Speaker 1: You are now listening to True Murder The most shocking
Speaker 1: killers in true crime history and the authors that have
Speaker 1: written about them. Geesy Bundy Dahmer The Nightstalker VTK every
Speaker 1: week another fascinating author talking about the most shocking and
Speaker 1: infamous killers in true crime history. True Murder with your host,
Speaker 1: journalist and author Dan Zufanski.
Speaker 2: Good Evening, The untold story behind the hit true crime podcast,
Speaker 2: The Clearing. This unforgettable memoir traces one daughter's moving quest
Speaker 2: to understand her larger than life childhood as she searches
Speaker 2: for the truth about her father, the serial killer Edward
Speaker 2: Wayne Edwards. One evening in two thousand and nine, April
Speaker 2: Belascio was searching online as she had been every night,
Speaker 2: for unsolved murders in the towns her family had lived
Speaker 2: growing up when she stumbled across the latest investigations into
Speaker 2: the Sweetheart Murders cold case. All at once, the buried
Speaker 2: memories of her father's dark history were awakened, and she
Speaker 2: knew she had to take action. She picked up the
Speaker 2: phone to call a detective, and the rest is infamous
Speaker 2: true crime history. Blacio bravely reveals an astonishing tale of
Speaker 2: a lifetime of manipulation, unexplained upheavals, and silent fear. Some
Speaker 2: part of her had always known what her father was
Speaker 2: capable of, but the full truth of how she came
Speaker 2: to these revelations is as riveting as it is quietly terrifying.
Speaker 2: The book that we're featuring this evening is Raised by
Speaker 2: a Serial Killer, Discovering the Truth about My Father, with
Speaker 2: my special guest author April Blascio. Thank you very much
Speaker 2: for this interview, and welcome to the program, April Blessio.
Speaker 3: Hi Dan, thank you for having me.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much, and congratulations on this book, Raised
Speaker 2: by a Serial Killer, Discovering the Truth about My Father. Now,
Speaker 2: let's talk about how your father met your mother in
Speaker 2: nineteen sixty eight on a city bus in Akron, Ohio.
Speaker 2: He was thirty five years old and she was twenty one.
Speaker 2: Tell us a little bit about the past that he
Speaker 2: had before your mother married him. Tell us about your
Speaker 2: father's background before we talk about your life growing up
Speaker 2: with your father and your mother and traveling the country.
Speaker 3: Well before my father had met my mom. He well,
Speaker 3: originally he was born in Akron, Ohio, and he was
Speaker 3: in and out of an orphanage due to his mother
Speaker 3: being unwed, and then when he was adopted by other
Speaker 3: family members, his adopted mother ended up passing away, so
Speaker 3: he was in and out of the orphanages. From a
Speaker 3: young age. He told people he wanted to be a
Speaker 3: crook and then and that's exactly what he did. From
Speaker 3: a very young age, he just set out to be
Speaker 3: a crook, from stealing bikes when he was a youngster
Speaker 3: to stealing cigarettes, stealing from his grandmother, and then those
Speaker 3: crimes just progressed. He turned into robbing banks, robbing gas stations.
Speaker 3: He ended up being on the FBI's most wanted list
Speaker 3: in nineteen sixty He was actually out on parole. They
Speaker 3: finally did catch him in Atlanta, Georgia, and he was
Speaker 3: out on parole in nineteen sixty eight when he met
Speaker 3: my mom at a bus stop in Akron, Ohio.
Speaker 2: Your mother was kay Lynn Headerly, But Wayne Edwards, your father.
Speaker 2: That's not his original name, was it.
Speaker 3: No, His original name was Charles Murray. And then when
Speaker 3: he was adopted, they changed his name to Edward Wayne Edwards.
Speaker 3: And I always knew him. Everyone always referred to him
Speaker 3: as Wayne. I just always knew that everyone referred to
Speaker 3: him as Wayne. I didn't even realize that his first
Speaker 3: name was technically Edward until I believe I read his book.
Speaker 3: I was in seventh grade, and I think that was
Speaker 3: the first time that I, or at least it really
Speaker 3: hit home. I might have heard about it before, but
Speaker 3: I just did. It just didn't stick in my mind
Speaker 3: until I was in when I read his book.
Speaker 2: He told your mother when he had met her that
Speaker 2: he was free after five years of prison, and he
Speaker 2: was sent there for armed robbery. But your mother married
Speaker 2: him despite that criminal record, didn't she?
Speaker 3: She did my mother when my father met my mom,
Speaker 3: my mom was actually engaged to someone else, and my
Speaker 3: dad was very charismatic, very much a womanizer, so my
Speaker 3: mom didn't have a chance. She was what some people
Speaker 3: might call, you know, a wallflower. She was very quiet,
Speaker 3: blended in, you know, didn't speak out much. She had
Speaker 3: actually was going to was just finishing up college to
Speaker 3: become a teacher, and when she met my dad, she
Speaker 3: just fell head over and heels in love with him.
Speaker 3: And he did tell her about his past, and it
Speaker 3: didn't seem to bother her. I think she thought because
Speaker 3: he was honest and upfront, and that he was stating
Speaker 3: that he was leading a reform life. She believed him.
Speaker 2: You talk about his past and is the developing criminal career,
Speaker 2: but it was plagued by stays in orphanages throughout his
Speaker 2: life as well. What did your father say to your
Speaker 2: mother regarding that upbringing and how did that affect his
Speaker 2: own parenting? What was his philosophy in parenting after being
Speaker 2: not parented at all in his life?
Speaker 3: Well, I would I would disagree a little bit. He
Speaker 3: was parented off and on, and I really believe the
Speaker 3: only reason that he was put into the orphanage was
Speaker 3: because he was such a troubled child. Nowadays, we have
Speaker 3: resources to help parents with children who might be difficult
Speaker 3: or you know, going through circumstances that you know, we
Speaker 3: don't understand. But at that time, the thing to do
Speaker 3: was to put them in the orphanage, especially you know,
Speaker 3: after his adoptive mom died, but his grandmother and his others,
Speaker 3: they were still involved in his life as much as possible,
Speaker 3: even all the way up, you know, to involved in
Speaker 3: our lives. But his big philosophy was he felt in
Speaker 3: his mind that he wasn't loved, that he wasn't shown love,
Speaker 3: and so he would he would tell people and I
Speaker 3: believe he spoke on this when he went around and
Speaker 3: did his public speaking, was that if a children was loved,
Speaker 3: that that conquers all that if you just love your
Speaker 3: child and discipline them. He also believed in discipline, that
Speaker 3: a child just needed love and discipline and they would
Speaker 3: they would be prosperous.
Speaker 2: Tell us about this. When he's in prison, he decides
Speaker 2: to turn his life around, supposedly and gets a book published.
Speaker 2: This metamorphosis of a criminal. So he's able to get
Speaker 2: a book published at thirty four years old in nineteen
Speaker 2: seventy two. Tell us about this book, the success of it,
Speaker 2: and the tours that he went on to support that book.
Speaker 3: The book. He was out of prison when the book
Speaker 3: was published. Even when the book was being written, he
Speaker 3: dictated to my mom the book. My mom actually typed
Speaker 3: it up, so she helped him write the book, and
Speaker 3: that was his claim to fame. His book goes into
Speaker 3: detail about his childhood. It goes into detail and extreme
Speaker 3: detail about his life of crime. And in the book,
Speaker 3: you know, he mentions how abusive he is, the things
Speaker 3: that he did to women, even as far as raping them.
Speaker 3: It's just it's it's just horrible. The things that he
Speaker 3: admits to in this memoir that you know, I as
Speaker 3: an adult, you know, looking at it now, I'm like,
Speaker 3: why would he admit to some of these things?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 3: I just didn't understand and still don't understand his book
Speaker 3: as to why he did what he did.
