Episode Transcript
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1:22
everyone and welcome to Episode Three Hundred
1:24
and Seventy The True Crime Overtime Podcast
1:27
On my version with me as always
1:29
is my partner and Jerome. My.
1:31
Gibson giving our you the i'm doing good
1:33
about you I'm doing great man. Three seventy
1:35
but a big number. just seems like a
1:37
big number. Done yeah was my way when
1:39
I was in the. Fifth, Grade is
1:42
Huskies and when you are a husky
1:44
boy yo! Yo. I
1:46
can remember doing episode two.
1:49
Three. and
1:51
outs three seventy like a rerouted
1:53
one through hello the three hundred
1:55
and sixty nine they did you
1:58
don't emerge had for breakfast And
2:00
I didn't even eat breakfast. I'm like, did I have breakfast?
2:03
Let's go ahead and give our
2:05
patreon shout outs We had Catherine
2:07
Christian. Hey Catherine KV. What's going
2:09
on KV? Babette. Hey Babette Mark
2:11
and Angela Well, thanks mark and
2:13
Angela Catherine Volibach. Hey Lisa
2:16
Thrasher jumped out our highest level.
2:18
Oh, you're awesome Lisa Melissa. Hey
2:21
Melissa J sledge Hey sledge. Rianne
2:23
hitching. What's going on? Rianne. Tasha
2:25
minority jumped out our highest level.
2:27
Thank you minority Kimberly Harris, what's
2:29
going on Kimberly? Charr jumped out
2:31
our highest level. Hey Charr. And last
2:34
but not least Thomas Roger What's up Rogers?
2:36
And then if we go back into the
2:38
vault This
2:40
week we selected Laura Sparkman. Look
2:42
at Sparkman in the house Yeah,
2:44
appreciate the new support the continued
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support on patreon We also had
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a couple of great PayPal donations
2:51
from Terry Laleo.
2:53
Hey Laleo and Maxine Rebecca Kretz.
2:55
Look at that Kretz Yeah, so
2:57
we had just appreciate all the
3:00
support we get you
3:02
know that Laleo that sets back in Elementary
3:05
school and they sing that song. Hey
3:07
Lalee. Hey Lalee. Hey Lalee Laleo. No
3:11
No, I was gonna sing if I don't want to do that. No,
3:14
I didn't go to grade school in the 50s So
3:17
I don't know. Okay, that's that
3:19
will not Play
3:22
well with anybody I don't think
3:25
no, I just don't remember I
3:27
remember lollipop lollipop Yeah, that's
3:29
a different song. You just wanted to pop
3:31
your cheek when you do that. Yeah, Oh, boom So
3:35
gives we have an episode out right now and
3:37
unsolved where we're tackling the
3:39
the outlaw of paths Incident,
3:42
you know big unsolved Kind
3:44
of mysterious case goes
3:47
back to 1959
3:49
we're in Russia. Yeah, so there
3:51
are some rough Pronunciations
3:54
to try to get through but
3:56
such a fascinating case. It really is
3:59
and You know i'm in when
4:01
i was in Siberia that i heard people talking
4:03
about it from your jail cell yeah
4:06
you think about nine hikers and they
4:08
were said to have been experienced hikers.
4:11
Wind up dead and then
4:13
the mystery is just kind of cascade
4:16
from there you know how their
4:18
tent was found how they were
4:20
found. I'm a little
4:22
ton of theory there are people opposed
4:25
over the years some more
4:27
plausible than others but it's
4:29
been talked about for a long time it has and
4:32
will continue to be. I buddy are
4:34
you ready to get into this episode
4:36
of true crime all the time i'm
4:38
excited we're talking about dan markel. 41
4:42
year old dan markel was a
4:44
well known law professor at florida
4:46
state university on july 18 2014
4:50
dan was fatally shot inside his home within
4:52
months of the murder. Investigators
4:55
uncovered a murder for
4:57
hire conspiracy involving his
4:59
in law. Oh those
5:01
are in laws i know we talked
5:03
about in laws before i know
5:06
i've said this i have a
5:09
great relationship with my. Why
5:11
parents get along well we spent
5:13
a lot of time together i did
5:16
you know second guess some things as
5:18
i was researching this case i'll be
5:20
honest with you. Like that specialty
5:22
they make you every night yeah
5:25
yeah the fact that my mother in law
5:27
drives it over here. Does
5:29
seem strange but you drink
5:32
it anyway yeah i drink it so
5:34
far so good. Dan markel was
5:36
born on october 9th nineteen seventy
5:38
two he grew up in the city
5:41
of toronto you're been to toronto
5:43
i have been to toronto i've
5:45
never been when i wanted to go
5:47
seems like a very cool city yeah
5:49
i've been to canada some places in
5:51
canada but never toronto. It's
5:54
a very large city yeah dan
5:56
was known as a highly intelligent
5:58
man he graduated. from Harvard
6:00
in 1995. Afterwards
6:02
he studied political philosophy at
6:05
the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and
6:08
then earned a master's degree at
6:10
the University of Cambridge
6:12
in England. He graduated in 1997 and
6:16
then returned to Harvard for law school which he
6:18
completed in 2001. It's
6:20
almost like maybe I would have passed them along
6:22
this journey. Well that's what I was thinking. I
6:25
know you studied at Harvard. I
6:28
know you were at Cambridge. I don't think you ever
6:30
made it to the Hebrew
6:32
University of Jerusalem but it
6:35
seems like you would maybe have
6:38
passed in the hallways at some point.
6:40
Yes, I did to Cambridge then I
6:42
went to Oxford to do
6:44
some lecturing and then Harvard.
6:47
Dan started off his career
6:49
practicing white collar criminal
6:51
defense and civil litigation
6:53
in Washington DC. In
6:55
2005 he was offered
6:57
an assistant professor position
6:59
at Florida State University.
7:02
So career wise he's doing good. Yeah
7:04
he was. I always
7:06
wonder why someone like
7:08
that would give up
7:10
maybe a successful career
7:13
in law to teach law.
7:15
Not that they don't make good money,
7:17
professors they do, but I just
7:20
sometimes wonder what's the driving motivation.
7:23
Maybe they just have the desire to make sure people
7:25
learn it so they can practice
7:27
it as best as possible. I
7:30
mean sometimes that's people's passion right
7:32
is to teach. Yeah that
7:34
definitely could be it and I think
7:36
a lot of people don't know what they
7:38
want to do. You know think
7:40
back to being in college. It's
7:42
like how do you pick your major? I don't
7:45
know this sounds cool or my
7:47
buddy's doing this so I'm going to
7:49
do this. Now there are other
7:52
people who know what they want to do from
7:54
Jump Street. That's true. But that's
7:56
not everyone. No. I can see you
7:58
going to law school. If you could go back
8:01
10 years, yes, I could see you making
8:03
that, that decision. Yeah. I think
8:05
it would be very interesting
8:07
for sure. But I think
8:09
I would try to parlay it into,
8:11
you know, maybe some type of
8:14
job with the FBI, criminal
8:17
forensics, something, something, I don't know.
8:19
Dan taught classes on criminal
8:22
law, upper level criminal
8:24
procedure, sentencing law and
8:26
policy, tort theory, and punitive
8:28
damages. Tort theory. You
8:31
like a good tort. I know that. Dan
8:33
was tenured in 2010 and
8:36
promoted to associate professor. In
8:38
2012, he was made full
8:40
professor. He was well liked by
8:43
students and faculty, and he was
8:45
known for his kindness and generosity.
8:47
So we're getting a picture of Dan here,
8:49
right? Obviously he's a very intelligent guy. Went
8:52
through, you know, some of the more
8:55
prestigious schools in the world. And
8:57
then kind of launches into
8:59
this teaching career. And it
9:01
just seems like everybody thought he was a, he was
9:03
a really good guy. Dan's
9:06
articles and essays were displayed in
9:08
top law reviews. He had opinion
9:10
pieces published in the New York
9:12
Times and the Atlantic. Dan's
9:15
work focused on retributive
9:17
justice, which is the study
9:19
of punishment in proportion to the
9:22
crime. And I'm a big fan of that. Well,
9:24
you and I talk about it so often,
9:26
right? In the cases that we, that
9:28
we do. Now, things
9:31
have changed over the years. I,
9:33
a lot of times when we're talking about
9:36
cases from the fifties and sixties, we're kind
9:38
of shocked at the sentences
9:40
that people got or the, the actual
9:42
amount of time that they did. But
9:45
then I think you can also go to
9:47
like the eighties and into
9:49
the nineties where, you know, a
9:51
lot of people were going
9:53
to prison for
9:56
like marijuana offenses, you know, the
9:58
whole three stripes. and all
10:00
that so yeah I just
10:02
want the punishment to fit
10:05
the crime. Yeah I think
10:07
that's exactly where we're at and also we
10:10
know in some areas sometimes the punishment
10:12
was harsher on certain people. Absolutely.
10:16
You know so I
10:19
think when you get into the discussion of
10:22
race, gender, and also
10:24
economic status. Of
10:26
course yeah. You know whether or not
10:28
you had the money to hire a
10:30
good attorney. Yeah, yeah makes a difference.
10:33
In 2009, Dan published a book
10:35
titled Privilege or Punish? Criminal
10:38
Justice and the Challenge of Family
10:40
Ties. I used to love family
10:42
ties. With the Keaton's? The
10:44
Keaton's. Yeah. Michael J. Fox. That was a great show.
10:47
He also ran a law blog
10:49
called Prof's Blog, which
10:51
he started around the time he joined FSU.
10:54
It was meant to be a forum
10:56
for young law professors and academics. The
10:59
blog was popular and
11:01
professors from all over the
11:03
US contributed articles. Dan
11:05
was married to Wendy Adelson, who was
11:08
also a faculty member at FSU. They
11:10
had two boys who were three and five
11:13
at the time that Dan was murdered. They
11:15
got married on February 26, 2006. Wendy,
11:19
who was about six years younger than Dan,
11:22
also earned her master's degree at
11:24
Cambridge and was earning her law
11:27
degree from the University of Miami
11:29
in 2006. That's
11:31
some smart individuals there. Yeah, kind of
11:33
a power couple, right? She
11:35
previously directed the Human Rights
11:38
and Immigration Law Project at
11:41
FSU Center for the Advancement of
11:43
Human Rights. At the time
11:45
of Dan's death, she was director
11:47
of the Medical Legal Partnership with
11:49
the FSU College of Law Public
11:51
Interest Law Center. So Wendy
11:54
and Dan were married for six years,
11:56
but she initiated a divorce
11:59
in September. September of 2012. Dan
12:03
returned from a business trip and
12:05
found Wendy, the children and most
12:07
of their belongings missing from their
12:09
home. Wendy moved out with
12:11
the help of her parents while he was away.
