email that he wrote back to the CNN reporter was Thomas.
When Ellen took her own life, it left me bewildered.
She was a wonderful and a kind person who had everything to live for.
When she died, a part of me died with her, unimaginably.
In the years that have passed, I've had to endure the unimaginable that's you are repeating yourself passing of my future wife, and the pathetic and despicable attempts to desecrate my reputation and her privacy by creating a narrative that embraces lies, distortion, and falsehoods in order to avoid the truth.
Mental illness is very real and has many victims.
I hope and pray that you never lose someone you love like I did, to a terrible disease and then be accused by ignorant and misinform people of causing her death.
If you're really writing a truthful story, dig deeper and please do some good by raising awareness for mental health Best SG.
So that's what he wrote, to this reporter and it's like, I don't know, dog, I didn't see you out there, because that's what he said about the mom too.
He was like, the mom's being all sad and stuff and maybe she should do something productive, like help other people and stop it from happening again.
Yeah, so the mother of a dead like, call fuck yourself, I fucking I can't.
And did we see you giving a big donation to like mental health organizations or becoming a spokesperson for them or anything like that.
No, like he's not doing any of that.
He's it's just like so fully shifting blame.
Why don't you You guys are despicable.
Why don't you do something to help mental health?
It's like, well, they're actually doing something by trying to solve a crime by asking you questions.
And that's the only statement he's ever given.
Okay, so top of episode three.
That's how episode two ends as we see a little bit of the statement from Sam and I'm just read the full statement.
Speaker 3Episode number three.
Speaker 1Yeah, tons of Internet sleuths guy DeAndrea is still on the case.
Him and his crew are chatting and he points out that the cops have always said that Ellen died between four fifty and five twenty seven, because that's all going off of Sam's information.
That's when Sam left to go downstairs and do a quick thirty five thirty minute workout and come back, and then he left the gym.
But he could absolutely be lying.
And you know, uh, this is like where they have a little bit of the conversation about her gassing up the car and like and and may like.
But that also that suicide can be a last minute decision.
And an other forensic expert said that she found evidence of strangulation, that there was certain hemorrhaging of neck muscles that there could be no he could have stabbed her post mortem exactly, we don't know any strangled her.
Well, she could have been alive but incapacitated.
She could have the reason why there's no like defensive wounds could be because she was like strangled choked out until she passed out and then he stabbed her.
So they're all chatting about how this this like whole timeline is based off of once again Sam's word.
There's a lot of interviews, there's a lot of footage of the parents.
The parents like relocate I believe down to Florida and their retirement age, and they're they're just so heartbroken.
Speaker 3This is their only child.
Speaker 1They talk about how there's been problems in their marriage that they've worked through, and they really just like they won't stop fighting for Ellen.
They owe it to Ellen to find out the truth and have the truth be out there.
And you know, in twenty twenty one, they petition with their lawyer, whose name is Padraza.
Uh.
Speaker 3They petitioned to have the case reopened.
Speaker 1They ask for footage of the complex security camera footage from the complex.
Speaker 3The cops are like, we don't have it.
We don't have it, there's no there's no footage.
Speaker 1Then they get the courts involved, and then the guy goes and then suddenly they're like, oh, that footage, that's what you owe.
Speaker 2Why are they covering firm?
Is it just because this uncle?
Like it's crazy?
This this is nothing of a man.
I think Sam is like a nobody.
Why is everyone so running around we don't have the footage?
Speaker 3Who gives a fuck about this guy?
Speaker 1I think at this point the cops are I think what happened was the guy the lawyer told this Sam exactly what to say and exactly like how to play it, and the cops bought it hook line and sinker.
And then now that they're being called out, they're doing what they can to cover their own tracks and their mistakes.
They don't want to lawsuit, they don't want like trust in the law enforcement to erode, they don't want any you know, so they're all covering their own fucking tracks because this is a goddamn mess, you know, and we've seen it a million times where the cops are just like, well, that's the narrative that we have and we're just sticking to it, and you know, we're covering, covering, covering, because we didn't make any mistakes.
And so, uh, they also realized guy DeAndrea and and uh also Padraza.
They realize that there's been this report a little bit all along that Phil, the security guard, this lovely man that I like, throughout the dock, there's been a report that he was with Sam when Sam knocked the door in.
That is in a couple of places, I guess, but it's not true, and the footage proves it.
Speaker 3The footage proves.
Speaker 1Him going downstairs asking Phil, can you come up here and fix this with me?
And Phil going I can't leave my post unless law enforcement comes, and so that that's when you see Phil going towards the elevator, getting in the elevator with two cops or EMTs or whatever it was law enforcement.
Speaker 3It was like it was crime.
Speaker 1I think it was cops, and the cops are like, oh yeah, no, the security guard was said, the security guard was there when he opened it, and then the medical examiner had that in their report as well.
So this information which I didn't really realize.
I thought that Melinda Warner's whole thing was like we let the body speak for itself, Like I didn't realize that medical examiners were given information like she was by herself.
The door was locked, like that clouds their judgment.
Speaker 2Well, no, because one of them in the interviews she said, it's like you need to hear the story and then look at the evidence to see if the evidence matches the story.
Speaker 3Okay, okay, I get that.
Speaker 1I got that that, but unfortunately they were giving him they were giving this original Emmy.
They were giving him bullshit information because Phil was not there.
So that just goes to show that nobody saw him break the door down.
Apparently one he's a liar he's a liar and a murderer.
Speaker 3Like it's crazy.
Speaker 1So there's neighbors that say that they heard in banging, like him knocking on the door.
And then one neighbor said that he walked by to take out his trash and that Sam goes I got locked the slide lock is on, like and showed him.
But the neighbor like, I don't know.
That's like one neighbor, I don't think that that's super.
That's not like as anything to hinge anything on.
You know, nobody saw him break down that door when it happened.
Allegedly, his uncle and nephew were on the phone and they heard it.
So they're calling it like earsay or something like that because they they heard it happening over the phone.
Speaker 2I love that we don't trust dozens and dozens of women when they are like, oh, that guy's a rapist, but we just trust like a guy and his uncle.
Speaker 1Well, this guy's lawyer uncle was on the phone, so that's probably good.
Yeah, like crazy.
So now they're getting depositions from three different medical exams, and they're all videotaped because it's during COVID, So all these depositions are videotaped, and they're like, how did the determination of suicide happen?
And basically they talk about how there was a meeting between the medical examiners and the cops which convinced doctor Marlon Osborne to change it from homicide to suicide.
No one has notes from the meeting.
They keep going, do you have notes from the meeting?
And he goes, I do not have notes from that meeting, and he goes, They go why not?
He goes, I do not have notes from that meeting.
Why I do not have notes from that meeting?
Like he can tell he knows he fucked up.
This guy, I feel like, and he's just kind of like trying to cover himself.
And so no one remembers who said what very sketchy, But there was this meeting between the Emmys and the cops, and the officers told this emmy nothing was disturbed, nothing was out of place, and that a security guard was there to witness Sam Goldberg breaking down the door, which is we know is not true.
Well, what a lot of them are saying, these law enforcement professionals, is like it didn't have to be labeled a homicide.
It could have been labeled undetermined and I remember I think we talked about undetermined in a certain case we talked about at the very beginning of the podcast, maybe like Lost Traveler or something.
There was like an undetermined thing from the Emmy, And it just means that like you don't know and you're leaving it open, like it doesn't close anything out, and it's so you should have they should have just made it undetermined because it's so obviously to me not a clear suicide.
If that's what they end up finding after all of this, Okay, but like it's undetermined would have been an easy move.
But why are the cobs so fucking on them having to make it suicide?
So yeah, no one has notes for miss meeting.
It's all based on a bunch of misinformation and that wasn't done.
