Kimberly and Christopher Vaughn - Part 2

0:00 Hi, I'm Tina, and I'm rich. And if there's one thing we've learned in over twenty years of marriage. It's that some days you'll feel like killing your wife. And some days you'll feel like killing your husband. Welcome to love, Mary Kill. You mean welcome to Chris Mary Kill. Get it. We've had a lot of chriss so. I didn't get it. I'm a little slow. I forgot what case we were talking about. We have had a lot of Chris's thought, you're right.

0:40 Yeah, Chris, and wh Chris Coleman, Oh yeah, Chris Coleman. Chris, help me out, Help me out. I don't have idea. I can't remember these things. No, there was at Chris w of course, how could we forget Christmas? And today we're back at it with Chris mall On. Yeah. The other day I was talking to Kylie, my bestie from Primetime Crime, and we were talking about Chris Vaughan because we really do talk about true crime together. She said, quote, He's the dang worst. Some harsh words from Kylie. Kylie is from Texas. I think she could have said a lot worse, but yeah, she just said he's the dang worst. Well, I did bring you a snack? Oh good, well I didn't bring you a snack. Our lovely listener, Shannon sent us a snack so sweet, so kind, So, Jenna.

1:30 I've been waiting for this. Yeah, it's We've had it for a couple of weeks. But she sent us some popcorn, she says, three bags of gourmet popcorn from the Cleveland I guess it's the Cleveland Caramel Corn Company. Yes, so different flavors of caramel corn. One is gourmet Dill pickle, one is Gourmet Grinch Mix, and one is Gourmet Cleveland Mix, which I'm gonna call about it. It looks a little like the Chicago So Chicago is known for caramel. Yeah, but this does look like it's a white cheddar. So it doesn't look like it's much like Garrett's because it's white and caramel. It's not like Garrett's is like the right yellow.

2:12 And what is the Grinch mix? You said it is cherry and green apple. I think Shannon said this is her sister's favorite, and it's a Christmas mix, but it's it's still good. Okay, We're gonna try all of them. Yeah, of course we're gonna try all of them. We'll be right back. So what did you think about the Cleveland Caramel Corn Company. I think it's really good. I think it's really good too. Yeah, I mean some of the flavors I like better than others. And the Cleveland mix I thought was really good and it was pretty different. I would get it again, Yeah, definitely, I would get that. The Grinch mix was it cherry and green apple? Really interesting. I actually liked it more than I thought I would. They'll pickle flavor not so much.

2:58 I really don't like that. I loved the dill pickle. I really think I love dill pickles, love them, and you do not. You're a sweet pickle guy, and I hate sweet pickles. It's so weird. I don't know how a week it work, but we do. Yeah, really good. I've been thinking we need to go away. We have not gone away for a weekend, and I have been thinking about going to Cleveland for a weekend. It's been a long time since we've been there. Go to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Maybe we've been it's been a long time since we've been there. That was awesome. Thanks so much, Shannon. Well, you have to rate them like for a second and third, well. I will give for sure. The first one is the Cleveland Mix. I'd give that ten out of ten. The Grinch Mix I would give eight out of ten, and the Dill Pickle mix go three out of ten. No, I just don't know.

3:46 The Dill Pickle was my favorite. I'd give it ten out of ten. The Cleveland Mix, which is it awful like the Chicago Mix, I would give that a nine out of ten, and the Grinch Mix I would give an eight out of ten. But hopefully we'll go to Cleveland soon and we'll be able to check it out in person. Yeah, there are BUCkies on the way, you guys know, I'm know he is. A little farther than I think we have to go to, like Cincinnati or or further to Cincinnati to stop thinking about BUCkies. I just think it would be really fun and it would be fun to just get a bunch of snacks. And you know it's four. Hours, four hours, five hours, all right? Do you want to get back to chrispan I sure do.

4:26 Do you want to give us a brief summary of part one? I would love to. If you haven't listened to part one, you should go do that now. In the early hours of Thursday, June fourteenth, two thousand and seven, just before sunrise, thirty two year old Christopher Vaughan was found limping along a rural road near Shanahan, Illinois, searching for help after he had sustained non life threatening gunshot wounds to his left thigh and left wrist. Vaughn, a devoted husband to his wife, Kimberly, thirty four, and a loving father to their three children, twelve year old Abigail, eleven year old Cassandra, and eight year old Blake, lagged down a passerby at five eighteen am and asked him to call nine one one. Tragically, when the police arrived on the scene, they discovered Kim and the three children were brutally slain inside the family's red two thousand and four Ford Expedition suv parked on a service road just off Interstate fifty five. The children were all shot twice, Kim once. Christopher was arrested for the murders on the morning of the funeral, But was it a rush to judgment. The devastating tragedy raised one important question. Which parent killed their beautiful young children? Did this loving mother kill her family and then turn the gun on herself. Or did Chris Vaughan attempt to cover up his own unthinkable crime.

5:41 Is there anything else you want to mention from part one? Well, the one thing that sticks out in my mind that I remember is that he left the car to go out to the road, which was I don't know how far away was the road wherever? It was like a football He only got a football field away from the suv when he was picked up by the man named John. And he never went back to the car to check on his family. He did not, like allegedly get he got shot by he said his wife originally shot. Well, he told the man in the pickup truck, I think my wife, my wife shot me, But he didn't say that to the police. Yeah, And he never went back to check on his kids or to try. To pay had amnesia, some sort of amnesia. Right. We're going to talk about that a lot more today.

6:22 I was looking back through my notes and I saw a couple of pieces of evidence that I forgot to mention during part one. There was an issue of PI magazine with an article titled how to make a homicide Look like a suicide that was found in the Vaughan Holme, but Chris said he didn't read it and his fingerprints actually were not found on it. And during the interrogation, when Chris said he was unhappy in his marriage, the detectives asked him, well, why don't you get divorced? And he said divorce is not an option. Oh, interesting, which we've heard a lot of times from these different guys, remember specifically Chris Coleman said it. On September twenty seventh, two thousand and seven, will County District Attorney James Glasgow announced his intent to seek the death penalty for Christopher Vaughan with support from the Phillips family, while Chris was awaiting trial. In twenty eleven, Illinois Governor Pat Quinn signed a bill abolishing the death penalty. While that sounds like a positive development, defendants facing the death penalty are given access to attorneys, expert witnesses, investigators, and other resources, which Chris no longer had access to. With the funding for Chris's attorneys withdrawn, he was given a public defender. This was a huge blow to his defense. His lawyers had spent years at this point working on the case. Chris's mom, Gail, said that his legal team was willing to take the fee that the state offered the public defenders, but the state would not allow it. So you can see how

7:52 that's a huge blow to his defense. Yeah, I never really thought about that that if you're facing the death penalty, you get a lot more resources I guess assigned to you, just because of the seriousness of that. I believe at the end of President Biden's term, he commuted anyone that was in federal prison that had a death sentence, he commuted their sentences, and there were at least two people that said no, thank you. They would rather have the death penalty and have. I think access to the resource, the legal resources to help them. Okay. Interesting. In April twenty ten, nearly three years after the murders, Chris was overheard in a pre trial hearing saying to his lawyers, quote, I'm done, I'm tired, I'm finished. I've had nothing to do for the past three years for an unknown reason. He'd been residing in the prison's medical unit.

8:42 So Chris is not a big guy. And remember he lost like a lot of weight. He went from one hundred and eighty pounds to one hundred and forty pounds, five foot eight or five foot nine. He allegedly killed three children, so I'm guessing that his time in prison probably wasn't really pleasant. This hearing focused on a defense mode to suppress evidence of three books on druidism, along with related Internet searches found in the Vaught home. Druidism or Druidry is a modern spiritual or religious movement that promotes the cultivation of honorable relationships with physical landscapes, flora, fauna, and the diverse peoples of the world, as well as nature, deities, and spirits of nature in place. Theological beliefs among modern druids are diverse, However, all modern druids venerate the divine essence of nature. Chris was drawn to Druidism, but Kim was not. The judge ruled in favor of the defense.