12:14
He found divorce papers sitting on the
12:16
bed. That's a pretty rough
12:18
way to find out, you know,
12:20
coming home, you know, when you're
12:23
on the road, any trip, you just want
12:25
to get home and get into your
12:27
nice comfortable bed at night. Oh,
12:29
I was gonna say I can't wait to get home,
12:31
see my family. Well, that too. You just want to
12:33
get into your jammies. So
12:36
it had to be shocking, right? Even
12:38
if the marriage was on the rocks
12:40
and they'd been talking about it, still
12:43
would be shocking to come home from a trip
12:45
and just find everyone and
12:48
almost everything gone. Yeah, and see
12:50
those papers sitting on your bed.
12:52
According to court documents filed by
12:54
Dan, Wendy took almost everything from
12:56
the house as well as hundreds
12:59
of thousands of dollars in cash
13:01
and equities from their bank and
13:03
investment accounts. Okay, that
13:05
might be a little shocking as well. Yeah,
13:08
I mean if your savings
13:11
and cash is all gone, you
13:14
know, I mean, it could be a
13:16
problem. The divorce was finalized on July
13:18
31st, 2013. The agreement included 50-50
13:24
custody and shared
13:26
parenting guidelines. Dan would
13:28
have to pay Wendy over $800 a month in
13:32
child support and a
13:35
$120,000 lump sum payment. He kept
13:37
the house and their accounts,
13:39
vehicles and other property were divided.
13:42
So the only question I
13:44
have is how do you
13:46
divide the accounts when she's
13:49
already rated them? Yeah,
13:52
I'm sure they did an accounting. They must
13:54
have of everything and said, hey, you know,
13:56
you got to put that back
13:58
in or we have to factor it in. after all this
14:00
in. I remember when I got divorced, I mean,
14:04
you have to put everything
14:06
on those disclosure sheets because
14:09
if you fail to, it does
14:11
not bode well for you. Yeah, so you had
14:13
to put your Rex West
14:15
income in there and
14:18
your $1 bills, you had to add all them
14:20
up, pull them out of your G-string.
14:24
There's $37, that'll put that down. Dan
14:28
and Wendy continued having
14:30
conflict over financial disclosures,
14:32
family heirlooms, and the
14:34
children's activities and school.
14:37
And is that unusual? There
14:39
are divorces that go fairly
14:41
smoothly, it's what
14:43
you would consider amicable. And
14:46
then there are others where it's
14:48
not at all. And everything is
14:51
contentious, down to which
14:53
CDs are mine and which are yours
14:56
and which albums do I get, which
14:58
photos, everything. And sometimes the other party
15:00
wants those things just to spite you.
15:03
Sure. A month and
15:05
a half before the divorce was
15:07
finalized, Wendy asked for permission to
15:09
move with the children to Coral
15:11
Springs in South Florida for familial
15:14
support. And so
15:16
that she could accept a new job opportunity
15:19
at a law firm. She wanted
15:21
to have majority custody of the children
15:24
and argued that Dan traveled often
15:26
and was not their primary caretaker.
15:29
So we just got done kind of talking about stuff,
15:34
whether it was pictures,
15:36
CDs, paintings, furniture. That's
15:41
one thing. Right. But
15:44
then when you have kids and
15:46
you talk about custody, that's
15:48
a completely separate issue.
15:51
Yeah, I mean, one, you're cutting into
15:54
my potential time with my
15:56
kids, looking at it from Dan's
15:58
side. But. It also can
16:01
make a difference on the financial aspects right
16:03
if you don't have your kids fifty
16:05
fifty now it's gonna be more
16:09
of the other spouse having them than that could
16:11
change what your child support payments are. When
16:14
he claimed that she was stuck
16:16
in tallahassee until dan decided to
16:18
leave and alleged that he
16:20
made life difficult for her at
16:22
fsu by telling her colleague she
16:25
had mental health issues and stole
16:27
money from him. So i
16:29
use the word contentious it's
16:32
still multiplied but we might
16:34
be passing that point into
16:37
maybe the area of nasty
16:40
things are getting a little nasty. Dan challenge
16:42
the motion arguing it was vague
16:44
and filled with false a
16:46
judge denied wendy's request to move
16:49
because she couldn't prove relocation was
16:51
in the best interest of the
16:54
children. Yeah i think most courts prefer
16:56
the kids to be an area where
16:58
both mom and dad are
17:00
located if both mom and dad can
17:02
find reasonable work. Yeah
17:05
i can see why that would
17:07
be right important to have
17:09
both parents in a
17:12
child's life. Dan started a
17:14
new relationship about a year after
17:16
wendy initiated the divorce he
17:19
was seeing a law professor at new
17:21
york university. He visited the school
17:23
often as part of his work dan
17:25
and wendy were still having conflicts over
17:27
the divorce by two thousand fourteen. In
17:30
february of that year dan
17:32
found a motion to enforce
17:34
the financial provisions of their
17:36
marital settlement agreement he claimed
17:38
wendy filed a false and
17:40
misleading financial disclosure form. That
17:43
shorted her assets by more than
17:45
two hundred and forty thousand dollars
17:47
it's a problem if it can
17:49
be proved. Well it goes back to
17:52
your point right you have to be
17:54
accurate with these disclosures he
17:56
said she took a diamond ring
17:58
belonging to his great. and
18:01
helped herself to over $600,000
18:03
in cash, liquid equities, and
18:05
other assets upon separation. So
18:08
this goes directly back to
18:10
my question. If
18:12
she did kind of raid some
18:14
of the accounts prior
18:17
to the settlement agreement,
18:19
how was that factored in? And it's kind
18:21
of sounding like maybe it wasn't. As
18:24
reported by the Tallahassee Democrat,
18:27
Dan argued that Wendy's parents
18:29
paid her legal fees, which
18:31
allowed her to take the
18:33
most aggressive and unsubstantiated legal
18:36
posture as possible. Wendy's
18:38
attorney filed a request to dismiss the claim
18:40
and told the judge that Dan only paid
18:42
$50,000 of the $120,000 he owed her. Don't
18:48
you just love it when two attorneys are going
18:50
out after each other because they're going
18:52
to have a hard time letting the other side
18:54
win? Well, because the people paying
18:56
them don't want the other
18:58
side to win. Exactly. And,
19:01
you know, when you get into an area of
19:03
a contentious divorce, then
19:05
you're going to have some savvy
19:09
legal attorneys battling it out. I
19:11
almost think as a divorce attorney,
19:14
you probably don't like
19:16
it when your client's an attorney because
19:19
they probably feel like they know as much
19:21
as you and how you should probably
19:23
do it instead of how you know it needs
19:25
to be done. That's a great point. We really
19:27
haven't discussed that, the fact that they're both attorneys.
19:30
And so I'm sure they're
19:32
more involved than the
19:35
normal person. In
19:37
March, Dan filed a motion to
19:40
enforce the parenting rule stipulated
19:42
in the divorce agreement. His
19:44
motion stated that Wendy's mother,
19:46
Donna Adelson, was the source
19:48
of what he
19:50
called parental alienation efforts.
19:53
Dan claimed Wendy violated the agreement
19:55
by letting Donna take care of
19:58
the boys without first asking
20:00
if he could watch them. I've
20:02
heard of that. I have not. And that,
20:04
you know, seems strange to me. You
20:06
would have to ask if
20:09
the boys could spend time with their
20:12
grandparents. Well, I think what he was
20:14
saying, you know, say you decided to
20:16
go out of town for a
20:18
long weekend, instead of letting
20:20
your parents watch them, you should
20:22
first come to me and say, Hey, I'm
20:24
going out of town. I'm going to have mom and
20:27
dad watch the boys or girls unless
20:29
you want to. Yeah. I, okay. I see what
20:31
you're saying now on three
20:33
occasions after the boys spend time
20:35
with Donna, they told Dan grandma
20:38
says you're stupid when
20:40
Dan asked why she said that the boys
20:42
told him, she says you're
20:45
trying to take her sunshine. From
20:48
her. Well, a little family drama. You're going
20:50
to have that. Well, and you're
20:52
also going to have each side's
20:55
parents taking their
20:57
side. Sure. Because they're
20:59
probably only hearing that
21:02
one side, right? So the Adelson's
21:05
are hearing Wendy side
21:07
and nothing else. Dan
21:10
wanted the court to prohibit Donna
21:12
from having unsupervised time with the
21:14
boy. I get it.
21:16
Okay. She shouldn't say that you're
21:18
stupid, but I do
21:20
think it's a little rough to
21:23
say that grandparents can't
21:25
have unsupervised time. Yeah.
21:28
Unless they've proven in the past
21:30
that they've done something wrong. I
21:32
can't see why you would want to enforce
21:34
that besides the fact that you don't like
21:36
the fact that, uh, they called
21:38
you stupid. Yes. There's gotta be more to it
21:41
than that. Sure. A hearing was
21:43
originally scheduled for May 15th, 2014, but it was
21:45
continued because
21:48
of a request from Wendy. Dan
21:51
was killed before the hearing took
21:53
place and you and I have
21:55
done a number of cases kind of
21:58
in this vein. It
22:01
could be divorce. It could be
22:03
you know business, but there's a
22:05
big hearing Getting
22:07
ready to happen and a
22:10
person ends up dead right before that hearing
22:12
is set to take place Oh, yeah, timing
22:15
is everything. Well, I
22:17
sure think it definitely means
22:19
something I think when someone
22:21
is killed right before a divorce
22:24
hearing It's really hard
22:27
to think that that doesn't have something
22:29
to do it When
22:31
you love someone you protect them in the
22:34
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24:51
July 18 2014
24:54
Dan was fatally shot in the head Inside
24:56
the garage of his Tallahassee
24:59
home. He spent that morning running
25:01
errands around 9 a.m He
25:03
dropped his sons off at preschool He seemed to
25:06
be in a good mood and spoke
25:08
to the staff briefly before he left afterwards
25:10
He went to the gym Dan was
25:13
shot at 11 a.m The
25:15
police report stated that his keys were
25:17
still in his vehicle and the car
25:19
was not locked Dan left
25:21
the gym at 10 38 a.m He
25:24
was talking on the phone as he returned
25:26
home and abruptly told the caller Someone
25:29
he didn't recognize was in his
25:31
driveway his last words were
25:33
hold on a second There's someone in
25:36
my driveway that is unfamiliar to
25:38
me The person on the phone heard
25:40
a loud grunt and muffled
25:42
background conversation followed by
25:44
labored breathing One of
25:47
Dan's neighbors heard the gunshots and called
25:49
the police the neighbor saw
25:51
a suspicious vehicle Leaving Dan's home at
25:53
the time of the shooting the
25:55
caller saw the garage door open and
25:58
thought Dan was going to pull out soon He
26:00
went to the house because he was
26:02
curious due to recent break-ins in their
26:05
neighborhood. He entered the garage and
26:07
saw Dan sitting in his car, bleeding
26:09
from his head. Dan was
26:11
moving, but not talking. The
26:14
driver's side window was bashed out, according
26:17
to the neighbor. He wasn't sure
26:19
if someone shot Dan or he
26:21
shot himself. What a scene to
26:24
walk up to. Yeah, that's what I was
26:26
thinking. A really grisly, nasty scene. And
26:28
it also sounds like there's some
26:31
confusion because this guy
26:33
doesn't really know what he's saying.