Speaker 2: But he admitted to a host of different crimes, including
Speaker 2: arson and burglary and theft. But also there was all
Speaker 2: kinds of things in there as you write about just
Speaker 2: his behaviors, past behavior, beating women and treating women poorly,
Speaker 2: but also that you say that strangely, he would give
Speaker 2: this book as sort of a calling card. He was
Speaker 2: very proud of this book and would give it to
Speaker 2: neighbors and new acquaintances and friends, wouldn't he He did.
Speaker 3: That was one of the first things that he did
Speaker 3: when we would go into move into a new neighborhood,
Speaker 3: is he would go knocking on the neighbor's door and
Speaker 3: present them with a book. Growing up, I didn't think
Speaker 3: much of it. Looking back now as an adult, I
Speaker 3: would have been embarrassed. I would have been embarrassed to
Speaker 3: have a book that states, you know, all the things
Speaker 3: that I did wrong, the heinous crimes, especially crimes that
Speaker 3: he didn't even get convicted for that he omits to
Speaker 3: And that just shows you the way that he thought.
Speaker 3: He didn't think like most people. But he was absolutely
Speaker 3: proud of this, of this.
Speaker 2: Book you talk about. In nineteen seventy four, with money
Speaker 2: from the book and tour engagements, Dad bought an empty
Speaker 2: lot in Doylestown, Ohio. And so you moved with your
Speaker 2: three siblings to Doyleston and to a rural farm community.
Speaker 3: Yes, yes, we originally he bought the when we moved
Speaker 3: from Acron, Ohio. We moved to Doylestown, and we started
Speaker 3: out by running a home, a farm home, a farmhouse
Speaker 3: right around the corner from the piece of property that
Speaker 3: he had bought to build our home on. So we
Speaker 3: were living in this farmhouse as he was slowly building
Speaker 3: the house on the piece of property. The house on
Speaker 3: the piece of property was on Kevin Drive and the
Speaker 3: farmhouse was on Taylor Road. And I loved that farmhouse.
Speaker 3: I just to this day, I have very fond memories
Speaker 3: of that farmhouse. But he ended up burning down the barn.
Speaker 3: He ended up burning down the farmhouse. He was never
Speaker 3: he never admitted that in his well the book was
Speaker 3: at was before that, But he never admitted that crime
Speaker 3: to me, but my mom knew about it, and my
Speaker 3: mom told me about it. My mom told me about
Speaker 3: that when I was a teenager. And here he had
Speaker 3: burnt down the barn and he had burnt down the
Speaker 3: barn because he was going to or wanting to collect
Speaker 3: insurance money on the lumber that he had been storing
Speaker 3: in the barn. But what he had did before or
Speaker 3: he set the bar on fire was he had moved
Speaker 3: the lumber out and made it appear that there was
Speaker 3: still lumber in the barn. And then I think about
Speaker 3: five months later, he burned down the house. And here
Speaker 3: again he did it for insurance purposes. He had insured
Speaker 3: the contents of the home which were not worth anything.
Speaker 3: I've actually have looked at the report from the fire
Speaker 3: department and what they said the contents were worth, or
Speaker 3: what my dad said the contents were worth, and I
Speaker 3: find that very hard to believe because we always had
Speaker 3: so little, very little, And I'm sure you know my
Speaker 3: dad lied about that. But what happened was the house
Speaker 3: didn't burn all the way down, and there was talk
Speaker 3: about maybe evidence of there being arson, and he went
Speaker 3: back a couple nights later within the I'm not exactly
Speaker 3: sure how many days later, and he stuffed rags inside
Speaker 3: the electrical box and set it on fire, and then
Speaker 3: the house burnt to the ground. After that, I think
Speaker 3: talking to people that were on the fire department at
Speaker 3: that time and talking to people in the area. As
Speaker 3: I've gone back in Denmine have done some investigating. He
Speaker 3: was suspected of burning the house down. People suspected him,
Speaker 3: but they didn't have any proof, and then it was
Speaker 3: just dropped.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about before we talk about the numerous times
Speaker 2: that you had to suddenly move or soon move, or
Speaker 2: right after school ended you had to move. You talk
Speaker 2: about nine different bedrooms in your life. Do you talk
Speaker 2: about that there's two different versions of your father, and
Speaker 2: he was the family man, wanted to have a family,
Speaker 2: so you saw growing up these two very contrasting sides
Speaker 2: of your father. Tell us about just a couple of
Speaker 2: the things that you saw yourself regarding your mother, and
Speaker 2: this sort of quick temper and turn in his mood suddenly.
Speaker 3: Well for starters, and this is what I remember, or
Speaker 3: I choose to remember, don't. I don't like to dwell
Speaker 3: on the negative. I really don't even you know, talking
Speaker 3: about my dad. I will talk about the bad things,
Speaker 3: and obviously I have, but I truly tried to dwell
Speaker 3: and remember the good times. And my dad was very fun.
Speaker 3: He was very loving, very charismatic. He loved kids. He
Speaker 3: would organize block parties for kids, whether it had you know,
Speaker 3: centered around Christmas or Halloween. Always had big parties, big
Speaker 3: get togethers the kids, the kids on the around the community.
Speaker 3: They love my dad, as did I. I hit my
Speaker 3: brothers and my sister, But there was another side to
Speaker 3: my dad that was very a flip. A switch would
Speaker 3: just flip and he would become very angry and very physical.
Speaker 3: I watched on you know, several occasions where he would
Speaker 3: hit my mom in the stomach and she was pregnant
Speaker 3: at the time. On two different separate two different step,
Speaker 3: two different occasions. I remember her being pregnant in him
Speaker 3: punching her in the stomach. He punched her in the
Speaker 3: jaw and broke her jaw. She ended up having her
Speaker 3: He broke her jaw two different times. And even as
Speaker 3: a child, I write about this in that book. I
Speaker 3: remember my dad throwing me across the room and I
Speaker 3: don't remember too much. You know, I don't really remember
Speaker 3: hitting the wall, but I'm told I did hit the wall,
Speaker 3: but I woke up, but he knocked me out, and
Speaker 3: I woke up with you know, being on the couch
Speaker 3: and him, you know, having a whole compress on my
Speaker 3: head and being very loving and asking if if I
Speaker 3: was okay. So the big contrast there and the violence
Speaker 3: was quite often, but and it was, it was very,
Speaker 3: very violent, but he was also very loving.
Speaker 2: Let's get to a person named Billy. One of the
Speaker 2: young men were working on the house. Your father would
Speaker 2: surround himself with young men and young adults and have
Speaker 2: them work in construction with him. And there was a
Speaker 2: young man named Billy, and he thought maybe that Billy
Speaker 2: had touched you and asked you about it. Tell us
Speaker 2: about this incident and your dad's reaction.
Speaker 3: Well, my dad, and my dad was always on the
Speaker 3: lookout for cheap labor, so he would hire and he
Speaker 3: did this for as long as I can remember. He
Speaker 3: would get young men, maybe right out of high school,
Speaker 3: in their late teens, early twenties, and he would promise them,
Speaker 3: you know, beer parties, barbecues, and these young men would
Speaker 3: work for my dad, and he would repay them with
Speaker 3: beer and barbecues, and I'm not sure if if he
Speaker 3: ever gave them cash. I never witnessed that, but I
Speaker 3: don't know whether he did or did not. And one
Speaker 3: of the men, young men by the name of Billy,
Speaker 3: was came around and would help my dad work on
Speaker 3: the house and would come to the parties. My dad
Speaker 3: always having backyard barbecues. He loved to barbecue on the grill.