9:37 Chris's religious beliefs could not be held against him. On August twentieth, twenty twelve, the trial finally started in Joliet, Illinois, more than five years after the murders. When I say Juliet, Illinois, do you okay? There you go? I figured, yeah, yeah. So if you're from Illinois and you say Joliet everyone just to suit like they know you're talking about the state prison. Yes. In the adjoining courtroom, Drew Peterson was being tried for the death of his wife, Kathleen Savio, although his trial had started a couple of weeks before that. Quite a coincidence, isn't it, well, Will County Attorney Terry Sullivan told the Chicago Tribune quote, to have two cases like that going on at the same time is unprecedented, certainly in will County and maybe in the country. The Von trial is the kind of case that should get national coverage, but it might be overshadowed with all the tom foolery going on in the court room next door, tomfoolery being one of my favorite words words. He said that the Von case was one of the most horrific cases in Will County history. At the end of each day of trial, Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow, a man who has never seen a camera he didn't love, fielded questions from the media. Currently serving his seventh term in office. Glasgow was up for re election in twenty twelve, and it was no coincidence that these two trials were playing out simultaneously.

11:04 Although the salacious Peterson trial received more attention from the media and the public. Was a research incidents. No, I mean no, it really was it, which is crazy to me. It's just so many manipulatives. Well, just having two high profile trials of that nature in the same area around the same time is pretty coincidental. But yeah, having the trials both go on at the same time as a strange decision. Yeah, so're researching this case. I was surprised that there's really not as much information about it compared to Drew Peterson, Like, there's no books on it. There is the podcast Murder in Illinois, but we'll talk about that more later. The prosecution had a long list of two hundred and seventy possible witnesses. They estimated the trial would last about a month.

11:48 Their argument Vaughan murdered his wife and three children so he could escape to the Canadian wilderness unencumbered by his wife and children, to live off the grid. Do you know how sometimes in a trial the attorneys they craft these wildly speculative narratives about the defendant to fit the evidence and motive in the case. Do you know what I'm talking about? In the case of Christopher Vaughan. No pontification or hyperbole was necessary by the prosecution. Vaughan made his desire to start a new life in the Canadian wilderness clear, and the evidence supported it. Although in my opinion, the defense did go off the rails. Kim, the defense argued, was so distraught over her allegedly crumbling marriage that she took not only her own life, but the lives of the three children. They claimed that the prescription drugs that she was taking, nor tryptolene and Topomax, which in rare cases have been linked to suicidal thoughts, drove her over the edge. In November two thousand and five, Kim began seeing a neurologist, doctor Prideep Basha, to treat her migraine and tension headaches. She was experiencing sensitivity to sound and light, nausea, vomiting, and sweating. The doctor believes stress was causing her frequent headaches.

13:00 September two thousand and six, Kim was prescribed Topomax and nor tryptilene, two prescription drugs that both have adverse side effects. All drugs have side effects, but both of these have serious side effects. Topomax came on the market in nineteen ninety six and was first used to prevent seizures by blocking electrical activity in the brain. It was approved for use in migraine treatment in two thousand and four. While there are better drugs on the market today to treat migraine headaches, Kim was prescribed Topomax. Topomax carries a stern warning for the patient immediately notified your health care provider if you experience any sudden changes in mood, panic attacks, impulsive behavior including aggression or hostility, or thoughts of suicide.

13:43 Topomax can also cause nausea and intestinal discomfort. It's also been approved by the FDA for weight loss. In September two thousand and six, Kim also saw a doctor for stress induced high blood pressure. The other drug prescribed for Kim was nor tryptilene. It's been approved for use in the US since nineteen sixty four to treat depression, nerve pain, and a laundry list of other off label conditions such as IBS, TMJ, and anxiety or Tryptoline carries a black box warning, the most serious warning issued by the FDA for younger patients aged twelve to twenty five. Your triptolene can cause a marked increase in suicide ideation, but with age the warning drops off significantly. But both of these drugs have the side effect of increased thoughts of suicide, in addition to confusion about identity, seeing or hearing things that might not be there, and feelings that someone may be controlling you or hearing your thoughts. Nor triptolene also causes nausea, vomiting, and digestive issues. Neither medication should be taken with alcohol. These drugs are prescribed together, but the patient should be closely monitored. The newer generation of antidepressant medications offer better results with fewer side effects, but if you or someone you know begins to taking these, or any new medication for that matter, observe them and check in with them for any changes in mood or behavior.

15:07 Kim had no history of suicidal thoughts or mental health problems other than the anxiety that she was dealing with. Kim's doctor at her last appointment said he was going to slowly wean her off the drugs. I'm not sure why, but maybe as school was winding down and the kids were more settled, her anxiety had lessened, reducing her headaches studies estimate that for every one thousand people treated with antidepressants, about four people experience increased suicidal thinking compared to those on a placebo, and the most dangerous time is when the drugs are initially prescribed. Kim had been on both drugs for an extended period of time. While antidepressants may cause suicidal ideation and young people in the short term, they ultimately reduce suicide rates by treating long term depression.

15:53 Back to the trial. During opening statements, the prosecution focused on Chris's demeanor after the tragedy. Quote, you, ladies and gentlemen, will be able to assess what his demeanor was like that day. You will be watching hours and hours of these interviews of the defendant and his interaction and his reactions that day, and you will be able to judge his demeanor his actions in that interview room on each of those days. Of course, as our smart listeners know, demeanor is not evidence. People react to trauma in different ways. In how someone looks or acts after a tragedy or in an interview room doesn't necessarily mean anything. People have different trauma responses.

16:33 Very true. One of the first witnesses called was Mark Daniels, owner of a gun store and indoor shooting range in Plainfield, Illinois. He testified that Vaughan had visited the shooting range twice, once on June six, two thousand and seven, at ten twenty five am, and again on June thirteenth, two thousand and seven at five thirty pm, just hours before the murders. Jurors watched eight hours of Chris's interrogation videos along with graphic crime scene five. He was impassive as the gory images were shown. Later, Gail, Chris's mom, said that he wasn't shown the images. He was looking at just like a blank screen in front of him, and everyone else had like a screen in front of them that showed the gory images. So he kind of got a lot of heat for that, Like, oh, he didn't react at all to the images of the autopsy or crime scene or whatever, but he really couldn't see the images.

17:25 Interesting. During the police interviews, Vaughan consistently claimed that he had no memory of what happened On the morning of June fourteenth, two thousand and seven. Several witnesses, including Kim's parents, testified that Chris was a very quiet introverted man who rarely talked and wasn't openly expressive. Then came testimony from Illinois State Police forensic scientist Nicole Fundel, who told the jury that the gun that injured Chris was no more than six inches from his leg when it was fired. Chris's fleece jacket, which he had been wearing at the time of the murders, had four bullet holes, according to court documents. Quote. One was above the left front pocket, one was in the lower back of the jacket, and two were in the left wrist area. Fundell determined that these holes were consistent with the passage of a single bullet made when the jacket had been wrapped or layered around the gun before it was fired. She offered three possible reasons for someone to do this, First to muffle the sound, second to conceal the weapon, Third to cushion the impact if someone was attempting to shoot themselves. That's really interesting about the bullet holes, because how else would you have four bullet holes.