26:36
Is he looking at a person who's
26:38
been murdered, shot in the
26:40
head, or is he looking
26:42
at a person who decided to end their
26:44
life and shot themselves in the head? Yeah,
26:47
and you've got to take stock
26:49
of the situation pretty quickly to see,
26:52
am I safe being here and
26:55
what I got to do about Dan? Yeah, got
26:57
to get him help, right? Dan
26:59
was rushed to the hospital and died around
27:01
1 a.m. the following day.
27:04
On July 1st, the police issued
27:07
a statement to Quash Speculation about
27:09
the shooting and helped neighbors feel
27:11
safe. They announced that Dan
27:14
was the intended victim of the
27:16
shooting. There was no evidence
27:18
that the murder was connected to a
27:20
random burglary or a robbery. Well,
27:23
that's one way to quash it. Well, it's a
27:25
way to try to quash it. I think
27:27
as a resident of the neighborhood, you might,
27:29
you know, you're still going to be a
27:32
little scared, especially if you had had a
27:34
lot of break-ins recently. But
27:36
the other thing is, how did they know
27:38
that? It
27:40
sounds like pretty quickly, right? Because this is three
27:42
days later, they put it together.
27:45
That someone purposefully intended
27:47
to kill Dan. At
27:50
this time, Wendy's attorney said she
27:52
was cooperating with the police and
27:55
was distraught, devastated and scared to
27:57
death. The police sought information
27:59
on the silver or light green compact
28:01
car seen in the area of the
28:04
shooting. The neighbor who reported the
28:06
shooting described it as
28:08
a newer Toyota Prius or similar
28:10
vehicle. Just wonder if that's the
28:12
right getaway vehicle. It is because
28:15
of silence. That's very quiet. Like
28:17
I'm thinking it is probably not the
28:20
fastest getaway vehicle, but. Actually, a
28:22
lot of the electric cars are quick. Can't get
28:24
up and go. They can get up and go.
28:27
The technology. I don't know. I don't
28:29
know about a Prius, but I know
28:31
that all electric, some of the all
28:34
electric vehicles are very fast from takeoff,
28:36
but you remember the episode where Andy
28:39
keeps it under five miles an hour and he
28:42
sneaks up on Dwight in his Prius.
28:45
That's true. Because it's, it's silent. So
28:47
why at that point during
28:49
the early stages of the
28:51
investigation, the Tallahassee Democrat reported
28:53
that it took an ambulance 19
28:56
minutes to arrive at Dan's home due
28:58
to an error. The dispatcher
29:00
filed the incident as priority
29:03
three instead of priority
29:05
one. As the dispatcher
29:07
gathered more information, the priority
29:09
was upgraded. It was
29:12
unknown. If the slow response contributed
29:14
to Dan's death, you know, 19
29:16
minutes is a long time. I mean, in
29:18
a life or death situation and could
29:22
have contributed. Maybe, maybe they could
29:24
have. Stop the bleeding, did something
29:27
to save his life. His life.
29:29
Well, I don't know how you could
29:31
ever know that for certain, but
29:33
this is like the
29:35
second dispatcher error
29:37
that we've had in, in recent
29:40
weeks. Again, I know it's
29:42
a very tough job, but it's also
29:44
a very important job. You
29:46
think about making a mistake could
29:49
be life or death. Yeah. You know,
29:51
I know we have great listeners that
29:53
are dispatchers dispatcher. I think. Yeah, absolutely.
29:56
And I'm sure she would say, yeah,
29:59
timing is everything. thing when we get
30:01
these calls. What an accuracy and all
30:03
that together. On July 31st,
30:06
2014, the consolidated dispatch
30:08
agency admitted that human error
30:11
contributed to delays and responding
30:13
to the shooting. A
30:15
report issued in September of that year
30:18
found that technological errors played a
30:20
role in the delay. The
30:22
CDA eventually settled with Dan's
30:24
family in August, 2016 for $40,000. Months
30:30
passed with no updates from the
30:32
police. A year later
30:34
on July 17th, 2015, the
30:37
police released new information about the Toyota
30:39
Prius seen at the crime scene. Surveillance
30:42
photos showed it was a 2006 to 2009
30:44
model painted silver. The
30:49
Tallahassee police said the vehicle may
30:51
have been used by the shooter
30:53
and then returned to the original
30:55
owner. Wendy Adelson resigned
30:57
from the FSU law school in
30:59
January, 2015, and
31:02
moved to the Miami area. So
31:05
I said within a matter of
31:07
three days, they somehow figured
31:09
out the Dan was
31:11
the intended target, but now
31:13
we're a year on. Yeah. And
31:16
no arrests have been made. So
31:19
it kind of makes you wonder what
31:22
they knew or what made them so
31:24
confident. Or were they
31:26
just trying to reassure
31:28
the public? Well, I think they would
31:31
for sure trying to reassure the public,
31:33
but could they have known
31:36
or felt pretty good about the
31:38
case, but just didn't have everything they needed yet
31:40
and it's just going to take time. Yeah,
31:42
that's absolutely true. To pull it all in, wrap it
31:44
all up, put in this little bow on it. In
31:47
December, 2015, Wendy
31:50
appeared on a podcast called
31:52
Writing Class Studio, which
31:54
features stories of students in a
31:56
writing class. She said she
31:59
wanted to tell her. side of the story. She
32:01
spoke about what happened after the
32:03
murder and claimed she was interrogated by
32:06
the police for eight hours. She also
32:08
revealed that she never felt passionate
32:10
love for Dan, but thought he would
32:12
be a good father. She
32:14
claimed Dan did not view her as
32:16
an equal, and that he used to
32:19
tell her he was the only one
32:21
who saw that she was secretly a
32:23
bad person. She also described
32:25
how the media treated her like
32:27
a suspect. Nothing like putting this
32:29
all out on a recording, huh? Yeah, I
32:31
did think it was a little strange that
32:35
you would decide to go on a podcast. Now,
32:37
I don't know how many people are listening to
32:39
a podcast called Writing Class Studio.
32:43
I don't think it's in the top 10 or anything like that,
32:45
but... But it's out there. It's
32:47
out there, and it's out there
32:49
and of record. Exactly. And
32:52
so, is
32:54
it smart to make
32:57
statements that the
32:59
police can go back and look
33:01
at, analyze? We'll
33:03
have to see. It would be months
33:06
before another major development in the case.
33:09
On May 25, 2016, 34-year-old Siegfredo Garcia
33:11
was arrested for possession of cocaine
33:18
in Hallandale Beach, Florida. Garcia
33:20
pulled up to a pump at a
33:22
gas station and was soon surrounded by
33:25
at least 10 cars from the FBI,
33:27
DEA, and Hallandale
33:29
Beach Police. That's a lot
33:31
of cars. That is a lot
33:33
of cars. You're like, what? I
33:36
just wanted to get some gas. What's
33:38
going on here? And from three
33:40
different agencies, he was
33:43
a main suspect in the Dan
33:45
Markell shooting. Garcia was
33:47
quickly charged with first-degree murder, and
33:49
the cocaine charge was dropped. You
33:52
know, cocaine charges are pretty
33:54
serious, but not compared
33:56
to first-degree murder. Garcia
33:58
had a lengthy... the criminal record.
34:01
According to the Tallahassee Democrat, he
34:03
was first arrested in April, 1997
34:06
when he was 15 years old. He was
34:08
arrested at least 21 more times
34:11
after that. Most of his
34:13
crimes were misdemeanors. Other
34:15
charges included assaulting an officer,
34:17
breaking into cars or
34:19
making or attempting to make an explosive
34:21
device. Yeah, that's a lot of trouble
34:23
to be in in a short period
34:25
of time. It
34:27
seems like it. Now, as
34:30
an adult, his charges included
34:32
trafficking, amphetamines, aggravated assault
34:34
with a weapon, criminal mischief,
34:37
and possession of cocaine and
34:39
marijuana. But some of those charges
34:41
were later dropped. But you can see, right,
34:44
it seemed like as he got older, his
34:47
offenses got bigger. Yeah,
34:50
I think they escalated as, like you said, as he
34:52
got older. Which is not unusual.
34:55
He was last arrested on October 9, 2012 for robbery
34:57
and resisting an
35:01
officer with violence. He was
35:03
sentenced on October 22, 2014. He received credit
35:05
for time
35:08
served and spent one extra
35:10
day in jail. His codefendant
35:12
received an eight-year sentence. I
35:15
really wanted to find out why the codefendant got
35:17
a lot more time, but there wasn't
35:19
much in the research about it. Sources
35:21
close to the investigation told
35:24
the Tallahassee Democrat that Garcia
35:26
was part of a murder-for-hire
35:28
plot and more arrests were
35:31
expected. Okay, if
35:33
you're part of this murder-for-hire plot
35:36
and you see this in the media or
35:38
the paper or on TV, you
35:40
got to be worried. Oh, I think
35:42
you're shaking. They're
35:44
going to be knocking on my door any
35:46
day now. After the arrest,
35:49
Wendy Adelson sent an email
35:51
to the Tallahassee Democrat saying,
35:53
these past two years have been
35:56
an extraordinarily difficult time for our
35:58
family. Although my children were will
36:00
always live with the tremendous loss of their
36:02
father. My hope is that
36:04
these new developments will finally bring
36:06
some closure. So is
36:09
she really happy and that, uh,
36:11
there might be some closure and the
36:13
family can finally move on or is this just
36:16
a smokescreen? Yeah. Well, that's what we're going
36:18
to have to find out. Right. Because the
36:20
way she's writing this email
36:22
is almost hopeful
36:25
that number one, they got
36:27
this guy, but they're also about ready to
36:30
get the other people involved. Then
36:32
in early June, Wendy Adelson's
36:34
family was implicated in the murder
36:36
for hire plot. The police
36:39
announced that Garcia and
36:41
accomplice Luis Rivera, a top member
36:43
of the Latin Kings gang, drove
36:46
a rented Prius from North
36:48
Miami to Tallahassee on
36:50
July 16th, 2014, and
36:53
arrest warrant was drafted, but not
36:55
yet served for Rivera, who was
36:57
serving an eight year federal prison
37:00
sentence for racketeering. So they knew where
37:02
he was at. Yeah, probably not a
37:04
great sense of urgency there. Rivera
37:06
known as King Tato
37:10
was the head of the North Miami branch
37:13
of the Latin Kings gang, which is
37:15
based in Chicago and operates in 39
37:18
different states. The group
37:20
distributes narcotics and commits
37:22
crimes, including assault, robbery,
37:24
burglary, and identity theft.
