Tara and Stephen Grant

0:00 Hi, I'm Rich and I'm Tina. And if there's one thing we've learned in over twenty years of marriage, some days you'll feel like killing your husband, and some days you'll feel like killing your wife. Welcome to love, Mary Kill Hey Tina, Hey Rich. That's sound funny, helium in the room, That's what it sounded like. That's very strange. There's just something in my throat. I thought you were just extra energetic today. I'll be honest, I am not, but I'm going to fake it till I make it. It's such a weird day. I feel like we're in a really weirdwilight zone. I know, I know, it's like a lot of breaking news. Nat O'Connor passed away, which I'm really sad about too. Yeah, there's this UF or not UF and we're not like conspiracy theorist people, but it's like it's real data. It's it's kind of freaky, like yeah, really freaky. Yeah. Through my whole life, I was always like very skeptical about UFOs and stuff like it just didn't like theoretically, it seems like so hard to imagine someone could fly from light years away to our little planet. But yeah, it's like there's stuff happening that's kind of real.

1:25 Yeah, and then we had this huge major storm. Yeah, we thought it was a tornado warning, but it was the sirens went off, but I guess the storm was bad enough where the winds were eighty mile per hour sustained winds. So yeah, it seems like every time we record lately, we have a thunderstorm. There's just been a lot of storms this summer. It's kind of weird. Yeah. Yeah, we started out a little anyone never mind, no one cares. I Can I just say something about Shenado O'Connor real quick, because yeah, yeah, it's like super sad. And when her first album came out, which was not her famous album, like her second Albu was the one where she became really famous. But I was obsessed with her first album. I listened to it like every day for months and months, and just such an incredible voice and incredible talent. I think some of the controversial things have overshared her music sadly, and for sure, Like I was just listening to the news and they were talking so glowingly about her, and it's say it to people when they're alive. Yeah, yeah, I love you and I love our listeners, and just keep on telling people that you care about them while they're here, not talk lowingly when they're not here. Yeah, agreed, Well I love you too, and I also love her. That was delayed. Well, you had you were going, you kept going, you had some things to say. I feel your love on a daily basis. I appreciate that. Gosh, we should have warned the listeners get a barf bucket. Anyway, you are presenting a case today, and I'm so excited. It's a Michigan case. We haven't done

2:55 a Michigan. You used to accuse me of only wanting to do Michigan case is, so I stopped doing them for a while. You are a very proud Michigander. I really am. I love Michigan. I do too. It's a great state. Yeah, I definitely very much transplant. I think people know probably know that, but I am. I have lived in Michigan more than I have lived anywhere else, but I was born in Chicago. Yeah, it's a great state. I mean, Illinois is a good state too, LANDA. Lincoln, Yeah, Illinois is a good state too. So yes, today, the case I'm going to talk about it's pretty well known. It was. It was in the news a lot in when it happened, and our locally a lot. Yeah, it made the national news pretty heavily. Mind if I have the snack that you brought me, Yeah, I'll just try it while you're talking. I'll just like this, Okay, I know it's gonna melts. It's a it's a frozen kind of treat that I made. So the case I'm going to talk about today is Stephen and Tara Grant, which happened in two thousand and seven, and it actually happened right near where I grew up, so it's kind of very I didn't live there at the time, but it's very close to where I grew up, So yeah, the area. Yeah, I listened to the I think I listened to the Dateline episode recently and that's when I was like, Hey, maybe you want to do this case. When they talked about Stony Park Metro Park, I was like, Oh my gosh, that's just part of who you are. Yeah, for sure, we'll get into all that.

4:20 But yeah, today's snack that I brought. Because we're doing a Michigan case, of course, I had to do a local Michigan thing. And so what I made for you today is what's called a Boston cooler, which I know we're not doing a Boston rich You're like my straight man. I know. It's a weird thing. It's a it's called the Boston cooler, but it's a Michigan thing. And basically all it is is Warners, which if you don't know what Warners is, it's a ginger ale that was made in the Detroit area. I think you can get it most places now. But it's really different than like out of Canada Dry or other ginger ales. It's much sweeter, it's really good. I think you brought it before, Yes, I have. You're right. So it's burners and vanilla ice cream and it's basically blended together in a little kind of milkshake. So I famously really dislike Burners, but we always try to keep it in the house because, in my opinion, Wurners is like super gingery. It's like really struggled compared to like a Canada Dry. And I don't like it, but I keep it in the house because it's really good for you know, stomach when you have it when someone has a stomach ache. Yeah, you are going to be surprised. I actually like this, like it good. Yeah, I don't hate it. Are you going to elaborate on the whole, Well, there's not much to elaborate on. Well you used to, like you've had these sense as long as I've made me one. Yeah, But normally you would just put a cannon. You would put a couple of scoops of wurners

5:51 and a mug or a copper or whatever, and then you would pour the urners over it, right, But this time you you blended it. Yeah. Technically, if you don't blend it, it's just called the burner's float, like a root beer float or whatever. But yeah, a true Boston cooler is blended. So yeah, it's it's not the burners isn't as like harsh as it normally is. So I should also mention I used Hudsonville ice cream, which is also a Michigan ice cream. Michigan paying you. Even the Michigan Board of Tourism any we actually do talk about Michigan a lot. And if you've never been to like Macina Island or we say up north meaning like Traverse City, and those are just wonderful places. And if you go, so Michigan, there's up north, but then there's the up so it's kind of it's kind of confusing. It is a little confusing. We talked about this before. Yeah, but the up is actually belong it's attached to Wisconsin. We don't how to go there. Again. There are two peninsulas, which is why our slogan used to be, if you seek a pleasant peninsula, look around you. Yeah, that's like the worst slogan. All right, well, why don't you dive right in. On Wednesday, February fourteenth, two thousand seven, thirty seven year old Stephen Grant walked into the Macomb County, Michigan Sheriff's Department to report his wife, Tara, thirty four missing. He said that he and Tara had gotten into a fight when she

7:23 came home from a business trip on Friday night, nearly five full days earlier, and that she had left. The fight, he said, was about Tara's frequent business travel. She was a successful executive at an engineering firm and was working on a project for her company in Puerto Rico, so she had to travel there pretty much every week, leaving Steve to take care of their kids. Six year old Lindsay and four year old Ian with help from Verena, Their nineteen year old live in Opere from Germany. Stephen told police he wasn't sure he actually wanted Tara back, and that he had contacted an attorney about for a divorce. Who goes to the police station and says, I don't need her bath, but I should probably report her missing. Yeah, Stephen is. He is one of a kind, as you'll see soon.