18:32 Bullet holes are really hard to explain. Yeah, I get it, but still, just having four bullet holes in his jacket, that would tell me that it wasn't just being worn like normal. And remember this jacket was really special to him because he had purchased it on his trip when he went on a scouting mission to the Yukon Territories. The defense would have a difficult time explaining why there was a bullet hole in the back of the jacket. The prosecution then focused on Chris's May two thousand and seven trip to the Yukon Territories. They called Stephen Willot to testify, a man from Ottawa, Canada, who met Chris on a now defunct social networking site called forty three Things in November two thousand and six. Chris went by the user named Flint or sometimes de woods Man. Willott was known as Flea. They bonded over their shared dream of living off the grid and eventually developed an almost daily email correspondence. Willot's court appearance was the first time the men were seeing each other face to face. In the emails, Chris confided to Flee that he was unhappy with modern life and wanted to leave everything behind. There were dozens of emails between them. In court, Willot read aloud some of Chris's emails. Quote, for me, it's to live a simple, peaceful life away from the government, big cities, and obviously ignorant people. I can't be content with having the same job for fifty years like my dad. In another email, Chris wrote, I have been married for a long time, and it was really just a few years

20:04 ago that I realized that it was not going to work, and I did not want to be obligated to live this lifestyle until I am dead. In these emails, he never called Kim by her name. I saw one email where he referred to her as the lady I live with. Oh wow. Yeah, but Chris wasn't worried about Kim. He said she'd be fine. Chris had a million dollar life insurance policy and he hoped that she would meet someone with their mind in the game. I've read one account where he had two point five million dollars in life insurance, so I think that was true because it was in court documentary. Yeah, Chris talked about carving arrows and sewing his own moccasins. He never once mentioned his children. The only thing he said he'd miss his jeep. Chris mentioned a woman named Maya to his pen pal, who he thought might join them in Canada. He seemed eager to get started, telling Willat in one of their final exchanges, I will be heading up there permanently soon. The plan is to head up in May to find out good place and then return later for good. I'd have to say I am a bit more than excited about it, and I'm spending every free day this month out camping and getting ready.

21:09 Sounds like you should put together a plan too. Let me know and we can compare notes. And he did spend a week in the Yukon in May. He had lied to Kim and told her that he was traveling for work. Chris made a request that completely rattled Willot. He asked his friend if he would help him fake his own death. Chris said he wanted to disappear, but he also wanted Kim to get his life insurance pay out. After that email, Willot cut off all communication. So that's pretty interesting. It actually seems pretty good for Christopher's case because it makes it sound like, yeah, I was gonna fake my own death. Why would I kill my wife and kids if I was going to do that? True? But will it was like, uh, I want no part of that. Yeah, And so he had to come up with a plan B and to fake your own death.

21:54 There's a lot of moving parts there, and it's not as easy to do as you would think. And allegedly he wanted Kim to get the money. So yeah, that's a good point. So if he was asking will It for help, and will It was like, I'm out of here, then maybe he had to go back to Plan B. Like you said, there was. A story recently in the news about a man from Wisconsin who faked his own death. He was kayaking where he left his kayak to make it look like he had drowned and then he yeah. And people looked for him. He was in Eastern Europe and I believe around Christmas time he was extradited back to the United States. Do you think his wife was like, just save him, just we don't need him and he can stay. Yeah, he wouldn't blame her. Oh. Chris's co worker, Allen Sue, testified that he and Chris were in Utah about two weeks before the murders.

22:41 In a text exchange, Chris told him that he had stayed out until five am and cryptically said, quote, things got interesting and he couldn't talk about it over a text. It sounds like his work trips were becoming a little wilder. Yeah, he was like maybe he was like having a midlife crisis or something. He was thirty two. You know, to some people, their midlife crazies start earlier. But he was exploring some new behaviors. On lying to Kim about what he was doing to. Next, Maya Drake took the stand. Maya was a dancer at a strip club called Scores near the airport. Which airport was it near? Oh? Hair Oh. She estimated that she met Chris four or five times. On one of his visits to the strip club, he gave her a one page poem he wrote for her.

23:27 According to Maya, Chris said he wanted to leave his wife, but he would make sure she was taking care of financially. Quote. He told me he wanted to leave his wife and moved to Canada and built his own cabin in the woods. He didn't care about money or material possessions. He thought his wife was too materialistic. Wait, are you not going to read us the poem that he wrote? Do you not have that? I don't have it? Disappointed in you? I have a few just words from it. Later on, I'm sure it was beautiful. Yeah, probably going to be in a book somewhere, maybe some plaques. I don't know. Chris confided in Maya that he was furious that Kim had recently spent five thousand dollars on curtains for their new home. He told Maya quote, She's going to get what she deserves. She won't see it coming. I don't think he meant that to sound nefarious.

24:17 I think her right. He was just going to leave her and she won't. She wasn't going to be expecting it. Another dancer, Kristal Miller, testified that Chris spent about five thousand dollars at her club on June six than June twelfth, which is a far better investment than curtains for your new house. Yeah. He told her that he had never been married and didn't have children. Crystal described Vaughan as timid. Instead of requesting private dances, Chris would spend time talking to the dancers about poetry, philosophy, and his dream of living off the grid. Later, he wrote Maya a poem from jail, using runic symbols associated with druidism. The FBI later decoded it, revealing phrases about ancient soul's speechless conversations and hopeful dreams.

25:02 He sounds so deep. Chris hacked in Amaya's computer and searched for her address and phone number, despite her never giving him her full name. Two more entertainers were on the witness list, but they were not called. Chris's behavior was becoming more reckless. He was visiting strip clubs multiple times a week and putting it on his credit card. Do you think that was because Kim would never see the bill? I mean it could be the State's expert in crime scene reconstruction, Matthew Nodle, explained that the nine millimeter gun found in the SUV was a semi automatic pistol. It had fully cycled after the last shot, meaning it was ready to fire again. In a suicide, semi automatic weapons often jam because the shooter's hand fails to support the gun after the fatal shot, because after the victim dies there is no pressure on the trigger.

25:52 It's called rimp list syndrome. Oh okay, I'm working out a case right now where this is interesting. I hope I explained this right. It was kind of confusing to me. The fact that the gun did not jam was a strong indication that Kim was not the one who fired the last shot, Doctor Larry Blum. The pathologists who performed the four autopsies testified that the nortryptolene levels in Kim's blood were at the low end of toxicity, but stressed the post mortem redistribution could have made the level appear higher than it actually was. After death, the body redistributes drugs into the blood as organs such as the lungs, liver, and myocardium purge them. That's kind of confusing.

26:33 Do you understand that. I think so. I'm not sure I quite understand it, but I think that the drugs they're stored in your organs, and then after you die, your organs kind of release the toxins and go back into the bloodstrepe. So that's when you test the blood, it might appear higher than it actually was. Gotcha. Forensic scientist Kelly Krainik testified about the sheer amount of blood found inside the Vaughn's SUV. There was a lot of blood and biological material throughout the vehicle. Remember when we talked about how the officers were walking up to the vehicle and there was a trickle of blood like hundreds of feet long that was coming out of the suv, disturbing.

27:14 Chris's blood was splattered on the driver's side door, on the jacket investigators believe was wrapped around the muzzle of the gun, on Kim's seatbelt and buckle, the passenger side of the console, the driver's seat, Kim's shorts and shirt, the floorboard, and even a book near Kim's feet. It's an awful lot of blood for a man who claimed that he wasn't even in the vehicle when the shots were fired. Kim's blood was found on the bottom of Chris's jacket, the right side of the driver's seat, the center console, and her own clothing. Of course, drops of Chris's blood were found on Kim, something forensic expert Paul Kish testified was significant. According to Kish, those drops of blood indicate that Kim was already immobile, likely dead when the blood landed on it her. Furthermore, Kim's blood on the console was smudged, and since she was dead, she couldn't have been the one who smudged it.