37:27
Gang members have also committed
37:29
witness tampering, murders, and kidnapping.
37:32
It's a pretty big gang. It is. It
37:34
also sounds like they're into just
37:36
about a little bit of everything. Like
37:39
Garcia, Rivera had a
37:42
long criminal history and received five
37:44
convictions in drug cases before he
37:46
was even 17 years old. His
37:49
attorney in the racketeering case
37:51
said his client was uneducated
37:53
and illiterate and was
37:55
diagnosed with schizophrenia at the age
37:57
of 10. The two alleged. were
38:00
linked to Catherine Magbineau, who was listed
38:03
as an associate of Garcia. Catherine
38:06
and Garcia have two children together. According
38:09
to unsealed documents, Garcia called
38:11
Catherine 2700 times in the two and
38:16
a half months before and after Dan was killed. That's
38:19
a lot of calls. I
38:22
don't think, in fact, I
38:24
know that I don't make 2700 calls in a year. To
38:27
anyone, I mean to everyone, let alone one person. Even
38:32
if you're in a relationship with that person,
38:34
that just seems too much. I
38:39
know my wife calls me every day
38:41
on her way home from work. She
38:43
doesn't work 365 days a year. Other
38:46
than that, I mean, I call you sometimes, I call a few other
38:49
friends, call my parents, but I know
38:51
I'm not making or even having 2700 calls in
38:53
a whole year probably. I
38:57
mean, you take that 75 days and divide it into this, what is
38:59
it? That's just a crazy amount of
39:01
phone calls per day. Well,
39:05
10 calls per day would only
39:07
be 750. Yeah. So you're
39:10
in the area of like 30, 25 to 30 calls a day. I
39:15
would be like, what now? I'm like, what
39:17
now? I would be like, what now?
39:22
Well, I say that anyway, when you call me, what do you want now? Yeah. Investigators
39:26
learn that around the time of the
39:28
murder, Catherine was in what they
39:31
called a very personal relationship
39:33
with Charles Adelson, who is
39:35
Wendy Adelson's brother. You
39:37
can make of that what you will,
39:40
very personal relationship. That
39:43
could be they were boyfriend, girlfriend. That
39:45
could be they were having, you know, rumpus
39:48
room time. I mean, it could be all
39:50
over the place. Rumpus room time. Sure.
39:53
Time spent in the rumpus room. Oh, okay. Just
39:55
want clarity. But let's go
39:58
back and talk about. this
40:00
fight between Dan and Wendy over
40:02
the custody of the kids. And
40:05
we said it right. Wendy wanted to
40:07
move the boys to South Florida to
40:09
be closer to her family, but
40:12
the judge wouldn't permit it. Emails
40:14
showed that Wendy's parents, especially her
40:16
mother, Donna, wanted her
40:18
to coerce Dan into allowing the
40:21
move. Charles Adelson disliked Dan
40:23
and didn't get along with him. Charles
40:26
was a cosmetic dentist and had
40:28
his own practice. Donna
40:30
worked with him. So I'm
40:33
assuming he had some money. They
40:35
were doing okay. Yeah. And a little
40:37
bit of money. Catherine MacBannua
40:39
also worked at the practice
40:42
and was the president of Garcia's
40:44
company, S Garcia
40:47
Solutions, Inc. Now I
40:49
don't know what kind of company that was.
40:51
I mean, I guess if you're a hit man, I
40:54
don't think you're going to incorporate, are you?
40:57
Maybe you need to have a type
40:59
of front to help him
41:01
wander some of the payments. That's true. That's
41:04
true. According to the
41:06
probable cause affidavit, investigators believe
41:08
the motive for this murder
41:10
stemmed from the desperate desire
41:13
of the Adelson family to relocate Wendy
41:15
and the children to South Florida, along
41:18
with the pending court hearing that
41:20
might've impacted their access to the
41:23
grandchildren. At a press
41:25
conference, Tallahassee police chief Michael
41:27
DeLeo did not call the
41:29
family formal suspects, but
41:31
said more arrests were expected. You
41:34
know, if you are the family and you
41:36
know your involvement in this, you've
41:38
got to be scared. Yeah. I
41:40
think every night, right? You're just
41:42
sitting on the couch wondering, are
41:44
they going to figure it out? When are
41:46
they going to figure it out? The Tallahassee
41:49
Democrat reported that in June, 2014, a
41:51
witness met Garcia and Rivera
41:54
at a motel. The
41:56
police did not locate their key
41:58
witness until January. 2015.
42:01
This witness identified himself as
42:03
a drug dealer and said he
42:05
sold cocaine to Garcia. The
42:08
witness said Rivera had a silver
42:10
short barrel revolver with him during
42:12
the June meeting. That
42:15
same month Rivera rented a 2008 Toyota Prius from July
42:17
15th to July 21st. His and Garcia's
42:23
cell numbers were written on the
42:25
contract. And when I saw that, I thought
42:27
that was a little string. If you
42:29
were going to get paid to go
42:31
kill someone, would you not buy
42:33
a burner phone? Would you put your
42:35
real cell phone number down on this
42:37
contract? I mean, I guess you
42:40
have to put your real name because you
42:42
have to show an ID unless you have a
42:44
fake ID. Yeah, I don't know if I'd even rent
42:46
a car. I would. Why not
42:48
just steal one if you're going to murder someone,
42:50
I guess. Yeah, I don't know. On
42:53
July 16th, the two men left
42:55
North Miami and traveled to Tallahassee
42:58
they arrived after midnight on
43:00
July 17th. They checked into
43:02
a hotel at 1am. Later
43:04
that day, Rivera called the witness they met
43:06
in June and had him book a
43:08
hotel room for the night in
43:11
his name. The Prius was captured following
43:13
Dan on the morning of July 18th, 2014.
43:15
He was seen in the parking
43:19
lot of Premier Health and
43:21
Fitness while Dan was there
43:24
exercising. Garcia's phone was
43:26
recorded near Premier
43:28
Fitness and was used
43:30
to call Catherine Magbineau. Garcia's
43:32
second phone, which was being used by
43:35
Rivera, was also detected in the area.
43:37
This is why you got to use
43:39
those with fray bags or whatever. You
43:42
put your phone in on airplane
43:44
mode, seal it up. Yeah, I
43:46
don't know what that is. That sounds like some
43:48
Jason Bourne type stuff. But again,
43:50
if you're using your real phone,
43:53
I mean, how much does a burner
43:55
phone cost? I don't know. I've never
43:57
bought one, but $39. Okay. I
44:00
assume you've used them quite
44:02
a bit, but we're also
44:04
in the area of technology
44:07
because this is, you know,
44:09
not even 10 years ago. So
44:12
cell phone technology was pretty good.
44:14
They're able to attract these people.
44:17
The Prius was captured at a
44:19
government building, a bank, and
44:22
a store on Dan's morning errand
44:24
route. And it was seen at
44:26
an apartment complex behind Dan's home.
44:29
So again, technology comes
44:31
into play because you have
44:33
all of this camera
44:35
footage, right? Surveillance type
44:37
footage that you
44:39
wouldn't have had years prior. A
44:42
witness at the apartment complex behind Dan's
44:44
house saw Prius parked in the corner
44:46
of the parking lot one morning. The
44:49
witness saw men walking down a path
44:51
that runs behind Dan's house along
44:54
a storm water drainage ditch.
44:57
They returned 10 minutes later. One
44:59
of the men was carrying something and was wet,
45:01
as if he fell into the ditch. So
45:04
I think to police, this indicated that
45:06
the two men were scouting the area
45:08
before the murder. Dan's neighbor
45:11
also saw the Prius backing out
45:13
of Dan's driveway after the
45:15
shooting. Right? We talked about that. I'm
45:18
sure at the time, it meant
45:20
very little to this guy. Number
45:23
one, he didn't know Dan was shot in the
45:25
head yet. No, he just heard
45:27
a shot though. Yes. So I'm
45:29
sure he, you know, he paid attention to
45:31
it, but didn't understand the gravity of
45:34
what he had seen. Now, later on, I'm
45:37
sure he did. Garcia and Rivera's
45:39
phones ceased activity at 10 a.m.
45:41
on the morning of the shooting.
45:44
Investigators believe they turned their phones off,
45:47
killed Dan, and drove back
45:49
to North Miami. Garcia's phone powered
45:51
on at 12 29 p.m. after
45:54
the shooting. At 12 30,
45:56
he called Catherine Magbineau after
45:59
July. 19th Garcia's phone
46:01
was not used again. So
46:04
I think, you know, like they thought they
46:06
were being smart. Okay. The
46:08
morning of the murders before we do
46:10
it, we're going to turn our phones
46:12
off. That way they can't prove we
46:14
were at the murder scene. Yeah. Yet
46:17
they've been all around
46:19
Tallahassee with these phones
46:21
on. In a car that they
46:23
run it with their telephone numbers on the
46:25
rental contract. So again,
46:27
think criminals thinking that
46:30
they're being smart, but not
46:32
really fully understanding the capabilities
46:35
of what law enforcement can do. The
46:38
Tallahassee police believe the two men
46:40
were hired to kill Dan and
46:42
noted that there was a transaction
46:44
in Rivera's checking account on
46:47
the evening of the murder, and that
46:49
never looks good. What money coming
46:51
into your account after someone
46:53
is murdered and you're thought to be
46:55
the hit man, that's like the police
46:57
witnessing you bringing me, you know, a
47:00
whole bunch of cocaine. And
47:02
that night I transfer a whole
47:04
bunch of money into your account. One
47:06
it's talcum powder. Okay. So it's
47:08
this expensive talcum powder. That'd
47:11
be some really good stuff. On
47:13
July 17th, 2016, the
47:15
grand jury indicted Siegfredo
47:17
Garcia and Luis Rivera
47:19
for first degree murder.
47:22
After his arrest, Garcia claimed he'd
47:24
never been to Tallahassee and
47:27
never made any trips with Luis
47:29
Rivera. And I'm sure when
47:31
he made that statement, he didn't
47:33
know all of the evidence
47:35
that the police had against him.
