Speaker 1: Sword and Scale contains adult themes and violence, and is
not intended for all audiences.
Speaker 2: Listener discretion is advised.
Speaker 3: This would have had them in a pretty bloody scene.
The body had like close to forty some stablings, and
so somebody to see all that would be probably a
lot to take airs.
Speaker 1: Oh boy, we got a doozy for you today. I
think you're gonna like it. It's gonna feel like the
old days. This is episode two hundred and seventy three
of Certain Scale, a show that reveals that the worst
monsters are real. I hate to be that guy, but
we do have mouths to feed out here. We're not
state sponsored like that communist NPR. So check out our
store store dot Sword and Scale dot com.
Speaker 4: Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: About thirty miles south of downtown Chicago, is the birthplace
of Michael Jackson. Gary, Indiana, nicknamed the Magic City for
its technological advancements in the nineteen sixties, Gary is mostly
known for being the most significant contributor of steel manufacturing
in the United States. The city's main steel mill, named
Gary Works, is the largest steel manufacturing plant in the country.
At its peak, the city had more than two hundred
thousand people living there since the nineteen sixties, though Gary
has seen a steep population decline. What was once a
bustling city brimming with innovation has largely become a place
of abandonment and rural decay, much like a lot of
cities throughout the US, especially in the last four years.
It has since been dubbed the most miserable city in America.
But plenty of people still live in Gary, Indiana. Many
people call it home. The population currently sits at about
seventy thousand. Back in the late spring of twenty fourteen,
the year that Sword and Scale started, I might add,
there was a young woman living in Gary who was
excited to share some big news with her family. This
young lady told her mother, father, and two older sisters
that she was pregnant with twins.
Speaker 5: While I was the oldest or as the Midland during
the eight or so.
Speaker 6: That's a cf one and I had back. He didn't
have any. So she found out that she was pregnant.
They think you know, you know she.
Speaker 1: In twenty fourteen, thirty six year old Geraldine Jones worked
as a census surveyor in Gary, Indiana. She had grown
up in tight knit Christian family and seemed thrilled to
tell her two older sisters, April and Tamiko, that she
was pregnant with twins. Sadly, that exciting announcement was followed
up with some tragic news. A few months later, Geraldine
told her sisters that one of her babies had died.
After Geraldine broke the news about the loss of one
of her babies, she seemed to fall into a deep depression.
Then came the day that Geraldine was supposed to give
birth to her surviving baby.
Speaker 7: That more than I've heard from her.
Speaker 6: And then I didn't That Monday, I didn't hear from her.
Speaker 5: In a war So I call. I called, like with
a little you know. April Abel was like, well, she
was leaving work trying to get to that foo. So,
but the thing is, she didn't.
Speaker 6: Tell us what happened.
Speaker 5: She was ever so by this time I.
Speaker 6: Left work, you know, my dad's.
Speaker 5: Here, his wife is here, her sisters, and so we
are kind.
Speaker 6: Of right around trying to re out what happened.
Speaker 5: When we lay find her at we caught up to
North Lake and called. We went out to South late
because we were already in that area, and then we
went over to home of the hospital and they had
no where about.
Speaker 1: Geraldine's family and friends frantically tried to find out what
hospital Geraldine had gone to, but they never could. Geraldine
was missing.
Speaker 6: Did she ever tell you who the baby?
Speaker 8: Yeah, we know who?
Speaker 5: Double was twenty years Randy.
Speaker 1: For much of her life, Geraldine was unlucky in love,
but in March of twenty fourteen, her luck seemed to
change when she met a young man named Randy Garrett.
Speaker 7: My first time meeting Randy was last year or Rochester.
April was at getting married, and that was my first
time meeting him when she when he came to the
wind and with my sister.
Speaker 1: As far as to Miko and April could tell, Randy
seemed like a good, respectable guy, and Geraldine was clearly
all in on her relationship with him. Unfortunately, after only
a few months of dating, Randy broke things off with Geraldine.
Speaker 9: Started out, you told me you met her back around.
Speaker 10: March into March last year.
Speaker 9: Okay, we're dating.
Speaker 11: But I started finding out more things about he was
kind of being dissionest about something, kind of turning the off,
things like that it just kept getting up and not
not jigging, so kind of cut it off.
Speaker 1: Okay, Randy ended the relationship, but he couldn't completely walk
away from Geraldine. A few weeks after the breakup with her,
Randy was told that Geraldine was pregnant with twins and
that he was the fun.
Speaker 9: How soon after that did she say she was pregnant?
Speaker 4: Uh?
Speaker 11: Had she called me like at the end of of
that year and told me she was.
Speaker 9: So, that's about three months after you made.
Speaker 1: After learning that he was going to be a dad,
Randy naturally committed himself to the role, even though he
had no plans of continuing a romantic relationship with Geraldine.
He decided that he was going to be a responsible dad,
and good for him, we need a lot more of that.
A few months after she told everyone about the pregnancy,
her sister and friends through a baby shower for Geraldine
and Randy attended.
Speaker 9: Actually went. It was actually a nice child. It was
a nice shower. I think her friends put it on
for to hand it off, decorated and she had fine.
Speaker 11: Garrett's girls thought, I'm like, wow.
Speaker 1: This extravagant baby shower was fun. It was a happy
time for everyone involved. Unfortunately, the good times didn't last.
A few months later, Geraldine told her sisters and Randy
that one of her babies had died. Geraldine slipped into
a deep depression, and when the day came for Geraldine
to give birth to the surviving baby, nobody could find her.
Speaker 6: Like, I don't know what's going on. She okay, you know,
I don't know. I don't know.
Speaker 7: Left work early. So it was a big mess today
that we thought that she was wanted to have or
had lost night. We never did fire her.
Speaker 1: Thirty six year old Geraldine Jones was missing and her
two sisters, Tomko and April were very concerned. Meanwhile, about
two hundred miles south of Geraldine's home, there was another
woman who was having problems of her own.