28:08 This is really interesting the blood evidence. Can you explain? I'm not sure I quite understand the logic behind drops of Chris's blood being found on Kim mean that she was immobile already. Okay, I'm I'm not a CSI. But if you think about like a drop of blood landing on someone, if you move the blood, it's going to show some sort of movement. And I think it was just like a drop of blood, Okay, And there wasn't like, you know, like if you have a nosebleed, let's say, and it falls, like there's going to be like kind of a trickle coming out of it, do you know what I'm saying. Yeah, And I think these were just like little plops of blood. So had she like moved, it would have the blood probably would have run. Yeah, that makes sense.

28:49 Chris insisted he got out of the suv before Kim shot herself, what Prosecutors argued that the blood evidence suggested otherwise. Instead, they said it showed he was moving over Kim's body after her death, and notably, none of the blood evidence pointed to a struggle. Not all of the blood on Kim was tested, but a major question remains. If Chris left the vehicle after he was shot to go for help, why was his blood on Kim and on the floor. He had no answer for the blood evidence during the trial, but years later he would have an explanation for everything. There's also the issue of the gun. If Kim had died by suicide, there should have been blood spatter on both the gun and her hand, but there was only one small blood spot on her left hand and none on the gun. Additionally, the expert testified that both of Chris's gun shot wounds were contact wounds or fired a very close range. Would Kim have leaned over to shoot him in the left leg. Chris told police that he had emptied the gun after he left the shooting range the previous evening. If Kim was the shooter, she would have had to have reloaded the magazine, but her fingerprints were not found on it. As for the children, the evidence suggested that they were shot from the passenger seat.

30:01 Prosecutors argue that Chris could have leaned over Kim her body slumped to one side, to shoot them, which would explain why his blood was found on Kim's seat belt and clothing. However, the forensic expert couldn't rule out the possibility that Kim had unbuckled, then turned around in her seat and fired the shots herself. But just because experts couldn't rule out the shooting and the suicide. That doesn't mean that it's likely. So a few days ago, I didn't know why you were asking me to do this, but we went out to your car and we. Did a little bit a very scientific recreation. Your car's a little bit smaller than a foreign expedition, but still I think what I learned from that is if you were sitting in the passenger seat of a car, it would be very difficult, I think, to turn around and shoot the person sitting directly behind you.

30:49 Yeah. If you remember so, Abby, Sandy and Blake are the children. Abby was behind the driver and then Sandy was in the middle and Blake was behind Kim. Yeah. Yeah, And when we went to, like, you know, the person behind the passenger, that was a really hard shot to make, unless you knows. You actually kind of got up out of your seat and got on your knees and turned around. Yeah, but and then you tried to like. Yeah, yeah, and were you. Able to do that. It was definitely an easier thing to do than it would have been. I think sitting in the passenger scene during. The trial, mistakes made during the investigation were revealed crime scene technicians failed to swab deep inside the barrel of the gun for Kim's biological matter. If they found it, it would have been definitive proof that the last shot fired was self inflicted, although Kelly Kranik said she looked down the barrel with a flashlight and a magnifier and she saw no blood. And they did swab down the barrel like a couple of inches, but not deep inside.

31:52 Another air involved a white towel with blood spatter found on Kim's lap. It was never collected as evidence, but there's pictures like crime scene photos of this towel runner lab. Instead, it was later washed at the crime lab, erasing whatever forensic value it may have had. They thought it was a cleaning towel. Okay, I thought I was going to ask if maybe they thought it was one of theirs. But yet still it was frustrating to investigators because they thought that could have been, you know, kind of definitive proof of what was on the towel, whose blood was on right top of it. After five weeks, six hundred exhibits, and eighty witnesses, the state rested its case. It presented a chilling picture a man deviously plot of the murders of his wife and children because they stood in the way of a new life he dreamt of in the Canadian wilderness. We'll be back after a break. Welcome back.

32:50 It's good to be back. Now we're going to talk about Chris's defense, okay, and how do you think his defense attorney started, Well. I know, if they're going to convince the jury that Chris is not guilty, that means they've got to convince them that Kim is guilty, because those are really the only two possibilities, right, So yeah, guessing it's something about that. You are correct. What I was getting to though, is his attorney is going to start with, well, we know Chris Bond wasn't a prod of course, yes, but he's not on trial for being a bad husband. Right, So yeah, you've heard that a few times. So yeah, it's kind of predictable, but that's where they started. George Lenard, Chris's court appointed defense attorney, floated the theory that Kim was distraught over the state of her marriage and decided to take her own life and to take Abby, Sandy and Blake with her as a twisted act of mercy.

33:40 Lenard said, quote she was of the mindset that if she was gone, they were better off with her come with me to heaven. The problem was there was no evidence that Kim was upset about her marriage. She was excited to get away with Chris the weekend before her death, and they had other trips planned that summer. Kim was excited about her graduation and what was next next. She never voiced concerns about her marriage to anyone. And you don't just wake up one morning with depression at a homicidal rage. Yeah, especially when you're woken at four am to go to the water park. You're not going to just wake up and be like, you know what, today, I'm going to. Grab the gun out of my husband's closet. And yeah, it just doesn't add up. The defense claimed that Chris suffered from disassociative amnesia also called psychogenic amnesia memory loss after witnessing a traumatic event as a coping mechanism.

34:30 He had no memory of what happened in the early morning hours of June fourteenth, two thousand and seven. It's more common in females, and the memory loss is typically short term. But even if Chris had amnesia, it doesn't mean that he's innocent. Right if he had done it, he could also be traumatized by exactly The defense called a blood spatter expert who said that the blood on Kim's left thumb was consistent with blowback spatter, meaning that she could have pulled the trigger. Kim was right handed. He cited cases where people had shot a gun with their weaker hand. So I'm sure you could find cases where somebody shot a gun with their non dominant hand, but it seems really hard to believe in this case, especially someone like Kim who wasn't experienced with guns. And if she were to shoot her kids in the back seat, how could she do that with her She wouldn't have done that with her left hands.

35:18 Well, I think the point was the last shot was the one that she would have shot with her. Right But I'm just saying you wouldn't shoot. You wouldn't use your right hand to shoot your the people in the back seat and then switch to your left hand. It doesn't It just doesn't make an sense. None of it makes sense. Kim's neurologist, doctor Pradeep Basha, testified. He said that she had anxiety, but showed no signs of depression. Hostility or anger. Quote. I never had any reason to believe she was depressed. She was always smiling and cheerful. Doctor Basha said that he did not worry about prescribing Topamax to Kim because patients who have problems with the drug typically are suffering from mental health problems, and Kim did not and never had. In addition, he said that nor Tripped has only one point one six percent homicide rate. Kim's sister in law testified about the meltdown Kim had about her school assignment during the Jeep jamboree weekend. Sandy's fifth grade teacher testified about a conversation she had with Kim in which she was upset because she hadn't been turning in her homework.

36:17 Kim said, quote, I've been crying about this all day. As far as I can tell. Those were the only two witnesses that the defense called that were witnesses to any sort of mental health problems that Kim was having. Those are pretty minor. Yeah, Yeah, that seems like quite a leap to go from being upset about her daughter turning in homework late and. You know, to that putting her in yeah, suicidal homicidal. Yeah. Friends of Kim testified that she was a loving, caring person. Quote. She just loved life. She cared more about others than herself. She just loved everybody. Robert Diel, a former Illinois State Police crime scene investigator, testified that during the investigation and after he posed the theory that Kim was the shooter, he was squeezed out quote every time I would come up with something that the evidence would suggest or support, or you would be able to at least follow the evidence to come to a logical conclusion. Basically, I was just given some other crazy way that this could have occurred, or they would change their theory of what happened to try to match the evidence, rather than letting the evidence dictate to you the events that occurred. He believes that Kim shot at Chris's head, but his watch deflected the shot when he raised his hands in defense.