47:38
Yeah. I'm sure he's thinking deny, deny,
47:40
deny. Luis Rivera was first interviewed
47:42
on May 24th, 2016, and he too denied traveling
47:48
to Tallahassee or having any knowledge
47:50
of the crime. Investigators learned
47:52
Rivera was not at work from July
47:54
16th to July 18th. Also
47:58
makes it tough to be a hit man. when you
48:00
actually have a job. It does,
48:02
because now you have to account for,
48:04
why were you at work? I
48:06
just needed some time off. But
48:09
it wasn't to go to Tallahassee. He
48:11
was interviewed again on May 27. Once
48:14
again, he denied traveling to
48:16
Tallahassee. But this time,
48:18
he was shown a picture of himself
48:20
and Garcia at an
48:22
ATM sitting in the Prius.
48:25
So he admitted he was in the
48:27
car and said that they did
48:29
rent the car and did
48:32
drive to Tallahassee, but it was
48:34
to visit Florida State University. But
48:36
never good when your story changes in a
48:38
murder case. Or never good
48:41
when you're caught in a flat out
48:43
lie. No, we did not
48:45
travel to Tallahassee. Well, yeah,
48:47
we did, because now you have a picture
48:49
of us at an ATM.
48:52
Oh, you met July 16, 17, 18. Oh
48:55
yeah. Yeah, I think that's when
48:57
we did that tour of FSU. Yeah, yeah,
48:59
that's right. Hey
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folks, you've heard me talk about how
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50:55
In late June, prosecutors revealed that
50:57
Garcia and Rivera failed at an
50:59
earlier attempt to kill Dan in
51:02
June 2014. Their
51:04
trip to Tallahassee was cut short because
51:07
a Miami rental car company found out
51:09
they left the area when the car
51:11
was rented for local use only. They
51:14
turned around and returned to Miami. That's
51:17
the other thing. You know, some of these cars today,
51:19
when you rent them, they have
51:21
tracking. Yeah. They know
51:23
exactly where you are, where you've gone, where you've
51:25
been. It was reported that
51:28
detectives began looking into the
51:30
Adelson family within days of
51:32
the murder, as well as Wendy's
51:34
ex-boyfriend, Jeffrey Lacoste, who
51:37
was a fellow FSU professor.
51:39
Lacoste was cleared a few days later. However,
51:42
on August 12th, he contacted
51:44
the police to tell them
51:46
about texts between him and
51:48
Wendy. They had plans to
51:51
travel to California from July 11th
51:54
to July 17th, but she canceled on
51:56
June 4th, two weeks before
51:58
Garcia and Rivera. traveled to
52:00
Tallahassee for the first time. According
52:03
to Lacoste, about three weeks after
52:05
the murder, Charlie Ailsen
52:07
asked Wendy and others to go
52:09
out with him for a celebratory
52:11
dinner. Wendy vomited during the
52:14
dinner, which Lacoste found
52:16
suspicious. As quoted
52:18
by the Tallahassee Democrat, he
52:21
believed Wendy was indirectly responsible
52:23
for the murder. When he was told Wendy
52:25
was not a suspect, he said, well,
52:28
she should be. That's coming from
52:30
her boyfriend or ex-boyfriend? Ex-boyfriend,
52:32
yeah. And he's a professor too,
52:34
right? So probably a smart guy, not
52:37
making stuff up. Well, you wouldn't think
52:39
so. Now, are
52:41
there explanations why someone might
52:44
vomit during dinner? Yeah, there
52:46
are. You're sick, you don't realize
52:48
how sick you are, but
52:51
you can also understand why
52:54
when put with everything else that's going
52:56
on, this guy would find some
52:59
of this stuff suspicious. Yeah, I'm
53:01
wondering if Jeffrey just didn't
53:03
know a little bit more information, but
53:05
wanted to be careful, but also make
53:07
sure that they looked into her. No, and
53:09
maybe he wasn't real happy. We don't know how
53:12
that relationship ended. So maybe he wasn't a
53:14
big fan of hers at this time. I don't
53:16
know. Three days after the
53:18
murder, investigators got a warrant for
53:21
Wendy's phone and email records. They
53:23
found keyword searches for Amy
53:26
Adler, Dan's girlfriend at the time,
53:29
Adler's ex-husband, and
53:31
Adler's brother. You got to be
53:34
careful with your keyword searches. Yeah,
53:36
I got to probably throw my phone away now. I
53:38
think most people would
53:41
not be happy if their
53:43
keyword searches were exposed. It
53:46
could be a problem. It could be. Not
53:49
saying it's criminal, sometimes
53:51
it could just be embarrassing. I
53:53
mean, mine are all good. All philanthropic?
53:55
Is that what you're telling me? We're all
53:57
about how to give your money to... charitable
54:01
organization. Absolutely. On
54:03
the day Dan was killed, Wendy
54:06
told investigators that her brother joked
54:08
about hiring a hitman. It's
54:10
always people joking about hiring a
54:12
hitman. Have you ever once
54:14
made a joke about hiring a hitman?
54:17
No. I mean you would
54:19
probably just do it yourself, so, but I
54:21
think the majority of people, it
54:24
just doesn't seem like a
54:26
joking matter. The right subject
54:28
matter to make a
54:30
joke about. I'm really not sure how that would come up
54:32
during a party. Just everyday
54:35
conversation. Yeah, you know, by
54:37
the way. I'm thinking about hiring a
54:39
hitman. Yeah. A TV repairman
54:41
came to Wendy's home on the
54:44
morning of July 18th and her
54:46
brother joked over the phone that
54:48
buying a new TV was
54:50
cheaper than hiring a hitman. She
54:52
said in her interview that Charlie
54:54
knew Dan treated her badly and
54:56
it was always his joke. Okay,
54:59
buying a new TV, I would assume,
55:01
is cheaper than hiring a hitman. My
55:04
thought was buying a new TV nowadays
55:06
is, I think, cheaper than having them
55:08
repaired. I'm thinking if
55:11
your hitman would be cheaper than
55:14
a TV, you probably don't have
55:16
the right hitman. Like in horrible
55:18
bosses. Yeah. When he looked up
55:20
wet work. That's right. So
55:25
you're telling me nobody wants to be peed on.
55:27
That's what you're talking about. I'm saying that's not
55:29
going to do the job. In
55:31
response to the accusations, the Adelson
55:33
family attorneys issued a statement saying
55:35
per the Tallahassee Democrat, there is
55:38
a reason that the police have
55:40
not arrested any of the Adelson's.
55:42
They weren't involved in Dan's death. Okay,
55:45
well that's what you want your attorney to say.
55:47
Yeah, I don't think your attorney's going to put a statement out
55:49
that says they're all
55:52
took part in this and we
55:54
just haven't been arrested yet. Catherine
55:57
Magbineau was arrested on October
55:59
1st. 2016 in
56:01
charge with murder. Investigators
56:03
considered Catherine the go-between
56:06
for the Adelson family. Investigators
56:09
couldn't link Dan Markell to
56:11
Garcia and Rivera until
56:14
they found Catherine three days before
56:16
the murder. The rented Toyota Prius
56:19
was in the area of Catherine's condo
56:21
near Miami. So again, I'm
56:23
telling you, they knew where this car
56:25
was. Yeah, they could track it. And it was
56:27
a big part of
56:29
the investigation. Now whether
56:32
that was through the cell
56:34
phones of these two guys or
56:36
through the Prius itself in
56:39
some way or just different
56:42
cameras or the cameras that we
56:44
talked about. In August
56:46
2016, prosecutors sought medical records
56:48
showing that Charles Adelson paid
56:51
half the cost of a
56:53
breast enhancement surgery for Catherine
56:56
Magbunua in October 2014. Family
56:59
discount, family, family.
57:02
Why don't think he did the
57:05
breast enhancement surgery? He was
57:07
a cosmetic dentist. I
57:09
mean maybe he took a shot at
57:11
it, but it didn't say he did
57:13
it for free. It said he paid
57:15
half the cost. I got you. But
57:17
if you're going to pay
57:20
someone for a hit,
57:23
instead of, you know, let's
57:25
say dropping five, ten
57:27
thousand dollars into
57:29
their account, wiring it, writing
57:32
a check. Well, what
57:34
about paying for a large chunk of
57:37
a surgery,
57:39
a breast enhancement surgery? That's one way to
57:41
go. You know, if that's something that she
57:43
already planned to do. Yeah, I don't
57:46
know how they were able to figure out it came from
57:48
him, but obviously he needed to do
57:50
a better job of paying
57:52
his half. Yeah, I'm assuming he probably
57:54
used a credit card or something
57:57
like that because he probably
57:59
never. Figured that
58:01
this would all come back around and
58:04
even if it did He would just
58:06
say you know, this is this person works for
58:08
me. I wanted to do this for them It
58:11
was my gift to them. Yeah after
58:13
the murder Rivera and Garcia
58:16
purchased several cars and Motorcycles
58:19
and around this time Catherine
58:21
began receiving paychecks from the
58:23
dental practice The checks were
58:25
signed by Donna Adelson I
58:28
always remember that movie With
58:31
De Niro good fellas. Yeah,
58:34
where they pull out that big heist they
58:36
say don't buy anything Exactly, and
58:39
there's a reason for that. You know, I
58:41
don't think these were wealthy individuals Who
58:44
before this were able to go
58:46
out and buy? Multiple cars
58:48
first of all who buys multiple
58:50
cars these guys rich
58:52
people maybe but yeah You
58:55
once you start showing off once
58:57
you get flashy when? Just
59:00
prior to this you had no
59:02
means to be flashy whatsoever You're
59:05
just sending out, you know, the
59:07
the bat signal like hey, come get me come
59:09
look at me Then that
59:11
spotlight on you and then
59:14
you have Catherine receiving
59:16
you know checks from
59:18
the dental practice between
59:20
July 2015
59:22
and November Catherine
59:24
deposited over $56,000
59:28
into her bank account That
59:30
is a lot of money no way
59:32
in the world. Was she making
59:34
that kind of money? working
59:38
legitimately with the Adelson's
59:40
active at the practice. Yeah,
59:42
it's no just not gonna happen. That's
59:44
gonna happen According to court records.
59:46
There was a phone call system in
59:48
place Catherine typically
59:51
called Charlie Adelson
59:53
he called his mother Donna and
59:56
Catherine called Garcia the
59:59
group continue continued exchanging calls on the
1:00:01
night of the murder and the day
1:00:03
of the murder. So then they've
1:00:05
got a call tree established essentially.
1:00:09
Yeah. Investigators
1:00:11
said Charlie did everything he could
1:00:13
to keep Catherine happy. She
1:00:15
purchased a car belonging to Harvey
1:00:17
Adelson, his father, for a bargain.
