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  • The Tooth in the River That Put a Killer Behind Bars

    The Tooth in the River That Put a Killer Behind Bars
    2026/09/10
    The Tooth in the River That Put a Killer Behind Bars

    A sealed produce bag, a human molar with the root and dried blood, and a single tan pump found wedged upright in a drowned sycamore launched a forty-two-year mystery about a woman murdered by manual strangulation. Who deliberately knotted, bagged, and hid that tooth in a missing shoe, and why did it take four decades and a misfiled census page to point investigators toward closure?

    In this episode, we tell the factual story of Janet Hunter’s murder in September 1979, the early investigation that produced a plaster bite-mark cast, the evidence that went into storage, and the cold-case work decades later that re-opened the file and followed the trail from a frozen tooth to new leads. How did small overlooked details - a rotated incisor in a bite cast, a faulty rear door latch, and unexpected DNA uploads - change everything?

    Person: Janet Hunter
    Date: September 11-14, 1979
    Location: Dellwood, Indiana
    Cause: Manual strangulation
    Investigator: Sheriff Arnie Pace

    - A tan pump, left foot, size seven with a brass buckle, was found wedged upright in submerged branches of a drowned sycamore on September 14, 1979.
    - Inside that shoe was a clear plastic produce bag knotted twice containing a human molar with the root attached and dried blood on the enamel.
    - Dr. Leonard Vance documented a full dental arch bite-mark on Janet Hunter’s left forearm and made a plaster cast showing a rotated upper-left lateral incisor.
    - Kevin Trout, age 26, was a prime suspect within three weeks but his dental X-rays showed no rotation of the upper-left lateral incisor and he was never charged.
    - The tooth evidence sat in a property-evidence freezer for forty-two years before DNA and genealogy leads from a misfiled census page and a consumer DNA kit reignited the case.

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    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    20 分
  • Dry Tote, Sealed Birthday Card, Rooted Hair: The Postmaster Revealed

    Dry Tote, Sealed Birthday Card, Rooted Hair: The Postmaster Revealed
    2026/09/09
    Dry Tote, Sealed Birthday Card, Rooted Hair: The Postmaster Revealed

    The tote bag was found dry, upright and sealed in scrub oak three miles from any road - despite rain days earlier - with helium balloons still holding air and no footprints leading to it; inside was a sealed birthday card in Jennifer Burke’s handwriting and a single root-attached hair that did not belong to her. Who left a perfectly preserved bag in an inaccessible field and why did one stray hair become the hinge that would later reopen this case?

    In this episode, we follow the sequence of discoveries from August 14, 1991 through decades of cold-case work, chronicling the tote bag, the sealed card, the non-victim root-attached hair, the original mitochondrial testing in 2004, and the new nuclear DNA possibilities that emerged by 2019 - could modern DNA methods finally answer who was responsible?

    Person: Jennifer Burke
    Date: August 14, 1991 (bag found); August 9, 1991 (disappearance)
    Location: landlocked scrub oak parcel three miles from the nearest route; Calloway Township area; Aldgate Street
    Status: Jennifer Burke found deceased; cause of death manual strangulation; tote bag preserved as state evidence
    Event: single root-attached non-victim hair logged separately by evidence technician Robert Speer in September 1991

    - The tote bag was discovered upright, dry and sealed with mylar "50" balloons still inflated.
    - Jennifer Burke had been missing for five days when the tote was found on August 14, 1991.
    - Jennifer worked at the Calloway Township branch library for 19 years and was 52 years old in 1991.
    - Evidence technician Robert Speer bagged the non-victim root-attached hair separately in September 1991 and noted its origin in handwriting.
    - Mitochondrial analysis in 2004 excluded every tested suspect and confirmed the hair was not Jennifer’s, with nuclear DNA methods becoming practical by 2019.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    17 分
  • The Mason Jar Note: "She Did Not Leave" Buried for Decades

    The Mason Jar Note: "She Did Not Leave" Buried for Decades
    2026/09/08
    The Mason Jar Note: "She Did Not Leave" Buried for Decades

    A sealed one-gallon mason jar sat three feet down on a concrete shelf above the waterline inside a septic tank for more than thirty years, holding a pink cotton scrap and a four-word notecard: "she did not leave." What caused someone to bury that message beside a property where Crystal Murphy vanished on July 14, 1991 - and who knew the truth all along?

    In this episode, we lay out the sequence of discoveries and documents found across three decades, from the morning Ruth Sullivan hit glass with a steel probe on July 9, 2022 to the buried foreman's note rescued from a storage box; we follow the threads that link a blouse fiber, a sealed tank, and an unusual construction request to the unanswered question: was Crystal taken or did she leave?

