Speaker 1: In the victim's own words, I woke up to him
Speaker 1: dragging me by the ankles through this field, and he
Speaker 1: dropped my legs. I heard him walk off, and heard
Speaker 1: his car door slam and him drive away. I realized
Speaker 1: I couldn't scream, and I couldn't figure out why. I
Speaker 1: had just enough strength to throw my right hand on
Speaker 1: top of my neck, and that's when I felt this
Speaker 1: gaping wound. And I looked at my hand and it
Speaker 1: was full of blood. I was eight years old. I
Speaker 1: was just left to die in a field. I'm Nicole,
Speaker 1: I'm Ben. And this is Wicked and Grim, a true
Speaker 1: crime podcast.
Speaker 2: Good morning, the following podcast.
Speaker 3: And he's grabbing semial that.
Speaker 1: We're back.
Speaker 3: We are, and it's guess what.
Speaker 1: The last episode before Christmas it is.
Speaker 3: It is so merry Christmas, happy Holidays, happy Honkah.
Speaker 1: Whatever you choose to celebrate. If you don't swish, you will.
Speaker 3: If you don't celebrate shit, happy Tuesday.
Speaker 1: Happy, We don't celebrate shit. There you go, yeah, just
Speaker 1: happy whatever, happy happy happy Oh.
Speaker 3: In the words of Ren and Stimpy, happy happy joy joy.
Speaker 3: There we go.
Speaker 1: We over here celebrate Christmas, so we will be doing that.
Speaker 1: So Merry Christmas to everyone that celebrates that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, hopefully you guys are all ready for the holidays,
Speaker 3: whether it's just downtime or not. Hopefully you're not trying
Speaker 3: to get to things done last minute. I know a
Speaker 3: lot of people are.
Speaker 1: Fair enough, I am not ready for the holidays. I'm
Speaker 1: going to admit that. Well.
Speaker 3: A big conversation I had at work today with a
Speaker 3: few people was how crazy people are. Oh literally, not
Speaker 3: like running red lights, cutting people off, just short tempers,
Speaker 3: getting angry. I hate that party because it live holidays.
Speaker 1: The saying is it's the most wonderful time of the year.
Speaker 1: But I actually don't agree with it, no at all. Like,
Speaker 1: for many reasons, this is.
Speaker 3: Like the time people get most depressed. Yeah, it's a terrible,
Speaker 3: terrible season for that.
Speaker 1: I feel like our Christmas is going to be fairly chill,
Speaker 1: like we don't have a lot of things going on.
Speaker 1: So I'm kind of into that. Yeah, but I'm also
Speaker 1: worried I'm not going to get my work finished in time,
Speaker 1: So we'll see, but will you will? But you know what,
Speaker 1: it will be waiting for me after the holidays. Fair enough,
Speaker 1: So there you go, and do you know what? What
Speaker 1: we've got patrons. We do. We always have patrons to
Speaker 1: thing because people are just fricking awesome. We were literally
Speaker 1: like people suck and now like people are awesome.
Speaker 3: People suck except you guys. You're different.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you're different.
Speaker 3: You're all amazing. Trust us. You know what we mean
Speaker 3: when we say people suck, we mean the general population.
Speaker 3: You guys are in general pop. You guys are cool.
Speaker 3: But we had some people sign up for Patreon this week.
Speaker 1: Who did we have?
Speaker 3: Well, I am going to butcher names because I swear
Speaker 3: people make it harder on us each time, on purpose.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I wonder, but I'll do my best.
Speaker 3: We had Tamara, Nicole O, Dreene Manassas, Nice, Morland Reedle awesome,
Speaker 3: Leanne Woodruff wonderful, and Ashes Love all sign up for
Speaker 3: Patreon this week.
Speaker 1: Amazing. Thank you so much. We actually super appreciate that
Speaker 1: we do.
Speaker 3: And even if you don't head over to Patreon sign
Speaker 3: up for whatever reason, even if you just don't want
Speaker 3: to money wise, we don't care. You're here and we
Speaker 3: appreciate the shit out of that too. Sure, So thank
Speaker 3: you so much for being here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think we just had one more thing we
Speaker 1: wanted to mention.
Speaker 3: We also wanted to thank people for our YouTube. Yeah,
Speaker 3: we posted that Casey Anthony video on YouTube.
Speaker 1: It's doing well, it is.
Speaker 3: And we got like I think, as of right now,
Speaker 3: it's like six point four thousand views. Yeah, so six
Speaker 3: four hundred views right now, and it's only been up
Speaker 3: for like seven days. So that's awesome considering we only
Speaker 3: have five videos on YouTube.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, no, I'm pleasantly surprised.
Speaker 3: We got to start posting more on there, I think
Speaker 3: so we do. So, Yeah, thank you guys so much
Speaker 3: for showing us. That's that love over there.
Speaker 1: And if you haven't watched yet, go watch.
Speaker 3: It links down below.
Speaker 1: You'll see our lovely faces.
Speaker 3: You will. If you don't know what we look like. Surprise,
Speaker 3: I have a beard. Yeah, and you can go see it.
Speaker 1: People lots time, we've got it. People don't really necessarily
Speaker 1: think we look like what we sound and I'm not
Speaker 1: sure if that's a compliment or an insult.
Speaker 3: I don't know. So although there was a comment on
Speaker 3: our video you can tell that they're Canadian.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah shit, we don't hide that at all. Fucking
Speaker 1: e rights, bud, I people can know I'm Canadian. Like
Speaker 1: in a minute, oh fuck yeah, but like literally thirty
Speaker 1: seconds she's Canadian fucking rites. Anyway. Wow, So today we.
Speaker 3: Have no chick, but I am drinking whiskey.