1:00:21
In 2016, he offered to sell her
1:00:23
his boat and offered her
1:00:25
his Range Rover. Hey,
1:00:27
I got a boat over here. I'll sell it to you. You
1:00:29
know what? I'll even throw in my Range Rover so you can
1:00:31
pull it. Well, you know who you
1:00:33
have to keep happy? Someone
1:00:36
who knows you did something very,
1:00:38
very bad. Yeah. I wonder if
1:00:40
they think about that. Well, I
1:00:42
think a lot of people incorrectly assume. If
1:00:45
you're involved in it with me, then
1:00:48
you're going to keep your mouth shut. But
1:00:51
we've seen in so many cases, that's not
1:00:53
always how it works. No, they extort you.
1:00:57
Yeah. Investigators also revealed that
1:00:59
an undercover agent gave Donna
1:01:01
Adelson a press release, referring
1:01:04
to the murder, and tried to
1:01:06
blackmail her for $5,000. Well,
1:01:09
it seems like a pretty smart tactic to use. Yeah,
1:01:12
because investigators then wiretapped the
1:01:14
calls between the Adelson's and
1:01:16
Catherine. On April 20, Charles
1:01:20
and Catherine talked about the black man.
1:01:22
According to the Tallahassee Democrat, Charles
1:01:25
told her, paying someone
1:01:27
off is not an admission
1:01:29
of guilt. He said
1:01:31
he would pay Catherine to call the
1:01:33
blackmailer, tell him she would donate to
1:01:35
a charity, and ask him
1:01:37
not to contact them again. Now,
1:01:39
I would argue with the paying someone
1:01:41
off is not an admission of guilt.
1:01:45
Now, there are celebrities who
1:01:47
ultimately pay people. Yeah. It's
1:01:50
in their best interest, even though
1:01:52
they may not have done whatever it is
1:01:54
they're being blackmailed for. That's happened. I mean,
1:01:56
you could argue with it for sure, but...
1:01:58
Yeah, you can. I don't
1:02:01
understand this. Call the
1:02:03
blackmailer. Ask him not to
1:02:05
contact them again. Oh,
1:02:07
well they've asked me not to contact so
1:02:09
I must stop doing
1:02:11
whatever I'm doing. Since you asked me,
1:02:14
I'm sorry for bugging you. Charlie
1:02:16
said that if that person was not an
1:02:18
officer, you better kill him because he's going
1:02:21
to be a big problem. He
1:02:23
added, if you can't do it, I'll
1:02:25
have someone else do it. Okay,
1:02:27
the stuff before, not all
1:02:30
that incriminating. This part, that
1:02:33
doesn't look good. Catherine asked
1:02:35
Garcia to track down the
1:02:37
blackmailer. They argued when Garcia said
1:02:39
he wouldn't do it. Well,
1:02:42
no, he's already got his cars and motorcycles
1:02:44
and he's good for a while. And
1:02:47
maybe he had a sense
1:02:49
that maybe the police were watching
1:02:51
or part of this plot. Well,
1:02:54
and Charlie must have had that sense too, because he
1:02:56
said if that person was not an officer, then
1:02:58
you better kill him. Donna eventually called
1:03:00
the undercover agent and said she had nothing
1:03:02
to do with the murder. On
1:03:05
May 24th, the FBI attempted to speak
1:03:07
to both Garcia and Catherine. Catherine
1:03:09
never came out of her house. Later
1:03:12
that day, Garcia told her
1:03:14
he was questioned by law enforcement.
1:03:16
They bought new phones at a
1:03:18
Walmart. Oh, now they're buying new
1:03:20
phones? You should have bought the new phones at a
1:03:22
Walmart in the very beginning. On
1:03:25
October 4th, 2016, Luis
1:03:27
Rivera pleaded guilty to second-degree
1:03:29
murder in exchange for a
1:03:31
19-year sentence that would only add seven
1:03:33
more years to his current sentence. He
1:03:37
agreed to provide information about the
1:03:39
murder. So, you know, really, if you think
1:03:41
about it, it's a pretty good deal for him. It's
1:03:43
a really good deal for him. You know, he's already
1:03:46
serving a federal sentence.
1:03:49
They say, hey, if
1:03:51
you cooperate, you only have
1:03:53
to do seven more on top of
1:03:55
what you already have, as long
1:03:57
as you provide us the information we need.
1:04:00
In his October 4th interview,
1:04:03
Rivera said he supplied the gun and
1:04:05
drove the car to the crime scene, but
1:04:08
Sigfredo Garcia was the
1:04:10
shooter. Rivera claimed that when he traveled
1:04:12
with Garcia in June 2014, he didn't know they
1:04:17
were going to Tallahassee to commit
1:04:19
murder until he got into the
1:04:21
car, and Garcia showed him
1:04:23
a photo of Dan Markell. He
1:04:26
thought they were going to commit a robbery.
1:04:29
Now for me, it's always a
1:04:31
matter of, do I believe what these people
1:04:33
are saying or not? But
1:04:35
there is this added component that
1:04:38
he can pretty much say whatever he
1:04:40
wants. Yeah, he has the
1:04:43
deal. The deal's already in place, so
1:04:46
does it mean he wouldn't try to soften
1:04:48
up his role a little bit? No,
1:04:50
not absolutely, but there's really no need for him
1:04:52
too. Garcia told him
1:04:54
he was hired to kill Dan because
1:04:57
of a custody dispute. Rivera
1:04:59
said he didn't know the names of those
1:05:01
who hired him. Garcia told him they
1:05:03
would be paid $100,000 in total, with Garcia taking
1:05:06
$40,000, Rivera taking
1:05:12
$35,000, and
1:05:14
the rest going to Garcia's on
1:05:16
and off girlfriend, Catherine. One
1:05:19
of the better paydays we've had for
1:05:22
hit men in some of our episodes. It's
1:05:24
quite a bit of money, right? $100,000, but let's break it
1:05:26
down. Garcia,
1:05:29
who was said to have been the shooter,
1:05:32
was going to get $40,000. Rivera
1:05:35
is going to get $35,000 for what? Supplying
1:05:38
the gun and driving the car? Yeah,
1:05:41
and the girlfriend's getting $25,000 just
1:05:43
because she arranged it. Brokered
1:05:45
the deal. The day before the
1:05:47
murder, they were in the Prius and
1:05:49
drove past Wendy walking with the kids.
1:05:52
Garcia told him Wendy came
1:05:54
to make sure everything was
1:05:56
alright. Rivera was nervous about
1:05:59
the way Wendy was. looked at their
1:06:01
car. He asked Garcia to call Catherine
1:06:03
and ask why she was there. Catherine
1:06:05
told him over the phone that Wendy
1:06:07
was there to make sure they were
1:06:09
not lying and she wasn't paying him
1:06:11
for nothing. So this really
1:06:14
implicates Wendy. Sure does. Polls are
1:06:16
right into it. Rivera
1:06:18
was three to four feet away
1:06:20
from Dan's car during the shooting.
1:06:23
They left immediately after and never spoke
1:06:25
about it again. Garcia threw
1:06:27
the gun off a bridge into the water
1:06:29
when they fled. The next day
1:06:32
they arranged a meeting with Catherine
1:06:34
Magbineau to get their money. Rivera
1:06:36
told the police Katie was in
1:06:39
the middle doing everything per
1:06:41
the Tallahassee Democrat brokering
1:06:43
then. Yeah. So she not only set
1:06:46
it up, she helped
1:06:48
make the payments and transfer
1:06:51
the money, all of that. Catherine
1:06:53
Magbineau was indicted for first
1:06:55
degree murder on November 29th,
1:07:00
2016. Well, she did make sure this happened the way
1:07:02
it did. Yeah. She was a very big part
1:07:04
of it. No doubt. In the
1:07:06
following months, the defendants scheduled trials
1:07:09
were delayed on February 7th, 2018
1:07:11
Garcia and Magbineau were both charged
1:07:14
with conspiracy and solicitation to commit
1:07:19
murder. In June, 2018
1:07:21
a judge ruled that they would be
1:07:23
tried together. Jury selection for
1:07:26
their trial started on September
1:07:28
23rd, The
1:07:31
defense sought to distance their respective
1:07:34
clients from the crime. And
1:07:36
this is what I always think is strange
1:07:38
about, you know, when two people are tried
1:07:41
at the same time, you know, most often
1:07:43
they have two different defense attorneys. Right. And
1:07:47
not only are they fighting the state or
1:07:49
the federal government, but
1:07:52
they're also kind of fighting each
1:07:54
other. Well, now it's time to save their own
1:07:56
ass. Right. According to the
1:07:58
Tallahassee Democrat, attorney
1:08:00
said, the only thing she's guilty of
1:08:02
is terrible taste in men. Basically
1:08:05
saying she had nothing to do with it.
1:08:07
Her boyfriend just happened to be a cold
1:08:10
blooded killer. Don't pay attention to
1:08:12
the fact that she got paid and
1:08:15
she broke her to deal because we have
1:08:17
proof of that. She got
1:08:19
new fake boobs and that was
1:08:21
part of the deal. Her defense argued
1:08:23
there was no direct evidence of her
1:08:25
involvement in the crime. Prosecutors
1:08:27
alleged that the Adelson family paid
1:08:30
a hundred thousand dollars for the
1:08:32
hit. They argued that Wendy
1:08:34
viewed Dan as a problem and
1:08:36
Catherine was hired to solicit
1:08:39
Sigfredo Garcia, who in
1:08:41
turn solicited Luis Rivera to
1:08:43
help kill Dan. Garcia's
1:08:46
attorney told the jury that Luis
1:08:48
Rivera's statements were inconsistent
1:08:50
and Rivera was the only one who could
1:08:53
put Garcia at the scene of the murder.
1:08:56
Wendy Adelson testified under
1:08:58
immunity at trial. She
1:09:00
testified that she knew some of her
1:09:02
family members were angry with Dan, but
1:09:05
she was not involved in the plot
1:09:08
to kill Dan and had no knowledge
1:09:10
of the conspiracy. Luis
1:09:12
Rivera testified about how he
1:09:14
was hired to participate in
1:09:16
the murder. Wendy's ex boyfriend,
1:09:18
Jeffrey Lacocks testified that on
1:09:20
July 13th, 2014, she
1:09:24
told him her brother Charlie looked
1:09:26
into hiring a hit man. He
1:09:28
first looked into hiring a hit man in
1:09:30
2013 after Wendy
1:09:32
was denied permission to move to
1:09:34
South Florida. Lacocks testified
1:09:36
that this conversation occurred as they
1:09:39
were breaking up. He didn't give
1:09:41
it a lot of thought at the time. And
1:09:43
I get that, right? People talk
1:09:45
about all kinds of strange things.
