Deadly Truths

It was tradition at the Leavenworth Penitentiary: before a man walked to the gallows, he was offered one last drink. Some refused. Some asked for whiskey. Others stayed silent. But behind that ritual lay a darker story — one about the guards who built the scaffolds, the warden who signed the orders, and the soldiers who watched death become routine. In this episode of Deadly Truths , Becca uncover...

They called them Public Enemies — men who robbed banks by day and captured headlines by night. But by the end of the 1930s, their hideouts had been replaced with cellblocks, and their getaway cars with wooden coffins. This is The Last Withdrawal — the true story of America’s final outlaw generation and the gallows that waited for them inside the walls of Leavenworth. The Great Depression gave birt...

He traded his pen for a microphone — and his freedom for a cell. This is the story of Robert Henry Best , the American journalist who defected to Nazi Germany and became “Mr. Guess Who,” one of Hitler’s English-speaking propagandists. He believed he was telling the truth. Instead, he became the vice of treason. Captured by Allied troops in 1945, Best was convicted of twelve counts of treason and s...

On October 27, 1995 , Sgt. William J. Kreutzer Jr. opened fire on a brigade formation during morning PT at Fort Bragg. He killed Major Stephen Mark Badger and wounded 18 fellow soldiers. This episode unpacks the events before, during, and after the shooting — from Kreutzer’s mindset to the struggle to subdue him, the trial, and the long legacy of that day. In this episode you’ll hear about: Kreutz...

On the night of March 11, 2012 , Staff Sergeant Robert Bales left his post in Kandahar and murdered 16 Afghan civilians , including children, in two villages — triggering one of the most brutal massacres by a U.S. soldier in modern history. In this episode of Deadly Truths , we explore: Who Robert Bales was — before, during, and after The sequence of events in the villages of Alkozai and Balandi T...

Bonus Episode: Before the Civil War ever began, Kansas was already on fire. In the 1850s, one man made it his mission to end slavery — not with speeches, but with blood. This episode dives into the life and legacy of John Brown , the radical abolitionist who turned the Kansas frontier into America’s first civil war. From the Pottawatomie Massacre to the Battle of Osawatomie , Brown’s war on slaver...

Long before his legendary last stand, George Armstrong Custer strutted through Fort Leavenworth, Kansas , a golden-haired Civil War hero convinced the rules didn’t apply to him. He was America’s “Boy General” — brave, photogenic, and utterly reckless — until the Army’s most haunted posttried to teach him humility. This Deadly Truths bonus episode traces Custer’s rise frombattlefield celebrity to c...

During World War II, thousands of German prisoners of war were held in camps across the United States — but some never made it home. Inside the barbed-wire fences of places like Camp Gruber, Tonkawa, and Fort Meade, Nazi loyalists turned on their own — murdering fellow soldiers accused of betraying Hitler or showing kindness to Americans. In the summer of 1945, fourteen of those killers were execu...

In January 1901, a young Black man named Fred Alexander was dragged from his jail cell by a mob and burned alive outside Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. His only “crime” was being accused — not tried, not convicted — accused. This bonus episode of Deadly Truths: Death in the Big House examines how racism, mob violence, and media hysteria collided to create one of Kansas’s darkest moments. Through histor...

Fort Leavenworth, Kansas — the oldest military prison in the United States, and the only one authorized to carry out executions. In this episode of Deadly Truths: Season Two — Death in the Big House , host Becca takes you inside the walls of the U.S. Disciplinary Barracks to uncover the stories of the men currently on military death row — soldiers once sworn to serve, now condemned for murder, rap...

Before true crime was a genre, one story changed everything — the brutal 1959 murders of the Clutter family in Holcomb, Kansas. Their deaths shocked the nation and inspired Truman Capote’s groundbreaking book In Cold Blood , a work that blurred the line between journalism and literature. In this bonus Halloween episode of Deadly Truths: Season 2 — Leavenworth, Death in the House , host Becca Clark...

Fort Leavenworth, April 13, 1961 — thunder rolled across the Kansas sky as Private John A. Bennett became the last soldier ever executed by the U.S. military . Convicted of raping an 11-year-old Austrian girl, Bennett’s case raised hard questions about justice, race, mental health, and mercy within America’s armed forces. He confessed to the assault, was tried by court-martial, and hanged at Fort...