Speaker 3: He was famous for his barbecue chicken, and he just
Speaker 3: loved to entertain and have people surrounding him. The first time,
Speaker 3: which I don't remember, this I picked. I first learned
Speaker 3: of this listening to my dad on a tape talking
Speaker 3: about how he had suspicions of Billy touching me and
Speaker 3: coming out of my bedroom when I lived on Taylor Road.
Speaker 3: And now I don't remember that, and I was probably
Speaker 3: four or five at the time. But Billy had been
Speaker 3: working for my dad for a couple of years, and
Speaker 3: it was when we were actually living on Taylor Road.
Speaker 3: Now we were in the house, even though the house
Speaker 3: was very rough, didn't have running water or electricity, but
Speaker 3: Billy had been up in the room one of the
Speaker 3: bedrooms doing drywall work and he asked if I wanted
Speaker 3: to help him, and you know, of course, I think
Speaker 3: I was seven at the time. I'm like, sure, and
Speaker 3: you know, I would just hand him the screws or
Speaker 3: the nails. And I got bored eventually, and I just
Speaker 3: started riding on the floor with a piece of drywalks
Speaker 3: that acted like a piece of chalk. And he asked
Speaker 3: me if I wanted to piggyback ride. And I remember
Speaker 3: this very, very adamantly. I remember this, but I never
Speaker 3: told anyone. I never told anyone until until after I
Speaker 3: turned my dad in. But Billy did touch me inappropriately,
Speaker 3: and I was on Billy's back when he was touching
Speaker 3: me inappropriately. His hand was up in my short area.
Speaker 3: My dad called me down stairs, and my dad was
Speaker 3: waiting for me at the bottom of the steps, and
Speaker 3: he had asked me if Billy had touched me in
Speaker 3: places that he shouldn't, And I knew I should have
Speaker 3: said yes, But there was a part of me that
Speaker 3: knew that Billy would be in a lot of trouble,
Speaker 3: and I didn't want him to get into trouble, so
Speaker 3: I told my dad no. What I didn't realize until many,
Speaker 3: many years, and it was after I turned my dad in.
Speaker 3: What I didn't realize was that my dad knew and
Speaker 3: he knew what Danny had had did, and supposedly that
Speaker 3: is the reason that he ended up killing Danny.
Speaker 2: Let's move on now, because it's there are other incidents
Speaker 2: where there are cops coming to the house. One time
Speaker 2: you answered the door and it's playing closed Guys and
Speaker 2: it's FBI. So just tell us that they're about these
Speaker 2: incidents where he befriends police or police come to the door,
Speaker 2: sort of your dad's general practice of befriending police.
Speaker 3: Well, I mentioned earlier that one of the first things
Speaker 3: my dad did was introduce himself to our neighbors and
Speaker 3: present his book to them. The second thing he did,
Speaker 3: or maybe in conjunction with that, was he befriended the
Speaker 3: local law enforcement, whether it was FBI, whether it was
Speaker 3: just beat cops. Details. He would befriend as many as possible.
Speaker 3: And what he did throughout his whole life, as far
Speaker 3: as I knew, was that he would gather information. He
Speaker 3: would hang out at bars and gather information and present
Speaker 3: this information to law enforcement officers, making it appear you
Speaker 3: know that he was a good guy and that he
Speaker 3: was helping them crack down on crimes. And one time,
Speaker 3: I remember we were on Kevin Drive in the house
Speaker 3: that my dad built and FBI. I didn't realize they
Speaker 3: were FBI agents at the time my dad told me
Speaker 3: about it. I just remember these two men coming to
Speaker 3: our door and they talked to my dad for a
Speaker 3: long time. He actually sent all of us kids outside,
Speaker 3: but they they came bearing gifts. They had given me
Speaker 3: a little treasure box. They a pocket watch, I believe,
Speaker 3: to another one of my brothers. I don't remember all
Speaker 3: the gifts, but they gave each one of us kids gifts,
Speaker 3: and I don't know the reasoning behind that. I just
Speaker 3: I love the little treasure box and it was something
Speaker 3: that I kept with me up until the time that
Speaker 3: I pretty much left home.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about Aunt Lucille, and let's talk about your travels,
Speaker 2: because you talk about the numerous states that you travel to,
Speaker 2: some of it in a big win of Bago, but
Speaker 2: also that many times you moved suddenly a couple times
Speaker 2: at night or at least once at night. So let's
Speaker 2: just talk about just these road trips and what they entailed,
Speaker 2: and just some of the places that you went to
Speaker 2: that later become very important.
Speaker 3: Okay, Well, first of all, Aunt Lucille and Lucille and
Speaker 3: uncle Ale Antocille was my dad's aunt, so she was
Speaker 3: my great aunt. She loved my dad very much. She
Speaker 3: was always in his life. She would go visit him
Speaker 3: when he was at the orphanage and she didn't end
Speaker 3: up having any children. Her husband, my uncle Al, had
Speaker 3: a stroke at a young age and she ended up,
Speaker 3: you know, taking care of him for all of their
Speaker 3: married life. But Aunt Lucille would come and visit us
Speaker 3: wherever we moved to. She also was very generous and
Speaker 3: would send money to my dad over the holidays for
Speaker 3: our birthdays to help my dad. By presence. She was
Speaker 3: just a very loving woman and she loved my dad.
Speaker 3: But she even though she loved my dad, she knew
Speaker 3: his flaws. She knew the things that he had did.
Speaker 3: She suspected him of things that he had done, even
Speaker 3: after he said he was reformed. But she still loved him.
Speaker 3: And as far as all the places that we moved,
Speaker 3: it was I believe nineteen seventy eight was our first time. Well,
Speaker 3: we after we moved from Akron, we moved to Doylestown
Speaker 3: and we stayed in the Doylestown area from my kindergarten
Speaker 3: through third grade, and then after that we picked up
Speaker 3: in the summertime, we moved to Florida. We stayed there
Speaker 3: for a year, ended up moving started to move to Arizona,
Speaker 3: but that my dad found that too hot, and we
Speaker 3: ended up in Brighton, Colorado. We lived there for a year,
Speaker 3: ended up moving in the middle of the night, and
Speaker 3: ended up in After that move, we ended up in Watertown, Wisconsin,
Speaker 3: and we only stayed there for a couple months. Once again,
Speaker 3: we packed up in the middle of the night or
Speaker 3: middle we started in the middle of the night. I
Speaker 3: think we left in the afternoon, or vice versa. We
Speaker 3: started early morning and left in at night. I'm a
Speaker 3: little bit vague on exactly when we started and when
Speaker 3: we ended up pulling out. After that, we landed in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,
Speaker 3: I stayed We still lived there for a year, and
Speaker 3: then ended up in Slippery Rock, Pennsylvania. From Slippery Rock
Speaker 3: before that, I would have been By the time that
Speaker 3: we ed up in Slippy Rock, Pennsylvania, I was in
Speaker 3: seventh grade, and before we finished our seventh grade year,
Speaker 3: due to my dad burning down another house, we ended
Speaker 3: up going down to Atlanta, Georgia, and stayed there for
Speaker 3: a couple months, and then ended up coming back to
Speaker 3: Slippy Rock, Pennsylvania, because that's my dad got caught for arson.
Speaker 3: Then we stayed in the Pennsylvania area, multiple places, multiple homes.
Speaker 3: One it was the longest time that we stayed in
Speaker 3: an area because my dad did end up going to
Speaker 3: prison for that particular arson, and then as soon as
Speaker 3: he got out of prison, we ended up moving to
Speaker 3: that which was in eighty six. We ended up moving
Speaker 3: to Burton, Ohio a couple of days before my senior
Speaker 3: year started, and then my father my family ended up
Speaker 3: staying in the Burton area for years. I think it
Speaker 3: was probably not until nineteen so at least ten eleven
Speaker 3: years they stayed in that area.
Speaker 2: That's usus as an opportunity to stop to hear these messages.