1:09:48
You know, they're in the process of
1:09:50
breaking up. She's talking about
1:09:52
something. Does he believe it or
1:09:54
does he even care? Yeah. But why even
1:09:56
talk about it if you know that you're not going to
1:09:58
be together? Well, that's all why. Why would you
1:10:00
talk about it anyway? Even if you are
1:10:02
together? The less people know, the better off
1:10:04
you are. But that doesn't seem to be
1:10:06
how people operate. Again, now
1:10:08
we're not talking about mastermind criminals
1:10:11
here. No, we're not. Catherine
1:10:13
Magbineau also testified at trial and denied
1:10:15
having anything to do with the murder.
1:10:18
She did tell the court that she
1:10:20
thought Charles Adelson was
1:10:22
involved. So again, you know,
1:10:25
this is so funny. Not
1:10:27
in the context that
1:10:29
somebody was murdered, obviously, but in
1:10:32
the context of these people trying to save
1:10:34
their own act. Right. I
1:10:36
mean, they'll do anything. They'll say anything.
1:10:39
Well, Charles Adelson was involved. We know
1:10:41
that. Sure, we do. But how
1:10:43
are you going to get around the fact that he
1:10:45
paid for half of your breast enhancement
1:10:48
surgery just because he liked
1:10:50
you, he was a good guy. The
1:10:52
employee of the month. How are
1:10:54
you getting around this $56,000 deposited
1:10:56
into your account within a matter
1:10:58
of, you know, four months or
1:11:00
whatever it was? This new Range
1:11:02
Rover, maybe you're driving, not driving.
1:11:04
I don't know. The boat. In
1:11:08
closing, Catherine's defense argued
1:11:11
she should be acquitted because
1:11:13
Rivera was an unreliable witness.
1:11:16
And obviously they have to
1:11:19
discredit Luis Rivera. Right.
1:11:21
He is the one kind of tying
1:11:24
everyone together. As far as the
1:11:26
witness, they have evidence that that's
1:11:28
tying a lot of these people
1:11:30
together. Garcia's defense told the
1:11:33
jury that it was
1:11:35
Luis who killed Dan Markell.
1:11:37
They questioned why Garcia would go to
1:11:40
the shooting if Rivera was
1:11:42
the real killer. I kind of
1:11:44
questioned why Rivera would go to the
1:11:46
shooting. Now, according to him, he didn't know he was
1:11:48
going to a shooting. I
1:11:51
still don't know why you have to pay this guy $35,000. You
1:11:55
can drive the Prius yourself. Take an
1:11:57
Uber. From Miami to
1:11:59
Tallahassee. I guess you could.
1:12:01
That's another record though. Keep
1:12:05
it running buddy. The prosecution reiterated
1:12:07
that they believed the Adelson
1:12:10
family, hired the killers, and
1:12:12
suggested Wendy planned her
1:12:15
alibi. On October 11, 2019,
1:12:19
Garcia was convicted of first degree
1:12:21
murder, jurors deadlocked, and
1:12:23
a mistrial was declared for cloth.
1:12:26
On October 15, the jury voted for life
1:12:29
in prison for Garcia rather
1:12:31
than the death penalty, and
1:12:33
prosecutors confirmed they would retry
1:12:36
Catherine Magbineau. The case moved
1:12:38
slowly for the next year. It
1:12:40
was kind of unclear if or when
1:12:43
anyone else would be arrested. Then
1:12:46
on April 21, 2022,
1:12:48
Charlie Adelson was arrested and charged
1:12:50
with first degree murder, conspiracy
1:12:53
to commit murder, and
1:12:55
solicitation of murder. That's a
1:12:57
lot of serious charges. It is,
1:13:00
but it's also kind of hard to believe
1:13:02
that with what kind of
1:13:04
came out, he wouldn't be arrested.
1:13:07
Now, maybe they just thought a lot
1:13:09
of it was so circumstantial that
1:13:12
they didn't know if they had enough because
1:13:15
it was all circumstantial. A
1:13:17
few months later, Catherine's retrial started
1:13:19
on May 16, 2022. Once
1:13:23
again, prosecutors argued Catherine was the
1:13:26
middleman between the family and the
1:13:28
killers. It's pretty much the
1:13:30
same testimony at this trial. Catherine's
1:13:33
attorneys argued she was being wrongfully
1:13:35
prosecuted. Catherine testified
1:13:37
about her son's disability, getting
1:13:40
sick with COVID while awaiting trial, and
1:13:42
her mother's death. I get
1:13:44
that those are all horrible things. They are.
1:13:47
I don't really know what they have to do
1:13:49
with being on trial for
1:13:52
murder or solicitation of
1:13:54
murder or being the go-between in
1:13:57
a murder. The prosecution presented
1:14:00
the wiretapped conversation where
1:14:02
Catherine and Charlie discussed
1:14:04
killing the undercover agent,
1:14:07
the pattern of phone calls between
1:14:09
the Adelson's Catherine and Rivera and
1:14:11
Garcia, and the payments made
1:14:13
to the suspects after the murders. Doesn't
1:14:15
look good. It doesn't. That's kind of
1:14:17
what I was saying. I
1:14:19
get it. You know, Charlie was
1:14:21
arrested, but it seemed like it took
1:14:24
a long time. And to me, they
1:14:26
had quite a bit of evidence. I
1:14:28
don't know what they were waiting on on
1:14:30
May 27, 2022. Catherine
1:14:33
Magbineau was found guilty of first
1:14:35
degree murder on July 29. She
1:14:39
was sentenced to life plus 60 years. It's
1:14:41
a hefty, uh, sentence. Yeah. She
1:14:43
actually got more than Garcia. Well,
1:14:47
you can make the case saying if it wasn't
1:14:49
for her, there wouldn't ever have been Garcia. Yeah,
1:14:52
that's true. Um, I also don't
1:14:54
know. Garcia's might've been life without
1:14:56
parole and maybe she got life
1:14:59
with parole, but plus
1:15:01
60 years, it didn't actually say
1:15:03
that, but that could be later that year.
1:15:05
Catherine agreed to act as a state witness
1:15:08
in the prosecution of Charlie
1:15:10
Adelson. And this is one
1:15:12
of the things that, that I haven't talked about yet.
1:15:15
I did kind of say, well, I wonder why they
1:15:17
were waiting, but this is probably
1:15:19
why. They were probably waiting
1:15:22
for the resolution of Catherine's
1:15:24
trial. Yeah. Cause now maybe
1:15:26
they can offer her a reduction in sentence.
1:15:29
Or some incentive, you know,
1:15:31
ramen noodles, ding dongs, whatever,
1:15:33
a pack of smokes here
1:15:35
and there jury selection for
1:15:37
Charlie Adelson's trial started on October
1:15:39
23rd, 2023. Pretty
1:15:43
recent. Yeah. No, this is
1:15:45
a very recent case. Parts of
1:15:47
it in opening statements, Charlie's defense
1:15:49
told the jury he was innocent
1:15:51
and he blamed Catherine and her
1:15:53
associates for the murder. So
1:15:56
I understand you have
1:15:58
to say you're, you're innocent. You have
1:16:00
to blame somebody else. But here's
1:16:02
my question. Gibbs, why
1:16:05
would Catherine Garcia
1:16:08
and Rivera want
1:16:10
Dan Markell dead? What,
1:16:12
where's the connection? Yeah. The only connection
1:16:14
is. The Adelson, right.
1:16:17
And Wendy. Defense attorney,
1:16:19
Daniel Rasbaum brought up
1:16:22
the bad joke Charlie made about
1:16:24
buying his sister a TV because
1:16:27
it was cheaper than a hit man.
1:16:29
He also told the joke to Catherine,
1:16:31
who was aware of the family's plan
1:16:33
to pay Dan $1 million to move
1:16:36
to Miami and commute
1:16:38
to Tallahassee. This allegedly
1:16:40
gave her ideas to plan the
1:16:42
murder. So again, right. I
1:16:45
said, what is the tie between
1:16:47
Catherine Garcia Rivera
1:16:50
and Dan Markell? Well, Charlie's
1:16:53
defense team is saying Catherine came up
1:16:55
with, with this idea because
1:16:58
we got a million dollars possibly
1:17:01
floating around, but think about
1:17:03
this family potentially offering
1:17:05
Dan Markell a million
1:17:07
dollars to move down to
1:17:10
Miami and commute to Tallahassee.
1:17:12
You know how far it is from Tallahassee to
1:17:14
Miami. That's a long trip. It is. Yeah.
1:17:18
As we learned from Garcia taking the Prius
1:17:20
from Miami. But if you
1:17:22
have the option to pay somebody a million
1:17:24
dollars or take them
1:17:26
out for a hundred thousand. By my
1:17:28
math, you save $900,000. Yeah.
1:17:32
According to defense attorney rash bomb, Catherine
1:17:34
admitted to Charlie that a friend of
1:17:36
hers shot Dan. She claimed she had
1:17:38
nothing to do with it, but talked
1:17:41
too much. And her friend learned about
1:17:43
the family's problems with Dan and
1:17:45
the $1 million payment. She
1:17:48
wouldn't give him any names, but told
1:17:50
Charlie he needed to pay her friend
1:17:52
within 48 hours or his family
1:17:54
would be next. So here
1:17:56
again is her diabolical
1:17:59
plane. I'll have these
1:18:02
guys shoot Dan and
1:18:04
then force the family
1:18:06
to pay us the money. Yeah.
1:18:09
Not that the family wanted us to
1:18:11
shoot Dan and then gave us the
1:18:13
money. I recognize you had a problem. I
1:18:15
took care of the problem. I know you have
1:18:17
the money to pay us. So pay
1:18:19
us or we're going to do you next. But
1:18:21
if that's the case, you had
1:18:24
a million dollars, why would you only ask for
1:18:26
a hundred? Well, you don't want to be greedy. No,
1:18:28
it's because it's already been established that
1:18:30
that's how much money changed
1:18:33
hands. Yeah. So, you know, if you're
1:18:35
crafting a story, it has
1:18:38
to align with the
1:18:40
evidence. Prosecutors argued that Charles
1:18:42
was the one who hired Garcia
1:18:44
because the family wanted Wendy to
1:18:46
move. Wendy Adelson testified that
1:18:48
her family had nothing to do with
1:18:50
the murder and she was surprised to
1:18:52
learn at trial that her brother knew
1:18:54
who the killer was. Catherine
1:18:56
Magbineau had testified she and Charlie
1:18:59
went to a Halloween party in
1:19:01
October 2013. Afterwards,
1:19:04
Charlie asked her if she knew
1:19:06
someone who could harm someone else.
