Beyond All Repair

What did Susie, Sean's girlfriend at the time of Marlyne Johnson's murder, tell detectives? Was a $10,000 stash of cash ever found in the Johnsons' home? Did Sophia have an alibi? These are just a few of the many questions listeners sent to the Beyond All Repair team. In this follow-up episode, Amory is joined by Beyond All Repair producer Sofie Kodner to answer these questions and more about the...

Amory talks to Shane about the 2010 report, along with the detective who wrote it and Rick Buckner, the lead detective on Sophia’s case 20 years ago. She explores what can legally happen from here, both with regards to Marlyne Johnson’s homicide case and with Sophia herself. Amory finally confronts Sophia about the 2010 report, and comes to a conclusion about the case. *** Consider becoming a "BEY...

After Sean’s conversation with Amory, he and his younger brother, Shane, talk to each other for the first time in two decades. Shane is open to hearing his brother out, until Sean denies a painful memory from their childhood. Their father, who has always defended Sean, starts sending aggressive voice messages to Sophia and Shane. Meanwhile, Amory has even more questions for Sophia just as Shane is...

After disappearing before he was supposed to testify in Sophia's second trial, Sean reappears in Guyana under the name Anthony Snow. He has since launched various ventures, including a short-lived campaign for president of Guyana in 2011, a land development business that’s been the source of allegations of fraud, and a robust social media presence. Sophia and Sean hadn’t seen each other or spoken...

Amory meets Sophia in person for the first time with a sense of uneasiness. While in jail awaiting her second trial in 2005, Sophia made a friend who convinced her to testify in her own defense. Today, this friend, Morgen, is Sophia’s life partner. After getting ahold of the footage of Sophia’s second trial, Morgen and Amory discover that Sophia told a different story about the day of the murder o...

The jury has reached a verdict: Sophia is found guilty of first-degree murder. At sentencing, Sophia hears victim impact statements, including one delivered by the woman raising her son. She is sentenced to 43 years in prison, and just as she’s settling into that fate, she gets a call from her lawyer saying that she’s won the right to a new trial. If you have questions about the case, the people a...

The prosecution in Sophia’s trial claims greed was her motive for killing Marlyne. Shortly after Sophia and Brad Johnson started dating, Sophia began stealing money from her employer. Sophia explains how the theft started and quickly spiraled out of control. By the time of the murder, Sophia was tens of thousands of dollars in debt, with a baby on the way. Was she desperate enough to commit murder...

Amory meets Lyn Page and Linda Dillard, friends of Marlyne Johnson and her husband Richard, who share more about the Johnson family. Richard struggled with alcohol abuse and gambled, and Marlyne had started saving money in case she needed to leave him. Richard eventually agrees to talk to Amory and shares memories of his wife and the day she was killed. If you have questions about the case, the re...

Sean Correia's credibility is called into question as Sophia Johnson and Shane Correia tell Amory about his role in their upbringing. Amory learns how these three siblings ended up in Washington state after being raised in New York, and how Sophia became estranged from Shane and their mother, with whom she’d been incredibly close. Sophia finds a new family in the Johnsons — Brad, her husband, and...

Amory learns more about Marlyne Johnson, Sophia Johnson’s late mother-in-law, and her murder is explored through footage of Sophia’s 2003 trial. Clark County Detective Rick Buckner and his team narrowed the field of suspects to siblings Sophia and Sean Correia (Shane Correia's older brother and sister). Sean testified during Sophia’s 2003 murder trial that he saw his sister standing over Marlyne’s...

Reporter Amory Sivertson has reopened a box that some members of the Correia family were hoping would stay shut forever. Amory first met the youngest Correia, Shane, in 2017 while interviewing him about his experience with homelessness. But there is another dark chapter of Shane's life: his older sister being accused of murdering her mother-in-law in 2002, when he was 13 years old. Now Shane wants...