So now they talked to this uh doctor Emery, doctor Emory, who is a neuropathologist about whether the spot there's all this like talk in it that maybe when she stabbed herself she hit the sheath of the spinal cord or something which would have made her numb, which would have allowed her to keep stabbing herself.
Speaker 3I don't know.
Speaker 1I couldn't make hens or tails of a lot of that, but doctor Emery is talking about how like whether that would be possible, and she said, well, there's three possibilities for one of these stab wounds, and one of the possibilities that she discussed is that it was done post mortem.
And Podraza, who is the Greenberg's attorney, he based on this.
Speaker 3He says, his like jaw hits the floor.
He's like, he can't.
Speaker 1He's stunned that this doctor is admitting that one of these injuries could have been done post mortem.
So Padraza, the Greenberg's attorney, he files a second lawsuit, which is a conspiracy lawsuit, and that's a civil trial against the city of Philadelphia, claiming that they are trying to hide this homicide.
So Podraza's team offers a deal to Osborne, saying to doctor Osborne, the original emmy saying, we'll settle with you if you admit that this should not have.
Speaker 3Been listed as a suicide.
Speaker 1And he takes the deal, which unfortunately he does not work at the Philadelphia Medicals Examiner's office anymore, so what he says now does not change anything on the official death certificate.
Speaker 3But the media does go nuts as.
Speaker 1Osbourne goes like on the record in the press, saying that the manner of death should have been classified something other than suicide.
Again, he does not say homicide, but he says other than suicide.
So now February third, twenty twenty five is the court date and both lawsuits get settled, and we'll hear more about that in our interview portion.
But two and a half months later, the Greenbergs say nothing has been done about changing the medical examiner's determination.
The then Attorney general now Governor Shapiro was asked about it publicly, and they play this clip in the doc that he says, we looked into it, and all of our information that we found pointed even further to suicide, is what Josh Shapiro says, and it's fucked.
But the Greenbergs do not speak to Sam.
He's moved on, he's gotten married and had kids, and he's at parties with Lisa.
Speaker 3I thought Shapiro was like a normal like fuck him, yeah, I.
Speaker 1Mean all politicians, I guess I thought he was one of the good guys.
But Phil the security guard talks about how like he thinks the family's looking for justice, but even the justice like won't be enough if they get it, you know, like they're obviously never going to have Ellen back.
Sandy the mom talks about collecting coins on the ground and she calls them pennies from heaven, and she's like, my my jar is getting full.
I'm optimistic.
Like these people are so strong like that they're able to not just fully.
She talks about it in the dock where she's like, I'm out of tears, Like I've just cried my head off for so many years and now I'm out of tears.
But like they're just I feel so there's something about these two parents, like they just have a look where I'm just like, I'm so sad for them, and they say, like the way that the documentary, like she says, if I could talk to Ellen right now, I would say, Mommy and Daddy love you and we're proud of you.
And I did start crying at that part, and then that's kind of the end of the whole thing.
There's some PostScript that on October tenth of twenty twenty five, which literally was like a month and a half ago, Chief Medical Examiner for Philadelphia, doctor Lindsay Simon, ruled Ellen's death a suicide.
Acknowledging that her injuries were quote unquote unusual.
Speaker 3Then what was the choking?
Speaker 1Like?
Speaker 3What the fought?
Speaker 1Like?
Speaker 3Fuck you what?
Speaker 1You guys are crazy?
You guys are crazy.
Some of them are saying there's no hemorrhage in the throat muscle.
Some of them are saying there is.
It's a it's crazy.
I'm surprised the FBI couldn't like be brought in to like clean the shit up and figure it out.
But Padraza is like, this is bullshit, and he wants to keep pushing for a new investigation.
Sandy and Josh do not accept that report from the from October of twenty twenty five, and they vow to keep fighting for the truth.
And of course, of course the Philadelphia PD, the Medical Examiner's office, the DA's office, and the AG's office, and doctor Osborne all declined interviews for this series.
Speaker 3So not surprise.
Speaker 1If you guys had your science correct and you stood by it, why wouldn't you get interviewed and just say this is what we found and this is why we believe it, this is the science.
And then I, you know, I did see a piece that talked about how Sam Goldberg is friends with the actor Adam Pally and that they started a podcast together about NBA basketball in the Pandemic in twenty twenty.
But I don't think it's running anymore.
It was called ball Sometime times lie, and I feel like Sam Goldberg sometimes lie as well.
But that's the recap.
I mean, we're furious, but we're excited because I.
Speaker 2Was going up to find like what I wrote, like the things he said about like the pathetic this that it's like, I guess we care about the woman you murdered more than you do your future wife.
Right, Yeah, you called anyone looking into this pathetic and despicable attempts to desecrate my reputation and her privacy by creating a narrative that embraces lies, distortions and falsehoods.
Speaker 1Fuck you, I just like even the wording of this.
I don't like the passing of your future wife like she was a person, like she was, she's not identified as fai and misinformed people.
And then your first complaint is that it's desecrating your reputation, and then you throw in, oh yeah, in.
Speaker 3Her privacy, in her privacy, and.
Speaker 2Then dig deeper and please do some good by raising awareness for mental health.
Speaker 3You know what, I'm going to.
Speaker 2Spend my time doing it deeper.
I want to make sure you go to jail.
That's what I'm going to make sure deeper.
Speaker 1It's like, you're not talking to documentary people, You're not talking to you don't talk to anyone.
You made this one statement, what's to dig deeper?
You're not letting it be to dig deeper.
It was your life with her, Like I don't know this, I don't.
I just it's like again, I can't put my finger on any of it, but it really doesn't feel.
Speaker 3There's something about that I don't will never know.
Speaker 2Because he had his uncle steel technology and then there was a crime scene clean up within a day, So I mean it like, yes.
Speaker 1It reminds me of like Karen Reid.
Shit, it reminds me of like all these.
Speaker 3But who is he with Karen Reid?
It was like all these cops.
Speaker 2So you're like, okay, all these cops are gonna have all these cops back, right, Like who is this loser?
Speaker 1He's the nephew of a prominent Philly attorney turn judge.
I forgot, I mean I want to buy that.
Speaker 3No, that slipped my mind.
Yes, that's what it is.
And like all what takes is that.
Speaker 1Guy, the uncle Schwartzman to know one fucking thing about the police commissioner or something and they're covering it up.
Speaker 3You know, we've seen it.
Speaker 1But anyway, let's move on because we're talking to the director.
Okay, it's time.
Our guest today, as we've teased, is an Emmy winning and Peabody nominated documentary film director.
Some of her recent projects include the series Sasha Reid and the Midnight Order and the Netflix stock Victim Suspect.
And she's a pal of mine who I've hung out with many times and was so excited to find out that she had directed this series and then we got a chance to talk to her.
So you guys please enjoy our chat with the director of the docuseries Death and Apartment six oh three.
Speaker 3What Happened to Ellen Greenberg Nancy Schwartzman.
Speaker 1This is a very special holiday episode that's coming out right before Christmas.
We want to give people all of the crime making gap right.
Speaker 4Right they go to their families.
Speaker 3Yeah, well, because that's right.
Speaker 2The things that we with the documentary where it's like they just all believed him, Like the number one suspect is always the partner, like the fact that they're like, oh yeah, him and the uncle heard it.
Speaker 3That's fine, all right, clean it up.
He's a nice guy.
Speaker 4He seemed really sad at the crime scene.
Speaker 3But like the call, the call, I just don't understand.
I do understand.
I see this camaraderie with these guys.
It's just like, is it's wild to witness.
Speaker 4I mean there's also like there's you know, a few layers going on.
The first is always human error and like dumb dumb police work.
Right, So dumb dumb police work.
Come in.
Someone made a really good point at the beginning of the year.
It's January eleventh, like we've cleared our slate of like homicides, We've solved our stuff.
January is a new year, blank slate.
Off is, we got the homicide right in a snowstorm with beat cops in a really low crime neighborhood.