37:31 Do you remember his fabulous turquoise watch that he was worried about the police returning to him? So this watch must have some sort of superpowers. I don't know if Wonder Woman gave it to him, but how can a watch deflect a bullet? Yeah, that seems it's pretty far fetched, right. Yes, what the defense didn't want the jury to know is that Dial had already testified at the trial next door. Coincidentally, he was also the CSI who investigated the death of Drew Peterson's third wife, Kathleen Saviot. His reputation and credibility never recovered after he botched the crime scene when he failed to gather any evidence from Kathleen's bathroom, resulting in her death initially being ruled a suicide. He was later reassigned by Will County to a patrol unit, his career as a crime scene investigator over. So this seems like a really important part of this case because here they had a police officer, a crime scene investigator, testifying for Chris Vaughan for his defense. But at the same time, this guy really doesn't seem like he was good at his job and he left.

38:34 If you remember Kathleen Savio, it was a bathtub and where the bathtub was dry, and the evidence might have been unclear as to whether it was a homicide or a suicide. But he came back with no evidence at all. Yeah, but I'm sure Chris Vaughan's defense attorney was thrilled to be able to have a crime scene investigator testify on their behalf Yeah. The final witness called was a rebuttal witness for the prosecution, who said that Topamax and nortrip de lan are commonly prescribed together and there is no strong evidence that points to an increase in suicide risk, and taking the drugs together does not multiply the risk. Assistant DA Chris Regis gave the closing arguments for the state, quote his story is so contradictory and so filled with holes that it completely reeks of guilt. Speaking on Chris's demeanor during the interrogation, Regis said, quote, think about the worst movie you've ever seen in your life and how bad the acting was. This was worse. The state argued that Chris's family were obstacles to the life he wanted to lead. The defense and their closing argument, presented by the public defender George Lenard, said there was reasonable doubt provided by expert witnesses that the forensic evidence could not rule out that Kim had possibly been the gunman. This drove me crazy because they didn't say that Kim did it.

39:53 They were saying, but we can't rule it out. So it was a possibility, but the defense will keep pointing to that as well. You know, we have witnesses that's saying that she did it. And Leonard argued that the state had proved only one thing, that Chris was unhappy and wanted to live a life in the wilderness, but they did not prove he killed his family. Quote, Christopher is not on trial of for planning to leave his family, And there was a big difference. Christopher has made mistakes in his life. There's no doubt about it. Nobody is saying that Christopher is a perfect husband or a perfect father in our show notes, I think the first or second source I have is the closing arguments, and it was like two hundred and fifty pages and I read it all and the prosecution, the state did. They did an excellent job summarizing the whole case. After hearing six hours of closing arguments, on September twentieth, twenty twelve, the jury was given the case at three thirty pm. It took the jury of eight men and four women just fifty minutes to reach a verdict in the five week trial.

40:57 Look at me, Christopher van was and what do you think? Guilty? Guilty on all four counts of first degree murder. Vaughan sat expressionless, as he had through most of the trial as he learned his fate. He was likely coached by his attorneys to remain calm. Now would be a really bad time to finally show emotion. Chris didn't turn around to look at his family. He looked straight ahead and then left the courtroom. David Butch, a spokesman for the Phillips family, said, quote, They've been through a horrible ordeal, but they are people of faith and this is what has gotten them through this. He said. The defense claims that Kim killed her children and herself at an insult to injury to her family. He added, there are a lot of unanswered questions. Will County States Attorney James Glasgow said after the verdict, quote, this case is not just a murder, it's an atrocity to annihilate your family. I can't think of a more horrific crime. He'll spend the rest of his life staring at the cold walls of his prison cell, and then he'll meet his maker for his real punishment. Judge Rosack sat Vaughan's sentencing for November twenty sixth, see was pushed back, however, so the judge could hear his appeal for a new trial. George Lenard, Chris's attorney, alleged that he didn't receive a fair trial because of the extra media attention Garner due to Drew Peterson's trial occurring at the same time. Leonard claimed that jurors were so disgusted by Peterson's media performance that it carried over to his trial. Quote. I don't know exactly what it is they were thinking, but forty five minutes and not asking for any exhibits, not wanting to hear any testimony. That's extremely rare. I've never heard of a

42:30 situation like that before, and that's odd. Seems like quite a stretch. The next day, the judge denied Vaughan's appeal. Before he was sentenced, Kim's sister and mother spoke to the court. Susan Phillips called Chris a selfish coward. Quote all this tragedy because one person was afraid to just walk away. Jennifer Ledbetter, Kim's twin sister, spoke about how painful it was to lose her. She said she was afraid that her presence caused her family pain because she looked so much like her sister. Quote our hearts ache with a knowledge that they were priceless to everyone but the one man who should have loved them more than his own life. Must be so hard for Jennifer to lose her twin. Yeah, twins are so close.

43:12 And yeah, I had forgotten that she was a twin. But yeah, I can't imagine that would be like losing half of yourself. Almost. Remember there was another case be covered. I think it was David and Belinda Temple, and Belinda was a twin. She lost her twin too, m hm. So tragic. Vaughn declined to speak before his sentence was passed down. Judge Rosac sentence Vaughn to four consecutive life sentences. The judge implied that he would have sentenced Vaughan to death when he said that he was quote very frustrated by the state legislature's restrictions on sentencing. James Glasgow said, quote there isn't a punishment that could fit this crime. You could lock him up for five hundred lifetimes and it wouldn't compensate the victims in this case or the family members.

43:54 I agree wholehearted too. Dell Phillips. Susan's father said, quote, I don't think he felt what we felt when we held our grandchildren. He's saying that, you know, he didn't think that he had a strong enough bond with his kid. Oh, you were looking at me like you didn't know what I was talking about. At the sentencing, Kim's family wept quietly. Later, they went to a nearby bar and ordered Kim's favorite drink, Lemon Drop Martini's We'll be back after a break. I wanted to go over with you in detail the evidence against Chris and the evidence against Kim. Okay, feel free to jump in if you think of something else. So Chris visited the shooting range twelve hours before the murders, and he went a week before that, and he hadn't really garned the whole time that they'd lived in Illinois.

44:45 When he returned home, he put the gun in his closet. Kim normally didn't allow the gun in the house, and he kept it in his jeep and like a locked glove compartment. When Kim felt ill, why didn't he just stop at a rest area or a gas station. Instead, he pulled onto this wooded service drive. He said, Kim did not want to get out of the suv because she was shy, and that's why he wanted to park in the desolate area. And there was an exit right before that, right with like a McDonald's and other things. And why did they leave their house at four thirty am to go to a water park three hours away when that water park didn't open until ten am? Yeah, he wanted to do it when it was still dark and there was little traffic.

45:30 Yeah, that makes sense. So he exited the vehicle to get help. Why didn't he call the police from his cell phone? Or why didn't he just drive to the police station or the hospital with his kids like he should have. Wouldn't you fight for your children in that situation? That's that's the one that really gets me. It's like that he just abandoned his kids to his supposedly homicidal wife. It just it just doesn't make any sense. No one would do that. And he was injured, but it was his left arm and his left leg. And if Kim was so homicidal, why didn't she go after him right? Why didn't she like, you know, chase him down the road, and why didn't she shoot him in the head. Yeah, and he wore the same clothes that he had worn the night before to the shooting range, A long sleeve shirt, a fleece jacket, jeans, and cowboy boots.

46:19 Not what one would wear to the water Parky. That's one of those things that you and I I would like be yelling at you. I'd be like, you're not gonna wear jeans to the water park. You look like an idiot. Yeah, And you would be right in that case. And Kim was wearing every when else in the car was wearing shorts and T shirts. I checked the weather that morning. It was already seventy degrees at five o'clock in the morning. So the only reason he would have done that is because he could then say, oh, that's why gunpowder is on the clothes, because I was. It was the same clothes I wore to the shooting range. I believe. So. Yeah, And he went to the strip club. And we know that he spent at least five thousand dollars on two nights, but we know that he went several other times, so we don't know how much money he really was spending at the strip club, but likely thousands of dollars. Yeah, because when you I know, I have to tell you this, because you don't know from personal experience that to get that private room with someone, I guess is very expensive.