Speaker 1: You are, actually, so today we're sharing. We will be
Speaker 1: sharing Jennifer Schwitt's story. Now trigger warning. As I mentioned
Speaker 1: the intro, this story does involve a little girl who
Speaker 1: is eight years old, which is real shitty.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but I'm.
Speaker 1: Going to be nice and tell you right off the
Speaker 1: bat that this is a survivor story, so you may
Speaker 1: want to stick around to find out how incredible this
Speaker 1: little eight year old just is.
Speaker 3: I'm I know this is not going to be a
Speaker 3: fun one, but I'm also very anxious because I want
Speaker 3: to hear the story and I'm super pumped that it
Speaker 3: is a survivor story.
Speaker 1: Well yeah, see, like if it was an eight year
Speaker 1: old involved and it wasn't a survivor story, it would
Speaker 1: just be shit.
Speaker 3: Right Yeah, Like, I know we're going to go through
Speaker 3: some depressing shit here. Oh yeah, but I know the
Speaker 3: light at the end of the tunnel, so I'm like
Speaker 3: looking forward to getting to that light part, you know.
Speaker 4: Yep.
Speaker 1: Okay, So in August ninth, nineteen ninety, in Dickinson Texas
Speaker 1: Dick Dickinson. Like Charles Dickinson, Jennifer Schewett was home with
Speaker 1: her mother, Elaine. Elaine was a single mom, but she
Speaker 1: was doing everything she could to make sure that Jennifer
Speaker 1: had a good childhood and didn't miss for anything. And Jennifer,
Speaker 1: even though at that very young age, understood what her
Speaker 1: mother was trying to do and what she was trying
Speaker 1: to give her, which I'm like, that's impressive, that is awesome.
Speaker 1: It sounded as though they had like a really good relationship,
Speaker 1: which I loved, love it. In one article I actually read,
Speaker 1: it was like they were each other's everything, which is
Speaker 1: so cute, so cute. That is so Jennifer, like a
Speaker 1: lot of children, especially at that age, was afraid of
Speaker 1: the dark.
Speaker 3: I can't blame her.
Speaker 1: I mean, I'm kind of afraid of it.
Speaker 3: I still am. I Okay, I'm going to admit something here.
Speaker 3: Mirrors in the dark. Yeah you read that fuck out
Speaker 3: of me?
Speaker 1: Yeah you hate it.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So when I go to the bathroom in the
Speaker 3: middle of night, that light is getting switched on, or
Speaker 3: I do not make eye contact with the mirror. I
Speaker 3: like talk to myself my head like it's okay, it's okay,
Speaker 3: it's okay. And I walked by it really quick.
Speaker 1: I mean even outside, like in the dark when I
Speaker 1: get home and i'm and I'm from my car to
Speaker 1: the house, like I almost to seel like running like shit, yeah,
Speaker 1: like I mean, it takes away one of your five senses.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, right, you can't see very well.
Speaker 3: And there's this saying that I heard not too long ago. Actually,
Speaker 3: it's that you're not afraid to be alone in the dark.
Speaker 3: It's that you're afraid you're not alone in the dark.
Speaker 1: Oh that's it. Yeah, that's terrifying, isn't it. Holy shit,
Speaker 1: I haven't heard that.
Speaker 3: That's fucking horrifying. And that nails it.
Speaker 1: It does, and I hate that. Oh gosh, Now I
Speaker 1: don't know how I'm gonna get through this. Okay. So,
Speaker 1: being that Jennifer was going through this phase, she would
Speaker 1: often sleep with her mom in her mom's bed, but
Speaker 1: this particular night, Jennifer was particularly restless, and since Elaine
Speaker 1: had an early shift at work the next day, she
Speaker 1: really wanted to make sure that she had had a
Speaker 1: good night's rest, so she asked Jennifer if she could
Speaker 1: sleep in her own bed for the night, and Jennifer
Speaker 1: said that she would, adding because I love you.
Speaker 3: Wow, I know, way to tug at the heart strings.
Speaker 1: She is like a little sweetheart, and I just feel
Speaker 1: it's kind of rare at that age to kind of
Speaker 1: be showing your parents like appreciation. So it sort of
Speaker 1: just shows like what an absolute gem she is.
Speaker 3: I think so. And I don't know if i'd say
Speaker 3: it's rare, Like I think a lot of younger kids
Speaker 3: do show that love and appreciation. I think it's just
Speaker 3: how they show it, to be able to show it
Speaker 3: on the level that adults generally communicate it, I think
Speaker 3: that that's pretty rare.
Speaker 1: It almost just seems like she understands what her mom
Speaker 1: is like. I don't know if sacrificing is the right word,
Speaker 1: but doing for her, yeah, which is really cool.
Speaker 3: She has that compassion.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So Elaine kissed her daughter good night, and Jennifer
Speaker 1: headed to her room, where she turned on her lamp,
Speaker 1: which was shaped like a light bulb that she just
Speaker 1: loved so much because it lit up her entire room
Speaker 1: and she didn't have to be afraid of the dark
Speaker 1: in there.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 1: The lamp itself was shaped like a big ass light bulb.
Speaker 3: Okay, so it was like a light bulb and a
Speaker 3: light bulb. Okay, Yeah, I thought it was weird that
Speaker 3: you described that the light was shaped like light bulb.
Speaker 1: Well, it was like I have a picture in my head,
Speaker 1: but it was a lamp that was shaped like a
Speaker 1: light bulb and it was super bright.
Speaker 3: No, I got you now. Yeah, it took me a second,
Speaker 3: so I had to clarify.
Speaker 1: So after spending some time reading, Jennifer was able to
Speaker 1: fall asleep. Now fast forward to the following morning, as
Speaker 1: Elaine was waking up for the day. Within minutes, she
Speaker 1: realized that something was horribly wrong. She hadn't heard anything
Speaker 1: unusual during the night, nothing that woke her up, but
Speaker 1: when she went into Jennifer's room to check on her,
Speaker 1: there was no Jennifer. Her bed was empty, and her
Speaker 1: bedroom window was wide open. Fuck, Like, that is not
Speaker 1: something a parent would ever want.