So this is not the most trained unit to pop in and they're like, oh good, you know it's snowing.
I want to go home.
Speaker 2You didn't have to do anything like that, homicide detective.
We weren't even called, Like, couldn't they have just called someone and fucking left to.
Speaker 4Didn't even call.
Yeah, they just took his word, which is a dune done like mistake at the top.
So the nine one one operator isn't also going to be communicating with the homicide unit.
Like there's so many hands, right, So there's ems, there's medical examiner, which I didn't know about.
There's like an emmy investigator who's different than a cop.
The emmy needs the cop.
Medical examiners and cops need each other.
The medical examiner needs to know was every window broken and footsteps all over to show that it was a break in, So they need information from the cops.
But at the same time, they're supposed to be neutral, and it's really twisted when those two agencies conflict with each other because then it starts to feel political.
So the fact that he looked at the body and was like, uh, this is the homicide, like could not be more clear.
There's twenty stab wounds, ten in the back, and then they clash with the police department.
So police department initially could have been mistake, and then there might have been pressure to stick with that ruling.
Speaker 3Right, So I just can't believe science.
Speaker 2I mean I can't, but like the whole thing with them is it's science and it's data and it has nothing to do with politics.
Speaker 3It's like it is what it is to do with politics.
Speaker 1And we were just talking about this because I said, I was like, I thought them was just supposed to read the body, but like you just said, they need some context, and then they gave them the wrong context like that yeah, filled with him and all this stuff.
Speaker 4You wanted to be totally totally neutral, and so it's really tricky.
Like that's where it becomes like, oh my gosh, crime is this sort of is it a science?
Is it an art?
Like we need some data and we also need like objectivity, So objectively, that body was so clearly a homicide.
By the way, for the record, the medical examiner who did the exam is also he was not considered like the best examiner in Philly, Like he was learned.
Doctor Osborne had multiple dings in his career for not catching things, and he saw that it was a homicide.
You know what I mean.
You're like if this guy who like ye miss things was so adamant, you know, but even if he had learned that there had been broken windows, that body is still a homicide, like whoever discovered it and whatever the condition.
Speaker 3It's just a person with a knife in her chest.
What are you talking about?
Speaker 2You wouldn't even take a dubad.
Just the fact what we talked about that is so upsetting that the only crime scene photos are from the building manager.
Speaker 4Like yeah, they're there are police crime scene photos, but they're not thorough.
They don't show her back now, they don't show what's under the sink and what's in the garbage, and they didn't check the trash shoot and the building.
Like I also learned, you know, the like I'm going to the gym.
It's kind of like a common refrain if you need to take a shower and change your clothes.
Right, it's like a it's a viable excuse for why like you're in Oh yeah, I took a shower, I went to the gym.
It's like a reason to not be in street wear.
It's like a reason to be like I was so sweaty, I changed my clothes.
So where are those clothes, the earlier clothes, And you know, was the laundry checked?
Speaker 1Was?
Speaker 4You know all That's the other thing in terms of her body as a crime scene, because that is the first place to start.
And this could also create motive, Like they didn't do a rape kit or an analysis on Ellen, so we don't know who she slept with, right, Like what if there were traces of someone else, which there weren't, But if there were, wouldn't that be like, oh my god, there's some other guy we should be thinking about.
Speaker 1You know.
Speaker 4It's like there that is investigation, even if it feels like, oh my god, that's invasive to Ellen, but that's a thorough, proper investigation that also just like wasn't done.
Speaker 1Yeah, also like how the door like functions and how the lot could have been tampered with, and there's like so many different.
Speaker 3Well and then speaking of tampering, can we talk about this uncle?
Yeah, well we have to.
Speaker 1We have to.
Clai is not related to you, even though you coincidentally have the same last name, no relation to be able to my mom.
Speaker 2In and grabber technology and then the change.
I just it's so mad, it's so maddening.
What did you know about the case before the doc?
What got you to do this story?
Yeah, that's a we should that's where we could start.
Also, we have obviously we dove into being enraged.
Speaker 1But what how did this because I know you signed on when like Dakota and el Fanning were producers, and like, what how did it come to you?
Speaker 4Yeah, well it came to me through producers who you know, had been interested.
I'd had like a general with them and we got along really well.
And then I don't even know if they knew I was from Philly, but the case came to me, you know, right when they were like, Okay, we need to get started, Like it was one of those things like okay, we're moving now.
So frankly, you know a lot of people in Philly have been tracking the story.
But I left Philly when I was eighteen and I moved to New York, so.
Speaker 1I was like, bye, but did you go to the same high school as Sam?
Speaker 4I sure did.
Speaker 1It's like so crazy, like it seems like something that you would have heard about this case from personal people and gotten involved.
Speaker 3But it's not how that happened at all.
Speaker 4It's so weird.
No, it's sort of like he's a bit younger than I am, and I only went to that high school for three years.
Like I've been part of the public school system for a really long time, and I went to Shipley.
Now turns out some younger people I know knew him from yours prior, but I just didn't know him, Like I hadn't heard about it.
I don't think his name was associated.
I don't think people really knew about this case until twenty nineteen, until Stephanie Farr wrote about it.
And at that point I'd premiered my first film, which was looking at a crime in Stubenville, Ohio.
Like it was just like I was just in a different headspace.
But the more I dug into the story, obviously sharing a last name, I had to text my mom, Mom, are we related to James Schwartzman.
She's like, no, but I know him.
My mom was an attorney in Pennsylvania and James Schwartzman was very prominent attorney.
He's like the head of the ethics committee at Villanova Law School, Like he's like a judge.
Now you know he was, mister, mister guy.
Speaker 1Can I ask you a question, did you ever come across in all of your research how close his relationship was with his uncle?
Because I'm so, I'm like, it's such a weird thing to me that he called his uncle when he couldn't get into the apartment.
Speaker 2I also want to know how close the uncle is to the Attorney General and all these people, and obviously maybe.
Speaker 1Close, yeah, because to me, he seems like the kind of uncle you call when you're in trouble, and that's why I'm curious.
Speaker 4So here's a couple of things.
Sam has two sisters, and you know, Camean is James's kid and they're about the same age.
So Cameyan and Sam were super duper tight, okay, and the families are really tight, so they kind of grew up as brothers and they travel together.
In our edit, we have thousands of photos and my archival producer was like, wow, this family like lobster.
I'm like what, We're all of them like eating lobster, like at the beach, Like they like to party.
This family.
Everyone's like big party.
They're like drinking.
It's like events, you know, like apartments, fell, a wedding, an engagement party, a lobster party.
They're eating shellfish like crazy.
They're drinking and partying.
But like uncle, like, Camean and Sam are really tight.
So it's a tight knit family of Philly is a big small town, so there is a world that this family super tight, and Sam's like a brother.
So the other thing I will always after making my film Victims Suspect, where rape victims are accused of a crime by going to report, they walk in without a lawyer, they go talk to a cop, and suddenly they're under arrest, I would always tell someone to get a lawyer before talking to the cops.
Always, right, So Sam getting a lawyer right away?
Speaker 3Like, of course, No.
Speaker 1I what I read on the CNN article was that he was on the phone with them when he was locked out, and that when he went.
Speaker 4To the calls, Sam made a series of calls like I can't get in, yeah, baby, Ellen's in the shower.
Speaker 1So I mean, like, of course I would totally we tell people get a lawyer immediately, of course on this podcast, But like why do you need a lawyer when you're just trying to get into your apartment where your fiance might be in the shower.
So I need a lawyer when you calling?
Speaker 3Yeah?
Speaker 2But also why are you then telling the cops all this stuff?
Like if you're trained not to talk to anyone without a lawyer, why would you then be taught to talk to all of them?
Speaker 1Right?
Speaker 4I mean I think that the calls are bananas.