Speaker 2: What we didn't talk about was in nineteen eighty at
Speaker 2: the Concord House in Waterton, Wisconsin. You mentioned your dad
Speaker 2: got a job at the Concord House and at night
Speaker 2: you say your dad frequented the bars like he did
Speaker 2: in most places that you lived, and he met a
Speaker 2: John Simon who said he had an old house to rent,
Speaker 2: and you talk about the house that had secret rooms
Speaker 2: and secret passages. You love this home. But and also
Speaker 2: at that time you discovered your dad's stash of true
Speaker 2: detective magazines and you opened one and saw stories like
Speaker 2: raping the Coffin, and you read some of this stuff
Speaker 2: and were just amazed at the content. But at that
Speaker 2: time something happened at the Concord House involving two people.
Speaker 2: Take us back to Concord House and what happened to
Speaker 2: two people there at that time.
Speaker 3: So in nineteen eighty we ended up, as we always
Speaker 3: did anytime that we moved, we always ended up at
Speaker 3: a campground before we found a place to rent, and
Speaker 3: we would always rent dilapidated homes that needed to be
Speaker 3: fixed up, with the understanding that my dad would fix
Speaker 3: them up in exchange for rent. The Concord House was
Speaker 3: connected to the campground that we had stopped out when
Speaker 3: we landed in Watertown, Wisconsin, and the Concord House was
Speaker 3: it was a bar in the evenings, I believe it
Speaker 3: was a bar in the evenings, but it was also
Speaker 3: like a reception hall. There was two different halls and
Speaker 3: on one way exactly when he met John I'm not
Speaker 3: exactly sure, but he met him at sometime and John
Speaker 3: was the farmer that leased land that there was a
Speaker 3: house on it, a farmhouse that was for rent So
Speaker 3: we ended up running this farmhouse on this land that
Speaker 3: John Simon rented, and then in the evenings my dad
Speaker 3: would kind of act as a bouncer at the Concord House.
Speaker 3: He also did some repair work at the Concord House.
Speaker 3: And in August of nineteen eighty, my dad was working
Speaker 3: at the Concord House and he came across a young
Speaker 3: man named Timothy Hack his.
Speaker 2: Girlfriend Kelly Kelly Drew.
Speaker 3: Yes, thank you. I always want to say Nancy Drew
Speaker 3: because of Nancy Drew, and I know it's not Nancy.
Speaker 3: So he ended up killing them. Now, no one knew this,
Speaker 3: but you know, we didn't figure things out until you know,
Speaker 3: later on in this up in too be the investigation
Speaker 3: that ended up turning into a cold case that I
Speaker 3: ended up calling and turning my dad in or telling
Speaker 3: them I suspected my dad because what I remember is
Speaker 3: I do remember that this young couple came up missing.
Speaker 3: And during the time that we were lived in Watertown,
Speaker 3: which was only a couple months, my dad was fixated
Speaker 3: on wanting to talk about Kelly and Tim, and I
Speaker 3: found that really strange, and he would he would talk
Speaker 3: about it with so many people, and especially with the
Speaker 3: kids around. And by this time I was in sixth grade,
Speaker 3: and I started realizing that some of the things that
Speaker 3: my dad did were not appropriate. But I also was
Speaker 3: at at that age that I really paid close attention.
Speaker 3: And one evening I remember him coming home and he
Speaker 3: was all muddy, and that's that's It's a very vague memory,
Speaker 3: but my aunt Lucille recalls, because my aunt was staying
Speaker 3: with us at the time, that my dad came home
Speaker 3: this one night in August all muddy, and so between
Speaker 3: her recollection and my recollection, we realized that it was
Speaker 3: around the same time that Tim and Kelly came up missing.
Speaker 3: But what I do remember is that, very very adamant
Speaker 3: about remembering, is that my dad showed up the next
Speaker 3: morning with a bloody nose and he had stated that
Speaker 3: it was broken, that he had broken his nose deer honey.
Speaker 3: And I remember thinking, dear hunting, it's in August. I
Speaker 3: don't think they hunt deer in August. I thought it
Speaker 3: was when it was cold out but I didn't, you know,
Speaker 3: being in sixth grade, I didn't think much of it.
Speaker 3: Not until years later that I started putting, you know,
Speaker 3: two and two together, and which led me, as my
Speaker 3: memories came forth, led me to looking on the internet,
Speaker 3: searching cold cases and searching Watertown on Wisconsin, and came
Speaker 3: across that was called the Sweetheart Murders. And as I
Speaker 3: started reading about the Sweetheart Murders, which had just been reopened.
Speaker 3: The state of Wisconsin had just reopened it because they
Speaker 3: were giving funds, so it was all over the internet.
Speaker 3: And as I was reading it, I remembered everything. I
Speaker 3: remembered the Concord House, I remember the campground, I remember
Speaker 3: the house that we stayed in. And when I did
Speaker 3: call up Detective Garcia, because that's who it was listed
Speaker 3: on the hotline, I gave him all this information. I
Speaker 3: explained the Concord House in detail. I explained the campground
Speaker 3: in detail. I explained the house we lived in in detail,
Speaker 3: the stained glass window, the spiral staircases, the secret rooms,
Speaker 3: you know, being on a farm. And until this day,
Speaker 3: everyone tells me that it's amazing that they're amazed at
Speaker 3: my memories, how adequate or how spot on my memories
Speaker 3: have been. So that was the case that, you know,
Speaker 3: started this domino effect when I realized that my dad
Speaker 3: was guilty after the DNA match came back supporting you know,
Speaker 3: there was a match to the DNA that they found
Speaker 3: on Kelly's clothing. I knew then that all the suspicions
Speaker 3: I had of other crimes I thought that he committed
Speaker 3: and other murders, because in the back of my mind,
Speaker 3: I always question everywhere we lived, people came up missing
Speaker 3: or were murdered, and they were usually young people, young women,
Speaker 3: or young couples. And you know, that's to me, even
Speaker 3: as young as I was, I'm like, what are the
Speaker 3: odds of that? How is that possible that everywhere we
Speaker 3: go were somehow surrounded by all these missing people or
Speaker 3: these murders. And so I just I just knew that
Speaker 3: my dad had committed more crimes. To this day, I
Speaker 3: still believe and I know for a fact, because he
Speaker 3: even says if you listen to some of his testimonies
Speaker 3: that he doesn't give specifics as to where or to
Speaker 3: what state, but he states that he committed more crimes.
Speaker 2: Let's go back, though, because you say, you're right, this
Speaker 2: This was an eventual realization that maybe you didn't even
Speaker 2: want to come to that realization, but you had a
Speaker 2: talk with your great aunt Lucille year before she died,
Speaker 2: and this was very important to your again realization of
Speaker 2: what your dad really was. Can you tell us about that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she was. She talked about that night in Wisconsin
Speaker 3: and about you know her, She remembering she remembered my
Speaker 3: dad coming home all muddy, his money, clothes, what he
Speaker 3: was wearing, and it bothered her because she had heard
Speaker 3: about the next day or shortly thereafter, about the missing couple.
Speaker 3: And when my aunt was talking to me about it,
Speaker 3: she said that she believed my dad has something to
Speaker 3: do with that missing couple. And we just we you know,
Speaker 3: we just talked and reminisced, and we shared our feelings
Speaker 3: and we shared with each other what we remembered. But
Speaker 3: you know it, even after that, it took me, It
Speaker 3: took me years to find anything, anything tangible or you know,
Speaker 3: to do anything about it, because saying it out loud
Speaker 3: and having suspicions is one thing. Having evidence or knowing
Speaker 3: for sure is another. And but that definitely was started
Speaker 3: me thinking more and more about what all my dad
Speaker 3: might have done because my childre and we're young at
Speaker 3: that age, and I you know, it was years. It
Speaker 3: wasn't until I forget exactly how many years later, at
Speaker 3: least eight years later, that you know, I didn't make
Speaker 3: that phone call. But there again, I had been looking
Speaker 3: trying to find something for a good year and a half,
Speaker 3: maybe even two years prior to me making that phone call,
Speaker 3: but I just couldn't find anything. There wasn't anything on
Speaker 3: the internet. And the only reason that I finally found
Speaker 3: something about the Sweetheart murders was because it was just reopened.