8:11 However, Stephen was all over the Detroit media and then the national media, crying and begging for Terra's safe return. If anybody knows just to just say something, just tell us to call me, call the police, call somebody. That's Stephen. He sounds sounds like a little snake, like a little worm. He sounds I hate him. Yeah, he sounds like a weasel, doesn't he? I think a weasel is too kinds cute? Yeah, fair enough, fair enough? It just so in since here. Yeah, So before we get too far into that situation, let's talk about how we got to this point. So Stephen Grant was born in nineteen seventy and grew up in Sterling Heights, Michigan. His parents were Alan, Susan and He had a sister, Alley, who was three years older. The neighborhood they lived in was typical of the Detroit suburbs in those days, blue collar, working class, lots of autoworkers, not a lot of diversity. His dad, al had his own small business. He ran a small machine shop that supplied tools and bearings to the auto industry. Stephen was described as energetic, curious, fun loving, and a rule breaker. He would borrow his mom's car before he had a license without telling her. He liked to play around with fireworks and explosives. One time he made what was essentially a pipe bomb that he blew up in the backyard, leaving a small crater. When his dad came home and saw the whole, he called the police, saying that someone had set off a bomb in his backyard. Yeah, Stephen lied to

9:43 the police, and he said that he saw two strange men in the yard. Likely story, right. It sounds something very much like what would have happened in your house, if it's possible. Stephen also alike to shoplift just for the fun of it. Sometimes he would get caught, but he was pretty good at talking his way out of trouble, even if some people found him to be an annoying know it all. After high school, he went to Macomb Community College for three years, but he never declared a major, so he didn't actually end up with any type of degree. He then enrolled at Michigan State University, first with plans to be a teacher, but when his application to the School of Education was rejected, he majored in history and he started thinking about law school. He had various jobs during college, at one point working for State Senator Jack Facson as an intern, which got him interested in going into politics. He had a reputation among Factson's staff as the young kid who was always hustling. But when Faxson's term ended in nineteen ninety four, Stephen was out of a job. He had one serious relationship while in college with a girl named Dina Hardy. People thought they might end up getting married, but they ended up breaking up after dating for about two years.

11:01 All right, let's talk about Tara. Tara Distramp was born in nineteen seventy two, the first child of Mary and Gerald. Three years later, her sister, Alicia was born. Tara grew up in the small town of Perkins, Michigan, which is in the Upper Peninsula, about twenty miles north of Escanaba. It's fun to say, it is fun to say. Yeah, very small, small town, rural upbringing. Everything the pasties, lots of pasties up there. A pasty is like a I know, it's like a pastry filled with meat and potatoes and vegetables and a little gravy kind of. It's like a pot pie, but in a in a pastry pocket like a cow. Very popular if you go up North Lake every feet yep, yep. So Tara's upbringing it was very rural, as you might expect.

11:54 She helped to tend to the family's goats, chickens, and cows. Every year, the family would collects syrup from the maple trees in their yard and sell it from a little roadside stand. Yeah, it sounds very idyllic, doesn't it. Well, not if you're a teenager. No, no, Well, Tara was very active. She loved to spend time outdoors. She went skeet shooting and hunting for rabbit or deer with her dad, and riding horses. She was a cheerleader in high school and also played clarinet in the band. Was the band I don't know but it must have been pretty small. Well, it was probably pretty small, because yeah, I was going to say she graduated in nineteen ninety third in her class, but that was out of forty students. So yeah, I'm sure the band was probably maybe everyone had to be in the band. Maybe it was a requirement. Could be. Tara had a type a personality. She was ambitious and determined and was confident that she could achieve anything she set her mind to. She also had a temper and she didn't shy away from an argument. At times, people nicknamed her terror or Terrible Terrible. She wanted more from life than her small town upbringing could offer. After high school, she went to the local community college in Escanaba while working and saving her money. During this time, she met and dated a guy named Pete Branchow, but it didn't work out because Pete had plans to join the Navy and go to flight training school.

13:20 Tara was heartbroken when that relationship ended. I think she always considered Pete to be the one who got away. After two years of community college, she transferred to Michigan State University to study business administration. Tara dated a few guys during her time at MSU, but nothing really serious. She didn't like boring guys. She wanted someone who was a bit more of a bad boy, someone maybe a little dangerous. During the summer of nineteen ninety four, Tara was on her way to completing her business degree with honors when she met Stephen Grant through some mutual friends. Tara wasn't super interested at first, partly because she was still in and on again off again relationship with another guy, but Stephen persisted and she finally agreed to a date. On their first date, he took her to Detroit and gave her a tour of the city. Growing up in a small town far away from the big city, Tara always thought of Detroit as a scary place, but Stephen showed her that there were some nice areas. He took her for a drive through Gross Point to look at the mansions. They had lunch at Fishbones, which is a really good restaurant in the Greektown area of Detroit, and then they went to the Detroit Institute of Arts, which is a really beautiful You have been approximately fifty times about that. That might be a underestimate. That's one of those places that, like, you know, if it's Father's Day or birthday or something, and we're like, well, what are we going to do the DA Why not?

14:48 Oh, it's a lovely place. I'm sure that Stephen probably seemed very worldly and confident to Tara. She was intrigued by the fact that he worked for a state senator and he was talking about law school. It was enough to maybe make her think that this was someone who had his ship together, had ambitions like she did, and was going places. Was he still at MSU? He was up there, but I think he maybe had dropped out of school by the time they met. So it turned out she was wrong about all of that, though very wrong. They went on a few dates, but it still wasn't serious. In fact, Tara was still seeing the other guy as well. But a few weeks after her first date with Stephen, Tara's grandmother passed away and she went back up north for the funeral.

15:33 Stephen surprised her by showing up unannounced at the funeral home to support her. Tara hadn't even told her family about Stephen, so they were really surprised. Tara's friends and family were all a buzz, like, who's this mysterious stranger who just drove six hours to be here. After an awkward dinner with Tara and her family, Stephen headed back to Lansing. The next day, Tara did two things. First, she called the other guy and officially ended things with him. Second, she called Stephen and told him that she was in love with him. After that, things started moving quickly. Tara graduated and got a job with an engineering services firm called Washington Group International. They moved to Auburn Hills, which is a suburb north of Detroit. Stephen proposed to Tara on the steps of the Detroit Institute of Arts, and they got married in Escanaba in September of nineteen ninety six. How long, so they'd been dating for two wish years, Yeah, right around two years. At the wedding, Steven struck a lot of Tara's friends and family as kind of a jerk. He was bossy and he ordered people around. Not everyone thought that, but there was definitely an impression that he looked down on sort of the small town folk, like he was better than them. After the honeymoon, Stephen and Tara settled into married life. Stephen struggled to find work he had dropped out of MSU when he went to work for the state senator and never finished his degree. He ended up going to work for his dad at his machine shop in Mount Clemmens. On the other hand, Tara was quickly identified

17:07 as a rising star at Washington Group. She was focused, smart, hardworking, and a natural leader. In nineteen ninety seven, Stephen and Tara bought their first house in Utica, Michigan, which is about three miles from where I grew up. One of their neighbors from that time described Tara as funny, intelligent, and beautiful, always with something nice to say. Stephen, on the other hand, I believe him to be one of the most arrogant people I've ever met. The neighbor said, pretty arrogant for a guy who couldn't find a job, right, yeah. Daughter Lindsay was born in two thousand. A few months later, they moved to a larger home in Washington Township, which is right near where I went to high school. One of the best things about where they lived is that right nearby there is a park called Stoney Creek, which we mentioned at the top of the show. It's a really incredible metropark. There's like four thousand acres beauty, full lake, paved trail around the lake for walking or biking. There's a nature center or a golf course, sandy beaches, fishing, boating, snowboarding, sledding, playgrounds. It's just there's tons to do there. It's a beautiful place, and I think that was a key reason why Stephen and Tara chose that area.