Speaker 3: Any parent, that would be your Whether it's sea, yeah,
Speaker 3: that's that's where you're immediately going.
Speaker 1: And you're like no, because whether they were stolen or
Speaker 1: like the kid just kind of like snuck out somehow
Speaker 1: or got out, Like, that's fucking terrifying. So Elaine immediately
Speaker 1: contacted the police, but by then some of the worst
Speaker 1: things imaginable had already happened to her daughter. Jennifer had
Speaker 1: woken up in the middle of the night, and she
Speaker 1: was no longer in her warm bed, but in the
Speaker 1: arms of a man who was running away from her home.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 1: Jennifer had no idea who this man was or what
Speaker 1: he was doing with her, as she went to scream
Speaker 1: and get the attention of anyone who may be awake
Speaker 1: at this time. The man realized Jennifer had woken and
Speaker 1: clamped his hand down around her mouth and her nose
Speaker 1: before she could even make a noise. As they approached
Speaker 1: his car, he stuffed her inside, making her sit on
Speaker 1: his lap, and sped away from her home, her safe place.
Speaker 1: But Jennifer wasn't going to make things easy for him.
Speaker 1: She kept struggling to get away from him until he
Speaker 1: shared with her that he was actually an undercover police
Speaker 1: officer and he was actually taking her somewhere her mother
Speaker 1: could come and pick her up again. Bullshit, that doesn't
Speaker 1: even make any sense. But like, she's a little eight
Speaker 1: year old girl, right, but she's still skeptical here.
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, he's throwing out like you can trust me.
Speaker 3: Any little kid who are that?
Speaker 1: Who can they trust the police?
Speaker 3: They trust the police, right, Yeah, So that's what he's
Speaker 3: doing right right there. He's trying to gain her trust
Speaker 3: with the first person a little kid.
Speaker 1: Could so disturbing. And I wonder if even like had
Speaker 1: that plan. Well I don't. The whole thing really wasn't planned.
Speaker 1: So he was just throwing out shit to try and
Speaker 1: make her calm the fuck down.
Speaker 3: I guess probably. I bet you if he planned it,
Speaker 3: he would have had like a fake badge or something,
Speaker 3: because little kids, no cops had their back.
Speaker 1: Actress and she'll ask about this here. So so Jennifer
Speaker 1: believed him, at least enough that she stopped fighting to
Speaker 1: get her way to get away from him. But she
Speaker 1: was a bright kid, and something about all this just
Speaker 1: didn't sit right with her. She kept or asking him
Speaker 1: questions like where they were going and what was going on,
Speaker 1: and eventually he pulled into a dark parking lot outside
Speaker 1: her elementary school and killed the engine of his car.
Speaker 1: He told her that this was the place where her
Speaker 1: mother was going to come and pick her up, and
Speaker 1: even let her get out of the car while she
Speaker 1: waited for her mom. M Jennifer stood there in the
Speaker 1: dark watching this man, trying to figure out if she
Speaker 1: should be afraid or just believe him. She knew that
Speaker 1: undercover police officers didn't wear uniforms, but she had no
Speaker 1: idea why an undercover police officer would take her from
Speaker 1: her room in the middle of the night, and she
Speaker 1: didn't know if she believed that an officer could while
Speaker 1: he was on the job, and that is exactly what
Speaker 1: this man was doing.
Speaker 3: She's definitely bright if she's thinking.
Speaker 1: She's literally eight yeah, like that's I don't know, she
Speaker 1: blows me away like that's just the icing. Well not,
Speaker 1: that's just like the tip of the iceberg.
Speaker 3: Wow, Okay, So she's really like analyzing this, like yeah, like.
Speaker 1: Esse, you wait, dude. So Jennifer pushed him a little
Speaker 1: bit more, asking him to prove that he was really
Speaker 1: a police officer, but the man only told her that
Speaker 1: his name was Dennis. That was enough for Jennifer for
Speaker 1: a while, but then she wanted more proof that he
Speaker 1: was what he said he was. She asked him where
Speaker 1: his gun and his badge were, and Dennis told her
Speaker 1: that they were in the back seat of his car
Speaker 1: and she could actually see them if she knelt on
Speaker 1: the seat beside him and had a look. Jennifer still
Speaker 1: didn't know if she believed him, but she wanted answers,
Speaker 1: and seeing his police badge would at least tell her
Speaker 1: if he was a real policeman or not. Right, So
Speaker 1: she got back in the car and looked at the
Speaker 1: back seat. But that was when Dennis showed his real
Speaker 1: face and Jennifer got the answer she was dreading the most.
Speaker 3: Wait, his real face?
Speaker 1: Was he like true colors?
Speaker 3: Okay? Gotcha?
Speaker 1: Yeah? So Dennis then drove just a few blocks away.
Speaker 1: It was a dead and gravel rolled rode, and he
Speaker 1: pulled off into an over grown field. Jennifer, at this
Speaker 1: point was panicking. Dennis then had a knife, held a
Speaker 1: knife to Jennifer's throat and said, am I scaring you?
Speaker 1: Little girl? Am I scaring you?
Speaker 3: Fuck?
Speaker 1: Like that's enough to give you goosebumb say? He attacked
Speaker 1: Jennifer both physically and sexually. He choked her, tried to
Speaker 1: break her neck, viciously raped her, slit her throat open,
Speaker 1: all before dragging her by the ankles through a field
Speaker 1: and leaving her for dead.
Speaker 3: Fuck this guy, oh yeah, shit, he.
Speaker 1: Is the epitome of like a nasty motherfucker.