    Person: Crystal Murphy
    Date: July 14, 1991
    Location: Caldwell Lane, Pickett County
    Event: Discovery of mason jar and notecard on July 9, 2022
    Document: Foreman's note requesting secondary port be sealed "tamper-proof" on July 17, 1991

    - The mason jar was found three feet deep in a secondary access port on July 9, 2022 at 9:17 AM.
    - The notecard inside contained exactly four words written in blue ballpoint: "she did not leave."
    - The pink cotton fabric in the jar later matched fiber type and dye lot to a blouse listed among Crystal Murphy's personal effects.
    - Crystal rode her bicycle two and a half miles east on Caldwell Lane each morning, touching a collapsed stone gatepost and returning by 7:00 AM.
    - Tri-County Excavation's foreman recorded on July 17, 1991 that a customer asked the secondary port be sealed from the outside and made "tamper-proof."

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    21 分
  • The Button in the Freezer: How DNA Broke a 29-Year Silence

    The Button in the Freezer: How DNA Broke a 29-Year Silence
    2026/09/07
    The Button in the Freezer: How DNA Broke a 29-Year Silence

    A discarded brown button and a partial male DNA profile sat frozen for nearly three decades before a retired postal worker found an evidence envelope knotted inside a glove - dated 1993 - beside a creek in rural Ohio. How did a routine volunteer shift, a missing Wednesday phone call, and a single industrial button become the clues that reopened Tammy Roberts’s death?

    In this episode, you’ll hear the sequence of events from the June 10, 1993 shift at the Dellwood Food Pantry to the discovery of Tammy’s body the next morning, the eighteen-month investigation, and the long custody of the file and evidence that waited in a police property room freezer - and why the question of who tore that button from its garment still matters.

    Person: Tammy Roberts
    Date: June 10, 1993
    Location: Dellwood, Ohio
    Case: Homicide with partial male DNA under victim’s fingernails
    Evidence: Single brown industrial-weight button; sealed evidence envelope dated 1993

    - Tammy Roberts was 28 years old and had volunteered every Thursday, 5:30-8:00 PM, for two and a half years.
    - Her body was found the morning after June 10, 1993, in a gravel lot three-quarters of a mile from where she parked.
    - Detective Ray Sobieski compiled 340 pages of reports and worked the case for 18 months before it was archived in winter 1994.
    - Lab analysis returned a degraded partial male DNA profile from scrapings beneath Tammy’s fingernails.
    - A brown button with industrial-weight thread, inconsistent with Tammy’s possessions, was recovered and later stored in a police property room freezer.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    19 分
  • The Freezer Humming on Millbrook Lane: Why Move a Murder's Evidence?

    The Freezer Humming on Millbrook Lane: Why Move a Murder's Evidence?
    2026/09/06
    The Freezer Humming on Millbrook Lane: Why Move a Murder's Evidence?

    A humming Kenmore freezer was found running on the backyard patio at 6:45 a.m., its compressor still cycling and contents frozen solid, while Sherry Davis lay dead inside the house - and no one could explain why the appliance had been unplugged, rolled outside, and left to run through a two-inch gap in the sliding glass door. Forty years later, an eighty-degree-below-zero skin-cell sample and a coffee cup in a pharmacy trash bin would begin to answer that question: who left their skin under her fingernails, and why move the freezer at all?

    In this episode, we tell the sequence of events from the morning Peggy Sanders found the open gate and humming freezer to the scene notes Detective Tom Greer circled and the preserved forensic sample kept since 1983, asking how those details - the moved freezer, the extension cord, and the skin cells - fit together to point toward a perpetrator.

    Person: Sherry Davis
    Date: May 14, 1983
    Location: 414 Millbrook Lane
    Investigator: Detective Tom Greer
    Forensic evidence: Skin cells preserved at -80°C since 1983

    - The freezer was discovered running at 6:45 a.m, on the backyard patio.
    - The orange extension cord was threaded through a two-inch gap in the sliding glass door.
    - Sherry Davis was 53 years old in May 1983 and worked 11 p.m.-7 a.m. as an LPN.
    - Scuff marks on the kitchen linoleum matched the freezer’s casters and its dedicated north-wall outlet.
    - Skin cells were recovered beneath Sherry’s fingernails and stored frozen for forty years.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    21 分
  • Three Strands, Thirty Years: How Hair Finally Betrayed a Killer

    Three Strands, Thirty Years: How Hair Finally Betrayed a Killer
    2026/09/05
    Three Strands, Thirty Years: How Hair Finally Betrayed a Killer

    A single clenched fist held three auburn hairs with root bulbs intact - each nearly six centimeters long - collected on April 9, 1991, then lost in a cardboard box and a garage for eighteen years; how did evidence this specific vanish while the autopsy noted a linear knee contusion indicating Amanda Wallace was running one to two hours before death? Who walked past the crucial campus loading dock step every week and went unremarked for thirty-one years?

    In this episode, we lay out the documented timeline from the morning Linda Gray found Amanda Wallace on County Route Seven to the discovery of missing items in 2022, tracing how evidence handling, storage failures, and overlooked maintenance logs shaped the case and asking whether those accidents or oversight let a suspect live free.