47:12 And he liked to have the private time with the girls to read them poetry and other things. In my opinion, he did this because he knew that Kim wasn't going to see the bills because she was going to be gone. Either that or maybe he did it without thinking and then when he realized, oh, she's going to see these bills, I need to act. Kim did suffer from anxiety, but there was no history of depression or any mania of any kind. Chris was the only one not to suffer from life threatening wounds. Everyone else suffered from a had wound, but him. We do have a motive. Chris admitted to several people that he wanted to live a life of solitude in the Canadian wilderness. He had made a plan to fake his own death. I feel like it's pretty solid the motive.

47:56 We know that Kim did not like guns. She had gone to the shooting range times but was not a good shot. Kim went to the shooting range with Chris not because she enjoyed it, but it was just something for them to do together. If she had shot the nine millimeter pistol, would she have been able to shoot so efficiently? Even at close range? There were no wasted bullets, maybe one waisted bullet. I just don't think that she would have been able to shoot so efficiently. No, I wouldn't think so either. And if all of a sudden Kim is a sharp shooter, why did she shoot Chris on the leg and the hand and not? Well, he blocked it with his magic watch, right, that's true. For a computer security expert, he was pretty careless. His stuff was encrypted, but someone was able to unencrypt it pretty easily, and that's how they found like all of the messages and his secret accounts.

48:47 And yeah, you would think he would have been able to encrypt it in a way that they would not be able to access it. Well, I think of Josh Powell, who wasn't an expert, and they're still working on unencrypting his devices. Yeah, good point, And there is some evidence against Kim. Some of these come from the Murder in Illinois podcast. Their kids called her monster Mommy sometimes because they were afraid of her. When she got in a bad mood okay. Abby allegedly told a classmate that Kim was hearing voices in her head and was a psycho, which I'm sorry find a twelve year old girl that doesn't call her mom. Side. Kim didn't allow her kids to have sleepovers, and I don't think she allowed them to have friends in their house, which I kind of understand. We always had a lot of kids in our house and we didn't mind. But when we lived in a subdivision, a lot of kids are going to come in and out of your house, and some parents, a lot of parents actually say no, you can only play outside, right right?

49:42 Yeah. Well, and just like the Chris's defense team argument, you can twist it around the other way. Just because Kim didn't like to have kids over at her house doesn't make her a killer one. She suffered from migraines, she was a student. You know, I can understand she was a single parent a lot of the time because he traveled, so yeah, she just might not have had a lot of time to deal with that stuff. After Kim passed away and they were going through the house scale, her mother in law found all these birthday cards that were unopened with the five dollars that she sent inside. Still, oh, so these were birthday cards that Gail sent to her children. Yeah, Oh interesting. The trajectory of the bullet that killed Cassandra proved that she was shot from the front seat. That was the one bullet that they could trace, and they definitively could tell like the exact trajectory of it, and that definitely.

50:32 Really points to either Kim or Chris. That could have been either of them. Both Kim and Chris's blood was on the seat belt buckle. And remember he said that he had left the car. Yeah, and if he had been shot like from if she had shot him from the passenger seat, his blood wouldn't get over to the seat belt on her side with the car. I don't think so. And remember she had told her doctor that she had a recent change in personality. Kim was taking two drugs with a side effect of suicidal ideation. But it's hard to believe that a person with no history of suicidal ideation or violence would suddenly go on a murder's rampage. There were no warning signs, and side effect does not equal cause and effect. Well, what you said earlier too, is she didn't have symptoms of depression, and so she was taking the drugs for her anxiety. Is that right?

51:21 So you know she was actually taking the drugs mostly for her migraine. The migraine together are used to treat migraine. And so the doctor that testified said it was really it would be really uncommon for someone who wasn't taking it because of depression to have suicidal ideations. And the suicidal ideation is typically in teenagers, well from I think the age of like fifteen to twenty four. Yeah. Since Christopher Roan's conviction, some people staunchly believe he is innocent. His parents are his biggest supporters and advocates. Bill Clutter, co founder of Investigating Innocence and the Illinois Innocence Project, is another of Chris's staunch advocates. Ex Indiana State trooper David cam who was exonerated for the murder of his wife and two children, is also a co founder of Investigating Innocence. Remember we covered that case in three episodes a while back, and it actually is one of our most controversial cases. I still get people messaging me sometimes like I can't believe you think he is innocent.

52:22 I remember leaving that case really being on the fence. Yeah, Clutter, who worked as an attorney's investigator, said he initially thought that Chris was responsible for the murders Untili met him. He told Lauren Bright Pacheco of the Murder in Illinois podcast quote, he just didn't strike me as a murderer. Okay, Well, there you have it. I'm sure Kim, who by all accounts was a lovely, lovely woman, did not present as a murderer either. But sadly she's dead and Bill can't meet her and assess her character. Well, it just seems really strange for somebody who's involved in the justice system in the way that he is to make a judgment like that based on, you know, just your impression of someone that, oh, exactly, Yeah, it doesn't make any sense.

53:04 Clutter and others who believe that Christopher Vaughan is innocent accused law enforcement of portraying him as a criminal mastermind and having tunnel vision for failing to consider Kim a suspect. I think that they have tunnel vision and confirmation bias. Yeah. They heavily point to the opinion of disgraced former Illinois State Police crime scene investigator Robert Diel he identified Kim as suspect number one and Chris as suspect number two. He claimed his opinion wasn't welcomed by the Illinois State Police and he was taken off the Vaughan case, although he was likely taken off the case because of his negligence, and he now has an ax to grind with the Illinois State Police, and he does speak pretty vocally about this case and how he believes that his opinions weren't respected. Yeah, Gail and Pete Vaughan, along with Bill Clutter were on the Doctor Phil Show.

53:58 I never checked my common sense at the door. I use common sense in looking at these things. And one of the things that stuck out to me above all else is Chris had talked about wanting to live in the wilderness, live off the land, go off the grid. And if that were true, the last thing a man that wanted to do that and knew how to do that would do would be to shoot himself in the wrist. You don't render yourself one handed. If you're getting ready to go live off the land into wilderness, maybe shoot yourself through the meat of the leg. But to shoot yourself twice takes a lot of commitment and to shoot yourself in the wrist where you might never be able to use that hand again when you're going to go live off Just does it make common sense?

54:54 Well, there you have a Kim's guilty. I mean, if you're going to go based on common sense, I mean, there's so many other things that point in the other direction that I'm just I'm a little bit aghast at Doctor Phil's comments there. I could only find one part of this Doctor Phil episode. It was two parts. I don't believe that they told him all the information. They didn't talk about any of you know, the strippers or a lot of the other evidence. They did not talk about that. Throughout the Murder in Illinois podcast, the host keeps promising new evidence. Like all listeners, I was waiting for a smoking gun evidence that would clearly prove Christopher Vaughan's innocence and make this case worthy of the attention of the Innocence Project and a fourteen part Deep Dive podcast. Sometime in twenty twenty one, Christi Ravaughan, amidst the production of the podcast, wrote his parents a letter.

