Serial Napper | True Crime for the Chronically Tired

She arrived in Auckland at 2:14 PM. By 3:32 PM, she was gone. In September 1998, 29-year-old Kayo Matsuzawa travelled from Japan to New Zealand to study English and explore the world she had dreamed of seeing since she was a child. She was careful. Prepared. Independent. And just months away from returning home. But during a short trip to Auckland, something happened in the space of just over an h...

17-year-old Hailey Buzbee vanished from her home in Fishers, Indiana, in January 2026. What started as online gaming turned into a year-long grooming process that ended in tragedy. In this episode of Serial Napper, we walk through the case of Hailey Buzbee, from the quiet early morning hours she disappeared… to the digital trail that led investigators across state lines and into the woods of Ohio....

Natalie McNally was 32 years old, 15 weeks pregnant, and preparing for a future she believed was finally falling into place. On December 18, 2022, she spent the evening with her family watching the World Cup final before heading home to her house in Silverwood Green. Hours later, she was brutally killed. Her boyfriend, Stephen McCullagh, seemed like the last person anyone would suspect. He had a p...

Professional cyclist Anna Moriah Wilson was in Austin, Texas, for a race when she was shot to death inside a friend’s home. What first looked like a quiet, targeted killing quickly turned into one of the most bizarre true crime stories in recent years, involving a secret relationship, a jealous girlfriend, an international manhunt, plastic surgery, and a 2023 murder conviction. In this episode of...

In October 1993, a small farming community in Wilkie, Saskatchewan, was shaken when Robert Latimer was arrested for killing his own daughter. At first, Tracy Latimer’s death didn’t seem suspicious. She had lived her entire life with severe cerebral palsy, daily seizures, chronic pain, and repeated surgeries. Her health was fragile, and her family had spent years caring for her through hospital sta...

In March 2021, 33‑year‑old Sarah Everard disappeared while walking home from a friend’s house in South London. What began as a missing person’s case quickly turned into one of the most shocking and heartbreaking stories the UK has ever seen...because the man responsible wasn’t a stranger in the dark. He was a police officer. This episode takes a deep, updated look at the full story of Sarah Everar...

When 25‑year‑old Joshua Saulteaux from Whitefish Lake First Nation, Alberta, scratched a ticket and won $1 million, it was supposed to be the start of a new life. Instead, just weeks later, he was gone, leaving behind his new RV, his phone, and a haunting scene of blood inside. In this episode, we trace Joshua’s short road from celebration to disappearance, exploring the fear he felt in his final...

This week, we return to one of the most haunting cases ever to strike the east coast of Canada: the reign of terror unleashed by Allan Joseph Legere, better known as The Monster of the Miramichi. In 1989, a quiet community was transformed into a place gripped by fear as Legere, an escaped convict with a violent past, stalked the woods, broke into homes, assaulted, tortured, and murdered with escal...

A heavy backpack. A quiet question in first‑period math. And a year of warnings that went unanswered. This episode of Serial Napper traces the long, tangled path leading to the Apalachee High shooting and the four lives lost in minutes. In this late‑night deep dive, we walk through the slow unravelling of 14‑year‑old Colt Gray: a boy raised in chaos, overlooked by schools, ignored by caseworkers,...

On the morning of February 18, 2019, 15-year-old Rebecca Reusch was supposed to go to school. She never arrived. The last confirmed sign of life? A Snapchat sent from inside her sister’s home in Berlin-Britz. At 7:46 a.m., her phone connected to the house Wi-Fi for the final time. After that, her digital footprint vanished. In this episode of Serial Napper, we walk through one of Germany’s most hi...

In the summer of 1968, the tight-knit community of Scotswood in Newcastle upon Tyne was shaken by two devastating deaths. Four-year-old Martin Brown was found in an abandoned house. Three-year-old Brian Howe was discovered weeks later, strangled behind concrete blocks near a railway. The person ultimately convicted? An 11-year-old girl named Mary Flora Bell. In this episode of Serial Napper, we di...

In 2005, just weeks after surviving a 41-day stay in the NICU, baby Emmanuel Woods died of malnutrition in Shreveport, Louisiana. His mother, Tiffany Woods, was later convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. Her crime? Switching her premature infant to cow’s milk after Hurricane Katrina displaced the family and disrupted access to formula and medical care. Nearly twenty y...