Imagine if, one day, you are accused of something. Something horrible, violent, heinous. Something you swear you did not do, and nothing you say can convince anyone otherwise — even the people closest to you. That’s Sophia Johnson’s story. Sophia was starting fresh: A new life, a new husband, a baby on the way. But it all unraveled on January 10, 2002, when her mother-in-law Marlyne Johnson was fo...

If you loved Violation, host Beth Schwartzapfel has a new recommendation for you. Hosted by Beth's esteemed colleague, Amory Sivertson, Beyond All Repair is a new murder mystery podcast from WBUR & ZSP Media — launching March 7, right here in this feed.

Part eight of Violation explores what time means behind bars. And listeners respond to the question: Did Jake get what he deserves?

An update on what's next for Violation...and a new investigation from WBUR.

This “Violation” update brings listeners the latest news in Jacob Wideman’s case, including his reaction to a ruling that leaves him few paths to freedom.

In August, lawyers representing Jacob Wideman argued before a judge in Arizona that state officials treated him in a “constitutionally impermissible” way when they revoked his parole more than six years ago. Lawyers for the parole board and the state corrections department said Wideman was trying to avoid following directions and therefore could not be trusted to be free. In this update, we fill y...

Two months after Jacob Wideman was arrested at work and brought back to prison — for failing to make an appointment with a psychologist on a particular day, as directed by his parole officer — he faced the Arizona parole board again. The board had to make a formal finding: Did Jake violate the conditions of his parole by not making that appointment? And, if so, should he stay in prison or be retur...

Six months after Jacob Wideman was released from prison on home arrest, he appeared before the parole board for a routine check-in hearing. His parole officer told the board that Jake was doing well: Jake’s employers and therapists gave him positive reviews, as did the director at his halfway house and the landlord at his apartment complex. But other people were coming to a different conclusion. A...

In 2016, after 30 years behind bars and seven hearings in front of the Arizona parole board, Jacob Wideman was released from prison. Being on parole is a strange hybrid between prison and freedom. You’re still technically serving your sentence, but in the community. When Jake first got out, he was on home arrest, a strict version of parole. He had to wear an ankle monitor so the state could track...

How do you build a meaningful life in prison, knowing you might never be free? What if whether you might one day be free hinges on your ability to build a meaningful life in prison? In Part 4 of “Violation," we follow Jacob Wideman’s decades-long journey through the Arizona prison system and hear how he prepared to tell his life story to the parole board. Two years after he murdered Eric Kane, Jak...

Imagine the worst day of your life, when you did the one thing you are most ashamed of. Now imagine having to convince a panel of strangers — who suspect you might be lying — how sorry you are. After years of preparing for this moment, you get only minutes to make your case. And the stakes couldn’t be higher: The rest of your life depends on whether or not the strangers believe you. This is how pe...

Not long after Jacob Wideman murdered his summer camp roommate, Eric Kane, in 1986 — seemingly with no motive — a question emerged in the breathless news coverage of the tragedy: Was Jake a “bad seed”? It was no accident that some reporters latched onto the phrase. After all, it was plucked straight from perhaps the most famous book written by Jake’s own father, acclaimed author John Edgar Wideman...

Why did Jacob Wideman murder Eric Kane? In 1986, the two 16-year-olds were rooming together on a summer camp trip to the Grand Canyon when Jacob fatally — and inexplicably — stabbed Eric. That night, Jacob went on the run, absconding with the camp’s rented Oldsmobile and thousands of dollars in traveler’s checks. Before long, he turned himself in and eventually confessed to the killing — although...

In 1986, while on a summer camp trip to the Grand Canyon, 16-year-old Jacob Wideman fatally stabbed his roommate, Eric Kane. Jacob confessed to the murder, but couldn’t explain why he did it. The crime devastated both boys’ families. For the Widemans, it was also a haunting echo from their family history. Just two years earlier, Jacob’s father, acclaimed author John Edgar Wideman, had published "B...