Like I looked at Sam's call logues now they are redacted, so it's hard to know exactly who he's talking to.
That guy was on the phone a lot.
He's like a caller, so he's just like a chat chat call call, call call.
There was some interesting activity on the call log because there are like moments that day that are there's no activity, which is interesting, right, You're like, there's no activity, then there's a flurry of calls.
Yeah, so that's interesting.
Oh, you know, really curious if if ever those those logs would be redacted, then we could see he's on the phone.
But Sam was a caller.
Uh, he was a phone guy.
He's not your usual dude who like barely picks up the phone, so he is active on the phone.
I would not call my mom if I was locked out of my house, I would not I would call my neighbor.
I would call my friend who might have my key.
I would call maybe someone to be like, ah, I'm so frustrated, But like I would not be doing that series of calls.
And if I were truly worried, I would have probably called And I won one a lot sooner than was done.
Speaker 1Yeah, because how many minutes passed before during the time where he came up from the gym at five thirty seven, when was nine.
Speaker 4One one called six thirty four.
Speaker 1Wow, So he just thought she's in there with the door locked, and maybe she's not paying attention.
Speaker 4She's taking a shower or she had that's what that's what if.
Speaker 3He's like, you know in his like story, Yeah, yeah, yeah, wow.
Speaker 4And we only found out that he was on the phone with his uncle in a tricky way.
So there was a blogger who is very like vocal and very like into pointing out potential connections and he received a cease and desist from James Schwartzman, and James in the cease and desist says, I was on the phone with my nephew when he discovered and broke down the door.
So it's kind of like I was an ear witness for when this happened, and I told him to immediately call the police.
So we only knew that because it didn't show on the call log because it's redacted, that it was with his uncle.
So it was just like, yeah, Dicey and convoluted put that into the.
Speaker 2Show and just you know, the nine one one call if you see someone with a night.
I just don't think anyone's first inclination is what he said.
Speaker 4Well, question, because I feel like I'm either three thousand years old or no one knows his reference.
Did anyone watch the musical Chicago?
Yes?
Speaker 3Of course, Thank you ladies, seeing the best movie musical of all time?
Speaker 4Thank you so agree, so good.
Speaker 1I saw the Revival on Broadway with Bby Newarth.
I mean my first Broadway I.
Speaker 4Saw Baby Newrth.
But I thought, actually, randomly, the movie was fucking amazing.
He fell on a knife, Yeah, fell on a knife nine times, and it kicks into he had it coming.
Speaker 5Yeah.
Speaker 4I'm like, there's literally a song where she says, oh my ex husband, he fell on a knife.
He fell on a knife.
Yeah.
Is no one making the Chicago reference?
Like nobody falls on a knife and nobody falls on a knife twenty times?
Speaker 3So what is the process of like.
Speaker 2Interviewing all the data, all the reading, how long does it take to make something like this?
And you obviously have a lot of experience in the crime, sex, crime, murder universe.
Was that something you were always interested in?
How did you get into this niche of documentary.
I guess all the questions process.
Speaker 4Amazing development team, a company called black Fin that got acquired by Lionsgate had been on the ground sprinting, gathering stuff for like a few years.
So they had gathered all the police stuff, had made the relationship with the lawyers.
We had all that to look at.
We have the photos to look at.
The family had done a ton of work, so things get really helpful when there's a lawsuit.
When there's a lawsuit, things get entered into evidence and then it's public and you can grab it or you can use it or things are you know, revealed in discovery.
So once there's a lawsuit, you're like, ooh, I got the police report, I got the surveillance tape, I get all these exhibits.
So twenty twenty one, and then thanks to COVID, those depositions were taped, so then you're like, oh my god, I can watch the deposition of this other medical examiner saying that she was already dead, possibly when one of the stab wounds came out.
I can look at her face, you know.
So we had a lot of material and then they had been like finding sources, like we love the beautiful building manager Melissa and the concierge Phil, and they knew about the project and they were willing.
So someone had already been like sprinting around Philly and Jersey to like grab these sources.
So when I got started, we had a pretty robust list of people that were already like a yes, and then you just have to like sprint to get them in the chair and do the interviews.
Yeah, So when I started, my first day was December third, and then it was announced that there was going to be a jury selection February third, so we had planned to shoot in March, and I was like, a first day of shooting is literally in two months, let's go, we have to get to Philly.
So my first day of shooting was like in the halls of city Hall when the city when the family settled, which was totally insane, So like the last moment, you know, the beginning of episode three was like the first day of shooting.
So you have to do that and then like work backwards.
Speaker 3And the family settled for undisclosed amount.
Speaker 4Disclosed not a lot barely covers legal it doesn't cover legal fees and full it's about six hundred and fifty thousand, oh my god, I know, you know, Joe Padraza, the attorney made a good point.
Two points one.
You want to go to trial, you want that moment, but often you don't get it.
So settlement is the bird in hand.
And then the other thing is when you're like, oh, the city they won twenty million dollars, the city will fight that, and most of those big ticket cases the person ends.
Speaker 3Up getting like nothing because they just appeal and appeal.
Speaker 4And yeah, so if it's a lower number that you're like, god, that sucks, it's like it you will get it right, versus like a higher number.
I mean sometimes of course you've got the higher number.
But the city was going to fight that.
So the fact that they agreed and the medical examiner reversed his ruling two days before because he didn't want get sued was pretty great.
Speaker 3Yeah.
And how is it doing interviews with you know, victim's parents like that.
Speaker 4Yeah.
I mean, so I'm very much done a lot of stuff around sexual violence and homicide is like a whole different game.
I did homicide, some of it with Sasha red in the Midnight Order with and those were older, those were like twenty year cases, and the women a lot of them were Indigenous.
They were treated so badly by the police.
Speaker 2That just covered that crime with the pig farmer picked in.
Yeah, and again it was police just like not giving a.
Speaker 4Fuck, not did not care, did not care.
So those victim and family met were so happy to just like have their family put out there and like listen to and those were sad, but it was it was beautiful, Like that was just beautiful because the case had been closed and he was convicted.
And even though some of the women were like, we know, we know my sister died there, but we're never going to get the justice, you know, but like I want to tell you about her.
That was easier when things are unsolved, when there's all these layers of injustice, then it's like a different, different story.
So I'm really grateful that a lot of those interviews with Sanny and Josh were over time, and I came in and had, oh my gosh, there they are when they first learned this, and there they are a couple of years later.
So the thing that's tricky, and this is like a little bit in the weeds for documentary stuff, is like you need a four year tail because you need to show time passing, but like networks are like, they do it in ten months and you're like, uh okay, and I needed to be filming years ago.
So development is very like expensive but important, So Sandy and Josh.
It's also tricky because you don't want to over interview people right, you don't want them to be tired of it.
And a lot of people are desperate to tell their story and feel like nothing changes because of it, so that can feel really frustrating for them.
But at the same time, Sandy and Josh are like, we're never giving up on our daughter.
We want everyone to know about her, we want the truth to come out.
So you know, it felt important for all of them to participate.
And I love that people that worked in the building showed up for Ellen.
They didn't have to, They absolutely did not have to do that.
That was fourteen years ago.
I love that a coworker of Sam put himself out there to show up in episode three and say, you know, basically, Ellen's family deserves better and I can tell you what it's like to work with Sam Goldberg right now.
Speaker 2No, yeah, And you can see what an impact Ellen had because even the students like talking to the students and the other teachers it.
Speaker 3And how sad they were.
Speaker 4Totally people loved her, and it's you know, it's funny.
I don't I don't know if you guys have this experience.
I'm sure you do.
Working in the kind of crime podcasting space, there's a lot of like very shaded elements to it, you know what I mean, Like people are so jaded about stuff, and you know, people will be like, oh, everybody loves the victim.
You know, she's you know, blah blah blah, And I was like, no, but actually, truly everybody loved Ellen.