Speaker 12: Nine when long words your emergency, ten West claith Street, Anderson, Indiana,
going on there, I got some random test message and
my girlfriend kind of came off of suicidal, and I
was just wondering if you could send someone out there
at check Lawrence, are you not and down? You know,
I'm not on the Noblesville all right? What's your name, Phila?
Her name Samantha Fleming. Samantha Fleming, Yes, And what you
say in the text something about who was tired of
all this shit, who didn't want to deal with it anymore.
She was talking about her mother, and mother just came
over or just kind of totally Random's never been to
the title before, but I prefer to be safe.
Speaker 1: In twenty fifteen, twenty three year old Samantha Fleming was
living in an apartment with her boyfriend in Anderson, Indiana.
In March of that year, Samantha gave birth to a
baby girl that she named Serenity. About a month later,
April sixth, twenty fifteen, Samantha's boyfriend went to the Anderson
Police Department and reported that Samantha and Serenity, we're missing my.
Speaker 10: Understanding that you reported to the place that you're.
Speaker 13: Ristmas.
Speaker 2: Yes, okay, and her name was Samantha, Samantha yes, describer.
Speaker 14: Jimmy, How how how was she.
Speaker 13: Birth?
Speaker 6: Uh July eighteenth, nineteen.
Speaker 1: Ninety three, Samantha and her boyfriend Rainie Stanley had only
dated for less than a year, and Rainie wasn't the
father of Samantha's newborn baby girl. The couple met online
just a few weeks after Samantha learned that she was pregnant.
They quickly became close, though, and moved into an apartment together.
After the birth of Serenity, Rainie planned to formally adopt
the child.
Speaker 13: Tell of you and Samantha together?
Speaker 6: Mm hmmm, proud about eight?
Speaker 13: Help do.
Speaker 2: I never probably for about welling talk for about a
month prior.
Speaker 13: So what do we talked? We talked on.
Speaker 6: Online chat app. Yeah, that's okay.
Speaker 13: Do you hear Joe?
Speaker 1: Me?
Speaker 13: Did not? Did?
Speaker 10: She just did? The twenty fourth of March, What's what's this?
Speaker 13: What's this?
Speaker 10: Jos name Serenity?
Speaker 1: Funny, Samantha and her baby girl were reported missing. Unfortunately,
since Samantha was an adult and presumably with her child,
an Amber alert could not be sent out. Just didn't fit.
Samantha's mom began handing out flyers asking everyone and anyone
to help her find Samantha. On those flyers, she wrote
the following. According to her boyfriend, Samantha and Serenity disappeared
from their home and Anderson, Indiana, on Monday sixth, around
twelve to fifty pm. Samantha left with only a few diapers,
one sleeper, and some formula. Nobody has had any contact
with Samantha. Her wallet was found near Fifth Street in Gary, Indiana.
We suspect foul play. Eventually, the local media picked up
on this story and began reporting about the disappearance of
Samantha and her baby tonight.
Speaker 8: On the night Dde Anderson's leis are searching for a
missing mother and her infant. Samantha and Serenity Fleming were
last seen Monday morning.
Speaker 11: Twenty three year old Samantha Fleming and her newborn Serenity
were reported missing by her boyfriend. Earlier this month.
Speaker 1: Two Indiana women, Geraldine Jones and Samantha Fleming, went missing.
They lived nearly two hundred miles apart and seemed to
have no connection to each other at all. The only
similarity they shared was that Geraldine was expecting a baby
in Samantha just had a baby. Weird For Indiana investigators,
this was a baffling case that only became more bizarre
and troubling as the events unfolded. As the police worked
to make sense of things, so two did Geraldine's sisters. Ultimately,
their paths converged. On the same day and at about
the same time, Geraldine's sisters and police investigators came upon
a horrific scene.
Speaker 13: Together.
Speaker 1: It came upon the aftermath of a brutal and senseless murder.
In April of twenty fifteen, twenty three year old Samantha
Fleming and her three week old daughter, Serenity were reported
missing by Samantha's boyfriend, Rainie Stanley. Samantha and Rainey lived
together in an apartment in Anderson, Indiana. According to Rainey,
on the last day that Samantha went missing, a mysterious
woman came to his apartment, claiming to be a case
manager for Child Protective Services, which is also known as CPS.
If you've paid attention to any episode in the last
ten years, so did she.
Speaker 6: Disappeared Monday about twelve fifty So.
Speaker 10: This past Monday?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 10: What did she do? How does she leave?
Speaker 13: All? Right?
Speaker 2: Caseworker camp in my house? I opened the door. She
identified herself as a case manager. She was here to
do a surprise visit. She looks she's yours in business life.
Speaker 13: She let herself in.
Speaker 2: I mean, you can ever consent to walk into my house.
She takes it upon herself to sit down at my table.
Speaker 12: Didn't get her in good.
Speaker 10: She just says he was a case manager with DC's good.
Speaker 13: I told her.
Speaker 10: Samantha was sleeping. She told me I needed to wake
her up.
Speaker 6: No, I didn't go on the way at Samantha.
Speaker 2: Samantha gets up and then she went on to mention
a cinemata to courtate.
Speaker 10: Never seen him before in my life.
Speaker 1: Rainny explained to investigators that Serenity wasn't Samantha's only child.
Samantha also had a son named Stephen. Before meeting and
ultimately living with Rainie, Samantha had dated a different man.
Allegedly that relationship was abusive.
Speaker 2: Supposedly, he held her, her friend and the baby seamen
hostage in his house and wouldn't let him go.
Speaker 10: Punsibly, he'd beat her. I guess she done it a
couple of times and the comp's been called out. At
that time, he was.
Speaker 2: One called criminal confinement. Was charged criminal confinement for holding
Prent hostage.
Speaker 1: With leonter Bleed after several domestic incidents. At court ruled
that Samantha and her ex were unfit parents, so Samantha's
son was placed into foster care. That ruling left Samantha
completely devastated. She knew that she was and could continue
to be a good mother in her mind, so she
broke up with her boyfriend, moved out of their apartment
and began doing everything she could to regain custody of
her son.
Speaker 13: She will show.
Speaker 2: Yes, because she has to meet certain standards before she
get a sumback. She has to meet with a therapists,
me with a case manager.