Speaker 3: Oh beyond beyond like when you first started describing his
Speaker 3: assault on her, like beyond disturbed and then having the
Speaker 3: audacity to continue and do those things. And am I
Speaker 3: scaring you little girl? Oh yeah, Like, holy fuck you are, Like.
Speaker 1: Obviously you're scaring her, you piece of shit.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well he's getting off on it is what it is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Like it's very disturbing. Oh fuck, Like it's so
Speaker 1: disturbing that people like this exist in the world.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh So, once Dennis left the crime scene without being
Speaker 1: caught or even seen, he was essentially getting away with
Speaker 1: a truly terrible crime. He had no connections to Elaine
Speaker 1: and Jennifer. He'd just seen Jennifer through her bedroom window
Speaker 1: and sense an opportunity, and unfortunately for so many people,
Speaker 1: his moral compass didn't lead him away from taking it.
Speaker 3: So he just happened upon seeing her through a window.
Speaker 3: That's it. Yeah, really, I see. I was assuming since
Speaker 3: he took her specifically to her elementary, that he would
Speaker 3: have seen or known well.
Speaker 1: I think it was like a relatively small town. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but it could have been like the only elementary.
Speaker 3: I didn't look up or just so happened to be
Speaker 3: the one nearby or whatever. Yeah, but I was thinking
Speaker 3: there was something to that. But okay, coincidence then.
Speaker 1: So when he'd sliced Jennifer's throat and left her body
Speaker 1: in that field, he was killing the only witness to
Speaker 1: his crimes, essentially guaranteeing that he would get away with it.
Speaker 1: But that morning, as it became light outside, though by
Speaker 1: just a thread, Jennifer was still holding on. Fuck yes,
Speaker 1: she remembers not being able to move her body. She
Speaker 1: tried to lift her head but couldn't as she went
Speaker 1: in and out of consciousness every time she would come too.
Speaker 1: She was in absolute disbelief that she hadn't died yet.
Speaker 3: And this is coming from an eight year old girl.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 1: She laid there that entire day. It was right before
Speaker 1: dark when Jennifer she could hear kids playing a game
Speaker 1: of tag in the field she was in when one
Speaker 1: of them actually tripped over her foot and she was discovered.
Speaker 1: Fuck yeah, like just brutal kidding. Most people in the
Speaker 1: community were already aware that a young girl was missing,
Speaker 1: so people and law enforcement were on the lookout for
Speaker 1: a child matching Jennifer's description, but I don't think anyone
Speaker 1: could have been ready to find what they found in
Speaker 1: that field that day.
Speaker 3: Oh I don't think so. No, could you imagine? Wow?
Speaker 1: Well, and you know it wasn't even touched on like
Speaker 1: the kids that found her, Like how traumatizing for them? No, kidd,
Speaker 1: I mean Jennifer, it's like much worse her trauma, but
Speaker 1: like she would not have looked well oh.
Speaker 3: No, right, no, the only thing that they would have
Speaker 3: is the only consolation to it is that she lived
Speaker 3: through it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but.
Speaker 3: Wow, Okay, sorry, my head's just going a million different
Speaker 3: places with this right now.
Speaker 1: I know it's very sad. So Jennifer was covered in blood,
Speaker 1: her body abused and covered in what looked like a
Speaker 1: horrible rash, but when first responders got to the scene
Speaker 1: to start cornering it off, they were in disbelief that
Speaker 1: she was still alive. She'd actually regained consciousness all the
Speaker 1: way back when Dennis had dragged her across the field,
Speaker 1: and somehow she'd kept it together and realized that her
Speaker 1: best chances of surviving this was to play dead. So
Speaker 1: as he's dragging her, her throat's like slit. She's playing dead. Holy,
Speaker 1: she didn't make a sound. She didn't even move when
Speaker 1: he dumped her body on top of a fire your
Speaker 1: ant's nest, and then drove away, And those two things
Speaker 1: are probably what saved her life. If Dennis believed she
Speaker 1: was alive, I imagine, being the scum piece of shit
Speaker 1: that he was, he would have finished the job right.
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, And can we just talk about that for
Speaker 3: a sec. Because sure, it's probably kind of obvious that
Speaker 3: playing dead is your most likely survival point in this.
Speaker 1: But I don't even think many adults would think to
Speaker 1: do that necessarily.
Speaker 3: Let's just assume everyone would think that. Okay, okay, just
Speaker 3: for the sake of this conversation. Here, now tell me
Speaker 3: you are conscious being dragged through a field.
Speaker 4: In immensible pain, slit throat, terrified as an eight year old,
Speaker 4: and you have the whereabouts to control your fear, your
Speaker 4: pain to play dead.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Like it's like she is one hundred and ten
Speaker 1: percent like a badass of the day.
Speaker 3: Oh no kidding. I can barely hold back tears if
Speaker 3: I stub my toe.
Speaker 1: I know, Yeah, it's it's unbelievable, and it gets even
Speaker 1: more unbelievable, like it really does. This case is mind
Speaker 1: blowing to me. It's mind blowing.
Speaker 2: Okay, well we'll continue to blow my mind though, Like, yeah,
Speaker 2: I am going to so as I was saying, her
Speaker 2: playing dead saved her life in my opinion, very much so.
Speaker 1: And that rash that was all of her body was
Speaker 1: actually a whole bunch of fire ant bites. So Jennifer
Speaker 1: said that whenever she started to fall asleep or lose
Speaker 1: consciousness again, the fire ants would bite her and wake
Speaker 1: her up. So doctors believe that those constant bites throughout
Speaker 1: the night had kept her body producing adrenaline and kept
Speaker 1: it from giving up from the loss of blood that
Speaker 1: she was suffering from, which is like wow, yeah, wow wow.