    Person: Amanda Wallace
    Date: April 9, 1991
    Location: County Route Seven, Callum Township; campus parking lot; culvert twelve miles away
    Autopsy: Dr. Patricia Oudt noted three auburn hairs (≈6 cm, root bulbs) and a linear right knee contusion 1-2 hours before death
    Recovered Items: green notebook and one shoe found in spring 2022

    - Three strands of auburn hair, approximately six centimeters long with root bulbs attached, were found clenched in Amanda Wallace's left fist.
    - Amanda Wallace was twenty-two years old and a second-year nursing student at Pryor County Community College in spring 1991.
    - Amanda was last confirmed seen at about 9:15 PM on April 8, 1991, leaving the campus library wearing one scuffed shoe.
    - Amanda’s beige 1986 Honda Civic was found the next morning in the campus parking lot with her bag missing and one shoe absent.
    - The green notebook and missing shoe were recovered from a county road culvert twelve miles from the death site in spring 2022.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    22 分
  • She Fed Them Every Morning: The Crystal Cole Case

    She Fed Them Every Morning: The Crystal Cole Case
    2026/09/04
    She Fed Them Every Morning: The Crystal Cole Case

    The locked padlock, the key on a kitchen hook, and two frantic miniature goats pressed against the shed door - a scene that made a homicide detective "stand still at the threshold." A male DNA profile recovered from Crystal's under-fingernails in 2005 matched no database, and a handwritten note nearly lost in a filing cabinet would later change everything. Who locked the padlock from the outside after Crystal went in?

    In this episode, we walk through the facts of Crystal Cole's death on Keswick Road in Tallow Springs and the slow-moving investigation that spanned decades. Hear how everyday routines, a subcontractor's unsupervised access, and modern DNA work intersected to raise the question: who could make that impossible lock from the outside?

    Person: Crystal Cole
    Date: March 11, 2003 (body found); time of death ~ evening March 8, 2003
    Location: Keswick Road, Tallow Springs, Fayette County
    Cause: Manual strangulation
    Evidence: Male DNA profile recovered from under fingernails (2005)

    - Crystal was 38 years old at the time of her death and worked as a billing coordinator.
    - The Brenton five-pin padlock on the shed was locked from the outside while the only key hung on a hook in her kitchen.
    - Two miniature goats, Pepper and Fig, were inside the shed and found frantic against the door.
    - Randy Vickers worked on Crystal's property for 11 days between September and October 2001 and had access to an unlocked box containing the same model padlock.
    - The male DNA profile recovered from beneath Crystal's nails in 2005 was complete but matched no database at that time.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    22 分
  • The Missing Placard That Unraveled a 34-Year Murder Mystery

    The Missing Placard That Unraveled a 34-Year Murder Mystery
    2026/09/03
    The Missing Placard That Unraveled a 34-Year Murder Mystery

    A single sun-bleached plastic evidence placard numbered seven, missing since February 12, 1987, turns up in a closed gas station lot in Teller Parish - and it leads to the collapse of 34 years of silence. How did a placard tucked between asphalt pieces reconnect a long-forgotten brown paper bag of evidence to a murder that had sat untouched for decades?

    In this episode, we follow the discovery on February 9, 2021, and trace the case back to the night Diane Dixon was strangled at the Sunbelt Fueling Center on February 12, 1987. We outline the preserved property-bag evidence, the long investigation with its missteps, and the questions that remained: what changed after the placard reappeared?

    Person: Diane Dixon
    Date: February 12, 1987 (time of death estimated between 2:00 and 4:00 a.m.)
    Location: Sunbelt Fueling Center gravel parking lot, Teller Parish, Louisiana
    Evidence: Evidence placard numbered 7; brown paper bag of biological and exterior scene material
    Investigator: Owen Marsh

    - The placard numbered 7 was found on February 9, 2021, propped between two pieces of broken asphalt.
    - The placard had been listed missing from the Teller Parish Sheriff's Office property records since February 12, 1987.
    - Diane Dixon was 58 years old and had worked the overnight shift at the Sunbelt Fueling Center for 11 years.
    - Deputies found Diane's body at 9:17 a.m. behind the dumpster enclosure; her car's engine was cold in the lot.
    - The brown paper bag of biological and exterior scene material sat untouched in the property room for 20 years and nearly was destroyed during a 2012 budget review.

    To listen to this podcast ad-free and access premium episodes, try our subscription with a 14-day free trial at obomedia.com.

    © 2026 OBOMEDIA. All rights reserved.
    This episode and its content (audio, text, and related materials) are the exclusive property of OBOMEDIA and are protected by applicable copyright laws. Reproduction, distribution, editing, or commercial use, in whole or in part, without prior written permission from OBOMEDIA is prohibited. For permissions, licensing, and business inquiries: business@obomedia.com.
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    21 分