Speaker 3: So it's very cold. Cases are very hard to find
Speaker 3: information on, especially when I started looking, because it wasn't Unfortunately,
Speaker 3: agencies didn't keep good records, or they they have thrown
Speaker 3: things away after so many years, or the agencies didn't
Speaker 3: talk with one another, and that's what happened with the
Speaker 3: Sweetheart murders. There was two different agencies. I think there
Speaker 3: was the local police department and the state Police Department,
Speaker 3: you know, asking questions throughout the throughout the community, and
Speaker 3: they didn't always communicate as to what you know, if
Speaker 3: one person it might not have been relevant, that they
Speaker 3: might not have thought it was relevant. Where someone else
Speaker 3: would have might have found it relevant because they're they're there.
Speaker 3: My dad was interviewed and but they they even questioned
Speaker 3: him about his nose, and he came up with the
Speaker 3: excuse that he had been shooting birds in the barn,
Speaker 3: and they believed him. But they didn't. You know, if
Speaker 3: they would have just done a little bit of background check,
Speaker 3: they would have realized his criminal his past crimes, because
Speaker 3: you know, he had a book, he was on the
Speaker 3: FBI's t had most wanted lists that should have raised
Speaker 3: some red flags, but it was never looked into.
Speaker 2: Let's use this as an opportunity to stop to hear
Speaker 2: these messages. What we didn't talk about is that before
Speaker 2: you reached out to authorities, you were tentative about it,
Speaker 2: but also you confided in your family. Your husband said
Speaker 2: to you deal with it, but you had to deal
Speaker 2: with your family and your family parts of your family.
Speaker 2: Your brothers didn't want you to go to authorities and
Speaker 2: were angry at you. But you reached out to your
Speaker 2: sister Janine, So there was some trepidation about coming forward.
Speaker 2: Let's talk about that coming forward to Chad Garcia now
Speaker 2: and when they go visit when he did go visit
Speaker 2: your father. What was the state of your father, What
Speaker 2: was the condition of your father? And let's talk about that.
Speaker 2: His demeanor when questioned finally by police, what I finally.
Speaker 3: Made that phone called Chad Garcia. Chad had to do
Speaker 3: some of his own investigation. Chad admitted to me later
Speaker 3: that when I when he first heard me start talking
Speaker 3: and he realized here I was the daughter of the
Speaker 3: person that I was suspecting of this crime, and I
Speaker 3: lived out of town. He thought it was a crank
Speaker 3: phone call. Anyway, when I called Garcia, Garcia thought that
Speaker 3: I was a prank phone call or trying to I
Speaker 3: had a vendetta against my dad. And then it was
Speaker 3: he was, you know, doing He loaded up or loaded
Speaker 3: up his computer and started realizing cross referencing things and
Speaker 3: finding out that, oh, look, you know Edwards. Wayne Edwards
Speaker 3: was interviewed, et cetera. So which led to Garcia calling
Speaker 3: me back weeks later asking if he could come to
Speaker 3: my home, and he did and interviewed me in length,
Speaker 3: took a DNA sample. But what I didn't know, and
Speaker 3: I think I forgot to ask Garcia exactly. But what
Speaker 3: I do believe happened is they didn't even use my
Speaker 3: DNA sample, because I think what happened was as soon
Speaker 3: as he left my house, they went down I lived
Speaker 3: in Ohio at the time. They went down to Kentucky
Speaker 3: and talked with my dad right away, and something that
Speaker 3: I said gave them enough evidence, I believe, to get
Speaker 3: a subpoena to get my dad's DNA. So when they
Speaker 3: knocked on my dad's door, you know, my dad was
Speaker 3: extremely overweight in a wheelchair on oxygen. But at the
Speaker 3: same time, I'm not saying that my dad wasn't in
Speaker 3: ill health. He also was a hypochondriac and he would
Speaker 3: play it up and make himself out to be sicker
Speaker 3: than what he really was, and he did that his
Speaker 3: entire life. They you know, spent a short period of
Speaker 3: time questioning them, and then they asked him if they
Speaker 3: could take a DNA sample. My dad had said no,
Speaker 3: but then they they should let him know that he
Speaker 3: will hear we have a subpoena, and they took his
Speaker 3: DNA sample and it was shortly A couple of weeks
Speaker 3: later they came back again to arrest him. But in
Speaker 3: the interview you can hear my dad playing it up
Speaker 3: about his ill health, and I could hear I've listened
Speaker 3: to the interview and I could hear what I call
Speaker 3: his lying voice, and I can just hear his lying
Speaker 3: voice throughout the interview. And when I listened to other
Speaker 3: tapes that because my dad was very adamant, he recorded
Speaker 3: and take on tech cassette tapes. He recorded conversations. He
Speaker 3: recorded so much, and as I've gone back and I've
Speaker 3: listened to these consette tapes, I can pick out his
Speaker 3: lying voice and it just it just irritated. It just
Speaker 3: really irritates me to this day. He just lied so much.
Speaker 3: I think he lied more than he told the truth.
Speaker 2: It's interesting the horrible crimes that he does talk about.
Speaker 2: When you talked about that person, Billy Labaco, dad admits
Speaker 2: that he thought I knew that he had molested you.
Speaker 2: So you get to hear him his account of why
Speaker 2: he murdered what and the details surrounding those murders.
Speaker 3: Didn't you I did, yes, I did hear that tape.
Speaker 3: I didn't listen to that tape or that recording. I
Speaker 3: didn't listen to most things until I started writing my book,
Speaker 3: or after I wrote my book, because I didn't want
Speaker 3: my memories this is one thing I was very careful about.
Speaker 3: I wanted to protect my memories. Even though I did
Speaker 3: the podcast, I protected myself from diving too far into
Speaker 3: the crimes that I thought I remembered my dad might committee.
Speaker 3: So I didn't want to taint memories. I didn't have
Speaker 3: a problem diving into and investigating crimes that I wasn't
Speaker 3: alive for or didn't know anything about. But so there
Speaker 3: were some things that I didn't listen to or dive
Speaker 3: into until I had most of the book written, just
Speaker 3: because I wanted to protect those memories in listening in
Speaker 3: hindsight and listening the cold. He was so cold, you know.
Speaker 3: I remember listening to him when he talked about Billy
Speaker 3: Lavico and Judy. When he killed Billy, he stated that,
Speaker 3: you know, Judy was there at the wrong time and
Speaker 3: that he didn't have any intention of killing her. And
Speaker 3: I believed he was lying because my dad that Billy
Speaker 3: and Judy were going to be at that spot. It's
Speaker 3: a spot that they had gone to in the park before.
Speaker 3: My Dad was familiar with it, and there's no way
Speaker 3: that he went there thinking that he was just only
Speaker 3: going to kill Billy with and leave a witness there's
Speaker 3: no way my dad. My dad is not stupid. He
Speaker 3: would have never done that. So to hear him say that,
Speaker 3: I'm like, why, why do you want to lie and
Speaker 3: try to manipulate people? Even now? You know? So, even
Speaker 3: when he confesses to things, he doesn't confess the entire truth.
Speaker 3: He puts spins on it. So I find it very
Speaker 3: irritating to listen to things that my dad has recorded,
Speaker 3: and also very sad, a whole range of emotions when
Speaker 3: I listen to tapes. And I haven't even listened to
Speaker 3: all of the tapes. I just haven't been able to
Speaker 3: bring myself. I have hundreds of hours of tapes, and
Speaker 3: I just to this day, I just haven't listened to
Speaker 3: all of them. I don't know if I ever will.