Welcome to Season Two of Deadly Truths . I’m Becca , your host — and this season, we’re stepping inside the heart of America’s most haunted fortress: Fort Leavenworth . Behind these stone walls, soldiers were tried, executed, and buried under numbered headstones — their stories silenced, but never gone. Between 1875 and 1961, at least 136 men were executed at the Old U.S. Disciplinary Barracks , m...

Robert Stroud, better known as the “Birdman of Alcatraz,” is often remembered through a Hollywood lens—mystified, softened, even glamorized. But the truth is darker. Originally sentenced to just 12 years for killing a man in Alaska, Stroud chose violence again and again behind bars. At Leavenworth, he murdered a prison guard, guaranteeing he would never leave the Big House alive. This Halloween, w...

Season Two, Episode One of Deadly Truths takes you inside the walls of Fort Leavenworth for a chilling Halloween special. We begin our October series with the infamous story of Carl Panzram — the Madman of Leavenworth . Born in brutality and shaped by abuse, Panzram grew into one of America’s most terrifying criminals. He confessed to murders, assaults, and arsons across the world, and in 1930 he...

In the late 1970s, Lake Tahoe was a paradise on the surface — neon-lit casinos, booming tourism, and endless alpine beauty. But beneath the glitter and pine trees lurked a predator. This episode uncovers the chilling murders of 27-year-old Brynn Rainey and 16-year-old Carol Andersen , two young women brutally killed just two years apart. For decades, their cases went cold, their killer hiding in p...

In 1979, two young women vanished in Reno, Nevada. Their bodies were later discovered in Hungry Valley — less than a mile apart — sparking fear and mystery that haunted the community for decades. Julia Woodward was 21, and Jeannie Smith only 17, when their lives were cut short. For forty years, their murders remained unsolved. Then in 2019, advances in DNA technology pointed investigators toward C...

In 1867, Julia Bulette , Virginia City’s most famous courtesan and the so-called Queen of the Comstock , was brutally murdered in her cottage. Strangled and left for dead, her killing shocked the booming mining town built on the riches of the Comstock Lode . This episode of Deadly Truths explores Julia’s extraordinary life, the crime scene, and the sensational trial that followed. The controversia...

In this episode of Reno Murders: Death in the Biggest Little City , we uncover the chilling history of the Donner Party tragedy at Donner Pass . Stranded in the Sierra Nevada during the brutal winter of 1846–47, dozens of pioneers faced starvation, desperation, and the ultimate taboo— cannibalism for survival . We’ll explore the journey westward, the fateful decisions that trapped them in the snow...

Killer Couples: Love, Control, and Murder Across the West When love turns lethal, the story takes a darker twist. In this episode of Deadly Truths , we investigate one of America’s most notorious killer couples —partners bound not just by romance, but by a shared appetite for control, manipulation, and murder . Behind the façade of an ordinary relationship, they plotted abductions, sexual assaults...

In the mid-1970s, San Mateo County, California was terrorized by the Gypsy Hill Murders —a string of brutal killings near Pacifica, Daly City, Millbrae, and South San Francisco. For decades, the crimes went unsolved. Then in 1976, Michele Mitchell , a nursing student at the University of Nevada, Reno , was murdered in a case that also went cold. Decades later, DNA evidence revealed the shocking tr...

From Jane Doe to Justice: Reno’s Sheep’s Flat Mystery takes you inside one of Nevada’s most haunting cold cases. In 1982, the body of a woman was discovered near Sheep’s Flat outside Reno. For nearly four decades, she remained unidentified as “Jane Doe.” In 2019, forensic DNA technology finally revealed her name: Mary Silvani—and unmasked her killer, serial murderer James Richard Curry. This true...

Murder in the Duplex: The Olympian’s Final Night on Yori Avenue In March 1963, Reno was shaken by the brutal murder of Sonja McCaskie , a 27-year-old Olympic skier who had once represented Great Britain on the world stage. Inside her small duplex on Yori Avenue , police uncovered one of Nevada’s most shocking and gruesome true crime cases. This episode of Reno Murders: Death in the Biggest Little...