Speaker 1: Like if he would have just left her in a
Speaker 1: spot that didn't have this atness, like she would have died. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that is just mind blowing to me. But back to
Speaker 1: when they found out that Jennifer was still alive in
Speaker 1: the field, The investigators rushed Jennifer to the hospital, still
Speaker 1: not really thinking that she was going to survive, considering
Speaker 1: how much blood she'd already lost and that she'd been
Speaker 1: lying in that field for about fourteen hours.
Speaker 3: Holy shit.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but Jennifer was determined not to make this easy
Speaker 1: for Dennis. He'd somehow managed to miss all of her
Speaker 1: major arteries he had sliced through her vocal cords. But
Speaker 1: even nat wasn't enough to stop Jennifer from telling everything
Speaker 1: she could remember about the man who kidnapped and assaulted her.
Speaker 1: She was, of course terrified of most men, especially the
Speaker 1: officers who came to speak with her and regarding her
Speaker 1: room right, being that he said he was a police sir.
Speaker 1: But once they gave her a pen and a pad
Speaker 1: of paper, Jennifer made sure her voice was heard. She
Speaker 1: told them what had happened. With her only being eight
Speaker 1: years old, she didn't even really understand what rape was
Speaker 1: and what exactly Dennis had done to her, but the
Speaker 1: amount of details she was able to remember is quite incredible.
Speaker 1: I'll start by touching on his name because I think
Speaker 1: it shows just how determined Jennifer was to make sure
Speaker 1: that she told the police everything. Because in her notes,
Speaker 1: Jennifer spelled his name Dennis d. N n Ees. She
Speaker 1: was too young to even know how to spell his
Speaker 1: name correctly, and through trial and there she managed to
Speaker 1: communicate his name with the place without being able to
Speaker 1: say a word wow, she was able to describe his
Speaker 1: car to a t, the color, the dent on the
Speaker 1: side of it, that there were beer cans in the car,
Speaker 1: and what kind of beer it was, Holy shit, And
Speaker 1: the brand of cigarettes he was smoking. Wow, Like she
Speaker 1: just remembered all of this. Was his name.
Speaker 3: You're probably gonna touch on this. I'm sure did he
Speaker 3: give his real name?
Speaker 1: He did? He did?
Speaker 3: What a fucking idiot? Good?
Speaker 1: Yeah, it is good. I think regardless of that, they
Speaker 1: would have we'll touch on that, okay. And on the
Speaker 1: top of it all, she sat down with a sketch
Speaker 1: artist and through her pen and her pieces of paper,
Speaker 1: she described exactly what Dennis looked like.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 1: Yes, like amazing.
Speaker 3: I'm sorry, but I don't know if I sat down
Speaker 3: with a sketch artist tomorrow, I don't know if I'd
Speaker 3: be able to describe them what you look like. I've
Speaker 3: been married to you for over a decade.
Speaker 1: I know. Like, honestly, it's just it's kind of it's unbelievable.
Speaker 1: I don't even know how to describe it. But how
Speaker 1: like she's eight years old.
Speaker 3: That's incredible, like absolutely incredible. There's no words that can
Speaker 3: describe how someone can have that consciousness to put all
Speaker 3: that together. In a situation like.
Speaker 1: That, when you're scared to death at.
Speaker 3: The age of eight, Yeah, like, holy fuck, I.
Speaker 1: Know, I know, I'm blown away. So the police and
Speaker 1: the media made sure that the sketch of Dennis was
Speaker 1: put up everywhere, but unfortunately, the case still went cold.
Speaker 3: Oh dang.
Speaker 1: Really, Jennifer had to live with the terror of knowing
Speaker 1: that Dennis was still out there somewhere, and if he
Speaker 1: came for her again, she wouldn't even have a voice
Speaker 1: to scream with. But that eight year old girl was
Speaker 1: determined to make sure that Dennis got what was coming
Speaker 1: to him. One day, when she was still in her
Speaker 1: hospital room, Jennifer cleared her throat and she managed to
Speaker 1: make a sound.
Speaker 3: Fuck.
Speaker 1: Yes. Her doctors were amazed. Dennis had sliced all the
Speaker 1: way through her vocal cords, and her doctors didn't think
Speaker 1: there was any way that they would ever heal again,
Speaker 1: but Jennifer once again proved them wrong.
Speaker 3: Fucking go Jennifer, I.
Speaker 1: Know she's badass. Slowly but surely, she kept working at it,
Speaker 1: and she got her voice back, And in her own words,
Speaker 1: she likes to think that she hasn't stopped talking since,
Speaker 1: which is a good thing. Because she'd have to stay
Speaker 1: stronger than most people ever have to be for another
Speaker 1: eighteen years. That was until a new detective, Tim Chromy,
Speaker 1: took over her case and told her that he was
Speaker 1: determined to make sure that the man who did this
Speaker 1: to her was finally brought to.
Speaker 3: Justice eighteen years later.
Speaker 1: Teen years later. Holy fuck, which is awesome.
Speaker 3: I assume this guy was going to get caught within months.
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, Wow, okay, no, So he began the huge task
Speaker 1: of trying to piece all of the evidence together after
Speaker 1: almost two decades of no breaks in the case. But
Speaker 1: in that time, DNA technology had come along in leaps
Speaker 1: and bounds, and something happened that blew this case wide open.
Speaker 3: Block.
Speaker 1: Yes, so at the crime scene there was pieces of
Speaker 1: clothing left behind. I think there was some of Jennifer's underwear,
Speaker 1: like a T shirt his the assholes underwear and his
Speaker 1: shirt or something. So using some of the clothing that
Speaker 1: had been found in that field, the investigators were able
Speaker 1: to extract a sample of her attackers DNA. They sent
Speaker 1: it away and it took some time, like I think
Speaker 1: about a year to get results. Being that this was
Speaker 1: an old case, it wasn't really like top priority, right,
Speaker 1: But eventually they got a hit from the database. That
Speaker 1: hit came back from a man, Dennis Earl Bradford. He
Speaker 1: was convicted in nineteen ninety seven for kidnapping in Hot Springs, Arkansas,
Speaker 1: and sexually assaulted a woman he met at one of
Speaker 1: the local bars. He was sent to prison, and it
Speaker 1: was from the sexual assault that his DNA was put
Speaker 1: into the national database. At this time, however, Dennis was
Speaker 1: living a somewhat normal life in Arkansas. He was allegedly
Speaker 1: living with his wife and three adult step sons and
Speaker 1: was a welder. I hate that.