18:18 And I'll just say I spent like many hours there as a young lad. I practically lived at Stony Creek. Yeah. My episode is like when we first started dating, and whenever we go in to like see your mom or the city or whatever, you'd be like, and this is where I ate lunch, and this is where I pluff a flat. It was. It's captivating. It's a tour down memory lane. But I would ride my bike up there like all the time, and just yeah, it was just a beautiful place. I've probably been there, I don't know once that I remember. Really, Yeah, we should go back. We should. We should do some biking and fishing and hunting and playgrounding and sledding all right.

18:59 In two thousand and two, their son Ian was born. The family was busy and active both Stephen and Tara. When she wasn't traveling, volunteered for field trips and other school activities. They biked, they ran, they went up north for vacations. They had a boat for a while. They would go skating and indoor rock climbing in the winter. Stephen was a really good cook, and he also became very active in their subdivision, serving on the board and eventually becoming president. Tara, on the other hand, continued to accelerate at her career. She moved up the ranks at Washington Group. She had to travel a lot, which meant that Stephen played more of a lead role when it came to parenting, driving the kids around their activities while Tara was out of town, which is also a very important job. It is why do you think Stephen couldn't find steady work. Was he just not willing to take an entry level position because of his arrogance. It just seems to me like Stephen was somebody who was kind of scattered, like he was.

19:56 You had, you know, one day, He's like, I'm going to be a teacher. The next day, I'm gonna be lawyer. The next day, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do that. He just seems like somebody who had lots of ideas but not really maybe a lot of focus. So with the situation with Tara traveling and having kind of a growing career, Stephen wasn't happy about that situation. From the beginning. It felt like, you know, her career was flourishing. But he, like I said, he kind of had big ideas and he you know, it just wasn't how he envisioned his life playing out. And I think this was definitely a source in their marriage of tension, even if they never showed signs of marital problems to any of their friends or family. When Tara spoke to family members like her sister Alicia, she mostly talked about her work, her busy travel schedule, the kids, but not so much about Stephen or their marriage.

20:44 In two thousand and four, during a family trip up north, Tara ran into Pete's mom. Do you remember Pete? How can I forget Pete? Here's one that got away, the one that got away? Yes, from her community college days. And apparently it got Tara thinking again about Pete, and she later reached out to him. The two ended up talking on the phone a few times and emailing each other. Oh danger red flag yes, and overtime, as you might imagine, the conversations became more flirtatious, and eventually Pete and Tara planned to meet up over the holidays. Tara lied to Stephen and told him that she had to travel for work, canceling the plans that they had made together as a family, so that she could hook up with Pete. But then Pete, who wasn't married but was seeing someone, actually decided to cancel, so the meetup never actually happened. Pete and Tara continued talking though over the next few weeks, until one day in January of two thousand and five, Stephen happened to find a love note that Tara had written to Pete. Stephen confronted Tara, who confessed to rekindling things with their old flame. Stephen told Tara that he wanted her to leave, which she did, and he also demanded that she give him Pete's phone number, which she also did. He called I will never give you my ex phone, just kidding I would. I don't have any ex boyfriends. Oh, I don't have any ex boyfriends. Stephen actually called Pete the next day, and he threatened to put a bullet in his head. If he continued talking to

22:15 Tara. Pete sent Tara an email letting her know that Stephen had called and threatened him, and that was the last communication the two of them ever had. Tara returned home after a week and patched things up with Stephen at least temporarily. Was Stephen faithful up until that point? He was? OK. We will talk more about that though, coming up all right later in two thousand and five, Tara, I should say, as far as I know, right, he seems like the kind of guy that might not be. Yeah, as far as I know, he was faithful, But that does not mean that there couldn't be something that I don't know there. Later in two thousand and five, Tara attended a Landmark Forum conference in Phoenix. Do you know what the Landmark Forum is? Does it have some going to do with land and marking l or nothing to do with either of those? But you know what ST is or you know what S is? Yeah? I think we talked about it in at at least a couple Yeah, yes, Susan and Felix Polk was the one. I remember, ye Holy featured well in the eighties when ST was becoming it was like a self help thing.

23:19 It was becoming controversial though, and people were starting to label it as a cult. It was very immersive. Yes, yes, so the founder, Werner Erhard, who was known as the father of self help, He actually repackaged UST and turned it into Landmark Worldwide, which is it's sort of like a kinder, gentler version of AST. I guess it'd be curious to read more about that. Yeah, and it's still around today. You could go to a you could go to a Landmark forum now, okay, I'll see you later, not right now. So Tara returned from the conference energized and wanting to work on her relationships. She wrote heartfelt letters to those close to her. So I want to read part of the letter she wrote to Stephens, so that you can kind of get a better idea of the dynamics in their relationship. I have not been present in much of our marriage. I have further invalidated you by always needing to make you wrong for me to be right, and dominating you to avoid being dominated, and in doing so, not really loving you at all. These actions have not allowed me to see you and hear you for what you really are, someone who loves me.

24:25 Unconditionally the impact of this has essentially been pushing away the one person who has fully committed to me to love me unconditionally. What became very clear to me is that you have been the only committed party in this marriage. You have made the efforts to change, and I have simply created more stories. I love you for the human being you are and for not giving up on me and supporting me in the possibility I have created for myself. Love Tara. What do you think of Tara's note that was word salad seems like a lot of words, and I'm not really sure what the meeting was. Yeah, I'm guessing a lot of the the words or the terminology came from the self help seminar heavily influenced by a psychologist or psychiatry. But I guess the thing the takeaway from me is that it's clear she was struggling with their relationship and the dynamics of their relationship, and she wanted to try to make things better.

25:15 So everything for me goes back to the Real Housewives, And it seems like kind of like a move housewife makes before the marriage, like it gets better, but then it ends permanently. Yeah, that's what it kind of like, you know, kind of like a last ditch effort to acknowledge their shortcomings. And yeah, I think it's very perceptive. You have learned so much from Real Housewives. I think that Andy Cohen and the Real Housewives really can change your world. I should say there were years where I was like, oh, it's so much misogyny, and I gave it up, but then I went back. Yeah, you always go back anyway. But I do give her credit for, you know, looking internally and making an effort, making an effort and those words. I'm like, I think I'm better now. But at certain points I think that I've taken you for granted.

26:07 And it's hard when you're in the throes of it and you have little kids and you're so immersed in parenting that you don't appreciate your partner. Yeah, for sure. Starting in two thousand and three, the Grants hired a live in o pair using a service that would match college aged girls from Europe with families in the US. What can go wrong there? Yeah. The arrangement allowed Tara to travel as needed and Steve to continue working at the machine shop, but they had trouble finding a stable O pair, some would come to the US and end up partying too much, and some just didn't like the work. They went through seven of them over the next four years. Some of Tara's friends, as you have so astutely pointed out, questioned the wisdom of having young college aged girls living in their home while she was out of town so much. But they never said anything to Tara because they knew that she wouldn't appreciate other people kind of sticking their nose into her business, and Tara was trusting by nature. If she ever had concerns about Stephen being home alone with any of their O pairs, she never mentioned them to anyone.