Speaker 1: Given Samantha's child custody situation, it wasn't unusual for case
managers from Child Protective Services to just randomly show up
at Samantha's home. So Rainie claimed that he didn't find
it strange or suspicious that this woman showed up at
his door asking to see Samantha. Supposedly, this woman told
Samantha that there was a scheduling mix up in that
Samantha was due in court later that day. She explained
that a hearing was going to be held about her son.
In fact, a judge could rule that Samantha's son should
be released from foster care and could go home with
Samantha on that very day. Big news.
Speaker 2: She starts getting everything ready and help her clean out
a bottle so she has a double of bottles to
take you whether she gets the thri She was getting
ready to go with her because this lady told her
she has a court at three Lot and Gary, Indiana.
Speaker 13: She get brought.
Speaker 2: She was taking her girl, Frid. I don't think to ask.
DCS comes around all the time. It's kind of normal.
They're allowed to take her places.
Speaker 10: I don't think much of.
Speaker 6: It until I got outside.
Speaker 2: And what's funny is this lady came into holding up
folder of paperwork.
Speaker 5: So she exactly, you know, she had.
Speaker 10: These papers for a reason.
Speaker 2: It's something to do with samanthas So she was trying
to look professionally.
Speaker 10: She did a decent job of it.
Speaker 2: She knew more than what you would think someone else
would know.
Speaker 13: Could talk to that she's been able to do.
Speaker 10: She sounds well did. She knows a lot about the case.
Speaker 2: I mean, my understanding is that they won't release that
information to visit anybody.
Speaker 6: She knew about Stephen.
Speaker 1: According to Rainie, this CPS worker knew a lot about
Samantha and her case. She seemed completely legitimate and suggested
that Samantha should bring her baby daughter to the court hearing.
Speaker 13: And then she says something wizard.
Speaker 10: Yeah, she told her she had to take the time.
It looked good for the judge.
Speaker 1: Rainie explained that Samantha was excited about the prospect of
getting her son back, so he helped to pack a
baby bag. A few moments later, Samantha, Serenity and this
mysterious CPS worker, whoever she was, walked out the door.
Rainie followed them outside, and it was only after he
saw the caseworker's car that he started to think something
about this situation just didn't feel right. The car was
a white Ford Sedan, which wasn't unusual for a caseworker
to drive, but Rainie noticed that the tag on her
license plate was expired. Now that's odd. Rainy claimed that
he didn't say anything about the tag, but he took
a mental note of it and later wrote down the
license plate number.
Speaker 15: Who are admitted the personal cast this plate the play
number U gave us for in the end in two thousand.
It was inspired right, was expired and that cars in
there's white.
Speaker 13: People that said they didn't even to renew the plate.
Speaker 2: The players, I said, on attack, but they still have
the play.
Speaker 10: They just didn't renew it. And they liked it because
his wife subverse.
Speaker 7: So they got to play, and they talked.
Speaker 13: To both parties.
Speaker 2: And so I wonder if I didn't get the plate number,
all you could.
Speaker 1: Have When the police followed up on that license plate number,
the one that Rainey gave them. It led them to
a middle aged couple who clearly had no involvement with
Samantha Fleming at all. Essentially, Rainy sent the cops on
a wild goose chase, which called his story in the question. Still,
the police knew that Rainy was telling the truth about
the CPS worker because Samantha and Rainey's neighbor also saw
the one. In fact, this neighbor led her into the
apartment building.
Speaker 16: She said she was from CPS, and I showed her
upstairs and she had a paperwork, like, you know, a folder,
a briefcase, stuff like that. She was dressed professionally. She looked,
you know, like somebody who worked for CPS or something.
Speaker 1: The police also determined that whoever this woman was, she
did not work for Child Protective Services. The CPS office
and Anderson confirmed that there was no court hearings or
home visitations scheduled for Samantha Fleming. One theory that investigators
entertained was that this whole thing might have been orchestrated
by Samantha. Maybe she arranged to have this fake government
worker show up at the apartment so she and her
baby could leave and escape another abusive relationship. But Rainy
didn't come off as the abusive type, and he seemed
to genuinely care about Samantha.
Speaker 10: Not that makes any dance sense that she's working for me.
Speaker 2: Wards, the only thing that's off was a suicidal time,
and like she said, she just needed to. Then I cold,
I don't want about it, and then I.
Speaker 10: Canceled the golf.
Speaker 1: Samantha Fleming went missing on April sixth, twenty fifteen, and
by April sixteenth, there was still no sign of her
and no news about who the fakes CPS worker was. Meanwhile,
back in Gary, Indiana, the family of Geraldine Jones was
finally able to find and make contact with Geraldine.
Speaker 17: Both of her.
Speaker 1: Sisters had frantically tried to find Geraldine on the day
she was supposed to give birth, but they could never
find out which hospital she went.
Speaker 6: To General Act.
Speaker 5: At this point, she wasn't talking to that anymore yet.
I guess understand, you know, you know Wenerneder.
Speaker 1: When Geraldine first announced that she was pregnant, she told
her family that she was going to be having twins. Later,
she told her family that one of her babies had died.
Somehow in her womb. The other one's fine, but this
one's dead. How does that work? And that nobody seemed
to care that she lost one of her children.
Speaker 17: Woe is me?
Speaker 1: Oh my god, You'll never believe how hard it is
to be a mother, especially if they're currents.
Speaker 7: She wasn't talking to us, so all of a sudden,
you know, she said, out a bad text message to
It was a big text, get involved with my sister,
my dad, me and and she said she didn't mean it.
But I call and told that. Well, you know, I
think it's not that message. I said, but you know,
everybody was acting out of being concerned, you know, I
told her, I said, you know that's not a message
you send the people, but that's concerned about you. I said,
you know, people only act out to be a concern,
especially if it's a family member.
Speaker 12: You haven't a baby, right.
Speaker 1: Geraldine made amends with her two older sisters. Both of
them were eager to meet their new niece. They wanted
to see Geraldine's new baby girl.