Speaker 2: He admits to four murders and then talks about someone
Speaker 2: we haven't mentioned, person named Danny Boy. Can you tell
Speaker 2: us brief about Danny Boy and finding out about his murder?
Speaker 3: Well, when Danny Boy, I knew Danny I wasn't living
Speaker 3: at home when Danny Boy came to live with my parents,
Speaker 3: or even when Danny Boy started hanging around my parents
Speaker 3: for a long period of time. But I didn't know Danny.
Speaker 3: I didn't know who Danny Boy was. I actually knew
Speaker 3: him in school. He happened to be on the wrestling
Speaker 3: team with my brothers and he would come over to
Speaker 3: the house. He was raised in a foster home. I
Speaker 3: knew his foster parents, I knew some of his foster siblings.
Speaker 3: So I didn't know him extremely well, but I knew him,
Speaker 3: you know, a little bit more than an acquaintance. So
Speaker 3: and I knew I had heard that he had moved
Speaker 3: in with my parents at one time, and I remember
Speaker 3: thinking that my dad did this because he could manipulate Danny.
Speaker 3: Danny was a very nice young man, and he was
Speaker 3: a young man who liked to please, but he wasn't
Speaker 3: always he didn't always make the smartest decisions, and he
Speaker 3: was easily you know, like I said, easily influenced. So
Speaker 3: when I heard that Danny moved in with my parents,
Speaker 3: I believe from the get go, from the very beginning,
Speaker 3: that my dad was using Danny because my dad needed
Speaker 3: someone to do things around the house because he couldn't,
Speaker 3: you know, And not to mention, he was probably charging
Speaker 3: Danny rent as well. And my dad was always out
Speaker 3: to get money anyway that he could, so that concerned
Speaker 3: me a little bit. And then when I heard that
Speaker 3: Danny he did join the army. I do remember hearing that,
Speaker 3: and my dad was there was a news article I
Speaker 3: remember reading because then it would make four members of
Speaker 3: my family if you included Danny as our family, which
Speaker 3: I don't. By the way, I don't include Danny as
Speaker 3: one of my siblings. He was never adopted by my parents.
Speaker 3: But there was a news article about, you know, having
Speaker 3: four Edward's children in the military, because Danny did legally
Speaker 3: change his last name from Glockner to Edwards. And then
Speaker 3: shortly after that, my dad gives me, calls me up,
Speaker 3: and I remember exactly what I was doing. I was
Speaker 3: laying on and it was in ninety six. I was
Speaker 3: laying on my living room floor trying to take a
Speaker 3: break because I had three young children, three toddlers. I
Speaker 3: had three children within three years. And I was laying
Speaker 3: on my living room floor as my kids were taking
Speaker 3: a nap, just trying to get a little bit of rest.
Speaker 3: And my dad calls me and he starts talking about
Speaker 3: a duffel bag that was on his front porch that
Speaker 3: had some photographs in it, and there was some teeth
Speaker 3: in it, and I'm and I was kind of foggy
Speaker 3: at first. He started talking and then I'm like, what
Speaker 3: are you talking about? Dad? And then he went on
Speaker 3: to tell me about Danny Boy was missing, and he
Speaker 3: think this had something to do with Danny Boy. And
Speaker 3: I remember thinking immediately the fog lifted from my brain.
Speaker 3: You know, I was wide awake now, and I remember thinking,
Speaker 3: you killed Danny. I know you killed Danny, and but
Speaker 3: how to go about proving it? I didn't know how
Speaker 3: to go about proving it. And I had heard one
Speaker 3: of my siblings had told me that they had actually
Speaker 3: went to the Burton Police Department and told them of
Speaker 3: their suspicions. Now, they don't have any record of that
Speaker 3: in the police department. I've checked, I've asked. I've not
Speaker 3: found any record of that. So I don't know what
Speaker 3: happened with that. He my dad ended up killing Danny Boy,
Speaker 3: and he this is what makes us so heinous. Not
Speaker 3: only did you know he went around saying that Danny
Speaker 3: was his son, and Danny referred to my dad as
Speaker 3: Dad and called my mom mom. When my dad was
Speaker 3: plotting Danny's murder. My dad had been plotting it for
Speaker 3: over two years, and he had to change a little
Speaker 3: bit at the end because Danny ended up was going
Speaker 3: to get a medical discharge from the army, and my
Speaker 3: Dad convinced Danny to go a wall one day before
Speaker 3: he was going to get discharged on a medically discharged
Speaker 3: and during that time he convinced he came up with
Speaker 3: this elaborate plan with Danny, saying that he was using
Speaker 3: this plan to extort money from one of Danny's enemies
Speaker 3: and which happened to be one of Danny's foster brothers.
Speaker 3: And my dad is recording this conversation on a cassette tape,
Speaker 3: and of course he has this whole scenario and you
Speaker 3: and when you listen to the tape, because we do
Speaker 3: have the I do have the recording, you can tell
Speaker 3: that my Dad is prompting Danny to say some things
Speaker 3: that Danny fell off script, but he used this and
Speaker 3: this was supposedly evidence that my Dad turned over to
Speaker 3: the police. But here Danny is participating, providing an alibi,
Speaker 3: participating in his own murder, and he doesn't even realize it.
Speaker 3: My Dad, after that tape recording, meets Danny up in
Speaker 3: the cemetery Ohio a little place called Troy Township in Ohio.
Speaker 3: It's right outside of Burton, and he shoots Danny in
Speaker 3: the back of the head twice. Danny never saw it coming.
Speaker 3: And it's just it's just awful. It's just for all
Speaker 3: no murder. There's no excuse for murder, any of the
Speaker 3: murders that my dad committed, but that particular one just
Speaker 3: seems extremely over the top. You know, it's even even now,
Speaker 3: after all these years, it's even hard for me to
Speaker 3: wrap my mind around it.
Speaker 2: That Jesus has an opportunity to stop to hear these
Speaker 2: messages now. Tell us about the circumstances in which your
Speaker 2: father is confessing but also wants the death penalty. Tell
Speaker 2: us about the scenario and how police suggest that he
Speaker 2: get that his wish.
Speaker 3: Well, he never, really, he didn't. Even though he was
Speaker 3: extradited to Wisconsin for the Sweetheart murders, he hadn't confessed
Speaker 3: to them yet. And he hated Chad Garcia. He hated me,
Speaker 3: and he hated Chad Garcia. Chad because Chad is a
Speaker 3: no no, Chad is very good at his job, and
Speaker 3: Chad is a no nonsense kind of police officer. He
Speaker 3: didn't put up with my dad's bs. He thought through
Speaker 3: my dad, and my dad didn't like that, you know,
Speaker 3: because my dad had the ability to rap law enforcement
Speaker 3: around his He manipulated people. He was an excellent manipulator,
Speaker 3: and he had many people fooled, even in law enforcement,
Speaker 3: and Chad was not one of those. So my dad
Speaker 3: hated him. And my dad did not want to be
Speaker 3: anywhere near Wisconsin or anywhere near Chad. So he came
Speaker 3: up with this idea that he would admit to Billy
Speaker 3: and Judy's murder. So he had dictated a letter to
Speaker 3: an inmate up there, and while he was in Wisconsin,
Speaker 3: to the Norton Police Department, and they received a letter
Speaker 3: but didn't know exactly what to do about it. And
Speaker 3: as they were talking about what to do about it,
Speaker 3: my Dad then wrote another letter to the Norton Police
Speaker 3: Department stating that you're going to want to put a
Speaker 3: needle in my arm once you hear everything I have
Speaker 3: to say, and he referred to Billy and Judy's murder.