27:11 In August of two thousand and six, a nineteen year old German girl named Verena Dirks started as their latest O pair, and she seemed to be working out well. She loved the kids, she was conscientious, and she was a good worker. All right, So now we're going to talk about the weeks and the days leading up to Tara's death. In October of two thousand and six, Tara's company gave her responsibility for managing their office in Puerto Rico as they were bidding on a contract for a project with the power company there. This meant that she would be traveling even more, flying out nearly every week. Usually she would be home for the weekend, but not always. At the end of two thousand and six, Tara wrote down her goals for two thousand and seven. Just hearing this list might make you exhausted, but I'm going to read it anyway, if you're all right. Buy piano.

28:03 Take two adult vacations Europe September anniversary, Paris, Caribbean end of March. In April, plan Walt Disney trip for November. Sit with a financial advisor. In January. Plan life better That was a little bit general. Look into buying a new car Chrysler three hundred BMW five. Start college savings account for kids. Get smart about finances, look into stocks other mutual funds. Steve's retirement plan has no plan. One weekend night a month is date night. Become a better communicator to Steve. Stop being angry, therapy if needed, stop yelling, Start doing fifteen minute a day meditation. Start yoga again for my soul. Have once a month girls night with Lindsay. Get reconnected with family, start exercising again. Revise and stick to budget, track spending on computer, file and box, old bills, receipts, keep office organized, start a card night plan, dinners out with friends or parties at house, plan once a month, kids date night. Look at balanced activities for kids, music, foreign language, Spanish sports, no more than two soccer, swim, gymnastics, baseball, football, yoga, karate. That's a lot. That is a lot Terra sounds like she might be a type a personality, Yes, but that's a lot. That makes me a little sad because she obviously is trying hard to make herself and her life better and she

29:33 that's that's way too much. Should just bite off if you want to change, pick one thing at a time, not four thousand. Yeah, that's a lot to start to try to think about for the course of a year. Yeah. So she traveled like every week, like Monday through Fright, that's pretty much, especially after she got assigned to the Puerto Rico office. How long is the flight from the US to Puerto Rico. Oh, gosh, I don't know. It's probably four or five hours total with connections. Yeah. So it turns out that Tara was not the only one keeping in touch with an old flame. Steven had also kept in touch over the years with Dina Hardy, which was his serious girlfriend from college. Steve would call her up maybe once a year or so to check in, but more just as a friend. But that January, Steven's tone toward Dina changed and became more flirtatious, and he started calling and emailing her more frequently. On January twenty fifth, in an email to Dina, he said quote, I like being married. I just think of marriage vows like speed limits. Sometimes you have to break them. Oh boy, you just need to keep an eye on the road to avoid detection. Un that's horrible. Yeah, So he and Dina made plans to meet on January thirtieth. Dina was living with a guy at the time, but she was still interested in hooking up. I guess maybe to add some excitement to her life. However, Stephen actually canceled before the date came. I don't know if he had a a pang of conscience or why he canceled, but he did. On the thirtieth though,

31:04 Tara was in Puerto Rico and Stephen was setting up an old laptop for Verena to use when he came across some old emails between Tara and Pete. Even though he already knew about what had happened with Tara and Pete and it had been two years ago, this kind of set him off on a downward spiral. Verena came home while Stephen was looking at the emails, and he asked her to read them. She did, and she was embarrassed because they were obviously personal and not meant for her. Stephen asked Verena what she would do in his situation, and she said he should talk to Tara about it. Over the next couple of days, Stephen talked to Tara over the phone a few times and brought up the old relationship again. He wrote her an email on February first, which said, in part, I will never say anything about him or that situation again. I did not and had not thought about it in a long time. Really, I trust that you are true to me, but I do worry. You are on the road a lot, and you do drink sometimes too much when you go out. I have all people am not pointing fingers about the drinking, but when people drink, they sometimes forget who they are for a time and do things they might not otherwise do. Stephen apparently did not see the irony of getting jealous over something that Tara did two years earlier, when at the same time he was flirting with his old girlfriend. Even worse, he started pursuing their nineteen year old oh pair. Verena shocked. That night, the thirtieth of January, Stephen was talking to Verena and he said something like, I'd like to tell you something,

32:36 but maybe I should just keep my mouth shut. This, of course made Verena curious, and so she begged him to tell her. He finally said, well, okay, you're beautiful. I want to sleep with you. Verena blushed and tried to laugh it off and changed the subject. She was a little bit creeped out, but also she was intrigued. But really, you think about that situation, like, Verena's nineteen and he's thirty seven, and she works for him, and she works for him, but I mean they're together every night, the kids go to about at a certain time and they probably just end up. You know, I'm not excusing it at all, but you just watched TV together or hang out together. So it's it's a weird situation, very weird. So that conversation led to Stephen and Verena talking more frequently, sometimes until late at night, and Stephen would continually tell her how beautiful she was. Tara came home that weekend. On Sunday, Stephen, Tara, the kids, and Verena all watched the Indiana Indianapolis Colts beat the lowly Chicago Bears in Super Bowl forty one. Sorry I had to add that. Verena thought that Stephen and Tara had worked out whatever issues they were having, as they seemed to be getting along fine. But then when Verena went back to her room that night, she had an email from Stephen that said, for what I'm thinking now, I would definitely go to Hell. Just thought i'd let you know an email. Yeah, she replied by saying, you know you're going to Hell anyway, so it doesn't matter.

34:05 What were you thinking about? He replied saying something about looking at her cleavage while they were on the couch watching the Super Bowl Nice. On Tuesday the sixth, Tara flew back to Puerto Rico. As that week went on, Stephen and Verena sent more flirtatious texts, had more late night talks, They messed around and spent the night in the same bed both Wednesday and Thursday night. On Friday morning, Lindsay, who was six at that point, came into Stephen and Tara's bedroom, asking where Verena was because she wasn't in her own room. Verena quickly ducked under the covers while Stephen distracted his daughter. On Friday the ninth, Tara flew home from Puerto Rico. She had a connection in Newark during which she talked to her sister Alicia on the phone for about forty minutes. She also talked to Stephen a few times during the day. He later said that they talked about her travel schedule, with him urging her to try and reduce her travel. Tara touched down in Detroit about nine pm. She called Stephen again on her way home, and according to Stephen, they bickered about her travel schedule again. After that call ended, Stephen called Verena, who was out at mister Bee's and Rochester been there many times. Verena didn't take the call because she was with her friends, but he left a voice message. It kills me to say that, but Tara will be home in five minutes, so you can't call anymore or send any text messages, but I will send you another text message to tell you that again. Don't forget to give me a kiss. When you come home.