Speaker 7: A couple of days later, I said, and I said,
you know what, you know, I try and tell her.
I said, well, I I guaid I want to come
see the baby. So you know, I went back there,
me and my daughters.
Speaker 13: We go by there, and so do you know about
when the first time you saw the baby was?
Speaker 1: That Monday, Tamiko visited Geraldine's home and met with the baby.
A few days later, Geraldine's older sister, April did the same.
Speaker 6: She finally said, you want to talk, So she changed
my job with Bella.
Speaker 5: I living baby, and I wasn't there right to golf.
Speaker 6: So I told Toya to kill her.
Speaker 10: I was shipping her out.
Speaker 6: I told Toy to kill her.
Speaker 5: I'll be home in about an hour.
Speaker 4: Told Hi about the house, my house.
Speaker 8: My partment?
Speaker 6: Really is she in my apartment? And broke Bella. We
talked and she apologies at Grabians. She came by, which.
Speaker 1: Geraldine reconnected with her family. Her sisters, April and Tamiko
were thrilled to meet their new niece. In a perfect world,
this would have been a happy occasion, but this certainly
wasn't a perfect world. April and Tamiko noticed that Geraldine
wasn't acting like herself. She was distant and strange. Something
was clearly bothering her. There was also another and much
bigger problem, the baby that Geraldine introduced to her family
didn't belong to her. In case you haven't figured it out,
that baby belonged to Samantha Fleming. In the late spring
of twenty fifteen, thirty six year old Geraldine Jones told
her family that she had given birth to a new
baby girl. Geraldine named the baby Bella and introduced Bella
to her older sisters, April and Tamiko. After they met
the baby, Geraldine did something strange. She left Bella with
her sister April and flew to Texas.
Speaker 5: Let's she usually telling her that she's ready to pressed
and the people.
Speaker 6: And they've always been a first like.
Speaker 5: The whole part of or you know.
Speaker 1: Geraldine told her family that she was severely depressed and
she wanted to be with her mom, who was living
in Texas, so she left her home of Gary, Indiana,
without her baby and flew to her mom's house. Once there,
Geraldine tried to kill herself by taking an overdose of
sleeping pills. Thankfully, her mom was home at the time
she found Geraldine was able to call for help before
the worst happened.
Speaker 3: Anything else I need to add she never said anything
about wanting to hurt her son anything like that.
Speaker 10: The thing, I had been sick and I just wasn't
able to get there.
Speaker 12: I really don't know anything in which she lost the baby.
Speaker 8: She wouldn't contact anybody, Yeah, not even no family, remember,
so I didn't understand it.
Speaker 1: About after this failed suicide tempt, Geraldine was committed to
a mental hospital in Texas. Her mom assumed that the
loss of one of her babies, and perhaps the postpartum
depression that came with the living baby, had caused Geraldine
to do what she did. Meanwhile, back in Indiana, Geraldine's
two sisters were starting to realize that this whole situation
it was a little weird.
Speaker 13: Right when she left. Did you guys feel like something was?
I mean, not that, but did you guys?
Speaker 3: Was you guys still like thinking, man, something is wrong here,
like the saying all, yeah.
Speaker 4: I think that was wrong.
Speaker 7: But I just I was kind of upset because I
was thinking that, you know, my thing was she had
just had a baby, and then she didn't tip off
to texts and I said, is a new baby? That's
that was my main thing. I was upset that she
had left the baby, right. I just thought maybe you know, right,
people and some women go to the postpartum I thought
maybe that was it.
Speaker 1: Geraldine's oldest sister, Tomiko, was mostly able to chuck things
up to postpartum depression, but Geraldine's other sister, April wasn't
satisfied with that. Na no, no, no no. In an
effort to hopefully make sense of things, April decided to
go to Geraldine's house in Indiana.
Speaker 3: And so then you went to Geraldine's house. Yeah, okay,
what were you going there for?
Speaker 13: Exactly? Della galwa okay. And then Tomiko showed up.
Speaker 3: She kind of said this, and she wasn't saying nothing
about it, but she said, April is the one that
will dig for information.
Speaker 13: I'm the one that just kind of stand by.
Speaker 3: This was after you guys had received the call that
Geraldine tried to commit suicide.
Speaker 13: That was all that.
Speaker 18: That's because I feel like something must have happened and
soon had to happen where she felt at no point
of return. So I need to figure out what I'm
getting myself.
Speaker 8: I don't know what's going on.
Speaker 1: April arrived at Geraldine's house and she brought along the
new baby. A short while later, Tamiko showed up there
as well. As soon as they walked in the house,
they knew something was wrong. They found empty bleach bottles
scattered on the floor, and there was an unexplainable eeriness
about the place. Everything just felt off.
Speaker 5: So she was just saying, it was just things that
were there that just didn't really April here. And so
when I sat elegent, it's on the table, you know,
on the couch, I was looking.
Speaker 6: So she's, you know, she shows me the bucket and.
Speaker 2: And yeah, it was bleach and.
Speaker 19: Mullane and stuff in there.
Speaker 5: And far as the kitchen anything, I don't, you know,
I just wanted to wash a bottle and.
Speaker 10: I set that bottle on the counter.
Speaker 6: But and I know it didn't know right, had I
known that it might have been something, then.
Speaker 1: I got my head hig for April and Tomiko. Perhaps
the most unsettling thing about Geraldine's house was a smell,
A rank scent of rotting flesh mixed with pungent chemicals
and bleach filled the house.
Speaker 5: And then like when I came in there and I
was sitting there, I mean, you know, like you know,
when the dark he came out, and it didn't it
didn't really smell like dark.
Speaker 6: It smelt like something else, that is the pul damp.
Speaker 5: And she said she's been up, but it was like
she just like it is.
Speaker 16: Yea other than the weird snows or anything out.
Speaker 5: Of the house that she served well, my sisters, no
and well. And once she pointed out, I looked at
the table, it was like a leech or and all
the other stuff in there.
Speaker 8: I don't know.
Speaker 6: Why did you think that?
Speaker 9: What made you think that?
Speaker 6: She said that? Little things?
