True Crime BnB

Episode 102: You Drink, You Die; The Chemists’ War What happens when morality becomes a weapon? During Prohibition, the U.S. government tried to scare people away from drinking alcohol by poisoning industrial ethanol. Instead, it unbridled a wave of tragedy that claimed thousands of lives. From speakeasies alive with whispered passwords, to fortunes gained through bootlegging, to hospitals overwhe...

This episode confronts the sanitized narratives that have always obscured the brutal truth of racial terrorism in America. This isn’t just history—it’s true crime that was never treated as such. From lynchings to massacres buried beneath smug silence, this legacy of violence shaped communities, policies, and the contemporary distrust that many Black Americans have towards law enforcement and insti...

This isn't our usual True Crime BnB. It’s not even ‘usual’ for Unexpected. It's a personal history—of how this podcast began, who it honors, and why it still matters. From a plastic bucket microphone to a quiet archive of resistance, this episode isn’t just a milestone in numbers—it’s a milestone in voice. It’s a tribute to the victims, the survivors, the listeners, and to Bailey and to our Baby B...

This bonus episode reflects on Frederick Douglass’s fiery 1852 speech and Susan B. Anthony’s words from the U.S. Centennial in 1876—reminders that the rights many of us hold today were not freely given. Civil rights for non-white men and women of all races were won only after generations of resistance, sacrifice, and struggle. Let today be a day of radical remembrance. And action. Find me here: ht...

To understand the longest-running crime in U.S. history—committed against Native Americans—we go back to 1492, when Christopher Columbus set sail on a misguided voyage to “India.” We brought sickness to North America, which devastated First Nations Indigenous people. Then we stole their land and killed their people, and despite our intrusions here, Native Americans were among the last people to be...

The history you think you know wasn't just written in books--it was curated, shaped, and edited by people with their own self interests. But before that, it was lived. And the people whose lives we study weren't usually the ones who got to tell their own stories. Some voices were amplified, while others were diminished--or erased altogether. In this episode, Sojourner Truth's famous speech at the...

Hello and welcome back to Episode 97 at the True Crime BnB! This episode has me feeling philosophical about the little decisions we make every day, and how those go on to affect the rest of our lives. Wendy Jo Halison was a college senior in California, In 1968, she headed off in her convertible to buy a hair dryer that was on sale. She never made it home, and her murder was not solved for 48 year...

Hello, Crime Family. Have a seat, and let's get into Episode 96. Frank Tranter was a 74-year-old retired man living in the Lion Farm Estate in West Midlands, England. His health was seriously failing him, he was nearly blind, and he lived alone in his semi-detached bungalow. All he wanted to do was listen to music and wave at his neighbors out the window. But, no. Along came a group of no-goods wh...

Hello and welcome back for Episode 95. Apologies for the delay in releasing this episode; if you follow me on Instagram you know I was traveling and came home with a stray 4 week old kitten, so lately I've been all about toys, kitten food, and counting the scratches all over my skin. This week I am covering the frustrating case of the murder of Holly Palmer, which took place in Granbury, Texas in...

Hello, Crime Family, and welcome back to Episode 94 at the True Crime BnB! I didn't plan to, but somehow I managed to have one case in each of the two most recent US states: one in Hawaii (became a state on Aug 21, 1959) and the other in Alaska (became a state on Jan 3, 1959). Hawaii is considered to be a paradise, and to many people, it absolutely is. But for Conrad Maesaka and Patricia Stevens,...

Hello, Crime Family, and welcome back to Episode 93 at the True Crime BnB. This week we have a little more cussing than usual, because it comes up in quotes that really contribute to the telling of the stories. Yes! I said STORIES. I'm harking back to the Bad Guy / Good Guy days, even in a solo episode, because if i can have an upper story to close the episode, then I will do that. First up is the...

Hey, Crime Family, thanks for bearing with me as I am dropping Episode 92 two days late. The previous week just didn't allow me to finish it for Friday, so I am doing my first-ever Sunday release so I can stay on track for every other week. So, that business out of the way, this episode is a bit of a throwback to the old bad-guy / good-guy format that I still use in collaborations, but I'm both ba...

