A Brief Case

Bernard Boursicot truly believed he was in a relationship with a woman and that they had a child together. The French diplomat dreamt of living in Paris with Shi Pei Pu, the mother of his child, and their son. This fantasy also included Thierry, a man he had been in a long-term relationship with. He would do anything to keep his loved ones safe. Anything, including espionage. But after 20 years, t...

Mohan Kumar had two wives, and neither of them suspected that he was still propositioning other women. It was clear they would have felt betrayed if they knew he was promising to marry these women, even without a dowry.  He would meet his unsuspecting victim, spend a few days together, and sometimes have sex. Before they parted, he would give her a pill, telling her it was birth control. It was hi...

The four terrorists were armed with submachine guns. After setting off explosives in the Pulau Bukom Shell oil refinery, the group hijacked the Laju ferry. They took five hostages - the crew of the Laju ferry. Tense negotiations over seven days, and finally, the hostages were returned safely. But in exchange, the terrorists wanted guarators, to make sure they'd leave safe.  Thirteen brave men were...

One by one, the members of Jolly Amma Joseph's family dropped like flies... Jolly was described as pious, friendly, and a delightful neighbour in a small town of twelve thousand. No one ever suspected her, it was more believable that the house was cursed...  First her mother-in-law, then her father-in-law, and even her husband. Six people would be dead before she was caught... Check out my website...

This week's episode is a double feature - Benedict and I dive into the case of the world's most notorious bicycle thief and uncover the absolute worst move you can make if you've lost the key to your bike lock... We talk about what the police did when it seemed that all the bicycles in Toronto were slowly going missing...  And the unfortunate mishaps of a middle-aged man trying to get his bicycle...

She watched true crime documentaries, she borrowed true crime books. Twenty-three-year-old Jung Yoo Jung was obsessed with murder... Then, she stabbed her victim a hundred and ten times... The police said she did this "out of curiosity". They said that she wanted to know what murder was like...    Check out my website: https://abriefcasepodcast.com/   Be my friend on Instagram: @abriefcasepodcast...

Heather Mack was a nineteen-year-old American heiress. She was a trust fund baby slated to inherit 1.56 million dollars.    Was the money the reason she killed her mother? The mother and daughter had a tenuous relationship - arguments, police visits, and abortions...    Sheila Von Wiese-Mack was bludgeoned in a St Regis hotel room, before being stuffed in a suitcase and abandoned in the trunk of a...

Cheng Jianan and Li Chiming were in their early twenties, taking a luxurious holiday in Bali. They were expecting five-star hotels, refreshing beers, rest, and relaxation.  Instead, tragedy found them. Jianan was found dead in the bathtub, while Chiming had crawled for 20 minutes in the hotel corridor before bleeding out...   Check out my website: https://abriefcasepodcast.com/   Be my friend on I...

Sagarika Chakraborty was far away from home. She had moved to Norway with her husband. Her husband, Anurup Bhattacharya, worked long days.  She did not speak the language, she had few friends, and even fewer allies in the city of Stavanger.   What could she do when it was decided that she was an unfit mother, that they were unsuitable parents? What would she do to get her two young children back?...

Jennifer Laude was just 26 years old. It was 11th October 2014, a Saturday night.  She started her evening at the Ambyanz disco bar in Olongapo, Philippines. Then, she left for the Celzone lodge with 19-year-old American Lance Corporal Joseph Scott Pemberton.  She would never go home.  Jennifer would be killed in the motel room, drowned face-first in the toilet... Check out my website: https://abr...

Le Thanh Van left behind a trail of death. There were former employers, friends, and even her husband's family... She was Vietnam's first modern serial killer, taking more than a dozen lives... How did she elude capture for so long, leaving authorities baffled? And what motivated her to commit such chilling crimes; or did she just fall into the habit of killing?   Check out my website: https://abr...

Piang Ngaih Don had been beaten daily, burned with a hot iron, starved, and deprived of sleep. When she died, she weighed 24kg. She had lost 38 percent of her body weight.  Her abuser wasn't a gangster or a thug, but still certainly a cold-blooded killer. Her abuser was a middle-aged murderer, married to a policeman. Her murderer, Gaiyathiri Murugayan, was documented on CCTV abusing her in front o...