Speaker 10: I mean, whatever you noticed like.
Speaker 6: This just a snail burst of all.
Speaker 5: Into right, I don't know it by human.
Speaker 1: April and Tomiko spent some time looking around the house,
but they never could locate the source of the awful smell.
A short while later, April left while Tomiko remained at
Geraldine's house with the baby.
Speaker 13: Where did she say she was going.
Speaker 7: To wire my nephews the money because he was coming
He lived in Chicago and he was just coming home.
Speaker 1: As Tamiko waited in Geraldine's house, she looked out a
window and noticed that a black car was slowly and
repeatedly driving by the home. It seemed like the driver
was lost in trying to find Geraldine's address.
Speaker 5: The banking and first time, I was sitting there outside
of the black carve pad.
Speaker 6: And I just.
Speaker 13: You know.
Speaker 5: But then when I come back again and he had
the police officers walking.
Speaker 1: It turned out that the black car belonged to the
lead investigator who was trying to find Samantha Fleming. Through
sheer coincidence, his path had converged with Tamiko and they
both arrived at Geraldine's house on the same day.
Speaker 3: At the time, this lady is basically a missing person
until we can, you know, prove otherwise. And we you know,
we don't automatically assume something bad, So we're starting on
the bottom.
Speaker 13: And we had this block number.
Speaker 3: With that block number come back to Geraldine and I
just unblocked it the night before.
Speaker 13: So I called her phone and just said, hey, it's
I told her who I was and what police department
I was. Well, she never answered. I left it on
the board.
Speaker 3: I was just gonna ask her, you know, I know
you're the one that came that called and you're the
one that came to Anderson to get her. You know,
where is she at? Were you just trying to help
her get away from this guy? Did you know her
from Gary? And this was kind of like a setup.
I was thinking, maybe she just tried to lure him
away from this guy, and Samantha knew about it.
Speaker 13: Samantha still on the run somewhere.
Speaker 1: A few days before Samantha went missing, Samantha's mom received
a phone call from a block number. When she answered,
Samantha's mom spoke to a woman claiming to be a
Child Protective Services case manager and this woman was fishing
for information about Samantha. When the police unblocked the phone
number that led them to gerald Deine Jones, she was
the fake CPS worker.
Speaker 7: What's so strange? Like I said, I was sitting on
the couch with the baby and I'm talking to her
like she's gonna talk, I said. I said, they must
be looking for somebody, right, But because I had no
food that you you were looking for Burrus address.
Speaker 13: Before, No, just that day.
Speaker 3: I actually come to Gary that day to try to
find Geraldine.
Speaker 1: When the investigator arrived at Geraldine's house, he met with
Tomiko in the driveway, who then let him into the home.
Speaker 13: I could smell the smell.
Speaker 4: You know, you know, I thought it was and this
is my aunt.
Speaker 7: Because I had never smelled a body before, so I'm thinking, like, Okay,
it's a.
Speaker 3: Dead mountain, right, I mean I smelled that, you know, mice,
but that smell itself would have been uh, there was
a lot and it was kind of like it was
kind of like a like I couldn't really tell one
hundred percent it was because there was some chemicals and.
Speaker 15: April.
Speaker 7: April was like with me, she said, do you smell that?
I said, And that's I thought.
Speaker 4: Maybe.
Speaker 1: Once inside the house, the investigator performed a search and
he was able to find what Tamiko and April couldn't.
In the back bedroom closet, there was a dead body
wrapped in plastic and duct tape. The body had been
folded in half, stuffed into a plastic tote, and was
soaking in a shallow pool of bleach. Unsurprisingly, the body
was later identified as twenty three year old mother of two,
Samantha Fleming, and her death was determined to have been
caused by multiple stab wounds.
Speaker 3: This would have had to have been a pretty bloody scene.
Speaker 13: The body had like close to forty some stab wounds, right,
and so.
Speaker 3: Somebody to see all that would be probably a lot
to take in, you know, just never dealing with that before, so,
you know, that's a lot of stablishings.
Speaker 1: At this point, the truth of the situation started to
become apparent to everyone. The baby that Tamiko and April
had been caring for didn't belong to Geraldine. The baby
was Samantha Fleming's missing daughter, Serenity. While disguised as a
CPS worker, Geraldine lured Samantha and her baby away from
her apartment. Then Geraldine stabbed Samantha to death and claimed
the baby as her own. The investigators who were working
on this case had a basic understanding of what had happened,
but there are still so many questions, questions that only
Geraldine could answer, like why or how did Geraldine choose
Samantha as her victim, how did that happen, what was
a connection between these two women, and obviously why did
Geraldine do all this? After Samantha's body was discovered, Geraldine
was promptly found in Texas and arrested a few days later.
She was transported back to Indiana, where investigators attempted to
question her.
Speaker 20: All this says, right here is just as you understand
what your rights are, right.
Speaker 10: It's not saying you're waving the rights.
Speaker 20: It just says, you've read the statement and you understand
what they are, and it says that we haven't made
any threats, version or anything.
Speaker 10: All this says is that you just understand what they are. Okay, Okay, Okay,
that's fine.
Speaker 20: Here's what we come down here, Ford, Okay, we come
down here to talk to you.
Speaker 10: To try to get your side. There's two sighs to
every story.
Speaker 4: Okay.
Speaker 10: There's a lot of un answered questions. Question you don't
want any answering them run out at home, Okay.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, Geraldine refused to talk to investigators and give her
side of the story. Smart for her, bad for society.
So in order to make sense of this homicide, the
investigators spoke extensively with Geraldine's neighbors, friends, and her two
older sisters.
Speaker 13: I mean, I know, you guys for the most part,
believed that she was pregnant. I'd be it for all
the part, Okay.
Speaker 3: Says she knew she had gained weight, but she wasn't
like one hundred percent, you know, never really thought about it.
Speaker 13: Just took her word for it.
Speaker 18: But I'm the most in the family. I would say
that I would be the most with the rowan tile
glasses all, so something really happens.
Speaker 7: Then I find out everything.