35:35 Make a noise and I will come downstairs so that I get my kiss. I will leave you a note on your bed. God, And then he texted her you owe me a kiss. I know it's so gross. Tara arrived home around ten thirty pm, according to what Stephen told the police much later after he was arrested. They started arguing after she said she had to fly back to Puerto Rico a day earlier than normal. Can I say that's really annoying to me that he's giving her such a hard time about her travel schedule. Yeah, like I know that he I understand him wanting her home, but there's nothing she can do about it, right. I know a lot. I've traveled a lot for work, and you've always been incredibly supportive, and oh, I don't I think that there were times though, I remember when I think our firstborn, you were traveling like a lot. Yeah, I think. Yet we're working on some major project, and I think it was it was hard, Yeah, especially when there was like snowstorms and you'd have to be out shoveling the driveway was well, I remember why, I was really pregnant with time and there is yeah, but I mean that's all fine, but it's just hard because she was working, she was providing for the family, and it sounds like they had a nice, nice lifestyle and there's nothing she could do about it, right exactly, So they're arguing, and again, according to Stephen, he grabbed her wrist, then she slapped him, and then he pushed her down and she hit her head on the floor. She then said something like that, I'm going to take the kids. You're going to be homeless. You're a piece of shit. So this is Stevens. This is yeah, we don't have Tara's account, unfortunately,

37:07 but this is what Steven said happened. And I think at that point when she said, you know, basically told him she was going to take the kids and that he was a piece of shit. He then choked her until she stopped moving, and he covered her face with a piece of clothing so that he didn't have to look at her while he killed her. He then started panicking, realizing what he had done and that Verena could be returning home at any time. He wrapped a belt around Tara's neck and he used that to drag her body downstairs, and then he put it in the back of her truck. When Verena came home from mister Bees around eleven forty five, she opened the garage door and saw Tara's car in the garage. She parked in the driveway and walked through the garage into the house. Stephen came rushing down the stairs in his pajamas and shouted, what the fuck are you doing here. Verena was like, huh, and Steven said, oh, sorry, I thought you were Tara. Is she still out there? Verina was like, what do you mean? Her car is in the garage?

38:05 Where is she? Stephen then started to cry, and he told the story that he would end up repeating over and over again to the police, family, friends, and the media over the next couple of weeks. The first part of the story was true. He and Tara had gotten into an argument when she got home, but then he said that he told her that she should just leave and go back to Puerto Rico. Now, he said that. Tara then made a phone call, unpacked her bag, packed a new bag, and then a black Sedan showed up in the driveway, She gave the kids a kiss, and then she left in the black car. Step Wait, what time is it? Oh? It was like eleven five and she gave the kids. Okay, I guess she could have kissed her sleeping Yeah, yeah, I think that was the So that sounds really familiar.

38:49 Why it sounds like the Anna and Brian Walsh story. Oh yeah, because she disappeared allegedly in a right share. Yeah, I guess it does. Stephen told Verena that she needed to delete, eat all the texts between the two of them because he and Tara were probably going to get divorced and the texts would come up in the battle for custody. A little after two am, Stephen called Tara's cell phone and he left a message. I think after two might help going on? I think you'll kids least next question? Okay, right, at least let me know what else going on. Steven's playing the part of the angry husband whose wife left him. Very strange, I know, because he wouldn't would he have called that suit? Like, would you have called if we had just had a fight and you know, I was probably spend the night, would you call me at two am. Maybe, I mean you would probably wait till the morning. If I did call you at two am, it would be more to try to work things out, rather than like, where where the fuck are you? You owe me an explanation type of thing. Yeah, me and the kid's an explanation to two am. Yeah. On Saturday, Stephen ran errands like any other Saturday, while Tara's body remained in the garage in the back of her truck.

40:21 He called Tara's cell phone a few more times and left more messages. He and Verena slept together again that night. Just a warning, this next part is pretty disturbing. Stephen decided that the best way to hide Tara's body would be to dismember it. On Sunday morning, he drove Tara's truck to his dad's shop, took her body in, put it on a tarp, and, using a hack saw blade from the shop, he cut Tara's body into fourteen pieces. Oh my god, yeah, I don't know how you'd do something like that. He wrapped each body part in black plastic garbage bags and put them all into a large rubber made container. He at the container back in the truck, cleaned up the shop and drove back home, leaving the container in the back of Tara's truck in the garage. How do you do something like that and then continue on with your life and your day and go and look at your children when you go home, and I know, it's baffling, and yeah, and to that point. The next thing he did after he got home was he took his kids out to Meyer to pick up some groceries. So just like you know, taking the kids out. And he told the kids at that point that mom was mad at him, but not to worry that she would be back. That night, Stephen watched Desperate Housewives with Verena, a show that Verina usually watched with Tara, and the two again spent the night together in the same bed. He got up at three am that Monday morning and he made the short drive to a wooded area on the north side of Stony Creek Metropark. He brought a sled with him,

41:51 put Tara's body parts on the sled and pulled them out into the woods, burying the torso in the snow in one place, and then burying the rest of the body parts under snow in another location. He also discarded a ziplock bag that contained rubber gloves that he had used when dismembering Tara's body after He's just a really bad idea. I mean, the whole thing is the whole thing. It's just because snow melts pretty quickly. Yeah, I don't know what he was thinking, if this was just a temporary thing, or what his thought was. After he was finished hiding the body parts, he called Tara's cell phone and left another message once again. It's quarter to seven. I'm gonna tell you this back in fifteen minutes. I'm a call Randy get loose cell number and was going on this is non seting, Tara.

42:39 You owe me a phone call. You owe me to let me know what going on between us. Please call. He's repugnant. Academy Award performance. There did that go in the blue profile? What? Oh? You know what? No, so you never saved your bloopers. I know, really unfair, Tara, It really isn't it really is. I know there wasn't even a good blooper though. I'm going to file a complaint with our HR departmentship and you were going to feel the repercussions of that for a long time. I'm scared. I am president of the oh, the human resources department.

43:24 Here all right, back to the story he got. Stephen got home before the kids got up for school, and then after they went to school, he decided that he had done a terrible job of hiding Tara's remains, and so he went back out, you don't say, unburied all the parts, took them further out and reburied them in the snow again. After that, he called Tara's boss, Lou, at his office and asked him if Tara had arrived in Puerto Rico. Of course, Lu said no, he hadn't heard from her. Stephen told Lou the same story he had told Verena about the fight that they had had and Tara leaving in a black sedan. On Tuesday the thirteenth, Stephen went to work and he called Tara's mom from there. He told her about the fight and asked if she had talked to Tara. She said no, and then she called Tara's sister, Alicia, who called Stephen right away and lit into him, telling him he was a terrible husband and there was no way that Tara would abandon her kids and not let her family know where she was she told Stephen he needed to go to the police station and report her missing. On Tuesday afternoon, one more time, he went back out and moved the body parts again. This time, he took the parts out of the plastic bags and scattered them around, hoping that they would be eaten by scavengers. Can I just just for a second, if you don't live in a snowy area, so snow does melt really fast, and even if the temperature is below freezing and it's a sunny day, snow still melts. Yeah, right, Like if you get I don't know how many inches of snow there were, but if you have eight inches

44:55 of snow on the ground and you have somewhat sunny day, two or three inches of the snow would melt, you know, right, Yeah, Yeah, this is yeah, just a really his whole plan here was just not very smart. I don't think he's a very smart guy. Apparently he's yeah, horrible. On Wednesday, Valentine's Day, nearly five days after he killed Tara, Stephen walked into the Macomb County Sheriff's department to report or missing. He told the police basically the same story he'd been telling everyone else, but Also he added some editorial commentary about how the kids really wouldn't miss her because he was more involved in their lives, and also that he wasn't really sure he wanted her back, and that he was probably going to file for divorce.