Like nobody had a bad word to say about her.
You know, someone someone said, oh, every dead girl's smile lights up a room, and I was like, oooh, that is a very like jaded statement.
But Ellen truly touched so many people, Like she was so family oriented, you know, like her family loved her, cousins meant everything to her.
Yeah.
She really just like touched a lot of people and really brought them together.
Yeah.
Speaker 1Well yeah, do you feel like since the documentaries come out that there's like going to be maybe any forward progress like legally or not really.
Speaker 4Feeling optimistic?
Speaker 1Feeling optimistic?
Okay, Okay, there could be some exciting movement.
All right, we're tuned in, we are seated.
My other question for you is, I feel like there's always this documentarian's dilemma, not dilemma, but choice of like are you going to do reenactments or are you not going to do reenactments?
Right, So you had very subtle reenactments, Like they were very subtle.
It wasn't like, you know, because we don't know what happened, So it wasn't like there was you had first of all, do you just go cast a girl that has the same silhouette as the girl who?
Speaker 3Like, did you have to do all that?
Like, I mean was that summer her dim?
Speaker 4Sure did?
Yeah, well, I mean you have to do reenactments like I remember watching there was something we were gonna do with Sasha read Show because the girls were so like gen z i roll Ye about bad crime TV and they were watching some terrible like BTK show and the girl, Oh my god, it's my favorite scene.
It did make it in they're like eating popcorn, like ripping, ripping the show apart, and the reenactments were ghastly like it was like a woman's legs are being dragged and She's like thrashing and the girls are like, oh my god.
And then I was sort of chided, like you can't like make fun of true crime on your true crime show, and like but can't.
I Right, So, you know, in this case, I feel like people need to see to understand.
Just in general, I think a lot of people have read about Ellen's case and they didn't get it, and then they're like, no, I'm going to show you.
I'm going to show you how physically close he was.
Like I'm going to build that kitchen, it's going to have the same dimensions.
You're going to understand.
We are going to take photos of everything that was on the countertop and we're going to put them a actually in her apartment on the countertop so you can see it, and then when we do the recree you'll see them.
You have to know this hallway.
So much went on in the hallway as Sam, all these people.
You know, you have to be able to feel the environment, you know, and understand what a neighbor might have seen, you know.
So we like measure dimensions and we do like set designs so it like matches the actual space.
And then in terms of her shape, it's really important because with re crase, that's all you have, like you can't really use your face.
So we ended up in the middle of the night, I woke up.
So we had cast someone who was like kind of okay, but like not right, and I woke up in the middle of the night and I was like, so not right, that's so not ill.
We found a former Miss Canada to be Ellen Okay, and she was perfect because Ellen was dropping weight.
Ellen was very thin in some pictures.
Ellen was not eating, which I understand when I'm anxious, that's the direction I go.
Some people go in the other direction.
I go in the like, oh my god, I have no apps T had, I cannot fucking eat anything.
So Ellen was really getting skinny.
And some people are like, oh, she was prepping for her wedding.
I'm like, that is anxious, fucking skinny.
Speaker 1And the wedding was eight months away, right, the wedding was in August.
Speaker 4Yeah, she was in what looked to me like anxiety skinny.
And so when you're in a recree and all you have is someone's shape, it has to match the shape.
Speaker 3It just does.
Speaker 4And Sam was perfect, and uh, yeah, I mean I think I think there's a lot of like, oh, recras are bad, but all every show has them.
Speaker 1Yeah, No, I'm so visual, Like I found myself really wanting to see somebody like her size, like holding the knife and show me how she could have possibly done that, Like wouldn't a medical examiner have to like show how that could have possibly happened?
Speaker 3Like what did her arm twist back up this way?
Did she do it this?
Speaker 1Like what are we talking about here with these backstab wounds?
Speaker 4Yeah?
Like yeah, and with that, it would have had to be for a liability and legal reasons, like the exact length of her arm and possible torque of her we could have done it in a kind of unroll.
Speaker 3Way, but like just watching you do it right now, it's like psychotic.
I know it's not, but I want to show.
Speaker 1I want to like show because I like saw that you did an Ama on Reddit and I saw a bunch of people being like, I'm sorry, I feel like this she took her own life, and I'm like, let me show, Like I would have been like, let's watch it happen, like let's see how anybody could have fucking done that, like you know what I mean, Like I'm just thinking of ways that you can just like shut it down because it's it seems impossible to me.
Speaker 4Yeah, yeah, I mean I think it's a little dicey in terms of legality to claim that this is exactly you.
Speaker 1Know, but I think everyone's ever like a lawyer would have done that in court or something, you know, like in court, a lawyer would have done that.
Speaker 4But yeah, also it's common sense, and like that's the other thing.
It's so insulting that these like institutions are like everybody has common sense and there's you know, look, you can still there might be people who say, oh, but she was you know, mental, and then you're like, okay, but one of the stab wounds was administered after she was dead, right, so let's talk about that.
Also, she had wounding to her straw muscles in her neck.
Hello, she was fucking choked.
Speaker 1That's what's so crazy too.
And they're like there were no defensive wounds.
It's like I was just saying this when we were recapping the doc.
I was like, did we check and see maybe she was drugged?
Like there's you know, it's like the latch on the door is like all they had.
Speaker 2That's how little they care about like women fucking dead, won't They don't give a fuck cause these wild explanations.
Speaker 1You know.
Speaker 2It makes me think of the Long Island killer where a woman was found like running naked and then in a swamp area and they're like, she was just out for a run.
And it's what you're saying.
It's like, do not tell me, like I am see, how how are you even doing this?
And it's like the they just don't give up.
Speaker 4Fuck, they do not care.
Speaker 6They do not care.
Speaker 4It's like she was choked.
Speaker 3Also, he calls and says, she's laying on her back, she was sitting the blood.
Speaker 2There's just so much.
Yeah, and we're not medical examiners.
This is basic, like you said, it's common sense.
It's also the care you would do when you get to a crime scene exactly.
Speaker 4You would do some basic stuff you do forensic examination.
You would check for that lock, you would understand if there's a missing screw.
The thing that always gets me also, especially because locks like that in that building can lock in on themselves.
I don't know how someone got in, but we do know that you can lock yourself out.
We know that, right, It's happened to me.
Speaker 3Building it's yes, it's happened to me.
Now I was there.
Speaker 4Now we all hate Now whenever I'm in a hotel, I'm like, oh fuck, I know how like unsafe.
These locks are not just to get locked out, But like I when I lock it, I know it means nothing, but the fact that that lock was engaged should not supersede.
At twenty stab wounds, ten in the back, thirty bruises on her body.
They found additional bruises.
I wanted a drop muscles.
I'm like, why is the old latch that we already know is like flimsy and manibble?
Speaker 1Lisa even said when it happened to her, When it happened to her at a hotel, they came with like a tool and they undid it.
So if that tool exists, then there's the reasonable doubt right there.
Speaker 3Yeah, like not the.
Speaker 4Worken gun, guys, not the smoking gun.
That lock is not a smoking gun.
It's not meat everything else.
Speaker 3Of a body.
Speaker 1Nancy, are you allowed to say what you think happened?
I mean like because they're like, I'm trying to figure out what I think happened.
Like there's no I know, I get a douche vibe from him, and I don't like this same care offore.
Speaker 3I go into that.
Speaker 2I do want to touch on Okay, you mentioned she was not eating, and you know there were all these other bruises the family.
You know, we talked about how the first date is kind of strange to isolate.
But like the friends saying, we saw her lesson less, you have bruises that had nothing to do with this attack.
Speaker 3She is losing weight, like there could have been a pattern.
Speaker 4Yeah, Like I would like really want law enforcement, and I do think they're getting better.
But I do think everybody needs to be trained in the signs of intimate partner violin.