Speaker 18: Like I've been found it out since she's been in jail.
I've never had a doubt that.
Speaker 7: She was not pregnant.
Speaker 1: Ever, eventually, investigators learned that Geraldine was never pregnant. It
was all a lie. She was a liar, and you
should never trust liars. The lengths she went to keep
that lie going were baffling. For nine months, Geraldine repeatedly
posted updates on her social media about her fake pregnancy,
which included sharing sonogram photos and updates about her frequent
doctor visits. She was basically mommy blogging without being a mommy.
Geraldine purposely gained weight and accepted maternity gifts from her
friends and family. She even let them throw her a
fucking lavish baby shower.
Speaker 6: What a cunt her those fake was not on the
right term, or her attorney who attorney thing whatever.
Speaker 4: She was doing all whole things.
Speaker 8: But you know, and yeah, I mean she appears to
be pant me and I never questioned it.
Speaker 1: April and Tamiko fully believe that Geraldine was pregnant it,
but there was someone who had some doubts. Geraldine told
her ex boyfriend Randy Garrett that he was the father.
Speaker 9: She kept insisting that she was pregnant.
Speaker 10: So I'm like, okay, I don't you know.
Speaker 9: I want to be responsible if she is.
Speaker 13: I want to know.
Speaker 9: So I was, I was saying, okay, I'll.
Speaker 11: Go to the doctor's pointing with you. But every time
I would like try to go with her, something would
come up. She'd be like, oh, I went yesterday. Oh
I didn't tell you I went yesterday, or or she
might have the point when she's like, okay, meet me
out there. Then when when when I meet her out there,
she might be already out there, she's coming out. Oh
he had to reschedule. He had to he had to
deliver a baby. Or would always be something pregnant enough?
I mean she looked she looked.
Speaker 9: Stach in the stomach. It seemed like her face is
getting more fuller. Did you ever touch your stomach at on?
Speaker 10: No, I never really touched her stomach. I never really
touched her stomach, but.
Speaker 11: It it looked like she was pregnant.
Speaker 1: Geraldine lied and successfully convinced everyone around her that she
was pregnant. That much the investigators knew. But the big
unanswered question was Why why do you do these things?
What's the fucking point? How dumb are you that you
don't realize you're gonna get caught eventually? Why had Geraldine
done any of this?
Speaker 13: You know, there's gotta be some underlying things going on.
Speaker 3: And basically everybody I talked to, and it's mainly her
family and friends, all say the same thing.
Speaker 13: It's to me, she's carried this lie on so far
with so.
Speaker 3: Many people that had left her no alternative but to
finish it.
Speaker 1: In June of twenty fourteen, Geraldine told her family and
ex boyfriend that she was pregnant. Nine months later, in
April twenty fifteen, Geraldine needed to produce a baby if
she was going to keep this lie going, because that's
the thing about lies, You got to keep lying to
protect the lie. But liars are usually pretty short sighted
type people and don't really plan ahead much. They just
plan for you to believe their bullshit.
Speaker 13: That's it.
Speaker 1: That's the extent of their plans. So Geraldine began hunting
when she found a woman on Facebook who had just
given birth to a biracial baby. This one checked the box.
There weren't a whole lot of requirements put it that way,
that woman was motive and opportunity. Motive and opportunity. That woman,
by the way, was twenty three year old Samantha Fleming.
But you already knew that, you know, trying.
Speaker 13: To figure out the connection.
Speaker 3: I don't think she knew the victim, and I don't
think her and the victim of Matt. I think Geraldine
smart enough. She was able to find out about this
person either you know, online, Facebook, whatever, and had a
lot of time to kind of and I'm just thinking
myself the whole time. I keep thinking, somehow I think
Geraldine ran across her herself because she spent she put
a lot of time and effort into this pregnancy thing.
I think she's pretty smart. I think she's very it smart.
She's able to get in there and Facebook and all
this stuff and somehow found this girl. But she had
to know a little bit about her DCS history, and
that's where I don't know, right.
Speaker 1: Samantha Fleming was very active on Facebook, and investigators would
eventually come to find that pretty much everything Samantha was
dealing with in regards to regaining custody of her son
was spelled out on social media.
Speaker 13: Again.
Speaker 1: More mommy blogging Mommy, blogging can kill folks. Her Facebook
posts and subsequent conversation in the comment sections went into
great detail about her situation and the struggles she was having.
Woe is me, got to tell everyone about it, So
listen up, ladies. If there was ever a cautionary tale
to warn people not to share their personal problems online,
this is it. Pay attention. Geraldine used this information that
Samantha posted that Samantha had shared online to pose as
a CPS worker who was overseeing Samantha's case and take
advantage of her. You see how the internet works? Are
you starting to figure it out?
Speaker 3: She called the victim's mother two days before this incident
happened anonymous, and they the mother gave her because she
was claiming to be a DCS worker and knew enough
information to make a sound good. The mother actually gave
her the girl's number, so she was sinking her out.
And then she called the victim and only said, I'm
a new caseworker. I'm actually the supervisor. The other girls
wasn't going to be on vacation, so I'm taking over.
Speaker 1: When Geraldine showed up at Samantha's apartment, the details that
she knew about Samantha's case made Geraldine's disguise that much
more convincing. Her act was so persuasive, in fact, that
she was able to lure Samantha and her baby from
her home into her car. Think about that. Geraldine told
Samantha that she needed to appear at a courthouse in Gary,
Indiana later that day because a judge was going to
rule if Samantha could get her son back. When Samantha
was in the car, Geraldine drove three hours from Anderson
to Gary, Indiana. Investigators believe that after they arrived and Gary,
Geraldine was able to lure Samantha into her home. She
may have claimed that she needed to make a quick
stop before going to the courthouse. Who knows what kind
of lie she sold. Apparently she was very good at it,
many criminals are. When Samantha stepped inside Geraldine's home, she
had no clue as to the horror that awaited her.
Geraldine attacks Samantha, stabbing her over forty times and killing her.