Speaker 3: That just like disturbs me that he was a welder.
Speaker 1: What do you was a welder? That he's just like
Speaker 1: living a fucking normal life. And even without what he
Speaker 1: did to Jennifer the other shit that he had done. Oh,
Speaker 1: how the fuck is he just living a normal life?
Speaker 3: Imagine being his wife and his being part of his
Speaker 3: family and then finding out this shit. Yeah, like I
Speaker 3: met you within piece.
Speaker 1: Of they have known any of it.
Speaker 3: I doubt it, highly doubt it.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So the local police department pulled Dennis over on
Speaker 1: a traffic stop and arrested him on a warrant. Now
Speaker 1: I'm going to have a glimpse into how the questioning
Speaker 1: of Dennis went. It was conducted by Detective Tim Cromi
Speaker 1: and FBI Special Agent Richard Renninson. So agent said, you
Speaker 1: ever heard the name Jennifer Shwitt. Dennis said yes. He
Speaker 1: told them that he remembered the story and seeing signs
Speaker 1: back in the Dickinson Dickinson area. I just wrote, Dickinson,
Speaker 1: what the fuck does that even mean? That's the town
Speaker 1: I know, but I should have said, like, I don't
Speaker 1: know I word. So he had seen signs back in
Speaker 1: the town of Dickinson about her being abducted, and he
Speaker 1: said that he prayed for her.
Speaker 3: I'm sure he fucking did.
Speaker 1: So the agent then said, did you ever have occasion
Speaker 1: to come in contact with her? And he said yes.
Speaker 1: He then asked tell me about it, and Dennis said no,
Speaker 1: And apparently the way he said no was enough to
Speaker 1: send chills up your spine, like very just no, like
Speaker 1: no emotion kind of thing.
Speaker 3: I'm surprised he admitted anything.
Speaker 1: I know that even knew the name.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Yeah. So the detective then said, you don't want to
Speaker 1: talk about it, and Dennis said no. The detective said,
Speaker 1: is there a reason why. Dennis said, you did your homework.
Speaker 1: The agent you're right, we did do our homework. And
Speaker 1: then the agent said, if you're remorseful about this, people
Speaker 1: need to hear that. And the detective said, there's two
Speaker 1: sides to every story. It was explained to Dennis that
Speaker 1: he needs to provide all the details of the attack
Speaker 1: so Jennifer could have the closure that she needs after
Speaker 1: all these years, and Dennis did crack. He said, not
Speaker 1: a single day goes by where I don't see that baby.
Speaker 1: There is no other side to the story. She was
Speaker 1: an innocent and I was a sick, deranged, beat up,
Speaker 1: little fucking' punk. He also described himself as a savage animal.
Speaker 1: The interview went on for some time. He told detectives
Speaker 1: that he didn't know why he attacked Jennifer or why
Speaker 1: he'd done anything that he'd done to her all those
Speaker 1: years ago, and he completely broke when the detectives told
Speaker 1: him that Jennifer had actually survived the attack, had told
Speaker 1: them his name, and managed to help a sketch artist
Speaker 1: put together a sketch of him that almost exactly matched
Speaker 1: the picture of Dennis's driver's license from the time. He
Speaker 1: could not believe that jenn was still alive.
Speaker 3: Wow m hm. So I mean just like that detective said,
Speaker 3: there's two sides to every story here, Yeah, first and foremost,
Speaker 3: Dennis lowest to the low, absolute fucking scum. And I
Speaker 3: don't say this about many people, at most people who
Speaker 3: commit crimes like this. However, I will give him props
Speaker 3: for realizing how fucking scummy he is, for realizing what
Speaker 3: how disgusting what he did was. Yeah, and having compassion
Speaker 3: towards what he did.
Speaker 1: I know, it's actually amazing because kind of how the
Speaker 1: interview was going, I didn't necessarily expect it to go
Speaker 1: any other way.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So because most people would deny, deny, deny, go
Speaker 3: to court, not guilty, like you know. Yeah, And it
Speaker 3: sounds to me like he, yeah, I did this, and
Speaker 3: I was fucking disgusting for doing it.
Speaker 1: And I think he had been caring it for too
Speaker 1: long that it almost like he needed to get it
Speaker 1: off his chest. And even after the attack, I don't
Speaker 1: have it in there, but he had tried to kill himself.
Speaker 1: So I mean, like he knows that he did something yeah.
Speaker 3: Really wrong, So I feel for him for that, but
Speaker 3: that doesn't change what he did.
Speaker 1: No, and the fact that he got to live eighteen
Speaker 1: more years and had two more victims that we know of. Yeah, right,
Speaker 1: there's probably more. Yeah, So his arrest was like lifting
Speaker 1: a weight from Jennifer's shoulders. She now knew that they
Speaker 1: had him, that he confessed, and all that was left
Speaker 1: was to take him to court for sentencing, and Jennifer
Speaker 1: was going to make sure that she did her part
Speaker 1: to get him sentenced to the full extent of the law.
Speaker 1: She spent hours going over her witness impact statement and
Speaker 1: getting ready to face Dennis in the courtroom, which was
Speaker 1: set to take place exactly twenty years to the date
Speaker 1: that Jennifer was found in that field, the exact Wow
Speaker 1: anniversary twenty really yeah.