Speaker 2But what's also crazy, But isn't that the thing of like that's who you assume is the person right away, But you have.
Speaker 4To also and if you look at various police reports like there and look at this happens in gender based violence with rat Oh my god, the lack of questions to potential perpetrators, are you kidding me?
Like Emma, there's a little girl in my film Victim Suspect, where these guys clearly had a game.
Two guys.
They find the freshmen, they drink and they separate the girl and the two guys go block the car, get her in.
No, no, no, They never questioned, They never tried to find.
I was like, these two guys had a game, they had a fucking pattern.
They would not have been hard to find.
She had a video of them, and they never went to look for these two dudes who have clearly fucking done it before.
Instead, they grill her and they don't like her answers, and they arrest her.
Are you kidding me?
So this is not This is like endemic that we don't know how to talk to potential perpetrators, right, we don't know how to talk Cops think because someone's DM is in your DMS that you know them.
I'm like, uh no, you don't.
So oh you were joking and send him like a eggplant emoji that's consent.
You're like, oh my god, what are you talking about?
So the lack of un understanding of like intimacy in general drives me insane.
So to not know what questions to ask for if my if my guy was covered in bruises and I was in the cause of it, I'd want to know, like, dude, what is happening?
Is your blood getting thineah?
Why are you you know, and I extensively interviewed everyone in Ellen's life.
Nobody said she was clumsy.
They said she was in neat freak and this and that.
You know, but you have a friend who might like, oh god, that girl's always breaking her ankle falling down the stairs, Like I have a friend like that.
If she had bruises, I'd be like, oh, well, she's kind of clumsy, and we could all agree.
No one said that about Alan thirty bruises.
She did not do contact sports.
She did pilates like I do.
I have bruises on my calf because I always bang my like you know, with the dresser or whatever.
Sometimes I whatever.
Maybe three thirty bruises, Yeah, a body is a lot.
And nobody said she had thin blood.
She was always bruising, like it's it's different.
Speaker 1And nobody said they ever saw like a snap like cause it's like they never saw them fight or snap, or that he had like a little bit of a weird like control over her or anything like that.
Speaker 4Ellen had told her parents that she wanted to come home to Harrisburg, and Ellen had told her cousin Debbie that she maybe wanted to go stay with her.
Yeah, so there were indications that like, hey, I want to come home, And I really understand Josh the dad, and it's like every dad would feel this way, Like I don't want my daughter to lose her job.
She worked really hard to get that job.
So if Ellen goes home to Harrisburg, she's essentially like quitting her job, right, and that's hugely disruptive.
And you know, but Ellen had indicated that maybe she wanted to come home for a while, you know, so oh that was in the cards.
But I think at the time also people just didn't know what to ask for, to look for, because on the outside, everything seemed so perfect.
And I think that's the other trap that happens to certain kinds of girls where and Instagram feeds that, you know, everything looks perfect.
Yeah, you have to be beautiful, be thin, be perfect.
My relationship's perfect, we have no problems.
But even her friends it said, my god, she never said anything bad.
Speaker 1It's also like I feel like, once the wedding is on the horizon, too, like people ignore so much behavior because they're like, well, the ball is like the boulder of the wedding is already rolling in motion, like I can't.
Speaker 3Stop it now.
Speaker 4You know, right, save the day.
Speaker 1Yeah, And it would be so embarrassing to call off my wedding, would you.
Speaker 4It's so weird, like with the whole calling off the wedding thing.
I just chatting with a woman who like they were engaged, and she found out her her boyfriend took out a huge her fiance took out a huge loan and gambled it all in a day, Oh my god, a month before the wedding.
And I was like, oh my god, I.
Speaker 3Just don't know what did she do?
Speaker 1She married out?
Speaker 3Oh my god.
Speaker 4Dwar Stom of course, but I'm like.
Speaker 6What do we do?
Like when you find out like, oh my god, I think my fiance just cheated on me before the wedding, you know, it's like really, especially when you're in your twenties, can we also just please remember ye that Ellen was twenty seven, just turned twenty seven.
Speaker 4That is not old and wise.
That is still you are still in your twenties.
And when you I feel like the train has left the station that save the dates are out.
I had another friend I remember this so well after college.
What was she like twenty five twenty six.
We were at the beach.
I remember her like shimmying out of her clothes in her bikini save the dates had gone out, and she's like, is it too late to cancel the wedding?
And I was like, no, I mean yeah, but no, yeah, and many years of unhappiness.
Speaker 1I know.
I've heard so many stories of that, people fighting out big secrets right before and then just going through with it and getting divorced later, like they'd rather do that than like cancel all the invitations and all the vendors and the embarrassment.
Speaker 4I feel like I think it's embarrassment.
I think it's the shattering of like, how am I going to tell my family?
There's so much shame on a good day.
Having your relationship end, if it was supposed to be a big one, has a lot of shame in it, you know, it just does it feels like a failure.
It can, you know, so canceling the wedding.
Speaker 2But even in the doc you touched on it where she she wanted to meet, so her friends were getting engaged.
I was part of the social group.
So it's not only like the cancel, but it's like wanting this thing over kind of the.
Speaker 3Person and.
Speaker 1Yes, and then I didn't even realize until I started doing some like extra.
It was probably in the dock and I just like blinked and didn't see it.
But like like the photos of like her toiletry bag on the bathroom sink, that she never wore her shoes in the house, her friend said, and so like why were her boots on?
Like so the theory that I was like seeing people putting forward.
And I don't know if you can or can't sort of agree or disagree with this, but like that was that she he like came home and she was like I'm going to go, and he was like, no, you're fucking not.
And that's when like the fight happened and he killed her.
Speaker 4I mean it it seems like, imagine if you're in a relationship and things are dicey and it's suddenly going to be three days stuck at home in the snow with this person also like you might have felt.
But she did get a full tank of gas.
Some people are like I always get gas in a snowstorm, and other people are like, I don't need gas, you know.
But she she was making a fruit salad and like maybe putting it in.
She was making something to take with her.
She was in her outside shoes.
Inside there was a toiletry bag that was pretty packed and a scarf in the bathroom.
Like it did seem a little hurried.
It did seem like things were moving.
Yeah, so we don't know, you know, a lot of people have different explanations for that stuff.
But it did seem like, uh, yeah, not like, Oh, I'm gonna light a candle and make some soup and I have my slippers on and I'm gonna like shock up for two days and yeah.
Speaker 3And this was a little before.
Speaker 2But we always say this, how like it seems the people that are supposed to be solving the crimes and the perpetrators of crimes kind of how view the women the same way.
And so it informs kind of everything because I liked and I didn't like, but that I forgot what person in the dock said.
Speaker 3If this was someone you love, will you be curious why.
Speaker 2She had bruises or you just like, oh, wouldn't you be curious how she was stabbed in the back, Like, wouldn't it be like, we need to get to the bottom of it.
Not she did this to herself, It's like, and he wanted it over and so did the fucking cops.
You know, it's like no curiosity of what actually happened to this person.
Speaker 4I also, yeah, I totally agree, And I also feel like I thought this was a very poignant point by her friends.
If you were so worried about her, if she was so off her rocker, yeah, hitting this place.
They had never seen her so dark before.
Number One for the record.
On a police report, Sam said she had never said that she had suicidal ideation and had never tried to harm herself on police Never done this, never said she wanted to do it, never threatened to do it.
Psychiatrist said, no ideation, never mentioned it.
I was not concerned.
But now you're so concerned about our mental health.
Howth come you didn't call her best friend and say I'm really worried.
Speaker 1When she said, well you still love me if I'm crazy?
You didn't want to call her mom or anybody or you know.
Speaker 4Yeah, you didn't want to say like, hey, I'm I'm worried.
I'm a little out of my depth, you know, Like what do we need to intervene?
Is there something?
You know what I mean?