45:38 What a guy. That evening, detective Sergeant Brian Kozlowski and Sergeant Pam McClain came by the Grants home and talked to both Stephen and Verena. They noted that Steven had a scratch on his nose. He said that he had gotten a metal shaving caught under his safety glasses at his dad's shop. They asked Stephen if there were any extramarital affairs, and Stephen said that Tara had been involved with someone in the past, but that was over just Tara. Yeah, he didn't mention anything about Verena and him. Of course, the detectives immediately thought that Stephen was acting strangely, very jittery, and very high strung. Do you think it's a little weird that he went to the police station instead of calling them, Yeah, kind of like most people just call and then the police station says, yeah, you should come in or we'll send someone to your house. Right yeah, I think that is a little bit weird. He was very I mean, obviously he was trying to delay things as much as possible, and he was very leisurely about the whole thing, like, Oh, I'll just waltz in here on my lunch break or whatever. Detectives talked to Tara's boss and they got access to her work email, her credit card, and her cell phone records. They saw that there was no activity on any of them since Friday night. They also checked with all the black car services in the area and no one had a record of a pickup that night at the Grant's home. After the conversation with the police, Stephen retained the services of a local attorney, David Greem. Greem immediately sent a facts to Detective Kaslowski, saying that people still use them once in a while. He said that due to the tone of the interview with Stephen,

47:12 that any further questions for his client should be submitted in writing to Greem and that Stephen would respond in writing. Farina's O pair agency made her leave the Grant home on the seventeenth because of everything that was going on. The police interviewed her again before she left to go back to Germany. They asked her point blank if she and Steven had been having an affair, and she lied again and denied it. After a few days, the story came out in the local press. While Stephen wouldn't talk to the police, the media didn't have a hard time at all getting in to talk. In fact, it seemed like he was loving the attention. Any reporter who called him. He was happy to talk to. The Macomb County sheriff also started doing regular news interviews, and then TERA's sister Alicia did as well, appearing on the early Good Morning America, Greta Van Suster and Show, and Nancy Grace's Show, among others. Both the sheriff and Elise Elisha were not too subtle in pointing the finger at Stephen. Steven's old girlfriend, Dina, who he had been planning to meet about a week before Tara went missing, decided that she should probably share her and Steven's email exchanges with the police, just in case they might be relevant. Those quickly leaked to the press, including the one where Stephen made the comment about marriage vows being like speed limits. Public opinion about Steven had been mixed up until this time, but now it was turning against him. He explained away the emails, though by saying it was just two old lovers joking around innocently. Detectives noticed that Stephen had mentioned Stoney Creek,

48:49 the metropark near their home, quite a bit during his TV interviews. He would talk about how that was one reason they bought the house, and how he liked to go running there. So on a hunch, they decided to organize a search of the park on Thursday. They think they were probably like, what kind of moron would would bury a body in the snow at a metro park where people are cross country skiing and running trail running and whatever. But then they probably also thought, well Stephen were talking about so on Thursday, the twenty second, they announced that they were organizing the search that would take place in two days on Saturday. Steven of course started freaking out, especially worried that they would find Terra's torso, because he didn't think that was hidden very well. The search was scheduled to start at eight am on Saturday. At five am, Stephen jogged the two miles from his house to where he had left the torso. He tried to carry it home, but it was too heavy, and so he ran back home, got the car, and then picked it up less than a half an hour before the search actually started. The search of the park started at eight am on the twenty fourth. It lasted four and a half hours, but they didn't find anything.

49:58 It is a big park and the location where Stephen had scattered Tara's remains was on the far kind of north side of the park, which was apparently an area that they just didn't get to. So it was just the police searching, not the public, I think so. Yeah. That afternoon, Stephen drove back to his dad's shop with Tara's torso he put it up on top of a loft inside the shop, above an office, hidden among a bunch of old parts and equipment. Shortly after the Stony Creek searched, the police found out about Steven's affair with Verena. Although Verena had denied it to the police, she had told a friend of hers, a fellow opere who the police also spoke with. Verena's friend spilled the beans if there had been any doubt before. Now the police were sure that Stephen had killed Tara, but they still had no body and no real evidence a break in the case finally came on February twenty eighth, over two weeks after Tara went missing.

50:54 Sheila Werner, a dental technician in her early thirties who lived near Stony Creek, was taking a little hike and she was getting some fresh air. She was picking up some trash when she came across a transparent gallon sized ziploc bag. Inside the bag were other plastic bags and a pair of rubber gloves turned inside out, and there was some red liquid pulled up at the bottom of the bag that looked like it might be blood. At first, she thought maybe it was left there by a hunter, but then she remembered the story about the missing woman that had been all over the news, along with the search of Stony Creek from a few days earlier. She took the bag home, set it in her garage, and called the police. An officer came out and examined the bag, noting that there were also what looked like dog hairs and a few metal shavings in the bag. The dog hairs were a similar color to Steven's dog, and the machine shop where he worked had metal shavings all over the place. How did dog ears get in there? That's a good question. Dog hairs get everywhere? You know that? Yeah?

52:00 Because he never so officers. They sent out a new team to search the area around where the bag was found, but once again they came up empty. They sent the bag to the Michigan State Crime Lab, which came back a day later to confirm that the red liquid in the bag was human blood. The police decided they now had enough evidence to ask a judge for a search warrant, both for the Grant home and for the machine shop. While the search warrant request was in process without Stephen knowing about it, he decided that his latest hiding place for Terra's torso, his dad's machine shop, might not be the best location because it tended to get hot inside the shop.

52:40 So on March first, he went back and picked up Terra's torso again, this time putting it in a storage container that had contained children's clothing for a garage sale, drove it back home and put the container in his garage. The next day, March second, Stephen gave another interview to the press. At this point, he was getting cocky, thinking that he had gotten away with murder. He decided to use the opportunity to criticize Tara as a mother, saying quote, I was a better mom than Tara was. There's no other way to put it. I was the mom in the house. She was gone all the time. If the kids needed someone to take them the swimming or school or soccer practice, I took them. Some of her family is said in the media how much she loved her kids and how she would try to fly back in order to attend all their functions. But that's not true. I can't recall one time when she did that. To be honest, as weird as it sounds for me to say this, I was the perfect mom, not Tara. Oh, he's disgusting. It's a horrible, disgusting human being. Did he say that too? It was a news interview.

53:45 On his way home from that interview, police officers pulled him over and let him know that they had a search warrant for his home. At this point, I think he realized that it was over. It was only a matter of time before they would find Terra's Torso Steve and let the officers into the house, and then he took his dog and he went for a walk down the road while the officers started their search. Shockingly, the police just let him walk off without anyone following him. While the investigators were searching Stephen's house, Detective Koslowski and some of the other officers were hanging out in the garage, staying out of the way but also trying to keep warm. About ninety minutes after the search started, Koslowski was poking around the garage and he noticed the green plastic storage container labeled kid's clothes. He thought it looked out a place, and he was pretty sure it hadn't been there in their initial search of the house that day, the day that Stephen reported Tara missing, just two weeks earlier. He opened it up and, to his horror, discovered Tara's Torso it was a shocking discovery because really all they were expecting to find during their search of the house was getting access to Stephen's computer. Immediately, they started looking around to see where Stephen was, but he was long gone. Again, it's kind of crazy that they lost track of him while they were searching his house. That's not normal police procedure. Normally, you would offer them to the suspect to sit in the back of a police card to stay warm or whatever, but they just kind of let him walk off.