1:19:09
They didn't discuss it further at that time. He
1:19:11
then started planting seeds in her head
1:19:14
to do the job and became
1:19:16
more adamant about it in the summer of
1:19:18
2014. Charlie
1:19:21
testified that he had nothing to do
1:19:23
with planting the murder and did not
1:19:25
hire anyone to kill Dan Markell. Again,
1:19:27
what else are these people going to testify
1:19:29
to? Well, of course, they're not going to
1:19:32
say, yeah, yeah, I did this and that
1:19:34
and you got me. I got so nervous
1:19:36
on the stand, I just admitted to it. He
1:19:38
testified that Catherine was panicked after
1:19:40
the murder and told him it
1:19:42
was all her fault because she
1:19:44
talked too much about the
1:19:46
million dollar payment. He agreed to
1:19:48
pay her friend and gave her all the
1:19:51
cash he had in his safe, which
1:19:53
was one hundred and thirty eight thousand dollars. He
1:19:55
later told his mother about this, but
1:19:57
never anyone else. He thought he would.
1:20:00
The killed if he went to
1:20:02
the police suicide pay the blackmailer
1:20:04
off. Now sensually. They.
1:20:06
Didn't have anything to do with the
1:20:08
murder. He didn't pay to have damn
1:20:10
killed. He. Just paid because he
1:20:13
was. In. Fear of His
1:20:15
Life. On November Six, Two Thousand
1:20:17
Twenty three, Charlie Eight Olson was
1:20:19
convicted of first degree murder, conspiracy,
1:20:22
and solicitation. On. Nov. Thirteenth.
1:20:25
Done. A loss. Was arrested
1:20:27
for first degree murder, conspiracy
1:20:29
and solicitation. Center. Has
1:20:31
been hard. Were. Intercepted at
1:20:33
the airports before they boarded a
1:20:35
flight to Vietnam. They. Purchased
1:20:38
one way tickets after their
1:20:40
son was convict. It. So
1:20:42
interesting that their own to Vietnam. Because.
1:20:44
Us doesn't have a. Extradition
1:20:47
Treaty. With. The In:
1:20:49
I'm. So you have that. you also
1:20:52
had though the one way tickets. Who buys
1:20:54
one way tickets to Vietnam? you not staying
1:20:56
there. Most. People here is a
1:20:58
place to visit, maybe for a little while
1:21:00
and in your coming back home. And.
1:21:03
The timings did. This is
1:21:05
a whole occurring after Charlie
1:21:07
was convicted. That. Tallahassee Democrat
1:21:10
reported that in monitor jail
1:21:12
phone calls with Charlie. Donna.
1:21:14
Discuss trying to flee the country
1:21:16
to a place with no extradition
1:21:19
treaty. So. They knew what they were
1:21:21
doing. Oh absolutely. Dominate Olson was
1:21:23
indicted on these charges. Two days
1:21:25
later. On December twelfth, Charlie Eight
1:21:27
or Son was sentenced to life
1:21:29
in prison. He. Found a
1:21:31
notice of appeal on December Thirty
1:21:34
first. Two thousand, Twenty three. So.
1:21:37
He knows we ramp this one
1:21:39
up. Gibbs. Like you said, it
1:21:42
is still pretty. Recent.
1:21:44
That. Events. Of have
1:21:46
been there are still some events
1:21:48
that are are going on. The
1:21:50
individuals who traveled to Tallahassee. And
1:21:53
Kill Dance have been convicted
1:21:55
and sentenced. But. Nine years
1:21:57
later, This. case istanbul You
1:22:00
have the recent arrest of Donna
1:22:02
Adelson, it's possible that
1:22:05
these charges could be dropped. Maybe
1:22:07
due to lack of evidence or
1:22:10
we may see another conviction in
1:22:13
the coming months. You know
1:22:15
this family decided to
1:22:18
take this action because they wanted
1:22:21
to make sure their grandkids were in their lives.
1:22:24
And now as some of them are not found
1:22:26
guilty, but they're mixed up in this and eventually
1:22:28
these grandkids are gonna be old enough to have
1:22:30
a better understanding of
1:22:33
what happened. I think it
1:22:35
just ruins that relationship. How can
1:22:37
you be involved with individuals
1:22:39
that may or may not killed
1:22:42
your dad? Oh, yeah. Yeah, absolutely
1:22:44
either way, right? So they're either
1:22:46
gonna spend so much
1:22:49
time in prison that they'll never see
1:22:51
their grandchildren or they
1:22:54
may go free but
1:22:56
be so implicated in everything
1:22:58
that these kids
1:23:01
wouldn't want to have anything to do with them
1:23:03
or may not be allowed to have
1:23:05
anything to do with them. I don't know. I think
1:23:08
we have to go back to Wendy though.
1:23:11
We haven't talked about Wendy much
1:23:14
because she was never
1:23:17
arrested. I think when
1:23:19
you look online, you have a
1:23:21
lot of people questioning what
1:23:23
was Wendy's role in this
1:23:25
whole thing? Did she know anything about
1:23:28
it? Was she the catalyst for
1:23:30
it? Or was
1:23:32
it just her family that
1:23:34
said, like you just mentioned, we
1:23:37
have to do something in order to
1:23:39
be able to see our grandchildren. And
1:23:42
took it upon themselves. And took it upon
1:23:44
themselves. And where's Harvey in all this?
1:23:46
So Don has been arrested, but
1:23:49
Harvey was fleeing with her
1:23:51
to Vietnam. He's not
1:23:53
been arrested yet. That's why I think this
1:23:55
case is a little bit far from over.
1:23:58
But as a grandchild when he... get older when you
1:24:00
want to know when you want to look at your grandfather,
1:24:04
if he's still alive and say, I read
1:24:06
all the transcripts. I read all
1:24:08
this stuff. Tell me, what did
1:24:10
you know about the murder of my
1:24:13
dad? Yeah. If he's never charged or
1:24:15
anything like that. Yeah. I, it's
1:24:17
just a very, very interesting case, but
1:24:19
it is one, um, unlike
1:24:22
a lot of solved cases that we do, this
1:24:24
is one that you still have to keep an
1:24:26
eye on. Oh, of course. Yeah, for sure. But
1:24:29
that's it for our episode on the
1:24:31
murder of Dan Markell. We've got some
1:24:33
voicemails, Gibbs. You want to check those out? Yeah. Let's hear them. Oh,
1:24:36
hi guys. It's Rhonda from Carson,
1:24:38
Washington. And I'm just listening to
1:24:40
the latest episode and Mike, you
1:24:42
said that if you went skiing,
1:24:44
you would probably tear every
1:24:46
ligament in your knee. Well, I
1:24:48
actually did that in 2014. I've
1:24:51
skied my entire life. And for some reason
1:24:53
on this particular day, it was
1:24:56
not going my way. And I
1:24:58
tore my ACL, my TCL, my
1:25:00
MCL, my meniscus. I
1:25:03
did it all. So I haven't been back to the
1:25:05
mountain since then. And, um,
1:25:07
sadly we'll never do that again. But
1:25:09
anyways, uh, love you guys. Keep your
1:25:12
own time thickens. Yeah. I remember when
1:25:14
that happened to me and I had to take that roll duct
1:25:16
tape out and just duck it, just
1:25:18
duck it. If you can't fix it, duck it.
1:25:20
That's right. Um, I
1:25:23
think this is just more fuel on
1:25:25
the fire of my resistance.
1:25:27
While you'd ever go skiing to
1:25:29
do certain things. She
1:25:32
mentioned it. She was an experienced
1:25:34
skier. Yeah. I am
1:25:36
not an experienced skier. So
1:25:39
the risk for me is even that much
1:25:41
greater. And how bad must that
1:25:43
have been for her to not ever go
1:25:46
back again? Oh yeah. That would be tough.
1:25:48
Kind of like me having to give up
1:25:50
golf. Like I can't play golf anymore because
1:25:52
of my shoulders, but how many CLs are
1:25:54
there in The knee? She Named
1:25:56
off a lot. Yeah. Didn't she? Yeah. There There's a
1:25:58
lot of them in there. In she door everyone
1:26:01
is equal to get back to. Sell.
1:26:03
It you need pretty my years in big trouble
1:26:05
here. Is
1:26:07
T V. I am from Columbus,
1:26:09
Ohio, Montana. I am listening to
1:26:11
the Rod Matthews case which is
1:26:13
just awful assassinate his arm and
1:26:16
machine to the part where we're
1:26:18
listening to the Ah that people
1:26:20
are talking about ritalin and the
1:26:22
litter Ritalin withdrawn how can impact
1:26:24
you I have been a special
1:26:26
educator and. Working. In but. Specifically
1:26:28
is all Not and A
1:26:30
D C and Attention That
1:26:32
disorders. Or different orders about to
1:26:34
call it. I'm also someone who has
1:26:37
a D H. The. End though it's
1:26:39
not brittle and I say that another form
1:26:41
as to me on top of that nice
1:26:43
didn't for tastes are a number of different
1:26:45
than he wants to help. With their
1:26:47
agencies armor and essentially issues and
1:26:49
I will say that Be A
1:26:51
First can say definitively that from
1:26:54
one person to the next that
1:26:56
there is or is not such.
1:26:58
A thing as this rental income down
1:27:00
or ritalin raids we call it adderall
1:27:02
rage. The people who take Adderall the
1:27:05
isn't. That awful he can happen or
1:27:07
why have been So am I mad because
1:27:09
that is a big problem is all couple
1:27:11
days and it can be a catastrophic what
1:27:14
happened to your body and your mind whereas
1:27:16
lot of people sometimes I didn't have an
1:27:18
impact and different brain chemicals in our for
1:27:20
the new medicines and what other medicines. Nike.
1:27:23
Taking food intake. all that. So
1:27:25
I've been watching as of situation for
1:27:27
and one to murder and one it
1:27:29
as it is a can be a
1:27:31
very real thing. Isn't that
1:27:33
much sense as a slow Love you
1:27:35
guys and our kids! Young, talented and.
1:27:39
Yeah. Thanks for colon in. Finding.
1:27:41
Some information another are certain drugs
1:27:43
that I do. That. If
1:27:45
I forget to take them one day.
1:27:49
As the day goes on start to
1:27:51
realize. This. Field This. Is.
1:27:53
What you blue pill know enough
1:27:56
to some. Of them. As.
1:27:58
a doctor prescribes stuff for
1:28:00
my health. Oh, okay. No,
1:28:02
not that. But, uh, now
1:28:05
you got me all flustered. I don't even
1:28:07
know what to say. So let's end it
1:28:10
on that. We had no mailbag. So that
1:28:12
is it for another episode of True Crime
1:28:14
All the Time for Mike and Gibby. Stay
1:28:17
safe and keep your own time ticking. The
1:28:56
wait is over. So far you're
1:28:58
not losing. The only thing you're losing is
1:29:00
my patience. Quickly, I see that. See ya!
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