Like why Allan had a huge friend group, they were all really tight, Like why didn't the boyfriend call the fiance, call the friends and say I'm super worried.
Speaker 3Yeah, it's right.
Speaker 5Really.
Speaker 4Also, it's like it's in the police report that she had never threatened to kill herself before.
Yeah, there was no idiation.
Like I'm just like, hmm, well that's sudden, then, isn't it.
Speaker 1And then those Google searches.
I don't believe those for a second.
I mean, to have an uncle, I want the uncle arrested.
I want the uncle fucking arrested.
You get to just take someone's laptop, no change, and.
Speaker 4They're not I mean, they're also just like not.
Speaker 1I know.
Speaker 4This is like a weird point that I find really important.
They were not married, therefore they were not family.
That person is not related to allan at all.
He did not get permission from the green Berks.
He didn't say, don't worry, I have her stuff.
He didn't tell them, he didn't ask them.
Speaker 1He did it.
Speaker 4That's literally beyond chain of custody of crimes.
Speaker 3That's like, and the fact that he's a judge right now.
Speaker 4Yeah, I mean he's probably I think retired at this point, but yeah, no, I mean he definitely knew better, right because he's like in the legal arena.
I'm just like, oh my god, why are you taking things that don't belong to you?
Well, birth are you doing?
Like how could you even think to do that?
Speaker 2What's is this an annoying thing that just came out and obviously took years of work?
But do you think about next projects or is that okay?
Speaker 4Oh yeah, for sure, I'm on something that's about to get started that's pretty fascinating, and I'm trying to develop a couple other things.
So it's always so bored, Like I guess maybe I used to be able to talk about what I was on, but I don't.
Speaker 1I can't.
Speaker 4You know, most times you kind of like can't talk about it.
Speaker 1Yeah, but anyway, and it's it's just being crazy because you have to work on it for like three years and just not say anything.
Speaker 4Yeah yeah, but then you build your team and then that's all you talk about with them, but nothing light.
But one of them feels really exciting and impression of the moment could expose a lot of you know, networks type of stuff, and yeah, that one I'm super excited about, and I think I'm gonna have to like kind of slightly build that one on my own, but I think it's it's it's an l a story which feels which feels fun, Like I'm excited to just be able to like get in my car and drive somewhere.
Yeah, start to like build a story like you know, fifteen to thirty minutes from my house, which is super cool.
Yeah.
Speaker 2And you like the investigative like reporting of it all in the research or do.
Speaker 3You like more of the film?
Speaker 1You do?
I do?
Speaker 4I like the twists in terms of something.
I like to try to get to the root cause of things, of like why things are happening and what people are kind of getting wrong about it and try to really understand the people at the center of the stories.
Speaker 1Yeah.
Speaker 3What do you watch for fun?
Do you watch ess Be?
Speaker 1How do you have a favorite episode?
Speaker 4We did reference in Victims Suspect, which was super fun because one of our the girls in the shaw, Diane Romeiro, had wanted to be a cop and she wanted to be Mrsta Heartigay.
She really wanted to do criminal justice us and then she was raped and then arrested and then they killed that.
Speaker 5Dream for her.
Speaker 2So and that's the curse where it's like what about all these rape victims futures.
Yeah, how is that not a concern for anybody?
Speaker 1Nancy?
This was fantastic.
We feel very lucky.
Thank you, right, Nancy.
I can't wait to see what you do next.
I mean, what an accomplished woman.
Speaker 2I really you know, this started out in this way of like, oh this happened, Oh you know the director through other people like let's get this going.
And then to know that she has like such a career in these documentary filmmaking investigat projects and I'm just so knowledgeable and cool and comes from a lawyer family so knows all this stuff.
It really was an incredible chance for us to talk.
Speaker 1To someone like Yeah, and like I literally sat at brunch with this person six months ago and we chatted.
Speaker 3I knew she like worked like in the business.
Speaker 1A little bit, but I like, don't.
I don't know, maybe because it wasn't done yet.
She wasn't like I'm currently working on a true crime documentary, because I would have been like, what tell me everything?
Like it just didn't come up and then I found out later.
So it's really exciting.
Yeah, and this I hope it enrages everyone.
I hope the case is able to get opened up.
She said she felt optimistic, but like who fucking knows, But.
Speaker 3Yeah, it's just.
Speaker 2Why doesn't like the lack of curiosity with the like the police and him and everyone of like not caring to find out what happened, Like if you really didn't do it, bro, aren't you curious?
You're not curious what happened to this person you were supposed to marry, Like you're sick.
I feel like he could do it again, And it's scary that you're allowed you could call your uncle and get away with murder.
Speaker 3Yeah, I mean, I do feel like the privilege.
Speaker 1It's like privileged people short of having like a video of you committing the crime and screaming that you are unrepentant and that you are mentally sound, I feel like there is they will always get out of jail, even if they get convicted, Like they get out of jail early.
It's like no, they just appeal, appeal, appeal, Like I feel like even if this the cops had done a bare minimum of investigation and this guy had become a suspect, he would have somehow gotten off, like with his powerful uncle and parents somehow down the road.
But I feel like it's it's I'm so sad for those parents.
This documentary like really felt like it just opened up their lives to us and they I'm so sad for them that they just are not getting justice for her.
But I hopefully my figures are crossed that this docuseries moved the needle a little bit because people really were talking about it, and it is.
Speaker 3The forensics are bonkers.
Speaker 1I would really also be interested in hearing somebody talk to me about my theory about snowstorms, Like why do the cops just like not do any investigating during snowstorms?
Are they just like tired, cold, busy.
It's like so crazy.
How three of these big true crime cases that I've read about in the past few years, Not that I mean Adnan Sayet is an older case at this point, but the serial case, the Karen Reid case, the Ellen Greenberg case, like all these cases happen when the cops are just kind of like slacking after a snowstorm, you know, and like at least in the case of the cereal thing, it was like, oh, it was a snowstorm, so nobody saw each other for a few days, so all the everybody's memory is fucked up because of the snowstorm.
Like when something changes your regular routine like a snowstorm, it's like everybody's memory is fucked up, Like but did I do that before the snowstorm?
Or how many days I in my house if we were all snowed in or whatever.
You know, it's just interesting how witnesses can already be unreliable, but now people are like forgetting details because of weather.
Speaker 2Yeah, you would think the police would do extra investigating and take extra meticulous information about a crime scene.
I mean, to see someone stabbed an initial year, it's unnatural.
It's just unnatural.
And I guess through truck.
But like I would never see someone stabbed and go they stabbed themselves like you wouldn't but you wouldn't even know that's a thing to do.
Speaker 3Like no, I also, because time is crazy.
I don't think I told you this?
Speaker 2Did I tell you that I met like the Elizabeth Holmes of fucking rape Kits?
This dumb cunt bitch.
Wait you've met when did you meet her?
Well, I'll tell you everything.
So basically there's a comic and I'm like caught and cold with him because I don't like love his views fully, but I my friends like him, so whatever, he's like a person around I'm around these kinds of people all the time.
But he always acts like, oh no, I'm religious, I want a wife, I want to be a good guy, all this stuff.
Then he says he's dating a Republican and I go, excuse me, So he's telling me that he's not white.
He's like dating this like white Republican and who's a millionaire and he doesn't care.
And he doesn't and I said, well, as long as you know, you can never have a leg to stand on with me.
He goes, I don't care.
I want to fuck her.
I want to fuck this person because he doesn't see women as people.
And I've experienced that throughout most of our interactions.
Speaker 3But huh.
And so there's a night at the cell at the view.
It's like a weirder night.
Speaker 1And I would say they hated most of us, but they hated me the most, Like it's probably in my time, I keep having a few of you.
But it was like brudle, how much they hated me.
Speaker 2But these two public defenders loved me, and this cute like multicultural table liked me, but everyone else like hate, like I got a state, people were like, oh no, and I go.