April 15, 2014. What began as a small student gathering near the University of Calgary ended in one of the most devastating nights in the city’s history. Five young people went to a house party in Brentwood and never made it home. The accused, 22-year-old Matthew DeGrood, the son of a Calgary police officer, would later be diagnosed with schizophrenia and found Not Criminally Responsible for the k...

In February 2025, 22-year-old Liam Gabriel Toman disappeared from Mont-Tremblant after a night out at Le P’tit Caribou. Last seen on surveillance walking toward his hotel, he never made it back — and his disappearance remains unsolved. After a day on the slopes and drinks in the village, Liam was captured on camera just minutes from his room. An extensive search followed. Weeks later, his wallet w...

In September 2021, Mchale Busch and her 16-month-old son Noah McConnell were murdered in their apartment building in Hinton, Alberta, by a neighbour the system already knew was dangerous. This episode explores how a young family, searching for safety and stability, unknowingly moved next door to Robert Keith Major, a convicted sex offender assessed as high risk to reoffend. Despite documented warn...

In October of 1978, a young woman’s body was found dragged into a roadside ditch along a rural gravel road in Lyon County, Iowa. She had been dead for months. She had no identification. No missing person report. No name. For 27 years, she was known only as Jane Doe. That woman was Wilma June Nissen. Wilma’s life was marked by abandonment and survival long before her murder. Born in 1954, she endur...

Kiara Agnew was 23 years old when she left Canada for the very first time. In March 2023, the Dawson Creek, British Columbia woman travelled to Playa del Carmen, Mexico to celebrate her birthday with her boyfriend. She sent happy videos home. Smiled from a resort balcony. Talked about food and the beach. Everything about the trip felt ordinary. Less than twelve hours later, Kiara was found beaten...

In December 2020, two little boys vanished from a backyard in California City just days before Christmas. Three-year-old Orrin West and four-year-old Orson West were reported missing by their adoptive parents, who claimed the boys wandered away through an open gate while playing outside. At first, it sounded like every parent’s nightmare. But almost immediately, nothing about the story made sense....

On July 9, 2014, a quiet home in Spring, Texas, became the site of an unimaginable act of violence. Six members of the Stay family were murdered in their own home. Parents Stephen Stay and Katie Stay, and four children, Bryan Stay, Emily Stay, Rebecca Stay, and Zach Stay, were killed by a man who believed he was owed something he had already lost. Only one person survived. Fifteen-year-old Cassidy...

In 2020, Suzanne Morphew vanished on Mother’s Day from a small mountain town in Colorado. The story the public was given was simple: a bike ride, an accident, maybe an animal attack. But Suzanne was never seen on a bike. In this episode, I return to the case I first covered when Suzanne was still missing and trace what happened next. The red flags that were visible from the beginning. The years of...

In 1999, fifteen-year-old Michael Palmer disappeared after leaving a graduation party and riding his bike home in Wasilla. His bicycle was later found in the Little Susitna River. His shoes were discovered nearby. Michael himself was never found. For eleven years, his family lived with unanswered questions. Then, in 2010, history repeated itself. Michael’s brother, Charles “Chucky” Palmer Jr., van...

On June 7, 2017, 19-year-old Tanner Ward left his family’s home in Trenton, Missouri, saying he’d be back in thirty minutes. He never returned. Six months later, Tanner’s body was discovered hanging in a tree just blocks from his home. Authorities ruled his death a suicide. Two autopsies reached the same conclusion. And on paper, the case was closed. But for Tanner’s family, the story never settle...

In the early morning hours of October 27, 2006, Dennis Hoy was killed as he slept in his girlfriend’s bed in Etobicoke, Ontario. At first, the story sounded almost tidy. An intruder. A shower running. A crime that appeared sudden and external. But this case was never simple. What followed was a tangled investigation involving a secret relationship, rehearsed narratives, a confession that was never...

On May 7, 1992, three young men broke into a McDonald’s restaurant in Sydney River, Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, planning to rob the safe and walk away with easy money. Instead, the night ended in one of the most shocking crimes in Canadian history. Three McDonald’s employees were murdered. One young woman survived with permanent, life-altering injuries. And a small community was left forever changed...

Five members of one family were found shot to death inside their home in Dunedin, New Zealand. Parents Robin Bain and Margaret Bain, along with their children Arawa (19), Laniet (18), and Stephen (14), were all killed in the early morning hours of June 20, 1994. The only person left alive was the eldest son, David Bain, who said he had been out delivering newspapers at the time of the murders. Ins...