Hello, I'm glad you've chosen to pop in at the True Crime BnB for Episode 91! This week's episode is pretty rough and covers a senseless crime against a West Alexandria, Ohio woman who, in February, 1989, was weeks away from giving birth to a son she had already named. Joy Gayle Morningstar Stewart was one of those rare people who brightened the day of anyone lucky enough to encounter her. When sh...

Hello, Crime Family, and welcome back to Episode 90 here at the True Crime BnB! This week I have special guest Miss Ruby Wilde, co-hostess of the Vintage Homicide Podcast, bringing the sad and senseless murder of Grand Ol' Opry and HeeHaw regular David "Stringbean" Akeman and his wife Estelle. But even if you already know what happened to Stringbean and Estelle, Miss Ruby has widened this story to...

Thank you for joining me to back at the True Crime BnB for Episode 89. Today I am taking you to Mexico City in 1958, and we are going to remember the murder of Harriet Ann Eckman Hicks. But there is a lot to remember about Harriet besides the way she was taken from her family. Harriet was a woman who made her own life and lived outside the bounds of what society expected of her in the 1950's. She...

Thank you for joining me this week for Episode 88, as we head to San Francisco, California and the horrific case of Frank and Annette Carlson. This crime took place in 1974 and was so excessively violent that the perpetrator tried to pass himself off as one of the many serial killers that were in that area in the early 1970's. Annette survived but has spent the last 50 years haunted by the events...

Background music is "Just Relax" by LesFM, uncopyrighted and legally obtained from Pixabay.com .

Howdy and welcome back to the True Crime BnB! Thanks for joining me for this Just One B, Episode 87! Today's case is similar to some of the cases we have covered in the past, but with one unusual factor. David Alexander was a nice Irishman living in Ontario, Canada. He was a good dad, a good husband, and carried the secret that his wife abused him. David still loved his wife Christine, but had com...

Hi guys, I'm sorry to have been MIA for the last month, but I finally made it back to this episode that we recorded at the beginning of December! But let me tell you, Episode 86 is worth the wait! This collaboration with MaryAnne from Social Detective is intense, and also longer than my normal episodes, see time stamps below. MaryAnne brings us the infuriating (no joke--this will make you angry) c...

Hello, my dear Crime Family, apologies that I couldn't get this episode out before Christmas as planned. We had a death in my family and my only focus was family last week. But for this episode I was lucky enough to collaborate again with my friend Lyndon from Murder at Bedtime with Lyndon and the Exiled Yellowbelly. Links to his channels and podcast are below. Lyndon brought us a heartbreaking ca...

Hello, welcome to Just One B week at the BnB! Today for Episode 84, I'm bringing you a story of a heroic mother who saved the lives of her large family when their home was consumed in a Christmas fire 62 years ago. Rosemary Shayotovich Swiger Starry thought of nothing except the safety of her bedridden husband and her eight children when their Christmas tree caused a house fire in the early mornin...

Welcome to the November Just One B, so this week, there is no good guy. I know, rough, but this is just how it has to be sometimes at the BnB. My case this week was a senseless, tragic, and random act of violence towards a young woman who was going to do great things in her life. Sharon Galligan was only weeks away from embarking on her semester abroad when she was a junior at the University of Ma...

Welcome back for Episode 82 here at the BnB! Thank you for joining me as I welcome Deb from Dying To Be Found podcast as this week's guest bad guy! Deb went big with her case this week, in the tragic downfall, crimes, and untimely death of New England Patriots tight end Aaron Hernandez. He did some terrible things over a number of years, but Deb shows us the double-edged sword of the life that mad...

Hello again, and welcome back to the True Crime BnB for Episode 81! This week is a solo Just One B, episode, but I'm still bringing you two stories. But since this is a Halloween episode, neither case has a happy or uplifting ending. Apologies for breaching the format, but these two cases are important and I wanted to share them both. The common themes of these two stories are that both took place...

Welcome back to Episode 80, my dear Crime Family! I've missed you! This week I had the pleasure of working again with Andy from Picture the Scene Podcast, with whom we also collaborated on Episode 41. Rachael was unable to join us, but Andy brought us a case from the UK, detailing the horrible domestic violence murder of Dawn Walker. This murder was, unfortunately, predictable, but the circumstanc...