I can't believe we're a hundred episodes in! Michelle and I have a great time recapping three of the most listened cases of the podcast: The Yishun Triple Murder  India's Bandit Queen - Phoolan Devi  The Murder of Abby Choi We also have a quick Q&A answering questions from Instagram. Who is Teddy? Which cases intrigue me? Why did I start this podcast...?   Check out my website: https://abriefcasep...

Jessica Wongso and Wayan Mirna Salihin were as thick as thieves. Both wealthy, beautiful Indonesians studying in the Billy Blue College of design in Sydney.  But life after college couldn't have been more different for each of them. Jessica had a tumultuous relationship with her Australian boyfriend; drunk driving, car crashes, and suicide attempts. Mirna married her boyfriend of eight years, Arie...

Javed Iqbal was a middle-aged monster. And one by one, the boys in the market square slowly disappeared. Why didn't anyone notice? Why didn't anyone care? The vats of acid were cheap, he bragged. Each vat of hydrochloric acid cost him 120 rupees, only about $2 dollars or so. He could have killed so many more if he wanted to. And the thing is, I don't doubt it... Help: https://donate.savethechildre...

Javed Iqbal was a pervert with a penchant for young boys. Everything that he did was driven by his vile desires, his ugly urges.  His existence was a reign of terror in his village in Pakistan. He opened an arcade, a gym, and even a school. Parents took care to keep their children away from him.   Javed had a reputation; so why did still skulk the streets...? Help: https://donate.savethechildren.o...

Abby Choi had a net worth of 100 million hong kong dollars. She appeared in magazines like Elle, Vogue, and was on the cover of L'Officiel. She was a socialite with four children and the co-founder of an animal rescue charity...  Who would want Abby dead?  Surely not her ex-husband, Alex Kwong; the father of her first two children. Abby still took care of his family, she paid for his expenses, she...

Be careful who you meet online; Aftab Amin Poonwala and Shraddha Walkar met on Bumble. It didn't take long for them to realize how much they had in common. They worked for the same company, grew up in the same area, they studied the same subjects... In less than a year, they would move in together. And just three years after the start of their relationship, Shraddha would be dead. She would be mur...

Caning is a form of corporal punishment in Singapore that involves administering blows with a cane, typically on the bare buttocks. It has been described as unimaginably painful.  Do you think that caning is an effective deterrent or a form of cruel and inhumane punishment? Michael Fay was an eighteen year old American teenager, sentenced to six strokes of the cane, four months in prison, and a $3...

Is porn illegal in Singapore? Why is Pornhub banned? Have Singaporeans been sexually suppressed for too long? This week, Michelle and I chat about the filthy, filthy subjects of sex, singaporeans, and scandals.   We also discuss the biggest scandal of all; the Nasi Lemak group chat. A pervert's paradise with more than forty thousand people discussing sex, trading lewd images, and promoting prostit...

Qandeel Baloch was Pakistan's first social media star. She worked hard and provided for her family. She financed their lives, paying their rent, food, and medical expenses. Her parents loved her. But her brother betrayed her. He was a hypocrite; when her personal details were published, instead of supporting her, he killed her...   Check out my website:  https://abriefcasepodcast.com/   Be my frie...

What's the worst thing that could happen at your wedding - an unintended ex crashing the party? A runaway groom? An overly intimate mother-in-law?  How about the murder of a cousin, then cannibalism? And what if the murderers decided they wanted everyone to partake? If they served your cousin to unknowing wedding guests...   Check out my website:  https://abriefcasepodcast.com/   Be my friend on I...

Otto Warmbier was sentenced to fifteen years of hard labor; what could've warranted this extreme punishment?  The twenty-two year old american had allegedly attempted to steal a propaganda poster from a Pyongyang hotel. On the last day of his tour, he was stopped before he could leave the country for this "hostile" act.  Otto was held hostage by North Korea for 17 months...   Check out my website:...

Issei Sagawa was small, ugly, and weak. He was obsessed with women who were the opposite; tall, strong, and beautiful. Allegedly, he didn't really want to date them or love them. Not as much as he wanted to eat them, so he could own them, so that he could absorb their energy and be tall, strong, and beautiful too...   And on 11th June 1981, Issei would turn his sick fantasies into reality. Thereaf...

It starts with a job offer - office administrator needed, relocation costs covered. Is it too good to be true; of course, it is. It's never that good...  It ends with cyber slavery. Trapped in a Cambodian scam factory, beaten, electrocuted, tethered to your desk... Every day, you send out another message: hello, I have a job opportunity for you! hello, have we met before? hello, I have an investme...