Then she wrapped the body in plastic, folded Samantha into
a plastic tub, and filled that tub with bleach. After
the murder, Geraldine claimed Samantha's baby as her own. This
story is insane. If you saw these events play out
in a movie, you'd probably laugh your ass off for
it being too unrealistic. It's like something you'd see on
the Lifetime network in between reruns of Christmas in July.
Maybe not Lifetime these days, maybe more like Oxygen, you know,
the formerly gay network that now just plays true crime
all day. Huh my nanny is a serial killer or
lethal Soccer mom, those kind of titles. Yeah, that sounds
kind of like this story. The major difference is that
Geraldine's story is actually true. These are facts. I'm not
making them up, and it's more outlandish than anything that
could come out of a Hollywood producer's un original brain.
Given how horrifically absurd this whole situation was, it begged
the question, what in the world could possibly drive someone
to act this way.
Speaker 13: I don't know if it's because of the boyfriend.
Speaker 3: Maybe she couldn't let it go and she was trying
to hold on to him, so she kept this baby
thing going.
Speaker 13: So then she has to find.
Speaker 14: A baby because the boy the Randy guys he said,
we started dating, he goes I really liked her, but
then it just seemed like, every time I turned around,
she was wandering about something, and it was like, well,
you know what it so, lie man, it's a habit.
Speaker 7: So I don't know if that's a part of you
know what, of the issues she may have, you know whatever,
let it.
Speaker 1: The prominent theory about Geraldine's motives is that she was
desperate to hold on to her ex boyfriend, so she
lied about being pregnant to keep him in her life.
Geraldine wouldn't be the first woman to do that, but
when you add the fact that she was also a
pathological liar, it made for a very bad situation. Geraldine's
lies painted her into a corner, and for her, kidnapping
and murder seemed like a better option than just coming
clean and admitting the truth. She had to keep the
lies going to protect the other lies. Also, according to
her sisters, Jordine was uncompromisingly desperate for attention. There's a
lot of that going around. And something else that may
have motivated her actions was jealousy.
Speaker 4: So when April got married and all of a sudden,
I just remember coming down and Journie saying she was pregnant,
and my first mind was, okay, she got pregnant on
purpose because Abel was getting all attention with her getting married.
Speaker 17: Yeah, so as far as when she.
Speaker 7: Told me she was pregnant, I'd be believe her as
she was pregnant.
Speaker 3: I don't know about April's part of it about being
you know, her getting married and.
Speaker 13: The attention, that's probably some of it.
Speaker 3: But I think she sees this Randy guy, and miss
Randy says the same thing to Miko April when you
say she couldn't tell the truth for nothing, I think
she started feeling like she was starting to.
Speaker 13: Lose Randy, and so she had to come up with
because he says, next thing, you know, now she's pregnant.
Had to keep it going.
Speaker 3: Maybe you know, was so used to not telling the
truth but getting away with a lot of it that
Randy wasn't putting up with it, and so it tested
her and pushed her to the point where she's like,
I'm going to show him.
Speaker 13: I'm going to really come up with a baby. It's
like everything she did was a lie.
Speaker 1: Despite Geraldine's refusal to speak with investigators, they were able
to obtain a pretty full grasp of this homicide by
this sick, sick, sick woman. They had the how and
the why. The only thing left to do was to
deal with Geraldine.
Speaker 17: This truly is a tragic story.
Speaker 21: Police believe that Serenity, the newborn girl involved in this case,
was less a month old when this all happened. Now
that little girl left to grow up without her birth mother,
twenty three year old Samantha Fleming after officers found her
body full of stab wounds and stuffed inside of a
closet in Jones's Gary home. That being said, just yesterday morning,
Jones was extra dded back here to Indiana from Fort Worth, Texas,
until she's currently being held at Madison County Jail. Investigators
believe the motive behind the murder and kidnapping was all
part of an elaborate plot for Jones to raise Serenity
as her own daughter.
Speaker 17: And when I say elaborate, I mean it.
Speaker 21: According to police, Jones post as a child services worker,
faked her own pregnancy and even through herself a baby shower.
Speaker 17: Now she sits in a cell awaiting her day in court.
Speaker 1: In twenty fifteen, Geraldine Jones was charged with kidnapping and murder.
As she awaited her court proceedings, Geraldine made many jail
house phone calls to her sister April sorright.
Speaker 8: You're not sorry, you start, you get sorry, you get
called no, I'm not I'm sorry. So okay, then I
guess you just deal with anything. I guess you. I
guess you deal with you being sorry.
Speaker 2: I did it.
Speaker 8: I don't have anything to say. I don't have reathani
to say. I have no compassion. My mind is all
as up. My mind is so messed up from this stuff.
I don't have any cause. And I'm a compassionate person,
but this here, I don't. I don't, I don't. I
don't have any I don't have any words. Everybody talking
about you, everybody talking about your face on fucking everywhere,
and just just would not stop. You just wouldn't stop.
But you know what, that's something you have to deal with.
That's something you have to deal with God with I can't.
I can't do anything. I can't do anything. I can't
fix it. I can't cover it up that I can't
do anything. But I'm won't do it. I ain't gonna
go into no debt, I ain't want nobody no money,
and I'm not gonna stretch myself. I will go ask
all this and that because I do it all the
same time. I'm always stressing and frustrating myself about this stuff.
I know not I'm doing it for somebody that don't
even appreciate nothing and just life and then just somebody
and treat me just like you treat men that everybody
and everybody's journey and everybody, and you expect us for
the same people that you fucking live you and that
the for real thank and trying to kill yourself. You're
a fan of Senior, this journey. You are so fucked up.
I knew you were glad about a lot of shit,
but I would never think this. And a millionaires, I
want to say, would do those shit like this, Jordan.
I wonder if if you would be a part of
those shit like this, not in a million years they
even but with any stammer innthing you have ever done
a life, I would never think.
Speaker 2: This about you.
Speaker 8: I don't even know who you are. I don't know
nothing about you.
Speaker 1: As you just heard, much of Geraldine's conversations with her
sister involved April expressing her very justified frustrations with Geraldine.
This went on for some time.