55:16 Stephen had a ninety minute head start by the time that the police found Terra's torso he had called a friend who came to pick him up, and then he asked the friend if he could borrow his pickup truck to go see his kids, who were staying with his sister. Stephen drove to see his sister and his kids, and he left the dog there, and then he took off with a bottle of viking In in his pocket. He started driving north, making a few stops along the way to buy some whiskey, some razor blades, Taylan LPM, a black plastic toy gun, a burner, phone, a notepad, and a few other things. Apparently he had decided he was going to commit suicide, but wasn't sure exactly how he wanted to do it. The toy gun was for a suicide by cops scenario. He kept driving north on the back roads, drinking whiskey and taking the occasional vikut in. At one thirty am, he called his attorney, David Greem and told him that he was planning to kill himself. Coincidentally, Greem had been trying to reach Stephen earlier in the day to tell him that he was dropping him as a client. He had been tired of Stephen talking to the media and finding out that he had been having an affair with his Opare was the last straw for Greem, but with Stephen rambling drunkenly about suicide, Greem decided that now wasn't the time to drop his client and instead tried to talk him down. When Stephen hung up, Gream was convinced that he was going to kill himself, and he decided that even though he was technically still Grant's attorney, he had a duty to call the police. Stephen also called Verena at

56:51 one point to tell her goodbye and to ask her to pass a message along to his kids. Tell them they have to be strong, tell them they have to be good and live, and tell them I'm sorry for everything I did kids, you know. And it's just kind of like, I don't know the fact that he would think that his kids would want to take, you know, life lessons from him, who you know, killed their mom, and as if they'd want to hear it from their opere who had an affair with their dad, right Stephen also admitted to Verena on that call that he had killed Tara, although he made it sound like an accident. As soon as she hung up with Stephen, she called the police the next and hematically and I pushed her back if she sank her head and was said.

57:42 So. Finally Verena came clean and told the truth, which was good. But I think up until that time I don't think she believed that Stephen had killed Tara. By that point, she was in Germany. Correct. Correct. The final call that Stephen made was to his sister Kelly to say goodbye to her. He told her that he was at Wilderness State Park, which is a spot that he and Tara had vacationed many times, and so I guess he decided that this would be the best place to end his life. How far away He's ninety minutes away from his house. No, No, much more than that. He was about three hundred miles away. This is way way up north in the Lower Peninsula. So his sister also contacted the police immediately after their call ended, and so they were starting to narrow in on where he was. After that call, he wrote a short note to his kids, and then he wandered off into the park, intending to walk until he passed out from the cold and froze to death. By now they were narrowing in on him. They were using a helicopter and a searchlight to look for him in Wilderness State Park. Eventually they found his tracks and they found him lying under a pine tree, apparently waiting to die. So I think I remember this, Yeah, this happening, and the live footage.

58:52 Yeah, maybe not live, but it was. I think I think this actually went on for more than twenty four hours, like after they found Tara's torus. It was more than twenty four hours before they found him, So it was like it was like the OJ fleemo. Yeah. Yeah. Stephen was taken to the hospital in Potoski, where they hooked him up to an idea great city. They hooked him up with a warming solution to get his body temperature up, and they put some frostbite boots on his feet. Eventually he started becoming alert and aware of his situation. He told the police officer that was keeping watch on him that he wanted to talk to his lawyer. The officer informed him that his lawyer it actually fired him as a client that morning, so I guess David Green after he called the police, he was like, yeah, I'm just going to announce that I'm not his lawyer anymore.

59:39 Good move. Yeah. So finally Stephen asked the officer to call Detective Koslowski and tell him that if he if he would make the trip up to the hospital, Stephen would tell him everything. And that's exactly what happened. Stephen confessed to the whole thing, now having a more specific location where he had scattered the other body parts. Police sent a hundred officers out to search the area again officers, I know, and they finally found most of Tara's remains. A few were never found, most likely eaten by scavengers. I know. It's horrible. Stephen was arraigned on March sixth, and he pleaded not guilty. Jury selection for the trial began eight months later in November.

1:00:24 Really, the only question was whether the jury would find him guilty of premeditated first degree murder, as the prosecutors were pushing for, or for a lesser charge of second degree murder or maybe manslaughter, which could mean that Stephen would possibly be paroled someday. In addition to murder, Stephen was charged with dismemberment of a corpse. Before the trial began, he changed his plea to guilty of that charge, which meant that he would definitely get at least ten years, But by Michigan law, that ten year sentence would be served concurrent with any other sentence he got, and so it was kind of irrelevant unless for some shocking reason, he was found not guilty of any murder charges. I'm not sure how I feel about these concurrent sentences. I know, it really doesn't make a lot of sense. I don't think so. The prosecution argued that Stephen had fallen in love with Verena and decided to kill Tara so that he could be with her. He had the opportunity to weigh the pros and cons, especially during the five minutes or so that he was strangling her, so that's why they argued it should be first degree murder. I always think about this in strangling cases. But can you imagine strangling someone for five That's such a long time to really think about what you're doing and yep, yeah, stop what you're doing, and you know, right, you've got you have plenty of time to consider it and change your change your mind. Well, did you think that I might have to get a job. Now, I don't know what he was thinking. Really, it's just horrible the whole thing. The defense focused on the lack of evidence that he had planned anything

1:01:59 in advance. He didn't buy anything before the murder to help him dismember Tara's body, and in his confession he talked about how he lost it and he claimed that Tara slapped him first, which then escalated the argument. They claimed that was evidence that it wasn't premeditated and warranted a manslaughter verdict. The trial concluded on December eighteenth, and the jury deliberated for sixteen hours. What do you think first degree secondary manslaughter or not guilty? I think second degree, But in my own personal like if I were making the laws, if you dismember someone, I just think that's you should get first degree. Yeah, it's like an aggravating circumstance or something like that. Right, you were correct.

1:02:46 It was second degree murder, which in Michigan law is an unplanned but intentional killing, or any death caused by reckless disregard for human life. Off the top of your head, do you know the difference in sentencing between first and second degree. Yes, well, first degree would be automatic life without parole. Second degree, the guidelines are nineteen to forty years, and the prosecution actually asked the judge to make an exception and go beyond those guidelines because of, like you said, the circumstances and the dismemberment and everything. Their recommendation was fifty to eighty years, while Steven's defense recommended fifteen to twenty years. Sentencing is so confusing because we've done so many different stories in so many different states and countries. Now I get really confused sometimes because life doesn't really mean natural life, and then there's time off for good behavior, which isn't part of this. It's very confused, it is, and every state is different, and I just think it's funny too. Like his defense recommended fifteen to twenty years, so the judge would be like, oh, okay, sure, now I like the fifty to eighty for him. I like that a lot. Well, the judge agreed with you, because the judge, noting how barbaric and evil Even's actions were, sentenced him to fifty to eighty years minus time served. So it is possible that Stephen Grant will be paroled, but not until the year twenty fifty eight, when he would be eighty eight years old. All right, So just a few notes on things that have happened since the trial. Tara's sister, Alicia, fought to get custody

