Hidden Killers Live! Daily True Crime News & Breakdowns

Unsealed federal court records in the Anna Kepner case have revealed a defense move that experienced criminal attorneys are calling highly unusual. The accused — a sixteen-year-old facing charges of first-degree murder and aggravated sexual abuse in the death of his eighteen-year-old stepsister — signed a written waiver requesting to be prosecuted as an adult. His defense counsel co-signed the doc...

The full panel, live and uncut. Former FBI Behavioral Analysis Chief Robin Dreeke and psychotherapist Shavaun Scott are sitting down with Tony for a complete breakdown of the Samuel Bateman case and Netflix's Trust Me: The False Prophet — from how he built the cult, to what it did to the people inside, to whether Short Creek will ever stop producing predators who call themselves prophets. Robin sp...

The final segment of our live three-part panel on the Bateman case and Netflix's Trust Me: The False Prophet. Parts 1 and 2 covered how he built it and what it did to the people inside. Now we're talking about what happens next — and whether "next" means healing or repetition. Former FBI Behavioral Analysis Chief Robin Dreeke and psychotherapist Shavaun Scott are back with Tony for the conversatio...

Going live for Part 2 of our panel on the Samuel Bateman case and Netflix's Trust Me: The False Prophet. If Part 1 was about how Bateman built his cult, this one is about what it did to the people inside it — and the damage that's still unfolding. Psychotherapist Shavaun Scott and former FBI Behavioral Analysis Chief Robin Dreeke are back with Tony for the conversation about the invisible wreckage...

We're going live with a conversation you're not going to want to pause. Former FBI Behavioral Analysis Chief Robin Dreeke and psychotherapist Shavaun Scott are sitting down with Tony to break apart the Samuel Bateman case in real time — starting with the question everyone who watched the Netflix doc Trust Me: The False Prophet keeps asking: how did a broke, homeless man get fifty people to hand hi...

Criminal defense attorney Bob Motta and retired FBI Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program Chief Robin Dreeke join Tony Brueski for a wide-ranging conversation that covers Rex Heuermann's guilty plea, the civil lawsuit against his family, and the federal adult indictment in the Anna Kepner case — bringing both legal strategy and behavioral expertise to bear on each story. Motta opens with...

A defense attorney breaks down the federal indictment against Anna Kepner's sixteen-year-old stepbrother — and examines the significant challenges facing both the prosecution and the defense in a case that involves a minor charged as an adult, contradictory early reporting, and a family splintering across multiple courtrooms. The conversation begins with the most striking element of the indictment...

A defense attorney walks through the strategic calculus behind Rex Heuermann's guilty plea — and explains why the timing, the terms, and the inclusion of an uncharged victim all point to a defendant managing his exposure rather than accepting responsibility. Heuermann spent nearly three years maintaining his innocence while his legal team filed motion after motion, each one denied. When the judge...

A defense attorney examines the civil lawsuit filed against Rex Heuermann's ex-wife and daughter — and explains why the complaint may not survive its first legal challenge. Benjamin Torres, the adult son of Gilgo Beach victim Valerie Mack, has sued Asa Ellerup and Victoria Heuermann alongside the now-convicted killer, alleging they knew about the murders, concealed evidence, and collected over a m...

Retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer brings her bureau expertise to both of the stories dominating the national conversation — and draws the investigative line between them. In the Nancy Guthrie case, Coffindaffer maps every documented failure from crime scene handling to evidence disputes to the structural problems that predate Nancy's disappearance, and explains why the cumulative wei...

The criminal case against Joseph Duggar has expanded beyond a single allegation into a multi-state investigation that's raising questions about systemic patterns of alleged abuse and concealment inside one of America's most publicly visible families. Joseph faces two life felony charges in Florida. He and his wife Kendra face eight combined misdemeanor charges in Arkansas. Investigators reportedly...

Retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer brings her experience investigating law enforcement leaders who clung to power under pressure to the Pima County crisis — where Sheriff Chris Nanos faces a unanimous no-confidence vote, a board threatening removal under oath, multiple federal lawsuits, and a recall effort, and still refuses to resign while overseeing the Nancy Guthrie investigation....

Retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer brings her bureau expertise to the documented investigative failures in the Nancy Guthrie disappearance — a case where the lead agency's own deputies have unanimously voted no confidence in their sheriff. Coffindaffer examines what it means when local law enforcement declares evidence unrecoverable and the FBI produces it days later. She analyzes the...

Robin Dreeke, retired chief of the FBI's Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program, provides extended expert analysis across three interconnected investigations — applying decades of behavioral expertise to the Duggar family's private crisis communications, the family system that produced two sons facing charges or convictions involving children, and the psychological control mechanisms of F...

From a behavioral analysis perspective, the Samuel Bateman case presents a concentrated example of cult control mechanics operating at their most extreme — a man with no institutional backing, no financial resources, and no prior following who constructed a system of total psychological dominance within a few years. Robin Dreeke, retired chief of the FBI's Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis P...

Robin Dreeke, retired chief of the FBI's Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program, applies decades of behavioral expertise to the structural question at the center of the Duggar family's unraveling: how does one household, operating under one parenting philosophy, produce two sons facing charges or convictions involving the abuse of children — and what does that pattern reveal about the sys...

When the private communications of a family in crisis become public, a trained behavioral analyst sees what casual observers miss — the word choices, the omissions, the gap between private reality and public performance. Robin Dreeke, retired chief of the FBI's Counterintelligence Behavioral Analysis Program, applies decades of expertise in reading human behavior under pressure to the Duggar famil...

Rex Heuermann pled guilty to three counts of first-degree murder and four counts of intentional murder in Suffolk County Court and admitted to killing Karen Vergata as an eighth victim. He has agreed to cooperate with the FBI's behavioral analysis unit. The sentence: life without parole. Retired FBI Special Agent Jennifer Coffindaffer provides the investigative analysis. She examines what a plea r...

Criminal defense attorney Bob Motta assesses the legal exposure radiating outward from Joseph Duggar's arrest. Kendra Duggar faces eight misdemeanor counts in Arkansas — four for second-degree endangering the welfare of a minor and four for second-degree false imprisonment — stemming from a home investigation that reportedly discovered locks on the exterior of children's bedroom doors. She retaine...

Rex Heuermann pled guilty to three counts of first-degree murder and four counts of intentional murder in Suffolk County Court. He also admitted to killing Karen Vergata — an eighth victim not formally charged — as part of the plea agreement. Sentenced to life without parole. He has agreed to cooperate with the FBI's behavioral analysis unit. Criminal defense attorney Bob Motta provides the legal...

Criminal defense attorney Bob Motta provides a practitioner's assessment of the legal landscape facing Joseph Duggar. According to investigators, Joseph allegedly admitted to the abuse twice before counsel was present — once when confronted by the victim's father, and again during a phone call monitored by Tontitown detectives. Motta examines what a defense strategy looks like when the prosecution...

Retired FBI Counterintelligence Chief Robin Dreeke — former head of the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Program — provides behavioral analysis of the later calls between Joseph and Kendra Duggar from Washington County. Joseph has reframed solitary confinement as a prayer closet. He reports a breakthrough in Bible study. He reads Kendra a devotional about boundaries — Moses, Aaron, and Pharaoh and their...

Retired FBI Counterintelligence Chief Robin Dreeke — former head of the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Program — applies his analytical framework to the first extended call between Joseph and Kendra Duggar from the Washington County Detention Center. Joseph is in solitary confinement, reading Psalms, doing push-ups, comparing himself to the Biblical Joseph. Kendra has stopped eating, can barely walk, t...

Jim Bob Duggar emailed his son Joseph in the Washington County Detention Center. The email — obtained through public records — compares Joseph to King David and the Biblical Joseph, frames prison as potential ministry, acknowledges "terrible decisions," and tells him God isn't finished with his life. He calls the charges against Kendra "ridiculous." The alleged victim — the child at the center of...

Nancy Guthrie remains missing. The 84-year-old mother of NBC's Savannah Guthrie was taken from her Catalina Foothills home near Tucson in February. Blood confirmed as hers on the porch. An armed, masked figure captured on doorbell camera footage. No suspect publicly named. No arrest. The investigation is in its third month under a sheriff whose own deputies have voted unanimously that they have no...