Speaker 3: So they came up. John Canterbury from the Norton Police
Speaker 3: Department went up to Wisconsin and interviewed my dad, and
Speaker 3: my dad said that he wanted the death penalty. He
Speaker 3: wanted to be extradited back to Ohio, and they were like, okay.
Speaker 3: But what John Canterbury didn't know at the time, and
Speaker 3: no one realized that at the time, was that when
Speaker 3: the murders were committed in nineteen seventy eight in Ohio,
Speaker 3: the death penalty wasn't in place, right And they didn't
Speaker 3: realize that until after the fact, after my dad did
Speaker 3: this confessing and then they broke the news to my dad.
Speaker 3: It was actually another detective. It was a detective Brian Johnston,
Speaker 3: who was from Burton, Ohio. So he came up to
Speaker 3: talk to my dad and him and my dad became
Speaker 3: really good friends. And Brian came up to talk to
Speaker 3: my dad and he broke the news to him about
Speaker 3: the murders. You know, you couldn't you can't get the
Speaker 3: death penalty because it wasn't in place at the time.
Speaker 3: But he said, you know, but in nineteen ninety six,
Speaker 3: the death penalty was in place. Do you have anything
Speaker 3: that you want to talk about in nineteen ninety six,
Speaker 3: And he was referring to Danny Boy's murder at the time.
Speaker 3: So my dad does eventually confess to Danny Boy's murder.
Speaker 3: But he's been trying to manipulate everybody. He wants to go.
Speaker 3: You know, if he's going to go down, he wants
Speaker 3: to go down his way. He wants to manipulate people.
Speaker 3: You know, he's because he doesn't know anything else, so
Speaker 3: he wants things his way. And that's the only reason
Speaker 3: that he confessed to the ones that he did. Matter
Speaker 3: of fact, he states also, I have another letter and
Speaker 3: a tape confession that if they didn't want to do
Speaker 3: anything about the Norton murders, he has another state that
Speaker 3: he could go to and have them come and talk
Speaker 3: to him. And that right there says that he's committed
Speaker 3: other murders. But you know, he never did confess about
Speaker 3: anymore to those murders, at least not to authorities. I
Speaker 3: have my suspicions that he might have confessed in a
Speaker 3: letter form to one of my family members. I don't
Speaker 3: have one hundred percent proof of that, but there's some
Speaker 3: evidence that points towards that. Some other letters that I
Speaker 3: have copies of that were written my dad wrote while
Speaker 3: he was in prison up in Wisconsin. So the whole
Speaker 3: thing was is that he was just trying to mimulate,
Speaker 3: and he wanted to say and how things were going
Speaker 3: to go. So he eventually got extra diite it back
Speaker 3: to Ohio. And it's not so easy just because you
Speaker 3: say you're guilty and you want the death penalty, It's
Speaker 3: not that easy. So they had to go through court,
Speaker 3: and they had to go through different prestige procedures. I
Speaker 3: ended up talking even had talked to my dad's lawyer
Speaker 3: from Ohio, and my dad lawyer from Ohio talks about
Speaker 3: how conflicted he was. You know, it's his job to
Speaker 3: stop things from this, like things like this happening, and
Speaker 3: here he has a client who's saying that he wants
Speaker 3: the death penalty and that he needs to fight for
Speaker 3: him to get the death penalty, and it went against
Speaker 3: everything that he believed in. But eventually the courts agreed
Speaker 3: and my dad was sentenced to death by the ejection
Speaker 3: I believe. But he ended up dying on death row
Speaker 3: a couple months before that was supposed to happen.
Speaker 2: You're right about that. Seven months before your dad passes
Speaker 2: away in two thousand and ten, you get a call
Speaker 2: from John Cameron, a retired detective working for the Montana
Speaker 2: Parole Board and he'd read about Billy and Judith murders
Speaker 2: in Ohio, and he thought of the infamous double murders
Speaker 2: in Great Falls, unsolved after fifty years.
Speaker 3: So I did get a call from John Cameron. I
Speaker 3: didn't know who he was other than that he had
Speaker 3: told me he was a retired detective and asked if
Speaker 3: he could come out and talk to me. And I
Speaker 3: was a little skeptical because it was a little bit
Speaker 3: different than the other detectives who had called me and
Speaker 3: wanted to come out and talk to me. So I
Speaker 3: had to, you know, call up and find out if
Speaker 3: he actually was a detective at one time, and come
Speaker 3: to find out he was. So he came out to
Speaker 3: talk to me and shed light on some things. He
Speaker 3: had a whole theory about a lot of other things
Speaker 3: that I disagreed with some of the things that he mentioned.
Speaker 3: I told him that I agreed with him, and actually
Speaker 3: showed him news clippings that I had of my father
Speaker 3: my father had saved and that that I had that
Speaker 3: were in regards to the murders in Portland, Oregon, some
Speaker 3: things about some clippings he saved about the Zodiac killings.
Speaker 3: John was very much, very much interested in my father
Speaker 3: in stating that he was responsible for many other murders
Speaker 3: that were cold and was trying to find evidence to
Speaker 3: back those suspicions up.
Speaker 2: So John Cameron thought that your father was responsible for
Speaker 2: many more murders. I interviewed John Cameron in twenty fifteen
Speaker 2: about his book It's Me, where he makes the claims
Speaker 2: that your father, through various methods and for various reasons,
Speaker 2: was responsible for many crimes other than the five he
Speaker 2: confessed to. In fact, many high profile crimes, John Cameron claimed.
Speaker 2: Tell us Now about the collaboration for the podcast The
Speaker 2: Clearing in twenty sixteen to twenty nineteen.
Speaker 3: Joshteen, whose investigative reporter, was actually the first reporter that
Speaker 3: I talked to. I finally came forward to talk to someone,
Speaker 3: and it was the reason I ended up talking to
Speaker 3: a reporter was because I was getting calls from lawyers
Speaker 3: asking them to come testify on the behalf of their
Speaker 3: clients to overturn their conviction or to help them to
Speaker 3: be proven that they didn't commit these crimes. And the
Speaker 3: last the one that just after the last phone call
Speaker 3: I received, it was actually from Scott Peterson's lawyer. I
Speaker 3: don't know if you are familiar with the Scott Peterson Okay, Well,
Speaker 3: I got a call from his lawyer asking me if
Speaker 3: I had any information that I would be willing to
Speaker 3: share that would hopefully help overturn Scott's conviction. And I'm like, no, no, no,
Speaker 3: And this was just one of many rabbit holes that
Speaker 3: people were going down because of a detective named John Cameron,
Speaker 3: who went on this elaborate I don't even know what
Speaker 3: you call it, you know, saying, you know, believing that
Speaker 3: my dad committed all these other crimes. And I was
Speaker 3: so tired of people talking about these supposed crimes, these
Speaker 3: high profile crimes that I knew my dad didn't commit,
Speaker 3: and they were not concentrating on the crimes that I
Speaker 3: believe that my dad committed. So Josh, I call him Joshteen.
Speaker 3: His name's Joshteen, the investigative reporter. I jokingly referred to
Speaker 3: him as a last man's stand because I had over
Speaker 3: the years, the months, not the years, over the months,
Speaker 3: you know, actually was year, sorry, over the years. After
Speaker 3: turning my dad in, I refused to talk to anybody
Speaker 3: I didn't other than detectives. I refused to talk to
Speaker 3: any reporters journalists. I turned everybody down, but Josh kept
Speaker 3: texting me and just reaching out to me, and he
Speaker 3: actually happened to reach out to me a couple days
Speaker 3: before Scott Peterson's lawyer had reached out to me. So
Speaker 3: after I hung up the phone with Scott Peterson's lawyer,
Speaker 3: I immediately texted Josh and I said, I'm ready to talk.