55:49 In the letter, he admitted that he had never suffered from disassociative Ansia, what he remembered. Everything that had happened on the morning of June fourteenth, two thousand and seven, won. Mom and dad. When Lauren showed interest in my case, I truly thought she would go the way of the others before. She still seems intent on telling the story. I know I have not been forthcoming, approachable, or even cooperative in talking about what happened. My standard deflection to any question is that I do not remember. It has been easier not to talk about the kids and more specifically, what Kim did. I have been really hopeful that I wouldn't need to talk about that morning. Ever, again, I don't know why now should be any different. I don't know if it would be better just to leave everything as is. If I'm going to fill in the blanks, it will be for you first. Perhaps that will be enough, and it won't be of any real value to give Lauren this. Just leave it as is. I did not know how to or want to deal with what happened that morning, so I lied about not remembering how kimberly shot my kids then killed herself. This is what happened.

56:55 We drove to the water park, as Kim and I had talked about the night before. Kim told me she felt sick. I pulled over and got out to give her a minute. When I was around the back of the truck, heading back towards my door, it sounded like the inside of the truck was exploding. I opened my door, saw the gun Kim was holding, and jumped in my seat to grab it. Kim fired at me. I fell back out the door, preparing to make another attempt. Kim looked at me and said, you will not take my kids. You killed them. She then turned the gun on herself and fired. I got back in to check the kids. Nothing could be done. I thought to drive the truck. Kim was slumped, so I tried to buckle her. My hands shook badly. I couldn't buckle the belt. I couldn't drive the truck. I got to the road to get help.

57:43 I was and am deeply ashamed that I failed to protect the kids. I am ashamed that I drove Kim to do something so horrible. I am ashamed that had she not shot herself, I would have taken the gun and shot her myself. I did not want to deal with what happened. I was completely unequipped to do so. I did not want to discuss why Kim did what she did. I did not want to repeat what she said to me before she killed herself. I was certain that the investigation would make clear what happened. How could it not. During the interrogation, I was back and forth between admitting my lie and continuing on. I was convinced that being caught lying would have me convicted without further consideration, regardless of the evidence. As I waited for the trial, I realized that it really did not matter that I had not fired a shot. I failed the kids. I drove Kim to do what she did. What she said was true. I was responsible. I will let the judge decide what my punishment would be. I am sorry for so many things. I have a lot of time to go back over a lifetime of mistakes. Some made little difference and others considerable. Saying that I did not remember the morning of the tragedy was a mistake, and I am sorry. Not taking responsibility was a mistake, and I am sorry. I hope that, after waiting all this time to talk about it, does not prove to be a mistake. Also, love you both.

59:02 Chris, what do you think of the letter. Wow, I mean it's it's pretty shocking. Like so he wrote this to the host of the to his mom and dad during ask them to basically share it with those And this is her new evidence that you were waiting. To hear through the pH She's calling this evidence. Yeah, this does not seem like evidence to me. This seems like somebody trying to find a new way to argue his innocence and making up a new story that maybe would catch on. This letter led to a crime scene reconstruction paid for by Jason Flome, a wealthy music industry executive, philanthropist, activist, host of the Wrongful Conviction podcast, and founder of Lava for Good who does some great work, including the Bone Valley podcast. In July twenty twenty one, Clutter, Lauren Bright, Pacheco, and other investigators and actors recreated the crime crime scene using the letter Chris wrote to his parents as a guy.

1:00:00 It was not at all scientific, it was theater. They determined that the blood evidence exonerates Chris and proves that Kim was the shooter. But that's not how crime scene investigation works. You can't work backwards. Chris has had over ten years to recreate his narrative to fit this evidence. There is a silver lining for Chris and all of this. While he won't be living in the Canadian wilderness, he'll still get to experience life without technology or modern day conveniences. He'll definitely be roughing it. What you said about recreating his narrative to fit the evidence, that really that says what I wanted to say about the letter, but I couldn't articulate at the time. That's what it feels like, is Okay, He's looking at the evidence and he's figuring out exactly what he could have done to make the evidence fit well.

1:00:46 And these people that are helping him, I believe that they're good people, and I believe that they believe that he's innocent. And it's just sad to me. Yeah. Will County State's Attorney James Glasgow told the Chicago Sun Times that Vaughan would go so free when hell freezes over. We prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Vaughan shot his children in the head and chest at plaint blank range after putting a gun under the chin of his wife and pulling the trigger. In January twenty twenty four, a federal judge find attorney Keith Altman, who represented Galeen Pierre Vaughan, five hundred dollars for their twenty twenty two lawsuit, which the judge called recklessly indifferent and said it had no foundation in the law and the lawsuit. Altman alleged the state misled the grand jury in order to indict Vaughan and misrepresented the blood evidence. So Christopher Vaughan remains incarcerated at the Pinkneyville Correctional Center in Illinois, a medium security president what. He is ineligible for parole and has exhausted all of his appeals. The only way that he will get out of prison is if he's granted a pardon by Illinois Governor J. B. Pritzker, or if new evidence comes to light that proves his innocence or merits a new trial, or.

1:01:56 If he escapes. I don't know what the hell he's doing in medium security prison, your wife and four people. It's because he is a little guy, and I think he's I think he's probably in danger. I don't know. I wasn't able to find much information about his prison life. This is the hard part. This is the part that I always get emotional in and you do too. But if I can't do it, you're going to take over Oka. But it's really important that we remember these these people as people and not just victims. Abby Vaughan was a gifted artist. She loved playing soccer and was a terrific goalie. She loved to read fantasy books and also enjoyed writing her own books. She had a goldfish named Larry. Sandy was a natural leader. Her family nicknamed her Commander Sander because of her take charge attitude. She loved to correl her siblings and cousins to perform skits and play backyard sports and games. She loved animals, especially frogs, and planned to start a dog walking business in her neighborhood. Blake loved reading in baseball. He was a walking encyclopedia of baseball facts. He enjoyed being a Cub Scout and especially love the Soapbox Derby. He was looking forward to seeing the new Fantastic Four movie. Kim loved being a wife and mother. She was an athlete in high school and still enjoyed playing volleyball. She was an enthusiastic Brownie and Girl Scout leader for her daughter's troops and an avid volunteer at her children's schools.

1:03:19 Rest in Peace, Abby, Sandy Blake, and Kim. I listened to the Murder in Illinois podcast as one of my sources, and I know how hard podcasters were, and I never want to say anything negative about another podcast, but I just want to say that I found it incredibly one sided, biased, and disrespectful to the victims, especially Kim. The podcast host damages her credibility by exclusively telling Chris's story without presenting the other side of the story. That approach might be acceptable in some cases, but in my opinion, the evidence simply does not support Christopher Vaughan's innocence. Blaming a woman who is no longer here to defend herself feels profound wrong. The host doesn't say a single kind word about kimber Le Vaughan or present any witnesses who do.

1:04:06 Even if you believe Kim shot the children, it wasn't a deliberate act. It was a tragic moment of possibly drug induced psychosis, something that should be met with empathy, not vilification. But to be clear, I do not think that is what happened here. There is simply no evidence whatsoever that Kim was suicidal. I'm also deeply bothered by how Chris's defense and Pacheco portray antidepressants. While there is a small slightly increased risk of suicidal thoughts, it's rare decreases with age and time spent on the drug. Taking antidepressants shouldn't carry a stigma. These medications help millions of people live better lives. That said, if you are a loved one notices changes in mood or behavior while taking any medication, always check in with your doctor. And I am not an expert, just someone who has carefully researched this case and formed my own opinion. I try to present both both sides, and it's okay if you disagree with me or rich And if Christopher barn truly is innocent, I hope that he gets a second trial. If you believe in his innocence, there is a petition that you can sign on change dot org. Right, I have some questions for you before we wrap up here. Do you think that there's any possibility that Kim was the murderer?

1:05:21 I mean, very very small possibility, certainly not reasonable doubt, possibility in my mind, I think, and again I didn't sit through the trial, but if I based on what I've heard, if I was on that jury, I think I would have had no problem voting guilty. Why did Chris decide to murder his family instead of fake his own death? You know, I'd a great question. I don't know why he chose that, or why he didn't choose divorce instead, But I don't know. I mean, maybe he just thought he faking his own death would be too hard to get away with, or I don't know. I mean, he had talked to his friend about that, and then his friend said he bond to have no part in it, and so maybe he just decided that it wasn't going to work that way.