1:04:20 of Lindsay and Ian against Steven's wishes, but she won. She also filed a wrongful death lawsuit against Stephen to ensure that he could never profit from his crime, and she won that lawsuit as well. Stephen's parents and his sister all had good relationships with the kids before Tara was killed, and they actually wanted visitation rights, but Alicia fought against that. When Stephen was on trial, was his family present supporting him? I think his sister was the main person that supported him. I'm not sure about the others. I know his dad did not attend the trial. I'm not sure about his mom. His sister, from what I understand, she's still sees him in prison. She's been like, obviously she doesn't approve of what he did, but she has still sort of been there for him. Yeah, So the kids had a few supervised visits with Steven's family, but then Alicia would tell them that she had to check schedules and she stopped calling them back. It ended up in court and Alicia was actually found in contempt. But I don't think anything changed after that. So I don't know that there's any relationship really between the kids and you know, Tara or Steven's side of the family. That's such a tricky situation. I see both sides for sure, but I know that it takes a village to raise kids, and the more love a child has in their life, yeah, that the better off they are. It's but I understand Alicia's point of view of not wanting to expose the kids too possible, like, oh, your dad is innocent, or you know any pro Stephen talk. Do they see their dad or did they talk to their dad?

1:05:54 I don't believe so, as far as I know, they did not see their dad. About six months after the trial ended, Stephen's dad al called the Saint Clair County Sheriff's office saying he wanted to report a suicide. The dispatcher asked it who it was, and he said me and hung up. Police rushed to his home just in time to hear a gunshot in the garage, and al Grant was dead at age sixty six. That is devastating. I know, it is so sad, so sad, And yeah, it's just you think about, like you kill someone, how many other people are affected besides just the person you've killed too, like all family and your own family, like I'm sure it just it just joys like so many lives and don't don't do it. Yeah. Lindsay and Ian Standerfer, which is the last name that they've adopted in their new family with Alicia and her husband, are now twenty two and twenty years old, respectively. As of a couple of years ago, at least, Lindsay, who looks very much like her mother, was studying pediatric psychology at Ohio State University. She credits therapy as making a huge difference in her life after everything that happened. I'm not sure if she's still working on her degree or if maybe she's finished. But I also discovered that she is a tattoo artist in her town of Chillicothe, Ohio, and it looks like she does some amazing work. Ian is attending college at the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. Neither of them has any desire to see or speak to Stephen Grant. Understandable every year Lindsay and Ian come back

1:07:25 to Michigan for Tara's Walk, which is an event put on by an organization called Turning Point to honor Tara's memory and to benefit victims of domestic violence. Yeah, it seems like both kids have grown up to be good, upstanding, you know, they've they've done everything possible that they can to turn what happened into a positive and help other people, which is just it's amazing, super admirable and amazing. Yeah. I credit to their mom. Yeah, yeah, for sure. So that is it. That's the story of Tara Grant and Stephen. Well, that was horrible. Thank you scrooning my day.

1:08:06 It's a horrible story. He's a horrible human being and he's still in prison and yeah, he's hopefully you're gonna rot there, I hope. So do you have any idea how much money did Tara make? I do not know how much she made, but it must have been a fair much. Sure she was doing pretty well because yeah, she was definitely at an executive level in her company. I'm just wondering, like we've had so many stories about like the if the women, woman is the bread winner and the spouse, just not like can handle it. Yeah, Yeah, like Anna and Brian Walsh. And I know there's others too that I can't think of off the top of my head, but yeah, a common theme, It is a common theme. Yeah. I don't know why men become so insecure if they're not the primary breadwinner. I think, and I don't get it at all. I mean, I know, I know we're in a situation where I'm the primary breadwinner. But I've I always look at us as a team, right, as like we're we make decisions together and we do what's best for the family. It's not about me or you or who's you know, Well, You've always been exceedingly kind and generous in that aspect aspect. But we do have we I'm not bragging, but we have a very good partnership, and I think we have both respected and understood what we bring to the table. Yeah. I just I just don't understand that mindset of like, you know, oh, she's the breadwinner, I'm I must be a loser or something like that, like raising kids is a hugely important job, like that's you know, when he did work. Yeah, but I'm sure I

1:09:38 just think he'd visions of visions of grandeur of you know, doing doing other things, I guess, and I don't know. Well, yeah, any update on Verina. No, I think Varina kind of went underground, like I don't think she wanted a lot of publicity, So I do not know anything about what Verina. What happened to Verna? Did you watch the Daylin episode? I did? It was Verina. I thought Verna was featured in it, not as an adult or not the current version of Verena. I think they had some stuff from when she was nineteen. I should probably stop listening to the dateline as I'm falling asleep, which people have told me that they listened to us while they're going to sleep, which I guess that's a country Sweet Dreams listeners come up with our ASMR episode, that's a good idea.

1:10:34 I kind of like that that idea. People say we have nice voices, and I don't. I don't. I think you have a love I think I have a screechy I don't know. I think it's horrible, but I appreciate the compliment. Yeah, any thinking of compliments. Oh, I was just gonna say thank you to our lovely listeners. And I think that you and I are just both very grateful people. I think because things have not always been the easiest for either of us, and I think that makes you were grateful and appreciative of things in your life. And I guess I wouldn't change a lot of things that have happened because that makes us, like I said, exceedingly grateful. So we are exceedingly grateful to all of you for putting up with us, for listening and supporting us. It means everything.

1:11:16 Yeah, it really does. Thank you and following us. You good job on this horrible story. Oh thanks. I appreciate that you're working really hard, so I do appreciate you too. And I'm not surely I say this every time you put together really nicely put together. I don't know how you do it. I don't know how you find the time. You're working really hard on you know, a lot of different things. So I'm going to have a hard time finding more Michigan cases to cover. But I don't think you will. I don't think you will. We'll see. But anyway, follow us on Instagram or Facebook at love Mary Kill or on Twitter at LMK pod. Hey we're on threads or on threads. I am going to be honest with our our listener friends. I'm a little overwhelmed right now with social media. I haven't been doing as much as I could because sometimes I'm just like, it's a lot and there's only so many hours in the day.

1:12:04 Yeah, social media is like I don't know, I hate social media like in general. Yeah, so yeah, like my personal social media, I've I just I don't really go on it. They're very much so. But yeah, I always reach out to us because I love to my favorite Yeah, my favorite thing is talking to you all, y'all. I didn't say that very good. All y'all. I'm not very southern, but yeah, and you could do that on social media, or you can email us at love Mary Kill at gmail dot com. What are we going to do with the rest of our day? I don't know what should do. We're true crime in maybe I had some ideas. I'm working on a new case and there's seven days of trial video that I have to watch. Are you gonna watch it in real time? You gotta go to the trial? It's night, I am. It's hard. It's hard to know when we talk about this a lot, but when to cut it off because I'm working on a case now, and I, like, you always say, what's the phrase, the business school term finishing returns? Yeah, I always just stretch it because I'm like, yeah, so I am working on three cases and I think one I'm almost done with. That's a lot, but maybe some pickleball later. Oh yeah, we should play some pickleball. And I think we might see a movie tomorrow. Oppenheimer. Oppenheimer, Yeah cool, look forward to that. All right, Well, until next time, don't kill your husband and don't kill your wife. Be the b of the