Speaker 3: Holy shit, Sometimes the universe just does some fun I
Speaker 3: know shit to you.
Speaker 1: Hey, I think that they had a say in the
Speaker 1: date choice because like he was going to play guilty,
Speaker 1: so they could pick a dight and they want to
Speaker 1: pick like the anniversary dight, which is kind of which
Speaker 1: is neat. Yeah, but Dennis still had one more card
Speaker 1: left to play, and he played it. He was found
Speaker 1: dead in his cell one morning. He'd hung himself during
Speaker 1: the night, robbing Jennifer of the chance to tell him
Speaker 1: exactly how she'd been affected by the things that he
Speaker 1: had done to her. Being the incredible human that Jennifer was,
Speaker 1: she was still determined to say her piece and not
Speaker 1: let Dennis also take this away from her. So in
Speaker 1: August twentieth, twenty ten, the twenty year anniversary, She's still
Speaker 1: decided to read her impact statement out loud beside Dennis's grave,
Speaker 1: telling him everything holy shit with I know, and there's
Speaker 1: a photo of this. It's just like wow within it,
Speaker 1: she said, this is just part of it. You chose
Speaker 1: the wrong little forty five pound eight year old girl
Speaker 1: to try and murder because for nineteen years I've thought
Speaker 1: of you every single day and helped in searching for you.
Speaker 1: In my heart, I knew you were out there alive,
Speaker 1: either in prison or living a lie. And now I know,
Speaker 1: listening to my heart all these years and never giving
Speaker 1: up on finding you, I was right. Once she finished
Speaker 1: reading through, she questioned whether he'd be hearing her, but
Speaker 1: in that exact moment, a fire aunt bit her leg,
Speaker 1: and she took that to be a sign that he
Speaker 1: finally knew just what he'd put her through and what
Speaker 1: she'd survived.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 1: Are you okay over there?
Speaker 3: Yeah. I honestly think that his suicide says so much.
Speaker 3: I think that alone says that he knew what he
Speaker 3: put her through and he couldn't face her. It's not
Speaker 3: that he couldn't face the prison time. I think it'said
Speaker 3: he couldn't face what he had done to her.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, yeah. And I think that he took the
Speaker 1: easy way.
Speaker 3: Out there, Yeah, definitely. So wow.
Speaker 1: So all that was left for Jennifer to do was
Speaker 1: to officially start her new life free from the shadow
Speaker 1: that Dennis had cast over it. But there was something
Speaker 1: that she was still struggling to do, and it was
Speaker 1: all Dennis's fault. Against all odds, Jennifer had survived the
Speaker 1: assault and getting her throat cut. She fought the odds
Speaker 1: and got her voice back, and she'd been able to
Speaker 1: move on with most of her life, and she was
Speaker 1: even happily married. But the damage done to her at
Speaker 1: such a young age during this assault had made it
Speaker 1: so that she would never be able to have her
Speaker 1: own children.
Speaker 3: She became a mother, didn't she.
Speaker 1: This was something that Jennifer was on the brink of
Speaker 1: accepting when a doctor saw her story on the news
Speaker 1: and reached out to her, volunteering his services. Dennis's actions
Speaker 1: at night made it so that Jennifer wouldn't be able
Speaker 1: to give birth naturally, but through treatments and another big
Speaker 1: batch of determination, Jennifer beat the odds again and now
Speaker 1: has two children of her own. Fuck yes, yeah, a
Speaker 1: little girl and a little boy. You could look at
Speaker 1: the story and say that Jennifer is one of the
Speaker 1: unluckiest women in the world. She was stolen from her bed, kidnapped, assaulted,
Speaker 1: and left for dead. Or you could look at it
Speaker 1: from a totally different perspective. She'd been left on that
Speaker 1: at hill, something that probably kept enough of grenaline in
Speaker 1: her system for long enough that she was able to
Speaker 1: be saved. She made doctors and medical staff by defying
Speaker 1: the odds, she survived, she got her voice back, and,
Speaker 1: last but certainly not least, despite all the things he'd
Speaker 1: done to her, she was able to start a family
Speaker 1: of her own. In a statement she gave to the press,
Speaker 1: she said, I am not a victim, but victorious, something
Speaker 1: that very few people that have gone through what Jennifer
Speaker 1: has gone through even have the opportunity to say. To
Speaker 1: this day, Jennifer has become a fierce advocate for other
Speaker 1: crime survivors.
Speaker 3: Hell yes, major badass of the day.
Speaker 1: I know, like she's an incredible human being.
Speaker 3: No kidding. And that little uh irony moment of that
Speaker 3: fire and biting her on the leg of that last
Speaker 3: moment too, Yeah, that's that's something.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I feel like that's definitely the universe saying something
Speaker 1: for sure.
Speaker 3: I do. I do think that just like that. Detectives
Speaker 3: did say that there's two sides to this story though,
Speaker 3: and I do feel I know he's not the good guy,
Speaker 3: but I do feel for Dennis in this case, how dude,
Speaker 3: because he he's a fucking horrible person. However, I think
Speaker 3: he realizes he's a horrible person and it's very remorseful
Speaker 3: for that doesn't mean he's a good guy, doesn't mean
Speaker 3: he should be forgiven, doesn't mean he didn't do this
Speaker 3: absolutely horrible shit. And I do have a feeling that
Speaker 3: he if he could take it back, he probably would.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I do think so. I mean, there was
Speaker 1: a I think it was forty eight hours did a
Speaker 1: documentary on this, which we'll have a link too because
Speaker 1: it was really well done and it shows clips of
Speaker 1: him in being interrogated right, Yeah, And like there's other
Speaker 1: clips on there too where it shows when he found
Speaker 1: out that she was alive, and it was just like
Speaker 1: like he was relieved, and like he was after he
Speaker 1: found out, he was pretty much like crying the rest
Speaker 1: of the fucking interview.