Speaker 3: So Josh and I met. We actually met in my
Speaker 3: lawyer's office because I was so afraid. I didn't know
Speaker 3: anything about reporters, about journalists, and you just hear all
Speaker 3: these horror stories about how their stories get twisted and
Speaker 3: they don't print the truth. And so I agreed that
Speaker 3: I would meet with him in my lawyer's office and
Speaker 3: that the recording it had to be recorded so that
Speaker 3: I had proof as to what I said and what
Speaker 3: I didn't say.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 3: But Josh is a great guy, a really great guy,
Speaker 3: and we got together and ended up it was his
Speaker 3: idea to do a podcast. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 3: when he mentioned a podcast, I had to ask him
Speaker 3: what a podcast was. I had no idea what a
Speaker 3: podcast was, so we laugh about it to this day.
Speaker 3: So he and I and Jonathan went and traveled throughout
Speaker 3: the United States, going and to the traveling to the
Speaker 3: places that I had lived, asking questions, diving, talking with
Speaker 3: the detectives, talking to people in the community. And this
Speaker 3: led to the podcast called The Clearing.
Speaker 2: What was the effect for you, people talk and throw
Speaker 2: the word around, bandy, around the catharsis that some kind
Speaker 2: of healing would be from unloading and releasing this burden
Speaker 2: that had beset you. What was the result for you?
Speaker 3: The first the healing process was something that took many years.
Speaker 3: The first step, the first domino, was when I made
Speaker 3: that call to Detective Garcia. And even when I made
Speaker 3: that call to Detective Garcia, I still was hoping that
Speaker 3: my suspicions were wrong. Matter of fact, I did not
Speaker 3: truly believe it until I called Chad up when I
Speaker 3: was on the way to visit my mom after my
Speaker 3: dad had been arrested. I asked Chad. I said, Chad,
Speaker 3: I hear what the news is saying. I see what
Speaker 3: the newspapers are saying, but I need to know. I
Speaker 3: need to hear it from you. Is that DNA a match?
Speaker 3: And Chad was like, April, I'm sorry, but yes it was.
Speaker 3: I'm positive. It's a positive match. It's ninety nine point
Speaker 3: nine percent, you know, accuracy, And I'm like, okay, and
Speaker 3: that's when it really hit me. Then I was slow
Speaker 3: starting to deal with things because then I started to
Speaker 3: have to slowly start talking to other detectives. Because when
Speaker 3: I originally talked to Chad Garcia, I gave him a
Speaker 3: timeline of every place I had lived and where and
Speaker 3: what towns I suspected my dad of crimes and what
Speaker 3: particular crimes, at least some of the particular crimes. So
Speaker 3: then this brought forth other detectives. So every time I
Speaker 3: would talk to a detective, it started cracking open, opening
Speaker 3: that healing that that you know, it was starting to
Speaker 3: that wound was starting to open up more and more.
Speaker 3: And then when I eventually started talking to Josh, and
Speaker 3: that was talking to Josh, which took hours, was the
Speaker 3: longest I had talked to anyone, and I, you know,
Speaker 3: there were I had my migrains. I remember laying on
Speaker 3: my head on the desk, my my arm on the desk,
Speaker 3: with my head on my arm, and I'm just thinking,
Speaker 3: I do not want to be here, I do not
Speaker 3: want to be doing this. And then as I continued
Speaker 3: to talk to Josh. You know, more healing happened. And
Speaker 3: then as I did the podcast and I got to
Speaker 3: meet uh while I reconnected with some of my childhood
Speaker 3: friends and even that happened started TAPPA before the podcast,
Speaker 3: and then Dave and Judy Hack reached out to me
Speaker 3: and they were Timothy was was Dave's son that my
Speaker 3: dad murdered up in Wisconsin. They reached out to me,
Speaker 3: and they were so loving and just embraced me and
Speaker 3: you know talking with them. So it was just every
Speaker 3: time I talked about the story. And even now I
Speaker 3: still get I still get choked, choked up, and it's
Speaker 3: still a continuation of healing because there's things that I
Speaker 3: don't talk about in the book I don't want to
Speaker 3: talk about I don't know that I'll ever talk about.
Speaker 3: So the healing is still it's still continuing and it
Speaker 3: probably will for the rest of my life. Definitely, you know,
Speaker 3: starting to talk to people, you know, it started with
Speaker 3: talking with the detectives and then talking with Josh, and
Speaker 3: then in definitely doing the podcast, and then I really
Speaker 3: thought I was good after the podcast until I started
Speaker 3: writing the book. It took me almost five years to
Speaker 3: write this book. Wow, and let me tell you it
Speaker 3: was very, very difficult.
Speaker 2: Yes, I guess the hardest thing to realize too, is
Speaker 2: because of this public showing of this, that the public
Speaker 2: release of this information. But it must have been so
Speaker 2: hard to realize, Like you say, you didn't come to
Speaker 2: it right away, to realize the monster that your father
Speaker 2: really was. All along the way, you could see signs
Speaker 2: that he was a criminal. He would steal from his workplaces,
Speaker 2: he was a he was a compulsive liar, and you
Speaker 2: notice that right away. He was a bad man in
Speaker 2: many many ways with his behavior. But it must have
Speaker 2: been incredible to realize that your father was the monster
Speaker 2: that he was.
Speaker 3: It was. It was crippling because not only did I
Speaker 3: come to that realization that all my suspicions were correct,
Speaker 3: because you know, all those years that I had those
Speaker 3: suspicions of some of the heinous crimes, you know that
Speaker 3: I suspected of home, suspected him of doing. I also
Speaker 3: felt guilty for feeling that way, for thinking that way,
Speaker 3: because this was my dad. And then after I turned
Speaker 3: him in, you know, realizing that my suspicions were crue
Speaker 3: and that were true and or confirmed, and then that
Speaker 3: there was even more out there, and then the guilt
Speaker 3: of turning my dad in, but the guilt of not
Speaker 3: turning him in sooner that if I would have turned
Speaker 3: him in sooner, you know, Danny Boy would have been
Speaker 3: would still be alive. So there's just all kinds of
Speaker 3: conflicting emotions, you know, you know, guilt, guilt in multiple ways,
Speaker 3: and then realizing this is you know, and this is
Speaker 3: a man, he's my dad. I still loved him, I
Speaker 3: still love him, but it doesn't mean I can don't. Yeah,
Speaker 3: it doesn't mean that I condoned his behavior.
Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely. I want to thank you so much April
Speaker 2: Blascio for coming on and talking about raised by a
Speaker 2: serial killer, discovering the truth about my father. This is
Speaker 2: a memoir. The release date is December third, which will
Speaker 2: be next week when this podcast will air. For those
Speaker 2: that might want to find out more about this book project,
Speaker 2: can you tell us if you have a website and
Speaker 2: do you do any social media?
Speaker 3: I am just now starting my social media. I've just
Speaker 3: started today or try today to make an x account.
Speaker 3: I am on Twitter. Of course Facebook. I'm the older generation,
Speaker 3: so I still do Facebook. I'm in the process of
Speaker 3: setting it up and everything would be under my name.
Speaker 3: That's one thing that's nice about having a very uncommon name.
Speaker 3: All my social media can be under my name and
Speaker 3: it's not taken. So I am in the process of
Speaker 3: setting that up and working with people to set that up.
Speaker 3: So keep an eye out, and you know, just google
Speaker 3: my name and you can find all kinds of stuff.
Speaker 2: Yes, raised by a serial killer, discovering the truth about
Speaker 2: my father. April Bilascio so much, Thank you so much
Speaker 2: for this interview. And you have a great evening, and
Speaker 2: good night.
Speaker 3: Thank you, Dan, and you have a great evening.
Speaker 2: Too, Thank you so much. Good night, good night,