I know they hated me, so I was like, I'll just stay here and get drunk.
And then later a tel mentioned Kent State and nobody laughed.
So I was like, they're dumb.
You don't even reckon, you don't even realize, you don't even understand this Kent State joke.
Like I was getting lived by this point.
But anyways, so during my set, there was a blonde girl with ear muffs that was very annoying.
And I get off stage and that's the Republican.
This guy is fucking and I go nice, she's wearing ear muffs inside the club.
Inside, this bitch can't get enough attention.
And not only that, she interrupted me a few times.
She was very disruptive, and then throughout the night we both stayed because he's gonna have sex with this person and I'm staying because you know, they're not gonna get me down.
And so I'm like watching her interrupt everyone sets, being annoying.
Everyone's distracted, and then she mentioned someone asked what she does for a living.
She goes, I invented a sexual cell app to help victims.
You're welcome and in my head, I'm thinking, is she Well, she's a Republican, so this doesn't make sense to me, and so it took me a little bit of time in research and then I figured it out.
And then someone that works there as a server as a journalist, so he's like, oh, I knew immediately what was up.
Speaker 3Five states are suing this bitch.
She is base.
Speaker 2Basically, the reason I'm thinking about it is because in the Death and Apartment six so three, the private eye goes, I do not profit off human suffering, and I will do this for free.
This bitch is selling rape kits online, at home rape kits, not telling people they're not admissible in court.
There's no chain of command like custody.
There's nothing.
You cannot use these at home rape kits in court.
But she's telling people if you don't want to go to a hospital, at least do.
Speaker 3This and charging them.
Speaker 1She is making money off of victims at their most vulnerable ways.
Speaker 3Her name Madison Campbell.
Speaker 1Yeah, I read an article about her YEP, and I think we talked about it on this podcast.
Yeah, at like years ago, because Lisa started this in twenty nineteen.
It's lead a health YEP and so saying, my god, I cannot believe that this comic who I know as well, is trying to fuck this woman, trying.
Speaker 2They've been fucking that he fucked her that night.
Oh my graced.
So then I go, do you understand that she's profiting off a victim, and not only that she's anti abortion, she doesn't care about women.
She is a Trumper, she voted for Trump, she is a Republican.
So that's what let me off.
So I'm like, oh, they're not going to the hospital, so they're not getting pregnancy tests, so they can't really get abortions, and then you're also probably not doing the like it's also the threshold of testing is better in a hospital, and like screening for STDs and all of that, it's at home.
Speaker 3These women will never get justice.
They are tricks.
Speaker 2She is profiting off of it, acting like a hero, trying to quote Voltaire in these fucking interviews, And I'm losing my mind, and I'm like saying, I'm gonna confront her.
He's like, don't confront her.
I go, I don't give a fuck.
You're a fucking piece of shit.
And then the next day we're around the corner and I'm like talking to everyone about I'm like, he's dating.
He goes, I'm going to dumper, I'm going to DUMPERO.
And it's just like, I'm done being nice to this person because do you know who?
Do you know who else she dated in fucking twenty twenty three Martin Screlly and this guy DMed her And it's like, there's other pretty girls you could be fucking that do not make money by tricking rape victims at their most vulnerable and horrible moments.
Speaker 1Like, yes, she dated this guy Martin Screlly.
Also the guy who, by the way, in case you don't know, uh, tried to like gouge pharmaceuticals because he was just like, why not for medications people needed?
He was a classic healthcare like loser bro.
And that these two bonded over being healthcare pariahs.
She said, yeah, disgusting, She's disgusting.
And then there's is she a fraud or a feminist?
Here?
Speaker 2It's like it is not used in court and it does not help the victims.
And you can work on trying to make rape kits, but get tested more accessible, easier, maybe at home doctors come, but it's like, no, you're profiting off of it.
These are like fake abortion centers, and he keeps saying, oh, I'm gonna dumpy.
Speaker 1Showing up to police stations with these kids, being like I got it, and they're like this doesn't do it.
Speaker 3Yeah, we can't do anything with this.
Yeah.
Speaker 2And he's someone that like thinks he's like pious in some way because he's like praying five times a day and not drinking alcohol.
And it's like you are, You're disgusting, actually, And and I've set into his face.
And then I brought it up.
We were all hanging out and there was like a group of five or six dud and I brought it up.
And there's one dude that was really like with me.
But also every time he's socially around, it's like all we're talking about is him trying to find like a good wife while fucking these people.
And I'm just gonna lose it and again on him, I think, but we'll see.
Speaker 1I know.
I couldn't believe last time he did my show that he had been divorced the second time, and I was like, what's going on?
Speaker 2Like what And it's fine things happened, but to like search for a way and it's always like I need this in a woman.
I want this, like I I want this kind of you know, demon but I need And it's like a woman shouldn't marry because you need that.
Speaker 3I don't know.
Speaker 2I don't like he talks about this and how we've used women and the way he speaks.
But if you're able to fuck someone this bad like I don't know, or be friends with someone that killed their girlfriend, you know, I don't know.
Speaker 1Oh my god, I just want to know what's happening with these lawsuits and how did she even get seed money for this idea.
Speaker 3I don't have a millionaire.
Speaker 1She's just money.
She has money, she's like a rich girl.
Yeah, she was miss Pittsburgh.
It's just wild.
Speaker 2It's just like, I don't know, we're all we're all hypocrites in many ways, but to try to like to have any leg to stand on in anything when you know this person is taking advantage of rape victims and that has nothing to do with you wanting to fuck or not fuck someone, which means you don't see these people as.
Speaker 3People like what is this?
Oh my god, that's fucked up.
Let's see that's so crazy.
Speaker 1Well, okay, let's get Let's move on to our what was mister peg due for today?
Uh, we're just for what was this to preg due?
Which is our you know, we try to direct guys something.
I think we're just going to tell you.
Go watch Death and Apartment six o three if you have not watched it.
It's really really good three episodes.
It's like perfect length wise, everything good information.
Speaker 3I liked it a lot, and I feel like, now that you've heard Nancy talk, go watch it.
Speaker 2And yeah, and it's also like, you know, it's Christmas time, give someone money, read a.
Speaker 1Book, donate, go back through all of our old wwspds in our highlights.
We have three highlights of all of the what we shovel the snow on some you know, someone's yard that can't Yeah, a lasagna for someone I don't know.
Speaker 3It's just like do something nice.
Speaker 1Yeah, but yeah, go and you can search through and there's a bunch of very specific organizations that we've highlighted and stuff, so you can always give if you can give.
Speaker 3And that's that, Thank you so much.
Speaker 2And next week, oh my god, we'll be doing Wrath, which is kind of like Wreath lol season but not not tonally Raths Season three, Episode two.
Everybody, so watch that Happy New Year, save holidays.
Speaker 3I hope everyone gets what they want.
Rath is going to be our last episode of the year.
Speaker 1Have a merry Christmas and a happy Hanukkah and if whatever you celebrate intabus, family and friends, festive us for the rest of us, and we'll see you next week.
Speaker 2That's Messed Up as an exactly right production.
Speaker 1If you have compliments you'd like to give us or episodes you'd like us to cover, shoot us an email it That's Messed uppod at gmail dot com.
Listen to That's Messed Up on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2Follow the podcast on Instagram at That's Messed Up Pod, and follow us personally at Kara Klank and at Glitter Cheese.
Speaker 1As always, please see our show notes for sources and more information.
Speaker 2Thank you so much to our senior producer Casey O'Brien and our associate producer Christina Chamberlain, and to.
Speaker 1Our mixer John Bradley and our guest booker Patrick Cottner, and to Henry Kaperski for our theme song, and Carly Geen Andrews for our artwork.
Thank you to our executive producers, Georgia Hardstart, Karen Kilgarriff, Daniel Kramer, and everybody at Exactly Right Media.
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