Speaker 3: He's still there. He still is, don't get me wrong here,
Speaker 3: And I'm so happy for Jennifer. Her story is absolutely
Speaker 3: incredibly amazing. There's just that one little piece that I
Speaker 3: just kind of want to make sure I mention that
Speaker 3: is all it is.
Speaker 1: But honestly, like, how could he have lived with himself?
Speaker 1: Like I think there was It just came back to
Speaker 1: me actually there was times where he had thought about confessing,
Speaker 1: but he like wasn't brave enough too.
Speaker 3: Basically, yeah, well if you really if you were to
Speaker 3: do those sort of things, Okay, let's say he good
Speaker 3: and evil side of him. Okay, he was evil and
Speaker 3: he turned good. How difficult do you think would be
Speaker 3: to face that evil side of you and admit to
Speaker 3: people that that was you. You even said he tried to
Speaker 3: commit suicide.
Speaker 1: Previously, basically right after it. Yeah, but I sometimes wonder
Speaker 1: if there's more to it because it seems so weird
Speaker 1: to me that this was just like a completely random attack.
Speaker 3: I think you would have said, I one hundred percent
Speaker 3: think you would have said if it wasn't.
Speaker 1: What the fuck kind of person are you? Though? If
Speaker 1: you're like, so she lived in like an apartment building,
Speaker 1: and like you're just cruising around and then you see
Speaker 1: this light and you look in there and you see
Speaker 1: a little girl, and then you're just like, fuck, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna go take this little girl and then I'm gonna
Speaker 1: like rape her and like pretty much leave her for dead,
Speaker 1: like because they were like, there's two sides to the store,
Speaker 1: and he's like, not a single day goes by where
Speaker 1: I don't see that baby. There is no other side
Speaker 1: to the story. She was an innocent and I was
Speaker 1: a sick, deranged, beat up, little fucking punk. So he's like,
Speaker 1: there is no other side, Like I'm a piece of shit.
Speaker 3: Yeah. So I do just want to say I don't
Speaker 3: want anyone to misconstrue what I've been saying about about Dennis.
Speaker 3: I just want to make sure that people understand I
Speaker 3: think it's just worth talking about. That's it. I'm solely
Speaker 3: with Jennifer on this. She was a fucking badass. She
Speaker 3: was the one who was taken advantage of and fuck Dennis. However,
Speaker 3: it's just worth that discussion. Yeah, because most people don't
Speaker 3: have remorse. Usually they have remorse if they were caught,
Speaker 3: and I think.
Speaker 1: And honestly, in a lot of cases, they don't even
Speaker 1: when they're caught.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And I think Dennis had remorse prior to, like
Speaker 3: you said, even because his suicide attempts. He's a shitty
Speaker 3: fucking person, Yeah, but he had that shred of humanity.
Speaker 1: But we do need to end the podcast about Jennifer
Speaker 1: because like he was fucking incredible. I cannot even think
Speaker 1: of I don't know just what she went through and
Speaker 1: the fact that she's like a mom and like goes
Speaker 1: on to advocate for people and got through all that
Speaker 1: is literally mind blowing to me.
Speaker 3: And like, like we were talking about playing dead through
Speaker 3: all that pain.
Speaker 1: Is that what a made amazes you the most?
Speaker 3: Yes? Yeah, yes, because when you when you come out
Speaker 3: of unconsciousness, you're confused, right, It's like waking up and
Speaker 3: you're not in bed, and it's like what's going on?
Speaker 3: You see that in the octagon when guys are fighting
Speaker 3: in the UFC and stuff, they're getting knocked out and
Speaker 3: they stand up and all of a sudden, the wrestling
Speaker 3: the referee because I think that's the opponent. They don't
Speaker 3: remember even getting knocked out, so she would have just
Speaker 3: regained consciousness but still had the wits about her to
Speaker 3: fight her pain, fight her fear, and just play dead. Yeah,
Speaker 3: against every instinct in her body.
Speaker 1: It's incredible.
Speaker 3: And then still remember all that shit, the details.
Speaker 1: I can't believe that she like remembered and she had
Speaker 1: a scar on his face that she remembered like one
Speaker 1: of the oh gosh, who was it was a detective,
Speaker 1: the special agent, I can't remember, but they said they
Speaker 1: had never seen like what's it called composite drawing? Is
Speaker 1: that what it's called so close to what the actual
Speaker 1: person looked like, which is and this is coming from
Speaker 1: an eight year old who when she was doing this
Speaker 1: was like in pain, she was on drugs, she was
Speaker 1: like traumatized.
Speaker 3: And probably not able to speak.
Speaker 1: So she's not able to writing down the details, and
Speaker 1: she still made like this picture look so much like him.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So shout out to the artist for that one too,
Speaker 3: because I'm sure that was not an easy to have
Speaker 3: them as well.
Speaker 1: No, they I think they were actually in that documentary
Speaker 1: and yeah, that was that was challenging, but they had
Speaker 1: ways and stuff to try to make it as helpful
Speaker 1: for Jennifer as possible.
Speaker 3: So Jennifer fucking badass, total.
Speaker 1: Badass of the day of the fricking end of the
Speaker 1: year for eternity.
Speaker 3: Well well done. That was an awesome episode. Yeah, I
Speaker 3: love to hear the survival ones.
Speaker 1: I know. That's my holiday gift to you all. It's
Speaker 1: a terrible gift, but it's better than it could have
Speaker 1: been if if she had died or something.
Speaker 4: Right.
Speaker 3: Yeah, So, if you guys want to check out some
Speaker 3: more of our social links all description below. We got
Speaker 3: the YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, you name it all down there,
Speaker 3: even Patreon if you want to support us there. If not,
Speaker 3: it's totally cool here just listening. We appreciate that.
Speaker 1: So thank you for being here and stay wicked.