1:06:04 Yeah, how emotionally immature. Must want to believe that the stripper you have spent four or five hours with is going to run away with you to the Yukon territories. Pretty emotionally immature. And yeah, writing poetry to your stripper friends, I mean, yeah, it just seems like he was very immature emotionally. How long would Chris have survived in the Yukon territories. I think he would have been eaten by a bear. Yeah, probably no offense to bears. They would have spit him out because you probably tasted really bad. Would you ever want to live off the grid? I mean there's a there is a certain like, you know, appeal to that, like being able to live off the grid, But I think the reality of it would It would just be really hard and really lonesome. And you know, as you get older too, you need you need people, you need help, you need medical attention and things like that.

1:06:57 So I just think, yeah, it would not be I wouldn't live up to the romantic ideal of living off the grid. Yeah, I think it would have gotten bored pretty quickly. I do want to thank Kyle for recommending this case. I want to thank our friend Nancy, who is a pharmacist who helps us with a little bit of research sometimes. I forgot to mention at the top of the episode when I was talking about Kylie in Primetime Crime, go listen to Kylie's latest two part episode on Darlene Holt's very interesting. She did a great job. I wanted to talk about sources really quick. I did listen to the Murder in Illinois podcast. That was not my primary source, although I had you listen to a couple of episodes of it too, because I didn't want to. I thought maybe I was being biased.

1:07:39 Yeah, what was you agree? My impression was definitely that way as well. I mean, but she did have interviews with a lot of his family members, which was interesting to hear their point. Of view, right, And that was the information that I gleaned from the podcast, was about Chris's childhood and some of the relationships that they had with Kim. We have a subscription to newspapers doc and a lot of time there was not a lot of information about this case. So I literally read every article in the Chicago Tribune on this case, and after citing twenty five of them, I stopped citing them. So if you're wondering where the information came from, it's really all the Chicago Tribune. So recently, we have had some new information about a couple of cases that we've covered that we wanted to talk about briefly.

1:08:33 One case that we covered a while ago was Ellen Greenberg, and that case is near and dear to my heart because it's so baffling. There is finally some movement in her case. After more than five years of contentious legal battles, Philadelphia settled two civil lawsuits brought by Ellen's parents, Sandy and Josh Greenberg, on February third, just days before jury's selection began. In one of the cases, they settled for an undisclosed amount of money sought to change the manner of Ellen's death from suicide to homicide or undetermined, while the second suit was for the emotional distress the botched investigation caused the Greenbergs. The Greenbergs had been fighting with the city of Philadelphia for fourteen years to change Ellen's cause of death. That was the thing that they wanted the most, and on January thirty first, doctor Marlon Osborne, the original medical examiner, agreed to change the manner of Ellen's death.

1:09:29 Oh wow, Just to. Remind you, Ellen died in January of twenty eleven in her apartment on a snowy night, from over twenty stab wounds, some in seemingly impossible to reach spots on the back of her head and neck. She was engaged to be married the next summer to Sam Goldberg, with whom she shared the apartment. The time of Ellen's death, Goldberg was at the gym and came back to a locked apartment. He had to break the door down. The police treated Ellen's death as a suicide because she was alone and the apartment was locked, they failed to do a proper investigation. They never called a crime scene investigation, and all though the medical examiner initially ruled her death as a homicide, by this time it was too late to gather any evidence from the crime scene. It had been professionally cleaned.

1:10:15 It seemed that Ellen's body had been moved, and it was questionable whether or not Goldberg had actually broken down the door. Yeah, the Greenbergs are hoping that there will be a formal investigation. Yeah. I hope there is too, but it sounds like a lot of the evidence is gone. Like, I don't know how you do an investigation so far from the crime. I don't know. But one of the cases you covered also got a lot of attention. Yeah, this was the murder of Mary Yoder, who was a chiropractor in upstate New York and Caitlin Conley, who had been dating her son, Adam Yoder was convicted of manslaughter I believe a few years back, and there was recently a documentary about her case. I think it was called Little Miss Innocent, and it's gotten a lot of attention since then. But her conviction was actually overturned, which was a real surprise. I didn't know it was even like in I knew there was an appeal going on, but I didn't know it was so close to being decided.

1:11:16 And I don't one hundred percent understand exactly the reason for overturning it, but it was it was kind of on a technicality that the warrant to search her phone was limited in some way, and I'm not sure exactly what the scope of the warrant was. They access some text messages, right, the. Police went beyond the scope of the warrant, and the judge said that they had to throw out the conviction. And she is now free from prison, and I think the state still has to decide whether to try her again or not this and this would the third time. She was tried once before and it was a hung jury, and then she was tried again and they wanted to find her guilty of I believe murder in the second degree, but the jury went back to Manslow because they weren't They didn't feel comfortable knowing that if that she intended to kill Mary, or if it was just that she wanted to make her sick, so they convicted her of manslaughter, and so now the question is, yeah, will they try her a third time, especially because they won't be able to use some of the phone evidence that was outside of the scope of the warrant, and that was really a big part of convicting her was finding this evidence on her phone.

1:12:24 So yeah, and they can't try her for murder one or murder too. Right because she was basically acquitted of those charges already. So it'll be interesting. This is another case that has very mixed opinions out there. There are quite a few people, including members of Mary Yoder's family, who will insist that Caitlin Conley is innocent. Well, and it's because of Bill had a relationship with Mary's sister, and a lot of people think that that was motive. Yeah, And most of the evidence shows that the relationship with Mary's sister started about two months after her death, which was still pretty soon, you might argue. But people that argue for Caitlin's innocence believe that he may have started the affair before Mary's death and that was the motive for murder. But there's not really any evidence to show that. So I strongly believe that Caitlin did kill Mary Yoga, but there are people who passionately believe otherwise.

1:13:19 Yeah, well, I'm with you, kid, I believe you. We share a brain. We do kind of, we actually don't. I think our raids are very different. There are three other trials in twenty twenty five that I am looking forward to. Busy here. Yeah, in August of twenty twenty five, we have Brian Coberger. Oh yeah, In April of twenty twenty five, we have Corey Richins, and Brian Walsh is going to trial in October of twenty twenty five. Oh wow. It's possible that any of these could you know, pushed back. But so far those three big trials. Yeah, the Brian Walsh one, we talked about that way like not long after we started the podcast, right, yeah, and it's been so long ago, but that's wild that that's finally coming to trial.

1:14:03 So we have our first big snowstorm that's supposed to happen tomorrow. I know you're excited. I wouldn't say I'm excited. Oh really, I would have been excited. I would have been excited about about a big snowstorm back in December, But now it's like, I just want winter to be over, even though we really haven't had any significant snow yet. Yeah. Well, I have like a whole day plan for us. We're going to watch Fargo, and then we're going to have a snowball fight, and then I'm going to make homemade pretzels and I'm making chicken and dumplings for dinner, and then. We can really have it all planned out. I don't know if you remember this, but I actually work at home, so I don't get snow days at my job unless our internet and power.

1:14:44 Go out, which then right, but unless you're I mean, you sound a little hoarse. Yeah, you're probably not feeling good. Yeah, that snowstorm probably won't help, So okay, I'm with you. All right. I've almost forgot to say congratulations to our friend and listener Elena for qualifying for the Boston We're so proud of you and we're so excited. And I don't it probably doesn't have everything to do with us, but I know she listens to us a lot when she runs. Yeah. No, we're so proud of you and that's great. Thank you all so much for listening and your support and your friendship. We appreciate it so so much. Until next time. Don't kill your husband, don't kill your wife.

1:16:01 The clock