Speaker 8: Please don't sorry. The steak fucking quiet because I don't
fucking feel like hearing that ship, and I don't feel
like hearing the whole bunch of shit. I don't fucking
feel like here the whole bunch of lives. I don't
start to hear none of that, because that's all you
have done the whole entire time, is fucking last the
whole entire time. That's all you've done, manipulate, lack and
do everybody all fucked up, and you just let everybody
out here to deal with this fucking bullshit. Everything that
you fucking sand out of your mouth is alive. Everything
the ship you've done is so so fucked up, Jerdan.
It is fucked up, and it is so fuck up
because you expect me to be out here trying to
get your money to get a fucking lawyer to help
you get out because you fucked up. I'm sick of
your ship, Jerdan. I'm so sick of your shit. I'm
sick of the where you fucking treat me. I'm so
tired of the way you fucking treat me, With the
shit that you do to people you have no fucking regards,
know nothing about nobody but your fucking self. The shit
is so fucked up. Even when you say you fucking sorry,
you fucking line, you sorry, you fucking got caught, You're
not sorry, you fucking sorry, you fucking got caught. You
have fuck the whole family, the family, your friends, your church,
your loved ones, and the people that care about us,
they care about Joe, motherfucking hands because they care about us.
You fucked them too. And you want somebody to give
your SIPs. You want somebody to run around bagging think
offing a fucking dead, a fucking damn twenty five thousand
fucking dollar lawyer to get your ass out, and you
just kick fucking people, and you're still fucking line. You're
still fucking line. I hope you kill one soul the
fucking truth because you ain't told nobody, because the shit
is fucked up every fucking day. Can't nobody eat he
nobody fucking clay. And then a story just keeps the
fucking unrabbling. Who does fish kind of shit?
Speaker 12: To people?
Speaker 8: Who the fuck does this kind of ships? People draw
rane the fucking a damn dear, a fucking dear journey,
You fucking lie a whole damn dear, You fucking lie
about this ship and I feel sorry for your ass
from the beginning, very fucking beginning, very beginning. I feel
starry for your ass.
Speaker 1: If this isn't obvious. April was fed up with her sister,
and she eventually told Geraldine that.
Speaker 17: She was on her own.
Speaker 19: Athul I have I know I'm messed up.
Speaker 8: I didn't have the ship. But you know something about
in my heart that I look at you. You know
what your nay, I don't. I can't tell you that
I know that, and you know that I honestly can
I tell you that. I know that. It is so
messed up. My head has been spinning and going in
all kinds of ways. And you know what, you got
a fucking way of showing it. The love that you have.
I don't need a drewe ring and now I love
that you have your evil a coni and you do anything.
It's like you're happy. Well sh is all fucked up
for other people and they lize and all kind of
shit is crazy. That's the love that you're as d
I don't know that time. How do I'll be better
left without it?
Speaker 16: How can you do it?
Speaker 8: I was just I want to pick up it? How
could I try it? That's not think about that. That's
remember about it.
Speaker 19: That's not true at all.
Speaker 8: I've never liked that about a shoe. I feel like that,
Yes you have. You have act like that when I
sit back and reflect yourself. When you love somebody, you
don't shoot a way with two three people. That I
know is true, you don't do it.
Speaker 11: Speak.
Speaker 1: In the end, though, April somehow found a way to
forgive her sister and agreed to help her through her
upcoming murder trial. I guess blood is thicker.
Speaker 8: Than water and I love you your range and you know,
no matter what you steal, my sister, I don't care
what those are, I still love you. I'm going to
be like I said, I'm gonna do whatever you have
I have to do no matter what. You just have
to be strong and know that God is doing something.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, for Geraldine, there wasn't much that April or God
himself could do for her. Geraldine killed a twenty three
year old mother of kids, and the police found the
body in her house in a closet. The police also
unraveled all of her lies and could easily prove beyond
a reasonable doubt that Geraldine committed this murder. A potential
death sentence loomed over Geraldine, and the best she could
hope for was a deal from prosecutors, which she eventually got.
In May of twenty eighteen, Geraldine pled guilty to voluntary
manslaughter and criminal confinement. She was sentenced to thirty years
in prison. Throughout the court proceedings, Geraldine made no statements,
and after the plea, her attorney gave a brief statement
to the press saying, quote, the state made the offer,
and Geraldine was satisfied with it. She's ready to put
this behind her. She's at peace.
Speaker 13: End quote.
Speaker 1: Geraldine was at PA. Well, isn't that nice? Isn't that
nice for her?
Speaker 19: Do you know how long it's took for me to
get here?
Speaker 8: Hell, four days.
Speaker 19: I traveled on the bus for two days, went through Louisiana.
I mean, it went through so many different states. And
then they took us to a holding place in Kentucky,
and they were so mean to you, like they would
make you sleep on the floor. They didn't give you
one small bottle of soap. I mean, it's ridiculous. Even
now I'm in lockdown. So it us And I ask,
she said, because of my classification, Because I guess what
I did. But my blunkie was telling me that because
of what I did, I mean, because of the charges,
that you want to be by yourself. But I'm thinking
like that, I'm here, I don't see no TV. I
only get out for an hour, and I was instantly
in isolation, like I'm in one self by myself.
Speaker 1: During her calls from jail, Geraldine spent a lot of
time complaining about the lousy conditions of the facilities she
was transferred to and the poor treatment she received. It
wasn't you know, yelpable. She probably wanted to speak with
the manager or something. Never once in any of those
calls does Geraldine mention Samantha Fleming. Never once does she
talk about Samantha's two kids, who are now forced to
grow up without a mother because of her. She doesn't
talk about Samantha's mom or her boyfriend, both of whom
were emotionally crushed by the murder that Geraldine committed. After
everything she did, after destroying countless lives for no reason
at all, Geraldine's world still only revolved around one person, Geraldine.
You can call this woman a lot of things. She's
a narcissist, she's a pathological liar. She's a killer. But
if you want to encompass everything, you only need one word.
Geraldine Jones is a monster. All right. That's gonna do
it for another one. Thanks again for joining us. If
you enjoy the show and want to support us, there's
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